Getting him to stop talking. That didn’t exactly make me look forward to the trip. I had a feeling I’d be spending a lot of time trying to steer the chattery squirrel to the topic of conversation we wanted.

 

Thruor had also suggested an appropriate bribe. I couldn’t think of anything to bribe a squirrel, even an intelligent divine squirrel, with other than nuts or maybe Squirrel Girl comics.

 

I bought a couple of the latter, just out of craziness. And read them. I decided that Loki must have whispered a couple of ideas in the ears of the writers who came up with this.

 

Which wasn’t a bad thing.

 

“Squirrel Girl?” Kanesha teased.

 

“Thruor’s taking me to talk to Ratatosk. She suggested a bribe.”

 

Kanesha laughed. “Squirrel Girl comics?”

 

“And nuts, of course. What else do you bribe a squirrel with? I think if I was a squirrel I’d like a story about squirrels saving the world.”

 

Kanesha considered that. “I like stories about black girls saving the world. Aren’t enough of them.”

 

“Yeah. Ugh. Does that make me the white girl protagonist and you the plucky sidekick?”

 

She made a face. “At least I get to be the love interest, even if I don’t need a man.”

 

I started laughing at that and couldn’t stop.

 

“What?”

 

“I’m…sorry…I…” I closed the comic. “I think I just needed to laugh at something.”

 

“Maybe you need more comics.”

 

Maybe I did. Or something. A good, funny movie maybe. Ghostbusters was gone, but…hrm… “I think I need a funny movie.”

 

“I’ll look what’s on.” She kissed me on the cheek.

 

I didn’t think there was much good on, but I was sure Kanesha could, at least, find something on Netflix. I looked at the comics then put them in little bags.

 

It probably was stupid, but I needed to know what the squirrel could tell me. Not, exactly, what he knew, of course. It didn’t work like that.

 

What he could tell me. What he was allowed to say, what I could understand. If he was translating for the World Tree that might not be very much.

 

But it couldn’t hurt. I supposed if he got mad with me he might decide not to talk to me for a few centuries, but…

 

What could a squirrel do?

 

Talk my ear off, apparently.