Her friends and family were sitting in a line against the longhall’s rear wall, backs pressed to the familiar tapestries. Riki lay with his head in their mother’s lap, still unconscious. A half dozen Archean soldiers stood guard, everything about them from the sounds of their voices and loud laughter to their postures indicating their sense of ownership over the situation.

Six soldiers. Black quilted gambesons, broad belts, leather caps, short swords at hand. Some were availing themselves of the breakfast left on the long trestle table that ran down the length of the hall beside the central fire pits.

All were at ease.

There was no sign of the commander. Through the ruined front doors across the hall Skadi could make the brightness of the morning, the movement of bodies, hear barked commands, the wails of the bereaved.

All emotion within her tightened into a fist. Her fear, her panic, her horror - all of it consolidated into a brutal nugget of dark and gleaming iron.

Skadi rose to her feet.

The closest soldier, a broad-shouldered oaf, his cheeks shaved, his hands monstrously large and hairy, turned idly and caught sight of her.

Their eyes met.

His widened in alarm and he took a step back, then he caught himself, forced a grin, and pointed with his stolen mug of ale as he spoke in Archean to his friends.

Surprise and amusement flickered across the other five faces as they all turned to study her. One of them, older, his face seamed and hard, frowned, suddenly wary.

“Guess you’re hungry for more of Patroclus’ shaft. But it’s my shaft you’ll have to settle for,” said the oafish soldier in heavily accented Nord, walking toward her, eyes heavy lidded. “A bright young thing like you. Agota’s going to cheer you right up. Make you smile.”

“Skadi, run!” cried Alfifa, her mother’s best friend. “Run!”

Skadi stood still, Natthrafn pressed against her thigh. She felt herself a thing, a weapon, without fear, without hate.

A sentence of judgment upon these six men.

And all the while her golden threads extended from her healed heart, the pain of the captain’s blow sharp but manageable.

Her expression checked Agota’s approach. He slowed, wary, blade in hand. He’d seen more than thirty summers and moved with the confidence of a man used to fighting.

No easy prey.

Had Freyja’s gift improved her own martial ability? Natthrafn felt comfortable in her hand, an extension of her arm, but no, Skadi realized; she was fundamentally still herself alone, a jarl’s daughter who’d played at war and watched the huscarls train the younger boys.

Agota reached for her arm.

From far, far away, Skadi heard the blood curdling snarls of Naglufr.

She slashed up with Natthrafn, trying to cut off Agota’s hand, but he snatched it back and raised his own blade, his smile turning ugly.

“So that’s how you want to play. Agota’s an old hand at this game.”

His blade was only slightly longer than her own, but hers was a needle compared to his cleaver. His arms were nearly as thick as her thighs. There’d be no parrying a blow from him.

He feinted, stepped back, laughed when she flinched. Turned as if to check on his friends, then rushed her, swinging at her face.

Skadi ducked under the blow, tried to sidestep, but his arm wrapped around her waist, the pommel of his blade descending toward her brow.

But then it wasn’t. Her vision doubled, and in a second she saw herself slash at his grasping arm with Natthrafn, parting his black sleeve, severing tendons, splitting flesh.

One of her golden threads faded from view.

Agota roared in pain, stumbled, and Skadi stepped past him, lashing backward with her slaughter seax to pass its edge across his neck, just above the thick, quilted collar, and part the flesh.

Agota took three steps, gurgled, then fell.

The other five guards went rigid with shock.

“You northern whore,” rasped one of them, half his face burned away by an old injury. Eyes hard, he and two others approached, tossing their food and drinks aside, spreading out wide to come at her from the sides.

Hesitation meant death.

Skadi burst into a run, leaped, fell upon the burnt man. He slashed at her, would have cut her in half mid-leap, but her vision doubled once more; instead he stumbled as he now stepped back, his cut losing strength, and she fell upon him like a mountain cat upon a yearling sheep, riding him to the ground, her seax sinking into the base of his throat and plunging down his gullet, into his chest.

They hit the floor and she rolled forward, off him, Natthrafn pulling free, to leave the man drowning in his own blood.

She came up into a crouch.

Another of her golden threads faded from view.

The two flanking soldiers exchanged a nervous glance.

Skadi rose, swept up a red enameled jar filled with white ale and hurled it at the first, then ran with a cry at the second, slashing with her seax, a flickering attack like a fistful of lightning.

He gave way, fended off her blows, his confidence near ruined, eyes wide with panic. He swiped clumsily at her head, signaling the blow well in advance, and it was child’s play to duck under and in, stab the seax into his bulging gut, twist and tear it out sideways, opening him up like a feast day pig.

“Skadi, watch out!”

She knew not who yelled, but she jerked aside just as a blade stabbed through where she’d been. No doubling of vision - an honest dodge. She wheeled, heart pounding, pounding, her throat closed tight, and slashed Natthrafn across the man’s face as he turned to attack again.

Opened his cheek, slashed through the bridge of his nose, cut a fine line through an inch of his skull.

He screamed, put a hand to his ruined face, and struck out wildly at her. She was flat footed, unable to react in time; his cleaver of a sword hacked right into her stomach.

Or would have - instead, that same doubling, and instead he stepped on a fallen mug, his foot flew out from under him, and he crashed to the ground.

Skadi fell on him like a vulture, stabbed Natthrafn’s point through his gambeson, right into his heart, and the man’s screams cut off.

Panting, she looked up, stared at the remaining two soldiers. A hard-faced older man and a callow youth, lips bloodless and pressed together tight.

The older man barked out a command in Archean, clearly addressing the youth, his voice tight with tension.

