Page 15 of Odin

If Olaf was watching her, she'd bet he was laughing his arse off. She could almost imagine him standing there in the courtyard, snow shovel in hand, massive muscled shoulders shaking as he hid his mirth behind one huge hand.

Fuck, was that really the answer? So fucking simple she hadn't even thought of it?

Because why would any sane person go out in a snowstorm...unless they were burying a body in the snow?

Freyja seized a shovel and began to dig.

EIGHTEEN

Odin waited until it was dark enough to venture outside before heading up to the roof to check on the ravens. The snowfall had faded to just a few flakes at a time, and he was surprised to find the ravens – parents and babies – had weathered the storm quite well, and while they were initially hostile, they soon calmed down when he laid out the table scraps from Freyja's last meal.

He did notice that the black tiles were now covered with snow, which the maintenance manual said was not a good thing. He wanted to ask Freyja's advice on the correct course of action first, though, for she was surely more familiar with these magical power systems than he was. All the knowledge he had came from a few pictures in a book.

The temperature was definitely dropping, with more snow on the way, so he should find her sooner rather than later to make sure the work was finished before the next wave of this storm hit.

He was just about to descend into the building again to search for Freyja, when he noticed movement on the ground.

What in the gods' name...?

He headed down to the courtyard instead. "What are you doing?"

She huffed out a breath and set down her shovel. "I'm looking for the missing body, only I haven't found it yet, which is why I'm still digging. Care to enlighten me, or are you just going to try to distract me with your dick again?"

Frigg had said and done many puzzling things in their time together, but Freyja made him feel like a witless fool.

She evidently knew it, too, for she grabbed his arm like he was a wayward toddler. "Come with me, and I'll show you." She took him to a room with metal tables, then stopped outside the door. "This is where I put the ice mummy to defrost on Friday. This is where it still should be, except it isn't." She patted her pockets, then scowled. "I left my security pass down in the loading bay. You'll have to open the door."

Obediently, Odin grabbed the handle, but it did not budge. "I do not believe I can." Unless she wanted him to break the door, which he suspected he could, but then he would have to repair it, and he did not know nearly enough about working glass or metal to do that.

She swore. "Fine, I'll go get mine. You stay right here and don't move until I get back." She stormed off before he could mention the possible power problems.

She returned soon enough with a small palm-sized rectangle that she swiped across a box with a blinking light, which went from red to green. Now she could turn the door handle with no effort at all.

He wouldn't mind a magic card like that. "Where do I get such a card?" he asked.

She frowned. "The university issues them pretty much the day you start, because you can't access most of the staff areas without one. Out here, though...maybe yours is still in the post. I guess I could take a look in the office, in case it's already arrived, but no one thought to open it..." She shook her head. "But that's not important. What is important is what's supposed to be here and isn't!" She strode into the room, then yanked open a second door that led to a cold storage chamber. "What do you see that's wrong with this picture?" She waved at the interior, as mist curled around her boots.

Odin looked inside. "There is very little here. A lot of empty shelves, and a table on wheels with a tub full of water." He stepped inside and peered into the tub. "Just a short hunting spear." He pulled it out of the water, the weight achingly familiar in his hand.

He'd set this spear in Loki's hand, the day his family had died. He would have done the same for Vali and Vidarr, when they were old enough. But now the only hand left to hold it was his.

Freyja blinked. "I didn't see that before. It must have been frozen in the ice with the body. The one that isn't here. Do you know where it is?"

From the fury in her expression, she evidently expected him to be able to answer her. But Odin could only shake his head. "You are looking for a man's body? One that you believe should be here?"

His first thought was Loki, the most likely man to wield Odin's spear, for Thor favoured his father's hammer, unwieldy though it was. But Loki would have only feigned death, and the moment no one was watching, shifted into a smaller, swifter creature so he could flee. Then he would return later, with information to help everyone. That was why he was the best scout they'd ever had.

"Where is it, Olaf?"

"I do not know. I had no idea you kept a corpse in here. The only things I have seen in the cold storage chambers are food supplies. Who would steal a body, yet leave such a valuable spear behind?"

She held out her hand. "Let me see that." She peered closely at the carvings, then dropped it back onto the table, beside the water filled tub. "I just know those are Viking runes. Karl or one of the others will know what it means."

Interesting. Freyja could read the maintenance manual well enough, so it had not occurred to him that she could not read this as well.

"This is a hunting blessing, invoking the gods' favour for it to fly straight and true," Odin said, pointing at the first line of runes. "These are the names of the men who have wielded it, in a direct line from father to son." The last name was his own, carved by his father on the night he'd become a man. He'd never had a chance to decide which of his sons would wield it after him. Now he never would. "Only a fool would leave this behind." He'd left it behind, the night Frigg died. She'd fought with it to protect their sons and herself, but it had not been enough.

Freyja sighed, as if she shared his pain. "Yeah, well, we should leave it here for now, where it'll be safe. Or as safe as anything can be, with people stealing bodies." She led the way out into the corridor, and Odin followed.

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