Addictive Rimeshade

by Poppet

  Love, oh I feel it, but it scares me shitless. Avoiding the commitment, I interrogate him while he's pliant.

  “Why do they think you're capable of evil? You clearly aren't. If you were you would have retaliated instead of being a docile victim to their agenda. You'd have waged war right back. You certainly had justification.”

  His tone is flat, saying, “It's easiest to believe the worst of someone. Lies, for some reason, settle easier than truth, which is why so many believe them without question. They consider the perpetrator of the lies to be trustworthy, a parent, someone they think has no agenda or reason to fabricate tales to manipulate. They've been manipulated from inception which is why they do not recognize it because he has always lied to his 'children'. When I speak the truth against his lies and manipulations, he tells the other gods that I am sowing weeds among the good seeds.”

  “He should be ashamed of himself,” I mutter.

  “He has no shame. A sociopath is incapable of it. They only care about their own interests, at the expense of everyone and everything else around them.”

  Curious, I pry, “So the other clans are birds. One is raven and one is eagle. What are you?”

  A wry smile carves dimples into each of his cheeks when he says, “Falcon. In Asgard I would fly as a falcon, but my clan here is the wolf.”

  Feeling bold, I pry deeper, “Have you ever been in love?”

  “Yes.” He stares at me as if debating whether or not to tell me, eventually saying, “When Skadi's father died, no one could get her to smile. For Odin's sake, I did it. Many will tell you he got her to laugh, but it was I. I penetrated her grief and anger and finally got her to fill Asgard's hall with her laughter. Only then would she take a husband to replace the father she lost, but again the way the choice was made was a fool's errand. She was unhappy. She ended up marrying Odin after her first handfasting didn't work out. In a way I saved her when I returned joy to her heart that day, and she repaid me when she saved me from torment. I loved her then.”

  He loved Skadi. I can't compete with that. I heard she has hair paler than the snow, her beauty unparalleled.

  He reads me, whispering, “You are her spirit-kin, her as-kunnigr, you share her beauty.”

  I love a man who says the right thing in a moment of female insecurity.

  “And your mother, who is she?” I whisper, cherishing this fragile intimacy.

  “Nál. Her name means needle. The only way to the realm of rest is through the eye of the needle, through me because I was born to grant the passage. Nál is an appropriate name for the mother who sews the ruptures closed, who sutures the hurt with her ethereal thread, through her bloodline. She gave birth to the truth bearer, the light bearer. The eye of the needle is the eye which sees all, without illusion, without bias. It accepts threads which seek to repair.”

  Closing my eyes, feeling his exhalations washing over me in waves of solace, I am envious of how their names define their role in the worlds of gods and men.

  As if reading my mind again, he slumps next to me, trailing fingertips up my arm, saying, “Your name means protector of the gods. It is delightful that the source has finally seen me fit of protection. I'm the only god never granted it. It gives its meaning and name to the laurel tree, a symbol of protection granted by the highest, seen in ancient Rome and Greece as a symbol of this supernatural protection. Oh Lara, you have fortified my heart.”

  The future looms before me with dread. I need to know what's coming. Who is this Ewan man?

  “Leug, I need to know about them. Tell me what I need to know.”

  His expression creases with resistant resignation. “I have set a trap to lure Ewan. It was Fenrir's idea. He is my son, the wolf. The clan is named after him, and the berserkrs have slain the wolves because Odin sees my bloodline as a threat. His legacy endures because his creatures, called mankind, still persecute the wolf. Ewan's clan embody Odin's rage, his bloodlust, his desire to hurt and mutilate. Ewan is Odin's grandson, so he views me and my kind as the eternal enemy of his god. I am not an enemy but the balance they refuse to allow voice or platform. Despite being separated from Asgard himself, his clan residing in the Caledonian caves, he is granted special passage to realm hop at leisure. He does Odin's dirty work, keeping an eye on me and murdering my bloodline whenever we grow to the point where we could oppose their reign of suppression.”

  I frown.

