Unbroken

Chapter 74

Loki walked quickly to the throne room. If what he'd overheard from Laufey was correct, Asgard had less than a day to prepare their army for an attack.
"Father, I need to speak with you" Loki announced as he entered the throne room. Odin was speaking with one of the council members and Frigga when Loki interrupted.
"Loki, I'm glad you are no longer afraid to speak to me, but a certain level of respect is still expected of you" Odin said to him. Loki straightened up a little bit and nodded.
"My apologies, but it's urgent. It can't wait" Loki said, Odin still looked peeved at the interruption.
"Loki-" loki didn't let him finish.
"It's about Laufey. I have concrete information about when they plan to attack" he said. Odin's offense was now taken over by interest. He turned to the councilman
"Leave. I need a few minutes with my son" Odin said. The councilman nodded and left the room without a word.
"What do you know?" Odin asked Loki. Loki was eager to give all the information he had while it was still fresh in his mind.
"Laufey sent an army to invade Asgard. Apparently there are secret gates that link the realms together so that they can travel without the bifrost and without the casket. His army will be here by morning, but the gate opens at the edge of Asgard so we'll have time to put together a stronger defense force" Loki said. Frigga was confused, how did he get this information?
"Loki how do you know this?" She asked. Loki turned to her, he'd barely noticed that she was there, he'd been to set on telling Odin that he forgot about the little rule of him not visiting Jotunhiem.
"Right, well... I went to Jotunhiem" he said. Odin and Frigga both shared the same look of shock.
"What?!" They both said in unison. "Loki that is crossing a line, you are not permitted to leave Asgard without my permission, and going to Jotunhiem is strictly forbidden!" Odin yelled angrily, getting up from the throne and walking toward loki. Loki shook his head.
"I know, but didn't go there physically" he said. Odin looked at him questioningly. "I used the magic Frigga has been teaching me, I sent myself there in an illusion  and listened to him talking about what they were planing" he explained. Odin calmed down quite a bit, but Frigga looked no less mad.
"Loki that is the one thing I told you not to do" she said "one rule. Only one. Since when are you bad at following rules?" SHe asked him. He shrugged with a slight smirk.
"Everyone told me not to take hints so seriously" he said. She didn't look amused at all.
"You could've been seen" she told him, trying to make him see how dangerous what he did was. But he only seemed more proud of himself.
"Oh I was seen, and it worked in my favor" he said with a mischievous gleam in his eye that neither of them had seen before.Frigga looked stunned and was about to speak but Loki didn't let her "Laufey caught me, so I acted like it was an accident. I told them that father sent me as a spy. Laufey thought he'd caught me and he was so eager to brag and mock that he ended up telling me his entire plan" Loki explained with a slight chuckle. Frigga was annoyed, but mostly because What Loki had done turned out to be genius.
"I know you didn't want me to go there, but I did, and now we know what to expect, we can prepare, we can be ready for their attack" Loki said, trying to get Frigga to see that he hadn't simply been rebellious.
"Did he find out you weren't real?" Odin asked. If loki was here then clearly he's not still on Jotunhiem. Loki nodded.
"Yes. He tried to kill me and- Well that obviously didn't work" Loki said. Odin looked disappointed.
"Loki your information is no help to us now" Odin told him, turning back to the throne.
"What? Why?" Loki asked.
"Because now he'll change his plan" Frigga told him.
"Wh- no, no he can't" Loki said "before he saw me I heard him telling his guard that it was too late to pull his men back. He's stuck in his plan" Loki said. Odin looked skeptical, but he clearly wanted to believe what Loki was saying. This was a great advantage to Asgard.
"Are you absolutely sure?" Odin asked, Loki replayed the scene in his mind once more and then nodded.
"Yes" He said.
"Good. The. Go to my study, tell he guards I sent you. When you get inside there is a vault with different artifacts, one of which is a book. The rest will be self explanatory." Odin said. Loki didn't really understand any of the instructions Odin had just given him, but Odin had already shifted to giving instructions to the guards.
