The club is Illiad in the south side of Birmingham Alabama.  Samantha Gurther, a twenty-one year old Heflin native, held out her five dollar admission fee and her license together, giggling nervously when both are handed back with an application form.  A sigh of annoyance from behind her haunts her ears as she hastily scribbles out name, address, telephone number on the small white sheet.  She hadn't expected to give her real name.  She'd expected to be Alexia Masters, a name that, she'd thought, was particularly strong and exotic.  

 It doesn't seem so exotic now.  And the clothes that she'd chosen for the occasion, a form fitting pair of dark pants and a silky red sleeveless shirt, look almost frumpy when compared to the casual grace and sexuality of those around her.  

 Form completed, Sam passes it back to the man behind the plastic window and waits while he fills out a red membership card.  Money and picture ID make their journey once more between hands.  Only one finds its way back and Sam pushes away from the counter, eager people behind her already flashing a card.

 Sam had never been inside a club before and so didn't know what to expect.  She blinked rapidly three steps away from the entrance, trying to adjust her eyes to the sudden darkness.  Her nose stung with the heavy scent of cigarette smoke, hints of things sweeter wafting in.  There was a large bar in the first room, manned by one rather tough looking lady, armored behind bottles of Jack and Baileys.  A raised platform displayed two pool tables already occupied.  

  It was surprisingly mundane. Sam had never been to a club before, but somehow she'd expected more of one.  Clubs were full of debauchery, she'd heard, and were sinful dens.  She flushed, picturing some of the ways such a place could be sinful, and is pushed from behind as a new crowd of people storms into the room, laughing boisterously.

 Sam stumbled, purse dropping to the ground.  With a muttered curse, she fell after it, ducking boots and heels in order to reclaim the small brown leather bag.  A foot swiped it away before her fingers could close on the strap.  Sam watched, dismayed, as it slid across the floor and narrowly avoided being stomped on several times.  It halted by the bar.  Sam straightened and fumbled her way towards it, feeling all the more a fool for having acted the country bumpkin.

 A hand pulls it up before she gets to it.  Sam follows the hand to the line of an arm, from there to narrow shoulders and a pointed face.  Red hair that in better light would be several shades lighter than her own auburn curls wisped too long around bright eyes.  She couldn't tell their color in the darkness.

 "This yours?" The man asked and he grinned at her.  He seemed the sort to spend a lot of time grinning.  His mouth was scarred, light tiny dots rimming the lips like some sort of tribal tattoo that almost seemed to catch the dim neon luminescence and toss it back like an affront.  

 Sam nodded, her eyes wide.  Half remembered warnings from Girl Scouts, years ago, seemed to flash through her mind.  Strange man, in the city, /talking to her/.  She was about to be kidnapped and held for randsom, like that girl on MacGiver and she didn't even have a thing of chewing gum and a paper clip to escape with.

 The man laughed, an easy slow sort of sound, and held the purse out.  Sam took it gingerly.

 "Sit down," the man said, gesturing to an empty stool beside him.  "I won't bite."

 "Promise?" Sam muttered but she edged onto the seat.

 "Promise."  His lips parted in a flashing sort of grin, more sharp edges than white, it seemed.  Sam was surprised, for she hadn't thought she'd said that very loud at all.   Neither particularly aided in settling her nerves.

 "I'm Luke," the man offered.  He had a strange sort of accent, drawing out the 'u' in a way that wasn't particularly familiar to Alabama.  

 "Alexia," Sam returned.  The lie was surprisingly easy to tell.  She clutched her purse tightly to her stomach and vaguely wished for a drink, or at least a fresh Camel.

 "New here?" Luke asked.  "I don't think I've seen you around before."

 "It's my first time," Sam admitted.  "I'm new to the area."

 "That would do it," Luke said cheerfully.  "No worries though.  We're all new at some point."

 Sam smiled at him shyly.  He was a *strange* man, she thought, all points and sharp angles half concealed by black leather.

 "I'll buy you a drink," Luke said grandly, spinning in his stool to stare at her.  He leaned on the bar with his right arm, chin heavily landing on his hand.  

