Thor's Serpents, page 1
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MM: To Dylan and Asia Alsgaard, since I learned Norse myth to be better at being your mother, the series is obviously for you.
KA: For my sons, Alex and Marcus, this trilogy was for you. And for my nephew, Marshall, I promise they don’t all die in the end.
ONE
MATT
“WOLVES AT THE DOOR”
It was hard for Matt to pretend he didn’t know two wolves had followed them from the campsite. Reyna seemed to have no such problem. Maybe she thought he was imagining the Raider Scouts. More likely she just wasn’t about to let something as inconsequential as imminent death distract her from detailing every mistake he’d made yesterday, fighting the Viking zombie warriors known as the draugr.
“And then, when you made it to the king’s throne, I noted a few tactical errors.”
“I’m sure you did.”
“I’m just trying to help you improve. You do want to improve, don’t you?” She smiled when she said it, not bothering to pretend she didn’t enjoy needling him.
“I have a suggestion for the next battle,” he said. “You could join me on the front lines.”
“I’m the descendant of Freya. Unlike Thor’s champion, I’m not supposed to be on the front line.” She moved aside a branch. “However, I could be persuaded to join you, if I had a proper weapon. I’d like a sword. The draugr king’s looked good.”
He shook his head and cast a sidelong glance into the surrounding forest, trying to catch a glimpse of the wolves. After the draugr fight, where Matt had recovered Mjölnir—Thor’s legendary hammer—he’d retreated to the forest with the other descendants of the North: Reyna and her twin brother, Ray, along with Laurie, Fen, Baldwin, and Owen. There, they planned to regroup before their next mission, but after the adrenaline-pumping fight, no one really wanted to rest. Fen had wandered off first. Matt had gone next, with Reyna following him.
Matt hadn’t planned to walk far, but after about twenty paces, he’d realized two of the Raider Scouts—wulfenkind—were following them, so he was leading them away from the others.
“We could take them hostage,” Reyna said. “Question them.”
He mouthed, They’re wolves, and she shrugged, as if to say So? While he’d agree it would be great to question Raiders, he wasn’t sure he should risk it when they had fangs and claws. Also…
“Questioning means getting them talking,” he said. “That could be tough if they’re in wolf form.”
“Oh, I could make them talk.”
He shook his head. He was getting used to Reyna. She wasn’t what he’d expected—in a lot of ways. He’d figured the descendant of Freya would be, well, more… blond. Reyna’s hair was blond, but she’d just dyed it black. When he’d first met her, she had her nails colored black, too, and had worn makeup in the same harsh shade. By now the makeup was gone, the nail polish was chipping off, and she’d traded in her black clothes for faded jeans and a T-shirt advertising some band he’d never heard of.
The wolves seemed content to follow, but Matt knew better. He might not be much of a football player—boxing and wrestling were more his thing—but a guy couldn’t grow up in Blackwell without playing the game. These two were flanking him. Waiting for him to fumble the ball, so they could swoop in.
The question was: what was the ball? He had his shield, which he’d taken back from the Raiders. He had his amulet, too, but its “Hammer power” only worked for a descendant of Thor. They could take the amulet, but it wasn’t unique and he could easily get another. The bigger prize, of course, was Mjölnir, but even the draugr king had barely been able to lift that.
The wulfenkind might want Reyna. If that was the case, though, he’d be tempted to hand her over because they’d discover their mistake soon enough—she’d probably drag them back, slung over her shoulder like a brace of wild turkeys.
Taking Matt out of the game would be more useful, since Freya didn’t play a major role at Ragnarök, the Norse apocalypse. But while the Raiders might have the advantage of wolf forms, Reyna had magic and he had both Mjölnir and his amulet’s power. So how did they expect to capture—?
Matt stopped short. Reyna kept going, still talking, for a few feet before she realized he wasn’t beside her. She stopped and mouthed, What’s wrong?
“I just remembered there’s a stream with a waterfall. I wanted to take a closer look. I think it’s over here.…”
He began walking left. Reyna apparently trusted he didn’t really want to check out a waterfall and fell in step beside him. Ahead, he could make out the wolves’ brown fur through the bushes. They regrouped, ready to block his path.
“They were herding us,” Reyna whispered.
He nodded. The Raiders must be camped along the path they’d been walking. As long as he and Reyna had kept going that way, the wolves had been happy to follow in the shadows. Now that Matt veered off the route, they’d strike and drive them to their camp.
“Showtime?” Reyna asked. When he hesitated, she whispered, “Don’t worry. I’ll help you.”
“That’s not—” He caught her teasing grin and shook his head. “I’m not sure it’s safe.”
“It never is. So…?”
As Thor’s champion, Matt was the group leader, which was way more responsibility than he liked. It also meant he couldn’t afford unnecessary risks. But his only alternative was to lead them back to the others, which he’d never do.
They could use a hostage.…
“Okay,” he said. “Follow my lead.”
“Yes, sir.”
Onward it was, then. Play dumb and wait for the attack.
“If you want a logistical problem to solve,” he said to Reyna, “figure out how I’m supposed to carry this hammer around.”
