.-.

Beneath

Chapter Two Hundred Fifteen – Ends

Loki stood in the middle of his study, the main one, the one where Thor had slept for a few hours under that old turtle blanket less than a week ago while Loki got some much-needed sleep. Thor had probably needed it, too. Most of Asgard had probably needed it. Loki wouldn't have been able to think his way out of the war and into his freedom without it.

The miniature anatomy model Eir had given him, hiding within it her means of blocking any attempts at outside interference while he slept, was safely tucked away, the first thing he'd collected from his chambers. He could sleep as much as he liked now, without fear of Thanos or the lackey or anything else.

He'd already been through his bedchamber and bathroom. He'd picked through his wardrobe again and pulled out a few things, including plenty of extra tunics and one complete set of attire formal enough to put on a good show in Nadrith's palace. Five sets of sleepwear, because he'd spent too much time stuck in the set he'd put into that Midgardian contraption that ought to be called a "shrinking machine" and never wanted to wear something so restrictive to bed again. Three precious pairs of boots, well-fitted, no giant scars in the leather. A pair of fur-lined leather slippers he'd sorely missed. The Carhartt overalls, heavy black material cleaned of red and blue blood, hole repaired, no questions asked, for return. The items Jane had bought him at the Pole-Mart, and the horse hat Mohsin had given him in Melfort. An ugly version of a helmet, one Loki had no intention of ever donning again, yet holding it in his hands and running a finger over that ridiculous clothed horse awakened a sense of fondness in him. Mohsin was a good man who had extended selfless kindness to him – car, home, company, a hockey game, and this hat – while Loki used him and silently mocked him for that very kindness.

It was more than he'd intended to bring. This way, though, there would be no immediate need to seek out suitable items on Alfheim. He also had the clothing he'd left behind at the South Pole of course, and some of those items he'd also grown oddly fond of. Green, of course, featured prominently in several of them, and those he had no need of. Perhaps he'd make an exception for the green henley; it was quite comfortable. Or he could adjust the color. A shift to blue, or even now to yellow, wouldn't be difficult and was unlikely to appear false to his eyes. Then he remembered he'd been wearing the green Henley that last day, and while he couldn't remember what had happened to it, he was certain it was no longer usable. What he didn't take that remained usable, he would ask Jane to deliver to Skua, the donation area where the other Polies could claim anything they wanted at no cost. His bed cover could go there, too; he would never sleep on such a small bed again for the rest of his life, not if he had any say in the matter. And it had come from Skua in the first place, anyway, an unpleasant gray color he'd shifted to green.

The easy part was done.

That left everything else.

Over a thousand years of everything elses. With around five thousand years of life, you did not – you could not – cling to every item ever possessed. Loki, of course, could keep more than most, with large chambers and access to plenty of physical storage, not to mention access to plenty of not-exactly-physical storage. Still, he had been taught to curate his possessions carefully, to treat not keeping an item as the default decision unless he was making regular use of it, to not invest too much sentiment in everything with a memory attached. He had not, he thought, accumulated beyond what was appropriate, and his chambers were uncluttered. It was still a lot, and memories surrounded him. Gifts, marks of achievement, mementos, special purchases, and not only in this one room. He'd once imagined razing it all to the ground, every bit of these chambers that testified to a life built on lies, a life he could never return to. He didn't know now if he would ever return to these chambers, but the urge to destroy had become muted.

Still, not destroying everything else didn't mean he needed to take everything else. Strictly speaking, he had what he needed. When he'd fled to Svartalfheim all those years ago, never intending to return, he'd taken the clothing on his body. Different circumstances, of course.

He thought of what Jane had brought to the Pole, but she was a bad example, having packed for a few weeks in Norway and not nine months in Antarctica. She had one photo, as far as he knew, and few personal items aside from clothing and a handful of decorative items sent by others or created there at the Pole. As for the others, he'd never been in anyone else's chambers there. In the Science Lab, though, everyone except Jane and him had at least one photo on the desk; Elliot had an electronic one that changed photos at regular intervals. Wright kept propped up on display a multi-colored plastic flower-shaped thing his niece had made for him with an iron – Loki had never understood it and had never cared to ask. Austin had taped odd drawings of talking animals, meant to be funny – some of them were, others Loki found incomprehensible – all over his desk. Sue, who almost never worked from the Science Lab, at least not when Loki was there, had still decorated the storage shelves near her desk with cloths painted with nature scenes; if she'd ever spoken of them, Loki hadn't been there at the time.

He wished he'd asked. About both what they'd brought, and why.

Loki shook his head at himself. He was getting off track, and this wasn't helping. He expected to be gone much, much longer than a mere nine months. He didn't need to erase his prior life, but he wasn't looking to recreate it elsewhere, either.

