Wanderlust
by Positively
Pairing: Alfred/Matthew
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DISCLAIMER: Hidekaz Himaruya owns the characters of Axis Powers Hetalia. East of the Sun and West of the Moon is some Norwegian fairytale, brought to my attention through Edith Pattou's lovely novel East.
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A HANDY GUIDE! (Pretty sure only the last two are canon):
Matthias: Denmark
Anders: Norway
Fridrik: Iceland
Lars: Netherlands
Berwald: Sweden
Tino: Finland
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The morning after his discovery of the shivering man, Alfred made a point to find more blankets for his bed. His days developed a routine: breakfast, sketch out maps, lunch, harp, talk to the bear, dinner, explore, bed. At night, he grew braver in the darkness. The gap between them seemed to grow smaller with each passing night, so that their shoulders now touched. The man didn't shiver anymore.
Soon they spent as much time in the library together as Alfred did with the harp. Kumajirou loved to hear him read aloud, especially of fairytales and mythology. Alfred, who had never really liked the idea of books, found the act of sharing words actually quite appealing. If his eyes got tired, he would just make up stories, or tell true ones about himself and his brothers. Kumajirou looked wistful a lot, and Alfred began to worry that he was making him sad; but when he got too engrossed in his music and neglected their reading time, Kumajirou would pace impatiently around the room, annoyed, with a put-upon expression (as much as a bear could have one). Pay attention to me, his actions demanded.
Alfred also made a daily trip to the single window in the castle. When Kumajirou found out, he made an adorable huffing noise, which was translated as mild disapproval. Alfred didn't know if the bear objected to the danger it presented or the homesickness it suggested, but both were unavoidable. He was gradually beginning to discover that the white bear was kind of an overprotective stick-in-the-mud.
He also shed. Sometimes Alfred saw tufts of translucent fur tumbling around in the corridors, and it made him chuckle.
At least three months had passed, by Alfred's internal reckoning, when the homesickness became unbearable. He couldn't play the harp, and he found no enjoyment in reading or telling tales. He'd simply collapse on the library's couch, face pressed to the soft red fabric, and try to summon the energy to care about anything. Kumajirou would lie on the floor, head resting on great paws, and make forlorn whuffling noises. "You are…sad?"
Alfred nodded. He wanted to say "I feel dull and broken," but it wasn't worth the energy to open his mouth.
"Your brother is well. The small one, Tino."
"Hrrmmmo," he sighed (I know). It had been one of the first things he'd pestered the bear about, back when he cared enough to be curious. Alfred felt the bear staring at him, could nearly feel the bone-deep sadness rolling off him in waves.
"I'm sorry," Kumajirou said.
"Me too."
And then the nightmares began. They were merciless, plotless things, devoid of any concrete events; Alfred woke up thrashing with the impression of terror and loss and horrifying suffocation, only to find that there was not much difference between the sleeping and the waking.
The man beside him sat up, every time, and held Alfred's arms. At first that made things worse, the confinement too much like the nightmares and the man unable to assure him otherwise. But given a few moments, Alfred would calm down, and the man would gently, shyly hold him, and stroke his shoulders comfortingly. The inability to whimper was both a blessing (for his pride) and terrible loss (of his voice and the power it afforded).
But as time passed, they learned of a new medium of expression.
They could not speak, but they communicated with their hands, facing each other in the darkness (though neither could see). Alfred got to know the contours of the man's face, his long nose and high cheekbones and soft, soft skin. His eyes that watered, sometimes, when their fingers and toes brushed together. Alfred grew braver and stroked his neck, fingered his collarbones. His fingers skimmed across shoulders, wrapped around to the back, skipped over shoulderblades and tripped down the knobs of spine.
Bony, he mouthed soundlessly, then realized that the man could not see. So he pressed his mouth to the man's shoulder and did it again: Bony. You're bony. And the man seemed to get it, because his own fingers slipped to Alfred's ribs and very pointedly counted each individual one.
The nights passed this way, Alfred staying awake with the man as long as possible, inhaling his hair and the heat of his skin. His mood improved slightly with the introduction of novelty, but he knew it was only a temporary fix.
