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PAIN RAKED OVER MY emaciated form. The times humans and animals found solace in this cave were beyond numerous. And the only beings that sensed me and whined were the wolves. Outside of them, no one acknowledged my rantings and ravings from beyond the magical veil. My existence was such slow torture that my mind had fallen into visions of vengeance.
My stomach stopped growling eons ago as my body feasted on its own fat and muscle structure. I was uncertain I could even walk at this point. My captors left me with little wiggle room—stand or kneel, but there was no motion forward or backward and I had fallen to my knees so many years ago that moving my arms now sent pain through every joint.
The floor was littered with what was left of my feathers, and I could not feel my wing bones any longer. It was as if they’d shriveled like the rest of my body.
I did mathematical problems in my head to keep my mind sharp, because when Odin came to kill me, I did not want him to win. If my mind broke, he won. I sang until my voice failed and then fell into a restless slumber out of sheer exhaustion.
The only indication of the passage of time was the change in weather, but they all blended into a shivering cold that had settled into my bones permanently. The sunrises and sunsets seemed endless. Either endless light or endless dark, blending centuries into one another.
My hair wrapped pools around my body and my fingernails had grown to the point they could scratch the side walls. I’d even tried to dig the chains out of the walls with them, but they snapped every time I’d tried. My toenails constantly broke because of the kneeling position I had been in forever.
I would have died long ago had I been mortal, and I would have been with my Hippocrates now in the afterlife. Damn Odin and immortality. Damn this cave and the slow progression of days.
All this because I couldn’t steal Hippocrates’s knowledge away from the human world just because Odin demanded it. I hated the fact I wished for death, but this existence was far worse than anything death could bring. I wished for Hela’s mercy, but it never came.
Darkness fell again, and my eyes adjusted to the night. I counted my breaths. In. Out. In. Out. In a continuous pattern. A thin glow illuminated the outside of the cavern, and I blinked as it got closer. It was probably another explorer. They’d been coming more frequently, bundled up in heavy gear that I had never seen the likes of. And a part of me envied the bulky clothing. But I had long ago stopped shivering.
Usually, explorers came in a party of two or more, and they’d set up a camp in the cave for a blink of time. Their campfires provided a flash of warmth in an otherwise frigid existence. And although they could not see or hear me, their company provided a reprieve from my crazed thoughts.
A lone explorer stepped into the cavern and scanned the back wall with his lantern. I only saw a silhouette, but he was tall enough and broad enough to give me pause. And the way he approached the magical wall, grew a foreign feeling in my chest.
Hope warmed me, but I doubted it. I could not allow that into my soul because the moment this stranger left, my spirit would be crushed.
He set the lantern on the ground, pointing it to the ceiling and I caught his profile. His eyes were aquamarine, and his cheekbones were severe as if he had been starving just as long as I had. But it was the pointed ear that sent a jolt of shock through me.
Fae. I blinked and tried to remember a fae entering the cavern in all the time I had been chained and came up empty.
He mumbled and reached for the wall of magic separating us. His hand brushed against it and sparks jumped from his fingertips. He smiled and looked down at something foreign that sent its own light on his mesmerizing face. His hair was dark and pulled back from his face.
“I am coming for you, goddess,” he whispered.
I shivered as his voice rolled through me in a wave of expectation. Is he talking to me? I could not afford hope, and I closed my eyes, even as it bloomed in my being.
He glanced over his shoulder and then back before he waved his hand in an arc, chanting a spell of his own. His magic blasted into my space, tasting like cinnamon and vanilla spice, and it breathed hunger into my bones.
The fae stepped through the barrier, and his eyes widened as they took me in. With a wave of his hands, my binds disintegrated, and I slumped onto the ground, pulling my arms in for the first time in eons. He slowly crossed the space, as if I were a skittish wolf and could bolt at any moment.
I chuckled softly at his approach. I couldn’t move, much less run away.
