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0.Odin lifted his head up and took a deep breath of the early morning air as they approached the elven settlement. The acrid tinge of fire and smoke was still apparent—unpleasant on the surface, perhaps, but here it represented something profound. The fires of change.The elves didn’t realize, of course. How could they, when all they had ever known was this miserable world? He looked around the village with its grimy windowless homes made of grey stucco which practically blended into the smoke in the air, small livestock animals wandering about entirely uncontained, and no real vestiges of a culture in sight: no technology, no apparent hospital, school, even shops.Inasmuch as they could be differentiated from the men at all, with all wearing the same featureless masks and formless cloaks, the women all did their work with their infants slung on their backs, children clutching at their skirts. What they could possibly be expected to learn from watching their mothers grind grain and attend to whatever other chores a society entirely lacking innovation required, Odin couldn’t possibly imagine. It was barbaric.Collected in what could be loosely considered a town square by his men, some of the women with their gathered children were still at their tasks absentmindedly, spinning wool as they stood silent and waiting in the eerie red light of Nidavellir’s ancient sun.It was a discomfiting sight, if a potentially hopeful one. Typically annexation came with more resistance, or at least unrest. Anger. But Asgard’s soldiers were repressing no mob, no defiance, and stood at attention almost alongside the still, hushed elves so apparently unworried by their occupation.It would remain to be seen if there was any chance of enculturing these creatures, or if slaughter was kinder, as his father held. But Asgard’s expansion coming at the cost of whole species was a fact that had always sat poorly with Odin, the destruction as far as he could tell wholly needless. What might Svartalfheim have become, if its people had embraced technology and reason and civilized morality? It had never sat right with him that no one had ever even tried.At least, he considered, if all of Nidavellir’s elven settlements were conquered as painlessly as this, then Jord, who was in command of the Valkyries, could not possibly criticize that leaving them alive was a waste of Asgard’s military resources. Especially not when she herself reaped benefits from the labor of elven thralls.He looked at the silent, masked crowd, and then he looked at the the only members of the crowd who weren’t yet wearing masks: a handful of very young children, clinging to their mothers’ skirts and looking solemnly up at Odin and his soldiers. Thralls were all well and good, and an excellent way for aliens to earn the right to live in Asgard, but Odin had been wondering lately what would happen if they were introduced to Asgardian culture earlier.He ordered a few of the young elves forward for inspection, directing those who seemed relatively healthy to his soldiers. Most didn’t go easily, needing to be pried away from their mothers, who murmured amongst themselves but didn't cry or attempt to grab them back. He was briefly surprised at even the muted show of attachment—especially from adults who left their children nameless and soulless until well after they began walking and talking—but then, Odin mused, even an animal had to be torn from its mother’s breast. It may have been that the base connection between mother and child was something even elvish society could not quell.He was about to motion a guard forward to fetch the next child, who’d preemptively grabbed its mother’s hand in both of its own, holding on tightly. But the mother quietly passed off the infant in her arms to a shorter elf beside her, and began walking the child toward Odin. Interesting. He allowed it, watching with mild curiosity as she leaned in and whispered something in the elves’ sharp, unsettling language.He gave the child an encouraging smile as he held its chin and began inspecting it for signs of ill health, its mother standing close beside, watching. He didn’t see her hand slip into her apron pocket, only the quick movement half a moment before he felt a sharp pain in his side, between two of his ribs just behind his breastplate. Before he could even process this, the child had twisted out of Odin’s grip and bolted into the crowd.He clamped one hand down on the injury, holding the little dagger in place where it was lodged in his leathers, and with the other twisted the woman’s wrist until she was forced to let go. A soldier grabbed her other wrist as she raised her clawed hand, and she was forced to her knees, screaming what could only be impotent threats as she was restrained.“Find the boy,” he told another soldier, before turning back to the woman. He pulled the little dagger free of his armor. Or rather, the kitchen knife, he thought bemusedly as he turned it in his hand. How… quaint. He showed it to the elven woman, asking curiously, “Did you truly think this could hurt me? I take it this is your first rebellion.” He tucked the knife safely into his belt and pulled out his dagger. “It’s very important to use the proper weapons when facing an enemy. You see this?” He showed her the wickedly sharp edge of the blade. “It’s made of uru, much more durable than your little vegetable peeler. And much more likely to actually wound.”The dead black orbits of the elf’s mask obscured whatever expression she wore. Who even knew if she’d understood him. But then she said, in measured, accented Asgardian, “Go fuck yourself.”Odin couldn’t help it. He laughed, huge chuckles that sent twinges up his side where the knife had bruised him. She was brave, this one, whatever else she was. Odin could respect that. He reached forward and carefully lifted the mask off, pulling it back over the tight braid all elves seemed to wear. Underneath he found bone-white skin and fine elven bone structure. She glared up at him hatefully, pale eyes burning. “I have to ask,” he told her. “Does your husband know how pretty you are, or are the masks worn in private as well?”She snarled at him, and Odin grinned wider. He turned to one of the soldiers and asked, “Have you found the boy?"“Ah–” one soldier began.“Yes sir,” another cut in quickly.“Good,” said Odin. “Kill him. And take this one back to Asgard.” The woman jerked against the men restraining her, but she wasn’t going anywhere. “Send her to me once she’s been processed.” 1.Loki had known a little of how Asgard treated its thralls before all of this. People talked, Asgardians bragged, a friend of a friend’s aunt helped an escapee once and had stories, that sort of thing. Going through it herself was an entirely different matter.She and the other prisoners spent nearly a week locked up like animals in a makeshift pen within the nearest Asgardian military encampment, awaiting a delivery to Asgard for processing which was pushed further back in the queue for every supply run or troop refreshment, and every sleepless night curled on the floor she reminded herself that things could be worse.She was lucky, even if she didn’t feel much like it. None of her family was in chains, the poor boy the Asgardians killed hadn’t been hers, and she may have been shaken up, but she hadn’t yet been harmed. Where other women were taken roughly in full view, she could hear the soldiers gossip when one so much as thought to give her a considering glance. In a matter of days, a paring knife had become a poison uru dagger, a desperate mother some secret assassin in hiding. It made a kind of sense, she supposed: that horrible commander she hadn’t killed, that was their king, as it turned out. The story was far more impressive (and far less embarrassing for him) if she was dangerous.Once through the Bifrost into the gleaming city of Asgard, they were all summarily deposited in a clean, bright government facility which nonetheless had clearly abandoned any lingering need to impress. It was staffed by blank-faced, tired looking Asgardians in uniforms suited to various purposes, one of whom stepped forward to greet the prisoners with a bland order to strip, first in the Asgardian language and then in three others, none spoken fluently.Their clothes were collected by more tired workers as Loki and the others were brought into a room that had been divided up into sections, and captives were shuffled from one section to another in order. “They call this ‘processing’,” she translated to the others in a low voice. Whatever that meant.At the first station, a lanky Asgardian swiped something cold down her arm and then pushed a long, thick needle into it long enough to inject something. He asked, “Do you understand me?” and pushed her forward as soon as she’d gotten past ‘yes’. The famous Allspeak, she could only assume, though she would have understood him anyway. At the next station a thin curtain partially shielded several benches from view, and she was instructed to sit as another Asgardian began attaching sticky metal chips to her chest and head and writing down what appeared on a screen. The elf sitting on the table across from her was another woman from her village—the one who’d hugged her in the makeshift shelter and told her her son was safe. Their eyes met briefly and Loki tried to return the strained smile as best she could. She didn’t know if they’d see each other, after this. Where they’d go.She was forced to look away when one of the two Asgardians examining her turned her head towards him with a gloved hand so that he could shine a fast-blinking light into her eyes. The other continued a manual examination, testing joints and reflexes before pushing her down onto her back, pressing at her abdomen as she blinked away the colors the light had burned onto the backs of her eyelids. He pried her knees apart and reached between her legs, and she could feel his breath on her skin for a long moment.