Berwald Dressed in Blood

Note: As promised, I have finally (and officially) introduced Berwald as an actual character and more than just a story. There was more planned to go into this chapter, but it was getting really long...

Warning: Gore involved.

Disclaimer: I do not own Hetalia, nor do I own Anna Dressed in Blood or any other references I may slip in. I am merely playing around with my writing skill, these characters, and this plotline.

Later that night, Elizabeta pulled up in her car. She had been about to knock on the front door when my mom opened it. I had been standing in the kitchen, finishing off the last few sips of my mom's protective herbal tea, so I caught every word of their conversation.

"Oh! H- Hello. You must be Mrs. Väinämöinen. It's nice to meet you. I'm Elizabeta Héderváry."

"Nice to meet you too, Elizabeta. Come in. Tino's in the kitchen." Two sets of slow footsteps approached the kitchen.

"You have a very nice house, Mrs. Väinämöinen. It has a really comforting feel to it, especially since you just moved here, right?"

"Yes, thank you. We got here about a week ago."

"Wow, you guys are fast at unpacking."

"Yes, well, we've grown used to it."

Mom and Elizabeta entered the kitchen right then. I put down my mug and noticed Elizabeta had changed from her jeans and t-shirt into a long skirt and blouse, and she had exchanged her sweatshirt and sneakers for a cardigan and knee-high boots. She waved at me and smiled.

"Hey, Elizabeta. I hope you didn't have a hard time finding your way here?" I asked. She shook her head no.

"It turns out you live just around the corner from my place. See, look, that big house over there is mine," Elizabeta replied, pointing through the window at the house peeking over the roofs of the neighboring houses.

"How convenient," my mom added. "Elizabeta, would you like some tea, or do you two have to go right now?"

Elizabeta glanced at her watch. "We don't have to be there right now. That would be wonderful. Thank you," she said, smiling.

While she and my mom chatted over mugs of tea, I changed into some nicer jeans and a button-up, throwing a hoodie over it. When I got back to the kitchen, they were just finishing up. "You ready, Tino?" Elizabeta asked when she noticed me standing in the doorway. I nodded. "Let's go, then."

I led her out the front door as my mom called after us. "You two have fun, and be careful out there!"

"Bye, Mom."

The drive to the covered bridge was long and winding. She had a simple little white Mitsubishi, extremely well cared for during its years. Elizabeta filled the silence with chatter, telling me about the town and what there was to do. She had smiled when I complimented her skirt, something I had done to try breaking the silence, and that was what had led to the chatter.

Elizabeta introduced me to some people when we arrived, and the party continued as most would guess teenage parties without supervision would go. Eventually, she pulled me to the edge of the bridge, right before the cover started to rise from the wooden bottom, and leaned against the railing, taking a sip of her punch.

"Something feels weird about everything this year. I dunno, it just… Something's off," she said in a soft tone, looking off to the side of me.

"Okay, well, what's different about this year?" I asked.

"It feels like something weird is going to happen," she explained. She was silent for a moment. "Do you want to hear about the most famous local legend?"

I shrugged, trying to keep up composure. "Sure. What's it about?"

"Ghosts and death." She inspected my face, most likely looking for signs that I didn't want to hear anything else, but when she found nothing, she took a breath to begin the story.

"Okay, well, back in the fifties, there were a whole bunch of boarding houses for the new immigrants to town. Most of them had pretty horrible conditions, but there was one that had great conditions. It was run by the Oxenstiernas, and had been since they had moved here. To be honest, my family stayed there for a while during the fifties, so a lot of what I'm going to tell you is what my family knew about it.

"There was this party the Oxenstiernas were hosting, and everyone in town was going to be there. It was supposed to be amazing. It was for the Oxenstierna's son, Berwald. He was turning eighteen soon, and when he finished school was going to inherit the boarding house. My grandmother knew him, and she said he was a nice boy, even though he was scary-looking, but he had once told her that he didn't want to inherit the boarding house. He had said he would be willing to do anything else for his parents.

"Anyway, before the party began, no one could find him, and his parents asked some of their boarders to help look for him. Eventually they found him dead in the basement. He had been wearing light colors, but they could hardly tell they had been light before, they were so drenched in blood. Not only had whoever killed him given him a… A second mouth… They also stabbed him an uncountable number of times.

