Immortally Embraced

chapter twenty-eight




I couldn’t stop smiling. “We need to tell Kosta.”

His tent was just on the other side of the VIP showers. Hand in hand, we dashed the twenty feet to his hutch and pounded on the wooden door.

No answer. Marc and I exchanged a look as we knocked again, harder.

The door opened a fraction and Shirley stood on the other side. Her hair was mussed, her lipstick was gone; I couldn’t believe she was going to let Kosta see her like that until … I gasped. “No!”

Colonel Kosta strode up behind her, naked except for a very short towel wrapped around his waist. “What do you want?” he demanded, moving in front of her.

For a second, my mind went blank. Kosta and Shirley sitting in a tree … I shook it off. “There’s been a new development,” I said, “the virus has been destroyed.”

The colonel’s eyes widened. “That’s good news,” he said in the understatement of the year. He reached down to touch Shirley’s shoulder. I don’t even think he realized he was doing it. His eyes flicked over Marc and I. “Meet me in my office at oh-nine-hundred.” With that, the door closed in our faces.

I looked at Marc. “Seems to me he’s going to take his time getting there.”

But I was wrong. Kosta beat us. We walked into his outer office to find Shirley at her desk, grinning like she’d never stop.

“Way to go,” I said, impressed.

“I told you I had a system,” she winked as she opened the door to Kosta’s office.

The colonel sat behind his desk, mellower than I was used to seeing him. He had his hands clasped over his chest and a cigar dangling from the side of his mouth. “Thanks, Shirley,” he said, giving her the once-over.

Shirley needed to write a book: How to Seduce a Demi-God in Just Under Fourteen Years.

Marc and I stood in front of Kosta’s desk.

He plucked the cigar from between his lips. “What do you know?”

I stared at him. Then back to her. Shirley and Kosta. Who would have thought?

“Thor lowered the virus and the crystal into his forge,” Marc told him.

Kosta shook his head. “Why would he do a fool thing like that?”

I shook my head, smiling. “He was under the influence of Eris and a reverse Zeus, according to her.”

Kosta lowered his cigar and succumbed to a belly laugh. The skin on his face and head grew ruddy. His shoulders shook. I’d never seen anything like it. He’d barely cracked a smile in the seven years I knew him. Now he was wiping tears from the corners of his eyes.

“Gods,” he said, standing, trying to gather himself. “Argus defected. His mother should be leaving for Olympus soon.” He eyed the closed door. “I did some checking when I got here to the office. My sources say the old army is calling the virus a dud. The gods are canceling the program.”

Holy Hades. “We did it.” I hugged Marc, not caring where we were. Kosta would have to get over it. We were alive.

The door burst open behind us. Shirley clutched the handle, wide-eyed. “I told her you were busy but—”

With a crackle and burst of feathers, a goddess appeared next to Kosta. She was Egyptian, with long black hair and an ornate headdress with an ostrich feather at the front. She wore a flowing white robe and carried an Ankh, which she promptly set on Kosta’s desk.

“Who are these two?” she asked, unfurling her wings.

“This is actually the one I told you about,” Kosta said, tilting his head at Marc. To me, he said, “This is Ma’At, goddess of justice—”

“And truth, and about eight other things,” she said, whipping a feather out of thin air.

Nice trick.

“Thanks,” she said, holding it out in front of us.

Holy moly. She knew what I was thinking.

“Hello? Goddess of truth,” she said, peering through the feather, making a thorough study of us.

“Nerthus isn’t too happy,” Kosta said. “She’s been humiliated because her virus didn’t work.” He nodded his head toward Marc. “She wants this one back to restart the program.”

Ma’At made a face. “Well, she’s not going to get him. I’ll tell her myself. He belongs with us now.”

My heart swelled.

Thank you, God.

“It’s Ma’At,” she said, “Goddess. And I’m not doing it for you. Or Eris.” She stood in front of Marc. “You are going to be quite valuable to us.”

Marc watched her. “I have no idea what you mean.”

The corner of her mouth curled up in a grin. “You will. In the meantime, you two belong together.”

My heart swelled. I knew that.

But how did she know that?

The goddess frowned as a riot of colors burst from the lower right corner of the room. A rainbow blazed arching past Kosta’s desk and over the line of ancient shields. “Iris?”

“Is this a good time?” a timid voice echoed.