One night, the man's fingers traced something along Alfred's arm:
M-A-T-T-H-E-W
Alfred remembered the bear, months ago, saying that he sometimes remembered things at night. Y-O-U-R-N-A-M-E, Alfred's fingers replied on Matthew's arm. As an afterthought, he added a sloppy question mark.
The man—Matthew—nodded enthusiastically. Alfred felt curls brush against the side of his face. And Alfred mouthed it into the other man's warm shoulder, over and over again: Matthew, Matthew, Matthew. Matthew. Something clicked into place, then, that There is a name I can attach to this body, to this person. He was suddenly real in ways that Alfred hadn't truly understood before.
He pressed his palm flat to Matthew's chest. They fell asleep to the steady rhythm of his heartbeat.
The two became fluent in each other's body language, and at some point Alfred's nightmares transformed into something of form and method. Here there was ice and silence and loss. Endless searching, painful yearning. It haunted Alfred, seeped into his bones and his waking mind, the sensation of wandering in a silent freezing wasteland where the land and sky blended without horizons, where the cold was sharp as a hatchet. Once again, the waking was not so much different from the sleeping: the castle's quiet clamored around him until he thought it would drive him mad, until he fled to the harp or the bear. He drowned the silence with his own music, or the sound of his own storytelling.
But it wasn't enough. He missed the clattering of seven other dishes at the dinner table, the good-natured scolding of his father, the snoring of his brothers in the night.
And then there was the window. He stayed later and later up in the rafters, a de-winged or otherwise broken bird, nose pressed against the glass in a way that would have been comical had his misery been any less complete and sincere. He stopped eating. He stopped talking with the bear. All that was left was the window by day, and Matthew by night.
Matthew, who breathed like quiet thunder in his ear. Matthew, who brushed his hand along Alfred's back when he thought Alfred was asleep. Matthew, who held him every night when he woke from nightmares.
Matthew, who was always gone by morning's light.
I wonder what my family is doing. I wonder if they're alright. I wonder if it matters. I wonder what would happen if I never came back.
I wonder if I will ever go back.
Despair took hold of Alfred like frostbite. It spread like a disease into every thought he entertained, until all his songs were dirges and all his stories were of defeat. The dangerous drop from the skylight to the floor in the cavernous window-room possessed his attention completely, to the point where he could not stop thinking about it. He became very thin.
What I wouldn't give to see a tree, just a tree, my kingdom for a glimpse of green, some grass, the sky, my god, the sky. To be free, to smell the air, to feel the wind, to see my family. The stars. My brothers. My father.
I wonder if I will ever go back.
The breaking point came one day—morning, afternoon, evening, it was hard to tell in this place—after Alfred hadn't managed to keep any food down for something like seventy-two hours. He shakily climbed the slender, wrought-iron spiral staircase to the skylight. As usual, he lifted himself precariously onto the railing, calves hooked around the middle bar with his toes just brushing the landing, knees bent in some gross approximation of worship, head turned upwards to the light. It was rather a lot like worship: To yearn pathetically for a paradise just out of sight, and quite out of reach.
Does it even exist at all? he found himself wondering. What if I go outside, and all that's there is Nothing? He saw his nightmares, the blank white of snow reflected by the blank white of clouds, a polar land without horizons, the fur of a white bear…
A sharp, unfamiliar fear filled him. What if the nightmares were real? What if Life had forsaken him, left him here to die among stone and snow and cold, dead books? Would it not then be better to die while his fantasies were still alive? Maybe he would be sent to a world of his own choosing…the Hereafter, the Next World, the Other Side. He could make it green and lovely again. He could feel the wind again. Freedom.
Without really thinking about it, or looking down to gauge the fall, he flipped his legs over the railing. His feet dangled out over thin air. Are you afraid, the white bear had asked him and, as he lowered himself and prepared to let go, truthfully:
No, he was not afraid.
But just as his fingers were loosening around the cold iron, a roar filled the chamber. Alfred gripped the railing harder in surprise, trying to determine the source of the pounding noise that seemed to shake his very body. Then he realized: the white bear was bounding up the elegant staircase, shaking it all the way.
When Kumajirou reached the landing, he wasted no time in enveloping Alfred in his enormous paws and jerking him back from the deadly fall. They fell backwards together, a blur of pure white and gold, and Alfred's face was pressed uncomfortably close to the snowy fur. If not for the heat of the bear, he might have been inside one of his nightmares: smothered by whiteness.