  He sounds serious, the mood shifting, when he says, “Odin has armies. That's how he maintains control of Asgard and Earth. Yes he created much, but his reasons for doing so are not loving, they were selfish. The harii are the raven clan. Odin needed them to gather intel, to cut down enemies in stealth. They can change into diaphanous shadow, and are dangerous and deadly. Macala is harii, and he leads the clan now for his grandfather. He wears the Raven form. They're called a conspiracy of ravens for a reason. You know, a murder of crows... a conspiracy of ravens, same difference really, either way it's not going to be friendly. They have united to wage war because the prophecies have come to pass. A female thur shook a mountain to the ground, then she raised it back up again. She is betrothed to Macala, so she will fight his war for him, but she is like you, she is of Skadi cloth woven, and she flies with the form of an owl. She is not a shadow, she is light. Ewan thinks I have kidnapped you with the intent to rape and harm you. I did it to draw him out, to lure him here, to even the battlefield to just me and Odin's representative. Man to man, god to god. We will end this the right way. He wants to take you back, to rescue you, and he has assembled three armies to do it. Without you it would not have been possible. I could not foresee that you would fulfill me, that I'd love you as myself and be willing to sacrifice everything to protect you. I did not foresee that you are a she-wolf, one of my own, the female balance finally sent to grant me inner salvation.”

  “Why does Odin hate you?” I dare to ask.

  He looks heartbroken, flopping onto his back and staring at the ceiling with eyes glistening with unshed hurt. He swallows as if it pains him, the motion difficult. When he speaks, his voice is so soft it reeks of hardship. “No one remembers. Me and Odin, we are foster-brothers, like you and Deliah. You understand that kind of bond because you love her like a sister, you felt in your heart she truly is. My sources have discovered you are her real sister, but I've yet to confirm it. I'll have the book of life and shadows soon, and then we'll know for sure.”

  “Really! She's my real sister! You could not have given me a better gift, not ever. Yay! That's awesome!” Instantly my heart swells, inflated with delight. Squealing gleefully, his expression douses my jubilation.

  I nod for him to continue, and he does, saying, “The modern world think it was Thor and myself who are brothers, not real brothers but through adoption. It was never so. I was Odin's brother. Thor and I were brethren and friends only through my relationship with Odin first. It is Odin who is my foster-brother. We mingled our blood, cutting open flesh, choosing to vow to be real brothers in blood. I loved him as much as he loved me … once. Odin lauded me as his brother, holding a place of honor for me at every feast, allowing no one to eat until I was there, at his side, brothers united, like twins from birth, best friends. We balanced one another. Then I came to Earth, to experience what it means to be female, for only by wearing every skin could I be fair to all. That is why I'm a shifter, so I will know every form and be kind to it, considering it my kin. This trait has seen me labeled trickster, evil, devil. How little they care to know my perspective. Anyway, I digress don't I?”

  He pauses, lifting my hand to kiss the back of it, affectionately rubbing my skin in his grasp against the soft stubble on his chin.

  Relishing the contact, I settle closer, resting my head in the curve of his shoulder when he continues, saying, “Odin went to the first giant and his well of wisdom, he traded an eye for foresight and foreknowledge. I was away, I didn't know what he was up to. That's when he gained the power of a jealous and possessive god, seeing in his future that in
the afterlife, at the battle of Ragnarök, my son, the worldsnake Jörmungandr, will release his hold on the world and the Earth will no longer have gravity or atmosphere when he retracts his protection, it will fall apart and all life on it will die. Fenrir will devour Odin, ending his reign of tyranny once and for all. Freeing his slaves from their slavery, his creation of mankind allowed to finally live without war or pain, without a god they owe for life, without a god who expects their bloodshed and allegiance for his own gain. Odin created all physical manifestations, but kept mankind in darkness for a long time, hiding the sun and the moon, which were eventually freed by the Raven clan. Odin also made a physical plane for his mankind to live, and the twins, the wolves you met in your kitchen, they will devour the sun and the moon, ending this strife called life. They are my grandsons, Sköll and Hati. That's why Odin assembles armies in Valhalla, outside the gates of Asgard, because he is afraid of his own future. If he hadn't been so greedy for power he would not have thrown me out, he would not have persecuted me or my children, and in turn theirs, and he and I would love each other still.”

