Winner Takes All (Were Witch Book 9) Read online

  And it had been a lie.

  She breathed in through flaring nostrils, calming herself. “Yes. I understand.”

  “Right,” Loki affirmed. “Fenris will attempt to distract us with his hired thugs, and then he’ll move on to something still more devious. For all our wisdom, we cannot say what, for certain. I don’t claim to know what his final moves will be, so you must remain vigilant. But we, the gods, will be watching out for you, watching your back, whether in person or from a distance. You are not alone.”

  She sighed. “Thank you. You’ve done a lot.”

  The god of mischief grinned. “I have, haven’t I? In any event, knowing that, enjoy the remainder of your meal.”

  He walked back toward the main doors from the diner. Bailey looked away for a second, and when she turned back, he was gone.

  Roland stabbed his fork into the fettuccine on his plate, his mouth twisted with disgruntlement. “Such a charming fellow. You’re right, though. He has done a lot to help us. I only pray it’ll be enough. What about the others? Shouldn’t we be hearing from the whole pantheon by this point?”

  “Hell if I know,” Bailey grumbled. “If I have to, I’ll pop into the council chamber and ask them. After supper, at any rate.”

  Fortunately, that proved unnecessary.

  The front doors opened and in walked multiple pairs of feet—at least a trio, by Bailey’s count. She turned around to look and was impressed, if not exactly surprised, to see three more members of the divine council stride into the diner.

  An old man at a table near the entrance stiffened and shook his head. “What in Sam Hill?” he blurted. The deities ignored him as they strolled past.

  The three had not taken any particular measures to disguise themselves. Thor, the Norse god of battle, still wore a studded helmet atop his red-bearded face, along with leather boots and chainmail armor. Thoth, the Egyptian god of wisdom, wore a blue shenti and an ibis headdress. Coyote, the Amerindian trickster god, had assumed his mundane persona of a fiftyish Native man with salt-and-pepper hair and was dressed in blue jeans and a maroon shirt, but something about his eyes suggested the animal he represented in the pantheon.

  Bailey called to them as they approached, “We were wondering when you guys would make an entrance. Wasn’t expecting something this, uh obvious, though.”

  Roland waved a hand with a flippant motion. “Oh, it’s okay. The good people of Greenhearth are used to supernatural beings barging in whenever they feel like it by now.”

  The three deities ignored the wizard’s comment and congregated beside the table, as Loki had done, though they had the decency to refrain from picking at the couple’s food.

  On the other hand, they also sat down next to the pair, scrunching in against them. Bailey found herself smashed between the broad, dark shoulders of Thoth and the paler but even broader shoulders of Thor.

  “Hi,” Roland said to them. “Remind us some time to teach you guys about the mortal concept of ‘personal space’ and ‘social distance boundaries’ and things like that, okay?”

  Thor guffawed, but Thoth only looked at the wizard and stated, “Very well.” Coyote bit his lip as though trying not to explode into laughter.

  Bailey pinched the bridge of her nose, though it was difficult to move her arms much. “Okay, yeah, fine. Loki was here five or ten minutes ago and gave us the general update about how he’s reasonably certain that you-know-who will be making his move soon. Do you guys have anything for us beyond that?”

  Thoth quickly reviewed the main facts, which, unsurprisingly, were about the same as what Loki had revealed. But he added something else.

  “It is true,” the lord of wisdom intoned, “that we shall support you, watch your back, and do all that we can. But for the time being, we must distance ourselves from the scene around you.”

  Roland, sweating from the heat of so many bodies packed together, muttered, “Great! Start distancing yourselves as soon as possible if you would, please.”

  The trio of divinities paid him no heed.

  Coyote quipped, “We will sneak in when we’re able to support you without being seen. Without revealing our aid and complicity in your quest to undermine the werewolf god. We must not disclose our hand too soon. Fenris must be allowed to think that no one suspects him and that he is getting away with it. Until the time is right.”

