Mischief Managed Chapter 3: Nectar of the Gods, a Harry Potter + Thor Crossover fanfic

A/N: Um…. I blame booklets. And hospitals. And stays in hospitals, dreaming about baby booklets.

Beta Love: The Dragon and the Rose, Dutchgirl01, Commander Shepard

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Chapter 3

Nectar of the Gods

The moment you have in your heart this extraordinary thing called love and feel the depth, the delight, the ecstasy of it, you will discover that for you the world is transformed. - Jiddu Krishnamurti

"Hey, mate," Theo said with a concerned look on his face. "She said she needed a little time to process things, not forever."

"Mother never does anything half-arsed," Draco bit out grimly, running his hands through his now almost-shaggy white-blond hair.

"Where is this holiday cottage anyway?" Theo asked. "Knowing your family, it is probably what others would consider a grand estate."

Draco rubbed his eyes wearily. "It's in a beach town near Morro de São Paulo. We'd go there as a family from time to time to get away from it all. Father had the place custom-built for Mother as his wedding present to her."

Theo whistled in clear appreciation. "Your father really never did things small, did he?"

Draco shrugged. "He was a total bastard, yeah, but he genuinely loved my mother. He loved me too, but he chose to show doing everything in his power to mold me into his idea of the perfect son. I don't think anyone even knows what a perfect anyone is, at least in a pureblood sense."

"My father certainly didn't," Theo agreed fervently. "He never seemed to know when to quit. Even when all of Riddle's supposedly loyal Death Eaters tried to convince the world that their precious dark lord was alive and well, he had to go and throw himself at Aurors to try and prove the Death Eaters were still a very real threat."

"Father's sense of self-preservation was always sufficiently greater than his gall, at least," Draco replied. "No matter what he believed, he only asserted himself when he knew it was safe to do so— or at least when he thought it was."

"Did I ever tell you that Weasel once tried to tell me to get…. Now how exactly did he put that? Ah yes. 'My slimy Slytherin paws off 'is Mione'?" Theo snorted derisively.

"I heard all about that scene from Potter," Draco said, grinning widely. "Even Harry thinks he went and pissed off the wrong wizard that time. I think that's when he first started to realise the Weasel wasn't exactly all there. Well, accept it, anyway."

"He didn't exactly have a big pool of unbiased friends," Theo pointed out. "Not that Slytherin was any better, yeah? We all had issues up until the evidence of the Dark Lord's rise and fall came beat our lot about the head."

"It took Severus pulling me by the ear, shoving my face down into a cauldron and making me actually work with Hermione before I realised she was nothing like what my father wanted me to believe she was. Which was basically some sort of vile, disgusting animal that somehow managed to 'steal' magic that didn't truly belong to her. " Draco rubbed his chin. "Father was right about Severus, though. Severus was always more the dad that I always wished I'd had. Crabbe and Goyle would think I'm completely mental for saying that, though."

"They are the mental ones, mate," Theo reminded him with a knowing look.

Draco laughed. "True. If I'd listened to those two, I'd now be utterly miserable, married to bloody Pansy and have seven blonde-haired, pug-nosed, very high-maintenance little brats with serious bad attitudes."

Theo shuddered. "Not a good mental image at all, mate. I'm trying to enjoy this tea, not choke and drown myself in it."

"Not half as amusing as it was when Blaise ordered Pansy to stop following him around or else he'd take after his mother and marry her, just so she could die of mysterious causes only a week later." Draco winked.

Theo snorted amusedly. "Blaise always knows how to charm the masses with his psycho mother stories. It's a pity he took so long to yank his head out of his arse about Hermione. She's damned good at dealing with scathing sarcasm."

"Considering who her father is, I should say so," Draco replied with a short laugh. "I still think it wasn't Severus who first taught her how to harden her feelings. It was the sodding Weasel."

"Really serves the Weasel right, getting himself turned into a ravenous, man-eating book and ending up being poked and prodded every day in the very bowels of the DoM." Theo said with a truly disturbing glint in his dark eyes. "His mum is all bent out of shape about it, though."

"Should've heard Moody, hah," Draco said, reliving the memory with obvious relish. "'Well, if your son hadn't been such a ruddy book-abusing arse-muncher, he never would haven't have gotten himself envenomated by a dying enchanted book with a grudge!"

"I don't know for sure, but I think her problem is more about losing the Weaselette," Theo said thoughtfully. "The only witch born into the Weasley line in seven generations, I believe. Losing two kids, one right after the other, to… wanton acts of literary abuse? Good thing that vicious Skeeter bitch wasn't around to sink her teeth into that one."

"So what are you going to do about this place since you father willed it to you?"

Draco shook his head. "No idea, mate. This isn't exactly my dream estate, you know? Yeah, I grew up here, and maybe that is why I can't really think of it as now being mine. It is more Mother's and Father's. It always was. I think Father really wanted me to marry Astoria and have lots of kids to fill the empty halls."

Theo raised a brow.

"So, now?" he asked.

"I die a lonely and bitter man," Draco mused, scowling down at the floor.

"Oh come on, Draco," Theo argued. "You're not some old miserly churl on the hill just yet."

"Pft, yet."

"You are such a negative Nancy, Draco," Theo said with an aggravated sigh.

Hermione ran her fingers across Loki's skin, as she slowly rubbed her face against his flawless cobalt chest like a cat. Her loving eyes glowed with a golden shimmer as her skin took on an equally gold sheen. Her touch was tender, light and warm. "Loki?"

"Hrm, my love?"

"I love you." She flopped down, snuggling into him with an arm draped around his chest.

"Those five eggs awaiting an opportunity to sing their way into the world did seem to hint of that distinct possibility," Loki teased gently with a smile, growling into her ear as he kissed her neck.

Hermione moaned, her eyes fluttering shut, enjoying the jolts of heady pleasure his kisses always wrought upon her. She ran her fingers through his mane of long raven hair with matching feathers. "You are still so much a beautiful dream to me , and I often find myself wondering how easily that other nightmare world could've become my reality. A world where I was never loved, one in which I never found you."

Loki pressed his palms against her cheeks. "My Hermione," he said tenderly. "That we found each other at all was a gift beyond price. In truth, any single, miniscule moment in a vast universe of moments could have gone wrong just as easily— but this is a right thing. This is our reality. This is our destiny, our joyous fate. I believe we were always meant to become as one. Those other realities all missed their chances. They failed. But we, my lady wife, did not."

"Do I need to send you screaming into the wanton throes of ecstasy in order to prove my point, my dear wife? Shall we add another egg or two to the growing clutch in our nest?" Loki's serpentine tongue flicked out to tickle the very tip of her nose. "It would have to be two, you know. A tiebreaker," he teased as he nuzzled her neck with his lips.

His crimson eyes met her golden ones, and he pressed his forehead to hers. "If it weren't for you, my love, I would never have been able to accept myself. My true selves."

"They are all you, Loki," Hermione whispered. "I felt that I could not betray my beloved blue serpent, my would-be mate. My dream, but that did not mean I did not find you incredibly attractive and desirable, long before I felt free to finally act upon those feelings. Even as my 'bookish' Handsome, I found you utterly irresistible."

Loki smiled serenely and hmmmmed, pressing his lips to hers. "Please allow me to demonstrate the effect you have upon me, my wife,"

"Please," Hermione breathed into his ear, "do."

Loki let a mischievous grin take over his face. "As my queen commands." Loki pulled a mug of frothy beverage out of nowhere and swiftly drank it down in a few seconds. His eyes glowed like twin red suns as he proceeded to explore the strange, velvety softness of the garden moss near the jungle surrounding their temple home, as he gently lay his young wife down upon it.

Hermione certainly wasn't complaining. Not at all.

A week later, two more eggs joined the others in the growing nest atop the temple. Two very self-satisfied quetzalcoatls entwined themselves lovingly around each other and the nest filled with their unborn offspring. And while Hermione might not have been to walk properly for a while following the week-long consummation, she found that being able to slither and fly at will was a good cover for the aftereffects of their rather prolonged indulgence in certain pleasurable… activities.

It wasn't every day that the queen stood before Heimdall to take the Bifröst to Miðgarðr, and Heimdall knew that his queen had had quite enough being separated from both of her sons. Odin, his king, was distant and ponderous, trying to see further than anyone else, but even his vision of the future seemed hazy when it came to Thor and Loki. Thor because they were always too close— Loki, because he had been the favoured son of Frigga.

Heimdall knew the truth, though he kept his own counsel. He had seen Odin take the abandoned babe from the frosty cradle in Jötunheim. But Loki had not been a bad son, no. He had been a perfect son— at least, until he had hit puberty. Everyone knew that eventually everyone went through that, and Asgardians were no different. The difference was in that Loki had never truly been an Asgardian, despite the glamour that made him look like one of them. He was Jötunn. He had been born a son of Jötunheim. That was the biological reality. Emotionally, he wanted the love of his parents: Odin and Frigga. And while Frigga had immediately embraced Loki from day one as her own child, Odin could not seem to connect with Loki, not like he did with Thor. For whatever reason it truly was— Loki had remained the son of Frigga far more intimately than he had with Odin. Heimdall had known that eventually there would be drama.

But Frigga, unlike the All-Father, had demanded to be informed the very moment that her sons became visible again, and today was the first day it had been so. Until then, Loki had only been seen in fishing villages, tormenting the poor sods with pranks in his obvious boredom. And then, one day, he had suddenly disappeared.

Thor had crash landed in some godforsaken desert in a place called New Mexico. There had been much drama and amusement in watching that play out for Heimdall, but then they had flown off to England in the hopes of finding a certain Dr Selvig and saving him from— himself? The good doctor had apparently seen too much or perhaps not enough, and so, unfortunately, his brain had become quite scrambled. Then, on the very day they had located him again, their entire group had become unviewable as well.

Yet today, Loki had unexpectedly reappeared just off the coast of Scotland, flanked by a contingent of centaurs that had followed them in from the coastal forest. Other than the centaurs, Loki appeared to be with only one other person, and—

That other person., a female— Gaia's tits!

Loki's mouth covered hers in a deep, passionate kiss as his hands gently wove through the woman's long, curled tresses. His skin was a blue as vibrant as the sea. His eyes were like glowing, crimson rubies. Yet she, this lovely, almost petite young woman showed no hint of fear whatsoever in either her face or manner. Her eyes were a warm brown that brightened into a glistening gold. They touched each other often, warmly, and without reservation. Unlike the far more restrictive social boundaries of Ásgarðr, the couple touched often, holding hands, and touching each other's faces with frequent caresses.

Heimdall could see that Loki's power had grown to a truly astounding degree. His control had grown as well. His maturity had grown along with a very stable emotional demeanour. And— was this possible?

Magic itself had bound the two together in only true way that he could see: the mating bond between a lord and their chosen lady, and it was just as powerful and distinctive as the one between Odin and his Lady Frigga. Heimdall's mind could hardly process it. Somehow, Loki had not only managed to come unto his own, but he had clearly embraced his carefully hidden heritage. He had somehow found his one true mate— and they were bound just as tightly and irrevocably as any other pair on Ásgarðr, perhaps even more so.

Little furry books bounced along merrily behind the pair, frolicking around their feet and rolling and playing together in the sand and grass. A few larger books took a moment to nip them in line from time-to-time, but they seemed glued to the pair and didn't wander too far. Sometimes Loki would scoop one up and rub his nose against the little book's cover, and a small but distinctive heart would grow across the cover. Heimdall had never before seen such a strange and remarkable thing, not in all the millennia he had served as the gatekeeper of Ásgarðr.

"Is he okay, Heimdall?" Frigga asked him softly, her bright blue eyes filled with pure motherly concern.

"I think you may be surprised, Lady Frigga, and not in a bad way." Heimdall moved little, having learned the value of a stoic and even stony regard after all the time he had logged in at his current post.

Frigga stood in front of the portal front. Her guards walked up beside her, silent and unquestioning. Theirs was not to question. Their duty was to protect their queen at all costs. As long as they did not do anything foolish like question where she wanted to go or why, she tolerated them as befit the Queen of Ásgarðr.

They were her most trusted, these four. Odin himself could not pull them off of her, not for any reason. They had remained loyally at her side for years uncounted. They probably saw a great deal more than most in what happened within the private lives of the royal family, which meant they had suffered through Thor's desire to frequently test his strength and battle prowess and Loki's magical pranks for their entire careers. However, perhaps that also meant that these few hand-picked guards had also seen Loki in his earliest, non-glamoured days. Could they possibly know that the second son of Ásgarðr's king and queen was actually an undersized Jötunn?

Heimdall figured they would, but Odin had kept the blue-skinned babe carefully sequestered until the lack of exposure to cold kept the babe from looking anything but like a true son of Ásgarðr. There was a small chance they were clueless as Loki himself had recently been.

Heimdall found that he truly hoped that did not prove to be the case. For after seeing how undeniably happy Loki had become since his banishment, he doubted very much if Loki would take any threat to his lady lying down. Loki was entirely too predictable in that which he would fight for. Heimdall knew that once that son of the king and queen had finally found something to truly live for— he would die to try and keep it.

Heimdall moved to plunge his sword into the opening apparatus, and the overwhelming bright light of the Bifröst opened up the path to Miðgarðr. Frigga and her guard walked through and promptly disappeared.

The moment Frigga arrived, she suddenly found herself being held at arrowpoint. Her guards positioned themselves around her immediately, shields up, putting themselves between her and any hint of danger, as was their task in life.

"Stop!" Loki's voice commanded, a twist of the old mixed in with what was so very new. It was a voice used to being obeyed without question. "I would like to see who would come down from on high to visit an exile when the All-Father himself chose to cast me out."

The gathered centaurs, their bows primed and drawn to release, slowly lowered their weapons, yet never moved their eyes away from their captives for even an instant.

Loki walked forward, placing himself between the unknown visitor and his lady wife. Hermione, curious as a Niffler after a shiny coin, peeked out from behind him, yet seemed to realise if Loki was positioning himself so protectively before her, there was something pretty significant going on.

The gathered books growled and bounced underfoot, unsure as to whether they should attack or stay, deciding at last to remain on watch at their feet, but Grim, Rith, and Violet herded the booklets behind them to prevent them from doing anything rash.

Loki stood tall and proud, his chin tilted up in a ritual show of arrogance. Yet, even so, his skin had turned an even darker shade of cobalt. HIs eyes were a smoldering, glowing ruby. He gathered his magical power around himself in an unmistakable display of strength and prowess, rather like a male lion showing off his mane to his rival to prove it was better far better for said rival to flee than attempt to fight. And, much like how the black-maned lion tended to have the advantage, Loki was endowed with quite an impressive mane of ebony hair and… were those feathers? Said ebony feathers seemed to be mixed with other shimmering shafts of a radiant, moonglow white, presenting quite a stunning picture.

"Prince Loki," the head of the royal guards bowed his head deferentially. They did not stand down, but they did acknowledge him.

A slender, manicured hand pushed the guards to the side. "My son," Frigga said, her delicate chin raised high, tilted with the accustomed grace that her station allowed. Her eyes, however were warm.

"Mother?" Loki whispered, his ruby eyes going very wide in obvious surprise.

"Do I get a hug, my son?" Frigga asked, eyebrows arched just so into her blonde hair. She reached out to him— kind, loving, and ever so much his familiar mother.

Conflict crossed his face. "You knew?"

"Your charm was at full potency even as a baby, my son," Frigga said gently. "To which, I was most certainly not immune. I loved you then. I love you now. Is this not what a mother does when she gives her heart and her breast to her child?"

"Why did you never tell me?"

"My husband swore me to secrecy and forbade me ever to tell you," Frigga admitted. "I chose not to fight it, but not for the reason your scowl tells me you are thinking. I did not fight it because I loved you. You were my son. It did not matter to me who actually bore you. You needed me, and I needed you. Odin said the Jötunn that had given you life had set you out as a sacrifice to the frigid ice and cold of the Casket of Ancient WInters. They had cast you out because you were so very small and you were viewed by them as a shame to your father's stature. Odin decided to take you in, unable to see an innocent die, especially after all the death he had witnessed on that one day alone. He always told himself that it was simply to ensure that the Jötunn honoured the peace treaty, but I know that, hidden deep within himself, he truly cared for you. And he still does, but he is far too proud, too proper, too stubborn, too bound by duty to open his heart enough to show that which lies within it, and I think— I believe that that was the true reason he gave you to me. He knew I would never fail you, even when he would again and again."

Frigga looked into her son's crimson eyes, her hand tenderly brushing his cobalt cheek. "But I did fail you. I failed to help you find a sense of peace, when you so desperately needed it. I had no idea why you would suddenly begin destroying things, get so terribly angry— we thought more structure would help, but it only made things worse, and I longed for the son that once came to me with all of his problems and fears. Instead you sank deeper into our Asgardian detachment. And the more you did-"

"The more rage I felt," Loki confirmed quietly.

Frigga nodded. "What changed, my son? Please tell me what brought you the peace we that could not."

Loki slowly wove his arm around Hermione's waist and pulled her to his side to stand beside him as his equal. "This is my lady wife, Hermione," Loki said slowly, staring into his mother's face for a response. "Her song called out to me across the ages. Her very touch stole away the all-consuming anger— the nigh-overwhelming need to destroy. It is what the mighty Asgardians choose to leave behind whenever in public. Royalty are to be seen but never touched unless behind closed doors— and while there I did not crave merely the attentions of some random female companion. I needed far more than what my brother chose to seek out so often. That which I so desperately needed, I have found here with her… my lady wife."

Frigga looked into Loki's face and then Hermione's. She seemed to look them both up and down very carefully, her blue eyes lighting up in obvious pleasure at what she found. "Yours is a true bond. A true marriage."

"Yet you are of Miðgarðr," Frigga said with no little wonder. "But you do not look as a child of Miðgarðr, not in entirety. The celestial pathways hang within your very hair— on the both of you. Just as keys hang on a great ring, waiting for doors to open."

"You sound very much like a dear friend of mine, Lady Frigga," Hermione said, bowing her head respectfully, "only a good deal more lucid."

"I have had several thousand years in which to perfect my sense of the here and now and the hidden Realms that most cannot see."

And then Frigga smiled, extending her arms to her invitingly. "Would my new daughter-in-law honour me with an embrace?"

Hermione looked to Loki for a hint as to what she should do, and he smiled and nodded encouragingly. She stepped into Frigga's arms and allowed the elder Asgardian Queen to enfold her into a warm hug.

Frigga sat on an enormous throne of Niffler treasure as she entertained a virtual horde of baby booklets with her songs and stories. The seven eggs hummed together in response, even the youngest two of the clutch. Even the Nifflers came up to accept her pets, doing her the favour of both gifting her rings and nicking her crown at the same time. Thankfully, the stolen crown didn't go very far, as all the treasure ended up in the same place eventually: piled high atop the temple's apex.

Hermione dozed lazily with Loki, their bodies pretzeled around each other as they relaxed, sunning themselves. Their bodies curled lovingly around their clutch of eggs as well as Frigga's impromptu sitting place. The booklets were bouncing up to bring her various trinkets and other shinies from hairpins to flowers from the surrounding jungle, and Frigga had taken time to get to know every single one, earning her a grand collection of furry little hearts from the equally furry booklets.

