Page 26 of Their Property
“Oh! Is this what you were talking about last night?” Kyrie took it from me with the utmost care, running a gentle hand over the worn-out, fabric cover.
“Mm-hm.” I watched in fascination as she marveled over the book. She opened the cover and read the Old Norse title page, her lips and tongue moving around the ancient language in a way that I wanted to feel on my skin.
Read to me, I thought.Better yet, readonme. Let me feel your voice on my skin.
“This is beautiful, Grudge!” she cooed, turning the pages carefully. She whispered another line of prose in Old Norse, and I held back a sigh.
Not as beautiful as you—God, fuck! What is wrong with me?
“I’ll take good care of this and return it to you soon.” She hugged the book to her chest, and I tried not to think about my body heat transferring to her. “Thank you, I love it.”
I fumbled for my notepad and quickly scrawled out a note.You’re welcome. Keep it for as long as you’d like.
Kyrie grinned and hugged the book tighter, turning her body away from me. “You might have to wrestle it back from me then.”
I held back the groan rising in my throat, hands clenching at the fantasy playing out in my head.Sweet girl, you shouldn’t joke about things like that.
Her eyes dropped from my face, head tilting curiously. “Grudge, what’s that?” She pointed at my arm, stepping closer and reaching all the way until her finger touched my shoulder.
“Ah.” She was looking at one of my tattoos, and I pulled my sleeve up to show her the full piece. Maybe there was something to T-Bone’s advice about impressing girls with tattoos.
Kyrie’s eyebrows raised, her face paling as her expression turned to shock. “Who is she? I mean, I’m sorry, it’s beautiful! But can you tell me about her?”
Her reaction puzzled me, and I glanced down at my shoulder piece again before releasing my sleeve. Kyrie leaned over eagerly as I wrote my explanation.
She’s a valkyrie. A mythical warrior woman from the Norse sagas. They choose who lives or dies in battle and take slain warriors to the afterlife. There are stories of them in that book, theProse Edda.
“A valkyrie,” Kyrie whispered reverently just as I wrote the word down. “So they’re like angels?”
Sort of,I wrote. Warriors thought of them as guardians, protectors. Some say valkyries were the fiercest of women during their mortal lives. Warriors themselves, protectors of their family, or mothers who sacrificed themselves for their children.
Kyrie’s expression grew even more bewildered as I wrote out my explanation. I was still confused by her reaction but unsure of the right question to ask her.
“Does it mean anything if…if a valkyrie visits someone in a dream?” she asked.
I stared at her for another few moments before writing a response.I’ve never heard of that. Maybe she is protecting you.
“It felt like a warning,” Kyrie said, her brows furrowing. “She kept beating an ax against a shield, making this drumbeat that went faster and faster.” Kyrie pulled her lower lip between her teeth. “And a raven landed on her shoulder and started cawing.”
Now it was my turn to look shocked. A valkyrie alone was one thing, but a raven accompanying her, a guardian of the fallen? That couldn’t be a coincidence.
Kyrie wasn’t even done yet. “And—shit, I’m sorry. This is stupid.”
I shook my head and rolled my hand in her direction, urging her to go on. I needed to hear everything, down to the last detail.
She appeared hesitant, but humored my request. “I saw her, or more like felt her, yesterday. When we ran into that boy on the road.” A smile pulled at one corner of her lips. “She almost felt like a fourth bodyguard. It was like I could sense her standing near me. I felt how badly she wanted to use her axe and shield to protect that boy. But she wasn’treallythere, almost like a ghost. So I stepped up and did it in her stead.”
Kyrie gave a small shake of her head and stepped away, her cheeks flushing again and her smile sheepish. “Sounds crazy, right?”
I shook my head and quickly wrote down,No! Absolutely not.But I couldn’t articulate my thoughts more than that and spun the pen in my fingers as I searched for the right words. I’d read the Eddas several times and never once read of a valkyrie guarding a living woman. And the raven…that had to be some kind of link to us. Or was that just wishful thinking again? The guys would know better than me.
In the time I was taking to think, Kyrie seemed ready to move on from the subject. “It’s probably nothing,” she mused, fiddling with her purse strap. “My father says dreams don’t mean anything. That it’s just your brain filtering through random information in your head. And this one was especially vivid, so maybe it just stuck with me.”
I pressed my lips together in a frown. I couldn’t disagree more. Dreams were messages from the gods. And they were telling her something, I was sure of it.
“Thank you again for the book, Grudge. I’m excited to read it.” Finished with our conversation, she headed for the door, and I dutifully followed after her.
“So, wait.”T-Bone rubbed his forehead with a sigh, swirling his whiskey with the other hand. “What exactly are you saying, Grudge?”