  “Aye,” Thor echoed, pounding his fist on the table with what was for him a light, gentle pressure, though it was powerful enough to rattle the wood as well as the floor beneath their feet. “But we need a favor, Bailey. There’s battle-work to be done, make no mistake. And you might notice that there are three of us instead of four. Balder, one of the few combatant gods, has gone missing. Vanished without a trace! Foul business may be afoot.”

  Thoth nodded and stared into the werewitch’s eyes. “We fear Fenris may already have struck against him, and we want you to find him.”

  Chapter Two

  The large group of gods and Roland decamped from the diner and, once out of easy sight, flew to a secluded spot in the wooded hills surrounding the town. It was getting dark, and the trees covered them all with deep shade.

  The deities collaborated on a psychic and magical scan of the surrounding area to ensure no one was watching. What they had to say could not be overheard by Fenris or his agents at any cost.

  A moment later, they were satisfied that they were alone and no magic was being employed to scry on them.

  “Okay,” Bailey began, “tell us the rest. Like, where do you think Balder might be? Any idea? Any hints he might have dropped before he disappeared? I’ll need something to work with here.”

  Thoth stroked his chin. “Nothing, in truth. No sign of him nor word from him, and we do not detect any traces of his specific magical signature anywhere obvious, either.”

  “Well,” Roland interjected, “where does he usually go? Or occasionally go, at least. Someplace you might expect to find him if he’s not at your headquarters in Asgard.”

  Thor turned to the wizard and squinted at him. “We were getting to that, lad. If it answers your question, I was about to suggest the training grounds where we sent Bailey before she was permitted to assume her position in the pantheon. Balder manifests there from time to time, and especially when there’s a bevy of new trainees, as there’ve been lately.”

  Thoth extrapolated further. “It occurred to us, and we discussed that the trainees would make excellent reserve soldiers if need be. Balder has overseen them before, and since most of them are demigods, half-breeds, or full deities who’ve not yet learned to use their powers, each is nearly as powerful as we are. One would be the equal of many dozen warriors of the monstrous species in a fight. We opted not to squander their potential.”

  The girl nodded. “Good, okay. Knowing he might be at the training grounds is a start. I’ve been there before and can portal to the place on my own. No one will be too shocked to see me, I think, but I’ll keep a low profile at first in case you-know-who is around.”

  Coyote smiled. “You have learned a thing or two, haven’t you? The old Bailey would have barged in guns blazing, wouldn’t she have?”

  “Hey,” Roland objected, “we snuck into those warehouses when we were rescuing the kidnapped Were-girls. You guys weren’t around for that, but I can confirm, as an independent witness, that it happened.”

  “Roland,” Bailey added, turning to her lover, “no offense, but I want you to stay behind.”

  He blinked at her. “What? Why? Yes, you’re more powerful than I am, but I’m getting kinda tired of you running off and leaving me to worry about you for a random stretch of time.”

  She ruffled his hair. “Yeah, I know, you’ll miss me. And the feeling’s mutual. But all I need to do is scout and see if Balder’s around, and I can do that by myself. If there is any serious danger, there’s no point in risking your ass alongside mine. We’d be better served by keeping you around here. People know, like, and trust you, and you have experienc
e with rallying and marshaling them when that kind of shit is necessary. And we both know it might come to that.”

  He pouted in a way that she recognized as entirely sincere and heartfelt.

  “Fine.” He sighed. “I don’t like the idea, but I’m smart enough to grasp the logic of it. Be careful, though. And come back soon.”

  They hugged and shared a quick, discreet kiss on the lips.

  As they separated, the girl wished they didn’t have to. She would rather have stayed in his arms and spent the night with him, and all the nights after that.

  But duty called, and if the safety of their world could be purchased through her efforts, then at last, she and Roland would be together forever, inseparable. A pair, mated for life.

  Soon.

  She turned away and focused her mind on the gods’ training grounds within the Other. She recalled the place’s geography, its look and feel and smell, its vibe. She remembered the flow of its magical vibrations and visualized the place where she wanted to make her entrance.

