6.
. . .
Loki took the hallway corner towards a block of empty rooms in a dead run, a scrap of cheaply whispered magic telling him there were no guards in a thousand meters. In a sane situation, what he ought to do was run like merry blazes towards the guards to notify them of someone who had successfully penetrated the finest palace in the Nine Realms, and whose security was no slouch when compared to much of the rest of the galaxy entire. The story of his life had gone well past sane a long, long time ago, and he fought to not laugh at the absurdity of his situation while padding barefoot, in a pair of layered robes and not much else, silently into the blackness of the guest wings.
If his attacker was anywhere, they would be here. Already, or very soon. He bared his teeth and glanced at a tall window, beyond which was the balcony he'd seen the shadow aiming for. If he ducked out, and they were almost there, they'd change course.
If they were here… he crept into the shadow of a statue near the doorway, knowing his cover was already blown, if that was the case.
His concerns turned out to be moot. A moment later, he saw the lighted rectangle of a door opening on the far side of the guest quarters, and a fast-moving shadow diving through it. Not a whisper of breeze had passed him, nothing.
"How the Hel-" Loki cut himself off and moved after them. On his way he realized there had been a second balcony, out of the way enough to be missed on a glance. A much smaller one, with a window that as he rushed by, he could tell it had been swung open forcefully from outside. His chase hadn't mattered much to the shadow after all. They'd just bypassed him as well as they could and kept right on going.
Ice settled next to his tailbone, not slowing him as he followed. His assailant knew the palace layout intimately. Far better than he could have guessed.
He kept trail through two more passages and a staircase leading down into livelier, riskier reaches of the palace, gasping for breath when he realized the night's watch was changing guard and if he stayed there too long, he would be caught out. He changed his route slightly to compensate. Then one more empty space waited for him, an abandoned room with an overgrown garden that connected it to other lower rooftops. He slammed his way in, ready to catch up to and stop that black figure.
The assassin hunkered on the far end of that garden, on the narrow railing that kept a visitor from the next drop, that shapeless black head cocking slightly at him. "Persistent," the figure said, muffled thoroughly enough by fabric and possibly something else, giving him almost no clue. "Where is Odin, then?"
Loki gasped for breath, staring at the figure, thinking. He could perhaps barely get across the garden fast enough to engage them, but for what? In the open air, he could see the rest of their weapons tinkling light and metal and deadly sharp at their waist. He was outmatched in terms of obvious tools, and still at a complete disadvantage unless he burned himself alight with magic. Lucky bastard, in his unlucky way, that he hadn't been the target they wanted. "Oh, now, hunter, that can't be all you want."
"Where is Odin? Is he alive? Did you slay him, prince?" The words were hissed this time. "Tell me that, and you'll sleep just fine this night. You look like you need it."
Loki swallowed, quickly looking for the trap that he knew had to be waiting here. Somewhere. Few in Asgard were that single-minded, and he needed more room to move. "And what about tomorrow's night? You've got a secret of mine. I've got a secret of yours. We have business, not a situation where you bark questions at me."
"Assurances are for the trustworthy. We're surely not that." The shadow stayed where they were, a gargoyle of indeterminate identity. He still failed to get a real idea of their profile. "We'll talk again. When I decide. Rest well, prince. While you can."
"Damn you," Loki spat, and he sped across the garden. Before he even passed the tall poppies, the figure fell back into the open air, graceful as a falcon on the dive. He saw for a split second the thin silver rope they were using to rappel down and away. By the time he'd gotten to where the shadow had stood, his hands finding the railing still warmed from the thin boots, they were gone.
He stared at the empty night, searching the stone walkways below, the other balconies. They were simply, utterly gone, clever enough to pick a multitude of back-up paths, and disappear down one… showily, even.
Loki shook his head, slumping against the rail and now more tired than ever. The chase cost him dear, with no profit earned for his efforts. He'd pay for it tomorrow, in full. Meanwhile, the knife dangled from his numbing fingers while he immediately went over the encounter in his mind a dozen times, though mostly he was delaying himself from having to make a trail all the way back past the damn guards to the royal tower that he called a lair.
He kept coming back to pick at the thorn that dug sharp into his back of his skull. How in hells had the would-be assassin done it all, when he lived there and barely could?
. . .
Ago ~
Odin chose his moments when it came to dramatic display. He was not a humble man, but he knew the worth of a good show in his own way, and when it mattered most. Armor was a thing he never scrimped on, for he was often at the front of battle's charge and needed to be both safe and a beacon for others to be inspired by. Formal dress before his private court was typically an afterthought. He left it to others in the family to be the flashy ones.
