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Chapter Text

"Try not to drown," the creature whispers and shoves him over the edge. His initial reaction is panic, a desperate sort of frantic, flapping wave that he does with his arms unnecessarily. He's not going to get himself to swim this way, only cause the sinking to happen faster. He tries to steady himself, to calm down, but all his breath escapes his lungs and slips towards the surface. He's helpless to stop it.

The water, unlike what he'd first suspected, is not freezing cold. He thought it would be, because it looked so crystal-like. So clear. So innocent. He was wrong, though. It's hot. Unbearably hot. His skin feels like it's boiling, and his eyes are burning, even behind the closed lids. He tries to kick up with his feet, but the water is too heavy. Too incapable of movement. It's like he's trying to push through solid rock, rather than a fluid.

He panics.

He's can't breathe, but he can't find his way towards the surface. His clothing is sticking to his skin, weighing him down. He is going to drown.

"You misunderstand my intentions," the creature says, laughing slightly. She glances back at him once, her eyes dark. There's a weight that's settled there, almost like regret, but he's not stupid enough to believe it. "I'm not going to hurt you. I'm a good mother. What type of mother would I be to wound you so?"

He feels his eyebrow lift. "I wouldn't go declaring it out of character for you."

The skin around the creature's eyes grows tight. She's smiling with venom, and turns fully around to face him, a small glass vial in her grip. She holds it out to him like it's a gift. "Drink this."

He stares at her, not twitching a muscle. He's been poisoned before. He's not going to take any chances, even if this is supposed to spare Fandral. Her eyes narrow the slightest bit, that faint smile twitching on the edge of her lips. He would learn, later, that it meant she was angry, but he didn't know it then.

"No." He states blankly.

"No?" She sighs softly, turning away from him. "Well, I suppose that dear Fandral will have to be up to work in the morning, poor child—"

The wet rattle of Fandral's lungs and his pale face flashes through his mind. Sif's open panic and the Volstagg's attempts to calm the children to ignore his own hyperventilating. His teeth grit and he snatches the glass vial from her, twisting off the cap. She looks smug, and for a moment he's tempted to throw it at her face.

He doesn't.

He's afraid of the outcome, and feels like a coward. Thor would never succumb to this witch's desires, even if it meant the cost of his own life. He hesitates all the same before lifting it to his lips, self preservation demanding that he cast the bluish liquid away and run. But where will he go? With Aetheitin in his system he's practically lame against the creature and her defenses.

Fandral. Those idiots will be the death of him. If this kills him, he will haunt them.

He forces his wrist to tip, and the liquid touches his tongue. The taste is faint, almost as if it's an afterthought rather than a prominent feature, and he feels slightly sick. He's studied potions before, he knows that the stronger the taste the weaker the concoction. There's less magic involved, so there's not much to mask the taste. The strongest magic-laced poisons have no taste at all.

Whatever this is, the creature has spared no expense.

When he's finished with the bottle, he does throw it at her head. His aim, sharped from years with a bow and throwing knives, holds true. The creature apparently wasn't expecting it, because the glass smacks into her forehead and she releases a shriek of pain and surprise. He allows himself a moment of satisfaction, but it's quickly tarnished when she leans down and picks up the intact vile before looking up at him, face alight with fury.

"Is that any way to treat your mother!?"

"No." He concedes, smug, "Of course not. I would never throw anything at my mother."

He lets it hang. Let's her fury grow to frustration as his implications settle inside her wild thoughts. He smirks faintly, but lifts a hand to his throat and rubs at it slightly when it feels tight. His chest is compressing, and his vision is growing slightly hazy. He tries a deep breath, but it doesn't help anything.

A blurred figure steps into his line of sight and his chest constricts with irrational panic.

It's a drug, he tries to tell himself. But it doesn't help his body's heightened flare or adrenaline and the more powerful urge he has to flee. The creature moves forward and he backs up, suddenly needing to be away.

Coward.

"I never did tell you, did I?" her voice doesn't sound right, blurred and pitched, "But my children really are so lovely. They dug that stream for us all, you know." The river. It doesn't look handcrafted with all the rocks, soil, tree roots and...things that shovels wouldn't make it past in the hands of youth. She made them dig a river? "But before they did that, we had to get our water somewhere."

He keeps pushing until his back hits something and his entire body lurches. He grabs for his magic, but there's nothing there but a gaping hole and it hurts more than any physical wound could have. He gasps, curling around his stomach, his back pushed against the solid stone behind him. He needs to run. He has to get away. He can't—

Can't—

"We had a well. Dried up now save a few hands of water." She says, and dread seeps into his stomach. His entire body rigid with a sudden realization on what he's leaning against. What she led him to. When he'd agreed to take the punishment for Fandral's illness, he'd thought it would be a few more hours of hard labor. Perhaps a beating. He'd braced himself for that, not this. He'd only grown more confused when the woman had guided him far away from the basement, from the field, from her dwelling—everything.

Hands grab his shoulders and he flinches back from them, trying to scramble away, but it's fruitless. He wants to start screaming, but he thinks he might already be.

"Try not to drown," the creature whispers and shoves him over the edge of the crumpling well.

He falls—down, down into the never ending blackness, but something inside him insists that he should have hit the bottom by now. That it wasn't ever this deep and he could see moonlight flickering through if he tried. But he keeps falling, and he doesn't stop, his heart a scattered mess inside his chest and entire being hoping for relief that isn't going to come.

He keeps falling.

Then he smashes into the hard earth of the bottom, water splashing against his face and through his clothing, soaking him. His head is plunged beneath the surface for a moment, and when he struggles, scrambling to yank it out, he can't remember which way is up.

He's going to drown.

She told him not to, and he's going to do it anyway.

Try not to dr—

Loki kicks his way to the surface and his head breaks free of the frigid water. He gasps for air desperately, ripping his eyelids apart in a desperate effort to see something other than the ever-pressing darkness. The twin suns beat down on him immediately, and though it can't have been more than a minute at most since he fell, it feels like an eternity.

The brightness hurts.

His chest aches.

Loki eyes the shore of with trepidation, but awkwardly shoves his way to it; limbs unused to the movement. He used to be better at swimming, he would do it frequently before...before, but now some days drinking water is hard enough. Relief crashes through him hard enough to make him wheeze when his feet smack against sand. He stumbles to his hands and knees as soon as he's on dry ground, coughing. His clothing sticks to his skin, his hair plastered to the sides of his face. He can't breathe, still. He's coughing like he's dying, even though he knows he didn't inhale any of the fluid.

"They were right. You do look like a drowned rat when wet." Someone sneers, and Loki feels his hands clench around the moist sand beneath his fingertips. The coarse grain is like daggers against his skin, and it's a relief.

"Come now," another voice says cryptically, "it was barely a little splash. You sound like you're dying."

Their jeering doesn't stop just because he's trying to remember how to put air into his lungs.

"Good grief, is that his spine? Do you have no muscle, my prince?" another questions mockingly. He sneers the title as Loki has long since grown accustomed to, but sounds bored at the same time.

Loki's teeth snap together. He spits water onto the ground between his pale hands and lift a shaking, sand-covered hand to try and swipe hair back from his face so he can see better. His attempt fails, sandy black hair falling in front of his eyes. The movement of his jostled arm causes his sedir to pulse. It's burning beneath his skin, demanding release. It's angry. Angrier than Loki can ever allow himself to be.

"Clearly not," the high-pitched wail of a female sing-songs, "we'd see it then, wouldn't we?"

Do they have to—!?

The tip of a sword lightly touches is hand, as if afraid he'll bite something. He doesn't react, trying to calm the swirling beast inside his chest. It feels unfamiliar to him, as if he hasn't been levitating items since before he could talk. "You yield, then? You've put down your sword. In a way. That does beg the question—can anyone see it in the river?"

Someone snickers. "Really. You'd think that you'd stabbed him instead of shoved."

The sword pokes at him again. "Are you still with us? Do I not claim victory?"

"Maybe he's having another fit!" A female voice suggests, upper class lip seeping through her tone. She and her other companion were servants who'd stopped to watch the battle like it was some sort of grand tournament instead of a training match. "The Norns know that he needs to be locked away where he won't hurt anyone instead of among the sane!"

Loki remembers to breathe, and exhales sharply.

"Boo!" Something screeches next to his ear, and Loki nearly goes toppling back into the water again in his effort to get away. It's less so much the sudden sound as it is the movement that startles him. Laughter bursts out among the group once more. "Ooh," the boy lifts his fingers, dangling them, "I'm the creature come back for what's left of your soul, huh? She's dead, you fool!"

He knows that.

"Allfathers," the swordsman sighs and draws his weapon back like there could be no worse fate in this universe than the one that has befallen him, "this is the future of our realm. A maimed prince who hasn't seen the training ground in months and a mad, glib-tongued snake who can't handle a little dip in the river!"

"Our beloved Thor has been lost to the madness of this creature!"

"And now the insanity of the Prince is going to finish him off!"

Before he can think, before he can process, Loki's hand shoots out and he grasps the origin of the voice with sedir, wrapping an invisible hand around their throat and squeezing. The delighted laughter stops abruptly as a high-pitched gasp takes its place. Loki's arm is trembling, but his sedir isn't confined to the constraints of his body.

He lifts his head, staring at the group with narrowed eyes. The laughter has stopped, the delighted chortles of their amusement ceased as they stare between him and the redhead with growing horror.

Not so funny now, is it?

Loki's hand twitches involuntarily, and the redhead jerks. His hands are raised towards his throat, lifted at the invisible hand like he can peel it away. Loki wants to laugh. Sedir doesn't work like that. For all he's been claimed insane, Loki knows that much. Water is dripping from his clothing, running down his face. Too much water, it's choking him. The water is a liar. It caresses where it should stab, soothes when it should bite.

Try not to drown.

He wants to be sick. He might be sick. He parts his lips to speak, but he can't get any words out. He wants to yell at them all to shut up, but there's nothing there but a desperate whine.

"He is having a fit!" One of the maids whispers in a despaired screech, grabbing onto the arm of the nearest soldier like he can save her soul, "Someone call for a healer! He's going to kill us in his madness!"

The redhead gasps, his face beginning to turn shades. Loki staggers up to his feet, stumbling despite his best efforts. There's seven Aesir, including the redhead, which means that no one has gone running for help. They were supposed to be running practice rounds, but it would appear that they forgot about their swords, instead standing there gaping at him like he's some sort of horrendous beast.

But their slander, and everyone else's, is nothing new. Even before the creature's trial. Before he had to be excused from the public execution because he was a coward. Frigga says that it was for the best that he "wasn't in the state to see his captor so soon after the torture", but he's not an idiot. He knows what it looks like, even if there's nothing that can be done.

Prince Loki, who can't even see his enemies to the chopping block, is one of Odin's heirs.

Asgard is humiliated. (Thor was there. Thor, who can do no wrong. Loki can't even—)

"Whoa, snake," one of the men in the group lifts up his hands, trying to placate. They're beyond that now. "This—this isn't a warrant for murder. Just...calm down, aight?"

"Yeah," they sound considerably more uncertain, and Loki wants to laugh. Instead he feels his throat grow hot from tears. "Yeah, just," another man waves his hands, like Loki is some sort of rabid dog he can ease the temper of. And he is an animal to them, isn't he? Snake Prince, everyone calls him.

"What on the Nine is going on!?" the voice startles him, and Loki's hold on the redhead, Hyn, falls. Hyn stumbles onto the green grass, coughing. The other six flutter over him, demanding the state of his health and wellbeing, but Hyn waves them off, scowling up at him. There's the barest edge of a smirk there, though, and Loki squeezes his eyes shut in defeat.

"I leave you alone for three minutes to practice your form, and now you're trying to murder each other?" Tyr sounds angry, which isn't anything new. Tyr usually sounds angry. He's a brusk man with an even brisker attitude.

Loki's teeth grit together.

"Loki attacked all of them!" one of the girls shouts, "Me and Mis came over to help, but he was already out of control." To add to the weight of her story, she breaks into hysterical sobs, and Loki can almost see as she buries herself against the nearest man and offers her crocodile tears.

And they call him the liar.

"Yeah!" one of the other youths agrees quickly, likely grateful that the servant girl was capable of spinning falsities. His enthusiasm is so quick, but false that the deafest of men could hear the quaver of mistruth within his voice.

High Commander Tyr stops, somewhere off to Loki's left. The group is quiet, and Try releases a breath before saying, flatly, "Loki."

He has no rank here. Tyr doesn't care about the heritage of his troops, Loki could be the All-Father himself, but if he's serving beneath this High Commander, he's just Loki. It makes him uncomfortable. Raw and vulnerable, like he's been stripped of an outer skin and forced to lay himself bare before the man.

He hides behind his titles, for all he hates them.

Loki chances opening his eyes and twists slightly to look back. As expected, Tyr is on his left. His red hair is slicked back, but the short beard is frizzing within the humidity of the day. The heat that had previously made Loki sick enough to affect his form beforehand. Enough that Hyn managed to shove him into the river instead of just disoriented him.

Try not to drown.

Loki parts his lips slowly, "What would you have me say, Commander?" he questions.

Tyr's eyes narrow. "An explanation would be nice—"

"We gave you one!" the servant girl wails. Loki wants to hit her. It's not a common feeling, and his sudden violence startles him.

"—You don't normally attack people without provocation." Tyr continues. His patience is thinning further, getting sharp and frustrated around the edges. Loki almost wants to keep pushing, just to see how far he has to go before it snaps all together. But because he's not stupid, he doesn't.

His voice is bland, "They shoved me into the river." He gestures towards himself for evidence to back his statement. Wail all they want, Loki is soaking wet. Tyr put them near the river because he thought that it would be a good real-life battleground.

Loki had bit his tongue to stop himself from screaming when the commander suggested it. He hates water.

Try not to—

"So you nearly strangled Hyn?" High Commander Tyr lifts one bushy eyebrow. His hard face is tight. "That I struggle to believe."

Well, he should. Loki's not about to admit that he's seeing things again. It's been more than half a year since the creature's execution. Loki should be fine now. The Warriors Three and Sif have bounced back as well as they can. They struggle, but they aren't like him. He, who spent no more time there than they did, but seems so much worse off. He knows what people say about him now. He's Odin's insane son, a "pity that the boy barely reached coming of age before losing himself", unstable. 

(And maybe they're right.)

"I don't like being wet." Loki's humor falls flat. In the awkward silence that follows, he swipes his long bangs away from his face, looking away. He catches the eye of one of the youths and they sneer at him angrily. Loki's temper flares again, but he forces himself to swallow it down where it won't damage anyone permanently but him.

They claimed they do this for Thor (they always do, because Loki went and got himself lost in the woods and if he hadn't, Thor would have been fine), but they slander him at a moment's notice? His brother doesn't—shouldn't—receive the treatment that Loki does. Asgard has ever been the golden prince's faithful coddler, just because of his leg doesn't mean he should lose that. Thor needs that support. He needs to bask in the warm sun's rays; he knows nothing else.

Tyr looks more frustrated than he did before Loki spoke.

It must be a gift that he can do this so often to people. Truly.

The High Commander turns to the others, and Loki knows he's lost the small fragmented chance he had to walk away from this without baring the full weight of the blame. If he wasn't dripping, if they hadn't shoved him, then maybe he would have been able to cling to his silvertongue. As is, here they are.

"Will someone—" Tyr starts up again, but a louder voice overshadows the High Commander, shouting Loki's name. He turns towards it by habit and feels his teeth set together even harder despite the relief that crashes into him all the same. He dreads her arrival, but welcomes it all the same.

Sif comes to a breathless stop in front of him, stopping sharply only to grab at his shoulders. He flinches back from the contact, but she holds fast, staring him up and down. The weight of her stare is no comfort, and he doubts he'll ever grow accustomed to it. "What happened? I heard the shouting. Are you hale—?"

"I'm fine." Loki interrupts. It comes between gritted teeth, and he watches her eyebrow lift with disbelief before something seems to register and she draws her gloved hands back, making a face. Her eyes linger on his hair before she comes to the startling conclusion that "You're wet."

"Hadn't noticed." He mutters. She rolls her eyes in annoyance, huffing slightly.

"Why are you wet?" Sif presses. When he stubbornly offers no answers, her head tips, staring towards the seven youth behind him. He can see her slowly putting together pieces of a fragmented puzzle, but he offers no guidance. They shoved him. They didn't...it's not like sparring is supposed to be gentle taps and giggling. It's meant to be shoves and bruises. He just overreacted.

As he is prone to.

Emotional.

"Loki attacked us!" Hyn exclaims, but his voice is wheezy. Loki suppresses a wince, but only just. "We shoved him into the river to protect ourselves, and when he crawled his way out he tried to strangle me! He's mad I tell you! He needs a cell, not a coddler!"

Loki's jaw tightens and he looks away for a brief moment. His chest hurts. There's too much there. He wants a release, but he can't...

A chorus of agreed murmurs sound within the group and Loki watches with hesitant wariness as Sif's jaw tightens slightly. There's a hardness to her eyes that promises someone's broken nose and Loki grabs her upper arm before she can do anything rash.

"Sif—"

"Don't." Sif rips herself free from the group and stalks past the High Commander to the other Aesir. Tyr makes a grunt of disagreement, but beyond shifting his weight slightly, makes no move to stop her. Loki wraps his arms around his stomach and digs his nails into his back. He hates this. He hates that she doesn't think he can handle himself, hates that she flutters around him like some sort of broken bird, hates that she—

Now he's just being petty.

But sometimes he wishes that they could re-settle smoothly into their previous arrangement: they ignored each other, only interacting with strictly necessary. They'd settled into something professional before the creature happened. Loki was okay with that. He doesn't...he doesn't know how to handle her now.

How to handle any of them.

He doesn't know how to have...It. Them. Friends. Even after all this time.

"What did you do?" Sif demands, jabbing her finger into Hyn's chest. A part of Loki, not shaken and screaming, is partially amused by this. He's been on the end of her fury too many times to count, for both real and imagined slights, he knows the fear that's flashing freely across Hyn's face.

"Who said that we did anything!?" another man demands. He's blond, and sporting a rather unflattering face of facial hair. Is he attempting to grow a beard on his neck for the Norn's sake?

"I do." Sif's hand rests on her sword. She's sporting a confidence he envies. "Because this is sparing you dimwit. Loki was supposed to attack you. That's how this works. Who did this?"

"He tripped, Lady Sif." One of the girls murmurs. "He's clumsy enough as it is without wet earth to help with that."

Loki digs his nails tighter. It's beginning to pinch skin, but the pain is a relief.

Sif doesn't laugh, but a few try for hesitant smiles that fall quickly. The warrior's back is so straight it looks nearly painful. Loki doesn't know whether to stop her, or watch. It's the strangest sensation to him to not have to defend himself.

And he hates it.

Sif's head turns, likely staring the entire group down. Her voice is still so calm, which makes this worse. "Who shoved him?" No one answers. Sif pulls on the hilt of her weapon, beginning to draw. Loki takes a step forward as High Commander Tyr does, prepared to stop her from doing anything stupid. She's so much more like Thor than she realizes. Hotheaded. Impulsive. Angry.

"I did!" A Aesir exclaims that Loki knows for a fact wasn't the perpetrator. It was Hyn because that's who he was fighting. The Aesir speaking was on the other side of the group when Hyn's hands shoved against his arm and Loki toppled. "It was me. No need to start taking off hands, my lady."

"I was rather thinking fingers, but I'm not fastidious." Sif takes a step back and goes quiet. She shoves her sword back into its sheath and Loki sees several of the Aesir openly relax. Idiots. Her fists are tight by her side, and Loki can almost see the calculating shift in her gaze as she determines where hitting the Aesir would hurt the most.

This is completely unnecessary. It's like she said. It's sparing. And they just shoved him, it's not the worst thing that's been done to him. A river of water won't be the death—try not to drown—of him. His jaw is beginning to hurt from how tightly it's clenched.

Loki steps up behind her, managing to grab hold of her shoulder before she can do anything. "Sif." He keeps his voice quiet. "Stop. It's nothing. We can go."

"I think not."

How much trouble would he be in if he punched her? Just this once? Probably a bountiful amount, he's already reacted wrongly once today. No need to add to the growing pile. Loki's shoulders slump thinking about the talking to he's going to get later.

Sedir is not a weapon of violence, Frigga will say, ignoring everything he's just tried to explain, it is a tool for healing and creation.

Why do you never think? Father will mutter, before heaving the great sigh that only Loki can make him draw, and then he'll begin to talk. Father will go on and on, as if somehow speaking at him enough will leave him properly castigated and repentant. It doesn't.

"Sif. Please." Loki tries. Her hazel-brown eyes catch his and her gaze softens almost immediately. He's already been the idiot today. There's no need to drag her down with him. Her posture relaxes somewhat, and Loki turns away in relief, prepared to leave the river far behind them, but Sif lashes out. He wasn't watching her feet, and he suspects she knew that.

The edge of her boot catches the shin of the blame-claiming Aesir and he crumples with a loud surprised shout. Given what Loki has seen her do on the actual field of battle, Sif was holding back considerably. Loki suspects the worst that the Aesir got was a deep bruise, and not a snapped bone. His jaw tightens all the same, irritated.

He side glances her, but the woman doesn't even have the audacity to look guilty.

"Lady Sif," High Commander Tyr sighs, "please stop damaging my students."

Sif scoffs and gestures towards three, "They were in Thor's class. They're long beyond your guidance."

"They're increasing their rank and therefore have to do more years of service." The Commander explains tiredly and glances towards the group. "Get him up. It's just a bruise." The Aesir glances at him, eyes narrowed, "I'd rather you left for the day, Loki. I'll inform your parents of what happened; regardless of what they say, don't come back until next week."

Loki's face heats with humiliation, his fists curling. Can he react like a normal living creature for once in his life? He shakes off the thoughts and forces himself to center in the present as High Commander Tyr stalks off with a huff. Clearly, he's determined that none of the wounds life threatening, and will continue to shout at other soldiers.

"Oh, she broke something!" the Aesir wails, gripping at his calf. The group is fluttering, obviously unsure whether to help Hyn or this idiot first. Hyn, much to Loki's quiet relief, seems mostly undamaged. There isn't even any evidence of Loki's mistreatment on his neck. "I can feel bone rattling within my muscle! Cruel witch!"

Sif smiles. "Indeed." She turns to him, gesturing away from the group, "After you then, my prince."

Loki turns on his heel and stalks off into the grass, ignoring the sharp jibes the group yells after him. Sif's hand lands on his shoulder, and he lets her keep it there until they're from view. Once they've entered the familiar arcs of the beginning of the palace courtyard, he shrugs it off and turns to her, attempting to breathe through the compression in his chest. The suns are helping dry him, but not by much.

The loss of the outside tension has made the inner one worse. He's wet. He's wet and afraid and why is Mother being quiet, she promised she would talk to him, she promised that the dark wouldn't...wouldn't...He's dripping. The world is blurring.

"You didn't have to do that." Loki snaps. "Why did you? I was handling the situation perfectly fine by myself."

He can't breathe.

Sif draws back, but only just. "Clearly. I was trying to help you. It's my duty in case you've forgotten."

To stalk him, she means. Because now she has to be involved of every gritty part of his life whereas before they barely spoke to each other. Before.

Before it.

Before her.

"You didn't have to take up the position of captain to my guard any more than the Idiots Three were forced to join it!" Loki hisses, his words are getting tighter. His vision doesn't look quite right. "I was handling it...I was...I…I—" he grabs at her shoulders to keep upright, feeling his mask crumple, "—can't breathe. Sif!"

He tumbles to his knees, and sees the woman kneel beside him immediately. Her hands grip his shoulders, the pressure tight enough to capture his attention, but not to hurt. The hardness to her face has fled, leaving only concerned sympathy in its wake. "Loki," her voice is soft, "look at me."

He's making hiccuping gasps, and his vision is blurred, but he lifts his head in her direction. "Breathe with me. In for four, out for seven. In…" she does the motion herself, raising her hands to mimic what she's trying to get him to follow. Loki manages to catch her rhythm after a few tries, but can't hold it for long.

Pathetic.

He buries his head into his hands and bites on his inner cheek to stop himself from screaming. It's been months. He has been free for weeks, so why can't he stop thinking about it? Why is he still trapped here? What is wrong with him?

He hears Sif sigh, dropping down next to him. Loki doesn't move. He lets himself crumple, because, though there are few people he trusts to let himself fall apart in front of, Sif was there.

She doesn't say anything. When they get like this, there isn't much to, is there?

At long last, she murmurs, "What happened?"

Loki scoffs, lifting his head up to grumpily stare at her. "Hyn shoved me. I fell in the river. There's not much more to it." He sets his teeth and looks away, but not before he sees Sif's head tilt slightly in confusion. He hasn't told a soul about what happened in the well. Not Frigga. Not Thor. Not them. He can't. Every time he tries to open his mouth, the words fail him. He doesn't even know what to say.

The children who were punished in such a way...they get it, and as much as Loki hates that they understand, it's a relief to not be alone in it.

Try not to—

He rubs his forearms, sighing heavily into the air. The column they stopped behind offers some shading, but not enough to ease the sheer misery of the twin suns beating down on them. He hates summer. He hates being wet. He hates Asgard. Hates that he can't escape the shadow of the creature, though she's been dead for so long.

"This...has to do with her, doesn't it, my prince?" Sif's voice is quiet. Loki bites his tongue to stop himself from correcting her for the umpteenth time. It's Loki. No matter how many times he's tried to tell her that, she keeps calling him the title. He's used to people saying it in mockery, he doesn't know what to do when people don't.

Loki looks forward miserably. "Doesn't everything?"

Sif bites on her lower lip. It's clear she agrees, but she won't admit to it. The Weeping Siren is something they avoid discussing with a wide berth. They've barely said a few clipped sentences to each other since the execution. Their ignorance isn't going to make her go away. Even dead she haunts them.

In the way that Hogun hasn't returned to his homeworld since they were rescued, how Fandral is never without a blade anymore, how Volstagg has little appetite, the way that Sif rubs her arm subconsciously when she's thinking, as if trying to ease the pain of her long-healed broken forearm. Thor's constant, prominent limp. Frigga's paranoia. Father's increased temper. The Warriors Four switching their long-held captain status among the army to join his guard.

It's been months.

How much longer do they have to go before she dies in more than body?

Sif gets up to her feet, if a little awkwardly, and holds out her hand. "I think it's better if we leave the past where it belongs, don't you?"

Yes.

But here they are.

Avoidance. Again.

He takes her hand and lets her pull him up to his feet. Loki's only damp now, and, with a whispered—physical words help concentration—spell, removes the rest of the water from his clothing. It hadn't occurred to him to do this until much later. His mind is far to much of a frazzled mess now.

Both of them are quiet as they go forward.

It's in times like this that Loki misses the arguments. At least there was something to fill the void.

000o000

Loki doesn't have an appetite at supper. He spins the food around the plate, but the thought of consuming anything makes him ill. So he lets it sit there and pretends to listen to the quiet conversation between his parents. Thor, on his left, is boredly looking towards the tapestry behind their parents chairs. The small, private family dining room has only one window, and it's behind the side of the table he and his sibling are seated at.

Loki doesn't know what Thor finds so fascinating about the tapestry; he and his sibling have been looking at the same woven cloth for decades. It doesn't change. Loki could draw a picture of the same waterfall behind Mt. Arne with his eyes closed.

The clicking of cutlery comes to a momentary lapse and Loki sees Frigga's lips purse. She shares the briefest look with Father before leaning forward on the table, clasping her hands together. And here it is. The conclusion of Frigga and Father doing their best to pretend they haven't been staring at him all evening. "Are you not hungry tonight, Loki?"

Loki bites on his cheek, giving a slight shrug. The fork makes its way around the rim again, pushing the grape through the fancy looking salad. Realizing that she's waiting for an audible response, he bites back an annoyed sigh and looks up. "Not really." He pauses for a moment before asking, hopefully, "I'm exhausted, may I be excused?"

"No." Father interjects before Frigga can get the chance to.

Loki slumps. So they heard about Hyn then. He braces himself for the inevitable and sees Thor glance towards him. There's the briefest raise of his eyebrows before he asks, "What did you do now?"

Loki's teeth set. He ignores his brother and looks to the other side of the table. Frigga is carefully picking the napkin up from her lap and folding it with a grace Loki doubts he could mimic on his best day. In silence, she sets the napkin next to her plate and clasps her hands together again, resting them on the edge of the table. The white tablecloth creates a stark contrast with her deep blue sleeves.

"Thor," her voice is even, "would you mind stepping outside, please? Your father and I would like to talk to your brother."

Thor's expression flickers. He glances towards Loki for the briefest moment as if hoping that Loki will ask for him to stay, but Loki makes no such movement. He sits in his chair, rigid, and watches as Thor sighs, but gives a nod to Frigga's question and stands. "Of course, Mother. Good even'."

Loki notices that Thor, as he always has since the healing rooms, keeps a firm grip on the rim of the table. It's in an effort to keep his balance.

Loki hates how he can't stop himself from looking down at Thor's leg. The malformation isn't as obvious as it used to be, months of continued treatment from Eir have some-what straightened what is left of the shattered bone. They're watching the injury now, waiting to see if Thor's body will be able to heal itself given the proper medication, or if they'll need to install a permanent brace.

Loki hates the phrase "watching something"; he's been in enough treatment to know that it means they're putting it on a shelf until it comes exploding off of it. Usually dramatically, and in a way that could have been prevented.

Loki sees Frigga's lips grow tight for a brief moment before Thor manages to right himself and exits the room quietly. His limp makes more noise than any words could have. The obvious sway to his posture, the leaning.

The brokeness.

The door laps shut behind the elder, and Loki turns to his parents as the weight of their gaze settles on him. Before he can really think about what he's going to say, he blurts, "It was sparring. It's not like I removed a part of his body permanently. He'll be fine. Eventually."

"Loki." Frigga's voice is flat. Her expression is still so carefully constructed to hide away her anger, but Loki isn't a fool. He can see it in how tense her hands are, how she's leaning towards Father. "You attacked with the intent to kill. Sedir is not a weapon. It's a tool to heal and create."

"I know that." Loki says between clenched teeth. "Did the High Commander even explain what happened?"

"He did." Father assures, expression growing sharp, "Why do you never think?" he mutters. Loki does his best to repress a flinch, but his father's anger weighs on his shoulders like a physical weight. Crushing him.

Loki's tongue snaps down from the roof of his mouth and, before Father can start on his familiar tirade again, shoves up to his feet. He slaps his hands down on the tabletop.

"I was thinking. I was defending Thor's honor. Why is it that he can beat someone bloody on a battlefield and receive a medal for it, but I shake Hyn around a little and this—" he gestures wildly "—happens?"

"It's not what he did, it's how he did it. Loki." Frigga's tone is disapproving now. "Sedir isn't a weapon; I thought you would know that by now."

They're going in circles.

"You only think that because you were raised among pacifists!" Loki throws up his hands. "You weren't there!"

They never are, but he can't say that. They're the king and queen of the Nine. Expecting more than this once-a-week meal together is more than he should. He's known this since he was young. Yet he can't help wanting.

Father's jaw has gained a tic, but both remain seated. It makes him feel stupid, and strangely childish, even though he left that part of his life behind a long time ago. Carefully, his father asks, "Tyr said that they most they did was shove you into the river. How could this warrant attack? A strangulation, for that matter?"

"It was sparing—"

"Don't use excuses with me, boy!" Father snaps, slapping a fist on the tabletop. Loki flinches back, his breath escaping in a harsh gust. "Your actions can not and should not simply be brushed to the side! This is not the first time one of these...outbursts has happened since the Weeping Siren—" something dangerously close to a squeak slips through Loki's lips at the spoken name "—and unless you manage to pull yourself together, we will be forced to interfere. You're not well, son."

Son. The word slithers into his subconscious and drags up nothing but nausea. His fists clench at his sides. He wants to hold the king's stare, but finds he can't. "Please don't...say that."

"My point proven exactly." Father snaps. Loki chokes, his nails digging into his palms. Not well? Do they think he's as insane as everyone else does? What is wrong with him? Why can't he get any better? Is he stuck like this? Eternally warring with the ghosts that haunt him? Is there no escape? What does he have to do to make people see him as more than a problem?

"Odin," Frigga's voice is sharp. A warning. Frigga rests a hand on her husband's arm before saying, softer, "What your father is trying to say is that we are concerned for you. What happened today is only proof that there's something else going on. If you would talk to us, explain your side…"

"Then you'll still be angry." Loki bites. A nastier part of him wants to sneer that they don't know how to be anything different, but he swallows the words. "What Tyr told you was the truth. I'm unwell." He steps away from the table, intending to slip away from the small confinements, but Frigga rises to her feet.

"Loki. Stop. Sit down. We're not done yet. We need to talk about this."

He freezes, wrestling between his urge to flee, but unable to. Defying authority isn't something he can do anymore after the creature. He tries, but the knowledge of the ever-awaiting consequences to his actions stops him before he can get much of anywhere.

He deflates. The indignation seems to seep out of him in one gust of air and he falls stiffly into the chair again. He waits for them to strike him, but it doesn't come. This isn't the Blodig Skog, he tries to tell himself, the circumstances are different.

But he can't help instinct.

Frigga's expression smooths over, "The High Commander asked us to prevent you from returning to the ring for the rest of the week. I agree. This isn't the first outburst where you've been reported as...absent mentally. What can we do about it?"

Do they really think if he knew that he wouldn't have told them?

He shakes his head. "May I be excused? Please?"

"Loki, please," Frigga seems earnest. "Please try better to control your temper. You're going to get someone hurt if you don't."

It stings, vaguely, that Frigga is more concerned about everyone else's safety than his own. He bites on his tongue. "May I go?"

Frigga looks hesitant, but Father gives a stiff nod, eyes angry. "Yes. You can go."

He almost sounds like he's trying to shoo Loki out of the room, and he bites harder on his inner cheek as he stands up. He tries to keep himself as put-together as he can before he slips away from the room. He shuts the door as softly as he can, even though his muscles are coiled tight enough to slam it.

"You tried to kill someone in training today?"

Loki startles at the noise, magic rising to the surface sharply in defense, but there's no threat but Thor. His brother is staring at him incredulously, obviously having been listening to the entire conversation. Loki's face heats with humiliation. He doesn't want to explain himself. He doesn't want to go into detail about what happened and why he did it. He already knows he's crazy, he doesn't need everyone around him to confirm it. Again. They already have.

"Yes."

Thor's eyebrows raise. He looks doubtful, but there's the slightest edge of unease on his face, as if he actually thinks Loki is capable of cold-blooded murder. Well. Pleasant thoughts. Such trust. Does Thor think he's mad, too?

His brother shifts on his feet, the briefest edge of a wince appearing on his features. "That doesn't..." he starts, obviously conflicted. "Why would you do that? What did he do to you?"

"I'm insane. Do I need another reason?" Loki starts pick his way through the royal family's wing to his room, tasting blood in his mouth. He must have been biting harder than he thought.

"Loki!" Thor calls at his back.

"Save it." Loki snaps without looking towards him. "I'm not in the mood for another lecture on honor."

"I wasn't—"

"Good eve, Thor," Loki says pointedly and slips into the confines of his room before his brother can formulate a response. He shuts the door quietly and doesn't bother to light anything, any strength leaving him almost immediately when he's alone. Loki slumps down against the wood, wrapping his arms around his legs and trying to breathe.

The darkness wraps around him, a familiar feeling. If Loki closes his eyes, he swears he can hear the rhythm of the Vanir children and Warriors Four breathing into the dark of the cellar. But when he opens them, he's alone.

Chapter Text

Thor hits the ground, hard, and for a wild moment considers not getting up. He could just sit here with the blood in his mouth from where they hit him and not have to stand on his shaky legs again and face the humiliation of getting kicked down once more.

But Thor was never taught to be a coward. And his pride refuses to let him lay here like he fainted.

Thor grits his teeth and tastes the blood in his mouth sourly for a moment before he gathers it along his tongue and spits onto the floor, pushing up to his hands and knees. He wraps his hand around the long, wooden stick and unsteadily gets to his feet. He sways instantly, his leg threatening to give out as the muscle twists with pain and Thor bites harder on the inside of his cheek.

He distributes his weight onto his right even though he knows it leaves him at a disadvantage and takes the stick into both hands, scowling. Releasing a noise in the back of his throat, he twists the staff around sharply, aiming to smack it against his opponent's hip. She's faster. Twirling out of the way, she claps the tip of her stick against his own. They trade a few more blows before she swipes his feet out from under him with embarrassing ease and Thor lands hard on his back, barely keeping his skull from clapping against the stone.

He bites back a groan as pain shoots up to his shoulders. More blood pools into his mouth, but it's from his tongue this time.

"Alright, enough," Fandral sounds a mix between exasperated and worried. "You're going to break something if you keep this up."

"No." Thor protests, grappling around for the stupid broom even though his body is screaming at him to stop. He can't feel beyond his knee anymore, and he knows he'll regret it in an hour or so when he's reduced to using that stupid crutch. It's humiliating, to have to place his trust of remaining upright in a glorified stick. He's the Crown Prince. A bloody son of Odin, he shouldn't have to hobble around like an old woman whose bones ache because of the weather.

Sif lowers her stick. "Thor," she sighs.

"No." Thor argues, shoving up to his feet. His legs won't hold his weight and he nearly goes toppling back down. Hogun grabs his arm and hauls him upright, expression far from impressed. Thor bites on the inside of his raw cheek.

"Stop this. You're going to do yourself permanent harm," Fandral says flatly.

"I won't." Thor yanks his arm from Hogun and teeters. Norns, curse it!

"How will you have us explain this to Lady Eir when you do snap your arm open?" Sif sounds tired, and rests the staff on the ground, leaning her body weight against it. The movement is so easy for her. Nothing like the hobbling mess Thor has become. Envy, cold and unwanted, seeps into his chest. "This needs to stop."

Thor scowls at her, then all of them. Fandral and Volstagg are seated on the couches shoved into one corner of what used to be a study. All the furniture has been squished into one corner, providing as much as room as possible for the mock-fights as he can manage. Not that there's much of a need for it, he and the others barely go a few feet before someone floors him.

"You said you would help." Thor grits between his teeth. "You swore."

Hogun looks pained.

Thor grips the staff harder. Sif gives him an apologetic look, "We've been trying this for months. I just don't think that what we're doing is helping."

So she's said. Often. Along with everyone else. They seem more willing to dissuade him than anything else.

"My mother won't let me on the training grounds." Thor spits, "If you don't agree to do this with me, no one will. I can't rule Asgard like-- this." The words taste sour. Perhaps even bitter. Thor suspects they are. Despite how he likes to feign ignorance, he knows what is being spoken of him. The Nine Realms laugh at them. The great Allfather and Mother, who, for all their power, have only a maimed man or an insane one as their heirs.

"And you can't do it broken beyond repair, either, mate." Fandral says dryly.

Thor scoffs, "You aren't going to break me—"

In a fluid move, Hogun both disarms and sends him flailing towards the floor again. Thor manages to catch his balance on his hands, but doesn't quite have the willpower to get back up again. His face is hot with humiliation.

"No? This isn't working." Hogun says, "Not in the way that we hoped. All we've done is limit your recovery. Perhaps we've even made it impossible."

"I won't be like this forever," Thor says to the floor, because he can't make himself look up through his long hair. "Eir will find a cure."

That's what Mother said, and Father. And here Thor is, half a year later, and in no better condition than he was when he arrived on Asgard. For all it's uses, sedir won't provide the answer that they want. Thor knows that this is permanent.

And he hates it.

If he can't even take care of himself, how is he supposed to rule Asgard? Take care of a family? Take care of his family? He can barely make it down a staircase without nearly breaking his neck. He has been reduced from one of the greatest warriors in the Nine to this.

He can feel their pitying stares on his back. They, like him, have few hopes of a recovery. It's the great unspoken thing between them. Thor knew this would be a hopeless endeavor when he started, but he couldn't just be idle. He has to learn how to fight with this...disadvantage or he'll never be worth anything.

Thor shoves up. He levels his weight and stares at Sif. He clenches his fists and raises his hands, jutting his chin out. "Fight me."

"Let's be done for today," Volstagg suggests. "We're not in any hurry."

No. They are. The Nine knows that they're weakened. Without proper heirs, Asgard is vulnerable. The sooner Thor can get up, the better. Then they can be seen as a source of power instead of pity.

Thor shakes his head harder, trying to ebb Sif forward, "Fight me."

Hogun rests a hand on his arm. "Thor—"

Thor shoves him off and elbows him in the sternum. Hogun stumbles backwards with a pained grunt and Thor moves to his right, placing his weight on his stronger leg before he swings towards Sif's face. She dodges the first fist, but misses the second that he brings towards her stomach. An expel of air escapes her harshly and she flips the stick up, going for his middle.

Thor staggers out of the way, barely, limping as he tries to skirt around her. But he's not moving fast enough. Sif comes in for the metaphorical kill and he panics. He can't hit the ground again today. The Warriors already know that he's pathetic, having watched his slow progress and simultaneous spiral over the last four months, but he won't get up if he's flattened.

He grabs the edge of the staff and yanks her forward sharply, unintentionally ramming their heads together. Pain flares his vision white for a moment, and Thor drops his hold on the staff as he brings his hands up to his face to hold the area. Sif already has her hands on her nose and he can see blood leaking through her fingers.

Thor almost winces.

A year ago and this mistake never would have been made. A year ago he was unstoppable. A year ago, a snide voice whispers in the back of his mind, you were running around inside of Vanaheim's forests and hoping that you popped out the right end, if you ever found one.

Fandral releases a curse behind him, and he hears the footsteps move towards them. Thor blinks back tears of frustration and Sif waves off Hogun as he tries to peel her hands back to see the worst of the damage. "I'm fine," she promises, but her voice is slightly congested.

"Sif, I—" Thor starts to apologize, feeling that it's warranted at this point, but all of them stop as a voice questions, "What on Helheim did you do?" and Loki shoves past Thor and forcefully pulls Sif's hands away from the wound. The nose is just bleeding, there isn't any other visible damage. Well, at least he didn't break it.

"I was…" Thor fumbles for an excuse. Loki doesn't know about what they're doing. No one does. If Loki knew that Thor had strung the Warriors into training with him every other day, he'd surely take it to Mother and Father, and then they'd start a whole mess about that when it isn't even warranted. Eir keeps saying to keep weight off the leg, to not over-strain himself, and other medical gibberish he logically knows makes sense, but can't get himself to follow.

He's not broken.

And he's so tired of everyone seeing him as that.

"We were," Thor tries. Then he realizes something. "What are you doing in here? You're supposed to be—" no, not training because General Tyr all but booted him out of it for reasons that no one will properly explain to him, so where is Loki supposed to be? "—you're not supposed to be here. We're busy. With things." He amends as quickly as he can.

When did Loki enter? How much did he hear?

Fandral rests a hand on his shoulder in support, but one of his eyebrows is raised slightly. Thor is a poor liar, always has been.

Loki turns to face him. Thor tries not to flinch back from the sight that greets him. None of them came back the same from Vanaheim, loathe they are to admit this, but Thor can never really get the image he has of his brother from before to really coincide with the after. His brother never really gained any of the weight he lost back, reducing him to a thin, almost skeletal shape that leaves him looking hungry and stretched. Loki seems always sick now, tires easily, but is pale from sleepless nights. He can hardly remember the last time he saw Loki smile, let alone laugh. And his eyes—so haunted, twisted carry little of the warmth he remembers from before.

Thor knows he's different now, too. The scar over his eye, the leg, the hesitance. They're never going to be the same again. They lost what they had before in those woods, and the Loki that was his brother instead of the ghost that haunts the halls of Asgard is gone.

"Am I not?" Loki lifts his chin slightly, challenging him.

Thor doesn't want to fight him. Not now. Any other time, he might've engaged in it, if only so they would talk. His jaw clenches, "No." He says flatly, "And there's a common courtesy called knocking if you'd be so kind as to remember it next time."

Loki snorts. "Because you always grace me with the same favor."

Thor sees the Warriors share an uncomfortable look behind him. He grits his teeth. "So what are you doing in here?"

Loki squints, almost as if trying to decide if Thor is worthy of the information. Then he flattens out unexpectedly, the fight draining from him. "Frigga sent me. She wants all of us to meet them in the throne room in twenty minutes." Loki hesitates for a moment and then looks towards Hogun, "Your father comes bearing a message from the king of Vanaheim."

Thor stills. Something heavy hangs in the air for a long moment, as if the mere mention of the realm outloud will summon its demon from the grave. She's been dead for a long time now, but it doesn't seem to help.

Hogun's face tightens for a moment with obvious discomfort. Thor knows that he and his parents have exchanged letters, but Hogun has refused to return to Vanaheim despite his parents' pleading. They wanted to keep the family together, but as an emissary of the king, Hogun's father couldn't stay on Asgard, and Hogun wouldn't leave.

The confrontation will likely be strained.

"My father didn't tell me he was coming," Hogun says after a moment.

Loki presses his lips together, "I don't believe this was a planned visit. I saw Governor Tusin's arrival, they didn't seem well."

Great. More problems. Can't Vanaheim take care of themselves for once? Thor mentally kicks himself. It's not his decision on whether or not to hear the Vanir people, it's his father's. And they are the sworn protectors of all life in the Nine, not just the ones they see fit. But Thor still can't help the coil of shame in his gut that stirs to life when he realizes that he would have preferred anyone over Vanaheim.

Vanaheim is…

That tension is still there between them all. Drifting too close to panic or apathy.

"He requested an audience with our father?" Thor asks, trying to understand. "So soon? Has something happened? Why would our father request all of us?" He knows how much we shudder away from the realm. Thor leaves that last part unspoken, judging from the faces of his friends and brother, they understand anyway.

Loki frowns, "I don't know." He casts a glance towards Sif's still-bleeding nose, then to Thor's head. "But I suggest that you clean up. Both of you." Thor's hand strays towards his hair and he grimaces when he feels how slick and disgusting it feels. Loki's right. He's not meeting with the king like this.

000o000

Thor spots Loki again when he enters the throne room, only a few minutes later than what his father wanted. But Thor is dressed in something better suited for the court and cleaned up as best he can with the minimal time, so he considers this a win.

His father is seated on Hliðskjálf, his mother on his right. Loki is standing on the stairs a little off center to Odin's left, and Thor takes his place beside him, trying to ignore how the eyes in the room follow his stumbling excuse for a normal walking gait.

The delegation from Vanaheim is already present, which only shows a stark contrast to Thor's dallying. He bites on his lower lip, even though it's a habit that his father has chided him on for doing in public. Uncertainty shows weakness, and weakness crumples empires.

Thor casts his gaze around the room. The curia regis are here, but that isn't a surprise. The stuffy old men and women of Odin's council are hardly absent in such meetings. Thor spots a few of the generals and High Commander Tyr as well. Sif and the Warriors Three are standing side by side within the small crowd, stiff.

Thor catches Fandral's eye for a moment, and the swordmaster gives him a brief nod.

His father clangs Gungnir against the hard stone and the volume of the noise makes Thor barely repress an open wince. Everyone snaps to attention, pulling their gazes up. "Governor Tusin," Father addresses, his tone even, "since we are all now gathered,"—that was pointed. Thor will hear of this later—"what is the message that your king has to offer us?"

Hogun's father clears his throat and takes a step forward, apart from the dozen or so men with him. Thor is struck by how tired the man seems. The Governor has never been one for smiling, at least, for as long as Thor has known him, but now the lines etching the sides of his face make him seem, well, grim. Thor's private hopes that this is some sort of grand celebration—a wedding, a crowning, something happy—are dashed as he sees those lines.

"Allfather," Governor Tusin says and dips his head with respect. He fingers a thick scroll between his hands, but doesn't open it. "This is a matter of extreme delicacy and not one that I would bring before you if my king hadn't grown desperate. We…" the man's gaze flicks towards Hogun for a moment, then pulls back to Odin, "we are in need of your assistance, my lord. My king stresses that he would not call upon your aid so soon given recent...developments, but we have come to consult."

Thor does not miss the pointed look towards him and his sibling when Governor Tusin hesitates around the word "developments." Is that what they're calling it now? The fact that, inadvertently, Vanaheim weakened the security of Asgard's future? Not Vanaheim, a quiet voice chides, the Weeping Siren. These crimes on her head, not the realm's.

Odin leans forward some. "And what would you like to consult about? You are more than welcome to Asgard's libraries, but I cannot help you if you do not explain why this is necessary."

The Vanir men behind Governor Tusin share an uncomfortable look. Hogun's father's hands clench around the scroll, then he releases a long breath. "It regards the Blodig Skog, sire."

Thor feels himself go stiff. Beside him, Loki's hands tighten into fists. If Thor wasn't looking for it, he would have missed the way that both their parents gazes flick towards them before drawing away just as quickly.

"I see." Odin's voice is toneless. It's almost a reassurance that he's so bland about this. No shouting, no screaming, just the same even tone he gives every other inquiry. "And what exactly about the Blodig Skog do you need information about? I would have thought that your own sorcerers and books would provide more answers over ours."

His father makes a point. It's in Vanaheim. Why would Asgard know more?

Governor Tusin is quiet for a moment, clearly trying to gather his thoughts. When he speaks, his tone is hesitant. "I wasn't sent here to speak with you about Asgard's sorcerers, nor peruse your libraries, Allfather."

"No?"

One of the men behind the Governor, a tall dark-haired bloke sporting a heavy beard leans forward and says something to Hogun's father sharply. It's in the Vanir tongue, and Thor can't quite catch it, but he sees his mother's brow furrow.

Hogun's father's face grows unhappy for a moment before he says, "I should backtrack, my apologies. We have...we have had recent troubles from the forest, sire. It isn't...behaving the way it should."

"Because it was always so compliant beforehand?" His mother says dryly. Thor feels some of the tension in him seep away as he has to hold back the sudden urge to laugh. This was clearly her intent—to ease some of the tension—because he hears a few Aesir cough sharply.

Governor Tusin isn't amused. "Perhaps that was a poor choice of words on my part. The Blodig Skog is not behaving as it has in the past. It's...sick."

Sick. How can a forest be sick?

"Speak plainly." Odin demands.

