Gears of Mischief (The Valhalla Mechanism Book 1) Read online

  Somewhere in the distance, the mechanical chimes of Big Ben rang once, twice, three times, and then stopped.

  I tilted my head, listening to the sudden silence, waiting for the other chimes as my fingers clenched tightly to the ledge.

  Big Ben did not chime again. . .

  Chapter Six

  I tucked the notepad and looking glass back into the pouches they belonged in at my hip before adjusting the hood around my head, making sure it was still in place. The three people, or whatever they were, still stared at the sky, the wolves beside them, so I seized my chance to make my escape. I made my way quietly back to the ladder, smoothing my hands down my trousers to relive some of the ache from crouching so long. I needed to get back to the Guild quickly and relay my message, write my report, and alert everyone who needed it. The director would think I was mad with what I had to tell him, but I had no choice. I had been given my assignment and I was expected to report, even if my report seemed too far-fetched, I could hardly believe it myself.

  I glanced over the ledge down into the alley, checking to make sure it was clear. Nothing and no one moved, not even the rodents of London risking their lives during whatever had transpired. The silence of London and the shadow of the wolf in the cloud unnerved me to the point where I believed the sight before me.

  Grabbing the top of the ladder, I swung myself around and dropped, not wasting time with the rungs. Instead, I used the edges and slid down. My feet barely made a sound when they touched the dirty alley, but when I turned, I jerked backwards in surprise, slamming against the metal ladder and sending out a loud ring as the steel of my weapons hit them. My knife was out before I even recognized reaching for it.

  The three people from the square stood before me, their eyes studying me as if I was a bug. The big one, Thor, had his arms crossed over his considerable chest. Even with the danger of being caught, the failure of it, I could not help noticing the definition of his muscles up close. The woman looked bored with the situation, but she raised her brow as I dropped into a defensive crouch and met her ice-blue eyes. Everything about the woman felt like winter, but it was not her I focused on.

  It was the magician.

  “Well, hello, little spy,” he purred, his voice like whiskey. “What exactly are you looking for?”

  I didn’t answer, knew not to, my mind churning as I searched for an easy escape. I could not combat lightning if Thor went for his hammer, and I was not sure I could combat the energy of the other one, but I refused to go down without a fight.

  There was no easy way. Difficult way, it is, I thought.

  I kicked out my leg swiftly, swinging low to catch the magician off guard, except he seemed to expect it. He nimbly dodged my kick, the corner of his lips ticking up in an expression that only filled me with anger.

  “Loki, stop playing with the poor woman.”

  Loki. I met the green eyes before me, saw the answering smile, and decided it was no longer possible to be stealthy. I needed to get away. I pulled the axe from my thigh and swung it. I held a knife in my other hand, and I managed to nick Loki with it while he was focused on dodging the axe. It did hardly more than make his laugh, but I dodged him only to come face to face with Thor, and Thor was a mountain of man.

  “Move out of my way,” I snarled.

  The big oaf laughed and shook his head, as if I entertained him. “You’re a feisty one.”

  I swung my axe, narrowly missing his chest. I attempted to dive around him, but he was too big, taking up too much space. I was going to have to fight. So I put all my attention on him and leaped into his chest. His hands immediately came around my waist, holding me back. I kept my attention on kicking his arse rather feeling the massive hands spanning my middle.

  “Calm down, you little sprite. We aren’t going to hurt—” Thor’s words were cut off when I landed a blow on the side of his head, forcing a growl to his lips. “I said ‘calm down’!”

  The magician, Loki, came up behind me, but the winter woman never joined in. Instead, she seemed wholly amused by the entire situation.

  I swung on Thor again and he dropped his hammer. “I won’t hit you, woman!”

  “Good!” I growled. “Then I’ll do all the hitting!” I flashed my knife and swung it, missing his chest by a millimeter. His arms were long enough to hold me away, but my legs were longer. With a violent kick, I dug my boot into his gut, kicking as hard as I could. Thor’s hands loosened, not as much as I had hoped, but enough that I dropped and spun, intending to use the advantage to turn and sprint away, but I came face to face with Loki again.