Tonight was the rare exception. His illusory image stood tall within countless homes too far away to come and see the announcement for themselves at the steps of Asgard's palace. His king's robe and its pieces of ceremonial armor were not only gold, but sparked with crimson red and adorned with the rare sight of glinting sapphire and ruby and emerald chains of office. Priceless decorations older than than any living Aesir, and a signal that despite the war raging hot only miles away, they were to remember their own brightness and glory.
Odin stood tall before the opened double doors of his palace, his hands spread before the gates and his family arrayed behind him. Thousands knelt on the walkways and the fields, mothers gently holding their young children in front of them so they could see the All-Father for the first time with their own eyes. "For countless millennia, the royal house has stood watch over our Nine Realms as thy shield and thy guide. It is our family's honor to serve, and our responsibility to be with each and every one of you. Our blood may be shed as easily as any of yours on the sacred battlefield, the blood that names us your King and your All-Father.
"To remember these things, to keep them alive within us, we mark seasons and centuries as best we may, to remember what we owe. The coldest solstice has come and gone, and so has a long millennia and no few wars that marred it. War already marks our new era, it is true. But war cannot defeat us. We are Asgard! We are the children of such war, born strong from it!"
Cheers rose, a sea-swell of pride that washed over every inch of gold from one end of the city to the other. Buoyed by it, Odin lifted his bearded chin higher yet. "More importantly, you are Asgard. Without our people to remind us of what we serve, we, the royal family, are nothing."
Behind him, as the cheers rose again, the two brothers bowed their head dutifully. Loki believed, of course, but he watched Thor's feet shift, impatient. It wasn't that Thor minded the festival season coming or disagreed with the meaning of the festival, Loki knew - it was that he'd had to slip back from where he'd been lurking among the war-bands, hunting 'witches,' in order to take his place at Father's side for the next several months.
Loki scraped over a black boot and ankled his brother once in the low calf to make him stop fidgeting, catching Frigga's unamused eye as he resumed his formal posture. Worth it. Thor stilled, squaring his shoulders and looking the proper stoic prince once again.
"The trees will change and spring will return. The war will burn on. We will maintain, and we will thrive. And so, to remind us, and to honor you, the Festival of Remembrance has come 'round again. Six months we grant it, to begin at dawn tomorrow, for meat and for mead and for merchants to be spread wide among the realm. And at the apex, the carnival that reminds us that we are in truth equals - the nine eves and the last midnight, where the palace is yours, the crowns are yours, and we, the royal family, are but shadows bound to our people."
Roars now, delighted and eager. Not a millennia since the last such revelry, but closer to three. Many had not been alive for the last. Odin himself had been a much younger man then, and king for scant centuries.
As the All-Father lowered his hands to the chaos of cheers and applause, the burning reds of sunset lit the palace from behind. Dragon's flames, a bard might call it, brought on by the words of a great king. Loki couldn't resist a quirk at the corner of his mouth at the theatricality of it, and how rare it was to see their King at the center of it all.
It would be up to him and Thor both to make a certain amount of appearances in the city, for morale, and to play up the central conceit of this particular fest as being equal to their people before Gods and Death Herself, and he realized he was actually looking forward to it. The previous festivals he'd experienced were often smaller things; the ends of war and a good trading season. The last absolute mayhem of a party had been when he was a child still, and he'd had to cover for yet more of his brother's foolishness.
This one, he might be able to enjoy simply as it was. When Odin turned, allowing them all to trail him inside, he found he was smiling.
. . .
He'd spied, but he still hadn't quite figured out what he was going to be walking into this morning. Loki stopped at the entry to the Queen's garden, observing the two handmaidens watching the seated one with a glower. He hadn't been able to overhear what was going on, not with the spells he thus far had at his disposal. He decided barging in like a bastard might get him somewhere, and curiosity couldn't talk him out of it.
"Look, I realize you've every right to attend the revels, but if you're going to be a bloody embarrassment about it, Kara, you ought consider carefully." Brigida sniffed, her and her snickering backup not yet aware they had an observer. "There'll be other festivals. Maybe you'll have stopped being half a barbarian by then."
Loki arched an eyebrow, watching Kara continue to silently work at her stitching. The silken ribbon found its place under her fingers deftly enough, hemmed in with a fine gold thread.
"You can ignore us all you like, but you know what I say is true. Girl, I don't even think you've been taught to dance yet. You've a curtsy or five, and your general lessons are up to date, and, very well, you can manage a platter in the high hall, but you're still barely in from the soggy winds." Brigida crossed her arms, Mette resting her chin on her taller shoulder with a grin. Loki leaned against the stone trellis, black against the noontime shadow. The queen waited for him in her rooms, up a few steps and within, and he knew he had only a few minutes to decide what he ought to do. "But those goaty feet of yours are going to fumble when it matters most, and I'm just trying to help you not embarrass yourself. I'm not trying to be cruel, you know."
