When she finally had the wolves settled and Fenrir had stopped pacing and growling and looking every direction, she drew him aside and questioned him on what had happened. What he had to say made her hold her head and rub her temples.
Second sire wrong, he growled. Brother not prey. Pack know this. Brother agree to help. We not attack. I show new wolves how to hunt with claws and teeth, not kill or hurt him. Brother agree to help.
"You…asked…Sleipnir to help you in showing your newest pack additions how to stalk and hunt?" she asked, feeling her knees buckle beneath her. "Loki found you hunting him and attacked? Did you tell him that you were going to be using your brother as practice before you started the hunt?"
She had known that the peace couldn't last, that the truce between the wolves and Sleipnir had been an odd, fragile thing. That Sleipnir and Fenrir got along well enough to sleep side-by-side had helped, had eased some of Loki's fears, but her husband had never trusted the Siege Wolves to fully obey their alpha.
I…not know how to communicate with him. Talk to you is easy. He not hear like you, not hear like Sleipnir, Fenrir said, one ear flicking back in his agitation. He paused before asking, Sleipnir come back? Second sire come back? They pack, pack stay together.
Sigyn could only sigh and thread her fingers through his fur and scratch his ear until he was calm again. "I don't know," she admitted. "If our situations had been reversed and I were the one to have found you stalking Sleipnir, I cannot say I would not have reacted as he had. I will talk to him and try to convince him to bring your brother back, but precautions may be taken. Will you promise to at least tell us before you try and train your wolves using your brother? If you can't find us, then hold off until you can. Can you agree to that?"
Yes. Brother not prey, not to be used as practice. Brother not to be seen or viewed as prey of any kind. I give order, he said solemnly. I…what is word? I…regret?
"Sorry. The word is sorry. It means that you are asking for forgiveness for what you have done," she murmured, standing and stroking his fur one last time. "I'm going to find him and relay what you told me. We may not return tonight so you'll have most of the night to hunt for yourselves."
Good hunting, dame, he said as he trotted off to rejoin his packs.
She turned from the wolves that were watching her with one eye and walked along the beach and edge of the forest until she was certain that she was alone. The flicker of power that washed from her reached across their magic to touch Loki's and tell him that she wanted something. There was a pause before she felt an answering flicker of acknowledgement. Another pause and then the familiar spell of teleportation wrapped around her to whisk her from where she was standing.
Instead of yanking her as it had done when he was distracted, it deposited her on the other side of the island as easily as though she had stepped through a door. It told her exactly what she needed to know about his mood between then and now. She was only surprised to find her husband sitting in the shade of a tree rather than looking after Sleipnir. The look that he pinned her with was just shy of hostile and even then it was tinged with a weariness that she hadn't seen on him in several weeks.
"Well. You certainly didn't get too far," she said by way of breaking the silence.
"He bit me and then galloped off when the spell frayed and deposited us here," Loki answered, voice tight.
There was another brief silence before Sigyn sighed and moved towards him. He, obviously, wasn't going to be the first to break it. Sinking down behind him, she could only be relieved that he wasn't twitching away from her in his anger. Digging her fingers into his shoulders and kneading the tension from his muscles, she hummed a familiar tune until he relaxed a little into her grip. She didn't ask to see the bite mark, knowing he had already taken care of it or would refuse to let her take care of it.
"You're a bit of an idiot, love, but I cannot say that I blame you for it," she said, draping her arms around his shoulders and resting her chin on his collar bone. "Protecting our children, even from each other, is second nature. You didn't hurt Fenrir, by the way, and he apologized for not communicating properly. If it's any consolation, I don't think he'll ask Sleipnir to act as prey to train his wolves to hunt."
She felt him stiffen against her. "That is what they were doing?!" he almost snarled.
Her fingers returned to his shoulders, not to knead but to hold him in place. "Fenrir says he asked and that Sleipnir consented and I'm inclined to believe him based on what I saw when you…ah…recalled me from the Tower," she said, her breath stirring the hair that had come loose from its usual meticulous placement. "If it will ease your mind further, there are other spells that we can set up around the island and help to protect them from each other should any of the wolves try anything against Fenrir's orders-not that I think they will."
