Loki was outside, but he didn't know where he was for all he saw was snow. There was a chill in the air as Loki warily did a full circle to try and find a landmark. In the distance he saw a tree, but there was nothing else breaking the field of white. With no other direction to go in he started walking towards the tree.

It got colder the longer Loki walked, colder and colder, bitterly so. He didn't have his jacket with him, and he wrapped his arms around his stomach as he shivered. The tree got no closer.

His lungs started to hurt from breathing in the icy air, and he stumbled, almost falling as he lost sensation in his feet and lower legs. There was nowhere else to go though, so Loki kept walking towards the tree. He wasn't aware of how long he was walking until his exhausted legs gave from beneath and he collapsed into the snow. With effort, Loki forced himself to stand, realizing that he wasn't wearing gloves and couldn't feel his hands.

An icy wind came up and chilled him further, slicing through his light-weight tunic effortlessly. His breathing became ragged from the effort of walking, and he painted uneven patterns in the air with every breath he exhaled. Exhaustion weighed down his limbs, and Loki began to drag his feet through the snow as he fought to keep walking.

Before too long the white sky and ground began to shimmer as if he were staring at a mirage, and he collapsed onto the snow again. The wind that had felt so harsh didn't anymore, as if Loki couldn't feel how cold it was. A little bit of snow was blown on top of him, and with effort Loki turned his head towards the tree. It was as far away as it had been when he had started walking.

His heartbeat was loud in his ears, and Loki knew he should get up and keep walking. The snow felt so soft though, and he was so tired. Perhaps if he just took a brief respite, and when he was done he could keep walking. Loki felt warm suddenly, and his eyelids felt heavy as his heartbeat began to slow. Although he tried to keep his eyes open or to stand up, he realized he was just too tired and they closed against his will.

As Loki slept, the cold finally killed him.

Loki jumped awake with a start, and his sudden movement knocked the book he had been resting his head on off of his desk. It fell to the ground and landed on its spine with a huge clatter, scaring him again. His breathing was fast and shallow, and sweat slicked his hair to his head. There were bloody crescents in his palms from where he had subconsciously clenched his hands from the dream, but slowly the shock of the nightmare faded and Loki became aware of his surroundings.

He was in his room on Gladsheimr, and had fallen asleep reading at his desk again. The doors to his balcony must not have been closed all the way because they had blown open in the night, and the wind blew fat white snowflakes into his room. Both his room and Loki were covered in a light dusting of white fluff, and it made his room feel very cold indeed.

He took a breath to slow his heartbeat and slowly stood, making the snow on his shoulders and hair flutter to the ground. His feet were bare, and his toes crunched on the dry snow as Loki walked over and manually shut the balcony doors, turning the lock so they wouldn't open by accident again. The cold made him shiver and Loki wrapped his arms around his stomach just as he had done in his nightmare.

It was a somewhat terrifying so Loki quickly snatched his jacket off of his bed and shook the snow off of it before putting it on. He crawled under the thick green comforter on his bed and curled up to try and warm up, wishing that he could just use his magic to perform a warmth spell. Unfortunately, Loki knew that using his magic was impossible right now.

Slowly the feeling returned in his fingers and toes, and his breath no longer hurt his throat. Loki was relived, and also frustrated at himself for being so weak. His nightmare of the cold killing him was the same one that he had had for the past four nights in a row, and had just had for the fifth time.

It was a singularly ironic nightmare since the cold had never bothered Loki before in his life. Even in the dead of winter, he could still walk around in a tunic with no gloves or jacket and be perfectly comfortable thanks to his ice magic. Now his immunity to the cold was gone, and it troubled him in both the waking and dream world.

Why was the cold his enemy all of a sudden? It had never been this vicious towards him before. Slítas wasn't with him anymore, having been sent back to Jötunnheim five days ago now, but Loki had been immune to the cold long before he had met his friend.

Was it because Loki had opened the rift to Jötunnheim five days ago and felt true cold, realizing that winter on Asgard was like a warm summer day compared to how cold it could be? The snow was starting to melt in his room, and Loki watched it without using his magic to speed in its banishment. He didn't regret sending Slítas back home away from his father's wrath, but Loki wished that being exposed to Jötunnheim hadn't affected him like it had.

