Helreginn

Vivid imagination perhaps attempted to fill gaps within thunderer's knowledge of Helheimr; does sovereign's being exist entwined with her world in a similar fashion as his flesh and blood threaded with the elements, the weight of her words settling uncomfortably both within his core and the very air he attempted to capture in his lungs.

' I do not,' and answers comes quiet, storm still drawn inward, held in a vice grip as a heavy breath leaves him, languidly pressing outward into much denser atmosphere.

' I would not be here, in your realm, beneath your sky, if I thought so.'

Balance, ripples and consequence; he had lived long enough to see how one life may shift the course of many, it was something understood, despite the flares his ignorance at times burning bright for all to see.

' I question because I do not know, for certain, and perhaps never will, what guides your hands and thoughts ' and tension eased from the massive shoulders, mouth pressing into a solemn, thin line.

' You may think me foolish, for regarding mortals in the way that I do. They are fragile, insignificant in the grand scheme of the cosmos, I am aware. Yet they shape more than we often credit.'

Gaze remains fixed on the path before them, the gangly and erratic foliage that was as unfamiliar to him as the depths of her inner workings, perhaps equally unnerving and rotten, yet worthy of existing.

Teeth bare, smile half amused and half self-depreciating. She aims to joke but sincerity shines more apparent, "That makes two of us." Hel understood parts of the worlds some spent whole lives and aeons trying to decipher.. and very little else. Nothing of her own self. Her ambitions and motives mumbled utterings beneath the screaming cacophony of instinct. Weary ears and disordered mind could never hear the undertones.

But deathling does hear his explanation. Like the tuning fork before the note, his words resonate.

Languid wrist unfurls to point upturned finger in his direction, "That part- is what I believe foolish. If they were insignificant, the balance of all things would not care for one life resumed."

Gentle breath leaves her nostrils. She understands his want of clarity. Some would give their eyes, Hel would give far more. To have it. To keep it. Even if she wanted to.. one who conceals.. could never give it.

Her best offer is only acknowledging that some answers, buried too long beneath grave dirt, can never be dug up.

"Frustratingly, I don't mean to obfuscate. My words are as clear as I can make them but the meaning..." She dances her fingers up in the air, wriggling them as her arm rises, "Always floats away before the sounds leave my throat."

Marisol slowed a bit when Hel matched her pace, the water settling around them. No map. No plan. Just a feeling. That should’ve worried her more than it did. Instead, something about it made sense. Not everything needed lines and directions because some things were just… followed.

“We can work with that,” she said, a little softer now. “Rivers lead somewhere. Even when you don’t know where you’re going, they usually do.” She glanced at Hel, studying her for a second longer than necessary. Marisol drifted closer without really deciding to, the space between them shrinking until it felt almost intentional. She reached out, lightly brushing her fingers against Hel’s wrist, quick and testing. Still warm. Still real.

“You’ve found him before, right?” she asked. “So there’s something you recognize. A feeling, or a pull… something that tells you you’re close?”

If she weren't so distracted with the task at hand, she'd take a more familiar, more brooding shape as she remembered how desperately at home she felt being weightless.

She didn't try to mask the hopeful smile that dimpled her cheeks. Marisol's willingness to help her was unexpected. It poured into her chest and washed away any doubt Hel had held that she wouldn't find him this time. Her gaze slowly found the fingers at her pulse. Hel blinked once, slow and curious. She turned her cheek down towards her shoulder as she watched Marisol, unsure what to make of the gesture.

Distracted by Marisol's words, she gave a small slow nod. "Blood calls to blood. When I am able to evade Rán's tendrils, I become like the sea turtles; Just waiting on a rip tide to take me where I am supposed to be."

@helreginn sent a sentence starter: ❛ i had it under control. you didn’t need to do that. ❜

𝄞₊ ⊹ -- Alexsander lowered his head in contrition. ❝I know…forgive me. I shouldn’t have overstepped.❞ He accepted responsibility – it was the only thing he felt he could do. He had allowed his personal grievances with her adversary to interfere with his decorum. He had no doubt in his mind that Hel could handle herself – that wasn't it. ❝I just…cannot stand to watch you be spoken down to like that. Not by him.❞ His concern for Hel manifested in his brooding gaze, downcast and sombre. ❝Mistake not my reservations for jealousy.❞ He added quickly. ❝But believe me when I tell you – his intentions are far from honourable. I…have my reasons for telling you this.❞ 

He would rather not revisit that vulnerability. Yet it arose anyway – the unpleasant memory forcing the tips of his claws into his palm, drawing blood from the pre-existing scrapes that scarcely had time to heal – a recurrent stress response working subconsciously to keep his emotions in check. Most of the time, he didn’t even realise he was doing it, though it was a simple and effective way of grounding himself in the moment.

