The toxin that the Other had gotten into her bloodstream left a nasty scar behind, and they'd had to graft new skin onto hers after Eir and her healers had successfully managed to get the poison out. Two days later and she was back to normal, and the scar was nothing more than another to add to her vast collection of them. In those two days Thor and Loki both came to stay incessantly with her, hardly leaving her alone except for when she explicitly asked for it, needing a break from all the attention and the hubbub. Between the two of them they'd taken on Thanos, and with his scepter, newly powered by the mind gem, Loki had taken off the Titan's gauntlet covered hand, letting it flop to the ground. With it went Thanos' power and strength, and his forces soon bent the knee as well. The Chitauri were the worst off, having refused to surrender and so had been slaughtered by the Disir and dwarves, while the Vanir and Jotunar took care of the Kree, returning them to their home only once they'd sworn to a peace treaty, the decimation of their race on the line should they break it.
Thanos was held, sedated and under strict, close supervision, deeper in the dungeons than even Oded was being kept. Natasha had sworn to see to Oded and his family should they not have helped, though Loki had done business with them the last she'd known and had gotten the mind gem. She hoped that Katrik didn't assume that would make things right, but was waiting on his reply. Injured or not, there was still a great deal to be done. Commemorative feasts and rites were held each night for those who had been lost, and the as the final death tallies were counted up Natasha felt her heart sink, but the darkness was finally done away with. Thanos was set to face a tribunal for his crimes, comprised of the Queen Regent of Vanaheim, Thor, Loki, and Hreidmar, and then afterwards Oded would have the same justice offered to him should Katrik not sue for peace. Part of her hoped he wouldn't, that he'd let his son face the penalty for the attempted rape of a woman, a queen none the less. She wanted to see the hope go out of his eyes when he realized no one was coming to save him.
She'd been having moments like that far more often, she realized with a shake of her head, looking up from where she'd been staring at the same page of a book while her mind had gone astray, Loki seated just next to her, enjoying a rare slice of peace. The violence in her mind, the desire for blood, for retribution . . . . She'd thought that the battle would slake it, do away with her need for action once and for all, that once things were made right she'd be able to return to the peace she'd been hoping for, but it didn't look likely. The shake had caught Loki's attention, and he pressed his palm into her own, frowning.
"Is everything alright?" His green eyes, for he kept his Aesir glamor up when he was on Asgard, seemed to bore into her soul. Her mouth went dry with the question. Was it? Would it ever be?
"I don't feel, I don't feel like myself," she finally murmured, closing the book in her lap and gripping the edges of it tight. "I thought it might go away once Thanos was done, and perhaps it will take me seeing his headless body falling to the ground but-." There she went, being hyper violent again. She swallowed thickly and bent her head, unable to look at him. A warrior society this might've been but these were times of peace. When all she knew was war, how was she supposed to adjust?
"I feel the same strain." Loki's hand wrapped around her closest one, folding their fingers together as he tipped her chin upwards. "It doesn't feel as though it was enough, as though justice has been done. Right?"
"Exactly. I feel like there's more that ought to be done. That now the world just . . . we don't have a mission, don't have a target. What do we do?"
He leaned over to press a kiss to her forehead, keeping quiet as he mused to himself. "We continue to make the realms as safe as we can. We rebuild, we fortify what we can, and we keep a vigilant eye to ensure that this never happens again. There are still marauders, and still those who would seek to do harm to who they perceive as weaker. We find them, and stop them."
That sounded fitting, and at least he had a plan. She smiled, and tipped her face up to kiss him gently. "I love you. I love both of you, you know that don't you?"
"Of course." He mirrored her smile and pressed a hand to the side of her cheek. "And we love you as well. It will all turn out in the end. You'll see."
She sat in on Thanos' tribunal, keeping to the side to keep the attention from herself as she watched the Titan being led in. His sedatives were wearing off, his dark eyes growing more focused as he stared at the four figures in front of him, a plethora of guards surrounding him to take the man down should he try anything. That was all he was now, without the gauntlet. Without the power, or death's favor. He was just a man.
"You seek to cow me into submission by this show of strength?" His voice was a deep rumble that made her bones rattle and pained her chest. Frigga, who sat at her side, clutched at Natasha's hands, knuckles white. Nat knew how the Queen Mother longed to drive her own dagger through the bastard's heart, and Nat would've been all too happy to help her accomplish the task. He was the reason behind all their suffering, their pain. And he would pay for it all very soon.
