Officer Anja Sørensen guided her patrol SUV onto the narrow shoulder of the steep service road halfway up the side of the hill. The sight was odd, but not unexpected, as she had gotten the call from headquarters alerting her to the situation. Headquarters is what the law enforcement and public safety community called the outpost that was little more than a guard shack a few kilometers inland.

A compact car was parked, with the driver’s side door open, at an angle facing a large tree that looked to be standing guard over the steep angle down to the Norwegian Sea. A motor scooter was parked a few meters away, with a young woman perched on the seat, arms around the young man standing in front of her.

Anja parked and climbed out of the vehicle a few moments after calling in her arrival over the radio.

“Good morning. I am Officer Sørensen,” she greeted them cordially but with authority. “Mr. Faarlund?”

“Yes, ma’am,” the young man shook her hand. “Avri Faarlund.”

“And your name?” Anja asked the young woman.

“Marit Bruun.”

She asked for identification, which they nervously provided. They checked out fine so far.

“So, you two are the ones who called in this vehicle?”

“Um, yes, I called,” said Avri.

The questions came thick and fast, mostly about touching or hearing or seeing anything.

“We even called out in case anyone was around,” Avri said. “No answer, though.”

“What were you two doing up here? The chain is gone at the main road, but you should know you’re not supposed to be here.”

The young couple looked at each other nervously, Marit biting her lip. Avri answered. “We were just… riding. There are some of us who like to come up here in the Summer and… just hang out.”

So, sex. Anja smiled inside, but not outwardly, maintaining her professionalism.

“It’s beautiful,” Marit offered.

Yes, majestic. Breathtaking. Sandhornøya is one of the most picturesque locations on the Norwegian coast, one of the few islands accessible by bridge, offering striking views of the sea and nearby islands and inlets, which the three of them now faced. Rugged forested peaks rose almost a thousand meters high behind them.

“Romantic?” asked Anja.

“Um, yes, I think,” Avri shrugged.

After a few more questions, Anja concluded the interview. “I’ll need you two to move along now. I’ll need to stay and have a look around.” She smiled to herself as she turned back to her SUV, waiting for the couple to separate from her a few meters. “Oh, Mr. Faarland, Miss Bruun?” she called, causing them to stop and face her. “You are at least using condoms, aren’t you?”

Marit blushed, and Avri smiled, looking away. “Um,” he stuttered. “We weren’t… we didn’t….”

“We didn’t do it, go all the way,” she said, fidgeting. “Not full sex.”

“Well, you be careful when you do.”

While Anja waited for the forensics team, she looked for details, without touching anything. There was no apparent damage to the vehicle, like dents, scrapes, broken glass, or fluid leaks. No apparent collision with the tree. The key was still in the ignition, attached to a large plastic key chain bearing the logo of a rental company. An oversized handbag sat unzipped in the front seat, with a phone face down in the passenger footwell. Nothing was disturbed down the slope in front of the car. Someone could have entered the wooded incline on the other side of the road, but the experts would investigate that.

Anja called in the license plate to Headquarters, and Jakob got back to her a few minutes later. The car was indeed owned by a rental agency, checked out in suburban Oslo the previous week.

“That’s, what, a thousand kilometers away?” Anja remarked.

“More than that, let’s see…” She could hear Jakob typing. “It would take probably two days to drive from there.”

Understandably, by policy, the rental company couldn’t give out customer information over the phone. It would be that evening before a uniformed officer could visit a branch office in person with credentials.

Within the next two hours, the forensics team, Elyse and Sigurd, arrived and took all the photos they needed before going through the car in detail. The phone wouldn’t turn on, so it took a few minutes of charging to get it to boot. Missed call and unread message icons showed on the lock screen, and a numeric pass code was required to unlock it. Nothing seemed too out of place with the handbag. A driver's license, credit cards, and an insurance card all identified the presumed driver as Freja Hæstad, a twenty-six-year-old woman from Oslo.

The three officers called out Miss Hæstad’s name several times as they worked, identifying themselves as law enforcement and assuring her they were concerned for her safety. No answer came.

