Dharma, 1974

LaFluer is good friends with Miss Collins, so he probably knows where she is. But when I enter the security hall to ask him, I hear him yelling at one of the other personnel. His usually friendly expression disappears completely as soon as he sees me.

"What the hell are you doing in here?"

I look behind me just in case, but he's definitely talking to me.

"Ben, you need to go home. Right now," Horace orders. "We're in the middle of something."

"Look, LaFluer, listen to me," one of the new security recruits begs. "Listen. . . I'm telling you, I didn't miss. I swear it was dead center. Right between the eyes."

"You don't get it, man," Horace butts in, sounding more unnerved than usual. "It doesn't matter if you got a clean headshot. Do you have any idea what you've just done?"

The new member looks wildly from LaFluer to Horace. "I cut off the head of the snake," he splutters. "I finally killed their god. I even killed that elk of hers. I thought that's what you've been trying to accomplish?"

"Oh, shit," Phil says from across the room. He points up at one of the security monitors. "They're here."

"How many?" Horace asks.

I move closer to see what he's looking at. Freyja rides atop the same elk this man claims to have killed. Does that mean her animals are immortal too?

"It's just her and Jarl Sigurd," says Phil.

"That's impossible," the new recruit stutters. "I killed her."

"You stupid son of a bitch." LaFluer grabs him by his collar and shakes him violently. "You can't kill a god! You've just killed us all!"

I jump at the blast of security alarm that blares through the outside speakers. The alarm suddenly fizzles out until I don't hear a siren at all. All of the men in the room turn to look at the double-doors leading out into the courtyard.

LaFluer swears. "I say we toss this trigger-happy dumbass out to the wolves. I'm not dying because Ryan wanted to be Quick Draw McGraw." Yanking the man behind him, LaFluer makes a break for the stairs just as a horrible crash echoes from outside and people start screaming.

I hurry around LaFluer and reach the doors first. If this new guy just tried to shoot Freyja, I want to be as far away from him as possible when the norsemen get here. I reach for the handle, but before I make contact, both double-doors are ripped from their hinges, and I find myself staring up into a pair of glowing white eyes.

Everyone has a specific rumor as to what the norsemen's god is like. Tony says she eats human hearts. Carol says she eats human souls. Jeromy says she has the head of an elk. Brian says she has the head of a wolf. Samantha thinks the feathers she's covered in are actual wings she can use to fly.

Annie and I have wanted to know what she looks like since the moment we learned she existed. Now, as I stare at her painted face and eyes that blind me with angry light brighter than jeep headlights, I cannot even fully process what I'm looking at. I can't move. I can't blink. I can't even close my mouth.

"He went rogue," LaFluer yells and pushes me out of the way. "He acted alone. Please, by all means, take him."

"What?" Ryan yells in protest, but LaFluer has already pushed him towards Freyja.

Without hesitation, she whips out her hand from within mounds of brown feathers and grabs Ryan by the throat, lifting him up off the ground. He chokes so hard, it sounds like he's throwing up. In a rush of bones and beads, she turns and walks out into the middle of the courtyard and drops him at her feet. Now that I'm not blinded by her eyes, I can see two antlers sticking out of her otherwise human head.

I can't hear what Ryan is saying, but his body language suggests he's trying to beg forgiveness. She reaches out again, this time slowly, with her hands gently resting on either side of his face, so it looks like she's comforting him.

His head bursts open like a smashed pumpkin, spraying blood all over. Bits of his brain dangle in-between Freyja's fingers like mango pulp. She lets his body drop with dead weight at her feet and shakes off the chunks from her hands.

"Jesus," LaFluer whispers beside me.

"Consider this your final warning," Jarl Sigurd announces over a woman's frightened screams, his voice accented like the rest of his people's."You and your people will stay on your land while our animals stay on theres. We will not ask again." He looks very much like he wants to kill us all. "You should all be on your knees, thanking our merciful goddess. You attempt assassination and all she required as penance is the one who pulled the trigger. If it were up to me, I would gut you all in a heartbeat."

And then they are gone.

As everyone around me begins nervously chattering, I feel the immediate fear leaving my body, and it's easier to think. I'm not going to die. I'm not going to die, and I just met my chance to make sure Horace and Annie and Miss Collins don't die either.

I finally met Freyja, and I think I know how to win her favor.