  Then she swept her hands to each side as though pulling open the doors of a cabinet.

  An ovoid portal manifested before her. Its surface resembled slow-moving water, though it glowed dimly with the color of fine amethysts.

  The girl gave one last glance at everyone present. She double-checked to ensure that her sword, handily cloaked from sight by magic, was still strapped to her back. Then she stepped into the gateway, icy cold and dizziness engulfing her as she was propelled through the astral plane toward her destination.

  Two figures sat, quiet and unmoving, in a shallow depression in the ground. Around them was one of the most obscure, lonely, foreboding, and unpopulated places to be found in the alternate dimension known as the Other. The Other was made from the residue of spells and arcane entities. They’d settled here over the millennia, forming an entire sub-universe.

  The region where the two men had come together was constructed specifically of the magical effluvium of beings who had died by violence.

  The ground was parched and cracked, yet listless or petrified plants grew, as well as gnarled, impassive trees and thorny vines. Most everything was the color of dried blood or pale ash. They’d found an area that could accurately be described as a forest, dead though it was, with thick-trunked trees like columns of stone, their branches clotted with crimson moss or dangling dark red leaves like strips of bloody flesh.

  Both figures were tall, though one was taller than the other, and broader of build. He wore a thick bulky coat with a hood pulled over his head. Only his nose and broad, square, stubbled jaw were visible, protruding from the shadows.

  “Ragnarök,” Fenris proclaimed. “Long prophesied and long dreaded. Sometimes dismissed, but no longer. We have passed the event horizon. It’s happening, Carl. You would not be here otherwise.”

  The other man appeared younger. He was athletic, dark-skinned, and had an air of relaxed humor about him. He was a scion, the product of a union between a goddess and a shapechanger, and long ago, he had pledged himself as an apprentice to Fenris, god of wolves. He’d arrived mere minutes ago.

  “As usual,” Carl replied, “you’re right. I am here, aren’t I?” He laughed softly. “But you’re right about the rest, too. That beautiful shining hall where the council meets will be ours. The usurpers; that’s probably what they’d call us, but they’ll be dead, so it won’t matter what they say or think.”

  Fenris sensed that his protege was deliberately holding back on delivering the full report of how his last mission had gone. He didn’t press him. He was savoring the moment, and with legs crossed and back straight, he relaxed, waiting for the scion to reveal the rest at his own pace.

  Carl’s fingers uncurled from his fist as he moved his hand to the side. Toward a slightly elevated mound of earth next to them, where a low table had been set up between two stumps serving as chairs. Atop the table was an old finely carven chessboard, with its two opposing armies lined up against one another.

  “All the pieces,” the scion pointed out, “are on the board. In place, ready to be moved.”

  Fenris smiled. “Yes. The contest will begin soon, and we have planned our game many, many moves ahead. We know how the enemy will react. Each and every step of the way, we will meet them, ready to neutralize their bungling attacks and remove their pawns. Checkmate will come soon. They will barely know what’s hit them. Shall we begin?”

  Both rose from their cross-legged positions on the hard dirt and sat instead on the stumps at each end of the small table. Carl positioned himself behind the white army, Fenris behind the black.

  They began in a fairly customary way. Moving pawns near the middle of the board, tentatively, to block one another’s movements and free up their more powerful pieces to enter the fray. Carl castled his king. Fenris did not bother, even after the space between his king and his rook lay open.

  The wolf-god looked up from the board at his apprentice. “How is our friend Balder doing? Has anything...bad happened to him?”

  Carl’s fingers closed around the head of a knight, and he answered the question as he picked it up and moved it in an L-shape over one of Fenris’ pawns to threaten his advancing bishop.

  The scion commented, “He’s lost. Hurting and on the run. I would not want to be in his position currently.”

  Fenris’ hand hovered over the dark, glossy pieces on his side of the board as he contemplated whether to move his bishop to attack another piece or whether to assail Carl’s knight with a pawn.