He looked around him with fresh eyes. He wasn't headed off to cook meals, or repair machines, or manage communications equipment, or throw himself headlong into scientific research. And he didn't need decorations. He needed items to help him occupy his time. Books he never tired of rereading. The endlessly reconfigurable puzzle that had kept him from boredom on many an occasion. The set of cards that lent itself to a number of games one could play alone. The set of enchanting sticks he'd always meant to work more with but had never made the time for. He would have it now.

He was digging through the cabinet drawer he was certain held the enchanting sticks when he saw the two wooden boxes in the back. Knowing what they held, he lingered over them. Learning a musical instrument could absorb a great deal of his copious free time. Perhaps when he returned to the Pole, he could also collect the recorder Selby had given him. He had learned that one tune on it, the Jurassic Park theme. Worked on a few others for the Mid-Winter party he would not be attending.

Annoyed with himself and his continual lapses into unnecessary sentiment, Loki grabbed the boxes from the drawer, yanked open the one beneath and found in it the enchanting sticks. With the packing itself requiring only the wave of a hand – in truth not even that, but it was habit – in another half an hour Loki's version of a bag was packed.

Which left just one more thing to do in these chambers. Refusing to allow himself to dawdle over it, he sat down at his desk, slight dips worn into the wood where he had so often rested his arms, and took a sheet of paper and a pen.

"With this document, I, Loki of Asgard," he began. For the purposes of the document, it would be better to add "son of Odin Borsonand Frigga Fjorginndottir," but he could not bring himself to write those words. He continued without them, adding, "do hereby foreswearall claim to the throne of Jotunheim, or apportionment thereof, through the line of Farbauti, and of Laufey before her, and of Nal before him." Three rulers back ought to be sufficient, as well as providing some minimal level of obfuscation should anyone else see – or be shown – this document. His statement would look highly suspicious, for no one else went around writing such documents, and Loki had never foresworn the Ljosalf or Vanir or any other throne, but at least it didn't outright confess the truth of his blood. He added his signature, "Loki of Asgard," just as he had signed the treaty. In time, perhaps he would even grow accustomed to it. His seal came last, and here "Loki Odinson" was written, but in old High Revival lettering, and worked in among other symbols and flourishes it wasn't easily recognizable. It was fine. Perhaps he'd eventually commission a new seal.

Loki tucked away both document and seal, then stood and allowed himself another moment to look around. This wasn't the first time he was leaving Asgard with the possibility of never returning. But it was the first time that had happened when he had the chance to quietly take in his chambers, knowing he was leaving.

He didn't linger, though. It was just a space within an oppressive space, and he would find another space. Jane would be waiting, and he had a few more stops to make before he could meet her.

/

/

Jane eyed the guard outside Thor's door as she approached from the service lift, the first time she'd been on these upper floors other than when Frigga had ordered her to the top. Thor was waiting in the lift, probably still holding back laughter. When she was close enough, she saw that the guard, while standing stiff and still and staring straight ahead, had pressed his lips tightly together, the corners pulling up into a smile.

Matching his quiet smile, she ignored him and stopped right in front of Thor's door, giving it three firm knocks.

"Thor's not in?" she asked when, after waiting ten seconds for show, Thor of course failed to come to the door.

"He is not, Lady Jane. You may wait for him to return, if you wish. I suspect he won't be long."

The guard pointed out a padded leather bench against the wall not far away, and Jane was thanking the guard when Thor's voice came thundering down the corridor.

"Jane! You've come for a visit! What a pleasant surprise! Please, come in. Kyrdulfur gave you no trouble, did he?"

"None at all," Jane said. They exchanged introductions, Thor laughing and clapping Kyrdulfur on the shoulder, Kyrdulfur openly smiling now and letting go of all pretense that the palace guards were Asgard's version of Buckingham Palace guards.

Thor's "chambers" were huge and sumptuous, a palace within a palace; Jane cringed to think Thor had used the same word for her cramped setup in the trailer and Loki had used the same word for the tiny bedrooms at the South Pole. Everything she saw was a mysterious hint of an insight into something about Thor she didn't know, his tastes, his past, his interests; everything sparked a question there was no time for. Then he led her out to the balcony, and she forgot about the carriage turning into a pumpkin. The nighttime view out over the broken bifrost was stunning. Around her were chairs and a table and plants and a waterfall tumbling onto what looked like slabs of marble, but something important was missing.

"Right over there. That's where…" That's where I'd put the telescope. She smiled to herself. She'd already forgotten Thor had excused himself to go back inside. He took it for granted, this view, she was certain. His whole family must. If I lived for another four thousand years, I'd never get tired of it.

The reminder of Thor's absence served also as a reminder of time's existence, so Jane further reminded herself that she would see this again, then left to trace her path back through the various rooms until she found Thor looking down at a credenza in yet another living room area, one he called a sitting room. She headed toward him, and when he started to turn she picked up her pace and caught him in a hug from behind.

