{-Alfonse-}

"You let them talk with each other?" Thrasir hissed. "What part of you thought that would be a good idea, you idiot?"

"It's not like they could've decided on a detailed plan," Líf defended. "I don't even know who they were talking about. If it's anything, it's a bird or something."

"And if it's not? You do realize they're just going to try to get him back, don't you?"

"They would have come no matter what I did."

"Well I know for a fact you could've killed them both and our job would have gone by much easier. Move over, I'll make sure they don't have a prince to rescue."

Líf gently put his hand on her shoulder. "If we kill him here Hel's not going to accept it as ours. You know she'll happily cheat us out of the deal, she made that obvious with Eir. She'd probably do the same thing if we just brought him to her. I… think we should bring him home. That way she'd have to acknowledge it was us."

"The more of your whims I allow, the less our chances of getting them back," Thrasir sighed. "Though I suppose you didn't screw up nearly as much as I thought you would this time. I'll restrain myself from killing him until we get to show him what his future looks like." She started walking and gestured for them to follow her. "Now let's get moving. Our goal is to put enough distance between us and his friends so then that thing can't track us."

Alfonse didn't need any nudge from Líf to walk in front of him. If there was one thing he couldn't risk, it was causing too much trouble. Even if it might slow them down a bit to argue with him, he was unarmed and outnumbered. They might not seem to want to kill him yet but that didn't mean they wouldn't simply stab him to shut up and move on.

He was willing to test his limits a bit, though. "How did you know Sharena's name?"

"The dead talk," Líf responded simply. "Whether you realize it or not, countless people have died that know her name. I made a guess about who she was and turned out to be right."

"That's not what it sounded like. When you first saw her, it almost sounded like you were concerned for her."

Líf's level front was cracking already. "I don't like hurting women. You're the only person I need to kill, so yours is going to be the only blood on my hands."

"Don't think that applies for both of us," Thrasir remarked. "I will happily murder all of your friends if I so please."

"So might I ask why you want to kill me..?" It had to be worth a shot, at least. Now might be the only time he could actually ask.

Líf briefly hesitated but didn't say anything. Thrasir just gave the simple answer, "Hel wants you and she made us a deal."

"But why does she want me?"

"How the hell should we know?" Líf muttered. "She's the god of death. She probably just wants to kill as many people as possible before she's back to waiting for them to come to her."

"You don't think anything is odd about the fact her goal has been the same person both times?" Alfonse felt like they must've known something that they weren't sharing. Everyone couldn't have just been following orders, right? "Technically just the prince isn't even an efficient way to send the kingdom into chaos, if that's what she wanted to do."

"Even the immortal eventually lose their value to Death, when at first they seemed to possess so much potential," Thrasir said after a moment of silence. "It's hard to make a deal with her. She won't trade any of her subjects unless we have something triple their value. Someone wants you and was able to offer something in return that satisfied her. This something, in turn, was so significant that she listened to our plea despite the person she wanted wasn't even born yet. Ours was the only deal I have ever seen her agree to without any real confirmation that she will gain anything in the immediate future…"

"What was your deal with her..?"

"We would kill the prince of peace. In return, she would return our subjects to us. But now she has others out for you, as well, meaning there's a chance that she might not even accept your death by our hands anymore. I suppose it is odd that she accepted something that clearly put her on the losing side…"

Alfonse almost felt bad for them… if it wasn't for the fact he had to die to help them. "What deals does she usually make?"

"A child died a while ago; something about a well that she either fell in or was pushed into. Not long after she came, Hel received a visitor. Her name… I believe she called herself 'Freyja.' Freyja wanted this girl. She offered the lives of as many adults as Hel wanted, all for one child. Hel accepted. In a single night, Freyja left this realm with the girl." Thrasir shrugged. "It's the only one, aside from our own, that I've heard her make. Eir mentioned there only being three deals Hel has ever agreed to, and until you're dead, it's the only one that has been fulfilled."

"Obviously you aren't now, but were you ever close to Eir?"

Líf shook his head. "Our similarities ended at the fact we're all just Hel's puppets."

"Why risk working with someone who it seems you don't even trust to uphold her side of the deal..?"

He quickly realized that was where he crossed the line. "Shut up," Thrasir barked. "We let you get comfortable but now it's time to remember whose hostage you are. You don't need to start worrying about dying unless you talk… we need to pay tribute to the lost before setting you up for the slaughter."

((A/N: So many things got hinted at in this chapter. And then you have Thrasir's story… it was subtle for about two seconds before she mentioned Freyja. After that you knew the kid-in-a-well thing wasn't just a coincidence and maybe remembered a certain Book IV character…))