Bryce & Danika

The thumping bass from the shitty old boom box

reached Bryce full two levels below the apartment.
The sweet, musky scent of mirthroot hit her when she
reached the next landing. And by the time Bryce
unlocked the door and stepped inside, she was already
dancing.
“There's my favorite person!” Danika shouted,
saluting Bryce with a rolled cigarette of mirthroot. A
pile of it lay on the coffee table before her, Danika's
bare feet inches away. Bryce's roommate gestured
magnanimously to the spread of drugs.
“Where the fuck did you even get that much
mirthroot?” Bryce toed off her heels, scrunching her
chafed, aching toes a few times to work some life back
into them. Then she reached under her dress and
snapped her bra free. She whipped it around her head
once for good effect, then sent it soaring across the
living area. It landed in a sweaty heap on the threshold

1
of her bedroom. Fuck, it was hot out. And it was hot
in here.
Even with the air-conditioning on, a light sweat
coated Danika's face. It probably didn't help that she
wore her familiar leather jacket, with Through love,
all is possible scrawled across the back, despite the
summer heat.
Danika took a long drag of mirthroot, exhaling
through her nostrils before saying, “I confiscated it
from some asshole tourists who thought it'd be cool to
get wasted in the Oracle's Park and see if they picked
up on her psychic vibes or whatever.” She rolled her
eyes. ”Gave them a formal warning and took their
drugs.”
Bryce chuckled, plopping onto the sagging couch
beside her best friend. “You're a real role model.”
Danika passed her the smoldering cigarette. “Oh
yeah. Crescent City's finest.”
Bryce inhaled deeply, every taut muscle in her
body relaxing at the taste of the smoke in her mouth.
On the crappy, too-small TV across the living room,
the evening news blathered on, barely audible above

2
the thump of the music on the boom box. The blackout
last week, blah, blah, blah—
“Where's everyone else?” Bryce asked, exhaling
slowly before passing the mirthroot back to Danika.
She'd gotten Danika's message half an hour ago: a
short video showing the pile of mirthroot—which had
then been on the kitchen counter—with music blasting
in the background, accompanied by the words Hurry
home quick, honey.
So Bryce had, locking the gallery up in record time.
So fast that she'd forgotten her dirty dance clothes
from the class she'd taken at lunchtime. So fast that
poor Syrinx had only gotten in one cuddle before she'd
been out the door with promises to bring him a big
treat tomorrow.
“Working,” Danika replied at last, smoke rippling
from her lips. „Being the role model that I am, I took
the evening off to enjoy the spoils.” She wriggled her
toes, each one coated in chipped purple nail polish, at
the mirthroot. “Bronson made me promise to leave
some for him, so don't make me a liar.”

3
 Bryce took another hit. “If we smoke all of that, I
think we'll die, Danika.”
“Nah,” Danika said, smirking as Bryce slowly
released a sweet cloud. “But you might still be high in
two days.”
Bryce's phone chirped, and she grabbed it from the
coffee table to find that an email from Jesiba had
popped up. Bryce skimmed its contents, then winced.
She'd just put her phone down, intending to ignore the
message for as long as possible, when Danika said,
rising to her feet, “Maybe three days.”
Bryce laughed, the room starting to slow and spin
with a familiar haziness. She set the mirthroot down
in the lopsided ceramic ashtray—a gem from their
half-assed college pottery class—and leaned back on
the stained cushions to savor the chill creeping over
her.
Humming along to the music, Danika padded into
the galley kitchen. Bryce's phone buzzed with another
message from Jesiba I expect a reply within the next
five—

4
 Bryce sighed and began typing back, any building
bliss fading away.
“Wanna go out?” Danika called from the kitchen.
Bryce propped her feet on the coffee table, sending
the email to Jesiba as she did. “No. My bra is officially
off and I am not put ting it back on.”
“Who said you need a bra on to go out?” Danika
emerged from the kitchen, munching on a soggy
leftover sandwich.
“There's still plenty of ziti from what I made last
night,” Bryce offered, the music starting to send
rippling gold rings through the room. Pretty. “That
sandwich is, like, six days old.”
Danika took another bite and said around a
mouthful, “I'd rather risk food poisoning from this
thing than that... concoction.”
Bryce flipped off her friend with a finger that felt a
million miles away. “You said the ziti was good!”
“It might have been on its own.” Danika crossed
her arms. “But you added...?”
“Sausage.”
“And?”