Standing before the rift he had made as Jötunnheim's cold air ruffled his hair, watching as Slítas returned home, that was the first time he had felt the sensation of being cold. Being exposed to the realm had done something to him, stirred something in his blood perhaps, and Loki now wore his jacket not out of habit to avoid his mother's scolding but because he needed it.

Loki supposed it was a mercy that these winter nightmares weren't Real Nightmares where the injuries he received in the nightmare were real and bleeding when he awoke in bed. He poked his head out from under the comforter and looked at the rune on his nightstand to see the time rather than do a charm. The rune said it was an hour before breakfast.

He could go back to bed, but Loki knew there was no way he was going to sleep and live through dying again. Reluctantly Loki climbed out from under the comforter and took off his jacket so he could change into his day clothes. This was done as quickly as possible, and Loki quickly put his jacket back on once he was dressed.

Once he was dressed he paused, he realized that it was too early for anyone besides servants to be awake. Cautiously, Loki decided to try again and carefully touched his magic to do a simple charm to evaporate the water. Instantly the temperature in his room dropped and Loki released his hold on his seidr. It was still doing it after all.

Whenever he tried to use his normal magic, his ice magic activated and froze the environment around him as if he were a Jötunn. It had started doing this five days ago, when he had returned Slítas and started having the winter nightmares. Loki didn't understand why his magic was doing this, or what it had to do with Jötunnheim because Loki was an Asgardian.

He thought that maybe he could talk to Sigyn as he tugged on his magic again, and once again felt winter's chill enter his blood. Loki doubted that the Jötnar got cold after using their ice magic, but there weren't any Jötnar he could ask. His fallen book he had knocked off the desk was sitting open mournfully, and Loki walked over and placed it respectfully on his desk.

Forgoing the magic book, Loki left his room and closed the door behind him, being both cold and hungry. For once, he wanted something warm to eat. With his goal in mind, Loki began to walk down to the dining hall without waking Thor from his deep slumber.

Ever since Loki had learned how to teleport he had sued the spell to get from place to place as often as he could. Doing this gave him more practice with his magic, and it also taxed his seidr. This forced it grow stronger, similar to how a person does push-ups to make their arms stronger. With his magic so… contaminated as it currently stood, he didn't dare risk a teleport.

Walking to the dining hall took longer than Loki remembered it taking, but he finally arrived. The hall was mostly empty as everyone was still sleeping. Only a few Star Guard were present, having just come off the night shift and eating a meal half-asleep. His arrival went unnoticed, and he slipped into the kitchen beyond.

The ovens were blazing inside the kitchen as the staff prepared a hot morning meal for the residents of Gladsheimr. Loki found the warmth refreshing as it chased away the chill that clung to him, but stifling at the same time as it clashed with his thrice-blasted ice magic. He wasn't noticed immediately, but eventually a scullery maid spotted him standing off to one side. She did not chase him out to wait to eat with everyone else as she approached, for many things had changed since Loki's had used the Tesseract.

"Princeling," she greeted him instead, "you're up early again. Same dream, same order?"

"Yes to both, Jeanne," Loki told her.

Jeanne was a mere scullery maid, but she would be able to take the food without facing a rolling pin, and she knew that in the five days since Loki had returned Slítas to his home that he had come in here every morning with shadows under his eyes from a nightmare. Most servants tended to be either plain of beauty of very beautiful, but Jeanne was neither with only fair beauty. She had mousy brown hair and hazel eyes, and was only in her mid-teens.

Loki hung back quietly so he wouldn't be spotted as Jeanne casually picked up a plate and put food on it. He had only given Jeanne his breakfast order once on the first day, and had never had to repeat it to her. Her good memory meant she'd likely move up from the position of scullery maid as she got older, and Loki hoped she would.

Many people thought that Jeanne was ugly, but Loki didn't understand why. Did they call her that just because of the scars on her face she had gotten when she was younger and had been involved in an accident with some boiling water? The right side of her face was scarred red from that incident, but Loki didn't think that made her ugly. After all, her smile was warm and her eyes were kind.

