Weaving Fate - Nora Ash Page 0,116

myself.

We definitely had to come up with some sort of schedule. Or a rotation. Norn-blessed or not, my poor vagina was still very much human, and if my four brutes had plans on making these sorts of nights a regular occurrence, I was relatively certain she was gonna pack up shop and flee the premises.

Ow.

Somehow I managed to get to my feet and stagger out of the pile of alphas still sleeping peacefully. You’d think they were the ones that’d been fucked beyond their limits, with how zonked they all were.

I took a moment to look back at them, and my heart stuttered with a warm kind of happiness I couldn’t put into words. I was finally whole. More than whole—their bonds in my chest filled me past overflowing. In the bleakest moments, I’d thought I’d sacrificed my sanity, my very essence to Fate. That being permanently hollow, broken, was my sacrifice for a chance to save the world and everything that lived in it.

I’d been so wrong.

Fate had gifted me my mates, not punished me with them.

Moving stiffly, I found my clothes and pulled them on, grimacing as I did. The second I got the chance, I was taking the longest, hottest bath known to man.

I gave my sleeping alphas a final lingering look before I quietly slipped out the door and made my way through Valhalla’s halls.

There were no guards stationed by Loki’s cell. I hadn’t met a single soul on my way from the tower room, last night’s celebrations seemingly having taken everyone out of commission.

I used my magic to gain access to the dungeon, pressing it through locks to click them open rather than melting them off.

The dark god sat on the bare floor, leaning against the rough stone wall with his legs outstretched, looking haughtily bored despite his dire circumstances.

“You came,” he said. There was no surprise in his voice.

“You knew I would.”

Loki inclined his head a fraction of an inch. “I saw your sense of honor when I touched your mind. And your soft heart. You were unlikely to wish your mates’ sire dead, even if they are currently somewhat disillusioned by my… ah, motivations. You understand the complicated devotion a child has to their parents—even if she feels betrayed by them. Don’t you?”

I drew in a deep breath, pushing down the hurt still festering from what my mom and dad had done. He was behind the deal that had sealed my fate—a deal made centuries before either of my parents were alive.

“Do you want to waste time tormenting me? Because at some point, your guards are gonna wake up from their hangover, and soft heart or not, I’m not going to risk mine or my mates’ lives for you.”

His lips pulled into a wry smile. With smooth movement, he got to his feet and walked across the cell floor to the bars separating us. This close, his presence was intimidating—almost as if the dark energy I’d seen when I fought him seeped from his skin and reached out to me with chilling tendrils. His eyes were as dark as his hair, and their touch as he looked me up and down put every hair on my body on end.

“Perhaps if I had truly been interested in breaking apart the nine worlds and ruling over broken ruins as the dark and terrible king Odin seems to believe is my true goal, I would not have given you to my sons,” he said, his voice raspy and silky all in one. “Such devotion. Such power. You would make a magnificent God-queen. A worthy mother of my spawn.”

I grimaced. “Yeah, no thanks. I’ve seen one of your spawn swimming around the Atlantic. Not interested. Now, do you want out or not?”

His smile hiked up a millimeter. “I suppose I better. Can’t give Odin the satisfaction of mounting my head on a pike, can we.” He reached his hands out between the bars. “Remove the ring.”

I looked at his hand, frowning at the iron band around his index finger. “What is it?”

“A band to suppress my magic,” he said. “Odin favors them. I suspect Saga and Magni have worn one similar to this during their stay in Valhalla.”

Now that he mentioned it, I did have a vague recollection of Magni having a metal band around one index finger.

“And it can just be popped right off? Seems a bit of a design flaw.”

Loki chuckled. “Not so much. You’ll need to put a bit of your magic behind it,