This is a oneshot that I started writing a while ago, and just finished now. I had no intention to make it go in this direction, but here we are I guess. A bit of Greek and Norse mythology, mostly Greek, but that's all you're getting from me. Oh yeah, and Iphigenia is not an OC. Despite her being the main character for most of it, I didn't want to list her as an OC and give everyone the wrong impression of this story. Without further ado: Kingdom's strife! (Also, please review me some titles seeing as I hate the current one. Thanks!)

"What is this grand place?" Iphegenia cried, gazing upon the palaces of silver and white. Golden fountains flowed, watering the crystal flowers on the trees of Ceres.

"Your future lies in this place. Your past was not well, though you have saved many by your sacrifice." The fierce tones of Artemis rang through the place, making a chorus with the melody of the winds. "For your sacrifice, I have chosen to spare you. Among the stars you must remain, however. I have chosen you to stay among the gardens of Olympus, the immortal waters." Artemis faded away, and Iphegenia twirled through the gardens, till she found the Nymphs of the pond. There she sat, gazing upon the upper earth, where the war was to happen. There she spotted the goddess of her damnation, or so the Nymphs told the story. The goddess of her life, or rather, her death.

"Who might that be, who smiles beneath the fires, and dances among the Nightshade?" Iphegenia asked of her companions, as she watched the goddess twirl through a wildfire.

"Oh, you talk about Eris!" Cried Aloela, Nymph of the Athen's River. "She is the creator of all things bad!" Aloela shivered in fear, and Iphegenia frowned.

"Had none thought to talk to Eris, that she might refrain from striking terror unto the earth?"

The nymphs shrieked and pushed Iphegenia away, appalled at the very thought. "Oh Gē, no!" Screamed all the nymphs. "The Chaos-wielded will tear us all apart! Oh no, for gain of none, you will receive no help from us!" Iphegenia ran then, realizing that to do this would have her leave the gardens, but all she could see was the cruel smirk of Eris, just daring Iphegenia to ask why her death was brought about.

The princess ran throughout the garden for two days and a night, before collapsing near an empty basin of stones. Indeed, she fell to her knees and cried tears like pearls, realizing that she must remain here, far from the Nymphs of the rivers, too far to see her dear friend Aloela, who was as peaceful as the bluebird.

The river of Iphegenia's tears flowed down from Olympus, through the center of the city Troy. The Nymph sat at the banks of the river and wove reeds together as she watched the citizens run back and forth, completing daily errands. For many days and nights, Iphegenia watched her river, named the Scamander after the lizards whom Iphegenia befriended.

On one of these days, she heard the clash of swords. Falling into the river, she drifted down towards the sound, only to spot two armored people sparring. They had strength and speed that most swordsmen could only dream of achieving. One of them took off his helmet, and Iphegenia saw the scarred face of a god that she knew well. Ares. Surely the other was Athena? But no, as the other showed her face, 'twas not Athena, but the very goddess that Iphegenia wished to know of. Eris. With burning yellow eyes and flame-like black hair, Iphegenia was filled with fear far too great to bear, so she dived down into the depths of her river and remained there for twelve more days, coming up only when she heard the clash of swords once more.

Iphegenia heard a scream, and rushed upwards, but almost screamed herself when she saw a Spartan soldier fall, a dryad running to his side, tears streaming down her face. She turned around defiantly, daring anyone to strike her down. Indeed, she was, and her young daughter with her. Both screaming as the flames tore at their birch skin, their crowns of bright emerald burning away into blackness and then nothing, death taking them slowly. Iphegenia let out a strangled sob, falling backwards into her river, the blood of the fallen filling her eyes, never leaving, there for years to come.

The next day, it had not stopped. As the soldiers attacked ruthlessly, Ares could be spotted in the sky above, smiling cruelly. Next to him Eris herself cackled and pointed her finger at soldiers, renewing their need for war, for chaos.

Iphigenia felt sick watching this massacre, yet she could not look away. She did all she could, putting out the fires of the dryads, singing to soldiers softly till they died, and praying to Hades that the soldiers had a good afterlife.

Still, all that she did was countered tenfold by the magic of q goddess. Eris drifted lazily among the soldiers' ranks, cackling as she waved her hands in front of their faces and obscured their vision. Some, she used as incentives, having them killed and their friends tried to avenge them. Others, she filled with rage to kill their dead friends' killers. It was war, it was horrible, it was bloody.

Loathe though she was to say it, Iphigenia was no match for a goddess that was in her element.

Her only hope was to talk to the goddess, try to convince her to call off the war in the only way she knew how.

Iphigenia caught the goddess alone one night, when the soldiers were too weak to do anything but go back to their camps.

"Why did thou do it?" She queried Eris, as the goddess was bruning flowers while perched upon a just-as-burned stump.

"Do what?" Eris asked with a tone of disinterest, barely giving Iphigenia the barest sliver of her attention.

"Start a war. Have them almost kill me. Laugh at their pain. Why? Why do thou do such things?"

Eris turned to her, glowing eyes splitting through the darkness of dusk. Her hair cackled and spat, though this was merely a shadow during this barely-lit time.

"I would ask thou why thouest cares." Eris replied simply, her tone haughty but laced with greater danger than just that.

"I wish to know why my waters are stained with blood." Iphigenia replied simply, though impatience rang true with her own tone of voice.

Eris sighed. "For as long as I have lived, a long time to be sure, I had nothing that I knew. I was an outcast of the worst kind, for I did not understand why. I tried so hard to be good and make my family proud, but still I was taunted for my dangerous appearance, then in the same sentence, for being weak. So I decided that I simply would not be weak. I poured my heart and soul into my chaos, or what was left of them at the very least, and it paid off.

"Despite him not being my father, Zeus tried to marry me off to a mere mortal, like he did to Harmonia. But I would not have it. For my defiance, I was banned from all events of any interest, and everything in regards to me was restricted till I agreed. Which I would not and will not do. Before I did anything else, I used my powers of chaos to go into the famous wedding anyway, and I left a small… gift.

"I was hoping that the bride herself would be involved in the scramble, but I was still happy in the end because of this war. While the troops still fight, Zeus has no thoughts for me. And as I am a deity of chaos and strife, the transition to war is not too hard for me. Adding to already-high emotion in a negative way always gets me what I want: more fighting.

"Alas, I fear that I cannot trust thee, so say goodbye to thy wishes dear nymph."

And Iphigenia felt herself burn, tasted smoke, heard the screams of the dead, saw black, and smelled death if that were even possible.

She could have sworn that she heard a voice as she took her last breath.

"I truly am sorry dear naiad, but I cannot trust thee. I cannot have my escape to freedom sabotaged because Zeus caught on." Eris spoke to the dead girl's body, watching it dissolve in the water of the river, and evaporate as steam from the heat of the fire.

Eris turned away from the battlefield, and drifted away on a breeze for days till she reached a far-off place. There, she chose to live for centuries, or perhaps millenia. When one was immortal, time seemed to pass differently.

One day, she heard a great ruckus. Eris looked outside of her enchanted cave home to see a man's silhouette, still forming from his teleportation. Time to play.

She changed her form to a young boy's, and placed herself in full view. The man, clearly a god, approached her.

"What is your name, boy?" He asked Eris. A name immediately came to Eris, what she was planning to name her son if she ever had one.

"Loki, sir."