They sat up and looked at each other. Alfred, exhausted and weak with hunger, could barely focus his eyes.
"You will die if you stay here," Kumajirou rumbled. He phrased it as a statement, and Alfred supposed that it was pretty much a given at this point.
"Yes."
"If I allow you to visit your family…will you return here…with me?"
"Why?"
The bear visibly struggled to reply. "Cannot say," he settled on finally. "I only request."
Life. Hope. The chance of seeing green, and the sky, and his brothers. "How soon can we leave?"
"You must not…allow yourself to be alone. With your father. He will question you…about me. You must not tell him anything. Please."
"Yes, I know."
"Your word?"
"Upon my word," Alfred replied impatiently. Kumajirou had reiterated this quite often in the past day, as he prepared to make the journey back to Alfred's home. Alfred wasn't really sure why it would be such a disaster if his father knew what was going on, but it didn't really matter. For the first time in weeks—months, even—he had something to look forward to. A reason to wake up and dress and eat and speak. He was invigorated; he was full of life.
Perhaps he should have listened to the bear's warning more seriously. But he was finally himself again, and it didn't seem all that important. What could Arthur do?
Perhaps he should have paid closer attention to Kumajirou himself. He moved more slowly, more heavily; as though he realized what this trip meant. As though he realized the fate he had resigned himself to, in order to save Alfred's life.
When they approached a large, attractive, and unfamiliar farmhouse, Alfred was momentarily confused. "Kumajirou, this isn't my…"
But then he saw Matthias standing on the porch with a rake, frozen in shock. As Alfred dismounted, he saw the rake drop from his brother's hand. At a distance, it was impossible to discern his expression; he tried to imagine joy, but could only see blank shock. His face was a mask, or a snowstorm. Canvas.
Then he jumped into action. "Alfred! Alfred! Father, come quick!"
And Alfred sprinted towards this new big house in time to greet the seven men in his life, Father and Matthias and Anders and Lars and Fridrik and Tino and Berwald. They dissolved into a seething mass of happy family.
"Alfred, we thought you'd never come back," Arthur said gruffly, wiping his eyes on his sleeve. Alfred noticed that his clothes were far less threadbare than he was used to; in fact, all of them were dressed in the kind of finery that they'd never had before.
"I was beginning to wonder myself, Father. What happened to the old farmhouse?"
"Long story, we'll tell you inside."
Tino smiled shyly at his younger brother, looking rosy and healthy. And that was such a miracle that Alfred decided then and there that his stay with the bear had been the best decision of his life.
Ah, the bear!
"I can't stay long. Kumajirou says I have a month, and then he will return for me…" His family let out a chorus of protest at this, but Alfred tuned them out. He turned to face the bear, who had not moved during the whole scene.
Kumajirou turned around to amble away, but Alfred called, "Wait!"
He bounded down the porch steps and, before even realizing that it was his intention, enveloped the bear in a warm and fluffy embrace. "I'll go back with you, when the month is up. I swear." They made eye contact, and Alfred was struck, as usual, by the humanity in his dark blue eyes. "Matthew," he whispered, without meaning to.
Kumajirou's—Matthew's—eyes widened, and his muscles shuddered a bit. "I swear," Alfred repeated, releasing the bear from his hold. "I swear." Kumajirou regarded him with an unreadable expression.
"We shall see."
He turned around and began to run, a silent white loping thing. Before long he had disappeared, and Alfred's brothers pulled him inside their new home.
"It was just after you left, Alfred, Tino started getting worse. And we didn't know what to do, so Dad—"
"—Father, he put the farm up for sale, thinking we could use whatever money it got us for medicine, but see, the guy who ended up wanting to buy the farm turned out to be—"
"Mama's long lost brother!" (This was chorused by all six brothers.)
"And he recognized us, of course, and wondered why we hadn't asked him for help, but last we'd heard, he was way down south and why should we bother?"
"But anyway, he thought we could come live on this property, farm the land for him, for a small rent."
"And he agreed to find Tino a good doctor."
"And now I'm healthy. And this year has been much kinder to the crops."
"So Kumajirou came through for you," said Alfred smilingly.
