From the Earth to the Shadows

by Amanda Hocking

  He didn’t answer right away, instead staring thoughtfully at the roof at his feet. “I have been alive for three hundred and thirty-eight years. I have just learned that in that entire time, I have never made a choice that wasn’t predestined, one that was my own. And here I am, being given the first true choice of my entire existence. It seems to me that it would be a travesty if my first and only choice I ever made was to give up the ability to choose.”

  “It’s going to be total chaos,” Quinn said, shaking her head. “There will be so much anger. People will die over this.”

  “People will die anyway,” Asher said gently. “This way, they get to live.”

  “Whatever you decide, it must be your choice,” Odin said. “For now I will return to Vanaheimr to see my wife, and I will let you do whatever it is you need to do.”

  NINETY

  The nine-pointed star had been messed up during the scuffle with the skeletons, so Oona carefully went over it with her ash-and-herb stick until it was fixed. Minerva directed us to each of our points on the star.

  Oona stood at the northernmost point in the first position, holding Thrúd with its carnation-pink blade. To her left going around the star was Asher with his blood-red Hildr, Teodora with burnt-orange Göndul, Minerva with lemon-yellow Skögul, Sloane with forest-green Ölrún, Valeska with bright teal Mist, Quinn with sky-blue Eir, Samael with dark indigo Róta, and finally me, with purple Sigrún, standing on the point between Samael and Oona.

  Above us, the dark swirling clouds finally parted enough to let the sunlight through. The smallest beam of light landed right in the center of the star.

  “So, we’re all going to hold up our swords, pointing them toward the sky,” Oona said, going over the plan one final time before we began. “Samael will read the incantation in the original language, while I will say it in English, and then you can all repeat after me.”

  Samael was the only one saying it in the original language, because he was the only one who could pronounce it properly. Oona believed that it didn’t matter what language we said the incantation in, as long as we said it, but she also thought it wouldn’t hurt to have someone reading the original text in its written language.

  Then she took a deep breath. “Is everybody ready?” she asked, and we all nodded.

  “Let’s get this done,” Valeska said and held her sword up high over her head, and we all followed suit.

  “Gang ût, ût fana themo margę an that bên,” Samael began.

  “Get out, away from the marrow to the bone,” Oona translated, and when the rest of us echoed her, our swords began to glow.

  “Ût fana themo bêne an that flêsg.”

  “Away from the bone to the flesh.”

  “Ût fana themo flêsgke an lebēn.”

  “Away from the flesh to life.”

  The swords had begun to glow almost blindingly bright, and Sigrún trembled in my hand.

  “Ût fana themo lebēn an that tōd.”

  “Away from life to the death.”

  “Ût fana that tōd an thesa strâla.” Samael was nearly shouting now, to be heard over the rumbling of the sky. The sun still shone through, but the clouds were swirling, and a strong wind had picked up.

  “Away from the death and into the atmosphere!” Oona gripped her sword with both hands, as most of us had started to do since they had begun to shake.

  “Uuodan, uuerthe so!” Samael yelled the final line.

  “Odin, make it so!”

  Suddenly beams of light shot out from the swords, meeting in the center of the star in a solid rainbow beam that blasted up to the sky. Wind was blowing from it, pushing us all back, but we held strong and would not be moved.

  Lightning crackled across the sky, and a twisted, screaming howl blasted through the wind, sounding as if a million demons were screaming all at once. The loudest thunderclap I had ever heard rattled through us, shaking the earth along with it.

  Then I had the strangest sensation, as if something were being pulled from within me. Like wisps of weight and pain, flowing through me, away from me, out into the air.

  I had lived my whole life with a vise wrapped around my heart, squeezing it so hard it could barely beat, but I’d never even known that it was there. I thought that was how life felt.

  Now it was breaking away, being ripped from me, and my heart pounded harder than ever before. It was really beating, for the first time, entirely on its own.

