Page 146 of Valkyrie Unknown

"So if Zeke is creation, I'm destruction?" My retort was flippant, but the words didn't feel right.

"Zeke doesn't represent creation."

Holy-- "Just fucking tell me already." I pushed command into my voice, and the sound reverberated back at me.

"You're--" Finn worked his jaw and clenched his hand. "Not listening." The words sounded forced.

That wasn't what he started to say. In the less than five minutes that I'd spent with Loki, despite how cryptic he'd been, he gave me more information than Finn was.

He's lying. Kill him.

The ax was in my hand before I registered summoning a weapon, and I was moving within striking distance of Finn.

"Whoa." He grabbed my wrist, his fingers digging into the tendon. My joins creaked and the bone ached, and my fingers loosened without my permission.

He reached for the weapon as it fell, and a sharpzztfilled the air.

"Fuck." He jerked back, and the ax fell to the ground.

The same thing that happened when someone who wasn’t me or Zeke tried to wield one of my enchanted blades. The ones that had bonded with me so only I could wield them.

Finn eyed me from a few meters back, with an expression I might call fear if I thought I was any sort of threat to him. "How is a weapon you don't want already yours?" He asked.

That was something Loki did to it. A trick. He was a trickster god, right? "It's not mi--"

"Fucking Hel. It only answers to you and you can summon it out of midair."

Great. And now we were back to what Finn thought he knew about my abilities that I didn't. He was wrong, though. I'd been trying for as long as I could remember to manifestanythingthat would prove I wassomething."Because Loki--"

"Becauseyou."

I waited for the voice it seemed only I could hear to argue with him.

Nothing.

"For someone who's so convinced you're going to be a god, who spends all her time looking for a way to do so, you sure do miss out on the obvious," Finn said.

"Nothing to add?" I asked the empty air.

Finn looked around us. "Who are you talking to? That's it, isn't it? You're crazy." The instant the words passed his lips, regret sank into his expression. "I didn't mean that."

Too late. I wasn't insane and Mom hadn't been either. Fury and doubt spilled through me and the ax was back in my hand.

"We're done," I said.

Even if he did tell me what he'd witnessed, there was no way I could trust he was telling the truth. Best case scenario, Finn tolerated me for Zeke's sake, and any friendship we had was shaded by prophecy. More likely, Finn was obsessed with Zeke, and would do whatever it took to ensure I couldn't be any sort of threat.

Where did that thought come from?

It seemed I'd been observing more than I realized.

"I'll find my own way out." I didn't dare turn my back on him, so I pointed at the void that sat on the other side of the doorway. "You first."

Finn shook his head. "I can't leave without you. As we've seen."

"Then tell me how to get us out of here."

"I have." Finn bit back.

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