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[b]| A S G A R D |[/b]

Asgardians loved to toot their own horns. They blew them when they were hunting. They blew them when they were feasting. They blew them when they were fighting. If there was one sound which the young king would have gladly lived every day since without, it was the sound of those horns. And they had been blowing now for over an hour, as the first of Hel's black banners became visible upon the rainbow bridge. The legions of Hel were marching on Asgard. The sound of drums brought archers to the walls, engineers to the catapults, and soldiers to the armory. The Warriors Three had returned with Beta Ray Bill, whose hammer [i]Stormbreaker[/i] would now lead the army of Asgard in place of his oath brother.

[i]Brother[/i]. Loki would have very much liked to have known where his were. Balder had taken up the quest to secure Thor's return to Asgard, a task which Loki had set for Sif. But the queen of Asgard had disagreed. How convenient for her that, as Hel marched on Asgard, both of her [i]actual[/i] children were no where to be found. Balder the Brave. Thor, the god of Thunder. And what was he? The trickster. The god of fools.

Staring down a massed army of the dead.

He knew from the sound of the footfall behind him that it was Sif, even before she spoke. "My lord, why do we waste time with preparations for a feast, when it is war that is upon us?"

From the balcony over which he now surveyed two opposing armies, the young king turned back to look up the warrior-woman of Asgard. She wanted to be out on the battlefield, but instead she was charged with watching over the king. He rather had the impression she much preferred combat to his presence. Perhaps the whole [i]hair incident[/i] wasn't quite healed as of yet. "If war be upon us, then I suspect that our guests should soon be hungry," the young god opined simply, turning back toward the war.

"Which guests do you speak of?" 

For a moment, Loki smiled in spite of himself. Or, perhaps, because of himself. After all, who knew Loki better than Loki? Turning away, the boy motioned for the woman to follow as he started back through the castle. "Who ever comes to dinner in Asgard, my lady," the young king asked sullenly, adding, "The dead and those who wish us so."

"And the fighting?"

Pausing, the boy turned to look up at her. The look in his eyes left no room for doubt that this was not one of his games. Or, if it were, it were unlike any before it. "The fighting shall be brief," Loki stated firmly, before marching on.

He stepped out of the barricades without armor. Without weapon. The soldiers stepped aside for him, the Warriors Three taking up position behind him even as Beta Ray Bill and Sif flanked him, as the young king casually strolled out of the security of Asgard's walls and onto the battlefield as though it meant nothing more to him than a Thor's Day walk. Dwarfed by the Aesir behind him and the dead before, the boy continued his gait unabated until he stood before a tall, green-armored woman in a wickedly shaped helm. The color held his eye for a moment. If she [i]were[/i] his daughter, she had a rather discerning taste in color.

"Lady Hela, we are honored by your presence," the young king of Asgard intoned with all the polite pomp that was to be expected. Holding out his cloak, he gave the woman the customary, if brief, bow of respect before straightening himself back upright. Craning his head back to look up at the woman, the boy stated, "We prepared a feast, but had not expected your [i]entourage[/i] to be so..." he allowed himself to trail off then, making a show of looking to the left and the right of the woman, at the army behind her. "[b]...robust[/b]," the boy concluded finally, fixing his eyes back up on the goddess of Hel.

"You may dispense with the pleasantries," Hela barked, her voice an otherworldly, rasping bark that resonated across the field. The dramatic effect sent one eyebrow up on the boy's brow. A parlor trick, but an effective one. He would remember that. "You will escort me to Valhalla or I shall escort myself upon the bodies of the Aesir," the goddess declared flatly.

The eyebrow that had been raised resumed its normal place on his otherwise bemused face. Raising one hand, the child-god motioned from the mistress of Hel to bend her ear closer to him. 

Instead, she grabbed the boy by the front of his cloak, raising him up to her own eye level. Which, was not how he'd hoped to get her undivided attention, but it would do. Lowering his voice to a whisper, the boy said only, "I am the Odinson. I sit upon the throne of Asgard. Valhalla is [i]mine[/i]." As he felt her grip tighten, the young king asked quietly, "Tell me, dear Hela, have you bothered to look [b]behind[/b] your ranks."

She was his daughter. Or, she was [i]a[/i] Loki's daughter. He knew that as truth the moment that their eyes connected and the boy found himself staring at a mirror. When she broke away from his gaze, the goddess dropped the boy back to the ground as she suddenly grew several meters in height, turning her head to look back behind her army. There were banners on the horizon, depicting a white sky dominated by a gold lightning bolt.

"There is an army of Greeks marching upon the Bifrost," Hela snapped from on high.

"Your powers of observation are laudable," the young Loki commented, raising his voice as he spoke up to the now giant-sized mistress of Hel. "Should Heimdall ever disappoint me, I should have a commission for you waiting in his observatory."

Hissing loudly, the goddess of the dead turned to look back at the small boy with the same baleful green eyes. "What trickery is this?"

"They are Greeks," the boy offered with a shrug. "They come for a wedding. Or a battle. I should say naught which I prefer."

"Whose wedding?" Hela demanded.

"Did your invitation not yet arrive?" Loki inquired smoothly, innocently. "We are uniting the pantheons. Asgard and Olympus stand as one."

Hela just held his gaze.

Inclining his head slightly, Loki feigned an innocuous expression as he remarked, "I do hope this isn't too inconvenient for your plans."

[b]"Forbidden!"[/b]

The bemused smile returned. "Perhaps the screams of the dishonored dead have dulled your hearing, so I shall give the courtesy of repeating myself," Loki offered, gesturing at the army behind him. "I am the Odinson. I sit upon the throne of Asgard. [b]I[/b] decide what is forbidden," the boy declared firmly, locking eyes on the woman as he added, "Now, you will lay down your weapons or... frankly, my lady, we shall send you all back to the Hel from whence you came."

The two just stared at each other. Another lifetime, another story, it was frankly frightening to consider what the two of them might have accomplished together rather than in opposition to one another. Sadly, few things - if anything - ever worked out that way in favor of Loki.

"Lady's choice, of course," the boy added smoothly.