Ah My Goddess Fan Fiction ❯ Trial By Tenderness ❯ Part 23 - GlowPath ( Chapter 23 )

[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]

Part 23 Glowpath



Skuld felt enthusiasm ripen through her as she viewed the floating image on her Holophotic Videmeotron. She had just started downloading images from the Russian satellite that was just now passing over China. More encouragement came from the webcast morning weather...the satellite photos showed no clouds over Beijing. For most of the past week, she had checked the weather for China as soon as she woke up. Conditions were uniformly rainy or cloudy each day, adding to the storms of her impatience.
The atmosphere around the temple was stormy as well. Two days ago, Megumi had returned from shopping at the mall deeply upset about something. This had thrown the house into turmoil. Keiichi was unable to convince Megumi to let go of her hurt feelings. Belldandy felt that she herself was to blame. Skuld eventually found out that Megumi had lost her best friend, because the guy that she liked had completely mistreated her. This justified Skuld's already dim view towards almost all mortal males. They were not to be trusted! Megumi was at fault for not taking her pills in Skuld's view, but Belldandy had assumed a guilty air even though Megumi had forgiven her.
However, despite everyone's pretensions of guilt and blame, Skuld felt really uncomfortable...because it happened to Sora. She *really* liked Sora. Sora was the first human female that she had hit it off with. The ilk of human relationships were so indecipherable to Skuld...except for her friendship with Sora. Skuld was grateful that she clicked with at least one mortal.
And now Megumi had stolen her boyfriend or something...Skuld just didn't know enough facts about these human male-female relationships. It was all too much of a bother to Skuld's analytical mind. She had a hard enough time comprehending how Belldandy could be attracted to Keiichi, even though she knew that her older sister's feelings of love were genuine.
"If only Urd was here to explain things..." Skuld said wistfully as she watched the Holophotic Videmeotron draw its map of Beijing in preparation for a pinpoint photo location. The first image pixilated on her floating video screen.
*hhuuuunhhh!!*
Skuld gasped and shook her head. Could it be?rom the overhead perspective of the photo, she could see a large mane of platinum-blonde hair. The next three photos confirmed it, as she noticed the tan features of the arms and legs of the woman in each picture.
"I FOUND HER! I FOUND BIG SISTER URD!" she screamed for joy at the top of her lungs. An electric bellow of stimme filled her, almost forcing her to jump up and down in glee. Thin clouds of dust from the tatami mats roiled underneath her stockinged feet as she bounded happily like a wild kangaroo.

* * * * * * * *

Belldandy was lying in her futon bed, relaxing herself away from the waking anxieties that accompanied the day's first realization that her sister was still missing. She had decided to sleep in her own room last night because Keiichi was emotionally exhausted from dealing with his sister and Genji. She smiled at his selfless effort to offer some comfort to Megumi in her crisis. Keiichi was really skilled at walking a fine balance in helping others: defusing stressful situations...while also sharing his contagious optimism. But he also had to emotionally support Genji, who was dangling at wit's end with the very frustrating feeling of being helpless in the face of Megumi's grief. Keiichi had a man-to-man talk with Genji until late last night...Belldandy finally turned in when she couldn't stay awake any longer waiting for him to come to bed.
She heard a pounding series of shouts, and jerked up into a seated position. Instantly alert, she climbed out her futon hastily, heaving the thin summer blanket off to the side. She put on a morning robe as she half-walked half-jogged to Skuld's room. Keiichi was already there, yawning tiredly. Skuld was joyfully skipping up and down and pointing at the floating holographic screen. Belldandy sensed that Skuld's excited mood was filled with exuberance.
"Could she have really found Urd?" Belldandy wondered hopefully.
"Look! See? There she is, I'm *positive* that's her! I told you that I could find her! I told you! I told you!"
Belldandy felt her heart halt and flutter as she saw the image. Her mind emptied itself of all thoughts for a moment as she let her feelings surface. She heard Keiichi gasp as he realized that it was Urd. A calming wave soothed her...they had found their older sister.
"Urd, what are you doing in *China*? I've missed you soooo much, Big Sister!" she thought. She turned to look at her younger sister, who was in a jubilant trance.
"Skuld, you're simply incredible! You found her!"
Skuld's brown eyes widened as she accepted the compliment with humility, rather than conceit. Looking in Skuld's eyes, Belldandy felt the strong bond between the three sisters beginning to seem like it was whole again.
"You're maturing, little sister," Belldandy thought as she reached out and hugged her. Keiichi came over and hugged the two of them as they regarded the holoscreen.
The pictures showed Urd walking down the street with an elderly Chinese man.
Belldandy's mind raced with cherished thoughts mixed with concern. Their search was over! But now what could they do? Could she talk Keiichi into going to China with her? She began to fervently examine the possible actions she would need to take to get Urd back home.
"Belldandy, we need to go there and find her. It would be so much easier if we could just get ahold of Cevn...he's already there. But since he's not answering our calls, we'll have to travel there ourselves," Keiichi said conclusively. Belldandy was so happy that her Keiichi had already decided that he was willing to go to China if necessary.
"I wonder if she met up with him? Maybe we can find two for the price of one!" Skuld asked aloud. She was still reeling from the fact that she had located Urd. Angry as she was with her oldest sister, all she wanted to do now was give her a big hug.

* * * * * * * *

The jail was moldy and filthy. There were no beds. A hole in the floor served as a toilet. The rank cell was crowded with too many men. I could hear screaming and cursing in the tense atmosphere. The economic miracle of 21st century China obviously didn't extend to jailcell conditions. The floor was strewn with straw and rocks chipped off the wall. The walls themselves were filled with carved graffiti, mostly protests against the authorities and macho bragging.
I was too strung out on my emotions to get much sleep, my surety of fears were stretched with certainty. I watched in a detached manner as the interior of the jail grew dark, a bare light bulb illuminating the cell. I soon learned that the men locked up with me were all veteran criminals. I felt afraid that they might attempt some kind of homosexual rape on me. To offset my fear, I mentally created a taxonomy of animal types for each inmate: snake, dog, panther, weasel, gorilla, etc. My back ached with tightening stress and my head pounded in accompaniment to my heartbeat.
Feelings of hopelessness stayed my waking night. My dissertation defense was the day after tomorrow! There would be no way I could make it out of here. My knowledge of the Chinese court system ached deep grooves in my desperation, as I knew that it would be weeks before I received even an initial hearing. My academic life was in ruins and I was facing jail time with these...goons. Admittedly, I had broken the law, but none of the bystanders had been forward enough to tell the police that it was to save Urd. Fear of the police was rife, especially with the recent ferment of Tibetan independence protests and the series of natural disasters a couple years back.
Breakfast was a piece of bread and a tin cup of water. Everyone in my cell was shouting about how strong he was, that he didn't commit such-and-such crime, that he had the best drugs, that he had gotten away with the direst crime, blah blah arf arf. I felt sickened with anger when one of them bragged about raping a coed from BeiDa. I feared for my life...and ignored anyone who tried to talk to me.
Despite my downtrodden spirits, I repeatedly tried to explain to the guards that I was a student at BeiDa, that I lived in Japan, and that my transgression had occurred while trying to save a woman's life. The jailers mocked me, laughing at my excuse and taunting me.
"Jailed man tell to judge, not us. You swim lake, you get six months labor camp. Hahaha, arrogant stupid yang kuei foreigner!" the jailers responded mockingly.
"*Six months labor camp*?" I asked incredulously as the other inmates added their laughter to that of the guards. Was he serious or was he messing with me?
I sat back down in the corner of the cell.
About an hour later, I heard whistles, catcalls and sexual comments filling the air. This jail was already overwhelming with heady smells and loud voices, but now what?
"Jailed man have visitor!" a guard announced in broken English. Evidently, he had forgotten that I had been talking with them in Mandarin the whole time. I tried to shut all the noise out. I heard a baton rapping on the side of the jail cell.
"Visitor here for foreigner! Come foreigner!"
I looked up and saw Urd...and Dr. Zhao. Urd had a smile on her face and Dr. Zhao...the stern expression he wore was the essence of intimidation. Instantly, I felt like I had been convicted and sentenced when I viewed the burning in his eyes. I felt emptied of any hope and filled to the brim with humiliation. Then the ludicracy of my situation struck me.
"She's done it again! How does she keep doing this? Of all the possible ways she could injure me..." I thought in a crimson rage.
"Urd, isn't it enough that I'm in jail because of you? But...I guess that isn't enough...you've completely ruined everything! Do you know who he is?" I clenched my hands around the bars in the doorway and shouted at her, yelling shrilly as I pointed at Dr. Zhao. She looked at me with one of those unfathomable Goddess expressions, like she was watching a child throw a fit over spilled milk.
"W..why would you do this to me? He's the *chair* of my dissertation committee, for God's sake! I'm screwed. I'm totally totally screwed!" I said, my voice heavy with anguish. I pounded my forehead on the jail bars to act out my frustration. My fellow inmates were shrieking with levity at my humiliation. She looked at me with an unfathomable expression.
"All right, you win! You want to see me brought down low...here I am. Bringing Dr. Zhao here has finished any chances of my..." I shouted, and then slumped against the wall, the mocking laughter echoing me towards a nervous breakdown.
I was going to lose it...
I reluctantly looked up at my two visitors. Urd's expression went flat, then a trace of tears glazed her eyes right before she suddenly turned her face away from me.
"What is going on here?" I wondered at her odd reaction. The inmates were laughing and making obscene comments about her.
"She must not understand debased colloquial Chinese, otherwise she'd be livid," I guessed. I had instinctively talked to Urd in Japanese every time I encountered her here in Beijing. Instead of gloating, she had reacted to my scolding with the sadness one has when they stand falsely accused. The look of betrayal arched heavily on her expression.
"Why is she acting this way? *I'm* the one who's being betrayed here," I told myself in a fit of righteousness.
"Enough!" Dr. Zhao shouted. Somehow, every buffoonish shirk in my cell stifled his loud talk.
"Here it comes," I thought with a flinch.
"Cevn, your friend woke me up at 5 am this morning to tell me that you had been taken to jail!" he announced.
"Shit!" my mind vaunted drearily.
"She obviously cares for you a lot, because she was worried sick about you. She told me the entire story of this...ridiculous incarceration. Needless to say, I was outraged that one of *my* doctoral students had been treated this way. So I called around this morning with her help and found out that you had been brought here. You're going to released momentarily," he pronounced in his 'official' voice.
I watched as Dr. Zhao turned to the guards, his visage tight with deep-felt rue.
"My name is Dr. Zhao Juzhi, Chair of the Philosophy Dept. of Beijing University. This man who you've jailed is a teacher from Japan who was *officially* invited by our university. And our government, I might add. He is a guest scholar acting as a representative of the Nekomi Institute of Technology, from Japan. This is the kind of stupidity that I thought had been consigned to the misdeeds of the Cultural Revolution. But obviously not, since arresting foreign dignitary scholars seems to the rule of the day," he announced in a commanding voice. The guards were cowering by this point; any mirth the inmates felt regarding the dressing-down of the jailer crew was kept to themselves.
Dr. Zhao was a volcano of ire. The silence hung heavy in the air as he addressed me.
"I just contacted *Head Commissioner* Zhang to arrange your immediate release. He's an old friend of mine...we knew each other as kids during the Great Leap Forward days. He informed me that he will suspend all nine officers who arrested you because they failed to properly investigate the situation." The jailers cringed as Dr. Zhao casually dropped the name of Beijing's head Police Commissioner.
"What the..." I said to myself, stupefied by this turn of events.
I looked at Urd with a guilty expression. I could see that she was deeply stung by my righteous tirade. Once more, I had misunderstood her. She had come here to help me...and I had rewarded her with accusations of trying to wreck havoc in my life. I felt confused, wanting to bury my face in my arms for shame as I sat in the now-quiet cell.
"This happens every time...a woman tries to get close to me...and I push her away. It *never* ends...it's as if I'm allergic to any kind of caring. I'm so paranoid...that I keep suspecting that an honest act of compassion on the part of a woman is actually a manipulative attack. Isn't there another way...a way out of this retarded Cassini Division that keeps cleaving my sensed from my heart? Why do I always do the wrong thing?" I framed my autumnal dismay. Dejection filled my soul as I struggled to form words around an apology.
"Urd...I'm so hopeless. I'm sorry," was all that I could get out. "What else can I say?"
"We'll talk about that later," she said tersely.

