Eric Linnaeus | Book 3 | Chapter 23 - It’s Tough Being a God (Patreon)

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𝕀𝕥’𝕤 𝕋𝕠𝕦𝕘𝕙 𝔹𝕖𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕒 𝔾𝕠𝕕ᴋᴀʀʏɴᴀ ᴇᴋʟᴜɴᴅ: ᴅᴇᴄᴇᴍʙᴇʀ, 𝟷𝟿𝟸𝟾. ʀᴇᴄᴏᴜɴᴛ: 𝟷𝟿𝟸𝟷-𝟸𝟾

─── .✦········· ───

It was a clear winter night. The air was crisp, and lazy smoke trails wafted upward from the village below. We were on the hillside above, lying in the snow, with only our coats protecting us from the ice. Brigetta was beneath me, and my hands were creeping under her clothes.

“Karyna, please,” she protested softly between kisses. She tasted sweet, if not mildly alcoholic like overripe cherries.

My magic surrounded us in an inky haze. I was suffocating her will, I knew she wanted me to stop but she couldn’t say the words and her body wouldn’t push me away. For most of us, our charm is an involuntary passive ability. It doesn’t do all that much; it just makes people happy, and they enjoy being around us.

Humans and creatures alike are inexplicably drawn to us. It’s not damaging or addictive in particular, it’s just a feeling of comfort when we’re around. Some Vanir have more charm while others have less, just as it affects some creatures more than others.

Lower species, humans, are particularly susceptible. Especially if they are close to us for an extended period of time. It can be confusing for them as it amplifies feelings in a way that can elicit unnatural desire. Those who are weak of will or naturally predisposed to deviancy commonly lose all control. Which can be dangerous to the young or inexperienced of us, if it’s not what they want.

This ability can also be weaponized. We can force others to crave us, manipulate them into trusting us, and so on. There’s very little a person won’t do for desire. Of course, I was using my charm on Brigetta. I wanted her to want me. I had always loved her in an unnatural way, and I didn’t care that we were related.

“If you want to stop… push me away,” I breathed, cupping her face in my hands as my hair fell around her.

“I can’t, your charm is too strong…” she huffed, looking away with a slight frown, and I felt a small stab of guilt.

“Why can’t we just be together?”

“Because it’s not right… please…”

“It’s not like we can make any babies together, what’s the big deal? A little part of you wants to, I know it does.” Truthfully, Brigetta’s father was my half uncle. We had the same grandfather, but our grandmother was shared only by marriage, not blood.

“Karyna…”

I kissed her passionately one final time before pulling away. I couldn’t stand the pleading in her voice, and I didn’t want to hurt her. A gentle breeze dissipated my magic, and I turned it off so that no more would influence her.

She looked relieved, resting her head back in the snow. “I hate it when you do that to me, you know. You taste like poison.”

“I am pure poison~!” I teased playfully. I hated it when she refused me. I loved her so much; we were soulmates, I was sure.

Brigetta smiled, setting a hand on my cheek as she spoke more softly, “No you’re not. You just want everyone to think you’re tough.”

“I don’t care what anyone else thinks.”

She was quiet for a moment, as if she was going to argue, but then thought better of it and told me instead, “I do love you.”

“Then why won’t you just be with me? No one would care…”

“Because I don’t love you like that. It’s a different love.”

“It doesn’t have to be-”

“Karyna,” she pouted, “Stop…”

I scrunched my nose, “Fine,” I agreed reluctantly and changed the topic, “Why aren’t you wearing your necklace today?”

I had noticed she wasn’t when I was touching her; the chain is long, and it usually hangs between her breasts. Our necklaces are identical and made from the same lump of silver. They’re special, all the women in our family wear a variation of them while the men wear rings or bracelets.

It’s our family crest, an asymmetrical design with spines along one edge and four small lines on the opposite side with a curved arch between. On the inner arch are the words ávöxturinn lindutrénu, meaning ‘of the linden tree’, to signify our lineage.

“Eiríkr has it,” Brigetta explained with a small shrug.

“Why? He has his own crest.”

“He stole it, and I didn’t even notice for a while after. He’s getting good at sleight of hand.”

Eiríkr was our youngest cousin, and a spoiled brat. Ever since his first almost failed revenant Brigetta spent so much time with him. She was trying to help him to walk again—a lost cause as far as I was concerned.

The damage had healed, but nerves had died. Nothing connected anymore, and his leg would never be better. We could write as many spells as we liked, our magic didn’t work that way; it’s not conductive enough and we couldn’t fix it.

“You love him more than me, don’t you?” I grumbled, jealous.

“I love you both equally,” she responded diplomatically.

“You love him more than your own brothers,” I countered.