 "You don't have to," Sam started, but was cut off by the impatient wave of Luke's free hand.  He then gestured to the bartender and, less than three minutes later, a strange amber liquid over ice that Luke had entitled a Rusty Nail was placed in front of her.  He urged her to try it and hesitantly, Sam placed it on her lips and sipped.  It tasted like honey, cloyingly sweet, with a rush of fire that came with good Scotch.  Luke grinned at her expression when she winced and shook her head. 

 "Not as good as the stuff back home," he said, holding up his own glass.  "But it's not bad either."

 "Where's home?"  The words slipped from Sam's mouth and she wasn't embarrassed over them, as she might have been back in Heflin.  She took another sip and felt wild, the technimusic beat from the next room strumming to vibrate up her feet.  

 "Where you hang your hat," Luke said and laughed.   Surprising herself, Sam laughed too.  She drank again and Luke finished his glass and ordered another.

 "This is such a strange place," Sam said, looking around.  

 "Not really," Luke said, drinking himself.  "You're new to more than the area if you think that."

 "Maybe," Sam agreed, curling the word in her mouth in a way that she never would back home.  She turned to lean against the bar, elbows hooked on the counter, watching with dark eyes the pool game directly across from them.  "New to Birmingham, certainly."

 "Birmingham," Luke snorted and shook his head.  Glints of light caught on double hoops set through his ears.  "You should go to New York, or New Orleans, or any of those 'new' places.  They've more spirit than this.  Why are they called that, anyway?"

 "Called what?" Sam asked, startled attention flying back to the red haired man.  Her apprehension seemed to be dwindling quickly, gone in a tide of alcohol and intrigue.

 "/New,/" Luke said, sounding disgusted.  "As if the old ones weren't bad enough.  Why not just come up with a new name all together?  It's not like they're anything at all alike."

 "I think people liked the familiarity," Sam said slowly, thinking of it.  She didn't remember much of history.  It had never really interested her.  Somehow, now, it seemed easier to place herself in the mindset of those generations past and she considered the matter for the first time.  "It was completely different from their home so they called it the same name.  It's the only thing that they would have been able to find the same."

 Luke snorted again.  

 "People are sheep," he proclaimed darkly.  "They always flock to the same things."

 "What about, whatstheword," Sam said, trying to think, "Bellsweater.  Something like that."

 "Bellwether," Luke mused.  "They don't count.  They're still sheep."

 "I like sheep," Sam said stubbornly.  "They make wool.  They're soft and gentle."

 "Never been to a farm either, have you?"  Loki asked, glancing sidelong at her, and Sam laughed.  She lifted her glass again and was surprised to find only naked ice clinking on itself.  Luke, seeing this, hailed the barman again and moments later another Rusty Nail was placed in front of her.

 "I might have wanted something different," Sam said peevishly, but she wasn't fool enough to push away a free drink.

 "But you didn't," Luke stated and grinned again, his earlier irritation seeming lost.  "You like familiarity.  *You* are a *sheep*."

 "Am not," Sam protested.  "I'm a *Mouse*."  At Luke's perplexed look, she explained.  "Chinese mythology.  Zodiac, you know?  Only they call it a Rat and I don't like rats.  What are you?"

 "Dunno," Luke said, still looking vaguely bemused at the idea of rats and mice and sheep.  

 "What year were you born in?" Sam persisted.  She knew the Chinese Zodiac, had taken an interest to it back in high school when she'd gone through a phase where astrology seemed to hold all of life's answers.  She'd long ago given up faith in it but the concepts still amused her.

 "That's a very personal question, isn't it?" Luke's teeth were very white in the dim light.  "I don't know if I should answer that."

 Sam sniffed and gulped down some of the too sweet Scotch.  Her nerves were now completely melted away, lost to the sweet half giddy sensation that marks being tipsy.  She took another sip but then put it down, determined to make it last.

 "Your choice," She said and strived not to sound irked.  "If you want to be all mysterious.  Kinda silly."

 "That's because you're *new*," Luke said, with a particular emphasis on the last word.  It was almost as though he meant she was new to more than Birmingham and honey flavored Rusty Nails.  

