Iceland, 1880

“Here, father,” Freyja murmured, tilting the steaming cup of broth to his lips. “Perhaps this will take away the chill?”

Her father slurped at the watery soup, his eyes blue and vacant as his trembling hands tried to cup hers. “It’s delicious, Freyja. One of your best.”

Freyja pasted a smile on her face, even though he couldn’t see it. Bitterness burned in her throat. “Yes, Papa. It is, isn’t it?”

There were more vegetables than lamb in the broth, and more water than both, but the fact he sought to spare her feelings made her shoulders hunch. It had been such a long winter, with little food or respite from the storms. The few coins they had left were drying up and her small herd of ewes was dwindling. She couldn’t justify slaughtering another just to add more flavor to their soup.

Her father coughed, that same dry, hacking cough that had haunted him all winter. Freyja grabbed a rag and helped to dry his cheeks with it. Sometimes she wondered if he would survive to see another winter.

A fluttery feeling rose up to choke her, and she forced it down ruthlessly. No point in being maudlin. He was here and this was now. The future could wait.

“How was the village this afternoon?” her father asked. “You didn’t see Ingmar’s boy, did you?”

If she had, then Benedikt would have no interest in her. Not a respectful interest anyway. He had already hinted he might have means to offer her coin to keep her larder stocked through the spring. Telling her father that, however, might send him to an early grave. He had such hopes. Freyja intended never to enlighten him; with his poor health, their dwindling resources, and her eyes, she was unlikely to make any sort of respectable match.

“He must have been busy, I’m sure,” she replied, squeezing his hand, then levering to her feet. Gathering the ceramic bowls together, she crossed to the kitchen. “He has all that land to tend, after all.”

Some of it theirs—or what she’d been forced to sell after her father’s eyes faded and he could no longer work the land. She’d done what she could, but tending to him took a lot of her time.

The shutters banged on the windows as the winds lifted. Freyja glanced through the glass toward the enormous storm clouds boiling on the horizon. A storm from the north then, and bound to be bitter with the kiss of Arctic winds on its breath. She could feel it in her bones, tingling beneath her skin as if she herself were tied to the storm. It would blow a mighty gale, tearing its way through the mountains that shielded their little homestead, then blow out by morning. She knew it, with some inexplicable sixth sense.

Most of Iceland suffered from bitter chill at this time of year, but the area surrounding Akureyri was somewhat warmer thanks to a trick of the coastline, of cliffs and mountains. Of course, out here they were virtually alone. It was a day’s sail to Reykjavik and longer overland, if one even dared.

“I have to fetch the sheep in,” she called, watching the dull gray edge of the clouds roiling. Lightning flickered in the distance. “We’re in for a storm.”

“Be careful,” her father called, sinking into his shawl and coughing again. “Don’t be too long.”

“I won’t, Papa.”

“And take Loki.”

She rolled her eyes at the small bundle of white fur that nestled by her father’s feet. “Come.”

The little arctic fox yawned at her, seemingly content to stay where he was. Another mouth to feed when she truly couldn’t, but then a part of her couldn’t throw him out the door. He’d been with them since he was a pup.

Freyja frowned, reaching out with the inner part of herself that had some sense of connection to the creature. Come.

Loki rolled to his feet and shook himself, discarding strands of long white hair. Underneath, his summer coat grew darker. Another week or two and he’d lose the rest of his winter coat. He leaped with agile quickness to dart beneath her skirts, and threatened to trip her.

“You will make me a nice fur muff one day,” she threatened, though he ignored her and scratched at the door, knowing full well the threat was harmless.

Skirts wrapping haphazardly around her legs, Freyja fought her way across the yard. It was almost five in the afternoon and evening was falling. In the village, most of the men would be retiring to the tavern to talk and laugh beneath the smoky eaves, whilst the goodwives tended their children and tucked them in for the night.

Not so out here. Freyja had been raised on these rugged slopes, beneath the looming volcanic mountain of Krafla. In the distance its constant plume of smoke seemed almost invisible against the gray clouds.

Still, its presence was more than felt. Freyja crossed herself. “Blessed Father, watch over us,” she murmured, glaring at the mountain. “Let dreki sleep another night.”

The small flock of ewes must have sensed the ominous press of the storm, for they were at the woven stick fence, bleating to be let into the small barn. Two snowy white lambs with black markings peered at her from beneath one old ewe. Despite her mood, Freyja couldn’t help a smile.

Loki watched them with avid interest, licking at his cheeks with his long pink tongue.

