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Okay. Got new laptop. Unfortunately, haven't managed to salvage the docs I lost with the old yet. Neither have I completely gotten used to this one yet. But ... meh.
Title: Weregild
Rating: PG-13
Fandoms: Supernatural, Norse myth
Characters/Pairings: Yahweh, Hel, Gabriel, Loki. Gabriel/Loki
Summary: He has brought back the sons He lost. All save one. And that one ... may be problematic. That one rests in Hel's Hall, and the goddess does not easily surrender what she has taken
Wordcount: 3525
SPOILERS: For 5x19 and 5x22!!
Disclaimer: Not mine
Warnings: Beware typos, because the I'm not used to this keyboard yet, and the layout on this thing is weird. Also probably blasphemy.
Her name was Hel. Loki's daughter, Ruler of the Halls of the Dead in Niflheim. Her name was Death among her people, though to that first and only Death, she too paid respect in her turn. She sat before Him, midnight-black and corpse-white upon her throne. Her name was Hel, and it was to her His search had brought Him.
He was not the first father who had come to her realm in search of his son. He was the first, though, who had deigned to come in person.
"Lady," He greeted her, with all the respect His children lacked. It pulled a smile from her.
"Lord." She inclined her head. Hel had never failed to offer honour when it was due. She would not begin now. "Welcome to my Halls, First-Father."
He smiled, faintly. "Thank you for seeing me, Hel Lokisdottir. I know you're busy of late ..."
The hint was well-taken, but badly aimed. She wondered why He mentioned it. "Yes," she mused. "For the trouble your sons have caused, I have been well busy. For the attacks they have made on me and mine, for what was mine that they stole ... Indeed. I have been ... busy."
He smiled at her. Gently. Without condescension, which was fortunate. Hel had never taken well to being patronised. "What did they steal?" He asked. He knew already, of course. He knew very well. But He was All-father of His people, and an All-father thrived on misdirection, trickery and slow guidance. Hel knew that very, very well.
"Lucifer Morningstar, who stole Baldur from me. Lucifer Morningstar, who slew my father. You know well what was taken, First-father."
"Ah." He pursed His lips, relaxed, faux-pensive, wandering at His ease to sit in the seat of honour beneath her, staring thoughtfully into space. He who knew everything, seeming to think it over.
Hel resisted the urge to roll her eyes. Men! Honestly.
"Is there a problem?" she asked politely. Pointedly. Her realm may not be suffering the vast upheavals all of His were going through, but she did have things to be doing. Sons and fathers to rejoin and separate, for example. Old grudges to repay, and debts as well. The dramatics, while typical, were not ones she really felt inclined to indulge right now.
"It was Lucifer who stole from you, then?" He asked again, contemplatively. "Lucifer? Not Gabriel?"
She smiled. And now they came to it ... "Gabriel's account with me is ... complicated. Why? Does it interest you?"
"You know it does," He said softly. Impatient in His turn, and not fond of being patronised Himself. Good. "You have taken him. I want to know why."
"Why should I not?" she asked, casually. "He stole my father from one prison, and locked him within another. He bound his will, imprisoned him, and carried him to his death. Some might find that cause for a grudge, don't you think?"
"Except that is not what happened," He reproached quietly. "You must know that. Gabriel, of all my children ... That is not what happened, Hel Lokisdottir. You know it."
She tilted her head, intrigued. "You deny that Gabriel carried my father to his death, to both their deaths, against his brother?"
"No. But I deny that Loki had no say in the matter. I deny that Gabriel imprisoned him." He smiled, very faintly. "I deny that even Gabriel, good though he was, could ever have held your father mute and helpless for centuries, and not suffered for it."
She laughed at that, shaking her head, and stood up, coming down to His level, coming to stand beside Him. "He would have suffered for it," she agreed, smiling sharp and cruel. It was truth, after all. "From the inside out, he would have been devoured, had he tried to force my father where he truly did not want to go." A tilt of her head, a slow smile. "And so? It changes nothing. Why not tell me what you want, First-father. Why not make this negotiation short."
He looked up at her. His human form, the shape He wore, was inoffensive. Shrinking. Almost feeble. But what lay within it ... those eyes had seen without trying what Odin All-father had hung upon the world-tree for nine days to gain. Those eyes had seen all that had passed for His children. That heart had mourned them, too.
"I want my son," He said, very quietly. "My son, who was not yours to take. My son, who died in my Name. My son. I want him back, Hel Lokisdottir." And then, because He truly was wiser than His children, and more respectful, He added ... "Please."
