The sun was high in the New England sky. It dripped its honey rays in steady rhythm. The trees were unfolding their green essence, the newborn leaves so tiny in their birth.

The air was sweet, the breeze, warm. And reds, violets, blues so luminous they recalled the waters of the sea. Color erupted in the expanse of the wood, and life teemed in opulent song.

Jane walked downstairs into the morning, the kitchen windows thrown open to welcome the fragrance, rid itself of the stale thickness of winter's air.

A piece of paper was found on the counter. Long, angular writing graced the surface.

The slip of star dust lays rust in it's wake, its fits and spurts forgive its haste. Scathingly real, their demure nature trips the soft light of glow.

And so it is, the fret of feeling...posit chance, love. Place your soul alongside mine. Mingle with moons, and let tears flow in the blazing sun. Bathe in incandescent light of Orion and Andromeda. Wave to the trees, sing to the garden, and smile for me.

We shall dance in the mists of morning. We shall embrace in the lucidity of day. And when night's first choleric wince threatens, I shall hold you fast in firm grasp, in muted memory, in constant sorrow, in gleeful fancy. In love...with you… in perpetuity.

I read your poem. Please pardon my curiosity. But I thought that since you appreciated the art, you might be agreeable to read my own…

Jane smiled…where was he, anyway? She opened the front door.

The sun assaulted her. She balked at its strength. She squinted, and went out into the open. Jane filled her lungs with the welcoming air, and went toward the lake.

It swam in a swirl of algae and lily pads.

"Jane! Come in, dear…it's nearly dinner!" her grandmother's voice yelled out.

"Hang on, Gran!"

She was skipping stones, nearly mastering the art.

And then she saw it…a doe and her buck, on the opposite end of the shore. They stopped and looked at her. They were motionless, steady, and graceful. The buck nudged the doe with his stunted antlers, as it was spring, and they were young.

Jane fancied that they were in love…though it was a silly notion. But the way they looked at one another, it certainly seemed so. Jane stood frozen, and they bent to obtain a drink from the obliging lake. She smiled at their companionship, and turned to return to the house.

Jane grinned at the memory. She decided to take a walk through the wood…perhaps Loki was lurking there.

She stepped on the carpet of pine needles and moss, suffocating any sound she might make. The temperature had fallen in the absence of the sun, and she pulled her sweater close. Delicately, she padded onward, picking up a stray stick and swinging it absentmindedly, brushing the floor with its length. She gathered stones of notice and put them in her pockets. She picked some flowers for the table. She squatted to gain a better view of some mushrooms.

A snap of a twig…Loki. She pivoted on her haunches, and saw a wolf in the distance, looking at her.

Jane froze. Could it be that same wolf? She swallowed. The beast eyed her…he shifted his weight…

She wasn't scared. For whatever reason, she knew she was fine. The thing heard a sound in the depths of the forest, and scampered off.

How very different things seemed! No longer was she paralyzed by uncertainty. No longer did the cloak of sorrow shield her eyes. She had found her strength…simmering beneath her skin all along. Like Loki's magic…she imagined it lingered still, though he claimed he couldn't state any certainty. She believed he was fibbing, that he did, in fact, know, but she decided not to call him on it.

She sighed, electing to make her way back to the house. She and Loki must've missed one another.

The gape of the wood presented itself, the radiance of light a warm welcome from the gloom of the wood.

She exited. Her eyes adjusted. And what she saw was this:

Loki, in the middle of the land between the wood and the house, standing in a circle of what looked like pollen, or dust, or fairies, or light…dancing around him, in mindless submission. His hand would stretch one way, and the particles would consent. That way, and they'd fly like tiny insects. Both of his hands threw up over his head, and they swirled above him in phosphorescent sway. He was a conductor of color, demanding a symphony of particle movement.

Jane's mouth hung agape.

He spotted her and smiled.

He clapped his hands together once, and the color matter fell in a sift to his palms. He began to walk toward her, and she joined him.

They met, and he held out his hands to her.

In his hands laid a necklace, its coruscate alive in the gem. Every color imaginable was spied, each brilliant and dull, alive and stationary.

"What is it?" Jane asked.

"It is the essence of light," Loki replied.

"The essence of light," Jane repeated, whispering.

"Do you like it?"

"It's…marvelous…" and she reached up to kiss him.

He put it on her, and turned her around…"It was the only thing I could think of to compare to your beauty, but I'm afraid…it is pale in its station."

"Stop it," she laughed and smacked his arm.

They made their way back to the house.

"Did you like the poem?" Loki asked. "I know that you read it."

"How do you know?"

"Because I know you, my alsking."

Jane laughed. "I did. Though I am slightly embarrassed that you read my paltry attempt."

"Why? It forged me forward. I had had some doubts…but your requests were none too dire. I felt like I could adequately bend, as you had asked."

"In more ways than one, I'd say," Jane replied wickedly.

His mouth curled. "Ooooh…you are rather naughty."

He sat on the sofa. "So…Jane…where shall we go? The Realms are at our feet. You are fortunate in your partner, for he can navigate any place in the vast cosmos you love so dear, sans the hindrance of the precarious BiFrost."

She snuggled next to him. "Well…I'm rather partial to Midgard, New England, and quaint cottages at present."

"You have no desire to explore, to roam, to discover the many wonders of other corners of our universe?" and he absently glided his fingers over her arm.

"No. I'm tired of wandering, Loki. And I'm sure you are. Let's enjoy the moment…let's live now, for tomorrow we die…"

He stopped his motion. "What did you say?"

"Tomorrow we die…? I think that's from the Bible…"

He nodded.

"What is it?" she asked.

And Loki told her of the elderly man he met in Boston, and everything that had transpired, and how he had coaxed him to go after her, and how he had given him his wife back. "I hope that they are happy…" he said.

"It sounds like something out of a cheesy romantic comedy…" Jane laughed.

"A what?"

"Nothing," she shook her head. "What will happen, though? You raised her from the dead?"

"Only until he dies. She will then vanish."

"Isn't that…wrong…like, I dunno. Playing god?" and Jane realized what she just said, and laughed heartily.

"I don't need to play, love," and he laughed with her, and seized her in passion.

And though his fits of doubt and sorrow never disappeared altogether, his melancholy subdued with every passing day, his anger quelled, his smile more plentiful and his laughter became more abundant.

Jane, for her part, was always the anchored one, despite her tendency toward the fanciful. She balanced his turmoil, which would present on occasion. And in those moments, when he felt most vulnerable, Jane would hold him, and would tell him of her grandmother, and he of Frigga, and they would find comfort in the physical sorrow their sadness created.

….and the summer raged between them both, and they soon did take to traversing the cosmos as Loki suggested…and the heat of the sun, and the warmth of the fire in the stone hollow of the sitting room, and the sultry gem which hung at her breast never dulled between them.

For in the very depth of their woeful winter they found in one another an invincible summer.

Thanks to everyone who followed, favorited and commented. What an engrossing tale to tell! I had someone ask if I listened to music while I write. The answer is no…I am to easily absorbed in music, which is counterintuitive to becoming absorbed in a scene I am writing (which I do, unabashedly). However, for this last chapter, I DID listen to "Music for a Found Harmonium," just for a short spell. This tale was dark, and the final installment cheerful, so the piece was apt.

Meet me in Helheim, dear readers! I anticipate a bumpy ride.