confining for man and beast, the air warm and stifling, hard to breathe.
After centuries of silence, Odin, Allfather of the Aesir and leader of Asgard, the god who’d turned Bjorn into the first Norse werewolf, was standing before him. He was an impressive sight in his custom suit with his white hair pulled back from his face and a patch over his missing eye.
“Someone actually left Valhalla?” It should have been impossible.
“Not Valhalla. No one would dare do such a thing. From Freya’s Hall. The woman must be found and slain for her deed. There would be chaos if people believed they could leave if the notion took them.”
The fine hairs on the back of Bjorn’s neck rose. The dead needed to remain in the afterlife for balance to be kept in the universe.
“Do not fail me.” Order given, Odin vanished as quickly as he’d arrived.
Bjorn sighed and ran a hand over his face. “I’m supposed to believe this is just a fucking coincidence?” This stank of another plot against the Brotherhood, but damned if he couldn’t figure out how, since Lucifer had been behind their recent problems.
And wasn’t it a happy accident that three members of the Brotherhood were meeting in person tonight for the first time in months? He jammed the rest of his belongings into his duffel bag, tossed the key card on the table, and left the motel room without a backward glance.
“And thanks for the starting point, Odin,” he muttered. After locking his bag in his truck, he took a deep breath, but it did nothing to soothe the adrenaline coursing through his veins. Needing to work off some of the excess tension, he set out on foot.
Everyone had an energy signal, one he could sense and scent. It was easy to tell the humans from the paranormal creatures that roamed the earth. This woman would reek of the afterlife. Or she should. He was working blind. It would take patience and cunning, but wherever this woman was, he would find her. Then he would end her. Or, at the very least, return her to Odin so it could be done.
To disregard the order or to defy it would mean his death.
Those whose lives had ended needed to remain in the realm of the dead. His beloved wife Anja and their three children were there, safe from the world of men who had carelessly slaughtered them. He would not allow anyone or anything to disrupt that peace.
He reached up and touched his chest where runes were inked above his heart. Their names were a memorial, a constant reminder of all he’d loved and lost.
The woman had defied the gods. She would die.
Pledge given, he prowled down the sidewalk, mulling over the problem facing him, peering at it from every possible angle. The moon was all but obscured by the clouds and city lights, but it was up there, hanging high in the night sky. Inside him, his wolf howled. He stifled the urge to throw back his head and release it. He’d been confined to the city too long.
Instead of leaving after the upcoming meeting and heading upstate to his rural getaway in the Adirondacks, he had to figure out how the hell he was going to accomplish what Odin had commanded.
The Brotherhood might have some ideas.
Tension gripped every muscle in his shoulders and back, and he released a low growl that made a fellow pedestrian jump out of his way. Even after all these years, he fucking hated asking for help. Harder still for him to accept he would get it.
Asher—father of vampires and a damn good hacker—could dig through the internet and find any reports of strange women appearing from out of nowhere. Or some other anomaly somewhere in the world. It was a long shot, but it was a place to start.
How had the woman escaped from Freya’s Hall? One didn’t simply catch a bus or plane. The only way in or out was with some considerable help.
The Valkyrie took their jobs seriously and wouldn’t do anything to upset the balance. Nor would they dare defy Freya. That left the other Norse gods and goddesses. They often stole one another’s shit and got into minor skirmishes, mostly to entertain themselves. Allowing, even helping, someone to leave the afterlife? That was unprecedented.
There were some rules even the gods were hesitant to break. But someone had stepped over the line, willing to tinker with the very fabric of existence.