A/N:
So it's nearly 5 a.m. and I'm still up writing.
Perfectly normal, right?
*twitch,twitch*
~
If there's no one beside you
when your soul embarks
then I'll follow you into the dark
~
He had never particularly enjoyed falling.
The memory was one he had done all in his power to push away, locked somewhere deep and inescapable in the far wretches of his mind.
But as he crashed hard into the coarse dirt of Svartalfheim, his tenacious efforts had been proven useless.
He hadn't slipped from Thor's grasp – no, he'd let go of it. Falling without purpose or destination. Not caring in the least, at the time, where he would land – or if he should ever land at all.
He'd never felt a chill so biting in his long life – the feeling of never being worthy; of never being able to rise to the standards set upon him. He would never truly be a prince – just a frost giant.
The all-consuming fear as the blackness swallowed him never seemed to fade. It rose a thousand prickling needled along his skin. Even now, it consumed him, filling him with a darkness that mingled easily with what had already been bred within him by unending failure. They kindled one another, thrived together, starting a fire so pure white and raging that it could only be sated with more power. More fear – the two becoming the driving force behind his every action.
Glorious purpose, he'd come to call it. And still, he couldn't imagine a better title for such a coercion.
He had felt outcasted in Asgard from the beginning, the reason being just out of his reach until the man he had once called his father admitted that he was nothing more than another one of his stolen relics.
He had only ever felt truly accepted by his mother – his loving, protective Queen.
He only cared to remember time spent with her in his adolescence – reading to both him and Thor, warning them, and instructing them on how to be prepared leaders. It was because of her teachings that he knew on which realm he lay – only it had seemed much livelier in the compelling soprano of her voice.
She had been the only one to visit him in his prison cell – to speak of her unwavering love for him, even after all he'd done – all the destruction and mayhem caused by his hand. He had felt undeserving from the beginning but it never physically ached until that moment.
Until her last visit.
His mind would have surely tortured him with the repeated scene but a soft voice had drawn him from it.
Jane had asked him something, but he couldn't have heard her right.
Jane approached the ship carefully. Sharp shards of metal and glass scattered the ground around the opening, her boots making light crunching sounds as she strode over them with cautious steps.
He had already disappeared inside ahead of her.
She stopped just before she reached the opening.
Raw memories of her parent's accident came flooding over her in a way that nearly filled her eyes, holding her so suddenly in place that she felt like she'd been placed back behind the glass of her cell.
The faces of the policemen that showed up at her door with the horrible news flashed through her mind; the pictures in the newspapers of what was left of the family car – crushed and scorched black on the roadside; their funeral – her trembling fingers placing a single flower over the tops of two empty graves.
She had been young back then but she remembered each detail. Even the ones she wished she could forget.
His voice reached her before he did.
"There's nothing of use to you in…" he stepped into view, hesitating when he spotted her, "here."
She quickly swiped at her eyes with the back of her hand.
His gaze grew intensely curious on hers. He bent down to place a hand against the bottom edge of the entrance, leaping down from the ship in one smooth movement. Her gaze fell to watch his black boots as he closed the space between them in three even strides. She slid her eyes closed and fought against the nagging instinct to back away.
"Your wounds…"
She tensed at the strange awe in his voice. His eyes searched her forehead like the lines of a book.
The pain she had expected came more from the cut itself than his touch, a single finger lightly shifting over the bloodied strands of hair that clung to her cuts.
"They are healing."
Her eyes shot open and she reached up to feel for herself. The sudden pressure behind her own touch still caused her to wince but she could easily feel that the deep cut was already closed over, tough skin taking the place of a raw slit.
She held out her hands between them to see the same along her palms. Blood still stained them but the cuts just beneath glowed red, the ones higher along her wrists taking the form of day old scars.
Her wide eyes flickered to him then back down, searching her hands in astonishment.
"This is amazing," she admitted distractedly, watching as the glow dulled to a soft pink. "Imagine what the world could do with this kind of energy... It could save lives."
He scoffed, his admonishing eyes gleaming.
"Your hope gives away your age, young Jane," he spoke down to her. "I've seen energy like this before. I've seen it used to destroy entire realms… ripping the very life from the core of each unfortunate soul and feeding upon it, as is its sole purpose," he popped the 'p's to drive in just exactly how wrong she was. "It garnishes the title Dark Matter for very good reason."
She set her jaw and met his gaze.
"It doesn't seem so dark to me," she replied coolly, holding her palm out to face him. "I suppose purposes can change when in the right hands."
His eyes tightened so slightly that she would have missed it had he not been so close.
"Well with you being so righteous, I can only assume that never in your life have you wielded one of these."
The finely decorated hilt of a glistening dagger hovered a mere centimeter above her outstretch hand, his own balancing the blade between long fingers.
It had shown up so fast that she wondered if he'd been holding it the entire time.
"No. But I can take care of myself if that's what you're asking," she wrapped her hand firm around the handle. "I've had to for most of my life."
He scoffed at her again as he released it over to her.
"You've barely lived. Now come at me."
Her brow pulled together.
"What?"