Ma’At stuffed her feather back into a fold in her robe. “Spit it out, Iris.”

“Priority message one from the old god leadership. START: Nerthus the condemned has wasted our time and our glory on a futile virus. STOP. Said goddess will be swiftly and irrevocably punished for her vile crime. STOP. Nerthus, venerated Goddess of the Sacred Grove, Creator and Blessed Ruler of Niatharum, Divine Mother of Thor, will be made the slave girl to Argus, High General of the Old Army for a period of one thousand years, for him to do with her as he wishes. END MESSAGE.”

Ma’At waved her hand, and the rainbow vanished. “Thank you, Iris.”

She turned to the colonel, reached onto his desk for the Ankh. “Good work, Kosta. I just wish I could stick around.”

“Yes,” he said, uncomfortable. His eyes traveled to where Shirley stood at the door.

“Put a sock in it. I know.” The goddess waved her hand and was gone.

Kosta’s gaze traveled to Marc. “We’ll get you set up here in camp. We’ll also put you on the schedule.”

“There’s a free tent close to the tar swamp,” Shirley chimed in from the door.

“I’d like that,” Marc said, wrapping his arm around me.

I couldn’t believe it.

At last, Marc was here, with me.

“I’d like to request a change in quarters,” I said, unable to contain my excitement.

“Give Shirley your application,” the colonel said, as if I had any doubt my friend would rush it through. He looked to Marc. “Make sure she leaves in the mornings with pants on.”

Knowing Marc, the rest of the time they’d be hanging from the rafters.

“I’d also like to get the lab up and running again,” Marc said as Kosta led us to the door.

The colonel considered it. “It seems harmless enough now that the virus is gone.”

Amazing. We could rebuild. Start again. We still had the anesthetic. And now I had Marc as well.

We walked out into the sunshine. It was a new day, a new era. At last, we could see people stirring in camp. Soldiers and clerks, doctors and nurses had made it onto the paths. Voices murmured behind tent flaps. Life went on.

Marc and I made our way to the swamp like excited kids.

We burst into my place, where Rodger now had TIE fighters strung from our laundry line.

He pointed a finger at me. “The decals are drying.”

“I don’t care,” I said with a flourish. “I’m moving out.”

Rodger’s face lit up for a second, before it fell. He recovered quickly. “I’m glad for you,” he said.

My roommate set down a large rock he’d been inspecting and went to shake Marc’s hand.

“What’s that?” I asked.

“Titurate,” he said proudly. “The largest piece I’ve ever seen. And I just found it, sitting outside the showers this morning. Can you believe it? My rock club buddies are going to go nuts!”

“So that’s it?” Marc said, walking over to inspect it. It was clear as a raw diamond and about the size of a basket ball. He bent over it, running a finger over a sharp edge. “It’s hard to believe this can vanish to powder.”

“You just have to hit the right frequency,” I said, repeating what Rodger had told me. “It’s like Eeeee,” I added, trying to hit a good pitch.

“No,” Rodger said over me. “It’s more like Eeeee-yeee.” He hit an octave higher. We sounded like idiots, singing to the rock. I had a feeling Marc was about to tell us that when—crack—the rock exploded to dust.

I gasped. “It worked!”

Fine powder rained down over us. Marc looked like he’d been hit with a sack of flour.

Rodger’s mouth hung open. “My rock!” he said, pointing to the dust on the floor, on Marc, in the air, on a stack of formerly red T-shirts. “That was my Titurate!”

“Tough break, buddy,” Marc said.

I felt bad for him. I really did. “The least we can do is help you clean up,” I said, wishing we had a broom, opting to open a few windows instead. It could just blow out, right?

“Just know you’re getting quite a housekeeper,” Rodger said, brushing off his stack of shirts.

“We’ll hire a maid,” Marc said, gathering me into his arms, getting dust all over me. What the hell? I was covered anyway. He nuzzled my cheek and whispered into my ear. “I’m going to keep you way too busy to clean.”

My body tingled just thinking about it.

“I think I hear my rock club calling,” Rodger said as he banged out of the tent.

We barely heard him.

I ran a hand over Marc’s cheek, his jaw; I found the jagged scar at his neck. “I can’t believe I have you back.”

“Forever, if you want me, Petra.”

He lowered his lips to mine, so familiar, so warm. So right.

Forever sounded good to me.