Chapter 44
CHAPTER
FORTY-FOUR
Two months later
Crimson Claw Pack Lands
Rolf punched Kraft in the face and watched him slam into a giant-sized boulder, cracking it. Nearby, a handful of lycans laughed their asses off.
“Told you,” one of them said. “Kraft is tough, but the draugr’s itching for blood.”
The lycan wasn’t wrong.
“I’m embarrassed for you,” Riley growled at her mate.
“Riley, that’s just mean. You should support your vampire,” Max said.
Rolf recognized the voice of Riley’s cousin. And then wondered why he cared enough to identify the guy.
“Kraft, sac up. You’re making us look bad.”
“Me?” Kraft rose, cracked his neck, and gave an all over shake.
In the crowd, money changed hands.
Rolf waited to feel something besides a general dissatisfaction with life. No humor, no pleasure, not even anger at being baited to enter this lycan brawling ring.
When Kraft launched himself unexpectedly at Rolf’s back, Rolf dodged at the last minute and watched Kraft faceplant into a tree.
The crowd groaned.
Riley laughed. “Nice one, you big puppy.”
The others started laughing. And that quickly, Rolf felt the crawling urge to leave and go somewhere else. Somewhere with less people.
He rushed away, running through the trees, ignoring Riley and Kraft calling after him. He returned to his vehicle parked at a hiking stop along Noblewood’s mountainous trails. An itch at his back froze him.
Ever since they’d defeated Hecate’s big bad Darkness in an epic battle that left him feeling lacking, he’d had the notion he was being watched. Followed.
A subtle glance around him showed no one there. Like usual.
With a growl, he entered the SUV and peeled away, heading back to Seattle.
He had no idea what was wrong with him lately.
The battle to end the Darkness that Comes had been decent enough. While he and the others worked to find the last Bloode Stone, given to his annoying father, of all people, Hecate had been marshalling several deities together to fend off the threats in foreign lands.
In Seattle, where the main battle had occurred, he and his kin, along with a massive amount of vampires, had fought against titans, jotuns, and chaos-tainted hell-borne and magir.
While Varu led them against a challenging enemy, Khent, Rolf, and Val had somehow—the details were still a little fuzzy—found Erland in an odd town outside the city.
Ilu had manifested outside of Val and neutralized the chaos before he—it—could take over the world. Such a pathetic end to a being that had been on the verge of annihilating existence.
Once Erland vanished, taking Ilu with him, all the tainted creatures left behind dropped unconscious. Some recovered. Many didn’t.
With the vampires no longer needed to combat such evil, the titans and jotuns decided to save their end-of-the-world battle for another day.
Then Varu was besieged by every-fucking-body about giving back the Bloode Stones.
Hecate had intervened, and Rolf still didn’t know what had happened when she’d whisked Varu away. But he’d returned, no longer encumbered by the sentient gemstones. He also seemed happier.
Whisking his mate away for a private celebration, he left Duncan and Macy in charge of the cleanup around the city. And their home, which remained a jumbled mess. Much of it had been attacked while the Night Bloode fought in the city.
He scratched his hand, annoyed all over again.
Every time he thought about his quest to find that last Bloode Stone, he grew foggy. Definitely magic at work, screwing with his memories.
And that wouldn’t do. He didn’t like anyone taking what was his. His memories, his bloode, his mate…
He tensed, unsure. Not long ago, before he’d joined the Night Bloode, his patriarch and the master of the draugrs had ordered him to find a mate they could somehow use to better the tribe. He hadn’t wanted to, but he’d agreed to get the dickbags off his back.
And lately, Odin and Loki made him want to grit his teeth as well.
Fuck. I hate this.
To make matters worse, his best buddy, Razer, refused to come back, returning to Fenrir and the rest of his shadow. Because he was “sad.” What the hell was he sad about?
The wolf wouldn’t tell him, but he’d cast a blaming gaze on Rolf before he’d vanished.
Needless to say, now Fenrir was pissed at him for stealing a part of his shadow.
It had happened several hundred years ago, but apparently, that didn’t matter.
Loki was miffed because Varu hadn’t turned over the last Bloode Stone he’d found, and the obnoxious valkyrie he’d been working alongside hadn’t helped the god either.
What was her name? Hlokk. He huffed. Cute and bloodthirsty but boring. All she wanted to do was cut off his head or find the Bloode Stone.
He felt that uncomfortable void inside him, a yearning for something just out of reach.