  I lifted my axe, ready to take him on and get away, but he lifted his hand, a look almost like an apology on his face.

  “This won’t hurt,” he promised, and blew whatever was on his palm into my face.

  It was a powder of some sort, something that smelled like elderberries and smoke, the smell not unpleasant. It smacked me in the face like the kick of a horse, coating my tongue, and before I could snarl and attack him for whatever he did, the edges of my vision grew black.

  “What did you do to me?” I growled, but the words came out garbled. My axe dropped to the ground with a clink and darkness consumed me. Fuck. . .

  I never even felt myself hit the ground.

  LOKI

  I reached forward as the woman collapsed, catching her before she could slam into the dirty concrete of the alley. She was dressed completely in black leather, her intentions to hide moderately apparent. She would have been successful, too, had I been anyone else. I’d known she was on top of the roof before we ever began fighting, knew there was someone watching us. I had not expected our watcher to be so beautiful, however, and I certainly wasn’t expecting the woman to hand us our asses.

  Thor groaned and straightened, his hand rubbing away the sting from her kick to his abdomen. She had gotten in a good solid blow. I was impressed.

  “Who would have thought the mighty Thor could be bested by a mere human woman?” I teased, holding the woman close. Her warmth seeped into my skin, relaxed me even, and I had an insane urge to keep holding her. She would mostly likely attempt to kill me if she knew those thoughts. It was a good thing she was unconscious.

  “She bested you, too, Trickster,” Thor reminded me.

  “Ah, but cleverness has always been the way to best me. She bested you with nothing more than a good kick.”

  Skadi rolled her eyes, stepping forward to peer into the woman’s face. “She’s fierce, a woman after my own heart, but we have bigger problems to think about other than how easily she bested the both of you. One of us must go back to Asgard and inform the Allfather.”

  I didn’t speak, and when Thor remained as silent as I did, Skadi grumbled. “I hate the both of you. All I want is to escape into my mountain and avoid all interaction except for my wolves and you Gods keep dragging me back into your messes.”

  “Ragnarök is everyone’s mess,” Thor pointed out, but I glanced down at the crossbow at her hip, at the intricacies of the build.

  “How is Hodor these days, Skadi?”

  Her cold eyes met mine, her expression anything but friendly, and it reminded me that even though we had just fought side by side, we were still enemies. We always would be after Skadi was the one to hang the serpent above my head during my punishment, after I had spoken unspeakable things to her for doing nothing more than following orders. I could still feel the drips of venom on my face, could still feel the agony it had caused, if I thought about it. But though Skadi had hung the serpent, and though I had attempted to kill her for it after I was released from my prison, I had hoped enough years had gone by to make the sting less.

  It seemed neither of us would ever forget, and Skadi would never see me as anything other than the villain I had painted myself.

  “Hodor is Hodor,” she replied. “I’ll tell him you said hello.”

  “Perhaps, tell him Thor did.” Hodor, also, did not like me. We should have been friends considering we both enjoyed
similar exploits and we were judged for reasons outside our control, but I had a penchant for angering everyone in Asgard, it seemed.

  I glanced down at the woman in my arms, studying her face where her hood fell back to reveal it. Her eyes were gently slanted, her cheekbones high. She was a beauty, one who most likely inspired many men to fall at her feet, and yet she was also skilled with weaponry. Who was she? Where did she come from?

  What was her name?

  “When Odin first told us about the prophecy, there was a mention of a book. For the briefest moment, Odin mentioned some sort of artifact or item that could help slow Ragnarök if it came to pass. I don’t know what it is, or even where it is, but it’s in one of his books.” Thor looked smug at remembering the fact, but I rolled my eyes.

  “You mean one of the thousands upon thousands of books Odin keeps in the library? How would she ever find such a thing?” I scoffed.

