Page 14 of Wild Hunt
I had half a mind to go after him, but told myself it was for the best to give him some space and sighed, stepping back to let Daphne into the room.
“What was that about?” she asked, dropping down on the edge of my bed.
I let the door fall shut and slumped against it. “Your guess is as good as mine.”
Chapter 8
Fenrir
Iwoke in a cold sweat, which was far from an isolated occurrence now that I was forced to sleep in my human form most nights. Every night that I wished to sleep inside the Academy walls, at any rate.
Playing Hades’ guard dog wasn’t something I minded so much as the fact that I had to live among the other gods in doing so. Keeping a regular routine of running through the forests that surrounded the vast property could only do so much.
That night, I dreamed of war. Devastation. It was the same dream I’d had since childhood, but lately, it was different. The embers of the ruins that had once been Atlantis seemed so real. The smoke. The screams. The chaos.
It was all so much closer than the dreamy illusion it had always been and my dreams were so much clearer.
They had been ever since she’d come.
I knew Kore had something to do with Ragnarok, or at least the hastening of it, and I’d known ever since the engagement had been announced. Whether Hades knew it or not remained a mystery. I’d tried to speak to him about it on more than one occasion, but he always shut me down. Always refused to listen to the truth.
How the hell was one supposed to be someone’s protector and guide when they were too damn stubborn to even listen to you?
I threw off the covers in the middle of the night and stalked down the hall toward his room. It wasn’t a surprise to find him gone and it was easy to guess where he was.
Sure enough, he was in the lounge, shooting a lonely game of pool in the dim light of the fireplace.
“Look who’s awake,” he said flatly without looking up, sinking another shot in the far right corner pocket.
“I had the dream again.”
He looked up, his eyes a flicker of silver. “You want me to tuck you in?”
I growled and stalked across the room, grabbing the cue out of his hand to snap the wood, just to make it clear I was serious. “Enough games. This isn’t child’s play and it’s time you stopped acting like it.”
“You mind brushing your teeth before you lecture me?” he asked boredly, pulling out a cigarette to pop in his mouth as he fiddled for his lighter. “The dog breath gets old.”
I snarled at him and he finally looked up. “Look, you’re a goddamn werewolf god. Ragnarok is encoded in your DNA. Of course you dream about it.”
“It’s different. It’s been different ever since she showed up and you know that.”
He rolled his eyes, blowing a ring of smoke up toward the ceiling.
“You can pretend like you don’t care, but I know you do. You’re not like your father.”
That got his attention. “You’re testing my patience, Fenrir.”
“Not a difficult feat when you throw tantrums like a child.”
His eyes narrowed, but he was silent.
“You know she plays a role in this,” I pressed.
“So what if she does? What difference does it make?”
“It makes a hell of a lot of difference if the end comes and we’re not ready,” I growled. “Or have you lost sight of that, too?”
“I haven’t lost sight of anything,” he snapped. “I’ve just been reevaluating, that’s all.”
