For weaverofhopes, who asked.
Un-beta'd as of yet. Thanks for the response on this story, guys. Your reviews and kudos mean a lot to me.
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Darcy walked down the knoll, past the stone obelisks and statues of Asgardians, toward the high outer wall of the Labyrinth of Asgard. Green, twisting vines grew up its sides and found their way into the stony cracks between the slabs of heavy stone. There was beauty in their unkempt wildness, but there was evidence of neglect as she drew closer. Some of the bushes as the base of the wall were dead and brittle, but her eyes were on the walls themselves - bits of the slabs were crumbling at the edges, but nowhere held the hint of a door or opening.
Darcy walked along the edge of the outer wall for a few minutes and grew frustrated with the lack of an entrance to the maze. She continued searching and broke into a jog, fearful that she was already losing time, when she came upon a man standing alone near the wall. He seemed to be drinking a strong-smelling liquid from a flask and he didn't notice her.
"E-Excuse me?" she asked, and the sound of her voice startled the man. He quickly twisted the metal cap back onto the flask and tucked it into his vest pocket.
"Excuse me," the man replied, and he turned to look at her. His face fell. "Oh, it's you." The dark-haired man turned away from her and picked up a brown glove with a glowing blue circle on the palm. He slipped the glove onto his hand.
"Excuse me but, I have to get to the center of this labyrinth; can you help me?" Darcy asked. She studied the man while he stayed silent at her question, but whether she was actually being ignored or he was just distracted Darcy couldn't tell. A floating white orb caught Darcy's eye and she squinted to tell what it was - she pushed up her glasses and saw that the little white floating objects were little white floating fairies. She glanced around and was surprised that she didn't notice them earlier, they were everywhere.
"Oh, how sweet," Darcy said as she watched the strange man raised his hand up to a particularly large one.
"Fifty-" a burst of energy came from the man's glove, "seven," he said, and the fairy fell with a dull thud to the ground.
Darcy gasped. "How could you?" she asked and she rushed toward the fallen creature, picking it up and cradling it in her palms. "Poor thing! You monster!" she said at the man, and cried out in pain when she felt a sharp bite in her hand, causing her to drop the fairy back to the ground. "Ow! It bit me!"
The man rolled his eyes. "What did you expect fairies to do?"
Darcy looked confused, studying this odd man, a puzzle to be solved indeed. "I thought they did nice things. Like- like granting wishes!"
The man scoffed. "Shows what you know, cupcake," he answered and took a few steps toward another one, blasting that one the same as the first. "Fifty-eight!"
"Terrible!" said Darcy.
"Huh? No I'm not, I'm Tony," he said, pointing to his chest, which she now noticed showed a blue glow that came directly from the center. "Who are you?"
"Darcy."
"That's what I thought," said Tony as he blasted yet another fairy with his gloved hand, "Fifty-nine."
Darcy stared after the strange man known as Tony. She didn't know if she should trust him or run from him, but he was the only person around who might be able to help her and the computers were on the line. She had to keep trying.
"Do you know where the door to the labyrinth is?" she asked, and he continued to search for fairies to blast into oblivion.
"Maybe," he answered nonchalantly.
"Well, where is it?" she asked, an edge of clear frustration to her voice while she followed him. He continued to wander along the side of the wall and blast fairies.
"Ooh, sixty!" he said and gave a little laugh.
"You get that that's like the first sign of a serial killer, right?" Darcy asked, but Tony ignored her. She gave a frustrated sigh. "Where is it?"
"Where is what?"
"The door!"
"What door?"
Darcy threw her hands up into the air. "It's hopeless asking you anything!"
"Not-" Tony said and paused, "if you ask the right questions."
Darcy sighed once more. "How do I get into the Labyrinth?"
Tony grinned and stopped his quest for innocent fairies to slaughter. "Now that's more like it," he said, and gave no further explanation. He simply strode past her and pointed at a set of heavy wooden doors that weren't on that wall moments before. "You get in there."
The doors opened on their own, showing yet another high wall awaiting her on the other side. Darcy turned and watched the doors with mild apprehension - there was really no turning back now.
"You're really going in there?" Tony asked, his voice a mixture of curiosity and concern. His wary eyes peered into the doors as well.
"I am," said Darcy, "I'm afraid I have to. The king of this place jacked my computers and who knows what information is on them. It might be important, world-changing even. Plus I'll probably get thrown in jail forever if I lose SHIELD's stuff, so I really, really need them back."