  Looking into eyes darker than broken promises I throw sanity to the moat, leaving it to drown while I dance with luna's shadow.

  His aura is blacker than secrets, heavier than obligation, and as seductive as stars blanketing the desert night. He is intoxicating, in all the ways he leaves words unspoken, the glances laden with suggestion, the mouth nipped with a pinch of regret. He is a mystery, an occult cypher walking on long lean legs, stooping to listen when I speak, betraying his pride was splintered long ago as he wears a stoop so well, like an aging friend, confidant, companion.

  It's all these reasons why I think I love him. He traces my hand as if reading a grimoire, the softness a paradox to the scowl of concentration he's masked with. When the masquerade ends, and it will, who will be this man? Friend or foe? Lover or assassin?

  He has that air of grave responsibility, ingrained as surely as ink under fingernails. No amount of scrubbing dislodges it, only time mends a stain that indelible.

  He's injected that mark under my heart, bleeding slowly into the chambers with every sluggish heartbeat... so labored with the tension of his penetrating gaze, stalling my pulse along with my caution.

  His troubles have already ruffled my bed and left a nest in my head, and oddly I want to harbor them, keeping them safe, turning them over when the sun comes up, exposing them as harmless, when I know in my soul they could wreck me.

  I know better, but I don't rightly care. When frost sprinkles a rime bridge of counterfeit firmament to cross into the realm of devotion, only a fool walks away instead of testing the slippery surface of a drawbridge which melts in the harsh light of reason.

  Do you ever get the instinct that you're dancing with the devil, and you love it, you love him, because his darkness is the cloak that covers the part of your soul that is always naked. It's like being home, where there's a nook with etchings scribbled with a blunt blade, branding the stone with your initials and hearts, a ladder of heartbreak you've climbed up and fallen off, crawling back to scratch his name one more time, into a rock who'll bear testament to your tribulations.

  The etched scars are ones you can see, trace lovingly, sighing melancholy into the cold breath of predawn, frosting the air with the exhalation of absolution.

  They're the passage for the blind, leaving ridges and fallen tears in a path to the place he's claimed. He read me so easily, splitting my soul into a prism, taking the ugly and making it beautiful, exposing each part, showing how even the ruptured and broken can be pretty when scattered into a mosaic for fingertips to form into a new mirage. To view true light you have to fracture it through a prism, and he's done that with me. He took what I thought was bland and revealed to me the beauty hidden therein, like a secret I didn't know was a part of me.

  This new image, it's still me, but a me I couldn't see because I was looking up instead of down. Jewels are underfoot, not in the sky. They only shine when you unearth them, wash them clean, rub them on a shirt, over a heart, folding me deeper into the hearth of his haven, in the underworld.

  I had to trip into a thunderstorm before I could see the lightning whipping back the night. It took a deluge of chaos to free the pain I've coveted. I've held to it like a rope of barbwire and it took a blind man in a death pit to show me the only freedom is when you embrace the darkness, wallow in the pain, bathe in it to wash away the illusion, see the beauty of the despair hidden there.

  We falsely accuse pain of driving away happiness, when surrendering to it buoys, inflating the depleted, reviving a mauled spirit with the bright bliss of hope. He surrendered to pain, and he showed me how to do the same. Our lovemaking hurt, on an emotional and spiritual level, the scratches and bruises merely a veneer for quiddity manipulated and remolded.

  My sister Liah, she's the same. We like it rough, we thought it was because we needed to own our pain, but instead we were merely attempting to reshape it.

  To recover from spiritual amputation we have to limp through the aisle of misery, to meander through the abyss of anguish, sweating and clenching with terror, enduring the unfiltered potency of our own dread.