A scan thirty meters back into the wooded slope didn’t reveal anything unusual. No signs of a scuffle were in or near the vehicle, and the back seat and trunk were clean, so the team wrapped up and left the scene after a summary report over the radio.

Anja received a call at home that evening from an officer who had just visited the Oslo rental car office. Miss Hæstad had picked up the car the previous Tuesday morning, and Oslo police were arranging to visit her address to check it out. Another lead: the rental was paid for by a company called Torva Industries.

In the little headquarters the next morning, Anja and Jakob praised the surprisingly reliable and fast Internet service, searching and making calls. Torva, an industrial materials company based in Bergen, was paid a visit by local police; Human Resources confirmed that Freja Hæstad was employed in their Oslo office.

“Curious,” said her supervisor, Mikel Bjelland, when he was contacted by Anja. “We didn’t hear from Freja yesterday. She was supposed to check in with our facility in Mo i Rana yesterday afternoon and start training with them today. What has happened to her?”

“We don’t know that anything has happened. We found her rental car abandoned, but there is no sign of any foul play. You said she was due in Mo i Rana yesterday, Monday, but she was farther North near Bodø, on Sandhornøya. At least the car was.”

“Yes, she was on a trip for us to do software training, starting in our Bodø facility,” Mr. Bjelland started, filling Anja in about the training.

“So, Miss Hæstad is your tech guru, your star software trainer?”

“Well, no. She is single, and the others here were hesitant to travel, especially up North, for a time that may require staying longer, because of family.” She was a decent employee, not stellar, more artsy than techie, but she knew how to fill in forms. She was to do training and user support in Northernmost Bodø first, then Mo i Rana, Namsos, Trondheim, and Kristiansund on the way back. “She volunteered to go, and was kind of excited about it, for the adventure more than the work I suppose. We agreed for her to stay in a lodge near Bodø while she trained on Thursday and Friday, and through the weekend.”

Anja asked more probing questions, business-oriented at first, and then about Freja personally. Did she know anyone there? Did he know of any current or potential or former romantic interests? What were her plans Saturday and Sunday? Mr. Bjelland didn’t know about Freja’s relationships or plans. “She’s pretty private, pretty melancholy, doesn’t talk about her personal life.”

When her conversation with Freja’s supervisor concluded, Anja contacted the owners of the lodge Torva had booked for Freja outside Bodø, and paid them a visit.

“She’s gone missing? Oh, dear!” Mrs. Vårvik exclaimed at the news Anja delivered.

“We haven’t determined that. We just found her car abandoned, and she hasn’t reported for work.”

After working in Bodø Thursday and Friday, Freja was last seen by the Vårviks on Friday evening They assumed she had visited some sights over the weekend, possibly Sandhornøya among a few places they had told her about.

“Did you think it strange, not seeing her at all over the weekend, and Monday?”

“Yes,” Mr. Vårvik said, “especially yesterday because she was supposed to check out. We were going to give it through today before calling anyone. We didn’t want to stick our noses in anyone’s business, cause problems.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, it’s not unusual for accommodations to have someone check in and not stay the whole time. We called worried about one man once and one woman another time. It turns out both times they were having affairs and used staying in a lodge as cover for spending the nights with lovers.”

“So you stopped asking. Okay, that makes sense.”

Mr. Vårvik unlocked the door to the room Freja had been occupying. Aside from a notebook computer presumably owned by Torva, there were typical young women’s articles, including toiletries scattered on the bathroom counter, some clothes hung and laid out and others discarded. The only slightly unconventional sight was the rolling suitcase, opened with some contents dispersed: a sex toy was prominently displayed for all to see, a pink vibrator.

Anja focused on the stack of three books on the bedside table. “Are these yours, or hers?”

“They belong to us,” Mrs. Vårvik replied. “Norse mythology and fantasy lore, I think that’s them. Freja did seem interested in them out in the sitting room.”