"Thanks for this," she said, pushing up on her toes to whisper it against his neck.

"You're very welcome," Thor said, covering Jane's hands with his. "I should have thought of it myself."

"It sounds like you're not here much anyway."

"True. Especially during the war. I was hardly even sleeping here." Thor turned and Jane's hands slipped from him. "The space is wasted on me."

"I hope you get to catch up on your sleep now. What's that?" she asked, looking down at an oval-shaped gold medallion on a chain and a knife – not the sort anyone would use for cutting a steak or chopping vegetables, more the killing sort – lying on a bundle of dirty-looking red cloth. Peering closer, she realized there was blood on the blade. She had noticed the red bundle there earlier, cloth folded up like a package hiding its contents, looking out of place as the only thing laying around on a surface that wasn't clearly decorative.

Thor turned back around, Jane now at his side. "Loki and I took them off of Brokk."

Jane nodded slowly. "Which of you got stabbed and didn't tell me about it? Or did Brokk get stabbed with his own knife?"

Thor winced. None of it was a secret, not from Jane, but he would have preferred not to upset her. He hadn't been looking at the knife, hadn't been thinking about the bits of blood still visible on it, but of course Jane didn't miss it. "Loki's hand was badly cut with that knife. His arm, too. I managed to avoid being stabbed this time, but I did have that pattern burned into my palm until I got it healed," he said, pointing to the talisman.

"Is that…an everyday occurrence for you and him, then? Getting stabbed and burned? Which one?" She knew they were both okay; Thor's hands she'd seen and touched enough to know they had no visible injuries, and Loki, too, she'd seen enough to have noticed if he had some gash on his hand. It was still disconcerting that this was apparently normal enough for them that neither had ever mentioned it, and Thor wasn't treating it like it was something they deliberately kept from her to avoid worrying her.

"Not quite," Thor said, holding out his right hand for her inspection. Her fingertip traced lightly over his skin as she studied it, leaving every nerve she passed over tingling with sensation. He swallowed before continuing. "I've met a few more blades and flames than I would have preferred to over the last several months." Head still down, Jane peered up at him through her lashes. Thor licked his lips. "And the arrows. So many arrows. I once sat down to a meeting with arrows still in my legs. More than once, perhaps. I broke them off and kept going. We're taught not to do that, but sometimes you—"

Jane let go of Thor's hand with a grimace, images of Thor walking around with broken off arrows protruding from him vying with the image she would never forget of Loki with a broken-off bloody sword jutting out of his back.

Thor rubbed his own fingers over his palm, then took the edges of the material from his cape and wrapped the talisman back up, tying it off with a knot at the top, not as nicely as the servant had but it would do. "These weren't meant to be left here. I was filthy and went straight to the bath."

"I'm glad you're both okay. No more blades or fires or arrows for a while, yeah?"

"I shall do my best to obey, my lady."

"Good," Jane said, turning but tossing a smile over her shoulder. "Next question: Is there a story behind that? I'm thinking there has to be a story."

Thor followed her gaze to the enormous antlers spanning over the wide entrance to the dining room, each tip coated in what looked like gold. "There is," Thor answered, a smile spreading over his face. "But it's long. And involves arrows."

"Tell me another time?"

Thor nodded and drew Jane into his arms one last time in privacy before they left his chambers and the palace.

/

/

"Are you sure I can't get you something? Tea or water? Skolmur managed to get us some fresh milk today."

Loki's eyebrows went up. That was tempting, after so long at the South Pole with only milk formed from a powder, and with milk in short supply on Asgard due to the war. But he didn't want to linger in Eir's home, and Alfheim would have plenty of milk of all sorts. "Thank you, but no. And again, I apologize for disturbing you so late. I don't know when I'll have another chance."

"It's fine. I'm glad you found me here. This is only the third night I've come home to sleep in a while now. Have a seat?"

"Just for a moment," Loki said and followed Eir over to a sofa, where she pulled her robe snugly around her and he took care with his cape, which wasn't quite as sturdy as his usual capes. "Is, ahhhh…."

"He won't disturb us. Go ahead."

Loki nodded. Skolmur had opened the door, but had promptly excused himself when Loki said he'd come to speak with Eir. "The scar," Loki said in preface, briefly holding up his wrist although it was covered by two layers of tunics and a leather and metal bracer. "I, ah…have little experience with other healers. If I go to a healer on Alfheim…?"

"Removing a scar isn't difficult. You just have to go slowly, to give the skin a little time to recover from the damage the treatment causes. Any competent healer can give you the treatments. You'll be fine."

