– K Á R A –
I stared out over the docks at the towering ships. Their sails were in and the crews were no where to be seen yet. The morning air was cool and the bite of winter would greet us soon.
Tayah stomped onto the planks towards me.
I could feel that untamed and raw energy rippling around her. Hot and angry. I smiled at the waves briefly.
"That animal in there has my best friend in this city somewhere. I will find him." She growled.
I remained watching the water as I answered her. "Tell me how you are here, Tayah."
She paused taking a breath and I could feel her eyes on me intently. She came to my side and crossed her arms. "The immortal I'm with... she was meant to be teaching me the basic techniques of the Valkyries." She snorted and I raised an eyebrow at her. "I was only supposed to fuse a portal to a place I recalled in Valhalla. I had a place in mind... I just happened to change my mind quickly–"
I pinched the bridge of my nose tightly.
"Yes but how?"
"I can't tell you that! It was much a blur of light and colour and falling... My energy took days to return to me."
Before I could control it a growl of frustration left me.
"Before you start. I did not ask for this–"
"It is not you I am angry with, Tayah. It's that damn, incompetent buffoon you arrived with. Astrid is not new to immortality and has managed to place you in more danger in a day than you have in a lifetime." I grit out, feeling a hum of thunder sing in my blood.
Maybe it would be worth removing her altogether... her energy was hardly worth the presence–
"I am immortal this time around." She said nonchalantly checking her nails.
"You are still on the mortal realm, immortal. You still bleed like they do... hopefully you won't need to use your energy for any reason other than to return to Valhalla."
A silence fell in the air around us then. A moment to consider the fall of fates around us. The furs on my shoulders brushed my cheeks in the salty air.
"It's good to see you by the way." Tayah noted with no small irony.
I finally cut my eyes to hers and my stoic features cracked. Only for a second.
"Stop distracting me."
She grinned broadly at me and set her hands on her hips. Why did this immortal have to be so damn adorable.
"You can admit you missed me too." She drawled.
"I will do no such thing. I want to find your mortal and send you back to Valhalla as soon as possible."
She feigned hurt and pouted at me. I grabbed her wrist when she tried to claim my face. I stared her down and slowly lowered it.
"This may be a game to you but I value you too much to lose you. I'm afraid you see a Valkyrie before you." I murmured darkly.
She stepped closer despite this and removed the space between us. Her lips dropped close to my ear. "I like it when you make it difficult." She whispered, sending a wave of energy through me.
I grit my teeth and I felt my eyes glow brighter. "Expect more of it."
"You are more fun to play with as the stoic immortal." She agreed with a wink.
"Tayah, can you please take your life seriously for once?" I sighed through my nose.
"I take many things seriously." She told me as she walked along the edge of the planks. "Exasperating you is a full time occupation."
"I could take that immortal energy from you and leave you here." I threatened.
"Kára, you could hardly bare to do it the first time let alone purposefully." She retorted, turning to me and flicking me the finger.
I strode up to her rapidly and grabbed her tunic collar leaning her over the edge of the water. She merely raised her eyebrows at me with a slow smile.
"I've been told I'm a poor swimmer. I think I'd just take you with me anyway."
I watched her eyes flicker between my own and felt the charge between us build in that painfully familiar way. I slowly pulled her back to the planks. She patted down my furred shoulders and left her forearms on them.
"So, what's the plan?"
"You can stop tormenting the mortal in there." I answered her, trying to get my thoughts clear again. Her eyes seemed to come back into focus at this. "I already found what I needed before John wasted his breath."
"Why did you let us–"
"Because I do not like the Assassins Guild." I interrupted flatly.
A grin claimed her beautiful features. At this distance it was hardly fair at all. "This wouldn't be because of that time with the Jaded Fylerns... or perhaps the ambush with poison?"
"Most who cross you, Tayah Ashrive, end up on the wrong side of my blades." I said as I moved a strand of hair out of her face.
"I think you and I will make quite the team finding him."
"Team?" I scoffed, bringing her back to arms distance again. "Tayah, you have no immortal armour or weapons. Your energy is as wild as a raging boar and you may just burn down a house trying to use that power."
"You can insult my ability all you like, Stormbringer. You can even try to force me to stay." She told me with a slow smirk. "I don't give a toss what you do, because I will be the one to stand before the mortals that took him and reduce them to nothing more than dust before me." She finished as her hair blew back in waves.
I stared at her completely lost for words. In seconds she could turn from carefree to immortal warrior in a blink. A formidable fighter in her own right I knew this but the idea of risking her at all was so unbearable now.
"Now. Which direction am I walking?" She demanded.
I shook my head slowly and let out a breath. "You will wear my armour for a start." I told her as her eyes widened and raked over my gleaming body. "Then we will meet Revna."