“Come look at this,” he said.The Asgardian who had shown her the light, now annotating more paperwork, peered down, then dragged his gaze up her body. “You jest,” he said flatly.The other man scoffed, pulling away and removing his glove. “I want no part in this. Let it be a problem for another man.” So saying, he rose and walked off.The other shook his head as if to clear it, then stood up himself, peeling the odd stickers from her skin before taking Loki by the arm. He led her to the next station and held a brief, hushed conversation with one of the staff. Eventually, a woman took several glass vials of her blood, replacing it with a number of clear injections that made her feel cold and dizzy. “Someone ought to collect you in a moment,” the Asgardian said coolly, already turned away.Loki sank to the floor and pulled her legs up to her chin. A moment turned into an hour, which turned into several, and she watched people file past her and into the next room in handfuls. She’d tried to ask one of the guards posted by the door when she could expect to leave, but he’d acted like he hadn’t even heard her. So she was left to sit and stew in the muffled cries and occasional scream from the next room.Eventually, the staff underwent a shift change, and while workers occasionally made to point at her, she was left alone in the crowded space.There was a little girl crying nearby, blood dripping from the scrubbed-clean spot on her arm where an injection had been made. A woman on the staff crouched down in front of her with gauze and a small cup of water. “I’ll only just press this down to stop the bleeding,” the woman reassured, making clear where her hands were. “Take some sips of this, and you mustn’t scratch. The pain will go away.”At least there was some kindness for the children, Loki thought numbly.Then the door to the next room opened, and the nurse brushed off her uniform as she turned toward it and snapped out, “Finally. I can hardly take a step without tripping over a thrall. Some of us are doing our work in a timely fashion, you see.”The guard gave her a disdainful look. “And some of us haven’t been cutting our corners,” he replied blandly.The nurse glared at him, hands on her hips. “Then get some more men. It can’t be so hard. If you walked into a tavern and asked, you’d like as not get half a dozen volunteers.” The guard bristled, but before he could respond the nurse was waving at Loki. “And for the Norns’ sake, take this one. It’s been sitting there half the day.”The guard gave Loki a skittering glance and rubbed the back of his head. “We’re awaiting word from our supervisor. I’m certain someone will be by soon. Perhaps a few more minutes.”A little under an hour after that, the door opened again and the same guard from before came backing out, followed by a pair of guards who clearly far outranked him. They were fresh faced and wore beautiful, intricately engraved plate armor, more like works of art than something worn on the battlefield.“—and if there’s anything I can do to assist further—”At the sound of the first man’s voice, the nurse from earlier stormed toward them. “If you think—” she stopped short when she caught sight of the guard’s companions, and her face went pale. “I am so sorry, sir. Sirs,” she said, wringing her hands now and standing stiff at attention. “We’re hard at work here, as you can see, and it’s been a long day. You honor us with your presence, sirs. Please, how can I help?”“Where is the invert?” one of the newly-arrived guards said abruptly, and for not being an order it certainly seemed to have all of the qualities of one. “The king cannot be kept waiting.”Oh, well, of course. Asgard’s much-tauted Norns forbid the king need wait even a moment longer. She had been so very busy in these last hours, after all. “Oh,” said the nurse, sounding as astonished as Loki felt, if not for the same reason. “You,” she snapped, turning. “Up you get!”Loki considered her options. “No,” she said simply, leaning back against the cold wall. She wondered, idly, what they would do.The nurse went incandescent, but the new guards simply exchanged a look and then each grabbed one of her arms, nearly dislocated them as they hauled her to her feet and began walking. Loki had to scramble to keep her balance to avoid being literally dragged behind them, and so she almost didn’t register the scene in the room they were passing through before they were out the other side again and into a brightly lit but plain stone hallway. She had no words to describe the disgust she felt, once she could spare a thought for what she’d seen: Asgardian men forcing themselves on their captives, adults and children alike; a man in half his armor standing mid-conversation with his foot pinning down the wrists of a screaming girl. She craned her head to look back at the door, as if staring at it long enough might prove it to be an exhausted fever dream.One of the guards dragging her scoffed a laugh, but said nothing as she was led through several increasingly ornate hallways past well-dressed Asgardians and downcast servants, some hurriedly averting their eyes and others staring at her openly, with undisguised curiosity.Loki barely noticed. All she could think of was being back on Nidavellir, the king ordering his men to send her to him. The fact none of the soldiers would touch her, after that.She was led through two huge, ornate golden doors and into an almost unfathomably gigantic hall, filled with pillars and more gilt than she had ever seen before. At the far end, a set of stone steps led to a raised platform, and in the center of the platform led yet more stairs to a huge, golden throne emblazoned with intricate designs of interlocking symbols, and so bright beneath the sun shining above the open-air hall that Loki could barely stand to look at it.She was brought to the foot of the stairs at the platform, close enough that she had to crane her neck to see him, her arms held painfully behind her back. The king of Asgard—Odin Spearshaker, Odin Glad-of-War—stared down at her from the high seat from which he looked upon all the realms, imperious, and then he broke into a wide grin. He turned and nudged the Asgardian beside him, a tall, muscular woman in armor as intricate as Loki’s current guards. “Jord,” he said, “here, this is the elf I was telling you about! The one who tried to stab me!” He slapped his thigh and gave a chuckle, then looked at her closely enough that Loki was acutely aware of her lack of dress. “Although when I requested the elf be brought before me, I did mean after you’d finished processing. This is very irregular.” His gaze traveled down. “Of course, so is this.” He leaned forward, still looking her over with an unsettling intensity, but when he continued there seemed to be nothing but curiosity in his voice. “Does it have a cunt as well?”“Ah,” said one of the guards from behind her. “We’re told yes.”“Fascinating,” the king breathed. “I must admit, I doubted the tales.”“The processing facility isn’t sure what to do,” the other guard said diffidently. “Obviously it can’t be housed with the female thralls.”The king nodded thoughtfully. “Naturally. We wouldn’t want any pregnancies.”Loki considered the alternative and tried to suppress a shudder. “All due respect,” she said desperately, and meaning none, “your concern is mispl—ah!” She could feel sinew in her shoulder tearing as one of the guards wrenched her arm back to shut her up, and tucked her chin to her chest in response to the pain, eyes screwing shut.“Of course, the male thralls can already be… unruly,” the king continued, as if she hadn’t made a sound. “Introducing such an outlet could prove disastrous as to their conduct.” He sighed, a laugh on his breath. “And so, the problem before us! What say you?”“My lord—” came a dubious reply from the armored woman beside him.“It does seem quite intent on making its will known,” the king said, in good spirits. Loki jerked her head up. He was touching his side where she had stabbed him. “It may as well be consulted.”She stared up at him, disbelieving. Was this some kind of joke? “I,” she started, then stopped. If not a joke, perhaps a test. She could imagine the desired response, Whatever you think best, my lord, or something else suitably deferential. The king made an an encouraging gesture. “I’m a woman,” she said frankly.She expected she’d have to fight the issue, try and fail to explain that other worlds were not so insistent on the immutability of bodies, but instead the king only peered at her curiously for a few moments. “I suppose that settles it,” he said. “That’s likely the best option, regardless; the problem of pregnancies can be easily rectified, and it is clearly not needful for this one to possess such an organ, besides.”Oh.Loki did not flinch so much as spasm, as suddenly cold as if someone had overturned a bucket on her head. In the past week she’d had little to do but imagine increasingly miserable fates, but in even the most unlikely of scenarios she had never considered that they would have her mutilated.