Thor Fic: "The Tale of Winter's Daughter" (Original Character, Loki/Darcy, PG-13), 1/2
Title: The Tale of Winter's Daughter (Part 1: Frost)
Characters: Loki, Darcy, Odin, Thor, Jane, Frigga, Sif, Warriors Three, original characters
Pairings: Loki/Darcy, Thor/Jane, mention of others
Rating: PG-13 for family drama, violence, angst, depression, dramatic irony, teenage hormones
Length: 4,970 words
Summary: This is the story of Princess Skadi of Asgard, sometimes called Skadi Lewis, or by many other names, but always, always known as Loki's daughter.
Notes: Part of an ongoing series. Originally posted on AO3 in March.
Part 1: Frost
“Skaði, the daughter of the giant, donned her helmet, and mail, and all her war-gear, and betook herself to Asgard”
- Skáldskaparmál, the Prose Edda
The third child born to Asgard’s royal house is a girl, the first daughter of her generation. Though her cheeks are rosy and her eyes bright and lively, her skin is bone-white pale, and her hair grows in black and shining.
‘Another spawn of Loki,’ the courtiers mutter, disappointed that the king and his beautiful, if mortal, queen continue to drag their feet on producing heirs, while the king’s younger brother is well on his way to having a regular brood.
The silver-tongued prince is enough trouble all his own. He needs no army of miniature versions of himself to add to his mischievous legacy.
But the princess is clearly of her father’s issue, were there ever any doubt. She has Loki’s hair, his flashing green eyes, his fine bones in the lines of her face. Her body grows into a shape like his; tall and long-limbed, with thin but sturdy muscle underneath.
And there is something about his grin, and his laugh, in the look of her smile. Merry and sharp, like the edge of a dancing knife.
She was supposed to be born in the winter - fitting, for a pale-skinned shadow-haired child. But apparently no one told her, or if they did she failed to listen, for she came nearly a full month early, as autumn leaves were only just becoming kissed by the first brace of frost.
‘In a hurry,’ her father says; ‘In a hurry to join her brothers. Always in a hurry.’
It’s true enough assessment when it comes to the princess. She scoots from nursemaids’ laps as soon as she is able to wriggle, flees the confines of the nursery as soon as she is able to run. On often bare feet she tears through the palace gardens, chasing after her two brothers or a dog or cat or sometimes nothing but the wind. Her hairs dries into bouncing unruly waves and her hands are always dirty from digging in the ground, her knees always bruised from climbing trees.
She is a wild child, and people cluck their tongues and say she is exactly what they pictured would eventually resolve, from the meeting in the middle of the strong wills of both her parents.
She is obtrusive like her mother, and confident like her father. And stubborn like them both. She refuses to learn the meaning of the word ‘no’. And whenever anybody tries to tell her ‘No you can’t’, her response is always ‘Oh yes I can’.
She is named Skadi, and her proper title by birth is Lokisdottir. But hardly anyone ever calls her that.
Strangers look out at the palace grounds and see this thick-maned sun-bitten boney little hellion, cheering and shouting as she fiercely swings a wooden dummy weapon, or laughing as she rolls in the grass.
“Who is that?” they ask. And the response is always the same.
“That is Skadi. Loki’s child.”
And so she is known by all. She is Skadi Lokischild.
*
When she is young all her memories are happy ones. Her childhood passes in a state of pure bliss.
Not surprising; Skadi is a princess and wants for nothing. Least of all the attentions of an adoring family.
Under the warmth of Asgard’s golden sun she and her brothers, and eventually a sister, pass the days playing games, racing up and down the rolling hills and meadows. When he is free their father is often there as well, and some of Skadi’s best memories have a long tall shadow standing next to hers, a strong hand she can reach for to squeeze hers whenever she wants it.
In the lazy heat of the afternoon the children grow more tired than they are willing to admit, and in a patch of thick cool grass or beneath the shade of a tree their father lies down and the little ones gather around him.
With her head pillowed on his body or tucked beneath one of his arms, Skadi closes her eyes and listens to the sound of his voice. He tells them stories, or talks about things to do with magic that only his sons understand, but listen they all do regardless.
The smell and feel of her father, the tenor of his spoken words wrap her in comfort and familiarity, and Skadi never feels safer.
All good things, however, must come to an end. And their endless days with Father having not a care but to dote on them collapse in the form of another sibling’s arrival. For a time, Loki can no longer run with them like he used to.
The princes are angry because it means he no longer can devote himself to their lessons. Who will they learn their sorcery from if not him?
“It’s not fair,” Wyclef complains, even though he should know better, being the eldest. Austen just stands there and backs him up silently with a look of hearty youthful disappointment.
“I’m sorry,” their father says softly, sighing. The small area of skin just beneath his eyelids is turning gray.
He looks down at his rounded belly and frowns, rubbing it. “Today I’m just too tired. Maybe tomorrow.”
Wyclef makes a petulant, wordless sound. He spins and tugs his brother’s sleeve, dragging his compatriot along with a muttered, “Come on, Austen”. The younger prince only spares one glance back for their father.
Skadi however stays right where she is, hands clutched absently behind her back, and bounces on her heels restlessly.
“Are we getting a baby sister?” Fandra asks in a chirping eager voice. Skadi knows she only wants one because she thinks it means she can dress her up like a doll.
“No, I don’t think so.” Father runs a hand across his stomach again, this time with a smile. “Actually I’m fairly certain this one is a boy.”
Fandra’s nose screws up in disappointment. “Yuck!” she declares, and then she too flounces off in search of less unsatisfactory fare. Skadi and her father are left alone.
Skadi comes closer after a moment, gaze fixated on her father’s swollen belly. Her parents take turns, so it was her mother that was pregnant with Fandra.
“Here,” Father gently takes her hand in his, and guides it to his side, “would you like to feel? He might move for you.”
Move her unborn baby brother does, if only just a little. Skadi hangs there silently, nose practically pressed into her father’s stomach beside both her hands in all her curiosity.
“You grew the same way,” he reminds her quietly. With an affectionate hand he briefly touches her cheek. “In the same place.” Skadi nods, knowing.
