Fic: Freezer Burn
A/N -This fic is the result of various bits of prompts that have been cutting and pasting and synthesizing over a period of several months. I can't remember if I actually posted it as prompt on a kinkmeme or not. I think I did. Or something with the same situation. But sometimes I spend several minutes typing into the comment box and then don't hit the post button because I decide I want to write it myself, eventually. So. Um. Yeah.
Backstory - Maggie's gift to Harry not only has info on Way's to get from point A to point B in record time, but also has select roads-less-traveled that hacks the time dilation of the never into legit time travel. And during his tenure as Winter Knight Harry had to skip a dozen or so centuries into the past, got in a political SNAFU with the Jotnar and ended up making Merry Sport with Laufey/Nal to get out of it. Skipped back to the 'present' just before Shit Got Real.
Which leads to The Story...
"…blue. Blue is nice color. I -like- blue…"
Loki thought he had prepared himself for every eventuality. Should he win, he would rule Midgard and keep it safe -from itself if need be- and should he lose, well… he'd been raised to embrace death in battle, if not to foolishly seek it. Pain was something he had long since become intimately familiar with. When the Chitauri fell, and Hulk's thrashing of him released the chains Thanos used on his magic, Loki hastily spent what energy he could repairing the excess damage before being carted off like an unruly animal.
"…your -uncle- has blue. Sometimes. Got his -cheekbones- too. Or, -no!- yeah, your grandfather's cheekbones. Mother's eyes..."
He thought he might receive an execution if only to remove whatever stain on the House of Odin his existence left. The All-Father certainly felt nothing for him, nor did Thor. Oh, Loki was certain Thor felt some level of guilt, but it was not the grief of two once-close brothers separated. It was the unsettled stomach of twice-thought, of knowing that one should feel bad yet did not.
Frigga, as ever, remained a silent supportive pillar as her husband and king handed out a coward's sentence. The Angel-in-the-House did nothing as whispers like snakes broke out in mumbled dissent. By all rights, Loki should have been locked away, exiled, or executed. Builders had been killed for lesser crimes. For the first time Thor balked at being the executioner.
But of course, killing the jotun meant all of Odin-King's hard work in rescuing and raising the changeling runt was for naught; would be tantamount to admitting a mistake.
The High-King of Asgard did not make mistakes.
"…my dad was an -illusionist-, you know? No, you probably don't. But -the- things he could do w-with -light!."
Nothing prepared Loki for the portal, blue-edged and crackling with cold, that sliced through the air just behind the throne.
Despite the snow the traveler tracked in with him, and the stature that surpassed Loki's own, it was not a Jotun that stepped through but a mortal. A mortal wizard with magic that was achingly familiar. An entourage of fey creatures followed the wizard; mostly sprites zipping through the air brandishing tiny blades when the Einherjar on duty stepped forward.
The wizard only had eyes for Loki, even ignoring Odin's demands, and when earthy-brown met glacial blue the mortal wizard became anything but. He was a scarred, spitting, demon of a wolf in human clothing. His den was carved, no, melted out of watching earth and coated in ice. Figures flitted at the corner of Loki's eyes, and the vague imprint of a woman -though Loki wasn't sure how he knew it was a woman- was burned into a far wall. In the center was a pile of gold that the beast jealously, zealously guarded, but when Loki chanced a closer look into the hoard -the wolf snarled, and sniffed, and then all but pushed Loki into it- he saw not the pressed images of long dead rulers and kings but everyday people. Blonde women. Brunets. Scarred men. Children. Some smiling. Some not. A single silver coin bearing the loveliest woman lurked at the edge.
Loki had not prepared for such. When the wolf-wizard stood in front of him, his sprites fanning out like an honor-guard, and demanded rite-of-kin Loki could not stop the tears from falling. Though it was a slavering, lead tongue that dropped the words, they were well rehearsed. Laws and loopholes aplenty. Thanking Odin for so generously fostering a lost child. Apologizing for having taken so long to retrieve said child. Claiming full responsibility for not rearing his son properly, and transferring all guilt and the decreed sentence over to himself. Legally.
