When the wolf at Loki's side shook and took a step, Loki called out to him. "Son, take his mount from under him and you will best Odin without worry. It is written that this is one battle that was always fated to be ours."

Fenrisulfr had, for the first time in an eternity, known peace. Feasts with his family, an interesting new friend that everyone seemed to call brother, and a new purpose burned within him. New purpose, and Sol. "I will make this as fast as it needs to be, then I will hunt at your side, Father."

"Be yourself, Fen. Just be yourself."

The words were heartening to Fenrisulfr. Himself was something that had been denied him for far too long. "Now I am free, I can be nothing else." Focusing back to Odin on his horse, Fenrisulfr started to lope forward. Pure joy poured through his being as he ran without fetters. He wished for the chill wind of Niflheim, but all he had was a warm spring breeze.

In his peripheral, Fenrisulfr saw as Thor started his chariot into motion and Heimdallr, also mounted, thrashed his horse into a gallop. He couldn't ignore the ground shaking as Jormungandr and their father set about charging too. But all Fenrisulfr's attention was on Odin.

Opening his jaws wider, he sighted on the god and let his hunger run free. It was only the last moment where he dropped his aim and tilted his head to the side to avoid the spear—and bit Odin's horse in half.

The spear Odin used connected with Fenrisulfr's shoulder, but his hide and thick fur kept the point from finding its mark and the weapon slid down his body instead.

Tossing his head, and the remainder of Odin's horse, Fenrisulfr gulped down the blood, flesh, bones, and saddle of the hapless beast. Twisting back and keeping his eyes on Odin, Fenrisulfr waited not a second before diving forward again and, this time, his jaws sought something less tasty.

Clamping his teeth on the haft of the spear and fighting Odin's grip on it, Fenrisulfr didn't see the short sword in the god's other hand coming until its momentum brought the tip within a moment of striking the side of his head. Releasing the spear, he dodged again and felt the spear catch on his ear.

"First blood, Fenrisulfr. You cannot best me, pup," Odin said, using his sword and then spear to put some room between them.

It wasn't how the fight was meant to go, but Fenrisulfr didn't care about prophecies too much. He feinted in, drew Odin's spear toward him, then used a shove from his forelegs to dodge around the weapon, catching it on his side, then pressing in and clamping his jaws around the wrist of his arm that held the short sword.

Odin's one eye widened as his wrist was cut, severed, and disappeared (along with his sword) into Fenrisulfr's throat. "Wait! I—"

It should have been a closer fight, and would have been if Odin had been astride Sleipnir. As it was, without his mount and with his weapons missing, he did everything he could to catch Fenrisulfr with his shield.

Bite by bite, Fenrisulfr chewed away the edges of the steel shield. He eroded Odin's bulwark until the god was forced to meet his teeth with his bare arm. This time he didn't bite clean through the limb, Fenrisulfr clamped his teeth on Odin's arm, lifted a paw to plant on the god's chest, and ripped the arm off at the shoulder.

Fenrisulfr let his hunger loose. He bit and ripped and swallowed until every last bit of Odin was gone—right down to his armor.

A scream pierced the air, drawing Fenrisulfr's attention to a younger god charging at him. It was a peaceful moment, one of Fenrisulfr's first since he'd been fettered. The god Vidarr was charging him and everything was going as it should.

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Thor lashed his goats into a battle frenzy. With his own mix-match of light plate pieces and studded leather armor, he charged at the giant wyrm. Jormungandr thrashed his coils in his haste to join the fight, and shook even Asgard with his bulk.

Calling on the power of the storm growing in the sky above, Thor brought down lightning upon his prey. Bolt after bolt struck Jormungandr, though they didn't seem to slow the beast. The fight wouldn't be easy, Thor knew, because while he had to crush Jormungandr with his hammer again and again to wear the beast down, it would take one good strike from the wyrm to kill him. Fate dictated that Thor would manage to slay the beast, but fate had become a thing of chaos.

Thor's transport was an early casualty in the fight. The chariot was smashed asunder and the goats were crushed, squeezed, and ground between Jormungandr's coils. He was fast on his feet, dancing from coil to coil and bringing Mjolnir down again and again. Bones shattered and scales were shed, the ground growing slick with Jormungandr's blood, and Thor's fury was slowly paying dividends.

Around the pair, though, a thick green mist had been growing more dense. Poison combined hung in the air. Jormungandr's breath made the location too toxic for a regular mortal to survive, and soon enough dangerous even for a god.

