It was snowing out ferociously and the wind whipped about his face mercilessly as he carried Frigga to the cave he'd found earlier and set her down. He had been surprised to find her as he had- frozen solid, and so obviously tortured- and his head ached. So much pain. So much suffering. Had it been his fault? He was so tired, and so cold. It was hard to think.
It may as well have been his fault, he decided, because at the very least he could have tried to come sooner and perhaps have spared her some of it. But he had been wallowing in self pity, much as he was close to now. His previous amusement was gone. There was nothing funny about the situation.
They had never been close by any means, but Frigga was still his mother. The distance between them had always been on her side, until he'd gotten old enough to realize that it was easier to pretend he wanted nothing from her than to endure the pain of rejection again. But he thought- in some ways- he would always be that little boy who had stumbled onto the discovery of his magic, and run to his mother for guidance...
"Mother?" He cried, running full-speed into her dressing room, a little frightened but mostly excited. What an amazing discovery he had made!
She was sitting at her mirror, one of her friends- a lady of the court whose name always tumbled away from Loki in a mess of vowels. They were joking about something he didn't catch, a powder brush in hand, but her smile had struck him. Why doesn't she ever smile at me? he had thought to himself vaguely, some of the excitement wearing off. "Look what I can do-"
They had turned to look at him, Frigga's smile fading. He'd gotten nervous then, with both of them staring at him. But he was so proud!
Concentrating, he held up the flower he'd brought in from the garden where he'd been playing. It was even simpler this time than before. Almost at once he felt the ice crystals creeping over and covering the flower, encasing it in a glittering shell. In a matter of seconds the whole flower was ice.
Something had dropped to the floor with a clatter and Loki had looked up, realizing instantly that he'd done something bad. Frigga's friend was open mouthed with astonishment, and more than a little fear.
"You will not be speaking of this," Frigga commanded, her voice steel, her relaxed manner morphing quickly into utter authority.
Loki had frowned, confused because she was still looking at him, shaken and stern.
But her friend answered haltingly. "I- yes. I mean, no. Of course, my lady."
Frigga nodded once. "Leave us," she said. The woman fled quickly. And Loki watched her go with a sick feeling in his stomach. Why was he always making a mess of things?
"Loki, you cannot do that again," Frigga said. "I know you didn't realize what you were doing before, but from now on I must forbid it."
What? "But-"
"No," she cut him off, and her voice was so harsh it frightened him a little and he shrank back. "I will not be bending on this, Loki. Put it out of your mind. You are not to do anything of this sort again."
Loki's mouth felt dry. He tried to swallow but his tongue felt like lead.
"I- okay," he said. He thought he might have whispered but couldn't be sure. All he knew in that moment was how he wished he could just do the right thing for once, and then maybe his mother would like him.
That thought echoed in his mind disorientingly as he stooped to pick up the powder brush that had fallen to the floor. The handle was made of a green stone, carved into a wolf that breathed fire. That detail had only stuck with him because he could only look on in horror as it turned to ice in his hand.
He had straightened, still clutching the brush, and looked up at his mother. Her eyes had been hard for him to read, but it was not a pleasant emotion on her face.
He could feel himself pale. How had this turned out so wrong!?
"I'm sorry, mother! I'm so sorry! I didn't try to do it with this one. Honest, I didn't!"
"Hush, Loki," she had said, her face thawing a little. "I believe you. But you must learn to control it, or it will control you."
He couldn't really wrap his mind around that idea, but he nodded because he wanted her to know he would try. Unsure, he offered her the brush. "Is it broken now?" He'd asked.
She'd hesitated, but then taken it. "No, Loki. It's not broken." Then out of nowhere she dropped it on the floor again and brought her heel down on it. The sound of the handle shattering into a hundred tiny shards of ice made Loki flinch. "Now it's broken."
Loki had stared at the shards of ice melting into a puddle on the floor with the feeling that something really Big and Bad had just happened.
He was six.
Loki shoved the memory aside and reached for his magic so he could restore Frigga to vitality, only to find his magic gone.
