| STATUS QUO [Tag: Reshi] |
[30 Dec 2008|08:00pm] |
December nights in Red Square were as brutal and as cold as the best places on the mortal plane. There was no lack for lighting from the large buildings surrounding him. But there was a darkness about the place that transcended visual understanding. It seemed to Erebos that no amount of floodlighting could displace the hold that darkness had on this part of Moscow. It oozed between the cracks of the snow-swept pavement. Curled around the slender bits of fur-clad mortality crossing in waves through the wide open spaces. Settled in yawning expanses between the great structures a long-ago dictatorship established. Stalked the backs of old women. Ate the shadows of sharply-dressed men.
The Greek god had no claim over Russia. But Moscow. Was. His. The city embraced him. Scattered his power throughout the streets. Feasted on him like a starving beast -- but made him only stronger. His breath fogged on the air. Here was a sanctuary for the Dark One.
Odd that he needed one, this night.
There was seeming nothing to trouble him. His reunion with Nyx had gone more smoothly than he had expected. Phlegethon was remaining quietly - thusfar - on the mortal plane, well away from the Underworld or Olympus. Akheron was true to his word and had stirred no further misfortune. And yet.
And yet.
Something troubled him. He could not name it. Erebos paced, unseen, through the throng of late-night revelers. Something troubled him. Stalked him as the darkness stalked the square. But here there was a peace that he could not find in Greece, in Haides, or the realm belonging only to the gods. He walked, shielded from mortal eyes, and waited for the city to clear his mind and reveal the true enemy within.
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| Footprints in the Snow (tag: Frigg) |
[30 Dec 2008|10:11pm] |
It was not necessary to make your way to the gates of Asgard on foot; there were simpler ways to arrive there for those who were allowed. And so even the animals of the wood looked strangely on the figure making his way through deep snow and barely marked paths to the home of the gods itself. A human interloper perhaps, somehow making his winding way up the world tree? The idea was preposterous yet what strange and desperate god would trudge through these uninhabited mountains and vales?
The figure was young and spry, dressed in dark warm furs that would not be out of place in Midgard, in the right climes. His hair was jet black and long, his beard as well, and he whistled jauntily as his boots crunched through the thick snow. Those were the only two sounds in the muffled winter wood. The figure winked his dark eye at a particularly stunned squirrel which stood on a branch above him, staring.
As the gates of Asgard themselves drew near the traveler stopped his whistling. He reached them unheralded, somehow, and as he set his mittened hand on them they swung open noiselessly. Letting them swing shut behind him the traveler continued on his way, the rhythmic crunch of his steps marking time. The sound was soon met with a counter rhythm, a series of staccato crunches as two wolves appeared from out of the white snow hurrying toward the stranger with hanging tongues. The man laughed ruefully as the two circled around him with excited leaps. "No fooling you two," he muttered, waving them off. They would not leave though until he produced two chunks of dry meat from his clothing, tossing them down to them. "Soon enough, soon enough," he murmured, continuing on his way.
The great hall of Valaskjalf was his destination, though it looked less grand with the piles of snow nearly dwarfing its sides. Smoke poured cheerily from its roof though, and the high windows surrounding its throne threw back the low-cast sunlight. He couldn't help smiling at the sight and was whistling again as he tugged at the rings of the doors, pulling them back through drifted snow and letting the warmth and light of his hall spill over him.
"Do you know hospitality in this distant hall?" he called out in his strange form, stomping his feet to divest them of snow and ice of many a mile. He cast these two dark eyes around the hall, avoiding the pull of that dark throne. "A traveler comes."
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