“He did his duty.” Vali placed his hand beneath her chin to direct her gaze back to his. He could see the guilt plaguing her heart, the guilt that was rightfully his to bear. “This battle was unavoidable, and it is likely that Sorrin would have met his end even if he would not have gone after you. It is not your fault, and I certainly do not blame you for his death. Now, where are you hurt?” She motioned to her shoulder, grimacing as he gently skimmed the exposed flesh with his fingertips.
“That’s a nice slice. May I heal you?”
“I’m fine. It’s only a graze.” Her eyes drifted to the hole in his chest, now gradually sealing shut as the day wore on. “How are you? Last I remembered, you were impaled.”
“It’s only a graze,” he grinned, echoing her stubbornness.
Her stormy eyes widened at him before a graceless giggle slipped from her mouth. “Did you just make a joke?”
He smiled. “I’m heartless, Ailsa. I never joke.”
She tamed her remaining bits of laughter with a firm hand across her mouth. She cleared her throat and took a deliberate step back, realizing how close she’d been standing. “I still hate you,” she said, reminding him as much as herself.
“As you should,” he replied. “But perhaps, just for tonight, you can hate me a little less.” His hand reached for her without thinking, like his head was no longer in control of his body.
She glanced hesitantly at his outstretched arm. “I need to know who you are.” The words came out slow. “I will not continue another step of this journey without knowing what I will face.”
Vali swallowed a large breath, dissolving his resolve. If the Vanir were after them, gods knew what else they would face on the road to Alfheim. The Tree already knew his secrets it seemed. “I will tell you everything you want to know.”
Satisfied, she nodded and accepted his hand. He pulled her in the opposite direction of the clearing where the bodies still piled, venturing deeper into the forest where they could rest for the night and search for their companions in the morning. The sun was setting, and the fog was patching thicker in some places. He needed to set up their camp before it swallowed them completely.
He laid out his cloak for her on the lumpy ground and started a small fire with the remaining kindle of his magic, and once she was comfortable, he finally spoke.
“They call me Vali the Heartless. I am the future High Lord of the Light Elves and the bastard son of the Aesir god, Odin.”
“You’re agod?”
Vali shrugged off her astonishment. “Technically I’m only part god, or a demigod as most like to call me. I have no following, so I’m not a true divine.”
Odin’s fucking eye.The semantics hardly mattered. Ailsa had stabbed the son of the Allfather. Three times, in fact. Her head fell into her palms. “I am so going to Hel now.”
A low sound escaped from his lips, a laugh that originated from deep in his chest. “Wish you’d been a little nicer to me now, don’t you?”
She lifted her gaze from their burrow in her hands to glare at him. “You forget I still have your blade, Vali. If I’ve already ruined my chance to please Odin, then I have nothing left to lose by stabbing you again.”
One of his brows jumped, like the idea excited him. “Always such a heathen.”
“Better than a filthy fae,” she replied. Or a half god—whatever in Hel’s name he was. “What’s the son of an Aesir doing so far from Asgard?”
Vali propped his arm on his knee as he sat against a fallen tree. The flames in the fire between them lowered by the slight of his hand, dancing to the motion of his fingers as he waved them absentmindedly. “Do you know the story of Baldur?”
Ailsa nodded. She knew the legends of the gods by heart. Her father taught her the stories of Odin’s son, Baldur. He was a favorite among the gods, unable to be harmed by anyone or anything in all the Nine Realms until Loki deceived the goddess Frigg into sharing the only element that had not sworn an oath of protection against Baldur. Loki tried to play off his deception, but his act of jealousy could never be undone.
The gods were devastated when he died. It was said Baldur’s wife’s heart literally burst from sorrow and the Aesir were unable to speak through their suffering for weeks. When Baldur could not be taken back from Hel, they took revenge on Loki. But Baldur’s death was the harbinger for the end of the Aesir. Their only chance at defeating Fenrir was now lost in Helheim.
Ever since, Odin has searched for a way to retrieve him from death.
Vali spoke across the fire where he lounged against a fallen ash tree, his arm propped over his knee. He rubbed the cracked blood stain over his chin, wiping it clean, before speaking of a side of history she had not heard before. “My mother was High Lady of Alfheim during those days. She was there when they gave Baldur to the sea and burned his body with his wife on the funeral pyre, as many beings attended his cremation. She once told me Odin’s pain was like a brand on her heart, she could never forget how the god was tormented after losing his favorite son.”
“You must not have been born yet.” Ailsa winked. Vali snorted and pretended to nudge a log in the fire, but she thought his cheeks colored an endearing blush.
“Technically, no, I wasn’t. But to be honest, I’ve never even met Odin.”
“You’venevermet your father? But you’re one of the Aesir!”
Vali shrugged. “I was not born to be his son. I was conceived solely for revenge and redemption. He never claimed me as his own, nor do I have a place in Asgard.”
When his silence replaced an explanation, Ailsa spoke for him. “You said you would tell me everything, but if you have changed your mind, I will not fault you.” She could tell when a man was retreating. Her father looked the same way when she asked him about her mother. He would grow quiet, look anywhere except her eyes, and now Vali was doing the same. He wanted to keep the truth buried deep within his heartless chest.