Part V: silent your secret falls
In the center of the Hall of Éljúðnir, there was a place permitted to Death, and Death alone.
There was a circular Chamber of Souls, held upright by nine golden columns. Each column represented each of the Nine realms, and within each column, a sea of stars floated and flew. There were steps leading down to a pool, pervading the whole of the room. The pool held naught but the dark ether of space, and the magical orbs of light that traveled to Helheimr no matter what they did to stay their course. The columns were ornate and graceful, giving the illusion of supporting the night sky itself.
In the center of the pool, Death reigned. She could call no soul – the millions of pinpricks of light around her, but she could feel them all. She could feel as they came closer, could watch as their lives flickered and blinked – as they finally winked out and she caught each and every one as her own. The pool was all dark indigos and violets and the darkest cast of black – gold shining beneath all where the roots of the great Yggdrasil ended, and gave way to the nothingness of the cosmos beyond.
Death was nothing more than an extension of her roots here, the dark cast of her hair and cloak painted dark to match the void over which she reigned. How the light of the souls graced her as she held out a delicate hand. How it brightened her, as if to give her one of her own.
To the side of the pool, the Hound waited with the scale, ready to take the souls to Hel's court for their final judgment. Ready to lead those worthy to the halls of Odin's own in Valhalla. Ready to leave those walking the every day yoke of life to Helgafjell, where they would find their After in peace. Ready to lead those evil and unworthy to the shores of Náströnd and the gnawing dragon, ready to consume them there.
But Death was not there to see what Móðguðr had for her to offer today. Instead she waded through the ocean of stars, and sought one light in particular.
By her right hand, there was such a star; a sun to the mortal souls swimming, one of millions. She touched the verdant light, and felt it pulse on her fingertips. Her own heart beat in time with this light. She was part of this light.
Death cupped her hand, and brought the sun up before her eyes. How the light now flickered . . . It drew so close to the reach of Móðguðr and her bridge. How selfish was the keeper of of the veil; how easy it was to pass through her guard . . .
The light flickered, closer.
Death breathed in deep, and felt her own heart seize.
Slowly, she turned, and walked towards the Hound. Her hair was black as the void between souls, and some of the lights caught there – clung to her cloak and her dress, covering her as the stars did the night sky. She felt all of their pain. Their suffering. Their struggles. Their triumphs. How their love and hate lingered with each soul even after all died and passed on to live life anew . . .
How Death had laughed when the skalds had penned her a cold and ominous being; how could she be, when she had felt every feeling possible to feel? When she had lived every life possible to live?
The light flickered in her hand. Death exhaled, wanting to keep the light burning on the kindle of her own heart.
But . . . she could not do so for too long. Eir's prayer hardly held the soul in stasis as it was.
The Hound bowed before her, and she waved the scale in his hands away.
"He does not yet fall – no matter what Mara may have told you," said Death. "He breathes yet."
The Hound looked to her, his golden eyes such a light in the darkness of her Hall. "He is stubborn," gave he, and there was an old fondness in his voice as his eyes locked upon her own.
She sniffed, caressing one skeletal finger of her left hand over the orb in her right. How it shuddered, recognizing her.
The Hound looked down to the souls which had attached themselves to Death, and tilted his head when he saw another light – scarlet like an evening sun, attached so to Death's hand. It refused to leave when brushed away, and the soul shook with an agony that had Death's brow creasing.
She held the second soul in her left hand, and recognized that as well. A soul only quieted by the presence of the first. Both beat with the same light.
"You understand, do you not, the implications of this soul passing through your gates?" the Hound said, his voice ancient in the room of stars.
Death closed her eyes, long and slow, and felt the flesh that fell from the left half of her body burn. "I do."
"He must live," the Hound said on an exhale, his voice troubled.
"And how many times have you told me that life and death is not for me to decide? That my post is for the dead, and not the dying?" Death rebuked. "Even his death will not effect me. Too much time has past. I am too tied to my realm to fade away due to a ripple in Time."
The Hound moved to hold her right hand, still covered in the flesh of one living, flushed pink with the blush of blood. "I would not see you give up the last parts of yourself."
Death leaned forward to cup the Hound's cheek with her left hand, a skeleton's caress found there. "No matter my appearance, I am still me beneath. Just Hel." Both of the souls danced over the slender bones of her hand, painting her Hound's skin with their colours. How they so sang with each other. How Death had long known the chorus of their song, the steps of their dance . . .
"Hela," the Hound sighed, the name an endearment on his lips.