"There's not an ounce of submissive nature in your body, Thanos," Thor boomed, having taken his position as head tribunal member as the king of Asgard. To his left sat Loki, whose red eyes were narrowed into crimson slits. The Disir, who'd stuck around at his request, hissed and snarled from their place just behind the council members, keeping them safe. No security measure was too great for this man. "You are here to be tried for your crimes against the realms, and the galaxy as a whole. Do you deny what you have done?"
"How could I when you seem fit to already keep me no matter what?" Thanos' lips twisted into a smirk. "You have an objective in mind, Odinson. Be done with this farce and make your demands of me."
"We have no demands other than your head on a pike."
Thanos' face contorted, and he made to stand up and step closer, his left arm hand-less and hanging, limp and useless at his side. The blades of several Einherjar as well as other guards were immediately pointed at his chest, throat, wherever it was they could, and the Disir tensed behind the council.
"Then be done with it," Thanos growled once more. "If you have the courage to swing the axe, do as you will. You are a king now, boy." He sneered, derision dripping from his words. "Do it."
"We will see this tribunal through to the end," Thor said, voice ringing absolute as Thanos was forced to take his seat once more. It went rather quickly, the council hearing the many crimes that Thanos had committed, and finding him guilty of all charges. The penalty of death was proffered, and accepted, and all the while Thanos sat and glowered, gnashing his teeth together. He couldn't so much as shift without the guard reacting, but the council members stayed absolute in their fearlessness of him. Natasha was just glad it would all be over soon.
Oded was brought in once Thanos had finished, the titan led back into the dungeons where he would wait for the next three days before being led to the square. The fire prince did not go easily to the seat where Thanos had once sat, fighting against the chains that kept his hands together in front of his chest and connected around the waist. The torc burned as he struggled to fight against its properties, and Natasha's spine straightened as he looked across to her and snarled.
"I demand to speak with my father! I recognize no other authority but his own."
"Your father does not wish to speak with you. You have cast shame upon your family with your actions." Loki spoke now, his voice cool and his gaze subzero. "We will hear from Queen Natasha of Jotunheim about what you have done."
"You listen to your mortal whore over me? I am a prince!"
"You were a prince," the Queen Regent of Vanaheim said with a snarl of her own, holding up a piece of paper upon which were scrawled words too small to be legible from where Natasha had stood. The Queen read them out: "I Katrik of Muspelheim, being of sound mind and body, strip Oded Katrikson of his titles and lands, renounce him as my heir, and place his fate into the hands of his victims. Let his punishment serve as a lesson to all who seek to travel the same, shameful path as he. Signed, Katrik Oberson, King of Muspelheim. If you wish to read it yourself, I offer it to you but we have verified the signature and the tribunal recognize that it is authentic."
The color left Oded's face, and his eyes widened with horror as he stared at the four of them in turn. "There must be some mistake-."
"There is no mistake. But we will hear no more of you," Hreidmar said, voice like rocks scraping against one another. It was a mark of how seriously Loki took his task that he wasn't shrinking away from the dwarf king on his left. "Natasha, my dear. Come forward."
She did, footsteps light and heart heavy as she moved closer. They heard her story with passive faces, heard from Heimdall who further testified to the truth of it, having seen what had happened before he'd called her back with Oded hot on her heels, and Thor testified as well to the manner in which he'd found the two, Natasha fighting back against the man, Oded the aggressor. For his crime it was suggested that he might be hung, and that his body be left in the square as proof, but Natasha cleared her throat at the Queen's suggestion.
"If I might?" She offered, heart thudding in her chest. "Send his body to his father. Let him make the proper funeral arrangements and services. It wouldn't do well to start a war with Muspelheim over something that can be so easily avoided. Leave it to the king of the realm to decide what is to be done with it."
Hreidmar gave a murmur of approval, and the matter was closed after that, Oded led away visibly trembling and shouting himself hoarse trying to demand sanctuary, safety, anything. No one would give it to him.
Natasha all but collapsed in her chambers once she found her way back, exhausted and drawn, as though she'd just fought in a second battle, but her mind wouldn't stop, wouldn't allow her to rest. Something was missing, and she thought about calling for Thor and Loki to come visit her, but that wasn't it. A part of her chest ached for what . . . she wasn't entirely sure. When it did hit her, hard as a brick to the back of her head, she asked one of the servants to fetch the Queen Regent to her, needing to ask a boon. She'd promised the child's mother that she'd look after him, and now she finally had the opportunity to.
A/N: Alright, so there's one chapter left-the epilogue, then this great and terrible fic will be done! Thank you all so much for taking the time to read this, and the two previous, it's been a hell of a ride. I can't write a whole lot right now on account of I'm heading into work, but I'll have a much longer author's note at the end of the next chapter. I'll try and finish that ASAP. Love you all!