 "If you're so experienced," Sam said hotly, not at all in a Sam like way but entirely, she thought, in an Alexia sort of one, "What are you doing here with me?"

 "Maybe I like inexperience," Luke said and leered at her.  Sam flushed, but the scrape up and down her body with his eyes seemed almost perfunctional, impersonal.  

 "You like something," Sam said, "But I don't think it's experience or it's lacking.  What are you doing here?"  She gestured to the plain walls and the now crowded pool tables.  

 "Thinking, mostly," Luke admitted.  "It's a good place to think."

 Sam blinked.  The music was louder now and she could hear cheering from the room beyond.  People swarmed over and around them, occasionally reaching between them to order a drink or to hail someone across the hall.  It was, in her opinion, the absolute worst place anyone could come to in order to think.  Perhaps that was the point.  She looked at Luke, his red hair falling into his face, black leather jacket schulshed up on narrow shoulders, his pinched face and scarred lips.  He caught her stare and held it.  She still couldn't tell the color of his eyes.

 "Won't your family worry?"  She asked finally, needing to say something.

 This seemed to amuse the man greatly, for he broke the stare, leaned forward, and laughed loudly.  It carried over the club music and people around them stopped to look.  

 "Which *one*?"  He asked when the laughter finally ceased.  He glanced at her with too-bright eyes. 

 "Any of them," Sam said and wondered how much he'd drunk before she'd arrived.  Perhaps a lot.  She wondered if he was dangerous for a moment, but the thought didn't stay long in her mind.  

 "I'm estranged," Luke said glibly.  

 "Oh," Sam said and then added "Your father?"

 Luke glanced at her over the rim of his glass.  He drained it, placed it down perhaps more roughly than was needed, and shook his head.  

 "My brother, if you wanted to call him that.  Though he acted like a father."  He waved off the bartender when he loomed close, apparently ready to offer another drink.  "Enough of it.  Let's go dance."

 "Dance?"  Sam squeaked in a most un-Alexia way and then tried to recover.  "I can't, I mean, I don't-"

 "Sure you do.  You just haven't yet."  Luke grinned, but it seemed darker, somehow, than that of earlier.  He pushed himself to his feet with the grace of the more than slightly inebriated.  He wasn't much taller than she was, Sam noted with surprise.  "Like I said, you're *new*."

 There was that subtle inflection again, but before Sam could dwell on it, she was tugged upward.  She barely had the presence of mind to snag her little brown purse and snake it over one shoulder before Luke was leading her to the back room.

 It was much louder in there; the music running not just through ears but also down legs, through feet and hands and body.  It vibrated, shaking Sam with every movement, made her heart pound with its rhythm.  There was a black light on and it made Luke's teeth glow purple when he glanced back over his shoulder at her.  His canines looked strangely sharp and she was reminded of a wolf, or a fox.  There was a smaller bar back here that was manned by a muscular blond man who did not wear a shirt.  Sam stared for a moment, but no one seemed to think the slightest thing of it, and then her attention was lost with the dance floor itself.  

 It was small and she was disappointed despite herself.  After everything she'd heard, she'd expected something ...larger, or that it would be filled with half naked people grinding or something.  There were people grinding, but mostly they were content to writhe, fully dressed, occasional partners splitting up to form new groups.  Some of the moves they made looked complex.  Sam gulped.  She wasn't particularly graceful in the slightest and had halfway resolved to pull away from Luke when they were on the platform, his fingers catching in her hair, his grin entirely too close to her face.

 "Just dance," He whispered the words, but somehow Sam still caught them.  "Don't worry about it.  They aren't looking.  They're *sheep*, caught up in themselves.  Just dance."

 And so she did.  Luke wouldn't let her be hesitant.  Sam was, as she'd expected, terrible at it.  She jerked her arms, swaying from side to side in a clumsy attempt to catch the beat of the music.  Luke shook his head at her, movements exaggerated greatly in the throng, and snagged her hips.  

 "Like this," he said, and showed her how.  