She studied Him. For a long time. Time without meaning, to the other realms, time that flowed only as she willed it, here, but time nonetheless. Time to see. Time to understand.
"You are not the first father who has come to me in search of his son," she noted, carefully. "The most powerful, perhaps, but that means little here. You know full well the success that other father met."
"You are not without mercy," He interrupted softly. "I know that too. Or was Odin's death in that motel an accident? Was his return to the world some days ago a mistake? Or ..." He stood in His turn, looking carefully at her. "Or did All-father make a deal with you, Hel? Did he offer his role in seeing his son returned to you, in exchange, perhaps ... for time with Baldur, here? For a death without cost, to speak to a son long dead? In the Halls of the Dead, where time means what you will it to mean, and a father may know many years with his child in the space of only a few days?" His voice softened, gentled, and there was hope and pity in equal measure in it. "Is that perhaps ... the quality of Hel's mercy?"
She stared back at Him impassively. "Is that what you want, First-father? To spend your time with him here? To visit?"
He met her stare. "I am not Odin All-father. What grudge you might owe me, for my children's crimes ... it is not what you owed him. It is not of that magnitude. Not even close."
"Your children violated my realm," she answered coldly. "Your children stole what was mine. Your children killed my father. Neither Odin nor his children ever managed that, First-father. The grudge I bear you and yours for that ..."
"But not Gabriel," He answered, low and vehement. "Not Gabriel. He harmed none of you. He freed your father from Odin's prison. He released your brothers as a favour to that father, albeit lessened and bound in agreement. He has given you no offense, Hel Lokisdottir! His only crime was to take Loki with him against his brother, and that act cost more than just your father's life. It cost him his own! It ..." He stopped, faltered, as she smiled. Stopped as He recognised her expression.
"Yes," she said. "Gabriel did that. Gabriel Giant-killer. He saved the Son of Giants, and all his monstrous children. He saved my father, and befriended him. And for that, First-father ... he was owed. He was owed."
He stared. "You ..." He murmured, for a second looking as shocked as the human he emulated. "You are ... protecting him. From me. You're protecting him!"
She pursed her lips, a faint, grim smile. "Am I?" she mused, leaning back to seat herself before Him, to offer back His earlier insouciance. "Perhaps I am. And shouldn't I? Shouldn't I, First-father?" Her voice cooled. "Your children invited Ragnarok. You let them. Your realms have descended into chaos and war, and you let them. Your firstborn invaded Midgard, slaughtered both his family and mine, and you let him. Gabriel died. And you let him. Tell me, First-father. Tell me. Am I so wrong to keep you from him, and let him have peace that little longer?"
He said nothing, for a moment. Said nothing, and sat Himself carefully down across from her. Said nothing, while He gathered His thoughts.
"You are a Trickster's daughter," He said at last. "You have watched your father's war for a long time. You have paid for it, too. You and your brothers. Paid for his nature, and his battles. And he ... It hurt him, to see you hurt that way, did it not? Hurt him. But ... did not stop him?"
She smiled, gently. "I know where you're going with this, First-father. I know. And you are not wrong. But ... Ragnarok is done, for you and yours. For now at least. It is done. And I see no reason to let my friend, my father's friend, keep being hurt for a war he has already died for. A war I can protect him from. Do you understand?"
He looked down. "Then ... you will not return him to me?" He asked, quietly. "You will keep a father from his son?"
"I have done that before," she noted, but gently. "I am, after all, a monster. You need but ask the All-father ..."
He shook His head, cutting her off, smiling ruefully Himself. "No," He said, gently in His turn. "Not a monster, Hel Lokisdottir. Merely ... unforgiving, maybe. And perhaps ... Perhaps not without cause. No. You are no monster. But ... This is not his home. Gabriel's. Whatever you think of me, of mine ... this is not his home. Do you really believe he will be happy, here? In your grim halls? No offense, of course, but Gabriel was never ... sedate."
She laughed, bright and amused. "Can you think of no better appeal than that?" she mused, shaking her head at Him. He flushed a little, not looking away, and now she saw it. Now He let her see it, the bright, desperate hope in His eyes, the very real fear and caring. A weak appeal, but persistent, because He intended to persist. Intended not to surrender. Intended to fight for His child.
"I will make any appeal that might work," He said quietly. "Any appeal that might see Gabriel returned to his world. Not Heaven. I doubt somehow he wants to return there. But his world. His friends."
"Friends like my father?" she asked, innocently, and His head snapped up, His eyes narrowing as He stared at her. She kept her face bland, waiting.
