Part Two

Time had no place in the realm of mists and fires, nor did sounds and touches and pain.

The air shifted like a creature alive, draping its dense mass thick with smoke and ash above the outcrop of rocks, smooth and jagged alike, burrowing inside shallow nooks, hanging by the edges in shivering tatters and slithering down polished slopes. It pooled around the man sitting on his throne of stone, caressing his skin and blinding his sight and shivering in the currents of his breath.

The man kept still bar the slow rise and fall of his chest. Fires burned dimly on the horizon where the land was cruelly torn and flowed with shimmering lava but the man watched unperturbed the play of light and shadow barely revealed through the ashen veil floating between him and the world. Thick threads of stone were seamlessly entwined with the flesh of his arms and shoulders, holding him in place with shackles pierced by the lifeblood of his veins, but no suffering lay in the unearthly fusion.

He did not question. He did not feel. He simply was.

When the debris cracked under footsteps, banishing silence like an evil spell, the man lifted his head to contemplate the silhouette approaching through mists, setting them aglow with the flame of the torch it held high. And, as the shadows yielded the slender body of a youth somehow so familiar to his eyes, the man frowned and his gaze wandered over the pale strands of his hair, his proud shoulders and the disdainful shape of his lips. His thoughts sprang alive, chasing after strands of forgotten, precious memories and his lips shaped the sounds of a familiar word.

"Norge?.."

The youth stepped closer with the same dispassionate ease and knelt at his feet, thrusting the torch into the ground.

"Close, but no," he said, gazing up to reveal eyes that shone purple in the halo of quivering light. "Well met, Danmörk."

"Island?" The man blinked, trying to lift his hand to touch the youth's face, but his arm was fused in stone and he sighed. "This must be a dream then, for the Iceland I know is but a child."

The youth shook his head, his hair shifting along with the movement then settling back in unruly locks.

"This is no dream, Denmark. Our kind never dreams. Our souls are not cut from the same fabric as a mortal's, and as payment for our eternal lives we were not granted the solace of dreams."

"This cannot be true," Denmark whispered. "Every night I dream, without respite. I dream of battles and ages long gone and of the times when we were careless and free."

Iceland raked his hand through the rubble, picking up a thin, black stone and twirled it in his fingers, watching the torchlight play on its polished surface.

"It may be so," he spoke thoughtfully, "but have you ever dreamt of something other than the things that have already come to pass?" He paused, waiting for an answer, but the other man just stared in silence, and he went on. "This is the place where our souls sojourn whilst our earthly shell rests, a place of remembrance, our heaven and hell. Each stone, each speck of dirt holds our future and our past. We come here to live within our memories, again and again, but only few among us, like my brother, can catch those elusive glimpses of things to come which we call premonitions. And yet even he, just like everyone else, forgoes all memory of this place once he returns to flesh and bones to pretend to live a mortal life among mortals."

"Then how do you know of all this?" Denmark asked, staring at the younger man in awe and Iceland laughed drily.

"I am different, for part of my soul is banished here until such times as you and my brother see fit to allow my body to grow strong enough to contain my essence whole. And so I linger here, and see you come and go and watch your so-called dreams, while my other half lives in that blissful haze you call childhood. Do not worry for me though," he added, catching the other man's saddened gaze, "my time will come and I am never lonely, for those of us who are bound in land share here the same confines, and your memories are mine just as mine are yours. Sweden and Finland used to be one with us, and my brother would have stood at our side now, had his soul not been shattered into a million pieces spread far and wide which must flow back together before he can hope to live again.

"For, you see, this is what is left of your Union. It's the spiritual representation of the land of Denmark-Norway, and you are its king. A cruel king, I might add," he smirked, brushing away the thin layer of ash that had settled on his arms. "Apologies, I'm afraid this is the doing of my volcanoes. My other self is not very happy with you right now."

Denmark closed his eyes and leant his head against stone, tears trickling down his cheeks.

"I killed him, didn't I," he murmured. "Norway. I remember now. I had my fingers around his neck and I pressed down and his skin was so soft and his breath so intoxicating that I could not stop until… until he was gone."

Iceland's gaze grew hard, and he got up and came to stand behind the other man and bent to whisper in his ear.

"Yes you did," he spoke, his voice a merciless hiss. "I've seen the future, Denmark. My brother will rise again, and one day he will kill you in retaliation. Then you will kill him once more, then again and again, and with every death and resurrection he will lose a piece of himself in this place. And if this comes to pass, I will end you, have no doubt about that."

"How can I prevent all of this from happening," Denmark asked, his breath coming out in ragged gasps, "if you have already seen it?"

Iceland stood back and leant against a rock, crossing his arms on his chest.

"The future is not set in stone, idiot," he spoke with less cruelty in his voice. "You can alter it once you find the will to escape the madness that has you trapped."

Denmark turned his head to face him and for the first time he smiled.

"Then there is hope," he said, "and I will find a way. And," he added, his grin growing wider, "if this is the man you become, it means Norge and I will raise you well."

Iceland snorted, but then his eyes widened as the other man tried to rise. Tendrils of stone were holding him back but he did not relent and pulled harder, until flesh and stone tore asunder and his teeth grit with pain. Blood was flowing rich and warm from flesh and stone alike and Denmark staggered under his newly found freedom, falling to his knees, and then tasting the jagged ground with the ashen skin of his face. And, as his blood stained the ground crimson, he drifted to merciful senselessness soothed by the faint whispers of the voice he longed most to hear.