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It used to make me feel whole.
Ales glided to my side, and I knew it was time. The light inside me vibrated, sending twitches of lightning to my fingertips. It was unruly, restless, and brimming over the harness I had on it. Once I entered the water, I might be not able to contain the Valkyrie any longer.
The boat had taken us as far as it could.
I didn’t take my eyes off the ocean when the others came to the top deck next to me and Ales.
The dark waves pulsed with life, willing me to come closer, summoning me from beneath the surface. No one needed to tell me we were here.
I forced myself away from the boat’s edge. I found everyone circled together on the top deck. Logan and Danny both exchanged tentative glances as they held their arms behind their backs, turning to look at Ales.
They cannot be so accepting of this.
My breath was coming too fast. My body was charged like a lightning rod of energy, and that wasn’t what you wanted to feel when you were about to dive into the ocean.
I couldn’t move from where my feet were planted on the deck. I looked over at Danny and Logan, who were strapping weight belts to their waists. I didn’t see any diving tanks. I didn’t see any masks or fins.
“Explain the plan to me one more time, please?” I croaked.
No one said a word.
I glared at Leo and Cri.
They were practically jubilant. They tightened the leather of their armor against their bodies.
Danny stripped his cotton T-shirt off and threw it onto the deck. When he twisted his body to tighten the diving belt, I saw the same marking I had drawn on his chest, now stamped like a brand over his heart. I looked at Logan, who had also shed his shirt, to find a matching marking on the left side of his chest.
I had put it there. The aether inside me surged when I stared at it. The Valkyrie approved, but it made me slightly nauseous to look at. It was the same mark as on Ales’ chest, but Logan’s looked raw and painful.
“I’m sorry about the mark. Does it hurt?”
Logan toed off his boots. “No. It just stings a little. It’s going to sound weird, but it tingles when I’m near you.”
Ales nodded. “Every Einherjar has one. It is our mark. It recognizes the Valkyrie.”
It was way too weird to learn they sensed the light inside me I was trying to bury.
The markings on my arms and palms had disappeared with the wind after I changed Danny and Logan. I looked down at my palms to check for the symbols. Nothing was different. They looked like the same hands I had always known.
“How are you guys just accepting this? Does anyone else understand how insane it is to weigh yourself down and jump in the ocean without any source of oxygen, like at all?” My voice made an odd shrill cracking sound when it reached a new pitch.
Logan shrugged. “We don’t have many choices. We went against direct orders when we helped you escape. We shot them. We are hunted now, just as much as you are.”
Danny nodded calmly. “There are not many places in the world to hide. The hunters have more resources than you can imagine, in almost every country. There isn’t a place for us here anymore. As far as I see it, it is one death or another. Besides, who doesn’t want to see what else is out there?” Danny waved his arm toward the ocean, then the sky.
Okay, clearly the optimist of the group. Not grounded in reality, but noted for future pep talks.
“Danny and I discussed it last night. We choose whatever is out there versus what is here. We’d rather fight with you for something that matters,” Logan said.
I didn’t think Logan had ever been that honest with me. I certainly hadn’t to him, except for when I kissed him. That was the truest I’d been to Charlie in years.
I needed to return his sincerity. “I want you to come too.”
Logan’s eyes darkened a shade. I almost took a step closer to him.
Bad idea!
“I mean, I need someone who is as miserable without chocolate as me.”
