I did, finally, get some sleep, curled on one of the beds, the sword close enough that I could grab it if anything happened.

But the question in my mind when I woke up was the same thing. How did I get Kanesha back to her life? Could I?

I could not stand the thought of being responsible for wasting her potential, but it was her choice. Maybe if she detached herself from me she would be okay. She was up before I was, and I could hear the sounds of her and Lizbet making breakfast in the kitchen.

Maybe I should disappear. No. I was going to talk to Mike. If the valkyries had protected him, I knew he would be okay. Protected him, not me.

Trusted me to look after myself. That felt good. The feeling that they might indeed be doing that felt better than I might have imagined before. Children were protected. Adults were trusted.

Of course, Mike wasn’t a child. I wandered into the kitchen. “I need to talk to Mike.”

Lizbet nodded. “I’ll call Thruor.” She moved into the other room, tugging out a disposable cell phone.

So mundane – but then, what was wrong with using the advantages of modern technology? Guns, cell phones, cars. The stupid idea that technology negated magic. Maybe technology bred cynicism and reduced the desire to use it, but it didn’t negate it. Wasn’t that a D&D thing?

No, a Tolkein thing. Dark satanic mills taking over the Shire, industrialization as evil. He had a point, in a way. Pollution caused problems, and the world was…not going to go to hell in a handbasket.

No. Somehow I was going to keep that from happening. Give humanity a chance to get their act together. I glanced at Kanesha. “If you leave now, they might…”

“No. They’re going to know hurting me would hurt you. I don’t think they’d ever believe either of us if we said we weren’t friends any more.” Her hesitation on the word friend was almost chilling.

Were we friends? Were we reaching to being something other than that…not more, not less, just other. Could I?

She was going to die. She was going to die and one day I wouldn’t be able to prevent it, but then, Lizbet was a ghost.

“That one is yours” echoed in my mind. “They can only hurt you so much,” I said out loud, not sure where the words came from.
They could kill her. I might…might be able to stop them from doing something else to her.
Then I heard the door downstairs open. I dived back into the bedroom to retrieve the sword.

A teenager came into the room…then melted and blurred into Loki.

“Father.” I stumbled over the word slightly, but I managed to say it.

“Good. You’re safe.”

“Safe and not kidnapped and taken to Muspelheim.”

He shrugged slightly. “I have a feeling he’d regret actually doing that.”
The thought of pretending to go along with Surtur then stabbing him in his bed came into my mind again, but I was not my father or some kind of Salome. I’d rather deal with this honestly.

Maybe that was my mother’s influence. “There’s enough breakfast for you. And chocolate pop tarts.”