Prompt Post 3
Welcome to norsekink .
Keep up the awesome, folks.
Announcement: All new and continuing fills for Round 3 should be posted in the Overflow Post.
THIS ROUND IS CLOSED TO NEW PROMPTS.
( Rules )
Keep up the awesome, folks.
Announcement: All new and continuing fills for Round 3 should be posted in the Overflow Post.
THIS ROUND IS CLOSED TO NEW PROMPTS.
( Rules )
Thor’s grip on Mjolnir tightened reflexively. Of course, Loki would not make his own rescue easy. “When did you last see him?”
“After the Allfather commanded him, he returned briefly to his rooms to revise a spellbook and collect some magical ingredients. Then he left the city gates and walked along the wall. He shielded himself from me before he reached the giant and his horse.”
“But you could still see the giant and the horse?” Thor asked, hopeful. It was obvious where Loki was headed, after all.
“I saw the horse break free of its bindings and run off into the woods, but I did not see how your brother achieved it.”
“Where is the horse now?”
Heimdall stared into the distance for some time. “He roams free on the great plains. As far as I can see, your brother is not with him.”
Thor sighed. It was hopeless. But he had to try, for his dear brother, the one he swore always to protect.
“Thank you, mighty Heimdall. I shall continue my search, but let me know immediately if you do glimpse my brother.” Thor claps Heimdall hard on the back. This man had watched them play as children and watched them grow into men. He saw all and it comforted Thor as much as he knew it bothered Loki. Thor was not surprised that Loki had invented a way to hide himself from Heimdall’s gaze, but he was disappointed. Heimdall might see all, but he did not speak of it (at least of Loki’s mischief or Thor’s various indiscretions). Thor liked the idea that Heimdall was there to summon help should they ever get in over their heads.
“Of course, my prince,” Heimdall replied. “But take solace in the fact that if Loki were truly in danger, he would not bother to hide himself from me.”
That thought did calm Thor somewhat. If Loki was in inescapable mortal danger, as many times before, he would shout out for Heimdall and for help. But Loki was secretive and prideful. Thor worried that whatever was keeping his brother from returning was grave enough to shame him, but not grave enough for him to overcome his pride and call for help. Thor could think of many things that could compel such a reaction and all were dangerous.
Thor returned to his rooms in order to gather supplies - a satchel of apples and his hunting gear - a few magical ropes that could form themselves into nets at a word (a gift from Loki), a simple bow and arrow that Thor could call back to him as he called Mjolnir, and clothes made of rough cloth and thick leather in browns and greens - more like Loki’s customary attire than Thor’s. Thor’s armor was heavy and ill-equipped for a quick search of the wood, but Thor could not bring himself to leave his hammer behind. He also stopped by the healing rooms to grab some herbs, in case Loki had been injured.
Thor contemplated making the journey by horseback, but halfway to the stable, he changed his mind. Horseback would be quicker, but Thor was reminded of their childhood games of hide and seek in which Loki would cheat shamelessly, using his magic. Over the years, Thor had gotten used to the subtle feeling of wrongness, the almost imperceptable chill that ran down his spine, that signaled that Loki was near and concealed somehow. But such searches were slow-going and contemplative. No, better to leave the distraction of a horse behind and make his way on foot.
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Thor winced, wondering if he would be able to met out such justice when he became king. In war, Thor was ruthless. He thought not of the lives he took, but only of victory. But he struggled with deception and struggled moreso to find that sense of ruthlessness in business and the political affairs of the kingdom. Thor often wondered why there needed to be only one king. Surely, Loki, with his silver tongue and his love of intrigue should handle the politics and Thor could handle whatever wars came their way (for Asguard was rarely without them).
Thor spent a long moment standing at the place in the wall where the stallion had run off. He forced his breath to calm, for his eyes to search out clues and for his other senses to alert him to the presence of his brother. After half an hour he realized that there was nothing to be found here and made his way into the wood. It had been a wet spring, and the night that Loki had succeeded in halting progress on the wall, it had rained a torrent, wiping away any hoofprints that might indicate the horse’s direction. But there were paths in the wood and broken twigs and thin branches that indicated they had been traversed recently and a great speed by a large animal - and the builder’s horse had been frightfully large, monstrous, almost.
The trail ended in a clearing full of sweet flowers that had recently been chewed by a horse. Thor spread out his cape and sat down, forcing himself into the meditative state that he despises. Thor had never been good at stillness, but he had put up with it for training, and later to try to learn at least a little of the concentration that allowed Loki his magic. He used his meager skill at stillness to find his brother upon occasion or for stealth in hunting (rarely in war), but he was desperate now.
Sadly, even his desperation was not enough to keep the meditation from slipping into deep sleep, the weariness of the journey combined with the exhaustion of worry dragging him down into the world of dreams.
He twitched against his soft leather cape as the sunlight fades, the long stems of flowers casting strange, jagged shadows around him. He dreamed of this very meadow. Loki stumbled into it, fear etched deep in his profound green eyes. He limped, falling to his knees before forcing himself up and onward. The stallion was huge and black as it broke through the branches, its great nostrils heaving. Loki cried out, tears streaming down his face as he struggled back. The stallion reared above him, kicking out its great legs. Loki was trapped.
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His heart was beating fast with adrenaline that would not fade with the dream. He charged back into the woods, impelled onwards by some invisible force that felt like fear and wrath and panic all curled up into a festering ball of black despair. He did not care to find a path, smashing trees to splinters with his massive hammer should they dare stand in his way. It didn’t take long to emerge on the shore of a mountain lake, its waters still and clear.
“Loki!” Thor called out. He could feel his brother’s magic in the air, if not his presence. “Please, brother. What has happened to you?”