He startled at my laugh, freezing in place. “You are alive?”
“If you call this being alive, then I guess I am. Are you real?” I tilted my head so I could see him clearly. “Either you’re real or my mind finally broke.”
“Your mind has not broken. I am Reyfyre, and I have been looking for you for decades, Goddess.” He crouched down next to me.
“I am no goddess, but I am immortal. Death doesn’t touch me, even when I’ve begged her to.” Speaking exhausted me. “I am Valkyrie.”
He leaned back and a bitter sneer formed on his lips. “You are one of Odin’s killing machines?”
“No. I defied orders. This is my penance.” I glanced around the room but couldn’t lift my arms.
He sighed and looked at my surroundings and then at me. “You do not look like someone who can help us.” He ran his hand through his hair, and locks fell from the elastic holding his hair back.
“I do not know how long I have been locked away, but you are right. I need to be nursed back to health and then get to Asgard to dole out my revenge.”
His eyebrows rose. “Asgard is no longer.”
That snapped my head in his direction. “What?”
“Most of the realms have been destroyed in Odin’s bid to rule all.”
I tried to prop myself up, but my muscles had atrophied to the point where they were nonexistent.
“And as for how long you have been locked in this cave...it’s been close to three thousand years, if the intel I received is correct.” He glanced around again. “It is a miracle that you are not dead.”
My mind couldn’t wrap around the timeframe he dropped. “I came in the time of Hippocrates,” I said, more to myself than to him.
“Who?”
My heart ached, and the vision of his life fading from his eyes accosted me. Instead of focusing on the devastation in my heart, I looked at the stranger, sensing more than fae from him. The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end at his proximity. “What are you?”
His pack slid off his shoulder and he unclasped it, pulling out a clear container. He set it on the ground and reached for me. “Mix breed. Fae and wraith.”
I recoiled. Wraiths were enemies of Asgard. But my motion did not deter him. He scooped me up until I sat against him, and then opened the container, pressing it gently to my lips.
“Water,” he whispered and tilted the bottle, wetting my lips.
I did not have the strength to pull away. The cool liquid caressed my lips and I could not help but lick the liquid off, savoring the small quench on my tongue. “Wraiths are my enemy,” I whispered.
He let out a laugh. “Well, we will see what we become when you get your strength back. It seems I am the last of the wraith bloodline, and you are the last of the Valkyrie.”
Somehow, I found the strength to pull away and stared at him.
“The Valkyrie are gone?” My voice cracked.
“Odin slaughtered them after they failed him and lost Asgard.” His lips pressed together in a frown. “He slaughtered anyone who had the possibility of standing against him. Wraith, fae, witchlings, Valkyrie.” His glance found mine. “He even murdered Loki. His own son. And he rules over what is left with an iron hand with Thor by his side.”
I blinked at him, and he brought the water back to my lips. “Take a small sip.”
I did as he asked, and the water tasted like the nectar of the gods. I wanted more and whined when he pulled it away.
“What is your name?” He searched my gaze.
I thought twice about telling a wraith of who I was, but he unchained me and even offered me water. “Kara.” I nodded toward the water bottle.
“Let that settle for a moment.” He dug in his pack, pulling out a blanket and then draped it over my shoulders.
“How did you find me?”
“Thor raved about chaining a fierce immortal traitorous goddess in the mountains. He seemed very proud that you were rotting for an eternity.” His lips curled down further. “The arrogant ass.”
“Why would he tell you?”
He snorted a laugh. “I overheard him. I was hiding in plain sight as a lowly busboy, collecting intel for the resistance.” He huffed. “They decimated the resistance soon after, and I made it my life’s mission to find the immortal goddess he spoke of.” He glanced at me. “I figure you have just as much, if not more, reasons to squash them like the vermin they are than I do.”
“And you think I will work with a wraith?”