* * * * * * * *

Urd watched Cevn as he walked next to her on the wide sidewalk. He seemed much more anxious than she had remembered him from before. People were milling about, enjoying the pleasant weather. She had tried to get his attention several times by gesturing or waving, but he just simply looked at her, then kept walking. Wordlessly, they strolled down the street. They had been walking for an hour without as much as a single word between them. His aloofness, preoccupation, anxiety...whatever it was, it was driving her nuts.
So she walked out ahead of him, then stopped and spun around to face him, blocking him to a standstill.
"Why don't you say anything? Or at least acknowledge me?" she challenged him. "You know, me...the Goddess who bailed you out of that smelly jail this morning?"
"I was wondering if we find a place and sit down," he suggested evasively. Yet, Urd was a little surprised at his request as they found a wooden bench by a temple and sat down. She noticed that Cevn sat down on the edge of the bench, as far away from her as he could be.
"He'd better be ready to talk now," she thought expectantly. Instead of talking, he just sat there and watched the pedestrians pass by with an unreadable expression. Well, it *was* readable; he had disinterest written all his face.
""Well?" Urd said, growing tired of the silent space between them. "What do you have to say for yourself? Or are you just going to sit there like a sluggard?"
"Where do I begin, Urd? I don't know why you came and got me this morning. I don't know why you're in China. I don't know why you're here with me, now. I guess you wanted me to *say* something instead of asking a bunch of questions...I'm sorry, but I just can't right now," he acknowledged, still eyeing the street and not her.
Urd admitted to herself that she was disappointed...she wanted to hear something solid with meaning. Like why he had returned to comfort her yesterday...
Yesterday. She didn't want to think about yesterday.
"I don't know what you mean. Still, it's good to see you, Cevn. I realized last night that there's a lot of things I really wanted to talk to someone about," she told him, recognizing that this was one of those times the Goddess had to take the initiative because the mortal was too hung up on himself. Again.
They watched the Chinese lifestream flow by...