"Lokisdottir," He said at last. "Trickster's daughter. You are his child, aren't you?"
She smiled, eyes sparkling. "Thank you," she said, sincerely. "I take it then that you follow my line of thought?"
"You want me ... to resurrect your father, in return for allowing me my son?" He asked, slowly, almost disbelievingly. She smiled encouragingly, motioning Him to continue. "You want me to bring back a pagan god, a pagan Trickster, no less? So that you will let Gabriel go?"
"Odin brought his son back to me," she explained. "He abided by his deal, and allowed his blood to remain in my Halls. To release my father now, with no angel to bind him, when he was well and truly killed ... it would seem ... biased. Unfair. But if you were to bring him back, in return for your son ... The All-father wouldn't be fooled, of course, but it would be within the bounds of honour. A father for a son. It is a fair deal, bought and paid, not simply given. You see?"
The First-father stared at her for a long, long time. Suspicious, considering. Powerful intelligence, and the kind of sly understanding she saw often in her father's and the All-father's eyes. Minds used to sneaking around what other people happened to think were the rules. Minds used to recognising when others were doing the same.
"Why do I think you were not alone in thinking this up?" He said eventually. His mouth twitching around a smile. "Why do I seem to detect a certain a certain Trickster's hand? And perhaps ... a certain son of mine, as well?"
"Oh, He is good," a male voice carried across the hall. "As suspicious as my blood-brother ever was. I know you warned me, but still ..."
Hel turned with a smile as her father strode into the hall, long, easy steps, alone in his form for the first time in a long while. Gabriel, wings outstretched, expression somewhere between sheepish and proud, walked comfortably beside him.
"Hello, Father," the archangel said quietly, stopping at Hel's side, leaning back a little into her father as he faced his own. Not in fear. Simply ... for comfort. Loki smiled softly at his back, sneakily protective. Hel hid her own smile, and wondered how long it would take for her father to actually admit he cared for the archangel who'd freed him all those years ago.
"Gabriel," Yahweh murmured, mouth soft and crooked. "You suggested this?"
The archangel shrugged, biting his lip. "Only a little?" he asked. "I might have mentioned, given everything Luci and our war has cost them, that you might ... be willing to help, a little?"
The First-father stood, slowly. Watching His son. "You ... believed I would come for you, then?" He asked, carefully. "After all this war. You believed I would come?" And oh, there was hope in His eyes. Real hope. Both Hel and Loki saw it, though they said nothing. This was a thing between father and child, and they both knew better than to interfere.
Gabriel swallowed, shifting uneasily, but he met his Father's eyes. He found courage enough to do that. "I always believed in you, Father," he said quietly. "I wanted ... I wanted a lot of things, knowing I wouldn't get them, and I resented ... many things, but ... I never doubted. I never doubted you. Even after you left. Even after ... Even after things began to go wrong."
The First-father shook his head carefully. "Your brothers did. All of them. Even Michael, in his way. They forgot ..."
"I couldn't," Gabriel said, his face shuttered and almost afraid, but determined. "I couldn't forget, and I couldn't stay, and I know ... I know you expected better than that, but I couldn't stay. I couldn't watch what they'd become, and the humans ... It was hard to keep faith, in a Heaven you'd abandoned, but among the humans, seeing them ..."
Yahweh smiled, very gently. "Yes," He said. "Yes. You were one of the few to realise that. One of the few to remember ... what you were supposed to be fighting for. The other ..."
"Tell me he's not dead," Gabriel muttered. "Tell me the little idiot didn't get himself killed again."
First-father laughed. "Oh, he did. Of course he did. Actually, you would have been proud of him, Gabriel. Certainly I was. He threw a Molotov cocktail of holy oil at your brother. At Michael. Just so Dean could try to free his brother. That's how your little brother went down. In defense of his humans to the end."
Gabriel grimaced, but there was a gleam in his eyes, an admiration. One that matched, rather eerily, the one in her father's. Gabriel had maybe been spending a little too long in Loki's head, Hel thought. Just a little.
"Father ..." he said at last. Nervous, hopping from foot to foot, and Hel wanted to shield him. To wrap him in the peace of her realm as she had threatened, promised, to take his fear and keep him safe in this place where even First-father had no authority. She had pledged herself to the Elder power, the Final power, Death, and as Its vassal, in her time and her place, even the First had no authority to supersede her own. She had the power, here, to protect Gabriel.
But not the right. Not between a father and his son. Not when both of them longed, so very much, not to need anyone else to stand between them.