Her brows wrinkled. She had nothing. Understanding of most conversations happened this way. Presumed meaning in the moment and clarity found hours past.

"Jealousy.." She noted aloud, something of an epiphanous note to her voice. Not only had the man been "speaking down", he'd been sizing her up and she'd failed to notice entirely. She couldn't mask the shudder revelation caused.

Squaring her shoulders back, Hel offered Alexsander a small nod of acknowledgement, "I won't say I condone it but I can say I appreciate it."

It was clear as day that he was in pain from every cough that tore through his lungs. Loki hated every moment of this. Something like illness had always made the day feel longer. But laying around was not something he liked doing either. He was bored and getting more irriated with the whole thing with every passing moment. And for Loki staying in one place and doing nothing was its own brand of torture. But his wary body was giving him no choice in the matter as well. ❝ I am quite sure that I would die of boredom long before any illness like this claimed me, laying here all day is insufferable. ❞ He was smirking a bit as he said those words. He knew that in the grand scheme of his lifetime, This moment was still small blip compared to. But the remaining issues was how often and easily he was becoming ill. He knew his natural immunity was still more damaged than it should be. ❝ Even if this illness, is but a blip in my long life, these blips are becoming far too often. ❞ he doubted there was anything he could do. He just had to ride them out. But when he felt better he wanted to spend time with his daughter properly. Loki was coughing again and groaned in pain. His eyes closed as he wrapped and arm around his stomach. Loki knew that he would recover and he had her to care for him. He knew that she would make sure he did get well again as well. But right now he was just so tired he barely could function and was starting to fall asleep again.

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Fortunately compartmentalization came as second nature and nurturing the not-yet-dead first.

Her gaze met his, a pointed stare as she bristled, "They will continue their pace until you learn to look after yourself.." In her vision, it was as if the words spilled out, their letters and syllables tangible like synesthisia. She watched them tumble out of her mouth and bounce right off the wall. Her father may have heard them but she knew before the sound even dissipated that he would not listen.

Tell me what I must do. Do I follow, when you give the word?

There were more mysteries in the world than he knew, it seemed. What was this place, and her connection to it? If the danger were not to present, he would be interrogating her.

Simply wait for my return. Her mouthless voice returned. Silent as you are able.

The Doctor went very still at the word she used. It was not Doctor. It was older. Older than Gallifrey’s burnt-orange skies. Older than the name he’d taken and the one he’d run from. “Oh,” he breathed. “That one. Haven’t heard that in a while.” He adjusted his coat. “I retired it. Bad branding.”

The wind shifted around him, and he did not turn as she circled him, though his eyes followed her reflection in the crystalline horizon. “Stories,” he agreed quietly. “Yes. We understand stories. We survive them. Sometimes we are them.”

At her invitation, his gaze flicked to the TARDIS. The blue box thrummed, and he arched an eyebrow. “Oh, don’t start. You like her,” he muttered to the ship. He paused then he turned to Helreginn. “And that worries me.” He stepped away from the place where he’d tapped the frost. “You say I’m welcome so long as I mean no ill-will. That’s generous. Suspiciously generous.” His eyes narrowed slightly. “Realms like this don’t trade in generosity. They trade in balance. In debt. In inevitability.”

He looked back at her fully now. “You’re not keeping me out,” he said. “You’re not trying to trap me. You’re not threatening. Which means one of two things.” A finger lifted between them. “Either I am spectacularly beneath your notice or you need something.”

One corner of her mouth lifted as he too spoke of stories. For an aeon now, when all was quiet and she sat alone, just her hollow realm and the endless dead, stories were all the company Hel had to keep. They sustained her far better than the food she was loathe to eat or the wine she over-consumed. Her eyes gleamed with curiosity; If maybe his words were as intentionally load-bearing as her own.

Hel stopped circling him.

"You're a deeply mistrusting fellow," she said, a breathy laugh to follow. "You have never been in my realm before. Not once, not in any of your lives. How do you know what I trade in? How do you know the weight of your presence?" Goosebumps prickled down her spine as overlapped sense of déjà vu slammed into her chest. He was not the first, not even this week, to purport to understand her realm while having utterly no idea about it.

The goddess blinked slow and asyncronously, exasperation apparent. In the briefest - almost imperceptible - moment between eyes squinting and fully shut, the golden honey of her irises was traded for pale grey.

His next guess, she let sit a while, lips pressed together, unable to conceal the amused smile his own unintended insult conjures in mischievous thoughts.

Either way, he struggled to understand how all of these creatures could have one father. Clearly, he wasn't human, to produce such varied offspring. And from Hel's description, he didn't seem like a pleasant sort of man.

"Did you grow up with him?" he asked gently.

Oblivious to the man's confusion, Hel went on to explain but not clarify, "He was doting once. Warm and open. I think the world of him." Think. Think. Thought. She pressed her lips together tightly, admonishing herself for the unwavering heart all her family resented.

