“You left her!” Bjorn shouted. “You left her in there alone!”
His words barely registered as the wound gaped, invisible fingers digging into my flesh and stretching it wide. A shrill scream tore from my lips. Rivulets of blood snaked across my chest and down my arms, invisible hands wrenching me left and then right.
“Freya!”
I howled in response, fighting to get away from the god’s grip, knowing that I’d been judged unworthy and that Hlin herself was going to rip me apart. My knees left the ground, the goddess lifting me into the air like a doll, blood gushing in torrents from the wound that now reached down to the bone, the white of my sternum visible. What felt like claws dug into muscle and bone, pulling and pulling.
“Ylva, break the circle!”
The lady of Halsar only gaped in horror, for it was too late.
My rib cage sprung wide, revealing my pulsing heart. Thump thump. Thump thump.
I screamed and screamed, and then with a sudden whoosh, I dropped to the ground. Gasping, I dug my fingers into the sand, certain I had only a few heartbeats of life left in me.
“Freya?” Hands gripped my arms.
I looked up into Bjorn’s panicked eyes even as I heard Ylva screech, “You cursed fool! Do you have any idea of what you might have unleashed?”
Bjorn ignored her, eyes raking over my body. “Are you all right?”
How could he ask that? How could he ask if I was all right when my chest had been ripped open. How…
The thought vanished as I looked down at my naked body, my chest whole but for a thin white scar, not a drop of crimson marring my white skin.
Not possible.
“I…” My mouth was as dry as sand. “She…she—”
“Is she marked?” Snorri was abruptly at my side, lifting my braids and pawing at me, searching. “Did Hlin claim her?”
He grew silent as Bjorn held up my left hand. On the back of it, painted in crimson, was a shield. The detail was unlike anything a mortal artist could have rendered, and with each thud of my heart, the blood forming it pulsed.
“She has been claimed!” Snorri roared. Catching hold of my wrist, he dragged me out of Bjorn’s grasp and to my feet, holding my tattoo up for all to see while I desperately pulled my bodice into place with my free hand. “Hlin has claimed her daughter and we have our shield maiden!”
The crowd, deathly silent until that moment, shouted their approval.
“Let us feast!” Snorri bellowed, finally letting go of me so that I could pull on the sleeves of my dress. “To the great hall!”
As one, the people surged to the hall, ever eager to be fed. Snorri motioned for me to follow them, but Ylva’s cold fingers latched on my right wrist, turning my palm skyward. “Look.”
Unease twisted in my stomach at the sight. It was as though my palm had been tattooed prior to my burns, whatever image that had once been depicted twisted and stretched into an unrecognizable mess.
“A second tattoo,” Snorri murmured. “I’ve never heard of such a thing.”
“Nor I,” Ylva said, and both looked to Bjorn, who shook his head, his gaze fixed on my palm.
“I can’t tell what it depicts.” Snorri bent closer and I curbed the urge to withdraw my hand, disliking the scrutiny.
“Likely because Hlin didn’t have time to finish it before Bjorn went barging in and destroyed my circle,” Ylva snapped.
“Because you abandoned her in there!” Bjorn glared at Ylva. “You’re the volva. You’re supposed to stay in the circle, but you left her in there to be torn apart.”
Snorri stilled. “What precisely did you see, Bjorn? Ylva? For all I saw was Freya on her knees.”
I was tired of being talked over as though I wasn’t even here. “He saw me torn in half.”
Bjorn gave a tight nod. “Was as if she were a prize being warred over, and both sides would rather see her destroyed than concede to the other.”
“A portent.” Snorri exhaled a long breath. “The circle allowed Hlin to grant us a vision. A warning of what is to come and what will occur if we don’t take care: Freya will be destroyed.”
Fear wormed its way down my spine.
“But that’s not all.” Snorri tapped his chin thoughtfully. “She also gave us an answer as to how we might avoid such a fate for Freya. Recall the story of the Binding of Fenrir, in which Tyr sacrifices his arm so that the gods might be protected from the wolf.” He gestured to my scarred hand. “It is clear that you, my son, must sacrifice to protect that which will save us all.”