So, my cold/flu is finally clearing up –touch wood! –and so I decided to celebrate by posting another chapter. Plus, I'm about to nose dive into a huge amount of work, so either I'll be posting very frequently as a form of procrastination, or there'll be large spaces between the updates. Could go either way.

Quick reply to Nyx: I have more or less figured out Fenrir's situation, but I am always interested in suggestions for any and all plot points, so if you have an idea, feel free to share.

Enjoy! (and I hope everyone had a nice New Year).

Edited: 24/06/13

Chapter 36 - Advice of a Daughter

Something twisted in Loki's stomach and he dropped his eyes. "Hel… what are you doing here?"

Hel's feet moved soundlessly across the floor, moving in a curve towards him, "I sensed what happened to you, and I wanted to come see you."

Loki did not dare make the obvious reply of 'why not come before' as he glanced up at his daughter all grown up. For over a thousand years his abiding memory was of a tiny girl with a bright eye and grey skin. Now she stood taller than him, and her good eye was sharp and clever, no more innocent wonder. The air was thick with a cloying scent, there were shadows all over his walls from the orbs of light around him. Hel had taken over his room by simply entering it.

"I…"

Hel's smirk widened, half hidden behind her veil, "This must have felt like the longest day of your life."

"No. That will always be the days I was-" Loki stopped himself, his eyes looking everywhere but at Hel. She finished his sentence for him.

"When you were with mother."

Loki nodded. "The worst… the worst was when you were born. You cried and cried all day and night and I could never make you better."

"My body wasn't capable of tolerating the environment of Asgard," said Hel in a quiet, almost thoughtful tone. Loki closed his eyes. He was not prepared for this moment in any way and he did not know what to do. He expected more from himself, for him to try and make this better, easier, happier. But it would be a lie, and he could not do that usually simple thing to his daughter.

How many times had he imagined this moment, coming face to face with his daughter and being reunited? In all those times, it had never been like this.

"Look at me father."

Loki swallowed and obeyed. What else could he do? Hel stared at him with a probing dark eye,

"Why are you so afraid of me? I have watched you from my realm, you are not easily frightened."

Loki swallowed, "I can't remember your face from when you were a baby."

Hel's expression shifted slightly. "What do you mean?"

"I thought I had a perfect memory of your face, that I could recall every detail of it. But I don't recognise the face before me. Which means I forgot." Loki sank into his chair and covered his face with his hand.

"Father-"

"Don't call me that!" Loki snapped.

"Why not? You are my father."

"What good is blood when I failed you so badly?"

There was a moment of silence, as Hel crossed the room and stood before him and began to speak,

"When I was born, you held me to your bare chest and promised me I would feel the sun on my skin someday."

Loki looked up and stared at her. Hel was looking at her own reflection over his head, "When I was a day old, you taught Jörmungandr how to bathe me. When I was a week old and suffering with pain you fought with mother, demanding she help me, and she refused, saying that I had to be observed."

Loki licked his lips, "What good are a few memories in comparison to a lifetime of abandonment?"

"Father, you forget I am Queen of Niflheim. When I was placed in that realm, I became a being that had always existed. Niflheim existed to hold me, so that I might be born and make Niflheim into existence. So I was already infinitely older than you when I was born."

Loki nodded, half remembering a time when he had tried to explain the temporal uniqueness of Niflheim to Thor. The big oaf had gone puce with confusion when Loki had used the words temporal causality loop.

"Father, I looked from my throne to you, and I saw you rear me. I saw you weep for my pain and I saw you kill my mother to save my life. And I have seen you and Princess Sigyn talk of me countless times… is she my step-mother?"

Loki blinked hard and then burst out laughing.

"Oh! Sigyn would be delighted to hear you call her that."

Hel nodded, the corner of her lips quirking up. "I imagine so, she has a strong nurturing instinct… it is a shame she is constantly denied the ultimate experience of actually raising a child."

Loki's humour vanished at once and he looked at Hel, drinking her in. "Oh Hela…"

As his pet version of her name fell from his lips, he got to his feet and reached out a hand, pulling aside the veil, and revealing the decaying skin, the cataract eye and the exposed teeth of Hel's dead side.

