Verðandi stared at Rafe for a long moment. Then she wiped a hand across her face as though removing spittle. She glanced at her palm and then back up to Rafe. “Very well, Raphael, I will grant your demands, this time.”
Verðandi turned her back to both of us. She took a couple of steps into the wider space between the trees. The snow was at least a foot deep there, but she walked on the surface without sinking in. She waved a hand out and the snow in a twenty-foot wide circle vanished. A ring of rocks appeared in the center and a small wood fire appeared out of thin air. She walked to the edge of the fire and started to sit down. A large flat rock appeared beneath her just as her butt reached it.
I was impressed. I’ve seen Rafe do a lot of magic, but I’ve never seen him create things out of nothing.
“Come, my Wanderers, sit with me and I’ll educate you.”
As soon as she spoke, two more rocks appeared, spaced evenly around the fire from her position.
Rafe trudged through the snow to the clearing and went to the farther rock. I followed him and sat on the nearer one.
Verðandi seemed to be gathering her thoughts, but Rafe was impatient. “Well, Verðandi, let’s hear what you have to say.”
“Rafe, give her a chance. You owe her the curtesy,” I admonished.
My mentor ignored me. Well, he was the mentor, but gees, Verðandi was the big boss, the one who had created the Wanderers.
“Do you remember me telling you that I think of all the Wanderers as my children?” Verðandi asked slowly while staring into the fire.
“Yes, you mentioned that after telling me that all of the other Wanderers were dead,” Rafe replied.
“There’s an explanation for that.”
She hesitated and after a couple seconds passed, Rafe said, “Then let’s hear it.”
Verðandi sighed. “A long time ago, before the gods left Earth and mankind behind, I made a mistake.”
A god admitting to a mistake, this had to be interesting, I thought.
“What mistake?” Rafe asked.
“I met a mortal and fell in love.”
What? I glanced at Rafe, but he was concentrating his full attention on our boss.
“And?” Rafe said.
“And we were lovers for many years. I gave him the same gift you Wanderers have of long life and we were happy for generations of your kind.”
Unable to contain myself any longer, I blurted out, “Then what happened?”
Verðandi gazed sorrowfully toward me. Her eyes were misty.
“Before he died, I bore him a child.”
Oh, my goddess.
“And this has something to do with the Wanderers?” Rafe asked.
“Of course it does, Raphael. Our child was the first Wanderer. That is why I look on all of you as my children. All of the Wanderers are the fruit of my loins. All of you are descendant from my union with a mortal. That’s what has always made you special, not just to me, but special in the capability to control the magics, just like my son did.”
Holy crap!
“Wait a minute,” Rafe said. “You mean, Walt, Rowle, Tess, me, all of us are your descendants?”
“Didn’t I just say that?” Verðandi snapped.
“And yet, there’s only a few Wanderers at any one time. How many descendants do you have by now?”
“What difference does it make?” Verðandi asked.
“Because if you have a lot of descendants, then why can’t you just gather up as many Wanderers as you need rather than limiting us to so few?”
“You all have the capability to become Wanderers, but you still have to prove yourself in combat before your powers blossom in you. I can’t just snap my fingers and turn you into Wanderers; you have to develop on your own.”
“So Rafe and I are related?” I asked. Gees, we’d been sexual partners since right after I became his apprentice. Was there an ick factor there?
“Yes,” Verðandi said, “but your common ancestor goes back centuries. You won’t ever have to worry if you have children of your own.”
“Whoa there,” I objected. “I wasn’t thinking about children. Oh, gees, we don’t have time to worry about children.”
“Then why did you ask?” Verðandi said.
I looked at Rafe and found that he was studying me.
“Don’t look at me like that, Raphael,” I snapped. “I’m not planning to raise any children, so just get that gleam out of your eye.”
Rafe held out a hand and automatically, I took it. Immediately his emotions blended with mine and I understood that he wasn’t thinking along the lines I had assumed at all. He was just amused at my swift denial to Verðandi.
Hell, I had leapt to the idea, not him. I’d just been worried about the ick factor in sleeping with a relative until Verðandi brought up children. Her statement had caused me to overreact. Rafe understood as well as I that Wanderers couldn’t raise children. I mean, gees, would we get sidecars for the motorcycles so we could carry our offspring on quests with us. Oh, hell no.
I dropped his hand, relieved and turned back to Verðandi.
“Then you know who our common ancestor was?”
“Of course, I knew him well,” Verðandi said.
“Was he a Wanderer, too?” I asked.
She hesitated and a tear appeared in the corner of her left eye.
“Yes, my child, he was a Wanderer too.”
“What haven’t you told us, Verðandi?” Rafe asked.
She sighed deeply. “You’ve met him also.”
“What? How could we have met him? Rafe’s met a lot