"All right." The matter didn't seem as urgent as it had before, but he did still intend to have it removed, and that meant having it done on Alfheim. The prospect of it was unnerving, having been so accustomed to seeing Eir for everything, and now aware of why he had always seen Eir for everything. If Eir said it was safe, though, it had to be safe.

"How have you been sleeping?"

"When it has come, it's been absent outside disturbance. I'm in your debt, Eir."

"You are not. I was simply doing my duty. I wish I had a real solution for you. To cease the connection rather than merely blocking it. As I'm needed less in actively treating patients, I'll have more time to continue studying it, but I'm not sure how much I can do without you here."

"The solution you gave me is good enough for now. You or I will figure something else out. Heimdall could get a message to me, or you could come see me yourself, if you make progress."

"All right, agreed. 'When it comes,' then, is it? Sleep isn't coming easily?"

"What do you think?" Loki asked with a dry laugh.

"I imagine you have worry and exhaustion battling for your mind."

"Only worry and exhaustion? It feels like there's much more."

"I'm sure there is. Loki…you should know that I spoke with your mother tonight. She found me after the pronouncement, told me that when you confessed to intentionally killing Baldur, you believed that to be the truth. I want you to know how sorry I am. I examined every inch of you inside and out and compiled a long list of every bit of damage. I remember long days and nights working on plans to get you eating again, to get you walking…but there's no physical examination and no scan that will inform me of that type of damage to the mind. I wondered about it, at first. I didn't hear the confession, and I thought perhaps you'd simply said what you felt you needed to say. Not even as a lie, precisely, but…desperation, fueling you to say things you didn't mean. But the entire time you were in the Healing Room, you never walked back from the confession. You even affirmed it. And I stopped doubting it. I wish it had occurred to me that your mind could have been weakened and damaged to the same extent as everything else in your body was.

"I don't see how you could have known. As you said, no scan detects madness."

"Scans do detect some forms of madness. But this…it wasn't madness. Oh, perhaps it was, but not in the way we normally think of it. Not in the way we normally look for it. The levels of isolation and deprivation you faced…it can lead the mind to strange places. But yours seemed whole and hale, and I didn't think to question that."

"I'm a master of disguise, after all, even to myself," Loki said with a wry smile. Perhaps, if he reflected on it later, he might be angry at Eir for not having somehow discovered that even he had believed his lie. Right now he had no energy left for it. "It was for the best that your scans didn't discover my particular version of madness. When I remembered the truth, I kept it to myself. No one believed me anyway, and I had no desire to wind up under another serpent." Something Eir had said struck him then. "You doubted my confession? My remorse, or…?" My guilt? He couldn't quite bring himself to say it. No one, that he knew of, had doubted his guilt, not by the time the judgement was announced. Certainly no one had ever said so after that point.

"I had questions," Eir said. "I thought it was possible that something had simply gotten out of hand. The Assembly was told what you said. It was just the sheer hatred they said you'd expressed, it didn't sound like you. But Loki, I don't mean to make it something it wasn't, as though I was convinced of your innocence. I was as mistaken as everyone else."

"Perhaps not as much as everyone else. I've never heard any others say they doubted my confession. Though I suppose they wouldn't have mentioned it to me if they had. Eir…is the mind that fragile? Is my mind that fragile? That I could so thoroughly believe things that weren't true, about what I'd done and why? That I could be so easily…." Manipulated. Toyed with. Bent. Twisted. Damaged. Word after word came to mind. Each was its own confession, to things he was could not fully think through the meaning and implications of, much less speak of aloud. It wasn't just the certainty of his belief that he'd desired Baldur's death. It was the certainty with which he'd gone to Midgard with the scepter intending to conquer it and make himself King of Midgard. The unfiltered accusation he'd tossed out at Thor, that Thor had thrown him from the bifrost. The fact that he was still able to picture it happening that way just as clearly as though it really had. The dreams stirred up by sickly gray hands from afar, costing him sleep and leaving him to fight off further contamination of his memories. "I saw him shatter you. Reduce you to a wounded animal, desperate and terrified. It took him less than a minute," Brokk had said. Loki could have killed Brokk just for that, because it was said in front of Thor. But it was true. Although Loki didn't like to remember it, he did. The Other knew exactly where to press to unravel Loki's threads and lead him to those dark places his mother spoke of.

"So easily led," Loki filled in, continuing what he'd been saying before and speaking over Eir, whose words had not filtered through his worries. "Misled."

"Not easily. What you experienced back then was by no means easy. You were severely weakened, and your mind deceiving you is no less a result of that than your legs refusing to hold you up. Neither of those things happened easily."

Loki nodded, thinking back on his arrival on Thanos's floating rock. "When I fell from Asgard and met Thanos and his lackey, my legs also would not hold me up. Do you think my weakness there was another manifestation of that?" He cast a deliberate glance over his shoulder, deeper into Eir's home where her husband was. "One that lingers?"

