A Death Goddess' Mortal Enemy

I groaned as I woke up. The blinding purple lights surrounding me caused my headache to intensify. I tried to rub my eyes but found my hands were tightly bound behind my back. I muttered Icelandic curses under my breath, squeezing my eyes shut as if it would help the pounding in my head. I shook the loose strands from my braid out of my eyes as I attempted to stand up, but my feet were also bound. I opened my eyes and squinted, trying to limit the amount of light I saw. I found that the four walls surrounding me were covered in ornate mirrors. No wonder I had a headache. Other than the fact I had just been knocked out, the mirrors were reflecting the light back and forth in every direction.

I sighed and hung my head as I realized this was a torture tactic. I was known for being prideful in my youth. Now the mirrors showed Hel Lokidttor, a Princess of Asgard, the rightful Queen of Helheim, the goddess of death, and the ruler of the dead bound by what looked like tendrils of purple magic. The mirrors reflected a queen in torn robes and messy hair, with bruises and cuts slowly healing all over her body. It showed how the decaying corpse half of her body seemed to look even more rotted than usual. It showed a pathetic goddess. What lovely psychological torture.

Not to mention the mirrors and multiple lights prevented me from shadow-travelling. A form of transportation that used shadows to bring a being from one place to another. Because of the lights being everywhere, there were no shadows or penumbras I could get to.

A door opened, and my head swivelled around to look at it. Big mistake. The room spun as I shook my head to try and rid myself of the dizziness.

The door was a black gemstone-rimmed mirror. My room in my palace had one exactly like it. It seemed Lilith had done her research.

Lilith Iolanthe. Daughter of a renowned, probably dead, seer and a dead mage who had betrayed Asgard. The sorceress who had destroyed my realm, Helheim, and my childhood realm, Asgard, and kept them in a pocket realm that was literally in her pocket. Who had imprisoned my siblings and friends (who managed to escape her initial destruction) in her purple palace. My sworn enemy.

“Mm, I love colour schemes, don't you?” Lilith said as she spun around. The end of her dark purple floor-length tailcoat caused a breeze of dust to come towards me. She giggled as she leaned down to look at me above her (once again, purple) sunglasses.

“Monochromatic, how original,” I said, sass lacing my voice.

“Oh, don’t talk like that, Miss Greenie. I know how much you love your blacks and greens,” Lilith teased, a grin on her face.

I glared at Lilith, and she laughed at the action, tossing her sunglasses on the floor. With a flick of her wrist, the sunglasses turned into a throne that looked exactly like mine, except, you guessed it, purple. It was getting annoying, her monochromatic colour scheme.

Lilith sat down on the throne gingerly, enjoying the way it made me feel. Fury coursed through my body and ended up at my fingertips, yet I couldn't perform any magic.

“Oh silly little goddess, you know you can't perform magic right now. Not with my magic binding you,” Lilith said. Her high voice reminded me of a tea kettle at times. “Nice work, don't you think? Binding a goddess.”

“Oh, please. You threatened to kill my ten-year-old brother if I didn’t let you knock me out. I wouldn’t be proud of that if I were you,” I seethed, remembering how she held my brother, Narvi, at knifepoint.

“Mmm, I still got the job done, didn’t I, my sweet soldier?” Lilith whispered, grazing a soft, manicured finger along my cheek.

I snapped at her finger, and she pulled back quickly while cackling.

“Don't call me that. I am a Queen,” I practically growled, thinking back to soldiers who came home from lost battles. How they looked like peasants and were ridiculed like them.

“What? Am I wrong?” Lilith asked. “Let’s talk about your titles, your highness,” Lilith said, "your highness" in a mocking tone. “Hel Lokidottir, well, that didn’t change. Princess of Asgard, hmm, let me think about that--'' Lilith tapped her chin in false thought “--I believe that I’ve actually...wait a minute, I could be wrong, but I think I destroyed Asgard, and it's in my pocket,” she tapped her thigh, presumably where Asgard was. “How can you be a princess of a kingdom that’s destroyed? Nobody would believe you.”

I looked at her thigh. How gruesome. My childhood home was in the pocket of a bastard sorceress. The daughter of a mage who betrayed her kingdom and was executed for it.

“Then there’s the one I think you’re the proudest of. The rightful Queen of Helheim,” Lilith smirked. “You couldn’t save your kingdom. I destroyed it, and it’s right next to my heart,” Lilith said, getting close to my face as she clutched her chest. “How could you be the rightful queen to a realm you couldn’t protect?” Lilith whispered.

I grit my teeth as I glared at Lilith, but hot tears formed in my eyes as I looked at her hand. Right there, in front of my face, were my helpless subjects, my friends, my realm. All of them lying underneath those perfect fingers.