"After his funeral, the boarding house was abandoned. The Oxenstiernas moved away, and for a while no one set foot in the house. But then, people started going back, maybe to look for things to steal and sell, maybe on dares, who knows. Those people would never come back. Everyone who set foot even on the porch would never be heard from again. But then, one police officer who was investigating all the disappearances had heard the rumors and didn't touch the house when he went to look. He looked in all the windows he could reach on foot. And when he looked in the window to the basement, he saw what was left of all the people who tried to go in. Human bones… Hunks of flesh… Buckets and buckets of blood… It was horrible. Everyone says Berwald came back and took out his anger on anyone who dared to enter his house, and that all the remains in the basement was what happened when he got angry and no one was coming in," Elizabeta said. She crossed her arms over her chest and rubbed her upper arms, looking down away from me. I put my hands on her shoulders.

"Hey, it's alright. It's not happening to you. You're safe, right here. Don't worry," I said, keeping my voice as soft and comforting as I could. She nodded, looking up and smiling at me, but the smile slipped off her face when she looked over my shoulder. I straightened and let my hands fall before I turned around. There stood Gilbert and his posse, with Matthias, Lukas, and Emil standing off to the side.

"Oh… Gilbert." The guy smiled and laughed, sounding more like a snake than anything else. He stepped forward and put his arm around Elizabeta's shoulders. She elbowed him in the stomach, and based on the wheeze he let out, she did it hard. He stepped away a bit before saying what he had planned on saying.

"So what're you doing hanging out with this freak? I doubt he's got anything interesting to say," Gilbert said, letting out another snake laugh.

"Shut up, Gilbert. You're the least interesting person here. You only talk about your stupid football and how 'awesome' you are," Elizabeta replied, her voice icy. As she spoke, I heard Matthias and the brothers stepping up behind me. This probably meant something bad was about to happen.

"Aw, c'mon, Liza! Lighten up! What's say you and I go and leave this here pipsqueak?" Gilbert said, stepping closer to Elizabeta again. I could tell she hated the nickname, but I hated the name he called me more than she seemed to hate hers. I knew I was on the shorter side compared to him and his buddies, but I was not some twig he could snap and leave in the dust. Deciding to try holding off on conflict, I balled my fists and dug my nails into my palms.

Elizabeta stepped away from Gilbert, scowling, but he just did not take the hint. He stepped back up to her, and this time he put his arm around her. This time, I spoke up. "Leave her alone, Gilbert. She obviously doesn't want you touching her."

Gilbert laughed again. "What are you going to do about it, pipsqueak? Hit me? Ooh, I'm so scared," he said, laughing as he finished. Matthias put his hands on my shoulders to try to stop me, but I was too angry to be stopped by just that.

I wrenched myself from Matthias' grip and stormed the few steps toward Gilbert, throwing my hardest uppercut at his gut. He wheezed and took his arm from Elizabeta, wrapping it around his stomach as he bent closer to my height. Taking advantage of his compromised position, I gathered his shirt collar in my fist and made him meet my eyes. "Say that to my face. I fucking dare you," I hissed. He said nothing, only looked at me. I scoffed and threw his shirt out of my hand, spinning away and walking back to Matthias.

"You seem really tense. You'd better calm down, or you'll be out of it for the important part," Lukas whispered in my ear as I came to a stop behind him, his hissed words barely audible. I took a deep breath and shook my head.

"I know, I know. Something about that guy just makes me so mad. This town is off," I replied under my breath.

Behind me, Gilbert began laughing. He had straightened, finally, and when he stopped laughing he squared himself and locked eyes with me again. "You're pretty cocky. I think I might like you." I scoffed again as Gilbert's brother Ludwig walked up to me.

"I'm sorry about my brother. He's not normally like this. I don't know what's gotten into him," Ludwig said softly as his brother continued to go on laughing like an idiot behind him. I shook my head.

"No, no, it's fine… I don't usually act like this either. I'm sorry for punching your brother." Ludwig nodded, which I could tell was his way of accepting my apology, and went back to where he had been standing before.

"Alright, so. You wanna get outta here and go see the famous Oxenstierna House?" Gilbert said once he finished his bout of laughter. He grinned at me and began walking toward the makeshift parking lot. Everyone there looked at each other and shrugged, walking to their respective cars amongst themselves. I climbed in beside Elizabeta, and the chain of three cars made their way out further past the woods, headed toward the house of death. She let me know outright that she was uncomfortable with everyone going out there, but she still drove me up there.

As we pulled into the long dirt driveway, I noticed a face staring down at us all from one of the uppermost windows. It was hard to see the face through the dirty window, but I knew it could only be one thing: Berwald Dressed in Blood knew we were here, and he was daring us to try going inside. The face flashed out of view after just a few moments of me watching, but that was more than enough for me to tell that this was not going to be some walk in the park.