“Well!” the king continued a moment later, clapping his hands together. “With that business done, you know, I don’t yet know your name.”She thought she might be ill. “Loki,” she said distantly.“Loki,” the king repeated, his accent curling strange around the vowels. “Welcome to Valhol,” he continued, and she nearly choked on her disbelief, or a sob. “I am Odin Spearshaker, King of Asgard and the Five Realms, son of Bor.”She laughed, not a pleasant sound. “I know who you are. And your father.” If she was very lucky, she thought, the others would only watch him take her, and would not take part themselves.Odin frowned. “Ah, yes,” he said, “‘Elfsbane’. My father made a great many choices I find… distasteful.” He leaned forward, settling his elbows on his knees and watching her with some inscrutable expression. Loki knew very well that her cheeks were wet, for all she’d tried to maintain her composure. She wondered what the king thought of it. If it made her more appealing. “I won’t force you,” he said, the note in his voice far too earnest to be trustworthy. “I wouldn’t like to break so singular and remarkable a thing as you. No, when you come to my bed, it will be willingly, and not before.”When. Of course. “And should that day never come?”Odin sighed. “You will be happy here, Loki, in time. Asgard is a joyous place.” 2.She hadn’t meant to cry. After a year in this place, one would think she’d be out of tears by now, and this had been what she’d wanted, besides. She clenched the papers in her hands, and then realized what she was doing and hurriedly straightened them out, running her fingers over the creases over and over.“Norn’s sake, girl, what are you doing here? You’re due in the palace in five minutes.” Groa hadn’t even gotten up from her own bed halfway across the barracks, but she managed to loom over Loki anyway as she glared. It was a talent of hers, one that had even the Asgardian thralls quaver rather than confront her, and the Asgardians never gave ground to a member of one of the ‘lesser races’.Loki glanced up at her, and then out the small barred window on the opposite wall and felt a surge of adrenaline. Groa was right, and the king would be furious if her lateness made him look irresponsible at the war meeting. She hurriedly tucked the letters under her blanket, scrubbing desperately at her eyes and brushing back her loose hair with her fingers. It would have to do, she supposed. She rushed out through the now-familiar halls: in this part of Valhol they were wide, well-lit passages used by servants and guards as well as the more trusted thralls. She came to a sudden halt when a hand wrapped around her arm and pulled her back painfully.“And what has got you running so afeared?”Loki made herself go still in the guard’s grip, and instead gave him a look borrowed from Groa’s worst moods. In truth, she was angry at herself. If she hadn’t been so emotional she would have been taken for running an errand. “If you wish to inconvenience your king,” she snapped at him, “by all means, stop me from performing my duties.”His expression darkened immediately, and Loki knew that she’d broken the rules by addressing an Asgardian—let alone a palace guard—with an ‘uncivil’ tone. But remaining for a lecture and making the king wait longer was… worse.The guard released her hand, and she turned on her heel and started down the hallway again without waiting to hear what his reply was. She would have to be careful when returning to the barracks tonight, and hope he wasn’t offended enough to pay them a visit. The guards had leave to punish thralls however they saw fit for infractions, after all.The conference room was full when she arrived, the table lined with Asgardians adorned in rich clothing and intricately engraved armor of silver and gold, listening intently to the king.The king glanced at her briefly when she slipped into the room, but didn’t pause in the tale he was weaving for the people at the table. Loki wasn’t sure if that was a good or a bad sign, but at least she wasn’t to be chastised in front of all in attendance. She went immediately to the table and collected two empty mazer bowls from the table, making her way to the mead casks in the next room on automatic. Her duties during a meeting were at least routine. She could trust her memory of what to do and focus her attention on maintaining a carefully calm demeanor.Her efforts were not wholly unsuccessful; she may have been red-eyed and disheveled, but her trembling hands didn't spill, and she at least held back the tears threatening to fall anew. What a picture she’d have made then, weeping like some hysterical slip of a thing who’d only just been processed. Her comportment was ill enough already, having only barely remembered to make the proper response when one of the old generals addressed her, and retrieving the wrong document for the king not once but twice.The second time, he didn’t even make mention, and she felt an unwelcome rush of gratitude at what she reminded herself viciously was only self-interest. Her conduct, after all, reflected poorly not only on herself, but on the king also.She hid her increasingly shaky hands as the attendees left by busying herself straightening some of the decor carefully placed to advertise Asgard’s wealth and prestige, stilling only when she felt the king approach her from behind.“I apologize for my performance tonight, Your Majesty,” she said quickly, before he could bring it up himself. “I will collect myself by tomorrow, I swear.”There was a low chuckle behind her. “To swear an oath, one must have honor to lose in breaking it. But your attempt is appreciated.” His hand hovered in the air for a long moment before he settled it upon her shoulder. “What ails you, my dear?”Loki let out a long breath at the comforting touch, and hated how glad she was for it. “A silly thing. I beg you not to trouble yourself, Your Majesty.”“Come now, Loki.” The hand on her shoulder tugged gently, and she went with it, allowing herself to be turned to face him. He gave her a reassuring smile. “There’s no need for such formalities in private. If someone has done you ill, I will look into it at once.” He brought two fingers up to her chin to tilt her head up, his touch still achingly soft. Kind. “I would not make that offer to just any thrall.”But, of course, his kindness did not—could not—come without strings. He leaned in slowly, and Loki turned her head slightly so that his kiss met with her cheek rather than her lips. She felt his sigh against her skin, but he pulled away wordlessly.“Will you sit with me?”“If His Majesty commands,” she whispered.The king opened his mouth as if to say something, and then sighed again. “No,” he said. “It’s not a command.” He took his hand from her shoulder and moved toward the door. “You may clean up and bring my papers to my rooms. Then take the night off.”Loki imagined spending the rest of the day alone with Groa in the dormitory, nothing but the words of those long-dead to dwell on, and she was suddenly furious with herself for hiding her loneliness behind duty.“Wait,” she said, voice shaking, and the king paused. “I—I would like to sit with you, if you will have me.”As a thrall, of course, Loki had never before sat in one of the ornate chairs. Even with the king's express permission, with him going so far as to pull the seat out for her, she felt her heart skip as she sat down beside him. It was several more minutes in silence before she found the courage again to speak.“I received a response to the letter you allowed me to send. Back… home.”“Ah.” There was a weight of meaning in that syllable. The king had told her, even as he granted the favor, that connections to the ‘life she had left behind’ would only leave her discontent. As though contentment was something thralls ever had.“I am not ungrateful,” she said quickly, through hitching breath. She could feel tears pricking again at her eyes, and she rocked forward, hands tucked beneath her thighs. “Thank you for—for allowing me the opportunity. It is only… a year within the Realm Eternal passes so very quickly—” Her voice broke, and finally her tears welled over. She couldn’t find the words to continue.The king’s voice was unbearably gentle. “I understand you had to try.” He paused a moment, and then said, a hesitant note in his voice she had never heard before, “Would you like to talk about them?”She took a shaking breath, as desperate as if she’d been drowning. “I would,” she said.He listened as she told him about her family. How even her youngest, Signi, not even yet named when she was taken, had lived and died before her letter had ever arrived, but how they had written letters. Some long, exhaustive accounts of things that had happened to them. Some short, and simply words they wished they could tell her. She told him of how her grandchildren had known her, when her letter arrived, from the stories they’d been told, and had passed all those letters onto her. She told him how proud she was of her eldest daughter, Gudrun, who at all of nine years old had taken it upon herself to be the lady of the house in her mother’s absence, and had cared for her father on his deathbed. Of the grief that permeated every one of the letters her husband had written her, that had sparked an answering ache she’d thought she had overcome.