Cold-Blooded

[]Chapter 8[]

At S.H.I.E.L.D., a commotion was rising. The air was thick with the anger and despair felt by nearly all members of the shady agency. A special group was gathered in a small meeting room, and at the helm of the mahogany table sat a very, very furious man. 

"Now the hell do you believe we are going to get her back? The North is nothing but a seething mass of storms, no one could make it in alive without help from Astridr herself," the man raged towards the team. 

"Send in Loki. I don't trust him, but he does have some control over ice- being a frost giant and all. By the way, Banner, that must be a new record. You lost a girl totally out of your league in six days," a cocky, black-haired man suggested loosely, not at all thrown by the angered man's raving.

"I know, Stark. I don't need you to remind me," a chocolate-haired man replied, rubbing his temples in sorrow.

"Even I could've kept her longer!" the arrogant man boasted, swiveling in his leather chair.

"She won't date you in the first place," a woman snapped, growing tired of their stupid antics. There was a situation at hand and it needed to be solved.

The man opened his mouth to say something, but the beginnings of words began to glitter on the wall, in ice. Each and every being there turned to watch as the letters wrote themselves out.

The only one allowed into the North will be the metal man, Tony Stark. The words read. 

"Can you hear us?" The woman asked.

Yes.

"Why Tony?'

His sarcasm amuses me.

"You'd go out with me, wouldn't you?" 

You'll find out when you get here. I will tell you now to not get your hopes up.

"Any other information we can use before we send him off?"

Tell him to cut straight through. If he wanders off the set path he will be killed. He will remain here for ten days and ten nights, and when that time is up, my decision will have been made. Whether it is in your favor or not is up to Tony.

The last part was murmured on every pair of lips. The man in mention, a Tony Stark, went to suit himself up for the long journey into the frozen wasteland that lay ahead of him. 

~*~

I sighed, running my hands through the ivory locks that made my hair. Had I really just gave into the weaker side of myself like that, after so much debating and arguing that made the other residents think I had gone quite mad?

My tired body slowly collasped into a nearby chair, wolf pelt wrapping around me as I sunk deeper into it. I awaited the arrival of Tony, knowing he would take his own jolly time- unless of course Fury worked himself into a frenzy.

Cloaked in a polar bear's warm skin and a silken dress, my garbs were no other color than white. Bleached cowskin boots clung my slender feet, hair left on for ice-gripping purposes. Neither were essential in my everyday life, I had control over everything here after all.

I rose wearily and made my way into the throne room, where a large fire roared in it's hearth. Who stoked it, you may ask yourself. Nameless woman came and went, and I paid them for their services. 

I called them the Silent Ones, immortal women who stayed for a good part of the year and left for what remained, always returning. I never associated with them, it was preferred by both parties. Our lives went on like this, like they had for several hundred years.