Don’t you dare. She snapped the thought at him and he sat down obediently, giving her a sly, long-suffering look.

It took little effort to draw the small herd into the barn, coaxing them into the separate stalls. Her boots shuffled over the thin straw, the air still and musty here. One pen remained empty and she hurried back outside to fetch the battered old ram from his own paddock.

Loki yipped as she stumbled. The skies were darkening swiftly now, large fat drops of rain spattering down. One struck her cheek like an icy bullet, wind whipping her skirts and shawl. Her long blonde plait slapped her in the face. The whisper of the storm drove through her, setting her alight with a feverish excitement, her heart quickening. This was the time she felt most alive.

“Henrik!” she called, her voice stolen from her lips by another gust. The pen was empty; or no, not quite. The ram cowered against the wall, head bowed as if to fight the force of the wind.

“You stupid beast,” she muttered, grabbing her skirts and straddling the fence. Loki darted in and snatched a mouthful of skirt, almost hauling her back onto his side.

“Curse you,” Freyja cried, trying to shake him free. A sudden sharp spatter of rain made her gasp. “Do you wish me to be soaked? Then I shall catch a chill and you must find your own dinner!”

The little fox worried at her skirts, his ears flat to his head. Freyja scraped the wet strands of hair off her face and tugged the material, her curses lost in another hammering echo of thunder.

Let go!

But the little fox would not.

Henrik bleated suddenly, turning in circles as if he didn’t know where to go. Freyja shot him a frustrated look, then reached down and grabbed Loki’s ruff. A blast of wind knocked her into the ram’s pen. She landed flat on her back in the mud, breathless and cursing—

A sudden roar echoed through the air, cutting through the thunder as if it were nothing.

The scream of it beat against her skin, pulsing in her ears until she was forced to clap her hands over them. The primal shiver of it seemed to be inside her, in her head, in her pounding heartbeat— everywhere. It was the type of sound that echoed down through ages past, and sent both man and animal fleeing in mindless fear.

It cut off and Freyja choked in her first gasp, lifting her head in disbelief as a sinuous tail flew directly over her.

“Wyrm,” she whispered, the heat draining out of her face.

Not just a wyrm, but the Great One. He who haunted Krafla’s depths, slithering out to stalk the night and hunt his prey.

She’d never seen him this close before. Golden scales gleamed even in the stormy darkness, each wing sweeping out an impossible forty feet wide. She shouldn’t be scared; the village paid its tithe and had for decades in exchange for being left alone. But there was something distinctly primeval about the sight of it directly above her. Some ancestral fear that made her feel like prey.

Then its forelegs curled up, claws plucking delicately at its victim. Henrik bleated one last time, and she could sense his fear as the wyrm thrust its wings downward again, launching itself into the air.

With her ram in its talons.

“No!” Freyja pushed herself upright in disbelief, mud squelching through her fingers. Without the ram she couldn’t breed. It wouldn’t matter this spring, but next year…. “No!”

Leaping to her feet, she chased after it. Curse you! We pay the tithe! Each week a lamb or goat was tethered out on the hilltop as sacrifice, though eddas told of a time when the sacrifice had been virgin flesh. Her father’s face flashed into her mind, thin with lack of nourishment and color fleeing his cheeks as he coughed.

“Come back!” She snatched up a stone and hurled it skyward.

A pitiful effort, for the wyrm sailed high, soaring beneath gray clouds with mocking disdain, both for her and the weather.

Freyja sank to her knees in the mud, the fist in her chest tightening. What was she going to do? Hope and pray one of the undropped lambs was a male? There were only two ewes still due to deliver, and even if the lambs were male it would be years before she could breed them.

She and her father didn’t have that time.

Something broke inside her. Tears she hadn’t shed even when her mother passed away three years ago, finally tore free. Since then she’d been holding on, trying to keep it all from washing over her as she looked after her increasingly frail father. Slamming her fists into the dirt, Freyja heard the lash of lightning strike the hill nearby. Again. And again. Lightning crashing down in answer to her fury. She would not accept this. She would not fail.

Not even if she had to take her ram back.

The cold rain washed away her hot tears as she looked up. Loki slithered through the wickerwork of the pen and licked at her hand tentatively as if to appease her, but Freyja shook him off.

“I’m going after him,” she told the fox. Dragging her shawl tight, she lurched to her feet, wet through, her skirts caked in mud.

The creature had terrorized her village long enough.

And Freyja was not without her defenses.