Qetsiyah's sorcery blew open a set of granite double doors. She marched into the halls of Eternity with tunnel vision. Her heels struck the marble in a methodical clack, heralding her arrival better than sparking pistols ever could. She sensed the agitation and the disapproval of her line. Strife and contention were not allowed beyond the doors due to the power which resided within those walls. Introducing such emotions into that environment would be the equivalent of detonating TNT in a nuclear power plant.

Usually she observed the rules. Hell, she usually enforced the damn things to show the daughters of her line, she'd changed and now walked in solidarity with them. Not then, though. No, for once she ran her side-eyeing descendants no attention. Her gaze remained locked on their blinder than a damn mole-rat resident seer. Whose blindness had blindsided her! How could she not know of Bonnie's impending two-step into motherhood? She felt like a fucking fool to have heard something she should've already known from Silas of all insignificant assholes.

Aslaug reclined with Emily on a semi-circular sectional under the domed sky light. They both appeared to be enjoying the attentions of a powerful empathic musician who'd taken his life at the height of his career and a prophetic poet who was still hailed by the modern world at large as the greatest rapper of all time. For whatever reason the emo musician believed himself to have inspired the name of their now home. Go fucking figure. It was just like a man to steal credit from a woman, and then attempt to apply the praise to himself. Not everything smelled like teen spirit. (Bonnie so did rip him off. Lmfao!)

"Gentlemen, Emily," she greeted through the tight clench of her teeth, trying her damn best to remain civil.

The men gave her a nod, while Emily assessed her with a stare which appeared one part curious and all remaining parts shade. "Qetsiyah," she finally acknowledged.

Qetsiyah's barely tolerating glance shifted to Aslaug. "It's imperative you and I have a conversation."

"Fellas," Emily said without removing her assessing stare from Qetsiyah. "Will you excuse us for a moment?" The men's head bobbed before they rose from the sofa. "And try not to wander too far, there's still the matter of your reincarnations to discuss."

When the men departed, her gaze flicked to Emily, "You can follow suit."

"No," she settled in for emphasis, "I believe I'll stay."

"You're troubled, what has happened?" Aslaug questioned.

Her hands clenched as she attempted to wrestle her temper into submission. "I don't know, you tell me, Seer."

"Qetsiyah, please. Passive aggressive doesn't become you. A solution will be more readily forthcoming if you just get to the point," Emily said leaning forward to reach for a crystal champagne flute on the leather ottoman before her.

Aslaug stared at her. The Seer's gaze brimmed with expectation. "Please..."

Her eyes rolled, before taking a seat next to Emily. She snatched the bottle of Glenmorangie Grand from the makeshift tea table and filled a flute. Wasting no time she gulped down the biting citrusy and vanilla goodness. Emily's upper lip curled in a—you can't take this bitch anywhere—sneer. While Aslaug regarded her with concern.

Once thoroughly buzzed, she began. "It would seem our Supreme is preggers." The news snatched Emily's head sideways. "A few hundred years before schedule."

Aslaug's eyes bulged from their sockets. "Preggers?"

"With child!" She exploded, while refilling her flute. "She's with child!"

"How?" Emily demanded. "Bonnie hasn't grown enough in her role or powers to alter the path you've laid before her."

"I know," she growled before taking another swig from her glass. "I'd hoped someone here could tell me what the hell is amidst." Her pointed glare impaled Aslaug.

Shock flared the Seer's gaze. Her mouth flapped open and closed as she struggled her way through speechlessness. "And you believe me to be aware?"

"You are the Seer, right? How the hell didn't you see this one coming," Qetsiyah snapped, slamming her flute back down on the ottoman. She was too damned piss to sustain a buzz.

Emily turned completely in her seat to scrutinize her. "Are you certain? Because we would've sensed a new addition to our line."

Qetsiyah snatched her glare from Aslaug and leveled Emily with a fully loaded hatemaker. "Yeah, and when's the last time you've even thought to try?"

They glared at each other for a moment before her descended daughter turned away. She rolled her eyes back to Aslaug who appeared to be even more confused than the last time she happened to cast her gaze upon her.

