“Then rub that ring of yours and open that black hole of yours,” Rebecca laughed, pulling back away from Matthew. “We’re not planning on staying here in Hel forever, I don’t think. You need to dump all those clothes out from in there, in here, so I’ll be able to sort through them.”

“Not in here,” Matthew said, getting up and taking her arm gently. “Follow me.” Tugging gently, he pulled Rebecca towards the exit, while deliberately ignoring Jennifer in the corner.

“Where we going?” Rebecca didn’t resist as she let herself be dragged along beside him. “And what about her? Is she ever going to wake up?”

“I’ll wake her later,” Matthew snorted slightly. Going out the door, he turned to the right and headed down the hall towards the steps which led down to the great hall. “She won’t wake up until I tell her to, I don’t think. I really didn’t know what I wanted to do with her, so I told her to sleep earlier. I think the shackles on her soul will keep her asleep until I give her some other order later.”

“She’s stuck having to do what I tell her to,” Matthew laughed bitterly, “and all I told her to do was sleep. I just wanted some time to think about everything before I had to explain it to her, or deal with her,” he admitted sheepishly.

“I understand,” Rebecca symphonized. “I probably would’ve did the…”

“We’re here,” Matthew interrupted, stopping just a little ways down the hall and turning to face a blank section of wall. “I’m going to need your hand for a moment,” he ordered, looking back at Rebecca expectantly.

“Sorry,” Rebecca laughed, sticking her tongue out at him, “I’m going to need them for a lifetime. I can’t just pull one off and give it to you, no matter how cute they might look at the end of your man arms.”

“I just need to see it for a moment,” Matthew snorted, reaching out and grabbing her wrist. Tugging her right arm close with one hand, he pulled a small knife with his other and then sliced it across her palm.

“Yeouch!” Reflexively, Rebecca tried to tug her hand away, but she couldn’t break it free from the iron grip Matthew had it trapped in – their level and difference in stats was just too great. “What the hell was that for?” Wincing, she half glared at Matthew.

“For this,” Matthew told her, releasing her wrist. Grinning back at her, he turned the knife and then slowly sliced it across the palm of his left wrist as well.

“We’re not going to make some idiot blood brother pact,” Rebecca snorted.

“No, we’re not,” Matthew agreed, half laughing. Turning, he placed his hand palm first against the right side of the bare hallway and held it for several moments, until a slight purple-violet glow shimmered under his hand. “Your turn,” he told Rebecca, slowly pulling his hand away.

“What the hell am I doing?” Frowning, Rebecca hesitated a moment and then shrugged lightly to herself and placed her hand atop the same spot where Matthew had placed his. A warm tingle filled her hand for a few moments and the glow slowly changed from a purple-violet to more of a crimson red before staring to fade away.

“It’s the door to your room,” Matthew told her, pointing as the shadows around the wall slowly retreated and faded with the glow, revealing a deep black door. “This place is special,” he reminded her gently. “Many of the rooms are sealed and hidden and can only be seen or opened by people granted the proper permissions. From now on, this room’s yours. No one but you and I can even see the door to it, much less open it.”

“My room?” Rebecca’s eyes sparkled brightly. Without waiting a second longer, she shoved on the door, amazed as it pushed open easily to reveal a room which seemed to be almost identical to the one she had been staying in before.

“I’m not much in home decoration,” Matthew admitted, shrugging slightly. “All the bedrooms are the same on this floor. I guess this is the default layout that just came with the place when I got it.”

“It’s wonderful!” Bouncing over, Rebecca energetically threw herself upon the bed

With a sudden loud “SPROING!!”, the mattress suddenly shot several feet up in the air, catapulting Rebecca upwards and through the exquisite silk canopy covering the bed. With an audible thump, she smacked against the ceiling and found herself plastered to it. Glued, like a fly stuck in honey, all she could do is squirm and stare wide-eyed down as the mattress fell to the side, sliding off the bed, revealing a simple wooden plaque with strange runes carved upon it.