“That’s not true; Eiríkr just needs me more now.”

I scoffed, tossing my hair back. I remembered when Eiríkr was still new to this world. Brigetta and I were thirteen when he was born. He was not a cute baby. His eyes were too big, and his cheeks were always puffy and red. Worse, he cried all the time; if any sound at all disturbed him, he was sure to make a fuss. He hated to be left alone and always demanded attention.

“He cries too much,” Brigetta complained, scrunching her nose in disapproval.

“Nonsense, the world is new to him and very frightening. You cried also as a babe, young lady,” our grandmother, Naenia, chastised her.

“No I didn’t.”

“Of course not,” she chuckled, “Why don’t you hold him?”

My cousin pursed her lips as if she wanted to refuse, but we all knew she would never do that. She loved holding him, and as soon as he was in her arms, he quietened. „Þú lítið skúrkur,“ Brigetta grumbled to him as he teethed on the pendant of her necklace.

“Can I hold him next?” Kári asked eagerly.

“No, you might drop him,” Brigetta answered without hesitation.

“I won’t drop him…”

“You’re not big enough to hold him.”

Kári was about five or six, plenty old enough to hold a baby. She just didn’t want to give Eiríkr over; that much was obvious.

“Why would you want to hold the stinky baby anyway? Come here,” I beckoned my brother over and pulled him into my lap wrapping my arms around him in a tight squeeze.

“Karyna, you’re squishing me,” he complained.

“I am not.”

“You are too!”

“Enough little ones, now is a time for quiet,” Naenia scolded us lightly; she was trying to settle the group of us into bed.

All of our parents were out on different jobs, that wasn’t uncommon, and Naenia was watching over us while they were away. In total there were eleven of us: Brigetta and two of her younger brothers. Myself, Kari, another of our younger brothers and four of our sisters. Then Eiríkr, who was so far the only child from his parents. He was the youngest, and I was the oldest.

We all looked alike with dark hair and blue eyes. But Brigetta and Eric’s mothers were identical twins, and their fathers were brothers. That made their families unusually close, and they looked even more similar as a result. Having seen ‘Eric’ recently, he looks nearly identical to Brigetta’s older brother, Hrafn.

I didn’t mind staying with our grandmother. We live in a small village with the others, and her house was the largest. The land grows fertile anywhere one of our kind stays, and our grandparents had lived in the house for a great many years; so the gardens around their house were like jungles.

Sometimes we would stay with our other aunt, Venere, but our parents didn’t like her all that much. That’s not to say they liked our grandmother either, it’s just that they disliked her less than they disliked Venere. My mother would always say that their side of the family was weak, and I couldn’t agree more. They had no interest in fighting, and it made them boring.

“Can you tell us a story, Amma?” one of my sisters asked. Amma is the word we use for grandmother, while Afi means grandfather.

“Of course, but only if you all settle into bed,” she agreed tactfully.

There was a brief flurry of movement as everyone hurried to do as they were told. Our beds were plush mattresses on the floor, and it didn’t matter in particular where we slept, but Eiríkr was supposed to sleep in the cradle. Not that Brigetta would give him up. She refused to put him back, and so she laid curled around him like a cat with him beside her stomach.

I thought Naenia might not allow that, but she didn’t say anything, so I supposed it was alright. Personally, I didn’t care, as long as he didn’t cry. And if Brigetta accidentally rolled over and squashed him, that was probably a bonus.

Kári moved to the mattress beside mine and settled in with our littlest sister while I pushed away the other two, I didn’t want them right on top of me.

“Is everyone settled now?” our grandmother mused, with her hands on her hips. Her long caramel hair was streaked with silver strands although her face was immortally youthful.

“Yes Amma,” several voices answered at once.

“Good, now where should I begin?”

“Can you tell us why the other half of our family is so weak?” Brigetta asked with a wicked smile. Her words were sharp, and Naenia looked displeased.

“Brigetta,” she warned.

“What? Everyone knows it.”

“That’s not true; they are no different from you.”

“Uncle Mercurius says-”

“My youngest son has much to learn about the world, and he should not be sharing his ideations with you. Next time he says something like that, be sure to tell him I said he was wrong.”

“Okay Amma,” she agreed easily. But we made brief eye contact, and I could tell she was lying. We both knew our parents were right, and our grandmother was, in fact, one of the weak ones.

I wondered if Brigetta would say that; she was vicious after all. Her first revenant had revealed her talent to be death, and the bloodlust she held was just as strong as her mother’s. My talent was fertility. I had hoped it would be death like hers, like my father’s, but no. I inherited my mother’s ability to make things grow well instead.

