Chapter 1
FREYR
MINUTES EARLIER
“You won’t drown! Join me!”
“Are you mad? Movement aside, I can barely stand!”
“So? Swim!” I glided backward through the water, my long hair plastered against my body as I floated.
Oli stared at me from over the edge of Skidbladnir’s bow.
I had not intended to take up his offer when he first presented it to me—presented himself as a gift from Loki to lift my spirits in the aftermath of Ragnarok.
I had laughed at him, for few elves, dwarves, or even fellow gods could handle the entirety of me inside them. How could a mortal?
In truth, the last several times someone had accepted my terms for being bedded by me, I was relieved when they begged for reprieve, and my cock never went near them.
Well, in most cases it went near their lips afterward, for they had wanted to please their king in thanks for the pleasure they’d received, even if not fully fulfilled.
While I appreciated my bed partners in whatever way I had them, it always felt hollow.
I had grown weary of endless carnal company.
If that was all I craved, I might have stayed in my loveless marriage longer.
No. Even then, I never could have kept Gerdr after she asked to be released.
I’d known she didn’t love me, but for years, I’d foolishly thought I could win her over anyway.
When, after Ragnarok, she could bear me no longer, how could I refuse her wishes?
She would have left anyway if I had tried, but at least this way we parted as friends and wished each other well.
Oh, to love so deeply but to not have the recipient of that love, love you back.
Was that how I had been making Ravnur feel?
I had noticed his looks, his longing. He had never been forward about any of it, not until after Gerdr left me and I surrendered to fleshly temptations to forget her.
Even then, Ravnur was subtle, chaste in what he dared.
As I told Oli, Ravnur had never asked for me to bed him.
The others all asked, practically begged me.
Ravnur was waiting for me to ask, but did I dare risk the potential sullying of our friendship should I fail to be able to love him as he wanted? Or did I sully our friendship worse by continuously denying him the chance?
“Are you going to ask Ravnur for a stroll?” Oli called down in challenge, as if reading my thoughts.
I had somehow sensed he would ask that and tried to be teasing in my reply. “Is that your stipulation for joining me?”
“Yes.”
“Then yes,” I answered softly.
I could imagine no greater pain than experiencing the loss of love again, and so I was terrified to even entertain inviting it back into my life, much as I missed it. But perhaps there really was nothing to lose if my numb existence was the alternative with Ravnur lost in his longing.
Oli climbed onto the railing of the boat, difficult though it looked after how raw I had left him, and leapt from the bow.
He never hit the water. In the moment when a splash should have followed his submersion, there was nothing, and I knew he was gone.
“Oh, Loki,” I muttered, and did the only other thing I could.
I laughed.
My mirth was temporary though, for as my body was cleansed by floating in the lake, being alone left me to consider the burdens I still bore that Oli’s company had only helped to alleviate for a time.
To truly banish my burdens—or rather, to make them bearable again and less like burdens at all—I had to move forward. I had to move on.
Could it be with Ravnur? The more I lost myself in bodies, the less I had to think about the ache in my heart, but that had only made it ache more each day for I did not even have the promise of hope anymore. I had grown so consumed by my despair that I had not been able to surface from it.
Ravnur was beautiful, but in all ways contrary to the beauty I had found in Gerdr. While her pale, gleaming skin had caught my attention from afar, and her strawberry-colored locks and clear blue eyes had kept it, Ravnur was her opposite.
Darker skin, black hair like the raven he was named for, and eyes the color of violets.
Yet, despite his darkness where she was made of brighter hues, Ravnur was just as radiant, for there was something else within him that brightened my days whenever we were together.
There was an ease with Ravnur that I had never known with anyone else, as if with him, I could be Freyr—no, Fricco—more than only god and king.
He had been of age when we first met but had seemed so young and fragile to me that I had scarcely noticed him as anything other than a subject in need. How quickly he had made a name for himself. How quickly he had flourished, and always in ways to make himself more visible and useful to me.
Over the years, even before Ragnarok, he had become my closest companion, taking the place once occupied by Skírnir.
Skírnir… whose very name stirred such regrets in me. He was the first I gave leave to call me Fricco, as only kin had been granted before.
A fellow Vanir, he had once been ever at my side, my personal attendant and messenger, but he worried too much about pleasing me. After I first saw Gerdr and wanted her, desperate for her hand in marriage, it was Skírnir I sent to entreat her to meet with me.
She had no interest, and out of fear of disappointing his lord, Skírnir had tried everything to change her mind, eventually to the point of threatening her.
What I took for meekness when we met was terror.
She assumed I would be just as villainous as my messenger and agreed to marry me out of fear.
But one cannot bed someone and not notice their discomfort.
