Curse Of Blood: Gods & Monsters

Chapter XLIII - Heida

She might have been crawling along for hours, for time seemed of no consequence down here, in the underworld, yet she was too affrighted to be wearied and the constant presence beside her was enough to keep her senses sharp.

Suddenly, she became aware of grey light filtering through a crevice, and leaves, in the wall up ahead. Heida nearly sobbed her relief aloud, she was that enlivened with fresh hope, and endeavored to move as fast as her injury would allow.

For a heart-stopping instant, ere she maneuvered through the gap, she was struck with the disturbing notion that the valdyr meant to indulge its depravity by stopping her at any moment, perhaps having brought her this far only to rip her from safety before rending her limbs from her body.

Still, she continued on regardless and moved past the leaves that she had earlier moved aside when Roth had first entered here. Once liberated from the monster and the darkness, she gave a whimper and moved out of reach of the vines that fell back over the mouth of the cave. She was finally safe!

There, amidst the tang of decay and audible crush of dead leaves, she wept, relived that the gods, and her mother specifically, had spared her from the jaws of death.

The unexpected susurration of fallen leaves being trampled nearby prompted a terror-stricken shriek from her throat, so convinced was she that the valdyr had escaped and meant to destroy her after all.

"Tis only me!" Frida said, her voice flinty despite the soothing touch of her hand on Heida's shoulder.

"By the Gods!" Heida enveloped her sister-in-law in her trembling arms. "We feared for your safety! Where have you been?"

Frida, meanwhile, remained silent an interminable moment. "You feared for my safety?" said she, dubiously, "yet you console yourself in my husband's arms..." Her voice quavered with both fury and heartache.

Heida pushed herself out of Frida's unreciprocated embrace. How was she to reply when she knew well that her guilt, and Frida's censure, was reasonably deserved. "I ... I am so sorry, Frida. Let us return to the hall and we can-"

"Where is Roth?" Frida's eyes shot immediately to the thick vines yonder, from whence Heida had crawled only moments before.

"It isn't safe here, Frida! We must go!"

Frida's ire was palpable even in the darkness. "If tis so treacherous tonight then you would not be out here ... with my husband." She stood therewith. "Methinks tis the discovery of your treachery that frightens you, Heida!"

"Nay! You do not-"

"Well, I have found you out at last! You were as a sister to me, and you betrayed me tonight without a single thought to how you would hurt me!"

"Forgive me!" Heida grabbed desperately at the hem of Frida's skirts as the woman made to head towards the cave. "No! Wait!" The beast had not been seen for many years, and she feared Frida took that to mean there was no longer any danger! Why could she not be as superstitious as the rest of her people. Why had she not stayed home!

Frida ripped her skirts out of Heida's hands and then watched, her ravaged eyes brimming with tears, as Heida struggled to stand and then fell back once more. "I will not leave you here as you deserve, sister," she said, "but do not interfere. Await me here." She began marching to the cave. "I must needs speak with my husband."

The appellatives, first sister then husband, was said with such disgust that Heida flinched. "Wait!" Of all the nights for her sister-in-law to evince spirit, now was the very worst time. "Take this!" Heida quickly removed her amulet and held it out as she struggled to stand yet again.

Frida, however, disregarded her and pulled the vines aside. "Roth!" she called out and, without the least bit hesitation, took another step forward.

Two things happened then. A low gnar of menace rumbled from the cave the very same moment Frida released an answering, blood-curdling scream that splintered through the woods. But it was abruptly and noisily cut off, as though her throat had been torn from her body.

"Frida!" Heida shrieked in horror, pulling herself to the mouth of the cave with maddened panic. "Roth, No!"

She reached the creeping vines, but sank despairingly to the ground, her relinquishing her face to the rocky floor, as her fingers came away sticky and hot, a pool of blood already gushing from the black mouth of the hellir. The warmth continued to puddle around her prostate form, her cheek wet with her tears and Frida's draining lifeblood.

With the grisly sounds of tearing and deglutition, as the valdyr glutted itself on poor Frida's body, Heida felt her mind descend into desolated madness.

This was her fault. She sobbed as she covered her ears.

Hours later she still hadn't moved. The blood had by then coagulated on her face, the tightness a grim reminder of what had transpired this night despite that the sounds from within had long since grown deathly quiet.

As the early morning sun poured its grey light through the mist and the silent leaves embowering this small corner of Hel, she lifted her head up slightly to see her hand clasped in a larger one that had emerged from the cave. The rest of Roth lay hidden behind the cascading foliage.

Neither of them said ought. She was not ready to speak; or to look at him. To see the recrimination that would surely be writ athwart his face. It was right that he blame her as she condemned herself — an adulteress like her mother, and not merely that but one that had failed to save her lover's wife.

Roth's hand was bloodied and still warm despite the frigid morning. For a moment all she did was stare at it, her hand lifeless in his. She could hear his silent weeping on the other side of the vines, and her own guilt-ridden sorrow soon overpowered his as she keened.

This was her fault, she thought again; and again as the sun rose higher to warm her algid blood.

🌟You saw this coming. Don't act so surprised. Poor Frida. Tell me, what do you think of this terribly predictable predicament?🌟