"Motherfucker!" he hissed, searching for the scent of geraniums, a murderous rage burning through him. He was so sick and tired of being treated like a fucking pawn is some fatesdamned game she was playing! He was the game-master! Him! And she dared to toy with him!? When he got his hands on her he would tear her apart.
But it was not there, the scent of geraniums It hadn't been Agda. His eyes fell on the scepter, and it's steady pulse of light, and he remembered that as he'd carried Frigga he'd felt a vague sort of strain and then relief. He hadn't thought much of it at the time, so distracted by trying not to run into any Frost Giants, but now he had little doubt that that strain had been his magic. Pouring into the scepter.
He had never heard of such a thing happening before, but the magic of the scepter was wild and unexplored. He had little doubt that such a thing was possible.
Sighing and cursing, Loki picked the scepter up, marveling again at how unique the magic within it was. Magic had a kind of language, but the Energy was like nothing that he'd ever seen before. It was difficult to control, and hard to understand, and almost like it had a mind of it's own.
He played around with it, trying to figure out how to communicate with it, and eventually got it to do what he wanted. But instead of just unfreezing Frigga, it burned her.
There was a sharp crack as the frost broke from her skin and fell to the cave floor and she inhaled hugely.
"Take your time," Loki said, all of a sudden feeling tense, and awkward. Frigga always made him that way. "Smell the flowers." So, okay, perhaps not the most appropriate thing to say to a mother figure when she's taking her first breath in months after being frozen alive. But, hey. There wasn't exactly protocol for this. Not that he would have followed it, he admitted to himself, even if there was. He wasn't much of a fan of rules.
"What-" Frigga said in little gasps, her voice hard. "are- you- doing?" Her eyes, normally a cornflower blue, had darkened as she glared at him.
Christ how that tone of voice made him bristle. He was not a child anymore.
"I'm helping you!" Almost out of nowhere he was engulfed in flaming anger, that she could let this happen to herself. He'd been worried sick over her, and- and that was it. He hadn't even allowed himself to think it before, so distracted by the Bifrost, and fucking Agda messing with him, and Sif, and Darcy... But now it was glaringly obvious: he'd been worried about her. And now that he knew she was okay, the worry had been replaced by anger that she'd put him through that. Never mind that she could never have intended for it to happen.
"You should not be here," she shot back, glaring harshly at him as she flexed her muscles tiredly. They must ache after being stiff and motionless for so long. "You should not be among...these creatures."
Loki laughed bitterly. How quickly they came upon their old arguments. "I am one of these creatures," he said bluntly. His lip curled when she tightened her jaw and he stalked off to the mouth of the cave. She was barely back and already he couldn't stand to be near her. It had been like this ever since he'd grown into a teen and realized that no matter what he did- she would never treat him as she treated Thor. She would never love him. So he'd stopped trying.
His resentment had grown deeper as Thor was showered with more and more honors and awards- though his resentment had never truly ever been aimed at Thor. In truth, Thor did deserve them. He was an excellent warrior, and he brought peace with him. And if he was reckless and arrogant about it, then he was also loyal and kind.
No, it was Frigga who idolized him, and Odin, who so easily shrugged Loki aside. It was them who he had started to hate. He realized now, thanks to his time on earth as a human, what he had never realized before: he had just been being a teenager. He'd been moody and had misplaced anger- just like every teenager in the history of ever. It was just that he'd actually had the means to do something about it. He'd been born with a gift- a gift that he'd cursed for how it set him apart, but that he had grown to love out of necessity. If he was stuck with it than at least it would serve him well.
So he'd nurtured his gifts, and with Agda's help, he'd gained control over them. Eventually he had become quite powerful with magic, even if he was not nearly physically on par with Thor when he had a sword in his hand.
And every time he'd acted out, every time he'd played a bit of mischief, he thought that it might all have been to see the look of distaste on Frigga's face. Which took a little bit away, now, from the Fuck You that it had been meant to be. But at the time every prank had been a little closer to the freedom from wanting her approval, and that was what he had been straining for so hard: to be free of the need to be validated by her. He hated the power she had over him.
