Fate Forgotten (2 page)

“You do realize she’s in labor? She’s probably already given birth to an heir. The next generation to benefit from your personal protection and aid. Shouldn’t you be off haunting DeLeons to ensure the right vows and promises are made?”

Mjölnir
vanished, and Thor’s gaze seemed to lose focus for a moment. “The baby came early.” Then his eyes narrowed. “Because of you.”

“Damned if I do, damned if I don’t. Had I stayed you’d probably be saying the same thing. But I left for her, Thor. Don’t forget that.”

He opened the car door and got back in, starting it up and pulling away without a backward look. He had better things to do than waste his time fighting with gods who, for some reason, felt compelled to interfere with men. And Eve.

Eve. The only woman who could understand him. Who could ever really know what it was like to live with all those lives in his head. All the wars, all the death; life after life, century after century. The gods spared him no sympathy, but Eve—Eve knew.

Damn it. How had this happened? He had been happy, married to Mia!

Until he saw Eve, radiant with her pregnancy. He cursed Mia for not warning him that Eve was with child. Something inside him had shifted at the sight of her. It wasn’t about the godchild anymore. It was about Eve. It was about how amazing it would be if he could share this with her, as Garrit did. To have her mother his own sons and daughters. It was about having her as his wife to love and cherish and knowing death would never truly part them. And neither one of them would ever have to hide their true selves again. He could give her so much more. He wanted to give her everything. The whole world, wrapped up with a bow, to make over in her image.

He had married Mia for fun more than anything, because she had spirit, misguided though it sometimes was, and because he could not stand to see that spirit crushed under the weight of what was
expected
of her. He had learned to love her. To appreciate her. To care about her, perhaps all the more because through him, she no longer need live within her sister’s shadow. Just not enough. Whatever those feelings were, they were pale and empty in comparison to what had broken into his heart when he had felt Eve’s child move within her womb, his hand pressed against her swollen belly.

“Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife,” he said, staring into the patch of highway revealed by his headlights as he snaked through the mountain roads. Of course, he never had cared for the rules. It was an instinct he hadn’t ever been able to shake.

But what if she wanted him too?

He had felt her jealousy, when she had first seen him with her sister. He hadn’t imagined that. And when she had thought of Paris, or her life as Helen, there was a fondness in those memories he hadn’t expected. She had longed for that part of him, whether she realized it or not.

Maybe Thor was wrong.

It didn’t have to be this life, after all. If he could only prove himself, his love, they could have an eternity together. And if the angels tried to stop them—if Michael came anywhere near him with that sword again—Adam would find a way to repay the Archangel for everything he had suffered.

No matter what his sin had been, they’d had no right to steal his memory before he’d even begun to live.

Chapter One: 154 AD

“You betrayed us,” Sif said. Her voice was cold, her eyes like golden glaciers. She stood beside Odin in the chamber, her hand on his shoulder where he sat on his throne. Frigg stood on his other side, her face soft, sympathetic. Her eyes as warm as Sif’s were frozen. From the way Frigg looked on him, with so much understanding, Thor wondered if she had seen some glimpse of his future.

Odin glowered at the floor, his forehead creased. He stroked his beard with one hand, and the raven on his shoulder with the other. He had not spoken yet, though he had emptied this smaller hall, his throne room, of all but Sif and his own wife. Thor wished he had sent Sif away as well. Wife or not, he had no use for her. Not anymore. And she had made it more than clear she had no use for him, either.

He could not understand why she had set herself against Eve. Sif had never loved him. Had lied to him from the first. What difference did it make to her that he had taken another woman to his bed, so long ago? That he had loved another goddess, when she had taken lovers of her own, betrayed their marriage and her vows even before that!

“If speaking honestly is betrayal to the Aesir, then I will continue to do so with my dying breath,” he replied.

“Odin made his feelings known to you, Thor. The Aesir were to stand together in this,” Sif said.

He raised his eyes to his wife, and kept his face blank. He wouldn’t let Sif bait him today. Not now. “Odin made your feelings known to me, yes. And I made clear to him, mine. There was no honor in this, Sif. To condemn a fellow goddess to death without allowing her to speak for herself would have been a grievous wrong. I would have spoken for any of you, any other god, if the circumstances had been different. I did what my conscience dictated.”

Sif sneered. “You acted selfishly to save the woman you love.”

“The Council made its decision. She is to be left alone.”

“Because of you!” Sif stamped a foot as her voice rose nearly to a shriek. “Because of your betrayal! Speaking against your own father!”

“Enough.” Odin’s voice was soft, but it carried the weight of authority. He looked up at Thor for the first time.

His expression was drawn, and the illusion that hid the dark hole of his missing eye flickered and faded. Thor could not tear his gaze away from the gaping blackness in his father’s face. But then Odin shook his head, and he had two eyes again.

“You are no longer bound to me alone, Thor, but to the Council. You can neither dishonor yourself in the task you have been set, nor dishonor us with betrayal. Follow her as you must. Spy upon her. But you are forbidden to know her, to touch her, to have her as your own. Forbidden to reveal yourself to her, as I know you ache to do. This is your punishment. For all time.”

Thor felt himself stiffen. It seemed as though Gabriel’s promise of reunion with Eve had not taken into account his father’s anger. “This is your final word?”

“I will not suffer your disobedience. If you were not my son, I would have you hanged for your disloyalty. As it is, I can only believe your actions are not your own. Go. Walk the earth and observe, as you have sworn to do. I do not wish to look upon you.”

