Stormbringer: Book 2 of the Wyrd

Thirteen

Thirteen

Em called it Operation Hearts and Minds. She hadn't given any more detail than that, just grinning a sly and dimpled grin, enthusiasm practically oozing between her teeth.

Sigmund was in trouble, and he needed their help. No surprises there, which was why they were currently standing outside of Hel's tent.

The word didn't really do it justice. Marquee would probably have been better, or maybe yurt. Wayne had never been clear on what a yurt was, exactly, but Hel's current office would've been Wayne's first guess: a sort of round, felt-covered building, mostly black, and decorated by a variety of skulls and glossy feathers that looked to have been shed by the Lady herself.

It also had two enormous Helbeasts curled around the outside, guarding.

The Helbeasts were really, really cool. Wayne had an entire sketchbook full of the ones she'd seen, no two of which were exactly alike. They all had horns, and feathers, and tails, and four limbs and two wings, but inside those constraints was nothing but variation. The smallest Helbeasts being the size of large dogs, the largest being, well.

The largest were the drekar.

Em had made that connection. Wayne had asked her, not long before Munin arrived, flicking through her sketchbooks and noting similarities until she'd said, "Hey, dooder. The Helbeasts and the dragons—?"

"They're jötunn— jötnar," Em had said, not looking up from her tablet even as she'd corrected her own noun form.

"Aaah." Suddenly, what Sigyn had said—had used Sigmund to say—about Loki's horse boyfriend made a whole bunch of sense.

Point being: Helbeasts. Wicked cool.

The one to the left of Hel's yurt was ice-themed, with blue-gray skin and copiously fluffy long white feathers. The one on the left was sleeker, with much more of its black skin exposed beneath iridescent green plumage. Both looked up when Wayne and Em approached the Helyurt, and Wayne gave them a smile and a wave.

"Um, hey," she said. "Can we talk with Hel for a moment?"

The white Helbeast huffed, gesturing with its head.

Like the drekar, the Helbeasts didn't seem to speak human-comprehensible languages. But they understood them well enough.

"Thanks!" Wayne gave both Hel's guards a little wave before stepping forward to poke her head inside the yurt's flap. "Um. Hello?"

The inside of the yurt was dark, Ásgarðr's sun blotted out by furs and black wool. The only illumination came from little lamps hanging from the ceiling, burning with some kind of eerie, blue-green magelight.

"Honored sisters, enter."

Hel herself was sitting on a mat in the center of a pile of cushions. She'd been kneeling when Wayne looked in, head bowed and hands folded into a purposeful position, like in prayer or meditation. If Wayne had to guess, she would've said it was something magic, given the charge in the air and the taste of copper behind her tongue.

Both sensations faded as Hel's attention shifted outward. Wayne entered the yurt, Em trailing along behind, and Hel gestured to the cushions at her side.

"Come, sit. I trust things outside are to your liking?"

Hel was wicked cool, and awesome, and kind. But she also had a bit of a stiffness about her, something overly cautious and formal. Wayne was used to it, because Em gave off the same vibe sometimes. It was the aura, Wayne thought, of someone who hadn't grown up with very many friends. The shield of someone who knew they weren't always an easy person to like.