The crowd falls into a hush. Not silence, no. Just reverent noise—the low sobbing of those touched by something divine. The moans of those getting off on the sight of it.

I take my blade and cut deep.

Across the spine.

Through the muscle.

Down both sides of the ribs, prying them slowly open.

“Blood for balance,” I chant. “Flesh for favor. Let the gods feast on what lies within.”

Oskar gurgles, eyes rolling, lips trembling.

I press my thumbs into the wound, digging past muscle, peeling back the skin with the care of a craftsman. Blood flows fast—thick, dark, splashing over my hands, and soaking the altar.

Giselle’s there, in the crowd, touching herself with one bloodstained hand, eyes locked on me like I’m the only god she’ll ever worship.

She understands.

She always fucking understands.

The sound is wet and terrible.

Blood flows like wine.

And I step back, covered, marked, possessed.

I work quickly, efficiently. The ribs are next. I snap them outward, one by one, the crack of bone echoing through the tent like thunder.

A woman in the crowd moans. Someone faints. Someone else pisses themselves and starts crying from the rush.

“He’s perfect,” Giselle moans, one hand still moving, the other painting her breast with his blood. “My beast. My executioner. My fucking god.”

I close my eyes, just for a moment.

I met her three years ago, at a lesser tent.

She was chained to a pole, laughing while she slit a man’s throat and licked the edge of the blade like it was candy. No fear. No remorse.

Just fire.

And I knew.

Knew the gods had intended her for me.

Not in a gentle way. Not in a soulmates-and-sunsets kind of way.

No—Giselle was forged for me in a forge of screams and spit and broken bones.

I didn't ask her name.

I just dragged her into the dark and carved my claim between her legs with my tongue.

She never left.

And now?

She prays with her cunt and calls me holy.

The lungs come last. I reach into the cavity, my arms soaked to the elbow, and pull them out—delicately, reverently—spreading them wide like wings.

“That’s it,” I whisper. “Louder. Let them hear you in Asgard.”

The Blood Eagle.

My masterpiece.

He’s still alive. Barely. The breath rattles in his throat like wind through broken reeds.

I tilt his chin up. He’s crying. Smiling. Dying.

“You did well,” I tell him. “They’ll take you.”

And then he’s gone.

His body slumps forward, wings of lung and bone framing him like some grotesque angel.

I step back, covered in him. The blood drips down my chest, thick and hot, like the gods themselves are kissing my skin.

The crowd is silent now.

Not out of fear.

Out of awe.