If we really were pursuing these assassins together I would not have her in anything less than impenetrable armour. My power practically was its own armour it only made me slightly more killable on this realm.
She broke her hold on me and turned to begin walking back to the warehouse but I stopped her shoulder. Holding her eyes.
"We are careful about this." I stressed, "Do not make the mistake of thinking you are invincible here."
"I always thought you were." She told me with something burning in her eyes. They seemed to go far away. "Even after you told me how vulnerable you could really be on this realm... I still never felt danger when I was with you. Maybe that's why I chose what I did so easily in the Underworld." She murmured with a shrug.
My arm dropped in shock as I stared at her. She turned and jogged back to the main doors. My head a mess and crowded with so many thoughts at once.
– T A Y A H –
"Tayah, come on." Kára called back to me impatiently.
I tore my eyes off the gleaming chest plate and furred shoulders that smelled of pine and–
"Honestly you act like you have not seen it on my person every slither." She muttered as we walked quickly between the shadows of houses.
Revna threw me a mischievous look over one shoulder. "I am sure she has seen you without it as well–"
My immortal shoved her into a nearby walled which only made the black haired demi-god laugh loudly. I watched her shielded back as we walked trying to gain focus again.
"How far?" I asked as we turned into another alley in an outer part of the city. The colossal shadow of the Vayleron walls made it all the more untrustworthy. The streets a quiet and dark place.
"Patience." Was all I got in return.
I grit my fist and felt it heat in anticipation. Revna glanced back at me again feeling the pulse in the air. "I thought you said she had no control of that."
A growl left me. "I have enough to see a mortal dead."
"Do not encourage her, Revna. Please." She muttered as she rested her hand on the hilt of her dagger.
"I am curious about you, new blood." She continued, ignoring Kára as she walked ahead of us now. Her bright eyes scanned me and I kept my eyes ahead. "I have never heard of a Valkyrie summoning them self to the mortal realm. Let alone two." She snorted.
"Believe me, I'm as shocked as you are."
"Have you tried using a relic?"
"Yes she has." Kára snapped for me. "And she will not be using one any time soon."
Revna kept up her curious eyes on me for a few more slithers until she shrugged and maintained a silent walk amongst the shadows. The sun was hidden behind clouds and the threat of rain hung in the greys when we finally came to a stop.
"There is our entrance." She murmured carefully pointing to a nondescript tiled house among many others. It looked positively pedestrian and ready for the taking.
I stepped into the road without a second more before a gloved hand yanked me back.
"You will watch the rear, immortal." Kára stated briskly without room for argument. "Revna, will take point with Thanatos." She said carefully removing the shield from her back and placing it in her waiting hands. The other immortal did not seem shocked, only patiently calm.
Her eyes blackened briefly before she shut her eyes and reclaimed control of the otherworldly power. Now she smiled darkly and I felt a brief shake under the ground at my feet. I swallowed loudly thinking of it.
"I will cut off any attacks from the sides or overwhelming numbers." She said opting for two gleaming daggers the size of her forearms instead of the spear on her back. This made me more than uncomfortable.
"First your armour and now your weapons. Do you seek death today?" I demanded.
Revna snorted loudly and shifted the shield in her arm. "The power of Hades calls to my own with this relic, immortal. It is best in my hands. As for Stormbringer... you would have to take much more from this demon for her to die."
Kára ignored us both and stared at the house across the road waiting for something. I sighed and dropped into a crouch. The armour shifted around my body perfectly. I really did need a set myself... but wearing my immortal's was just as perfect. I inhaled and smiled slightly.
"Now." She said, moving from position as two men left the entrance and pulled crimson hoods over their heads. The rain started falling on us as we crossed the cobbled road.
She palmed the door handle with a glowing hand. It fell away to ash at her fingers. We swept in silently. Candlelight filled a small living space. A hooded head snapped up to us from a chair, dropping the scroll in hand and drawing a sword.
"Fuck are you–"
A throwing knife pierced the air ending that conversation before it started. The most shocking part was that I did not know if it left Kára's or Revna's hand... How could anyone stand a chance against them both. But I had no time for sympathy for what would come today. I needed Kaden.
Another sound of movement and shuffling sounded in the next room. Kára dropped a nod and Revna took lead entering the doorway. She darted into the kitchen with an axe drawn. A shape dropped from the ceiling but she rolled away in a breath and sent the axe spinning into the assailant's head. He crashed to the floor in a heap seeping blood.
She set her boot on his back and yanked it out with a crunch. After wiping the blood on his cloak she rotated it in her hand a few times and nodded back to us. I shook my head and cast my eyes around.
"This is not what we are looking for." I deadpanned in disgust. All far too civilian, unfortified and basic. More of a safe house than–
"Over here." The blonde goddess told us, staring at the bookshelves near the small fireplace.
