Chapter 4- Thorki

Thor dragged Loki back to his cell, which had been left empty. The guards stared and gaped, muttering about dark magic and necromancy. How could the False Prince still be alive, after the Allfather announced and the search party confirmed his death!? Had Thor Odinson actually found a way to bring him back? No, the prince didn't dabble in sorcery. It must be that snake, Loki, who had found a way to come back from the dead.

Paying no attention to them, Thor shoved Loki into the cell roughly and then stepped in. His younger brother straightened and brushed himself off before looking at Thor dryly. "Was that really necessary?" Thor ignored him completely, pacing around the cell before turning to glare at the wide-eyed guards, who were whispering among each other.

He was about to dismiss them when Loki raised a hand, gesturing to the guards, who stiffened for a moment before filing out quickly. Thor turned back to him, narrowing his eyes. "What did you do to them?"

Loki shrugged. "Just encouraged them to leave." He smiled innocently before seating himself at the table. "Ah, my old cell. Do have a seat." Thor glared in fury, before crumbling and sitting down. Loki, his younger brother, was somehow alive, and all the feelings he'd suppressed with grief came rushing back, somehow bigger than ever.

"How?" Spoken by Thor, the word seemed to reverberate around the room. Loki didn't look up, fiddling with the needle silently. "How did you survive that?" The elder repeated, a determined look in his eyes. "Tell me."

"I would; but I doubt you'd understand a word of it." Thor growled,"Try me." Loki shrugged. "Sure." Quickly, Loki rolled up his sleeves to show the now familiar scars embedded in his skin, permanent and many.

At his shoulders were two thick bandages that were being bled through. Thor was on his feet in a moment, peering at them. "I shall get a healer to assist you." However, Loki shook his head and unwound the bandages, inhaling sharply whenever the bandage caught on his sticky blood.

"W-wha...Loki!" Thor slammed his fist onto the table and yelled. "Are those-"

"Words of Power? Yes." Loki nodded calmly. Thor recognized the forbidden symbols from their lessons in the past. The symbols were so strong, they had to be forbidden after warlock followed warlock into the abyss of death, the symbols they tried to use driving them mad and in most cases over the edge. "I am fine. You wanted to know how, now you know how."

For a moment Thor waited, but Loki turned away, and so he left, sadness filling his eyes.

Later that night, Thor lay in his bed, unable to sleep. How was he to, when his younger brother, who somehow escaped the supposedly inescapable clutches of death, was ensconced in the dungeons below. After tossing and turning for a while, he shook his head and got up, slipping into his street clothes. It was a lost cause to hope for sleep tonight.

Just as he was about to leave, he picked up a small glass ball, the size of his palm, from the side table next to his bed. Shaking it gently, he spoke. "Glamour." Immediately, a sphere seemed to cloak his for a moment, and when it fell away, he looked completely different, short brown hair replacing his long blond locks and his features rearranged to look like that of a peasant. Smiling quietly to himself, he thanked Loki once again for the present his younger brother had presented him for his 17th birthday, knowing the elder loved sneaking out to mingle with the commoners.

He slipped out the door, quietly and quickly avoiding the guards and padding into the streets, heading for the nearest tavern.

It was time to see what trouble the guards had stirred up this time.