Her heart clenched, remembering the young one alive and laughing in her training lessons, joining her mother on guard duty, though she was small. She didn’t deserve to end up here.
Why was she here? Solveig didn’t want to ask but she needed to know.
“Is your mother with you?”
The witchling seemed to know what Solveig was really asking.
“We all are.”
No.
Emotion swelled within her, and though she’d not had it back long, she missed the power it would have fuelled, the revenge she could have wielded for this witchling’s sake. For all her people.
It was her fault. She’d failed them.
The little Vanir witchling held out her hand. “I will show you the way,” she said sadly.
Now that the girl was talking, Solveig had to try one more time.
“Before we go, can you tell me, have you seen a Fae male wash ashore? Alive?”
The witchling looked confused at first, and then her face broke into a wide smile. Solveig was delighted to see it until it turned feral.
“Don’t worry, General, we got him for you.”
Solveig did not like the sound of her dark and foreboding tone.
She followed the witchling, keeping her eyes open for more spirits. Some white and translucent like the young one in front of her and others solid, looking always alive but with a faint shimmer to them marking them as dead.
Last time she was here, there were no spirits—only solid beings. It must have something to do with whatever magic Ragnvald was wielding.
The more she thought of it, the more she was sure she was right. The wispy spirits were those that should have made it to Valhalla but had been directed here instead.
She saw more familiar faces and soon, a crowd of white spirits lined her path—the faces of her fallen people, the Southern Wilds coming to greet her. Her cold heart swelled with too many emotions, grief and guilt at the forefront.
The anger she’d expected from them was nowhere to be found. Did they not know she’d failed them?
As one, by some unspoken signal, they all raised their fists to their chest, a salute. One she did not deserve.
She tried to make eye contact with as many as she could, honouring each of their sacrifices. Though she searched the throngs of spirits for Signe, Idunn, and Veda, she could not find them. It was foolish to hold hope in her heart that they’d made it to Valhalla.
If Ragnvald wouldn’t loosen his grip for witchlings, he certainly wouldn’t for her shieldmaidens.
Which begged the question, where were they? Did he trap them in the pits of Hel?
“Why are you here?” she whispered to no one in particular. It seemed that the witchling who led her was the spokesperson.
“They want to honour you,” she said quietly without looking back.
“I don’t deserve them.”
“And that is why you do.”
So much wisdom for one so young, but Solveig could not agree. There was much the witchling didn’t know—much Solveig had to atone for.
She didn’t think she could take any more when the witchling changed her course abruptly, turning down an abandoned path, stopping at the top of a steep hill that led into thick mists.
“He is down there,” the witchling said. Without another word, she turned and joined her people.
