Page 3 of Bottoms Up (Mythic Beast #4)

“Usually, yes, but I believe the necklace likes the idea of looking similar to how it once looked.”

He waved his hand at me, and I felt clothing on my body. I looked down to find myself in jeans and a T-shirt, and my favorite dressy athletic shoes. Something caught my eye off to the left, and I looked to see a matching ball cap on the table beside me.

“I can pop us to Italy to a jeweler I trust. You should leave your phone here.”

I was about to ask him to let me talk to Kirsten when he telepathed, It’s best we don’t talk too much about this. I’ll need you to stand up, if you’re amenable.

I reached for the ball cap, stood, and the next thing I knew, we were somewhere else entirely, the air around us cooler and smelling faintly of ash and iron.

We faced each other, Mordecai steady and unmoved while I blinked, off-balance from the abrupt shift in scenery.

Old buildings surrounded us, made of handmade brick, the alley too tight and too close after the spacious suite.

The ground under my feet was uneven — cobblestone edged with the same kind of brick, and I took a slow breath to ground myself while I followed Mordecai out onto the street and into a squat, low-roofed building.

If this was Italy, it was an old section.

Was it modern-day, or had he taken me back in time? Could he do that?

“Do you have time to rework some metals for me?” Mordecai asked a man with his back to us.

A short, skinny old man turned and smiled at Mordecai. “For you? Of course. What have you brought me?”

I noted electric lights above us, so we hadn’t gone back in time.

Mordecai motioned toward my neck. “The pendant and the chain, so it’ll be a mix of gold and titanium.”

The old man looked at my chest and then frowned at Mordecai. “It can be done if the fire’s hot enough.”

Mordecai was silent, and I got the idea he was still waiting for the elderly man to come to a decision. While no one was talking, I telepathed, Where are we? I thought we were in Europe, but he speaks English.

Italy. I worked some magic so you can understand him. He’s speaking Italian but you’re hearing it in English. He won’t understand you, however. I’ll need to translate if you want to speak to him.

Well, that was a handy trick.

The wizened old man returned to his bench, head bent over a pale blue stone while Mordecai and I telepathed.

It looked like he was cutting, or perhaps sanding or polishing the brilliant gemstone — peering at it through a microscope while he turned it, carefully deciding before he put each surface to the wheel.

Finally, he turned and stood again. “My granddaughter hasn’t been able to get pregnant.”

Mordecai was silent a few moments, and inclined his head. “The problem is with her husband, not with her. There’s a one-time solution.”

“What do you want the finished product to look like?”

Mordecai motioned to the table beside the old man, and he lifted a piece of paper with a sketch, studied it a few seconds, nodded, and walked out of the room.

Mordecai motioned for me to follow, so I did, and felt the giant man walking behind me.

I mean, Julian is really tall, but he isn’t terribly muscled. Mordecai’s muscles have muscles.

What are you? I asked him.

When he didn’t answer, I telepathed, Your brother is a demon. Logically, that would mean you’re either an angel or a demon.

Your logic is based on writings you’re familiar with and is completely logical, but I am neither.

So the Bible is wrong?

The Bible was written by men. It’s close, but not entirely accurate.

“Start with this,” Mordecai told the old man, and he tossed what looked like an ear into a tall, thin container. Not a human ear, some kind of animal ear.

The old man looked into the pot and said, “Orecchio di maiale d’oro ? ”

Mordecai merely lifted an eyebrow at him, and the old man shrugged, lifted the container, put it into some kind of machine, closed a lid over it, and worked with some dials.

That didn’t translate, I told Mordecai.

I’m aware.

The old man left. A few minutes later, I heard the same noises coming from the front that I had before, and Mordecai touched the kiln — or whatever it was called — a few seconds before I felt the weight of the necklace leaving my body, and I realized Mordecai had opened the lid, tossed it in, and closed it so fast I hadn’t even seen him move.

I still wore the chain, but the coin was gone.