"You love him," Yahweh said softly, at last, looking between Gabriel and her father, looking between the archangel, killer of giants, and the Jotunsson he had saved. Looking at the way Gabriel's wings partly shielded Loki, and the way her father in return stood ready to pull the archangel back, away from an attack. "That is why ... you love him, Gabriel. Don't you?"
The archangel swallowed hard, and refused to look back at the god behind him. Refused to meet Loki's eyes. Or even hers. And he said: "Yes. I'm sorry, Father. Yes. I've been part of him for ... for so long, and I ... Yes."
First-father stepped up to His son, reached out with human hand to gently lift his chin, to meet Gabriel's worried, fearful gaze. First-father reached out to His son, and smiled. "Then you would have me make this deal?" He asked, voice bright and bubbling with amusement, power, joy. "You would have me raise a pagan god, interfere in another faith, stir up who knows what kind of trouble? Make an enemy of Odin All-father? You would have me do that?"
Gabriel shrugged lopsidedly, and tried a little grin. "Are you going to tell me you wouldn't enjoy it?" he challenged, bright and daring, mischievous. "Come on, Dad. Remember who you're talking to, here!"
Yahweh's smile changed, then. Softened, grew serious, gentle. Loving. "I do," He whispered, very softly. "I do, Gabriel. I remember you. My child. I remember you ..."
Gabriel's face moved, flickered through too many expressions to number, to explain, but chief among them was pain. Grief. Hope. Relief. Love. Simple, bittersweet, pained and joyful. Love between monsters, between gods, between an angel and his Father. Love.
"I missed you," he rasped, crumbling faintly. "I missed you, Dad. I knew you weren't coming back, not until ... not until what had to happen happened, but ... I missed you. You know?"
"I know," First-father answered, His own voice rough, rougher than the human shape He wore would warrant. "Believe me, Gabriel. I know." He gifted the archangel a trembling smile, and gripped His son's hand.
"I should hope so," Loki muttered to her, pressing close against her, watching his archangel warily. Hel smiled up at him, at her father partly tamed, at her father who offered support for no gain of his own for the first time since she'd known him.
Perhaps Gabriel was not the only one affected by their long cohabitation. Perhaps the archangel was not the only one changed, perhaps for the better.
"What say you, First-father?" she interrupted gently, stepping forward once more, moving Gabriel gently out of her way, though not enough to break his contact with his father, taking a small delight that the archangel did not flinch at her touch as so many did. Taking a small delight that Gabriel cared for her as much as she for him. Since that day so many, many years ago when he had revealed what he'd done to her father, for her father, since the day he'd curled down inside himself to let her speak to a Loki freed from Odin's vengeance ... Gabriel was hers, now. Hers to protect, hers to gather, hers to deal on behalf of. Hers to challenge First-father for, if need be, and surrender to Him too, if it was necessary.
"Will you deal with us?" she asked again, watching Yahweh's face, watching the flicker of challenge and mischief and intelligence there, watching the way His eyes turned repeatedly towards His son, and the way they softened then. "Will you free my father, and your son, First-father? Will you deal with Hel Lokisdottir?"
The First-father laughed, rich and infinitely amused, and shook His head with rueful surrender. "I don't believe I have much choice," He murmured, reaching out to touch hands with a smile, and seal the deal. "I don't believe anyone could have much choice, with all three of you to deal with."
"Oh, there's always a choice," Loki murmured, voice hard and gleaming, but his smile was soft as he reached behind Gabriel and wrapped an arm around his waist. "Always, First-father. Sometimes, though ... the choice to strike, though more fun here and now ... would rob us of the chance for amusement tomorrow. And that ... that is a true shame, don't you think?"
"You have such fascinating priorities, darling," Gabriel murmured darkly, curling back into her father's embrace, smiling a Trickster's smile. "We should probably work on them."
And the First-father smiled, and joined His hand with hers and they looked on them, son and father to the First and Last, and winked with her as they sent them where they needed to be. As they sent two Tricksters back to their world, and let mischief loose once more.
"They can work on it somewhere else," Yahweh murmured, shaking His head with an ancient smile. "Don't you think, my dear?"
"I think," Hel said, smiling proudly at the father of a stolen son, who'd come to her realm to challenge her, "I think you're exactly right, First-father." She loved her father, loved him with every shred of her being ... but between him and Gabriel, Odin and Baldur and the First-father's Ragnarok ... Quite frankly she needed the rest.
"Oh yes. I think you're exactly right."
