When Hela had first stepped onto a battlefield, she had been a little over four hundred years old, coming up to most soldier's knees and brandishing twin swords in clumsy, barely-calloused hands.
"Are you really sure she's ready to be here, Your Highness?" one of the infantrymen had dared to ask, gazing down at her too-large armor skeptically.
She'd stabbed him in the thigh then and there, right in front of her father and half of Asgard's forces, fighting the urge to cringe as bright crimson flowed out after she yanked her sword back and the man yelled in terrible pain.
The other soldiers drew back a bit at her violence, and Odin had smiled proudly, one eyebrow raised rather cruelly as his man collapsed, clutching at his thigh to stem the bleeding.
"She certainly looks ready to me," he said mildly, nodding his head in approval, and she smiled confidently back.
Five hours later, in the safety of her war tent after the battle was won and done with, still drenched in blood and rain water, she'd curled up and sobbed harder than she had in her entire life.
"Allfather, please!"
The king was a weak little man, groveling on the floor like a dog for a scrap of meat.
Hela watched in fascination as he pressed his entire face into the blood-stained marble of his false throne room, and tried not to look too smug when her father smiled down at him indulgently.
"Calm yourself, sire. I am a reasonable man," Odin ordered calmly, and Hela couldn't quite hold in a derisive snort, even if it earned her an impatient side-eyed look. "I'm sure we can come to an agreement that suits the both of us."
The sniveling false king looked up beseechingly, eyes wild and desperate. "Allfather, there is little my people could offer you!" he cried, trembling with terror; false or not, what kind of people would allow this man to be king? "We will gladly swear our fealty, but we are not warriors! There is nothing we could do for you on the field of battle!"
"Perhaps, sire," Odin's smile became distinctly menacing, and Hela couldn't help but match it. "But there is certainly more your people can offer aside from farming, don't you agree? Don't worry," he forestalled any continuing protests with a wave of his hand, "I would never ask anything of your people that I would not ask of my own."
Three days later, Hela watched the false king's subjects struggling to move a marble block that would soon be the floor of Asgard's brand new palace, and grinned to herself.
Hela marched back across the Rainbow Bridge alongside her men, Fenris' hulking figure stalking beside her like a great omen of calamity.
The smile she gave Heimdall as they passed the gatekeeper was not returned, but she wasn't bothered; the man was loyal, if distant, and she could respect his stoicism in the face of violence. Not everyone reveled in war the way she and her father did.
Speaking of her father, the king of Asgard was dismounting his horse as she led her battalion back to the Realm Eternal. She didn't fight the teasing smirk as he groaned in relief once his feet hit the Bridge. "Alright there, old man?" she asked innocently, twirling Mjollnir by the strap as she walked up to him and curtseyed mockingly in her blood-drenched armor.
Odin turned to her with a huff, rolling his eyes dramatically. "I believe I'll live; the throne will not be needing you for some time yet, I assure you."
Hela laughed roughly, strapping Mjollnir to her hip so she could properly reach up and slap her father on the back, grinning as he voiced a protest. "That's too bad! I was thinking that glittery seat of yours was looking pretty comfortable; perhaps I'll take a nap there before washing off all this blood I spilled in the name of keeping this empire of ours safe?"
Her father, normally so serious when she returned from a campaign, smiled so widely his cheeks nearly split. When he spoke, it wasn't full of teasing, but genuine pride. "You did a marvelous job, my dear. You truly are my greatest pride, as a father."
Hela did not blush, did not start to smile, did not feel her eyes growing warm with tears.
Hela just slapped Odin across the back again, ducking away from him and laughing unapologetically when he cursed in surprise. "Love you too, old man!"
Hela believed that when the day came that she sat on the throne, that she would be a Queen remembered by the Realm Eternal, from the day of her ascension until the end days of Ragnarök.
She believed in Asgard, in the glory of their conquest, in their divine right to rule the Nine Realms and lead these savage worlds into a great era of peace and advancement for their people.
And she believed that her father was the greatest man and the most powerful king in all the universe, and when he told her how proud he was of her, she knew she was the Queen that would lead the universe into its next age.
She hadn't known that her father had lied.
About a great many things.
A/N: This kind of sucks but I ran out of time oh well
~Persephone