Governor Tusin shoots another glance at Hogun, clearly trying to get his attention for something, but Hogun is staring resolutely at the far wall. Clearly disappointed, Governor Tusin returns to Odin's words, "For the last several hundred years, the Blodig Skog has remained relatively within the same span of land. It never expands or contracts, nor does it ever grow old, wither, or die. It has remained in a state of...how do I say this? Immortality, perhaps. But now…"

Frigga takes a step forward, "Are you saying that there's something wrong with the spells?"

"From the best our sedirmasters can tell, yes." Governor Tusin doesn't miss a beat.

Thor eyes his mother as she tilts her head with obvious confusion as she explains, "But those spells have been in place since before I was a child and I've never seen them falter."

"You misunderstand. They're not faltering. They're expanding. The Blodig Skog is consuming the nearby fields and towns. Ju, Terrif, Faar—they've all been lost to us. The capital is overwhelmed with the refugees. It's how we first became aware of the problem."

Thor feels some doubt spike in him at that. The Blodig Skog isn't something you can exactly ignore. It's...well, huge. And to consume at least three towns, even if they are a little small, without anyone making note is just...strange. If outer territories in Asgard suffered the same fate, they would know before the homeless arrived for aid.

"I see," Frigga says, "and what was occupying your time?"

"We," another hesitation. This time, the Governor's gaze rests on him and his brother. Loki pulls his gaze away quickly, but Thor holds the stare. "There has been something of a plague spreading throughout the realm, my lady. We have been busy trying to keep it contained. Queen Freya suspects it is from the forest as well, as we can find no other source, and it appears to be affecting only those with magic."

And now it's giving plagues? It's a forest.

Thor sees his parents share a look from the corner of his eye, but he can't interpret what it means.

Thor stares at Governor Tusin and can't help but feel slightly puzzled. What is he doing here? If they know that the forest is expanding and they have a plague they're dealing with, why did they come to Asgard? If they needed medical aid, wouldn't they have just sent word, not a party?

Why the personal visit? Why?

"And what is the consultation that you're here for, then?" One of the members of the council, Lord Agra asks, "If you're not here for our libraries, what would your king have us do?"

Governor Tusin is quiet. Then he licks his lips and says, "There are few who leave the Blodig Skog with their sanity intact"—Thor feels his stomach clench, his mind immediately leaping onto dire straits about where this is going—"and fewer who have remained for longer than a few weeks at a time without going mad. We need to understand what the Blodig Skog is doing so we can heal it and the only way we can begin to accomplish that is to speak with those who know what the enchantment feels like."

No.

Thor's not…

No.

His leg begins to throb dully. Likely from the sparring session earlier, but he can't help but feel like it's mocking him. Remember, remember, it taunts, lest you dare think about forgetting. No. Never forgetting. The sensation of the Weeping Siren's sedir slinking beneath his skin as he writhed and then her wild grin as she clenched her fist and he felt the bone explode—

"You have read the reports of what occurred when we sentenced the creature Rydant to death." Odin's voice has gained a harder edge and it snaps him back into focus. There's anger there. Thor resists the urge to squeeze his eyes shut, shifting his weight to his right leg heavily. The pain is getting worse. Sliding from a throb to a deep ache. "Use that. What difference does it make if it's from mouth or from paper?"

"The difference," the man who spoke in Vanir to Governor Tusin speaks up, voice harsh, "may well be the survival of Vanaheim. We do not want them to speak of it. Our sedirmasters need to study them for the faint traces of the enchantments in a controlled environment. And—beyond that, the Weeping Siren was the child of one of the enchanters. We need to find her home and see if she has any records on why the Blodig Skog is doing this, but the glamour she left remains and our map will reveal nothing to us. With your permission, Allfather, we ask that you let us take your sons, the Warriors Three, and the Lady Sif to Vanaheim for a few weeks to locate her hovel, and allow our sedirmaters to look them over."

The words hang in the air. Heavy.

Thor swallows thickly, barely daring to breathe. Slowly, he lifts his eyes from the floor to the Warriors first. All of them have lost any color in their faces, staring at the Vanir man like he just suggested they commit mass murder. Thor glances to his left. Loki was picking at his palm, but his fingers have stilled, something nothing short of horror flashing over his face openly.

Thor doesn't think he's faring much better. It feels cowardly to be afraid of the woods, but Thor does not want to go back.

Vanaheim. The Blodig Skog. The Weeping Siren's hovel. Could Vanaheim have come up with a worse request list? Please say no, please say no, please say—Thor catches himself and grits his teeth. Whatever his father's decision, he has to be okay with it. He can't refuse to aid to the Vanir because he's a coward.

The silence stretches for long enough that a different Vanir man prods carefully, "My liege?"

Odin gets to his feet. Thor watches him, his chest tight. His leg is cramping now, Thor doesn't know how much longer he can remain standing. He's leaning heavily into his right foot already, he's close to toppling. "I cannot give you an answer now, Governor. You are welcome to stay the night. We'll reconvene in the morning with a decision."

"Allfather, we don't—"

"You will make time, or I will outright refuse you." Odin snaps. He lifts his elbow up and Frigga takes a step forward, taking it. Odin looks towards the group of tired Vanir men once more, as if this scrutiny will reveal something he missed in the last few minutes. "I assume that this is your last hope, for I would not expect you to demand such a high price first."

A high price? Taking them back to Vanaheim is a high price?

"No, my lord," Governor Tusin sighs. "We will wait." He seems less happy about that than he did anything else he said. Thor presses his lips together tightly, trying to will his leg to stop aching.

His father steps down the dais and begins to move towards the back exit, Frigga at his side. Thor knows that he should follow, but he doesn't know if he can move without falling flat on his face. He's already humiliated Asgard enough, he needn't add something else to his alarmingly long list.

Loki turns, walking towards the exit and Thor swallows his pride and tries to follow. Key word: tries. He makes it a whole two steps before his leg gives and he releases a noise of surprise, toppling forward. His hands grapple for anything to help keep him upright, and his fingers clench around his younger brother's shoulder.

Loki jerks, nearly sent to the floor by the force of Thor's fall. Thankfully, he manages to keep his balance and by extension, Thor's. Thor squeezes his eyes shut for a brief moment, willing the Norns to end it here, but they don't.

Thor steadies, lifting his head to look up at his brother. Behind them, Odin and Frigga have stopped to stare, which only makes this worse.

Loki's jaw clenches somewhat, but he moves, pulling Thor's arm around his shoulders and wrapping a hand around his waist to keep him upright. Thor refuses to look at the raven-hair's face as he hobbles forward with the support. His limp is much worse than normal. It had to be in public that this happens? He couldn't have had it happen tonight, when he was asleep?

"Thank you," Thor whispers to his brother, his voice barely audible.

They follow their parents from the room. Loki a sick, wispy thing and Thor the broken doll hauled over his shoulders. How can their parents ever take pride in them again? How will they ever recover from this? Thor is not a worthy heir. He's an embarrassment. He will never live up to his father's legacy like this.

If he ever could have in the first place.

000o000

Frigga ushers them into the sitting room within his parent's bedchamber and Loki lowers Thor to one of the couches before taking a seat beside him. Mother moves to his side instantly, kneeling down in front of him. "Are you alright?"

"No." Thor admits in a mutter.

"Eir said not to overexert yourself," Frigga chides. "What have you done this time?"

More than you want to know.

Thor shrugs. Loki lifts a skeptical brow in his direction. Thor sends a scowl in his as warning. If he mentions one word of what he saw earlier, Thor will crop Loki's hair to his ears without remorse. "I must have just walked on it too long." Thor tries, but it sounds more like a question than a statement. He clenches his fists, wishing he could come up with a decent fib for once.

Frigga opens her mouth, looking like she wants to protest before she sighs and shakes her head, "Is it a sharp pain or an ache?"

Thor thinks about it for a second. "Ache. I didn't break the bone again, Mother. You can stop fretting. I haven't done anything worse than normal."

Which is true. Technically. His mother just doesn't know the full extent of what "normal" is.

"I'm your mother. It's my job to fret." Frigga protests. She looks towards Loki, frowning. "You're pale. Do you feel sick?"

Loki shakes his head, still wordless. He hasn't said anything since the meeting. It's...concerning. Thor doesn't know what to do about it. Maybe he would have Before, but in this messy, strange land of After? No.

Frigga gives Loki's knee a quick squeeze, drawing back somewhat before she looks at Father. Odin helps her to her feet and they take a position on the couch across from them. Thor digs his nails into his palms. He knows what this means. They have their most solemn conversations in this setting, where his parents become his parents and not his king and queen. Norns, they must have already reached their conclusion about Vanaheim and now they're going to tell them, and Thor is going to have to go back.

Father opens his mouth to say something, but the panic explodes through his chest and Thor interrupts flatly, "No."

Loki's gaze lifts from the floor to Thor's face as if he's a stranger. Thor swallows thickly, refusing to meet his younger brother's stare. He knows he's much less vocal about his apprehension regarding the whole mess, and it's just a forest, but he's...afraid. The thought disturbs him. He doesn't scare easily. Somehow running around in the trees is what does him in?

What he went through compares little to what the Warriors and his brother suffered. He was just lost. They were kept and tortured.

Mother frowns, "Thor,"

He shakes his head, hating how small he feels. He's supposed to be brave, but he's shying away from this. "No. I won't go back. They're mad if they think that this plan will actually work. What are they going to study off of us? It's been half a year since we stepped foot in the forest. Any remaining magic will have left, won't it? We don't have to go back."

Mother rubs her thumb across her palm. "Not necessarily, son. Magic that strong can remain for years."

Great.

Mother appends after a moment, "But I don't suspect that's everything. Their claims for a guide...navigation through the Blodig Skog is impossible without a map. We only found the tunnels by sheer chance."

Chance. It took them days to find those tunnels. Thor wandered for months with madmen. The forest let them go. There's no other explanation. That wasn't them.

Odin sighs, "I fear there is more they are withholding from us." Frigga frowns, obviously sharing the concern. She drums her fingers against her thigh for a moment, sitting back a little. His father remains still, lips pressed together.

"Even so," Thor hates how nearly frantic his voice feels. "Is it possible that we could just…" the words get caught in his throat. They won't come out, and he's relieved. He started speaking before he thought about it, but trying to weasel his way out of this is cowardly. He's the prince. Wasn't he trying to prove his worth to the Warriors not an hours past? If he remains here, Asgard will know he's unfit for the crown.

There's another stretch of silence, then a thought occurs to him, far slower than it should have. "Why do they want me?" Thor asks, "If their primary concern is navigation. I can't help them find the Weeping Siren's hovel."

He didn't even see it.

"But you were there, Thor." Frigga says, lips twisted. "If I'm being honest, even I can sense the Blodig Skog on both of you still."

Loki twitches.

Thor wrings his hands. He forces his leg to stop bouncing, making sure to keep his other completely still. The slightest twitch sends flares of agony through the limb, reminding him that it is unhappy with the abuse it endured today. "What does that mean? Are we...enchanted?"

Loki snorts openly, as if the idea is nothing short of ridiculous. Thor shoots him a scowl, wishing he would say something instead of just silently judge everything he's saying. Loki should be asking questions, he's always curious about this kind of thing, but he instead seems to be focused on memorizing the rug.

"No," their father says, seeming tired. "I don't know what the long-term effects of the forest will be. No one does. As Governor Tusin mentioned, anyone who enters leaves mad or goes missing. The mad are usually dead within a few months. Your group are the only survivors in both mind and body that I know of."

Thor blinks.

Oh.

He...didn't know that. Which seems puerile. It's been half a year. If he made history, he should know that he did. He's always been so aware of these things before, but there was all those weeks with Madame Eir and then trying to learn to walk again, and then the mess behind the Warriors and Loki's return...maybe he just...hasn't had time to learn?

No. He never asked, and no one ever brought it up. Thor knows about the Blodig Skog, as well as any other Asgardian. But all the statistics and little details he memorized to pass tests or write papers have slipped his memory over the years.

Nonetheless, this brings up a lingering, weighted question: why?

Why are they the only people to have walked away without a problem? A millennia of history to back the stories and the claims, and suddenly they're fine? Some of those children were there for years before Loki or the Warriors arrived. And they're shaken, but overall there have been no negative effects. Why, why, why?

Maybe...maybe this is what Vanaheim is truly trying to discover by studying them. How they walked away with their sanity. If the Blodig Skog is spreading, and they can't find a way to stop it...they'll need to know how to survive it.

Frigga releases a tight breath. "The Vanir can manage without you if you choose not to go"—something in her tone betrays that she's rather they did, and it stings slightly, but Thor forces himself to remember that this is Frigga's home world, of course she would do anything for it—"but I think it would be within our best interests to at least scope out the situation. We can always leave."

We.

"You'd come?" Thor blurts. He feels a slight flush rise to his face when he sees the look both his parents shoot him, as if the answer to that question should be rather obvious. But it's...not. They're the head of the Nine. They can't just drop everything. Strangely, though, the idea of them being there makes him marginally less opposed to the whole thing.

But only marginally.

"We can't leave you there, alone, given what happened last time." Odin says briskly. His grip on Gungnir loosens some. "But it's your choice, not ours."

Thor almost wishes it wasn't. It doesn't feel like there's really a win in this situation. They say yes and have to go, or they so no and Vanaheim falls apart.

"I think," Loki's voice is soft, and Thor turns to look at him, "that we don't have any options here." Frigga shakes her head in disagreement, but Loki lifts up a hand to quiet her before she can say anything. "Vanaheim is on its last leg. This has clearly been going on for months, and they've only now spoken up because they've run out of options. For us to deny them would be to sentence them to death."

"We can find something else." Odin says. His tone is still that even, flat thing. "You needn't suffer through anything else."

Something dark flickers across Loki's features. "You're worried that I'll snap if you take me back there?" The question is delivered like he's simply asking about their father's boot. Thor twitches slightly, slightly aghast that Loki would ask something so outright of their father.

The skin around Odin's eyes grows tight. Not with shame, but something else. Sorrow. "No, Loki."

"Liar," Loki whispers. His brother closes his eyes and misses the momentary flicker of grief that flashes over Odin's face. Thor feels his lips part at it. Rarely does his father show emotion so freely. It's...raw.

"I'm trying to help you, Loki," Odin says.

Loki snorts, but Thor notices his hands are trembling. Thor resists the urge to grab one and try to help. Loki reacts so violently to touch now. Thor doesn't know how to help him anymore. He hardly knows him anymore. (Stop that, he chides himself, Loki is trying to get better and your harsh judgement offers no aid.)

Frigga rests a hand on her husband's arm and gives a slight shake of her head. Then she turns to them and her expression flits with regret. "Loki is right. As much as I want to put both of you—and the Warriors and Sif—before Vanaheim, it is our duty as guardians of these realms to put them before ourselves. I'm sorry. We will leave for Vanaheim at first light."

A tightness settles in his ribcage next to his heart, squeezing at the muscle as it attempts to pulse.

"Wonderful," Loki says, without an ounce of excitement in his tone.

Thor thinks that summarizes his sentiments about this exactly.

Chapter Text

It smells the same.

Sounds the same.

Looks the same.

Is the same.

Vanaheim's long hillsides spread out into fields with tall crops bursting up from the dirt like it's beyond the Vanir's ability to stop. The clouds are slowly slinking towards the horizon, thick and gray, promising rain that he knows from previous experience will show little mercy. The distant capital, Bo-An, is the only change. The only relief from the ghosts in his head.

He can remember all too well standing in the Weeping Siren's stupid field watching the clouds slowly pass over the horizon and miserably awaiting the next rainstorm. Or the days when the blunt edge of the knife would strike his palm just right and he'd had the blood streaming down his fingers.

But he couldn't see Bo-An from the Weeping Siren's field. He couldn't see it. He's not there.

Loki's fingers tighten around the reigns for Moa anyway. He tries to focus forward, and not how much breathing is beginning to hurt. Pollen. It smells like pollen and wet wheat. He still doesn't know if this is just a permanent fixture into Vanaheim's atmosphere or the smell of the distant farmlands.

It's fine.

He's fine.

His brother is on his left, close enough that if Loki stretched out with his left hand enough he could brush his fingers against his arm. Thor wasn't there, either. His parents are ahead of him, mounted atop their own horses. Governor Tusin is on Frigga's left. None of them were here. It's fine.

He can breathe, and manages to keep the tremors hidden.

But then his eyes will slide somewhat, and he'll see Sif or Fandral's heads silhouetted by the sun and the smell that makes his lungs ache and he'll be back there. Standing in that field with the dull, bloody dagger and a bleeding hand.

Loki grits his teeth and focuses forward.

This is just going to be for a few days. Frigga said that it wouldn't be more than two weeks at most. He wants to cling to that, but he's not placing all his hopes upon it. The original trip wasn't supposed to be more than a few days as well. How long can it take to hunt a stupid beast? Thor had asked when their father had warned them not to take too long the first time.

But it takes much longer when the beast isn't stupid.

And you stop being the hunter.

Sif whispers something he doesn't catch and Fandral releases a strained chuckle. Nothing about this place is funny. Loki's jaw is beginning to ache from how tightly it's clenched. Ahead of him, Hogun is resolutely ignoring his father's attempts to talk with him, instead engaging in a conversation with Volstagg like his very soul depends on it. Eir and the dozen or so members of her staff she brought are discussing what the "illness" Governor Tusin mentioned might be.

People are talking. Like this is just some sort of vacation.

But he and Thor are quiet. Any attempts at conversation by either or both of them have been dropped and trodden upon. Loki doesn't want the small talk, and neither of them want to discuss anything else. So the silence remains.

The small figures waiting at the gate to the entrance of Bo-An slowly grow larger until Loki can make out distinct details on his uncle and aunt's faces. Freya looks pinched, her dark, graying hair pulled into a tight bun. There's nothing fancy about it, which speaks more for her exhaustion than anything else could have. Loki has long since learned that within the royal circles, hair is used to show a sign of status.

His uncle, King Lin, is standing beside his aunt, tall and equally worn. His eyes hold shadows so deep they mimic long smears with charcoal. Beside them is a small guard, a few of the members of their council and all of his cousins.

Including Tjan.

Loki lets his eyes slide over the latter, unwilling to stare the man in the face. Thor visibly tightens at the sight of him, but makes no comment. Loki spares his sibling a side glance, wondering what it must be like to see Tjan after wandering through that stupid forest with nothing but Tjan and the remainder of his possessed guard to hobble after him. Evidently, judging by the tightness of Thor's jaw, it's not a good feeling.

Their party comes to a stop, and Loki waits for Odin to dismount before following suit. He bites on the inside of his cheek and grips thick locks of Moa's mane, trying to draw comfort from her. She brushes up against his side to compensate, not kicking him like she normally would if he tried to do this any other time, the pesky horse.

Odin approaches Lin, and the two of them hold gazes for a moment before Lin extends his hand in companionship. Odin grasps it, the silent one-up over. They shake firmly, like comrades, then let go.

"Odin," Lin says with some measure of relief, "thank you for coming. I'm sorry this was so sudden. I'd meant to send for your aid sooner, but I suppose it never made it to the halls of Asgard until now."

"No." Odin promises.

If Lin had seriously thought that dropping enough hints over the last few weeks and hoping gossip would get him the help he wanted, his disappointment isn't all that surprising.

Loki watches, almost detached, as Frigga wraps her sister in a quick embrace. They say a few words that Loki doesn't quite catch, then draw apart. Loki bites on the inside of his cheek, vague memories of the two of them talking as he laid in somewhat-comatose after they were pulled from the caves coming to mind. He doesn't have many memories from that time—none that really make sense—but he does know that they spoke around him.

"We have much to discuss," Lin says, tipping his head somewhat to stare among their group. Loki forces himself to straighten and stop hiding behind his horse, even though he wants to keep burrowing into Moa's neck like a coward. He clenches his teeth down harder, and barely hides a wince from the pain.

Lin catches Loki's eye for a moment, something flickering across his face that Loki can't catch. As soon as it's there, it's gone. Vanaheim's king turns to his father, "I figure it would be better to kill two birds with one stone, while we council together, my head healer would like to start her analysis now. The sooner the better."

If he wasn't watching with such intent, Loki might've missed as his father's posture tightens slightly. Like someone grabbed strings attached to his collarbones and yanked backwards. Loki's eyebrows furrow with confusion, glancing once at Thor to see if his brother caught the action as well. Thor's gaze is pinned upwards, though, not staring directly up, but his gaze pinned above the heads of everyone. His fingers are thrumming anxiously against the saddle of his stallion.

Loki's lips press together tightly, and he turns his gaze back towards the kings.

That's when he notices Odin is looking back at them. It's a fleeting glance, but a heavy weighted one all the same. It doesn't feel like an assessment of their character, or a search for flaws, just...Loki doesn't even know what to make of the expression.

He's not even sure he wants to.

He's tired. He doesn't want to keep thinking about this. He just wants someone to point him to where he needs to be next so he can be one step closer to sleep. It's barely afternoon, and he's already ready to return to bed.

Odin releases a breathy noise. Something between a grunt or a growl. "I'm not sure that I—"

"Really, Odin," Lin interrupts, hard edges pinning his face into an ugly thing. Anger and frustration. A man worn to bone. "There's nothing more they need to hear, and they're only here because we need this study." He softens somewhat, "Please, this wouldn't be my first choice, but we've long since run out of options."

Odin blows out a slight breath, but gives an affirmative nod. From the corner of his eye, Loki sees Thor's shoulders drop a fraction, and is surprised when he realizes that his own followed suit.

But what were they expecting? That Odin would say no?

000o000

The group splits, Frigga giving his shoulder a squeeze as they pass and what's probably meant to be a reassuring smile. It feels more like a grimace, and Loki can't even get his lips to try and mimic something close to it. He's slightly afraid that if he parts or tries to move them, all he's going to do is scream, long and hard.

Even as they move after Vanaheim's head healer—a tall, bony woman with long gray hair and hard features—Loki can feel the eyes of the heads of state pinned on the back of his head. He grits his teeth behind his pursed lips and tries to ignore the sensation.

They take a back entrance into Bo-An's palace, which thankfully spares them the journey through the city center. The less people, the better. Loki doesn't know if he can manage and social graces at the moment, and he thinks Thor may take off someone's head on accident with how sprung up he is.

The Warriors are behind him now, along with Lady Eir and the small team she dragged in. It's formalities of rank. He and Thor are expected to take the front. Loki would much rather be squished somewhere in the middle. Not leading the ground, but not exposed. Middle-men seem to die less. The captain of Thor's guard is back there somewhere, too, along with a small, in-training squadron he dragged along "for experience" that Loki has yet to make acquaintance with. Captain Ullr is renowned for his skill in whipping stubborn idiots into shape for the army, so he's not to hopeful anyone pleasant got pulled along with them in this nightmare.

Loki's only been to Bo-An's palace a few times. More in his childhood, but it ebbed off as he got older. Still, the halls of Asgard's palace are familiar, since he knows every inch of it, top to bottom in a maze he's been memorizing since he could walk, often with Thor at his side. This is not. The architecture is drastically different from the golden pillars and tall hallways. Everything in the palace seems slightly...pinched, as if someone was molding the walls and designs with clay then a giant forefinger and thumb came and squashed it.

It's claustrophobic.

And very gray with flecks of silver. Dull. That might just be because gold is reflective, but stone isn't. Not in a mirror-like way.

Silently offering judgement to their designs and architecture keeps him busy as he first hands Moa off with reluctance to the stable hands then follows the head Vanir healer into the palace. Before the Siren, Loki would have been all too happy to immerse himself inside the less familiar culture. He still would. For anywhere that isn't Vanaheim.

He thinks he might raze the palace to the ground if given the opportunity. There were sigils smeared and carved inside the Weeping Siren's cellar that are on the walls and pillars of the palace. Meant for protection, prosperity, and more, but it doesn't really matter. He'd spent long hours shaking with pain from Aetheitin rubbing his hands along the wall behind himself in that cellar. He doubts that anyone but him bothered to do so. He has his doubts the Warriors even know about the carved marks. It's not like there was an abundance of light to see by.

Loki shakes his head to clear his head of the thoughts, but it doesn't really help. He scrapes harder to bring focus, and when that doesn't work either, digs the nails of his left hand inside his right wrist. The jolt of pain on sensitive skin brings the world into focus.

Thor is eyeing him, and Loki resolutely looks away from him, refusing to be embarrassed about the time slip. It's not as frequent as it used to be anymore, but that doesn't mean they've vanished all together.

They finally step inside the Vanir healing wing, and Loki digs his nails in again. Most of Vanir architecture doesn't believe in windows, and the healing wing is no different. It's claustrophobic, but not without light. He can only remember one time that he's been in this room here previously, and it was when Thor did his utmost to lose three fingers after he accidentally mis-fired one of the Vanir's guns and shot open his palm when they were barely more than children.

His stomach heaves in reminder at the gruesome, bloody injury and he stares at the open room, trying to spot differences from that visit. The room doesn't look like it's aged a day. There's witch-lights bobbing through the space, causing a low thrum of sedir to push gently against his senses. The room itself is mostly open, beds spread out and separated by long sheets. Healing sigils carved into almost every square inch of the walls. Vanir and their sigils.

Medical equipment is tossed to and fro, though, and despite the overall appearance of clean, the more he looks the more of a mess becomes visible.

Unlike last time, where Thor was the only patient besides a wailing newborn, the room is overfilled, causing Vanir to spill out on the ground and occupy as much space as possible while still leaving walking space. There are easily fifty cots, but it isn't enough for the ill. Loki's brow furrows.

The staff looks stretched, but there aren't nearly as many aides as there should be in a situation like this, which means they're also unwell, or there's another room full of the sick that they're also looking out for. Loki's betting on the latter.

The patients don't...it's hard to describe. There's seems to be a split difference, with no gray areas: they're either borderline catatonic, staring up listlessly and twitching every so often, or violently fighting against restraints meant to keep still and screaming, babbling, or begging for help. The sound is jolting and rattling, making something in his chest squeeze with discomfort.

The catatonic, separated from the screeching, mad group in some form of isolation, appear to be undergoing some sort of transformation. Skin is peeling off or missing in large chunks leaving raw muscle exposed, sometimes bone, and a few are spouting features that are nothing short of animalistic. What looks like horns, wings, claws, anything and everything. They're shapeshifting into something. Slowly.

Knowing the pain of bones snapping in and out of shape as they adjust, Loki's gut twists with sympathy. He's managed to get the transition down to a few seconds at most, but they often leaving him panting and his vision white for a few seconds. He can't imagine the agony of it happening over what must be days.

Governor Tusin is right. This would completely swallow up the focus of the capital. With this occupying their time, Loki doesn't know how they noticed the Blodig Skog was becoming a problem. They didn't give them enough credit. Then again, the governor also made it sound like a bad case of food poisoning, not...this.

"Help me," a woman pleads, coughing raggedly. Blood dribbles down her chin. A trembling hand lifts out to him, and Loki thinks she looks vaguely familiar, but he can't place from where.

He skitters to a stop, unsure if he should reach for her and see if there's something he can do to appease her suffering. She's looking directly at him, glossy eyes red-tinged. Her skin is rubbed raw around her hands, scraped down to what he suspects is finger bones beneath the bandages. His mouth parts wordlessly. His chest is constricting further. He can't get in a full breath, and he doesn't know if he's supposed to do something.

"Help..." the woman moans.

"I don't..." Loki whispers. I don't know how. I don't know if I can. I don't know if it's possible.

A hand grips his elbow in a pointed, but firm gesture and pulls him forward, yanking him into the present. Loki's steps fumble for a moment before he can catch his balance, and he looks up to see Thor watching him from the corner of his eye. Loki ducks his head. Maybe it's a testament to how rattled he feels by this sudden discovery, but he doesn't yank his arm away from his brother. The head healer—Loki can't remember her name—doesn't stop. She moves through the ill with practiced ease, not pausing once. She nods a few times in acknowledgement when some of her staff call out greetings, but that's it.

Finally, they exit the large, open space and enter a hall. It leads off to doors, and sometimes warded, but open walls of sedir for observation. Loki spots a few creatures—is that a griffin?—behind the sedir walls, but tries not to let his gaze linger. He doesn't understand what's going on, and he's afraid to break the silence to ask. A quiet hush has fallen over their group, and the solemn mood feels like a penance for their healthy state.

The head healer finally stops suddenly and opens a door, gesturing for them to take a step inside. Loki hesitates, but follows after Thor when his brother squares his shoulders and steps inside.

Loki hadn't realized the healing wing was so big. He'd only be in the patient recovery area when Thor nearly lost his fingers. This room better resembles what he knows well from Asgard. He spots a soul forge, and a few other bits of Asgardian medical technology before spotting the dozen or so aides standing aimlessly.

The Vanir head healer turns to face them, something tight in the expression she gives them. She doesn't smile, or try to explain, just gives them a long, tired stare, before stating flatly: "You see the state of my people out there?" her accent is clipped. She wasn't born noble. Allspeak is only given to the nobility, and their children, so to have an accent means she learned Asgardian by study.

Loki pauses at her question, uncertain if it's rhetorical or not.

It must be, because she adds a moment later, "That is the state you should have crawled from the Blodig Skog in. You are living miracles." It's said like an accusation.

Loki can't help glancing back towards the door.

That...

That's what they should be?

Loki feels a little stung with surprise and glances to Thor for a moment, uncertain what to do with that information. He knows logically that they're supposed to be mad, read about the cases from books, and saw the Weeping Siren's state, but to actually see what it means…

That's different.

It's like being backhanded.

Yes, the state they're in isn't what they walked into the Blodig Skog in, but they aren't...like that.

"Then how…?" Sif's voice is quiet. She sounds younger than she is, and Loki has to strain his neck muscles so he won't look back at her by instinct. It would, much to his annoyance, break "proper protocol."

"That's what we're trying to understand. I just thought you should know how lucky you are." The words are sour. Everything about this woman seems a little bitter, like their very existence grinds against her own.

She waves a hand slightly, and her awaiting aides move, walking towards them. "Everyone will be assigned an aide. So long as there are no complications, this shouldn't take too long."

Having spent time in the healing wing before, Loki knows that's probably an empty platitude and braces himself.

000o000

The tests aren't exactly physical, but they're exhausting all the same. The aide he's assigned, a young woman by the name of Farr is quiet, but effective. He's pushed through the soul forge first, then forced into a seat so she can weave some sort of machine through his hair so she can look at his brain. She pushes and prods with her sedir, and Loki forces some of his defenses to fall so she has the ability to look where she wants to. It's uncomfortable and invasive. It takes all the self control he has not to simply throw up the wards and walls again, then watch her stumble back as her sedir is pushed from him forcefully.

Loki puts his subconscious in charge and retreats to the back of his mind, pretending that this entire experience isn't happening and doesn't bother him. Every time he opens his mouth to ask Farr to stop or take a break, he thinks about the babbling insanity just down the hall. He can endure a little discomfort if it will help them get better.

He'll be honest in admitting he's in a bit of a mood when she's beginning to wrap up at last after long hours, then, as "just one last thing," she turns to him with an empty syringe. Loki's stomach drops to his feet and his breathing stops for a moment.

The first few are always the worst, son, it will get easier from here.

Farr doesn't seem to notice the breath skitter, and says something about blood—taking his blood, maybe—and then reaches for his arm. No. He's—no.

Loki's remaining open defenses slam upwards again, and Farr yanks back from him sharply, her brow furrowing as the inevitable headache pushes against her skull from being pushed out of his aura. He winces somewhat in sympathy, but he doesn't back down. He forces out a panicked, half breath and shakes his head. "No."

"I just need to take some blood," Farr rubs at her forehead, sending him a somewhat dark, exhaustedly pointed look. "Then we're done. You think you can manage that?"

The syringe gleams in the hard light.

His jaw grits.

He doesn't...she's not putting a needle in his arm. Not unless she knocks him unconscious first. He thinks about that woman with her bandaged hands, then his eyes close for a moment as he submits.

"Give it to me. I'll do it." He reaches out his hand expectantly, and Farr stares at him for a moment, brow drawn together, clearly puzzled.

"It's no trouble for me, Your Highness."

"I do it, or it doesn't happen."

"I doubt you know—"

"I'm medically trained, I know where to find a vein," he bites sharply on the acid, but his tone is still harder than it should have been. Farr's eyes tighten around the edges at his tone, and she drops the empty syringe into his awaiting palm. Having the needle makes him sick, and his mouth tastes like blood. Frigga used to inject him with water when he couldn't sleep without the familiar pinpricking.

The room they entered maybe an hour ago suddenly feels like open exposure. His arms. If she sees the marks and recent scars...she'll know. She'll know, and Farr is one of the last people on this planet or any other that he wants to bare witness to what he's done.

His hand is trembling, and he clenches his fingers around the syringe, feeling childish.

But he can't stop the need.

He looks up at Farr, who is waiting expectantly. "Would you...I'm…" his mouth fumbles around words for a moment. "Will you leave?"

Now she's looking at him like he's one breath from his already fragile sanity snapping. His jaw twitches, annoyance, fear and frustration burning in his stomach. "I'm sure you've heard some gossip spat around about what happened to me with the Weeping Siren." He says, keeping his tone as flat as he can. It doesn't even tremor, lifeless, "It's this or nothing. How many vials do you want?"

Farr looks at obvious war with herself, but sighs and grabs two more small bottles to be interchanged with the one already present in the syringe, then pushes hair from her face and leaves the room with muttered comment he doesn't quite catch. Judging by the tone, that's probably for the best.

A breath comes gushing out of him when the door closes and he takes a moment to close his eyes and refill his lungs slowly. The syringe feels awful in his hands. Weighted. Heavy.

Painful.

Loki sets it on the bench beside him, lifting up his right hand to slowly remove the straps for the vambrace, then yanks up his dark sleeve to the elbow. His arm looks slightly bruised and he rubs his thumb absently over a raw cut, grounding himself with the pain. They hurt, of course they hurt, but it's a relief. The compression in his chest eases, like the danger of imploding can be whisked away by drawing blood.

Ridiculous.

But truth.

Loki sighs heavily and opens his eyes, flipping his arm so his forearm is resting up against his thigh. He stares at the pale skin for a moment. His arms looked bruised for weeks while the abused veins healed, making them look splotchy as well as swollen. It didn't help that while the veins healed, sedir finally started pumping through his body again, making his entire body ache for weeks on end.

Now it looks mockingly normal.

Loki traces the vein he wants to use up to the elbow, then with more skill than he really cares for, inserts the needle. The pain is familiar. Cold fingers touching against his arm, murmured assurances and the dull, lifeless feeling that encaptured him while sedir was trapped, pinned, corroding inside of him.

The first few days are always the worst.

Loki finishes drawing the blood, yanks down his sleeve and wraps the vambrace back on and pushes his thumb into the inside of his wrist before opening the door and handing the warm vials to Farr. She nods, clearly distracted and points him down the hall.

"Kia wants to speak with you," she says, "after that, you can wait for the Lady Sif and Lord Fandral to finish."

He's not entirely sure who Kia is, but nods anyway, probably a little too happy to be leaving her presence.

Kia, as it turns out, is the Vanir head healer's name. She looks up from papers she's staring over as he approaches and gives him a visual once over. Her lips are pressed into an unhappy line that she parts with what looks like effort as he approaches. She doesn't bother with a greeting, instead lifts up the paper, "You have sedir."

How does she make every sentence seem like a threat?

He blinks. "Yes?"

Kia shakes her head somewhat, looking baffled. "Everyone out there," she gestures towards the sick bay, "have traces of it, or are inborns. The more powerful, the worse off they are. You saw the...things they're turning into. That should have been you."

Something cold settles in his stomach as he remembers the deformed limbs of the sick.

His mouth feels dry. "But?"

"This." She lifts up the paper so close to his face it almost smacks against his nose. Irritated, he pushes it down and stares at it for a second. It's the readout from the soul forge, but it doesn't make a lick of sense. He knows what it's supposed to look like, and this is far from that.

He blinks, but it remains the same.

He cants his head, "Is that...warding? What is that?"

It looks like someone took his normal energy, then cut it open, leaving a raw, open wound to fester. It's open above his ribs, and should hurt, but he didn't even know it was there until a few seconds ago. The gash is cut in some sort of symbol he doesn't recognize. About as long as his palm, and open across the middle of his ribs, acting as some sort of drain for a faint dark energy. It's seeping inside the cut, but it's faint, like it's been slowly dying out since he left the Blodig Skog.

But he didn't even know he was infected.

His left hand lifts up to his ribcage, but he can't feel any wound. Prodding at it with his sedir reveals the same thing. Whatever the symbol is, he's numb to it.

"Maybe." Lady Eir says behind him. He barely contains a jump, but turns to look at her anyway. She's peering at the readouts from behind him, a similar one in her own hands. "It looks like extensive spellwork, must've taken days. You and the Warriors all have it. My best guess? This is from the Weeping Siren."

He drops the readout, suddenly sickened.

She tainted him. Her disgusting spellwork and presence is still clawing into him.

Kia frowns, "I would say it's warding. Not individual, see," she lifts up Loki's report and holds it against someone else's. Sif's, he thinks, but the words on the papers aren't forming words. "They're exact replicas. You don't get that with individual work."

"That's true," Eir concedes, leaning closer to the readouts. "That doesn't mean that it's not the Weeping Siren."

Loki forces down nausea. "What about Thor? You said that it's all over me and the Warriors, but he hardly interacted with...her."

Kia shakes her head. "He must've. He's got the same symbol."

When? Why? The Weeping Siren left Thor to die. She tried to sever his tibial artery when she crushed the bone. If she'd meant to keep him, she'd have brought him back to the cellar. Thor wandered in those woods for months and came out more or less sane. Nothing like the Vanir in the room behind them.

But if it wasn't her, then what did this?

Lady Eir sighs, "Not that it really matters I suppose. Is this the main oddity you've found?"

Kia's eyes turn back to him. "Is it true that you were given Aetheitin for the duration of your stay with her?"

Stay? That makes it seem like they just joined together for some tea.

That tension clenches inside him again. "Yes." He grits between his teeth.

Kia's nods. "That was probably for the best. We've been giving it some of our patients. It seems to stave of symptoms."

What?

Lady Eir's lips downturn. "That's not a long-term solution."

Aetheitin staves of symptoms. It stops symptoms. They're covered in warding they didn't walk onto Vanaheim with, and left with sanity more or less intact. The Weeping Siren may not have been giving him the drug to simply pacify him. What if...she knew about this sickness...and she gave it to him so he wouldn't succumb...

The thought makes him sick.

And another almost makes him vomit.

Fandral. He got sick. They all assumed it was because of the rain. But Fandral's family bears little talent for sedir, and the Warriors are basically bone-dry in that department. All of them, and the children in the cellar. Just because Aetheitin repressed his sedir doesn't mean he couldn't sense it.

Fandral may have caught whatever this is anyway, but because he doesn't have symptoms the sickness was mild. And in a sick way, the Weeping Siren isolated him from Fandral by letting him take the punishments. She must've known about this, and she didn't care to tell anyone about it.

The madness.

But now it's spreading with the forest.

The Weeping Siren's violence may have been mostly meaningless, but the Aetheitin...that…

Loki removes himself as discreetly as he can from the conversation and finds an empty washroom. He vomits and shakes, shuddering violently against the wall as he pushes his head down against his knees and tries to assure himself that he's fine.

000o000

Loki sits stiffly down on the waiting bench and tries to ignore the sounds of the ill within sight from where they're seated. When Sif and Fandral join them, they're ushered upstairs. After enduring an awkward dinner with extended family, Loki retreats to the guest bedroom he's sharing with Thor.

He collapses on the bed, boneless, and refuses to move when Frigga arrives a little later with Odin. There's a murmured conversation that he doesn't have the willpower to muddle through, and then Frigga brushes a hand through his dark hair and presses a kiss against his forehead. Their presence is a little weird, but he assumes they're here to see what the Vanir did.

Loki wonders if they've seen the sick.

They're haunting; an image burned into the inside of his eyelids.

When Loki's pushed from his half-drifting, half awake state, his parents are gone, and Thor is missing from the other bed. He squints into the dark, but his sedir senses no one else in the room with him. Muttering a light curse under his breath, Loki silently promises his sibling that if he decided to get drunk, he's going to stab him.

Loki shoves up with effort, detangling himself from the blanket someone threw over him at some point in the last few hours, getting to his feet. He sways somewhat, but manages to hold his balance. Thor was quiet during dinner, which means that he's upset, which…

Loki looks towards the doors towards the balcony and rubs sleep from his raw eyes as he moves for them. The air is cold enough that his breath steams, but it doesn't bother him. Thor isn't within sight, but he wasn't expecting him to be. Turning his gaze up towards the roof, Loki spots a dangling leg.

He's been doing it since they were children, climbing to the highest point available—as if Thor can find a place that will finally allow the clouds to embrace him.

Loki resolutely doesn't look down as he clambers up beside his sibling, biting on his tongue sharply when he slips somewhat. His arms ache dully, but not enough that it stops him. He keeps focusing up, and tries not to think about what a fall from this height would entail. Not death, which Loki thinks might be the worst part, you'd have to remember every moment of the fall and then the crack at the bottom.

Silently cursing the elder for his stupid perching habit when he slips again, Loki startles somewhat when a hand wraps around his wrist. Thor looks at him with an expression Loki can't quite decipher, but nonetheless hauls him up so he's no longer on the sharp incline of the rooftop.

Thor holds onto him for a moment longer, obviously checking to make sure he's not going to fall. When Loki doesn't, he pulls his hand back and returns his gaze to facing the rolling hills in the distance. Loki frowns somewhat, drawing up a knee and resting his chin on it. He can't see the Blodig Skog from here, for which he's not mourning.

Thor looks at him between long strands of blond hair. "What are you doing up here? You hate heights."

Loki winces. He does. At least Thor isn't teasing him mercilessly about it tonight, just stating a fact. "Have you slept at all?" he evades instead.

Thor shrugs. "Not really." He admits. Loki doesn't say anything, and Thor heaves out a breath, "Did you see the warding?" Loki straightens, pushing his lips together. He gives a slight nod. Thor shakes his head somewhat, "I didn't think...Tjan has it, too. They didn't know about it because Eir never put any of us under a soul forge. I don't think she saw a need. All this time, it's just been sitting there..."

Thor rubs at his face.

Loki brushes dark hair from his eyes as the wind plays with it. He feels tired, but taut.

"She's supposed to be dead," Loki whispers, an admission that he didn't plan on saying. "She's supposed to be...and she's still here. Still effecting us. Still…" he turns his head away, and pushes his finger into his wrist.

"I know." Thor murmurs.

"I thought it was over."

"I know. I did, too."

They both watch the dark swaying fields for a long few minutes in silence. Loki rubs his thumb along the bone of his knee and then faces his sibling, afraid to ask the question, but wanting an answer all the same. "What now?"

Thor's only answer is a wordless shake of his head, but he doesn't need to say anything. I don't know is portrayed without a problem. Loki turns his head forward and miserably wonders who does.

Chapter Text

"All that blood was never once beautiful. It was just red."

-Kait Rokowski

The healing wing beckons them the next morning. Having spent a majority of the night awake and listening to Loki not sleep, Thor is already irritable when sunlight peaks over the horizon. Loki seems to take that as all the invitation he needs to stop pretending that he's resting, and disappears into the washroom.

Thor shoves up, runs a hand through his tousled hair and sighs with resignation when he realizes he doesn't care if he has a bedhead. Show of the State indeed. He's exhausted, but his stomach is pierced with anxious holes, and he fears if he tries to lay down again, all his sanity will bleed out through them.

What feels like forever, but is probably only a few minutes, Loki exits loo collected and brushing a few strands of his slicked hair back. The shorter strands fall out of place next to his ears, and Thor raises his eyebrows somewhat. "It's beautiful, brother. Very warrior-like."

Loki lugs a dagger at him with a scowl.

Thor leans back a little, but it's unheeded. Loki's either too tired to aim properly, or didn't want to take the chance of Thor's morning reflexes. Not that it'd be a problem, given that he didn't sleep. The weapon misses miserably, clattering to the floor.

"You're one to talk." Loki mutters, managing to get the pieces tucked behind his ears.

"At least mine isn't soft like a flower."

"Do you want me to hit you, brother?"

Thor's mood lifts a little at the banter. Loki doesn't...he hasn't really done this in a while. He just...reacts, not acts. His sibling still looks miserable, but at least he's talking. Wary, and not wanting to overstep his boundaries by pointing anything out, Thor smirks a little, like this is before.

"I actually need to feel afraid for it to be a threat," he says smoothly. His brother throws a shirt at him, and Thor flinches a little, unexpecting the sudden assault. It covers his head, and he pulls it away from his face. Loki is turned away from him. His shoulders are rigid, and his entire body seems like it's one moment away from snapping. The moment of normalcy is over.

Thor's shoulders slump a little.

Quietly, he gets up and tosses the shirt at his brother's bed.

Breakfast passes too quickly, and they're back in the healing wing, running tests. The nurse he's paired with is considerably less chatty than yesterday's, and it forces a solemn mood on him. Appropriate, given the circumstances, he supposes, but not welcomed.

They don't learn a thing beyond what they'd already gathered yesterday. Not surprising, given that Eir just wanted to run the soul forge over them all again, but still.

He wishes that this meant something.

People are suffering, and he can't do a Norns-cursed thing about it.

They're released, and Thor attempts to keep himself useful by helping take care of the sick. Basic first aid is required for the army, and Thor's patched up too many battle wounds to be bad at it. But sickness is something different, and though he knows intellectually what he should be doing, he still flounders a little.

Regardless, the overworked staff seems grateful for his (and the Warriors, who have refused to leave) contribution. Loki stuffs himself in beside Eir, trying to help figure out what all the sigils are, and how to replicate them. Or how to make it into a potion? Something like that. Other sedir-related things that Thor doesn't understand.

Hours later, they're finally shooed from the room for the evening meal. With Vanaheim's royal family. Again. It's only to be expected, honestly, but that doesn't make him any more excited about it. He knows that his attitude shows as he's seated, judging from the look his mother gives him.

Thor forces his face to relax.

And focus very hard on something beyond who he's seated next to.

Minutes drain. Thor's teeth grit. The soup they're eating is hot.

As covertly as he can, Thor downs the entire glass of water in an attempt to help the burning sensation. It doesn't really help. His mouth still feels uncomfortably warm and strangely sticky. His lips are doing that numb-thing that feels like they're about to burn off his face or swell.

He buries a grimace behind the glass, then slowly sets it back on the table with regret.

Water's supposed to help spice. It holds nothing against Vanir food. Never has, and Thor suspects it never will.

At least it's some sort of consolation that Loki seems to be having the same problem beside him, picking through the soup like it's in danger of harming him. Shoulders hunched and face slightly leaning forward, he looks like he's trying not to be sick all over the table. He knows that this is meant to be an honor to dine with the royal family, that they've prepared what they can to try and impress the head of Asgard, but Thor would have been perfectly happy if they'd left it completely bland.

That, miserably, reminds him of the commonplace joke he's heard too many times in his travels: That Asgard was actually looking for flavor in their food when they were conquering the Nine. Personally, he thinks the flavor is perfectly fine, but he's been told many times that's because "Asgardian food doesn't have any flavor at all."

From the other side of the table, Fandral subtly kicks him. Thor lifts his gaze up somewhat to the swordsman in time to catch the wide-eyed, pained face he shoots at him. Thor presses his lips together and flicks his gaze in the direction of the water in question.

Fandral shakes his head, eyes pinching at the sides in hopelessness.

A year ago, this might've made him laugh. In the space of everything now, it seems just...pointless.

Thor drags his spoon through the soup and tries to remember how to be hungry.

Sif shoots Fandral a pointed look, and he makes a face of complaint that she rolls her eyes in response for. The restraint on their voices is something he doubts would have happened last year, either. Norns, who are they?

"Thor?" the voice is calm. Thor still feels himself tense up despite it, and is suddenly reminded why he's been so focused on the food. He quickly shuffles a spoonful into his mouth and braces himself. He tilts his head as he chews. The soup tastes like ash as he glances at Tjan's face.

His cousin is staring at him. Dark hair is hanging on the sides of his face. Shadowed eyes smeared with lines meet him. This is the third time that he's tried to start a conversation. Thor can't keep ignoring it without it becoming obvious that he's doing so.

Thor forces himself to swallow. "Yes?"

He shouldn't have drunk all the water.

Tjan's lips part with what looks like some effort. "I…I..." he seems to fumble, like he has no idea what he's going to say now that he actually has Thor's attention. "How...how are you, cousin?"

Thor's teeth grind. Mindless conversation. Sure. Let's do that. "How would you expect?"

Tjan winces a little, hand clenching around the spoon. His other is resting next to the bowl, and clutching so tightly at the white tablecloth that his knuckles are washed of color. "I'm...I'm not sure, to be honest. I'd hoped you to be better than I am, at least."

Right.

"And how would that be?"

Tjan's lips downturn, pinch, then release. "Are you angry with me?"

He seems genuinely surprised by that idea. Thor closes his eyes for a moment, wrapping his patience together. Tjan was possessed from the moment they met in the tavern to when they entered Asgard, only finally freed by his mother. His actions weren't his own. But it's not the Weeping Siren that he remembers in those woods.

She broke his leg. Tjan and his remaining men broke something else.

Thor opens his mouth to retort, but Loki's hand lands on his shoulder. A warning. Thor realizes at that moment that one of Tjan's older brothers, Han, is staring at them without even trying to hide it. Next to his younger sibling, he could probably get Thor in the face if he threw cutlery. A part of Thor is both grateful that Loki spotted it, and sour at it.

He shouldn't need his little brother to look out for him.

He doesn't want him to.

He wants to leave this stupid table. He wishes that their parents hadn't agreed to this dinner. That they didn't have to spend the entire day in the healing wing again, being probed like poking at them enough is actually going to solve anything. Wishes fervently that he could crawl back to bed, in Asgard, and try and sleep this off.

And, while he's at it, he wishes that whoever was in charge of seating had the decency to seat Tjan on the other side of the table. That's what they did yesterday, though that might have been an exhausted mistake rather than intentional.

Thor would rather chew off his own foot than talk with his cousin.