It will be years before she’s old enough to realize this is strange. That she is an anomaly because she was sired by her mother and birthed by her father.
But there is much about Skadi’s life, about all her brothers and sister’s lives, that none of them think to question. They are oblivious to the idea that their world is anything but normal, growing up with nothing to compare to; surrounded by each other and protective family, uncaring as to the opinions of outsiders.
In the easygoing way of children Skadi believes that things are the way they are because they are just so. They don’t warrant any kind of comment.
Of course Wyclef has magic, and Austen does too. After all so does Father. Isn’t that the way it works?
Much of her early days when she’s old enough to slip out of adults’ sight is spent following behind her brothers. They pull their pranks and have their little things they call ‘adventures’, and for the most part they do not mind that Skadi is there. After all she’s nearly as good as another boy: she’s as strong as they are, and before long she might be able to out-wrestle both of them. Both her brothers are thinkers, and so not as inclined to feats of strength.
It is a cold day when the three of them are playing outside, and the world is thick with the gray and white of snow. They cross the courtyard nearly huddled together, one minute jeering and laughing, and occasionally pelting each other with slush.
The next minute however Austen, who has been carefully watching his sister’s face, stops, his eyes going wide.
“Skadi, what are you doing?” he asks her accusingly. “How are you pulling that trick?”
She makes a face at him, equal parts confusion and exasperation. People call her and Austen “twins” and though they aren’t really - they’re not quite five months apart - they have that sort of relationship.
“What are you talking about?” she demands.
Wyclef has stopped walking and gazes steely-eyed at them both.
Austen points. “That! Do that again,” he commands. “Breathe out.”
Still mystified, Skadi nonetheless dutifully does so, her breath released in a slow puff of air. At last she sees what her brother means.
Where he and their older brother create a small cloud of steam with every exhale, Skadi’s is perfectly invisible. She’s never noticed this before.
“You’re hiding your breath,” Wyclef notes, sounding a bit jealous. “How are you doing that? When did you learn it?”
“And here I thought you couldn’t even do magic,” Austen adds.
“I can’t. At least, I always thought so. I can’t do anything else,” Skadi protests. “I don’t even know what I’m doing now.”
Her brothers look at her inquisitively, thoughtful. Austen raises a hand near in front of her mouth and shivers when next she breathes out.
“It’s not even warm,” he remarks.
Wyclef has a hand on his chin, stroking it as he studies her. He takes in the lighter cloak she has on compared to them, her lack of gloves or anything on her head.
“You aren’t even cold right now,” he gathers at length, slow, “are you?”
Skadi shakes her head. Flakes of freshly falling snow cling to her hair and flick down against her cheeks and neck, not bothering her in the least. “No.”
They have always been a little bit cooler, to the touch, than their mother or just about anyone else. In their unthinking way it was assumed they got it from Father, who often has colder skin himself.
But Skadi is the coldest of them all.
In the end the three mutually shrug it off and decide it must just be another of the many pieces of the abilities present in their family. Perhaps it is some inherent magical skill Skadi has that she doesn’t know how to use properly.
By the end of the day her brothers have all but forgotten it. Skadi herself means to ask, but first there is mischief and then there is chastisement, and at dinner their uncle the king regales them with the exciting story of his latest grand adventure, and after dinner Mom sneaks them extra cookies and hot chocolate with a loving, conspiratorial smile.
Before long Skadi is being bundled into her nightgown and then off to bed, her hair brushed and her face washed, yawning. She doesn’t think to ask any questions, and she never bothers to wonder about it again.
After all, it can’t hardly be anything important.
*
The most sour-faced, most boldly slanderous of the subjects on Asgard comment that Loki cannot, it seems, ever do anything right, ever do anything properly.
Yes, he married - enough of a shock in itself, really. To a mortal woman, true, but so was his brother’s wife, and so little fault could be found in that. He went further in his duty by producing heirs, though the way he went about it was all irregular. Carrying more than half of them himself, and having so unseemly many, and having not the courtesy to wait for his elder brother to have so much as a son first.
And as for Loki’s sons - they are not proper princes worthy of the legacy of Asgard. They are like their father; students of magic, relying on cunning and sly trickery over strength. They aren’t warriors.
The eldest abandoned even the pretense of trying to learn. Years ago he eschewed lessons in combat completely in favor of fully devoting his time to becoming a master sorcerer. The second still attends such lessons dutifully, but he’s of a mild disposition bordering almost on timidity. A fighter he may yet be, but he will never be a bold soldier, and certainly no general.
And then along comes Loki’s daughter. A princess. And she, it soon becomes apparent, is not to perform to the duty that’s expected of her either.
From an early age she snatches up knives and sticks, and eagerly throws herself into doing what her brothers do not.
Girls are still a rare sight on the training grounds, but with the Lady Sif as lead instructor none who seek a place there are turned away. Skadi is young, but determined, and she grows much faster than the full-blooded Asgardian students. Quickly she moves her way up the ranks, from being someone who is merely learning how to fight to someone who excels at it.
She is swift, sure of foot and hard to catch. And when she lands a blow she strikes true and hard. Her favored weapon is the spear-staff compound, not unlike her grandfather’s Gungnir.
And when she fights, her eyes turn bright and alive, a fierce laugh sometimes bubbling up from her throat.
The judging, curious eyes watch Skadi Lokischild as she barrels and beats her opponents bodily into the ground, black curls waving freely and white teeth shining, and clearly enjoying every minute of it.
With begrudging and some grumbling, they are forced to concede. Like the rest of her family Skadi may not be what is proper, but at least, at long last, here is someone to live up to being worthy of the royal legacy.
She will be - she is - a warrior of Asgard.
But for now, she is still young. And so no, not a real warrior yet. Much to her regular, almost daily frustration.
In Skadi’s fourteenth year there is a tournament held, a series of open matches in single combat, performed for the amusement of the nobles and honor in the eyes of their king. There is a small purse to be won, but like most such things on Asgard it’s done really for the glory.
And Skadi is not allowed to compete.
