Anathema.

The crackling of a campfire breaks the silence; the quiet wood in the witching hour of the night.
The smell of the burning coal and wood fill the once fresh air.

The glow of the flame radiate off the trees and the clearing...
Only challenged by the glow of the moon overhead.

Alone sits a loathsome only and ill-begotten Jack.
 The sole name it has ever known.                     
             A title divested of any real name.
                       Curs-ed, branded, banished.

  The Jack sits alone, nothing to reclaim, tarnished.

A cold wind brushes its hands.
The Jack looks at its hands as it tries to warm them up; those pallid, cadaverous hands...
(If the wolves got to it like this..)

                              The tearing of muscle and flesh,
Gnashing teeth,
            To be rent asunder.
                                        Only to be left in its gore...
 ..It tries not to think about it anymore.



The Jack stares into the fire watching the embers dance with the flame.
(How long has it been?

Days?
           Weeks?
                                  Months?
                                                                                           Years..?)
                              
                            A feeling of uncertainty in its skin.

Before it can dwell on thought, the sound of leaves crunching breaks it out of its almost rest, almost unconsciousness.
 Then a voice.

                                  “So, here are thee...
                               Klára ze Srebrnej Brzozy.”



The Jack looks up.

A greyed man stands on the other side of the fire, with wolves on either side of him.
The Jack thinks back to before, then back to the man, trying to dissect intent and purpose from him.

One of his eyes is a matching grey, almost silver; as if the blind eye could see what cannot be seen.
Around his frame a fur coat of a hunter, yet he walks with a cane, could be useful if this is trouble.

The Jack speaks,
 “Have you come to deliver this ill-begotten to the æfterlife and into the abyss?
   Has my time truly ran out so quick'ly?
                          and what is that name you said?”


             “Firstly,
                          If only you would be such a lucky child.
              Secondly,
                              No, not today, it is not your time.
                 Lastly,
                                It is yours, Klára.”                        

The Jack stares at the man before it stands on weak legs.
Starting to speak once more, a flame seeping out.

“Death is not a treat for me, it's not a prize. I have died for every day that I have lived!
And you are wrong..! I have no name to speak of, not anymore.”

The man sighs before matching the intensity.       
             
                              “What shall I call you then?        
                         Jack, Knave, Hound, like the rest?
                              I don't think you want that.
     You could lay claim to this new name ‘stead of being an ill-begotten Jack.”

(Klára… Klára.. I don't hate it, I could get used to it, I guess..)
The Jack sits back down and takes a deep sigh.
Its eyes wander to the fire again as it speaks.
“Allright.. fine. I accept this name, on one condition.  
                               You have to tell me your name.”



The man sits down on the log adjacent, his wolves rest beside him. Calm and collected just as he.
                            
                        “Many call me Kvæðir, others say Kvasir.
                                        But those are titles.
                          My actual name is what you want it to be.”

Klára pauses and thinks, speaking mostly to itself.
“Kva.. that works. What an odd name though.”
While it is thinking, one of the wolves approach Klára, causing it to flinch and move back.
Kva speaks again, this time asking.
                                  
                                “Harkening back to what you said, pray tell..
                                      What is death to you if not peace?
                     For me it is an end to a beginning and a beginning to an end.
 Death is just the final chapter in the beautiful book that is life, which is why I gave you a new name, a new start.
                            A new chance to make a good story for yourself, as someone once did with me.

                                           What is death for you?
                                                                             I'm curious, Miss Klára.”

 Klára relaxes her shoulders for the first time in a long while, she's missed talking to someone.

“I-.. Hm...”
Klára thinks to herself before answering.
“Death is the ultimate judgment..
The thing that makes us strive to claw and scratch to live, and the ones who don't they die.
The comfortable ones don't fear death 'cause they don't know what it's like, others die for them in their stead.
I hate it. I hate it and everything else.. 'specially the comfortable ones or the people who off themselves on a whim.
Don't they know the people who love and care for them will only end up with a hole in their lives, a lingering shadow around them and everything associated with them!
I'm.. sorry. I don't know what came over me....”

                                                       “Well...”
Kva takes a deep breath and stands up with his cane, walking towards Klára before resting his hand on her shoulder.
                   “You have a new life now, Klára. You can do whatever with it.
Go against the authority, stop people from dying by their own hands, make something worthwhile, there's a lot you could do.
            Whatever you do will be your choice to make, you no longer have strings.

For what you said.. Those people had a darkness which they thought would never fade, and it seemed the only solution.
             Sometimes you can't change someone's mind, but you can try at least.
  Klára,
           Make sure others can have their own story to tell, and not end far too soon.
                    Give people a new start and a new life as I have with you.
                                A name under Dom ze Srebrnej Brzozy.
                                         The House of Silver Birch.
                                  That is my final will and testament.

Live with honor,

“Fath-?”
Kva vanishes before she can say anything, the once lit campfire dying out, the last of its embers before Klára.
She falls down to her hands and knees, as the wolves surround her now, they are her's.
Along with the coat Kva once had, old and faded, as if not worn for tens or even hundreds of years.
“Live with honor.. huh...”
She clutches the coat and slowly gets to her feet, this time even more unsteady.
One arm then the other, she puts on the coat, looking at the sky, the sun starting to rise and coat the land in it's warmth.
“Whether a Jack or Klára, I will be a good father and mother for unwanted souls and the lost in the world.
For you, Father.”