What is left, when all you can do is question your very existence? When everything that you are, everything that you cherish, is reft away in a moment of pain and fear? And that which remains is but ashes and memory...

And even those memories are suspect now... Oh Lucian, what did you discover in Valhalla? What made you violate the sacred laws, and drove you to enter Lord Odin's private sanctum? I refuse to accept that it was only to give me a trinket, no matter how beloved it was to you... your life was worth more than that!

I should not feel this way... not about a mortal. Gods can love only Gods, and even then our duty to Lord Odin come before any other considerations... even those of the heart.

But my heart will not listen. It will not obey what I know to be the very essence of my existence, the truth of everything that I know and hold dear. Instead, I feel... drawn to you, Lucian.

It was something different from anything I had ever felt before, that day we kissed in the meadow. A simple case of mistaken identity, yet... it felt good, to know that you saw me as someone special. Someone other than one of the Goddesses who rule fate...

Is that why I came back to his place, this field of endless flowers? Because I want to find some sign of you here? To believe that you will return here again, just as you did so long ago? No... no, that is a false hope, a delusion of my troubled mind...

Why am I doing this? He was a mortal, completely beneath me... why should I care if he lives or dies, let alone what he thought of me.

The wind sweeps past me, sending another cloud of petals into the air. And I hear his voice in the breeze, a faint memory... "I know it is wrong to feel this way about a stranger... but after all this time... I still love her..."

My vision blurs with unshed tears as I fall to my knees, the words and feelings we shared back then still echoing through my mind. All of my life, I had always been more concerned with the merits of the mortals I had chosen, and yet the feelings of one young man suddenly mean more to me than a hundred brave warriors ever could. My tears finally begin to flow unnoticed, leaving hot bitter tracks down my cheeks... the only outward sign of the storm of emotions that rages within me. Why... why did it have to come to this? Why did it have to end this way, Lucian???

All at once, there was a sense of... something. A moment of recognition of something familiar, yet long forgotten. Something that was important to me. Something that I needed, a promise that I needed to keep. As each moment passed, the sense of urgency grew within me, tearing about like a caged animal looking for release. I glanced around, searching... looking... yes, there!

I crawled forward, moving almost to the base of the grave marker that was the only break in this endless field of sun bleached flowers. I could feel... whatever it was that called me, just below the soil at the foot of that gravestone. It seemed to reach out for me, and in response I tore into the packed earth, my fingers beginning to bleed as I clawed downwards towards the source of that urgency.

I leaned back a moment later, my hands cupped lovingly around a glittering silver earring. A perfect match for the one that Lucian had sacrificed his life to deliver to me.

But... how did I know this was here? Lucian, of all the foolish sacrifices, all for a simple earring. You were always sacrificing yourself for me, Lucian. Always trying to be by my side, always trying to protect me from a world I did not seem to be capable of understanding...

...

Always...?

Lu...cian...?

Yes... Lucian was trying to save me. He had always tried to protect me from Mother. In the end he had pulled me away from her, against my own will, in order to prevent me from being sold into slavery like his sister had been...

Lucian had a sister...? I had... a mother? No... I could not have had a mother, or father... Gods do not possess such things, for we are forged from the ether by Lord Odin's will and might. But these memories that tear at me, what are they? These shards of sadness, of pain and longing? I have no life that would account for recollections such as these! I have served Lord Odin, now and always... it is to this task that my life is dedicated, and from this task that I draw my happiness and joy! But Lucian believed differently... and he gave up his life to try and prove that. To... help me... But Gods can not be saved by mortals, nor can they have any feelings towards then...

They can not... unless... the God too, was once a mortal...?

Impossible! Preposterous! I am Lenneth Valkyrie, one of the Goddesses of Fate in service to my Lord Odin! He is my life, my duty, my only love!

No, no, that is wrong, a lie! My heart cries against my mind, bearing proof of what I felt for Arngrim, Lucian, Mystina, Lezard... Gods do not become emotionally involved with mortals, for they are but mere insects to us. But I feel respect and friendship for Arngrim and Mystina, repugnance for Lezard, and... oh Lucian, WHY?

I want to forget all of this! I want to forget the pain, the loss... I want to forget Lucian's death. I want to rest, to be alone here in this place, with the memories of my love and happiness... the only memories that I have left of you, dear Lucian...

The memories of a Valkyrie...

The memories of a girl named... Platnia...