Thor's Serpents

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MM: To Dylan and Asia Alsgaard, since I learned Norse myth to be better at being
your
mother, the series is obviously for you.

KA: For my sons, Alex and Marcus, this trilogy was for you. And for my nephew, Marshall, I promise they don’t all die in the end.

I
t was hard for Matt to pretend he didn’t know two wolves had followed them from the campsite. Reyna seemed to have no such problem. Maybe she thought he was imagining the Raider Scouts. More likely she just wasn’t about to let something as inconsequential as imminent death distract her from detailing every mistake he’d made yesterday, fighting the Viking zombie warriors known as the draugr.

“And then, when you made it to the king’s throne, I noted a few tactical errors.”

“I’m sure you did.”

“I’m just trying to help you improve. You do want to
improve, don’t you?” She smiled when she said it, not bothering to pretend she didn’t enjoy needling him.

“I have a suggestion for the next battle,” he said. “You could join me on the front lines.”

“I’m the descendant of Freya. Unlike Thor’s champion, I’m not supposed to be on the front line.” She moved aside a branch. “However, I could be persuaded to join you, if I had a proper weapon. I’d like a sword. The draugr king’s looked good.”

He shook his head and cast a sidelong glance into the surrounding forest, trying to catch a glimpse of the wolves. After the draugr fight, where Matt had recovered Mjölnir—Thor’s legendary hammer—he’d retreated to the forest with the other descendants of the North: Reyna and her twin brother, Ray, along with Laurie, Fen, Baldwin, and Owen. There, they planned to regroup before their next mission, but after the adrenaline-pumping fight, no one really wanted to rest. Fen had wandered off first. Matt had gone next, with Reyna following him.

Matt hadn’t planned to walk far, but after about twenty paces, he’d realized two of the Raider Scouts—
wulfenkind
—were following them, so he was leading them away from the others.

“We could take them hostage,” Reyna said. “Question them.”

He mouthed,
They’re wolves
, and she shrugged, as if to say
So?
While he’d agree it would be great to question Raiders, he wasn’t sure he should risk it when they had fangs and claws. Also…

“Questioning means getting them talking,” he said. “That could be tough if they’re in wolf form.”

“Oh, I could make them talk.”

He shook his head. He was getting used to Reyna. She wasn’t what he’d expected—in a lot of ways. He’d figured the descendant of Freya would be, well, more… blond. Reyna’s hair
was
blond, but she’d just dyed it black. When he’d first met her, she had her nails colored black, too, and had worn makeup in the same harsh shade. By now the makeup was gone, the nail polish was chipping off, and she’d traded in her black clothes for faded jeans and a T-shirt advertising some band he’d never heard of.

The wolves seemed content to follow, but Matt knew better. He might not be much of a football player—boxing and wrestling were more his thing—but a guy couldn’t grow up in Blackwell without playing the game. These two were flanking him. Waiting for him to fumble the ball, so they could swoop in.

The question was: what was the ball? He had his shield, which he’d taken back from the Raiders. He had his amulet, too, but its “Hammer power” only worked for a descendant of Thor. They could take the amulet, but it wasn’t unique and he could easily get another. The bigger prize, of course, was
Mjölnir, but even the draugr king had barely been able to lift that.

The
wulfenkind
might want Reyna. If that was the case, though, he’d be tempted to hand her over because they’d discover their mistake soon enough—she’d probably drag them back, slung over her shoulder like a brace of wild turkeys.

Taking Matt out of the game would be more useful, since Freya didn’t play a major role at Ragnarök, the Norse apocalypse. But while the Raiders might have the advantage of wolf forms, Reyna had magic and he had both Mjölnir and his amulet’s power. So how did they expect to capture—?

Matt stopped short. Reyna kept going, still talking, for a few feet before she realized he wasn’t beside her. She stopped and mouthed,
What’s wrong?

“I just remembered there’s a stream with a waterfall. I wanted to take a closer look. I think it’s over here.…”

He began walking left. Reyna apparently trusted he didn’t really want to check out a waterfall and fell in step beside him. Ahead, he could make out the wolves’ brown fur through the bushes. They regrouped, ready to block his path.

“They were herding us,” Reyna whispered.

