Chapter 167 Odin Speaks

Chapter 167 Ravens In the Silence
FREYA -

Freya stood at Casey’s window with the old football pressed against her stomach, staring at the raven on the fence while Grace's name stayed cold in her mouth.
She could feel Casey's attention sharpen and his wolf grow alert. Outside, the dead still stood in the gray yard, their faces turned toward the bird instead of her.
Casey’s phone buzzed on the nightstand.
The sound cut through the room hard enough that Freya’s fingers tightened around the football. Casey stepped away only far enough to grab the phone, and the bond stretched with him in a soft, living way that didn’t hurt. She watched his eyes move over the screen, then felt his concern press warmer against her ribs.
“It’s Tyler,” he said, his voice low. “Grace texted him looking for you. He told her to come here, and she’s at the gate."
Freya turned from the window. “She’s here?”
“He tried calling you first.” Casey’s gaze flicked up to hers. “It goes straight to voicemail.”
Freya set the football carefully on the edge of his desk and crossed the room. Her bag sat where she'd dropped it last night when her hands had still been shaking and all she could think about was Casey. She dug through the front pocket until her fingers closed around her phone, but the screen stayed black no matter how hard she pressed the button.
The dead had said Grace’s name at the window, and Grace had been at the Ranch gate before Freya even knew to look for her, and it sent a chill down her back.
Casey came closer. “We don’t have to do anything until you’re ready.”
Freya looked down at his shirt hanging over her thighs and the blanket wrapped around her shoulders, and heat climbed into her face before she could stop it. Last night moved through her in flashes of hands, breath, and Casey’s mouth against hers, but the bond stayed calm beneath it, warm and open.
“I need my clothes,” she said quietly.
Casey nodded and turned toward the door without making her ask. “I’ll be right outside.”
The simple comment made her insides warm.
Freya dressed quickly, pulling on yesterday’s clothes with stiff fingers and brushing her hair back as best she could. The Anchor still hung from the lamp, and her hand paused near it, but she didn't pick it up. Whatever waited outside the window had come because of what she was, and hiding from it behind the stone felt wrong now.
When she stepped into the hall, Casey looked up from where he waited near the wall, and something in his face softened before he reached for her hand. When her fingers curled through his, they walked down the stairs together.
The Ranch was quiet as they moved. A few lights glowed near the kitchen, and somewhere deeper inside, pipes hummed through the walls. Outside, the sky had lightened enough to turn the windows pale, but the sun had not broken over the land yet.
A guard met them when they made it to the gate. “She wouldn’t come inside,” he told Casey. His eyes moved from Casey to Freya and stayed there a second too long. “She said Freya had to come to her, and she kept looking at the fence like something was sitting there.”
Freya’s stomach tightened. “A raven?”
The guard's face shifted. “Yea. How did you know?”
Casey’s hand tightened around hers once, and Freya didn’t answer because Grace was already coming through the gate.
She walked fast, one hand closed around something black and her shoes damp with grass. Her hair was half pulled back, loose strands sticking to her cheeks, and her face looked pale in the early light. When she saw Freya, her steps faltered, but she forced herself forward until she stood in front of her.
Her eyes flicked to the guard, and she asked, "Can we talk away from everyone?"
"Sure," Freya said before all three of them walked to where Grace's car was parked.
“I tried to call you,” Grace said once they'd closed the doors. “But he said I wasn’t supposed to.”
Freya leaned closer, and Casey moved with her. “Who?”
Grace opened her hand. A black feather lay across her palm, glossy and too dark against her skin. “Odin.”
The name made the Claim heat against Freya’s chest.
Grace swallowed, and her eyes flicked once to Casey before returning to Freya. “The Stones awoke last night, and Odin came to me in a dream. I woke up with dirt on my feet and this on my pillow. He said your Mate bond anchored you, and now the dead know you can hear them.”
A current of goosebumps made its way across her skin.
Casey’s thumb moved once over her knuckles. “What else did he say?”
Grace’s shoulders pulled tight, but she lifted her chin. “He said not to let her be called toward the voices. I think they can take her if she lets them."
Casey’s voice went quiet and hard. “Then I'll stay close. I won’t let anything take her away from me."
Warmth moved through Freya’s chest, but it didn’t erase the cold crawling beneath her skin. “What does he want me to do?”
Grace looked past them, toward the road that led away from the Ranch and toward the old field. “He said you have to come to the Stones as the sun rises higher and before night comes back.”
Freya stared at her, and the dead outside Casey’s window seemed to press closer inside her memory. Their gray faces and waiting eyes.
She could go back upstairs and put on the Anchor and pretend for one more hour that this wasn’t happening. But she was tired of running. Of hiding.
Freya squeezed his hand. “Then take me to the Stones.”
Grace nodded, and some of the tension around her mouth finally loosened.
Casey texted a quick message with one hand before sliding his phone away again. “My dad knows we’re going to the Stones,” he said.
Then he stayed quiet for the rest of the trip. His shoulder would occasionally brush hers, and butterflies would fill her stomach.
The old field opened ahead, and the sun was touching the horizon as they reached the Stones.
Dew silvered the grass, and pale light slid over the tops of the crooked circle. Ravens waited in the trees, as an eerie silence surrounded the Stones. The Claim warmed harder with every step, and the bond between her and Casey settled deep inside her.
Grace walked to the edge of the circle and placed her palm against one of the Stones. Her fingers trembled, but her voice held. “Don’t answer every voice and don’t promise anything. Stay with Casey and listen for the one that comes through the clearest.”
Freya stepped into the circle, and the moment her foot hit the grass inside, the whispers stopped so suddenly that the quiet was deafening.
Casey’s hand found hers, and Freya held on as the air in front of her shifted. The sunlight thinned between two Stones, and a voice moved through the circle, rough with grief and love.
“Little wolf.”
Freya’s knees weakened because it had been too long since she last heard that voice.