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Chapter Text

Despite what some people said later, Thor did not go running off straight to Jotunheim.

It had been a pleasant evening out on the balcony, but he wasn't a fool. The crowned prince of Asgard didn't go running off half cocked for the merest slip of affection. Treasure or glory, certainly, but after some mysterious wisp of a boy who'd disappeared as swiftly and inexplicably as he'd come? Hardly. Their time together had barely measured an hour, all told. As pleasant as it had been(and it had been pleasant), it had been all of an hour or two.

Unfortunately, his mother was determined to not let it go that easily.

"Tell me more of the one you met," she said over breakfast, leaning one elbow against the edge of the table, her fingers knit neatly together. "They say the two of you spent quite some time together, out on that balcony alone."

Thor looked up from the hunk of bread he was eating from, the soft grain saturated in tender oil, his goblet of chilled wine in his other hand. He'd been hoping to enjoy his food in silence, to eat and then make his way down to join his friends in mock combat, but it seemed it wasn't to be. His mother was nothing if not determined, and even four days since the feast, she stubbornly brought it up again and again, her smile deceptively sweet.

Queen she might have been, but she always got her way, and for the last few years she'd been hinting heavily at finding Thor a spouse -- with his coming of age, her plans had gone from speculative to outright.

Thor was young yet, centuries away from the throne, but not from marriage or children, and the purpose of the feast that night, set up by the Queen herself, had been for him to find some suitable mate.

Which at first, was why he'd spent it out on a balcony with a lad not more than a few decades younger than himself.

It was purely circumstance that he'd chosen to remain out there for very different reasons.

"Mother," Thor replied tiredly, taking another bite of his bread, chewing lazily around his words. "We've already been over this. All we did was talk."

"And dance," she reminded. Thor had no idea how she knew that, but he'd never had any idea how she knew everything else -- she just always did. It was the way of things, being the son of a powerful seiðkona. He should have expected the walls to have ears(and apparently eyes) in the hall that night.

"He wouldn't even fit your demands," Thor pointed out. "He was male -- and I cannot very well give you grandchildren with a man."

There was no shame in bedding another man, so long as one wasn't unmanned in the act, and Thor had no intention of being so. But it hardly made for a marriage. A man married a woman, no matter how comely another boy might be.

"You said that he looked elfish, though," Frigga countered. "If he is half-elf, he may be able to bear young. Elves are all the same gender, the spritely little things... And what a fine match that would be -- a union between Asgard and Álfheim."

Thor sighed. It seemed his mother was not to be so easily dissuaded. He should have expected it, really.

"And what would you have me do? Propose based on a dance? A poor dance, at that." He gestured at her. "Believe me, you'd me more ashamed to present us at court than not."

Frigga's hand dusted through the air, brushing aside the issue as so much nonsense.

"Nothing a little bit of training cannot cure, my son. You've shown yourself a devoted student when the subject is something you care for. We simply need to get you to put down your sword for a few scant hours. If you put your mind to it, you could be quite a king."

"I have never once seen Father dance," Thor pointed out. "It hardly seems a necessary skill to rule."

"My battles were different from what you will face, Thor," the King joined in, leaning against the head of the table, plate of pork belly and spiced roots in front of him. "I was a king of war. A king who came to the throne in the throes of violence and turmoil, when it seemed that Asgard herself would fall. I was looked to for strength and courage, to be more of a statue than a man, a figure unfailing. But we've had peace for nearly three hundred years now, and the people look to the throne for something quite different. When you are king, you shall have the battle of diplomacy before you -- of expanding and growing our kingdom, and working with the kingdoms that are our neighbors. Your mother is not wrong to see you dressed with skills befitting that job. To be able to waltz and talk, to be able to greet and entertain. You cannot throw your hammer at everything."

Thor frowned, feeling the weight of Mjolnir hanging from his belt -- his gift from his father the night of the feast, given to him at the end of the ceremony that had crowned him heir apparent. No longer a child but a man, a man fit to rule Asgard when Odin chose to step down.

He knew he should recognize his parents' wisdom, knew that they had ruled this kingdom for hundreds of years, but at their breakfast table it just sounded like more chaffing. More rules to keep him bound and bored, studying books and etiquette instead of winning glory and honor before his peers.

"Perhaps I would rather be a king of war than one of peace." Thor shoved his words onto the table, and was pleased by the furrowing of his father's brow, the shock of his mother's tiny inhalation. "When I am king, Asgard will be admired and feared. We will never have to worry again, our place in the Nine Realms secured -- not by tea parties and balls but by the sword and the shield. I need not learn when to raise my pinky or tend to my hair like a woman. I shall be as my father was: a conquerer."

"Fool of a boy," Odin's voice scratched from the head of their table, leaning forward, his one eye fixed on his son. "You play with wooden swords and think yourself a warrior. You know not the meaning of desperation, what it is to look before you and see nothing but desolation and despair. You live in opulence and think yourself powerful because someone has given you power. If you saw war, true war -- what it means to lose, to be responsible for loss, to suffer -- you would piss yourself with blood. You are a vain and foolish boy."

Thor glared and him and shoved himself up from the table, chair scraping against the floor, and he stormed out of their morning room, his red cape fluttering behind him.

-----

In truth, it was six months after the feast that Thor went to find his Jotun bride -- a fact that would eventually be dropped in the story telling. Far more romantic to spin a tale of desperation and longing, a story where Thor would not listen to his parents and ran from the palace the next day.

But what actually happened was quite the opposite.

It was in the wake of a gloriously successful campaign to Nidavellir, Thor, Sif and the Warriors Three returning with great spoils, that his father handed down the order to go and find Loki.

Really, Thor didn't understand what his father was so upset about. He and his compatriots had returned unharmed and with armfuls of new treasure to add to Asgard's glory. That the dwarves were less than pleased with their excursions hardly mattered. No dwarf would dare to attack Asgard. All the same, three hours after returning home, confined to his chambers, Thor looked up when his father king strode swiftly in.

"I see that I have raised me a warmongering hooligan for a son." Odin's voice did not boom, but it booked no argument, loud and commanding. Thor prepared to argue anyway. "I thought that perhaps these rooms belonged to a prince of Asgard, the heir to the throne and a grown man -- instead I see myself in front of a little boy who would risk lives to play his games!"

"Father," Thor said dismissively. "It isn't as if anyone was harmed."

Even the dwarves had gotten out with only a few scratches and some ruined buildings.

"Because you are lucky does not make you wise!" the king barked in return. "And even with your good fortune it will take me decades to win back the respect of the earthen kings. Dwarves are slower to trust even than elves -- it was only my victory in the war with Jotunheim that they gave me their grudging respect; now I find myself facing their ire."

"How are they a threat to you?!" Thor exclaimed, arms going out to either side. "What need do the Aesir have to fear such lowly creatures?!"

"Is that how you see the world? Those you can trod on and those you can't? You would stomp about the worlds, taking what you will just because you can and caring nothing for those left behind?"

"No." Thor flustered at that, shaking his head. He was no bully. "That's not what I did--"

"I see I have been remiss in my duties." The one eyed king shook his head slowly, voice and expression going sadder rather than angry, and his father's wrath Thor could endure, but never his disappointment. "I saw my son, my shining first born. I saw him victorious in the ring and proud upon the dais before his people. I saw that pride and thought it pleasure in duty, in serving his kingdom. I saw it as pride in his people, his realm. Instead I find it is vain arrogance, pleasure taken in his own strength and beauty."

"Father--"

"No. No more words from you. No more excuses from either of us. It is time you learned what your feckless thuggery will bring -- and time that you see what good, instead, your strength could beget." The white haired god of all children paused then, his face impassive, but Thor knew he was thinking. Not from his expression, but because the Allfather was always thinking.

Thor said nothing, the judgment already passed and nothing he could say would sway that. All he could do was wait for the sentence.

"I believe I shall strike two birds with the same stone. Your punishment will be to fulfill your mother's desire," the king decided and Thor stiffened, because there was only the one thing his mother wanted from him at the moment, and it was as far down the list as Thor could mark a want.

"No, Father," he begged, taking half a step forward. "I hardly think that marriage will solve anything with the dwarves--"

"You leave the dwarves to me. For the last time, I shall be cleaning up your messes. Now, you shall go and clean up your father's. You are to seek out and rescue the child you spoke to that night, the boy Loki."

"But I--" Thor was already objecting before he'd even really taken in the words. His brow furrowed at first that his father would harp back on that, because it had been dismissed months ago. While there were many races across the realms, races of great variety and multitude, there was no guarantee that Loki was from one that would allow him to bear an heir, and Thor's queen mother was not heckling him for nothing. The subject had, rather, been concentrated on finding him an Aesir bride -- or perhaps Vanir, if he could woo one of their cousins.

But that was only his second reaction.

His third was the realization that his father had used the word 'rescue.'

Thor tensed, fingers curling into fists as if expecting a fight, and a part of him was -- not from his father, of course, but from whatever amorphous threat lurked out there. It was a quest. Another in a long line, and perhaps coming too soon after the completion of his last, and his companions would most likely grumble and complain, but a quest nonetheless.

"Rescue? What do you mean? Loki is in danger?" he asked, thinking back to the boy he didn't know at all. He'd thought of him often enough. Not every day, or even every week. But whenever he was presented with one new contender, one new potential bride -- many kind and many smart and all beautiful, but all missing some spark. Not wit or conviction, nor even their ability to put him in his place(the Valkyrie had certainly felt no compunction to still her tongue for a prince).

Rather, it was the longing. The wistfulness he'd seen that night, as if all of Asgard, a normal, dull sight for him, was bright and effervescent. Loki looked at everything as if it were new, but at the same time as if it were inaccessible. New, but not his, and the duality, the mystery, the unsolvable puzzle that his strange visitor had left him with had kept Thor up some nights. He could only wonder at the way that Loki seemed to see the world.

To Thor, the world was a place to be conquered and taken, made his. To Loki it seemed quite different, and Thor couldn't quite find the words to describe it.

He'd decided that if he ever saw the boy again, it would be the first thing he asked him. And now Thor was learning that perhaps he'd never get to ask him at all -- Loki, slender, spry and sharp like thorns, was in danger.

"What has happened to him that you've not told me?" Thor demanded, feeling the first spark of unfair anger.

"You had not thought to ask."

"I didn't think you'd keep something from me!"

"I keep many things from you. The secrets and knowledge I keep that you do not would outweigh the world, my son. Would break the back of the Midgard Serpent. Of the boy I will say only this: Heimdall has seen him, and so have the Norns. He is stuck but not trapped, held but not prisoner. He suffers but has done no wrong. He is captive but has no captors. You will find him in your own time, just as you will find your answers, and I can only hope that when you return you will be more than a man in form only. And perhaps, with grace of the World Tree, you will still your mother's nerves and let me have a good night's sleep."

And leaving nothing but riddles, the Allfather turned away, Gungnir striking the ground as he walked purposefully back towards the door. Thor searched his father's words for some kind of meaning, but before he could even voice his confusion, Odin stopped in the doorway, looking back at him.

"Oh, and this time? You shall leave your band of buffoons behind. This is for you and you alone, Thor. I will see it done."

And with that final commandment, one that Thor could not break, prince or no, his father king vanished from the room, leaving Thor to flounder.

-----

He wasted only some time. As little as possible.

The first several minutes had been understandably baffling. But he had little time to burn -- he'd only known Loki for an hour, but even if he hadn't known him at all, no one deserved to be--...

...well. Whatever it was that had happened to Loki.

If he required rescuing, it surely had to be unfortunate. After all, people didn't need rescuing from fortunate things.

Tired and dirty as he was from his journey to Nidavellir, he grabbed his saddle bags, yet unpacked, and headed down to the stables. He didn't bother with rations -- whatever realm he was traveling to, he was more than capable of living off of the land. With fresh horse and fresh little else, he rode down the Bifrost, listening to the familiar crystalline beat of hooves against the rainbow bridge, the sparks of stars flying up off of them, his mare's white coat dappled with the burning light of the endless universe, the bowers of Yggdrasil's highest branches.

When he came to the portal at the end, he reined the mare in, pulling to the right so that she danced to her side, Thor looking down into the impassive gaze of Asgard's eternal guardian.

"Heimdall," he greeted, messy blonde braid falling back from where he'd flipped it over his shoulder, swinging down against his back. Given all the times that Thor had used the Bifrost by duplicitous means, at best, he was used to the dry, appraising look that the guardian gave him. To most, it was no different from his usual, blank expression -- but Thor knew. Brat or no, though, he was still royal, still the crowned prince, and he didn't balk at speaking up, despite Heimdall's near infinite powers. "Tell me, do your eyes see one called Loki?" he demanded, his mare still pacing, ready to run.

"My eyes see all," the ancient Aesir drawled, voice like a tomb. His hands rested surely on the hilt of his sword, the hilt of his key.

"Then you know where Loki is -- and that my father has sent me to save him."

"For once, it seems, you will use this bridge for a purpose worthy of a prince of Asgard."

"I have always used it for a worthy purpose." Thor smiled smugly. Heimdall frowned, as much as he ever did.

"Three days," the guardian promised. "You will have three days in Jotunheim--"

"Jotunheim!?" Thor broke through, all humor draining from his features. Loki was in Jotunheim? It was one of the few realms that Thor had never journeyed to -- a realm forbidden to him and all other Aesir, and while he shirked many rules, he knew better than to ignore this one. He'd only been a small child at the end of the great war, but he could still only vaguely remember the face of his father, bold and brash and with two eyes that gazed at him with love. He could only vaguely remember that face, before Jotunheim had taken it, and his father's eye, away forever.

It was the land of Frost Giants -- behemoth monsters with no valor or honor, raving animals in the shape of men, but savages at heart. They were the beasts of his childhood, stories that still sent a shiver through his skin, but he was no small child now. He was a man, with a man's weapon upon his hip, gifted to him by the king of all lands, the king of all realms, and he would allow no monster to cow him.

His expression became set and hard. If Loki was trapped in Jotunheim, then this was serious. Who knew what those creatures had done to him. And Thor had let him languish there for months now.

Beneath him, his mare pranced, feeling the anxiety and anticipation of her master, hooves striking the rainbow stone of the Bifrost bridge.

"Open the Bifrost for me, Heimdall," he ordered, pulling on the reins to steady her.

The guardian nodded.

"As it has been ordered by the king, so shall it be. You will have three days. On the setting of the third day, I will open the way home. If you do not come, I will not open the Bifrost again. I will not endanger Asgard or her people."

Three days. Three days to find and rescue Loki, or he'd be trapped on Jotunheim forever. He was a warrior who'd fought in many realms, conquered many foes, been trained by the Einherjar themselves, and was the son of the great Allfather -- but the idea of being locked away in Jotunheim, unable to see Asgard's golden spires again, was enough to make his heartbeat speed up, the smallest sliver of fear breaking off and rushing through his blood. He would never admit to it, though.

He pressed his lips together and nodded.

"I understand."

When Heimdall opened the gate, opened the light of the universe in front of him, Thor moved forward without looking back -- as he aways had. As he always would.

-----

Jotunheim was a land of childhood nightmares and daydreams both for Thor. When he'd been very small, his mother had told him that his father was away fighting, that their people were at war. She was sparse on details, her language softened for a child, but the Einherjar who'd returned from the fighting with ice scars on their skin were far less demure. Their stories had been told with hardened smiles and lowered voices, tales to frighten and inspire, chuckling amongst themselves when the young prince had looked at them with wide eyes.

Thor had been torn back then -- torn between the desire to run to the Bifrost and chase after his father, to stand beside him in glorious battle, to fight as gods did against the wickedness of the world, and the desire to run and hide in his bed, covering his face with the sheets and promising himself that no Frost Giants would ever be able to get past Heimdall.

Thor had grown up, of course. He'd grown out of being a little boy and learned the thrill of danger and the rush of life almost lost. He'd learned what the warriors of his people meant when they talked about the passion of battle and the beauty to be found in glorious rest. And yet the Jotnar and their fabled red eyes had always hidden from him, just beyond the reach of his vision, and Jotunheim had remained a world unseen, still threatening in all its secrecy.

Something unknown, and therefore still on the edge of fear.

When his horse's hooves touched the frozen ground, hit off of the ice and kicked snow up as she danced to find her landing, Thor braced himself, holding to the saddle as his thighs tightened around the barrel of her chest, his other hand pulling her reins back. It was only after she'd steadied, the two of them coming to an uneasy halt, that Thor raised his face into the howling winds and looked upon Jotunheim for the very first time.

It was a desolate wasteland of winter and a sky as dark as the darkest night -- darker than Asgard, at the pinnacle of Yggdrasil's great reach, ever became. His home was always bathed in the light of the cosmos, star dust and galactic ether floating overhead, in the spaces between the burning light of the stars. Jotunheim was in shadow, worse than even Svartálfaheim, which was at least caught in a perpetual twilight. The cold stung against Thor's skin, the wind rushing up against him and whipping his hair against his shoulders and neck, the last of his braid coming undone. He reached down under him, opening one of his saddlebags to pull out his heavy cloak, grateful he'd had it in there. It wasn't as if he'd had time to pack specifically for this trip.

He had the basics, everything he'd need to set up camp and survive away from Asgard's light, but there was a benefit to knowing where one was going before one headed there. Muspelheim and Niflheim had wildly different climates and disparate environments -- being prepared greatly boosted one's chances of survival.

But Thor had ventured to almost all of the Nine Realms, had adventured and quested in the greatest of fires and in the most vicious of storms. He was a son of Odin, the king of all the universe and the Allfather, and Thor didn't doubt his ability to survive even this frigid world. At least for three days.

He pulled his cloak around his shoulders, keeping out the worst of the biting chill, the airy hands that grabbed at his skin and tried to tear the warmth from his bones. He'd always thought that Jotunheim would be like Niflheim -- cold and expansive, a crystaline forest of frozen life, tranquil and quiet and lonely. While the two realms certainly had the snow and the ice in common, Thor found himself almost longing for the beauty of Niflheim. The sun still came out there, beyond the icy clouds, shining rainbow dappled light across the frosted surface of the snow, and the only sound for miles was the chime of ice brushing ice.

Jotunheim was something far less ethereal. It was brutal and beastly, far more mundane and much more harsh, a physical world of flesh and survival, not the eternal stillness of the realm of the unhonored dead.

Over Thor the sky was a darkened blue, no light able to crack the clouds, and with an already wearied breath he nudged his mare's sides, guiding her forward. She picked up her feet, moving awkwardly through the deep snow and down a rolling slope, frost already building against her sides. Druna was a good steed though, a warrior's steed. She had braved many challenges with him, and Thor had no doubt of her courage. He steered her forward, no direction to guide them and only three days to fulfill a mission that Thor was beginning to think might be impossible.

It hadn't seemed so bad on the other side of the Bifrost.

Now he was faced with the reality of Jotunheim; an unending blizzard, an entire world and Thor was looking for one missing boy. Though surely Loki had to stick out amongst the Frost Giants. And Heimdall saw all -- he would have set Thor down near Loki's location. It was just a matter of figuring out which direction to go from there.

Such a thing was easier said than done. The blizzard was thick enough that visibility was barely anything, the world white and blustery all around him and no landmarks or points of light to go by. He flicked a lode stone into the snow at the site of where he'd been deposited. Three days. Three days and he would have to return here, whether he'd achieved what he'd come for or not.

Thor was unaccustomed to failure, though, and with that in mind he urged Druna forward, the two of them making slow but steady progress through the storm.

Without the sun it was impossible to say how much time had passed. Searching through the barren landscape it felt like an eternity, his Aesir skin used to golden light and fair breezes, used to the eternal scent of sweet spring in endless bloom, not this ravaging winter, a chill deeper than any other in the Nine Realms. He thought he could stand it better if he had greater visibility, but when the storm died down he changed that estimation. Even able to see better, all he could make out were endless plains of slate rock and snow and the distant mountainous glaciers at the horizon's edge. There was no life here, no light, no break in the clouds and no green birth to be found creeping through the ice. When they came upon a stream, Thor had to shatter the frozen surface to allow Druna to drink, and even then she wickered in discomfort at the cold.

"Tis a miserable place," Thor agreed softly, rubbing a hand through the white hair on her broad neck, her stout legs steady at the water's edge. Her long tail flicked back and forth at the snow crystals that fell upon her coat.

"I cannot imagine how any would have survived here long," Thor continued, talking to his horse in lieu of other companionship, too used to the company of others and disliking the emptiness of this place. "None but Frost Giants live here, and I would gladly leave them to it."

He glanced up at the sky, uncertain of how to determine time without a sun. He thought that he could perceive the direction of the low blue light that permeated the clouds, lower down now than when he first arrived, and that meant he was near sunset. Three sunsets. That was all he had to find Loki, and it hadn't taken him long at all to know that this was no world to envy. He couldn't imagine what it would be like to be trapped here, to be kept in captivity by the Jotnar, the monsters of his childhood. Thor thought briefly of the feast months ago and Loki, so strange and different and fascinating. He thought of the quicksilver expressions that had darted over the delicate features of the other boy, the darkness that had flashed behind brighter eyes and the merry secrets that had danced just beyond Thor's reach. The prince frowned.

"Come, Druna," he murmured to his mare, pulling himself back up into her saddle. "We have little time."

Who knew how long Loki had been trapped in this wasteland? No wonder the boy had been so reticent to speak true to him, though Thor wondered if there was perhaps a curse in place -- after all, why return here? Perhaps the Jotnar held something dear hostage, a family member, or some treasured gem. Perhaps they'd taken Loki's heart and placed it inside a box, or sewn the cuttings of his hair into a doll. Magic was a strange and wily thing, one that Thor did not claim to understand.

The fact of the matter was that something bound Loki here and Thor had come to save him, and resolute that he would not fail in that, the prince urged his steed up the embankment, her hooves making slow progress over the slippery ground.

Thor structured their search in something like a spiral. Heimdall would have placed him near Loki's prison, so Thor could not risk going straight one way and ending up moving away from wherever it was he was meant to go. He held the lode stone's companion in his hand and kept the pull of its direction to his left, steering Druna ever outward in wide circles, snow building in the thick of his beard.

Near the end of the first day a heavy blizzard set in, covering even the meager light of whatever sun dared grace this world. The clouds were so thick, so dense, that all the landscape seemed drenched in pitch, vanished from sight and cast into shadow. He pulled a small stone from his pack, round and smooth and perfectly spherical -- a magelight, and the heat of his hand stirred it to life, emitted a faint golden light.

Thor kept going as long as he dared, but soon there was nothing, not even the dim blue glow off of the surface of the snow, the world gone blank and hollow. The wind howled desperately all around him, snow flecking past at great speed, but invisible until his beleaguered magelight illuminated it. Jotunheim was vast and wide open in all directions, but hidden by the darkness. Thor could imagine all kinds of creatures lurking in that space, watching from beyond the tiny circle of his existence, where his light ended, and while fear was something he'd long put to childhood, the feeling made him uneasy. He felt his back itch at its bareness, at the feeling of imagined(or he hoped they were imagined) eyes upon him.

