House Of Gods 9 - Samantha Snow Page 0,65

about all of their friends and loved ones. She knew she would miss them, but she also knew that she wanted, needed, this time with Brandt. Kemma would still know and communicate with her parents, and that was enough for now. They were released from prophecy, and Freya’s gift to them was a time of intimate solitude.

“I’m ready,” she whispered to him as he felt her breath against her back.

Brandt closed his eyes and began to pluck the individual memories from each head. When he was finished, not even Lopt would remember his own son.

Below, in the restaurant, Erik and Colby were touching all sorts of kitchen tools that they weren’t supposed to and getting yelled at by the cooks and waitstaff. The man who had poked his head up into the loft came to speak to them again.

“I am sorry,” he said to them. “But the people you are looking for are not here at the moment. Perhaps you should try again later.”

“What kind of bullshit is that?” Erik said. “I’ll go take a look myself.” He started to push toward the hallway, but several of the workers came to block his path.

Both Erik and Colby began to get irate and questioned whether Brandt and Brenna were okay. But Jerrik saw the look on the Asian man’s face and noticed the way his eyes darted back and forth between the ceiling and the kitchen, and he could tell that Brandt and Brenna were there and did not want to be bothered.

“Hey,” Jerrik said as he pulled Erik’s arm away from further controversy. “Let’s just give them some space and come back tomorrow.”

He knew there wouldn’t be a tomorrow, at least not one they would remember, but he knew it was the right thing to do. Ever since he had first helped Brandt and Brenna in the apartment when the initial prophecy was still up in the air, he had always been on their side, and he wasn’t about to switch teams now.

“Fine,” Erik said as he grabbed a bowl of lo mein from the counter to take with him. “But tomorrow, if we’re still turned away, I’ll make my own entrance into the loft.”

The restaurant man seemed intimidated by Erik’s threat and took a few steps backward into the hall. Jerrik approached him after Erik and Colby had already stepped outside, and he pulled the letter out from his pocket to give to the man.

“I know they’re up there,” he said.

The man began to look nervous and hostile again, but Jerrik calmly lifted his hand to show him the folded note.

“Please,” he said. “Can you just give Brenna this letter?”

The man took the paper from Jerrik’s hand. “I will.”

“Thank you.” Jerrik nodded and turned without another word to walk out of the restaurant.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Niflheim was nothing short of astounding.

When Tara had first chosen the realm as their starting ground, she did so simply because it seemed like a logical place to begin since it was the first of the nine worlds to be created, and also because she was dying to see the dragon fabled to live there and guard the realm. If someone had asked her honestly which reason was more of the driving force behind her decision, she probably would have admitted it was the dragon.

Niflheim was cold, and dark, and shrouded with mist and ice. The dragon, Nidhogg, was said to live beneath the surface of the world, where the fierce beast gnawed on the roots of Yggdrasil that penetrated its core. When they arrived, the land was wholly unwelcoming, and the bitter air lashed at their skin, causing immediate frostbite, prompting them to cover every exposed surface with furs that were draped around them. Even Tannin’s horns felt the ache of the brutal cold.

He wrapped his arm around Tara as they walked across the barren land toward what looked like a capital building. Tannin did not know much about Niflheim, aside from what Helia had told him, which was not all that welcoming. According to her, Niflheim was home to an afterlife that housed many of the dishonored dead. At the time, he had difficulty understanding how that seemed any different than the debauchery and raucous that was to be had in Hel, but Helia assured him that it was indeed quite different and that Hel was not such a bad place to be. He had prepared them both for a less than gracious greeting, but Tara had assured him that since they were to