Page 48 of Vow of the Undead (The Bloodrune Saga #1)

I stood before the grave with the Valkyrie after another full day of training with the stake, with compulsion, and hoping to tease out Odin’s gift.

I turned my hand over and a beam of moonlight cast over my pale palm, giving enough light for me to see that the lifeline from my hand to my wrist wasn’t even red anymore.

All evidence of my sacrifice had been erased now. Not even a scar was left. Thanks to Kayn, and our connection.

“Isn’t it ironic?” I said to Stasia who was inspecting the open grave. “That the pain of a sacrifice required by the Gods was healed by the creature they condemn?”

“Not all of them. Loki seems to like the monsters in the saga of the Children of Ragnarok ,” she said.

“Also, the sacrifice gave you an answer. It’s not like Odin came down here himself and forced your hand over the altar.

Just like when he chose to hang from the tree of Yggdrasil, you chose to sacrifice yourself. And it was only a little cut.”

Stasia was no stranger to giving voice to what needed to be said, though neither of us was entirely right. We weren’t wrong either.

I stared at the grave where Kayn had just buried himself.

This was my last act of training, raising Kayn from sleep with compulsion.

Since I’d only tried that once, and it’d been a process of trial and error riddled in shock and fear, I hadn’t noticed any subtle powers from Odin that may have mingled with Loki’s compulsion.

After a few minutes to allow him to slip into sleep, I’d drop to my hands and knees and wake him.

This time, focusing on any extra abilities, strength or speed, though none of those would make sense with raising a vampire from his grave.

Still, this was the task remaining and I'd only practiced it once. And Kayn wasn’t about to let me leave without attempting everything that might draw our knowledge of what Odin had gifted me.

I needed all the help I could get against the king.

I blinked up at the Valkyrie. Her hidden face piqued my interest. Why keep her a mystery? I wanted to see the eyes of the warrior woman who served Odin. Why did the Gods keep their answers a mystery? Freya could have given my mother a vision.

But I supposed the Gods were not here to serve me, and as Stasia reminded me, the Hávamál taught the history of Odin, which gave the example that not even a God himself was above sacrifice.

The Poetic Edda said he hung from the tree for nine days and nine nights with a spear in his side in order to access the runes they used to communicate with us today.

Stasia snapped her fingers in front of my face.

“I release you from your trance.” Coming from Stasia, I knew it was a joke, though how she spoke so lightly of witchcraft, I didn’t understand.

“Look, I’m in awe of her beauty too.” She nodded toward the statue.

“And I’ve definitely wondered what it’d be like to kiss a Valkyrie.

But I’m willing to bet your lips are reserved for the Exile, so what are you doing staring at my woman? ”

I smiled to mirror her smirk. Heat burned my neck and I curled my bottom lip under, remembering the connection between me and Kayn, the pulsing energy that enclosed us in a moment of his pure compassion and my eager willingness.

Our connection was quiet, similar, like an unspoken prayer.

He knew and accepted that I needed protection when he first guarded me from King Drakkar, and later, he knew and accepted that I needed someone to catch me, to heal me.

Finding him through my mother was no mistake, no coincidence.

She’d once been the only one with an arm around me, willing to accept me as I truly was, and willing to heal me despite the risk to her.

“Huh,” Stasia’s voice cut through my thoughts.

She was grinning even wider now. “Now I assume you’re lost in thought about kissing both the Exile and the Valkyrie together.

And while I definitely don’t blame you, I hate to have to tell you that this Valkyrie is just a statue. Her lips would be as cold as Kayn’s.”

I raised my brows. “Contrary to what goes on in your mind, I wasn’t fantasizing about kissing. And Kayn’s lips aren’t cold.”

She shook her head. “I still don’t understand how a creature who is neither living nor dead can heal a human.”

“A witch,” I corrected. Though I was technically both, there was still a distinct difference.

“And I don’t get it either. But my mother says she once received a response from Odin that said the answers to everything are lost in our history.

That’s one of the reasons she insists on not letting the true history of our ancestors die. What she can remember, anyway.”

“Speaking of an answer from the Gods.” She shifted her eyes to the grave. “Does Kayn think you’re ready?”

“Yes. He hasn’t said it, but I can tell.” In the way that he praises me.

“So your plan is to sneak in and kill the king first?” Her green eyes were brightened by the surrounding grass. Snowflakes caught in between the blades of grass and along her eyelashes, but they melted quickly. The last stretch of the Polar Nocturne was always the coldest.

“I can only compel one vampire at a time, so yes. Him first, then I’ll track down each member of the council.”

I palmed my hand to my stomach, willing for the contents of it to stay within me.

Sour bile sloshed and pushed up my throat but I swallowed it back down and finally dipped to my knees.

The soft earth bent beneath my legs as I prepared to raise Kayn from his sleep.

Ever the loyal friend and handmaiden, Stasia kneeled beside me.

“You look worried,” She said with a frown.

“Need food?” Using the Valkyrie’s broken wing to pull herself up.

I glanced up at her, shaking my head. She stood over me now, casting a thin shadow from the light of the moon.

“I don’t believe that. Worried looks require food.

I’ll skin those rabbits Kayn caught for us and make a stew before you leave.

” She stooped over me and slapped me on the back.

“I promise, once you have stew in your stomach, that frown will turn over.” When she straightened she patted her stomach and turned around, hiking in long strides to the front of the temple.

She wasn’t gone long when a scream split through the night.

The silence of the Polar Nocturne carried the chilling sound across the cloudy sky and it seemed a drop of water slipped down my back, trailing over my spine.

My blood went cold. Had I lost myself in a dream—a nightmare—again?

Was it in my head or real? I pushed out a slow breath but cut it short when I recognized the tone of Stasia’s voice. This was real and happening right now.

I shot to my feet and gathered my skirts in my fists. Running across the graveyard proved difficult when I had to weave through headstones and my every step sank into the soft grass. Snowflakes caught on my eyelashes and, when I blinked them away, the moisture left my vision blurred.

The scream fell away as I cut around the edge of the Hall of the Gods. Stasia stood several feet back from the temple doors, her chest heaving and breath ragged. Before her lay a body with blood pooling on the stone around it.

I drew a sharp breath and slapped my hand to my throat where overwhelm squeezed me tighter and tighter. Dragging my feet forward, I made my way to my friend, my hand half heartedly lifting to land on her bent arm and comfort her.

“Forget food,” she said, spitting the words out. “I’m never eating again.” She hinged forward with her hands on her knees as she cupped her hand over her mouth.

I ripped my eyes from her and finally took in the dead person lying across the temple’s steps, like a sacrifice, as her blood seeped into the cracks along the stones.

Holding my breath, I dipped to a crouch and carefully shifted the scraggly hair from her face.

Stasia screamed again, the pitch piercing in my ear.

The shrill sound cut off abruptly when she spun around and spewed everything in her stomach over the snow-flecked grass.

I scanned the dead woman’s face, the sharp point of her nose, the pale skin, a slackened mouth with splits in her dry lips.

“Embla,” I said, releasing my breath with her name. The young servant woman in the castle. No wonder Stasia had screamed, they’d likely known one another. Perhaps they were even friends.

Two distinct holes were pierced into the curve of Embla’s neck where a vein bulged.

She’d died by vampire bite, and it was messy.