The seer began. "I don't understan-," The colored drained from her face until she appeared to be Japan's next not Geisha.

"What?" Qetsiyah's stare narrowed. "What do you know?"

"It's him," Aslaug whispered.

"Oh my goddess! There is another to be born of our line!" Emily damn near rotated in her seat to regard her with a wide stricken gaze.

Qetsiyah didn't bother to mock her descendent with a—get your shit together—glare. She continued to study their resident Seer. Mentally, she shook her head. Bonnie and her subliminal demands. Didn't she realize Aslaug's third eye needed bifocals?! Markos would've never let a premonition like this get pass him. Damn Silas!

"We didn't see this coming because the path of a god cannot be ordered or altered," she uttered as her trembling hand reached for a champagne flute.

Emily smacked her hand away. "No, Aslaug. You know you're in recovery!"

Not there for Aslaug's twelve step journey, Qetsiyah waved Emily off. "Yes, but Bonnie hasn't fully embraced her divinity-,"

"Our Supreme is not the one to whom I refer," Aslaug said with a shake of the head as her distant gaze lingered only the good Goddess knew where. "It's Hvitserk I mean."

****

Sigurd stumbled from a shieldmaiden's tent. The taint of sex and bitter ale wafted about him in an odorous tell all. Speaking his sins better than a tongue with a mind for confessions ever could.

"There's discourse between you and I, Sigurd," Bonnie said from a darkened enclosure near a covering across the way. She moved from the shadows into the light. His eyes flared as his mouth flopped open. "And this is not an accusation. For I'm more than aware that I'm the one who placed it there."

She spun on her heel and began to walk away from him. Without telling him to, he followed her. They needed a resolution and they'd need space in order to discover one.

"You're with babe," the ache in his words resonated in her chest.

As she led them into the forest, her head bobbed. "Yes."

"It's not Halfdan's," this statement met her ears in a near whisper.

Her eyes stung. She shook her head. "No, the baby isn't Halfdan's."

"Why would you save me only to turn away from me?" He hurled at her back. She sensed he'd stopped walking so she turned around to face him. Instead of being met with anger, he appeared broken. He sank to his knees. "You should've allowed me to greet my end at the edge of Ivar's ax. The pain would've been nothing compared to your loss of confidence and the agony of your indifference." Bonnie fell to her knees in front of him as she near exhausted herself spelling the area around them for privacy. She swayed a bit. Sigurd grabbed her arms to steady her. "Valkyrie?"

"Although you left with Bjorn, I thought when you discovered me missing you'd come back for me." She whispered though there was no longer a need to. "I thought you'd both come back for me, but neither of you ever did." She raised her gaze to meet his. "Six years Sigurd. For six years you didn't need me, so I find it really hard to believe you're dying without me now."

He let go of her arms to clasp her hands in his. "I nearly met my end at the bottom of the ocean twice attempting to get back to you before I finally gave over and allowed fate to have the right of it. Believe me not, see for yourself." He placed each of her palms to the sides of his head.

She didn't have to access his memories to know he spoke the truth. For whatever reason, her, Hvitserk's, and Ivar's path were meant to intertwine uninterrupted for that moment in time. "I'm sorry, Sigurd. There's been many people in my life who's sworn to be there for me, and when shit is falling like rain they're nowhere to be found. I just thought...,"

"Do not ever liken me to those faithless deceivers from your past. We are one you and I, so if shit ever does begin falling from the heavens I'll be right there at your side braving the muck." A genuine smile stole her lips unawares as she threw herself in his arms. "And also searching for Margrethe. Something tells me if that should ever come to pass she'd be the one to have a hand in it."

She snickered. "And a foot."

"Or whatever limb she could manage," he said, while smirking down at her. After a moment, the levity between them doubled in girth as his scrutiny crept over her face. Unease flared to life in his cool sapphire blues. "You appear unwell, Valkyrie. Shall we give unto each other now?"

Her smile fled her lips. "I'm unable to accept offerings, Sigurd. The baby won't allow me to."

"What?" He pulled her away to search her face. "But you've been making use of your sorcery."

She lowered her gaze. "I know, but nothing major. Only a few simple barrier and protection spells, here and there. I haven't displaced anything through time in weeks."

