It takes nearly three days to round up all the body parts, even with the memories of where I put them. Or . . . where Baldr put them.

Or Loki.

Whoever.

Look, point being it takes a while, but I do it, and because of that, the Helbleed pulls back from Pandemonium.

On the evening of the third day after the end of the world, I stand on top of my tower—Travis’s tower, whatever—with a box of ashes, looking out over the city.

“It’s, um. It’s a nice view from up here.” Sigmund shifts, nervous. He’s standing to my left and half a meter behind, anxious about getting too close to the edge.

“Yeah,” I say. “Yeah, it is.” Pink and orange light glitters off the lake and, in the background, the dark curves of Woolridge roll gently against the sun.

I look down at the box in my hands. Not a lot of ash in a person, as it turns out. Even a tall one like my daughter.

Loki’s daughter.

Jesus. I think I need to cry. Someone needs to cry, anyway.

“Are you all right?” I feel Sigmund’s hand, cool and gentle, settle against the small of my back.

“No,” I manage, voice choked and thready. “No, I’m not.”

“I’m sorry.” He doesn’t know what else to say. What else is there to say?

“Do not grieve, husband.”

The voice still makes me freeze. It’s Sigmund’s, but it isn’t. Because Sigmund, as far as I’m aware, doesn’t know how to speak Old Norse. He also doesn’t call me husband.

Neither does Sigyn. At least, not me me.

“What would you have me do instead?”

I let Loki answer his wife, because it seems like the polite thing to do. The guy’s kinda falling apart over the ashes of the daughter he murdered. The least I can do is give him a few minutes of talk time with the ghost of his dead lady.

I feel her—feel Sigmund—close the gap between us, resting her cheek against the skin of my back, tracing one hand across the faintly glowing whorls of the tattoo.

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“I would have you rest,” Sigyn says. “Do not fret over your daughter’s dark designs. She is where she wished to be.”

“Dead?” Loki spits, his black heart aching, memories reeling with the feel of the sword as it pierced her breast. The gentle touch of her dying fingers, smooth and soft and pale.

Sigyn just laughs. “Do not underestimate your own, husband. Hel is her father’s daughter.”

Loki huffs, looking down at the box once more, thinking about an endless, flat gray ocean, and a shore made from the corpses of the dead.

It’s windy, this high up above the street, and maybe Loki calls down a little more. Just enough to catch the ashes he throws. To take them off into the night, the first stars of evening as their guide.

When he’s done, he tosses the box aside, and turns to face his wife.

It’s still Sigmund, of course. A little taller than Sigyn was, and softer, and darker. And we can still see him, with the Wyrdsight. But he’s hanging back, and the thing that overlays him now is cold and stern and endless. Victory and compassion, all rolled into one.

When Loki kisses his wife, I look away.

“Sigga . . .” he breathes after a while. Somewhere deep inside, I feel his pain. Resentment, maybe. He’s dead—the ghost of an old story, now retold—and he knows it, but . . .

“Hush, husband.” Sigyn lays a kiss on his cheek, holding his face between her hands as she looks up with a borrowed smile. “We will meet again.”

“Sigga!”

But then she’s gone, and it’s just Sigmund.

He pulls his hands away, taking half a step back as he says, “Um!”

(“tssch, take him”)

Then I’m me again. Whoever that turns out to be.

“Do you reckon that’s gonna happen a lot?” I ask.

Sigmund relaxes at the words, spoken in a language he understands, in idiom he finds familiar. Then he gives an awkward laugh. “Um. Maybe?” He can’t quite meet my eyes when he adds, “I mean. I don’t mind. Not really. Um . . .” He’s oozing fluffy pink clouds of embarrassment but also, I think, a smudge of anxiety. I don’t blame him; Loki is a little scary. Definitely a few logs short of a bonfire, if nothing else.

(“better mad than a spoiled, glass-backed fool”)

I guess we’ll both get used to it. Whatever it is.

I kiss Sigmund, mostly because I can, then go to fetch the discarded box. Loki might be happy littering my rooftop but Nic will kill me if she finds out.

“Sig?” I ask.

“Yeah?”

Around us, the wind is picking up, and Sigmund has started to shiver. Out in the distance, the fat lazy orb of the sun burns on, uncaring, as the Earth slowly turns its face.

“Take this downstairs and put it in the recycling for me?” I hand him the box. The inside is still smeared with ash. I try not to notice.

“Sure.”

“I wanna do something up here for a bit. I’ll meet you at the restaurant in ten.” Tonight’s a date night. Nowhere fancy, just somewhere we can be together.

“Okay. You have fun. See you then.” He gives a little wave, I return it, and then he’s gone. Off the rooftop and down the elevator, heading toward the ground.

I’m heading down too. Just . . . not that way.

There’s a concrete balustrade around the rooftop. To stop people falling off. I jump onto it, claws digging into the concrete, and look over the edge.

It’s a very, very big drop.

When I open my wings, they catch the wind and nearly send me falling.

“Woooaa shit!”

I end up crouched on the edge of the wall, all four claws gripping the concrete, heavy tail held out for balance.

Beneath me, the city hums its static hum. Above, the wind dances through an endless, inky sky.

And me?

I let go of the edge, and teach myself to fly.