"Look at you… my baby, my daughter. A queen and a woman. You're remarkable."

Hel's face softened into a smile, "Father."

"Hela, I'm so sorry."

"For what?"

Loki blinked, wrong footed by the gentle question. "I should have found a way to help you. I should have been there to raise you. I should have come to find you in Niflheim."

Hel regarded him calmly, and reached up with her gloved hand, touching his cheek very lightly. "Father… you have to understand I am so much older than you are now. You will never be as old as me. And I see things in a way you never will. You see into a god's lifetime, which a mortal will never comprehend, but I see even wider."

Loki turned his face into her touch, "I don't understand."

"You fear I feel abandoned, you fear I do not know you love me, and you fear that I hate you for never coming to see me. But father, you could not have come to Niflheim with me. Once you are a part of it, it doesn't let go. Even I can only leave for brief moments before I must return. If you had taken me, it is likely Fenrir would have died inside you. You could never come to see me, you had to let me go so we could both survive."

Loki's lip curled in disgust, "Survive… so Fenrir could be chained and suffer, and I never get to see you."

"I have become strong enough to leave for a short while. I can come see you now."

Loki frowned, "That seems… convenient."

Hel smiled, "You don't believe me?"

"I don't believe that after one thousand and twenty two years I suddenly get a magical enhancement and my daughter in my arms, after a surprisingly easy meeting with my councillors. It's all very… heart-warming." The sneer on Loki's face felt exaggerated, ugly, under his daughter's fingers.

Hel nodded, "I can understand that. You've always been naturally suspicious. In fact the only person you don't suspect of having an ulterior motive is your wife."

Loki narrowed his eyes, "Meaning?"

Hel sighed, "I meant nothing by it. I just meant I can understand why you would feel suspicious. You expected me to rage at you, to hate you, to justify your feelings of failure… almost make it worthwhile your feeling that way because it was true. You can't imagine that I would honestly accept my fate, even be content with it, because you resented it so much. You were denied the opportunity to raise any of your children, and felt we should feel as angry as you. But how could I resent you giving me to Niflheim, my destiny, the realm that I brought into existence when the universe began? You gave me life so I could make a place for the dead to reside."

Loki turned away, leaning on his desk and dropping his chin to his chest. "It wasn't fair! I wanted to raise you, and your brothers. But I lost you all through fate or my own actions."

Hel's healthy hand, with perfect nails, rested on his shoulder, "Father, I would have loved to have been raised by you. But I am not suffering, and I have not suffered since I was placed in my realm. If I had stayed here, I would have been in agony all my days. Would you have wished that on me?"

Loki felt his eyes stinging and he wiped at his cheeks, trying to hide his face, "No. Never."

"You are tired father, come and rest."

Loki shook his head, resisting the pressure on his shoulder, "This isn't real. It can't be. This is my new magic tricking my mind by giving me what I want."

"If it was really your magic and your wish, would I not be a babe, with perfect skin all over?"

"I never cared what you looked like," hissed Loki, "I only wanted you to be happy."

"And I am."

"Without me!" Loki burst out. "You were better off without me! If Fenrir had another father he would be better off too. If Jörmungandr had another father, he would be a prince of Asgard, not a serpent in the bowels of Midgard."

Hel sighed and Loki found himself being held by her. Her right side was warm, the left was a damp cold. Her half lips pressed against his temple and then she nudged his brow with hers.

"Father… I came because your actions, your transformation, have sent ripples through the universe. And you must be prepared to deal with that. People will come for the casket, and they will come for you."

Loki let out a broken laugh, "That makes more sense. My baby girl comes to see me, proving she never needed me, to tell me instead of getting things right, I've gotten them wrong. Yes, now I can believe this is real."

Hel sighed, "Father…"

"I love you Hel, my little Hela," said Loki, clinging to her, inhaling the smell of her skin. She still smelled the same as she had when she was a baby, of decay and warmth that mingled awkwardly.

"And I love you father, my brave, clever father." Hel tugged him to his bed and helped him lie down. "I can't stay much longer father, I have to return to Niflheim soon."

