I woke to the soft rumble of male voices, too groggy to make out the words. It took me a little while to realize that the disorientation came from being wrapped in a warm cocoon. It had been so long since I’d felt anything but Grim’s chilly touch that Bjarni’s body heat threw off my senses.
Reluctantly, I cracked my eyelids open. Judging by the gray light, it was barely dawn, and Bjarni was out cold on his back underneath me, snoring faintly. On his left, Magni was curled up with an arm slung over my lower back, and on his right, Modi…
I blinked as I realized Modi was resting with his head in the crook of Bjarni’s arm, even if his leg was wrapped over mine. It seemed everyone had gotten awfully close during yesterday’s events.
Speaking of getting close… I grimaced as my numb lower parts twanged when I tried to shift and it became evident that I was still straddling Bjarni’s half-erect cock.
Irritated, I poked my blond mate in the chest.
He cracked an eye and gave me a sleepy, “Hmm?”
“You’re still in me,” I hissed quietly so as to not disturb my sleeping mates.
“Mm,” he agreed, eyelid sliding closed again.
“Bjarni! Pull out.”
“Don’t wanna,” he murmured. “Missed you.”
“I missed you too, but if you don’t get out of me in three seconds max, I’m gonna ask Magni to zap your balls,” I threatened.
Bjarni cracked both eyelids this time to give me a reproachful stare. “That’s harsh.”
“Bjarni.”
Sighing, he shifted his hips, and I bit down on my lip to stifle a whimper as he slowly slid out of my hypersensitive channel. He pulled free with an audible pop and a groan from me as my opening panged at the sensation of suddenly being empty.
Bjarni made an unhappy sound at the loss, pulled his arm free from Modi, and hugged me tighter to his body before he closed his eyes again and went back to sleep.
I flexed my pelvic muscles experimentally, grimacing at the deep, responding ache from my worn body. Someone was absolutely going to be carrying me today. Really, it was the least they could do after that stunt Modi and Grim pulled.
“…could have come to us. You know that. Or I thought you did.”
Saga’s low voice pulled me from my self-pity, and I craned my neck to follow the sound. He was sitting with Grim a few yards away, far enough that their voices wouldn’t disturb us, but still close enough that I could make out their words.
“She is your mother,” Grim said softly.
My heart skipped a beat as I realized what they were talking about, what had been laid bare when Grim opened his soul to me yesterday—to me, and to them.
“You think I’d choose her over you? After what she did? Grim…” Saga was clearly struggling to stay quiet through the awakening of his temper. “All those times we made you visit her as adults, all those times we teased you about not wanting to go… Gods, brother. I will never forgive myself. And I will never forgive her.”
“I… wasn’t sure you would have believed I didn’t want it. You saw me… with her. That first time.” Grim’s voice was quiet, but steady. I reached for him through our bond and found the connection open. He responded with a tendril of darkness—a caress against my innermost, promising me that he was okay.
“That means nothing. I would have known that even then. I told you, my first rut, I nearly fucked a mountain troll. Bjarni rutted a dwarf. He wasn’t even certain she was female before he had her legs spread.” Saga reached out and grabbed Grim by the shoulder. “Once this is over, I will make sure she pays for what she did.”
“Annabel has already promised to murder her,” Grim said, soft amusement in his voice.
Saga snorted. “I bet she has. She’s got a nasty temper, that one. And a bit of a protective streak.”
“I don’t need either of you to kill for me,” Grim said, his amusement fading. “It was a long time ago, and I have done… much that might make me deserving of worse, since.”
Saga was quiet for a long time before he said, “That part… was difficult to see clearly. It was… muddled. I don’t understand who could persuade you to betray us. I saw… something in your memories. Some… entity.”
“I am still under a silencing spell. I cannot tell you who, only that he showed me the worst of my fears made flesh. I still thought I could fight against Annabel—this pull she has on me—that I could choose my own fate, even if it meant the end of everything. It was better than you and Bjarni dying.” He scrubbed his face with both hands. “I never thought we could have… this. Even if we can’t stop Ragnarök, even if it is all for nothing… I wish I had been brave enough to give myself to her sooner.”
