Valkyrie Hunter

“Gwen wake up!”

I jerked awake in unfamiliar surroundings. For a moment I thought I was outside in the snow. I wasn’t I was in a comfortable bed in a rather sparsely decorated room. I mean I had a bed, a table and a chair and that was it with no where to store clothes. Then again it was typically Valkyrie in furnishing. As awareness grew from my sleepy state I realised the voice had addressed me was a more familiar one.

“Mouse?” I said rubbing the sleep from my eyes. She wasn’t in my room she was in my mind.

“I’m sorry Gwen.” She began with an apology. “We could have rescued you when we learned what happened. We were not allowed to interfere.”

I guess she was talking about me being dumped in the heart of a blizzard and left to die. It hadn’t stopped them before I wondered what had changed. “Go on?”

“And I shouldn’t be speaking to you but I doing it anyway.” She sounded defiant.

“Why?”

“The First One says we’re are interfering with your development.”

I didn’t know who this First One was beyond he or she was helping the Keepers move to a new world. The world I’d spent the last eight weeks on. “How could dying in the snow not interfere with my development?”

“Yes I am well aware of that,” Mouse said sadly. “We cannot go against him. We’re not strong enough to go out into the Galaxy on our own.”

I noted she said ‘he’. “What’s that got to do with me, I’m only one person?” I rather not have the Keepers in my life. But against my better judgement I was a realist and they were created from my DNA which had to account for something.

“We do not know and it frustrates us?”

I changed to a different subject. “Is Scout ok?” She might be a Keeper but she showed me how traumatised she was, I suppose how they all were.

“She’s a lot better thanks to you. We found a T’Arni psychologist on Saros we are sending her to. After you suggested it we thought it over, it is helping.”

I worried about Scout. Then I didn’t want to expose the Keepers to anyone that might exploit them. “They know she’s a Keeper?”

“We’ve had to disguise her form and have called her Scout Hunter. Is that ok with you?” Mouse seemed to want my consent. “I’ll stop it if it offends you?”

“Why Hunter?”

“Because we share you essence. I know it was taken without your consent to remake us. I hope you forgive us?”

I hadn’t really thought about it, too much other shit had occurred between then and now. “I have a long time ago,” I said that to reassure Mouse.

“Thank you Gwen and I’m sorry I have to go.”

I felt her presence withdraw from my mind.

I was awake and I doubted that I’d be able to go back to sleep. I wasn’t even sure what the time was. I got out of bed dressed in the loose bra and panties that I’d been provided with and went for a walk. Stepping out of the door to my room I considered my route. I hadn’t been shown much last night if it was night. Like a starship this place had no windows and I had no way of knowing whether it was night or day. The quartz panels covered the walls of the corridor outside my room. There were several doors one, which led to the bathroom. Ignoring the doors I headed down the corridor towards the door at the end. I exited that door into a wide what I’d call a hallway with high vaulted ceilings and archways leading off it. I took one of the archways at random and found myself in what appeared to be a museum of some sort. Banners in red and silver lined the walls each banner had a glass fronted cabinet under it. As I stood there examining my surroundings I noticed a subtle difference in the banners. All the banners had the same red/silver banding of the clan. But on some a thin line of a different colour separated the red and silver. I wondered the significance of the separator as I was drawn to one with a light green band.

“Couldn’t sleep as well?” a voice asked from behind me.

I turned to see Miranda in the archway. She was wearing a red and silver bed gown with a blue dress underneath.

“I did try to,” I said. I wasn’t going to say anything about Mouse. I still wasn’t sure of these people yet.

Miranda walked over and brushed her hand along the edge of the banner. “This is the Hall of the Martins,” she told me sadness cut an edge in her voice. “I come here when I can’t sleep. Standing here it helps me fix what is important in my mind.” She gave me a sharp look. “What made you choose this emblem to stand in front off?”

Her question surprised me. I hadn’t considered any significance in it. There must be something if she was asking me. “I don’t know?” I said truthfully.

Miranda stepped across and ran her finger down the green centre strip. “Jenna chose the green to represent fertile lands.”

“Jenna,” I remembered her mentioning that name last night. I had a feeling it was important.

“My biggest regret,” she said sorrow in her words. “I should have been harder.” She gave a sigh. “Ancient history no going back and fixing that mess?”