Violet, Rith, and Grim snuggled into Hermione's mane of colourful feathers, and seemed quite content to allow their progeny to smother Frigga with affection as they continued to smother Hermione and Loki with theirs. Practice made perfect for the baby booklets, and Frigga certainly wasn't minding that at all.

As Thor walked up the temple steps from the outside, he looked but a youth of a few hundred years rather than the grown adult of a thousand plus that he actually was. Mjölnir was downstairs, sitting on the kitchen counter, covered in happy baby booklets, and he was finding it quite ironic that the enchanted hammer could go from pounding the everliving shite out of Lucius-book to serving as such a gentle booklet babysitter. Even more amusing was that the booklets would topple Mjölnir over and drag it around by the strap, moving it from place to place so they could perch on it and cuddle. The hammer, normally so stubborn in who it chose to allow such things, simply went along. Sometimes it would firmly place an edge on a booklet in order to pin it down, keeping it from running off into trouble, and the disappointed, overly curious booklet would sigh and complain but eventually give in to the hammer's sound "advice."

How such things were even possible had opened Thor's mind to another world— another Realm— filled with infinite possibilities. Loki and his mother were not two of such a rare sort anymore. Here, magic was far more common than the admittedly crude might of the sword and dagger. Yet, even here, there was magic to be found within Mjölnir as well— magic he had never seen before, much less considered, until very recently.

The young human wizards, Draco, Theo, and Harry, had each taken their own amusing turn at attempting to move Mjölnir around, with no success whatsoever, only to have a bunch of furry baby booklets topple the hammer over and easily drag it off to another room. His Jane had found considerable amusement in the frustration and woe it caused the youths in question. Thor had laughed as well, but the young wizards just waved their fingers at him and informed him, "At least we can hold our fair share of butterbeer without becoming mentally compromised."

Thor had pointed out that the entire reason it was so good was that it did render him mentally compromised, at least with regards to his Jane. Jane was certainly not complaining. At all. Ever.

The only thing Jane had complained about was when, just the other morning, she had suddenly burst out of their bed and his arms to rush out to the lavatory and hurl. She blamed it on the incredibly rich food that Severus had concocted in the kitchen. The man could cook extremely well, that was for sure. Thor was pretty sure he had polished off an entire platter of toasted coconut prawns all by himself. The man had a prickly exterior to be certain, but he cared deeply about his family in a way that showed through many subtle gestures and deeds. He suffered being hugged by Hermione from whatever angle she launched herself at him. He made epic meals without a word being said, smiling ever so slightly when Hermione, his brother, and even Thor himself assisted with the cleanup. Jane would try, but Severus would scowl down his impressive nose at her, saying nothing but causing Jane to quickly flee to cuddle with Heliotrope and countless of his brothers and sisters.

Shortly after Jane's rather loud dash to the toilet, a Niffler arrived with a small vial and a note and placed it on the bedside table and then left— having snatched up Jane's favourite pair of earrings in exchange.

"Since I cannot trust you not to overdose, kindly drink the entire vial. You should then feel rather less apt to continue issuing devout praises in worship of the porcelain god."

It was unsigned, as it always was, but there was no mistaking the man's distinctive handwriting. Who, then, was the porcelain god? Jane had snatched up the vial and downed it shortly after reading the note. No questions, not so much as a hint of hesitation. And they hadn't had any further episodes since.

As Thor reached the top of the temple steps, he placed a large hand on his younger brother's serpentine snout and smiled as his forked tongue flicked out and tickled his skin. His brother's glossy cobalt scales were like polished shields. The huge quetzalcoatl eyed him with lazy curiosity, moving very little. The glistening eggs thrummed in the light, pulsating with pure magic. They had substantially increased in size, having grown to stand almost as tall as a grown man— save the two newest eggs, that were playing catch-up. Yet, even as he knew the time difference, he couldn't help but think the older eggs were singing and whispering to the little ones, encouraging them to speed up their growth, that they might all be ready to hatch at the same time. Just when that would be, however, Thor had no idea.

He did know that he would do absolutely anything in his power to protect them— his brother's unborn quetzalcoatl children. When and how would they emerge? What colours? Would they be able to change their forms instinctively from birth? So many questions had been bandied around the dinner table, and many of their friends had been placing bets.

Amongst their honoured allies, the goblins and the centaurs and the ambassadors from various cultures, visitors came and left under Loki's and Hermione's watchful eyes, they talked, sang, and prayed to the glistening eggs— singing their worship to not only the quetzalcoatls that were there in front of them, but their unborn young as well. Thor could sense how the power seemed to grow and expand with such ritual and devout worship.

While the Asgardian gods existed and grew in power without worship, it became clear that the quetzalcoatls were somewhat different in this way. Loki and Hermione drank in the power of their visitor's faith and strengthened the power of their family and ability to spread their divine influence. And if seeing them in person wasn't enough to sway a nonbeliever, they had considerable power with which to flex.

The goblins had started to craft small satellite islands as guest quarters for the visiting ambassadors, giving them a place to stay after making their, in many cases, extremely long journeys, and the good reputation of the goblin nation was growing just as swiftly as the faith in the new quetzalcoatl family.

South American devotees came and crafted elaborate and ornate ornaments for the quetzalcoatl mane, feather shafts, and body. They painted the scales with shimmering markings as in the days of old, imprinting the ancient maps of the stars upon their scales. They even decorated the booklets with golden leaf, making their covers shine just like the manes of their master and mistress. Thor had little doubt the painted markings were protective in nature— a desire to keep their cherished feathered serpents safe, but they were also like maps, detailing both what had once been and what could be possible in both the distant and not-too-distant future.

Perhaps, even a greater honour was that Loki and Hermione permitted them to paint the eggs as well, and the eggs appeared to greatly appreciate the consideration. They sang to the painters, and the painters sang back, and Thor couldn't help but think that something significant was going on— something profound. It felt… extraordinarily powerful.

"What is this, brother?" Thor asked quietly, his thumb rubbing gently at the quetzalcoatl's nose scales.

The cobalt serpent tilted his great head and sang. "Nnnnnnnh."

Then, very clearly inside his mind, Thor heard Loki's distinctive voice. "Faith."

Thor's expression now hovered somewhere in-between curiosity and total fascination. "It is an odd sort of strength, brother," Thor said. "It feels different. Somehow… dynamic."

Loki eyed his brother with his glowing crimson eyes. "Feels right. Natural."

"Why have you not spoken to me in this way before, brother?"

"I have tried," Loki said patiently. "Perhaps, you were not yet ready to hear me."

"Not much could surprise me at this point, brother."

Jane huffed, slightly out of breath, as she climbed up the temple stairs. "Thor… we really need to talk. Now."

"Yes, my Jane? What is it?"

Jane stopped, crushing her hands into fists as she rubbed them up and down her trousers nervously. "We're... grrhvamph."

Thor eyed Jane curiously. "We're what? What are you trying to tell me, Jane?"

"We're. I mean, I'm. I mean—"

"Jane."

Jane stared at Thor with pure panic in her wide brown eyes.

"I am here for you, my Jane, just tell me what you need of me."

"I'm pregnant," Jane finally blurted out.

"You're—" Thor stood there, staring back at Jane, utterly dumbstruck.

"Pregnant." Jane stared up at him, clearly terrified.

Thor drew her up into his arms and twirled her around joyously. "You're pregnant! That's— That's glorious news!" He embraced and kissed Jane enthusiastically, looking deep into her eyes and grinning from ear-to-ear.

"Well, my son," Frigga's unmistakable voice rose above the eggs just before she came into view, stepping out from behind the sliding coils of Hermione's impressive mass. Her glistening scales slid smoothly against Loki's like the mechanism of a gigantic lock as Frigga approached her now-speechless elder son. "Will you introduce your mother to your most illustrious lady wife, hrm? Surely you would not do so scandalous a thing as to grant me grandchildren before marriage, while even your mischievous brother, the notorious rule-breaker, can somehow manage not to do that, my son?"

Thor paled significantly. "Mother. I… uh. This is Lady Jane." Thor thrust Jane in front of him almost like a protective shield, causing Jane to squeal in startled surprise.

Frigga kindly extended a manicured hand, and Jane looked torn in-between kissing it or taking it in her own, or some combination thereof. After a moment's hesitation, Jane gingerly took the hand, almost reverently, as the quetzalcoatls rose high above them, their heads and necks lovingly entwined as they let out a series of soft hisses, which Jane and Thor both strongly suspected to be the serpentine equivalent of laughter.

The eggs sang to their parents, and Hermione and Loki sang back to them, the temple virtually thrumming with their combined power.

"Busted," the eggs giggled in unison. They each chimed a different note in a bright harmony, and the nest vibrated with their excitement.

"Keep this up and our eggs will hatch themselves just to embarrass you further," Hermione hummed, hissing lovingly to her eggs.

"Whu— why?" Jane squeaked.

Hermione's radiance beamed outward like the sun. "Their father is the God of Mischief," she hissed with considerable amusement. "And I'm the daughter of a textbook Slytherin. Add in a splash of reckless Gryffindor bravado and a shameless inability to discern when their lives might be in danger, and they will hatch into molten lava while thinking that it's a perfectly beautiful day."

"Lava?"

"What's lava, Mum?"

"Does it taste good?"

"Does it tickle?"

"Can you bathe in it?"

"Can you paint with it?"

"Does it taste like yummy croutons?"

"Hush, egglings," Severus' voice crooned as he thumped the eggs with his hands gently.

The eggs thrummed happily.

"Grandpa, Grandpa!"

"Grandpa!"

"Love you."

"Love!"

"Sing to us, Grandpa!"

"Sing to us, please?"

Severus's eyebrows furrowed, his face sombre.

The eggs thrummed hopefully.

The dour-looking wizard sighed, sitting down in the middle of the clutch of eggs. "Fine, what do you spoiled egglets want to hear?"

"The Ballad of the Suneater!" they answered, their excited voices chiming in.

"Norse ballads? Truly?" Severus rolled his eyes, shaking his head mock-sadly.

"Pleaaaaaaase, Grandpa!"

Severus mumbled, placed his hands on the nearby, smaller eggs, and began to sing. "I sing to you the ancient ballad of the almost-marriage of Lady Freya, Goddess of Ásgarðr, to Thrym, a giant of Jötunheim and how the mighty Thor had to cross-dress and pretend to be the bride in order to get close enough to smash his mighty hammer, Mjölnir, into Thrym's face."

"Yay!"

"Stories!"

"Cross-dressing Uncle Thor stories!"

"THAT story!?" Thor moaned, holding his head and flushing a deep shade of red.

"You crossed-dressed to almost-marry a giant?" Jane gasped.

"To smash his face!" Thor yelled, hiding his red face in his hands.

Crack.

Crackle.

Split.

The nearby smaller egg cracked open and a dark-scaled baby serpent broke free, singing her approval of the chosen story-ballad. Her scales were glistening obsidian with rainbow glints, but as light shimmered over her, a deep blue cobalt shone richly underneath. She then had a surge of magic, and a crowned mane of downy feathers wreathed her neck. Her golden eyes stared adoringly into Severus' face.

"Grandpa!" she hissed, curling her scaled body around his neck and flapping her downy wings. "I'm Raina!"

Severus' pale hand gently caressed his grand-serpent's head. "Hello, my little scaly love. Welcome to the world."

Hermione's head lowered with Loki's. Their forked tongues flicked gently over their firstborn daughter, who really should have been premature but had somehow managed to not only catch up but hatch before the rest of their offspring.

The other eggs vibrated with a little disappointment.

"No fair!"

"We were supposed to be first!"

"Quick learner!"

"Takes after Mum!"

"Gosh."

Tap. Tappity-tap-tap. Tap.

"Want. Out. Of. This. Egg. NOW!"

"Nnnnnn!" Raina sang happily. "Grandpa, Grandpa, all mine. All mine!"

"No fair!"

Rattle.

Crack.

Crackle.

SCHLORP!

A rainbow-coloured baby serpent shot up out of the top of the egg and wrapped snugly around Thor's head, knocking him over and sending him tumbling down the steps.

"Hi, Uncle Thor!" the baby serpent hissed directly in his face. "I'm Itzel!"

Thor lay sprawled and wheezing on his back.

Loki's tongue flicked lightly over Itzel. "Excellent aim, my daughter."

Thor tried to gently pry his highly enthusiastic face-hugging niece off of his face with no success whatsoever. She merely tightened her scales around his nose and neck, wings fluttering, radiating moonbeams of childish love and adoration.

Thor twitched and gave in with a sigh, going totally limp and surrendering to the young serpent's loving embrace of his face. Jane looked on with no little amazement, reaching out a tentative hand in disbelief. The little rainbow-scaled baby unfurled herself from Thor's face and curled around Jane's wrist, slithered up her arm, and stared into Jane's wide brown eyes with her ruby eyes. "Hallo, Uncle Thor-mate Jane."

Thor groaned at that interesting new title for the mother of his unborn child. "Jane," he grunted. "Please consent to marry me, lest my mother and all of my nieces and nephews come up with more and more embarrassing titles with which to address you."

The great quetzalcoatls watching from above hummed together in amused approval. Hermione's golden tongue dislodged her second-born daughter from Jane long enough to scent her out and imprint her essence on her tongue and mind.

Shimmering platforms of magic formed between the islands, and a glowing train of supplicants and devotees streamed from the surrounding ambassador islands. All of them carried various colourful and elaborately patterned banners. Some carried bells on staves, jingling them as they walked. Some of them sang mantras. Others blew sacred conches. They all gathered together, a mixing of cultures, all peacefully celebrating together to welcome in the bright new generation.

Slowly, the main representatives from each party— centaurs, goblins, Asian, South American, and more. All of them made their way up the temple steps, bowing respectfully to the great serpents. Loki and Hermione nuzzled each other, moving their coils away to expose their eggs to the audience. Gasps of wonder and praise went through the gathered. They sang their praises and worship and a swirl of power manifested as winding wisps of cosmic energy that joined with the quetzalcoatls and through them, it was shared with the hatched and unhatched inhabitants of their nest.

One dark purple egg rocked violently back and forth on the dias, sending random pieces of treasure tumbling off and a pair of Nifflers scurrying after. The top split with an almost-explosive shatter of pottery-like shell, and the inner, fleshy membrane pulled away. Then a midnight blue head popped out. Two pearl grey eyes looked this way and that, a mane of blue-black downy feathers ringed the serpent's head. Two damp wings pumped wildly, drying the down on them and his mane into perfection. He slid out of the egg, leaving his caul behind, and Hermione and Loki dipped their heads to lick and nuzzle their newly-hatched son.

He radiated his love to his huge parents, beaming in pure joy at having made his way into the world. "I am Vidar," he said with pride, nosing his parents one by one, his tail rattling and rustling gleefully.

SPLORCH!

A blur of moonstone scales, ruby red eyes, and colour-shifting rainbow feathers pounced him from the nearby egg.

"Hallo, brother! I am Geir!" the enthusiastic brother serpent announced.

The two brothers went tumbling down the temple stairs and one head-glomped one of the South American ambassadors, and the other landed in a startled black centaur's arms.

"Hi!" the brothers greeted their proud parents as the two quetzalcoatl adults dipped their heads and gave their latest budding offspring a proper licking over.

As Frigga's private guard stood protectively around her in the face of so many strangers from various different places. While they watched down the temple stairs, a nearby crack and squishing sound released a blur of gold and green, honey-coloured wings, and green-flecked amber eyes that burst forth from the confines of its shell and happily wrapped itself around Frigga's face.

"Hi, Nan Frigga!" the excited serpent said as he wrapped lovingly around her head. He flapped his honey wings rapidly. "I'm Naseem! I love you!"

The startled royal guards looked conflicted between guarding and the precise opposite of guarding, knowing full well that even one single mistake would surely result in their being utterly obliterated by one or both sides. Hermione lowered her head and wrapped her golden tongue around her glomper son, gently prying Naseem off his Nan as she transferred him over to Loki. Loki promptly slurped the excited baby serpent with a distinct hum of fatherly amusement.

"But! But! Nan!" Naseem protested, wriggling wildly and his little wings flapping madly.

"It's okay," Frigga said with a fond smile. "Come to me, little one."

The happy little serpent quickly darted over and re-wrapped himself around Frigga's head lovingly, radiating pure adoration.

As a wizened older man and woman walked up together for a closer look at the newly-hatched babies, they leaned on their chimed staves before making a series of sacred gestures towards both Hermione and Loki, clapping their hands together as they wrapped rune-carved beads around their fingers. The elder quetzalcoatls lowered their heads together, tongues flicking as they gently pressed their noses to each of their supplicants. Plumes of magical faith rose off the couple's group and fed to them, and from them they offered it up to the quetzalcoatls.

"Hnnnnnn," Hermione sang, streams of solar energy flaring off of her scales.

"Nnnnnnh," Loki answered, his lunar energy mixing with hers and forming into a combined flare of power.

They flapped their wings, and a surge of Aurora Borealis came to life over the area.

A pearlescent cream-coloured egg with large gold speckles rocked back and forth in the nest of golden treasure. Crackling, tiny beams of light seeped out of the cracks as its occupant struggled to break free. A bright scarlet snout pushed up and out, a cream coloured tongue flicked in and out, curiously testing the air. Wreathed in mane of coppery down, the young serpent finally pulled herself free of the egg, sending shards of her shell tumbling away. Her crimson body faded into pale gold along her belly as it led to a shining, gold-tipped tail. She fanned her copper wings, her startling sky-blue eyes shining like beacons. She curled her body around the couple, snuggling with them. "I am Natsu, and I wish to know you better."

After Loki and Hermione licked over their new baby daughter with their tongues, they allowed the couple to share their daughter with the gathered group of ambassadors, allowing her to soak up the energy and pets and worship of her supplicants. They allowed Natsu to rub up against each person, cuddle with them, and have them adore her as befit such a fortuitous birth. She rolled and basked in the faith of her adoring visitors, working the crowd with the expertise of a born professional. The faith energy flared, and Natsu flapped her wings, her baby down transforming into a full array of feathers in a great surge of power. Sheer happiness caused Natsu to emit a brilliant solar flare, filling the area with radiant heat and brightness, causing a hum of appreciative ooohs and ahhhs.

Only one egg remained, but it was the smallest one of all, barely up to the height of an adult human thigh. Hermione and Loki licked the surface, testing the egg, but were seemingly unconcerned if their youngest preferred to wait a little bit longer. Loki and Hermione moved the treasure around the last egg, carefully tucking it in for a longer gestation period. The rest of the serpentlets were all being adored by their own devotees, and the surge of faith power was thrumming throughout the temple, radiating off the quetzalcoatls and blazing through the surrounding atmosphere with coloured surges of shimmering light. The jungle biome bloomed, practically glowing, and the air tinkled with the sounds of soft breezes, birdsong, wind chimes, and— life.

The main commotion died down after many, many hours of celebration and veneration, and each delegation that came went out into the world to spread the news.

