The Goddess Embraced (The Saga of Edda-Earth Book 3)

by Deborah Davitt

  Books. Hundreds of them. Not a surprise; Regin had taught seiðr for generations, and her husband had been a technomancer. Sigrun started digging through the container, and then paused. Timeless place or not, if she had to dig through a crate and then repack it, she would be here for hours. She shook her head, and picked up the packing list on the side of the container. I should have thought of this first. Let’s see . . . . her personal jewelry was sold, except for her locket, which went with her into the Veil. Not that she has it now. It would have just held her wedding picture, anyway. That’s probably the reason she doesn’t have it . . . she doesn’t want to remember anything. Not even the good, because it led to the bad.

  Sigrun continued to scan the list. Her assets were stripped, house and household items such as the icebox and other appliances, sold . . . all coin donated as weregild to various charities that aided people after the Day of Hel’s Demise . . . very fair. Items preserved at Freya’s direct request: several decades of thaumaturgy journals. Her husband’s books. Either would only cause her grief. Actually, I’m not sure that there’s anything in here that wouldn’t cause her grief . . . . What’s this? Journals. She kept journals? I shouldn’t read those. Though if she ever wrote anything about Brandr in them, she might want those entries back. The later ones, she should never see again.

  Her eyes skimmed lower. Letter of reprimand from Hel herself, marked ‘dangerous to read . . . burst the blood vessels in the eyes of Brandr Ilfetu . . .’ Sigrun touched that set of runes, and a piece of paper emerged from the container, floating to her hand. Her eyes ached as she gazed on the runes, which crawled along the page, and she could hear the death-goddess’ contemptuous voice as she read the words. You have failed me, Reginleif. I know your Name. But I also know that the best way in which to punish you, is not to twist your Name and tear you apart from the inside, but to punish the one closest to you. Human life is so very fleeting, is it not?

  Sigrun dropped the letter, the remainder unread. It was ancient history, but reinforced her desire to ensure that she would never become what Hel had been. She touched her eyes, briefly, and her fingertips came away clean of blood, before she returned to the list. Journals, music recordings for a photogram, pictures in frames, various. Those are of her family, though. Those will hurt. That’s not the point.

  What is the point, Stormborn? The voice at her elbow made her jump, and she exhaled when she saw that Loki had just coalesced there. I’ve startled you, daughter?

  I had somehow expected you the instant I opened the crate, like an efreet appearing from a bottle, Sigrun said, lowering her head. The delay lulled me.

  I was otherwise engaged, so when I had a moment free from assisting Thor with looking suitably menacing to the south of here, I sent this shadow-self to you. What are your intentions towards my other errant daughter and her personal effects? Something to do with justice, no doubt? Loki’s tone was arch, and his brows rose over his eclipse-silver eyes.

  Sigrun closed her own for a moment. I do not know if this has much to do with justice, she admitted, and you might rightly regard me as . . . meddling with one of your own, as I once accused you of meddling with me. She winced. But humans cannot live without hope. Reginleif has endured much punishment. She understands the severity of her crimes. The depth of her responsibility and her guilt. A human court, if they did not sentence her to death, would certainly sentence her to life in prison, if not torture. Though if that is not what she endured in the Veil, I am not sure what else to term it. She paused.

  You argue for leniency?

  I state that her punishment has been served, and her parole continues . . . but that she sees herself as still imprisoned. To be punished for eternity is something that she accepts. Brandr . . . Sigrun paused, watching as Loki’s fox-like grin lit up his face. Ah. You knew about that.

  Of course I did. It would be somewhat difficult for me not to know. Loki chuckled. Generations of young bear-warriors have tried to woo pretty girls with the line, ‘Do you not wish to have the might of Thor inside you?’ And quite a few of those have been daughters of my line.

  Sigrun cleared her mind and turned her face into a mask. Loki cackled. You want to say it. You desperately want to say it. It would be refreshing for you to set loose the sense of humor that lurks behind all of Tyr’s sternness, daughter. Come. Prove that there is something of me in there. His shadow-self tapped her breastbone, lightly.

