Chapter One - Prologue
The drums rang out, loud and strong, pounding a tempo that moved through the ground and sent vibrations through her entire body.
As if she needed anything to add to the nervous tremors that would not go away.
She tried to keep still as she listened to the merrymaking outside of the tent; her village was having a celebration in honor of the god that had come down from the skies to visit them. She'd heard her mother talk about how it had been years since the gods had come down to show their people favor. How it was a privilege to catch a glimpse of the face of one such god, how she should be honored to be offered as a sacrifice to said god. Ororo had sat and listened to those words numbly, trying to keep the tears at bay and be the brave young woman her family expected her to be.
Offered as a sacrifice. The very thought made her shudder - not with fear this time, but with anger and indignation. She was not property, to be bartered for favors. She was not an object to be offered to stroke the vanity of selfish deities. Ororo was a person, and every second that she sat in the traditional finery of her tribe, waiting to be accepted as a sacrifice and taken to the realm of the gods, her blood boiled with the very unfairness of it all.
"Ororo, look at you." Her sister's voice broke through her thoughts. "You're beautiful."
Ororo gazed up at her sister. Zula was lucky; she was a few years Ororo's senior and already wed. The village would only sacrifice a maiden, pure and untouched by a man. She didn't smile as her sister fussed over the ornate beads that had been braided into her snow-white hair. Zula adjusted the ceremonial garb that Ororo was wrapped in.
"It's going to be okay," Zula said softly, cupping her younger sister's chin in her hands.
"How can you possibly know that?" There was no anger in her voice for her sister, only despair. "I will never see you again!"
"But I know that you will be smiling down at me from the heavens," Zula replied with a smile. "After this night, Ororo, whenever I look up at the stars, I will think of you and know that you are walking among the gods. Think of how wonderful that will be!"
Ororo gazed back at her sister sadly. Those who do not bleed for the sacrifice feel no pain to offer it, she thought to herself. Aloud, she said nothing.
"Ororo!" She heard her mother's voice call softly through the flap of the tent. "It is time."
He was satisfied with this tribe, he thought. It had been far too long since he had paid them a visit, and the feast they'd set out in his honor reminded him of how much he missed these trips to Midgard. The men looked upon him with awe and reverence; the women clung to his every word, his every movement, with adoration in their eyes, and the children gathered about him excitedly, some too young to remember when last he visited, but recalling the stories they'd been told by their parents nonetheless.
Odin's eye fell upon the heaps of gifts they'd lavished him with. Piles and piles of handmade trinkets, each signifying something different. Beautiful woven garments, ornate carved figurines, beads and baubles and strings of jewelry. There were even a few hand-crafted weapons among the gifts, and he looked with approval upon them. As he was wont to do whenever he visited, he would take these things back home to Asgard, and give them to his family.
The tempo of the drums changed, and a hush fell over the crowd of merrymakers. The chief of the tribe, who sat to Odin's right, leaned over.
"My lord," he began. "See, we have selected a maiden for you as a sacrifice."
Odin heard the words the chief whispered to him about the young woman, but he paid them little attention as the maiden was brought before him. She was young, very young, and even though the set of her face was stoic, he could see the tremors that racked her slender limbs, the fear and turmoil in her cerulean eyes.
"What is your name, maiden?" He thundered out, amid the hushed calm of the crowd.
She stepped forward, her shoulders squared, and looked him directly in his eye. "Ororo," she answered, her voice soft but clear.
He nodded, appraising her with his eyes. She was beautiful, he noted. Her skin was dark, the color of the bark of the folkbjörn trees on Asgard, but her long, braided hair was as white as Odin's own snow-colored locks. Though she was young and slender, she maintained an impressive height, and he could see that her figure had already started to fill out.
She will be a gift for Thor, Odin decided. His firstborn was to be coming of age soon, and he and the maiden seemed to be of comparable years. Perhaps she will do well as his personal servant.
Ororo watched Odin, wondering what he was thinking behind that one wise eye of his. She could feel the presence of her family a few feet behind her, but she refused to break eye contact with the god before her. He mustn't think I'm weak, or else he will just kill me before we even get to Asgard, she reasoned. There is no place for the weak among the gods in the sky.
"Ororo," Odin finally repeated, gracing her with a smile that was not ungentle. "Have you prepared yourself for a life away from your family and friends?"
Ororo's breath caught in her throat, and viciously, she tamped down the wave of emotion that threatened to break free. Blinking back the tears that sat just behind her eyelids and swallowing the lump in her throat, she nodded. "I beg of your favor, oh great and wise One," she recited from memory what her mother had taught her to say, should this day ever come. "I leave behind my family, my friends, and my village and pledge my life in service to you. My only wish is that I be a worthy sacrifice."
The Allfather nodded slowly, accepting her recitation. "Very well then," he conceded. "Let us away to the Realm Eternal."
Her heart dropped to her feet at his words. She knew about the warrior culture of the gods of Asgard - her mother had told her stories of how their children were trained to fight almost before they were able to walk. They thought nothing of offering up blood sacrifices, of killing innocent women and children if it would tip the scales to their favor in battle.
She shuddered involuntarily. Part of her wanted to kick and scream, to claw her way back to her mother and father, to cling to them and refuse to be offered up as a sacrifice, refuse to give her life up. But the other part of her, the part that frightened her the most, was willing to go along with it, to embrace the thought of ending her life prematurely. Ororo fought the temptation to run back to her parents, steeling herself with the thought that, no matter what happened from this point on, she'd done the honorable thing and secured favor for her people.
She did not look back as she followed the Allfather to her fate.