Hermione yawned from atop the temple landing, her coils having formed the nesting bowl to cradle the last egg while it continued its incubation. The other serpentlets gathered around and sang to the egg, offering encouragement or solace or perhaps some combination in between.

Loki and Hermione had licked over and imprinted on all of their hatched progeny, adding their new songs to the fabric of their family, and Frigga and Severus were perhaps the most happily serpent-smothered grandparents on Miðgarðr. Raina hung on Severus like a serpent stole, and sang about her dreams and adventures within the egg— traveling the cosmic pathways and seeing the ancestral temples were her ancient kin had flown and nested. Severus, in turn, looked utterly peaceful— a contentment of having both daughter and family closer in a manner his birth one had not afforded him. Some of his nigh-forty years suddenly seemed to melt away, making him look like a much younger man with far fewer regrets plaguing his mind and soul.

Frigga and Severus spent hours together, speaking of the matters of gods and mortals, and while Frigga crafted shards of the hatched eggshells into various talismans, Severus set each one with a tiny, crystal vial where a tear from Loki and Hermione combined to give the focus a personal blessing— and perhaps, one day, one very special boon of extraordinary healing to one most desperately in need: a blessing from the quetzalcoatls that had found themselves and their family to start their family in the most unlikely of places. No one that left the hatching that day left without something. From the littlest of goblets, who had gleefully hugged and caressed, brushed, and groomed the little serpentlets, to the high priests and priestesses and ambassadors, each visitor gained a talisman to take home with them. Each carried an unmistakable mark of the favour of their quetzalcoatl gods. And while Loki was well and truly used to the general concept of Norse godhood, Hermione was much more laid back. She accepted it because the faith was undeniable. The power it gave and the protection it blessed her family with soothed the pathways of her acceptance. Having Frigga, Loki, and Thor near to help with the transition made it easier as well. Loki, perhaps, was her greatest connection to what they truly were— what they had become, together.

Frigga and Thor seemed awed by the power of such faith— their powers and magic, or what they believed were simply Asgardian norms, did not tap into faith as intimately as it seemed the quetzalcoatls did. Faith, while perfectly acceptable to have as a god, was not the core of Asgardian power— but they were not like the other pantheons. Asgardians were, in fact, mortal… give or take five thousand years or so.

"Somehow, we have lost touch with the power of worship and faith," Frigga said to them as they crafted. "In our rise to protect and guard the Nine Realms, we simply went on without regard to how others perceived us. We forgot what had made us gods to begin with—and unlike those gods who bound themselves so intimately into the cosmos itself for whatever side they so chose, we, the Asgardians, continued on as a people, refusing to take on the mantle of responsibility that true godhood bestows."

"Intimacy with the souls of the faithful," Severus had nodded in agreement, calmly grooming Raina into a purring, hissing, blissfully happy serpentball. Naseem chomped playfully on his sister's tail, but refused to loosen his grip on his beloved Nan.

"And realising that my youngest son and his mate have not only accepted such a mantle but have done so fluidly brings me no small amount of pride," Frigga admitted, caressing Naseem's glossy green head as the baby serpent cooed adoringly at her. "Already, the very lands have begun to reflect the strength of the growing bond between the living gods and their faithful."

Frigga looked up and smiled at her towering serpentine son. "It gives my heart peace to know that he has found such acceptance in who and what he has been all along. I hold this in no small regard as the work of your wonderful daughter, Severus."

Severus snorted, wiping his nose with the back of his hand as he continued to work steadily. "She somehow possesses a set of skeleton keys to even the rustiest of heart locks. They slide in without you ever realising it, and then before you know it, you cannot imagine your life without her."

Frigga smiled. "Then I am very glad that she has them."

Hermione's head dropped down, and her golden tongue slurped her wayward clingy serpentlet and pegged both Severus and Frigga as well. Naseem giggled and slither-hugged against his mum's snout as Raina protested meekly at being dislodged, but she wasn't fooling anyone. All of the newborn baby serpents projected absolute love and adoration to their parents with a tangible vibration. Each baby serpent was chock full of a great many eons of ancestral memories, stories, ballads, songs, and even— causing Severus to roll of his eyes at such a thing— limericks.

There once was a great God of Thunder

Who held such a hammer of wonder

He met this lady named Jane

No one claimed she was plain

And proceeded to hammer her under.

Frigga promptly lost her tea all over poor Naseem, who proceeded to absorb every drop quite happily, while Severus continued on with his intricate charm-work, smirking into his lap.

On one day one brother found beer,

And consumed it with joy and great cheer

Then he found buttered scotch,

Everyone thought he had botched

For he proceeded to drop trou without fear.

Naseem had his mouth open for Frigga's tea, and she just poured all the rest into his waiting maw.

There once was a wizard named Harry,

But alas, we saw only him quite rarely.

He's always buried in books,

The offspring give him plentiful looks,

Wondering who he might finally marry.

-o-o-o-

There once was a young wizard with issues.

Who thought he might run out of tissues.

He longed for a witch to complete him

Barely sat still to meet them

So he cuddles alone with his Shih Tzu

-o-o-o-o-o-

A man went out hunting for Snorkack,

But instead somehow landed in Borlac.

He Portkeyed to two places

Punched a few random faces

Then he arrived to crash-land on his back.

-o-o-o-o-o-

Crack!

Xenophilius Lovegood fell out of the sky, arms and legs flailing wildly, his Portkey flying out of his hand to bonk Loki on the snout, squarely between his eyes, as his body finally made landfall. Xeno finally came to a rest, flat on his back at the top of the dais as he expelled a rather loud grunt. He had two black eyes, half his white-blond hair had been singed off, there was some sort of odd-looking horn sticking out of his arse, and a butterfly net was clenched tightly in his hand.

A tiny creature, pale pink and utterly naked, with no fur at all, a pair of crumpled pearlescent horns, and beady black eyes stared up out of the net at all the onlookers staring down at it and its captor.

"Eeeeee!" The marbled grey egg on the dais rattled and cracked. Bits of "pottery" shell popped off and came to rest within the nest. A silver-grey snout popped out. Two bright rose-pink eyes peered up out of the egg. There was a flash of bright orange and crimson belly scales and white wings as a spring-loaded baby quetzalcoatl burst out and tackled the netted creature and then splatted smack into Xenophilius' face just as he was endeavoring to stand up at last.

Just then, Luna and Draco were rushing up the temple stairs together, gasping for breath, their faces distinctly flushed and their clothes and hair looking oddly… rumpled and disheveled, several buttons appearing to be unfastened as well. "Father, we tried to fet—"

At the newest baby serpent's impact, Xenophilius went flying backwards into his daughter and Draco, and they all went tumbling arse over kettle back down the steps. Meanwhile, Xenophilius remained oddly oblivious to everything, as a rosey-eyed serpent was face-hugging his head fiercely, her oversized floofy rainbow tail smacking him repeatedly between the eyes and upside the head as she wriggled with delight at finally getting to make her own debut into the world.

"I'm Yoki!" the little serpent said, her long tail smacking into him mercilessly.

Hermione's golden tongue wedged itself under the little serpent and jiggled her wriggling offspring off of Xenophilius. She passed the bundle of premature tail floof to Loki, who licked her over and inspected her expertly with his huge crimson eyes.

Yoki slumped, her moon wings drooping and mane of fluffy down rustling. "Sorry, Mummy and Daddy. Couldn't wait anymore."

Loki exchanged glances with Hermione as they hissed back and forth to each other.

Severus stared, one eyebrow raised high, at Draco, who was being rather unceremoniously squished in-between Xenophilius and Luna Lovegood. "So, Draco. I take it that even the momentous birth of an entire nest of baby quetzalcoatls cannot get you to arrive promptly, much less in a… proper and appropriate state of dress."

Draco simply wheezed in embarrassed distress, his grey eyes going very wide.

Luna just stared at a piece of eggshell that had landed nearby. "Oh, that's okay. He has a very convincing tongue."

All the baby serpentlets flicked out their tongues simultaneously in response, causing Severus to reach down and smack Draco upside the head with the flat of his palm. "Idiot boy."

Loki flicked his tongue out to Hermione, tickling her snout, and she hummed at him in response.

Severus stared up at the two of them, clearly unimpressed. "No more baby serpents for you for a while," he admonished them sternly. He withdrew a tin from his robes and pulled out what looked like rice candy. "Open."

The two quetzalcoatls obediently extended their tongues, and he placed a piece of the "candy" on the top of their forked mouth appendages.

"Swallow."

They did.

"Good quetzalcoatls. We wouldn't want you to beat out the Weasley family in less than a year, now would we?"

Loki murrrred to Hermione, a rather smug serpentine smile plastered across his snout.

"My Jane," Thor said, holding her by the shoulders. "I do not ask such an important question idly. I do not ask because you are… blocked up." Thor scratched his head in confusion. "I ask you to be my wife because there is no one else for me. You are the one woman that I want. Yesterday. Today. Tomorrow. Whatever may come, I want you by my side."

"I'm not a goddess, Thor," Jane sighed, sitting on the settee and wringing her hands in obvious distress.

"I am not asking you to be."

"Your father wants you to be king. A king needs a proper queen," Jane said quietly.

"That queen would be you, if it should come to that." Thor grasped her hands in his much larger ones. "I would have no other, Jane. I love you, truly."

"Thor, I'm a big girl," Jane told him firmly. "I can have a child and yet provide more than adequately. You don't have to feel that just because we share such a connection that I must have a ring. But that just isn't necessary, you know? We don't need to do this. I don't— I don't want it to be a wrong decision that we made in haste."

Heliotrope bounced in-between them, spronging up and down excitedly. A single, red rose hung between his covers. A delicate band of gold hung from a gossamer strand of celestial thread. A pair of stones, one the shimmering orb of the sun, one the moon, were bound together in what seemed— was— the glistening encasement of a single living tear.

"My love for you is true, Jane," Thor said softly. "Please, I wish you to take this ring. Consider it a token of my love for you. Take whatever time you need to decide if you wish to wear it as a reminder of what we have or the promise of what we could have. I know precisely what I want, Jane. Please, do not believe that the sole reason I wish to make you my wife is because we are expecting a child together."

Heliotrope bounced, purring fervently in encouragement.

Jane slowly closed her hand over the booklet's warm, furry cover, her fingers plucking the ring off the rose. She closed her fingers around it. "I promise to consider it."

Thor covered her hand with his. "That is all that I ask, my love."

The tall blonde woman clutched a bundle of pristinely preserved black hair in her fist as she walked through the ancient roots of Yggdrasil. Many, many forgotten gateways branched out from the great tree's roots, and many, many more remained both remembered and not. The key to travelling to many of them had been lost, but there was only one place she currently desired to go, and Odin himself had given her the keys to go there: a lock of Loki's hair and a ring wrought of olden wood rather than metal, worn and weathered with age to a distinctively shiny patina.

"It is time for you to remind my son of his duty to Ásgarðr," Odin had instructed her. "Bring Loki back from exile and the two of you shall be wed before all of Ásgarðr, as we agreed was your mutual duty."

Duty.

Duty was the story of her life to date. She had been promised to Loki as his future bride, virtually from the moment of her birth. Now, it was her appointed task to bring her wayward betrothed home. The irony was that they had never been close. They had been somewhat familiar, nothing more than casual acquaintances. He had never lied to her, but he had never been as loud and ostentatious as his older brother. He had never been interested in anything more than idle conversation, spending time in the library or performing subtle trickeries. The only thing they had ever enjoyed together was, ironically, dagger play. Her skill in magic, while not terrible, was neither vast nor creative to the point of subtle artistry.

Odin had hoped she would one day be Loki's perfect counterpart, but instead—

Instead, Loki had found solace in a lovely young sorceress on the outskirts of Ásgarðr, seeking her out instead of Sigyn. The more Sigyn would seek out Loki's presence, the more he would hide from her, until one day she was caught by Odin as she sulked alone in the gardens, lamenting that Loki would never be hers.

The young sorceress had disappeared shortly after— and everything that had been stable and relaxed about Loki had abruptly disappeared along with her. He had become violent, angry, vicious and destructive. He had become blatantly cruel to her face. He told her in no uncertain terms exactly how he felt about her golden girl looks and her petulant posturing.

Finally, Loki, too, had been exiled.

What magic had that other girl had that she had not?

Sigyn clenched the lock of hair in her hand and wore the wooden ring, slamming her hand into the nearby tree root. "Take me to Loki," she demanded.

The roots curled around her body and flung her into the vast beyond.

Years earlier…

"Are you cold, my Lady?" Loki asked, pulling the young sorceress close to his body as he pressed his nose into her curls.

"Never when I'm with you," she said, leaning into his muscular warmth as they watched the glorious cosmos unfold outside the confining walls of Ásgarðr.

The pair snuggled together under the perpetually blooming tree, sitting on a woven blanket that looked stolen from the depths of the royal palace.

"You're avoiding your brother again," she said, her fingers tracing intricate patterns across Loki's arm.

"He is an annoying braggart," Loki said with a snort.

"You have your moments as well, dear Loki," the brunette sorceress chuckled warmly.

Loki arched a brow at her, fighting back a smile. "My Lady Idonia," he purred. "Do I not please you?"

"Most times, aye, you do," Idonia said with a smile in her gold-brown eyes..

"Only most times?" Loki gave a pout, putting out his quivering lower lip.

"I am not a fool, Loki Odinson," Idonia chided him gently. "I know there are a great many others who would wish to sample your prowess just as assuredly as they do your brother's."

Loki growled, his arm looped around her slender waist possessively as he nuzzled her ear. "I have no interest in any of them."

Idonia smiled sadly, her fingers tracing his cheekbones with love and tenderness. "They do interest you, my prince," she said. "You enjoy toying with them like puppets on strings— pieces on a game board, or warriors on a field."

"Not as you do," Loki said, leaning her back into softness of the blanket. "I would prove it you, if you would but choose to accept me."

"What I feel for you is very deep and powerful," Idonia said softly, "but I am not anyone of great status. I do not curry the favour of our King. To even be here, with you— if he were to know—"

"I care not for your status," Loki said, his lips but a fraction above her mouth. "I want you. You. I— need to feel you upon my skin. I wish to leave my mark upon your throat. I wish to spoil you for all other men that no one, no other can ever sway your favour."

Idonia's eyes widened as Loki's eyes began to glow a soft red. Her curious fingers traced the strange indentations that were appearing across his flesh, and the moment she did so, Loki let out a low, tortured groan filled with undeniable want.

"You're," Idonia whispered, "so incredibly beautiful."

Loki slammed his palms into the ground next to her head, his back arching with pure pleasure as he rubbed his cheek against hers like a cat. "I. Need. You." Loki's words were guttural, almost more animal than man. Intricate runic patterns rose and spread across his back, unbeknownst to him as his skin took on a rich shade of cobalt. "Please," he moaned desperately, his breaths becoming heavy and needy, full of unmistakable desire.

Idonia wove her fingers through his hair, sending his body into a spasm of pure ecstasy. She drew his head down as she tilted her head to the side to expose her soft neck to him in invitation. "I am yours, my prince," she gasped but only a moment before his teeth clamped on her velvety skin, leaving the mark of his teeth against her flesh. Her eyes rolled back, filling with a strange radiant light, taking on the gold of the rising sun. She clawed at his back, her fingers fitting perfectly into the grooves of his rune-covered skin.

He moved against her with haste, eager to feel her exquisite touch everywhere he possibly could. He guided her hands to where he needed them, but he needn't have put in too much effort. She slid against him as though made for him, both eager but nervous. He worshipped her every curve, his insistent mouth wreaking havoc on her breasts as his deft hands encouraged her to open to him.

Whatever lovers they might have had in the past, none of them mattered anymore. In that moment, it was only the them— two bright and shining beacons of magic as their individual energies twisted and writhed against each other, curling around the other more and more tightly.

Mine.

Blue-white magic surged across Loki's skin as their mouths mated, spreading across Idonia's in a writhing, lifelike stretch, seeking, reaching out to claim her as his own. Shimmering ghosts of feathers and scales hinted at hidden secrets within the spirals of magic. The stretch of giant wings that flapped high into the darkening sky.

Loki's hips ground upward as his hands pulled Idonia's fevered body close to him, preparing to bury himself in her sweet, all-encompassing warmth that they might reach the glorious, blessed completion that they both so fervently desired—

KZZZTTTTBAM!

Odin's spear slammed down between the two lovers. Odin's face was a mask of wrath. "You are promised to another!" he roared. "How dare you defy your duty to Ásgarðr, Loki! And you, sorceress! How dare you even touch what is so far above your station!"

Loki went flying half-naked out into the dark hillside, his body immediately taking on the normal, pale appearance of the young Asgardian prince.

Odin was now holding up Idonia by the scruff of her neck. "I forever cast you out of Ásgarðr, Idonia! For your crimes against the engagement of my son Loki to Lady Sigyn, you will be trapped in a mere mortal's life so that you may learn your true place among those as insignificant as yourself. BEGONE!" Odin roared, throwing the screaming young sorceress into the swirling cosmos beyond the walls of Ásgarðr.

As Odin glowered over the crumpled body his youngest son, it was all Loki could do to grasp the blanket in his arms and press it close to his face— the last tatters of the unmistakable scent and magic of his beloved Lady Idonia, his sole remaining shred of comfort.

"Munnin," Odin said darkly. "You will take care of the rest."

One raven from Odin's shoulder swooped down upon Loki— vast black wings seeming to stretch infinitely across the cosmos as it swooped down and took every single remaining memory of Loki's lover away— even the strange memories of bright scales and feathers, golden eyes, cobalt skin, and the sweet, soft caresses of undeniable love, both given and returned.

The next morning, Loki Odinson awoke in his cold, lonely bed— feeling a raw, gaping emptiness in his heart and soul, as well as a seething, burning, uncontrollable rage that could not be quenched. But thanks to Munnin's touch upon his memory— Prince Loki knew not why.

And below— far, far below in Miðgarðr— Hermione Jean Granger was born unto parents who had never known magic and most definitely had no love for the gods.

Loki opened his eyes, crimson having swallowed up his ice-blue irises. His arm reflexively curved around his mate's waist as he pressed his face into her curls. Eyes glowing, he clamped his teeth into the soft skin of her neck, the slight glint of his pointed canines flashing as the driving need to reinforce their bond filled his entire being.

Hermione's body tightened against him, and her magic flared up to meet his. She gasped his name in ecstasy as her eyes rolled backward. He suckled on her skin like a hungry lamprey, drinking in her magic even as his spread from his runic markings to fuse with hers, their distinctive cocktail of pure magical energy sliding together as one.

"My Prince," Hermione whispered as she shuddered with pleasure, her voice seeming to come from far away.

"Mine," Loki growled possessively, his magic flaring brightly as it poured into her. Hermione cried out, body spasming in his arms, but he covered her protectively with his body, keeping the contact of his flesh with hers. He sang to her. His voice rumbled as his magic resonated.

Mine. Mine. Mine.

Their bodies merged together like the draw of opposing magnets. Loki drove into her desperately, each thrust flaring the bond between them. Hermione cried, whimpered, and gasped Loki's name, her hands curled into claws as she clung to him.

