Loki Laufeyson

The hall is in fine form tonight. Dozens of bodies pack the massive room, all of them burly and thick, blue skin glistening in the exertion of drink and the pulse of firelight. Fire for light only; most of the giants before me are barely dressed, wrapping furs and leathers placed strategically, but otherwise they are lost in revelry, as always. As it should be.

I cannot sleep. The castle is quiet, the party long died down. There is only the sound of distant murmuring — guards on patrol. They stand watch to keep at bay any of the creatures here, the wildcats and monstrous beasts that plague this icy utopia; but my second in command, Fenrir is right. We have grown soft. It is boring here. I feel his rightness through every part of me, though I’ll be damned if I ever admit it to him. I scrub a hand over my face and roll out of my bed. The window is open, showing the wide, glittering expanse of Jotunheim spread before me. There is the city that has built up around this fortress, and far beyond it, other civilizations are beginning. Our frost giant legacy, spreading far and wide, thriving. What the fuck is wrong with me, that I could look at any of this and feel empty? I grip the window ledge in hard, tense fingers. I will need to find some way to reconcile this gnawing. I cannot let these thoughts spread. Fenrir is a cancer, and I —

A bolt of lightning streaks through me. Stronger than the gnawing, more insistent than any instinct or worry. This is an alarm. One I set personally, a magic I wove centuries ago, eons ago. It flares again. Persistent. A ringing in my head, and I stand there for a long moment, struck dumb with confusion. The alarm means the border of Jotunheim has been breached. But that is not possible. It can’t be — Fenrir. Fury overtakes me, and for a brief moment, I am glad for it. Something to do, an enemy at which to direct my restlessness — for Fenrir is now an enemy, if he defied me and opened the portal.

I dress quickly, throwing on my warrior’s uniform, the leather breastplate and tight leggings that hold sheaths for knives, my favored weapon. Then I am out the door. I consider alerting my guard, but I want Fenrir alone. The less his ideals and actions spread to my people, the better. Only a handful of those closest to me know where the portal is, let alone that it is still possible to reopen it. We all came through it to flee here, but I shifted the break after the last was in so it was more hidden, protected. Fenrir is one who knows its location. He was trusted. He does not know how to open it — none do, save for me — but that does not mean he hasn’t figured out a way. Betrayal is metallic, but fury burns stronger. I race out of the castle and through the city gates, crossing the wide, wondrous landscape of Jotunheim’s snow and ice in deliberate, smooth strides. My boots sink into snow up to my knees, fluffy blankets of fresh powder, but I do not slow; my breath puffs into the air, warm against it, and my bare arms do not feel the chill. None of us do — we thrive here, at home in this frozen realm, and so as I run, I am infused. Hills pass under me until I reach an outcropping of rock that stretches over a pond. It is small, frozen solid, and kept sheltered under this rock so any passersby would see only jutting black stone and heaps of snow, not the icy water beneath. I skid to a stop at its bank and do a quick sweep, but Fenrir is nowhere in sight. The snow leading up to the pond is undisturbed, no tracks other than my own. And against a boulder across the pond, the portal is unchanged. It is naught but a thin line half my height, perpetual light that shifts and changes like the ripples of color that sometimes paint the night sky. It is not wider, nor open, and I sigh in relief.

One beat, I stay motionless, limbs poised against the snow. Then my eyes snag on . . . on something. Something lies on the far side of the pond, paces from the rip, just next to a section of the surface of the ice that has been broken through. Whatever broke it lies perfectly still, a small mass of darkness half covered in snow, half in the icy water. In a few bounding leaps, I cross the pond, and kneel next to the form. My eyes dart around, waiting for Fenrir to stage his attack — it is what I would do. Lay a trap, distract and trick — The form at my feet moans softly. Something chatters, like teeth. I look down at it. It’s . . . alive. I alone can create corporeal illusions that are felt and can be heard. Confusion and shock make a sudden war in my chest as I bend closer. The late hour covers everything in darkness, but it is never truly dark here, not with the stars and the moon and the reflective snow. So I have enough light to let my eyes adjust on this bundle. It’s human. A woman. She chatters again, her whole body shaking in the beginning stages of hypothermia. The thick clothing she’s wearing is soaked and freezing, ice crystals hanging from the tips of her dark hair, her lips so blue she might have frost giant blood if she wasn’t slowly freezing to death.

That war of confusion and shock lasts for only a beat longer before my muscles move of their own accord. I snatch the woman up and cradle her to me. She’s so small, thin and light enough that I can carry her easily in one arm. The portal behind me is unmoved. It gives no answers, no explanation. But she might. I am off again, racing back across the tundra, package in tow

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