In the end, however, it was the darkness that saved him.

He would have never seen the dim light of the frostfire during the day, hidden behind a ridge of rock and mostly obscured. It barely cast a haloed glow around the edges of the ridge, and Thor saw it only because there was nothing else to see. In the absolute dark, even the faintest light seemed powerful.

He stowed his magelight back in the saddlebag and pulled Druna sharply to the right.

The storm had died down considerably then, though the darkness prevailed, and it was easier to navigate his way around the ridge, following the lower snow plane to where the dark rock jutted out of the ground. On the other side, Thor's eyes widened, seeing before him, for the first time, the Jotnar. Frost Giants.

There were about ten of them milling around a frostfire burning on some petrified wood, the dark blue light flickering around the cleared area of their camp -- or their home, Thor amended, seeing two entrances into the rock, natural caves that had been further carved to be made livable. The giants themselves were as huge as tales told, easily twice the height of a man, and their bodies were mottled shades of blue, ranging from dark to light, from greyish to almost cobalt. Across their skin were slung scar lines, though the stories said they weren't scars at all but in-born, the ridges marked by the frost that the giants could call upon and summon ice into their hands. Mage lines, a magic bound to this world and gifted only to her children.

One or two of the giants had hair, but most sported bony ridges, plates jutting out from their skulls and down the backs of their heads. And even from a distance, Thor could see the blood red of their eyes when they came to rest on the young prince, and motion around the camp slowly ceased, the Jotnar one by one coming to a halt to look at the Aesir in their midst.

They didn't attack, though.

Thor firmed his jaw, swallowing back any hesitance, and he felt the hum of Mjolnir against his hip, her song telling him of glory, of battle, telling him he had nothing to fear, and he didn't. He was a prince, sent here by a king, and even if the monsters attacked him they'd face the dead star heat of Mjolnir's uru surface -- a force that few could withstand. Thor had been trained by the Einherjar themselves, was the son of the Allfather, and whatever hesitance he felt, he knew it could be nothing compared to how Loki felt, trapped here with these animals.

The thought sat sour at the base of his stomach and he urged Druna forward, the proud mare prancing over the bare rock, hooves clapping hard against the slate, echoing as he approached the light of the frostfire. Thor reached down to grasp Mjolnir's handle, pulling her up to bare and thrusting her out towards his enemies when he pulled Druna to a halt in front of their camp.

"I am Thor, crowned prince of Asgard, and I have been sent here by Odin Allfather, Odin Giantslayer, to rescue the Aesir you hold imprisoned." Mjolnir didn't waver, nor did Thor's eyes, only Druna's feet pacing slightly beneath him. "You will bring him to me or tell me who has him."

The command came out smoothly and unjarred, and in the empty wilderness it seemed to echo impressively, carrying with it all the authority of Asgard's golden throne. Thor waited for them to fight or to acquiesce, those two the only options that Thor saw before them. He was surprised when nothing happened at all. The giants watched him and he watched them, red eyes meeting blue, and Thor was glad to say that he saw wariness there, saw the way their dull gazes landed on Mjolnir's singing metal before they flicked back up to the prince's face, and none dared to attack.

Finally, though, one of them moved forward, horns protruding from his head, flaking keratin and a thin skin, curling up from his temples. His face seemed old and weathered and his nose hooked, as vile and villainous as a creature could look, and Thor tightened his grip on the hammer's handle.

"We have not seen an Aesir in many years, good prince." The inflection fell strange upon the words, full of things that Thor didn't know, nor wished to, though he felt the distraction of curiosity. "Not since the great war between our peoples."

Thor's brow furrowed.

"You lie," he accused without thought. "I have seen him. Perhaps he is of elfish blood?" Loki had claimed not to be, but Loki had hidden many things, it turned out. "Heimdall himself has seen him here, and I have been sent to retrieve him. You will give him to me or you will feel my wrath, and believe me when I tell you that it is worthy of the name Thor."

"Oh, I have no doubt of your brutality, Odinson," the Jotun said, voice still strangely slick, and Thor expected hate or a sneer there, not a flickered look of amusement. "It runs in your blood. But I can no more give you some imagined hostage than I could give you the wind. Your guardian must have...misseen."

"Heimdall is never wrong, Jotun," Thor replied, warning in his tone. He kept his arm out, kept the threat of Mjolnir there and visible. He pursed his lips. "The boy," he said finally, perhaps haltingly. "He said--... He said that his name was Loki."

And at that, the giant's eyes widened with recognition, and after a moment he laughed, as if Thor had told some kind of joke.

"What?" Thor demanded, brow furrowed in a scowl. "What do you mock?!"

"Nothing, my prince," the Jotun replied, still chuckling. "I shall fetch you your...Aesir."

He bowed then, an obvious mockery that made Thor growl, lowering Mjolnir, knowing he was missing something here but having no clue as to what. Druna shifted under him, shoes scraping the slate rock, and Thor steadied her with the reins, watching the Jotnar move around and talk amongst them, throwing him distrustful looks that he gladly returned. Despite all his threats, he was loathe to engage in violence. His father hadn't actually said anything, but Thor knew that to open hostilities with the Frost Giants would not be in Asgard's best interests. He was as reticent to start a fight as they, and he suspected that they knew that. Perhaps why he'd been treated in such a casual manner.

A moment later another Jotun came from one of the caves, dragging what appeared to be a child with him-- no, not a child. The boy was dwarfed next to the giants, but he didn't have a child's features, didn't have that look of growth yet to come. He was actually almost Thor's size, looked fully grown, but just as blue as the other Jotnar around him. A runt. A Jotun runt, with slender golden horns jutting up from dark hair.

The runt was squirming and twisting, arguing with quickly spat words, trying to yank his wrist from the great hand encompassing it, but to no avail. His skinny limbs were no match for the titanic strength of the monstrous creature pulling him along. When the giant got close he threw the runt forward, the smaller Jotun stumbling and coming to a stop next to Druna's side.

It was a heartbeat later that the runt lifted his head to look at Thor, and his red eyes widened hugely, going round, black pupils dilated in the darkness, and he went stock still.

Thor stared at him for a moment, then looked up at the older giant.

"What is this?" the prince asked.

"You demanded Loki," the Jotun replied with an infuriating smile. He gestured to the runt. "This is Loki."

Thor scowled.

"This is not Loki. Not the one I seek."

"I am afraid this is the only Loki we have to offer you, Aesir--"

"The one I search for is no Jotun runt--!"

"Oh do shut your mouth," the runt hissed, and Thor wasn't expecting that. He looked back down at the little beast, a poorly cut, poorly tanned hide wrapped around skinny shoulders, dark hair pooling around the curve of his neck and curled into a low braid, messy and the ends crystallized with frost.

"What?" Thor asked, baffled.

"You have no idea, do you? You are a buffoon," the runt snarled, looking up at him, its skinny fangs bared. Thor thought on a full sized Jotun the expression might have been threatening, but he had nothing to fear from such a little monster. Even the other Jotnar, who knew well enough that Mjolnir could end them, seemed to regard the runt as pathetic.

"Do you know to whom you speak?" Thor demanded, unwilling to be insulted so by such a meager thing.

"It is you who lacks understanding, not I!" the runt yelled back, leaning forward slightly, red eyes murderous. "I cannot believe you-- What are you even doing here?"

"I have come to rescue the one called Loki--"

The runt interrupted him again, laughing cruel and sharp, shaking his head. Long hair slipped over his shoulders, dangling around his chin, uncombed and uncared for, and Thor couldn't help but notice how prominent the little beast's bones were, jutting up from under pale blue skin.

"Rescue? You are even thicker than I thought... There is no one here to rescue," it said, shaking its head.

"I was told by my father--" he started, but was cut off again. He couldn't remember the last time he'd been treated with such impertinence.

"Surely this is some jest of the Allfather... A punishment, perhaps, for sneaking into his shining realm." The runt snorted. "You came here for nothing, Prince of the Aesir. Go home. Go back to your golden spires and lavish feasts. Go back to your drink and your brawl and forget about Loki Liesmith."

"I will not!" Thor shouted back, offended at the very notion of abandoning a quest, of leaving Loki to this heartless world. Druna stamped her hooves under him, feeling his agitation. "I have come here to find Loki and I will not leave until I have done so."

"You have done so, you foolish creature." The runt threw his arms out to either side, anger seething in those blood red eyes, but Thor felt a similar frustration at this game, this obvious mockery.

He held Mjolnir aloft in threat, willing to book it no longer.

"The Loki I seek is Aesir!"

"Must you always mistake my race?!" the runt yelled back, bright and sharp. "I am no elf. I am no Aesir. I am no mortal or dwarf or whatever other race you might think to pick for me! Face it, Highness -- you have traveled far for a Jotun runt. You must prepare yourself to be as disappointed as I was when visiting your world."

Thor blinked, his eyes wide and Mjolnir still hefted above him.

Ljósálfar.

It was what Thor had teased Loki with so at the feast, had enjoyed the way it made the other boy's face contort in a distasteful grimace, the way it set him on edge and kept him from retreating behind a shield of indifference. At the time it had been merely amusing, but he had also enjoyed the way it had played at the beat of his heart, the way it had stirred that age old lust of men, of warriors such as he.

None could know of that except for Loki, and when he looked down from Druna's back he saw that same anger there, that haughty hate, as if Thor's mere existence, the temerity of his heedless words, offended him. And it probably did.

He'd just acted a fool. More than that.

He lowered Mjolnir from where he'd hefted her, let her gentle song fade from his ears, his thumb pressing tight into the bindings of the leather wrapped around her handle. He lowered her and let his hand dangle by his thigh, by the barrel of Druna's chest, unwilling to holster her here, in front of such villains, but knowing now that his was not the place to threaten.

"...Loki?" he asked, a part of him still disbelieving, because it wasn't true. Couldn't be true. It didn't make sense. The beautiful, well spoken, dignified young man that had so easily slipped away from him was no Frost Giant. No ice hearted monster. No killer of babes, consumer of bones.

"Yes, you fool," the runt--Loki, hissed. His dark eyes, set in the red, darted around, as if willing to truly look. Then he gestured away, the movement quick and understated. "Now get out of here."

"But I--"

"Do you truly think to rescue me? From what, pray tell? Go home, Thor. I had the grace to leave your world when my time was up, now you show me the same courtesy."

"My time is not up," Thor replied, still feeling somewhat numbed. "I have three days."

"Norns curse you, go! You're doing me no favors!" Loki spoke louder this time, gestured more firmly, and Druna was a war horse but she was no fool. She danced a few cautious steps away from the Jotun's claw tipped fingers, black ice clinging to their edges. Thor's hands flew up to steady her, pulling on the line of her reins, feeling her prance beneath him, but his eyes didn't leave Loki's face.

He could see it now, if he looked closely, if he looked beyond the strange lines under the runt's skin, if he looked around the curve of the blue and imagined the silver light of Asgard's moon.

If he wished away the Jotun between him and Loki.

There was the spark, there was the heat. There was the face that had rolled its eyes so elegantly, the hair that had curled at the base of the neck, though now longer, braided. There was the boy that called him oaf and looked at him with such sadness when he'd run from the balcony, like he hadn't wanted to go at all.

The boy who wasn't a boy at all but a Jotun, a monster of frost and blood, a beast of angry waste and endless war, lacking in honor or grace. A savage thing barely better than an animal, and Thor thought of Loki's hands, thought of his cold, cold fingers and the feel of them against his lips. He thought of breathing onto them, breathing out a piece of himself and feeling it sink into flesh that felt frostbitten. He thought of his lips against the flesh of a Frost Giant.

His expression darkened.

"Deceiver," he said, but the accusation lacked the volume it deserved. Stuck in his throat.

Loki rolled his eyes just like he should, just like Thor remembered, but stained red, bathed in strange blood unfamiliar to him. Like something perfect tarnished. Like the golden halls of Asgard smeared with the excrement of bulls. It was ugly. An act of blasphemy.

"I should kill you," Thor said, and it was meant to be powerful, meant to be a threat, but it came out almost breathless, as if this discovery had knocked Thor from his feet, and he felt a bit like it had. His hand tightened around the reins enough to sting, and Mjolnir shivered in his other palm. "How dare you trespass in the home of gods!"

"As you trespass here?"

"I am a prince! I may go where I please -- this realm is defeated. You lay beneath us."

"You are a fool and a braggart. Are you done lording your father's victory over us, princeling? Vain little bird that flew too far from home. Fly home to your father and your shining city. What claim have you here? None to Loki, that I can tell you now. Your quest is a failure before you've even started, so fly away home--"

A thick hand came to cover Loki's mouth, eclipsing most of his face. The giant behind him was huge in comparison, huge to Thor as well, and though Loki glared at him balefully his voice was stilled, the giant's other arm coming around Loki's body, as if to restrain him.

"Ignore the child," the Jotun said, though it sounded more like a demand, as if he was unused to using his voice for anything else. Loki clawed at the hand, leaving angry marks, but the giant was unperturbed. "If he has trespassed, you are welcome to take it out on his hide. Or take him to your people for his punishment."

Loki's eyes widened and he clawed a bit more frantically.

"His life means nothing to you?" Thor asked, surprised and feeling a strange queasiness.

"He is no child of mine. A runt that has been dogging my tribe's footsteps since we skirted near to Utgarde. You would be doing me a kindness -- and I hardly invite the wrath of Asgard down upon my kith and kin. He is young and foolish. I remember the heat of Odin's fury and the memory tires me. If it is his life you want, it is yours." The giant shoved Loki forward, hands still tight on his form, and a fire burned in Loki's eyes, staring up at Thor as if to burn through him.

Thor remained still, considered the offer, staring down at the runt, at the wild mess of Loki's wind stirred hair, at the frost that caught in his eyelashes. Black strands shifted like cobwebs, interleaving as the cold winter wind blew harder, tugged at the edge of Loki's fur as it tugged hard at Thor's cloak, but the wet light of Loki's eyes remained unmoving, unblinking, stiller than stone, unforgiving as ash.

Thor's jaw clenched and he shook his head.

"...I will take my leave. I am...sorry, for my disturbance." It hit him only a second later how absurd it was to apologize to a Frost Giant, but he was too thrown off to take it back. He looked back down at Loki, who was thrown from the giant's hold, and he winked through the snow, disappearing and reappearing a moment later on the ridge, his claws scratching on stone as he perched there. A sorcerer then. That was how he got into Asgard, how he had changed his features.

Thor frowned.

Without another word he turned Druna away, pulled her head to one side and steered her away, hooves clattering over the bare stone until they cleared the camp and entered the snow banks. Thor's mind was a maze, an endless loop of sounds and surprise, and he fought to clear it, to figure his way out around the anger and betrayal and the humiliation of being so fooled. So shamed, and in front of the eyes of enemies.

Shamed by some runt that even the Frost Giants sneered down at.

Thor winced.

Ahead of him was a copse of stone trees, thin trunks spread out and leaving a lonely looking forest, but it would be good enough to bed down in for the night. He had no option but to wait for Heimdall to reopen the Bifrost -- and until then, he was stuck here. Stuck in some foreign land, in the land of his childhood stories and childhood nightmares, somehow awful and underwhelming at the same time. Stuck with the embarrassment of having been tricked by a trickster, a weakling and coward who had used magic, used women's seiðr to fool him.

Thor scowled, nose wrinkling and pride stung. And the worst part was that he was certain that his father knew. That his shame was public, and just as bad, his father had sent him here anyway, to make him face it. To humble him.

But Thor didn't feel humbled. He felt hurt.

Betrayed.

The memory of the night of the feast flashed frost fast by his eyes, Loki's surprise at the kiss, the coldness of the hands in his, and he thought, imagined, fingers turning monstrous and blue within his own.

Wincing, Thor dismounted, leading Druna into the copse, pulling the reins over her head and tying her to the unmoving branch of a tree. He sighed and placed his hands against her sides, looking up at the eternally snowing sky, dark and moonless as the world settled into night.

One sunset gone.

Chapter Text

The trees of Jotunheim bore no resemblance to the forests of Asgard, the unbroken wilderness that ran around the edge of the Realm Eternal, intertwining greenery, speckled with the dust of stars, at the crown of Yggdrasil's great boughs. The copse that Thor settled in that night was nothing like that, nothing like the warmth that Thor associated with the soft green, the sunlight that spilled and dappled over the fragile fibers of leaves and grass, stirred by gentle winds.

These trees were tall and spindly, sparse in their distribution, and their trunks were as hard and grey as stone. Branches thin as bone stretched out at odd and irregular angles, skeleton twists of twigs that sprung leaves as clear and diaphanous as gossamer. When the harsh blizzard winds of this unrelenting world howled and stormed, the leaves would knock against each other, creating a forest of bells, tinkling and giggling, laughter that spread like a wave.

Thor tied his mare's reins to a tree and set up camp as best he could.

There was more than enough space between the slender trunks for him to establish himself, and the canopy, as strange as it was, kept out the worst of the still -- eternally -- falling snow. There was no point in trying to dig down to the earth beneath the snow, for there was none. Jotunheim was a world of ice, and beneath the snow was only the hard stone slate of the ringed world, a realm of ocean and stone caught in time and temperature. Instead, Thor lay out his saddle pad against the hard packed snow, settling down upon it. His heavy cloak would have to do for warmth.

He was no Frost Giant, not made for this world of freezing rain and ice, but he was Aesir, a god of the heavens. The harsh conditions would not kill him, as uncomfortable as they were.

He waited and watched as the conclave of Jotnar left their caves, moving out into the snow desert with spears and bolas in their great hands, the heavy winds picking up. Thor ruffled through his saddle bags, pulling out some simple snares, setting them up around the woods, as far from his camp as he could dare, uncertain of when the beasts of Jotunheim came out, or even if such beasts existed, though they must. After all, what else could the giants be hunting?

Thor spent his time waiting by cramming snow into his waterskin, holding the bag to his chest until the snow inside melted.

A few hours later Thor was reasonably pleased with his situation. He had tacked his blanket to the trees around him, having to use Mjolnir to drive the tacks into the petrified wood, making a rudimentary shelter for the night, and he'd caught a winter stoat in one of his snares, the creature small and long, with several legs on either side, but it would make for a reasonable meal. He was skinning the beast when he saw the hunting party return, the Jotnar gathering together, a group of them carrying a much larger kill between them. They had frostfire on poles to light the way, setting them up around the life worn area outside their caves, the blizzard having slowed almost to a still, and Thor could hear their boisterous laughter, their foreign tongue.

The cold blue light spread out from their enclave, and as strange as it looked, Thor couldn't help but feel a little envy, his own camp fine enough, but the sound of laughter and stories reminding him quickly of his solitude. He'd never done well with being alone -- he could manage, of course. He was strong and able, and as harsh as this realm was, Thor knew he could survive it. But he was used to having his companions with him, used to sharing the warmth of their hearty banter. Loneliness attacked not his body but his mind, always had, and silence suited him ill.

He had to remind himself, however, that this was no excursion for the Jotnar. They weren't setting up camp for the night. This was their life. While Thor would return to his warm bed and his ample chambers, this was the best the giants could hope for.

Thor made a face at the strange feeling of pity in his gut, and was glad for the distraction when he noticed movement to the east of the Jotun gathering. Thor's eyes narrowed, and he saw a small figure shifting closer, thin limbs climbing over the rocky ridge that held the entrance to their caves. It didn't take Thor but a minute to recognize Loki -- strange, blue Loki -- scuttling over the cold, stony ground, like some mouse or jackal, a wily scavenger, his messy fur covering dangling awkwardly over one shoulder.

Looking at him just brought up a myriad of confused feelings -- betrayal and a lingering affection fighting a quiet war, memories of some simple night coming up hard against a thousand ugly stories and a childhood of hate. The Frost Giants had tried to take Midgard, and when the Aesir had denied them the monsters had tried to march upon the Realm Eternal. Hundreds of warriors had lost their lives, their sacrifice glorious but still a loss, still something that Thor knew his father had felt keenly from the throne. Thor himself could only envy them the chance to fight, the chance to stand in war and glory and touch the unending passion of battle, of fighting for life and home, fighting for breath and blood. Thor had grown up in the aftermath of the great war, hearing only the tales of its beauty and its horror, hungering for the laughter of scarred old men remembering the age of their victory.

And the Frost Giants, the Frost Giants... They were the ultimate foe. Savage and bestial but strong none the less. An epic army of warriors, powerful. The perfect foe.

Thor had hated them all of his life, their ugliness, their brutishness, and yet he'd hungered to see them, to fight them. That Loki, whom he had kissed and danced and argued with, whom he'd come to save, of all things, was a Jotun-- It was the greatest insult. That Thor's own father had probably known just made Thor burn with shame. An ugly sickness curled in his belly, and he watched as Loki climbed over the black rocks of the ridge, jumping down into the thick snow.

Loki didn't seem nervous, but Thor could see the tension in his frame just before the boy darted in, a flare of green seiðr flashing as he waved a hand, the small Jotun running amidst the cries of his clan. Thor frowned in confusion when he saw Loki grab a rib of the kill, still crystallizing over the frostfire, and yank hard. The rib snapped, and in the next second Loki was running out again, this time dodging the great hands of his kin.

Thor understood now why he'd been utterly unable to catch the boy, when he'd run from the palace. Loki had learned to be quick to survive, just as Thor had learned to fight. Only Thor had learned to fight in an arena, learned to fight with his father's Einherjar, with blades that would always pull before real damage was done. Since then, Thor had put his life on the line in true battle, faced monsters and hordes, but it wasn't comparable to growing up like this -- fighting for every inch just to survive.

Thor lived to fight. Loki ran to live.

One of the bigger giants, at the edge of the circle, managed to clear his head enough of the seiðmaðr's bedazzlement to reach out and grab Loki's frail ankle, and the smaller Jotun tumbled face first into the snow. In a heartbeat, Thor was half up from his knees, his hand on Mjolnir's handle, knowing he was not allowed to break the truce, not allowed to fan the flames of a war long embers but not fully put out. But all the same, he watched carefully as the Frost Giants milled around Loki's prone form, watched the brief struggle for the stolen rib, the flail of Loki's feet and hands, long blue limbs kicking up in the air, but in the end the food was recovered, and the others moved back to the blue glow of their camp, while Loki scrambled away.

Thor watched as the small beast panted, hunched down on feet and hands in a crouch, trapped on the edges of his pack, but unable to get closer. Surviving by living on their scraps and by being marginally closer to the frostfire then he was the wolves of the night.

It was pitiful. And yet Thor did not feel the disgust he expected.

Discomforted, he turned from the scene and returned to the preparation of his own food. The petrified wood was no good for lighting a fire -- proper fire, and not the frostfire of the giants -- so Thor pulled out two emberstones from his saddle bags, the deceptively light rocks heavy with magic, created by the seiðkonas of Asgard for use on such journeys. He pressed them together in his palm, feeling warmth spark and build within them, and he placed them on the ground before the quickly growing heat could burn him. He flicked his hand in the cold air, watching as the stones began to glow, and then fragile fire curled up into the icy wind. It was magic and not true fire, and did not flicker as it should. Instead the flames moved like ether, like smoke, licking and drifting over each other, dipping upwards like water never did. He had no kindling to transfer the magic to, to let it burn properly, so he would have to settle for this.

