#and the hand-through-heart thing WITH THE SPEAR OF DESTINY AROUND?? POETIC

[tacagen]

WHY IS NOBODY TALKING ABOUT HOW THIS SUCKER NOT ONLY GOT A NEW DESIGN BUT FUCKING DIED AGAIN EXACTLY 3 PAGES LATERRR

[justfandomwritings]

The Soul Stone (Part 1 - Loki)

Pairing: Loki x Reader

Word Count: 2.3k

Warnings: None right now

Summary: The Soul Stone had a soul all its own, and she was destined for power and greatness that only one man every truly understood.

Notes: This is more introduction than actual chapter.... It’s a bit, how to put it, it’s a bit more “Marvel Mythology” than most Marvel fanfiction is, but I think it’s kind of a fun take on it. (P.S. For fans of my blog, this is not the Loyalty spinoff).

Soul holds a special place among the infinity stones. You might say it has a certain wisdom.

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Not many living had witnessed the power of an infinity stone. Fewer still had wielded one and lived to tell the tale. If more had, they might have seen the difference. They might have known.

Philosophers might have waxed poetic about the essence of each stone’s purpose. Historians might have cited stories and myths of their power and its consequences. Humanitarians might have argued about the ethicacy of using such weapons on other beings. Generals might have deterred their use for fear of the recoiling effects on the man or woman who wielded such a thing.

As it was, no one knew, and no one saw it coming. 

The infinity stones bestowed great power on those strong enough to wield them and destroyed those too weak but bold enough to try. Between them, they controlled the six singularities of life and the universe: Space, Mind, Power, Reality, Time, and, of course, Soul. 

Since the dawn of time, since the cosmos divided these concentrated entities from each other, only two had found their way back together: Space and Soul.

How Odin found them, no one ever knew. He left Asgard and his pregnant queen one day with two eyes and empty hands and returned with one eye and two stones to a baby nursing at her breast. 

The Fates, he thought, had blessed him. A beautiful baby girl and enough power to conquer all the realms. Perhaps the Norns had gone soft. 

Urdr seemed old even then, and though she had lived just as long as her sister, Verdandi had never aged a day in body or mind. Perhaps the older sister’s memory had let something slip and the ageless sister’s mind was not wise enough to catch her mistake. 

It seemed, to Odin, a likely thought. The Norns were never so kind if they could help it. They showed up at the birth of every child and judged them for their worth, on their family’s past and the world at present. It was not in their nature to be so giving. 

Odin didn’t know, and how could he have, that the stones lived a life all their own, that one of them also judged him. There was no one to ask about the power the Fates had laid at his feet. There was only Odin and his thoughts. 

Looking down on the two stones, he kept the blue for himself and gifted the yellow to his daughter. 

Space was Odin’s to command, and the souls belonged to Hela. Though it would be wrong to say she commanded it. More accurate to say that it commanded her.

The stones bestowed great power on all those who wielded them, and the Asgardians were no exception. But that power came at a cost. 

A cost Odin only realized too late, when he looked out from his throne and saw his daughter, realms away in Jotunheim, slaughtering men, women, and children by the millions with no remorse. She wasn’t his daughter anymore. She was a monster of his own creation, of the soul stone’s creation

If the philosophers, historians, humanitarians, or generals had gotten to see the stones at work before he laid one around his daughter’s neck, they might have been able to tell Odin what the Fates had truly ‘blessed’ him with. 

Space, Mind, Power, Reality, and Time. These were all parts of the universe which existed around the wielder of their stones, things that someone could manipulate and control. But the soul was a different story. To command the stone was to have a soul, and to have a soul was to be at the mercy of the Soul. No one ever used the stone, the stone used them for its own purpose. 

Souls were dynamic, fickle things; and their stone was no different. It let souls go and called them back on a whim, tumultuous and violent. 

Anyone who held it long enough would know that, but it allowed few to live long enough to learn. 

Hela was one of those, and in her it created a bloodlust unmatched across the millennia. In her, it created a goddess of death. 

Odin sent the Valkyrie against her, but by the time they arrived they were no match for her cruelty. 

It took the Space Stone and Odin himself riding against her, drawing her out to the edge of the universe and trapping her beyond the boundaries of it with his own infinity stone, before her murderous rampage finally came to its end. 

And there, where his daughter had once stood, where Odin had consumed her with a blue portal of his own making, was the Soul Stone. Floating in the nothingness, waiting to be claimed.

