Read Online Valkyrie's Kiss by Kristi Jones - Free Book Online Page A

about me. ”
    “ No,
I can ’ t do that. ”
    His eyes held
the same look I ’ d seen in the street, the same look he ’ d given the young Afghani girl with the gun. “ You must. ”
    “ Jess —”
    Skuld twisted in his arms.
    "Get
out of here, Sabrina. I'll hold her until you go."
    “ I ’ ll come back for you. ”
    “ I
know, now go! ”
    I reached
for him and kissed him hard on the cheek. I inhaled deeply, committing his
scent to memory. I put my mouth to his ear and whispered, “ I ’ ll be right back. ”
    I fled the
chamber, my heart swollen with love and despair. Leaving him with Skuld was terrifying, but I had no choice. As I ran down
the tunnel, Skuld ’ s voice echoed off the walls. “ You will bring about the destruction —”
    And then
her voice fell silent.
    ****
    Flying from Salzburg
to the village of Vogelburg , my emotions were in
turmoil. For the first time in my life, I felt out of control. What was I doing
running an errand for the terrible goddess Skuld ? And
how could I bear leaving Jess behind?
    Speed was my ally
now. I had to hurry. I had to make sure that he spent as little time as
possible in the clutches of Skuld .
    Why did Skuld want to keep Jess? There were only two reasons I
could think of. Possibly this stone she wanted was incredibly valuable and Jess
and I just happened to fall into her lap, letting her take advantage of the
opportunity to get it without leaving her lair. But if that was the case, that
still left unanswered questions. Why couldn’t Skuld leave the throne room and get it herself? What did she risk by leaving?
    The second, more
terrifying, reason that Skuld kept Jess was that she
wanted him . I’d never heard of a Norn
wanting to have anything to do with the human world. It worried me. It
frightened me.
    The
stone. I didn’t know what the stone did. Nobody
really knew what the stone did. I’d heard stories when I was young. When my mother
told me stories of the ancient ones, the stone was always quite mysterious. It
was said to be very valuable. More powerful than Odin’s spear, Gungnir , more magical than Freya’s falcon cloak.
    But I didn’t know
what it did. Nobody I’d met had any real knowledge of the stone. It was a
legend, a mythical enchanted object from the far distant past whose meaning had
been lost with the passage of time.
    The wind rushed in
my ears, my thoughts pressing in around me. I had to move faster. If I was
lucky, the stone would be unprotected and easy to find. If all went well, I
could return to Jess before dawn.
    When I arrived at Vogelburg , the full moon illuminated a small Alpine village
nestled in the valley beneath Wetterstein mountain . The tall fir trees dwarfed a scattering of small
cottages littering the valley floor. The air was cool and crisp, the cold still
having a firm grip on the month of March.
    I chose the church
steeple as my landing site and looked down at the small graveyard below me. The
pilgrims’ road was to my right. That is where I needed to search.
    First I scanned
the graveyard. The Vogelburg graveyard was a known midden .
    I suppose the term midden is derogatory, but also fitting. It is a place
for the corpses to go. The stiffs, the Valkyries currently
serving their Death Duty. When Valkyries serve their Death Duty, they
are forced to wander the earth as corpses for ten years. But with the
population explosion of the last two centuries, it has become necessary to hide
from prying mortal eyes. The midden provides a place
of refuge, a place to rest or hide, if the Valkyrie’s family will not help her.
    I didn’t want to
make contact with any stiffs. They were desperate creatures, bored and in pain.
Sometimes they tried to attach themselves to the living. They needed or wanted
someone with power to help them. Not that there is much that can be done except
to try to alleviate their pain with strong and continual doses of morphine.
    I didn’t like to
think of the Death Duty.
    It brought back
painful