This happened because Synekdokee prompted me to write a story about the Finnish legend of willow-o-wisps that she wanted to illustrate. I took a lot of liberties and turned it into fantasy/horror, since that's my comfort zone and I missed writing in that genre. Illustrations will be linked on my profile page.
Syn's wikipedia-enhanced description:
Aarnivalkea, Finnish will-o-the-wisps, were believed to mark the location of a treasure deep in ground or water, which could only be taken when the fire was there. Sometimes magical tricks, and even dead man's hand, were required as well, to uncover the treasure.
Finally, please heed the warnings and let me know if I need to add any other triggers.
Aarnivalkea
After months of chasing Sebastian's group, the feel of the pickaxe swinging through the air would have been far more pleasant in Erik's memory if the blunt tip had actually sank into Shaw the way he had intended it to. As it stood, he didn't savor the satisfying way it sank into the meaty flesh of Shaw's bicep, not when Shaw's witchery opened the wound in Erik's flesh instead. He should have known better, but in the heat of the moment violence had been more a part of him than thought.
Rather than tearing the man apart whilst alive, Erik had to wait for Shaw's death lest the horror he planned be inflicted on himself. And wait he did, though he was by no means unoccupied as he drowned the man in the shallow water of the sparsely-wooded mire.
Erik lay stretched out on Shaw's back, his legs twined with Shaw's legs and his feet hooked around Shaw's ankles. He'd drawn Shaw's ankles up in a firm lock to prevent him from kicking free. Shaw's arms were similarly of little advantage to free himself; Erik had slipped an arm under each of Shaw's armpits and had linked his fingers together on the back of Shaw's head and shoved down. He was physically stronger than Shaw, but Sebastian's witchcraft kept him young, vital, and strong enough that keeping his snarling face beneath the shallow and murky water was a challenge.
"If I…!" There was a wet gasp as Shaw sucked in cool air. Erik forced Shaw's face down yet again, frigid water and bits of shredded moss splattered out at the impact, limning Shaw's head and Erik's hands in a halo of speckled green and brown organic matter.
The next time his face came up, gasping again, he snarled and spat out peat-rich water. "…I can't tell you where…!"
Snorting with effort, Erik pulled up on his back legs to consolidate as much of their combined weight as possible on Shaw's head. Shaw's face was again planted to the ears in the mire's brackish water. The sun's diminishing rays lit Erik orange and the mire golden and green, played along Erik's chapped and broken lips as he lowered them to one exposed ear.
"I clearly recall you saying you'd rather die than tell me where you hid it," Erik rasped as his blood mixed with water and saliva dripped from his chin. "Call it an unfortunate moment for me to rediscover my faith in you."
Shaw's thrashing renewed but Erik was fueled with fury and saw to it that not even Shaw's nose came up from the dark water. Erik supposed it was like drowning in a sponge; too good for the wretched bastard. Too good for a murderer, thief, and sadist.
It took less than a minute for Shaw's struggles to slow, then falter. Erik was only disappointed that it didn't take longer. Longer, though, with the run they had already made through the alternately spongy and muddy terrain, might have been a step beyond even his ability to endure. Especially after the stupidity of the pickaxe after Erik had slaughtered Shaw's group.
Erik unhooked his legs from Shaw's but remained on his unmoving back a few minutes more. Erik's brief rest came partially out of caution, and partially from exhaustion, but mostly due to a growing and confusing feeling of unease. Fueled by angry determination, his chase across regions fertile and wasted, arid and otherwise, had left him nothing but weathered skin stretched over rangy muscle and bone. With Shaw's body cooling beneath his, Erik's vigilance struggled to give way to his body's sublimated demands for rest.
Weariness finally forced his chin past Shaw's head to the loamy earth. No sooner did his chin hit the wet moss next to Shaw's submerged face than a fresh wave of anger consumed him; Shaw had an easy death, but there was still much to do. Erik dragged himself off Shaw and used his angry energy to flip the body over.
Shaw's glacial eyes stared sightless from his pale, blue-tinged face through bits of ravaged moss floating on their surface. Erik cursed; in his fatigue he had wasted good time he could have used to drag Shaw's body from the mire and into the ancient graveyard in the dense woodland nearby. Now he wasn't sure he had time.
Blinking back the brightness from the sun's complete descent into the tree line, he gauged how much time he had and found himself wanting. He would have to attend his witchery-inflicted wound after he was done with Shaw. Despite the pain and blood loss from the injury, Erik grabbed one of Shaw's ankles in each hand and threw his weight forward into a hurried pace toward the taller trees beyond the wet flatland.
It took him far longer than he'd hoped and though he tried to avoid slender stumps and other snags, there was more than one moment when Shaw's clothes or belt caught on something and came to a halt that wrenched Erik's arms. The terrain grew worse as he pulled the body into the ragged perimeter of the old-growth woods. Finally, when a stone grave-marker stopped the body once more, Erik's bloody hand slipped right from the leather covering Shaw's ankle. Erik set his jaw and decided he had gone far enough.
Arm numb from trauma and blood loss, Erik seized the dead man's leather belt and looked askance toward the setting sun. He couldn't see it for the trees but the growing dimness meant he would have to work fast. Alacrity was his sole intention, for the pagan operation he intended to perform would be blasphemous in any community he had ever lived in or passed through.
Erik turned back to the task at hand; he would have time for distaste later. He unfastened Shaw's belt with hard fingers, ripped open the ties in his pants, and kicked the dead man's legs open. This wasn't something Erik cared to do; among his own people it was a terrible desecration. But if Erik wanted to find the treasure Shaw had stolen, then Erik had no time for second thoughts; he'd already tried other ways. Shaw would never give up in life, so it remained for him to give up the location in death.
Erik reached into Shaw's pants, flipped back his flaccid penis, and grabbed his sac and stones. The wrinkled skin was still warm. The skin was thickly haired, but soft, delicate, and the knife from Shaw's boot had no trouble parting it. It was the tissue beneath that was tougher. Holding tightly, careful not to spill much blood or seed from the sac, Erik cut the fleshy purse free.
The sun had disappeared from the horizon leaving only diffused light and the sky clothed in the colors of its descent. It gave Erik just enough light to use the same knife to stab through the graveyard's leaf litter and moss. It took several minutes of frantic hacking delivered by Erik's unwounded right arm, before he had a hole deep enough. By then, the last of the sunset had retreated behind the trees and Erik was forced to gauge the hole's depth by feel.
When the hole was the depth of his hand, from the tip of his middle finger to the start of his wrist, Erik placed the severed flesh within. Before covering the nearly cool sac, he scraped his bleeding arm with a swath of moss and dropped it in. For good measure Erik cut free the arm of his homespun shirt and tossed it into the hole, too.
In contrast, it didn't take long to fill the cavity with the displaced dirt. He packed the loose dirt down, but not by too much lest he make things too difficult for the earth to give birth.