Loki grabbed her healthy wrist, holding it tight. "Wait! I can see if Sigyn is able to meet you. She'd be so happy to see you."

Hel smiled softly and sat next to him. "Father, I will come and see you again. And I would be happy to meet Princess Sigyn. But tonight I will have to go soon. I have one thing left to tell you."

Loki sat up, "What?"

Hel's face became serious, "Fenrir, you wish to free him."

"Yes, I will free him, and I will restore him. Do not say that I cannot."

"You can," Hel reassured him, "But you must be willing to cause harm to another for it."

Loki frowned, then his expression cleared, "The dark thread between Fenrir and Odin."

Hel nodded, "Yes. That thread is connected to the collar around Fenrir's neck. It is an evil tool, it feeds off Odin's fear and anger, his worries over what could threaten his realm, his family, and all of it wraps around Fenrir. That is why he is what he is now. It is not how he was meant to be at all. He was always going to be a mighty wolf when he wished, like Jörmungandr is a mighty serpent, but he was never meant to be a monster."

"I've touched that collar a thousand times since it was put on him. I never sensed anything like that."

"Did you sense the thread in Odin when you touched him before?"

Loki shook his head. Hel nodded, "Father, you've altered, become more than you were before, it's heightened your senses. You can sense more than you could before."

Loki thought hard, eyes narrowing, "Does Odin know? Does Frigga know?"

"Afi Odin and Amma Frigga have no idea," said Hel. She grimaced and curled her fingers into the blanket. "I must go. The air…"

"Wait! Where did the collar come from? I thought it was made by Brokkr, but why would he make such a thing?"

"I don't know. You must find out."

"How do I undo the damage? How do I free Fenrir from this spell?"

"I'm not sure. It could be as simple as removing the collar. But I doubt it. All that rage and hate and fear must go somewhere." Hel backed away, gently tugging her wrist from his grasp. "I have to go father."

"Hela, stay a few more minutes, please." Loki climbed off the bed to follow her.

"I will come back," Hel promised, avoiding his reaching hand. "Goodbye father."

"Hel!" Loki grabbed for her, but she was gone and all he caught was air. His breathing was the only sound left in the room.

"Hela…" he whispered, but there was no reply. His chest expanded as he gasped for air, but the room seemed devoid of it. He staggered back to his bed and lay down, curling up into a ball. He lay very still and reimagined Hel's hand upon his face.

His daughter, all grown up, a regal and powerful queen. She was happy, or at least content with what she had become and what life had been dealt to her. And she had created something out of it. A place for the dead to go that was neither punishment nor glory, a place for the average person to go, where they would be at peace and rest until Ragnarok.

When Loki had awoken after a month's delirium and sleep, flushed with magic-fever, after Odin had brought him home, Odin had explained what had happened to his son and daughter. He had told him about what had happened when he had placed Hel in Niflheim.

"I went down into the boundaries of Niflheim, and approached the place where death and life meet. As I stepped closer, Hel seemed to settle in my arms, in a way not even your mother or Eir could achieve with her. She turned her head towards the boundary, and I saw a ripple in the air. A stirring in the realm where nothing stirs. I almost turned away, concerned that Hel would be harmed, but she reached out both hands towards it… and I knew she had to go there. So I held her out and her hands touched the barrier.

"At once there was a flash of light, and in an instant I saw the birth of the universe before my eyes. As it grew Hel was there, and she grew with it, from babe to woman. As regal as a queen, she called upon the forces of the forging universe and wrapped it around her form. The forces seemed to morph into the dimension of Niflheim, crafted to match her unique form. And then everything returned to as it was before, and I stood on one side of the barrier, and Hel stood on the other side, with a grand crown of horns, and a green gown. With her good eye she looked straight at me, and she smiled at me."

And here Loki remembered that Odin had rested his hand on Loki's shoulder, squeezing it and the closest thing to a sentimental smile Loki had ever seen on his face as he said,

"Loki, she has your smile."

Loki let out a sharp laugh as he realised Odin was right. Hel did have his smile. He had not been able to imagine Hel smiling at all, she had cried from the moment she was born until the last moment Loki had seen her. He realised he had always imagined her crying whenever he had thought of her, but that was not the case, she was not suffering. In fact she had thrived.

