New Asgard, way back when

"This is what you saw in the dream?" Wong scrutinised the photo in his hand. He appeared very impressed. "You conjured this from Loki's dream?"

"No. I Googled it, what do you think?" Stephen gave him an exasperated look. "Loki's brain isn't exactly connected to a copier machine."

He propped his cheek up with his fist. Returning to sleep after such rude awakening was difficult but he managed to coax Loki (and by coaxing he meant slipping him a sleeping draught) to bed once more, whereas Stephen himself had stayed up for the remainder of the night, pacing back and forth, too restless to sleep. He would have marched straight into Thor's chambers with his discovery had it still not been such an ungodly hour of the morning.

On second thought, maybe he should have, since Thor did break the door to his hotel room a few years ago…for which Stephen had more or less reluctantly forgiven, given how petrified he was that his little brother was going to die. The fact that it was Stephen who had knocked Loki up also helped his case.

And now here we are, Stephen thought ruefully.

But anyway

"Yes, those boils look like what I saw."

Since New York was six hours behind Asgard, Wong was his next best option to bounce ideas off. As brainstorming partners went, he was not half-bad. Brilliant, in fact.

Wong crinkled his nose. "These look nasty."

"They are what you would call Milker's Nodules, a manifestation of an occupational viral skin disease. It's the same virus responsible for Pseudocowpox." Stephen knew the special study module he had done on infectious diseases when he was a trainee doctor would come in handy someday. "They are often found on the hands of workers who come into direct contact with infected cow udders, and judging from the number of lesions, I'd say he comes into contact with them a lot."

"So…you're essentially looking for a sorcerer who also freelances as a cattle farmer? A rancher?"

"More specifically, a dairy farmer. The poison was in the milk, not the meat," Stephen reminded him. "The cattle must have grazed on white snakeroot for the toxin to contaminate the milk. It was not native to old Asgard, that could explain why it was not detected by the Healers."

"Nor is it native to Norway." Wong interjected, since his botany knowledge could rival Google's after all. "It is native to –"

"Central and eastern North America, I know," Stephen cut him off tersely. "But I altered the soil chemistry and ecosystem when the Asgardians first settled here, remember? It was the only way to allow for livestock production and create agriculture diverse enough to sustain a self-sufficient economy."

Stephen inhaled deeply. "The only thing they can't grow here is deep-water seaweed. And ghost peppers. Those are banned now."

Wong shook his head. "You have a strange way of showing you care."

Stephen gave him a look that simply meant Wong had strayed off-topic and should get back on the damn topic.

"So. Any milk cattle-rearing sorcerer with the tiniest bit of knowledge on alchemy could have seen it as an opportunity." Wong studied the photo again. "If we're dealing with a sorcerer, why didn't he conceal them? Loki would put a glamour over these till the end of days and never take it off."

Stephen rolled his eyes. "Loki's vanity is unparalleled." Alarmed, he turned his head to make sure Loki was still asleep, before swivelling in his chair to face the open portal again through which Wong was watching him from the Sanctum Library with a sly smile on his face.

"What?"

"Nothing. Again, it's sweet that's all. The care you take to not hurt his feelings."

"I'm more concerned about the bodily harm that could come to me more than anything had he heard such a comment. Now can we get back to the subject, please?" Stephen asked irritably.

"Yes, the magic cowpox thing." Wong looked thoughtful. "You did say he walked out of a mirror, but with no legs? A true mirror walker would have preserved the integrity of his physical body."

"So it was a semi-solid, incomplete illusion, projected from a remote location." Stephen nodded. "That would explain why he did not cast a glamour over his hands. He wasn't physically there at the dining hall."

"Guess you're lucky the mirror wasn't floor-length or we would have missed this vital clue." Wong studied his friend. "You okay? You look beat."

"I'm fine," Stephen said. Upon realising how irritated he sounded, he shook his head. "Sorry."

"Don't run yourself into the ground, Strange. Too much coffee, too little sleep…plus you did just recover from some serious wounds from your last battle."