  But on the other side in a warm pocket of precious sombre darkness is a shadow waiting to hold your hand, to kiss away the fears, opening denying eyes to the truth. There is nothing to fear in the dark, it's familiar pain, it's hardship we've already endured, we've won that war even though we are entrenched in the battlefield of our minds... it's the unknown, the yet to traverse, that is what we should fear. However when you let your shadow fall ahead of you, with the light behind you, you'll see your path grow long and elongated as a bridge, your soul walking on ahead of you as your own shadow undulates and snakes over virgin territory, your own darkness looking around corners and whispering for you to follow the path less travelled, the one leading to a cavern of forgotten prayers.

  Darkness craves illumination to create shadows, and shadows are our allies, they never leave us, forever attached, forever seeking a new den to hide from the harsh glare of false bright.

  Reminding us always of the part of us which isn't physical, the incorporeal aura we call anima, ether, it will never be caught or captured. You can't net a shadow and put it in a jar, it's a part of me that will always be free, that's why it never leaves me. It's a physical reminder from birth that shadows are not dangerous, they are friends of the ethereal plane, our messengers. A message from the father of shade, the master of it.

  We are occultists. Occultation is what our shadow achieves, casting a shaded image of us onto the earth, hiding what wishes to remain unseen.

  Like Leug. He wishes to remain unseen, but he stepped out of the night to beckon me home.

  And here I am.

  Home.

  Turning the rough hand over, I lift it, snuggling into his palm, first kissing his fate line, then licking slowly down his love line. I will wear this path down, sucking off his fingerprints, rejuvenating an old soul with the fever burning inside me.

  Resting it on my chest, I stare into shuttered eyes, hoping he can feel how harshly my heart thunders with his proximity, hoping my spirit can seep through his skin, beating out with every pulsation of blood, the rhythm the oldest tune.

  Witches dance to it, crows fly to it, and devils succumb to it.

  Somniferous osmosis lulls through touch, surrender has become my friend.

  I'm here to surrender.

  Outside the wind haunts like whale song, but in here, in here all I am is a pulse waiting for an answering echo.

  I'm writing on your skin with kisses, it's my new diary, the whispers of my heart finding purchase on a body binding a heart that matches mine. Life hurts, we all know that, but carrying someone else's guilt is harder. I carried Steve's, you carried Odin's. If I'm going to write in a diary, this is the one I know my secrets will be safe inside.

  Every unspoken contact between our souls fills the hollows of my past, planting my hopes in spiritual words, f
illing up the pages of a bruised mind with doodles of adoration, soul-mates, eternities, infinities.

  Wishes are insubstantial to the eye, but to the spirit they're boulders building steppingstones, creating steps out of the dungeon of loneliness.

  I'm a devout scribe, I'll write on your body every day until I run out of pages, until we run out of ages, until we're both free from the shackles of regret.

  Caution is a word now redundant. All we have is now, let's make it count. Tomorrow our blood may run cold until we're drained as efficiently as the last mead vat in Valhalla. We'll perish, become memories, living on as myths and legends, told to children to burn truth out of their minds, become tales of caution, stories used to bind and imprison, shredding the hope of those who'd dare to be reckless enough to burn the rule book, to scatter its ashes, and laugh at the flame coursing up the walls of a straw house.

  I'll burn, maybe I already have, for you.

  I may be reckless, but I can say I did it for the right reasons.

  If I rescue you, you'll save me. I love you, and you already love me. You declare it without shame, saying my name like a vesper at midnight, speaking it with the inflection of affection.

  We'll cling inside this kiss, living on one breath, touching with each others fingertips, feeling one another's blood coursing the way we once felt the cold sting of rain battering windowpanes the day you called me to my door.

  I'll burrow into you, hiding in the blanket of your spirit, and you, you can hide under the cover of my starlit quilt, hewn and embroidered with wishes, soul threads, and the promises I can't say.

  I've been dead all my life, now I finally inhale. If they take you from me they slay me again.

  I can't weather that pain.

  Let me fade into you, falling into your shadows, diaphanous as the heavy sigh you just blew into my hair, caressing my nape with your closeness.

  I wish we could become a rainbow, building bridges no one can harness or capture, filling the sky with rapture, boldly celebrating our freedom, sharing our beauty, knowing no one can rob us of it again. The spectrum, to each other, forever joined, the light bonding us as one as surely as the darkness binds us now.