  “It had a blue cover and a gold foiling of a wolf running on the cover. There was a long scratch down the spine of it, like someone dragged a knife through the words.”

  I frowned, annoyed with myself for underestimating Thor, just as everyone else always assumed the worst of me. Thor was an observer and noticed details that not everyone else did. I didn’t apologize for my assumption, however. Thor had already dismissed it, had already moved on without a second thought.

  “I’ll see if I can find anything. Hodor will help me.” Her eyes flicked to me then, studying my stance and the woman in my arms. “Try not to kill her. I like the woman.”

  I tilted my head. “Why would I kill her?”

  “Why do you do anything, Loki?”

  There was hatred in her eyes, coldness. I was used to the look, used to being seen as nothing more than a mischief maker, so I said exactly the thing she expected me to say, became the person she wanted to see.

  “Amusement,” I replied, shooting her a smug smile, one she would never know was fake. “Mostly.”

  Skadi sneered and looked over at Thor. “Keep him out of trouble, and for the love of Valhalla, make sure you don’t make Ragnarök worse before we can find a way to stop it.”

  Her two wolves followed her as Skadi strode from the alley, off to search for a branch of Yggdrasil to take back to Asgard. The closest one was in the opposite direction that she took but some petty part of me didn’t call out to correct her.

  Thor eyed the woman in my arms, her body limp from the sleeping powder I had hit her with. “How long will she be out?”

  “At least an hour. We should question her, see if she knows anything or saw anything of use.”

  “And then let her go?” Thor eyed me closely and I sighed.

  “No, I was going to put her in my dungeon.” I rolled my eyes. “Of course, let her go. When have I ever murdered an innocent person?”

  Thor opened his mouth to answer but I shot him a glare and he quickly closed it again. I shouldn’t have asked the question.

  We had no time for such a debate.

  Chapter Seven

  I came awake like the perfect cup of tea, a few bubbles into a rapid boil. I was aware that I was somewhere I didn’t recognize, remembered the strange people who took me, but after that, nothing. Anger flowed through me at the thought of being captured, but instead of letting it get to me, I pushed it down behind a smile. I flicked open my eyes and looked up at the two men I had the urge to gut. I kept the smile on my face, holding it all behind my mask.

  The room I was in was not unlike my home, though the couch I sat on was sturdier than I was used to. I glanced at the bigger one, Thor, again, and wondered if the furniture was made to hold all that muscle. Both men stood opposite of me, watching carefully, studying me. Perhaps they were waiting for me to make my move.

  I sat up, careful not to touch too much of the couch in case there was some sort of poison in the thread. I had once seen a man drop dead in five minutes from rubbing against such a poison, and it had always stuck with me. I had been the one doing the poisoning, of course, but still.

  “Aren’t the chains a bit of an overkill?” Thor grumbled to Loki.

  I looked down. Indeed, my wrists were wrapped in large chains, and though they were heavy, they were also loose. Mistake number one. Carefully testing my wrists in them, I realized quickly that I could slip free—it was what I did for a living after all—but I stayed where I was out of a morbid sense of curiosity. If they suddenly attempted to kill me, I would change tactics, but I could not stop seeing the elves disappear or the bodies that had been there before they vanished before my eyes.

  “She almost bested you,” Loki pointed out, his brow raised.

  Thor frowned. “I don’t hit ladies.”

  I sat up and batted my eyelashes at the big one, playing up the innocence. Always leave it to a man to raise his brows with interest in his eyes at the flirtation. “Why don’t you let me free,” I encouraged, “and I’ll show you how much of a lady I am?”

  The problem was, I didn’t know if I meant I would kick their arses or kiss them, but maybe I could do both, in that order. Thor was obviously attractive, so many muscles that I had never seen before. His wide shoulders tapered to a narrowed waist, and I eyed what I could see. He had changed into a clean white shirt at some point, the suspenders he wore now red. His hammer leaned against the wall behind him, carelessly thrown to the side as if it didn’t harness the power of a storm somehow.