He thought of leaving it there. He thought of running from his pain, from his failure, from his mistake. 

In his youth, he had thought it was the key to his ascent. Now, he saw only his demise, for there was no truer demise than turning his back on his own blood.

It was only the knowledge of the monster that lay within the seemingly innocent yellow gem that kept Odin from walking away. 

He didn’t make the same mistake twice.

Out on the edge of the known, and creeping beyond it into what lay yet undiscovered, Odin crafted a new portal and followed the Soul Stone through it. He touched down on the planet above whose surface he had fought his daughter. A planet which would one day bear the name Vormir. 

He buried it there, at the base of a mountain and spent months casting over it a spell which, by the end, he was sure even the Norns themselves could not break.

The stone would never see the light again, he was sure of it. To use the stone would be to sacrifice what one loved most, and he could think of no one who would do such a thing but a monster, and monsters could not love. 

As he whispered the last words of his incantations, sealing the stone beneath the surface, a pulse of golden light echoed through the air, not of Odin’s doing.

Just as the Space Stone was present with a doorway to all creation, the Soul Stone was alive with a soul all its own. It knew what was being done to it, and its bloodlust, its longing for more souls, would never allow for such a thing willingly. 

In its dying moments before it was consumed in the earth for millennia to come, the Soul Stone went against its nature. It released a soul, a piece of itself to see to its purpose.

A baby, falling from the heavens and into Odin’s arms.  

“At last.”

Odin didn’t know what sorcery this was, but his instincts clutched the babe to his chest as he whirled his spear on the voice behind him.

“Urdr, Verdandi,” Odin greeted coldly. “You knew what would happen when you took my eye. You knew what would come of this.” 

“We knew nothing.” Urdr rejected. “Only that it was your fate to end up here.”

“And to bring us her,” Verdandi finished her sister’s sentence.

They had a way of doing that. Urdr was the past, finished by Verdandi, the present. 

Verdandi nodded, “and completed by her.” She spoke as though she could hear Odin’s thoughts, as though she could see into his mind and body, could know what he was thinking, feeling, doing, at any moment. And perhaps she could.

“The future,” Urdr took a sloshing step through the water in which the three figures stood, “is in her hands now. She is one of us.” 

Odin looked down at the sleeping, innocent face of the baby girl in his arms. She had come out of nowhere. Fallen from the sky as he finished sealing the stone away from the universe forever. A blinding golden light and then a baby, falling through fog and smoke. 

She was in his arms before he could of who she was or the consequences she might bring. She was, after all, just a child, only a child. Too small to understand where she was, too small to know who he was, too small to comprehend what he’d done. 

It was impossible to believe. This child, a Norn. Urdr had been older than anything in existence for longer than anything had existed. Verdandi had been present longer than the presence of the Aesir or any other living thing could remember. Now they thought to add a child to their midst. A child who rested in his arms. 

“She completes us.” Verdandi took a step forward. “It was always your destiny to bring her to us, though we could not see it until she was here to show that to us.” 

“You would take the child from my arms.”

It wasn’t protectiveness that made Odin protest her removal. He felt no affection for her. In fact, when he looked down on her, he felt nothing at all. She was, seemingly, this whole in his vision for which he could not attribute a single emotion. 

He protested in defiance of Urdr and Verdandi. They had known, in some part of their minds, what would come of him and his daughter, what she would do to the universe and what he would have to do to stop her. 

“We take nothing for which you will not be repaid twice over.” Verdandi promised. “She has shown us that.” 

Twice over. Two children. Odin didn’t have the heart, not after Hela. 

“Go home, Borrson.” Urdr urged. “Go home to your wife and your son. We are not done with you yet, but there will be many blessings in your kingdom before we meet again in strife. Enjoy them while you can.” 

Odin was powerful, with the Space Stone in his pocket even more so, but even he dare not stand up to Fate made flesh. 

He handed the baby over to Verdandi as he walked past with his head hung under the weight of his pain. 

As promised, he returned home to find Frigga with his son in her arms.

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Loki. One of the priestesses of the temple had given Odin the baby’s name. 

For the third time in as many weeks Odin found himself with a baby in his arms. 

The first belonged to Fate. The second belonged to him. The third belonged to Laufey. 

Abandoned by the King of Jotunheim as Hela launched her attack, Loki was too small for the Frost Giant to give him even a passing glance. A war was being waged on their soil and only the strongest were worthy of the King’s time. 

