I feel like the queen of the sea, like there is a power within me that is so strong it’s frightening, but I am still proud of it—immensely.
AARIC
“She looks like a goddess,” Gunnar rasps from next to me.
We’re both holding onto the side of the ship as it rocks with the waves. I don’t tell him that I am the reason his feet are unsteady beneath him as the boat rocks and water splashes inside. Instead, I am focused on my wife.
She indeed does look like a goddess, like a sea goddess. She belongs at the bow of a ship. It is her rightful place, the bow of my ship.
“Aaric, what has happened?” he asks.
I don’t say anything right away. I’m intently watching her. The mist has started to dissolve, but the waters are growing rougher with each passing minute.
“She is angry with me,” I admit.
“I gathered that.”
Without turning my gaze away from her, she is too majestic to look away from. I am enthralled by every single aspect of her right now. My heart speeds at the sight of her, the way she looks almost otherworldly.
Something flashes to the side. I see it out of the corner of my eye. Turning my head to look directly at it, I let out a gasp. Nobody hears me thankfully and I’m glad, because standing on the water, right next to my boat is my father.
My dead father.
I haven’t laid eyes on the man himself for fifteen years, yet here he is standing before me. I know that he is not real, that it is his spirit that’s come to me, but it doesn’t stop my desire to wrap my arms around him in a hug.
“Aaric,” his voice carries.
Walking over to the side of the ship, I lift my hands and curl my fingers around the side. Holding my father’s spirit’s gaze, I gulp as I watch him.
“You must heed the fate that the gods have sent forth for you,” he advises.
“I am trying,” I whisper.
He nods his head once. “You must open your heart to your wife, son.”
“How?” I ask.
It isn’t easy for me to know what to do or how to do it. I have been a warrior since I was a boy. I am the oldest son, I am also the only child my mother and father had together. The woman who gave birth to me died doing so. I have never seen my father in love with my mother.
The woman that he married and had the rest of my siblings with wasn’t my mother. He was respectful and kind toward her, but I doubt he actually loved her. Perhaps he did, but I never saw the evidence of that, the tenderness, the doting. All of the things that I know Liv wants from me, I have never seen them myself.
I recall him telling me stories, when it was just the two of us, about my mother. I know he loved her. He admitted it to me more than once. She was the woman he loved, his heart’s other half, the match that the gods had given him for lifelong companionship and devotion.
“I loved your mother, completely. She was my soul’s other half. If you do not accept Liv, if you do not allow yourself to fall in love, you will forever be lost on earth and in the afterlife.”
“Are you lost?” I ask.
He shakes his head, giving me a sad smile. “Nei, Aaric. I loved your mother. I cared for my other wife, but I loved your mother. She was waiting for me in Valhalla. Dhuis kept her safe for me, we were reunited.”
“Fadir,” I rasp.
His lips turn up into a sad smile as his eyes look over my face. “The gods grow frustrated with you. Quit being stubborn, my boy. She is your fated.”
I open my mouth to say something else, to ask him a dozen questions that are just on the tip of my tongue, but he disappears before I have the opportunity.
Gunnar’s hand clamps down on my shoulder and squeezes a few moments later. I haven’t looked away from where my father was, afraid that he will appear again and I’ll miss it.
He doesn’t.
“Go to your víf,” Gunnar murmurs.
Turning to look at him, I wonder if I should tell him of my decision. The one that will change his life forever. I could make him wait until we return. Shaking my head, I clear my throat, then decide to tell him my decision.
“You will marry Sylvi,” I announce.
“Aaric?” he asks with a hitch of his breath.
I shrug a shoulder. “You love her?” I ask. He presses his lips together, his eyes telling me everything that I truly need to know. “She is yours upon our return. You will wed.”
“What about the warrior on Faraway Isle?”
My lips twitch into a smirk. “He will listen to his konungr and do as I say, if he does not, then blood will be shed. Does not matter, Gunnar. Sylvi chooses you, who am I to deny her happiness for an alliance?”
Gunnar’s eyes smolder with a raging fire that I don’t think I’ve ever seen in the height of battle before. He clears his throat, then before he says anything, he wraps both of his arms around my shoulders in an embrace.
“I love her,” he rasps. “Something changed the last raid we went on, when we came back. I fell for the woman.”
Slapping his back, we both clear our throats. He steps back, his eyes finding mine. “I will forever care for her, Aaric.”
“I know that you will. If you don’t, you will answer to your konungr.”
His lips twitch, and he nods his head. “I will, indeed. What about you, Aaric? Are you going to soothe your víf?”
Flicking my gaze up to Liv’s back, my lips twitch into a small smile. She very much still looks like the goddess of the sea at the bow of my ship. This is where she belongs, this is where she is free, where her spirit is at ease. This is where I will endeavor to bring her—often.
Walking away from Gunnar, I head toward my fagr.
Chapter Twenty-Six
LIV
I stand at the front of the ship for longer than I should. Eventually the waters calm as I calm as well. The mist completely disappears and everything goes back to normal, or as normal as things can be in some alternate universe that has magic, pink sand, green water, and blue sparks fly from my husband’s tattoos and eyes randomly.
“Liv,” Aaric’s voice rumbles.
Turning around, I lift my gaze to meet his. His lips turn up and it’s almost a sad smile. Frowning, I take a step toward him. Lifting my hand, I press my palm against his bare chest, right where his tattoos are.
“Aaric?” I whisper.
He lets out a sigh. “I do not know how to love,” he admits on a murmur.
“What?”
He nods his head once, his eyes focused on mine. “You want me to love you, to say the words and to show you, but I do not know how to do this. I know how to be a warrior, how to be a konungr to my people, how to be a brother to my siblings. I do not know how to love a wife.”
The way he says these words, I know that without a doubt he means them all, every single one of them. Nodding my head, I tip my head back and look into his gorgeous blue gaze.
“We will learn together, Aaric,” I breathe. “I’ve never been in love with a man before. I thought that I had loved, but in the end, it was only lust and nothing more. We’ll learn together,” I repeat.
He dips his chin, his lips brushing mine. I let out a sigh, smiling as I look up at my husband. Maybe there is hope for us yet. I get a weird feeling, as if someone is watching me. Shifting my gaze to the side, something appears out of the corner of my eye and I jump at the sight of it.