Sequel: Running Games
Title: Weregild
Rating: PG-13
Fandoms: Supernatural, Norse myth
Characters/Pairings: Yahweh, Hel, Gabriel, Loki. Gabriel/Loki
Summary: He has brought back the sons He lost. All save one. And that one ... may be problematic. That one rests in Hel's Hall, and the goddess does not easily surrender what she has taken
Wordcount: 3525
SPOILERS: For 5x19 and 5x22!!
Disclaimer: Not mine
Warnings: Beware typos, because the I'm not used to this keyboard yet, and the layout on this thing is weird. Also probably blasphemy.
Weregild
His name was Yahweh, Elohim, Eloah, Adonai, Shaddai, Tzevaoth, Ehyeh-Asher-Ehyeh. His name was God. His name, for the moment, was Chuck Shurley. His purpose ... was to find His child.Her name was Hel. Loki's daughter, Ruler of the Halls of the Dead in Niflheim. Her name was Death among her people, though to that first and only Death, she too paid respect in her turn. She sat before Him, midnight-black and corpse-white upon her throne. Her name was Hel, and it was to her His search had brought Him.
He was not the first father who had come to her realm in search of his son. He was the first, though, who had deigned to come in person.
"Lady," He greeted her, with all the respect His children lacked. It pulled a smile from her.
"Lord." She inclined her head. Hel had never failed to offer honour when it was due. She would not begin now. "Welcome to my Halls, First-Father."
He smiled, faintly. "Thank you for seeing me, Hel Lokisdottir. I know you're busy of late ..."
The hint was well-taken, but badly aimed. She wondered why He mentioned it. "Yes," she mused. "For the trouble your sons have caused, I have been well busy. For the attacks they have made on me and mine, for what was mine that they stole ... Indeed. I have been ... busy."
He smiled at her. Gently. Without condescension, which was fortunate. Hel had never taken well to being patronised. "What did they steal?" He asked. He knew already, of course. He knew very well. But He was All-father of His people, and an All-father thrived on misdirection, trickery and slow guidance. Hel knew that very, very well.
"Lucifer Morningstar, who stole Baldur from me. Lucifer Morningstar, who slew my father. You know well what was taken, First-father."
"Ah." He pursed His lips, relaxed, faux-pensive, wandering at His ease to sit in the seat of honour beneath her, staring thoughtfully into space. He who knew everything, seeming to think it over.
Hel resisted the urge to roll her eyes. Men! Honestly.
"Is there a problem?" she asked politely. Pointedly. Her realm may not be suffering the vast upheavals all of His were going through, but she did have things to be doing. Sons and fathers to rejoin and separate, for example. Old grudges to repay, and debts as well. The dramatics, while typical, were not ones she really felt inclined to indulge right now.
"It was Lucifer who stole from you, then?" He asked again, contemplatively. "Lucifer? Not Gabriel?"
She smiled. And now they came to it ... "Gabriel's account with me is ... complicated. Why? Does it interest you?"
"You know it does," He said softly. Impatient in His turn, and not fond of being patronised Himself. Good. "You have taken him. I want to know why."
"Why should I not?" she asked, casually. "He stole my father from one prison, and locked him within another. He bound his will, imprisoned him, and carried him to his death. Some might find that cause for a grudge, don't you think?"
"Except that is not what happened," He reproached quietly. "You must know that. Gabriel, of all my children ... That is not what happened, Hel Lokisdottir. You know it."
She tilted her head, intrigued. "You deny that Gabriel carried my father to his death, to both their deaths, against his brother?"
"No. But I deny that Loki had no say in the matter. I deny that Gabriel imprisoned him." He smiled, very faintly. "I deny that even Gabriel, good though he was, could ever have held your father mute and helpless for centuries, and not suffered for it."
She laughed at that, shaking her head, and stood up, coming down to His level, coming to stand beside Him. "He would have suffered for it," she agreed, smiling sharp and cruel. It was truth, after all. "From the inside out, he would have been devoured, had he tried to force my father where he truly did not want to go." A tilt of her head, a slow smile. "And so? It changes nothing. Why not tell me what you want, First-father. Why not make this negotiation short."
He looked up at her. His human form, the shape He wore, was inoffensive. Shrinking. Almost feeble. But what lay within it ... those eyes had seen without trying what Odin All-father had hung upon the world-tree for nine days to gain. Those eyes had seen all that had passed for His children. That heart had mourned them, too.
"I want my son," He said, very quietly. "My son, who was not yours to take. My son, who died in my Name. My son. I want him back, Hel Lokisdottir." And then, because He truly was wiser than His children, and more respectful, He added ... "Please."