It took Stephen a few seconds to gather the courage to broach the issue; he had let it linger long enough. "Why didn't you tell me Loki helped you out?"

"Not my secret to tell, was it?" Wong shrugged. "All that mattered was you lived."

Stephen opened his mouth to speak but Wong lifted a finger. "If you're going to blame me for whatever fight you and Loki ended up having, think again. Always carefully seek the root cause of a problem and fix that. I'm your friend, not the collateral damage in your relationship."

Momentarily stunned, Stephen could only stare.

"Yeah." One would never think it looking at him, but Wong always came up with the wisest thing to say. Stephen could not help but smile wistfully. "I think…we have fixed that. Sort of."

"Good." Wong reached through the portal and clapped a hand on Stephen's shoulder, hard. "Now can we get back to the subject? It's ten and you're already making me miss Game of Thrones. Make it damn worth it."

To placate him, Stephen handed him a platter of smoked kipper and some crusty bread. "Here. Some supper for you, for starters."

At least Wong looked pleased with the offering.

"The root cause," Stephen echoed Wong's words. "What is the root cause…"

"Yes. A sorcerer who is after Loki and your son. Why?"

"Getting rid of competition?" Wong wondered aloud. "Loki is one of the most powerful sorcerers in the Nine Realms, or so he claims…kill the sorcerer and claim his powers, that sort of thing?"

Stephen tapped his fingers on the table in frustration. Ideas were harder to come by when one was sleep-deprived and jittery from too much coffee. "Asgard is no more. And we're light years away from the Nine Realms, now with the Bifrost and the Space Stone gone."

"Yeah…the Sanctums would have pinged us anyway if anybody metaphysically suspicious has entered our orbit." Wong's small eyes widened at his next Eureka moment. "I've got it. Maybe someone is vying for the attention of our eligible Sorcerer Supreme, and wants his baby mama out of the way?"

"Where do you come up with all these crazy theories?"

"Just checking if you're still awake." Wong gave him a savage grin. "It would have been fun though, fending off an octogenarian temptress?"

"That's it. I'm cancelling Netflix."

"Tell me about the arrow incident." Wong hurriedly changed their train of thought in the effort to salvage his cable subscription. "You say it penetrated Loki's shield…which was the size of -?"

Stephen frowned as he tried to recall, "A 50-meter radius geodesic seiðr dome."

Wong whistled. "Some force. That should have withstood anything."

"Against a seiðr-fortified arrow, it couldn't. For a given force and considering the relatively miniscule surface area of the tip, the pressure it generated was enough to penetrate the shield."

"Yes, but didn't you tell me that warrior lady leapt in and covered your boy with her own body?" Wong counter-argued. "If that were true, how did she manage to break through? The defect should have only been where the arrow entered. The rest of the dome should have still been impenetrable."

Stephen slowly raised himself from leaning against the chair until he was hunched over his knees. "Wong…"

"I'm onto something." Wong marvelled. Then his nose crinkled. "Am I?"

Stephen stared at him. "The arrow did not only penetrate the shield. It took it down completely."

"But how?" Stephen resorted once more to pacing as if trying to match his footsteps to his racing mind. "Wait a minute…it's coming…"

He stopped in his tracks. "In order for the shield to collapse completely, it would have needed to be neutered by something of similar strength, similar wavelength, similar energy signature –"

"Like acid-alkali neutralisation to produce salt and water…" Wong was beginning to understand it now.

"The arrow. It wasn't seiðr-fortified, not really." Stephen felt like he was grasping at straws. "It was more like…"

"Seiðr-coated," Wong supplied helpfully.

"Yes!" Stephen snapped his fingers. "Exactly."

He turned to gape at his friend. "Wong, you're a genius."

"I have been told," Wong concurred readily. "But Strange, the formula really isn't that simple. You have to know exactly just how acidic Loki is, in order to formulate the right pH alkaline to blast his shield."