"Oh, I'm certain of that," muttered Kara, still focused on her stitches as if they were all that mattered in the world. "You've been incredibly educational, Brigida, and I am so thankful for your long ministrations. You spend too much of your time on my faults."
"Are you trying to be sarcastic with me, girl?"
"Oh, dear me, hardly." The same gentle monotone. Loki's other eyebrow lifted up to match the first. "With you, I've learned more than I ever would from any simple book on manners."
Brigida eyed her suspiciously. "And what lessons mean the most to you, little barbarian?"
Kara secured her needle on the edge of a scrap cloth, tracing her fingertip across her work with a small nod of approval. "Well, I'm rather working on the details, Lady Brigida, but I think I've got down how to not grow up to be a complete bastard."
Mette gasped in a long, horrified breath at the sudden twist of insubordination. She did it again as Brigida started to lunge forward, her hand in the air like a snakebite.
"Ladies!" Loki gaily sung the single word into the air like a bardic verse entire, whipping into the garden like he hadn't just watched the entire showdown happen. The tableau froze, except for that rising hand that swiveled down to smooth a stray hair stuck to Brigida's forehead. "My Gods and stars above, what a lovely afternoon this looks to be!"
"Your Highness," said the pair, their combined tone a titch more flat than usual. Loki pretended he had no idea they were less than enthused to see him, although the grin stuck on his face threatened to give him away.
Kara rose with a simple curtsy, allowed to be silent in her position as the junior handmaiden.
Loki clapped his hands together once as he strode into their midst, looking at each of them in turn. Then a look of earnest concern crossed his face. "Did I interrupt something? I thought I heard merry talking."
"Of course not, my lord." Mette gathered her skirts with a bob of her head, playing coverup. "Only, well, discussing preparations for the revelry days ahead."
"Certainly!" He beamed, deeply enjoying the pair's attempts to hide their discomfort. He could sense Kara watching him, and he turned to her with the same light smile. "Why, half a dozen merchant carts are already pulled into the streets in front of the palace, two from Alfheim and one not even from the Nine entire."
"Not even from the Nine, Your Highness?" She clasped her hands together with a tilt of her head, playing along better than the elder girls did. "Now that's a rare thing."
"The Dwarves begged it, some spacer traders who work in rare ores. We thus allow a few out from the deep, a morbid little place for miners where they toil in the skull of some beast of old." Loki shrugged, seeming to forget the detail and already visibly moving on. A mayfly enjoying his few hours, he pretended to be. "Oh, and how was that book you were reading? The lore from a while ago?" He looked up at the sky, squinting. "Has it really been a couple of years? I should have asked sooner. Oh, well."
Kara blinked at the abrupt segue. "Quite good, Your Highness. And I most appreciate the suggestion you made at the time. I believe I've worked my way through most of Gaimmena and his contemporaries since."
"Excellent." Loki turned back to Brigida, just as abrupt. "Ah. And before I forget, it's my duty to be certain everyone is reminded of the few rules of the festivity. Since you were discussing preparations, naturally. And the dominant rule is, there are indeed scarce few rules as the Nine Day Feast approaches, save that all are welcome. Even these odd creatures from deep space, and the drunkest Dwarves, and, well." He chuckled. "Everyone except me, as it happens!"
He watched the two girls' expressions, adding the coup de grace. "And my good brother Thor, of course."
The pair looked even more somber. He tried to not grin like an absolute maniac, settled for only slightly looking like a maniac, and watched them attempt to not back away from him. "It will be a pity to not share your company at such a grand time," managed Brigida.
"And me, yours." He bowed his head low, not quite a full and elegant scrape. He frowned as he came back up. "Mm. I've been running all around this damn palace today like an idiot, and now I'm near forgetting what I came for. Lady Kara, would you guide me up those few steps and announce me to my Mother? I think these two want to return to their planning. It's all terribly exciting, I can't help but understand…" He trailed off, acting flighty and enjoying the utter confusion he'd leave behind. There wasn't much else he could do to interfere on her behalf, skirting not a few boundaries already, but if she led him up, odds were strong Frigga would then send her off on some errand away from the garden. She had her own patterns, as a Queen.
"Certainly, Highness." She dipped a curtsy and did exactly that, rewarded by his plan by then being promptly shipped off with a handful of scrolls from the hand of the Queen. Kara said nothing. He said nothing. But he wondered, distantly, if Frigga knew what was going on. And if she did, would she ever do anything about it?