Idonia. My sorceress.

Mine.

Our bond frees us from Munnin's thievery.

We are free.

Free of Ásgarðr.

Free of Odin.

Our thrones shall be crafted out of the cosmos itself.

Our children shall spread across the Nine Realms, singing the songs of the Ancient Pathways.

We shall never be parted again.

I shall never leave you.

Hermione. Idonia. My sorceress.

My queen.

My goddess.

My love.

A blast of combined solar and lunar energy roared out between them as they reached completion together— bodies, hearts and souls mated together. The temple grounds burst into the colourful rays of the Aurora Borealis.

Meanwhile, in his potions lab, Severus Snape fed Raina a salt and pepper prawn and rubbed her chin fondly. "This is why mummy and daddy have serpentine birth control. Yes it is."

Raina stared up at her grandfather with absolute adoration, humming a happy little tune. "Love you, grandpa!"

Severus lowered his head to kiss the little quetzalcoatl on the head. "I love you too, miscreant. Now, eat some cucumber." He held out a slice of cucumber between his fingers.

The black rainbow-obsidian quetzalcoatl serpentlet curled lovingly around his wrist and munched on the crunchy offering obediently, radiating nothing but utter contentment. Tiny strands of lunar and solar magic slithered off her markings and wrapped themselves intimately around Severus' pale skin, burrowing into the lines of his magic.

Severus gave a soft gasp of wonder, bracing himself against the chair as he sank into it, his eyes wide as trickles of gold and silver flowed through each vessel, filling his black eyes with glistening stars. Her magic flowed through his body, driving away the old, tar-like magic that had once bound him to another… a dark, evil, megalomaniacal monster of a master.

Mine, Raina announced happily, snuggling into her grandfather's neck with a warm purr.

Dark ichor flowed out from the skin of Severus' arm, instantly smothered by the gold and white tendrils of Raina's inherent magic. Ancient Mayan-like markings spread up his arm, rising from his skin like runic scars, glistening and beautiful.

My Priest. My grandfather. Mine.

Raina rubbed her head affectionately against Severus' cheek.

"Yours," Severus' voice said in a choked whisper, his gaze and voice filled with love.

Raina lovingly stuffed a piece of cucumber into Severus' mouth.

Kersplat.

Squeak!

Rustle, rustle.

Squeak!

Rrrrrr?

Boing. Squeak.

Boing, boing, boing… squeak.

Sigyn slowly opened her eyes to find a tiny, furry— book?—sitting on her chest. It had a gold cover and tiny purple spots, ruby crystalline teeth, and bright blue eyes.

Rrrr?

It bounced on her chest, a small golden question mark appearing on its tiny cover.

Rustle. Rustle. Rustle.

Boing!

The booklet was quickly joined by several others, all of them staring curiously at Sigyn as she lay stunned and supine on the chill stone floor.

"Hhhrrgh," she managed. Where was Loki? She had the lock of his hair— the ring Odin had given her— so he had to be here. Yet all she had managed to do thus far is land flat on her back and then find herself accosted by a vast multitude of small, furry, possibly sentient, book-like creatures. Where was here, anyway?

There was a soft humming nearby, and Sigyn froze instantly, then swiftly brushed the blanket of purring, bouncing booklets off of herself. She followed the sound, and realised she was stepping out of what might have been a small library or perhaps a nursery— for books.

The room opened up into a larger chamber, dimly lit with seemed to be torches, yet there was no heat or smoke. Large, furry tomes hopped along the shelves, herding the smaller booklets ahead of them with toothy nips to the spine. "Normal" books surrounded her, all bearing various strange and obscure titles. Magic had never been a true passion for her, but she could tell as her hand drifted across the covers that each of the books were imbued with magical energy.

Odin had arranged for her to get the very best in magical and weapons education, as befitting a proper Lady of Ásgarðr, and she had done her level best to work steadily towards the end goal. It was both her duty and privilege to be known as Loki's betrothed. She was expected to keep up, and she had—but Loki had consistently never taken more than a cursory interest in her, at best.

Why, she had no idea.

Then again, it wasn't expected for one to be in love to marry. It was expected for her to stand by Prince Loki, second in line to the royal throne of Ásgarðr.

As Sigyn explored further, she saw the silhouette of a woman with a lush mane of bushy curls interspersed with a fine, delicate array of feathers. The woman ran a familiar pearl-encrusted comb through her long hair. It looked like one of the ornate combs found within the palace in Ásgarðr, only there was a distinct touch of age about it. A tiny golden book bounced up and down on the nearby shelf, and she drew her hand across its fur, extending the pearled comb into its care. The book purred and rubbed up against her hand before bouncing off with her comb.

Sigyn looked down to find a little pink-furred book snuggling up to her sandal. Tiny, furry hearts floated across its cover as it slathered sticky book paste all over her ankle and toes.

"Eugh," she said, using her foot to push the oddly flirtatious book away. It bounced back to rub up against her sandal and foot again and again, making adorable squeaking sounds, and Sigyn pushed the little book away again, pinning it under a large, unmoving book specimen.

The pink book squirmed and gave a sad squeak, casting more hearts towards her paste-covered foot and ankle. Golden letters appeared across its spine: The Seductive Lure of Sexy Sandals.

Sigyn made a face, unsure what to think of this exceedingly strange library and its equally strange inhabitants. She refocused on the woman, feeling very strongly that she knew her from somewhere, someplace.

The woman wore a soft, almost transparent throw. She seemed utterly comfortable— the kind of casualwear that occurred only in private, behind closed doors in Ásgarðr. A line of little books were following her around, and she ran her hands over each one as one would a favoured hound. They nuzzled her fingers and got paste all over them, but the woman only smiled and ruffled their furred covers, looking on them fondly. She opened one of the bookcases, and a creature that looked like a huge snake with a feathered mane yawned widely into the woman's face.

"There you are, my little love," the woman said with affection. She pressed a tender kiss to the serpent's nose. "Don't hide from your brothers and sisters for too long, now."

The crimson-nosed serpent playfully chomped on the woman's nose, its forked tongue sliding lightly across her face. The woman grasped the serpent by the head and pressed her forehead to the the beast's. "I love you too, miscreant. Go on now."

The maned serpent rubbed its head against the woman and slithered down the bookshelves and away, presumably to join its siblings.

Sigyn pulled her shawl more closely over herself, thankful for the enchantments that had been sewn into its fabric. Travel amongst the Realms required such things. The passing of gods had be calculated, either seen or unseen. Sigyn, however, was the Goddess of Fidelity. Hers was not to be at the forefront of battle. She was to be put on show when needed, to be held up as a living example of duty. She had to remain faithful, and her duty to Loki was to bring him home so they could both go on with their lives together.

A tall, familiar figure moved in behind the woman, long black hair moving like a curtain over his pale face and eyes that were both ice and emeralds at the same time. "Are you ready?" he whispered into her skin. "The delegation is here."

The woman turned to look up into his face, her eyes bright and warm. "We were never taught much about Jötunn culture," she said a little nervously. "What if I say something wrong?"

Loki's most mischievous smile was tugging insistently at his lips. "All you need to do is scream my name as we doth join in our most intimate of unions."

"Loki!" the woman gasped, shoving him with her hands.

"Do I not please you?" Loki purred the question. "My. Lady?" He brushed his hand against her cheek.

"You know you do," the woman replied, flushing deeply.

"Do you know what it does to me?" Loki asked. "That look? That catch of breath whenever you think of me, moving inside you. That you want… me?"

The curl-maned woman touched his cheek lovingly. "How could I not want you, my Handsome. My Prince?"

Loki stared into her face intently. "The Jötunn firmly believe that unless a union is witnessed to be true and mutual that it is but a farce— a false claim to a peace that shall never be consummated. This— what we have together— could, will, broker a peace between Jötunheim and Miðgarðr in a way that Ásgarðr could only dream of."

"They can't just take a temple full of baby serpentlets as sufficient proof?" the woman asked with a rather amused expression.

"Formalities," Loki murmured into her ear.

"I know nothing of Jötunn culture—"

"Nor did I, love," Loki pointed out gently, "but the elders have been more than accommodating in seeing to our impromptu education. Things— that might have helped you make a more informed decision, once upon a time."

"Did you think my decision would have changed?" The woman's laugh filled her eyes with a golden radiance.

"You accepted a monster, even then," Loki whispered.

"You were never a monster, Loki," she said firmly. "You were always kind to me. Aggravating. Trickster. Hiding my books. Sneaking kisses when you knew what it did to me."

"You were not blameless, my Lady," Loki said, the brush of his lips upon her forehead. "I was mad with the sheer want of you."

"Was."

"Am still."

"Liar. It is but a dull roar now, eventually fading to nothing."

Loki growled loudly, his shoulders hunched as he caged her body up against the bookshelf with his arms.

Sigyn flinched as the scent in the air began to change to something musky and undeniably powerful. It smelled of ancient, secret places and primordial shapes moving under the darkness of Creation. Her hand immediately reached for the token she had brought with her, instinctively clasping it tightly as if it would prevent her from drowning or being torn away from the very ground.

Loki grunted, his hands clenching as he forced himself to back away. He summoned a shimmering robe that seemed to be crafted from wispy plumes of snow-white fur. He drew it across the woman's shoulders and trembled slightly as his fingers drew across her skin. He drew out an intricate crown that seemed to be crafted of ancient ice, guiding it to her forehead.

"Idonia," he whispered, puffs of fragile, almost insubstantial ice crystals forming as his breath ghosted against her skin. "Beloved Hermione. Stand with me at my side that they may know us as one."

"Do I have to?" Hermione replied teasingly, a flicker of mischief tugging at her lips.

Loki stuck out his lower lip in a pout, sinking his eyebrows mock-sadly for overall effect. "You would force me to forever lament the entire Cosmos, teaching my spawn the bitterness of a fickle female scorned, who dangled the greatest treasures of all the Realms, then just ran away?"

Hermione tilted her head up haughtily, closing her eyes and feigning the wish to ignore him properly.

Loki ran his hands over the soft skin of her waist. "Are you a cuckoo bird, my love? Laying your eggs in our nest and then leaving me bereft?"

"Hardly bereft," Hermione said resolutely, her eyes still closed as she turned her head away from him.

Loki attempted to wriggle his way against her, but she continued to deny him, turning her body from him just so. He gave a soft growl of frustration and pressed his mouth to her ear, breathing heavily into it.

Hermione shuddered slightly, her body instantly reacting to his warm breath despite her best intentions.

A soft knock announced the presence of another. "Far be it from me to interrupt another stunning demonstration of electromagnetic lighting, you two, but the delegation has arrived."

Hermione flailed wildly, her arms pulling her along the bookshelf. She wrapped her arms around a startled-looking golden book and fled the room, tiny wisps of fur and feathers were the only remaining trace of her having been there.

Loki glared in the direction of the interrupter, but there was no true heat behind it.

The dark-eyed man crossed his arms across his chest. "Whenever will the honeymoon be over, hrm?"

Loki's eyes glittered with ice and emeralds. "Never."

As Sigyn slowly found her way out onto a high platform, she pulled her shawl protectively around herself. The platform set high in the sky, set before a ceiling that was nothing but an open expanse of swirling space— much as was seen from Ásgarðr when peering down at the other Realms from the Bifröst. The pathways were stone, yet frost and mist rose up in tendrils from them simultaneously. Grey and darkened blue banners, the colours of Jötunheim, flew on countless banner poles.

She tightened her grip on her dagger, instinctively knowing the Jötunn as her mortal enemy. Despite the peace brokered by the All-Father, every Asgardian knew that the giants were a danger beyond measure. Had Odin not forced the hand of Laufey and ensured peace between them, the war would still be raging.

Everything about them was unnatural. They stood tall and proud despite having been soundly defeated. They wore almost nothing— exposing so much of their strangely patterned skin to the frozen winds as if to thumb their collective noses at the Asgardian sense of decency. Their eyes, so unnaturally red and malevolent-looking, glowed like embers in a fire that simply refused to die.

The parade of banner-carriers circled around the platform. The most forward of their number knelt down, making room for the others behind. Even so, their size made them seem to tower over the figure of Loki and his chosen paramour.

Idonia.

That thrice-damned sorceress— would she never be free of that shameless betrothed-stealing whore? Odin had cast the girl out of their world forever. She had no godhood, no title, no name. She was nothing. Nothing!

Why then did Loki continually insist on rubbing her in Sigyn's face? How had they even found each other again? Was this why Odin wanted her to retrieve Loki? Before—

Was she sent here to stop this meeting between the Jötunn and the odd inhabitants of this strange place? Was that her true task?

Sigyn fidgeted as she saw Loki standing up on the dias with the traitorous Idonia. She couldn't hear the conversation, but the Jötunn were offering up what appeared to be finely carved containers of some sort of salve. Idonia— she dipped her fingers into it and began to trace patterns across Loki's skin even as he did the same to her. Their fingers dragged across each other's flesh, leaving trails of glowing, ice-like markings.

Loki was losing his clothing piece by piece, his pale skin shining in the dimness, save for the soft glow of the salve. Idonia covered every bit of his skin with shimmering runic markings— just like a Jötunn would have.

Sigyn's skin crawled. Why would an Asgardian prince submit himself to such humiliation? Looking just like a hated Jötunn?

Then, Loki's hands deftly disrobed his partner, tracing even more of the distinctive Jötunn markings upon her skin with the glowing salve. The more his hands roamed, a change appeared to be coming upon the raven-haired prince of Ásgarðr. His skin was darkening into a shade of dark cobalt blue. His eyes smoldered with a deep crimson glow.

He looked exactly like a Jötunn!

Loki then lowered Idonia down into some sort of "bowl" that seemed to be lined with white fur as the Jötunn used their banners to block any view of the proceedings. But it didn't take much for Sigyn to fill in the blanks of precisely what was occurring behind the concealing banners. A low, deep groan lead to a feminine shriek of ecstasy as an vivid outpouring of intense, multi-coloured light blasted outwards from the very top of the dais. A blast of frigid, icy wind novaed out from the center, and the Jötunn stamped their banners with a rhythmic thunder.

The Jötunn rose from kneeling, all letting out a united chant of solidarity and unmistakable approval.

"We hereby witness and swear peace between our united peoples," a wizened Jötunn said, waving his banner across the platform. "As one of our own unites with his true lifemate, she not being born of our kind, we recognise the ancient covenant's rebirth with their sacred union of bodies and souls. For as long as this union remains true, so too shall our vow of peace."

A line of elder Jötunn stood around the couple. Each dipped their fingers into the glowing, ice-like paste. They drew their fingers across Loki and Hermione's skin, sending a flare of frost and ice energy singing across the markings.

"I, Hakon, witness your union," the grizzled elder Jötunn said. He drew an ornate belt around Loki and Hermione's waist. The fingers of ice-like, living crystal moved across their waists. "May the ice sing your children to sleep, that they may never know loneliness."

"I, Jord, witness your union," an elder female said, drawing gossamer fabric to hang on the waist belt. She pulled a stole of soft fur across Loki's shoulders and Hermione's breasts. "May the frosts favour you eternally, blessing your family with its gentle kiss."

"I, Áki, witness your union," a Jötunn with a jagged slash that went down half of his face said. He drew his fingers across their markings as he set a growing crown of ice in their hair. The tendrils slithered across their foreheads, growing and spreading like the roots of the Yggdrasil over their skin. "May the winter's chill temper your emotions so that the heat of anger can never melt the bonds of love that you share."

There was a rustle amongst the Jötunn as a larger member of their number walked up the path to the main platform. He carried a large club slung over his shoulder, but it was covered in ornately formed ice carvings. There was a thick fur stole wrapped around the giant's shoulders, tied and pulled into tassels and trimmed with the claws and teeth of some great animal that had obviously not parted with them willingly. He had scars running across scars that ran across his runic markings, creating a pattern that bore a striking resemblance to a patchwork design. He stood in front of the other elders, obviously revered in a way others were not, but his carriage seemed somewhat conflicted. It was clear that he was used to being the one others deferred to, but he now stood at the top of the dais with a slight bow to his broad shoulders.

He slammed his club down in front of him, using the shaft in which to lean upon. "I, Laufey, King of the Jötunn, bow in acknowledgment of my own personal failings. Long has our kind struggled to remain strong and independent. We have long desired our freedom from the yoke of any rule but our own, and we have— I have— always associated power with one's physical stature."

"Despite our most treasured legends," Laufey said, "peace was won via the power of one force vanquishing another. Odin of Ásgarðr bought our peace by defeating me in combat and stealing the Casket of Ancient Winters to ensure that our people never used it against another race again. It was there in which I did descend into self-loathing and despair, and I abandoned my child as a runt to the icy colds, cursing fate that it gave me something weak just when my people needed something strong."

"Then, to my everlasting shame," Laufey confessed, "my enemy did offer what I could not, and I have lived with my weakness and regret ever since that shameful day. I will make no excuses for my actions. I do, however, beseech you not to judge my people based on my sins, my shortcomings, and my own fears and weakness. The elders have witnessed the truth of this union before the ice and snow at the frozen core of Jötunheim. Now, before you, I lay down all my shame and my sins, that my people may rise again. I pray to you, give us a sign of your favour, even if I must be cast out from my people, so that they may know the glorious blessing which has reached our ears even in the very bowels of Jötunheim."

The King of the Jötunn remained unmoving where he was, and there was total silence. Nothing, but the soft wind blowing across the dais and the flapping of banners in the air signalled that anything was going on.

"Nnnnnnnnnnngh," a melodious note rang out in the air.

"Hnnnnnnnnnnnn," another voice answered, and the entire platform shuddered as two sets of great wings unfolded as if unwrapping from a vast mountain. A glimmer of cobalt and golden scales rubbed against each other in a flare of black and rainbow feathers.

The feathers rattled and flared, shuddering. Scales moved against scales. Feathers brushed against feathers, and plasma shot out from every extended feather as a resonate song shoot the very sky and ground. Rising out of the temple, seven smaller serpents drifted through the streamers of plasma, dancing along the trail of magic as if it were a road made just for them. They darted and flew to and fro, twirling, and looping playfully as they sang their songs in reply to the far more massive adults.

The serpentlets slid around the Jötunn elders, allowing them to touch and stroke their bodies as they flew by. Gasps of wonder and astonishment rose up from the gathered crowd. The large cobalt serpent entwined his body around his mate's and then lowered his huge head, gently nudging the young serpentlets towards the bowing king of the Jötunn.

Seven bright faces cocked their heads and tasted the air curiously with their forked tongues.

"Hello, grandfather," they sang, performing little cartwheels in the air.

Laufey hesitantly extended one gnarled hand, scarred and worn from so many past battles long buried. The serpentlets rubbed up against his hand with their feathered manes. His hand trembled as the baby serpents mobbed him, covering his mass with their writhing, serpentine bodies.

If the King of the Jötunn felt any discomfort at all, it was soon lost as he was plowed over by a wave of curious, forgiving baby serpentlets under the calmly watching and approving eyes of their parents.

"Nnnnnnnnnnngh!" Hermione sang.

