Sunday's Child Read online

  Sunday’s Child

  Grace Draven

  Sunday’s Child Copyright © 2014 by Grace Draven

  King of Hel Copyright © 2004 by Grace Draven

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  King of Hel interior illustration licensed for use, art by Archia Oryix.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author's imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Contents

  Sunday’s Child

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Epilogue

  The King of Hel

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Epilogue

  About Grace

  Dedication

  SUNDAY’S CHILD is dedicated to my two favorite guys:

  my husband Patrick and my son Brendan – that beloved puzzle piece.

  Sincere thanks to the author Elizabeth Hunter for allowing her magnificent Gio Vecchio to have a cameo mention in this tale.

  Prologue

  Were it something more meaningful or noble, Andor Hjalmarson wouldn’t think twice about choosing execution over such humiliation, but to willingly die because he coaxed the wrong woman to his bed made him one idiotic martyr. He was neither an idiot nor a martyr.

  His aunt, the Supremely Divine, Majestically Beautiful, and Eternally Sublime Dagrun of Ljósálfheimr pinned him with a glare colder than sharpened icicles. “You are an idiot,” she declared.

  Andor stiffened but held his tongue. He balanced on the thin edge of Dagrun’s mercurial mercy. A glib remark, or even a rebellious one, and she might well rescind her offer that allowed him to keep his head attached to his shoulders.

  The sainted, immortal Nicholas of Myra stood beside him, not at all pleased to find himself dragged into such an awkward situation but still willing to help the ljósálfar queen’s troublesome nephew. “I can keep him busy for the length of his exile, but his skills will be wasted with me. You’ll lose a capable warrior, Your Majesty.”

  “And you’ll gain one, Nicholas.” A black scowl marred Dagrun’s perfect features. “And keeping him busy is exactly what he needs. He obviously has too much time on his hands if he’s running about Ljósálfheimr seducing all of Algr’s concubines.”

  “I seduced one,” Andor protested. “The least of the king’s favorites.”

  “Silence.” Dagrun rose from her throne. Her graceful strides carried her across the length of the throne room until she stood almost nose-to-nose with Andor. He lowered his eyes before her glacial stare. “The only reason your head isn’t mounted on the gates of Niflheimr is because of Algr’s affections for me and his recognition of my affection for you—which is fast souring.”

  The queen swept back to her chair, her gown’s long train shimmering with the ethereal light cast by far off Asbrú. Andor’s eyebrows rose as Dagrun’s gaze found the venerable saint once more, and her features softened. Had there once been more than friendship between the ljósálfar queen and this Christian bishop made immortal?

  “I place Andor in your capable hands, Nicholas. Surely, a thousand years under your tutelage will teach him respect and caution.”

  Andor almost blurted out such exile would likely only teach him boredom. He kept the words behind his teeth as Dagrun’s eyes narrowed.

  Nicholas tucked his vestments around him and smoothed his beard. He bowed to the queen. “I will do my best, Your Majesty.” He glanced at Andor, the expression in his eyes both resigned and wary. “Ready, son?”

  Before Andor could answer or protest, the saint tapped the end of his crosier twice on the marble floor, and the realm of Ljósálfheimr disappeared. His exile had begun.

  1

  Nicholas wondered if he’d fallen from favor with the elf queen. What other explanation could there be for her sending him the most prideful, stubborn creature to walk any plane of existence? If he weren’t already a saint, dealing with Andor Hjalmarson for a thousand years–and a day–without killing him would guarantee Nicholas canonization. As it was, he braced himself for another of the countless arguments he’d had with the elf over the centuries.

  Andor scowled, arms crossed. “Every house celebrating Christmas in Philadelphia now has a few unique gifts under the tree, as you requested.”

  Nicholas rubbed his temples. Andor’s interpretation of help during Christmas delivery often involved unexpected chaos. “Would you care to explain your actions at the Wilmington household?”

  “Not really.”

  “Andor, you stripped a man down to his underwear, tied him to the banister with tree garland–which I’m certain you strengthened–and set off the house alarm on purpose!”

  “What was I supposed to do? He was robbing them! Don’t you think there’s something a little pointless to delivering gifts to people just so others can steal them?”

  The saint began to pace, his once stately bishop’s robes now filthy from a long night of world travel. His back hurt; he was hungry, bone-weary, and desperately needed sleep. Having a small crowd of his gnomes meet him at the gates when he returned with yet another tale of Andor’s escapades wasn’t exactly how he wanted to end the Season.

  “If you felt the need to interfere, you could have done so in a less obvious manner.”

  Andor refused to budge in his defense. “I left him without a single bruise.” He smiled. “Though he cried as if I’d broken every bone in his body.”

  Nicholas groaned. “Son, I can see why your people thought you strange. You have a sense of justice and compassion they don’t possess, and it’s been honed over the years. But you have a clumsy way of going about it. I have a reputation to uphold—kindly, giving, jolly and all that. Children won’t want to stay up and catch a glimpse of me if it becomes known Santa travels with a vigilante elf.”

