Julia Lelieveld and the battle with the underworld

When the dark night turned into a gray morning, we stopped at a German roadhouse. We had already crossed the border three hours ago. My arms were cramped around Lucas’s body, I carefully freed myself from him and got off the bike. He followed me and put his bike on the stand.

“Come on, we need something to eat,” he said. And he walked into me in front of the restaurant. Here and there people were having breakfast. We looked for a table by the window. This way Lucas could keep an eye on his motorcycle. We put the helmets down next to us and sat across from each other. We looked at each other. Too tired to keep our feelings to ourselves. His eyes were fragile and lost. I don’t think I looked much different. “What do you want to eat?” he asked, taking the card. I shrugged my shoulders. “It doesn’t matter, order some. I’m going to the bathroom.” He nodded and looked at the map. The toilets were at the end of the bar. I really needed to. We had already driven for about 5 hours. After peeing, I looked in the mirror. I didn’t look that good. My eyes are swollen and red spots cover my face. You could also see the bruises from the fight. Lucas didn’t look much better. People will think when they see us like this.

I washed my hands and my face, I really had to stay awake. I looked in the mirror one more time. My eyes were sad. I kept the thoughts of Renzo far away in my head. If I thought about it now, I would lose myself again. I took a few deep breaths in and out and walked back to the table. To my surprise there were two large cups of coffee, a fried egg with toast and a plate of waffles. I inhaled the smell of the food and my stomach rumbled automatically. “Enjoy your meal,” said Lucas earnestly. “Thanks, you too.” We quickly ate our breakfast in silence, we were both more hungry than we realized. Lucas sipped his coffee. I never liked coffee. I picked up the head and smelled it. No, it still didn’t smell good. “You’d better drink it, we have to stay awake a little longer.” I nodded. He was right about that and I took a sip, the bitter taste making its way down my throat. I shivered for a moment. I really had to get used to this. “What’s your plan?” I asked him. He looked up. “I think it’s best if we drive for a few more hours. Then get some sleep and drive again tonight.”

“Tonight?”

He nodded. “I think we can drive as unseen as possible.”

“Ah.” I nodded, he could be right. And that brought me to my next question. “How do you know where to go?”

He seemed to think for a moment. “I’ve heard that the underworld can be entered in Greece, that’s all I know. We’ll find out on our journey there.”

Geez, I thought to myself. If only we could do that. And as if he could read my mind, he said, “We can do that. I have faith in that.”

He seemed to think for a moment. “We’re driving via Romania, there are people who can show us the way. Today I want to drive to the Austrian border and there we will have to go to sleep somewhere. Then we can drive to Hungary tonight and from there we’ll see whether we should rest or drive on to Romania.”

All I did was nod. This was totally unknown territory. I had to trust Lucas on this.

We paid with the money I brought. Before we started the long drive to this roadhouse, we stopped by my house. Dad had set aside a lot of money for emergencies. He knew he wouldn’t be home for a long time, so wanted to make sure I had enough. Well that came in handy now. We would go a long way with this money. And not unimportantly, I had filled my toilet bag as full as possible. Lucas had advised to wear warm clothes, as it could be cold on the bike. Well, he was right about that. It had been cold last night. I was so happy with my thick gloves.

Once outside, the sun shone faintly in the sky, the clouds forming a gray blanket over the world. The air was chilly and it was damp, I shivered for a moment. I pulled my zipper all the way up and filled the slit of my helmet with my scarf. I saw Lucas do the same. He quietly helped me onto the bike and sat down in front of me. I grabbed him tight and before I knew it he was speeding into the gray chilly morning to an uncertain destination.

At the end of the afternoon I noticed that Lucas was becoming less alert, his driving style was getting sloppy and he had already shaken his head a few times. I moved my arms a little and held him a little tighter, hoping he would notice. But he responded immediately. He nodded his head to the side and I nodded back. He slowed down and stopped on the side of the road. He took off his helmet and I followed suit. He looked tired. It couldn’t be otherwise, we had only stopped once from last night. “I think it’s time we got some rest.” To my surprise, he immediately gave in. “I think so too.” He took out his phone and looked for a room nearby. “I found a room about 20 miles from here. It’s the only one close, the next one isn’t for 200 miles.” “That’s fine, we’ll take it.” He nodded and immediately reserved the room on his phone, looked at the route and put his helmet back on. I did the same and held him tight again. It seemed like he was going even faster than we did before. In less than fifteen minutes we were already in front of the hotel. Well, hotel? It was remote and looked outdated. Lucas stopped his engine in the parking lot and got off. I also got off and stretched out completely. Lucas followed my lead. We looked at each other for a moment and then back to the hotel. He raised his shoulders. “Maybe it won’t be too bad.” “I hope so,” I said.