She studied Him. For a long time. Time without meaning, to the other realms, time that flowed only as she willed it, here, but time nonetheless. Time to see. Time to understand.
"You are not the first father who has come to me in search of his son," she noted, carefully. "The most powerful, perhaps, but that means little here. You know full well the success that other father met."
"You are not without mercy," He interrupted softly. "I know that too. Or was Odin's death in that motel an accident? Was his return to the world some days ago a mistake? Or ..." He stood in His turn, looking carefully at her. "Or did All-father make a deal with you, Hel? Did he offer his role in seeing his son returned to you, in exchange, perhaps ... for time with Baldur, here? For a death without cost, to speak to a son long dead? In the Halls of the Dead, where time means what you will it to mean, and a father may know many years with his child in the space of only a few days?" His voice softened, gentled, and there was hope and pity in equal measure in it. "Is that perhaps ... the quality of Hel's mercy?"
She stared back at Him impassively. "Is that what you want, First-father? To spend your time with him here? To visit?"
He met her stare. "I am not Odin All-father. What grudge you might owe me, for my children's crimes ... it is not what you owed him. It is not of that magnitude. Not even close."
"Your children violated my realm," she answered coldly. "Your children stole what was mine. Your children killed my father. Neither Odin nor his children ever managed that, First-father. The grudge I bear you and yours for that ..."
"But not Gabriel," He answered, low and vehement. "Not Gabriel. He harmed none of you. He freed your father from Odin's prison. He released your brothers as a favour to that father, albeit lessened and bound in agreement. He has given you no offense, Hel Lokisdottir! His only crime was to take Loki with him against his brother, and that act cost more than just your father's life. It cost him his own! It ..." He stopped, faltered, as she smiled. Stopped as He recognised her expression.
"Yes," she said. "Gabriel did that. Gabriel Giant-killer. He saved the Son of Giants, and all his monstrous children. He saved my father, and befriended him. And for that, First-father ... he was owed. He was owed."
He stared. "You ..." He murmured, for a second looking as shocked as the human he emulated. "You are ... protecting him. From me. You're protecting him!"
She pursed her lips, a faint, grim smile. "Am I?" she mused, leaning back to seat herself before Him, to offer back His earlier insouciance. "Perhaps I am. And shouldn't I? Shouldn't I, First-father?" Her voice cooled. "Your children invited Ragnarok. You let them. Your realms have descended into chaos and war, and you let them. Your firstborn invaded Midgard, slaughtered both his family and mine, and you let him. Gabriel died. And you let him. Tell me, First-father. Tell me. Am I so wrong to keep you from him, and let him have peace that little longer?"
He said nothing, for a moment. Said nothing, and sat Himself carefully down across from her. Said nothing, while He gathered His thoughts.
"You are a Trickster's daughter," He said at last. "You have watched your father's war for a long time. You have paid for it, too. You and your brothers. Paid for his nature, and his battles. And he ... It hurt him, to see you hurt that way, did it not? Hurt him. But ... did not stop him?"
She smiled, gently. "I know where you're going with this, First-father. I know. And you are not wrong. But ... Ragnarok is done, for you and yours. For now at least. It is done. And I see no reason to let my friend, my father's friend, keep being hurt for a war he has already died for. A war I can protect him from. Do you understand?"
He looked down. "Then ... you will not return him to me?" He asked, quietly. "You will keep a father from his son?"
"I have done that before," she noted, but gently. "I am, after all, a monster. You need but ask the All-father ..."
He shook His head, cutting her off, smiling ruefully Himself. "No," He said, gently in His turn. "Not a monster, Hel Lokisdottir. Merely ... unforgiving, maybe. And perhaps ... Perhaps not without cause. No. You are no monster. But ... This is not his home. Gabriel's. Whatever you think of me, of mine ... this is not his home. Do you really believe he will be happy, here? In your grim halls? No offense, of course, but Gabriel was never ... sedate."
She laughed, bright and amused. "Can you think of no better appeal than that?" she mused, shaking her head at Him. He flushed a little, not looking away, and now she saw it. Now He let her see it, the bright, desperate hope in His eyes, the very real fear and caring. A weak appeal, but persistent, because He intended to persist. Intended not to surrender. Intended to fight for His child.
"I will make any appeal that might work," He said quietly. "Any appeal that might see Gabriel returned to his world. Not Heaven. I doubt somehow he wants to return there. But his world. His friends."
"Friends like my father?" she asked, innocently, and His head snapped up, His eyes narrowing as He stared at her. She kept her face bland, waiting.
