Page 79 of Vicar
“I’m going back to Múspellsheimr.” Shocked, Trinity looked from Vicar to Revna. “Because I can do that from here, can’t I? I can return to that world through the magical Múspellsheimr residue in the underbelly of this mountain.”
“If you were a Múspellsheimr dragon and possessed a tremendous amount of power, perhaps.” Revna glanced from Trinity’s younger self to her, sensing something. Startled if she didn’t know better. “But then you were a Múspellsheimr dragon as much as you were an Alfheim dragon, weren’t you?” she said softly, eyeing Trinity in a whole new way. “And a remarkably powerful one at that...something I only now see.”
“Yet it’s there.” Fire flared in Loki's eyes as he looked closer at Trinity in that how-can-this-benefit-me way of his. “If you can but tame your inner conflict, you could become even more powerful.” His cunning gaze drifted to Vicar. “Both of you could, for you are her other half. He who pulled her soul free of the darkness then,” he paused and gestured at the memory, “well, I suspect you’ll see soon enough.”
“I won’t let you go, Trinity,” young Vicar vowed, grabbing her wrist when she tried to head deeper into the cave again. He clenched his jaw. His eyes grew hard. Resolute. “Not when I have enough power now to stop you.”
She kept shaking her head, and more tears fell. “No, you don’t.”
“But you do,” Trinity said hoarsely. “And I knew it.” She inhaled a ragged breath. “By filtering my inner Múspellsheimr and making it your own over the years, you’d resurrected your former Múspellsheimr dragon enough to draw on his power. His Múspellsheimr magic.”
“I wouldn’t see you give yourself over to that world again,” Vicar replied, remembering just as clearly as her now. “I wouldn’t have you taken prisoner by that male dragon again.” A vein ticked in his temple. “Because he would have seized you the moment you returned.” His gaze went to the churning sky. “Just like Violence would have the first chance he got.”
“Yet he never did,” she reminded, as glad to remember that as he was. Violence had pursued her, had come close to getting her with her ever-increasing volatile Múspellsheimr personality, but hadn’t yet. It was obvious in young Trinity’s eyes that she wasn’t going to let him either.
Any more than she was about to let her sisters or Vicar suffer one more day.
“I came close to giving into Violence a few times,” Trinity murmured. “I hadn’t seen him yet but felt him. Heard him in the dragons he spoke through. Felt his pull.” Her gaze went to Vicar. “Just like I did in your chamber at the Keep. That same compelling pull that had become so strong that I recalled it the moment he was close again.” She closed her eyes and thought about it before she opened them. “He never showed his face. Never would. Not unless I gave myself over to him entirely. Until we joined forces.”
“Because it’s too grotesque for you to appreciate unless you’d fully embraced your Múspellsheimr side,” Thor realized. “Unlike his brothers Evil and Darkness, Violence doesn’t morph as easily to anything other than what energizes him. Pure violence.”
“So, what are we talking here?” Jade wondered. “The Walking Deadsort of messed up?”
“No,” Vicar replied, in Trinity’s mind enough to know what Jade was talking about. “More like the face of every man or dragon who has met a terrible end in warfare. The face of someone who has suffered great pain. Brutal torture. Been caught up in unbelievable violence. The sort of violence that leaves even the strongest warrior broken for life.”
“Ah.” Jade cringed. “So way past the horror of what the undead look like.”
“Ja,” Loki confirmed. “Violence at his best.”
“Which I never saw and don’t intend to,” Trinity said, hoping she was right while at the same time dreading what was coming.
What they both sensed moments before the memory played out.
“Yes, I do have the power to stop you, Trinity,” young Vicar promised.
Pain flashed in his eyes before he fully embraced his Múspellsheimr side and did something only he could because of their connection. Because of the power she herself had given him over the years.
“I’m sorry, Trinity,” he ground out before he pressed the Alfheim stone into her hand. A rock she had refused to touch for some time because her Múspellsheimr side was growing too volatile. The inner conflict touching it caused was too much. She didn’t know how to control it.
Vicar did, though.
Enough to know when combined with his own power, he could keep her safe. He could keep her from returning to Múspellsheimr and forfeiting her life.
“I love you, Trinity.” He cupped the back of her head, squeezed her hand tighter around the Alfheim stone, and made sure her eyes stayed with his. “And I will find you again.” He shook his head. “You might not like who I am when I do, but I will.”
Ignoring her tears, he pressed his forehead to hers and did what he had done many times before, only a hundred times more intensely this time, praying it would work.
“Stay close, don’t go,” he chanted, reciting what he had said when they lay together, only now it was a means to pull her into him. To transfer the difficult Múspellsheimr parts so he could alleviate her distress which would allow her to keep helping her sisters find balance.
“Oh my God,” Trinity whispered, tears rolling down her cheeks as well. “What did you do, Vicar?” She looked from the memory to him, horrified. “What did you take on?”
“All of you he needed to,” Thor said softly, impressed. “Every last bit.”
Like Trinity, Vicar felt his other self’s every emotion. The extraordinary relief that what he was doing was working. That he could keep her safe. That he could give her back the balance she needed to help her sisters.
“I don’t think I’d ever hated and loved anyone so much as I did you at that moment,” Trinity managed, wiping away more tears. “You used my own powers against me, and it worked...” her voice dropped to a whisper. “We lost each other.”
“No,” young Trinity wailed, feeling her Múspellsheimr half draining into him. He was taking on far too much. Assuming such a heavy swing of multiple personalities that life wouldn’t be easy for him going forward. “Don’t,” she whispered. “Don’t do this to us, Vicar. Don’t do it to yourself.”
