A Little Vision
Rowan collapsed in his arms, physically exhausted from Crowley blowing her mind and rocking her body. Quite literally. She was in a daze as he laid her on the table, on the blueprints of Hell and Helheim. He hovered over her, looking down at her with a satisfied grin, stroking her cheek as his other hand stroked her leg lightly, sending a blissful tingle throughout her body.
"You ravenous Devil." She said with a dazed smile, too weak to move.
"Does that answer your question?" he asked her and she let out a weak giggle, as if she was high on drugs.
"What question was that again?" she asked and his grin widened as he stared down at her.
"Take a moment, Darling, before you begin constructing Helheim." Crowley said, about to turn away from her, fixing his clothing.
"Hey." She snapped, narrowing her eyes on him. He glanced over his shoulder at her and she raised her hand, curling her finger, telling him to come back. Crowley grinned and towered over her again, a dark glimmer in his eyes. Rowan grabbed his tie and pulled him down in a kiss, keeping him there as she tenderly moved her lips against him. She could still feel that heat.
When she released her grip on his tie, she sucked his bottom lip before he stood back enough to look into her dark eyes.
"You tore my dress." She said and his lips twitched into a grin.
"Too much dress, not enough skin." He replied and she let out a little dark laugh.
"And you? Next time, no clothes at all, skin to skin. Understood?" She replied and his lips spread into a devious smile as his hand grazed her collar bone, doing down to trace the outline of her sweetheart neckline.
"You can bet on it, Chickadee." he replied and helped her as she tried sitting up, still feeling slightly dazed. She couldn't quite sit up well, so he brought her to rest against him, her head nestled in his neck, as he wrapped his arms around her.
"Good." She whispered, taking a moment to gather what remained of her dignity. Rowan pulled away from him and fixed her hair, the fabric of her dress repairing itself as her eyes glowed. Crowley watched her fix herself up and moved aside so she could swing her legs off the table. She slid off, not as graceful as she had intended and grabbed the blueprints of Helheim, about to leave his throne room.
Crowley gently gripped his hand onto her forearm, making her stop beside him, meeting his dark eyes. His free hand tucked a stray strand of hair that she missed, and gave her a seductive smile.
"Beautiful, as always." He said and released his grip on her. Rowan remained, her soft lips tenderly broadening into a smile.
"Until next time, Stud Muffin." She replied and walked away before he could protest against her pet name for him. She wasn't sure it fit him, but it sounded good at the moment.
Rowan opened the doors and closed them behind her as she glanced at her Draugar who waited in the corridor at a respectable distance from the throne doors. They kept their eyes low, but she could detect little smirks they were trying to hide.
"Would any of you like to comment?" she asked and they looked up at her, expressions blank. "We have work to do." Rowan added and turned towards Bjarni who gestured to follow her. Agmundr and Raganhar followed, occasionally having Rowan glance over her shoulder at them. "Have you updated these two on Helheim?" she asked Bjarni, who nodded in response, giving a slight smile.
Rowan knew they were way too silent for a reason and it was beginning to annoy her.
"Spit it out." she said and the air around them felt heavy. She was intentionally thickening the air, making them squirm under the tension.
"We're happy for you, Milady." Bjarni said, walking next to Rowan, giving a little smile. "You and Crowley go well together." She added, her smile broadening.
"Even if we didn't like him." Raganhar said and Rowan had a little smile on her lips.
"We thought it highly disrespectful to interrupt, even if an hour has passed." Agmundr said and Rowan stopped, looking back at him with a dark smile on her lips.
"You kept track of the time?" she asked, her eyes dark as if daring him to answer.
"It was roughly an hour." Raganhar specified, ignoring the warning Bjarni was trying to tell him with her widened eyes. "An hour and a few minutes." He concluded and Bjarni looked away, shaking her head. Rowan narrowed her eyes in a playful glare and continued walking down the corridor, trying to leave Hell, but it was seriously like a labyrinth.
The Draugar remained silent as they followed Rowan to the entrance to Hell, which just seemed like a dead-end.
"Oh, we didn't talk about this part." Rowan said, realizing that she really did hit a dead-end. How was she going to make the so-called entrance of the Underworld when she couldn't even make the channel between the entrance and Hell? She stared at the wall, knowing that her Draugar were silent because they couldn't help her and figured she didn't need their help; she was Hel, this was her thing.
Only she was pretty sure she never built the first Helheim.
Rowan placed her hand on the wall, thinking back to when Crowley said Heaven, Purgatory and Hell are limitless. But that still didn't help.
"How did you change your nails?" Bjarni asked and Rowan glanced at her, a little confused by the question. What the Hell did her nails have to do with this? As her Draugar blinked her eyes black, Rowan understood and looked back at the wall, thinking of how she had turned her nails black simply by thinking about it, wanting it.
She gave Bjarni the blueprints to Helheim and placed her hands on the wall, focusing on how she wanted the channel between the entrance and Hell to resemble. Rowan thought of what she wanted. No slides, no trains and no buses; something modern and quick, with a one-way ticket kind of feel.
And an idea hit her. An elevator.
However, she wanted to keep it more or less on equal ground, perhaps an incline would be better. Instead of an elevator, the channels could be escalators going down. If someone was to try to go back to the entrance, it would be kind of fun watching them running up a belt that goes down.
Rowan started envisioning Hell's channel going up. The walls would be dark with sculptured designs of tormented souls and demons on both sides of the escalator as the souls reached the bottom. As she thought of it, she pressed her hands so hard against the stones, that a small jagged piece pierced through her palm. She gasped and pulled her hand away, leaving a spot of blood on the stone, but noticed how the wall seemed to tremble.