“Next time, hon,” her mother promises, brushing her hair and giving a quick kiss. But Skadi is still far too young, it’s explained; she hasn’t learned enough to be on level footing with the recruits that will be coming from all over Asgard.
But though she’s still young and small Skadi thinks she has learned more about fighting than anyone gives her credit for. She thinks her parents are too overprotective, scared that she’ll get hurt.
Anyone who loves fighting near as much as Skadi knows no fear of pain. And has plenty of brashness in spirit, besides.
So she sneaks off and finds a way to enter herself anyway - under a false name.
The day of the tournament she shows up wearing a dark gray fighting uniform that covers her from neck to bootstraps. Her hair is worked into a tight plait. Her face - and this, she thinks, is cleverest for her of all - is hidden behind a battle mask. It covers everything, not revealing a feature.
The other contestants eye her oddly, but there’s nothing in the rules prohibiting it. Skadi has not really been hit by the changes of her age yet: her body is thin, more straight than curved, and if she pitches her voice low and husky she sounds, if not entirely like a boy, indeterminate enough she could be imagined as either male or female.
She’s allowed two weapons. Skadi picks a fighting staff and a short blade, and lines up with the others. Soon the first round begins.
If her father or any of her immediate family were present in the audience, her charade would surely be over before it began. But Loki is bored by watching others fight, and his sons are likewise, and his wife would not come without him. And because the contestants are young it is no grand spectacle to which the entire royal family is obligated to attend. They speak King Thor’s name in hail at the opening, and he’s not even here.
But his father is.
Sitting in the central seat among the judges is Odin the All-Father, his hands neatly folded before his lap, his expression schooled in calm solemnity. Still one of the most revered men in the Nine Realms despite having passed on the crown to his eldest.
And when Skadi enters the ring for her first match, she feels a prickle of nerves as Odin’s gaze passes across her. Will he recognize his granddaughter? Surely he’s one of the few gifted enough to peer beneath her disguise. And the mask itself is usually hung as decoration in Loki’s private quarters. Odin may know it.
But Odin says nothing. Though, as Skadi stands at the end of the match triumphant, his one eye sparkles, and briefly he seems to smile.
Now that he’s retired from kingship the All-Father’s favorite pastime is to be a doting and indulgent grandfather. But as much as he loves all his grandchildren, it’s whispered that there’s one he especially treasures.
And it’s not the oldest grandson, nor the youngest. And it’s not the polite, intelligent middle son, nor the pretty and charming second daughter, either.
Though Skadi needs no favoritism to get her way through the next few rounds. She earns it, by winning and soundly defeating her opponents. She is pleased with herself, and proud, her excitement growing with each passing second. Won’t the look on her parents’ faces be grand, when they see that she’s won the tournament?
The sun is high in the sky as they crawl on into the late hours of afternoon. The fifth round begins, and by now things are getting different. The weaker fighters have been fully weeded out now and Skadi is definitely the smallest combatant left. Her parents weren’t entirely wrong, after all - she’s much younger than most who would compete in a tourney.
The draw pits her against a hulking youth three times her size in heavy shoulder-pads. As the two of them step down to face each other Skadi finally feels uncertainty and apprehension dawning.
The match is scarcely begun before Skadi realizes she’s in trouble. She’s skilled, yes, and fast, and with a zeal for battle. But this boy has had much more training than her, and his strength is too great for her to make up against.
She knows long before it’s over she’s already lost. The least she can do is go down fighting and make it a good battle.
She gets in a few commendable shots. An attempt to trip up her opponent goes awry however and the boy regains his ground. Before long Skadi is trapped solely on the defense, dodging one blow after another.
With a lucky strike he twists her staff from her hands, splintering it in two. Bringing his heavy axe overhead he bears down on her, too fast for her to draw her blade.
Stepping backward quickly Skadi’s hands are up in front of her, shielding. Her mind races. In the space between heartbeats she decides to defend herself with ice - from both palms emerge a solid blast of silver crystal, encasing the axe and attempting to freeze it in place.
Skadi practices on and off with her strange power. Though she was never really sure where her affinity for cold came from, she had the feeling it might come in handy.
She will be thrown out of the tournament, of course. Using magic is against the rules. But she was about to be disqualified anyway, by defeat, and at least this way she comes off uninjured. Her family will be furious enough at her for the disobedience and deception without her having gotten herself hurt in the process.
With a crackling sound the ice coats itself over the blade, handle, and gloved hands of the now-bewildered young man wielding it. Some of the momentum still carries and Skadi is knocked flat on her back, winded. But other than that the weapon is now harmless.
The stands are dead silent. Lying on the ground, Skadi props herself up by her elbows, beneath her mask grinning.
And then the cry starts.
“Jotun!” voices roar from the audience, louder and louder, frenzied and deafening. “Frost Giant! Monster!”
These words stand out among a hundred other senseless yells, a flurry of movement as the spectators are suddenly full of mass anger and panic.
The other fighter drops his axe with a yelp and backs away as hurriedly as he can.
Skadi stares at it all, astonished. What is everyone yelling about? What is happening?
The All-Father leaps to his feet, one arm outstretched, his face twisted and eye wide with alarm. “Wait!” he shouts.
But it’s too late. The crowd is already rushing the field.
They bear down on the lone figure left in the ring before she can think to run or defend herself. Violently she is hauled to her feet, her mask torn off, and then Skadi is discovered.
*
Luckily the shock over finding what face lurks beneath the mask calms the crowd to stop them from tearing her to pieces. The All-Father is able to restore enough order to have her handed over to the guards, who take her not to a dungeon cell but a small and empty room in the palace where she’s locked in.
She’s given the impression that this is done as much if not more so for her own protection.
But protection from what? What is the reasoning behind this chaos that has suddenly gripped everyone? She doesn’t at all understand what’s going on.
She knows, vaguely, mostly from her lessons on history, that once the Asgardians and the Frost Giants were hated enemies. That once there was a war.
