The doors shut behind him with a soft, resonant boom, muffled by thick wood and older magic woven into the grain. Silence hung heavy in the chamber, like ancient dust settled over forgotten truths.
Vali stood still, letting the quiet stretch between them.
Odin, Allfather of Asgard, King of the Nine Realms, sat at the far end of the raised dais. His one eye shimmered faintly beneath the dim glow of the hanging crystals above — not merely watching, but seeing.
Every detail.
Every hesitation.
Every unspoken truth.
Vali exhaled slowly. So it begins.
He walked forward — not rushed, not slow, merely steady, each footfall echoing on the etched stone floor. The chamber was deliberately built to make the space between monarch and subject feel immense. Yet somehow, it felt even longer now.
Did this walk always feel so cold?
When he stopped at the base of the dais, he did not kneel.
He simply looked up.
Odin didn't speak right away.
Instead, he studied him in that unknowable way he always did — as if trying to gauge the shape of a mountain by the shadows it cast.
"You've returned," Odin finally said.
His voice was low. Deep. Less thunder and more weight.
Vali nodded. "As summoned."
A flicker passed through the Allfather's expression — something unreadable. Regret, perhaps. Or wariness. It was gone as soon as it came.
"You were presumed dead," Odin continued. "The message I sent was a test. I half-expected silence."
Vali's jaw tightened. "You always did prefer ghosts to sons."
Odin raised an eyebrow at that.
"Is that what you believe yourself to be now?" he asked, his tone calm. "A ghost?"
"I'm not sure what else would survive what I did."
He let the words linger. Odin didn't interrupt.
"I was left for dead on Vanaheim. The ambush wasn't random," Vali continued, voice colder now. "Someone knew my route. Someone ensured no reinforcements arrived. The Vanir had never attacked that far east until that day."
Odin's fingers tightened subtly on the armrest of his throne. "You suspect treachery."
"I don't suspect it," Vali said. "I survived it."
Odin's gaze sharpened. "And you believe the source lies within this court."
Vali did not respond.
He didn't have to.
His silence was answer enough.
The Allfather leaned back slightly in his seat, eye narrowing. "And what will you do now, Vali? Storm the court? Drag names into light? Seek vengeance with a sword in hand?"
"I'll do what I must."
"For Asgard?" Odin asked, voice quieter now.
There it was again.
That tone.
That weary, uncertain gravity that crept into Odin's voice whenever things grew personal. The mask of a king slipping just enough to let the father show through. Not warmth — no, Odin was never warm. But there was something just short of sorrow buried in that question.
Vali didn't answer right away.
Instead, he looked around the chamber — at the tapestries, the floating runes overhead, the crown resting on a pedestal beside the throne. All the things that symbolized power. All the things that used to mean something to him.
"I used to think Asgard was my future," he said quietly. "That if I trained hard enough, bled long enough, obeyed deeply enough, I could become part of it — a voice at your side. A sword for the realm. I see now… that was never meant to be."
Odin said nothing.
"You sent me on that mission knowing I might die."
Odin's expression did not change.
"I sent you because I believed you could endure what others could not."
Vali scoffed softly. "That's not trust. That's utility."
A flicker of something passed through Odin's eye again — frustration, perhaps. Or guilt. Maybe both.
"You are my son in all but name," Odin said.
Vali's head tilted.
"In all but name," he repeated flatly. "Yes. That distinction has always been very... convenient."
There was a long silence.
And then Odin spoke again — slower this time. Measured. As if the words were old and hard to lift.
"You think I didn't know?" he said. "That Angerboda whispered poison into the court? That your absence was her gain?"
Vali's breath caught.
"You knew," he said, voice dropping. "And yet you let it happen."
"She has power still," Odin replied. "Power rooted in ancient blood and older alliances. Her time may have passed, but her influence remains dangerous."
"And so you left me to die."
"I waited to see if you would survive."
Vali laughed — a dry, humorless thing that echoed far too loudly in the vast chamber.
"Survive," he repeated, looking away. "As if survival in a world that betrays you is some kind of reward."
"I needed to know," Odin said, voice firm, "if you were ready."
"For what?"
Odin rose slowly.
There was no thunder in his movement, no divine glow. Just age and weight and certainty.
"To take your place."
Vali blinked.
"My... place?"
"As my heir," Odin said simply. "Or something more. Something beyond titles."
A pause.
Then Odin descended the steps — one by one, eyes never leaving Vali's.
"I did not name you before, because the court was not ready. Because Asgard was not ready. And because you… you were not ready."
Vali tensed.
"And now?" he asked.
"Now, the question is not whether you can lead," Odin said, stopping just in front of him, "but whether you will. Whether your heart still belongs to this realm — or if you intend to burn it down for the sins of its rulers."
Vali stared at him.
Long and hard.
And for a moment, it was just the two of them. No throne. No guards. No history.
Just a weary king.
And a son forged in exile.
"I don't know," Vali finally said.
It was the most honest answer he could give.
Odin nodded once.
"Then stay," he said quietly. "Observe. Watch them all. Make your judgment. When you are ready… choose your path. Not as my weapon. Not as my heir. But as yourself."
Vali didn't respond right away.
But for the first time, something cracked in the cold around his eyes.
He gave the faintest of nods.
And Odin turned and walked back to his throne.