Chapter Forty-Five
Rey
Aric bends forward, heaving, shouting out in pain.
“Aric!” My hands fly to his shoulders, then his back, my gasp tearing through the night.
The sound of a branch snapping jolts us both out of the moment. We whirl toward the noise, my heart hammering, the rune still glowing behind us.
Before either of us can react, though, a figure in all black darts from the shadows, sprinting down the path. Their movements are fluid, fast—too fast. By the time I take a step forward, though, they’re already vanishing into the trees.
We don’t even bother chasing. We wouldn’t catch them.
Dread sinks into my belly. Just how much did that person see? And what were they doing following us?
“Too spry to be Professor Higgins, but still, add another person to the list,” I mutter, clutching my bleeding palm.
Aric frowns, breath uneven, seemingly from the pain he’s still in. “What list?”
I scan the dark campus. “Of people who don’t like our families.”
Aric barks out a laugh. “That’s gotta be a very long one.
To save time, just write down ‘everyone.’” Then he sobers and glances across the grounds.
I follow his gaze, staring at the silent windows, at the looming halls where shadows watch but never speak.
My chest tightens. So many secrets in the still silence, so many unspoken truths. “Even those closest to us.”
I shudder, voice barely above a whisper. “Especially those closest to us.”
The storm rumbles overhead, punctuating the truth neither of us wants to admit.
He glances at my bleeding palm, then covers it with his uninjured hand. A chill runs down my arm at the touch.
And when I pull my hand away, it’s healed.
It’s obvious he knows so much more about himself, the situation, and my family than I’ve been led to believe. But I’m focused more on my hand, which still tingles where he healed it, and the fact that when I asked, he didn’t lie. He laid his cards on the table and trusted me.
I’m still on edge as we walk back to the dorms. Aric with his tattered shirt on and three runes shining beneath it and me stunned he’s agreed to help me find Mjolnir. I should feel relieved.
I can save Laufey and myself, I can finally make my father proud, and yet, am I really grabbing the most powerful weapon in the world for Odin?
And are the Giants who hid it really going to let him give it to me without a fight? Will we even have a choice, or will Mjolnir make it for us?
“So,” I say, trying to restart some semblance of the truce we had in the woods, “is this new for you?”
He arches a brow.
“The stalker in the woods. Someone coming after you, watching you?”
He rubs his chin as we finally make it closer to our dorms. “I’ve had my moments. Do you think they saw anything?”
I shrug. “If they did, we can just say they were drunk. I mean, who would believe them? They saw us slice our hands and cover a rune that then lit up. Would you believe them?”
“Yes, but I know what I am.”
“Same.” I glance around. “According to my father, there are more people like us here, but since the Bifrost is—”
Am I really just spilling secrets now?
He smirks. “Broken. You can say it.”
Wow. Okay. I’ve clearly been misled into thinking he’s ignorant of these things. But just how much he knows isn’t clear.
“Right. Okay,” I say as I process. “So they don’t have access to their power or memories, and they just cheerfully exist here, powerless and…happy? I guess?”
“Why wouldn’t they be?”
“Is Sigurd? Odin? Happy with their memories, I mean? I’m assuming since you know who you are, Sigurd does, too,” I fish. No reaction. Not even a flash of emotion on his face. “Is he happier, though, for it?”
Aric frowns now. “Sometimes I think having tasted true power makes you angrier when it suddenly gets ripped from you.”
“Undoubtedly.”
We both stare up at the admin building. “History has a tragic way of repeating itself,” Aric murmurs. “Do you really think our story will end any differently?”
“I do,” I say, and I actually mean it. “Because I’m the outlier here. Mjolnir will recognize my blood, and I have something Odin doesn’t.”
“What’s that?” he asks.
“A heart,” I whisper.