Free Timeless by Shelly Thacker

but their safety had been entrusted to him.
    As his uncle had been swift to point out.
    Erik Valbrand had ordered him to arrange their funeral, since few on Asgard were familiar with the ancient rites anymore. Hauk had spent the day preparing the bodies, with their families’ help, then set them out to sea after nightfall, in the very longship that had carried them to their fate, set ablaze.
    He had had no time to mourn—and less than an hour to gather necessities for this bride he did not want, return to his vaningshus and collect her without getting a blade in his gullet, and bring her here to the althing .
    Hauk stared up at the towering wall of stone before him. He had not attended an althing , had not even set foot in this part of the forest, in years. Everyone believed his absence was due to his well-known opinion that this custom, like so many others, should be changed. That it was a waste of breath to gather here at midnight on the night of the raiders’ return, offering toasts to the gods and listening to the elders’ endless speeches about the old ways and ancestral traditions.
    No one knew the true reason he stayed away.
    He resisted the tightening in his throat, the ache that filled his chest. But as he listened to the men in line taking their vows, one after another, he felt something inside him tearing open. Felt the memories rising from the deep, black place inside where he kept them locked away.
    Karolina .
    The thought of her name made the feelings spill through him.
    How excited he had been, standing here beside his first bride. How proud and pleased with himself—just as young Svein and the others were now. Grinning like a witless fool, as eager as a stag in rut.
    Utterly unaware of how soon it would all end.
    He swallowed hard as the memories flashed across his mind, each one sweeter than honey and more bitter than the last dregs of spoiled wine. The gentleness of her voice. Her silhouette at the window in the mornings, her every movement so serene as she combed her long blond hair. The softness of her palm pressing his hand against her belly, so he could feel their baby kick.
    The sound of her screams as she died .
    Hauk shut his eyes. She had called out his name with her last breath.
    And taken their unborn son with her.
    He clenched his jaw, trying to force the unwanted emotions away. In command of himself after a moment, he opened his eyes and glanced up at the waterfall.
    Only to be assaulted by memories of the second time he had stood here, years later. Beside Maeve.
    Maeve, whose laughter had brightened his life like the sun. She had been so entranced by the moonlit waterfall, she barely uttered a sound during the ceremony. His cheerful, Celtic lass had been happy to leave behind her life of poverty in Ireland, had quickly fallen in love with Asgard’s beauty... and with him.
    And for a time, he had known hope. Had allowed himself to believe that this time, it would be different. That she could heal the emptiness inside him, the loneliness that had been with him since he was a boy.
    He could still see the look on her face when she found the first gray hair in her ebony tresses, how she had made a jest over it...
    And when he lost her, as well, the emptiness inside him had widened and deepened, and his life was all the darker for having known even a brief touch of the sun.
    Hauk dropped his gaze to the trampled earth beneath his boots, trying to shrug off the memories as Avril had tried to shrug off his hand earlier. None of it mattered any longer. He had learned his lesson: ’Twas better to be alone than to be left alone.
    Better not to hope for a life different from the one the gods had given him.
    In the years since he had lost Maeve, he had allowed every feeling, every desire, every dream inside him to cool and harden into ice. Blessed, numbing ice. Until he wanted nothing, felt nothing. Most of the time it was not even a struggle anymore.
    Except here, in this place.
    “ Ja ,” another