“Wha… what the hell?!” Not certain if she was furious or flabbergasted, Rebecca could only remain stuck to the ceiling and sputter as Matthew slowly walked forward and examined the wooden plaque.

“Laughter… Loki… Candle… You… Time…” Matthew struggled to decipher the runes, then shrugged slightly to himself. “Are you okay up there?”

“Do I look okay,” Rebecca asked, exasperated. “Get me the hell down from here!”

“I would,” Matthew told her. “Only thing is, I don’t know how. I think you’ll be fine in a bit though,” he tried to reassure her. “I think it’s just Hel’s father’s way of saying hello or something.”

“Hel’s father?” Rebecca asked, dreading to know the answer.

“Loki,” Matthew told her. “The God of Mischief, Trickery, and Lies. I think the message here probably says something like he’s going to laugh at you for the time it takes a candle to burn or something.”

Sounding disgusted, Rebecca asked, “And how damn long is that? How big a candle are we talking abo…”

Interrupted with a loud, “PLOPP!”, Rebecca suddenly fell loose from the ceiling, crashing down onto the wooden slate and springs, before bouncing off onto the mattress.

“About that size,” Matthew told her, trying to hide his face and not laugh as Rebecca struggled to get up. Frustrated, she kicked the mattress several times, before flopping to sit back down on it.

“That ruined my damn bed,” she muttered moodily, staring at the massive hole dangling in the canopy. Glaring at the bed, she asked, “Is that damn thing going to do that every time?”

“I think it’s that plaque with the magic,” Matthew told her, a smirk twitching across the corner of his face. “I think it’s got some sort of repulsion enchantment on it, or some type of bounce magic. At least you triggered it by leaping on it,” he told her, unable to hold back his laughter. “Can you imagine if something like that would’ve triggered in the middle of ‘sexy time’?”

“It would’ve been your last damn ‘sexy time’ ever,” Rebecca told him as she grabbed up the wooden slate in both hands, swung it, and smacked Matthew in the ass with it.

“SPROING!!” The runes on the board shimmered brightly for an instant before Matthew was suddenly catapulted forward to crash against the wall, and the board was ripped from Rebecca’s hands as it rocketed into the hallway. When it crashed into the opposite wall, the runes lit up again and it sproinged in a rocket arc down the hallway, bouncing and reverberating repeatedly from one side to the other until it echoed down and side passage and out of hearing.

Staring first at Matthew as he rubbed his hips and started to get up, then out into the hallway where the plaque had ricocheted out of sight, Rebecca couldn’t help but start laughing. After all the death, horror, and betrayal that she’d seen in the last few days, it was somehow quite refreshing to remember that not everything in life apparently had to be so serious all the time.

A stray thought crossed Rebecca’s mind, causing her to smile slightly to herself. If Hel was Matthew’s mother, and he was her man now, then that meant the goddess had to be her mother as well, in a way. Loki was apparently Hel’s father, so that would make him her grandfather.

“Thank you, Grandfather,” she whispered to no one in particular. “I needed that.” Looking around, her heart felt much lighter as she skipped past the mattress to head over and open the doors to the wardrobe.

“Now then,” she laughed over at Matthew, “open that ring of yours and start tossing me the clothes from in there. I want to put them up, and while I do that, you can fix my bed for me.”

Rubbing his red nose from where he crashed into the wall, Matthew thought about refusing but then shrugged it off. Somehow Rebecca’s eyes seemed a little brighter and she seemed a little more lighthearted. Sighing to himself, he shrugged slightly. He didn’t think he’d ever understand a damn woman, but for now he didn’t need to. She seemed happy for the moment, and that was all that really mattered for now.

“You wish is my command,” he told her solemnly, bowing deeply at the waist, before straightening up and rubbing his ring. They were going to have to get back to the dungeon at the school soon, but a few more moments to relax and let things settle shouldn’t harm anything. At least, he hoped it wouldn’t.