A Sinister Game (35 page)

Max smiled. It was the secret, knowing smile of someone who had an ace or two up his
invisible
sleeve. Victor’s grip unconsciously tightened
again
on his beautiful captive.

Where was Thor? The son
-
of
–
a
-
bitch
god had
also
vanished
when Victor had turned
invisible and slipped through the clearing to surprise Victoria.

Victor could certainly use his help
right
now. And Simon? Where the hell was
he
?

“You know th
e truth in your heart, Victoria,
” Black
continued privately. He
didn’t want to hurt her. But if he had to
knock her out to force the pill Jeannine
Cure had given him down her throat, he would. He would do anything to keep Blood from
taking her and
wiping her mind again.

“It was no trick of mine that they killed your sister, Victoria. Was it?”
he asked, whispering the words into her ear. At the same time, he released her with one hand and
allowed
cold
power to gather in his palm. If
he coated Blood with the ice, the dark leader
would b
ecome visible to everyone. T
hen Victoria would realize the man’s duplicity.

It wouldn’t hurt
to try
.

As if sensing w
hat Victor
was about to do, Max’s eyes widen
ed – and t
hen he was diving for the ground as Victor pulled his arm back and hurled the ball of cold
at him.

Victor Black was the champion of Ullr,
who was not only the god of ice, but
the god of the
hunt
. Determining what an opponent was going to do before they did it was one of the things a hunter needed to be able to do.

A
s
Bloody Max dove for the ground to avoid being hit by the swirling, whirling ball of frigid
air
,
Black’s aim followed him.

T
he ice hit Max
head-on, coating his entire form with an electric chill so glacially bitt
er, it forced his skin to turn
temporarily blue. Max’s invisibility
instantly
dropped in the assault.

Max lay stunned on the ground. Victor looked down at
the woman in his arms. She was staring at her
prone
t
eam
captain with wide
eyes.

“Max?”

He read her thoughts. She didn’t want to believe what she was seeing. It was damning proof of something she’d started suspecting since Max and
Victor’d fought with cold magic on the streets of Ocanus.

She was confused and hurt. Max had deceived her. Now she wondered how deep that deception went.

“Do you believe me now, love?” Victor asked
softly.

She remained unmoving, her gaze locked on Max.

Suddenly and very unexpectedly,
Ty Murrey pressed the
activation
button on a small device in his hand. Victor
recognized the device too late.

He
felt the s
urge of power that shot from it
like a stiff, electrically charged wind.
It hit Victoria full force,
stunning her so that she stumbled back in to him. But did nothing to Victor; it had clearly been meant for her.

Her legs gave out from under her, and
Victor caught her up in his strong arms, lifting her
completely
as her eyelids
slid shut
.

He scanned her mind. Her thoughts were blank. There was only silence and darkness. It was like a sleep of death.

Victor’s fingers curled tightly around her and he pulled her in close. Fear coursed through
him – f
ear and rage and a need for vengeance. His
burning gaze
found Ty Murrey, looking somewhat unsure, but desperate.

“What did you do to her?”
Victor demanded, his voice barely louder
than a whisper, but his words laced with a kind of
deadly, dangerous magic
.

“I- I don’t know,” Ty stammered. “It’s not supposed to hurt her!”

Blood was up on his knees by that time
,
tossing away what ice still remained on his body
. “The saps, Ty! Get them on her!”
he instructed with a gritty voice.

Ty jumped
glanced
warily f
rom his captain to his Victor.

Black
read his thoughts. Ty wasn’t so sure about his orders
any more.
And Black had Victoria. Getting to her would mean going through Black, which Ty was fairly positive would have been impossible for anyone just then.

Victor drove the thought home. “Attempt to come near us
Murrey, and I will open up eve
ry pore in your body until it’s
leaking blood
,
”
Victor
promised.
He didn’t even need to raise his voice. Ty understood perfectly.

“Give
the saps
to me!” Blood demanded
, and Victor felt another surge of power make its way across the clearin
g, this time
from Blood to Ty
.

Ty
immediately pulled the leather bracelets from his belt
and tossed them to his captain.

Max
caught them and faced Victor. His white t
eeth were bared
in a snarl of hatred
.

There’s n
ot much time….

Victor blinked. He’d caught a stray thought from Max’s mind!

The words were
just barely discernible, floating free on the
suddenly
unprotecte
d surface of his consciousness
.
Max was becoming desperate; his emotions were on overload.
Victor
realized
in that moment of resolution
that
Maxwell Blood would stop at nothing to get Victoria back. It was something they had in common.

