Page 94 of Valkyrie Unknown

“To see you. To catch up.”

He huffed a laugh. “You simply thought that you would drop in after a few hundred years of no contact and sayI missed you, let us celebrate our brotherhood.”

“I would’ve called, but no one I talked to could find a phone number for you.” It seemed some of Azzie’s gift for sarcasm was rubbing off on me.

“I do not have a phone.”

“That’s an enviable position to have.” I turned slowly to face him.

Tyr’s grunt was noncommittal. Out of the corner of my eye I saw the shape of a man as large as I was. The flash of movement, the release of pressure against my spine, was all the hint I needed to take several rapid steps back.

Sunlight flashed on steel as Tyr swung the ax through the spot where I’d just stood.

It seemed the months of practice with Azzie had served me as well. I met his gaze, searching for an indication of the nature of his attack. One corner of his mouth pulled up, and a hint of a smile shone in blue eyes.

I grinned and fell into a defensive posture. “Are you certain that you want to do this?”

“I live with many doubts and regrets.” Tyr sheathed the ax and took up his own fighting stance. “This will not be one of them.”

A fight in which I could go all out. This would be excellent. I made a tentative lunge, throwing a punch, to see how Tyr would react.

He blocked with no effort, and raised an eyebrow. “Have you gotten soft, Bear?” He jabbed at my gut.

I absorbed the hit in favor of moving within his reach, to twist and bring my shoulder into his side to knock him back.

Tyr grunted, though the sound was one of surprise rather than pain. He gripped me under the shoulders, dragging with him as he stumbled, and throwing us both off balance. A low chuckle rumbled through the ground; a sensation I felt more than heard, and the sound of a pleased god. Tyr was a skilled opponent regardless, but the fact he did all of this despite missing a hand made him all the more impressive.

He recovered as I did, and we pulled apart to circle each other.

The sparring, knowing I could go all-out, felt good. However, combined with Tyr’s haunted look and thoughts of Azzie, it dragged up a past I worked to keep buried.

“There are rumors you travel with a woman.” Tyr lunged again.

I was ready, and met the charge as a wall, ready to take the impact in order to retaliate. “You know better than to believe rumors, especially from unknown sources. Who told you such a thing?”

He hadn’t heard it from Aya, of that I was certain. Her brother, Frey’s, mate, Fen, had betrayed Tyr, others, long ago, and Freyr and Freya chose to stand by Fenrir rather than face the truth.

Tyr changed tactics before he hit me, stepping to the side to hit me from a new angle. A favorite move of Azzie’s, and I was ready. I countered his blow with one of my own, and the fight was on.

“She told me.” Tyr’s words sank into the rhythm of the fight. “The woman. Azzie.”

I faltered at her name, and was punished for my misstep with a fist to the kidney. “How?—?”

“She’s a fighter who does what she does because she believes the world should be fair.” Tyr lingered after the hit. “You tell me, when she muttersplease help me, where do you think it goes?”

Tyr heard her prayers? “How?” I took advantage of his pause to drop and sweep a kick at his feet.

He tried to jump, but waited too long, and my attack sent him stumbling as well. “That’s how prayers work.”

I glowered at his condescension. Of course, when one muttered a plea into the air, if they didn’t direct it at a god, it tended to reach the ears of the deity whose values that individual embodied.

Gods drew their power from faith. From prayers. With a lack of people praying to specific entities these days, gods had found new ways to keep access to that faith. There were many gods of sex, and of war, and those who stayed powerful specialized. Tyr represented war and justice. Making things right for the repressed.

“She’s a potential.” In my mind Tyr’s revelation made her a god praying to a god.

Tyr shrugged. “She’s not a god yet.”

No, she wasn’t, and I was grateful for that.

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