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“Let’s just agree to disagree,” Tveir snorted with haughty superiority. “Now, tell me what you saw. I have recorded my findings, but I need yours to keep the data consistent.”

Instantly excited all over again, Einn pushed up on the crooked, knobby toes of her left foot and twirled wildly in the opposite direction.

Taunting her sister with a few words every time she spun in her direction, she snarked, “I saw…” Switching feet and direction in the blink of an eye, she added, “…Hel looking…” Three spins and she added jazz hands to her repertoire. “…into her mirror…”

“That was months ago!” Tveir pushed the words through gritted teeth.

She was two ticks from losing her shit all over everything and everyone in her path–especially her sister.

She was a perfectionist. Some might say anal.

She said efficient and thorough. Getting no new data felt like failure–abject failure and a complete waste of time.

But maybe, just maybe, there was some way to turn it all around.

She needed answers, clues, details, data she could put together.

Any progress would make the latest experiment salvageable.

Of course, she would need to be revised, but that was no problem.

That was one of the many prices she paid for working with her sister.

Tveir would turn this mess around. She’d done it before, and she’d do it again.

She would not and could not accept the loss, not after all the time, energy, and work devoted to this project…

Devoted to their escape… Devoted to making those responsible for a life of seclusion pay for all she’d suffered.

She would get all the answers she needed, and she would do it right that very moment. “I want to know…”

“And you will.” Einn stopped twirling then tap danced from one side of the laboratory to the other. “Wait for it…” Bending at the waist, she kept her rounded back as straight as she could and stuck the extended finger of her left hand in Tveir’s face. “Ahem… I recorded it.”

“You what?!” Tveir spat, unsure if she was more pissed off or impressed. “Is it untraceable? Is it behind all of my fire walls? Is it…?”

“Chill out, Sis,” Einn mocked with a snicker that made Tveir’s blood pressure rise.

“I’m chill.” She forced the words from her lips, knowing it was the only way to get her sister to continue.

But was she? Was she cool? Could she control the desire burning deep within her soul to loosen the reins of the flames of rage that had always been her constant companion and scream, yell, and break everything in the vicinity…

including her twin’s neck? Tveir wasn’t sure, and that was not a place she liked to be.

She could not lose control. It would not be prudent at this stage of the experiment.

It would be just another delay; one she couldn’t blame on anyone else.

And…

She was perplexed by her sister. When had Einn ever done anything without her? They were a team, a matched set. Some had said opposite halves of the same brain, but Tveir knew that was the one thing she would never ever never share with Einn.

But still…

They’d done everything together from the moment of their conception. From the moment their hearts had started to beat, they’d been inseparable. Of course, it was hard not to be in the tiny area afforded them in their mother’s womb, but none of that mattered. They were everything to one another.

They were even each other’s most fierce competition, and it all started with their race out of the womb.

Sadly, Tveir had been thirty seconds too late to claim the top spot.

But that didn’t stop her from being more intelligent, more observant, and infinitely more manipulative in every way.

These were the qualities of which she was sure her father was most proud.

After all, you don’t get to be the Trickster god without revering those very same traits and so many more.

If she could only confirm who her mother was. It was something she planned to uncover as soon as they were free. Wouldn’t dear old dad be surprised when they all showed up in Asgard together… One happy, yet murderous if she had it her way, family.

Yes, she adored her father. Both she and Einn looked forward to every one of his visits, especially the presents. It didn’t matter how old they got, gifts from dad were the highlight of the month.

If only he hadn’t been so concerned with keeping their grandfather, the All Father, the one and only white-bearded freak Odin happy, they would be up in Asgard, living the high life, in a gorgeous castle with servants and access to the latest and greatest technology the universe had ever seen.

But no, Loki was too worried with the ‘optics’ of having two more children out of wedlock.

Ha! As if dear old dad wasn’t bedding any maiden who caught his eye or smiled his way seven days a week and twice on Sunday and dropping offspring like the white, puffy pappus of a dandelion blowing in the wind.

No, she knew the real reason Loki had opened a Rift in the fabric of Time and Space and tossed his amazing twins through the glittering, glowing, twinkling prisms of the God particle into a Realm he’d created just for them with no entrance or exit.

He’d done all that and more to remain in favor with The Powers That Be and hide their unusually unique and exceptional appearance–which she had no doubt was the undeniable clue to their mother’s identity.

And it was all bullshit–a pile unfair, unjust, unmitigated, super stinky cow patties a mile high and three miles wide. She and Einn knew it and so did Loki. Why else would he show up every month without fail bearing gifts and making promises he never intended to keep?

Because he was the biggest, loser of a butthead ever created, and a shitty parent to boot.

Did he do that to any of his other children? Did he act like Narfi, Váli, Jormungandr or Fenrir didn’t exist? No. No, he did not.

Hell, he even welcomed their sister, Hel, the chick with two faces mashed together, black hair on one side and white on the other, and a bad case of the poo-poo-poos to Family dinners.

He showed her off to anyone and everyone he could, and worst of all, made sure she was given a godhead and a kingdom! HEL. WAS. A. GODDESS!

But not Tveir and Einn. Oh, no, he hid them away and prayed no one ever found out about his dirty little secrets. He…

“Oh, do stop your pouting, T,” Einn tutted with an added snort of derision. “You need to get over all your daddy issues, and…”

“And you need to get the hell outta my brain.” Seething, grinding her teeth with such fury that her jawbone popped and she was sure her wisdom tooth cracked, her perfectly polished and practiced veneer was cracking. “These are my thoughts. These are…”

“A stupid waste of time.” Stopping her dance and dropping to the flats of her feet, Einn slammed her hands on her weirdly pear-shaped hips. “We don’t have time for psychotherapy, Sis. We are very nearly there, so close to…”

“Stop! Don’t say a word aloud. We can’t trust…”

Gasping, her eyes open so wide it was as if her enormous, dark, prominent, globular eye balls were about to fall out of the sockets in her inordinately flat face, Einn’s thin, gray lips formed a perfect circle. “Oooooh yeah. I forgot.”

“And that is precisely why you need me, my dear E.” Tveir nodded.

Smiling as her phenomenal self-control returned and she felt the air of superiority and satisfaction rolling off of her in waves nearly sucking up all the oxygen in the room, she added, “I focus on the details, the things that you can’t be… ”

“Yes, yes, yes, T, I know. You focus on the boring shit that no one ever sees, and I put everything together. I am the builder. I am the master engineer. I am the right-brained…”

“And that makes me the left-brained side of our partnership, as we have discussed ad nauseum.” Rolling her bulging, black eyes, Tveir tapped the tip of the long, thick, olive-colored nail protruding from the end of the index finger of her right hand on the screen of the tablet she’d pulled from the Earthly Realm during their one and only successful experiment.

Switching to their own unique brand of mental communication, she added, “Can you feel it? The heaviness of Father’s Sorcerous Cage. It’s still there. It’s still…”

“Yes, but I am close to cracking the code. I looked into Helheim and into the Realm of Promise. I heard what the Omnipotent Beings known as Hope and Patience said. I smelled the succulent buttery aroma of those things they called biscuits. I’ve nearly cracked the code. Give me just…”

“You have two human days,” T snapped. “Not a second more.” Snapping her fingers, she pointed at the far wall as a massive countdown clock with digital numbers the color of the rind of very ripe key limes appeared.

Starting at forty-eight, it began ticking down the seconds as the minutes and hours flashed in time.

“And if I need more time?”

“That, my dear sister, is not an option.”