Dark Gods (Dark Wolf Series Book 5) Read online

“What do you mean, you couldn’t? You did what your father wanted, so once Loki was put away why couldn’t you come home?”

  “I had to be dead, to everyone. Otherwise my father would have no grounds to hold Loki. If I wasn’t dead, then Loki didn’t arrange my murder and he would be freed.”

  “And would that be so bad? If Loki was free?” Nan asked as she looked down at the floor. Cadric put his finger under her chin and tilted her head back up. She evaded his eyes and he let her go.

  “My father believes that Loki being free will bring about Ragnarok,” he said as he rested against his desk and folded his arms across his chest. Sometimes he cursed his father for his ironclad belief in the end of the world. It was what had started this whole thing.

  “Surely you don’t believe that do you?”

  “I don’t know what to believe. Asgard is far away from me now, in another time and place. Loki is locked away, so it’s a moot point anyway,” Cadric said. Nan grew quiet, and a troubled look came over her face. “What is it?”

  “Did you think about me at all? When you were gone, did you think about me?”

  He stood straighter and reached out to take hold of her arms. She looked up at him, and the past fell away. She looked like the woman he’d fallen in love with so many years ago, and his heart pounded in his chest with how beautiful she was. How could he have walked away and left her all those years ago? He reached his hand up and caressed the soft skin of her cheek. She grasped his hand and lowered it to his side.

  “You don’t have to answer me, I shouldn’t have asked. It was a long time ago,” she said as she turned away from him and went to the door.

  He couldn’t let her leave. Her coming here right now was bad timing with everything else going on in his life, but he couldn’t seem to let her go.

  “Nan,” he said as he came up behind her.

  “You don’t need to answer. I’d rather not know, since I suspect I know what your answer is.”

  He gently grasped her arm and turned her to face him. She took her hand and placed it on his chest, over his heart.

  “If you think my answer is no, then you’d be wrong. Everyday for the past thousand years, you are what I’ve thought about. First thing in the morning when I wake and last thing at night when I go to bed, you are who I think of.”

  “You don’t have to tell me what you think I need to hear. I can see what you’ve built here, and it is not something that could come about without your entire focus.”

  She was so wrong about that, and it seem very important to him that she know that.

  “All this started out as a distraction, something to keep my mind off you. I built a life here. I started an organization, and I’d like to think I’ve made a difference. It’s what’s kept me going, it was my reason for facing each day for a long time. I’m dedicated to the Order of Odin, and it has become my life. But don’t think for one moment that I forgot you because I didn’t.”

  * * *

  Evening had descended by the time Nan and Baldr had arrived back at his house. They had hardly spoken a word to each other during the car ride home. She didn’t know her husband’s reason for the silence, but their argument in his office had left her emotionally drained. It would take time for her to regain the strength to go another round with him.

  They’d eaten a silent meal together, and now he was ensconced in his home office and she was left at loose ends. She’d had more than enough time to think today, but it appeared the she was going to get more time whether she wanted it or not.

  She grabbed a heavy sweater from the hook by the back door and stepped out on to the veranda. A brisk wind stirred and she wrapped the sweater tighter around her as she sat down on the rocking chair at that sat alone on the immaculate porch. Baldr must not receive many visitors here if he only had a solitary chair outside. She rocked slowly as she hugged the sweater to her.

  She thought about what he’d told her in his office earlier. Had he meant it? That he hadn’t stopped thinking of her after all this time? He had no reason to lie to her since there was nothing for him to gain by it. He wanted her to return to Asgard, and it would help his cause further to tell her the opposite, that he hadn’t thought of her at all. Baldr had always been honest, so much so that his manner of speaking was blunt at times. She hugged the knowledge that at least he hadn’t forgotten her close to her. It gave them a starting point to rebuild their marriage. What that marriage would look like, she had no idea, but she wanted to find out.

  “Mother.”

  Nan jumped as her son’s voice came from her left. She turned her head in that direction and her son, Forseti, walked toward her. She closed her eyes and opened them again, doubting what she was seeing. What was her son doing here? She turned her head and looked toward the back door of the house. She hoped Baldr didn’t choose this moment to come out. There were things she’d neglected to tell him and didn’t want him to know. If her son was here because of those things, she didn’t want them to talk to each other.

  “Mother,” he said again as he came closer to her. He looked so much like his father. He hair was a little long, a little shaggy, but it was the same blond shade as Baldr. He kept a neatly trimmed mustache and goatee, and she may be biased but she thought it made him look handsome. He’d grown into a man and she could not be more proud of him. But as much as she loved him, she was dismayed to see him here.

  “What are you doing here? How did you find me?” she asked as she nervously licked her lips and glanced over at the back door again. She hoped Baldr would not hear their voices.

  “I knew you’d come to him as soon as you left,” he said, as his mouth tightened. While she was on the path to forgiving her husband for leaving them, her son was not. “Why you would want to bother with him I’ll never know. Is he worth breaking the rules for when he walked away from us without glancing back?”

  Nan stood, her legs shaky as she approached where he stood on the other side of the railing. Her heart pounded and her palms became slick with sweat. How much did he know?