"Hhhhhhhhhhnnnn!" Loki replied, their bodies writhing back and forth in a rhythmic dance, wings brushing, scales sliding, and feathers entwining as they rose up above the gathered, undulating to the pulses of the cosmos in tandem.

Plumes of faith energy rose up from the gathered Jötunn, rising to merge with the elder quetzalcoatls. They fanned their wings and sang in harmony, guiding the energy meal into seven smaller meals for their brood of growing serpentlets. The baby serpents sang out their gratitude in response, adding their songs to the serenade. They flapped their wings and undulated as best they could in an attempt to emulate their graceful parents.

Loki slithered just so.

Hermione mirrored his movements precisely.

The serpentlets tried their best to imitate in their fashion.

Loki shook his mane of feathers, dipping his head. Hermione moved her head smoothly under his, and the babies did a chain wave of movements in an attempt to make it look intentional.

Loki's tongue flicked out and nudged all of his wayward offspring.

Hermione fanned her mane feathers, shaking them just so, and the serpentlets did the same, their downy poofed manes making them look more like lions. The babies happily bounced and twirled, showing off to their proud parents with their various dances and songs.

Vidar curled up on the end of Laufey's warclub, wrapping his midnight blue self around the shaft as he stared up into his grandfather's crimson eyes. He showed off his bright silver belly scales, doing a little slithering dance. He clacked his jaws together, mock chomping and withdrawing playfully.

Laufey's arms opened, almost shyly, as if the gears of an ancient mechanism were opening after countless centuries of neglect. The young serpent pounced like a spring, thumping into the Jötunn king's arms.

"Grandfather!" the serpentlet cried joyfully, snuggling into the giant's arms.

Twin trails of icy tears flowed down Laufey's cobalt cheeks, crashing to the floor and shattering into countless shards.

As Sigyn's hand trembled, her mind having taken in far too much in a very short time to remain unaffected by the day's stunning revelations, her fingers blindly tugged out the token-beacon Odin had given her. She crushed the lock of Loki's hair into and threw it blindly, her face blinded by tears drawn by yet another bitter betrayal upon her back.

She had done everything that she was asked.

Everything.

Odin had wanted her to marry a— Jötunn?!

An unnatural blue-skinned creature from a heathen people who didn't even have the common decency to cover up their nakedness but for a few random shards of ice? Jötunn— they were all murderers! They had killed countless Asgardians in so many hideously brutal battles. They had beaten in the skulls of noble Asgardian warriors, leaving them to freeze to death on the ice floes.

She didn't care if King Odin himself had seen fit to adopt some little blue-skinned whelp from the enemy and then deigned to call it his son— the Jötunn could never be trusted. They could never be civilised. They could not be— MARRIED, most especially not to HER!

She would never willingly bind herself to an… abomination like that.

Monster.

Beast.

His perverted body, even now, was twisted into another equally beastly shape, dragging his chosen mate into a disgusting perversion of body and soul along with him.

That could have been her.

SHE could have been twisted and deformed into a horrifying snake-like beast.

NO!

He could have been touching her with his monstrous body— forcing her to bear his mutant spawn! Forcing her to debase herself to the lowlier peoples of the Nine Realms in order to curry favour for some sort of god-like ascension—

She would NEVER rely on the worship of some fanatical group to give her power. She was a goddess in her own right. She needed no one's aid to be what she was!

She did not need to transform herself into some hideous monster in order to make a favourable impression!

She should have known. She should have seen it coming! All those tricks. All those illusions Loki had performed. All of it was telling her that he wasn't what he appeared to be, yet somehow she hadn't seen. She hadn't even thought to see! And had she taken Loki back to Ásgarðr, they would have been married. They would have been bound together forever— she and a primitive, uncouth Jötunn!

A part of Sigyn was trying to tell her that Loki had ever been the furthest thing from uncouth and uncivilised, but that small part of her was being completely drowned out by thousands of years' worth of ingrained prejudice. Forgetting that only moments before she had longed for Loki's touch just as much any other hot-blooded woman of Ásgarðr would have. He was undeniably attractive— a son of the royal family. Marrying him would have set her for life—

A mere illusion.

Just like Loki, himself.

All of it would have been a lie.

Sigyn threw the beacon, and it bonked a startled moonstone-coloured baby serpent on the nose. The baby serpent's ruby eyes whirled slightly as she shook her head to clear it, even as the thundering drone of the Bifröst roared to life and swallowed up the top of the platform with the formation of the rainbowed gateway.

Itzel's ruby eyes widened in fear as several figures materialised in the rolling mist of the Bifröst. A huge, red-bearded man hoisted a large axe high over his head as his eyes focused on what was around him. The tip of his boot pinned the young serpent down to the ground by her tail, and she frantically pulled and struggled to free herself.

"Jötunn!" the man bellowed, pulling back his axe to heave it around. "Raaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!"

A huge warhammer went sailing through the air as the Warriors Three, Sif, and a large contingent of royal guards poured out of the Bifröst gate to meet the Jötunn delegation with extreme prejudice—

"Grandpa, why did those people attack us?" Raina peered down from Severus' shoulder, her tail tightly fastened around his neck like a safety lanyard.

"Because they are imbeciles," Severus said with a sniff, unstoppering a particularly noxious-smelling potion and pouring it down via a funnel through a hole in the mouth area of a patient sporting a full-body cast. Only a tuft of bright blonde hair stuck out the top and one golden sandal where a lone foot remained intact, save for about twenty wholly infatuated baby booklets that were industriously slathering themselves all over the exposed sandal.

A tall, silver-haired Jötunn female clucked her tongue in a disapproving manner as she tended a number of bodies that were bound snugly to their respective infirmary beds. Her dark ruby eyes held a weight of age and had a look of resigned tolerance about them. "Immortal, mortal—" she muttered. "They all end up in front of me eventually."

"May I watch?" Raina asked, her tail looped with eager curiosity.

"Of course," the giantess said, extending an arm.

The little serpent moved over to wrap herself around the giantess' arm, hooking her tail over her shoulder to anchor herself in place.

"What is this one?" the Jötunn female asked.

Raina sniffed the pertinent bottle. "Ew!"

"More than ew," the elder chuckled.

"Bone-mender. Couldn't you just gnaw off the arm and have it grow back?"

The man in the cast groaned loudly, struggling.

"That technique doesn't work for everyone, my dear," the giantess clucked amusedly.

"Daddy was really pissed," Raina said critically, staring down at the mangled man who was sporting multiple heavily bandaged limbs and wore various colourful balms and ointments all over his face and body.

"As well he should have been," Thor's low rumble of a voice came as he strode into the infirmary. He cradled little Itzel in his muscular arms as the young serpentlet was playing up the wounded baby for his benefit, showing off her bandaged tail like a badge of courage.

"I should crush your skull for what you did, Volstagg," Thor said darkly, staring into the full body cast of his longtime friend. "Not that Jane did not accomplish that all on her own with Mjölnir. I am certain that father did not see that coming, lest he would not have sent the lot of you to crash a civil diplomatic procession."

Thor sat himself down on Volstagg's leg, causing the other man to groan pathetically. "On the bright side, Lady Jane has accepted my hand in marriage, so I suppose some good did come out of this, even if it means that all four of you will be laid up for an entire month or two as your bones grow back. From what Lady Hermione tells me, it could have been far, far worse."

Thor peered into the man's face, then shifted his weight slightly to relieve the painful pressure on Volstagg's brawny leg— almost reluctantly. "My Lady Mother does wish to question all of you regarding your exceptionally poor timing," Thor said after a long beat. "Of all the times you might decide to turn up, you arrive here fully armed to fight surrounded by Jötunn elders and my brother's, erm… unique family."

"They are the enemy," Volstagg wheezed. "You know this as well as I!"

"I am fully aware of what our people's history entails," Thor said darkly. "Would you heedlessly throw away the opportunity of a lasting peace? Would you have me, as a future king, blast us back into the times of unending war and undo over a thousand years of truce?"

Volstagg, to his credit, remained silent.

Thor paused, looking thoughtful. "I know that you crave a warrior's honour. You desire to prove yourself in battle, but this is a battle already won by my younger brother. That battle was won with an altogether different kind of sword."

A gathering of baby booklets were tugging on Volstagg's beard hair, curiously investigating their captive audience. They took turns bouncing up and down on his chest cast, wrestling with his beard and accidentally-not-so-accidentally taking a nap over his breathing hole.

The female Jötunn clucked her tongue at their antics, gently moving the booklets to the side to keep her patient from smothering to death on her watch.

"Lady Ishea?" Raina asked.

"Yes, child?" the Jötunn female replied.

"How long do they have to be under ice?"

"Normally, they would heal much faster, I think," the elder replied. "But this sorry lot were badly mangled by a god and a goddess."

"Mummy and Daddy are?"

"Mmmhmm."

"Why?"

"They were both born to be," the healer replied, soothing the young quetzal's downy mane. "Just as you and your siblings were."

"Oh." The young quetzalcoatl seemed to ponder things for a moment.

"Aren't they gods too?" Itzel asked, she peeked her head up over Thor's arm and stuck out her tongue curiously.

Ishea gave a gallant shrug. "There are gods and then there are gods," the healer said. "Even the Jötunn have their gods."

The two young serpents seemed to ponder this impromptu lesson together. "What do real gods do?"

Ishea sat down, opening her arms for the two babies to come join her on her lap. They curled up and stared up at her attentively. "Gods watch over their people, sometimes protecting them from themselves, sometimes allowing them to make their own mistakes. But the gods that make their names known forever are the ones that give their blessings in exchange for faith. It is not to say there are not cruel gods, unfair ones, or even imperfect ones— but a true god remains true to themselves that they may remain true to their people. One cannot be the God of Succor and yet have never given anything but strife. One cannot be the God of Wisdom and yet only offer foolishness and yet reject the worth of knowledge. Your father is the God of Mischief, yes? Where would he be without his tricks?"

"With Mummy!" the babies replied bluntly and in unison.

The elder Jötunn laughed warmly. "And yet she too is a goddess made form. Can you guess what she is a goddess of?"

The two baby quetzalcoatls pondered silently, tails twitching as they considered the question. Their down manes poofed out in their avid concentration.

The dark opalescent serpentlet used the tip of her tail to scratch her face. "She's pretty inspiring!"

"She makes Grandfather smile," the rainbow-scaled serpentlet said.

"Mummy makes everyone smile," Raina said, head-nudging her nestmate playfully.

The two serpentlets giggle-hissed together.

Floooop!

Plop.

Their emerald-green brother flopped on top of his sisters with a hiss, his wings flapped just enough to hover and then he dropped on top of them with a thunk. The two sisters moved over to let him snuggle with them, radiating pure contentment.

"Hi!" Naseem greeted the elder Jötunn.

Ishea smiled at him, rubbing her fingers under his scaled chin, just under his soft, downy ruffle.

"Uncle Draco wanted me to leave him alone so he could feel up Lady Luna in the library," Naseem announced with a yawn. "Not sure why he's so awkward about it. Mummy and Daddy courtship dance for each other all the time."

Thor made a distinct choking sound as Ishea laughed out loud.

Raina, Itzel, and Naseem all stared at Thor, eyes whirling. "You dance for Lady Jane too, don't you?"

Thor turned bright red. "I do not. Dance."

The serpentlets eyed each other somewhat suspiciously, peering at their Uncle Thor with half-lidded, soul-searching stares. "How do you prove your prowess then?"

"What if your scales aren't shiny enough?"

"What if your eyes aren't glowy enough?"

"What if your song isn't echoey enough?"

"How do you show her without any feathers?"

"How do you show her without sliding your body against hers so she can feel your muscles properly?"

Three sets of intensely curious no-boundary baby serpent eyes stared up at Thor.

"How do you impress her without a proper mane?"

"Can Lady Jane sing?"

"Can you sing?"

More serpentine staring slapped Thor upside the face.

"What do Jötunn do, Lady Ishea?" Naseem asked, tongue flicking with interest.

The elder Jötunn smiled wistfully. "My mate once hunted the great ice elk and brought me the softest of furs. We mated until the hide had tanned itself to perfection. He gave me three strong sons and one equally strong daughter. It is customary that the first mating is not interrupted, and the elders will tend the hut to make sure ample food and water is left for a new couple until they they conceive— the one test that ensures that the bond is true. But first, the male must get his foot in the door. And he did bring me substantial offerings of his prowess for many months. He hunted the great frost seal, bringing me the blubber, so rich and decadent. He brought me the teeth and claws of the saber-toothed snow beast, stringing them on the sinew that I might know of his bravery. He brought me skinning knives made from the fangs of the Garkokva that I might never suffer a dull cut that might ruin my projects. Oh, what a male he was. When he beat his chest and gave me that look, ah, I knew he was for me."

The serpentlets snuggled closer to her, eager to hear her story.

"He could not carry a tune," Ishea laughed. "But he could carry me, and so he did, straight into his hut under the full light of the quadmoons. I am pretty sure I couldn't carry a tune either, not that he had any complaints. And now that my children have grown and gone to the far reaches to find their own lives and mates, I am content that he would be proud to know his children carry his honour and his legacy."

"What happened to your mate, Lady Ishea?" the serpentlets asked together.

Ishea soothed their manes gently. "In a time of war there are a great many victims. Innocent or not, justified or not. He gave his life for his people and his king. His family. I am not dead just yet, little ones. A Jötunn lives on until their life ends, and I do not court Death today. Perhaps, I will find a male with blazing eyes and a fine appreciation for a woman of rather smaller stature."

"Jötunn have some strange ideas of what is considered smaller stature," Thor observed after a moment.

Ishea smiled. "Our benevolent goddess gives us these tokens that we might blend in and be protected from the heat of the unfrozen wastes," she said with no small smile as she fingered a pendant that seemed to be made of textured ancient pottery— remnants of a outer shell of an egg. "Does it help you forget that we stand some twenty to thirty feet tall without them?"

Thor blinked. "My apologies, my Lady Ishea. I believe you are correct. It is easier to forget when you are— on the same level as me."

"No need for apologies, young prince," Ishea said with a chuckle. "It is a gift our goddess gives us. Her blessings allow me to be here, tending your people. It allows our King to parlay with you without the old enmity between us. This you have done, with no vehemence in your heart. For the first time in thousands of years, our people have peace not bought in blood nor by threat of it. The same could not be said in the time of my once-mate."

Thor gave a soft sigh. "My Lady Ishea," he said. "Is there anything you might wish of me? Something you wish to see from this coming together of our peoples?"

"Pray, Prince of Ásgarðr, that this understanding between us remains beyond the wings of our quetzalcoatl god and goddess," Ishea said quietly. "For only then will both our peoples be safe from the blind, unthinking hatred that caused these friends of yours to throw themselves heedlessly into the wrath of your brother and his mate."

The baby quetzalcoatls had fallen asleep in Ishea's lap, snoring softly as they snuggled into her warmth.

"I will remember, Lady Ishea," Thor vowed grimly, his hand resting gently on Itzel's downy mane.

"Draco Lucius Abraxas Abyssinian Malfoy, you will stop snogging the shite out of Luna Lovegood at once and help me with this table!"

Draco, his face red and clothing decidedly rumpled, staggered out of the far room. He swallowed hard and attached himself to the end of the long table Theo and Harry had been trying to move without him with limited success.

Luna, looking quite like the cat that had eaten the canary with relish, walked out into the room as though she owned the place.

Harry rolled his eyes, just happy to finally get the damn table moved to the right place.

"Why aren't you using magic to do all this?" Draco muttered grumpily. "You wouldn't need me to—"

Theo slapped Draco upside the head with his palm. "There are guests here who may not appreciate us flinging magic around, idiot."

"How am I supposed to—"

Harry smacked Draco upside the head from the other side. "You're the one who volunteered to turn Malfoy Manor into a sodding brewery, mate. Don't tell me you slept through that."

Draco muttered a few rather rude things under his breath.

"You could just marry her," Harry said as they set the last of the tables in place. "Instead of merely living in sin."

Draco folded his arms across his body. "She says the Krumfit Addlebees have to be migrating before we can be married."

"Oh, now that's a swell reason," Theo muttered, shaking his head.

"She's going to end up pregnant before you finally get married," Harry predicted, grinning cheekily at the blond Slytherin.

Draco spluttered, trying in vain to smooth out his outfit so it looked a little less frumpled.

"Lonely my arse," Theo muttered. "You're going to populate this bloody huge place with an entire horde of mini-Malfoys, and they are all going to come out of the womb as drunk as fuck."

"Still don't understand why we can't set up this thing with magic. It's not like anyone is here to notice," Draco muttered. "Why have magic if you can't use it?"

"Severus said he's still working to try and isolate that last element that gets the Asgardians and Jötunn drunk," Theo explained. "That also requires an entirely magic-less environment."

"Why the bloody fuck does he have to do that HERE!" Draco roared.

A multi-coloured sock flew across the room out of nowhere and stuffed itself into Draco's mouth.

Harry shook his head. "Because YOU decided to turn this place into a brewery, you short-sighted sod!"

Draco glared daggers at him but finally slumped in resignation. "It's a great idea, I'm telling you. I just had no idea it would turn out to be such a vast undertaking."

"Tom is practically ready to fly to the moon," Theo reported, grinning widely. "You can't get better exposure than at the Leaky, at least within the Wizarding world. As for the rest, well, it should take off on word of mouth alone."

"You do realise there is a bunch of blue people a few rooms over rearranging all of the silverware so it's not insulting?"

"Define 'insulting'."

"That's what I mean!" Draco hissed. "How the hell are we supposed to know these things?!"

"That's easy," Luna said casually. "The silverware sings when you put it in the right place."

Theo, Draco, and Harry all stared at Luna uncomprehendingly.

Luna stared back at them serenely. "What? You can hear it, can't you?"

The wizards looked at Luna somewhat dumbly, scratching their heads in confusion.

"Mmm, pity," Luna said a little sadly. "They really do sound quite beautiful. Father only had a few pieces of fine silverware at home. They didn't carry a very good tune."

"Silverware is for eating with!" Theo protested. "It doesn't sing."

"Doesn't it?" Luna seemed thoughtful. "Sometimes, I wonder if you lot are all there," Luna said cheerily. Then she bounced off, humming a jaunty little tune to herself.

The three wizards exchanged glances.

Theo just shrugged. "I'm not the one trying to impregnate her."

A red-faced Draco desperately tried to bury himself under the marble tiles of Malfoy Manor, but, alas, it didn't do him a lick of good.

"Did you dance for her?"

"Did you use your tongue?"

"Did you wiggle and sing?"

Seven curious serpentlets stared intently at Draco as he tried hopelessly to stare a hole through his tankard. "This is not appropropriate baby serpent conversation!"

"Of course it's appropriate baby serpent conversation," they chimed together. "How else do we get brothers and sisters?"

Draco just gaped at the baby serpents. "I— hey, that is none of your business!"

The serpentlets blinked at him, shaking their manes at him in bafflement. "Humans are so silly. You spend all your time trying to peel clothes off, but then when you do, you don't want to discuss it with us."

"Yes, discuss!"

"Is she happy with you?"

"Does she sing?"

"Is it more of a moan?"

"Daddy really likes when Mummy moans."