* * * * * * * *

Cevn felt so awkward. In the short time he had known Urd, they had been through a roller coaster of emotions together. He was gripped by deep roots of concern for her. *Did* she attempt suicide? The entire episode yesterday pivoted towards that probability. He debated with himself about how he should broach the subject.
"I could just act like it never happened, but what good is that? I would just be ignoring who she is. Urd has been living with the knowledge that the Ultimate Force is preventing her from being in love with a guy...for how long? Centuries? Millennia? Yet something happened *now* that caused her to snap. How does one talk to an immortal being about suicide? Chances are, she'll do it again...because she already tried once. She's a freaking lunatic! But I *have* to bring it up, despite all the craziness it will cause between us," he thought, measuring his resolve.
"Urd, why do you want to die at life?" he confronted her.
Urd looked at him sharply and felt an anger boiling inside of her. Her vision narrowed as she saw reality in a reddened hue. She definitely didn't want to talk about *that*. She felt like he had gone for her narrow throat with a knife.
"You said you wanted to understand me and support me, then you go and ask me something like that!" she said spitefully, almost spitting out the words with feline anger.
"Urd...you tried to *kill* yourself yesterday!" Cevn stated firmly.
"No, I was just trying to test and see if my Goddess powers had returned," she replied sheepishly, instantly regretting her weak attempt at deception. She was amazed at herself for spewing such a lame excuse. Even Skuld could do better than that in the excuse department!
"That's bullshit! When you were screaming and ranting, you said that you *wanted* to die. Don't you realize that you have something that mortals have coveted throughout history? You're freaking *immortal*, Urd! You have seen and done things that I could only imagine. And yesterday you wanted to throw it away. Well, it's too bad that you have to live as the Goddess of the Past, but I feel that if you die...then the Past will die with you. And that cannot be allowed to happen."
"So what if it does?" Urd snapped back, the horns of her contempt blaring golden.
"I'm not even going to get into that. W..we're talking about *you*! You need to look in that dark, painful place inside of you, whatever that is...and bring it out in the light and deal with it instead of ignoring it," he said.
Urd felt her anger mount in the face of his determined, almost instructional tone of voice. But she also felt fear accompanying it. This was getting too close to home for her.
"What if he's right about me...about me running from my feelings? But there's nothing wrong with me! Is there?" she wondered, swirling in a shadowy confusion. Her fear increased as she felt more and more vulnerable. "What does he think I've been doing? I have felt that dark place he's talking about...it's what drove me to want to..." She couldn't finish the thought, as it would be an admission to herself that she tried to take her own life.
"What I do with my life...my existence...is my own business!" Urd replied flatly. "It's definitely not yours! Besides, you're here to apologize to me for that incident back in the jail...not to read me the riot act!"
"Wrong! Your life affects *everybody* around you. There's is a houseful of people in Makuhari who are undoubtedly worried sick about you. Yes, I know that you have to live with a deep pain. But pain is part and parcel of life...as much as joy. Your sister Belldandy says that all the time. You've got to stop running from the unwonted chorus of offenses scything your heart. They will *not* overwhelm you all of the time. I promise you that. I've had my share of pain in this life...and I'll be the first to admit that it still governs me to my own debt. But I haven't given up on the hope that it will lessen or go away."
"That's where you're off the beam, Cevn. I *have* given up hope!" Urd said defiantly. She folded her arms across her chest; her gesture vividly indicating that she was emotionally walled off from him.
"Urd, if you've given up hope, then how is it that you feel love towards someone? You admitted yesterday that there was someone special in your life! How can it be that the Ultimate Force prevents you from having someone to love...but permits *you* feelings of wanting to give love?"
Urd was stunned into silence. She had tormented herself over that question for millennia...to no effect. Now, this mere mortal was trying to lecture her about it. As if he knew anything about anything.
"As long as you feel love...there is hope inside of you," Cevn said, as if citing a fact of life. "You, above all the creatures in this universe, should know that the only forever against time...is love. This prohibition levied on you by the Ultimate Force...it isn't happening *to* you. It's happening *for* you!" he said with conviction. Urd looked at him as she felt bittersweet emotions conflicting inside of her.
"Forever..." she said reflectively.
Urd thought about how this young human mortal could reach into her and touch her pain, then transform it into something positive. She wanted to believe him...but she couldn't. She felt her anger cool as she decided to tune him out.
"Forever is a long time to be alone...which is something you can't possibly understand, kiddo. I don't want to talk to you anymore," Urd said as she started to get up to leave. Unexpectedly, Cevn reached out and grabbed her wrist. She raised her hand instinctively to slap him...
"Urd, if you leave, you're only running again!" he accused. Urd sat back down on the bench to defy his accusation. He wasn't going to get away with this!
"Okay. I'm not going to run, at least from a mere mortal like you, Cevn. I'm gonna sit here and tell you everything you want to know, so you'll see for yourself how full of shit you are. You think you can stand toe-to-toe with me?" she confronted him resentfully. If he wants to play, she'd make sure he'll get played. Idiot.
"Don't you start with that 'mere mortal' stuff! This 'mere mortal' saved your life yesterday! I know that whatever's coiled inside of you...is really painful, Urd. But you gotta let it out. Don't let it roll over you!" Urd felt a seething black cloud-like form roil up to her consciousness, and then envelop it with abject despair. It shuddered her with surprise, as if she had been swept away by a sudden flow of lava. She had heard this all before, this encouragement to get past her fears. But somehow it was different this time, because she could really feel the loneliness. She wanted to scream at the wide open universe...
"I...it hurts" she gasped. Cevn looked at her in shock...it was as if an invisible fist had seized her, intent on squeezing out her hope and replacing it with pain. He had no idea that she was so enwrapped in her emotional darkness. It was right at the surface.
"What if she loses it?" the clinical part of his mind observed, noting the telltales of a bioenergetic catharsis. But this was Urd, not some client at a drug rehab. Urd was as close to an omniscient being as he would ever experience.
"What the hell can I do to help her through *this*?" he wondered, realizing that, despite all words to the contrary, he *was* a mere mortal. A simple idea formed in his mind...the only thing he could do was try to avoid letting Urd feel that she was alone with her grief.
"Urd...trust me. I know it's hard to trust me, with all the mishmash that has gone on between us. But I want you to grab my hand and don't let go until it passes. Just *be* the pain, just this once," Cevn said slowly.
"Y..you're insane!" she weakly remonstrated. But then, for the briefest of moments, Urd felt a flimsy impulse to trust this mortal. For some reason, she'd been raging at him ever since he'd come to Japan; he was only one she could really let herself go off on. Skuld would run off and hide. Belldandy would look at her and offer an inane wisdom teaching. Keiichi and the other mortals weren't even up to being a target for her candor, they seemed to be pushed away whenever she really let it all out. A flash of insight buzzed her: maybe the reason why she always got intensely emotional around him…was because it was safe to do so. Could it be him? Beyond the fact that he was an idiot, he somehow pulled feelings out of her without even trying. Or is it me? She closed her eyes...and then she whirlpooled into the mouth of her personal nightmare garuda-dragons…and was swallowed whole.
"Hurts...so lonely," she said in a shaky girlish whisper, exposing her inner torment. Urd was shaking like a leaf as the familiar melancholy gripped her. She felt herself being consumed by her pain. She was frightened of it: frightened that it would never leave her, once she fully experienced it. The last barrier of resistance fell and she stood with a naked soul, to face her greatest loss. She felt fragmented, as if her feelings were being torn away in different directions.
"Thousands of years...alone...Belldandy has one...I can't...never feel the love of a man...all alone...sysop because I didn't want to be around anyone...Skuld needs love...how can I love her...so lonely...no one to share myself with...sisters understand but *don't* understand...I've felt so hopeless for so long I forgot what it's like...Troubadour in the past...Cherry Blossom Spirit in the past...love all gone...nothing now inside of me...I can't handle it...it hurts too much...it's suffocating me...empty Past empty Past empty empty EMPTY!" she voiced the unjust stains upon her heart.
"Urd, that emptiness is *not* you. It's only a part of you!"
"I DON'T WANT TO BE EMPTY! I DON'T WANT TO BE ALONE ANYMORE!" she cried in a wailing voice. Cevn heard the tortured agony in her voice and fought back his own tears as Urd burst into wretched sobbing. It was if his own pain was being wrenched from him as he watched her lose herself completely in it. And struggle to return.
Minutes passed as Urd physically shook from the naked intensity of her feelings, her face taunt with the ebb and flow of the sense of loss as it assailing her. Cevn squeezed her hand.
"Urd, you're *not* alone! You are so much more than your pain...you're a Goddess in every sense of the word. You have boundless opportunities; they encompass you with their riches. You have a life song you can sing to the farthest reaches of reality..."
Urd couldn't believe what had just happened. Her mind was regaining itself again, as if it was emerging from a storm cloud. Her whole body was shuddering...but deep inside she felt an unanticipated sense of tranquility, feelings that seemed so contrary to what she had just experienced. She was no longer being driven by her own foreboding sense of doom. Her recent profound melancholy had somehow been lifted away from her.
"What did you just do to me?" she asked, frightened by the fact that she was emotionally raw.
"I was only here with you...you were the one who broke through your pain and loneliness. Two people together can create something that is greater than both of them...something that can allow one of them to break free. No, it wasn't that you broke free...that's not what just happened. Urd, you *drove* it away. You banished that intolerable suffering, you *made* that pain leave," Cevn said, unable to think of any other explanation. If Urd felt like something 'had been done' to her, it would be difficult for her to realize that her chrysalis had been brought about by her own courage. She needed to be encouraged to accept this as a genuine emotional breakthrough, brought about through her own efforts. Because this was the truth; she had wrestled through her limitations and fears and emerged resilient.
Urd shook her head in disbelief. She felt like the suffocating fog that had been hanging over her was gone. It felt like she was gradually decompressing. She listened to birdsong tempoing against the stride of traffic noise. Silent moments passed as she regained her sense of jeunesse. She sensed that something was amiss...her hand was empty. Cevn, who had been so warm and supportive a little while ago, was withdrawing into himself. Cevn started to let go of her hand and she quickly grabbed it back.
"Don't let go!"
Cevn felt the familiar fear coming back. He was all right while Urd was caught up in her emotional overflow, safe because in a sense, he was an observer, a helper. But now that things had calmed down, he realized that he was sitting next to her...so close. Too close. All the voices in his head told him to run, because he felt that it was just too wrong for him to be sitting next to a beautiful woman like Urd. He could no longer check his fears away.
"He's caving in to that fear he has," she noticed as she read his expression of timidity. Or was it emotional withdrawal?
"In the water...why didn't you let go of me?" she asked, wondering how he could be so strong one moment...and so sheepish the next.
"I..I don't know. You tried to kill yourself...I wasn't going to just sit around and wait for you to die. Not then, and not now," he said, looking away from her. Urd gathered herself, a galleon afloat a storm-frothed ocean. She didn't want him to 'go away' to that place he recoiled to when he was afraid of her. Not after what he had just done. She needed him, level-headed instead of crazy with anxiety. The worst fear was that the intense pain she had encountered would revisit her, and she'd have to face it alone.
"Look, Mister Mortal Pseudo-psychologist! I don't want to hurt myself, or throw my life away in a lake. I *don't* feel like that anymore, so why don't you give it a rest! I feel alive, and I want to live..." Urd countered resentfully. This was getting irritating.
"It's not over yet...when you were drowning yesterday, something broke inside of me...you have no idea what I was feeling...I felt..."
"Ehhh??" Urd exclaimed, the confrontation she had readied suddenly frozen in her throat. *This* admission sounded more than simply interesting to the Norn of the Past. Cevn's voice somehow was different...
She leaned forward, inches from getting in Cevn's face, sensing that something *major* was going to force its way out of him. Maybe, just maybe, she could widen the crack in his defensiveness enough to help release it.
"What *did* you feel? Tell me!" she demanded. Cevn looked at her with an alarmed expression. All of a sudden, he realized that he was way out of his league. Urd had taken his intercession and turned it right back on him.
"This is what I get for dealing with a suicidal Goddess who has just experienced a full-on emotional explosion!" he reproached himself, feeling panicked. He reflected inside of himself, recreating the moment when he knew it was Urd that was dying in the water. He remembered how enthusiastic Urd had been when she was teaching him the God's portion of the Enigma Book. Then he recalled how Urd had worked so hard to restore his eyesight. Urd, underneath all of her character defects, possessed a very loving nature. His awareness of *that* was what hurt the most when she was dying...knowing that her loving presence would be extinguished. And that it would affect him very personally.
Cevn turned his focus to his own feelings.
"Something about her makes me felt very comfortable and threatened at the same time. Urd is totally beautiful...she is the most beautiful woman I have ever seen. I wouldn't be a hetero male if I wasn't physically attracted to her. But she's so fragile. God, I have a dissertation defense tomorrow and here I am trying to sort through my feelings. About life. About her. Why can't it just be simple for once? I really care about her...I must, because here I am talking with her despite everything she's done. But what do I feel? I don't have a clue...all I know is that she's grabbed hold of the part of my heart that is hidden from me...no one has ever done this before."
Urd watched as Cevn seemed to be fighting an internal struggle. After a few moments, he hung his head low and stared at the ground despondently.
"Urd, I shouldn't be thinking this...I'm sorry...I know that it's not your fault. I don't want you to think badly of yourself. I'm sorry...I'm just so disgusting...it's only going to be hopeless. *I'm* hopeless. I can't tell you what masters my heart, because I don't know what to feel. But I know what I feel. And I shouldn't feel it. I don't deserve to feel it...it was torn away from me. Just forget about me, forget you ever met me. I'm sorry..."
"Dammit, Cevn! You told me not to hide from my feelings, but now you're evading yours. Just say it! None of this 'I'm sorry' crap, none of this indecisiveness! You *can* do it...and you *will* do it," she challenged. She grabbed him by the shoulder and shook him vigorously, as she would when rousing Skuld from a deep slumber.
"You stood up to the Almighty when Skuld got her license suspended. So I know that you can stand up one more time and *face* whatever's inside of you...and feel your true feelings.
"What is your kokoro?" she asked in a demanding voice.
Cevn felt everything wrap him up in fear and self-loathing. Urd wasn't there, Beijing wasn't there, his dissertation wasn't there. He stared at the cracks of the sidewalk and felt the familiar intense distress fill his heart once more. He closed his eyes and gritted his teeth as it all flashed by...the pain of his life structuring itself around his all his potential futures, blockading them. When he heard Urd ask about his kokoro, he wanted to disappear into an oasis of dissemblage.
Out of the viscous buckling of his ego, a voice inside of Cevn shouted "*you're not me*!" at his pain. His own inner voice, not the voice that veiled him in gauzelike strands of self-reproach. It grew stronger, confronting all the trauma of his life, challenging his fears and depression. He realized that, for the first time in his life, he could somehow talk back to the pain. It was just a whisper...but it was a whispered challenge.
"*I'm..not..me*," he rasped in a thin, shaky voice.
Urd tilted her head, bewildered by what he had just said. This was confusing as hell! 'I'm not me,' he says. How could he not be himself? He’d have to be a moron, or stupid-faced loaded. But he doesn’t get loaded, and he seems intelligent despite his bursts of idiotic behavior. How could he think this way about himself? Unless he’s lost his mind, or lost himself.
"Unless..he..lost..himself?" she thought.
“Oh my God!” she gasped...and then suddenly she realized exactly what had happened, why he acted the way he did around her. He was like a piece of origami paper that had been folded into itself...but the resulting shape resembled nothing. Crumpled. This was what she had been searching after when she impersonated Dr. Ogawa; but she had no idea it was this much of a maiming flaw. It was breaking her heart to even consider it, but there it was.
"What are you saying?" she asked, trying to sound calm and conceal her insight.
"I'm not me...this sense of trauma, of failure, of self-disgust...isn't the real me! *This* is me...this inner voice of hope! *This* feeling is me...not all of the pain I have been carrying for all these years! There's a lot of pain, but it doesn't always have to define who I am. It almost feels like I'm somehow escaping out of its reach. Just like you did a little while ago," he explained, clenching his hands into tight fists to try and relieve his shaking.
"Urd...ever since I first met you, you somehow touched a special part of me...but, despite all we have gone through...God, I d..don't know how to say this. Okay. I want you to know this. If I could take away that Norn of the Past condition, I would in a heartbeat. But I can't. But I also think there has to be a way I can help you to somehow thwart the Ultimate Force. So that you can be with this God, or Earth Spirit, or whoever it is that you said you feel love towards. All I can promise is that I'll do my best to make it happen for you. You don't deserve to be alone forever, Urd. You deserve to have that love inside of you accepted...and reflected back to you a hundredfold. You *are* lovable, Urd...everyone is...and I think that this person that's in your heart will discover that truth. Not in the Past, but in the Now, where it *can* happen for you" he said, stealing a quick shamefaced glance at her.
His glance made Urd suspicious...but she sensed no signs of threat, harmful intent or deceit. Only caring...only kindness...only genuineness.
"If you only knew what *is* in my heart, maybe you could tell me," she thought sadly. A thousand times someone had been in her heart, all her life. But it was a haze, she didn't know who it was. She'd been searching, but she had given up that search long ago. Yet, it pained her to witness how hard he had to struggle just to reach his heart. He shuddered, and Urd realized that Cevn was silently grieving. And yet, despite his own personal agonies...he still wanted to help her! She couldn't believe he could be so borderline ridiculous in his caring, and yet she couldn't believe how it was touching her very deeply.
"Urd...this is so fucked up that I'm even thinking it, he continued. "I'm sorry that I'm even considering this…I didn't even realize it until everything that happened yesterday, and now I feel so selfish," he stammered.
"What could be so bad that he feels that much guilt?" Urd wondered, watching him seem to draw into himself, dipping his head.
"It's okay, just try to say it," was all she could offer. She'd been playing therapist with him before, but now he was really pouring every bit of his heart out to her.
"But..sometimes deep inside of me, I wish...I only wish that somehow *I* was that man in your heart. I wish that it was *me*...God, I wish it was me...because I...snff...feel that I think I can learn to love you...the way you deserve. The way that love is supposed to be, the kind of..snff..love that frees souls to be companions, to be themselves," he stuttered out. He paused for a moment, then finished.
"*That's* my kokoro..." he said in an almost inaudible voice.
Cevn quieted himself, mentally preparing for the forceful rejection that he knew was coming. In matters of love, his kokoro could never be anything more than utterly worthless. Yet, he had admitted his secret fearwish...he had become totally vulnerable. To the most beautiful crazy Goddess on the planet.
"A blow to the head wouldn't be unexpected at this point," he told himself.

