(“vituð ér enn, eða hvat?”)

People aren’t the only things that die. Sometimes stories do as well, when there’s no one left to tell them. Here, now, in the space between the turning of the page, everything comes unraveled. And, for one bright moment, I see.

This is what it looks like: the high vaults of Éljúðnir, the sleet-soaked hall of the Queen of Death herself. And there she is, standing, sword drawn, before a man. Before Baldr, who carries a spear and someone else’s twisted snarl upon his features.

In the language of the gods, Hel says, “Your plan will fail, Bright One. We have made sure of it.”

Baldr sneers. “Too late, girl. You cannot protect your father now. He will die.”

“Yes,” Hel says, her mouth a lipless, rictus grin, eyes obscured by a veil. “And yet your plan will fail.”

Baldr hefts his spear. “Pity then,” he says, “you will not be here to gloat over my demise.”

They fight. It’s long, and brutal, and bloody, and a metaphor. Life and death, struggling for control.

This time, life wins, and Baldr’s spear pierces Hel’s breast. As Baldr looms above her, eyes mad and lips split into a blood-soaked grin, a hand raises to caress his cheek.

As she dies, Hel says, “I free you, Father. Free your mind from the chains you placed upon it. Forgive us for what we have done. Trust us that all will end as you desire.”

With her own blood, Hel traces runes upon her father’s cheek, and, from them, truth worms into his mind.

In the end, life is a fleeting, fragile thing, and death rides victorious in its wake.

It takes only a moment until the thing wearing Baldr’s skin is screaming his daughter’s name.

It is not himself he blames for her demise.

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This is the memory death gives: another hall, Valaskjálf, and another god of death within.

“My wife is a childish fool.”

“Mm. I would not say such things within her earshot. Lest you favor your bed as cold and empty as your heart.”

Odin growls, hands clenching about the edge of the balustrade. He leans forward, looking out over Ásgarðr as the sun sets beneath the Tree. Behind him, Loki lounges in a chair, whittling wood with a small knife.

“The time of Ragnarøkkr is upon us,” Odin says. “My son dreams of his own death and the very Fates themselves conspire against me. Frigg’s petty games will not prevent this.”

Loki does not lift his eyes from the shape within his hands. A toy for his unborn child. “Prophecy is her domain. Perhaps her ‘petty games’ mean more than you know.”

Odin scoffs, pride burning in his gaze. “I will not entrust my son and my kingdom to the sentiment of a single, fretting woman. The future has been spoken. Baldr will die, it cannot be avoided.”

“Then why fret yourself? Let him die. You have other finer sons. What matters the loss of one?” Beneath Loki’s knife, a wolf emerges. This one has no fetters.

“If Baldr falls,” Odin says, “he will go to Hel. I will not have a son of Odin held prisoner by that fleshless íviðja hag.”

The knife stops, and eyes as green as poison look up for just one moment. Just one. Then, “So send another in his place.”

Odin turns, looks to his blood brother with furrowed brow. “What do you scheme, Loki?”

“The prophecy is as it says.” Loki does not meet his brother’s gaze. “Baldr will die. But perhaps if your son were not wearing his own skin when it were to happen . . .”

Very slowly, Odin begins to smile. Very soon, Loki will cease to do the same.

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And then this, the last piece. Not a hall, this time, merely the inside of one small house.

Someone screams. The thing is curled up in a corner, and it wears the skin of Loki. It is not him, and Sigyn, who stands behind it, knows that this is so.

“My children,” it howls. “What they did to my children. To me. Monsters, every one of them!”

The thing that now wears Loki’s skin is a soft and coddled soul. It knows nothing of pain, of heartache, of injustice. Knew nothing. Not until it pulled the tunic from its borrowed flesh and saw the scars beneath.

Remembered every wound that made them.

Sigyn watches the beast that is not Loki. The beast that is her husband. Its agony is a tangible thing, bleeding through the small and ill-kept house, sending the fire leaping.

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“Husband,” Sigyn says. The title seems the most truthful of any she could use. “You must not dwell upon such things. They happened long ago.” The lie burns upon her tongue, and it does not convince.

“Monsters,” the thing that is not Loki hisses. “Hypocrites, liars. I will make them pay. Reveal their rotten cores.” When he stands, madness burns in bright green eyes.

When he leaves, it is with hatred set in his new hearts. Yet, beneath that, he is a soft and coddled soul. And, ultimately, it is not his enemies who pay the price.

Not yet.

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Between the turning of the page, in the flicker of the frame, it all falls into place: Loki’s scheme, Odin’s plan, Sigyn’s victory. And Baldr, trapped between all three. The perfect patsy, pulled apart and made anew as, stitch by stitch, the Wyrd unravels.

It was supposed to be a simple trade, a soul for a soul. Baldr held safe in Ásgarðr, beneath his father’s all-seeing eye; Loki given pride of place within his daughter’s grave-cold hall. When things were over, with “Loki” dead, Baldr’s soul would be restored to his true self, ready to take his place upon the throne.

That was the plan. Until Sigyn usurped it, in love and revenge. Mixed it up. Extended the Ragnarøkkr out half a century or so, giving Baldr the freedom to get used to Loki’s name, away from Odin and from Ásgarðr. Sigyn reforged herself while she was at it, using her soul to weave a different ending from words writ into the first.

Here, between the turning of the page, I have to make a choice. The outcome was supposed to be preordained.

Loki and Baldr. There’s so much of both of them trapped inside, too much for a single heart to hold. Around us, the world begins to crumble, and still all we can think about is soft brown skin and nervous laughter. Of eyes like ice and a heart of frozen steel.

