Authors Note-
Thank you for the reviews on my last chapter 3 A huge thank you to Octobot and SixOneSixZero on AO3 and to Duvainel89 on !
Aela knew she should have felt something as she was dragged through the misty, dark camp. Shame, horror, revulsion… It was there, but as if through a screen. Visible, but not quite within grasp. The ground beneath her feet should have been wet, given the mist, but was instead harsh and rocky, the fog rolling upon it in a way that was almost beautiful - as if the cloud cover had a mind of its own.
She expected to stop at some sort of tent, a ceremonial area of horrific welcome. Hel's agents on pikes or unruly soldiers in stocks as a punishment. Instead, it felt as if their guide simply decided he'd had enough and waved at one of the men surrounding him to unshackle the group.
"You're here to fight" he began, voice a gruff drawl. "Whatever you did in the past, I don't care. If you have combat training, move to the left. If you don't, go to the right. And please, if you want to survive you'll be honest with us here because there's no test. I don't care if you live or die, as long as we keep the army within the realm below us from spilling out into ours, and the ones around us. So no bravado. No bluffing. Choose a side"
Aela rubbed at her wrists, the skin raw and tingling from the shackles. Some moved to the left, herself included, but many chose the right. She couldn't help but wonder what they'd done to end up here, without the ability to fight. How many spur of the moment decisions or unfortunate situations had caused the recipient to lose their lives upon this ancient battlefield?.
Their overseer sighed and waved once more to his group, voice an apathetic drawl as he spoke. "Go and see if any of these forsaken souls are capable of holding a sword. If not, take them around the tents. See what work we can find them" He turned away from their retreating forms, back to his new soldiers. Aela found a rare phenomenon. He looked through her, entirely uncaring. She was used to being underestimated, looked down upon, but not through. She'd always commanded attention, regardless of whether it was complimentary or not.
"I swear I'm getting less and less every time...right. Follow my Second to be fitted for armour. If we have whatever you're trained in, fantastic. If not, well you best get to the training rings and build up some stamina so fatigue doesn't get you before the enemy does. Or cobble together something. We're at a lull currently, so you'll be expected to keep out of trouble and work your sentence either sitting and waiting or helping around the war camp"
His second was short, but past that Aela couldn't determine his race. He didn't speak, just took off; expecting that they'd follow. The tent was large but as ragged as the others. The inside, however, smelt so familiar that she felt the punch of it within her core. Leather, tanned hides and soaked whetstones. It was as much a part of her as her horns, as her hair. And in the centre, someone she hadn't seen in as long as she could remember. He was tall, with strong legs; thighs thick enough to crush skulls. One of his arms was strong, corded with muscle; and the other unformed; halting at the forearm. He'd been born that way, he'd told her as a child, as he fitted her for her first shield. No grand battle, no tale of savagery. Just a wound from the womb. His eye, that was from a barfight though, he'd chuckled. He'd tell her the story when she was old enough.
They'd never gotten around to it. She didn't know what had happened, but one morning her father simply announced that he'd gone. If he recognised her, he didn't show it, though she'd grown much since then. How would she appear to him now, gilded finery exchanged for prisoner's garb, ribbon twisted plaits exchanged for the beginnings of fuzz. Fiery eyes dimmed by grief.
"Right. You're my new recruits then? Let me look at you"
He gestured for them to line up, and when they didn't immediately move the Second pushed them into position with the end of his sword.
"Are we doing names, or just weaponry and armour?"
"Hurry it up Themsal" the second glared, "they're here to serve a punishment, not to make friends"
"We're all serving a punishment" the artisan shook his head. "I'll be fitting you, and then you'll go to Serath to have the brand. Form a line, and step forwards.
Aela stood to the back, letting the others go first. Not knowing whether to give her name or not. Not wanting the conversation, the pity in his eyes. Knowing it was inevitable. She'd hoped to keep it quiet, not reveal who she was. Another personal choice, taken from her. She wouldn't lie to an old friend.
"Last but not least. Shy, are we?" he joked. "Don't worry, I won't have to measure you in front of everyone, I have an eye for sizes. Head up now, stand straight"
She stared at his chin as he took her in.
"Good musculature, you favour your right hand but I can tell you train with both. Formally too, your stance is balanced. Sir, you'll want this one with the recruits. Am I right?" He asked, and Aela nodded. "Whoever trained you, they weren't cheap…" he muttered, moving around her. "Well?"
She kept her eyes down, muttering a response. "They weren't"
"I knew it" he chuckled, absently waving. "It's the looseness of the arms, the perfect symmetry in the hips" He turned towards the shorter man who had brought them in. "You can always tell self-taught vs formal training" he explained, not caring that the soldier looked as if he'd never cared about anything less than this conversation. "Self taught fighters always have bad habits. Everyone develops them as they age, but you don't get symmetry like that without a capable instructor. Plus those tattoos, not just anyone can take down a Hor Verglace!" he laughed; the deep, booming laugh that had often woken her as a child when she'd fallen asleep draped across the laps of her father's circle after festivals "...Under which Lord were you trained?"
Aela swallowed. He moved forward, pressing a breastplate against and tutting, moving to a slightly snugger fit down the line.