"I'm not exactly happy with you, no," Thor admits, his voice more level than he was expecting. Loki sighs, like he'd wanted Thor to stay quiet, but hadn't been expecting it.

For some reason, that annoys him, too.

"But that wasn't me," Tjan says softly. "I didn't...I wouldn't have done any of what I did if I'd been thinking clearly."

Sure. But he's never been a pleasant person to begin with in the first place, so it doesn't exactly earn him any bonus points. The fact that Thor didn't notice that he was possessed (had suspicions something was off, but he didn't suspect that) should be an indication enough of that.

Han tips his head slightly with a warning glare, daring Thor to say something.

Thor bristles a little.

He wants to fight. Wants something to punch, because frustration is intangible, but Tjan isn't. But no matter how appealing slugging him would be, it's unprincley, and his parents are seated at the table. His mother would kill him. Tjan is her nephew. And they're her sister's guests.

Thor glances at his younger sibling and sees the tight, frustrated expression lingering on the hard edges of his thin face. Anger bleeds out of him when he realizes that Loki is preparing himself to deal with the mess Thor's anger will bring. It's a familiar look.

Thor's fists clench slightly.

No, he thinks.

He turns his gaze back to the soup, tilting his body away from his cousins, but that's the extent of it. No fist fight, no verbal brawl. Just childish silent treatment.

Across the table, Thor sees his mother cough lightly into her hand, as if she's withholding herself from saying something. Weirdly, though, she's not looking at him when she does it.

000o000

Blink. Breathe. Sleep. Eat. Cough. Tired. Aetheitin.

They pass four more days in this pattern, all with nothing to show for it. More sick are brought in, none are allowed to leave. Sixteen die before anything can be done for them, limbs skewed and bones sticking out wrong. Sometimes through skin. Deformities that make them look bent, hollow, and victims of a fall.

Slow shapeshifting, is what Kia says when Thor asks.

Why? He wants to return, but doesn't. No one knows. His question will only frustrate her. It isn't insanity. It isn't even a normal plague. Only really affecting those with sedir, turning them into...something. Thor loses track of how many doses of Aetheitin he slides into veins in an attempt to alleviate the symptoms.

It makes him sick, thinking of Loki coming off of the drug. The haunted, vacant look to his eyes. Seeing the sedir running through his veins, and the agony that it caused. The words brain dead still haunt him.

And he's doing that to these patients. On purpose.

Some of them are lucid, and they'll attempt to talk with him. He tries to keep up a cheerful front, but he understands why Vanaheim is crumbling under the weight of this. They've lasted a month. Thor hasn't been here a week, but it feels like he's lived through a decade.

Fever check, grab more blankets, water, Aetheitin, repeat.

Say something to the Warriors, check on Loki, return to some meal, sleep.

Repeat, repeat, repeat.

Five more dead. Limbs bent. Eyes painted white. Lips blue from asphyxiation. Asphyxiated or exsanguinated, the only two choices for death by this.

Loki's all but vanished behind a pile of books Kia has hauled inside, and after day two, his parents join the search. Thor is put through another soul forge, then another, and wonders why they think they're going to get a different result after the fourth time.

(They don't. He thinks it just makes them feel better.)

000o000

"It's not the Weeping Siren," Eir says, and sets a thick stack of papers down on the table. Thor decides that must've been Loki's idea. Loki always thinks things out better when he writes it out on physical paper, even though it's more work.

Lin frowns, leaning forward. Eir, the Vanir royal family, their head healer, his family and a few others he doesn't recognize are all gathered around the small table in what Thor suspects is Lin's office. He's not sure, because he's never been in the office before.

"I don't understand," Freya says, brow furrowed. She reaches for the papers, but her hands stop before she can touch them, as if the single touch will infect her. Thor tilts his head a little, confused. Freya plows forward like nothing happened. "What else would it be?"

"Pardon my hastiness," Eir says, formally, unlike what she would normally do if this was just Thor's parents. Look, Thor wants to whisper to Loki, she is capable of respect. He suddenly aches for the Warriors Four. Or a time when things were easier. He's standing next to his father, and he thinks the king wouldn't take the joke very well. "As you know, we've been going over the sigils for the last few days, trying to find differences between them. Or how to replicate them, but working backwards through spells isn't my expertise." Eir continues.

"It's mine," his mother interrupts lightly.

Eir shoots her a pointed, slightly annoyed look.

Ah. There she is.

His mother braces a hand on the tabletop, "The point is that the sigils are exactly the same, but it's not the same spell caster." She shuffles some of the papers forward, the soul forges, and taps at one. "The one's done to my son, Tjan and his men weren't done by the Weeping Siren."

That hangs for a moment. Thor recovers himself, and clenches his hands by his sides. "Then who was it?" blurts out of him, even though he's probably not supposed to be talking right now. Eyes swing to him, and Thor wavers underneath their stare for a moment.

Kia releases a long, weighted breath and shakes her head. "We don't know."

Oh.

Lin leans back a little, lifting a hand to his face, rubbing at his mouth. "That's unfortunate." Understatement. No one comments on that, though, and lets the king gather his thoughts. "If there's a separate caster, was there a different sedir wielder in the forest we're unaware of? Nephew?"

Eyes swing back to Thor.

He fumbles for a second. "I, uh," he gets out. Then forces himself to relax. This isn't the first time he's been asked questions. He's the prince of Asgard, for the Norn's sake. "Not that I remember."

Kia purses her lips. "Casting a spell like this would have taken well over two hours. Is there any unaccounted for time where you woke up more tired than usual? Maybe you saw a shape you've discounted as your imagination?"

"Don't you think if I thought there was someone else out there, I would have mentioned it by now?"

"Son," Odin's voice is a warning. Not angry, but Thor still feels himself bunch up.

"I don't remember any sort of sorcerer," Tjan says after a moment of quiet, and Thor tries not to grit his teeth together. You hardly remember anything. "But there were four of us. If it takes a minimum of two hours for each spell, that's a good portion of a single day. Why would none of us remember that? Would the sorcerer force us to forget it?"

The thought of someone influencing his thoughts like that makes him sick.

Thor thinks about the sorcerers that Tjan said he lost in the Blodig Skog. Maybe…

"We don't know," Frigga says, and coughs sharply into her hand. She looks down at it for a second, and Thor sees something in her eyes before her fist closes, "My apologies. We have to consider the possibility that they may be the source of the sudden spread."

But if that's the case, they're killing people.

So why would the sorcerer save Thor and a handful of possessed Vanir?

Lin pales a little, sharing a look with Freya. Thor's father cants his head, "Is there something you would like to share with us, Lin?"

"No. We—I," the king stumbles over himself for a moment before shaking his head. "In order for a sorcerer to release the Blodig Skog like that...they'd have to be powerful. There are rumors of guardians that were charged with keeping the forest contained. But if they could contain it, they could release it. Perhaps…"

"I've never heard of any guardians," Loki murmurs. He's standing on the other side of Eir, and has been looking at the papers for much of the conversation. As he speaks, he seems to draw himself upright.

Lin shakes his head, "You don't have nearly half the lore on this forest that we do, boy."

Loki bristles a little. Not obvious. Thor clenches his fists.

"But it doesn't make him ignorant." Odin counters. "Loki is well versed in many subjects, and Asgard's libraries aren't little."

Loki's eyes lift to their father, slightly wide.

"Odin—he's right. There are rumors. Most of which are told by word of mouth." Frigga stops to muffle another cough. Thor's eyes narrow a little, a sense of dread coiling in his stomach. "Are you suggesting that one of these...guardians preformed the sigil?" Lin nods, "Then how did the Weeping Siren know of it?"

Lin hesitates. "I'm uncertain. Perhaps she stole it from them."

Eir sighs, "This is complex magic, your majesty. It's something you have to be taught. You can't just take it from someone's head or mimic them. Why do you think we're having such troubles replicating it?"

The question is rhetorical, and Freya seems to ghost over it completely, "Alright, throwing myth aside, there is someone out there who knows how to perform the spell and we need to know that if we're going to have any chance of stopping this epidemic before it spreads to cover all of Vanaheim. Someone has to go out there and find them, and the only people we know of that are immune to the Blodig Skog's effects are—"

"No." The voice isn't his. Or Loki's. It's a unanimous declaration from their parents in sync.

Freya slumps, looking to her sister, "Frigga—"

"I'm not putting my children or their companions through that again. Find someone else." Frigga demands, "The only reason we agreed to come was because you said we would just have to stay within the palace. Run tests. They aren't ready to go running around through that Norns cursed place again."

No. They're not. But he can see Freya's point.

Loki looks like he might be sick, face white and drained of all color. Thor wishes they were standing closer.

"Our people are dying," Freya pleads, "we don't have any other choice."

"Would you risk your son, then?" Odin's voice is sharp. "He's as immune to it as mine."

The argument escalates from there. Like words are a battering ram that can be used to beat the others down into shape. The auras of the room are getting thick with anger, words bouncing and bouncing.

Thor doesn't say a word. Loki doesn't either, even though everyone else seems to have an opinion. This is probably why Eir wanted to share her theories with a small group first. Because they've—

"Our only other option is a handful of children! It's them or no one. They lasted months and are unharmed!"

Oh, Norns. Thor breathes. In. Out. He should be panicking, but he only feels deathly calm. Like it's a veil he's hiding behind. They're really is no backing out of this. They're going to have to return, but it won't be Loki's nightmare, running around in that stupid field, it will be his.

They're going to have to go out there and find a stupid wizard so he can fix this problem.

Which makes sense.

It does.

Thor doesn't know if he can watch any more of the Vanir people's limbs distort, or the Aetheitin, or watching them cough up blood as their insides deform first, then the bones and—

Thor stops.

He looks at his mother, and sees blood speckling the tips of her hand where he can see it. She was coughing. But she wasn't coughing. Oh, Allfathers.

No.

His breath catches in his throat, in his chest. He doesn't breathe and doesn't try to.

The argument ends in a stalemate. As of today, their fate is not to storm into the forest, but Thor's not sure of that's for the best. Part of him is irritated. This should be his and the others' decision, not their parents.

Frigga coughs again, and Thor expels the air, hard. He should say something. Yank her down to the healing wing, but all he wants to do is cover his eyes and try to be ignorant. He needs to...needs to...

Blood on her hand. Blood. Blood, blood, blood...

000o000

Day five vanishes, and Thor blinks and is suddenly upstairs in his and Loki's shared guest room, trying to scrub blood off of his hands in the sink and breathing heavily. It's not coming off, stuck underneath his nails. He doesn't know where it came from, if it's his or someone else's. Red painting the sides of his nails, touching at his skin.

No, he thinks.

He scrubs harder. His skin starts to come off in small flakes and big peels. It's red underneath. More blood. His fingers look a little skewed and he thinks he's going to vomit. He's leaning on his right side, because any weight on his left leg sends fire up to his hip, nearly paralyzing him. Too much walking. He needs the cane.

He wants to…

He doesn't know what he wants.

No that's wrong. The blood. The blood to come off—Off, off, off.

Scrape, clean, dig. Everything is a set of patterns now. A ritual to be followed. People are dying. He's useless. His head hurts. Why does everything feel so far away? Are those his hands? No. He's pretty sure that they're not. His face feels funny. Numb. Something is leaching from him, and he needs to keep it there, but he doesn't know what it is.

Ritual.

Scrape.

Clean.

It doesn't even hurt. It probably should. That's a lot of blood. But these aren't his hands, so why would it hurt?

You can't fight an illness.

Useless. Like his leg. Like…

"What are you doing!?" the voice is almost piercing. Panicked. Thor lifts his head a little from the sink to see Loki staring at him with wide, horrified eyes. Thor tilts his head a little, wondering what could make his sibling look like that. Loki breaks across the space, grabbing Thor's wrists and yanking them from the water. It's steaming in the sink.

There's still blood. He needs to get it off.

"Loki." He slurs.

"Oh, Allfathers," Loki hisses, then swears several times as he yanks Thor from the bathroom towards the bed. He shoves him down, careful to keep the hands from brushing against his knees. He's gripping the hands, and all the blood. Loki's murmuring something, then looks up. "Can't you feel this!?" Loki sounds a little frantic.

"Those aren't my hands." Thor says.

"Aren't your…" his brother falters.

His sibling is very far away.

All those misaligned limbs. Looked like his leg those days in the Blodig Skog. The weird angle his calf had taken, despite all his attempts to straighten it out. Tjan had been there. Still possessed. Thor never really got the time to sit still because he had to keep Tjan and the two other survivors of his guard from killing him. It was like being hunted for months, and Thor grew very tired.

Cloth wraps around the hands Loki's holding, Thor doesn't know where it came from, and then they're carefully—oh so carefully, like they're delicate and precious—set on his lap. Thor doesn't move them. He wants to keep scraping the blood away, but he can't use those hands to do it. They're scraped, stiff, and unresponsive.

The cloth is turning red.

There's the faint scent of pine needles, Loki vanishes. Then he returns, their mother in tow. He's saying something, but Thor doesn't want to process the words. Too far away. He's going to float.

His mother says something to him.

He says nothing.

She carefully unwraps the hands and Thor watches her eyes widen a little at the sight. Red-rimmed electric blue. She looks a little flushed. Sick. I already knew that, is what comes up, and Thor's mind blanks for a moment.

Then he remembers. Watching Frigga cough into her hand, palm lightly blood splattered, but she'd hidden it quickly, and Thor remembers thinking no. That's when thinks started to blank. When his hands started to get bloody.

Because he can't—

He can't—

Norns—

Loki is rubbing at his arm. He's been doing that a lot since they got here. Unconsciously, Thor thinks, but it's still the rub all the same. Every so often, he'll wince a little.

His mother asks him something again and Thor just blinks at her. Loki leans down and, under the direction of something their mother is saying, pushes against the bloody left palm. Not his. He tried to get the blood to go away.

Where Loki touches, fresh skin grows over, spreading like water spilled across a tabletop. There goes all his hard work. They're going to be all bloody again.

Then, despite their mother's reach for them, Loki clasps the hands, fingers trailing on the inside of the wrist. The grip is tight, and seems like it should hurt. Mild pity swirls through him for the recipient of that death clench.

His mother's fingers ghost over his head, maybe touching something.

Thor just pins his gaze forward. Sleep sounds good. But he has blood. That doesn't make sense. Frigga coughed blood into her palm. He has to clean that off.

No.

No, no, no.

A keening noise escapes him. Loki grips the hands harder.

No—

000o000

The pain registers first, not the death clench. It shoots up through his leg, lingering in his hip and making his entire ribcage contract. It's not sharp, it's not burning, it's cold. Sharp and bitter, like ice groaning to support weight. He can barely flex his toes inside his boots, let alone attempt to move his knee.

A gasping, rigid inhale is what he calls breathing.

Norns, he's dying.

"...shh," his mother's quiet voice soothes. "Shh. You're alright, just breathe through it."

She's sitting next to him, her hand on his shoulder. It's nice. His brain feels like it's slowly leaking back into his skull. He wishes his family was more contact happy. Maybe that's why he's always trying to do it first. Physical affection. Contact happy?

Then he registers the pain in his hands. The grip isn't really tight, but the nails digging into the underside of his wrists are. Pinching skin, and it's painful. He grimaces, attempting to pull his hands back a little to alleviate it.

"Thor?" He hasn't heard his brother sound afraid like that in a long time.

That's enough incentive for him to open his eyes again, and he does so, blinking his sibling into shape. Loki is kneeling in front of him, hands still wrapped around Thor's. There isn't a mark on him from where he burned and scraped the skin off his hands, and it almost feels like there should be. Proof that what happened was real.

But disgust quickly follows. Followed by horror.

What did he do!?

"I…" he fumbles with his tongue, but it's deadweight in his mouth. The single word seems to fill Loki with unimaginable relief, because his shoulders slump and his grip loosens a little, but doesn't let go. Loki's hands are cold.

His mother releases a breath beside him, tracing a hand through his hair. "It's alright."

"I," he gets out.

No.

He blinks several times, but nothing seems to really register. Hands clench his.

"Thor," a different voice. He looks up, and sees his father standing there. His expression is closed off, but there's something different about the way he's standing. He takes several steps forward, closer, but so far away. He reaches a hand out, and rests it on his forearm. The skin is rough, but warm.

So much contact, like they think if they grip him hard enough, it will keep him here.

Thor feels the bizarre urge to laugh. He chokes on a hiccuped sound. "I," he says.

All he can say. All he's said. I, I, I.

No.

I burned my hands off. I saw what you hid, Mother. I, I, I.

He starts to laugh, and tears stream down his face. The movement jars his leg, and the tears become ones of pain. Loki grips harder, desperate. It's funny in a sickening way. Three of the most powerful beings in existence, and none of them can do a thing to help him.

"You're sick, Mother," Thor gasps out. "Sick, sick, sick."

His mother's grip tightens, and Loki looks up at her, eyes widening with dawning comprehension. "Frigga—" he starts, but his voice chokes off, horrified.

"What is he talking about?" Odin's voice...Thor can't figure out what it sounds like. Another laugh escapes him.

"I'm fine," Frigga dismisses, "it's just a cough."

"Just a cough?" Odin sounds angry, but it's worried anger. The type where it's nearly hysteric. Pained. "That's how all of this starts! Why would you not say anything!?"

"Sick, sick, sick," Thor chants under his breath, "I saw the blood. Gotta...gotta wash it off."

Loki grips his wrists, his knuckles white, nails pinching in.

Odin is reaching to cup his mother's face, his expression is wide-eyed and opened. The sight makes his stomach roll. Thor can't deal with this. His chest is heavy. Heart fluttering. There's something wrong with him. He needs...

"Please put me to sleep." Thor murmurs, "Please." His throat hurts. "Please, please, please…"

He doesn't think his parents hear him. That's okay.

He doesn't want them to know how much of a coward he is for wanting an out. Something doesn't...

"Please..."

One of Loki's hands releases his hand to reach up and wave in front of his face with a complicated finger movement. He feels the slight tug of sedir, an ache in the back of his skull, then consciousness slips away.

Chapter Text

"We can do something." Sif says, not bothering to stop to look at him, hands wringing. Her bare feet trek back and forth across the stone, slipping over a smooth rug before returning to the stone. It patters softly, like rain. A sound to listen to beyond his heartbeat.

Loki watches her go back and forth once more before lifting his head a little. He feels defeated. He wants to laugh. "What? Choose the flowers for her funeral?" he asks. His tone is bitter, and he doesn't care.

Maybe he should. It might help this awful emptiness that's snuggled up inside his stomach.

Fandral makes a noise in the back of his throat, like he wants to agree or laugh, but knows it's not appropriate. Sif gives him a look, and Fandral lifts up his hands in surrender. "What? It's not like he doesn't have a point, my lady. No one has walked away from this. Two of Vanaheim's most powerful elder sedir users have given up the ghost."

Loki's throat tightens. He closes his eyes sharply and breathes in. The image of Frigga sitting on the cot while Kia tended to her is branded on the inside of his eyelids. She'd coughed up blood and reacted like it was just a normal fact of life. How long, he'd wanted to demand, rattling her shoulders, how long did you know?

For all that he's studied this outbreak, he didn't realize how quickly it spread.

Who's next? His mind frantically flails, who, who, who?

"Perhaps it would not be best to bring that up now." Hogun offers. Loki can feel the weight of his stare on his face. He doesn't want to look up to meet it. He just wants to curl into a small ball on this hard floor and let it swallow him.

"Oh. Right. Sorry." Fandral says.

He's not fragile. He doesn't need them to treat him that way. (He does, and he hates it.)

Loki still doesn't lift his pinned gaze, letting it rest somewhere to the left of the bedpost hidden beneath the dull orange blanket of Thor's bedspread. His brother is still resting soundly on top, face pinched and stressed, looking he's decades older than he truly is. It's strange. A year ago, Loki would've said that his brother was always carefree and indifferent to just about everything.

Now…

Thor burned off the skin of his hands, and Loki doesn't even know why. A marvelous job he's been doing helping.

They're supposed to be close. Loki's never felt more distant from him. And it hurts, somewhere deep inside, to realize how far the chasm between them is. They aren't even the same people anymore. Just two strangers pretending to be brothers.

"I'm serious," Sif continues, "we can do something. I refuse to just sit here and let the Queen die."

"Do you think any of use would let her?" Volstagg asks softly. It's the first words he's spoken beyond a heartfelt "not her" when Loki explained the situation to them. Loki lifts his heavy eyes to look up at the man.

Hogun is seated on the simple desk shoved against one wall beneath a large mirror, and Volstagg has taken the chair. Mirrors are everywhere in this palace. It's how Loki thinks the Vanir pretend they have open space. The air tastes stale here.

Sif is pacing. Fandral is leaning against the back of one of the couches, arms folded across his chest and brow pinched. Loki, like a child, collapsed against the end of Thor's bed and pulled his legs up to his chest some five minutes ago. He doesn't think he could get up if he tried.

It's easier not looking at his sibling. At least this way he can claim that he's close.

Thor's empty eyes yesterday…

Norns, Loki's bones feel heavy. His body aches with residual anxiety. He clenches his fists and squeezes his eyes shut, breathing out stiffly. His mother is dying. His father likely wont leave her bedside until she passes. His family is falling apart, and all he can do is stand and watch it happen.

He doesn't know what to do.

"No. Of course not." Sif snaps, running a hand through her hair. It's something Thor does. Loki wonders who accumulated it from who. "But you don't understand. I'm not suggesting that we synthesize a cure. I'm not a witch. My understanding of sedir is rudimentary at it's best...But I do know how to track people."

What?

"What on the Nine does that have to do with anything?" Fandral asks, flicking his hands out. "We're talking about their mother, Sif, not some Norn's cursed hunting trip!"

"I…" Sif's steps falter. She looks like she's chewing on her lip to brace herself against something. "I know that. I'm not an idiot, Fandral. I simply mean...I mean that…that we..."

"...we can find the sorcerer of the wood." Hogun finishes, grim.

Loki clenches. He thinks he's going to be sick. Oh, Norns. Why would you…?

Sif gives a slight nod, folding her arms across her chest tightly. One thumb rubs absently at her arm.

The sorcerer, who's in the Blodig Skog. Who's in the place that they're warded against. That his father protested against them going to, but everyone knew was only a matter of time. It's a necessity. Not a request.

If...if they can somehow find the sorcerer before Frigga gets worse...could they ease the symptoms, or banish them all together? If they could find him, would it be possible to save her? If he sits here and does nothing, she's facing certain death. No one has recovered from this disease, and without those sigils, no one will.

His uncle was right. This isn't something they can run from.

He has to...has to…

He squeezes his eyes shut.

Volstagg curses, getting to his feet. His face has lost all color, and there's a wild franticness in the way he's holding himself. "Norns, woman!" he exclaims, "What would possess you to think of returning to that place! We didn't come here to relive that torture, we came here to help!"

Sif's tempter is equally hot. "And what good have we done? Tell me, Volstagg. We've stood around and tended to sick fevers and watched the helpless die. By remaining here, we are prolonging their suffering."

Norns, Loki can't imagine what being around the ill for so long would have been like. He stayed behind closed doors with the medical professionals and sedir wielders, trying to come up with a solution and looking at test results. Hiding behind books, as he's oft to do.

"And us losing our minds is going to help them?" Volstagg counters, still pale. He doesn't look angry, he looks like he's about to be sick. "We barely made it out the first time, and I won't make the jump at saying any of us really left it behind. I'm no fool."

Sif's jaw bunches.

"We don't even have a map," Fandral says. His posture is leaning towards Sif, but his mouth is a tight line. Sif casts angry eyes on him. "I'm not saying that we don't do this," Fandral adds, though it's obvious he wants to, "I'm just...think about this logistically. We don't have a map, we don't have supplies, and we don't know the first thing about how to track this...wizard down in the first place. If he even exists."

He does. He can't not. Loki saw the sigils carved into Thor's essence. Someone did that, and it wasn't the Siren. She didn't care.

"We'll figure it out!" Sif exclaims. She's gone still. Her hands are shaking softly, underneath where she's hid them, but it's causing her entire arm to tremble. "I won't just sit here and wait!"

"Sif," Hogun's voice is patient, eyes far away. "Fandral is right. Even if we all agreed to do this, we'd need the means. The only reason we survived last is because of the Siren."

Loki feels nausea tighten a knot in his throat. He feels cold, like life has been drained from him. It's a truth that all of them have known for a long, long time. Not one they wanted to address. The reason, Loki thinks, that they stopped fighting so hard at the end. The Siren provided for them, and in a sick, twisted way, they grew grateful for that.

They were losing themselves to her, because she gave them basic necessity. Shelter, food, warmth. If she'd just left them out there to die, they would have died. But she didn't, and though she ended their lives, she saved them, too.

The silence lingers between them as they drink that knowledge, as sour and bitter as it is.

Sif swears under her breath.

Loki feels like following, but his tongue feels heavy and laden in his mouth. Given this, it surprises everyone including him when the soft words fall out of him. "I don't owe my life to her,"

He refuses to. He won't. Can't.

Four pairs of eyes land on him. Loki doesn't bother to come to attention. Just rubs very softly at his left thumb between two fingers. He releases a shuddering, pained breath. His lungs don't feel large enough for his body, twisted and pulled taut inside of him. He meets their eyes, because he has to, not because he wants to.

"There's no one else to do this." He says. His tone is flat. Lifeless. Only appropriate, a bitter part of him murmurs. "It's us or Tjan. His men died in Asgard a year ago, if you'll recall." A fact that he learned second hand. No one told him. "And I don't know about you, but I don't trust him to find his own feet, let alone a sorcerer whose hidden so well inside the wood his existence became a myth and bedtime story."

It makes him wonder, far and distant, how long the Weeping Siren was also there before she revealed herself. Then he thinks he doesn't care. Let her rot, whether in the past or present.

The Warriors and Sif are quiet for a long moment.

None of them want to do this.

But has it ever been a choice?

Hogun sighs softly, looking down at his hands, then his socks. And Loki remembers the conversation on a rooftop what feels like a lifetime ago. "Loki can track the sorcerer with his sedir...and I'll talk with my father about borrowing the king's map." He says.

Almost as one, they slump. With this choice comes commitment.

Volstagg sighs. "So it will be,"

"So it will be," Loki murmurs to himself.

Sif opens her eyes, expression strained. "We'll collect supplies from the palace. Everyone get some sleep. We'll leave tomorrow morning."

000o000

When the Warriors and Sif have left, Loki doesn't bother climbing onto his own mattress. Thor can whine about it all he wants later, about how it's not manly and they're not children anymore, but he doesn't care. He climbs onto the mattress beside his older brother and lays there, staring at nothing.

The night isn't young, nor has it passed to old age yet. Somewhere in the middle.

Helplessness has become a familiar feeling as of late. He hates it all the same.

Loki flips to his back, staring up. The ceiling is dull and gray, offering little entertainment. There's a few cracks, but the creases of the stones fit together so seamlessly he doesn't think he could get a fingernail wedged between them. It's hard to tell where one begins and another ends.

Minutes pass. Then an hour.

Thor breathes beside him, his peace an illusion. He was screaming yesterday; bloody, raw hands burned to muscle, but Loki could tell he didn't feel the pain. These aren't my hands, he'd said. Then later, more panicked, begging, please put me to sleep.

Please let me die, is what Loki thought in return.

His eyes burn. He rubs at them, then pushes against them, digging his palms into his skull. It isn't enough, it never is. His stomach is bunching, his chest aches with the pressure. There's too much inside him, and he's going to choke. Make it stop. I can't breathe.

I can't do this, he thinks frantically, then, I won't do this.

He can't go crawling back to the hell he barely escaped from. He can't pretend that they'll have magically procured answers in the morning on how best to do this. That they'll even get explicit permission, and won't just drop off the face of the planet. (If they even ask in the first place.) His father was so against it when they suggested it the first time.

But that was before Frigga.

Before Thor's panic.

Loki thinks if he asked, his father would say yes. And that would break him. Would it, a soft voice asks, would it really? You already know that you're expendable. At least if you left, he'd still have the family that matters to him. His wife, and his golden boy. You're just the mad one. The shadow.

Loki presses harder against his eyes, breathing out stiffly. Shadows are only important when the sun is shining.

Thor inhales and exhales beside him. The spell wore off a long time ago. Whatever sleep he's in now is of his own violation. Loki wishes he could reach over and shake him, ask his opinion. Or his help. None of them brought up bringing Thor, and Loki doesn't know if they will—these aren't my hands—how can they? His brother has suffered enough.

And he still has to return. He doesn't...doesn't...doesn't—

You're a coward.

He is.

The Siren is dead, and you linger here like she's going to crawl out of the dark and latch onto your soul. Pathetic. You know, even if she did drag you off, would anyone look? Would anyone want to? You haven't given them any good reason as of the late. Loki and his madness.

Stop. Stop, he can't, he—

Loki rolls. His chest is compressed. Every breath feels like he's sucking oxygen from water.

At least you know that the Siren did love you, in her own way. You only keep things you want, and at least she wanted you. She left the golden child and took the shadow.

Loki doesn't owe her anything. She didn't do anything for him. She broke him.

Even if that's true, you miss her.

An awful, grasping panic settles inside him. He sits up. Energy is screaming through him. He feels like he's at the epicenter of an explosion, and if he doesn't move, he's going to be hit. He scrambles off the mattress, breathing heavily, but not enough. He needs his thoughts to quiet. Needs his head to silence. Stop thinking, stop, thinking, stop thinking, stop—

She could have cut off your arm, and you'd have said thank you.

Stop, stop, stop—

And now you don't even notice that anyone else is suffering. Thor is obviously struggling, and what have you been doing? Nothing. You just sat there and pretended you both weren't drowning, because that's easier, and you've always loved the easy way out.

Loki gasps, hand fisted over his sternum. His heart is fluttering around his ribs, pounding on the cage it's entrapped on. He thinks he's dying, and the only thing he feels is a deep sense of relief.

Thor is your brother. Your best friend. When was the last time you honestly asked him how he was? When was the last time that you thought of someone other than yourself?

His eyes are completely dry. He's not crying. He's still and motionless. And he needs to—has to—stop thinking!

At least her love was authentic. Everyone around you feels fake. You're fake. Your fake parents, your fake brother, your fake friends. They said they were glad to have really met you, whatever that means, and you know what you said in return?

Sharp. He needs something sharp. Sharp brings blood and blood—Stop thinking.

Absolutely nothing. You just smiled weakly. You couldn't even tell them that you thought it was a lie. You just sat there in silence while they laughed, and now they want to go back to the place you all died and—

The first cut is deep. A thick, heavy slice across his forearm. Blood wells, pooling, red, and thick. The pain is a shock, but a familiar one. Loki chokes on air, dragging the blade up, but forcing it to be more shallow. He scrapes through older cuts, older scars. Older silences.

You—

The pain aches.

The energy in his chest is still pumping. Demanding a release and a penance.

He cuts once, twice, again, again, again, again…

His thoughts are completely silent.

000o000

"Loki Fjörgynn Vé!"

Loki closes his eyes and represses a shudder, ducking his head close to Moa's side for a moment to gather himself. He can't remember the last time someone shouted his full name. It's a common belief on Asgard that to scream someone's full name is to condemn them to possession, not that Loki's found any evidence of it.

Sif looks up from where she's re-checking through a satchel and their eyes catch.

She looks as apologetic as she does frustrated.

Both of them know that voice.

Loki raises up to his full height and steps around Moa, leaving a hand against her muzzle in a stupid attempt at comfort. She shuffles against him, but turns her head to look, obviously interested. Traitor.

Thor stalks towards him from the other side of the barn, looking every inch their father's son. His eyes are furious and crackling, his aura thick and oppressive. Loki tastes ozone, and can feel the electricity bunching in the air.

Trailing behind his sibling is his Volstagg, who has the decency to look slightly guilty. Not enough. Loki can tell that it wasn't his brother that approached Volstagg, but the other way around.

Strangely, it's not Thor's presence that makes his body tense up. It's who's following after. No. On the Norn's—what are the chances? Standing behind Thor is the captain of his guard, Ullr, and a handful of his soldiers he was training.

Hyn's expression is perfectly blank when Loki catches his eye, but looks strangely smug as well. The four around him are staring with a mix between apprehension and anger. Loki can see the blond Sif inflicted violence upon leaning on one leg awkwardly. They're staring. Wary, confused, but waiting, bated. Like this is all just a show specifically for them.

Loki grits his teeth, and wishes, not for the first time, that his family's drama wasn't a spectacle to be enjoyed. Some days—often—he hates his title, and all the weight that comes around it.

"Yes, brother?" Loki asks.

At least, a part of him recognizes dully, Thor seems coherent. He's angry which means he isn't despairing, which means that he won't go burning his hands beneath the spray. Which...it isn't good, but it's all he could have asked for when he left his sibling this morning. He didn't intend to see him until he and the Warriors had returned.

Thor's eyes flash. He stops about a foot in front of Loki, to which he takes a half step back. "Keep your forked tongue behind your teeth. What on Helheim are you thinking!?"

"Thor," Fandral says, seeming to appear beside the blond. He doesn't touch him. "Breathe, my friend. It's not like we're laying siege to Jotunheim."

"No," Thor rears on the swordsman, "instead, you're going to run off into a place that's cursed, actively killing people, and drove you all mad!"

Loki flinches back from that. He feels like he's been slapped. For all the gossip has slipped around the palace, Loki's never heard Thor accuse him of insanity. Not to his face. Not like this—like it's a weapon to be swung at a moment's notice.

Loki's jaw grits. His eyes slide to Hyn and his group of idiots. Moa shifts restlessly.

Sif bristles, stepping up beside him. "Look. Your accusations aren't going to help you make your point. We're leaving once Hogun returns from his father, and unless you're going to strap us down, there's little you can do to stop it."

"Maybe I should if you think this wise!"

"It's a forest, Thor. Not a dragon." Loki says softly. He feels old, and very tired. "We'll be back in a week, maybe a fortnight."

If they're being hopeful. The Blodig Skog is massive, and it's expanding. They could circle it several dozen times and still miss the sorcerer. If he's even in the wood in the first place. That's something they've all privately tried not to consider. If he's left...they can't search an entire planet in a few days.

"And I'm just supposed to sit here?" Thor scoffs in disbelief.

"That was the plan, yes."

"Loki!"

"What do you want me to say!?" Loki exclaims, stepping closer. "That I'm sorry? That we won't go? Because I wont."

"That's not—"

"You demand an answer, and you're wasting our time. Our mother is dying. Vanir are dying. We don't have time to sit here and trade a petty argument." Loki seethes. His jaw aches. He feels like a coiled snake, ready to snap out and bite anyone who tries to soothe him. Snake Prince. How fitting.

Thor's eyes squint. This anger is familiar. He hasn't seen Thor look so alive in a very long time.

"You're running off on some stupid self-sacrificing quest when our father explicitly ordered us not to. He said it wasn't necessary."

"Our father doesn't know everything."

"And you do?" Thor counters. His lips twitch, like he wants to smile, but his anger wont let him. Loki has no such restraints. His lips split into something bitter and he holds it, leaning in, like a snake bite.

"At least I'm actually willing to go."

Thor flinches back, obviously stung. Regret settles in his stomach, but it's fleeting. Anything to get Thor away from here. Away means safe. Away means that he won't interfere. Away means that they won't fight like it's the only thing they know how to do anymore.

"I'm not a coward." Thor growls in disagreement.

"No?"

"Loki," Sif says, very softly behind him. A warning. But Loki's never been very good at not sticking his neck out where he shouldn't.

"I'm just not being crass."

"What on the Nine is idiotic about finding the one source of help we know of!?" Loki protests, truly, and honestly confused, "Tell me, brother, honestly! What do you have so against this!? Aren't you usually for the self-sacrificing plans, it's not like we're doing blood rituals! We're not—"

Thor grabs his shoulders, shaking him roughly once. His grip is iron. "I CAN'T LOSE YOU!"

Loki's eyes flick up to his face, and his mouth snaps shut. Thor's eyes are red and wet. Haunted. His face is pale, and it's obvious that despite the hours of sleep he managed, he could still lay down for another fifteen. He looks more like an exhausted, lost man than he does a prince. Or Loki's sibling. We are strangers, he realizes. Perhaps we've always been.

This isn't anger. Not all of it. It's panic.

"I can't…" Thor inhales, obviously trying to gather himself. He doesn't let go, and Loki doesn't struggle. He's too shocked by the outburst to move. "I won't do that again. I can't. You don't know how long I spent thinking you were dead. You don't know how long I spent thinking about how to tell our parents I failed you. You mean too much to me. If I mean anything to you, please, please don't do this."

Loki doesn't know how to answer. He works his tongue behind his teeth, thinking, spinning, spiraling. His fingers twitch. He can't meet his sibling's eyes.

"Thor," he says at last, his voice barely above a whisper. "Brother, we don't get that choice."

Thor closes his eyes, shaking his head twice, lips pinched. Gathering himself. "Why?"

Because fate is a cruel mistress, with little regard to personal opinion or feelings? He doesn't know. He wishes he did. Loki flexes his fingers, pulling his nails away from the inside of his palms. He keeps his answer simple, "We need those sigils."

And Loki, as much as he doesn't want to think about it, is honestly the only one who can't refuse to go. He's the only warded seidr wielder. The only one who can learn how to do the sigils firsthand, if they don't manage to bring the sorcerer back with them.

Thor releases a sharp exhale through his teeth, then let's go of Loki's arms and moves down the stable. Past Sif, who doesn't try to stop him, only watching with something aching on her face. Thor stalks down the stable, and Loki turns, but does nothing else. His lips part, but he can't form the question.

Thor stops in front of his stallion's stall.

Loki's stomach sinks in realization, but he doesn't try to fight. It's not a battle he'd win.

"What are you doing?" It isn't him, or Fandral, or Sif. It's Captain Ullr, whose moved half a step closer.

Thor opens the gate and rests a hand on the horse's muzzle, gently guiding him into the open space. "My sibling and my companions are fools," Thor mutters in question.

"And therefore...?" Captain Ullr questions.

"I suppose we must ask ourselves this: who is truly the fool? The fool, or the man who follows him?" Thor answers cryptically and starts for the tack.

Captain Ullr sighs longsufferingly.

"You're going?" Volstagg sounds disappointed, and Loki casts him a side-long look. To anyone else, the question would be innocent, a concern for Thor's safety. Loki knows better. Volstagg approached his brother in the hopes that Thor would stop them. Trying to fight departure is something Loki wants to grind his heels down into. But he knows that it won't do anything.

If Volstagg truly wanted success in that endeavor, he should have talked with Odin.

"Do I have a choice?" Thor asks, back to them. "You aren't going to stop, and I'm not letting you go alone. Looks like we're stuck together."

"Your Highness," Captain Ullr's voice is more patient than Loki was expecting. "I don't think this is a wise decision. This forest is dangerous. It's not something you can kill. Not something that can be fought. You stepped in for what was meant to be a few days, and we nearly lost all of you. What makes you—any of you—certain this trip will be any different?"

"They aren't, Captain. And I don't suspect that it will be."

Loki twists around, startled, and looks at the other entrance of the stable. Governor Tusin stands there, hand wrapped around the hilt of a blade strapped to his waist, looking ready to kill something. Hogun is beside him, expression pinched in a rare display of visible frustration. When did they get here? How long were they standing there?

Loki bites on the inside of his cheek. He feels exposed. He wishes more of their arguments took place behind closed doors, where their only witness is each other.

Fandral recovers himself first. He smooths the front of his shirt, as if trying to brush away dirt. "Your confidence astounds me, Governor."

Governor Tusin steps forward and scoffs, "Don't backtalk me, boy. Your overconfidence will get you all killed out there."

Overconfidence. Loki could laugh. That's what this is, certainly. All of them fumbling and trying not to cry tears of sheer frustration. His hands are shaking. He's not breathing deeply enough. The world feels gray.

"Otōsan," Hogun sighs, flicking his gaze up.

"No." Governor Tusin lifts a finger towards his son's face. "You have spoken plenty, son. If you intend to stay on the remaining good graces of mine that you have, you will keep silent."

Hogun shoots his father a heated stare, but presses his lips together pointedly. His jaw bunches, and his eyes flick away.

Loki rubs at his palm with his thumb, agitated.

Governor Tusin releases a skittering breath. His face has aged. There's worry there, and a deep seated dread. It hardly boosts Loki's already low outlook on this. The governor steps forward and pulls something from his cloak, holding it out to them. Loki realizes then that the man is hardly dressed formally. He's in a light tunic with loose pants. If the ground wasn't damp with a light rainfall last night, Loki wonders if he'd even have bothered to put on shoes.

Hogun must've dragged him from bed to discuss this. Loki feels a mild discomfort at that fact. It's not something he would dare to do with his own father.

The item is a rolled up sheet of paper. The map of the Blodig Skog. Loki doesn't want to touch it. The realization is as deep rooted as it is startling. He'd rather chop off and eat his own foot than lay a finger on the paper. It's not the map that they used to get out of the tunnels—that one is sitting safely in his father's office again—but it doesn't really matter.

Neither Sif nor Fandral make a move to handle the parchment.

Apparently sensing their apprehension, Volstagg steps forward and takes the proffered item. His fingers barely touch it enough to hold it, and he handles it like it's a dead, bloody animal.

Governor Tusin scoffs lightly as he watches them.

Somewhere behind them, Thor drops something and curses under his breath.

"You come back," Governor Tusin says, his tone as commanding as it is apprehensive. "Vanaheim can't stand another political battle right now. Not like last time." Last time? What last time? "And beyond that, I'd rather not have the deaths of King Odin's children on my head. Nor Asgardian noblemen's children. Vanaheim is already blamed for your madness. We'd go to open war if you don't return. Bare that in mind, would you?"

"We're not going to die." Sif says, shaking her head. "Does no one have faith in us?"

"You've told no one of your excursions. How could they?" The governor counters. "And it's not like you have a good track record. Take the map, but don't be crass about this."

Loki forces his mouth to work. "Thank you, governor." The words feel flat and false. He thinks they are.

Hogun's father smiles thinly. He looks to his son, and rests a hand on his shoulder for a long, weighted moment. There's something shadowed in his face when their eyes meet, and Loki sees the hard exterior of politician slip away from him for a moment. It's the expression that Loki's seen fathers give their sons before they go to war. Many of which don't return.

This feels like a death omen.

"You've grown to be a fine man," Governor Tusin says. "Do your family proud."

"I will," Hogun promises. His expression is soft.

The older man nods once to himself, then pulls his arm back with what looks like effort. He meets Loki's gaze and nods again, then turns and strides from the stable, cloak billowing behind him. Loki watches him go until he can't anymore.

Volstagg tucks the map inside his saddlebag.

Then they stand there for a moment, breathing. The only sound is the light rainfall outside, their breath, and Thor moving in the background. They've beat all the servants here. Sunlight hasn't even made an appearance yet.

An indiscernible amount of time later, Thor steps up beside him, reins gathered in his left hand. "When do we leave?" he asks.

"We were just waiting for Hogun," Sif answers as if coming from a daze, her gaze sliding to the man.

They stand still. Taut. Breathless. Pained.

I don't want to do this, Loki thinks softly. He digs his nails inside his palms.

"I'm going to have to tell your father where you went if he asks," Captain Ullr warns. Loki would be surprised by his lack of resistance, but he also knows that the captain has been in charge of Thor since their childhood. He knows his brother a little too well than to fight. He might even know him better than I do, Loki realizes, and feels a rush of bitter jealousy. "I cannot keep the truth from the king."

"I didn't expect you to," Thor admits. His face has drained of color. Loki wonders if any of them don't look a stiff breeze from passing out.

"Allfathers help you when he learns," Captain Ullr murmurs, "I'll be lucky to keep my head."

"This is a terrible idea." Hyn protests, and several of his fellow soldiers nod along with him. "You're going to get yourselves all killed. What good will you do Asgard dead?"

Ha. They are Odin's sole heirs, that's ture. Without them, there will be conflict in a battle for the throne. But it's not like that fact has ever really stopped them before.

"Better than we'll do it standing here." Thor counters.

"Your brother is insane, my prince, there's not much good he does period." Another man says. Loki's teeth clench together, and he looks away, face hot. He bites on the inside of his cheek. Talking does nothing, he reminds himself, and violence isn't a long-term solution. Hyn stomps on the man's foot and he grunts.

Fandral makes a move forward, but Thor lifts up a hand to stop him. The movements are small, but present. Thor slips a step forward, then grabs the young man by the front of his shirt, hauling him up. His brother is tall, but it strikes Loki then how much he towers. "My brother is not crazy," Thor says. You just said otherwise, Loki wants to say. "I'd have you remember that. Speak such insults again, and you'll find yourself in a world of hurt."

"Thor," Loki murmurs. He feels tired. He didn't sleep last night.

His brother drops the man, who's staring at him wide-eyed.

"Sorry, my lord," Hyn says smoothly. His eyes are burning embers when they flick to Loki, "it won't happen again."

Of course. How many times has Loki heard that lie in his lifetime?

"I should hope not." Thor moves back to his stallion, and mounts him in one smooth motion. A lifetime of practice. Thor was riding before he could walk properly. His hands are clenched around the reins, and his posture is stiff. Loki wonders for a long second if they should swallow their pride and go see their mother. To say goodbye, if it comes to that.

But Loki doesn't want to face their father, and the thought of seeing Frigga lethargic like that, bloodied as she was, he just...he can't…

You are a coward.

"Come on," Thor says, "we have a lot of ground to cover, and little time."

Loki brushes a hand against Moa's side. Whether to reassure himself or the mare, he's not certain. He grabs hold of the saddle and hauls himself onto her back. Last time, their journey was supposed to be a few days. This time, they're estimating a week. Loki's not optimistic.

How long, he quietly asks himself, before the forest lets us go?

Chapter Text

It should have been harder. To slip away from the palace, from their guards, the safety of the city, people. But it wasn't. It's almost laughably simple in retrospect, but that doesn't surprise him. They have too much experience to be sloppy about this. Fear makes him want to stop, even if logic dictates he has to go on.

The journey from the edge of a crumbling, abandoned city into the Blodig Skog feels like a heavy, wet cloak is being draped around his shoulders. Thor doesn't know what to do with this energy, how to disperse or use it, so he simply lets it settle in his stomach, his fingers, his bones and lets it fester. Linger.

Once inside, there are no directions for them. Nothing to point them to the mythical wizard who's supposed to fix this for them. Help them save his mother, and the rest of the Vanir. They loiter for a moment at the forest's edge, uncertain, before turning north and continuing. His brother has some ideas for tracking the wizard, but without a sure lock onto his sedir signature, he only has a vague direction to go.

They don't stop until the sun has long since set again, and they're exhausted, tired, and hungry.

Camp is set up in silence, bedrolls laid out and food eaten like they're preparing for an execution.

Thor feels an obligation to break the silence, get them laughing, but all his words get stuck somewhere between his throat and his teeth and won't come out. So his humor falls flat inside his mouth, and remains there.

The fire crackles, the taste of smoke is almost numbing. The forest beyond them is utterly silent and still, like it's caught in suspended animation. Their breaths feel booming and echoing, the shifting of the horses like battle cries screeched into the open air.

How, he wonders privately, can something be so devoid of sound?

Night has settled firmly on them when Sif asks quietly, "Do you think we're going to die?" She's scraping a stick inside the fire, poking at ashes and hot coal to keep it alive. Thor looks up at her, and feels slightly nauseous at the question.

"No." Fandral says. He laid down some half an hour ago, but clearly hasn't fallen asleep yet. Thor doesn't know if any of them are going to rest tonight. Or until they leave. Exhaustion will demand it of them, but paranoia will keep them active. "There's nothing out here to kill us, Sif."

Ha.

"The Weeping Siren isn't the only thing that populates this wood," Thor mutters, tossing some of the forest debris he was picking at into the flame. The fire accepts it with a hiss, sending up a plume of sparks and smoke. "There's plenty else to do the job for her."

Fandral snorts, then deadpans, "Encouraging."

Not meant to be, Thor wants to retort. He keeps his lips pressed together and scowls into the flame because it's easier to be angry than afraid. He breathes out stiffly, and sees Sif staring at him subtly. He catches her gaze, and she pulls her own away, returning her brown eyes to the flame.

"What about you? Do you think we will?" Thor asks. As soon as the words are out, he wishes that he hasn't said anything. He doesn't want to know her answer.

Sif's lips press together and she frowns.

Volstagg flicks an anxious stare up at him, clearly as unwilling to hear the response as he is. Thor clenches his hands and sweeps his gaze across the small clearing they've taken to calling camp for the night.

Fandral has turned on his side to face them, giving up on the pretense of sleep. Hogan is balancing a lamp on his knee, eyes fixed on the map of the Blodig Skog that Loki has been staring at for the better part of two hours, trying to work some sort of sedir onto it or maybe scribble on top of it. Thor's not entirely sure; he's spent most of that time trying to pretend that they're not here, of which has included ignoring his sibling.

Loki's wound so tight it's impossible to ignore the tension. The reminder. At least with the Warriors, he can dissimulate their silence as one of contemplation; as if they're working out a rather difficult situation in a quest, rather than sitting here.

Here.

"I don't know," Sif says at length, drawing his attention back to the shieldmaiden. She releases her lower lip and glances towards Hogan and Loki. Her shoulders tighten. Neither his sibling or the Vanir give the slightest indication that they're hearing anything from the conversation. Some part of him is relieved, even as a surge of annoyance rushes through him.

How nice it would be to simply engross himself so thoroughly into something that he could forget.

Sif scrapes her stick through the flame. A flurry of sparks shoots up towards the sky, swallowed into the black night. There's no moonlight, or stars, instead the sky is thick with overcast, which doesn't surprise Thor. Vanaheim is nothing if not wet.

"I hope not," Sif adds softly.

"We won't." Thor says, not to offer her comfort, but because he needs to hear it. His voice is loud, firm, confident. It sounds nothing like what he's become used to over the last months. "We're not going to die. None of us are going to die."

Five pairs of eyes rise to look at him. He swallows thickly under their scrutiny, but plasters something he hopes looks somewhat optimistic to his face. "We're the elite of Asgard. We'll find this wizard and return to Bo-An. You'll see."

Loki's gaze pulls away first, returning to the map with what looks like some reluctance. Thor turns his gaze to the fire so he doesn't have to watch everyone else lose faith in his words. No one has an answer for him.

