My link on the chain is tucked into my palm, and I open my heart, reaching for the tiny moments that our bodies became stronger over the past few months – the places we’ve touched one another and the feelings that have grown into something beyond explanation. I hold on to the feel of him around me. His voice reminds me I can be afraid and keep moving at the same time. Despite the anxiety at war with my desire to find him again, I press my wrist into my chest, keeping the chain close to my heart, and step into the flames.
30
SHAW
Last night, Vidarr left for the Vanheim and returned with a new idea. A Dísablót ritual calls a goddess to the Mortal Realm. If Rasha is alive, then the women will be able to call her home.
Convincing Jorvik to allow Joanna and Katrine to perform a Dísablót ritual isn’t the easiest task. And Vidarr is risking his magic every day that goes by, staying with me in the Mortal Realm while we argue with Jorvik. He wants to wait for Harald’s word to find the reindeer herd and would rather forget his sister ever existed. Now that we’ve told him our plan to call her from the open channel he laughed like a fucking maniac, prompting Joanna to close the meeting room for several hours.
I don’t want to ask what Joanna promises him, or if it is our constant bluffing and willing her to be alive that finally wins him over, but he does have a soft spot for Joanna. I remind him the clans will never let him keep his seat on the council if his sister is alive and well. So to prove us wrong, at dusk, he marches his slithery ass through the snow and into the forest.
“These are her closest friends?” Vidarr asks. His power is waning, and he refuses to tell me what happened when he crossed back over. “I don’t know about the old woman.”
“She wouldn’t take no for an answer.” Between Katrine and Joanna stands a sturdy elder who cussed me out and told me her name was Edith. She gave us no choice. Insisting she’d come to honor the offering given to the female goddess, she grumbled about how the feminine power of three, Maiden, Mother, and Crone, would make the ritual stronger.
“I won’t be able to stay.” Vidarr winces as he keeps himself upright.
“Can you feel her?” I ask, gripping his shoulders. Being without Rasha for four days is a torture worse than exile.
“I feel Vali, and he’s furious.”
“We have never done this before. Shaw! Are you coming?” Katrine’s voice carries on the wet wind blowing through the trees. With winter shedding the bitter cold to usher in Spring, the storms have been dumping tumultuous amounts of heavy, wet snow instead of crystal clear flakes.
“Harald will kill us if he finds out we are worshipping the goddesses,” Jorvik whines from his post under a tree with his scrawny arms crossed like he has a hundred other places to be.
“Well, don’t tell him.” Vidarr snorts.
“Alright, make a triangle in the snow. The vertex point needs to face where the Ivalo River flows into the sea to open the sacred space to femininity,” I explain. The women, including Edith, map out a large triangle in the forest clearing.
“When I was a girl, we had a Dísablót every year to call forth the goddesses, especially when we were worried about a woman ready to give birth or before a battle to give our Shield-maidens strength in the fight.” Edith takes over explaining the ritual while Vidarr and I gather snowdrop flowers and any holly berries that haven’t been eaten by passing creatures. Aslaug’s amber eyes flash through the dark trees, and I beckon her closer.
“We are being hunted,” Jorvik whispers, but no one so much as flinches. Aslaug pounces out of the tree line and into the clearing, causing Jorvik to reach for his axe.
“Relax, she’s a friend,” Joanna calls. Aslaug sits with her paws holding down the wings of a raven so the frantic bird can’t fly away. “Do you remember me?” Joanna’s voice is small as Aslaug peers up at her, blinking in recognition. “Can I take your offering?” she asks. Aslaug retracts her long claws for Joanna to pick up the dying raven.
“Why a raven?” Katrine grimaces at the way Joanna quickly snaps its hollow-boned neck.
“Once upon a time, ravens were used to call the Valkyries. It is our best chance at using the three of you to call forth a goddess,” I explain.
Katrine’s concern shifts into a smile. “So we are Valkyries?”
“Perform the ritual and find out.” Try as I might to keep a straight face, I match her smile with a smirk. The women are intelligent. They know there is more happening here than a simple prayer. While they are busy, I take out the amulet and drip tiny amounts of our bonded blood on the wood. Striking the iron, I watch as sparks skitter over three torches, and the bundles erupt into flames.
“Edith is the oldest,” Vidarr starts. The elder woman huffs a glare his way. “I don’t mean to insult, but your connection to this world is strong, so you should lead.” He walks back his instructions in a smoothing tone, and Edith picks up a torch on her way to the bottom of the triangle.
Joanna slices the black bird’s chest open and dips her finger into its warm blood. Painting a solid line down Katrine’s and Edith’s lips, she stops to look at Jorvik, and her body tenses like she wants to ask but already knows the answer.
Walking through Vidarr and I, Jorvik finally comes to her side and takes one finger to coat Joanna’s lips with a thin red line down to her chin.
“Thank you,” Joanna whispers and places the dead raven in the middle of the triangle. Joanna takes her place across from Katrine. Jorvik falls back by the trees while Aslaug stays on heightened alert by his side.
Edith clears her throat to say, “Once, we worshiped the goddesses. Once, we prayed for their might. Tonight, we reclaim that power in the name of Rasha.”
The women close their eyes. Vidarr uses the moment to open his hands and call his remaining power to light the triangle in beautifulflames. Joanna jumps when the raven’s body bursts into orange and yellow fire, but she holds her place and the torch high.
“I will see you at home.” Vidarr flashes a clever smile and steps into the flaming triangle. The world shifts. His magic and the combined power that the women have unknowingly brought forth connects, yanking my heart through my ribcage. I clutch the amulet in my palm and desperately search my soul for the fragments of Rasha’s connection to my realm.
It is easy to find. I don’t know why I doubted us. Every ounce of what I have to give is met with her unending love. There is sadness and hurt forming around the bonds, being quenched in the deepest well of our connection, but it never falters.