Weary to the bone, Erik stood. He submitted to the knowledge that he was cold, wet from the mire, and hungry. He hadn't eaten anything since that morning and he hadn't had anything resembling true rest for months. Sighing, he bent down to again grab the corpse by the ankles and drag it back to the camp where he'd murdered the preponderance of Shaw's party in their cups. It wouldn't do to attract scavengers to the site of his grisly planting.
Walking on the edge of consciousness, Erik managed to drag the body out of the graveyard and into the mire before his strength left him. He fell to his knees hard enough that even on the outskirts of the mire, the knees of his wool trousers were instantly resoaked. It was too much, he realized in dim comprehension. He needed to see to his wound, sleep, get warm, and avail himself to plenty of clean water and good food to recover. All those requirements were things he couldn't attain if he continued to try to move Shaw's corpse through the mire.
Erik released his burden for the last time that night and shambled back toward the camp where he hoped his horse remained. Even if the gelding had wandered off, there were four more horses still hobbled near the remains of Shaw's camp.
Erik woke with no memory of how he made the journey back to Shaw's camp. He didn't question it when he found his face stuffed into a bed roll that smelled of wood smoke, white furs wrapped around his torso and still clutched in his fists. His muscles protested his attempts to sit up, but he stubbornly forced his stiff and weak body to comply.
The camp was populated overwhelmingly with corpses; only the horses kept the living in the majority. In his weakened state, burying bodies was out of the question. If he didn't need to stay in the area for a few more days, he would leave them to them to rot despite scavengers. A pyre was his best bet and considering the heavy superstition about the nearby graveyard, there would be no human beings to investigate the resulting smoke.
With an urgency he could scarcely believe, Erik availed himself to the group's stores of foodstuffs. Most of the food was dried meat and fruit and required more chewing than his hunger could give it. His teeth tore into tough sinew and he drooled like an animal with each handful of tart berries. He wolfed much of the food down half chewed and swallowed painfully around every gulp.
When he was finally able to slow down and chew, his gaze was drawn to the three corpses there in the camp. Gathering what wood he could to assemble a pyre as a precaution against scavengers was crucial, but before he could start any work, he needed to finish eating and then tend his wound. Wiping his face with his remaining shirt sleeve, Erik turned his focus from sustenance to his injury.
It took time to wash dried blood from the wound and bind it carefully. It wasn't a pleasant wound; Erik used the pickaxe for any number of odd jobs such as a climbing, repairing tack and harness, and piercing skulls. It tore a rough puncture that would be difficult to keep from infection. But once it was secure, he changed his ruined shirt for a clean one from his enemies' supplies and turned to the horses.
It was a pleasant surprise to find his gelding had shown up. He had yet to insert himself among the other four horses but was cropping grass on the outskirts of their little herd. They were all experienced mounts and though they were no strangers to death, Erik found them skittish. He attributed their behavior to the deaths of their riders and his own gelding's uneasiness to that of the other four.
Erik took care to interact with them and spent extra time soothing his roan. By the time he was ready to look for wood, the gelding was in an easier mood that entailed prodigious amounts of sniffing and head butting. Erik took it all with good grace and kept his injured shoulder well out of the way.
Shaw's lover and two henchmen were ablaze by noon. All three had been strong opponents Erik might have been able to take on individually, but were beyond him en masse. There was no honor in killing them the way he had, but Erik would pay any price to take back that which Shaw had stolen. In his diminished state honor was a luxury Erik could ill-afford.
A wind came up from the south, but wasn't forceful enough to create concern for spreading or extinguishing the fire. The pyre would burn steadily and hot enough that Erik deemed it would easily take Shaw's corpse once he returned with it. He swung up onto his gelding's back to retrieve the body. The wind tousled his hair and rippled across the gelding's mane as they headed off for the mire.
Erik saw the crows before he spied the body. Wary of a live human being, the black birds scattered reluctantly from their carrion, cawing and flapping their black wings irritably; a few rose up on the breeze. The corpse wasn't far from where he left it, littered with feathers, dirt, and sodden from the mire's standing water. The crows, it seemed, were not the only animals to have mauled the dead man; others had obviously come in the night.
Inured, but uneasy with the smell of death, Erik's horse stood solid, ears forward, as Erik slipped from his back and made his way across spongy sphagnum moss to the corpse. With his shoulder weak and painful, Erik would have to rely on his gelding's strength to drag the stiff corpse back to the pyre. He wrapped the middle of his rope around his hips then tied an end around each of Shaw's ankles. Thus secured, he got back up on the gelding and urged it back to the fire. Taking the brunt of the corpse's weight together, Erik held on tight to his gelding's saddle.
The stiffness of the body after twelve hours in the mire made it much easier to drag back to the camp. Despite his shoulder injury, Erik had little difficulty flinging the corpse onto the blaze. For a few moments he watched the body blacken and burn.
While it threw oily smoke up into the sky Erik caught a glimpse of odd movement from within the fire. From Shaw's corpse he thought he saw a figure rise up in the flames: a figure of a handsome, naked man with eyes that burned blue. The man looked at him with his flame eyes and smiled with white-hot teeth.
Erik frowned and rubbed vigorously at his eyes with his knuckles. When he looked again, there was no such phantasm. Attributing the strange sight to weariness, he turned his attention back to his horse. The gelding went along gamely when Erik took his bridle and walked him back to the mire and through to the edge of the wood.
Once inside the wood again, a strange sight greeted Erik that the darkness of the night before had concealed: many of the old spruce and pine trees within the wood had swaths of bark cleared away from their trunks. Aged and weathered markings were carved deep into the pale flesh beneath.
The mutilations were old; in every case tree bark was slowly growing back over exposed flesh. Erik understood none of the marks; he didn't even find them passing familiar. Just inside the perimeter of the woods the strange marks were ubiquitous, but as they moved deeper, the harsh marks grew fewer and farther between.
Near the old, moss-bedecked graveyard, Erik's horse stopped abruptly. With a whuff of inhaled air, his nostrils flared and his tapered ears stood straight up. Wary of his horse's good sense, Erik stopped and soothed him with reassuring strokes to his huge roan head. He murmured soothing nonsense to the uneasy animal, but pulled him along.
There was no telling what had his horse spooked; wolves, other people, or even the natural witchery that lingered in places like the old graveyard. If there truly was danger, Erik wanted his horse for a quick getaway. With his arm painful and his body weak, he didn't imagine his chances would be good in the event of an attack.
Though hesitant and more than a little antsy, the gelding followed Erik into the graveyard. There were more crows within; they croaked and cawed to each other from the many ancient, often crumbling, piles of stone. More interesting to Erik by far was the small mound of dirt where he had buried Shaw's sack of flesh. Dirt was scattered all around; the site was partially unburied.
