Wicked Gods Read online

  Wicked Gods

  The Curse of the Allfather, Book One

  D.N. Hoxa

  Contents

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  Also by D.N. Hoxa

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Also by D.N. Hoxa

  Copyright © 2020 by D.N. Hoxa

  This book is protected under the copyright laws of the United States of America. Any reproduction or other unauthorized use of the material or artwork herein is prohibited.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales, is entirely coincidental.

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  Also by D.N. Hoxa

  WINTER WAYNE SERIES (COMPLETED)

  Bone Witch

  Bone Coven

  Bone Magic

  Bone Spell

  Bone Prison

  Bone Fairy

  SCARLET JONES SERIES (COMPLETED)

  Storm Witch

  Storm Power

  Storm Legacy

  Storm Secrets

  Storm Vengeance

  Storm Dragon

  VICTORIA BRIGHAM SERIES (COMPLETED)

  Wolf Witch

  Wolf Uncovered

  Wolf Unleashed

  Wolf’s Rise

  TRAPPERS, INC SERIES (ONGOING)

  Reaping Willow

  Angel Wings

  STARLIGHT SERIES (COMPLETED)

  Assassin

  Villain

  Sinner

  Savior

  MORTA FOX SERIES (COMPLETED)

  Heartbeat

  Reclaimed

  Unchanged

  For my daughter;

  Thank you for giving me a reason to sing again.

  One

  It’s a pretty good sign that you’re fucked when a half-troll looks at you like you’re his next meal—one he was going to enjoy very much. People say trolls don’t eat flesh, but those people don’t know shit. Not to say that they’re all idiots, but…they’re all idiots. Trolls will eat anything that comes their way. And the half-troll coming for me with all the strength in his three-hundred-pound body was no better. His skin was light blue, and his body was abnormally formed. His chest was wide and extremely thick compared to his hips, and he had no belly button—I could see because he’d chosen to wear only a pair of loose, grey shorts to the fight. His face was round, the back of his head completely flat, and thick, wire-like strings of white hair sprouted on the top of his head here and there. His small eyes were black and set close together, and paired with his round nose and the thin lines that were his lips, he looked like a really bad drawing. He was three times bigger than me and much stronger, but he was slow. I was fast. That’s why I managed to slip to the side before he reached me and kick him in the left knee so hard, he fell against the wire fence around the cage. No, sorry—the ring.

  “What’s the matter, big guy? Your legs giving up on you already?” I said with a forced grin. I wanted him angry. When people were angry, they made mistakes—even half-trolls.

  Pissed off, he growled as the crowd around us cheered, giving me the extra second I needed to jump on his back and hang onto his neck, my legs locked tightly around his hips like a good little monkey. His skin was stretched tight over his abnormally big muscles, and slippery from the sweat, but I managed. Once I was as comfortable as one can be on a half-troll’s back, I pushed my fingers in his eyes.

  His roar shook me to my core, but I didn’t let go. The numbers on my hypothetical paycheck depended on my holding on, so letting go was not an option—unless I wanted to get in the cage again next week, which I didn’t. So no matter how many times he hit me with the sides of his fists wherever he could and threw himself back against the wires of the cage to make me let go, I didn’t.

  Just a few more seconds, just a few more seconds.He was going to give up. He had to. Trolls, even halflings, liked to see. Everyone liked to see. Still, I began to have doubts when troll blood began to coat my fingers. Why the hell wasn’t he tapping me? I didn’t want to hurt him more.

  Well, I did, but that wasn’t the point. I was tired, my muscles were aching, shaking, and I maybe had one minute before my body gave up. If I let go, I was a goner. I should have exercised more. I was only human, and all my opponents had some kind of magic in their blood, so I needed to train. A lot. A lot more than this, apparently.

  The crowd was going wild. They loved this kind of a show. People fighting until one of them was knocked out or couldn’t stand any longer? Bring it on! The more blood the better. And if one died, it was going to make everyone’s fucking night.

  But not in my cage. I never killed. If it came to it, I would be the one to tap, no matter that that had never happened before.

  When the half-troll threw me against the fence the last time, the back of my head seemed to explode. My body became numb. I don’t know how I held on for three more seconds, but I did.

  Three more seconds was all it took for the ugly creature to tap on the fence—three times. I surrender.

  He’d surrendered.

  Letting go had never felt so sweet. My fingers were drenched in his blood, my knees were shaking, my muscles weak from having had to hold onto him for so long, but I grabbed the fence and held on. It was over. It was over. I was done—and I had won.

  The half-troll was on his knees in front of me, holding his face with his huge hands, screaming. If past experiences were anything to go by, he was going to get up any second now and try to kill me for kicking his ass in front of everyone—rules be damned. With shaking legs, I walked the short distance to the door and slammed my hands on the fence while Sennan pretended to have trouble sticking the goddamn key in the hole. The bastard was grinning. He was enjoying this.

