Odin 08

An ambush was upon her, an ensuing onslaught of bright colors and loud noises that was as unwelcome and as unanticipated as it had been sudden, those sights and those sounds and most of all those smells, filing into the now cramped space around her. There was over a dozen assailants, each charging forward in a wave of silk and satin finery, those thick brocades and heavy skirts all a whisper with the rustling sound of many a gown in motion. It couldn’t drown out the sound of their voices, that loud, abrasive roar that could have put to shame an entire regiment of soldiers, that laughter and excitement such that it hurt Lenneth’s ears to listen to. It wasn’t just that of their voices, or the vivid and varied hues of their clothing, it was all of it, from the eager hunger of their expressions, to the sickening sweet stench of their perfumes. It was a full out assault on nearly all of her senses, Lenneth under an attack of a far different kind.

Used to the violence and brutality of war, the blood and the gore, Lenneth was completely caught off guard to be the focus of anyone’s interest. Or that of their curiosity, that blatant admiration that bordered on malicious. Or of the sly compliments and hurtful observations, Lenneth born and bred for the battlefield rather than made prepared for the intricacies of a human’s social complexities. Forged steel had always been her weapon of choice, Lenneth more a fighter rather than that of a diplomat. Her strength and abilities honed and trained on the Plains of Idavoll, it was now the words that were her undoing. The questions and the comments, the openly blatant rudeness, Lenneth not so much admired as put on display for any and all to touch and poke at her.

They picked up on everything. From the unusual color of her hair, to the questions about the divinity that had been stripped from her. They even tried to pry the secrets from her, eager and ready for any and all tidbits about the Heavens, about the land that these damned would NEVER see. The Valkyrie was on guard against that, not ready to betray her king and her people, or the home that she had been protecting for thousands of years.

She could keep safe Asgard’s secrets, but the woman couldn’t protect her own heart even half as well. Not from these women, not from their blunt eagerness, from the downright inappropriate questions that they asked.

“What was it like to be a Goddess?”

“How does it FEEL to be made mortal now?”

“Do you know what the means? Are you even prepared for that tragic a reality?”

“Where will your soul go when you die?”

She had no answers for them, she had none for HERSELF. Lenneth hadn’t had time to dwell on the hard truths of her lost divinity, hadn’t even begun to process what it might truly mean to be mortal. She knew next to nothing of what she would face, the hardships of her own body, the demands that would be placed on it and on her. Lenneth was downright ignorant, the only true certainty that she had, was that of how time was now against her.

Every second spent here was wasted, her time a commodity that was in ever dwindling demand. It made life seem all the more precious, it’s every act valued. From the breath that she still drew, to the ever weakening source of strength inside her, that mortality a poison. A death sentence, Lenneth feeling the first kernels of a human’s fear. For the first time in her long and storied life, the Valkyrie was feeling afraid to die.

Unprepared for it, and equally as unready to actually live, Lenneth found her breath coming out faster, in short panicked bursts. The narrow hall seemed to close in around her, the women crowding her back against a wall. She nearly startled in place against it, practically flinched when one woman ran a finger down the length of her bared arm. The piercing green eyes of another, of the blonde woman who Lezard had named as Mystina, watched carefully of Lenneth’s every reaction.

There was power in that gaze, that and a cool kind of detachment. A serpent’s feigned indifference, this woman missed not a beat of the Valkyrie’s torment. Pinned under that gaze, and under the onslaught of the prattling females, the fight or flight tension that existed inside her was then boiling over, Lenneth’s hands making fists. It would have been tantamount to suicide to attack them, an inglorious end to a life that had spanned centuries. It would have brought dishonor to her name, to her very king, the shame of Lenneth’s failures as a Valkyrie weighty enough already, without any more needless folly added to that tally.

Aware of her duty, of both it’s expectations and it’s burdens, Lenneth met the jade green gaze of the blonde. The space between them seemed to crackle electric, the Valkyrie FEELING the woman’s power. The immense source of it inside her, it made Lenneth’s skin crawl with her unease, her every instinct screaming out a warning, sparking a need to strike down this threat. Still more warrior goddess than human in thought, it was the woman’s physical limitations, her mortality and all the odds that were now stacked against her, that just barely held Lenneth in check.

A leash around her emotions, around her inborn instincts, she could only stand there and endure. A victim of a curiosity that bordered on cruel, Lenneth bore the weighty brunt of her pride, the woman not one to bring shame to the glorious name of the Valkyrie. She was after all the first, and most likely the only one of her kind that this damned bunch would ever see. The one and only taste of the heavens afforded, and even made mortal the former Goddess was still sublime. Existing as an example of what they should have all aspired to, Lenneth was both a person to be envied and admired.

The blessings of her blood, the divine knowledge inside her head, Lenneth was a shining tangible proof. A beacon of hope and a promise, the one time Goddess’ very existence enough to shake the foundations of even a sinner’s faith. More than one damned had had reason to look upon a Valkyrie and been made to feel the poignant regret, their doubts and their fears manifesting as a keen awareness of their sins. The choices that they had made, the acts and decisions that had helped blacken their soul.

To look upon a Valkyrie was both a blessing and a curse, the Goddess a reminder of the heavens that did in fact exist. The paradise that was denied to so many, the doomed and the damned forever barred from it’s lands. The doubt and despair of that awareness had driven a lesser mind mad, Hel’s faithful angry, that scheming determination driving many to commit even greater acts of sin. It was either that or repent, and Odin was not a God known for his mercies or his compassion.

She was almost bitter then, the first traitorous stirring blooming to life inside her. Lenneth resented the God, resented more than just his inability to forgive. There was that deep seated need inside her, the overwhelming sense of urgency that she still had, Silmeria’s immortal soul in ever present danger. More concerned with her sister’s fate than that of her own, for the first time ever, Lenneth wondered if Odin had been WRONG.

It was blasphemy to even think that, to let doubt of any kind take root inside of her heart where her lord and her king was concerned. That first betraying trickle inside her, Lenneth tried to fight it, tried to push it back before it could become even more. Her traitorous heart whispered of the unfairness, of the injustice of it all, Lenneth shaking with her efforts to suppress such a voice. She spun from one though to another, rushed past both the love and the horror, to focus on the facts as she now knew them. The divinity and the strength that the Valkyrie had been stripped of, the enemy nation she had been placed in the midst of, and the man whose love would enslave her. None of it helped to fight against her anger, against it and the helplessness that was welling up inside her. Lenneth shook all the more, a million questions upon her, the former Goddess’ thoughts drowning out the voices all around her.

She could have screamed then. Could have erupted into a full on despair, Lenneth reeling in place, drowning amid a sea of feminine finery and breathing in the sickly sweet stench of thickly cloying perfume. The faces all blurred together, their voices nothing more than a dull, unintelligible roar. Her very world seemed to fly apart, and it was only the sudden firm grip of a hand around hers, that brought the Valkyrie staggering back.

Wide eyed and quite possibly gasping, Lenneth rapidly blinked her eyes at the jacketed back presented before her. At the trust that it implied, Lenneth aware of how tempting and vulnerable a position that it was, that back an open target that would have welcome the sharp tip of her blade. She might have thought him a fool then, the measure of protection that the love potion afforded him not equating that to mean that the Valkyrie inside her was at all tamed.

That wild spirit inside her waged a fierce war with the enchantment that Odin had placed Lenneth under. She fought those sickening soft feelings, the love that tried to take hold of her, some weak part of the Goddess’ heart finding itself touched by the protection that Lezard was now offering. The rescue, that pull on her hand, that urged Lenneth to break out into a run, the long, flowing skirts of her gown nearly tangling around her legs before the Valkyrie thought to gather up the worst of them with a fist.

