Chapter 27-Draugr
Something tore through me.
Not pain.
Not quite.
It was so much worse.
It was absence.
Hers.
I stopped mid-step in the northern corridor of the Asgarheim Runevald Institute, the ancient stone beneath my boots humming faintly with warded magic—and then going still.
Too still.
The bond—Gods.
The bond snapped.
Not broken.
Never broken.
But pulled so violently it felt as if something were dragging Serena out of the world entirely.
“Serena!”
Her name left my mouth as a growl, low and dangerous, vibrating through my chest as every instinct I possessed surged forward at once.
Wrong.
Something was very fucking wrong.
Not hunger.
Not fear.
Something older.
Something deeper.
The Norns’ threads tightened around my ribs like iron chains.
I could feel her—but not here.
Not fully.
She was slipping.
Through time.
Through memory.
Through death.
And something else—something vast—was answering her.
“Fuck.”
I moved.
Not running.
Not walking.
Hunting.
The corridors blurred as I tore through the Institute, wards flaring in protest as my power rose unchecked. Students scattered, their fear thick in the air, but I ignored them.
Nothing mattered.
Not rules.
Not restraint.
Not Professor Kenna’s warnings.
Not the fragile balance I had spent years maintaining.
Only her.
The deeper I moved into the academic wing, the stronger it became.
The pull.
The surge.
The wrongness.
Magic bled into the stone walls, twisting the runes into jagged patterns as the very foundation of Asgarheim reacted to what Serena had unleashed.
Ghosts.
Thousands of them.
No—more.
An army.
And they were feeding.
On her.
“Unnasta!”
The word tore from me as I reached the sealed doors of Bannerman’s classroom.
The wards screamed.
I didn’t hesitate.
I drove my fist into the barrier.
The impact shattered the air like glass.
Ancient runes splintered under the force, cracking outward in spiderweb fractures of light and shadow.
The ward resisted—Gods, it resisted—but I was beyond caring.
The Draugr did not knock.
I broke through.
The door exploded inward.
And chaos met me.
The classroom was no longer a classroom.
It was a battlefield.
Ghosts filled the space—writhing, screaming, clawing at the walls, the ceiling, the students.
Some were translucent, others flickering with unstable corporeality, drawn into the physical realm by Serena’s power.
By her command.
Students were thrown back, dragged across the floor, held suspended in midair by invisible hands.
Bannerman stood at the center, chanting frantically, his red dragon hissing as it coiled tighter around his shoulder.
And Serena—Gods.
Serena.
She hovered above a shattered wooden table, her body arched, bound in a past that bled into the present.
Purple flames consumed her skin—not burning—but transforming.
Her eyes—they were not entirely hers.
Time layered over her like a second body.
Sicily.
Blood.
Chains.
Pain.
And beneath it all—power.
Raw.
Uncontrolled.
Ancient.
“She’s gone too deep!” Bannerman shouted.
“I can see that,” Professor Kenna replied sharply from the far side of the room, her voice cutting through the chaos like a blade.
But she did not step forward.
She waited.
Watched.
For me.
Of course she did.
“You know what to do, Draugr,” she said.
I already moved.
The ghosts lunged at me as I crossed the room, drawn to the same power that anchored Serena. Claws of memory and regret scraped against my skin, trying to pull me into their hunger—I roared at them.
The sound tore through them like a war horn.
They scattered.
Not gone.
Never gone.
But they recognized something in me.
Something they would not challenge.
Death answered death.
And I was older than most of what she had summoned.
I reached her.
Her body was ice beneath my hands.
Wrong.
So fucking wrong.
“Serena.”
No response.
Her lips moved—but not in a language I recognized from this life.
Ancient.
Human.
Broken by pain and fury.
Her magic lashed outward, pulling harder, wider, dragging more of the dead toward her like a collapsing star.
She was feeding them.
Unknowingly.
Uncontrollably.
If this continued—she would burn out.
Or worse.
She would become something that never returned.
“I will not let you go. You must come back to me, Unnasta. Come back!”
I grabbed her shoulders, grounding her as best I could, forcing my presence into the bond.
Nothing.
She didn’t see me.
Didn’t feel me.
She was too far gone.
I felt it then—the other pull.
Not hers.
Not mine.
Hel.
Not the goddess herself—but the realm.
The edge of it.
The boundary where souls lingered.
She stood on it.
And she was not alone.
“She’s crossing,” Bannerman said hoarsely.
“I know.”
My jaw clenched.
Decision.
Now.
Or lose her.
I brought my wrist to my mouth and bit down hard.
Blood welled instantly, thick and dark.
Power surged through it.
Ancient.
Cursed.
Bound.
“Forgive me,” I muttered.
Then I pressed my bleeding wrist to her mouth.
For a heartbeat—nothing.
Then—she latched.
The pull was immediate.
Violent.
Not gentle.
Not careful.
She drank.
Greedily.
And I felt it—the bond roaring to life.
Her magic recoiling inward.
Her soul—thank the pitiless Gods—her soul snapping back along the thread that bound us.
“Come back to me,” I growled, voice breaking now. “Please, mate. I will not be without you—come back!”
The words tore out of me without permission.
“Ek elska tik, Unnasta. I love you, mate!”
Her body jerked.
The ghosts screamed.
The entire room shook as her control faltered—then shifted.
Changed.
Focused.
Her eyes opened.
Purple met purple.
Recognition.
“Raven,” she whispered.
Relief hit me so hard my knees nearly buckled.
“Unnasta Minn,” I breathed.
She was back.
Not whole.
Not steady.
But mine again.
Around us, the ghosts surged once more—but this time, the power wasn’t spiraling out.
It was pulling in.
Controlled.
Directed.
She stood—barely—and I steadied her, my arm tight around her as she looked at the destruction.
At what she had done.
At what she had become.
And then—she took it back.
I felt it happen.
Not as a surge.
As a command.
The dead obeyed.
One by one, then in waves, they were cast out—sent back to their places, their realms, their waiting.
The room stilled.
The storm ended.
Silence crashed down.
And then—Serena collapsed in my arms.
I mean to say I caught her before she hit the ground, lifting her into my arms as if she weighed nothing.
“Sorry,” she murmured faintly.
“You have nothing to apologize for,” I said, my voice low and dangerous as I looked at the wreckage around us.
The Institute trembled.
The wards strained.
And every ancient thing buried beneath Asgarheim had just taken notice.
Of her.
Of us.
Of what we had become together.
I tightened my hold on her.
Mine.
Not as possession.
As truth.
As fate.
As inevitability.
And for the first time since I had taken the Draugr’s burden—I understood something terrifying.
The curse had never been my end.
She was.