Some months back the tumblr Lokane archive, magic-n-science, was running a prompt event to lead up to Thor 2. And I couldn't help but bang a quick little drabble out for it! This should be considered a brief glimpse into Loki's head, set between chapters 17 and 18 in my fic 'To Cleave the Stars'. I hope you enjoy.

Prompt: Longing

Loki had assumed it would be the days that were hardest.

And they were hard, make no mistake about that. When he'd manage to lose himself in the dusty sanctuary of the library until some passage or line or tidbit struck his fancy, and he'd read it aloud (slyly, coyly of course, as if he could pretend it was for his own benefit and not hers), and it wasn't until the silence stretched on mercilessly, unbroken by that tiny greedy gasp of hers, that he'd remember he was alone. That jarring moment was almost the worst - biting into a beautiful fruit only to find it green and sour.

But the nights were agony of a whole new sort. Waking amidst snarled sheets, stiff with sweat that had frozen in the frigid air that blanketed him, azure fingertips brushing a furrowed brow that still felt the downstroke of a kiss' flight.

A child's logic, absurd and yet persistent. He had given this self to her, laid it at her feet along with its mundane twin. How could she not realize? Not come to claim? The potential answers laughed in his ears all night, driving sleep away.

He was riddled with myriad injuries both real and ephemeral, a lifetime of struggle mapped on his body and soul. Cankered slivers of envy that drove relentless red fingers of poison towards his heart. Crooked and jagged scars, cutting like lightning across the pale sky of his skin. But this was something different, pain new and unwelcome. A gently weeping wound that never changed. Never festering, never healing.

A perfect and simple hole. The absence of something essential.

Nurtured by this forlorn meal of memories he supped on each night, that didn't even have the decency to be bitter enough for him to grow to loathe. Just pale imitations - smoke and shadows, withering to ash on his tongue.

Longing wasn't a spread of empty plates, hopeless enough to prompt change.

It was a feast of crumbs that slowly starved, no matter how long one dwelled at the table.