“Stop it,” Memory whispers.
“No. Go back, live your lives. I’ll do this.” I wipe the sweat off my forehead and look at Odin. “Let me do this.”
“Ethan, don’t!”
“Enough.” The god’s voice is a heavy whip, cracking over the clearing. We stagger. Memory drops to her knees, and the crow on her wrist flies into the air. “I wander the earth for eternities searching for enlightenment, and yet I’m still surrounded by stupidity,” Odin says. He turns to me. “My son made you a similar offer, and you declined. Why?”
“The sacrifice was too high.”
“You chose a girl’s wishes over a god?” His ancient eyes narrow.
I shrug, which is dumb because the pain from the cut spikes up my arm, and I can’t hold back a shudder.
So did you, the crow says, landing on the head of a stone wolf. Just now. You chose my mother over Yvengvr.
Odin’s brows rise in surprise, and then his face cracks with a smile, and he laughs, another huge boom of thunder. The ground shakes, and I kneel, no longer able to fight the pain and my exhaustion.
“And he says we’re loud?” Faye complains, fingers in her ears.
The god of all gods rises from his throne, and lays his hand on my head. I feel it, the connection, hurtling at me like lightning from his vast mind, and the others are there too, a chorus behind his huge presence.
Then all I see is black, and the voices fade.
28.
Minutes
I’m pacing the tiny hallway outside the bedroom when Mimir comes out and shuts the door behind her. “He’s going to be fine,’ she says. “Exhausted more than anything else. This is mild compared to what I’ve seen him get. I made a salve that should help with the scarring.”
We stand across from one another in the tiny hallway. Curiosity gets the best of me. “So you’re his social worker?”
“Since he was six.” She nods once.
“And you are also Mimir. A witch.”
“The witch. Yes.”
“I’m not sure I understand all this.”
“Yvengvr had to wait many years for the bloodline to come together. Ethan was the wild card. I had to make sure he was protected after his parents were gone.”
“What happened to them?”
She shakes her head. “That is his story to tell. But you can thank me later for helping him make it this far.”
“But you planned this all along? For Ethan to fight Anders? To fight for us?”
“He was a fool if he thought I would sacrifice my own child, not to mention another one I loved just as much. Yes, all of this was orchestrated. He didn’t know what to do but trust me.”
“Thank you for saving us,” I say. She smiles. I look at the door. “Can I go in?”
“Only for a minute. Dean Burnett called me. He thinks we’re already on our way to the station.”
“But he didn’t do anything! Jeremy started that fight.”
“Jeremy doesn’t have a record.” She places her hand on my arm in sympathy. “I hate it for him, but I have no choice and Ethan knew the consequences.”
“It’s not fair.”