* * * * * * * *

Urd felt like she had been struck by one of her own thunderbolts. Her mind filled with incredulity...but her heart was filled to the bursting point.
The Cherry Tree Spirit and Troubadour had been the loves of her youth, of her minority. But once she reached her 180th millennium, the Almighty had unexpectedly summoned her...and with a heavy spirit, He gravely informed her that her role as Norn of the Past meant that she could never again experience the love of a man in the Present. She had been shattered by this disclosure...and immediately threw herself at any young God, just to disprove it. Not a single member of the opposite sex reciprocated her attentions with any degree of affection or love. After many millennia of repeated failures, she returned to Kami-sama and begged Him to lift the 'curse' that prevented her from being in love with a fellow God. The Almighty patiently explained to her that there were aspects of the Ultimate Force that even He could not alter. She could evoke desire, yearning, and friendship in the hearts of Gods and mortals...but never could she evoke romantic Love. The only ones that could truly love her were her parents, her sisters, and her Lord. Kami-sama in His infinite compassion and mercy helped Urd to reluctantly accept her lot as best she could, for as Norn of the Past, she had taken on the most onerous of burdens.
Faced with this barrier to true romantic affection, Urd learned that the only 'affection' that she could warm up in the breasts of her fellow male Gods was desire twinned with lust. So she chose to make the best of her dilemma. By becoming a virago...very sexy, very naughty...Urd found that she could briefly catch male eyes with her own. At least this way, she could be the object of some type of male interest other than friendship.
At best, her ever-so-limited experiences of what it was like to be noticed by a man...were nothing more than pale shadows of the fondness her heart earnestly yearned for.
The self-proclaimed Goddess of Love...could never be loved!
Confronted with the fact that the prohibition against being loved, of being half of a *couple*, was permanent in its merciless reality, Urd's long mournful surrender to bitterness became a life within her life. She had lived with her loss for so long, burying and reburying her sorrow in the struggles of her heart...that it had finally flushed her of all willingness to endure the pain. That was why she wanted to die.
And now *this*!
"That's...impossible! The Ultimate Force doesn't allow it! Anyone that I feel romantic inclinations towards...cannot love me back! Cannot feel attracted to me...cannot feel lovekindness for me. Ever since I reached my Goddess adulthood, that's the way its been! There's no way that this can be happening! But...he said...but he said it," she thought with awe.
"My Lord...that's my *heart*...my Lord, he's touched my heart!" she said to herself in rapt shock. The power of her emotions was daunting...they were so intense. She was amped up in a way that she had never been before.
Then it hit her with a loud "kachin!"
"He said that he *loves* me. Does that mean that I love him?" she wondered. She felt a euphoria-like feeling warming her as the cup of happiness inside of her overflowed with joy.
"Despite the Ultimate Force, despite his own life's pains, despite the eons of loneliness in my own life, despite it all...he just offered himself to me," she thought. A further realization gripped her as Urd realized that Cevn had *saved her life* yesterday. She had taken his rescue for granted. By denying her suicidal impulses to herself, she necessarily denied his loopycrazy efforts to save her life. She had lived so long without the slightest notion of what it would be like to die...how could she pay heed to a near-death experience? She felt so ashamed.
"He risked his life to save mine and then I treated him like dirt," Urd realized with a flush of discomfort.
"He saved my life...he saved my love...he even thinks he saved himself to give me love," she marveled, speaking in a silent voice only she could hear. Urd had known all along in the past three months that her feelings seemed different around Cevn; to the point of being weird and reckless. But she never expected that *this* could happen. Her whole being simply reasoned that this was just one more time that love wasn't going to find a way to her heart...no matter what *she* felt!
"I'm so sick of crying, of feeling so hopeless inside..." he lamented in a bitter voice poignant with despondency.
Urd heard him say this, and a long-dormant part of her came to life. She hadn't been comforted by a man...she hadn't comforted a man for so long. The closest she had come to being a source of comfort was when Keiichi thought that Belldandy was going to have to return to Yggdrasil. The infamous Cherry Tree incident...and all she could do was reassure Keiichi that Bell wouldn't leave him because of some chance encounter he had with her when he was in grade school. Both wizened and deprived by the millennia, Urd looked at Cevn anew, and realized she wanted to do more than just comfort him.
Yet...within his distress, somehow Cevn was comforting *her*, Urd sensed. A silly, stupid, simple mortal with a phobia about women...a man who had been chanced into her life because Belldandy was indisposed to grant his wish request...and now he was turning her world upside down! And if the feelings he claimed were contained in his heart were true, then he had somehow pierced the impossible Ultimate Force...
It just wasn't possible that he could love her. In answer to her incredulity, she heard Belldandy's voice in the back stretches of her mind, as clear as her sister's eyes were the blue of the sky.
*"Follow your heart, my sister..."*
...and Urd almost fainted from shock as it dawned on her that *he* was that misty figure in her heart!
She *had* to tell him. Because if she could tell him, if she could somehow get the words out, then this whole experience wasn't just some crazy daydream she was having. If he could really hear her...then she would know for certain that the UF prohibition...was gone. That a miracle had happened, one that she had been wishing towards for her entire adult life.
*"Follow your heart, my sister..."*
This time it was Skuld's voice in her mind. Her dearest little sister, the one she had fought with, yelled at, teased and embarrassed. The little girl who somehow knew of...and was part of...the Future. She had even told Urd to listen to her heart. Hundreds of times...
"I don't know when it started," she started, fighting back fears and tears. "But I eventually realized that I truly, *truly* felt a change within me...towards you. It's kinda funny and sad. Sad, because my feelings seem to always trace a trap around my heart...and funny, because I would have never imagined *this* would have happened when I brought you to Japan. In your own weird and wonderful way, you've allowed me to love you...even though I could never tell anyone my suspicions. Not even myself, most of the time. Until now."
She watched him spasm with inexpectation.
"I was afraid to admit what was going on inside of me, because I knew it would just be a futile folly on my part. That I could even feel it...was an impossibility I had lived with for thousands of your life-spans. So I dismissed it as only being in my mind. You know me, the crazy one. The crazy Goddess. Funny, I really thought I *was* going crazy. Love is supposed to awaken one to hope, not the other way around. But you...you awaken hope within me, Cevn. And...unless this is some cosmic prank the UF is playing against me, I feel myself *awakened* around you. I don't even care if it is some kinda cosmic joke, b..because my feelings towards you are...feelings of love. If they weren't...I wouldn't be so afraid of them right at the moment. So, I guess...no, I *know* this means that...I've been telling myself that I'm in love with you...and not even knowing it. Until now."
"And that's *my* kokoro," Urd admitted. She hoped that her frankness would touch him as far down in his soul as possible...without scaring him to death. More than likely, he was probably shocked into paralysis. She was almost shocked into paralysis, replaying his heart-stopping confession in her mind.
For that's what it was. All the drama and emotionality aside, he had basically confessed his love for her. She felt a surge of anger, a resentment towards everything that had wronged them both. Had wronged him to the point where he had...lost...the deepmost part himself. The part of him that he needed to give, so he could feel whole. Urd sensed her whole being wanting to reach out to Cevn and put an end to his loneliness for good. Forever. Somehow, she felt that reality had given her the strength to do that. She looked at him; unable to move a muscle, he had been so heart-struck by what she had just said. Wordlessly vulnerable, she reached out and pulled him to her, holding his head against her breast and soothing his hair.
She spoke to him, calmly and confidently.
"It's okay...*you're* not alone either, Cevn. I know what I feel, honey," she said softly, then giggled to herself as she remembered how much he hated being called "honey". He was probably too distraught to even notice. She felt him shudder; his whole body quaking against her embrace. Fighting against himself, tremoring his loneliness into her. He gradually relaxed and with a sigh leaned into her hug, sobbing. Urd felt his arms reach around her back as he hugged himself to her even more tightly...and realized that the flowering of her heart...had been wordlessly accepted.
She smiled mellowly as her tears fell against his hair.

