[The first thing I've written in months and it's fic for ancient Germanic literature I don't even know I'm sorry]
It was a surprisingly cool midsummer night, the wind drifting lightly through the halls of the palace in Hungary as the visiting soldiers rested uneasily. In the darkness, Hagen watched the entrances warily, watching for those that might mean him harm. It was a mistake to come here; he had told Gunther as much before they left, and his encounter with the water nymphs had only cemented that fact. They would die if they remained, Kriemhild would make sure of that; her wrath at Siegfried's death was too strong to allow any of them to live. This was especially true of his own life, Hagen reflected, as it had been his hand that ended Siegfried's life. Were it within Kriemhild's power, he would be dead already.
A figure moved in the shadows by his side, and he began to reach for his sword, only pausing as he recognized Volker's features in the darkness. The minstrel offered him a humorless smile, holding his fiddle loosely in one hand.
"Would you care for some company?" he asked. "Two pairs of eyes spot more danger than one."
Hagen returned the smile, relaxing slightly in the presence of his friend. "It would be appreciated. My thoughts are poor company indeed."
Volker settled in next to his companion, and began to quietly tweak the strings on his fiddle, tuning his instrument as silently as possible. "Your anxieties are well-founded. The Lady Kriemhild has much reason to despise us."
"You have done no wrong to her. Your only crime is loyalty to me after my own."
The musician shrugged lightly. "If that is a crime, I would gladly accept her wrath. You are my dearest friend, Hagen."
The two fell into silence, and in the darkness Hagen regarded his companion with a furrowed brow. It did not seem fair that Volker should have to suffer for this crime. A kind friend, a daring warrior, an excellent musician... and a dead man, if his loyalty remained. There were things that he wished to say, that he felt needed to be said, that he couldn't bring himself to voice as they stood in the darkness.
"I doubt intruders would be hiding in my cheekbones," Volker murmured lightly, not meeting his companion's eyes as he spoke. "You have been staring."
Hagen looked away quickly, focusing his attention once more on the entrances. "I was simply lost in my thoughts."
"Would you care to share what distracts you so? I have never seen you as lost in thought as you have been today."
He sighed lightly, words swelling through his mind but never escaping his lips. How was it, he wondered, that it was so easy to lash out in anger, to spout insults and incite arguments, but it was so difficult to give voice to kinder thoughts? Why could he not simply say the words that screamed through his mind at every moment? "We will die here, Volker. None of us shall ever return to Burgundy."
"Then we shall die," Volker responded. "But we will resist. The fates may claim our lives, Hagen, but that doesn't mean we should retreat into ourselves, paralyzed by our own destiny." He placed his fiddle on the ground, turning to face his companion. "Perhaps it is better to say what must be said, then to die with the regret of being silent."
"That is easy to say," Hagen replied. "My thoughts are not so easily expressed." He met his friend's gaze, their eyes locking in the darkness. "Our fates are set in stone, but if it were possible to change what is to come even the slightest amount, I would not save my own life. I would wish only for you to survive."
Volker smiled lightly. "Surely my life is not more precious than your own. If you were to live, I would give my life a thousand times over."
"Even once would be too painful, my friend."
The two drifted again into silence, but it was a full silence, loaded with unspoken thoughts. Volker glanced toward the entrance, a worried expression crossing momentarily over his face. "It is nearly morning," he said. "We cannot dwell on the past forever."
"Why not?" Hagen answered. "The past holds brightness and joy, the future holds only blood and misery."
"And the past does not?"
His brow furrowed, and he stared at the minstrel in confusion. "What do you mean? For us, at least, surely the past is more promising."
Volker moved away, walking slowly toward the entrance. "You only choose to see the past in its brighter shades, Hagen. You must not ignore its shadows in favor of the light."
A creeping sense of dread was spreading across the room, a gnawing paranoia in Hagen's mind that something was not right. The shadows suddenly seemed strange, the walls skewed at unreal angles. Light had begun to spill in through the entrance, and as it his Volker's face he could see blood, dark red and freely flowing, spreading across the minstrel's face from a large wound. The injured man faced him, staring as if the wound were barely even there, his eyes blank and clouded as he gazed at his former companion.
"We cannot avoid our fates, Hagen. If we are destined to die, we must face that fact."
Terror swelled through Hagen's mind, and with it a flash of memories, realizations that he had forced into the back of his mind, in favor of a more pleasant stance. He could remember the halls, lined with blood and bodies, the hundreds dead at the force of Kriemhild's wrath. He could remember fighting, tearing through mail with his sword and felling enemies at every turn. And he could remember Volker, falling to the ground in a pool of blood as the minstrel's eyes grew pale and distant.
He shut his eyes tight against the memories, wishing and hoping that it was not the truth. The light faded away, replaced by a cool darkness. But as he opened his eyes, the dread returned.
A dungeon, cold and dark, and his hands shackled tightly to the wall behind him. And in front of him, the lovely Kriemhild, face splattered with red and her eyes filled with a dull rage. She raised one hand, and in it he saw the head of her brother, his lord, Gunther. She dropped the severed flesh with a thud, her actions showing no despair for her actions. Any love for her brother had been lost with the death of Siegfried, replaced only by the need for vengeance, for closure.
In her other hand, she held a blade. He recognized it immediately: Balmung, the sword which had once belonged to Siegfried, which had been unjustly stolen from him by his murderer. Kriemhild wielded the blade confidently, and swung it swiftly down onto her offendant's head. Hagen took the blow without protest, a fitting payment for the atrocities he had committed.
A payment for the deaths of Siegfried and Ortlieb, at his own hand. For the deaths of Giselher, and Gernot, and Gunther. For Rudiger and his men.
For Volker. For him in particular, it seemed a fitting punishment indeed.