Odin had never affected him quite the same. He'd had his own issues with Odin, but they had never been as long-term or as deep-rooted as with Frigga, even though Odin had in fact punished him much more violently. Odin was tough, and he was harsh at times, but he had always been willing to give Loki another chance. Frigga had never given him a chance to begin with.
He could hear her scraping the ground as she moved around at the back of the cave and he glanced back to see just what she was doing, only to curse himself for a fool.
He looked out at the blizzard just beyond the cave and then longingly back at the dryness of within the cave and sighed. There was no help for it.
He took his jacket off and offered it to Frigga, who stared at it blankly.
"Take it," he said. She was shivering, her body not reacting well to being thawed and then thrust immediately back into a freezing environment. It was cold, even for him, and his body could tolerate much lower temperatures than hers could. She must be in considerable discomfort, and there was a real risk of frostbite. There were various magical means to get limbs back, but it was not a pretty thing, and the experience of losing one was not to be desired.
If he'd had his magic he might have offered to transfigure her, into an acorn as he had done to Idun, perhaps, so that she would not feel the cold so. Not that she would have agreed, he was sure. If there was anything that Frigga abhorred more than Frost Giants, it was magic. As it was though, Loki did not trust his skill with the scepter to even make the offer.
She sat against the wall, huddled, with her knees bent at her chest looking miserable, and the least queenly that he'd ever seen. Usually she was perfect, not a hair out of place. It must be humiliating for her to be like this, Loki thought. The whole thing must be humiliating.
"I'm not going to t-take that," she said, refusing to reach for the jacket.
Loki felt a flash of annoyance. He was getting cold now, too, without it. The least she could do was alleviate some of his guilt by just taking the damn thing.
"Yes, you will," he said firmly, draping it up over her knees and up to her neck, covering her shoulders. It was thick and warm. It should help. "I'm going to look for firewood."
Frigga frowned deeply. "In this weather?" She asked skeptically.
"Yes," Loki said shortly. "Obviously in this weather. I can do it, with a little help from this," he said, patting the scepter. Well, he was relatively sure he could do it, anyways. And it was always good to play up your sureness.
He did note with relief that her shivering had gotten less violent. Getting the pack of food he'd brought, he dropped it on the ground next to her.
"I know you're hungry," he said, "but try to eat slowly. Your stomach isn't used to food and it will rebel if you give it too much at first. The same goes for water."
She gave him an odd look that he couldn't decipher and said, "I know."
Right. Of course she did.
"Well, excuse me for trying to help," he muttered to himself, heading back out of the cave.
"I didn't mean-" she started, but Loki cut her off. It wasn't important, really.
"No, it's fine," he said.
"It's cold out there," she said. Was that her way of asking if he'd be okay?
"Don't worry about me," he said, letting his skin turn blue. His Frost Giant features were always waiting for him, ready to make an appearance as soon as he gave the word, and the molecular make-up of his skin combated the cold more effectively when he was in this other form. "I'll be fine."
And he walked out into the blizzard.
The storms of Jotunheim were infamous for their unpredictability. They could as easily last for days on end as they could go an hour and then leave as suddenly as they came on. The one thing they could be counted on was their brutality, and that when they came they came violently, wind whipping through the landscape unforgivingly. Part of the reason Frost Giants had grown to be so tall was that the storms left drifts of snow six feet high at a time from an average snowstorm, and they had had to have longer legs just to survive from day to day. You could not hunt for food if it took you hours to go just a few hundred yards.
Neither Loki or Frigga had this advantage, and especially with Frigga being stiff and unused to such exercise- it would be a long way back.
As soon as he sent a hint to the scepter that he wanted it's help, he felt it waking and reaching out. He could almost feel it, trying to understand what he wanted, and he was looking forward to being able to study it at length. It was fascinating. He wondered that he had not ever heard of it being used, except as an ingredient in magical objects. What was wrong with his ancestors, that they would not make the most of such an incredible thing?