Coughing, struggling with the poison surrounding him, Thor raised Mjolnir one last time as Jormungandr's body lay smashed and broken. Looking the great beast in the eyes, Thor smiled. "This was always going to be our moment, beast. Fate holds no surprises for you or I."

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"It comes to us now," Loki said, reaching his hand forward to rub Sleipnir's shoulder and neck. He never let his eyes lose track of Heimdallr, though. "We don't need to fight. My war is with Odin and his."

"I picked my side so long ago I can scarcely remember a time when I didn't stand with him. We both know how this ends, Loki, and now we must engage in combat to ensure the future flows." Slowly drawing his sword, Heimdallr looked at Loki with a raised eyebrow. "Shall we?"

"Sleipnir, no matter how this goes, I'm proud of you." Loki drew a thin, long sword that was matched by a buckler on his off side. Squeezing with his thighs, Sleipnir jumped into a charge.

Heimdallr expected all manner of things. Seeing Loki mounted on Sleipnir, chief of those weapons he'd expected was a lance of some kind. When Loki drew a javelin from behind his back, Heimdallr had barely a moment to react before the dart was flying toward his mount.

If Loki'd thrown the weapon at Heimdallr himself, he could have dodged it or even deflected it with his shield. When the barbed tip sank into the big muscles just under the horse's neck, though, the animal screamed and its forelegs collapsed.

Not slowing in the least, Sleipnir hardened his eyes and heart, leaving eight heavy hoof prints on the horse's neck, and then tried to overrun Heimdallr too.

Rolling out of the way at the last moment, Heimdallr managed to regain his feet again with his sword still in hand. He was at a huge disadvantage now and well knew it. Having to avoid Loki and Sleipnir would be practically impossible. "I gave my word."

For Loki, the fight wasn't glorious or honorable. The blinders had long since been removed and he could see when someone was throwing their life away for no good reason. Circling around Heimdallr, he probed the other god's defense again and again. Every stroke and cut was met with his shield and, once he'd regained his footing, finally some probing thrusts of his own.

For every blow Heimdallr sent Loki or Sleipnir's way, each would get two good strikes back. Loki's light blade was proving far less of a problem than each time Sleipnir's hooves slammed into his shield. Relentless, the finest of horses was wearing him down and, worse, didn't even look to be strained while doing so.

His future, Heimdallr could see coming. He would struggle and fight, maybe even mark Sleipnir in the process, but his fate was narrowing down to a single path. That single path had an end—death. He grasped at straws. He tried more daring strokes, only to be forced back by Sleipnir's extra legs. When the final strike was coming—delivered by Loki—Heimdallr could at least acknowledge that he'd tried his best, even if he'd failed.

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Kaz circled high above the field, looking down and watching the battles and the overall war.

From what he could see, Loki and Sleipnir had Heimdallr where they wanted him, Freya and Hel were directing their combined armies, and the combined pair of Hati and Skoll were fighting at Garmr's side to flank and keep Tyr off guard. Of Jormungandr and Thor, Kaz could surmise that the fight wasn't going well. Though the green mist surrounded the pair, what he could see of the wyrm's body wasn't moving.

He scanned around and spotted Vidarr charging at Fenrisulfr, which meant he had a choice to make, though it was a bad one. "Fafnir, can you go and distract Vidarr from killing Fen?"

"What—?" Fafnir didn't get the word fully out before Kaz slipped his left leg over and jumped off. Left with little other option, he tipped his wings forward at the front and stooped into a dive. As he cleft the air toward Vidarr, Fafnir shaped and wrought the magic of himself and the air around him into a cone. Not only did it speed his descent by making him cut through the air easier, but it was a very potent weapon that he directed with little twitches of his magic.

Vidarr had almost reached the huge wolf when he noticed a shadow around him. His reflexes were the only things standing between him and the pile-driver that Fafnir bore into its inevitable explosion. Looking at the mess the dragon had made, Vidarr snarled out, "What are you doing, wyrm? You cannot rob me of this. It is my birthright to slay the wolf!"

Behind Fafnir, Fenrisulfr was taken aback by his defender. "Fafnir! What's the meaning of this? Let me do battle with—"

"Fenrisulfr, I don't have the time. The only soul in this damned existence that I trust has asked me to keep you two from fighting." Shaking his head, Fafnir started weaving wards around him, hardening his scales and talons beyond even their usual strength. "And so here I will fight."

