Author's note: thanks so much for the reviews, the favs and the follows. :D And I'm sorry about the late... ;-;

No Grave Deep Enough (Primordial)

All of the God's children they all have to die
Pauper to King sworn enemies to kin
From men without sin to those with the beast within
The grave is absolute, the grave is all

O, Death where are your teeth
That gnaw on the bones of fabled men
O, Death where are your claws
That haul me from the grave

Do you have justice to trump the divine
To steal the sanctity from their sermon
Reduce to ash, writing of piety
And conquer the lord's word
I think you do

Do you bring fear to the hearts of heathens
When your breath is upon their necks
And the Gods will not answer
And the sun is not in the sky

O, Death I am not ready for the grave
So turn your steeds around and loosen your reins
I am not one for the tomb

So rise my brothers, rise from your graves
Throw your shackles off and stand by my side
So rise my brothers, rise from your graves
No grave is deep enough to keep us in chains

It was late in the night when Ilsa came in the kitchen and found Kroenen looking at the cupboard, full of canned food. The blonde-haired woman frowned:

"What happened here?" she asked, raising an eyebrow. The masked man turned around to face her and he tilted his head:

"That dress is almost as old as me," he commented. "You should ask Alma some for some fashion tips," Ilsa grimaced and curled her hands into fists:

"You do are the nicest man alive... I have no idea of what you told Alma to make her think you're something good, but I'll find out, and when I do Master won't be pleased with you!"

"I wouldn't be so sure about the «alive» part, even though I do have a functional heart," Kroenen chuckled and looked again to the cupboard. "Alma had an intense summoning training this evening. I want her to be able to take things off her pockets silently. And because I'm a very cautious man, I told her to practice with food."

"We won't need that food, we will never come back to this place! We will triumph!" Ilsa widened her blue eyes so much they seemed about to jump out. "How dare you to doubt?"

"I don't doubt, Ilsa; I just don't know what will happen, how our new world will look like. Remember, novelty requires destruction of what is old," The masked man shrugged. "And since I have no idea of what will happen, and since Alma needs food... caution never killed anybody. Besides, she's getting better with controlling her powers," The dark lenses of Kroenen's mask looked at Ilsa again, and she couldn't help but feel an unpleasant shiver. "Had a good time with Master?"

"None of your business," Ilsa blushed and looked at the cupboard. "I presume there isn't a single bottle of wine...?"

"Why would I tell Alma to waste energy with useless things?"

"Master likes wine!" Ilsa let out a helpless hiss. "You're impossible!"

She turned around and left.

The next person to get in the kitchen, a few hours later, was Alma, and Kroenen stood up from the chair and left the book aside to meet her halfway from the fireplace and the other chair. The young girl was wearing socks and a t-shirt that fitted like a dress, and it wasn't black, so the masked man presumed she had just woken up and hadn't realised she was wearing such ridiculous outfit:

"You should be sleeping," Kroenen said when he stopped in front of her. She didn't have makeup, and she did look sleepy:

"I can't sleep... I feel tired, but I can't sleep. And I can't get myself a glass of milk, all I can find is the bloody glass!" Alma explained annoyedly. "Can you make that trick to make me sleep?"

"No, that's not how things work..." Kroenen chuckled, placed both hands on her shoulders and made her spin around. "But I can borrow you a boring book, they make wonders!"

"There's no such thing as a boring book..." Alma complained, but allowed Kroenen to push her gently and they both left the kitchen and climbed the dark staircase to the second floor. The masked man looked at her, and this time he was sure she actually had a weak pale glow. They crossed the long corridor and stopped in front of Alma's bedroom:

"There is," Kroenen assured and made his way to his own room. "Get yourself comfortable."

Little later Alma was lying on the bed and Kroenen was sitting next to her, reading Dostoievski's «Crime and Punishment»; it was in German, so he had to translate it. The process itself was slow, since he wanted to pick the most boring English correspondents to the German words. And when chapter one was over, Alma was fast asleep. Kroenen sighed, relieved, because he was starting to feel sleepy too. He tugged her blanket a little and left, silently.