“Goddess of Death,” Lilith went on, enunciating each word carefully. She leaned back in her chair and crossed her legs. “Are you even a goddess anymore? With Asgard and Helheim destroyed, there’s no one to respond to prayers or remind mortals of your existence. You’ll be forgotten, and you’ll lose your power. Plus, you know I’ll be destroying the rest of the realms, even the minor ones, leaving the best for last.“

Lilith leaned forward in her replica throne until her nose was mere millimetres from mine. I fought the urge to head-butt her or at least make her bleed. I hadn’t noticed the hand behind her back until she brought it out in front of her. She held up her other hand above it and cast an orb of white light on it. A single marigold flower was in her hand, the yellow petals a stark contrast with the purple colour scheme around us.

My jaw went slack, and my eyebrows raised nearly to my hairline. I recognized the marigold immediately.

“How did you get that?” I asked quickly before thinking my words through.

“I did my research. He loved these flowers, didn’t he? What was his name?” Lilith asked as she leaned back in her chair. She waved the hand with the white light around as she thought. I couldn't help but notice how her eyes matched the colour of the marigold. The colours were practically reflecting off one another. “Was it, Clance? Carl? Cahir?”

“Ciarán,” I whispered almost involuntarily. “His name was Ciarán,” I repeated. His name fell from my lips effortlessly. I had nearly forgotten how soft and sweet his name felt to say, but there was a bitterness to it. He was gone. Gone from my grasp forever. I had loved him once, but I couldn’t any longer.

“Ah, yes, Ciarán,” Lilith said, playing with the petals of the marigold flower. She sounded almost...envious for reasons I didn't know. Lilith looked at me like scum before narrowing her eyes slightly. “Kneel,” she said, deathly calm.

“I beg your pardon?” I asked. I had to have misheard her. It was so random when she said it. Or perhaps she was trying to make her ego feel better after a spark of jealousy.

“Kneel, before your future queen,” Lilith said. Her eyes threatened many terrible things towards me. No doubt more forms of torture if I didn’t obey.

“You will never be my queen,” I said as I glared at her, my clenched jaw returning.

“I said kneel!” Lilith yelled as she stood up roughly, the marigold’s stem slightly bending because of her. I was reminded of how tall Lilith was, and I couldn’t help but breathe a little faster as I was forced to look up at her. “Before the future queen of Helheim!” She added as if it would cause me to immediately get on my knees and pray for forgiveness.

“You will never be the queen of my realm!” I fired back. Staying put on my butt. I held my head high and kept my jaw locked as I stared at Lilith with the cold dead eyes of the fair and just queen of Helheim. Exactly the way I perfected it.

“It is my birthright!” Lilith argued as she clutched the marigold in her hand tightly.

“It’s my birthright!” I shouted in anger. How dare she claim my throne as hers! It was predestined to be mine since before I was born. Unless...

Before I could finish my thought, Lilith threw out her empty hand in anger, letting out a large semicircle of raw magic.

I tried to cover myself, but it was useless. I couldn’t shield my head or face since I was bound. Lilith’s raw power destroyed every mirror covering the walls, spraying shattered glass everywhere. Lilith's eyes widened as she realized what she had done. She quickly threw both of her hands out in front of her and made the fastest magic shield I had ever seen. I couldn’t help but watch in awe as I saw her perform a stunning spell very quickly. What she did was practically godly.

I didn’t realize Lilith had included me in the force field until after she let it dissipate. I could feel the residue of her power in the room. It was like a buzzing in my body, in my hearing, coating my skin. Hell, I could even taste the buzzing of power.

Lilith looked down at me, scowling. “I won’t repeat myself again, kneel,” she said in an unnaturally low voice.

“Oh, we’re still doing that?” I asked, channelling some of my father's sass.

Lilith clenched her jaw and furrowed her brows before relaxing her face. “I’ll make you kneel one day, my sweet soldier,” she promised.

Lilith leaned down to pick up the discarded marigold flower. She smirked, sensually grazing it along my cheekbone as she stood up. She plucked the bud of the flower from the stem and dropped the stem in front of me. She stuffed the bud into what was probably her bra. The action made my face hot and made her laugh.

“I think I’ll be keeping this Midgardian flower. Oh, and let this whole ordeal be a reminder of how helpless you are here,” Lilith said as she waved her hand, causing the throne to disappear. She turned around and walked out, closing the door behind her.

I sat and silently started at the door for what felt like hours. I finally got the strength to look at the marigold stem. Tears filled my eyes as I thought about all the happy moments Ciarán and I had before leaving him for my duties as a queen. I broke his heart, and I still regretted it.

I thought back to what Lilith said about ruling Helheim being her birthright to distract me from my emotions. Perhaps when she was young, her father told her he had foreseen the future and saw she’d be the queen of Helheim one day. Lilith was a hard worker and must’ve studied hard to learn all she could to be a queen. It must’ve broken her heart when she realized she would never rule a kingdom. Not to mention losing her father…

That is when I realized both of us had very similar goals. We were avenging our families and ourselves. Which begged the question, who was the real villain?