“He never found another?”Loki could only shake her head. “The girls even tried to find him someone. But he wrote to me that it simply didn’t seem right, when I still lived.” She didn’t mention the words that had followed. His hope that she had managed to find some measure of comfort, and his blessing if she had. I should hate to think of you alone in that world. “Such loyalty is admirable. And it's no wonder, that you should inspire it.” His voice was sincere, almost reverent, as he added, “You are quite remarkable.”Loki felt her lips twitch into a sad smile, despite herself. She glanced up at him to see an echoing smile. She thought of her dear Bjarte’s last wish for her, and wondered what he would have said had he known this to be her source of comfort.When the king’s fingers brushed her cheek, she leaned into the touch, her eyes fluttering closed briefly. There was a question in his eyes when he leaned forward, and when she gave him the slightest nod it should have felt like giving in, it was giving in, but there was strangely a kind of freedom in that.The kiss, when it began, was soft, the king cupping Loki's cheek in his hand like she was something fragile and precious. She followed when he rose, caught at such an angle that she was wedged between his body and the conference table. Her hands scrabbled for purchase on loose parchments as he deepened the kiss, the press of his lips insistent and demanding for half a moment before he seemed to remember himself and let back enough to give Loki a way out. She didn't take it. Instead, she returned the kiss as insistently as she dared, nipping softly at the king's lower lip, and she could feel the turn of his smile against her mouth. The tight grasp on her arm that had held her upright softened, and the king brought his hand down to clasp her own, his thumb rubbing soft circles into the back of her hand. His other hand slipped down as well, the pads of his fingers feather-light on her throat and then traveling further still to cup her breast.Loki didn't deserve this affection, this kind of careful touch. Her husband was dead; what right did she have to find anything like solace in the arms of the man who had torn her away from him? She sobbed into Odin's mouth, and when his touch stilled questioningly she despised herself for the answering press of her lips, half-desperate, and the way her free hand clutched at his arm.The king broke away from the contact to kiss down her throat instead, sucking a bruise into the join of her shoulder as he twisted her nipple roughly between his fingers, making her gasp. He brought his other hand low to gather up her thin skirts with his fingers and slipping his hand underneath, his touch warm on her bare thigh.“Oh,” she breathed unsteady, almost despite herself, and watched the king’s half-obscured face like it might augur his intentions.(Not as if they had ever been unclear.)Odin nipped at her throat beneath her jaw as his hand drew up her hip and further yet, settling in the dip of her waist and curling ‘round. Her skirts hiked up, she was exposed as she hadn’t been in his presence since she was first brought before him, before they had cut her. The king ducked his head to peer between her legs.The moment was brief and terrifying, Loki unable to read his expression as he took in the patchy, discolored line of branching scar tissue above her cunt, but the king made a sound in his throat—neutral or approving, she couldn’t know—and pulled her in close. She could feel the shape of his arousal pressing against her, could even feel her own arousal burn in her belly, sharp and not without a kind of pain in its company.She knew, largely, what she could expect from Odin, what he would feel like; kingship imparted no particular qualities but ego, and many men had known her. But she had no idea what to expect from her own body, whether the pain of those damaged remaining nerves might chase out pleasure, if she could even experience release. She had been too afraid to touch herself after the wound had healed, in fear of pain or panic, and in fear of her own shame for the act. Loki tucked her head into the king’s shoulder, hiding from his gaze and gasping into his finery as he gave a final pinch to her nipple before he made to reach between her legs.“All is well?” he murmured into her mussed hair, and she nodded, feeling suddenly like she might begin weeping anew. She only couldn’t bear, just yet, the kindness in his eyes. Not when she was still so foolishly, needlessly afraid of everything, and herself, and nothing. “I should like to have you,” he continued, his fingers at her entrance but not yet pressing in, allowing her a final chance to object. “If you are amenable.”She gave another nod, and, buried in Odin’s shoulder, a quiet, whispered, “Yes.” 3.The annexation of Nidavellir was a complicated thing, with a great number of aspects needing careful handling: the responsibilities of the crown were as wide and varied as overseeing the conscription of warriors ready and willing to give up their homes and families for what was to them, in a different timespeed, full years without contact for the glory of Asgard, to organizing a consistent flow of goods into the city and adjusting importation laws to accurately assess quality. It was complicated business, and the law had to take into consideration especially concerns that an influx of imported goods of alien manufacture could have the unintended side effect of devaluing superior Asgardian products.Odin was looking over a set of proposed reforms to the Merchant Law for what must have been the fourth time in little more than a week, and frankly, the various proposals and revised proposals had begun to blur together and he could hardly remember what the differences were meant to be. He sighed and rubbed at his temples. Sitting beside his desk, Loki looked up briefly from the thin sheet of cloth she had been weaving in between duties. Speaking of elven crafts.He leaned back in his seat and watched her work for a moment, the movements at once so similar to memories of his mother weaving in the evenings as he completed his lessons, and so alien. The bulk of the work was done with her fingers and thin shed sticks trapped within the warp threads, the tension provided not by weights, as an Asgardian loom used, but by the frame she made of her own body, a thin leather strap around her back and a long dowel braced on her feet. The pattern she worked on must have been long-familiar to her, completing the complicated movements required of the design with practiced ease.“Why is it,” he asked her, more to voice his thoughts aloud than because he expected an answer, “that as soon as goods begin showing up from foreign worlds, no matter in what volume and what restrictions in quality are imposed, people suddenly wish to buy nothing else?”“Perhaps because it is better,” Loki said matter-of-factly, in a tone Odin was wary to allow even in private. “I assure you,” she continued as she slipped a thin heddle between the layers of her warp, “my work would meet well, even surpass, any Asgardian standards.”He chose not to comment on the tone for now, instead setting aside his papers and asking, “Is that so?”“Obviously,” she said. Not for the first time, Odin was sure that if he hadn’t taken her from Nidavellir she would have been long dead at the hands of some Asgardian warrior. “I take great pride in my work,” she continued, as though speaking on this was her due, “and I will not have it maligned. I see that look, Your Majesty, and I will have you know that I speak true! Several of the Asgardian women in my barracks dormitory have expressed their envy, and—hah—even old Pala admitted my skill eventually.” The name was unfamiliar; if Pala was another thrall in her dormitory, any fight between the two had not made its way back to him.Yet Loki was in a talkative mood, it seemed, and continued without his prompting, setting aside her weaving to gesticulate emphatically. She began to detail her ten-year feud with the matriarch of the entire region’s market, begun when the old woman asserted that her cloth was overpriced for its quality. Time had clearly done nothing to mellow Loki’s feelings on this matter, and she let out an outraged little huff that Odin privately admitted to himself was adorable.