"Lokisdottir," He said at last. "Trickster's daughter. You are his child, aren't you?"
She smiled, eyes sparkling. "Thank you," she said, sincerely. "I take it then that you follow my line of thought?"
"You want me ... to resurrect your father, in return for allowing me my son?" He asked, slowly, almost disbelievingly. She smiled encouragingly, motioning Him to continue. "You want me to bring back a pagan god, a pagan Trickster, no less? So that you will let Gabriel go?"
"Odin brought his son back to me," she explained. "He abided by his deal, and allowed his blood to remain in my Halls. To release my father now, with no angel to bind him, when he was well and truly killed ... it would seem ... biased. Unfair. But if you were to bring him back, in return for your son ... The All-father wouldn't be fooled, of course, but it would be within the bounds of honour. A father for a son. It is a fair deal, bought and paid, not simply given. You see?"
The First-father stared at her for a long, long time. Suspicious, considering. Powerful intelligence, and the kind of sly understanding she saw often in her father's and the All-father's eyes. Minds used to sneaking around what other people happened to think were the rules. Minds used to recognising when others were doing the same.
"Why do I think you were not alone in thinking this up?" He said eventually. His mouth twitching around a smile. "Why do I seem to detect a certain a certain Trickster's hand? And perhaps ... a certain son of mine, as well?"
"Oh, He is good," a male voice carried across the hall. "As suspicious as my blood-brother ever was. I know you warned me, but still ..."
Hel turned with a smile as her father strode into the hall, long, easy steps, alone in his form for the first time in a long while. Gabriel, wings outstretched, expression somewhere between sheepish and proud, walked comfortably beside him.
"Hello, Father," the archangel said quietly, stopping at Hel's side, leaning back a little into her father as he faced his own. Not in fear. Simply ... for comfort. Loki smiled softly at his back, sneakily protective. Hel hid her own smile, and wondered how long it would take for her father to actually admit he cared for the archangel who'd freed him all those years ago.
"Gabriel," Yahweh murmured, mouth soft and crooked. "You suggested this?"
The archangel shrugged, biting his lip. "Only a little?" he asked. "I might have mentioned, given everything Luci and our war has cost them, that you might ... be willing to help, a little?"
The First-father stood, slowly. Watching His son. "You ... believed I would come for you, then?" He asked, carefully. "After all this war. You believed I would come?" And oh, there was hope in His eyes. Real hope. Both Hel and Loki saw it, though they said nothing. This was a thing between father and child, and they both knew better than to interfere.
Gabriel swallowed, shifting uneasily, but he met his Father's eyes. He found courage enough to do that. "I always believed in you, Father," he said quietly. "I wanted ... I wanted a lot of things, knowing I wouldn't get them, and I resented ... many things, but ... I never doubted. I never doubted you. Even after you left. Even after ... Even after things began to go wrong."
The First-father shook his head carefully. "Your brothers did. All of them. Even Michael, in his way. They forgot ..."
"I couldn't," Gabriel said, his face shuttered and almost afraid, but determined. "I couldn't forget, and I couldn't stay, and I know ... I know you expected better than that, but I couldn't stay. I couldn't watch what they'd become, and the humans ... It was hard to keep faith, in a Heaven you'd abandoned, but among the humans, seeing them ..."
Yahweh smiled, very gently. "Yes," He said. "Yes. You were one of the few to realise that. One of the few to remember ... what you were supposed to be fighting for. The other ..."
"Tell me he's not dead," Gabriel muttered. "Tell me the little idiot didn't get himself killed again."
First-father laughed. "Oh, he did. Of course he did. Actually, you would have been proud of him, Gabriel. Certainly I was. He threw a Molotov cocktail of holy oil at your brother. At Michael. Just so Dean could try to free his brother. That's how your little brother went down. In defense of his humans to the end."
Gabriel grimaced, but there was a gleam in his eyes, an admiration. One that matched, rather eerily, the one in her father's. Gabriel had maybe been spending a little too long in Loki's head, Hel thought. Just a little.
"Father ..." he said at last. Nervous, hopping from foot to foot, and Hel wanted to shield him. To wrap him in the peace of her realm as she had threatened, promised, to take his fear and keep him safe in this place where even First-father had no authority. She had pledged herself to the Elder power, the Final power, Death, and as Its vassal, in her time and her place, even the First had no authority to supersede her own. She had the power, here, to protect Gabriel.
But not the right. Not between a father and his son. Not when both of them longed, so very much, not to need anyone else to stand between them.
