I retreated to my room and packed up my few measly belongings. Lost in the endless whirlpool of my thoughts, time passed quickly, and Baldur returned before I could wonder about him or worry about his return. His voice carried through my bedroom door as he talked to Thorin. I squared my shoulders, stiffened my spine, and went out to join them.
“Solina,” Baldur said. “We need to plan our next steps. Staying at the cabin any longer is probably not safe.”
I nodded. “I agree. And I know exactly what we need to do next.”
Baldur’s eyebrow arched. “Oh?”
“Kill that damned wolf,” I said. “It all begins and ends with him, and we never should have lost sight of that. I’ve been thinking about it, and it’s possible the Aerie has resources we can utilize. Maybe Skyla can convince the Valkyries to join the hunt. This is what they were made for. Skyla has been looking for a cause to unite them. Hunting Skoll—it’s the perfect thing, the answer to their battle lust.”
Baldur bit his lip against a smile. “Battle lust?”
“How long has it been since you’ve given them a purpose? They train and play fight and hold tight to their traditions, but there’s no outlet for their aggression. The Aesir have squandered a powerful resource. We should have exploited them sooner.”
“You think Skyla can lead them to a unified action?” Baldur asked, tactfully ignoring my squandered comment.
“I’m depending on it. We were driven apart by our own stubbornness, by fate and circumstance. It made us easy pickings. But we’re back together… for the most part.”
Val was gone, never to return, and I mourned him. I grieved the man my brother had loved, the man I had considered a dear, if deeply flawed, friend. The Val I’d thought I knew was merely a ghost of someone who had died eons before. I still felt his absence like a missing organ, but I hid my concern for Val in the same dark place I put all my other unhelpful emotions. “With the Valkyries behind us, it might be possible to end this thing. Once and for all.”
“But you don’t trust them,” Baldur said.
“Not completely. But I trust Skyla, and we need their help.” I turned and eyed Thorin. “I want to trust you too, know that you’ll be at my back, be the wall everyone has to go through first if they want to get to me.”
Thorin scowled. “Why don’t you already believe that?”
“You’ve chosen Baldur over me too many times.”
Thorin flinched. His gaze shifted to Baldur.
Baldur nodded. “It’s true. I released you from your vows, but I still made demands of you.” Baldur’s gaze shifted to me. “Don’t be too hard on Magni. There are thousands of years of allegiance between us. That’s a lot of indoctrination to overcome in a short time. It won’t happen again.”
“Easy to say,” I said, “now that you have Nina back. Swear to me that you’ll make no more demands of Thorin’s loyalty. Swear to me that when I need him, he’ll be free to decide for himself.”
Baldur nodded. “I swear it.”
I turned to Thorin. “Swear that I am your only priority. Promise my well-being comes before anything or anyone else.”
Thorin snarled. “I swear it, but only if you swear not to run headlong toward danger and ignore the counsel of those vowed to protect you.”
I wasn’t going to run headlong toward danger, but that wasn’t the same as avoiding it altogether. And I was going to listen to Thorin’s counsel, as well as Baldur and Skyla’s. But I was ultimately going to make my own decisions. I should be an attorney: there are no true mutual agreements, only the appearance of them. “I swear it.”
“If the Valkyries will come,” Baldur said, “tell them to meet us at New Breidablik. If Vali Lokison truly has command of Odin’s ravens, New Breidablik is the only place safe from their omniscience.”
“How will we track Skoll from New Breidablik?” I asked.
“I’ll reach out to my network,” Baldur said. “They’ve been off the job since we found Nina, but I can put them on Helen’s trail and, thereby, the wolf’s.”
Once we agreed on a course of action, we all made ready to withdraw to New Breidablik.
Out on the cabin’s front porch, Baldur blipped away after casually saying, “See you back at the ranch.”
I sucked in a breath and held it as Thorin stepped close. “Before we go one step further,” he said, “there’s something I need to do.” He slipped Mjölnir from his pocket, slid the pendant free from its chain, and stuffed the hammer back into his pocket. He dangled the chain before my eyes as a hypnotist might.
“Put my leash back on?” I asked, already lifting my hair out of the way.
“After all that’s happened, you would go without it?” Thorin leaned close. He slipped the chain around my neck and fastened the clasp. The gesture brought him intimately close as his fingers brushed against my neck. Like an afterimage burned on my retinas, the brief and ghostly likeness of a woman in a horse-drawn chariot appeared, racing across a field of blue. The vision might have meant Thorin was thinking of Sol, or it could have meant he was thinking of me. Where does she end and I begin?
“No.” I fingered the necklace. “I don’t mind it. I just wish I didn’t need it.”
Thorin studied me as he adjusted the chain to lie flush against my skin. He held my gaze for a moment. What did he see when he looked at me that way? What was he looking for? Thorin exhaled and shook his head, breaking the spell. “Things aren’t going to be like they were before, are they?”
“I still believe in you, if that’s what you’re wondering.”
And it was true. No matter my muddled emotions, I still believed in his powers and abilities. Nothing had stopped him from being the God of Thunder.
“But no, things aren’t the same,” I said. “Another layer of my naiveté has peeled away. If there was any innocence still living in me, I think it’s gone now.”
Thorin shook his head. “You are the sun, Solina. You may be wiser and harder, but nothing can take away your light.”
Glad you think so. Me… I’m not so sure. “Neither of us is the same as we were before,” I said. “And especially not to each other.”
Thorin’s breath caught. I was close enough to sense his reaction, and it felt like anticipation.
“It’s not something I’m willing to define, yet. It’s not the right time.”
He eased his hands around my hips and drew me in. “You’ll let me know when it is the right time?”
I slid my arms around his neck and held him close—maybe a little closer than necessary. “You’ll be the first to know.”
