Killer Frost (Mythos Academy #6)(64)
Author: Jennifer Estep

I hope you’re proud of me, I thought, still staring at the goddess. I’ve done the best I could to save everyone.

The goddess tipped her head at me, but that was her only response.

The doors flew open, and Vivian and Agrona came striding into the main part of the library. Loki stepped inside after them, flanked by Reapers on all sides. My heart sank as I realized exactly how many Reapers were left. They still outnumbered us three-to-one, if not more. “So,” Agrona purred, stopping a few feet away and looking at Linus. “It’s finally come down to this. Your final, ultimate defeat, and here you are, hiding behind a teenage girl, no less. I’m rather disappointed in you, Linus. I would have thought that you would have man-

aged to hold out for at least a little while longer.”

Linus straightened up to his full height. His eyes were full of hate as he stared back at his former wife. “Well, not all of us have a god on our side,” he snapped back. “Or plot and scheme for years to put his soul into an innocent boy’s body.”

I frowned. Everyone knew that Agrona had tried to put Loki’s soul into Logan’s body. That was old news. Still, something about Linus’s words resonated in my mind in a strange way. Something about Loki wanting a new body, a mortal body . . .

Agrona arched a blond eyebrow. “Still angry about that, dear husband? Tsk. Tsk. You’re setting a bad example for your innocent boy there, holding such a grudge.”

Logan stepped forward, his hand tightening around his sword. “He’s not the only one. One of the happiest moments in my life is going to be the one when I finally kill you for everything you’ve done to my family.”

“Unfortunately, that’s not the deal we made,” Agrona said. “Vivian and Gwen will do the fighting. And then we’ll see what happens to the rest of you.”

She smirked at her former stepson. Logan took another step forward, but Linus grabbed his arm and shook his head.

“Let it play out,” Linus said in a soft voice that only we could hear. “Remember, every second counts.”

Logan didn’t like it, but he reluctantly nodded his head and stepped back.

“Well, then,” Agrona said. “I say we let the battle begin. My lord?”

She turned to Loki, who nodded his head at her. Then, the god’s gaze flicked over to Vivian.

“Do not fail me this time,” he said in his silky, but deadly voice. “Or you will not like the consequences.”

Vivian trembled the faintest bit. “Of course not, my lord.”

She bowed to him, then turned and strode toward me, stopping in the middle of the library floor. I stepped up so that I was standing about five feet away from her. We’d cleared all of the chairs and study tables out of the way, so there was only open space around me and Vivian.

“No interference from anyone,” Linus called out in a grim voice. “Those were the terms we agreed upon.”

“Don’t worry.” Vivian smirked. “I won’t need any help with her. Not this time.”

“Well, well, well, aren’t we feeling confident today, Viv?” I mocked her. “But you’re going to lose, just like you always have before.”

“We’ll see about that,” she hissed.

She held her weapon up by the blade, and I did the same with Vic so that the two swords could see each other. Lucretia’s red eye snapped.

“So, we meet again, Vic,” the other sword purred. “For the last time.”

“Of course, it will be for the last time,” Vic snapped back. “Because I’m finally going to cleave you in two, you simpering sword!”

“The only one who simpers around here is you, you overconfident hunk of metal!” Lucretia cried back.

I would have stood there and let the two swords trade insults all day long, as it gave Metis, Nickamedes, and the others more time to heal and evacuate the wounded, but Vivian lowered her sword and tightened her hand around the hilt once more.

I did the same, and the fight was on.

Vivian raised her sword high overhead and charged at me, trying to use her Valkyrie strength to end me with that first, hard, sharp, powerful blow. Her sword crashed against mine, sending red and purple sparks everywhere. It took all of my strength to hold on to Vic and not crumple under her attack, but I managed it.

“Die, Gypsy!” Vivian hissed. “You first!” I hissed back at her.

We broke apart and continued our battle. Back and forth, we fought in the middle of the library, hacking and slashing our weapons at each other over and over again, each one of us trying to kill the other.

I whirled around after parrying Vivian’s latest attack and glanced at the clock mounted on the wall of the glass office complex. Only three minutes had passed since we’d started fighting. Funny, but it felt like forever. Or maybe that was because I’d been battling Vivian ever since she’d tricked me into finding the Helheim Dagger for her. Either way, I needed to keep going, even though I was already utterly exhausted from the battle out on the quad.

So the next time Vivian gave me the slightest opening, I pretended to trip over my own feet instead of slashing my sword across her arm like I should have, like I really wanted to.

The Reaper girl blinked in surprise before her eyes abruptly narrowed. She frowned. “What are you doing? Why aren’t you attacking me with everything you have?” “Because I don’t need to,” I mocked, not wanting her

to realize that I was trying to draw the fight out for as long as possible. “Face it, Viv. You’re not half the warrior that I am. I can kill you anytime I want to. I just want to humiliate you first in front of all your Reaper friends—and especially Loki.”

I raised my sword and charged at her.

Clash-clash-clang! Clash-clash-clang! Clash-clash-clang!

Once more, we fought, and once more, we broke apart and started circling each other. My eyes flicked to the clock on the office complex wall again, but only two more minutes had passed—

“You . . . you . . . you’re stalling!” Vivian snarled. “Why? What are you up to, Gwen?”

A golden light blazed in her eyes, and a sharp, sudden pain exploded in my head, as though she had stabbed a knife deep into my brain. I screamed, but the pain intensified. Vivian stepped forward and slammed her fist into my face, adding to the agony. I rocked back, but I didn’t go down, so she punched me again. This time, the pain was so intense that I felt my legs sliding out from under me and my ass hitting the marble floor.