The betraying rustle of those onerous skirts could not drown out the sound of the women’s upset. That of the voices raising in protest, one in particular shouting that Lezard would not be able to keep the Valkyrie all to himself for much longer. The man said nothing to that taunting truth, the only betrayal of his own unease that of his fingers tightening a more secure grip around her. Lezard ran as though the demon beasts of Nifleheim had just given chase, as though Hel herself was breathing down their necks.

There would have been no chance of escape if THAT had been the case, Hel and her demons were a relentless, near tireless force to contend with. Lenneth knew that first hand, having at times hunted after the monsters of Nifleheim that had dared to step past the boundaries that Odin himself had set in place. Each time the pursuit had taken weeks, the underworld’s beasts having left a trail of dead bodies in their wake.

Each time it had resulted in death and devastation, and each time Lenneth or another of her kind, had seen to putting an end to the blasphemous blight spreading across the realms. Honored and revered as upholders of Odin’s law, Lenneth and the Valkyries were familiar with most if not all of the threats to the nine realms of Creation. The strategies in her head, their weaknesses hers to exploit, Lenneth not only knew of most if not all of Nifleheim’s demons, she had killed off her fair share of them.

Familiar and well versed with what they were, with what they did, the underworld’s denizens were monsters in every sense of the word. The brutality that she had seen, that Lenneth had faced, and none of it had prepared her for the realities of the human world. It wasn’t just the sights and the sounds, the outside stimuli, or that of the love potion, it was all of it, Lenneth thrust into the middle of a world that she knew NOTHING about.

That was the true source of her discontent, her upset only magnified when those women had approached her. Those smiling, prattling females who had taken the choice from her, Lenneth surrounded by questions and a malice that had been apparent in more than one set of eyes. She wasn’t prepared for a subterfuge of emotions, for an admiration that was in truth a thinly veiled contempt. Picked on and preyed upon, Lenneth had all but frozen in place. Had all but panicked, the weight of their questions a burden her heart hadn’t been prepared to take.

She could have died then, lost to the foreign fright inside her, the uncertainty that had made the woman panic in way that she had never. Lenneth wasn’t used to fearing anything, wasn’t used to not having some kind of plan, her thoughts all a jumble. It took the grounding force of HIS hand to have saved her, Lenneth grabbing onto Lezard like the life line the man had become to her.

Gratitude bubbled up in her heart, one uncertain second where her steel resolve and iron determination had faltered, Odin’s enchantment then attempting to sink it’s claws more firmly into her. It took a concentrated effort to remember to fight against the effect, Lenneth’s thoughts inwardly screaming, the woman trying desperately to keep her feelings from becoming any more muddled. Not even the horror of the day’s discoveries, the realizations that had been born on it’s heels, could completely stop the love from winding a sliver thin tendril through her. She nearly fell then, her chest tight with that foreign emotion. With that unwanted feeling, everything else was overshadowed, Lenneth looking out with the eyes of a stranger.

She might have HATED Odin then. For the crimes committed against her, for the love that might still enslave her, such faltering thoughts making Lenneth stumble. There was a very real war being waged on inside her, the battle not just for Lenneth’s heart, but for the woman’s sense of self. She was drowning, fighting to remember, to be the Valkyrie that the woman was in truth. The warrior Goddess whose only love was that of her sisters, and that of the battlefield. It was that woman, that soldier who took her duties so seriously, who chafed at the idea of becoming nothing more than any man’s plaything. Damned or divine, it mattered not, Lenneth not about to simply lay down and become some slave of the enchantment’s love.

Remembering the Valkyrie who had commanded armies, who had spent the entirety of her immortality fighting, it was that woman who Lenneth drew strength from. It was her sword that forced back the worst of the enchantment’s effects, the Goddess finally thinking past her upset and panic to truly look at the situation and facts with shrewd eyes. The hard truths of her reality, that horror that HAD made Lenneth despair, was now tilted over and analyzed, the woman looking for a deeper meaning behind this punishment.

Desperate for a reason, for an actual purpose beyond that of being made to play part of an alliance that would seal and tie Asgard and Nifleheim together, Lenneth grasped at and built upon what little she knew. That of Nifleheim and it’s Midgard holdings, the souls of so many damned and unworthy, both the dead and the living, desperate but ever so loyal to the Goddess who had offered them her cruel favor. Hel, who might as well be little more than a thief, carving her mark onto so many, ruining them and their chances at the Heavens. It was fact that those favored by Nifleheim’s Queen, noble and commoner alike, that taint upon their souls kept them from the ultimate in paradise. Such was her ruinous brand, that even those warrior souls in Hel’s keep, could not ascend to the Heavens through any of the sanctioned means.

It would take an intervention of the divine sort, for a soul cursed by Queen Hel, to stand even a chance at salvation. Odin had never been so inclined. He had never even shown an inkling of caring about those souls damned, and the people lost under Hel’s command. Until NOW. Lenneth could not figure out the catalyst, the reason behind Odin’s sudden show of interest. The former Valkyrie Goddess did not think for one second that it was a case of his heart becoming benevolent. Maybe it was wrong of her, blasphemous even, to think so unkindly of her king. It didn’t stop the seeds of suspicion from having sprouted inside her, Lenneth needing to understand, needing a reason, an excuse to place behind this so called sham of an alliance.

Her brow furrowed with that thought, Lenneth wondering what in Odin’s name, did the God hope to achieve by allying with the underworld’s queen. Odin had the power, the strength, and he had the army borne of both einherjar and Valkyrie at his command. He had the best and the brightest, the most capable and the most skilled. Culled from nearly all of the nine realms, Odin’s Valkyries and their einherjar, had kept not only the Heavens free of Hel’s influence, and impeded Brahms’ push for more power, they had helped defend much of Midgard and Alfheim, and even such places as far out as Jotunheim. They had stayed the worst of Hel’s hand, had minimized much of the threat of the undead blight from spreading across those realms. Yet Asgard’s troubles remained, waylaid by strife and siege, the vampires and the monsters at their command, a poison that had taken root in the heavens. No matter how many the Valkyries and einherjar destroyed, more always came, leaving less and less time for those battle driven Goddesses to guard over the many realms of Creation.

Stretched thin as they were, the Valkyries and their subordinates had still endeavored to maintain the balance of Creation. To keep the situation from becoming so dire and so desperate. For the most part they had been succeeding, despite the occasional losses that they had suffered when it came to Midgard and it’s people. The mortal realm was such, that even with those few cities lost to Nifleheim’s grasp, Odin’s faithful still numbered in the triple thousands.

No matter how Lenneth looked at it, the situation was such that there was no true merit in aligning the heavens with the underworld’s queen. Hel was a viper, that venomous bitch laying in wait, ready to seize any and all opportunity to advance her own mad ambitions. There’d be not a lick of hesitation in her, back stabbings and betrayals just the latest two exploits of a Goddess who was known for her lies and manipulations. Only a fool, or someone very much desperate, would even think to place any kind of trust in the ruler of Nifleheim. Odin had never been either, instead sly like a fox, and keeper of the ancient wisdom. Leaps and bounds ahead of all who would oppose him, Lenneth’s love addled mind struggled to keep up.

Less effort was needed for her body to match pace with Lezard Valeth’s hurried and harried one. She heard as well as felt the rustle of her gown, that long length of skirts bunched up and gathered in hand. Felt the glide of the floor beneath the silk of her feet’s slippers, a breeze dancing across her skin from the speed of their movements. They surely made for an odd sight, this pairing of divine and damned making a mad dash about the castle. They flew past open doors, and startled expressions, ran past more displays of wealth than Lenneth had been prepared to see.

Everything all blurred together, the sights and the sounds, Lezard’s hand gripping hers the only grounding force Lenneth currently had left. It would have been easy to fly away in truth, to give herself over to the enchantment and the love it would force on her. Only her own stubborn will held it at bay, only the sheer and overwhelming need for this situation to be something more than this nightmare of a punishment, kept the Valkyrie from falling. In her head she kept screaming, the repeated thought insisting there HAD to be meaning to Lenneth being stationed here, in the heart of enemy territory. They had to be wrong, both Lezard and Queen Hel, this alliance and marriage nothing more than a trick. The question then, a trick on whose part? Nifleheim or Asgard, or both? It made her stumble then, a half formed idea taking root, Lenneth realizing she was primed for a position to undermine Hel and her twisted ambitions.