But that was so long ago - hardly ever anyone even talks about the Frost Giants anymore. Skadi has never seen one; she doesn’t think anyone left on Asgard has, not for a very long time. She remembers once that Uncle Volstagg said they had fought a few, in that little-spoken-of time before Skadi and her siblings were born, and he was all prepared to tell them the tale - but Uncle Thor had suddenly turned grim and awkward, and made him stop.
Skadi asked her parents about it, later, and her mother had given her father such a pointed look. But Father turned away, and his response was snappish, and he quickly changed the subject.
Skadi remembers because later that evening her parents quarreled. She knows they did, even though it wasn’t in front of her, because that night they slept in separate bedchambers, something they almost never do.
But then, though she hates to hear it, and argues when she does, Skadi is a child. She doesn’t know that she has been sheltered.
Mom puts them to bed reading out of books she brings from Midgard, of ‘fairy tales’, and full of spirited young heroines. Their aunts and uncles tell hearty battle stories and funny jokes of past exploits. And Father weaves such wondrous tales, of magic and secrets from all across the universe.
They don’t know that when he was their age, their father and his brother, and every child of their generation, was told stories of the dreaded and evil and ugly Frost Giants.
Finally after many hours Skadi is let out of the room she was locked up in and taken to another, larger chamber. There her near entire family is waiting - her father, her mother, Uncle Thor and Aunt Jane, Grandmother and Grandfather. Even her older brothers are there.
Wyclef and Austen look as confused as Skadi feels. Everyone else though looks worried, and ashen.
“Oh, god, Skadi…” Mom rushes to her, and holds her tight, and then begins obviously looking her over for signs of injury. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine, Mom, but-” Skadi pushes at her, breaking her grasp. “What’s going on? Why is everyone so…?”
She trails off at the looks the adults exchange. And then the king comes forward.
“Is it true?” Uncle Thor asks, somber. “Is it true what they’re saying happened in the ring?”
“I saw it myself,” Grandfather replies softly. “Skadi summoned winter’s touch to her, made ice form from nothing in her hand.”
Grandmother presses a hand over her mouth. Aunt Jane hugs herself at the middle and frowns tight. And Father…Father looks like he’s going to be sick.
Skadi can feel her cheeks grow hot from embarrassment and shame, even though she isn’t at all sure what she did wrong.
“I-I’m sorry,” she stammers. “I know I shouldn’t have used magic in the ring, and I didn’t want to, but I didn’t have a choice. And I’m sorry that I never told you I could, but I-”
“Wait.” Father holds up a hand, looking ever more shocked and stricken. “You have always been able to do this? It’s nothing new?”
Skadi gazes at him naively. “Yes?”
“We’ve seen her do it before,” Austen chimes in. “Skadi is immune to cold, and can freeze things with her fingertips, and sometimes even her breath.”
“It’s been like that ever since she was small,” Wyclef confirms.
Father is thunderstruck as he stares at him both. “You have all three known about this, for years now, and it occurred to none of you to say something?” His voice rises as he makes his demand. The brothers shrink back, slightly, and then exchange a furtive look of frowns.
“We never knew it was important.”
“I still don’t know why it is,” Skadi interjects. “Why is everybody talking about this? Why does it even matter?”
She expects Father to answer. She is surprised when he falls silent, his lips pressed tightly together.
“It matters because…” Grandmother steals a look at her second child, taking a step forward. “Because the ability to control ice in such a way, and so innately, is known to be native to only one species. What you can do, Skadi - in the eyes of the people of Asgard, it’s very…significant.”
She waits for further explanation but none seems to be coming. Skadi’s brow furrows as she looks around at one person to the next.
“I don’t understand,” she insists, with a rising wariness. “What’s going on?”
“One of you, tell her,” Aunt Jane snaps, breaking the silence the elder members of their family seem to be locked into. Her head turns, expression close to anger. “Someone needs to tell her, right now!”
“Tell me what?”
Mom gulps, eyes blinking heavily, and reaches for her daughter again. “Skadi-” But to her surprise she’s cut off.
“What this means, daughter, is that your heritage is even more mixed than you already knew.” Father moves in as he speaks intently, his hands going to rest on Skadi’s shoulders. He bends down, slightly, so that he is closer to meeting her eye.
“There is a secret that this family has been hiding for more than a generation.”
His voice is quiet, earnest, each note ringing heavy with emotion. There can be no doubt he speaks what is solemn truth.
“That secret is that…I was not born of Asgard. I am a Jotun. I have giant’s blood,” he reveals. “And that means, daughter, that so do you.”
Skadi stares at him for a moment, overcome, and then she pulls free of his grasp.
“What? No!” she exclaims. “How can this be? You raised me to know myself to be a daughter of Asgard! To be proud of what I was!”
But can she be proud of her lineage if it’s a false one? How can she stand with her head held high, and know herself a warrior, if not a drop of real blood from her homeland runs through her veins?
How can she even be sure who she is anymore? Or what?
Skadi looks down at her own hands as if trying to identify some flaw in them, some telltale giveaway in their color or shape.
“Skadi,” her father breathes, all sympathy, as he puts a hand out for her again.
But she turns from his reach, and whirls on him, her face alighting with fury.
“Don’t! Don’t touch me,” she orders him. Pulling back further she stares into his face as her eyes narrow, her head starting to shake. “How dare you. You…you lied to me,” she seethes, the realization of so much betrayal making her voice come heated and thick.
And Loki goes completely still where he is, one hand part way outstretched. The color drains from his skin as his face fills slowly with something indescribable.
Something that seems very much akin to horror.
But Skadi barely realizes, and doesn’t care, as she continues her tirade.
“All this time, how could you do it? How could you mislead me so? How could you do this to me? I hate you,” she finishes in a scream.
“Skadi,” her father manages, “Skadi, no-”
But the words come again, louder, unrelenting:
“I hate you!”
Her father stumbles backward, numbly, expression broken. His legs seem to give way under him weakly. Both his brother and wife catch onto him so he doesn’t fall to the floor.
But Skadi has already turned her back on him. She runs, out the door, heedless to any arms or beseeching voices that try to stop her. She runs fast as her feet can carry her and keeps running.