Erik gave one more soothing stroke to his horse's soft nose and closed the remaining distance between him and the obscene burial. He crouched near and searched the ground but found no stray signs of blood or semen. Nor were there signs of the interloper in the mossy ground or displaced dirt. Erik frowned at the dirt that still remained within the small pit; it was sufficiently packed that he felt certain the earth retained hold of Shaw's seed and Erik's blood. The lack of finger or claw marks from the mysterious digger set him on edge.
Gritting his teeth against the idea of losing his chance at Shaw's treasure, Erik decided that the best thing to do would be to lay his camp right there in the graveyard. With a sense of grim finality, he refilled the hole and packed the dirt once more.
That afternoon he made camp there in the mossy old gravesite, among the many cairns. He built up a small fire that he could cook with and watch over the little mound throughout night. The dirt marking the site of his strange burial remained unchanged after the disturbance that first morning. The second morning was the same.
On the third morning, Erik began to worry that his timing had been off; growing the fern he needed was a macabre recipe that called for accuracy rather than faith. Like any plant, it would work whether or not he believed it would; it was enough that he had provided seed to the morbidly fertile ground of the old bone yard. It needed nothing else from him to grow other than the appropriate timing of the planting. If there was no activity after three nights and three mornings, chances were that he'd failed. It was a bitter thought that not even Shaw's death could sweeten.
With a small fire cooking a marsh hare he'd trapped, the moon a waning crescent overhead, and scratchy blankets and furs scavenged from Shaw's group underneath his body, Erik leaned back against his saddle and continued his watch. Outside the graveyard, all five horses were taking turns dozing or laying down for a few hours of true sleep. Erik heard nothing unusual from the five who were still in the process of establishing a new hierarchy since Erik's gelding entered their little herd.
His arm wasn't getting better. For all the wound had scabbed over, the edges remained painful and red; infection was a forgone conclusion. Erik began thinking about cauterization. The idea held little appeal, but losing his life or limb was much less desirable.
As he pondered heating his knife in the fire, the impression of burning blue eyes caught Erik's fancy. Since there was nobody around to observe him, he considered passing the time with a hand down the front of his pants. Picking at the rough laces, he loosened them up and slipped a hand into the front of the wool trousers. A thrill of heat surged through him, clenching low in his gut, as he ran tantalizing fingers over his warming cock. The fire was hot on his skin as he brought his swiftly hardening flesh up and out into the night air. A wet bead of precome surfaced at the tip of his prick.
Unfortunately, the sight of his own seed instantly reminded him of what he'd done to Shaw. Snorting in disgust at his folly, Erik tucked his failing hard on back into his pants. The thought of what could become of his own seed were it spilled around the graveyard killed any further notion of fucking his hand. He pulled his hand from his breeches and laced them up once more.
Beside him the fire crackled and spit.
It wasn't until the fire burned down to embers and his belly was full of rabbit and edible fiddlehead ferns, that Erik noticed a glint in the vicinity of the mound of dirt. Wary, he sat up and leaned forward over his knees, all his senses gathered and compressed into a single tight focus. There was something shiny reflecting the orange of the fire's embers from the little dirt hill.
Erik bit the inside of his lower lip and rolled up into a tight-muscled crouch. He didn't straighten; instead he leaned forward and edged closer along the cold ground on his hands and feet. It was easier to see as his eyes adjusted to the dimness and he crept closer: there, from one side of the pile of moss was the shiny, wet tip of a tightly curled frond.
At first glance, it wasn't like any of the other ferns within the forest. While the growing frond shared many of their characteristics, from the tightly rolled tip to the slightly furry exterior, it was not green but a sickly-looking white. Far more bizarre than its pale flesh was the thin film of vaguely milky fluid coating it. Erik made a face despite himself and reflexively wiped his hand on his bunched thigh. He was relieved he hadn't followed through on his prior sexual impulse.
The frond continued to grow and as it slowly reached into the air, tiny furled fronds along the stalk began to appear and unroll with it. The curled spirals closest to the ground loosened and began to uncurl from tight balls covered in omnipresent wetness into fans of tender, slick, white leaves. Near the base of the frond, the moss churned in slow motion, heralding the appearance of several more identically white and wet fern heads.
Mystified, Erik watched them all come up, uncurl, spread their sickly white fronds, and drip. Bits of moss and dirt trailed slowly down the frond heads, glided down their stalks, borne down by the wet streams. The fluid put Erik in mind of mucus, come, and the fluid exuded by the marsh's sundews. It wasn't important, though; not what he was looking for. As each coil of fern unfurled, Erik watched for spores.
Less than an hour later, the fern was full and lush and its growth slowed. In the place of movement, it began to emit faint light, not unlike that of the moon through a veil of clouds or a candle obscured within a tent.
With the light came movement; flickering red dots began to form beneath many of the fronds. Those were what Erik had hoped for; he watched, breath coming shallowly to him as the red dots grew in color and definition beneath their leaves.
As the dots grew, they began to emit faint light as well. Many did not grow much, their lights winked out and they dried on the underside of the fern like tiny, wrinkled scabs. Others grew larger within growing drips of viscous fluid, looking like nothing so much as glowing, red frog eggs left to gestate on a leaf. A few fell from the ferns and hit the ground where their light immediately doused. A few slid together and, a flurry of light and movement later, consumed one another. Those that consumed one another grew brighter, bigger, and strangely more buoyant.
Finally, only a few were left and they came off their fronds seemingly of their own accord. They floated around the fern in drunken spirals and arcs. Two collided and there was another flurry of light and movement as they struggled together. One was consumed and the victor grew brighter. As they became more confident with their flight, they also became aware of one another. A brief but dazzling struggle ensued; each spore fighting to consume the other until, finally, there was only one left. Erik could only assume that it was the one he needed.
Left arm stiff and weak, Erik brought his right back and settled on his haunches, readying himself for a spring. The newborn will-o'-the-wisp drifted in loose curves around the fern, then moved toward Erik and then back to the fern. As it moved and dipped, fat drops of viscous fluid, streaked with red, fell away, until Erik could suddenly make out, from within the light, the impression of miniature limbs. At the center of the silvery glow was a tiny human-shaped creature.
"Show me where Shaw hid his treasure," Erik growled with all the authority he'd had before Shaw robbed him of everything. "Lead me safely there."
The will-o'-the-wisp dipped violently and a large glop of fluid came off its tiny body as it shot up from the apex of its tight curve. The wisp came closer to Erik than ever before. He considered whipping his hand out as he had planned and seizing it, but decided that wouldn't be the best idea if it was willing. And could it be willing? This was a creature born of the earth, Shaw's seed, and Erik's blood; how could he trust it?
The will-o'-the-wisp bobbed before him; he caught the vague idea of a female form with beating insectoid wings and a mouth full of sharp teeth.