5
 Bryce winced. “Some other stuff?” Okay, maybe
she'd gotten a little overeager adding things to the
recipe. She'd stopped herself after the garlic and olives,
though.
Danika nodded sagely. “Yeah, no ziti. Let's go out,
though — I've still got plenty of room for more. Pizza,
then beer. Then whiskey.”
“I have work tomorrow,” Bryce hedged. “Jesiba's
already messaging me about the pile of paperwork she
wants me to fill out before she even gets in tomorrow
morning. There's no way I can get through it if I'm
nursing a hangover. Or still high.”
“Just two drinks.” Danika promised, unraveling
and then re-braiding her blond, corn-silk hair with
strands of amethyst, sapphire, and rose woven
throughout. “I'll have you in bed by one.”
That was a big fucking lie, if Bryce had ever heard
one. But if Danika wanted to go out, only the two of
them, no mention of making it a party with June and
Fury....

6
 “Please,” Danika asked, frowning slightly. She
approached the coffee table and picked up the
mirthroot cigarette, inhaling again.
“I could use it.”
Even with the haze of the drugs, it was hard to miss
the tight— ness in Danika's face, her posture.
So Bryce asked, as soberly as she could, “You all
right?”
Danika shrugged, inhaling again. “Sabine. As
usual.”
There was something in the way Danika didn't look
at her, didn't meet her eyes... Bryce wasn't entirely
sure she bought it, even though Sabine was always
nipping at Danika's heels. But what else could it be?
Maybe something with Thorne, but Thorne's panting
after Danika had never seemed to bother her before.
If Danika didn't want to talk about it, though, Bryce
wouldn't push. She'd be there when Danika was ready.
Bryce took another drag of the mirthroot herself,
free-falling into the serene calmness, and said,
“One—I want to be back here and in bed by one.”

7
 Her best friend, the sister of her soul, winked. But
some of that tightness, that distant worry remained—
just a glimmer. Even as Danika said, eyes glowing
with wolfish delight through the cloud of mirthroot
smoke, “I'll get you a fresh bra.”

“There's a thousand-mark fine and a permanent

citation for public drunkenness,” a male voice lectured
Bryce and Danika two hours later, right as the clock
neared midnight.
One in the morning loomed, but maybe she could
push it to two. It was such a warm, beautiful night, the
wind sighing through the palms. the kind of summer
night that would linger in Bryce's memory for years.
The mirthroot still wrapped around her senses,
heightening and yet soothing them, making her savor
every perfect detail of this night.
Sitting on the rim of a fountain in a market square
near Archer Street, Danika swigged from her bottle of
beer. They'd gotten a six-pack from the nearby
grocery store—and then another. This was their third.

8
They had only the who cares effect of the mirthroot to
blame for it, Bryce supposed. “No one likes a narc.”
Bryce snickered up at the trio of wolves standing
around them: Connor, Zach, and Thorne. It was Zach
who had spoken. and though his tone had been
perfectly dry, his dark eyes glittered with amusement.
He made up half of the twin duo everyone called the
Ghosts. If Zach was here, Zelda couldn't be far away.
But it was Connor who Bryce really looked at—
and promptly tried to ignore. Especially as he said, “A
little public drunkenness never hurt anyone.”
His tone was the opposite of Zach's, though. He
sounded amused, but she could have sworn something
disapproving shone in Connor's eyes as he looked at
her Bryce glazed up at him as if to say, What? Danika
needed a drink. And some mirthroot. A lot of it.
She could have sworn Connor's frown said, There
are better ways of helping her deal with Sabine.
Bryce shook her head. He saw too much—noticed
too much. She changed the subject. “Where's my
bestie?”