Anja picked up the top book, a very old, plain olive-green hardcover with worn corners. Scanning a few yellowed pages, she was interested, but not shocked, to see illustrations of fully nude people, in natural settings, all outside, walking, eating, conversing. Fantasy lore, but not the mainstream kind. Deyt Alltydefte, the title read. Sounded like a mash-up of Nordic language words for the/this forever, or the/this everafter.

The forensics team that visited the hillside on Sandhornøya the next day to retrieve the rental car scanned the area more thoroughly. Elyse called Anja to give her the news.

“I can’t say for sure, but we may have found something of your Miss Hæstad.”

“Oh?”

“Maybe two hundred meters up the hill, we found some footprints. Bare feet, not shoes. At least two sets of prints leading to crevices in a rock face. But also a pile of clothes. Women’s clothes, folded neatly. I’ll send you a picture.”

Anja stared at the photo after her conversation was over. A pair of slacks, something silky like underwear, a light blazer, a pair of flats with thin socks set inside. All placed in a neat little stack.

Four Days Earlier:

Freja Hæstad came to a stop on the shoulder of the Kystriksveien scenic coastal route, the map on her phone imploring her to turn right onto the road leading to the bridge to the island of Sandhornøya.

“Fuck it,” she muttered to herself. “Why not?” The keepers of her lodge had pointed out a dozen sights in the area around Bodø, and she planned to use this weekend to explore. That’s the real reason she had volunteered to come on this trip. She pretty much hated her job, but it was about all that she could find a year ago. Four years out of University with an Art degree, she waited tables and cleaned office buildings in Oslo for a while before landing a boring but better-paying nine-to-five position doing data entry and inventory reporting for Torva.

She was inwardly excited to volunteer to head out to Torva’s remote production facilities, officially to “train users” on their new software, but personally as a solo adventure. The training sucked. As she guided her little rental car over the bridge, though, she managed a relieved sigh. It was Friday night, so she had Saturday and Sunday to herself before heading South toward the next dreary industrial facility. Maybe these next days, even starting tonight, would make it worth it? She liked driving, and this long road trip gave her time to listen to music, admire the breathtaking landscape, and frankly to fantasize.

It sounded silly, and she would never tell anyone, but she imagined life as a nomadic sea nymph or wood nymph, choosing whom to interact with as passersby hiked or swam within her realm. She had stopped frequently on her two-day drive North to take in her surroundings, and had softened the frustrating training time the past two nights by indulging in a surprisingly provocative illustrated novel she found at her lodge. Deyt Alltydefte told of a realm — she liked the rough translation The Evermore — where the inhabitants’ nudity allowed them to see and appreciate each other’s physical and personality traits naturally, without barriers or artificial enhancements. Their rare forays into our world delighted some and repulsed others.

Such a realm appealed to Freja, as she had a healthy sex drive and would relax excitedly nude at home, but she wasn’t considered very attractive, with two very short-term boyfriends in the past, and no recent or current prospects. She had a satisfying masturbation session earlier that evening, her mind stimulated by the book’s sometimes sexually explicit depictions of life nude in the outdoors, and her vagina stimulated by the comfortable fit of her vibrating dildo.

Worn out by her travel and awful training days, sated by her orgasm-punctuated fantasies, and having her timing thrown off by the eerie all-day sun, Freja had napped for three hours that night. Restless again, her adventurous spirit convinced her to slip out of the lodge to take a drive late at night and experience the famed mid-summer midnight sun.

As another view of rocky shores soaring above shimmering sea inlets came into view, she woke up her phone screen, noting the time. At 11:53 pm, the sun, though low in the sky, illuminated her surroundings just like any late morning or early evening back home.

But, her face fell as she swiped into the messages she had been ignoring, coming to a stop on a wide gravel shoulder. A second message from her boss, wanting a report of how things went in training, expecting it before she made it to Mo i Rana on Monday. And, her roommate, not so much a friend, was accelerating her plans to move in with her boyfriend, resurfacing Freja’s fretting about finding a new roommate or paying the entire expense of her flat starting in July. Next week.

“Fuck, fuck!” She tossed her phone, which tumbled to the floor, face down in front of the passenger seat.

