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  Rock, Paper, Shivers

  Bitter Ashes ~ Book Three

  Sara C Roethle

  Copyright © 2016 by Sara C Roethle

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Created with Vellum

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  1

  The cold wind stung what was visible of my face, and my hands and feet were numb despite the thick gloves and heavy duty winter boots. As far as the eye could see in any direction was crisp, pure white, almost blinding as the sun made its slow descent toward the horizon. I stood alone, musing over everything that had gotten me to this point, camping out in a frozen wasteland, contemplating summoning gods.

  It had taken us weeks to get to our location. Weeks of hiding from our enemies while we traveled through the larger cities. Weeks of plotting our next step. Weeks of waiting for the key to rear its ugly head in an attempt to possess me again. We’d made it all this way without conflict. I shouldn’t have been surprised since we’d taken so many precautions, but still, by this point, I expected things to go wrong at every turn. More surprising than our success so far, was that the key had remained dormant within me.

  Mikael appeared by my side, staring out at the cold landscape ahead of us as the breeze played with his long, auburn hair. “Are you ready?”

  I shook my head. “No.”

  I rubbed the slight bump of my belly, still not fully believing I was growing a child inside me. My winter clothing was all cinched up around me, so my pregnancy didn’t show, but the entire group knew regardless. Sophie had a big mouth.

  “Freyja is, among other things, the goddess of childbirth,” Mikael reassured, placing a hand on my shoulder. “She will not harm you or your child.”

  I turned and raised an eyebrow at him, though my eyebrows were mostly covered by the black hood of my jacket. While I wore a top of the line, full-length, micro-down coat, plus many layers underneath to keep me warm, Mikael had only added a heavy, fleece lined, knee length coat to his normal Viking-esque gear. His dusky red hair whipped about freely in the icy air, yet he seemed unfazed. I was freezing even with all the layers. Camping out in the Arctic Circle was no joke.

  “She’s an ancient goddess,” I countered, “one who left our people long before you were even born. You have no idea what she’ll do.”

  Mikael smirked. “No, I don’t, but you know I wouldn’t tell you that your child will be safe if I didn’t think it was true.”

  “Because of our oath,” I agreed.

  Mikael rolled his strange, amber eyes. “I wouldn’t lie to you about such a thing, even with a blood oath hanging over my head.”

  I sighed, not because I thought he was misleading me, but because I believed him. The past few weeks had been trying. I’d finally been reported missing back in the States, but luckily still had fake identification from Diana. Many of Mikael’s people, living safe within the Salr, had never possessed any real forms of identification, so we’d had to purchase a batch of fake IDs for them. Never mind that Mikael already had a guy in place to make the transaction go smoothly, and had around ten different personas in place for himself, all with passports, bank accounts, and backstories. Some even owned property.

  We’d done much of our traveling by train, with me gritting my teeth the entire time, waiting for the cops to storm in and take us all away. Mikael had been the one to keep me calm through it all, oddly enough, and I’d really come to depend on him to keep the panic away.

  Alaric and Sophie had been there for me too, but they were both a little more blunt, a little less tactful. They said exactly what they thought, which usually wasn’t very comforting, though I appreciated it in a whole other way.

  I turned to see Alaric waiting in the distance near our camp. He wore a more modern coat like mine, and a stocking cap over his long, black hair. Even from the distance I could tell he was smiling at me, I could feel it. Alaric might not be the best with comforting words, but he offered me partnership. We could both be worried together about ourselves and our child, and we could both be brave together. At that moment, if I didn’t have Alaric’s bravery helping me along, I probably would have called off the whole thing. I wasn’t fit to summon gods . . . but then again, who was?

  Mikael walked by my side as we started back toward the tents. The dense snow beneath our feet crunched, but didn’t give way. I’d slipped and fallen on my butt on some of the harder-packed patches more times than I’d like to admit, far less graceful than any of my companions.

  As we reached Alaric, Sophie and Aila came into view, both in full winter gear with their hoods pulled up. Aila looked gargantuan, but dangerous with the added layers on her already tall, muscular physique. I just looked like a fat penguin.

  The other members of our small group, Faas, Tabitha, and James, waited inside the large tent that was our main base. The snow mobiles we’d used to reach such a remote area were parked around the tent, covered by fitted tarps, but otherwise ready for a fast escape.

  We hadn’t wanted to risk bringing any more of Mikael’s people into our plan, so it was just the eight of us. We needed to be as unfindable as possible.

  Many had voted against even bringing James. He was the weakest link without his memories. The arguments had ended though as Mikael pointed out that James was the only one who could create heat from nothing. It was a useful backup skill when camping on the frozen tundra.

  I reached Alaric and stepped into the cradle of his arms, feeling some of the tension leak out of my body at his nearness. If Freyja didn’t work out, we’d be using Alaric and Sophie to summon Bastet. I really hoped Freyja worked. I had no desire to meet a cat-headed war goddess.