Two weeks he had sat on the steps of the temple waiting to die, as all around him Hela slaughtered armies by the thousands. Two weeks he had survived every knife and sword that went flying over his head, every crumbling icicle and stone from the columns of his final sanctuary, every blast and bolt of the battle taking place around him. Not to mention the hunger, the thirst, the chill.

Laufey had abandoned his son for being small, but Odin could see the boy was strong. 

He wasn’t waiting to be rescued; he wasn’t waiting to die. He was surviving on his own, as best any child could. 

Something in him made Odin stoop to pick up the baby. Pity, impulse, or something else entirely, Odin dropped to one knee and reached for Loki.

Blue skin turned white as Jotunn touched Aesir, and only the weight of his tiny body in Odin’s arms kept the King from drawing back in shock.

A child, this child, was his enemy, as true as any other in the universe. It was Jotunheim whose defiance had brought his daughter to madness, Jotunheim who had forced him to turn against his own family, Jotunheim who defied his will and rule even now. 

And Laufey was their king. This was, by all counts, Laufey’s son. Odin should, by all rules of war, kill the boy now as a message to his father. But then, hadn’t Laufey already done as much.

He’d abandoned his son to the snow and frost with no intention of bringing him back in from the cold. He hadn’t checked on the boy during the fighting, hadn’t lifted his eyes toward the temple, hadn’t protected his son in any way. Laufey had been content to let him die, by blade or by weather, during the fighting. Loki was as good as dead, and killing him wouldn’t make that any more true.

Something in Odin whispered to him. Whispered that Hela was the Goddess of Death, not Odin. Whispered that the boy didn’t have to die. Whispered that if death was his Fate then the Norns would have taken him before Odin arrived. Something whispered that he should take the boy,  whispered that no one would miss him, whispered that his place didn’t have to be here, whispered to bring him to Asgard.

And Odin, for once, listened. Not because he wanted to, but because somewhere, on the other end of the galaxy, realms away, the future of a little girl with more power than she realized willed it. 

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Next Time on Part Two.... Coming Soon

Taglist

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[micoroll-blog]

The Poetic Eddas

Lays of the Gods Voluspa

The Wise-Woman's Prophecy

1.2.3.4.5.6.7.8.9.10.11.12.13.14.15.

Hearing I ask from the holy races, From Heimdall's sons, both high and low; Thou wilt, Valfather, that well I relate Old tales I remember of men long ago.

I remember yet the giants of yore, Who gave me bread in the days gone by; Nine worlds I knew, the nine in the tree With mighty roots beneath the mold.

Of old was the age when Ymir lived; Sea nor cool waves nor sand there were; Earth had not been, nor heaven above, But a yawning gap, and grass nowhere.

Then Bur's sons lifted the level land, Mithgarth the mighty there they made; The sun from the south warmed the stones of earth, And green was the ground with growing leeks.

The sun, the sister of the moon, from the south Her right hand cast over heaven's rim; No knowledge she had where her home should be, The moon knew not what might was his, The stars knew not where their stations were.

Then sought the gods their assembly-seats, The holy ones, and council held; Names then gave they to noon and twilight, Morning they named, and the waning moon, Night and evening, the years to number.

At Ithavoll met the mighty gods, Shrines and temples they timbered high; Forges they set, and they smithied ore, Tongs they wrought, and tools they fashioned.

In their dwellings at peace they played at tables, Of gold no lack did the gods then know,-- Till thither came up giant-maids three, Huge of might, out of Jotunheim.

Then sought the gods their assembly-seats, The holy ones, and council held, To find who should raise the race of dwarfs Out of Brimir's blood and the legs of Blain.

There was Motsognir the mightiest made Of all the dwarfs, and Durin next; Many a likeness of men they made, The dwarfs in the earth, as Durin said.

Nyi and Nithi, Northri and Suthri, Austri and Vestri, Althjof, Dvalin, Nar and Nain, Niping, Dain, Bifur, Bofur, Bombur, Nori, An and Onar, Ai, Mjothvitnir.

Vigg and Gandalf) Vindalf, Thrain, Thekk and Thorin, Thror, Vit and Lit, Nyr and Nyrath,-- now have I told-- Regin and Rathsvith-- the list aright.