“My honor was at stake,” she was fuming in defense of some ridiculous turn of events in her impassioned tale of intrigue and what passed for industrial espionage in the women’s sphere. “More than that, the honor of my family! What would you have had me do?” She lapsed suddenly into silence, curling her arms around her stomach and wearing a pained expression. Most likely she had realized finally the liberties she had taken.He gave her a fond shake of his head. She may take liberties, but they were as much a part of her charm as her odd, almost obsessive presumption that she had honor to defend or to lose. She was an elven thrall, and an invert besides, honorless thrice-over, and yet there was a spark in her, an aspect of her soul which rang true to the insistence, brave and stalwart and true. What might Loki have been, he wondered, had not the incomprehensible culture she’d been born in forced her to take up the role of a housewife, of all things?He was interrupted from his musing—and his nearly-forgotten papers—when a mazer bowl of mead appeared at his elbow. He hadn’t even noticed Loki get up, but there was her loom rolled up neatly beside his desk. She continued around behind his chair, her hands trailing across his shoulders in an manner extremely presumptuous for a thrall. Now what was she up to?“Perhaps,” Loki said, her voice low and sultry beside his ear, “your mind would be clearer after a short respite.” Loki’s fingers started to massage at his shoulders, and he let out a sigh. She wasn’t wrong. Odin had been looking at these papers for hours and the words had begun to dance on the page. For Loki to be the one to suggest such a break, however, was… unusual, to say the least.He glanced up at her face above him. “Did you have a suggestion?”Loki hesitated, sudden uncertainty clouding her features. “I wouldn’t mean to presume…” she started.“Nearly all you do is presume,” Odin said playfully. Before Loki could withdraw as she had already begun to, apologies on her tongue, he placed one hand over hers on his shoulder to keep her in place and added, “If I were unhappy with you, I would have made it known.” And had on earlier occasions, as she well knew.Loki stilled. “Your Ma—Odin,” she corrected herself, the ginger note in her voice giving way to confidence and light humor. “I would presume to kiss you. If you want to.”It was the first time she had ever called him by name, and Odin felt a thrill he knew he shouldn’t really be feeling at a thrall addressing him so familiarly. The scandal if anyone found out he’d been encouraging her. “I always want to kiss you.”He pushed his chair back from the desk as she moved around it so that she might have better access, but he neither stood nor made any attempt to direct her. She was the one who had begun this, and he wanted to see just how far she would go without his help, how well she had learned to anticipate his needs in the past five weeks. She had picked up the duties connected to her role as Odin’s attendant remarkably quickly, and it stood to reason her intuition would extend to these more intimate matters as well.Loki leaned down to kiss him, one hand braced on the arm of the chair. She was hesitant, still, in a manner which reminded him of those first timid kisses from his youth, and she stopped halfway to him to tuck her hair behind an ear, a faint blush on her face. Not for the first time, it struck Odin how beautiful his fiery little thrall was, especially when her attention was directed completely at him.Directed at him, perhaps, but lacking the usual single-minded determination she gave those things she put her mind to. Loki’s lips finally met Odin’s in a nearly chaste kiss, soft and uncertain when her tongue came out to press against his lips. Odin suppressed a chuckle, his grin parting his lips for her; as often as they’d engaged in such affairs of late, that she would be shy… It was surprisingly endearing. He reached up to cup the curve of her breast through the layers of her dress, passing the pad of his thumb back and forth over her nipple and feeling it harden under the fabric. This position gave him a wonderful vantage point to play with her breasts, which were too small to cup in his hands at other angles. He pinched and pulled at the sensitive skin, greedily swallowing up the sounds he coaxed out of her.After fully two or three minutes had passed with Loki making no move to escalate beyond the hand she brought up to gently cup his jaw, Odin made the decision to take things a step further. Left to her own devices, Loki might keep him wanting for hours yet.He slid one hand down her leg, hiking up her skirt and hooking his fingers behind her knee to pull her halfway up onto the chair with him. Loki broke the kiss with an indulgent smile curling on her lips and a laugh alight in her eyes, shaking her head minutely before she shifted her weight and brought her other leg up to bracket his thighs with her knees. Good girl. Odin hummed his approval and tweaked her nipple, watching enraptured as Loki jerked her head down to hold back her cry. When she looked back up at him it was with her pale eyes blown so wide they were as black as if she was wearing her mask, and her teeth drew blood where they worried at her lower lip. What a beguiling creature, and passing fair.He brought his hand further up her leg under her skirts, pausing when his fingers found coarse linen. Odd, that. He undid the belt of her underthings easily enough and pulled them off, letting them drop to the floor. Loki hissed a ragged inhale above him when he brought his hand back to the join of her legs to drag the backs of his fingers across the scarred skin above her gash.The women Odin had lain with would often as not slip their hands between their bodies when Odin laid with them, touching themselves as he moved inside of them. Loki never did, nor to Odin’s understanding touched herself at all. There was a certain thrill in that—having her wholly dependent on him for her pleasure.Such a firm touch did not come without pain, but it was Odin’s understanding that there was no real avoiding it, and a soft touch offered no stimulation. The pain would ease, some, as her arousal grew, and Odin had no fear of that initial pain she shied away from herself; soon, Loki would be begging him for his touch.Odin pressed dry fingers into Loki’s cunt in a single, quick motion, the palm of his hand pressing hard against the place where the elf’s cock had once been. Norns, she was so wet already.Odin crooked his fingers and she pulsed around him, gasping, her whole body going tense above him. Loki reclaimed his mouth, kissing him again in earnest, and her hand fell from his jaw to reach between their two bodies, deftly freeing his cock as he fucked her on his fingers, her grasp shaking and desperate as she took him in hand.He didn’t realize her intentions until she shifted her weight and brought her hips forward, hand still twined ‘round Odin’s cock. She wanted to ride him.Laughing, he broke their kiss and caught Loki’s wrist in a firm grasp. “No,” he told her, still chuckling. “I may grant you certain liberties, but this is not a presumption I can allow.” He was, after all, king, and therefore the moral center of Asgard.“Must anyone know?” Loki’s tone was playful, but there was an undercurrent Odin wasn’t sure what to make of. “I thought you liked me for my gall.”It was a tempting thought. Tempting enough that Odin thought ruefully that this was precisely the danger of allowing an elf this close to him.But Odin wouldn’t have risked his honor on Loki if he wasn’t confident in his ability to resist, and so he did not regret gently pulling Loki’s hand away from his lap. “I do, pet,” he told her, and it wasn’t a lie. She started to frown, and he added a firm, “Don’t push.” He twisted his fingers inside of her and watched her shudder. “Behave yourself, and I will take you as thoroughly as you wish.”Loki huffed out a breath. “You're an ass,” she said without much heat, and quickly surged forward to peck his lips before she eased herself off his lap. She caught the hem of her skirts in the back as she went, hopping up onto the desk behind her and leaving the fabric all bunched up on the tabletop. She spread her legs and looked up at him, impish and expectant, the rest of her skirts falling between her knees. Odin rubbed his fingers together absently, sticky and wet from her. It wasn’t until he went to push himself upright that he noticed the blood. It mingled with the fluids from her arousal, staining his fingers bright red and dripping down his hand to his wrist.He wasn’t bleeding. But that meant Loki—her gasps had been a mix of pain and pleasure, to be sure, but he’d assumed not from an actual injury. Did she not feel she could tell him this?“Why didn’t you say you were injured?” he asked her, and then chided himself for his sharp tone. Anger certainly wouldn’t make her feel safer. Loki stared at him, visibly confused. “I’m not.”