Made giddy with the realization, with the idea of what she stood poised to do, Lenneth’s hopes and ambitions all but flew apart, the second Lezard turned to steady her with both of his hands. They caught and lingered about her waist, both supported her upright, and kept her from tumbling feet first down a staircase she hadn’t yet noticed. Wide eyed and startled, Lenneth felt the fast beat beat of her heart, that nervous patter starting long before she looked up into his face. It only thrummed louder then, that erratic pulse a reaction to the dark promise that lurked in his eyes. To the hunger in that amethyst color, the desire and even the concern. He stared at her as though she was the only woman in the world, as though only Lenneth truly mattered.

It was a stark look of a man in need, of a man whose desire was great enough to justify ANY sin. Lenneth found herself blinking rapidly in flustered response, the gasp having caught in her throat. His fingers sinking their grip into her waist further impeded her ability to breathe. She could feel the warmth of them, of him, through the thin layer of her clothing. She found it unbearable, the touch AND the open hunger of his stare. Never had a man looked at her in this way, never had any dared! She was more warrior than woman, a lesser deity in her own right, Lenneth a Goddess who had never been worshiped for more than her sword. This Lezard looked at her not as the battle maiden who had led many a confrontation to a decisive victory, but simply as a woman.

There was no defense against it, against him, Lenneth shaking, actually trembling from the effort that it took to not fall into him. Her heart skipped one erratic beat after another, and the situation was made worse by Odin’s enchantment and Lezard’s propitiatory nearness. Both strove to affect her, to drive the Goddess half mad with a wanting of her own.

The push and pull play of the enchantment’s attempt at desire, and Lenneth’s own inward fury, made for an explosive mix. It left her both dizzy and confused, her mind clouded over one second with love, only to have the Goddess fight tooth and nail for the clarity to be able to think past Odin’s magic. In the split second that it took for that sliver thin glimmer of love to warm the Valkyrie’s skin with a blush, she pushed and lurched her way back to freedom.

The distance now established between them, Lenneth couldn’t help but to fix Lezard with an angry stare. All her proud resentment and fury was within that gaze, the Goddess needing someone to blame, someone to hate. He seemed to realize it too, but the shiver that went through him, was not one borne of fear or revulsion. If anything, the man seemed to admire her MORE, as though her spirited self was exactly the kind of challenge he wanted in a bride.

“Ah, forgive me….” The silence between them was finally broken.

“You presume too much!” The words spat out of her angrily. That amethyst gaze blinked slowly in response, but he didn’t quite apologize, Lezard instead asking Lenneth if she had WANTED him to let her FALL. It was the gesture with his hand that then got her to notice, the Valkyrie spying the staircase that had laid situated a scant few inches past where the man had caught hold of her.

She might have paled then, the dawning realization upon her. It was a long, long way down, each step and the floor below them made of carved stone. She wouldn’t have come away whole from the experience, Lenneth understanding she’d be lucky if a broken arm or leg was the worst injury she might have sustained.

What might have passed for pity flashed into his eyes. Her fists curled in helpless response, Lenneth cursing him and the gratitude that locked up in her throat, this Lezard having enough good sense to not point out what she had already realized. That of the fact that she could have died if he hadn’t caught her, if he hadn’t stopped her fall. She still couldn’t thank him. She wouldn’t! Her resentment such that it stubbornly needed an outlet of some sort.

It was difficult to outright hate him, Odin’s enchantment such that the love it was attempting to force on her, made Lenneth somewhat more tolerant of unforgivable acts. Such as the fact of his mere existence, the magic inside him so powerful, and so black, that Lenneth could taste the corruption of his soul. This was a man who had made the dark artes a part of him, though the Goddess hadn’t yet ascertained just what level of bad and depraved he truly was. Once it wouldn’t have mattered, no matter the degree of sin and sordid magic, his a tangible taint that would have merited an immediate execution. But times were apparently changing, and not just because of the enchantment’s love. If the alliance was at all to be believed. It still made her queasy, Lenneth sick at the thought of the Valkyries having to perhaps work side by side with such damnable souls.

Worst yet though, would be to love one, Lenneth suppressing another shiver. She couldn’t stand to look at him, she couldn’t stand to NOT, the conflicting emotions inside her, the real versus the manufactured, Lenneth’s truth versus Odin’s enchantment. It forced her to be on constant guard, the slightest slip ready to tumble her head first into a full blown case of love. She had to fight every step of the way, had to stay vigilant against her heart’s softening. Against the unwanted longings stirring inside her. The sickening sentiments, the questions and the urges, Lenneth never before having wondered about what the texture of a man’s hair would feel like.

Her fingertips actually itched with the desire to touch him, that question needing an answer. She refused it, refused HIM, Lenneth deliberate as she told herself that she would just have to make do without the discovery of just how silk soft his hair might truly be. Her fingers then curled inwards, in yet another outward sign of her internal struggle. She frowned at Lezard then, the woman shaking her head no.

“Don’t!” But who was that snarled out word for? Him or for her? Rhyme and reason had left her, Lenneth feeling as though she could no longer tell up from down, the Goddess so focused on her heart’s battle.

His head cocked to the side, the pity gone now to his curiosity. “Dont?” He echoed, and had the grace to not sound confused. “Don’t what, Lenneth?”

Her frown became a full out glower, but the words whispered tightly out of her was soft, downright plaintive. “Do not pity me!”

His eyes widened slightly at that, watching her as Lenneth lifted a shaking finger to point her accusations at him. “Do not pity me, and do not mock me!”

“I’ve done neither.” Lezard said in answer to her exclamation. “Nor would I ever.” His step forward brought him closer to her, Lenneth anger heightening at her body’s immediate response. The weakness that it showed him, the woman having taken a step back to avoid him.

“You lie!”

Now he was the one frowning, Lezard staring at her with some sort of perplexity. “I’ve not had any real reason to lie to you, and certainly not about this.” He took another step forward and another, until he had cornered her against a stone wall. Lenneth fought her shiver of unease and fixed him with a mutinous look.

“You haven’t been entirely truthful either.” She pointed out. “Every act of evasion is as good as a lie. What did you offer, what did Hel, for my Lord, Odin, to have ever agreed to this union?”

She saw the hesitation, saw the tick in his jaw, as his teeth clenched together for one second more. “You can’t even tell me?” Lenneh then demanded. “Or is it that you won’t?”

“My Queen’s secrets are not mine to give, any more than Odin’s are.” He was standing booted toes to her slippered ones, the man so close that Lezard’s breath was a warm caress on Lenneth’s skin. His finger was suddenly pressing against her lips, gentle but insistent in it’s demand for her to keep quiet. “Valkyries have always been coveted prizes, the reward your King dangles to the most favored of his followers. Hel merely followed suit, and awarded your hand to one she considered worthy enough of a Goddess.”

She wanted to bite him then, and the threat of it must have shown in her eyes. Lezard abruptly pulled his hand away, placing it instead on the wall to the right of her. Lenneth’s blue eyes flashed at that, the Valkyrie feeling boxed in and indignant. “Worthy!? YOU!?” She could keep from scoffing, that sound making his lips curl for some reason.

It made her shake, her insides all a quiver in response to that half smile, half smirk.

“Maybe not by the Heaven’s lofty ideals…” He murmured throatily to her. His head was bending closer to hers, the warmth of his lips almost upon hers. “But by Queen Hel’s…?”

Lenneth audibly swallowed at that. “And just….” She hate how breathless a quality her voice had taken on, how invitingly female she sounded in the moment. “Just what does one need to do to be considered worthy in Hel’s eyes?”