Tears returning again, Freja noticed her turnout was the base of a gravel road that went up the hill. The chain across was detached at one end, and she convinced herself that was permission to proceed.

She flicked the headlights on since it was pretty shady with the sun on the other side of the hill as she ascended. She was almost scared twice as the sharp turns were a bit too narrow for her comfort, giving her visions of tumbling down the hillside and being swallowed by the sea. But would that really be so bad? And who would miss her? Even her divorced parents and older brother didn’t much keep in touch.

Pulling off the path at an angle at a particularly scenic and now sun-bathed overlook, she came to a stop just in front of a large tree. She got out of the car, leaving the door open, giggling to herself at much of the world’s ignorance about Norway’s climate. Enjoying the warmth — it had reached 25°C during the week — with arms wide, she imagined this as her realm, roaming a wild, majestic, enchanting island close to the top of the world.

Enchanting. Like the humming resonating in her ears? Sighing? Singing? Chanting? What she heard was more than wind noise. It was melodic. As she crossed the road, Freja wasn’t in a trance, but she couldn’t resist moving forward, uphill. The sound was like an eerie but beautiful hybrid of voice and wind.

Several minutes later, Freja’s impromptu nature walk was interrupted by a sight that made her mouth drop open.

“Oh, I am so sorry!” Freja apologized, stopping within a few meters of two naked young women. They seemed interested, but not embarrassed or startled. “I was just, I…” She couldn’t explain why she was here, but she didn’t really need to.

One of the girls spoke in a smooth, low, lyrical voice. In a language Freja didn’t recognize.

“Were you singing? Is there hiking here?” Freja’s questions weren’t looking for answers as much as determining whether they understood her. Their replies came in short phrases and shrugs. Freja tried Swedish and Danish, since she knew a few greeting phrases in most Nordic languages. German and English, at which she was pretty proficient, got the same response.

Waving her toward them, the two women turned up the hill. Fuck it, why not? had become the mantra of her little excursion, so she followed. Their hair was quite long and wavy, one very light blonde and one plain brown, similar to her own. They were perhaps her age, judging by their voices and developed bodies including dense pubic hair.

As they reached a clearing, the two women stood and faced her, coming close, evidently enthralled by her clothing. Speaking to her and each other, they ran their fingers along the cuffs and hem of her jacket, which she removed. The women smiled. Off came Freja’s shoes and socks, her bare feet feeling free and soothing on the cool, damp ground. She was almost embarrassed to have only a camisole on as her top, as she chose her outfit because it made her feel sexy even though no one ever told her that she was.

She appreciated these ladies’ bare bodies, not showing off, but just natural. They weren’t any more “perfect” than she was, blemished, not smooth, and lacking seductive curves. Maybe in an act of solidarity with these curious strangers, Freja unfastened her slacks, pushing them and her plain maroon panties to her feet and stepping out of them.

The two seemed to ask questions, repeating the same phrases. “Syldje”, the blonde said, tapping her chest with her fingers. The other said “Janitte” with the same motion.

“Oh!” Freja exclaimed, almost giddy, realizing that they were giving their names. “You, Syldje?” She touched the blonde’s arm.

“Sjedt,” came the reply, probably a “yes,” with a smile and nod that translates in any culture.

“You, Janitte?” The other’s response was the same.

“I,” she said happily, tapping her sternum, “Freja.”

“Freja,” Janitte repeated. “Syldje, Janitte, Freja,” the three of them said in rounds, pointing at each. Touching each.

Janitte pointed along a path leading from where they were standing, and she and Syldje frolicked forward, just out of sight. Freja followed the sound of what she thought was the earlier singing voice, stopping to lift her camisole over her head and gather the rest of her clothes.

Now completely nude, she stepped into the clearing where Syldje and Janitte had stopped — joined by two others! One was a man about the same age, and one a woman perhaps a few years older. Both were completely nude as well, and Freja found it difficult not to stare at the man. She had awkwardly fumbled with two boys at University, but had never seen a man completely naked in person. His uncircumcised penis was mostly hanging but pointing slightly outward from a nest of light brown hair. He was lean, blond, and had facial hair that she couldn’t quite call a beard.