“You’re bleeding.” Odin held up his hand to ensure she could see. “I understand that there is some expectation you complete your duties despite minor ills, but this is neither minor nor your duty.”Loki watched his face for a moment, looking for something in his expression, then broke into laughter, that continued in the wake of whatever expression was on his face just then. She doubled over, clutching her sides, and took deep, ragged breaths. “You’d,” she started. “You’d have every woman in the thrall’s quarters on bed rest for days out of each month, then?”Odin frowned. “That’s hardly comparable. Bleeding is natural in women, in those circumstances, but for you—”Loki’s expression lost some of the mirth that had filled it ‘til now. “It is just the same,” she told him sharply. Reading the disbelief on his face, she scoffed, shaking her head. “Your preconceptions do you ill, my king. I swear to you—on your trust, if you will not accept my honor—that I am unhurt, and I am willing.”Odin didn’t particularly like being told he was wrong, and he was torn between rebuking her for her tone and dissecting that statement. She couldn’t possibly mean—and yet.When he still hadn’t responded, Loki pressed. “Very willing. And if you will not have me this night, I beg your leave to handle it myself.”The cheeky little elf sounded irritated. If Odin had not been of like-mind on the matter he’d have taken her to task. As it was, Loki’s much-needed chastening might be accomplished in a way that was pleasant for them both. Finally, Odin stood and grabbed Loki by the back of the neck as he kissed her thoroughly, worrying further at her bloodied lower lip with his own teeth.“Perish the thought,” he told her seriously, and then he pushed her back onto the desk and hiked her dress all the way up to her armpits to give himself full access. When one of her hands came up to grasp his arm as he did so, he picked it up and moved it pointedly to the table’s edge beside her hips. “If you cannot still your hands,” he told her, “I will tie them for you.”Loki hummed, and turned her hands so she was grasping the edge of the table and looking up at him with a secret little smile that told him she knew exactly how much he liked it when she obeyed him in this, made sweeter by how hard-won that obedience was.His eyes raked over her body: the messy pool of her long, black hair like spilled ink on the tabletop, the look of her pale lips bloodied and swollen, the pink welts from the press of his nails on her breasts, the blood staining the insides of her thighs and the bloody streaks and fingerprints where he’d unknowingly spread it. Odin imagined what it would look like if that blood had been put there by him; if she’d allowed him to draw it, and he let out a low groan as he began stroking himself back to hardness.Once ready, Odin brooked no further delay, only catching his hand under one of Loki’s knees and pressing it to the tabletop, trapping her arm and improving his angle as he buried himself to the hilt in one motion that left her gasping, back arching beneath him. He set a brutal pace, her blood an odd kind of lubricant, and once satisfied that her twitching hands would stay where he had bid them, Odin brought his free hand, still tacky with half-dried blood, up to her breasts.It wasn’t long before she was close, her thighs shaking taut as a bowstring and her head thrashing silently as he fucked her. Eyes screwed shut, Loki had no warning for the hand which pinned her arching chest down to the tabletop, no warning for his other hand slipping from her knee to press the pad of his thumb, unforgiving, into the sensitive tissue at her mons. The cry she made when her climax hit her was barely audible, and she quaked as she spasmed around Odin’s cock.A loud knock came at the door. Odin froze in momentary disbelief.The knock came again. “Odin! Odin, my friend, I know you’re in there!”Norns be damned, that was Thor Tempestkeeper, the old ex-general. Why was he so early? Odin locked eyes with Loki beneath him, her eyes wide.“Keep going,” she said in a desperate undertone, and then she raised her voice and shouted toward the door, “A moment, my lord, if you would! You weren’t yet expected.” Her voice was remarkably even, and could have just as well been doing some mildly strenuous dusting.There was the faint sound of shuffling at the door. “I suppose I might have sent warning,” Thor called back cheerily. “My apologies! By all means, finish tidying up, and let your master know I’m here when he’s available. These old bones have nothing but time these days.”Amid all this, the threat of discovery on the other side of the door only pushed Odin’s climax nearer, and his thrusts came unsteady as Loki, too, struggled to retain composure. “Verily, my lord!” she called, then summarily snapped her jaw closed to swallow back a cry. She shook around Odin as he stilled and came inside her.He could give himself only a moment of pause to catch his breath before pulling out, extending a hand to help Loki to her feet. She smoothed down her skirts once standing, and then bent down to retrieve her underthings, offering Odin an unimpressed look when Odin kicked them under his chair before she could.Lacking the ability to voice argument, however, made clear her attitude was only that; Loki made no effort to grab for the underthings again, as she would no doubt have if the lack distressed her, and hurried to the door to greet old Thor as Odin was even still pulling in his chair after tucking himself away.There was still blood on his hand, flaking off as it dried but terribly conspicuous still, so Odin kept it carefully out of sight in his lap as Thor entered and collapsed into the chair opposite with a great heave. Loki moved quietly to a cabinet along the adjacent wall, collecting a service with which to wait upon Odin and his guest, bowls of mead and a platter of treats soon arranged on the table between them.Odin made every attempt to keep his attention on the old man’s recounting of the latest rumors from the old guard on the war council, but found his thoughts ever returning to the underthings lying underneath his chair, covered in Loki’s blood, and the consequential knowledge that, without the linens to stem the flow, there was no doubt a stream of blood and come dripping down the thrall’s legs, hidden beneath her skirts. He wondered it it would reach her ankles before Thor left. If anyone might notice.This was, he realized, going to be a very distracting meeting. 4.It was too soon to be on her feet and working again, truly. If Loki had been back home she would have arranged to stay in the house for a few weeks yet, both mother and child adjusting to life together, with neighbors bringing dishes to tide the family over and keep things in order.Here, she was told she’d been lucky to get the few days off she’d been allowed once her first contractions began, only because Odin had not wanted her to give birth while on duty.Here, she hadn’t even needed to insist on privacy during her labor, keeping the baby out of sight of its father so he wouldn’t worry over the sickly color of its skin in its first few hours.Here, she’d been told she should leave the baby with the old women who maintained the small nursery in the corner of the barracks. They’d come to her that morning, before she’d even started getting ready for her work day, and it had been the first time since she’d begun to sleep in the king’s bed that they’d looked at her as if she was kin. “They never want to meet their children,” they’d told her, sympathy and warning both. But Loki had remembered the wistful way the king had spoken of finally having a child when she’d told him the news. How he’d spoken of being a father.What if he expected to meet the child, and she failed to bring her?It had seemed the safest option, then, to fashion a cradleboard with what materials she had available and sling the babe across her back, as she had done for her other three children. As she made her way through the hallways to the king’s quarters, though, her confidence in that decision wavered. Guards and servants alike stared sidelong, speaking in hushed voices, and their contempt for her and the child both was made wholly clear.It was just a baby, Loki thought, a little helplessly. It was hardly as though it had gone unnoticed in the past months she was with child, and the newborn’s pink face made clear an Asgardian was responsible. They could hold Loki in reproach for neglecting an herbal remedy for her condition, if they would not place blame with the king or any other man, but to hate the child for the sole fact she existed?How could a life be so taboo?She arrived at the door of Odin’s quarters before she was ready to, and faltered for a long moment, staring at the familiar, intricate carvings surrounding the handle.She found the king on the balcony, standing with his back to the room and looking out over the city. She closed the door carefully behind her, and he said, “Have you seen the new arch erected in the lower gardens? I commissioned its design in the likeness of some of the monuments built on your world. Its beauty shines resplendent, with the skill of Asgardian architects to bring out its full potential.”Did he truly expect her to dignify that with a response? Even if it were not a backhanded compliment to a planet whose pillaging he likewise commissioned, it was hardly as though Loki’s opinion of the Realm Eternal’s gaudy, overwrought æsthetic had changed in the six days she’d been confined to the barracks. Asgardian artistic sensibilities were as appalling as their regime; how Odin honestly believed she would come to appreciate either, she didn’t know.Before her silence could become noticeable, the baby on her back gurgled, and the king’s hand froze where it was gesturing at the city. He spun around, looking not at Loki but beyond, through her as though he might be able to somehow see the newborn on her back. Any lingering concerns Loki has about whether he wished to see the child were wiped away in an instant.Odin took a ungainly step forward, strangely hesitant. “I confess I thought you would come alone.” There was a note in his voice. Something akin to wonder. “I would like to hold—is it a boy or a girl?”Loki wondered if there was a correct answer to that question in Odin’s eyes. “A girl, like as not,” she told him. Here, the child would have no choice to decide she was anything else. Loki began to undo the criss-crossing straps holding the cradleboard in place against her spine and brought the baby around for the king to see, wrapped up in swaddling—the thin blanket issued to Loki with her cot—and laced up into the cradleboard. She had borrowed the frame from a thrall in the kitchens who was from Nidavellir as well, but the wrap she had made herself, a thick, lined fabric with intricate patterns and protective symbols in the weave.She loosened the laces, carefully lifting the baby out. Odin held his hands over the newborn as if afraid that if he touched her she might break, and for the first time Loki considered that he had never held a baby before. She carefully transferred her to the king, maneuvering his arms into their appropriate positions as she did. Once he was cradling the infant, she freed the baby of her swaddling cloth.