Fili, Kili, Fundin, Nali, Heptifili, Hannar, Sviur, Frar, Hornbori, Fræg and Loni, Aurvang, Jari, Eikinskjaldi.

The race of the dwarfs in Dvalin's throng Down to Lofar the list must I tell; The rocks they left, and through wet lands They sought a home in the fields of sand.

There were Draupnir and Dolgthrasir, Hor, Haugspori, Hlevang, Gloin,

Dori, Ori, Duf, Andvari, Skirfir, Virfir, Skafith, Ai.

1.2.3.4.5.6.7.8.9.10.11.12.13.14.15.16.17.18.19.20.

Alf and Yngvi, Eikinskjaldi, Fjalar and Frosti, Fith and Ginnar; So for all time shall the tale be known, The list of all the forbears of Lofar.

Then from the throng did three come forth, From the home of the gods, the mighty and gracious; Two without fate on the land they found, Ask and Embla, empty of might.

Soul they had not, sense they had not, Heat nor motion, nor goodly hue; Soul gave Othin, sense gave Hönir, Heat gave Lothur and goodly hue.

An ash I know, Yggdrasil its name, With water white is the great tree wet; Thence come the dews that fall in the dales, Green by Urth's well does it ever grow.

Thence come the maidens mighty in wisdom, Three from the dwelling down 'neath the tree; Urth is one named, Verthandi the next,-- On the wood they scored,-- and Skuld the third. Laws they made there, and life allotted To the sons of men, and set their fates.

The war I remember, the first in the world, When the gods with spears had smitten Gollveig, And in the hall of Hor had burned her, Three times burned, and three times born, Oft and again, yet ever she lives.

Heith they named her who sought their home, The wide-seeing witch, in magic wise; Minds she bewitched that were moved by her magic, To evil women a joy she was.

On the host his spear did Othin hurl, Then in the world did war first come; The wall that girdled the gods was broken, And the field by the warlike Wanes was trodden.

Then sought the gods their assembly-seats, The holy ones, and council held, Whether the gods should tribute give, Or to all alike should worship belong.

Then sought the gods their assembly-seats, The holy ones, and council held, To find who with venom the air had filled, Or had given Oth's bride to the giants' brood.

In swelling rage then rose up Thor,-- Seldom he sits when he such things hears,-- And the oaths were broken, the words and bonds, The mighty pledges between them made.

I know of the horn of Heimdall, hidden Under the high-reaching holy tree; On it there pours from Valfather's pledge A mighty stream: would you know yet more?

Alone I sat when the Old One sought me, The terror of gods, and gazed in mine eyes: "What hast thou to ask? why comest thou hither? Othin, I know where thine eye is hidden."

I know where Othin's eye is hidden, Deep in the wide-famed well of Mimir; Mead from the pledge of Othin each mom Does Mimir drink: would you know yet more?

Necklaces had I and rings from Heerfather, Wise was my speech and my magic wisdom; . . . . . . . . . . Widely I saw over all the worlds.

On all sides saw I Valkyries assemble, Ready to ride to the ranks of the gods; Skuld bore the shield, and Skogul rode next, Guth, Hild, Gondul, and Geirskogul. Of Herjan's maidens the list have ye heard, Valkyries ready to ride o'er the earth.

I saw for Baldr, the bleeding god, The son of Othin, his destiny set: Famous and fair in the lofty fields, Full grown in strength the mistletoe stood.

From the branch which seemed so slender and fair Came a harmful shaft that Hoth should hurl; But the brother of Baldr was born ere long, And one night old fought Othin's son.

His hands he washed not, his hair he combed not, Till he bore to the bale-blaze Baldr's foe. But in Fensalir did Frigg weep sore For Valhall's need: would you know yet more?

One did I see in the wet woods bound, A lover of ill, and to Loki like;

By his side does Sigyn sit, nor is glad To see her mate: would you know yet more?

1.2.3.4.5.6.7.8.9.10.11.12.13.14.15.16.17.18.19.20.21.22.23.24.25.26.27.28.29.30.31.

From the east there pours through poisoned vales With swords and daggers the river Slith. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Northward a hall in Nithavellir Of gold there rose for Sindri's race; And in Okolnir another stood, Where the giant Brimir his beer-hall had.

A hall I saw, far from the sun, On Nastrond it stands, and the doors face north, Venom drops through the smoke-vent down, For around the walls do serpents wind.

