The Trickster: Ragnarok

by: Shadow Chaser

Disclaimer:

I do not own any characters from the Marvel Cinematic Universe. All characters belong to Marvel Entertainment, Marvel Comics, and Disney. I am not writing this story for profit, only for my own (twisted) amusement. I will try to return the characters unharmed, but some they might have a few scuff marks.

Story:

Chapter 3

"What," Loki was inwardly surprised at how calm he sounded was while he tried to process what Heimdall said.

"I cannot see him," for all of his stoicism and unflappable demeanor, Loki had never heard Heimdall's voice waver, the small thrill of fear-borne puzzlement in it – much like he had never heard Odin's voice so shaken earlier in the morning. Today was a day of firsts and somehow, he did not like it. It did not feel right, did not feel natural. He somehow wanted it to be him that caused the unnatural, the God of Chaos as had been one of his monikers. For some odd reason, hearing both Heimdall and Odin sound so...mortal for the lack of a better term- He shook his head a little, covering it by walking up to where Heimdall was standing by the edges and resolutely vowed not to look down into the black abyss of nothing- The screams that had strangled his voice- Icy blue eyes that promised infinite pain- He fell-

"I saw mountains bathed in Mjolnir's power before it was suddenly extinguished by a flash of blue," Heimdall said softly, a frown on his face as his golden eyes stared intently on a fixed point that Loki could not see beyond the mass of starlight and the passing of dusty dark nursery star clouds that hid parts of Asgard from the unwanted eyes of the other races beyond the realms' borders. "The Crown Prince did not raise his weapon and for a second, I thought I saw him talking with someone. Someone I could not see...until he was cloaked in shadow..."

Heimdall abruptly closed his mouth, his frown becoming even more pronounced and he looked like he was about to say more before he turned his head slightly and Loki looked back to see a young man dressed in the outfit of a Court page bow his head. There was nothing extraordinary about the young page, but Loki could not put his finger on what bothered him about the page with dark dirty blond hair and light eyes until he realized that it was his outfit. It was completely matte black with an occasional sheen of shiny black. That was not what the pages of either the domestic or realm court wore. There were faint designs on the outfit too, catching in the ambient light of the golden Observatory that looked like...feathers... Most telling was that the page's body was facing them, but he occasionally turned his head to glare at Jormungandr who had frozen, hands still half-way up when he had been plucking the skeins at the domed edges of the Observatory. Jormungandr had a petulant frown on his face, but looked like he was trying to ignore the looks the page was throwing at him.

"Munnin," Heimdall called out, bringing the page's head back towards them and Loki blinked, hiding his surprise.

He had long heard rumors that those who physically became familiars instead of the spellwork to summon a spirit-like familiar, taking the shape of whatever the caster wished, retained their humanoid forms. But even their humanoid forms had been limited and rarely used. Jormungandr was technically not his familiar, just punished and forced into his serpentine-form by Odin due to his actions two years ago. Loki knew that there was spellwork involved that bound a familiar to the command of its master, but had not invoked it after Fury had given him Jormungandr in the aftermath. He supposed that he was merely content to see if Jormungandr would break away in rebellion again or pretend to stay close enough to strike once more. Binding him as a true familiar was a waste of his time and magicks.

But the fact that the young black-clad page who stood before him was Munnin, and not in raven form... It begged the question as to why the Allfather allowed him to retain his human form when none of the Court nor anyone, save perhaps Heimdall – judging by how he knew it was Munnin – had ever seen the ravens out of their animal form. Even now, Loki thought of them as ravens and studying the young page, perhaps looking only a couple of hundred of years younger than he, wondered why they were in human form.

"Sleipnir is acclimating somewhat," Munnin shrugged as if it did not concern him and Loki could see bits of the aloof raven in the young man's countenance. It was...a bit disconcerting to say the least, but he kept his face passive and body in a disaffected manner. "Huugin is relating him exploits and tales for the Courtiers to feast upon."

Out of the corner of his eye, Loki caught what could have been a brief smile on the corner of Heimdall's lips and had the distinct mental image of Huugin and his continuous cawing and cackling as the raven was wont to do whenever not delivering the Allfather's summons or reporting back what it had observed. "The Court must be fascinated," Loki said dryly, wondering what Huugin's human form looked like compared to Munnin's.