  And then whatever it was, all the invisible shackles inside me were gone. The ceremony was over, and we all collapsed onto the concrete, gasping for breath.

  “So that’s it?” I asked, looking over at Oona. “We’re free.”

  She smiled tiredly, but the happiness was evident in her eyes. “Yeah, Mal. I think we’re actually free.”

  NINETY-ONE

  Classical music was still piping in through the speakers in the elevator as Samael and I rode down alone. Everyone else had gotten off two floors above us, where the Seraphim and head Eralim were scrambling together to figure out what had happened.

  An interrogation by the Evig Riksdag was still in store for Samael and myself, but I wanted to check on Bowie, hidden away in Samael’s panic room, and we wanted to get Gungnir safely locked up before somebody else could get their hands on it. Plus I could really use a moment or two to breathe before being bombarded with questions and paraded through meetings with officials.

  In fact, the very first thing I did after the elevator doors closed on the chaotic scene unfolding on the highest floors of the Riks—one that quickly swallowed up all my friends, who gave me rueful looks over their shoulders—was lean back against the wall and exhale deeply.

  “You can say that again,” Samael said with a tired laugh.

  He leaned against the copper wall beside me, his hands shoved in the pockets of his dirt- and bloodstained pants. His wild curls had come loose from their bun and the wind had wreaked havoc on them. The expression on his face was more weary than anything else, and I didn’t know that I’d ever seen him look so disheveled and lost.

  “How are you holding up?” I asked him.

  “Okay.” He thought for a few seconds before elaborating, “It’s hard to say. How about you?”

  “Same, I think.” I shrugged. “Do you feel any different?”

  His brow furrowed. “I feel … exactly the same and entirely different. My heart feels like it’s beating so much harder now.”

  My hand instinctively went to my chest, where my heart hammered away. “Yeah, I know what you mean.” I looked at him, and as the elevators opened to the deserted twenty-ninth floor, I asked, “Did we do the right thing?”

  “I think we did.” Samael nodded as we walked down the long corridor toward his office. “It’s impossible to ever really know for certain. Would the world be safer if there were still no free will?”

  He stared down at the black marble floor as he spoke. “Maybe, but it never really felt all that safe to begin with. Immortals will probably be unhappy, but I think trading in an endless lifetime of predestination for a mortal one with choice—that has to be better.”

  “What do you think is going to happen now?” I asked.

  “I don’t know,” he said with a heavy sigh. “It’s going to take a while for everyone to adjust to the new world order, and some won’t be happy about it. Especially now that Kurnugia is closed.”

  “So everyone in Kurnugia is just … gone?” I asked. I was surprised by the strange sense of loss and guilt that washed over me at the thought of all the creatures and immortals I’d met in Kurnugia and Zianna being snuffed out in the blink of an eye. Lyra, the kirin, Kalbi the Kting Voar, Sedna and the whole court.

  “I can’t believe that would be the case.” He shook his head. “Odin and Frigg’s son is still down there, and I can’t see Frigg writing a prophecy that would kill him. But they can’t come up to the surface, either. So I assume they’ll be allowed to live out their one lifetime down there, only now those who are mortal
ly wounded will die instead of getting up again. Within a hundred years or so, I imagine it will be empty.”

  “What will happen to the immortals that live on earth?” I asked, even though I wasn’t sure if Samael knew any more than I did.

  “The same thing will happen to you or me—we’ll make our lives, hopefully filling them with loved ones, hobbies, and careers that make us happy, and, eventually, we will die.”

  “But not today,” I said, knowing that I should feel relief and pride in that.

  “Not today.” He looked at me then, smiling warmly. “You did good. I think your mom would be proud.”

  “You really think so?”

  “I do,” Samael said emphatically. “She would’ve made the same choice, if she’d been able to.”

  “Do you think…” I swallowed hard, gathering the courage to finish my question, delaying hearing an answer I feared I already knew. “If she had free will, do you think she would’ve loved me?”