Thor took the stoat and set it up over the flame to roast, settling back against the trunk of a tree, thick arms crossed over his chest to preserve the warmth of his heartbeat, and shut his eyes.

He let himself doze, taking some much needed rest, no real recuperation having taken place between his game with the dwarves and his journey to this far less jovial world, but tired or not, prince or not, Thor was a warrior of Asgard, and not to be so easily caught unawares.

He cracked one eye open when the stillness of the copse was disturbed by a clump of snow falling from above, landing with a quiet, wet, plath against the ground. Thor smirked a little.

"You are not so sneaky as you imagine yourself to be," he commented, not pushing himself up from his slouch. If one of the Jotnar wanted to attack him, it would have come at him face on, a crash of snapping branches and thundering footfalls -- a bellowing cry of war. No, Thor already knew who it was. The little Frost Giant who he'd already witnessed trying to make off with food.

Thor's amusement fled, however, when Loki jumped down from the branches above, landing in a crouch. Even the grumpy sneer across the monster's face could not wipe away the dirty feeling of betrayal. Of having been used and played. Him. A prince.

Thor's expression fell to something thicker, something set and firm.

"What do you want, Jotun?" he asked, even though he was already well aware.

"To kill you while you sleep, prince of Aesir," Loki responded bitingly, blue hand resting between his crouched knees, his poorly hewn fur hanging unevenly from his slight frame. Thor could easily imagine a sliver of a dagger hidden away within the folds, Loki's hand fast and deadly. But the prince snorted.

"You are a better liar than that." He cast the beast a glare. "I remember."

Loki grinned then.

"I am certain you do. How does it feel then, Odinson, to have been taken in by a Frost Giant?" The runt crept closer, bare foot shifting across the snow. "Do you feel a fool? I assure you, you looked quite the idiot before, asking for an Aesir. Asking for Loki."

"And who is Loki?" Thor asked, his eyes hard but his expression still relaxed back against the tree, unwilling to give this tiny creature the satisfaction of having put a warrior of Asgard on guard. "I had thought him a lost elf, or perhaps a boy dreaming above his station. I come here to find he is a runtling Jotun, not even a threat to his own people, let alone Asgard. Yet even a harmless trespass is still a trespass--"

"Do not dare to call me harmless!" Loki hissed, leaning forward. "I was born small but a small hand can as easily slit a throat as a large one. If you dare to think me harmless I shall gut you in your sleep. Keep a wary eye upon me, Odinson, or I shall pluck them both out." His lips curled into a smile then. "Make you twice the man your father is."

Thor glared but didn't say anything in response. It was a Jotun who'd taken his father's eye, and Thor could only vaguely remember how he'd looked with two -- his hair less grey and his face less carved. Thor knew better to underestimate the Jotnar. It was easy to dismiss this one, a runt and a coward, but even that runt had managed to take him in.

His mind couldn't help but scrape back again and again to the night of his coming of age, to the night out on the balcony and the fool he'd been made by some Jotun get. Some Jotun get so small and pathetic that it was pitied and despised even by its own monstrous race. It wounded Thor's pride, sullied his father's crown, to think the first born prince of the Aesir had been fooled in such a manner. He could easily imagine how Loki had laughed at him in the wake of his game -- whatever game it had been. Thor glanced up at the creature who'd so easily duped him, and snorted when he saw the look on Loki's face. It was impossible to miss the way he was eying Thor's roasting stoat.

“You may share of my kill,” he said, looking over at the runtling. “Tis not the way of a warrior to starve a creature no greater in stature than a child.”

His words were meant to wound, as he himself felt wounded. Injured somewhere beyond his pride and unwilling to admit to it. He thought of Loki's face, his pale Aesir face that night, and how short their time together had been. Thor had hardly been pining -- but he also would have been lying if he said that the memory hadn't lodged itself somewhere inside him, brought out in silent moments when the lights were low and the bark of the court was distant and beyond the privacy of Thor's own chambers. The memory that he took out to look at only when in his rarely found solitude. The memory of the boy on the steps of the palace.

Loki's now red eyes flicked up in a glare, so unlike the green gaze that had met Thor's own with such sadness. The little monster nodded, unprepared to turn down the charity, even as loathe as he was to partake of Thor's gift. A warrior of Asgard would sooner starve to death than sup of his enemy's fare, would sooner have his body turned to the vultures than to lay upon the kindness of a foe. But the Jotnar had no such honor or value, and Loki's hungry gaze touched once more upon the kill. Thor did not consider himself a great reader of minds or faces, but he knew want when he saw it. Who knew how many days had passed since the runtling had managed a mouthful?

Thor refused the pang of pity that battled arduously at his castle walls.

He reached out over the fire, feeling its heat as he grabbed the petrified branch. It burned at the palm of his hand, but in comparison to the frostbite it was pleasurable, and he let the burn sink into his skin. He pulled out his butcher's knife, a short, sharp blade made for skinning and for slicing kills rather than for the field of battle, and set to dismembering the strange creature.

It was more joints and tendons than meat, and Thor wrinkled his nose at the gamey meal he was about to partake. Still, he'd had worse. Royalty though he was, he'd spent many nights afield, had slept in mud and mire, had eaten of dirty roots and drunk of stale pools. To adventure as he did required a certain hardiness, and he was a prince, but a prince of warrior men. He sliced himself a hunk of the stoat, muscle and bone together, and delivered it to his mouth on the flat of his blade.

As his teeth ground through the thin snaps of leg, he cleanly cut a fourth of the beast free, offering it out to the runtling on the other side of the emberstone fire.

Loki looked it over, then reached to take it in clawed hands. He juggled it a little, clearly uncomfortable with the temperature, then laid it out in the snow. He licked his fingertips and made a face.

Thor chortled a little to himself as he cut another bite.

“Not to your liking, Jotun?” he asked, leaning back against the hard grey stone of a tree, his legs sprawled casually before him. “Tis a beast of your world, not mine, and a gift besides. If you are too good for such a thing then go ahead and starve.” He waved a hand. “You'll not see me cry in protest.”

Loki sneered.

“It's hardly the beast's fault that Aesir know nothing of how to prepare food. I remember this from the night I slipped past your defenses.” He smirked at that, and Thor's expression fell to a scowl. “The night I attended your feast. Everything at your lavish table was bitter and salty, an insult to the taste buds. At first I thought your kitchen staff must have blundered, must be paying for their mistake with their hides, but then I saw so many eating and making merry, as if the food were not disgusting beyond measure, and realized the fault was not in the food but rather in the Aesir themselves. Your palate is no different from the wolves -- animal and undistinguished.”

“Aye?” Thor asked, twiddling his knife in his fingers. “And how would you prepare a meal finer than one found in the halls of Asgard? How would a little savage monster make a dish greater than all the masters in the kitchens of the palace?”

“Simple -- I would use frostfire.” With that Loki lifted a blue hand, the fingers thin as twigs and delicate as bone, twisting through the cold air as if to draw the frost. A second later blue flame sparked and ran up his skin, curling up into the wind and detaching from the Jotun's skin, dangling in the air. “Like any civilized creature does.”

Thor scowled.

“And is it common to use seiðr?” he asked. His own mother was a seiðkona, and a talented one at that, but it was the place of women to know the secret arts, just as it was the place of men to know the crash of swords and the spill of blood. Only women stabbed in the back with their cunning, with their cheating magics. A man faced his enemy face to face, with every tooth bared.

Loki snorted.

“Hardly. Magic is thought to be the way of your people, not mine.” He picked up a fallen branch, thin around and not too heavy, shaking it a few times to make the icy leaves fall. He then transferred the frostfire to burn upon its petrified stone skin, in every way that true fire never would. “The Jotnar do not use magic. I had thought--... I had thought, when I went to your world, that I would find some kindred spirits. But it seems your people sneer at magic just as well as mine. The only difference is you sneer while still making it your beast of burden.”

“Tis not the business of men to intrude upon women's work, just as it is not the place of women to intrude upon warriors.” Thor shrugged his shoulders in dismissal. “Magic is their way. Not ours.”

“They are of you,” Loki pointed out. He picked up his portion of the stoat's carcass, moving it back and forth over the cool licks of the frostfire, leaving frostbite burns upon the flesh, dark and black and scarred.

“And what of your women?” Thor asked, watching the stoat flesh turn rigid, slowly crystallizing. Little sections of it began to build up in ice, turning the meat steadily blue, the frost like tiny pieces of glass jutting out from it. “If they do not practice seiðr, then where did you learn?”

“We have no women,” Loki said dismissively. He glanced up in time to catch Thor's surprise and then chuckled. “Nor do we have men. We are Jotnar -- creatures of frost and ice, formed from the bitter silence of winter. We have no need of such distinctions.”

“So you truly are as an elf,” Thor shot back with a smirk. “I was right with my first guess.”

“I am not an elf!” Loki snapped, his calm cracking, and Thor laughed, feeling tension bleed from his shoulders.

“Deny it all you will, Ljósálfar, I know your secret now.”

“Brutish fool -- you think because a race is not like your own that they are all the same. It should be clear enough to you now that I am nothing like an elf.”

“No,” Thor agreed with a smile. “For an elf is much finer to look at.”

Loki just glared at him and did not reply, turning back to his task of cooking the stoat -- or, as far as Thor could tell, uncooking it. The meat steadily crystallized, turning a darkened blue, as if bruised, and covered in tiny crystals of ice. It looked hard as rock and fully unappetizing. Loki continued to move it back and forth until he appeared satisfied, snuffing the frostfire in the snow.

Despite the look of it, Thor did not at all expect the crunch when Loki bit into the meat, as if he'd turned it all to glass.

“Ugh!” Thor's sound of disgust was entirely unplanned and came straight from his gut as he watched the Jotun chew what sounded like a mouthful of pebbles, licking wet lips stretched in a grin, fangs bared thusly as he chuckled.

“My poor, sweet prince... Would you like to try a bite?” he offered, lifting one dark, clawed hand to snap off a limb. It broke like stone, nothing at all like flesh, and Thor couldn't help but find it perverse.

“No!” he refused immediately and without a heartbeat of consideration.

“So scared?” Loki teased, his voice a drawl. “And here I had heard tell of your bravery. How ashamed would your mother be to hear of her son, defeated so swiftly by little more than a roast--”

“Give it here,” Thor grumbled, swiping the limb from Loki's fingers. It felt hard and inedible in Thor's palm. It was cold as stone and ridged with sharp edges, like something formed through the ages in a cave. Thor wanted it nowhere near his lips, let alone his gullet.

Loki, though, took another bite from his frostbitten carcass and chuckled, as if watching an amusing child, and Thor glared. He was not about to be bested by some Jotun runt.

He shoved the morsel in his mouth before he could think too much about it and bit down.

It was like chewing ice, or rocks, and it splintered apart in his mouth, the smaller sections melting, and almost immediately his mouth was flooded by an incredible sweetness, heavier than the most decadent dessert, thicker than the thickest cream. It ran sticky down the back of his throat, and he almost immediately began to choke and cough, leaning over as he thumped a fist against his chest, spitting out what he could onto the snow.

Loki was cackling.

“Ugh--” Thor groaned, still hacking, gathering the sugary spit up in his mouth to spit it harshly out. He wiped the back of his hand across his lips. “It was sweet.”

“Of course,” Loki replied, like he was an idiot.

“Meat should not be sweet.”

“Who says so?”

“Everyone! That was-- It was cold and sweet, like a dessert, nothing at all like it should be.”

“You keep saying 'should be' as if there were some omniscient source, but all I can tell you is that I found all food on your world except your “dessert” to be bitter and distasteful. It tasted like...warm ash.” The Jotun sneered. “Disgusting.”

“Your people are even more flawed than I previously imagined,” Thor tutted, shaking his head. “How can you not enjoy a roast of lamb with mint? Carrots and green leaf drenched in butter and cream? Salted venison? A side cut of pork cooked in its own fat juices? You miss out on so much, just for the joys of confections.”

Loki took another crunchy bite.

“As I said,” he got out around chewing. “The Aesir have a palate no more distinguished than that of wolves, tearing into your meat bloody and still warm.”

Thor didn't deign to respond, merely shoving a handful of snow passed his lips to dilute the heavy flavor still stuck on his tongue. The two of them sat in silence for a time, Thor leaned back against his tree trunk with his hands pressed into the warmth of his arms. The bitter wind moved through the trees, creating an unending chorus of bells, the icy leaves hitting one another in waves, but the worst of the chill, at least, was blocked off in the copse. Thor didn't look forward to a good night's sleep, but it would do.

He watched as Loki finished devouring his section of the stoat, small crystals of blue ice sticking to blue lips, and Thor could see the flash of tiny, needle like fangs hidden away inside that mouth. A mouth he once came so close to pressing against his own.

He was prepared for the roil of his stomach, the shiver of disgust. But not so much the pang of hollow regret.

"What was your purpose? Why did you come there that night?" he found himself asking, despite himself, his voice soft. The Jotun looked up at him, red eyes searching his face, and then shrugged.

"I doubt you would be interested, highness," he dismissed.

"I asked, did I not?" Thor replied. He wished he wasn't curious. He wished he could forget Loki and this whole rotten mess. He wished he were home with his friends, celebrating the spoils of their adventures and drinking himself thick with mead. He wished his mother had never started out on the whole ridiculous quest to see him married off, that she'd just let things be. He wished he'd never looked out onto that balcony and seen a lone figure, had never felt that curious tug that had damned him and led all the way here, to this.

But the past could not be undone, and now Thor wanted to know.

"You owe me that much," he said.

"Oh?" Loki's eyes narrowed. "For what do I owe you?"

"For the meal," Thor replied instantly. Loki gave him a skeptical look and Thor shrugged. "It is the way of our--...It is the way of the campfire. He who does not bring the food must bring the story."

"And you wish to hear my story?"

"I would wish--... I would like to know why. If this was all nothing more than a lie, I would like to at least know the reason behind it." Thor's eyes slid to the side, looking out into the darkness of Jotunheim's clouded night, the howl of the wind beyond their meager shelter. "If I can bring nothing else home with me, I would at least like to bring the truth."

Loki didn't respond immediately. In fact, the silence stretched long enough that Thor thought the Jotun would just ignore him, and the shifting light of the emberstone fire was just enough for the corner of his eyes to play tricks, making him doubt if Loki were even still there. He refused to turn back though, refused to look.

"...I already told you," a voice finally said, hushed but still hard as ice.

Thor's brow furrowed and his confusion led his eyes back to Loki's form, his unreadable face.

"What do you mean?"

"That night. When I was there. You asked me why I had come to your feast and I told you...I wanted to look at the palace."

"You didn't come there just to look at the palace--" Thor dismissed immediately, and then his eyed widened. Unless Loki did come to look at the palace. That was what a scout did. They scouted ahead. "What were you sent to find?"

"Nothing," the Frost Giant replied trivially, looking down at his claws. "I didn't go to find, I went to see."

"What is the difference?"

Loki laughed then, a sound like broken bells, like the laughter of the icy leaves against each other, a winter sound. He looked at Thor with those blood crimson eyes and smiled, but it was nothing like the smile that night.

"Oh sweet prince... It is a difference you will never understand. Not with your food and your drink and your merry making. Not with your golden halls and the sport to choose to fight. To hold a sword in your hand and play with it as a toy. You will never understand what I see with my eyes, and I shall never be able to give it to you in words you could understand."

"I am not stupid," Thor replied, a slight frown on his lips. It was the way for many to assume him a fool, and he was not. He had never done well at his studies, never held the concentration to them that they required, but he was no idiot. The silence and drone of the scholar was not for him, his mind always leaping away to better places and his body eager to run. He was not made for desks and paper and quiet discussion. He was not built for it. But he had eyes that knew how to see and ears that knew how to listen, and in his own way he'd had learning. He wasn't afraid of this frozen world or its frozen people. He knew how to survive, how to hunt, how to fight. He knew how to withstand the bitter cold and the raging heat, knew how to treat his wounds and how to find water when the land was parched dry.

The Nine Realms had been his classroom, and he felt it learning enough for him.

"Perhaps you are not," Loki said dismissively. "But you are not me."

"What does that mean?"

Loki pushed himself up then, his fur slipping off of one shoulder, baring the skin to the night air. It was light blue and ridged with almost delicate looking scars, dissimilar to the powerful lines traced through the thick skin of the other giants, hard lines over hard muscle and frozen bone. Loki was different. Loki was a shard of ice, something slender and delicate, too easily broken. Something sharp.

Dark hair moved like a snake, one clawed hand pulling it back from over the curve of his neck, the loose braid slipping back behind him, and Thor blinked as if bespelled, eyes darting up to find amusement on the Jotun's face -- a knowing look that Thor instantly disliked. It was a look he instantly wanted to press, to push for some answer to a question he didn't know, to discover what secret lay beyond those lying lips. But Loki just quirked them, hand resting in the crook of his neck and fur askew, hanging unevenly off of his body, his legs jutting out from under the cloth of his wrap like sticks, ankles speaking of a winter far too long and far too hard.

"It means that I am Loki," the Jotun replied. "And there is none in all the worlds that shall ever understand me."

Thor opened his mouth to reply, he knew not what with, but the impetus urged him to speak even as he floundered. Before he could find any, however, Loki turned away, glancing back over his shoulder with sly eyes, eyelashes white with frost.

"Thank you for the food, Odinson. I hope that my tale was entertaining enough."

With that he waited for no response, gone with a flash of snow and seiðr, a dark figure appearing once more between the shadows of the trees and then disappearing completely. Thor watched the black space that offered him nothing but the empty howl of the wind and slowly settled back against his trunk. Behind him, Druna had ceased her pacing, her head dipped and resting as much as she could in the cold, her coat thick and her body sturdy, a warhorse worthy of a prince.

Thor, however, found sleep elusive. The cold bit at him, crawled up his skin, but it was not that which plagued him.

Now he looked once more at his memory of the boy on the balcony, brought it out in this private place and cupped it to his heart, but in his mind's eye all he saw was blue skin and fearless eyes and something else.

Something missing.

The thought worried him through the night.

-----

When dawn came, it was wane enough that it took Thor awhile to realize that it had occurred at all.

He was used to the sun creeping in, poking its rays at the edges of his eyelids and sneaking under, used to the glow of it. Even in Svartalfheim the sun came out, purplish and pale though it was. Here, it was Druna's nose at the small of his back, nudging insistently for attention and food, which woke him.

"Mff," he said when a particularly determined nudge pushed him from where he was leaned, causing his cheek to land in the snow. He snorted and pushed himself up, brushing the snow from where it clung in the bristles of his stubble, his hand planting deep into the cold as he pushed himself to stand.

The morning was dim and dark and thoroughly unwelcoming, and Thor decided at that instant he disliked this world more than any other. He'd always wanted to come -- its forbidden nature alone was enough of a temptation. Thor didn't like closed doors, didn't like sealed rooms. He was an adventurer, a discoverer by nature. But even aside from that, Jotunheim was the world of a race that had once threatened Asgard, had waged the last great war, a war in which even the greatest warriors of Asgard had come home scarred and worn. And the others had not come home at all.

It had always seemed the ideal place to test his mettle.

Now, Thor found Jotunheim to be nothing but a world of misery -- darkness and winter in every direction and not even the decency to hold the serenity of Niflheim. The few Jotnar that Thor had encountered had been a small and beleaguered lot, little more than hunters eking out a bare living against the slate rock. They were hardly the menacing monsters that Thor had always imagined fighting. Imagined and feared. He wished he could now decide whether he was disappointed or relieved.

The fact of the matter was, though, that it hardly mattered. In the end, his mission here, to come and save Loki, a Loki who didn't exist, was impossible. He had two days until Heimdall once again opened the Bifrost to invite him home, and until then Thor could do little but wait. It would serve him best to get back to the opening site, or at least close, and find camp there. The idea of missing his one call home was more unappealing than ever, and Thor tried to dismiss his shudder as little more than a shiver from the cold, but the excuse was hollow even in his own skull.

He packed his things, mushing the ashy remains of the emberstones into the snow and folding his blankets up into Druna's saddlebags. He pulled out a small sack of grain and fed it to her by hand, watching her thick lips eagerly scoop up the barley from his palm, chewing on it around the metal of her bit.

"Good girl," he murmured, putting his hand against her muzzle when she was finished, feeling it twitch and search around, hot blasts of air coming from her nostrils as she smelled the sweet barley scent on his hand, hoping for more. "Not too much longer now," he assured. "Two days and you shall be home in your warm stall, and we shall both dismiss this as a folly to be forgotten."

He eventually pulled his cape back around his shoulders and took Druna's reins in hand, leading her out of the copse, her thick hooves plodding through the snow. The storm seemed to have died down some, snow still falling but the wind quiet, and it took Thor a moment to realize just how quiet it really was. The Jotnar had not been exceptionally loud the night before, but they had made the unmistakable sounds of life -- of feet against ground, weapon against stone, the low murmur of conversation and the hissing whisper of the frostfire.

Now there was nothing, and Thor looked over as he walked out from the trees to see the campsite abandoned, the frostfire gone and the caves dark and empty. No light or life stirred and he frowned, confused. The caves, while mostly natural, had obviously been cleared out, and the site around the fire was arranged with stones as seating, still left there next to the dark stain of the pit, vestiges of life that made the scene lonelier than it would have been with none at all.

The stillness of it all only made the motion at the corner of his sight jump, and his head snapped to the side, seeing Loki come to a sudden stop in a snow bank, long limbs splayed and one hand deep in the snow to steady himself. Messy hair fell over his shoulder and his poorly fitting fur was shifted squint over his collar. His sharp red eyes caught on Thor, staying there.

The prince remained braced, but did not automatically reach to embrace Mjolnir's handle.

"What are you doing here?" he asked instantly. Loki snorted.

"What am I doing here? I belong here, Odinson. You are the one out of place."

"Believe me," Thor replied dryly. "I intend to remedy that as soon as possible, but the Bifrost will not open for two more days. Until then, I am a most unwelcome guest. But you did not answer my question -- why did your clan leave you behind?"

"My clan?" Loki asked, then made a derisive sound. "Do you truly think that they are my kin after last night? You heard Geirröd -- I am not of his blood line. They are merely the latest group I have used for my own ends."

Thor's brow furrowed.

"Used?" he asked.

"I was born...weak." Loki looked defensive even as he said the words, as if prepared to fight over them. "I am full grown, but as you can tell, not nearly the stature I should be. I am not as large, nor as strong as a Jotun, and this world has little patience for weakness. I cannot hunt, not to much effect, and though my magic has grown in time, I cannot depend upon it to survive. It is far easier to stay close to other Jotnar and eat of their straps, or whatever I can steal."