“You told him you wanted the necklace and chain melted.”

“I wanted it hotter than for just gold.”

The next thing I knew, he was holding something else in his hand, and he opened the lid and tossed it in, too.

“The container is called a crucible,” Mordecai told me. “The crucible is in a furnace. I just put your gold in with the gold from pieces of two other magical items. If I’m right, the three magics will cancel each other out.”

“And if you’re wrong?”

He shook his head. “I’ll get us and the old man out of here a second or two before the explosion.”

A jolt of fear tightened my gut. The word explosion didn’t pair well with words like magic , especially when five feet away from a fucking furnace.

But I reminded myself who I was standing next to — a man who could teleport through time and space without breaking a sweat.

If he said he could get us out, he could. Probably .

“What magical items are you mixing it with?”

He hesitated so long, I didn’t think he was going to answer, but he finally said, “The ear of a golden boar and a small piece of a magical sword. A bit of decoration from the handle, not the sword part. Jewelry, animal, item of war — all sentient, and all made by dwarves.”

He scratched his chin. “Magical theory is more art than science, but the right balance of intent and origin might let the magics cancel each other out. Do you have something you know to be pure silver that you wouldn’t mind donating to the cause?

I’d like my jeweler friend to braid the combined gold piece with a copper piece and a silver piece to make a bracelet.

I have the ideal copper piece to melt, and can come up with something silver, but it feels as if the silver should come from you.

The gold from the necklace belongs to you, and if the silver does as well, that will make it more yours than anyone else’s. It feels important.”

“I have a silver torc that goes on my bicep.” I sent him an image of it, and where in my home he could find it, and it was suddenly in his hand. “This is perfect. Thank you.”

Mordecai looked through some containers on a shelf — crucibles, I supposed. He lifted one, put my torc in it, walked to a different furnace, put the crucible into it, sealed a lid over the top, and pushed a button on the side.

He did the same with what looked like a small copper statue — a naked man standing in one of those narrow one-person chariots, minus the wheels.

I have no idea what made him Roman — other than the curly hair, the shield and sword, and his foot on his helmet.

It was maybe four or five inches tall, and I only got a quick look, but it seemed old.

“What’s the significance of the dude you’re melting?”

“It was me, once upon a time. It isn’t anymore, but putting something of a piece of me in…” He sighed. “Symbology is important. This is going to be about more than the sum of the ingredients.”

Once all three metals were in the three furnaces, he walked to another wall and looked through what I thought might be molds.

He chose one, and turned to look at me. “This is going to be a lengthy process, but it feels as if you should be present. Also, I want to stick with you for a while. Find a spot to sit, but please stay within my sight.”

There were a half-dozen work stools, and none looked comfortable. No sooner than I had the thought, a big, cushy armchair appeared near the shelves with the molds — not the one I curl up in to read, but damned close.

“You should be out of the way there, but I can move it if we need something in that area.”

My e-reader was on the seat when I got to the chair, and I opened it and went in search of a book on magical objects in mythology.

I found a college textbook with great reviews and didn’t care how much it cost. It was time to get at least a half-assed handle on whatever the hell was happening around me.

It turns out, the golden boar was called Gullinbursti which, as best I could tell, was Norse for Golden Boar . Creative bunch, those Norse.

It had golden bristles, so its entire body wasn’t gold, and it was forged by dwarves, so that part fit.

It could move through air and water faster than any horse, and its bristles were said to radiate with a golden glow, lighting its path.

It was a gift to the god Freyr, who rode it around like a badass and occasionally hitched it to a chariot.

Had he been the dude on the chariot? No, Mordecai said that’d been him. Was he Freyr? No. Surely not.

I kept reading — I’d learn all I could about the golden boar before I researched the naked Roman guy.

Turns out, Freyr’s sister, Freya, had a magical boar named Hildesvini that she used in combat. Considering Freya had owned the original necklace, that was probably important.