"I'm not sure I understand," says Erik. "What exactly is it you're asking?"

I have absolutely no idea. I don't know what possessed me to think I could solve this by just talking to Erik. He's been polite, never once interrupting, but I can tell he has zero interest in my attempts to argue for peace. At this point, I'm just babbling.

I take slow breaths through my nose and furrow my brow in a desperate attempt to look like I'm not struggling to conceal my anxiety. "Okay, look. . . do you think I'm stupid?"

Erik blinks, his head slowly tilting like a curious bird. "Of course not."

"Good," I respond with hearty relief. I half expected him to say yes. "Because I'm not. And I'm getting really sick of people treating me like I am. I may not know exactly what's going on, but that's because nobody feels inclined to explain anything. It's not my fault my rebirth wiped my memory."

Erik stares off into the trees, seemingly lost in thought. "I apologize on behalf of the clan, my lady. We were unsure if your memory would return by now. I see that it will not." He nods. "I would be happy to share my knowledge with you. What exactly is it you would like to know?"

Uh-oh. My brain goes completely silent. There's a dozen questions I want to ask, and now that someone is finally offering unlimited answers, I cannot think of a single one of them. To buy me some time, I simply say, "Thank you." Think. Think. Think. Think. Think. "Why are you at war with the . . ." Others? Barrack-dwellers? What are they called in this universe? "People on the mainland?"

"They worship a false god," he answers. "They should be making offerings to you or the other Aesir—"

Is that it? "That doesn't offend me," I interrupt happily. "Why should it offend you? I don't care. Let them make offerings to whatever they want."

Erik looks at me like I have bats flying out of my ears. "This. . . doesn't offend you?"

I'm Catholic, so technically all of this is blasphemous anyway. "No." Although Erik is calm and isn't making any special attempt to seem domineering, my hands still shake with nerves. I squeeze them and fold them behind my back. "Besides, that's not entirely true. They have a shrine for me back at the barracks that their people regularly make tribute to." This is going good. He's not yelling. I think he's listening to me. I start to remember other reasons I needed to talk to him. "I know you brought the female survivors here for your people, but . . . did you know some of them are already married?"

He nods for me to continue, as if my point was not evident.

"That's. . . bad," I finish lamely. "I mean. . . if you want to assimilate the survivors into your clan, you have my support. They have to stay somewhere, and from what I can tell, you do a good job of protecting your people." Like I'd hoped, Erik doesn't take this as condescending and looks pleased with the praise. "I don't have a problem with that. I have a problem with killing off a bunch of men because you don't want genetic competition. It's. . . honestly, it's gross. People should be able to choose who they marry."

I can't believe it. He's not yelling at me. In fact, he actually looks like he's agreeing with me.

"And another thing. . . uh, I had a talk with Charlotte. I'm sorry, but she doesn't want to marry you."

Erik snorts a short burst of air. "I have no interest in Charlotte."

I may have been single all my life, but that doesn't mean I'm stupid. I people watch. I've seen plenty of movies. I've shipped enough fictional couples to notice carefully concealed affection when I see it. "If you still love Jane, why'd you call off the engagement?"

"I did not end things with Jane," he says, sounding surprised I would suggest it. "Is that what she told you? One day I was engaged, and the next moment she informed me I was not. She's the one who proposed. Did she tell you that? Our marriage was to be the great uniting of our people."

For once I feel lightheaded from intense excitement. This is amazing. Is it really this simple? I used to matchmake for my friends all the time. I'm a fantastic wing-woman, if I do say so myself.

I think I might actually be able to help these people.

Ben exhales sharply through his nose in what I suspect is a concealed laugh.

Jane shoots a confused look at him, and then stares back down at me. "Are you insane?"

I shrink away slightly at her tone, the adrenaline running out of me. "This is great news. I thought you'd be more excited."

"I would rather boil myself alive in a vat of my own piss than marry that man," she states flatly.

"Erik said you proposed to him." I'm so confused. "Why'd you break the engagement?"

Jane rolls her eyes. "Irreconcilable differences."

"You don't think you can reconcile?" Unbelievable. This was such a simple solution, but of course she has to be difficult. "You have no interest in marrying Erik? None whatsoever?"

"Look at that," Jane exclaims sarcastically, turning and shooting Ben another look. "She's catching on."

I'm so upset, I have to bite the inside of my cheek to keep from laughing. "I'm just trying to help."