  And then my eyes went to the other one, Loki, the one who had dared to use some sort of sleeping magic on me. He was attractive, too, though he was far slimmer than Thor. It didn’t take away from the muscle he had in the slightest. His cheekbones practically begged to be licked. I blinked at the swift change of my thoughts. Strangely enough, it was probably best not to imagine licking my captors.

  There was a feeling of otherness from the two, though that didn’t surprise me. I had seen Thor produce lightning from nothing and Loki spin what I could only call magic. If they were mere humans, they wouldn’t be capable of such things I imagined. But what did that make them? Gods, like the elf had said? And did I honestly believe that?

  I was logical. I knew logically that the men in front of me were different, and logically I knew I would jump at the chance to bed them if they turned out to not be evil and the opportunity presented itself, but also, I knew—logically—that I probably shouldn’t. It didn’t keep me from imagining doing just that, however, when Loki shifted closer and kneeled. Even in the position, he was above me, his height something that would make him stand out in any room.

  “You can’t fool a trickster,” he murmured, and I admired the way the gas lamps shone on his red hair. Sometimes, if I caught it exactly right, it looked like it was on fire. “I can see your cleverness shining in your eyes, little spy.”

  “Can you now?” I grinned. “A so-called trickster would also recognize how badly I’m going to sock him in the nose for putting me to sleep.”

  “It was necessary.” He shrugged. “We didn’t want you to hurt yourself.”

  I rolled my eyes, tempted to give him a piece of my mind. “You didn’t want me to hurt you,” I corrected.

  “Well, I was mighty worried about how strongly you kicked Thor. I couldn’t have you beating him black and blue.”

  I tilted my head, studying him. “Would you have allowed me to get that far?”

  “I considered it.” That alluring grin. “Purely for entertainment value.”

  Carefully, I began to pull my wrists from the chains, taking care not to make any noise, or allow them to jingle with my movements.

  “I’m glad I could be of service to you.”

  Loki’s eyes heated at my words and I paused, just barely avoiding wrinkling my brow. Was he having the same trouble as I was? I wanted to escape, was going to any moment, but I also could not help imagining breaking my chains and tackling him. This was a man who was smart, and he could no doubt hold a conversation about things other than himself, and he was fair game. He looked like such an adventurer. Sur
e, he was holding me prisoner, but that could be rectified.

  I paused in my musings. Bloody hell, I was starting to sound desperate for someone interesting.

  “What sort of creature are you?”

  I blinked. “Creature?”

  “No Midgardian moves the same as you do.”

  “I’m just a human.” I didn’t even know the other options. I flicked my eyes over to Thor where he stood. “I’m fast, but if he would have landed a blow, I’d have probably been mush.”

  Thor looked both proud and worried about my statement, his blue eyes focused on mine. There was interest there, too, and I found it odd that they both seemed intrigued by the spy they captured. I was attractive, sure, but attractive enough to catch the attention of some sort of supernatural beings? Of course, perhaps, it had nothing to do with sexual interest and everything to do with pure intrigue over a woman skilled in fighting.

  “So, what are you?” I asked, both out of curiosity and distraction.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I saw the entire battle, saw you fight them with magic and lightning, respectively. Are you scientists?” If they were, that would explain the lightning. The hammer could have a mechanism that generated it like a modified Tesla coil. The magic could be explained away as basic alchemy if it was not for the clear magic in the bottles at his waist. Of course, not all of what Loki did was alchemy like I had ever witnessed.

  “I don’t think you would believe us, spy.” Loki tilted his head. “Besides, you’re currently working your way free of the chains anyways. There’s truly no need to answer more questions.”

  Pausing the slow pull of my wrist, I met his vibrant green eyes. “Are you going to stop me?”

  “Why should I? It’s far more intriguing to see you make your own moves.”