{-Sharena-}

They traveled a couple of days until Reginn was able to excitedly announce that they were in the capital of Jötunheimer.

The seiðjárn of Niðavellir was one thing. The height and grandness of Jötunheimer was completely different. In some ways, it felt much more familiar; aside from apparently having people much bigger than them, the scenery looked like it could belong in Askr. No one on the street said anything about their presence. The guards of the castle simply looked at Reginn and let them all through.

Reginn confidently led the way to the throne room. A jötun was waiting there; someone shorter than all the others they passed, but still taller than any of them. Her face lit up when she saw them and she bounded up to Reginn.

"If it isn't my favorite dverger!" She picked Reginn up, twirled her around, and gave her a kiss on the forehead before setting her back down. "Whatcha doing here? And who's these friends with you?"

Reginn was a bright red and smiling, letting out a near-nervous chuckle before saying, "Dagr, these are all people from Askr. They're Alfonse, Sharena, Anna, and Fauna."

"I don't know where that is, but hey, welcome to Jötunheimer!" Dagr gestured to another room. "Let's get out of the way before Mom yells at me. Then you can tell me how you met Reggie!"

"Reggie…" Lekra mumbled as the group followed Dagr.

The room overlooked a large arena of sorts; outside, rows of seats were nearly full as a large amount of jötun sat and watched the battle. Dagr rushed to the window to watch, with Reginn quick to join her, but the others (aside from Fauna, who stood right by the door) approached a bit more cautiously.

"Yeah! Knock Nótt down a peg!" Dagr cheered. It didn't look like either of the contestants were winning. "She's won way too many matches this week!"

Reginn did little but watch in awe.

"This is normal for Jötunheimer, then?" Alfonse was the only one to dare disrupt their concentration.

Dagr immediately found that much more important than figuring out who was winning. "This isn't normal where you're from? What's wrong with you dverger?! Coliseum battles are the best! Nothing's better than the equaling ground of a battlefield."

"With weapons like those, these kinds of things are illegal in Askr," Anna remarked as she watched the fight. "Definitely not something we watch for fun."

"You're talking about death matches," Dagr replied casually. "Those only happen between convicts; as far as the law's concerned they're both going to die anyway, so we give them some hope and get some entertainment out of it too. This is just a regular battle. If I had to guess, that unfortunate guy said something Nótt didn't like so she called a duel. We jötun tend to solve our problems with swords." She pointed to one of the fighters. "That one's Nótt. Don't root for her."

"Isn't she your sister?" Sharena asked.

Dagr shrugged. "It's a long story. Maybe later." A bird flying into the arena caught her attention, but perhaps what she noticed the most was that it stopped the duel. "Huh, I wonder what that's for… probably nothing important." She looked back at them. "Back to what we were talking about before. How'd you meet Reggie?"

"Emblian soldiers thought she was a threat and brought her to us," Alfonse replied simply. "Then she told us she'd gotten King Fáfnir interested in conquesting our kingdoms and here we are."

Reginn filled in the gaps. "You know how I told you about that super boring place Ótr stationed me..? Well, first I stowed away on a ship because I was bored. Then I told Fáfnir and Ótr about it. I heard Fáfnir mention conquering them and I felt bad so I went and warned them."

Dagr gave a very sophisticated nod compared to what she said. "I'm assuming Ótr doesn't know because he's definitely gonna flip when he hears it."

"I ended up telling him there were rebels somewhere but I never told him they were technically with me…"

"It sounds like my bad influence is rubbing off on you. Now all we've got to do is make you a convincing liar!"

Reginn looked like she had something to say but held it back to instead say, "We visited Eitri earlier, which is part of the reason we're here. She said if we wanted to stop Fáfnir, we'll need the true heir of Niðavellir and Gramr."

"The true heir's the best-kept secret around here!" Dagr's laugh was nowhere near being nervous, but she still gave the clear impression she knew who it was. "But I can definitely help with Gramr. I know exactly where Mom—"

"Dagr, I swear if you entertain a single bit of this..!" The door swung open and Nótt marched right through. The four of them nearly instinctively backed away from her, Dagr, and Reginn, definitely not wanting to be grouped into whatever was going on.

"Dverger! Remember they're a lot more pathetic than I am!" was Dagr's first line of defense. "If you have to hit me, let's do it in a place where we're not going to drag them into this."

"Your friends are the problem!"

"H-Hey now, if you have to be pointing fingers, they're Reginn's friends."

"Did they already tell you why they're here?"

"Yeah, to get Gramr for the true heir of Niðavellir."

"Do you know what they're going to do with that?"

"Uh… remind Fáfnir other places aren't his toys..?"

"Kill him! And kill Ótr! It's all in the letter." Nótt stepped back and breathed. "It's from Ótr. I am expected to stop Reginn and her plans of treason in a simple matter: death. But I will admit that it doesn't sit well with me… I'm not even sure why he would suggest such a thing to happen to his sister. So we will solve this in the way of the jötun—Reginn, I challenge you to a duel for Gramr."

((A/N: Honestly I don't remember if Dagr actually had a nickname for Reginn but I went with Reggie for two reasons: it made sense, and it was the nickname of a former president of Nintendo of America. At that point it was too fitting not to use.

Reginn may be an incredible thief and pickpocket (and may or may not have, out of pure curiosity, looked through the other four's things), but she's terrible at lying about it. It's a good thing that very few people notice it.))