Arthur was frowning. "Good fortune came through for us. Sheer blind luck. I hardly think your bear had much to do with it. I've been meaning to ask you, Alfred, you can't really intend to return—"
"I have every intention of returning," Alfred replied hotly, eyes blazing. "I will not go back on my word."
They stared each other down for a long moment, like a pair of wolves circling. Arthur looked as though he was about to argue the point, but Fridrik put an arm on his shoulder. "There will be time to discuss it later. Tonight, we celebrate."
Alfred walked through the village, mildly disoriented. Their new farmhouse was on the opposite side of town as the old house, so he was walking in the exact reverse direction to which he was accustomed.
Their front door was just as Alfred remembered: a friendly, peeling green. A bell sounded as he entered.
"Liz, get that customer, please, I've got…" But Roderich dropped the cake of rosin in his right hand, and barely held on to the violin in his left as he caught sight of Alfred. "Is that…?"
"Alfred!"
Elizaveta ran forward and practically tackled him to the floor.
Neither was very pleased to hear that he would only be staying a month—and Elizaveta was even more incensed when he refused to talk about the whys—but they still insisted that he come and practice his harp as long as he was around.
He started off with some of the tunes that he learned in the castle. His skills were a little rusty thanks to that self-imposed silence in those last miserable weeks; and this harp was startlingly unfamiliar compared to the beautiful golden work of art in Kumajirou's castle. But when he was through Elizaveta wiped tears off on her sleeve, and even Roderich's expression approached worshipful. After a few moments of pointed silence, he stood up and started criticizing Alfred's posture.
It was good to be back, Alfred reflected.
Alfred didn't really give Kumajirou's warning that much thought. He and his brothers were far too busy reveling in the joy of his return; it felt like nothing could ever go wrong again. He insisted upon helping with the farmwork, though they tried to convince him to stay in bed. But Alfred was through with being indoors. It was inexpressibly wonderful to be outside again with the sun on his skin and the wind in his hair. It was like waking from a winter nap into the lovely spring. A bear awakening from his hibernation.
Sometimes it was tempting to tell his brothers that maybe he wouldn't go back with the bear. But then he remembered that the last night before they had left the castle, Matthew had shivered for the first time since they'd begun to hold each other.
No, Alfred would return with the bear when his month was over.
But Arthur managed to get him alone one evening, when the others were setting the table.
"Tell me about the bear," he demanded, standing in front of the kitchen door.
"His name is Kumajirou. He's big and white. He sheds. It's hard for him to talk. I've told you this already," Alfred replied. "Excuse me."
But Arthur continued to block his exit. "Does he feed you well? You look awfully thin."
"Yes, I usually eat very well in the castle. He took me back here for a break. Because I wasn't eating what he offered." He felt a stab of shame at that—rather immature, a hunger strike.
"And what about sleeping?"
"I sleep fine. Nice comfy bed, and all that."
But Arthur's eyes were narrowed suspiciously, and Alfred was suddenly under the impression that he knew, somehow, and deeply disapproved. "Really, Father, can you stand aside? I want to bring the rolls out to the table."
Curse his shaking voice! It seemed to cinch Arthur's suspicions, and he crossed his arms over his chest. "Alfred, I don't think you're being entirely truthful with me. Are you?"
"And just why the hell is it any of your business how I sleep? I'm an adult, I'm living on my own, and I can sleep however I damn well please!" It sounded a lot dirtier than it really was.
"How dare you speak to your own father like that? I raised you, and I—"
"You let me go off with a giant bear to save the rest of your family!"
"I never asked for you to go! I was the one begging you not to go! You're the one who's going to go crawling after that monster—"
"Matthew is not a monster!"
There was a moment of silence, like the pause at the end of a prayer, during which Alfred realized his mistake.
"I thought his name was Kumajirou."
Alfred remained stubbornly silent.
"Look, Alfred," Arthur said tiredly, slumping into a chair, "Son. I just want what's best for you. I just want to protect you. If you feel the need to go back with that mon—with that bear…then fine. I don't get it, but fine. But please, let me at least do this one thing to protect you. You're right, I haven't been a very good father. But I worry about you. And I need to know about this Matthew—and where he sleeps."
Alfred was undone by his father's concern, and the story came spilling out of him, like water from a spout. He had gotten exceptionally good at storytelling, come to think of it, thanks to all the time he spent in the library with Kumajirou.
