Valkyrie

Chapter 1: Eira

I never knew what my mom looked like. And that might sound cliche, but it was true. Dad never had any pictures of her, he could only describe her. Could only tell me that I looked so much like her, the same blonde hair and fair skin. She'd been like a Queen he'd told me, a goddess among men. Someone we hadn't been worthy of. Apparently that had been true, given the way she'd left us. Perhaps she had thought she was too good for us, that the daughter she gave birth to didn't matter at all. When I was little, I'd pretend that she really had been a Queen, and that she would come to get me one day-- and we'd all go to her kingdom, and I would marry a Prince.

I don't think that way anymore. As I got older, dad got worse. He would go out looking for her, calling her name. He'd always leave me with my Aunt Sophie, sometimes only for the weekend and other times for days on end. I knew he was getting worse each time I laid eyes on him-- messy hair, eyes wide with panic and filled to the brim with tears. And each time, I could feel myself getting older. Not in the sense of aging, but in the sense that I no longer felt like a child. I couldn't bring myself to believe him when he told me he'd seen her. He'd seen her with golden flowers in her hair, looking like the goddess he'd always believed her to be.

When I was eleven, my aunt didn't let me see dad anymore. At first I didn't mind, my aunt's apartment was more than big enough for the two of us, and had a nice view of Manhattan. I could go to school and come home, but she wouldn't let me see him. "He's too unstable", she'd told me when questioned. "It's not safe." I knew what it meant. Dad was crazy she told me, he's going to get some help. And as much as I wanted to deny it, I couldn't. There was nothing I could do or say that would stop her from sending dad away, and I had to watch from the doorway as they sent him off. The last glimpse I had of him was from that doorway, his black hair already turning grey. He watched me from the backseat, his eyes pleading with me-- as if he was asking me not to send him away. I should've fought harder for him then, after all he'd been the one who raised me to a certain degree. My aunt had tugged me back inside, saying "Eira" in the sternest tone she could muster for an eleven year-old whose father she'd sent away.

Eira, my name. The only thing my mother had given me, save for the pendant around my neck. I'd wanted to throw it out so many times, but dad insisted that I keep it. I held onto it tightly as the car rolled away, dad turning his head away from me. I watched the car go from inside, up until it was lost among the other cars in the city. After that, she did everything in her power to make me forget about him. Almost everything I wanted I got, she ensured that I knew that she was wrapped around my finger. Ensured that I wouldn't hate her, no matter what. I lived a normal life after that, made lots of friends and kept my pendant hidden under my clothes at all times. It was too weird, too strange..even for me. I didn't want to be labeled as crazy as my father was. I'd wanted to be normal, sane. A girl who thought too much about boys and makeup than she thought about an actual future. Any notion that I was anything but normal was shoved in the back of my mind, never to be brought up or brought into the light.

Bellemont was the school she sent me to, another way of telling me how spoiled I was. The campus was decent enough, freshly cut grass and buildings that were almost castle like. Unfortunately, Bellemont meant the spoiled rich girls who people always loved to hate. I suppose that you're expecting to me say that I didn't /ever/ fall in with that group, that I distanced myself from them as much as possible. There are only ever two choices: you either became one of them, or you dared to be "different" and strove to find yourself. I chose to become one of them. Both to forget my crazy father, and to further prove that I was nothing but "normal". I wouldn't see my mother, or beautiful women in battle armor. I would be the stereotypical popular girl, and be quite happy with my position in life. ..Or at least, I thought that I would be.

There was always a feeling that I had in my gut, or a thought that I had in the back of my mind. Something that screamed "danger", telling me to run. Of course, this was ignored more often than not. After all, why would I listen to it? Sometimes mom's pendant would burn me, its mark left on my skin. Another warning sign that was ignored. I never told Sophie about it, for fear of being labeled crazy. Mad. After all, why would mom have had a magic pendant? Especially one that she would've given to me? It wasn't as if she'd bothered to see me grow up, or even visit every once in a while. Erika Thorne had seemingly never existed, I didn't even have grandparents on her side to meet. My curiosity was seemingly insatiable.

And it would only get worse.