Throwing himself at the dragon, Vidarr slammed his dwarf-wrought blade at the obstacle to his destiny, only to have it swiped aside. The fury at the loss of his father and this interruption combined, and he shifted his grip to holding the massive sword in his right hand while drawing a hand axe in his left.

If Fafnir had hoped the god would see reason before, he abandoned that now. Meeting each swing of axe and sword with his talons, Fafnir worked magic to try to slow the berserk god down—but such was the power of his rage that the mana sloughed off him as quickly as Fafnir could cast it.

So fixated was Vidarr on Fafnir and getting by him, he failed to notice that Fenrisulfr had flanked around behind until the wolf clamped down his jaws on Vidarr's right shoulder, ripping his sword arm off with one bite.

There was a primal magic all its own when fighting—and hunting—a foe with Fenrisulfr. Fafnir's senses were doused in blood and the flesh that the wolf was even now swallowing. When Vidarr turned to face Fenrisulfr, Fafnir pounced forward and closed his mouth around the god's head—biting down and shearing through skin, flesh, and bone. He'd barely swallowed when Fenrisulfr took Vidarr's upper torso, then Fafnir ripped free a leg.

When the body of the god was no more, wolf and dragon howled and turned to face the rest of the Æsir host. The battle was still young and their bellies screamed at them for more food.

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Kaz watched the acidic, poison mist coming toward him. There weren't a lot of ways to avoid it killing him, but an easy one that he could do was to adapt his lungs and windpipe to be similar to Jormungandr's own. It took focus, though, which was in short supply as he plummeted.

Figuring that hitting the ground could be recovered from, but that Jormungandr's cloud couldn't be, Kaz completed the changes he hoped would protect him and fell into the green mist.

Pain blossomed in his legs as his knees and shins failed under him. Snarling his anger, he nonetheless found himself able to breathe.

With the fortitude of a redcap, Kaz's bones knit and formed anew, his muscles binding to the recently broken lengths, and where white bone had poked through his flesh he now had fresh scars that were slowly fading into regular skin again.

All around Kaz were Jormungandr's coils. Stacks of them here and there, and everywhere he looked they bore the marks of Thor's hammer. It was incomprehensible that one man—even a god—could have smashed up Jormungandr so much as to disable him, but Kaz couldn't see any movement. There was still the feel of life in the huge wyrm, though, and Kaz's left hand tingled as he reached out to touch the nearest coil.

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It wasn't enough, though. Kaz was sure he could never have enough magic to heal Jormungandr from this beating, but he was more than just a mage. He built a mana weave that would bind to Jormungandr. The weave would draw on the wyrm's mana and the mana around him and pour it back into his body as healing. Not blind healing, either, it was subtle and would reinforce Jormungandr's own body's reconstruction.

No sooner did Kaz loose the weave than he heard Thor's voice: "This was always going to be our moment, beast. Fate holds no surprises for you or I."

Turning in the direction of Thor's voice, Kaz started to run, jumping from coil to coil, drawing sword and shield as he went and then the mist parted to reveal Thor climbing up onto Jormungandr's head. The hammer raised up and Kaz could hear the muscles in Thor's arm tension, preparing to bring Mjolnir down for the killing blow.

"Thor! Are you going to fool with that beast any longer when I am your true opponent?" Kaz's shout at least distracted Thor from his grisly task. He watched the god's head turn toward him and clanged his sword on his shield. "I took Sleipnir out from under your nose. I took word from Loki to his lost son, bringing him back to fight. And now, Thor, I'm here to kill you."

It was, Kaz realized, completely unavoidable. This had always been his fight—the one he could and needed to affect. Every other fight he had turned the outcome in advance, but Thor had been untouchable and Jormungandr hadn't any weaknesses to shore up. Now Kaz had to do the thing everyone had warned him not to; he had to fight Thor on his own.

"A mortal shapeshifter? This is what Loki sends in his stead to save his son's life? I can admire your bravery, but this is suicide." Nonetheless, Thor readied his hammer, bringing it back and ready to drive through his foe.

"That's the weird bit. Did you know that everything we mortals have about you casts you as the hero? Boasting and besting everything, always willing to put your strength into any fight that looks just." Kaz looked down at the sword and shield he carried. "And now I have to stop you from being a bully for your father."