At Stephen's glowering look, Wong shrugged, not the least bit guiltily. "Just a term."

"And one would do that how?"

"Either one has to get very close to Loki when he performs the spell, or…" Wong hesitated.

"Or…?"

"He has in his possession a part of Loki."

"You mean literally or figuratively?" Stephen asked, somewhat possessively.

Wong rolled his eyes. "Literally, you dumbass. A piece of Loki. Fingernails, lung tissue, a tooth, something." His eyes lit up. "Blood? There was plenty of blood to be had, wasn't there?"

"The biohazard disposal team took care of it, they incinerated every trace of Loki's blood with magic, leaving only the one sample I took to Banner." Stephen stared at his feet, as if the answer was somehow written on the floor. "Such precious biomaterial was too dangerous to keep."

"I'd imagine so," Wong said glumly. He could only imagine what catastrophe ancient blood like Loki's could cause if it fell into the wrong hands. "So what then?"

Stephen kept staring at the floor. There was a lock of black hair stuck underneath the leg of his table, the very table where Loki had sat when Stephen gave him his haircut. The cleaners must have missed it.

And something at the back of his brain just clicked.

Stephen bolted for the tiny chest of drawers in the walk-in wardrobe where he kept his miscellaneous jumble of bric-a-brac and truly priceless, precious things –

"Strange?"

"You stupid, stupid man." Stephen palmed his eyes. And sighed.

"Strange, what's the matter?" Wong peeked his head through the portal, keeping his voice down to a loud whisper lest he wake Loki, or worse, the baby next door.

Stephen cursed aloud. He always made sure he had a piece of Loki's hair with him at all times; it was a habit Loki consented to and had never minded, but he had always kept it on him, never somewhere anyone could get their hands on. Until three nights ago when Loki requested to have his hair trimmed.

And Stephen had stupidly gone and let his guard down and not thought twice about keeping a few locks of it in the wardrobe, seeing how it was their private chamber and should be sufficiently warded.

Or should have been. "It's gone."

You idiot.

"What's gone?" Wong hissed.

You big fucking idiot.

Stephen looked at the empty trinket box in his hand. "Loki's hair. Someone's taken it."

Wong's countenance shifted into one of dismay and extreme displeasure. If it had been less dire of a situation, he would have chastised the Sorcerer Supreme for being so careless. It would be counterproductive to do so anyway, judging from the look of fury on his friend's face. "That's not good, Strange."

"Really, Wong. I wouldn't have guessed," Stephen said sarcastically. Who? Who could have had access to their room?

Always the better man, Wong ignored the snark and wasted no time putting his impressive brainpower to good use. "Someone who has free access – personal aides? Housekeepers? Maids? Pay some people enough and they would do anything."

Stephen shook his head. "No, the wards wouldn't have allowed just anybody in."

"Then it must be someone close to you. Someone you trust."

Someone you trust.

Wong saw the look on Stephen's face even before it occurred to Stephen that the answer had perhaps been staring him in the face all along.

"You need back-up?" he offered quietly.

Stephen's lips worked to form words but his thoughts were simply racing too fast to vocalise.

"Wong, go watch your show." Stephen finally heard himself say, numb and hollow-voiced. He slipped on his sling ring. The Cloak flew from the coat rack and settled around his shoulders. "I'll holler if I need you."

Wong was silent. After a short eternity, "Be careful."

"Am I ever not?" Stephen gave a small smile that did not quite reach his eyes.

"Well, knock 'em dead, my friend." Wong started to butter a piece of crusty bread. "You know where I'll be. In front of the idiot box with my kippers and my non-alcoholic beer, having a good time not fighting forces of evil." After a beat, he added as if an afterthought, "Holding the fort for you, uh, here."

"You're a true friend, Wong."

Stephen stood over the crib and watched his son sleep. Stian was a peaceful baby, never waking unnecessarily, save for feeding or a change. He reached down to gently flip his baby onto his back into a safer sleeping position, but in a matter of seconds, Stian had once again rolled onto his tummy into his favourite sleeping position, sticking his bottom up in the air as if giving his father the proverbial one-finger salute.