And Death grinned a crooked grin. "Besides, you know much of these souls – of the Thunderer's soul, in particular. All is not lost. Not yet."
Gently, she clasped the souls in her hands, her touch tender.
"There is always a way for life."
.
.
Eir was already silent and waiting besides Heimdall when the thunder of the bifröst released them once more upon Asgard's hallowed shores.
Sif knew not whether to thank her brother's sight, or Frigg's vision, and so she settled for silence as she trailed behind Thor – stronger than she, bearing the weight of his brother to Eir's Hall. The warm bronzes, and the thick curtain of incense and burning herbs assaulting her senses as soon as she entered the hall of healing.
"Poison," she found the word slipping off of her tongue to Eir's ears when the healer asked how Loki came to harm. "The wine was touched with something – we know not what, and Loki drank all."
Thor laid his brother down on one of the beds in Eir's hall with a gentleness that few would attribute to the Thunderer – smoothing out the black rise of Loki's jacket with strong hands as he said, "Anann administered an antidote to the poison. It failed."
Eir glanced to Thor as he spoke before turning to the prince still before her. The gentle planes of her face were clouded with a thick worry.
"And yet, she seemed to be shocked of its failure," Sif said softly, her brow creased in thought. It made no sense – truly it did not. Anann had no want for Loki's life, and the curse upon Thor had been truly lifted.
Eir's brow furrowed at that, and both Sif and Thor stepped a pace back to let the healer to their other. Eir was a fiercely lovely woman, daughter of one of the Firsts in the time of Bor himself, who had seen to the universe's creation. Her skin was rich and healthy, a dark shade of brown amongst the fair race of the Aesir. Her hair was as rich as the soil after the rain, watered down to the roots, falling over her shoulder in a thick rope of a plait. Through the thick band of it, the tips of her ears could be seen – pointed, betraying her Álfar heritage. Eir had been a daughter of the Álfar and Vanir both, and one of the first to move to Asgard when Frigg wed Odin, and took up reign as Queen. Her connection to the wooded race was what gave her her skill as a healer – being bound to the powers of the seiðr as all of her sisters were.
She wore the white robes of a healer, dyed a deep scarlet about the neck and sleeves to denote her rank as master amongst her apprentices. Her belt was weighed down with pouches of herbs and healing stones, and she smelled sweetly of her potions.
Sif had never had a scrape or injury that Eir had been unable to aid – but this was different. So very different. She clasped her hands together, bouncing her weight up and down on the balls of her feet as she fought the urge to kneel with the healer at Loki's side. She wished to keep one of his hands in her own.
Instead, she stood as a comrade only, and watched Eir as she worked.
Eir leaned over Loki's still form, a golden mist about her fingertips as she chanted under her breath. As she chanted, the mist swirled, the patterns and depth of it telling a tale that only Eir could tell. "His veins swim with venom," she said, confirming their story. Her voice was thick with worry. She moved to take Loki's hand in her own, her strong fingers pressing at his wrist, feeling his pulse. "A slow moving venom, and yet it is sure of its course." She looked up at them. "Do you know what poison was used?"
Thor shook his head, but passed Eir the chalice from the Mórrigan. "No," he said, his voice rugged from his throat. "But Anann bid us take this. She said you would understand."
Eir raised a brow as she took the chalice. At her touch, golden runes flared about the rim of the horn, and she sucked in a breath. "Anann," Eir said on a sigh.
"You have a familiarity with this witch?" Thor asked, his eyes cloudy with the remnants of his anger.
"I taught Anann this spell centuries ago, during the Great War," Eir said as she placed the chalice down. "I never thought that I would be seeing to one of her victims after so much time has passed."
Thor was silent, and Eir darted a glance to him. "Many allies, from many realms, were sought when the creatures of snow and ice invaded Midgard's shores. The Mórrigan were some of the strongest Odin aligned himself with . . . indeed, it did seem as if I spent as much time healing as inflicting injury in those days."
Sif bit her lip. "Then you are familiar with healing this wound?"
"It is a curse as much as it is a poison," Eir said, her old voice worried. She waved a hand, and her mist disappeared from about Loki's body. "The water mixed with this wine was from the same tributary that feeds Mimir's well – combine that with the blood of war, and any venom from a mythical creature . . ."
"Like a hippogryph," Sif muttered, remembering the gleam of the stallion's horns.