Thor ground his teeth. Not his own. Was that what his father wanted to think? That he was bewitched somehow? The truth was far more insidious, whether Odin wished to believe in it or not. For the first time in more than five cycles he had followed his own conscience, his own will, rather than his father’s! And his choice had been right and honorable.

But so be it. Thor turned to leave, Sif’s smirk catching his eye, though he did not give her even the satisfaction of a glower. He left the hall without another word, ignoring the silent stares of his brothers as he passed through the large feasting hall on his way out. There was little laughter today, no rich scent of roasting meat. Even the hearth fire barely smoked, as depressed as the rest of Odin’s hall in deference to its king.

His father had spoken, and he was cast away. At least he would not have to watch Sif flirt and fawn over the Trickster at every meal. And she could hardly take exception to his absence if Odin had ordered it. After so many years of being leashed to Asgard, even so small a freedom as the right to wander the earth came with more relief than sorrow.

But he could not leave quite yet. He went to the world-tree first, kneeling before it as he had once done as a small boy, on another plane, in another world. Another lifetime. He rested his forehead against the trunk and closed his eyes. It had been a long time since he had prayed to his mother for help, for guidance, for anything, and he could not quite bring himself to do so now. Instead, he breathed in the scent of the bark and the sweet smell of the fruit that made the branches bow around him, savoring it all. This much, he would surely miss.

“Thor?” Frigg’s voice was gentle as a breeze. A far cry from the shrillness of Sif’s tone.

He dropped his hand and rose. Perhaps a step-mother was the next best thing. Frigg had always been kind. She favored her own son by Odin, Baldur, but Thor had never begrudged her that. Everyone loved Baldur.

“I’m afraid my father would not like to see your pity for me, Frigg.”

She smiled and raised a hand to his face, stroking his cheek. “Your father loves you, Thor. Do not think otherwise. But we, none of us, can resist the calls of our mothers. It has always been your fate to return to Her, and Odin always struggled with the knowledge that he would lose you.”

“My mother is long gone. Gone even from my memory.”

“But not your heart.” She dropped her hand, and her expression became grave. “You walk the path you must and there is little any of us can do to stop it. Sif will yet have her revenge, but it will be some time coming. I’m afraid you will spend a long and lonely life, Thor, and you will know heartbreak and pain even more intimately than you do now. But you’ll also know love. The love of your mother and your sister.”

He shook his head, frowning. “But I have no sister.”

Frigg smiled again. “Don’t you?”

Perhaps her second sight had confused her. There was a reason Frigg rarely spoke of her visions. There had been more than one night that she wept uncontrollably because they had overwhelmed her.

“I appreciate your words, Frigg.” Small comfort though they were, he could not insult her. “Thank you.”

“Remember them.” She studied him for a moment longer, the smile still tugging at her lips. “And perhaps you will remember your mother as well.”

He watched her walk away and sighed. The riddles which plagued him were tiring. The angels, first, and now Frigg as well. Would Ra start next? And Athena?

Athena. He plucked two of the Golden apples from a branch hanging heavy with fruit. The tree had always recognized him, had never refused him its bounty, though he had never admitted his ability to anyone. Not even his father. He owed Athena a thank you, and Aphrodite her gift, and he knew it was not just her sister who loved things made of gold, though Athena would never admit to the weakness.

With the fruit tucked between his tunic and his skin, safe and protected, he let the lightning take him from Asgard to Greece, to the olive grove where he had once sat with Athena and begged for grain. He could not go directly to Mount Olympus without invitation, but Athena knew to look for him there when he came to see her. He sat down on the stone bench, worn now with its age, but still sturdy.

Athena?

Here so soon?

He grimaced, though only the trees could see him.
My father could not abide to look at me any longer.

Ah, Thor…
She sighed in his mind, and then she stood before him, her pale skin washed with a glow of moonlight. She touched his face. His cheek, his hair, his lips. Her fingers feather-light on his skin. “I am sorry for your pain.”

He caught her hand and kissed her palm before releasing it and standing. “I have brought your sister’s payment.” The golden apple glittered even in the half light, and she took it. He held out the second. “And a gift for you. With my thanks.”

She raised her face to his, but her eyes were sad. “Could you not think of some better way to thank me?”

He didn’t smile. “If I could offer you what you wanted, I would give it freely. Without asking for any favors in return. But I would not do to you what Sif has done to me, and I wish you would not ask it of me.”

“She’s still your wife. Even after this.” She looked away. “I thought she would have demanded Odin allow her to divorce you.”

“She may still. She is much at my father’s side these days. I do not think he would deny her anything. But this amuses her, to keep me chained. Odin has forbidden me to reveal myself to Eve. I may only observe her. Look, but never touch.”

“A grave punishment.” Her jaw tightened. “Was it Sif’s idea?”

He shrugged. The hardness of her voice worried him. “I do not mean to hurt you. Giving you my body, empty of love, would be unworthy. You deserve more. My brother Baldur—”

She laughed. “Your brother Baldur is hardly an adequate substitute for you. He would not even think of standing against your father or his mother, no matter what they asked of him. He would not go to the lengths you have for love. And he does not have your spirit. He would never argue with me if he believed I was bullheaded, or call me out when I behaved like a fool. He is too good, Thor. Too kind.”

“What would you have me say? I value your friendship. I have no wish to lose it. Not like this. Not now.” He had already lost so much. His father’s respect. The love of his wife. Eve. Over and over again, he lost Eve. And would continue to do so.

She shook her head, her lips pressed into a thin line. The apples disappeared into a pouch at her waist and the smile she gave him was strained. “I would invite you to my father’s house, but Ares is there, and he was quite put out by the Council’s decision. It is better if he does not see you so soon.”