Kroenen went back to the kitchen, but the Russian author had left him with little apetite for reading more that night. So he just stood there, sitting on the chair, lost in thoughts. Happy thoughts. Kroenen didn't really know how to behave with all that happiness in him.

As usual, Alma joined him early in the morning, and as usual she had her meticulous black makeup and was wearing black skinny jeans, a black hoodie and black jackboots. She had a radiant smile and sat on the empty chair in front of Kroenen, then slipped a hand into one of her pockets. Kroenen just watched, with his arms and a leg crossed, and she removed a bowl of cereals from her pocket:

"Success!" the Irish girl squealed happily. "Now I just need a spoon... hold this for me, Specky Four-Eyes."

"You are making progress," Kroenen complimented as she handed him the bowl and stood up to get a plastic spoon. "And seems you had a good night, thanks to the boring book."

"The book wasn't boring, I want to know what happens next. It's very interesting, I never tried Russian literature," Alma replied, retrieved her breakfast and sat on the chair. "Now you either keep reading it to me, or you'll have to teach me German."

"I've read that book once and it was enough. I will teach you German so well, Pooka, you will forget you are English-speaker," the masked man assured with a chuckle. "But you fell asleep, nonetheless."

"Your tick-tack heart is class, lad. It's so relaxing it put me to sleep," the girl informed. Kroenen tilted his head. "«Class» describes something good..."

"Indeed, it will be much more practical to communicate in German..." Kroenen concluded with a sigh. "Is your backpack ready, Pooka?"

"No..."

"Don't forget the water, and the food, and you should dress snow clothes."

"Will there be snow? I've never seen snow! Deadly!" Alma's eyes shone happily and she took a mouthful of cereals.

Present day, Russia, cemetery not far from Moscow

A purple flame rose between two tombstones. Ilsa stepped out of it, followed by Alma, then by Rasputin, and finally by Kroenen, who closed the book and gave it to Rasputin. The purple flame vanished. Alma was the only one who didn't have snow clothes; according to her, they were everything but elegant, and she would rather be cold for a while than commit such a fashion crime. Kroenen by no means was able to change her mind...

Before them, all they could see was the city of the dead, with its greyish and dark buildings covered in snow and wrapped in dead vines, with its paved streets frozen, with little bits of broken tombstones or statues here and there. The cemetery was delimited by a rusty, darkened fence, broken and twisted in some places, also covered in snow. It was a cloudy day and the wind was just a soft breeze, too weak to make the snow swirl around the visitors.

Rasputin smiled and leaded them to the mausoleum section. Ilsa hurried to follow him, doing her best not to look at the statues of angels and hooded figures. Alma covered her head with the hood and slipped her hands into the pockets of the leather flight jacket she had found in one of her pockets. Kroenen followed Alma, utterly annoyed with the fur trim of his snow coat, that was constantly getting stuck on the metal respirator of his mask.

Following Alma, the German man took a moment to study her and concluded she was uncomfortable, maybe cold...? Ilsa was uncomfortable too, walking with short and quick strides, but Alma's were larger and slower. She was reluctant, even though she didn't want to show it.

They left the tombstones behind and the paved streets of the cemetery widened as they reached the mausoleums. Kroenen took the chance to move beside Alma:

"Is there anything wrong?" he asked quietly, looking at her and feeling his mask pull the fur trim. "I thought you would like the snow." Alma looked at him, her big green eyes very shiny in the shadow the hood cast on her face:

"I just... I don't like graveyards..." she mumbled and looked down, to the snow:

"This is a cemetery."

"Whatever, it has fucking dead people underground!" Alma muttered grimly. Kroenen frowned under his mask:

"Show some respect for the dead and their resting place, Alma."

"Their resting place took my grandma..."