The scepter pulled him away from the mouth of the cave, and up the foot of the mountain. It was difficult to sway it from it's task in order to to melt the snow in from of him so he could actually move, but he managed to convince it. He could vaguely feel his own magic within the scepter, but it was faint and seemed disinclined to return. It had been his constant companion for some two hundred years, and the only time he'd been without it was when he hadn't known any better, down on earth. But now that he was himself again, he felt it's loss keenly.
The scepter's pull proved correct, and Loki was able to bring back some dead branches that a quick drying spell rendered burnable. What he was more worried about was getting out of Jotunheim without leaving a clear trail for Frost Giants- or Beasts- to follow. How were they supposed to travel through this land- especially Frigga- without him having to melt the huge drifts of snow from their path first? He sighed. Another problem.
Frigga was shivering again when he got back, and Loki felt a stab at his conscience.
"You came back," she stated, and Loki gave her a look. Was she out of her mind?
"Of course I came back," he said, dumping the wood on the ground a few feet in front of her.
"I th-thought maybe you'd leave me here," she said. "As...revenge, or something. I don't know," she said, looking uncomfortable now. "I suppose it seems silly, now."
It was insulting, really, that she thought that lowly of him, and it stung. Why she would think he wanted revenge on her, he had no idea. Revenge for what? Her only crime was not to love a child that wasn't her own- which was no crime, really. Simply a sad fact on his end.
"Well you may rest easier, then, Frigga," he said softly. "I have no schemes of vengeance against you. Now hush and I'll start a fire."
She did, and he pointed the scepter at the wood and spoke a spell for fire. The wood burst into flames. He smiled, pleased- he was getting better at communicating with the Energy.
"Thank you," Frigga said, stiffly, and Loki looked over at her from where he sat across the flames. She was eying the fire warily. "I am grateful. That you came for me."
Loki nodded, a little flush of pleasure running through him at the praise, reluctant though it
had been. It was no wonder he'd stayed away from her for over a hundred years- he was so wrapped up in wanting her approval that it was unhealthy.
"Well, it was on the way," he said, brushing off the thanks.
Her lips curled ever so slightly, and the white scars marring her perfect face contorted. Interesting. He wondered how his father would react on seeing her again. He'd never really been sure what was at the basis of their relationship. It could be love. Neither of them were very affectionate, but he supposed that was just their way.
"No, really," he said, wanting it to be clear that he hadn't done this just for her. "I needed something from Jotunheim, and you just ended up being there too."
"Of course," she said impassively. He noted with approval that she'd stopped shivering entirely and now looked to be completely fine. "And just what did you need from this realm?" She frowned. "And how are you here?" she asked. "Last I knew you had been sent to Midgard or some such. And Odin- is he? What is the state of Asgard?" Her voice became more worried, the more she remembered.
He'd been wondering when the past would catch up with her. The last time he'd seen her had been in the throne room as Baldr knocked him unconscious and she'd looked at Baldr with an expression of shock on her face. He wondered how much more had gone on when he'd been out of it.
"You were sent to Midgard," she said. "I saw- him- do it. Odin must be alright, then. Yes? To have brought you back." She was anxious now, her eyes troubled but hopeful.
"Yes, he's fine," Loki assured her, and she sagged in relief. "He woke from his Odinsleep in time to set everything to rights. Bringing you back was the final step." He paused, thinking it over. "Well, I suppose there are more steps now, since the Bifrost broke, but aside from that-"
"The Bifrost...what?"
"Broke," Loki repeated. " It's dead. Finished. Over. Bye-bye."
"I- how?"
"Laufey," Loki said grimly. "And me," he allowed. "There was a fight. The Frost Giants came in through the Bifrost somehow-"
Frigga frowned. "That should not be possible."
"And yet it happened. When sent to Earth- Midgard- I suppose, Thor and I were given new memories, and we were as mortals. We did not even know who we had been- that we had ever been someone else. We did not even know each other very much, having been given memories of each other that we didn't get along." Which, in itself was strange and made him think that Agda really must have had a hand in his sentence to Midgard. That detail was exactly one that would have delighted her.
