Chapter 8

Where else do you have to go?

Despite it all, through a near attack by Buddy, getting a face full of phony woodsmoke, and even a cup of well-prepared tea, that thought continued to bounce around in my head. I should have been too exhausted for an existential crisis, and yet, there I was an hour after we’d said our goodbyes for the evening, tossing and turning.

It’s funny; I’d lived my last few months in the Nagoya Tower in a state of near-constant paranoia. Maggie had been the focus of my fears. She knew I wasn’t really Soren Marlowe, and my mental energy went into appeasing her. With her gone, it was like there was a hole in my mind.

I didn’t regret killing her, obviously. The crazy bitch had earned what she’d gotten, and if anything, a clean death from my blade was too good for her after what she had done to me and mine.

However, I wasn’t much freer without her dangling the sword of Damocles over me. Even on the other side of the world, I was still playing my role as a good little Wizard Corpsman. How long had it been since I’d just gone somewhere for the Hell of it? It seemed like I was always being shuttled to-and-fro because of somebody else’s say-so.

Where else do you have to go?

“I don’t know, but that’s half the fun,” I said, the words banishing the phantom Yukiko from my mind. I was going somewhere just for the sheer joy of going there! Sure, Mr. Maki had said we would be waking up bright and early for our first assignment of the work study. I figured if I wasn’t going to sleep anyway, I’d be groggy with a fun memory.

Smartphones were such a wonderful invention, for all I’d badmouthed them. A quick search showed me every restaurant, bar, and hangout in Keflavik. A few promising spots were even in walking distance from our rented house.

Clothing was the real problem; my handy phone reported it was just a whisker over freezing outside. If I was going to go sneaking around late at night, I couldn’t be wearing my Wizard Corps uniform. A pity; the enchanted wool would have been perfect. I’d accumulated most of my casual clothes for the humid Japanese summer. The most winter-friendly thing I owned was a black, white, and blue scarf I’d received as a gift from Kiyo. It was coming apart a little in the middle, but it had been an act of love… back when she loved me.

I flipped on the lights in my room. It was smaller than what I’d enjoyed back in the Nagoya Tower, but listening to Kowalski’s story of his childhood, I realized that was a bad measuring stick. It had the same sense of age about it everything else in the house did, but it was at least electrified. A quick check in the closet showed that whoever had been there last had left behind a perfectly good jacket that was a little short in the sleeves and tight in the shoulders. It beat the alternative, though; a quick check of my phone’s weather app reported that the temperature had slipped below freezing while I’d dithered about.

“No sense waiting any longer, then.” The challenge was that the aged floorboards were bound to creak if I looked at them wrong, much less walk across them. Zone of Silence was good at blocking sound, but it was always fixed to a particular spot. I considered casting the spell around my feet, but I wasn’t sure if that would do much to deaden my tread.

I realized that I didn’t have to be completely quiet; I simply had to keep the others from overhearing me. I padded out into the hallway in bare feet and whispered the spell for Zone of Silence over everyone’s doors to block the sounds of my exit. Thankfully a spoken spell doesn’t have to be audible to anyone but the forces of magic.

Once I was sure I had my house key, phone, and wallet, I was out the door. I dispelled the Zones of Silence once I was in the clear; no sense leaving a shimmering barrier that somebody would spot if they needed to use the loo.

I nearly skipped as I walked down a nearby street. Once I got out of the residential zone and into Keflavik proper, I could stop using my Merlin’s Lantern. Icelanders had invested in some powerful streetlamps, which I thought was a sensible precaution during these long winter days. Between them and the moonlight, it was almost as good as daylight.

I wasn’t alone, either. There were humans everywhere I looked, which startled me. “Who else but me is bored enough to go out on a night like this?”

I arrived at my destination, which my phone had identified as something called a ‘sports bar’. Back home, that would have meant a pub with a boxing ring in the middle. Watching somebody else fight for my amusement sounded like a good time. I doubted they’d have slaves or prisoners to throw in, but volunteer matches could be just as interesting, if not as desperate.

Imagine my shock when I strolled in and saw the walls covered in silent televisions, mostly full of older men talking to the camera, their serious words captured in poorly spelled subtitles. A few were in English, but I couldn’t understand what they were talking about. One bit stuck out to me:

“The thing is, it’s Robertsson’s match to win or lose.”

“Yeah, but he’s going to be facing Reimarsson, and he’s going to have something to say about it, too!”

Both opponents would have an impact on the outcome of a game? Such scintillating commentary. The place seemed popular, though, and I had a didn’t have much luck finding a seat.

A portly bartender shouted something in Icelandic at me as he filled a glass stein from a tap. I was impressed that he didn’t have to look away from me to measure out just enough drink to prevent a spill.

“Come again? Sorry, I don’t speak your language.”

He rolled his eyes. “Tourist or refugee?” His English had less of an accent than mine did, though mine had faded a bit with constant practice.

“A bit of both,” I said.

“Oh, you’re a smart one? Then you can answer me this question.” He pointed to a sign near the cash register written in Icelandic and below in English. “What’s on this sign?”

