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I SLEPT ARMED to the teeth, with visions of Erik’s wrath keeping me restless. I went through countless sparring runs in my head to figure out how to defeat him when his strength so greatly outmatched my own, but every scenario ended in my death. When the first light of the day broke through the sheer curtains in my room, I rolled to my feet.

The tension in my shoulders didn’t release, even as I pushed the axe off my bed. It beat against the marble ground with a hollow sound that echoed to every corner of my vast bedroom. I dropped my dagger next. I couldn’t live in fear.

I undid the confining straps of my sandals, stretched my toes, and walked onto the balcony overlooking the dawn. A cold sting bit in the air, awakening me as my mind raced through details of last night.

“This is ridiculous,”

I muttered. “I don’t want to deal with dramatic gods for two months.”

One of them could kill me in an outburst before I figured out where I belonged.

Below, Ve’s horses that I’d stolen neighed, almost like agreement. I stretched over the balustrades. “You can go back to Ve,”

I told them. “You aren’t tied down.”

They stayed put.

“I’d like it better here too,”

I said. Hitta Haven was tiny in comparison to the other god’s homes, but it was my favorite. “Best of all, there are no gods here to deal with.”

I leaned against the wall and shut my eyes.

It wasn’t long before a voice called out. “Ruin? Are you there?”

“Spoke too soon,”

I grumbled. I stepped forward so he’d see me. He stood by his horses, petting them with one hand as his gaze scoured the house. I lifted a hand, and his eyes rose to find me.

“May I come up?” he asked.

“As long as you leave all weapons behind,”

I said back. “I’m implementing a danger-free zone.”

He chuckled. “Does Delight honor that zone?”

I patted my empty belt. “Delight has retired for the day.”

He gave his horses one last stroke and dropped some green apples for them to munch on. “In that case, I’m coming up.”

I stayed on the balcony where the air was crisp and the morning skies were coming to life with streaks of pink. The clouds that hung on the ground were thinner today, letting me see much of the endless mountains and temples along Asgard. Frigg would be coming soon with a basket of breads and vegetables and likely a string of questions from Odin about this cut along my cheek, but she’d get no more answers than he had.

From behind me, Ve strode up the stairwell and into my room. He eyed my weapons on the floor. “You know, I always pictured what you would be like. I thought you’d be peaceful and serene, like your móoir.”

A hint of mockery lined his tone as he stepped over the axe.

His eye went to my cheek, and his body froze. “He cut you.”

He breathed the words, almost in disbelief, but darkness coated them like he’d known this would happen. Like I wasn’t the only one Erik had cut.

“I’m fine.”

In a heartbeat, Ve was at my side and lifting a hand to hover it next to my skin. “What did he do to you?”

“It was provoked,”

I admitted, withdrawing from his touch.

Ve tightened his jaw. “That doesn’t give him the right to touch you.”

His hand lifted again. “Can I heal it?”

The sting wasn’t noticeable anymore, and I doubted it was deep. It must have been a ring or the bracer on his wrist that had nicked me. “I’ll survive the injury. How was the rest of the party?”

“Insufferable,”

he replied, still staring at the cut. “Please, I’m the god of healing. It’d be insulting if you didn’t let me heal this.”

Another thing I hadn’t known about him.

I sighed, and stepped back into his touch until his fingers grazed the edges of my wound, bringing a dim sting with it. He shifted closer to put his other hand on my other cheek, close enough that every wisp of his dark hair was distinguishable and the scent of champagne noticeable on his breath. He studied my skin with intensity, while I tried to figure out where to look. I finally settled on the collar of his shirt just in time for the sting to melt away. A warm feeling spread over my cheek before it settled down.

He backed up. “Good as new.”

“Thank you. That’s a fancy trick.”

I touched the skin. Not only was it healed, but I swore it was smoother too.

He chuckled. “You’re welcome. In the future, try not to anger Faoir. Can you do that for two months?”

“I shall be on my best behavior,”

I promised.

“I’ll believe it when I see it.”

He rested against the balcony railing and stared over Asgard in the direction of his parents’ home, though it was on the other side of the closest mountain. When he set his hand against the balustrade, a smudge of orange paint stuck out from his sleeve. I stared at it. Erik had mentioned he paints. I’d hated not knowing that already, but in truth, I knew nothing about the god before me, other than snippets of information adding up to nothing.

He wanted to travel but I didn’t know why. He liked to paint but I didn’t know what. His faoir had a temper but I didn’t know if that same hot streak ran through Ve, or what he was like in the quiet of evening when the day had died down. Was he carefree or wound with stress? Simple or complex?

What I did know was to convince people of our pretend love, we’d need to know the basics about each other. I set my elbows on the railing and braced myself beside him. “I didn’t know you were the god of healing.”

“As is my grandfather,”

he said. “Which is where I got my name. I enjoy healing, it’s a soothing job that lets me fix things instead of taking them apart.”

It was different from the interests of the boys back home, who were more concerned with spearing things than mending them. Different from me, too. He’d called me savage before, but I wondered how deeply he meant that. Where everyone else saw me as a god, did he only see my axe and think that was all there was to me?

I pushed the thought away.

“I didn’t know you had a brother either,”

I said. “And a sister.”

He stiffened, and his brows drew down. “I don’t have a sister.”

I frowned. “Erik told me you did.”

His voice was scratchy, like my words had prickled him. “I only have Leif.”

“Okay, I’m sorry I brought it up.”

There was something there, but I didn’t want to pick at it yet. The morning was too gentle to disrupt, and after a crazy night, I wanted to stay far away from complicated matters.

He cleared his throat. “You have a sister though. No brothers?”

“Just five sisters. Tova, the most notable of them all.”