"You want to help? We don't need a matchmaker, we need you to harness your powers so you can effectively babysit your people. We need you to prove you're a god worth listening to. We need you to stop being such a disappointment."

"Jane," Ben warns.

"What, Ben?" She whirls around and yells, "We're all thinking it. She's our best chance at stopping the genocide of our people? Look at her. Tell me you were expecting someone so short and. . . docile. Oh, gee," she says in a higher octave, "Why can't we just all hold hands and roast marshmallows over the fire? Tee-hee!"

She's mocking me. I come to her with a viable answer to her people's problems, and she mocks me. She has the power to end this war by sucking it up and at least attempting to talk through whatever relationship drama happened between her and Erik, and instead she shoves all the blame back on me. How is any of this my fault?

"Oh, shut up," I snarl.

It's only after Jane cuts off mid-sentence and blinks at me with surprise that I realize I spoke aloud. Now that it's out, I can't seem to stop.

"You think this is funny?" I continue loudly. "You think this is funny? You people came to me for help. Everyone keeps telling me the worlds gonna end if I don't do this or I don't do that, and you people cart me around like some brainless ameba, and you leave me in the dark when telling me what's going on would mean I could actually be of some help. And what do I get out of all this?" I jab a finger up at her. "You knocked me unconscious the first day I got here!"

"It was day four," she mumbles.

"And their people," I turn and jab my finger at the general direction of the door, "just tried to poison me! So please, Jane, explain why the hell I should care about what happens to any of you?!"

"Hm. You're still short. But this," Jane swirls a finger around, gesturing to my outburst. I watch as her slightly raised eyebrows flatline, her mouth slowly forming a smile. "I can work with this."

I never could understand my dad's problem. His controlling nature was so aggressive, my siblings and I had to learn Italian in secret because for some xenophobic reason, he only wanted us to speak English.

I grew up with the mentality that women are to stay home, breed, and keep their mouth shut because what on earth could we intellectually offer? Even though I obviously don't agree with any of that, it's been drilled into me all my life. Sometimes I can't help but relapse back into the days when I really would shut up and sit down when my father ordered me to.

Like right now.

On the bright side, I was able to convince them all not to kill the male survivors of Oceanic 815. Unfortunately, that re-opened the can of worms about equal distribution of survivors between Ben's people and Erik's people, of which Erik refuses to budge.

I try not to flinch as Erik continues to rant, but it's proving more difficult than I'd hoped. Unlike when he was speaking to me directly, he is very angry and loud and reminds me a little too much of my father. It also doesn't help that the majority of norsemen at the meeting—sorry, Thing, as Gail so often corrects—seem to agree with Erik's argument.

"We are a people of war," he explains. "We have always been a people of war who have prayed to a goddess of war. Long before my ancestors set foot on this island, our people valued strength and power. But with every new generation, our people grow soft. We are losing our culture, my lady. Your culture. I won't let that happen."

A few of the older men grumble in agreement. A few of the younger men look at me to see if I have anything to add.

Freyja's not the goddess of war. Is she? I though she was the goddess of love and fertility? What was it my professors said? She was responsible for guiding people into the afterlife?

How would risking the lives of both these societies be more beneficial than seeking a permanent truce? The less dead people, the better. Maybe I should bring that up? Make them feel guilty for wanting to give me more work by carrying more dead people to Valhalla or Hel or wherever?

Should I slam my palms against the table? Leave the Thing without another word? What am I supposed to do? I look at Jane, but she's no help. Ben is busy writing something. Annie wasn't allowed to attend the Thing. And the rest of the men in attendance are either ignoring me or staring blankly at my seat at the end of the long table.

"I guess. . ." I clear my throat and start again. "I don't think we should. . ." I have no clue what I'm saying. I'm tired, I'm starving, and I'm one-hundred percent done with living this weird stressful version of the show. I just want to go home. Nobody's listening to me anyway.

"Since when did you all decide to elevate the position of jarl to that above the Vanir?" I look up at the voice and lock eyes with Liv. "You want to talk of madness, Erik?" she continues. "That is madness. You are my dearest brother, and a strong leader, but you are mortal—nothing else. To claim otherwise is blasphemy."

The grumbling returns, only this time, I think it's in my favor.

"Lady Cora," Liv continues, and I can't help but feel elated at being rescued. "I for one would like to hear what you have to say."

