Howl for Me

blooded American male.”

“What do we do about the Old Man?” Fen stared into his father’s eyes. “He scarred my mate.”

Logan blew out a breath, all humor leaving his face to be replaced by grim determination. “We find him and kill his ass.”

Fen frowned, confused. “How will that hurt him? Has his ass done anything wrong?”

Logan’s expression blanked just before he burst into laughter worthy of Kir.

He barely breathed as he doubled over.

“What the hell?” Jordan stared at Logan as if he’d grown a second head.

“What did you do to him?”

“I asked him why we wanted to kill the Old Man’s ass. Surely the beast has no say in what Odin does.” It was probably as much of an innocent as Sleipnir, Fen’s half brother and Odin’s eight-legged steed. The last time he’d seen his brother the beast had cast him one sorrowful glance before taking Odin away into the night sky.

He had no idea how long ago that had been, nor did he want to. He only knew he’d recognized that look. For all his brother seemed to be free, he was just as imprisoned as Fenris.

Her lips twitched. “Oh. American Idioms 101. When we say we want to kill someone’s ass, we mean we want to kill them.”

He shook his head. “Why didn’t he say so?”

“He did, you just didn’t understand it.” She patted his shoulder. “You’ll get it eventually. Jeff will help.”

He stared toward the bedroom door and smiled. “Yes. I know he will.”

Jeff, delicate and fragile looking, snored so loudly the door rattled. Fen grinned. Next to him, Jordan bit her lip to keep from laughing out loud. Gods, his mate made him happy.

Chapter Nine

“So.” Jeanne Grimm had papers strewn all over his dining room table, and he couldn’t be more pleased. Jeff stared down at the charts and diagrams she’d whipped up while he’d been sleeping and grinned. She pointed to a spot on her timeline. “Heimdall blows his horn.” She moved to the next item. “Odin speaks to a decapitated head.” Her finger moved along, ticking off the things listed in the prophecy. “Yggdrasil, the World Tree, trembles.”

“Earthquake?” Jordan popped yet another piece of pizza in her mouth. For a woman who professed to hate olives she was eating a metric ton of them recently. And was that pineapple on her pizza as well?

“Good thinking.” Jeanne nodded approvingly. “Some Ettin is loosed. Any ideas?”

No one said anything. Then again, the majority of those in the know were currently in Kir and Logan’s condo holding their own war council. The Grimm family had been relegated to Jeff’s place, not that he was complaining.

He bet they came up with stuff much sooner than the Norse gods did.

Sometimes all it took was a fresh perspective on an old problem, and who better to help them with that than Jeanne Grimm? The woman would make a five-star general look like a scatterbrained dork.

“Note to self, look that up later.” Jeanne scribbled something down on a Post-It note and attached it to her timeline. “Okay. Next, the Aesir are at council.”

She tapped her pen on the table. “Scratch that one off, ’cause I’m pretty sure it’s happened more than once and will happen again.”

“During an earthquake, while the Old Man talks to a decapitated head?”

Jordan sighed in bliss as another bite of olive and pineapple pizza disappeared into her face.

“How can you eat that?” Jeff shuddered in revulsion. “There’s no meat on it.”

Everyone stopped and stared at him. He shrugged. “What?”

Jeanne turned her attention back to the papers on the table. “Dwarves groan.” She grimaced. “I’m pretty sure they do that every time they see Leprechaun Returns: 3D.”

Jordan choked on an olive. Jamie helped by smacking her back so hard she fell off the sofa.

Jeanne shook her head. “Children. Settle down.” Jordan got back on the sofa, but not before giving Jamie a death glare. “Hrymyr sails from the east during a flood.”

Again, blank stares met her questioning look. “No clue, Mom.” Jeff got up and snagged his own piece of extra pepperoni. “Add another Post-It.”

She did. “The monstrous Beast twists in mighty wrath. Jormungandr? Or someone else?”

Jordan frowned down at her pizza. “Dad said Jor wasn’t the serpent.”

Jeff stared at his sister. “He did? Then who was the serpent?”

She stared right back. “Odin?”

Jeanne sighed and tapped her pen again. “Okay. So part of this could refer to

Jormungandr, part of it could not. The Snake beats the waves sounds like him.”

“Yeah, it does, since he was banished to the sea.” Jeff took his seat next to Jamie and watched their mother pace.

“The Eagle is screaming.”

“That’s because they haven’t won the Super Bowl in forever.” Jamie flinched when Jordan popped her one on the back of the head.

“The gold-neb tears corpses, Naglfar is loosed.” Jeanne rubbed her eyes wearily.

“Screw this. Bring me a laptop.”

Jeff hopped up to do his mother’s bidding. He soon had her set up at the table, some of the papers set aside carefully so as not to disturb their order.

“Okay. If I remember, there’s more than one translation of the Poetic Edda.

Your friends have only given us one. Let’s see what else is out there.” Jeanne grinned and began to type. Soon she had another version up on the screen. “Loud blows Heimdall, the horn is aloft. In fear quake all who on Hel-roads are.”

“Not much difference that I can see,” Jeff muttered. He leaned down to stare at the screen over his mother’s shoulder. “Look there. This seems to say the Eagle and Naglfar are the same— and the tawny eagle gnaws corpses screaming; Naglfar is loose.”

“So we need to find out who Naglfar is.” Jeanne made another note. “Right.

Next.” She scrolled a bit. “There.”

“O’er the sea from the north there sails a ship
With the people of Hel, at the helm stands Loki;
After the wolf do wild men follow,
And with them the brother of Byleist goes.”

“Another name to add to our list. Who’s Byleist and his brother? They’re in both translations.” Jeanne’s pen was tapping again. It was quickly driving Jeff nuts. His mother typed in a quick Wiki search. “Oh. Byleist is Loki’s brother.”

Jordan gasped. “Logan has a brother?”

Jeff groaned. “You mean there are two of them?”

Jeanne rolled her eyes and continued.

“Surt fares from the south with the scourge of branches,
The sun of the battle-gods shone from his sword;