  I looked to Aila, who we’d be using to summon Freyja. All we needed was a bit of her blood. Aila looked nervous, her eyes a little too wide, and I knew it wasn’t the prospect of slicing her arm open that had her worried. She’d suffered countless injuries over her long life, but it wasn’t every day you met your patron deity.

  Faas appeared from within the tent, just as bundled up as me. As executioners, denizens of death, we were much stronger in the magical department, but slightly lacking in the physical. In other words, we were a lot more prone to the elements.

  Faas’ white hood covered his blond swatch of hair and eyebrows, leaving only his eyes and nose visible. His eyes no longer held intense hatred for me, but they were still wary. His job was to step in and drain my energy if the key took over again, and I didn’t blame him for being nervous about it, and I was still just as nervous around him. Even though he was built smaller than any of the other men, and tended to be less aggressive, he’d mastered skills I’d only recently found out I even had, and he knew how to use them to kill, maim, and control. He couldn’t heal though. That little quirk was mine alone, but he had a little quirk too. He could drain energy from those who were uninjured. I could only steal from someone who was already near death, or from a weakened human. Faas had been draining my energy for weeks, keeping me weak enough to prohibit the key from using me to murder everyone.

  We’d also
kept me away from any corpses so I couldn’t get a quick boost, just in case, but the key was still a force all on its own. Even without anyone to drain, it could do a great deal of damage before running out of juice, despite Faas draining my energy.

  Still, the key hadn’t been present in my mind, except for the occasional emotion leaking through. It was deep in hiding, which made me even more nervous than when it was trying to take over. At least when it tried to take over, I knew what it wanted. When I had learned from Mikael how to shield my thoughts and emotions, the key had learned too. It had built a brick wall between us, letting me know that if I wouldn’t let it in on my plans, it wouldn’t let me in on its plans either. Of course, I had a feeling it could still hear everything that was said, so it probably knew what we were planning with Freyja. Either it agreed with the ritual, or it was waiting for the right moment to pop in and cause chaos.

  “Is everything prepared?” Mikael asked as Faas went to stand near him.

  Faas nodded, though the gesture was almost imperceptible in his thick coat. “We’ll begin the ritual as soon as the sun sets.”

  We all nodded in agreement, because there was nothing else to do. We were about to use my connection to Yggdrasil, the World Tree, to pull one of the old gods through into our world. If we succeeded, we would ask for her aid. It would be her choice whether she helped us, as there was nothing we could really do to compel her.

  We were banking on the small chance that Freyja was a magnanimous goddess. My hopes were not high. I couldn’t claim to know much about the old gods, but I knew one thing for certain. No one does anything for free.

  2

  The thick wool blanket between my body and the ice didn’t do much in the way of warmth, and sitting so close to Aila only increased my lack of personal comfort. She wasn’t a warm and fuzzy person at the best of times, and her nervous energy was making me itch and sweat beneath my coat.

  I would have complained, but even with my discomforts, I was in a better position than most everyone else. Aila and I sat in front of a large fire built in a circular pit James had melted in the ice. The fire illuminated the darkness around us, but only so far. Glancing out in any direction, there was only pure blackness dotted by occasional distant stars. Though the moon was full, clouds obscured much of its light.

  Aila and I sat on the blanket by ourselves, while everyone else stood on the other side of the fire, watching us like we might sprout second heads any moment.

  Worry creased Alaric’s brow, while Sophie just looked bored. Since I had discovered long ago that Sophie’s bored face was actually her worried face, I gained little confidence from either of them. Heck, even Mikael looked worried. Next to him stood James, who continuously glanced over his shoulder, like we might be attacked at any moment. He was probably right.

  Faas moved to crouch beside Aila, while Tabitha stood behind him, holding an ornate chalice, and a wicked looking, curved blade. Tabitha wore a coat similar to her brother’s, the white fabric, nearly the same color as her long hair, blending in with the surrounding snow. She handed Faas the blade as he held his hand out for it, then crouched to hold the chalice underneath Aila’s bare, outstretched arm.

  I inhaled sharply and turned away as Faas sliced into Aila’s forearm, then glanced back to watch her vibrant blood flow into the chalice. The liquid looked dark with only the firelight to illuminate it, flowing across her pale skin like ink.

  Aila turned to me. “I hope you know what you’re doing,” she said flatly in her heavily accented, deep voice.

  I tried to smile encouragingly, but really I had no idea what I was doing. We were basing our actions on legends Mikael had read about in a really old book. The ritual was based around using one of the leaves from Yggdrasil, the World Tree. None of us had ever actually performed such a ritual, since Yggdrasil had been destroyed long before any of us had been born, even Mikael. To many, the tree was nothing more than legend.

  Even though I was the youngest amongst us, I’d managed to touch Yggdrasil in person, sort of. My spectral form had traveled back in time, leaving my body behind, but I’d still had the power to unintentionally drain energy from the tree. The power enabled me to return to my body, where Alaric and Mikael were, and to take us all back home from Viking times.

