Chapter 24 #2
I should extend Freya some faith. I should help her, even if I fear she’s wrong, but I can’t do it, not if it means destroying the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.
She’s right about that. This egg is different.
It’s unique. It’s compelling. I reach my hand out, and as she begins siphoning off the magic that’s freely offered in the massive courtyard in which she married Odin a decade and a half ago, I take advantage of her distraction, and I place the large red egg in its place.
And then, before she can stop me, I run.
I hear her chanting, and as I move away, I continue to hear her through the bond. Once I get down the tunnels and reach the back exit, I launch and pump my wings as hard and as fast as I can. I just have to reach Euphrasia, and then together, we can—
Gullveig!!
Magic explodes around me, and I feel rather than see Freya’s spell go awry.
Without the egg to summon Veralden, with the flame egg instead, she manages to create an insane amount of heat.
In fact, something behind me is burning so hot that I worry I might melt.
My wings might catch fire. Freya the ice vanir has somehow created a hot spot that reaches to the very core of our cavernous home.
The heat from below and that from the destroyed egg begin to meet, creating some kind of explosion that expands both upward and outward.
Bring it back, Gullveig! I need you! I need that egg.
I waffle for a moment. Should I turn back?
I look down at the egg in my hand, glowing softly, and I can’t do it.
She can’t take this one and destroy it. Sacrifice is one thing, but destruction of something this beautiful is wrong.
If that’s truly what Veralden Radien demands, if it’s what he is, I don’t want anything to do with him.
And destroying beautiful things like perfect, powerful, varied and precious eggs?
It’s never going to bring us what we want.
I keep running until I reach Euphrasia. “I have it,” I shout. “But she knows. Her spell isn’t going right without it.”
I can tell. Euphrasia tosses her head.
I follow her direction until I see it. Vanir in the distance, fighting Odin, are popping into sight, and then they’re flying backward, shooting ahead, and darting to the side, all of them aiming unerringly for the main courtyard and Freya.
“What’s going on?”
Her spell’s doing something to the vanir, Euphrasia says. I wish I knew what.
Water aesir are teeming around the small boat with the children in it. Fagen’s there too, his bags stowed, his spear in hand. I wave to my girls, and they cheer. “Mom!”
I want to go with them, but I worry. “I should make sure Freya. . .” I offer the egg to Euphrasia.
She takes it, but she tosses her head to the other water aesir.
Take them all the way across the bay. Hess is waiting for them.
Fagen’s sister escaped the vanir lands and joined us a decade past. Their aunt’s a good, solid woman.
Strong and smart. They’ll be alright with her and their father until I can rejoin them.
“You mustn’t bring that egg close,” I say. “Stay here. Let me see if Freya is—”
Odin shoots past us overhead, and then he whips back and crashes into the ground beside us. What’s happening?
I swallow. “I—Freya wanted—I stole the egg she meant to use to call Veralden.” I wince. “I know that was bad, but she—”
Odin shakes his head. No, that was right. I’m going back to get all the other eggs. You will come with me, and you can reason with her.
Euphrasia comes too, carrying the egg I took, buoyed up by Odin’s presence I suppose, much as I am. But when we reach the ledge in front of their chambers, Freya’s eyes are wide, and she’s not listening to anything anyone says. She’s still chanting, but she’s clearly seeing something we aren’t.
And vanir are flying through her body and disappearing.
That’s not good, Euphrasia says.
Not good at all. Odin calls to her. Freya.
Her head snaps our direction, and her eyes widen. “Gullveig! You came back. I need that egg. Now, before it’s too late.”
But Odin has stepped in front of me. You can’t have any eggs. You can’t save people by destroying others. That’s where we went wrong. We can’t defeat the vanir by killing every last one. It’s as evil as abandoning your children.
Freya’s face is sad. “We could have, together.” She shakes her head. “The problem is that, like Veralden with Jore, you didn’t truly love me.” She shifts so that she can see me. “I loved you truly too, Gullveig. Always. I hope you can find peace in a world without the vanir.”
Then Freya’s body begins to convulse. “It’s not enough,” she whispers.
“I need more magic.” She closes her eyes, and then reopens them, finally seeing us.
“Euphrasia.” She cries out then. “My husband. My bonded. And my best friend.” She shakes her head.
“You’re the reason none of the water blessed joined me?
” Her eyes are pained. “Then you can pay the final price.” She lunges toward Euphrasia and grabs her leg.
Euphrasia screams, dropping the egg.
I barely catch it before it hits the stone ground.
Freya appears to be taking something from Euphrasia, something the water aesir doesn’t want to give. She writhes, and she keens, and then she trembles.
The water blessed down below are keening, too.
And then Euphrasia’s wings shrivel up and shrink, sucking into her back until they’re no longer there.
At the same time, Freya disappears.
The moments after her departure are pure chaos.
Plenty of strike aesir, storm vanir, moon vanir, and even one flame aesir aided Freya in her plan, but not a single water aesir did. They all looked to Euphrasia, and she cautioned them to be careful. After Freya’s departure, every single water aesir was left wingless.
And every single sky child who aided her departure had been changed.
Instead of moon vanir, storm vanir, and strike or flame aesir, they had become smaller, and they had no wings.
They did gain a sudden affinity for the land around them.
Odin started calling them earth blessed, but he didn’t use aesir or vanir to designate them, because none of us could tell which was which anymore.
The first earth-sky children were born that night, and not of their own volition. But Freya was right about one thing. Everything requires some kind of sacrifice. Sadly, we usually don’t get to choose what it is, and our parents almost never show up and clean up our messes.
We’re left to handle those ourselves.