"Very few remember us," Munnin's light eyes turned towards him and he was struck at how eerily similar they were to their raven forms, as if they knew and understand what he was implying. And he realized to a certain extent, the ravens had known, considering they had human forms. They understood everything and probably saw almost everything. Munnin's gaze told him that he was not fooled for one second by his attempt to hide his surprise at his appearance, but also told him that he did not care one whit about it.

"The Court must also be beside themselves," Loki arched an eyebrow and saw the faint hint of reaction from Munnin, the barest acknowledging of his head and realized it reminded him of when the raven tilted its head, its animal equivalent of laughter. He also realized that Munnin, and probably Huugin too, had been in their animal forms for so long that they had almost all but forgotten how to express themselves in their human bodies. Curious and interesting as he glanced beyond the human-raven to Jormungandr who had lowered his hands and was looking a bit nervous as he shifted from foot to foot, staring at Munnin. Considering that Jormungandr had initially tripped on his own feet and had not had much time to be in his serpentine form, he wondered if there was some animal instinct that took over whenever they were in their animal form for long periods – as if they had all but forgotten how to be human.

"News," Munnin asked in a flat tone, turning his light-eyed gaze on the Guardian who nodded solemnly.

"The Crown Prince has disappeared. I cannot see him in my gaze, but before he disappeared, I saw him talking with someone, but that person was cloaked in shadow, as if he knew my gaze was upon him," Heimdall intoned and Munnin tilted his head, staring at the Guardian with unblinking eyes.

"Shadow," he stated and Loki bristled a little at the unsubtle implication of that statement. Munnin was still as blunt as if he was a raven, human or not. But before he could counter the human-raven's statement Heimdall nodded again.

"It may be Baldr as Sleipnir claimed, but I do not know. I could not see," the Guardian replied and Loki once again, felt like there was a big piece he was missing – that he should have known something of this conversation, that the names were familiar if not the type of spellwork.

Apparently whomever Heimdall saw, this Baldr or whatever, was capable of cloaking him in shadow. He knew it was significant only because there were not many who were able to do that, and Loki knew for a fact where he had learned that particular spellwork from. A thought occurred to him; perhaps his teacher would be amiable to a conversation about her other students. Maybe this Baldr, or if it was not Baldr, was a failed student of hers, or perhaps someone whom her daughter had taken a shine to – he was not blind to know that Hel was fickle with her affections – if they really could be called that considering she ruled over the realm of the unjudged dead. Odin had said that Baldr had died in his arms, so perhaps Hel would know whom this Baldr was that the Allfather had revered so much and had utterly terrified Sleipnir. Loki did not miss the tremble of fear that had permeated his voice when he had spoken of him after his arrival.

The only problem he could see with this was Heimdall and the Allfather. Requesting permission to travel to Helheim was most certainly to be met with suspicion from the Allfather, even in a private audience sans the gossiping Court. Traveling through the shadows of Yggdrasil and cloaking himself to meet with Hel was also out of the question as he knew that Heimdall kept a strict eye on Lady Hel in the aftermath of the coterie's second attempt at insurrection. Heimdall would never falter in his duties as the watchman of Asgard ever again, especially when Hel was concerned.

There was another way to bypass Hel all together to see his teacher, her mother Lady Death, but it required stepping from the shadowed pathways of Yggdrasil and the last time Loki did that Thanos had been there to receive him... Even though Thanos was safely imprisoned in the Tesseract, Loki had no real inclination of enacting that extreme of a measure all to get information from his former teacher.

So the next best option was to do his own research. Asking Queen Frigga would be an option except he had a feeling that she would not be so forthcoming considering her reaction to the day's events. The fact that Thor had all but disappeared from Heimdall's gaze was a bit of concern for him, but Loki was far more concerned about the caster of such a spell than of why Thor had disappeared. Thor was capable of defending himself and was most likely somewhere on Midgard, just away from Heimdall's gaze.