Thor doesn't even have an answer for himself.

000o000

It's somewhere mid afternoon the next day, as they're watering the horses, that Loki approaches him. None of them slept much, and it shows in their faces. Thor feels stretched and weirdly achy, like his limbs needed to be horizontal for longer. Not to sleep, but just remain inactive.

The Warriors are gathered together in a small group off to the left of him, doing a weapons and supplies check. He didn't feel like joining, and doesn't know if Loki did. He hasn't spoken to his brother since their argument in the Vanir's royal stables yesterday. Loki's face is impassive. Thor feels his tense.

His brother is gripping the map in one hand. It's rolled like an innocent—albeit long—piece of parchment. "The sigils that the sorcerer cast on you, I need to study them."

Thor rests a hand on his stallion's neck. Victory's head shifts somewhat in acknowledgment, long black mane dripping into the river as he does so. "Why?"

"I've had little success with my other theories. The sigils are the only known source of this enchanter's magic. I might be able to draw an active signature from it." Loki pulls his lip against his teeth, "But I hold little hope. The spell I know of is only effective when an enchantment is being actively cast. It's why I couldn't track the Siren when we first encountered her."

Thor feels incredulous. The argument with their cousin feels like it happened decades ago, but the stinging humiliation he felt at the time lingered with him. Now he could care less about it, but then, it had felt so important. "But you said—"

"I lied." Loki interrupts, voice smooth. "The only margin of success I had was when she took Idrissa. She was casting a spell to draw her in, it was a summoning."

Idrissa…? Thor squints for a moment before he remembers. She was one of the children. The second to last one taken by the creature. The one that Loki and Sif nearly rescued before losing her. He frowns, and Loki wets his lips, looking oddly uncomfortable.

"That...screeching, she was doing? It was a summoning?"

"Yes."

"Huh." Thor intones. He's parsed those days over in his head, looked over every detail, and yet, he feels like he still knows so little. It makes sense, in retrospect, he guesses. It would have been rather pointless to take a child then announce that you're doing so while you walk away.

Loki releases his lower lip, "It shouldn't hurt, or take more than a few minutes."

"Norns, brother. I didn't say no." Thor points out, slightly exasperated. Loki only stares, and Thor pats Victory's neck twice before sighing and saying in a tone more complacent, "What do you need me to do?"

Loki guides him away from the horses, directing him to sit on a large trunk of a fallen tree. It's splintered down the middle and blackened, like it caught fire. Much of the wood surrounding them does, almost as if someone fought a battle with only flame.

"Just sit still and remain quiet." Loki instructs. He unrolls the map, all but dropping it into his hands. "And hold this."

Thor catches it on either end, feeling disgusted by the feel of the paper. It's coarse, almost like thick fabric or a tapestry. The maps are old; perhaps even older than his father. Thor guesses it makes a sick sort of sense that they wouldn't be made from actual decaying, rotting paper.

The map is open to the location they're inside of. The small stream runs west for several more miles, growing thicker as it does, and the forest is dense and heavy surrounding it. What little notation on the map it is in Vanir, but what the Allspeak doesn't cover, his mother made sure he understood.

There's hills east of here, and a ravine. Thor's lips twist with a frown as he sees that. If it's the same one he remembers walking past, it's deep enough it was impossible to see the bottom. Thor wonders suddenly about the tunnels that the Warriors, his brother, and the children escaped through. He can't see any exits or entrances nearby. Maybe they're not close enough to the Weeping Siren's abode.

But those tunnels stretched for miles. How deep into the forest were they?

They had to travel south to leave the wood and get back to Ju, the small town that housed them for a few days before they could make it to the capital. Even with that knowledge, Thor has no idea where they are in relation to the place.

Loki's cold fingers touching his forehead brings him back from his wandering thoughts, and he inhales sharply at the feeling. Loki's eyes flicker half open as he twitches, but when Thor makes no indication he's in pain, he closes them again in concentration.

Norns, his hands are cold. They always are.

Loki's other hand moves out to rest his fingers very lightly on the map, off center by a few inches. Thor holds it steady, afraid now to drop it.

His brother's fingers start to glow softly, veins alighting beneath the skin. Thor feels a rush of ecstasy, adrenaline, and an overwhelming energy surge through him. The sensation makes his insides twist, and he bites on his tongue to keep himself from vomiting. His nose burns with the smell of pine and plant water.

Loki's face scrunches lightly. Eyelids drawing tighter together, lips thinning.

His limbs begin to ache from the pressure, fingers going numb. The need to release surges through him. He doesn't know how to make it stop, how to let it go. His mouth opens, but sound gets caught somewhere on his suddenly heavy tongue.

Allfathers…stop, stop, stop…

This isn't what magic feels like. Not normally. Not to him. Not from his family. It's usually a caress, not like...It feels like his chest and lungs are being forced beneath a slow moving harrow. His skin is burning.

His hands start to shake. Loki's breath catches, hitching, and it doesn't release. Thor realizes the tight lines on his face aren't from concentration, but pain. His hands are straining, like they want to pull away, but Loki won't let them.

He forces his tongue to move, scrape some noise out from his throat to beyond his teeth. "Lo…"

The map gives a sharp, electric jolt beneath his fingers, and some sort of warm buzz screeches through his limbs. Thor's sitting still one moment, the next he's being flung backwards, tossed as if he weighs nothing. He's not braced for the fall, and his elbows take the brunt of it, scraping along the rough foliage before his back, neck, and head smack into a tree.

He hears a sporadic thump further off, and then there's a deep, guttural soundwave that ripples through the air. It's deafening, and Thor flinches in on himself as much as he's able, hands clamped over his ears, eyes pressed closed.

What did you do? Thor thinks frantically of his sibling. What on Helheim did you—!?

Air feels like it's been sucked from him, and it won't come back. He tries to gasp it in, or sip it, but the fiery pain in his lungs refuses to cooperate with him. The skin on his chest feels hot and sticky. He thinks he's bleeding, but he doesn't know from what.

Some amount of time later, maybe a few seconds, but it could be an hour, something touches his head, trying to peel his hands back. His eyes pull open and he jerks back from the contact. He sees Sif there, her eyes wild, gaze almost frantic as she says something to him. No, she's shouting. He can't hear her, and even when she manages to pull his fingers away, that doesn't change.

Volstagg is leaning over her, expression pinched and eyes blown wide. He looks like he just saw something awful, and he's struggling to comprehend it.

Thor's frantic, aching head manages to scrape something out. "Loki," he tries to say, but can't hear it, or anything else, come out. The syllables escape his throat, he feels that, but he can't hear anything beyond the ringing. Sif's eyes squint, and she shakes her head, eyes flicking back to his arms again and again.

Thor tastes the coppery wetness of blood in his throat.

His chest screams, and Thor opens his mouth and gasps in. Air is finally released down, and he coughs, hard and choking. Sif turns him on his side, trying to help him. His mouth feels funny, but he keeps breathing anyway, despite how numb and strangely fuzzy it is.

Sound starts to lazily make its way back, and Thor tries to sit up, pushing with his hands. The pain surprises him, and he nearly falls, but Sif's hands wrap around his back and help him upright. Thor looks around frantically for his brother.

Please be okay, his heart pleads, as his head screams at him to shake his younger brother roughly and scream what did you do?!

He spies his sibling hobbling towards him with Fandral trying to provide aid, but clearly his attempts have been rejected. His brother's nose is leaking blood, lips stained with it, and eyes red and raw. His face is ashen, contrasting starkly with his dark hair. There's faint wisps of smoke trailing from his hands.

He doesn't look like he should be upright, let alone moving.

Thor tries to get up and shorten the distance, but Sif pins him in place with embarrassing ease.

"Loki?" Thor croaks. His voice is hoarse. Thor thinks longingly of water.

"Norns," Loki gasps, all but collapsing to his knees in front of him. Fandral's hand shoots out to wrap around his bicep to make the fall a controlled descent. "I don't…" he pants, coughing. Blood sprinkles the forest floor from the force of it.

Norns.

"What did you do?!" Volstagg asks, almost hysterical. It's strange. He may be easily frightened, but Thor wouldn't have said he'd be one to lose himself. "You were supposed to be looking at the map, not—whatever this was."

"I needed," Loki says, and shakes his head as if trying to clear it. He groans, pressing dark red fingertips to his forehead. "I needed..."

Thor reaches out a shaky hand to touch his sibling. His heart is pumping wildly in his chest, panic and adrenaline washing into a strange lethargy. Loki's arm is real when he makes the contact. Thor grips his wrist, suddenly wanting—needing—the contact.

Loki's eyes shudder.

"Loki?" Thor whispers.

His brother's lips thin. He looks like he's going to be sick. Blood slips down from his nose, across his lips, painting his chin an awful red. Thor wants to reach out and wipe it off, not wanting to see it, but when he lifts up his other hand to do so, he realizes that it's already covered in dirt, forest debris, and blood. His blood.

Hogan releases a loud profanity. Thor almost jumps at the sound of his voice. He didn't realize the Vanir wasn't in their cluttered group until his voice sounded from further away. All of them turn to look towards the man.

Thor's eyes widen. Where the fallen trunk used to be, and surrounding it—some fifty paces away—is a wide arc of destruction. It's not on fire, or tipped over, it exploded. Burst into fragments so small the air thick with a cloud of ash and dust. Wooden chips and bits of leafs are hot embers washed across the ground. In controversy to the flame, there's spikes of ice sticking out from almost everything, snow falling among the debris. The stream is frozen, and the horses on the other side of it, watching them with wariness, but unharmed, much to Thor's private relief.

Vaporized. Everything looks vaporized. The sort of scene he would expect to see after a battle. Not...whatever this was.

"What…?" croaks from him.

Hogan is kneeling in the center, where Thor and Loki were. Where the map should be. He's perched there with an obvious wariness, and already looking when Thor lifts his eyes to meet his stare. His gaze then slides to Thor's younger brother. Something akin to brief horror is openly visible on his face before vanishing.

Loki sees it. His entire body clenches up. Thor grips his wrist harder. Don't let go.

There's a long few seconds of breathless silence. No one moves. No one says anything. Just staring.

Hogan abandons his perch, stalking towards them, intent to harm obvious in his gait. Before Thor can do much more than try to push up a little more, the Vanir warrior has grabbed Loki's shirt and hauled him upright. Out and away. Thor's fingers scramble, but he can't keep a good hold. Hogan's grip is rough, his expression muted, but fearful.

Thor feels sick.

"Hogan!" Sif exclaims.

"Whoa, mate—" Fandral starts.

"What did you do?" Hogan demands in a low whisper. When Loki doesn't provide anything beyond a frantic scrabbling to grab his wrist, Hogan shakes him hard enough that Loki releases a pained sound. "WHAT DID YOU DO!?"

"Hogan, please," Loki whispers.

"You destroyed it!" Hogan isn't shouting anymore, but it's close. A confused sound is all that escapes his brother. "The map, you fool! It's been untouchable, unbreakable, for centuries and you destroyed it. We have no way to leave the forest now. You just exploded our only way out!"

Thor feels his face bleed of color. His gaze flicks back to the destruction. The ashes. Ice. His brother's back. Oh, Norns…

"I...what?" Loki sounds impossibly young. His voice is almost gasping; breathy and panicked. Out and in, rattling. "I…"

"Norns, how could you be so reckless?" Hogan shoves Loki backwards. His brother stumbles, tripping over his feet and landing harshly beside him in the dirt, elbows ramming into the hard earth in a way that looks like it bends his wrists painfully. "Don't you care? The Vanir are depending on us. My father is depending on us. Your mother—"

"Hogan!" Sif snaps, seeming to have regained control over her tongue first. She releases Thor to get to her feet. Thor barely keeps himself steady without her support. "Stop it!"

"Did you not see what he did!?" Hogan demands, flustered. Furious. His stoic composure is lost. He gestures wildly towards the ashes. "We need that map!"

"It was an accident." Sif counters.

"I don't care!" Hogan exclaims, stepping up to her. "Whether it was an accident or not doesn't matter! The map is gone." Hogan casts a murderous glance towards Loki, who flinches back like he's been struck. "And now we're trapped. Again."

"I thought—" Loki tries, tone sharp and wet all at once.

"Did you?" Hogan bites.

Thor feels his lips part, but it's without purpose. Shock begins to leach away from him, crawling to whatever hole it emerged. Thor feels the pain, the burn and the bruises, but also anger. Loki didn't know. How can Hogan blame him for that!?

"Enough," Volstagg commands sharply, reaching out to grab Hogan's arm and pull him away. "You're high strung and saying things that you'll regret. Come with me. Clear your head." Hogan jerks against the grip and Loki flinches like he was expecting physical retaliation. His body is braced for it, Thor realizes, hung tight around his shoulders, but loose to absorb something. It doesn't seem to be a conscious decision, but a reflex.

And a stance Thor has seen more than once. Often. Over the span of years. But noticeably absent since they came back from the forest. Along….along with the worst of Loki's clumsiness. His brother may have two left feet the more comfortable he is, but not nearly as notably recently.

And.

That...

Norns, how could he be such an idiot?

He's not sure, exactly, what second it strikes him that the Warriors and Sif have hit his sibling before, he can't even remember standing, but he is acutely aware when his fist slams into Hogan's face.

Hogan staggers from the force, enough that Volstagg has to grab him to stop him from tumbling to the earth. "Thor!" the man exclaims, "What on the Nine—!?"

"You were going to hit him." Thor interrupts. His tone is cold, but heated; all at once. Hogan looks up at him through the hand pressed against his split cheek.

"What?"

There's a frantic undertone to his voice. One that causes Thor's fists to clench.

"Were you going to hit my brother?" He feels the collective air of the group catch, almost as if to replace a squirm of discomfort. It answers more than any words could have. Hogan's wide-eyed, pale face stares back at him, eyes flicking once toward where Loki is behind him. Thor shifts to block his view.

Breathless, tense silence swims between them, as if no one can think of anything to say. No excuses, no explanations. Words tumble off his lips, falling in a toneless accusation. "You have hit him. All of you."

He's not sure if this feeling is anger or disgust.

"Thor," Sif says weakly, her hand brushing his arm. Thor twists away from her grip, turning to face her. Her eyes are wet, face nearly white. The regret is obvious, but it doesn't feel like enough. "I'm sorry. We…"

"You would try to excuse your behavior?"

"That's not what I—"

Heat leaks into his tone, "How could you?! He's my brother. You struck him. You hurt him."

For an awful moment, he is grateful, so grateful, that his back is to his sibling. He doesn't want to know what he's thinking.

Air is wrapping inside his throat, attempting to strangle him as it passes in and out. But he doesn't stop. He can't stop. His ability to control his tongue has been lost to him.

"I should have all of you executed." There's a flinch from all of them, and Thor feels something wide spread onto his face. A smile of despair. "Did you forget? It's not enough that I placed his life in your hands more than once. Not enough that he's my sibling. You disrespect his titles to place yourself above him. He's your prince. You swore when you took your oaths for the Einherjar that you would protect my family. Allfathers, you're his guard now. How on the Norns name could we trust you with such a task!?"

They hit him. They hit him. These people he's trusted with his own life. That he's spent so much time with since adolescence. His entire world has rocked; that they would do that to his sibling. He knew about the ribbing, and the insults, and the words that dug in like a bite and infected as one. But that was retaliation on both ends. None were innocent of it.

But he didn't know that it was physical. The Warriors would have told him if Loki returned the favor. Before the Siren, they kept little private.

"Because we've changed!" Sif's voice is raised, but it doesn't seem so much out of anger as it is to get his attention. "We don't have an explanation or an excuse. But we are trying to do better."

On some level, he recognizes this. On another, he doesn't care. He didn't know them before. How can he trust their word now? His mouth thins. Rage feels hot and cackling on his tongue. A whip to use and strike with. "Get out of my sight. Now. Before I do something I'll regret."

"Thor..." Fandral attempts weakly

"Did I ask?"

That stays any protest. The Warriors begin to move towards the horses, and that reminds him where they are. His teeth grits and he reaches out, snagging Sif's arm before she can get out of reach. Her body bows, as if braced for a strike. "Don't go too far." He pushes out. This isn't Asgard. If they wander off, it means they don't come back.

She nods, eyes shying away from him. Refusing to lift any higher than his collarbones. He lets her go, and she all but flees from his presence.

Thor breathes. In, out. Ragged things.

I didn't know them. I don't know them.

He shakes his clenched fist. The knuckles sting lightly from how hard he hit Hogan. Not broken. He doubts he'll get more than mild bruising. They hit him. They hit him. How could they…? He and Loki have gotten into physical brawls. They're siblings. Beating each other is part of being brothers. But...he just...

He braces himself, teeth clenched and jaw tight, as he slowly turns around to face his younger brother.

Thor didn't hear him get up, but Loki is on his feet. His face hasn't regained any color, still looking faintly gray. His eyes are raw. Looking into them is like staring at an open, infected wound. His body is tense enough that if Thor shoved him, he'd tumble like a flat board.

Neither of them say anything. He doesn't know what to.

His sibling's hand bounces, almost as if he's trying to decide whether or not to hit him.

"I didn't know," Thor finally croaks. He feels like he's confessing to a gruesome murder.

Loki's head turns slightly, ever so slightly, lips pushing into a thin line. Thor almost expects him to laugh and mock him. He startles more than he cares to admit when his brother instead makes a faintly pained noise. Thin threads of water spill from his eyes, despite what looks like his brother's best efforts to withhold them from their course. "I thought you did."

Thor feels like he's been gutted. What? Air is pushed from him. "How could you…?"

The sorrow flickers away, ebbed with anger. Wet rage. It causes his brother's tongue to loosen. "Because you didn't give a damn about anything else! You heard what they would say about me. You would join them! How on Helheim was I supposed to think that anything differently!?"

"You're my brother!"

"You say that like it means something."

What!? Thor feels incredulous. "It does. I would never have let them hurt you if I knew!"

That draws out the startled, vindictive laughter. His brother takes a wobbly step forward, tears still falling. "I shouldn't," his brother presses out, "have to have told you. We've spent thousands of hours with them. Weeks at a time. But you didn't see, because you're never looking at me! Do you really think that they're the only ones to mock my titles? You know they all call me Snake Prince?"

His face drains of some color. Oh, Norns…I started that.

But even if he feels disgusted with himself, it's secondary. Prominent is the feeling of a lightning bolt. Ready to strike at anything, splitting it, burning it. "Do you believe me to be omniscient? How am I supposed to know this if you won't talk to me?"

Loki's hands flare out, indignant. "You think I haven't tried? You're too busy basking in your glory. I am your shadow. I've always been your shadow! Trailing behind you, meaningless. Norns, if I could have any of the respect you do…"

Thor makes a weird noise in his throat. "Then you can have it! You say you are my shadow. You have no idea what it is to drown in the sun."

His brother scoffs.

Thor feels a deep-seated frustration. The urge to grab his brother's shoulders until their eyes meet and shake him. You don't understand! You mock my troubles and you don't understand. "At least, where you stand, our father could care less about what you do. I don't have that luxury. Norns, you don't understand how your invisibility is a gift."

Thor's head swings to the side when Loki's fist collides with it. Blood pools onto his tongue when he bites on it, unexpecting the blow. His brother smacks two bony fists against his chest with enough strength air is forcefully pushed from him as he's knocked back a step. "I hate you." His brother's voice holds a desperation that belies his fury. "I hate you!"

Thor shoves him back, pushing his cold hands away. Loki staggers. When he's regained his breath, he pants, "Because you're jealous?"

Allfathers, how could he ever be jealous of this?

Loki's mouth parts wordlessly. His eyes are wild. He shakes his head in clear disbelief. He looks like he's reached the end of a very long rope; spent and emasculated. The energy buzzing through Thor refuses to let him reach the same state. Loki says nothing, jaw bunched, but it's clear he's reaching for something, anything.

"You—" Thor starts to say. That's as far as he gets. A large shadow passes over them, swallowing the sun. Thor whips his head up, anger dead on the tip of his tongue as he spots the winged figure stretched out in the sky above them. Powerful scales covering the muscle frame. Sharp, piercing eyes. Horns.

He feels his lips part.

On the Nine, is that a wyvern?

Chapter Text

"There are days when I can't stop hearing my mistakes

over and over and over."

-Unknown

"Get off!" Loki shoves forcefully at his sibling, fingers digging sharply into skin and armor, the words jumping from him before he can stop them when he can speak again. The force of Thor's tackle threw both of them to the ground, and Loki doesn't have the will to fight. Frantic energy is pulsing through his entire body, making him feel sick to his stomach. Thor's going to hit him. Beat him. And Loki can't—

He shouldn't have said what he did.

Norns, why did he say any of that?

Lies are more gentle than truth. Shouldn't he know this by now?

Thor doesn't get off of him, and doesn't seem particularly interested in complying to Loki's shoves. His body is braced over Loki's, his elbow digging into Loki's ribs and his breath hot against Loki's face. His brother makes some sort of sound in his throat, a grunt or a hiss, and whips his head up toward the sky. His entire body is braced, a shield. Not against him, Loki realizes after a moment, but for him.

What on Helheim?

Loki follows his brother's gaze up toward the cloudy sky. The figure sweeping through the air is clearly recognizable and Loki feels his entire body go stiff. He didn't see it, before. He wasn't paying attention. His heart thumps frantically against his ribs, begging to run. But breath has seized in his lungs, and Loki doesn't think that he could move if he tried.

Norns.

Loki's hands jump, scrambling across the ground, trying to find some sort of purchase, something to grab, hold onto, ground him. A wyvern. Here. Now. A dragon. Of course it's a dragon. Loki could laugh. How fitting.

He remembers clearly Volstagg's paranoia those first few nights they were in the forest. The Weeping Siren was not the only thing out here. That barrier she had set up, with the gift of hindsight, Loki has realized it was less to stop them from leaving and more so to stop things from coming in. She would hardly have been able to raise her "children" if they were all dead from the Blodig Skog's creatures.

His brother swears heavily, and Loki forces out a panting gasp, kneeing his brother's thigh sharply to force him move. Thor does, but it doesn't seem to be voluntary so much as his body simply toppling over at the pain. He lands hard on the forest floor beside Loki, eyes pinned to the sky, but no longer using his body as the first line of defense.

Good.

Norns, it smells like burned paper.

His entire body aches like he was slammed into a wall, and there's rocks digging into his spine and skull. Loki watches the dragon with wide eyes. The creatures are rare on Asgard, with sightings limited to every few hundred years. Granted, maturity takes well over a century for dragons to achieve, and it's unlikely that they would bother to leave the protection of their shelters before then. Not as if that matters here.

The sweeping, powerful gust of wind caused from the wyvern's long wings billows harshly into him, like getting slapped with sharp knives.

Loki feels himself caught in suspension between wanting to fight and the desire to bolt.

Oh, Norns.

The wyvern roars, a screech of power and threat. A grating scrape against his eardrums. The sound pierces to the very center of his body, splitting him into pieces and rattling the chunks against one another. The sensation is as overwhelming as it is terrifying. Loki releases some sort of gasped choking sound, curling in on himself, but facing Thor, hands pressed against his ears in an effort to offer relief.

Thor, beside him, does the same, clamping his hands against the sides of his face, expression twisted with pain. His eyes squeeze shut, but Loki can't imagine doing the same. His gaze tracks upwards, following the path of the dragon. It sweeps above them, circling. There's almost no life in the Blodig Skog. What creatures do exist here are reclusive. How on the Nine have centuries gone by and everyone missed the bloody dragon?!

The roar ceases, and Loki feels himself gasping, instinctive tears springing to his eyes. Oh, Allfathers...

He turns to his side, wheezing in thin sips of air. His throat feels like it's closing. His hands are shaking, his entire body feels...buzzed somehow. As if he's been drinking heavily. Thor stumbles up to his feet, leaning heavily against his left leg, and draws his sword. What he plans to do with the bloody thing's beyond Loki. Dragon skin is too thick for dwarven metal. The scales repel magic. The best defense they have against it is to vanish.

Loki follows his brother to his feet on trembling legs, wishing desperately he had his bow. All he has are daggers.

His mouth moves before any sound comes out, as if he's forgotten how to speak in the face of this. "What...what on Helheim is that thing doing here?"

"How on the Norns am I supposed to know?!" Thor shouts, not looking back at him. He adjusts his weight, taking a sloppy guard stance.

It's getting closer.

Loki's body tenses, waiting. This is how they die. It won't be because the Blodig Skog drove them to insanity, it will because this dragon burnt them alive.

The dragon dives toward their heads, sweeping a good ten feet above them, but he and Thor duck instinctively anyway. He casts a frantic glance toward his sibling, breathing heavily. What do they do? Do they fight? Do they run? What do they do?

Loki casts his eyes wildly around them, searching for some sort of weapon. What can they use against something so deeply impenetrable? His sedir would be useless. His gaze catches on the Warriors Three and Sif, standing beside the horses and looking toward the dragon. He can't see their expressions from this distance, but their body language speaks enough for them.

Weapons have been drawn, bodies tight with tension, but relaxed enough for a fight.

Loki's mind races. They don't have the equipment for this fight. Asgard has specific tools for dragons, nothing of which any of them have. Why would they have? As far as they knew, they were going to be tested medically in Bo-An. Without those tools, their best option is to retreat and regroup. Survival is more important, isn't it?

"Thor—" Loki starts to say. It doesn't matter, because his voice has never mattered.

The wyvern draws closer toward them again, aggressive, angry, and ready to kill. Loki doesn't know what they did to anger the creature so thoroughly, but it doesn't matter. Its temper won't be soothed by anything but death. The dragon reigns heavy, thick blue fire down toward Thor.

Loki's body releases, and he dives toward his decidedly not-fireproof sibling, throwing up a hasty shield. The Warriors should be fine, out of the line of fire. Or at least, out of the kill zone. He thinks. By the gods, he hopes.

The shield crumples, but holds beneath the weight of the flames, and Loki feels his heart frantically beat against his chest. His hands ache. The flames spill off the shield like water, bouncing off of it and landing around them. But the flames are a blanket, not a stream, and swallow them, sending the world around them into a harsh blue. The dragon ceases fire, leaving the world a burning, wet mess around them. The ice is melting, soaking into the ground and turning it into mud.

Loki can't hold the crumpling shield and doesn't bother to try. He drops it, looking up toward the creature. The claws are easily as long as his entire arm. The wingspan is a massive, impressive site, the wings filled with holes and patchy skin at the edges, speaking of the creature's age. A long tail is spiked with sharp, white spikes. Loki's eyes scan the white scales for some sort of chink, something they can use to their advantage. Wings are the primary target in a defensive situation. The sky is their element, grounding one forces them into yours.

If there is something, Loki doesn't have the time to study it out. The dragon roars angrily, wings flapping powerfully. The gust of wind blows the flames sharply into Loki's face. The pain is impressive. Loki has always had a sensitivity to burns, and this is no exception. The gasped, choked sound that escapes him is awful and pathetic.

The scent of charred, burning skin fills his nostrils, making him nauseous.

Loki pants, hand coming up to touch at the skin instinctively. It feels tight, hot, and wrong against his fingers. Fresh tears from in his eyes, threatening to fall.

His entire body shies away from the flames, but they're everywhere, blinding in their brightness, deafening in their sound. The sharp blue makes him feel encased. The dragon is moving above them, Loki can hear it distantly, but what it's doing is beyond him. It can see them from that position, see how it failed. It will come back. Finish the job.

Oh, Norns.

Thor's fingers—what he assumes are Thor's fingers—wrap around his bicep, yanking him toward his feet. Loki thinks he says something, but it's impossible to hear it. Distantly, Loki hears the dragon roar again, and the deafening sound of fire. The Warriors, he remembers. Norns, curse it.

Loki stumbles up at Thor's persisting, his ankles feeling locked and broken. His entire body wants to shake. They stand there for long seconds, looking at the fire. He should do something. He can do something about this. He knows how to summon water. Why isn't he doing anything? Do something, he commands himself, stop standing there uselessly with half your face melting off.

But he doesn't.

He just shakes.

Thor, apparently deciding that risking burning alive by staying where they are is worse than any injuries they may sustain from brief exposure, hauls Loki toward the flame. He doesn't seem to have a direction he's going in except away. Loki can't see through the tears, can't breathe through the pain, and he stumbles behind his brother as if his feet belong to someone else.

He closes his eyes as the heat consumes them, not wanting to see. The sensation is awful, sharp and cold, hot and painful. Endless and short all at once.

Thor's grip on his arm is iron, relentless in its desire to keep them together. The two of them stagger out of the flames into the clearing, the flames burning brightly behind them. Loki's shaking refuses to be ignored any longer, and he stumbles, crashing onto his knees, but Thor doesn't care. He keeps hauling Loki forward, shouting something at him harshly. His eyes, when he glances back at Loki, are crazed.

Oh, Allfathers.

Thor keeps pulling him toward the forest and the thick, dense leaves as cover. The wyvern roars behind them, still angry, still murderous, still there. The Warriors. Sif. Oh, Norns. They left them there. They should have—what if they—

If they split up, the chances of them reuniting are slim to none.

The Blodig Skog swallows life.

"Thor," Loki gasps, and his face spasms at movement. "Thor, we can't—the Warriors. Sif. We can't—"

His brother doesn't cease moving. He tears through the forest as if he can't simply will obstacles from their path with sheer persistence. "There's nothing that can be done," Thor snaps, and there's little room for argument. He's angry. Still. But is he angry enough to condemn them to their deaths?

Loki tries anyway, "If we split up—"

Thor stops, turning to grab Loki roughly by the shoulders. Loki flinches, bracing for a blow that never comes. His brother simply shakes him harshly once. "What would you have me do, brother? There was a dragon in the way."

As if he missed that.

"We can't leave them," Loki tries, feeling desperate. The Warriors and Sif are not collateral damage. Loki doesn't know what he would do if they died. Their companionship is so raw, so new, so wanted. They can't die. Loki has such a hard time connecting with people, and to have to start over…

"We don't have a choice." Thor's face is young and pained, eyes wet with regret. They're his friends, too, Loki remembers. "We don't have a choice," his brother repeats softly. Then he adds, as if in after thought, "even if we did return, they wouldn't be there. They'll have done the same as us."

Running. Because apparently they're cowards, not warriors.

Loki closes his eyes, squeezing them tightly to stop tears from escaping. They're leaving them. Damning them. Loki destroyed the map. There's a chance that they could have all made it out on their own, but splitting up reduces those chances immensely.

This, the voice is prominent and harsh, is your fault. You think you know what you're doing, and instead you've guaranteed all of your deaths. What were you thinking? Were you thinking? Hogun was right.

Loki realizes he's crying softly, but there's nothing that can be done.

Thor's face twists with compassion, but if he'd planned on saying something heartfelt, it's lost to the circumstances. The wyvern roars, distant and far off, but close enough to bear concern. His brother's eyes narrow, a tense edge setting into his shoulders. It makes him look older than he is; turning him into a battle-worn soldier instead of Loki's sibling. His grip tightens on Loki's arm again, as if he's afraid the sound will tear the two of them apart.

With a tight set to his shoulders, Thor turns back toward the forest. He pulls Loki along with him. Loki doesn't fight him, afraid that if Thor stops, he'll collapse entirely.

000o000

They travel for what must be hours before Thor's body seems to cease function. He collapses to his knees, his entire body stiff, bowed and broken. The pained sounds that escape him make something Loki's chest squeeze painfully. His brother's hand goes to his leg, his fingers barely touching it before they withdraw. Thor's eyes squeeze shut and he tips his head up and away, breathing through his mouth.

Exhausted, Loki carefully lowers himself beside his sibling. The ground is rough beneath him, and the air smells of stagnant water. The flaming clearing is far behind them, as are the Warriors and Sif. Moa, Victory—all of their horses. All of their supplies. Even Thor's beloved sword was left to melt. They're on their own.

"We should stop," Loki whispers, "we can't go on like this."

Thor laughs shortly. It's an aggrieved, pained sound, pushed out of him by force. "You say that like we have somewhere to go."

Loki's teeth press tightly together at the reminder. The map. One of three in existence, and he desecrated it. He doesn't even know what he did, which makes this worse. More terrifying. He knows that the others stared at the destruction left in the wake of the map and thought this is the end, but all Loki could think was I am powerful.

The maps are supposed to be indestructible. They're legendary for that.

And Loki destroyed it. By accident.

Not that it's...gods, not that it's anything to take pride in. Not in these circumstances. Maybe not in any circumstances. That map is a livelihood for someone, and Loki destroyed that. Because that's what he does. Anywhere he goes he leaves behind ruin.

"We'll find some way out of here," Loki promises, because someone has to pretend to be optimistic when both of them are drowning in despondency.

Thor gives him a miserable, pained look. His expression shows obvious doubt, and Loki doesn't know what to do with it. He should comfort him, but Loki doesn't have the words to even begin to try. Not for the first time, his silvertongue has failed him.

His brother slowly shifts, attempting to straighten out his left leg but fails with a sharp cry. His hand slaps against his knee sharply, the closest place to the injury he can touch without grabbing hold of it. Loki's lips purse together tightly, and he forces himself closer.

"Maybe I should look at it," he suggests softly.

"So you can explode my leg next to the map?"

Loki stops moving toward him, braced. He feels lingering nausea in the back of his throat, tasting of ash and cold. It was an accident. He was just trying to track the sorcerer. And he failed.

They've failed.

Oh, gods.

They failed.

Their mother is going to die. They have no means by which to find the sorcerer anymore. Loki didn't just kill their only means of escape, he's killed their mother, and the sedir wielding Vanir. This was the one hope they had left. Even the Allfather stood helpless in the midst of this sickness. And Loki...

What did you do? Hogun demanded of him. And Loki didn't have an answer then, and barely has one now: I killed them all.

Thor must see something in his face, because the tightness around his eyes releases some. He doesn't apologize, but he bites his lower lip and turns his head away, shifting his leg toward Loki in a wordless request. But how can Loki even think to use sedir on his brother with what he did? What if he does destroy Thor's leg? Power is a burden, not a gift.

"I...I can't." Loki whispers. He still feels sick. Frigga is going to die. I am powerful. "I'm sorry."

"Loki," Thor sighs.

Too much hangs between them. They're pretending to be civil when all they want to do is scream. The tension was curbed, not dealt with.

"You saw what I...what I did." Loki says. He digs his nails into the inside of his wrist. The pain is harsh and springs instinctive tears to his eyes.

Thor's fingers curl into the earth. "It was an accident."

Was it? He doesn't believe that. Hogun didn't. I don't even know if I do.

"I can't." Loki repeats.

"Then don't." Thor snaps, seeming pent up. "I don't care. But if you think to hold a grudge, can you wait until after we're free from imminent death?"

"What?" Loki stares at him. His mouth moves. He can't talk again. He finds himself speechless more and more lately. "You...I'm not...do you think me so petty that I would not help you because I'm cross?"

Thor shakes his head. He lifts his dark, angry eyes up to Loki's face. Loki flinches at the sight. "I don't know. I don't know you anymore."

Loki makes a choked sound. The words sting. Burrowing deep into his psyche and curling inside his stomach like poison. I crawled through hell, and my best friend doesn't recognize me on the other end. Oh, Norns. She killed him. The Weeping Siren. She killed him in every way that matters, leaving behind a shaking, empty shell. He's broken beyond repair, and Thor doesn't know him anymore.

Just two strangers pretending to be brothers, he thinks, and the words have never felt more fitting.

No, Loki thinks.

Trying to pretend that the words haven't sent him reeling, he carefully rests a hand on his brother's left shin and winces when Thor does at the pain it brings him. Thor should still be walking with aid. Everyone who knows anything about his condition knows that. Walking this long without any breaks or any help has likely done the healing injury in.

Holding a majority of his sedir in a death grip, he tentatively touches the wound with it, trying to understand what's wrong. The muscles have cramped painfully, and Loki sends a relaxant to them, trying to ease the suffering. Thor's body relaxes by inches, slowly easing up. He breathes deeper, until he can open his eyes and they don't seem glazed.

Loki withdraws his hand, ending the spell.

"Thank you," Thor murmurs softly.

So they're back to pretending everything's okay then. Fine. Loki nods, sitting back. "You need to stay off that."

Thor slowly draws the leg toward himself, hand gripping just below the knee. The other comes down to slowly rub at the calf with tentative fingers. The pain was great enough that he's afraid to cause another spasm. Thor. Afraid. Loki's lips push together with sympathy and frustration.

Norns, he's an idiot. Why didn't he say something sooner? Did he honestly expect that Loki would demand they carry forward when Thor can barely stand?

"I'm not sure that's an option," Thor grumbles, blowing out a breath. He finds a sore spot in his leg and his face tightens, but he says nothing. Always says nothing, as if he doesn't trust Loki with the pain. The thought is unexpectedly bitter and depressing.

How am I supposed to know this if you won't talk to me?

Loki tentatively reaches up a hand to prod his face, feeling at the disformed skin and biting sharply on the inside of his cheek at the pain. His throat tightens as he represses a sound. He shouldn't have bothered. Thor's eyes snap up to him, and his face sharpens to a white pallor, as if he just noticed the injury for the first time.

They're both covered in burns dotting across their bodies like some form of body art. The fact that Thor didn't notice half his face was melting off doesn't sting.

It doesn't.

You're never looking at me.

"Norns, Loki," Thor moves toward him like a broken, stiff old man. Loki holds impossibly still as his brother lifts up his hands to feel around the wound. Both of them have rudimentary healing skills, any member of the Einherjar does, and his brother's assessing eyes are knowing. "This needs a healer."

"What a pity." Loki says, pulling his face away. Thor lets him go. "I don't have one on hand."

Thor sighs, some mixture between annoyed and something else Loki can't quite place. He's not sure that he wants to. He's gathered enough wounds from his sibling's words today. "It must hurt," Thor says, because stating the obvious is one of his go-tos when he doesn't know what to say.

"Naturally," Loki mutters.

Thor chews on his lower lip, thinking. "What do we do?" he asks. He sounds desperate. Broken. Norns, what happened to his brother of two years ago, that would face any problem head-on and laugh at consequences or doubt? What happened to his brother that was not afraid to take charge in situations? What happened to his brother?

This fragmented creature in front of him surely cannot be the same person.

Two strangers pretending to be brothers.

Thor doesn't know him, and...maybe Loki doesn't know him, either.

Loki knows he should feel shame for such thoughts, but he just feels tired. So, so achingly tired. He wants to curl into a ball and slip peacefully into death through sleep. No more sickness, no more forest, no fighting, no words that feel like daggers, no nothing.

"I don't know," Loki admits.

Thor looks at him, really looks at him then, as if he was expecting more from Loki. As if Loki was supposed to have all the answers, and now that he doesn't, Thor is incredibly disappointed. The feeling makes Loki's chest compacted and hot.

He's the smart one, isn't he?

He should have the answers.

But Loki doesn't have any.

000o000

"Loki." His brother shakes him awake, and Loki blinks rapidly for a few seconds, his vision blurred and wet in his right eye. He squeezes them closed again, not wanting to face the truth. Thor was right. He needs to see a healer, it's getting worse with time instead of better. If he doesn't get it looked at, the chances of him going blind in the eye are high. Loki closes his eyes again.

"Loki," Thor says again, and shakes his shoulder roughly once more. "Loki, come on,"

Loki slaps his hand away weakly, but refuses to move. What's the point? They're lost. The forest has claimed them, and the easiest course of action would be to let it take them. Easiest? Ha. No. It's the only option.

You did this. You destroyed your only means of escape from this wretched stretch of land. You condemned your brother and your only friends to this. You damned the Vanir. Your mother.

Thor shuffles impatiently beside him, shoes pushing at the dirt and pine needles. Loki wonders where he got the energy. When they both collapsed into rest last night, Thor could barely move. His sibling seems rearing and ready to go, and Loki can't fathom it. He feels more drained than he did before sleeping. Breathing is taking the bulk of his vigor. Moving would be a jest.

"Loki." Thor pursues, "Norns, are you dead?"

"No," Loki whispers. He shouldn't feel as disappointed by this as he is. What is wrong with him?

"Then get up," Thor says, impatient. He shifts his weight again, the earth crunching beneath his feet. The sound is loud in the quiet forest, and Loki twitches at it.

"What, pray tell, is so important?" Loki mutters. He still hasn't opened his eyes. He's not sure if he can. He's so exhausted. He just wants to go back to sleep.

"I've been up for hours, and I was thinking," Thor begins to explain. He waits, as if expecting Loki to say something there, and maybe another time he would have thrown in some sort of jibe, but speaking is too much effort. Thor carries on, though he seems slightly off balance, "I was thinking about what we last saw on the map. There was a river that stretched through a majority of the Blodig Skog."

Yes, some rivers go on for a while. That's how erosion works.

Loki's mouth twitches.

"Loki, the river becomes the Bohai."

The Bohai?

He's jesting.

Loki stills. His chest releases as if having been waiting for this for hours. A surge of weak, feeble energy washes through him, enough that Loki can slowly lever himself into a sitting position. His limbs feel like they're weighted with lead. Why can't he move? Maybe he's sick. Norns, one can only hope. Maybe his body is finally catching up with his brain. It's dying right along with him now.

"How can you possibly," Loki presses a hand against his forehead as a surge of pain from a sudden headache washes through his skull. He digs his palm into the skin, feeling slightly nauseous. The pain is spiked, like nails pushing against his forehead. Through gritted teeth, Loki finishes, "know that? What the map shows you changes based on your location."

"Yes," Thor agrees. There's a slight hesitation, as if there's more to this that he wants to say, but withholds, "Think about it: there aren't a lot of freshwater sources on Vanaheim that are above ground. You know as well as I that they have an entire ocean beneath their capital city. But the Bohai is different. It's the river that they settled around, like how the Élivágar lakes are where Asgardians found their source of life?"

"I'm not an idiot." Loki squints his right eye open half heartedly, looking at his sibling beneath his arm. Thor's face is shadowed and his hair is a mess around it, but his eyes look bright and he actually seems hopeful.

Optimism.

Disgusting.

The burns look better, and he's not leaning as much of his weight onto his right leg today, which Loki thinks is good. With a sigh, he asks, "What exactly is your point?"

Thor explains quickly, "If this river really is connected to the Bohai, then we just need to follow it east until it reaches one of the outerlying villages, like Ju. We'll be out of the forest in a week at most."

Loki stares at him through his blurry vision, caught between disbelief and amazement. Did his brother really just...solve the Blodig Skog's labyrinth? Something that scholars have been attempting to do since the forest was first formed? Centuries of effort, hours of labor, and his sibling solved it in a few hours.

What on helheim?

"How…" Loki can't form words for long seconds, "how do you know this river connects to the Bohai. You're just assuming."

Thor hesitates again. His mouth twists, and his hands jump. "When I was...when Tjin, his guard and I were...out here last year, we spent a great deal of time wandering. That river was the only stable. When we returned to Asgard, I read up on it."

Loki blinks. His mouth moves once soundlessly. Thor was out here for a very long time, Loki remembers. A majority of the time that Loki and the others were trapped with the Siren. There is no one, Loki thinks, that knows this entire place better than his brother does. Everyone else never returned or used the map. But how can no one have noticed this pattern before?

But why would they want to?

The Blodig Skog has always been haunted. Always wrong. For as long as Loki can remember, he's been told stories about why the forest is hell incarnate. No one would have had the inside knowledge that his sibling does to know what to connect. And honestly? What else do they have to go off of? They remain where they are and they die (good), and Thor, at least, would find that unacceptable.

But that means moving.

And Norns, Loki doesn't think he's ever been this enervated in his life.

"Do you know where the river is?" Loki submits, his shoulders slumping.

"Yes." Thor nods, getting to his feet. He staggers a step when he tries to place weight on his left leg, and quickly balances himself on his right. Not that much better than yesterday, then. "It's not that far from where we are. Come on." Thor encourages.

Loki rubs at his headache. His face aches, but without the proper resources, Loki would do more harm than good if he tried to heal it himself. "I don't think I can get up," Loki admits, his voice barely above a whisper. The confession makes his face hot.

Thor sits on his haunches in front of Loki, his expression open. Concerned. "What do you mean? Are you injured? Beyond—" Thor gestures toward his own face as if to encompass Loki's injury.

There are scatterings of burns across his body and his legs feel charred and ache when he moves them, but nothing to explain this bone weariness. "No." Loki says. "I can't. I don't…"

Thor shifts forward a little, and his closeness makes Loki want to retreat. "You don't look well, little brother." Thor says after a moment, his eyes are searching, his mouth pressed into a frown. It makes Loki feel scrutinized, and he hates it.

"Never mind," Loki shakes his head, not sure how to make sense of it, and not wanting to try. "Just—" the words help me stick in his throat, as if they're some sort of curse. But they feel heavy and weighted, like a barbed weapon. Everything is still too fresh. Norns, they didn't even finish their argument. They were interrupted.

Loki keeps waiting for it. For Thor to pick up where they left off, because Thor has never been one to leave these things unspoken before. And Thor won't want to help him when he's angry. So asking for help would be asking to impel the argument on.

Thor waits for Loki to say something, but he doesn't. His brother sighs quietly, then leans forward to haul Loki's arm over his shoulder. "Thor—" Loki starts to protest, thinking of his sibling's leg.

"I can manage." Thor promises.

Liar.

"Thor."

Thor hauls Loki up, and the vertigo from moving too quickly makes him sway heavily into Thor. His brother stumbles as he tries to support both of them, but manages to remain upright by some miracle.

Loki pants, and Thor's teeth press together, but they say nothing. Thor pulls him forward, and Loki tries to help as best he can, stumbling half blind beside his sibling. Thor limps and Loki nearly runs into anything in their path with how messed up his depth perception is. They carry forward because they have to.

Getting out of the forest is a priority. Loki won't let Thor die here.

They come to the river after some time, a rushing roar of water spilling beside them. The loudest thing Loki's heard in the forest since the fire last night. The strange, haunting part of this is that Loki didn't hear the river until they were almost standing on top of it. Water sources this large aren't silent like this, especially when Loki can barely see the blurry side of adjoining shore to the rushing river.

"We're near the thinnest part," Thor says beside him. He's winded and his voice is tight with discomfort.

Loki raises his eyes to his sibling's face. "You're jesting."

"No." Thor says. He doesn't say anything more on that.

They stop to drink from the river, then carry forward. They don't talk. The hours drag on. The sun sets in the distance. The rainclouds split open with a vicious roar of thunder, and it begins to pour on them. Loki was too disoriented to bother with a fire last night, and doesn't want to try today. He and Thor camp beneath a large tree that keeps them damp instead of soaked.

Thor stretches out his right leg out and the pained, hollow expression on his face makes it look like he's dying.

"I'm sorry." Loki whispers. If he could have moved by himself, he would have. But he couldn't. Thor should have left him to rot. He wishes that someone would. When does he get permission to stop?

"Don't be." Thor says between his teeth.

"I want to help. Can I help?" Loki asks, leaning forward. The tree is wet behind him, and the wind, when it brushes against his back, is chilled. The cold is a comfort.

Thor shakes his head, not looking Loki in the eyes. "I just want to sleep."

You let me help last night. Loki wants to point out. Did I not provide you comfort? But last night...neither of them were thinking clearly. Thor has had time to remember why he's angry. Loki squeezes his eyes shut with despair. He's going to hate you, too. The only thing you're good for is making people hate you. When are you going to take a hint?

Loki presses his knuckles against his mouth, feeling sick.

Thor sighs, "Go to sleep, brother. We still have a while to go."

Loki watches the river flow the entire night, but he never falls asleep. Thor does at some point, his body twisted with discomfort and his face scrunched up. Loki leans forward and presses his fingers against Thor's leg, sending a rush of healing, numbing energy through his sibling's leg. Thor slumps, the lines easing on his face.

Loki bites on the inside of his cheek, numb and hurting everywhere at once.

When Thor wakes hours later, Loki forces himself to get up first. The rain hasn't ceased, but that isn't unexpected. Loki plays crutch today, forcing his sibling to lean against him and promising that he's fine and feels much better after sleeping when he doesn't. Thor seems relieved at the support, even if he doesn't say anything.

They follow the river again until nearly dusk when it splits off into a stream leading north. The sight is horribly out of place in the midst of the natural waters. It's obviously handcrafted, which is...weird, given that the Blodig Skog is famous for being lifeless. What on the Norns…?

"What on Helheim is that?" Loki asks, wiping rainwater from his eyes carefully. A useless task, given that the rain immediately soaks him again.

"I don't know," Thor admits, "I haven't seen it before."

Loki's brow furrows. "I thought you said that you've followed this river."

"I said I've seen it."

Loki ignores the snap. "Where do you think it goes?" Loki asks, genuinely curious. He looks toward the north, trying to follow the river's path with his eyes. He can't see the end from here. It disappears into the trees.

Thor shrugs, looking tired and done. "Does it matter?"

No. Probably not. But the Blodig Skog is so unexplored...and it would only take an hour at most to see. Loki can't explain it, but he feels drawn to the stream somehow, as if it's asking for him. He needs to see the end of it. Loki pulls Thor with him toward the water. Thor doesn't protest, even if his face tightens.

Maybe he feels the same pull. What is that they say about the forest? You only get out if it lets you go. Maybe this...maybe this is what's happening. The forest is spitting them back up (and keeping the Warriors and Sif, Norns, no). It's letting them leave.

Loki doesn't know what that would feel like. They had a map when Loki got out last time. Loki tries not to wince at the reminder of his failure.

"Loki," Thor sighs in soft protest.

"Don't you feel that?" Loki asks, picking up the pace. He has to get there. Something awful is going to happen if he doesn't. Thor stumbles beside him. "It's like some sort of...I'm not certain. Is this what it felt like when the forest led you out?"

"I don't know." Thor says, exhausted, "I don't remember getting out."

Loki stumbles over a step. He looks toward his sibling, "What do you mean you don't remember?"

"I have no memory of leaving the forest, Loki. I was there, and then I wasn't. Eir said it was delirium and exhaustion." His brother explains. His patience has ebbed, leaving the tone sharper than Loki thinks Thor intended for it to be.