A verbal spar hadn't been what Thor expected, and he was sure he wasn't drunk enough to properly participate in it. "Sometimes you have to follow your father. You have to walk a darker path than you would have otherwise. Sometimes you have to get mud on you." Shrugging his shoulders, Thor could feel the desire of the young man to avoid a fight. "But that doesn't change what you have to do. You're in the way of my destiny."

Thousands of generations of living near humans had rendered griffon reflexes and senses to the point where they can detect a swat coming before the one planning it had even started. Even with this genetic super-reflex, Kaz almost felt the crushing blow Thor had sent his way.

Mjolnir whispered through the air like the proverbial irresistible force. Thor arrested the swing at the end of its travel and brought it back as he stepped forward, almost taking Kaz's head off twice. "Come on, fight me!"

Sinking into his training, Kaz had hoped Thor would have died by now. He circled, probed with his sword, and Thor slapped his blade away with Mjolnir. It was by-the-book training that Bellona had taught him. Test your enemy, find their skill limits, then press them on those. The problem for Kaz was that every probing attack and feint he tried was parried—he got nothing but a brick wall of defense from Thor.

Then, in a strike that was a blur of motion, Thor struck at Kaz's shield and ripped it from his arm. The blow had broken Kaz's forearm in the process, though the bones quickly reknit. "This poison will k—" Kaz had no time to finish goading Thor, the hammer coming again, then again, and a third time as Thor looked to be going pale.

The next blow he sent at Kaz connected with flesh and bone. Mjolnir hit Kaz in the upper left arm, shattering the joint at his shoulder and sending the limb flying. It had, Thor could admit, been a very credible fight for a mortal. The blood flowed from Kaz's shoulder for a moment before he shifted his body to protect himself from blood loss. "Better than you had any right to be. Your teachers and your own tenacity would have been celebrated in Valhalla."

But as Thor tried to deliver a clean death-blow, Kaz dodged and brought his sword up and along Thor's arm. Blood flowed for a moment as the god-wrought blade bit and left Thor's flesh stinging, but the bleeding quickly stopped. What Thor noticed about Kaz now was that his right arm—the one still attached—had an unsettling black sheen about it that extended onto his weapon.

Risking a glance at his arm, Thor could see flesh that should have healed instead appearing to blacken around the edges. His blood hadn't stopped flowing because of his natural regeneration—the blood vessels had withered, died, and shriveled up. "You studied under that accursed witch! You bring foul sorcery to combat?!"

"I bring anything to a fight that lets me win it." Kaz drew his death magic up around the blade in a denser sheath. "You're a god and I'm not. If I didn't use everything I have, what would be the point?"

The words actually brought a smile to Thor's face. He took a step back to give them both some space. "I can respect that. It won't save you, but I respect that." With his piece said, he stepped forward with the implacable motion of a man for whom the mountains trembled, and worked himself into a fury of swings.

Over and over Kaz had to give ground. Thor pushed him ever backward, forcing him to lose positioning or his life. The swings weren't aimed at his head or arms, Thor was now swinging for Kaz's center of mass.

It was taking far longer than Thor would have liked, but he finally pushed Kaz until he had him backed into a cul-de-sac formed of Jormungandr's coils. He kept up his pace, positioning Kaz with no more room to retreat. "Sorry. For what it's worth, I would have liked to have had a drink with you and—" He halted at Kaz's laughter. "You mock me at your moment of death?"

"I'm not mocking you, Thor. It's relief. You smashed off my left arm with your hammer—the arm that carries Hel's gift of life." Kaz got his laughter under control. "But it was a trick Loki taught me that will be your downfall."

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With just a damaged arm to work with, Miaow hadn't been able to make much of a body, but what she had was boiling with life energy. Kaz had led Thor away from where she landed, giving her the chance to shape herself from that lost limb to a slim feline.

Walking over to Jormungandr's head, Miaow started purring. She could feel the spell Kaz had woven working still inside the world serpent. His head was gigantic, the size of a large house, and even his nose was comically huge compared to Miaow. Nonetheless, she jumped up to the tip of his nose and rubbed her cheek against it.

Life magic poured from Miaow. It had been a struggle to keep it contained within her, but as she let it go, she felt Kaz's spell in Jormungandr soak up the raw mana and turn it into a firestorm of regeneration.

Starting slowly, Miaow started to lick at Jormungandr's nose until the magic roared through his body. Her purr started in earnest when she felt the first twitches of his muscles. "Feeling better?"