"A thief then."

"And a liar and a cheat." Loki grinned, baring his small fangs. "As I said, Odinson, I was born weak, but the Norns gave me one blessing, and it is by that, by my cunning, that I live."

"Thor," the prince replied. Loki looked confused and Thor clarified. "I told you that night on the balcony, to call me Thor."

"Even now?" The Jotun spread his hands outward, eyes challenging.

"I would say 'no' if it weren't for the fact that you call me by my parentage not out of respect, but to mock me. In light of that, 'Thor' will do just fine."

Loki laughed, a crowing sound, and he made his way down the rest of the slope, coming to walk across the flat ground to Thor and Druna. The monster reached up to pat the mare's withers, and Thor was somewhat surprised that his horse didn't balk. Instead, she stood still and allowed the touch with only a swivel of her ear.

"Thor, then," Loki said, voice lower. "Well, Thor... I think I shall accompany you, until you leave this world. It is clear from your performance last night that you need a nanny to watch after your stumbling, oafish footsteps."

"I need no such governance. I have survived the threats and perils of many worlds, and bleak though it may be, Jotunheim does not frighten me."

"It is not you I worry for." Loki rolled his eyes. "If you should stumble and freeze to death you'll see no tears from my eyes. But it is in my interest to keep the wrath of Odin from visiting us once more, and in my interest to keep you from bumbling your way into another situation like last night with someone far less patient that Geirröd. Any other giant might have tried to take your head, and whether you won or he had, the rest of us would have to suffer the consequences. No, I shall not leave you to wander around by yourself."

"And if I refuse your company?" Thor asked, scowling at all the insinuations of his incompetence. The little Jotun certainly played well at words -- better, even, than Fandral. Thor did not consider himself poor, but it was not his most honed skill. Words were for the weak, those who had nothing else to fight with.

"Then I shall find a way," Loki replied, eyes narrowing slyly. "As I always do. I know more of this world than you, and I have made a living following those who would rather not my presence be there." Loki paused, then slid forward, sashayed, almost, and his eyelids dipped as he drew close to Thor. "Come now, my lord, tis only two days. My company cannot be all so loathsome, can it?"

"You mean to seduce me?" Thor asked with incredulity. "I will admit to being somewhat adventurous in my exploits, but I have never had the whim to bed a Jotun."

"You did not find me so repulsive that night at your palace. I seem to remember you being quite dashing in your attentions, in fact." Loki lifted a hand, holding it up to Thor, knuckles up. "Shall you not give me another kiss?"

Thor knew he should have been angry, or disgusted. He should have turned away then and left the Jotun to his devices, whether he followed him or not, but instead, he felt only a strange curiosity, staring down the line of Loki's arm and to his unfamiliar face. Thor could see there the underlying make of the boy he'd seen on the balcony -- the bone structure, the lay of his skin. He could see the way that Loki moved and the flicker of his expression, and yes, all of that was altered, changed, but not so much that Thor couldn't make him out.

And yet something else was there. Or not there. Something was missing and Thor couldn't figure out what.

"...You look different," Thor said in reply, his brow furrowed as he scanned the Loki's features, looked for the clue, the tell, that would lead him to the answer. But Loki just rolled his eyes again and dropped his hand back down to his side.

"I'm blue, you dolt," Loki replied, as if Thor were thick. But Thor just shook his head.

"No, it is not that. It is...something else." But he had nothing else to say, no other hint to give, for Loki's face gave little away. The Jotun looked confused, curious and wary all at once, and the feeling pricked at the edges of Thor's consciousness, irritated him like a gnat buzzing just out of reach.

It was that, more than anything else, that changed his mind. Others might have called him thick or stupid, might have dismissed him as a brute and little else, but a warrior was more than just muscle and strength. He knew better than to ignore a curiosity, and his mind would not allow a mystery to go unsolved.

He moved around Druna's side, opposite Loki, and shifted his foot into a stirrup, giving a hard tug to pull himself up and over, settling down near the pommel. He looked down to see Loki's still wary gaze, his dislike of Thor's odd actions obvious. The thought just made Thor smile -- he had so enjoyed throwing Loki off, that night on the balcony. He had so liked that look of genuine surprise written across fey features.

The prince leaned over, offering a hand out, never expecting to do so to a Jotun beast, but his father had sent him here, and he had two days to solve this mystery. He wouldn't waste it.

"If you must come then I suppose you should at least ride with me. That way I may keep an eye on you," he said, palm still extended. Loki looked it over, seemed to study it, before his gaze flicked back up to Thor's face. Thor merely remained still, letting the offer stand.

Finally, Loki reached up, wrapping blue fingers around Thor's wrist, and for a second Thor expected to feel the prick and pain of those blackened claws sinking into his skin, just for the insult of it. But Loki only held firm. Thor had never thought he'd willingly take the hand of a Frost Giant, of one of the monsters of nighttime stories and whispered tales, the beasts of war and snow that had killed so many and fought without honor. But here he was, pulling one up onto the saddle behind him, Druna taking Loki's weight without problem. Loki's touch did not burn as the stories had said.

"I did not expect you to be so accommodating, Odins--...Thor," Loki said, a goading curiosity there.

"I'm sure you shall find a way to make me regret it," Thor replied, not giving into the unspoken questions. Instead, he picked up Druna's reins and reached into his jerkin for the twin lodestone. He held it tight in his palm, waiting to sense the tug, the pull as it weakly tried to reach its twin, then turned Druna in that direction.

She picked up her hooves, making her way slowly through the deepening snow as they left the slate rock campsite and moved back up the slope into the fields.

-----

The ride back was considerably easier than the ride out. Or, at least, it started that way.

The flat icy plains of Jotunheim stretched out under darkened skies, though the thin light of the sun beyond the clouds managed a diffuse effort at lighting the way. It turned out that the evening before, Thor had begun to edge up into the foothills of some mountains, had found the Jotun camp at the crest of a ridge, because now Druna was carefully picking her way down slippery slopes, the snow crunching under her hooves with each cautiously placed step, muscles shuddering under Thor's legs as she struggled to keep them upright. Down the slope of the hill was a long valley, stretched out between low peaks, a hollow for the wind to run through, and an eventual outlet at the horizon that Thor could just barely make out, hazy though it was.

The weather was fairer, clearer, and dispensing less of a beating than the evening previous, and Thor kept his head up, rather than hunched over in his cloak. If the weather held, they could have no problem making the Bifrost site by sundown, and Thor would simply have to camp for one more night until Heimdall summoned him home.

No, the problem was not at all getting home. The problem was what to do when he got there.

He was no fool -- Odin King saw all the worlds from Hlidskjalf, saw all the way down the length of the World Tree, and he may have one eye less than the great guardian, but that did not make him someone easy to deceive. The day that Thor's father came to his chambers and asked him to save a Frost Giant, the man had been perfectly aware of what he asked. The truth behind what he asked. He would have known the whole time exactly what Loki's true nature was, and that left Thor guessing.

Thor was no fool, but that did not mean he could stand toe-to-toe with the One Eyed King. He loved and respected his father, and in nearly all things tried to earn that look of pride from the man, but Odin was Odin and would ever be. He was a schemer and planner. He had secrets behind secrets, and not even Thor's mother or Heimdall himself knew the true depth of Odin's planning. And Thor, a warrior true, was no Queen of Asgard or endless watcher.

So his father had sent him to rescue a Frost Giant. To bring it back to Asgard, after a century long war that had ended with the eternal ire of the Aesir and the damning of Jotunheim to darkness. No Jotun would be allowed to set foot in the Realm Eternal. Except Loki already had. And was now offered the invitation of the king himself.

And Thor, for the life of him, could not see his father's game.

He did not intend to bring Loki back. He would not be the idiot that carried a Jotun runt back home like some sad trophy, nor would he bow witlessly to his father's orders. But that meant that he would arrive home empty handed, and he would have to explain that to his father.

Thor cursed quietly under his breath when he realized that it was just as likely that Odin's mysterious lesson lay in that direction as well. That perhaps Thor was meant to disobey and not bring Loki back, and Odin had planned that from the beginning. It was as much of an unknown as everything else. Whether or not Thor acted on his father's words or disobeyed them, he had no idea which one was the one his father had banked on.

He scrubbed a weary hand through his greasy hair. He had no mind for schemes, nor did he wish to. He was a man of action and truth, a man of sincerity. He disliked trying to second guess others -- and himself. He wished his father had just said upfront what he truly wanted to say, instead of playing this game, whatever its esoteric point might be. Now Thor found himself guessing at everything and uncertain, all with a Frost Giant pressed to his back.

Never in his life had he imagined such a thing would happen. That he would turn his back on such a creature. It made him feel rigid and uneasy, his body constantly distracted by the movement of Loki's hands, always waiting for the slip of a dagger into his side, or the cold pinch of a shard of ice, cutting his flesh so finely that he didn't notice it until it was too late. Loki hadn't said anything since they'd set out, and the silence only unnerved Thor more, though he couldn't think of anything to say to break it.

Loki was, at once, both the boy he'd kissed and the creature he'd spent his whole life hating. Thor had no idea how to begin reconciling those two things.

He disliked introspection, and even more he disliked changing his mind.

Druna finally reached the snow plain, her gait evening out as the slope disappeared, and soon they were making reasonable pace, though he still couldn't urge her to anything more than the occasional trot, the snow too deep for her to pick up her feet.

"Is there no road? No path to follow?" Thor asked. He hadn't looked for one the day before, as his spiral pattern search hadn't well lent itself to following a predetermined route. Now, however, following the steady, constant tug of the lodestone, he wished for packed earth, something to give Druna her head on and let her stretch her legs. Unfortunately, behind him, Loki merely snorted.

"A road, on Jotunheim?" he asked, claw tipped hands resting against Thor's leather jerkin. "A sweet and simple notion. No, the paths here have been long hidden, and the caves and tunnels of my people long filled in."

Loki's tone was clipped and angry, and Thor glanced back at him with a narrowed look.

"Your words are too sharp, seiðmaðr. Why am I to blame for your people's misery?" he asked. It surprised him little that a race as beastly as the Jotnar would have little care for the organization and planning required to execute civilization.

Unfortunately, Thor's words only caused Loki's eyes to narrow more, going slender and cold.

"It was your people that destroyed our tunnels, the ice bridges we'd formed to span chasms and gorges. It did no good for the Aesir to allow us to move armies and supplies, so they did not merely conquer -- they laid waste behind them, so that no resource could be used against them. Of course, they thought little for what they left in their wake, when they had packed up their weaponry and their war tents and returned home. Now you must deal with the actions of your people just as I must -- there are no roads, Thor, and no caverns to travel through. You shall have to move as we do: slow and to little end."

The words made Thor feel a strange swoop within his belly, though it made little sense. It had been a time of war, and a war started by the Jotnar when they'd made aggression upon Midgard, a protectorate of Asgard, under the promise of succor by Odin himself. They could hardly claim victimhood. All the same, Thor disliked being caught unaware, disliked looking the idiot, and it was clear he'd stuck his foot in his mouth.

"...It was not a war that we started," he pointed out, but quieter, reticent.

"No, but you did end it," Loki replied enigmatically and sighed, and Thor caught a puff of warmer air coming from his lips, surprising the prince. His own breath had been fogging since his arrival, but the Jotnar were of this world, ran as cold as this world, and Loki, while far colder than Thor, was not as cold as he should have been. Thor had little time to contemplate the conundrum, as Loki soon continued. "I have no love of the Jotnar. We are just as foolish and bullheaded as your people, just as driven by violence and need. Yes, my people started the war, started it before my own birth, and left me the gift of its aftermath, but it was your people that lied."

"Lied?" Thor asked, more confused and curious than offended, now. He glanced back. "Of what did we lie?"

"...nothing," Loki replied, and Thor knew not how to push. He was a prince and accustomed to people bowing to his whims, but Loki had already firmly established that he cared little for Thor's orders. In the silence that lingered, Thor reluctantly took up Druna's reins once more, steering her over to the side of the valley, their strange party making its way out of the foothills and out to the snow plains.

They stopped around midday -- at least, Loki claimed it was midday. The sky was still so thick with dark clouds that Thor could hardly make anything out. While a diffuse light came through that wasn't present during the night, it was too general for him to ascertain a direction, or the judge the time from.

They stopped at the side of a frozen stream, Loki jumping down from Druna's back to land in a graceful crouch, barely making a noise in the snow, a clawed hand extended to balance himself. The Jotun straightened and made his way over to the stream, fur shifting messily and dragging over the ground, leaving small trails in the snow behind him. He scurried up to the edge of the ice, one hand extending out over it, and Thor was a god of elements, insensate to the dealings of magic, of seiðr, but he could see it glow and mist around Loki's fingertips. The Jotun scratched at the surface of the ice, his magic turning hot and bright as it burned the ice away.

"Does that not hurt?" Thor asked, walking up, Druna plodding along behind him, her reins in his hand.

"The fire?" Loki asked without looking up, breaking his way down to where the water was rushing.

"I was taught that your kind hate the heat."

" 'My kind'..." Loki chuckled with a huff. "I do not have a kind, Thor. Yes, the Jotnar are not accustomed to heat." He glanced up at Thor with red eyes. "But I am not like most Jotnar."

"You are small," Thor said, observationally.

"I am more than that."

Thor opened his mouth to inquire more, but Loki did not give him the opportunity. The Jotun got to his feet, bare in the snow, and his clawed fingertips touched Druna's soft nose carefully. Thor frowned a little at how much his own damned warhorse seemed to like Loki, pushing her head into him like he was some fair maiden offering treats. Instead, Loki led her to the hole scraped in the ice, letting her lower her head and drink, the Jotun crouched down near her. Thor let things lay, pulling out some dried meat from Druna's saddlebags, a paltry meal, but enough to see him through. Jotunheim's chill tickled at his skin, hissed against it, wanting to creep in, to get past the cold layer of his flesh and crawl deeper into his muscles, down to his bones, stealing the core of him. If he were mortal he would have been dead within a few minutes of stepping out onto this icy world. Even if he'd been another Aesir, one of lesser stock, it wouldn't have taken but a few hours. But the blood of Odin was strong, and the cold was forced back, the Asgardian fire within him springing back and burning hard, as it always did, unfettered and unafraid, and he ripped at the meat in his hand, eating it aggressively, as if to ward off the insidious plans of the wind.

They rested for at least an hour, by Thor's estimation. They said little in that time, Loki tending to Druna's mane and listening to the babble of the stream, the only sound in the icy air besides the occasional rush of a breeze, the landscape open and endless.

When Loki came close, Thor flinched, but the runtling monster said "Let me," reaching out. Thor knew he should have denied him, should have ordered his hands to stop, but instead he found himself still, sitting there tense as dark claws came for him. He shivered and shut his eyes as he felt the tips grace his scalp, running over it as they combed through Thor's hair. He'd hardly had time to rest and recover from his journey to Nidavellir, let alone wash and clean himself in the baths, so his skin was still smeared with the remains of ash from his last excursion, and his hair was oily, strands sticking together in the frigid temperature. The thought of the royal baths, warm and steaming with heat, their clear waters still and sound echoing in the bathing chamber, bouncing off of the fine tiles that lined the walls and floor, made Thor long for the feel of them, the familiarity and the bone-deep heat.

It didn't help that every time Loki's hand, strange and blue and dangerous, brushed his skin, goosebumps traveled in his wake.

The Jotun(a Frost Giant, touching him, daring to touch a prince of Aesir, without retribution) pulled Thor's hair back over his shoulders, having fallen out of its braid awhile ago. It had been loose and messy by the time he'd come through the Bifrost, but by now the ribbon had given up completely, beaten back by Jotunheim's winds. For a few moments, Loki's fingers just ran through Thor's hair, untangling knots and separating locks, no small feat, and doing so with surprising diligence. Thor was half tempted to note that he was no tender young thing, that Loki could be more vigorous, but the warrior was loathe to break the silence, to acknowledge that this was happening at all.

Finally, Loki separated Thor's long hair, long enough to just reach past his shoulders, into three equal parts. The Jotun braided it tightly, binding it up with Thor's red ribbon, his small fingers nimble and skilled.

"...thank you," Thor said finally, because as comfortable as ignoring this was, his mother would have had his head for not at least giving his gratitude.

Loki didn't reply. He just shrugged after a pause, and pushed himself to his feet again, leaving Thor rubbing awkwardly at the back of his now bare neck. Colder, yes, but at least now his hair wouldn't be whipping around in his face. What was more significant, however, was that he'd just let a Frost Giant touch him, run fingers through his hair, and Thor couldn't help but think back to the pictures in his storybooks as a child -- pictures of giant, grotesque monsters, horned and covered in ridges, and while the other Jotnar he'd seen very nearly lived up to such horror, Loki did not. He had a grace to him, and was missing the jagged armored plates that adorned the others of his kind, but he was Jotun nonetheless. He was a creature that Thor had grown up despising, and to think he'd willingly let one touch him was at once shocking and worrying.

The prince reached back to brush a hand over his tight braid, uncertain as to his thoughts, and once more he wished his father had never sent him here. Or that Loki had never come to the ball.

He thought suddenly of chilled hands within his own, trying to breathe out his heat, the warmth of his Aesir flame, and pressing his lips to fingers formed by Jotun ice, and winced. He didn't know what he wished, anymore.

When their break was over he was happy to mount up once more and turn his mind to the task, to any task, really, that would distract it from too many thoughts, thoughts both wild and unwieldy, and thoughts that had plagued him all the night before, ever since learning the truth of the boy on the balcony.

Through the afternoon and into the evening, the dim light waning, they made their way out onto the snow plains, following the tug of the lodestone, Druna making unsteady progress through the deepening snow. Out here it was less rocky, the snow going on for ages beneath them. It was hard packed enough to walk over, but the top layers were looser, and with the weight of two people on her back, Druna sank down to her knees. Thor was beginning to consider dismounting and walking alongside her when a rumble in the distance grabbed his attention.

Thus far, the weather had been mild, at least as far as 'mild' went in Jotunheim. Cold enough to kill but no blizzard, no churning winds and stinging snows, no burning storm that left a layer of frost and ice upon his golden skin. The air had been clear, allowing Thor to see for miles around them, and the wind sung hollow through the threads of the hills, ducking in and out and in between them like chimes in a music box.

Now the air hung eerily still, not even a breeze blowing, and the horizon was obscured by something dark and tall, stretching from the earth into the sky. Thor narrowed his eyes, trying to make it out through the dim light, but the eternal clouds that obscured the realm made it hard to see, especially for Aesir eyes, too used to the bright and the dawn. Whatever it was seemed thick and opaque, like the cotton wool he'd seen the spinners working with on their looms, threading the bushy material through the weave and stringing it out. The clouds rumbled distantly, less like thunder and more like a low roar, some animal too long chained.

Lightning and storms were Thor's domain, were his natural element, and he feared them not, but the wall at the edge of the world seemed different, other, and he felt Druna balk beneath him.

"What is that?" he asked, tightening his grip on the reins as his horse paced, shifting sideways as she flicked her tail. He heard Loki mutter a soft curse.

"Ymir's Breath," the Jotun replied, quiet and wary. Thor glanced back over his shoulder for more, and Loki stared at the horizon, eyes taking a long heartbeat to tear themselves away, looking up at Thor. "It is the final breath of Ymir, the first of all Jotnar. They say it was your people who killed him, but the legend is so old that even the elders do not know its certainty. I was told by my-- I was told that when Ymir was slain, the last of his breath fled his lungs, seeking to live without a heart. It is...not a storm. Not like anything that you have seen. It is the icy maw of death, Thor. We must turn back."

Thor pursed his lips, looking forward once more as his mare backed up another pace. The storm, or whatever it was, looked like a wall, something encroaching at such a distance that it didn't seem to move at all, but Thor knew that to be a lie. It was moving at an incredible rate -- far faster than Druna could run, even with her strength. Even if they turned and ran, it would catch them still. Thor looked off to the horizon and saw death, ground to sky, wind as hard as a stone, and rolling towards them.

"...the Bifrost site is yonder," he said finally, hands tightening on Druna's reins. There was no choice.

"And your life is in the other direction," Loki replied over his shoulder.

"My life lays on the other side of the Bifrost, in Asgard."

"You will not live to see her if you ride into that. Worse, you would doom your horse, who is a creature that inspires far more affection than you." Loki's tone was scathingly, but then went lower. "And you would doom me as well."

Thor looked surprised, and he glanced back over his shoulder at the beast.

"But you are Jotun, you are of this world, formed from ice and frost." It made no sense to Thor. He had always heard the Jotnar lived by the cold, that they couldn't abide heat. The giants back at the campsite had worn little more than breechclouts, despite the frigid air -- but Loki had burned through the ice as if it didn't bother him.

"Even a Frost Giant would be wary when faced with Ymir's Breath. It is the vilest cold you have ever felt." Loki's voice went strangely far away then, softer, and Thor could hear the hollow roar of the storm in the distance. "It will tear the skin from you, until you feel nothing but the chill. Until you are battered to your bones and even sight it beyond you. It is so cold that it will suck the air from your lungs, pull it straight out and steal it for its own. Only those with frost for skin, only the Jotnar can survive such a thing, and you are no Jotun."

"But you said that it would doom you--"

"Nevermind what I said! Mind what I say. There is no getting to your Bifrost, not tonight, and you still have one more day. We must move away from the ice wall and find shelter to take until it passes. There is no alternative. No other choice." Loki's cool hands pressed to Thor's back, and he couldn't feel the cold through his leathers, but he shivered anyway, for reasons he could not grasp. "Listen to me, Odinson. Thor. Listen to me."

The tempest roared again in the distance, wakened from too long a slumber, something ancient and primordial -- even to a god. It screamed, but the earth remained still, so strangely calm here as chaos descended. Loki's lips were near his ear.

"Listen. You must run. You cannot fight the sky itself. Your hammer cannot defeat the wind -- Jotunheim has her pleasures and this is one. She will eat you, consume you piece by piece and call it a boon. This world forgives weakness little, Odinson, and pride is just such a weakness."

Thor stiffened momentarily, planning to object. No Aesir claimed weakness, and no warrior of Odin King would ever consent to the insult. In his world, in the world of his people, now would be the time to challenge, the time to throw down in the face of death and prove his strength. There was no honor in running, no honor but the honor found in the fight.

But in the end, the coming chaos would win.

Thor could feel Loki's hands tightening in his cape, and it shocked him a little to realize that the little Frost Giant genuinely did not want to be here. Thor glanced back over his shoulder and saw Loki staring off towards the churning horizon, his red eyes so still, even with Druna's movement beneath them. They were brighter than most Jotun eyes, Thor noticed, a little more like ruby and a little less like blood, and they hid a carefully contained fear. Loki's blackened claws hooked into the edge of Thor's cape and the thick leather covering his bicep, and Thor felt the urge to run in Loki's grip. He knew it right before the Jotun shifted, before he moved to run just like he had that night in the palace.

