Perfekt Order (The Ære Saga Book 1) (26 page)

“Fine.” Brynn sighed. “So here’s the deal.
Freya has been looking for a match for Tyr for-freaking-ever. He
has this weird complex and doesn’t think he deserves to be happy,
so he’ll hook up with girls but he won’t get serious about anybody,
because he thinks he’ll just destroy their spirit or get them
killed, whatever.”

“I gathered that,” I murmured.

“Right. Well, the Norns told Freya there’s a
prophecy about who Tyr’s going to end up with. Apparently he’s
destined to be with a girl
not of Asgard
.”

“What does that mean?” I asked.

“It means he’s not fated to be with a
goddess. He’s fated to be with someone from another realm. It could
be a light elf, or a mountain giant, or…” Brynn waggled her
eyebrows.

“Or a human?” Did that mean Tyr and I could
actually be…
fated
to be together?

“Or a human,” she confirmed. “But the
prophecy doesn’t say
which
human. Something that specific
would take away Tyr’s agency, you know? The Norns are supposed to
guide, not dictate. So it was up to Freya as Goddess of Love to
lead Tyr in the direction of a good non-Asgardian match.”

“Hold on. Freya’s Goddess of Love?” I
gaped.

“Yep. Also head of the valkyries. Anyway, she
knew Tyr needed to get out of Asgard to protect Elsa, so she found
a handful of girls who met her
very
specific
qualifications—you included—and planned to introduce all of you to
Tyr and hope he’d fall for one of you. But then Fenrir attacked
you, and Tyr’s always been a sucker for a damsel in distress. The
fact that you happen to fit the profile of his ideal match from
both Freya’s standpoint, and the prophecy, well…” Brynn shrugged,
finally taking a breath. “Sometimes things just have a way of
working out.”

Except my ‘ideal match’ was an immortal
battle deity, and I was an Engineering undergrad. Romeo and Juliet
had nothing on us in the star-crossed lovers department.

“Why is Freya so keen to match up Tyr? Did
Tyr know what Freya was up to? That she’d lined up a bunch of girls
for him to meet?” In other words, had I inadvertently entered the
world’s most bizarre dating competition? One where nobody bothered
to ask me if I wanted to participate?

“Oh, gods, no. He didn’t know anything about
the whole dating plan when Freya suggested he bring Elsa to
Arcata—he only knew it was wooded, remote, and close to one of our
safe houses. Freya’s filled him in since, and he’s none too
thrilled he moved realms in part to satisfy her matchmaking needs.
He’s resisted every match Freya’s tried to pair him with.” She
elbowed me in the arm. “Guess you’re too irresistible, even for the
bachelor god.”

“There were other girls…” My brain
whirred.

“There were.” Brynn spoke matter-of-factly.
“In Freya’s mind, any one of them could have been a match for Tyr,
but based on your profile, and your unbelievable stubbornness, we
thought you had the highest likelihood of winning him over. It’s
why Freya moved me in here, instead of with one of the other girls.
You were our best bet, and in the event you accomplished what we
hoped and captured Tyr’s heart, we knew you’d require protection
immediately. Possibly sooner.”

The words made my blood chill. She hadn’t
been wrong about needing protection. Fenrir’s attack came within an
hour of my arrival in Arcata—before I’d even met Tyr. But that
wasn’t the only thing Brynn said that left me unsettled. “Wait. I
was your best bet for what?”

Brynn’s eyes filled with moisture for just an
instant before she blinked it away. “Tyr’s got a lot of darkness in
that pretty little head of his. We’re afraid if he loses one more
person close to him, he could snap. And if that happens, we need to
make sure someone with a strong unifying spirit is with him, to
keep him grounded. You’re amazing at bringing people together; you
know that, right? You’d make a great Unifier. That positive energy
is what he’s going to need if, Odin forbid, we lose Elsa. We’re
counting on you to keep him on our side. Because if the God of War
goes dark…” Brynn’s eyes turned down and she bit her bottom lip.
She looked absolutely gutted. “Well, it wouldn’t be pretty.”

I cradled my head in my hands and breathed
slowly. The immortals of Asgard were counting on me to keep their
war god from falling into darkness. Because according to the
Goddess of Love, I was his best match.

