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Prison Break

The Jotnar rescue their princess.

By Marie SinadjanPublished about a year ago Updated about a year ago 10 min read
3
Prison Break
Photo by Ralph Mayhew on Unsplash

This flash piece is a rough draft of a scene from the prequel novel of The Prophecies of Ragnarok, a Norse mythology based new adult series I'm currently writing with Meri Benson. It may or may not end up in the final version of the novel. This was also written in response to 8Letters' #31Letters challenge, an invitation to write every day for the whole month of January.

Here are the shorts we've written so far for the prequel, in chronological order:

Hotel Fen, the first published book of the series, follows after this point.

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In Norse mythology, Hel is said to preside over an underworld realm where she receives a portion of the dead. She is referred to as a daughter of Loki, and is described as having been appointed by the god Odin as ruler of a realm of the same name, located in Niflheim. Her appearance is described as half blue and half flesh-colored, and further as having a gloomy, downcast appearance.

Hodr is the blind son of Odin and Frigg, who is tricked and guided by Loki into shooting a mistletoe arrow which was to slay the otherwise invulnerable Baldr, his twin brother.

(Wikipedia)

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Valhalla's nightly feasts continued as usual, but the rumors of a Jotnar uprising had prompted Odin to heighten Asgard's security. More guards had been posted all throughout the realm, on rotation. Heimdall constantly had a small team of Einherji with him to help man the Bifrost. Curfew had been even imposed on the younger members of the family — including Odin's twin heirs, and Geiravor, Loki's daughter and the Allfather's ward. A directive that both she and Hodr had not taken well, first because at seventeen they weren't children to be corralled anymore, and second, well, because they were in the habit of sneaking out after dinner, when everyone was too drunk to notice where they'd gone.

Geiravor did not understand what the curfew was really intended for. It wasn't to protect her, inasmuch as Odin asserted it was. It was to protect them from her, the heir to the throne of Jotunheim. Her people, sworn enemies of the Aesir, were only waiting for her to come home and claim her rightful place — a homecoming that Odin had managed to prevent under the guise of keeping her in Asgard as his ward.

But what Odin had not been able to nip in the bud were the feelings one of his sons had for her; what had been a harmless companionship between Hodr and Geiravor when they were children had sprung full-grown into teenage passion. They had even already planned to marry, a plan that apparently had only been impeded by the fact that Loki had left Asgard and had yet to return, thus the boy had not been able to properly ask for her hand.

As was their routine every night, Geiravor left the table first. She veered toward the general direction of her bedroom, but doubled back by the time she got to the last hallway to take a different path, one that led her out to the training courtyard. Hodr would usually follow around ten minutes later, inevitably delayed by his mother and twin brother, and a detour through the kitchens to pocket some snacks. Then they would head together to the forest, to their spot by a small river, where a patch of her favorite silver ice-flowers grew. Though sometimes they would simply end up kissing in a corner of the courtyard, hidden in the shadows.

Tonight, however, there was already someone waiting in the shadows, a face Geiravor hadn't seen in many years. Skadi, her cousin, stared quietly out of the darkness with sharp, watchful eyes, before beckoning her closer.

Above them, ravens flew and cawed.

"What are you doing here?" Geiravor hissed, looking equal parts alarmed and confused. A Jotnar in Asgard, at the height of the rumors of a rebellion? Odin would have Skadi's head if she was caught. Skadi was a skilled huntress, but Asgard was a forest littered with many lethal traps, and Odin had his sons and an entire army at his disposal.

But Skadi was unafraid. "I have come to bring you home."

"What?"

"You are a princess of Jotunheim. You are not meant to be in this cage." Skadi's voice was laced with venom and contempt, but her touch was gentle when she finally stepped out of the shadows and took Geiravor's hands in hers. "The time has come for you to take your throne, to claim your birthright."

"But—" Geiravor's head was spinning, as if the ground had been unceremoniously yanked from right under her feet. She hadn't actually believed the rumors. She'd thought Odin had merely overreacted to her father not having returned for quite sometime, despite Loki's track record for disappearing for months at a time for no reason at all. Why would the Jotnar take up arms against the Aesir anyway, after peace had finally been forged by Odin and Loki's blood oath? She'd read the books, heard the stories...

Skadi abruptly released her hands. She looked disgusted. "You have been corrupted. All these years—" She caught herself before her voice grew loud enough to alert any of the guards patrolling nearby, and she just shook her head. "Geiravor, what have they done to you? You can't... you can't possibly believe you're one of them now?"

Wasn't she? Geiravor wanted to tell Skadi that she was, in fact, marrying one of the Aesir princes, but something in her cousin's wounded gaze made her swallow her words and recall the times she'd questioned her place in Odin's court.

"Have you forgotten what they did to Fenris? To Jormungand?" Skadi pressed, stepping even closer to her, and for every step, Geiravor took one back. "You saw Laufey's Palace for yourself. You saw what the Aesir had done."

Of course Geiravor had not forgotten. She'd tended to Fenris after he was beaten by Odin's sons after he shapechanged, for the very first time, into a wolf and accidentally bit off Tyr's hand. She'd watched helplessly as Thor dragged Jormungand out of her room by the hair on Odin's orders, to be punished for a crime she had yet to commit; that was the last time Geiravor ever saw her little sister. And she'd once stood before the headless warriors in her grandfather's palace, their bodies left to be forgotten by time, their souls robbed of their rightful afterlives.

