Mythos (38 page)

“It was, Mel. I—”

Regin cut me off. “Let me answer that one, please. I am not Ahllan, but I have her memories, and I know all of her deepest wishes, including the last. Your Ahllan did not think much of gods and powers. She was not a praying troll, but she did offer up a few final words to one power before she died. That power was the Raven and the words were ‘thank you.’ ”

I bowed my head to hide the tears that started in my eyes. “Thank
you
.”

“The Raven broke Odin’s hold on the reins of the future,” said the voice. “He did it at great cost to himself and by making exactly the choice Ahllan would have urged upon him. I am the result of that choice, and I think she would call that a success worth the price.”

“I still don’t understand,” said Melchior.

“Melchior,” said the voice, sounding more like Ahllan than ever, “leave it there. Please.”

“When you put it that way,” said Melchior, “how can I refuse?”

I knew that later I would tell Melchior everything. I’m sure Regin knew it, too, but I silently thanked her for the mercy that would allow me to do it my own time and way.

“Thank you, Melchior,” said Regin. “The part of me that was Ahllan appreciates it. Now, Ravirn, you have little time and much to do.”

“What does that mean?” asked Tisiphone, and there was a note of worry in her voice. “What price did you pay?”

“I’ll tell you about the price later,” I said, “when it’s a little less raw. Please don’t give me that look; it’s got nothing to do with the time issue. That’s separate. While I was at MimirNet, I picked up our tickets home. Unfortunately, the bus leaves very shortly.”

“I don’t want to see you go,” said Fenris.

“Funny you should say that,” I replied.

“Funny why?” asked a hard, cold voice from the doorway.

Loki had returned, and he looked awful, covered in bruises and deep gashes like he’d lost a fight with a bear. He also looked suspicious and angry.

“Funny because I’ve a proposition to make.” I smiled my best winning smile while swearing inwardly—I’d rather hoped he wouldn’t get back so soon.

“I don’t think I’m going to like this,” said Loki.

“Probably not,” I agreed. “But that’s beside the point.”

“What
is
the point?” Fenris asked, before Loki could speak again, and Loki looked none too happy about that.

“Making RuneNet into Mimir’s Mirror is only the first step on the road to averting Ragnarok,” I said. “The next one is bigger and much more important.”

“And that is?” Loki demanded of me.

“In order to make this universe into a multiverse and create the possibility of a future without Ragnarok, there has to be a first split in the fabric of reality.” I mentally crossed my fingers and willed Regin to back me up on the next point. “Because Regin and Mimir are so closely balanced, the split has to be huge, or Mimir will be able to close it back up.”

“Is that true?” Loki asked Regin.

“Substantially,” replied the computer. “There is much more to it than that, but Ravirn is correct that the initial rift needs to be something that fundamentally changes the current trajectory of events.”

“What does that have to do with my son?”

Fenris rolled his eyes. “You’re not interviewing my date for the prom, Dad. I can speak for myself. “

I touched the bruising around my eye. “Do you know how I got this?”

“Do I care?” retorted Loki.

“You should. I got it when I took control of Mimir by the only possible means.”

“You did tear your eye out and throw it into the well,” Melchior said accusingly. “I knew I didn’t hallucinate that.”

“I did,” I said. “Do you know what that means, Loki?”

“You’re going to tell me. Why should I answer?”

“That sounds like a yes to me, Boss,” said Melchior.

“Me, too. It means that for the time my eye was in the well, I knew everything. That includes knowing what it takes to create the future you claimed you wanted. The one in which you would know that somewhere, somehow, and in direct contravention of Odin’s prophecy, your boys survived. I can give you that, but there’s a cost.”

“And it involves me,” said Fenris, his voice filled with growling undertones. “So why the hell are you talking to Loki instead of to me. If the price is mine to pay, then it’s me you must convince.”

“Fenris!” said Loki.

“Shut up,” barked Fenris. “I’m tired of being told the equivalent of ‘sit’ and ‘stay’ whenever you want me to do something. I’m your son, not your hound, and I will make my own decisions. In this and in all things.” He looked at me, his eyes hard, his ruff raised. “You will speak to me if you want something from me, not my father. Got it?”

“I do, and I’m sorry. That’s what I should have been doing all along. Do you want to discuss this in private? Or would you rather I said it here?”

“Here.”

I took a deep breath. If I wanted him to come with me, I had to get this exactly right.

“I want you to come with me back to my MythOS. If you remove yourself from this pantheoverse, it will irreparably break the chain of events that leads to Ragnarok.”

“Is it the only way to do that?” asked Fenris.

I wanted to say yes. I really did. Odin had made it very clear that, if I didn’t get Fenris out of the Norse MythOS, I was in for potentially eternal suffering. I tried to open my mouth to say yes. It was such a simple word. It should have been easy. It was impossible.

“No, it’s not,” I said. “It’s a powerful way, but it’s not the only one.”

“I won’t have it,” said Loki, and I could see the chaos blazing high in his eyes. “Fenris, you are staying here, and that’s final.”

With hungry eyes, Fenris indicated the silver cord that bound him. “Will it break the chain around my neck?”

“I don’t know,” I said.

“It will,” said Regin.

