InsaneJournal

hail the winter days after dark
Who: Ben [Hodr] & Abel [Fenrir].
What: A young Hodr and baby!Fenrir meet.
Where: Odin's hall, a long time ago in a place that probably doesn't exist (anymore).
When: Here and neither.

A young wolf lay spread before a roaring fire, eyes closed in contentment as the flames beamed heat over his belly. A son of Loki should probably never have known such kindness, and yet the Aesir were happy to treat the wild thing like a pet. Full from the scraps of the latest hunt, he was left to his own devices while the others were gone again -- for what purpose, Fenrir could not have said, not did he care.

He rolled his front onto his paws, his back still splayed flat against the floor, as he looked over the hall. Rugs and furs were thrown carelessly about, as were weapons of every conceivable measure. Tables and chairs filled the space, their tops set with plates and half-full mugs of mead. Every inch of the hall espoused that its owners were well used to a life of excess, won at the tip of a spear or a sword.

But Fenrir did not realize this, nor care. He rose up onto all fours, and crept silently toward a chair, which he attacked with tooth and claw until he brought it crashing down for his own amusement. Once the unliving beast was set upon its side, his imagination causing it to breathe its last, he set to work on a wooden leg with teeth, gnawing quickly and easily through the wood to make it crack even more loudly than that of the giant fire warming the entire hall.

The noise did not go unnoticed, though for the most part it went ignored. Asgard’s thralls did not care to interrupt Loki’s child, wary of sharp teeth and a sharper father. But Hodr had no such reservations. After the initial crash he followed the ensuing cracks and crunches to the main hall, pausing just inside to listen and get the feel of the space.

“Who’s there? I can hear you.”

The wolf pup did not answer immediately, too content with the cracking sound beneath his teeth. The leg was snapped in two; less satisfying than that of true bone or flesh, but reminiscent all the same. It clattered to the ground.

"As can many, I would think," Fenrir offered teasingly. "I'm not exactly being quiet." He did not move from his spot, watching the other as he approached. "If it was your chair, I'm sure the All Father can have you crafted another." The attitudes of the Aesir were rubbing off on Loki's son.

“Yes, but I am the only one who bothered to come. The servants are scared and the others are preparing for a raid.” As he spoke, Hodr walked along the edges of the hall towards the wolf’s voice, passing near where the chairs stood and pausing when he felt a space where there should have been none. “That was Sif’s. Thor won't be pleased.”

Fenrir shrugged, as much as he was able with his lupine physiology. "Thor is rarely pleased with aught else aside from a thick piece of mutton and a keg of mead. It does not help regarding who my father is, so why ask for permission when apologizing is the easier path?" With that, he sat up enough to shove the chair over, bringing another leg to his waiting jaws.

"You are... Hodr, right? I so rarely see you, you might be a ghost." He set to work on the new leg, setting it against his teeth and cracking it far sooner than he might have liked.

Hodr gave a slight smile, apparently unoffended by the remark, or at least too used to the sentiment to bother showing anything. “Who would notice me when my brothers are there?” It was true. With Tyr and Thor, certainly, but when Baldr was present…. Who would pay attention to a shadow when they could be basking in the brilliance of the sun?

He moved closer, cocking his head as he listened. “Are you eating it?”

The wolf pup nearly swallowed a piece of the chair's leg in his abrupt laughter.

"No," he shot back, mock-offense in his tone. A paw that was probably too large for a young animal rose up, settled on the chair leg, and cracked it completely until it, too, was separated from the rest. "I'm merely chewing on it. Can you not se—" He paused, muzzle tilted upward as if that might give his gaze a better line of sight. Those same yellow eyes narrowed, finally taking in the milky white orbs embedded in Hodr's face.

"Ah, now I see why they leave you behind. What use might a blind man be on a hunt? A shame you don't have a nose or ears like mine to make up for the lack." His tone was blatant and unabashed, merely stating fact without a thought to the other man's feelings. Such were the ways of the Norse.

"What do they keep you for, then?" He rolled the chair over once more, bringing up a third leg.

“Oh, probably just to keep Baldr happy. And they’re used to me by now. It's too late to change their minds,” Hodr replied lightly with a smirk that served to downplay the seriousness of the question and his rather flippant answer. Odin had been under no obligation to keep and accept his youngest son, no father was if a babe was born sickly or ill-made. Frigg told them often as children how Baldr had wailed unceasingly every time that they were parted. Perhaps he really did owe a greater debt to his twin than he knew.

After a bit of calculation and positioning himself he placed his hand on the back of the elaborate chair where he could sense it lying on its side, letting the vibrations travel through his palm as the wolf worked methodically at it.

“You’re very strong. You must be very large too.”