The question was a blow, one Lezard stiffened at. She felt no victory in the moment, Lenneth staring at the man crowding in so close to her. “Just WHAT are you in Hel’s kingdom?”

There was a somber look to his expression now, the amethyst tortured by whatever truth was his answer. His mouth started to part, the sensual shape of his lips attempting to form the words he seemed loathe to give voice to. The first syllable never came, a clatter and commotion sounding behind him, as a startled group of female servants blushed and stammered over the scene they had just come across.

The moment was then ruined, that haunted light fading away, as though the feeling had never even been there inside him. “Le….Lezard?”

“Oh, do pardon us your lordship!” The servants were babbling, some outright giggling. They were all wide eyes and staring, many trying to peer past Lezard to get a good look at his bride to be. He didn’t quite seem relieved by the interruption, nor was he outright annoyed. If anything, he gave a kind of sickly smile to the women, which only seemed to bring out the crimson of their blushes.

Lenneth’s own embarrassment could almost surpass that of the giggling and giddy maids, the Valkyrie beyond mortified at what these women had come across. At the intimacy that Lezard’s closeness to her had been implying, Lenneth’s boxed in position lending the illusion that a kiss had been about to have happen. There was real shame at the thought, Lenneth’s mouth opening, as though she would try to explain the situation. The words were on the tip of her tongue, then swallowed up before the woman could give voice to them, the Goddess knowing she was literally caught between a rock and a hard place. The truth as it was, and the truth as the maids might decipher based on her actions.

Loathe as she was to accept things as it was, Lenneth understood how important this alliance would be to Hel and her followers. The benefits and privileges that might be allowed them, whatever that might truly be. The rewards Odin might give, the promises he might have already made, such were the endless possibilities as to drive a person mad with wanting and determination. Lusting for any and all scrapes of what Odin might have offered, there would be few if any inside this castle who would take kindly to his Valkyrie’s insubordination in ANY measure.

Aware of what her presence here meant, what her compliance and submission would bring them, Lenneth would have to tread very carefully amid the murky waters that was Flenceburg. She couldn’t appear to be too defiant of her husband to be, of his wants and his needs, the rebellion inside her not something that these people, that Hel, that not even Lord Odin, would appreciate. Already deemed a failure in her king’s eyes, Lenneth could not afford to be branded a traitor too.

Helpless by the realizations, the knowledge that her hands were in fact tied, the Valkyrie still could not give up on the thought that there might be a greater purpose for her being here. She’d go insane otherwise, Lenneth lost to the enchantment, to Lezard and to Queen Hel. The Goddess couldn’t bear it, fighting even harder against Odin’s magic. She couldn’t guard her expression though, her eyes still so defiant and upset, Lenneth grateful for the shadows Lezard’s back cast her in. The measure of protection it implied, Lenneth keeping hidden from the servants who were ever so curious about her.

So bothered by the situation, by her nightmare of a reality, Lenneth didn’t immediately pick up on any oddities of this arrival. Preoccupied with her upset, and with Lezard’s presumptuous nearness, the Goddess wasn’t surprised she hadn’t heard the footfalls, or the rustle of clothing. She had been completely unaware, not picking up on anyone’s presence, or that of their energy until after the maids had gasped out at their sudden findings.

She blamed this on the enchantment, on the love Odin had tried to force down her throat. Her senses so dulled and consumed with fighting it, and this unnatural attraction to a sinner, Lenneth was aware of so little else without a concentrated effort to focus. Even now her thoughts drifted about in a lazy, distracted shuffle, keeping the Goddess from being fully present in the moment. She knew that too was dangerous, Lenneth surrounded by sinners and the damned. There was so much to be on guard against, so much sin and corruption every which way that she could have turned. The most suffocating of unworthy stood in front of her, Lezard focused on saying something to the still somewhat giggly group of maids. His brand of dangerous energy was such that she was drowning in resentments, unable to immediately pay heed to anything, to anyone, else. She nearly missed it completely, that distinct lack of spark about the servants. The magic that wasn’t there, the sin and corruption of soul that they all appeared to be lacking. These women were ones who would be considered worthy, if only they would pick up a sword and die in Odin’s name.

She was then wide eyed with the realization that these weren’t the sinfully damned, but more the circumstantial unfortunate. The left overs in Odin’s kingdom, the souls who would never be deemed worthy enough of the heavens, truly doomed for their inability to fight and die in battle. The Valkyries knew of such people, knew of their existence, and their hopeless state. They had also never known what to make of them, of the people who would not take to battle, even to save their own souls.

Such was the fate of these innocents, that the Valkyries themselves had been divided on what should be done with them. Some absolutely blinded with their loyalty to Lord Odin, fell in righteous support of his decree. Others expressed or kept quiet their own doubts, few if any loose enough of lip to outright proclaim Odin’s stance cruel. There was even a few like Lenneth, who had never been able to truly decide the right and the wrong of it, unable to support such a rigid law, but equally unable to fight to change it.

The laws of Creation had always remained intact, had always been there to protect only those deemed worthy of Odin’s paradise. It wasn’t right, and it wasn’t fair, that those who led quiet, simple lives, that those dutiful people who died of sickness, or of time, could not be allowed into the heavens. Those righteous number of the devoted, and of the children who died before they could ever be given a choice, and always Odin had refused them all. Damned because they were doomed, these unfortunate only had one place to go, one God to turn to.

Lenneth wondered if it would be the same for her soul when SHE died. Would she be consigned to Hel’s tortures for all eternity, or would she be welcomed into the oblivion of nothingness, the Valkyries nothing more than divine energy displaced once dead. Her newly afflicted mortality left her in doubt, this endless suffering knowing no bounds, one worry and thought after another scurrying about her confused and tormented mind. If the woman had been less than a Goddess, if she had been any weaker of the heart, the Valkyrie might have broken down sobbing.

Tortured as she was, Lenneth refused to give anyone the satisfaction of her tears. Not even Lord Odin. She let Lezard make his excuses, the giggling gaggle of women being made to move on past them. There was almost a disappointed whine to the group, the ladies again trying to catch better sight of Lenneth.

“Ah…” Lezard breathed out a sigh once the last of the servants was gone. “Do forgive them their curiosity…”

“It’s understandable.” Lenneth murmured. “I would think anyone would be curious about your new bride.”

“Well yes, but not for that reason alone.”

“What other reason could there be?” Lenneth wondered. He seemed flustered in response, and for one brief moment, the Valkyrie thought the man would not answer her at all.

“They have never before been privilege to get this close to a Valkyrie. None of us have.”

“None?” Lenneth’s eyes widened with astonishment. Lezard had turned at her gasp, a raised finger pushing against the gold pane spectacles that had started a slide down his nose. The amethyst of his eyes were dark, an absolutely serious look in his eyes as the man gave the Goddess his regard.

“Is it really that shocking?” Lenneth started to nod an almost absent minded yes, but Lezard wasn’t yet done, fixing her with a deeply curious look of his own. “When was the last time you, when any of the Valkyrie, has had reason to come to one of Hel’s holdings?”

Lenneth’s mouth started to open, then abruptly closed with a sound. “Ah.” Addled as her mind was, the Goddess was still able to focus enough to think on the question. “There’s always a Valkyrie or two dispatched to other realms…” She murmured. “Depending on the crisis and threat faced…” Unspoken was that the threat was almost always a monster of Nifleheim’s make, let loose upon the unsuspecting masses of Creation.

The cities under Hel’s protection have never had reason to worry in that regard. After all, there was no true benefit in the underworld’s goddess allowing her pets to run a muck in her own holdings, Nifleheim’s Queen instead intent on terrorizing those who fell in and worshiped Asgard’s divine pantheon. Such had been Hel’s hate for Odin’s own, countless indiscriminate killings resulting from her nightmarish creations rampage across the realms.