Saga squeezed his shoulder. “It’s a lot to ask—sharing her. I fought against it too, before I understood the truth of our connection. Of course, I didn’t fuck off to Hel in the process…”
Grim snorted and lowered his hands with a sigh. “I have done unforgivable things.”
Saga watched him for a moment, then shook his head. “You may have fought against the Norns’ web, but I think perhaps this was the only way you could surrender to Annabel. You had to feel for yourself what this bond means. No amount of telling you could have explained what it’s like.
“So no, brother—what you have done is not unforgivable. Not for us. Not after showing us…” Saga hesitated, his brows drawing into a frown. “Not after baring yourself to us like you did. You took her from us—to Hel, of all places—and I should want to strangle you for it… but I don’t. I understand why you did what you did.”
Grim exhaled a deep breath and glanced back at me. “How can one little human do this? Unite enemies and offer redemption where there should be none?”
Saga chuffed a quiet laugh and followed his gaze back to mine. He gave me a soft smile. “I’d suggest it’s that magic pussy of hers, but I don’t want to piss her off. I’ve been apart from it for too long to risk her withholding it.”
I gave him a glare that only made his mouth hike into a broader grin. Even Grim chuckled. He breathed deeply again and clasped his hand to Saga’s shoulder in quiet thanks. Then he looked back to me.
“We should wake the others. If Hel leaves with her army before we reach her, we will be stuck here.”
Magni carried me bridal-style as we made our way from Freya’s glade and deep into the woodlands. He spent most of the time looking between my abdomen and face, a look of wonder and happiness on his handsome features that pulled at my heart. The joy of our reunion was palpable in all my bonds, and it relaxed every tightly wound nerve in my body.
I was finally home. Even here, in the middle of Hel. I was home, and no task was too great when I was surrounded by my mates. Not even persuading Hel to let us leave the realm of the dead.
Sometime during the middle of the day, Saga insisted on swapping Mimir’s head for me, and Magni shifted me into his arms as he picked up the unusually quiet prophet. Mimir had been treated to a first-class seat to our debauched reunion—something I only discovered when Magni pulled me from Bjarni’s embrace and into his own that morning, and I saw Mimir’s head sitting not too far away, facing where we had spent the night.
But unlike when he’d watched Grim and me, he didn’t comment on what he’d undoubtedly witnessed, and he spent the day humming to himself as we made our way toward the swirling vortex of souls darkening the gray sky.
We saw none of Hel’s creatures on our journey, and I was starting to suspect that it was thanks to the presence of the five battle-hardened alpha gods making up my escort. Grim had been a formidable enough opponent for even a mountain troll—as peaceful as I felt while in their midst, I doubted even the most nightmarish of Hel’s denizens would be keen to tangle with four more.
My peaceful state lasted until evening.
Saga sat me down on a fallen tree trunk to go with Magni and Grim to find firewood. Even though it would provide us no warmth, a fire would still ward off some of the nocturnal horrors—and as Bjarni said, it just felt wrong to make camp without one.
I hadn’t sat on my tree trunk for more than twenty seconds before Modi scooped me up, stole my seat, and placed me in his lap.
“Hello, you,” I said, and then hummed when he gave me a soft, lingering kiss. “How are you holding up?”
The corners of his eyes crinkled as he took me in. “You are asking how I am doing, when you are the one who has been complaining of being sore all day?”
I swatted his chest. “I can worry about my mates, even after they savage me like a pack of horny wolves. But… I know things were still… raw with us before I left. New. That you struggled a bit. How…?”
He scoffed and tugged lightly on my braid. “I am fine, Anna. You being gone…” He swallowed, and for a moment, raw pain flickered in his eyes before he composed himself. “Being ripped open from the inside out has a way of putting things into perspective. Especially sharing it with the others. Like Grim learned yesterday, I too discovered that there is a special bond between all of us. It helped me through these past weeks of searching for you, and it opened my eyes to the truth of our union. You and I would not be whole without them, as they would not be complete without me.”
Silently I bumped my head against his. He stroked down my back in response and breathed deeply against my hair, scenting me, even if there was no smell to be found.
