FREYA DID NOT remember much from the earlier years of her life. There were bits and pieces, but they did not fill out the holes in the much bigger puzzle. Her mother's fingers running through her hair. Her father's calluses when she held his hand. Her sister's gentle laugh. Her brother's pleasantly bright eyes. Dancing with the other village girls during the festivals. Travelling to Halmhend for the market. Her own melodic voice as she sang.

Her childhood was but a vague memory, as if someone had etched the experience into the sand on the beach and the sea had washed it away. There were but a few moments of clarity, and she clung to them when she slept in her tent at the northern front.

One such moment was the day the Inferni came to their village. It happened in the late hours of the evening, when her mother had finished putting Skadi to bed and Matthias was grumbling about something she could not remember. Her father was sitting by the hearth, Freya at his feet with a book. At seven years old, she was much better at reading than Skadi, who was a year younger. It was not something she should have prided herself in, as she had had plenty of trouble at that age as well. But she did, and she read aloud every evening before she herself retired to her small bed by the window in her shared room with her siblings.

Her father ran a hand down her head as she mulled over a particularly difficult word. He smiled down at her as he basked in the warmth of the fire. The irony of him taking pleasure from the heat did not escape her years from then when the only clear memory of his appearance was his burnt corpse, blackened and hard and horrifying.

The screams started soon after that. Not far from their home. Too close. Freya could not move from her spot on the floor, her thin nightgown not enough to chase away the shiver that coursed through her body. Her father slowly stood up and walked to the small window on the other side of the room. Her mother stood by the door to the room where Freya and her siblings slept, eyes wide and ghostly pale. Matthias was close to her as well, still as a statue.

"Gedrenen," her father said slowly. Strangers. And then his eyes widened and his breath caught and he stepped away from the window with haste. He did not say anything, ran to the corner of the room where his axe leant against the wall. Not a battle-axe like she had seen some of the soldiers and druskelle carry. Just a normal wood-chopping axe, dull, rusty and old.

"Arne?" her mother called the name worriedly, brows pulled together. "What is wrong?" Freya slowly put the book down. Her palms were suddenly sweaty, and there was a horrible feeling of angst rising in her belly. Matthias was next to her in seconds, wrapping an arm around her as she stood.

"Drusje," her father spat viciously and tore the door to their home open. He did not wait for any answer from her mother, nor did he say goodbye. Freya felt tears in her eyes. Hot and uncomfortable. Witches, the strongest forces in the Ravkan army. The years he spent as a druskelle had left a long searing hatred for them in her father. He was still broadly built years later, with muscled arms and wide shoulders. If anyone could put the dull and rusty axe to good use, it would be him.

A gasp came from where her mother stood, and then she was disappearing behind the door to Freya's room. Moments later, she came out, clutching a bleary-eyed Skadi's hand tightly in her own.

"Quickly, put on your furs!" she told Freya and Matthias, pulling her own on before she draped the furs over Skadi's shoulders as well. Matthias did not need to be told twice and Freya quickly followed after him. He was older than her by three years, much wiser and far more grown. If he was listening to their mother, then she most definitely should. Freya respected her mother in everything and trusted her decisions, but it was good to have the confirmation from her brother. "We will hide in the woods."

The snow was cold beneath her bare feet, and Freya cursed herself for rushing out of the door so quickly. It did not matter, when they made it to the woods and hid she would curl her entire body in her furs and her lack of footwear would be of no consequence.

It seemed that they were not the only ones with this idea, as many other women and children were making their way between the wood and stone houses. Some stopped and stared in the direction opposite to the woods, hands covering their lips as if they were in shock. Freya could not help but look over her shoulder. What she saw made her stop. The entire southern part of their village was burning. The globe of light the flames created was bright, captivating and fear-inducing. The tendrils of fire licked at the black sky, rising higher and higher every moment. The screams Freya had been trying to ignore hit her ears now as hard as an avalanche, and she found she could not move.

