Loki (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
complicatedliar) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
bladesofasgard2012-04-28 09:48 am
complicatedliar) wrote in bladesofasgard2012-04-28 09:48 am
Entry tags:
A truth revealed
Loki made a good show of returning to his room. Not because he thought that Thor would have him followed; his brother didn't have a conniving bone in his body. Rather, Loki knew that people gossiped. That was their nature. He didn't want to give anyone a reason to talk about him, not now, with his paranoia cranked to its highest level. Particularly not when idle gossip very well could make its way back to Thor's ears, when everyone wanted the curry favor with the man, preferably at Loki's expense.
In his room, he cloaked himself with invisibility and then left again by passing through the wall. Strides quick but muffled with magic, he made his way down to the vault. A quick spell had the guards on a wild hare chase, looking for a noise that kept moving further down the hall.
The vault was one of Loki's favorite places in the palace. He enjoyed the artifacts, all of the history and the way the place breathed with power. While he hadn't been allowed to make use of any of the more interesting artifacts, he could still at least touch and inspect them, consider situations where their use might be needed.
Loki didn't pause to do his normal slow inspection of the place. He dropped the invisibility as he entered the vault, walking quickly to the back where the Casket of Ancient Winters waited. He paused a few feet from it, mouth suddenly gone dry as if he was faced with a poisonous snake. His hands shook, the urge to turn and leave almost overwhelming.
But no. He needed to know the truth. He couldn't plan properly without possessing all the facts of a situation. And...
He needed to know.
Loki gripped the sides of the Casket, felt it respond to his touch as if he were an old friend, not some Aesir captor. He watched its power wash the color from his skin, leaving him pale and blue, riddled with the markings of the Jotun. Its power chilled his heart, filled his brain with ice so that he couldn't think.
He jerked his hands away, stumbling back a few steps. Loki held his hands in front of his eyes, steady now, inspecting the new skin that was suddenly his clinically, like it belonged to someone else. There was no denying this; the evidence was irrefutable. Even as he warmed slowly, hand once again returning to the shade he thought of as natural, he still felt that chill within him. It had been there all along, really, had made him different, let him measure and consider when his fellows always charged in.
He was a Jotunar.
As if that was a puzzle piece he'd been missing, so many more things made sense now. That he'd always been weaker than the others, that he'd looked at the world in a different way, that he'd never gotten along with people the way Thor did, that they always looked at him as if there was something fundamentally wrong that they couldn't quite articulate.
There was something fundamentally wrong. He was a monster, somehow hidden in their midst.
More questions flowed through his mind - how had he ended up here? Why had Odin claimed him as a son? What had been his purpose? There must have been some higher purpose, because Odin never did anything without a reason. It was the one place where he and Loki had always understood each other, looking at the world as some sort of great chess board.
Loki took a few, unsteady steps toward the door of the vault, but no. Odin was beyond questioning right now.
Did Frigga know? How could she not?
Think. He couldn't think. There were too many questions, too much emotion welling up, rage and betrayal and something far colder - hatred. He gritted his teeth around all of those feelings, fought the urge to scream, scratch at his own skin as if that would somehow deny the truth. That would do him no good. No amount of denial could erase what he had seen.
He forced himself to take a few deep breaths, to focus enough that he could cast a cloak of invisibility again. Then he left the vault, feet taking him to Odin's room.
His mother looked startled when he stepped through the wall, crossing the floor to stand in front of her. He remembered many times he'd come to Frigga as a boy, sniffling around a bloody nose, kneeling beside her an resting his head in her lap. He wished that he could do that again, but things were no longer that simple.
Hands clenched at his sides, Loki said, "I know that you are not my mother, and Odin is not my father. What I do not know is why." It came out far more bluntly than he'd intended, all in a rush, but he at least didn't scream the words, maintained some semblance of control.
Frigga's face went pale, tears - what reason had she to cry? - showing bright in her eyes. She shook her head, holding her hands out to him. "Oh Loki. You are our son."
He did fall to his knees then, because his legs simply would no longer hold him up. Frigga pulled him closer, one hand stroking his hair. Quietly, she told him how Odin had brought an abandoned child - the son of Laufey - home from Jotunheim, how she'd cared for him and raised him as their own, how she had wanted to tell him the truth, but Odin had disagreed. How they hadn't wanted Loki to feel different.
But he had, he wanted to say. Every hour of every day, he'd been different, and everyone else had known even if they hadn't been able to articulate why. No sound emerged from his throat.
"You are our son," Frigga repeated, hand still stroking his hair. "You will always be."
Loki closed his eyes, trying to incorporate all of this into his understanding of the world, of himself. At least now he knew why he'd always been treated like an unworthy bastard, why Thor had always been Odin's favorite. No one would want a monster on the throne of Asgard. Suddenly it made Odin's words - that they had both been born to be kings - a cruel joke. Loki had been an abandoned runt, the supposed heir to a ruined realm. It seemed somehow fitting.
No.
No, he would prove himself worthy. He would show that he was as strong as Thor, and far more clever besides. He would show Odin that he was as good a son. And perhaps he could remove the taint of his blood as well. Because if all of the Jotun were gone, no one could count Loki among their number. And if it was he who slew all of the monsters, well, there was no choice but to call him a hero.
Beneath his cheek, Frigga's skirt was damp. Strange, and impossible, considering he hadn't been crying.
"Would you like me to... tell Thor?" Frigga's voice was hesitant.
Loki smiled. The expression felt strange and wooden. "Don't worry, mother. I'll take care of the situation myself."
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He didn't want to see Sif, yet he also did. She was still the center of his world, the person he loved most. But he also couldn't imagine touching her, knowing what it was that lurked under his skin now. It made him feel faintly ill, to think of the years they'd had together, and he'd been some sort of slumbering monster the entire time.
"But of course you are right. I can only rest briefly, but I shall seek her out." He would do nothing of the kind. With the preparations for war, it was unlikely that there would be much time for his whereabouts while asleep to be a topic of discussion. "With your permission, I will bid you good night."
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"You look terrible." He added, frankly, and rested a hand briefly against the side of Loki's neck. "Go. Rest well, brother. When the bards write songs of our victory, I do not wish for them to sing of the darkness beneath your eyes."
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Without explaining that statement, he left the room by the door. He was a bit tired to do his normal tricks, but hopefully he would be able to evade Sif all the same. He couldn't face her, not now.