  “That is interesting. I would be curious to know the details of the story.” He repositioned his bishop to threaten both Carl’s advancing knight and a nearby pawn.

  Carl studied the board, making no move for now. “It seems that Balder was somehow shot with an arrow. By someone with sufficient skill and magical power to inflict serious injury on a god, of course.”

  The scion raised his eyes toward Fenris’ half-shadowed face, and his smile mimicked that of his master.

  “Ah,” said the wolf-father, “I see. An interesting rumor. I will not bother to inquire further as to who could possibly have done such a thing.”

  Since they had both agreed that it would be best to take Balder out unexpectedly and from a distance, Carl had been practicing his stealth and stalking skills and his archery.

  However, Fenris’ smile receded somewhat as he contemplated what the scion had said a moment ago. Balder was on the run. He wasn’t dead yet, but for Carl to have returned to report the incident, he must be confident of success. Fenris had forbidden him to return with a report of failure.

  Balder was alone, therefore, and grievously and mortally wounded.

  Carl seemed to sense his mentor’s thoughts. “He will die soon. It’s only a matter of time until both the arrow and the magic take their toll on him.” He moved his knight again, closer to the black side’s king.

  Fenris took the knight with his queen and handed the piece to his mentee. “Good,” he stated.

  “He’s finished,” Carl emphasized, seizing the knight and flinging it into the woods.

  The lycanthropic deity responded with a slow nod of his head. “I am impressed. You have proven yourself worthy on many occasions, but in all honesty, I was not certain you could handle the job. It would seem that you have. Balder, still alive and free, would have posed a great threat to us. With him out of the picture, we’re one big step closer to victory.”

  Carl chuckled and shook his head. His face was slack with borderline disbelief that it was finally happening, but his eyes twinkled with mirth. “Victory. Yes. After all the time we’ve spent preparing ourselves. What is the next step, Wolf-Father?”

  “Next,” Fenris elucidated, “we begin to gradually unleash the monsters of the universe, the exiled savage peoples and slumbering behemoths, against Asgard in a series of staggered attacks.”

  This was mostly review, and the scion bobbed his head in acknowledgment. His shoulders twitched with impatience.

  “
One at a time,” the wolf-god went on, “in wave after wave, they will assail the borders of the divine realm, weakening the boundaries between their territory and that of the gods, and drawing the council’s attention to them. That also means drawing attention away from us. They will fear to look away from the burgeoning wars at their gates, and as such, they will not be looking at me. I will be beside them, inside their walls. It will be easy to get things ready for the masterstroke, the moment when they drool and sputter and struggle to grasp that I have already won.”

  Fenris took Carl’s second knight with a rook, and in so doing, threatened his king. The game was not over, but it had suddenly grown more serious.

  The scion frowned as he considered his next play. “I wish I could be there with you to see it. Perhaps I will be, depending on how all the details go.”

  “Perhaps,” Fenris agreed. “Let us finish this game quickly, then make our final preparations. The End of Days—and, afterward, the Beginning—are upon us. Be ready.”

  The icy rush died, and Bailey stepped out of the astral channel of her portal and into a grassy field. Overhead, the sun shone. Thick, beautiful, old-growth forest like something from medieval England surrounded the sward, and a castle complex rose at its center.

  She paused, looking and listening. Everything was quiet.

  Under her breath, so softly that it would have taken another lycanthrope to hear, she murmured, “Fuck me.”

  The walls and gates of the stone structure had broad scorch marks all over them as well as nicks, cracks, and gouges, as though blunt objects of great size and power had impacted them, along with fire. She couldn’t tell how recent it had happened, but the markings hadn’t been there the last time she’d seen the place.

  And the silence was eerie in its flat, dead oppressiveness. No birds, insects, or animals sang or scuffled. There were no noises of sub-deities training, fighting, or feasting, as there should have been during the daytime since this corner of the arcane dimension had a day and night cycle much like Earth’s.