Just as Loki jerked, moved to the side to dismount, Thor's hand snapped up to cover his reluctant companion's, stopping him there. Loki's gaze flicked to Thor's, not yet jumping down but still tense, ready to run. Ready to run like a warrior never would. Everything that Thor was, everything that Thor knew, held it in contempt, thought cowardly and weak.

But he looked at Loki's eyes and saw no weakness there. The Jotun didn't blink, didn't waver. He was still like a statue until the first gust of coming wind stirred his dark hair, sending it fluttering like the first layer of snow, black stands brushing blue skin, a bruise of color and a heavy shadow cast across the thin cut of his clavicle. Loki's hand was tense and his motion stayed, but Thor knew there was only a heartbeat. Only one heartbeat and Loki would rip his own hand off to leave.

To survive.

"...very well," Thor said, his voice not quiet but soft. His hand remained over Loki's, the skin beneath his fingers strangely soft, like cloth worn down by use, and he looked at the monster at his back and wondered how he could look away. Loki remained still, so still that Thor was certain he would leave anyway, vanish in a wink and leave Thor to his foolish, brave fate, but a second later Loki became animate once more, settling upon Druna's back more securely, his other hand coming to Thor's waist.

Thor pulled his own back to take the reins, turning the horse around. She was eager to move away from the tempest, shifting around swiftly as Thor set her back in the direction they'd come from, using the trail they'd already plowed.

"No," Loki said behind him, Thor glancing at him. "Tis no good to run away. You cannot out pace Ymir's Breath."

"You just told me to run--"

"I told you to run, not which direction to run." The Jotun gave him a sharp look, before glancing over to the foothills to their right. "There -- towards the stone. We may take shelter there, and the dead shall pass us over."

The edges of the mountains ran like the ridged back of a dragon, sharp and irregular, jutting up at intervals of its own fancy, dancing back and forth across the landscape and each one building upon the last. The mountains were distant from them, but not the lower foothills, and there was enough hard, black slate there that they might chance upon a lee to take for safety. There was no trail cut to the hills, which would make their pace slower, and they would be traveling perpendicular to the force barreling towards them, making their time limited.

This time, Thor didn't bother to argue. He pulled hard on Druna's right rein, feeling her fight him at first, before she tossed her head, kicking up her feet as she slogged into the thick snow, making her way across the wide field. As eager as she was to move, filled with the energy to escape what Loki seemed to believe was certain death, there was only so much she could fight the forces of nature. As with all warrior steeds she was short and stocky of leg. It made her a powerful force in battle and capable of carrying Thor in his full armor, but in snow so deep, she had difficulty picking up her hooves, and it slowed her considerably.

Still, she was a steed of Odin's stock, a battle mare of horses as fine as those ridden by the Valkyrie, and like any horse that Thor had ever chosen to take as his own, she had a will to match his own. She feared the storm -- the not-storm -- but she was as Thor was: uncontrolled by her fear. Unbridled of death's powerful thrall.

In the end, Thor was certain it didn't take them long to reach the rocky crag, but it didn't feel that way. As Ymir's Breath bore down upon them, itching at Thor's neck, it felt like their every step took an eternity, every hitch of Druna's legs too slow. What had started off as a distant, barely moving thing was now roaring through the valley, falling over the lower hills like a shroud and hiding their peaks from sight. It seemed to swallow them one after the other, faster than any normal storm that Thor had ever seen, and he knew, this close, that Loki had spoken true. This was no natural storm, nothing like the winds and gales that sung to Thor when he clasped Mjolnir's handle, nothing like the sheets of ripping rain that drenched him through and made his heart beat wild, in tandem with the thrum of the thunder.

No, Thor knew storms. He knew them as he knew his own blood.

This was something else.

The force drove its way up the valley, and the sound it made, as it got closer, resembled less and less the howl of the wind and more and more something too animate, too close to living but not. It reminded Thor of the wails of Hel, of spirits bound to an eternity of unnatural unrest, clawing at the edges of their own banality, their unwanted immortality. The dead that refused to die.

As Ymir's Breath drew closer, Thor thought he could hear the scratching of their nails, like glass upon stone, echoing up the sides of the slate ridges.

"There!" Loki's voice barely penetrated the overlapping screams of the oncoming maelstrom, eating up all the wind around them until there was barely any left to breathe. Thor followed the long blue line of Loki's skinny arm, followed the point of his finger over to where the hillside slid into the earth, the snow just barely disguising an opening that Thor had mistaken for a shadow. He urged Druna on, though it was unnecessary, the warhorse charging through the more shallow snow at the hill's edge, fighting for the space her master guided her to, reins slapping against her withers. Thor didn't bother to look to their side, to check on the progress of the beast bearing down on them -- it didn't matter now. They would either reach safety or they would not.

The rock at the beginning of the hill slope cut out to the side, making for a relatively thin but tall opening in the side of the hill, facing away from the dead wind. It was wide enough for Thor and Loki to fit, but Druna would have a hard time, her body barreled and thick, built for war. Thor didn't hesitate. When Loki leapt down from her back the god pulled out his hunting knife, yanking the girth of the saddle out from her side and slashing through it. The saddle and pad fell to the ground with a thick plop, and Thor gathered up her reins, pulling her forward and towards the tight darkness. If the outside was dim, the cave was pitch black, but Thor had little time to worry about such things. He shifted in front of Druna, pulling her along with him. She balked briefly at the tight entrance to the cave, feeling the stone scrape at her sides, but one terrible shriek just outside had her kicking forward, pulling through the thinnest part and running by Thor.

The prince stumbled back, falling on his behind. He looked up just in time to see the bleak grey of Ymir's Breath outside the cave, and a horrible, hollow face, something stretched and obscene, a gaping maw and wind for eyes, something half formed and colder than the heart of ice that Thor's own father had stolen at the end of the war. It was a death older than even the Allfather, older than Bor or Asgard, and for a shuddering, missed heartbeat, Thor felt the dead star vibrations of Mjolnir's uru metal go still and silent.

Soulless.

Then Loki's thin figure appeared, cut itself in between Thor and the horrors outside. The seiðmaðr held up his hands and then slammed them together, the rock itself obeying his call. The outer wall of stone was yanked inwards, grating violently against the hillside as it sealed itself shut, tighter than a tomb.

In an instant, all light was gone, and Thor was left in darkness.

-----

In the blank dark of the cave, Thor heard his breath and his heartbeat above all else.

The air around them was still, though Thor could hear the raucous beat of violence against the stone hills protecting them, could hear the scrape of teeth and wind distantly through the thick rock, though it didn't seem nearly thick enough. Thor had seen many things, had seen the wandering dead, but not the vicious. Not those still animate -- animate not with the glory of Valhalla but with the frightful anger rightfully left only to the living. To those who could change the world.

This was the icy vengeance of those who could take no vengeance, who were left with only fraught madness.

Thor feared few things, death least of all, should it be honorable. But he had feared then, for a second. For a heartbeat.

For a heartbeat he had felt the unquenchable life of Mjolnir go out, all the magic in her gone dead and still, and Thor had felt so terrifyingly mortal. He had known, for but an instant, what it meant to die slowly. To know that his body was not growing but aging. Dying constantly as it struggled to live. To shed nails and skin and hair, to have his body betray him to the grave. Walk determinedly towards it, not with sword and hammer, not with blood and the screams of berserker rage, but with nothing more than the weary wear of time. To be defeated not from without but from within.

Betrayed by his own form.

He took great gulps of air, hunching over as he attempted to recover himself, a hand coming to his chest as if to check for his pulse -- not the weak and thready beat of a mortal muscle gradually fading, but the steady clap of elemental thunder, the boom of the heavens, beautiful and eternal. The heart of storms, driven not by blood but by lightning.

He was yet still a god, and he had never before had occasion to be grateful for that.

A second later there was a sound like flint on steel, though such things were not needed for seiðr, and when Thor looked up he saw blue frostfire dancing over Loki's palm, illuminating their shelter. The strange light flickered over Loki's gaunt features, spreading shadows like rumors and a hazy blue glow glinting over his eyes and along the curve of his graceful horns. It set him starkly against the stone, and his face was impassive. Unmoved.

For some reason, that bothered Thor more than anything else.

"Good," Loki said. "You are not dead."

"Your concern is overwhelming," Thor replied, though he was still panting. He took the opportunity to glance around then, pushing himself up onto unsteady feet, the graveled ground of the cave gritty beneath the soles of his boots. He saw Druna first and reached out to her, putting his hand against her soft nose. He was glad to see that she was as winded as him, that he had not been the only one to feel the grip of mortality. He rubbed along the stout length of her jaw bone, trying to ease her as she tossed her head with nerves. He had seen her covered in blood many a time, and rode upon steeds just like her into the clash of shields and spears. She was a warrior just like he, but neither of them were fools. He knew why she had run as she had.

He glanced around her to take in their strange quarters, finding a cave blocked in on all sides, going no deeper into the hillside than a few paces. It was cramped for two people and a horse, but it would suffice, and be a welcome respite from the worst of the cold. Of course, Thor had had to leave the saddlebags and all his supplies in the snow outside the cave when they'd come in, which meant they had no blankets or provisions, and no emberstones to start a fire. It had been a worthwhile sacrifice, to escape the coming malevolence, but Thor was not looking forward to a night spent on the frozen stone with nothing to afford him comfort but his cloak.

He was just grateful that he'd kept the lodestone the breast pocket of his jerkin. He had no desire to go searching around outside, and no real hope that his things would be easy to find come the morning.

"Just as well, I suppose," he murmured, looking up at dark ceiling of the cave, no vent or escape there.

"What?" Loki asked, the Jotun stepping up beside him. His fur had fallen off in the fury of the escape, laying in a pile on the cave floor, and Thor blinked a little when he found himself staring at bare blue skin, only a breechclout wrapped around Loki's thin waist. It was the usual attire for the Frost Giants, but there was little of the great frozen monsters that begged a man to look at them.

Loki was... Loki was different.

"I--" Thor started, then cleared his throat. "I was saying it was just as well that I cannot start a fire in here. There is nowhere to release the smoke."

Loki clucked his tongue.

"Foolish prince." The Jotun shook his head, walking over into the center of their living space, crouching down. The longer toes of his feet gripped the rock like a cat's, claws scraping quietly against the stone, and Thor noticed a golden bangle around Loki's ankle -- everything the runtling wore was dirty and of poor quality, but Thor had not before noticed the string of fine gold wrapped there. He had no chance to ask of it, as Loki continued. "You use magic and yet know nothing of it. The fire you burned last night produced no smoke -- did you not see?"

Thor frowned before responding.

"Usually I transfer the flame to wood and let it burn as fire naturally does, but your realm affords little in the way of branches or kindling. Last night I had no choice but to allow the fire to remain upon the emberstones, and I had no opportunity to observe the behaviors of the flame, given the situation I found myself in." All of a hundred paces from a camp of Jotnar, with a runtling sorcerer plucking at his meal and dropping pieces of riddles.

"Magic needs no air to consume, and produces no smoke. It burns upon the spirit, upon the living energy of the world and those who make it, as a child suckles upon his mother's teat. Flame made of seiðr is not like the crude thing you make from sticks and stones." Loki brought up his other hand, both cupping his frostfire, and Thor watched it flicker and build -- but he wasn't expecting to see it change in hue, to see it go from pale blue to heated orange in a sudden burst, sparks spitting up into the shadows. Loki's smile looked like blood in the dancing light.

"There," the runtling said, lowering the magical flame and depositing it upon the floor. No emberstones and no kindling for it to burn upon, yet it grew and expanded as if floating an inch above stone was its natural place in the world. Of course, it looked much as the fire the night before had -- less like flame and more like something wispy and curling, like breath in the dead of winter, or steam rising in the caldarium after a long brawl in the arena.

"...I did not know that a Frost Giant could conjure true flame," Thor murmured as he thought of the spell Loki had used at the river. Thor wished to be cautious, but the fire was too tempting in its warmth. The god moved closer, lifting one hand and reaching out to feel the heat radiate out onto his palm, starting small but building until it became a soothing hurt. Thor moved his hand back to crawl as close as he could.

"I am an unusual Frost Giant," Loki pointed out.

"Yes, but is not heat your natural enemy? Your anathema?" Thor's questions halted, however, as he watched Loki lift his hands as well, pressing them palm out towards the fire and then rubbing them together, like a chilled messenger boy at a war camp. Thor's eyes widened. "...you are shaking."

It was true. He could see it now, the very slight tremble of Loki's limbs. There was no fat there, no real built muscle, and an Aesir of his condition would have hardly survived the deadly cold of Jotunheim, but Loki was not Aesir -- that much Thor had had drilled into him. Loki was Jotun, was born of this world and native to its temperatures. All the other Jotnar dressed in little, if anything at all, and walked through the snow as if it were nothing at all, but Loki wore a poorly tanned fur-- A fur that Loki must have tanned himself, Thor realized. The Jotnar did not have such practices, had no need for them. Loki would have had to have made his poor blanket himself.

To keep the cold out.

The runtling's red eyes avoided Thor's, looking instead into the heart of the seið-fire.

Before he could summon the thought to command it, Thor's hand moved, snapping out to grasp Loki's forearm, commanding the Jotun's attention, and Thor was glad when that crimson gaze flicked to his own. Once more, Thor was aware that Loki's skin did not burn cold beneath his own.

"You said before-- When we were facing down the tempest. Ymir's Breath. You said it was your doom, but then later you said that a Jotun could survive it, if but barely. You are...not like them."

"...I am an unusual Frost Giant," Loki repeated, almost warily, and Thor was no politician, no man of great words and careful thought, but he was no dullard either. He could see well that this was a sensitive subject. He could see it written as clearly across Loki's blue features as he could see his scars.

For once, Thor wisely kept his mouth shut. He would never know that it was his silence that moved Loki to continue.

"I told you that I was born weak. Small. My ice lines--" Loki's free hand shifted, moved to touch the long scars on his captive arm. "They do not run cold as they should. I cannot make ice."

Thor blinked. He knew that the Jotnar could make ice from nothing, but he had always assumed that it was simply magic. Seiðr. But Loki claimed that the Jotnar looked down upon seiðr, saw it as an Asgardian trick. Thor had never known that the ice weapons the giants formed were a kind of elemental summoning, very similar to his own elemental connection to lightning. He had never known that the scars were not scars at all but...conduits, strange, raised veins that carried ice for blood.

"...they are what burn us," Thor deduced. Loki glanced up questioningly. Thor explained. "In the stories of the war, I was told that the touch of a Frost Giant was enough to turn Aesir skin black. If held too long, the frostbite could rot a limb away. But it is not the skin itself -- tis those lines. That is why your touch does not harm."

Loki made a face at that, and Thor belatedly realized he'd pointed out a weakness, but the Jotun nodded.

"I was born more than just weak. I was born sick. Born...warm. I cannot form ice, nor cause the formation of frost, save through use of seiðr. Because of that--... Because of that, I...feel the cold. The first spell I taught myself was how to make heat. Fire. How to melt the snow."

Thor could only imagine what that must have been like, living in a world of people who thrived upon the cold, who saw fire as a deadly beast. For Loki to learn to summon it at will, for a seiðr wielding runt to call upon the devious and hated enemy of their people. It was an insult beyond insult. A call to holmgang to any who saw him.

And it was that or be forever frozen, forever afflicted of this forsaken world and its bite.

"No other Frost Giant has ever felt the cold. They do not even know the meaning." Loki's eyes were distant as they stared into the magical flame, watching it move not with air currents but with the shifting of his own eternal spirit. His voice went quiet. "I do. I know what it means to be cold."

Thor felt his own mouth open, some instinct to speak despite his lack of words. He knew not what to say, nor how to say it. He could no more conceive of what it would be like, to be not of one's own people, than he could conceive of living a mortal life. He was not only Aesir but the very definition of it. He was a prince, and as such, he was the model for what his people were. They followed Odin now, but soon they would follow Thor. They would write themselves around what Thor was and what Thor aimed to be. He had never had to concern himself with fitting in -- others fit the mold he created for them.

Loki was not merely a runtling or outcast. He was a creature born of a world that did not want him, and a people he was fundamentally parted from. He felt the chill that no other Jotun would ever be able to understand, a concept too foreign for them to even comprehend.

Thor was still searching for a response when Loki spoke again, forestalling any continued discussion of the topic.

"You should bed down." Loki's voice was low, shifting down to lie upon the frost hardened ground, his head resting against his hand as the other pulled his shoddy fur up over him. He lay on his side with his back facing Thor. "There is naught we can do till the morrow."

"And if the maelstrom has not lifted by then?" Thor asked after a beat of silence. He somehow found himself wishing to know more, to return to the conversation they'd just almost been having, but he could find no graceful way to bring it back -- and Loki had no patience for graceless things. That much Thor had figured out for himself.

"...then there is naught we can do then either," the runt replied.

"I must reach the Bifrost site, Loki. I cannot remain here."

There was a pause, then Loki snorted.

"Who would want you to?"

It was a peculiar response, and Thor felt a curiosity tug at him. A part of him wanted to lean over, to lean close and keep the fire from separating them, but he never had the chance.

"We shall have to find another way, if there is no clarity in the morning. I shall find a way, as I always do..." he said, repeating the words he had spoken just that morning, when he'd sworn to follow Thor, his voice strangely soft this time. There was a pause then, and Thor thought Loki was done speaking, until his voice came back, firm as ever. "You will just have to lower your hammer and listen for once though." Loki pulled the fur up higher then, a useless motion, but one meant to forestall a response. "Now. Go to sleep. I am tired and have no more wish to speak."

Thor frowned but said nothing in response, knowing he would get nothing but insults out of Loki now if he pressed. With the dead wind howling outside and the biting cold of the frozen stone beneath him, sleep seemed a weary prospect. With all the thoughts that Loki had lodged inside him, prickly words that stung and settled like glass, Thor was certain that he would find no rest.

But until tomorrow, at least, he had no choice but to listen to the silence of their unnatural flame. In the flickering light against stone walls, Thor was left with the company of only his thoughts and the strangely uncomfortable reminder that only one day remained.

Two sunsets gone.

Chapter Text

Thor woke up frozen stiff with a pebble in his side.

He was laying against the thin layer of frost that covered the ground of their meager burrow. He shifted slightly and let out a grunt, feeling the cold in his bones, sticking down in his joints. Hardship wasn't something unknown to him, wasn't something completely unfamiliar as one might have assumed with a prince, but Jotunheim was still something entirely different. Two days was more than enough for the golden god of thunder.

His frostbitten nails scratched against the hard ground as he turned himself over, pushing himself up halfway, his half-damp hair falling ratty and tangled against his jaw, slipping over his shoulder in half frozen chunks. He reached up to sweep it back, feeling sickly and sore. He'd had nothing to eat since the winter stoat two days before and Jotunheim seemed loathe to separate with any kind of sustenance. It took him a moment to hear the sound outside their den, or rather the lack of it. The howling of the wind that had tortured the stone the night before, whipped against it and beat its fists upon the walls, trying to crawl in, had vanished. The storm that had chased them seemed to have have vanished vanished -- the Ymir's Breath or whatever it was that the Jotun had called it. They were, at least, less than half a day's travel from the Bifrost site. Half a day's travel and then half a day more to wait, until Heimdall opened up the Rainbow Bridge.

One day more and Thor would be home.

The thought had his eyes turning to the Jotun, his gaze traveling over the slate grey ground, towards him. Druna still stood in the corner, her head hung and half asleep, one hoof resting on the toe, and between Thor and her lay the small blue creature that had been their reluctant guide. Loki was curled upon his side, on the other side of the mageflame, black hair in rivers over the stony ground, his red eyes shut, lashes pressed against the cheek and half frozen there. His dark claws had scratched the permafrost but now lay relaxed, his poorly hewn fur draped over him, a shoddy blanket against the cold, and Thor thought about what he'd said last night about the cold, about the ice of Jotunheim and his own poor blood.

Thor had gone on many adventures, many quests, many feats of daring-do, across the Nine Realms in his time -- or, at least, eight of them. He had climbed mountains called unclimbable, slain monsters claimed unkillable, and he had survived always, come home triumphant with sacks of gold or with arms full of trinkets. Come home with great pelts of beasts sorely sought and sorely feared. He had feasted in banquet halls long dead, he had fought creatures of fire and brimstone. He had gone through the long night, where no sun could shine, and come out the other side. Thor was no stranger to hardship, despite his upbringing, despite his status as the only son of Odin Allfather, the only true heir to the throne that sat at the crown of all Yggdrasil. While he had been draped in fine cloth and surrounded by fine food all of his life, Thor had put himself in the position of suffering many times, and done so willingly, for claims of glory or claims of honor. He had grown up in the shadows of warriors, in his world, and to them the suffering was virtuous, a great thing to be told. But never had Thor had to fight against his own world.

Always, Thor had had somewhere to return to when he was cold or tired, when he hungered, when he was injured and bleeding, when he was at his end, when he was at the very limits of what he could stand, he had only to call for the assistance of his father's guardian, a man who watched all the Nine Realms with his all seeing eyes, and Thor would be home again. Home, where the healing chambers waited, or the banquet halls, or the many women who would fall willingly into his bed if he but impressed them with a story.

Asgard had always been his. When he was born it was promised to him. It was as much his as the pelts and trinkets he'd brought back, as much his as Druna and what lay in his saddlebags. Asgard was more than merely the world he came from -- it was his world. He had never been at odds with it. It had always been home.

As an Aesir, Thor could easily imagine why one wouldn't want to live in Jotunheim. It was, of all the realms, clearly the most disagreeable. It was cold and dark, a world full of suffering and woe, a world of storms made not of wind and sleet but of death itself, a magic beyond the elements, that could kill in an instant and rip the flesh from one's bones. A world denied a sun, with constant clouds and eternal shadow. Rock and ice and stone and nothing truly living, not in a way that Thor understood it. In a way, this world was deader than Niflheim, deader than Hel, for the creatures that eked out their living on this stone, upon this frozen ocean, Thor wasn't certain he could call it living. And when he looked at Loki's face, he was sure he had seen more joy in the faces of the dead.

Loki had never had anywhere to return to, because his home was, in fact, not a home at all. He had been born at odds with his own world. The Jotnar were, as monstrous as they were, cut for this world. Their hard, ridged bodies were edged out of the earth itself, edged out of the ice, as if an artist had chiseled them, someone with blunt tools and blunter force. They fit here amongst the jagged edges of the rocks, with their horns and their red eyes and their deep claws. They fit.

But Loki did not.

Loki had said that Jotunheim had little pity for weakness, and that much was true. Loki had been born weak, and Thor could little fathom how he'd managed to survive at all. How he'd managed to survive babehood. To even become a child toddling about after his elders. Asgard was a realm of warmth and light, but Thor knew that there had been a time when even he had been dependent upon his mother's skirts, when he had followed, tripping, attempting to walk in her shadow, attempting to imitate the cut of his father's form. Every man was, at one point, a child, and a child could not fight back.