She let her hand fill with bright power before placing it against the wood and paper and crumbling it away. I watched as it piled, combusted instantly and revealed a dark tunnel within. I turned to the nearby table and instinctively picked up a candle.
"You won't need that." Revna laughed, casting me a disbelieving look. "You really are new blood."
I heard Kára growl back at her before she entered.
"Have a sense of humour, Stormbringer. Gods."
"It is not the Gods fault you were bestowed with the jesting skill of a knave."
I couldn't stop the laugh that left me at the unexpected jab from her. Revna grumbled something under her breath that made me grin wider.
As we entered the tunnel I noticed it slope downward and the stone turned into patches of dirt beneath us. Revna was tracing her hands along it with a chuckle in the darkness.
"Oh what a fast end they will have down here."
This gained my curiosity.
"So, you truly are in your element underground?"
"My elemental is the earth of Hades, immortal. I could end armies in this environment with a flick of the wrist. Not many can survive being buried alive by limitless stone and dirt."
"Concentrate. We are close." My immortal called ahead of me in the darkness.
Then I too could hear it. The voices in the silence beyond. The voices of the ones who took him from me and would die today. The ones that would never see daylight again.
We were presented with a thick wooden door. But Revna did not hesitate. She flung a hand forward and a boulder materialised from the floor and flattened it entirely. I shook off my shock as shouts sounded beyond. But I was not ready for the pace of the fight.
Stone shards shot from the ground at multiple angles and impaled four men with weapons barely drawn. Another two died at the hands of a blonde demi-god with deadly throwing knives. The remaining two tried to scramble into a door at the back only have it sealed by a wall of rock. They froze in disbelief before the stone and whirled on us with stark terror in their blood.
Revna clenched a fist and stone pinned them both to the door.
Kára approached them leisurely, removing her daggers from bodies. Then she set a hand casually against the rock that Revna commanded.
"Where is the third Lion mortals?"
They blinked rapidly exchanging a look under the hoods. I had seen looks like that before and it sent unease through my stomach. They swallowed before one panted out. "Dun-dungeons. Sta–aircase down the right through–this door."
"My thanks." She cut their throats before me and I flinched involuntarily. Everything was so fast, so lethal... I couldn't even take a breath before the hide out was decimated. I couldn't decide if it was fear running through me as I watched them work together or something else.
It made me uneasy.
The stone moved the bodies away and cleared the door with it. I stared at them as they crossed the threshold.
"Hold this room with Tayah while I fetch the buffoon." She told us as I stared aimlessly out in front. I felt her eyes watch me closely for a second before turning her cloaked back on us and descending to the dungeons.
"Gods I haven't felt this alive since the fall of the Jurrian Empire." Revna murmured beside me.
I nodded as if I had any agreement in the matter. I had to focus on the reason for our carnage. Not the fact that it didn't even seem fair or even just... I had killed many before but not like that. This was immortal intervention.
"You look like you have never seen death." She blurted beside me with an eyebrow raised.
Before I could answer her with an excuse the sound of footsteps rushing the hallway tore my eyes off it. Revna smirked and gestured to the four of them with a hand.
"Come, immortal. I will not have all the fun."
I swallowed and cut my eyes to the crimson hoods as they rushed us with daggers and knives. Revna however, took a few paces back and crossed her arms. I grit my teeth and ducked the first knife as it sailed over my head. I caught the other blade and used it to parry a dagger aimed at my throat before punching him off his feet.
Two more engaged me as I heard the immortal whistle between her teeth. "You are not even trying." She said cuttingly.
I ducked and clashed another blade before kicking one assassin off his feet and disarming the blade of another. The fourth engaged my back and I barely had time to spin and jab his throat making him choke before I kicked him into the wall, rendering him unconscious. But the fourth had already got to his feet and the blade was flying through the air kissing my cheek as it sailed into a solid piece of stone.
Revna stepped before me and clenched a fist. Three shards of stone impaled him at angles from the ground. He choked dribbling blood and she turned to me slowly. I froze when her glove grazed my cheek and showed me my blood.
"This is what happens when you hold back." She murmured in lethal quiet. "She was right to keep you from here. You are not ready for this."
I grit my teeth but said nothing. I could not argue with her because she was not entirely wrong. After what I had just seen... I had no capacity to unleash anything immortal on these souls.
Her head turned behind me and we saw Kára emerge from the stairs with a mountain of a man beside her looking like a bruised cabbage in cloth. His hair was still short but his stubble had grown into a beard too.
"Kaden." I choked out, staring at the giant who was slumped against her, a moment before his eyes met mine and widened.
"You took your damn time, little Tayah." He grinned despite the old blood running down his chin.
I laughed back the tears before running to him and burying my face into his chest.