Chapter II

Brown eyes awoke in the dark, searching for some focus, information. White soft skin felt the sheets beneath it and caressed them. Nostrils flared with the sense of mould. Hears detected screaming from afar.
Movement is felt… The moldy smell intensified… Light is seen…
A woman with a candle holder walks in slow steps to the bed. She sets the candle holder on the table and it surprisingly lights the entire chamber. She sits on a throne-like chair, crosses her legs and stares at the bed, smiling mischievously. The uncomfortable moments of stillness were passed with the studying of the sheet’s movements. Soon, the woman propped her chin, on the fist.
- How long will you pretend to be a sleep when you are awake?
No answer was received.
- It is not at all without irony, that during the long sleep, you’d pretend to be sleeping.
This sentence caused an abrupt movement. The sheet flew and the occupant of the bed sat and saw the hostess for the first time.
This woman was the source of the moldy smell that invaded all of the room. Her legs were decomposing, as a corpse that has not buried, but her upper body and face were that of a beautiful lady. She wore a green gown; open almost down to her navel, exposing almost the entirety of her corpse-like skinned breasts; her legs were revealed by the opening of her dress, which seemed to be as a robe, rather then an actual dress. Behind her neck, the dress extended a long self-standing collar, which stood higher than the woman’s head. He black hair cascaded to her shoulders.
- I can safely say that sleeping as done you good, my dear girl.
– Am I dead? - The woman on the bed fearfully asked.
– Wasn’t that what you wanted? - That was her answer.
The woman looked at herself, and found herself wearing a white tunic; she looked around the room, and recognized nothing. Nor the bed, nor the table, nor the chairs, nothing looked recognizable, even though they were all usual objects, all seemed different. She rose from the bed and the touch of the ground also felt different to her feet, she walked to the end of the room, where a mirror was propped against the wall, and as she looked at the mirror hopping to finally recognize something, she was devastated to see she could not recognize herself. On the mirror stood the image of her death, her blue red-stained gown and the axe, her companion in death, were her only recollections. She turned to the woman in green for answers she needed not phrase.
– I am Hella, and this is the Underworld. - The woman stated as she rose from her throne-like chair. - You are dead. You’ve taken your own life. - She approached her in soft steps. - That was your death, Haldora. - She said pointing to the mirror. - And this is who you will be from now on!
Haldora opened her tunic and saw her scar; the line ran from her chest to her stomach and seemed to pull her skin into it like into an abyss.
– When that scar is healed, the world of the living will no longer be in your head and you will be ready to start again.
– Where is he? - Haldora shyly asked.
– There is no he! - Replied Hella, hinting her rage at the question, and then living as softly as she had arrived.
Haldora caressed her own scar, as if it were a baby… Her expression, as sad as a childless mother.

The field was run through the river of red. As thick as a velvet mantle, it ran freely down the hill, nothing was its obstacle, not the resting weapons of men, nor the bodies of such men, the mantle covered all and soaked the brown land beneath it. Here and there the river parted and allowed something to stand in its way, sometimes a moving limb, from a not quite so deceased man, other times the moving of people either rescuing or robbing. All throughout the field was a daunting silence, heavy as the air, thick as the blood and cold as the fog that now steadily lay beside the dead.
At a distance, a wailing was faintly heard.
The fog could hardly let anyone see or hear the way, but one could almost make out from where this wailing was coming from. Walking the field, meant kicking the iron armors and sinking feet into mud, but above all this noise, still persisted the wailing. Alas… one could see its source.
At the centre of the battlefield, stood a banner, as high as the birds could fly, but what kept it standing was not the ground beneath it, but the body into which it was impaled. This man laid on the ground, his armor pierced by the wooden stake, his skin bloodless was gray-white and his eyes, still open, stared the endless sky, like lifeless orbs. Over his body a woman wailed, cursed and cried. Her blue gown, stained with his blood and the earth beneath her, served as a shroud to his axe, which lay blood-stained at his side. This woman caressed his face as if he still lived and stroked his hair, as to make him fit to see his maker. Her words were not understood, amidst her rage, but her pain was both visible and palpable.
Soon the crying was not enough and the woman closed this man’s eyes and with a superhuman strength removed the stake from his armor and with the banner covered his body. His body was now prepared to take the journey to Valhalla. She then raised her arms to the heavens and commanded the gods to take this man into their bosom. Out of the mist came several young blonde women, all wearing golden armors, as shinny as the sun. These women came close to dead body and scooped his soul as if it were an infant begging for his mother’s bosom. As the golden women were hence occupied, the blue-wearing woman took the man’s axe, from the ground and held it to her chest as hard as she could, almost instantly a new stain would appear running down her dress and her face would become paler and paler. She looked at the golden women, and stretched her arms for them, but she was of no interest to them. The golden women began to fly away with the man’s soul, leaving the grieving, bleeding woman behind. In an instant of courage, she jumped and grabbed a foot of one of the goddesses, but was soon shaken off and plunged to her death, as she hit the red-soaked brown land.
Axe at her side, blood on her dress, and no life on her face, she lay cold, waiting…