We set sail immediately back to the mainland, and now I stand in the same spot I stood in my nightmare, staring at the entirely male group of Oceanic 815 survivors. Some of them are characters never fully introduced in the show, but the ones I know—Jack, Charlie, Sayid, Jin, Hugo, Boone—stare at me with a mixture of everything from fascination to pure unadulterated hatred.

Like I did with the women, I double check my observation before clearing my throat and announcing, "Where are the rest of them?"

"This is everyone," Erik answers.

"Michael Dawson and John Locke are missing. Not to mention Kate Austen is missing from the women's group." It feels good to be right—and yes, I mentioned the characters by first and last name just to spite Erik—but my voice still falters at the look on his face. "This isn't everyone, Erik. And what have you done with the tail end survivors?" I give him a moment to answer before saying, "You do have the tail end survivors, don't you?"

Erik turns and speaks old norse to one of his men, and they laugh.

I try my best to ignore him and ask the survivors where Michael, Locke, and Kate are. Much like when I asked the women back at Hydra, all these men do is glare at me. That is, until I ask Hugo.

"Hey, so like. . . I know you're an animal god or whatever, but. . . just try not to freak out okay?" Hugo fidgets while he thinks of the best way to approach the subject. "Before we got. . . you know, surrounded by these Viking dudes. . . they may have gone into the jungle to. . . uh. . . to hunt boars and . . . stuff. Sorry about that."

"These hunters should be punished, my lady." Liv follows closely beside me, with Jane and a small group of guards not far behind, as we trek deeper into the jungle. "It is illegal to hunt the sacred island boar."

Thankfully, Liv knows how to track because I'm completely turned around. Every tree looks the same to me. For all I know, we could be going in circles.

I don't think we should punish someone who didn't know the law before breaking it. We just need to find them and tell them not to hunt boar anymore. Why is everyone's first reaction to inflict corporal punishment?

"Lady Cora! Lady Cora," Fenrir barks excitedly at my feet. "I smell blood! Lots of blood!"

A child's scream pierces through the trees and makes my hairs stand on end. "Did you hear that?"

A wailing little piglet comes bursting out of the tall grass. He hauls abruptly when he sees us and turns to flee in the other direction. "Help!" he cries in perfect English. "Help! There are more of them!" In his mad dash to escape, the piglet gets his stubby little legs caught in a tangle of vines and he crashes down, screaming louder than ever. "Don't eat me," it begs as I get closer. "Don't eat me! Mama! Help!"

"It's okay," I say in my most reassuring voice. "We're not going to hurt you."

"Liar! You hurt my brothers!"

"No, that wasn't me," I promise the frightened piglet. "I'm here to protect you."

"You're here to eat me and my family," he refutes and thrashes in the tangled vines. When Fenrir trots closer to sniff him, the boar says, "Stay away from me! I'll bite you!"

"Please don't bite us," I beg. "We just want to help you. See?" I hold out my empty hands. "I'm not eating you. Fenrir's not eating you. None of us are eating you."

The piglet finally stops thrashing and oinks, "You're not going to eat me?"

"No, I'm not. Come here, it's alright." I gently untangle his legs and scoop up the little baby boar, cradling him in my arms and brushing a hand over his bristly black hair. His birth must have been recent because he's no bigger than a loaf of bread. He looks up at me with big, frightened eyes. "Fenrir," I say to the excited pup at my feet, "can you smell humans from here? Take us to them."

We find Locke, Michael, and Kate in the middle of tying up a dead boar. Once they realize they're surrounded, they surrender without a fight. But I barely notice.

I point at a fully grown boar stumbling towards me on unstable hooves. "That one's hurt," I say to no one in particular.

"Please," the dying boar gurgles at me, "why is this happening? Make it stop." It looks like they attempted to slash his throat, but they didn't cut deep enough to make it quick. "I think I'm dying. . ."

"Brother!" The much smaller piglet in my arms thrashes wildly. "No!"

I reach for the larger injured boar as he coughs up blood and collapses, unmoving.

Liv pulls me back. "You cannot help him now. Look, he has already passed. You two, take the survivors back to the beach. We'll discuss the terms of a trial later. Just get them out of here. Cora? Cora? Cora, we need to return to the beach."

I stare up at the hanging boar, sliced open from its throat to its back legs, blood spilling out of it, organs already partially removed. I flinch away from a hand on my arm and turn to find Liv.

