The Quest for Valhalla

Chapter 3

“His death was unfortunate, yes, but that is no reason for you to act like a shivering simpleton and leave the organization because you have a sudden influx of emotion!” Lita chided loudly in her intimidating tone. Like a teacher, she circled her subordinate in the hazy room filled with her cigar smoke. He looked up at her, weary of her, as they all were. From her lips, the thick smoke seeped as she mouthed her words, giving her the likeness of a human dragon.

‘No wonder they call her “Fire Breather” behind her back,’ he thought. To make matters worse, the ambitious Lita had flaming red hair down to her waist. It impressed upon her employees and associates her fiery disposition and passionate pursuits of her goals. Once Lita set her mind on something, no amount of discourse or argument could deter her.

She most certainly had the means to support her confidence, being an heiress of a great fortune and boasting an education most could only covet. Now she was sucking on her Dominican cigar, pacing around the chair where her best thief sat shaking. Her eyes flashed to his, quickly reading his every facial expression to determine his attitude and loyalty.

“Sebastian, you are one of my best people. Please don’t make me…” she stopped to take another drag of the choice tobacco and Sebastian’s pleading brow followed her tall silhouette crossing the daylight-lit window. Through the smoke that curled and billowed as her figure disturbed it, he saw her as a primordial deity. Perfect beauty, even in mature age, she walked gracefully. “…get rid of you. You have given me over two years of promising service thus far and I would hate to see you… go,” she sighed, clearly finding it tedious to have to select her words to sound less malicious.

But by reputation, all who knew her name knew that Lita was malicious without pardon. Fearful of her vast knowledge of history, science, physics, and anthropology, many of the people she employed never corrected her or dared call her bluff on anything. She was as reckless as she was smart and she made no secret of her intentions.

‘If Lita says she is going to kill you, you had best update your will.’ Sebastian recalled the words of his first colleague after he joined the ranks of her organization. At the time, he thought it a rookie joke, something to warn and unravel the new guy, but he soon noticed that some of the men he worked with had disappeared after failing at missions on occasion. Now, here he sat, confronted by the Dragon Lady herself, only just managing his bladder control.

“Now, tell me again: why you did not collect the vial in the store room, as you were told?”

“Madam, the vial was not there. It really wasn’t. I checked the lock box you showed me in the picture, but it was empty, I swear! Even the other containers — I checked them too! Nothing,” he explained, hardly capable of keeping his voice even.

“I lost a man, Sebastian. A very capable man whom I have trusted for years. He was killed while serving as a decoy…” she lunged at him, the devil in her low growl as she planted her slender hands on either sides of his chair, frightening him to the bone, “…for you! For you! And all that for you to fail? You could not bring me the one thing I sent your party for, Sebastian! And I lost Jürgen! I should put your fucking head on a spike for this!” she roared in her damaged voice, hoarse from smoke and a childhood stint of chronic bronchitis, which almost destroyed her vocal chords. Many of her subordinates imagined she would sound like Marianne Faithfull if she ever tried her hand at singing. But the only singing one could expect from Lita would be the Banshee keening of a death omen.

“I’m so sorry!” he cried out. He did not mean to, but his voice gathered volume in desperation. Lita mistook it for raising his voice to her and before he could retract or explain she landed a devastating blow against his cheek bone, leaving his skull burning and his mind in perceptive twilight for a good 10 seconds.

“Don’t you ever! Ever!” her snarl sank low as she slowly mouthed each word in his ear. Her breath burned into his outer ear, her lips grazing the skin as she grunted. His skin crawled from the sensation, but he did not feel the expected follow-up strike.

“I’m sorry, Madam. I’m sorry. I did not mean to…” he whispered in a shivering whisper which appeased her.

“Don’t grovel, Sebastian. It is not becoming — especially in a man,” she said plainly.

“Leaving my employ will not absolve you of your inadequacies and it will most definitely not save your life if I decide to correct your mother’s mistakes,” she continued. This time Sebastian simply nodded. The sweat trickled from his temples and he could feel his legs numb when she dealt him one of her sadistic looks.

“Now, if the relic was not in the store room, I venture to guess they would have thought to move it from its container, but not from the premises. Unless they thought it good to split up the find to separate possible dangerous conjunctions,” she said to herself as she rounded the table, the hem of her long emerald dress dragging behind her on the untreated cement floor of the small musty room. Then she stood still for a moment and all Sebastian could see was the orange burn of the cigar’s end as she sucked on it.

“Conjunctions, Madam?” Sebastian uttered in deep uncertainty, expecting a roaring reprimand, but Lita simply looked his way.

“This may surprise you, my dear pet, but in ancient times, there were as many biological and chemical hazards as there are today,” she smiled a cold grin of condescension. “In fact, much of what we know about metallurgy and alchemy, things that have helped our historical tyrants create a vast array of killing methods throughout the ages, come from antique scrolls. Museums have become overlooked by recent generations as lazy storage facilities for sentimental objects their benefactors could not bear to throw away. Houses of forgotten glory. Nothing more than pawn shops for the historical snobs and arrogantly wealthy.”

Sebastian watched his employer thinking, but at the same time he knew she was painfully aware of his attempt at provoking her pity by exhibiting interest. As a matter of fact, he knew Lita was humoring him only to use the opportunity to make him feel like an ignorant idiot. She was successful.

“Conjunctions of chemicals, conjunctions of incantations, whatever you can summon to your little brain as being two components of one weapon, are locked away in a myriad of ancient artifacts. The world, those who still bother to employ calculation or philosophy, would be terrified to know what power lies in the past they are so ardently trying to shove onto shelves for school children to marvel at,” she almost whispered now, as she approached him with swaying hips, her hair forming a scarlet halo around her upper body and head in the blinding light of the small window. “Inside many of these relics, you see as dust-covered bookends lie secrets of terrible power, components of deadly force embedded in sciences that could pulverize the world as we know it with consummate ease. Sometimes, in an attempt to preserve the genius discovery, and to prevent them from being utilized as weapons of mass destruction, the past scholars and scientists have elected to harbor the different cog wheels of one machine in different items, usually those that would seem least conspicuous to the scrutiny of the suspicious,” her lips curled as she concluded her sermon and she doused her cigar.