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The Gloaming of the Gods	By : Gracelynn Category: Harry Potter > General > General Views: 1678 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 9
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- 11
How brittle
time can seem when it stretches out like a field of ice between lovers. For as
kind as it can be, it gives equal measure in pain. If Freya thought she could
bear away the sharpness er ler love in the river of fluid and blood that flowed
from the thighs of childbirth, she was quick to learn a different truth. For as
she died and was born again with tiny iny man-child that emerged in slippery,
victorious violence from her womb, she felt the widening of her heart and
realized that one fed the other, as love always breeds more terrifying love. So
in the long joyous nights when she worshipped over the sturdy limbs of her son
she poured all the love she was not free to give to Albus into the child. And
if she was not completely happy, she was at least fulfilled; and for awhile,
consumed as she was by the needs of a baby, her sleep was sound, and dreamless.

When the
boy was older, and Freya stepped into the dream world once more, her keener
heart, honed by more love and time and the fear of love�s shadows, felt the
edge of despair that cut its way into their world of grass and water and damp
soil yielding to the press of bodies. It was more than the sadness of yearning
fulfilled only in the dark hours, as they unraveled all the pretense and armor
that had kept them clothed all the day; it was the serpent wriggling through
the loosened threads as they discarded them. It insinuated between them,
tainted the fabric with the dishonor that crept in on tiny, cunning feet. And
always, the first moment Freya looked into her husband�s brown eyes the next
morning, she ached for him; the kind man whose wife would not be unfaithful
corporeally, but could not be faithful in her heart or in her dreams.
Sometimes, when she looked at one of his canvases or watched him hold an apple
for their son to bite into, she loved him. And at times the smudges and small
specks of oil paint on his brown knuckles gave her the urge to touch him, and
the cin oin one of his white teeth made her heart contract painfully in
affection and regret that she could not give him more.

~~**~~

�What is this place?�
His fingertips drug their slow weight over her skin, retracing, again and
again, the path his mouth had taken down her torso.

�It is whatever you
want it to be. This is your dream, Albus. I just meet you here.�

�Then this is Elysium,
and we are both dead already.�

�We are both here and
back in our separate beds.�

�Neither here nor
there.� He stared up beyond the marshy grasses, away from her.

�Together. We are
together, at this moment.�

�Are we?� The sky was
an indiscriminate blue above them, all the colors of their small world muted as
if in deference to the vital, primal luminosity of their nakedness. �I wonder,
at what cost?�

She fought the
reaction to roll away from the vacancy in his voice. He was far away, further
even than dreams, and she felt her loneliness keenly in the circle of his arms.

�Let the cost be mine
to pay.�

�Ah, Freya. It does
not work that way. The burden of guilt falls heavy on my soul as much as yours.
And all that I cannot give you that is given by another weighs down my heart no
matter where I am; dreaming or waking.�

�Then send me away, if
it will spare your heart, Albus.�

�It would not matter.
You are my heart.�

~~**~~

Freya lay
in the golden glow of a warm afternoon, listening to Thanos rub paint into a
small canvas by the open window. Her eyes drifted shut, weary from a sleep that
was not restful, and she let herself slip into a shallow unconsciousness.

The soft scratching became the liquid
sway of a river, and she watched from its waters as Albus approached the bank.
She beckoned to him, but when he moved to enter the river�s embraith ith her,
she saw that he had only one arm. He moved toward her, but suddenly she
realized that the muddy bottoms were far below them. When had the river become
so deep? She found that if he swam, he could not hold her; and if he held her
in his one arm, he could not stay afloat.

He heaved
himself back up onto the river�s banks, and she made to follow. On the earth,
they could hold one another. But she found, as she tried to leave the river,
that the weight of her body, so buoyant in the water, grew heavier than she had
the strength to bear. She slid back down the embankment until only her head
remained on the grasses. Tears made slow tracks down her face, but then Albus
put his one hand in her hair and they stayed that way for a long time.

She swam back up to her bedroom
when she felt the sticky fingers on her arms. She blinked awake, and the
serious face of her son loomed over her.

�You were
crying in your sleep,� he said solemnly. �I woke you up from the nightmare.�

She cupped
his cheek. �It wasn�t a nightmare, love. I was happy in it, for awhile.
Nightmares are only bad.�

He seemed
to mull this over, �If you were happy, why did you cry?�

She sighed.
�Well, you can be sad and happy all at once sometimes. I dreamt that I saw
someone I loved very much, that has been gone for a long while.�

Thanos
crawled up onto the bed and pulled the woolen blanket over his brown legs.
�Sometimes when Papa shears the sheep I am happy and sad at the same time. I am
happy that we will have the big piles of it in the kitchen and turn them
different colors. But I am sad because the sheep look so small without their
coats.�

Freya
smiled and curled around his small body.

�Was it
real, Mama?�

�Was what
real, love?�

�Was the
happy real, even though it was just in a dream? Does it still count?�

She stared
at her son, this little floppy-haired Socrates, presenting her answers wrapped
in questions.

�Yes. Yes,
I suppose it does.�

He nodded,
and put his little hands over the brown paint streaks he had left on her arms.

�But that
means that the sad counts, too.�

~~**~~
- 9
- 10
- 11
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The Gloaming of the Gods