There had been a time when Loki could not fight back. Could not fight with his quick wits and his quicker tongue. These were all things learned. Things that had taken time. And Thor felt a curiosity upon his lips, wanting to reach out and shake the other boy, to rouse him and ask him what had happened, how it had happened, and who it had happened with. Who had raised him? How had given him comfort? Who had given him succor? Who in this cold, desolate world had taken a kindness to a weakling babe, a runt that had no future in a world like this, a world with no pity for weakness.

But Loki's secrets had secrets, and Thor already knew if he asked, he wouldn't get the answer he was looking for, or at least an answer he could understand. Thor wondered, for what he thought had to be the thousandth time, what Loki had been doing in Asgard, and what it had felt like for him. This time Thor thought less about the goal, whatever it was that Loki had come for, and whatever it had been Loki had been seeking, and wondered instead what the Jotun had seen, what it had felt like, what it had felt like to be warm.

Thor had never imagined a world where something like warmth was a hypothetical, where the light of the sun was longed for but unknown.

He had always been told that the Jotnar despised heat, that their bodies ran so cold that even the warmth of a normal body, of an Aesir hand, was enough to burn them. Enough to burn the Aesir in return.

But Thor had touched Loki many times now, and found no discomfort in it. He wondered if Asgard had burned, if it had felt like the fire Thor had always imagined in his childhood stories, when he'd invented games in which Frost Giants invaded their golden realm, their shining city. When he'd fought with wooden toys and wooden horses, when he'd fought against the evil Frost Giants. In many of his stories the clouds would part and the sun would shine down, beat down upon the ice monsters, turning them into little more than snow and slurry. Thor felt more questions, always more question when it came to Loki. Had it been the spell? Had it been whatever it was that had made Loki look like one of Thor's people? Had that been what protected him? Had that been the thing that had staved off the heat? Or had it been the night?

After all, Loki hadn't come during the day.

Was it the heat or the sun itself? After all, Jotunheim's sun was kept away from them, hidden behind the cloudy layer above them in the sky, disguising its beams and its brightness.

Had Loki been protected by the stars? While magic was common to the Aesir, not at all taboo as it was to the Frost Giants, Thor had never been good at it. How Loki's magic worked, Thor didn't know. Perhaps it had just been a glamor that he had cast upon himself, something to hide himself from sight. Perhaps it had been something deeper. Something more fundamental a change. Perhaps there had been a protection against the heat.

But if there was such a thing, why was there not one now? If he could guard himself against warmth, why not against cold? Was he, perhaps, a creatures built between worlds, a creature unfit for any one in particular? The thought made Thor's heart pang in sympathy despite himself. He wanted the feeling to go away. But as he'd learned in Loki's presence, the things he wanted were strange and awkward and difficult to control.

He reached out, hand lifting before he'd even aware that he was moving, and it hovered there, scant inches above Loki's form. Thor had spent his childhood fearing the Frost Giants and chasing after them at the same time. The thought of touching once had been terrifying in a way, but it had also churned his stomach. The idea of these great, evil monsters, these vile beings of the dark and the cold, everything anathema to Asgard. They were ugly and villainous. They were the opposite of the Aesir. But Thor had already touched Loki many times before this.

His fingertips touched Loki's bare shoulder and no matter how many times he'd touched him, he felt the same hesitant beat of his heart, waiting for the frostbite, waiting for the chill, but Loki's skin was no colder than the stone upon the ground -- warmer, even, and Thor wondered how painful it must have been to grow up in a world such as this, when one's blood ran warm and not cold.

One fingertip traced a scar, the ridge running up over Loki's shoulder, the ice conduit the seiðmaðr had told him. The vein through which the Jotnar's ice ran, their ability to summon it to their hands. Under his finger the ridge felt as warm as the rest of Loki's skin, and it made Thor frown.

"What do you look for, Prince of Aesir?" the Jotun asked, and his eyelids fluttered slightly open.

Thor jolted a little in surprise, caught unawares in his observations, and his finger sprung back as if scalded. Scalded by what should have been ice.

A broken Frost Giant. That was what he'd come to rescue. He cleared his throat and looked away, into the nothing darkness of their solitude.

"...Nothing. It is nothing," he repeated, feeling stiff. He remembered standing on the balcony, watching the pleasant way the green eyed boy had stammered and flustered in irritation, in uncertainty. Now, in this form, it seemed like Loki was carved from ice, and his every move, every word set Thor on edge. Pushed him precariously close to bumbling inanity.

"You were touching me," the Jotun observed too smoothly, unshaken, and Thor flushed. "Touching a Frost Giant. I thought your kind abhorred even the thought."

"We do. I do--"

"And yet."

"...and yet," Thor murmured, turning his head back to look at Loki. The seiðr flame was still burning between them, lower now, redder, casting a ruddy light across them and the cave walls, scattering jagged shadows carelessly. It made Loki's skin seem paler, whiter, almost lavender, like the fields of Asgard in spring, tiny, pale petals in bloom and draped across the hills in a fine gown. It also gave his red eyes a bloodish glow, demonic and dangerous, as if they glowed from within with an other worldly delight. Thor swallowed.

He reached out before he'd even thought to do so, and he saw, for a second, the ice shatter. Loki looked surprised as Thor's hand came to cover his cheek, frost scars rough and raised against the meat of his palm. Thor felt for something, a pulse of a second heart, the feeling of arctic blood flowing through veins too warm to be good, but he felt nothing. He pressed his lips together.

Loki hadn't been lying. He'd been born small, but that was hardly the harshest curse that Jotunheim had placed on him. He wasn't cold. He was warm. Normal to an Aesir but sickness for a Jotun. How Loki had managed to survive at all seemed a mystery to Thor -- how he continued to a sadder story than the prince wished to contemplate.

He looked at the way Loki's eyes widened just slightly, watched the fleeting surprise and for a second he saw the flush of the boy on the balcony, his stinging words and harsh critique. Now the flush was a darker blue, something almost blackened, like flesh exposed to the frostdeath. Thor wondered if his lips would turn so if they touched Loki now, if this broken Jotun could summon enough power to blacken him from the inside out.

Thor leaned in and kissed a Frost Giant of his own volition, and it didn't even feel like he didn't want it.

He hadn't kissed Loki at the feast. It had seemed improper -- a funny thing for a boy such as Thor, who'd taken plenty of willing girls to his bed to play, as well as the occasional serving boy. He had been intending to, when he'd first looked out at the balcony and seen the dark haired slip of a boy, only a century or two younger than himself but slighter. Fairer. It had seemed a worthy diversion, a worthy indulgence. He hadn't been interested in pleasing his mother's whims by finding a suitable bride. He was young, only just named a man in full and crowned as the heir apparent. He had wanted...

Well. Freedom.

When he'd first seen the boy out on the balcony, it had just been a chance to rebel, to seek after someone so obviously inappropriate to warm the throne next to him. It was meant to just be a night of fun and fleeting romance, something enjoyable for the both of them but nothing lasting.

But moons had passed, and now Thor was trapped in a cave on Jotunheim, kissing the boy on the balcony for the first time. But the boy was a monster, a creature of nightmarish legend, a beast of the cold wild. He didn't feel like that in Thor's hands, though. He felt...like Loki. He felt like Loki.

Thor could still feel the scar ridges beneath his fingers, could feel the little needle-sharp fangs when the Jotun opened his mouth to him, let their tongues press together, a slick, wet glide. Loki tasted not of frost and blood but of sugar and honey, sweet but cool, almost sticky, and Thor felt a brief huff of laughter in his chest at the memory of the Jotun's sweet tooth. He imagined seeking out the palace chefs, having them prepare frozen plum blossoms and sugar ice crystals. He imagined presenting Loki with spun caramel, woven into a delicate bridge, and mint leaves crushed into sweet cream. He wondered what sort of face Loki might make upon tasting such things.

Loki's lips pressed to his own, not cold but not warm either, sliding over Thor's skin, caressing in rhythmic motion, Thor's breath coming a little faster. Loki's body was beyond slim -- Thor could feel the line of his collarbone under his hand, could trace the jut of his shoulder. There was muscle there, sinewy and born from struggle -- not weak or helpless, but no warrior, not like Thor was used to. The runtling monster reached up, and Thor felt dangerous claws pass over his leathers, heard the scratch of them, and he wondered if Loki could claw his heart out. Loki was a seiðmaðr, a wielder of magic and wile -- he would never meet an opponent head on, bare and in battle. Instead he would do this: crawl and sneak, lie and cheat and creep his way in, until a man was naked and vulnerable before him.

Thor was perched over Loki's slender form, but he shivered when he felt the ice blackened claws skim his neck, against the throb of his pulse.

He was laying with a Frost Giant. He was in the arms of predator.

He pulled back after a moment, Loki's knuckles curling slightly under his chin, and he looked down. There below him was the face he expected, blue and red and foreign, but for a moment he saw something more. He saw, for a heartbeat, the boy on the balcony, before Loki blinked and it was gone -- whatever 'it' was, that strangely missing piece that Thor couldn't place -- and the Jotun arched its eyebrow up at him.

"...well. That was unexpected," he said, black hair a messy pool below his head. Thor had the irrational urge to touch it, drag his fingers through all the knots, to see if it would shine and shimmer like the locks of ladies at court.

Thor opened his mouth to respond, but came up empty.

Loki swallowed slowly, and his look of mirth began to fade, become something more wary, more guarded. Thor knew that he was supposed to respond in kind, to insult or joke, to play this moment off, but his mouth could come up with nothing. It seemed that only his hand had an idea of what to do, creeping up to touch upon Loki's cheek, beginning to cup it.

That was when Loki pushed him up, hands planted firmly against Thor's shoulders.

"Get off of me, you great oaf." Loki grunted as he shoved at Thor, not weak but far from strong enough to best Thor in a battle of brawn. Thor moved away though -- an oaf and a brute he may have been, but he had never pinned someone unwilling beneath him. Those who had warmed his bed had always been eager to tumble with a prince, and Jotun or not, Thor had no desire to take what wasn't given. He let Loki up, watching the blue runt scramble to his feet, his fur remaining on the ground, revealing his body, clothed only in his breechclout and a golden cuff around one arm, and Thor blinked at that.

The jewelry looked strangely fine for a creature that scavenged meat from the edges of camps and lived like a beast in the woods.

Thor pressed his lips together. It seemed, no matter how much he knew, Loki always remained a mystery, a new question popping up on the edge of every answer.

The Jotun took a moment to compose himself, claws brushing his long hair back, separating one lock to tie around the rest, binding it into a loose tail, enough to keep it out of the way. His movements were short and sharp, impatience written across his face.

"Have you forgotten?" Loki asked when Thor just sat there looking up at him. "Your rainbow bridge is to open in but half a day. Do you really wish to dally here and lose your opportunity to return home? I assure you, as dazzling as this world may seem upon first viewing, it is not the paradise you might think it to be. I would caution you against relocating."

"I--" Thor started, then shook his head. "You are right."

The prince pushed himself to his feet, brushing errant bits of dust and moss from his clothing. Druna stirred at their motion, big dark eyes opening as she shifted her weight, and Thor went to her for the welcome distraction. Something to look at that wasn't Loki and Loki's skin. That wasn't those white light lines that traveled all over him, not hideous and deformed as Thor had heard in stories but instead something delicate. Something to be traced with the eyes.

And the fingers.

Thor's jaw clenched and he set himself to his task, taking up Druna's saddle pad and tack, his motions purposeful as he set to dressing her, Loki somewhere at his back, and Thor tried to imagine away the sensation of eyes upon him.

He found himself more than eager to be free of their cave, which felt less like shelter and more like a tomb now -- the walls that had seemed perfectly sufficient but moments ago now seemed too close, too tight, and he was eager to get out, back under the dark clouds.

More eager still to return home, where the sky went on forever and he never had to doubt himself.

-----

When Loki's seiðr parted the stone and let in the wan light of day, they found themselves with a whole new set of problems.

The tempest had past over, but left in its wake a coating of snow too thick and too new to be walked upon. Even Druna's long legs would just sink through it, leaving her floundering. Worse, there was too great a chance of falling into a crevasse, to be slowly crushed to death as the ice melted just enough to let them sink deeper. The lodestone in Thor's palm pulled him towards the end of the valley, straight through the middle of the mountains, but the path was impassable.

"I refuse to remain here," he growled, the idea of it unbearable as well as insulting. It stunk of defeat.

"You would be surprised how little the world cares for your refusal," Loki replied dryly, leaning against the dark stone of their temporary haven. "You may stand here and refuse all you like, but I promise you, reality has a will that would best even yours, Prince of Aesir."

Thor looked back at him over his shoulder.

"No one asked for your company." He reached out, taking Druna's reins in his hand, grasping close to the bit. She would not like this, but nor would Thor. "If you fear to tread further then you may go back to wherever it is you come from. But as you said, I have no desire to remain here. I will reach the Bifrost site, no matter what obstacles this thrice damned whore of a realm might throw in my way."

He was just tugging Druna forward when Loki's snort stalled him.

"Come now. Do not be so dramatic. I did not say that there was no way there -- merely that this one is no longer available to us. Do use your head, Thor, or else your poor beast shall have to suffer for your idiocy." Loki strode past him blithely, ignoring Thor's scowl. "I told you that I would guide you out of this world, and while my word is worth little, it is still the only word I have." He looked out at the valley, so thick now it was almost impossible to see. "The straightest path is obscured to us -- but the mountains rise above the worst of the snow fall. We shall be able to take a path through the north, or what remains of one. It is a bit...scenic, but not so long that you will miss your scheduled appointment. We shall just have to pick up our pace a little."

The Jotun turned to look at him, his black pony tail dancing sharp through the air, and his smile vicious enough to cut. Thor saw the small fangs there, and he felt a sense memory of them against his tongue. The image of them should have brought forth disgust, or perhaps derision, but instead Thor felt a strange desire to reach out and touch them -- press the pads of his thumbs to them, feel their tips. To feel them skirt so recklessly against his own lips.

Thor turned his head away.

It took them most of the morning to forge their way up the mountain. Thor was steady enough on the jagged rock, though he slipped frequently on patches of ice he could not see. Druna, however, had difficulty. Short and stout as she was, she was bred for war and battle -- not for conquering uneven peaks. Her uncloven hooves skidded frequently, Thor having to stop to steady her. He refused to leave her behind, however, as he kept expecting Loki to call for. A warsteed was as much a warrior's possession as his sword or his bow, existing only for his pleasure, a device to be used insofar as it was useful -- not meant to slow or lever. He would be called a fool for getting stuck in this world just because he was unwilling to abandon his horse, and it wouldn't have been the first time he'd been mocked for his attachment to his steeds, but Thor could not help it. They ran into battle with him as much as his companions did. They showed as much devotion and bravery, and Thor could not see them as mindless as a piece of steel or wood.

He had brought Druna here, and he would take her home again.

To his surprise, Loki made no mention of his determination to half carry a warsteed up a mount slope. Instead, each time Druna slipped or balked, the little Jotun would pause, perch upon an outcropping or settle back against a ledge while Thor calmed the mare down, murmuring to her as he ran his hand over her muzzle.

Loki himself, of course, scurried up the slope as if built for it, his claws occasionally leaving little white marks, shallow chalk scars against the dark stone, the Jotun as swift and deft as a stream in spring, pausing only when Thor or Druna had difficulty. He spoke only if Thor addressed him, making no move to assist, and Thor not asking him for it. He felt that Loki would reach a hand out if Thor asked for it, but he was too proud to look for that, and with panting breaths the prince made his ascent up the mountainside, his hands red and sore from gripping the rock and his eyes following the darting movements of the runtling Jotun.

'You are to seek out and rescue the child you spoke to that night, the boy Loki.'

Thor remembered his father's words in that moment, the gravity of his voice and the riddles he'd spilled. The Allfather was occasionally taken by the same sight as the Norns, and few were privy to his machinations and plots, but it was always the case that he knew more than he was letting on. Now, though, as always, it was becoming more clear.

Loki was no damsel, no helpless maid in need of salvation -- he fought for every inch of life, struggled for it, with the ferocity of any warrior. Small though he was, the battle he fought held far more relevance than any Thor had waged. Loki didn't seek a fight for gold or treasure or glory. He didn't return from his battles with proud stories to tell adoring crowds. Every day Loki got up and fought hunger and desperation just to survive to the next hollow sunrise.

Back in Asgard, Thor might have dismissed such a struggle as empty. Worthless. There was no blessed rest in Valhalla for death in the face of that.

But here, now, watching Loki scramble up the rocks, remembering watching him running from the other Jotnar to hide, licking his hands with frenzied need to get a scrap of food, Thor felt the first curling of shame in his belly. Thor wandered into his fights -- had the choice of not pursuing them, denying them if he pleased. Loki had no such choice. It was this or death, and he still chose to rise everyday and face it, to fight.

Loki was no damsel, but rather a creature trapped by circumstance. Thor might have called it pathetic once, knew that other warriors of his ilk would sneer at such a thing, but when Thor felt the rocks beneath him tumble away, felt the world tilt and his stomach fly to his throat-- When Thor saw death in the reeling sky and the heady rush of air, it was the snatch of a slender, clawed hand about his wrist that forestalled his demise. It was the hand of a Jotun runt that caught him and held them to the rock face, and it was red eyes, wide and worried, that met Thor's, and Thor could feel no pity at all.

Loki survived. A strange little malformed monster, someone Thor might have called a victim, had he been a woman, but it was Loki who knew how to survive when Thor was himself floundering.

When all of Thor's strength and warrior's pride would have guided him to an ugly death in the snow. Wily, deceptive and misbegotten, Thor couldn't help but wonder if Loki was, in fact, a warrior after all. A warrior who fought fate, for if any creature had been born to die, it was Loki.

And yet here he still lived.

"...careful, Odinson," Loki cautioned quietly as Thor righted himself, pulled himself closer to the stone and let the rapid thump of his heart slow. The fall might not have killed him, but it would have certainly delayed him from reaching the Bifrost in time. He pressed his lips together briefly.

"...Thor," the prince corrected, looking back up at where Loki was perched. The Jotun looked him over, then nodded once before turning, pulling dexterously up over an outcropping, looking back to sight a path that Druna could weather.

They finally reached one of the higher ledges. There was no easy, straight path, but the ridge was flatter here, and the three of them could make their way down the long line of the mountain range, down towards the foothills. Thor felt slightly out of breath by the time they evened out, but he wouldn't dare to ask for a reprieve. Instead, when Loki looked back at him with an arched brow, Thor waved him off, taking up Druna's reins once more and pulling her forward. The stout mare seemed tired as well, ready to be tucked back into her warm stall with her dry hay, but like Thor she seemed to have her pride. She was, after all, a steed of the royal stables, a mare he'd picked out for himself a long time ago. She was just as proud as he.

The walk down the slate was as silent as the journey up the mountainside, Thor's eyes flicking up from his steps only to trace Loki's form, the Jotun picking their trail ahead of them. His hair battered about in the cold winds, locks fraying and twisting against one another, wrapping around in loops one second and flayed out straight the next, long and dark and more hypnotic than Thor would have liked.

He tried to keep his mind off of such things. Things like the kiss.

By midday the snow had picked up again, the wind blowing against them and making each step the worse. Thor braced himself against it, holding the edge of his cape up over his mouth and nose, a thin barrier against such a vicious monster, but it would have to do. Loki tried to protect himself as well, but at the edge of his fur cloak Thor could see the way his thin blue shoulder shivered, perhaps not as effected by the bitter cold as an Ás but certainly not passed over.

They stopped in the lee of a stone ledge that came out of the ridge, Loki wrapping his arms around himself, but Thor almost laughed. What heat could a Jotun make for himself? He could not rub himself warm, could not blow hot air against his fingertips. Loki did not run cold as he should, he did not burn like his brethren did, but nor was he warm. He was trapped in temperance, shivering with cold but his shivering making no heat. It was a pitiable condition.

"Here," Thor started, moving to remove his cape, to place it about Loki's too meager frame, but instead of receiving the gift with grace, or at least with gratitude, the little Jotun snorted at him.

Snorted at him.

"I do not need your clothing, Thor." He tipped his horned head to the side, blood red eyes too pleased. Not bashful and sweet as Thor might have expected from anyone else being bestowed a prince's generosity, but instead sly. Full of pleasure more his own. "I am not a maid to be tucked under your arm. Or did you forget that it is you who are vulnerable here, not I?"

"I am hardly vulnerable, you little weasel," Thor replied, scowling. "I have faced the fires of Muspelheim and the dead silence of Niflheim. I have stood before the golden throne of Hlidskjalf and been under the eye of the Allfather himself. Question not my strength, for it is I that wield the power of Mjolnir, not you."

"Oh, forgive me," Loki begged with no sincerity. Indeed, he bowed at the waist, spreading his arms from under his furs, his lips quirked unevenly, an infuriating smirk. "Shall the great prince take his great hammer to my head for speaking the truth? You shall have to be quick if you wish to, for you may be strong, but I am swift, and know well how to hide amongst the snow. You may recall that I have lived for centuries in this barren land, while you have only just survived two days by the skin of your teeth, and with no insignificant assistance from me. Better still, you may recall that I can conjure flame at a whim."

He straightened, flaring his clawed fingers in a quick twist through the air, blood red flame springing to life above them, burning without smoke and shifting eerily as ether, elements of the fire moving through one another in beautiful jerks.

"I can warm myself well enough," he reminded, his eyes bright in the flicker of light, shadows cast over one side of his face, up the long line of his horns.

Thor lowered his hands, the ends of his cape dragging through the snow, and he frowned as he turned his head to the side. He would not call it pouting.

"...I only wished to help," he said finally, though he had to recognize that his motion had come with some insult. He would have thrown off such an offer, if another made it to him, and with offense if the other had been a man -- though, as Loki had pointed out, he was no man. Or he was a man and more. Thor was not certain of how such things were distinguished.

Loki's smirk faded slowly, and he let out a breath that had the audacity to mist in the air.

"I am unused to kindness," he said finally, and settled himself with a heavy thud upon the dirt and stone in the shadow of the lee. He set his fire down to float above the rock, and encouraged it higher. Thor tied Druna's reins out of her way and settled as well, pulling his cape over his lap and lifting his hands to bring them some warmth. Loki watched him.

"Why do you not make fire yourself?" the Jotun asked after a moment, watching Thor try to gather heat.

"I only had two emberstones with me. I had little time to prepare for the journey, and I knew not where I went."

"Why not make it yourself? Why use another's seiðr and not your own?"

Thor's immediate impulse was to make a face, but some better judgment made him hold it back. The last thing he wished to do was get into another match with Loki, or to offend him once more without even meaning to. It was an insult to think a warrior would use magic, but Loki would not know that, and Thor was finally beginning to realize that the things he held to be true beyond doubt were not necessarily true universally.

