Chapter twenty-nine
Eisa
A knock on the bedroom door roused me from my reverie as I contemplated my new reality.
I was Dragonborn. I was going to marry my mate. The necklace around my throat was the tear of a literal goddess, and, somehow, I had to close the Rift.
“Come in,” I called as I worked the comb through the wet knots of my hair.
Arik had been overly optimistic about the possibility of us being handfasted last night.
Though Amaya squealed with delight at the suggestion when we finally returned to the temple kitchens, Sigrid had already gone to bed.
Even as furious as I was at her secrets, I understood her reasons for them.
It just wouldn’t be right to be handfasted without her.
Plus, I’d needed a bath. And sleep. And another bath this morning after Arik spent the early waking hours showing me exactly how he felt about our upcoming handfasting. Again.
Delicious, Idunn purred in draconic satisfaction. She was curled around Baldur so tightly across our mental bridge that I swore I could feel Arik’s every move as he went through his usual training routine on the hill far above us.
Since his return last night, she’d insisted on remaining close to him. She hadn’t even wanted to let Arik go and train this morning, employing all sorts of diabolical–and, I had to admit, enjoyable–tactics to delay him.
Most satisfactory, Baldur agreed sleepily. But I believe we can do better.
Baldur had no memory of the time he had been separated from us.
The last thing he remembered was taking the poison into himself as Arik went to his mother’s chambers.
Everything had gone dark before he’d had a chance to warn Arik, and he’d only woken when he returned to incorporeal form in Arik’s mind.
For Elysia’s sake, I groaned, trying to shut them both out of my mind lest they have me jumping Arik’s bones before we could be handfasted.
Thank the Hearthmother that Arik had used Baldur’s magic to soothe my poor, aching thighs.
“It’s me.” Sigrid entered my room, one arm carrying a package wrapped in paper and string, and the other gripping the head of a gnarled, wooden cane. She had a look of defiance on her ancient face that I knew well. “I know you are angry–”
“I’m not.” I rose and wrapped the old woman in a tight hug, ignoring the way the package was squashed between us. “I mean, I was, but I could never stay angry at you, Mormor.”
Do you need me? Arik’s voice came across our mental bridge so clearly I started in surprise.
I’m fine. It’s just Sigrid.
Baldur huffed in disbelief, and it was so good to hear his growls in my head again that I didn’t even admonish him.
Sigrid sniffed, and I let her go so she could secretly wipe away the tears I knew she didn’t want me to see. “Well then. Good. Because I have more I need to tell you, and it would be inconvenient to shout it all through the door.”
I laughed and patted the bed beside me. We’d slept in one of the empty dormitories, of which there were several now that so few priestesses remained.
Arik had given me a withering look when I’d suggested we leave the single beds apart, pushing them together so he could “properly grovel,” in his words.
I had to fight a flush as I remembered the groveling.
“You seem happy with him at least.” Sigrid said, arching a brow at me. “It’s been awhile since we discussed such things. I don’t suppose you need a refresher on the mechanics?”
“Absolutely not.” Sigrid grinned, and I felt myself flush. “Your cough is better?”
“It comes and goes.” Sigrid waved a hand dismissively as she placed the paper-wrapped package on my lap. “Here.”
“What’s this?”
“This is for you. A gift from your mother.”
“My mother?” I was too eager to wait, ripping into the paper to reveal a spill of blue, shimmering fabric beneath, the same light blue as the priestesses’ robes.
“I see you still open gifts like you did when you were nine,” she sighed, her lips tipped up in a bemused smile. “Yes, it was your mother’s. Her wedding gown, in fact. Fashioned from the robes of a priestess, since it was the only fabric readily at hand.”
I pulled the paper away and admired the gown that fell across my lap. It had a square neckline and a white antler-bone belt, and it laced up on either side. Something fluffy peeked out below, and I unfurled a fur wrap, white as the snow of the untouched Odemark.
“Sigrid.” I shook my head, trying to form words. It was probably the most beautiful gown I had ever seen, and definitely more beautiful than any I’d worn. “She was married in this?”
“She was so stubborn.” She stroked her hand over the fur wrap and smiled. “She used to sneak out, you know. She had a boat hidden in the woods, and she’d sneak over to the nearest town at night. That’s where she met him.”
“I don’t really remember him,” I confessed, trying to picture my father. He’d been killed when I was only six, and the trauma of losing him, along with all of our worldly possessions and selling ourselves to Henrik, had blocked him out of my memory completely.
“He loved her, despite his failing.” Sigrid sighed, looking older than she had only the night before. “And she loved him. Your mother thought he’d protect her from Dragejakt.”
“Protect her?”
“Married women are usually given an exemption if they’re found to be Chaosborn,” Sigrid explained.
“And she wasn’t supposed to exist. I was afraid the drage would kill her if they discovered her, but she assured me he would keep her safe.
” She shook her head with a huff. “She should have come back to me when he passed.”
“Why didn’t she?” I asked. I would have grown up here in this temple, surrounded by quiet and solitude and priestesses who would have cared for me, rather than beaten me.
“For you, I think.” Sigrid settled more deeply onto the bed as she folded up the gown and wrap. She looked at me, her eyes piercing. “You know I would have saved her if I could.”
I swallowed. My mother. She would have saved my mother. “Why couldn’t you?”
Sigrid sighed. “I might have been able to help if she’d written sooner. She already knew she was dying when she told me where to find her. Find you.”
“What about the Tear?” I asked, suddenly angry. “You gave it to me when I left. Why didn’t you try giving it to her?”