I saw there wading through rivers wild Treacherous men and murderers too, And workers of ill with the wives of men; There Nithhogg sucked the blood of the slain, And the wolf tore men; would you know yet more?

The giantess old in Ironwood sat, In the east, and bore the brood of Fenrir; Among these one in monster's guise Was soon to steal the sun from the sky.

There feeds he full on the flesh of the dead, And the home of the gods he reddens with gore; Dark grows the sun, and in summer soon Come mighty storms: would you know yet more?

On a hill there sat, and smote on his harp, Eggther the joyous, the giants' warder; Above him the cock in the bird-wood crowed, Fair and red did Fjalar stand.

Then to the gods crowed Gollinkambi, He wakes the heroes in Othin's hall; And beneath the earth does another crow, The rust-red bird at the bars of Hel.

Now Garm howls loud before Gnipahellir, The fetters will burst, and the wolf run free; Much do I know, and more can see Of the fate of the gods, the mighty in fight.

Brothers shall fight and fell each other, And sisters' sons shall kinship stain; Hard is it on earth, with mighty whoredom; Axe-time, sword-time, shields are sundered, Wind-time, wolf-time, ere the world falls; Nor ever shall men each other spare.

Fast move the sons of Mim, and fate Is heard in the note of the Gjallarhorn; Loud blows Heimdall, the horn is aloft, In fear quake all who on Hel-roads are.

Yggdrasil shakes, and shiver on high The ancient limbs, and the giant is loose; To the head of Mim does Othin give heed, But the kinsman of Surt shall slay him soon.

How fare the gods? how fare the elves? All Jotunheim groans, the gods are at council; Loud roar the dwarfs by the doors of stone, The masters of the rocks: would you know yet more?

Now Garm howls loud before Gnipahellir, The fetters will burst, and the wolf run free Much do I know, and more can see Of the fate of the gods, the mighty in fight.

From the east comes Hrym with shield held high; In giant-wrath does the serpent writhe; O'er the waves he twists, and the tawny eagle Gnaws corpses screaming; Naglfar is loose.

O'er the sea from the north there sails a ship With the people of Hel, at the helm stands Loki; After the wolf do wild men follow, And with them the brother of Byleist goes.

Surt fares from the south with the scourge of branches, The sun of the battle-gods shone from his sword; The crags are sundered, the giant-women sink, The dead throng Hel-way, and heaven is cloven.

Now comes to Hlin yet another hurt, When Othin fares to fight with the wolf, And Beli's fair slayer seeks out Surt, For there must fall the joy of Frigg.

Then comes Sigfather's mighty son, Vithar, to fight with the foaming wolf; In the giant's son does he thrust his sword Full to the heart: his father is avenged.

Hither there comes the son of Hlothyn, The bright snake gapes to heaven above; . . . . . . . . . . Against the serpent goes Othin's son.

In anger smites the warder of earth,-- Forth from their homes must all men flee;- Nine paces fares the son of Fjorgyn, And, slain by the serpent, fearless he sinks.

The sun turns black, earth sinks in the sea, The hot stars down from heaven are whirled; Fierce grows the steam and the life-feeding flame, Till fire leaps high about heaven itself.

Now Garm howls loud before Gnipahellir, The fetters will burst, and the wolf run free; Much do I know, and more can see Of the fate of the gods, the mighty in fight.

Now do I see the earth anew Rise all green from the waves again; The cataracts fall, and the eagle flies, And fish he catches beneath the cliffs.

The gods in Ithavoll meet together, Of the terrible girdler of earth they talk, And the mighty past they call to mind, And the ancient runes of the Ruler of Gods.

In wondrous beauty once again Shall the golden tables stand mid the grass, Which the gods had owned in the days of old, . . . . . . . . . .

Then fields unsowed bear ripened fruit, All ills grow better, and Baldr comes back; Baldr and Hoth dwell in Hropt's battle-hall, And the mighty gods: would you know yet more?

Then Hönir wins the prophetic wand, . . . . . . . . . . And the sons of the brothers of Tveggi abide In Vindheim now: would you know yet more?

More fair than the sun, a hall I see, Roofed with gold, on Gimle it stands; There shall the righteous rulers dwell, And happiness ever there shall they have.

There comes on high, all power to hold, A mighty lord, all lands he rules. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

From below the dragon dark comes forth, Nithhogg flying from Nithafjoll; The bodies of men on his wings he bears, The serpent bright: but now must I sink