"Like a hippogryph," Eir inclined her head. "It is a deep spell, but one simply fixed. The spell attacks the foundation of a being's elemental makeup. It tears at the soul until water from one of the worlds of creation is applied."
"Then why did the waters of Múspellsheimr not heal him?" Thor asked.
Eir shrugged, her eyes troubled. She opened her mouth, as if to speak, when at the entrance to her hall there was another shadow.
The queen's normally graceful glide was a quick clip as she crossed the healing room to her sons. Her eyes were shadowed with worry, not even the warm light all about them warming them. Her fingers where white knuckled as she took in the sight of her child – pale, even more so than normal, and so very still, his pulse a lazy cadence at his neck.
A deep breath. "What ails him?" so asked Frigg.
"Poison," Eir said, her eyes careful upon the gaze of her queen. "Anann's."
Frigg reached over, and took her son's hand. It was cool, clammy in the warmth of Eir's chamber. "And the elemental waters have not healed him?"
Eir shook her head slowly. "Anann's antidote failed." There was something flickering in the healer's eyes, something Sif could not identify as she seemed to communicate silently with the other woman.
Frigg's concern turned to stone then, her worried ministrations to her son lost as she looked up to the healer. "The waters of the Overway," she muttered. "Of course."
Eir nodded, holding up the vial that Anann had given to them. "The antidote was brewed properly, the curse of poison set to be carefully lifted once more. There is . . . there is nothing I can do, my lady."
Frigg nodded, biting her lower lip. "I understand."
"I can slow the poison's hold," Eir said, the kind planes of her face troubled. "But I cannot cease it . . . I can merely put his body in a stasis, until another antidote can be found. I will go to my volumes, and see if there is another way – often, there is for those patient enough to look."
Frigg's smile was thankful. "I thank you, my friend." Her gaze slipped over her son, shadowed as she took in the stillness of him. Her eyes then paused on Sif, stopped on Thor. "I must inform your father of what has occurred," she said, her words spoken as though her mind was far from them all.
She turned to leave, and her son followed. "Mother," Thor stopped Frigg, his hand massive on the delicate curve of her arm. "I am so, very sorry. It is my fault -"
"Hush," Frigg breathed the word like absolution. "There is no fault to assign, no blame to take. Your brother merely did for you what you would have done for him."
"He never would have been to the Mórrigan's moon if not for -"
"- it is a foolishness you have repented for," Frigg interrupted. She had reached out to take his hands in her own. His grip swallowed hers, his form dwarfed her, but still Thor seemed to swim small in her gaze. "Loki's choice was his own to accompany you – to aid you so. Accept it as such, and move forward – no matter what direction that may be."
Thor nodded, the bobbing of his head small and child like. Sif felt her chest ache for her friend, as if some large creature had thrown its weight against her. She braced her feet a shoulder's width apart, finding her balance.
Frigg tightened her small hands over Thor's, a mother's smile meant to comfort on her face before she turned to walk away. She always was such a graceful thing, seemingly blown by the sea wind from beyond rather than held down by the weight of the air above.
Eir watched her sovereign leave, the corner of her mouth hooked before she released a breath she had been holding as a sigh. Sif turned at the sound, found the healer, and found Loki within her gaze. The weight upon her chest grew, fit to strangle.
"Is there anything we can do?" Sif asked, as restless as an arrow, poised to shoot, but she had no aim. Her fists clenched and unclenched; her feet rooted her against moving. Still, she did not take Loki's hand in her own.
Besides her, she could feel the heat of Thor returned to her side. She did not turn to meet his gaze.
"Pray," Eir said simply after the silence had stretched beyond. "Hel hears all, and she can keep his soul in stasis better than even I."
Sif swallowed past the lump in her throat. Hel was always a woman for the mortal kind to fear and worship. She was always so far from the warrior race of the Aesir, who lived to times indefinite unless it was by blade they were felled; and once felled into Valhalla the soldiers marched. Hel was never the one Sif thought to meet at the end of her life.
"I have never said my graces to the mistress of Niflheimr," Sif said, the title heavy on her tongue.
"I have, many times," Eir said, her old voice weary – for she had seen much of death in her Hall. Much of life, as well. The woman was weaving her hands in a complicated pattern, and at her touch, the mists grew around her friend – pulsing and golden, like a shield. Sif started when she recognized the shield that held great Odin when he slept in his enchanted slumber. Stasis, Eir had said that she could hold Loki in, slowing the toxin and delaying his death. But once lifted . . .
Sif set her mouth like a shield before the thought. She would not think of that, not yet.