Running to get as far away from her father as she possibly can.
LINK TO SECOND CHAPTER
Characters: Loki, Darcy, Odin, Thor, Jane, Frigga, Sif, Warriors Three, original characters
Pairings: Loki/Darcy, Thor/Jane, mention of others
Rating: PG-13 for family drama, violence, angst, depression, dramatic irony, teenage hormones
Length: 4,970 words
Summary: This is the story of Princess Skadi of Asgard, sometimes called Skadi Lewis, or by many other names, but always, always known as Loki's daughter.
Notes: Part of an ongoing series. Originally posted on AO3 in March.
Part 1: Frost
“Skaði, the daughter of the giant, donned her helmet, and mail, and all her war-gear, and betook herself to Asgard”
- Skáldskaparmál, the Prose Edda
The third child born to Asgard’s royal house is a girl, the first daughter of her generation. Though her cheeks are rosy and her eyes bright and lively, her skin is bone-white pale, and her hair grows in black and shining.
‘Another spawn of Loki,’ the courtiers mutter, disappointed that the king and his beautiful, if mortal, queen continue to drag their feet on producing heirs, while the king’s younger brother is well on his way to having a regular brood.
The silver-tongued prince is enough trouble all his own. He needs no army of miniature versions of himself to add to his mischievous legacy.
But the princess is clearly of her father’s issue, were there ever any doubt. She has Loki’s hair, his flashing green eyes, his fine bones in the lines of her face. Her body grows into a shape like his; tall and long-limbed, with thin but sturdy muscle underneath.
And there is something about his grin, and his laugh, in the look of her smile. Merry and sharp, like the edge of a dancing knife.
She was supposed to be born in the winter - fitting, for a pale-skinned shadow-haired child. But apparently no one told her, or if they did she failed to listen, for she came nearly a full month early, as autumn leaves were only just becoming kissed by the first brace of frost.
‘In a hurry,’ her father says; ‘In a hurry to join her brothers. Always in a hurry.’
It’s true enough assessment when it comes to the princess. She scoots from nursemaids’ laps as soon as she is able to wriggle, flees the confines of the nursery as soon as she is able to run. On often bare feet she tears through the palace gardens, chasing after her two brothers or a dog or cat or sometimes nothing but the wind. Her hairs dries into bouncing unruly waves and her hands are always dirty from digging in the ground, her knees always bruised from climbing trees.
She is a wild child, and people cluck their tongues and say she is exactly what they pictured would eventually resolve, from the meeting in the middle of the strong wills of both her parents.
She is obtrusive like her mother, and confident like her father. And stubborn like them both. She refuses to learn the meaning of the word ‘no’. And whenever anybody tries to tell her ‘No you can’t’, her response is always ‘Oh yes I can’.
She is named Skadi, and her proper title by birth is Lokisdottir. But hardly anyone ever calls her that.
Strangers look out at the palace grounds and see this thick-maned sun-bitten boney little hellion, cheering and shouting as she fiercely swings a wooden dummy weapon, or laughing as she rolls in the grass.
“Who is that?” they ask. And the response is always the same.
“That is Skadi. Loki’s child.”
And so she is known by all. She is Skadi Lokischild.
*
When she is young all her memories are happy ones. Her childhood passes in a state of pure bliss.
Not surprising; Skadi is a princess and wants for nothing. Least of all the attentions of an adoring family.
Under the warmth of Asgard’s golden sun she and her brothers, and eventually a sister, pass the days playing games, racing up and down the rolling hills and meadows. When he is free their father is often there as well, and some of Skadi’s best memories have a long tall shadow standing next to hers, a strong hand she can reach for to squeeze hers whenever she wants it.
In the lazy heat of the afternoon the children grow more tired than they are willing to admit, and in a patch of thick cool grass or beneath the shade of a tree their father lies down and the little ones gather around him.
With her head pillowed on his body or tucked beneath one of his arms, Skadi closes her eyes and listens to the sound of his voice. He tells them stories, or talks about things to do with magic that only his sons understand, but listen they all do regardless.
The smell and feel of her father, the tenor of his spoken words wrap her in comfort and familiarity, and Skadi never feels safer.
All good things, however, must come to an end. And their endless days with Father having not a care but to dote on them collapse in the form of another sibling’s arrival. For a time, Loki can no longer run with them like he used to.
The princes are angry because it means he no longer can devote himself to their lessons. Who will they learn their sorcery from if not him?
“It’s not fair,” Wyclef complains, even though he should know better, being the eldest. Austen just stands there and backs him up silently with a look of hearty youthful disappointment.
“I’m sorry,” their father says softly, sighing. The small area of skin just beneath his eyelids is turning gray.
He looks down at his rounded belly and frowns, rubbing it. “Today I’m just too tired. Maybe tomorrow.”
Wyclef makes a petulant, wordless sound. He spins and tugs his brother’s sleeve, dragging his compatriot along with a muttered, “Come on, Austen”. The younger prince only spares one glance back for their father.
Skadi however stays right where she is, hands clutched absently behind her back, and bounces on her heels restlessly.
“Are we getting a baby sister?” Fandra asks in a chirping eager voice. Skadi knows she only wants one because she thinks it means she can dress her up like a doll.
“No, I don’t think so.” Father runs a hand across his stomach again, this time with a smile. “Actually I’m fairly certain this one is a boy.”
Fandra’s nose screws up in disappointment. “Yuck!” she declares, and then she too flounces off in search of less unsatisfactory fare. Skadi and her father are left alone.
Skadi comes closer after a moment, gaze fixated on her father’s swollen belly. Her parents take turns, so it was her mother that was pregnant with Fandra.
“Here,” Father gently takes her hand in his, and guides it to his side, “would you like to feel? He might move for you.”
Move her unborn baby brother does, if only just a little. Skadi hangs there silently, nose practically pressed into her father’s stomach beside both her hands in all her curiosity.
“You grew the same way,” he reminds her quietly. With an affectionate hand he briefly touches her cheek. “In the same place.” Skadi nods, knowing.