The dwarves who made Freyr’s pig — Brokkr and Sindri — were famous for making magical objects. What were the odds they’d made the necklace, too? I looked them up in the book, and they’d made the golden ring Draupnir , the golden-bristled boar Gullinbursti , and the hammer Mjolnir .

Draupnir didn’t seem to have anything in common with Freya’s ring — unless we were counting shiny gold jewelry with a mind all its own — but Mjolnir is none other than Thor’s hammer, and that was legit cool.

I looked up Freya’s ring next, which was called Brísingamen , which I already knew since I’d looked it up before, but apparently needed to reexamine now that my life had turned into a crash course in Norse drama.

According to the book, the dwarves who made it were named Alfrik, Berling, Dvalinn and Grerr.

They wouldn’t take money for the necklace, so she paid the way most mythological goddesses pay when they really, really want something sparkly.

She slept with all four of them, though the story might be more fun if she’d taken them on all at once, rather than one per night.

Loki found out how she’d paid for it and tattled to Odin, who I guess was in a relationship with her at the time, so he blew his temper and decided a fitting punishment was to force her to kick off an unending war between two kings.

And then, because what else would Loki do, the trickster god stole the necklace from her, someone else fought him for it and returned it to Freya. No idea if she fucked that guy or not, but I figure there’s a decent chance she did.

Next, I tried searching for a naked Roman guy on a chariot, but nothing looked like what I’d seen.

I added sword and helmet to the search, and boom, there it was.

Not similar to it, but exactly like it, though the one pictured was bigger.

It was Ares, sometimes known as Mars. Both were gods of war.

The statue guy didn’t look a whole lot like Mordecai, but I looked up Ares, and… Fuck me . It was Mordecai.

When I compared the two statues, the younger version had the same nose, mostly the same mouth.

My heart beat faster, because if that statue was really him, if he’d once been worshipped, what the hell was he now? Was I standing in a room with an actual god?

“I’m not him anymore,” Mordecai said from across the room.

His voice was so calm, so ordinary, it grounded me.

I’d already known he picks up on way more than Marco.

Rather than launch back into fluster edging toward the road to hysterics, I considered how long it’d been since people believed in the old gods.

Since the beginning of Christianity? Longer?

I was pretty sure the pantheons were mostly history by then, but I wasn’t sure.

I had other questions, though, so I told Mordecai, “Will is different when he’s Lord Byron.

I mean, on stage, and for a couple of hours after we perform.

Suli and Hailey aren’t two different personalities, and yet, they kind of are.

Not as much as Will and LB, though.” I shrugged. “I’m always Silver.”

“But there are still two versions of you.”

It took me a minute to realize he was right, and also wrong.

“Right now, I’m not especially male or female, and I guess that’s the base version of me, who I was before I formed the boy-me and girl-me versions, in an effort to fit into society — so I think there are actually three versions of me.

We’re all the same person. I know we can look different, and I am, because I naturally walk like a girl sometimes, or a boy.

There are times, like now, when I’m either both or neither.

I think it’s the latter, but the former can also be argued. ”

“And Animal versus Mikey?” he asked.

“Other than the hat, they’re the same guy. He’s real no matter what.”

“As are all of you. As am I, no matter what name I go by.”

“Where are the rest of the old gods?”

“Most live on Olympus. Humans started fighting over us, so we all agreed to stay out of the affairs of men. A couple of us stayed here, but they’ve insinuated themselves into supernatural society, a way to live in the human realm and still stay out of the legal definition of the affairs of men . ” He lifted a shoulder. “Mostly.”

“So, there’s a golden pig without an ear? Is he pissed?”

“He is, but he’ll grow it back. I had to decide between part of the head or part of the tail. Heads and tails are another layer of symbolism. Yin and yang. Good and evil.”

“Two sides of the same coin?” I asked.

He didn’t grin, but looked amused. “You are an impressive human. You’re good for Julian, and if you one day move into Homewood, you’ll be a worthy resident. Kirsten and Cora have accumulated an interesting household, and it keeps growing.”