Chapter 1

The blazing prince was the sickest child Fárbauti had ever seen. Loki was small for a giant's offspring, weak and wracked with harsh coughs that roused Fárbauti and his mate, Laufey, in the night. Their child did not laugh, he did not smile, he did not respond to the voices of his sires. Farbauti and Laufey dodged the topic of their son, too proud to admit to Jotunheimr that Loki was a feeble child. Such sickness was a distressful omen, especially for the firstborn of two renowned kings.

Loki was also feverish by frost giant standards. To his parents, however, this was dust in comparison to the fact that Loki had not opened his eyes at birth; it worried them of his eyesight. The royal couple swore the healers to secrecy; they had to be certain of their child's nature first, if he would truly possess power greater than any jötunn of the realm.

On Loki's second birthday, he opened eyes and they burned not red, but instead like fiery gemstones. The instance of a jötunn with hot skin and orange eyes was so rare to the point that most had thought it to be only a legend. The powers lamented seemed impossible; unbelievable, even. Afterall, how could a frost giant exert such a blaze? But on Loki's second birthday, when he stared the couple in the eyes, there was no denying those tales. And that meant the small jötunn had been born with the power of both fire and frost, naturally wielding inordinate amounts of energy. Loki was not merely an abnormality of the jötnar: he was a child that would grow to manipulate magicks that no other jötunn could touch, and they would flourish under his command.

Fárbauti knew that Asgard would never allow such a being to grow to maturity. He ascertained that his eyes would be glamoured and that none other than his family would know the warmth of his skin. Laufey refused Fárbauti's wishes to completely conceal Loki until he was as untouchable as legend would have it; they could not separate their prince from his people.

Jötunnheimr instead adored their prince from a distance. Loki held himself with a proud decorum and moved with the elegance of a snowy wind. An avalanche of luxuriant hair fell mid-way down his back, ever silky and Stygian where no flecks of ice nestled in the strands. From time to time, he would visit the cities and jest with his people. None knew his name or the true structure of his face; these were Farbauti's conditions. Heimdall could never see Loki's face, nor could Loki's name be spoken where magicks did not shroud it. Farbauti was adamant on the topic of Loki's concealment, demanding that he hid anything that could be used to identify him.

When the younger princes arrived a year apart from each other, Loki flaunted them like jewels such was his pride. It was as if his excitement overcame that of the rulers. He stayed with them, even by night and especially during the ones too cold for jötnar when they huddled next to the warmth of their elder brother. They were the only ones other than his sires who knew of his magic and the drain it placed on him.

After practicing fire magic, Loki could sleep for days at a time with little indication that he lived other than the warmth of his skin and the rise and fall of his chest. Sometimes he would wake and find his hair in braids, or a small library's worth of books on top of him – his brothers often bored of waiting for him to open his eyes as they lingered. Whenever this happened, the door was guarded heavily while Loki rested so that none could touch him in a helpless state.

Laufey watched his son in awe as he nurtured sparks and then blazes. The growth of the fires was followed by the clandestine fears of the two kings, haunted by the life of unknowns Loki wrought effortlessly. Loki, however, knew who he was, his place – even if the rest of his realm did not. He was the Prince of Fire, the blazing royal, the protector of two siblings who piled objects upon his sleeping form. When Jötunnheimr had need of the unbridled power of fire, Loki swore to protect his home.

A trio of Asgardian warriors had traveled to Jötunnheimr on the Bifrost. The Asgardians ambushed a patrol and jötnar dispatched the trespassers mercilessly, leaving their bodies to be ravaged by the realm. Not so much as a fortnight passed before Asgard retaliated by clogging Jötunnheimr with their army, ordering them to lay waste to the realm. Laufey summoned the eldest prince to the castle parapets as the unopposed Asgardian soldiers marched on their home city. The king stood aside as Loki's skin flared with orange as if it were an ember.

Loki made certain that war was over before a drop jötnar blood was drawn. He seized the plain in fire.

A battalion of Asgardian warriors crisped in the inferno conjured on the black ice of Jötunnheimr. The ground beneath them liquefied instantly and they sank into a roiling lake admist cries of alarm and fear at the power that should have been beyond the jötnar. A third of the battalion's warriors, an unfortunate two hundred, swam desperately to the edge of the water, burdened by their armor. Most sunk in the body of water, their efforts to swim in vain as a sheet of ice spread over the blazing prince of Jötunnheimr regarded them with a look of weary disappointment as a father would a child as he brandished his power; he'd expected much more from the so thought mighty Asgardians. The prince raised a trembling palm to unleash another elemental burst, but never had the chance.