Before Jormungandr could reply, the feline on his muzzle shook her head.

"Don't talk, don't move. Kaz is fighting Thor to buy you time to heal. If you move or speak, you'll give the game away. Let your body heal and be ready to strike when Kaz needs you." Miaow gave his snout a final lick for good measure and then jumped down.

The pull of her body to Kaz's was like an elastic rope. She simply let it tug her along as she trotted along Jormungandr's spine toward where Thor was trying to position Kaz. She kept a flow of magic from herself into Jormungandr, ensuring he knew where he'd need to attack.

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When Miaow jumped down and hit Kaz's shoulder, he felt her return to his mind and body both. "Welcome back, Miaow. Did things go well?"

Thor stared at the once-again-whole Kaz. When Kaz tilted his head up, Thor did likewise in time to see a pair of huge jaws close around him.

Thor's right arm fell to the ground, fingers clutched in a death grip on Mjolnir's handle. Lifting his immense head up, Jormungandr tilted back and swallowed before letting loose a deep rumble that shook the entirety of Asgard.

There was a moment of silence that enveloped the battlefield as another fight that should have been decided in a draw tipped in the children of Loki's favor. A long voice broke that silence. "Find Fenrisulfr, Vidarr, and Fafnir. They need your help, Jorm!"

Had anyone else spoken his name in such a clipped and abbreviated fashion, Jormungandr might have been upset. As it was, though, he was alive entirely by Kaz's doing. Finding the trio among the greater melee going on would have been difficult, dust clouds were enveloping the field and stealing line of sight all over. The feel of bipedal feet on the ground was likewise useless for finding them. When Jormungandr felt draconic talons, though, he started off as fast as he could.

᱿I can't believe we managed that. We helped kill Thor!᱿ Kaz felt like he wanted to fall over. Weariness beyond words edged in after his life-or-death battle with Thor. Despite it all being a con, he'd managed to pull off what Freyja had promised him he could.

᱿Helped? Kaz, you stood up to him for so long I was terrified I would come back and find you dead. I like this new power, but I don't want to be parted from you for a week!᱿ Miaow couldn't stop herself from twitching in worry.

The poisonous mist was clearing around him now, some of it scattered by Jormungandr's movement, but Kaz felt a laugh boil up inside. "Even if I offered to cuddle you on the couch and spend a whole day rubbing your tummy?" He barely even registered he'd said the words instead of thinking them.

᱿Tomorrow we can do that. Right now you need to not fall over. There is still a war going on.᱿

"I have something to deliver, too." Kaz walked over to Thor's arm and, using his sword, managed to bend the fingers back enough to release the handle of Mjolnir. "There was some kind of legend that only the worthy can pick it up."

Miaow snorted. ᱿A load of crap. That was a modern thing. You wouldn't be able to use its power, sure, but you only have to be strong enough to carry it.᱿

"Yeah, I know that. Still a bit intimidating." Closing his fingers around the short handle of Mjolnir, Kaz strained the muscles in his arm to lift the hammer and hold it. "No wonder this was enough to rip my arm off."

Walking through the green mist to its edge, Kaz stopped when two men put themselves in his path. He set the hammer down. "Modi and Magni?"

Modi, looking every bit the same build as his father, and the spitting image of his brother. Looked at Kaz's hands rather than the hammer. "You killed him?"

Following Modi's gaze, Kaz noticed his arms were stained red from where he'd had to cut Thor's hand off the weapon. "No. Jormungandr killed him, as the prophecy predicted."

"You didn't kill him," Magni said, remembering the triumphant roar that had shaken the world. "You saved the wyrm. Did father strike a mortal blow to Jormungandr?"

"When I found them, Thor had beaten Jormungandr to the brink of death and was about to finish him. I set a healing spell in motion and drew Thor's ire to myself. He took off my left arm with one strike"—Kaz noticed both brothers looked to his left side—"which made keeping him from doing the same to my head hard. While I kept up the distraction, I used my severed arm to deliver a huge blast of healing magic to Jormungandr."

Both sons of Thor looked on as Kaz's left arm grew bright with healing magic.

"When, at last, your father had me cornered, Jormungandr had revived enough to continue the fight. Thor had been slowed by the poison, but it was Jormungandr's fangs that dealt Thor the death blow." Kaz left unsaid that Thor was already mortally poisoned, and by the look on each of his son's faces—Kaz assumed they both knew it too. Them both breaking into huge smiles came as a surprise, though.