In the end, it’s not Odin they call Victorious, and only the æsir are stuck with a single beat within their chests.

I make my choice, take Loki’s fate, and eat his heart.

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The first thing we do is breathe. Huge, painful, gasping breaths. The gasps of a newborn. A chorus of agony, kept in time by the discordant feel of rib-caught drumming.

We’re alive. For the first time in centuries. Properly alive, not the awful half lives we’ve had since the cave. Since the arrow. Since everything went wrong. Since it started going right.

“Lain!”

Curled up on the ground, coughing, we feel cool hands against our shoulders.

“Lain!” Someone saying our—saying my name, over and over. “You’re alive!”

“In—hnngh. In a m-minute.” Maybe.

Opening my eyes does nothing, so I feel out with the Wyrdsight. The first thing I hit is Sigmund, a blaze of relief, of joy, of love. And something under it, too. A core of ice-cold certainty. Of victory.

When I try and sit, he helps me up. We’re in the foyer at LB, just near the elevators. In the middle of a big, cracked hole of half-melted tiles. Gungnir is lying on the ground, next to Sigmund. Forgotten. For now.

Sigmund is holding me like someone plans to take me away at any moment. Breathing still hurts and the beat of my hearts is still not quite in sync, so I just sit still and let him do his thing. He’s happy. I’m alive. All is well.

“We won,” Sigmund says. “We did, right? I mean, Baldr, he just sort of . . . burnt up. Vanished. He’s . . . he’s dead, right?”

“Uh,” I say. “Yeah, about that . . .”

Sigmund goes very, very still. “Loki?” He knows when I lie. Right.

“Sort of,” I say. Then, “It’s, uh. It’s complicated. I’ll tell you later. But . . . yeah. We won.” Everyone did. Everyone who matters, anyway.

Somewhere deep inside, past the flames, something new coils against my mind. Something dark and vicious. Slippery and ancient.

“Hey, Sig?”

“Yeah?”

I kiss him.

It’s good. Really good. He thinks so too, if the pepper flare of lust and the way he grabs my head is anything to go by. He’s still not a great kisser, but he’s getting better, enthusiasm and near-death experiences working wonders.

Deep inside, the dark thing stirs. Bubbles to the surface. Spreads through my hands and lips and tongue. As it does, the cold core in Sigmund soars to greet it.

See? Everyone wins.

When Sigmund pulls back, he’s flushed and blinking. “Wow,” he says. There’s fog on his glasses.

“Yeah,” I say.

“What was that?”

I grin. “Do it again and find out.”

He bites his lip, leans forward to oblige. Gets halfway before context comes crashing back. “Um. Maybe . . . not here?” he says. “It’s nearly dawn. People are going to start coming in for work soon.” He blinks, looking around. “And the Bleed—”

“Healing,” I say. One little Wound’s got nothing on the reboot of the Realms. Somehow, I get the feeling Hel knew that. I get the feeling she knew a lot of things. One day I might even get the courage to ask about it.

Sigmund slumps, relieved that things seem to be over. “Thank god,” he says, and I accept the praise. “Let’s get you upstairs. Um. Everyone’s up there. Dad and Em and Wayne. Your scary VP lady. I guess we should tell them we’re not dead. Can you stand?”

I manage, mostly by leaning against Sigmund. He’s cool under my skin, and solid, and there. Banged up and stinking of the ash of Múspellsheimr. Changed by the mists of Hel. But still Sigmund.

Me? I’m . . . someone. I’ll work out exactly who some other time.

A stray memory, mine but not mine. Of Sigmund stepping out into the foyer, Gungnir in one hand, mind a storm of anger over Star Wars. I’ll have to ask him about that. Later, once I’ve explained why I know it.

As we stagger back toward the elevators, one of them opens. Care of Nic, who watches eternal through the building’s cameras. She’s gonna want one hell of a debrief on all of this. Fuck.

“Urgh. I need a smoke,” I say as the doors close behind us.

Sigmund leans me against the mirrored wall, but doesn’t try to move away, hands ghosting over the skin of my chest. There’s a new scar there—healed and bloodless—from where Gungnir pierced two hearts, both of them mine, held in separate cages.

“I can think of something better than cigarettes,” he says.

“Oh?” I manage, right before he kisses me. Not for long, just enough to leave the taste of a newfound fearlessness on my tongue. “Oh. Yeah. Yeah, that’s much better.”

“You know,” he says, hands moving down to settle around my waist, “I can’t kiss you if you taste like nicotine. It’s way gross.”

“Duly noted.” I grin. “I don’t taste like it now.”

“No,” Sigmund says. “You don’t.” He doesn’t return my grin. Instead, his fingers tighten on my hipbones as he says, “Lain, you . . . Yyou died. I saw it.”

“Nah,” I say. “I was dead when you met me. Now I’m better.” That’s how these things go, the buffer overflow error of the reborn god.

Sigmund closes his eyes, moving closer, cheek over my hearts. “Good,” he says. “Stay like that. Please?”

“Yeah. Yeah, that’s the plan.” When I nuzzle against his forehead, he turns his face up to meet me.

We kiss, and it’s better. Better than the last time, better than the first time. Better, always. There’s a metaphor in there somewhere, and I’m sure I’ll find it one day. Beneath Sigmund’s tongue, perhaps, or hiding in his hair. I’ll keep looking. I’ve got time; it’s a long way up to the penthouse, after all. When we reach it, there’ll be friends and allies, family, explanations. Fantales. One ruffled raven. And the first rays of dawn, exploring the remade world with all the wonder of a child.

Welcome to the Golden Age. An old end, but a new beginning.

Stick around. You’ll see.