Excelsior: Loki

Chapter 5

Katja screamed as the blistering pain from the ring made it seem as if it was melting into her skin. "Ingenbjorn! Help me!" she cried. 

Ingenbjorn dared not to step any closer, she knew how hot the ring could get and she rather it was her sister than both. She started to cry and cower as Katja fell to the ground, curling up into the fetal position, tucking the burning hand into her chest. 

While her other hand was pulling one of her daggers out of the sheath, quick footsteps resounded off of the spiral staircase. As they neared her, she screamed louder, outstretching her hand and raising her dagger. 

Suddenly it stopped, the sensation, the screams, the steps, and Katja opened her eyes, a blue hand on hers. Or at least, it looked blue to her, it could have been the same colour as her skin, but Katja was missing an eye, and she didn't know if that affected her sense of colour as well. There was also the possibility that she had gone insane from the incredible amount of pain she had experienced. Whatever the reason, she disregarded the blue. 

She did not, however, disregard the raised lines upon the hand that curved and flowed in an enchanting almost calligraphic design, embracing almost every inch of skin, drawing her eye up towards the rest of the body, which was far better than the already enamouring hand. 

The lines disappeared under an exquisite deep green linen shirt, with a low V neckline, which unveiled more of the fascinating lines that crawled up along the side of his neck and face, enhancing his sharp features, stopping at his cheekbones. Katja shook her head, embarrassed to have been staring at the poor man. She mentally scolded herself for being rude even before introducing herself. She couldn't help but feel like she had seen this man before, and maybe that he was Prince Charming. But Prince Charming did not have lines, that she would have remembered. 

He removed his hand from hers and she swore she knew this touch, the same gentle sense of delicacy and tenderness, the same cool feeling. Katja noticed something off with her hand, for the ring was gone, and in its place, a raw red outline of where it was. Its engravement: "To do a great right, do a little wrong" circled just beneath the snake. 

"Are you alright?" he asked, his voice timid, yet silverly symphonious. She had definitely heard this man before. She looked up into his eyes, but they were blood red, and she knew for a fact that Prince Charming's eyes were green, almost the same shade of this man's shirt. 

He stared deeply at her, his iris seeming to shift in shade constantly, becoming every red in the universe, sometimes all at once. He was the red that flowed through her heart, and he was the red that flowed out of her father, he was the blue of her ball gown and the blue of the waterfall, he was timid and yet, fueled by hatred. He was the undoing of all that there is and all that there was, he was the undoing of himself and the birth of his new life. He was made to be more and in the red of his eyes, she knew that this was not a mistake, it was not an accident. She knew the red of his eyes and the blue of his skin. She knew. 

He did too. He saw her eye and he knew who she was. Her eye was the gold that adorned his helmet, her hair, the white of his people's home. He did not need the snake ring to know that she had found him and that she was before him. From the moment he touched her hand, he knew. 

But, neither said anything about it, the wonder in each other's eyes evidence enough and yet, without saying it out loud, both were too afraid to confront it: the binglesnipe in the room. 

He dropped his gaze to her hand and saw what had happened and stood up, stumbling back a couple steps. "I'm sorry," He whispered, his voice wavering, his eyes watering, his hands trembling. Then he just disappeared. 

"I forgive you," Katja whispered back, a second too late. 

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