Stephen chuckled softly and felt his eyes and chest burn. He struggled to contain the fury threatening to erupt from boiling over. If his suspicions had any footing in truth, he would find out very soon. For the time being he simply had to give her the benefit of the doubt.

He mumbled a spell and cast the golden shroud of protection over Stian's sleeping form; the incantation was one of the strongest protective spells Stephen knew, tied to his own life force for good measure.

Only grievous injury to his person or death could break it.

Stephen leaned down to kiss Stian's forehead, savouring the sweet smell of milk and baby shampoo. "I love you, buddy."

He kissed Stian's cheek in swift goodbye before heading back toward the adjacent master bedroom where Loki still lay in peaceful, dreamless slumber, from which he would not awaken, at least not in the next few hours.

"See you in the morning, Loki." Stephen quickly kissed him goodbye; any longer and Stephen feared he was never going to leave. Loki did not stir.

Stephen straightened and fingered the long strand of blond hair he had plucked off the headrest of the rocking chair in his son's nursery just moments earlier.

"God I really hope I'm wrong about this," he muttered to himself. And disappeared through a fiery portal into the deep night.

Stephen found himself standing in the middle of a grassland, an open landscape as far as the eyes could see. A small, idyllic wooden cottage stood in front of him, behind which loomed a craggy, ominous mountain. Metal pots of dried and wilted flowers hung from the walls on each side of door.

The seter could not have been built more than five years ago but the design was traditional, the barn adjacent to it basic and unadorned except for metal milk cans decorating its wooden walls.

Stephen did not have to wait very long for his vision to adjust to the inky blackness of the night. The moon was full. The sky was clear, with not a rain cloud to be seen. He looked at his feet.

True enough, what first appeared in the dark as icy snowflakes coating every inch of the open grass field were thousands of tiny clusters of white flowerheads, amid bud-shaped floral bracts and relatively larger, open leaves, similar to those of rose plants.

It was white snakeroot.

He looked around.

Acres of it. All around him.

A peculiar numbness began to set it, but he doubted it had anything to do with the chilly Scandinavian night air biting into his exposed face and hands. The little hairs on the back of his neck bristled.

Something was coming.

He heard it before he saw it, the sounds of metal scraping metal, tinny and grating against the dead silence of the night.

Ten yards away, a golden, hulking figure stepped out from behind the wooden barn, his armour glinting in the light of the moon.

O-kay.

He had not expected Yrsa to come out brandishing cuffed hands in easy surrender, nor had he expected this.

As his adversary marched closer, Stephen realised what had made him appear so tall; his helmet sported giant, double-curved horns branching out from the sides of his head like a minotaur. A long spear, taller than its bearer, slammed into the ground as he walked.

"Stand down, Soldier." Stephen half-heartedly tried for diplomacy, as one always should in a parlay. "By order of Thor, King of Asgard."

The Einherjar warrior paid him no heed. And the moment he struck, Stephen was ready, parrying the spear swooping in a downward arc toward his face with a loop of golden fire, a grin fast breaking across his face –

For he needed not hold back in this battle.

The Einherjar was no human. Beneath the shrouded shadows of the helmet, his face was a grey husk of hollow sockets and hanging dead skin, barely clinging to facial bones long distorted and maimed by rot and decay.

Undead yet undeniably strong. Still. Nothing Stephen should not be able to handle –

He summoned a golden circle and slammed it into the deadwalker's chest, sending him sliding half a metre across the grass but no further. His tattered golden cape hid his fighting hand but Stephen saw it coming and sideswiped his body, cleanly missing the thrusted spear that would have gone through his chest if he had not.

He looped an arm around the shaft of the spear and snaked his forearm all the way up the hilt, bracing it against a raised knee.

Stephen mustered all his strength and with a chopping motion, he brought his other arm down and split the shaft in two. The spear head fell harmlessly onto the ground.

