I stopped and inhaled a deep breath. “It smells like carpet and paint.”

“Maybe he has a really thorough housekeeper,” Val said. “But if he does have guests, why would they wonder? Who would have a reason to question? People are mostly lazy about the truth. If lies are easy and convenient, people will usually accept them.”

“You speak from experience?”

“You disagree?”

“I don’t accept lies, even the easy ones. I think I’ve proved that.”

“You are an exception, a very perplexing and often infuriating one.” Val stepped closer and scrubbed a thumb over my lip, wiping away my pout. “I respect you for it, Solina. But it won’t do you any favors. There’s safety in believing lies.”

“So Helen would have left me alone if I had just believed Mani died in some mundane manner? I don’t think so.”

“No.” Val shook his head. “She still needs you dead, but she wouldn’t have bothered taking up the fight against anyone else.”

I thought of Kalani and Inyoni, who was not innocent but so young and naive. “Are you trying to say it’s my fault other people have been hurt by Helen?”

Alarm flashed across Val’s face. “No. I’m absolutely not saying that.”

“What are you trying to say?”

Val exhaled a noisy breath and tossed his hands out at his sides. “Whatever it is, I’ve fouled it up. All I meant was that Grim keeps up the lie—we all keep up this lie about who we really are, and it keeps people safe, ourselves included. Our kind don’t die, but it’s not so hard to make us hurt. That’s a very fearful thing when you know suffering can last an eternity.”

What kinds of hurts had Val suffered that could last for an eternity? And do I really want to know? Probably not. Not today anyway.

“Well, I—” I started.

Val put a hand over my mouth, silencing me. Downstairs, a door slammed shut, and footsteps resounded off the kitchen’s tile flooring. Val dragged me to Grim’s walk-in closet, eased open the door, stepped in, and pulled the door closed behind us.

The footsteps, accompanied by a familiar voice, pounded up the stairs. “No,” Tori said. The bitch. “I’ve just got to grab a few things, and I’ll hit the road.” After a moment of silence, she said, “I’ll be there around sundown at the latest. Probably before then.” She paused again, and I gathered she was on her phone, maybe with Grim. “Okay. Got it. I’ll see you then.”

Tori’s footsteps clacked on the bathroom-floor tiles. The clinking sounds of something—Toiletries? Cosmetics?—carried to the closet. Val and I held our breaths, and my heart pounded frantically against my ribs. I didn’t fear discovery, really. Even if Tori found us hiding in the closet, at most we would lose the advantage of secrecy. It’s not like she’d attack us. Or would she? Maybe her arrival was providing the break we needed, though. She was going somewhere, meeting someone. If Grim wouldn’t lead us to the sword, then Tori gave us our next best lead. Val must have thought the same thing. His grip on my arm tightened, and he pulled me closer.

Tori left the bathroom and went back downstairs. Val and I exhaled but stayed in the closet, still and silent, until a downstairs door opened and closed, signaling Tori’s exit.

“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” I asked.

Val nodded. “Follow that Valkyrie.”

Careful not to give ourselves away, Val and I slunk away from the house and climbed into the Yukon. I let Tori’s blue Subaru go a good distance down the road, but not out of sight, before I started our truck and pulled away from the curb.

“Where do you think she’s going?” I asked. The question was mostly rhetorical as I assumed Val and I had drawn similar conclusions. “Grim?”

“That’s my guess,” Val said.

“But where? Where would he go?”

“When you’ve been around as long as we have, you tend to collect places—homes, hidey-holes, temporary and long term. He could be anywhere. Or nowhere.”

Tori led us through town on a route that delivered us onto I-5, heading north. She merged onto the highway, and I dropped back, letting several cars fill the space between her Subaru and our Yukon.

“I’m going to check in with Skyla,” I said, digging my phone from my pocket. “See if the Aerie has heard anything.”

“You think that’s a good idea? I thought the idea of sneaking away in the night was because we don’t trust the Valkyries.”

“I trust Skyla, and I think it would be a good idea if someone knows where we are. Just in case.”

Val waved his hand as if saying, Fine, do what you like.

Skyla answered on the first ring. “Mundy, it’s about time I heard from you. Any word on the sword?”

I filled Skyla in on our trip to Corvallis, my conversation with Thorin, my meeting with Grim, and the results of our investigation of Grim’s house.

“So, you’re following Tori out to who knows where to do who knows what?”

“Pretty much.”

“Just you and Val?”

“Who else?”

“How about a couple Valkyries? For backup.”

“What do you mean?”

Skyla’s exhalation carried through the phone’s speaker. “Just listen and keep an open mind.”

She launched into a story about how Embla and Naomi, one of the other women jockeying for leadership of the Valkyries, had awoken for their regular early-morning training and discovered the Yukon missing. They had gone to Skyla and gotten her to admit what she knew about the disappearance of one sun goddess and her faithful Aesir sidekick.

“You told them?” I asked. “You know I don’t trust them.”

“Well, I do,” she said, defensive and resolute.

“You’ve known Embla is your aunt for five hot minutes, and you think you can trust her? That’s not your call to make.”

“Well, who the hell else do I have if I don’t trust her?”

“You have me. You have your loyalty to my brother’s memory.”

“I am loyal to you. Everything I’ve done is for your benefit. You think you’re going to do what? Confront Grim and Tori, a god and one of the Valkyries’ best fighters, and talk them out of the sword? You already told me how well diplomacy worked with Grim. Are you really ready to fight them for it?”

“Yes,” I said. “If I have to.”

“You’re not a fighter, girlfriend. Not one equal to Grim and Tori.”

“I have my fire.”

“You can barely control it. You’re a danger to yourself.”