Philophobia ➤ W.M.

| b e g i n n i n g |

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  Like most stories, this one started with a girl. Let us refer to her as Doa, a lowly peasant woman who lived like most Asgardians did: in a small village on the outskirts of Asgard's markets.

  This woman's one true desire was to love, to be cherished and forever wanted. She would wait day after day to find one person to discover the spark with. Doa desired someone to be there for her, even when her days led her to the taverns. She didn't ask for much in a lover, just to be comforted and appreciated. To be loved. That was the goal she strived after.

  One fateful day, Doa believed that her wish had become reality. She had stumbled across a man in a nearby tavern. Weariness had been plaguing her from a long day of work, so she had headed to the building in hope of relief from alcohol. Not long after she had stumbled into the bar and slid into a bar stool, she stuck up conversation with a man who looked similar to her.

  His voice was as smooth as silk, and entranced Doa so much that she could sit there for hours and drink it in, instead of the alcoholic beverage that sat untouched on the counter. They talked for what seemed to be days, like they were old friends that had parted ways for a short time. Doa was the happiest she believed she could be, so joyous that she dreamed of the moment when she had retired to her home.

  Time passed, and but a few months later, the two had officially become lovers. They yearned to stay together every waking, and sleeping, moment, both deeply entranced in the drug known as love. Doa was confident that they would be an unstoppable force, never to be split, even in the most dire of circumstances. She was blinded by love.

  That fact became obvious as a few more months passed. The man she believed she was destined to be with indefinitely fell out of love with her. Maybe he had never truly loved her. After all, the relationship had ended quite abruptly, and particularly ugly. The man had disappeared without a trace, leaving little more than a note, and she was left to mend a broken heart on her own.

  Despite any previous heartbreak, Doa jumped back into the relationship game, still determined to reach her happy ending with love. She headed back to the bar she had met her previous lover, and spotted a woman who was drowning her sorrows in countless drinks. Doa had hesitantly approached the drunken woman and they started speaking, hitting it off better than the man and Doa ever had.

  One thing led to another, and the two became lovers. This relationship went even better than Doa's last, like it was out of a fairytale. Secretly, she was convinced that a goddess was watching over her. The love that she had fallen into was richer and better than she could have imagined, so much so that she knew she would spend her life with her lover.

  The new relationship was blissful. Until it ended, even sooner than Doa's previous. This split caused more heartbreak than was assumed possible, and she had quickly accepted the fact that she would never love again. Years upon years passed, and she went through relationship upon relationship, but barely any lover surrendered the same love from her soul.

  One last chance of love came in the form of another woman, so many years that Doa had become ill with a fatal disease in her old age. So, in an attempt to cherish the love she had discovered before her untimely demise, Doa admitted that she loved the other woman and told of the yearning to be with her forever. The confession did not go the way Doa had planned, however, and her lover had abandoned her in a flurry.

  Pain had erupted in Doa's heart, so deep that she had passed away the next day, alone and broken hearted. No family or lover in sight, she passed through the gates of Valhalla, though the hall was supposed to be for whom Odin had deemed worthy.

  Little did the deceased woman know, the goddess who had been watching over her had requested that Odin send the woman to the hall. Astrilde had begged her father, after she could not find the love Doa seeked for her. It hurt even more to believe that love would triumph for Doa, as all it did was hurt her for years upon years.

  Astrilde had returned to the palace horrified that something as beautiful as love could do such a thing to a person. In her state of mind, she had gone to her brothers without a second thought, crying out about how Doa had died heartbroken.

  Ever since those series of events, Astrilde started witnessing a different side of love. A side that destroyed entire civilizations, a type that hurt her more than it could hurt anyone. A side that showed how every time one were to fall into it, it would end badly. Astrilde started to lose faith in love, slowly but surely.

  Eventually, she believed but one thing: Love is a curse.

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