A Valkyrie's Apprentice: Book Two

Know What You Are

– T A Y A H –

As I let a slither of my power glow before them I watched their faces.

Each one of them. Disbelieving. Weighing the possibilities. Considering the next actions. None of it calmed the rage in my blood. The way my power called to me and not to end things amicably. They dared to draw steal on the immortals responsible for saving them and a boy of infinite more value. If was not for his safety I was not sure how I would end this...

The war lord growled something across at me and Yanu tightened his grip on my tunic. My power rose to the threat and the fire grew more hungry. The dark haired man flinched and I resisted a smirk.

His expression froze for a slither and I threw Kára a quick look. But to my surprise she too was frozen in place–the only possible explanation was...

"Greetings, again. Daughter." The many voices spoke beside me. I managed to resist the flinch. It was hardly a shock. I had done the one thing no immortal should ever–I had done many things that broke promises and laws since...

"Odin." I spoke with more calm than I felt.

The hood of shadows and smoke tilted and paced before the crowd of unmoving mortals. Suspended in a bubble of captured time. Our own reality for a moment.

"You seem to take delight in causing problems for the realms." He noted in a tone absent of emotion. It was not accusatory or angry. It simply was.

I lowered my hand and let my power dissolve. Then I moved away from the boy that stood clinging to nothing now. I met what I could only assume was the God's stare. Nothing but a black absence of light under the hood.

"You know what my intentions were." I stated.

"Indeed. Yet you did not fully understand my own. Nor did my Stormbringer it seems."

I stayed still and patient. I would let this god speak what was often missed for once. I had no intention of rushing in-between sentences. I wanted it spoken plainly for once. The cloak looked down over the glaring mortals, arms pressed behind his back.

"I think you have known for quite some time that you are irregular. Not only in your immortality and come to being." He began, considering the small, meaty humans. "I considered this when you ripped a rift from Valhalla to the mortal realm by accident. Then again when your power reacted to my relic in quite the way it did."

"So the gifts weren't just to help me defeat a power crazed immortal." I murmured.

The hood tilted again almost in humour.

"Stormbringer could have destroyed that immortal with no outside help at all. You know this. The relic and cloak were to confirm what I already concluded." 

"And what exactly is that." I asked slowly, feeling the endless fire simmering under my skin.

"You are an original."

My spine went rigid. As if a poker had gone through me entirely. Then the words circled my skull in a storm. Original. Impossible. There were only two left. One was Kára and the other... unknown to me–

"I do not understand."

"Yes it even surprised me, daughter. Although I do not believe you to be my daughter. Rather Ares offspring to be more specific."

I choked out and my brows pinched. "Ares was destroyed. Kára was there–you confirmed."

The god paced to the fireplace to watch the frozen flames stand in their raging golds and reds. Consuming nothing for a moment–until time was set free once more.