Sif stepped closer to Loki's side, close enough for the wisps of gold to rise and brush her own skin, leaving static in their wake. Thor was half a step behind her, she could feel his gaze on his brother, felt it as it met her own.
And Eir prayed.
"Fearsome Hel," Eir bowed her head as she wove her magic, "grant this soul your strength. Be blind to him, and let him fall not into your grace."
And Sif whispered, close enough to Loki's side so that the side of her last finger brushed his own. "Fearsome Hel, ninth realm be blessed . . ."
.
.
"The waters of Múspellsheimr did not heal him," said Frigg first as she marched into the Hall of Valaskjálf - her husband's throneroom where he sat about governing their realm and all others. Her hair was a halo of lightning about her in the half light, her robes billowing as she cast a shadow large enough to rival that of her husband, still and mighty upon the throne Hliðskjálf.
Odin turned his one eye to her, the light from the cosmos beyond reflected there. "Eir was unsuccessful then?"
Frigg inhaled deep through her nose, "Eir can do naught when her tongue is tied by our secrets. By our deeds and shames." Eir, one of Frigg's dearest of ladies, had delivered Thor, that dark night on Vanaheimr so long ago. Eir had been there when Odin had brought the shadowed babe from Jötunnheimr, not even seven days later. In those early years, she had been both sanity and friend to her queen as she helped with the trials of raising a child so far from home.
Odin was silent, his body a bowstring, pulled tight.
And Frigg continued. "The water of Múspellsheimr may heal a child of flame – one of Asgard's sons. But for Loki, it will not . . . He is not born of fire. He needs the waters of Niflheimr. His life can be restored only from the icy waters of the Underway."
And still Odin was silent. Frigg feared the turn of his decision even before it was spoken. She took a step forward, not daring to breach the steps between them. Still, she did not bow; as one of his subjects, pleading. She held her head high, and allowed her face to catch the light.
"And the Underwater may not be accessed without express permission of Hel herself," Odin said, his voice a blade being struck against a whetstone. "Which I cannot allow."
Frigg shook her head, meeting the fire of her husband's gaze with the flint like one of her own. "Such a venture will save my son – will save our son," she held her hands before her stomach as if it were truly of her womb that Loki was born – rather than just her heart. "My son," she pleaded, her voice catching in her throat. "My son so much that it is if I, rather than Nál, had bore him."
Odin's gaze softened, whether at her pain or his own, Frigg knew not – could tell not. When he spoke, his voice was gentle, weighed down by his decision. "He is not ready to know the secrets of Niflheimr."
"Then he need not know!" Frigg exclaimed. "Hel swore by the ichor in Yggdrasil's boughs – she will breathe not a word of her heritage."
"And look where she was begotten that tongue of hers!" Odin finally spoke sharply. "Do you trust a word the daughter of the Liarsmith has to say?"
"That is but a prophesy's title," Frigg hissed between her teeth, her hands clenched as her fury mounted. "It is not a title of the boy we have, here and now, with us. Hel will hold her secrets. She will not risk the Ancient's premature fury."
"Yet, prophesy tells a different story," Odin challenged. "A story of Loki, backed with the armies of Hel, marching against Asgard eternal . . ."
"That is but one Norn prophesy," Frigg shook her head, unmovable as stone at the old argument. "I have woven many a future – and there is a way to circumvent the Twilight while still keeping our son."
"And you expect me to take that chance – with Asgard's fate in the balance? I will not trust these realms to the role of dice." Odin's words were final, and still Frigg bristled – needing first father and husband rather than sovereign and king.
"It is for Asgard that I would see the brightest possible future pursued," Frigg said lowly. "You trust naught the strength of your son."
"I know exactly my son's strength," Odin returned, his voice rising. The torches lining the chamber rose in time with his anger. "And he would crumble under such a revelation."
"He shall not!" Frigg insisted. "Now with knowing the strength of his family's regard for him. Not while knowing just how far we would go to keep him with us."
"And do you trust such a regard to hold under the weight of the truth?" Odin returned. "Do you trust Thor not to blink twice at having a son of the Jötnar as blooded kin? Trust the daughter of Týr to still hold so pretty a smile, rather than disgust, for him? Do you trust Asgard not to whisper? Do you know your son to be strong enough to not bend under that weight? For him to break is for the Twilight to descend upon us all."
"I trust Thor's heart," Frigg exclaimed sharply. "I trust brave Sif to hold the courage we have long held her in esteem for. And I trust Asgard to be a realm of the elite, and welcome what we have called our own."