Kroenen nodded slowly, understanding immediately, and decided not to ask for details. Instead he moved a little closer to her and placed a gloved hand on her shoulder, hoping it would reassure her.

The group snaked in the mausoleum area for a little while, until finally Rasputin stopped before what looked like a miniature of a Scottish castle, made of black marble. The top of the Yefimovich mausoleum was covered with frozen undergrowth and the arch door was made of steel. It appeared to be a completely normal mausoleum; in fact, there were bigger ones in that cemetery. Rasputin grinned. Alma frowned and unconsciously moved a little closer to Kroenen. Both Alma and Ilsa startled when Rasputin opened his arms and the steel doors cracked open with a screech. The Russian man then turned around, still grinning:

"Our new headquarters!" he explained and got in. Ilsa sighed sadly and hurried to follow him, because unlike Rasputin, Kroenen and Alma she couldn't see in complete darkness and move without stumbling on something. Alma froze and her pale face grew paler, and she gave a little step back when the masked man squeezed her shoulder:

"I don't want to go in there!" the Irish girl muttered. Kroenen moved behind her and stood there, stopping her from moving away. He then placed his other hand on her other shoulder and pushed her gently:

"I assure you that as long as you stay with me, nothing bad will happen," he promised. But Alma just shook her head, even though she allowed the masked man to push her:

"They keep dead people in there!"

"No Alma, you are not going to see dead people. We are not staying with the dead people," He sighed patiently. "I go first, ja?"

The Irish girl mumbled something imperceptible as Kroenen held one of her hands and walked ahead of her. Reluctantly, Alma followed him, keeping a certain distance and looking everywhere. But as soon as they were both in the mausoleum the steel doors closed with a loud BUM!, and the girl shifted into a raven and landed on Kroenen's shoulders, digging its claws into his shoulder and puffing up its feathers. With a low chuckle, Kroenen held the bird like it was a cat and hurried to follow Rasputin and Ilsa, who stopped when they heard the door closing:

"We have to stay together, only with me you are safe from the traps," the Russian man explained and proceeded his way, down the stone staircase. Ilsa, holding the back of Rasputin's coat, frowned:

"I can't hear Alma," she said. A raven cawed:

"That's her!" Kroenen exclaimed and smiled under his mask, looking at the raven on his arms. The girl, now bird, looked like an oversized ponpon, and hid its head under one of its wings. Kroenen sighed but decided not to bother her; if she had to wander alone in those tunnels, he was sure Alma would be able to make it as raven, just like she had done in New York.

The staircase ended in a small hall with corridors branching in three different directions. Disposed in circle, into small niches in the wall, were coffins. The masked man ran a finger along the raven's back, reassuringly, but Alma just curled into a smaller ball of feathers. Rasputin stopped and turned around to face his followers, like he was a touristic guide. He raise an eyebrow when he noticed Alma, but decided not to comment:

"The danger lies behind these corridors," Rasputin began to explain. "Each trap... is better than the other," He took a moment to laugh and Ilsa laughed too. "I'm sure the Anung un Rama will bring his comrades, and once the enemy is here they will be forced to follow separate paths; Karl, you are standing on spiked metal plates that will shoot up and divide the enemy in two groups," Kroenen looked down and graciously moved aside.

Rasputin made his way to the left tunnel, and Ilsa and Kroenen followed him. The tunnel ended on a chamber with stone walls, and water ran down on the walls:

"This is the perfect environment for the Sammaels, who will be here anytime soon," the Russian man said casually while crossing a small stone bridge towards an hexagonal structure on the other side. Kroenen felt the raven on his arms shiver a little. The German man looked around, to the huge gears on the walls and below them, and felt a sudden fascination for that place; it was like being inside a gigantic clockwork mechanism. "Every step the enemy takes forwards, is a step they won't be able to take back."

