Freyja and Idunn both nodded.
“What is it you need my daughter to do?” Isabel asked.
Alva turned to her mother and clasped her hand, giving it a tiny squeeze. “I won’t leave you, Momma.”
Isabel smiled. “You will be queen someday, my sweet, and you must see the bigger picture, no matter how difficult it is. If this Bernard—the man you partnered with, right?” Alva nodded and pressed her lips together. “If what he does jeopardizes Midgard, as Freyja believes, then it also jeopardizes Asgard and the other seven worlds. We are all linked, whether by physics that hold our worlds together, those who believe in us, or the love we have for one another.”
Her mother smiled and once more cupped Alva’s cheek, her blue eyes glittering like gemstones. “Go, daughter, and fulfill your destiny. I promise to be here upon your return. Your sisters and these two amazing goddesses—my friends—will keep me safe until then.”
“You swear you will?” Alva whispered, unable to shake the fear building inside her chest. She had lost the father she loved too soon and now her mother—
Isabel leaned forward and kissed Alva’s forehead. “With all my heart, my sweet, I promise.”
Alva reached up and wrapped her arms around her mother’s cool neck and held her close. “I will be incredibly angry with you if you aren’t and will petition Hel to seek out your spirit. You don’t want to see me when I’m angry.”
Her mother chuckled. “I’m quite certain I don’t.” She kissed Alva’s cheek. “I love you, Daughter.”
Alva held her mother a bit tighter. “I love you too, Momma. Please heal...find a way, for me.” Closing her eyes, she breathed in her mother’s scent, memorizing the light floral bouquet of lilies and sunshine, before dropping her arms.
“I will go toSökkvabekkr and seek out Sága for our people, so you don’t need to worry about that,” Adriana said.
“Thank you. I will try to join you—you don’t need to do this all on your own.” Alva jerked to a stand and whirled around to face Freyja. “Send me to where I need to go.” With a sweep of Freyja’s arm, the room dissolved into a whirlpool of browns and grays. In seconds, the darkness of space seeped into the center, the tendril snaking through the earth tones as the more brilliant colors of planets and millions of stars bled into the mixture.
In a single blink, Alva found herself speeding through the multiverse toward her unknown destination. As usual, the frozen matter of space nipped at her heels but never really touched her skin, which she was grateful for. She loved warm weather and abhorred cold.
The few trips she’d taken to Mimir’s well of wisdom for Idunn to get more of the special water had been horrible. Unfortunately for her, the well was in J?tunheimr, beneath the Midgard root of the ash tree, Yggdrasil—the tree of life—and J?tunheimr was a land of ice and snow. She shivered, hating even to think about it.
In the distance, she made out a familiar blue planet. She slowed, and the bright white lights of the incoming stars grew long tails as she hurtled past them. In a blink, she found herself speeding toward a vast blue ocean and a line of several green spots. The green expanses increased, and she slowed until the tip of one boot dug into the white, sandy beach enough to propel her forward a few steps, her arms spinning around her as she regained her balance.
“Excellent coordination, my dear. You would have made an Olympic gold gymnast, you know.”
Freyja stood just off the beach to her right between two tall palm tree trunks. Alva arched one eyebrow at the goddess’s more casual attire. Instead of her regular long, medieval-style gown, she wore a mid-calf, lilac dress covered in white polka dots. The diamond-shaped neckline emphasized her breasts, and the bow hanging between them was just adorable. Her gaze lowered to the dress’s high waist, which was fitted and showed off her slender abdomen. What Alva wouldn’t give to have an hourglass figure like Freyja’s. Instead, she had always felt rather chunky standing beside her.
Alva glanced around the sandy beach, the brilliant sunlight almost blinding as it hit the sparkling sand. Shading her eyes, she squinted, making out buildings in the distance and beyond that, the smokestacks of ships.
“To answer your next question,” Freyja said as Alva faced her once more. “I brought you to Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, for a reason. Today is Sunday, December 7, 1941, and the time is two o’clock in the afternoon. The day is very peaceful and quiet, is it not?”
“Yes, it seems to be. Why, though, is this particular day and time so important?”
Freyja glanced over Alva’s shoulder, then back to her. “This is only one of many events that have been changed. Today is the day Japan bombed the ships here at Pearl Harbor. By the end of the attack, only two hours and twenty minutes after it began, two thousand four hundred people were dead and one thousand two hundred wounded. Three hundred planes were damaged or destroyed, and of the one hundred ships, sixteen of the most important were either sunk or severely damaged. It was this battle that pulled the United States into the war. It was this battle that completed the Allied tripartite because, without America, the Axis Powers would have won the war.”
Alva watched as a young couple strolled toward them on the beach, their hands clasped between them. The man, almost a head taller than the woman, leaned closer to her, his light-brown head almost touching her brunette hair. Alva noticed she was dressed in a pristine-white nurse’s uniform, but they were still too far away to make out their features. Peals of hearty feminine laughter floated toward them as the woman laughed at whatever the man was saying. Two children, a young boy and girl, ran out from behind them, shouting something as they passed.
Freyja grabbed Alva’s arm and pulled her toward the palm trees as the family drew nearer, the goddess standing with her back to them. “They cannot see or hear us, but they would feel something off if they were to run into one of us. Alva, I need you to understand the importance of what this means.”
“Freyja, I do understand. I know how important the Americans were to the war effort, in Africa, Europe, and the Pacific.” Something caught Alva’s attention, pulling her gaze back to the family who were almost even with them as they walked along the beach. Just as she was about to turn back to Freyja, the man’s head rose, his gaze locking with hers. She froze, recognizing Bernard’s incredible gold-specked brown eyes as he returned her stare, then just as nonchalantly looked back to the woman as they strolled away.
“Alva, what is it?”
Ignoring Freyja’s question, she turned, her eyes tracking Bernard’s every step, and took a deep breath. “I believe I may know why the Japanese attack on Pearl never happened.”