Chapter Text
Loki was not truly listening to his so-called friends' petition. He had no intention of even attempting to restore his brother to power, not when he had things to prove that could only be done if he was allowed to put his plan all the way through. Perhaps, after he had vanquished the king of Jotunheim and proved himself loyal to the crown of Asgard, if his father had still not awoken, he would work on the proposition of bringing Thor back. He would have no reason to try and keep the throne to himself at that point.
He suspected that at the very least, Lady Sif knew that he was not taking their pleas seriously. He would admit that it was even possible none of them were convinced of his act, but it wouldn't matter.
At least, it wouldn't have mattered, until Heimdall walked in.
Loki knew that Heimdall already suspected he had something to do with the Frost Giants that had reached Asgard during the coronation. He did not expect that the guardian of the Bifrost would come to him bearing good news.
He did not expect to see tears in Heimdall’s eyes. “My king,” he said, bowing low, weapon pointed downward. “We must find your mother. There is news from Midgard.”
And Loki didn't know it yet, but nothing was ever going to go according to plan again.
Heimdall outright refused to tell anyone even a bit of what was going on before Frigga was found and brought to join them. She wasn't difficult to find, Loki was still planning how exactly he could get her out of the room and out of danger before Laufey showed up, in case his plan went awry. He sent a guard to fetch her from his father's chamber, where she sat at Odin's bedside, waiting for his awakening.
“Loki?” Frigga had a talent for remaining graceful, even when she was frantic, and although she was rushing in, terrified of what had led to her son sending a summons for her, rather than going to find her himself, she still maintained her poise, just as a queen should.
Deep down, they both knew Loki would not be so bold as to send a summons for his mother. His relationship with his father was tenuous at the best of times, but not with Frigga. “What is wrong, my son?”
Loki could only give her a helpless shrug. “I do not know, Mother. Heimdall informed me that he needed to speak to us, urgently. He has news from Midgard.”
Heimdall bowed to the queen. “I am afraid there is no easy way to say this, my king,” he said, still addressing Loki, the highest ranking member of the royal family in the room. Loki wished, for the first time, that everyone would do away with royal protocol and tell him what was going on. News from Midgard could only be about Thor, and Loki could not for the life of him think of what would have Heimdall fighting tears about his brother. Thor was safe and completely out of the way, exactly where Loki needed him to be. What could have gone wrong?
“I was watching over Prince Thor, as part of my duties, my king, and I witnessed -”
Heimdall had never faltered in his speech, never hesitated to deliver news before. “Out with it!”
He didn't mean to be so harsh, he knew he should have been kind. The sad flicker on his mother's face told him of her disapproval, but he couldn't bring himself to feel bad yet.
“The Prince has been hit with a mortal arrow,” Heimdall said, “I am sorry, but it… It was a mortal wound. Prince Thor is dead.”
The sound of his mother's scream was not one that would ever leave Loki's ears. He felt as though the air had been knocked out of his lungs. Lady Sif let out a horrified gasp, and Volstagg turned immediately on Loki. “This is your doing! Had you listened to us and freed him -”
“Who are you helping, Volstagg? With that attitude, you may as well blame the Allfather for exiling him!” Lady Sif snapped, “believe me when I say that there is no love lost between Loki and I, but it is pointless to blame him!”
For once, words failed the young prince, the acting king of Asgard left at a loss for words. He could not find a way to defend himself from the accusations, could not find words to comfort his mother, he could not think of anything to say that would be of any use.
His brother was dead.
That had never been a part of any plan Loki had made.
It was true, from the moment that his father had fallen into the Odinsleep before his eyes, he'd had a plan. A way to prove not that he should necessarily be the heir, but that he was just as worthy of consideration as his brother, despite his origins. It was true that the plan required Thor to be kept out of the way. His brainless heroism would mean that he would take care of any plot before Loki had a chance to do anything. It was incredibly likely that Thor would slay Laufey before he got anywhere near Odin.
But Thor was never supposed to die.
“Don't be naive,” Fandral was saying. “He could have done it if he wanted to!”
“Perhaps it is unreasonable to expect him to undo Odin's last command as his first,” Hogun said, “he could not have predicted this.”
“Couldn't he? He is a witch, an -”
“Enough!” Frigga cried, and that finally got everyone's attention. “Turning on each other does nothing! Volstagg, Fandral, you will watch your words before my son, the King Regent and Crown Prince of Asgard. Thor would not want this from any of you!”