As he lay there, Loki realised that he no longer felt the pain of her loss, at least not in the strength he had nursed for so long. In its place, a new emotion was growing. Pride. He was so proud of his daughter.

Just wait until he told Sigyn she was an acknowledged step-mother to the Queen of Niflheim.

It was almost the height of winter in the land known as Antarctica, and pitch black save for the faint light of stars and the moon above, with occasional flickers of green. A group of emperor penguin males huddled together for warmth, oblivious to the lights above them growing brighter and more intense. They did not even notice the figure of a woman descending from a bright flash of purple among the green and landing on the ice with light feet.

Hel looked around with her good eye, unbothered by the howling winds or the ice chips blowing all around her, as she walked across the ice. She extended her senses, searching for a distinctly large emission of life, somewhere at the bottom of the ocean beneath her. Eventually she came to a stop and waved a hand in front of her. A large hole appeared in the ice, melting all the way down to the bottom. Hel called up a small ball of green energy and dropped it down the hole.

Then she waited, watching the penguins shift in a simple rotation to give every member of their flock a chance to be in the centre of the warmth. With her own instincts, natural and well honed, she could see which of these males would die before the sun rose again, and which would be bitterly disappointed that their eggs did not hatch.

A low rumble caught her attention and she looked back to the hole. Something was making its way up the opening. Her lips curled into a smirk as the rumbling grew louder and louder, until, with a faint pop, a huge head emerged from the hole. Scaly, with fangs curling over the bottom lip, the huge serpent turned his ruby red eyes to her.

"Jörmungandr, brother," Hel called, holding out her good hand. "We must speak."

Jörmungandr snorted, the sound like a small sonic boom, and the penguins all squawked in alarm. Jörmungandr started to slither back down into his hole and Hel growled.

"Jörmungandr, get out here now!"

Jörmungandr may be a huge beast now, but Hel was not Queen of Niflheim because of fate alone. With a small gesture of her hand Jörmungandr was pulled by invisible hands back up the tunnel, his head going higher and higher into the sky as more and more of his body was pulled through.

"Brother, the ice may be thick, but you are the largest being in this realm, and I rather think the humans will be upset if you break their continent." Hel called in a light tone.

Jörmungandr snarled, thrashed, but he could do nothing against Hel, and eventually he sagged. Hel watched with mild fascination as he seemed to go very still for a few moments, then his tail emerged from the tunnel and he continued to gradually shrink. Eventually he was as long as a tall man, and his body started to alter. His scales receded into pale skin, arms and legs separated from a central body, and the pointed face squashed backwards into the head.

Once he was back in his Aesir form, Hel freed Jörmungandr of her magic and he landed in a crouch, hissing in discomfort.

"This form is unused," he rasped at her over the wind as she approached.

"It has indeed been a long time since you have been this way." Hel examined her brother as he rose to his feet. He was light grey in colour, with red eyes and black hair matted on his head. His stubborn refusal to leave his snake form had slowed his aging hugely, so although he ought to be a fully grown man, he appeared as a youth, lanky and awkward as he folded his arms across his naked chest.

"What you want?" he spat, voice craggy and hoarse.

"I want you to forgive our father," said Hel without hesitation.

Jörmungandr turned away at once, walking towards the hole. Hel reached out and grabbed his bicep, pulling him back.

"Hear me brother!"

"Father killed mother," spat Jörmungandr. "Hate him!"

"To save us! To save me," snapped Hel, "We were children who had never felt the sun on our faces, and father wanted to give us that. He was little more than a child himself, held prisoner by our mother to be a toy for her amusement."

Jörmungandr threw Hel's hand off, but he turned to her.

"Monster! Father ate her heart."

"He had no choice, it was the only way to get away. He ate her heart to take control of her seiðr, to undo all the concealments around us, in time for Odin to find us." Hel softened her voice and reached out her hand. "And through that terrible act he gave us another brother."

"Brother?" Jörmungandr tilted his head to the side, thinking hard for a moment. Then he nodded slowly, "Fenrir."

"Yes, I told you of him."