"Wait, my child," Laufey hummed, fingers closing gingerly over the eldest prince's. "You have done plenty; they will not return for the casket for a time, and the survivors will terrify the rest with their stories. Fárbauti and I will hold the palace."

"And me?" Loki asked, swaying with the drain of his magic.

"You must not be in your normal rooms; it's not safe for you to stay here now. Go and rest in the temple – if the Asgardians approach, they won't seek recompense there. Rest." Laufey touched Loki's neck fondly and bent to his knees to be at eye level with his grown but stunted child. Laufey combed a hand through the prince's inky hair and shooed a piece of it out of his face, gazing into the brilliant orange eyes of his child. "You need to rest after using that kind of magic. The rest of our warriors will clean up here. Go to your brothers, child of mine."

Loki's face was distant with fatigue and as pale as a sheet of snow. "Yes, sire." He swayed gently and faced the battle he had just truncated. He could faintly hear the screams left by the beautiful power of the flames, something frost nor fire could fix and his eyes glinted. Although captivated, the jötunn was positively exhausted and he could only just see clearly enough to know what was passing before him.

"Loki, go. They would have razed our cities." Laufey beckoned a guard who towered over the blazing prince. "Escort him to the temples."

Loki squeezed his eyes shut.

Laufey turned to his son. "Please go before you are so exhausted that I must carry you."

"Yes, sire." Loki braced himself against the guard's arm and found himself in the temple before having even processed that Laufey was no longer by his side.

The temple was colossal, wrought of stone and ice. The walls were a shade of blue akin to a deep river. The building had a main floor and two wings, as well as an open-air observatory from which one could see for miles if they ascended its spiral staircase. The temple was located east of the city, providing those who came a respite from the tumult of the city. It was large enough to hold hundreds of jötunar at any given time, though it was usually occupied by a handful of attending sorcerers and healers, most of whom had been called to the castle.

Loki stumbled gracelessly into one of the empty priest beds in the west wing ... and into the view of his brothers.

"Loki!" Býleistr chimed from the stairs, descending as quickly as his feet would let him.

Býleistr was followed by Helblindi, a close third in age. They were nearly the same height, Loki never having grown past the shoulder of his parents and the younger two not old enough to possess a giant's stature. They all seemed like children.

"You were amazing," Býleistr lavished, gently pulling on Loki's shoulder.

"Hrmmph," the oldest prince rumbled, stuffing his face into the mattress. Helblindi threw his arms of his brother's shoulders, anticipating a shove. When none came, he snuggled into Loki's neck, nuzzling the sleek hair of his brother and inching into bed beside him. Loki was always hot to a frost giant's touch, a spectacle that his brothers had known happily as children, cuddling under the same blankets in the palace.

Býleistr spread a blanket over the two of them. "I miss my bed in the palace," he laughed. He slid in next to Loki nonetheless.

The eldest was hiding an affectionate smile in the sheets as he fell into an easy sleep.

"An entire battalion of Asgardian warriors lost on Jötunnheimr; reports of fire in the realm; our warriors, the lucky ones, returning with frostbite and scarring burns. And they're sopping wet," Thor was seething. He shook in fury and with the weight agony that had befallen his people.

Frigga had joined him in the throne room, knowing that her son was at his worst. Odin was deep in his sleep, unreachable. The blood was on Thor's hands.

"Mother. Please. How can this be? How can the jötnar wield fire and Heimdall know not why? This should have been an easy day of forcing back jötnar troops, of a true fight and not a slaughter of our people. I had not even arrived with a second wave and yet we were already beaten. Next time, I will go first. I will slay Fárbauti and Laufey where they laugh on their wretched thrones. I will destroy their frozen palace."

Frigga smiled as if offering condolences.

"Mother, I am sorry for you to see my like this. Whatever power they possess, however this has happened, it must be stopped. And we must retrieve the casket because this is what happens when the jötnar have power. They kill us in scores," Thor said with finality, volume beginning to lower.

"Thor, you know that it would be wrong and foolish to send in another few hundred of our people to their deaths."

"I know; I cannot let more of our people die this way and there must never be such a force released in our realm," Thor sighed. "I will go in. I will take a small group of warriors who know what must be done; they will not expect us again so soon. We will go straight to their temples and capture their high priest. Or I shall get their heirs. Perhaps the beloved crown prince Heimdall says they praise. Heimdall says the royal family is hidden from him. Cowards." Thor looked at her in the eye, imploring. "Mother, I ask of you this for the safety of Asgard: lend us a cloak of your magic so that we may enter unnoticed. Heimdall can take us out of there after we find a jötunn."

Frigga tightened her lips.

"You know I must go even if I do not have your blessing," Thor reasoned. Frigga sighed heavily; there was no stopping him.

"You have it, my son."