Loki shakes his head. This forest. Norns, this forest. The idea of being released and having no memory of it is horrifying. "That doesn't make sense. You should remember—"

The two of them stumble into something, and it's like being smacked in the face. His entire body feels squished and stretched all at once, like being pulled through the Bifrost, but landing in the air instead of landing on your feet. His senses burn with sharp, pulsing pain, and his nostrils fill with the smell of burning incense. Loki staggers, dropping his brother as the two of them tumble to their knees beside the stream.

What the—?

Loki looks up, confused, and feels his entire body seize.

No.

No.

Allfathers—

Loki scrambles away, frantic, and feels his back smack against something. It's hard, like some sort of wall, and Loki turns around, his muscles buzzing, and slams a fist against the invisible wall. A ripple of yellow washes beneath his fist, but the barrier remains steadfast. Just like it was last time.

Loki swears heavily, scrambling to his feet. He puts more power into the next blow, slamming his fists into it with desperation bordering on madness. Sedir begins to build in his hands, and he throws that against the barrier next. But nothing stops it. A frantic, hoarse noise escapes his throat as he yells wordlessly, slamming a wave of sheer power against the barrier. No spells, no thought, just power.

The barrier wavers, but stays. His fists are bloody.

"Loki!" Thor shouts, and he must have been saying it for some time, because his brother grabs Loki's wrists, hauling him back from the barrier. "Loki, what the Norns—?"

"We have to get out of here!" Loki shouts. "Norns, I can't do this again!"

"What are you talking about?" Thor demands, tightening his grip when Loki begins to struggle. Loki pants, desperate, broken. He looks up toward the field again, and feels tears of helplessness escape him. I can't do this, he thinks wildly, I'd rather die than go back. "Loki! Talk to me, Norns curse it!"

"This—this—" Loki's mouth won't move. He can't stop looking at the field, his eyes jumping over everything as familiar to him as the insides of his eyelids. The house. The stream. The stream. He can see the tables, and the ashes of the barn Sif burned to the ground. The grain. He can't see the cellar from here, but he knows where it is. "T-T-this is the—"

Loki sinks to his knees, his legs giving out, and Thor follows him down.

"Loki?" Thor's voice has gentled at his distress.

"This...oh, gods," Loki whispers. "This is...her's. This is. Her's."

Thor stares at him dumbly for a moment before realization seems to dawn. He looks back at the Weeping Siren's field, and his mouth drops a fraction, eyes widening. "This was the Weeping Siren's domain?" Thor looks back at him, his fingers tightening on Loki's wrists.

Loki nods once, barely daring to breathe. His chest is contracted, but somehow, he still finds the air to laugh. Of course. Of course. I'm never to be free of her. Never, never, never—

Thor looks back at the field, then swears heavily.

Chapter Text

So this is what it looks like.

Thor would never be able to admit this to anyone, but he's always been deeply curious as to where the Weeping Siren kept his sibling and the Warriors for well over a year. Loki barely talks about what happened, let alone gives descriptive factors. The Warriors were better with that sometimes, but not often. Thor knew there was a field. He knew about the barn they burned to ashes, and the cellar. But that's it.

In complete honesty, it looks...simple. Dull, almost. A long field with mostly dead or overgrown crops, trees surrounding the edges. The stream they followed into the space splitting the meadow into two. A rocky house up a small hill, looking like it's about to topple over. The burn scars of a building toward the edge of the forest. A faint shimmer over the air, yellow-tinted. Like the prison cells in Asgard.

He tries to imagine what it looked like when the Warriors and Loki got here. When there were other children there as well. He can't. It just seems lifeless and apocalyptic.

So this is what it looks like.

Loki is sobbing. Thor forces himself to look back at his brother. He's crumpled against himself, his back pressed against the barrier, legs pulled against his chest. His skin is almost gray. He's shaking faintly, hands trembling as his breaths come out in short, heavy pants.

Thor feels the last of his anger ebb away at the sight, and a spur of guilt for even thinking to be curious about this land when the sight of it broke his brother. Now is not the time to satisfy his desire for knowledge.

Slowly, it dawns on him that he doesn't know what to do. He doesn't know how to help. His fingers bounce against his leg for a moment. This isn't something he can give comfort for. Thor is useless here, as he always is in regards to the Weeping Siren. The Warriors would be better at this. If they're still alive to do so. Norns. He doesn't even want to consider the possibility. They walked away from the dragon, they must have. Even as confused as he is with his feelings regarding them, he doesn't want them dead.

Thor carefully sits down beside Loki, staring at his brother's profile. The skin is red and looks sore and painful. Above his cheekbone, the burn is dotted with blisters, but the skin doesn't look brown or leather-like. Thor doesn't think the burns made it past the dermis layer, for which he's grateful. Still, he knows they need to find something to help with the pain. And treating it because he doesn't know how long they'll be here.

He doesn't know how long they'll be here.

It took them a year to find a way out last time.

Thor pushes his tongue against the back of his teeth, feeling frustrated. He should know how to help this, and he doesn't. Words fail him. He and Loki are such strangers now, that any of the methods Thor would have used a long time ago to help he's unsure would entice the reaction he's hoping for. He wouldn't comfort his brother, he'd just start another argument.

The rain pours heavily onto them, and Thor tries to take comfort in the familiar sensation, but can't. It doesn't feel like home here, it feels like shards of glass penetrating his skin.

At last, he submits, knowing that he's going to make a mess of this no matter what he says, "She's not here anymore."

Loki scoffs, wiping water from his face. His trembling has eased up some, and there's a dead, resigned look that's settled into his expression. It scares Thor to see it. It looks as though Loki's given up. "Not that it matters. We won't get out of here."

"You got out last time." Thor points out cautiously. He stares out at the barrier. He doesn't know how they will. They destroyed the entrance to the caves when they left. Thor remembers that much. Part of him has always been soaking in details for their captivity, as if he's been starved for them, and he hates that about himself.

"Last time we had a map." Loki's tone is vicious. He attempts to bury his head into his hands and a full body wince ripples through him. Thor shifts immediately, pulling Loki's hand back so he can stare at the burn. His eye is bloodshot, but Thor is reassured by the vivid green iris. They need to wrap this wound, at least. Norns, he can't imagine how much it hurts. His lower legs are dotted with similar burns from when they ran through the flames, but though they sting, he imagines it isn't nearly as bad as this.

Loki can't even talk without pulling on it.

If Thor's being honest with himself, Loki probably shouldn't be talking.

Thor sighs, trying to be patient. With himself, and his brother. "We need to get this cleaned up. Is there somewhere with medical supplies here that you can remember?"

Loki's teeth set, and his gaze jumps up. Thor follows the brief flash to the house on the pathetic hill, but when he looks back at his brother, Loki is squeezing his eyes shut as if trying not to cry again. Thor gives his shoulder a reassuring squeeze, and Loki tenses up beneath him. Thor tries to remember a time that Loki wasn't shying away from contact and can't. The thought is depressing.

"C'mon, little brother," Thor says quietly, and gets up to his feet. A sharp, nagging pain shoots up to his hip, and Thor grits his teeth together. The mud causes him to sink a good few inches into the earth, and Thor once again curses Vanaheim's near-constant rain. Loki takes his offered hand, with his cold one and Thor hauls him up to his feet. For all his mental disarray, Loki is steady once he's upright.

They move slowly toward the house, the mud, rain, and their own physical state hindering their progress. At least the one benefit of the constant rain is that despite the mud's best efforts, they're clean. They cross up the hill, and Thor gets his first good look at the home.

It was a pale blue at some point, but the wood has rotted and the paint has peeled, landing in clumps surrounding the house. The roof is a deep red, shingles missing and patchy. The porch has collapsed on it's left side, and there's evidence of smashed glass and flower pots littering the wood as if broken in anger. The entire thing looks like it was held up by hope and a prayer.

Loki stops for a moment as he lays eyes on it, and Thor wonders how many times he was in the building. He tries to remember if Loki mentioned being here, but the only thing he can think of is when Sif broke her arm and she was brought here. That was before they found the caves. Thor looks toward the grave of the barn once more, noting the distance.

Loki squares his shoulders, breathing out sharply. Then he stalks up the steps while Thor staggers up them behind him on his bad leg, and shoves open the door. Thor is only half a step behind his brother, and gets the strong whiff of stale air and dust as it exits the house. It's cold and bitter, almost like mold or days-old blood.

Loki stops in the doorway, his shoulders tight. "I…" he intones.

Thor glances at his face, pale and afraid, and hates the Weeping Siren all the more for this. Loki is so rarely actually afraid of something. This creature has taken enough from his brother. Thor wishes she still lived so he could make her suffer. He takes what solace he can in her execution, but it still didn't feel like enough. She shouldn't have died. They should have kept her alive. You can't hurt in the grave.

"We need to get out of the rain," Thor reminds his sibling. Loki nods in agreement. He doesn't move. Thor gently takes his upper arm and steers him inside of the building. For all Loki's apprehension, Thor is slightly afraid that there's going to be something waiting for them in the house. Some sort of trap, spell, or perhaps the Weeping Siren herself.

There's not. The meager light from outside bleeds in through small, grime-covered windows, revealing the cramped space. There's a sitting room toward the immediate right, stuffed with books and other assorted junk. The couch is unusable, stacked high with boxes and thick, dusty volumes of books on spells in Vanir, Asgardian, and what he thinks might be Dwarven.

In front of them stands a large kitchen with a window, which provides a majority of the paltry light. Off of the left of the kitchen is a hall that leads toward the rest of the house. Sleeping quarters, maybe. There's no table. A counter island is all that occupies the floor space. There's gatherings of dried, brittle oats resting on a blue towel, a long stained wooden spoon beside them. It looks as if the Weeping Siren simply walked away in the middle of her work and never came back.

But that is what happened. She chased after his sibling, the children and the Warriors, and she never came back here.

The house feels unsettled and empty somehow, as if still waiting for her return. The feeling is unsettling, and makes everything in him anxious to leave again.

He forces his tongue to move, so he'll focus on something else. "Where are the healing supplies?" Thor asks, wiping water from his eyes. His clothing is soaked and sticking to every available part of him, and their feet track mud across the floor. But by the Norns, it's a relief to be out the rain. Something that he's never really felt before. Thor looks around the small space, trying to decide where to start looking first.

"I don't know," Loki whispers, as if afraid to raise his voice any higher. The Weeping Siren is dead, and Thor has no problem disturbing the silence of her home. He'd spit on her grave. Let her rot in Helheim where she belongs.

Thor's brows draw together. He looks back at his sibling. "I thought…" he hesitates, so many assumptions I've made about this place, and so many that have been wrong. "Haven't you been here before?"

"No." Loki's gaze stops looking at the oats, lifting to Thor's eyes. His fists are tight by his sides, his entire body braced, as if expecting a blow. "No, I haven't."

"Sif said—"

"It was just Sif." Loki interrupts. He takes a few steps forward, as if lured toward the counter, and pinches a few oats between pale fingers. His face tightens, and he crushes the grain, looking up at Thor again. "I don't know where to start looking. She said she only saw the kitchen. I assume it's here."

Thor nods, and moves toward the cabinets, his eye catching sight of the far wall. A streak of white is spread up from floor to the ceiling, contrasting the flower wallpaper so harshly that it's almost painful to look at. There's tally marks painted up the wall, the oldest a pale gray, and the newest barely any better. It's a height marking chart, Thor realizes. A Vanir tradition that Thor has always privately thought stupid.

Thor squints at the names. Yei and Holland.

The Weeping Siren's, he remembers.

The tally mark is the most cared for thing in this entire building, as if the Weeping Siren made sure to keep it in good shape when she lived, and even in death, her spirit cares for it still. The thought unnerves him, and Thor forces his gaze away.

He pulls open a cabinet, eyes jumping over bottles and jars, but he has no idea what they mean. Potions. Great. Sedir is far more reliable than witch's brew. He closes the door and opens another, searching for some sort of gauze, clean cloth, herbs—anything related to medicinal supplies. Eventually, in a drawer, he finds what he was looking for.

He pulls out gauze, cleaning cloths, and some sort of ointment in a bottle. He doesn't know what the ointment is for and leaves it in the drawer. He turns back to face his sibling. Loki's gaze is distant, as if lost in memories, and the pinch in his brow reveals they aren't anything good. Thor circles the counter's island, and nudges his sibling's boot.

Loki jerks a little, but he blinks and his gaze returns to the present. "Loki?"

"Hm?"

"Just checking," Thor says, and doesn't answer for what, even when Loki's gaze grows confused. Thor sets the supplies on the countertop, and studies the burns critically. "We need topical cream for this. Alloeh vera or something."

"Right," Loki agrees, and this close Thor can see how the skin is pinching and pulling when his mouth moves. Gods, that's disgusting. "Because I always have some of that on hand."

Thor ignores him, trying to decide how to apply a cover. He doesn't even know if that's what he's supposed to be doing. He knows you're supposed to keep burns cool, but the rain has done that so far. Unless the Weeping Siren has some sort of burn cream, then Thor doesn't know what else to do besides apply a cool compress to the area and pray for a healer.

Thor slumps a little. Caring for this wound gave him purpose, and without that, he has nothing. There are the other burns on their legs that they need to think about sooner rather than later, but for now…Thor feels desperate. Disappointed. Frustrated.

"Do you think the Siren has burn cream?" he asks. He nods his head up towards the cabinets. "It's filled with potions."

Loki submits with a sigh, nodding. "I imagine so."

Do we trust it? Is the real question that Thor wants to ask, but is afraid to. He wants to help Loki, not poison him. And while the Weeping Siren may have been intending to help her "children", she was mad. Who knows what concoctions she came up with? Or, Thor eyes the thick dust covering some bottles to the the point they look gray, when they were made.

Loki's lips purse together, and the two of them move toward the cabinets. Thor looks over the bottles that are, for the most part, thankfully labeled. But the further they get in rifling through the supplies, the more Thor realizes that the labels are meaningless. It's mostly shorthand, and probably not the standard system and instead the Siren's own form of gibberish. Thor moves the bottles around, kicking up dust that's probably been there since before he was born. It makes the air thick, itchy, and uncomfortable, but Thor doesn't think either of them could get the window opened if they tried. The house would collapse around it first.

"What do you think she made all of this for?" Thor questions what must be twenty minutes later in annoyance, "She obviously wasn't doing anything with it. Don't potions rot with age?"

He shifts his weight. His legs ache dully from the burns, and he thinks that if he has to keep standing on his left leg for any longer, he's going to tear it off with his teeth.

Loki sets several bottles on the counter beneath the cabinets. "They do," he confirms. "She wasn't selling them, either. She sold the grain for livelihood."

Thor pauses for a moment, thinking of the field. She sold the grain. She went to cities, holding more than two dozen captive, and traded with people? The thought is disturbing. If anyone had noticed that she wasn't...right, would his brother have been rescued sooner? He tries to imagine children working on that day in and day out and can't. He tries to picture his brothers and the Warriors there, and he still can't. The entire field just seems…lifeless from what he saw. The crops are a mess and clearly uncared for, and it's hard to picture them at a prime, let alone his brother, the Warriors, and the children having actually been there.

It's something out of a dream, but not even his dream.

Thor shuffles the items around, and holds a weighted one against his palm for a moment, staring into the milky white liquid, and sees his reflection staring back at him. His eyes look dead. He pulls his gaze away, setting the bottle down. "Do you think that she knew she was going to die?" Thor asks, and feels surprised by the question.

Loki hesitates for a moment, then sets a different bottle down. "I don't know," he says softly, "I don't think so."

Sometimes Thor is surprised when villains like these aren't all knowing. Part of him always thinks that they must be because they held and hurt so many for so long they have to have the gift of sight. But the Weeping Siren, when it comes down to it, she was just a Vanir woman. She didn't know everything. The fact that she held his sibling and the others for so long was just...luck.

Thor shuffles around a few more bottles, blinking back tears from the dust. "Was Sif the only one who came up here?" At Loki's look, he appends, "You just said that you'd never been. I was wondering if the others had."

"I think Fandral was here once or twice, too. He got sick when we first arrived." A dark look crosses over Loki's face, some memory taking hold. Thor wants to ask, but he bites his tongue instead. He knows better than to try now.

Loki sets down one of the bottles a few minutes later with a dull clink. "Here, I think. Ignis subsidio."

Fire relief, Thor translates in his head.

Loki turns to place the bottle on the countertop island, and Thor steps forward. The substance inside is a strange gray paste, and Thor immediately distrusts it. Loki has to wipe dust away from the cork, and Thor wonders what century the substance was last used, let alone created. Potions rot, he reminds himself. If this does more harm than good…they shouldn't put it on Loki's face first, he decides.

Thor and Loki share an apprehensive look. "Do you think it's safe to use?" Thor asks.

Loki's lips press together. "I don't know," he admits, "I'm not sure."

Thor takes it from Loki's pliant fingers, popping off the cork with his thumb. The substance inside is utterly odorless, and Thor's not sure if that's a good sign or not. "Should we have shook it first?" he asks after a moment. Loki shakes his head, looking certain of this fact, and Thor nods. They both stare at the bottle, as if waiting for it to make the first move.

Gods, they're children. It's a paste, not a foe.

Thor tips the bottle sideways, and slowly watches as the liquid spills toward the exit. He dumps some into his awaiting palm. It's cold to touch, and makes his palm go slightly numb. But there's no pain, and his fingers don't fall off, so he takes this as a good sign. He hands the bottle to Loki, then leans down to tug up what remains of his pants and reveal the burns along his left shin. Red skin, blistering and oozing faintly, shows itself. Thor can barely feel it. The pain from the permanent injury is so much that he just assumed they were the same.

His lips tighten at this realization.

"Thor," Loki inhales his name with disapproval. But it's not like Thor knew how bad they were. They've been busy otherwise.

Thor smears the paste across his leg, and almost instantly, his shoulders relax with relief. Tension he hadn't even realized was gone. The cream sinks into his skin, and it starts to lose the red sheen, the healing substance working quickly to ease pain and repair damage. It's not a spontaneous fix, but it's enough that he takes relief in it.

"Oh, thank the gods," Loki whispers.

"What? You didn't think it would work?" Thor asks, looking up at him. He sees Loki's expression and feels vague irritation wash through him. "You didn't think it would work."

Loki is pouring some of the paste out onto his own palm, "I didn't," he concedes. He carefully smears the substance over his own face, careful to cover the blisters and the burned skin. His lips push together in discomfort, and Thor watches the cream and skin react with a careful eye, checking to make sure that nothing will go wrong. They should have waited a few more minutes to see if there was a delayed reaction, but it's too late now.

Nothing goes wrong. It almost seems too easy. Loki's body drains of some tension as the burns release, and Thor finds himself relieved. Perhaps Loki won't lose the eye after all, thank the Norns.

They pass the jar back and forth, dealing with other burns scattered across their bodies from the wyvern, and Thor feels himself beginning to grow tired. Feeling marginally less like death helps with that. The adrenaline that's coursed through his veins for days has dulled and quieted.

They've both shifted, leaning their backs heavily against the countertop now, damp and cold, and miserable, but better. They both wrap their burns with the gauze in silence. Loki, too, doesn't seem to know what to do about his face and doesn't bother with it.

"Is it helping?" Thor asks, and gestures at his own face to encompass his brother's. Loki nods, still looking pale.

"I think so."

"Good. That's good." Thor says, somewhat awkwardly. Norns. When did he lose the ability to talk to Loki? Was it before or after the Siren?

Loki sighs heavily. He places the cork onto the bottle, sheltering what remains for future use. Thor can't imagine why. It's not like anyone is going to come here by choice. When they leave, if they leave, they might be the last guests this house sees.

Norns, he hopes so.

"The barrier," Thor begins, trying to figure out a way to ask his question. "You've all said it was impenetrable. But you didn't have your sedir at the time, so do you think our chances are better this time?"

"No," Loki says, quiet. "I don't know what spell she used, and I might end up doing more harm than good if I tried."

Thor feels frustrated, and gestures vaguely toward the sitting room. "There's hundreds of books there. I don't care if we have to read them all if it means we'll get out of here. Surely instructions for it must be written down somewhere."

Loki pauses, then shifts forward toward the cabinets. "It's something to try." He sounds tired. Thor feels tired.

"Should we—what on Helheim is that?" Thor stops himself mid sentence, staring. The books are quickly shoved out of his mind, as if they were never important.

Loki's arm, suspended in the act of putting away the bottle back into the cabinet with his sleeve having slipped to his mid forearm, freezes. He almost drops the burn cream in his effort to hastily yank the sleeve back down. But the damage has already been done.

Thor's seen it.

He swears heavily. Dozens of cuts lined his brother's forearm, inside and outer, as if he fell into open glass. They're fine cuts. Too fine to have come from anything that's happened the last few days. If Thor didn't know better, he'd even say they were made by a knife. But that's ridiculous.

"What on Helheim happened?" Thor demands, reaching out a hand to grab his brother's arm and get a better look at the wounds, but his brother snaps his forearm back, as if embarrassed or ashamed of it.

"Nothing."

Thor stares at him. Norns, does his brother think him stupid? "That didn't look like nothing."

"It's not your concern," Loki corrects hastily, turning away from him.

"Loki," Thor tries hard to find his patience. "Despite what you might think, I'm not an idiot. Those were made by some sort of blade. Someone hurt you. Who?"

Norns, not again. I'll rip out their throat with my teeth. I'm supposed to protect him. I promised I would protect him. Why can't I do that?

Loki shakes his head, lips pushed together, looking faintly gray. The burned skin on his face just makes him look almost pitiable, kicked down and beaten.

"Was it the Warriors?" Thor presses. Dark, swirling anger makes his chest hot. Of course it would be them. They've already struck his brother enough that he flinches when a hand is raised. Not much else could be beneath them at this point, would it?

Loki looks pained at the suggestion, and this only makes Thor more suspicious. "No. Drop it, please."

Thor feels both incredulous and furious. It was the Warriors, wasn't it? They've betrayed his trust so deeply, then lied to his face when he asked if they had hurt his brother again. He never knew them, did he? Gods, maybe it would be better if the wyvern killed them.

Thor scowls at his sibling darkly, wishing that for once, Loki would be straight with him. "How? How do you expect me to just drop that? Someone is hurting you deliberately, and clearly over time, and I'm supposed to just ignore that? You're the one who said I'm never looking at you. While here I am, looking!"

Loki swears darkly in their native tongue, backing up a step. "It's not your problem. No one's doing this to me. And even if they were, I would handle it."

"You shouldn't have to!"

Not by himself. Thor wants to help. Why won't Loki just let him help? What has Thor done to betray his trust so irrevocably that Loki doesn't want his help anymore? Gods, it hurts. He's failed as a brother. A son. A friend.

The words register, and Thor pauses, backtracking. "What do you mean no one is doing this to you?" Loki is still backing up, inches by inches, looking as though he would rather be anywhere but here. If Thor wasn't strung out, in pain, and slightly crazed at the hopelessness of their situation, he might be inclined to let him go. He's smart enough to know that sometimes retreat is the best option. But not now. Not today.

"Loki." The word is a growl.

Loki seems to just...snap. A vicious sort of hiss escapes him as he nearly shouts, finger slapping against his chest as if to claim blame, "I am, alright!? Me. Crazed, insane, unstable Loki. Happy? I'm doing it."

Thor stares at him.

Loki's…

What?

He mind spins around this information, trying to piece it together and make sense of it, but he can't.

Norns, there were so many cuts. And Loki's…doing that to himself. On purpose. Thor has paid enough attention to his education to not go with his knee-jerk response, which is to immediately despair that the claims of his sibling's insanity are true. His tutors have made sure that he understood that mental pain is sometimes just as severe, if not sometimes more so, than physical.

If Loki's doing this, he's hurt. It's not because he's crazy.

And, Norns, the Weeping Siren hurt him.

Thor exhales slowly, trying to understand, Allfathers help him. "Does it help?"

Loki seems surprised and apprehensive at the question. His face has tightened, and he still looks braced, as if he expected Thor to yell. He rubs at his arm anxiously. "No. Yes. I don't know."

Thor considers this, wondering how. How could physical pain offer relief? But then, doesn't he do something similar when he hits things when he's angry? That moment of relief when his fist collides with whatever it is in his target, brief sometimes that it may be? It's a distraction, he guesses. A relief. A release, maybe?

"Why?" Thor asks. His voice has lost octaves, making it feel almost shrived. "Why do you do it?"

"I just need to make my head quiet," Loki bites on his lower lip, "sometimes I want to stop feeling." His hand drums anxiously again, "Does it matter?"

Yes, Thor protests mentally, it does. Of course it does. If Thor can understand why, maybe he can get Loki to stop. He nods slightly, but says nothing further of it. A conversation for later, maybe. Norns, this feels...heavy, almost. Like a suffocating blanket. Loki hurts himself. Part of him wants to wail into the universe, begging for something else, for this to be some sort of sick joke.

Loki hurts himself.

"How...long have you…?" he gestures slightly, but can't seem to make himself say the words, how long have you been hurting yourself?

How long have I not noticed?

Loki looks away from him, picking at his left palm. Anxiety is so prominent in him that Thor thinks if he takes a step closer, he can breathe it in. Loki's eyes look heavy. Shaded. "This...this wasn't because of the Weeping Siren," Loki explains. His mouth twists. "She wasn't...she didn't help. But it...it's been a very long time."

Gods.

"Does anyone know?" Thor asks.

"No." Loki almost smiles tiredly. Thor can't fathom why.

"Do you want them to?"

Loki hesitates. "No."

Why not? Thor wants to ask. Do you not believe we would help you? But again, Thor bites on his tongue, thinking carefully about his words. An accusation doesn't have a place here. Instead, Thor leans down a little until he catches his brother's tired gaze. "I'm sorry, brother. If I had known…"

What? What would he have done? Run off to tell their parents and hope that by some miracle, they actually had the time to spare to help? He and Loki have so often been alone. Their parents feel like a weekend tag along to their lives, not something actually there. Not something to help. Or support.

The thought is bitter, and he shoves it away, ashamed.

Loki has relaxed some, as if the fact that Thor is still not shouting is a relief. His expression looks more open than it has in months. When he speaks, his voice is gentle. "What would you have done, honestly?"

"I don't know, but something," Thor mutters. He runs a hand through his hair. "You should have to go through this alone."

Loki shifts, leaning his weight against the countertop. He folds his arms against his chest. "You're already stressed enough as it is. You didn't need this on top of everything else. Father places too much on your shoulders."

"I'm to be king someday." Thor points out.

"You won't rule alone."

I wish. The thought is longing, but a familiar one, and he sighs to it. His father has stressed the importance of being able to stand on his own two feet. He's supposed to be able to run not one realm, but nine. Even if he has the parliament and the curia regis, it means very little. Asgard is his to bear. A task that felt far more possible before he was Injured. "Maybe," Thor concedes, "but I will rule. If I'm not a king, what am I?"

"My brother." Loki says, indignant.

Thor's words are a soft echo, "You say that like it means something."

Loki looks at him, but he doesn't seem hurt, his expression only inquisitive. "What do you want it to mean?"

"I don't know." Thor sighs, miserable. But I want it to mean something more than it does, he thinks, depressed. I wish that I felt more that you said that, but there's nothing. Just a void. "I'm sorry," Thor says earnestly, thinking of their argument.

Loki understands, nodding his head. "Me too." He rubs at his arm again, but it's a simple brush this time, not the clawing motion of before. They're both quiet for long moments, thinking. Then Loki looks up at him, gentle but knowing, and gods, I've missed you. Thor can see him. His brother. The hard edges have been chipped away by the vulnerability of this conversation, leaving not a traumatized ghost, but his sibling. Maybe, he considers, they aren't nearly the strangers it's felt like for so long.

Loki asks, quietly, "Tell me what it's like to drown in the sun?"

Thor's response is immediate. "Only if you explain to me the shadows."

Loki's lip quirks a fraction, as if this is some sort of inside joke instead of verbal knife wounds. But he gives a slight nod, and Thor takes relief in this. He chews on his lower lip, lets it go, and rests his hand on the countertop. He wishes he had something to do with his hands. He looks at the space just above Loki's hair instead of his brother's face.

Thor doesn't even know where to begin. It's not something he's verbalized before, not something that he ever thought he'd get the chance to. Slowly, he starts, "I feel all this...pressure. All the time. Father is always watching me, and I don't feel like I have any room to breathe. His approval means the world to me. I just want to be as good of a king as he is, but I can't even be a good son."

"According to who?" Loki asks, his head tilted a fraction. He's thinking. Processing. Listening.

Thor pauses. He'd never really considered that before. All this implied pressure made it impossible to breathe. "I...myself, I guess."

Loki cants his head forward, "Maybe some of it, do you think? But you and I know that our father can be overbearing."

Thor snorts quietly. Can be? He always is. Thor shakes his head, "It's not just him. The entire Nine looks at me Loki, all the time. The only time I have breathing room is when we're on those quests, or when I used to be with you." He takes a deep breath, "And we can't leave the capital, and you've...not been there, and I...feel very alone. Mother and Father try, but you know as well as I that we are first most heirs, children second. What I would give to be out of the spotlight, and be able to stop being seen and my every move corrected or scrutinized."

What I would give to feel connected to people again, Thor doesn't say, because it's too raw to think, let alone speak.

Loki is nodding to his words, his brows drawn together, and the look on his eyes isn't pity, but sympathy. "I'm sorry. I've not been ignorant to everything, I just...I'm sorry."

Plenty of that to go around, it would seem. Thor sighs, shaking his head. He brushes hair out of his face. "It's my responsibility to look out for you, Loki, not the other way around."

I'm the older brother.

Loki looks at him for a moment, and he almost seems insulted. "Of course it goes both ways, you moron. Why would it not?"

That's my brother, Thor realizes, and a calm feeling settles in his stomach. Familiarity. Comfort. He doesn't have anything to say to that. The words have reassured something deep inside of him, always terrified of being left alone or behind. Of course it goes both ways. Thor holds the words close to his heart, refusing to let them go. How sentimental you are, a quiet voice mocks in the back of his mind.

He makes an awkward sound, almost like a cough, but not quite. "What about you?"

Loki shrugs. He picks at his palm again, and sighs, "Not much to say, I think."

There he goes again. Deflecting. As if the idea that someone might be willing to listen to him is horrifying instead of comforting. The thought makes him upset. Thor nudges the side of his brother's mud-covered boot, hard. "Come now, I just bore my soul."

Loki kicks him back, an automatic gesture. He almost seems surprised by the action, because he looks down at his feet. "I don't know." Loki rubs his thumb across his palm. He exhales slowly, refusing to look Thor in the eye, "The Weeping Siren...changed things. Before...I just. I couldn't get our parents' attention no matter what I tried. Frigga tried, gods bless her, but beyond magic when I was young, it's been so hard...and Father never sees me. I just want to be connected. I want to belong, and I'm always an outsider looking in. I don't want to be alone, yet I know that I am. It's my role. And after the Weeping Siren, with everyone vying for my attention, it all feels false. Because I know that if I wasn't...how I am, that they would stop seeing me."

Oh.

Oh.

Norns, that's terrible.

Thor thinks of Loki's reactions these past few months, and feels like he understands their meaning for the first time. Loki shying away from their parents, and his animosity to their kindness. How he always seems like he's at war with everyone, even though no one fights him back. All of these little moments, adding up to this.

Loki felt so invisible, that the slightest bit of new attention is unwelcome and painful. Thor thinks of your invisibility is a gift, and winces. He asks, cautiously, "Do you really think we wouldn't see you if the Siren hadn't happened?"

Loki's hands fidget. He looks away. "I haven't been given much evidence to the contrary."

A pang twists Thor's chest. He promises himself that he'll do better. They've always had each other, but it seems not even that has played out recently. Thor says, with sorrow, "You're my best friend, Loki. I'm sorry. I...I want to help you feel seen. For you to be my equal. You shouldn't have to be alone."

Loki looks wistful, "I think I always will be."

"No. Not anymore. I swear to you, brother." Thor says firmly, and by the Norns, he means it. No more. The Weeping Siren connected the Warriors and his brother, but it nearly tore them apart. No more of this.

Loki's smile is grim. "It seems like all we have is each other."

Thor nods, and reaches out a hand to clasp the side of Loki's neck in a familiar gesture. He almost feels like crying when Loki doesn't pull away from him, but instead leans into the contact, his cool skin a comfort. "Always, brother."

He squeezes Loki's shoulder, then asks softly, "So you..." he can't make himself say the words. It's awful. They taste like ash in his mouth and death in his throat. He gestures instead to Loki's arm, "You do that because of...this?"

Loki chews on his lower lip. "Sometimes. It depends."

Thor nods. He pushes his tongue against his teeth. It would have been nice, he thinks, for their to have been one solid problem behind Loki's actions that he could try and fix. But there isn't, and he's disappointed, but not disheartened. He makes sure Loki is looking at him as he asks, sincerly, "Next time you want to...hurt yourself...will you talk to me?"

Loki looks down at his arm. His fingers clench, but his eyes are honest, "I make no promises. I'll try." He repeats a second later, as if convinced of this, "I'll try."

"Thank you." Thor whispers.

Loki looks at him, and his lip quirks up a fraction, laughter in his eyes. He looks more relaxed than Thor has seen him in months. Years, maybe. He looks...maybe not happy, but content. Alive, Thor realizes, he looks alive.

"Norns, we don't have to hug or something, do we?" Loki asks, feigning disgust, and Thor laughs, the sound both unexpected and genuine. He can't remember the last time he laughed. But by the gods, it feels wonderful.

000o000

Hours later, after a scavenge around the house for food that reveals nothing more than dusty tomes, thick texts in old Vanir that Thor can't read despite his best efforts, and the weapons lost by the Warriors and Loki so long ago, the two of them retire to bed. The Weeping Siren has one master bedroom, and two children's rooms, both of which are immaculate. The dust, again, seems to be cleaned by her ghost. Neither he or his brother feel comfortable in any room, so they lay down on the sitting room's floor, facing the door.

Loki picks his way through one of the Weeping Siren's texts for a while, and Thor does the same. He doesn't find anything about the barrier, but he wasn't expecting to on his first try.

Both of them are quiet, not because they're angry, but because when they are on good terms, he and Loki rarely speak to each other. Thor has never found someone he can be so silent with and face no consequences with that for.

Eventually, Thor gives up on the text and sharpens the edge of Sif's spear, not because it needs the maintenance, but because he needs something to do with his hands. After some time, the two of them try to sleep. Since they didn't find any food, and Thor's stomach twists with growing hunger and nausea. Neither of them have eaten in four days now. He knows they can go on for much, much longer, but he's not keen to do so.

They don't talk about the barrier, they don't talk about escape plans. Thor knows that will come in the morning, but for tonight, they both take pleasure in being out of the rain. Loki falls asleep rather quickly, his breaths deep and even, but Thor can't rest. His mind is spinning endlessly. He's staring at the ceiling as his anxieties run around him, shouting into the silence and making the entire process of sleep something distant and unachievable.

Eventually, Thor's mind lands on the Weeping Siren, as it often does, and he thinks about this house, and the creaking that sounds like breathing, and dripping water that sounds like singing. It's like she still lives here, and he hates it. He doesn't know how Loki fell asleep, but Thor guesses he must just be used to the presence by now.

Then that gets him thinking about the cellar, and he realizes how close he is, and Thor thinks about that for a while. Another hour must pass before he sits up silently in annoyance, and determines that he isn't going to sleep tonight, so he might as well try to do something productive with his time.

He doesn't know how, or why, but he finds himself outside. The rain has slowed to a slow drizzle, and Thor finds himself wandering the fields, looking for the cellar. It's like a tracking spell has seized him, and he's forced to find the bloody thing or die trying.

He does, after some time. A trap door lays open on the ground, weeds and plants having grown around it as if to drag it back into the earth. Cement waterways carved into the sides of the hatch ensure that any runoff water from nearby will leave the cellar alone. But the door itself has been left open, and Thor knows that the cellar must be flooded.

Thor stares down into the darkness, apprehensive. There's a rope ladder leading down into the space, but it looks looming and endless. They were down here, every day. They slept in there. Norns, he can't even imagine what that would have been like. To work all day and then know that this is where you were returning for rest.

Thor knows he shouldn't go in. He should just turn around and leave the ghosts undisturbed, but he can't. He's not even sure that he wants to.

I want to understand. No. He wants to see. As if the suffering that was inflicted here is something that can be viewed and displayed. As if it's something that should be seen.

Norns. He's horrible, isn't he?

He chews on his lip, then stops, remembering his father told him it was childish. Thor lingers at the top for a moment more before sighing with annoyed, guilty defeat and clambering down.

His feet hit the bottom sooner than he expected, but part of him has been expecting it to simply lead to the Void, so that's not much of a surprise. Thor immediately sinks to his mid calf in water. He'd been expecting more. A lot more. There must be some sort of drainage system in place somewhere in the room. He squints into the darkness. The light above him provides enough to see into the room by, but not to make details out.

The cellar, everyone's called it, and Thor concludes it's a fair assessment. The ceiling is high enough that he doesn't have to crouch, but the room still feels cramped. Bunk beds line the walls like cages, blankets askew across the thin mattresses, as if everyone left in a hurry.

They had. They did.

Everything about this meadow feels suspended in time, as if it's still holding it's breath, waiting for everyone to return. It's haunted. Dragr could walk among them now, and Thor wouldn't be able to tell. They probably do. But it's the ghosts of the living.

Thor takes a harder look at the space, trying to place pieces together in his head. He walks forward slowly, feeling disconnected from his body. He feels wrong. This place is wrong, and he can't imagine being stuck down here for hours at a time.

On the end of the beds, as Thor was looking for, are restraints. Loki used to have to sleep with it for a while. He was so restless that the lack of them would drive him into a deep panic. Thor remembers the heartbroken, empty look his mother had had that first time she did so, and it's lingered with him ever since.

This is something he knew about.

The cellar smells like Loki and the Warriors did when they found them in those tunnels so long ago: damp, old, and of waste.

Gods.

This is horrific.

Every night. Every. Night. For a year.

There's a broken needle plunger floating in the water, and it brushes against Thor's leg. Thor remembers Sif explaining the story to him in the healing wing all those months ago. Fandral stabbed her with a needle. She was incapacitated after that. That's…when we realized we could get out.

Thor looks back at the entrance, and sees the filtered light streaming down toward the floor. It looks looming. Something stretched out and false, but hope for the captives of so long ago.

This feels wrong.

He shouldn't be here. He should leave the ghosts buried where they belong: the past.

Thor glances back at the plunger, and shifts it with his foot, watching it lazily drift away into the darkness. "I hope you're suffering," he mutters to the Weeping Siren's ghost. "You've earned nothing less."

"You never met her, did you?"

Allfathers!

Thor startles violently at the voice, whipping around frantically, fists appraised, but it doesn't matter. A boney fist grabs him by the throat and hauls him off his feet. It's not Loki. A tall Vanir man, black hair streaked with gray. He's dressed in what barely pass for rags, and looks like a poor, decrypt beggar. His face is lined and his beard is thin. His eyes, when Thor dares to meet them, are haunted and ancient. A black tattoo, wrinkled and indescribable streaks up the left side of his face from his chin to his hairline. It seems to be some sort of design, but Thor doesn't know what for.

Thor swears hoarsely, digging his fingers into the forearm, kicking his feet uselessly. The water splashes violently.

The ancient man offers a lopsided smile. It's so lonely that Thor's chest aches. He doesn't lower his fists, still braced, still ready, because no one knows where this is and who on helheim was running around in the forest and what is this man doing here and why why why—

"What—who—?" Thor sputters.

"I believe you summoned me," the man says, his tone perfectly neutral. Summoned...what...how—?

The map. Loki blew up the map. The wave of sedir must have caught the man's attention.

Thor feels strange. Not a good strange, a hollow, chest-squeezing-pain strange. This is the sorcerer. The one they set they set out on this stupid quest for in the first place. The last hope of the Vanir and his mother. The reason for their mission. A reason for hope.

Thor's fingers tighten compulsively. he thinks he might be sick.

"You're—" Thor tries to squeeze out.

"The bloody forest," he breathes. Then in a mutter of Vanir, "Wo de jian yu. My prison." He sighs, then smiles, looking directly at Thor. "But not...anymore."

The sorcerer waves a hand in front of Thor's face. Then, with a wave of pain that paralyzes him from his stomach to his skull, Thor loses consciousness.

"Man who didn't know how and when to stop."

-Unknown

Chapter Text

"You know why big brothers are born first?

To protect the little ones that come after."

-Kurosaki Ichigo

Loki becomes aware of the low vibrations of feet walking beside him on the floor before a hand clamps over his mouth. He jerks into wakefulness, nearly jack knifing upward as he attempts to scramble away from the pressure. It doesn't let up, and Loki panics, eyes turning up frantically, heart slamming against his ribs.

An older man crouches next to him, a faded tattoo spread up one side of his face, his ancient eyes looking worn and exhausted. His loose, faded clothing has holes and makes him look thin and brittle. When Loki meets his eyes, there's something edged and dark about them. He looks crazed.

Who on the Nine-?

He and Thor were the only people here. No one knew where the Weeping Siren's hovel was. No one. They spent nearly a year here because no one knew where they were. No one. So how-?

The man raises a bony finger up to his lips and murmurs a quiet, "shhh."

Loki manages to shove his hand off and scrambles up to his unsteady feet, drawing his daggers from his cache in a fluid motion, body braced. "Who on Yggdrasil are you?" Loki demands in a low hiss. His eyes frantically jump across the Weeping Siren's sitting room for a moment, but he can't see his brother anywhere. He can't even sense him in the building.

Thor was here when Loki fell asleep. He wouldn't have left voluntarily, not when they both know the history of this place. Whatever happened to him, Loki suspects that this man had something to do with it. Loki swears violently in the privacy of his mind.

They shouldn't have let their guard down. The Weeping Siren isn't-wasn't the only thing out here.

The old man, Vanir, Loki can see as he takes a step into the grimy light, laughs quietly. He raises his arms out from his sides, outstretching them as if in some sort of performance. "Don't you know, child? You asked me here."

Loki tenses, wondering, mind frantically trying to play catch up. He sweeps his gaze out over the man, stretching out his other senses as well. Vanir, sedir-wielder, one of the ancients, and there's something about his sedir that feels almost familiar. As if Loki's spent a great deal of time around it recently.

The man's body neck twitches faintly, like some sort of spasm.

The warding. On Thor. His sedir feels like the warding on Thor. Which probably makes this the sorcerer. The guardian of the Blodig Skog, whatever you want to call him. Norns.

"I-" Loki starts to say, not letting down his defense.

The man laughs, clapping his hands together as if delighted. The sound makes something in Loki's chest jump with surprise, "Good, good. I thought you should know...before. I'm impressed. You couldn't have sent up a better beacon than that. Destroying one of the maps...gods, I never would have thought anyone would have the gall to do that."

Norns. It was an accident. Don't people get that? It wasn't Loki having gall, it was him not knowing what he was doing. Loki bites on his tongue, refusing to say that thought out loud. Instead, he asks the more obvious one, "Where is my brother?"

"Hm." The sorcerer intones.

Loki's eyes narrow. He tries to smell blood, refusing to remove his eyes away from the man, but he can't. Thor seems to have just stood up and walked out. There's no signs of a struggle, and there's no lingering feeling of a spell. But that doesn't make sense. "Is he-?" Loki starts to say.

The Vanir's head turns sharply toward him, and he advances toward Loki quickly, apparently finished with the conversation. Loki scrambles backwards, and they retreat into the kitchen. He has to find a way out of this house. If he can get into the field, then he'll have an advantage. There are few places he knows as well as that Norns-cursed field.

But first, "Where is Thor?"

The Vanir flicks a hand, and he's swept off his feet, crashing violently into the counter island. The daggers get lost somewhere in the air. Pain shoots up his shoulder and the side of his head and he feels the skin around his eyes tighten.

He scrambles to move away from the counter, and sees something slam something so hard into the countertop that the old wood splinters, cracking from base to wooden countertop.

Loki rolls up to his feet, throwing up a hasty shield.

Something rams into it with force hard enough that Loki stumbles back a few steps, forcing his hip into the counter. His shield holds, but barely.

Aggression and power. It's not a combination that Loki's faced very often, or at all, honestly, and he once again curses Frigga's insistence not to teach him how to fight with magic, not that she doesn't know how. Anything he knows he taught himself. Sedir is not a weapon, she'd say, or sedir is a science, Loki.

Parlor tricks, Loki wanted to snap back at her, you think it's parlor tricks.

Gods. If they all survive to the end of this, he's going to demand her secrets.

Loki flicks his eyes up, looking for weapons and the fastest way to the exit. The Vanir is still approaching, not bothering to keep the distance between them, and Loki reaches out a hand, grabbing hold of the books scattered around the couch and pulls.

The thick, heavy tomes fly off the couch, ramming into the Vanir's back with force that looks staggering. He releases a gasped sound, as if he's been hit in the stomach, and Loki ignores him for a moment.

Turning his eyes instead toward the rest of the room, he summons the two daggers from off the floor, throws a hand out toward the door to explode it from its hinges with a heavy push, and races for it. He drops the shield to save energy, and has scarcely made it out of the doorway before something hits him from behind.

Loki goes flying off the porch, slamming hard into the dirt, rocks, and dry weed below in a roll.

Curse it!

Loki pants, trying to catch his breath as he rolls onto his back, whipping his head up to see the Vanir's figure fill the doorway. He stalks toward Loki, angry, and Loki wonders what on the Nine he's hoping to accomplish here. If he'd wanted to strike a death blow, he should be working harder. This doesn't feel like a fight to death, it feels like the sorcerer is...toying with him.

Loki forces himself to his unsteady feet, inhaling the smell of wet wheat, dirt and stale water. It disorients him. But it's not then. It's not. This time he has weapons, this time he has magic, this time...Thor is missing.

Loki pulls up another shield, continuing to retreat as the sorcerer stalks toward him. "Where is my brother!?" he demands again. "What did you do to him?"

The Vanir doesn't answer, instead, he reaches out a hand, and Loki can feel the sedir gathering in the air for something powerful, hot, and overwhelming. He swears, dropping the shield and throwing one of his knives. It flips through the air twice before burying itself into the sorcerer's stomach to the hilt. The Vanir jerks, concentration broken, as Loki had intended.

The man's hands come down to his stomach, and his eyes flash, raising up to meet Loki's.

But Loki is already advancing, finally, flicking his wrist to draw another weapon as he smoothly steps into the man's personal space, holding a dagger against either side of his throat. He leans in, "Where is my brother?"

The Vanir spits in his face, laughing.

Loki flinches.

"Your brother? Him? Him I devoured." The Vanir smiles, revealing a set of rotting teeth, and Loki feels something hot expand in his chest. Devoured. What does that even mean? If the Vanir killed him, wouldn't there be some sort of body in the Weeping Siren's hovel?

But devoured…

Norns, curse it.

Loki presses the knives further into the man's neck, drawing a red line. It looks bright and ugly, smelling of rot. "Did you kill him?"

Norns, please. Please give me this one thing.

"Do you think that I fear death, boy?" the Vanir chortles. "You can't kill me. You need me."

Loki doesn't hesitate. He doesn't stop to parse the words. Keep him talking. "Why?"

"Quid pro quo. You do something for me, I'll help you with that unfortunate plague." The Vanir explains.

He knows about the plague, then. Loki urges, "What? What do you want?"

"Your brother."

And that possessive, hissing snake coiled in his stomach rears. Loki narrows his eyes, feeling himself tighten. "No. That's ridiculous. You can't have him."

The sorcerer laughs, "I already do." Then, in a blurred movement, he slaps his palm flat against Loki's stomach. Pain like Loki's never experienced overwhelms him, and he topples to the hard earth, knives landing somewhere around him. Something hoarse and wet squeezes up through his throat and Loki coughs violently, unable to catch his breath.

His mouth tastes like blood.

His entire body feels like it's trying to crawl out of himself, filling the hollow spaces with sharp, hot agony. It's what he imagines being burned alive would feel like. Loki feels himself start screaming. A rattle that makes his entire head ache and feel like it's swelling. Make it stop, oh, Allfathers, make it stop, stopstopstopstopstopstopstop-

The Vanir man's hand lands over his mouth again, and Loki feels something swallow his voice. A spell. He silenced him with a spell.

Loki wants to laugh.

He wants to cry.

Instead, he chokes on his inability to breathe. It's like his lungs are filled with fluid.

"I told you to be quiet," the Vanir says harshly, as if speaking to an unruly child.

Loki thinks, wildly, that this must have been what the Vanir intended to do with him from the start. Loki wasn't supposed to wake up. What the goal of this is, beyond torturing him to death, that Loki can't parse. He can't think. It's too hard to breathe. He's going to suffocate.

Loki thinks, though he's not sure, that the man murmurs something like, "let's just hope your brother cares for you as you do him," then there's a sensation, like having his skull broken into a thousand pieces from pressure, and Loki retreats into himself.

000o000

Thor wakes up to the sensation of being dragged by under his arms. His legs have gone numb and his hands feel scraped and rubbed raw, as if they've been pulled across something rough and unforgiving for a long time. Disorientation floods him for long seconds, and he can't remember what happened. He doesn't know where he is.

"Loki," he mumbles, squinting out into the dark. There's...a ceiling, maybe? Darkness. There is no sky. His feet scrape loudly on the floor. The space sounds enclosed. But that doesn't make sense because of the darkness. This is the Void. Maybe it's just his ears echoing. There's some sort of light, in front of him, flickering. A candle. No lantern. What...?

The last memory he has, it was dark. No. That's not...quite right. The last memory he has...it was not dark. It was-Choking, fingers pressed against his throat, a smile, my prison...but not anymore-of the sorcerer.

The sorcerer.

Thor swears violently and loudly, as if the words will help him come back to himself, fighting against the hold. His entire body feels sluggish and unresponsive, as if he was just dragged out of a deep sleep. He starts to twist around, hands flailing to grab at the wrist of the person that's dragging him, but before he can make more than a fleeting contact, he's dropped heavily to the earth.

Thor swears again, this time in pain.

He scrambles to put feet between himself and his captor, expecting to see the sorcerer, only to see that it's-

"Loki?" Thor chokes out. He stares up at his sibling for long seconds, wondering what on the Allfathers name his brother is doing. His brother stands behind him, lantern in one hand and appraised, his other hanging limply by his side.