"That matters not!" Sigurd growled as anxiety made a mockery of his features. "Ayanna said any sorcery expelled required sufficient recompense. If you don't compensate the use of your energy with sorcery then it shall draw it from you until-,"

"I desiccate." She finished for him with a wave of the hand. "Sigurd I'm more than aware what happens to an immortal who refuses offerings. But I don't know what to tell you! She's not feeling the blood. Every time I even think of ingesting it my stomach attempts to leap out of my body by way of my throat." Sigurd stared at her belly with wide eyes. Her brows bunched. "Sigurd?"

His flared stare flicked back to hers. "It's a girl babe?"

"My sorcery believes so," she said with a bob of her head. "All we Bennetts ever have are girls. Can't recall when there's ever been a boy born into our line. Except in that vision I saw of me and-,"

He placed a palm to her stomach and leaned down. "Hear me and hear me well, Little Valkyrie. I'm about to make your mother an offering so she may maintain her strength and see you into Midgard. You will be brave and allow this to happen. For you are your mother's daughter and it is impossible for you to be anything less." He then straightened, withdrew a dagger from his trousers and tore open his wrist.

"Sigurd, that was cute but-," he pressed the wrist to her mouth effectively shutting her up.

She waited for the first drop of him to trigger her gag reflex, but the unique tang of his blood slid down her throat without any issues or resistance. Her sorcery which swirled about her in listless movements, sparked to life and hurtled through her veins to greet Sigurd's blood head on. A tightening in the bottom of her stomach let her know she'd had enough. She tore her mouth away and heeled his still oozing wrist. While doing so she leaned forward, placed her lips over his and gave back what he so selflessly gave to her. His hands roamed over her back as she wrapped herself about him. She pressed against him, wanting to be close to him. Needing to be one with him. It had been so long.

****

Bjorn gaze moved over Bonnie. She appeared to have regained her gilded glow in his absence. The dark circles which ringed her eyes had faded and she had the look of someone well rested. In verity, just gazing upon her pilfered the air from his body. It always had. Halfdan seemed just as besotted. He clasped her hands in both of his and doted upon her as if she were a crippled babe. Bonnie even seemed pleased by his witless attentions. Ack! He tore his stare from Bonnie and Halfdan to regard his mother who'd just entered the strategy tent with the Christian priest.

When she took her place at the table her stare moved to him. "What is the news from Vestfold? Will they agree to an accord?"

"No." He allowed his gaze to travel over each of the warriors in the tent. "They are in a position of strength and it's a truth they are more than aware of. Harald says when next we meet it shall be in battle."

Halfdan scoffed.

"And what of Rollo?" His mother demanded. "Did he explain his purpose for getting involved?"

"He wasn't there," he answered.

This time it was his mother who scoffed. She then turned her heaven pigmented gaze to Bonnie. "Worry not, Supreme. In this we shall triumph."

Bonnie inclined her head in a nod. "There is no other choice. We no longer have time to entertain such notions as accords and peace talks." She rose from her seat and began to round the table. "Now every available moment will have to be in preparation of battle and learning our adversary. And in order to truly know our enemy we have to become them."

"In what way?" Halfdan questioned as he lingered on the edge of his seat. His gaze shackled to Bonnie as if his sight had been bound by chains.

"By likening your thoughts to his so you can predict what strategies he'll be minded to enact," Bjorn answered Halfdan even as his gaze held Bonnie's.

"And who would know the Boneless one better than you, Intercessor?" Heahmund pandered.

Bonnie held his gaze. "Bjorn and Sigurd. They can tell you better than me what Ivar will do next and that is what we'll build our strategy upon."

****

For the next couple of new moons they prepared. Bonnie, Sigurd, Halfdan and Bjorn came together to plot strategies based on what they each knew of Ivar, Hvitserk and Harald. To Bjorn's displeasure Bonnie placed contingency plans in the event the opposing army triumphed over them. Yet if she'd learned anything from Elena's slippery when on the run doppelgänger it was how to work the hell out of the alphabet in regards to a backup plan.

