The Wages of Sin (Blood Brothers Vampire Series Book Two) (18 page)

Bork jumped in. “All right, I think we should all
take a second to just calm down.”

“I want to know where this guy’s from,” said Eilif,
a bit more aggressively.

“So do I,” said Ragnar.

“I’m going to agree we need to calm down,” said
Gunnar. “I meant it innocently. If he doesn’t want to answer,
that’s his business. Let’s not start making enemies. We’re all in
this together.”

“Yeah, so let’s fucking open up to each other,
right?” said Ragnar.

“Guys, guys, seriously,” said Helgi. “This is
getting fucked, all right? It got real fuckin’ ugly out there, but
we can put it behind us now, you know? We made it, thanks to the
gods, and—”

“
We
are
the gods,” said Odin.

Nobody said another goddamn word. The looks on the
soldiers’ faces varied from puzzlement (Gunnar) to terror (Helgi).
The boat rocked on the tide and nobody paddled or spoke. They only
sat quietly in the wind.

“I happen to have some friends in a small village in
Yorkshire,” said Odin, “friends who were killed not too long ago.
Seems a few Viking soldiers broke into their home, killed women and
children and innocent farmers, raped women of all ages and cut
their heads off. Only person they left alive was a baby who
couldn’t have been more than a few months old, and I’m surprised
they did that, frankly.”

“What is this? Who are you?”

“Odin,” said Odin, for the first time. “I am your
god. And I do not forgive you for what you have done.”

Gunnar was the first to stand and raise his axe and
Ragnar followed suit. When Gunnar took his first swing at Odin,
Odin dodged and caught his arm, then buried his own axe in Gunnar’s
shoulder at the neck. Gunnar hit the deck in shock, and wouldn’t be
getting up.

As soon as Gunnar had gone down, Ragnar struck Odin
in the side with his axe and sent him staggering back toward the
stern with Loki and Tyr and Bork. Tyr caught Odin and helped him to
stand.

“I didn’t realize Odin bled,” said Ragnar as Helgi
raced to cower at the bow and Eilif struggled to stand.

Odin stripped off his armor as the soldier stood
dumbly. The blood ran down his naked skin from his chest to his
thigh, but the flow had slowed already. He took one of the jars of
water and poured it down his side and when he washed the blood away
there was no wound.

“What… What…” Ragnar tried to speak but he had no
words. He had begun to believe.

“It’s true!” said Helgi. “They are the gods and
they’ve come to punish us for what we’ve done. No, no. Oh shit,
we’re doomed.”

Bork couldn’t watch. He was pressed against the
stern with his head turned skyward, looking out to sea. He did his
best to ignore the sounds of his fellow soldiers’ screams, their
cries for forgiveness, for mercy.

“When your victims cried out for mercy you laughed
and mocked them,” said Tyr. “You will have no more mercy than you
gave them.”

Once this had been said, an odd calm came over
Helgi. He knelt before Tyr and exposed his neck willingly,
convinced of the vampire’s godly stature as Tyr drew back his axe.
Helgi died a noble death, a warrior’s death, and it was perhaps
what was best for him following the emotional damage he’d taken at
war.

Ragnar got it the worst. Tyr and Odin stuck axes
through his hands and spears through his calves, pinning his legs
to the deck and his hands to the gunwale. Eilif came hopping at
Loki with his axe in his hand, but Loki cut his remaining leg off
and he was left bleeding and wailing on the deck.

When they were all dead or disarmed, Loki went into
the extra bag they’d brought and came up with a small satchel. The
contents were a substance they’d learned the composition of in
their years of traveling, a secret weapon dating back to the early
years of the Byzantine Empire that the Greeks called ‘sea fire,’
though the rest of the world called it Roman Fire. They’d brought a
dozen satchels of the stuff and Loki poured the contents of one of
them onto the deck and set to work igniting the fuel with a flint
and some steel.

“What are you doing? What the fuck are you doing?”
said Ragnar.

Bork glanced back to the boat for a minute, unable
to contain his curiosity. A small fire had started in the boat and
it was quickly becoming a large fire, spreading toward a sack Loki
had thrown as close to the bow as he could get it.

And then BANG!