Her mother's order to run to the woods was gone from her mind, and she could only stare at the great cloud of black smoke that rose above their village, visible even in the darkness. And then the first of them came. A man dressed in a strange blue robe, a determine look on his face. Freya opened her mouth to warn the people around her, but by then there was a ball of flame flying from his hand. Freya dropped towards the ground, hitting the snow with a loud thud. She scrambled away from the man, the cold of the snow biting her skin.

Chaos broke out around her, taking the form of terrified screams and people who scrambled away from their attacker. One woman was trying to run so hurriedly she had stepped onto Freya's arm, and a sharp pain shot through her bone as a muffled crack sounded through the air. Freya cried out in pain, clutching her arm to her chest and kicking her feet against the snow in an attempt to move. She just had to move and then she could hide. Her father would find her, surely, or perhaps Matthias.

"Freya!" her brother called to her, and Freya barely had time to make out his form in the distance before someone else stepped on her. She was knocked flat against the ground again. Gritting her teeth, she let her injured arm go and leaned against the healthy one. She pushed herself up onto her knees, then onto one foot and then– someone knocked into her again, and she hit the ground for a third time. She wanted to scream out in frustration, to curse the people who were running around her for not helping her.

She knew all of them! The old crone who had told her stories when she was younger, the three girls who lived across the street. None of them seemed to care about her peril now as they ran in the opposite direction of fire-wielding man.

Freya swore she would not give up, but as more and more people ran past her and she was left in the snow with a broken arm, she did not know if she could continue fighting. And then an arm wrapped around her and she was hauled to her feet. The smell of pine filled her nose, a smell she was so familiar with. Her brother smelled like that, marked with the many hours he climbed the pine trees in the forest surrounding them.

"Come on!" Matthias shouted, voice almost blocked out by the screams around them. "Run! Go!" Freya listened without a second thought. The snow bit into her skin with its coldness as they ran towards their mother, who was already at the edge of the forest with Skadi in her arms. She looked terrified, and Freya could not understand why. Matthias had saved her! They were going to escape! But then her mother screamed, Matthias let out a yell and a foreign hand wrapped around her and pulled. She was jerked back so violently it had forced the breath from her lungs. Her back hit someone's chest and their arm pressed into her abdomen, keeping her still.

Freya screamed, kicked, swung her arms despite the pain. The person struggled, but their hold did not loosen. Matthias became a blur in front of her as tears filled her eyes. His shouts were incoherent, muffled as something rang loud in her ears. She was going to die, she realized at the person jerked one of their hands an flame burst to life in it. The heat caressed her skin, but she knew it would hurt if it got any closer to her. And she was right, the nerves in her jaw and cheeks screamed as the fire approached, as it singed her skin raw and red.

As the first tendril of fire touched her skin, something tore open inside her chest. It burst like overwhelmed floodgates, so painful and yet freeing at the same time. And then the world around her seemed to bend, the sound in it gone as if it never existed. Her vision cleared as her tears fell. Matthias' face was vivid now, marked by tears just like her own and so afraid. But there was something else in his expression. Shock. Disgust. Bewilderment.

The sound returned with an agonizing boom. The person holding her jerked away with a shout. Freya fell forward onto her knees and covered her ears. The thing inside her chest built up with pressure and she screamed. The sound turned thin and high-pitched. It was a powerful force capable of stunning a grown druskelle. It had the power to bring men to their knees. And that is what it did. Everyone around her covered their ears, scrunched their faces and curled in on themselves, as if that would save them from the high frequency pitch that rung through the air.

When she stopped screaming, the world fell quiet. Not the same quiet it had been when that thing opened up in her chest. It was a normal silence. A stunned silence. Freya felt the heavy weight of stares upon her. She herself was utterly shocked. What had just happened? She had never experienced such a thing before! Her eyes flicked up to the sky for a moment. It was divine intervention, it had to be! Djel did not want her to die yet!

But then she looked at Matthias, and there was only pain in his eyes. It was something she had not expected. Just as she did not expect the word that fell past his lips in a harsh whisper.

"Drusje."