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Loki doesn't tell anyone what she's doing. They'd be disappointed; she'd get in trouble. And it's not hard to keep it secret; this is hardly a new habit for her, writing incessantly in incomprehensible ciphers. She still diaries, still processes, still makes her decisions - and now she also spell-weaves.
It is a long, hard, painstaking process. She has to come at it from both ends - peer at possible combinations of her symbols to see what makes sense, and come up with a visualization of her desired end result so she knows what parts she needs to build. She's never done this before, and keeps having to go back and edit things. One of the fourth-tier parts has so many third-tier parts in it that she takes weeks of trying just to hold them all in her mind at the same time and make them snap together into a single object she can keep memorized in its entirety. She spends a stack of notebooks as high as her waist working out another fourth-tier part, only to discover that she's got a key "word" wrong and has to start completely over because it affects everything else.
When she starts, she resigns herself to the possibility that her spell will take an entire year.
This estimate is soon revised.
It takes half a century of stolen time and backtracking and double-checking.
But it will be worth it, she thinks, if her mother will love her unreservedly, if she can keep up with Thor, if she can put her scepter - now a bit short for use as a cane, for a child her size - aside and run and dance. (If she can do magic.)
And once she casts it, it will stay forever.
She has just about built herself from atoms; there are separate bits of this spell for each muscle in her body in its current shape and accounting for its future growth (she's been reading anatomy) and connecting them all to her mind, directly, commanding their obedience.
She assembles the ninth-tier pieces into a single, unified whole, and it shines bright in her mind, and she knows exactly what to do with it, from cube-inspired knowledge stamped as bright in her thoughts as though she'd touched it yesterday.
It's all together now.
She wills it.
She knows the difference at once though there's no visible effect - even in how she holds up her head, how the last page of her notebook feels under her fingers.
She wants to get up, twirl, leap, pick up her scepter and brandish it like a sword, run down the halls whooping and show Thor.
But she doesn't. It wouldn't do to be conspicuous. (Heimdall is watching; she can't read the cipher but she can see the results.)
Loki is going to have to pretend to have outgrown her clumsiness, spend the next ten or fifteen years still tripping occasionally but less and less. Maybe she should get new shoes; maybe she should ask about learning to dance. Some outward excuse. Something less sudden.
She sketches a plan in her non-magical cipher, and sets about enacting it.
(Meanwhile, she contemplates what spell she should build next.)
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purposeful_glory
"I want to leave tonight," she says. "There's just one thing I have to do first. I love you, sister! I'll come for you when it's time!"
And she hugs Loki again and dashes off exuberantly.
And she hugs Loki again and dashes off exuberantly.
Loki sighs, and picks out armor, and a real glaive, not a practice one. If she's lucky, they'll be able to beat the bear without her having to rescue either of them with healing magic. And then she goes after Thor to find out what this thing is.
Loki can run quite lightly and quite fast, even armored.
Loki can run quite lightly and quite fast, even armored.
einridi
Thor is sneaking into a certain treasure room. She is not very sneaky, but it helps that no one except Loki is watching.
She walks up to the pedestal on which Mjolnir rests, and she takes the handle in both hands and lifts. It comes up fluidly. Thor steps back.
She walks up to the pedestal on which Mjolnir rests, and she takes the handle in both hands and lifts. It comes up fluidly. Thor steps back.
"Sister," exclaims Loki. "How did you do it?"
Loki nods. She feels rather better about this expedition if Thor can wield Mjolnir.
Her current horse is called Foglsöngr, and she's black-and-white piebald, and young still, eager to go. Loki saddles her up.
Her current horse is called Foglsöngr, and she's black-and-white piebald, and young still, eager to go. Loki saddles her up.
einridi
Thor's horse is named Landhȧ́r, and she is a few years older than Foglsöngr but every bit as enthusiastic.
It's a day's ride to the last known location of the bear. No one gives them any trouble on the way.
It's a day's ride to the last known location of the bear. No one gives them any trouble on the way.
That's good; Loki would not like to have to explain this more times than she currently expects.
She looks for signs of the bear, and for things that might be appealing to giant bears.
She looks for signs of the bear, and for things that might be appealing to giant bears.
einridi
That is good, because Thor did not have even that sophisticated of a plan for actually finding the thing.
In the event, they do find tracks; finding this bear has never been a problem. Thor suggests that they dismount and lead the horses along the trail; she has never used Mjolnir before and is sure she could not wield it from the back of a terrified horse.