"Yes!"

"Do you?"

Seven pairs of bright baby serpent eyes peered holes into Draco.

"I do not like it when she— MERLIN! HERMIONE!"

A bushy-maned witch poked her head around the corner. "Draco, I can hear you floundering helplessly from five doors down. What is it?"

"Your spawn are interrogating me about my sex life!"

"Why, is there something wrong with it?"

"Whu— what?"

"Is there something wrong with your sex life?"

"Well, no, but—"

"Might as well just share with them, Draco. How else are they going to encourage your fertility and bless your union when you finally get married?"

Draco stared, his jaw dropping in shock. "This so isn't right, Hermione! They're babies!"

"Baby quetzalcoatls," Hermione corrected him. "Not human! They came out of the shell knowing more than most adults do. They just need to understand application and real life context."

Draco hissed, "Can't they learn about, I don't know… agriculture instead of my very private sex life?!"

"Ancient cultures believed that sex magic enhanced the bounty of their crops. Feeling particularly virile, Draco?"

"I-but… FUCK!"

A rainbow-colored sock stuffed itself into Draco's mouth, again out of seemingly nowhere.

"Besides, there is nothing even remotely private about YOUR sex life, Draco," Hermione pointed out blithely, passing him a long French baguette and a plate of individual butter pats. "Seeing as you apparently couldn't help yourself from going down on Luna right in the middle of King's Cross Station."

Draco dropped the butter plate to the floor, his face going even paler than normal before turning a particularly vivid shade of Gryffindor.

A gathering of baby booklets circled the fallen butter patties, looking rather forlorn at the shameful waste of perfectly good butter.

Draco recovered enough to wave his wand and fix the problem, but he was frazzled enough to hold his wand upside down, so while the butter was cleaned up, his tie enthusiastically tried to strangle him to death.

"Have you seen Uncle Severus?" Draco finally squeaked after a long struggle to subdue his tie.

Hermione shook her head. "I made sure they had plenty of food, tea, and nutritional supplements.

"Food, tea, and…" Draco repeated after her, obviously puzzled.

"Seems as father has successfully isolated the element that makes all good Asgardians and Jötunn very, very happy with each other," Hermione said without a single beat missed. "Via thorough testing, of course. Apparently, Lady Ishea and Severus have far more in common than any of us ever suspected."

Draco's face seemed torn somewhere in-between the thought of mad, passionate sex and his uncle in the same situation, and his mind chose run off screaming into the night without leaving any forwarding address. "What?"

"Oh, don't be such a silly prude, Draco," Hermione admonished him. "Not after what you and Luna did in the middle of Hyde Park. At least father had the decency to properly ward his private rooms."

"My uncle is in a relationship with a giant blue woman?"

"Jötunn, Draco," Hermione corrected patiently. "And THEY are currently in a very committed relationship, thanks to the manipulations of my sweet and well-meaning little serpentlets."

Draco was painfully silent and very pale.

"They are both very adept potions people. She's a healer. They have a great deal to base a life and relationship on. They know exactly what they want, and they aren't afraid to just tell the other what that is. Honestly, it's about time. Father really needed someone other than me to talk about such things. Thor is planning to take him out to teach him how to properly brain a sabre-toothed frost cat and bring her back the appropriate teeth and claws. Other than that, all of the pertinent customs have been blissfully taken care of."

"But, this is Severus!" Draco protested.

"Draco, love, do you really want my father living for thousands and thousands of years cranky and alone?"

Draco's jaw dropped. "Well, no, but— wait, what do you mean thousands?"

"Raina claimed him as her high priest, Draco. Do at least try to keep up. He will live as long as she does. Not that I wouldn't have, eventually, but I had wanted to at least breach the subject with a little more tact. Maybe over dinner or something. Oh well. Chalk one up for serpentlet enthusiasm. Bad enough that every single one of my ever-helpful spawn have wrapped themselves around Lady Frigga's and Minerva's hearts so tightly, I think they are both singing prayers of the faithful in their sleep. Vidar has his eye on claiming Minerva, and by eye I mean his mane, tail, wings, and heart. Naseem has Lady Frigga so thoroughly smitten, she could call the faith without even trying. I couldn't be more proud."

Draco finally shook the dumbfounded, gobsmacked look off his face. "How are you taking this faith business so well, Hermione?"

Hermione tilted her head. "Perhaps when I found a little of my own, it opened the doors for others to share theirs too. Just a year ago, you'd never have caught me believing in such things, but a year ago I believed myself to be truly alone. Now, I've seen a great many wondrous things, and I can't help but think that it has brought people together in ways I never even dreamt it could."

"Besides," Hermione said after a moment. "Theo was trying to get me to believe in myself long before I even made the shift."

"Yeah, but he was joking," Draco huffed.

"Was he?" Hermione asked. "Any more than Luna is joking?"

Draco paled, perhaps realising what he had just sounded like. "I'm sorry, Hermione, it's just— to me, gods were the things you revered and spoke of often, but you didn't just sit and have actual conversations with them. They didn't ever come down from on high and beat you upside the head with an overgrown hammer. I grew up with you, yeah? I have a pretty hard time seeing you as—"

"Draco, I would never ask you to see me as anything but how you do," Hermione said thoughtfully. "But, even you have some faith, or you wouldn't be able to hear the serpentlets. You wouldn't have been able to hear me, either."

It was Draco's turn to become thoughtful.

"Believing in something seems so much simpler when you are staring a baby quetzalcoatl in the face seven times over." Draco smiled a bit sheepishly.

Hermione grinned. "I think I figured out a lot of my soul searching the day I first laid an egg."

Draco spluttered, then laughed. "I'll give you that."

"It's okay, you know," Hermione said, sitting down in the nearby chair. "You don't have to wear your faith on your sleeve in order to have some. If anything, I've come to appreciate that big things come in small packages. Blessings aren't always obvious, you know? Sometimes, the role of what some consider to be divine is merely pointing out how simple things are really big things. Or the other way around. You wouldn't think Minerva is all that faithful on first glance, but she really is. She has a respect for the old ways that goes back a lot further than most. Then, you realise that she's practically a powerhouse of faith, and it's truly humbling. Knowing it was always there, just under the surface— yet I had never seen it so clearly."

"Father always spoke of the Old Ways," Draco said slowly. "But, I think I realise now that he was never faithful. It was purely a means to an end for him. I think most of the Pureblood rhetoric is floating away from their true meaning and shifting towards something twisted and custom made to fit the common desires of a very select few." Draco drew his hand across a baby booklet's cover, smiling as golden letters spelled out: Contentment: Only Minutes a Day To a Better You. The lime-coloured booklet purred happily, rubbing up against his fingers and getting tiny licks of paste on them. Draco scooped the booklet up and rubbed his nose against the little one's furry cover, and the booklet projected a number of furry hearts in return.

"Then again," Draco mused. "Perhaps faith comes from witnessing little things that shouldn't be possible, yet somehow are. Maybe it takes the hand of some meandering god, utterly bored one day, who happened to set into motion something far greater than even themselves. Maybe that is what gods do; set random things into motion in ways that make us all the better and stronger for it. Or maybe it kills us— or turns your father into a slavering, mindless foaming-at-the-mouth book with serious… issues."

"That's pretty specific, love," Hermione said with a warm smile.

"I aim to please," Draco replied with a soft snort. "Moody says reversion of the curse requires true remorse, kind of like how you can't heal your soul after a killing curse unless you feel true remorse for what you did. Needless to say, my father isn't going to be anything un-furry and un-booky anytime ever. He's been changed long enough, he's not even human anymore— though that fact did help me make the decision to make Malfoy Manor over into the Asgardian Brothers' Brewery. I get a perverse kind of pleasure in knowing that father would be beside himself with rage and threatening to murder me over it."

"Your father wants you dead and you find that comforting?" Hermione chuckled.

"Considering it means I am nothing like him, yes," Draco said with a quirk of a smile. "Come on, let's get this party started. I hope Uncle Severus is capable of walking a straight line to put in at least a token appearance."

"Swagger," Geir commented, slithering rapidly across the table with a pair of goblin goblets happily chasing after his tail.

"Strut," Yoki giggled as she righted the candlestick and ignited the ends of the candles with a puff of fire from her mouth.

Vidar and Naseem raced across the table, their manes poofing out as they slithered together, wings flapping just enough to propel them forward even faster. They carried a large teapot between them, balancing it between their coils.

Natsu popped up out of the flower pitcher, her bright scarlet snout flashing a shiny crimson enamel. She nudged aside the flowers in the pitcher and slithered out, using her nose to poke the flowers back into place. She breathed on the flowers, a cloud of celestial plasma circling around the petals and making the flowers expand and glow.

"Grandma Minerva is waiting for us!"

"I want her as my priestess!"

"You already have a priest!"

"I can have both!"

"No way, that's not fair! I want her as my priestess!"

"Me too!"

"Can we time share?"

"Back to Grandma Minerva!" the serpentlets cried together, disappearing with a tell-tale FOOP of mist and celestial plasma.

Draco eyed Hermione, who had a look of almost-smug pride on her face. "I rest my case."

"Welcome, my friends and family, to the grand opening of the Asgardian Brothers Brewery," Draco said, raising his glass to all that were gathered. "It is with no small amount of pride that we introduce our first line of new beverages to everyone, and I'm sure it goes without saying that the stretch of today's celebration goes farther than just the Wizarding World."

"My father once drilled into me that the very stones of this manor were set into place for the achievement of greatness, and I believe that what we are celebrating here today is about much more than merely extraordinarily tasty beverages. I believe that today is about the meeting of new friends and new family. May our drinks be a part of both our families and yours, reminding us that once upon a time, we all gathered together to share our lives. Perhaps, it was around a fire. Perhaps it was amongst our families, or perhaps, it was amongst friends new and old. Whatever the reason, welcomed guests, we invite you to partake of our drinks and food, good company, and good conversation. Celebrate with us the beginning of new relationships without the looming threat of war."

A roaring cheer went up in the main hall of the new Asgardian Brothers Brewery as human and non-human raised up their tankards in celebration.

Asgardian Brothers Brewery Provides Ample Fine Libations To All

As of yesterday, the new Asgardian Brothers Brewery has opened its doors to the Wizarding World and beyond, or so their posters would have you believe. Their most famous and highly sought-after drink, a buttered scotch liqueur known as "Asgardian Aphrodisiac", has taken the Leaky Cauldron by storm, selling out in a matter of hours and then again as dozens of new kegs were flown in.

Tom, the proprietor of the Leaky Cauldron, says business hasn't been booming like this since the end of the Wizarding War. People have come from many far off places, both Muggle and Wizarding, just to sample the new line of drinks. While other taverns have also put in to serve these drinks under contract, the Leaky Cauldron remains the main venue.

"The Leaky Cauldron has been the mainstay of Wizarding Britain, a bridge between two worlds for as long as I can remember," Asgardian Brothers owner Draco Malfoy said in interview. "It is only right that it remain the centerstone of our business. This business is to be founded on friendship and family— and family is not always blood but who you choose for yourself."

"Mr Malfoy, is there any truth to the rumours that you have laced your drinks with a powerful aphrodisiac?"

"Extensive testing has gone into the creation of our new line of drinks," Mr Malfoy replied. "They are perfectly safe for all ages and cannot take away anyone's free-will or create anything that wasn't already there to begin with. That is the beauty of it. The secret ingredient lies within each drinker. Only you can tell us what that might be."

"So the question may be not what I put into my drinks but why YOU think our drinks possess aphrodisiac qualities, hrm?"

Seven sets of bright, shiny eyes peered over the counter at Minerva, and she smiled as the serpentlets chittered hungrily from their perches. Faith energy meals aside, it had become Minerva's chosen task to prepare their food on alternating nights with Lady Frigga, sometimes with both women sharing the duty with relish.

She'd had them all watching her with rapt attention as she had prepared the sheep's lungs, liver, and heart as well as cutting the suet so fine it was like flour. She minced the onions as finely as any potions master, swirled fragrant spices over the mixture after sniffing them carefully, and then mixed it all together with the finest Scottish oatmeal. Sprinkling in a bit of pepper, salt, nutmeg, and mace, she had mashed it all together into the cleaned stomach, tying the ends together with string before poking holes in the sides to keep it from exploding.

Now, of course, it was the waiting game, and while the haggis was cooking in the pot, Minerva mashed and creamed the potatoes and turnips, amused by the serpentlets eagerly licking their chops in avid anticipation.

She broke up the mashing and creaming by making Abernethy biscuits, sifting the flour and baking powder into a butter mixture as she mixed in sugar and caraway seeds, eggs, and milk. The serpentlets tried to help her roll the dough, using their noses to help beat on it for her. They ended up with flour and caraway seeds all over, but Minerva just laughed and helped them help her.

"Someone is having entirely too much fun," a low voice rumbled amusedly as the Jötunn king bowed his way into the excited kitchen. The serpentlets rushed over to greet him, getting flour and caraway seeds all over him too. The giant shook his head, soothing each one on the mane with a surprisingly soft smile tugging at his lips.

"Hello, Lady Minerva," Laufey greeted the witch with a polite bow of his head. "I have been out hunting for the ever-hungry stomachs."

Minerva smiled at him. "Please, by all means, King Laufey," the elder witch said. "I'm sure the hungry stomachs will not protest."

The giant smiled swiftly, heaving up an impressive haul of fish on a string as well as as bundle of silver-white fur that seemed to have something carefully wrapped within. The scent of ice and brine was strong with just a hint of wood smoke. "If you will permit me?" Laufey said quietly. "I would honour your kitchen by giving you first taste of my hunt."

Minerva tilted her head. "I haven't ever been asked that before, laddie, but do whatever makes you feel at home."

Laufey unbundled the wrapped skin, exposing a goodly length of a fresh cut of fatty blubber and the meat of something that had a dark purple colour. He tugged a slender knife from his neck, deftly carving a choice piece from the bundle. He raised it to his face, sniffing it critically, and plucked it off the end of his knife with his fingers. He lifted the offering to Minerva's mouth. "With my own hands, I did take this life that others may live. I offer to you, to bless your kitchen, that life may be shared by all those who enter it. May they not ever leave hungry or wanting."

Minerva, flushing a little scarlet, gently took his offering from his fingers, chewed, and swallowed. Her eyes went wide. "I'm not quite sure what that was ye gave me, lad, but are most welcome in my kitchen anytime."

Laufey tilted his head, staring into Minerva's face with no small amount of curiosity and respect. "You honour me with your acceptance."

He gestured to the fish. "These are the rainbow ice-fish of the Sakondir. It is our tradition to smoke them immediately after catching them lest they burst into flames. And this—" Laufey gestured to the skin-wrapped bundle. "This is fresh blubber from the great ice-seal, one of the oldest traditional foods of my people. It is said that when Jötunheim was dark and still, even the fish were frozen in the waters. Only the ice-seal remained moving under the floes with the greater whale and a smattering of hungry sharks. Were it not for the seal and the whale, we would not have had oil for our lamps and food for our people. Whether this is entirely true or not seems irrelevant. The story remains."

"Well, I may be ignorant of a great many Jötunn customs, King Laufey," Minerva said, "but I know precisely what to make of a well-smoked fish when I smell one." She favoured him with a genuine smile as she gestured for him to sit, which the giant king did, if somewhat awkwardly.

The serpentlets excitedly whispered amongst themselves, nosing each other and looking back and forth between Minerva and Laufey, gears quickly turning in their little heads.

Minerva poured milk into a saucepan and heated the smoked fish in it, bringing it to a boil. She tended the pan until the fish began to flake when poked. She mixed some flour with some milk and then stirred that into the saucepan, cooking it until it became thick. She sprinkled in a fair amount of grated cheese, egg yolk, and flaked fish, seasoning it with pepper, salt, and a sprinkling of some mixture that seemed to be her go-to spice. She folded in an egg white and then poured the mixture on slices of toast, laying them out over a pan and using her wand to guide the pan to the stone hearth to grill.

The serpentlets bounced excitedly, licking their chops, knowing full well that anything Minerva made was going to be way more than merely edible.

As the batch of toasties cooked, Minerva swiftly set about preparing the blubber, cutting the skin and blubber into finely diced pieces. She breaded them, casting them into heated oil until they were golden brown, and then drained them.

She pulled out the toasties, the haggis, and the mashed neeps and tatties, dishing out servings for each of the serpentlets. The baby serpents bounced in place, eager, but knowing better than to dive in while grandma was watching them.

"And what do we say to the provider of our meal today?" Minerva asked them.

"Thank you, King Grandfather!" the serpentlets chimed together.

Laufey tilted his head. "And what do you say to the one who prepared your meal today?"

"Thank you, Grandmother Minerva!" the serpentlets chimed again.

"You may eat," Minerva said with a smile, chuckling as the young serpents promptly dove into their plates, licking them clean in their boundless enthusiasm. Within a few minutes, they were pleasantly plump and equally drowsy, barely able to drag their plates over to the sink filled with soapy water. Minerva helped them scrub their plates and set them in a rack to rinse and dry, ruffling each serpentlet with tender touches.

They were all limp, sleepy balls of scales and feathers within minutes, and Minerva tenderly tucked them into their shared rookery. They snuggled up with each other almost immediately, radiating well-fed contentment.

As Minerva shuffled back into the kitchen, she noticed that the Jötunn king had not moved from his perch. He sat on the stool with the stillness of the dead, his startling crimson eyes watching her with a deep, pulsing glow. "You too must be hungry, King Laufey. Will you allow me to fix you a plate?"

The Jötunn tilted his head. "As long as I am not the only one eating."

"Rest assured," Minerva replied with a smile, "I am quite hungry myself."

Minerva busied herself by dishing up a plate for the Jötunn king, passing him the best morsels that the serpentlets hadn't taken. She poured him a drink and set it beside him before making a plate for herself. Sneakily, Minerva waved her hand over a row of curious pepper shakers, and they turned into a plate of jam-covered biscuits. She placed a few on Laufey's plate with an amused wink.

The Jötunn nibbled on the biscuit with a raised brow, a tug of a smile on his blue lips. "I'd imagine you have learned to be very creative with hiding food from hungry babies with bottomless stomachs."

"I'd probably feel bad if they weren't more than stuffed all of the time," Minerva replied with a soft chuckle. "But I think we both know that hungry serpentlets only think they are always starving."

"A very long time ago, my mate once believed that an entire ice floe full of whales would not feed our son and daughter, for surely they would never stop eating. I brought her the richest blubbers to feed her so she could in turn feed our children well, and yet she swore upon the gods and the ice and snow that it still wouldn't be enough. Never had I worked so hard to bring plentiful meat to the table, but I believed nothing could keep me from their sides." Laufey looked thoughtful. "And what of you, Lady Minerva. Did you have a mate? Children?"

Minerva sipped her tea and sighed deeply. "I was once in love with a man who was not magical, and I was given the ultimatum that I could either live with him and never be able to use magic again or live a life with it— leaving him behind. By then, magic was far too ingrained in my life for me to ever give it up. There was another man, whom I had come to love, and we married. Yet only a few years after, he was killed after being bitten by a venomous tentacula— a very dangerous plant— and I was left without him as well. And, until fairly recently, our world was at war and that was no time to raise a family. I then chose to dedicate myself to education— teaching."