And Odin, oh, Odin could say nothing, as ineffective as his astute wife less he choose between losing face or losing the faith of his people.
Loki's trial was so very public.
"…no, no, no. It's gonna be, be… be… okay. Don't cry. Please, -don't- cry. Uh, ah, wanna hear a story? I never -got- to read you bedtime stories. How 'bout this: A Long Time Ago, In a Galaxy Far, Far away…"
Loki wept. He wept and was grateful for the muzzle that left him some dignity. He wept for the arms that embraced him, that made him feel small and protected, for the blood dripping around them that was his yet not. He wept for the magic that sang through his veins and had always set him apart. Loki never had the patience for Aesir rune work, or natural gift Jotun Ice-Craft, but now he knew what he did was mortal magecraft. Loki cried for each and every one of the hundred lashes that Odin declared to be his punishment, though not a single barb-tipped whip touched him.
The trickster had long since grown used to laughter and jeers at his expense. His punishments had always been met with mirth, and not a single person had offered to help when his mouth was sewn shut…
But the only thing he could hear was his own muffled breathing and the dazed, pain, love- filled , hitched babble of his father as the whips continued their work. No one in the chamber laughed. No one jeered. Occasionally someone gasped, grunted in disgust, or walked away.
Then it was over, Loki's chains dissolved, and his father slumped unconscious. The wolf-wizard's heart was still beating. What would have left an Aesir -or a Jotun- broken for weeks should have killed a mortal, magus or otherwise.
"Loki…" A voice soft and unsure. A hand raised.
His father's back was a ruin of meat and blood. In several places the whip's claws had dug down to the bone, and caught.
His father was cold.
Was breathing.
A raised hand found itself cut with a line of steel, and backed off.
"Home, lordling." A small, child-like and oddly somber voice said by his ear.
"Home?"
He slung his father's farm around his neck, carefully hauling him up, and one of the larger of his father's court stepped forward to assist. He nearly didn't let her, and felt his own face try to twist into a wolfish snarl.
That not-child voice again. "Demonreach, my lord."
The earth that watched, eyes like green coals...
"Okay." His father was unusually cold for a mortal. "Okay."
Backstory - Maggie's gift to Harry not only has info on Way's to get from point A to point B in record time, but also has select roads-less-traveled that hacks the time dilation of the never into legit time travel. And during his tenure as Winter Knight Harry had to skip a dozen or so centuries into the past, got in a political SNAFU with the Jotnar and ended up making Merry Sport with Laufey/Nal to get out of it. Skipped back to the 'present' just before Shit Got Real.
Which leads to The Story...
"…blue. Blue is nice color. I -like- blue…"
Loki thought he had prepared himself for every eventuality. Should he win, he would rule Midgard and keep it safe -from itself if need be- and should he lose, well… he'd been raised to embrace death in battle, if not to foolishly seek it. Pain was something he had long since become intimately familiar with. When the Chitauri fell, and Hulk's thrashing of him released the chains Thanos used on his magic, Loki hastily spent what energy he could repairing the excess damage before being carted off like an unruly animal.
"…your -uncle- has blue. Sometimes. Got his -cheekbones- too. Or, -no!- yeah, your grandfather's cheekbones. Mother's eyes..."
He thought he might receive an execution if only to remove whatever stain on the House of Odin his existence left. The All-Father certainly felt nothing for him, nor did Thor. Oh, Loki was certain Thor felt some level of guilt, but it was not the grief of two once-close brothers separated. It was the unsettled stomach of twice-thought, of knowing that one should feel bad yet did not.
Frigga, as ever, remained a silent supportive pillar as her husband and king handed out a coward's sentence. The Angel-in-the-House did nothing as whispers like snakes broke out in mumbled dissent. By all rights, Loki should have been locked away, exiled, or executed. Builders had been killed for lesser crimes. For the first time Thor balked at being the executioner.
But of course, killing the jotun meant all of Odin-King's hard work in rescuing and raising the changeling runt was for naught; would be tantamount to admitting a mistake.