We stepped into the hall which was divided by a wooden counter. In front of the counter next door were two old chairs and a table in between. A dusty fake plant perched on a crocheted yellowed rug. An older woman sat behind the counter and looked up at us from her computer. She smiled kindly, showing her unkempt teeth, and said hello in a language I hadn’t heard before. Probably the dialect of this region. Lucas nodded and showed her the reservation on his phone.

She nodded and babbled again. Lucas tried to communicate with her in his best German, but it wasn’t easy. He tried to explain to her that we would like to have twin beds and I think we succeeded. We paid her for 1 night and got the key. She pointed us to one of the stairs and held up 2 fingers. Luckily we understood that. The second floor. Lucas led the way up the narrow wooden staircase that creaked with every step we climbed. Three doors opened onto the first small landing. We walked past the doors to the second staircase, it was even narrower than the first, Lucas’ elbows touching the walls. Once on the second landing, there was only one door. The door number matched the number on the key. He opened it and looked carefully around the corner. “That’s not too bad,” he said with relief. He led me into the room. I crossed the threshold and surprisingly I stepped into a bright room. There was an immediate door to the left and an extension of that wall was a large wardrobe. The large double bed was under the point of the sloping roof and to the right of the bed was a large comfortable sofa. Opposite the bed was an antique dresser with a matching mirror. A lot of daylight came in through the two large skylights. The bathroom was simple but neat, there were plenty of towels and it looked clean. Lucas put his bag on the floor, I followed his example. We both sigh deeply. He held onto the bridge of his nose and closed his eyes. I quietly came and stood next to him. “Are you holding up?”

He raised his shoulders. “I’m just really tired.” I nodded, I knew how he felt. “Are you hungry?”

We hadn’t eaten anything since our stop at the gas station.

He opened his eyes again and looked at me. “Yes, quite.”

I grabbed my bag and took out the sandwiches, the fruit, the bottles of drinks and the chips and put it on the bed. “This is what I have.” “Better than nothing at all.”

He sat down on the bed and started a sandwich. I sat down on the other side of the food and grabbed a sandwich with some sort of egg salad. Oh, I was so hungry that this even tasted good. We ate in silence. What had to go through him? His father was murdered yesterday and now he is on his way to get revenge. Would that be his way of processing? His way of reacting? I remembered being mad at everyone when my mother was killed. Would Lucas now experience that too or would he only focus his anger on Evil? I shivered at those thoughts. Evil, what would he do to Renzo? How would he be? No, I wasn’t going to think about this, I’d drive myself crazy with all the thoughts. Ugh, I wasn’t hungry anymore. I put the rest of the sandwich back in the wrapper. I tried to think of something other than Renzo. The circle came up in my mind, well that wasn’t much better. What would they think? What would they do? I’m sure they’d be really mad at me.

“Hey, are you okay?” Lucas looked at me concerned. I looked into his eyes. He, too, was fighting with himself, judging by his gaze. I shrugged my shoulders. I didn’t know where it came from, but I got sad. How did it come to this? “Honestly? Not really,” I admitted. He nodded. “I think I know how you feel.” I nodded too. “I think so too.”

I got up and got ready to go to sleep, the hot shower was wonderful, it made me completely drowsy. I brushed my teeth and put on my clothes for when we had to leave quickly. When I came out of the bathroom I saw that Lucas had made up the couch with the extra bedding that was in the closet. He looked around and smiled briefly. “What?” I asked. “You quickly learn how to put your clothes on.”

I shrugged and laughed too. “Take the bed, I’ll sleep on the couch.” “Are you sure?” I asked him. He nodded. “I’m so tired I can sleep anywhere.” He grabbed his things and disappeared into the bathroom too.

It didn’t take long for me to wake up to Lucas’s alarm. I rubbed my eyes, I wasn’t ready to wake up at all. I picked up my own phone and saw that it was 1 a.m. I knew it was safer and faster to travel at night, but gosh I was tired.

I got out of bed numb and went to the bathroom. I washed my face with ice cold water which helped to wake me up. Lucas followed my lead, he also looked broken. In silence we packed our things and left the room. It was even colder than this afternoon, I saw Lucas also shivering for a moment. He set his GPS and we got on the bike and drove at high speed into the dark night.