"Then you are naive," Odin hissed. "And I will not allow your softness for the boy lead to this realm's destruction."
"You are his father!" Frigg suddenly screamed, emotion a raging thing in her voice. "You took that right from Laufey, took this decision from his kin as soon as you bound him in illusion and a false name! Now, you shall honor that title – that responsibility. Let go of your pride and your fear, and save your child."
"Saving one will bring destruction upon all," Odin matched her tone. "He cannot handle the knowledge of his heritage. It is for my son, for my bride, for my people and all of the realms that I make such a decision – and I do not make it lightly."
Frigg thought of her false son, pale and clouded by Eir's charms; and set her jaw, made her eyes a shield and her words a stone. "Shame upon you, Odin Borson, for the path you would set us all upon. You know not what your actions will wrought." When she spoke, her mouth was filled with prophesy, and it rang sharper than her words loudly spoken.
And from the entrance of the throne room, low and mocking clapping could be heard. King and queen both turned to the sound, startled at the interruption. In the golden shadows, and the turbulent cascade of the lighted cosmos, a small woman cast a long shadow, her eyes embers in the half light.
"My, but I have forgotten how one of your rows could be heard the very realms wide." Anann, center cord of the Mórrigan let her voice ring out, her smile a sharp smirk and her hands still clasped coldly.
"You," Odin hissed upon seeing her. "You caused this knowing full well of the results of your actions. Your visions, your poison," Odin spat the word like a curse.
"I merely showed the three what you have naught the courage to show them." Anann stepped closer to Odin upon his throne, her hands white knuckled on the curve of her shepherd's hook. "War has a way of catching up with us all, my friend – even when it seems that we have all paid its price twice and thrice over again."
Odin stood then, rounding on shepherdess, his expression fierce. "It is not your place, witch, for you to lecture me on war's horrors."
Anann merely stood straighter under his anger. "You are not the first of the Bor's blood to try to intimidate me as such this day - so curb your bite, Allfather, for you can strike me naught."
The scowl on Odin's brow was a mirror of Thor's. Anann hitched the corner of her mouth upon seeing it as such. Before Odin could say more, she spoke, and said: "That boy you took from the ice is this realm's greatest hope. Thor is a sword, sharpened and ready to be aimed. He will be such a sun after your reign, Odin Borson; his light will touch everything now cast in shadow. But, light though he is, he cannot battle the evil that gnaws on the roots of great Yggdrasil alone. A sword is nothing against the Ancient's power. And so, where your realm was begotten in flame, so in flame it will be swallowed. It will take a healer's magic to save these lands – or, do you so quickly forget what blood gave you your second son?"
"Laufey?" Odin snorted. "His legacy is laughable."
"And what of Nál Laufeysbride?" Frigg spoke then, still a viper, ready to lash at her husband. Her voice was forged iron. "She was the greatest enchantress these lands have ever seen – even Eir learned her art at her side."
"Measures are being taken against the Twilight," Odin still insisted, waving his hand at his queen's words. "My kingdom is not as defenseless as you think."
"The reveling, muscle bound idiots who reside in Valhalla?" Anann barked a laugh. "Hel too has her ways, and I would take the soul of a plain man with everything to lose over one of your gluttonous warriors – drunk on ancient mead and the pleasures of the Valkyrie."
"All are warriors you used to fight alongside -"
" - and half are those I harvested from the battlefield myself," Anann cut in sharply. "You know as well as I that your army can only hope for a stalemate upon the Twilight. All will die; good and evil, unless a new path is struck now."
"Asgard is not ready to know!" Odin thundered at the implications in her words. "Loki is not ready to know."
"Loki is not ready, or you are not ready?" Anann challenged. "The longer you withhold the truth, the greater the blow will be."
"Then he will die now, with the truth," Odin declared, his voice iron. "But he will die with an honorable name – free of his role in the prophesy to come. He will die as my son, and as a favored one of Asgard. He will die embraced by the house of Odin."
Anann fumed. "And that house will embrace naught the blood of Laufey, whom once you cherished?"
"Laufey took his stance against all we built for in these realms. He moved against me. Against Midgard -"
" - and was punished accordingly," Anann snapped. "We all remember the horror of the Great War, when Jötunnheimr waged war with the very stars. Do you wish for that to come again – but its horror increased a hundred fold on every realm?"
"I am staying war with my actions today!"