"And is he- is Thor alright?" she asked.
"He's with his wife and children. But he is trapped there." He looked at the flames as the wood crackled before him. "I hope he is okay." And that he was looking after Darcy and Nathan.
Frigga's brows rose. "Wife and children?" She repeated with incredulity. "He has mortal children?"
Loki nodded. "As do I," he said. "Well, one child, and anyways."
Nathan...how old was he now? Six? Seven? Christ, how time was flying by- and yet how long every day was. He hoped Darcy was taking pictures. He hoped they were happy, and that they were well.
"This has all gone wrong," Frigga said, rubbing her brow tiredly with a hand that Loki couldn't help but notice had only four fingers. Her pinkie was missing.
His poor mother, he thought. They had all suffered because of Laufey.
"None of this was supposed to happen." She sighed sadly and gave short, sharp laugh. "I had it all planned out, you know? Thor was meant for Sif. Once he got a little older- once he matured a bit- they would have gotten along just fine. He was already friends with her- it would have been easy to push him into something more. And of course she was half in love with him, anyways- it would have been nothing."
Loki looked at Frigga with interest. He hadn't known how much thought she had put into this- but then, he'd been away from court for a long time. A hundred years, at least, by his count.
"Does he love her?" She asked, staring into the flames blankly.
Loki thought back to those years on Midgard- the weekends that he and Darcy had spent with Thor and Jane, of the look in Thor's eyes when he glanced over at Jane playing with the kids.
"Oh yes," he said.
"Well that's...horrible. What is to become of her in the years ahead? What of his children?"
Loki had the same worries when it came to Darcy, and Nathan. Already he had missed several years with them. And how much longer would they even have?
It would never be enough.
"He'll probably ask that she take the test to become Aesir," he said. It was what he would do with Darcy, when he got back to her.
"Do you think she could pass it?" Frigga asked, hopefully.
Loki thought about it. It was different for each person, but it was always a rigorous, nightmarish thing that put you through hell and then spat you out. "Fates, I hope so," he said. And he hoped Darcy could too.
Frigga must have caught on to the undercurrent in his voice when he'd said that, because she looked up at him curiously. "You love her too, don't you?" She asked. "Your own wife, I mean."
Darcy. He could almost smell that lemon perfume she loved so much. He dug his nails into his arms sharply, trying to beat back the longing through physical pain.
"More than life itself," he said solemnly.
Something passed over Frigga's face before she shrugged her shoulders.
"I had someone in mind for you, too, you know," she said ruefully, and Loki looked at her with some surprise. He had not expected that. "But I suppose that's gone up in smoke as well." She shook her head as if dismissing her matchmaking as foolish. "The best laid plans," she murmured.
"Hmm," Loki said noncommittally. He couldn't afford to think like that- he needed his plans to work.
They talked for a little longer- Frigga told him a little of what had transpired with Laufey on her end, and Loki was surprised- but pleased- that she had volunteered information to him. She was normally so self-contained. It was more out of loneliness than anything else, he figured. She hadn't had anyone to talk to in months.
But the tolls of the day soon caught up with him and he drifted off to sleep, his last image of Frigga, staring into the fire, her eyes burning with something fierce.
Loki did not envy Laufey. He had much to answer for.
The fire had burned out when he woke in the morning, and the air was chill. He stretched stiff muscles in his back and neck. Sleeping on the ground was never ideal.
Frigga was awake already, and she greeted him with a small smile. The scars on her face were actually incredibly beautiful, the way the sun was just coming up and finding it's way into the cave. They were like silvery feathers, marking up and down her beautiful face- an interesting contrast to her refined, sculpted features and her light blue eyes. Long had Frigga been known for her incredible beauty, even among Asgardians- who were famed for their beauty.