  Andor’s hands curled into fists. Like Nicholas, he began to pace, his long legs eating up the space in the cozy parlor.

  “Why not a vigilante? A protector? Have you kept track of how many times we’ve been shot at, fired upon and attacked over the years? I took a crossbow bolt in the leg from John Peasant in 1343 while leaving a gift at the end of his child’s bed. Remember that?”

  “He mistook you for a leprechaun bent on mischief.”

  Andor growled low in his throat. “Shows what good it does me to glamour myself as one of your nisse so I don’t scare people.”

  He had a point. Despite the frivolity and lightheartedness associated with Saint Nicholas and the Christmas season, it was a dangerous business. Nicholas himself carried a few souvenir scars from Christmases past.

  He was saved from arguing further by a polite knock on his door. “Enter.”

  The door opened, admitting Carolan, one of the diminutive nisse chiefs. His ears, pointed like Andor’s, but much longer and more pronounced, twitched in agitation. “Forgive me, Nikolai, but we have a problem.”

  Nicholas stopped short of another groan. There was a hot pot of tea waiting for him and a comfortable bed ready for when he finally had a chance to sleep. It looked as if he might not see either for some time to come. “What now,
Carolan?”

  “You bypassed a delivery.”

  “What?!”

  The gnome pulled a small scroll out of his pocket. “Indeed. One Claire Summerlad, age seven, Dallas, Texas, United States.”

  Andor snorted. “Not my fault. You assigned me the American east.”

  The saint passed a hand over his eyes. “I’m getting too old for this.”

  “You’ve been the same age for almost seventeen hundred years. That’s not much of an excuse.”

  Nicholas laughed, the sound booming off the walls. Andor had gotten in a small dig, one that restored Nicholas’s good humor, despite his weariness. “Touché, Andor.” He nodded to Carolan. “I’ll take care of it now. It’s one household, a meager one at that. There won’t be much to bring.”

  The nisse chief bowed. “I’ll have her things waiting when you’re ready.”

  After he left, Nicholas turned to Andor. “You’re welcome to join me.”

  Andor raised an eyebrow. “You trust I won’t do something against your rules?”

  Nicholas chuckled. Despite his many transgressions during his long servitude to the saint, Andor remained one of his favorite helpers. The nisse didn’t always understand Nicholas’s tolerance for the unruly, often haughty elf, but they hadn’t witnessed what he had.

  The early years of the twentieth century had been bleak ones, when men seemed hell-bent on destroying each other in the travesty known as the Great War. Millions died on hillsides and in trenches from wounds and disease. The greatest drain on his magic had taken place then, when gifts weren’t toys or trinkets but nearly dead hope, a pail of food to eat, a loved one returned alive from the battlefield.

  It was during one of those years they had passed over a field carved into a maze of trenches. The December air was icy, filled with the scent of sulfur. Nicholas had sent Andor to a small village nearly razed to the ground by war. Only two families remained, widows with children and an old man. When he returned for the elf, he wasn’t at their appointed meeting place. Instead, Nicholas found him in one of the trenches.

  A soldier, gut-shot and bleeding out, lay dying in the frozen mud. He was no more than eighteen, and Nicholas remembered him as a small child, vibrant and determined to catch Pére Noël stuffing his shoes with treats by the fireplace.

  Andor crouched over him, his graceful hands bloodied as he spread them over the boy’s wound. Nicholas remained silent as the elf spoke softly, ancient words of ljósálfar power that brought comfort and a surcease of pain.

  The boy’s stark face relaxed, turned peaceful as he stared up at Andor. “Are you an angel?”

  Andor’s pale, unearthly beauty took on an ethereal glow, magic pouring from him as he met the soldier’s gaze.

  “If that’s what you wish.”

  “I don’t want to die alone.”

  Andor’s voice chimed like the music of bells. “You’re not alone. Your forefathers await you.”

  The boy’s expression turned beatific as he looked past Andor’s shoulder to a spot beyond the world’s reality. “It’s Christmas,” he said.

  “Yes.”

  “Merci,” he said on a gentle sigh. His eyes glazed over, and he was gone.

  Andor passed a hand over the soldier's face to close his eyes. “You’re welcome.”

  When he climbed out of the trench, his broad shoulders were bowed. He looked to Nicholas. “There’s much death here.”

  Nicholas clapped a hand on Andor’s shoulder. “Come, lad. We’ve more to do this night.”

  That moment had forever changed the saint’s view of Andor Hjalmarson, and while his antics during the Season sometimes drove Nicholas to distraction, he’d never forgotten the elf’s compassion.

  “Nicholas?” Andor’s question, laced with impatience, brought him back to the present.

  “Hmmm?”

  “Are you certain you trust me to behave?”

  “No, but I want you along anyway. Gather your things. We’ve a small girl to visit.”