Loki decided he'd improvise and figure out what Odin wanted him to do, so he turned to leave.
"Loki" Odin called before he made it out. Loki turned around and gave Odin his full attention "memorize as much of the book as you can, then find Trinity and the to of you meet me in the meeting room" Odin instructed. Loki was confused once again, but he just nodded and left the throne room and headed to Odin's study. The guards let him in and he found the door to the vault, but he had no idea how to open it. He put his hand on the door and pushed, and the door opened with surprising ease. Loki didn't take time to think it was weird to have an unlocked vault, he just entered and searched for the book. It didn't take long for him to find it, it was the only book in there, and when he opened it he saw that it was a book of maps. Maps to the gates on the different realms. Loki quickly opened it and started scanning the pages to force all the information into his mind. The book was small, it illustrated the locations of all the gates and explained how to use them. Loki sat there for a long time trying to remember everything about each of the gates, the when he'd decided he memorized enough, he closed the book and quickly walked to the healing room to find Trinity.
"Get Trinity" Loki instructed the first healer he saw, which happened to be Rea.
"Don't you come barging in here telling me-" Loki didn't have time to listen to her complaints so he cut her off.
"Go get- Trinity" Loki saw her come in from the next room.
"What's wrong?" Trinity asked.
"Father needs us in the meeting room. We finally have a lead, and we might be able to stop laufey before he even starts this war." Loki said. Trinity didn't look as confused as Loki thought she would, in fact, she looked excited.
"Finally" she said as she dropped everything she was doing and left with Loki. They walked with a quick pace to the meeting room, but Loki was still confused about Trinity, why would odin want her to come? And why did she seem like she was expecting it?
"You know what this is about?" Loki asked her. She nodded
"Yeah, I do. The king recruited me to do a job for him and I think it's finally paying off" she said. Loki wanted to ask more but they arrived at the meeting room, so he decided to put it off.
"Good, you're here" Odin said when Loki and Trinity entered. The rest of the council was there as well.
"Anyone want to explain what's going on?" Loki asked, everyone else seemed to know what was happening, and no one was confused about why Trinity was there.
"In a minute. Did you memorize the book?" Odin asked. Loki nodded and shrugged.
"Yeah i think so, I know I have at least the Asgard and Jotunhiem parts memorized" he said. Odin nodded.
"Perfect" he said, then held out a hand for loki to give him he book, Loki handed it over, then watched in shock as Odin threw it into a fire pit that was nearby.
"Why-" Odin didn't let him finish.
"That's dangerous information. Somehow Laufey got ahold of it, so I'll make it impossible for anyone to do the same. Loki, you're the only person on Asgard who knows the locations of these gates" Odin said. Loki realized that suddenly he was carrying a huge responsibility, and he wasn't sure he appreciated how Odin just dumped it on him with no warning.
"Now, I've already filled in the council, why don't you sit down and I'll go over it with you as well" Odin said. Loki took his seat.
"Ever since Laufey threatened war I have been setting up camps and bases all around the realm.
Trinity has been helping me. Trinity has done physical evaluations of almost ever soldier on Asgard and has assisted in decided where each man should be stationed. She's also set up several of her own medical camps in the more vulnerable areas of the realm, and she's been teaching some of the other healers fighting skills" Odin explained. Loki smirked a little bit, she was teaching her friends what he was teaching her. Nice. Odin then shifted from talking only to loki to talking to the whole room "We obviously want to send our best and strongest to the gate sight, Thor is assembling an army now. Trinity and Loki, I want both of you to be part of that army, Loki knows the most about the frost giants, and Trinity is our best healer who is also a soldier. I'll be splitting the rest of you among two groups; one will be with Thor's team, the other will be at a camp closer to the city. Are there any questions?" Odin asked. There was a very loud silence as everyone quickly tried to get in their head that war was about to begin. "Good, then Loki and Trinity, go prepare yourselves for battle and join Thor by the front gates" Odin instructed, they both got up quickly, and left to get ready for war. Loki knew he should be afraid of the frost giants, but honestly, he was looking forward to some sweet revenge.