They crossed the bridge and found themselves in a narrow, arched stone corridor, covered in rows of rusty, yet sharp steel blades, that ended with a small stair to a stone chamber; one of the walls was missing and there were only the metal rods, and behind them huge gears. There also gears scattered along the walls, and from the ceiling came ropes, hooks and pulleys. The floor was made of wood and there was a small, dusty table with an equally dusty chair. A few grandfather clocks were lined along one of the walls. Kroenen had to admit he did want to see those mechanisms work:

"Here is our first defense. Karl, I rely on you to finish the enemies who come through that corridor," And Rasputin suggestively tilted his head towards part of the wooden floor, and even though it was completely dark the masked man noticed there was a trapdoor.

They crossed the chamber and got in another corridor, longer and larger:

"The Sammaels are currently bellow us, I think they like their new home," Rasputin said, hearing faint growls echoing through the stone walls. Kroenen felt Alma shiver harder.

After a while walking on that corridor, they finally reached the catacombs; it looked like an amphitheater flanked by large columns, the ceiling was a glass dome, up high, and in the wall in front of them there was a model of the solar system. In front of the model was the statue of an angel, holding a key. All around there were statues of bowed men holding swords, tombs and funerary niches, and huge mechanical gears. In front of the angel there was an altar, and not far from it there was some kind of big rabbet in the stone floor.

The light coming from the glass dome was weak, but Ilsa was visibly pleased with it. They stopped exactly in the middle of the catacomb and Rasputin opened his arms:

"And here is where we will triumph! Now..." He smiled, looking at his followers and still not commenting the fact that there was a raven curled in a ball, on the crook of Kroenen's elbow, and that the masked man seemed more interested in it than in the stage for their last act. "Ilsa and I are going to retrieve what is rightfully mine... and most needed for our success. In the meantime, the two of you..." Rasputin signaled Kroenen and Alma with his head. "...stay here. Go to your post and don't leave it until I come back. And don't let Alma leave your side, Karl."

Ilsa grimaced when Kroenen bowed his head, turned around and left. She moved closer to Rasputin and placed a hand over his shoulder:

"Grishka... I think this was a bad idea! Look at Alma, she isn't ready for this!" the blonde-haired woman hissed. The Russiam man chuckled and looked at Ilsa, whose frown grew bigger. "And Kroenen is up to something, just look at them! Yesterday I found that silly girl washing-"

"Ilsa, you've had her age too, and it wasn't that long ago!" Rasputin winked and Ilsa blushed a little. "Don't you remember the first time you saw the spirits I talk to?" Ilsa's blush darkened. "About Kroenen... he's just following my orders, I told him to make something useful out of Alma."

"You know there's something going on, tell me!"

But Rasputin just laughed.

When Kroenen stepped into «his» chamber, the wall with the giant mechanisms lit up bellow the floor level and an orange light filled the room with a comfortable weak light. Kroenen knelt on the floor and managed to release the raven's claws from his arm and put it carefully on the floor. The raven tilted its head several times, looking at him with its little curious eyes and still looking like a ponpon. Kroenen chuckled and poked the top of the raven's head with a finger:

"I always thought ravens were not supposed to look fluffy," he said, amused, and laughed when the raven pecked his finger and became bigger, until the raven was replaced by a young girl. A very pale and definitely not happy young girl. Kroenen stood up, left his backpack near the table and undressed the snow jacket and pants that he was wearing over his suit. Alma didn't move, looking around suspiciously. With a sigh, Kroenen walked to her and pulled her hood down, and managed to take the backpack and her jacket away from her. "There are no dead people here, Alma..."

"They are, in the tombs," the girl muttered sadly and hurried to trot after the German man when he decided to explore a little «his» chamber. When he was done exploring, he gently guided Alma to the chair and made her sit, then crouched in front of her:

"Death is just another step, Alma. You don't have to fear it, or fear the dead. You just have to respect them. The dead are just empty shells; their soul is somewhere else," he explained, holding her hands. "Your grandmother is surely in a better place, where she can see you, and I'm sure she's happy with what she sees."

