Well of Dreams (The Runic Saga #1)

Prologue The Norn

Vereandi

I n the days before the end, mankind dwelled in madness.

Focused on fabricated satisfaction and marred by manufactured wars, nation battled nation, convinced of their own righteousness.

Technology dismissed belief, and hatred replaced compassion.

They’d been told the world would succumb to demons, but they never suspected the birth of monsters would originate within their own hearts.

Mankind forgot the gods, but the gods had not forgotten them.

Summoned by the calloused hearts of men, demons and giants infested the world.

Only the AEsir , deities of wit, strength, and valor, could rise against them.

The golden blood of the gods and the black ichor of demons covered the Earth.

Then Sutr, the giant of fire and darkness, burned the world to ash.

This was Ragnarok , the beginning of the end.

Nations sank beneath the waters. All was silent.

Yet Yggdrasil , the tree of life, endured.

With branches clinging onto the darkened heavens, its roots sheltered the last nation, cradling it above the waves. That nation, Evrópa, was all that remained of the Earth.

Sheltered by the tree, humanity survived. Awakened by the Norn — those three goddesses of fate who had survived Ragnarok— mankind was reborn from the ashes. For what are gods without mankind to worship them?

When the waters receded, the humans rebuilt, forming communities around ancestral bloodlines. In rediscovering lost technology, mankind grew and flourished. But when extinction threatened once again, the Norn imbued within humanity a bit of their own galdr , the power of the gods.

V ereandi shut the book, not minding the puff of dust it exhaled into her face, then looked into the faces of her sleepers.

The boy and girl appeared to be approaching adulthood, with a hint of youth rounding out their faces.

They slumbered at the base of the stone well, their hands separated by only a width of grass.

The young goddess’ pale fingers brushed aside a lock of flame-red hair and traced the runes on Urer’s Book of the Past .

The old crone would scold Vereandi for taking it, but she didn’t care.

Her sleepers liked to hear her tales of old, even if Urer said they couldn’t hear her in their suspended state.

Besides, the stories reminded Vereandi of the golden era, when mankind had truly revered the gods.

As they should. As they would again one day.

Vereandi rose, balancing bare feet on the well’s edge and grasping the book in both arms. Urer might actually kill her if she dropped it into the still waters that dripped, dripped, dripped from the deep stone walls.

As always, Vereandi’s eyes were drawn to the runes etched deep into the rocks.

With delicate yet sturdy fingers, she’d carved them there herself.

They glowed at her touch, warming at her presence.

For all of Urer’s grand stories, it was Vereandi who held the power of the runes.

As light as air, she leapt, her feet brushing the bark of the roots that nearly strangled the well within their grasp.

More of Vereandi’s runes decorated the gnarled roots that snaked away from the well, leading to the enormous trunk of the ash tree, Yggdrasil .

From the top of the tree, endless branches reached up to block the sky, casting half of the clearing into shadow.

In that shade, Vereandi’s sleepers lay unaware as the humming child-goddess settled beside them, the book still clutched against her chest. Although there was no wind, her vibrant red hair twirled and twisted about her face like tendrils of flame.

She gazed at the bodies with eyes older than her size implied, then sprang to her feet, clambering back onto the edge of the well.

“And now,” she announced, “the wondrous Vereandi will perform her famous balancing act!”

She strutted along the well’s uneven edge, teetering every so often on the crumbling stone, looking as though she might fall and plummet into the depths of the bottomless well.

Making a great show of it, Vereandi squealed loudly, flailing her arms with every slip before regaining her balance and directing deep curtsies to the bodies in the grass.

A deep voice echoed from within the well. “They cannot see you, Vereandi.”

Vereandi squeaked and nearly toppled over the side. “Urer! I didn’t see you coming.”

Age-spotted fingers with thick nails cut down to squared tips curled around the stone.

With deceptive ease that belied her age, an old goddess pulled herself from the depths and sat on the edge of the well.

A loose, graying cloak hid her slight frame and hooded her wrinkled face.

Strands of fading auburn hair hung like dying embers within the hood.

She ignored Vereandi and the sleepers in the grass, instead locking her gaze on the water deep in the well.

“That is because you are too focused on your present,” Urer said. Her eyes narrowed on the book in the girl’s hands. “That doesn’t belong to you.”

Vereandi stuck out her tongue but handed over the book.

“They can’t see me now , Urer, but when we wake them they will remember that I was their friend in their darkest hour.

It will be just like the old times!“ She clapped her hands in delight at the thought.

Was it not a wondrous thing to be involved in such a momentous occasion?

Urer only listened to the drip, drip, drip of the well. Moments passed. The sleepers neither tossed nor turned. The only proof that they lived at all was the slight rise and fall of their chests.

“Do you hear that, Vereandi?” Urer asked. “That is the sound of time passing away. Remember Ask and Embla. Soon, these mortals you are so fond of will be gone from us, forgetting us just as before.”

Vereandi huffed, springing to a nearby tree root. She ran a small hand along its bark, her thin fingers finding the grooves of runes that yearned for her touch. “You say I live too much in the present. I say you focus too much on the past. Why can’t we make our own future?”

She leapt from the root, landing next to the two bodies.

With a quick glance back at Urer, convinced the clearing was otherwise empty, she snatched the sleepers’ hands in hers.

They did not resist as Vereandi wove their fingers together.

From within the folds of her cloak, Urer pulled out yards of tangled, multicolored string that dripped from her fingers as she watched.

Satisfied with her work, Vereandi returned the sleepers’ hands, now properly intertwined. “There, they look much happier now.”

A scolding voice shook the clearing. “Do not touch the mortals, Vereandi.”

The girl shrank from the voice and stepped away from the sleepers, folding her hands behind her back. Urer shifted on top of the well but otherwise ignored the interruption, continuing to untangle her mass of strings.

From the depths of the well, the voice spoke again, this time no louder than a sigh. “We must send them back. Let us see if they can change Fate’s design.”