9
 Danika laughed. “I'm right here. You must have
stoked more than I realized.”
“I meant Ithan,” Bryce said innocently “Hey!”
Danika objected.
“Second—best friend,” Bryce amended.
Thorne chuckled. “Sleeping Big game in a few
days”
Connor cautioned, “Do not invite him out. He
needs rest.”
“Of course,” Danika said. „It's a big, fancy,
important sunball game. Why, the fate of the world
rests upon it! We'd never interfere with that.”
Bryce and Danika swapped a glance. As soon as
the trio left, they were totally messaging Ithan — the
fun Holstrom, as she often teased Connor.
But Connor didn't look like he'd appreciate being
teased at the moment. Gods, did everyone have
something smoldering inside them right now? Was it
the summer heat? The way he was staring at her...
Bryce became keenly aware of how high her dress
had ridden up her thighs, how much bare leg she had

10
exposed, the drunken angle of her feet in her high
heels.
“Look,” Thorne said, ever the voice of reason,
“Amelie and the Black Rose Pack are on patrol tonight.
Just... be careful.”
“Let them try something.” Danika snarled, and
even Bryce tensed at that. Danika was spoiling for a
fight.
“Don't even think about it,” Connor warned, teeth
bared in a way that reminded Bryce he might have
been an Alpha in his own right if he hadn't chosen to
serve Danika instead. “A confrontation with Amelie is
the last thing you need right now.”
“Oh?” Danika rose gracefully to her feet, only
swaying a bit. “Why?”
Thorne stepped between them, the Omega flashing
a disarming smile. “Because I don't want to have to
drag you into jail for murder.”
That seemed to appease Danika, who gently patted
Thorne's face. He held her gaze, and Bryce was
surprised to see that Danika was the first to look
away—like she couldn't stand whatever she found in

11
Thorne's expression. Bryce could have sworn pure
pain and longing filled Thorne's stare.
But Zach nodded to Bryce as she stood, heels
wobbling on the cobblestones. “Keep an eye on her,
B,” he said.
Bryce saluted sloppily. “Will do.”
Danika snickered, slipping an arm around Bryce's
shoulders.
“We’ll go take our public drunkenness inside.” She
tugged Bryce from the fountain, from the square.
“We'll be drinking ourselves into oblivion at Lethe
should anyone need us.”
Bryce glanced over a shoulder to find Connor still
frowning after her. She didn't like that look, or all she
read in it, so she just winked at him and let Danika
lead her to Lethe's forgetful embrace.

The whiskey bar was fairly busy for a weeknight.

People still in work clothes sipped the expensive stuff
from crystal glasses at the array of high tables, while
drunk assholes like Bryce and Danika perched at the

12
bar, downing straight shots of the cheap nail polish
remover Lethe claimed was their house whiskey.
If they could have afforded the good stuff, they
would have bought it gladly, but Bryce had zero
money, and though Danika technically had the funds,
Sabine was the one who signed off on the credit
payments.
Bryce didn't usually mind the cheap crap, but
Danika was putting away an inordinate amount of it
tonight. What was going on with her?
Bryce sifted through all that had happened in the
past few days. Or tried to. With all the booze in her
system—why had they started with beer?—she could
barely think at all.
There was only one moment that stood out amid the
drunken blur. “What's up with you and Thorne?”
Bryce asked Danika with no warning whatsoever.
“Huh?” Danika knocked back another whiskey.
Gods, what number was that? Bryce herself had had...
She tried to count on her fingers, but they multiplied
and blurred.

13
 Down the bar, an angel in the uniform of the 33rd
was checking them out. She couldn't tell if he wanted
to try to arrest them or try to fuck them. The red-haired
male wasn't bad-looking, actually. Tempting enough
that if she hadn't been seeing Reid Redner, maybe—
“There's nothing up with me and Thorne,” Danika
said shortly, signaling for another whiskey. “You
gonna talk to that angel or what?”
“Not my type,” Bryce sniffed.
“Liar.” Danika teased. “He's hot as shit.”
Bryce laughed. “You go talk to him, then.”
Danika winked. “Not my type.”
Bryce considered. “When was the last time you
even went on a date with someone?”
Danika nodded her thanks to the bartender and
sighed for a long moment. Like she was about to say
something—
Gods, Bryce's head was spinning. Maybe she
should stop drinking.
“You're Danika Fendyr,” a male growled from
down the bar. They looked, and the male—a great,
hulking brute of a draki with greenish scales running