“That’s boring. I like battle strategy better.”
“All the strategy in the world won’t help if I strain my wrist carrying this thing.”
“Whine, whine. You’ve got a magical hammer, a magical necklace, a magical shield, magical battle-goats… and now you want a magical hammer holder, too? You’re so spoiled. You know what—”
She swung around midsentence, her hands going out, lips moving in a spell.
Matt lunged at the charging wolf. Reyna hit it with a jet of fog, which startled the first wolf, and it fell back, leaving Matt with the second, still barreling toward him.
Matt swung Mjölnir. Then he realized he was aiming a solid metal hammer at a kid’s head. Yes, it was a Raider, but that didn’t change the fact this “wolf” wasn’t a draugr or a troll or any other kind of Norse monster. One blow to the skull with Mjölnir, and this kid-in-wolf’s-clothing would be dead.
Matt couldn’t stop the swing. The momentum was too much. All he could do was divert the strike. It still hit the wolf in the front leg, and there was a sickening crack as the bone broke.
The wolf yowled in agony and collapsed onto its side. Matt wheeled on the other one, now recovered from the surprise of the fog blast and racing toward him. He quickly switched Mjölnir to his left hand, but that threw his balance off too much for a good punch. He launched his other Hammer instead—the invisible blow from his amulet.
There was a flash of light and a boom, announcing the invisible punch, but it came too late for the wolf to veer off course. The Hammer blow knocked the beast backward into a tree. Matt ran to tackle it, but Reyna was closer and leaped in first. She knocked the wolf down and then pinned it in a choke hold.
“Umm…” Matt began.
“Did I mention I know self-defense? Aikido and karate. When your dad owns a casino, you need to know how to take care of yourself. You aren’t the only fighter in this little god-gang, Matt.”
“Okay, but what I was going to say is that you’re using a hold meant for a person. That’s not a—”
The wolf bucked and slipped right out of her grasp. The beast twisted around, snapping. Matt managed to yank her away in time. Then he jumped the wolf… as the one behind them began yowling in fresh pain.
No, not yowling. It was howling.
Wolf. Howl. That was how they communicated with pack members.…
Matt leaped up, cursing. Reyna looked as shocked at the oath as if he’d changed into a wolf himself. He tore past her, saying “Use the fog. Confuse the other one” as he lunged for the wounded wolf. He grabbed it by the muzzle, managing to avoid inch-long fangs. He snapped the beast’s jaws shut and cut off its howl midnote.
“It’s calling the others,” Reyna said. “I’m sorry.”
Reyna cast her fog spell. When the wolf ran through it, she landed a surprisingly accurate kick to the underside of its jaw. It fell back with a yelp. Then, lost in the fog, the beast started to howl. And in the distance, other wolves replied, their howls growing closer until Matt could hear the pounding of paws.
“We need to go,” he said quickly. “We can’t fight them all—”
Reyna delivered one more kick to the second wolf while Matt released the injured one. They started to run. Behind them, he caught t he sound of voices. Human voices. That wasn’t unusual—not all Raiders changed to wolves for a fight. But what slowed Matt was one of the voices. The loudest of them. Shouting. He couldn’t make out the words, but they sounded angry.
He knew that voice. Knew it in a heartbeat.
He’s been captured. He’s in trouble. I need to help him.
Matt turned back. The fog had cleared, and he could see a few wolves in the distance. Behind them were two figures. Hattie, one of the leaders of this pack of Raiders. And standing beside her, shouting orders at the wolves?
Fen.
TWO
FEN
“LEADING THE ENEMY”
Fen lost his footing as he saw Thorsen stare at him in shock. Fen couldn’t tell Matt that he’d fought Skull and won control of the very pack of Raiders that he and the descendants of the North had been fighting only yesterday. Fen wanted to tell Matt what had happened, to explain that he was trapped, that he wanted to walk away from the Raiders and rejoin Laurie and Matt. Unfortunately, what he wanted didn’t matter anymore. Fen was bound by magic far older than any of them. He had to stay with his pack; they were as much a part of him as his lungs now.
Even more powerful than the need to stay with them was the absolute compulsion to do right by them. If he had the ability to make the pack of wulfenkind join the side he wanted to be on, his new position wouldn’t be all bad, but he had to do what was in the pack’s “best interest.” Helping Matt stop Ragnarök and save the world would endanger all of the wulfenkind because Matt’s side—which included Fen’s cousin and friends—wasn’t likely to win. Ragnarök was fated. Even the death of the gods hadn’t stopped the prophesized battle from coming. The Raiders believed that the end of the world was better for them, and that the new world order would give them freedom and security. Since Fen was bound by magic to do what was best for his pack, Fen was stuck on the wrong side of the coming fight. He was Matt’s enemy now.
Worse yet, he was his cousin Laurie’s enemy.
Fen muttered a word he wouldn’t have said around Laurie. He wasn’t a big thinker, so figuring out how to fix the mess he was in seemed impossible. Laurie was the one who thought things out. Laurie was the one with plans. He was the one who threw himself into danger to keep her safe.
