But he was not so moved that he was blinded to the scar circling his wife’s throat or the furrows in her back, or deafened to her cries in the night. As Leif had said, he had only returned the sword into the hands from which it never should have been taken. As Brenna never should have been taken.
So Vali simply gave Leif another single nod. Then he turned and helped his wife onto their boat so that they could leave Geitland and its new jarl behind.
~oOo~
As they had expected, the other jarls had been prepared for battle with Åke and were relieved to find instead a small karve docking at their shores, with a new jarl and the balance among them all restored. That the new jarl was Vali Storm-Wolf, who was wedded to the God’s-Eye, was all to the better.
Vali took his opportunity with Finn and then with Ivar, when each wife had drawn Brenna off for womanly chat, to judge their feelings about Calder. Both considered Calder a shadow of his father, and bore him little affection. Then Vali made the kind of statements that would indicate that, should the alliance break between Geitland and Karlsa, Jarl Vali would be their true friend.
Jarl Vali. Such a strange sound those words had together.
It was a delicate balance, to persuade a man both that the alliance was sound and peaceable and that, were it not, Vali would be the stronger friend, but Vali had always been good with words.
When Brenna and Ivar’s wife, Alva, returned, Vali moved the conversation to a more neutral topic and then stood to take his wife’s hand. She wore leather breeches and tunic on the karve, but in the jarls’ halls, she had reverted to more elegant, womanly dress—all of which had been taken from the belongings Hilde had left behind. Vali would be glad to get his wife to their own hall, where clothes might be made new for her.
“We would like to walk the town on our own for the afternoon, if we have your leave,” Vali said, pulling Brenna close.
Ivar, an old, grandfatherly man with a snow-white beard, the braid of which lay over his vast belly, yet still hale and astute despite his years, smiled and laid a gnarled hand on Brenna’s shoulder. “Of course. I remember you both as young children. You were strong then and you have grown into legends. It pleases me that I may call you friends and equals now.”
“May I ask, Jarl Ivar…does my mother yet live?”
Ivar made a serious face. “Dagmar Wildheart. Yes, I believe she lives. She has not been to Halsgrof in many a year, but I am certain word would have come to me if she had gone on from this world. Do you know nothing of her?”
“No. I have had no word since my father died, long ago.”
“Brenna God’s-Eye. I’m sure it has been difficult to live with such a gift as Odin gave you. I saw with my own eyes how you struggled as a child, and I imagine that what I saw was little more than a flash of understanding. I realize why you might have run away. But you have done your mother a grave injustice all these years. Perhaps you are now my equal, but I am much older than you, so I speak the wisdom of age when I tell you: to lose one child is a great agony. To lose them all—I cannot imagine that pain. To lose one while she lives? Even gods have been driven mad by such a loss.”
Vali sensed Brenna’s back straighten in self-defense, and he wasn’t surprised at the edge in her voice when she answered, “I know the pain of losing a child.”
Ivar’s expression softened. “Then I am deeply sorry for you both.” He turned and held out his hand to Alva, who came near and took it. “But perhaps knowing that pain, you might find compassion for her?”
“Thank you for your wisdom, Jarl Ivar.” Brenna’s tone was chilly. Knowing her the way he did, Vali understood that Ivar had made a much greater impression than she would admit.
~oOo~
She was quiet as they walked through Halsgrof toward the woods. Vali noted the smithy, but he barely looked. That was not his father’s shop. The sounds and smells of it turned his stomach, but that was always the case, whenever he neared any smithy anywhere. It was a phantom memory, without fists.
Once in the woods, near the shoreline, Brenna paused at a great old tree. Vali took no special meaning for the place, but his wife crouched at a small nook in the base of the tree and stroked it as if she expected the bark to feel her touch.
“It’s so small.”
He crouched at her side. “I don’t understand, my love.”
“When we came to town, my mother and father would send me away while they did their business. Mother would give me a bit of hacksilver for the sweets-monger, but I never used it. I hated going there, where all the children were. Adults were fearful or suspicious, but children were mean. So instead, I would come here, and tuck myself down into this nook. I would spend the afternoon almost asleep, my eyes closed, telling myself stories about what my life would be like. I imagined myself to be a great shieldmaiden and voyager. I even imagined that I might be jarl someday myself.”
“And you achieved all of that.”
She smiled. “You are jarl, not I.”
“I would hand the title to you in the space between two beats of my heart.”
“No. I don’t want it. When I was a girl, all I saw was the wealth and comfort. Now I know what goes on behind. And I don’t speak well with people. I will stand with you, but it is right that you are jarl.” She stroked the tree again. “I cannot believe that I ever fit into such a tiny space.”
“You were very small when first I saw you. You grew tall and strong since, but then, I took you for much younger than you were.”
“I was in my little nook when I heard you and your father. You and he were there.”
