Challenge Twenty-Four

#WIPWednesday - Excerpt/Blurb of your work in progress.

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I have several works in progress, but I like to stick with Fanfic for Wattpad. So, I have been working on a 'To Live Again' sequel on my downtime between editing major works. Editing of which IS TRYING TO END ME. So, progress is slow with the sequel, but I'll finish it someday.

Also, because I am a Marvel/Mythology nerd, I'm slowly writing a Loki/Sigyn fic, based in the Marvel Thor world. So some of that is already available on Wattpad, but I know it's buried under that infuriating Algorithm. So, I've added a little excerpt for that too. Mostly because I'm working on that again...because...THOR RAGNAROK FEELS.

'One More Moment'
Prologue taken from Legacy of Hope - A To Live Again Sequel.
By: CJ Callahan

Three thousand years, they reckon.

Three thousand years - if not more - have passed. I don't count. I don't like too. Numbers, and archives, and dusty, old ledgers, stacked up on creaking shelves seems a meaningless recount of the years.

My Naneth always told me to live.

She would say; 'Celairiel don't spend your life looking back or gazing forward, you won't find anything remotely useful there. Just live right now, in this very moment, and feel everything...soak it all up...because you shall never feel it so strongly again.'

I loved my Naneth's wisdom. She was never wrong...not once. I would tell her I lived if I could. Oh, just one more moment with her would be grand.

One more moment.

After centuries of moments lived, why is one more so important?

Ai...Just a moment...all the things I would do in just one more moment.

I'd stare at the sun a second too long. I'd kiss my niece on her perfect little nose. I'd dance with my older brother, and sit and read awhile with my younger. I'd rest at my mother's knee as she brushed my hair. I'd stand with my Adar under the forest eaves at twilight, listening to him recount the ancient years.

I would relish every detail, because even in three thousand years, there are never enough moments like those. Never enough times to whisper 'I love you' to your parents as you race out the door. Never enough opportunities to tell your brothers' just how proud you are of them. Never enough seconds to waste away in laughter with family and friends.

Standing here, on the edge of oblivion, somewhere between madness and sensibility, I can't help but think of all the moments I wasted. In the face of terrible evil all I can see is the wasted opportunities to pour love into simple lives.

But, none of that matters now.

Not even him.

Although, if I had one more moment, I'd spend it all on him.

Just to see his smile. A smile that has more light and kindness in it than a thousand words could ever express. He makes the world better just by being in it. That is why I stand here, not him, never him.

He will understand...only he could.

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Two Edged Sword
Excerpt from Chapter Two of 'Is It In You?'
By:  CJ Callahan

Absently, Loki plucked at a string of cord unravelling from the frayed ends of the blanket draped across the couch. He let his attention become fixated on the motion of winding the thread tightly around his fingers, until the blood choked from the skin and turned them blue. A deeper, harsher, blue than  that of any true Asgardian. His suffocating digits seemed almost navy now as they turned numb, he grimaced and brashly yanked the thread free of the blanket, tossing it half way across the prison cell in his irritation with it.  It was funny how such an insignificant object reminded him so much of his hatred for Odin. The god of lies and mischief he may be, but it was Odin that made it so - he created the lie, Loki was only bringing it to fruition. You reap what you sow, and all of that poetic philosophy. 

There was a clang in the stillness, not a particularly loud clang, but a muffled sound of wood against stone. A few of the inmates snuffled and rolled over in there sleep, huffing at the mild disturbances, but for the most part everything remained quiet. Loki twitched towards the sound, and fluidly came into standing. His eyes trained curiously to a point in the distance were the noise emanated from. He narrowed his gaze, striding confidently to the edge of his cell.

There was something free and unbound scurrying about in the dark. Something opportunistic and sneaky...he knew a rat when he heard one.

Raising his index finger, Loki tapped the force-field like glass. Whatever or whomever it was - if they were up to no good - should know that the prison guards were 'resting their eyes' beyond the pillars of the main corridor. The coast was relatively clear, any unsavoury guests would be most welcome now.

The guest, however, was not a rat. In fact they were more like a frightened mouse.

Shoeless feet appeared around the edge of a pillar, and with quick but silent dance like motions, they almost glided across the cold ground. The rustle of the white silk and tulle hems of a dress was the only noise, as a spectre appeared in the night to haunt Loki...or perhaps it was the other way around?

"Lady Sigyn, to what do I owe the unfortunate displeasure?" Loki asked in a mocking voice, his lips twisting up into an angry snarl.

"You would not have said that so long ago," Sigyn replied quietly as she slide up against the brick columns supporting the cell. "You can be as hurtful and vindictive as you like, I care little."

"Then why are you here?" Loki prompted his sneer widening when the woman's grey eyes boggled knowingly. Sigyn didn't answer, instead she bit her lip and bowed her head. She was always too easy to read, her heart was too open. Placing his palm on the glass, Loki leaned towards the guilty party; "it is a simple question...if you do not care why are you here?"

"You are twisting my words," Sigyn hissed, her eyes suddenly snapping upwards to meet his, a strange new fire in them. "I said I care little how you treat me with your foul words, but I never said I did not care for you."

"Care?" Loki snorted and hunched back from the glass, chuckling darkly and shaking his head. "Oh Sigyn I am afraid you cannot win my forgiveness by throwing such petty emotions at me...caring? You care little for me, goddess of fidelity."