It was a cruel joke that Laufey had disfigured her so, and yet almost poetic. Of all the Asgardians he knew, Frigga was the most proud. To have a reminder on her own skin of when she had failed- to have to see it every time she looked in the mirror- it was cruel indeed.
But she was smiling slightly, and it was a beautiful thing, scars and all.
She was a good woman, whatever her faults with him had been, and there was a reason that she was beloved by the people.
"Good morning," he said, sitting up and reaching for the pack with food.
"You still do it," she said, almost fondly, as she pushed the pack towards him.
Loki frowned. What was she talking about?
"When you were a baby," she explained. "You used to talk in your sleep." She shook her head, smiling down at her hands. Loki frowned to notice that they were dry from the cold, and the stumps where she was missing her pinkie on one hand and her ring finger on the other were inflamed. "I didn't know you still did."
"I talked when I was a baby?" Loki asked, distractedly. He wanted to help her- he could use the scepter to calm the inflammation. But she abhorred magic. How could he bring it up in a way that she would accept his help?
She chuckled briefly. "Well, not with words at first, of course. But you would murmur in your sleep." She smiled. "You would always let us know if you were having a good dream or a bad one."
Her eyes found his warmly. "I hadn't thought of that in years," she said with surprise.
Hang on. "Us?" He frowned. "I was under the impression that Maggar watched over me." Maggar had been his nursemaid until he was six and had graduated to being tutored with Thor.
Frigga looked at him as if he must be daft. "Not until you were a year old and didn't need me anymore," she said.
I always needed you.
The thought was reflexive, and Loki brushed it away, annoyed by it.
"Oh," he said, a little uncomfortable. "I hadn't realized."
Frigga stared at him piercingly, her head cocked to the side. "I'm beginning to think there is a lot you didn't realize, Loki."
Loki coughed, looking away. He was beginning to think so too, and he was finding that he did not like the idea that perhaps he had been blinded by his own issues. It was unpleasant to think that he might not see as much as he liked to think he did.
He took an apple and bit into it. It's skin was crisp from the cold, and refreshing.
"We should leave as soon as possible," he said. "Do you think you can walk?" Frigga sent him a withering glance and he raised a hand. "Well you were frozen for like six months. I'd imagine anyone would have a rough time walking after that."
"I can walk," she said firmly. "And I can leave now. How far into Jotunheim are we? You said we were to walk, so I assume you cannot flash us home for whatever reason, correct?"
He stared at her, a little shocked. He was so unused to seeing her like this that it was easy to forget that before she'd married Odin and become the All-mother she had been a fierce warrior in her own right.
"Well?" she asked.
Loki swallowed the bite of apple in his mouth and nodded.
"Right, then. You can finish that as we walk. We haven't a moment to lose."
"Umm. Okay," Loki said, impressed. He got up and shouldered the pack. "Let's get this pony on the rode."
Frigga rolled her eyes. "Well, I suppose it's better than being called an ass," she said, standing up as well and brushing her skirts off.
Loki frowned. "What- oh," he said, grinning. "You made a joke."
Frigga raised a brow. "How shocking."
Loki chuckled. "I just didn't know you had a sense of humor."
"Perhaps because it's dry, like my old bones, rather then reaching out and smacking you in the face, like some people."
Loki laughed a little harder. Where was this playful woman coming from? He had never seen her before.
They made slow progress, and their cheerful mood of the morning quickly dissipated.
It was no longer snowing, but the night before had done it's damage. The snow was higher than ever and Loki had to be constantly using the scepter to melt the path ahead of them, which meant he was constantly focusing his energy and he had a pounding head-ache before the sun announced it to be afternoon.
And that was not to mention the chilling cold- he had put his blue self on to combat it, and the constant motion helped a little, but poor Frigga suffered more severely than him, his jacket not enough of a match for the bitter temperature.
The brilliant white of the snow hindered how far ahead Loki could see, and so sometimes he had to backtrack because he'd started going the wrong way, and he had to squint to be able to see in front of him.
What he wouldn't have given for sunglasses.