"As you wish, Guardian," Munnin's short curt bow was suddenly belied by him turning into a raven with a quiet popping sound and flying out of the Observatory. As soon as the raven flew away, Jormungandr let out an audible sigh before clearing his throat and looking sheepishly at them.

"You would do well to heed the authority of commands, Jormungandr," Heimdall said and Loki saw the young black-haired man nod, looking chastised before bowing slightly to him.

"Your absence at the feast may have been noticed, my Prince," he suggested quietly before leaving the Observatory to wait with the horses.

Loki flicked a look at Heimdall who only stared after Jormungandr's retreating form with an unreadable gaze and knew that the Guardian would not answer what had transpired between Munnin and Jormungandr. He knew that the ravens always stared at at Jormungandr whenever he was in his serpentine form, but had always thought that it was perhaps more predator-prey, than anything else. Judging by what had happened, he was wrong, but at the same time he did not exactly care of the opinions between the two. It was more than likely due to Jormungandr's actions two years previous that probably drew the ire of the ravens and for that matter, it was Jormungandr's fault.

Seeing that he would probably get no more from Heimdall, Loki made to leave when the Guardian spoke up, his voice quiet.

"Sleipnir was a good man," he intoned and Loki caught the wording of his statement and paused, turning his head a little, but still faced away from Heimdall.

He smiled shallowly as he tilted his head in acknowledgment, completely understanding the wordplay the Guardian had surprisingly given him. The fact that the two of them never saw eye-to-eye and combined with the wariness of mistrust from recent events, Heimdall was still intelligent enough to see things that some would be blind to. Heimdall had been, was still, a threat to Loki as far as he was concerned, but for now, there was a mutual understanding to what he said. There was something afoot that neither of them could see, but it seemed Heimdall knew that Loki was perhaps the only one able to find the answers needed to whatever mystery was started.

"Your absence was noted at the feast," Loki was not surprised at the sound of her voice as he looked carefully through the hundreds of titles on the old tomes in one corner of the library within Asgard's palace walls.

"Noticed, but not commented upon, per usual," he replied as he reached up and traced a title, squinting for a second, trying to remember if this was the one he had read on a footnote from another tome. Pursing his lips in disappointment, he brushed past the tome and read the next one before plucking it off of the shelf and set it against his other hand and opened it.

"Could you not take solace in the fact that your absence was noted?" she sounded a little annoyed and Loki snorted softly.

"Sif, my absence is always noted and greeted with a sigh of relief," he said, releasing the spellwork to lower himself to the ground with an absent wave of his hand. He found the passage he was looking for and bookmarked it with a finger before shutting the tome and carried it with his hand.

"Is that what you think?" he saw Sif waiting by the start of the shelves, her arms crossed in annoyance.

"You think no less when I decline your half-hearted requests to join the others in the training salle when Thor has gone to Midgard for weeks on end," Loki commented mildly as he brushed past her and placed the tome on the table he had been sitting at, opening it up to the page he had saved with his finger. He noted Jormungandr already eating from the plate of food that Sif must have dropped off, his body dis-intended a bit from swallowing what looked like part of a boar flank that had been cut. The snake was now slithering up the stem of a cup and drinking the wine.

"That is not true-"

"You, my dear Sif, may have more sympathy to try to include me in your training since, but the others do not care and like times of old, would have not begrudged me to come train with you in Thor's absence," he waved an absent hand at her as he plucked a smaller piece of meat from the plate and ate it. He looked up to see her standing by the table, her lips pressed into a thin line and he knew he had hit the truth with her.

"You twist my words and intentions," she replied gesturing to the plate of food, "not even a thank you for ensuring you do not starve to death while you work."

"Thank you," Loki replied insincerely and Sif rolled her eyes and growled under her breath.

"For the love of the Norns, I do not know why I put up with you-"

"You are free to leave," Loki interjected with a thin smile and Sif glared at him. His smile grew a little wider at her abrupt movement to leave before she turned back around and shook her head.

"You are not a child anymore Loki. You wish to be King? You wish the respect?! Then act like you want it," Sif said acidly, a mirthless smile on her face, "otherwise-"

"Your precious beloved Thor will always be King, Sif," Loki shot back, his calm mood evaporating in light of her words, "a thousand years of reputation precedes me and cannot be changed so quickly. I was always Thor's shadow and even you knew that. Paltry words to try to soothe a wound that has long festered will not get you anywhere."