He had betrayed them. Betrayed her. And she couldn't bring herself to hold it against him. Not because she was admittedly the most similar to him or because she was so naive as to misinterpret heinous actions.. Truthfully, she didn't know why. By all accounts, she should hate him. But she'd long since given up trying to make sense of her own heart. It's current flowed as mysteriously as the Élivágar.

"Maybe." Eve said. She had little experience with people, but all of the interactions she had did not instill her with confidence. She had seen all of them and well maybe it was because Hel wasn't a human. Though she had seen just the same from others like her or just like her.

The tone is familiar, deflection dressed as jest, resolve wrapped in barely-present restraint, something the As had utilized himself, often and recklessly.

' It is,' the retort comes at last, sharp yet shaped calmly, his own deep bass void of any disdain or mirth.

Gaze shifts to the scenery beyond, toward old fields and envisioning halls hiding behind the horizon, where grudges were fed eagerly like fires of a hearth.

' I do not doubt you gave them fair and true warning,' and a breath is released, warm air mingling with its near-icy counterpart.

Concern settles upon countenance, the shapes and lines of features visibly contorting during the change.

' The Jötnar are not a people who heed caution when pride is stirred. Neither are mine, if we are being honest. If it comes to blows, it will not end at your borders. It never does.'

A pause, and voice is adjusted to not carry the worry it so audibly held a moment before.

She knows what she asks.

Ire turned outwards, unearned.

A war she does not want but weighs against an eradication they could not avoid...

"It is not what I want but if you stand too long, feet pointed in my direction, eyes staring into the heart of me, my realm.." She inhales shallow and sighs deep. Fatigued. "A war that was already coming or the total extinction of my people.. I.." Bone thin fingers reach for the pendant above her sternum, the only security blanket inprisonment allowed her to keep. "I'm but one woman. I've no oracle, no sage man or woman of wisdom to guide me. I've run down the scenarios in my head until my thoughts fractured."

Unkind ears play games with said thoughts. The horns of war and screams, closer to memory than prophecy. She winces.

He had heard the rumors; he had seen the nests to the north, said once to have been the homes of beings taller than trees. But nobody in living memory had seen one.

Truthfully, he did know nothing of giants, particularly if Hel was implying that she was in any way related to them. He'd heard that they were kindhearted, yet dimwitted, which Hel certainly was not.

It made sense that she would be born in winter, a daughter following several sons. It matched her temperament. But that didn't answer his question.

"But where?" he pressed.

The dead of winter.. Fimbulvetr's first cold sigh. The youngest and only.. One who stands apart.. Her beginning an end, the quiet whispered warning before the horns.

She remained quiet a while, her stare contemplative and soul-piercing as it ever were. Then she smiled again, thoughts abandoned, "If I told you a name, would it have any meaning to you at all?"

He knelt beside her, reaching cautiously for her hand. Not out of fear, but uncertain if his touch was welcome.

"Hel..." his voice was barely more than a whisper. "I..."

Her name, always most precious a sound from his mouth, was the necrosis of her insides. Painful.

She slowly lifted her eyes to him, whole skies and oceans swirling their sunset depths.

She inhaled, sharp but quiet as tears fell and cleared her vision in their absence. She brought her other hand to cover her mouth.

Hel had almost... Almost...

Almost stole from herself moments already too few.

And more than almost borne a guilt she would never shake in her attempts.

It’s evident how much Hel relishes in the forest. Váli can see it on her face, in her eyes, in the way her walk slows and muscles relax. And he must admit, he does feel better. Perhaps his sister is on to something with her longing for the quiet of the woods. Though, if Váli were alone, he knows it would only take a matter of moments before the ever-present dread took over. The gnawing reminder that something is coming for him, for them.

A caged creature in the gold and gossamer of godly city, she remembers herself in the wilds.

She slowly rolls her head across her neck to meet his eye, a playful grin worn on night-pale face. A single thin brow quirks upward, silent challenge. They both know she'd get in less trouble. And also with what strength she could drag him low should he betray her..

Setting her sights forward, her smile grows into something more sincere. Future trouble or no, she delights in the serenity of now. Without much thought or a single word, Hel leans over and takes her brother's hand in her own before she begins happily swinging his arm between their two bodies.

"You're just...good?"

That didn't quite fit, either. If she was a purely benevolent god, she would choose more than just him to help. Unless she had a whole group of pet projects that she just kept separate from one another, she seemed to treat Dustfinger with a difference.

After a beat, Hel schooled her expression as she lifted her face towards his. Her voice softened, frustration dulled against the curl of her tongue as she replied, "There was no decide. I try my best to offer comfort where I'm able. But yes," She nodded once and turned her fingers up towards the man, "you were there. And I was able. No thought, just raw instinct. I cannot explain it. I cannot justify it. And you, you need to stop overthinking it. "