[X] Go home and tell mum that the Bifrost is in the sky.
Reluctantly you drag your eyes away from the rainbow crossing the sky. As much as you want it to mean dad's decided to visit Hel is right. You don't know who's come to the Iron-wood over that rainbow. Besides you are getting kinda peckish and the cottage has food that you don't have to hunt.
"Hel's right, it could be anyone not just dad, we should go and tell mum." You shuffle on your paws, claws digging into the earth and you glance between the rainbow and home. Hel's hand descends on your head in a brief stroke that crumples your ears. If her arms weren't full of flowers you're pretty sure that would have been a hug. A glance up to her shows that she's smiling, if only on the living half of her face.
"But it's papa." Jormy whines and starts a tentative slither towards the rainbow. You pounce on him without thinking, claws failing to even scratch his thick scales. He doesn't bother to flick you off. Hel calmly steps in front of him.
"How about this, you carry me and Fenny back to the house fast and if mum agrees that it's dad then you can go find him." Hel suggests and you scramble fully onto your brother's back before starting to climb up towards his head.
"Or you two could go and I can go find him." Jormy suggests hopefully, raising his head a little higher and sending you tumbling back down his back. Regaining your feet you look around your brother. Hel doesn't look in any way convinced.
"You're wasting time," she says bluntly, with a disapproving look up at Jormy's huge snakey face. "The sooner we get home the sooner we know what's going on. Even Fenrir is using his head about this one." You grin proudly. Hel never used you as an example of what to do before! Your tail starts wagging furiously, thumping against Jormy's scales every other wag. Jormy curves round and down to look at you, tongue flicking out to taste the air. You have the perfect way to help your sister persuade him.
"Please big brother, my paws are tired." You pull the most soulful expression you can, eyes wide, ears drooping and one paw raised pathetically. Jormy narrows his eyes at you.
"You just want a ride, don't you." He asks. You wag your tail harder. Jormy sighs. "Fine." He slumps dejected and Hel settles herself primly just behind you on Jormy's back. You hunker down, Jormy's scales hard and warm against your belly, and work your claws into the tiny gaps between the scales as best you can. It's not perfect, you have been thrown off 'accidently' before, but since this is serious you're sure Jormy won't do anything too stupid.
With a ripple of muscle you feel through your belly and paws Jormy starts slithering. For a giant snake, body the same size as a tree trunk, he can really move. The wind generated by his movement is plucking insistently at your fur, bending your ears back and whistling through your teeth. The only downside is that this close you can practically taste Jormy's salty, fishy scent. You'd hunker closer but you're pretty sure that would just make things worse. The speed, along with the movement side to side, does funny things to your tummy, filling it with butterflies that make you want to laugh. You do, face into the wind, mouth open wide to let out a whooping, giddy laugh.
Jormy seems to take that as encouragement and puts his head down. You feel his long muscles bunch up under you then explode forward. The wind becomes a gale, pinning you ears back. Your mouth is filled with air, the salty scent that clings to Jormy, the fresher cleaner scene of crushed grass and a few delicate floral notes. You'd whoop and howl but the sounds are pushed back down your throat.
Jormy stops suddenly, coiling up around you and Hel to stop you both flying off him and into the wall of the cottage. Instead you get a faceful of greenish scales before tumbling to the grass in a tangle of limbs and tail. Jormy hisses a laugh. You glare up at him, vision partially obscured by your forelegs.
"Not funny." You growl, disentangling errant limbs from each other and standing.
Hel's dismount is far more dignified than your own. Jormy guides her in a graceful slide down his scales onto the grass. Her flowers even survive intact, they don't seem to have lost so much as a petal.
Hel hurries up to the cottage with you trotting at her heels and Jormy right behind you. She pulls the door open, losing a scattering of blue flowers to the dirt. You dart in to pick them up, slender stems no less gross and planty than when you helped pick them.
"There's a rainbow, we thought maybe the bifrost and dad…" Hel stops just inside. You squeeze past her easily into the warm smoky interior of the cottage. Mum's sitting in her favourite chair, knitting something you really hope isn't a coat for you, and staring at Hel like your sister's a ghost or worse.
"Mum what's wrong?" You ask, dropping the flowers. They aren't as important and mum is.
"Get back in the forest, don't come out until nightfall. Go!" Mum hisses at you, normally calm, smiling face now made up of hard lines and anger. You've never seen mum this angry, the time Jormy accidently crushed half the cottage doesn't even live up.
"Wh-"
"Go Now!" Mum stabs a finger out the door at the forest. You start to object but a part of mum's scent is wrong, there's a harsh almost metallic element to it that shouldn't be there. You've only smelt it in prey animals before, or when Jormy was being scolded for crushing half the cottage. Mum's scared.
"Come on Fenrir." Hel murmurs, leaning down to shuffle you along beside her with one hand. You dig your paws in, leaving mum when she's scared isn't right! You won't do it.
"But, mum…" Hel pushes you along more insistently, you lock your legs but it makes little difference. Hel's just stronger than you are. Reluctantly you turn and pad slowly along with your sister.
"What's wrong? Is it papa? Can we-" Jormy stops the moment he takes in the two of you. Hel is dour, withdrawn into herself and probably thinking. Your tail is between you legs, ears down against your skull.
Leaving mum like this is wrong, you hate it. There's a horrible empty yawning pit in your tummy and to make it worse you're hungry. There's a bird on the gatepost. Black feathered and plump. It's maybe two mouthfuls after catching it but they look like good, if feathery, mouthfuls. Your mouth is already watering just thinking about it.
