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I leave the window open, curtains billowing in the breeze. No one is stirring inside, so no worries there. I check the front door.

What the fuck. She locks the door but not the windows? I go back to the window and slip through silently. This is getting tedious.

I hear a light snoring from one of the rooms and head directly there. This whole plan was a waste of time, and I need to get to the store before it closes. I have a dog to spoil.

She’s lying on her stomach, blankets pooled around her waist. She’s short and petite and reminds me of GV, which gives me a shudder. That disgusting pus yellow hair, I bet her eyes are big and blue too. The quiver travels down my spine to my tail, making it rattle on the floor. Even that doesn’t wake her.

What’s a guy gotta do to scare the crap out of someone these days? Oh, I know.

I leap onto the bed and start jumping, lips pulled back in a malicious smile that I don’t feel inside.

She tries to sit up but flounders in place like a landed fish. I could set up my phone to take a picture, holding her up like a trout.

Damn it, that was funny! Come back, laugh!

The springy mattress gives a groan before the base breaks with a loud crunch under my weight. I stop jumping to see if she’s surprised.

Yup, she’s staring up at me with eyes bulging out in terror, and yes, they are blue.

Score for Kimi.

“Good gloaming, Delegate Tremaine. Would you mind giving me ahand?”

15. Anger

Aodhan

I jerk awake in a pool of sweat, myriastradclose to overtaking me. The night terrors have not been this bad for years. I manage to calm myself by breathing deeply while sitting still. This routine has gone from a daily routine to every other hour. It should not be this bad, yet it is. It has been for some time now.

I open my eyes to take in the dingy motel room. My computer is still on the desk, the screen blank from inactivity. A glint of metal catches my eye, and I roll off the bed away from it to land in a crouch, prepared to strike.

The spear rests against the wall, waiting to be picked up.

“Rud fucking dúr.”

I rub a weary hand over my face in irritation.

The ten-foot stick of blessed wood taunts me with a sparkle of light from its metal tip. Of all the gifts myseanathair, Lugh, could give me, a cursed spear is my joy. It only appears to me when battle is coming. I used to love it. A reminder that he is with me through my trials even after all this time.

Now, I despise the sight of it. Where was he when I truly needed him? Where was my spear when I called it then?

It has been dogging my steps for several weeks now.

I refuse to pick it up.

I will not accept whatever call is being made for me. I have other business to attend to. Yet, it never fails to appear. Shrunken to the size of a walking stick in a rental car’s trunk. Propped against a home as I pass it. The list goes on.

Being a demigod is a never-ending turmoil of struggling to be a hero your parents would be proud of and sayingfuck thisso you can walk away to find peace.

The spear is a reminder that I am not following the path I’m supposed to be on. I’m on the road Iwantto be on.

I supposeseanathairhas forgotten I’m half berserker.

My phone begins an insistent ringing. Few people have the number, so I know this is a call to be answered.

Reaching the nightstand, I glance at the caller ID and frown.

Svend is in the Disputed Territory farther south than my current location. He’s one of the only males left alive that I trust with the knowledge that I’m even in the Americas right now. He wouldn’t simply call to enforce a visit, although he did request it. Perhaps he’s deep in his cups. If so, this conversation should be entertaining, at least—or blackmail material for his sweet wife.