Nerves I would have understood in a marriage bed, especially given my endowment, but though her body could accept me, her frigidness never warmed.
She had no desire for me, and when I finally asked, she admitted as much and told me everything.
Some of the mortal accounts of my tale say that, instead of gifting my sword to Gerdr’s family as dowry, I gifted it to Skírnir in thanks for his success in bringing me my bride.
I gave it to him all right. I took it back from Gerdr’s father for that very purpose—to give it to Skírnir blade-first. Even in my rage, I was not cruel, but killed him swiftly.
Then I presented the blade to Gerdr herself as a true offering and begged her forgiveness and that she give me the chance to woo her properly.
She agreed. She did try. But she could not love me.
She could not find joy in my company the way Ravnur did.
I took much joy in his company too, for joy is infectious when shared.
It builds upon itself. The simple acts of telling Ravnur my accomplishments and hearing how the talented storyteller could bring those tales to life were some of the rare times I had felt any true joy as of late.
Not to mention the interest he took in my hunts.
The care he took in preserving my mount.
The soothing sound of his voice when he shared news with me of things I had missed while away, be it a new rosemary honey being served at a local food stall, or a birth I needed to offer my blessing upon.
Watching the stars together after a rowdy festival when all but us had gone to sleep was more peaceful than being in another’s company or being alone.
Unlike Skírnir, Ravnur cared more for truth and the state of our realm than purely pleasing me.
I knew I could leave Alfheim when necessary, and it would be safe in his hands, young though he was compared to other hirdmen.
I could leave without worry and look forward to my return, knowing he would be there to greet me.
There was no one else I was as eager to tell of my exploits, and not only to have Ravnur retell them later.
To others, it was obligation. To Ravnur, it was a different bliss altogether, for seeing him smile eased my wounded heart.
I was smiling myself, just from recounting it all in my mind, just from thinking of Ravnur, while recalling my many erogenous exploits left barely an impression at all.
Upon my initial return from Ragnarok, I hadn't even looked him in the eyes.
I couldn't then, but his was the first gaze I was eventually ready to meet, for I knew he would not judge me for what he found in mine. Had I been blind all this time, not willing to see or embrace that he might be worth the pursuit of what I had thought I’d spurned forever?
I whistled, and from over the side of Skidbladnir came my sword.
It flew to just within reach so I could grasp its hilt and lifted me from the water to deposit me back on the boat’s deck.
I called upon the sun to dry me with a burst of its rays—as the god of sunshine is wont to do when in a hurry—and quickly found fresh clothing to put on, even if much of my hair remained damp.
If I waited a moment longer, fear might make me go back on my word to Oli.
I didn’t bother returning Skidbladnir to its miniature form to take with me. I raced up the hill on foot and through the city, barely nodding in greeting to any citizens I passed, and went straight to Ravnur’s door.
He answered my knocking immediately, as if he had been standing just on the other side of it.
“My king—”
“Do you love me, Ravnur?”
“…what?” The instant widening of his eyes was soon lost when he glanced at the ground. “I-I, um… of course, my lord, I—”
“Do not lower your eyes when answering.” I gripped his chin to tilt his head up. “I do not ask a hirdman if he loves his sovereign. I ask if you, little raven, love me?”
Those violet-blue eyes pooled with liquid, like flower petals covered in dew. “Yes. Surely you knew that.”
“I suspected, but you never pursued me as others did.”
That seemed to ignite a spark in Ravnur that would not be quenched by the starting flood of tears.
He pulled out of reach just as a few streaked down his cheeks.
“Because I will not be a number. So if that is why you are here, you can go. I do not care if your mortal was so disappointing that you seek solace in another.” As soon as he finished saying the words, he looked stunned at having been so blunt, but oh, how grateful I was for his candor, for it proved his passion. “My lord, that was thoughtless of me—”
“No, I prefer for my subjects to be honest. Solace is not what I seek in you, Ravnur. Perhaps hope is. Would you consider a stroll in the woods tomorrow? A hunt together? Just us?”
That too left Ravnur looking stunned. His expression kept warring between joyful and hesitant. Caution was good, for I was uncertain if I could offer what he wanted, but I wanted to try.
So too, it seemed, did he.
“I would like that very much, my king,” Ravnur said.
“Raven, you can and are encouraged to call me Fricco, as you usually do.”
He smiled and any remaining wetness in his eyes dried. “It would be my honor to accompany you… Fricco.”
“The honor would be mine. Then I will see you tomorrow.” I bowed my head, taking my leave so I might calm my buzzing nerves, which I imagined would only grow in the interim.
Promise fulfilled—to Oli and to what remained of my heart.
Now to survive the stroll itself and whatever it might lead to.