Asgard's New Princess

Chapter 17-Terrors

Chapter 17

I screamed; fire exploded around me. "Eren."

Turning, I saw Loki, doubled over. His skin and my fire were the same color, but had been polar opposites.

"Loki!"

I ran to him, but he seemed to be backing away from me two steps for every one of mine. He was dying, and it was my fault. I couldn't quite reach him...if I could get to him, I could help him...

Thanos laughed in the distance and I shot a fireball at him, but that too hit Loki, this time in the neck. I screamed in horror.

Thanos took the shape of my uncle and I ran at him. He shook his finger at me, then silently pointed down, to the floor. At Loki's body, part burned, part pale, and part blue.

"Eren." The voice was soothing. "Eren, wake up. It's just a dream."

Loki was blinking up at me from the floor. I couldn't breathe.

I emerged from my restless sleep to find Loki watching me. Quenching a surprised and disgusted squeal, I backed down the steps. He turned away from me.

"Who-did-did I...?" I gasped. "Loki, was I the one who did that?" His left cheek was blackened and burned, from the bottom of his eye socket and following his jaw to the corner of his mouth. "I'm sorry. I am so so sorry. I didn't mean to...I never meant..." I wasn't eloquent; I couldn't even convey that single thought with the shock and overwhelming revolt I felt toward myself.

"I know you didn't. You were upset."

"Don't justify this! What I did was terrible! Loki...how could you not have told me this earlier, last night, whenever I came down? I could have-could have done something!"

He chuckled and looked back around at me, careful only to show the right side of his face. "Done something? Like what? Call for the healers? Odin? Tell my mother, who doesn't know I've moved from this spot?"

"I can help. I can heal burns, especially those made by my fire."

This surprised him, and he looked around at me, slightly amused. "Have you burned someone before then?"

"My uncle," I admitted shyly. "Not on purpose though! He got in the way!"

He laughed, then grimaced. "Unless you can do it from there I doubt you'll be able to help."

I got as close as I could to the golden wall. "Sit down. I'll try."

"I did not mean now. You're too exhausted to walk, much less do something like this."

"Yeah, and that's going to stop me." He sat down and I smiled. "Wise decision."

The magnetic field that was keeping him in and me out wasn't supposed to handle the heat particles I sent through it, my skin millimeters from the surface, Loki's burn inches away on the other side. Cold fire drifted through it and landed on his face. He flinched, but so had my uncle at the beginning, so I continued.

I didn't feel any more tired now than I had before, I noticed as the blackness slowly gave way to pinkness. I smiled at that.

Starting at his eye socket and moving downward, I watched in amazement as the black seemed to just disappear, and new skin replaced it. My uncle had had a tiny burn on the back of his hand, about the size of my thumbnail, so I hadn't seen this before.

"Done. See, told you I could heal it. Not completely though, it's still raw, so don't like lay on it or scratch it or anything."

He smiled. "Lay down, Eren, in your own bed. You'll sleep better there."

"I'm not leaving."

"You are, or I'll call the guards down to get Thor."

I narrowed my eyes. The last time I had challenged him on something like this, he saw my conversation with Sif. Did I want to challenge him? Obviously. "You wouldn't dare."

"Are you quite sure?" He opened his mouth to yell down, but I beat him to talking.

"Thor would carry me roughly; it would hurt more than it would help," I said quickly.

He laughed and laid down on the floor. "You make a convincing argument, Eren."

"Of course I do. I'm a protégée of Loki the silver-tongue."

"You're the only one to call me that."

"I heard a few maids saying it a few years back. I wonder why, because I don't think it was for the same reason." He grimaced, and I dropped the subject.

"Perhaps they did, but I'm sure many people here have less flattering names for me now."

I smiled. "So show them wrong once you get out."

He scoffed. "Odin would never see me freed. I will reside here until Thor takes the throne, and that could be in a thousand years or more."

A thousand years...I had forgotten how long Asgardians lived. He looked over and noticed my expression. "I certainly won't live that long. I might live for another hundred years or two. As I said, I gave most of my life to Thanos. After what happened a few days ago, I would be surprised to find that I had a hundred years left."

"You went from five thousand years to a hundred in a year. Hardly seems fair." I laid down on the step, heating the stone until it became softer. Loki moved a few feet away. "Sorry. Did I make it hot over there too? I didn't mean to."

"You're just better than you think."

I smiled and looked up at the ceiling, cooling off some. "Perhaps. That or I have less control than I would like to think."

"You have as much control over your powers as I have over mine."

Then a thought hit me. "I guess we've seen that I can't touch you when you're blue."

He chuckled. "You did not touch me. This is where I touched you." He showed me his hand, which was merely pink. "My face you hit with that blue fire. Very effective if you're looking to hurt a Frost Giant, but not very effective on Thanos."

I moved onto my side, keeping the molten rock down where it threatened to cling to my dress. "Is he going to come back?"

"He isn't one to give up."