Darcy took tentative steps through the heavy double doors into a never-ending alley, the high stone walls on both sides giving off a claustrophobic feeling. She peered down each side of the long alley, both of which seemed to have no end to them that could be seen. Bunches of weeds and thirsty flowers grew all over these walls, with patches of bright green moss covering some of the pillars that dotted the sides. Patchy, dying grass was beneath her feet.
"Cozy, ain't it?" Tony asked, startling Darcy who had been focused on which way she was going to go. He laughed at her and held out his hands toward either direction. "Now, would you go left, or would you go right?"
"Oh, I'm not sure. Which way would you go?"
"Me? I wouldn't go either way," he answered, shrugging his shoulders.
"If that's all the help you're going to be then you can just leave," said Darcy, who began inspecting some of the odd flowers that clung to the walls.
"You know your problem? You take too much for granted. Take this labyrinth for instance- even if you get the castle in the middle, you'll never get back out again," Tony told her with his hands on his hips.
Darcy shrugged. "That's your opinion."
"Well it's a lot better than yours," Tony shot back.
"Thanks for nothing, Brony."
"It's Tony! And don't say I didn't warn you," said Tony, and he strode back out of the heavy wooden double doors, muttering to himself.
Darcy chose a direction and started walking, as each looked just as viable as the other. Her eyes searched for arches, cracks in pillars, anything that could indicate a doorway closer to the center of the labyrinth, but none presented themselves. The toe of her dark brown boot kept catching on knots and roots sticking up out of the dying grass and she grew even more frustrated.
"What do they mean calling it a 'labyrinth'? There aren't any turns or corners or anything, it just goes on and on!" she sighed in frustration, but kept walking, until a thought dawned on her. What had she learned in the short time she had been here?
"But maybe it doesn't," she said to herself, "Maybe I'm just assuming that it does, taking it for granted."
Darcy broke into a run. She would find something soon- she had to. Prickly branches of the unkempt flora and fauna of this part of the labyrinth kept hitting her as she passed, but they did not slow her as she continued her run. But after a while she grew tired and even more frustrated that there was absolutely no sign of any kind of opening, so she did what any reasonable person would do and started beating the shit out of a nearby wall with her bare fists.
When she was tired of fighting a losing battle and bruising the crap out of her hands, she slid down the wall and sat on the ground in defeat. She rested her head in her hands and tried to think, when she heard a tiny voice.
"'Ello."
Darcy looked around in confusion and didn't see anyone standing near hear. A gold glint caught her eye and she turned her head to look at the wall she was leaning against and found a tiny man, no bigger than a worm, standing on one of the jagged bricks and looking at her.
"Di- did you say, 'hello'?" she asked the little man?
"No, I said 'ello', but that's close enough," she said the man with a good-natured grin. His golden hair was tied back at the base of his neck and he had a tiny suit of golden armor paired with a tiny bright red cape.
"I've never seen such a small person before. Are you a citizen of Asgard?" she asked him.
He smiled at her and hit his chest with his fist once. "Indeed I am, my lady. My kind are called 'brownies' if you please."
"Well it's nice to meet you, Mr. Brownie."
"Oh, I am a brownie, but my name is Thor."
"Well it's nice to meet you, Thor. Um, by any chance do you know the way through this labyrinth?" she asked. She scooted around to face him while they conversed.
"What, this land? Oh no, I'm just a brownie. Thinking of taking the wife to see the outer wall in our twilight years, though."
"Oh," said Darcy, and her face fell.
"Come inside and meet the missus," Thor offered, gesturing to a crack in a crumbling bit of wall, inside of which Darcy would never have been able to fit.
"No, thank you, though. But I have to solve this labyrinth, and there aren't any turns or any openings or anything, it just goes on and on!"
"Oh, it's full of openings!" Thor answered, "But you cannot see them."
"Where are they?" Darcy asked, a renewed sense of hope coursing through her.
Thor gestured his tiny, beefy arm across the alley to the next wall. "There's one right there, it's right in front of you."
Darcy got up and inspected the area that Thor gestured at, but there was absolutely nothing there. It was just the same solid wall that she had passed the entire time. "No, there isn't" she told Thor.
"Come inside and have a flagon of our finest Asgardian," Thor offered.
"That sounds really tempting right now, Thor, but I have to solve this labyrinth and I've got to do it stat. Now you said there's something here, but there isn't an opening!" Darcy said.
"Of course there is," said Thor, "Try walking through it, you'll see what I mean."
Darcy turned back to the tiny man. "What?"
"Go on, then."
Darcy looked at the solid brick wall and back to Thor. She jerked a thumb toward it. "That's just a wall, Thor, there's no way through."
Thor grinned. "Things aren't always what they seem in this place, so you can never take anything for granted."