It takes Thor a second before he realizes that Loki doesn't look quite right. He's balance is slightly tipsy, and his head is cocked, but his face is blank. He looks like he's being held up by strings. There's a fine sheen of sweat along his hairline. His eyes are glowing faintly, reflecting the light in an usual manner.

"Loki?" Thor breathes, again. There's no reaction.

Norns curse it.

Thor gets to his feet slowly, cautious. Loki's dead, glowing eyes stare back at him. Like a dragon iris, reflecting in the darkness. It's not right. It's not normal. What on helheim happened? Thor remembers going to the cellar, he remembers running into the sorcerer, but he remembers nothing of anything happening to Loki.

Did the sorcerer do something, and if so what? Thor will kill him if harm comes to his sibling.

He carefully scans their surroundings, realizing that they're in some sort of enclosed tunnel. Stalactites hang from the ceiling lowly and are forming crystals that gleam in the firelight. Thor doesn't recognize the area, but that's not unexpected. The Blodig Skog has so many unknowns.

Thor starts to get up to his feet, leaning against a nearby wall for support. Loki's eyes follow him slowly. What happened? How did this...no one is supposed to know where the Weeping Siren's hovel is. So how does this sorcerer?

"Can you walk, then?" Thor raises his eyes up to the impatient voice, spotting the sorcerer standing a few feet ahead of where his brother is. If he hadn't called out, Thor's almost certain that he would have missed him in the darkness. No, he did miss him. It's an unsettling feeling. He's usually a lot more aware of his surroundings than this.

"What did you do to him?" Thor says harshly, lifting his gaze up to Loki, but his brother isn't paying attention to him. Instead, Loki blinks at him, expressionless. It's unsettling. Almost as if his brother's soul has been sucked from his body, leaving nothing but an empty shell behind.

The sorcerer makes some sort of sound in his throat. "What did I do to him? You did this to him."

What? How? Thor's gaze flicks between the silhouette and his brother, confused. "I-I didn't…"

He can hear the irritation in the man's voice as he growls, "If you think you've suddenly become a sedir-wielder in your sleep, you'd be mistaken." Thor's shoulders slump a little at that. The sorcerer steps out into the meager light, a thick tome-one from the Weeping Siren's home, Thor recognizes-balanced between his twitching hands. "This is my negotiation. You do something for me, and I'll let him go."

Thor's teeth grit. His hands tighten into fists. His nerves light up, braced for a fight. "No."

"No?" the sorcerer says, amused. His gaze lifts up from the text, and Thor can see the same gleaming off-light of his eyes, a mirror of Loki's. Thor doubts this is a coincidence. It must be a visual aid to some sort of spell. Thor doesn't know if it's a good thing or not, because most of the more powerful spells that he knows of show nothing discernible. The more powerful the sorcerer, the less flashy they become.

"You do realize you have no cards here, don't you?" The sorcerer's head tilts. His left knee jerks faintly, and Thor's eyes jump from the limb back to the man's face.

Thor tries to debate if he could overpower the sorcerer before he could get anything cast. But the pain lacing up his leg assures him that his chances would be very low. Maybe before. Not now. His tongue pushes against the inside of his teeth in shame and embarrassment.

If you had not been broken, you could help Loki.

Frustration washes through him. "What do you want from me?" Thor asks.

"Ah, the question of the day," the sorcerer muses, and turns away. He begins to walk through the tunnel, and Loki stumbles after him as if dragged. Thor, unwilling to let his sibling out of his sight, hobbles after the two of them. His leg aches as if the muscle is trying to cramp or overstretch, but he pushes the pain to the back of his mind.

When the sorcerer continues to remain silent, Thor's thin patience draws to its edge. "Do I look to be in a gaming mood, sorcerer? Answer me! What do you want?"

"What does anyone want?" the Vanir says cryptically.

Thor swears.

The man laughs faintly. "This just proves my point. I can avoid the question forever. You'll follow me to the end of the Yggdrial when I have your brother. You hold no leverage here."

Thor would. There's little he wouldn't do for Loki, which isn't a new realization. He's known this for as long as he can remember. If the sorcerer is trying to reveal new information to him, he'll have to try harder.

Between gritted teeth, Thor says, "Fine. I don't. What do you want?"

The Vanir sighs, as if disappointed. He doesn't answer. Thor stops asking after a while, following behind his brother and the sorcerer in silence. He tries, and fails, to get Loki's attention, and eventually gives up on that, too.

He doesn't know how long they walk, only that he's tired and irritated by the end of it. The sorcerer seems to have an endless supply of energy, but appears to recognize that Thor is lagging behind and declares they're taking a break. Loki drops to the floor, sitting on his heels like he was dropped from suspension. Thor carefully takes a seat beside him, eying the sorcerer, but the Vanir man doesn't seem to care.

Making sure to keep the sorcerer in the corner of his eye, Thor carefully takes Loki's lax hand, rolling the inside of his wrist up to feel for a pulse. Loki's skin is chilled to the touch and his fingers are turning deep blue, fingernails black. His heartbeat is slow and sluggish, as if every beat is an effort the muscle isn't sure it wants to keep pushing for. His breathing is ragged and wheezy.

Thor squeezes his nails into the inside of the tender flesh of Loki's wrist, waiting for some sort of response. There's nothing. The empty eyes stare forward, glazed and unfocused. Loki isn't there. The burn on his face is gone, Thor realizes. Only smooth flesh has been left in its place, as if the incident never happened. The sorcerer must have healed him, and Thor doesn't know what for.

"Loki," Thor whispers, desperate.

His brother says nothing. Does nothing.

"He can't hear you."

Thor startles, already swinging his fist back at the sorcerer beside him, but the Vanir dances away, laughing. The old man's hand twitches. "He can't hear you," the sorcerer repeats, as if rubbing this in.

Thor gets to his feet. He can taste ozone, and his mouth feels like it's bloody and scorched. "Enough of your games! Release him. I'll do whatever you want. Just leave him alone."

The sorcerer lifts up a finger, wagging it, "Not yet. Your cooperation is necessary."

"For what?" Thor demands, raising his hands up, annoyed. "You have my cooperation!"

"No. Not yet." The sorcerer turns away, as if something caught his eye, but Thor doesn't waste the opportunity, brief as it is. He leaps at the sorcerer with as much power as he can muster, and the two of them go down onto the hard cave floor in a tangle of limbs. The scuffle is brief, but dirty, with vicious blows taken and no restraints shown on either of their part.

The man may be an impressive sorcerer, but Thor is barely a third of his age, if that, and easily overpowers him. Soon, he has the man in a stranglehold, his fingers wrapped tightly around his neck as the sorcerer fights him desperately, his jugular jumping beneath Thor's fingers

"Don't…" the sorcerer wheezes. His body trembles beneath Thor.

"Give me one reason why." Thor counters, his voice without warmth. "You die, so does your spell." He tries to sound far more confident about that than he feels. Sedir is such a fickle thing, having a mind of its own. Thor doesn't actually know if it would help anything. Loki would have, but that's the problem.

"You...deal…" the sorcerer tries again.

Thor grips him harder, trying not to focus on how the body is bucking and he can feel the life draining beneath his hands. The sensation is sickening, no matter how many times he's faced it.

The sorcerer finally releases one of Thor's forearms, hand clawing along the earth for long seconds before Thor hears Loki gasp, then begin to cough. The sound is so jarring to the silence of the Vanir dying, that Thor whips his head up toward his sibling. It's his fatal mistake. He catches only a glimpse of Loki coughing up blood before the sorcerer grabs hold of Thor's arm again, and all muscle strength in him gives out. Thor collapses bonelessly on top of the old man, who shoves him off and gets to his feet, swearing in a hoarse, gravely whisper.

Inside of himself, Thor panics.

Norns, curse it.

Loki. Is he okay? What's happening. There was blood. And Thor can hear him beginning to sob with pain. What did the sorcerer do? Thor will kill him. And he'll enjoy it, Allfathers help him.

The sorcerer grabs Thor by the hair harshly, hauling him up into a seated position, forcing Thor to look at his sibling. Loki is curled on the ground beside where Thor left him, as if he tipped over. He's curled in around himself, legs pulled against his stomach, hands laying limply beside his stomach, wheezing in between heavy coughs. His face is stained with blood and...gods, that's sedir. He's coughing up sedir.

Sedir's another type of blood, Thor reminds himself. Maybe it isn't…

Gods.

The Vanir's voice is a low hiss, still raw and sounding faintly swollen. "You did this to him. You. If you cooperate, he gets to live. If you don't, he dies slow and painful."

The Vanir drops his head, and Thor collapses, his muscles taking life again. He crawls toward his sibling slowly, reaching out a hand to run shakily through Loki's messy hair, trying to offer comfort. His brother moans beneath the contact, eyes tightly pinched shut. Tears mix with blood across his face, and the blue Thor noticed before on his hands is getting worse. It's spread up past his wrists now.

Thor feels an energy pass through him, like a ripple of sound. It's dull and somewhat uncomfortable, but Loki's shaking stops. He stops crying, and coughing, returning to the empty shell that's barely breathing. His eyes glaze over. The spell. It must be the sorcerer's spell that keeps him functioning. Whatever it is that's spreading in his brother, poison, sickness or whatever, the sorcerer keeps at bay with his spell.

Despaired, Thor closes his eyes.

I don't know what to do. Norns, I don't know...

Angry, lost, and helpless, Thor glares up at the Vanir. "What," his voice is low, "did you do?"

The Vanir is watching both of them from a crouched position a dozen feet away. He's massaging his throat with one hand, looking irritated and angry. "He's sick." The sorcerer says, as if that explains everything.

"I can see that," Thor growls. "You did that to him. Why?"

"Motivation," the sorcerer shrugs. "I don't care if he lives or dies. Just you."

Thor's fingers tighten in Loki's hair. A surge of protective panic washes through him. "If this is about our father, and you hope to gain some sort of ransom, I assure you that my brother's death would-"

The Vanir laughs loudly. He shakes his head, "Odinson, if I had wanted to ransom you, I had ample opportunity last year."

Thor tightens at the reminder. The wood, and Tjan, and wandering and not knowing and thinking Loki and the others were dead. The hopelessness he felt at talking to his parents. Everything. And the sorcerer made sure that he wouldn't go mad before it happened. He put the sigils on Thor. He's right. He did have ample opportunity, and the realization makes something in Thor panic.

"Then what exactly do you hope to accomplish here?" Thor knows his sounds exasperated, but he can't pretend to try and be diplomatic about this. The man clearly doesn't care for such formalities anyway.

There's a slight popping sound, as if the air itself just snapped together, and a low blue flame starts in front of the sorcerer. The fire quickly spreads into a controlled circle, and Thor feels blood drain from his face. He recognizes that fire. "You…" he breathes, lifting his eyes up.

The Vanir's head spasms faintly. But his look is knowing, "Dragon flight is the fastest means of travel I know of. Your brother seemed rather keen on getting me there swiftly."

Thor swears under his breath. Of course. Because things can't get much worse now, can they? The sorcerer a shapeshifter. He was the wyvern. It makes sense, thinking back on it. If his goal was...this, whatever this is, all along, then separating them from the Warriors was part of the plan. He practically herded them into the Weeping Siren's field.

That would also explain the timing. Loki blew up the map, and not ten minutes later a dragon appeared. But it wasn't a dragon. It was the sorcerer he inadvertently-on purpose? Thor never asked-summoned to them.

Thor rubs a hand over his face. "Gods."

"As for your brother, I'm helping him, after a fashion. I'm slowing down his symptoms. He'd be dead within an hour if I didn't. I'd bear that in mind if I were you." The sorcerer's look is pointed. Thor's stomach tightens anxiously at the reminder.

The symptoms, the coughing and the blood; if Thor didn't know better, he'd say that the illness almost reminds him of the plague racing through the capital. But that doesn't make sense, because Thor didn't see symptoms advance this quickly while he was there, and…

Norns.

"We don't have time for this," Thor avers. Then, realizing that he may be able to use this, he adds, "Thousands are dying. We need to get back to Bo-An and offer aid. There's a sickness there that's killed hundreds." The sorcerer stares at him blankly, so Thor cautiously continues, "That's why we came here, for your help. The Vanir people are relying on you."

The sorcerer stares at him for a long moment before he rolls his eyes up. "How unfortunate."

Thor hadn't expected the sorcerer to break down into tears, but for the man to show some interest in the fact that thousands are dying would have been a reassurance. He just seems...cold. Distant. Tired.

Bitterly, the man adds, "Wouldn't it be terrible not to receive the aid you're desperately seeking?"

Thor hesitates, unsure what to say in response to that. He's scrambling for negotiation skills he doesn't have, having long relied on Loki's, because he has to help Loki, and he get out of here so they can return to the capital.

Keep them talking. "You...what do you mean?" Thor asks.

The sorcerer clicks his tongue. "The Vanir government has long been self conceited and narrow minded. I begged them for help with the forest when the burden fell to me, and they turned me away."

You're a myth and a legend. Thor wants to say. No one believes in your existence anymore. How can you have gone to the government?

Thor rubs a hand anxiously through Loki's hair. The soft locks offer him some comfort. "What burden?"

The sorcerer sighs heavily. "It wasn't mine to bear alone. Gods, if I could find Rydat, I'd murder her for abandoning me. This was just as much her prison as my own, selfish wretch. But no, she had to go and build her family." The sorcerer sneers the last word, and the fire crackles loudly, as if responding to his irritation.

Rydat. The Weeping Siren's name, he remembers.

Thor gapes at him for a moment. "Wait, you mean, you-you knew about the kidnapped children?"

"Why would I not?" the sorcerer scoffs, "I was there often enough."

Thor remembers the man's first words to him in the cellar, what feels like years ago instead of earlier today-if it was today, his sense of time is so warped in this place-you never knew her, did you?

Norns.

If he knew what was going on, why didn't he stop her from kidnapping nineteen children? For holding children captive for years? If he knew her so well, did he know about the beatings and the slow starvation? The Aethitian? The psychological destruction that she left in her wake? Did he know about that and do nothing?

"She's dead," Thor says suddenly, as if his mind just caught up with the conversation.

"What?" the sorcerer looks at him, and for the first time since Thor met him, he seems confused.

"Rydat," the name is unfamiliar on his tongue. "She's dead. Asgard executed her months ago."

The sorcerer's hand twitches faintly, like a shudder racing up from his palm to his shoulder. The man's lips twist. The man stops, looking at him with new eyes. Something else is hidden in the irises. Sorrow. He's mourning the creature. Norns! As if she's ever deserved tears.

The man looks at a loss for long seconds. Then angry. "Why? How on the Norns do you not know? What possessed you to kill her! Don't you know!? You did this to me! All of you! How could you be so cruel! DIDN'T YOU KNOW!?"

"Know what!?" Thor shouts, equally frustrated but his voice tight. He wants to throw something.

The man stares between the two of them, his face lined with anger that slowly bleeds from his features. Then, he closes his eyes, looking his years. "Gods, who am I kidding? You're still a child. You wouldn't know."

Thor's jaw sets. He's been of age for a very long time. He's not a child. Not anymore. Not even when he wants to be sometimes, just so he can once again have that innocence.

"She would have had immunity. For whatever she did, it was more important that she survived." The sorcerer hisses, then shifts his position, rocking his weight forward.

Thor scoffs loudly. His words are flat, "You're jesting."

The sorcerer opens his eyes. "Am I? How would you know? You know nothing about the Blodig Skog, that much is obvious. You condemned me to this slow suffering, and I didn't do anything to deserve it."

Thor doesn't know that he believes that, and feels horrible for it. He doesn't say that, instead admitting, "I don't understand,"

The man snarls, "The Blodig Skog, as you must be aware, at least, was created by a group of sorcerers. A Vanir woman had broken a sacred oath of sedir, and she was forced to give a blood sacrifice to the spell. Her spirit lives on in the woods."

Oh, Thor thinks, spent.

The curse. It's a haunting.The entire forest is ripe for dragr and other supernatural creatures. That, he supposes, would explain the feeling. But even still, it doesn't cover everything about the wood. Not the insanity, and not how anyone who enters the forest never leaves.

"Why? Why curse the wood at all?" Thor asks, "Didn't they see that it would have long-term consequences?"

The sorcerer shrugs. His foot fidgets. "Maybe they didn't care, perhaps it didn't seem important at the time. Who knows? The forest grew on to take a life of its own eventually. It's not the same wood it was when I was young. It's...darker."

Great. So whatever the problem is, it's getting worse with time instead of better. Spells rot with age, he remembers his mother explaining. Long after the caster is gone, the spells can't sustain themselves anymore. Sedir isn't a weapon, it's a science.

"But that's beside the point. The Blodig Skog needs sedirwielders to keep it contained. We make sure that it stays within the parameters the first casters gave among many thousand other details you'll never understand." The sorcerer explains heatedly.

Thor leans forward. "'We...' You?"

"I am." The sorcerer confirms. His left hand twitches. "I am Benar, son of Lui. My mother was one of the original casters of the forest." The Weeping Siren was the daughter of one, too. Thor remembers feeling surprised by that. Now there's only a growing sense of dread. "Rydat and I were the last descendants still alive. There were thirteen casters. Only four had heirs. It's a familial burden, to have to care for this forest."

Thor's mind is spinning. "Wait. So you mean...the forest. The Weeping-Rydat. She was here because it was her job to look out for the forest?"

She didn't just want to hide the evidence of her kidnappings. But of course it wasn't just that. Her children were raised here, weren't they? This was their home. The Weeping Siren raised a family here. Not by choice, it would seem, but because she had to. It was her job.

Norns.

"Yes." Benar confirms. He sighs, his eyes seeming to grow darker, "We were the last remains of the keepers. I can't keep the forest alive anymore. I'm not as young as I used to be. I have my limitations, and all of Vanaheim is suffering because of my weakness."

Nausea builds in the back of his throat. He asks, his stomach thick with dread, "So you mean to say...when...when we executed the-Rydat, we caused this? We broke the balance, and that released the Blodig Skog?"

Benar bares his teeth, his neck doing that strange spasm-jerk again. "Yes. You did this to me. You owe me."

Norns, he's right.

I am innocent, the Weeping Siren kept saying. Thor wonders if what she really meant was I am immune, because Benar is right. Her life would have been more important for the stability of the Vanir people than her crimes. Even imprisonment would have been a safer option than execution. They caused this.

But did they? Because, Norns, Thor feels frustrated. If Governor Tusin could drag up information about her family history, her husband's betrayal and her murder of him and they can't manage to find any connections between the Weeping Siren's position in the forest and the possibility that she may be a guardian?

But why would they have been looking for it?

The guardians were a myth. A story passed around to entertain children. They weren't something to fear or look after. If no one ever told them, how were they supposed to know?

Thor whispers, again, "What is that you're hoping to get from me, then? We didn't know any of this. Loki suffered at Rydat's hands terribly. He doesn't deserve what you're doing to him."

"I don't care about your brother!" Benar snarls. "He can rot. I just need you to do the ritual and end this." At Thor's blank look, he explains in an irritated rush, "There's a pool beneath the forest at its center that connects the Blodig Skog with Yggdrasil. A willing blood sacrifice would need to be given to the water in order to sever the ties with Yggidsdrial. Once that was done, then the forest would be cut off from any sedir. The spell would be broken."

They…

That's…

Ending the Blodig Skog is an option?

"Why...why has no one done this before?" Thor asks. "If all of you were so exhausted of taking care of the forest, why did none of you try to stop it completely?"

Benar levels him with a hard stare, annoyed. As if the two of them were supposed to know this already. "Because we couldn't. The spell prevents casters and their descendants from interfering with it. Someone unrelated to the casters would have to end the spell."

Like me.

"A blood sacrifice. Someone has to die." Thor says. The words out loud feel dirty. He doesn't want to face the consequences of them. Because of course it would have to be them. The forest can never let them go. They'll never be free of it, and now one of them is going to die to stop it.

Because that's their job. Their duty. They're meant to protect the Nine. Even at the cost of their own lives.

"They don't call it the bloody forest for nothing, child. People die here all the time. Their blood never dries and the forest is always soaked. It's time for it to come to an end. What is one life in the face of thousands?" Benar growls.

What indeed. Nothing. It's not even a question. "Why…" Thor pauses, "why did you not just say this from the beginning? I'll help you. I don't want this forest here any more than you do."

Benar laughs. Then his eyes fill with sorrow. "The bloody forest," he murmurs, "Wo de jian yu. My prison. Always."

Thor closes his eyes for a moment, breathing in shakily. A blood sacrifice. Death. Benar intends to kill him, because if Thor doesn't agree to the ritual, he'll kill Loki instead. It's an unnecessary motivation. Thor knows that this needs to be done. Even if he's terrified of the prospect.

Somewhere, deep within him, he feels like he's always known he would die protecting his family.

"Loki doesn't need to be a part of this," Thor says quietly. "Let him go. He deserves to go home. To live."

"He's had a part in this since Rydat took him," Benar snarls. "And he'll have a part in it until I say it's over." He extinguishes the flame, and Loki's body drags itself to standing, the balance tipsy and off. "Get to your feet. We've dithered enough. You can crawl for all I care."

Thor gets to his aching legs. His balance feels lopsided and off, and he grabs at the wall desperately. It's only after his gaze flicks to the back of Loki's head that he realizes that he'd been expecting Loki to grab him. He didn't realize Loki had been doing it so often.

His brother's care is often subtle instead of loud. Thor forgets that.

He grits his teeth, closing his eyes for a moment, holding back frustrated tears.

For Loki, Thor thinks, and pushes forward.

Chapter Text

Thor doesn't know how long they wander in the dark. He's not sure that he cares. It's just one endless road after a thousand of the same. He's been here before. He's fought this before. The caves feel endless, and Benar's drive to drag them through the entire labyrinth is unprecedented. Thor finds himself beginning to hide in the back of his mind, retreating from this entire experience. It's a familiar feeling; this empty, lonely waiting.

It's how he survived the Blodig Skog. But if he's being honest with himself, he's not sure how much more mental stamina he has left to spare.

Loki, for his part, does not get better. Even with Benar's spell, his brother grows worse. The blue coloring stretches up his arms to the edge of his throat, lingering like some sort of rash. It slowly begins to hurt when Thor tries to touch it, so cold that it feels numbing. Soft ridges appear on his brother's hands as well; feeling like swollen veins when Thor touches them. He's terrified of what this means because blue skin is often one step away from dead limb and even if the coloring isn't quite right, does it matter? Loki always has to do things his own way.

He doesn't know what to do.

He wishes he did.

Loki would have fought Benar. He wouldn't have let the old Vanir drag Thor around like some sort of puppet for what must be days. He wouldn't have let them get captured in the first place because he never would have been stupid enough to go exploring the Weeping Siren's hovel on a whim. Thor burns with his inadequacy and hates himself and Benar all the more for it.

On one of the breaks, Thor doesn't know if it's day or night, a week from the cellar or a year, Thor dully lifts his hands over the blue dragon flame that Benar conjures for momentary warmth. The caves have only grown worse in temperature the further they've progressed; the constant frigidity making them feel like a prison or a punishment.

Benar is reading through a different book, his gaze thoughtful. Thor doesn't know where the man gets the texts but assumes that he's storing them in some sort of cache. Loki does the same. When he's not…

Thor glances up at his sibling, sitting still beside Benar, rigid, expression empty. Norns, it's so disconcerting to see him look like that. Thor would trade his soul for Loki to wake from this...stupor. The word doesn't feel right, but Thor doesn't have a better one for it.

Thor pulls his gaze away with effort, returning it to his hands. They're coated with dirt, as hands always seem to be when outdoors is involved for long periods of time, no matter if you've been around any dust in the first place.

Thor scrapes some of the black dirt away from the edge of his left pointer finger with the nail of his right thumb. It flakes off in chunks. That's not...Thor pauses, eyes narrowing. That looks like skin. He turns his hands over carefully. There hasn't been much light while they've been down here, only Loki's lamp with Benar's long-lasting flame inside.

In the blue light of Benar's dragon fire, Thor studies his palms carefully. The edges of his fingers are white and blistered, the skin beneath that a bright red. It looks like he grabbed something hot and it burned him. The dirt he scraped off wasn't dirt. It was flakes of frost and dead skin from blisters.

Frost?

Thor carefully bends his fingers, feeling nausea at the sight of his swollen fingernails, tinged purple. What the Norns? It's cold down here, yes, but not cold enough for frostbite. He swallows compulsively, touching the white skin. He can't feel anything. He knows logically that his fingers are touching because he can see it, but it's like watching someone else's hands move.

Those aren't my hands, Thor remembers telling Loki what feels like a lifetime ago.

Thor's gaze flicks up to his brother by instinct, a question on his tongue, a plea for assistance, for Loki to pull some sort of solution out of nothing that he heard of in a book somewhere. But he stops himself before he opens his mouth, because Loki's glazed eyes stare back at him, vacant.

Thor's gaze drops to Loki's hands, blue, black, swollen and possibly dead, and wonders. Gods, what if it's contagious, whatever's wrong with him? And me, like an idiot, I've gone and got myself infected with the same problem.

But it has to be some sort of spell. Not...a sickness. That doesn't…

Loki was coughing. He was feverish, weak, and tired.

But sick?

Thor clenches his hands, trying to bury evidence of what he's discovered. If he tucks his fingers into a careful curl, making sure to keep his fingernails buried inside his palm, it's almost impossible to see save a lingering redness.

"You shouldn't touch him." Benar's voice, raspy and quiet as it is, startles Thor. He bites harshly on the tip of his tongue to stop himself from swearing.

"What?" Thor asks, looking up.

Benar is still staring at the book tucked on his lap, gaze pinched. Thor thinks that he's imagined the man speaking altogether, but then the sorcerer's ancient eyes lift up to him. "You shouldn't touch him, your brother, it will only make that worse." He tips his chin toward Thor's hands.

He knows. Thor, stupidly, automatically tucks his hands against his chest, trying to hide them. He's a child, Norns.

"Why?" Thor asks, dropping his hands into his lap. He grimaces when he realizes he can't feel anything below his wrists touching his thighs. He hadn't realized this was happening. How long have his fingers been without feeling? He doesn't remember this in the Weeping Siren's hovel, but maybe he wasn't paying enough attention. No, Loki would have noticed, even if Thor didn't.

Benar sighs, as if the idea of talking to Thor is exhausting. On top of the book, his fingers spasm. "Your skin against his skin is a bad idea. You're hurting yourself." The sorcerer says the words very slowly, as if he doesn't expect Thor to understand him.

But touching him, Thor wants to protest, is the only way that I feel I can help. Loki obviously can't hear him, but maybe he can feel Thor gripping his wrist on occasion and it helps keep him here. Reminds him that he isn't by himself.

Thor feels his expression darken. "As you intended?"

The sorcerer rolls his eyes, flexing out his hand. "Believe what you will, Odinson, but I am not in charge of the will of the universe."

What? What does that have to do with anything? Thor shakes his head, annoyed. His voice has a hard edge, "Do you honestly think I don't know this is your fault? You made him this way. This is your doing. If you don't want me to damage my hands, then fix him."

The sorcerer sighs, muttering something that sounds like insolent child under his breath in Vanir. He returns to his book and ignores Thor, a multitask that he's become good at.

Thor grits his teeth, lifting his hands up to the flames again. The blue dragon flame is warm against his wrists, but Thor couldn't say if he was sticking his palm into the coals. He can't feel it. The numb, white, blistered skin looks back at him, taunting.

Desperate for a distraction, he casts his gaze up. Thor manages to catch a glimpse of the edge of the sorcerer's book and realizes with some surprise that it's written in ink, not printed. It's some sort of journal, scientific or personal, because that's ancient Vanir scribbled all over the pages in uneven, faded lines. The paper is thin and almost see-through, brittle with age.

Thor has to swallow twice before it feels like he can speak. "What is that?" he nudges his chin in the direction of the book.

Benar looks up at him beneath thin eyebrows, scowling. "A book." He says, irritated.

Obviously.

Thor pushes his tongue against the back of his teeth. "I can see that." He answers, gesturing toward the item in question. The sorcerer pulls the book closer to his stomach as if afraid Thor is going to yank it from his hands. Thor doesn't know why he bothers, it's not like Thor can read it. And there are no helpful, convenient pictures for him to try and guess the meaning of the book with.

"Good. You're not blind. You must be proud." Benar sneers.

Thor flicks his gaze up to the cave ceiling, trying to quell annoyance. There's just something about this man that makes Thor want to hit him every time he opens his mouth. "I mean," Thor says, managing not to grit his teeth with considerable effort, "that you're always reading those books. Why?"

Benar's fingers twitch. "For information."

Gods. It's like wringing water from a rock.

"What information?"

"The ritual." Benar's eyes flick to the side for a moment, then he sighs heavily; resigning himself to the conversation. "I want to get it right the first try. I can't keep waiting around for people to try their hand at the forest."

Thor feels apprehension settle in his stomach. "What do you mean?"

"I mean," the Vanir shakes his head, "that I have no intention of waiting any longer. I want to get it right the first time."

The ritual. The killing. Thor feels the now-familiar thrum of anxiety as he thinks of it, wanting nothing more than to retreat or run. But that's not going to happen, because if ending the Blodig Skog and freeing everyone from the curse is how they win this, then Thor will lay down his life. That's what a king is supposed to do.

But does it make him a coward, then, that the idea is terrifying? Aesir die in battle all the time, and their names are carried into Valhalla with respect and honor, but Thor has never wanted that fate for himself. He never expected it would happen. His father has made his place on the throne seem like it was a constant, and Thor never worried that he would die young.

The illusion of immortality is a gift that Thor wishes he could live in again.

He bites on the inside of his cheek and exhales slowly. This is what has to happen. His life versus thousands is not a choice.

"Is it a complex process?" Thor asks, referring to the ritual.

Benar scowls at him once more before returning to his book. Thor represses a sigh, realizing that if he wants an answer to that, he'll have to fight for it. He doesn't know if he has the will for that. He's tired, cold, and miserable.

"Is it?" Thor pushes, figuring that he'll annoy information out of Benar anyway.

Benar ignores him through several more verbal nudges before exhaling slowly. "No, not from what I can see. Rydat would have known more than I do, Norns curse her."

Thor's head tilts at that, curious. How? She was mad. "What do you mean?"

Benar's fingers smack impatiently on the book. "I mean that she spent a good majority of our lives keeping me from this ritual. She guarded the direct entrance to the tunnels, keeping the Xīn Zhī Chí from me. Now, now I can finally end the Blodig Skog without her making constant efforts to cease any progress."

So that's where they are, then. The tunnels beneath the Blodig Skog.

Norns.

That's...he hates—he hates—that the behavior of the Weeping Siren's idiosyncrasies makes more sense when he learns more about her. It's like accepting everything she did as okay, and it wasn't. Someone has yet to give him a reasonable answer for why she kidnapped and held twenty-four hostage. Her reasons for being in the forest—those make sense. Everything else doesn't. And nothing will convince him otherwise.

"'Xīn Zhī Chí'?" Thor asks instead.

"The pond. It's the official name," Benar waves a hand, "yet another detail Rydat didn't bother to give me. It's like she thought I couldn't be trusted." He laughs darkly at this and shakes his head, clearly irritated.

Thor raises his eyebrows but decides to say nothing.

"So the ritual takes place over this Xīn Zhī Chí?" Thor asks.

"Yes. The Xīn Zhī Chí is an integral part," Benar explains, "the free will sacrifice has to kill themselves at the edge of the pond, when their body hits the Xīn Zhī Chí, according to this"—he lifts up the book—"they'll be dead instantly. Their lifeforce breaks the spell."

Thor swallows, glancing at his brother. "That doesn't seem overly complicated."

"I need to know how they die," Benar says, "these can be annoyingly specific."

"Sedir always is," Thor agrees, carefully rubbing two fingers together. He watches them touch and the skin push against one another but can feel nothing.

Benar grunts at Thor's comment as if he's unsure whether or not to protest or agree.

Later, when the sorcerer makes them get up and puts out the flame, Thor still grabs Loki's wrist. At least, until Benar sharply slaps Thor's hand away with a pointed look. "Don't damage yourself any further," Benar commands, "you may need to do something with your hands."

Because it's not concern. Just irritation that Thor would dare to help his brother over fulfilling Benar's wishes.

000o000

Sometime later—days, weeks, years—Thor wakes up to the sound of vomiting. It sounds painful and hoarse, almost like fingers are being stuffed down someone's throat to scrape something up via fingernails.

Thor carefully rolls to his back, then sits up, hands carefully placed in his lap, curled into numb fists. At least, he thinks they are. When he glances at them, they're resting flat on his legs, and he curls them with effort.

He sweeps his eyes across the cave, looking for the source. Loki is slumped beside him, eyes closed and head tipped back against the rocks as if his neck is broken. He's breathing, which is Thor's only comfort. He represses an involuntary shudder at the sight, closing his eyes only momentarily before he turns away.

He spots Benar some dozen feet away in the meager lamplight, heaving up blood.

Thor stares at him.

As awful as it is, he feels no desire to help. His leg throbs dully beneath his knee making movement a chore, and if Benar keels over, Thor's not going to protest. So long as whatever hold he has over Loki ends.

Benar coughs wetly, sitting up shakily and wiping blood from his face with a trembling hand. One of his fingers spasms and smacks him in the face instead, and Benar swears darkly in his native tongue in between heavy pants.

Thor swallows twice before he can say anything, "What's wrong with you?"

Benar looks back at him, his reflective eyes sharpening. Blood is smeared down his beard, casting color into the white in horrifying criss-cross patterns. "Nothing." He snaps.

Thor raises an eyebrow, "You look like death."

"I am death," Benar snarls and gets to his feet. He wobbles, having to grab at the slippery cave wall to stop himself from falling flat on his face. Thor doesn't move, watching him warily. Benar closes his eyes, forcing his exhalations to lengthen. It doesn't seem to be working, and he coughs again, spitting more blood into an awaiting palm.

Gods. What is wrong with him?

Thor opens his mouth to say something, but a hand clamps over his wrist. Thor's eyes widen, his breath catching in his chest. His eyes drop to the blue fingers clamped over his skin, following them up to Loki's face. His brother's pale skin is soaked with sweat, his breath a faint wheeze.

His eyes are still squeezed shut, head lying in that awkward angle, but for the first time in days—weeks, months, years?—Thor feels as though his brother is actually there. Thor grabs Loki's wrist with his other hand, squeezing it in reassurance.

Thor's gaze turns back toward the sorcerer and the blood bubbling out of him. He remembers, faintly, as if from a dream, Loki explaining to him that overexerting yourself in sorcery can lead to the body doing a forced bloodletting. Sedir is another form of blood, and when it's overstrained, it snaps back violently.

But the sorcerer has shown no evidence of strain. At least, as far as Thor is aware, but his knowledge of sedir is hopelessly limited.

Thor grips the cold wrist beneath his own. Maybe...maybe this is happening because Loki is fighting back. Norns, he hopes so. What he would give for that to be the case, instead of Loki's sudden free will—limited as it is—being some sort of by-product of Benar's lack of control. Or whatever this is.

"Loki," Thor whispers hopefully, barely daring to breathe.

Please, please, please.

Thor watches Loki's face, looking for minute expressions, looking for his brother. But there's nothing there save faint strain and eyes rapidly moving back and forth underneath closed lids. He looks like he's dreaming.

Come on, Thor urges him on. You can do this.

Loki doesn't escape his prison.

Benar slams a fist against the wall, letting out a sound of frustration, and spits onto the floor. His hand shakes, sliding against the wall and leaving a bloody smear against the stone. Thor watches, tense and feeling faintly sick, braced to put himself in front of his sibling should Benar's temper turn on them.

The sorcerer's eyes alight sharply with a faint green, and Loki makes a sound in the back of his throat like he's being impaled slowly. Loki's grip goes lax against Thor's wrist, and Thor whips his head back toward the sorcerer, dawning comprehension slowly sinking into him. The sorcerer is siphoning power off his brother.

Thor swears under his breath, surging up to his feet.

How dare he!

Benar breathes out slowly, relaxing, his shoulders dropping. He breathes easier and the shudders slacken considerably. Loki's skin goes faintly gray, and he looks like he couldn't move a muscle even if he was begged. Thor's teeth set.

Thor starts to move toward Benar, not exactly sure what he plans to do except cause bodily harm, but Loki's hand clamps around his wrist. Thor turns to face him, hope jumping into his throat. Loki's eyes, still slightly hazed and glassy, look back at him. They're red-rimmed, looking as though he's been rubbing at them, or he's about to cry.

"Th...Thr...C-cold," Loki whispers with an exhale of air, then his body slumps to the floor, boneless.

"Loki," Thor collapses to his knees beside him, grabbing Loki's shoulders to shake him roughly. But Loki doesn't react to anything. Not when Thor slaps him, or when he rubs at his sternum, nothing. His brother might as well be dead save a faint rattle.

Thor swears; hopeless, tired, and angry.

He settles his brother against the ground with a gentleness he doesn't feel, then gets up to his feet. The air tastes like ozone, and Thor can feel his blood practically cackling. For the first time since that bloody quest, since everything, Thor feels powerful.

He turns furiously toward Benar. "Release him." His voice isn't loud, but in the space of the cave, it doesn't need to be. It sounds heavy and commanding, the way that his father's has always been and Thor has eternally wanted his own to be. It doesn't sound like his voice. It's...cold.

Benar raises his eyes up and grins. "No. No, I think not."

Thor's head tips to the left, his eyes narrowing. His face feels hot. "If you kill him, I won't help you."

Benar doesn't seem intimidated. His lip twitches up, as if he finds the entire thing hysterical. "It's funny, you thinking you have some sort of say in this. Odinson, how many times do I have to tell you? You hold no cards here." Benar sneers. He waves a hand, and Thor sees Loki jerk in his peripheral vision, then curl in on himself in a full body shudder.

And something in Thor just—snaps. Like glass breaking across the floor; messy, irreparable, and loud.

Not this time.

Thor lurches the distance between the two of them and slams his fist into Benar's face. The wave of power that ripples off of his skin into the ancient Vanir's feels like getting slapped by vibration alone. Benar is slammed into the slippery wall, head cracking. He stumbles away from it, clearly dazed, but lifts up his hands in defense.

Thor doesn't care. He advances, feeling something hot in his core; like an ignition. He can't stop it, and he wouldn't want to try.

Benar casts some sort of sorcery at him, but Thor brushes it off. It stings, obviously, but he's not stopped. Because Thor feels like the very air has become a part of him, swallowing him, consuming him.

He moves with fluidity he hasn't felt since his leg was broken.

Benar's offense grows more rapid, but it means nothing.

Thor lifts up a hand, his stomach muscles tightening and—releases something in him. Lightning sparks across the length of his arm, as if his fingers are Mjonlir, and slams into Benar's chest. The man goes flying back, electricity zapping across his entire body.

Thor stalks after him, a dragr in the making, and hauls the old, smoking Vanir off the floor by the throat. "I told you," Thor spits, angry, his voice still that cold, empty nothingness, "to release him."

The Vanir's narrow eyes have dulled to a blurry brown. His face sags and he looks, for the first time that Thor can remember since meeting him, afraid. Good, Thor thinks darkly. He should be.

"I do that," Benar's fingers scrabble to grab at Thor's forearm, trying to relieve the pressure on his throat. "And he dies. You want that?"

Thor narrows his eyes, and feels the air spazz around them, "Do I look to be in a gaming mood?"

"I'm not jesting!" Benar gasps, "Why would I lie about this?"

Why would he not?

"Then tell me what you did to him!" Thor growls. "Surely you didn't intend for his death."

Benar's bare toes smack against Thor's calf, desperation obvious. Thor releases him a fraction, letting him get air to talk. "I infected him," Benar explains in a rush, "I infected him with the sickness that's racing through the capital. I release him from the status I put his body in, and he'll be dead in days. Tell me how that benefits you."

What?

Thor snorts, laughing darkly. He gestures back to his brother. "Does he look well to you!? He's getting worse. Whatever magic you've cast on him isn't working."

Benar snarls angrily, fingers clawing into Thor's forearm. "It's working fine, you dolt!"

"He's turning blue!" Thor counters in disbelief.

Benar stares at him, as if utterly wordless for long seconds. Then he begins to laugh. His lips split up into something utterly joyous and it makes Thor want to hit him again. "Gods, you don't—you don't know?" He laughs again, as if this is some sort of inside joke. Thor's teeth set. He doesn't ask, because he's terrified of the answer. Ignorance is easier. It's always easier.

"Nevermind that," he growls, "give him back his magic. Now." Benar wiggles, scowling at Thor darkly. Thor lifts up his other hand, lightning crackling between his fingers. He lifts it up to Benar's face. His voice is low, "Think very carefully about your next words."

He means it.

He'll take this man's eyes if he has to. He'd kill for Loki. He has killed for Loki.

The Vanir must see the truth of Thor's words in his face, because, though he's silent for long seconds, he lifts out one hand, growling under his breath. Thor hears Loki gasp sharply behind him, as if breathing for the first time in days.

Thor drops Benar to the floor, shoving him roughly. The man stumbles, barely managing to catch his balance. His glare is dark when Thor meets his eyes.

"I'm working with you," Thor reminds the man coldly, "not for you. Remember that. You don't hold all the cards. You're holding as many as I allow."

He turns his back to the man and returns to his sibling's side. The powerful, flaming core in his stomach seems to settle at the sight of his brother, as if breathing for the first time in years. Loki is curled in on himself, his teeth set, eyes clenched shut, fists curled tightly against his stomach. He looks as if he's in agony.

He kneels down next to Loki, carefully resting a hand on his brother's arm. "Loki," Thor whispers.

Loki's hand reaches a shaky hand out and grabs Thor's wrist again, the grip painful in its intensity and chill. Thor doesn't say anything, letting Loki clamp onto him, glad to offer any sort of relief, meager as it is. "I'm here, little brother," he promises, hoping Loki can hear him in the haze of pain. He rests a hand on Loki's hair, running numb fingers through the stiff locks.

They stay like that for a long time.

000o000

"Wh-wheeere are w-w-e goin-g?" Loki whispers harshly.

Loki can barely talk, his throat ravaged from coughing. His entire body is racked with violent shivers that make Thor's bones ache. His eyes are clear and flit around the space with obvious wariness, but he's alert and alive and Thor could ask for nothing else.

Thor is careful to be gentle with him, trying to help where he can in the face of his brother's pain. Overall, Loki just seems cold. Endlessly, hopelessly cold. It's odd. In all of their long lives, Thor can never remember Loki being cold. It's as if the resistance he was born with was stripped away and left him raw and vulnerable to it.

But there's a vast difference between wandering the caves with only Benar for company and having Loki at his side. His brother, quiet and exhausted as he is, helps Thor's mood considerably.

Benar is wary of Thor after, as if afraid that Thor will bite him. It's an arrangement that Thor doesn't protest at, glad to put distance between himself and the Vanir. The old sorcerer still drives them forward, hissing and snappish, but it's muted.

Loki can't walk by himself—can barely stand—so Thor swings his sibling's arm around his shoulders and hauls him forward. Thor takes the lamp, not trusting Loki capable of holding it. Loki stumbles beside him as if heavily intoxicated, but his eyes hold clarity they haven't in a long time. Even though he can barely talk, he doesn't need to. Thor and his sibling share glances sometimes, an understanding passing between them.

"This...pond. The Xīn Zhī Chí. I don't know," Thor says in answer to Loki's question. "Benar, the sorcerer, wants to do some sort of ritual with it."

Loki swears under his breath.

"Yeah," Thor sighs in agreement.

His brother shivers violently, his jaw gritting as if trying to keep himself from biting his tongue. "D-do yo...u know what it is? Th-the-the ritual?"

Thor pauses. He debates with himself for long seconds. Loki would protest, he knows, and he doesn't want to argue with him. For right now, he's just grateful to have his brother back. "A sacrifice of some sort," Thor says.

It's not really lying if it's just an omission.

Loki hums tiredly, as if too exhausted to push further answers out of Thor.

Thor takes relief in this and firmly buries any lingering guilt.

000o000

Loki didn't think that he would recognize their destination on sight. When Thor mentioned a pond, he thought it would be a dark crevice of water hidden behind rocks and stuffed into some obscure corner of the tunnels, easily forgotten.

It's not.

The...Xīn Zhī Chí, Loki thinks Thor called it, is enormous. It's easily deep enough for a warship to sail across and wide enough that it would be needed. Loki can barely see the other side, and if not for the natural dark red luminescence that spreads from the rocks on the bottom of the crystal-clear pond, he wouldn't be able to.

The entire area looks like someone let a child have a go with glowing paint, sparkling and breathtaking. The ceiling above is speckled with what looks like stars. It's beautiful. And immensely overwhelming. The magic is almost like intoxication, so powerful that it burns when he breathes and makes his shaking limbs grow numb.

The glow from within the pond pulses faintly, like a weakened heartbeat.

The Xīn Zhī Chí. The pool of heart.

"Oh," Thor inhales beside him; about the extent of noise Loki thinks he could make himself if he could talk easily.

"Ha!" Benar cries triumphantly upon seeing the Xīn Zhī Chí. He throws up his hands in victory, elated. "That witch! She thought she could sway me, but no! I won—at last!"

The sorcerer turns toward them both, his gaze hungry. Loki bites on his tongue to quell nausea. He's not sure how much longer he can remain in this room without forcefully purging himself to try and balance out his body with the energy of the room.

Benar smiles, showing teeth. His gaze shifts to Thor, "Pay up, boy. This was our pro quid pro. I didn't just drag you to the center of the forest for you to stare at it."

Thor stiffens beside him, suddenly looking gray. He knows what Benar means.

Wait…Loki stares at his brother, realization slowly dawning in his foggy, pain-addled mind. Thor said that Benar wanted to make some sort of sacrifice. He...Thor. He wants to sacrifice Thor.

"Th-Thor." Loki murmurs, silently cursing his weakened voice. He coughs into one hand, wiping the blood on his shirt.

"You swore," Benar reminds, impatiently, "your life for your brother's. That was the deal."

"T-Thor." Loki says more urgently.

But Thor is breathing in to steady himself, and slowly lets Loki go. Loki sways, struggling to remain standing. He has to tighten his stomach muscles in order to remain hunched over, and coughs hoarsely.

Even still, he grabs at his brother's wrist and—Gods, what on helheim is wrong with my arm? It's blue, his fingernails black. He hadn't noticed that until now. His veins look swollen, causing ridges to appear across his arm in what almost looks like an intentional design.

This...What did Benar do to him?

He's never heard of a spell like this.

"Thor," Loki says forcefully. His brother looks at him, and Loki can see the resolve crumple a fraction. "Do-does he-he mean to k-kill you?"

Thor sighs. Yes, then. And he knew, Loki can see it on his face. He knew the entire time, and Norns, Loki is going to kill him. "No." Loki protests.

Loki could laugh. No. Loki would kill a thousand for him. He'd bring cities to their knees if it meant his brother would live. It terrifies him, the things he'd do for his family. How there is almost no limit to the blood and desecration. As long as they were safe.

"Loki," Thor closes his eyes. "It's for the better of Vanaheim. Doing this ritual breaks the spell on the Blodig Skog. If I do this, then the people will be free. It's not a choice, brother. I have to do this."

The entire forest? Everything would be over? Gods. That sounds wonderful. But not...not at the cost of his brother. Loki scowls at him, trying to hide flaring panic behind anger. "N-n-no."

Thor shakes his head, "It's not a choice." He repeats.

Of course not. But it doesn't have to be you. Loki thinks, if it's just one of us..."J-just...one person?" Loki asks for clarification. He's already mad. His loss wouldn't be a great one.

He breathes out.

"No." Thor says with force. Loki startles, looking at his brother, whose expression has grown fierce and angry. As if he read every thought that crossed Loki's mind. Maybe he had. Sometimes he forgets how well his brother knows him. "No, I won't let you do this."

He's not surprised that Thor's not protesting that they do it at all. They both know that's not an option. He just doesn't want Loki to die. Loki feels himself slump slightly, "Th-Thor..or," he sighs, "th-ther-ere's not really another...opt-tion. You're Asgard's heir, I'm n-n-not."

Thor's expression grows pained. "That doesn't mean you don't deserve to live."

What do I have to live for? Loki thinks miserably. Centuries more of this insanity? The feeling of solitude swallowing him? He doesn't want the throne, and Thor dying would mean that it ends up with him. He doesn't know what he's meant to do, but ruling a kingdom isn't part of that. Maybe this is it. Maybe his entire life has led up to this moment. One noble sacrifice for the Snake Prince.

And besides. That's only assuming he lives.

Which…

"You c-c-an't die." Loki says. Norns call him selfish, but he couldn't handle watching Thor die. No. It's not an option. Never.

"You can?" Thor protests, pulling his hand away from Loki. Loki has to lean back on his heals to stop himself from toppling over. His brother shifts his weight, folding his arms across his chest, trying to make himself appear hard. But Loki has been arguing with his brother since he could talk. There's little he can do that will shut Loki up.

"Whaaat m-makes you a b-b-etter option?" Loki snaps. He wishes his brother would shut up. Talking feels like torture.

"Because it's not you!"

They're going in circles. Loki shakes his head, baffled. He clenches his fingers, digging them into his palms. Norns, they're beginning to burn. It's like they're bruised.

"Th-Thor…" he sighs. There isn't another option. It's just him.

"No. No. As prince-heir, it's my duty to look out for the citizens of the Nine. Not yours. Asgard needs you. They'll do fine without me."

Loki scoffs. "I-i-diot."

Thor's eyes narrow, and he jabs harshly into Loki's shoulder with one finger. "I'm not going to let you die. You're my little brother, Loki."

"So you-you think I'm j-just going to l-let you?"

"Norns!" Benar snaps, and both of them pause, turning to look at him. He's holding his head in one hand, looking as though he's lost all his composure. His skin has taken on a sickly, white sheen. It's the pond, Loki realizes. It's making him sick. "I don't care who dies, just end it." Benar demands. His entire body is beginning to tremble, his breaths coming out as harsh pants.

Thor takes a step closer toward the man, "What's wrong with you?"

It looks like the sorcerer's entire body is trying to claw its way out of a layer of skin. He's off-balance, nails digging into his hair as if braced to remove great chunks. His eyes are glassy.