"You little flute will make me cry," Alma mumbled and smiled sadly. Kroenen put on and indignant expression, completely forgotten Alma couldn't see his face:

"A flute, me? What are you, a bagpipe?"

The Irish girl laughed, briefly, but that was enough to make Kroenen smile under his mask; he didn't like to see Alma sad, that was wrong, so if he had to use a sense of humor he wasn't really sure he had, he would. And he would see what had happened to her, to understand better the situation and know what to do. The masked man raised a hand and placed in over her head. Alma hesitated a little, but nodded.

Kroenen got in her mind.

Seeing through Alma's eyes, he noticed he was in the same dark room, only lit by the fireplace, where her grandmother used to be sewing. Right now Alma was lying on the floor, over her stomach, drawing clothes. The drawings weren't bad at all for a ten years-old. Kroenen could only see the paper before him, but he heard someone sing, and by the voice it was an old woman. Alma's grandmother, and she was singing in the language the German man didn't know.

Suddenly, the woman stopped singing and there was a «thud!» of something falling to the floor. Alma lifted her eyes from her drawing and saw the old woman lying on the floor, in front of the fireplace, still holding the skirt she was sewing and the needle with thread. The little girl screamed and hurried to crawl to her grandmother, calling her in the strange language. When she leaned over the body, she was met by a pair of lifeless green eyes.

Alma screamed again and everything became too confuse for Kroenen understand; there was an uncontrollable shift between arms and wings and horse legs while the girl tried to use the phone, there were black feathers floating all around, then everything became black and there were only voices, fragments of conversations:

"Help!"

"-dead-"

"It's your fault!"

"-just a child-"

"-strange child-"

"-dead-"

"It wasn't me!"

"-menace-"

"-old woman was a bad influence on her, I'm glad she's dead!"

"-natural death-too old-heart-"

"-funeral-graveyard-Alma has to go, or people will wonder."

Slowly, the blackness gave place to a small graveyard. There were still voices hissing and Kroenen couldn't hear what was being said at the funeral; there were at least 50 people gathered around a freshly open grave, and next to it was a dark coffin. Alma was in the front row, her mother and father holding on her hands with maybe a little too much strength, maybe hoping that would prevent Alma from growing wings or horse legs or anything like that. Kroenen began to see everything foggy; Alma was crying, but the graveyard itself was almost completely hidden in fog.

The coffin was put in the grave and buried.

Everything went black:

"-gone-"

Kroenen found himself in Alma's room, looking at the closing door. He heard her parents lock the door and her vision blurred again because of the tears.

And he decided he didn't want to see more and pulled her to a strong and comforting embrace. She was sobbing and clung to him like her life depended on that. Kroenen stood up and she followed his movement, and for a long while they stood like that, with Alma sobbing lowly against his cold metal breastplate. Kroenen sighed; even though he had never been affected by someone's death, he knew what it was like to suddenly find himself alone, with no one to talk to, in a hostile world. And seemed Alma's grandmother had been the only one who had treated the girl like a proper human being.

The Irish girl sighed and looked up at Kroenen's dark mask:

"This place... it reminds me of her..." she mumbled sadly. "And even though I don't want to forget her, I don't like to remember through certain things."

"But you have to be strong, the eclipse is in five days... and we are staying here," Kroenen replied gently. "There are no tombs here, and Master said you are not supposed to leave my side."

"Fine... I'll get used... eventually... hopefully..." Alma sighed again. "My makeup is horrible, isn't it?"

"Nothing you can't fix," And Kroenen patted her back amiably. She offered him a smile. "That language... Irish?"

"Irish Gaelic, yes," she confirmed, not very sure about letting him go right then. Alma had vague memories of being hugged, by her parents before the transformations begun, and by her grandmother until the day she died. From that day on no one else had been this close, only Kroenen, and even though his breastplate was uncomfortable his arms around her felt good.

So she decided to shift into raven and stay on his shoulder until she couldn't stand as a raven anymore.

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