"My lady," she says softly, "I'm sorry. You could not have helped him. Either of them. We will ensure their lives are celebrated tonight."

I nod. Gag on the stench of blood in the air. Hold the wailing piglet tighter to my chest. Struggle not to gag again. Nod.

The norsemen waste no time lighting massive campfires on the beach and butchering the piglet's dead brother and mother to use for meat and God knows what else. I didn't stay to find out. I don't want to smell it anymore.

I sit in the sand with Pumba's warm little belly in my lap and Fenrir's floppy limbs flinging sand in the air as he scouts out the surrounding area. Pumba stopped oinking a while ago, and now he sits perfectly still, taking a depression nap while my people cook his family just down the shoreline. I wait for laughter or tears, but I just feel irritated.

"It's not wise to be out here alone, my lady."

"I'm not alone, Gail." I wave a hand behind me towards the trees, not bothering to look up. "Liv's been watching me behind that brush since we returned. I don't think she knows I know."

"Cora," Gail pauses. "I can't imagine what you're feeling right now, but just know they view this as a funeral of sorts. A remembrance for who those boar were as living things."

"By cooking and eating them?" I snap.

Gail walks closer to where I sit watching the waves crash against sand as the sunset melts every shade of orange together. "I brought you some fruit instead," she says. "You need to eat something."

"No offense, Gail, but I don't even know for certain you don't want me dead."

Gail retracts her offering and takes a seat next to me in the sand. "I never knew my parents. Grew up in foster-care. Nasty place with equally nasty caretakers who made it very clear they were taking me in for the money." She shakes the bowl to mix up the cocktail of berries and chunks of assorted island fruits, picks a mango slice at random, and offers me the bowl again.

"No thanks. I know how this works," I say as she takes a bite. "I've read The Princess Bride."

Gail laughs and reaches for more fruit. "Long story short, I worked all my young life to be the best of the best. The brightest. The sharpest. I excelled in college and was set to start research projects that would change the world. There was only one problem." She pauses, and I wonder if she expects me to make a guess. "I was a woman."

Oh, right. She would have been attending college in the 60's or 70's judging by her age. I'm sure that was. . . lovely.

"There was always some bright-eyed-pea-for-brains young man who'd waltz into the lab and try to take credit for my work. I had a few projects completely stolen because the department always sided with a man over a woman. I was so disheartened, I almost dropped out of the science program all together. That's when I was approached by the Dharma Initiative. They told me I was a highly sought after candidate."

Gail offers me the bowl again and smiles when I relent and take a handful of blackberries. Poison me. I don't care anymore. I'm starving.

"You can only imagine how flattered I was," she says. "Of course I accepted their offer of employment. The Initiative was conducting new and exciting research, and I was eager to be a part of their next big scientific breakthrough."

"How did you end up with the norsemen?" I ask, already reaching for more fruit.

"You brought me to them," she answers. "After I was finally approved to work on Hydra Island, I discovered the cruelty of their animal experimentation. I expressed my concern, but they threatened to imprison me if I didn't continue with the experiments. I didn't take their threats lightly, as I had no family to inquire about my absence, and I was afraid they would have done worse than imprison me if I didn't fall in line. You gave me another option. You took me from Hydra and brought me to your people on the mainland, and with them I have stayed for the past 30 years."

"But you don't live on the mainland."

Gail smiles. "Yes, well. All of the women and children moved to Hydra after the Great Liberation."

"Why only the women?"

"It's safer there," she answers. "The monster cannot cross the ocean."

"Oh." I reach for more berries. "What's the Great Liberation?"

"It goes by a few different names. The Great Liberation. The Incident. The Hydra Catastrophe. You stormed Hydra, freed the experiments, and. . . well, dear, you killed everyone else on that island."

Gail hands me the bowl as I shovel mango and papaya and berries in my mouth as fast as I can. Maybe if I eat more, what she's saying will make sense.

"Cora, when you saved me from the Initiative, you gave me more than a place to stay. You taught me not to take shit from anyone." She gives me a knowing look and nods towards the fire down the beach. "Especially not some cocky bastard with delusions of grander."

I don't say anything, but she keeps talking.