“I’m going.”

If I lived in a fairy-tale world, that would have been the end of it. Fenris would have said, “I’m going,” and we all could have departed to live happily ever after at Raven House. But Fenris was not the last to speak.

“I’m staying,” Tisiphone said into the instant of silence that followed Fenris’s declaration.

“What!” I yelled in the very same breath as Loki.

“You can’t,” we said together.

That was where the conversations diverged.

“I won’t allow it,” said Loki.

“I don’t want to leave you,” I said.

“Deal with it,” said Fenris.

“I know,” said Tisiphone.

Then she reached out and took me by the hand, leading me away from the computer room and the yelling match between Fenris and Loki. As we went out the door, I looked back at Melchior, reluctant to leave him at a time like this. He caught my eye and made a shooing motion. Out in the hall, Tisiphone wrapped me once again in her wings.

“I have to stay,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper.

The words were soft, but I could hear the resolve beneath, and it was as hard as her claws.

“Why?” I asked.

“Would you believe it’s for love?” She bit her lip.

“I might,” I replied, “if you explain it to me.”

“I’m more than half in love with you. You do know that, right?”

“Better to say that I suspected it. Just as I suspect that I’m more than half in love with you. That hardly seems a reason for you to stay behind when I have to leave.”

“Do you really have to leave?” she asked.

“I do, and soon.” I quickly told her about what had passed between me and Odin.

She nodded. “I suspected there was a deal involved, though I didn’t know with whom or for what. Knowing you have to go and knowing the details makes it a little easier to say good-bye.”

I was getting steadily more confused.

“Let’s come back to that in a moment. You still haven’t explained why we have to part at all,” I pointed out. “Normally, when you proclaim you’re half in love with someone, the next step is to spend more time with them, not send them off to an entirely different universe.”

“It’s because I won’t be able to keep loving you if we go back. Here, I can remain Tisiphone and in love. At home, I will become the Fury once again, and Furies do not love. We can’t. If I go home, I will have to give up what we have here. I have lived four thousand years and never felt as I do right now. I’d rather love you and be apart than not love you and be together. Do you understand?”

“I do, though I can’t say it makes me happy, more like I’ve been punched in the gut.”

“Would it help if we skipped straight from here to the part where we say our farewells with incredibly intense sex?” She winked at me, but there was a tear in her eye.

“Tempting . . . but first I still want to know why my deal with Odin makes saying good-bye easier.”

“It’s two things, really. First, I’m still bound to Necessity. She may have betrayed me, and I may not be a Fury here, but she is my mother, and I could not abandon her if I didn’t know you were going back. I hate her but I also love her, and it’s in my bones that she must be fixed. I know that you will find out why Necessity sent us here and if she is all right, and that you will fix her if she isn’t.”

I raised an eyebrow, but before I could reply, Tisiphone put a finger to my lips.

“You’re about to tell me you’re no hero,” she said. “That’s bullshit, and we both know it. A hero isn’t a thing you are. It’s what you do. If you look me in the eye and tell me you’re not a hero, the only one who might believe the lie is you. Don’t. Go and fix Necessity instead. Find out what happened. If you do that, I can stay here, stay Tisiphone, love you. Then, when you’re done, you can come back to me.”

“I see one tiny flaw in this plan,” I said. Well, several, actually. Starting with the fact that anything that could mess with Necessity was likely to eat me for breakfast. But I decided to settle on the most immediate problem. “Its name is Odin. Tall fellow, one eye, two ravens, exceptionally grim disposition. I promised him I’d take Fenris away, and I rather think he frowns on those who break their promises.”

Tisiphone grinned impishly. “Did you promise him you wouldn’t come back?”

“I . . . uh . . . no.”

Tisiphone’s grin turned into a laugh. “Some Trickster you are. Can’t even see a loophole when it practically crawls into your pants and bites you in the ass.”

“Speaking of getting into my pants,” I said, “you mentioned something a couple of moments ago about the part where we say our farewells with incredibly intense sex.”

“I did.”

“Why don’t we skip to that part now.”

Sometime later, Tisiphone and I lay side by side on the giant bed.

“Do you think we should go back to the others now?” she asked.

“I suppose we’ll have to. I’ve a promise to keep.”

“How will you get back?” she asked.

“I don’t know. I didn’t ask about the details. I probably should have—”

“Click.”

“Did you hear that?” I asked.

“What?” asked Tisiphone.

“I’m not sure. It sounded metallic, kind of like an . . . abacus.”

“Click. Click.”

I caught Tisiphone’s hand in mine and drew it to my lips. “I’ll be back,” I said, brushing her knuckles with a kiss. “I promise.” Then I dived for my clothes.

“Click. Click. Click.”

Blackness darker than any night caught me in an invisible hand and moved me through space. For a brief instant the lights flickered back on, and I found myself standing naked in the computer room, my leathers clutched in front of me along with Occam and my pistol. Fenris and Loki were still arguing. Melchior was sitting at Ahllan’s feet, less than a yard from where I’d appeared.

“What the—” he began.

“Time to go,” I said.

“Click. Click.”

Fenris let out a howl that made the walls shake, and Loki stopped speaking, looking stunned.