Page 26 of Alien Viking's Plunder

He walked on, and Josie followed. She remembered enough of their landing to know that Bragr had saved her life by curling up around her and had kept her safe, while he had been beaten up pretty bad. He had bruises and little cuts all over him, and his limp made her think he had hurt his foot. That could have happened while he was pushing her out of the way of the falling sail. After he had taken her back from the skrymtir.

“So if my math is correct,” she mumbled to herself, “he has saved my life a fuckton of times.”

But that was only fair. He had also abducted her from Unity, so keeping her alive was the least he could do.

She had turned off the camera and the headset — there was not much to record while walking, and she wanted to save the battery. She felt for the knife hidden in her belt. She didn’t want him to know about it, in case he were to change into a jerk. And she had wanted a weapon like the stick — it was better to keep those vettir at arm’s length.

There was much less snow here among the boulders, and they were so tall she had trouble knowing which way they were going. It was like being inside a labyrinth, hoping not to meet a dead end.

Somehow they were always able to keep going without doubling back. The rocks gradually became smaller, until they were walking on frozen gravel as the layer of snow thinned out. It was also getting dark fast.

The vettir were nowhere to be seen, their screeches silent.

“As I hoped,” Bragr said and pointed ahead. “That should be easy to defend.”

Josie had no idea what he was talking about until she spotted a crack in the mountain, tall and narrow. “What is that?”

“It’s a crack in the mountain,” he explained. “I saw it from far below. And hopefully it is a cave. We can’t keep going in the dark. There are worse things than vettir and dfergir.”

They slowly made their way up the scree slope. Two vettir circled the boulder field far below them, but most of the monsters seemed to have left.

Bragr looked into the crack. “There’s no troll smell. It would be too narrow a crack for them anyway.”

Josie frowned. “There aretrollsin these mountains?”

“This is where they live,” Bragr confirmed. “Wait here. Scream if you see anything. The dfergir will soon be here.” He got down on all fours and crawled into the crack, which was too low for him to walk upright.

Josie looked at him going in. He had some incredible muscles, and they flexed with every move. What would it be like to run her fingers down those thick back muscles, pulling him closer, pulling him into her—

There was a soft sound behind her, as if from a down pillow being shaken.

She spun around. The whole swarm of vettir was coming at her from the darkening sky, claws stretched out in front of them. She barely had time to lift the staff and swipe it at the nearest one.

“Bragr!” she yelled. “Vettir!”

The last word drowned in the insane screeches from the descending swarm. Josie couldn’t even aim at them, just swung her staff at the mass of claws and beaks. She hit some of them, but they just screeched and beat their wings to stay right in front of her, but out of reach.

Josie retreated to the rock face, pushing her back to it. But the vettir were coming closer, diving at her and trying to get a hold on her hair with their claws. A big vette grabbed her stick with both its claws and yanked at it. She didn’t let go, so she was pulled away from the rock face, losing her balance.

Immediately a cloud of vettir was on her, grabbing her arms and pulling her to the ground with their sheer weight. Others pounced on her feet and ankles and the fabric of her uniform.

They all beat their wings frantically, and despite Josie doing her best to kick and punch and scream, they slowly lifted her into the air, their screeches deafening.

“Bragr!” Josie screamed, panic tugging at her as the ground vanished beneath her. All around was a nightmarish whirlwind of leathery bat wings, flying feathers, pointy claws, sharp beaks and black, fierce eyes.

“Murder, murder, murder!”the vettir screeched as they lifted her higher.

She knew they meant it. She was dead. All they had to do was let go of her and let her fall.

A hand suddenly gripped her ankle, holding her firmly.

It was Bragr, standing on tiptoe as he reached into the deadly cloud of vettir to keep Josie from being carried away.

With an insane cacophony of screeches, the vettir who weren’t lifting Josie attacked the Viking. He swung his sword at them, but clearly couldn’t use it properly while also holding Josie’s ankle and trying not to hit her.

Josie punched blindly into the screeching mass of gray and orange, dislodging several of the vettir. But others took their place, gripping her with their claws and pecking at her with their beaks. “Murder her!”they screeched. “Murder! Murder!”

Bragr shook her once, a hard movement that made her teeth rattle. And it worked. Several vettir lost their grip on her.

---