  “Come on, come on, come on,” I whispered under my breath, and when the crowd cheered once more, I knew the half-troll had made it to his feet. I turned around, taking in deep breaths to calm my racing heart, knowing what was coming. Remember before when I said he was looking at me like he wanted to eat me?

  Well, he no longer did. His eyes were red with blood and so much hatred, if he got his hands on me, he was going to go down in history as the half-troll who ripped a human in half.

  He charged me.

  “Sennan, you son of a b—”

  I fell back and blacked out completely for a split second. It must have been the fear. The sound of the fence door falling shut and then something slamming against it like a fucking rock shocked me awake, and I found I was still standing, Sennan’s hand behind my back holding me upright. I was out of the cage. The half-troll was still inside, screaming bloody murder, slamming his huge fists on the fence that separated us, his spit showering my already dirty face.

  Squeezing my own hands into fists, I resisted the urge to break Sennan’s nose—or try to—and ignoring the cheering crowd, I lowered my head and made my way to the back. The people didn’t touch me, pat me on the back, hi-five me like they would any other
winner. No, I was only human, and for that, I was thankful. I made it to the back without anyone trying to kill me, which had happened twice after a fight before, and I finally allowed myself to sit down on the metal bench.

  I liked to tend to my wounds in the privacy of my apartment, but tonight was different. I could barely stand. That half-troll had really done a number on me. Turns out, getting slammed against fences repeatedly while you tried to hold on with all your strength could turn your muscles to jelly. Who knew? On the other hand, if I didn’t wash the cuts and put some alcohol on them, who knew how badly they’d get infected? Sennan wasn’t exactly known to keep his cage clean, if you know what I mean. Layer upon layer of blood and other bodily fluids coated the floor and the fences. It’s why he kept a first aid kit in the back room, right next to the showers.

  Cursing under my breath, I got out of my black clothes, ones I was going to have to sew now that they had more holes than fabric in them, and I stood under the shower while the lukewarm water washed the blood and sweat off me. Two minutes was all I was willing to give it. Standing naked in the back of Sennan’s joint, even though I’d locked the door, was no smart thing to do, and I wasn’t eager to be caught that vulnerable by anyone. As soon as most of the blood and sweat were off me, I dried myself and used half a bottle of alcohol from the kit. I had three big cuts on my back and other, smaller ones on my arms. Nothing that wouldn’t heal in a couple of weeks. As soon as I got home, I was going to need to bandage them. It was going to be close to impossible because my hands didn’t work backwards, but that’s what mirrors are for, right?

  The one I was looking at right now, a small one hanging on the wall over the two old sinks, showed a ghost, just a shell of who I used to be. My hair was dark brown, almost black without strong light, and I kept it long enough to reach the middle of my back because it was easier to secure it in place that way for fight nights. My skin had never been tan, but I’d never been this pale, either. The lack of sunshine in this place sucked the life out of me. My eyes were once a vibrant blue that now looked lifeless and cold, and my lips were a disaster of dried skin. But my body was still the same as it had been because I’d never stopped training. My muscles were my most powerful weapon, even though I didn’t look like much to people, which had always worked to my advantage.

  When someone knocked on the door, I was ready to leave, dressed in my dirty clothes, my face only half covered in black ink now. I don’t know why I bothered. Everybody knew me. They knew who I was. But that black ink I smeared all over my face had become a mask behind which I could hide, no matter what the others saw. Fight nights weren’t fight nights unless my face was as black as my hair.

  I knew it was Sennan even before I opened the door, but seeing his square face and piercing blue eyes still brought goose bumps up my arms. Sennan was an Arc—an Arcane witch. A spellcaster, able to use the magic around us to do just about anything he put his mind to. Now that there was basically no magic in Vanah, he couldn’t cast for shit, but he was still strong. Stronger than the average citizen and much stronger than me. I never forgot that—not just for Sennan but every creature that breathed the Vanah air together with me. My life depended on it.

  “You cleaned up nice,” he said with a sneaky smile as he stepped inside the back room.

  “You here with my money?” I walked back to the shelf where I’d put my small bag with my equipment, relieved that I wouldn’t need to be back here for at least another three weeks.

  “Sure, sure,” Sennan said, watching me like he always did. Like he was trying to tear me apart with his eyes just so he could see what hid beneath my skin. I amazed him—he’d told me that much on many occasions. “You did well tonight. Very well, Morgan.”

  “Well, I didn’t die,” I mumbled, and with my bag strapped to my back, I stood in front of him, eager to get my money and get the hell out of there.

  But he didn’t give it to me. “I’ve got an offer for you.”