  “It would be easy for me to say yes, of course, but I’ve always taken you as the type of person that prefers the truth over kindness,” Samael answered carefully. “And the truth is that I don’t know. I don’t know how much Marlow’s personality and dysfunctions were endemic to her or Frigg’s predestination. It’s impossible for us to ever fully understand where our choices ended and the prophecy began. And sometimes some people make really shitty parents.”

  “Sometimes life deals you a bad hand,” I agreed wearily.

  He stopped short then, just before the doors to the office, and he put his hand on my shoulder, so I would look him in the eye. “But Malin, listen to me—you are not the sins of your mother,” he said, speaking with conviction. “You cannot let yourself be defined by her or her actions or whether she loved you or not.

  “You spent the first nineteen years of your life trying to earn the love of a woman who would never give it to you, and whether that was by her own choice or design, it doesn’t matter,” Samael went on. “We’ve done something really spectacular here tonight—you’ve done something. And it would be a shame if you let resentments and transgressions from the past overshadow your future.”

  Tears were stinging my eyes, so I looked away and wiped at them roughly. “At least we have each other, right?”

  “That we do.” He put his arm around my shoulders. “And though we’ll never understand what went on in Marlow’s head, she definitely had her own demons to battle. But despite all that, and even after her death, she still managed to help save the world. If she hadn’t gathered those four swords, I don’t know if we would be free now.”

  EPILOGUE

  I sat on the couch in my apartment, with Bowie lying on his back beside me so I would pet his fat belly. I had promised him plenty of cuddles and carrots if we made it through that whole mess, and we had, so I was more than happy to deliver on that promise.

  Right now we were watching NorNewsNow, because it was good to check in and see how everybody was handling all the changes.

  “It has been forty-two days since Ereshkigal’s failed attempt to open up the underworld,” Ellery Park was saying at the news desk. “And while officials still don’t understand how her actions led to the end of immortality, most are making the best of the new situation.

  “Many feel happier, and most are reporting that they feel like they have more control over their lives, as cleanups continue all over the world. Old regimes are falling, and new ones are being put in their place,” Ellery went on. “Some are speculating that this might be the beginning of the twilight of the gods—”

  No one knew about our part in it, other than Samael and a few Seraphim at the Riks. They feared immortal retaliation against the nine of us involved, and the reality was that Ereshkigal’s actions helped bring about the change.

  Oona came out of her bedroom and cast me a disapproving glare. “Are you seriously going to sit in front of the TV all day again?”

  “I don’t sit in front of the TV all day,” I corrected her, but I stopped petting Bowie long enough to start picking up some of the take-out boxes that had piled up on the table. “I just don’t know what to do with myself now that Valkyries are no longer a thing. And I did get a job at Dillinger’s, so it’s not like I’m doing nothing.”

  She sat down on the couch beside me and clicked off the TV, so I would give her my full attention. “I really think you should consider going back to Ravenswood. Now that nobody can live forever, there’s a bigger demand for supernatural-related careers, especially thaumaturgy and apothecary. I’ve already got an apprenticeship lined up for sorcery in January. The demand is so high they’re fast-tracking me.”

  “It also helps that you’re really good at it,” I said, but she brushed off my compliment with a demure smile. “I’m happy that you found a path that speaks to you, but you know that magic and all that has never really been my forte. I haven’t figured out what I want to do or who I want to be yet. I am deciding what I’m going to do with my life for the first time, so I want to take my time.”

  “Fair enough,” Oona allowed and stood up. “I just don’t want you getting depressed.”

  “Honestly, I feel happier than I have in a very long time,” I said. “Maybe ever. You don’t need to worry about me yet.”

  “I’m always going to worry about you. It’s my job. You’re my best friend.” Oona grabbed her book bag from where she’d left it by the front door. “I have to get to class now, but I should be home around five if you wanna grab some dinner together.”