It will be years before she’s old enough to realize this is strange. That she is an anomaly because she was sired by her mother and birthed by her father.
But there is much about Skadi’s life, about all her brothers and sister’s lives, that none of them think to question. They are oblivious to the idea that their world is anything but normal, growing up with nothing to compare to; surrounded by each other and protective family, uncaring as to the opinions of outsiders.
In the easygoing way of children Skadi believes that things are the way they are because they are just so. They don’t warrant any kind of comment.
Of course Wyclef has magic, and Austen does too. After all so does Father. Isn’t that the way it works?
Much of her early days when she’s old enough to slip out of adults’ sight is spent following behind her brothers. They pull their pranks and have their little things they call ‘adventures’, and for the most part they do not mind that Skadi is there. After all she’s nearly as good as another boy: she’s as strong as they are, and before long she might be able to out-wrestle both of them. Both her brothers are thinkers, and so not as inclined to feats of strength.
It is a cold day when the three of them are playing outside, and the world is thick with the gray and white of snow. They cross the courtyard nearly huddled together, one minute jeering and laughing, and occasionally pelting each other with slush.
The next minute however Austen, who has been carefully watching his sister’s face, stops, his eyes going wide.
“Skadi, what are you doing?” he asks her accusingly. “How are you pulling that trick?”
She makes a face at him, equal parts confusion and exasperation. People call her and Austen “twins” and though they aren’t really - they’re not quite five months apart - they have that sort of relationship.
“What are you talking about?” she demands.
Wyclef has stopped walking and gazes steely-eyed at them both.
Austen points. “That! Do that again,” he commands. “Breathe out.”
Still mystified, Skadi nonetheless dutifully does so, her breath released in a slow puff of air. At last she sees what her brother means.
Where he and their older brother create a small cloud of steam with every exhale, Skadi’s is perfectly invisible. She’s never noticed this before.
“You’re hiding your breath,” Wyclef notes, sounding a bit jealous. “How are you doing that? When did you learn it?”
“And here I thought you couldn’t even do magic,” Austen adds.
“I can’t. At least, I always thought so. I can’t do anything else,” Skadi protests. “I don’t even know what I’m doing now.”
Her brothers look at her inquisitively, thoughtful. Austen raises a hand near in front of her mouth and shivers when next she breathes out.
“It’s not even warm,” he remarks.
Wyclef has a hand on his chin, stroking it as he studies her. He takes in the lighter cloak she has on compared to them, her lack of gloves or anything on her head.
“You aren’t even cold right now,” he gathers at length, slow, “are you?”
Skadi shakes her head. Flakes of freshly falling snow cling to her hair and flick down against her cheeks and neck, not bothering her in the least. “No.”
They have always been a little bit cooler, to the touch, than their mother or just about anyone else. In their unthinking way it was assumed they got it from Father, who often has colder skin himself.
But Skadi is the coldest of them all.
In the end the three mutually shrug it off and decide it must just be another of the many pieces of the abilities present in their family. Perhaps it is some inherent magical skill Skadi has that she doesn’t know how to use properly.
By the end of the day her brothers have all but forgotten it. Skadi herself means to ask, but first there is mischief and then there is chastisement, and at dinner their uncle the king regales them with the exciting story of his latest grand adventure, and after dinner Mom sneaks them extra cookies and hot chocolate with a loving, conspiratorial smile.
Before long Skadi is being bundled into her nightgown and then off to bed, her hair brushed and her face washed, yawning. She doesn’t think to ask any questions, and she never bothers to wonder about it again.
After all, it can’t hardly be anything important.
*
The most sour-faced, most boldly slanderous of the subjects on Asgard comment that Loki cannot, it seems, ever do anything right, ever do anything properly.
Yes, he married - enough of a shock in itself, really. To a mortal woman, true, but so was his brother’s wife, and so little fault could be found in that. He went further in his duty by producing heirs, though the way he went about it was all irregular. Carrying more than half of them himself, and having so unseemly many, and having not the courtesy to wait for his elder brother to have so much as a son first.
And as for Loki’s sons - they are not proper princes worthy of the legacy of Asgard. They are like their father; students of magic, relying on cunning and sly trickery over strength. They aren’t warriors.
The eldest abandoned even the pretense of trying to learn. Years ago he eschewed lessons in combat completely in favor of fully devoting his time to becoming a master sorcerer. The second still attends such lessons dutifully, but he’s of a mild disposition bordering almost on timidity. A fighter he may yet be, but he will never be a bold soldier, and certainly no general.
And then along comes Loki’s daughter. A princess. And she, it soon becomes apparent, is not to perform to the duty that’s expected of her either.
From an early age she snatches up knives and sticks, and eagerly throws herself into doing what her brothers do not.
Girls are still a rare sight on the training grounds, but with the Lady Sif as lead instructor none who seek a place there are turned away. Skadi is young, but determined, and she grows much faster than the full-blooded Asgardian students. Quickly she moves her way up the ranks, from being someone who is merely learning how to fight to someone who excels at it.
She is swift, sure of foot and hard to catch. And when she lands a blow she strikes true and hard. Her favored weapon is the spear-staff compound, not unlike her grandfather’s Gungnir.
And when she fights, her eyes turn bright and alive, a fierce laugh sometimes bubbling up from her throat.
The judging, curious eyes watch Skadi Lokischild as she barrels and beats her opponents bodily into the ground, black curls waving freely and white teeth shining, and clearly enjoying every minute of it.
With begrudging and some grumbling, they are forced to concede. Like the rest of her family Skadi may not be what is proper, but at least, at long last, here is someone to live up to being worthy of the royal legacy.
She will be - she is - a warrior of Asgard.
But for now, she is still young. And so no, not a real warrior yet. Much to her regular, almost daily frustration.
In Skadi’s fourteenth year there is a tournament held, a series of open matches in single combat, performed for the amusement of the nobles and honor in the eyes of their king. There is a small purse to be won, but like most such things on Asgard it’s done really for the glory.
And Skadi is not allowed to compete.
