Sorcha's Secret World, Part one.

Chapter 31, Satisfaction is not in my nature.

"You seem happy," I said, as we sat snuggled up on the sofa.

"I am," Loki smiled. "For the first time since, well perhaps since forever, I am perfectly happy. I got everything I could possibly desire right here."

I smiled up at him.

"Well, almost everything, anyway." he amended.

"Oh?" I raised an eyebrow.

"There is one thing," he admitted, "one thing I would love to call mine, but I can't place my hands upon. Quite literally, actually."

I sat up a bit. "What is that then, my love?" I asked curiously.

"Do you remember what my grandmother was holding when we visited her?"

"It was a staff, with leaves and a snake I think. The snake was holding a gem."

"That is correct. It wasn't truly there, it was there only in my grandmother's memory. The real staff lies where my mother fell, unable to be touched by anyone but the hand of the queen of Jotunnheim. It is cursed you see, unable to be picked up by anyone else. I tried touching it, a long time ago, and nearly lost my life."

"You've been back to Jotunnheim?" I asked.

"Yes. There is a place here on Midgard where the veil between the two realms is thin. It once was a holy place where people worshipped my mother, a place of great power. There is a portal there."

"What is Jotunnheim like?"

"Cold, as you may have guessed, covered in snow and ice. What was once a beautiful realm, a magical winter wonderland, is now a desolate, inhospitable ruin, haunted by the souls of my people.

As far as I can piece together, the realm itself was attacked while the Jotunn's bravest warriors fought elsewhere. After the attack none were left alive in the realm itself. The few Jotunn remaining elsewhere were hunted down and killed eventually. As far as I am aware, I am the last of my kind." Loki said it as if it was a simple matter of fact.

"Loki, that is awful," I began.

"You can't truly miss that which you have never known," he shrugged. "And that is beside the point. I'm not telling this as a heartbreaking tragedy meant to invoke your pity or garner your compassion.

I want that staff, as much as I wanted the Friezegem. It is mine, my birthright as the last living descendant of the royal line.

It belongs to me.

I have attempted several times and in multiple ways to gain possession of the staff, but I have failed thus far. Shapechanging to appear female did not grant me any success, the staff remained poisonous to the touch. I am the prince of Jotunnheim, not its queen."

Loki sighed. "I told my grandmother I wasn't married, and while not untrue, I have been married in the past."

My eyes opened wide in surprise, but before I could say anything Loki continued.

"It was always out of convenience, never out of love. Merely as a way to gain possession of that which is rightfully mine.

Being married is not sufficient though, the person I'm married to has to be acknowledged as the rightful queen by Laufey, my mother, who to this day still haunts the throne room of the Jotunn palace. So far she has not deemed any of my mates worthy, some she even struck down on the spot.

Presenting them as Jotunn by the way of a glamour didn't make much of a difference either. Mother's spirit saw right through that."

Loki winced. "It was.... Unpleasant. Both for me and my bride."