"Who said anything about soothing a wound, Loki?" Sif stopped and turned to face him and Loki started, surprised, before the curl of a smile appeared on his lips. He loved it when Sif tried to fight back, to turn his words against him and this latest one was refreshing to say the least, aside from her previous attempts. It had been a long time, not even counting the time she had been 'bidden' to watch him, since she had that much hate, that much anger or focus in her wordplay.

And he realized, something was riling her up to act this way. Something bothered her because she had long ignored him or only made half-hearted attempts to fight back with her words since the breaking of his coterie hundreds of years ago. Actually, the last time he had this much of a fight with her was during their brief moment of physical companionship in the aftermath of the coterie, before they mutually decided to end it.

"Why are you here, Sif?" he asked, "surely for naught of even a single event that I have done to earn your wrath and ire."

"You've always earned my ire," Sif replied a bit dryly before heaving a deep sigh and took a step back towards him, "Sleipnir."

"Seems to be a popular topic today, even in the dead of night," he was aware of the sandpaper feeling behind his eyes. He had been up before the Court was in session in the early morning to now in the library when the rest of Asgard was asleep except for the drunken rabble at taverns and the like.

"What did you find?" she asked and Loki arched an eyebrow.

"Barring the presumptuousness of that statement-"

"Loki, I know you," Sif interrupted again, her eyes flashing with an emotion that he could not quite identify, "there are two places you are most likely to be found if not in Court or near the Allfather's side biding your silent case to be Heir presumptive. Your rooms with your experiments or in the library."

Loki frowned a little, but before he could get a word in edgewise, Sif continued, "You hide when you do not want to be found. When you are afraid-"

"I am not afraid-"

"-When you...you have not set forth to the other realms like you used to," Sif pursed her lips tightly and Loki narrowed his eyes.

"Those were always at Thor's biding, his...adventures, and I have no need to hide behind his shadow like some errand boy destined to ride on his coattails," Loki replied a little testily, crunching angrily on a small nibble of food on his plate, "what I do is on my own-"

"And Asgard has noticed, Loki. Or have you not been observant during the feasts and the Courts?"

"And what would you know of the Courts? You, constantly training with the Warriors Three, all because Lady Sif still thinks that she is of better birth than what her station has given her-"

"You have been hiding, Loki. Hiding for the past three years since you've returned. You only go to realms when the Allfather commands it, even Thor has extended invitations to Midgard-"

"Those mortals do not care, nor are of need for my help-"

"But you do not leave," Sif overrode whatever else he was saying, "you hermit here, and the Court has noticed. Loki, why do you think there has been no talk of your exploits, even when you tried to destroy Jotunheim? Why do you think the battle against Thanos has not been spoken nor of your fight with your coterie on the Helicarrier?"

Out of the corner of his eye, Loki noted Jormungandr had frozen a little, hissing softly before going back to eating a few slices of apples. "The Allfather forbade it," he replied; there was no other explanation.

"He might have," Sif replied, but shook her head, "since when did that stop you? Since when did Loki the Trickster God obeyed the rules laid out before him?"

Loki froze mid-bite and slowly put down the food he was about to eat and stared up at Sif with an icy look. She knew very well, if not all of the implications of what had happened in the past few years for him to be acting the way he did. But never did he expect her to use it in such a way. It stung and he stared at her, "Get. Out."

She shook her head and crossed her arms again, "No."

"Get out," he replied softly, summoning a spell to throw at her for her insolence and comment.

"I will not-"

"Sif-"

"You must have seen the adoration the Allfather had for Sleipnir. Everyone could see it at the feast. You must have seen it and you felt threatened by it. That's why you are down here in the library while the rest of Asgard sleeps. You do not know how to respond to that and so you want to know everything. Because you will not go against the Allfather after what happened with Thanos, because you wish his protection even with Thanos' imprisonment. But you do not trust Sleipnir and so you want to know about him so you can go to the Allfather with proof that this man...this man who had so suddenly dropped into the Court is not who he claims to be."