Their feet had gotten soaked before he'd figured out how to make the newly melted snow run on either side of them like small twin streams, rather than just become a puddle at their feet. He'd done a drying spell on them and then one to make their clothes water-resistant, so that was something at least. But his mind clutched onto the feeling of frozen, wet socks sadistically, even though he knew them to be dry now.
Never had he thought he would look forward to the the huge, slippery sheets of ice that were the ground on the far side of the mountains.
They ate lunch while walking. And then dinner. When night fell and prohibited them from going further, they dug themselves into tall snowbanks and packed the snow tightly over themselves. It would actually act as an insulate after the chill wore off after an hour or so.
It was a miserable way to spend the night, and it did nothing to improve their moods.
The next few days passed in a similar fashion.
Loki had finally said fuck it to strategy and just reached out to Frigga and had her give him her hands one night after he saw they were more raw than normal, and he'd performed the spell. Neither had said anything about it, but his spell had worked and the inflammation was gone from the severed joints, and the dryness as well.
They talked little, each living in their own mind as they walked on, endlessly through the frozen wasteland.
Loki's mind more often than not was caught on memories of Darcy, and of Nathan. It was a brutal way to spend the day, stuck in memories of such a happy past while he was stuck in such a stark, depressing land.
Sometimes he thought he'd just dreamed them. That maybe it was all a cruel joke that had been played on him- some wild story about falling in love with a mortal woman. Him. The God of Mischief. That someone would walk up to him one day and say, "Hey, buddy, I know you've been trying to get back to Midgard, but here's the funny part- ain't nothin' waiting for you there. I've just been fucking with you! Isn't that great? Here, have a bite of my sandwich."
There was always a sandwich involved. Maybe he was just really wanting one. He was sick and tired of the multi-grain bars that he'd packed, seemingly by the hundred. What he wouldn't give even for another apple. What had he been thinking?
That the bars would give them more nutrients than anything else and kept better. But they sure as hell weren't as appealing.
Still, miserableness and difficulties aside, they had made progress. They didn't have to actually climb any of the mountains, but rather go through the valleys between them.
They were walking, again- everything drearily, monotonously similar. Loki's head throbbed nearly constantly now, and he cursed his magic for the thousandth time. The scepter probably could get him back to Asgard- it was the main part of the Bifrost, for the fates' sakes!- but fuck if he could figure out how.
"Can you-?" Frigga asked, gesturing to the snow and giving him the canteen. One thing they did not lack was a water supply.
Loki obliged, and handed her the canteen, now filled with fresh water. As he did so he noticed that her hand was shaking slightly.
"Are you okay?" He asked, frowning. Perhaps he could...do...something, he thought vaguely. It was hard to concentrate past the vice-like pressure on his brain that came from using the scepter constantly.
"Of course," Frigga said dismissively. "It's just the cold. It's fine."
Loki nodded once, letting it go, but his frown remained. He'd tried using a warming spell on her, but it had slid off like water on oil. He wasn't sure if it was because of the scepter, or if it was just Frigga. She had seemed to know something about it but refused to speak of it.
As for himself, it affected him poorly. He wasn't able to control the strength of the spell using the scepter in the same way he could when he used his own magic, and instead of just warming him it had burned him, as it had burned Frigga when he'd melted her from her ice casing.
"We should keep going until nightfall," he said, though she surely already knew that. It was more because suddenly he couldn't stand the silence anymore than anything else.
Frigga just nodded and put the canteen back in the pack, her hands going quickly back to the warmer solace of his jacket's pockets.
He had hoped that she would continue their exchange, but she fell silent again. And it turned out that he was too tired after all to really pursue it.
The snow was good cover. Especially for Frost Beasts- like the great white snow lions that prowled the mountains, living off of the hardy snow rabbits and goats that lived on the slopes of the mountains, and- when they could get them- unwary Frost Giants.
Loki almost didn't notice it as it leaped for him, so well did it's coat blend in with it's surroundings. When he did notice, there was just enough time to brace himself somewhat for impact, and to hold up his arm in defense and then it was on him.