"M-magic...ov-over…" Loki tries the word several times, frustrated. "Over-dose."

"What?" Thor looks back at him now.

Loki lifts a shaking hand out to the pond, trying to convey his meaning. He's careful to entrap his sedir inside of him, terrified. The sensation is overwhelming, of course, but when magical overdoses happen, any spells in use become amplified. Sedir gets strained to its limits and beyond.

"I don't…" Thor says, helpless.

"B-Bad?" Loki offers.

Benar gasps sharply, collapsing to his knees. Loki and Thor move toward him automatically, and Loki has to grab at his brother to stop himself from toppling. His legs feel stiff, swollen, and painful. Movement is a punishment and breathing is a curse.

"E-End yo-your spells," Loki says, and the sorcerer shakes his head, looking angry. "Y-you-youh have," Allfathers, why can't he just talk, "have to pull magic back t-to you."

Loki reaches out a hand, unsure exactly what he was planning to do, but his finger brushes the man's forehead, and he snaps his blue—why is it blue, what happened to him—hand back to his chest. His skin is hot to the touch. Burning, almost.

Benar's eyes have closed, his skin deathly pale. He's beginning to sway, unable to hold his weight; Loki curses, and lifts out his hand again, aching.

He wants to lay down.

He wants to curl into his nothingness and let death consume him.

He swears under his breath, casting a quick spell, trying to find a diagnosis. The moment that his sedir makes contact with Benar's, Loki's vision goes black. Hot, burning pain scrapes through his blood like his sedir is attempting to expel itself forcefully through his skin.

His fingers pulse and Loki loses himself to the pain for long seconds.

When he can manage to get his eyes open, Thor is leaning over him, his eyes wide and panicked. He's swearing loudly in their native tongue. "'m fine," Loki mumbles, shoving away Thor's hand when it tries to touch his face. Loki sits up slowly, Thor's hands a brace against his back and shoulders.

What on the Norns is wrong with him?

Sedir shouldn't feel like… Norns, Loki doesn't even know what that felt like. Death? Torture?

Benar has begun to shake. As they watch, he turns toward them slowly, his eyes a milky white. The smile he gives is crooked. He coughs harshly once, "Stabbing. It's a stab. In the heart." He says weakly. "For the ritual."

"What on Yggdrial is wrong with you?" Thor demands, his fingers tightening around Loki's shoulders.

Benar laughs, coughing blood and sedir up. It spills down his chin. "The bloody forest," he breathes. Then in a mutter of Vanir, "Wǒ de jiānyù. My prison." He sighs, "Not...anymore."

Frigga. His sedir felt like Frigga.

Loki swears, frantically backing up, grabbing Thor's arm and pulling him along. Thor goes with a startled sound. "You." Loki says. "It-It was y-y-ou. You're-you caused the-the pl-plague." He's only heard of cases of this few and far inbetween. A sedirmaster causing some sort of infection. He knows it's possible, but Norns, he can't imagine doing it.

Benar lifts his head weakly from the floor. His eyes, narrowed into slits, are delighted. "I...am th-the plague, boy."

His sedir is...rotted. And he's...Loki doesn't understand the logistics of this completely, but he knows enough. He is the plague. His infection is going to kill their mother. Kill thousands. It has killed thousands. And he's delighted by this.

Sadist.

"You…" Thor breathes. His hands curl into fists. He storms forward before Loki can stop him, and grabs the old man, yanking him off the floor by the front of his rags, shaking him harshly. "You've killed thousands! Don't you care!?"

"Wǒ de jiānyù." Benar breathes again. He laughs once more, a harsh, grating noise, coughing roughly, and spits blood onto Thor's face. It's contaminated, Loki thinks frantically, he's going to make Thor sick with this. "Not anymore. Now—ha!—now you h-h-have to kill the wood in order for anyone to survive. I poisoned the magic in it. I rotted it, and it will never get better unless you end it."

I was a good mother. The Weeping Siren's heated defense comes to his mind. She was self righteous. She was insane. Benar is no different. These woods...they change you. Maybe the weight of trying to carry them did irreparable damage to the two sedirwielders, and they went crazy together. She kidnapped and held people hostage for years, and Benar slaughtered thousands in order to make a statement.

Thor punches Benar in the face. The Vanir's entire body rocks with the motion, and shakes violently. Thor drops him, disgusted, and takes a step back, wiping the bloody spit away from his cheek.

Benar's head rolls to the side and empty eyes stare back at Loki, that grin still lopsided across his lips. "This...is...your prison...now. Wǒ zìyóule."

I'm free. His body goes completely still. The entire room seems to suck in a breath, and Loki finds himself tensing, waiting, his heart in his throat, stomach at his knees. All he can think is a long stream of swears.

He won't release the spell. He won't release the spell because that would mean sparing thousands, and that would mean that...that they wouldn't have to...gods, he can't think. The magic is making it hard to focus. This much concentration is...Bad. Painful? What is it?

Thor swears darkly, running a hand through his hair. "Is he dead?" Thor asks.

Loki shakes his head, unsure. He doesn't want to touch him to find out. And even if he was alive, would it matter? They have to...end this. The forest. The plague. Everything. One of them has to die. Thor must be thinking the same, because their eyes both slide toward the Xīn Zhī Chí.

"Thor," Loki says, his voice very quiet. "It-it has to-to be me."

"Loki—"

"No," Loki sits up slowly, trying to quell nausea. "Look—look at me. I'm-I'm d-dying. I can-can feel it. It's-it's okay. The-the spell. It's...it's…" he grabs at his stomach, digging his nails into the flesh. "It...has-has to be-be me. It m-makes sense."

Thor is quiet for long seconds, angry, but thinking. His face creases with frustration before he slams a fist against the cave floor, swearing. "Forhekse deg!"

Loki closes his eyes, trying not to tremble. Thor shifts behind him, and when Loki opens his eyes again, his brother has gone to kneel beside Benar's collapsed frame, rifling through his clothing for something. "Wh-what're—?" Loki starts to ask. He coughs harshly, and closes his eyes again, trying not to cry.

"A dagger," Thor snaps. He must retrieve it, because Loki hears something being unsheathed. "Norns, curse it!" His brother growls again.

Loki starts to slowly lever himself upright, barely able to move. His insides feel paralyzed, as if his organs had been taken out, twisted, then sewn back inside him in the wrong places. His heart pounds with his headache, and Loki wants to claw his skin off.

The weapon Thor has in hand is barely the length of Loki's forearm. It's old and dull. Loki wonders vaguely where Benar had it on his person, then decides he doesn't care. Loki forces himself to move to the shore of the Xīn Zhī Chí.

He reaches for the weapon, and Thor hands it to him with reluctance; but Loki's hands are shaking too much to hold it steady, let alone shove through the muscle.

"You're...let me help," Thor says, his voice soft.

Loki nods, trembling, feeling sick. This needs to happen. This is important. One noble act. He can't do this.

Norns. He wishes…

It's okay.

It's fine.

He wanted this, didn't he?

Thor grabs the weapon, his dirt-coated fingers rough and warm around Loki's cold fist. Loki breathes out unsteadily, feeling sick, afraid, and hopeless. This is what he wanted, isn't it? What he craved. He can do this. It's okay. It's okay. It's okay.

"Loki," Thor's voice is soft, and he smiles sadly. His head tips down until Loki meets his eyes. The two of them share one last look. Loki grimaces, his eyes wet. He's shaking. He's going to collapse. "Jeg elsker deg, lillebror," Thor whispers in their native tongue.

I love you, little brother.

Fresh tears spill down his cheeks. "Je-eg els-ssker deg også, bror-bror," he promises.

I love you, too, brother.

Thor still doesn't move. His hands are rigid, his muscles stiff. Loki gives him a weak smile, eyes wet. "It's-it's ok-okay," he promises quietly. He inhales sharply, "It's okay. I-I u-u-understand. It's o-okay."

Thor nods, his muscles bracing. Loki tenses up despite himself, closing his eyes to brace for the final blow. It will hurt, he knows that it will hurt, but in the midst of the rest of this pain? It will be nothing. He's been stabbed before. He can do this. It's okay.

"I'm sorry," Thor whispers. A hand roughly shoves him, pushing him with force away from the Xīn Zhī Chí. Loki stumbles, going down to his knees heavily, the harsh landing jolting up his body, scraping his palms against the rough stone.

Wait, what—?

The knife gleams in the light, reversing direction.

Loki has a moment to realize oh before he swears heavily and lunges for his brother, but it's too late. Thor plunges the blade into his chest, in his heart, because Thor knows how to kill things. He knows weapons like Loki knows sedir. Loki never even touches him.

"NO!"

The sound is torn out of him like a punch. Thor makes a mewled, hoarse sound then tumbles back into the pond with a splash. Loki scrambles forward, not breathing, not blinking, not anything but fear and a chanted no, no, no.

He lied to me.

He lied to me. He—

Thor submerges into the pond, swallowed by the water, and a concussion wave smacks through the air, brutal in its sensation, deafening in the intensity. Screaming. It sounds like screaming. Loki clamps his hands over his ears, still frantically making his way toward the pond. He watches as blinding white light pulses from the pond, streaking across the floors and ceilings. When it runs beneath Loki's feet, it unsteadies him, toppling him to his knees again.

The powerful, overwhelming feeling of sedir vanishes, and its absence makes his lungs feel out of balance. The Xīn Zhī Chí is just water now. No spells. No magic. Nothing.

Thor.

He has to get to Thor.

Oh, gods.

He lied to me.

(I'm sorry.)

He lied to me.

He scrambles up to his feet, moving toward the Xīn Zhī Chí, his vision gray. He stumbles to the edge of the pond and sees Thor sinking toward the bottom, a red plume surrounding him. Loki doesn't think twice. He crawls toward the edge of the Xīn Zhī Chí and throws himself into the pond.

The water rushes around him, painful in its familiarity. The rushing waves. Her voice. Always her voice.

Try not to drown.

Loki shoves the memory aside as best he can, pushing further into the water, kicking his feet. He has to reach him. Thor, he has to—

Norns. That idiot.

Allfathers, please let him be alive.

His fingers strain to grab any part of his brother he can reach, desperate. After a few tries, he grabs a handful of Thor's tunic and pulls up, straining. Adrenaline is fading, making his body weak and broken. But he pushes because he has to break water. He has to get Thor out of here, has to—try not to drown—breathe.

His lungs burn in his chest, never really prepared for the water in the first place. He breaks the water, gasping, hauling Thor with him.

He treads to the shore and pulls himself and his brother onto the cave floor. The two of them tumble to the hard, cold floor, soaking, bloody and broken. Loki coughs hoarsely, shoving his brother onto his back.

Benar's body lays feet away, completely still. If he felt the wave of the spell leaving, he makes no indication. He could be dead. Loki doesn't care. Let him rot.

"Oh, gods," Loki whispers, leaning over Thor. His brother's face is white, eyes closed, lips parted. There's blood everywhere, soaking everything, but he shouldn't have died that quickly. Even if it was to the heart, death wouldn't have been instantaneous.

Loki lifts a shaking hand over Thor's body, pulling water from his lungs with sedir.

Thor doesn't breathe

Loki's trembling fingers feel at his neck, but there's no pulse. Thor's skin is red where Loki's fingers touched him as if Loki burned him. But his skin is cold.

Loki grabs his brother's jaw forcefully, checking his airway before frantically shoving his hands against Thor's chest to begin compressions. "Breathe," he demands of his sibling, frantic. Thor's chest feels flimsy beneath his fingers; breakable.

Ten, thirteen, seventeen...

Loki swears.

Twenty. Twenty-six...

Loki leans down and breathes life into his sibling's body. Thor remains unresponsive beneath him. He's not breathing and why won't he breathe Norns, curse it!

Seven, fifteen, twenty-two…

Nothing.

One, eleven, twenty-nine...

"Breathe, storebror," Loki begs between sobs.

Eight, seventeen, twenty-six…

Something snaps beneath his hands. A rib. Maybe ribs. Loki keeps pushing, begging, pleading, whispering to the gods to give him this one thing, just this one thing—

Four, sixteen, twenty-two...

"BREATHE!" Loki shouts, slamming his fists against Thor's chest. Thor doesn't breathe. Because he's not going to breathe. He's never going to breathe again. He's dead. "Gods, please d-d-don't leave me..."

He's dead.

It was supposed to be me.

Thor shouldn't be dead. He shouldn't be going cold and bleeding. He should laugh, and smile, and make those stupid jokes no one finds funny. He should be warm. And here. And breathe, and love, and talk, and embrace, and swing Mjolnir around, ascend to the throne. He should be here. He should grab Loki by the back of his neck and offer comfort. They should share laughs and conspiratorial smiles. They should be together, side by side forever. Brothers until death.

Until death.

Thor should be here.

Loki falls against his brother's still, unbreathing corpse and weeps.

"Love is a dagger. It's a weapon to be wielded from far away or up close,

You can see yourself in it, it's beautiful.

Until it makes you bleed."

-Loki E3

Chapter Text

"I accidentally messed up my life, how do I start a new account?"

-unknown

"Sif." Fandral's voice is quiet.

Sif ignores him. She rummages through her equipment again, trying to figure out what she's missing. Food, medical supplies, water…She should get spare clothing. Not for herself, but for...them. Their own wardrobe was dirty, bloody, and tarnished when they stumbled back into the capital. There isn't any reason to think that Loki and Thor's would be any different.

Maybe she should grab some healing stones from the healing wing.

Just in case...in case.

"Sif," Fandral repeats with more force, his voice closer.

Sif puts a hand on Restless' neck, taking comfort in the warmth of the skin beneath her own. Her horse stands as resilient and strong as ever, her eyes deep and knowing. There's a sadness to them that makes Sif's stomach tight. Even her mare knows what Sif refuses to accept.

Finally, Fandral's pale fingers wrap around the bag in her hand, snapping it closed with force. She looks up at him, indignant, but finds that words escape her when she sees his face. Worn, empty, and pale, he looks sick. He probably is sick but from fatigue and sleepless nights.

"Sif," Fandral's voice is soft. Gentle. Understanding. She's never wanted to hit him more. "What are you doing?"

"What the rest of you refuse to." She snaps. She tugs the bag from his grip with effort, nearly ramming her elbow into Restless' stomach in the process. Her legs feel weak. She thinks she might collapse, but if she does, she'll only cry, and she wants to do that even less than she wants to face Fandral's common sense.

Fandral closes his eyes as if the words have hurt him.

Sif turns away, fingers fumbling to make sure that everything is still attached to the saddle. She knows it is. She just needs something to do with her fingers. Needs to not look Fandral in the eyes. It's like being gutted, looking into the despair that mirrors her own.

"No one wants to find them more than I do," Fandral says carefully, "but Sif, even the Allmother doesn't think they're—"

Sif grabs Fandral by the front of his shirt. She hauls him down to her eye level. Her fingers are so tightly wound in the clothing they ache. "Don't say it," she commands him. "Don't say it!"

"How can I not! Everyone suspects it now!" Fandral grabs her shoulders. "Holding out on hope is only going to hurt you."

Sif is indignant. "So it's better to just accept that they're gone?"

Fandral sighs, his shoulders slumping. "No. But be realistic, please. Nothing leaves the Blodig Skog."

This time, she shoves him away instead. She's always been physical in her anger, a fact that she's never been proud of. Even less so, after the way that Thor looked at her, after...after. Loki had just stood there with a wide-eyed expression, and Sif had felt nausea curdling in her stomach. Thor had been so angry.

If she had never deemed it appropriate to hit the second prince in the first place, they never would have separated. And wherever the two princes ended up after the wyvern, they would be there, with them.

Instead of out here, useless and unknowing.

Everyone says that ignorance is bliss, but Sif has found it is instead a greater form of torture. If they...if they are gone, then she at least wants to know how it happened. When it happened. Did the dragon get them? Was it something else?

While she and the others stumbled out of the forest by chance, where were Loki and Thor? Where are they now? She wants to do them the justice of a proper burial. The thought of their spirits being tied to this wretched place for eternity feels her with despair she can't put into words.

"We did," Sif says in protest of Fandral's statement. "We did it twice."

For something meant to be so fatal, its track record as of late is sporadic and unfaithful to the tales.

"The forest let us go," Fandral says. He shifts his feet, looking away from her. "That wasn't us, and you know it."

Because no amount of tracking or knowledge of the forest would have helped them in the long run. The enchantment was powerful, which just makes this worse. Because what makes her and the other Warriors worthy of release, but not King Odin's sons? This wasn't luck. Maybe it was punishment. It's always easier to die than survive.

Sif closes her eyes, exhaling slowly. "I'm going after them. You can't stop me."

"Sif." Fandral sounds tired. "It's been almost two weeks since the spell broke and everyone woke up. If they were going to show up, don't you think they would have?"

Unless they can't get out of wherever they are! There are any number of reasons that the princes haven't returned to them. Death doesn't have to be the only one that they accept as fact!

"So you would give up on them, too?" Sif opens her eyes to scowl at him. He looks like he might be felled by the force of her glare, bone-weary as he is. He runs a hand through messy hair.

"No." He says sharply. His eyes, when they land on her face, are fierce. "I'm doing what they would have wanted—"

"They wouldn't have wanted to be forgotten about in some forest in the middle of nowhere—!"

"I'm living for them." Fandral interrupts. Sif stops and clenches her jaw. Her fingers curl where they're pressed against Restless' flank. Tears spring to her eyes, and she blinks them back, feeling her throat burn in disapproval.

"Oh, Sif," Fandral reaches forward and pulls her into a hug. His embrace is warm. She crumples inside of it, burying her head against his shoulder.

She can't even speak, so consumed by emotion that she feels physically incapable of breathing. She doesn't cry, she doesn't scream, she doesn't yell. She just stands there and trembles like the world is falling apart around her. Fandral holds her gently, carding fingers through her hair.

He doesn't say anything either.

Somehow, it's more bitter than sweet.

When Sif finally pulls away, it's not to hit him. It's to slowly start removing the tack from her horse.

000o000

When Sif and the other Warriors had staggered back into Bo-An ten days after they left, it was to a city brought to its knees. Sif had decided then and there that she hated the Blodig Skog with a passion that she couldn't describe.

The city was deathly still. The only life that Sif could find in her surroundings was herself and the other Warriors. The dead lay in the streets, still and pale, looking endlessly into nothing. It's as if the plague accelerated rapidly and was taking anyone now, not just the sedir wielders.

It wasn't until later that she learned that everyone had retreated to quarantine in cities beyond the capital as if they could outrun the disease if they tried hard enough.

Sif remembers expecting to come back to the palace and find that everyone had died.

But the Allfather, looking weary and half dead, had greeted them at the gates to the palace. His eye had scanned over their group with hope and panic, desperately looking for something. Sif had known then that Loki and Thor hadn't returned, even before King Odin had asked, with his voice bordering on despair, "my sons?"

It had been Hogun who spoke because Sif hadn't managed to pull her tongue down from the roof of her mouth. "We don't know, my lord. Are they not here?"

"No," King Odin said. He gripped Gungnir, suddenly looking his age. "You are the first of your party to come back. Come, tell me what transpired."

Sif had nodded, already trying to cycle through events in her head so she could get the report straight. She'd had half a mind to storm back into the bloody wood and drag the two princes out then and there, but she didn't. Instead, she'd taken a step and collapsed.

Waking up had been like walking into a dream. Confusing, with the filter between reality and fantasy blurring together.

There were distant faces, questions demands to know what happened, how they got out, reprimands for leaving in the first place. There was medical aid given to their bruises, scrapes, and sympathy for their emotional scars.

But there was no rejoicing.

The mission they set out to do, the one that no one wanted them to go on, but all had silently hoped for success on, failed. They did not find the sorcerer who cast the sigils to protect them from the Blodig Skog's influence. They did not find the guardian who would show them how to stop the forest from consuming the Vanir. They did not find a cure. They found nothing.

They lost everything instead.

No Loki. No Thor. Their queen lay dying in the healing wing among thousands of others. King Odin sat at his wife's bedside with despair. Asgard and Vanaheim's futures lay hanging in the balance, perhaps on the brink of war, because Sif hears rumors that King Odin blamed the Vanir royal head for the entire mess.

And as Sif sat there, drowning in her sorrow, all Sif could think was how angry she felt. Angry at the Blodig Skog. Angry at the Weeping Siren for forcing them here in the first place. Anger at Loki for being such a selfless pain in the rump, anger at Thor for not stopping them in the barn. Anger at the wyvern for separating them. Anger at the Vanir for not being able to fix this. Anger at herself.

"Where's the bite, then?"

"What?"

"The bite. The big, nasty infected bite."

Sif looked up at the head healer through eyelids that felt swollen and raw. She didn't understand and had felt some of her anger ebb as she was forced to focus on something else. She wasn't... "What?" she repeated, her voice hoarse. The glass of water she had been holding was tepid, and she couldn't remember who put it in her hands in the first place. It was supposed to help her throat, dry from dehydration.

But Sif had already drunk enough water that she felt nauseous, and her throat still felt scraped and raw.

Vanir's head healer, Kia, looked up at her from behind a device. It looked like a tablet but didn't function as the one's on Asgard do. The woman's expression had been flat, but her brown eyes were sprinkled with mirth. "The bite," Kia said once more and gestured toward her with one hand as she rapidly flipped through something on the device with the edge of her thumb. Pictures, maybe? "It's about the only thing not wrong with you."

Oh.

Sif blinked. A jest. It's a joke. Her lips pressed together. "Hilarious."

Kia lifted her eyebrows as if to say that's fair, then set the tablet down on the bedside table. "Lean forward for me," Kia requested. Sif obliged, because what else did she have to do, forcing her body forward sluggishly. She nearly spilled the water all over the bed when a sharp pain lanced up her back, but Kia's hand snapped out and steadied it.

Sif had bitterly thought she'd wished her other mistakes could be prevented that easily. Instead, she failed the most important quest of her life and lost two of her best friends while she was at it. And if that wasn't enough, King Odin's temper could easily come reigning down on her and the other Warriors, pinning for execution or imprisonment. They had lost Asgard's future.

Kia gently pushed down at the base of Sif's skull, then her fingers traced down the vertebrae in her neck. "One of my aides said there was swelling in your spine?"

The feeling of Loki's horse trampling across her back in the frantic race for survival after the wyvern spilled its fire ghosted across her back. She grimaced, then explained, "Nothing serious. She just said it was bruised."

Norns, Kia's fingers were cold.

"Hm," Kia murmured. Her fingers traced further down Sif's spine and she tried not to audibly gasp as Kia came across the center of her back. Moa isn't a lightweight, and she was an animal prepared to kill for survival. Sif's lucky to have made it out without any broken bones. "Any numbness in your legs?"

"No," Sif assured. "It just hurts."

But Sif had made sure that Loki's faithful horse made it back with them anyway, even if walking had felt like death, and yet that was still somehow better than riding a horse. She had felt somewhere between bitter and cold at the prospect that Loki might never see the mare again anyway, and her efforts to track down the spooked animal would have been for nothing.

"We'll keep an eye on it," Kia promised, and pulled away. She stared at Sif's face for several long seconds before her narrow eyes softened. "Sif, you're exhausted. You need to get some rest, alright?"

As if she's earned any. Not until her questions are answered. Sif shook her head. "The others?"

"All fine. Just as dehydrated and tired as you are." Kia said, somewhere between annoyed and pointed. "That long without water is bordering on dangerous for Aesir. You need to keep drinking that," her chin tipped toward the glass in Sif's hands. "You'll be able to see them shortly."

Sif had felt mixed feelings about that idea. She'd wanted to see her shield brothers, of course, but the thought of facing them had made something in her heart twist. They failed it together, but Sif still feels responsible. This was her idea. She pushed them all into it. If she hadn't been chomping at the bit and gone to Loki, then none of this would have happened. Loki still would have come up with some other stupid idea to get them all killed.

Which would have been better. At least Sif wouldn't have had to sit with this heavyweight in her stomach.

Sif stared into the glass. Within the water, she could see the reflection of a sunken-eyed, boney girl staring back at her. It was a hollow face, emptied of anything meaningful.

Sif pulled her gaze up.

The Weeping Siren had felt so different, she remembered. When she returned it felt like she was practically buzzing. The creature had been in the prisons below them, alive, and Sif would have severed her arm if it had meant that the woman would be pleased with her again. Because the Weeping Siren did something to Sif. This? This entire mess is because of her.

There's no one to blame but herself.

If Loki and Thor never leave that wood, it will be her fault. Because she's the one that decided they needed to go.

Norns, she had cursed, because she had expected the forest to spit them all out at once. All of them. Not just her and the other warriors. After the map was destroyed, Sif didn't expect to see Bo-An again. She thought she would die in that wood; a sacrifice to it.

When they got out, she thought their luck had turned for the better. But it didn't. Because it never does. Why would it?

Kia sat on the edge of the bed and sighed. Sif had only felt guilty at the woman's attention. The Vanir are dead and dying, and Kia giving Sif more than a once-over must mean that Sif must truly look miserable. "Lady Sif, I understand that you're worried, but like I already told you earlier, there have been no sightings of Asgard's princes since you left—"

"Is that supposed to make me feel better?" Sif interrupted. She closed her eyes. They felt hot. "If they're not here, then they're still out there. We lost them."

"I know," Kia said. "But they came back before."

"'No one comes back from the Blodig Skog'," Sif recites. It was written inside her textbooks. It's spread in folklore about the wood. It's practically stamped across Kia's face. Sif could see it. The Vanir doesn't think that Loki and Thor were coming back.

And honestly? Who could blame her? The wood consumed and it doesn't give back. It means the bloody forest for the Allfathers sake.

"You did," Kia pointed out.

Sif scoffed. It was everyone's favorite argument. "Norns, did we?" she demanded. She opened her eyes to give the healer a hard look. "We all carry it in us now. We never really leave, it just follows us everywhere we go. And now…" Now Loki and Thor aren't going to come back. Sif bit her tongue. The thought felt treacherous to voice out loud; an admittance that she's lost hope when she should cling to it.

So she didn't say it. She didn't say anything.

Kia's narrow eyes had creased with sympathy, and she released a soft breath, "We don't know everything that happened out there, my lady. Try to remember that, alright? Asgard's princes could still live yet."

Kia hadn't sounded like she believed it.

Sif wasn't sure if she had, either.

But life, as it always does, had had to go on. Sif's spine healed until it was only a low throb when she bent the right way, and she got out of the bed to return to her previous duties: running errands for the exhausted, overworked healers. It was the only thing she was good for at the time. An illness isn't something you can fight with weapons, and that's all Sif was trained in.

The Warriors had clustered around her, as if, should they stay together, they would manage to make it through this.

But Volstagg had gone quiet and would rarely smile, and Fandral's jokes became fewer and fewer as if the idea of trying to be humorous exhausted him. Hogun had spoken with his father, a conversation that Sif wasn't privy to, and had barely spoken since.

The stares were the worst. Everyone knew about the abnormality of them. How they could survive the wood and walk away unscathed, but the Vanir families were dying and the sounds of grief were like a wind drifting through the air. Everyone knew what they had set out to do, and what they hadn't returned with.

No spell to fix anything, no sorcerer to heal their balms and save their suffering loved ones.

Gods. They might as well have committed the murders themselves.

About a week since they returned, and two days since Sif was released from the healing wing, she was running errands to grab clean towels from the laundry when something hard struck her in the back of the head. She'd dropped the towels in shock, already drawing a long dagger strapped to her waist as her hand automatically came up to grab at the affected area.

Sprinkles of glass cut open her skin, glittering through her hair like stars falling from their perches.

Several older Vanir stood behind her, looking furious and sorrowful. Their breath smelled of alcohol, and Sif felt herself recoil a fraction from them. She didn't drop her sword. Perhaps she should have, to show that she meant them no ill will, but there was mead dripping from her scalp to her shoulder from the bottle that someone smashed against her skull.

Sif glanced at the door to the laundry, trying to plan an escape.

But all she could think about was broken bowls and the Weeping Siren snarling at them. Her temper had always been short but furious, like the pop of cooking oil. Painful and searing, but so short you were never really sure if you'd imagined it.

Unless it left you bruised.

Sif had felt herself slip out of focus, mind caught elsewhere despite herself, and when she returned, one of the women in the group had gripped her by her face and was shaking her. "What makes you so special!?" she'd screeched. Her grip was bruising and Sif couldn't keep a grip on her sword, as if her fingers were suddenly soaked.

Sif had sputtered, unable to form words.

"Why do you get to live and not my son?" the woman had demanded of her. Her eyes were red-rimmed and her cheeks splotchy. Her breath against Sif's face was foul.

"What makes you more worthy than any of our families!" a man had shouted at her from the crowd.

"Or my wife?"

"My children!"

"My husband!"

"You're not worthy of this blessing!"

Sif's hand had pushed against her scalp. And unlike so many times before this, when she had handled people screaming at her or someone shouting, Sif had felt...small. Or, at least, as if she had wanted to become small. Her chest compressed, and she felt the absurd urge to run and fight or start crying.

The woman gripping her face was pushed away, and someone else came now, and Sif barely managed to duck the punch. But her vision was already spotty, and her head was aching something fierce, causing her balance to feel tipsy when she grasped for it.

The next hit she didn't avoid, and Sif crumpled to her knees. Their words and blows fell upon her with brutal intensity, intending to maim, or even kill. She fought back, but it was useless. She was tumbling toward nothingness, and she couldn't hold herself.

"You failed us!"

She felt like something was screaming at her. A voice. A woman's. No one here.

"Where is Asgard when we need it—"

Her vision kept dotting in and out, and when she inhaled, it was to the scent of dust and grain. Or dust and old books. Not the faint clay and alcohol of the hallway.

"—who saves our children when they disappear in the night, or when they die in the streets BECAUSE OF ASGARD!"

She fell to her side, and someone smacked her in the ribs. Sif didn't cover herself. Her hands were shaking. Her vision blanked.

"YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO SAVE US!"

And she was deaf to anything.

Get out! GET OUT! Get out you wretched, ungrateful—

Mother was screeching in her ears, kicking her in the stomach when she couldn't stand, and Sif was lying on the floor, clutching her broken arm to her chest. She was panting. She was panicking. Because the story of Mother's children was not one for her ungrateful ears, but Sif didn't know that.

She didn't know that.

The blow struck her in the ribs, and then Sif was scrambling, running away from Mother's house, into the field. Inhaling the scent of dirt and wheat and running for the barn. But her bare feet slip on something, and she falls, reaching out wildly to stop herself from smacking face-first into the hard ground—

And she's ducking an object thrown at her head by Mother, feeling the knife slice through her palms as she chops the wheat, wishing she could bury it into her chest instead. She's watching as Mother slams Fandral's head against the table and screeches at him to eat something when the swordmaster had spent the whole night unable to keep down water.

She's reaching to help him with the cut on his face from the splintering wood and tumbles instead to Loki's side after the Weeping Siren struck him hard enough that he toppled into the wheat, disappearing as if swallowed by it. His eyes are dead when she meets them, and the skin is already red on his face. She moves to help him up—

Finding herself at Volstagg's side, cursing as she watches Loki wrap something around his arm. Volstagg is silent. His eyes are closed and she reaches out to grab his hand

Watching as Fandral carries Hogun forward through the caves, his leg bent out of alignment, the two of them looking pale and sickly

Hearing the snap of Loki's bones as the Weeping Siren's boot slams against his chest, screeching I am your mother as Loki begs for his brother between bubbles of blood in his throat. Hearing Loki sobbing as the Aethetin rushes through his veins, and she's holding him against her as he whispers sorry, not used to this, and feeling anger and confusion when she didn't understand why.

She pulls away and watches instead as Thor beats his knuckles bloody instead of crying when he learns that his leg's wound may be permanent.

And then she's gasping as the Weeping Siren pulls on her hair, over and over and over again, twisting it like a leash between her fingers until Sif had felt tempted to beg Loki to cut it all off again. Because he had done such a good job in shearing it the first time, and he'd only thought it would be funny.

And she tumbled back inside of herself, shaking, sick, and feeling the ghostly feeling of rough fingers against her skin as a soft voice whispered, There's no need to be afraid, daughter. Mother is here now. She'll keep all of you safe. I promise. And soft lips had kissed her forehead.

Sif wasn't able to cry, though she thought she should have been.

Her body was stiff and everywhere hurt, but when she looked up, the only person in the hall was herself. Sif had lain there for a long time, her breathing shallow, her mind frantically jumping through memories that felt too fresh to have been so long ago.

It's over. I'm safe, she told herself.

She shakily pushed herself up, wondering what she could have said to stop the onslaught. What she should have bargained for. Her stomach is twisted into knots, and her hip felt swollen when she tried to move. Her vision was blurry. Her head ached.

She hadn't been sure she could move.

But there was no one coming to get her, so Sif had struggled up to her feet with support from the wall. She'd wiped glass from her hair and tentatively touched wet patches of her skin that were bleeding. But she hadn't protested. She wasn't angry. Sif had understood.

She'd failed. She deserved this, didn't she? Their anger wasn't without reason.

But Sif had realized then, with a sickening sort of jolt, that she had imagined the Weeping Siren comforting her, and it had actually brought her a sense of safety.

Sif had gathered up the towels and limped back into the healing wing. She'd handed them to Eir without a word, and gone to sit down in the aide's room of rest. Eir did not follow her. Sif hadn't expected her to. The room was empty. It almost always was. Sif meticulously cleaned the cuts, her mind elsewhere.

She hadn't noticed Hogun had stepped into the room until he gently took the supplies from her and started doing the work himself. Though his eyes were fierce, he didn't say anything, didn't ask who had done it, and Sif was grateful for it. Volstagg would have waged war in her name, and Fandral would have gathered up the cavalry for it.

When Hogun was done addressing her injuries, he'd sat beside her on the bed and carefully combed every bit of glass from her hair.

Sif had cried, then, when he was finished, and he had only held her.

Sif fell asleep in his arms and woke up to see her shield brothers quietly talking about something with some force. Sif had had an idea of what it was and only rolled over, refusing to think about those that hurt her. It's not like they gave her their names before they struck her. But she knows that the Warriors wouldn't want to let an insult like this go.

She never learned what they did, if they had done anything.

Sif had simply woken up and returned to help Eir the next morning.

But the words run in her head, spinning and spinning for days. You were supposed to have saved us. You were supposed to have saved us. You were supposed to have saved us. And Sif couldn't help but think of Thor and Loki, somewhere out in the woods, saying the same thing to her.

She watched as King Odin joined Queen Frigga in the bed, brought low by the illness, and terror spread through the entire capital with new heights. Because if Odin Allfather could succumb to this plague, who would be spared?

Two weeks since they parted ways with Loki and Thor, Sif woke up to the sensation of something smacking her in the stomach. It felt as though the very air was alive, and reaching out to strangle her. There was no way to describe it. Her nerves were alight. Her body was fire. The air was thick and sucking her lungs dry. If she had been standing, she would have been felled by it. It was painful, but it was comforting. It was dry and wet. It was everything and nothing.

Then it was gone.

Sif stumbled up, and her vision blinked white for several seconds as if she had been staring into bright lights.

What on Helheim?

She had been unable to do much else than sputter cusses as she stumbled down to the healing wing, finding that the aides were picking themselves off the floor. Everyone was talking loudly, and the feeling of fear was so present it felt heavy. There was an undertone of swearing passing through the room as if it was a quiet chant meant to save them.

"What was that?"

"Gods save us!"

"It's something else come to kill us!"

Sif hadn't known what to do there. She'd stood, helpless, watching as the aides switched to trying to calm the distressed Vanir down, assuring them that they would figure this out. But Sif doesn't know what answer they're expecting to fall out of the sky. That was sedir. It was obviously sedir. But for what?

The panic had only grown worse as minutes passed until physical blows were being thrown. Sif had gone to help, and she, like everyone else, had stopped at the dull, echoing clank that passed through the room. Sif knew that sound. Her heart was in her throat, she turned and looked up slowly.

There, standing side by side, was Queen Frigga and King Odin, the latter gripping Gugnir. They were awake. They hadn't been the last Sif had heard. Eir was afraid Queen Frigga wouldn't make it to the morning. But there they stood, defying all odds, alive, and if Sif didn't know better, well.

"That is enough," King Odin said quietly. His voice was a fraction of its usual strength. "Look around you. Do you not see what is happening?"

Sif had released the arm she was holding back, and looked. And then she saw what King Odin meant. The sick were slowly sitting up or rising to their feet, looking confused and dazed, but alive. Those that Sif had not expected to live another hour were blinking awake. It was as if the great fist that had been slowly suffocating them all was released.

Sif had slowly sunk to her knees, unable to contain her relief.

The shouts of fear and anger were quickly replaced by shouts of joy and love. Couples reunited, children were embraced by parents, tears were shed and the fear was so quickly replaced that it was almost hard to believe it had ever been there in the first place.

But Sif knew.

And Sif wondered.

Because, gods, that sort of thing doesn't just happen.

She thought of Loki and Thor. Watching them get swallowed by the wyvern's flames, but when they went back to search for them, it was as if they had never been there in the first place. What if, she quietly tempted herself, what if…?

Sif had watched carefully as Queen Frigga pulled Eir to the side and quietly asked a question. Eir had sighed and carefully pulled the Allfather and Allmother away from the public. Sif looked away. She knew what the queen had asked about. She doesn't want to watch their joy turn to sorrow. Because Loki and Thor are still not here.

It's the only thing that dampened her joy.

Because they should be here.

They should be here.

But they aren't.

000o000

The Vanir threw a celebration to put any Sif has ever attended to shame. The people are alive again, they exclaim, no one is getting sick, the forest has stopped spreading. We are saved! The gods have taken mercy on us.

Sif isn't the only one to feel Loki and Thor's absence. She can see it on those from Asgard, who are happy for the Vanir, but it's obvious something is missing.

When the celebrations have dulled, Sif expects and isn't surprised when King Odin starts sending search parties out in the woods. It's almost disturbing when all of them return. No one gets lost. The forest is...just a forest. The enchantment has been stripped. But they still don't find Loki or Thor.

Someone manages to put together what happened the day that everyone woke up, Sif doesn't know how, and she doesn't care. Someone suggests that the only way that a total, complete recovery to those still living to be that instantaneous would only be if the sickness was magical in origin. A biological pathogen created by a sorcerer. Their death would have caused everyone to be released because such a powerful spell requires constant maintenance.

Then Queen Freya suggested the possibility of the Blodig Skog's spell being broken, and the absence of Asgard's princes, and someone puts two and two together and Sif finds herself staring at a very unpleasant four.

The Blodig Skog, everyone knows, was a powerful spell. It wasn't something that could be removed by sheer grit and determination. Loki is a powerful sorcerer, but even he wouldn't have been able to do much.

But there are dozens of things they could have done instead, and the Allfather and Allmother come to a bitter realization that both their children are likely dead.

They call off the search parties.

Sif finds herself staring out where she knows the forest is, and thinking you were supposed to have saved us. The bitter anxiety that consumes her drives her forward. Forward until she's standing in the stable, and Fandral is talking her down from doing something stupid.

Sif stands in that barn.

She stands there and feels her heart sink because…

Because somewhere. Somewhere she knows they're dead, too.

It's almost four weeks after they return to Asgard that Sif has any reason to hope. Because Heimdall arrives in the palace looking winded and almost panicked, and words are racing out of him so quickly—Sif is told in a second-hand account she doesn't believe—that he can barely be understood.

Because Loki just arrived in the palace of Bo-An.

And he's requested an audience with his parents.

000o000

They're in Vanaheim's palace within the hour. Sif watches as King Odin and Queen Frigga burst into the room with a force that almost seems to make the entire space quaver beneath them. Sif thinks of her own parents, relieved at her return and holding her so tightly she couldn't breathe, and wonders if Asgard's royal head feels that same desire.

Sif shifts her gaze around the throne room. As anything is in Vanir architecture, the ceiling is low, and there are no windows. The light comes from what looks like hanging golden sticks, giving the room a cozy, homely feel. Queen Freya and King Lin sit in their respective thrones.

Vanaheim's entire court seems to have stuffed itself behind the barristers, looking between the dais and the entering Asgardian party.

Sif shoves her way to the front as Queen Frigga comes to a halt, then King Odin. The Queen makes a horrible, agonized sound, something that causes Sif's chest to compress in instinct at hearing it. "Oh, gods have mercy," Queen Frigga whispers.

The entire room is silent as if holding its breath, waiting, daring someone to make a move.

Sif manages to push past the Einherjar surrounding the Royal Head and stops.

He's there.

He's here.

He's alive.

Oh, thanks the Norns.

Loki is slowly getting to his feet, the movement unsteady. He was kneeling at the side of something before they got here, but the Snake Prince has turned to face them. His body is thin and haunted, his clothing torn and bloodied. His skin looks infected, blue stretching up his face like tattoos and leaving thin white patches. His veins look like they're sticking from his skin in an unhealthy manner. Almost as if there are patches of skin that are swollen.

He looks like the lone warrior returning from a massacre.

And at his feet—

Sif inhales sharply. She can't speak. Air has collapsed in her lungs, causing her breaths to come in thin wheezes. Her knees feel weak. Hogan's hand grabs hers, his grip tight. Not for her comfort, but his own.

Thor is slumped on the ground. From what she can see, his skin is pale with a gray tinge. The front of his shirt is stained with red. His chest is still. His hands are resting on his stomach, his face turned away from them as if Loki had thought to include his dead brother's comfort when he settled him.

Dead.

Oh, Norns.

Loki lifts heavy green eyes to them. His gaze doesn't change. He looks empty. Vacant. Both of them look out of place in the spotless room. They're dirty, cadaverous, and emaciated, more like beggars pleading for scraps than the powerful, imposing figures Sif knows them to be.

Sif drinks in the sight of them anyway. Somewhere within her, she's screaming.

Loki licks his dry lips, half dark blue, half red, and—gods he almost looks Jotun—whispers, "I-I bring the body of my br-brother," Loki whispers. His voice is flat. Emotionless. His eyes are dry. Sif knows he must have been weeping at some point because the eyelids are swollen and red-rimmed.

Body.

Thor.

But Thor isn't a body. He's an Aesir. He's never so still, so quiet, so dead. This can't be right. She's dreaming. Any moment she'll wake up and this will all have been some sort of joke. It has to be. Oh, gods, it has to be.

The court watches, silent.

"Oh, Norns have mercy on me!" Queen Frigga exclaims, agonized. She moves past Sif, lifting her skirts to run to her sons. She collapses to her knees beside her eldest, hands shaking as he reaches out to touch him. King Odin is only a half step beside her, his hand against his wife's shoulder, reaching out to touch Loki, but the Snake Prince shies away.

The most powerful beings that Sif knows of kneel beside their son, looking beaten and broken.

Sif squeezes Hogun's hand.

"Thor," Queen Frigga says. Her voice echoes in the silent chamber. She grabs Thor's face between two hands. Her sobs are loud and ugly. "Thor, baby, please. Don't do this to me. Thor. Thor, please. THOR!"

Loki looks like he might be sick.

"Frigga," King Odin whispers, staring at Thor what looks like dawning comprehension. He doesn't seem grieved, almost... Sif doesn't have words.

"No," Queen Frigga denies. She slaps Thor's face. "No. Not my son. Not my son!" But no pleading or bargaining is going to reanimate Thor's corpse. He's dead. Oh, gods. He's dead. The realization seems to strike her for what it is because tears begin to spill down her face. Fandral's expression is contorting as he tries desperately not to cry, but Volstagg and Hogun have already given up the battle.

She watches as the other Asgardians slowly lower themselves down to one knee, head bowed. Sif follows, but her limbs feel stiff.

Queen Frigga's sobs echo in the room, and Sif watches as the heads of the Vanir slowly lower in mourning. They all make some sort of sign across their chest in near unison, a Vanir funerary custom to bring well wishes to the departed.

And then, as if the climax to some grand drama, Loki makes a soft "oh" noise. It's so different from the tears that it might as well have been shouted. Sif turns her attention to him and feels herself jerk back by instinct, her hand itching for a weapon. Blue skin. It's not...oh, gods, she could laugh. Norns, what sorry excuse for a warrior does it make her that she couldn't recognize a Jotun on sight?

Jotun.

Loki.

What on Helheim—?

Loki is staring at his hands as if seeing them for the first time. Whatever spell that was keeping his appearance Aesir has leached away completely, leaving behind only his...true skin. This. Frost Giant. Jotun. Loki?

King Odin swears and makes to get up to his feet, but it doesn't matter. Loki topples to the side, crumpling against the floor with a harsh crack. It sounds painful and jarring, but Loki doesn't move, lying beside his dead brother, completely still.

Not brother?

Brother.

Jotun.

What is going on?

A murmur is going up through the crowd. People talking. Confused. Because Loki isn't Jotun, that's ridiculous. Loki is Queen Frigga's son by birth. Everyone knows this. The Jotun war ended and they celebrated with the gift of a second heir.

The Jotun war ended and they…

Oh.

Skyte.

King Odin moves to cover Loki as if trying to bury him beneath his imposing figure and layers of clothing. And why would he think to do that, instead of offering aid to his fallen son, if not for other reasons? But Jotun?

Scratch Thor being dead. This is the joke.

Loki.

Jotun?

Queen Freya and King Lin were already descending their thrones before Loki collapsed, likely to offer comfort to the distressed queen, and King Lin is hauling King Odin away from Loki with a force that Sif wouldn't have thought him capable of, especially in such a political environment.

Sif notes, distantly, that both Queen Frigga and King Odin reach for Loki, unable to touch him. This feels like this dream. Queen Freya kneels beside Loki, not touching him, and makes a sound in her throat.

"Sister," her voice is calm, too calm, as she addresses Queen Frigga, "tell me this is not Laufey's child."

Sif thinks she's going to be sick. Oh, gods. That's...the ridges. Familial markings. Sif doesn't know much about Jotuns, who on Asgard does, but she remembers hearing that somewhere. Those savages had no other way to mark their clans than by horribly swollen patches on their skin. His veins look swollen.

Vanaheim's relationship with Jotunheim is very different from Asgard's. They trade often, and Sif has even heard it said that the two realms are even friendly with each other. Just another reason to hate Vanaheim.

Because Jotunheim is evil.

Anything from it was spat out of Helheim.

But Queen Freya would still recognize Laufey's markings on sight. Laufey. The name Sif has used the same way that Midgard use devil. Her knees feel weak. She doesn't think she's breathing. Not Loki, oh, Norns not Loki.

Queen Frigga doesn't look like she can move. Her tears have stopped, but she's frozen in place, her lips parted, but unable to speak for herself. Queen Freya's eyes raise to King Odin. "Say something," she commands him. Sif waits, breathless, but King Odin doesn't. King Lin holds him around the chest, and the longer he stares at King Odin, the more furious he seems to become. Abruptly, he shoves the Allfather away from him.

"How dare you!" he roars.

"How dare I?" King Odin spits. "Watch your tongue!"

King Lin punches the Allfather in the face. Sif inhales sharply, and watches as the Einherjar advance, preparing to intervene, and she should be moving, too, but all she can do is kneel there, looking stupid. "You stole him!" King Lin shouts, "A child! Has Laufey not suffered enough under your hand!? After all that you took from him in that Gods-Forsaken war, you end the deal by KIDNAPPING HIS SON?!"

The people are beginning to talk now, rapidly, and the room feels like it's echoing. The walls are falling into the cramped space, and the ceiling feels like it's spinning. King Odin lifts his hand to stop the Einherjar from advancing, and King Lin does the same to his own guard.

Abduction.

Abduction?

"Laufey had left him to die! What was I supposed to do!?" King Odin's voice is just as loud and piercing; it's like watching lightning bolts fight for louder thunder. "He was just a babe! I saw an innocent life and I decided to spare it."

King Lin laughs, "Because you're such a saint!"

King Odin snarls, making a low sound in his throat. "Enough! I won't stand here and be ridiculed when my son is in need of medical attention and my wife is in need of comfort. Can you not spare us this moment?"

King Odin makes an advance for Loki, but King Lin steps in the way, hand on his sword hilt. Queen Freya is already beginning to gather the prince into her arms, and gods what are they doing, she should stop it, this isn't going well and what are they doing, what are they doing—

"A moment!" King Lin shouts, still furious, "Would Laufey have not liked a moment with his son? Would Laufey not have liked a moment to grieve? Or to comfort his wife! But you allowed him none of that! You are a cruel, inhumane creature, Odin Allfather. You deserve less than the scraps you demand Laufey live on."

King Odin's shoulders draw together, and his hold on Gungnir tightens. "It was war. Laufey had left him to die. What answer will satisfy you?"

Sif's vision grays and she forces out a breath.

King Lin scoffs, drawing up to his not unimpressive height. His narrow eyes are fierce. "None! We are taking Prince Loki under protective custody until we can decide what is to be done with him. Whether or not he should be returned to his homeland, or if your story proves to be true, which I doubt."

King Odin moves forward in a way that if Sif didn't know better, she would say was almost panicked. King Lin draws his sword and points the tip at King Odin's sternum. Sif feels her hand go to her spear, and her body tense. Every Asgardian does the same, sliding to their feet. Their movements are almost synchronous as if this had been practiced, but Sif doesn't think any of them do this by choice. These are automatic reactions, ones ingrained into her. They're not choices. It's the only reason she moves.

"Go, wife," King Lin tells Queen Freya, who nods and begins to move. Loki is gathered in her arms, unconscious, unaware, a Jotun. Laufey's son. A prince of two realms. A prince of their enemy. Oh, gods.

"Do not test me today, Odin Allfather. My scholars tell me that the Blodig Skog's unexplained magics was because you killed one of its guardians. Your realm killed thousands of my own because you never thought to think about your actions." King Lin says angrily.

"So you'll take my son as recompense!?" King Odin exclaims, outraged.

"I am tired," King Lin's voice is low, "of bowing to every whim you can conceive. Loki will go home, to his family. Perhaps that will help him finally heal from his madness."

"My son is not mad, he was hurt and is healing," King Odin spits. "And even if he was, it was your mercy mission that got him captured by that Norns-cursed creature in the first place! You want to point fingers, remember that there are still three pointing back at you."

Sif closes her eyes.

Please let this be over.