I squinted; the bar was dimly lit except for the glare of the televisions. “It is illegal in the Republic of Iceland to serve alcohol to anybody under the age of twenty.”

“And how old are you?” he asked. “You barely look old enough to shave.”

“Old enough to know better,” I replied. I knew how old I was, roughly. Demons weren’t much for birthdays, and Mother hadn’t been the sentimental enough to celebrate mine. I estimated I’d been born in the fall, which meant if I wasn’t twenty yet, I was in spitting distance.

The real question was, how old was Soren Marlowe? I had been underage last time I’d visited Iceland, but maybe I’d missed one of my disguise’s birthdays? The Dark Lord knew I’d had other things to occupy me.

I pulled my ID out of my wallet only for the bartender to snatch it out of my fingers. “Huh, looks like it was back in August. I swear, you kids look younger every year.”

The dredged up a memory of Maggie Edwards telling me about it in a bid to make some sort of connection with me. Thinking of the redheaded terrorist killed my good mood in an instant. Thankfully, I was in the right place to kill those thoughts. “To Me,” I said, casting my spell with an indignant tone. The minor spell sent the plastic card flying perfectly to my waiting hand.

The bald man’s eyes went wide, and he pulled at his beard. “You’re a wizard.”

“So, what if I am?” I asked warily. I didn’t have much experience with mundane humans, so I wasn’t sure how he’d respond to that.

“I thought that looked like a military ID.” He ignored me a moment, sliding the draft beer down the bar to a waiting patron’s hand. Pulling out another chilled stein, he went back to filling it. To my surprise, he set it on the wooden bar in front of me.

“I didn’t order yet,” I said.

“First one’s on me,” he replied.

“What’s the catch?” I asked. I’d learned to be wary of unexpected gifts.

“No catch,” he replied. “You’re out there keeping us safe from the Horde; it’s the least I can do.”

I nodded, feeling perhaps a bit awkward about my stolen valor. After all, I’d just gotten a free drink because he thought I fought monsters just like me. “Awfully kind of you.”

I stepped away, looking for a place to enjoy my first drop of alcohol in months. That nonsense about my birthday had cost me valuable drinking and carousing time. I didn’t understand why humans were so adamant about a silly thing like booze; back home, we drank it like mother’s milk. Another area where Our Father Below’s libertine philosophy was superior.

Finding a seat was harder than I thought. I finally realized the purpose of the televisions; each table had its own tribe, marked by colored sports jerseys, and they looked on their chosen screen with rapt attention.

I didn’t recognize the logos of any Japanese baseball teams, the only human sport I’d learned anything about. It seemed that friendship with Hiro Takehara had not prepared me for the wider human world. Not surprising, since he’d always been an odd one.

Not wanting to intrude on their little parties, I cast my eyes on the outer edge of the seats, far from the flickering light of the televisions. That was when I saw a chance to play my favorite sport, and it wasn’t baseball. A blonde woman sat alone in a circular booth made for four people. Well, perhaps not four like her; even from the other side of the room, I could tell she was tall for a woman, and broad in the shoulders.

I quickly checked my hair in phone’s front-facing camera (still perfect) and sauntered over to her table. Without waiting for an invitation, I slid into the booth across from her. “Oh, this won’t do at all.”

She looked up from her phone, seemingly unperturbed by my intrusion. She gave me a quick once-over, which I took as permission to do the same. She made me think of an old book of Norse mythology I’d read as a child, with a stature worthy of a goddess. She was striking with her high cheekbones, piercing blue eyes, and imposing figure. Even better, while she was muscular, she wasn’t lacking in soft features, and it took an act of will to meet her eyes again.

“What won’t do at all?” she asked in accented English, her tone guarded. She pulled me out of my half-daze, forcing me to respond.

“Somebody as lovely as you shouldn’t be alone.” I straightened up, placing a hand on my chest. “I’ll gladly volunteer to keep you company.”

“Who says I’m alone?” she countered. “Maybe my friend is in the bathroom?”

“There’s no glasses or plates on this side of the table,” I said.

She pointed to a group of men transfixed by a football match. “What if I said my boyfriend was over watching the game with his friends?’

“Nonsense,” I said, leaning forward. “If he existed, how could he tear himself away from you?”

“Did you practice that line?” She chuckled and visibly relaxed. “Alright, you got me. I’m alone. I suppose I might let you stick around. What’s your name?”

“Tom Brown,” I said, saying the plainest name that came to mind. Soren Marlowe wasn’t supposed to out on the town, after all. “And you?”

“Heida Bryndísardóttir,” she replied.

“Heida? What a lovely name,” I said. I hoped the Icelanders weren’t like the Japanese, preferring that you use the surname until you got better acquainted. I wasn’t sure I could have said `Bryndísardóttir` if she’d pressed me.

Her lips pursed into a challenging grin. “You’d say that about any name I gave you, Tom.”

“Certainly not,” I said. “If you’d been a Gertrude or an Olga, I’d have politely moved on without comment. We’re fortunate that the label matches the package.”