Sigrid patiently stroked my head. “I did, my Eisa.”
The anger deflated from me. It was too late. My mother had asked for help too late.
“Why not take me away?” My voice cracked. “Why sell yourself to Henrik at all?”
“Your mother said you’d be safer somewhere where the dragons could find you.
She thought bonding a dragon would make you stronger.
Save you from her fate.” Sigrid put one of her gnarled hands over mine and squeezed gently.
“By then the risk of her birth being discovered was minimal, and I couldn’t leave you there all alone. Not when I could help protect you.”
“And you knew what I was.” I hadn’t meant to sound accusatory, but Sigrid flinched nonetheless.
“I did.” She met my eyes, her gaze a watery blue, clouded with age.
“Or at least, I strongly suspected. But, my Eisa, believe me when I tell you that your mother was as dear to me as a daughter. As you are a granddaughter. I believe that the Goddess never blessed me with a daughter of my own because you were meant to be my family.”
I couldn’t hold back the sob as memories of my mother—her tragic, painful death—washed over me. Sigrid held me and patted my head like she had so many times in my youth.
“I was able to ease some of her pain,” She continued as I tried to collect myself. “And on that note…” Sigrid pulled another small package from her apron pocket, the same apron she’d worn for years at Henrik’s, as I sat up and dried my tears. “This should help.”
I frowned, sure my face was still puffy. “What is it?”
“A tea. Made from shepherd’s purse and chasteberry, with a dash of moonflower and a pinch of magic.” She beamed proudly. “Your mate told me. It won’t stop your cycle from coming, but it will ease the pain and shorten the length.”
I blew out a breath, part surprise and part aching relief. If I never had to deal with the level of pain and bleeding I’d had over the last four days again, it would be too soon. “Thank you. Isn’t chasteberry–”
“A contraceptive.” Sigrid nodded sternly. “Which I know you don’t need, dearest, but it’s useful for its other properties too, so you’ll take it like the instructions say, and write when you need more.
Amaya and Freya both know how to make it.”
If she was gone, she meant. I frowned again, my eyes catching on the Tear I had kept around my neck since the day before. “You should have this. To make you well again. At least until I need it.”
“Its magic won’t stop the inevitable, my Eisa. I am eight hundred years old.” Sigrid smiled sadly and shook her head. “And as soon as you have all the Tears, I will be ready to die.”
“All the Tears?” My chest hollowed out. If I had to hunt them all down, it could take years. Arik didn’t think we had years. “How many are there?”
“Three.”
I breathed a sigh of relief. “Oh, thank the Goddess.”
Sigrid chuckled. “They are the Goddess’ essence incarnate, and she is triune. Maiden, Mother, and Crone. Three-faced. Humans only recognize the Mother, of course, short-sighted and short-lived as they are.”
I blinked, not sure there was room in my mind for any more theology. “Where is the last one?” I reached for the gem instinctively, and it warmed in my hand. “If you had the first, and this is the second, there must be one more.”
“Ah, well, that is the problem you see. No one knows.”
“What do you mean no one knows?” I reeled a bit. An object of incredible magical importance should have been guarded through the centuries. “I thought the volva were their guardians?”
“I mean the third has vanished.” Sigrid leaned on her cane, her face serious.
“One was entrusted to the priestesses at àsynjaheimr. That is the one that you have already taken into yourself.” She nodded toward my chest. I could swear I felt the scar tingle as if it knew we were speaking of it.
“The others were sent east and west, but their locations were kept secret. Only those who protect them know where to find them.”
East. An idea clicked into place. “?strheim.”
“What’s that, dear?”
I tugged on the necklace, wishing for some sign of confirmation as I met Sigrid’s gaze. “You said east. Arik’s mother is from ?strheim!”
“It’s possible.” Sigrid looked skeptical. “I suppose if the last volva priestess had no successors, she might entrust it to a lady of the house.”
“Where in the west?” I pushed. “Do you have any idea where the third might be?”
“I do not.” Sigrid took one look at my crestfallen face and chuckled. “But fear not, my child. Freya and Amaya and I will help you. We shall travel west and seek our sisters and the final Tear, since our purpose here has been fulfilled.”
“Sigrid, you can’t,” I admonished. “You’re too–”
“Old?” Sigrid interrupted with a cackle.
“Of course I am. But I’m also magic. Where age trips me, magic will pick me back up.
And now,” she stood, her ancient back cracking.
“Let me do your hair properly for your handfasting.” She tapped a low stool with a brush she had seemingly produced out of nowhere.
“Magic?” I asked, taking the place she had indicated.
Sigrid winked. “Just a touch, here and there.”
I sat, letting Sigrid brush my hair out. I hadn’t let her do it since I was twelve and had realized the value of keeping my appearance as rough and wild as possible.
Something was nagging at my mind, and Idunn gave me a little mental shove. “Arik said a portion of the Rift had been closed before. The last time there was a blue at Ironholm. Could the Tear have been lost already?”
“I suppose it’s possible.” Sigrid looked thoughtful. “But perhaps we will find answers to that in the Book.”
My heart gave a lurch, and I whirled to catch Sigrid’s wrist. “What book, Mormor?”
She looked down at me, her hand still poised holding the brush. “The Book of Chaos, of course.”
I stood in excitement, and it was enough to get Baldur’s attention as well. We’re coming.
“You have a copy of the Book of Chaos?” I asked excitedly. “Here? I thought the only copy was kept in the palace.”
Sigrid gave me a bemused look, and the brush vanished. “Technically, it is. The only copy, I mean.”
“Then how–”
“We have the original.”