  Against her will, Sigrun’s lips quirked. So, what you are saying is, that every time Brandr and Reginleif . . . have relations . . . .

  What a way to put it . . . .

  Sigrun’s chin came up, and the light of defiance came into her eyes. Very well. It’s not just him having his way with her, but a small portion of Thor is having his way with you? It felt like complete effrontery. It was effrontery, and so far above beyond the line that she fully expected to be slapped into the next time-zone for it. And yet, he’d practically invited her to flyt with him.

  I would not advise telling Cloudwalker that it’s a small portion. Loki’s smirk grew wider as Sigrun spluttered. But yes. In essence. Until a god-born is cut off from us, as an ascendant like yourself is, we are aware of their interactions, particularly emotional ones that are charged with power. And since these two know each other’s Names, and call each other by them in their . . . relations . . . he guffawed again at Sigrun’s expression, Thor and I are both well aware of the situation. He pointed to the open container. You believe that our bear-warrior requires some assistance?

  Sigrun got control over her face. I am not certain that anything less than Tyr appearing to her and telling her that she is . . . She sighed. Not free of guilt, because Reginleif will always feel that. Not clean, because she will never feel that, either. And I would not alter her memories, because that would change the person that she is now, fundamentally. It would cheapen what she has learned. But I would like to remind her of something that Brandr has told her, in my hearing. She brought up from the crate what she’d been looking for. An album, filled with images of Regin’s service in the Odinhall. And it fell open to the correct page . . . 1910 AC, the year Sigrun had been born. She glanced down, and there was Brandr’s graduating class, and their chief instructors, all in full armor. She was astounded by how young her mentor looked. His beard had still been downy, and his grin had all but split his face. The other bear warriors around him had all been a little shorter, and with lighter hair. Reginleif, to the side with the other instructors, had been looking away from the camera, her short cap of white hair framing her face. But she had been caught smiling. Sigrun cleared her throat. Brandr reminds her that she spent some two hundred years in loyal service before she strayed. For once not on the side of the prosecution, and unsure of what else to say, Sigrun shook her head. It means something, does it not? And yet, how to weigh two hundred years of loyalty against all the lives . . . .

  I am in agreement with you, Naglfar. Loki’s image rested its hand on her shoulder. But the trick will lie in making Shadowweaver see this, herself. He paused. You understand her.

  Of course I do. Sigrun looked down. But for luck, and the unlooked-for kindness of the gods? I would be her. She looked up again. The pictures should be a guerdon from you.

  You ask me to intervene? Loki’s chuckle danced among the shelves. Oh, but what shall I ask of you in return, a favor for a favor? Perhaps . . . you might just have to owe me. He paused. Or perhaps, you should undertake this task, yourself.

  With your permission? Sigrun asked, warily. It is not polite, to interfere overly with those bound to another . . . .

  You are as much my daughter as Hel was. You hold much of her essence inside of you. You are, in fact, as I hoped she would become. Loki leaned forwards, and brushed a kiss on Sigrun’s hair. Reginleif is your kin. Kin-bonds tie the most tightly, but they are also the most gossamer of bindings. Go. Bring hope to her, if you can.

  One small piece of the world at a time, Sigrun thought, lowering her head, closing the container, and
turning to leave once she knew that Loki’s presence was gone.

  Brandr moved through the refugee center, the crowds parting around him. Impacts on his shoulders from the various jotun and cyclopeans who happened to be there today, and an impression of harpies and dryads scuttling out of his path. Off to his left, a room filled with old incubators, donated by the local hospitals and veterinary clinics. He could see dozens of eggs in there, tended by expressionless harpy males. Every egg had a family name and an identification code written on its surface in black ink, and there was a rigid record-keeping system for checking an egg in and out of nest-care. To his right, he could see a group of refugees in a sort of gymnasium, all following an instructor in some sort of tai chi chuan exercise. Jotun at the back of the class, dryads and harpies at the front. The fenris, centaurs, and leonnes couldn’t, naturally, manage the postures demanded by either tai chi or yoga.

