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[allfather-odin.livejournal.com]

Date: May 20, 2000,
Setting: Lower Tadfield-
Status: Private
Summary: The end of Frigga Blot
Warnings:  Allusions to Smut, but nothing graphic.

After The spirit of Winter Solstice had left the manor, the party died down rather quickly.  That was OK with Wednesday.  He had done his part to celebrate the spirit of Frigga, and while it had not been as grand or as large as he would have liked, it was simply the way things were now that the Bronze age had ended.  Before he left the hall, he grabbed Frigga's picture and put it in his jacket pocket, patting it fondly, if a little sadly.  Feeling like an old and useless man, Wednesday left the manor to take a walk.  

Tadfield, both Upper and Lower were not large by any means, but somehow even the scant lights made the stars seem so distant.  Wednesday remembered what the stars had looked like after he and his brothers had put them in the sky.  They had glowed like the fire of Muspelheim.  It was using those stars that his people had sailed their ships to the New Lands.  No wonder his people had lost their way- the stars that had been their guiding light had faded with the coming of false light.  

Wednesday walked with his head down, reciting his charms and memories like a mantra.  With words he tried to fill the emptiness in his heart.

"Well, Wanderer, seems you're a long way from home."  

Wednesday looked up quickly to where the voice had come from.  Not far from the road was an ash tree.  And she was standing under its boughs.  Wednesday's eyes opened wide.

"Frigga.  How did you get here?"

Frigga smiled, beckoning him over to her.  "Do you think that you are the only one who knows how to weild Yygrdrasil's reigns?  You always did have a tendency to underestimate me.  'Tis a pity, for you have lost dearly on several occasions for your low appraisal.  One day you'll learn that not everyone flaunts their abilities as much as you."

Wednesday propped himself against the tree.  Even though he now knew how his ex-wife had come to be with him, it didn't explain why.  "My dear, it is my nature to flaunt, as you put it,"  he wanted to hold her hand, but was unsure if that would be welcome, so instead he simple leaned his head back against the smooth bark of the tree.  "Are you here because of the insults?"

"Of course not.  You've called me worse than 'slut' and 'whore' even when we were still married.  No, its your melancholia.  Even after all these ages, I can still feel your grumpy mood thousands of miles away,"  she said, gently lacing her fingers with his.  He looked at her, and she gave his hand a squeeze.  Her eyes reflected all the knowledge of men.  "You're feeling old, Odinn.  Old and alone.  Have I not always been there for you when you feel those things?  In spite of everything that has happened, haven't I always been here at your side during the darkness?"  She pulled his face close to hers, her hair smelling like sweet  mountain strawberries.  "I am here now, Odinn.  Many things have changed, but some things never will."

He gazed at her, the light wrinkles on her brow smoothed, her skin softened and she looked as she had in the beginning.  All except her eyes which shone the wisdom of ages, as much, if not more knowledge than he himself possessed.  "You're right, Frigga, many things have changed.  But I still love you.  And I always will."

"I know," she said, because she did indeed know.  They kissed, then, under the boughs of the tree, with the cool night wind flowing through her strawberry-blond locks.  He ran his hands through her hair and along the lines of her body, she did the same to him.  Equally matched, they re-acquainted themselves with the eachother.  

***
They lay beneath the tree, the long grasses of the field surrounding them.  He held her in his arms, their breaths slowing down and falling into harmony.  They looked into the branches and remembered.  

"So what now?"  He asked.

Frigga raised herself to one elbow, looking into his good eye.  She was one of the few beings that could always tell which one was the real one.  "Now, I go back to Berkeley,"  she said as she stood.  Her body was silhouetted against the full mood, and his breath caught in his throat.  

"You won't stay?"  He hated the way his voice betrayed him.

She smiled with just a tinge of sadness, but began to gather her clothes and put them back on nontheless.  "I have my own life now, Odinn.  My store, my customers, my friends.  I don't belong here anymore than you would belong in California.  It is the way it must be and you know it."

And he did.  So similar they were, so well matched in ways.  And yet, because they were so similar, they could never be happy together for long.  It was for this reason that both of them had been unfaithful in marriage.  The reason they had had so many explosive arguments and battles.  They were like a lit match and dry wood.  Their passion thrived on it, but fire cannot last forever.  Eventually it dwindled to nothing.

She left him.  Her back turned towards him even as it was in the photograph kept in the pocket near his heart.  After a few minutes, Wednesday stood up and dressed as well.  Walking back towards the manor, he looked forward to settling into his bed, and hopefully dreaming of what had just happened.  

He looked to the sky.  For the first time in ages the stars burned brightly in his eyes again.