Blood Moon

Everything was white or off-white or some pale color, except for the lamps, which were red and swung gently and yet somehow gave of white light. She didn’t notice the floor moving, but the lights were swaying. There was nothing but a hall full of doors that were all closed before it disappeared behind a turn. 

“Hva faen?” Eyvor said again as she got to her feet, still swiping at her eyes to banish the tears there. “Hello?” she called down the hallway. “Is anyone there?”

No answer.

“Jake?”

Nothing.

“Steven?”

Silence. She heaved a sigh.

“Marc?”

Not even a whisper of a sound.

“What in all the Realms,” she said to herself. Well, there was nothing left to do but start looking around. She was obviously in some type of hospital, but why whatever afterlife the boys had gone to looked like a hospital, she couldn’t understand. “Time to start opening doors.”

The first door Eyvor came to was actually locked, but she broke that pretty easily. She was met with a view of London from atop a building, in the pouring rain. From the disappearing robes, it was probably Marc, and he stood at the edge of the building, looking straight down. “Marc!” she yelled, darting forward. Even if he didn’t know who she was, she wasn’t going to let him do what it looked like he was thinking about doing. With horror, Eyvor watched as he put a foot out in front of him, hanging over the edge. She tried to grab his jacket, but her hand passed right through him. “Marc!” she tried again. He didn’t hear her. Then, after a minute, he gave a quiet laugh and stepped back down onto the rooftop, away from the edge. Marc turned, the armor appearing back around him, and he ran off. “Marc!” she shouted after him, but again, her cry went unheard. Eyvor shook her head, trying to come to terms with what she just watched, before she found the door back into the hallway and was back with the swaying lamps. 

The next door was unlocked, and it was, again, Marc, but he was in a nightclub, talking and laughing. Eyvor was able to pass through the crowd easily, as she slipped right through the people there. He seemed to just be enjoying himself with a group of men, so she headed back to the doorway again. 

“Memories, maybe?” she mused aloud before shaking herself again. She needed to find them. That was the most important thing. She had to focus, and there was no telling how long Hel would be able to keep her here. 

The next door she found unlocked had the sound of laughter echoing out from behind it, and it was curiosity more than concern that had her opening it. It was her and Steven, having dinner. It wasn’t the full evening, it was just the pair of them, laughing over and over, pure joy filling the room. She smiled. These were definitely memories, then.

Eyvor hurried through doors, opening them just to peek inside. Most of them were more memories, the good and the bad. She was able to pick out Steven’s versus Mark’s versus Jake’s after a few doors. Jake’s and Marc’s memories left her shaken, anger and sorrow warring within her for dominance. Steven’s memories left her lighter, smiles playing at the edges of her lips. But still, there was no sign of any of the three of them. 

She was pleasantly surprised to find memories of herself behind more of the doors than she expected, given how short of a time she’d been in their lives. Those were usually Jake’s memories. It wasn’t the memories of the people they took down together, either. It was their conversations, sitting in his cab or in her apartment, or even just on the phone. That made her smile as much as Steven’s memories did.

Then she found the open door.

It was already standing open, and it was such a random door that she wouldn’t have stopped if it hadn’t been open. Looking inside, she found a coffer like the one that had been in the golden tomb, but this one was empty. There was nothing inside it. Had one of them been in here? Either way, it was something different, and it spurred her on, running through the halls and only stopping when she heard something behind one of the doors. 

She found a second open door, but this one was different from the one before. The strange coffer was moving! It was shaking slightly, rocking back and forth faster than the lamps were swaying. At first, she didn’t want to do anything, but she heard a quiet, angry growl that she knew as well as she knew her mother’s voice. Eyvor darted forward, her fingers grasping at the seam between the lid and base of the coffer, and she pulled, the lid flying off and shattering against the wall. She didn’t care. She cared about the man that came stumbling out of it, falling to his knees while gasping for air. She dropped to kneel in front of him, clutching the shoulders of his shirt.

“Jake?” she asked, tears of relief springing into her eyes. Eyes rimmed with red and dripping water looked up at her, and he let out a huff of disbelief, his eyes wide and unbelieving.

“¿Gotita?” he rasped, his voice gravelly like always, and she whimpered, hauling him in by his shirt and hugging him. She buried her face in his shoulder and cried, and she wasn’t ashamed about it. He was grasping the back of her shirt, and she could feel the subtle shaking of his body. She wouldn’t mention it.

“I thought–” she started to say, her words choking in her throat. “I thought I’d lost you. I–I thought I was too late. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I came as fast as I could.”

“They’re gone,” Jake answered. “I can’t feel them anymore.” He sounded–he was scared. She was too, honestly. She pulled back, and they held one another’s faces.

“I–they have to be here. Maybe they’re sleeping. We’ll find them,” she answered, her words quivering with emotions. “They’re not–” She pressed their foreheads together and tried to think past the swirling emotions. “You’re here. I found you. We’ll find them. It’ll be okay. We’ll find them. I–” Her voice gave out in favor of a sob.