Freja had always been self-conscious about her breasts. Whereas the ideal according to popular culture was full and round with upturned bullet nipples, hers were loose, small, turned outward, with large puffy bumpy areolae. The third woman had breasts much like hers, bringing a smile to her face.

The simple introductions mimicked the previous ones, Freja learning and repeating the names of Thorgen and Miende as she neatly folded and stacked her clothes on a flat rock.

Freja couldn’t believe this wasn’t a dream or fantasy. She sat naked with the others for a long time, listening as they talked, even recognizing a few words in context. Could she stay in contact with them and learn their language? They offered her what they were drinking, a strong fermented beverage that smelled and tasted like apples and berries, passed around in an earthen cup.

Their nudity was initially a naughty thrill to Freja, but less erotic and more liberating as an hour passed, perhaps two. The next hour had the five of them sitting, then standing, on a rock outcropping, looking out over the treetops into the sea, holding raised hands as they laughed. And the next hour was overtly erotic, their nude bodies lying against each other in the sun, holding, swiping, caressing. Freja had never much entertained the idea of sex with another woman, but enjoying Syldje’s and Miende’s bare skin just felt natural. They moved occasionally, reclining against each other in turn, it seemed. Thorgen’s penis alternated several times from thick and stiff to slim and soft.

The one male’s arousal wasn’t in isolation. At a measured pace, the whole scene built to a stimulating, erotic sharing of touches. Freja found herself leaning back against Syldje while the blonde’s fingers dipped into her pubic hair, watching Thorgen and Miende kiss while Janitte caressed his shaft.

Syldje’s fingers splayed and stroked Freja’s hair, uttering the sound “piyen”. Goosebumps formed over Freja’s neck and arms, as the word sounded so much like the Norwegian pen or Danish pæn. Pretty.

“You think my hair is pretty?” Tears began. “Pen?” She turned her head to look into the blonde’s eyes.

“Sjedt, sha piyen.” Syldje raised handfuls of Freja’s hair and let it fall.

Freja started to see herself as the others saw her and each other, embodying a natural beauty. She took a turn caressing Thorgen’s handsomely erect penis while she shared kisses with Janitte, whose fingers slipped between her thighs. On her back with her head propped up on Syldje’s lap, Freja masturbated while watching Janitte mirror her movements.

Miende leaned over Freja, touching a breast to hers while it jiggled. Smiling and giggling, the older woman breathed, “piyen.” Again, “sha piyen.”

“Sjedt, piyen,” Freja replied. Yes, her breasts were pretty, like Miende’s. The two puffy, pale, bumpy teat points glided together, hardened with arousal. Freja couldn’t hold back, finishing herself off, squeezing her eyes closed through her climax with Miende’s hand clamped over hers.

Janitte’s climax came as Freja watched, but simply touching seemed to be enough for the others.

Freja guessed three or four hours had passed with her new friends. She felt invigorated, not tired, even though it was perhaps four o’clock in the morning, the sun slowly traveling and rising into the new day.

Miende slipped into a crevice in the rock outcropping. After a few moments, while the others chatted, Freja approached, intrigued, listening. Thorgen gently held her shoulders as he pushed past her, saying some words and brushing his cheeks to hers before following Miende. Freja gasped as he just seemed to disappear. Peering into the crevice, she didn’t see a cave or rock face behind, but rather a murky blur.

Syldje and Janitte held one of Freja’s hands each, facing the crevice. What Syldje said sounded like a question, the pitch of her last word raised. Alltydefte. From the book in the lodge. The Evermore.

“Alltydefte?” Freja pointed into the crevice.

“Sjedt, deyt alltydefte,” Janitte replied, smiling at their mutual understanding.

Freja considered her clothes stacked nearby, her ID and phone and other belongings in the car she’d left down the hill. Her job, her acquaintances, her distant family. None of that mattered.

Freja nodded forward. “Sjedt, deyt alltydefte.”

The three stepped forward, vanishing into the crevice.

Into The Evermore.

Into Deyt Alltydefte.