It wasn’t until later that I learned control over fertility had an extended range of uses, including inducing infertility. I loved that part of it, it made me more like Brigetta, and she was what I wanted to be.

“Listen well now, our family is not divided into two halves; we are all one,” Naenia preached, subtly reprimanding Brigetta as she began. “Mercurius believes that we are greater than many others, and that he is greater than us. It is true that once there were war-like people.

They wished to do nothing more than fight all day and enjoyed hunting great beasts. It was their reckless nature that very nearly killed all else, and as their clan approached our territory we prepared. We knew the ways of battle well and knew of their advance long before they reached us, so when they arrived at the borders of our territory we fought them on equal ground.

Our strength surprised them; we were not weak as they believed. But the battles were terrible; many died, and the land suffered. With both sides wounded a peace treaty was formed. It is not right to destroy others simply because we are different from them,” she paused momentarily to look at Brigetta meaningfully before going on, “We exchanged peoples to better understand one another, and it was from the union of both that our family descended.”

“Father and Uncle Mercurius say that’s a lie, and that we never ‘peacefully’ exchanged anyone with them,” my cousin answered as she twirled Eiríkr’s hair between her fingers.

Naenia looked annoyed, “My sons are incorrect, and the exchange of people was for peace and harmony,” she repeated firmly.

“But our ancestors were better than them. We are better than them.”

“We are each unique in our own ways, and these differences should be celebrated. However, there is no separation; we each bleed the same.”

“No,” Brigetta continued factually, “Some of us bleed better. Mercury says your hair is light brown because you don’t have much magic, and that we have dark brown hair because we’re stronger.”

Amma pursed her lips, “And what of your brothers who were born with fair hair? Or Eiríkr?”

My cousin paused, “Eiríkr’s hair was fair when he was born,” she agreed, “But it is dark now because his magic has tainted it; he is one of us.”

“No. It’s because we are descended from both Æsir and Vanir. We are not separate peoples; our ancestors became one. That’s why some have dark hair, child, because we are their direct ancestors.”

“Father and uncle say-” she began again, but our grandmother stopped her.

“That is quite enough. Mercurius is wrong, as is your father, and you will not repeat their ideals under this roof. Do you understand me?”

“What are you going to do about it? Father says-”

“Is everything alright in here?” It was our grandfather, Eyvindr, who spoke from the doorway, his deep voice scaring us all into silence.

“Your son has been telling the children horrible things,” Amma answered him with mild irritation.

“I’ll talk to him,” he assured his wife, then spoke gruffly to us, “Sleep. Now. And put the young one back in his cradle.”

“But he’s asleep, and he likes being near me,” Brigetta protested quickly.

“If you lay near him, he might die. Your talent is death, remember,” Amma warned.

“I always turn it off when he’s around! I know he’s too little. I’m careful with him-”

“This isn’t a debate.”

Naenia took Eiríkr from where he lay beside Brigetta and sent her to another room. I’m certain that was done to punish her, and of course, Eiríkr cried for half the night after that. No one got any sleep.

When at last all was quiet, I crept into the room Brigetta had been taken to. Her eyes gleamed in the darkness, and I could see her teeth as she smiled, “Took you long enough.”

“Your real favorite cousin wouldn’t stop crying, I had to wait until he was quiet.”

“Jealous?” she teased.

Admittedly I was. Brigetta was my favorite cousin, but I knew I wasn’t hers. “Maybe,” I grumbled, and she grinned.

“Come here then.”

I moved over to her, and she wrapped me in a tight hug, kissing my cheek sweetly. “You don’t need to be jealous; I love you too, Karyna!” she assured, and my face heated with embarrassment.

“Did you get in a lot of trouble for talking like that to Amma?”

“Not really, but I’m going to go spy on them, want to come?”

Of course I did. We crawled silently from the room into the hall and downstairs to the kitchen. We could hear our grandparents arguing in hushed tones but couldn’t make out what they were saying until we got closer.

“-both of them,” Amma hissed annoyed.

“I didn’t raise them to be like that, you know it…”

“It’s your side of the family they get it from. I remember when you thought the same things they do.”

“I never told them that-”

“No. But you let your brother near them, and he filled their heads with these ideas. Claiming superiority- it’s nonsense!”

“Keep your voice down, my love,” Eyvindr soothed her softly.

“They’re turning half my grandchildren against us…” There was a slight tremble in her voice, and I wondered if she was going to cry. It would be pathetic if she did, further proof that they were weak.

“I will speak with them.”

“It’s too late for the eldest of them, did you hear what Brigetta said?”

“I heard enough…”

“Maybe we can still save the littlest of them-”

They started to move toward us, and we scurried out of the way. We hid in the hallway closet, sandwiched between their coats and cleaning supplies. “Amma hates you~” I teased Brigetta in a whispered tone.

