Three Slices by Chuck Wendig, Kevin Hearne, Delilah S. Dawson Read Free Book Online Page B
Tags: General Fiction
first, but as soon as he looks up at my approach and I see the scarred, puckered tissue around his eyes and his condescending smirk, I tell Orlaith to run back to the cabin and hide inside using the doggie door.
Go as fast as you can or he will hurt you. Don’t argue; just go.
No, he needs me for something. But he will use you to control me. If you are out of his reach, he can’t control me. Go.
Orlaith turns and runs but speaks as she does.
I will.
Loki’s smug grin at my approach fades as he sees Orlaith bound away.
“Aw, where’s she going? We came to such a lovely understanding last time.” Last time, he did something to Orlaith’s mind and used her as a hostage; I wouldn’t let him do that again.
“You’re not welcome here, Loki. Leave.”
He affects a hurt expression. “Where’s your hospitality, Miss MacTiernan?”
I brandish my staff and my axe and say, “Right here. If you’d like a sample of my hospitality, say the word.”
Loki’s hair ignites as he scowls at me, perturbed by my attitude. “You went to Asgard.”
“Indeed I did.”
“Why?”
“I’m sure Odin would love to tell you all about it. He’s anxious to see you, in fact. Why don’t you go ask him?”
“I’m asking you.”
“I’m not answering. Leave now.”
The flames around Loki’s head flare up and his eyes turn dark. “Perhaps you need a reminder of how this relationship works. When I need something, you get it for me, whether that be the Lost Arrows of Vayu or a simple answer to a simple question. Tell me why you went to Asgard and what you discussed with Odin,” he says, and then points a finger at the cabin before adding, “or does your hound need to pay for your mouth?”
Seeing him fall back on that same threat angers me—not only because he’s threatening an innocent creature but because he thinks so little of me that he doesn’t think I’d have prepared for it. That’s okay: He’s already revealed that has a short fuse and I exactly how to set him off. “Suck my balls,” I tell him.
Loki blinks. “You don’t even have —”
“They’re still bigger than yours.”
He flinches as if I’d slapped him—and I suppose that, verbally, I had. Not only had I cast aspersions on his manly man-bits but I’d interrupted him to do it.
“Bitch,” he growls, immediately grasping for the world that most men do when they encounter a woman they can’t control. His entire body ignites into a pillar of flame and his voice snarls out of it, “It seems you need a lesson.”
He rockets straight up in a ball of fire and then arcs over my head toward the cabin. You’re inside now, right, Orlaith?
Good. Stay there and don’t come out, no matter what you hear.
While Loki’s eyes are off me, I trigger invisibility using the bindings carved into Scáthmhaide and jog uphill, craning my neck to follow his progress. I’m curious as to how precisely the wards will affect him when he hits them, and I murmur bindings to increase my strength and speed.
When Loki hits the Druidic wards against fire, he doesn’t smash against them like a bird hitting a window, which I was kind of hoping for. Instead, his fire is simply snuffed out like a candle wick between fingers, and he keeps going on inertia, a thin smoking body that’s now falling out of the sky instead of flying through it. His initial cry of surprise is followed by a cry of terror as he realizes he won’t be able to control his landing, and I shift from a jog to a full sprint, closing on where he’ll land.
He breaks his right arm trying to cushion his fall, a sharp crack and then a wounded howl as he rolls in front of our cabin. He cradles it with his left arm for a couple of revolutions and then, as he struggles to push himself to his feet with his one good arm, I leap onto his back and sink my axe into it until the blade disappears. It’s buried in his left shoulder blade and I
Go as fast as you can or he will hurt you. Don’t argue; just go.
No, he needs me for something. But he will use you to control me. If you are out of his reach, he can’t control me. Go.
Orlaith turns and runs but speaks as she does.
I will.
Loki’s smug grin at my approach fades as he sees Orlaith bound away.
“Aw, where’s she going? We came to such a lovely understanding last time.” Last time, he did something to Orlaith’s mind and used her as a hostage; I wouldn’t let him do that again.
“You’re not welcome here, Loki. Leave.”
He affects a hurt expression. “Where’s your hospitality, Miss MacTiernan?”
I brandish my staff and my axe and say, “Right here. If you’d like a sample of my hospitality, say the word.”
Loki’s hair ignites as he scowls at me, perturbed by my attitude. “You went to Asgard.”
“Indeed I did.”
“Why?”
“I’m sure Odin would love to tell you all about it. He’s anxious to see you, in fact. Why don’t you go ask him?”
“I’m asking you.”
“I’m not answering. Leave now.”
The flames around Loki’s head flare up and his eyes turn dark. “Perhaps you need a reminder of how this relationship works. When I need something, you get it for me, whether that be the Lost Arrows of Vayu or a simple answer to a simple question. Tell me why you went to Asgard and what you discussed with Odin,” he says, and then points a finger at the cabin before adding, “or does your hound need to pay for your mouth?”
Seeing him fall back on that same threat angers me—not only because he’s threatening an innocent creature but because he thinks so little of me that he doesn’t think I’d have prepared for it. That’s okay: He’s already revealed that has a short fuse and I exactly how to set him off. “Suck my balls,” I tell him.
Loki blinks. “You don’t even have —”
“They’re still bigger than yours.”
He flinches as if I’d slapped him—and I suppose that, verbally, I had. Not only had I cast aspersions on his manly man-bits but I’d interrupted him to do it.
“Bitch,” he growls, immediately grasping for the world that most men do when they encounter a woman they can’t control. His entire body ignites into a pillar of flame and his voice snarls out of it, “It seems you need a lesson.”
He rockets straight up in a ball of fire and then arcs over my head toward the cabin. You’re inside now, right, Orlaith?
Good. Stay there and don’t come out, no matter what you hear.
While Loki’s eyes are off me, I trigger invisibility using the bindings carved into Scáthmhaide and jog uphill, craning my neck to follow his progress. I’m curious as to how precisely the wards will affect him when he hits them, and I murmur bindings to increase my strength and speed.
When Loki hits the Druidic wards against fire, he doesn’t smash against them like a bird hitting a window, which I was kind of hoping for. Instead, his fire is simply snuffed out like a candle wick between fingers, and he keeps going on inertia, a thin smoking body that’s now falling out of the sky instead of flying through it. His initial cry of surprise is followed by a cry of terror as he realizes he won’t be able to control his landing, and I shift from a jog to a full sprint, closing on where he’ll land.
He breaks his right arm trying to cushion his fall, a sharp crack and then a wounded howl as he rolls in front of our cabin. He cradles it with his left arm for a couple of revolutions and then, as he struggles to push himself to his feet with his one good arm, I leap onto his back and sink my axe into it until the blade disappears. It’s buried in his left shoulder blade and I
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