Darcy glanced back at Thor once more before facing the wall. She took a tentative step toward it, and where her toe should have hit solid brick, it just stepped right through. She took another step, holding out her hands to make sure she wasn't going to smack her face on anything.
"Hey!" Darcy said in delight. She could see that there were two more pathways behind the opening she had just walked through. She started to head to the one on her left.
"My lady! A moment!" she heard Thor call.
"Thank you, that was incredibly helpful," Darcy said, and started walking toward the pathway on the left again.
"But don't go that way!" Thor called.
Darcy reappeared in the opening again. "What was that?"
"I said that you should not go that way. Never go that way."
"Oh. Thanks!" Darcy said brightly and disappeared behind the path to the right instead.
Thor turned to his wife Jane who had just come out of their front door to see what all the commotion was about. "By the nine, if she had kept on going down that way, she would have gone straight that that castle."
"Thank goodness you helped her," replied Jane.
Darcy was surprised to find herself to be glad over the traditional maze that she was now in. Although there were endless turns, twists, and dead-ends, it was better than the monotony of the endless alleyway. She came upon a pillar of concrete hands that pointed in all different directions, obviously meant to confuse, and decided at once that this entire place was bullshit.
Suddenly Darcy could see the shining golden castle - closer than it was before, but still it was so far away- but her vigor was renewed and her resolve was steadfast.
"I'm coming," she said, and kept working through the maze.
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The throne room of Castle Asgard was absolute chaos. Nobles of Asgard ate, drank, laughed, and fought right then and there in the middle of it. It looked as though someone who didn't care very much merged the dining hall with the throne room, and the king didn't seem to mind it.
The king himself sat on his golden throne, overlooking the madness in the room. He was no longer in his black traveling clothes; today he wore a forest-green shirt with a loose open front that revealed his pale chest. Black calf-high boots, black gloves, and tight grey pants completed his outfit. He was clearly bored and anxious, tapping his staff against the floor rhythmically and glancing at a huge clock every so often.
Three hours down already.
Riotous laughter broke out that derailed the king's train of thought. Now that his attention was shattered focused on a person across the room who had caught his eye. She had her back turned and her long, dark hair flowed to hair waist. He strode over to the person and put a hand on her shoulder. The person turned around and the king was shocked to discover that it was not a woman, but a man who gave him a huge grin.
"Your majesty," the man said.
"You remind me of the babe," said the king.
"What babe?"
"I'm not doing this with you," replied the king, and he left the throne room in a hurry to be in his own quarters. The silence would do him good.
The king closed the heavy wooden doors of his quarters behind him and glanced over at the two computers that had taken up residence on a large wooden bureau near his bed. He looked through them. They were irrelevant.
A means to an end.
He strode over to the large stone window, peering out of it, his face unreadable. He clasped his hands behind his back as he thought - about the girl, about the game, about the prize that was at stake. He slipped a crystal ball into his hand from the no-space that existed between his world and the girl's where he kept his most sacred objects. He turned from one hand to another several times and peered into it.
And just as he had told her it would, it showed him his dreams.
The girl appeared in the crystal. He watched her, as he had for such a long time: watched her run, watched her get frustrated over his labyrinth, watched her search and search and search. It pleased him to see her in his world and he had dreamed about this day for longer than he dared to remember. He hadn't expected to fall in love with anyone, especially a mortal, but since the first time he saw her in his crystal he couldn't put her out of his mind. There was no one like her in his kingdom. Fiery. Fearless. And willing to fight for what she needed.
Exactly what he wanted.
"But the rules," he moaned aloud to himself, when he heard a loud knock at the door. He slipped the crystal back into the no-space.
"Sire? I could not help but to overhear you outside the door," said a guard.
The king gritted his teeth at first, but decided against becoming enraged at the offending guard. He was so close to what he wanted and while it had him on the edge, he also felt excited for the first time in what seemed like eons.
"I said," the king said louder, "The rules."
"The rules, sire?" the guard asked, opening the door of the quarters.
"The rules, my fine friend, keep me from doing whatever I want, unfortunately," the king said. "What kind of magic spell to use? Not that it matters. Nothing will work."
The guard had no idea what the king was talking about but nodded in agreement anyway.
"She must come willingly, in the end," the king said softly to himself. His emerald eyes peered out the window into the distance, into the area of the labyrinth he knew that she was currently making her way through. "But will she?"
"Sire?"
"Enough, you may go," said the king, and he waved the guard off with a lazy hand. The guard hesitated, but did as he was told and exited the room, shutting the heavy door behind him once more.
"But will she?" he asked aloud once more, a hint of worry clouding his eyes.
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