"Gods, don't take my son!" Queen Frigga pleads. Sif hears a scramble of movement and opens her eyes again to see that Queen Frigga has risen to her feet and is struggling in the grip of King Lin's guard, trying to reach Loki as Queen Freya walks away with him. The men have to fight to keep her in place, and Queen Frigga's struggles grow more desperate. "Freya, I beg you, sister! Please, he is my child! I don't care that he is Jotun, I've never cared! Please, please!"

But Queen Freya doesn't stop.

And Sif feels hot rage bubble to the surface of her skin as the inside of her grows cold with something that feels like ice.

King Lin pulls his sword back, but King Odin just stands there, looking furious, but helpless. "Take the corpse of your boy, Odin," King Lin's voice has unexpectedly gentled, as if he remembered that Thor was there, "and go home."

"Dra til helvete, din jævel!" Queen Frigga shouts in Asgardian. Sif feels herself tighten. Gods, she doesn't know if she's ever heard the Allmother swear in public before.

"Hypocrite." King Odin hisses. "You would kidnap my child, and condemn me for the same crime?"

"I'm saving him." King Lin corrects.

"This is not the time to bring up petty grudges and arguments—" King Odin starts.

"Enough!" King Lin shouts. "While you are Vanaheim, you will respect my rule. I will not be questioned. Take your son's corpse before I give him a Vanir funeral. You should be grateful I'm giving you even that much."

Then King Lin turns and walks away. He walks away. As if this is of no consequence. As if he didn't just steal the second prince of Asgard, Jotun he may be and demand their compliance with it. As if this is okay.

King Lin's guard releases Queen Frigga, and she topples to the floor beside Thor's body, weeping.

King Odin leans down to murmur something to her that she shakes her head at. He kisses her forehead, then gatherers their son's corpse into his arms. As if he has no intention of staying here to fight for Loki. As if he's just going to leave.

Sif feels indigent. The son he hasn't seen in months and he's just going to leave him!

What if Laufey comes, what if the Jotuns claim him, and they have to start another war to get him back? (What if, a dark, terrible part of her suggests, the Jotuns claim him, and Loki doesn't want to come back?)

"Come," King Odin says quietly. He looks defeated. Queen Frigga gets to her feet shakily, and follows her husband, looking broken.

And Sif, unbelieving and incredulous, slowly turns and follows them, trusting that King Odin must have some sort of plan. That he must care. That he can't leave Loki here, because Loki is his son. He has to have some sort of alternative.

Something.

Because if he doesn't, Sif will be back. And this time without mercy. She'll come to burn their kingdom down if it meant she would retrieve the Snake Prince. She'll make them beg. Because no one just gets to take Loki.

Not after the Weeping Siren.

Not after that makes this whole disaster worth it to me.

Not after realizing that Loki is her shield brother. Her prince. Her friend.

No, she thinks firmly, not this time.

Chapter Text

"In another universe, I did not let what you did  destroy my life,"

-Unknown

He wakes up.

Gasping.

Stabbed.

Dead.

(Dead?)

Thor opens his eyes, but there's nothing around him save darkness. It stretches on for as far as he can see in every direction, endless and consuming. He's blind. No. He's dead. He can remember the blade piercing through his chest and the pain—

His hands come up to his chest, frantic, patting down his clothing for holes from the knife he knows should be shoved through his tunic. His skin is whole beneath the broken cloth. There's no evidence that the stab even happened, but he can remember the pain. If it never happened, why can he remember the pain? Remember Loki's horror-stricken eyes and his hand reaching for Thor before he fell backward. He remembers hitting the water, the sensation of cold, then nothing else.

Norns, did he fail?

If he did, then that means that Loki will try instead, and—that—he has to find him and stop him. He turns, looking for the Xīn Zhī Chí, but is met again with only that blackness. When the tunnels were without light—rare as it was—it felt similar to this, but it's so much heavier.

He's afraid to breathe, the air is so still.

He doesn't know what this means. He can't hear himself breathing. He can't hear anyone else breathing. There's no movement of air around him, no water in the distance, there's nothing. The silence almost hurts.

"Loki?" Thor says and flinches at his voice. It echoes, surrounding him as if it's spinning, then fades out.

Thor shuffles his boot against the ground, making sure there isn't a ledge, then steps forward. His foot makes no noise against the blackness. It's like he's walking through a void. Or suspended in one. He doesn't understand what's happening.

If he had failed the sacrifice, wouldn't he just be laying at the bottom of the pond? He fell back into it. Why would he instead be...wherever this is? This isn't water. The surrounding space doesn't feel heavy enough for that.

"Loki!" Thor calls again. His brother doesn't answer. Nothing answers.

Thor keeps moving forward slowly, hoping to find some sort of answer. Because there has to be an answer to this, doesn't there? Surely this can't be it; wandering in this darkness forever.

This is like some sort of waking dream. Maybe this is some sort of dream. A nightmare. He fell back into the water and some sort of unconsciousness. That would make sense. Magic is...confusing on its best days, with rules that seem to bend around each other rather than work together. If he was meant to die but didn't actually die then…

He's still alive.

Just…

Unconscious.

"Wake up," he commands himself. "Wake up." The words carry forward, spilling across the space and ready to return to him, over and over again.

Wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up…

"Wake up!" He commands himself, desperate. This is a dream, isn't it? Norns. You're always supposed to have more fingers in dreams. Thor lifts his hands, brushing his thumb across them, desperate. One, two, six, eight, ten. No others. Ten fingers.

This has to be a dream, Norns, curse it!

"WAKE UP!"

Wake up wake up wake up wake up wake up...

"This isn't a dream," a soft voice says behind him. It's a woman's. Melodic. Beautiful.

Familiar.

He jerks around, feeling his breath catch in his chest. In the darkness, holding a lone candle with light that makes his eyes ache, stands a woman. As tall as Sif with long silver hair hanging over her shoulders, a face lined with age, but her posture doesn't show it. A deep red dress hangs over her frame, embroidered at the edges. Shoulders straight, head up as if supporting the weight of a crown, she looks like a forlorn queen.

Oh, Norns—

"You—" Thor starts to say.

"Me." The Weeping Siren sighs. Her face looks pained.

"What…?" Thor stumbles over the word, confused and frustrated, "I don't understand. You're dead. My mother killed you."

Thor watched it.

She writhed.

"Hm. Death is such a relative term, isn't it?" the Weeping Siren asks rhetorically. She lifts out a hand and jerks her fingers in a follow gesture. "Come with me." She says and starts to move away. Thor lingers where he is for long seconds, tempted to stay just to spite her. But she holds the only source of light in the suffocating dark.

Grudgingly, he follows after her. As if the thought just occurred to him, like a phantom ache he recognizes should be here now that there's someone else, he braces his weight on his left leg, completely prepared for his right to ache up to his hip, but when he steps onto it, nothing is wrong. The limp is gone. There's no lingering pain or the feeling of bone being misaligned. His leg is...fine.

The over accommodation for an injury that's no longer there sends him stumbling forward a few steps before he can catch himself.

The Weeping Siren looks back at him between strands of silver hair. Thor feels his face heat despite himself. He may have gotten used to trotting around like half his body is ready to give out, but he's still a prince for the Norns sake.

"What is this?" Thor asks, trying to distract her from it, "Are we dead?"

"This is Hel." The Weeping Siren says. Then she stops, turns around to face him, and shoves her arm through his chest.

Norns, curse it!

Thor inhales sharply despite himself and stumbles back from her. The woman's arm slides from his chest easily, as if her fingers were a blade. Thor isn't whole. He's an apparition.

"Does that answer your question, Thor Odinson?" she asks.

Oh, Norns.

He's dead.

This is…

It's dark here. Thor hadn't expected that. This is Hel. That makes sense, doesn't it? If this was supposed to be Valhalla, it would be full of bright lights and laughter. It's not suffering if you're comfortable. His stomach twists painfully, or maybe he imagines that it does because he doesn't have a physical body to react to his stress anymore.

He's dead.

"If—This—" he stops, biting on his tongue. Questions upon questions linger in his mind, but he's reluctant to share his thoughts with this creature. Instead, he asks the bland, superficial one. "How do you know my name?"

The Weeping Siren continues forward. Thor realizes he can't hear her moving. No footsteps, no rustling of clothing, no...breath. That aching silence hasn't gone away, and it's only broken when they speak. Thor himself isn't breathing. At least, not audibly. Everything is consumed into the Stygian.

"I know lots of things now," the Weeping Siren says, and it sounds like a mixture of a sigh and a groan. "I've been wandering here for a very long time, Odinson"

"In...here. Hel." Thor clarifies.

"Yes," the Weeping Siren snaps. She shakes her head. "You've done something incredibly brave or incredibly stupid depending on your perspective," she adds.

Thor's lips pinch together. I couldn't let Loki die. He was going to stab himself, I could see it. But one of us had to die.

He's not going to argue with her. Madness can't see reason.

"So you know, then; about the forest?" Thor asks, his shoulders dropping.

"I do." The Weeping Siren agrees. She glances back at Thor again as if making sure he's still following. The candle casts her face in shadow, making her eyes seem sunken and the irises filled with black. "I spent a very long time keeping Benar from doing this very thing. He'd marked you that day in the forest." She shakes her head, annoyed.

Every time he turns around lately some obscure background detail is being dropped into his lap. All these things he wouldn't have thought twice about in this whole bloody experience are suddenly wildly important.

"What?" Thor asks.

Gods, he needs to have Loki teach him more about sedir. If there's one thing that this entire experience has taught him, it's that magic has an unfortunate habit of being more important than he wants it to.

If there's ever an opportunity for Loki to teach him sedir. This…

This might be it. Wandering in Hel until Ragnarok.

The Weeping Siren shakes her head. "He kept trying to get a sedirweilder to do his bloody ritual, but he couldn't find the entrance to the Xīn Zhī Chí, and any sedirweilder he dragged along with him keeled over. Without protection, the magic in the forest is...overwhelming to say the least. But you—you came along, possessing enough sedir in your blood to perform the ritual, but not so much that you'd die before you got there."

What?

Benar could be dead because of the overwhelming power? Gods, could Loki? That had never even occurred to him. But Loki said he was dying, he practically begged Thor to kill him to end his suffering. But Thor couldn't do it. He'd never had the mind to. It was his intention from the start that he would be the one to receive the fatal blow, even when he'd pretended to acquiesce.

Thor's brow furrows. "But I—but Benar never mentioned anything about that. He just said you couldn't be a descendant of the original casters."

The Weeping Siren makes a sound of irritation in her throat. "Of course he did. He believed in only giving 'relevant' information."

Thor stares at her back, brow furrowing. They didn't like each other very much, did they? They seem to know each other well, but time has turned that familiarity into hatred instead of a strengthened bond.

"You don't seem to be fond of him," Thor says.

The Weeping Siren turns on him. Her expression is carefully blank. She keeps the distance between them, but her eyes flash. "I want him dead. I'd drag him down here with me if I could."

Thor hesitates. "He might be. Dead, that is. I'm not certain, but when I...left, he wasn't..."

Breathing. He wasn't breathing. His body was laying on the floor feet from me, and he wasn't breathing, and I didn't care.

The Weeping Siren snorts, no love lost between them. "Good." She turns around again, and Thor follows her forward. "Hopefully he and Tuss are suffering together. They can figure out a way to conspire their way out of Hel together. Wouldn't they love that?" She shakes her head, disgusted.

"What?" Thor asks. "Who's Tuss?"

The Weeping Siren laughs again. Her voice is soft, like listening to an instrument beautifully creates notes with ease. It makes something in Thor shudder away. It's perfect, but it's too perfect. She shakes her head. "Of course he neglected to tell you of his crimes. Benar has long been trying to end the forest, even since we were children. He viewed our gift as a curse, and as such, he's been trying to escape."

"He couldn't just leave?" Thor asks.

The Weeping Siren shakes her head. "Our parents tied our lifeforce to the forest when we were born. We couldn't spend more than weeks at a time away from the forest without facing death. Ending the forest would have meant killing all of us at once. I and other casters resigned ourselves to it. I married another descendant and started a family. I was happy. Until it was just me, my husband, Tuss, and Benar left. Benar, you see, had been killing the other guardians. I was tasked with guarding the entrance to the Xīn Zhī Chí and had done so faithfully for centuries. Not even my husband knew where to find it. But Tuss had long since grown to hate our entrapment, and the two of them attempted to kill me and my children to get to it."

Oh. That's what that...

Oh.

At her trial, Governor Tusin said that her husband had attempted to kill their children. Thor didn't realize that there was anything more to it than a dishonorable, poor excuse for a man. But there was a plot against her.

The bones of her children are somewhere in that cave, dead before she could find them, destroyed by the very thing she was attempting to protect. Thor remembers Sif talking about that. She looked sick and grew quiet when she spoke of them.

"I—I didn't realize…" Thor trails off. He's picking at his palm and forces himself to stop. Loki's habits are rubbing off of him.

Norns. He can't believe he stabbed himself in front of his brother.

"Nor did I." The Weeping Siren snarls, her hand clenching into a fist. "Benar came to me. For years afterward, offering me comfort. He confessed to me the last time he was there. Because he was drunk. Not regret. Not pity. Intoxication."

Gods.

"Even still. I'm sorry for your loss, but that doesn't make what you did right." Thor says, "You have no idea what you did to my brother. To those children. You killed them in all but the body."

She never saw them after. She never saw the consequences of everything that she did. She got to leave. Thor had to stay and pick up the pieces, which felt like a worse punishment than death would have been.

The Weeping Siren laughs, brushing hair from her face, "I know, child."

Thor doesn't have anything to say to that. At her obvious lack of remorse. Her voice echoes around them. I know, child, I know, child, I know, child, I know, child…She doesn't care. She never cared. She professed to love them, but she'd forgotten how to a long time ago. Thor feels sick. He doesn't know if it would have been better if the creature had felt a true fondness for them.

"Where are we going?" Thor asks, suddenly tired. His hands drop to his sides.

Cryptically, the Weeping Siren answers, "Looking."

"For?"

"Your brother."

Thor stiffens. A flare of panic surges in his not-stomach. "Why would he be here? He's fine. He was alive when I left him. Loki wouldn't—"

Oh, gods, he would, wouldn't he?

"Relax," the Weeping Siren says, and he can almost hear her roll her eyes. "He's not dead. Not yet."

His not-stomach settles back into its proper place, and the compression around his chest loosens. "Then why—?" Thor starts.

"Because he's calling for you." The Weeping Siren says quietly, "And you don't belong here."

Which would be wonderful in concept, but in practice, "I'm dead." Thor says bluntly, "I'm in Hel with you! How is finding my brother going to help that? Loki can't raise the dead."

"No." The Weeping Siren agrees. "But you're not meant to be here. You're upsetting the balance. You have to go back."

Thor shakes his head. Norns. "I died, and you're going to kick me out of Hel?"

The Weeping Siren looks back at him seriously. "Balance, Odinson, completes the universe. Everything is in perfect balance. You were never meant to be here. You have to go back. You will go back. When we find your brother."

"How?"

The Weeping Siren shrugs, then she carries forward. Her head cocks to the side. "He's crying for you. Can you hear that?"

Thor's stomach twists with guilt, pain, and oddly, love. "No," he whispers.

"A pity." The Weeping Siren says, and she sounds remorseful. "It's beautiful."

Thor doesn't know whether or not to be disturbed by that.

The Weeping Siren continues to talk about mindless things. The wheat in her field, the river that she misses, her children. They walk for a long time, Thor a silent companion beside her. The more she talks, the more he realizes that the hate he's held against her for so long has numbed to intense pity. This woman has been broken so many times that every time she put herself back together, there was more and more of herself missing.

She seems better now than she did at the trial. Saner, somehow. As if being away from the Blodig Skog has finally given her mind time to settle.

Which would make sense, wouldn't it? If the center of the forest could kill sedirwielders by being in the presence alone, then why wouldn't the thick, overlaying magic throughout the whole wood not drive them slowly crazy?

Except for Loki. Except for all of them.

Because of the sigils. Why they came out to the forest in the first place.

"The sigils," Thor interrupts, and she looks back at him as if surprised that he spoke. "The sigils you put on my brother and the others. How did it keep the magic from...affecting them?"

The Weeping Siren's lip quirks. "Ah. It was a clever bit of magic. Tuss came up with the concept for our children. They didn't have our immunity, you see—" did you even have your immunity? "—so he found a way to make the magic of the Blodig Skog simply reflect off of them. I used it on my children from the womb and otherwise to keep them safe from the forest."

"They weren't your children," Thor says stiffly.

"No." Her face falls a fraction, "Perhaps not all by birth. But I loved them all the same."

If love is hate, then yes. You loved them. Thor thinks darkly.

"I miss them," the Weeping Siren admits, her voice soft.

Thor shakes his head, disgusted. "How can you possibly—" he stops. The Weeping Siren has drawn up to a halt, her spine going stiff. Thor's not-heart jumps in his chest. "What?" he asks, "What is it?"

The Weeping Siren lifts her candle. Then she turns to him. Brown eyes stare at him, into him, like water crashing against the cliffside. Cold, and powerful, and merciless. "He's gone. What have you done to him?" She demands.

Thor backs up a step, his hands raising slowly. "What? Who's gone?"

"Loki. What did you do to my son?!"

"He's not your—what do you mean? What happened to him?" Thor's mind is scrambling to catch up with this sudden change in direction. She was following the sound of his voice, wasn't she? What does that mean if Loki is quiet?

"He stopped crying for you." The Weeping Siren's face twists. "The sound of his tears was beautiful. What did you do to him?"

Oh, gods, Loki, if you did something to yourself—

"How could I have done something to him?!" Thor gestures to himself, then around them, "Do you not see this? Loki isn't here. There's nothing I could have done to him. There's nothing here but darkness!"

The Weeping Siren snarls, then leaps at him.

Thor tries to shove her off, but her fingers are like claws and the persistence at which she fights is breathtaking and painful. The candle gets lost somewhere in the skirmish but doesn't go out, and Thor has a moment to wonder how the Weeping Siren can land physical blows if she could shove her hand through his chest.

The Weeping Siren shoves him to the floor or whatever counts as it here, and rams a knee into his sternum, grabbing the sides of his face. Her expression is narrowed and Thor swears, frantic, trying to shove her off.

But it doesn't matter.

When her cold fingers touch his face, the world explodes into color around him. A room—cave? No, it's too bright—bursts into view. It's pulsing, colors blurring around them. People, candles. He recognizes it, but he can't tell from where. He turns his head away at the pain, but he catches the Weeping Siren smile from his periphery.

Thor blinks, squinting, and slowly follows her gaze.

And then Thor sees.

Loki.

His brother is on his knees, in front of...him. His body. Loki's just sitting there, his face dry, Thor laying in front of him with his hands on his red-covered chest. Loki looks...Thor doesn't even have words. His expression is empty, yet gutted, and he doesn't look like he can breathe, let alone move.

He's not crying, Thor realizes. The Weeping Siren said that he'd been quiet. But if she could hear him, and...gods, what is this? Are they haunting his brother? Like dragr? This is madness.

Thor shoves the Weeping Siren away, intending to move for Loki, but the second that the Weeping Siren's fingers leave his head, the world vanishes into darkness.

The Weeping Siren snarls, lunging for him again. "Let me see him!"

Thor rolls out of the way, then up to his feet, putting distance between them. Norns. He used to listen to the Warriors talk about how the Weeping Siren's moods were quick to change, and he never understood until now. She was prone to violence, Fandral explained once.

"What on helheim is wrong with you!? What was that?" He gestures to where Loki would have been. "Are we haunting my brother? Are you haunting him?"

The Weeping Siren shakes her head, and he backs up a step when she advances on him. "No, of course not!" she snaps. "That wouldn't make any sense."

"Then what"—Thor barely manages to keep himself from shouting—"was that? You said that when we found my brother, you would...I don't know, shove me back? We found him. So what is this? You've been listening to him cry, as if this is some—" Thor doesn't even have the words.

Loki wasn't in the tunnels, Thor realizes suddenly. Oh, gods. That was the Vanir throne room. That's why he recognized it. How long has it been since he fell in the Xīn Zhī Chí?

The Weeping Siren growls at him, and Thor lifts up his hands, backing up. "Now, Odinson," her voice has dropped an octave, revealing a nasally, hissing tone. This—this is the voice he remembers in the tunnels, when she was standing over his brother asking and we've been very happy together, have we not, dearest? while Loki sobbed beneath her. Not the sweet, melodic tone she carried at her trial. It's a façade, he realizes, this perfect tone. She uses it to play with people.

"What sort of game is this?" Thor demands. The Weeping Siren's expression tenses, but she says nothing for long seconds, "Answer me!"

The Weeping Siren hisses, drawing in on herself. "You aren't dead, you fool. How little you know about the workings of magic to think that you were."

Thor backs up a step. He feels off balance. His not-chest feels tight. He can't get himself to speak, let alone move. "What?"

"Benar didn't do his readings," the Weeping Siren's tone is taunting.

"He was always reading—"

The Weeping Siren laughs. "Of course he was! Can't mess up his one chance, can he? If he failed the first time someone tried to end the Blodig Skog, the magical backlash would have killed him, you, your brother and everyone in the forest. But he never did figure out what happened when he submitted someone to the free-will sacrifice. I did."

Thor closes his eyes. He feels old. So very, very old; ciphering through this woman's riddles to find truth, if there is anything to it.

"When you stabbed yourself, and you hit the water, the magical backlash of your blood"—she points at him—"and the forest caused your fylgja to expel itself from your body."

"This...is astral projection?" Thor asks hesitantly. "But I don't know how to astral project. I'm not a sorcerer!"

"As if that has never been more obvious," the Weeping Siren says dryly. "Did you not see yourself, Odinson? If you are dead, how have you not rotted? How is your body in perfect condition despite weeks having passed since your death?"

"Weeks—" Thor can barely get his mouth to form the word.

Weeks? It's barely felt like a few hours.

Oh, gods. Loki…He can't even imagine…

"I'm...alive." Thor feels his balance give, but in the absence of anything to grab onto, he falls to his knees heavily. The ground beneath him feels like nothing. As if he could reach out and fall through it forever. My body hasn't rotted. Loki was...does Loki know? Of course he doesn't know. He wouldn't...he would try and help me.

He wouldn't...oh, Norns.

"Then you…" Thor looks up at her slowly. That fierce, twisted expression of want is still on her face, and her body is tense. She's preparing to jump him again. So she can see. Which must mean that she can hear Loki, but not...gods, this is all so confusing.

Thor asks, cautiously "How are you here? You are here, aren't you? This isn't some...creation of my imagination."

"No," the Weeping Siren assures. "Your mother expelled me from my body and then destroyed it. My spirit was drawn back to Vanaheim. It doesn't have anywhere else to go. I can't return to my body. But you...you can. Eventually. If you can ever learn how to put yourself back into it."

"What—?"

"I enjoy it. Listening to him," the Weeping Siren's gaze grows pained. Then angry. She turns back to him. Her shoulders grow tight. "Let me see him."

"Stay away from me," Thor commands, getting back to his feet.

Norns.

What is happening?

Thor takes a stab into the dark, "You're...you've attached yourself to me so you can watch him. And that's why you won't help me. If I return to my body, you can't see him. You won't be able to do anything, because you'll be dead."

The Weeping Siren laughs. "So limited! Do you not know the depth of my power? I could claim your body as my own now that we're finally close enough! I just have to get rid of you first. Then I? I can return to my family. So we have reached a dilemma. I want to return to my children."

Norns—

Thor backs up, "They weren't your children."

"They were." The Weeping Siren smiles at him, moving closer, like a snake coming in for the kill, "Even now, I can see, Loki is still mine. My son, my child, even your Allmother couldn't take that from me!"

Thor wishes he had a weapon. He lifts up his hands, as if he can form a barrier with his flesh alone.

"Hold still," she sings quietly, and his limbs stiffen. Thor swears in the privacy of his mind. He forgot about this. How could he have forgotten about this? "And let me go in for the kill." She moves toward him slowly and reaches out her hands.

"You—" The Weeping Siren's gaze jumps away from him suddenly, then her head tips. Brown eyes widen with horror and she starts to scramble away from him, swearing under her breath. Thor watches her with confusion as she lifts up her hand, preparing for...something, when she just…

Stops.

Her body spasms, growing ethereal, then she opens her mouth to shout a furious "no!" and the candle snuffs out. She goes with it. Thor staggers a step forward, the spell broken. What—?

But there's still light. Behind him. Thor closes his eyes. This must be something worse. If it can make the Weeping Siren vanish, then he's not even sure he wants to know.

"Thor."

He stiffens. Then, slowly, he turns around.

His legs go weak at the sight of her, and he starts to fall forward, but Frigga's arms wrap around him, catching him. Holding him. Helping him. Thor clings to her, gasping, trying not to cry. "Amma. Amma—what—"

"Shh," Frigga grips him tightly, resting her head against his shoulder. Then she pulls away, and cups his cheek. "You've been here long enough, I think."

Thor looks behind them, where the Weeping Siren stood, "But she—"

"Is gone." Frigga promises, her expression tight, "She won't bother you again. Close your eyes."

Thor does.

He feels Frigga do...something because the energy of the room changes, then her hand shoves through his chest and grabs something. He gasps, trying to reach for her, but suddenly he's falling

Out

In

Down

Everywhere and no where

And then out of and into and

Then he breathes. Inhaling air. Air. His eyes snap open, and he sees—sees. No blackness. But light. A face. His mother's face. Leaning over him. Crying. She gathers him into her arms and he can't breathe, can't move, his body isn't his it's—what is this—he's—

Thor feels his father join his mother, and they hold him

And they hold

And he can't

What is

He gasps, because all he can do is breathe.

000o000

"All things considered, you're in surprisingly good health," Eir says carefully several hours later. She pulls her hand away from Thor's neck and leans back to study his face. Her gaze is intense, and Thor feels himself shy away from it.

She turns away and conjures something, handing him a glass of water a moment later. "Keep drinking this. I can't begin to describe to you how dehydrated your body is."

Thor's drunk enough water that he already feels nauseous and bloated, but he obligingly takes a sip. He looks into the cup and chews on the inside of his lip. The water has flavor, and it keeps making him want to spit it up. Thor doesn't ask what Eir put in it. He doesn't want to know.

"There's no lasting consequences?" His father asks. Thor's gaze lifts up. His parents stood at the end of the bed for the entire examination, their gazes so fierce it felt like if they blinked, Thor would die. It's a level of scrutiny he's not used to.

"No," Eir assures. She turns away from him again, organizing something. "Nothing I could find."

"Thank the Norns." Frigga murmurs softly.

"Astral projection for this long isn't unheard of," Eir says, and Thor tries not to wince at the term. "Although I will admit I am unfamiliar with the time dilation that you experienced," she looks back at Thor at this, "You said that the entire thing felt like less than two hours?"

"Yes," Thor confirms.

It's been six weeks since the Warriors last saw them. It's been seven since they left Bo-An in the first place. Thor doesn't know if he was expecting it to be longer or shorter. It feels both too long and too short.

Eir shares a significant look with his parents Thor can't interpret. Her hands move. She's cleaning off something. "Astral projection is in real-time," she explains, "which is why this is strange."

It's not like anyone trained him on it. What? He's supposed to know how to do it properly the first time? He's not a sorcerer. How many times does he have to keep telling people this?

Thor shrugs slightly, playing with the cream-colored blanket pulled over his crossed legs, his left one aching dully. Unlike when he was...a spirit, or whatever that was, his leg has not healed. He's exhausted, but not tired enough to sleep. He's over-anxious. Everything feels slightly buzzed, like he's waiting for something to go wrong.

"It wasn't by my choice," Thor says, "maybe that's why this was different."

"How could you possibly know that?" Eir looks back at him. Then at Frigga. Her hands go still. "I've barely heard of the Xīn Zhī Chí."

Frigga shakes her head. She's picking at her palm. "I know of it. But anything written about the Blodig Skog I'm reluctant to trust. It's more legend than truth now."

"The Weeping Siren explained it to me," Thor says. The words feel awkward coming out of his mouth. The name has been a forbidden topic. Frigga winces, then closes her eyes. "Among other things," Thor adds, quieter.

He picks at the blanket again, digging his nails through the threads.

He looks up at his mother. "Are you're sure she's…"

"Yes." Frigga says firmly. She sighs and takes a step forward, gathering Thor's hands into her own. Her fingers are warm against his palms, but the sensation still feels somewhat bizarre. Almost as if he hadn't had contact he can remember in six weeks. "I never thought this would happen. Especially to you. Astral projection is an advanced magic. When you leave your body, you join the spirits around you. Being able to ward off against them takes skill and years of training."

Thor feels himself slumping a little. "Loki would have known what was going on. He would have been able to find his way back to his body."

At his brother's name, both his parents tense. Eir makes an unhappy face and turns away from him. Thor eyes them suspiciously, but before he can say anything, Frigga squeezes his hands. "Maybe," she concedes, "but Loki has only begun to learn this. He's leagues ahead of other sorcerers at his age, but even still. We don't know this for certain. No one blames you for not knowing, Thor."

Thor sighs. He rubs a thumb across the rough skin of Frigga's palm looking around the healing room for a moment. Asgard's. Eir explained what happened on Vanaheim while she was treating him, albeit a condensed version. Thor can't believe that it worked. Part of him had expected failure when his consciousness had come back to him.

"How did you even know?" Thor asks, looking at his mother.

Her lips twist unhappily.

"I could sense your presence in the room immediately," Odin explains from his position beyond Frigga. He's gripping Gungnir in one hand, looking old. "When your mother was not overcome with emotion, she could as well. Your mother took the dive to find you once we'd returned to Asgard. Then she cast the spirits attempting to haunt you out."

Spirits. Not spirit. Which means there must have been others he didn't see. Wonderful.

Thor nods. "Why didn't Loki…?"

Why didn't Loki know? Why couldn't Loki sense me?

"I don't know." Frigga sighs.

Thor looks around the room once more for his sibling, but Loki is just as absent now as he was when Thor woke up. "Where is he?" Thor asks, looking toward his parents. "My brother? He's not…?"

"No," Frigga assures. "No, of course not. He's alive."

Eir snaps something closed with force.

Thor's eyes flick toward her by instinct at the sound. Still watching the head healers back, he asks, "Then where…?"

"Isn't that the question," Eir says sharply and looks at Odin pointedly. There's a ferocity in her expression that Thor's never seen before. Anger, frustration, and...protectiveness. The combination makes him wary.

Thor tries to catch his mother's eye, but she won't look at him. Thor raises his eyes to Odin. "Father? Where is my brother?"

"Your brother is still in Vanaheim." His father explains.

"What? Why?" Thor asks.

"Your father is a fool." Eir grumbles.

Odin sighs, weary. "Eir, leave us. We have a great deal of talking to do, and it would go smoother without your commentary."

Eir snorts, shakes her head, and sets down what she was working on. She exits the room without another word and shuts the door sharply behind her. Thor slowly pulls his gaze back to his parents. Frigga releases his hands and takes a seat on the edge of the bed and Odin sinks onto Eir's unused stool.

There's silence for long seconds before Odin says, "You know that your mother and I love your brother, yes?"

Thor is quiet for a moment. He wrings his hands in the cream blanket. The skin is whole, any traces of the frostbite removed. When Thor asked about them, Eir said that she doesn't remember even seeing them. Which means that Loki must've…

"...yes?" Thor agrees after a moment. His parents and Loki have their issues, but Thor believes that their parents love them.

"I only hope your brother knows the same," Odin sighs. He grips Gungnir tightly. "While we were on Vanaheim, your brother was unfairly forced to out something about himself. Something that should have been his decision about whether or not he wanted to reveal."

Thor nods slowly, not understanding. "Reveal...what?"

"Your brother was adopted, Thor," Frigga says quietly.

Thor stills, his blood rushing cold.

They—

What?

He doesn't look anything like us. Thor remembers thinking when he was younger.

"We've loved him as our son since the day he was brought into our lives, but for his protection, we decided that his true nature should be kept from the public," Frigga continues. "Laufey left his offspring to die on Jotunheim when the war was over. Your father took him home. Loki is—"

"Jotun." Thor finishes, breathless.

His skin was turning blue. He wasn't sick. Whatever glamor or second skin or whatever on Helheim it was was wearing off. Loki was sick enough that his body couldn't sustain it. The sickness, at least from what Thor understood, drained magic slowly as the body sought to fight against it.

Loki's magic was wearing thin. It wasn't trapped inside him like it was with the Aethitan. It was wearing away, piece by piece.

That's why he burned me.

Benar knew.

He told me not to touch him because he knew.

"Yes." Odin says, softly. "Your brother is Jotun."

And Thor—

Thor sits with this for long seconds, slowly processing it. My brother is Jotun. Loki is Jotun. Loki is Jotun. He's a Frost Giant. Laufey's son. Thor's brother. He's not here. Because he's on Vanaheim.

Loki is Jotun.

I don't care.

Because Loki may be Jotun. He's Jotun (the name feels strange, even in his mind), but that is not all Loki is. That's...Loki is Jotun. But Loki…Memories flash through his mind in rapid succession. Loki learning how to walk and tumbling into Thor when he couldn't keep himself up anymore. Loki shortening his name into a slurred babble that he'd say all the time. Loki curled up next to him when he was frightened. Thor showing Loki how to hold a sword properly. Loki showing him the first bit of magic he did. Loki approaching him after a brutal training session when no one dared to talk to him. Loki making him laugh, Thor making Loki laugh. The two of them fighting in the training ring. Loki helping him with their lessons, Loki being there. Loki being his best friend for centuries. Loki being there, by his side, with him, always for anything.

And his parents—

Background characters. Their entire lives. Present enough, but Thor? Thor and Loki raised each other. They played together. They fought together.

Loki is Jotun.

Sure.

Thor doesn't care.

Something tight and almost painful builds in his chest. Anger. He's angry. No, he's furious. Because—because how dare his parents think to keep something like this from Loki? This is Loki's body. Loki has a right to know that! What were they thinking? This isn't fair. This wasn't right.

"What on the severed hand of Tyr is wrong with both of you!?" Thor bursts out.

Frigga draws back from him. Her expression closes. "What?"

Thor shoves the blanket away from his legs, wishing he could hit something. "You kept this from him!?"

"You're...not upset that he's Jotun?" Frigga seems confused.

"What? No. Of course not. It's—" terrifying, awful, different "—not my choice. And it's not like Loki asked to be born Jotun!" Thor pushes his fingertips against his temples. Trying to make sense of this and swim through the emotions crashing through him. He shakes his head.

"Thor," Frigga reaches for him, but he pulls back.

He looks at both of them, meeting their eyes heavily. "This was Loki's body. You had no right to keep that from him. I don't care that he's Jotun. I don't care that he's adopted. You lied to him—you lied to both of us our entire lives!"

"I know. We didn't have a choice." Odin says, pained.

Thor scoffs, throwing up his hands. Of course you did, he thinks bitterly, you just didn't care.

"You don't understand," his father presses. "When I took Loki back to Asgard, I was afraid for his life. You have no idea what the political environment that swept through Asgard after the war. Things are nowhere near where they should be, I'll admit, but they are eons better than what they used to be."

"Fine. You didn't tell Asgard. But why," Thor's voice is ice, "didn't you tell Loki?"

Frigga's eyes close. She sighs, her face lined with regret. She's still picking at her palms. "It was just easier. We kept telling ourselves that we'd tell him this year, or this month, but the timing was never right."

Thor closes his eyes, hissing through his teeth. "There was never going to be a good time."

"I know." Odin admits. "But like your mother said, it was...easier."

"Cowards." Both his parents are quiet at his accusation. Thor opens his eyes, and all he can see on their faces is agreement. It makes his stomach feel heavy. He refuses to feel guilt, looking away from them. He shifts his position slightly, wincing when his leg aches. "Why is Loki on Vanaheim?"

It's supposed to be a question, but it sounds like a threat.

"Your aunt and uncle recognized the familial markings. They took Loki into protective custody because they thought we kidnapped him—" Frigga starts to explain.

"And you LEFT HIM THERE!?"

"No!" Odin's voice has gained an edge, at last, as if tired of being beaten. "No, of course not! He is my son. Lin will feel my wrath before this is over—but I did not leave your brother there. How could you think that? I would not abandon my child."

"You—" Thor doesn't even have words.

"Thor," Odin grabs his hand and squeezes it. Thor forces himself not to slap it away. "I have a plan. I had a plan before I left Bo-An's palace." He sighs, then gets to his feet, clearly weary. "Come with me. It's time that we put it into motion anyway."

Thor stares at him, feeling old, afraid, and betrayed. He doesn't move.

Odin's expression unexpectedly softens. "Loki will be alright, Thor. I swear it. Asgard will not stand for this insult."

Thor looks down at the blanket. "You would go to war for this?"

"Hopefully," Odin's tone has gone hard. "I will not need to."

000o000

"Loki," Freya's voice is soft. Loki feels the bed dip where she sits on it. He refuses to look up at her, pulling his legs closer to his chest. As if, should he curl up tight enough, it would somehow manage to help.

It won't.

Nothing will.

"Will you not talk to me?" Freya asks quietly.

What does she want him to say? That he's grateful that she revealed the truth his parents hid from him. And that rather than stay on Vanaheim to help him, his parents fled to Asgard to lick their wounds. His brother is dead, as still and cold as Benar's corpse was. His friends abandoned him. His entire realm left him for scraps.

He hasn't said a word since Freya and Lin explained the situation to him, and he doesn't plan to start now.

Freya sighs.

Loki doesn't look up at her. He keeps his head carefully tucked against his knees. At least this way he doesn't have to look at his true form. Kia said that with time and proper rest, his magic would return to its full strength. Then he could hide behind the glamor once more. Because that's all Loki is. Hiding behind appearances.

"Your father said that he found you on Jotunheim and took you home. That Laufey had abandoned you." Freya says after a moment. "I thought you should know."

A pang shoots through his chest.

Loki looks up at her. Dark hair is pulled out of her eyes, and her heavy gaze is studying his face. Loki hasn't spent a lot of time with Frigga's sister's family, but she's not unfamiliar to him. Loki just wouldn't say she's a comforting sight.

Loki opens his mouth, but the thought of talking exhausts him. He looks away from her.

Freya sighs. "I know this is hard—"

Do you? Loki wants to snap? Have you learned that your family isn't who you thought it was? That your father is a monster? And that now you are a monster by association?

"—but you'll get through this, I promise."

Freya pats his leg and stands up. The thought of her being gone is almost worse than her persistent talking. She starts to walk away and unlike before when solitude was a welcomed gift, his tongue unsticks itself from the roof of his mouth and moves of its own accord.

"You don't believe your own sister?"

Freya looks back at him, her expression puzzled. "What?"

"Frigga. She told you that I was...that Laufey...you don't believe her? Are you so close with the Frost Giants?" The term comes off his tongue venomously. More so than he meant for it to.

Freya comes back to the bed. She sits down on the edge again, and just looks at him. She thinks about her answer for long seconds before she says, carefully, "I'm not sure what I think. Laufey is...he can be cold. I don't know if I believe that he would abandon his own son."

Why wouldn't he? I was the son. He doesn't want me.

No one wants me.

Loki bites on his lip. He looks down at the red bedcover. The guest room that he's been placed in is dressed in the colors of Vanaheim: red and brown. The entire room feels slightly cramped despite having little to no other furniture save the bed, and this only increases the anxiety swirling in his stomach rather than appease it. But Kia said that he should remain in bed for at least another day.

"Do you think they hate me?" Loki asks.

"No, nephew, no. I believe that Odin and Frigga do love you." Freya says quickly. "They just didn't make the best decisions regarding you."

"So they should have left me to die?" Loki looks up at her sharply.

Freya's shoulders drop. "Of course not."

"I…" Loki looks away from her. He doesn't know what to say. He doesn't know if there's anything he can.

Freya sighs heavily. "Loki, when your party went missing last year, my son was part of that group. Tjan came back and was barely coherent. His mind had been meddled with. He was barely a shadow of the man I raised. I wouldn't wish that pain on any parent."

"You did that to mine." Loki points out, frustrated. He shakes his head. They're not even my parents. Why am I arguing for them?

"This is a complicated situation. I think that Laufey deserves to have a say in it." Freya says. "We've already made contact with Jotunheim. We're leaving tomorrow so we can meet with him."

We.

Hahaha.

"Don't I get a say in this?" Loki asks, desperate. He doesn't want to meet Laufey! If he did abandon him, why would Laufey suddenly care about the son he cast off? He wants to talk to Thor. He wants to talk to his not-parents. Their betrayal hurt, but he has to get their accounts. He has to see for himself. Do they really hate him?

"We'll take your word into consideration," Freya promises. "But for now, get some rest, nephew. You're exhausted."

Loki bites back something nasty in response to that. He closes his eyes, trying to slow down his breathing. When he opens them, Freya is gone.

000o000

Exhaustion follows him like a shadow, and Loki falls asleep soon after. Kia comes in to check on him and assure him that he can do moderate activity with nothing "too exciting." Afterwards, a few of his cousins talk with him briefly. But time, as it always does when one is dreading something, practically vanishes.

His aunt and uncle arrive, and despite Loki's inward protests, he doesn't see a way out of this. His magic is drained to the point he couldn't conjure basic fire. And even if he did leave the palace, where would he go? It's not like he could shout for Heimdall to take him back to Asgard.

Asgard doesn't want him.

Jotunheim probably won't either. Which is good, isn't it? Maybe Laufey will meet with them and then lop off Loki's head.

Loki wrestles into another pair of clothing, brushes back his messy hair, and follows after his aunt and uncle. He tries not to flinch at any reflective surface that they pass. The blue skin makes him sick to his stomach. Which is funny, because the first thing that Lin had told him when he woke up was that he had nothing to be ashamed of, and his true race was something to take pride in.

Both his aunt and his uncle emphasized heavily that being Jotun was okay.

But Loki still flinches back from himself.

He follows after his aunt and uncle and the entourage around them, looking at the floor and feeling like he's trying to crawl into himself. Maybe he is. He wishes he could vanish. Loki follows the well-worn path from the guest room to the exit of the Vanir palace.

Their means of travel lies on the outskirts of the city, as Asgard's Bifrost does. Exposing people to that level of energy on a daily basis would cause ill-effects.

But when they exit the palace, stepping out into the surrounding courtyard with the city of Bo-An beyond it, Loki stops.

He can't breathe.

The urge to throw himself behind his aunt and uncle strikes him, but he forces himself to stay where he is. He feels exposed. Disgusting. Everyone can see his skin. Can see him.

Why couldn't I have just died in that forest?

Norns, please.

Because it's not empty like Loki was expecting.

Asgardians stand in the courtyard, stretching out in every direction. Their expressions are carefully guarded steel. The Einherjar, members of the government, the citizens—everyone. Toward the front he spots Sif and the Warriors. They're armed, and not afraid to show it. A lot of the citizens are armed.

Gods.

Did they…

Did they come to kill him?

A memory flashes through his mind. Standing beside his brother when they were children, their father in front of him as he explained the Jotun-Asgardian war. Thor cheerfully proclaiming when I'm king, I'll hunt the monsters down and slay them all with a smile on his face.

He feels sick. He thinks he's going to be sick.

He stops moving. Standing there, breathless.

"What is this?" Lin exclaims, drawing to a halt. He seems just as confused as Loki is. He doesn't know if this is reassuring or not. Because it would be better if Lin knew why this was happening. What was happening.

They're here to kill me.

Oh Norns.

This is no less than he deserves.

Thousands of eyes turn to him, and Loki feels all the air seep out of him. The Asgardians raise their weapons high above their heads, and Loki braces himself for some sort attack, something, and—

The Asgardians sink to one knee, bowing their heads in respect. Their weapons lower, falling to the earth in front of them. The sound is like a loud bell ringing. Loki's lips part. He doesn't understand. What are they doing? This is something that the court does in respect but that's ridiculous because Loki is…

Jotun.

Crazy.

Loki.

This...this is some sort of...he doesn't even know. It's not funny, but mockery has long been the choice of humor when it comes to him.

"King Lin!" His fath-Odin shouts from the crowd. He emerges from somewhere—Loki doesn't manage to catch it before he appears—dressed in his full battle propaganda, Gungnir firmly gripped in one hand. Beside him, Frigga stands with a sword in one hand, her hair pulled back into a tight braid. Layered in armor and regal garb they look the part of some of the most feared and respected beings in the Nine Realms.

They look ready for war.

"What is the meaning of this?" Lin asks, taking a step in front of Loki. Loki doesn't move. He's afraid to. He doesn't know what this means.

Norns.

Loki leans to the side a fraction to see beyond Lin's pale red cloak. Odin gestures around himself to the Asgardians surrounding them. "My people and I have come to claim our prince. We disagree with the decision that you've taken, and we've come to rectify that."

They've…

Loki looks around, staring at all the Asgardians. They...they came...to Vanaheim for him? Not to kill him, but to...take him back? Loki wasn't...he didn't think that...he never would have imagined this. Not for him. For Thor? Certainly. But him? They don't...like him.

But they're here.

And they've seen him. Not the glamor, but him. His true skin. And they bowed their respect in his presence. They all came for him.

Loki's hands fall to his sides. His breath escapes him in a ragged hiss.

King Lin stares at the Asgardians for long seconds, as if he's trying to figure out what to make of this. "You mean to tell me that despite the very strong opinion of Frost Giants in Asgard, all of you came to claim Prince Loki?"

There's a murmur of words throughout the crowd. Some version of "yes" from what Loki can make out. Odin takes a step forward. "Yes. Why would we not? Loki is ours. Perhaps not by blood, but he is Asgard's all the same. He has a home with us."

Home.

With them.

Because they don't care. They don't care if he's Jotun. They…

Loki's throat burns. His vision blurs.

"You kidnapped a child, warped his mind, and now you expect us to return him to his kidnappers?" Freya's voice is quiet, but still penetrating. Loki's throat closes. He closes his eyes and wraps his arms around his stomach. His father took him from his sire. Loki wasn't meant to be Asgardian. He was taken.

"That's not what happened, jiejie." Frigga says, her tone hard. "You know this."

"We know what you told us." Lin counters.

"Do I strike you as the type of woman who would willingly keep a child from their parents without reason?" Frigga counters. "Loki is my son. I didn't bear him, but I have loved him as my own since he was placed into my arms. You will not keep him from us."

"Aye!" the cry rises through the crowd, like a rippling echo. It's powerful in its intensity.

"Return our Jotun prince!" Someone shouts,ns to then begins chant it, and it picks up rapidly throughout the Asgardians, becoming a chorused shout. "Return our Jotun prince! Return our Jotun prince!"

Loki takes a step back. His chest is tight, and his hands are shaking. Emotion is crashing into him, through him, around him. His legs feel weak at the pressure of it. His body is beginning to hurt. Like claws are wrapped around him, digging until he bleeds.

Lin says something to counter it, but Loki's beyond hearing.

And then he sees him. Stepping out beside their parents, wielding Mjolnir above him like a flag, shouting the chant with the other Asgardians. Long blond hair is clean, his face removed of the dirt and blood. He's dressed in familiar Asgardian armor, long red cloak billowing behind him.

Thor.

Alive.

Here.

Now.

Alive.

But he was...he was…

Loki doesn't remember making the conscious choice to move, but he's shoved his way in front of his uncle. Thor hasn't vanished. Loki blinks, but he's still there, standing beside his—their?—parents. Moving. Alive. Speaking. Alive.

Oh, gods.

Fresh tears spill down his face. Loki almost wants to laugh. Of course. It's not his true parentage that brings him to tears. It's not thinking he'd been abandoned by his family and realm, left to die. It's the sight of his sibling doing nothing fantastic but move. But breathe.

Loki was so sure…

Thor looks toward him, and their eyes meet. Relief and heartache and pain and loss wash through him. The people around him cease to have any meaning. Background noise to another life. He takes a step forward, intending to move to his sibling and punch him, but a hand grabs his bicep.

Loki flinches bodily and turns to look back at Freya.

Her expression is pained. "Loki," she says, her voice soft. "What are you doing?"

And Loki just—he can't. He tears his arm from her and shakes his head, taking a step back. Putting his back to Asgard. And for the first time in a long time, Loki believes that they won't let anything happen to it.

The Asgardians quiet, and the silence almost aches.

"This is my choice." Loki finds his words after a moment. His voice feels weak. "I'm not a child, Yímā Freya. I'm...I'm thankful...that you would intervene for me." And he is, gods, he is, because if he had been left to himself...he doesn't know what he would have done. Knowing that his aunt and uncle didn't care that he was Jotun was...it was a relief. And it matters. It does. But it's not the only thing that does.

"You believe them, then?" Lin asks. "That Laufey left you?"

"I don't know Laufey," Loki admits, and I don't want to, he doesn't add, "but if I was taken, why didn't he search for me? And...and I trust my family."

Freya nods, smiling tightly. "Then I respect your choice, Odinson." She reaches out and pulls him into a quick embrace. Her words are meant for him alone when she whispers, "If you need us, we'll be here for you. Always. You're not alone, Loki, I swear it."

He nods, and pulls away from her. Her smile softens into something gentle. Lin dips his head and backs up a step, respecting his choice.

Loki closes his eyes, bracing himself, and turns around.

The eyes burn into him, but their gazes aren't painful. They're almost comforting.

Loki walks toward his family. They meet him halfway, and Loki throws his arms around Thor, burying his face in his brother's shoulder. Thor's grip is almost desperate. "I hate you." Loki whispers. Thor laughs quietly, his voice equally soft.

"I know."

"I thought you were dead."

"I know. I did, too."

Loki closes his eyes, exhaling in relief. They're okay. He's okay. Thor is alive.

Frigga's hand brushes against his hair. "We need to talk. All of us, as a family. We have much to discuss."

Loki nods, but he doesn't let his brother go. For so long, Thor was nothing. He was still and dead, and Loki may not understand how this happened, but he's not going to fight it. Thor is here now. His brother is alive. He didn't lose anything, but he gained everything.

At length, he finally draws back from his brother. He looks around himself, first at his family, then the Asgardians surrounding them, here for him.

Loki closes his eyes, exhaling slowly.

They're going to be okay, injuries, limps, mental distress and all.

Loki looks up at his father and says, "Let's go home."