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I pulled my sleeves and searched within for the energy to keep moving. Glancing down, I looked at the marks that were etched into the skin of my forearms. The marks had begun to fade ever since I’d left Muspelheim. Their meaning was lost to me. Not even Ogun could decipher the strange markings.
“The dead are coming closer,” Fyrcat said, leveling each of us with her cold stare.
“I need to learn how to defend myself,” I said as I followed them, doing my best to keep up. “But I wouldn’t even know where to start.”
I was surprised when Skarde stopped running and turned to face me. “Start with what is in here.” He placed his hand flat against my chest where my heart was. “You are strong and resilient. There’s a warrior inside you, but she will not fight her way to the surface if you doubt yourself.”
I can’t explain why, but I hugged him. He was a bit awkward, his hand caught between us, but I felt a bit of the sadness leave his body. It was then that it suddenly dawned on me—that things had been tough on Skarde. It had to have been difficult being snatched out of the afterlife and catapulted into a world that was no longer familiar to him. Then he’d been forced to side with a woman he hated in an effort to save the people I cared about. He’d done so much for me, and I hadn’t thought of him until now.
Skarde was secretive, and I still didn’t know if I could trust him, but I wanted to. His hand slid up to my neck, thumb settling at my pulse point. He bit his lip, and a shiver raced down my spine.
“Keep moving,” Torsten growled at the same time that Fyrcat cleared her throat.
“Draugrs,” she said, enunciating the word so that crisp irritation rang in every syllable.
I’d been leaning toward him, but at her words, I took a step back. My back hit a tree trunk hard enough that it knocked the wind out of me. Ogun reached out a hand to steady me.
“Looks like you’re not just the flavor of the one brother,” he said in a light, teasing tone.
“Shut your mouth, Ogun,” Torsten responded.
But Ogun continued to look at me, arching his left brow suggestively. There was an amused smirk on his face that was wiped away the second Skarde snatched the dwarf off his feet.
“Mind your tongue.”
“All of you are so tangled up in your romances that it’s amazing you haven’t been completely overrun by zombies by now.”
Skarde dropped Ogun and stalked ahead.
“Fool,” Fyrcat sighed.
“Would you stop calling him that?” I asked. “You’ve tied him in enough knots already. Don’t add name-calling to the list. One day with you and he’s muttering about houses and acting crazy.”
Fyrcat’s eyebrows shot up and a small, secretive smile curled her lips. “I see.”
Well, I didn’t, and it was beginning to piss me off.
“How far away are we?” I asked.
“Close. It’s up ahead, in about two miles, but we have to hurry.” She paused a moment and then nodded. “Freya tells me there are several dozen draugr in the way. They’ve come to kill her.”
Chapter Sixteen
Torsten
My brother was hurting, and my mate looked seconds away from running after him.
It set my teeth on edge. Though it was the height of selfishness, there was a beastly part of me that wanted to sling Jovi over my shoulder again, just to keep her nearby.
There was nothing I could have said that would have brought Skarde comfort. Leaving the favor of the Aesir was more than just changing allegiance, it was a change in one’s identity. Skarde had been one of Odin’s attack dogs for so long, I wasn’t sure if he knew who he really was outside of his duties. The lost look on his face had said everything. The only constant we both had was Jovi and Skarde didn’t even have the assurance that even that was real.
But thoughts about Skarde and Jovi would have to wait. For now, we needed to concentrate on the walking dead who were still a threat.
“How many are there?” I asked.
Fyrcat nodded and reached into a pack she’d slung over her shoulders. She produced a pair of dowsing rods and tapped the ground. Her eyes fluttered shut, and she mouthed silently, counting in her head.
“Thirty ahead, twenty behind. I’d say we have five minutes before they close in. Maybe less.”