"I can't say. You've told me next to nothing about what happened to you after you fell from the bifrost. But based on what you did tell me, what lingers now is no more than a remnant byproduct of the connection forged through a magical artifact. That isn't a result of whatever the fall through the abyss did to you physically…or to the upheaval you experienced before you fell. It isn't a question of strength or weakness."

"When I can do nothing on my own to fight off that…invasion, other than forgoing sleep entirely – hardly a permanent solution – it certainly feels like one."

Eir leaned in closer; Loki was more conscious of it than he thought he might once have been, but he didn't lean away. "Asgardian warriors are raised to believe they can fight off any attacker. You can't fight something that sinks its teeth into you while you're asleep, something that won't let you wake. But why must you fight on your own? When you fight with blades, do you insist on fighting alone? Consider it weakness for a fellow warrior to assist in the fight? Do you consider your fellow warrior weak when you assist?"

"Of course not," Loki said with a scowl, already knowing where this was headed.

"Then don't consider it weakness that your fellow Asgardian warrior assists you in this fight, either. Not all battles are fought with blades, and not all warriors wear armor."

"I'm well aware, Eir. You are one of Asgard's most valuable warriors, and when I said I was grateful for what you've done I wasn't saying so to be vacuously polite."

"I doubt anyone has ever called anything you've ever said or done 'vacuous.' Still, I hope my point is made. Speaking of warriors without armor…there's a boy, not yet of age, who was working in the Healing Room during the war. Fridulf Hjalmarson. The one who tried to help you when you showed up with a knife wound laced with magic."

"I remember him. Clearly untrained, but he managed to remove some of the magic. I thought he might not be of age. Impressive in one so young and without real training."

"May I tell him you said so? The nature of your wound intrigued him, and your support of his attempt to treat it encouraged him."

Loki briefly considered it and saw no reason to deny the request. "You may. He didn't know who I was at the time; I had disguised myself."

"He still doesn't, as far as I know. He was questioned about it, once we realized it was you, but he was kept in ignorance of who he'd attempted to heal. Thor also saw him during the war – our healers were spread thin and we relied heavily on trainees and even youths such as Fridulf to assist with basic tasks. Fridulf told me he resented working in the Healing Room at first, that he wanted to be out fighting. Thor convinced him that with his skills he was even more valuable as a healer treating many warriors than he would be as one more warrior on the battlefield himself. And his experience treating you taught him that he does have a gift for healing magic. This morning he told me he's thinking of studying to become a healer. Thank you for the part you played in that."

"I didn't do much, and what I did was hardly selfless. I would—" I would speak with him, if he would like. Discuss the study of magic. I suppose he could pay me a visit on Alfheim. Realistically, Loki would not be speaking with the boy. He had done so on a few occasions, met with someone who showed an aptitude for magic. He had enjoyed it. That was his old life, though. Others could encourage the boy, apparently even Thor, strange as that sounded – Thor encouraging an Asgardian boy into healers' robes when that boy spoke enthusiastically of battle. "You may tell him I think it would be an honorable pursuit for someone with his gift. That is, unless you think that would send him running in the opposite direction."

"I've only spoken with him a few times, but he doesn't strike me as that unreasonable. I'll tell him."

"Good," Loki said, standing to make his farewells.

"May I?" Eir asked when Loki stood at her threshold, an arm held out.

He nodded after a moment's hesitation and opened his arms for a hug. Loki had felt Eir's affection – even love – all his life, but she did not often express it in such physical gestures. It felt unreservedly good, and lasted longer than the perfunctory thing he'd expected. He couldn't help but recall his mother telling him he needed people who cared for him in his life; Eir without question was among that number. He had missed this. He'd missed Eir. Affection without demands or expectations or needs. Eir's hand was exceptionally light.

"Thank you," he said softly when they parted. "Good night."

/

/

One quick errand later, plus confirmation that Lifhilda would be readied and waiting for his departure to Alfheim, Loki was covering ground in long strides. The wooden hut-like structure with the vaulted open ceiling came into view, back exactly where it was when Odin had sent him off to Midgard with a scarred wrist, a wounded foot, and a few changes of clothing and grooming items, while Frigga gifted him a repurposed gem and a secret escape route. He supposed work on the bifrost would soon begin again. A cordon of guards was positioned around the building, and near its entrance stood Odin and Frigga, as expected, Jolgeir and Krusa, less expected, and, disappointingly, not Jane, which meant he was going to be stuck here waiting. Heimdall, he assumed, was inside with the Tesseract.

Much had changed since he'd been brought out here months ago. Most notable, at least in what it signified, was the absence of the chief jailer. Glancing about to see if Jane was approaching as well, probably with Thor, since Jolgeir wasn't with her – she wasn't – Loki had to correct himself. At least as notable, and far more shocking, was that the last time he'd departed Asgard from this little building he'd insinuated a threat against Jane, and now he was departing with her, at her suggestion. Eventually.

