The climb up wasn't hard. She'd scaled colder, snowier, icier. She was built for this. And! She could see more and more of the mainland with every step, fueling the fire under her ass that had gotten her to this point in the first place. The burning desire to be home, stronger, even, than her boundless curiosity or wanton sense of adventure.

Bragi hadn't seen her family since Apollo's... fall. She... didn't even know if he was okay. (Not that she even cared. The brat was her... hers.) It was just... It would be nice to know how they were doing. To see them again. She missed them. She didn't know how long she'd been gone.

She missed them every time. And she could actually spend time with them, now! Without having to worry about it all getting wrenched away from her the next time she closed her eyes. She could hug Cupid without her skin getting all weird and prickly. She could train with Tyr without it being all awkward afterwards.

...Did they miss her? Would they even recognize her without...

She... shook it off. The setting sun had painted the sky in familiar tones by the time she crested that final rise. The first gust of wind whistling through her fur, unbidden, as she looked out and saw land stretching out far below her for untold miles. Plains and forests and mountains and rivers. But she couldn't see the ocean.

Now, Bragi was no expert, but she was pretty sure that the like, main thing about an island was that it was surrounded by ocean.

So where the fuck was the ocean.

She turned and just saw more mountains. She turned again and saw mainland. She knew she lived in the north, and the sun set in the... west? But the sun was gone, and she couldn't remember which direction it had gone in.

Her breath hiked. She didn't know where she was. She missed her family. She wanted to go home but she didn't know where home—

But then, a bark. Bragi turned, saw the owl first, thought huh, and then finally saw— holy shit? Sindri!

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