But Laurie was impossibly out of reach.
Fen’s only comfort was that she wasn’t alongside Matt and Reyna as they tried to vanish into the woods. Laurie wasn’t there to see that Fen was leading the enemy. Yet. He snarled another word, and the girl who was now at his side laughed.
“Feeling guilty?” Hattie asked. “That will pass, you know. We will win the great battle, and you’ll be glad you’re with us.”
“Shut it, Hattie,” Fen said. He glared at her, and she ducked her head obediently instead of punching him. It was an odd feeling. Hattie was a wolf like him, second in command of this small group of Raiders until this morning. He’d spent more than a few hours nursing bruises he got when she enforced the former pack alpha’s rules. Hattie was scarier than most boys he knew, and that was when she was being nice.
She stepped closer. “We can take them. Thorsen and the witch are alone.”
“No.”
“They’re not your friends anymore. They’re our enemies,” she pointed out.
“I said no,” he repeated.
“It’s a great chance… or we can follow them to camp,” she continued. She was supposed to offer him ideas. Once Skull, the pack’s former leader, recovered from the fight, that would be his role, but right now, Hattie was his advisor, and she was doing her job.
The small group of Raiders who had come with him to collect the scouting party were whooping and hollering as if they had achieved something remarkable by finding Thorsen. They hadn’t. All they’d done was reveal that Fen was with the Raiders—and earn one of the Raiders a broken leg.
“Pull back!” Fen ordered.
He stopped walking, and the three Raiders with him—all in human form—stopped, too. The two kids who were wolves came to stand in front of him.
“What are you thinking yelling like that? Head back to camp before you get us all captured!”
“They’re running away. We could go to their camp and capture them all,” Hattie argued.
“Really? There are a lot of Berserkers and more gods’ representatives in that camp. There are six of us and one’s injured already.” He looked at them, meeting wolf and human eyes, before asking, “Who do you think would win that fight?”
All the Raiders, both humans and wolves, looked down. For a flicker of a moment, Fen wished he could tell the Raiders to pursue Thorsen and Reyna; then Fen could let them know why he was gone, why he was on the enemy’s side, and maybe they’d have a plan to get him out of this mess. Unfortunately, as much as that was what Fen the person wanted, it wouldn’t be in the best interests of the pack—and that was what Fen the Alpha had to do. He had to protect the pack by leading them on a path that would be best for them, not best for him.
The forest around them was silent except for the sounds of birds and small animals. There were no signs yet that the Berserkers or anyone else was coming after the Raiders. That didn’t make Fen relax: he’d been with the heroes long enough to know that they could move silently. Thorsen could have already retrieved the others. They could be ready to attack at any moment.
“Move it,” Fen snarled at the Raiders. “And you two”—he pointed at two of the Raiders whose names he didn’t know—“carry him. He can’t hop all the way back to camp on a busted leg.” He gestured at Hattie. “You lead. I’ll take the back.”
In some ways, it was just like being with Matt and Laurie: someone had to take first and last position, the vulnerable needed help, and danger was everywhere. The difference was that the danger was now because of his friends instead of to them, and Fen had to protect those who were in his pack instead of protecting his friends. Fen huffed in frustration, but he kept his words to himself.
After the other Raiders started toward camp, Fen shot one last look in the direction that would lead to his cousin. As he walked away from the heroes’ camp, he tried not to think about the look of betrayal he saw on Matt’s face. He and Matt hadn’t always been close, but going to Hel, escaping a river of dead people, and fighting monsters created a sort of friendship. Now they’d all hate Fen. He couldn’t explain, and they’d all remember his earlier mistakes: keeping his ties to the Raiders a secret and stealing the shield and lying about it.
They’ll probably believe I was a traitor all along.
Fen really didn’t want the world to end, but he wasn’t sure if Matt and the others would believe that now. They’d already discovered that some of the myths seemed impossible to avoid. In the myths, Loki led the enemy. He was the one who freed monsters and brought them into battle against the gods. Since this whole crazy descendants-of-dead-gods business had started, Fen had feared turning evil because he was the representative of Loki.
When he’d found out that Laurie was the god’s champion instead of him, Fen had been relieved and disappointed. He figured he would go into the upcoming battle to help the real Loki’s champion and keep Thor’s champion safer. He’d thought he would fight at Laurie’s and Matt’s side, but now… now he was confused.
Loki’s champion was fighting on the side of good, where Fen wanted to be, and he was tricked and trapped on the other side. Was it because the myths said Loki led the monsters and Loki’s real representative wasn’t going to do that? Were there two champions, one for each side? Or was Fen just supremely unlucky? Trying to figure out the line between what could and couldn’t be changed from the old myths was the sort of thing that he counted on Laurie and Matt to explain.
He led the Raiders to their camp, still thinking about everything that had changed literally overnight and how much he’d lost as a result.
“He was right there,” one of the Raiders said as he transformed into human shape. “We had a chance, and the boss said—”
“Exactly. I’m the boss now,” Fen growled at the boy. “And any advantage we had to my being here was lost when they saw me.”
