Harrogath, 1901 AD - 1940 AD
The twentieth century arrived like a thunderclap.
Kaelan felt it in his bones—a shift in the fabric of reality, a quickening of time itself. The world outside Harrogath was changing faster than ever before. Machines. Wars. Discoveries. And heroes. Always more heroes.
The travelers brought news with each passing decade.
In 1910, they spoke of a man in Gotham, a city of shadows and crime. He fought without powers, without gifts, relying on nothing but skill and will. They called him the Bat, though that name would come later.
In 1918, they spoke of a woman in the trenches of the Great War—an Amazon, they said, fighting alongside the soldiers, saving lives, ending battles. She vanished as suddenly as she appeared, but those who saw her never forgot.
Kaelan listened to every report, every rumor, every wild story. He felt the threads of fate tightening, weaving together into a pattern he couldn't quite see.
The time was coming.
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The second sign became the third, then the fourth, then too many to count.
Rifts opened with increasing frequency, each one carrying a whisper of her presence. Children spoke her name in their sleep. Seers dreamed of a woman with dark hair and sharp eyes, walking toward them through mist. Even the ancestors stirred, their spirits restless with anticipation.
"She is close," the eldest seer said. "Closer than ever. The barriers between worlds are thinning."
Kaelan stood on his hilltop, watching the sky. Valgard's vast form watched with him, twin suns burning in the heavens.
"How close?"
"Years, perhaps. Months." The seer paused. "There is something else. A darkness gathering. On Earth. In other dimensions. Something ancient is waking."
Kaelan's jaw tightened. "The thing in the dark?"
"No. Something else. Something new." The seer's silver eyes were troubled. "The threads are tangled. I cannot see clearly. But there will be a war. A great war. And she will be at the center of it."
Kaelan said nothing. He simply waited.
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In 1938, a traveler brought news that shook him to his core.
"A man of steel," the traveler said. "He appeared in a city called Metropolis. He flies. He has strength beyond measure. They call him Superman."
Kaelan felt the name resonate in his soul. He had read about this man, centuries ago, in comics from his old life. Kal-El of Krypton. The first of the modern heroes.
"When did he appear?"
"Months ago. Maybe a year. The stories are still spreading." The traveler leaned forward. "There are others too. A speedster in Central City. A vigilante in Gotham. A girl with magic in Fawcett."
Kaelan nodded slowly. The Justice League was forming. The war with Darkseid approached.
And Sigrid was still not here.
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In 1940, the world erupted.
War spread across Earth like wildfire—nations clashing, cities burning, millions dying. The heroes fought where they could, but there were too many battles, too much darkness.
And in the midst of it all, a woman appeared.
She emerged from a rift in the mountains of Greece—not young, not old, but ageless. Her dark hair fell past her shoulders. Her eyes held memories of another time. She wore simple clothes, traveler's clothes, and she carried nothing but a small knife at her belt.
She walked down from the mountains and into a world at war.
The locals who found her asked her name.
She smiled—a sharp, dangerous smile—and said, "Sigrid."
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The name reached Harrogath within weeks.
A dimensional rift opened in the southern plains, and a messenger stumbled through—one of the few who still remembered the old ways, who knew how to travel between worlds. He carried a single piece of paper, worn and creased, with a name written on it.
Sigrid.
Kaelan held the paper in trembling hands. Two thousand years of waiting. Two thousand years of hoping. Two thousand years of loneliness.
And now, finally, she was here.
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He went to her immediately.
The rift opened in the same mountains where she had appeared. Kaelan stepped through into a world of snow and wind, of peaks that touched the sky. Below him, a village huddled in a valley, smoke rising from its chimneys.
He walked down the mountain, his heart pounding.
The villagers stared as he passed—at his size, his tattoos, the axe at his side. But he paid them no attention. He followed the pull in his chest, the thread that connected him to her across millennia.
He found her in a small house at the edge of the village.
She was sitting by a fire, mending a cloak, looking for all the world like an ordinary woman. But when she looked up and saw him standing in the doorway, her eyes filled with tears.
"Kaelan," she whispered.
He crossed the room in three steps and gathered her into his arms.
She was solid. Warm. Real.
"I waited," he said, his voice breaking. "I waited so long."
"I know." She held him tight, her face buried in his chest. "I'm here now. I'm here."
They stood there for a long time, holding each other, while the fire crackled and the wind howled outside.
Two thousand years of waiting, finally over.
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END OF CHAPTER 44
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