She pointed to a stand of pines not far off, and suddenly the memory of that day struck him in violent, vivid detail. He shut his eyes and shook his head at the force of it.
“Vali?”
The memory of his father’s abuse, and of his own terror as his tongue was yanked forward, and as the knife bit into it, gave way to the sound of Brenna’s young voice, loud and sure, full of righteous fire and fury.
“Vali?” Brenna laid her hand on his arm, and he opened his eyes.
That small girl who’d save him from the horror of that day, who had saved him from so much more, was the great woman at his side now. A storied shieldmaiden. His wife.
“I love you, Brenna God’s-Eye.”
Usually, she flinched when that name was used, but this time, she smiled—the first full, brilliant smile he had seen from her since they had been reunited. “And I love you.”
He slid his hand into her hair and made a fist, knotting the tresses with his fingers. “I love you. I love you. I love you.” He kissed her.
Over and over, he repeated those three words, punctuating each repetition with a kiss, and as he did so, he took control of her. He laid her down on ground soft with moss and fallen pine needles, and he pulled her finely woven gown up her strong, scarred, beautiful legs.
There in the woods where they’d first met, he loved her deep and long.
~oOo~
The next morning, Ivar happily lent them two fine, strong horses for the ride to the village of Brenna’s birth. The occasion of riding horseback provoked Brenna to ask about Freya. Vali considered telling her that the mare was safe, but instead he told her the truth.
Her eyes glittered with sadness, but she nodded. “It was a good offering. The gods were with you, so they saw her worth.”
Vali believed that as well. For all they had suffered—for all Brenna had suffered—now they were together and strong, and they had set right more than merely their own lives.
Perhaps they were about to set right one thing more.
It was past midday when they approached a tiny cluster of buildings. Brenna’s posture changed, as if she were trying to see more clearly.
“This is your village?”
“It is where I was born, yes. Up that hill there, deep in the woods, is where Oili lives. If she still lives. She was an old woman when I was a child. She is a healer and a völva—it was what my mother meant for my l
ife. But if my eye is Odin’s gift, and if any power at all comes from it, it is not the power of the sight.”
“No. It is the power of the spirit. Your spirit is stronger than anyone I’ve ever known, shieldmaiden. You have a godly spirit.”
She turned to him. “Then you do believe my eye is inhuman?”
“I believe it does not matter. However you came to bear Yggdrasil and all the colors of the worlds in your right eye, whether it was a gift from Odin or an accident of birth, your spirit is a mighty thing. If your eye is the way that people see your greatness, then so be it. Perhaps that was all the gift Odin thought you needed: no mystical power, merely something to set you apart.”
She cocked her head, thinking about his words, and then she smiled. “I like to think of it that way. That feels right. All my life I’ve struggled to understand, but that feels right.”
They had been riding as they’d spoken, and Brenna had led them off to the east, toward the wooded hill. They neared a small homestead that seemed to have fallen on hard times. None of the village seemed prosperous, but this stead was in dire need of repair.
Brenna nudged her horse forward and took the lead. She pulled up just outside a door. Before she could dismount, the door opened, and an old woman stepped out. Her hair was a dull, greying blonde, woven into a simple braid over her shoulder. She wore an oft-mended woolen dress and worn leather shoes. But she stood tall and straight, a simple woolen shawl over her shoulders.
Was this Oili, the old völva?
She stood in the doorway and stared up at Brenna, her eyes wide and her mouth agape.
Vali noticed that her eyes were the exact color of Brenna’s left eye—the clear blue of summer sky.
This was Dagmar Wildheart.
At the same moment Vali knew her, she fell to her knees. “Brenna.”
Brenna dismounted and held out her hand. “Mother.”
Dagmar Wildheart, a storied shieldmaiden in her own right, reached up and clutched her daughter’s hand, but she did not rise. Instead, on her knees before her only living child, she wept.
~oOo~
There had been no effusive exchanges of apologies between these two strong women, no heartfelt cries of mutual love. Brenna had asked her mother to stand, and Dagmar had composed herself and stood. They had embraced stiffly, and then Brenna had introduced her mother to Vali.
Then they had gone into the derelict house, and Dagmar had offered them a meager meal.
Vali sat back and watched them as they navigated their reunion. What was clear to him, in this dreary house, seeing mother and daughter face to face, was that Brenna was the stronger of the two. Dagmar might have fought trolls in her youth, she might have fought in Jötunheim and killed giants—the stories would have it so, at least—but she had been broken. She had lost her children, and she had lost her husband, and she had given up that which was her own self and closed what was left off to rot along with this house.
Vali didn’t think there was any loss that would cause Brenna to give up herself.
Clearly, Dagmar would die here; she was waiting to die here. Without knowing why he did so, Vali suggested that she go with them to Karlsa. Both women agreed with little resistance. Brenna gave him a surprised glance, but then she nodded and reinforced the idea. By the time they retired to the straw mat on the floor, they had decided that Dagmar would leave her single goat and her five chickens for Oili, and they would pack up whatever belongings she wished to keep and ride for Halsgrof and the docks the next morning.