  It was not a fond memory for me, because in that moment I’d realized I truly was death. The key might have influenced my actions, but I was the one that had nearly killed the tree without even trying. More frightening still, was that it had felt amazing.

  Not only had some of that power remained within me, connecting me to Yggdrasil forever, but the key was also originally a part of Yggdrasil. The key’s existence within me strengthened that connection, or so we’d hypothesized. The tree’s untimely death, centuries after the time I’d seen it, created the Norns as they are now, in individual forms, but it also created residual chaotic energies of destruction. In other words, the key. It was as much a part of Yggdrasil as the fates.

  Faas took my hands, drawing me out of my thoughts. He guided them toward the fire, close enough to burn. I winced, but held my hands steady above the flames as he pulled away.

  Tabitha stood with the chalice full of blood clenched firmly in her gloved hand. She circled behind us, then crouched at my side opposite Aila. I closed my eyes, wanting nothing more than to retract my sore hands. The blood Tabitha poured over them actually came as a relief. It dripped from my skin, sizzling in the fire as it hit, but I barely heard it.

  With the touch of blood and fire, my body came alive. Not only did my human senses seem more keen, I was hit with a sudden symphony of emotion. I could sense Alaric’s anxiety and Mikael’s apprehension. James’ fear and frustration. I didn’t have time to ponder my new clarity as Tabitha began to chant in Old Norsk over my bloody hands.

  As her words dipped up and down in the cadence of an ancient chant, my entire body began to tingle with energy, enough to make me dizzy and a little sick. The key reacted, like I’d been terrified it would. I wasn’t sure if it was to Tabitha’s words or the blood. Maybe both. I’d never reacted to just blood before. Usually I needed the corpse that went with it.

  My hands began to throb like they were filled with too much blood, and I realized that I’d leaned forward enough to completely encase them in the flames, yet they didn’t burn. Tabitha continued to chant, while everyone else watched on silently.

  Something was thrumming in my chest, but it wasn’t my heart. I could feel energy building toward . . . something. I started to panic, worried the key was about to take over like it had done when it first retreated into my body. The energy reached its apex, throwing my head back as it surged upward.

  There were a few silent moments where everything seemed still, and I couldn’t hear over the ringing in my ears. Once I was able to breathe, I brought my head forward to see the veins in my arms lit up like molten fire. The air around my face shimmered with gold. At first I couldn’t tell why, then my eyes focused on the night sky around me. The branches of a great tree formed in the air above me, shining like the sun. Yggdrasil.

  I could no longer sense nor see anyone around me, just the tree. I wanted to reach out and touch the shining branches, but felt frozen in place, a prisoner to the power that had taken me over. As I continued to stare up at the branches, a bright bolt of light, like a giant shooting star, touched down on one tiny twig at the top of the spectral tree. As soon as it hit, I could sense an immense presence, the likes of which I had never felt.

  It shot downward, traveling through the branches of the tree toward my face. I screamed as it came barreling toward me, but at the last minute, it veered down a lower branch and sped toward Aila. It hit her like a Semi truck, throwing her from the blanket to land on the hard ice with a thud.

  The moment the energy hit her, the entire tree winked out of existence, and my hands, still in the fire, began to burn.

  I screamed and withdrew my hands as everything came back into focus.

  Alaric appeared at my
side. “How do you feel?” he asked frantically. “Did it work?”

  I turned wide eyes to him, holding my burned hands away from my body. I shook my head, not because I thought the ritual didn’t work, but because I had no idea what the hell had just happened.

  I looked over my shoulder to Aila, who was being helped to her feet by Mikael. She seemed stunned, but unharmed.

  I gazed into Alaric’s eyes. “Did you see that?” I asked, half-hoping it had all been a figment of my imagination.

  “The tree?” he questioned. At my nod, he replied, “Honey, that tree is going to be emblazoned in my memory until the day I die.”

  I turned my gaze as Faas came to crouch on my other side, while Alaric wrapped his arms comfortingly around me.

  “Aila?” I questioned. She’d seemed fine, but now she was mumbling something to Mikael behind us.

  “She’s fine,” Faas replied, as he looked me up and down, likely probing with his magical senses to see if my energy was still the same after the strange occurrence. “You seem unchanged as well,” he added finally.

  “But whatever that was that came through the tree hit Aila,” I argued. “I thought it was coming straight for me, but it veered from its course and hit her.”

  Faas raised his pale eyebrows. “Something came through the tree?”

  I nodded, and turned to Alaric for verification. He had to have seen it.

  Alaric frowned. “I saw only the tree, then Aila was suddenly knocked aside. Still, if whatever you saw intentionally went for Aila, perhaps Freyja attempted to join us after all.”

  We all moved to look back at Aila, who still stood in the darkness with Mikael. They had been joined by Tabitha.