Most time Hel’s ambitions had been manageable, the monsters that she had given leave to bring death and devastation to any and all in their path, easily hunted and put down. Sometimes however, the underworld’s Goddess tried to extend her reach further than being that mindless slaughter of innocence. There was a real malevolence to the Nifleheim’s Queen, Hel not satisfied to merely be some mild nuisance. No one had ever understood why, the Goddess who ruled over those damned and those doomed, insane to the point that even Hel might not remember what her own reasons for warring against Creation were.

Lucid or insane, whatever the reason, war had resulted often enough. Midgard was the unfortunate caught in the cross fire, it’s lands the field on which the battles took place. The fighting that sometimes last hundreds of years, with cities and civilizations caught in the middle, the broken bodies of the faithful spread out among the fires of real ruin.

The wars had never come close to granting Hel access to the Heavens. The best she could often reap, was more souls for her torture, Nifleheim positively bloated with the damned and unfortunate. The unworthy. It made not one bit of difference in the balance of Creation, those number of souls consigned to the Underworld no match for the heavens and the Valkyries that guarded over the many realms. With the combined might of those lethal beauties, and that of their loyal soldiers, the einherjar, that were legion upon legion to command, the divine troops had seen to keeping Midgard safe and in Odin’s control.

Or at least they once had. That war that had never ended, that had gone on far longer than Lenneth had been a Valkyrie, had started to change things. Brahms and his undead forces, their relentless attempt to press deeper into the heart of Asgard, had left Odin busy. Had left his troops divided and harried, not enough Valkyrie to go around and over see all of the nine realms. Midgard had been the one to suffer the most, the mortals unable to self govern and protect themselves from most threats. Especially that of the undead, or that of Nifleheim.

Ever the opportunist, Hel had used Odin’s distraction, to steal some of his strongholds scattered about Midgard. The desperate and the damned, the unguided and aimless, the fearful and the resentful. Those she could not seduce into her service willingly, Hel had sometimes managed to just TAKE. Several prominent strongholds of human civilization had been lost to Nifleheim’s grasp, and Lord Odin had either been too busy or too uncaring to try and get them back. In fact, by Lenneth’s own reckoning, it had been hundred upon hundreds of years, since the last war between them had truly been waged.

Lenneth had lived a long eternity, her immortality having stretched out for centuries. Nearly all of that time had been spent on one battlefield after another, these endless repeats of war such that the Valkyrie couldn’t always remember when exactly the events had happened or for why. It took a real concentrated effort to think, the Goddess made mortal trying to recall when exactly had a Valkyrie had any business with any of the cities under Hel’s control. Or with the nation of Flenceburg specifically. Was it two hundred, or was it three hundred years since this city in particular had been lost? Did it even matter, save to cement it as truth that it would have been a long time indeed before ANY Valkyrie would have had any business with this nation and it’s people.

Flenceburg and other cities like it, were all but considered lost to the heavens. Less than lost, they and their people had all but been abandoned by Odin. Lenneth and the other Valkyries had always assumed a reckoning would come, that the God who ruled over Creation, would one day take back the people and places that had been his to begin with. The relentless Brahms and his undead invasion, had simply made Odin’s priorities shift to keeping the Gods’ paradise safe above everything else.

Lenneth supposed she couldn’t blame him. Asgard was after all the center of Creation, the source from which all the realms drew their strength and sustenance from. Both a hope and an ambition, the heavens were what most people aspired to reach. That not even half made it there, was just another sad truth born of Odin’s strict decrees.

Odin brought order to the chaos that Brahms and Hel would unleash if either one of the two were to take control of Creation. That was an unshakable belief so many held, the safeguarding of the realms, it’s prospering and health so dependent on the rigid and righteous rule of the chief God, Odin. No one knew what would happen if someone else were to take control, no one wanted to even think on it, so frightened of the world and it’s twisting under the rule of the likes of Hel and Brahms.

Odin was not perfect. Lenneth KNEW that. But he had always been the best choice, the only choice, to rule over Creation and it’s people. He did what he had to, even the things Lenneth could not truly hope to understand. This supposed alliance with Nifleheim was just one of them.

Her thoughts spiraling down one tangent after another, Lenneth could barely remember what had set them off THIS time. Something about the Valkyries and their lack of presence in Flenceburg.

“I suppose we have been a rare sight in these parts.” She was grudging in that acknowledgment, having to bite at her tongue to keep from saying anything more. It didn’t stop the thought from forming, from Lenneth thinking on how difficult it would be for any of the Valkyrie to not want to strike down and execute the most corrupt and faithful to Hel’s cause. Even Lenneth, afflicted with an unwanted love coursing through her veins, and holding a loose knowledge that Odin himself WANTED this alliance, still found it difficult to be around a man as tainted with sin as Lezard appeared to be. She couldn’t imagine how her escort would have handled delivering her into his hands, nor be surprised at the thought of how quickly the Valkyrie who would have made up her honor guard, how quickly those women would have fled at the first chance given.

Certainly they wouldn’t have stayed long enough for the people of Flenceburg to get near, for any to even catch a glimpse of them. It was for their protection, and that of this nation’s, Odin not one to be pleased with the idea of any of his Valkyries reacting on instinct, and rampaging about killing all sinners and heretics that they might have come across, especially not when the God had been in the midst of securing an alliance with the biggest sinner of them all.

Lenneth’s sigh in response to her thoughts was misunderstood by Lezard. “It will take time for them to get used to you.”

Her lips pursed together as though she had tasted something foul. Lezard had noticed the soured expression, his own eyes showing a gentle amusement to it.

“You are the first Valkyrie to not only walk among us, but the first of your kind to be given as a bride to anyone who owes an allegiance to Hel. Of course they will be curious.”

“It doesn’t mean I have to LIKE their curiosity.” Lenneth retorted, surprised when Lezard agreed.

“That you don’t.” His lips quirked, but didn’t quite give over to a smile. “But do try for SOME tolerance. For the curiosity and the many questions you will have to endure.”

“Questions?”

He nodded. “You are a beautiful, intelligent woman. A former Goddess. The things you have seen, the life you have lived….some are more determined the others in their desire to….learn from you.”

“Like that one woman…I believe I heard you call her by the name Mystina?”

“Yes.” He seemed put upon then. “I will of course speak to her, to them all. They are in sore need of reminding to leave you alone and not pester you. Although some, like Mystina, will not let anyone or anything lessen her desire where you are concerned.”

“Desire?” Lenneth arched an eyebrow at him, confused by his choice in words. “And that is what?”

“Oh I am almost positive she means you no harm…” Lezard quickly said, and failed to reassure Lenenth. “But you do represent an opportunity to her. One she will be loathe to ignore.”

He suddenly looked around, as though remembering they were out in the middle of some corridor, apt to be seen and eavesdropped upon. Lezard then grimaced, and moved to reach for Lenneth’s hand. A hand she deftly maneuvered out of his way.

“Not here.” He said out loud. “There’s little to no privacy here.”

“All right. Lead and I shall follow.” Lenneth gestured for him to step ahead of her. Lezard hesitated anew, as though he was contemplating making a grab for her hand once again. Just the thought of it made Lenneth uneasy, both for the desire expressed, and the thought of what effect physical contact would have on a heart that was battling so strong an enchantment.

Lenneth vowed then and there to minimize as much physical contact as possible between her and Lezard Valeth. A clear head was needed, as well as a heart that wasn’t befuddled by love. The decision must have shown in her eyes, it and her new found determination getting the man to slowly nod and turn away from her. It felt like the most triumphant of victories, a well fought battle whose win had been hard earned.

“Careful now.” The man then advised. She wondered if he was really talking about the staircase, or if it was a comment in response to her bit of defiance when it came to not giving Lezard her hand. Either way, she made sure to not only hold up her skirts so as not to trip over them, but to get a firm grasp on the railing that wound it’s way to the bottom of the stairwell.