"He died fighting," Modi said.

Nodding, Magni added, "No poison took him this day, and he died doing what he loved." Reaching out, he took a firm grip on Mjolnir and lifted it. "Come. This day will end better than it began," he said to his brother.

Looking away from the brothers, Kaz noticed a mounted figure on a prancing horse approaching him. Loki, sitting high in his saddle, wasn't looking at Kaz, though the huge looming figure behind him held the god's complete interest.

The problem with Kaz stepping aside and letting the family have a moment, though, had eight legs and was extra excited. "Blasa! Blasa! You saved Uncle Jorm!" Leaping in a manner absolutely alien to equines, Sleipnir landed on Kaz, pushing him down to his back so appropriate face-licks could be applied.

"Hey! Sleip! Noooo! Please stop!" Kaz flailed on the ground, trying in desperation to stop being licked, but he knew in his heart that he couldn't.

Dismounting from Sleipnir, Loki crouched beside the pair and reached a hand to his son's neck. "I think another ten licks will be needed." He ignored Kaz's groan and Sleipnir's enthusiasm, patted his son, and turned to approach Jormungandr.

Squirming and struggling through the last ten licks, Kaz finally got out and reached up to Sleipnir's neck to haul himself to a standing position once more. "Wait, what about Fafnir and Fenrisulfr?"

"They're hunting einherjar together. We saw them while we came over here. I beat Heimdallr! Daddy didn't let me kill him, though." Sleipnir still wasn't sure why that had been the case. "But we're winning! We're not supposed to win!" Pressing his nose to Kaz's hand, Sleipnir jerked back. "Blasa! You're covered in blood!"

Looking down, Kaz shrugged. "Only some of it is mine. It took some work to get Mjolnir from Thor's hand—even when his arm wasn't attached to his body anymore."

"You should clean it off before you go home. Mommy said you have left your mate to come here and fight for us, and you shouldn't go back unless you're clean for her."

Kaz didn't feel like explaining gender diversity to Sleipnir, and doubted Jaybird would be too upset with him either. "You're right, I'm just a little wrung out right now. Fighting Thor was— He was an amazing warrior."

Now that the fight was over, and by prophecy he couldn't directly take part in another, Kaz felt no desire to crow about his deed. Thor was fighting for his life and his honor, that he was connected to Odin too tightly to shift his allegiance was now moot. "I think I need to go home, sleep for a week, and throw up. Probably not in that order."

"And then you'll come back and play with me again, Blasa?"

Grinning, Kaz shoved his whole body mass against Sleipnir, not that it impacted the horse's stance at all. "Sure will, but only if you come and say hi to my friends and family."

Licking up one side of Kaz's face, Sleipnir laughed. "I will! I really will!"

Kaz was about to reply, when Fafnir landed beside them. Like Kaz's arms, Fafnir's claws were all covered in blood, as was his mouth. "Hey. I guess we both lived through this, huh?" Reaching into his dimensional pocket, Kaz pulled out the coin he'd saved for Fafnir. "You can keep the change if you open a portal back home for me."

Fafnir was charged with vitality. He'd hunted and killed and fought beside the greatest hunter ever to live—he'd not felt so sharp or attuned to life before. He was a font of boiling mana that wanted to do things, so he wrought a portal for his friend and student. "Go, but don't be a stranger to these lands."

Not bothering with a cleaning spell, given Fafnir's state,, Kaz grabbed up Fafnir's neck in a hug. "Thank you. I couldn't have done any of this without you."

Not minding a little affection, Fafnir was nonetheless surprised when Sleipnir crashed against him and nosed at Kaz. Stretching a wing up and around each, he let out a sigh. "You have shown this old dragon that there is still much to live for in the world. Don't think this won't come back to haunt you, Spakr—Kazuma. I will come to visit. Be prepared."

"That sounds ominous." Kaz leaned back and tried to fight back the tears leaking from his eyes. "I'll be coming back to see Hel after I've recovered. I'll see you both then."

Fafnir opened the portal for Kaz and watched the strange dragon (as Fafnir thought of him, at least) walk back to his life.

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This story is released under the Creative Commons BY-NC-SA license. If you are paying money to see this or the original creator, Damaged, is not credited, you are viewing a plagiarized copy of the story.