But the close contact had put him in more peril than he realised when a strong hand wrapped itself around his throat and squeezed. The pressure behind the grip was equal to the strength of three men and Stephen began to choke. Strike one –!

The undead hand would have crushed his windpipe had it not been for The Cloak who whipped around his back to jab itself into where the Einherjar's eyes used to be, the sentient cloth barrelling past the empty sockets and drilling into his brain.

Stephen dropped to his knees as the grip around his neck loosened. Coughing harshly, he barely managed to dodge the heavy boot from coming down onto the top of his head, the depression it left on the earth reminding Stephen of a small crater, and he breathed a prayer of thanks all his brains were still in one piece –

Pick up speed, pick up speed

The deadwalker had brute strength. Stephen had everything else.

He conjured a golden whip and lashed out, looping it around the Einherjar's neck which bulged with the protection of his golden helmet.

Stephen poured more magic into it than he ever remembered pumping, perspiration beginning to dew on his forehead. He did not know the word so he just threw one in the language he knew, and since Latin always seemed to work…

"Decapitat!"

And it did.

The severed head rolled and bounced off the ground once.

Stephen took a few steps back, half-expecting the headless body to do something dramatic like burst into flames or disintegrate into ashes, but it did neither.

Nonchalantly, the headless warrior bent down, picked up his head, and screwed it back onto the cervical spine again, crepitus and all.

O-kay.

Stephen frowned.

Strike two. Major strike two!

The Einherjar was on the move again, and it was block, parry, block, parry as a flurry of heavy blows came from all directions. An uppercut to the jaw had Stephen seeing stars. His golden whips did little to soften the hits and Stephen was fast losing ground.

Time for a decisive move, for he could not afford to waste time here and get himself needlessly killed. Stephen flipped himself back, giving the widest berth between the deadwalker and himself as he could without losing his advantage of speed and agility.

If you can't kill the body, kill the spell.

Stephen hated necromancy.

Well, who wouldn't, raising the dead was after all evil, one of the evillest deeds of all – and the ugliest of spells. To undo the dark magic was no easy feat but it could be done.

Stephen just hoped there was not going to be maggots.

Giant mandalas bloomed for his balled fists as he chanted the words to the Spell of Revelation in his heart.

The Einherjar was coming for him again.

Good.

Stephen spread his arms apart, wide and welcoming. And waited.

A few milliseconds before the Einherjar's fist would have landed on his chest in a devastating blow, Stephen ducked and thrusted both his hands into the Einherjar's breastplates and launched his Spell full-force –

The ground around them exploded in pelts of soil and ripped-out white snakeroot. Stephen closed his eyes and held his breath to keep from aspirating the poisonous particles that were fast contaminating the air around him.

He teleported to safety just outside the circle of battle and waited for the geyser of energy to die down and the dust to settle.

A creak of metal against metal heralded the resounding crash that followed a split second later, as the heavy golden armour collapsed against a structure that was no longer holding it up. As the air cleared and returned Stephen's vision, he glimpsed the numerous, elongated structures poking out from the pile of disjointed pieces of armour, polished-white and gleaming.

It was a pile of bones, human from the looks of them, the skull grinning up from underneath the helmet conferring the undeniable truth.

His heart pounded madly with exertion.

Before he could brood any further on the sheer maliciousness of the dark sorcery behind it all, a light beamed across the grass.

It was coming from the barn.

The double doors, previously locked and chained, were ajar. It was an invitation, one Stephen knew he should, but could not refuse.

He pushed them open. They swung inward silently without a sound, sweeping away hay from the earthen floor and clearing a path toward the interior of the barn.

A rotten, nauseating smell instantly assaulted his senses and his stomach roiled. The light he saw earlier had come from a gas lantern hanging outside. It did little to illuminate the interior of the barn.

"If you're looking for Yrsa she is not here."

The man had his back toward him, hunched over a table, working on something on the table top.

"It was you I was dying to meet."