“Where are we going?”

“Somewhere where few if any will disturb us, and those that do, won’t be of any real consequence.” She wasn’t satisfied with that answer, anymore than she was keen on isolating herself to be alone with this Lezard.

“Does such a place even exist?” Lenneth wondered out loud.

“They are few and far between, but real enough they are.” They had progressed closer to the bottom of these steps, Lezard’s pace no longer so harried and hurried as it had been earlier. “In fact, there’s one not far from where we are now, that will be ideal for our chat.”

“Right….” They had reached the floor, and were now heading down it’s winding path of a corridor. They weren’t alone, there were more people, servants by the plain look of their garments, moving about. Many had heavy burdens in their arms, boxes and barrels, crates of fresh food and steins of wine. Those who didn’t carry nourishment and refreshment, moved with loads of fabric in their arms, laundry that would need tending to. There was even a few people on their hands and knees, scrubbing at spots on the floor, while others headed towards the stair case with what appeared to be ornate pieces of fancy adornments meant to decorate a room.

All of them were wide eyed and attentive when Lenneth passed by. Some even went so far as to stare at her in slack jawed wonder, and one woman had what appeared to be tears in her eyes. It all made Lenneth feel very uncomfortable, this shock and this awe, and especially those tears born of a mix of sorrow and joy. Some of these flabbergasted people seemed seconds away from prostrating themselves and genuflecting before her, Lenneth the tangible proof they had begun to doubt the existence of.

Bothered by it, by the effect she was having, Lenneth found herself stepping closer to Lezard. She immediately hated herself when the Goddess realized what she had just been doing, the Valkyrie knowing she was no damsel in distress to cower by or seek the protection of a man, of anyone. She was a warrior, of commander of legions, and her back stiffened with the pride of an accomplished tactician. She met the eyes of each person, quickly tasting of their energy, and coming away shaken when there were more innocents than not about this place. Lenneth simply didn’t understand the why of it, the how of why a nation known as hotbed of loyalist and Hel’s faithful, could have exist people who were free of all but the minor of sins.

So troubling were these innocents, that Lenneth couldn’t keep the frown from off her face. Were they all hostages? Slaves? Why were they not in Crell Monferaigne, or one of the other holy cities devoted to Odin’s rule? Why was this world not as black and white as Lenneth had been led to believe, the depraved and the damned, the sinners and seduced, those made corrupt from their many misdeeds, the ones who had abandoned their faith and Odin’s worship, were all that should have been left in a city like Flenceburg. Why instead was there this mingling of both sides, the damned working side by side with the unworthy but faithful? She did not know, Lenneth’s confusion and distress mounting, the woman disturbed by just how many relatively sin free people she was encountering. It even made her a bit angry, Lenneth wanting to yell at them, to bid them to pick up a weapon and fight for their God, rather than waste away their eternity as Hel’s victims.

She had been distracted again, Lezard suddenly catching at her arm. The tension did not leave Lenneth, if anything it grew worst at the touch, her eyes sparking with dismay and defiance, the woman reacting without thinking in an attempt to jerk free. His fingers curled almost painful about her, Lezard effortlessly pulling her with him through a doorway. The people about this place seemed none the wiser to what had almost happened, too busy, too consumed with their own private thoughts and sentiments that had been stirred up at the sight of the Valkyrie.

A clatter to the front of Lezard, drew Lenenth’s attention. A woman had just dropped a heavy burden, a sack of freshly picked vegetables that scattered across the floor. She didn’t even seem to realize it, too busy staring at Lezard and his bride to be. Others were following suit, their shock making them abandon their tasks at preparing the evening meal, so that the only sounds that could be heard was that of the fires crackling, and the meats roasting over them.

Lezard seemed to pay no heed to the reactions, making his purposeful way to a distant door. That door exited out into an enclosed space, a garden from the looks of it, but nothing to rival the landscaped beauty of Asgard.

“Here?” Lenneth inhaled deeply of the many different scents that made up the servant’s herb and vegetable garden.

“I don’t think Mystina and her group even KNOW that this place exists.” He let out a hoarse chuckle, Lezard seeming loathe to let go of Lenneth’s arm. She fixed her gaze upon the offending hand, staring at it with narrowed eyes as though that would force Lezard to play heed. When it didn’t, the woman jerked hard, nearly upsetting the balance of them both.

“It must seem strange…” Lezard then said, after he reluctantly took the hint and let go of her arm. “That someone like me, would have to hide in his own castle…”

“It doesn’t seem strange, so much as SAD.” Lenneth corrected. “Though I suppose such is the way of life among Hel’s people.”

“You mean among us vipers and backstabbers.” He didn’t quite grin. “You can say it. I won’t judge you for that truth.”

Only she wasn’t entirely sure it was a complete truth, not after spying the energy of so many innocents amid the servant class. Lenneth thus said nothing, instead just waiting for Lezard to finish one of the things they had begun conversing about out in the hall.

“I really will try to check Mystina’s behavior.” He then said.

“Just WHAT is that opportunity she seeks where I am concerned?” Lenneth tried not to sneer. “I WON’T be her prey.”

“No one said anything about preying on you!” Lezard quickly protested. “Though I suppose with Mystina one can never know for sure…”

“That doesn’t exactly bolster confidence…” Lenneth’s tone was dry and droll now.

“Mystina is…complicated.” He settled on. “Sometimes I wonder what she is more of. Scholar or Mage….both compete as her passion. Ah I see by your look, you have hazarded a guess as to where this is going….”

“If she is so invested in learning..I suppose to her, I represent a fount of information.”

“You’ve lived through things that are only stories to us, fought in wars we’ve no real records of. Most of all, you know of the heavens….” Lezard explained. “That alone is worth its price in gold to her…”

“If it’s war that she wants, I can tell her plenty.” Lenneth’s tone was grim. “But if she thinks to use my knowledge to betray Odin and secure a win for her Queen….” She then grimaced. “Ah but I forget such things are in the past now…”

“The alliance…”

“Yes. The alliance.” Lenneth sighed. “Though I still think it best for Asgard’s secrets to remain it’s own. At least until Nifleheim has otherwise proven it’s worth…”

“You don’t trust in your King’s decision?” An unreadable look was in Lezard’s eyes. It left Lenneth wondering if he had honestly expected her to betray the people of Asgard, to tell their secrets to any and all who would listen. She’d never be so uncouth or that eager, Lenneth vowing that not even under the threat of torture would she reveal anything that could be seen and used as a weakness against Asgard and it’s people.

“It’s not up to me to decide if his decision was right or not.” Lenneth tried to deflect. “But even allied as we now are, Odin would not want me to play the fool and give away everything to you and your Queen.” She drifted away from him then, intent on some of the greenery before her. The Valkyrie’s fingers were careful and nimble, caressing the curling vine of one of the many things planted here.

“Still you’re unhappy with what he has decided…” It was clear Lezard wasn’t intent to drop this line of thought just yet. It made Lenneth fight not to clench hold of the vine and destroy it, her anger spiking at this man’s presumption.

“Of course I am not happy!” She growled, but wouldn’t look at him. “How could I be!?” Lenneth then demanded. “My sister’s soul is in jeapordy, the heavens are intent on aligning themselves with one of their WORST enemies, and I’m left to do nothing but fight against the love my king would CURSE me with!”

She couldn’t stop herself, couldn’t keep from crushing the vine. “I do not want to be here.” Lenneth informed him in a withering tone. Her regret and her anger was spiraling out of control, spiking stronger and stronger deep inside her as the two fought for dominance over her. In that moment there was room for nothing else, not even the love Odin’s enchantment tried to afflict her with.

The feelings and resentments bubbled up within her, the unfairness of it all hitting Lenneth harder than it had ever. She didn’t want to be reduced to whining, but it was all too much for her, cast out of Asgard, denied both her godhood and the right to avenge and fix what was happening still to her sister, Silmeria. Lezard was just the latest in a long line of offenses, Lenneth tired and angry and all but ready to scream.

