Calder studied his sons. All three, now nearly men. Gunnar, Torsten, and Halvar. The last, born not long after his brother Halvar’s death.

Gunnar pulled back the string on the bow and nocked the arrow.

Careful, son, do not let the elk hear you.

But Calder did not voice the thought. He’d brought his boys up well, they were strong hunters, good men. He and Brenna had done a fine job. He cast a glance backward at the woman who’d claimed his heart.

She caught his gaze and smiled back. She’d never told him what resulted from her visit to the village all those years ago, the visit that he knew she’d hoped would set his bear free. That had never happened.

What did happen, which was the final stroke that led Calder to tell his sons about his life’s dream—he’d learned his sons had bears. And like his bear, theirs were chained to never make their presence known.

He’d learned this when Gunnar was six summers old. Gunnar had come to him, told him he could hear a roaring, but could not find the animal that caused the roar anywhere in the forest.

That was the day that broke Calder’s heart. His son’s bear was a prisoner. It was the curse that he carried and passed on to his sons.

He’d found out, as the years progressed, that the curse passed on to each of his sons.

His hatred had grown renewed for the witch Freyja who had not only killed his men and taken his bear, but also killed his sons’ animals.

The last part of the curse, well, Calder had not learned that immediately.

Oh, no. That had been revealed to him two years ago when he and his family had been set upon by vagabonds who traveled through the wilderness and made victims of all they came across.

It was when this group made the fatal mistake to attack Calder and Brenna’s family that Calder learned the nature of the final part of the curse that Freyja had visited upon them.

Oh, yes, this curse that caused him and his sons to become like beasts in battle, cutting down the men, moving with a speed and a bloodlust with vastly more ferocity than any shifter Calder had ever known.

The curse’s overpowering strength was such that Calder caught Torsten’s hands around Brenna’s neck when he pulled him off her.

The bloodlust blinded Torsten to all but the others who would berserk, killing at will.

Torsten had shed tears, putting his young head in his mother’s lap and begging her forgiveness.

And Calder’s fury and hatred for Freyja and her kind burned more fiercely than he could have thought possible. It was because of her he lost his bear, and nearly lost his mate.

After the melee, after the brigands that had set upon Calder’s family were dead, Calder took his sons out to the forest to talk to them, to explain what had happen.

He’d told them about the village. Their people. How they had once been bear shifters and now were cursed by the witch. How his boys carried the curse, and as far as he could tell, it would be transferred as such, from father to son.

He also told them about the Valkyrie, a secret he hadn’t even told Brenna about.

For Calder held a secret. On his many hunting trips, he’d not only brought back meat to sustain his family, he’d visited the village where it all began.

He’d seen the women. The Valkyrie. He’d noted the way they trained. He’d witnessed their hatred of men.

And he’d fostered his own hatred. He’d noted the Valkyrie. He’d seen an occasional visit from Freyja. And he would have attacked, if he’d thought for a moment he could be victorious. The thought that he might lose his life and leave his mate to fend for herself and their sons had stayed his hand and his temper.

It had not, however, quenched his thirst for vengeance. He would carry this desire, and he would pass it on to his sons, that was his intent.

So, he’d told his sons about the witch and the Valkyrie, their uncle Halvar. He’d told them everything, and when they grew older, he’d taken them to see the Valkyrie village. He’d taken them three years in a row, until the last time, when they’d found the village gone, all signs of where they’d gone carefully hidden.

Calder and his sons had scouted, studied the ground for any sign of which direction the women had gone. There was no hint, no clue. It was obvious there was a deliberate attempt to keep their tracks hidden.

Why? Did they know he was watching them? Did they know he targeted them? Spied on them? Was that why they’d moved?

“Where do you think they went?” Gunnar had asked him.

“I do not know, son.” But he made it his mission to find out.

And his sons had made it their missions as well. And their sons’ sons. And so on, and so forth, through the generations, the rivalry of the Valkyrie and the berserkers was born and fostered.

There would be no peace between them until the berserkers’ bears were returned to them.