When dusk started we stopped to refuel and have something to eat, we had driven all the way through Austria and were now just over the Hungarian border. He had said that we had to make one more stop before we got to Romania, there we would find someone who could tell us more about how to get to Evil. I hadn’t asked any further questions, I had so many and didn’t know where to start. I had to trust Lucas on this. Halfway through the afternoon it started to rain and with the cold that was already there, this was really no fun. I thought about using the elements, but I was afraid of misusing my powers so that I wouldn’t be able to use them when we really needed them. Half an hour after it started to rain it only got worse, we were already completely soaked and the road didn’t get any better. Lucas stopped at the side of the road under an overpass. He took off his helmet and looked at his phone. I followed his lead. “We have to stop, this can’t be done anymore.” I nodded. He looked at his phone and looked for a place to sleep. “Shit, nothing around.” “Probably there are places, but not yet connected to internet bookings.”

“Yes, I think so too.” He looked at his phone again. “Two miles away is a village, we ask for a place to sleep.” ”Good.” We put our helmets back on and drove on. It didn’t take long before we arrived at a village. What immediately struck me was a large white church, in front of the church was a square with several benches. The village consisted mainly of low-rise buildings. Outdated and poorly maintained houses, only the buildings around the church were more beautiful. Lucas stopped his bike in the square and nodded at a building with a sign. We took off our helmets and walked to the building. It turned out to be a cafe with several tables, food smells coming from the kitchen. The people sitting at the bar and tables kept an eye on us. They were probably not used to outsiders here. I stayed close to Lucas as he walked to the bar. He put google translate on and asked if there was a place to sleep. The man behind the bar nodded and pointed up. Through translation and some hand gestures we managed to get a key, after we immediately ordered some food and drinks, we paid everything at once and looked for a somewhat remote table. Lucas looked really tired. “Good thing we stopped, right?” He looked doubtful. “I would rather have driven on. This area is not well known.” I looked at him questioningly. “There are a lot of e-warriors and followers of evil here.” I looked at him startled. “How do you know that?” “I was taught by my father. It turns out that in these countries there is more activity and they are more adherent to their beliefs, so there are more supernatural happenings here.” I nodded and looked around. Some people were back at what they were doing, some were still looking at us. “Do you feel something?” I asked him. He shook his head. “Not yet, but it doesn’t fit right.”

A shiver ran down my spine. “Hey, it’ll be okay. Okay?” Lucas looked at me intensely. I nodded.

While I looked over my shoulder for a moment, I saw the man coming from behind the bar with a large tray. There were two glasses of water, two steaming bowls of soup, warm bread and a plate of some sort of mashed potatoes, some vegetables and a piece of meat. Anyway, it smelled really nice. We thanked the gentleman and started eating. Half an hour later everything was gone, gosh, that’s nice. Especially after we were so cold and wet. My clothes were already starting to dry out a bit, but it still didn’t sit well. “Come on, let’s go upstairs.” Lucas took the key and I followed him. Our room was directly above the cafe and we looked out onto the square where the church and Renzo’s motorcycle stood. This room was a lot smaller, it contained a double bed and a dresser. A bedside table just fits on one side of the bed and a chair on the other. The other door in the room opened onto a tiny bathroom. We both looked at the bed and then at each other again. We were too tired to discuss it. This time Lucas took a shower first. While Lucas was taking a shower, I turned the heating under the window all the way up so that we could dry our clothes on it.

The bathroom door opened. “Jesus, it’s hot in here.” “We really need to dry our clothes before moving on.” “You’re right, but what a heat.” I agreed with him, I had already undressed a lot because it was so hot and because my clothes were already half over the heating it started to smell musty. I rushed into the bathroom and took a hot shower, which my numb muscles appreciated. Once done I stepped into the room and it was like hitting a wall from the heat. Grose. I saw that Lucas was already in bed, he had completely stripped down to his boxers and had shifted the blankets to the foot of the bed. And the worst part was, I didn’t blame him. I took off my clothes down to my bra and thong. It was really very hot. As uncomfortable as I felt towards Lucas, I really needed to get some sleep. I turned the clothes on the stove for a while and I could already feel them getting drier, nice. I looked at my phone and saw that it was 5:30 in the evening. My rhythm was totally disrupted. I suppressed a yawn and lay down next to Lucas. He lay with his back to me, I did the same and turned my back to him. “Good night,” I told him. “Night”, I got as an answer. This time I didn’t have a peaceful sleep, I dreamed about Renzo and Evil. That he was tortured and gave up. I yelled for him not to give up, that we were coming to rescue him. But he didn’t seem to hear me. Evil against it, he looked at me with a vicious smile and beat Renzo against his stomach with a red-hot poker. He cried out in pain. I screamed, but it was no use. Renzo hung limp from his shackles. “Julia, Julia! Wake up.” I felt someone hold me and shake me briefly. I woke up with a start and looked into Lucas’s dark eyes.