Secrets of Valhalla by Jasmine Richards Page A

leaving an absence. Something had been cut away and not replaced. It wasn’t a door—not really—but Buzzknew that he and Mary would have to pass through it.
    He stepped out onto the metal limb to get a closer look, but his foot immediately slipped on the cold metal and he fell backward against the trunk with a thud. His arms and legs splayed in a lucky tangle of limbs that somehow kept him from falling.
    â€œBuzz!” Mary cried. “You all right?”
    The fear that he thought he’d left much farther down the tree rushed back again, but this time Ratatosk was not next to him to calm him down. Buzz swallowed hard, trying to bring back saliva to his dry mouth.
    â€œI’ve had better days,” he said, getting himself into a safer position. He managed to look down through the foliage, and he saw that Mary was just a few branches lower than him. But the squirrel was nowhere in sight.
    â€œWhere’s Ratatosk?” he asked. “I think I’ve found the right branch.”
    Mary pulled herself upward so that she sat on the tree limb just below his. “He said he could hear something from farther down the tree. He went to check.”
    Buzz wrinkled his nose and sniffed the air. “Do you smell that?”
    Mary inhaled. “Smoke?”
    With a swish of branches being thrust aside, Ratatosk appeared, his sides heaving. His delicate, furry head, which poked up through the leaves, glistened with sweat. “He’s back.” The squirrel panted. “And he’s coming up here.”
    â€œWho?” Buzz asked.
    â€œLoki?” Mary said at the same time.
    The squirrel nodded. “Loki and his dragon. He saw yer bag, Buzz. He knows someone’s on the tree. Yer’ve got to get out of here.”
    Buzz felt a bead of sweat roll down between his shoulder blades. “I’ve found the branch.” He pointed upward. “It’s right there.”
    Suddenly, they heard branches cracking, and Ratatosk looked over his shoulder and then back at them, his eyes wide. “So what’re yer waiting for? Go!”
    â€œBut—”
    â€œGo! He won’t follow you into Saturn’s world—not without more backup. He can’t be working by himself.”
    Mary had clambered up past Buzz and was now scuttling along the solid silver limb toward the rip in the sky. It didn’t seem to affect her movements at all that the branch was made of slippery metal.
    â€œHurry up, Buzz.” Her voice was almost completely snatched away by the wind that was coming through the rift.
    Buzz climbed onto the first part of the impossibly smooth branch but stopped to look back at Ratatosk. “Come on, then,” he said.
    The squirrel shook his head. “I ain’t coming. Someone’s got to stop Loki and Nidhogg from getting up here until yer through.” His red fur rippled in the wind, and he glowed so brightly in the morning sunlight that he looked like a ball offlame. He raised a paw in farewell even as the smoke behind him began to snake around his body. Plumes of black grasped at him like shadowy fingers.
    â€œGo!” the squirrel demanded again. “I’ll be fine.” He then turned and leaped into the heart of the smoke.
    Buzz tried to call out the squirrel’s name, but the word couldn’t get past the knot in his throat. Instead, he pulled himself farther onto the silver branch, moving carefully and slowly toward the rip in the sky. Mary was some distance ahead of him now, and Buzz held his breath as she stood up gingerly, balanced for a moment like a ballerina in tortoiseshell glasses.
    â€œI guess this is the bit where we start our quest,” she shouted over to him. The wind coming from the rift buffeted her strongly, and she swayed back on her heels. “Cross the threshold and all that.”
    â€œWhat are you going on about?” Buzz yelled. “Just get through the rift before you fall off that branch,