“But I have missed you… so terribly,” he murmured, voice gruff. “I need some time with you. Just you.”
I grimaced and pulled back to look at him, one eyebrow raised. His lap was turning distinctly pokey, giving a pretty clear indication what he meant by needing “some time” with me. “Look, I missed you too—all of you. But I’m human, remember? I’m quite sure my lady parts are going to fall off if you guys don’t slow down a bit.”
“Actually…” Mimir’s voice sounded from where Magni had sat him down before heading out to look for firewood. “After your mates offered you their powers, you are not… quite human. More of a demigod, if we are to get technical.”
I blinked and stared at him. “I’m sorry… are you saying I’m a god?”
“Demigod,” he emphasized. “They imbued you with their combined essences, and they changed your DNA in the process. It was… quite spectacular to watch. Even in my long life, I have never seen the creation of a demigod before. I did not realize Freya would have known of such magic, if she even knew that was the outcome of her instructions to you.”
So that was why he had been uncharacteristically quiet about our reunion—he’d been… awed? I shook my head and tried to come to grips with what he’d said.
A demigod. I was a demigod?
“What… What does a demigod do? I mean… How am I different?” I asked.
“Well, for starters, plum, you should easily be able to handle your mates’ amorous attentions,” Mimir said evenly. “Your body will be tougher—not quite as strong as a god’s, but able to withstand much more than a human’s. And your lifespan will be longer—if we get out of Hel, of course. Even without Idunn’s apples, you would probably live three, five hundred years. Give or take.”
I opened my mouth, to say what I wasn’t entirely sure, but Bjarni broke in with a happy, “Excellent!” He straddled the tree trunk Modi and I were sitting on and reached out to cup my cheek. “If we start now, we might be halfway done before the others get back.”
I glared at his smiling face. Of-fucking-course the only thing he cared about when hearing, “hey, your mate’s a demigod!” would be the part where he didn’t have to worry about breaking me with too much sex.
“Did you miss the part where y’all had to carry me around all day because I’m still hurting from last night?”
He shrugged and leaned in to steal a kiss. “It’s like sparring. In the beginning, you hurt, but the more you do it, the more your body gets used to the strain. Eventually it’s no longer painful.”
“Or,” I said, pulling back from his kiss to continue glaring, “it’s like kicking a god in the balls. He’s a god, so he’ll probably be fine, but he’d still very much like to avoid it.”
Bjarni heaved a sigh. “Again with the testicle threats. We just want to pleasure you, sweetie. We need to.”
“He is right,” Modi said quietly. “I need this, Anna. I need you.”
I leveled my glare at him, but the earnestness in his eyes made me bite the inside of my cheek as I reconsidered. They were all plenty capable of forcing their will when it came to sex, but they weren’t. Not this time.
Bjarni curved his strong hands over my lower belly. “We’ll be gentle,” he murmured. “Please, little goddess. We need to worship you.”
Goddammit. “Fine. Fine. Fuck’s sakes.” I leveled them both a glare for good measure and folded my arms over my chest. “At least turn Mimir around this time.”
“There is really no need, plum; I’ve seen you intimate a great many times,” Mimir protested. “One more won’t matter.”
I glared at the talking head. “For a bodiless man, you’re a real pervert.”
“I am merely academically interested,” he said mildly. "Mating habits have always fascinated me. Of course, when I was still intact, so to speak, I did occasionally indulge past scholarly interests.”
I gave my alphas a pleading look.
“On it,” Bjarni chuckled as he got up from the trunk and turned to the prophet. “Sorry, old man. If we make it out of here, I’ll find you a nice whorehouse to vacation in, hmm?”
Mimir sighed. “I guess that’s better than nothing. But I have rarely seen an omega who enjoyed her knottings as thoroughly as your mate.”
I choked out a sound of protest as blood filled my cheeks, but Modi wrapped his fingers around my chin and pulled my focus back to him. The smolder in his eyes made tendrils of awareness crawl up my spine, the embarrassment of Mimir’s observations fading into the background.
Some three hours later, as I was falling asleep on Grim’s chest, surrounded by my four other, sated mates, I had the thought that maybe the prophet hadn’t been entirely wrong.