had been ripped apart, I still had to save her. Fate or not, I loved her. And I had the wand. The power of the gods was finally in my grasp.
I held Levateinn, ready to scribe a portal spell.
As I did, though, I felt Ganglati’s presence floating through my mind, confusing me. Whispering in my thoughts. You must finish what you started, Galin. You must complete the sacred task.
“Not now, Ganglati. I need to see Ali.”
And yet he was seizing control of me. Anger rippled through me. My wand hand continued to move, but it wasn’t me tracing the runes. A portal expanded in front of me and Ganglati forced me into it. When I stepped out the other side, I found myself in Hela’s throne room.
Fury simmered. Shades drifted around the dark stone, and votive candles flickered in ancient alcoves. Directly in front of me rested the remains of Hela herself. The body of the goddess reclined on a crumbling stone throne, a spindly crown on her head. Her dry, leathery skin was stretched tightly over her bones. One half of her face was faded blue, while the other gleamed like fresh bone. She seemed to grin at me, her lips peeled back over moldering teeth.
I gritted my teeth, wishing that I’d thought this promise through better. This was not the time to raise gods.
But I had seen my future—that I would be king. This was the path the Norns had woven for me. Perhaps this was a necessary step.
I lifted Levateinn, and the silver wand simmered with powerful magic—once wielded by Hela’s father, Loki himself.
I shivered. Around me, the temperature dropped as shades swooped in to watch. I brought down the wand, then twisted my wrist to scribe yr—the rune for life.
A stream of silver magic unspooled from the end of Levateinn. It struck the dead goddess in the center of her chest, spreading over her like liquid metal. It didn’t drip downwards as a normal fluid would. Instead, it flowed in all directions, along her arms, under her dress. It pooled at her feet even as it slid up her neck.
Around me, the shades whispered with growing excitement.
Liquid silver continued to flow from the end of Levateinn, washing over the goddess now, seeming to bathe her in metal. I stared, awestruck as the magic began to work. A strange elation filled my heart at the idea that a god would be alive again.
The movement began in her feet—the frozen muscles of the goddess’s toes unclenching. Next were her fingers, trembling on the arms of the obsidian throne. Still, it came as a surprise when her entire body moved. A giant spasm that threw her head back against the throne.
“Yes!” screamed Ganglati, floating next to me. “My queen returns.”
I clutched Levateinn with all my strength, staring at what was unfolding before me. The stream of silver had become a rush of power that filled the desiccated goddess with magic.
Hela’s corpse spasmed again, and again, until she was literally thrashing on her throne. Around me, the shades were shouting, their wispy bodies twisting and churning in the air. They surrounded their queen until all I could see was the occasional shimmer of silver beneath their frantically hovering forms. Magic vibrated over the room.
Then, suddenly, the shades went still, hanging in the air. I heard a noise that iced my heart: a deep, rattling gasp that grew louder and louder. The first breath of a goddess who’d been dead a thousand years.
The gods are alive again.
And yet I couldn’t linger here. I needed to get to Ali.
Hela sucked in a second breath, and with it, the shades spun in a terrible gyre, round and round like the whorl of a fearsome tornado.
Shivers ran up my spine at the wonder I was witnessing here, awe stilling my breath. I could see the goddess now. Her skin softened as she inhaled the shades. Then, she opened her eyes and fixed me with her dazzling gaze.
She was beautiful in an eerie way—blue, swirling tattoos covering one half of her face, her skin pale as ice on the other side. She had delicate features, and her body glowed with a pearly light. Her dark hair fell over her robe, her body now gleaming with silvery light.
She stared at me, beautiful and terrifying at the same time, and I wanted to fall to my knees. When she held out her hand, my mind went blank.
“You, my king, have brought me back to life. Just as