Very gently, Victor lowered her to the groun
d, never taking his eyes off
Blood’s furious form.
He
straightened
again
.
“Come and get her, Blood.”

It was all the challenge Max needed.

Loki turned to Odin and gave him a
look
.
“Haven’t we let this go on long enough?”

Odin had pulled Loki
, Andromeda,
and Thor out of their locations a
nd back to his throne room the
moment Rose Tyrnan had decided to go outside to meet with her
teammates
.

He claimed he’d retrieved
them
in order to allow
things
to play out as they “needed to
”
with the humans.
At least Loki’d managed to give Black the boon of
being able to see
through Maxwell Blood’s invisibility before he’d been yanked away.

But now his
champion was
unconscious and Black and Blood were about to go head to head over her.

“I knew you wouldn’t be able to keep
your chaotic nature from interfering in this, Loki, and that’s why I came. But for fuck’s sake, those aren’t children
out there. They don’t need to be nursed.”

Loki blinked at the All Father. When he was in a mood, he was really in a
mood
.

“My champion is
asleep
,” Loki insisted, trying to keep the fire out of his tone. “Don’t tell me that’s all part of the plan.”

“
Svarte, din teiting, Loki.
” Odin swore softly. He
closed his eyes and shook his head, using his large fingers to pinch the bridge of his nose.
Since the wall had been erected, Odin had headaches. He’d had them for centuries now.
“You must let them do as much as they can on their own. Save what strength you have for when it is truly needed.”

“But this is
our
fight,
and the humans are fighting it!” Thor interjected, his storm-gray eyes shooting lightning sparks.

Odin shot him a weary glance and sighed. “Because a fight
concerns
you does not make it
yours
, Thor. Likewise, many battles that may
not
concern you
are
yours to fight.”

“Oh fuck,
” Ullr sighed loudly, “he’s speaking in riddles again.” The powerful god of winter and the hunt ran a hand through his
pitch-black
hair and shook hi
s head. He was a handsome god, d
ark and swarthy, tall and strong, with eyes that shifted from the coldest blue to the clearest glacial green at a moment’s notice.

Loki glanced in Andromeda’s direction. J
ust as he’d feared, she was watching Ullr. Not that he could
technically blame her. The ice god
was beautiful in that dangerous way women seemed to
love
so damned much.

Plus, she’d been Ullr’s
champion
in life
. She
still
carried ice magic in her veins, could control the cold, create winter, read minds, and vanish like the final snow on a spring morning. Ullr had given her the power she possessed and he was the one who had
ultimately made her a goddess
.

In truth, Loki was grateful to Ullr. Andromeda was Loki’s mate, and she never would have been had Ullr not brought her here to live among them.

“How much longer?”
Loki asked impatiently.

“Not much,” Odin replied, simply. Then he straightened, his long white hair and beard shimmering in the shafts of late afternoon sunlight that shot through the
windows
.
His one good eye glittered
intelligently
.
“In fact,
now
will do.”

* * * *

Simon was fairly sure that if Thor hadn’t given him a smidgeon of
his godly strength before he’
d
suddenly and inexplicably
disappeared
, he
would be having a panic attack right now. He was used to fighting well enough. But
those were just Games. This had become something entirely different.

This involved gods. It involved guards and i
nno
cent people a
nd an utter lack of rules. Whe
reas on the Field, even the smallest
wound would be healed at once by a
light leader
no matter which side of the Game you were on, here and now, he could very well die.

They all could.

And he
didn’t like the sound of that, b
ecause
though he
now remembered that he would die a hero
in battle, Valhalla was not exactly a giant library. It was a giant hall made for eatin
g and fighting and
copulating
and then
dying
and doing it all again the next morning.

Simon wanted books. He wanted
knowledge
.

Simon
straightened his glasses.
He closed his eyes and tried to get his fears under control.
It was time to pull his mind back into the present and
concentrate. Focus.

He opened his eyes and
slowly looked around.
Game Control’s guards surrounded him
. Of course, they didn’t know he was there. They were watching Max
and Victor
out in the clearing
. They didn’t see Simon where he crouched quietly beneath the underbrush.

Thor had
turned him invisible and
unceremoniously dumped him in the midst of his enemy so that he would get a better shot at them with the anti-nausea-sleep gas.
H
e’d warned him that the invisibility wouldn’t last long. The gods were trying to conserve their strength for
a possible
upcoming battle with the Game Lord.