He faced me. “Is that animosity I detect?”

“Complication,”

I corrected him. My hand went to my hair where my familiar braid was missing, and I thought of Tova and how she was doing. As the bite of Trig’s betrayal was lessoning, the throb of missing her was growing. “Tova is everything you’d expect from a girl marked by Odin. She’s strong, brave, and smart, but also kind and compassionate. Beautiful as well. It’s impossible to dislike her. I loved being her sister. The entire clan adored her, but that put her on edge with them. She’d tell me she hated going through town because she felt like she was being watched all the time—which she was—and it unnerved her. But when she was with me, she didn’t have any guards up. She was my best friend, and I got the best parts of her.”

My hand dropped from my hair as my heart squeezed tight.

Ve waited for more of the story. When I didn’t say anything, he nudged me. “Why the complication then?”

I sighed. “It involves a boy. Do you think you can handle hearing about your fiancée and another love?”

He put a hand to his chest. “I will try to hold back the jealousy.”

“Okay then. I fell in love.”

Ve didn’t blink. “And she didn’t approve.”

“She approved,”

I said. “She approved of him more than I realized.”

I sped through the rest of the story so I didn’t have to relive it twice. “I wanted a life with him, and Trig told me he wanted to marry me too. Then, just as I think he’s about to propose, he asks Tova to marry him instead.”

“What?”

Ve’s eyes bulged. “Why?”

I swallowed the lump in my throat. That one memory was enough to open a chasm of pain, and it threatened to drown me with all the hurt. Every insecurity lived inside that memory: when Trig chose my sister over me.

“Because I am no one,”

I said. “And she is everything.”

And now, I’d never know how long Tova had cared for Trig or how long he knew he’d marry her instead. But as I retold the story—the emotions raw and the truth laid bare—I realized I couldn’t return home and pretend like all was fine. I’d do as I’d been planning to do before Balder found me in the vineyard. I’d find a new clan to call home. I never considered my heart to be tender, but it was too fragile to survive returning home.

More than that, last night reminded me I didn’t belong in Asgard. I’d find my safety in running.

“I’m sorry,”

Ve said softly.

“I’ll be fine,”

I said as I pulled myself back together. “It hurts because this happened a few days ago.”

His jaw dropped. “A few days! Gods, that’s why you’re so irritable.”

My gaze sliced to him. “Irritable? I think you mean assertive, and I’m always like that.”

“You always threaten gods to do your bidding? Get in fights with a hundred-year-old deity that led to your face being sliced open? Grumble at anyone who tries to get close to you?”

Perhaps I was irritable. “My face wasn’t sliced open,”

I mumbled.

“There you go grumbling again.”

He chuckled. The skies were bright now and the misty clouds thinned away from the trees while the flowers opened to find the rising sun. The warm light hit the brown flecks of Ve’s eyes and turned them almost golden when he fixed them on me. “I prefer this version though.”

I blinked. “Of what?”

“Of you. I prefer the real you over the one I’d imagined in my mind. This one is more exciting.”

It was the tiniest sliver of approval, but my thirsty heart soaked it up like a sponge.

“How about you?”

I asked. “What’s your big life story?”

“No story,”

he said. “At least not yet. I’m hoping to have a few though once I get to Earth.”

“I fear you are going to be sorely disappointed in my homeland.”

I looked over Asgard. Earth was nothing like this. By now, the trees back home were losing their leaves and the grass was dead, and the fjord would soon be freezing. “Why do you want to go there so badly?”

He crossed his arms and thought about it for a few moments. “It’s more I don’t want to stay here.”

“That bad?”

I asked, thinking of his faoir.

“Not usually, but…”

He ran a hand through his hair. “It’s hard to describe. All I know is I don’t feel like I’m home yet. I’m hoping I’ll know where I’m supposed to be once I get there.”

I thought over his words until I found something familiar in them. “You’re searching for where you belong.”

His eyes brightened. “That’s it. I’m searching for where I belong.”

“Well, any clan would be thrilled to have someone like you,”

I said truthfully. Someone of his size and strength would be a valuable asset to them. “Though they’ll get suspicious when you don’t age.”

He laughed. “I’ll move on then. Or maybe return here. We will see. You’re going to have that problem as well.”

“What?”

“You won’t age at the same rate either.”

I’d forgotten he thought I was a goddess. For a terrible moment, I opened my mouth to correct him. He wasn’t planning to marry me, and after two months, he wouldn’t see me again. No part of his plan or his future depended on me being a goddess, but the words stuck in my throat. Perhaps it was my sense holding them back. He didn’t need to know, and I didn’t want to share information with him that could be used against me. “I’ll figure something out,”

I finally said.

“You’ve got time. For now, I’d like you to meet some of my friends.”

When my brows raised, he put a hand to his chest. “Don’t look so surprised. I had a life before you showed up. Besides, it involves your favorite activity: fighting.”

He backed from the balcony, but I hesitated. “I think I’ve fought enough gods.”

I touched my cheek.

“These ones are nicer,”

he promised, flashing a smile. “And not nearly as skilled as me so you have a chance. They finished building the arena for the Champion Games, and its tradition my friends and I sneak inside to spar in it first.”

I frowned. “You’re the same age as me. You’ve been to one other Champion Games in your life.”

“It’s my first year joining,”

he said with a laugh. “My brother is older than me, and he started it.”

Mention of the Champion Games put a knot in my stomach, but I didn’t want him to see. “I’ll go, only for the chance at a rematch with you.”

He picked up my dagger and tossed it to me. I caught it by the hilt. “Looks like Delight is coming out of retirement,” he joked.

I sheathed it with a sharp clang. “When do the Champion Games start?”

“In two days,”

he said. “The mortals will be here soon.”