And then his hand throbbed, and he sensed someone watching him. Inside the SUV?
“Fuck,” he roared and drove faster. “What is wrong with me?”
Instead of heading home, he parked outside the magir bazaar.
They’d had some damage during the main battle.
But the real problem was that too many humans remembered the weirdness that had occurred during the fight.
MEC was doing their best, but they couldn’t quite scrub the image of a giant Orion fighting a jotun in Lake Washington.
Or the sight of hellhounds covered in black gooey chaos running up and down the streets devouring people.
Headlines and social media continued to spread the notion that Seattle had overtaken Portland for being the weirdest big city in the States. He snorted with amusement.
Humans had no idea.
Calling on his ability to go in stealth mode, he slipped through the human-looking shop of touristy trinkets and walked down a secret backstairs to the entrance of the bazaar. He let himself be seen because the gargoyles guarding the place could feel the presence of magic.
Spotting him, they quickly stood back and allowed him entrance, depriving him of a battle he needed.
Even more annoyed and still not sure why, he cloaked himself and headed into the bazaar, noting that most of the damage had been dealt with. Apparently, a rift from one of the underworlds had opened in the marketplace while everyone topside was fighting chaos.
After circling the shops, he saw that even the Ribald Unicorn, the pub Val’s friends owned, looked in top shape except for a few outlying cracks in some supports.
Two bear shifter brothers argued with Val, but not enough to alert her mate.
Khent stood to the side, speaking with a young man.
A mage, by the look of him. Hmm. Rolf had spotted the guy before.
He’d been teaming up with Macy’s friend, the half-demon.
The mage seemed to annoy Macy though her friend had been warming up to him.
For irking their Bloode Witch, Rolf liked the guy.
As he thought it, the mage glanced right up at him, his eyes a blazing, striking blue. He shouldn’t have been able to see Rolf, but he nodded in greeting.
Dropping his glamour, Rolf walked over to him and Khent.
Khent’s eyes narrowed. “Slumming?”
Rolf snorted. “What’s with the mortal?”
“It’s pronounced mage,” the young male said, snippy.
Khent looked down at the human. “Ah, the arrogance of a lesser. It never gets old.”
The mage grinned. “I’ll tell Val you said that.” Before Khent could respond, the man said to Rolf with a sober expression. “Tell Sylvara when you see her that not everyone forgot. And we’re grateful.”
Rolf frowned. “What?”
The mage turned to Khent. “Anyway, I was wondering if we could borrow you and Val for a job next week. We’re having some issues with reanimators outside the city. I need an expert necromancer for it.”
“Ford, I’m not sure my mate has yet forgiven MEC.”
“Well, she can hate them all she wants. Not that I blame her,” he said bluntly. “But I’m not MEC. I just contract for them. Besides, I think necromancers belong there. She’s got so much experience and knowledge they really need. And, I mean, think of all the good she could do for us lesser beings.”
Khent rubbed his chin. “Hmm. There is that. She does like helping you inferior creatures.” He ignored the guy’s put-upon expression.
“Sylvara?” Rolf murmured, the name warming him inside. As if he should know it. And he did know it.
A shock of lightning hit him. Hard.
Around him, magir scattered. Khent had Val in his arms some distance away, glaring at anyone who came too close.
“Well, well. There he is. Time to pay up, bitch.” A valkyrie with shaggy brown hair that looked as if it had been chopped with gardening shears and wielding a long sword pointed it at him. “Odin says hi.”
Before the valkyrie could strike him again with her lightning, a woman landed between them. Tall, with long black hair, a massive battle ax in her hands, and a muscular frame with all the right curves, she shook her head at him.
“I leave you alone for a few weeks and you let a weakling like Brunhild take you down? This is so disappointing.” A blue sigil lit up her hand.
His own hand burned, but Rolf couldn’t look away from the woman.
I know her. I do. But how?
“Hey, Sylvara.” Ford waved.
Her eyes, the color of clear diamonds, widened but she quickly hid her surprise and nodded back.
“Sylvara?” Rolf stood, shaking off the shock of energy ripping at his heart. He studied her from head to toe. “I like your ax.”
A valkyrie? Yet…not. He swore blue markings appeared on her face then vanished, like the markings of the Wyrd sisters.
Destiny. The Great Weave.
His…mate.
He flashed his teeth at her.
She blinked. “Ah, hello? Rolf?”
Incensed, he attacked.