Disclaimer: I do not own Hetalia, only the story idea.
Chapter 3
The veil of silence fell again, suffocating the fireplace's warmth and the homey feel. Matthias looked back at the door. Suddenly it seemed impossible to leave. Impossible to leave Lukas sitting on the couch with his head hung. Impossible to leave his savior exposed and vulnerable.
Matthias strode back to the couch and sat down heavily. The fire's heat was becoming increasingly suffocating and it seemed to slither down his throat.
"I was drinking in a bar before I you found me. Truthfully, I thought I was going to die out there in the snow." He said, not really knowing what else to say.
"You were about to die. The cold was beginning to slow your blood down and your heart rate was becoming weak. If I had not warmed you, you would have been dead in half an hour." Lukas said, his tone vacant and emotionless, completely empty.
Matthias just stared. … How? How could Lukas know all that when Matthias was lying in the snow? He hadn't touched him, hell; he hadn't gotten within one meter of him, so how did he know that his blood pressure and heart rate were low? He really wasn't human. No human could do that.
Lukas's eyes flickered up to Matthias's. His small bow-shaped mouth was bent into a slender frown and the bottom lip quivered ever so slightly. His fingers nervously tapped on the cap of his knee, perfect oval nails cascading in an incessant pattern.
"You are quiet again," He whispered.
"I'm sorry. I was just thinking." Matthias's voice was quiet, too. Lukas didn't make a snarky comment or say something about his intelligence. The atmosphere was oppressive and humbling, forcing them to keep their voices low and throaty.
Moonlight fell through the single window of the house, dousing its corner in blue glow. Objects radiated and shined, as if gilded in silver. But, in reality, they were just objects. Still just ordinary objects. The fire's light stretched to meet the moonlight and they collided, making a battle front. Warm yellow against cool blue, waging a silent war in the back of the house. This fact unknown to the human, but strikingly urgent to the being.
"I don't understand." Matthias said. " What's going on? I can't help you if I have no idea what's going on?"
Lukas looked at him; his eyes almost seemed to pity him. "You cannot help nor can you change what is going to happen."
"But what is going to happen!" Matthias shouted. Lukas jumped back immediately, skittering away like a forest animal. He was so different from before. Why was he so different?
Matthias's heart pounded in his chest, his blood flowed hotly through his veins. Something was wrong. So terribly wrong.
"Please, Matthias, just leave. It would be better for you." Lukas pleaded.
Matthias watched his savior carefully. His body language was flighty and quivering like a small animal's. But the movements still held the being's supernatural grace and his power leaked through them. He was sure that Lukas possessed some kind of power, something scary and beautiful that could kill him in an instant, but he wasn't showing it. Something was scaring him, Matthias realized, something that Matthias didn't understand, something he wasn't sure if he wanted to understand.
"Lukas," he said. "Calm down. Everything is going to be okay. Everything will be alright."
Lukas met his gaze, his eyes clandestine and guarded, hiding emotions that that brimmed under the surface. His body shook slightly as if he had the chills; his breaths caught in his throat and came out erratically. He looked like he was going to have a panic attack at any moment.
He stared at his hand. His eyes were focused on it. He kept looking at it as if it was completely foreign to him. It looked like it was terrifying him. Then he quickly mumbled something under his breath in a strange language and his body seemed to instantly still. Suddenly, he was as pacific as a glacier and his eyes became frigid again.
A chill rippled through Matthias, sending ice coursing through his veins. Cold gripped his lungs, squeezing them, tightening around them like a great snake. The frost dug its fangs into him, sucking the warm marrow from his bones. His mind flashed back to when he was lying in the snow. He was helpless and pitiful, again. The darkness was returning, again. He was dying, again.
Cold.
Panic.
Dark.
Death.
Cold.
Panic.
Dark.
Death.
Cold!
Panic!
DARK!
"MATTHIAS!"
Matthias's eyes shot open. Lukas's face was right in front of his, contorted in worry. His fingers were clenched around Matthias's shirt; his knuckles were taut and white.
"Lukas? What happened?"
"I almost killed you again, idiot." Lukas released his shirt and settled back into the couch. The cushions whined and bent to accommodate his weight. The glow of the fire washed over him, bathing him in a full body halo. He looked like an angel, a pure creature that had been cursed to this brutal planet, an innocent lost in the throws of fate.
"You're not very good at killing things, are you?" He gave a huge toothy grin.
Lukas stared at him as if he'd grown another arm.
"… What?" He looked so confused.
Matthias burst out laughing. The sound ricocheted around the room and bounced against the wooden walls. It was light and fluid and brilliant and it awakened the room. Everything seemed to be right again, everything seemed to be safe. Lukas looked at him with a simple expression of content as if the worries of the world didn't affect him at all.