 They moved together.  Sam, never athletic, lost her breath quickly but didn't want to stop.  Luke's hands were as impersonal as his leer had been.  It wasn't invitation and she did not touch him in return.  It was easier then.  Luke knew the dance.  He knew the steps and he showed them to her, not cringing away when she inevitably lost track of them and trod on his foot.  When at last Sam showed some slight competency, he released her to dance alone.  

 Luke didn't move away, but as if his dropped hands showed some sort of disconnection, people moved in, and Sam found herself with a tall muscled black man, who smiled but quickly moved on, and then a petite blonde haired girl, who pushed herself against Sam and laughed when Sam blushed dark enough to see in the black light. 

Then the same sort of magic that had occurred at the bar slowly stole over her.  She relaxed a bit, and the crowd seemed to welcome her in.  The music was easier to keep track of now, Sam's feet moving easily, her hands rising above her head.  She strained her eyes for Luke, not precisely uncertain to be dancing alone, but uncomfortable.  She thought she caught glimpses of him, through the crowd.  Occasional hints at red hair or a swirl of black leather out of the corner of one eye would cause her to turn, only to find herself with someone else, some other stranger rising out of the sea to smile and grin and be lost in the next spin.

 It was impossible to stop.  Her mouth tasted of honey and her blood seemed almost fire hot.  When a strange man placed his hands on her ass and pulled her forwards, she only laughed and pushed away.  When a strange woman caught her hair, she only returned the favor, staring into eyes that changed color with each catch of the strobe light.  The sight of two men in a corner, pressed so tightly that they seemed almost one body with two backs, didn't start her.  Here, on this floor, nothing seemed surprising.

 A blond man stepped into her path.  He was impossibly tall, so much so that Sam, not short herself, had to crane her neck to look into his face.  His eyes were an equally impossible shade of blue, like lightning caught still.  He wasn't dancing and Sam, her arms about to go around his neck, blinked in surprise and shook her head.  He was breaking the spell.  She wanted to dance and so turned away, but his arm caught hers and he pulled backwards to lead her away from the others.

 Unnerved, she leveled an Alexia sort of glare at him but his grip on her upper arm didn't slack.  The thrill of the dance faded quickly to annoyance and the realization that she was tired, legs weak under her.  Made almost frightened for it, Sam was unable to pull away as he lead her to a table beside the dance floor.

 "Sorry about that," he mumbled after a moment.  His voice was very deep.  Sam stared at him, at his oddly long blond hair and oddly open face and she snatched her arm away.  He looked quite uncomfortable as well, glancing around the room as though he expected to be attacked.  He looked oddly like a bashful Hell's Angel, lacking only motorcycle skins.  

 "What are you doing?" Sam hissed, quickly glancing around to ensure that they remained in the main crowd of people.  She took a cautious step backwards but hesitated as he spoke again.

 "Sorry," the man said once more and he honestly sounded mournful.  He looked entirely misplaced, the single straight man in a sea of fools.  "I'm looking for someone.  They said that you were talking to him."

 "Who?"  Sam asked before she could stop the words.  "Luke?"

 The man's face lit up.  Against her better judgment, Sam could feel her reserve melting, victim to both alcohol and an strange feeling that this man could be trusted, that this man was one she could like.  
 
 "That's him!"  The man exclaimed.  "Do you know where he went?  I've been looking for him for ages."

 Sam blinked again.  "Are you his brother?" she queried, suddenly suspicious.  "Because he had a fight or something with his brother and-"

 "No, no," the blond man looked away, excitement falling to a subdued sort of misery.  He did not appear the sort to hide his emotions.  "I'm a friend.  Or I was."

 "What's your name?"

 "Dead meat," a cool voice from behind her answered.  Sam looked up to see Luke, looking cold and furious, standing at her shoulder.  The blond man stood quickly, his chair almost falling over.

 "Lo-" he started, but Luke cut him off.

 "My friends," he said icily, "Call me Luke.  As you are not one, you can call me Lopt."

 "Lopt."  The man repeated, looking miserable again.  "You haven't used that in years."

 "I've not had reason to."  Luke's eyes narrowed.  "What the hell are you doing here, Tor?"