It bounced and bobbed effortlessly around him in the cooling evening air. But for the furious movement of its tiny wings the will-o'-the wisp made no noise at all. Bouncing along in the air, it moved past the fern. It bobbed and weaved with sudden darting movements, but the creature didn't move far from Erik, though it always remained outside his reach.
"Stay close to me, so I can watch my footing in this strange place," he bade the strange creature.
It continued to dance about, but took a meandering path closer to him. It lowered itself until it was on his eye level, not far from the ground with him still in his crouch. The will-o'-the-wisp hovered under the leading end of a bramble and then, quite suddenly, its glow went out.
Erik squinted in the darkness; the fern's light was fading, and the moon was a covered sliver in the sky. His heart raced and his stomach clenched around the rabbit he'd eaten. If the will-o'-the-wisp was gone, he wouldn't find Shaw's treasure. He leaned closer to the spot where the will-o'-the-wisp's light had winked out, trying to catch some trace of it. Perhaps it would leave a trail of viscous, milky fluid he could follow.
What he found was a tiny, naked, dark-skinned creature hanging off the bramble by her even tinier hands. Her red-stained teeth glittered, needle-like and plenteous, in a wide grin the moment he saw her. Her eyes were white, devoid of iris and pupil, reminiscent of the fern's flesh in color. All four of her insect wings glowed faintly as they moved slowly behind her, as if they were all lazily treading water rather than air.
Erik was thankful to see her dry of the seed, blood, and soil that birthed her. If not for her teeth and strange eyes, he supposed she'd be a beautiful little thing. He said, "Let's go."
The little female creature shook with silent laughter; her tiny eyes closed and crinkled, her mouth, full of thorns, fell open with her silent apoplexy of humor. In the next instant, her eyes opened into slits and her mouth closed on a sneer. Her wings came to blurring life and with them the light that obscured her form.
Erik winced with the sudden onset of light, but stood swiftly and followed as she began to bob back past the glowing fern.
The will-o'-the-wisp took to an erratic path, but even though Erik's sense of direction wasn't what it once was, he knew when he got to Shaw's treasure it wouldn't matter. On the other hand, with his witchery-inflicted wound headed toward infection, it was possible that getting the treasure wouldn't matter, either, if his planned cauterization failed.
Though his guide sometimes doused her light as Erik followed, the tiny will-o'-the-wisp always brightened again just a bit farther ahead. The path she led him on went deeper into the graveyard, into areas where the old cairns were increasingly crumbling and decrepit; often held together by moss or upturned by overgrown tree roots. The only sound in the strangely quiet wood was Erik's moss-hushed footsteps as he moved behind the will-o'-the-wisp.
Eventually, she led him to the foot of a strange little hill; in the dark, he was surprised by the sudden change in elevation. Regardless, he set foot on it and began to climb. Above him, the tiny will-o'-the-wisp darted up the incline in a sinuous path of light. She stopped at the crest and bobbed and floated in slow arcs. Her illumination revealed the strange hill for what it was; at the top of the mound were several mossy stones, each about the size, if not shape, of a human head. The moss on each stone was broken, scuffed from recent movement; though the concept of 'recent' in the old forest was suspect.
The hill was not a hill at all, but a barrow bigger than all the others. It seemed an appropriate place for somebody as irreverent as Shaw to keep his stolen treasures.
Favoring his injured arm, Erik resumed climbing the mound by the will-o'-the-wisp's light. Just as he was nearing the top, Erik saw all the little shadows the wisp's light cast down the hill split and become two. Eyes narrow in confusion and concern, he looked up to find the source of the strange display; his eyes were greeted by the sight of a second will-o'-the-wisp.
The shadows around Erik, including his own, danced away and toward each other in a steady rhythm. They split and joined only to split and join again as the two will-o'-the-wisps circled the barrow. The new one, an orange fireball with its own orbiting blue light, circled clockwise, while Erik's guide circled counter to it. Uncertain what the second will-o'-the-wisp portended, Erik watched warily. He suspected the new wisp was actually the treasure's guardian, but he had thought the guardian would have left when Shaw died.
"Ah, look at you," said a sudden voice from the disembodied flame. "I have rarely seen such an interesting will-o'-the-wisp; pretty with teeth."
The fiery will-o'-the-wisp halted above the stones. Its blue light curved around it in a loose arc and then shot right up into it. The blue light incited a conflagration out of which a vaguely human form began to uncurl. "Oh, and here one of the proud fathers. Congratulations on your newborn."
Erik's eyes narrowed further at the mellifluous voice and its deeply disturbing words. "I've come for the treasure."
Flame rippled across the indistinct form in what Erik took for amusement. "Oh, I think that's obvious, my friend. You've traveled quite a long way to take it, haven't you? That doesn't bestow any particular rights upon you, however."
The response marked the creature clearly as the guardian of Shaw's treasure; an aarnivalkea in the language of the people native to the area.
When the flame finished rippling, the creature's form was clearly human in shape. The shape it assumed was young, if not tall. What his masculine body lacked in height it made up for in strong arms, muscled thighs, and a broad chest. Standing atop the hill gave him the only height over Erik its human body achieved.
"You have the treasure or protect it?" Erik asked, annoyed that he found the aarnivalkea's assumed face seemed strangely familiar and himself unwillingly affected by the warmth coming off the aarnivalkea's undeniably fit human body.
"Maybe a bit of both." The aarnivalkea smiled, and it was a kind stretch of lips accompanied by a tongue that moistened them: embers sparked across his lips in the wake of their moistening. "Erik, isn't it? Your name is Erik."
"If you know my name, aarni," Erik said by way of agreement, "then you must know Shaw stole the treasure from me."
"My name is Charles," the aarnivalkea replied with a dip of his head. "And how do I know you didn't give this precious treasure to him? You don't seem the type to be easily thieved from."
"Shaw is dead, so there's no reason to protect the treasure," Erik replied, not bothering to entertain the creature's argument. "What do I have to do to regain what he took? I don't remember a challenge amongst the legends."
Charles grinned and the red embers of his pupils flared behind the blue irises. "Ah, Erik, your problem is rooted in memories, is it not? Of course there's a challenge and mine is quite simple."
"Is it?" Stung, Erik snarled, "Stop wasting time and tell me what it is."
"Fire spirits such as myself prefer a straight-forward challenge. You may have heard of it." Charles brought his hands up and rubbed them together; they threw off smoke and sparks in the process. "I will relinquish the treasure if you lay hands on me and not lose hold until sunrise."
In the far-off lands Erik hailed from, and in those he had traversed in his chase, the aarnivalkea's challenge was not, indeed, an uncommon feature in stories and legends. The news brought Erik's mood low; how could he hold onto a being of fire for four or five hours, especially with his arm so weak? "How is that possible? I would have to go back to my camp for gloves and there's no reason to believe I could find my way back here if I did."
"You need no gloves; my flames will not burn your flesh," Charles smiled. "At times you may feel as if you are on fire, but my flames will never harm beyond a moment. Won't you try for the sake of this precious treasure? I think you will."