* * * * * * * *

Cevn felt totally empty...totally emptied out.
"I just told Urd the feeling that was at the innermost core of my being. She's a beautiful Goddess and I'm only a mortal. I have so many defects...too much wormwood in my cup. It'll never happen...but at least I told her my true feelings. Feelings buried so deep that even I didn't fully sense that they were there," he bitterly admitted, reckoning that his situation was hopeless.
Then Urd started to answer him...and he felt like he was caught in a blast-wind when she said that she loved him.
"I can't accept what she said. She just said...that she feels love...towards me?" he thought, hoisted by his disbelief. But Urd's words seemed to touch him on a heart level, challenging everything he knew about himself. About her. About love. As he replayed her words over and over in his mind, his heart gradually felt fired with a swanpool of feelings...with relief, with gratitude, with joy. It was surreal and clear at the same time. Like waking up from a long nightmare.
And then he felt a pair of arms reach around his shoulders and pull him forward. Fragrant platinum-blonde tresses of hair fell softly on his cheek as his head was gently rested against a soft bosom. He felt his whole body start shaking, as all the fear and hopelessness spasmed him harshly, not wanting him to feel, not wanting him to believe. He gripped his heart tight until the storms of disbelief and pain passed. Exhausted, he collapsed against her and closed his eyes, the tears flowing freely as Urd gently rocked him, stroking his long hair with her fingers, letting him melt into her.
Cevn felt like he was abruptly jolted into a dream world. Urd had done the thing that he least expected. It was too unreal...too anomalous. Too much like a dream, the kind of dream that keeps coming back during waking hours. She spoke to him, calmly and confidently assuring him that this was her dream too. Instead of panicking at the close physical contact with a woman, he squeezed himself against Urd so closely that he could hear her heartbeat. He felt Urd shudder in his arms and knew that she was crying too.
"I can't believe it this is happening. That someone in the whole of creation wants me! And of all the beings in existence, of all the women on this planet, it's Urd!" Incredulous, Cevn lifted his head up...and saw that she was just a breath away from his face. He thought of the sunburst of gratitude she had just given him, and realized that for her, he had somehow become a dreamline to her heart. His heart's ambition was clear to him; he had told Urd that he would devote himself to freeing her from the lonesome millennia she had endured. Straightening himself up and gulping his fear down, Cevn pulled her tight against him and hugged her with as much affection as he could convey. Urd looked at him with a shocked expression, and then smiled wanly and rested her head against his shoulder. A few minutes passed and then she looked up at him with an enchanting expression. Her eyes were emerald-turquoise with hints of brown and blue...they were absolutely beautiful...and they were smiling with unabashed joy. He felt like he was swimming in them.
"Urd...I know now why I was brought into your life. To love you. That is why it was you who received my request for a wish...instead of just any Goddess from the Relief Office. That is why I am here with you now. I promise you my heart...it's yours from now on!" he said, mounting his increasing confidence with a smile. This Goddess had become a harbor for a lifetime of prayered whisperings. A harbor...and a profound answer to them.
Urd looked at him, touched by his promise...and then was stunned at what it implied. He had *heard* her! He had truly heard what she had offered up out of the deepest part of her heart, and had reflected it back to her. Without a doubt, her feelings had touched Cevn's soul. These emotions, these intensities that she was feeling...it was all real! As in "the Ultimate Force can kiss my ass, because I am in love" real. As in "this changes everything" real. As in "my sisters are going to be so happy for me" real. She thought of Belldandy and Skuld...which brought another heave of sobbing to pass through her. And Cevn *still* held her, letting her cry against his shoulder, letting her pour her feelings into him. Just like Keiichi did with Bell whenever her sister needed him.
"He's mine, he's all mine!" she thought with glee, realizing that Cevn was going to be to her like Keiichi was to Belldandy. Her elation made her feel giddy...and silly.
After the embrace, the two of them sat wordlessly on the park bench, bedazzled by their shared discovery of their mutual endearment. No words could frame the sparkling of their hearts. Finally, Urd broke the silence.
"My sisters are going to *shit* when they find out about this! They'll totally freak out!" she remarked, then started giggling. Cevn joined in, and a moment later they were boisterously laughing, startling everyone that walked past them. They laughed maniacally until they were both almost hoarse.
"This is too far-fetched to be reality...but it *is* real!" Urd thought privately as her giggling subsided. "You're going to have watch out for Skuld...she may not take kindly to the idea of *both* her sisters being involved with mortal men," she cautioned him.
"Yeah, she's probably going to bugged by this." It was lame, but it was a joke. Urd offered him the courtesy of a token snicker. Cevn looked at her with a solemn expression.
"Urd, I was planning to deliver my dissertation, and then just disappear in the Gobi Desert. I wasn't planning to go back home," he admitted...then realized that he just called Makuhari "home" for the first time since he arrived in China.
"I left because of you," they both said at the same time. They looked at each other in surprise, and then Urd giggled again...they were thinking in synch already. She pointed at him.
"You first..."
"OK. After I found out that you were impersonating Dr. Ogawa, I felt that I had been victimized. I've been strong for myself over the years of my recovery, so much so that I was confident that I wouldn't ever be victimized again. But when it happened, I completely lost my senses. I couldn't defend myself from myself, if you know what I mean. I assumed that everybody would find out all those deep dark secrets that I had disclosed to you...then they would jointly reject me. Then I would once more wind up hopeless and alone. So I decided to cut my losses and go to China early...that way I could say that it was my choice to be alone...instead of being driven out of everyone's lives..." Urd interrupted him and grasped him on the shoulders.
"Cevn, I want you to know that I am *really* sorry that you had to experience that. If you and I are to start being an *us*, then you're going to need to forgive me. I can sense in your heart that you haven't yet."
"Yes, that's true...but I've come a long way in accepting your little mistakes...and your big ones," he noted. Urd frowned at him with a mock-angry look.
"Anyway, I came here with the idea that I had no life to go back to in Japan, hence I was going to the Gobi to discover myself. Or maybe disappear forever. So that's pretty much my story," he finished.
"Your turn..."
Urd sighed, realizing that she wasn't the only one with suicide on their mind. She'd have to really talk to him about that. But not now.
"This is going to be really hard for me to talk about. I impersonated Dr. Ogawa because I cared about you. I couldn't stand it, seeing that how you were imprisoned by your past. I am very much in tune with the Past, y'know. I knew you were lonely and I wanted to help. At first I did it out of sheer curiosity. You know me...wanting to 'fix' everybody around me. Initially, I just wanted to find out why you were so afraid of women...so afraid of me. And other things, like how you knew I had a Second Class License. I had never seen any man react to me the way you did on the day I brought you to Japan. But somewhere along the way, I stopped seeing you as a challenge and started thinking of you as someone I cared about. That I might be falling in love with you...the real you. I don't know how to say this other than just saying it: all I've had to go on is fantasies. I could always fantasize about being in love and being loved back."
"I think I understand," Cevn ventured. Urd was bemused by his cute effort to try and understand her, even though his expression betrayed his confusion.
"But the feeling was different with you. So I had to keep the charade up, I had to find out if my feelings were just fantasies, or they were honest. Something I couldn't do back at the temple. The more you opened up to me, the more I wanted to be there for you. I think that's what clued me in that I was truly feeling you here in my heart. Then you found out about my disguise...and you blew out of there, blew right past me. There I was standing in that hallway, knowing that I would never see you again. That tore me apart. I knew that I had blown any chance of ever being with you, or even being around you. So I felt that there was nothing left for me in Makuhari. I was mad at you, at myself...and I felt some real pain. The lovelorn kind. All the hurt that centered on being Norn of the Past, being unable to love in the Present, it all got torn open again. I knew that I couldn't go home...I couldn't stay there knowing that my actions drove you away. And I knew that they would find out eventually. So I got really drunk and decided to go to Switzerland...and then I found myself here instead."
"Switzerland? Serves you right for getting drunk," Cevn teased. Urd didn't quite know how to take that remark. Cevn was so weird with sake. She already felt a tinge of bitterness as the reality of their relationship made itself known.
"This thing between us is going to need some work if it is going to succeed. I need booze as a powerup source, regardless of how he feels about it," she thought with a flash of worry.
"Eventually, we're going to have to hash that aspect of our lives out. And some other things," she said in a determined voice. "But not today."
"Urd...do you plan to go back home?"
"Just like you, I didn't plan on it...but now I wonder..." Cevn felt exasperated at their mutual evasiveness towards returning to Makuhari.
"This is ridiculous...we *belong* there! I have to finish my dissertation defense this week and then I can fly back. Would you be willing to stay another week?"
"Are you kidding? Honey, you better tell that roommate of yours that you're having an overnight guest for the last few days you're in China. Better yet, why don't you kick him out and give him some hotel money," Urd said, smiling seductively. Cevn felt a definite apprehensiveness towards Urd's self-invitation to spend the night in his dorm room.
"Urd, that idea *really* scares me...I need to let you know this," he admitted. Urd looked at him softly, realizing that he was still quite jittery. She herself was jittery. With a hint of disappointment, she decided that she could be patient for him to loosen up.
"It's understandable, considering what he's gone through in his short mortal life," she reminded herself.
"Roommate? How the hell did you know that I have a roommate?"
"Hey, I didn't become the Eldest Norn on a lark, y'know," she taunted him. Cevn and Urd laughed again. They were still off-and-on hugging each other on the bench.
"Hey, it's getting late in the day and you have a dissertation to deliver tomorrow. We'd better get back, honey...hee hee, I get to call you 'honey' now!" Urd snickered triumphantly, and then sang the words out at the end. She almost broke into raucous laughter it when she saw the irritated look come across Cevn's face. They both stood up. Cevn noticed that Urd was addressing him as Cevn, instead of the usual Cevn-san.
"We need to make a call to Makuhari when we get to my dorm room. There's some Goddesses there who miss their older sister," Cevn stated. He tried to envision the joy on Belldandy and Skuld's faces when they would receive *that* call.
"Cevn...don't forget that they miss you too. You've really made a big impact on our lives in just a few months," Urd challenged him. She was aware once more how it was so like Cevn to ignore the fact that others love him.
"I'm going to have to work with him on that," Urd promised herself.
Urd decided that she couldn't wait any longer 'to work on him' and darted forward, intending to give Cevn a quick kiss on the lips by surprise.