Skadi rose to her feet. Four men she’d killed, and none of them had wounded her. Two bright, golden threads yet extended from her heart, slowly gyring about the room, passing through trestle table and guards, disappearing into walls and ceiling, their runes heavy and potent.

Her mother was gaping, the Nearós Ílios priest, Damian, equally aghast.

Skadi raised Natthrafn. The blood slipped from its blade like water from a puffin’s back, beading and running until it shone silvered and clean.

The young Archean hesitated, eyes wide, then scrambled over the trestle table, kicking wooden bowls in his haste, to land on the far side and vault the fire pit.

Instinct.

Skadi hurled Natthrafn. Seaxes were not meant for throwing, but she felt pressure all around her, felt scrutinized, as if the world itself were holding its breath and watching, and Natthrafn flew true.

It sank to the hilt in the Archean’s back and the young man crashed into the far trestle table and lay still.

Her remaining two golden threads disappeared.

Had she expended them both with the throw? Were they tied to the blade?

Not taking her eyes off the older soldier, she bent and took up an enemy’s sword.

The older man stepped back, his nostrils flared, his jaw clenched, his pulse visibly pounding in a vein across his temple.

He was terrified.

Use that, thought Skadi. She prowled forward, blade held back and behind her like a fox’s tail. He’s seen you slay five men. He knows not that your wyrd is expended.

She glared at him, and it was easy to pour her fury and outrage into her stare. The older man, almost forty, blanched and stepped back again. His blade wavered, and he clasped it with both hands.

“You cannot stand against me,” said Skadi, not caring if the man understood. “I am blessed by Freyja. You will die like your friends.”

The older man took another step back. Damian, the priest, rose up behind him and brought a stout stool down upon his head with all the strength in his body.

The crack of wood on bone was audible, the leather cap doing little to soften the blow, and the last Archean pitched forward.

Damian stared down at the man, his alarm evident, his golden eyes wide.

“By the gods,” said Skadi’s mother, rising swiftly to her feet. “Freyja must have blessed you in truth, girl. I never saw the like.” But then she caught herself, the shouts and wails from outside breaking through her shock. “Alfifa, Gudrun, help me with Riki. The rest of you, gather the children. Our only chance is to flee into the mountains.”

So like her mother, decisive and quick. The stunned women broke out of their stupor and moved to do as they were bid.

“How did you do that?” asked Damian, his Nord soft and lilting with his Nearós Ílios accent.

Skadi felt lightheaded and grinned at the handsome priest. “It wasn’t my wyrd to die today.”

“Apparently not.” She’d never seen the young priest so shaken. His golden cat eyes darted to and fro, and he ran a hand through his thick, tousled black hair. When he’d first arrived at Kalbaek a year ago, half the village girls had fallen for his exotic looks, his tawny skin, and neatly trimmed beard and mustache. But his pacifism, willingness to forgive slights, and endless focus on sharing his religion had killed their interest one by one.

Natthrafn.

Skadi stepped onto the bench, leaped the trestle table neatly, then vaulted the smoldering coals in the fire pit to land before the slain youth. Gripped her seax’s handle and tugged it free, the slender blade slipping out of the Archean’s back with terrible ease.

Two golden strands appeared about her, emerging like rays of the sun from her heart.

A large figure darkened the doorway, powerfully built and with a massive sword athwart his shoulders.

Patroclus. He didn’t seem surprised, nor upset at the sight of his dead soldiers; instead, he studied Skadi, his one eye narrowing, and he smiled.

Skadi stared in turn; a cluster of threads emerged from the captain’s heart, golden and fine as her own, but too many to count at a glance. Ten? Twenty? They grew more diffuse the farther they stretched from him, their runes enlarging and also losing focus. The air about the man was heavy with a dusty gold radiance.

So many threads. His wyrd was powerful, overwhelming.

She heard again Urdr’s voice, the matron norn, echo in her mind: “You are blessed, not immortal. Those with greater wyrds shall crush you beneath their heels as if you were no more than an empty eggshell.”

“I’ve learned to trust my instincts,” said the commander in smooth Nord, stepping into the hall. Behind her, Skadi sensed her people freeze like field mice in the presence of an owl. “Rarely do they play me false. I thought you dead. Yet here you stand. I shall not make the same mistake twice.”

Skadi tightened her grip on Natthrafn. Desperate, furious, she called out, voice imperious, “Mother! Get away! I will hold him while I can.”

An agonized silence, and then she heard her mother whisper harshly, “You heard her. Help me with Riki. Go. Go!”

The captain shrugged his huge sword down and gripped the long hilt with both hands. “I admire your bravery, young maid. But I’ve hewn down heroes in my time. You are not such.”

The longer she kept him talking, the more time her people had to flee. “Some hero killer you are. Sent to fight old men and unbearded boys. Even then you brought twice the needed number.”

Patroclus sneered. “What you might call cowardice the Archean Empire calls efficiency. It’s why we’re conquering your king’s islands with such ease. Who are you?”

“Skadi Styrbjörnsdóttir, daughter of Jarl Styrbjörn Sorenson, granddaughter of Soren The Gaunt. You stand in my father’s hall and are not welcome here. Leave or I shall have your head.”

The captain laughed. “Well met, Skadi. I am Patroclus Choniates, Kentarchia of the Archean Third Army. Shall we?”

To her surprise, Damian moved into her field of vision, his stool held warily before him, down the line of the trestle tables, his handsome face tight with fear and determination.

“Let’s,” said Skadi, and with a fell mixture of despair and determination stepped up onto the trestle table to face the kentarch.