The fire was settled in its place. The flames resting now, taking a break from their enchanted dancing. Tiny ballerinas resting their bloody feet before they had to pirouette again.
There was still something wrong. Matthias knew it. But he wouldn't ask, he wouldn't force Lukas again. He wouldn't break this perfect atmosphere. Lukas would tell him eventually, before this was night was through.
Matthias relaxed deeper into the couch. How had he ended up here? With this person? He had expected to die and now he was meeting possibly the most amazing creature on this planet. What would Tino and Berwald think of Lukas? Would they even meet him?
"Hey Lu, when all this is over, how about you come and meet my family?"
Lukas blinked and his head tilted.
"Really?" he asked in disbelief.
"Yeah!" Matthias said loudly, his smile widening. "It will be great Lukas! I'm sure Tino and Berwald will love you. And they have this son named Peter, who's still pretty young, but I'm sure he'll like you, too. Oh, and you can see my house and maybe I could make you dinner. Then, …" Matthias was rambling, his mind was wandering through all the possibilities. But, then, he looked at Lukas.
Lukas sat on the couch, silent and unmoving. His face was turned towards Matthias, but his eyes weren't concentrated on him. He was someplace else, Matthias realized, he was lost in his own imaginations.
"Lukas?" he asked quietly.
The being's gaze immediately refocused on him. He thought for a moment, and then spoke quickly and quietly as if he was being cautious.
"I've never been in a human town before. You're the first human I've ever met. "
Matthias's blue eyes widened. "Really? Oh, then I have so much to show you. There's so many people I'd like you to meet. Maybe you could even stay for a while. Yeah! I have an extra room that…" His voice trailed off and his thought becoming lost in the winter air.
Lukas was giving him that pitying look again. He looked him the same way he would look at a child who didn't know the ways of the world and was naïve to reality. He knew something, but he wasn't telling the Dane. Suddenly, he felt like a fool. Who was kidding? This beautiful being, his savior from the snow, didn't belong with humans. He was too wild, too visceral, too ethereal. Too inhuman to be in humanity.
Lukas sighed and ran a hand through his hair. The light glinted against his blonde tresses and the pin in Lukas's hair, making it shine like gold. He seemed to stop at the pin, his fingers resting on it for a few seconds.
"Where'd you get that pin?" Matthias asked. He didn't really know why he asked, but the words seemed to rush out of his mouth.
Lukas looked into the fireplace, thinking about the answer before saying it.
"I found it on the body of a woman, who had frozen in the snow."
What! Matthias almost yelled, but he caught himself before he did. He waited instead, anticipating that Lukas was going to say more.
"She had died from the cold, much in the same way that you were going to die. I found her long after she had died; her body did not even hold warmth anymore. She was curled up into herself. Ice was covering her hair, the frost had turned her fingers blue and her beauty had been swallowed by death."'
He paused, then continued, his voice low and melodic.
"I had never seen death before then and she was the first human I had killed. I was ashamed with myself; I was devoured by the guilt in the same way a wolf gnaws at a bloody bone. I took the pin to remember her, but her death and petrified face continued to haunt me. I did not know of humans before her, but I learned of them soon after. She does not disturb me any longer, after all her death has just became one of many."
He was finished and stared into the glowing flames, enraptured by distress created in his own mind. The firelight licked his face gently, like the comforting kiss of a mother, and smoothed his already beautiful features.
"I am sorry." He whispered, the swell of the Northern wind leaving his lips. "I should not have told you that."
Matthias was quiet. He wasn't sure what to do. He felt like he should comfort Lukas somehow, but at the same time he was anxious. Unease had wedged itself in his mind and was bouncing between the vertebras in his backbone. The instinctual fear for his own life was growing stronger by the moment and becoming hard to ignore. But he had no reason to fear the being. Lukas hadn't hurt him.
Yet. Whispered the tiny voice in the back of his head.
No. Lukas wouldn't hurt him. Lukas was no danger. Lukas was his savior.
The assertion comforted him; at the same time he felt like he had taken a snow leopard for a house cat.
He settled further into the couch and risked a glance to his watch. It's shiny glass face read: 4:24 am. Early morning, too early for the sun, but too late for the hideous acts of night. A gentle, buttery time where moon prepared for her descent and the sun for her rise.
In the tiny cabin and its solitary universe, the fire glimmered again, danseuses lining up for rise of the curtain, embers licking at their heels.
A/N: Happy New Years, everyone! Here's a chapter to kick off your 2015. Thank you all for the response that this story has been getting. It's really just a short side story that I didn't expect anyone to read. Hopefully, the next chapter will be up in a few days.
PLEASE REVIEW!
Keep Writing,
Silver