“You mustn’t forget to support the head,” she reminded Odin as he extended one finger towards the baby’s hand, watching in awe as tiny fingers curled around his.“Have you named her yet?” the king asked, smoothing the baby’s thin black hair down with one thumb.Loki looked up at his face, startled. “She’s barely two days old. Why would I have named her?”He stared at her for a long moment, and then comprehension dawned. “Loki,” he said. “Dear heart. Children don’t die in Asgard.”Loki thought of Groa’s youngest, just a year old, whose passing last month had come but days after the assigned Asgardian healer announced after hardly looking that she was badly behaved and it was a cold.Asgard’s vaunted civilization at work.“As you say, Your Majesty,” she told him, in lieu of agreement. The look he shot her told her he hadn’t missed that, but he didn’t comment.Instead he shifted the baby in his arms, clearly growing more comfortable with his hold on her even as they spoke. “I was thinking the name Hela, for a girl,” he told her. “The last Hela was a Valkyrie born from lowly farmhands outside of Asgard. She proved her honor five-fold on the battlefield and was given a hero’s funeral. A fitting name, I think, and a soul who will go far with what this child has.”Ah, yes. The Asgardian belief that a child carried down the soul of its namesake. It was truly unique to their culture, and Loki had never quite managed to understand it nor the complicated rules which governed an acceptable choice—too high-class a soul for a child’s station, and it would be an insult, too low and it would never learn proper conduct; if the child was named too late, or its namesake had not received a funeral, the soul may not come at all. The few Asgardian thralls, women who lost their rank for crimes of theft or incest, were preoccupied bar none with these concerns.She knew the response the king expected of her, however. And she knew that this was important to him. “It’s a beautiful name,” she told him, and it wasn’t a lie.“As it should be,” the king said, “for a child so fair.” He peered down at the girl’s features, tracing the soft curve of her ear with the tip of his finger. “She looks like you,” he said.“She looks like a baby,” Loki retorted.Odin chuckled. “Even so, she shall be a striking figure one day, when she stands as Asgard’s queen.”Loki stared at him, mute with abject shock. She—she must have misheard him, somehow. Or. “Your Majesty,” Loki said desperately when she could find her voice, and the king tore his gaze away from the baby to look at her in concern. “That is a cruel joke.”“There is no joke,” he said plainly.“How could it not be? Forgive me, Your Majesty, but you cannot possibly claim the people of Asgard will accept a thrallborn queen, and of elven stock, no less! They hate her already, and for nothing more than breathing. Asgard will not stand for her as their queen.”“They will accept it, as they must, for the word of their king is law.” Odin’s voice was stern, and brooked no argument. But his face softened as he continued, “She is of Asgardian stock as well, and royal. I have thought long on this, Loki, and I believe it is the right course. You can’t think I would have allowed you to have the child if I was planning to condemn her to thralldom?”No, of course not. Only others’ children, without his blood and without some precious Asgardian soul destined for honor, deserved that. She shouldn’t be so grateful to a man who could only wave a hand and spare them all their fates.And yet, she was.“Thank you,” she told him.He might have responded to that, but a polite knock at the door interrupted them. “Ah,” the king said, “that must be Nanna. Duty calls, I suppose.” The king handed out the baby—little Hela, Loki supposed, and it was so strange to have a name for one so young—for Loki to take from his arms, and he gave a wistful sigh before raising his voice to call the servant in. Loki wrapped Hela up in her swaddling cloth as quickly as she could, overcome suddenly with mortification. How long had she been standing here cooing over the baby instead of attending to her duties? It was fortunate for her that the king had been similarly distracted, but if she was to convince him that she could perform as well as usual with the baby in tow she mustn’t allow such a lapse again.As the servant entered, Odin said to Loki, “I shall have an official statement written up today, however. All of Asgard must know of the new heir.” The heir to Asgard, Loki thought in wonder, looking down at Hela, a squirming bundle in rags. It was more than she could ever have hoped for. She wondered what kind of queen she would make—if she would continue the king’s conquest of the realms.The king was still talking, turning to the servant still waiting patiently in the doorway. “Nanna, you are here in good time. I have just told Loki the good news, and as she has brought the baby here I don’t see any need to delay further. Loki, this is Nanna, the chief nurse here in the palace. She also oversees matters of ethics specific to women and children. There is no one in all the realms more qualified to raise the next queen of Asgard.”Loki stared at the aging Asgardian woman, who stood stiffly at attention and made little effort to mask the distaste in her eyes as she watched Loki clutch the swaddled newborn to her chest. Loki took a half-step back almost unconsciously.“Why is she here?” she asked, her voice far too sharp for addressing the king, especially in company.“She will be taking Hela to the royal nursery.” The king sounded almost confused, as though he couldn’t imagine why Loki was hesitant. “You can trust her, Loki. She raised me.”Loki went cold and hugged Hela closer, backing away from both the king and the servant. She was shaking, but she didn’t know how to make it stop. She turned to the king, helplessly. “She’s my child.” She heard the servant, Nanna, give an irritated sigh, but the king merely waved a hand at her to quiet her.“This is perfectly normal, Loki. A royal heir must be raised in the royal nursery.”“It is not normal,” she practically hissed at him, and she could feel tears pricking at her eyes. She’d already had three children ripped away from her, on Nidavellir, and the king was asking her to do it again, and she couldn’t. “A baby needs its mother. Please, don’t take her away from me.”“I am not taking her from you,” the king said, steel in his voice now. “She is the heir apparent to the Five Realms, and being given the very best care available. As her—” his lips thinned before he continued “—as her mother, you can visit her occasionally, if you like, but there are rules to this. Or,” he added, casual in a way that was anything but, “you can be selfish, and raise her yourself. As a thrall. As your son would have been, had you not intervened. I assume your feelings on that matter haven’t changed.”How dare he. Did he think to convince her this was reasonable by reminding her of the child he had ordered killed in front of her to prove a point? The child he still thought had been hers?And yet.And yet what choice did she have? He was right. She thought of the fear that grew in the hushed silence when a guard came into the barracks dormitory late at night, when all you could do was stay as still as possible and hope he left soon, and then she thought of Hela growing up with that fear. A sob forced its way out of her throat, and perhaps the king read the defeat in it. He stepped forward and gently took Hela from Loki’s arms, turning to hand her to the servant. They stood in silence for a long moment as Nanna’s steps faded away.