The chamber around the father and son changed, taking on the look of an outdoor courtyard. It was reminiscent of the courtyard in which Loki had killed Baldor. The paving stones spread out from the center where Loki and Farbauti were standing, spiraling out in a circular pattern and bordered by thick but relatively low stone walls.

Loki glanced down and then looked up and around, taking in the setting. Shivers raced down his spine and uneasiness settled in his stomach. He didn't have a good feeling about this, not at all.

When he glanced back up at Farbauti, his father was staring right at him, his eyes glittering with that intense light.

"The trial," he intoned. "Son, you must prove it to me. Prove that power flows through your veins. Prove to me the essences of fire and ice fuse in your blood!"

Farbauti stamped his foot, and lifted up his hands. Tendrils of ice snaked out from where the jotun stood, covering the courtyard with a sheet of thick ice. Loki glanced down only to see the ice enclose around his feet, securing them in place.

Farbauti only smiled when Loki looked up at him for an explanation. Spreading his hands out, the jotun started to speak as ice twined around his legs and webbed across his skin, forming a layer of crystals.

"This is the trial, Loki. Show me your power. And I don't want any of your Aesir power – I want your jotun power. This tournament was never about cunning or trickery. I tested that the last time you were here. No. Break your oath to Odin – yes, I know all about that. I felt like disowning you that day. But now – break your oath. Yes! Break it, abandon it, throw your word to the winds! Show me."

This was it. The deciding point. Skadi's words pertaining to his oath raced through his mind once more, and Loki closed his eyes. He had to decide. Would he break his oath to Odin, or would he choose not to?

The ice started to creep up Loki's legs, slowly entrapping him, as he deliberated. He had never put so much thought into breaking an oath before. But before, he had always been breaking an oath to a jotun. Now, he was breaking one to an Aesir. And not just any Aesir: he was about to break an oath to Odin, the Allfather.

Playing with fire earlier hadn't really been breaking the oath. It had been walking on a very thin line. But now, if he tapped into the ice power hiding somewhere inside him – considering he could even find it – that would be severely breaking his oath. And how would that affect his chances at a pardon from Asgard? His chance at reconciliation with Sigyn?

But he had to bring back Brisingamen to earn that pardon, to make up with his wife, and the only way that Loki could see to that end involved somehow defeating Farbauti.

The ice had reached Loki's waist now, and Farbauti's eager expression had twisted into a scowl. "You're starting to disappoint me, boy," he said quietly.

It was those words that decided Loki's course.

As the ice started to enclose his clenched hands, Loki closed his eyes once more and channeled his energy into his fingertips. For the first time in his life, he wanted to disappoint someone. He wanted Farbauti to look on him with disapproval. And most importantly, he wanted to show Farbauti that he still thought of himself as Aesir. That he was through fighting his half jotun, half Aesir heritage. He had forged a name for himself as no one other than Loki, the trickster. He didn't need a father's name. He hadn't even needed his mother's name.

He was simply Loki.

It took the jotun several moments to notice the skin of his son's hands glowing red. It took him another several seconds to figure out exactly what Loki was planning on doing.

"Don't...you...dare," Farbauti hissed, taking a threatening step forward. The ice covering his body glittered menacingly in the light. "I swear to you, you will regret it, boy."

"Perhaps," Loki said, looking up determinedly. "But I swore to Odin, that I was Aesir."

The ice imprisoning the trickster shattered as Loki's hands glowed with the intense heat of fire. Fringed with the glowing blue-white tongues of blazing flame, Loki lunged at Farbauti, a pattern that resembled the red glow given out by hot coals raging just beneath his skin.

"No!" Farbauti cried, anger racing through his voice. "You can't turn against us like that!"

Loki ignored him as his flaming fist landed a blow on Farbauti's ice-encrusted jaw. The ice cracked beneath the force of Loki's blow.

The blow seemed to snap the jotun out of his surprise and he attacked back with a strength and a fury that caught Loki off guard. But the trickster regained his balance after being forced back a few steps.

Father and son fought, the essences of ice and fire surrounding them, the one fighting for supremacy of his race while the other unleashing centuries of rage and pent up power. Loki punched and kicked, the flicker of fire protecting him from the ice of his opponent, while Farbauti tore at Loki, seeking to get past the fire guarding him. The ice hissed as it came into contact with the fire, smoke and steam rising and twining together, creating a slight fog around the two combatants.

But Loki had an injured leg slowing him down, and Farbauti had millennia of experience battling with ice as his weapon. This soon manifested itself as Farbauti slammed Loki into the ground and the fire coating his son extinguished suddenly and completely. The jotun, his knee planted firmly in Loki's chest, sneered down into his son's face.

"I told you you'd regret this."

Loki tried to struggle, but Farbauti just clamped his hand down on the trickster's throat. "Ragnarok is coming, whether you submit today or not, whether you endorse it or not," he told him. "It is barking at the Aesir's heels as we speak."

"I think..." Loki choked. "You just hear Fenrir."

