Planar Chaos: Aethertow (Patreon)

IMPORTANT: This is the second of two chapters that I’ve posted today. You can read them in either order, but they’re going to be posted as Chapter 56 And then Aethertow. Scroll down to read the other one!

Planar Chaos: Aethertow

Continued from Armageddon 

In the end, I couldn’t do it by myself.

But I’d made Hel fight for every step into Asgard.

She was dragging me, now, by the scruff of my neck as she marched into the palace.

I could tell from the marble columns in my peripheral vision, even as I was too battered and weary to raise my head up and look around. My legs and feet scrapped against the floor, armor shattered. I was out of ideas, and more importantly, out of energy.

Hel, on the other hand, was still utterly immaculate, as if I hadn’t managed to stand in her way at all. As if I was just and inconsequential mortal as she’d called me. But the halls of Asgard told a different story. 

They were empty.

Not a single soldier, or noble, man or woman, was in sight. Every room, every corridor, every chamber was devoid of life. When I managed to glance around through the haze of agony pervading my limbs, I saw signs of hasty departure, tables overturned with food unfinished, weapons lying on the ground where they’d been abandoned.

There was only Hel, her henchman, and me. If nothing else, I’d bought the Asgardians enough time to run from their would be killer. Hopefully, that would be enough.

At length, we reached the throne room. Hela threw me halfway across the chamber, so that I landed face up beneath the glowing Mural of Odin and his sons and the realms protected by their benevolent rule. I’d always thought it was a bit much, but it never seemed polite to mention it.

The click of Hel’s boots on the stone rang out in the silence. She came to stand above me, all statuesque beauty and stone-dead eyes. “How far they go, to deny their rightful queen,” she said. I grunted, glancing towards her little pet Asgardian.

The hulking brute in armor looked about as comfortable as I felt, but he also resolutely avoided my gaze. I’d get no help from him. 

Not that the rest of the Asgardians had been much…help.

I could only shudder at the memories of the bodies, all in golden armor clad, covering the square in a carpet of yellow and crimson.

“Did you know,” Hela said, “that this is not the first Mural to grace the throne of Asgard?” 

“Please,” I muttered, “Enlighten me.”

She laughed throatily. “Do keep prattling, Mortal, it provides me no end of amusement.”

Then, with a flick of her wrist, a dozen swords flew up and shattered the ceiling. She took care to put one right in Thor and Loki’s eyes, petty bit of spite that it was. The metal tore into the mural, sending great chunks of stone and plaster plummeting to the ground. 

I quirked an eyebrow, crushed to death by alien art, what a way to go.

I saw the piece that would kill me, Odin’s massive head, amusingly enough, as it slowly cracked and cratered, before tearing free. It fell towards me, the old man’s eyes judging and stern. Sorry old man, thanks for the medical plan, though.

In a flash of steel, a massive blade shattered the stone. Instead of being crushed to death I was just splattered with flecks of stone and glowing paint instead.

“How nice,” I muttered.

“I think so too,” Hela said. “This is such a better piece of artwork.”

I blinked once, looking back up at the vaulted ceiling. There was, another Mural, hidden behind the first. They both had Odin, I noticed, but that was where the similarities ended. The first was all gold and bright, with paintings of unity. Loki in Thor done up with Halos of golden light.

This one was about war. 

The blood red background glowed like living shadows, cut starkly by figures in dark armor. Swords, spears, and the dead featured prominently. On one side was Odin, girded for battle and slaughter, directly opposite on the circular surface, was Hela, mounted on a giant wolf.

She looked down at me, a triumphant smile curving across her features. “See now? I am the true queen of the nine realms. Your true queen.”

“Pretty picture,” I said. “What’s behind this one?”

Hela blinked. “What?”

I coughed up a puff of dust. “I’m a pretty good friend of Thor’s, you know.” Her eyes tightened at that. Thin skin, such a common trait in villains. “And he didn’t seem to know about you at all.” Of course, he could have just not told me, but I was willing to bet…

“No,” Hela hissed, voice low. “Father never saw fit to inform his second born of the true Queen of Asgard.”

“Well,” I said softly. Hela leaned closer to catch my words. “Why do you think you were the first?”

She stiffened, eyes coming down into a sharp V. But before she could speak, or else stab me in the throat, I continued. “He was quick to lock up the past, wasn’t he? Almost eager to shut you away? What makes you so sure, then, that you were the first child he cast aside.” I could see the thoughts turning behind those dark eyes, the haze of paranoia sharpening into a blade of doubt.

Perhaps I’d learned more from Emma than I ever wanted to admit.

“What makes you so sure,” I said, “that there isn’t another Mural hiding behind yours. Another mistake, from before he ruled the nine realms. It would be easy to bury wouldn’t it? To hide so deeply that not even you would know about it. About a real first born…”

With a roar, she turned, plunging a wave of steel into the ceiling, tearing apart the stone. In a heartbeat, her visage cracked and tumbled down, revealing…

Blank stone, the floor above the throne room.

I turned my head to look at the other Asgardian, the one who trailed in her footsteps like a lost puppy. As our gaze’s met, I raised a brow as if to say ‘this is who you serve.’