“I can understand that.” She would not look at him, would not even deign his words with any kind of response. “You are in a new place, a new home….” Lezard continued. “One among many strangers. Your whole world has changed overnight, and continues to shock and surprise you. It’s no wonder you suffer, not when you’ve been left by your king to flounder until you adapt.”

Still abusing the crushed vine with her fingers’ harsh grip, Lenneth risked a sidelong glance at Lezard. “What if I am never able to adapt?” It was meant as a challenge, but came out as more of a sigh. “I am a warrior.” She reminded him. “I LIVED for the battle. For the thrill of blood and victory. Fighting isn’t just in my soul, it’s what I am….so tell me, Lezard, how am I to content myself to be nothing more than some man’s wife? To have nothing more be expected of me, save for my body to be the vessel in which to birth you, your children?”

“Lenneth!” That thread of anger that snapped out in Lezard’s voice shocked her into turning fully towards him. It afforded her a complete view of his expression, the passion that heated his eyes, the amethyst gleaming with a kind of mad fury. “You are SO much more than that! Than any of it! Do not ever doubt or undersell yourself ever again…!”

“It is the TRUTH!” Lenneth insisted. “Odin has mapped out my entire existence, be it on the battlefield or in YOUR BED! It’s by his decree that my fate has always been sealed!”

“I do not believe that!” He argued. “I refuse to accept that fate is so unchangeable! For you, for me, for anyone!” The man looked so enlivened, stepping towards her with a bold gesture and confidant words. “You, WE, can make our own!”

“Make my own…” For one second her voice held a wistful edge to it, and then Lenneth was letting loose with a scoffing sound. “How?” She demanded. “When my free will has been attempted to be stripped free from me? With that spell cast upon my heart to take all choice away from me!?”

“You’ve not given into that spell.” He pointed out. “You don’t love me….”

Not yet, were the words on the tip of her tongue, the unspoken truth she dared not speak out loud. It and those unwanted sentiments, Lenneth knowing there was a part of her that was already breaking from exhaustion, the near constant fight against Odin’s enchantment taking it’s toll. She was already so tired of it, of him, Lenneth just wanting a chance to to be by herself, in the vain hope that the magic would lessen it’s grip if there was enough distance between them.

It couldn’t have been even a handful of hours since she had been kissed awake. Only a small fragment of time that felt like it’s own eternity, the battle waged inside her making every second extend for a tortuous amount of time. Nothing could soothe her, her anger and her horror the only way to somewhat staunch the effects of the spell. She chose to embrace anger, to purposefully pick a fight with him.

“And what of you!?” She demanded with narrowed eyes. “What would you do if I tried to seize a new fate for myself? One that did NOT include you!?”

It was almost laughable the way that he hesitated, the way that this Lezard tried to dance around in an attempt to evade answering the exact question. His eyes actually blinked in rapid succession, the man swallowing audibly, before recovering enough to speak. “I would hope that you would be amenable to a future with me.”

“I am not.” Lenneth insisted flatly.

Again that blink of his eyes. Was that some sort of defense mechanism, or a betraying tick? She just didn’t know, and Lezard was already rushing forward, words spilling out of him in an almost uncertain manner. “I don’t want to have to force you into anything that you don’t want.” He told her. “But…at least give me a chance….”

“A chance to do what!?” There was an undercurrent of suspicion in her that had reacted to those words, a disbelieving snort manifesting in her head.

“To change your mind. To COURT you.” He explained. Was that desperation coloring his expression now? Was he that frightened of Hel’s displeasure, as to show patience to his rebellious bride to be?

“Fear not, Lezard.” Her words were a half hearted reassurance. “I will not go against my King’s orders.” Regardless of how little she might truly understand them, Lenneth still holding out hope there was something more for her to do here, vain as she was beginning to believe that thought to be. “Besides.” She added with a wry attempt at a smile offered up to Lezard. “Wherever else could I go? Cast out of the Heavens and made mortal as I now am…I’ve neither the strength nor the things needed, the money to strike out on my own. I have nothing to my name, save the gown that I wear.”

“You think it would please me to hear your choice was based on that?” He scowled. “The idea of you staying simply because you feel dependent on my charity and kindness…”

“I stay because I have been given an order by my King.” Lenneth corrected him. “I will not do him or myself such dishonor, no matter how much I find myself not agreeing with the punishment I have been given.”

He still didn’t look very happy. “I hope that in time, you can come to look upon me as something other than as your punishment for what has happened to your sister…”
It stung, his words, the raw honesty of his unwittingly hurtful statement. It sparked to life new depths to her anguish and despair, Lenneth closing her eyes but unable to shut out her mind. Or the memory of her sister’s near lifeless body in the undead king’s arms.

“The fact remains that you ARE.” Lenneth snapped her eyes open with that. She couldn’t disguise the pain shining in her blue eyes, or the naked grief of her expression. “By Odin’s own words, did he damn you as THAT. I’ll never be able to NOT think of you as that, so long as I retain my sense of self. My sense of self, and my control over my heart’s own choices.” Such a sad twist of her lips accompanied those words. “I suppose we will soon learn just which is stronger. My heart, or Odin’s magic….”

“That damn Odin—” He seemed to think twice on his words. “Your King does us BOTH a disservice, and only furthers a suffering that is immense enough on it’s own without his magic.”

“It is no fault of Odin’s!” Lenneth protested. “That magic SHOULD have made me love you. I am the one you need blame for all this. If I was less desperate or less stubborn, maybe then I wouldn’t have the strength needed to fight of the worst of the enchantment.” He seemed to be considering her words. “It must be a shock to you…” The Goddess added. “Expecting to awaken a Valkyrie who would not only be willing, but happy to become a loving and obedient wife.” A faint smile then, Lenneth able to find the amusement in his situation, even if she could not actually laugh over it. “When I am NONE of those things.”

“You do present me with a challenge.” Lezard admitted. “As well as one to yourself….”

“It’s all I have left….” Lenneth stated, meaning the fight against the enchantment placed on her.

“I’m not so sure. There is so much more life has to offer, that I have to offer, if you would just open yourself up to the possibility, and give yourself over to…to learning to love me of your own free will….”

The Valkyrie didn’t think it possible. Even if Lenneth did somehow have a choice, she knew that she could never choose to fall in love with a man like Lezard. A man whose soul was made foul with the weight and depth of his sins.

There was also the very real truth of her sister’s situation, Lenneth’s concern for Silmeria such, that even affected by Odin’s magic, the woman couldn’t forget or forgive what had happened. The fault that she felt, the mad grief and wild desperation all still within her, playing buffet against the enchantment. Such was her need to right the wrongs done to her sister, that Lenneth knew for a fact that love would never enter the equation without Odin’s magic as it’s bolster.

These hard truths alive in her head, in her belabored heart, the love that she fought against, that she was afflicted with, still kept her from outright crushing him. At least on that point, Lenneth turning away as though to hide her troubled expression from the man.

“Wouldn’t our marriage be better for it?” Lezard then asked. “Wouldn’t WE be better?”

It was a surprising sentiment, the most whimsical of hopes, that innocent seeming desire such that the Goddess wouldn’t have attributed the having of it to a man, a sinner, like Lezard.

“Love…” It wasn’t a rebuff of his words, that quiet murmur that she voiced. Her parents had once had had a form of love, distant though that memory now was. A pure and freely given affection that came from both the man and the woman, that husband and wife friends as well as lovers, the two a keeper of each other’s laughter and secrets. It had been a love great enough to have conceived Lenneth and her two sisters, the pain and the sorrow of a life stolen from the battlefield, forgotten to the joy of a loving man and family.