More giggles. Why couldn’t the girls at the Nagoya Academy have been this easy to win over? Mariko had turned me down the first time I met her, Yukiko had slammed me into the roof of an elevator when I kissed her, and Kiyo had taken weeks to convince she wasn’t the future Mrs. Hiro Takehara. The half-empty glass of red wine in front of her probably wasn’t hurting my chances.

“You’re an outlander, right?”

“Yes, I just arrived in Keflavik this afternoon. Or was it night? You can hardly tell around here.”

She rolled her eyes. “The summers make up for it, but I understand about the long nights. What in the world brought a foreigner here in October?”

“School assignment,” I said. I did always prefer lying with the truth, when I could. “Are you a local?”

“I’m here for work. I grew up in Reykjavik.”

“Oh? What do you do?” She had an adult air about her, but if I didn’t miss my guess, she wasn’t much older than me. I could guarantee she’d been carded on the way in, if only to give the bartender an excuse to chat with her.

“I do some work for the government,” she said. Her tone was disinterested, and she glanced up at one of the screens. “Oh, my game is back on.”

“Which one?” I took the chance to close the distance a bit, since I had the excuse that it would give me a better view of the television. “American football?”

She shook her head, pointing to a few people on the ice, one holding a broom for reasons I couldn’t fathom. “No, curling. It’s my favorite, and it’s the world championship this week.”

I cocked my head at her. “Curling? Can’t say I’ve heard of it.”

“You’re a curl virgin? We need to fix that!” She scooted closer to me. “I’ll tell you all about it!”

“Please, enlighten me.” It looked frightfully dull, but I pasted a grin onto my face. The things young men put up with for the chase!

“Well, you see that man with the large rock? That’s called the curlball. The objective is to knock the other team’s curlball off the ice.” She tapped the edge of my stein with her wineglass to emphasize the point. “The one who pushes it down the ice is the pushman.”

“I see. And what’s the broom for?”

“He’s the brusher,” said Heida. “His job is to clear the ice of debris so the curlball can hit the other as fast and hard as possible.”

I studied the players, and I couldn’t help but notice that most of the curlballs fell short of the mark. “World champions? They don’t seem to be very good at it; they keep missing.”

“What a thing to say,” she said. “It’s early in the curl-skirmish. You see that man giving the orders? That’s Bently Ulfsson, the greatest curlmeister in the league! He’s thinking thirteen pushes ahead!”

I narrowed my eyes at her. “You’re taking the piss, aren’t you?”

The blonde woman nearly bust a gut laughing. She didn’t stop for more than a minute, forcing her to lean on me for support. “Oh my God, I thought you’d never catch on! You’re so trusting.”

“It’s all part of my devious plan, my dear,” I said, grabbing her around her trim waist. “It lured you right into striking distance.”

If I’d tried that on Mariko, Kiyo, Yukiko, or even Rose, that would have earned me anything from a shocked gasp to a slap to the face.

Heida, though? Her lips met mine before I knew what was happening, and that hand wasn’t on my stomach just to steady herself. Thank goodness for all of that military conditioning. The kiss left me dazed, and the sweet taste wasn’t just from the red wine. By the Dark Lord, they made human girls like this? I’d been missing out!

“I’m thinking you came here for the same sport as me,” I said, smirking down at her.

“No, I’m here because Tuesday is ladies’ night,” she said. “Finding somebody who made me laugh was a bonus.”

“Glad to be of service,” I said. “We should go somewhere more private. To continue our discussion of curling, of course.” It was a bit of bluff, since I didn’t exactly have somewhere I could take her. However, this was the best luck I’d had since leaving Pandemonium. “I might be able to show you my own technique.”

“I’m sure you could. Wish you’d flown into town on the weekend, Tom,” she said, failing to stifle a yawn. “I’ve got an early day tomorrow; they’re making me work with a bunch of dang trainees.”

“Sounds miserable,” I said. “Perhaps a raincheck?”

“Is that your phone in your pocket?” Before I could reply, she tapped her smartphone against mine, producing a muffled ding.

“What was that?” I asked.

She chuckled again. “That was my phone number, you silly. What, never gotten a woman’s number before?”

“I have, just not so quickly.”

“Why waste time? Life’s short.” She scooted out of the booth, and I followed right after. Maybe a bit too eagerly, but she didn’t seem to mind. She reached out and tapped the end of my nose. “Boop!”

I wasn’t sure how to take that, besides an instinctive reaction to reach for my nose. She started laughing again.

I’d been right; she was nearly as tall as me. That made her a bit harder to catch when she stumbled, but I managed.

“That wasn’t your first glass of wine, was it?”

“Guilty,” said Heida, straightening up again. “Nice catch.”

“Of course; you don’t have a big nose to break your fall like me.”

“No, but I have my airbags,” she said, adjusting her chest and chuckling again. “You were staring a hole in my shirt when you sat down.”

“Also guilty,” I said. “You don’t seem offended.”

“I know how to take a compliment. Help me outside, please. I have a taxi on the way.”

“Gladly, my dear.”

After I saw her off, I walked back to the rented house with a spring in my step. I hadn’t sealed the deal, but I felt more like my old self than I had since Kiyo had left me. You’ve still got it, Malthus.