"You think well of anything that looks twice at you without spouting insults," he shot back without thinking the words through. He winced a little when her nails dug into his skin through cloth.
"Brain. Filter. Engage," she said, voice dangerously pleasant. "I trust Fenrir and that means, to an extent, that I trust his pack to obey him. If I didn't, I wouldn't have suggested that we bring Sleipnir with them. There are a number of other options that we could have taken advantage of, but I thought it might be for the best that they be around each other, especially if we are to continue working with them. Cohabitating now will help them to adjust later or am I wrong? Isolation isn't the best option for them, especially since that is what they were more or less trapped in before we got them back. Do you agree or don't you?"
The glare he turned his head to shoot at her was only halfhearted at best. "I do…agree," he admitted. After a moment of maintaining his glare, his features softened and he relaxed into her grip. Another moment and her hands slid from his shoulders to smooth down his shirt. "I hate it when you're right."
"No, you hate it when I talk sense into you," she corrected mildly. After contemplating what she had to say, she added, "Maybe it's for the best that we set up a few spells to allow for communication between the four of us. It would help for if we run into another situation like this."
"Do you remember the spell that Odin used to create the link between you and Fenrir?" he asked and she had to grimace.
What she remembered of the day wasn't the spell that Odin had cast, it was the feel of hands restraining her and the screams of agony as her boy was forced from one form to another. Sights, scents, sounds, and feeling after that had been fragmented. "No," she said. "And I don't suppose you'd know one that would allow for something similar, if by less intrusive means?"
He glanced thoughtfully at her before saying, "There is a variant spell by which one can temporarily read another's mind. If we anchored it, that might allow for a two way understanding."
"Or blow up entirely and link us all together all the time," she pointed out. "Which-much as I love you-would not be ideal. Why don't we try temporary spells first and work our way up from there?"
"Fair enough," he admitted.
This time, their silence was a comfortable one, until Sigyn blinked and remembered what Jarvis had said. Her arms tightened around Loki as she shivered. "Speaking of spells, how certain are you that your spell took Odin to the prison and not someone else? Is there a way to obtain a visual without upsetting your wards?"
"I am…not entirely certain," he said. "And, yes, there is a way to obtain a visual, but…" his voice trailed off as he lifted his hands and shaped a small square of fire in the air. "There is a small chance that he will be able to see us if I use this spell."
There was a question there that he posed to her, a risk he was asking if she was willing to take. When she said nothing against it, he activated the scrying spell and felt a flicker of relief when the familiar image of the barren dirt and rippling shields of power. Only…the dirt was not quite so barren anymore. There were small buds of green and hints that it had rained recently. Shifting the view a little, he saw the familiar golden armor and grizzled mane of white hair he had known through his childhood and beyond. Loki was transfixed studying the image of his foster father until Odin turned and looked up.
Sigyn clapped her hands around the image just as Odin's lips began to form words-Hello, son among them-and let the magic fizzle out around her hands. The square vanished and her arms went back around Loki, who was utterly still with shock.
"Stop it," she whispered to him. "Stop questioning right and wrong. What is done is done and we've three packs of wolves and Sleipnir to deal with. Then we need to rest and prepare for hunting Amora. We've plenty to do and little enough time to do it in. We can start with tracking Sleipnir down and making sure that he took no harm from the packs' practice and then we'll need to assure Fenrir that we're not going to leave him here. And before we even consider leaving again, we should look at setting a spell that will allow specific individuals to come and go as necessary. I've an idea about where it should lead to, but…"
Her voice washed over him and he let his mind pick up the thread of her words while adding details of his own to it. Right or wrong, she was correct in telling him there was much to do without worrying over what had happened.
A/N: I didn't realize how abrupt the ending to the previous chapter was until it was pointed out to me so ANOTHER UPDATE and you can totally thank Maia2 for it. :)