 "Looking for you," Tor said quietly.  Like Luke's whisper, Sam had no trouble in hearing him.  She was beginning to think she'd been forgotten.

 "And lo," Luke intoned, a strange sort of dark glee entering his tone, "You've found me.  In the middle of sheep.  In fucking *new* Birmingham."

 "They know you're gone," Tor looked away.  "They're looking for you now, I'm sure.  I just found you first."

 "Fuck them," Luke said shortly.  "And fuck you too.  I didn't hear you saying anything back then and I don't want to hear it now."

 He turned, a flare of black leather, and Tor reached out to catch at one sleeve.  Luke stared down at it as though it were something vile, and transferred the glare back to the blond man, who flinched, but did not let go. 

 "I'm sorry," Tor said, still in that strange, quiet tone.  "They shouldn't have done that.  I didn't think it would go that far."

 "It did."  Was the curt response.  Sam stared at both of them, wondering what had happened.  She was being all together ignored but was at this point beginning to think that to be a good thing.

 "I know.  I'm sorry."  Tor's voice, still meloncholic, slipped down another notch.

 Luke grinned at him.  It was a dark, strange sort of grin.  Wild.  Sam was suddenly very glad that it was not directed at her.  It made the dotted scars over his lips stand out, silver flashes on his pale skin.

 "Not as much as you will be."  The tone that Luke used was mild, but the grin suddenly carried both threat and promise.  Sam shuddered.

 "Lopt...” Tor sounded pained.  He looked it.  His fingers loosened and Luke pulled away, placing his free hand on Sam's bare shoulder.  

 "Go back and tell them," Luke said suddenly, his fingers pressing strangely hot into Sam's skin, "Tell Wođanaz, and Tir, and Sgn, and that golden toothed bastard and all of them, that I stand against them.  I wouldn't have.  You adopted me and I would have followed until the end of days and to hell with my blood family, but he killed Narvi and I was lost to you.  If I must make a choice, I stand by the Jotun against the Aesir.  They never caused brother to kill brother only to punish someone else entirely."

 Tor went strangely still as Luke spoke, large hands clenched into fists as though the spat words were painful or offensive.  Then he shook his head, sighed, and looked back up at Loki.  His electric blue eyes were saddened.  

 "If that is your wish," Tor said softly.  

 "It is."

 "So be it then.  I'll relay your words to my father."  He stood, towering over both of them, and oddly then bowed to Sam.  

 "My lady," he rumbled towards her, "I thank you for your assistance.  You need never fear storms."

 "Er," said Sam, somewhat shaken, "Okay, then.  No problem.  Honest."

 The giant straightened, nodded to Luke, and turned to leave.  Luke watched him go, fingers still hot and tight on Sam's shoulder.  When the blond man had disappeared through the door leading to the outside, Luke's hand slipped away and the anger faded.  He looked tired instead.

 "Luke...” Sam murmured, staring up at him.  

 "I told you I was estranged," He grinned again, but it wasn't the dangerous one of moments before and it didn't reach his eyes.

 "Strange family."  Sam couldn't help saying.  

 "Very," Luke agreed.  Then, in front of her, exhaustion dropped and the grin became a real one, lighting his face and making him seem young again.  

 "It's time for me to leave," he said, and, like Tor, swept a bow.  His was more impish, quick, as though he were mocking something.  Sam, more at ease, laughed.  

 "Will you be back?" She asked.
 
 "I wouldn't say no," He answered.  "I don't know where I'll be."

 "Somewhere with sheep," Sam thought aloud, and Luke laughed himself at it.

 "Most assuredly."  He flashed her yet another smile, raked a hand through his hair -it really did need a trim, Sam thought- and leaned forward to press his lips against the corner of his mouth.

 "My lady," he said, turned, took a step away, and them looked back over a shoulder.  "Samantha is really much prettier than Alexia.  You should stick with it."

 Sam's mouth dropped and she stared, but he merely tipped an imaginary hat and was lost as a man darted between them.  Sam stared into the crowd for a long moment after he'd left, licking the taste of honey from her lips.  He didn't reappear.