  He’d been pinned down in Tyre an additional week after Reginleif and the harpies had been rotated back to Jerusalem for some downtime, and she hadn’t been at his apartment when he’d gotten in this afternoon. He’d been subtly moving her in, over the past two years. Quietly taking a few of her books each time he’d stayed at her apartment. Distracting her, so that she forgot her clothes, or her toothbrush, at his place. There was now nothing left at her apartment besides her mattress, a day’s change of clothing, and her name on the lease, but she still held onto it. Still, aggravatingly, called it home. Brandr assumed it had something to do with independence, or the habit of many years, and kept his mouth shut. That, at least came easily to him.

  A volunteer directed him to her, and he paused outside the small conference room, his eyebrows going up at the placard outside. The Differently-Human Marriage Seminar? We can’t just say ‘cross-species,’ because some of them still can interbreed with regular humans . . . the fenris and lindworms prefer to be called people and not human. The lindworms can only mate among themselves, and have the hardest time convincing people that they’re ‘human.’ More or less. The fenris can marry the hveðungr, but most of the original fenris didn’t even remember who they were, let alone their families . . . . Brandr frowned for a moment. On the other hand . . . the fenris born to sane adults are what, twenty-five now? I suppose there’s probably some . . . lucky couple . . . out there that’s trying to make it work without shape-shifting. Gods. Things I don’t want to think about. He shook his head, rapidly. Some of the less reputable brothels in Judea—ones that got shut down, hard, by the authorities, when caught—ran live sex shows. There wasn’t anything illegal about that, per se. It was the fact that these were billed as ‘freak-shows,’ and could be quite detrimental to the health of the participants if people weren’t . . . exceedingly careful. Satyr on dryad . . . male and female . . . probably safe enough. Satyr on naiad . . . in a tank of water, with breathing apparatus for the satyr? Titillating for some people, apparently, and probably wouldn’t result in death if the satyr’s breathing equipment was adequate. A harpy female, dressed as a dominatrix, and tormenting a chained minotaur? Apparently, an act that was highly in demand among a certain crowd. But male centaur, minotaur, or leonne on male or female human? There had been people rushed to the hospital after several of the shows had gotten out of hand. Bowel resections weren’t fun, and there had been fatalities before the gardia had cracked down.

  Brandr winced and returned his mind to its previous consideration of the increasingly loaded term of ‘human.’ Gods only know what the centaurs and leonnes prefer to call themselves. The harpies, dryads, and nieten consider themselves human, the jotun call themselves human, the cyclopeans call themselves giants, and the minotaurs . . . well . . . . He pushed the door open a crack, not wanting to intrude if Regin wasn’t done with the seminar, and peeked in. She currently sat at the center of a small group of couples. One male harpy/female human. One dryad/nieten. A triton lounging in an inflatable rubber pool of water, holding hands with the human woman who knelt on the carpet beside his pool. A jotun with a cyclopean, which made Brandr grimace, and then . . . yes . . . a centaur male with a human female. Brandr put a hand over his face, briefly. He’d heard of leonnes and centaurs being able to make it sort of work, though obviously, children weren’t going to be an outcome of that sort of relationship. But male centaur/female human wasn’t going to work out in the long run. Even male human/female centaur was . . . iffy, at best. They’d certainly be in for a lot of sheep jests, and the man would probably find himself given a fair number of boxes and step-ladders as practical jokes.

  Reginleif’s face was a smooth mask, but her voice, with all its subtle siren harmonics, wasn’t quite neutral as she said, “Ah, Achille and Amaranthe. It’s your turn to discuss the difficulties of the post-transition life.” She pinched the bridge of her nose, briefly.

