The Immortals After Dark 11: Dreams of a Dark Warrior

When a trio of other women staggered out onto the front porch, Regin held up the head and made an exaggerated curtsy. They cheered drunkenly. Witches, no doubt. They were the Valkyrie's all ies and notorious drunks.

One laughed, tripped over her own feet into a pratfal , then laughed again.

Regin turned back to face his direction. With her skin glowing brighter and her expression animated, she punted the ghoul's head like a footbal , then shaded her eyes melodramatical y. As it sailed far above him toward a nearby swamp, she cried, "It. Might. Go. all . The. ... Way!"

She cannot be one thousand years old.

The witches cheered again.

That task completed, she plucked a sat-phone from a holster on her belt. She texted something, her fingers so fast they were a blur, then strol ed over to her car and hopped inside. The engine purred when she started it. She pulled up in front of the house, honking the horn and rol ing down the windows.

"Nix!" she cal ed. "Get your ass out here!" She said something to the witches in a lower voice, and they howled with laughter. But when Regin turned from them, her easy grin faltered, her demeanor preoccupied.

Another Valkyrie sauntered from that madhouse, a black-haired one with vacant eyes, cradling what looked like a paralyzed bat in one arm like a babe.

She had to be Nix the Ever-Knowing, a powerful soothsayer. Though she looked to be in her mid-twenties, she was one of the oldest-and most crazed-immortals on record.

She wore a long, flowing skirt, cowboy boots, and a T-shirt that read VALKYRIE in big block letters with an arrow pointing up at her face.

Flaunting themselves. The arrogance. Christ, how he hated them.

She too proffered a braid to the wraiths- a toll of some sort? -then joined Regin in the car, blowing a kiss to the witches. The two Valkyrie pulled out, some asinine song blaring from the car stereo-the only lyrics were "Da-da-da." They bobbed their heads in unison to the music.

As they passed, he drew back into the brush, his heart thundering. But the dark-haired one turned, looking directly at him with eerie golden eyes.

Just as the hair on the back of his neck stood up, the soothsayer mouthed, You're late.

Regin the Radiant sensed some enemy was hot on her ass as she sped down dark country roads.

But she simply didn't have time for a fight to the death just now. Regin had to reach Lucia before it was too late.

She adjusted the rearview mirror. "Are we being fol owed?"

Nix nodded happily. "Usual y." She tapped her chin with her free hand. "You know, you think you don't like it, but actual y You'll miss it when it's gone."

Regin scowled at her sister, doing her damnedest to ignore Bertil-the bat Nix carried. It'd been a gift from a secret admirer. "Seeing as we're on our way to the Loreport, you probably should tell me where I'm flying out to tonight." Nix's last report on Lucia had her in the Amazon, of all places.

"Hmm. Should I remember?"

"Me. Meeting up with Lucia. Who's gearing up to slay Cruach, her worst nightmare." Crom Cruach was the ancient horned god of human sacrifices and cannibalism-and the monster who'd tricked Lucia into leaving Valhal a. Every five hundred years, he tried to escape his prison. For the last two times, Lucia- with Regin as her trusty wingman-had forcibly denied his parole. "Any of this ringing a bel , Nix?"

Blankness.

"Gods, I don't have time for this!" Lucia was out there alone; Cruach was rising nowish. And Nix was spacing?

"Don't shriek," Nix chided. "You'll hurt Bertil's ears, and he needs them for echolocation." As she stroked her new pet in a love-him-and-pet-him-and-cal -him-George kind of way, her eyes were even more vacant than usual. Her visions of the future had been hitting her rapid-fire lately, and they were taking a tol .

Assholes were laying odds in the Lore betting book that Nucking Futs Nix wouldn't make it through this Accession with any remaining sanity intact. And there wasn't a whole lot remaining.

"Don't fret, love," Nix said reassuringly.

"How can I not fret ..." Regin trailed off. "You're talking to the freaking bat!"

She tickled its bel y with a claw. "Coochy-coo." Regin swore the bat smacked its lips with contentment, snuggling into her arm.

Had Nix been feeding that little winged rat her blood? "Don't you know that those things spread Cujos?

Damn, Nixie, you're getting worse. Even more cray-cray than usual."

She briefly glanced up. "That's fair."

"Uh-huh." Regin downshifted, tires squealing as she swerved to dodge a roadkil -bound possum.

"But what about your own cray-crayness, Regin? You've been behaving very badly of late. Getting high on intoxispel s and picking fights. You are acting out, and it simply must stop unless you invite me to join in."

Also fair. But what else was Regin supposed to do? A year ago, she and Lucia had undertaken a badass mission to discover a way to defeat the unkil able Cruach forever. Instead of merely imprisoning him. They'd traveled all over the world together, risking their lives.

In other words, good times. But then Prince Garreth MacRieve, Lucia's werewolf admirer, had started fol owing her everywhere, sticking his nose where it didn't belong. Regin's solution? Euthanasia.

Lucia's solution to Regin's solution? Leave her behind when she was nursing a hangover.

Abandoned me like last year's wardrobe. Regin's claws dug into the steering wheel. After a mil ennium of never leaving each other's side. But last year's wardrobe is determined to make a comeback.

"Nix, you promised you'd tell me where Luce is if I did everything you asked me. I cleaned your room. I took your Bentley to the shop after you went off-roading again. And I put in hours at the Lore foundling house with those little punks." Regin had begun to cal it the Lorphanage and predicted it'd stick. "I need to keep moving anyway. You know he's returning soon."

Aidan. With his heart-stopping smile and big, possessive hands. Though she longed to see her Viking in any reincarnation, she'd decided that he might actual y live a ful life if he never found her.

Nix sighed. "Have you truly given up all hope of finding a way to be with him?"

Regin glanced over at her, trying not to feel even a sliver of hope. "Any reason not to give up?"

"I believe my advice to you was 'Go find and bang your berserker.'"

"Huh. well , see, I tried that, and it didn't quite work out for me." The last four times! "I just can't ... I'm not doing it again." The guilt got worse with each reincarnation. She was his doom, might as well deal the deathblow herself.