  “What do you mean?” she asked. She kept her voice steady as she willed the rest of her to settle. He couldn’t possibly know the extent of what she’d done in her anger over learning that her husband was alive. His sense of justice was very strong due to the god he was, and he would not be standing so calm before her if he knew.

  “Mother you know what you’ve done,” he said sighing as he came over to her and placed his hands on top of hers where they rested on the railing . “Odin didn’t give you permission to leave. You know it weakens Asgard without the strength of all of us there. He’s given me orders to bring you home.”

  Nan sagged imperceptibly as relief coursed through her. As far as her son knew, her only sin was leaving Asgard without permission, which meant that Odin also didn’t know the true extent of her crimes against him. She almost wanted Odin to know since she detested him and had always resented the hold he’d had on her husband. But for Odin to know, her son would have to know, and that she didn’t want. It was best if he thought she was guilty of the minor infraction of leaving without permission, which deserved only minor punishment.

  “I don’t know why your grandfather insists that we all be there. Asgard has been weakening since Christianity came to Scandinavia. With Asgard weakening, so is his power, and we can’t have that can we,” she said, her words bitter when she spoke of Odin.

  “It’s hard for him to accept how things change. And rules are rules mother,” Forseti said reasonably. He didn’t carry the same resentment of Odin as she had. Odin had spent plenty of time with his grandson after Baldr had departed, but fortunately Nan had counteracted his influence on her son and Forseti didn’t follow Odin as blindly as his father had.

  “We could do so much here, that’s all. I've seen what your father has done here during his time away—”

  “I don’t want to hear about him,” Forseti growled as he raised his hand up to stop her speaking.

  “He is your father, a
nd I know he’s sorry that he missed so much time with you,” Nan said, knowing her son was not ready to listen to what she was saying. “Please, I need more time here. I’m not ready to go back yet.”

  “I don’t understand you. You want to stay with him, after what he did to us, to you? How can you waste more of your life on him? You’ve wasted the past thousand years of your life grieving a man who hasn’t given you a second thought.”

  “He has thought about me,” she said, knowing that her son would not be moved by his father’s insistence that he hadn’t forgotten them.

  “So he says,” Forseti said as his eyes narrowed. “Words are easy now. Actions would have been much better. Why did he not come back?”

  “Odin forbid it,” she said. She’d always allowed Odin to have a relationship with his grandson and had done her best not to taint it with her own dislike of the old god. But Odin had played a large part in denying Forseti a father and it was time he knew it. “He could not return because Odin wanted him to stay dead in the eyes of everyone in Asgard.”

  “Is that what he’s telling you?” her son asked, and she knew he was not ready to entertain his father’s side of the story. Perhaps he would be eventually, but it would not be today.

  “I need to stay, at least for a while,” she said, pleading with her son with her eyes, hoping he would understand.

  “Why? Why would you give him another chance?”

  “I want us to be a family again,” she said quietly. “I want my husband to be by my side.”

  “We can never be a family, too much has happened. You need to move on, to put the past behind you and live your life for yourself.”

  Nan reached up to touch her son’s face. He grasped her hand and held it. She could see the pain in his eyes and knew that she was not the only one hurt by his father’s sudden resurrection. She wished she could have spared him this, but seeing Baldr again was something she had needed to do for herself.

  “If I’m going to move on, I need to be with him now. Can you stall Odin for me and give me a little more time please?”

  “I don’t want you hurt anymore,” he said as he gave her hand a squeeze. “He’s hurt you enough.”

  “I know, but this is something I have to do. Please do this for me?”

  Her son sighed and nodded his head. “I’ll give you more time, but Odin won’t be satisfied until you are back where you belong. It’s fortunate that he has another distraction at the moment, and his focus will be on that for a while.”

  “Oh, what is that?” Nan asked, although she could guess.

  “Loki has escaped. No one knows how he did it. Odin wants him found, but it’s proving difficult. Loki has cloaked himself somehow, which means he’s much stronger than he should be. So Odin won’t miss you for a while longer, but he won’t be stalled forever.”

  “Thank you,” Nan said as she leaned forward to kiss her son’s cheek. He patted her hand and turned from her. She closed her eyes for a moment and when she opened them her son was gone.

  She turned back toward the house with a mixture of relief and dread jumbled inside her stomach. Odin did not yet know what she had done, and if luck was with her he would never find out. As she walked back into the house a tiny voice nagged inside her head, telling her that she’d never really been that lucky.

  Chapter 6

  Loki stirred in his bed, a grin tugging at the corners of his mouth as he stretched and clasped his hands under his head. It was very good to be him at the moment. His stirring disturbed the women laying in bed with him. One had milky and hair the color of flames, and the other dusky skin and hair the color of midnight. He’d thoroughly enjoyed both of them, but as the morning light hit him, he had to will himself not to think of another woman.

  He’d been locked away for a thousand years, with only his loyal wife, Sigyn at his side. Even she had grown tired of playing the devoted wife once his punishment had gone past the five hundred year mark, and she no longer sat with him as she once had. He could not blame her for it since she was a young and vibrant woman and she deserved more that to chain herself to a man destined to be punished for eternity. Especially when she had not been his first choice. He had grown to love his wife, but another had stolen his heart first. One who had chosen another over him.

