Page 9 of Battle of Witches
“Get Ravyn and take her. I’ll stay and finish the potion so I can wake Killian.”
I bit my lip. I really wanted to be there when he woke up. I wassupposedto be able to heal anything, and I couldn’t wake him. Some gods loved and treasured their offspring, and then you had those like my father who thought their children were lower than dirt because we were born and not formed from the Aether.
Magical birth control had been a thing with the gods for ages, and as long as you redid the spell when you were supposed to, gods didn’t have to worry about accidental offspring. Some of them were rapist, pieces of shit that went around creating children with mortals they just abandoned, and others had ego problems about wanting to spread their seed with no intention of being good parents.
That was my father. He constantly called me a defective, little runt before kicking me out of his realm to go live in Asgard with Odin. IknewI wasn’t defective. Plenty of gods figured out their main powers and just stopped there. Not me. I wasconstantlyexperimenting with what I was capable of, and I knew I was doing things other gods hadn’t done before.
But all my father’s berating came flooding back in when I couldn’t wake Killian. I wasn’t just doing it for Ravyn. I loved him, too. I even asked Reyson to try when I couldn’t do it, thinking a primordial might be able to do something I couldn’t.
“How much longer until the potion is ready? I’ll get her there and come back to be here when he wakes up.”
Minerva gave me this knowing smile. Killian and Minerva knew each other much longer than Killian and I did. He wouldn’t be waking up to a stranger, but Ihadto be there. I had all these awful thoughts while he slept that Asfrid was torturing him with nightmares.
I didn’t feel bad about most of the shit I had done to people, and I’d done alotof shit. I knew terrible things were going to happen if my creations managed to pull off coming back in this century.
I knew I couldn’t protect everyone if I couldn’t stop her, but I expected to be able to protect the people I loved. I needed toseeKillian wake up.
Chapter7
Ravyn
Iwas happily smashed between two Vikings and deliciously sore in all the right places. Sleipnir and Bjorn were already passed out, and I was just about to follow when Loki came barging into my bedroom. He seemed supportive of this whole arrangement before, so I didn’t think this was a jealousy thing, and they wouldn’t have woken Killian without me.
“I’dneverbe so rude as to interrupt afterglow from a threesome a thousand years in the making, but if you don’t get out of bed and get dressed like,right now,you’re going to miss the birth of your niece or nephew.”
My twin could have theworsttiming sometimes. I jumped out of bed to find my clothes. Sleipnir and Bjorn were already getting dressed. Ineededto wake Killian, but I couldn’t miss the birth of my sister’s first child.
“Killian and the potion?”
“It’s almost ready. I’ll bring you all to the hospital and come back so we can wake him. I’ll bring him straight to you. I’d wait for you to be there, but I think Killian would want to be there for this, too.”
Fuck! IhatedAsfrid. I didn’t want Killian to wake up without me, but I knew he’d be devastated if he missed the birth of Ripley’s firstborn. When we got Valentine, I was going to beat his face to a pulp.
We were dressed in no time. Loki handed me my phone, and we all grabbed him. We appeared in a hallway. Felix was waiting, and a nurse stood out with a tray. She yelped when she saw us and threw a cup of ice at Loki.
“Is there something wrong with a car and the front door?” she snapped with her hand on her heart.
Felix was in fullnew daddymode and being a little extra.
“Not when my witch is in there about to give birth at any minute! Her twin needs to get in there before she kills us all!”
Felix looked ready to panic, and it was just so adorable. But then, I heard a crash from the room, and my sister shrieked. They tended to let a lot of people in the delivery room because many supernatural species were polyamorous, and there were a lot of concerned daddies and family members.
“Get her some Oreos!” Reyson roared.
Reyson and his cookies. He just kind of latched onto them. I knew he knew damned well Oreos weren’t going to fix this, and he’d probably seen a woman give birth before, but he was never the possible father. He was in there losing his primordial shit all over the place, just suggesting anything off the top of his head.
What my sisterneededwere those ice chips the nurse just threw at us when Loki scared her. Where was she anyway? She came bustling back through with another cup of ice, and don’t think I didn’t notice that elbow she threw at my boyfriend. Loki kissed my forehead.
“I’ll go help Killian and bring him to you. Go be with your sister before Reyson destroys this entire hospital because she’s in pain.”
“Thanks,” I said, sneaking a pinch to his butt.
He pretended to be shocked, then disappeared in a flash of flame. Thankfully, that nurse had already gone into Ripley’s delivery room with the ice. Loki was right. Reyson had total ginger-cat vibes, but only when my sister was happy. He’d basically kill everyone on this planet if she stubbed her toe, and he thought it was someone else’s fault.
I rushed into the delivery room and tried not to laugh because my sister was probably in a lot of pain. Reyson had his hair up in a man bun, and they didn’t really have scrubs in his size. But bless him, he tried anyway and was busting out of them. Balthazar and Gabriel were crowded around the other side of the bed, encouraging her to breathe.
I’d traveled to Hell with this entire group to rescue my twin and fight demons. Theydid notlook this terrified the whole time we were there. Even Balthazar, who I was pretty certain wasn’t scared of a damn thing at the rate he poked Kaine Dragovich, looked like he was about to wet himself.