"You keep talking as if you know me," Erik said. "You don't."
"Oh, foolish man," the creature of flame said as he stepped toward Erik, the heated air coming off him sent Erik's auburn locks dancing. "I may know you better than you know yourself."
"Really?" he said. "Let's see."
Erik gave no warning; simply seized Charles, encircling his torso, right beneath his muscular arms. Just as quickly, flame burst out along Erik's woolen shirt sleeves. Every portion of his clothing that came in contact with the aarnivalkea instantly blackened and curled back from his skin. The ashes smudged between them or fell to powder the grave on which they stood. The pain of the fire was sudden, but brief with the wool's flash-consumption.
Erik's arms were long, but he intended a tight grip, so his chest hit Charles' in another burst of flame and charring wool. Charles' face twisted from smug teasing to surprise. His lips parted and he blew out a draft of smoky breath. His broad hands, perhaps acting under their own instincts, settled on Erik's ribs and burned away more of his shirt as they traveled around his back in a return embrace. "My friend, you surprise me."
The smell of burnt and burning wool was thick in Erik's nose as he jerked his hips to the side. He was far more concerned with keeping his stomach or, more terrifying by far, his groin from connecting with the aarnivalkea's body. In so doing, he needed to get both feet to Charles' side and that meant sacrificing solid balance. It was animal instinct, not logic, that dictated in that swift moment that he choose the more awkward stance.
And still his left thigh pressed firmly against Charles' bare thigh. The fire was just as quick to consume his trousers' thicker wool in a flash of fire and pungent smoke.
"You said your flames don't burn," Erik hissed angrily. In the back of his mind, he noted that his arms were not on fire, nor his chest or his ribs. He was not in any immediate pain.
"I said my flames won't burn your flesh," Charles said in a tone best suited to explaining simple truisms to young children. "Your clothes are a different matter, I'm afraid."
Despite the short fires that had burned through patches of his clothing, he found Charles' body uncomfortably hot, but not damaging. Charles' skin was smooth as a child's, but stretched over sturdy, mature muscle that no stripling could possess. Erik inhaled in shock at the pleasing feel of the aarnivalkea's form and his nose detected scents of musk, blood, and burning peat.
"I know so much about you. I know all three of your Norns," Charles whispered into Erik's ear. "The strong woman who was your mother, the resilient woman that was your wife, and the joyful little bundle that was your daughter."
Gnashing his teeth, Erik shifted his hold on the aarnivalkea's ribs and squeezed hard. Far from tricking him into weakness, it was the rage of knowing what he lost, what Shaw and his witch had stolen, that fueled his will to hold on. Logic dictated that a creature that could change forms would not likely be hurt if he cracked its human ribs, but Erik saw no reason he couldn't try to hurt it.
The smile Charles gave Erik was not unkind. "The treasures I hold are the most precious, but they'll be yours again come sunrise. You will have all those wonderful memories back; those of your mother, those of your pregnant wife, and especially the little girl she gave you. You will even have your witchery over metal."
The encouraging tone the aarnivalkea used was confusing, possibly a trick, but Erik felt it intruding on his defenses. "Save your taunts and manipulations, aarni."
"I do not speak in cruelty or taunt." Warm hands lifted from Erik's back, but the fire spirit dropped his fingertips down again and drew them across Erik's torso. Each volatile pass of his fingertips released a burning patch from Erik's stolen shirt until the last of the fabric fluttered away on a singed breeze. "I know your secrets, I know your witchery, and I know why you hate Shaw so much."
Erik's heart quickened in his chest, he clenched his arms harder. Thoughts of how to subdue the aarnivalkea altogether began gathering in his mind. "Shut your lying mouth."
"Because the Frost witch did not take that, did she?" Charles brought his hands up again from Erik's back. This time he ran his fingers through Erik's hair in an intimate gesture.
Erik braced himself for more of the repugnant smell of burning hair, the puff of flame that would announce the loss of his auburn mane, but it didn't come. He wished it had; there was far more to fear from tenderness than cruelty.
"Initially," Charles brought his lips close to Erik's ear, fingers pulling gently at Erik's hair. "Initially his strength, his charisma, and his encouragement of your magic, tempted you. You remember, don't you, the night he nearly seduced you?"
"Damn you," Erik snarled, caught in a truth he scarcely even acknowledged to himself.
"You resisted, but you remember taking the lust he inspired to your matrimonial bed. Your wife was delighted, because you had so rarely hungered for her. It was the first time since your daughter was born and you ploughed her with the strength of your desire for another man."
Erik saw red that had nothing to do with the aarnivalkea's flames. He squeezed as tight as he could, hoping to crush ribs, and began to pick the smiling creature up from the ground. To what end, he didn't know, he had to keep his hold.
It didn't matter his intent, for as he lifted and compacted the aarnivalkea's ribs, the fire spirit kicked out at Erik's awkward stance. A warm foot hooked behind Erik's ankle and pulled. Erik tried to save himself from falling by transferring weight back to his other foot, but the aarnivalkea had anticipated that much and pushed his face into Erik's, his lips covering Erik's in an open-mouthed kiss.
Overbalanced in a moment of shock, Erik fell backwards. Charles' hands slid to the back of Erik's head, his face turned to press his warm cheek against Erik's, and he angled his legs to straddle Erik's thigh. When Erik's back hit the pile of stones on the old barrow, his head was cushioned by hands, his face was not bashed by Charles', but the front of his pants and small clothes were seared away by Charles' skin as he lay upon him.
"There's no shame," Charles murmured soothingly next to Erik's ear. "In fact, we've hours until the sun frees me to return the treasure. Wouldn't you like to experience that thing you dream about? Wouldn't you like to let me have my mouth on you? It has been many years for me and I hunger for it."
Erik looked into the aarnivalkea's eyes and began to snarl, but the curious blue flame he found there, the warmth of the creature's regard, the plushness of his shapely lips… they were far more tempting than Shaw had ever been. He felt his cock stir and his will to violence waver as Charles began a slow rut against his thigh. He couldn't see what Charles was doing, but he could feel the size and shape of his bowed cock rubbing against his bare thigh.
Erik swept his hands up Charles' back and seized his head by handfuls of hair. It was just long enough for Erik to twist around his fingers before gripping hard. "No tricks."
"I can't promise that," Charles moaned, his cock smearing hot seed on Erik's thigh. "But I promise not to hurt you and I promise not to trick you while I pleasure you. As long as you are holding me, any part of me, I am bound."
"This holds no meaning for me," Erik stated. "I only want to know the truth of my desires for myself."
"Of course," Charles moaned and slowly pulled back over Erik's body. His hot tongue slid over Erik's neck as he tracked backward on all fours.