  “Well, we were married for two years before the day of transformation,” the centaur said in Latin, putting a hand on the woman’s shoulder. “And I obviously changed.” He grimaced. “We were evacuated from Crete in and around the tidal waves, and I never went mad, the way some of the other Changed people did. And we’ve tried to work it out, since then.” He shrugged a little. “We, well, we divorced. Got back together . . . broke up again . . . .”

  Behind the door, Brandr shook his head, and watched Reginleif’s wings flick a little, a sure sign of mild annoyance. “So why are you here today?” she asked them, raising her eyebrows. “You are currently back together for attempt number three?”

  “Well, try four,” the woman said, nodding. “We’ve stayed very good friends, through all of it.”

  Regin’s expression didn’t change. “And the reasons you’ve previously broken up?”

  They gave each other hesitant looks, as the others around them all seemed to wince a little. “Well, there were the dietary changes,” the man admitted, after a moment. A centaur had to eat about three times as much as a human did, on any given day, mostly in grains. Fortunately, they had the digestive system to handle even uncooked grains, and their molars had increased in size, had thicker enamel, and grew in continuously, allowing them to handle the dietary needs. “But that’s a small thing. I, ah, had to relearn toilet control—”

  “Which is no different than if he’d been in a bad accident,” his former wife put in, staunchly. “But I admit, I didn’t like living in the centaur trailers in the refugee camps. I wanted a bed and lavatory facilities that weren’t a pit in the ground. But we’ve worked out how he can use a human—” she paused, giving the others an apprehensive glance, “er, a standard toilet now . . . and I happen to be living in an apartment that doesn’t have any stairs . . . .”

  Movement among the others. All of their daily lives required compromises. Sometimes, very large ones. But they obviously weren’t entirely finding this a comfortable discussion. “And you got back together how?” Regin asked, sounding tired.

  “Well, I’d been seeing someone else, a normal man.” This occasioned shifting in the chairs and in the wading pool. Normal was a loaded term these days. “But I realized I just was never as happy with him as I was with Achille. I couldn’t talk to him the way I can talk to Achille.”

  “And the time before that?”

  “Well, I’d been seeing a female centaur,” the male replied, “and it didn’t work out. I happened to run into Amaranthe at a taverna, and it was just so good talking with her, that . . . one thing led to another.”

  There was a long pause. “It’s wonderful that you’re still friends,” Regin finally said. “You have friendship and affection based on mutual history. And that fact that you can talk to each other is very important.” She paused. “But I doubt living arrangements or food requirements were what really caused you to break up every other time. Any number of people married to people of other cultures have to deal with such, after all.” She regarded them steadily. “You have a fundamental problem with intimacy and sexual relations, don’t you?” Her expression never changed, and Brandr suppressed his guffaw. He’d heard her use that exac
t tone on young bear-warriors and valkyrie for decades.

  And with the same results here. The pair squirmed. “Sex doesn’t equate to intimacy,” the woman replied, with a little indignation.

  “It’s been a problem,” Achille admitted, with more candor, and got a look from his former wife.

  “It’s a fairly important portion of a marriage or other adult romantic relationship.” Reginleif’s back stayed sword-straight. “Now, someone who’s had their back broken, and no longer can feel below the waist . . . their spouse would probably stay and tend to them. That’s loyalty, and it’s a beautiful, exceptional demonstration of love. And yes, it’s a wonderful example of how intimacy doesn’t necessarily equate to sex. I applaud you for being committed enough to keep trying, but . . . neither of you is sexually dysfunctional. You’re both relatively young, just past thirty. One of you sleeps standing up, and is too tall and large for most human living spaces. You can barely share a bedroom, and that alone puts a damper on physical contact, which is a part of intimacy. You have no children, and cannot have them, short of adoption, which doesn’t provide any connection of family between you. In terms of sexual contact, there’s either married celibacy, mutual masturbation, or the option of an ‘open marriage,’ as I think the young people are calling it these days. The arrangements made in the ‘freak-shows’ at the brothels would be highly inadvisable.” Reginleif’s tone hadn’t changed a whit. As empty and blank as a recording. But everyone around her reacted in uneasy embarrassment now.