"Support your claim," he took a step back from her, spreading his arms out to his sides in show. "I am defenseless to your many years of training." His eyes danced with harsh amusement.
It was enough to fuel her.
She lunged forward, driving the knife deep into the center of his chest.
His mocking smile was all teeth.
"Wrong one."
It was his voice – but layered, coming from somewhere behind her.
She turned around to face three of them, each of their right eyebrows cocked at her as they waited for her reaction to the display.
Frustration knitted her brow further.
"Your enemies here will try to deceive you," they spoke in unison. "This world is riddled with dark magic – was created by it…"
She lunged again before they could finish, nearly stumbling forward as the projected Loki she targeted disintegrated into dust around the dagger's blade.
"...And the weak of mind will easily be overtaken."
They surrounded her now. At least eight of them circled around her, though forced concentration wouldn't allow her to properly count.
They were slightly crouched in waiting – wound up tight for the attack. Each of their eyes followed her every small movement.
She found her bearings and straightened, turning slowly to take her time studying each one. They were identical, each of them displaying the same scratches and dirt smudges along their faces, the same gleam in their eyes, and arrogance upon their lips.
She shook her loaded hand. One of them blinked – the others lagged behind him – and she lunged.
Just as the tip of the blade pierced the fabric of his tunic, his hand snapped up to restrain her wrist.
Even in her position, she couldn't help the pride that lifted her lips.
"I would have gotten you," she spoke aloud. She found she simply had to.
"How?" He asked, genuine curiosity and utter disappointment lilting his features.
"You flinched," she shrugged, masking bubbling self-satisfaction.
He took a full step back from her before freeing her hand.
His eyes considered her for a long moment.
"I'll have to keep that in mind."
She had already decided she didn't like this realm. The dark clouds above stayed so thick that she couldn't tell if it were night or day.
The wind whipped around them, pelting sand into her eyes every so often, no matter how much she squinted or covered them with her hand.
He walked ahead of her, so much so that every gust of tainted wind would hide him completely from her view.
She would quicken her pace each time, trudging just fast enough through the thick sand to make out his dark silhouette in the distance.
On the fourth time, she'd lost him completely, turning her attention to her feet for just a second and rising to find a wall of rust. Her right hand reached down to rest on the dagger's hilt at her side as she moved just a little faster. She opened her eyes as wide as she could, searching the shifting winds.
Only when she spotted him did she release it.
He stood still, half facing her direction. Agitation strained the plains of his face.
When she neared him, he beckoned her with his hand.
She passed him and he fell in to stride just off her left flank.
They walked like that for a long while. Her ears trained in on his footsteps behind her. The pelting sand was relentless. She placed a hand over her mouth so she could take a breath without the heavy taste of mud coating her tongue.
She stopped.
"Can I at least know where we're going?"
He didn't.
"To find shelter," he spoke flatly as he passed her. "Unless you wish to spend the night in open Svartalfheim. If so, you will need much more than that measly dagger."
Her nose wrinkled at his back as she moved to catch up.
"Svartal what?"
"Realm of the Dark Matter."
She stopped again. A sudden fear fluttered deep within her belly. She had missed it the first time he'd mentioned it, but now she remembered every detail of the Dark Elves with startling clarity – the way their guns fired pure, black energy – the energy that flowed through her veins. The vicious obsidian beast… darkness personified.
"You mean realm of the Dark Elves… you're taking me to them…" She heard the angst in her own voice.
He must have too, as he drew to a halt a few yards away.
"Your manner of observation is as profound as it is perilous," his resonant voice pierced the wind as he called back to her over his shoulder. "You can either continue to follow or perish where you stand. Either way, I will not be stopping again."
He proceeded to keep his word as soon as he'd finished speaking them.
They stilled her just long enough for dirt to cover her boots up to her ankles.
And for hours, she trudged through the sand behind him.
By the time Jane saw it, her eyes had become so useless that she was convinced it was a mirage.
A fuzzy mountain of towering, jagged rock stretched high along the horizon; white blankets of snow capping each of its highest peaks along the cloud line.
Though the sight was an amazing one in such a place, her mind could only seem to process one thing.
Shelter.
He had pulled a significant distance ahead again but the idea of getting out of the damaging gusts easily livened her steps. She'd managed to catch up with him just as they neared the base of the range.
She stayed a few paces behind him as he started the incline, maneuvering smoothly over jagged rocks and strange angled slopes. He would glance back at her every so often.
She was not finding it to be so easy.
The ground would slip from beneath her feet in certain spots, the soft piles of sand perfectly matching the color of solid rock. She threw her hands out each time to stop herself from tumbling over, focusing so much on her steps that she'd nearly ran into his back.
She peered around his still form and into the gaping mouth of a dark cave. It was a beautiful sight to sore, sore eyes.
When she failed to move, he looked over at her.
"Now you lose your vigor?"
If her eyes had been in working order, they would have challenged him.
Instead she ducked around him, taking measured steps to cross the lip of the cave's mouth and enter the protection of darkness.
And he followed.
Epigraph: I Will Follow You Into The Dark - Death Cab For Cutie