Page 31 of Kiss of Wrath

“My father isn’t a nice man. He beat my mom, before she died. A lot. And he locked me and Sam and Larry and Linda in the closet one time when we tried to help, and then he forgot to let us out, and it got dark, and we were . . . afra— mad. He even beat Maggie’s back with a belt when Mom wasn’t home.”

Owl Girl was beaten with a belt?

A rage rose in Mordr and he could practically feel the steam coming out of his ears, but he caught himself just in time before going berserk. When he was calm again, he remarked, “But your father is in prison, is he not? That is what your sister told me.”

Ben nodded. “Yeah, but he’s gettin’ out soon. That’s why I need to learn how to use a sword. Or a gun.”

Oh, hell in a basket! I hope there are no guns about. Forget about the danger of a barbecue fire, this child is going to shoot his eyes out, or someone else’s.

At Mordr’s order, Ben went over to sit with his brothers. They looked like little angels . . . sodden, dirty angels with cowlicks and freckles and enough energy to launch a longship. Just to punctuate that thought, one of them let out a loud fart.

Mordr was shaking his head at the daunting task of trying to turn those mischievous boys into well-behaved young men. It would be like trying to harness a whale and riding the seas on its back.

He was putting the cover over the barbecue grill when Miranda came out. She had changed to black denim braies . . . tight black denim braies with a sleeveless red shirt. Her wild red hair was piled atop her head with a claw-like thing. She was barefooted, and he noticed that her toenails had been painted a pale peach color, like little shells.

The woman was not young—at least in her thirties, probably older than his thirty-one human years. She was slim, and he preferred a little meat on the bones of his women . . . well, back when he had women. She had small breasts while big ones were more desirable, in his opinion, leastways ones that filled a man’s hand. And of course there was that red hair. Still, once again, Mordr felt a punch to the stomach, and lower, just gazing at her. What did it mean? Well, he knew what it meant, but why now? Why her?

She took one look at the boys sitting elbow to elbow, behaving, and demanded of him, “What did you do to them?”

“Disciplined them. As should you, if you were not gallivanting off to casinos.” Gallivanting was a perfect word he’d picked up from some old lady in Louisiana when visiting Ivak last year. Tante Lulu was her name.

“Discipline?” She bristled. “Did he lay a hand on any of you?” she asked the boys.

Mordr saw Ben consider telling her about the slap to his buttocks, but reconsidered. The three boys said, “No.”

“He’s jus’ gonna hang us from a tree,” Larry offered.

“Whaaat?” She turned to Mordr.

“It was a jest.” He favored Larry with a dirty look, and the boy just grinned at him.

By the runes! I am losing my fearsome demeanor.

“He is going to give us each a sword, though,” Ben chirped in, “if we behave.”

She gave Mordr a look that would have intimidated a lesser man, but not him. He just flashed the same look back at her. “You will not give these boys weapons of any kind,” she said evenly. “Not a sword, not a gun, not a knife, not brass knuckles, not anything that could kill or maim. Do you hear me?”

“They heard you in California.”

The boys were protesting loudly. “Please, Aunt Mir. Please, please, please.”

“We’re gonna be real good. I’ll even change my underwear every day.”

“I’ll do my homework, even when I don’t wanna.”

“He’s a Viking. He kin show us how to use a sword without cuttin’ off a finger or nothin’.”

“Absolutely not!” she said vehemently.

“Don’t you think you are overreacting?” Mordr asked. “Even little ones need to learn how to protect themselves.”

His mention of protection seemed to give her pause. But then she reaffirmed her opposition, “Not with a deadly weapon.”

“Son of a Saxon bitch!” he exclaimed. “Since when is a wooden short sword a deadly weapon?”

“Wooden?”

“Did I not mention that they would be wood?”