The whole ship was up in flames and Tyr and Odin had
leapt into the water. Eilif followed shortly, but given his pain,
his exhaustion, and his wounds, after he hit the water for the
first time, he never came up.

Ragnar was still pinned to the boat and he was
jerking his arms and legs, trying to get free. One hand slipped out
from under an axe, separated mostly into two different appendages
thanks to a cut that went all the way through his hand between his
middle and ring fingers. The flames had overtaken him and his skin
was boiling and popping as he screamed and waved his one free hand
in the fire.

“It’s done,” said Bork to Loki as they stood in the
last part of the dragonship not yet consumed by fire. “Make me
immortal. Make me like you.”

Loki buried his axe in Bork’s chest. “You’ll live
forever in Niffelheim. You’ll dine and fight and die in battle
every day until Ragnarok comes. And then you’ll fight and die
again. Isn’t that what you people believe?”

Loki laughed like hell as the fire lit half his face
and a dying Viking cried out in pain what seemed like miles
away.

“Loki,” said Bork, in shock.

Loki laughed once more. “Whatever,” he said.

Then he dove into the water and swam for shore with
his Brothers.

Back on the beach they shed their Viking armor and
the three of them stood naked in the night as a ship burned on the
water in the distance. The fire was peaceful, even romantic from
this distance, and one would never know of the violence that had
taken place there.

The Black Rose. It was done with. Burned. Wilted.
Conquered.

Tyr and Odin never fully communicated how
uncomfortable they were made by Bork’s murder, who neither of them
was convinced deserved what he got. Loki would have argued that
nobody deserves anything, that chaos is all the world has to offer.
Perhaps they’d all have been right.

“Did we do something good here today?” asked
Tyr.

“I don’t know,” said Odin. “Do you feel good about
what we’ve done?”

Tyr was silent.

Loki shrugged. “I feel pretty good, I guess.”

“They were killers and rapists. The world is a
better place without them. We’ve done a service to the Earth,
haven’t we?” asked Tyr.

“Sure,” said Loki.

Odin nodded. “You’re wondering whether it would be
better without us.”

Nobody said anything. None of them tried to
answer.

The Black Rose would always carry a certain weight
for them, but they’d have trouble defining what it was in words. It
may have meant that they were evil. It may have been a symbol of
the other world where they lived, separate from humanity, of the
relationship they had to mankind. They might have made it their
insignia as a means to keep them at a distance. Part of it was
perhaps the idea that killing could be just, though they’d lost
sight of it somewhere along the way if that were the case.

What it came to mean above all else was that the
world was cruel. It was a reminder of their denouncement of God, of
their commitment to themselves. Along with the names of Norse gods
that they used from that night forward, The Black Rose—which they
would later tattoo over their hearts—meant they were gods, forever
to walk the earth, forever to kill men, forever at a distance from
humanity, existing only for themselves and for each other.

In short, it meant ‘Brothers.’

CHAPTER
TWENTY-TWO

Tyr didn’t know how long he’d been tied up in the
cellar. Not long. Maybe twelve hours or so. His joints weren’t too
tired yet and he wasn’t starved for blood, but the chains binding
his arms to the wall above his head were made of silver and they
were chaffing and irritating his skin as well as making him feel
nauseated.

The fact that a silver chain even existed in Loki’s
house was disgusting. They had a few silver weapons with which they
beat one another’s brains out for sport some nights, but nobody
ever would have chosen to fight with chain alone. Silver chain
served one purpose and that was to bind a vampire in place.
Somewhere along the line, their trust in one another had fallen to
such a level that Loki felt the need to keep it around. And sure
enough, it was now being put to use.

For a few hours Tyr had stopped breathing and tried
to listen, hoping Eva wasn’t suffering at the hands of Loki. Under
other circumstances his primary concern being tied up for so long
would have been boredom, but today he had to hope his girl wasn’t
being murdered elsewhere in the house.

He heard nothing. All of the walls were thick and
well insulated and even if she was screaming at the top of her
lungs he’d probably never notice. He tried calling out for Loki and
Thor and even Eva, but nobody answered. It wasn’t long before he
surrendered to the futility and stood waiting to be set free
whenever the others got around to it.