“Next time, hon,” her mother promises, brushing her hair and giving a quick kiss. But Skadi is still far too young, it’s explained; she hasn’t learned enough to be on level footing with the recruits that will be coming from all over Asgard.
But though she’s still young and small Skadi thinks she has learned more about fighting than anyone gives her credit for. She thinks her parents are too overprotective, scared that she’ll get hurt.
Anyone who loves fighting near as much as Skadi knows no fear of pain. And has plenty of brashness in spirit, besides.
So she sneaks off and finds a way to enter herself anyway - under a false name.
The day of the tournament she shows up wearing a dark gray fighting uniform that covers her from neck to bootstraps. Her hair is worked into a tight plait. Her face - and this, she thinks, is cleverest for her of all - is hidden behind a battle mask. It covers everything, not revealing a feature.
The other contestants eye her oddly, but there’s nothing in the rules prohibiting it. Skadi has not really been hit by the changes of her age yet: her body is thin, more straight than curved, and if she pitches her voice low and husky she sounds, if not entirely like a boy, indeterminate enough she could be imagined as either male or female.
She’s allowed two weapons. Skadi picks a fighting staff and a short blade, and lines up with the others. Soon the first round begins.
If her father or any of her immediate family were present in the audience, her charade would surely be over before it began. But Loki is bored by watching others fight, and his sons are likewise, and his wife would not come without him. And because the contestants are young it is no grand spectacle to which the entire royal family is obligated to attend. They speak King Thor’s name in hail at the opening, and he’s not even here.
But his father is.
Sitting in the central seat among the judges is Odin the All-Father, his hands neatly folded before his lap, his expression schooled in calm solemnity. Still one of the most revered men in the Nine Realms despite having passed on the crown to his eldest.
And when Skadi enters the ring for her first match, she feels a prickle of nerves as Odin’s gaze passes across her. Will he recognize his granddaughter? Surely he’s one of the few gifted enough to peer beneath her disguise. And the mask itself is usually hung as decoration in Loki’s private quarters. Odin may know it.
But Odin says nothing. Though, as Skadi stands at the end of the match triumphant, his one eye sparkles, and briefly he seems to smile.
Now that he’s retired from kingship the All-Father’s favorite pastime is to be a doting and indulgent grandfather. But as much as he loves all his grandchildren, it’s whispered that there’s one he especially treasures.
And it’s not the oldest grandson, nor the youngest. And it’s not the polite, intelligent middle son, nor the pretty and charming second daughter, either.
Though Skadi needs no favoritism to get her way through the next few rounds. She earns it, by winning and soundly defeating her opponents. She is pleased with herself, and proud, her excitement growing with each passing second. Won’t the look on her parents’ faces be grand, when they see that she’s won the tournament?
The sun is high in the sky as they crawl on into the late hours of afternoon. The fifth round begins, and by now things are getting different. The weaker fighters have been fully weeded out now and Skadi is definitely the smallest combatant left. Her parents weren’t entirely wrong, after all - she’s much younger than most who would compete in a tourney.
The draw pits her against a hulking youth three times her size in heavy shoulder-pads. As the two of them step down to face each other Skadi finally feels uncertainty and apprehension dawning.
The match is scarcely begun before Skadi realizes she’s in trouble. She’s skilled, yes, and fast, and with a zeal for battle. But this boy has had much more training than her, and his strength is too great for her to make up against.
She knows long before it’s over she’s already lost. The least she can do is go down fighting and make it a good battle.
She gets in a few commendable shots. An attempt to trip up her opponent goes awry however and the boy regains his ground. Before long Skadi is trapped solely on the defense, dodging one blow after another.
With a lucky strike he twists her staff from her hands, splintering it in two. Bringing his heavy axe overhead he bears down on her, too fast for her to draw her blade.
Stepping backward quickly Skadi’s hands are up in front of her, shielding. Her mind races. In the space between heartbeats she decides to defend herself with ice - from both palms emerge a solid blast of silver crystal, encasing the axe and attempting to freeze it in place.
Skadi practices on and off with her strange power. Though she was never really sure where her affinity for cold came from, she had the feeling it might come in handy.
She will be thrown out of the tournament, of course. Using magic is against the rules. But she was about to be disqualified anyway, by defeat, and at least this way she comes off uninjured. Her family will be furious enough at her for the disobedience and deception without her having gotten herself hurt in the process.
With a crackling sound the ice coats itself over the blade, handle, and gloved hands of the now-bewildered young man wielding it. Some of the momentum still carries and Skadi is knocked flat on her back, winded. But other than that the weapon is now harmless.
The stands are dead silent. Lying on the ground, Skadi props herself up by her elbows, beneath her mask grinning.
And then the cry starts.
“Jotun!” voices roar from the audience, louder and louder, frenzied and deafening. “Frost Giant! Monster!”
These words stand out among a hundred other senseless yells, a flurry of movement as the spectators are suddenly full of mass anger and panic.
The other fighter drops his axe with a yelp and backs away as hurriedly as he can.
Skadi stares at it all, astonished. What is everyone yelling about? What is happening?
The All-Father leaps to his feet, one arm outstretched, his face twisted and eye wide with alarm. “Wait!” he shouts.
But it’s too late. The crowd is already rushing the field.
They bear down on the lone figure left in the ring before she can think to run or defend herself. Violently she is hauled to her feet, her mask torn off, and then Skadi is discovered.
*
Luckily the shock over finding what face lurks beneath the mask calms the crowd to stop them from tearing her to pieces. The All-Father is able to restore enough order to have her handed over to the guards, who take her not to a dungeon cell but a small and empty room in the palace where she’s locked in.
She’s given the impression that this is done as much if not more so for her own protection.
But protection from what? What is the reasoning behind this chaos that has suddenly gripped everyone? She doesn’t at all understand what’s going on.
She knows, vaguely, mostly from her lessons on history, that once the Asgardians and the Frost Giants were hated enemies. That once there was a war.
But that was so long ago - hardly ever anyone even talks about the Frost Giants anymore. Skadi has never seen one; she doesn’t think anyone left on Asgard has, not for a very long time. She remembers once that Uncle Volstagg said they had fought a few, in that little-spoken-of time before Skadi and her siblings were born, and he was all prepared to tell them the tale - but Uncle Thor had suddenly turned grim and awkward, and made him stop.