"May I have a word, my prince?" Krusa asked, breaking away from the others and bringing the shrinking gap between him and Loki to nothing.

Loki came to a halt and fixed him with an expectant look.

"I want you to know that when I presented Geirmund for approval as the new supplies advisor, I had no idea he—"

"Let me stop you. These apologies are growing tiresome. Of course you didn't know. No one did. I cannot bear you ill will for not knowing something that even I did not. I should thank you for your choice, in fact. Had that man continued to toil away in obscurity, the truth would never have been revealed. How about this: When you select a successor, perhaps first ask whether he ever murdered anyone and kept it a secret while someone else was punished for it, and go from there."

Krusa thanked him with a pained look and took his leave; Loki lingered for a moment, watching his back, the gait that lacked energy, the slight stoop in the old man's shoulders that Loki couldn't remember noticing before.

Loki had never particularly liked Krusa – the man was ornery and on the whole not terribly likeable – but he'd held the man in a measure of respect for his directness and lack of pandering. Krusa was himself, and didn't waste time caring what others thought of him much less trying to shape those impressions, except in the performance of his duties. Thus, although Krusa had never been particularly friendly toward him, Krusa wasn't particularly friendly toward anyone except, presumably, the man's actual friends, and Loki didn't have any sense of how Krusa viewed him. When Loki was being sent away to Midgard hobbled by Odin's restrictions, had Krusa been in favor of his execution? Loki wasn't even sure he wanted to know. Safer, perhaps, to assume they were all against him – Krusa, Bosi, the entire Assembly save Eir and neutral Finnulfur, Tassi who served him with a smile, Tassi's father who stormed off refusing to serve him at all, the entire realm – differing only in how willing they were to admit to it.

Footfalls sounded behind him, and by process of elimination, Loki knew it was Jolgeir. "You haven't lost your charge, have you?"

"You trained me too well for that. I came to bid her farewell. I didn't know you'd be here, too, not until I got here."

"Ah," Loki said, turning to face Jolgeir, who'd been standing beside him. "But since I am, you'd like to take the opportunity to…? If it involves an apology, I'm afraid I've already reached my limit for the day. Whatever responsibility you may or may not feel, it isn't my responsibility to allay it."

"That's fair. I wouldn't ask you to."

"Not directly, no. But isn't that exactly what you seek, when you confess your error and apologize? An acceptance of the apology, reassurance, understanding…so you can walk away with your burden lightened? I tire of lightening everyone else's burdens."

Jolgeir didn't answer, and didn't walk away, so Loki turned again, this time to look out over the broken bifrost and the splendor of the cosmos out beyond it. He had long taken this view for granted, and he didn't know when he would next see it.

"It seems to me," Jolgeir began, drawing Loki's surprised glance, "that one could adopt that view and use it to justify never apologizing to anyone for anything."

"You are bold, Jolgeir," Loki said after a moment's silence spent sizing up Jolgeir's expression and finding it difficult to read. "And sometimes too familiar."

"I would apologize, my prince, if I did not think it might be interpreted as a selfish effort."

Loki drew in a deep breath and let it out with a bit of a laugh; a smile cracked Jolgeir's straight face in response. He'd forgotten Jolgeir's sharp wit. He'd perhaps never fully appreciated it, as young as he was in the days when Jolgeir last was a regular and more personal part of his life. It was easy to lapse into envisioning Jolgeir as merely a fighter, brawn without brain. Such would not have been given the responsibilities Jolgeir had. Jolgeir's elevation to Chief Palace Einherjar had brought the two into occasionally closer contact, but Jolgeir had remained on the periphery of Loki's life ever since the arrest, a title more than a person. That unexpected encounter in the Healing Room some two months ago had catapulted Jolgeir right back to the center, at least for a time.

"When I found you in the Healing Room that first time…how did you know it was me?"

"The way you asked about the queen. Like someone who cared, in the personal sense, but didn't wish to show it. And anyone working in the Healing Room really should have already known the status of the royal family by then. And I know you changed your voice a little, but it was still familiar, the cadence of it, your particular manner of speaking, something like that. And…healers who come to treat you don't tend to hover by the door in silence until cajoled inward by their patients. But it was when you asked about the queen that I knew it was you."

"Thank you, Jolgeir," Loki said after a heavy stare.

"For what?"

"I was growing overconfident in my abilities. With that dose of humiliation you've made me an inept youth all over again and dropped me back onto a cold hard floor."

"You asked," Jolgeir said, shoulders moving in a shrug.