"Quiet one, eh. Still, you're familiar. Come on, I bet we've got some classmates here in the existing soldiers; save you not knowing anyone. Was it-"
"They aren't here to make friends" their escort reminded, impatience in his stance. "Please, stop trying to make friends with the prisoners"
"Oh come on" Themsal argued, leather measuring tape flipping in the air as he did so. "This one has some fight stories. If you were Nifl, you'd know what that ink represents"
"It doesn't matter, she's about to lose it"
Aela's head whipped around. "I beg your pardon"
His laugh was at odds with his glare. "She speaks!"
"You cannot" she gasped, ignoring the Tailor behind her in favour of the second. Her voice lowered to a growl, and she felt her magic, the fire shine in her eyes. "You can take my hair, and my dignity, but you will not take my markings"
"Why - worried you won't be as beautiful without them?" he mocked. "We've no space for a spoiled princess here"
"They are as much me as my hands, as my skills. I have earned them. You will not take them from me"
He scoffed, stepping forward. "We'll see about that. Getting on my bad side on your first day isn't wise. I can make your life miserable"
"It's already there. You won't have any effect" she spat, feeling her fire bubble within, the dragon claws raking throughout her insides like the caress of an old friend.
"So you do have some fire in there. What's your name, prisoner"
Aela stuttered at that.
"And there it goes. Name. I'm not asking a third time"
She could feel eyes on her. The other new initiates, Themsal at her rear. The workers, their flitting paused to watch the interaction. "Aela". It was a common enough name, but she still heard the vacant sound from behind her. The pause in breathing, so small others may not have noticed. To a hunter though, the God of Hunting no less, the absence of noise was as much a marker as its existence.
"And do we have a surname, Aela. Or am I just to assume you're a noble daughter, here following your own stupid actions to become a thorn in my side"
"Hylmdattur"
"...Hylm's daughter...oh now this is interesting. Sending his own daughter to the very pits of hell. You must have been a bad girl"
Aela glanced down, hating the looks she was getting from the room. The almost lascivious tone in his voice making her feel sick to her stomach. Her father condemned them all to this miserable existence and had doomed her to join them.
"I can see why you'd hesitate to give that name"
"I have no other" Loki was dead, after all, and Nifl women didn't take their husbands names in the way other cultures did.
"Well Aela Hylmdattur, I'll be keeping an eye on you. Take the armour and put it on, and we'll get you to have those tattoos covered. I don't care who's daughter you are. You have no power here"
"I'm going to have to adjust it" the voice behind her interjected. "You know what it's like fitting armour to some of these women - it's going to be too tight on the top if I fit the stock to her waist, or sliding everywhere if I make it loose enough for her to breathe. She can come back tonight, and we'll have it ready"
"Fine. Take a cloak for warmth and come with me"
She accepted the cloak, hating the pity in Themsal's one working eye. Sliding it on, and covering her bald head with the hood, fastening the fronts around her horns. It was far too large, and slid over her face, but she was glad for the cover. Glad to not be able to see the eyes of her new companions on her as she walked. The tent they moved towards felt too dark, wrong, now she knew what awaited her there. Ahead of them a howl could be heard over the wind, and a figure stumbled from the flap; covering his face as he ran. What fate awaited her, within its depths.
"You lot," an attendant said, gesturing to the group "With me"
"I'll see you later, Princess" the Second mocked as he left them.
They followed the attendant in, and she felt a hand brush against hers in the darkness. It shook, and she knew they felt the same, in that moment. Their tattoos were sacred. Whatever was to happen here was vile, and they could all feel it in the air.
"Get in the chair and grip this tightly. You're going to be branded with the mark of our soldiers. From this day on, you're a member of the front lines, the condemned army. Your markings will go only when the General that commands it releases you. Whatever your crimes, whatever your reason for being here, I care not. I will mark you as ours until we see fit to release you"
"Why ain't you lot marked?" One of the Nifl's asked, gesturing to the attendants. "I've not seen one person with some sort of mark"
"We remain within the camp, through different magic. You will be sent out, and as such must be marked as ours, lest you get any ideas of desertion"
Aela scoffed internally. Really, where would they go? The whole area was a wasteland, they all knew the situation of where they were. Forwards, the only thing that awaited them was Hel itself, and behind...It had taken days to reach the area, days of traversing nothing. Too often had the forces of hell managed to break through before they'd started supplementing the army with the prisoners of the nine realms. Any villages that had once been here having been raised to the ground hundreds of years before. No-one had tried to move back in, after all, when the only people for thousands of miles are soldiers who were serving sentences and the dead themselves, you didn't really want to encourage tourism.
They were in Niflheim, but gone were the dense forests, the clean air they provided. The way the suns rays permeated through, shafting beautiful light through the trunks. The scent of sap in the air. It felt just as foreign here as when she'd first gone to Asgard. Just as unfamiliar.
She pulled away as hands grabbed hers, as cuffs were once again enclosed around her wrists before she could snatch herself away. Would she though? Would she snatch herself away? She wanted to, wanted to fight the injustice that was happening, but couldn't bring herself to. She was too tired, too worn thin. She pulled, but not as hard as she was capable of. It was half-hearted and she knew it, hated herself for it.
It was only as she was pulled towards the seat, as a thick piece of leather was shoved between her fangs and the woman hissed at the sight of her plentiful ink that she truly writhed, tried to move out of sight.
It was too late though. There was a room full of people there to pin her, to hold her back. And she was tired and hungry, and weak. The room span as something hit her, hard. She blacked out, the last thing she saw before the room went even darker than before the dirt floor as it swiftly approached.