A Valkyrie's Apprentice: Book Two

Fight Harder

K Á R A

I stared at the wooden ceiling of the empty warehouse apartment. Considering the fanciful dream of her. My imagination couldn't have been wilder... yet it felt too damn genuine to not press those words. Your fates are tied to nothing but an end now. If you seek her out one of you will suffer.

I was already suffering. Who on the realm would think separation alleviated that?

I sighed and swung my legs over Kaden's horrific excuse of a bed. The sheep's wool left the sinking thing too frequently. I plucked a chunk of white off my shoulder and rolled my neck.

It had not taken long to return the night before from the rift Thanatos had opened. The dark shield glinted in the corner and I drew it onto my back.

I needed their scents. Objects from the men and any evidence I could use to track them down across every corner of the realm. I was half expecting to throw the door open last night and find them there–wide eyed and gawking when I told them Tayah was gone.

But the familiar stab of emptiness lay the space bare.

As I made my way into the kitchen with the small stove and familiar wooden table with many stab marks through it I felt the longing all the more. I plucked up a chess piece. The queen. Still thrown aside from our last game before it had all changed so much.

"Where are you now." I murmured, staring at the corse wooden carving.

I pocketed the piece and scanned the rest of the room. I walked to John's workstation and made out various leather pouches in different sizes with a splash of red paint or orange. I shrugged and took three into my cloak before taking his work cloth that had a heavy scent of Keavesmith all over it.

I cast one final look around the kitchen before sinking slowly onto the space in the centre and closing my eyes. I stole myself into the calm focus easily and sent out a call.

"Stormbringer." The voices spoke simply before.

I opened my eyes and calmly bowed my head.

"Odin."

"I am surprised–yet pleasantly." The voices spoke with caution.

I narrowed my eyes. "I never said I did not wish our paths to cross again, merely that I hoped your mind would change."

The god chuckled briefly before drawing his cloaked arms together.

"What is your reason then, daughter?"

I paused and considered my words before speaking.

"I had a strange... experience last night."

The god waited patiently. After all, dreams were the one place a god could not see. The one realm that remained shrouded.

"I saw her." I stated, without bothering to clarify who. "–and she told me your own words to her before we were separated." I stated clearly.

The cloak of shadow and smoke seemed to consider this. "It would not be a shock to me that you were seeing Tayah Ashrive in your dreams again–"

"But I think it was really her." I pressed.

"Valkyries cannot enter the dreams of other Valk–" The god's words suddenly cut short and mused upon something else. I felt my entire body tighten.

"What have you seen?" I demanded quickly.

I thought he would disappear before my eyes at that moment. Leave my questions hanging before me but he finally tilted the hood of blackness at me.