Years passed beneath the waves.
To the nine sisters, Heimdallr was a wonder their child, bright-eyed and calm where most were wild. He learned quickly. He listened more than he spoke, and when he looked at them, it was as if he already understood what they meant to say.
Eistla taught him to swim through the riptides.
Ulfrún showed him how to hear the whispers of the current.
Angeyja made him run along the seabed until his legs ached.
Each sister passed on a fragment of strength, grace, patience, and will.
Heimdallr accepted it all quietly and when the others slept, he trained alone. Sometimes he stood beneath the waves for hours, holding his breath until the water turned dark around him. Other times he ran across the ocean floor, pushing himself until his muscles burned. He did these because he feared the war is not ending anytime soon and also feared it will finally come to them and he was not sure if he was strong or capable enough to do anything
The thought came often, but he never spoke it aloud. The sisters had given him life, love, warmth and security. They didn't need to know that, deep down, he doesn't truly trust the Æsir gods because of what he has seen them do during the war, but to put there mind at ease he smiled when they smiled but he trained when they were looking and when they weren't looking.
And every time he felt his strength grow, a strange dread filled him as if the difference in strength was still so vase and unsurmountable.
Sometimes Járnsaxa would watch him from afar. "He's not like the others," she said once.
Greip laughed softly. "Of course not. He's ours."
But Járnsaxa's gaze lingered on the boy moving through the water, tireless as the tide.
"It looks like he is fighting against something," but she couldn't just tell what
Heimdallr didn't hear her. His world was the steady rhythm of his heart and the pull of the sea around him.
Each day he trained longer.
Each night, the pull of the surface grew stronger.
And though he could not yet name it, a fire had already begun to burn within him a quiet resolve that one day, he would be strong enough to go above and never bow to anyone again.