Stuttered gasps of surprise escaped Erik as Charles lapped across his dusky nipples. Shame bubbled on the periphery of his conscious as he realized that sex acts with a male stranger inspired more lust in him than any woman he recalled.
Encouraged by the pleasured gasps, Charles laved extra attention on Erik's nipples, going so far as to pull one pebbled nub between his lips and tease it gently with suction. In reply, Erik's cock further filled with blood, coming erect against Charles' stomach. The hot skin there ignited more pleasure along the sensitive organ's head and communicated tingling lust down to his tightening loins.
By the time Charles slid all the way down Erik's long body to tongue gently at Erik's circumcised cock, the man was a delirious wreck. Eyes half-lidded with lust, Erik watched through the haze of his lashes as Charles pressed open-mouth kisses to his fully erect cock. His lips caught on the dry skin around the flared head, but slipped easily the moment precome smeared across them. The sight and sensation wrenched an animal groan from Erik.
When Charles looked up again, his eyes burning, his lips were glossed obscenely with precome and saliva and Erik wanted nothing more than to fuck the aarnivalkea's mouth with all the surprising passion he inspired.
You can have exactly that. Erik did not question that Charles could speak, despite the slow push of his lips down Erik's straining, red-crowned cock. Or later you can assault my ass with this ridiculously huge phallus of yours.
The hot, wet constriction of Charles' mouth drove Erik to an ecstasy he had never known was attainable. Plumes of steam issued into the night sky with Erik's every pant. He was vaguely aware he had begun drooling, but there was no self-consciousness left within him to care. His fingers gripped Charles' hair so tight, he worried that he might pull the locks right out and thus lose the challenge. A long lick of the aarnivalkea's magma-like tongue swirled along the crown of Erik's cock as he changed grip: he gave a shout of pleasure but managed to desperately frame each side of Charles' head with his hands. One thumb sank into the hinge of his jaw, the other juddered unsteadily, digging into Charles' cheek.
The callused thumb on Charles' cheek was the more dangerous of the two; though the pad was tough from horse reins and tools, it still communicated the feel as Charles sucked up and down the hot length of his cock. Just beneath the thin skin of his cheek, Erik could feel the back and forth of his cock, the up and down of Charles' maddening tongue.
Blue-green eyes showing white around the irises like a horse in fear or rage, Erik looked down at Charles and the acute madness of his profane mouth. He watched steam curl up from his cock on every backward motion of Charles' devilish head. His toes curled, churning the moss covering the cairn. Such pleasure had to be witchery, he thought, complete witchery, but it was impossible to care when his stones were drawing up tight, his loins knotting in delicious tension, his cock burning with the pleasure of a mouth's friction.
Just hold on, he told himself. Hold on. Hold on.
It's okay to let go, came Charles' voice. You can let your body go. Come for me, Erik. You're trembling for release.
"Nnng," Erik groaned harshly, "No. No, I won't let go."
You foolish man, Charles' voice said. Hold me with your hands, but let go of the knot in your body.
Erik was too far gone to understand the simple instructions. He shook his head violently, but kept bringing his hips up to meet Charles' every push. Just as Charles' said, Erik was trembling in need for release. His skin was slick with dripping sweat and beginning to steam like their breath.
He felt Charles moan in pleasure and frustration and groaned in response at the vibration the sound transmitted up his cock. Erik was on the edge, the very edge of an orgasm the like he had never experienced. It was a wild thing waiting at the center of his control to shake him from the core of his being outward.
Oh, Erik, give it to me. Charles' voice was no longer cunning or condescending: he begged. Give me your orgasm; I haven't felt one in so long and never one so strong as this. Please, give it to me. Oh, please.
And with Charles' pleading, came harder suction and then firmly stroking fingers right behind Erik's balls. The unexpected touch startled Erik, but between the surprise and the intense pleasure found there, Erik could withhold no longer. The final barrier was broken and the trembling of his body became a tectonic shake. His hands were cruel on Charles' head; he held the aarnivalkea's face tight and fucked into his mouth in sharp, stuttering bursts that bloomed out of time with the stars bursting behind his eyes.
Yes, yes, oh fuck yes. Erik!
And if his own pleasure wasn't enough, there was Charles, a supernatural lightning rod of sensation, feeding his orgasm right back into Erik's mind until the pleasure was maddening, blinding, cataclysmic. Erik's vision grew dark around the edges, but bright in the center until he shouted wordlessly with a pleasure too intense. His vision flashed bright and then he knew nothing.
A combination of cold and warmth, weariness and agony, greeted Erik when he woke. The sun was burning across the periphery of the trees, rendering the warm, white furs covering him a spectrum of crystalline silver and gold.
Much like three days ago, he didn't remember the journey back to his camp. Unlike that morning, the pain was not from his wounded arm, but the cramping of muscles against cold and uneven rocks.
Gritting his teeth against his muscles' outrage, Erik sat up and found himself, not at his camp, but at the top of the barrow. Confused, he looked about the man-made hill. He smelled burned wool, found the tattered and burned scraps of his clothing, and the pile of stones at his back. His groin twinged with a low, pleasant ache.
Of Charles and the little will-o'-the-wisp he saw nothing. And yet, he had not brought the Frost witch's white furs with him to the barrow. Pulling the furs aside, he found himself naked and the pickax wound no longer red and angry.
Hope welled up in him at the positive sign of healing. Biting the inside of his cheek, Erik immediately tried to call to mind his daughter's name, her little face, the weight of her in the crook of his arm.
His stomach clenched on terrible dread when he recalled… nothing. Only that she and the rest of his family were dead.
Erik shook his head minutely in denial that was rooted deep in his heart but blooming in his flesh. How could he? How could he have been so stupid? So weak? No, he couldn't imagine it, couldn't imagine that the deaths, atrocities, and sacrilege were all for naught. His heart raced wildly in his chest, but he closed his eyes and felt for north, for coins among the dead, for his pick axe back at the camp. And, again, he felt nothing, not even the ghost of his once-innate witchery.
Instead, he remembered Charles. He remembered the desperate passion in his flame-blue eyes as he'd sucked on Erik's cock, the feel of his tongue stroking him to life, the wet heat of his mouth as his cock had disappeared past red lips. The memory didn't enflame his senses, rather he felt something inside him curl up at the edges and shrivel in revulsion. His stomach empathized by constricting and Erik barely managed to turn to the side and vomit down the hill rather than on the white furs.
What happened was clear: he let go. In a momentary lapse of his iron discipline he had thrown away all. His daughter, wife, parents, and magic traded for a fleeting moment of blinding pleasure. Every bit of that ecstasy found its equal opposite amount in bile; Erik spent an unknown amount of time bent over, retching over the sun-drenched moss.
Weak in body and spirit, Erik eventually descended the barrow. With the white furs held about his body, he stumbled barefoot through the cairns, his subconscious guiding him back to his camp where the will-o'-the-wisp had been spawned.
