“So,” Clara said. “You tie magic into an object by using enchantment.”

 

I nodded. “Dwarves are really good at it.”

 

“But the dwarves won’t supply…”

 

“They don’t sell to fire giants or frost giants. Tired of them wandering into their realm to fight each other. We can maybe fix that in the long term. Angrboda’s working on it on her side.”
She wasn’t a queen, but she had a lot of influence in her realm. Having been Loki’s partner gave her a certain cachet. And she also had a certain level of friendship with Skadi, the winter goddess.

 

“That’s a worthwhile angle. It’s all very well to…”

 

“We sound like a pair of environmentalists.”

 

“It’s the same thing, though. It’s like draining your drinking water for industrial purposes.”

 

“Still, I feel as if there has to be something else, something that doesn’t…feel quite so much like a metaphor.”

 

“Says the goddess.”

 

I grinned at her. “Oh, come on. Reality doesn’t fit into nice story chunks like that.”

 

“Or does it? The nine realms affect each other, they’re tired together.”

 

“Still.” There was something I was missing, something that kept it from being some kind of neat, tidy tie-in where water and fire were just the same thing and it was all about environmentalism.

 

The cold stars.
That was the piece which did not fit. The cold stars.

 

“But you’re right. Without an alternative, people will keep doing it.”

 

“And people are notorious for not noticing or caring what they’re doing to their land.”

 

“I think they’ve noticed. I think they care. I think they genuinely don’t know how to fix it.”

 

“And the king is tied to the land.”

 

“Isn’t that a Celtic thing? The entire marrying the land symbolically stuff?”

 

“Yeah, but it’s a common superstition. The health of the king, the health of the land.”

 

“Which might be why Surtur’s convinced he has to go ahead with his plan.”

 

“After binding a suitable successor to the land.”

 

“For which he seems to be nominating me.”

 

“How else is he going to get Aesir blood into the equation? It might…it might be that would stabilize things.”

 

“That fits something Loki told me.” I sighed. “Don’t want it.”

 

“Doesn’t that make you more qualified.”

 

“I’d do almost anything to get out of it, so no. It doesn’t.” If I hated and resented the land, then I could not be a good queen.

 

If it was only what kept me away from where I wanted to be and who I truly cared about.

 

The worst part was it was a land I could learn to love.