After somewhere between six hours and three days,
there were footsteps outside the door and when it swung open Loki
entered the room. They were both silent for some time, as brothers
are after one of them burns the other’s house down and ties him up
for an extended period of time.

“How you feeling, buddy?” Loki asked finally.

Tyr stared into Loki’s eyes and said nothing.

“Well, I’ve got some bad news for you. Eva died last
night.”

An electric current ran through Tyr, tightening his
body from the inside. His jaw clenched and all of his muscles
seemed to flex. His eyes shut as tight as they could and his body
held like this for a moment before everything started to loosen and
he was left with only the trauma in his mind.

“
One more week,
Loki. That was all she ever wanted, all I ever wanted. You couldn’t
even give her that, give
us
that? One week?”

“This wasn’t my decision, Tyr. It was hers, if
anything. She just let go.”

“Fuck you!” The cry came from Tyr’s mouth without
conscious decision. He was acting now on some overwhelmed instinct
with which he wasn’t entirely familiar. “You’re lying. She was
alive when I left the house with her. She wasn’t the picture of
health but she had a week left in her easy. If she’s dead, you
killed her.”

Loki pulled up a chair and took a seat in front of
his Brother. “Okay Tyr, you want to know the truth? The truth is
you killed her. You’ve been killing her all her life. First her
parents, then her innocence, and now you’ve broken her with your
lies.”

“What are you talking about? What did you do to
her?”

“All I did was open her eyes. I freed her from the
bonds you tied, told her all the things you wouldn’t. I told her
about the people you’ve killed, the things you’ve done, and… her
parents. I think that one was the deal-breaker.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“I made her understand what you can’t—that humans
and vampires are incompatible for obvious reasons. In our world
she’s prey, and in her world we’re predators. As soon as she
grasped that, she had nothing else to live for and her little heart
gave up beating.”

Tyr jerked at the chains but it only hurt his hands.
He was stuck here until somebody unlocked him. “I’m gonna kill you,
Loki. Our whole lives you’ve taken anything you wanted and I’ve
gotten scraps. I’m not playing your game anymore.”

“You’ll get over it. You always get over it. In a
few days she’ll be a piece of your past and we’ll move on. You’ll
thank me for it later. We’ll laugh about it. I’m already laughing
about it.”

“Take these chains off so I can cut your fucking
head off.”

Loki sighed. “You make a persuasive argument, but
I’ll pass. I understand how you feel and I’ve got it all sorted
out. We’ll give her a big New Year’s Eve funeral pyre in the spirit
of new beginnings and sentimental bullshit. So cool off. I’ll let
you down when you get a grip, when you can be reasonable.”

He patted Tyr’s cheek with pity and left the room as
Tyr shouted and cursed after him.

It couldn’t have been more than a few hours Tyr
spent struggling with the chains, fighting his inner self for
control, and howling for Loki before the door to the basement
opened again. But it wasn’t Loki who entered this time. It was
Thor.

Thor had spent all day in a hotel room churning over
whether it was time to go. He’d gotten on the phone and nearly
booked a flight for tonight, but it was short notice and no tickets
were available. He settled instead for a red eye flight the
following night, and he took the delay as a sign. When the sun went
down, he headed for the house and as soon as Loki left for the
club, he came in and found Tyr.

Tyr went limp. He wasn’t ready for Thor. Since
hearing the news, his mind had been so stuck on Eva and what Loki
had said or done to her that he’d never even stopped to consider
Thor’s involvement.

“Hiya Tyr,” said Thor placidly.

“What did you two do? Why? What did she do?”

“Tyr, I’ve been unfair to you.”

“What was your hand in it? Did you participate? Or
just watch and smile while Loki did his thing? Maybe a high-five
and a drink afterward?”

Thor paused. “I’ve been out of the house, Tyr. I
spent all of last night looking for Heimdall. I don’t even know
what you’re talking about.”

“Loki told me Eva’s dead. Is it true?”

Thor looked over his shoulder at nothing in
particular. He’d figured as much. Her odds of making it through the
night alone with Loki hadn’t been good. At this point killing Eva
felt cold even by Loki’s standards, but that didn’t mean it
couldn’t happen.