Prologue
Fenrir
Is every creation born innocent?
Should I lay the blame on Loki and Angrboda? My father, full of knowledge and magic, brought me into this world with a purpose. A giant, monstrous wolf—destined to kill Odin.
Or should I blame the gods who raised me in captivity? The ones who watched my form grow and answered it with fear. They tried to bind me—iron first, then magic thread—until Ragnarök itself. And then they wondered why I tore limbs from bodies.
Why I fulfilled my destiny and swallowed Odin whole.
When my purpose was complete, I met my death with my jaws forced apart until the pain became unbearable. The sound of my bones cracking as they were ripped asunder never left me. No one came to my rescue when the sword plunged through my flesh. The final blow.
No mother.
No father.
No sibling.
There was no Valhalla. No Hel. No afterlife for a half-god like me.
I drifted through darkness in silence. Pitch black, without a hint of light.
Of hope.
The fragments within me began to shift.
Some burrowed into tormented warriors—men already cracked by battle and blood. Some lived only long enough for me to feel them starve, wither, and die, forgotten by the land that birthed them.
But a few endured—sleeping, waiting, buried beneath time and blood.
They kept the final fragment alive.
The last piece of me.
And once again, I wondered—was I born a monster, or did my tormentors create one?
Rage was all I had left as I drifted through time and space.
Dark. Hideous. Unadulterated wrath.
Until it was time for me, Fenrir, to live again.
Chapter 1
Blaidd
The first sense I remember was warmth. I later learned it came from my mother. The voice inside my head unlocked memories that would eventually make sense. It came to me in childhood—soft whispers at first—and it never led me astray. In time, he became my trusted companion.
While people stared from a distance, or whispered behind my back and made me an outcast, he was there. Soothing me. Reminding me they were beneath me.
Six years old
“I want to play with that,” Rhys said, trying to pull my train from my hands.
He was being rude. Mum told me not to grab. We had to ask nicely and wait. Miss Hampton said the same.
“No,” I said, holding the train above my head.
