Page 82 of Rune

At that moment, almost as if she was waiting for his permission to move,Móðirstood and beseeched the clan to follow her up the trail, whereFaðirwas tending to a second fire.

The entire crowd shifted to this altar, bent their heads, and cried out to the gods.

“Save Rune from the Beckoning,” they said. “Let her return to us.”

I sucked in a quick puff of air, watching my parents with their noses against the ground, pleading to the gods to save me. Pleading just as hard as they had with Tova. Despair in every note of their wails. I sank to my knees beside mymóðirand put a hand on her back, feeling the roughtexture of her wooly coat. She gave no indication that she felt me. But I willed her to feel my presence. To know I was okay.

From Tova’s recount, they’d believed I’d run away. I had run away. But then the gods chose their mortals, and I never returned. They must have thought I’d been chosen as well. It was a despairing thing to believe, for if that were true, only one of their daughters had hope of returning to them. We could not both live.

A tear streaked down my cheek. “I am here,” I whispered. “You have not lost me.”

“I wanted you to see this.” Balder was at my side now, bent besideMóðir. His eyes were gentle. “I know the Viking way is harsh, and it is difficult to form attachments to something you think you will lose.” He meant me. I was the thing they thought they would lose when I was little. He went on. “But they care. They’ve always cared. I wanted you to see how much.”

The scene hit me hard—my sisters crying and parents with stiff expressions like they were one gust away from cracking. They didn’t just break for Tova. They broke for me.

My thoughts drifted back to the altar Ve brought me to when he showed me the gifts mortals had left for young Astrid. I’d cried at the thought of love gone wasted when I’d been yearning for it my entire life. Specifically, the love of my parents. I couldn’t know what it was to look at a dying child, and how they must have detached themselves from me to prepare their hearts for loss, but I’d thought the love never returned after that. Worse, I believed I would never have a welcome place in Danmark.

This was only a burning fire, but to me, it was a mark. There would be burned wood, a charred place on the ground, and smoke hanging inthe air. A piece of Danmark would be different because of someone’s love for me.

Having someone care for you enough for that love to imprint the world was the greatest form of endearment.

It was lasting. It was eternal. It was like faith that never wavered.

The last idea was a punch to my gut.

My faith had wavered. It more than wavered, it split like a branch in winter with no life to support it. A second tear fell, this one heavier.

“I’d cast it away,” I said as I stood from mymóðir. “I’d thrown away my faith. When you met me in the vineyard, I didn’t believe the gods were real. I didn’t believe in anything.” Shame plunged a deep knife into my chest until it was difficult to lift my chin to see Balder.

But Balder, instead of rebuking me for such a thing, smiled. There wasn’t a hint of judgment to his tone. “It is natural to doubt.”

“I more than doubted. I cursed you. I hated the thought of gods who didn’t answer prayer, who only took sacrifices and pretty words and gave us nothing. There was no love left in my heart for any of it.”

Even still, his expression was soft. He swept his eyes over the mountainside. “Look at the trees.”

I frowned. “Do you not hear me, Balder? I don’t deserve a place in Asgard. I threw my faith away.”

“Look,” he said with more force. “Study the pines. Tell me, which did Ve paint?”

For a moment, he sounded like the man I’d met in the vineyard whose words were nonsense. I turned to the trees where wind rattled the branches like shivering bones. “But these aren’t painted. They are real.”

He spread a slow hand around him, signaling everything. “No, we gods paint the world as we see fit. Some of these trees were from Ve’s imagination. Get a good look, and tell me which ones he drew.”

I tried to quickly absorb that while pulling in the details of the trees. As far as I could tell, they were natural pines, with reasonable differences as trees should have, but nothing to tell me whose hand had crafted them. I tried to guess anyway. I pictured Ve with a brush in hand, carefully creating any of these wonders. But Balder shook his head at each one. Finally, I relented. “I don’t know. I’ve never seen him paint.”

His smile told me that was exactly what he was looking for. I still didn’t understand.

“You have never seen Ve paint,” Balder repeated. “You haven’t spent enough time with him to know what his paintings look like. In the same way, you hadn’t spent enough time with the gods to know the way our hands moved. We moved all around you, but if you don’t know us, how can you see when we act? How do you know what a tender hug from us feels like if you’ve never sought it out? How do you know what our whispers sound like if you don’t know our voice? Spend time with us and you will know it when we move.”

The words sunk in. He was right. I’d been afraid of the gods. Angry with the gods. Tried to please them so I’d have approval. Even demanded things from them. But I never sat to speak with them like a friend. There had been no relationship at all.

Balder had shown me much today. More than I thought possible. I dried my eyes. “You have fair points.”

He smiled. “Good.” Then he glanced to the sun. “We need to leave the land of mortals now. Are you ready?”

This time, I was. My path ahead felt more concrete. I no longer wavered in what I had to do or where I was meant to be. My life wouldn’t be like it was before, built with callousness and strife—I would seek the beauty, seek the gods, and find room in my heart for my family.

I silently gave my parents my promise.I will return, I promise.

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