  “Yeah, that sounds great.” I smiled at her.

  As soon as she opened the door, she bumped right into Asher, who had his fist raised like he was about to knock. Once they both apologized to each other, multiple times, about their awkward clumsiness, Asher came in, and Oona left.

  “I come bearing gifts.” He held up a bag of kibbeh, then sat down on the couch beside me.

  “Ooh, thank you!” I leaned over and kissed him quickly on the cheek. “I’m starving.”

  “So what’s your plan for today?” he asked.

  “I don’t have to work, so I was gonna watch bad movies and hang with Bowie,” I said around a mouthful of the delicious fried croquettes. “What about you?”

  “There’s a recruitment going on downtown at the old Riks building. They’re creating a special forces unit with the police to handle the new overflow, now that there aren’t Valkyries to help keep order. I thought I might check it out.”

  “You think you might want to join that?” I asked.

  He shrugged. “It’s a wide open world, you know?”

  “I do.”

  “Oh, my grandma wanted to know if you want to come over on Friday for supper?” Asher asked.

  “We have that double date with Quinn and Valeska that night, remember?” I asked, and recognition flashed across his face. “I think we’ll probably end up going to Carpe Noctem or something, but I still don’t want to bail on plans with them.”

  “No, that’s fair, I just forgot.” He reached over and snagged a kibbeh out of the bag before I ate them all. “I’ll tell my grandma another night.”

  As I munched on my food, we lapsed into a comfortable silence.

  “Are you still happy?” he asked finally.

  “Why do people keep asking me that today? Yeah, I’m happy.”

  “I meant, you still think we made the right decision?”

  “Yeah, of course.” I tilted my head. “Do you?”

  He nodded. “I just wanted to know, now that the dust has settled from everything, that…” He shifted and cleared this throat. “I wanted to know if you still felt like your choices for, um, life and … everything, were still your own. If you still wanted to make them.”

  “Are you asking me if I still want to be with you?” I asked.

  “Yeah.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “You told me before that it’s the choice that makes something real, and I wanted to know if you would still choose me.”

  I set down my food and t
urned to face him more fully. “I don’t know if I would’ve chosen you on my own. But that doesn’t matter. Because every day since we did the Drawing of the Nine, I have chosen you. I have wanted to be with you and see you and kiss you and love you. And I will choose you every day from now on, no matter what the gods say.”

  “Good.” He leaned down and kissed me gently but sweetly.

  Before we could get too deep into it, my phone began to ring. I thought about letting it go to voice mail, but the ID said it was Samael.

  “Sorry, I should grab this,” I said as I untangled myself from Asher and answered the phone. “Hello?”

  “Are you busy?” Samael asked.

  “Why?” I hedged.

  “I have something that I want your help with,” Samael said. “You were one of the more promising Valkyrie students I’ve had, and with the upheaval in the world right now, I’d like you to join me.”

  “Join you in what?”

  “Just because Valkyries are out of work and immortals don’t live forever anymore doesn’t mean that crime or scheming have gone away,” Samael explained. “A lot of the new faux-mortals are pretty pissed off. But I think if you and I worked together, we could stop innocent lives from being lost. What do you think? Would you ever consider working with me again?”

  I thought for a second, but the truth was, I’d probably decided as soon as I answered the phone. “I’m in.”

  GLOSSARY

  ACHERON GORGE—a gorge in Kurnugia. It was once called the “river of woe,” but it has long since dried up. It is a home to lost souls, who cry out in agony for all of eternity.

  ĀDITYAS ELIXIR—an energy drink from Southeast Asia made with mangoes and caffeine, named after the Sun God in Hinduism.

  AIZSAULE DISTRICT—a neighborhood in the northwestern part of Chicago. It’s home to many demons and other impious immortals. While it is still within the bounds of both United States law and the Evig Riksdag, the demon Velnias has a large amount of influence. The name comes from the Latvian underworld, where Velnias is revered.