14
down his muscular arms under his gray T—shirt—
tipped his glass toward them.
“What about it?” Danika asked, the words slurring
only slightly.
The male downed his whiskey in one gulp, steam
puffing from his nostrils. “Heard a lot about you.”
Bryce leaned forward on the bar, peering down its
shining length at him. “All good things, I hope,” she
said with saccharine sweetness. It was definitely the
mirthroot prompting her to sass a draki.
The draki spared her a glance, his reptilian eyes
sweeping over her, then back to Danika. Bryce was
dismissed. Invisible, unworthy of more than a look.
Maybe a quick fuck in the alley, if he'd condescend to
that. Bryce's fingers clenched around her glass.
“Heard you're a handful,” the draki said to Danika.
“Who the Hel are you?” No drunkenness fogged
Danika's words now. They were crisp and sharp.
“Just a guy from the north,” the male answered,
twisting his glass in his clawed hands. “Passing
through. Didn't think I'd see local celebrity.” He bit

15
out every syllable of celebrity, his pointed white teeth
glinting.
“Happy to make your night,” Danika said, her
smile all teeth as well.
“Your mom's a hateful bitch, you know.” The bar
quieted.
But Danika remained utterly unruffled. “Oh, I
know. What'd she do to you?”
The male's pupils narrowed to the finest of slits.
“Not to me. To my cousins. They're just kids. Came
down to the city for a fun weekend and never made it
back home. Last we heard, Sabine Fendyr was having
a little fox hunting them through the streets.” Bryce
put a warning hand on Danika's arm, but said nothing.
Danika, however, said, “That doesn't surprise me.”
She nodded toward the male. “You come down here
to settle the score?” The wood bar smoldered beneath
the male's clawed, scaled hand. “You gonna try to stop
me?”
Danika flashed a crooked grin. “Hel no. I'll wish
you luck, if anything.”

16
 “Danika,” Bryce said. There was defying Sabine,
and then there was outright mutiny. If Danika went too
far over the line, she'd pay.
Smoke curled from the draki's nostrils. “I did hear
you weren't like her.”
“I'll take that as a compliment.” But Bryce didn't
miss the gleam in Danika's eyes.
The male nodded to her, then slid off his stool,
aiming for the door. He had almost reached it when he
turned back and said to Danika, “You tip her off and
I'll come back to find you first.”
With that, he was gone.
“Solas,” Bryce breathed after the bar resumed its
usual low-key murmur of activity.
Danika drained her whiskey. “The poor bastard
doesn't realize that he's not going to walk away at all,
whether Sabine knows he's coming or not.”
“You should be careful,” Bryce said, fear clearing
her mind for a moment. “You don't know who the fuck
that is—”
“If he wants to take out Sabine, he's my new best
friend.”

17
 Bryce squeezed Danika's arm, hard. “That's a dumb
fucking thing to say.”
Danika didn't answer; she only ordered yet another
drink. And Bryce didn't object when another slid in
front of her, too. After that encounter, she needed it.
And the next one. And the next.
Music began, and Bryce was dancing to it, even
though Lethe didn't have a dance floor. She made the
whole bar her dance floor, and Danika was dancing
beside her, and they were laughing and laughing, all
thoughts of Sabine melting away, the rest of Midgard
with her.
Minutes or an hour passed, and all Bryce knew was
that she was sweating, and back at the bar once more,
downing yet another whiskey. The hot angel had
vanished, though she'd made a decent attempt at trying
to lure him with sex-eyes to her side as she danced.
But the snobbery of angels ran deep. He might have
given her sex-eyes right back, but he'd no doubt flown
directly up into the lofty towers of the CBD and
laughed with his friends about the half-human—

18
 “Come on,” Danika said suddenly, pulling her off
the barstool. “Let's get tattoos.”
“Tattoos!” Bryce burst out laughing. “No fucking
way.”
“Pleeeeeeaaaaase,” Danika whined. “Best friend
tattoos.”
“Absolutely not.”
Danika then unleashed her ultimate weapon: the
puppy eyes. And damn if they weren't effective. “I'm
sad and lonely and I want to get a tattoo with my best
friend.”
“My mom will kill me,” Bryce protested.
“We'll get it in a place where she won't see.”
“It'll hurt.”
“You're so drunk you won't even feel it.” Danika
squeezed her hand. “Please? Pleasepleaseplease—”
Bryce sighed. What was some ink in her skin?
Right now, just about any idea sounded good. Granted,
what Danika had said—sad and lonely—lingered, but
Bryce would press her on that tomorrow.