“I don’t care. She’s so weak, did you hear her almost crying?”

It was hard not to laugh, and Brigetta covered my mouth with her hand, “Shhh!”

Our parents taught us to be strong. We didn’t cry, and we knew how to fight. Sometimes we got to play with our other cousins, all half-cousins on our grandmother’s side, and we always beat them. They weren’t as strong as us when we wrestled, and even the ones who were older than us didn’t know how to write good spells. Venere’s children were so fragile, it was shameful. I’m glad we killed them.

We waited for a long time, and when Brigetta and I could finally come out of hiding, we returned to the rest of our siblings. I cuddled in with my sisters; now that they were asleep, they wouldn’t squish me, and Brigetta took Eiríkr from his cradle to lay with him.

“You’ll get in trouble,” I warned her.

“What are they gonna do about it? Cry some more?”

─── .✦········· ───

Our parents returned not long after. I ran to my mother with my siblings and our cousins did the same. My aunts didn’t arrive with their husbands, so Mercury and Silvius were alone as they approached the house.

“Where’s Mother?” Brigetta asked curiously as she approached Silvius.

“She and Katla decided to detour. They’ll be home by dinner,” he assured, although Mercury put a handout to stop the girl.

“You don’t have my son with you?”

“No, Amma and Afi still have him. They want to talk to you,” she answered easily, and our uncle looked irritated.

“How annoying,” he muttered.

“Do you need us to come in with you?” my mother offered.

“No. This will only take a moment.”

Mercury trotted up the steps and disappeared into the house. The plants nearest to his feet wilted as he passed, and his aura was visible. My uncles are dangerous men, and both had venomous tempers; but Mercury was the stronger of the two.

As promised, he returned only a few minutes later with Eiríkr in his arms. He nuzzled his son gently, brushing the boy’s cheeks with his long lashes causing him to give a soft sound of content.

“We won’t be leaving the children unattended with their grandparents again,” Mercurius announced calmly.

“Did they give you trouble?” Silvius asked and Mercury chuckled.

“Do you think they would dare? No, they simply wish to teach the children useless things.”

True to their word we were never permitted to stay with our grandparents alone again. One of our older siblings would watch over us instead, and as time passed that duty fell to Brigetta and I. Although I preferred to participate in missions.

─── .✦········· ───

I learned how to revenant from Mercury. He was by far the best at it; he could activate so quickly that it didn’t look like anything happened at all; if you blinked you would miss the transition between death and revival completely.

“It’s me, anyone home?” I announced myself as I walked into their house ready for my next lesson. Some time had passed, I was by then in my late teens and Eiríkr was nearing five or six.

“In here,” Mercury called from the other room.

Bright laughter filled the air, and I entered to find him lying on the floor with Eiríkr. I can only assume the man had been trying to teach his son how to write spells. But that had long been abandoned and a variety of kids toys lay around them. A checkers board, scatter jacks, some monstrosity of wooden pieces that it looked like they had been trying to build at some point.

Mercury was blowing air onto Eiríkr’s exposed stomach, causing the child to squeal with delight.

“Stop it, stop it!” his complaints were plainly insincere.

“Sorry, what was that? I didn’t hear you,” Mercury laid his ear on Eiríkr’s stomach, “Did your stomach say something?”

“You’re too heavy, get off!”

“Wow that’s a lot for a stomach to say-”

“Karyna!” The boy struggled in earnest to get up so that he could run to me, and Mercury chuckled to himself as he allowed his son to go.

He met me at full speed, and I stumbled, “Geez, relax. It’s not like you didn’t see me yesterday.”

“Where’s Brigetta?”

“She’s still at training,” I answered with a pout. Why did he always have to ask about her first thing?

“Eiríkr, clean up your toys, then you can talk to Karyna,” Mercury ordered, and the child reluctantly moved to do as he was told.

It was easy to forget that Mercury once leveled an entire human town on his own when you saw him playing with his son.

“Are you ready to begin?” he asked calmly.

“Yep,” I answered with a smile. His teaching method was unpleasant. He used the ring on his thumb to slice the artery in his throat, and when he bled out, his energy activated.

It leaked from the wound as an inky blackness, and the injury closed over. The markings beneath his skin grew dark as his magic traveled upward like a liquid along well-carved pathways.

“Begin to find your way back before your own death overcomes you, that is how you revenant faster. You should see the way out before the door has even opened. And don’t be late for the meeting today.”

He gave the brief instruction before smashing my head against the floorboards. It was so quick I didn’t see my death coming, and by the time I revenanted, it was dark out. It must have taken me hours to come back; I truly had no talent for it, and I definitely missed the meeting.

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