"I am no seiðmaðr. The use of magics is..." Thor tried to find a less abrupt way of saying it than he would of, but Loki was looking at him with enough expectation that Thor felt fairly certain he already knew the answer. "I have never been talented at it," he finished finally.

seiðr was women's work, women's art. Thor had learned the art of the sword and the mace, and eventually the hammer. He had learned the art of blood, what it meant to bleed upon the ground, and what it meant to make another bleed so. The art of the warrior was simple in a fashion: step to one side and your opponent will step to the other. Move one way and he will move the other, swing and he shall block, attack and he will parry. Look for the opening. Look for that sweet spot. And when that spot could not be found, deliver with such force that the shield could be broken, hit with such power that none could be denied.

Thor had never had much love for academics, but in a way the dance of the warrior was much like math. It was a simple equation. Magic, however, dealt in the illogical.

It was a force of secrets and lies, a force of back handedness, it crept around in the dark, making up excuses. It stabbed in the back. It went one way and then went the other, with no tells. Magic was conniving and sneaky, and not only did Thor have no art for it, he had no will. He had no desire for it. He wished to show himself, all of himself, to his opponent. To stand upon the battleground naked -- to take his blows and offer his own in return. He wished for pure honesty, to know, all through him, to know that he had won in all fairness, that he had won through his strength alone. The true victor.

Loki just huffed a hollow sound and returned his gaze to the seið-wrought flame.

"I do not remember my first use of seiðr," the Jotun said finally. "It was always there. I saw it as I could see light and shadow, felt it as I could feel cold and hot. I knew it to be part of the world as anyone ever knows anything, and that others could not sense it as I did was unknown to me." His eyes flicked over to Thor. "seiðr, the arcane divine, is not of our kind. I was told by those who had lived through the war that it was a tool of the Aesir. It was not the place for lives, mortal or immortal, to touch upon the divine. Magic was given and taken by forces much greater than ourselves, greater than even the Allfather. That the Aesir used and abused it for victory was seen as...hateful. In our world, magic was given only by the Winter's Heart."

"Winter's Heart?" Thor asked, his brow furrowed.

"You call it 'the Casket.'"

"...I see." Thor had seen the Casket as a child, had been taken down there by his father, his hand tucked into Odin's much larger one, and the two of them had looked upon the spoil of war that had been ripped from Jotunheim's grasp, leaving it powerless in the wake of the Asgardian victory. Thor had thought it a great testament, a memorial to the glory of their people's warriors, but his father had always looked at it askance, as if he didn't wish to face it truly. He had spoken few words, only telling the tale of how he found it, the story of what it did and why it had to be guarded by the Destroyer, and some intended wisdom that Thor had found no use for in the days of his childhood. Thor had thought of the Casket little in the years since.

He'd never thought much of any place that could not be conquered, that held for him no spoils or songs.

"I had believed," Loki continued, "that upon entering the world of the Aesir, I would find kin. That I would find wielders of seiðr and the use of it as easy and usual as breathing. But it was not. Though I felt it all around me, saw how your world was built upon it, I heard how the men of your halls laughed. Dismissed it as weak and cowardly, as something less. At least here seiðr is a monster, a beast not to be courted. In your world it is a dog -- kept upon a leash and pulled out to perform tricks."

He turned his head up to look at Thor properly then.

"You think that my magic is shameful, just as my-- just as everyone here does. Yet you would sit here and freeze to death rather than ask for power from a source greater than you. Are you really so proud?"

Thor shifted uncomfortably, disliking the way that only two days with Loki had changed how he would react to such a question. Two days ago, he would not have accepted insolence like that, and even now he felt his nose wrinkle slightly, but it took nothing more than the memory of Loki's lips upon his to gentle his temper. He could not help but think of how his friends would laugh -- Thor Odinson tempering himself in hopes of getting between a Jotun's thighs.

"Where I come from, pride is not a bad thing," Thor grumbled in response.

"There is a difference between pride and arrogance."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning that you may be proud only in what you can do. Pride need not boast. Pride need not scream. Pride is known." Loki placed his black tipped hand over his chest, pressing in against the fur, as if to reach his heart. "Pride lives within. Arrogance lives without."

"Do you think me so spoiled that I know nothing?" Thor asked, frowning. "I know not seiðr, but I have spent my life in lessons, both physical and of the court."

"And yet you fear to lower your head."

"Why should I?" Thor crossed his arms at that, drawing himself up. "I am a prince. It is the place of others to lower their heads before me."

"Because in the end you lower it only to your fear. To your arrogance. You are ruled, Prince of Aesir, whether you wish it or not." Loki held up a finger, as if imparting a lesson. "You live in a cage of your own making, controlled by such simple things. You refuse to kneel, not because you resist tyranny or madness, but because you fear to. You are afraid to appear weak. You should fear more to be weak. Let others think themselves full. Let them think they have bested you, that you are defeated -- what care you for the thoughts of those beneath you? In the end, you let them rule you."

Thor made an even greater face than that, unable to argue with Loki's logic but finding every bone in his body rebelling against the idea regardless. How could he bow before any but his father? How could he, a prince, bow to those his lessers? And yet Loki's words echoed the thought -- if they were truly his lessers, why did he care so well what they believed? But Thor couldn't stand the idea of such creatures thinking themselves better than him. It turned his stomach.

This was what he hated so about seiðr. It played in too much trickery, leaving Thor confused and nauseous, uncertain where before he'd been so sure. He preferred a battle where he could pit himself truly against an opponent, to beat each other bruised and bloody and whoever felled the other was proven right. It was simple. Straightforward.

It made sense.

"You are truly an annoying creature, Jotun," Thor commented, but the quirk on the edge of his lips softened the words, and they weren't without grudging affection.

"That is only because you have made the mistake of listening to me," Loki replied with a grin, his fangs displayed widely.

They paused by the fire for only a short time, not wanting to linger too long and miss the opening of the Bifrost. Thor rolled the lodestone in one palm while his stomach growled, ignored for now as he pushed a handful of snow into his mouth, running his other hand across his lips. He pulled Druna up on to the lowering ridge, which descended into more foothills, and the path seemed sure enough that they could dare to mount.

Thor pulled himself up first, Druna shifting her feet, and Thor leaned over to offer Loki his hand, pulling the Jotun up behind him, his furs pressed to Thor's back, and where the intimacy had been simply convenience the day before, now, when Loki's hands came to touch him, held to the side of his waist, Thor thought of the cave and the way Loki had felt beneath him. He flashed a brief, unwanted vision of riding with Loki through the fields of Asgard, or even fair Vanaheim, what it would be like to show him such places. Places bright and warm.

Thor couldn't help but think that Loki was correct. He had indeed made quite a mistake, but not merely the one of listening.

Druna plodded down the uneven slope, Thor and Loki leaned back in the saddle to maintain their balance as the mare shifted each leg, hooves grating a hollow sound upon the stone, a sound made darker by the lonely echo that followed. They ended up having to ascend another hill, one where there had clearly once been a maintained path, though it was now in disrepair, sections split in the rock or littered with fallen stones. The heavy snow fall the night before wasn't helpful either. When they finally did reach the hill top, a pale, flickering light caught Thor's attention out of the corner of his eye.

He pulled back on Druna's reins, coming to a stop as he looked out over a dark plain, past a dark line in the snow field, a great canyon, he could only presume, to where a shadowy shape lay upon the horizon. With the dim light and navy blue sky, as well as the frosty wind that seemed intend upon burning Thor's eyes, it took him a moment to realize that he was looking at the outline of a city, and the winks of tender light came from what must have been windows.

There were not many of them, though. In fact, whole swathes of the city -- a grand one, Thor realized as his eyes continued to pick out the shape of buildings against the clouds -- were pitch black, apparently unoccupied, with only two, perhaps three areas meagerly lit by sparse sparks, almost like campfires in the night. It was only after staring for awhile, trying to determine what he was seeing that he realized how uneven the buildings looked. It was, perhaps, architecture. The dark elves, in particular, seemed to like a strange, twisting kind of fashion, which often made buildings look like misbegotten dreams and their clothing like veins and cobwebs.

But the more Thor looked the less it seemed like an unfortunate sense of beauty and more like ruin, the jagged edges of a tall building showing where part of it must have collapsed, and the edges of the city decorated by what appeared to be piles of rubble. The more Thor could discern, the more it looked to be in a fantastic state of disrepair.

It only struck him belatedly that Loki had yet to say a word.

Thor looked over his shoulder at the Jotun and found him staring out as well, his proud blue face caught in profile, the dark blue strands of his hair twisting up from over his shoulder to dance in the air with the snowflakes. His posture was rigid, and his red eyes too sharp and dry, almost wary.

"...what is this place?" Thor asked, looking back out to the horizon.

There was silence, and for a moment Thor thought he would get no response. Then he heard Loki speak.

"Útgarðr," he said, and that was enough to make Thor's head jolt back in surprise, looking at Loki again.

"Útgarðr? The capital of Jotunheim?" Thor remembered plenty of tales of the taking of the city, of the years it took to break through the ice walls, to conquer the huge warriors that had defended it, the hordes of them seemingly unstoppable. He remembered the Einherjar speaking of the day they'd almost breached the city's gates, until an army from the hills had come to defend the flagging guards, driving the Asgardians back yet again. Thor also remembered his own father speaking of the day the city fell, the day he lost his eye, and the day he'd taken the Casket from its stand, leaving the King of the Jotnar alive but defeated. Returning victorious.

But in all the tales that Thor had heard, Útgarðr had been no desolate wreck. It had been a capitol city with walls so high that even ten ladders would not have scaled them, that even the strongest of the Einherjar could not throw a grappling hook to clasp them. Walls so high and so thick that even the armies of Asgard had pitted themselves against them for nearly ten years before they'd finally fallen. It had been a city full of streets and houses and the flare of frostfire running in strange gullies linked from building to building. A city full of people, he had heard.

"...what happened here?" he asked, confused.

Loki gave him a look as if he were the worst kind of fool in all the realms.

"War," he replied, the word a rebuke and an answer all in one. It was almost enough to make Thor remain silent, not wishing to incur more such speech, but he had too many questions and they burned to pass his lips.

"I do not understand," Thor said finally, looking at the city. "The war passed nearly a thousand years ago. Surely...Surely your people must have rebuilt. Why does it remain in such a state?"

Loki shook his head, and Thor was not certain at what: the question, the answer it would call up, or something that even he could not fathom.

"You think war a game, do you not? Some great quest to embark upon, to string upon your breastplate. A pretty gem to show the world your worth... That is the war of the victors, my lord. This... This is what happens to the defeated." Loki finally tore his red eyes from the distant city, and out of the corner of his eye, Thor saw the Jotun looking at him. "Your father took the Casket. There was no rebuilding. There was no progress. There was only vengeance and the sad creatures that mill around spouting it. They were so consumed with war that it was all they could imagine, the only thing they could hold to. And Útgarðr fell, far worse than Odin Giantslayer could ever force it to."

Loki shook his head again, lowered this time, and Thor could not quite catch his eyes no matter how he tried, could not see into them at all.

"The war passed nearly a thousand years ago..." Loki said, repeating Thor's words. "But not here. Here the war remains, the giants merely waiting for their adversaries to come back. For them, the war has never ended."

Thor didn't know what to say to that. War had been all he'd dreamed of since he was a boy. He had grown up on the tales of it, on the laughter of men around the hearth and the spill of mead as they became merry. He had grown up knowing that all he'd ever wanted was to be a warrior such as them. To be looked upon as his father was, with the love and respect of an entire people. War was not stagnant and old. It was hot and immediate, something with no time for thought, when the head turned off and left only the heart, the beat of it so strong that all else faded to a roar and the world became wonderful, filled with the desperation to fight, to fuck, the ecstatic fluidity of life and death all the swing of an arm, the curve of a bow. It was the greatest state, the breath of the Úlfhéðinn, the crazed wolf, or the Berserkr, the wild bear. It was when men were naught but the truth of themselves, bare to bones and filled with a passion beyond even the telling of the Norns.

To break free of fate.

Thor had never thought that there was another side of it all. He could never have imagined such a thing devolving to torpid rage and bitter regret. To become as slow and aged as a mortal, and just as meaningless.

He pressed his lips together, his grasp tightening around the reins so that the leather bit into his chilled hands, the skin there red from the winter's sting. He turned Druna away from the city, back down the path that lead towards the snow fields.

"Come," he said, though he knew Loki needed no words. "We must get to the Bifrost before sundown."

Loki did not reply, and Thor thought he could just make out the weak flickers of frostfire light from the corner of his eye, the silent cries of the ones left to live in the wreckage of the past, homeless within their own homes.

Lifeless within their own lives.

-----

When they finally crested the final ridge, when the Bifrost site came into view, its signature tattooed into the snow, Thor felt a rush of air leave him, his shoulders sagging. He hadn’t realized how tense he was, how heavy the weight had settled upon him, until it lifted, blown away by the fresh gasp of frozen air as it swept up the slope.

He had made it. The Bifrost sat before him and sunset not too far away — he would not be stuck upon this frigid Hel.

While he had never thought that he would be, in his conscious musings, it seemed that some part of him had feared, had imagined an interminable life of darkness and hunger, no longer on some valiant quest or adventure to make for epic song, but trapped within a never ending night, parted from his friends, his family, and his throne. The life he’d always known was destined him.

He felt a cold breath against the back of his neck, brushing against the hairs there and making them prickle, and it reminded him that this was just the world that he was leaving Loki in.

Loki was not going home. He was not ending a journey and returning to warmth and light and laughter. He was merely escorting a wayward prince to his farewell. And then he would return to this — to everything the last three days had offered Thor. Each day monotonous and repeating. Where every day was the same as that which preceded it. As that which followed.

“Relieved?” Loki asked, his words causing no clouds of vapor in the air as they crept over Thor’s shoulder.

“…it is hard not to long for home,” Thor replied as diplomatically as possible, and wouldn’t his father be impressed to hear such an attempt? Thor had multiple times offended ranking members of the noble houses at court, having little care for diplomacy, and his excursions out into the Nine Realms were hardly peaceful in nature. It wasn’t in him to seek the path of least conflict. He was born of thunder and lightning, born of the clash and the ring of steel, but the image of Loki standing alone in the wasteland remained in the forefront of his mind, the Jotun runt’s skinny legs sticking out from under the rag of his fur. Thor could imagine his red eyes, not fighting or arguing, but staring forward. Accepting.

The wind rushed by, bitter and stinging, and grabbed the image from Thor even as he shook his head, drawing Druna’s reins up and pressing his heels into her chest as she started forward. She navigated the slope down, her head pulled back as her stocky legs conquered the deep snow, carrying the two of them across the plane and to the Bifrost site.

Thor tried to clear his head by changing the conversation. He looked up at the cloudy sky.

“I assume it is not yet after sunset,” he more said than asked. “Your sky gives nothing away.”

“Jotunheim rarely gives anything away,” Loki replied, and Thor could hear his smirk. “But yes. We have not yet passed your deadline. We are…close, but there is still time. The light dips wan, and soon the hour shall be upon us. You will go back where you belong.”

There was a tone in Loki’s voice but Thor could not read it, and he hesitated to ask, loathe, for some reason, to enter another verbal spar with him. Not now.

They came to where the Bifrost had left its indelible mark in the frost and Thor pulled Druna to a stop, hearing the mare snort as she shifted her weight. Thor glanced back at Loki, uncertain how to tell him that he needed to dismount, but before he could even attempt the Jotun was slipping down from where he’d perched, having ridden side saddle behind Thor, and his bare feet met the snow with a soft crunch. Thor pursed his lips and gripped the pommel, throwing his leg over and dismounting as well himself, his hand still clasping the reins. He stood there, watching as Loki ventured out into the center of the circle, looking upwards at the expressionless clouds, the wind stirring his dark hair.

Somehow the world seemed all the more silent without Loki’s words.

It seemed even lonelier now, even more desolate, than when Thor had first arrived, alone and in darkness. It seemed to stretch forever, and Thor could only see Loki, standing without cover, standing as the lone mark against the blank canvas of the snow. The single figure jutting up from a horizon built from snow and stone and misery.

It made Thor shiver in a way the snow had yet to, and he looked away.

He pretended to busy himself with Druna’s saddle bags, packing away the lodestone before going to collect its partner, his eyes purposefully avoiding Loki. If Loki thought something of it, Thor did not know, and the Jotun said nothing, but Thor could feel that red gaze upon him. If Thor could have, he would have laughed. What a warrior he made — afraid to face a runt.

Afraid to face the one weight that still had yet to abandon his shoulders.

Instead he settled down and waited for sunset to come. He tucked his cape around him, Druna standing to his side, and he looked out at the jagged edges of the slate mountains in the distance. Loki didn’t disturb him, and it seemed as if his last hour here would be spent in silence. That Thor knew he would regret it seemed to make little difference.

Soon he would be home, greeted by his mother, who was sure to have worried despite herself, greeted by his father, who would regard him with his one wise eye and wait for the tale to fall from Thor’s lips. To find his friends, who he had not even had the chance to talk to before leaving for the Bifrost; who would be envious and enthralled with the fact that he’d been to Jotunheim, demanding that they tell him everything. One quick thought of he and Loki’s fervent kiss that morning and he knew that he would be doing some careful edits, a strange heat bundling in his chest and in his neck at the idea of sharing such things. Of telling people he had pressed his lips to those of a Frost Giant — willingly.

But even that idea sat awkwardly in Thor’s head now, uncomfortable in the space that Loki had whittled out for himself within Thor’s mind. After all, he had been willing, he had wanted to, at the time, and apparently before that as well, even though he hadn’t known Loki’s true nature. Twice now Loki had bent Thor’s attention to him. Twice he had drawn Thor’s heart to beat and had Thor’s lips pressed to his skin; both Aesir pink and Jotun blue.

The boy on the balcony still haunted him, somehow, and Thor remembered well that it was none other than his father who’d sent him here — and Odin always knew more than he let on.

The thought just made Thor frown.

He had no opportunity to consider it further, though. The sound that pulled his attention was, at first, not a sound at all, but a vibration. A rumble in the earth that hummed dull beneath Thor’s skin and made his brow furrow. He reached down to feel the snow, then press into it, as far down as he could go, to where there was enough hard packed ice for him to sense the tremble through the skin of his hand. A few precious seconds ticked by, his heart beat fooling him and making him doubt himself, but when he heard the first of the dull roar, the noise that was so distant and stretched that it seemed almost like the wind itself, he lifted his gaze to the horizon.

Even in the darkness he could see the pale clouds of kicked up snow, the churning of the elements caused by only a mighty presence — or the presence of many.

Thor pushed himself to his feet.

"What is that?" he asked, standing straight and true, his knees locked and body braced. The hard north winds claw at his cloak and at his hair, trying to batter him, trying to bring him low, but he had no care for them. He stared out across the icy expanse, into the deep blue dark, to whatever it was that came for them.

He saw Loki approach from behind him, come to stand at his side and gaze at the horizon as well, and they were silent for a moment, a heartbeat, before Loki cursed quietly.

"Laufey," the Jotun said, the name like a breath that the wind stole away, Thor only catching a glimpse of it before it was gone again. He turned sharply to look at Loki.

"Laufey King? Laufey Needleblade? The King of the Jotnar?"

"None other," Loki replied, a low bitterness there. "We passed too close to Útgarðr. He must have heard of your presence here."

His blue hand was still wrapped around Druna's reins, held tight beneath her chin. She stamped her hooves, moving restlessly, feeling the vibrations of the earth. Laufey brought an army with him, enough to make the ground quake beneath them all.

Thor took Mjolnir's handle, looking grim.

"No!" Loki said, releasing Druna to put both hands against Thor's, covering his knuckles around Mjolnir's grip. "What are you doing?! The Bifrost will open soon and you may leave here without confronting him."

"That is the coward's way out!" Thor objected swiftly, unable to stomach the idea of running. To even consider such a thing went against everything he believed, everything in him.

"And staying here to fight is the fool's way!"

"Better a fool than a coward!"

"Better a coward than headless corpse!"

"You mistake me if you think I would be afraid to die here, like this. And you mistake Mjolnir's strength if you think that an army, even an army of Jotnar would take me down." The prince frowned at Loki, his pride feeling damaged by the mere suggestion.

"Your father fought my people for years, Odinson. He fought them with an army and with the might of Gungnir, and it still cost him an eye and much more. You are no Odin. Not yet."

Thor raised his eyebrows at the 'yet,' at the speculative tone in Loki's voice, but he hardly had the time for another messy ramble through the workings of Loki's quick and confusing tongue.

"I will not run. Not again." Loki had already convinced him to do that once. With a tempest Thor lost no honor, but he would not run from warriors. He would not show his back.

"Then you will start a war. Either you will be killed and Odin will come to crush us once again, or you will kill Laufey and stir my people behind a cause once more."

"They have no Casket," Thor pointed out. Without the device the Jotnar couldn't travel the worlds. They were trapped here.

"And if you kill their king they will have nothing left." Loki looked at him with burning red eyes. "You have seen what your people wrought here. Do you truly believe that the idea of death and destruction will hold the giants back any more than it would you?" The Jotun made a soft sound of derision. "I had hoped, when I was a child, looking through the mirror at your shining world, that things were different there. That I would find kindred spirits. Instead I find more battle hungry brutes, more idiotic fools more ready to throw themselves and others onto the tips of their swords than to do something greater."

"Something greater than glory? Than the honor and bravery of men?"

"Yes!" Loki's yell echoed in the long empty plain, scattering through the fast falling storm. He bared long, white fangs, face twisted in a rictus of desperate anger. "It is all you do! All of you! You, your father, Laufey! You run around swinging your hammers and swords and leave nothing but rubble behind! You destroy! You play a child's game to stroke your own ego, so that you may play at children's games with other children and brag about who has wrecked the most life! And in the meantime those who have no wish of your foolishness live in the mess you leave behind. You are a child! A squalling, insolent infant! You think that because your father won here before, stripped us of our power, that we are nothing more than defeated. You think that you may do as you wish and go home and never have to deal with the consequences, but there are more ways between the worlds than your rainbow bridge, Odinson, and if you do this I shall raise an army behind me and climb the World Tree myself to see them raze your golden world to the ground!"

The speech came fast, spat with fury, and Thor had a vague idea that he should take it as a threat, that he should turn Mjolnir from the advancing hoard and strike down this venomous snake here and now-- But it was only then that Thor realized Loki's hands had been on him this whole time. Blue, Jotun fingers, stained with winter, were wrapped around his hand, wrapped around Mjolnir -- Thor had allowed this monster into his space, to touch his royal self, and didn't even think about it.

He looked at his hand, looked at the light blue scars that ran over the back of Loki's, and felt the frosted wind pluck at his cheeks, reddened by the cold bite.

He'd allowed a Jotun to touch him and didn't even think about it. Because it hadn't mattered.

Because...it was Loki.

Thor felt his teeth grind together, felt the tension in his jaw, his lips pressing against each other, and it was surprisingly hard to lower his hand. He didn't let go of Mjolnir, didn't give in yet, but he turned his eyes away from the battle, to Loki's set face. The wind blew behind him, making the Jotun's black hair flicker and wave by his gaunt cheeks, casting shadows across his icy skin. His brow was set and his blood red eyes didn't waver.