19
 For right now, the night was still young, and they
were young, and would one day be nearly immortal.
The whole world lay at their feet.
So Bryce sighed again and said, “Sure. Why not?”

They weren't the only drunk assholes in the tattoo

parlor at two in the morning. No, they'd actually had
to it, but now here they were. Gods, time was bending
and slowing, then shivering and speeding up.
Danika had told the tattoo artist that she had a
design and specific text in mind—Through love, all is
possible—and wanted it done in a certain way. She'd
said something about bringing an additive for the ink,
a special wolf thing... No, that couldn't be right. This
had been spontaneous, and what the fuck did Danika
know about tattoos? She had her pack tattoo, but
nothing more.
Bryce lay face down on the plastic-wrapped leather
of the tattoo table, the room spinning, spinning,
spinning, Danika was spinning, too...

20
 Literally sitting on the tattoo artist's stool and
spinning, like all that mirthroot and booze wasn't
impacting her at all.
“Why am I going first?” Bryce asked.
“Because you're about an hour away from paking
and pussing out. I've got at least two hours until that
point.” Danika halted her spinning, fixing her bright
eyes on Bryce. “Cold feet?”
Bryce snorted. “No. But again: my mom is going
to freak.”
“Ember's got tattoos. And you're way past the legal
age.”
“You already have Through love, all is posable on
your jacket. Why do we need it on our skin?”
The traced lettering—in some strange alphabet that
Bryce had never seen but Danika had insisted on
using—was drying on Bryce's back while the tattoo
artist prepared her supplies and ink in an adjacent
room.
Danika winked at Bryce. “Best friends and all.”
Bryce smiled drunkenly, resting her chin on her
hands. “Best best, best friends.”

21
 Danika kissed her brow. “Always.”
“No matter what.” Bryce closed her eyes, humming
to herself.
Danika's voice was soft. “No matter what.”
Bryce opened her eyes at that softness. “Hey—
what's that all about?”
Were those tears in Danika's gaze? Danika just
winked again, though. “I love you, B. You know that?
There's no one else who would put up with me, or go
along with me on all this... craziness.”
“I believe the term Thorne would use is bad
influence.”
Danika grinned crookedly. “Nah. You're the good
in my life.”
Bryce's heart squeezed. “Right back at you.”
The door groaned open, and a moment later, the
tattoo artist reappeared, little pots of ink in hand. “This
stuff you gave me is some weird shit,” she said,
snapping on her gloves. “Took a while to dissolve.”
“But it mixed in?” Danika asked a bit sharply.

22
 “Yeah,” the artist said, fixing a mask over her
mouth. “No guarantees that it won't fuck with the
healing or the longevity of the ink, though.”
“It'll be fine,” Danika assured her. “The Prime gave
it to me. Sacred wolf tattoo crap.”
“Sure,” the artist said, clearly not caring one bit
where it came from or what it was. She probably only
wanted to get through the night's endless parade of
assholes.
Danika waggled her brows at Bryce, drawing a
laugh from her. “Don't move,” the artist said, fingers
testing along the knobs of Bryce's spine, the expanse
of her upper back. “I'm starting.”
“Here goes,” Danika said to Bryce, and reached for
Bryce's hand, their fingers interlocking.
“Light it up,” Bryce whispered to Danika as the
artist stepped on the power pedal and the tattoo gun
buzzed to life.
Danika just squeezed Bryce's hand gently. And as
the tip of the needle bit into Bryce's flesh, piercing
even through the drunken, stoned numbness, she
whispered, “Light it up, Bryce.”

23