"He casts a spell so that you can't see his face?"
"And no torch will light while he's in the room."
Arthur looked horrified. "Alfred, what if he's a troll?"
"Trolls aren't real, Dad."
"Yes, well, you'd have said the same thing about talking polar bears this time last year, wouldn't you have?"
Alfred shrugged. "Fair enough."
"The tales of trolls say that they love human skin—does he seem to have a preoccupation with yours? And they have magic that can befuddle the senses. Make you blind and deaf and that sort of thing. Listen, I think I have something to help. A flint, that your mother said would catch a fire even in a blizzard. You must use this to light a candle one night, when he comes to join you in bed, and get a glimpse of his face. If he's a troll, you must flee the castle! Or he'll take your skin."
Alfred stowed the flint and wax candle in the bottom of his pack. He would know if Matthew was a troll, wouldn't he?
But he was curious. About his face, what it looked like. It filled him like an obsession, the need to see Matthew's face. He dreamt about it, what he might see if he were to light that candle and look upon his housemate, his bedmate, his heartmate.
Saying goodbye to his family and friends was harder the second time around, not least because Alfred felt like he had a choice in the matter. The only thing driving him onward was the promise he'd made to Kumajirou—Matthew—that he would go back.
When they saw each other again, Alfred found himself bafflingly drawn forward, without the slightest inclination to stay back with his brothers and father. You are a mystery I will solve, he thought quietly at the bear. "I told you that I'd come back," he gloated. Kumajirou rumbled noncommittally, but Alfred liked to think it was a thankful rumble. He climbed onto his great furry back and waved at his family.
He noticed, distinctly, in the instant before they passed out of sight: Arthur gesturing at Alfred's pack, and winking.
Alfred's resolve to respect Matthew's privacy lasted all of two hours.
At first he had been determined not to muck around with whatever magic the castle employed at night. Kumajirou had warned him not to be alone with Arthur, after all; had he foreseen something like this? But it kept haunting him, the idea of seeing Matthew's face, of being able to look into his eyes and know, and it was maddening, Alfred's curiosity.
And what was the worst that could happen?
Alfred was not afraid.
And so that night he hid the candle and flint in the pocket of his robe, and waited for the bed's weight to shift. The deafening silence and pure darkness descended, and Alfred reached out to gather Matthew into his arms. He was shaking again, and much thinner than before.
S-O-R-R-Y, he spelled onto Matthew's arm.
After nearly an hour, once Alfred was sure that his visitor was firmly asleep, he pulled the flint out of his pocket and lit the candle. Holding it carefully aloft, he held it over Matthew's face…
And gasped, and heard his gasp, and knew that something was terribly wrong that the silence was broken.
Matthew was beautiful. The candlelight glowed off his soft, pale skin—human skin—and then his ash-colored lashes were fluttering, and Alfred jerked the candle back. A drop of wax fell on Matthew's shoulder, and that's when his dark blue eyes—identical to the bear's—snapped open.
"No, Alfred," he said sadly. You great big idiot hung in the air between them. "You've chosen to listen to your father?"
"No, I didn't mean—"
"This is my curse: to live as a white bear during the day and a man at night, until I sleep in silence beside a person for one whole year. If that year passes, I will become a human again, and marry the one who lay beside me. If, however, the host should fail to keep the silence, or look upon my face, the enchantment is broken and I must marry the Troll King. If only you had held out another month...but now I must go to the Troll King, and-"
"Let me come with you!" Alfred begged. "This is my fault, I shouldn't have—please, let me—"
"No, you can't. The Troll King lives in a castle that can't be found. I must leave to marry him."
"Tell me where! I'll come for you! I'm not afraid," he insisted, though his voice was choked with sobs.
Matthew's lovely face twisted with disgust. "'East of the sun and west of the moon.' That is where the castle will be."
Desperate, Alfred clutched him by the shoulders. "I swear to come for you. I'll find a way. Matthew…"
And the beautiful prince leaned down and kissed Alfred lightly on the lips. "I appreciate the thought, but I do believe this is goodbye."
He disappeared, silently, in a whirl of snow and wind.
Author's Note: What would Jesus do if he was attacked by a polar bear? Hint: this is a trick question.
I'm starting to think this will be closer to four or five parts. At least four.
Please review!