He had not realized she had moved closer to him and suddenly leaned across the table and stared him straight in the eye, "You are jealous, Loki. So tell me, what did you find on Sleipnir?"

Loki stayed silent for a long moment before a faint smile appeared on his lips, "You think you know me so well Sif..." He saw her open her mouth and shook his head and tutted, "No. You have spoken your piece. I will give you the victory that you have spoken it well. It is to your credit to realize how much you have shown or not have shown in the past years. You are right, you know me well, know of my apparent habits or lack thereof. But do not presume that you know everything."

Her glare told him that she would not even considered the schemes and plans going on in his head nor of anything else, but she only nodded in response. Loki wondered if she knew of the geas he had made with Thanos, but she had not even spoken a single word of it nor did it seem that Thor had told her about it. The Avengers knew of it, but even then, they truly did not know what it was to have a geas. Director Fury might have had an inkling, but it was only that. No, Loki hoped that if his fruitless research for the past two years was for naught in Asgard's libraries, he would ask the Allfather regarding it – but it would many years after memory had settled some of what had happened on the Rainbow Bridge.

The Bridge.

The Bridge...That was it! That was where he heard the names first spoken- He remembered the excruciating pain, the agony of the pull of commands, of forcing him to do things he did not want to do. He remembered the black stitches on his lips, the first thing Thanos had done when they had left the Helicarrier. It had felt like years when he had personally stabbed the needle through his skin and into his flesh, but it had been only a few minutes. He held up a hand to stop Sif from saying anything as he closed his eyes and searched his memories, trying to avoid the ones that reminded him of what had happened and forced himself to focus. He remembered mostly pain, but also remembered the tessellation he had, his plan, buried deep within, to stop Thanos-

Loki took a deep breath and forced himself to focus past that, the irony that he had been felled by Thanos himself in a last ditch effort to take him out with him. Past all of that and to before...

The Mad Titan tilted his head and turned to look at Thor who was rooted to the spot, unable to do anything except breathe, "Look at him, Allfather, he knows nothing of what we speak. Allfather, are you so ashamed to have killed your own brother Loki who slayed Baldr before him that you dare not tell either of your sons, especially the one named after a long lost older brother, before you?"

"Baldr was Odin's younger brother, and Loki...his older one," he murmured absently, opening his eyes and grabbing one of the tomes in the small pile he had collected, pushing away the plate of food. Jormungandr hissed in surprise, but slithered over and stared with a curious reptilian look as he opened it up and started to flip through it. It made sense now, what Heimdall had said and also some of what Sleipnir said earlier in the throne room. He had skipped over the family tree in this particular tome only because he thought he knew what Heimdall meant, but perhaps it was something else.

"The Allfather was not the Crown Prince?" Sif blinked in surprise and Loki gave her a brief humorless smile.

"Surprised are we?"

"Um-"

"Here," he stopped at the illuminated manuscript of the genealogy of the House of Bor, Odin's predecessor. Underneath Bor's name were three names, Loki, Odin, and Baldr. However, he noticed something odd about Baldr's name and saw that it had an additional dotted line and was a little lowered next to Loki and Odin's name, as if someone hastily fitted it into the manuscript. Loki's eyes traced over it before glancing down at Odin's own and saw that Thor's line was solid while his was dotted, but still equal to where Thor's name was. "Baldr was adopted..." he murmured quietly before looking back up at his namesake's name and saw that there was an additional line drawn downward to denote heirs. Except this one was dotted and Sleipnir's name was on it.

"Sleipnir was the Crown Prince's adopted son..." Sif murmured, also peering at the manuscript.

She absently moved her hand away as Jormungandr nudged at it and slithered over to look. It explained Heimdall's comment, but not why Heimdall had not easily said that Sleipnir was the Crown Prince's adopted son. But then again, the Guardian had stated that Sleipnir had helped Odin kill the Crown Prince after Baldr had been slain...or supposedly now if the red-haired man's words were true. Loki knew that a renouncement of that claim would have eliminated the line and Sleipnir's name from the royal house's line, but the fact that it was still in the tome and manuscript meant that it had not been renounced.