She hadn't forgotten. She'd only shoved those memories into the far recesses of her mind, unable to reconcile them with the benevolence Odin and his family had shown her. She'd wanted for nothing growing up... for the most part.

Skadi grabbed her by the forearm, fingers gripping so tight Geiravor winced. But her cousin did not back down. "He does not love you," Skadi told her in a low, dark voice that made Geiravor shiver. "You are a means to an end. He will never have a crown as long as Baldr lives. But if he marries into the throne somewhere..."

Geiravor wrenched her arm away, shock and hurt blooming on her face from the accusation. "Y-You're lying. Hodr—" Her voice broke when she said his name. "Hodr's not like that."

"Then why didn't he ever stand up to his father for you? If he truly loved you, why did he let your family suffer at his father's hand?"

The girls faced each other in a silent standoff. Geiravor stood almost unmoving, though her eyes glistened with tears, and her lip quivered as her emotions warred with her thoughts. Living in Asgard, as Odin's ward, had been... complicated, to say the least. The Allfather's family had been largely inconsistent; warm and welcoming in one moment, disdainful and cruel in the next. Deep down, Geiravor knew she never really belonged. Did it matter, then, whether or not Hodr loved her?

"Geiravor?"

As though she'd summoned him with her thoughts, Hodr emerged from a doorway behind her — though he immediately noticed that she wasn't alone, and she could hear the crunch of his footfalls against ice as he hurried across the courtyard to join her. He was agitated, frost forming wherever he stepped.

Skadi swore under her breath, but instead of grabbing Geiravor once more, she sank to her knees and stared up at her cousin. "My queen," she implored, holding out her hands and desperately hoping Geiravor would take them. "We need you. The Houses refuse to stand behind your father. They believe him tainted by the Aesir. But you..." Skadi's indomitable countenance faltered. "We have suffered for far too long. Together, with you on the throne, the Jotnar can be free once more."

"Geiravor?" Hodr called out again. He was still too far away to hear or see anything clearly; the training courtyard was massive. He started to run.

"If he loves you," Skadi whispered, "he will deny his father, his name, and follow you."

The warning bell on Heimdall's lookout by the Bifrost rang then, blaring across the realm like a rhythmic hammer blow to one's skull. It had never sounded in all the years Geiravor had been in Asgard. Skadi had been discovered.

Everything in her was still a jumbled mess, but Geiravor took Skadi's hands and helped her up anyway.

Skadi glanced over Geiravor's shoulder and gave the approaching Aesir prince a seething look, as if Hodr had alerted the guards to them. "We have to go. We'll never have this chance again," she insisted, pulling the feather cloak she wore off her and settling it around Geiravor's shoulders without waiting for her cousin's express agreement.

"Geiravor! What's going on?"

Geiravor turned to face Hodr then. Her expression was unreadable, dazed and confused and determined and apologetic all at once. "I... I have to go."

"Go?" He skidded to a halt a few feet away from her, his confusion preventing him from moving any closer. "Go where?"

"My people need me." Geiravor was reeling from how fast everything had happened; it was only Skadi's firm hands on her shoulders that kept her from falling over. Around them, the sounds of the hunt intensified, and Skadi began to steer her away, into the shadows.

Geiravor held her arm out to him. "Come with us. We can fix this, you and I. We can bring peace to your people and mine."

"My queen," Skadi repeated, and this time Hodr was close enough to hear her call Geiravor by her proper title, as well as the fear in her voice. Any longer and they would be captured. Skadi could not allow that to happen. "We have to go."

Geiravor stood her ground, certain that Hodr would take her hand and join them. But when he just stared at her slack-jawed and said, "My father..." before trailing off, she came to the startling realization that Skadi had been right.

If he loves you, he will deny his father, his name, and follow you.

"We have to go!" Skadi cried out as a group of warriors rushed into the courtyard.

Geiravor felt Skadi grab her hand, magic coursing from her cousin's fingers. The feather cloak, touched by the Jotnar huntress' spell, began to come to life. Geiravor had never learned to shapechange, unlike her father and brother and cousins, but the cloak would do it for her. Skadi's escape plan was clear then; they would fly, as great hunting birds, out of Asgard and toward Jotunheim.

That Skadi brought only one cloak meant she'd known Hodr would not join them.

But a spear came hurtling through the darkness and pierced Geiravor's shoulder before her transformation could be completed, sending her flying into one of the courtyard's walls. She screamed in pain, her vision blurring. She tried to move but she'd been pinned to the wall—

"No!" Hodr yelled, a wall of ice erupting from the ground.

It was only when Skadi rushed over to her and yanked the speartip out of her shoulder that Geiravor realized the ice wall stood between them and the rest of the Aesir.

The last thing Geiravor saw before she and Skadi took flight was Hodr gazing mournfully at her through the ice.

Short Story
3

About the Creator

Marie Sinadjan

Filipino spec fic author and book reviewer based in the UK. https://linktr.ee/mariesinadjan • www.mariesinadjan.com

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  • Test3 months ago

    This piece of writing is a masterpiece.

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