"This is my home just as much as it is Erik's and his men. I cannot imagine living anywhere else. I have taught more children than I could ever hope to count." Gail smiles fondly. "Annie was my star pupil. She's made a fine doctor." She takes one of my hands and squeezes. "Cora, you are the closest thing I've ever had to a sister," she whispers with such sincerity, I have no choice but to believe her. "And I will personally dismember anyone who tries to hurt you. Oh, you have some mango on your chin, dear." Rubbing her sleeve over my skin, Gail cleans the mess and smiles.

"Miss Collins," Ben's voice is almost drowned out by the crashing waves. "I need to speak to you. No, you can stay Gail," he adds when she starts to stand. "In fact, I'd prefer if you did. Christopher just delivered some. . . less than encouraging news. We have no other choice. It's time we tell her."

I reach for more fruit, but my fingers probe an empty bowl. "Tell me what?"

"Here?" Gail asks in surprise. "Are you sure you want to discuss this here?"

"At least I know we're alone here," he answers softly, and I get his reasoning. He's standing close, but the rough high tide drowns out his voice. If anyone wanted to eavesdrop, they'd have to be close enough for us to know they were near.

Instead of taking a seat on my left, Ben walks behind me and takes a seat on the opposite side of Gail. I notice he also has a bowl full of fruit and what looks like carrots.

I frown in confusion. "You're not eating boar?"

"I don't eat anything that once had a mother." Ben pops a berry in his mouth and chews. "I'm afraid I'm going to have to be frank about this. Time is not our ally at the moment." One, two, three berries. I watch him chew. Another berry. Chew. Another. Chew.

"Benjamin," says Gail. "Do you want me to tell her?"

"No. Sorry. I. . . Miss Coll—" Ben pauses, puts the bowl down beside him in the sand, and finally looks over at me. "Cora, I'm afraid I need to ask for another favor."

The laugh I'd been waiting for all afternoon comes bursting out of me. "Yeah, sorry, but I don't think Erik will be interested in marrying you."

"We don't mean Erik," Gail cuts in. "There is one position above him in the governing hierarchy."

Who ranks a jarl? Liv? No, she's already married. "There is?"

"Yes," Gail says with a small nod. "A god."

I wait for them to explain more, but they both just stare at me.

There are only two things that can placate Erik's insatiable need for tradition: war or a marriage between the two governing factions. A few years ago, that was slated to be Jane and Erik. Now, apparently everyone expects me to bite the biggest bullet of my life by marrying a complete stranger.

Gail speaks first. "What do you think?"

I find myself squinting instead of laughing. "I think you need to come up with another plan."

Ben's eyes dart away towards the water before looking back at me. "Did you not hear what I said? My contact just disclosed Erik's secret intent to kill my people tomorrow with or without your consent. Kill them. Take their children. I'm not even sure he'll spare the women at this point."

I know it makes me a horrible human being, but I don't care. I'm not going to forsake a life's worth of promises to myself because a group of grown adults want to act like the children from Lord of the Flies. "Yes, I heard you. You're both going to fight it out tomorrow."

"Fight it out?" he questions slowly. Ben looks from me to Gail and gives his head a small shake of disbelief. "This isn't a schoolyard brawl, Cora. I just had to evacuate my daughter so she won't have to watch the death of everyone she's ever known."

I know. I know, and I'm sorry. "My answer is no. Think of another plan."

"There is no other plan," Ben says snidely. "Just because I haven't explained to you every failed idea we've attempted up to this point doesn't mean I'm presenting this last resort lightly. You think I haven't exhausted every alternative option before relying on marriage to you?"

In one swift motion, I lean over Gail and slosh my cup of water in his face. Pumba wakes up and hops off my lap, asking what's going on. Ignoring whatever Gail is trying to say to me, I stand and walk toward the fires as Pumba and Fenrir follow so closely I almost trip on them.

A few people try to get my attention as I approach the collection of roaring fires, but I am filled with a single-minded determination. I find her sharpening a knife.

Jane raises an eyebrow when she sees me. "Not here," she says and stands, motioning for me to follow her away from the chattering men. "Something tells me you weren't a fan of the idea."

"You can end this."

"I like your optimism," she says. "It's cute."

"You can stop all of this, right now. Why won't you?"

"We can't assassinate Erik." Jane inspects her sharpened knife in the faint moonlight glow, not even looking at me. "There's about ten norsemen ready to replace him and his ideological hangups. Ben was supposed to explain that to you."