Over those risings, she and Sigurd's bond strengthened. They'd once again found the accord they'd misplaced during their six years of separation. She also discovered herself gravitating more to Halfdan. On the training field her gaze searched him out without conscious thought. Whenever they dwelled within the same space, be it while strategizing or simply when she happened to stand too close to him, she always searched for an excuse to touch him. Though they still didn't share a tent, they'd taken to spending many long hours in each other coverings. Halfdan would tell her tales of the Mediterranean and she'd tell him stories of her past. Stories she'd never told anyone other than Sigurd. He even talked to her belly when he thought she slept. Out of all the things he'd done to make her emotions sit up and take note, that one act secured her affections.

As well as things were going among her husband and her Enforcer/Confessor that's how bad her relationship had deteriorated with Bjorn. He barely spoke to her outside strategizing meetings. Which she believed to be for the best. For being the center of his focus never boded well for her and she had no natural or learned defenses when it came to him. So she counted on the indifference he bestowed upon her to keep the longing which smoldered for him in a fading ember state rather than having it returned to its resting state of raging flames. An when his indifference wasn't enough she relied on the pain. The pain of knowing there was someone out there better for him than her. The pain from witnessing him love another the way he claimed he could only love her. And the overall pain of seeing his life move on without her.

"It pleases me to say I believe you to already be carrying," Bonnie overheard Bjorn whisper to the right of her.

A low wisp of feminine laughter greeted her ears. "There is no way you can be sure of this. Though your efforts last eve were indeed worthy of such an outcome, husband."

A scorching heat pierced her chest. Not unlike the dagger she'd drove into her heart to save Klaus. Her vision blurred. Damn her pregnant hormones. It seemed any little thing as of late threatened to turn her tear ducts into fucking Niagara Falls!

"What do you think, Bonnie?" Lagertha's voice sounded as if it came to her from a great distance. "Do you believe our efforts will prove us victorious?"

She blinked. Her breath and words alluded her.

"Intercessor?" Heahmund's voice hurtled towards her.

None of this would work.

Torvi leaned forward and reached out to her from across the table. "Bonnie?"

She locked eyes with the pale blonde for a moment, and then tore her gaze away to regard her Enforcer/Confessor. They stared at each other until she felt a warm calloused palm slip in hers. She turned to gaze up at her husband, before turning back to regard Lagertha.

"No," She said, allowing the word to fall flat from her lips. "Our efforts are not enough to prove us victorious. I must bleed."

"Bonnie-," Halfdan began.

She lifted his hand to her lips and kissed the back of it as she held his gaze. His protest halted.

"So you will bleed for your trusted?" Lagertha questioned, hope cavorting just at the edge of her tone.

"No," Bonnie shook her head as she slowly returned her gaze to Lagertha. "I'll bleed for them all. Just as they shed blood in my name, I shall shed mine in there's." The room went from cathedral silent to def con nuclear. Everyone except Halfdan and Sigurd began yelling at once, Bjorn and Ubbe being the loudest of them all. She raised her hands. "Ready our warriors. The ritual will take place this eve after second meal." When she turned to leave, they attempted to protest once more. "I've spoken and my decision is final." With that said, she exited the tent.

****

"We cannot allow her to do this," Lagertha said, rising from her place at the table to pace the tent. "Doing so could harm the babe." She halted and swung her head from side to side. "And that's a burden no mother should have placed upon their heart." Her gaze moved to Bjorn. "You must speak with her."

"I intend-,"

"Bonnie's mind is set," Halfdan said, not having a care for Bjorn's interference in his wife's decision. "As our Supreme we can do no more than accept and obey her will."

"The Black has the right of it," Sigurd agreed, settling Lagertha and Bjorn with his glare. "If this is what Bonnie is minded to do then no one here shall attempt to sway her from her intent."

"Ack!" Bjorn scoffed as he waved a dismissive hand at Sigurd.

He leaped from his seat over turning it as he went, and then stormed from the covering. His wife abandoned her place at the table to harry his steps.

Lagertha nodded her approval even as concern darkened her gaze. "The safety of her babe is what is best for our Supreme. Losing a child is guilt a mother never pardons herself of and this is the grief I mean to spare her."