She turned to Loki. “You are heir apparent to the throne and Regent in your father's absence. Your word is law. What will be done about this?”
Loki's mouth was dry. He could tell that deferring to him was not truly a decision his mother made because he was meant to be the king, it was because she was barely holding on to her composure and asking her to do this too would be too much. She needed him to handle this, because her son, her trueborn son, the one she had grown inside of herself she birthed through blood and pain, had been murdered, and try as she might, she could not be strong about it for long.
Loki forced himself to take a deep breath. “This cannot be tolerated,” he said, “Midgard must answer for the death of my brother. There is only one answer, one action we can take. Blood demands blood. We will assemble the armies of Asgard and leave as soon as they are ready.”
“I will go with you,” Sif said immediately.
“Not everyone can,” Loki said carefully. “My father is in a vulnerable state. The palace cannot be left without guard.”
The more he talked, the less he had to think about what he had just been told. About how reality was crashing down around him.
About how he was never going to see his brother again.
“I will remain with my husband,” Frigga said, “you should take Hogun, he is the commander of the Einherjar. If I might keep the palace guard, Volstagg and Fandral, that will be enough.”
He had expected his mother to object to the idea of conquest and vengeance upon Midgard. His entire life, Odin had been the one whose fury ran hot and whose sense of justice was icy cold. His mother tempered his father's actions with gentle grace and mercy.
But despite eyes that were glassy with tears, her face was cold and hard. Her child had been murdered.
His mother asked to see him privately before he continued war preparations. He couldn't find it in himself to deny her, so he asked Lady Sif, Heimdall and the Warriors 3 to leave the room while he spoke with her.
“You are all that is left, my son. Not only in terms of a poor mother's heart, having lost one son and being made to send her second off to war, but you are all that is left of the future of Asgard. To my eyes, neither you nor your brother was ever what could be called spare,” she spat the word bitterly, as though it offended her. “As if either of my children could be a spare , but now… there is only one Prince of Asgard. Our future is on your shoulders.”
Frigga reached up and touched his cheek. “You do not have to go. Do not take offense,” she said quickly, seeing the way her youngest and now only child bristled. “You will be a blessing to the armies of Asgard, you are a skilled tactician and will be a brilliant commander, but you do not have to go. You could send Lady Sif and Hogun to command the troops and remain here to rule Asgard. It would not be improper. I cannot force you, and I will not even ask you, because it is not fair of me to ask you to put aside your vengeance for your brother's life in order to stay here and soothe your mother's worried heart, but I will remind you and present you with your option. You are not needed on the front lines, if you do not wish to go.”
Loki sighed. “Mother…”
“You do not have to stay just for my sake. If you insist you will go, I will not try to stop you. I would have only one promise from you, Loki.”
“Anything.”
“You must swear, for my own sake and for the good of the realm, that you will come back alive. The realm cannot lose you, it would mean a crisis of succession, but more importantly I cannot lose you. I am not prepared to say goodbye to both of my sons, not to mention -”
Loki hadn't even thought of what she was implying. Now that she began, he knew exactly what she wasn't saying.
No one knew if Odin would wake up this time.
If Loki went to Midgard and put his life in danger, faced whatever was capable of killing Thor and vowed to end it, Frigga may lose her entire family.
Could he really do that? Could he really ask his mother to see him off and wish him well when it meant he was asking her to accept losing her entire family?
“Mother -”
“I am not asking you to stay behind. I understand that this is important to you. On some level, I wish that I was going with you. My son and your brother have been murdered, I cannot condemn you wanting to deal justice from your own hand. For that reason, all I am asking is that you promise to come home.”
If she was his father, and not his mother, he would have had no trouble dodging the vow she wished for him to make. Odin's preoccupations had never truly concerned Loki. Not any further than he needed to account for them to remain an option in the line of succession.
But he could not deny his mother. “I will come home. I do not know how this gets better, but if it is within my power to make it so, I will. Thor will be avenged, Father will awaken and I will come home. But this is something I must see through myself.”
His mother nodded as though she had known that would be the answer all along. He suspected that she had.
He reached out and hugged her tightly. “I don't know what happened, I won't pretend to know how this is going to go for me. Hours ago, I would have said it was nearly impossible for a Midgardian to be a threat to us, but hours ago I would have been a fool. Regardless of that, I will do all that I can to ensure that Asgard's future is safe. And I will see justice for my brother.”
