A Snake and Fox

Prologue-ing

It was just supposed to be a quick nap—a quick break from being cooped up for so long in a tiny furry body, a quick break from having no human tongue to speak among the new people.

But, as your conscious flutters alert, and as you feel a strong grip circling tightly around your wrist, and as you stare wide-eyed into the angry blue eyes of a certain jotun-god, you know you are in trouble.

-~-~-

You are not meant to be here.

You are meant to be in Japan. Specifically, in the Forest of Correction, or "Tadasu no Mori," where the tall, long-living elms and plum trees reign and where an ancient, holy sanctuary stands—a series of bright red fences, gates, and temples, Shinto temples covered by slanted black roofs with accents of bright whites. Every piece of the land is under the authority of a goddess and her son, a god of thunder, whose grandfather guided the Kami clan to this bountiful forest. This land, this Land of the Rising Sun, is where your mother is from.

You are also meant to be in the United States of America. Where, without any proper ceremony, your father sailed back home to with your mother in hand. Those light-haired, light-eyed men were almost too easy, your mother would muse. They would come to our lands with their foreign wealth and foreign ways and not know a single thing to protect themselves against us spirits. This is when your mother would snuggle closer to you with a sigh—he was simply too good not to rob.

And so, as tradition, your mother wed your father, only to run off with a mass of his wealth in tow, into some protected forestry, where she will give birth to you, and then you will live on that foreign soil for years to come, hunting and foraging and stealing, with your only knowledge of Japan spun from the tales your mother would tell, in her wistful lull and somber gaze, and your only knowledge of the American ways experienced from expeditions into human homes. 

Asgard is as foreign as it is grand. The home of your capturer is a floating golden castle that kisses the sky and is filled with sweeping walls and ceilings of vibrantly painted stories and rooms full of artisanal crafted metals, powerfully magicked items, and ancient books and scrolls. Yes, Asgard is foreign. I do not mind that though.

But, now, staring into those angry blue eyes that belong to no one other than that Loki, you want to wince. How much easier it would be if you had let yourself be abducted to Japan instead of letting yourself be abducted to here, in Asgard, in the bed of some Asgardian prince of some foreign rule, in some foreign world.