Out of reach • A Loki fanfiction

Chapter 14 - Playing with fire

"Drau- what?!" Harald yelled as he came to face the creature in combat once more. He truly was good with his sword, swinging it as if he was trained to do. He would've beaten his enemy too, if it hadn't been for a Draugr to be able to completely ignore a headless body. Because as soon as Harald got rid of his head, the remaining parts simply kept on standing. And fighting.

"Draugr." Era repeated, nocking her very last arrow to let it fly in the leg of the Draugr Harald was facing. The arrow pinned the creature against the tree behind him, leaving it stuck and struggling as it stood. "They're said to be ghosts. To haunt the living, giving us things to ponder over while we sleep."

"That sounds wonderful."

"They shouldn't exactly be real either." Loki finished as he blasted the remaining Draugr for the fifth time against a tree with his magic. Then, he turned to Era, and magicked her quiver back to full. "Fighting the Jotnar or getting rid of trolls, I know how to do. But you've recently read the book, Era, and I know you to be intelligent enough to remember it. Tell me how to defeat these."

The high pitched, gut wrenching shriek of another Draugr gave Era barely the time to think about it. She turned hastily around, only to witness another creature coming right at them. She nocked the arrow after the next while Harald got his headless enemy back to spar. The green flashes in her eyes motivated to let her move faster, harder, and with more skill. Once close enough to the beast, she pulled her own blade from in between her boot, kneeled in a swift motion to the ground, and released the creature of one of its legs. Stumbling, it fell to the ground, but crawled forward as a beast hungry for its prey.

"Era I need you to focus!" Loki yelled trough the sound of many more to come. "Think!"

"I- I..." She stumbled over her thoughts, her hands holding onto her head. It was hard to focus while the two men at her side fought these creatures, while Era suddenly had no energy left to multitask. But it helped. The book was coming back to her, the words were filling her brain again. "Weak to silver, but not lethal." She mumbled. "No souls, no life, no heat..."

Then it came to her. "We kill them with fire!"

Loki's smirk grew wide after blasting the Draugr once again away from him. "Good girl."

Those last two words were soft, not even meant for anyone's ears. But Era heard them as clear as day. And it had her shiver from head to toe. At least, until her brother pulled an arrow out of his sister's quiver, and used it to pin the crawling Draugr with its neck to the ground. "Watch it Er, damn it!"

Era didn't even realise the drops of blood streaming down her boot. The sight of fire coming from Loki's palms was too distracting to think or feel anything else. She just acted. Era acted by taking multiple arrows into her hands. "Loki!" She yelled, to which he immediately responded from in front of a display of fire. Just a single look later, and he knew what she meant. So he set her arrow tips aflame.

She shot where she could, arrow after arrow. The remnants of clothes caught aflame before the grey of their skin did. They lounged forward once more, but were forced to a halt when they did nothing more than turn to ash.

These three were gone. But there was more danger lurking from behind the trees.

"Lord Harald." Loki turned to him, with sweat from the heat dropping down his temple. "I need you to bring yourself and your sister to safety. Follow this path back to the castle, you both will be received and taken care for there."

"What?" Era protested. "No."

Lightning from a certain hammer sounded not from too far away. A sound that had the three of them momentarily pause. But to return to the moment as fast as it came. "Lady Era, there really is no debate of-"