Farbauti's eyes burned. Loki felt like they were going to blaze a hole straight through him. "Your wolf-son will soon have his vengeance. Yes, and Hel, too! And Jormungand will finally be permitted to rise from the seas and join us! And you...Loki, Trickster, Thief, my son, are fated to lead us all in the final battle! You will tear down the gods!"

As Farbauti said this, he held his ice-coated hand up. The frost around his fingers suddenly started to thicken and lengthen. Spikes of ice forked out from his fingertips, their points glinting.

Farbauti removed his knee from Loki's chest and shook his head in disapproval. "Don't make me want to kill you, boy."

And with that, Farbauti plunged the icicles protruding from his fingers into Loki's chest. Loki gasped, the freezing ice seeming to steal his voice away. Cold seeped into Loki's bones as he felt the icicles lengthening inside him, twisting their way around his organs. He felt one strand of ice brush against his heart, and intense agony overwhelmed him, made him dizzy. But he still couldn't scream.

Farbauti yanked his hand back, and Loki barely registered the fact that there was no longer any ice on it. His eyelids slid closed as the chill swept through him. He was going into shock.

"This will teach you a lesson," he heard Farbauti say. It sounded like it was coming from a million miles away. "You fail, you get punished. It's the only way you will ever learn." Standing, he looked down at his son, a pleased expression crossing his face as he surveyed his handiwork.

Loki was numb. He could hardly move. The freezing cold emanating from the ice crystals Farbauti had forced into him had rendered him immobile. He could still feel them twining themselves around his organs and the rest of his inner structures, wrapping themselves around blood vessels, curling around his bones, snaking their way up and down his spine.

Literally, Loki felt shivers going up and down his spine.

Farbauti nodded, his outline sharply distinct. It was like Loki could see every single detail of the jotun and the courtyard surrounding him. But as his father began to speak, the trickster realized his hearing was still not functioning correctly.

"Someday, you will understand why I had to do all this," Farbauti swore. "Someday, son. While I am glad to see you have control over the essence of fire, that is not the kind of demonstration I wanted to see today. I wanted to see ice. I needed to see the power sleeping inside of you."

Loki's teeth started to chatter. He could feel the ice slithering up the walls of his throat and up through the back of his mouth. A pulsing feeling began to shoot through his brain as the ice tendrils continued to ascend.

"This pain is not unnecessary, Loki," Farbauti continued. "I promise you. This...." He waved his hand in the air, fingers moving in a circular motion with the gesture, as he sought for the right words. "...invasion, of sorts, of your body is absolutely essential."

Loki drew in a deep breath; it scraped his throat going down, feeling like knives. "Why?" he mouthed, barely able to get his lips to form the word.

Farbauti, catching the question, considered it for a moment. "Why?" he repeated thoughtfully. "So you won't fail me again. This serves the dual role of punishment for everything preceding today, and preparation. For the future. For Ragnarok."

Loki's limbs were stiffening as the ice spread out through them. He didn't know how this ice was going to prepare him for Ragnarok, but he didn't think Farbauti was planning on elaborating on that point.

So this was it. The end. Between his injured leg and the five gaping wounds in his chest from which the frost had originated, Loki was finished.

"Baby, touch my hand."

The voice, the voice of his mother, jerked Loki out of his dazedness. She seemed to kneel beside him, her worn hand held out in front of him, the edges crackling with fire. Her form flickered, but she was there. Even if she was only a ghost.

"Touch my hand."

Loki stared at the image of Laufey. This wasn't a flashback, no. This was his mother.

The mother that had died thousands of years ago.

Loki shook his head slightly. He could barely even manage that simple gesture; how was he supposed to touch her hand?

Laufey seemed to understand and she brought her flaming hand closer. "Your father always considered you as an end to his means," she told him sadly. Her mouth never moved; her voice only existed inside his head. "But never me."

Loki felt tears spring up in his eyes, but the frost caught them and solidified them, covering his eyes with a thin film of ice.

"Baby, it's got to be now. Before you're gone. Please, Loki."

Slowly, Laufey started to lower her hand towards him. Farbauti, who had walked a few yards off, didn't seem to notice anything. As she lowered her hand, her form flickered severely, and she almost disappeared.

That motivated Loki to strain to lift his right hand to press against hers. It was something that she had done with him when he was a child. Her hand, with the fire dancing around it, and his hand, which would then catch the fire from hers. It was one of the earliest times he had ever played with flame. Before Laufey had grown much more wary about encouraging him along that path.

Ice cracked as Loki lifted his arm, inching it upwards. It seemed like forever before his palm came in contact with hers.

But there was no one there.

Loki felt his arm stiffening into his new position and he scowled inwardly. He remembered the dancing flames on his mother's hand and thought of those.

Fire.

The ice, which had spread throughout his body, now began to spread tendrils across to each other, filling up the space inside him.

Fire.

He didn't know what would happen when the ice finished spreading.

Fire!

And with that last, final surge of energy to his fingers, Loki's frozen hand burst into flames.