"Foolish young man." The man chuckled. His voice was certainly that of an old man, hoarse and raspy, but with his back turned, Stephen could not tell for certain. "Didn't your mother ever teach you to think before you speak?"

Stephen was silent. The magic that lazily stirred the air around him felt dark and ancient. He strengthened the invisible layer of protective shield around himself.

The man showed no sign of alarm. Not even when Stephen sent a ball of energy up onto the rafters to cast a light over them both, fluorescent and bright.

A carcass of a cow lay on the long table. A Holstein-Friesian, from the looks of its black and white markings. The stench was emanating from its bulbous abdomen where decomposition had broken down the belly and grotesque loops of distended intestines had ruptured through, dripping black and green fluids onto the hay-covered floor.

The man put aside his knife. He wiped his hands on the leather apron wrapped around his sides.

"I see you have met my son."

"He was not your son."

"Not in spirit, no. His spirit is long gone." He turned his head slightly. Stephen could not see it, but he could swear the man was wearing a sneer from the way his voice mocked his own spine-chilling words. "Thanks to your Prince."

The man finally turned.

He had to be in his seventies at least, his aquiline nose prominent against a face, rough and haggard, weathered with age, hatred, and – deep sorrow. It was not someone Stephen recognised, but the look in his eyes was one Stephen had seen many, many times in his line of work.

This man had suffered a loss, the deepest loss man could ever suffer in his lifetime. The death of a loved one.

Loki was right. This was personal.

"You do not know me, Sorcerer." The elderly man explained, almost kindly. "You would not."

"Does Loki know you?"

"I know not." The man waved a hand derisively. Now that the barn was brightly lit, Stephen could see the nodules dotting both the palm and the back of his hand. "I care not."

"But it is a shame that you came alone." The old man appeared almost worried for him. "You should have brought the Prince with you."

"Loki is never going to come within a foot of you."

"Oh yes he will." The old man's watery blue eyes hardened slowly. "When I string your corpse and that of your son from my rafters."

Stephen's blood turned to ice in his veins. Unconsciously, he deepened his breaths and centered his Chakras. His senses tingled in anticipation of upcoming battle.

"Loki."

Only static and silence.

"Loki." He tried again before he remembered that Loki was in very deep sleep, thanks to the draught Stephen himself had made him drink.

Stephen did not know whether to congratulate or berate himself. All he knew was they were all in danger and he could only hope his shields around himself and his son back at the nursery would hold.

The old man took an involuntary step back, his frail form pushed back by the waves of energy radiating from Stephen's core and he knocked his back against the table. His freckled hand grappled for purchase and pawed a loop of intestines that squelched under his palm.

"My, my." He sneered, not fearful in the slightest despite Stephen's blatant display of power. "All that raw energy. Nothing could touch you now."

Stephen frowned.

The old man reached down once more for the knife he had left on the table –

Stephen raised a hand to block –

The old man hissed, "Not from the outside at least!"

and drove the knife into the dead cattle's belly.

And a hot surge of pain tore through Stephen's abdomen, sharp and blinding. A silent scream grated against his throat as he fought for breath, his gasps harsh and laboured.

With a cackle, the old man withdrew the knife, and stabbed the cow again.

This time Stephen could not hold back a scream as the agony drove him to his knees. He felt like he was being gutted alive. His magic flew crazily around him trying to fend off the invisible knives that were never there in the first place.

He could not breathe, let alone think; he had never felt such agonising pain, not even when he died time and time again at the hands of Dormammu had the pain been this intense. Black spots danced in front of his eyes as bile and blood rose in his gullet.

"Loki…"

He called again but it travelled across the connection weak and thready.

The dark sorcerer stabbed the cow again. And again.

Blood, black as ichor, spewed from Stephen's lips. As he tumbled to the floor The Cloak caught his body as he collapsed, cushioning his head and preventing it from slamming into the ground. He bargained with his burning insides for one last breath of mercy and

"LOKI!"