I shook my head. “Have to get the powers back to the gods.”
“Still haven’t heard the story there.”
“Mithra was just how we expected him to be: annoying and demanding. Made a lot of threats, reminded me who he was and how hard he wanted to tell us all what to do all the time.”
“He threatened you?”
“Naturally. With the warden position. I said no. Ryder said yes.”
“Yeah, I can see that. What I can’t understand is why.”
I shook my head, searching the front of the bait shop for Ryder. He was still inside looking for the video. “I don’t think he understands what he just did. He doesn’t even believe in gods.”
“That doesn’t matter when a god believes in you.”
I sighed. “I tried to stop him.”
She moved her hand to my shoulder and gave me a squeeze. “I know. Do you want me there when you hand back the powers?”
“Yeah, I think that would be good. Could you pick up Crow? We can meet at his shop.”
“They’re not going to let him store the powers.”
“I know. Odin’s up next, right?”
She nodded.
“Okay, so we should all just meet out at Odin’s place.”
“I’ll gather the gods. You get some coffee on the way.”
“That works. I think Piper should be there too.”
“You really want to do that to her?”
“I’d rather she be revealed to all the gods when we’re there to run interference than one-on-one when we’re not.”
“True.”
Ryder strode out of the shop and headed toward us.
“Why don’t you come with me,” Myra said. “We’ll drop the video off at the station and lock it up.”
Ryder looked my way. “Okay with you, boss?”
It was so normal, so not like the last few hours, that I almost smiled with relief. “Yeah. Good. And come along with Myra to Odin’s. You’ll want to see that dog-and-pony show too.”
He hesitated, his body language sort of bent my way as if he wanted to touch me, or hug me, and had decided halfway through that he probably shouldn’t.
“Sure,” he said. “See you there.”
They got into the cruiser and I slipped into the Jeep. It might have been more comfortable to put the water bottle of god powers in the cup holder but I was feeling a little paranoid about letting it even that far out of my sight. So I kept it in the inner pocket of my coat, slid the seatbelt in a mostly-comfortable position over my chest, and headed toward the first drive-thru coffee shop in Ordinary.
~~~
Halfway through a quad-shot latte, I pulled onto Odin’s property.
He wasn’t out with his chainsaw, which surprised me a little since it wasn’t raining. Not that everything wasn’t still soggy as a broken wash machine’s spin cycle, but there was a little bit of sunlight shouldering through the clouds just in time for the day to be slipping toward sunset.