"I did," Loki agreed easily. As the shock faded at just how thoroughly he'd revealed himself – or just how skilled Jolgeir was at seeing what could not be seen – Loki recalled the words Jolgeir had spoken that most affected him, words he hadn't been able to accept for what they were at the time. "Why did you say you trusted me? I know those words were no accident. I know you weren't referring to my supposed intent to treat your eyes."

"Because I did," Jolgeir answered, no hesitation in his response.

"But why? You had no reason to. You knew what I'd done. You had every reason not to."

"I don't know if I can explain that. It was instinct, but…more than that. I can't claim to know you as I once did…but I was certain that whatever was going on with you, you wouldn't desire Asgard's destruction. It wasn't Asgard you tried to destroy with the bifrost, after all."

"And yet you knew, or believed you did, that I was quite capable of turning on and destroying what I supposedly loved."

"A thousand years ago, yes. I believed that an aberration. And I—"

Jolgeir's gaze darted away and Loki glanced around to see if he'd missed some distraction, the approach of Odin and Frigga, or Jane and Thor, but Odin and Frigga remained where they were and Jane and Thor were still not in sight. The latter was beginning to sit uncomfortably but Loki pushed it aside as something outside his control. "You what?"

A reluctant gaze swung his way again. "You probably don't know what became of me…after your brother's death?"

"I know a few key details of it," Loki said in a tone drier than the South Pole air.

"I left the Einherjar. Well…I didn't so much leave as I was expelled."

"You were blamed?" Loki asked, cutting off Jolgeir's attempt to continue. This had never occurred to him. Jolgeir had been in charge of Baldur's protection, yes, but that protection had been deemed unnecessary and removed, at Baldur's insistence, and with Odin's and Frigga's approval.

"I blamed myself. I was…not handling myself well. They had to expel me. I was a miserable useless lump. No one knew what to do with me, and I didn't know what to do with myself. I drifted through a few decades like that."

"You've done surprisingly well for yourself since then." Loki believed him – Jolgeir was no liar, nor could Loki see any advantage in this story if he was – but imagining him in such condition was impossible, not when Jolgeir had remained strong and steadfast, even his sense of humor intact, shortly after the loss of both of his arms and, when Loki first encountered him, his sight.

"Yes. I owe that to you."

Loki drew his head back in skeptical surprise. "I somehow rescued you from throwing away your life, did I?"

"Yes. I mean it. It's not something I thought I could ever tell you. Not something I thought you'd ever want to hear."

"I don't know that I want to hear it now. I do however know that if you don't enlighten me it's going to considerably dampen my already questionable mood. So explain this magic I worked in ignorance that took you from a miserable useless lump to having command of the palace guards."

"It's simple, really. You overcame the worst mistake you could have possibly made, murdering the brother you loved, as I believed then, and the punishment that followed it…. I know you disappeared for a while afterward, but then you returned, and your family welcomed you back and you again took up your mantle as prince. You inspired me. If you could overcome so much and hold your head high to begin your life anew, then surely I could, too. I could at least make an honest attempt."

Seconds passed, words not coming, and Loki eventually settled his attention back out on the nighttime sky. He remembered well what he'd told Jane about Jolgeir the first time that name came up, remembered it because he hadn't given this man any particular thought in ages, probably not since the short-lived bitterness he'd felt when Jolgeir was named the new Chief Palace Einherjar. "I once admired him. I still do. But it's not mutual."

"I'll never forget that. I know the courage and strength it took for me to request readmittance to the Einherjar, to do what was necessary to earn that readmittance. How much harder it must have been for you. If you'd wanted to turn your back on Asgard, you would have done so a long time ago."

Loki listened, though he gave no indication of it. He wasn't sure what he thought about what Jolgeir was telling him. Should he be proud of surviving what he had, of repairing and resuming his life? He'd had little choice. It was that or…it was that. Yet the idea that he had inspired Jolgeir was a nice one, once the shock of it had passed. Jolgeir's calculation was wrong, though, for he was missing the key fact that Loki was not Aesir, and was by nature a prince of Jotunheim, not of Asgard. Not to mention, Loki was at this very moment turning his back on Asgard. Literally, even. He turned completely around, now facing in the direction of the palace, and there at long last were Thor and Jane walking toward them. "I'm pleased to have been of service," Loki said, his tone one of humor, for he had to say something. Most of the other thoughts that ran through his mind were too sentimental to speak aloud. Perhaps there was one…. "I'll consider it the repayment of my debt to you, for that time you saved me when Thor tried to drown me."

Jolgeir, now at Loki's side and also watching Thor and Jane approach, broke into laughter. "I'll never forget that. You were both so young. I was watching the trees and the paths, on the outside chance of an assassin or kidnapper lurking about, when I see you and Thor over on the dock, and you've both got your boots off and Thor's pulling your shirt off, and we all knew you were afraid of the water, and—. I mean no insult, of course."

