Page 40 of Valkyrie Song

He can't die now. I need him. More than I need air or Light or hope, I needhim. He's my destiny, my shelter, my home. Without him, there is no future worth saving for me.

Something—some instinct or desperate need, perhaps—flickers through me. I reach for him without conscious thought, sending every ounce of Light I have pouring into him.

"He's mine, do you hear me? This warrior is mine!" I cry, willing to defy the Gods themselves if that's what it takes to keep him right here. Where I go, he goes. Not a step more. That was his promise, and I intend to hold him to it.

His body lifts from the ground, blazing like a tiny sun.

My sisters cry out all around me, but I barely hear them. And when they reach for me, I barely feel them. I'm too focused on Stephan, on keeping him right here, tethered to me the way he promised.

I don't even know what I'm doing as I reach for his soul, pouring every ounce of Light I possess into it. I pour my love and devotion into it, binding myself to it along every path I can find and every new avenue I'm able to forge. I keep on and on, until I can't breathe or think or move.

I funnel everything into him—down to my soul, giving him every single piece of me.

"You have to stop!" Rissa cries, trying to pry my hands from his body. "Kara, please! Stop!"

My hands slip from his body as my sisters pull me backward. I lose my grip on the Light. Or perhaps it simply burns out. I'm not sure, but a final wave of it rips through me and into Stephan, taking the last of my breath with it.

I list to the side, the whole world losing focus.

"I love you, Stephan," I whimper, slipping into the inky blackness of unconsciousness.

Stephan waits for me there. At least, some version of him does.

"Come back to me, Valkyrie," he whispers, his callused hands running across my cheeks, as gentle andrealas ever. "Come back to me."

Grief and pain well in my chest at the sound of his voice, at the trickery of my dreams. Not even here can I forget: Stephan is dead. He lied. He left me. And he didn't even take me with him.

And no matter how much Light I poured into him, I couldn't save him. I failed.

"Come back to me, princess. Please." His lips brush mine, his hands tangled in my hair. "Ég fer þangað sem þú ferð."

Something in his voice—in his kiss—sends a jolt through me. It's grief and pain. As if I'm hurting him.

My eyes fly wide open.

For long moments, my mind refuses to comprehend what I'm seeing. I'm stretched across the ground, my head in Stephan's lap, his worried face bent toward mine. My sisters hover in the distance, their mates behind them. But…it isn't possible.

I watched him die. I felt him die. And exactly like I feared, I couldn't save him.

There is no comprehending how he's here now. It doesn't make sense. It isn't real.

I tell myself that over and over…right up until I feel him whispering to me through the bond, his thoughts flooding into me, filling me with warmth, with Light. With hope.

"S-Stephan?"

He smiles, his piercing gray eyes full of softness. The same devotion echoes in his mind, thrumming through me in powerful waves of gold. "I love you too, Valkyrie," he breathes. "Ek elska þik."

I push against his chest and feel how solid it is. Tears spring to my eyes, hope growing. "You're alive." My bottom lip quivers.

"Nei."

"I don't understand," I whisper.

"You needed a sacrifice, princess," he murmurs. "That's what the Bifröst tried to show you. Valkyrie can travel beyond the Veil, but they need the soul of a warrior to Light the way. Without one, no matter how hard you try, the Portal won't take you where you need to go. It can't." He nods toward the Bifröst. "It was designed to protect the Veil at all costs."

"I…" I crane my head, glancing toward the Bifröst, not sure what to say.

The varulv no longer pour from it. And it's no longer flickering. The surface is calm and clear, serene even.

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