*Bump*

"What was *that*?" Cevn asked.
"A kiss, you baka!" Urd replied smartly.
"No...I meant the 'bump'!" he said, rolling his eyes. Cevn didn't know whether to be more astonished by Urd's attempt to kiss him, or about whatever bumped him as she tried. His wide-eyed expression was almost amusing to Urd.
Urd felt a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. She tried to grasp his hand, only to feel her hand repulsed as it came within a couple of inches of his. There was some kind of invisible force around him.
He tried to touch Urd on the cheek with his hand; his hand was brushed away like it was touching metal. It was as if Urd had some kind of force field around her all of a sudden. He looked at Urd with his mouth dangling open with befuddlement.
"Cevn...I think the Ultimate Force has asserted itself. I can't seem to touch you. It's like there's a barrier around my body that prevents it!" she reasoned. He responded by trying to hold her hands...with the same results.
"We can't touch!" she shouted in angry frustration. Urd clenched her fists at her side.
"Dammit...I don't believe this! After a good part of a hundred thousand years, I fall in love...and I can't even *kiss* him!" she shouted.
The immensity of the figure of time that Urd stated staggered Cevn mentally. He could relate to her disappointment despite his comparatively minuscule mortal years of loneliness.
"Urd, I would have kissed you so happily," he thought.
"Even if the Ultimate Force won't let us touch, I *know* that we already have touched...our hearts have touched," Cevn said, trying to console Urd. Urd was taking this set back much worse than he was.
"I think I know what happened. Earlier, when we had admitted how we felt towards each other, we were touching. You were holding my hands *before* we...talked. So there was no reason for the UF to keep us from physical contact. But once we broke contact, the Ultimate Force intervened to keep us apart. I don't really understand what's happening, but that's my best guess. When we get back, I'll ask my sisters to help me find a solution," Urd said, trying to sound confident.
But deep down, she harbored major doubts that anything could be done.

* * * * * * * *

An hour later, they reached BeiDa. Urd was all eyes as she walked up to the fourth floor of Shao Yuan and entered Cevn's dorm room. It was crammed with boxes of paper and books. Cevn's bed was on the right side of the room...she sat down on it, feeling exhausted all of a sudden. Cevn handed her the phone and smiled.
"Feel free to take a nap after calling them. I'm going to take a shower...the hot water's on and I smell like a jailcell. I don't know how you were able to put up with it."
"The same way I've put up with you since I brought you to Japan," Urd snapped back without missing a beat. Cevn shook his head and left the room. Urd smiled to herself with embarrassment; her comeback sounded almost wifey. Fortunately it had went right over his head. Her light-heartedness was quickly passing as she recognized that this call was going to be *hard*. Bittersweet with anxiety, and yet relieved, she phoned home.

* * * * * * * *

Skuld was worried about her sister. Belldandy had seemed *a lot* different since she got back from her last roadtrip search for Urd. It wasn't readily apparent...in fact she didn't notice it until a couple days later. Belldandy seemed to *glow* with some kind of energy that she didn't have before. But it was the little things that made Skuld suspicious.
Belldandy would hum little ditties to herself in the kitchen, much more frequently than before. When she was around Keiichi, she was almost epiphanous. Skuld noticed that her elder sister was slowly refurbishing the house, adding a family picture section on one wall with portraits of her and Keiichi, plus all their friends and her sisters. When she went out the door with Keiichi, she would actually walk so close to him that she was leaning shoulder-to-shoulder with him, her arm tucked under his. Before, the most they ever did was hold hands when they walked out of the house. Whenever Belldandy slept in Keiichi's room, that next morning she would be extra cheerful and warm to everyone in the house. Sickeningly warm and cheerful.
Skuld emerged from her lab and walked down the hall to the dining room. Belldandy was sitting at the table, reading a magazine.
"Since when did she read magazines?" Skuld wondered. Then she caught the title of the magazine.
"Primadonna Lady!" she said aloud in surprise.
Belldandy suddenly flipped the magazine down so Skuld wouldn't notice. She smiled innocently at her younger sister.
"When did you start to read *mortal magazines*?" Skuld grilled her testily.
"Well..I..uh..I just wanted to know more about this mortal world. After all, we've been here a while and we have to live on the Earthrealm. We need to know what makes mortals so...human," she answered matter-of-factly. Skuld heard evasiveness threading every syllable of her sister's explanation. She screwed her face in an expression of disdain.
"And you're going to learn about *this* from 'Primadonna Lady'?" Skuld said in disgust. "I don't think so! What's in one of those magazines anyway?"
Skuld suddenly made a grab for the zine. Belldandy pulled it away just as her fingertips brushed it.
"Giveit giveitgevit give it!" Skuld shouted angrily.
Belldandy felt embarrassed...she knew that she was blushing. Skuld was looking at her with *that* look...the one that transforms her angelic delicate features, brushing them with a child-like accusatory stare. She had figured that Skuld would spend most of the day in her lab...leaving her to read undisturbed.
Megumi had caught her reading a different women's magazine yesterday and didn't say a word. In fact, Megumi winked at her.
"Why would she do that?" Belldandy wondered, remembering the curious reaction of Keiichi's sister.

