Prologue
Someone was on the Bridge.
Heimdall opened his vision, well aware that more than one set of sandaled feet had pressed against the rainbows that made up the Bifrost Bridge. As the Guardian, it was his job to protect the ways to all of the worlds the Bridge connected to. Keeping the dead from crossing to Midgard, or the Jotuns from storming Asgard, all of it fell upon his shoulders. But those coming up the Rainbow Bridge were no threat, not to anyone but Heimdall.
Heimdall winced. How had the Nine discovered…
Of course. The greatest of gossips was linked to Yggdrasil, the World Tree. Ratatoskr the Squirrel carried slanderous words from one end of Yggdrasil to the other, from the Great Eagle at the top of the tree to the wyrm Nidhoggr who lived amongst the deepest of Yggdrasil’s roots. Nothing escaped Ratatoskr’s ears. Heimdall’s ever-growing discontent would be ripe gossip indeed. And the Nine were closely tied to Yggdrasil. The talk would reach their ears faster than Sleipnir in a race.
Heimdall understood why, once the Vanir were defeated by the Aesir, each of them had been given positions of honor by Odin, the leader of the Aesir. Tyr, leader of the Vanir and of the Lios Alfar, was still the God of Justice. Nothing could truly take that title from him. It was how he was shaped. Njord retained his title of Lord of the Seas, while Freya was still the Goddess of Beauty. And so Heimdall remained Guardian, even if Odin had little understanding of what the title Guardian truly meant.
But what enraged Heimdall, what made him wish desperately to crush Odin, was the redistribution of Alfheim into Alfheim and Svartalfaheim. The light elves and dark elves now called Frey their lord, but Frey made it obvious that he preferred the company of the Lios Alfar. The Lios Alfar were treasured and treated as such, while the Dökk Alfar were considered lesser than they’d been. Frey, as their lord, made his favor clear, much to Heimdall’s dismay. Bringing them back together was no longer possible. The Land of Light and Shadow had forever been divided.
Frey was not lord of the elves, either light or dark. He never had been. And what he was doing to both races was abominable.
Svartalfaheim, the realm of the Dökk Alfar, was filled with toy makers, artisans, and weapon smiths, while the Lios Alfar was filled with bards, artists, and actors. The Dökk Alfar had been closely allied with the Lios Alfar. They exchanged ideas, making each realm a true paradise for elven kind. No one had denied the beauty of either the realm of Light or the realm of Shadow, for each had their place in the World Tree.
But Frey was the lord of sunshine. A god of Light. And neither shadows nor darkness had any place in his world, for both diminished him. As such, the Dökk Alfar, the Dark Elves, were viewed with suspicion, no better than Jotun in the way Frey treated them. Had he grasped the depths of Frey’s hatred of the Dökk Alfar, Heimdall would have killed him rather than allow the Dark Elves to be subjugated by his Vanir brother. Frey had hidden his loathing well to avoid Heimdall’s gaze.
Worse, the Light Elves now viewed themselves as above not only the Dökk Alfar but the human race as well. They declared their home, once Lios Alfheim, to be Alfheim, the home of the only true elves. They called the Dökk Alfar dwarves, mocking them, writing plays and jests about their weakness, while all the time Frey clapped and laughed as if he’d never broken bread peacefully at the Palace of Shadows. Dökk Alfheim became Svartalfaheim, a last, brutal display of Frey’s hatred, for svart meant black. Thus, some took to calling the Shadow Elves Black Elves instead.
Of course, all would be restored in time. The Vanir would be avenged, the conqueror overtaken and slain. Frey would no longer rule over the elves, light or dark. And all it would take was one man’s love and loyalty to another. A man all thought incapable of love, let alone loyalty.
Loki.
Loki would be the catalyst of the Vanir’s triumph over their oppressor. If only Heimdall could tell them, tell his brothers and sisters that this fate was not theirs to live forever, he would be free of the burden placed upon him by the Nine. But he could not, would not break his oaths, and thus the elves suffered whilst he, alone, stood watch and waited. Waited for the day Odin was brought to his knees. How he wished he would be the one to take down their oppressor and free his people, but it was not to be. Another held that honor, and that horror.
“I sense your pain, my son.” The first of the Nine reached him, placing her hands on his shoulders. Her beautiful face was kind, her hair filled with sunshine, for it, as well as her eyes, glowed with its own light.
“Be strong, my son.” The second of the Nine reached him, touching his hand in sympathy. Her green eyes were wise, her hair decorated with summer flowers. Her scent brought back memories of a simpler time, when Odin had been nothing but a rumor on the wind.
“It will take time, but you will be freed.” The third of the Nine’s touch was so cold it burned. Her skin was the color of snow, and her dark hair glittered with shards of ice.
The fourth of the Nine’s gaze burned, and the ground at her feet smoked. “I will help you when the time comes.”
“As will we all, sister.” The fifth of the Nine’s changeable cloak swirled around her in rainbow colors. The axe and mail she wore reminded Heimdall sharply of the Valkyrie, the warriors who carried off the worthy dead to Valhalla.
“No one will take you from us.” The fierce tone of the sixth of the Nine matched her attitude. She, too, wore a breastplate and wielded an axe, but she was of sturdy build and tall, with legs like tree trunks and arms that touched the sky.
“Be at ease. Our son sees all and will protect us with his last breath.” The seventh of the Nine embraced him tightly. The smell of earth and wind and homemade bread filled him with love, for she had been the one to nurture him the most.
The eighth of the Nine snorted in disgust. “But will he keep to his word?” The hiss of her breath stole his own from his lungs. Death crept upon him but there was no fear, for it was not his time. The eighth protected him as well, in her own fashion, and when the time came she would be the last mother to hold him. She would cradle him gently, as she always had, so how could he fear her?
“He will.” The last of the Nine smiled at him. Her dark hair swept across her face, highlighting her silver eyes. A cloak of mist and shadows surrounded her, but she held on to the hand of the first of the Nine, her silver nails digging into the first’s flesh and leaving behind crescent shapes in her skin. “Because he must.”
Heimdall bowed to the women who’d created him and loved him with all of their hearts. In turn, he loved them, guarding them ferociously from any who would do them harm. “Ragnarrok will come, and when it does, I give my word that I will be ready.”
And he would enjoy every moment of it.