He nodded. The Raiders must be camped along the path they’d been walking. As long as he and Reyna had kept going that way, the wolves had been happy to follow in the shadows. Now that Matt veered off the route, they’d strike and drive them to their camp.

“Showtime?” Reyna asked. When he hesitated, she whispered, “Don’t worry. I’ll help you.”

“That’s not—” He caught her teasing grin and shook his head. “I’m not sure it’s safe.”

“It never is. So…?”

As Thor’s champion, Matt was the group leader, which was way more responsibility than he liked. It also meant he couldn’t afford unnecessary risks. But his only alternative was to lead them back to the others, which he’d never do.

They
could
use a hostage.…

“Okay,” he said. “Follow my lead.”

“Yes, sir.”

Onward it was, then. Play dumb and wait for the attack.

“If you want a logistical problem to solve,” he said to Reyna, “figure out how I’m supposed to carry this hammer around.”

“That’s boring. I like battle strategy better.”

“All the strategy in the world won’t help if I strain my wrist carrying this thing.”

“Whine, whine. You’ve got a magical hammer, a magical necklace, a magical shield, magical battle-goats… and now you want a magical hammer holder, too? You’re so spoiled. You know what—”

She swung around midsentence, her hands going out, lips moving in a spell.

Matt lunged at the charging wolf. Reyna hit it with a jet of fog, which startled the first wolf, and it fell back, leaving Matt with the second, still barreling toward him.

Matt swung Mjölnir. Then he realized he was aiming a solid metal hammer at a kid’s head. Yes, it was a Raider, but that didn’t change the fact this “wolf” wasn’t a draugr or a troll or any other kind of Norse monster. One blow to the skull with Mjölnir, and this kid-in-wolf’s-clothing would be dead.

Matt couldn’t stop the swing. The momentum was too much. All he could do was divert the strike. It still hit the wolf in the front leg, and there was a sickening crack as the bone broke.

The wolf yowled in agony and collapsed onto its side. Matt wheeled on the other one, now recovered from the surprise of the fog blast and racing toward him. He quickly switched Mjölnir to his left hand, but that threw his balance off too much for a good punch. He launched his other Hammer instead—the invisible blow from his amulet.

There was a flash of light and a boom, announcing the invisible punch, but it came too late for the wolf to veer off course. The Hammer blow knocked the beast backward into a tree. Matt ran to tackle it, but Reyna was closer and leaped in first. She knocked the wolf down and then pinned it in a choke hold.

“Umm…” Matt began.

“Did I mention I know self-defense? Aikido and karate. When your dad owns a casino, you need to know how to take care of yourself. You aren’t the only fighter in this little god-gang, Matt.”

“Okay, but what I was going to say is that you’re using a hold meant for a person. That’s not a—”

The wolf bucked and slipped right out of her grasp. The beast twisted around, snapping. Matt managed to yank her away in time. Then he jumped the wolf… as the one behind them began yowling in fresh pain.

No, not yowling. It was howling.

Wolf. Howl. That was how they communicated with pack members.…

Matt leaped up, cursing. Reyna looked as shocked at the oath as if he’d changed into a wolf himself. He tore past her, saying “Use the fog. Confuse the other one” as he lunged for the wounded wolf. He grabbed it by the muzzle, managing to avoid inch-long fangs. He snapped the beast’s jaws shut and cut off its howl midnote.

“It’s calling the others,” Reyna said. “I’m sorry.”

Reyna cast her fog spell. When the wolf ran through it, she landed a surprisingly accurate kick to the underside of its jaw. It fell back with a yelp. Then, lost in the fog, the beast started to howl. And in the distance, other wolves replied, their howls growing closer until Matt could hear the pounding of paws.

“We need to go,” he said quickly. “We can’t fight them all—”

Reyna delivered one more kick to the second wolf while Matt released the injured one. They started to run. Behind them, he caught the sound of voices. Human voices. That wasn’t unusual—not all Raiders changed to wolves for a fight. But what slowed Matt was one of the voices. The loudest of them. Shouting. He couldn’t make out the words, but they sounded angry.

He knew that voice. Knew it in a heartbeat.

He’s been captured. He’s in trouble. I need to help him.

Matt turned back. The fog had cleared, and he could see a few wolves in the distance. Behind them were two figures. Hattie, one of the leaders of this pack of Raiders. And standing beside her, shouting orders at the wolves?

Fen.