"None taken. I believe I was five. Being afraid of things was permitted." All true, though it was still a tiny bit irksome to learn that they'd all known about it, especially now that Loki knew where that fear likely came from.

"I was watching this little interaction and I said to myself, 'Nothing could possibly go wrong here.'" Jolgeir paused to laugh again. "I started running as soon as you and Thor did. It wasn't funny at the time, of course," he said, quickly sobering though a smile remained. "Terrifying would be more accurate."

"No doubt."

"Allow me one more thing."

Loki turned a skeptical eye on him but said nothing.

"I do regret arresting you. I took no satisfaction in it, even though I'd thought that finding Baldur's killer and arresting him was the only thing that would bring me satisfaction. What I regret the most is that I thought with that arrest my work was complete. I stopped at the first answer I found, instead of finding all the answers. I don't tell you this to ask for you to say or do anything to lessen my burden. I've learned how to deal with my burdens and continue living. I learned that from you."

A long silent moment passed in which Loki again did not know what to do with the things Jolgeir was telling him and could find no words. "Well…," he finally began, "I regret being arrested." He glanced over to see Thor and Jane joining Odin and Frigga. "I regret that there was ever a need for an arrest."

"Indeed," Jolgeir said with a crisp nod.

"Come. Give Lady Jane your fond wishes."

They ambled over toward the little hut, and as Loki watched, the small gathering there split. A tight knot of tension gripped Loki, growing and filling up the space left behind by the relative good will and calm that was shriveling away. He'd known he wasn't going to enjoy this, had tried to ignore it, to pretend it would just be he and Jane when he knew that wouldn't be the case. But he hadn't known Odin would draw Jane away for a private encounter.

"What is that about?" Loki asked with a deliberate glance toward Odin and Jane, who were still walking, when he and Jolgeir reached Frigga and Thor.

"He wanted to speak with her," Thor said.

"I see. That does make more sense that my initial assumption that he wished to take her on an impromptu tour of one of the museums."

Thor shot an exasperated look at Loki before turning to Frigga. "Do you think we should rescue her?"

"I don't think Jane would appreciate being rescued. I'm sure she can handle herself. Your father may not have gone out of his way to welcome her here…but he has no ill will toward her."

"I would simply like to be able to leave sometime tonight. Or rather, since it's already too late for that, before dawn breaks."

"If he keeps her until dawn, dear one, I'll rescue her myself, all right?"

Thor gave a reluctant nod, while Loki took the opportunity to withdraw the document he'd prepared.

"Take this. Read it later and do with it as you see fit," he said, holding it out to his mother. Giving it to Thor, as king, would have been more proper but Loki didn't trust Thor not to open it up and start reading it in front of Jolgeir, and his mother had the same ability to hide the document away that Loki did.

"What's that?" Thor asked as Frigga took the document and sent it right away again.

"Nothing important," Loki said. "It can wait until later." Shut up, you idiot.

Thor glanced at Jolgeir and nodded. "Loki…can we also talk? It won't take long, I don't mean to keep you. I had hoped for a few minutes alone before you go."

"I don't—"

"Loki, go. Thor should have a chance to say farewell, too."

"We've already done so. But very well. I'm standing right here. Please feel free to say it again."

"Jolgeir, accompany me on a short stroll, would you?"

"Of course, Your Majesty."

Loki fixed a hard stare on both of him as they started past him. Jolgeir's expression was back to his smooth professional one; Frigga graced him with a smile.

"Don't worry," she said over her shoulder. "If he tries to keep you until dawn, I'll rescue you, too."

/

Random tidbit: The reference to "High Revival" writing is from "Trials," one of my stories in the continuity of "Beneath." The idea of it is loosely inspired by the old German script, although High Revival is meant to be less similar to and more opaque than "normal" writing than the German example; reading something written in High Revival requires study, and kids do study it in school, but it doesn't necessarily stick without continued exposure or particular interest.

Big thanks to "PerkyBird" who helped with some continuity checks for this chapter and the next.

I feel like I'm forgetting something...probably a dozen somethings. But that's all I've got for now. Oh! I remembered one: Thank you also to everyone who got back to me with their suggestion regarding that cryptic reference in my own notes to Thor noticing a "cloth." I think that had to have been it. Sorry, I failed to keep track of the several of you who told me this and can't remember anymore.

Previews for Ch. 216: Odin - that big teddy bear of a man - has a little chat with Jane. But you already knew that. Thor and Loki also have a little chat. But you already knew that, too. So, hm, what can I tell you? OKay: One of these things goes better than the other. The polls are now open!

Excerpt (surprisingly hard to find one this time):

"Thor."

"Yes?"

"In all seriousness, I am warning you. If you do want me to ever return to Asgard of my own free will…"

"Yes?"

"Inviting Frost Giants over to Asgard for a few tankards of mead from time to time will ensure it never happens."