**Ring!**

Skuld looked apprehensively at Belldandy and backed away from the phone. Belldandy smiled soothingly at her sister...Skuld was *still* frightened by the phone after the call from Kami-sama.
Belldandy picked up the receiver.
"Hey guys, uh...how are things back in Makuhari?"
Belldandy felt her heart screech to a halt. Speechless, she pointed towards the phone and mouthed "Urd" to her younger sister. Skuld dashed off lightning-fast to the living room to grab the nearest of the remote phones in the house.
"Urd! I..is that really you?" Belldandy asked.
"Of course it is," the voice on the other end of the phone answered matter-of-factly. "And I didn't even call collect!"
"Urd...do you have *any* idea how much we have been worried about you?!" Belldandy shouted into the phone, her emotions pivoting between resentment and relief.
"It's just like her to call us up out of the blue...and then act like nothing's happened," she observed with disdain. Belldandy looked over to see that Skuld was turning red-faced as she walked towards the dining room with the remote phone held to her ear.
"Urd, where do you get off leaving us here without telling us where you were going! Isn't that a little irresponsible? No, that is major bigtime totally irresponsible! In fact, that was a really shitty thing you did!" Skuld yelled into the phone as she angrily paced back and forth near the dinner table.
"Skuld!" Belldandy urged with a surprised voice, astonished at her little sister's vulgarity.
"And furthermore..snff..I've really missed you so much Big Sister...*that's* why I'm so angry! You have no idea what we have done to try and find you! Belldandy and Keiichi and Megumi and Genji searched *all over* Japan. Then I..I..snff..built a machine and I found you in Beijing. Elder Sister and Keiichi were planning to come and get you next week."
"Who's Genji?" Urd asked. Belldandy tried to calm Skuld down by interrupting an upcoming Skuld-blast of words.
"Urd, there's been...some changes since you were gone...you'll just have to see for yourself when you get here," Belldandy explained. A sinking feeling heeled her words...Belldandy had simply assumed that Urd was going to come back. What if she had decided to stay in China? Steeling herself, she bluntly aired *the* question that had plagued all of their minds for most of the summer.
"*Are* you coming back, Big Sister?"
There was a silence on the end of the phone. Keiichi came out from the hallway, and Belldandy told him it was Urd on the line. His face brightened with excitement as he walked behind her and wrapped his arms around her waist.
"I'm so happy for you, my love," he whispered in her ear as he kissed her cheek.
"I'm happy for me too, now that we don't have go on any more search missions for that missing miscreant of a Goddess," Belldandy whispered in his ear.
Belldandy heard sobbing on the other end of the line.
"Yes...I'm definitely coming back..snff..I've worried you so much. I've been such an ass! You don't know how much I've missed all of you. I..I tried to ignore it, but I got really homesick. You all must think I'm terrible."
Belldandy and Skuld looked at each other tellingly, sensing some degree of genuine remorse in their older sister's voice...but not enough by any means.
"We'll talk about that later," Belldandy said in her gentlest soothing voice. Aware of the delicacy of this call, she didn't want to risk getting Urd so upset that she would change her mind about returning. The three of them silently held their phones in the dining room.
"Belldandy, Skuld...I ran into Cevn here. He's okay, Keiichi, and he'll be returning with me. We plan to catch a plane there next weekend. He's got some huge project that he has to present, there's boxes all over the place."
"Uh, Urd...*where* are you?" Belldandy asked.
"I'm calling from his room. He's in the shower."
Belldandy and Keiichi heard a loud "thud" over their phone. They looked into the living room, and saw Skuld looking blankly back at them. The phone was lying on its side on the floor. Little by little, the youngest Norn's face began to lend expression to her deep dismay as her long black hair formed a corona around her.
"HENTAI!!! ECCHI!!! PERVERT!!! BAKA!!!"
They both regarded her younger sister with shock. Despite Skuld's almost near-nil Goddess powers, the interior of the living room was plastered with the resentful cast of her assumptions, rendered into bright angry grafittios. As she read the words, Belldandy knew that she wasn't that far behind Skuld with her own racing bent of suppositions. She had to get a grip on herself; this certainly wasn't one of those lurid love-hotel scenarios she found in some of the mortal magazines she was reading...
"I met up with him yesterday. By the way, things have changed on my end...I've really had a massive change happen in my life. It's a surprise," Urd said cheerily over the phone. Belldandy felt herself apluck with curiosity...something nice must have happened to Urd and now she wants to come home.
"A surprise?" Belldandy asked, amused when she noticed that Skuld had overheard her and then immediately swooped the phone back up to her ear, her angry paralysis of a moment earlier already forgotten.
"What is your surprise?" Skuld asked impatiently, "And why are you in *his* room, too? I wanna know right now..." Urd's voice cut her off in mid-sentence.
"Hey, I could talk to you guys for hours, but I've gotta go...I love you both very dearly. You too, Keiichi...I know that you're there listening. You guys take care and I'll see you in a week. I'll call every day to check in," Urd assured them. Skuld felt relieved that she had promised to phone back daily.
Belldandy felt jittery with excitement. This had been such a wonderful day for all of them. First, Skuld had located Urd, then this evening, Urd called home. Then she felt a tinge of worry...she had forgotten to tell Urd about the warding spell Skuld had detected.

* * * * * * * *

After nightfall, Keiichi asked Belldandy if she wanted to take an evening walk with him. She nodded her head and grabbed an light summer jacket, and then they slipped out the front door. As soon as they left, Skuld got a mischievous look on her face as she regarded the magazine. Belldandy had set it face down, open to the page she had been reading. Skuld picked it up. Her eyes widened in surprised anxiety as she read the title: "How to Drive your Mate Wild in Bed!" She felt a hot flush come to her cheeks.
"E..Elder Sister!" she shouted lividly, venting her anger in the empty house. She accidentally ripped the magazine in two, she was so angry.
"Ooops!" she said, putting a gloved hand to her mouth.
This was *too* much! Could Elder Sister and Keiichi be doing this...thing? The disgusting mortal body thing? Then she shuddered as she connected the fact that Urd had mentioned that she was in Cevn's room.
"Oh please, Kami-sama, not *her* too!" she fervently wished.