"I'm not talking about assassinating Erik," I hiss. "Why won't you marry—"

"He's not my type," she interrupts.

Her nonchalantness—the casual way in which she condemns her own people—enrages me. "You're willing to risk everyone's safety because he's not your type? What is wrong with you? You proposed to him. He's obviously still in love with you. Why won't you at least try to talk to him? What's so wrong with him?"

Jane sheathes the knife. "He's a man."

I frown at her in confusion. Yes? And? "Oh. Ohhh."

"Yeah, oh."

I sink into a crouch in the sand at the revelation, and poor Pumba takes the opportunity to try and climb back into my lap. Now that this plan is completely shot to hell, my head lulls as the adrenaline dies down. "Sorry," I whisper, "it just . . . seemed like you were jealous. I mean, you beat Erik up pretty badly because he got engaged to someone else."

"I wasn't—" I watch as her angry expression instantly drops. She takes a seat next to me. "When I was leader," she says more gently than I've ever heard her speak, "I thought I could fix everything myself. I was trying to do what's right. I was trying to help my people. I thought I could. . . I thought I could get over it. But Erik is obsessed with tradition. You think he'd marry me without wanting children? Just the thought of that man's sweaty—" Her entire face puckers. "In the end, I just couldn't go through with it."

"Well, I'm not getting married in your place."

"Ugh," she exhales up towards the moon. "I knew Ben would butcher this. Listen, forget whatever it was he told you and listen to me. We are asking you to sign a contract and host a small party. That's it. It would be the complete opposite of traditional. You two wouldn't even be living on the same island. You can go back to Hydra and sit on your throne and bless newborn babies all day, and we can go back to the barracks and not die."

What she's saying makes complete sense, and at the same time, it makes me sick to my stomach—surprisingly more sick than the thought of an actual war. "I can't."

I wait for her yell at me, but she lowers her voice and calmly says, "I'm listening."

Where to begin? How am I supposed to explain the entire history of my intensely religious Italian family? The massive dysfunction of my parents marriage? The fact that not a single one of my Sicilian relatives have ever gotten a divorce? Years and years of crying myself to sleep at night and promising I would never get married so I could always be in control of every aspect of my life?

My mother willingly married my father—moved across the world to be with him—because she fell in love with him. But people lie. People change. People learn to hate each other after it's too late.

That's not even taking into consideration my intense fear of rejection. How am I supposed to explain all of this in a way Jane would understand or care about?

"I'm sorry, but I'm not marrying anyone. It's. . . an ethics issue."

"Oh," she scoffs, "and letting a few dozen people get slaughtered isn't against your ethics? Got it. If you'll excuse me, I need to get a head start back to my friends at home." When I try to apologize, Jane spins back around. "Do you want to know what the shittiest thing about all of this is? I grew up with the norsemen. All those men sitting around the fire? They're my friends just as much as my neighbors back at the Barracks. So no matter who dies, it isn't about sides to me anymore. A lot of my friends are going to be dead tomorrow."

I want to scream at her that what she's asking of me isn't fair. Marriage may not be that big of a deal to her, but it's a sacred thing in my family. Marrying a complete stranger is out of the question. It's insulting.

I stay seated in the sand and watch Jane walk away towards where Ben and Gail are standing near the shore. Pumba rubs his little wet snout against my arm, but I don't pick him up. I run a hand over his bristly back to calm him down and watch as Jane tells Ben something, gesturing angrily in my direction. They go back and forth until he nods down at the sand and the two strap on their backpacks and disappear into the trees.

I've been knocked unconscious, poisoned, threatened, guilted, and pressured since the moment Ive gotten here. I haven't even been able to eat a real meal without something happening to induce vomiting. No one here has my best interest at heart because they're so preoccupied with their own. I'm being treated like a genie who grants unlimited wishes.

So what if these people war with each other? Who cares?

It's not my problem.

Pumba continues to silently rub his snout against my arm. I look down and see him for what he is—a frightened child whose family was just killed in front of him.

It's not my problem.

Like Ben said, the kids won't be harmed.

Tomorrow, Indiana will probably share Pumba's fate. How could I ever look at her again knowing I could have stopped it? How many other children live at the Barracks? How many other children are about to lose one or both of their parents?