"And what happens if Loki does die? What happens if you surrender him to Hel's hall. For he shall learn the truth from Hel should you push her to that. What happens when she shows him the cloth of the Nornir? What happens when he sees just how you let him go due to his blood and his upcoming role in the Twilight? War comes from either path!" Anann finally cried. "My bones ache with the promise of it – great Yggdrasil herself cries with it! Níðhöggr growls his fury, and Veðrfölnir screams her warnings from between the eagle's eyes. Your shield-maiden – even she can feel the threat swallowing this land."
"Enough!" Odin finally cried, his eyes sharp as he jabbed Grungnir down upon the bronze floor, hard enough for it to crack. Beyond them, the sky rumbled, the sea sloshed angrily in its cradle. Still, Anann stood to the soverign of Asgard with war in her eyes. "My decision is made. And it is final. Go back to your moon, daughter of Mórrigan, and pray that I still remember my debt to you."
Anann bowed mockingly, "You kill us all with your blindness, Borson. Heed me, but you will regret this path once taken."
"Then so be it," Odin thundered. Steel rang in his words.
And Frigg flinched. She inclined her head, silent as she clenched her hands into fists, curbing her words.
Anann looked once at the queen, and then walked to the edge of the hall, and the balcony beyond. There, where the shadows of the throneroom met the dying sunlight, she let the air take her. A beating cadence of bird's wings, and the angry cry of the raven her last farewell. In the rafters high above them, Huninn and Muninn cawed angrily to match.
Odin was still, watching her shadow as she flew away.
"The waters of the Underway reside in the spring of Hvergelmir." Hvergelmir, the river of icy water that played but one role in creation. The river that was the frozen heart of Niflheimr.
"So I know," Frigg said.
"And then you know as well as I what resides at the mouth of that spring?"
"Níðhöggr's nest," Frigg echoed hollowly. The great dragon who gnawed at the roots of the great Yggdrasil, whose evil souls from Hel's realm did naught to assuage his hunger. She remembered centuries ago, when the great dragon had been bound in the deep. When the Nornir had spoken their words, and the first step against the prophesy of Twilight had been taken.
"I will not ask my son," such an inflection in the word that Frigg winced upon it, "to make that journey – to fight that fight."
"Your first, too, is strong," Frigg said. "Thor will surprise all one day, even you."
"And until that day," Odin inclined his head, "I will not see his life spent on a fool's mission."
Frigg opened her mouth to protest – did he not know how easily his one son would agree to fight to save the life of another? For wasn't that why Loki had fallen? Thor's fight had not been his to bear, but shared blood had made him take his brother's trials as his own. Long such was the right and reason of kindred. Such bonds would be the thing to break prophesy – to let life start anew when such ends seemed infalible.
She held her arguments in her eyes like spears when Odin finally said: "I will not be crossed on this." There was a weight in the silence that stretched. Long and pregnant. "Am I understood?"
Still he looked to the cosmos beyond; more than ever he was a star to Frigg, the heat of him unreachable, but the light falling everywhere without escape.
And she bowed her head. "Yes, my lord."
.
.
Sif had exhausted her prayers to Hel, and now, she had nothing left to give.
Her tongue was tired. Her throat was parched from the power of her words. She ached as if struck, but she had no foe to strike back against. Her bruises were beneath her skin, her ache of the heart rather than that of a wound inflicted. Would that steel have stolen from her than such trickery, so that she would have blood to clean, a wound to sew.
Instead, there was only silence.
Candlemarks ago, Eir had left in a last attempt to find an answer in the depths of her tomes, with the healer's magicks that she held within her centuries. Sif prayed that she was successful, but hope was a weary beat within her breast.
Thor had fallen asleep the last candlemark, and Sif had yet to awaken him. He cast a darkly comic pose – the large form of him cramped in the small chair at his brother's bedside. His head had fallen from where he had propped it on his hand, and instead his head lobbed forward gracelessly against the steel of his chest plate. At any other time, Sif would have checked to see if he drooled there, ready so to tease her friend for more than his boisterous snores, but she could not bring herself to move. The Thunderer had yet to deposit of his battle armor, and Mjölnir was a silent sentinel at his side.
Sif too was still clad in her armor – dusty with the red soot of the Questing moon, and absent its gleam from the perils of their adventure. How far from them all that time now seemed, how meaningless the breaking of the curse seemed to now weigh.
Her hair fell in tangles before her eyes, loosened from its queue high atop her head. She let it hang there, for pushing it away would mean taking her hands from Loki's, and that was something she simply would not do. Would not risk that he would awaken while she was not at her vigil, that he would see some other gaze than her own when he opened her eyes . . .