After about a minute of quietly slipping from station to station around the kitchen, Jeanne returned with his breakfast. She passed him a tray that had his food, a pitcher of milk, mug, and even silverware and a napkin. Loki was amazed s ever that she had managed to sneak all of this away without getting caught by the hawk-eyed chefs.

He accepted it with a polite, "thank you."

Jeanne curtsied to him and then went back to doing her chores. No one in the kitchen seemed any the wiser to her theft, and Loki left before someone did notice him. For a mere kitchen maid, Jeanne was awful sneaky, and she didn't even have any magic.

Normally when Loki didn't want to eat breakfast with Thor and Thor's friends he would go outside and sit on one the roof of a patio or covered walkway, but he could no longer do that because it was cold out and Loki now felt the cold. He set his tray on one of the empty tables in the warm dining hall, and ate quicker then he usual would for he wanted to leave before Thor came. Loki knew that Thor meant well, but he didn't want his older brother to baby him because of his new weakness.

Once Loki finished eating he put his tray back into the kitchen with the few other dirty dishes from the Star Guard who were here so early. He beat a hasty retreat to escape the stifling yet welcoming warmth, and thought about what he could do not. Today was Saturday, so he had no lessons to attend and wasn't sure what to do.

He could go to the library or back to his room, but he couldn't wander around Gladsheimr's grounds anymore because of the cold. When Loki thought about it, he simply didn't have much to do on a free day. Not like Thor who could probably imagine something to do with his clique of friends. Loki knew that Thor would be glad to have Loki tag along but Fandral, Volstagg, and Hogun were Thor's friends, not Loki's.

In the past five days, the mood around Gladsheimr had darkened somehow, and Loki knew it was mostly because of him. Jaro's arm was still in a sling, and Sif had mostly stayed in her room as she got used to having such plain hair and recovered from Slítas turning her blood to ice. Oddly enough, Loki didn't regret hurting or letting harm come to either of them, and he wondered if maybe he should.

Loki had begun to drift through the halls by now, and he stopped walking to look out a window. A virgin layer of snow dusted everything, and icicles hung from the edges of roofs and trees branches. Sparkles of rainbows danced around as the sunlight from the clear sky shined through the icicles, painting a scene straight from a storybook.

He bounced on his toes a little when he saw the sun was out, although the frost on the windowpane he stood next to made it clear it was below freezing. With the sun out then it was bound to warm up, and even if it was cold out it always felt warm when you stood in the sun. Loki debated what to do and then tightened his jacket around himself before starting to walk outside.

Although the best place to be alone was the royal gardens, it was always possible one of his parents would be there, and he didn't want to see them right now. Due to that, Loki headed to the courtyard the window had looked over and found that it was still empty once he arrived. It was cold out and the air was crisp, but the sun did make it feel warmer than it was.

There was no one about, so Loki cautiously sent out a sense echo. Sense echoes were the simplified form of a senseline and instead of placing lines around him, he sent out a ripple of magic that bounced to a set distance and then returned to him. The sense echo returned successfully, and Loki was curious about his magic. If he could do a sense echo, then could he do a spell?

The answer soon became a clear no, for the moment Loki tapped into his magic his magic tried to slip free. He fought back, terrified of losing control, and clamped down on his magic to try and drag it in line. His magic fought back just as hard as he fought, and Loki soon gave up and let his touch on the magic fade.

Although he had only been in contact with his magic for a few seconds the temperature had dropped drastically in those few seconds. No matter how many times he fixed his magic it always went wild again. He finally trusted his magic, and now it was biting him. Would he ever be a mage?

He leaned against one of the pillars as he sat under the patio and overlooked the snow. Loki closed his eyes and relaxed. Before long his lack of sleep started to catch up to him, and his head nodded once as he threatened to drift off. Briskly Loki shook his head to wake up, but ended up drifting off anyway.

This was a different dream then the usual nightmare, for all around him was snow that whipped around the air like rain as if he were in the middle of a blizzard. He could barely see the hand he raised in front of his face to try and shield his eyes from the razor sharp wind. The wind seemed to whistle, as if mimicking a song, and it was a song Loki knew.