In a haze, Erik walked into his small camp and went straight to wash the taste of vomit from his mouth with water from his supplies. He drew out clothes from those he'd kept from Shaw's group and dressed. For long minutes after dressing, he simply stood, staring into space in mute shock and self-revulsion.
A foul smell lingering under wood smoke finally pulled him into a form of consciousness. Glancing at the fire he had lit the night before, he was surprised to see it still smoldered. It was an odd thing; he had intended for the fire to die out after he'd finished cooking the previous night's rabbit. By all rights it should have, but then he hadn't brought the white furs out to the barrow, either. Perhaps the aarnivalkea had fed it for his pleasure after swallowing so much of Erik's seed.
And what did that portend? Erik had come endlessly down the creature's throat, wave after wave of sloppy seed had pulsed from him. Would that mean the aarnivalkea could have some sort of hold on Erik? Not only had he let go, he had likely laid the groundwork for possible enslavement.
Erik used more water to wash himself as best he could, then went about the morning packing up camp and tending his horses. He wanted to be as far away from the area as he could; there seemed to be no sense in staying in an area that could serve as a position of strength for the aarnivalkea.
As he kicked dirt over his campfire, the lingering smell he noticed earlier grew more pronounced. Not far from the fire was the little mound of dirt, the vile burial site that had grown the fern. The fern had obviously died before he'd returned to camp; it was a blackened and gelatinous mess that appeared to have melted over the mound in brackish rivulets. It smelled like maggot-ridden meat and old sex. Disgusted, Erik dug up the fire's ashes and covered the putrid remains.
Erik was packed and on his way by noon. The horses were uneasy to start with, but once underway they began to relax and enjoy the chance to move around more. The few times he stopped to let the horses drink from streams or rest his aching muscles, Erik's gelding tried to express concern for his rider's low mood. The horse shoved at him with his huge head and reached for him with his flexible lips. Erik patted the animal absently, but found no solace in the act.
Sunset came early and lingered long in the northern country's autumn. Shaw had once told him that in northern winters sometimes the sun never came up at all. Months ago, Erik had snorted and called Shaw a liar, but had since learned he truth of his statement.
Though the evening was even more frigid than the night before, Erik didn't make a fire when he set camp. He contented himself with stores of dried rations and what wild plants he could scavenge and bedded down after sunset for a restless night. Hours after the horizon no longer entertained the sun's glow, he lay against his saddle, thinking what plans to lay, what direction to turn his life. He was considering turning himself over to his shame and fury by joining a mercenary group or even brigands once he was further south. In the midst of his bitter musings he caught a glimpse of light from the corner of his vision.
Erik didn't move but for the quick darting of his keen eyes in the direction of the light. But as quickly as it had come, it was gone again. Thinking that perhaps he had glimpsed a falling star, he stared into the distance and fell back to his thoughts.
Not a few heartbeats later, far off, back the way he had come, the light flashed again. Erik sat up. Behind him, the horses were shifting restlessly, their tails swishing in agitation. In the moonlight he could see their ears flicked forward in the direction the light had flashed.
The next time the light shone it had halved the distance to the camp. Erik could even see light reflected amongst the tree trunks and branches. He stood and moved to soothe the horses; he didn't want them to run if he could help it. In any other circumstance, he wouldn't be able to blame them. As it was, the morning's despair was rapidly giving ground to murderous anger.
Erik seized one of the water bags and took up a long, wicked dagger he'd looted from one of Shaw's minions. He folded the bag double in his left hand, held it tight so it bulged out and away from him, and spun the dagger's hilt between his right hand's fingers. His stance was wide and centered, knees slightly bent, and his hands low.
When next the light appeared it wasn't a flash, but a slow glow of flame some ten meters away that threw the many coniferous trees into orange relief. It extinguished just as slowly, leaving no trace of its passage except as a scar on Erik's night vision. He gripped the leather bag tighter, halted the dagger's spin, and strained forward with killing intent.
He waited, but the flame was slow to reappear. Heart thundering in his breast, Erik continued to strain forward in the stillness of the night. His hands pulsed with every pump of blood through his system. Yet, long minutes passed and there was no light.
But then a warm, smoke-laced breath moved over the back of his ear. "Erik, no."
Erik was a swift economy of movements, less graceful than purposeful; he slammed his hands toward one another behind his back.
As he hoped, the water bag burst on the blade and spilled forth over the aarnivalkea's stomach and torso. But rather than twisting his face into agony at the water splashing over him, the fire spirit wore only an expression of pained dismay. "Stop, Erik. Don't you want the treasure?"
Thou he had whipped around, dagger on its way for the aarnivalkea's ribs, Erik managed to turn his hand at the last instant. Instead of sinking the dagger into the fire spirit's assumed flesh, the flat of Erik's fist pounded into his wet and steaming side. Charles grunted with the strike and danced back, one hand covering and protecting the site of impact.
Erik's head tilted in confusion even as his chin jutted in rage. "What are you talking about? What treasure?"
Charles took his hand from his side and brushed water from his skin. He was as naked as ever despite the cold night air. "My treasure."
"You tricked me into letting go," Erik accused, flexing his wrist so the dagger again came out at a ninety degree angle to his forearm.
Charles bit his lip. "Well, yes and…" Charles sighed and rubbed at his fair face. "And… yes; that's in my nature and I cannot be other than what I am. I did trick you, but all is not lost."
Erik eyed the spirit warily. "Then give me the treasure."
"It isn't Shaw's treasure," Charles said. "There's another treasure. It's my treasure in return for the gift you gave me."
"And what gift did I give you?" Erik scoffed. His fingers moved on the dagger, finding a more secure grip. He wasn't certain he could kill the aarnivalkea, but seeing him react to the blow to his ribs gave Erik hope that he could at least hurt him.
"Your pleasure," Charles sighed, and a sad sort of wistfulness graced his bruised lips.
Bruised, Erik knew, from the furious fucking his mouth had received the previous night. The thought was both tantalizing and sickening.
"Your pleasure," Charles repeated, "and your seed. I owe you more than you realize. If Shaw had died and none came for his treasure, I would have been stranded on that barrow until it and the world passed away."
There it was, the aarnivalkea's ulterior motive. "And you repay your debt with treachery. Better you stay there than come to me now."
"I told you; it's my nature." Charles huffed in frustration. "Until you freed me, I had to protect Shaw's treasure whether he was living or dead."
"And I freed you?" Erik asked, his suspicion clear.
"Yes," Charles nodded. "You freed me and now I must offer you my treasure as I offered it to Shaw long ago."
"What is your treasure?"
"I can't tell you that, but I can tell you that Shaw accepted it and," Charles looked beseechingly at Erik, "that I much prefer it to be in your hands."
"And if I don't accept it?"
"I can't tell you that, either."
"What can you tell me about it, then?" Erik spat angrily. "I'm through with your trickery. Isn't it enough that you deprived me of my memories of my daughter? Even her name!"
