“He keeps saying things and I don’t understand,” I said fervently. “I keep seeing these … these flashes of the world falling apart. People being undone by the inside out. Sometimes the sound in my head gets so loud that I think it’s going to explode. There’s death. Death everywhere, and it’s all screaming to me, and I don’t know what’s going on!”

Donnar was silent for a moment, and when he spoke, his voice was both soft and sad. “I did tell you your path wouldn’t be an easy one.”

“Do you know what’s wrong with me?” I asked. “Why I’m seeing all these things?”

Because I’m a part of you now, Janneke.

“No!” I shouted, not caring who heard. “Shut up! You aren’t part of this conversation!”

“But he is,” Donnar said. “He’s very much a part of all of this.”

It’s all about me. What I know. What you can’t know. Unless …

“Unless you want to end up like him.” Donnar somehow finished Lydian’s sentence though his voice was only in my head.

“I want an explanation,” I said, trying to keep my hands from shaking. Hel, was it too much to ask to have my life for once not be tainted with my tormentor? Was it so hard for the Norns to let me live in some relative peace for once? Was I cursed to this plague for all eternity? He was dead. Dead and gone and cold in the ground somewhere, and yet somehow, he was still here, doing what he always did. What he’d always done. Tormenting me.

“I can’t tell you,” Donnar said. “But I can show you.”

I took a step back, suddenly frightened. “I’ve seen the things you’ve shown me. Forgive me if I’d rather not deal with the mental torture.” An iron knife with an antler bone handle, shoved deep into my father’s flesh, the proclamation that we were all monsters, his body turning into mine as it bled out and then slowly faded from sight. Yes, I’d had enough of what Donnar could show me to last a lifetime.

“You don’t have the luxury of refusal, I’m afraid.” He held out a hand, sharp talons glistening in the light. “You must see. You must.”

“Or what?”

“The end of the world.” Both Lydian’s and Donnar’s voices spoke at the same time, resonating in my own head and in the space around me, hanging heavily in the air.

“It’s never something simple, is it?” I asked sardonically.

In my mind’s eye, I could see Lydian. His hair was frazzled and his face was smudged with soot, his clothes ripped like millions of fingers had torn their way into them. But the smile on his face, so much like his nephew’s, was the same. What happens when the serpent stops eating his tail?