And judging by how fearful and serious Sleipnir was mentioning that Baldr was alive...something did not add up. "The obvious reason is that Sleipnir claims to have escaped Baldr only to seek revenge upon the father that had been slain."

"Obvious?" Sif glanced at him, "is it not the truth? Would you not have killed those who had tried to kill Odin?"

"I did..." he gave her a look before shrugging, "Laufey."

She pursed her lips together, irritated, "After you let them in."

"A ruse, no doubt," he shrugged again and saw her narrow her eyes, not believing his words for one second. He was a bit surprised that Thor had not babbled to his friends what had happened in the moments after he had killed Laufey before he had gone to the Bifrost to wipe out Jotunheim. Thor had certainly seen his deception back then, but the fact that Sif made no other comment to indicate she knew what else had transpired, accusations thrown in the Allfather's resting room, amongst other things, surprised him. It would have been readily easy for Thor to say such things, to bask in the grandeur that he had saved Jotunheim from Loki's hand at the heavy cost of the Bifrost, but had prevented the genocide of an entire race.

"Then why is it not obvious?" Sif asked and Loki smiled slightly. This was why he sometimes tolerated Sif, not because she always jumped like any other warrior to the obvious conclusion, especially whenever Thor was involved, but because she wanted to know the reason why it was not obvious. The Warriors Three would not even deign to hear any other explanation except if it was coming from Odin himself, but Sif had at least some inkling of being a strategist. Breaking the expectation of the Court for a female warrior probably had something to do with it, but it at least showed Loki that she was still somewhat open minded about certain things – and mulishly bull-headed on others, especially in regards to the other races and magick.

"There is something that does not add up. For one thing, did Sleipnir mention anything about Baldr during the feast?" he asked, cursing inwardly that he did not go back to the feast as the others had suggested.

"Yes, but only in context of a tale from long past. The older members of the Court remember some of his exploits and wished the younger ones, the Warriors Three and I included to hear of them," she replied.

"According to Sleipnir, Baldr is alive and on Midgard," Loki said and saw Sif stiffen a little.

"We should warn Thor-"

"The idiotic fool can take care of himself," Loki ignored her plea, even though the fact that Thor had all but disappeared from Heimdall's gaze disturbed at him. Heimdall had not even mentioned seeing a Vasily Karpov to which Sleipnir had mentioned being Baldr's name on Midgard. Then again, Sleipnir may have been lying, but to what end? Killing the Allfather right now would serve no purpose and for some odd reason, something about Sleipnir struck Loki as not really wanting to do that, considering how Eir, Frigga, and Odin had reacted. The sheer amount of adoration and of affection shown to someone whom suddenly just tore into existence in the throne room and not even a single one of them had batted an eye at the use of such magicks. He drew in a quick quiet breath...Sif had been right, he was jealous.

What was it that Heimdall had said...the previous Crown Prince had been Sleipnir's mentor, teacher, and confidant. He was to be the Crown Prince's Sentinel, a title he had never heard of, nor ever seen it recorded anywhere. Then something happened and Baldr was supposedly killed, then Crown Prince Loki killed by Sleipnir and Odin. Sleipnir was a battlemage...and had said that his core was ripped out by Baldr which meant-

"Crown Prince Loki was a mage...as was Baldr..." he whispered, the realization that magick existed in such form, existed in such open form in Asgard long ago. In the present Asgard, magick so readily banned, if not so much not even spoken with reverence and awe and instead with a fearful hatred and unnatural dislike of it.

"Correction, my Prince," the two of them turned in their chairs to see Sleipnir standing by the entrance to the library, a solemn expression on his face, "both the Crown Prince and Prince Baldr were magisters. The best of us...the strongest of us..."

Author's Notes:

More mental casting notes to pass along: Munnin (and also Huugin) in my head are played by Jamie Bell channeling a bit of Griffin from "Jumper." I unfortunately had this cast long ago before I found out he was playing Ben Grimm/The Thing in the reboot of "The Fantastic Four," later this year and don't quite have the heart to change it to another actor (plus eventually I want some weird reference/nod to "Snowpiercer" later in the story).