"Not yet," the pup admitted. He was certainly larger than normal foundling, but overly large ears and paws hinted that he would grow even larger still. There had already been whispers that he would outpace ever god in Odin's hall, that he would grow too big, and what would they do with him then? But Fenrir shrugged them all off, not thinking much of it. Perhaps when he was bigger, they would take him to hunt, and he would be the greatest of them all in felling huge beasts. Wouldn't that be a sight.

"Here," he offered, rising from the chair and padding around it to Hodr's side. He butted his head against the young man's hip. "See? Large enough. I'm up to your waist."

“You're bigger than most of the hunting hounds.” As he spoke he reached down, slow and cautious, to touch the wolf’s head. It wasn't timidity, but more a wordless sort of politeness; giving Fenrir ample time to pull away from the exploration if he wished to. “You seem big enough to me.”

Fenrir was used to being handled; unlike Odin's wolves, or the wild ones that lingered just outside the warmth of the hall's doorway, trapped within the confines of cold woods and blistering wind, Loki's son had known only kindness at the hands of the Aesir. He shoved his head harder into Hodr's hands, encouraging the man to touch him. He enjoyed a good scratch behind the ears, when he felt amenable to the idea, but he was no stranger to the odd pat or touch from those coming into or leaving the hall. Tyr was the most familiar, but the oath-bound god brought Fenrir scraps of food from the hunts.

"I'm told with time that I'll only grow larger. When do you think I'll stop?" A chuckle rolled out of his throat. "We could make a wager of it, though I suppose you might be stuck accepting my word for it."

There was indeed a brief bit of scritching behind the ears, but for the most part Hodr’s fingers moved with a purpose, gentle and thorough as they explored. He had never felt a living wolf before and now Fenrir was serving as a map, crystallizing in his mind what wolf meant.

“I'm a better judge of size than most think,” he laughed. “I'll take that wager.”

"Very well," Fenrir agreed, moving his head slightly up so that Hodr's hands found his jaws. The teeth within were knife-sharp, made to rend through meat and bone without a second thought. "What shall we wager?"

“I don't know. I've never bet against a wolf before.” His fingers roamed carefully over a few of Fenrir’s teeth without any visible fear. In his mind he was busy comparing them with what he knew of the teeth of various dogs, cats and the bear cub that Thor had briefly and ill-advisedly attempted to keep as a pet. “What would you choose?”

Fenrir laughed again, stopping only when he momentarily gripped Hodr's hand in his mouth. It was enough of a press to leave indents in Hodr's fingers, but Fenrir released him otherwise unmolested.

"Perhaps something simple; if I win, you will bring me the largest leg of mutton you can find. Something you can handle, hm? And a prize I would be happy to win.

"But if you guess correctly, I will take you out of doors, perhaps on one of the hunts I will lead when I am older. There may be other uses to you yet, Hodr, son of Odin." With that, he butted Hodr's hands with the top of his head, redirecting fingers to the spots he liked scratched most.

When Fenrir nudged, Hodr willingly obliged, going back to scratching and petting rather than his earlier steady exploration. As he did so he appeared to be giving the matter some serious thought. “But what will make your hunts any more interesting than those that I have been on before?”

For he had been on a few. Not many, true, but enough where he was certain he must have had the feel of the thing. Unless Baldr specifically asked he largely didn't bother any more. He enjoyed riding and he enjoyed company, but sitting on a horse that was following another horse that was following a hound that was following a deer surely held a hidden thrill that only sight could reveal.

It was a fair question, but Fenrir bristled all the same. When he spoke next, it was with an impassioned tone, doing his best to sway Hodr to his side.

"I should think it would be interesting simply because it's me," he offered at first. "And because we won't hunt simply deer and their ilk. We will hunt beasts worthy of defeat, things that would make a name for anyone who slew them. Trolls, lindworms, and draugr.

"Now, does not that excite your blood, Odinson?"

Hodr made a noncommittal noise in the back of his throat as he continued scratching. The idea did excite him, though how feasible it actually was was another matter entirely. The thought though of arriving at his father's hall bearing the carcass of some great, ferocious beast was nothing if not enticing.

“If you grow large enough to slay a lindworm then I shall hunt one with you. Whether you win the wager or not.”

Fenrir's eyes closed in bliss; he received far more than his due when it came to caresses, but between destroying Sif's chair and now this, he was well content. The only thing that might make it better was Tyr bringing him back the leg of an elk or something similar. It seemed his wish would soon be fulfilled; the doors on the opposite end of the halls suddenly slammed wide, the hunters returned from their endeavor. Fenrir's head snapped out of Hodr's hands, away from the blind god and toward the others who were quickly filling the long-empty space with the sounds of laughter and conversation.

Without so much as a goodbye, Fenrir leapt to his feet, moving to greet the Aesir who called Odin's hall their home. He could smell blood, and from there, he hoped there might be meat.