“Rosa de sangre,” Jake breathed, his eyes closing as he took shaking breaths.

“Don’t go where I can’t follow,” she said, shaking him slightly, the broken pieces of her heart slowly knitting back together as she buried her fingers in his curls. “Please, I can’t lose you. Don’t leave me behind again.”

“Lo siento, rosa de sangre. Lo siento mucho.” She knew what that meant, at least mostly. 

“Never again,” she whispered, gripping his hair as if he would slip through her fingers if she let go. “I’m not leaving your side ever again. I–I felt empty. I don’t want to feel like that ever again.”

“Lo siento, rosa de sangre. Yo también te amo.” She pulled back again, searching his eyes.

“For once, Jake, please, just tell me what you’re saying,” she asked. “Please.” They stared at one another for a moment before Jake surged forward, knocking her backwards and nearly onto the floor if she hadn’t caught herself with one of her hands.

He was kissing her.

It took her a moment to gather her thoughts, honestly. She had never been kissed before. Her rigorous training with Tyr hadn’t left a lot of time for figuring that sort of thing out. She hadn’t given it much thought. 

But it clicked together.

The reason she liked being around Jake so much, why she wanted to be near him all the time, why she promised herself to protect him above all the other people in Midgard that she’d come across in her time there.

She loved him. 

She’d told her dad Jake was the missing piece of her song, and that was right, but honestly, she hadn’t been trying to be romantic. He just felt like an important piece of herself that she needed as much as air to breathe.

But it was more than that. It was more than just being important to her. 

She loved him. And he was kissing her, because Jake was a man of action, not words. He would rather do something than stand around talking about it. He loved her.

They broke apart for air, and she stared up at him, shocked.

“¿Entiendes eso, rosa de sangre?” he asked, a smirk pulling at his lips even though both of them were still crying.

“I–” She blinked at him and took a second before she launched herself at him to kiss him again. The storm of emotion inside her was calm and yet worse than ever, but she knew that this was right. She stopped to breathe again and hugged him tightly. “Elsker deg også, Jake Lockley.” Jake chuckled, and for a moment, they were okay. Then Jake tensed.

“I can’t feel them. Where are Marc and Steven?” She pulled back and got to her feet, holding a hand out for him as she wiped her eyes, forcing herself to focus on the reason she was here in the first place. 

“What do you remember?”

“The tomb. There were people. Marc fought them, and I couldn’t get to the front because Steven was right there. Then–” He looked at her with wide eyes. “He shot us.” Eyvor nodded.

“You’re dead, Jake. I found you in that tomb, with bullets in your chest.” She shuddered. It would take a while for the memory of that to stop haunting her.

“But–if you’re here–gotita, what happened?” Jake seemed just as upset at the thought of her being dead as he did missing Marc and Steven.

“I tried, Jake, but I just couldn’t do it. Mother’s the goddess of spring, not life. But I had to try. I’m selfish, I guess. I asked Hel to help me find you.”

“Who?”

“Midgardians call her the goddess of death. Those who die unworthily end up in Helheim, while those who die honorably go to Valhalla. I had–” She blinked hard and swiped at her eyes again. “I had to know where you ended up. I needed to know. She said you weren’t in Helheim, so I asked if she could take me to you, to where you, Steven, and Marc were. And now here I am. I’m fine, Jake, I promise. I mean, I am now that I found you.”

“Where are they?”

“I don’t know. If there aren’t in your–” Jake stalked out of the room, looking around the halls she had traversed. “I found two open doors. One was yours. The other had another coffer like–”

“Sarcophagus,” he interrupted as he set off down the hall, his step determined. She followed after him, as always. 

“What?”

“It’s a damn sarcophagus. We gotta find those two. No tellin’ what they’re gettin’ themselves into.” They were in their own bodies? How interesting. It was the easiest answer, but one that hadn’t occurred to her. She was just hoping that she found them and she could handle them switching if needed. But to be three separate people? It would occur to Jake first. He knew a lot more than she did.

“I’ve been checking doors,” Eyvor said. “At least, the ones that have sounds behind them.”

“What’s in there?” Jake asked, peering through the foggy glass of one of the doors.

“Memories, I think. Yours, Marc’s, Steven’s.” Dark eyes snapped over to her. “I stopped looking once I realized,” she assured him. “Like I said, only the ones that make noise. I was trying to find any sign of you. I think I found where Steven or Marc were? If they’ve got their own bodies, and you were in that sarcophage–”

“Sarcophagus,” Jake corrected.

“Right. If you were in one, maybe they were too, but the one I found was open, so someone maybe let them out? I don’t know. I haven’t seen them. It’s a big place.”

“Any ideas?”

“Just keep going. We have to reach the end sometime.” She gave his bicep a light punch. “Let’s find your boys, Lockley.”

“Right behind ya, rosa de sangre.”