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Loki is not technically banished. This is just - giving her mother space. To think. About what to do with her wayward child. She will be called back in a few years for a more permanent decision. Midgard's nice enough, anyway, and Sigyn's coming along.
The Bifrost lights up in all its colors and -
- this might be Midgard, but it is not a part of Midgard she ever saw and not the place she was expecting to be dropped, and there is no Sigyn with her.
She holds Lævateinn ready as a glaive. Maybe her mother feared her sorcery and thought she'd best be sent somewhere deadly under the impression she was meant to survive the trip -
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purposeful_glory
Findekáno shakes his head violently. "To bear children into troubled times is considered a great injustice to them. Into a world where other children are starving - you'd have to be more selfish than Fëanor."
purposeful_glory
"Which is very civilized of you, but not all peoples think that way. Too, some of them have not invented the ability to decouple the having of children from the traditional method of doing so and cannot bear to be without the latter. ...Possibly that is also different here, I wouldn't know."
Findekáno looks extremely confused. "Yes, I think so, because I'm not sure what you're talking about."
"Elven...parents?"
"Trying to make a child. It's a lot of magical and emotional effort, it's not as if you could do it halfheartedly."
"Really? How does everyone else do it?"
purposeful_glory
"Well, you have not explained the mechanics underlying the emotional and magical effort, so I don't know if I need to explain the entire procedure or just assure you that it's entirely physical for the rest of us..."
"No, I imagine - your thoughts seem about right, though I'm not married and don't know for sure. But just - you do that, and sometimes a child results? By accident? Oops?"
purposeful_glory
"Yes. Absent the aforementioned inventions, that is; Asgardians have them, Midgardians have only low-reliability options and I have witnessed couples avoiding each other for fear they will have a fourteenth mouth to feed. By accident. Oops."
"Oh. Wow. Does the inventor of the Asgardian solution not desire to teach it? Worlds full of people unwillingly having children...
purposeful_glory
"Midgard does not know except as stories they take to be fiction about Asgard at all, let alone how to manufacture our conveniences. It is among the things I'd been hoping to change if I'd inherited the throne one day. I would have loved to go to Midgard with an entire library of knowledge -" She shakes her head.
"You're in line to rule Asgard?"
purposeful_glory
"Well. Not very, as you can tell from the whole, socially unacceptable, banished, thing. My sister is not only older but has always been more in line with Mother's preferences. But I had some hope. And my sister as queen might have listened to me even if I held no formal power."
"Then she'd be a much better ruler than certain people."
purposeful_glory
"...I am not sure she has our mother's ability to think long-term. Which Odin has, albeit not according to the values I would choose. But she is not the worst princess Asgard could have, no."
"It's a problem I've been thinking about a great deal, lately. What to do if your nation is ruled by reckless and dangerous and unqualified people."
"Fëanor can't win the war. He's already gotten ten thousand people pointlessly killed at Alqualondë - the harbor - and then he left half his host stranded out of sheer spite and another ten thousand have died on the road and we cannot win a war with him in charge.
We also can't win it if we depose him, because his sons will never follow us and their people will never abandon them."
We also can't win it if we depose him, because his sons will never follow us and their people will never abandon them."
"His father - Finwë, my grandfather - was our King for the great journey in Valinor. He ruled us for more than four thousand years. He was adored by everyone. He was a good man, great King, bad father. And he favored Fëanor."
Findekáno laughs, and then sighs, and then shakes his head. "That one's a long story. And I don't know how much people in your Asgard do differently, but - when we marry, we marry for the lifetime of the world. Before we came to Valinor, some would remarry if widowed, because otherwise you'd be alone forever, but in Valinor you could just wait for your spouse to be returned to life.
Finwë's first wife was named Miriel Serindë, and by all accounts she was stubborn, difficult, and a very unhappy person. She was more unhappy after her son was born. She stopped wanting to be alive. They tried to get the Valar to fix her, but the Valar said there was nothing wrong. And then - she died. She just left her body. We can do that, if we want to, but it's very rarely - Mandos offered to give her a new body, but she didn't want that either. She said she just wanted everyone to let her be dead for a while, and leave her alone. But Finwë was lonely, and ruling a kingdom and raising a child alone, and he'd plead with her, with the Valar, with everyone, to fix her and bring her back.
And she refused. At first she said "not yet", and then she said "stop asking", and then she said "I will categorically never return to life." And - and Finwë met someone else.
My grandmother Indis had loved him for a long time, and when he married someone else she had moved away, but her heart never moved. They met when Finwë was traveling, and she saw that he was lonely, and - there was no precedent, but they petitioned the Valar to dissolve his first marriage. And the Valar said that the marriage could not be dissolved, but that since Miriel never wanted to return to life he could marry again - but now she couldn't return to life. Even if she changed her mind. Because then a man would have two living wives.
Fëanor was opposed. He was a child of sixteen, at the time, and they didn't let him speak at the hearing but he made it well known he was opposed, and he hid the morning of the wedding and caused a great deal of pain to a good many people, and he never got over it, and he remains convinced that Miriel might have chosen to live again, eventually. And Finwë feels overwhelmingly guilty, and he loved his first wife more than his second anyway, so he's awkward around us. If he could do it all over again we wouldn't exist and everyone knows it. And he favors Fëanor."
Finwë's first wife was named Miriel Serindë, and by all accounts she was stubborn, difficult, and a very unhappy person. She was more unhappy after her son was born. She stopped wanting to be alive. They tried to get the Valar to fix her, but the Valar said there was nothing wrong. And then - she died. She just left her body. We can do that, if we want to, but it's very rarely - Mandos offered to give her a new body, but she didn't want that either. She said she just wanted everyone to let her be dead for a while, and leave her alone. But Finwë was lonely, and ruling a kingdom and raising a child alone, and he'd plead with her, with the Valar, with everyone, to fix her and bring her back.
And she refused. At first she said "not yet", and then she said "stop asking", and then she said "I will categorically never return to life." And - and Finwë met someone else.
My grandmother Indis had loved him for a long time, and when he married someone else she had moved away, but her heart never moved. They met when Finwë was traveling, and she saw that he was lonely, and - there was no precedent, but they petitioned the Valar to dissolve his first marriage. And the Valar said that the marriage could not be dissolved, but that since Miriel never wanted to return to life he could marry again - but now she couldn't return to life. Even if she changed her mind. Because then a man would have two living wives.
Fëanor was opposed. He was a child of sixteen, at the time, and they didn't let him speak at the hearing but he made it well known he was opposed, and he hid the morning of the wedding and caused a great deal of pain to a good many people, and he never got over it, and he remains convinced that Miriel might have chosen to live again, eventually. And Finwë feels overwhelmingly guilty, and he loved his first wife more than his second anyway, so he's awkward around us. If he could do it all over again we wouldn't exist and everyone knows it. And he favors Fëanor."