  Rolling my eyes took effort—my muscles were still screaming and I really needed to lie down, but it was a necessity because I already knew what was coming.

  “No, thanks.”

  “It’s one time—and one time only. You’d make five times what you made tonight. Everyone knows you could use that money.” It almost sounded like a warning.

  “And you could use a good old-fashioned smack in the head, which I’d personally provide if I could reach that high.” I grinned. “We’ve been over this before. I’m not doing it.”

  “I know we have, but people change their minds every day,” he said, completely at ease, like he was talking about the weather, when he was asking me to agree to kill someone for the fun of it—or die trying.

  “Well, I didn’t. And I won’t—not for this,” I reassured him.

  “Think about it, Morgan. It’s just one fight. You do a clean kill—no entertainment required, and you’ll be rich.” The greedy gleaming in his eyes annoyed the hell out of me.

  “Or you could stop being a pain in my ass and pay me my money. I am not going to agree to kill anyone.” It was bad enough that I had to beat others for a living. Trying to kill them was a whole other story. I refused to do it, no matter how many times Sennan asked or how much money he offered me.

  “You’re going to have to take lives eventually. It’s a cruel world out there. You know that, don’t you?”

  “Killing someone who wanted to kill me would be completely different. I’d be killing for survival. Here, it would be killing for money, and no amount of money is worth a life.”

  Sennan laughed, but I expected as much. “I am shocked every time you come through my door alive and breathing, but okay. Suit yourself.”

  “Uh…my money?” I repeated, more pissed off than I had any right to be. Of course he was going to ask me to kill, and this wasn’t going to be the last time. The people of Vanah didn’t feel the same way about killing as I did. They didn’t mind death, not like people back home did. To kill for entertainment was perfectly okay—so long as you were up for it. This wasn’t going to change, and the sooner I understood that, the better off I’d be.

  “By the bar.” He nodded his head at the door. “Come get a drink. On the house.” And without waiting for my reply, he headed out of the back room.

  “You suck, Sennan!” I called, knowing he’d hear me, but that was just about all I could do to the guy.

  It was very much like him to play games, but I didn’t want to let it get to me. His bar was upstairs, right above the “hidden” ring he kept going for his regulars. For their entertainment.I was going to have to pass through to get out anyway, and I wasn’t leaving there without my money.

  The bar was called the Magicless Lounge, and it was big, almost always full of people. You could find all kinds of creatures in there: Arcs, who were one of the strongest creatures of this world, alongside the Diviners, witches who used to harness their magic through their fancy worship rituals for the gods. Their magic was gone now, but once upon a time, people said that both breeds of witches were strong enough to defeat an entire army all by themselves. You could find shifters who no longer shifted, too. And trolls and half-trolls, pixies and imps, who looked like elongated versions of a human—and even nightwalkers came by the Lounge every now and then. In our world, they were known as vampires who needed to suck the blood of others in order to survive. Sennan didn’t care who he served as long as they paid—and they always paid. Otherwise they ended up dead.

  I kept my head down as I walked among the drunks, singing together with the band Sennan had hired for the night, made of two freakishly tall pixies singing and playing strange-looking violins. The song was one I recognized, though I couldn’t understand old Norse. I barely found a spot by the bar where Sennan and his imp bartender served the drinks. The imp wasn’t as tall as the pixies, but his lips were still longer than normal, and his fingers looked really freaky, too. Impertinence got the best of me, but as soon as the guy sitting next to me stood, I took a seat on the half
-broken stool, afraid I might fall if I didn’t. A glass of ale slid in front of me, and Sennan winked like he didn’t know how much I hated that shit. To indulge him, I took a quick sip and prepared for my stomach to turn. I wasn’t going to throw up in front of everyone, but it took everything I had to take my mind off the fact that my body wanted nothing to do with that awful drink. Then, I raised my hand toward Sennan, and mouthed: money.

  He laughed because he knew that that was exactly what I would do, and dragging himself closer to me, he put a dirty brown bag on my palm. It weighed exactly as it should—seventy silver coins. The price I was paid to beat people up until they surrendered. The only thing that kept me alive in that godforsaken place.

  Putting the money in my bag, I turned around without athanks, intending to run all the way to my apartment if my body allowed me.

  Just then, the music stopped abruptly.

  The people began to whisper, then shout.

  It was like a scene from a movie, though I hadn’t seen one of those in three years. When the background music changed, you knew something was about to go down. Nothing even mildly surprising ever happened in Vanah. Theft, murder, rape—it was all “usual stuff” here, so even against my better judgment, I stopped to listen.

  Then I caught that word that made my flesh rise in goose bumps: human.

  I turned to the bar again to find Sennan face-to-face with the man who was probably giving him all the details. I didn’t think—I elbowed my way back to him and waited until he finished, tapping my foot against the dirty floor.