A COLD WINTER NIGHT

Chapter 25 - Are You Ready?

Edvin's POV

Our plane descends into the wild winter storm, rattling us and all that is in it. My hands grip the arm rests besides me, holding on tight. Charlie comes wobbling through the aisle, smiling brightly.

"Gotta love turbulence, am I right?' he jokes, before passing to sit beside me. He buckles his seatbelt and we both stare ahead, him smiling, me not.

"Ahhh. It's good to be back home," he happily sighs.

"How long has it been, since you left?" I ask, mostly making small talk so that I can distract my mind from imagining our plane crashing before I can ever get to my Clara.

"Ohhh. Let's see. You remember that day, Jakob called you right before he was ambushed by those Swedish thugs?" I look to him.

"It was right after that. I saved your brother that day. He would have bled out after he got shot but I made a deal with him."

"What deal?" I ask.

"That I'd heal him, but he'd have to accept that I wasn't going to stop pestering him for his soul," he says.

"Jakob obviously took the deal and what? Faked his death, and ran away to America where he met Danny?"

"Yep," he says, looking ahead. "Danny might have taken him under his wing, but I'm the one that led him straight to his soulmate," he reveals, pointing his hand forward as if to make his point. Charlie then looks to me. "I knew his future, Edvin, just as I know yours." Charlie stares ahead again, sighing.

"My visions, they come to me at random times and not fully, but just little snippets here and there. Sometimes they change though. Sometimes they don't. Just depends on the level of intervention and the surprise of the unknown," he adds.

"I've always known where to find Danny," he says, looking back at me. "Just as I've always known where to find his sister. I told Jakob this and then we set sail to the great land of freedom, both taking on new identities."

"Jakob knew you were the Draugr this whole time," I realize. Charlie nods.

"He sure did," he states. "He also knew that one day, he'd make his first sinful kill. I had foreseen it and I showed him. A couple of men were to attack our poor sweet Clara on their way home from date night. That's when he would have done it. He would have killed not one but both of them to protect her, and after he had done what was needed to be done, I would have taken his soul. He would have finally allowed me to claim it," he reveals.

"You've been waiting for that moment this whole time and Jakob knew that, but I don't understand. Why would he allow you to take his soul then and not later in life? He could have waited to die of old age and then you could have claimed his soul. He could have lived a long, happy life with Clara. Why would he give that up?" I wonder.

"Jakob had his secrets, Edvin. He was paranoid that your father would one day find him and destroy everything he had worked so hard to build. He was afraid that he would come after not only him, but Clara too, so he had decided, when the time came, he would give her up, because he knew, his father would come for them. It was only a matter of time. That's when I decided to play the role of a private investigator and keep tabs on him. I helped him and Danny secretly monitor not just your father, but you too. We visited you, often," he reveals.

"What do you mean? When? Where?" I eagerly wonder.

"In the city. You wouldn't have recognized us. You know, with my ever-changing forms and your brothers' new handsome identity, but we were there. Watching you, passing you on the street, sitting across from you in that little café you used to enjoy your morning coffee in. We even came across you quite often in the building you worked in. Jakob and you even had a conversation once," he mentions, and I swallow back a hard gulp.