Jörmungandr nodded again. As he calmed down, his movements slowed to a crawl. Even as a warm blooded being Jörmungandr had a reptile's slow movements except when he was angry. He was quiet, very thoughtful, if a bit primitive in his thoughts and words, but he had only been five when he had retreated into his serpent form. In many ways he still was a five year old.

"Fenrir hurts," Jörmungandr growled, "Afi hurt him."

"Afi did not do it by choice," said Hel gently. It amused her to call Odin 'grandfather', after watching him grow up and become the King of Asgard. She had often imagined the look on her Uncle Thor's face if she walked into the Hall and called Odin by the title, not to mention all those around her father's court.

Maybe one day.

"Brother," Hel reasserted herself in the present, holding out her good hand, "Our father longs to have us back. He tried to find you, I watched as you fled from him, ignoring his pleas for forgiveness."

Jörmungandr looked sullen, dropping his head and turning away. Hel stepped closer. "Jörmungandr, you know in your head and in your heart that our father loves us, and he is willing to admit he was not a perfect father… but I will not have him say he failed us because you cannot forgive him for giving you freedom."

"He wasn't there," Jörmungandr muttered, long hand tugging at his matt of hair. "Killed mother, then left us with Afi and Amma, in that big golden place."

"He was sick. He could not see anything but nightmares and delusions as mother's seiðr poisoned him. When Fenrir was born he was better. If you had not run away so soon you would have seen that."

"You left too." Jörmungandr sat on the rim of the tunnel, legs dangling over the seven thousand foot drop.

"Oh you cannot blame me, I was already in Niflheim when I was brought there, not to mention that I was a baby in Afi's arms and dying of pain. You could have stayed, but you were angry and wanted to punish father. But you've hurt him enough, and he loves us. You are the only one of his children who is free to go to him now and embrace him. And you would deny yourself his love to be spiteful?"

Jörmungandr said nothing for a long time, long enough for the penguins to resettle. Hel waited patiently. Then Jörmungandr sighed,

"Think about it."

Without another word he slid over the rim, already morphing into his serpent form. Hel sighed and stepped back, waiting until she heard a splash before sealing the hole up. She knew that this could not be rushed, and that her father needed time to get used to himself again, before Jörmungandr reappeared, and Jörmungandr's slow nature would ensure it would not be too soon. But at least she had made some progress towards helping her family.

For centuries Hel had wanted to go to her father, to save Fenrir, to bridge peace with Jörmungandr, but she was not a politician, the dead do not rebel or demand anything of her, and she gives them the care she can, and she was reluctant to cause her father more pain by revealing the truth. Besides which, Hel had only recently discovered the truth about Fenrir's binding, from a frightened soul who had come to her needing to confess. The soul had only admitted that she had been privy to the ordering of the collar, had overheard what the purpose of it was.

Fenrir was fated to battle someone and defeat them, but it wasn't Odin. But the intended person was powerful enough to alter the original prophecy, replacing their name with the All-father's. As soon as the collar had been in Odin's hands it had begun to play on his fears and anger, very quietly and gently pulling at them for centuries, until Fenrir had been born. By then the collar's magic had made Odin incapable of seeing anything but the creature he so feared, even if all he appeared as was a helpless pup.

Hel had realised that things had been left to fester too long, as was the most common problem with the immortal, and decided that as death was the most dramatic of forces to wrought change, so she would act to help her family. Perhaps her father could forgive her grandfather for what had been done to Fenrir, for Odin, although mighty, was not infallible. He was a man, and men make mistakes, just as Loki had, as Thor had, so had Odin. And in this he had been tricked by powerful seiðr.

Surely it could be forgiven?

I hope Hel's creation of Niflheim wasn't too confusing. Basically the realm had to exist to allow her to be born in order to allow her to create it. 'Tis a simple temporal predestination paradox causality loop XD. (got that from Family Guy episode 'The Big Bang Theory'). So Hel is probably the oldest being in the universe that we know of so far.

Oh! And that game is still open regarding Hlin and the other handmaids (who should turn up at some point). Figure out what TV characters (all from the one show) I based them off of and I'll dedicate the next chapter to you.

Night's Darkness