Chapter Text
Loki knows he has made an error in judgment when a Frost Giant attempts to burn him as his brethren did with Volstagg a few minutes earlier and it results in his armour and undershirt crumbling under the Jotun’s hand, and little more. He can feel the sharpness of the cold and unforgiving pressure of the Giant’s grip, where his garments have gone to waste, but nothing else, no excruciating pain as his skin withers away at the cursed touch.
It is all he can think about, even as he helps Fandral and commands for the group to retreat, bids Thor to follow along fruitlessly. Even as they start urgently beckoning for Heimdall and they receive no other reply than the whistling of the frozen winds around them, and a veritable Jotun army cornering them against the edge of a dark chasm several kilometres deep. He should have been burned by the cold magic of the Jotun, his arm should be ruined with how long the Frost Giant directly touched his skin, so, why is it not ? And why did the Giant give him such a spine-chilling stare?
Loki is still thinking about it, like the veritable Midgardian broken record, when Thor and Odin join them by the ledge in quick succession, their group taking a relieved breath almost in tandem. But their Father’s thunderous expression quickly diverts his attention, pushing his own rising worry and suspicion to the side, like it often occurs whenever Thor and Odin are involved. The two of them have an astonishing ability to fill up his mind the same way they would a room, the way air fills up a balloon until it’s fit to burst, with their larger than life presences and even larger spats and problems.
It is less vexing this time around, partly because of his own befuddlement, but mostly because unease starts creeping up on him at Odin’s unexpectedly tempestuous attitude. The All-Father’s temper is hardly an unprecedented occurrence, but it has seldom been aimed at either of them to the extent Thor is obliviously facing with his usual stubborn and jovial set. Well, shite, he must have misjudged this too.
The idea of storming into Jotunheim and Laufey’s Court might have been all Thor’s, with his well-known haste and that adventure-filled head of his, yet Loki had not fought him all that strongly about it, even in spite of his own trepidation at how their actions might interfere with his own plans with Laufey. Because he had thought that in spite of said trepidation and doubt, this was not an entirely awful way to move his own schemes forward and make his point about Thor’s unfit coronation come across nice and clear before cutting his losses with the Jötnar. He even thinks that Heimdall - who is indeed very loyal but hardly as blind or enamoured as the rest of Thor’s friends - might have seen his logic when they appeared at the Rainbow Bridge. It might have been why he did not immediately bring them in as they called for him, if Odin still hadn’t reached him or heard what had happened.
It genuinely was not a bad plan, Loki accounted for as many variable and scenarios as he possibly could in the time he had, and had found it all more worthwhile than whatever else he could have come up with himself in such short notice that he would also have had to communicate to Thor or company, and with it possibly creating a trail leading back to him. He might not have liked the speed at which events were unfolding, would have rather had more time for them - for himself - to prepare for this so-called quest, but he’d accepted the risks.
The situation worsens further when they make it back to Asgard and the Rainbow Bridge, away from the prying eyes of Laufey and his people, Odin sending the Warriors and Heimdall off to take Fandral to the Healers, all looking somewhat sombre and crestfallen, clearly affected by the All-Father’s tone and expression. Loki understands it, the shock of the experience when they have seldom been so up close and personal with it - but then again, the shock never quite wears off with time according to his own experience, it doesn’t matter how often he witnesses his Father’s ire.
But this… This is different, he can feel it in his bones, in his skin, the way magic coils and burns around and between them, the way Odin’s eye shines with something other than mere rage and indignation at being disobeyed so crassly and unrepentantly, by his first born no less. Loki would almost be tempted to call it terror if he did not know any better, and then is tempted to do as much regardless when Odin jarringly stops his scolding, face falling for a split second before whirling around and walking up to Heimdall’s post and Hofund still in place with a dreadful sort of determination, loudly proclaiming the banishment of his eldest son with harsh manners and even harsher words. Loki is left stunned speechless and frozen on the spot, unable to do much more than watch with mounting horror and guilt.
He had planned for this, for Odin to finally snap, open his eye to the truth and take matters into his own hand where his favourite son’s impertinence and arrogance are concerned, but he had envisioned their Father’s punishment to be less of one worthy of the word, and instead more akin to the adventures of old they had grown up listening to, seated on his very knee. The kinds that had either spawned bloody twisted echoes in places like Midgard and Vanaheim when whispered to the ears of folks such as the Norsemen of old, or had been watered down for good little children like them. The kinds that always came to an end with the achievements of victory, knowledge, brotherhood and wisdom, even love sometimes.
But for Odin to send Thor away to Helheim itself, from where escape and growth are impossible and there are no victories or romances to be had… It might just be the biggest folly of them all in this day and hour.
There is a woman towering above him when his vision stops swimming and watering after hitting the ground with all the might of the Bifrost and none of his usual grace or endurance.
The woman is tall and slender, toned like Sif is, like a warrior, and with the same kind of bearing, confident, proud and more alert than expected at first glance - it reminds him of all his youthful imaginings of the Valkyries of old. But there is a certain thinness to her too, her skin a sickly pale that rivals the greyish sky above them and the dirty snow beneath, her eyes a watery, washed out shade of blue that reminds him more of Loki’s than of his own, framed in some black powder, coal perhaps, and maybe even slightly sunken. She wears her long, straight black hair down, disheveled and half falling over her sharp face. Her leathers and cape are definitely Asgardian in make, although of a traditional style, old fashioned even, he believes. Loki has always been the more fashionably inclined out of the two of them.
She regards him with the kind of clever, cunning gleam in her gaze that he would often catch shining in Loki’s and Mother’s eyes, yet there is something far crueler, rawer and colder than what he has ever seen in his fairer kin too. Like a barn cat quietly contemplating an unsuspecting field mouse, like the kind of glint he sometimes finds in Father’s eye - it is not a very reassuring thought.
“Welcome to Helheim,” her voice is deeper than he would have expected but also just like he would have imagined given the chance, as deep as the sky is high and as cold as the frozen waste he has fallen to, impassive and distant like great mountains - it sounds almost bored, really. “I am Hela, and I will be your Queen in this forsaken land, Thor Odinson - brother.”
There is a stirring in the air and the earth, a whisper across still waters, as if an omen of dark tidings.
In Asgard, it is felt by the witches and magicians, and by the remaining royal family, even if Queen Frigga is the only one with enough presence of mind to truly discern its chilly touch. On Earth - otherwise known as Midgard or Terra -, it is but barely perceived by a select few, Mystics and witches, and even a few others, folks who do not yet know they have more than a touch of magic to them. As for those in the far reaches of the galaxy, hiding in the shadows, corners and pits of it, the winds of change are welcomed with the kind of glee a cool summer breeze might elicit in others.
Depending on who one might ask, it either feels a lot like dodging a bullet, or a lot like someone has walked over their grave.