A part of her was thankful for Eir's absence, for Thor's slumber.
His face was pale, even with the golden light that cloaked him. The shadows about his eyes were thick and purple, like bruises. The black of his clothes swallowed him like a pool of ink, his hands were a white sliver against the darkness from where they had been crossed over his chest.
His brow was furrowed. He still was restless, even then.
He would dream, Eir had said – the stasis she had placed him in encouraged it, to keep the mind strong where the body failed. Sif hoped that the dreams left to him were peaceful. She hoped that he felt none of the heartbreak they so all did . . .
Her hands tightened about his. Her palms sweated. She hoped he could feel her so – hear her so past where he was lost to her.
Distantly, she remembered sitting with Odin in his sleep her first century knowing the princes. She had sat with Loki that one night, her hair still golden, and had teased the boy for the shadow in his eyes. Didn't he know that the Allfather was only sleeping? He would always wake up. Asgard would always have her king.
And Loki only said, "Someday his sleep will be eternal."
And Sif had not known what to say to that – had only a child's concepts of sorrows and time as she elbowed her friend, hoping to draw his melancholy from him with violence where her words had failed. Thor had ended up wrestling her to defend his brother's honour, and she had left Thor with a bloodied lip that Odin had smiled upon seeing when he awakened.
Now . . .
Now she understood the shadow that had been in his eyes. She wore it as her own, as her hair fell raven black into her eyes. She tossed her head angrily, the force of it shooing her hair away from her eyes. Over his chest, her hands clenched about his own. She could feel his heart beat, slow and sluggishly, as if it were nothing more than his cursed stubbornness and mule born nature that kept it going.
Her grip upon his hand was battle strong – as if she held steel rather than flesh and bone.
And she pleaded on a whisper. "Loki, you must wake up."
She waited for the tell tale signs of him hearing her, remembering mornings where he feigned slumber as she rattled away at him. She looked – for the crinkle at the corner of his eyes, for the twitch behind the high sweep of his cheekbones. For his mouth to quirk, quick as a heartbeat before being hidden and silenced once again.
He was completely still, carved from marble before her. Stone and just as cold . . .
"Loki Odinson, you shall wake up, and you shall wake up now." Sif struck her jaw out determinedly. Her words rang imperiously; a challenge across a battlefield. "Odinson . . ."
He did not blink. Her hands tightened about his own, feeling his fingers clench like arrows bunching in a quiver. How easily she could so snap them . . .
Challenge failed, she took to threatening: "If you do not wake up," she tilted her head arrogantly with her words. "I will take the volumes that you hid in my rooms, and take them all to our grotto. And there I will drown them in the river."
She waited for a response. None came.
"You think I do not know about them – you think yourself so clever when you conceal them in the shadows, but I know of your stashes. I know of your stash in the weaponry, in the warrior's hall - all of them will be emptied, I so swear by Yggdrasil eternal."
He did not blink. His hands were still so cold. Her touch did naught to warm him, and why would he not warm? Why would he not turn and gaze upon her?
"And then I shall tell the Keeper what befell all of her missing books, and so cross will she be," Sif continued, her voice echoing oddly in her throat – it was a desperate woman who pleaded so. A woman Sif did not know herself to be. "She will have you pulling scribe's work for the next century, my friend."
Silence.
His face was so still . . .
"Do you hear me, Loki?"
Her words were useless. Her great devotion was not enough. Her home was falling to ash all around her, and she had only her silences to aid her.
"Loki?" Sif remembered her vision so, and her hold turned desperate. "Please, don't leave me here alone," she let her voice turn delicate. She showed her throat with the words, laid her tenderest parts open and naked for a fatal blow. Defenseless was the shield-maiden in that moment, and Sif was content to be that way so before Loki. Always she had been . . .
"Please . . ." the word echoed in her throat, it was a wet sound, drawn from the deep parts of her.
And still, he did not respond. She waited for his hands to tighten over hers in comfort, she waited for him to smirk and tease her concern. She waited, but no reply came. Only silence, and cold hands, and the faintest whisper of a heartbeat . . .
. . . already, it was as if she held a corpse.
.
.
From the edge of Eir's hall, silent in its shadow, Frigg watched the shield-maiden with a heavy heart.