Loud laughter echoes over from the where the largest group sit with Erik, talking cheerfully. I take note of their weapons. The rest of the norsemen guard the very confused looking survivors broken up into three smaller groups around three separate fires.

Erik brings up a chunk of Pumba's—Mother? Brother? There's no way to tell—roasted family member and takes a ravenous bite.

Tracking them down is near impossible in the darkness, especially since I only had Gail to point me in the general direction they left in. Fenrir would be more useful if he wasn't so easily distracted. It takes a concentrated effort not to huff loudly as I snake my way through the beaten path of trees and brush and long blades of jungle grass. Jane raises her gun for half a second when I finally hurry up behind them.

"Would all of this stop?" I smack away bugs and thank all that is holy in this world that I don't have the ability to understand insects. "Can you guarantee our marriage would stop the war?"

"Honestly?" Ben falls silent and closes his eyes. When he opens them, he's looking very intently at a fern. "There's honestly no guarantee of anything. All I know for certain is the only alternative they will respect is war."

"We just sign a piece of paper?" I ask. My whole body is shaking, and not from the temperature. "And that's it? You stay on this island and I go back to Hydra?"

They both stare at me like they cannot quite figure out if I'm agreeing to their demands or just being difficult.

"You can go wherever you'd like. They're technically both your islands. But yes," Ben answers quickly when I frown. "It's essentially down to penning a comprehensive yet thorough treaty alongside the usual wedding license—"

I turn and start the walk back to the beach.

"Is that a yes?" Jane yells after me. "Hey? Hey! Cora, stop!"

"Yes, it's a yes," I answer. It's difficult not to sound as angry as I feel, but even more so when Jane huffs a laugh.

"No," she says, smirking, "I meant you're going the wrong way. Beach is this way."

"Okay." I clear my throat, but the yelling continues. "Excuse me?"

One of the norsemen paces in the sand, jabbing the air with a finger and yelling in an indecipherable language. A few men push him and laugh. A few look at me and immediately lose interest.

I inhale a lungful of air and order as forcefully as I can, "Excuse me? I need to say something." But it still isn't enough to get everyone's attention.

I can smell the roasted boar and it makes my stomach groan in protest. I can never have bacon again. Sausages. Pasta Carbonara. Prosciutto. I can never eat some of my favorite dishes ever again without hearing the confused gurgling pleas of Pumba's dying brother. And here they all are, eating away at a creature I could hold a conversation with just a few hours ago.

A pain shoots through my eyes and my chest tightens with what I can only assume is panic, but for some reason it doesn't feel like panic. It feels like I'm drowning. My chest hurts like I'm breathing water, but instead of losing consciousness, I feel like I could punch through a brick wall. A man sitting nearby looks over at me—his eyes quickly filling with fear—and he drops his helping of boar in the sand.

"Sit down," I scream, and the entirety of the group practically collapses to the sand in a mad scramble to seat themselves. Even the survivors hurry to sit and scoot away from me.

This might be the angriest I've ever been. Looking around at all the frightened faces—who usually gossip about me behind my back or ignore me completely—somehow makes it easy for me to say exactly what I'm thinking. "Since some of you can't seem to honor commitments, I find myself with no choice but to fulfill them for you."

I pause, expecting pushback, but nobody so much as coughs.

"You want to go back to the old ways? Fine. You want me to lead by example? Fine. There will be no war because I've decided to end what you two started." I point at both Jane and Erik. "There will be no war because I will be the one to unite our peoples through marriage."

I watch as the northmen pause to process what I've said and then collectively lose their shit.

"No," Erik begins, "my lady—"

"Do not speak," I seethe through clenched teeth, and he sits back down. "Correct me if I'm wrong, Erik, but isn't this entire mess your fault to begin with? You want the old ways, congratulations. Here they are."

"He hasn't told you?" Erik stays seated but smiles smugly in Ben's direction. "Go on then. Tell her."

I look over to see Ben's uncomfortable expression flickering in the campfire's blaze and immediately realize something is wrong. "Tell me what?"

"Tell her what you did," Erik commands. "Remind everyone what you are."

"I—" Ben opens his mouth to answer but changes his mind. It's confusing to see him so shaken. He's supposed to be the one person on this island who always has a plan, but it legitimately looks like he doesn't know how to respond. For a second I find his eyes, but he cannot keep the contact.

"You coward," Erik sneers. "Goddess, he is the reason you were reborn. He is the one who killed you."