* * * * * * * *

I looked out the window across the dimly-lit campus. Urd had crashed out on my bed moments after she called home. I turned my head to look at her sleeping form. We had stopped by the campus medical unit on the way: me, to get stitches where Urd had beaned me with the rock; Urd, to check for residual effects from her near-drowning. Urd was exhausted, and I wasn't too far behind.
My thoughts jumbled at the sight of her in my room. I would have never dreamed things would turn out this way. I felt sympathetic towards her...it must have been rough for her to call home after all this time and admit that she had been in the wrong. She must have felt like a turtle without a shell.
"Vacation's over...it's time to go home and face the music," I thought. Both of us would have to face up to our little fear-driven escapade.
My 'vacation' was almost over too. I would also have to talk to my friends back at Makuhari and meet their resentments head on. But right now, I had to concentrate on finishing strong with my dissertation. My eyes were stinging from the effects of the water yesterday. Tomorrow, I would face the arduous process where the members of my dissertation committee members would interrogate me about my research. The last four hours I spent poring over my work, trying to remember everything in it, didn't help much either. I needed to all but memorize the whole thing to be adequately prepared for tomorrow. But there was no way that I could do *that*.
I had to give myself credit. I was offering a dissertation in a second language in a foreign country...after being sent there by another foreign country. I wondered if the US had any records of me, or did those just disappear along with all other traces and memories. I had two English versions of my dissertation handy, just in case.
Learning Japanese and then Chinese was one of the most difficult things I had ever attempted. I thought that advanced physics, Latin and Greek, and calculus were bad...but memorizing all those characters was worse. I struggled for years before I became comfortable enough to be confident. My professors in both subjects had worked really hard to educate me. The fact that I was able to lecture and seminar in both was no small feat on my part. It felt strange...the night before my doctoral defense and I was vacillating towards confidence.
It was nothing short of a miracle that I survived my drug addiction. One episode in particular splintered my attention. I had been out walking in the middle of a freezing blizzard, feeling hopeless and empty inside. I was 16 at the time, going through an intense case of alienation and teenage angst compounded by my full-blown drug habit. I was dopesick because I had no heroin, so I was high-dosed on LSD. For some reason, I decided that I was just going to keep walking until I froze to death...because I had read somewhere that freezing to death wasn't a particularly painful way to go. The next day, I came to in a hospital. A city worker bulldozing the snow-covered streets had found an arm sticking out of a snowdrift after he plowed though it. It was me. That was where my drug addiction had brought me. But that wasn't the exclamation point to my active using. I endured two more years of it, crushing my life in fistfuls of syringes.
Now I was in China with eleven years clean from drugs. Despite being handicapped by severe depression and all sorts of trauma, I was going for my Ph.D. tomorrow. I sighed and looked out the window again at the campus. Because China had a much lower living standard than the US, the campus itself wasn't illuminated by the panorama of bright lights like a typical American or Japanese University. This was the most prestigious educational institute in China...and yet at night it was much more poorly lit than N.I.T.
"Someday, I think, this will change. With ambitious students like Lin, it might be in the next decade...but it *will* change," thought. Bone-tired, I heard Urd walk up behind me quietly.
"You don't know how much I wish I could hold you right now, Cevn," she said reflexively. I knew I jumped a little at her sudden vox, because she tittered a giggle.
"I may be crazy to think this...but right now I wouldn't mind that, Urd. I could even give you a good backrub too. I bet that you've probably never had one...at least in the mortal sense. This *is* frustrating!" I said as I snapped a pencil between my fingers. Urd sighed and whispered in my ear.
"That's it! It's really getting late...you should be coming to bed," she said in soft, but commanding voice.
I felt a rush of panic as I realized that my roommate was gone and that I was alone with Urd. Sex-starved Urd. Voluptuous, blatantly sexy Urd. Giddy with newly-found love Urd. Urd who said she had been unattached for almost a hundred thousand years. I envisioned her as a hungry cat and myself as a small mouse, then I chuckled at the analogy. Being honest with myself, Urd could take my breath away just by sitting at the dinner table. Now that our hearts had touched...
...Urd wasn't the only one who had been love-starved. Exhausted, I thought that it was entirely possible that she was the cat...and I was a tiger. I bet that would really freak her out! She smiled at me enigmatically, and I felt a shiver of embarrassment; what if she had 'heard' my brief burst of ecchi thoughts in her mind?
"Here's where the clumsy who-sleeps-in-which-bed stressout and tapdance begins," I thought wearily.
"Urd, you can sleep in my bed and I'll sleep on the floor," I offered, trying to be the gentleman. Actually, trying to keep from facing my fears. I was afraid that Urd would cut loose with some kind of attempt to turn this evening into a decidedly erotic direction. Visions of somatic nudity danced in my head.
"I am definitely *not* ready for this!" I firmly admitted to myself. I didn't think anything could stress me out any worse than my dissertation. Ironically, *this* situation managed to stoke the ovenfires of my anxiety even more.
"Are you kidding? No way!" she replied directly. "I will *not* permit you to sleep on the floor on the night before such an important event in your life!" she said, assuming a protective air.
"Okay, then you gotta sleep in my roommate's bed," I replied, drawing the boundary.
Urd looked at me with a scornful face.
"Why?"
She'd only uttered a single word...possibly the first word ever spoken by a human. Perhaps the first word that bounced off the cavewalls of antediluvian history. The word that kept bouncing, no matter how many generations of mankind had tried to interpret its course and dialectic. I felt like thumping her on the head with one of my books...how could she ask that?
"What an idiot!" I thought, resentful that she had ignored everything she had learned about my past. Forgiving her because she was who she was, because she had been through a hell of loneliness. Still, that single word was almost a demand. Or even a command.
"You idiuh..uh..I think that maybe a little bit of your younger sister's naivety has rubbed off on you. Or did you forget my life history, *Dr. Ogawa*," I sharply retorted. Urd winced as I called her by the name she assumed when she impersonated my therapist. But the point was made clear. Or so I thought.
"Cevn, didn't you say today that you were brought into my life to love me? Well, I need some love *right now*! I'm still feeling pretty freaked out...I don't know why, but I am. Guess this is what happens when you've been single 90,000 years, and then someone suddenly pretty much confesses that they've fallen in love with you! My heart just had a cave-in a few hours back because someone heard me confess my love for them. I'm totally glad that we talked and got honest with each other about our feelings. I'm still in absolute shock about that...right down to the currents of Soul in my being! But, I feel as if something is still wrong with me. I feel as if someone has cast a spell on me to make me feel horrible. I need you to take a big risk and sleep with me in the same bed. *Just* sleep, mind you! We can't touch, because of the Ultimate Force...and you have no idea how much I want to touch you. How I want to touch you. But, because we can't touch, you don't have to worry your little head about things getting out of hand, at least for today," she pointed out, looking at me with a Byzantine expression at the end of her explanation.
I shook my head "no", still feeling awkward and afraid at the same time. But I challenged my fears...and realized that maybe I was being an idiot. I was all caught up about why she couldn't take my 'woman phobia' into account, while here I was ignoring her feelings. Her *heartfelt* feelings.
"C'mon, I *really* need you to give me something to go on. Then, unexpectedly, she walked right up to me, stopping just a few cm short of my face, and looked deeply into my eyes with a searching expression. As I was bathed in her emeraldine eyes for the second time today, I knew that there was no way in the world that I could refuse her now; and I knew that I'd be safe with her, safer than I had been in a long long time.
"Urd...how can I say no to that? I know I said that I needed to learn how to love you, so I guess tonight I'm going to learn to trust being in bed with a woman."
"I'm not a woman...I'm a Goddess!" Urd said, imitating Skuld's "I am not a kid!" voice. I laughed at this...I had forgotten about her knack for vocal impersonation.
Urd sat down on my single bed and pulled herself under the covers, patting the space on the bed when I was supposed to sleep. At least she wasn't trying to sleep naked or something. She was fully dressed, as was I. I climbed under the covers and lay down next to her. I was so tired. Emotionally, I had been a human riot the past two days. I knew that tomorrow would be one of the most stressful days in my life. I felt sleep climbing into my consciousness almost as soon as I hit the pillow. Emerging from the myriad background noises, I focused on the rhythm of sleepsoft breathing right next to me...a sound that I never would have imagined hearing again. I sat up my bed, torn between gratitude and tears. I knew that I could stay up all night; this had been one of the most joyfully overwhelming days in my life. I laid back down on my dorm bed, and felt her breath against my face, which caused me to cry silently because I didn't want to wake her.
But, tomorrow...
I spent a few minutes winding my tension back down to a bearable level. I studied her face, feeling healed of all my pain as she rested against the pillow. She had *healed* me; at this moment in time I could not sense anything except joyful serenity. Closing my eyes, I hoped for a few hours of sleep.
The last words I heard were a whispered "I love you."

* * * * * * * *

Megumi had phoned Sora's house a dozen times in the past few days. Each time, Sora would hang up on her...or her parents would say that she wasn't home. Megumi wanted to set things right, but was unsure of how to accomplish it. How could she explain Aoshima's obsession with her at the restaurant...without divulging the *true cause*? If she were to tell Sora about the 'beauty enhancing spell', she would have to reveal the secret of the Goddesses. But if she didn't tell Sora the truth, she couldn't possibly excuse what happened last weekend. It was impossible to try and explain it in terms of normal-range behavior.
It was bad enough dealing with Genji, who had just found out that Belldandy and Skuld were much more than he thought they were. Watching his shocked face, she remembered how shocked *she* was way back when Belldandy first came into their lives. Genji had taken the revelation that Bell and Skuld were Goddesses quite diffidently at first; withdrawing from all of them for a short while. Megumi silently thanked Keiichi for his pep talks with Genji, which soon brought him around again. She noticed that Genji was gradually become less tense after these discussions with her older brother.
But she was worried that the breach in her friendship with Sora would become a permanent one if she didn't take action right away.
"How can I get Sora to realize that the mishap last weekend was not *my* fault?" she mused over and over again. Megumi sat at her desk, doodling on the piece of paper. Gradually, a plan formed in her mind. Bit by bit, she realized that she *could* demonstrate the power of the spell Belldandy had put on her. If she did this, then Sora would have no recourse to argument. After all, she *didn't* like Aoshima one bit, especially in a romantic sense.
"Poor Keiichi..." Megumi thought as she composed her plan.

* * * * * * * *

Mara was dressed in a black lace chemise with a red leather miniskirt and a red short-sleeved blazer. She was finally able to put on her red and black tennis boots as her foot casts had come off when she rematerialized her mortal shell this morning. She still needed the crutches to get around, but it would be a matter of a few days and she would be mobile again.
She viewed the image on the screen with surprise and disappointment. It displayed Urd and Cevn sitting together on a bench in Beijing in what looked like an embrace. The next several images showed Urd staring upwards with a blissful countenance. Mara felt her stomach churn with disgust as she saw the look on Urd's face. Could she have fallen in love with the pseudo-Demon Cevn?
"I can't believe it! She..that she would go for *him*? I was always wary of Urd, she seemed to be the smart one of the three...but this just proves that she is as stupid as her other sisters. Falling in love with a mortal...bah! Yeeesh!!" she mutter to Slayer, who was perched on her desk.
Mara felt a momentary flash of anger when she realized that this new situation meant that Urd was probably emerging from her deep desolate emotional state. Mara had wanted Urd's misery to be long and drawn out, in proportion to all the times Urd had defied her. Despite the ward that Mara had caused to be cast on her, Urd had found happiness. The Demoness clutched at her belly as her stomach growled, a fitting metaphor for her frustration.
Mara had heard a rumor this morning from Demon Central's Grief Office that Urd actually tried to take her own life yesterday.
"I wish I coulda seen that," she said out loud to the other Sere-Hawks perched on the mini charnel tree. Mara envisioned Urd's last moments of existence before her spirit was snuffed out and collected by the Reaper. But her reaction was bittersweet...in a way Mara was glad that Urd hadn't died because she was a good opponent. This kept the game interesting for Mara.
The game of Grief. The game she would eventually win, once she successfully summoned Isilblius.
"Urd...you may be feeling good now, but having a mortal for a boyfriend will make you exquisitely vulnerable in so *many* delicious ways. Now, I can hurt *you* by hurting him," she exclaimed to the screen.
In fact, with an elegant twist of her mind, she realized that she could make Urd squirm by threatening or harming her mortal charge. Even more so, now that Urd had feelings for him. Just like she did with Belldandy. Urd had a much shorter fuse than Belldandy, which meant that Mara could easily goad her into impulsivity. An impulsive Urd was a defenseless Urd, as far as Mara was concerned. Remembering their small-deity-kid days, back when the half-Demon Urd and she could mingle when Urd made her mysterious visits to Vanagdrasil, Mara recalled that whenever Urd acted with spontaneous intent, she *always* got over on the Eldest Norn.
"This may be a blessed turn of events, but I know that I can gain leverage on the Eldest Norn...and make her pay for all the recent insults she's gotten away with!" she swore. Urd had been stripped of her powers, while Mara had only been demoted to Second Class Demon powers. Not enough to take on Belldandy, but more than enough to wreck havoc on Urd and Skuld.
If Urd was on a pink cloud due to recent events, then her guard would be down. Mara relished the thought that a strike at Urd now would be deliciously painful, since she was probably almost silly with joy. Mara decided to make one more call to Vanagdrasil and rein in some more favors from her Demon comrades at the Grief Office.

* * * * * * * *