"You deny it all you want, but it does not change the truth Loki. You can twist and convince yourself otherwise, but you know how I feel. I would not risk my life by coming here if I didn't care," Sigyn murmured in a quiet but strong voice, her eyes never leaving his. He would not dream of challenging her on this...he couldn't...she did not believe it was in him to be so petty.

"You are nothing but a manipulator, a farce," Loki snapped, his eyes narrowing as he shrewdly observed how each word he flung at her caused her to react, though of course she tried not to. With each accusatory allegation he made, she tried harder to convince him - or maybe herself - that it was not so. It just as easy as he had imagined.

"Loki," she breathed and rested her forehead against the cell wall. "They told me you were dead. They tricked me. I thought I could trust them. I thought I could salvage your dignity, what was left of your memory, I did not know what else to do I was heartbroken!"

Tears sprung to Sigyn's eyes in that moment, as the memories of that fatal day returned. The destruction of the bifrost, and the lies she had been fed, it made her blood run hot in fury. When she discovered she had been hoodwinked into revealing Loki's plans to a devious Sif, it was all too late. The so called champion took her ill gained news to Odin and Sigyn found both herself and the memories of her fallen Loki disgraced.

She found out much later that he was still alive...alive and arrested! Not one soul came to tell her, not even the Queen. It was by mere gossipers on the streets that she heard the tale - Loki had tried to take rulership of Migard, only to fail at the hands of the Mighty Thor. What wonderful transformation did that brute go through to make him any more deserved of the throne than Loki? Just because of blood and entitlement, like he was some kind of prized bull. It was despicable, and Sigyn had long since decided that bowing to Thor was not something she could stomach.  He was the unworthy one in her eyes, because he had always deemed himself more worthy than her...more worthy than most. Not that Loki was much better, but his ways were more appealing.  He thought before he spoke, considered before he acted, and that held more merit to her than a god with a hammer and a thick head!

"I was always loyal to you, you know that to be true," Sigyn groaned, the pain in her chest burned and bile rose in her throat. It was confusing and painful to see her love before her; alive and thriving.

She had believed him long dead, she mourned him, and now he was here and she could almost touch him. Her lifelong friend, her confidant, the man she gave herself to. Yet, here he stood, hating her and rebuking her for her infidelity...the shame was almost unbearable.

Loki watched on with a stoic face, barely touched by the broken pleas Sigyn mewed. It was what he wanted, he wanted to see her beg for him. He wanted to let the shame of her one mistake burn her into acceptance and submission. Maybe then he could put that one little blip behind him and forgive her, after all she had forgiven him his on countless occasions...it was the least he could do. However, he still wasn't finished with her. She wasn't quite broken down enough...she still wasn't feeling it on a personal level.

"I find it rather ironic that you come here to snivel out your defence in a white gown," Loki mused, his gaze sliding away in the distance. He smirked at the sudden halt of her barely audible whimper. "White, the colour of purity, of fidelity, of innocence...is it not?"

"Loki...do not...it is all have-"

"Yes, I can see that," Loki sniffed in disgust. The dress was mended, the hems frayed, the white discolouring and turning grey. It had been a beautiful gown, he remembered the day she was gifted it by Frigga, for her honour and chastity. He also remembered the last time he seen it; were it lay as a crumpled heap on the ground.  When  he had thoroughly revoked any notions of honour and chastity.

It gave him a small pleasure to watch Sigyn's features colour at the shared memory. This was his true hold over her, and he could tell he still remained the only one that had ever touched her, and by the look in her eyes he was confident he would only ever be the one to possess her innocence. It was always exactly how he wanted it.

"A harlot in white...do you think you fool them goddess of fidelity?" His words were soft and sweet, and they cut straight into the core of her being. The final and finishing blow had been executed flawlessly.

Sigyn knelt to her knees, her eyes downcast, her lips parted in shock. She had not expected the blow, at least not one as low as that. Her fingers slid over the fabric of the worn out dress, the very last of her elegant gowns. It was a symbol for all she was, and a shrine for all she had lost. Loki knew this, he knew this because it was she that had comforted him that night.

The confusion and the panic at discovering what he truly was...a frost giant.

She had warmed his skin with hers, she had showed him acceptance in the face of fear, and she bolstered him when he needed it most. From the beginning she had been loyal, she had proven that to him that night. Loyalty, devotion, care was all that she displayed in the act and he was a fool if he thought for a second she did not see through his game.

"A harlot in white? Is it truly in you to call me that, you, a monster in a god's skin?" Sigyn spoke evenly as she rose to her feet, her tear rimmed eyes falling over Loki, she half smiled at the flinch he gave. Those were the words he had whispered when he showed himself to her, before he cowered from her touch. "You can point the finger at me, my dearest Loki, but I know the words you spoke in the dark that night. I also remember the pleasure and the joy. I remember each touch and how you held me, and I remember the days that followed. The promise you made, the confession you gave, and the gift-"

"Stop!" Loki snarled and lunged at the glass. The same cutting knife he used to slice into Sigyn was slowly worming its way into his heart. Sigyn barely flinched from his advance, she bravely held his seething gaze and the ice in his veins began to splinter; "The Loki you speak of is dead! He was weak and disillusioned, when he allowed one as pathetic as you to bolster him...I will not make that mistake again!"

"My love," Sigyn murmured sadly as her eyes soaked up the pain and anger in his - although it was difficult to find beneath a layer of cold indifference. "Don't you know that they hurt me too?  You can loathe me all you wish, but right now, I am the only ally you've got...we both know that. I am not that naive Loki...you made sure of that."