  He shoved aside thoughts of his past. Both women were lost to him at the moment and that was just one more grievance that could be laid at Odin and Baldr’s feet. He would have his revenge on Baldr and then he would deal with Odin.

  “Time to get up ladies,” he said, his voice booming in the bedroom. He had work to do and laying about in bed wouldn’t get it done.

  The brunette obeyed him immediately and Loki enjoyed watching her full behind as she left the room. The redhead didn’t seem inclined to part company with him yet. She pouted and reached out a hand to stroke him. He enjoyed the feeling for a moment before he shoved her hand away.

  “I have too much work to do and have no time to play. You can have as much of that as you want later, but for now I need you to get out of bed and fetch Connor for me,” Loki said as he pulled her in for a swift kiss to soften the blow of his rejection. She obeyed his demand with a pout on her face and got up and left the room.

  He got out of bed and stretched his arms above his head. He didn’t think he’d ever get enough of the freedom he now enjoyed, after spending an eternity chained beneath that giant snake. With a swift motion he reached for his jeans, which he had discarded in haste last night and pulled them on. He leaned his hip against the bedside table and crossed his arms over his massive chest as he waited for his second in command, Connor, to arrive. Things were proceeding nicely, and Dany Cavanaugh had succumbed to his blade with an ease that had surprised him. The old werewolf truly had no fight left in him, but Loki could feel the power his sacrifice infuse his very marrow.

  He had a crew watching Baldr’s place. It would soon be time to make his next move, but he wanted to plan for any eventuality, hence his minions keeping an eye on his enemy.

  There was a knock on the door, and Loki bade Connor to enter. His second in command walked in, his eyes respectfully downcast. Connor was a werewolf, in fact all his crew were. Loki found that he had a natural affinity for the wolves, and that they made the best henchmen. All they needed was a firm hand which Loki had shown them, and they were now his to command. Their civilized veneer was paper thin, and it took little prodding to bring out their animal natures, which help them break through any moral dilemmas they may have with any orders he gave them.

  “You wanted to see me?” Connor asked as he glanced toward Loki, keeping a respectful distance between them. Loki stayed where he was.

  “I did. Do you have any intel for me?” Loki asked. Loki studied the other man carefully as he hesitated and his face grew pale. “Connor? I asked you if you have any intel for me.”

  Connor’s face grew paler still at the edge of steel that had crept into Loki’s voice. He cleared his throat and shuffled his feet as he avoided Loki’s eyes. The rough edge of impatience crept into Loki’s body, and if his lieutenant didn’t hurry up and explain, he was sure he was going to do something that Connor would deeply regret. Connor risked as quick glance his way, and must have seen something in Loki’s face because he straightened up.

  “Something has happened that you should know sir. A complication that we are not sure how you want it dealt with.”

  “How will I know how to deal with it if you don't fucking tell me,” Loki said, his voice growing darker by the second. One problem with using werewolves is that once they decided who the leader was, they showed very little initiative and had to be told what to do in all but the most simple situations. Loki took a deep breath. His impatience with Connor served only to tie the other man’s tongue. He did his best to squelch the anger rising inside him to expedite this situation. “What has happened?”

  “There was an incident at the target’s home. A woman was there, watching him. The full moon made the wolves assigned t
o watching his home a little undisciplined.”

  Loki was sure Connor was softening the truth. Loki would have thought his second in command would have had more sense than to send a group of wolves out to to Baldr’s place during the full moon, but apparently not. The crew out there would have had little control over their baser impulses, and group mentality would have taken over. Loki could only imagine what took place, but he wanted Connor to spell it out for him.

  “And what happened,” Loki said as he looked Connor in the eye. The other man’s gaze dropped immediately and Loki knew that whatever he was going to tell him would not be good.

  “They attacked her sir,” Connor said, his voice low as he continued to look down at the floor. Loki uncrossed his arms and rubbed his hand over his face.

  “I’d assumed that much, Connor,” he said. “Did they kill her?”

  “They thought they had sir. She wasn’t breathing, and they eviscerated her. They would have brought her here as a trophy but there was a were-bear roaming the woods, and he chased them out.”

  The were-bear was probably a member of the Order sent to watch over Baldr, but Loki’s concern wasn’t the bear. His attention was caught by something else Connor had said and he looked at him with intense focus.

  “If they gutted her how is it that they only think they killed her?”

  “She’s been seen, sir. At the house. She doesn’t have a mark on her. She was on the porch talking to a younger version of the target.”

  Nan. Loki’s mouth tightened, and he folded his arms back across this chest.

  “Pull the crew. We don’t need him watched anymore. It’s time to put the next phase of our plan in place,” Loki said as he straightened.

  “Do you want me to prepare Eduard Rouben?”

  “No leave him on ice for now. His time will come soon enough. I think it’s time Baldr learned what’s at stake for him.”

  “Very good sir,” Connor said as he nodded respectfully and turn on his heel. As soon as he left, Loki relaxed his iron control over his emotions and paced the room.