Chapter Text
Whenever the people of all the realms considered what they wanted in a potential soulmate there were some characteristics that apparently bore mentioning: Chivalry, attractiveness, loyalty, common interests, patience, courage, combativeness, ambition, the size and shape of the one or other body part…
To be quite honest, Loki had never known what he was looking for in a partner. Any of those commonly viewed as desirable traits were quite alright, unless of course they played out in a fashion that was not. Fate was supposed to work in a way that would take care of any negative sides by simply not matching anyone with a person who was not right for them in any case. So what was even the point of wasting too much time thinking of any prince or princess charming?
The one thing Loki thought he knew for sure was that someday he would lay eyes on the person the Norns had picked out for him and the skies would go from different shades of gray to the everchanging play of colors his mother had told him about for the better part of a millennium.
Then he knew nothing…
~+~+~
“Honestly, brother, at this point I feel you are being needlessly dramatic.”
Loki continued to stare out of the window as if Thor had not seen fit to grace him with his thoroughly unwanted presence. They must have had the same discussion, if one could even call it that, at least once a day ever since…
“It is not as though you have been banished.”
The sharp inhale that Loki could not quite stop would likely only encourage Thor to keep on blabbing. As if Loki wanted the reminder of Thor’s recent banishment and everything that came from it. As if he was not feeling the consequences painfully each and every day!
“Besides, it changes nothing,” Thor finished so casually that Loki wanted to stab him straight through the throat, perhaps to silence him, perhaps to make him bleed and hurt so that he could share some of Loki’s emotions the way he so often claimed he was attempting to.
“Nothing,” Loki repeated almost tonelessly instead. The anger, as seemed to be the norm lately, was gone even faster than it had come, leaving very little will to do anything behind. “Everything is the way it has always been.”
For the first time in the past weeks Thor was not immediately able to think of a reply and Loki was grateful for it. Any and all visits he had received since that fateful day in the vault had either ended in complete silence or with more shouting than Loki thought he could summon the will to do anymore.
“I have never been different,” Loki muttered, looking out the window and at the sky that was as gray as ever, “And never will be.”
The urge to shed tears over the fact that he could only now see that truth was starting to feel just as superfluous as everything else. What even was the point of anything anymore?
“You don’t know that, Loki,” Thor finally said, his voice lacking its usual booming quality for once. No doubt he was no more convinced than Loki was and perhaps Loki should have given him some credit for the attempt, but even that seemed like too much effort.
“Leave me be. You must have better things to do than wasting time on a Frost Giant,” Loki replied after he realized that Thor was more persistent than usual that day.
If he had known that some part of him had still not fully acknowledged that indisputable truth and saw fit to shed more tears over it after all, he would have kept his mouth shut. Instead he found himself squeezed against Thor’s too familiar and still too broad frame.
~+~+~
In his dreams, Loki sat at his mother’s feet and listened to her describing the colors of her favorite painting. He could never quite imagine what they would be like, but it never kept him from asking her about every different shade he could make out. The colors his mother was speaking of had to be stunning and much better than what Loki’s eyes were able to perceive. The magic behind it all, his mother explained, was one of the great mysteries of life and fate. Something that was missing falling into place as soon as that one person came into your life. Perhaps it was the Norns deciding to weave the strand of your shared life in color, perhaps a kind of magic that was older even than Asgard.
One day, Loki imagined, he would understand it all and maybe even find the answers that nobody had before. It was a matter of patience and learning everything there was to learn. Loki could do both. Not that day, but eventually!
And then the dream changed.
Touching the Casket of Ancient Winters.
Feeling himself change.
The truth Odin had never told him before.
Knowing that it was true.
The entire world falling apart around him and then…
Blinking his eyes open Loki was reminded of the day his mother first came to him, saying that he had been back in his chambers for three nights that had passed without him noticing. Shock, she had claimed, which felt like an understatement, but for lack of better word was the description that stuck.
Eventually Thor returned from his banishment to Midgard, a changed man, at least in some respects. Loki suspected that their mother told Thor to be mindful of his fragile state and not speak about everything that had changed for him, but it took hardly more than one good look for Loki to know. Perhaps it was unfair and a sign of a cruel heart that Loki felt his world shatter some more at the realization that Thor of all people had found his missing half, that he could now look at the world and see everything that Loki could not, but since nobody had ever claimed that the Jotun as a whole were anything other than cruel that seemed fitting enough.
“Are you with me, Loki?”
After blinking another couple of times, Loki finally looked away from the fabric of his mother’s dress and met her eyes instead. It had to have been decades, if not centuries, since he last woke up to her sitting at the edge of his bed, stroking his hair as if he was a young child struck by illness.
“I am not sure I like the look of that beard on you,” Frigga said when Loki kept quiet. She had to be sure enough that his mind was no longer wandering to places long and not so long ago. So far at least Loki found that she only ever spoke of such things to him when he was paying attention, other than Thor, who seemed to constantly be talking to fill the silence no matter how late Loki decided to join the conversation either with his ears or tongue.
“I am sure I don’t like the state my life is in,” Loki mumbled without moving a muscle more than necessary to get the words out. He might have been to some extent able to pretend that this was the kind of conversation they might have had during better times, but could not bring himself to bother.
“It is up to you to change that,” Frigga stated as she continued to run her fingers through Loki’s too long hair as if he might not bite her hand for what she had just said. To tell the truth, if she were anyone else, he might have considered it. Thor would have borne teeth marks for attempting to pet him alone already, stupid encouraging words or not.
“Don’t make fun of me. Not you,” Loki whispered. With anyone else he could have disassociated himself and simply let them speak, likely after the well deserved bite or stab, but not with her. After spending a millennium hanging on every word Frigga said, especially in that tone of voice and when her attention was on him alone, Loki could not bring himself to turn his focus somewhere else so completely that he did not hear all the things she had to say that he already knew he did not want to hear.
“Oh my sweet boy,” Frigga breathed and before he knew what was happening his mother was lying next to him so she could hug him tight without forcing him to move. As much as Loki felt like a young boy once again, he could not summon the same surety that his mother would make everything right that was wrong with the world that had been an integral part of his actual youth. “There are things that none of us can change, but it is always up to us what we make of them.”
When Loki met Frigga’s eyes there was nothing in them that spoke of uncertainty or trickery. She was every bit as earnest and wise as he was used to. Nothing had changed. Then again, of course nothing had changed for her. “Like treating a Jotun runt like your son?”
“You are my son, Loki,” Frigga answered, as unwavering as Loki had hoped she would. And perhaps a part of him had known that this at least would turn out exactly as it had. If there was one thing, only one, that still felt almost normal, it seemed fitting that it was none other than this. “And if you renounce me as your mother, you will still be my son.”
Loki stayed quiet for a few long moments as he considered everything his mother had said and a couple of things she had not actually said.
“What do you think I should do?” he finally asked, only barely refraining from adding a ‘mother’ if only to make sure that she understood without a doubt that he would never view her as anything else. Perhaps his entire world had become quite a bit colder and grayer, but this one thing would never change, that at least he was sure of.
“Your brother will return to Midgard in the morning. Perhaps a change of scenery?”