Thor panted down from his previous panic, letting the moonlight on the lake soothe his frayed nerves. The panic was another of Loki’s glamors. Sometimes he used it to force foes away and other times, as now, he used it to draw an enemy into a trap.
Thor knew his brother would not hurt him, so there must have another reason to lead Thor here. And there was. He glimpsed a white figure in the moonlight. At first he thought it was a unicorn or maybe even a pegasus, that figure staring at him across the still waters of the lake. There was something calm in its gaze - wise. Thor never enjoyed the mystical as his brother did, but he has always been as unafraid of magic as he was of war, so he charged headlong through the marshy reeds at the lake’s edge, stumbling after the massive white horse, of size to rival the black stallion.
The horse was unimpressed by Thor’s struggles, continuing to slowly chew the sweet grasses it had found on the lake’s shore. It did not startle or flinch when he approached, only stared at him with cool green eyes. It’s white coat glowed ethereally in the moonlight, seeming to weave a spell that pulled at the edges of consciousness in the same manner as the norns. This horse was magical, no doubt. It held within it a house of many twisted rooms, a creature of illusion that stored the rest of its nature outside of time and space.
Thor approached slowly. Like the norns, like his brother, like all things that lived with one foot in the physical and one foot in the dimensions of heaven, this creature could be unpredictable, dangerous in its otherworldly motivations. But when Thor reached his hand out to pet it, it stepped up to him, nuzzling his palm. It’s skin was cool, like it was made of the moonbeams itself.
“Where is Loki?” Thor asked those ageless eyes. “Where is my brother?”
The horse snorted, tossing its head. It could be amusement or one of those unfathomable feelings that only a magical horse would know.
Thor ran his hands through the horse’s silky mane, perfectly untangled despite how the horse appeared to roam free. “Will you lead me do him?” Thor whispered. “Is that why he has drawn me here?”
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Thor hunted game woods of great towering trees with his bow and single arrow and his companion munched on wild grasses and drank from clear mountain streams. Horses were capable of sleeping standing up, but at night, his mount kneeled down and let Thor curl against her for warmth. Thor looked at the stars and imagined other realms, felt magic coursing through the world as he’d never felt before. He became inured to the stillness that came with the steady rhythm of the horse running down the moonlight plain and way the wind rippled in exact counterpoint to his motion as they galloped seemingly straight into the dawn light. He began to feel the differences in the rays that his skin absorbed and those which were reflected back into space. He could feel energy humming around him, the knots in the tendrils of matter that made up the universe. He teased at them, feeling on the brink of some great discovery. Magic lived, it breathed, it pulsed in the very nature of all things.
In the silence, with no one but his horse and the beautiful sprawling nature of Asguard, Thor was finally coming to understand what he brother found so enchanting when his eyes clouded over and he dove into the fabric of the cosmos, returning half as an illusion and half as a dream.
Thor felt Loki’s presence many times on their journey. Sometimes it was the spine-tingling feel of being watched and other times a feel of love and comfort that he’d felt since childhood seeping deep into his bones. Other times it was an abiding sense of joy that seemed to creep in from the outskirts of awareness rather than within.
The white horse seemed to ride on the eddies of the wind and to delight in freedom and chaos. There was no pattern to its movements, zigzagging across the plain, but every change of direction, every flick of its mane, were steeped in firm intent, so tangible that Thor imagined that if he just pulled loose one of those knots in the firmament, he could see himself and the horse riding straight into some glorious future.
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Loki did not mean to be found, but he meant to share something of his soul with Thor, that much was certain. Thor knew he had not met the horse by accident, but through some profound machination of his brother’s.
Thor smiled, stroking the horse’s neck as he lead it through the pastures on the outskirts of the city, down sun dappled paths strewn with leaves. Summer had passed them by as they rode and fall was upon them.
“You can tell him that he need not return swiftly if he does not wish it,” Thor told the horse. “I understand now, why the world tempts him away. But I miss him dearly. Tell him to return to me so that we may share these gifts he has given me.”
The horse snorted, seemingly disdainful of the idea that she could communicate with Loki at all. She had a sense of humor, Thor had learned in their travels.
Thor found a stall for his new steed in the stables and left the door unlocked when the horse gave a frustrated whinny when he made to lock it.
“Of course,” Thor acknowledged. “I will not steal your freedom.” A sadness settled suddenly upon his heart, because he was a crown prince, one-day a king, and he could feel the creeping weight of the chains that would bind him with responsibility one day. There would be no months riding on the endless plain, no frivolous nights spent camped out in the woods or dozing with his head in his brother’s lap as Loki read about the secrets of the great beyond. Though Thor had been fullgrown for centuries now, he was finally feeling the gate to his childhood swing shut, as he had closed the gate to the pasture door earlier.
He patted the horse with sorrow, knowing that she would one day again be free, while Thor would remain here.
“Do you think that’s where he’s gone?” Thor asked the horse. “Do you think that with father’s threats he realized that mischief would no longer be tolerated and that if he returned, it would be to responsibility and not freedom? We are growing into our inheritance day by day. Do you think he meant to make me realize all the wonders of the universe that would be denied to me once the duties of the throne came upon me?” Loki’s gifts were always part wonder and part cruelty, after all.
The horse did not answer, instead munching on the hay that the stable hands had fetched for her.
Thor sighed. “I must go to the palace now. But promise me this: if you do long for freedom once again, you will not leave before letting me say goodbye.” Like his brother had.
The horse stopped chewing, nuzzling at Thor’s throat in assent. With one last stroke her her flank, Thor made his way toward the palace.
TBC soon!
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