The winds of war are strong and unforgiving, lashing about the Asgardian warriors as they slay frost giant after frost giant. Odin is at the forefront of them all, a dark and ominous presence in his glittering armour roaring commands in the biting cold of Jötunheim while his spear shines sharp and slick with the blood of fallen Jötnar.
Cloaked in mist and his flickering seiðr, Loki runs, crushing the snow beneath his ice-blue feet. He does not know who started the avalanche that led to this dreadful crusade, but right now, in this cruel moment, his people are paying for it. Dearly.
The Aesir are nothing the like of which he has ever laid eyes upon in his life, with their pale flesh and coloured eyes, their sneering red mouths. He would have been curious had they not invaded Jötunheim in a flash of brightness, spilling from a bridge of rainbow light with their swords and bloodlust. It is disconcerting to young Loki and his paltry number of years, Loki who has only read of warfare and bloodshed within whatever dusty tomes he has read in their ice palaces.
Reality is so much harsher, and truth is a painful knife.
His father is nowhere to be found, having shoved him aside with his brothers to hide before forming his own ice javelin to join the battle himself. Loki's small fingers tremble as he frets, and he bites his lip as he tries not to cry for the deaths of his brothers. They had been separated during the skirmish, Helblindi and Býleistr's hands slipping from his own as they ran to avoid the Aesir who were intent on slaughtering any Jötun they could get their hands on, even the children. Loki had found their dead bodies outside the palace later, hands still linked tightly and lovingly even with the blood seeping from their small chests.
Disgust swells in his chest at the thought. The Aesir prided themselves of being warrior gods of noble origin and unparalleled honour, and yet here they were, slaying an entire race simply because... of glory? Of treasure? Loki shakes his head, red eyes blinking to see through the howling storm as he hides behind a rock. Lifeless bodies surround him at every turn, Jötun and Aesir alike, their spilled blood haphazard red on the snow just like a crude painting.
It unsettles him.
Loki dusts down the rough edge of the rock, sitting down on the snow with his back to it to rest, if only for a moment. No more running for now. He sighs and tilts his head back, shuts out the sounds of screams and strangled voices around him as lives are taken, eyes gouged out and swords and ice blades clash.
A gloved hand darts out suddenly, warm and frightening, yanking him to his knees. Loki cries out, eyes wide in fear, and sees an Aesir before him. The Aesir's smile is cutting and unkind, and the sound of him unsheathing his sword is the single most terrifying thing Loki has ever heard in his entire life just then.
"Jötun," he snarls as he lifts his weapon, pointing it at Loki. He spits the word like it is something vulgar, and Loki backs away from him slowly. "Your kind have proven a bane and a curse to us long enough; that ends today. The All-Father will have this realm!"
He could never hope to truly outmaneouvre a warrior with a sword, Loki thinks in despair, his seiðr is nowhere that developed yet. He looks to the sky, to the stars and the other realms, weaves the words in his mind like a silent prayer.
Please!
The sword swings, the glint of its edge something like finality.
It misses him, but barely. Fear crashes over Loki like a wave, drowning out everything else. Time seems to slow as his seiðr flares wildly around him in his panic, curling green flames swallowing him whole. Loki can feel himself fading into his seiðr, sounds and sights dying around him.
The Aesir bellows in fury and charges at him. He pulls at Loki's arm, ferocious, and Loki feels the strangest sensation overcoming him as his skin creeps white from where the god has touched him, even through the snakehide glove. Shock seizing his throat, Loki jerks away, looking down at himself in horror as his body shifts to take the appearance of an Asgardian instead of his winter-blue Jötun skin, his seiðr spiraling out of control.
The green flames surround him like a tempest, and they block out the Asgardian as everything around Loki dissolves into a blank darkness.
And then, he's falling.