That was it; envision the construction while marking the walls with her blood.
"Does someone have a knife?" Rowan asked her Draugar and Raganhar stepped up, holding a long silver blade.
"Will an Angel blade do the trick?" he asked and she replied by using it to slice her hand open, her blood spilling out along with a ghostly glow, like she was peering at her own Godly soul. "Careful, Milady. You're part Angel." he added and she heard, but didn't pay much attention. It wasn't like she was going to stab herself.
Rowan placed her bloody palm on the wall, pushing and it suddenly got sucked into her channel, metal churning up, as if there was hidden metal in those stones. It began forming the foundation of an escalator, going up, reaching that dead-end wall with her blood on it, she was certain. The belt was then created and the steps, going up.
From the bottom of the escalator, it looked complete. Rowan turned to her Draugar with a smile.
"Follow me." she said and began walking up the escalator, touching the walls with her bloody hand. Sculptures of torment soul and demons began protruding from the stones, as if invisible artists were carving the very images she pictured in her mind. She had envisioned the souls destined for Hell to start descending, seeing just stoned walls, then they would notice artistic depictions on the walls of the Seven Deadly Sins; things those souls might have really enjoyed in life but must now pay the price. Then, as they go passed, the depictions would turn violent and deadly, eventually leading to demons dragging wicked souls down to Hell, showing them how they would suffer.
And those souls will know they are in Hell and there's no going back.
As Rowan walked up the escalator, her thoughts were realized and when she reached the top of the rather long escalator, the dead-end wall was waiting for her next idea: the entrance of the Underworld.
Rowan placed her hands on the wall, giving it some thought before she willed it.
What did she want; a waiting room with plenty of seating, like an airport? She wouldn't want it to look too comfortable, not that anyone likes to wait for their flight with nothing to occupy them.
Then, she decided she liked the idea. A waiting room it was.
Rowan envisioned gray tiled floors, gray cement walls and about one hundred seats all in neat rows, because it was better to have too many than too little. That would be the first step to the entrance.
She willed it and watched as the dead-end wall got sucked in, as it seemed dark cavern walls began disintegrating, creating a large room about the size of a high school gymnasium, slowly being recovered with gray cement and chairs being fabricated out of metal and dirt, taking on the form of not-so comfortable cushions. Once that was complete, the cavern floor turned to gray tiled floors.
There was the entrance to the Underworld.
Rowan walked in, her pumps clacking against the floor, echoing. Her Draugar followed her and looked in amazement. She snapped her fingers and large ceiling lights illuminated, making it look sort of dreadful.
"We could always decorate a little later. I'd like to create that portal for Death and his reapers, although I'm a little uncertain how I'm going to accomplish that." She said, turning to them, seeing that they didn't have the slightest clue. She turned towards the back of all those chairs, in the center of the wall where she'd like the portal to be. Rowan placed her hands on the cool cement, thinking of Death.
At that moment, the wall shook and she stepped back, unsure of what was going on, although she had an idea. There was a circular glow and then a shape emerged, a shape she recognized as the frame of an ancient being; Death himself.
He looked at her blankly and then glanced at the entrance of the Underworld, pursing his lips as if making an opinion on her work.
"Good." He finally said after a few silent seconds that seemed more like minutes. "It's neutral." He added and Rowan nodded. That was pretty much what she was going for. Wouldn't want to give the souls an idea where they were going until it was too late. "Took you long enough." He added and there was that little hook that made him an asshole.
"Yeah, I was thinking of designing this later. You know, some nice little motivational posters like What doesn't kill you, makes you stronger and humorous things like Why did the ghost cross the road? To get to the other side." Rowan said with a slight smirk on her face. Although her Draugar smiled, Death didn't. "I think I really nailed it with that one. I'm nearly laughing so hard that I started coffin." She said, grinning at the old bugger whose face would probably crack if he smiled. "Gotta have a bit of humor in death." she added and he continued to stare blankly at her. "I mean death, not you Death." she concluded with a little grin. "'Cause I'm sure that doesn't happen, like ever." She added just to piss him off. Although her Draugar seemed a little nervous but how much she was pushing his buttons, he seemed to expect it from her.
"Perhaps you were right." He finally said, which made her smile innocently. "We won't work well together." He added and her smile turned dark.
"Oh, lighten up a little. You look so grim. Oh, I think that pun was dead on arrival." Rowan said with a little wink which only seemed to annoy him. Maybe she should just get on with business before he has a senior's version of a temper tantrum. "I was going to make the channel to Helheim in that corner. As you can see, I've gone with escalators." She said and Death simply looked in the corners, as if he wasn't really that interested.
"Have you planned the construction?" Death asked and she arched an eyebrow at him. Bjarni stepped up with the blueprints, handing them to the old guy.
"Thank you." He replied, glancing at Rowan as if to say her servants were more intelligent.
"You know, I have a few more death puns up my sleeve." Rowan said, narrowing her eyes slightly at him, warning that maybe they really won't be working well together if he had an attitude like that.
"Well, perhaps you should impress me to urn a bit of gratitude." Death replied and Rowan arched an eyebrow at him with a slight grin.
"So Death's not so stiff after all." She said, crossing her arms over her chest, her grin broadening as he gave her a slight warning glare.
"I've come to realize that a lack of humor around you might be a grave mistake." He replied, glancing at the blueprints of Helheim, according to Rowan, ignoring her grins as he joined her juvenile joking. After all, He just needed to help her for a few more minutes and then he could leave Gadreel in his place to suffer horrible puns.