It would take years to process all of
this.

“How does Henrik play into everything?” I
rubbed my temples.

“Henrik is Tyr’s bodyguard.” Brynn pulled an
emery board off her nightstand and started filing.

“Sweet, goofy Henrik… with the glasses always
slipping down his nose… the guy who bakes… he’s the God of War’s
bodyguard?”

“The glasses are for show. He thinks it makes
him blend in. Please.” Brynn tossed her hair. “Do you think we have
to worry about vision? We can see five times farther than mortals.
In the dark. Some of us have X-ray abilities.”

How was that even possible?

“Why does the God of War need a bodyguard,
anyway?” I asked.

“Who do you think the dark elves go after
first when they move to debilitate Asgard? God of War. Take out the
leader, it’s super easy to pick off the followers. It’s Combat
101.” Brynn went back to her nails.

“So why did Freya send you?”

“To protect you.” Brynn looked up.

“Of course. You’re here to protect me…”
Suddenly Brynn’s ability to head fearlessly into a rodent-infested
attic made sense. She probably saw a lot worse things as a
valkyrie.
Yeesh
.

“We were worried the fire giants might follow
us here—there was this revolt happening when we left. That’s why I
wasn’t there to look out for you the day you arrived in
Arcata—sorry about that, by the way. But the giants ended up not
being an issue.”

“What exactly is a fire giant?” I pulled my
knees to my chest.

“A really, really evil monster.” Brynn put
down her file. “Trust me, you don’t want to go to Muspelheim.”

“Have you been there?” I asked.

“Of course. We visit all the realms in our
training. Our primary function as valkyries is to bring fallen
soldiers back to Asgard. The only requirement is that they be of
solid moral character, so most are human soldiers, but occasionally
we’ll find a diamond in the rough in one of the other realms.
Anyway, we take half to Odin to defend the realm, and give half to
Freya to disperse as she sees fit. I have no idea how she handles
her job. Being warrior goddess of love sounds good on paper, but in
reality they’re such different functions, you know?”

“Huh.” I paused. Maybe whoever said all’s
fair in love and war was talking about Tyr’s bestie. “So what
exactly are your duties? You bring dead soldiers to Freya and Odin.
Anything else?”

“I’m Tyr’s second.” Brynn rested her head
against her pillow.

“His second what?”

“His second bodyguard. Henrik’s his primary.
Tyr’s got all kinds of fancy weapons at his disposal, but Henrik
likes to kill with his hands. He’s the one you need to watch out
for.”

I closed my eyes. My TA was a trained
assassin, and my perky little roomie was a valkyrie. Jason was
right—college was definitely
not
turning out the way I’d
imagined.

“There are a lot of scary monsters in the
realms, Mia. We can’t afford to take chances with the lives of our
charges.”

“Doesn’t that make you nervous? Killing
people?”

“Monsters,” Brynn corrected. “I’ve never
killed a human. And not really. All gods and goddesses have
extensive combat training from primary school on. Drop us in just
about any situation and we’ve got it covered. Perps very rarely
survive.”

“This is unreal.” Gods and monsters and perps
and realms… my-black-and-white world crumbled into a million shades
of grey. I examined my cuticles, wondering if I should be nervous
about being alone with a trained assassin.

“Now that Fenrir’s back, Tyr will probably
order me to protect you full-time.”

“Why?” My hands gripped the bed.

“Because.” Brynn looked at me as if I was a
few needles short of a haystack. “Fenrir’s going after the people
Tyr loves. Duh.”

My hair flew as I whipped my head back and
forth. “Tyr doesn’t love me. We’ve only known each other a couple
of months.”

Brynn rolled her eyes. “For a math genius,
you’re unusually unobservant.”

“Whatever,” I muttered. This wasn’t a
conversation I was ready to have with myself, much less anyone
else. And especially with someone other than Tyr. We had a pretty
heavy State of the Union talk ahead of us, and I wasn’t about to
have it with someone else, first. “So you and Henrik are here to
protect Tyr. Tyr’s here to protect Elsa. Fenrir’s out to hurt
pretty much everyone.” I paused. “What about Elsa? Besides being
Tyr’s sister, how does she play into all of this? She’s not a war
god too, is she?”

