Stormbringer: Book 2 of the Wyrd

One

Here's the trick: Endings only look like endings from the front. From behind, they look like beginnings.

It's the second-to-last day in March, and the sky over Pandemonium City is a riot of orange and gray. It's getting darker earlier, the sun swallowed by the ravenous hunger of autumn. Daylight Savings is nearly done. It's not quite cold yet, but it's getting there, and winter is, by all accounts, definitely coming.

The inside of the car is warm, even with the top down. Sigmund's in the passenger seat, dressed in ratty jeans and his old black N7 hoodie. His head is back, dark curls fighting with the wind. Exhaustion rolls off him in waves, and not only because he's spent the whole day shifting boxes of crap into my apartment.

Two months ago, Sigmund Sussman killed a man. Well, allegorically speaking. But allegorically doesn't count for much, not at three a.m. with the feel of rune-scarred wood beneath his palms. With the memory of the way Baldr's skin had tried pushing back against Gungnir's bite. Tried, and failed.

To say "all things" swore no harm to Ásgarðr's favored son is, perhaps, an overstatement. The great beast that gave its tooth never made such a foolish oath. It loathed the golden-haired little brat, and shed no tears when he died.

Not that first time, nor the second.

Baldr was born to die, that's what dying gods are for. But it doesn't mean Sigmund was born to be the man to do it. And all the allegory—all the happily ever afters—in the world can't wash the blood out of his mind.

So he hasn't been sleeping well. I know this, because he's mostly been not sleeping in my bed, and I don't sleep at all. Not since being imprisoned in a cave for a thousand years, poison burning my eyes to milky blanks. Rebirth may have given me back my breath and heartbeats, but the blindness and the insomnia stayed. I don't mind so much. Half measures are all I'm made from now.

Allegory. Go figure.

Point being, Sigmund stays at my place, most nights. That apartment I bought for Lain, a literal lifetime ago, all trendy open-plan and within convenient walking distance to work—the head office of my company, Lokabrenna, Inc. Sigmund tells me he sleeps over to save on petrol and on parking. I don't mind the excuse. We both know the real reason.

We're taking things slow, for both our sakes. For Sigmund, even living out of home is scary new territory, let alone cohabiting with a lover. For me, I just don't want to fuck things up. I was celibate for a thousand years, once. A few weeks now won't kill me.

I hope.

Two months ago, I destroyed the world. Today, I helped Sigmund move into Lain's apartment. Tomorrow, I'm going to have to make a trip. Something I've been putting off, and something that might see me out of the city for a while. So, tonight, we're going out. To celebrate.

"Hey, Sig. We're here."

Sig blinks awake when I touch him, drawing the deep breath of the chronically wrecked as he does so. The taste of his exhausted disorientation is bitter in my throat, and the guilt of it makes me say, "If you're too tired . . ."

But Sigmund shakes his head, pushing himself out of his slouch and giving me a smile. It's worn around the edges, but genuine, and his fingers are cool where he laces them through mine. "Nah," he says. "I'm okay. Or will be, after some food."

Sigmund doesn't lie—can't lie—and so I return his smile with a kiss, then pop my door and step out of the car. He does the same on his side, then joins me on the pavement.

We're in Aldershot, Panda's most overpriced suburb. My billionaire CEO alter ego, Travis Hale, has a mansion here somewhere. It's a huge, austere thing. All harsh right angles and enormous plate-glass windows, settled on a three-acre block of landscaped native garden that fades into undeveloped bush just past the boundary fence. TV crews come and film it sometimes, and Travis hosts parties there at others. But that's about all it's good for.