The song of the blizzard wind was the same as the melody of his magic. This blizzard was his magic, and clearly it wasn't very pleased with him. Loki stumbled back in the snow and fell… only to start back awake.

He was still in the courtyard where he had sat, and a chill had set in from sitting in one place for so long. His muscles were stiff, but Loki didn't pay it much mind. What exactly was going on with his magic?

One of the sun's rays shone in his eyes, and Loki leaned behind the pillar to get out of its reach. The sun was higher in the sky then before, and if Loki was looking at the sun correctly, then from the amount it had risen he estimated that he had been sleeping for almost an hour. He chewed his lip and stood, flexing his limbs to shoo away the stiffness.

He wished his magic would stop trying to kill him.

The doors to Gladsheimr's interior opened then, and a group of children stepped out. Loki looked at them as he rubbed sleep from his eyes, and recognized Jaro in his sling with horror. Quickly, he inched into the shadow of the pillar, and was relieved when Jaro didn't see him. Unlike Thor, Loki had no taste in brawling, and was even less inclined to get into a conflict without his magic.

Loki was saved from that possibility when two more boys came out from the opposite side of the courtyard. It took Loki a moment to recognize them. His first thought was that it was Thor, but no, it was Baldur and his younger brother Hodr. Baldur and Thor looked very similar, with Hodr only a little plainer then Baldur. Those two looked like brother at least, Loki thought crossly to himself, Thor and I don't look anything alike.

Hodr noticed Jaro and his "pack" first thanks to his unnaturally sharp vision and he elbowed his brother with a grin before kneeling down and scooping snow into his hands. Loki knew what would happen then, and tried to slip deeper into the shadows. It started when Hodr threw a snowball at Jaro and hit him on the side of the neck when Jaro looked away to speak to one of his friends. Jaro stumbled forward, and might have fallen into the snow if one of his boys hadn't grabbed his good arm to stabilize him.

Loki was too far away to hear precisely what Jaro told Hodr, but he knew Jaro well enough to be able to fill in the blanks. Hodr simply threw the snowball that had been in his other hand in response. Jaro sidestepped that one, but it clobbered one of his friends in the face.

Instead of throwing a snowball back, Jaro threw a punch at Hodr. The crack echoed as it connected solidly with his cheek, and the noise made Loki flinch against his will. Baldur caught his brother before he fell, and said something to Jaro. Jaro's look was haughty and he turned his back to them as if it was no concern.

That quickly turned out to be a mistake as he was ambushed when Baldur jumped onto his back and flattened him into the snow. Jaro's friends went to help their alpha, and Hodr jumped to his brother's aid, leaving Loki to watch in amusement at the brawl that had just broken out.

Two on three.

Even though Baldur and Hodr were outnumbered the two brothers made a good team like Loki and Thor did, so the odds were surprisingly even. Loki never got into a brawl if he could help it though, finding the heavy-fisted fight distasteful. All they were doing was hitting each other until one stayed down, and their technique did not appeal to Loki as it seemed to for Thor.

Another contestant suddenly jumped into the fray, and it was obvious to Loki that it was Thor. Hodr and Baldur were Thor's cousins though, so Loki supposed Thor had a valid reason to reinforce them and of course Thor would not be able to resist a chance to fight. Thor looked less like he was helping his cousins though and more like he was simply fighting.

Two on three on one.

Fandral, Hogun, and Volstagg were with Thor but they were hanging a little further away. It was Fandral who decided they had better help their prince and waded into the fight, hitting one of Jaro's friends before getting ambushed by the other.

Two on three on two, Loki corrected himself with an amused thought at the battle royal that was taking shape.

Loki amended his tally of the teams when Fandral was thrown back onto the snow and helped up by Hogun. Fandral spoke quietly to Fandral, and all three of them promptly piled into the brawl to help Thor. It was so ridiculous that Loki almost clapped a hand to his forehead.

Two on three on four.

Sounds of the fighting finally reached inside the palace, but it was a boy with dark red hair who answered the call. He was smart enough not to try and break up the fight by himself, and he vanished back inside to get adult aid. Before long, the red-haired boy returned with three Star Guard.

