Eirik walked back toward me, cleaning the brackish blood from his axe with a handful of white snow.

  Looking around, I realised the combat had moved us back to be near the now-fractured shield line. Smoke curled upwards from splintered barricades, and far off, something howled once before it, too, fell silent.

  The battlefield was still. Not empty, just peaceful. A torn banner clung to a broken spear, its emblem too damaged to name. Above, a Valkyrie passed us by, one wing clearly wounded as her silhouette cut across the sky.

  I let out a breath I had not realised I was holding; it came out ragged.

  Eirik arrived, walking with a casual steadiness that did not match the carnage. He grunted in approval.

  “I did not think you would be so calm.”

  “To be honest… me neither.”

  He chuckled. “You have now become a warrior who truly appreciates death.”

  As he spoke, he handed me his water skin, motioning for me to drink. I reached out, then froze. There, on the back of my right hand, a faint blue rune in the shape of Yggdrasil was glowing softly. I noticed that another rune was on my forearm, half hidden beneath my armour. There was another glowing rune in the shape of an hourglass.

  “What is this!?”

  Eirik squinted at the runes, a flicker of recognition and something like respect passing across his weathered face.

  “Ah, those are your Saga-mark and Rune-mark, though I’ve never seen a Rune-mark like yours. The Saga-mark indicates the beginning of your story; these are mine.”

  He raised his own hand. The Yggdrasil tattoo flared slightly; it looked just like mine, but his first Rune-mark was on his other arm, where he holds his shield. It was the shape of a small house, but when I looked closer, I realised there was a shield emblazoned on the door. Eirik then activated another rune on his axe-wielding arm; this one was etched in the shape of a pair of crossed axes. Looking at my mark again, his expression became thoughtful.

  “Though it is a little strange you have only just received yours... Normally, your Saga-mark and first Rune-mark are already in place when the Valkyries take you in. Your Saga-mark and rune marks activate and appear upon your death, and then the Valkyrie determine your entrance to Valhalla after all... You shouldn’t be able to come here without one.”

  I stared at him in shock, “Does that mean I’m dead?”

  Eirik paused at my alarmed reaction, hand reaching up to his chin to think, letting a moment of silence pass between us before answering.

  “Not necessarily... Some say Saga-marks appear when you cheat death for the first time, marking the moment the Norns notice your survival. For others, it’s when they accomplish a feat that can change the fate of others. My first rune came when I saved my family and village from raiders. My second was when I died in a duel with the chief of a barbarian tribe, but I managed to take that bastard with me and was thus chosen to enter Valhalla.”

  He met my eyes. “Either way, it means you have begun the path. You are making a saga of your own now.”

  “Do these runes do anything?”

  “Yes and no. Many have a variety of effects. Mine greatly enhances the strength of any shield I hold, and the other greatly empowers me when I become heavily wounded in one-on-one combat. And before you ask, I have no idea what yours does. Everyone’s runes are usually different in effect, even if they appear similar. It is up to the individual warrior to connect to and utilise his own runes. Having never seen yours before, I can’t even begin to give you advice.”

  This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

  I opened my mouth to ask more, but he raised a hand.

  “You can ask the Valkyries for the rest when we return to camp, as I cannot be sure I am answering you correctly.”

  As we began walking, I noticed something deliberate in his stride, neither hurried nor proud, but steady and grounded. Two Rune-marks... What kind of pain and effort does that carry? How much 'life' has he lived to walk with such calm? After all, I too ‘died’ for mine technically.

  Seeing me looking at his Rune marks with clear curiosity, Eirik sighed before adding, “The easiest way to find out what your runes do is to engage in combat, though I don’t recommend allowing yourself to become wounded unto the point of death just to check.”

  I felt terrible. I didn’t mean to dredge up his memories of his death with my curiosity. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to...”

  “It’s fine. I made my choice back then, and I have never regretted it. My family went on to live a stable life without me. Odin even allowed me to say goodbye to my wife before she entered the cycle of reincarnation in recognition of my service.

  I came to a stop, eyes widening in shock. Eirik kept walking forward. I looked at him with new eyes, truly his shoulders were broad to carry such a weight on his soul. How long had he been fighting for Odin for him to even say goodbye to his wife’s soul?

  The path to the Asgardian fortress wound through scorched snow and broken weapons. Patches of blood-stained ice marked places where the shield walls had failed. The dead had already been gathered into pyres, though not all had been whole enough to carry. Survivors of the battles trudged past us. Some bore fresh scars. Others limped or leaned on shattered spears like crutches. None of them particularly walked like victors; they were just people surviving another day.

  Through it all, the wind whistled through the wreckage of battle, carrying the faint crackle of distant flames and the occasional hollow clang of weapons. A Valkyrie was walking off to the side, lighting a line of corpses one by one with the glowing tip of her spear. Flame shimmered upward, soft and respectful. No one spoke.

  A battered pair of Einherjar passed us on the trail, heading toward the burning horizon. One paused, squinting at us.

  “That is the newblood from the shield wall,” he muttered to his companion.

  The other glanced back at me. No salute, just a faint nod, and then they were gone. I was not sure what to feel. Grateful that I had survived? That I had died and somehow come back when others hadn’t?

  A flicker of light caught my attention. My Saga-mark pulsed once, faint but warm, as if it knew something I did not. Above it, a line of text ghosted across my vision:

  [LIBRARY INTEGRITY: 62% → 64%]

  I looked back at the battlefield. The wind moved differently now, no longer howling or whistling, but whispering through the broken pines and now-hollow armour, as if the world was releasing a long-held breath. A trio of Valkyries flew in formation high above, silent as shadows, scanning for movement that would hopefully never come. The pyres in the distance continued to glow, their dark smoke twisting into threads against the twilight.

  A single raven perched nearby atop a planted standard; its feathers matted with frost as it turned its head to watch us trudge onwards. Before, I would have seen this all as just a game board to be reviewed; pieces on a map, a set of win conditions and strategic respawns. But now I saw the human cost.

  I had fought in that shield wall and stood my ground. Fought for survival; lived and even died. I looked down at the Saga-mark on the back of my hand. Considering how many stories must have ended before getting to this point, I hope mine will be a saga worth telling.

  Patchy’s Note:

  Quick spoiler: a Saga-mark isn’t a tattoo you get just by killing something. It’s a deeply personal and permanent rune that contains the story of your soul. It is formed when you do something that changes the ‘expected’ result of an event, altering the future story of the universe, no matter how big or small.

  I admit, I don’t understand the workings of the ‘divinity’ empowering this process, but I’m told it was laid down millennia ago by Odin himself and some external ‘visitors’ (origin unknown).

  Patchy’s Note: Whilst rarely happening, this is not an unknown event amongst the Einherjar. Many warriors who have exemplary service to Asgard have met their immediate families upon their eventual deaths for their final goodbyes before they cross the bridge to cleanse their souls in Hel (literally, as it turns out, there’s a bridge with a guardian leading into Hel that only allows the dead to pass).