"I did not deprive you of your memories, but I have kept them from you. I'm sorry. Truly." Charles looked miserable, the burning coals behind his irises dimmed low and dark. "I can tell you that I think you will use it for better things than Shaw did. He never understood it for what it was."
Erik shook his head and sneered at Charles. "No. Leave me, aarni, I want nothing to do with you."
Charles' face turned ashen in a moment, his mouth dropped open in horror; the heat surrounding him guttered and the subtle glow from under his skin dimmed. "Is that your answer? You don't accept my treasure?"
It was not sympathy that moved Erik's tongue in reply, but his usual harsh honesty. "I never said that. I don't like you. You seduced me, tricked me, and kept the only good things in my life from me. But that doesn't mean I won't accept something from you that could help me now that my memories and magic aren't coming back. It would be stupid not to."
"Then you… accept the treasure?" Charles' face contorted in a complicated expression Erik couldn't decipher. Perhaps it was a fear to hope warring with a desire to hope; he had known that complex hash of emotion far too intimately once.
Erik turned his back on Charles and returned to the furs and blankets he had left. "I haven't decided. As you should know, I seem to do tragically stupid things at critical moments."
Soft footfalls followed Erik to the furs, he felt heat at his back as he sat down among them and began to settle against his horse's saddle once more. Ignoring Charles' presence, he pulled the bedding up to his chin and closed his eyes. If Charles wanted to hurt him, he would have done so by now.
"What are you doing?" Charles asked, traces of confusion and incredulity threaded through his honeyed voice.
"Going to sleep," Erik snorted. "I'll think more clearly in the morning."
"But I have to leave again at sunrise," Charles protested. "Can't you tell me now?"
"Sooner I sleep," Erik replied, "the sooner I wake up."
A singed breeze was evidence of Charles' huff of frustration. "I'll wake you when the sky begins to brighten."
"No, you'll do nothing and hope I wake up before sunrise."
Another exhale of hot air and smoke announced Charles' dissatisfaction with Erik's answer, but he made no protest nor did he speak. Erik heard scuffling amongst the forest floor's leafy litter as Charles crept forward, smelled a brief scent of burning leaves, and then nothing. He fell into a deep sleep, heat radiating against his face.
When Erik next opened his eyes, it was to a sky that was half blue and clouds lined with pink. His face was still bathed in warmth and he was comfortable within his bedding. Looking from the sky to his side, he saw Charles sitting cross-legged, eyes already on him. Perhaps he had never looked away at all.
"Good morning Erik," he said carefully. "Did you sleep well?"
The blankets and furs fell to Erik's lap as he sat up. His eyes swept around the small camp, to the dozing horses, and further along the ground to leaves and grass that were limned in hard frost. Around Charles and several paces out, however, the ground didn't exhibit a hint of frost or dew.
Without a word, Erik emerged from his warm nest of bedding and crossed the leaves to the frozen earth and ran his hands across the frost. He gathered the cold and wet and rubbed his face vigorously; the sensation of cold water on his hot face was refreshing. He preferred to keep his face clean-shaven but with winter encroaching he considered letting his current scruff grow into a beard.
Again he heard footfalls behind him, but this time he smelled the burning leaves and grass before Charles drew close enough to warm his back.
Erik didn't wait for Charles to say anything more; he stood and turned around. His height over Charles gave him a sense of security that he knew was false. So it was with a guarded look and feet securely placed in a careful stance beneath him that Erik spoke.
"I accept your treasure, aarni."
Charles' eyelashes fluttered over his glowing eyes and he rocked back on his heels. A moment later his lips stretched wide, showing his teeth in a joyous grin. He covered his face with his hands and laughed in obvious relief, even moved one hand to wipe at his eyes in a strangely human gesture.
He made a grab for Erik's hands next, but Erik stilled him with a flat look. "I accept your treasure, but not you."
Charles' smile turned sad again, but didn't leave his eyes entirely. "Oh, Erik, once you accept my treasure, you can't reject it. In order to receive it you had to bind it to you with word, seed, and deed. All you lacked was the word."
For several moments Erik was confused, but then he remembered the barrow again and the forceful way he had spilled himself down Charles' throat. The treasure… it was Charles.
"And now that you have the treasure I can share what I hold with you." Charles was beaming again, though his eyes remained a bit tight at the corners. Charles slowly brought one hand to his temple and closed his eyes.
Suddenly, Erik felt a sensation like movement and then, in his mind's eye, he saw a baby girl. He felt her weight in the crook of his arm and he heard his own voice say her name.
These memories have kept me such good company for many months. It is the most beautiful and precious treasure I have ever guarded. Whenever you like, I can bring you into my mind and show them to you, Charles voice affirmed with quiet strength, but I cannot give them back.
"Anya," Erik said, voice beginning to tremble. Charles' words, even though they were clear to him, were less important than experiencing the memory. "My daughter's name is Anya."
That's good; you can remember her name after this by speaking it or telling yourself what you see here. However, you can't have these memories back: that's the trouble with losing the challenge. But I have them and I will keep them in perfect condition. This was the only way I could think of to overcome the rules that govern my nature. You can look at your memories whenever you like, but each time will be just like the first.
"You mean, I won't remember my daughter's name," Erik said. He felt his eyes burn as they filled at the behest of the turbulent emotions swelling through his heart. "I won't remember, except when you show me?"
You'll remember whatever you say, because that creates a new memory, but you will only remember what your words can inspire in you. Your words may never be enough, but it is better than what you had before now.
Moisture overflowed the border of Erik's eyes and forged twin trails down the harsh planes of his face. "I miss her."
Across from him, Charles' eyes were wet as well. Erik had no idea when Charles' took his hands in his and squeezed them. He found that he didn't mind as much as he had earlier.
"I'm so sorry, Erik. It isn't a perfect solution, but at least you have bound me." Charles gathered Erik's hands together within his warm palms. "I will keep and guard any treasure you wish. I hope only that you keep me at your side; I have been alone so long."
Erik nodded as tears gathered beneath his chin and fell. The drops fell on their joined hands. He was filled with conflicting feelings; relief and joy at recovering something he thought totally lost, but also a sense of mourning knowing he would experience the loss whenever he was not within Charles' mind. It was more than he had had for so long, though, that he finally succumbed to relief.
Charles guided Erik back to his bedding, this time burning nothing that he touched, and helped the relief-weak man to rest. Curling around Erik, enveloping him in gentle warmth, he murmured gently to him. "As long as you live, neither of us ever has to be alone again. I am your aarni, now."
With the horses nickering gently in the background, surrounded by warmth, and filled with conflicted relief, Erik fell into an exhausted asleep. In the last moments, before the slanting rays of the sun crept across the tops of the trees, Charles brushed his heated lips gently over Erik's brow. "And you are mine."