In the event, they do find tracks; finding this bear has never been a problem. Thor suggests that they dismount and lead the horses along the trail; she has never used Mjolnir before and is sure she could not wield it from the back of a terrified horse.
Loki agrees readily; she is now more agile on foot than on horseback. She carries her glaive in one hand and leads Foglsöngr with the other.
einridi
And in an hour or two, they come upon the bear.
It is much, much larger than anything or anyone Thor has fought before. Its shaggy hide is dotted with the broken ends of old arrows, and scars from the swords or axes of previous opponents. Its paws are each individually bigger than her head. It could bite her in half with a single chomp and not take much trouble about it.
She takes a deep breath, raises Mjolnir, and charges with a yell as thunderclouds fill the sky.
It is much, much larger than anything or anyone Thor has fought before. Its shaggy hide is dotted with the broken ends of old arrows, and scars from the swords or axes of previous opponents. Its paws are each individually bigger than her head. It could bite her in half with a single chomp and not take much trouble about it.
She takes a deep breath, raises Mjolnir, and charges with a yell as thunderclouds fill the sky.
...Loki's spell cannot actually resurrect the dead. And she would need to be conscious to cast it, even if all the difficult work of assembly is over and done. She suddenly regrets this very much, wishes she'd run and told Father, but there's nothing for it now. She circles around, looks for advantageous terrain - they'll need all the help they can get. At least she and Thor can flank it.
einridi
Thor ducks under the swing of a paw and brings the hammer up against the beast's lowered head. She's always been a big, strong girl; she expects it to be a solid hit.
She does not expect the bear's head to snap back with a loud crunch, nor for the hammer to keep going, dragging her arm in a full circle until she wrests control from it at the last moment and hauls it up to strike at an incoming paw. Claws screech on metal. Thor lets the hammer's incredible momentum spin her in another circle, and when she comes back around she dips low and swings high and leaps for the bear's face.
She does not expect the bear's head to snap back with a loud crunch, nor for the hammer to keep going, dragging her arm in a full circle until she wrests control from it at the last moment and hauls it up to strike at an incoming paw. Claws screech on metal. Thor lets the hammer's incredible momentum spin her in another circle, and when she comes back around she dips low and swings high and leaps for the bear's face.
Loki finds high ground; it won't help her if the bear chooses to stand, but she has reach, with her glaive, and if the bear stands Thor can knock its hind legs out from under it; she reaches down and slashes at the animal's back.
einridi
The bear does, in fact, start to stand. Mjolnir hits it in the chest. It falls over backward; Thor lands on its chest and smashes its already broken jaw one more time with the hammer.
Well, Loki's a little redundant, although she may have usefully distracted it. That's all right, Thor is okay so far, so is she, that's the point. She drops onto her stomach at the edge of the ledge she's standing on for reach and stability, stabs down at the bear's stomach; she'll be on her feet in a moment if it gets its footing back.
einridi
It is not going to get its footing back. Not with its head looking like that.
Thor stops hitting it when it stops moving; she jumps off, rolls, comes up facing the bear's corpse, and backs away warily, because with beasts like these you never know.
It remains dead.
She laughs.
"Sorry I didn't leave any for you, sister!"
Thor stops hitting it when it stops moving; she jumps off, rolls, comes up facing the bear's corpse, and backs away warily, because with beasts like these you never know.
It remains dead.
She laughs.
"Sorry I didn't leave any for you, sister!"
"There will be more bears," says Loki, and she pulls back her blade and leaps lightly down. "That was amazing."
Celebratory dead bear hugs?
einridi
Celebratory dead bear hugs!
"I should clean my hammer," she says. "And you, you've blooded your spear, sister!"
"I should clean my hammer," she says. "And you, you've blooded your spear, sister!"
Loki nods, and wipes down the blade of her glaive, still grinning. They aren't even hurt.
einridi
Thor finds something to wipe blood and fur off Mjolnir. The hammer's head isn't even scratched from the bear's claws or teeth. It cleans up as good as new.
"We should camp for the night, I think," she says. "It's too late to make it back home by morning."
"We should camp for the night, I think," she says. "It's too late to make it back home by morning."
"We didn't bring a tent or anything," Loki says. "Maybe we could go to the village it's been bothering and tell them we killed it and they will give us a place to sleep."