All that Lenneth knew of love, she had learned from her mother, from their family’s interaction with each other. The love that she had felt for them, that she still felt for both her sisters, to such a degree that the Goddess knew her heart had had the capacity for it, long before Odin had tried to curse her with it. But just as she had, and could love, Lenneth realized, the distant memories of her parents, of her father in particular, colored her views on just what kind of man would be WORTHY of a Valkyrie.

Lezard Valeth was as far removed from that ideal as one could get, his sins and his allegiance to the underworld’s queen, the very taint on his soul, all doing their damage. It mattered not what he might be like as a person, how seemingly affable or how charming, he and his expressed sentiment were. They all rode on a desire, a hope that had no basis of a true chance, his existence tolerated only because Lenneth had had no choice.

Aware of and resentful of her lack of it, that spiteful part of her that tried to be tempered by Odin’s magic, rose up inside her. It spit out in words, the hurtful truths that were alive as a part of her. “I would NEVER choose to fall in love with you, with anyone, whose soul could be so corrupt.”

She had glanced at him then to see the full extent of her words’ assault on Lezard. His eyes were beyond startled, Lenneth piercing him with a grim look of her own. “Does that surprise you? That I can still sense the sin that lays heavy on you?” His lips parted on a hoarse sound that bore no resemblance to any known word. “It speaks to me. They all do….”

“And…and what exactly does it say?” Lezard appeared to be bracing himself, as though he knew the damage his soul and her words could do.

“That yours is the blackest of them all.”

“Then you know….” He whispered, ashen faced and shaken.

“I know not nearly enough!” Her agitation had snapped, the woman all but ranting now. “Not of the why, not of the how anyone could corrupt their souls to that point. I don’t understand, and I doubt Odin does either, for how else could my king have allowed Hel to give me to you!” The anger trembled inside her, all of it and Lenneth’s bewildered hurt and betrayal given a voice at long last. “My ONE failure was not so great as to have merited THIS!”

He more than flinched in place, Lezard reeling as though she slapped him.

“Do I not suffer ENOUGH!?” The Valkyrie wanted to then know. “Denied all right to avenge my sister, to go after her, to save Silmeria’s very soul from the clutches of the undead!?” Her eyes surely flashed then, Lenneth advancing on Lezard with every next word spoken. “Stripped of my divinity, my friends, my people, with no real way to know what is happening with EITHER of my sisters. You think I can be happy like this? That I can learn to love you of my own free will!? When I don’t even LIKE you!? When your very soul screams at me for the affront to existence that it is!?” She was breathing heavily with that, Lenneth panting with her anger, her body having crowded against Lezard, invading his personal space with a threat and an aggression that was all pure Valkyrie.

“I’m….” He audibly swallowed. “I am sorry…”

“Your sorry is NOT good enough!” Lenneth snarled in his face. In the moment she felt none of it, none of Odin’s magic, the enchantment swallowed up whole by her anger and rage over the situation they were both in. She didn’t know if she was at all being fair to Lezard, the one time Goddess didn’t think she even CARED. “Your sorry won’t save my sister!”

The Valkyrie felt exhausted then, the mortality that had been forced on her, catching up with her. She swayed unsteadily on her feet, breathed harder for the effort of staying upright. “I don’t even know WHAT you are.” Her tone came out broken, Lenneth now shying away from Lezard. From the touch that she expected him to give. That he made no solicitations, no attempt to reach out and steady her this time, wasn’t a comfort. Nothing was, Lenneth bereft, lost and nearly to the point of tears, set on alienating herself from the one person she could not afford to lose.

“Just WHAT are you?” She tried again. “To me, to Hel, to the magic inside you? Why does your soul cry out to me so!?”

“I am of Hel’s inner circle.”

Lenneth couldn’t stop the gasp, the protest that rose up inside her. It was worst than she could have thought, Lezard so enmeshed with the undeworld and it’s goddess, as to be a confidante!

“I have her ear, and her proxy.” Lezard continued. “I RULE Flenceburg in her stead. It is by her grace and her judgment that I have anything of everything. This castle, these people, my position….even the bride that I would take.”

“What do you do, what have you done in her name?” That whispered out question, Lenneth wasn’t sure if she really wanted the answer. The Valkyrie got it all the same, Lezard’s own look bitter as he told her that he had done anything, and everything that his Queen had ever asked of him.

“Why? How!?” Her distress plaintive in her voice, disturbed the stark quiet of the garden with it’s volume.

“Why what?” He countered. “Why would I choose this, why would I play loyal lap dog to the Queen of the damned?” Lenneth was barely moving her head, the terse nod bidding Lezard to continue. “How could I NOT?” He then asked her. “Do you think I had any more choice than you did!?”

“I was born in one of Hel’s holdings. How long do you think it was before her faithful alerted her to a prospect as great in magic as I had been showing the potential of?” It was a rhetorical question, Lezard expecting no real answer from Lenneth. “You think she would pass up on the possibility presented before her? On ANY opportunity she might come across? She makes use of what falls into her grasp, much like your King does.”

She couldn’t muster up the proper outrage, couldn’t protest that Odin and Hel were not similar in that regard. Anymore than she could protest the fact that as soon as possible, Odin had had a sword put in Lenneth’s hand.

“I NEVER had a choice.” Lezard said. “Not with my life, and not with my studies. Any and all magic that was mine to command, anything I showed the slightest skill at, she demanded I learn. All in order to utilize better use of me. I was nurtured and I was groomed, forced to become what she had need of.”

“Odin calls you and your kind Valkryie. But did you know there is a word for one such as I? A name for the most powerful of Hel’s people?” She flinched with the question, Lezard’s hand raising not to strike her, but to push his glasses up the bridge of his nose.

The word already known inside her, Lenneth tasted both it’s shaping on his tongue, and the horror that it brought with it. Necromancer, her world reeling about, her legs feelings so weak. A Necromancer was before her, a creature long thought to have been made extinct by Odin’s very own. The Valkyrie had been singled minded in their determination, hunting this brand of human to extinction thousands of years ago. Lezard’s claim, his very existence, should have been impossible. Yet his soul was black enough, unusual enough, that Lenneth knew his words were no idle boast.

“Does Odin know?” But how could he NOT. How could anyone NOT know, once they had encountered him, once they had felt a taste of the power within Lezard’s soul. Lenneth hated him then, even as the magic she had been cursed with, softened her heart with it’s manufactured love.

Love trying to wind a choke hold on her heart and it’s emotions, Lenneth wondered how Odin could suffer a presence like Lezard to live. It was disturbing, Lezard an affront to creation, a blasphemy even Odin should not overlook. Why then was she here? Why was Lenneth expected to marry, to love, to make babies with a man whose blood line should be stamped out!?

“I disgust you.” His face was an emotionless mask, not betraying any of what he now felt.

“How could you not?” Lenneth asked him. Yet the curse was still there, it’s love fighting against Lenneth’s rightful sense of loathing. “If not for Odin’s magic, you’d be dead already. Dead by my hand. That is how much I am unable to suffer your continued existence.”

“I thought that magic wrong.” It was a surprising admission grated out. “I didn’t approve of it or Odin’s decision to use it on you. But if that is the only thing that gives me a chance with you…” She wasn’t surprised to learn just how opportunistic Lezard could be, the woman backing away from him then on unstable legs.

“I’ll fight it and you.” She warned him.

“I’d expect no less.”His eyes gleamed with cold calculation. “I had wanted to court you the proper way. I still do…”

There was nothing proper about it, about any of this and she told him that. His smile was that of a sad slant, a tired bitterness leaking into his expression. Lenneth suspected her own visage mirrored that emotion of his, her mind still reeling with shock and horror. She wasn’t able to think, to feel past those emotions. In fact it would be several hours later, before the Goddess would realize just how all consuming these revelations had truly been. How powerful, Lenneth’s grief over Silmeria, briefly forgotten, the Valkyrie lost to her own self pity and doubts.