I ate slowly, partially to avoid another vomiting spell, and partially to fill my time. If I was being honest with myself, filling the time was the bigger challenge. During my first pregnancy I’d had my doctoral dissertation to finish, with the very real deadline of childbirth to inspire me. It seemed like every time I blinked, another trimester had flown by. But here on Asgard, I had exactly zero obligations.

I hated it. Feeling useless was fucking miserable. I’d spent my first week on Asgard huddled in a thick blanket, sitting on the beach as my body slowly healed. The scrapes and bruises closed and faded while I watched the ocean, the shifting lines of foam, the dance of the waves, and the brave little seagulls, diving into the cold and emerging with tiny, silvery fish in their beaks.

Once I could move without wincing in pain, I realized I had to find some way to fill my time before I went completely insane. First, I tracked the setting sun, trying to determine if its position on the horizon was static or in flux. Two days later, after the wardrobe provided some reasonable supplies, I started mapping.

I began with the beach. The mouth of a large river was about two hours’ walk from the cottage, and dedicated myself to mapping its progress. That was where I saw river otters for the first time. Transfixed, I spent an entire afternoon sitting on the broad banks of the slow, wide river, watching two otters leap and dive in the stony rapids.

That night I’d started another project: Asgardian wildlife inventory. The inventory was, by and large, quite satisfying. I’d noted almost one hundred species, mostly birds, and almost all of them were new to me. In lieu of any colored writing utensils, despite my repeated mental pleas to the wardrobe for pastels or oil paints or even a good old box of Crayola crayons, I had forced myself to pick up the discarded embroidery hoops and spools of colorful thread. I was halfway through a pathetic embroidered rendition of a strange orange and purple song bird which liked to hang out around the rose bushes. Sewing, I had to admit, wasn’t a bad way to pass the long evening hours between darkness and sleep, that time when the normal humans back on my world were doing the dishes, or watching TV, or reading a book.

Or making love.

My chest clenched. I set down my fork. The plate before me was still half-full, but my appetite had faded with the sunlight. I glanced at the windows, now filled with darkness and the strange, smudged reflections of candlelight, and a familiar stab of anxiety shot up my spine, making my heart race uselessly.

Yes, this was the worst time. This, and first thing in the morning, when I roll over in the bed I once shared with Vali and find myself alone. Again.

Goddamn it, I missed people. I missed hearing about Zeke’s bar fights, and telling Colin he’d have to take a shower at least once a week if I was going to let him teach the freshman biology lab. I missed my job. I missed—

“Stop it,” I said, slamming my palms down on the table. The plate jumped, then vanished.

“That’s all over and gone,” I hissed to myself. “Over. Gone.”

My voice fell flat in the empty room. I shivered. Not a great habit, talking to yourself. Almost as bad as letting myself think about Montana State University, or Zeke and Colin. It was almost February now, if time tracked here the same way it did in our world.

Almost February. I was halfway through the first trimester of my pregnancy, assuming a half-dragon gestated like a normal human baby. And I’d been entirely alone now for over a month.

I sank into the rocking chair by the hearth and closed my eyes. Well, not entirely alone. I’d seen Óðinn exactly once since he brought me to this very kitchen before enigmatically and somewhat rudely vanishing. It was just after I decided to map the coast. I’d walked south until I discovered the massive cliffs where, a lifetime ago, I had found Vali after Níðhöggr tortured him with memories of his brother.

That place sucked me in. I’d spent all afternoon pacing those great, dark cliffs, lost in a fog of despair. It was late at night when I finally found my way back to the cottage, and I’d crawled under the covers still in my clothes, trying desperately not to think about how terribly much I still loved Vali. The next day I was too nauseous and depressed to eat; I hardly left the bed. Some distant part of my mind began contemplating the best way to leap from the ocean cliffs, and I didn’t seem to be able to stop those images. How easy it would be to walk to the border where the green grass faded to a sheer, dark wall. And then to take one more step. A little step, even. Like a move in a dance.

Óðinn appeared in the bedroom that night, scaring the ever-loving shit out of me. I screamed and jumped back so hard I bashed my head on the wall

“What the fuck?” I demanded, yanking the covers over my chest although I was still wearing the blue dress I’d put on the previous morning.

“You’re not eating.” Óðinn said. He frowned and folded his arms across his chest, looking like the world’s most disapproving father.

“I’m pregnant,” I growled through clenched teeth. “It’s called morning sickness, you fucking idiot.”

Óðinn pursed his lips and furrowed his brow. For a heartbeat, he looked like a very old man. Then, without warning, he vanished, leaving the air in the room swirling. As I stared at the empty space where he had been standing, my heart seized so violently I felt like a chasm had opened in my chest, a vast, dark crevasse of loneliness.