"Mum said to go back to the forest and stay there." Hel tells him. Without thinking you're low, belly against the ground and eyes fixed on the delicious looking bird. It craws, looking around inquisitively, and you creep closer.
"Oh, not papa then." Jormy says morosely. You're nearly there, just another inch and you can spring up from the grass, claws out and smash the bird from the post. Jormy and Hel are still talking about something, you barely hear them your whole attention reserved for your imminent meal. Maybe if Jormy asks nicely you'll share a bit with him.
"Huh, where's the puppy?"
You spring, muscles bunching then extending in a lightning fast motion no one can imitate, rising from the grass like black furred lightning front paws outstretched and claws extended.
"Fenrir don't-!" Too late! You're already sailing through the air, target oblivious right in front of you. You can taste it already, just as good as it smells, all tender and meaty and-
"CAAW!" The bird spooks at mum's shout and flaps away. You sail clean over the bench post and land snout first in the long, springy grass of the plain outside mum's garden then tumble tail over head. The world flashes past, blue sky to green yellow grass to brown dirt and repeat.
You stop when you hit something hard and end up on your back looking up and three tall, broad men in clothes that look like fish scales. You swallow dryly, you know who they are, dad told you more than enough stories about saving them from their own foolishness to recognise three Aesir when you tumble into them.
The first one you notice, thick leather belt looped around the barrel of his chest over the fish scale metal coat, must be Thor. He's not hard to recognise, wild scraggy red hair and beard, oversized belt and hands stuffed inside burnished gauntlets that shine silver in the dimness. His hammer hangs off the belt, head to large for the short grip but according to dad no less potent a weapon for its deformity. His huge arms are folded over his chest as he glares down at you.
The next Aesir is slighter Thor, blonde hair rolling down over his fish scaled shoulders like a golden river. There's a sword belted at his hip and one hand rests idly on its pommel. Unlike Thor this Aesir has nothing but nobility about his features. He almost seems trustworthy, which really cements which of the Aesir this is. Tyr, honourable, brave and too trusting according to dad.
The oldest has long white hair that brushes his shoulders cut to a neat line and a beard that's neatly trimmed so it's more like your fur than human hair. There's a black patch over his right eye that looks soft like rabbit fur and perched on his shoulder is a large black feathered bird. Odin, and you have a sinking feeling that you just tried to eat his pet. Oopsie?
Odin looks down at you, fixing you with the piercing stare of one bright blue eye. You can't look away. Your stomach twists itself into a knot and your heart starts hammering against your ribs like it's trying to escape. Under that merciless stare from the king of the Aesir you don't dare move, not even to run away. Odin's intent is very clear. He wants you dead.
You cringe down against the ground, desperately trying to meld with it so Odin will stop looking at you like that. A whine slides between your teeth completely unbidden and you hurriedly get your paws under you to back away.
Thor's hands go to his hammer and he growls through his teeth. Odin's paralyzing stare leaves you to fix on his son. You take the opportunity to scarper back to the safety of the cottage and mum. Hel and Jormy must have had the same idea, they're in the garden with mum. Jormy towers over the two of them and when you sprint through the gate Hel scoops you up to her chest. You can feel that her heart is beating almost as fast as yours it.
"I'm sorry." You whisper, even if you didn't know that the bird was Odin's this is still your fault. Hel hugs you tighter and doesn't say anything.
The Aesir enter the garden, look around the wreckage you left this morning with unconcealed disdain and disgust. Mum steps forward, putting herself between the three of them and you, Hel and Jormy. Fear is pouring off her now, Jormy can smell it too going by how he's clenching and unclenching his coils around nothing.
"Step aside woman, your brood are monsters that must be dealt with before they destroy the Nine Realms." Thor orders mum arrogantly, looking down on her. You snarl, a low rumble through the whole garden and Jormy's hissing layers over it in a menacing counterpart. Mum stays perfectly calm in front of the three armed Aesir
"Where is your brother, Odin, where is Loki?" Mum asks pointedly, despite the fear you know she's feeling her voice doesn't waver. "You wouldn't do anything to your brother's children without at least his presence, would you Allfather?"
"Loki has nothing to do with this. Stand aside or-" Thor stops at Odin's raised hand.
"You do not seriously believe that my tricksy blood-brother cares about you or your monsters? Or that we'd have found you without his help?" Odin smiles, his teeth are white and square like your sister's and mum's. He doesn't smile like they do, there's something wrong with it sending shudders up and down your spine.
"Loki did not wish to see the necessary deed done, that is all. Now stand aside, Angrboda or I will do worse than simply banish your children." Your stomach sinks, filled with lead and ice. Dad told Odin where to find you? Dad let this happen? You don't want to believe it but it makes too much sense. Why else would he rarely visit, only sometimes stay for more than an hour or two? Why else doesn't he seem to care about you when he is here?
[ ] No! You don't believe it. Dad said Odin was half as smart as he is and almost as good with words. He's just trying to trick mum and you. Well you won't let him. You believe in dad, even if he'd laugh to hear you say it, he's dad. You'll trust him until the end of the world! Odin's wrong and you're going to let him know how much!
[ ] Dad's a wash, deep down you knew it from the start. He's always been distant and distracted with all of you, like his mind is elsewhere. You're just an excuse for him to skip Asgard, or an unwanted result of him loving mum. That's… it's not fine, and it will hurt Hel and Jormy, but at least now you know and you won't be fooled again. That doesn't mean Odin can do whatever he likes here though, this isn't Asgard!
[ ] Who cares. Odin's just saying this to try and hurt mum and you and Hel and Jormy. Maybe he's right and maybe he isn't but you aren't going to cower in your sister's arms and let him say it unchallenged. If no else will tell Odin where he can shove it you will!
