The hammer struck again.
Clang.
Clang.
Clang.
Each blow echoed through the frostbitten clearing, bouncing off pine bark and brittle bones. The old smith's arms trembled with every swing, breath fogging the winter air. His forge was a joke—barely a stone pit with a cracked bellows—but Tanya stood watching with the patience of a god.
Or at least the performance of one.
The villagers called her "Valkyrja" now, mouths thick with awe and terror. Children stared at her from behind curtains. The men avoided her eyes. The women brought her food and whispered blessings they didn't understand. Only the blacksmith dared speak plainly to her—perhaps because he was old enough to know death already had a claim on him.
"You want blades," he grunted, wiping sweat from his brow. "But I've no good steel. Just what we melt from plowshares and scrap."
Tanya nodded once. "Then melt them. I only care that they kill."
The old man paused, studying her face. "What war are you preparing for, lady Valkyrja?"
Tanya's golden eyes flicked to the flame. Her voice was quiet.
"The one that hasn't started yet."
He said nothing more after that.
---
By dusk, the village square had been cleared. Snow shoveled. Stones moved. A wooden platform raised.
Tanya stood atop it, cloak wrapped around her like wings of black ash. A crude iron circlet—more like a band of rusted steel—rested on her brow, another piece of theater. Below her, the villagers gathered, faces pale in the firelight.
They hadn't been summoned. They came on their own.
That was the difference between fear and loyalty, she thought. Loyalty asks. Fear simply expects.
"Tonight," Tanya began, her voice carrying low and steady, "I accept your offerings. Shelter. Food. Trust."
She paused. Let the silence thicken.
"But tribute is not one-sided."
The villagers murmured, unsure. She raised her hand.
"I give you warning. This land will burn. Raiders still prowl. Jarls still war. Gods do not protect you. They watch. They wait."
She took a step forward.
"I do not wait."
Her hand lifted, and a small orb of golden light flickered to life in her palm—her last scrap of magic for the day. It hovered above her fingers, casting a soft glow over the crowd. Several gasped. A child cried out.
"I bring fire. I bring judgment. But I also bring walls. Weapons. Order."
She closed her fist, snuffing the light.
"In return, I ask for three things."
Her voice sharpened. Authority cut through it like ice through glass.
"One: Iron. From tools, from hinges, from the bones of your homes if needed. Melt it. Forge it. Stockpile it."
A few glanced at one another, nervous. Some nodded.
"Two: Oaths. No man or woman here speaks my name in vain. My words are law. My enemies are yours."
She stared directly at Ivar from before. He dropped his gaze.
"And three…"
Her tone darkened.
"Children. Those without fathers. Those strong enough to stand. I will train them."
Gasps this time. Protests rising in whispers. Tanya let them stir, then sliced the air with her hand.
"I do not ask for slaves. I ask for survivors. Warriors."
Another beat. One of the mothers sobbed, clutching her son.
Tanya did not blink.
"You kneel to gods who demand sacrifice and give nothing. I offer survival—and I demand the same."
Then, finally, a voice spoke up. A low, unsure murmur.
"Are you truly a Valkyrja?"
It came from a boy, no older than twelve. Thin. Pale. A wooden rabbit toy clutched in one hand.
Tanya stepped down from the platform, boots crunching in snow. She walked slowly until she stood before him. She knelt, eye-level.
"I was a soldier," she said. "Where I came from, we fought for nations. For orders. For gods who hid behind flags."
She touched her chest.
"I died once. I woke here."
The fire cracked beside them.
"I don't know if that makes me a Valkyrja. But I do know this: I won't die again."
The boy nodded, not understanding, but feeling something in her words that wasn't myth. It was rage. Will.
And that was something this world understood.
---
Later that night, Tanya sat by the hearth again, the carving still in her pocket. She rolled it between her fingers, feeling the grooves. Something tightened in her chest—some vague, sick echo of another life. Of trenches. Snow. Gunfire.
Of dying in prayer and waking in hell.
She hated that memory. Not for the pain. But for the fact that something in her still feared it.
She heard footsteps.
"Lady Valkyrja."
The old blacksmith.
"I've begun melting the hinges. We'll make you your blades."
She looked up. He paused, then added:
"And the children… they came."
She didn't answer. Just stared into the fire again.
Outside, the snow began to fall anew. But it didn't fall soft anymore.
It fell like ash.