He shrugged. “Half-wraith,” he corrected. “I could just leave. You’d still be barricaded behind that wall of magic, even without the chains.” He started to get up.
I willed my muscles to move, and my hand clasped on his wrist. My nails somehow missed him as they curled in front of us. He broke through Odin’s magic, so he must be powerful. “Why don’t you take him on yourself?”
“I am not immortal.”
I laughed at him. “Valkyrie can be killed. One strategic slice of a blade and we fall.”
“Same with the gods. They beheaded Loki. Made a grand spectacle of it, too.”
I shivered. Loki always walked the line between what was right and wrong, but he didn’t deserve to be publicly beheaded. He chose when he fought, regardless what his father said. I had respected Loki in a way that I never extended to Thor. I shook the thoughts out of my head and focused on the fae. “Reyfyre, you must have magic that can stop them if you’ve broken through Odin’s magic.”
“I do have strong magic, but even my father fell to Odin, and he was stronger than I am. I need someone to have my back and the same motivations as I have to save this realm.”
“Why would you want to save this realm?”
“If I had been left in the fae realm, the fae would have killed me—same with the wraiths. So my parents did the only thing they could to keep me safe. They hid me here among humans, taught me to glamour my ears and blend in. And in the dark caves we explored, they taught me to tap into my magic. Then the Asgardians came and destroyed anyone who posed a threat to them. My father and mother included. But they sent me away right before the resistance fell.” He stared out the opening of the cavern. “They saved my life. But their deaths were televised, along with the rest of the resistance fighters.”
“Televised?”
He grinned at me. “You’ve been here a very long time. The world has changed as you soon will see.” He offered me another sip of water. “Assuming you agree to align with me.”
I sighed and glanced at the opening to my cave that had never changed in all these years. Could this fae-wraith be giving me a line to gain my favor? Wraiths were only interested in destruction—although, if what he was saying was true, a wraith and a fae fell in love. And had a child, no less. What in Valhalla’s name would cause such a connection?
Of one thing I was sure; Odin could cause such an alliance.
I nodded. “I will align with you.”
With a wave of his hand, my out-of-control nails on my hands and feet clipped to the manicured level they once were, and the weight of my hair eased. I turned my head as Reyfyre opened his bag, and my hair tickled me at mid-back. “I don’t know if this will fit you, but it will at least cover you until I can get us down the mountain.”
Fabric dumped over my head, and he helped me put on the strange frock, pulling my hands through the sleeves as best he could. It pillowed around my body like a warm blanket and a hood settled on my head. The weight of it nearly crashed me to the floor, but he steadied me as he picked me up off the ground.
Pain gripped my legs as he helped me straighten them, and I gritted my teeth together.
“We have a lot of work to do to get you back to fighting strength.”
I wanted to snort laughter at the given, but I had no energy left. I wondered how he was going to get me past the magical wall until he undid his bag to reveal straps and clasps that I’d never seen before. He slid straps around my legs and across my back and over my shoulders, making almost a small seat for me. I was confused when he squatted and pulled the ends of the straps in front of him where clicks echoed in the quiet cave. He reached for the straps that hung over my shoulders and pulled me flush to his back. More clicks sounded and then he stood to his full height.
My legs dangled by his sides, loosely covered by the fabric. I rested my chin on his shoulder.
“I came prepared.” His voice echoed as he crouched and picked up the water, tucking it away somewhere I couldn’t see.
His magic swirled and a moment later, he shot through the barrier with me on his back. His heartbeat slammed against mine as if he hadn’t been so sure it would work. Without another word, he swiped the lantern from the floor and turned it off, sliding it into a holder on his chest.
Then he stepped out into the clear night, and I saw the stars for the first time in three thousand years. I was more than thankful for this freedom, but a small part of me still balked at partnering with a wraith.
And so, let the battle for the realms rage.
THE END
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Continue with the next installment in the Fallen Valkyrie Duet, MODERN GODDESS on the next page.