Laufey looked thoughtful. "When war came knocking on my door, I led my people on the front lines, freezing our enemies that my people would come to prevail. And in my anger and eagerness to face battle up front, war took my mate and my children— crushed in the rubble of the winter throne. The healers cut my unborn child from my mate's womb, hoping to save it, but in my grief, I was unable to embrace him. All I could see was my dead mate and our dead children—and a premature runt of a babe as all that was left to me. I cast him down beside the Casket of Ancient Winters and walked away into the depths of our wastelands, where I did starve myself for years in my pain and guilt for not having been there for my mate when she needed me the most."

"That son… was Loki?" Minerva asked quietly.

Laufey nodded grimly. "My runt of a son— was born to be a god."

Minerva looked into Laufey's face, staring at the creases and lines on his face. "I'm no expert on fate, King Laufey," she said quietly, "but perhaps, while not ideal at the time, there was a reason things happened as they did. Had your son not been adopted by your enemy, he would never have met she that would one day become our Hermione. Perhaps that is something the Norns might know better. I cannot say for certain, but had Loki not been of Ásgarðr, believing himself of Ásgarðr, he would likely never have met Lady Idonia. Had he not met Lady Idonia, she would not have been cast out of Ásgarðr and he would never have had his emotional breakdown. He wouldna have been cast out, and he wouldna have found her again. I'm nay sayin' it was the perfect choice. I'm not even sayin' it was the best way to handle things at the time, but maybe— just maybe— things have a way of workin' out as they should."

Minerva cast a glance to where the serpentlets were snoozing away peacefully. "All you have to do is look in there to realise just how much you still have. What you still can have."

Laufey's crimson eyes flickered with emotion. "You are a very wise woman, Lady Minerva," he said quietly. "I will think on what you have said." He took her hand and brought it to his mouth, pressing his lips gently to the back of her hand. "I would show you the lands of my people, if you would humour an old, battle-scarred giant."

Minerva smiled. "Bring it on, laddie. I haven't taken a holiday in over a hundred years."

Laufey stood, extending his arm to her. "You are remarkably brave in the face of the unknown. I must be careful that others do not catch on to your willfulness and skill, lest I have to bury their skulls in the ice for the right to walk with you unmolested."

Minerva laughed. "Oh, lad. No one would be fighting over an old cat like me," she said with amusement. "You needn't worry."

Laufey's crimson eyes met hers warmly. "Do not be so sure," he said as his hand covered hers, and she looped her arm around his. He guided her out of the kitchen and toward the portal to Jötunheim.

Seven sets of eyes cautiously peered up and over the edge of the rookery nest. The serpentlets hissed excitedly, tails slapping each other in a high-tail display of congratulatory glee.

"Think he will dance for her?"

"Maybe he'll sing to her!"

"Will she sing back?"

"Do you think they'll be done by breakfast?"

"I dunno, they might need a little time first!"

"What's a little time?"

"Not a whole lot of time?"

"How long is that?"

"I dunno…"

"Why don't we ask Mum and Dad?"

"We could ask Uncle Thor!"

"Shh! Shh!"

"Someone's coming."

"Quick, everyone pretend to be asleep!"

As Lady Frigga walked in to check up on the sleeping baby serpents, her motherly senses sent up a curious radar. She carefully tucked them all in and closed the door, feeling like she was forgetting something or someone. "I'm sure it will come to me in good time," she muttered, wandering back to her private quarters.

Frigga noticed a distinctly lessened air of disdain as she walked into the infirmary to check on the Warriors Three, Sif, a number of unfortunate royal guards that had unwisely joined them via the Bifröst gating, and one near-mummified goddess of fidelity. All of them were in full body casts, but Frigga couldn't help but think the lot of them were doing well enough considering they had all taken the beating of a lifetime from a raging, protective Quetzalcoatl father and an equally furious mother.

The greatest surprise, however, had been Jane's rampaging fury at the endangerment of the serpentlets. She had taken up Mjölnir and proceeded to beat in faces like a professional— if there was even such a thing as a professional facebeater. Frigga had always preferred the use of magic tricks and dagger play, the tools of the more subtle trade. There was something to be said about righteous motherly fury, however, and Jane had more than proven herself by breaking almost every possible bone in the invading Asgardian party.

Her husband was probably fit to be tied— sitting there on his golden throne wondering what in Helheim had happened. Frigga confessed she was quite amused by that particular mental image, even if she didn't confess that fact out loud. Royal propriety and all that. Still, she was enjoying her little jaunts to Miðgarðr far more than most knew. Even the members of her personal guard were in love with the serpentlets— providing no small amount of faith feeding for the little charmers. They had quite literally hatched onto an openly adoring audience, and Frigga could only approve with how naturally they wrapped themselves around the hearts of everyone they encountered. She could really expect no less from her son's children— especially with a such a wonderful mother like Hermione, the one-time Lady Idonia.

Her son had carefully protected Lady Idonia's identity, even from her, and after having found out what Odin had done when he had found out— she couldn't really fault Loki for having done so. Yet, as she was now learning, Jötunn could no more deny their need for their mate than their own need to breathe— the agony of the breaking of his mating bond being what had not only driven Laufey half-mad with grief, but had caused him to abandon his newborn premature son to the ice and snow and then exiling himself to the barren wastes to mourn the loss of his mate and that of his other children.

Frigga, despite having held a grudge for over a thousand years against the "monster" who could abandon such a wonderful son as Loki, realised that there were a great many things about Jötunn culture and the nature of their physiology that was still very alien and far apart from Asgardian norms. While the typical Asgardian was, at least behind closed doors, quite capable of great intimacy and compassionate touch, Jötunn truly needed it. Their unique needs had been forged over untold millennia spent living in the icy wastes of Jötunheim. Bonds had to remain strong and powerful to support the couple through long periods of time spent away on epic hunts— insuring that when reunited, the pair's bond would still be as strong as ever, both committed to the joint raising of their children. Take away one part of that, and the system simply broke down, to devastating result.

Loki needed Hermione as much as he needed air, food, and drink. He literally could not go on, and would have eventually gone mad without her, twisting into a cruel parody of the loving son that she knew he was. And Lady Idonia, cast out of Ásgarðr and stripped of everything that that had marked her as one of their own, would have pined herself away to nothing— forever calling out to the mate who sang in her very blood.

And it had all had been done in a desperate effort to protect Loki from ever finding out that he was not Asgardian, but Jötunn.

While Frigga certainly understood why her Lord Husband wished to protect Loki from himself, neither of them had any idea of the biological and psychological needs of their adopted son. Odin had merely gone ahead and arranged for his son's marriage, hoping that being wed to a suitably well-bred Asgardian woman would settle him down and keep the secret forever at bay. But Loki had already made his choice of mate— just as inevitable as the return of the solar winds. Idonia had, unknowingly, through her love, sealed a peace between their peoples without the ties of duty or obligation. She had accepted her Jötunn lover and mate for no other reason than her genuine love for Loki himself.

She had defied thousands of years' worth of built-up hatred, bigotry and prejudice and had been heedlessly cast out of Ásgarðr for her open-hearted acceptance. Then Loki had fallen into madness at the sudden loss of his beloved Idonia, and Muninn had stolen away all of his memories of her as well as her memories of him. Only tattered fragments had remained— fragments and the gaping psychic wounds.

Frigga watched as Lady Ishea carefully tended the number of badly injured Asgardians who would be spending plenty of quality time in traction, renewing their ice casts and pouring potions down their mouth-holes. In Ásgarðr, they would have been laid up under a energized force-field and set upon by a team of healers wielding the most cutting-edge of Asgardian medical technology. But here, it was all about old fashioned healing, save for the fact they were regrowing bones. Sound, at least for the quetzalcoatls was a weapon unto itself. As surely as Hermione's song could lure Loki from the very depths of Helheim, their song could transform into a deadly thing that could cut, shatter, and atomise whenever the two were foolishly crossed.

Thus was the touch of the gods.

Theirs was the touch that healed.

Theirs was the touch of divine vengeance.

Frigga sighed softly, wondering when she had settled into this peaceful acceptance of something far greater than herself. She found herself accepting a great many new things of late: the love of her quetzalcoatl son and his mate, a bundle of enthusiastic serpentlets, a future daughter-in-law who successfully brained an entire team of Asgardian warriors with the power of the God of Thunder, and the fact that there was a great deal more to their ancient adversaries, the Jötunn, than thousands of years of misunderstanding had ever permitted them to realise.

And Frigga only had to look at the scene before her— watching the gentle touch between a human wizard and an Jötunn healer, each with their own vast collection of battle scars, to realise things were truly changing. Ásgarðr had to rise and adapt or be left hopelessly behind. And if anything proved the power of human resilience and adaptability, Frigga saw it there in front of her every day now: love.

She was no goddess of love, yet she was not untouched by it. Humans, Jötunn and Asgardians, none were perfect. Even the gods were not perfect. But the true gods adapted to suit the changing needs of their people, even as the people strived to become ever better for their gods. The dynamic was constant, fluid, living. That was something her own people had lost sight of, maintaining that essential fluid dynamic between the gods and the faithful.

Frigga, however, was quickly learning that one could have faith and yet still be a god. She was the goddess of marriage, but that did not exclude her from being one of the faithful in service to her son's family. Service was hardly imprisonment, either. She was happy to be close to her family. She was glad to be of the same heart as the growing Naseem. There was joy in her heart in knowing that now and a thousand years from now, her bond to one emerald and gold quetzalcoatl would remain strong— great joy and relief.

She would get to see her grand serpents grow up on their own terms, in their own timeline. Faith didn't seem like such a terribly unreasonable price for such a wondrous gift.

As Frigga entered the kitchen, however, she was reminded distinctly of a very young Thor and Loki attempting to make breakfast for their parents, only instead of using her beauty powder for flour, the kitchen was literally covered in actual flour. Grey-scaled Yoki's orange belly was coated with fried onions, and moonstone-coloured Geir was equally covered in a liberal amount of cherry preserves. Natsu' scarlet snout was slathered with what looked like baked beans, and chopped parsley was all over her downy mane. Vidar had supplemented his own mane with pieces of black pudding, turning every so often to snap at the remnants as he wielded a frying pan of sizzling back bacon, flipping it expertly with his tail.

Raina and Itzel were evidently on sausage duty. One was holding and moving the frying pan about with her tail, and the other was turning the sausages with a spatula grasped tightly between her jaws. Vidar was frying up tomatoes and mushrooms, and Naseem was guarding the perfectly toasting bread on the hearth.

Seven sets of shining serpentine eyes suddenly stared up at Frigga, their bodies frozen as they were caught in the act of "cooking".

Frigga, without missing a single beat, calmly picked up the egg-frying pan and set to work, allowing the serpentlets to continue their endeavours to make a full English breakfast all on their own. She had to admit that they were quite talented for creatures without hands. Considering what they were capable of without hands, she wondered what would happen the on the day they decided to shapeshift themselves into something a little more hands-friendly.

Their father was the God of Mischief, after all.

Draco and Harry stared rather blearily at each other across their plates of eggs. Theo practically shoved mugs of hot black coffee into their faces, lifting their chins so they wouldn't drown but not enough to actually help them drink it.

"You two are totally pathetic," Theo said, shaking his head. "I swear if I wasn't already partnered up with you both, I'd have to write you off as utterly worthless."

"Just because you have your morning apostrophes doesn't mean we have to," Draco grumbled into his coffee.

"Epiphanies, idiot," Theo said, rolling his eyes.

"Whatever," Draco burbled.

"Did your IQ automatically leak out of your ears along with that thirtieth drink?" Theo pulled Draco up by the hair and stared at him. Draco just stared blankly at him, drooling out of the corner of his mouth. "Disgusting," he sighed, dropping Draco back down into his coffee. "I swear you revert to the likes of Crabbe and Goyle every time you drink."

A pale hand swung around Draco's face and yanked his head back. Severus scowled down at Draco, stuffing a sealskin filled with "something" into his mouth. "Drink," he ordered the younger wizard.

Draco spluttered, his arms flailing wildly.

Severus curled his lip at him, moved over to Harry and the black-haired wizard got the exact same treatment. Harry spluttered and coughed, nearly aspirating his own dose of the concoction.

"Pathetic," Snape informed him, his words dripping with derision, then he dropped the small sealskin bladder on the top of the table as he hoisted a much larger bundle wrapped in the still warm and steaming sealskin of a fresh hunt. "I leave you alone for half a night and you can't even dress yourself properly in the morning." He pinched the front of Draco's shirt which was conveniently located on the wrong side of him. "House elves on strike, hrm?"

Draco flushed. "You know as well as I that we gave them a break for the festivities as to not insult the… foreign guests."

"Far be it for me to give grave insult to any of our— foreign guests," Snape drawled lazily, eyeing Draco with mild interest as the younger man suddenly flushed an even deeper shade of beetroot.

Severus tugged the sinew tie off of the steaming bundle, a flash of his charmed silver dagger glinting in his hand. He carved the skin and blubber deftly, not even looking at where he was guiding the knife. "I have hunted the great ice-seal that you might never go hungry. I have survived the fangs and claws of the sabre-toothed beast and have brought them as my offerings to you, that the creature's ivory may adorn your lovely neck. I filled the bladder of the Harkurauk with the waters from the highest and purest glaciers on Jötunheim, those waters which purify any poison or disease that might plague yourself or those you cherish. I offer you to you the food obtained from my hunt, today and every day until I take my very last breath."

Severus slammed an enormous rune-carved tooth of something huge into the middle of the table.

Lady Ishea leaned over and ate the sliver of seal skin and blubber off of Severus' silver knife, her blue hand wrapping around the carved tooth as she yanked it off the table. She hung it from a chain around her neck as her crimson eyes glowed brightly. "I accept you as my mate and husband. Hunter. Provider. Sire of our future children." She carved a sliver from the carcass and tenderly fed Severus from her own fingers.

Severus bowed his head formally as Thor strode into the breakfast dining area, carrying what could only be described as the most gargantuan slab of seal that shouldn't been able to fit through the door and yet somehow did. Thor made a formal, courtly bow, and heaved the carcass onto the main breakfast table. "I bring the results of Severus' hunt that all may witness his most impressive prowess this day. I, Thor of Ásgarðr, hereby state that I did watch him fell the beast entirely on his own. It was my great honour to assist him in carrying it here that our honoured guests may partake of his most successful hunt."

The Jötunn stomped their feet in appreciation and roared their overwhelming approval throughout the halls of Malfoy Manor. Sounds of congratulations and undeniable approval came in multiple forms— shoulder clasping, back thumping, and the sharing of carving duties in which to share and partake of the food from the still-steaming carcass.

Harry and Draco immediately paled and fled for the lavatory. Theo, on the other hand, didn't hesitate to break bread and make fresh toasties, sharing them with their other Jötunn guests.

"Well done, father," Hermione said with a smug, Cheshire cat grin. "Even I didn't rate a fresh seal and traditional ivory carving."

Severus flushed crimson.

Loki wrapped his arms around Hermione's waist from behind. "I am more than happy to hunt frost-seal for you, my love," he purred into her ear. "As well as prove my own prowess in procuring carved ivory for your utterly edible neck."

Hermione blushed a most becoming shade of Gryffindor. "That won't be necessary."

"Hnn," Loki purred. "Are you quite sure?"

Hermione flushed again, even deeper.

Loki pressed his head tenderly to hers. "It would be… so not a problem."

The couple was then, unfortunately, interrupted by the arrival of an owl, which had apparently been blocked from the main banquet hall. There was a shuddering pop as the far shutters suddenly burst open, and a flood of owls of all shapes and sizes came tumbling out, hooting frantically.

Theo caught one owl before it fell into their breakfast or became breakfast for one of the hungry Jötunn. He gestured to Hermione and Loki frantically, knowing that there had to be a good a reason as to why the birds had been banned from the main banquet hall. Irritated Jötunn were starting to reach for their weapons, obviously annoyed by the vast number of swooping, hooting birds.

Hermione pulled out her wand, and with a powerful rush of both celestial power and her own magic, she banished the hooting cacophony out of the breakfasting area, sweeping from the room in the manner of her father, her robes billowing behind her like a banner. Loki swept out behind her, the flow of his robes matching hers in both dramatic flare and gravity defiance.

The gathered serpentlets, which had been garnering food from all the guests lowered their heads and tried to make themselves look unobtrusive and easily ignored.

"Uh-oh," Natsu said, her tail twitching nervously.

"Mummy isn't happy," Yoki said fearfully.

"If mummy isn't happy, then daddy isn't happy either," Geir said knowingly, hunkering down next to the tempting selection of jams and jellies on offer.

Thankfully, the celebration kicked right back into high gear with the removal of the offending parliament of owls.

Severus pulled his robes across his chest with a habitual tug.

"Would this be a bad time to tell Grandpa Severus that Grandma Minerva and Grandpa Laufey haven't come back yet from their walk last night?" Vidar asked quietly, lurking next to the towering sausage pile.

Severus' eyebrow twitched. "What?"

"Rut-roh," Naseem squeaked, pulling Vidar by the tail to hide behind a large vase of flowers.

Severus pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed. "I swear to Merlin, we can't leave that dotty old man alone for a single weekend without the shite hitting the fan, taking off the roof, and then setting the entire castle on fire. Five to one that it somehow involves bloody Hagrid, harmless creatures that aren't harmless at all, and requires some sort of custom-made salve to be created by yours truly to repair the resultant damage."

"When do I get to meet this marvel of a man?" Ishea asked, her crimson eyes widening with curiosity.

"Never," Severus hissed. "He will try to hire you, and then you will never be free of him."

"How long to wizards usually live anyway?" Ishea asked interestedly.

"Albus Dumbledore is akin to a cockroach, my lady," Severus muttered. "Cut off his head, and he will still be running around like nothing significant has changed at all."

Ishea looked rather impressed.

"That is not a good thing!" Severus insisted.

"Jötunn do appreciate the will to survive against all odds," Ishea noted.

Severus just shook his head. "There is survival, and then there is Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore. Minerva would call it sheer dumb luck."

There were owls… everywhere. There were owls dangling from the curtains, owls in the cabinets, owls in the tea service, and owls in every single window.

"Ragghhhhhhhhh!" Hermione raged.

Owls were sitting on the chairs, the tables, the candlestick holders—

They filled the crevices, getting their scroll-wrapped legs stuck in random places. They hooted and carried on, some in distress while others were not.

"No, they won't go away because Minerva isn't here to take the owls' messages!" Hermione growled, sounding more like her father than the kinder and more compassionate witch she was normally known as.

Rith and Grim were snapping irritably at the owls, driving them away from their booklets. Violet was squirming under a particularly chunky owl with a disgruntled look on her oval face.

RrrrrRRRrrRRR!

Nip!

CHOMP!

HOOOOOT!