She tried to remember if she had ever seen Sif so – if anyone had ever seen Sif so, soft and liquid without the steel that seemed to form her very bones. Frigg had always wondered if fate would be kind to the warrior, knowing as she knew that the battlefield could be sodden with blood at a war's end – and not only with the blood of an enemy. Comrades bled. Young men died, and wives were made widows to look after fatherless sons. Warring Sif would learn that, her loom had always said, but this way . . .
Frigg felt her jaw set, displeased with the way things were playing out. Her skin itched, she wished to weave her loom anew – any future, other than the one their feet were quick upon now.
It would be so easy to . . .
Her eyes traced over the three as her thoughts spun themselves. Of Thor weary and repentant, and Sif vulnerable and desperate. And Loki ready to die for his kindred . . . she trusted that heart to hold him through the worst of truths. She trusted all three with the future of her people, of her land and of great Yggdrasil eternal.
Their shoulders were wide enough for the burden she had to give.
And were they even not . . . she was queen of the Aesir, but yet she was mother first. And prophesy would no longer harm all that she held dear.
With a determined stride, Frigg made her way to her loom, her eyes flashing as a plot unfurled in her mind. It would do well for her husband and lord to remember that all her son had learned of seiðr and trickery was not from books and a sinister prophesy alone -
- it was from her.
And she would not surrender her own to Hel's realm. Not yet.
. . . not yet.
Mira's Mythological Madness
Note: I am far from an expert in Norse paganism, and all mistakes are mine own. ;)
Anann: Was a Celtic warrior goddess of fertility, cattle, and prosperity. Sometimes she is actually called Mórrigan herself, for she is the center of their three fold cord.
Éljúðnir: The hall of Hel, within the center of Helheimr (the ninth realm) which is upon the world Niflheimr, the homeworld of ice, located beneath the third root of the Yggdrasil.
Garmr: Hel's hound, who is comparable with Cerberus, I have him as a shapeshifter here, and Hel's chief adviser, and link to sanity while ruling over the dead.
Helgafjell: A peaceful Hall in Hel's realm where those who didn't die a warrior's death found their afterlife in peace.
Náströnd: Comparable to the Greek Tartarus – the black part of Hel's realm where evil souls were cast to in the afterlife. Here they were devoured by the dragon, Níðhöggr.
Níðhöggr: The dragon imprisoned in Niflheimr, who gnawed at the roots of Yggdrasil. He, along with Surtr, will be the two to set fire to the Yggdrasil during Ragnarök.
Móðguðr: A Charon-esque figure in Norse mythology that guarded the bridge that seperated the living from the dead.
Hvergelmir: The spring in Niflheimr where all cold rivers come from – one half of the force needed for creation. Now, the dragon has his nest above the spring, where he gnaws on Yggdrasil's roots and devours the evil dead.
Seiðr: Norse term for magic.
Nornir: Plural for 'norn', the three Jötunn woman who are the Fates, and are very compatible with their Greek/Roman counterparts.
Ragnarök: The Twilight of the Gods, the final battle of good versus evil where all will die, and a select few will be reborn to restart the cycle of life anew. The exact events of the end of the world are: First, the Fimbulwinter will come – a winter so cold and deadly that it will last three years. At the end of this, the wolves will succeed in their quests to devour sun and moon – upon which, Heimdall will blow his horn, awakening the fallen warriors in the hall of Valhalla. The violence of the falling stars free Loki from his bonds, and he goes to Hel to gather up an army of the dead. They sail from the underworld on a ship made of human nails, cresting on the waves made by the world serpant – who too exits the sea to join the fray. Loki's undead army team up with the Jötunn forces, and together they wage war against the Aesir/Vanir and the fallen from Valhalla. While they are destroying each other (Fenrir kills Odin, Thor slays Jörmungandr but is mortally wounded, Loki and Heimdall slay each other), the dragon and the fire giant Surtr (who has the forces of Múspellsheimr) set fire to Yggdrasil eternal. All die, but for a man and a woman – and Baldr, who is symbolic of spring and new life, and from this mankind is created . . . There is a whole debate on the Christian influences on such a myth (the dragon, an apocolyptic batte, a new heavens and a new earth), but that is a discussion for another time. ;)
Bastard Odin: No, I do not think him to be intentionally cruel with his decision here. He is simply making the hard choice for his realm. Having known of the Prophesy of Twilight (in my verse, anyway), that is the main reason he took Loki in – and he'd rather see Loki die with his honor and a good name rather than cause Ragnarök prematurely when finding out about his herritage. Right? Wrong? That is for the reader to decide.