Skadi asked her parents about it, later, and her mother had given her father such a pointed look. But Father turned away, and his response was snappish, and he quickly changed the subject.
Skadi remembers because later that evening her parents quarreled. She knows they did, even though it wasn’t in front of her, because that night they slept in separate bedchambers, something they almost never do.
But then, though she hates to hear it, and argues when she does, Skadi is a child. She doesn’t know that she has been sheltered.
Mom puts them to bed reading out of books she brings from Midgard, of ‘fairy tales’, and full of spirited young heroines. Their aunts and uncles tell hearty battle stories and funny jokes of past exploits. And Father weaves such wondrous tales, of magic and secrets from all across the universe.
They don’t know that when he was their age, their father and his brother, and every child of their generation, was told stories of the dreaded and evil and ugly Frost Giants.
Finally after many hours Skadi is let out of the room she was locked up in and taken to another, larger chamber. There her near entire family is waiting - her father, her mother, Uncle Thor and Aunt Jane, Grandmother and Grandfather. Even her older brothers are there.
Wyclef and Austen look as confused as Skadi feels. Everyone else though looks worried, and ashen.
“Oh, god, Skadi…” Mom rushes to her, and holds her tight, and then begins obviously looking her over for signs of injury. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine, Mom, but-” Skadi pushes at her, breaking her grasp. “What’s going on? Why is everyone so…?”
She trails off at the looks the adults exchange. And then the king comes forward.
“Is it true?” Uncle Thor asks, somber. “Is it true what they’re saying happened in the ring?”
“I saw it myself,” Grandfather replies softly. “Skadi summoned winter’s touch to her, made ice form from nothing in her hand.”
Grandmother presses a hand over her mouth. Aunt Jane hugs herself at the middle and frowns tight. And Father…Father looks like he’s going to be sick.
Skadi can feel her cheeks grow hot from embarrassment and shame, even though she isn’t at all sure what she did wrong.
“I-I’m sorry,” she stammers. “I know I shouldn’t have used magic in the ring, and I didn’t want to, but I didn’t have a choice. And I’m sorry that I never told you I could, but I-”
“Wait.” Father holds up a hand, looking ever more shocked and stricken. “You have always been able to do this? It’s nothing new?”
Skadi gazes at him naively. “Yes?”
“We’ve seen her do it before,” Austen chimes in. “Skadi is immune to cold, and can freeze things with her fingertips, and sometimes even her breath.”
“It’s been like that ever since she was small,” Wyclef confirms.
Father is thunderstruck as he stares at him both. “You have all three known about this, for years now, and it occurred to none of you to say something?” His voice rises as he makes his demand. The brothers shrink back, slightly, and then exchange a furtive look of frowns.
“We never knew it was important.”
“I still don’t know why it is,” Skadi interjects. “Why is everybody talking about this? Why does it even matter?”
She expects Father to answer. She is surprised when he falls silent, his lips pressed tightly together.
“It matters because…” Grandmother steals a look at her second child, taking a step forward. “Because the ability to control ice in such a way, and so innately, is known to be native to only one species. What you can do, Skadi - in the eyes of the people of Asgard, it’s very…significant.”
She waits for further explanation but none seems to be coming. Skadi’s brow furrows as she looks around at one person to the next.
“I don’t understand,” she insists, with a rising wariness. “What’s going on?”
“One of you, tell her,” Aunt Jane snaps, breaking the silence the elder members of their family seem to be locked into. Her head turns, expression close to anger. “Someone needs to tell her, right now!”
“Tell me what?”
Mom gulps, eyes blinking heavily, and reaches for her daughter again. “Skadi-” But to her surprise she’s cut off.
“What this means, daughter, is that your heritage is even more mixed than you already knew.” Father moves in as he speaks intently, his hands going to rest on Skadi’s shoulders. He bends down, slightly, so that he is closer to meeting her eye.
“There is a secret that this family has been hiding for more than a generation.”
His voice is quiet, earnest, each note ringing heavy with emotion. There can be no doubt he speaks what is solemn truth.
“That secret is that…I was not born of Asgard. I am a Jotun. I have giant’s blood,” he reveals. “And that means, daughter, that so do you.”
Skadi stares at him for a moment, overcome, and then she pulls free of his grasp.
“What? No!” she exclaims. “How can this be? You raised me to know myself to be a daughter of Asgard! To be proud of what I was!”
But can she be proud of her lineage if it’s a false one? How can she stand with her head held high, and know herself a warrior, if not a drop of real blood from her homeland runs through her veins?
How can she even be sure who she is anymore? Or what?
Skadi looks down at her own hands as if trying to identify some flaw in them, some telltale giveaway in their color or shape.
“Skadi,” her father breathes, all sympathy, as he puts a hand out for her again.
But she turns from his reach, and whirls on him, her face alighting with fury.
“Don’t! Don’t touch me,” she orders him. Pulling back further she stares into his face as her eyes narrow, her head starting to shake. “How dare you. You…you lied to me,” she seethes, the realization of so much betrayal making her voice come heated and thick.
And Loki goes completely still where he is, one hand part way outstretched. The color drains from his skin as his face fills slowly with something indescribable.
Something that seems very much akin to horror.
But Skadi barely realizes, and doesn’t care, as she continues her tirade.
“All this time, how could you do it? How could you mislead me so? How could you do this to me? I hate you,” she finishes in a scream.
“Skadi,” her father manages, “Skadi, no-”
But the words come again, louder, unrelenting:
“I hate you!”
Her father stumbles backward, numbly, expression broken. His legs seem to give way under him weakly. Both his brother and wife catch onto him so he doesn’t fall to the floor.
But Skadi has already turned her back on him. She runs, out the door, heedless to any arms or beseeching voices that try to stop her. She runs fast as her feet can carry her and keeps running.
Running to get as far away from her father as she possibly can.
LINK TO SECOND CHAPTER