~oOo~
The next morning, Vali opened the door while the women were still dressing and came face to face with a tiny, ancient hag with wild white hair.
“Hello,” he said, surprised.
“You are the wolf,” said the old woman. “And the storm.”
“And you are the völva.” It wasn’t a leap to guess that she was Oili.
“You brought the God’s-Eye home, and now you mean to take the Wildheart away.”
He wondered if the old woman ever used anyone’s name. “I do.”
“That is good. Her heart has not been wild these long years since. She has more story to tell, but it won’t be told here.”
He felt Brenna’s hand on his back and sidestepped so she could come through. The old woman gasped, her toothless mouth wide, and rushed up to Brenna, reaching with her spotted, clawed hands. Vali lunged between them. “Watch what you do, old woman.”
“It’s all right, Vali,” Brenna said. “She means no harm.” She pulled on his arm until he stepped aside again. He felt a bit ridiculous, shielding Brenna from an ancient woman barely as tall as his elbow, but she was a völva, so who knew what she might be capable of.
“Hello, Oili,” Brenna said and held out her hand. The old woman grabbed it and turned the palm up. She brushed her shriveled fingers over it, frowning down as if in great concentration, muttering to herself all the while. Then she gasped again and stared up into Brenna’s face.
Letting go of Brenna’s palm, Oili stepped close and laid her hand, as flat as she could make it, on Brenna’s belly.
“Your womb thrives and fills again. You nurture a great warrior, Brenna God’s-Eye. Songs and stories will be made for her. Her light will be bright and warm as the sun.”
As Vali watched, his heart pounding with growing joy, Brenna laid her hand over Oili’s on her belly. “I am with child?”
“Not often do the gods let me see so much so clearly. It will not be an easy carrying, but if you are strong, she will be. You will need your mother with you. Go north and make your home. You and the wolf will fill it full with daughters and sons, until the day your family is complete.”
Brenna shook her head and dropped her hand from Oili’s. “It can never be complete.”
Oili patted her cheek. “Your boy of thunder waits for you, God’s-Eye. The gods keep him well until the day you join him.”
With that, the völva stepped back and reached into her patched hangerock and pulled out a small, soft leather pouch on a cord. She took it from her neck and held it out to Brenna. “Give this to your mother. Tell her I thank her for the goat and chickens.”
Then the old woman turned and shuffled away.
For a few stunned moments, Vali and Brenna watched her go. Then Vali went to his wife and knelt before her, laying his own hands on her belly. She was still so skinny.
“Do you think it is true?” He leaned his head against her.
Brenna laid her hands on his head. “Oili is a true völva. Think of all she knew of us. Yes, it is true.”
He stood and took hold of her chin. “She said it would be a hard carrying. I would keep you safe and comfortable. I would have you let me take that care. Please.”
“She said I should be strong, and that our daughter would be. Don’t try to make me weak. But I promise to be careful. And I promise to try to be patient with you and your care.”
He grinned. “That is enough. Now I want to get you home. To our home.”
His magnificent wife cupped his face in her hands and beamed up at him. “You are my home, Vali. I need no other.”
Oili had not overstated the difficulty of this pregnancy. From nearly the moment Brenna’s feet touched Karlsa soil, she had been sick and sore. The babe rested high, and as she grew she seemed to crush Brenna’s lungs and stomach so that she could never catch a full breath and she struggled always to keep any food long enough to nourish them both.
Olga and Dagmar had both fussed without cease, and Vali had nearly gone out of his head. Brenna had been weak and ill enough by the end that she accepted any and all care offered to her. The truth was that, even knowing the prophesy, she felt sorry for herself and struggled to keep her spirit.
She had found it easier to stay strong when she had been shackled in Åke’s dark hovel.
She worried endlessly that Oili had been wrong, or that there had been some twist in the words of the seeing that would take her happiness away. Prophesies were slippery, their import subje
ctive. She thought of how Åke had taken his last prophesy. He had thought it meant his great success, but instead it had meant his ruin.
While she had struggled and suffered, Karlsa prospered. They had been welcomed as heroes, and there had been a great celebration when Vali reported that not only had Åke been defeated, but Vali himself was their new jarl.
Then, mere weeks after Vali, Brenna, and Dagmar had landed in Karlsa, just as the first snows of winter lay over the ground, many of the warriors who had stayed behind in Geitland arrived, reporting that Calder and his ships had returned, and that Leif had killed Calder in single combat. Eivind and Ulv, with the rest of Åke’s raiders, had been given the chance to swear fealty to Leif and save their heads. Eivind had refused. Ulv had sworn to Leif.
God's Eye (The Northwomen Sagas #1) Page 30