Astrid watched from the shadows near the house as her father and Sigmund stacked the wood for the bonfire. Aelric’s chain flashed in the fire light of the torch she held. Ljót was at his side, her arms snaked around his waist. Astrid smiled to herself. It was a good match. He would be happy with her. She watched the dancing and the fiddling from the darkness, just like when her eldest brother was chained, and just like that night, she also watched her cousin Lodvik peel away from the festivities. She moved behind him, quiet as the night, catching him just as he was stepping into the lane at the front of the farmhouse.

               “Going back to your woman?” she asked. Eylaug had delivered the twin girls. They were not thriving. Hrist had mixed several medicines for them, but nothing seemed to help. Eylaug did not have enough milk.

               Lodvik spun on his heel, his surprise at being addressed evident on his face. But he frowned when he saw it was her. She felt her frown deepening too. “I don’t know. It’s not like I want to be there either,” he said.

               “Why has she not chained you?” Astrid asked.

               Lodvik looked at her like he couldn’t believe that she didn’t know the answer already. “Don’t you witches know everything?”

               She had decided not to correct anyone when they called her witch. They would call her one behind her back anyway. “Because you didn’t give her boys?”

               He shrugged. “It is not a happy match, Astrid. I do not care.”

               She let her revulsion settle before she spoke again. “You should have come to me first Lodvik.”

               “I know,” Lodvik said.

               “Remember that, cousin,” she said, “And next time, trust me.”

               He looked at his feet, his expression darkening. She nearly choked on the shame he felt. “I will trust you, Astrid,” he managed to say.

               In the distance, she could feel Edda, full of power, full of love for Hrothgar. Astrid wondered if the other Bairns could feel her love for her brothers and her cousins through the wild magic. It had never occurred to her to ask until she had felt Edda’s love sliding towards her on the waves of the power.

               She turned her attention back to Lodvik. “Ask Helga to help Eylaug,” she said.

               He sneered, but at her stern frown, he softened. “Will it help?”

               Astrid laughed. “Did you not know that Helga nurses babies for women who have trouble?”

               Lodvik’s jaw dropped. “She does?!”

               Astrid nodded. “Strip away all the wild magic, Lodvik, and we are just ordinary women,” she said.

               “Ordinary women,” he echoed. Then he laughed. “Goodnight, Astrid,” he said.

               She watched him walk down the hill, his form melding into the night. But the fear he had felt just a moment before was gone. It had been replaced with hope. It called back to her as he moved away. She smiled to herself and went back to Aelric’s celebration.