I sobbed until my entire body hurt. Sleep finally claimed me, curled up like a kitten in the heart of the great bed I had once shared with my husband. The nauseous churning in my stomach woke me hours later and forced me to vomit thin, acidic bile for twenty minutes before I could stomach any of the scrambled eggs, hard biscuits, and smoked fish the kitchen table offered me.

That night was the worst. My first night here was pretty bad. The second night, the night when I realized no rescue was coming, or even possible, was worse. But the night when Óðinn appeared and vanished, teasing me with the possibility of companionship, was the new record for Worst Night on Asgard.

I did not return to those cliffs. Once I started mapping the northern coast, and tracking the wildlife, it was slightly easier to forget those high walls, with their whispered promise of a swift, painless death. I curled an arm around my waist, pressing slightly to feel the ripening bulge of my uterus.

“Stop it,” I whispered to myself.

I had considered not eating again, just to bring Óðinn back. But my thoughts hadn’t gone any further than idle speculation. Even if I did bring Óðinn back, what the hell could I say? Would I beg him to stay and chat with me for a few hours? To take me back to wherever it was he lived?

“Stop it,” I said again, more forcefully this time. The candles flickered slightly.

I bent over and grabbed the stupid embroidery supplies. Usually trying to do a freeform needlepoint of a new species took all my mental effort, leaving plenty little time for feeling sorry for myself or fretting over the impossibility of what came next. Squinting, I threaded my smallest needle with bright orange thread. The little bird had a brilliant orange chest with a purple-capped head. Right now, I was trying to fill in the breast, although it was already slightly lopsided. I jabbed my needle into the silky fabric, pulling the thread taut.

The candles on the table flickered again. I frowned. The windows were all closed. My skin crawled, shivering with the delicate prickle of electricity. The hairs on the back of my neck tingled.

“Hello?” I said.

The air in the room shifted, as if a door had opened behind me.

Loki stood before me, almost touching the kitchen table. His wild red hair fluttered and settled around his shoulders. His cold, blue eyes widened when they met mine.

“No!” I screamed, jumping to my feet. Spools of threads and embroidery hoops went flying. “Loki, it’s a trap!”

The air swirled. The candles sputtered. Thin gray wisps of smoke rose from the few candles whose flames had just vanished, overwhelmed by the sudden motion. My entire body shivered, and my skin felt like it wanted to crawl away from my body.

“Loki!” I screamed.

Another figure appeared behind Loki’s tall body. Loki’s pale eyes widened even further, and his lips parted silently. A bloom of red appeared in the center of his chest, spreading across the dark green fabric of his shirt. I stared, transfixed, as the green of Loki’s clothes turned black.

There was a smell, I realized numbly, a sharp, coppery tang which overlaid the omnipresent brine of the ocean and the sweet beeswax of the candles. I opened my mouth to say something, but nothing came out.

Loki slumped forward, falling to his knees. His head tilted upward, almost pleadingly, but his eyes were strange, soft and unfocused. A thin red tendril of blood leaked from the corner of his mouth, streaking across his pale skin. I had an absurdly strong urge to wipe it away.

I tore my eyes away from Loki’s face. Backcountry first aid lesson one, my stunned brain chimed. Assess the situation.

A thick, red pole rose from the center of Loki’s back. No, it wasn’t red. It was wood. It only looked red, and shiny, because it was so covered with blood. The coppery tang in the air thickened, and my stomach clenched.

The slick, red stain vanished and the pole became wood just below the two strong hands. I forced myself to look at the person behind those hands, although I knew who it was. Who it had to be.

Óðinn did not meet my eyes. He stared at Loki’s crumpled body as if he expected it to run away, as if he was pinning it to ground instead of twisting a weapon in what was clearly already a fatal wound.

“No,” I said.

I meant it to come out as a shout, but it was little more than a whisper. The whole scene felt like a nightmare, one where you can’t find your voice to scream. Blood poured from Loki’s chest, just about where his heart should be. It coursed down the shaft of Óðinn’s spear in thich red ribbons of blood and pooled on the tiles of my kitchen. Some of his blood was soaking into my embroidery hoops. Damn, I thought. I’ll never get that out.

Something flashed in the corner of my vision. I looked up. A bright line of electric blue was shivering in the air, almost level with my face. I watched with a numb, detached interest as the hissing blue line pressed against Óðinn’s exposed neck. Óðinn’s hands relaxed around the shaft of his spear as he stood straight.

I knew that blue. I’d seen that exact shade before. For some reason it was deeply comforting. It even had a name, didn’t it? A nice name.

“Hrotti,” I whispered.