“Oh, gosh no. She’s way too valuable to allow
in combat. She’s a High Healer, someone who can perform
extremely
improbable healings. She’s got super intense
magic. Well they both do, from what I understand.” Brynn wiggled
her eyebrows. “Like I said, you’d make a great Unifier if you and
Tyr make it permanent.”

My head felt like I was on an out-of-control
carousel.

“You look exhausted.” Brynn patted my hand.
“Why don’t you try to get some sleep? I’ll be up for a while if you
have any more questions.”

I couldn’t imagine getting any sleep tonight,
let alone having some job in Asgard. And a future with Tyr.

“I think I’m all questioned out for now. I
should probably go think about all of this. Thanks for talking.” I
stood and walked to the door, opening it slowly. When I stepped
into the hall, Brynn called out.

“I’m here if you need anything.
Anything
.”

“Thanks.” I gave a small wave, then walked
into my room and flopped face-down on my bed.

My boyfriend was an immortal warrior, my
roommate was a valkyrie, and whoever married Tyr might be the key
to intergalactic peace. And it could very well be me.

I DIDN’T GET ANY
sleep Friday night,
and I spent all of Saturday going back and forth on whether I could
handle being with Tyr, now that I knew what he was, and what was
expected of him… and what was expected of the girl he ended up
with. Tyr had only just come into my life, and up until last night,
I’d thought he might become a semi-permanent fixture. But now… now
I realized he wasn’t at all what I’d believed him to be. How could
I be in a relationship with someone who’d pretended to be something
they weren’t? But then, how could I walk away from the first guy
I’d ever fallen this hard for? Tyr made me feel things I’d never
felt for anyone, ever. Which was problematic, considering I’d been
ready to sleep with him, and our entire relationship was built
on a lie
. Or was it? Technically, Tyr had never outright
lied to me. Everything he told me about his friendships with Brynn
and Henrik, his life in Malmö, and even about his parents and his
sister had all been true. He’d lied through omission, which was
pretty lousy, but he’d always changed the subject when things got
too complicated, or too close to the truth.

The truth.

The truth was, Tyr was an almost
one-thousand-year-old Norse God. G.O.D. Apparently he was a very
important one, because he had a big-deal job. And if I understood
correctly, he was a totally unflappable killing machine. My first
real boyfriend was an immortal assassin, tasked with defending the
universe from perma-destruction.

What had I gotten myself into?

Could I really be in a relationship with Tyr,
knowing everything that would come with it? He was a god—
a
god
. He’d live forever, or until something killed him. He’d
look twenty years old for at least the next couple of centuries.
He’d always have monsters and demons and evil elves and giant dogs
trying to kill him, and if I chose to be his girlfriend, and maybe
someday his wife, all those creatures would come after me, too. I’d
have to take a whole new kind of self-defense class, which would
have been exciting if it didn’t involve fighting Hel. Literally. A
perky blond bodyguard would follow me around twenty-four hours a
day, and even if she was one of the best friends I’d made at
Redwood, I’d still have no semblance of privacy. I’d have to lie to
my parents and Jason; that one bothered me the most. Tyr didn’t
just go traipsing around telling humans what he was. Being with him
would mean keeping his secret and secrets were a rare breed in the
Ahlström household. Eventually my folks would want to meet Tyr, and
then what would I do? Bring him to Connecticut and hope he won them
over with his charm? He was a stickler for bringing flowers, a
point that would earn him favor with my Southern mother, but what
would happen if we dated for a few years? My dad would expect him
to propose. Would he want to do that? Would
I
want him to do
that? And what about children? We were from different planets, or
realms, or whatever; could we even
have
kids together? Would
Tyr want to? What if we did get married? What would happen in three
decades when I had crow’s feet and the occasional grey hair, and
Tyr still looked like a twenty-year-old frat boy? How would we
explain that?

My head pounded from all the questions, and
by late Saturday afternoon I couldn’t take it anymore. I called the
one person whose advice had never steered me wrong.

“Hey, Sis.” Jason answered on the first ring.
“Shouldn’t you be out with that dreamboat of yours? Tire?”

“
Tee-er
,” I corrected. “And yeah. I
should be. But we sort of had a disagreement last night. So we’re
spending the day apart.”