The High-King of Asgard did not make mistakes.
"…my dad was an -illusionist-, you know? No, you probably don't. But -the- things he could do w-with -light!."
Nothing prepared Loki for the portal, blue-edged and crackling with cold, that sliced through the air just behind the throne.
Despite the snow the traveler tracked in with him, and the stature that surpassed Loki's own, it was not a Jotun that stepped through but a mortal. A mortal wizard with magic that was achingly familiar. An entourage of fey creatures followed the wizard; mostly sprites zipping through the air brandishing tiny blades when the Einherjar on duty stepped forward.
The wizard only had eyes for Loki, even ignoring Odin's demands, and when earthy-brown met glacial blue the mortal wizard became anything but. He was a scarred, spitting, demon of a wolf in human clothing. His den was carved, no, melted out of watching earth and coated in ice. Figures flitted at the corner of Loki's eyes, and the vague imprint of a woman -though Loki wasn't sure how he knew it was a woman- was burned into a far wall. In the center was a pile of gold that the beast jealously, zealously guarded, but when Loki chanced a closer look into the hoard -the wolf snarled, and sniffed, and then all but pushed Loki into it- he saw not the pressed images of long dead rulers and kings but everyday people. Blonde women. Brunets. Scarred men. Children. Some smiling. Some not. A single silver coin bearing the loveliest woman lurked at the edge.
Loki had not prepared for such. When the wolf-wizard stood in front of him, his sprites fanning out like an honor-guard, and demanded rite-of-kin Loki could not stop the tears from falling. Though it was a slavering, lead tongue that dropped the words, they were well rehearsed. Laws and loopholes aplenty. Thanking Odin for so generously fostering a lost child. Apologizing for having taken so long to retrieve said child. Claiming full responsibility for not rearing his son properly, and transferring all guilt and the decreed sentence over to himself. Legally.
And Odin, oh, Odin could say nothing, as ineffective as his astute wife less he choose between losing face or losing the faith of his people.
Loki's trial was so very public.
"…no, no, no. It's gonna be, be… be… okay. Don't cry. Please, -don't- cry. Uh, ah, wanna hear a story? I never -got- to read you bedtime stories. How 'bout this: A Long Time Ago, In a Galaxy Far, Far away…"
Loki wept. He wept and was grateful for the muzzle that left him some dignity. He wept for the arms that embraced him, that made him feel small and protected, for the blood dripping around them that was his yet not. He wept for the magic that sang through his veins and had always set him apart. Loki never had the patience for Aesir rune work, or natural gift Jotun Ice-Craft, but now he knew what he did was mortal magecraft. Loki cried for each and every one of the hundred lashes that Odin declared to be his punishment, though not a single barb-tipped whip touched him.
The trickster had long since grown used to laughter and jeers at his expense. His punishments had always been met with mirth, and not a single person had offered to help when his mouth was sewn shut…
But the only thing he could hear was his own muffled breathing and the dazed, pain, love- filled , hitched babble of his father as the whips continued their work. No one in the chamber laughed. No one jeered. Occasionally someone gasped, grunted in disgust, or walked away.
Then it was over, Loki's chains dissolved, and his father slumped unconscious. The wolf-wizard's heart was still beating. What would have left an Aesir -or a Jotun- broken for weeks should have killed a mortal, magus or otherwise.
"Loki…" A voice soft and unsure. A hand raised.
His father's back was a ruin of meat and blood. In several places the whip's claws had dug down to the bone, and caught.
His father was cold.
Was breathing.
A raised hand found itself cut with a line of steel, and backed off.
"Home, lordling." A small, child-like and oddly somber voice said by his ear.
"Home?"
He slung his father's farm around his neck, carefully hauling him up, and one of the larger of his father's court stepped forward to assist. He nearly didn't let her, and felt his own face try to twist into a wolfish snarl.
That not-child voice again. "Demonreach, my lord."
The earth that watched, eyes like green coals...
"Okay." His father was unusually cold for a mortal. "Okay."