Page 8 of Last Thrall of Asgard

“The men? Taking it a bit harder. Stubborn lot. Odin won’t even let me cross back into the city. Which, honestly, is taking the grudge too far. They’ve forgiven me for worse! Well, maybe not worse, but enough individual times to count for one especially bad time. Don’t you agree?”

“Hold on.” I raised a hand to stop Loki because I still didn’t understand. “Wheredo I come in? You want my… help? With what? Cheering up the male gods so they go into retirement happy?”

“Precisely!” Loki smacked my shoulder again. “You’ve got it. And having seen you in action, I know you’re up for it.”

“Wait, you…” It was then I remembered what else Loki had said.

We mainly need someone willing to fuck.

“Are youfuckingkidding me?” I snarled. I didn’t even care anymore if he turned me into some terrible creature or chucked me off the rainbow bridge. It was all the same! It wasalwaysthe same. I was something to be used, and nothing more. But no.No. I would not lie down and take this anymore, just to be tossed aside when I was no longer wanted or needed or worth a damn to anyone.

Sure, whatever the gods might do to me might be worse than punishment from the family that owned me, but… would it really be? Could anything be worse than being treated like property? If the gods were finally intervening in my life, and this was the make of it, then…

“Fuck you,” I spat. “No. Find someone else and send me back home to my miserable, and apparentlygods-given existence.”

Loki teetered backward on his heels from my bellow.

Then he laughed again.

“Well done! I get why it has to be you. See, the gods don’t need some wanton worshiper licking their boots. They need a goodswift kick in the rear! And, in some cases, maybe something else in the rear. Or to fill up yours? Who’s to say?”

“I refuse—”

“But! I am not asking of a humble thrall as a powerful and, admittedly, beloved Jotun. You already balk at what a thrall is supposed to be, given your beauty. Your wit. Your nerve. Come now, wouldn’t you like to prove the gods wrong about mortals deserving the class they’re born into? Wouldn’t you like to be more than a slave? Be a savior, a sage, a courtesan like no other, who is so wanted, you bring even the gods to their knees?”

He waved a hand at me, and I felt the change before I looked down and saw it. My clothing had transformed. It was similar to before—trousers, tunic, belt—even in the same colors, with the tunic blue and its trim a pale tan, only now, the quality of the fabrics and leather, the workmanship of it all, the embellishments and stitching, was far finer than a thrall would wear.

“Do that, Oli, succeed in pleasing all whom I send you to, and you will not leave here a thrall any longer. You will be the last thrall of Asgard to ever walk its halls—and beyond. Because I will make you free.”

I looked at Loki with a start. “One might call it foolish to accept any offer from the trickster god.”

“Trickster? Is that my reputation on Midgard? How simplistic! I prefer mischief maker, thank you. Because I assure you, Oli, I am a delight.”

“You literally admitted to starting Ragnarökfor the fun of it.”

“That was destiny! I figured I should at least enjoy myself if we were all doomed anyway. Is it really fair to blame someone for what’s fated?” Something wavered across his face as he said that, but it was gone just as quickly.

“Can I get any guarantee you will keep up your end of the bargain? You did just admit to the story where you tricked your way out of a bargain with a builder.”

“Fuckedmy way out of it,” Loki said, as if it rude to not include that part. “And absolutely. I’m glad you asked. A god’s oath.” He extended a hand to me.

“Your word isn’t good enough.”

“Mysticallybinding. Go on.”

There were nerves in my belly, anxious and bubbling, but I couldn’t say if it was fear or dread anymore. If there was any chance at changing my fate, I had to take it.

I clasped Loki’s forearm, and he curled his long fingers around mine.

One of the snakes embroidered on his sleeve came to life, still as stitching, but as if alive, moving across the fabric from his sleeve to mine.

“If I be lying,” he said, while the stitching glowed and then went dormant again as part of my new clothes, “that snake will come back tenfold upon me, and the Midgard Serpent will swallow me whole.”

“Truly? The serpent lives too?” Jörmungandr, a giant serpent, large enough to encircle the world, and another of Loki’s monstrous children.

“We all do, born anew.”

“Even Odin, you said? I thought he was never meant to come back.”

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