I had a feeling she was telling me because it was about me. “What has that to do with me?” I knew it did but I wanted to hear Miranda say it.

“Because this is the emblem of the Landottir clan.”

I swallowed hard. I had learned recently that a male Valkyrie from the Landottir had been rescued and taken to Earth, my mother’s grandfather that was. I hadn’t had the chance to ask her about that. None of my family on my mother’s side had shown any Valkyrie traits. Blue eyes, pale skin, blonde hair and tall. I was taller than average but I wasn’t near the height of the average Valkyrie. “Great, great grandfather Theo,” I said mostly to myself.

Miranda must have heard me for she said, “Theobald to be exact, the grandson of my daughter.” Miranda paused then continued. “Well one of them that is.”

I thought about it and reflected on what I’d learned. “Why did you not bring him back?”

“Because he was safer on Earth.”

Which made no sense to me since he was Valkyrie. “But why?” I persisted.

“Because there were over five thousand Valkyrie who followed Jenna to the new colony. Five thousand of which two thirds were women and children. Only three dozen escaped. Most returned to the clan few didn’t. Jenna wasn’t one. She died giving that last of the survivors a chance to escape to a nearby T’Arni colony. The clan was all but wiped out.”

I felt a chill run through me. It sounded close to what Scout had endured. I wondered if there were parallels.

“Who would do such a thing?”

“Orsini.”

I blanched at her words as I remembered my own encounter with the Orsini. I had an idea one I didn’t like, one that made my blood run cold. “Why did the Orsini attack?”

“That I don’t know and I’ve spent a long time looking.”

I didn’t like it but there was a question I had to ask. “Do you think there may be a link between that and what happened to me on Cathon?” My mind replayed Solstrid’s last words again and again trying to see anything in them.

“I don’t know,” Miranda said honestly.

That wasn’t at all reassuring. I changed subjects all this speculation wasn’t getting me anywhere. I wanted to know more about my mother’s great grandfather. “And Theo how did you disguise the fact that he wasn’t human. You have to be ninety percent human to get into Security?”

“That wasn’t down to me,” Miranda said quickly. She paused and spoke again her tone softer. “It was in a way I suppose. I asked the Council to hide him and make him forget his past. It was the only way I could think of to keep him safe. That last bit I regret. But he would have never moved on from his mourning over Jenna.”

“Which brings me to my parents?” I eyed her suspiciously. “You didn’t arrange that?” I regretted taking that tone with her but I had to know the truth.

“No it was purely serendipity.”

“Serendipity?” I wasn’t sure what she meant by that.

“A happy circumstance. I, nor did the Council force them to marry. I did know the Council were keeping an eye on families they were interested in.”

That gelled with what Miri told me. Then I realised Miri had been named after Miranda. Then I remembered sitting with Thirika when Mother Sigrunn mentioned Marsha, one of her clan. I looked at Miranda through new eyes. The Valkyrie must have thought a lot about her to name their children after her.

Miranda spoke again. “Despite what the Isolationists think the Valkyrie need genetic diversity. It’s what keeps them strong and stabilises any defects. The Valkyrie are tops at genetic manipulation.”

“So that was why Mother Ronja and Mother Sigrunn where so keen to have me in their clans.” The thought troubled me. Then I realised that Mother Sigrunn had talked to me before I was altered when I still believed I was a hundred percent human. She had wanted soldiers not breeding machines.

“Our clan,” Miranda corrected me.

“Yeah right,” was my automatic response.

“Don’t be too quick mock what you don’t know!” Miranda cautioned me. “You carry my blood no denying that.”

What she said was true. “Ok I’ll admit that but…” I cast my mind back to my first encounter with Gudbjorga. She had thought that I was vaihdokas but she changed her mind. Yet when I encountered Thirika she had told me I was of the blood. Something had happened to me between the boarding the ship and arriving on Alfheimir. I began to wonder if it had something do with what they called my warrior soul. But it didn’t make any sense. It was a while before I spoke again each of us deep in our own thoughts. “So how did you form your own clan?”

“Something we can discuss in the morning. I suggest you go back to bed. If you can’t sleep I’ll find some needles and thread and you can alter those clothes we’ve given you.”

She glanced at my clothes or rather the lack of them. I was only wearing the underwear Ella had given me.

“We can’t have walking around in that state what would the neighbours think?” She said with a smirk.

I had to laugh at her comment.