The owl tried desperately to move, but his talons were all tangled up in Violet's fur, and the owl trip-walked, smooshing poor Violet with each drunken stagger. Rith and Grim tore off after the offending owl, their covers snapping, eyes blazing, and teeth flashing menacingly. Owl feathers flew wildly in every direction. The infuriated books promptly started de-feathering all of the owls within range, driving the frantic owls to vacate their perches and flee to higher ground.

RrrrRRRR!

Rith and Grim growled at them, bouncing up and down on the table as if preparing to launch themselves from the ground up.

Loki rubbed his temples wearily. "What will it take to get these annoying feathered messengers to finally cease and desist?"

Then Loki froze, a wicked grin spreading across his handsome face. He waved his hand toward Rith, Grim, and Violet.

FfffffffPOP!

Each book sprouted a pair of wings. At first, Rith and Grim kept at the bouncing and snapping at the owls, but Violet immediately figured out she had evolved and promptly zoomed off after the owls, her wings beating wildly as she snap, snap, snapped after the offending avians.

Grim and Rith seemed to take a moment to reassess what normality was, beat their new wings, and zoomed off after Violet, screeched to a halt in mid-air, and tore off in random directions after the stubbornly persistent birds. The owls hooted in clear distress, utterly unused to being harassed via both land and air, and proceeded to fly out of the main vestibule of Malfoy Manor just as fast as their wings could carry them.

Hermione eyed Loki somewhat suspiciously.

Loki wore his best, polished halo and his sweetest, most angelic smile.

"Hnn," Hermione grunted, one eyebrow raised much like her father's. "I don't believe that in any way, shape, or form."

Loki pouted at her, sticking out a quivering bottom lip for effect. "Such a sad lack of faith, my lady wife."

"On the contrary," Hermione said rather archly. "I have utter faith in the fact that that even enchanted books don't simply sprout wings and chase away owls without any help whatsoever from you, love."

Loki tilted his head to the side. "You did want the owls gone, did you not? Just think of all the time I saved you from having to pick all the little bones from your teeth."

"So you do admit to having tampered a bit with book evolution, hrm?"

Loki's jaw dropped a little. "Point for you, my lady wife."

"This isn't right," Harry groaned, sipping his hangover cure mixed with strong black coffee in a vain attempt to make his pounding headache go away. "I don't care what Snape said was in that sealskin bladder—"

"Maybe you just made yourself immune to the hangover cure, mate," Draco said, rubbing his eyes. "Severus isn't the type to say something is what it's not."

"There is no way I'm immune to the hangover cure," Harry protested grumpily. "I'm just still sick from having witnessed people eating some raw seal-thing off the breakfast table."

Draco grunted. "It shouldn't have bothered me after some of the tartare parties father had."

"Your father had—"

"Father had a great many kinds of parties, Potter," Draco said with a long sigh. "What's one more on top of all that?"

Harry frowned, staring moodily into his drink. "Parties should never include the eating of disgusting raw things."

"Oh, get over it, Potter," Theo said, sitting down at the table. "Lady Ishea, this is Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy."

"Ahh, the other two proprietors of the Asgardian Brothers Brewery," the Jötunn female said with a smile. "Such chaos falls in the wake of your liberal libations."

"Wh-whuuut?" Harry slurred.

"You'll have to excuse poor Potter here," Theo said, smacking Harry soundly upside the head. "He lost his manners along with his sense somewhere around drink number thirty."

Ishea frowned. "My mate fed you the purest waters of Jötunheim carried in the bladder of the Harkurauk. You should not be suffering—from continued intoxication."

She placed the back of her hand to Harry's forehead. "Are either of you feeling feverish at all? Maybe nauseated?"

"Definitely nauseated," Harry groaned miserably.

"Are you like the Dahge bird? Could you possibly be pregnant?"

Harry choked on his toast. "No. Definitely not."

"I dunno, mate," Theo said. "You did share drinks with that half-giant, Hagrid, earlier—"

"Half-giant?" Ishea asked, curiously.

Harry looked up blearily. "Hagrid's mum was a giant, but his dad was human."

Ishea looked confused. "How is that possible?"

Harry blinked. "No offence, Lady Ishea, but— you and Snape—"

Ishea shook her head. "But that's precisely the point, Harry Potterson," she explained. "When a Jötunn takes a mate in willing consummation there is a merging of essence, of soul. There are no half-giants because there are no half-matings. A child of a Jötunn is a Jötunn. A mate of a Jötunn is a Jötunn."

The three wizards looked towards Severus and stared somewhat dubiously.

Ishea shook her head. "It is a lifetime commitment. Is this not so for your own people? Jötunn do not… divorce. It is why we must feel the bond long before the claim is made. It would be… unspeakable to abandon ones mate after such—"

"Giants here on Miðgarðr are—" Theo struggled for the right words. "They are not the kind of people you can reason with. I swear that I do not say this to be insulting. They are not known for deep conversation, honour, or dedication to the welfare of their own mates or even their children. They— have also been known to rape indiscriminately, and then beat their progeny until they are either dead or mean enough to survive."

Ishea looked utterly horrified. "And this Hagrid—"

"Hagrid is kind of an odd case," Harry said, scratching his head. "His giantess mother abandoned him not long after birth, and his wizard father died very young. Some of us think— Hagrid doesn't really know his own strength or anyone else's either. He means well enough, but he never learned and doesn't understand that creatures that might not be dangerous for him can be a serious danger to everyone else."

The Jötunn healer's face went from blank shock to frank disgust. "I have no right to judge," she said slowly, forcing back her instinctive disgust. "Long has my own people's culture been misjudged by others. I will not be guilty of the same, but I do not believe that you would knowingly lie to me about this Hagrid's kind."

A flutter of black robes signalled Severus' arrival as he sat down next to Ishea. His pale fingers lightly traced the runic markings on Ishea's hand as he soothed her, noting the unmistakable signs of distress in her face and posture. "Rubeus Hagrid is a man with far more heart than sense," he said. "He will make you feel bad for him even as he sets dangerous animals loose upon random schoolchildren. He ordered a violent, dangerously enchanted book for his students because he thought it was cute, but he neglected to tell anyone how to handle it until countless students found themselves in the infirmary with a good deal more nasty paper cuts than any one person should ever have. While our local furry book collection possesses both personality and sense— let us just say that the Monstrous Book of Monsters had many more casualties than fans, much as with most of his classes."

"He… taught younglings?"

"Attempts to, yes."

Ishea seemed to struggle with that chain of thought, and decided that staring at the nearby food was far more productive.

Severus, wordlessly, carved her off a piece and tenderly drew it to her mouth, which she accepted with a shy smile.

"I look forward to sampling your prowess upon the furs, my mate. Perhaps, we can find a willing elder to bear witness to the validity of our union?"

Harry and Draco both turned green, but whether it was because Severus was feeding the female healer raw seal meat or because Severus was acting the tender lover— no one really knew for sure. When Ishea, equally tenderly, fed Severus a piece of seal, Harry and Draco groaned together and attempted in vain to make themselves one with the table.

"You really should try it before you denounce it," Severus said with a resigned sigh, observing Draco's and Harry's antics with a strange sort of tolerance. "It actually tastes quite decadent in its raw form, which cooking oddly seems to lessen. Perhaps it is the nature of the beast itself, which would normally never be seen outside of a frozen environment."

Severus carved off a small piece with his silver knife, extending it outward in invitation.

Harry and Draco flinched.

Theo, however, plucked it off the end of the knife and ate it. "Merlin! It tastes like lobster dripping with garlic butter sauce! Sign me up for the next hunt!" Theo seemed to notice that a small group of young Jötunn females were eyeing him quite positively after he bravely partook of their traditional fare with gusto. "Excuse me, gentlemen," Theo said, adjusting his collar. "I think I'm going to go introduce myself to the ladies."

Severus snorted, shaking his head at Draco and Harry. "Your friend obviously embraces the new and different far more easily than you two dunderheads."

"I can't help it, Uncle," Draco moaned. "I'm still seeing double. Triple even."

Severus' face suddenly became quite serious. He pulled out his wand and waved it over them. "I fed you both the purest glacial waters of Jötunheim. You shouldn't be feeling the effects of any type of poison or disease— and that includes intoxication. Thousands of people were knackered to the point of spewing truly dreadful poetry and fornicating heedlessly in the hallways, but none of them are suffering now. What in Merlin's name did the two of you get into?"

"Nothing!" the two wizards swore together.

Severus' eyes narrowed suspiciously. "Believe you, I do not." He waved his wand slowly over their respective abdomens and his wand flashed bright pink and blue.

"What?!" the boys blurted together in panic. "What does that mean?!"

Raina popped her head up from the nearby salad bowl, sending bits of lettuce and chunks of Roma tomatoes flying in all directions. "You're pregnant!" she cheered, her wings flapping in glee.

Naseem popped out of the fruit and cheese tray, cubes of cheese and fresh berries zinging out to pelt Harry and Draco in their heads. "Oooooo, you must dance really well!"

Geir slithered out of a gigantic loaf of bread, having hollowed it out from the inside. "Did you sing?"

Itzel slithered over and lay her head up against their fabric-covered abdomens, listening carefully. Draco tried to shove her away, but she had virtually velcroed herself to his skin in sheer tenacity. "I count at least four!" she said proudly. "Someone check my count!"

Natsu slithered up and stuck her head on their bellies. "Confirmed!"

"OoooOoo!" Yoki cheered.

Lady Ishea scratched her head in confusion. "They informed me that males of your species do not carry their young when I suggested that they might be pregnant."

Severus arched a brow. "At this point, my lady, these two could be mutating into some kind of man-eating fungus beast and it wouldn't surprise me at all."

Draco and Harry, however, had chosen that moment to faint dead away onto the floor.

Severus let out a weary sigh. "They just had to find a way to postpone our happy nuptials."

"Fear not, my mate," Lady Ishea said. "I'm greatly looking forward to thousands of years of joyous celebration. What is a few more days?"

Severus flushed, his pale skin turning a rather dashing shade of pink.

"Wake up, Uncle!" Geir said, biting Harry on the nose.

Natsu and Itzel were pegging Draco in multiple places. "Wakey, wakey!"

By the time Draco and Harry had recovered enough blood flow to their brains to regain consciousness, Severus and Ishea had propped them up on their own settees out in the garden for a little sun and fresh air.

"It seems like their skin was penetrated by some type of sucker," Ishea said, having examined their bellies more closely. "I hadn't noticed it before due to their many protests to the contrary."

"I've seen that sort of wound before," Severus answered, running his pale hand through his black hair with a grunt. "They're from a type plant we call the Venomous Tentacula."

"Is it typical for that type of creature to impregnate non-species hosts?"

"Typical? No." Severus wrinkled his nose at the thought. "But that really means nothing in the Wizarding world."

"You have such strange things on Miðgarðr," Ishea commented. "Birds that carry messages, yet they look like the Harutauk, which we must kill on sight, lest they come back in greater numbers and steal from our hidden food caches."

"Yet strangely we have so many similarities," Severus said with a grim smile.

"Yes," Ishea agreed. "And I find that I am very glad of that."

"Well, the good news is that I can numb the area and extract the baby tentacula seedlings and all those strange drunken hangover symptoms will instantly disappear," Severus said. "The bad news is, I can extract the baby tentacula seedlings and all those strange drunken hangover symptoms will instantly disappear."

"That's not very nice, father," Hermione laughed as she walked in with a crystal tray of what appeared to be ice-jellyfish cut into rings and seasoned with minced shallots and lime juice. "I have also brought the two of you a light snack."

"You are a true blessing upon this Realm," Ishea praised with a slight bow as she took the tray. "How did you know that I love ice-jellyfish?"

Hermione smiled warmly. "You dream of them, my Lady Ishea."

Ishea smiled. "Your kind consideration honours me, Lady Hermione."

Hermione grinned. "Besides. What sort of daughter would I be if I neglected the prayers of my father's mate?" Hermione held out her hand, pressing a closed shell into Ishea's open palm.

Ishea set down the tray for a moment and opened the shell to expose a glimmering inner surface. Her eyes went wide. "You found a floe oyster!"

"A blessing upon your mating," Hermione told her with a knowing smile. "Elder Hakon was kind enough to tell me what was traditionally given to a new couple to… help, ah, seal the deal with a fertile outcome. Not that my father will need any additional encouragement, of that I'm quite certain."

Severus was flushing very red as he busied himself with extracting the tentacula seedlings from his godson's abdomen.

Hermione knelt beside her busy father and gently pressed something into his hand, staying his wand for a moment as he tried desperately to think of England. "This is for you, father."

Severus stared into his palm and then looked at her, emotion swimming in his eyes. There in his hand was a silver framed pendant made from one of her progeny's egg-shards— exactingly carved and enchanted to allow a Jötunn to walk easily amongst those of Miðgarðr.

Severus choked back a cry and crushed Hermione to himself, pressing his nose into her thick, warm mane of feathers and curls. Hermione radiated absolute, unconditional love with the warmth of the solar winds, her phantom wings wrapping around her father with nothing but the purest of affection and respect.

Meanwhile, the collection of baby Venomous Tentacula seedlings leaned over and bit Draco squarely on the arse.

The air in the garden grew heavy with cold and frost as the portal to and from Jötunheim suddenly activated, and two figures stepped through. Albino peafowl frantically scattered out of the way as blue feet touched the ground, wrapped only in a swirl of leather and fur that seemed more for show than any kind of practical use.

The Jötunn king stepped free of the portal's swirling snows, seemingly unaffected by the cold yet disturbed, perhaps, by the utter lack of it in the garden. His arm stretched outward as a slim feminine figure took her place by his side. Soft, fluffy fur hung from her shoulders, dripping with the claws and teeth of a great, vicious frost-beast, icy jewels, and intricately wrapped crystals. Her elegant head crests were deeply carved, much like Laufey's own, and intimately wrapped by a living crown of ice.

As she moved, crystals tinkled gently, a delicate cover of soft seal-skin adorning her breasts and hanging from her belt in a flowing loincloth trimmed in pristine blue-white fur. Her deep blue skin, mottled with aegean spots, shimmered with radiant good health. Runic markings flowed across her flesh in a seamless tapestry. Her eyes, as deep as sangria, glowed with a hint of bright ruby. Her long hair— as white as the most pristine snowfall— fell about her shoulders in tightly woven warbraids, almost covering the dark, mottled almost-stripes that swirled both within and outside of her distinctive Jötunn runic markings.

The couple moved as one without speaking, brushing by those in the garden as though they were not even there. They moved into the next room, and King Laufey inclined his head to a number of the Jötunn elders inside. A number of them stood at once, silently, following their king even further into Malfoy Manor where the private guest chambers had been allocated for their royal guest.

"What just—" Draco started.

"Who was that?" Harry asked. "The woman with King Laufey?"

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmh! The serpentlets sang, popping their heads out from amongst the flowers.

"It worked!"

"Yay!"

"Most excellent!"

"He did sing for her!"

"She sang for him too!"

"Little late though, they were supposed to come back before breakfast!"

"They're old. That's okay."

"True."

"She's not feeling old anymore!"

"Hee!"

"Good thing we claimed her as ours!"

"Yes!"

"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?!" Harry yelled, and a multi-coloured sock appeared out of nowhere to stuffed itself into his mouth, knocking him flat off his chair.

Geir slithered onto Harry's chest and peered directly into his face. "Poor Uncle Harry. He just doesn't understand."

Naseem shrugged, making his wings ripple. "That's okay. We can't all have mum's brains."

"Um, not to seem equally ignorant here, but some of us here are not in the divine know about stuff like this," Draco whinged. "What are we missing here?"

The serpentlets all exchanged puzzled glances.

Natsu stuck out her cream-white tongue, flicking it at him playfully. "Well, when two beings love each other very much…"

A loud shriek of feminine ecstasy echoed throughout the halls of Malfoy Manor. Hundreds of stomping Jotun feet cheered after.

"Marriage happens," Vidar added smugly.

"Finally!" Raina flapped her wings.

"Mission accomplished," Itzel crowed happily, beaming rainbows off of her scales and wings.

"What are they talking about, Hermione?!" Draco and Harry yelled as Hermione and Loki came strolling down the hall arm-in-arm.

Hermione and Loki, who looked like they had just licked the fresh cream right off the top of the milk, just smiled at Draco and Harry with the most blatantly shite-eating grins possible.

"Mmmm, I predict a sharp increase in Jötunn birth rates, the likes of which they haven't seen in centuries," Loki purred, carefully adjusting his halo. "Go dad!"

Another feminine shriek ripped through Malfoy Manor as a blast of heated magic flared outwards, knocking random objects off of tables and plants off of pedestals. White peacocks ran around blindly in circles, obviously unsure of where to go or where to hide or even what the heck they were hiding from.

"Hnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnngh," Hermione sang. "Go dad!"

"Nnnnnnnnnnnnnnnh," Loki sang back to her. "Long live the parents!"

Hermione and Loki launched themselves up into the air, shedding all semblance of humanity or Asgardian shape or form. Celestial plasma swirled as their wings beat together, and the two quetzalcoatls rose as one, sliding against each other as they sang. Solar and lunar light blazed throughout the sky as gaseous particles in the atmosphere charged and painted the sky in radiant colours reminiscent of sunrise and sunset mixed together in a glorious display.

"Hnnnnnnnnnnn!" Hermione sang, whooshing away in a quick dart.

"Nnnnnnh!" Loki replied, immediately giving chase.

"Wait for us!" the serpentlets cried, beating their wings frantically as they rushed to chase after their parents, long trails of celestial plasma left hanging in their wake.

Draco and Harry exchanged confused glances as they were left, alone and abandoned, with only the white peacocks for company.

"Introducing King Laufey and his Queen, Lady Minerva, High Priestess of Vidar! Huzzah!"

"Huzzah!"

"Introducing Lady Ishea and her mate, the High Priest of Raina, Severus!"

"Huzzah!"

A army of baby booklets bounced by with a small cluster of Venomous Tentacula seedlings, all making the most obnoxiously cute squeaking and cheering noises. Rith, Grim, and Violet clapped their covers in approval, still sporting their rather useful sets of wings. Grim spat out a barred owl feather, looking the very picture of innocence.

Harry and Draco stared at each other in complete shock and then promptly slid to the ground in a dead faint. Again.

The army of baby booklets bounced up to cuddle on their chests, the baby Venomous Tentacula seedlings curling their baby fronds around them in a planty hug.

After a moment's pause, one of the seedlings leaned over and chomped onto an unconscious Harry's nose.

Golden letters appeared on the nearby booklet: Love Hurts: Breaking Down the Species Barriers.

A/N: After spending about 2 weeks in the hospital, I can safely say that sepsis is horrible and I don't recommend it for anyone. Thank you to those of you who have sent me well wishes. It meant a lot to read them while stuck in the place no one ever wants to be for any length of time. Morale was pretty low there, and every bit of positivity helped. I thank you for that. And please thank The Dragon and the Rose and Dutchgirl01 (and Flyby Commander Shepard) for refusing to let me suffer it out alone. I can't even begin to tell you what that means to me. I can honestly say the world is better with them in it, and my life is no exception.

I really hope you enjoy this chapter. It is full of hope and promise for a better and brighter world— something I need, even if I have to rewrite canon to make it happen. MAUHAAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHA! (ahem)