“This is the right choice,” he said, hushed, when she finally met his eyes. He leaned down and gave her a soft kiss. Loki stood and allowed it, but didn’t respond, still watching the empty doorway where Nanna had been. 5.Loki must have gone to the nursery. She always did when she was upset with him.All she’d had to do was listen to him. Play the dutiful thrall and agree to discuss things later and he would have explained. Had he not told her, time and again, that he would take care of her? Had he not told her, that she was under his protection, that he would keep her from harm? That she was his? When he’d told her he would never do anything without her consent, he hadn’t expected her to flaunt that privilege like this.He remembered Loki’s face as she had set the tray of mazer bowls on the table hard enough they rattled. As she had told him, to his face, in front of the most powerful generals in Asgard, “There's nothing to negotiate, Your Majesty. I refuse—that is the end of it.”And with that, she had as good as forced his hand. She knew how important it was that the king of Asgard be seen as in control of his domain. If he could not keep even a thrall in check, what reason did any of the others have to respect him as their leader?There was dread in her eyes when he’d told her, his anger barely checked, that he would deal with her later, and she took her leave wordlessly.“Oh, yes,” Jord said with a scoff into the silence left in Loki’s wake. “I can see you’ve done an excellent job teaching that creature how to behave.”He couldn’t get the sight of her out of his mind through the remainder of the meeting. There was much to do, still; wartime decisions which had nothing to do with the liberties his thrall felt entitled to take. He addressed those affairs distractedly, allowing his generals to provide the bulk of discussion. Through it all, the issue of Svadilfari’s offered terms hung heavy over the meeting, unspoken.“If I might make a suggestion, Your Majesty,” Sigvaldi spoke up near the end of the meeting. “Perhaps Svadilfari’s request is more of a boon than he intended. I can think of few better ways to cow an unruly thrall than a reminder of what little worth its protestations are.”Old Thor, present for his fast-fading memory of when last Asgard waged war with the elves, gave the general a dark look. “There’s no need for that kind of talk,” he said.“I must say, I quite agree.” Odin stood with a suddenness that had several members of his war council looking at him warily. “Let us reconvene here overmorrow, and take these two days to evaluate the options before us.”Damn it, he hadn’t intended for this to happen.Was he fooling himself, with his affection for her? For all the potential he saw lurking beneath that elven exterior, she was still only a thrall. Perhaps Jord was right.He hesitated for a long moment at the door to the nursery, before he chided himself for his useless sentimentality. A king must always be willing to make the hard decisions for the good of his people, and Odin had always prided himself on his ability to do just that, for not only Asgard but all the worlds under his control.He entered to find Loki sitting on the floor in front of little Hela, watching her construct a children’s puzzle, each of the small tiles painted with a fragment of an old tapestry. Hela turned at his arrival, offering a bright smile and a wave. “Papa!” Loki, her shoulders tense, didn’t move.“Hello, dear,” he told his daughter fondly, then turned his attention to her mother. “I am not going to hurt you, Loki.” Perhaps his weariness showed in his voice, or perhaps she was as unhappy with their fight as he was. She looked up at him, finally, and when he held out a hand she took it and allowed him to pull her to her feet. “Did you really think I would have handed you over to someone else to be assaulted?” “That’s not for me to presume, Your Majesty,” Loki said stiffly, her eyes not quite meeting his. “I am, after all, quite accustomed to Asgardian punishment these days.”Odin sighed. “You know that’s different. When have I allowed cruelty for the sake of it, rather than the law?” Loki stared at him, and Odin got the distinct feeling he was missing something. Whatever it was, Loki did not seem inclined to share. Odin pressed on.“You ought to have trusted me,” he insisted. “I would have discussed it with you. And if you refused the offer—in private—I could have arranged a reason to refuse.” He had planned to declare the terms insulting. Terms no self-respecting king would bow to.“And you can’t now?”“…It will be more difficult.” It was impossible, she had put him in an impossible position, but telling her that would not help matters. Any refusal now would appear to be a concession to her ill behavior. But perhaps he could still salvage this.“If I sent you with a retinue of mine to deliver a letter stating my refusal of Svadilfari’s terms, would you be amenable to that?”Loki’s response was wary. “And when he realizes it’s a refusal?”“He would not be so bold as to defy the crown, not when his place in Asgard’s favor is so precarious.” Svadilfari was a jarl in a now-defunct empire, with a small military under his control and equipped with a truly fascinating breed of warhorse. His pledged loyalty to Asgard would be of great value, but it would also not come by force, and was deeply uncertain. Perhaps he would capitulate to Odin’s sovereignty, gage the full strength of his forces to Asgard for the sake of his own position and comfort. But it was perhaps equally likely he would take that refusal as an affront, lashing out at the king by taking the prize Odin forbade him.But telling Loki that could do only ill. Instead, Odin finished, “You will be in no danger from him.”“Truly?”“Indeed.” He felt a sharp pang of guilt, and reminded himself that this was necessary, and that any outcome was in his favor. He placed an arm tentatively around Loki’s shoulders, reassured when she leaned into the touch, and watched Hela busily fit pieces together on the floor, the old tapestry depicting Asgard’s fortification half-finished.Everything would be fine. +1“It… isn't blue,” said Frigga curiously, looking down at the baby Hela had abandoned to the nursery in her exile, her voice quiet so as to not disturb her own baby, Thor, sleeping on the other side of the room.“No, Your Majesty,” the nurse said diffidently. “He took an Asgardian color soon after we received him. All seemed well, and he took to the bottle without issue, so we found no need to bother Your Majesties with a report.” She shuffled her weight. “Was that in error?”Odin thought with some discomfort that perhaps he should have asked after the child once or twice since the birth. He’d thought to distance himself, in order to force Hela to assume the weight of responsibility for the child. It had seemed fitting, given the actions that had led to the infant’s existence.“No, Mjalldis,” he said. “You’ve done perfectly well.” He looked at the baby.He’d been furious when Hela had confessed her pregnancy to him. Moreso when she’d insisted on allowing it to continue. Cementing a victory by shaming the ruler of the opposition was an old tradition, it was true, but to do it with a jotunn, in the same breath as well as announcing the creatures a worthy opposition to put down? It was distasteful, to say the least, even without evidence of the mistake lingering on, firstborn to the heir apparent.Well. Now it was Odin’s problem, he supposed.“Has he been given a name?” If so, Hela hadn’t mentioned it to Odin. But then, their relationship had been deteriorating. It was possible she had simply neglected to tell him.“No, Your Majesty.”Frigga was still staring down at the child, an odd look on her face. She had not liked Hela, the few times they had so much as spoken in Odin’s presence. He’d been concerned at first. They were to be mother and daughter after the marriage, after all, by law if not by blood. But the expression on Frigga’s face now was almost… pity. She reached one hand out and let the babe grasp at her finger, and Odin was suddenly, vividly transported back in time to when he had first set eyes on little Hela.There was nothing of the child’s monstrous father in his face now. Only dark curls that looked so much like his mother, and his— and Loki.If only things had been different, he thought. The tragedy of her death—his own fault, that his lenience with her created the situation—was only outmatched by the tragedy of what could have been made of her life in better circumstances. If she had only had some kind of moral guidance, anyone to guide her away from the perversions of the culture she was born to.He wondered…It was commonly believed that once a man’s soul had been tainted so, it could never regain its former honor. But how often had that claim been tested, Odin wondered? If anyone could overcome such limitations, he felt that it would be Loki.“What do you think, Frigga, of naming the boy Loki?”Frigga looked up at him in surprise. “Naming him after your old thrall?” Her lips pursed. “Whatever fetish you may have, we’re talking about a baby. And a relative, no less.”“No! No, I only—” He sighed. “Loki was failed, not only by Nidavellir but Asgard as well, and I will carry the guilt for my complicity in that to the end of my days. If there is any chance for that soul, what better upbringing could it be provided than within the walls of Valhol?”Frigga’s face went fond, then. “You’ve always been soft.” But there was no judgement in her voice, and she turned back to the child, who offered her a toothless smile. “Loki, then. The invert thrall becomes a prince. Who would have thought? You must have been a remarkable soul indeed, to gain such an honor.”“She was,” Odin agreed. “And he will be even moreso.”