Then Hela grabbed my throat and lifted me into the air. “Clever little snake,” she said, pulling me close enough that I could smell her breath. “You pour poison in my ear.”

“Then why did you listen?” I asked. “I thought you were so sure of your position as the ‘Queen’ of Asgard.”

Hela sniffed, casting me to the side. The ground wasn’t any softer this time, either. “The mural is of no consequence, I will rule Asgard, regardless of your petty plots.”

“And whom will you rule?” I asked with a grin. “Where are your subjects, oh great queen? What worshippers walk these halls?”

She stomped on my stomach. I gagged, breath forced from my lungs. I was still recovering with my power, slowly patching even this damage, but…

“I have been more than lenient with you, worm,” she said. “But I think it is time for you to learn your place. Where are my subjects, you ask? The petty cowards who fled will be brought to heel. As will the rest of the Nine Realms.” She leaned forward pressing her weight into me. “Starting with you.”

I gasped for breath as she hauled me upright again, forcing me into a kneeling position. “Kiss the feet of your Queen, human,” she said, a sword appearing in her hands. Wreaths of green fire wrapped around us. “Kiss my feet, and swear yourself to my service. Or I will cut you in two.”

I felt her power thrum around me in anticipation. It was waiting for my oath, eagerly. To bind me, to own me.

I laughed.

“Do you really think you’re the first?” I asked.

“You’ve used that trick already, little creature.”

I grinned. “Have I? You think you’re the first then, to hold a sword at my neck and bid me to bow?” I looked up at her. “You’ll find that we humans aren’t so easily cowed these days.”

Her sword pressed deeper, digging into my skin.

“Swear,” she hissed.

I lifted my chin. “I would rather die on my feet than live on my knees.”

Her eyes widened as I lunged, letting the sword cut across my throat. She pulled back, arm arcing up.

I tasted iron.

But I grabbed touched her wrist, pulled—

“What are—!”

And ripped us both from the fabric of reality.

I felt Hela strain in my grip, as if reaching back to touch Asgard.

But we had not limbs, nothing to grab onto here, nothing to push off of. Here all beings were adrift in an endless sea. And I could already feel the current eating away at her being.

All the power in Asgard wouldn’t save her here—

We lurched.

With a thunderous clarion, we crashed back into reality. My eyes widened as we smashed down into Odin’s elaborate throne. It shattered.

Hela screamed.

She looks as if she had been burned, with patches of skin flaking off into dust, but even as I watched she started to heal once more.

“Insolent—!” she stared, her hands reaching towards my neck.

I pulled again.

The first time, there had been no resistance, but now it felt as though Hela had braced against something. That she was somehow anchoring herself to Asgard.

Her fingers closed around my neck. Then, with a roar, I ripped us free.

Spikes of agony lanced through my chest as we slipped into the space between planes once more.

This time, I could feel as Hela tried to pull as back.

This time, we crashed through a rack of weapons, the armory. I grabbed her wrists before she could choke me.

Out again.

I lunged towards a distant plane. I felt like something was tearing inside of me, but I pulled.

Hela pulled harder.

My back hit a pedestal, cracking the stone and knocking the air from my lungs. A cube of ice and winter toppled to the ground, shattering.

Into the black. I saw the connection she had. Her very being, her power, was linked to Asgard. With it, and with her towering might, she pulled.

The burns were getting worse, already one eye was scabbed over.

But I could barely breath through the pain. Something inside of me was breaking.

Hela punched me, I caught her fist.

We tumbled, end over end, down a flight of stone steps. Something sharp dug into my stomach. 

I elbowed Hela in the face.

Her head snapped back. 

I yanked us into the darkness again.

I felt as she reoriented, pulling back towards Asgard.

This time I held on, stalling. It was as if the tips her fingers were on the ledge of reality. Through the connection, a seemingly infinite supply of power flowed into her.

While my reserves were finite.

I felt the flame in my chest gutter and snap. 

I felt Hela’s vicious joy as she clawed her way back into Asgard. Around us, the world began to solidify, her hand clenched on the edge of Odin’s shattered throne.

With a scream I pulled, reality fragmented, blurred away. I had no target, just away, away, away.

I pulled with every facet of my being, and I felt her teather stretch.

It was not immutable. 

But nor was I.

I was burning now, like and a core of molten gold trying to melt its way through my chest.

Slowly, Hela clawed her way forward once more.

I had nothing left to give.

Slowly, the formlessness began to sharpren, to give way to form.

But perhaps…

I saw her fingers, but more than that, I saw her connection digging deep into the essence of Asgard.

There was something I could take away.

With a roar, I brought the weight of my soul down upon Hela’s connection to Asgard. To the very land on which we fought.

It strained against me, clinging to her, by right of birth, by right of blood.

But I was a P*l%@nsw!^ker.

It shattered.

Form shattered.

I shattered.

Reality slipped away.

For a ceaseless breath, we hung, burning, in the space between all things. 

Then we slammed into the earthy ground. Trees and birds and clouds and sky closing around us. Reality replacing the void.

At my side, Hela tried and failed to push herself upright. Her burns, slowly closed, even now, but I could see there was no strength in her. 

I knew that there was none left in me.

In my chest, the barest ember flickered…

And died.