"You love him," Yahweh said softly, at last, looking between Gabriel and her father, looking between the archangel, killer of giants, and the Jotunsson he had saved. Looking at the way Gabriel's wings partly shielded Loki, and the way her father in return stood ready to pull the archangel back, away from an attack. "That is why ... you love him, Gabriel. Don't you?"
The archangel swallowed hard, and refused to look back at the god behind him. Refused to meet Loki's eyes. Or even hers. And he said: "Yes. I'm sorry, Father. Yes. I've been part of him for ... for so long, and I ... Yes."
First-father stepped up to His son, reached out with human hand to gently lift his chin, to meet Gabriel's worried, fearful gaze. First-father reached out to His son, and smiled. "Then you would have me make this deal?" He asked, voice bright and bubbling with amusement, power, joy. "You would have me raise a pagan god, interfere in another faith, stir up who knows what kind of trouble? Make an enemy of Odin All-father? You would have me do that?"
Gabriel shrugged lopsidedly, and tried a little grin. "Are you going to tell me you wouldn't enjoy it?" he challenged, bright and daring, mischievous. "Come on, Dad. Remember who you're talking to, here!"
Yahweh's smile changed, then. Softened, grew serious, gentle. Loving. "I do," He whispered, very softly. "I do, Gabriel. I remember you. My child. I remember you ..."
Gabriel's face moved, flickered through too many expressions to number, to explain, but chief among them was pain. Grief. Hope. Relief. Love. Simple, bittersweet, pained and joyful. Love between monsters, between gods, between an angel and his Father. Love.
"I missed you," he rasped, crumbling faintly. "I missed you, Dad. I knew you weren't coming back, not until ... not until what had to happen happened, but ... I missed you. You know?"
"I know," First-father answered, His own voice rough, rougher than the human shape He wore would warrant. "Believe me, Gabriel. I know." He gifted the archangel a trembling smile, and gripped His son's hand.
"I should hope so," Loki muttered to her, pressing close against her, watching his archangel warily. Hel smiled up at him, at her father partly tamed, at her father who offered support for no gain of his own for the first time since she'd known him.
Perhaps Gabriel was not the only one affected by their long cohabitation. Perhaps the archangel was not the only one changed, perhaps for the better.
"What say you, First-father?" she interrupted gently, stepping forward once more, moving Gabriel gently out of her way, though not enough to break his contact with his father, taking a small delight that the archangel did not flinch at her touch as so many did. Taking a small delight that Gabriel cared for her as much as she for him. Since that day so many, many years ago when he had revealed what he'd done to her father, for her father, since the day he'd curled down inside himself to let her speak to a Loki freed from Odin's vengeance ... Gabriel was hers, now. Hers to protect, hers to gather, hers to deal on behalf of. Hers to challenge First-father for, if need be, and surrender to Him too, if it was necessary.
"Will you deal with us?" she asked again, watching Yahweh's face, watching the flicker of challenge and mischief and intelligence there, watching the way His eyes turned repeatedly towards His son, and the way they softened then. "Will you free my father, and your son, First-father? Will you deal with Hel Lokisdottir?"
The First-father laughed, rich and infinitely amused, and shook His head with rueful surrender. "I don't believe I have much choice," He murmured, reaching out to touch hands with a smile, and seal the deal. "I don't believe anyone could have much choice, with all three of you to deal with."
"Oh, there's always a choice," Loki murmured, voice hard and gleaming, but his smile was soft as he reached behind Gabriel and wrapped an arm around his waist. "Always, First-father. Sometimes, though ... the choice to strike, though more fun here and now ... would rob us of the chance for amusement tomorrow. And that ... that is a true shame, don't you think?"
"You have such fascinating priorities, darling," Gabriel murmured darkly, curling back into her father's embrace, smiling a Trickster's smile. "We should probably work on them."
And the First-father smiled, and joined His hand with hers and they looked on them, son and father to the First and Last, and winked with her as they sent them where they needed to be. As they sent two Tricksters back to their world, and let mischief loose once more.
"They can work on it somewhere else," Yahweh murmured, shaking His head with an ancient smile. "Don't you think, my dear?"
"I think," Hel said, smiling proudly at the father of a stolen son, who'd come to her realm to challenge her, "I think you're exactly right, First-father." She loved her father, loved him with every shred of her being ... but between him and Gabriel, Odin and Baldur and the First-father's Ragnarok ... Quite frankly she needed the rest.
"Oh yes. I think you're exactly right."
Sequel: Running Games
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