  2

  The home Nicholas had accidentally bypassed in his deliveries was on the second floor of a derelict apartment building that looked as if it wouldn’t pass the most relaxed building code. The foundation sank at one corner, causing large cracks to stair-step up the brick walls. Balcony railings hung loose from their moorings or were missing altogether. Windows were cracked or completely shattered, trash littered the walkways, and in one very dark corner of the building, a man tightened a makeshift tourniquet around his arm and reverently kissed the plastic chalice of a hypodermic needle.

  Andor followed Nicholas up the stairs to Claire Summerlad’s apartment. In his centuries among them, the elf had seen the rise and fall of men and their civilizations. He’d been amused and admiring to watch great minds figure out the world was round, how gravity worked, what made the light bulb shine and how to fly to the moon. He’d been equally horrified to watch the white mushroom cloud explode skyward. Men had surpassed the álfar. They had become god-like in their ability to destroy. Yet, for all their knowledge, their power and their creature comforts, they were sometimes reduced to this—running poison through their veins in a futile attempt to stave off an internal darkness.

  “Leave him be, Andor. He’s far beyond any small comfort we can give him.”

  The saint’s advice interrupted his reverie, and he was surprised to find himself back at the bottom step. “He can’t see us, Nicholas. What harm would it do?”

  “None, but what good would it do? There’s someone waiting for us, one whose belief is so powerful, it gives her strength and hope. That poor soul gave those up long ago.”

  Andor sighed. Nicholas was right. There were some too far gone for even his brand of magic to touch and ease. He jogged up the stairs on silent feet and followed Nicholas through the closed apartment door.

  It was dark inside save for the single strand of twinkling lights wrapped around a tabletop artificial Christmas tree that looked as if it had been rescued from a dumpster. One small gift, wrapped in red paper, lay under its lopsided branches.

  A faded couch and a lawn chair were pushed against one wall. Two egg crates, stacked one atop the other, supported an old TV. Garland made of construction paper loops hung above the window looking out onto the main walkway, and a child’s hand-drawn pictures of Santa and all his entourage were taped on the walls in various places. This was an impoverished household, but one where the spirit of the season was alive and well.

  Nicholas motioned with his hand, and both he and Andor became visible once more. The elf raised an eyebrow. “You don’t often do that. Are you hoping she sees you?” He didn’t bother whispering. The magic suffusing the apartment kept their voices silent to all save each other.

  The shuffle and crackle of Christmas paper was loud in the room as Nicholas dug in the small bag he brought. Three colorful boxes wrapped in gold and silver paper, with cascades of ribbons pouring down their sides, joined the lone present. They were accompanied by unwrapped gifts as well—a stack of books and a sketch pad with artist pencils.

  The saint’s eyes twinkled. “You might want to glamour yourself, lad. She’s coming down the hall now.”

  Andor had only seconds to overlay a glamour, that of one of Nicholas’s nisse. Even after all these years, it still unnerved him when those children lucky enough to “catch” Santa and his helper looked at his legs when they spoke to him in their high, breathless voices.

  Claire Summerlad, age seven, was a skinny, graceless child made up of knobby knees and elbows. Her short, blonde hair stuck out at all angles, testament to the rigors of a restless sleeper. She approached the door slowly, as wary as any creature who senses a strangeness to its surroundings.

  From his vantage point, Andor had a clear view of her face when she caught sight of Nicholas standing next to her decrepit little tree with its array of gifts beneath it. Gray eyes widened to the size of dinner plates, and her mouth formed a silent “O” of amazement.

  “Hello, Claire. Merry Christ
mas.”

  It never failed to send a tingle down Andor’s spine when a child uttered Nicholas’s name with such wonder. He felt it again when Claire spoke.

  “Santa?”

  Nicholas laughed, a great rolling thunder of mirth that made his beard shake and might have awakened the entire apartment complex if the magic didn’t work to keep it contained. He held out his arms.

  The child ran to him, but skidded to a stop when she caught sight of Andor off to the side. It was his turn to gape. Claire wasn’t looking at his legs. Instead, her head tilted back, eyes looking far up to his much greater height so she could meet his gaze.

  His indrawn breath echoed louder than Nicholas’s laughter. A Sunday’s Child. Claire was a Sunday’s Child, and one with enough of the Sight to see beyond his glamour. She walked closer until she was directly in front of him. Andor paused for a second, then crouched until he was eye-level with the girl.

  Nicholas stood forgotten as, for uncounted moments, elf and human child stared at each other, enraptured. “What do you see?” he asked her softly.

  A small hand rose, fluttered across his face. “Forever. I see Forever.” She smiled, revealing a missing front tooth.

  How rare a thing to find a Sunday’s Child in this age of disbelief. Hundreds of years earlier, ljósálfar like himself would have hunted her, made her a changeling to live among them and guard against her betraying their presence with her deep Sight. Now they would take her just to assure themselves they hadn’t completely faded from the world.

  “I like your ears,” she said. “They’re very pointy.” Claire grinned but didn’t try to touch him.