The Star Guard quickly began to break the boys apart. When Jaro and Baldur didn't stop trying to strangle each other as they tussled on the ground, the red haired boy stopped it for them. He kicked Jaro across the face, and then did the same for Baldur. That broke them up, and the Star Guards were able to get a grip on them.

Loki observed the damage from the brawl without moving. It looked as if the sun was setting around Thor's eyes from the bruises, and his lower lip was bleeding. Fandral wasn't putting any weight on one of his feet. There were scratch marks on Hodr's cheek and neck. Blood was running from Hogan's hairline and down his cheek to drip to the ground. Volstagg had a dazed look as if he had a concussion. Of course, both Jaro and Baldur seemed to be covered in bruises. One of Jaro's goons had a broken nose that dripped blood, and the other was cradling his chest likely from broken ribs.

Jaro and the red-haired boy began to bicker, and Fandral said something that made Jaro turn red. The Star Guard's grip prevented Jaro from restarting the brawl, and it was obvious Jaro was not happy about that. Before the brawl did get a chance to begin anew the two Star Guard holding Jaro and Baldur dragged them inside while the third ushered the rest of the children in.

Considering their injuries, Loki assumed his brother and the other children were being taken to the Healer's Ward. He hovered in the shadows, unseen as the courtyard emptied again. A gentle tug on his magic pulled the shadows around him in an invisibility veil. He bit his lip as he fought for control.

Loki's control slipped suddenly, and a ripple of power razed across the ground with telekinetic force, shearing away the snow and sending him flying through the air backwards. He fell hard onto his back on the stone floor with a ringing head.

When Loki sat up, dizzy from his spell slipping from his control he put pressure on his wrist and jerked his hand back as pain spiked up the wrist. Clearly he'd landed wrong, and Loki figured out what had happened fairly quickly as he tugged the sleeve of his sore wrist up and saw his skin covered in bruises and burns on his palms and fingertips. The spell had recoiled back into his hand, and damaged his blood vessels while causing hairline fractures up his arm all the way to his elbow.

He exhaled in relief that the recoil hadn't caused more damage as his body began to work the damage. It was thorough however, so Loki decided it might be best for a healer to see it. With a sigh at his magic, he began to slowly walk after the group of brawlers, cradling his arm to his chest.

Sigyn was refilling the bruise balm ream when a ruckus drew her attention and a group of Star Guard walked in escorting a group of children. The children looked as if they had just tried to kill each other, and might yet again. She wasn't surprised to see the group aware that the more time the Asgardian children spent stuck indoors with their lessons, the more desperate they'd get to find something to do.

The guards roughly deposited their charges in the room, and stepped back. For an instant, it looked as if the children might resume whatever fight they'd been in previously. They realized that guards were braced for exactly that, and so reluctantly stopped.

Sigyn saw Thor and the other two heirs to Asgard's throne, Baldur and Hodr, but saw no sign of Loki. Either he hadn't deigned to help his sibling, or he hadn't been present. She finished topping off the balm, but didn't put it up since it looked like she might need it.

A boy with dark red hair leaned against the doorway. Sigyn recognized it as Angborn, but since the son of Eirill was not injured she turned away from him to the other children. Likely Angborn had fetched the Star Guard to break up the brawl rather then participate in it, and that was why he was uninjured.

"Which of you needs medical attention?" She asked loudly.

Thor shook his head that he was fine, and both Hodr and Hogun shook it off as well. Baldur and Jaro both appeared to be willing to accept her offer, but gave each other scything glares when they stepped forward. Fandral nudged Volstagg forward as well, but the rest of Jaro's friends stayed quiet. Sigyn waved the boys that were badly injured forward to check their injuries and see if she could heal them by herself.

Back to Loki since the story is not only about the Raiders and what's happening on Jotunnheim. With how dark things are going to get on Jotunnheim i figure you would appreciate some fluff although this chapter is serious in some ways as well. I will say that cabin fever starting to play its role in driving the boys crazy. In some ways it is almost laughable.