He looked so different from that night on the balcony and Thor still couldn't say why. Beyond all the cosmetic, there was something else there, something just beyond Thor's reach.

"So you would have me lay down my arms? You would have me give up my honor like a gutless braggart? It is not death I fear, Loki. It is this: the loss of myself to time and hesitance. To see myself grow complacent and fat, spoiled by luxury--"

"You are spoiled by luxury, you blind oaf," Loki said, but his voice was lower now, without the driven heat of his rant. "You have lived your life choosing your battles. Choosing when and how and why. You throw your will upon others, force others to take the consequence of your wreckage. You asked me what your father wanted? He wanted you to grow. up. You are not a child. You are not a warrior. You are a prince, and one day you shall lead a people. The warriors of your world have the luxury of running around, doing as they wish, flattering themselves with blood and mead and drunken stories. But you? You shall be king. Your honor is not your own, Thor. It never was. Your honor is the honor of Asgard. You bear the mantle of responsibility. The world has given you everything on a golden platter, assumed your fitness, your worthiness. I only ask you to prove it."

"By running from a fight?" Thor asked, his voice strained and a little desperate. If only Loki would ask something else of him, something different, anything--

"By not killing my father," the Jotun replied drolly, and it took Thor a moment, his mind searching through lists and tapping at the abacus until the answer lighted in his eyes, widening with realization.

"...you are Laufey's son. You are a prince."

But Loki just looked at him tired.

"I am Loki Laufeyjarson," he replied, finally letting his fingertips drop from Thor's hand. "I am the firstborn son but no heir. I am a prince who shall never be king."

"What? Why?"

"Have you not seen me, Thor?" The Jotun put on a nasty smirk, eyes going vicious and cruel as he tipped his head to the side, dim light glinting off of his golden horns. The last dim light of the day. Sunset was almost upon them. "I am a runt. I was born sick and small. Deformed. Worse, I am a wielder of seiðr, the art of magic -- a trait associated with your people, not mine." He shook his head. "There is no love lost between Laufey and I. It is not his life I plead for."

"Then what?"

"My freedom."

Thor's brow furrowed, confusion coloring his features then. He'd been sent to save Loki, to "rescue" him, Odin had said. To free him. But Odin's words, as always, had been true: Loki was no captive. There were no jailers here.

"You are free," the prince argued in return. Loki scoffed.

"I am chained to my fate, as everyone on this forsaken world of ice is. If you do this, if you fight this battle, you will decide the fate of all of us. You will set in motion a machine that cannot be stopped, a machine of war and smoke, a machine of blood and fire. You will be the fuse that lights the spark and the cog that turns the wheel, and the rest of us? We shall merely be pieces forced to play our parts. No, I do not plead for Laufey's life. There are many in this world who have wronged me, and he is not the least of them -- I would happily disabuse him of his head, he and many others, but if you do this, if you do this now, you take the choice from all of us. The future shall be set, and you will take the voice of the world with you in one swing of your hammer."

The thought shouldn't have made Thor uncomfortable. It never had before. He was a prince, a future king -- it was his place, his birth right, to decide the fates of others. It was his place to shape the world around him, and for the world to submit. But Thor looked up through the blizzard, through his frost stiffened hair and the black tendrils that dance around Loki's face, looked through the blur of white snow pushed past them by a wind traveling violently forward -- straight across the plain and to that very advancing army. Thor looked up into Loki's unwavering eyes and saw no fear there.

No fear.

Thor felt himself draw up short.

That was the difference.

He remembered the boy on the balcony, the way he blinked and his eyes darted about, remembered the heated words he spat and the quick apologies that followed. He remembered the slight hesitation, the heartbeat that would pass between words and the way the boy was reluctant to meet his eyes at times. He remembered the way the boy looked out over the city with some kind of too old longing, as if the light of Asgard would pull the breath from his chest, and the way fear had beat loud and clear in the boy's expression on the footsteps of the palace.

Thor remembered the boy on the balcony, and blue or peach, he remembered the fear there, and the hope. For there could not be one without the other -- without hope there was nothing to fear.

And here, in this dark world, Loki was fearless.

Thor loosened his grip on Mjolnir's leather wrapped handle, felt his shoulders sag. He didn't want to destroy Loki in his wake. He didn't want to crush this cunning runt who had survived only by his wit and by his fingertips. He didn't want to destroy Loki's will with his own.

He wanted to see, once more, the boy on the balcony, who had wanted something more.

Thor looked heavenward, up at the black clouded sky, the final sunset imminent. The army was getting closer, the sounds of their violence creeping up around them. Thor did not know which would arrive first. He looked back at Loki.

"Heimdall will open the Bifrost soon." He pursed his lips, bouncing his hammer's weight in the palm of his hand. "If I went--...If I did what you asked, would you come with me?"

Loki stared at him, then out at the white cloud of the snow churned by the feet of the Jotnar, the cloud coming ever closer. His heavy eyelashes webbed flakes that were thrown by, frost catching along his jaw. He looked alone, a stature carved from the snow itself, from slate and from snow, kept locked here, unmoving. Captive. A prince, just like Thor, but always bound -- his fate never his own.

"I would not come on conditions," the Jotun replied, finally, eyes coming back to meet Thor's. "No such decision would ever work if I came not of my own will. I will not come with you to keep you from slaking your bloodlust. You should refrain for more than a bargain. You should not need an incentive like a child offered a sweet fruit to do their chores."

Thor grit his teeth again, and he felt pity for Loki, felt some strange affection that he could not seem to banish, but that didn't mean he'd given up his pride completely.

"I am not a--" he started, but Loki didn't let him get far.

"But I will only consider leaving with someone who would listen to me," the other prince finished.

Thor looked at him, let his eyes take a feast of the image, the hard cut line of the Jotun's slim form against the backdrop of the wasteland. White and white and white and blue, blue and black, like a bruise, a wound beneath the surface. Loki's long, dark hair was tossed wearily in the wind, the flakes of frost building up on the angles of his anatomy, against the line of his jaw, the dip of his collar bone. His fur hung awkwardly and blew to the side, revealing a body marked with useless lines, lines that refused to summon ice as they were meant to.

The world moved around him, but Loki remained still.

Thor looked down at his own hand, at the dark leather wrapped handle of Mjolnir, resting in his hand like she was meant to be there. And Thor always thought that she was. It had never been a question, not one in him and not one posed to him. She had been placed in his hand as easily as mead, and with as little forethought on his part. All he had cared about was that he was becoming a man. A warrior. That he was finally taking his place as the heir apparent.

But never had he wondered if he deserved such a thing.

If he was worthy...

He raised his head.

"...you are a prince," Thor said, Mjolnir feeling heavier in his hand than she ever had, and he turned her over, the butt of his palm up, looking at the lost Jotun prince. "This is your world." Thor pressed his lips together. "What happens next..."

He pressed her into Loki's hand, into the hand of a Frost Giant, and Thor almost imagined that he could feel her confusion. He didn't know if he was doing the right thing. He had no idea. But then again, he never had. He'd always acted on instinct, always acted first in the interest of his whims -- what he claimed as honor. But he had never lived as Loki had. He had never clawed at the earth just to show that he had existed.

Perhaps he was doing the wrong thing. But perhaps he'd always been doing the wrong thing.

The only way to find out was to do something different.

He wrapped Loki's fingers around Mjolnir's handle, and then removed his hands, leaving her in the hands of the enemy.

"What happens next..." Thor repeated. "Is up to you."

Loki's red eyes were wide, lashes stretched high enough to almost touch his brow, his mouth softened into a small 'o,' and suddenly he was no longer a statue. No longer a piece of ice carved into a familiar shape. No longer something unmovable. Unafraid.

"There you are..." Thor murmured, seeing the boy on the balcony there before him, blue and ice ridden but the boy all the same. Filled with the same fragile hope.

The ice below them was trembling, and the sound of the army was all around them, growing from a distant rumble to a great roar, the beat of feet and hooves and the scream of angry voices. It was too late to run, and too late to fight. Thor was only looking at Loki as the mob surrounded the small rise upon which the Bifrost had opened three days earlier.

The sun began to set.

“Asgardian!” a voice called, a voice that called just as much for blood — an enemy, a foe. A call to battle. But Thor couldn’t look away from Loki.

From finding out what Loki would do next.

The Frost Giant was looking at him with those wide red eyes, eyes that now seemed too large for his fragile face. He tilted his chin down to look at Mjolnir, sitting so unassuming in his hand, her power nothing subtle; her reputation nothing unknown. She was hard uru mass, unending cosmic energy — the death throws of a massive star contained within a mortal shell that seemed far too small, too humble, to be real. She was a force, as real as any element, as true as any magic, no god or goddess but something even more primal, and she had the power to shape the winds.

If she so chose.

“You trespass here, Odinson,” that voice called out — Laufey’s voice, Thor could only assume. It held anger, some stagnant rage left cold after a thousand years, not a fire but frostbite, blackening the skin and removing all feeling. Laufey would kill him, if given the chance. He’d brought an army, after all. “Did you think you could dally upon my world, my realm, and I would not know it?” He made a sound of disgust. “Or has the Allfather, in his great wisdom, sent you here? He will regret it, when he is returning the Casket in trade for your neck.”

Loki’s hand shifted over Mjolnir’s handle, dark claws touching upon the leather, pressing into it and leaving indentations. It was doubtful that Loki had ever held such power. Had ever been given such a gift. Thor’s eyes darted to the golden clasps around the Jotun’s arms, and it made sense now, where it came from. Some piece of royal treasure that the prince had taken for himself. Perhaps stolen. Perhaps given. But the last trinket of a life now past, either way.

Power had been Thor’s since he was a child. He was born into it — strong and golden and the heir. The heir to the world and all other worlds. He had been born a prince and handed power in Mjolnir’s might; the power to mold the world. He wondered if Loki had ever, even for a moment, had such a power. A prince, but in blood only.

“…what will you do?” Thor asked quietly, and he couldn’t help the tension in his body, standing on a precipice now. War, perhaps, or death. Neither had ever frightened him before. But neither had ever been on any terms but his own. Now he knew not what would happen, or where this would lead. Loki could throw the hammer at his father and take them to another war, or to their graves. He could take Thor to his knees before him in the snow, bring him low. He could take Thor’s life, or he could take every inch of him. All Thor could do was wait.

“Odinson!” the voice called from outside their realm, and the wind blew Thor’s red cape about him, the tattered ends fraying and his hair stirring around his neck.

The boy on the balcony was quiet, no quick words, no sharp eyes. He was silent, and Thor hung on a breath, waiting to be saved.

Loki looked up.

“What are you doing here…?” he asked once more, his voice far softer than it had been two sunsets ago, his eyes searching for an answer. “Why did you come here…?”

Thor laughed quietly, not knowing how he could have been so blind, how he could have always been so unknowing — but perhaps Loki was right. He was a buffoon.

“…I came here to rescue the one called Loki,” he said again. “I came here to rescue you.”

He reached out, and the pads of his fingers brushed just the knuckles of Loki’s hand, wrapped about Mjolnir’s grip, felt the fierce bone of them and the spring stream cool skin. Warmer than the blizzard that beat around them.

The touch could go no further than that, for in the next heartbeat, the world rushed in again, and everything happened in an instant.

There was a cry and the screaming rush of air, something being hurled, and Thor did not have time to turn to face it, to see what it was that would kill him. Indeed, the spear would have lodged itself in his throat, a punishment for the gall of daring to ignore the furious demands of a king, and he would have died an ignoble death, bleeding out and choking upon the snow, if not for the clang of metal upon metal, the ringing reverberations and then the splintering of wood as Mjolnir crashed through the spear, battered and broke it aside.

Loki stood panting to Thor’s side, having pitched himself forward to deflect the deadly blow, and only then could Thor turn, his hand reaching out. But before he could grab Loki’s shoulder his eye caught upon the last fading spark behind the clouds, the greenish wink of a star going out, hidden beneath the blackened shroud of Jotunheim’s miserable skies.

The sun had set.

Above them the clouds began to rumble, the heavens themselves churning as the snow around them picked up, swirling thickly through the air in a vortex as the air charged with otherworldly energy. Thor could feel it, the static that bounced against his skin and beat in his heart, the power of a storm brewing, and he felt every hair on his body lift as the Bifrost opened behind him, hitting the ground in a flash of light and a boom that followed a heartbeat later, shaking the earth and sending the snow rippling out, like a stone thrown upon a lake. Thor felt the ground shudder and watched as the army of Jotun were thrown from their feet, only Laufey keeping them as he stumbled to steady himself. Thor saw blood red eyes, and then Loki was shoving him back.

“Go!” he yelled, hand outstretched, and Thor was torn, wanting to reach for that hand, to drag Loki with him. But he had left the choice in Loki’s hands. That and much more.

His lips pressed together grimly, Thor turned, grabbing for Druna’s reins as he heard the enraged shouts of the army all around him, getting to their feet now, and he had precious few seconds before they would attack. He pulled himself up onto the mare’s back, pulling back on her bit to steer her around, looking towards the column of light that had descended from the sky and now scoured the stone earth.

He heard Loki grunt in exertion and Thor looked back over his shoulder to see Mjolnir sailing for Laufey and the army around him, her sure weight tumbling over and over and forcing the Frost Giants to throw themselves back to the ground once more to avoid her, purchasing Thor just a little more time.

“Loki!” he yelled, over the thundering pulse of the Bifrost, over the shouts of the Jotnar, over the clang of weapons thirsty for Aesir blood. He pulled Druna around and he knew he was wasting the time that Loki had bought him, but he had to try. He thrust out his hand towards him, fingers extended as far as they would go, the storm of the Rainbow Bridge shatteringly loud and bright, the gale yanking on Thor’s hair with a terrible violence, and Heimdall would keep it open only so long.

He would not risk Asgard. Not even for her prince.

But Loki hesitated, looking back at Thor with eyes so wide, eyes so afraid that Thor thought he might break, and Thor had never seen anything more beautiful. He couldn’t help but smile, couldn’t help but choke on a laugh, and he reached even further, as far as he could go, as if he could wrap his fingers around that fragile hope and bring it forth. As if he could clasp that power in his hands.

Be worthy of it.

But in the end, it could only ever be Loki’s choice.

The Frost Giant hesitated, his dark hair having come undone in all the violence, twisting about him wildly. His hands were curled before him, a lifetime of decisions placed in front of him in an instant, and he hesitated to reach out. The Bifrost roared behind Thor, and he knew he couldn’t linger. He couldn’t wait for long — couldn’t wait at all. Soon enough the Bifrost would close, or Laufey would reach them, or a lucky warrior would place a spear or an axe in his flesh, but Thor could not help himself.

He waited. He lingered. Just a moment more. Just a second. Every heartbeat the one that would change everything, every flicker of his eyelashes the one where Loki would take his hand, and he couldn’t bear to tear himself away, afraid that the instant he did would be the one where Loki would reach for him and find him gone.

But the sun had set. Three sunsets gone and Thor had run out of time.

Underneath him Druna jerked and half reared, her nature stalwart but she was no fool. They lingered in danger here, and Thor had no more heartbeats to give. His hand drew back as he pulled Druna towards the Bifrost, only to feel something cold and firm clasp him. He jerked back to see Loki looking up at him, full of uncertainty and fear, but holding to his hand tightly, a tenuous but true connection.

Thor gripped with all his strength. He would not let go.

He pulled Loki towards him, feeling the Jotun clamor up behind him on Druna’s back, his claws digging into Thor’s leathers. Thor pressed his heals into the horse’s sides, afraid that the Bifrost would wink out right in front of him, leaving the two of them at the mercy of a terrible army.

“Wait!” Loki yelled, his voice barely audible over the rush of noise, and Thor looked back at him like he was mad, but before he could ask he saw Loki thrust a hand out, and Mjolnir flew to him, slammed into his palm as his fingers reflexively clasped, and Thor heard Druna whinny as he drove her into the light, feeling the energy of the Bifrost all around them.

Out in the snow, he saw Laufey King snarl, saw the old hurt and hate in him, in the unforgiving, unforgetting red of his eyes as he yanked a spear from a nearby warrior, hurling it towards them, the grudge in his blood, ages old and left from wounds of a war long over, too strong. So strong that he would kill his own child to kill Thor. To take from Odin as Odin had taken from him.

But the Bifrost pulled upon their skin, and in a flash of light they were gone, ripped from the earth and up into the cosmos. Behind them, below them, Thor heard the ragged cry of a king of a useless kingdom, denied even this. But even that sound was fleeting, vanishing as quickly as the stars did around them, and they were pulled out from under the misery darkened skies and into the light.

-----

The first thing that Thor felt, as Druna rushed out into Heimdall’s chambers, her hooves clipping and ringing against the bronze, was the rush of warmth — of Asgard’s sweet air, and Thor breathed deep of it, pulling it into his lungs and his frozen veins, not even realizing how numbed he’d become until feeling came back in a wave, tingling through every limb.

He pulled Druna short, the mare breaking her run and coming to an uneasy halt, steadying herself upon the Rainbow Bridge, the sound of her hoofbeats echoing in the domed hall of Himinbjörg, the energy of the Bifrost still crackling, sparking not with electricity, not like lightning, but with arcane energies. Thor watched as they bounced off of the dome, dissipating slowly as the rhythm of the great mechanism began to slow, the portal closing behind them and leaving them safe.

Safe.

Safe, Thor reminded himself, only from the ravaging winds and horde of Jotunheim — not at all from the fallout of what had just happened.

“The young prince returns,” Heimdall noted, his age old voice rumbling over the words and finding scars in them. His bright orange eyes, all-seeing and full of stars, flicked effortlessly to Loki, though he must have always known what was happening; had presumably seen it all. “And he brings a souvenir.”

Still breathless from their heady escape, Thor was not inclined to indulge the guardian when Loki was still at his back.

“You know my father sent me to get him,” he replied defensively, tired of feeling like the last one to be let in on the secret.

“Did he now?” Heimdall asked, his tone so maddeningly unreadable, nothing there to put it one way or the other. Thor frowned, hardly in the mood to play this game after the last three days, and he could clearly feel Loki’s cool hands against his sides, a reminder of things far more pressing.

“Thank you, Heimdall,” he said shortly as he pressed his heels to Druna’s sides, urging her forward. “For your timely rescue.”

The ancient guard of the gates merely nodded once, a dip of his chin and nothing more, his large hands settling slowly over the hilt of his broadsword, and Thor knew already that their interaction was over. Heimdall stared out into the cosmos, and Thor was eager to take it for the dismissal it may or may not have been. He turned Druna, letting the mare take them out of the chamber and onto the Rainbow Bridge. She needed little urging, ready to return to her warm stall and trough full of oats and hay. Thor knew the feeling.

But the journey was not quite over yet.

He kept Druna at a walk and glanced back over his shoulder, looking at the Jotun prince, seeing that now familiar blue facade, but cast in light so wholly different. Not the dim blue of Jotunheim, but the pre-dawn glow of Asgard’s golden light. It made his skin look different, less like the crysal clear water of an icy pond, frozen in winter, and more like the fresh blue bloom of the palest hyacinth, early in spring. His scars cut white lines, almost iridescent in Asgard’s glow, and his eyes…

His eyes were as red as ever.

“Are you alright?” Thor asked, not even certain himself what he was referring to — their near brush with death or the fact that Loki had just left him homeworld behind. Perhaps forever.

The Jotun looked out at the horizon, at the edge of Ífingr, where the great sea flowed down in a great waterfall to Vanaheim below them. His gaze traced over that line, then away from the edge, over to the mighty city of the Aesir, dim but shimmering, quiet now and only just beginning to wake. A radiant creature about to break from its chrysalis, and Thor had never stopped to think of it as anything other than morning. Not, at least, until he saw it through Loki’s eyes.

“…I have watched this world forever, it seems,” the erstwhile prince of the Jotnar said, and it was strange to hear a monster speaking so softly. Thor had never expected the voice of the boy on the balcony, full of longing, to drift so effortlessly from the ice blue lips of Loki. “Ever since I learned how to peer through the realms when I was a boy, tucked away in what remained of the great library in Útgarðr… I looked for something different. Something more.”

“And now you are here,” Thor said softly.

“I was here once before,” Loki reminded. Thor thought on this, trying to reconcile everything he had thought before with everything he knew now, and what the reality of their life might be like. Different and unexpected and nothing like Thor had ever had planned for him — an adventure, he couldn’t help thinking, a bit of a smile on his lips.

Different, certainly, from the ones he was used to, but different, it seemed, did not mean bad.

“It will be different,” he declared with princely certainty. “I shall make it so.”

“You shall make a world for your monster?” Loki asked, and Thor pulled Druna to a halt, twisting to look back over his shoulder at Loki. He was blue and horned, his eyes red as razors and his fingers tipped with claws. He was every ice beast that Thor had imagined in his youth, and yet nothing like them at all. Thor had thought of Loki as beast, as animal, and even just a moment ago he had thought much the same, but it was an old word, and old thought, and it was not the kind of king he wanted to be — nor the kind of world that he wanted to shape.

It seemed his father had some wisdom left in him after all.

“You are no monster,” Thor said, low but sure, watching the light begin to grow against Loki’s cheek, spreading over Ífingr’s vast surface as the cosmos turned. For a moment the Jotun looked surprised, looking caught off guard, and Thor smiled, remembering just how much he had thrilled to put such an expression upon the boy’s face that night, to keep him guessing. To see that hope spring and spark.

Then Loki huffed, chuckling a little as he shook his head.

“And you are no god,” he replied with a smirk, looking up. Thor could not help but twist down to kiss it away, his fingers against crisp cool of Loki’s chin, and Loki did not pull away. He tasted like juniper, something stark and new, emerging from winter, and Thor felt the first light of the sun upon his skin, a wash of welcome warmth, rolling in like the tide. When he drew back he saw Loki’s eyes wondering over his face, even as the Jotun’s dark claws traced every feature, cupped the ridge of his jaw.

“Oh, the king I shall make of you…” Loki murmured, and this time it was Thor’s turn to laugh, tossing his head back and belting it out.

It seemed his mother had not been quite wrong either.

“Come,” he said with a grin he could not help, and exhausted as he was he found he was not yet ready for sleep. “You wished to see all of Asgard, did you not?”

“I have seen it before,” Loki said dismissively, but Thor did not allow that barbed tongue to turn him off.

“Ah, yes, but you have not seen it in the light,” he replied with confidence. For a moment Loki hesitated, looking at him undecided, but Thor knew now how to wait. How to let Loki return to his hand of his own volition.

“…fine,” the other prince finally responded airily, as if he were bestowing a grace upon Thor and not the other way around.

And in the light of Asgard’s dawn, it seemed less like ice and more like gold.

Something rare and worth fighting for.

Thor smiled and turned back to face forward, urging Druna on, their quest not so much over as it was only beginning, laid out before them in burgundy and crystal, in the myriad of colors as the light hit the rainbow bridge to guide them home.

Three sunsets gone, and one just beginning to rise.