He was going to have to admit his hand and what had happened. Even though no one knew, and he might get away with never telling anyone who had snuck the Jotunn onto Asgard, there was a pit in his stomach that wouldn't ease up.
He had caused this. If he had not pushed Thor to respond, to disobey Odin and go to Jotunheim, and if he had never snuck the warriors into the vault to begin with, his brother would be alive.
When Odin awoke and was forced to deal with what had happened during his Odinsleep, Loki would confess.
And if part of getting justice for Thor meant that Loki had to face it as well, he would accept that. He would get his justice and vengeance now, because there was no telling what he would face when his father awoke.
“You must assemble the armies and depart. News will spread quickly, you will want to be facing the troops before you tell them what has happened. They must hear it from one of us, not the gossip among soldiers. Despite our pain, we are who our people look to for strength. The soldiers you bring with you will be constantly looking to you. You must be strong.”
Loki nodded. “As must you, Mother.”
Her slight smile wavered, but Loki was surprised she could force a smile at all. “I am not ready to break just yet, my son. I will survive.”
He had never doubted his mother before, and even though the situation called for it, he decided not to doubt her now.
He had enough to worry about without inventing more.
He took the spear. It was not his preferred weapon, and he would have felt more comfortable fighting with his daggers, but the spear was the symbol of the King of Asgard. It was Odin's weapon, the one he had used when he had led the armies against the eight other realms and conquered each one.
It was symbolic, if nothing else.
His mother had another idea of something he should bring, even if he did not want to when she suggested it.
She led him to the vault and he pretended not to know where she was going to go with us for as long as she would go without telling him.
“Here, it is nothing more than a trinket, and it never will be. Your father took it to weaken the realm, but he cannot wield it. It does nothing for us but sit here and represent the victory over Jotunheim.”
“If I bring the Casket,” Loki began, “it will confirm any thoughts that our people have regarding my right to lead us. If the weapon is useless to Father, it is because it cannot be wielded by any who are not Jotunn. Is now truly the time to reveal that secret to all our people, immediately after they lost the Crown Prince? Now we are to tell them that the one who is presumed to take that place is not Aesir?”
A hard look across his mother's face. “It is a weapon that once nearly ended Midgard. Their entire realm was nearly lost, until your father stepped in. It is a weapon, therefore, that they cannot hope to beat. A weapon that would turn the tide if things went poorly, that would show them they have no hope and strike fear into their hearts. Bring it with you. You needn't use it, unless you choose to. But if I know you have it, it will go a long way to reassure me that you will be safe.”
Not for the first time, he wished his mother was less persuasive. He reached out for the Casket, but hesitated.
He wasn't sure he could touch it. He wasn't sure who could stand to see his skin change again, to lose such an integral part of himself that he had always taken for granted. He was certain that if he saw his skin change to ice blue again, it would break him.
“You are Loki,” Frigga said gently, “Loki Odinson, my youngest son and the future King of Asgard. It cannot make you into something you do not choose to be. You are stronger than it, you simply did not know to try when you picked it up. If you resist, it will yield. You will remain you.”
Still, his hands trembled and froze as he reached for it.
“Was it not I who taught you to master your abilities? Not I who taught you that you were the only one who could control your own form? If you must doubt your own abilities, I cannot stop you, but do not doubt what I have taught you.”
Loki took a huge gulp of air, and placed both hands on the Casket.
Immediately, he thought he saw his skin turn blue, and he squeezed both eyes shut. His mother touched his shoulder.
“You can stop it. You are my son, and a sorcerer as powerful as you comes along but once in a generation, I've told you that. You will not be defeated by an object such as this.”
He exhaled, and as he opened his eyes, he saw the blue receding from his fingers.
“There. You can store it exactly how you store your daggers, and now I know that you have it if you need it. As I said, it is not only a mother's love that makes me insist on these measures. You are the only heir to the throne. If you do not return, our realm will be plunged into a crisis of succession from which there may not be a way out.”
Standing before the ranks of the army of Asgard was entirely different than Loki had ever imagined it would be.
When he was young, it had almost been fun to imagine that someday, he would command the ranks of Einherjar, the fiercest warriors of the Nine Realms. For some years now, he had been relieved of that notion. The throne would go to his brother, a perpetual fool with a temper hotter than the fires of Muspelheim. He had not been happy, but he had known that to be true. Despite all of his efforts, he had never entertained the notion that he could convince Odin otherwise. Thor would inherit, and the only way Loki would ever see the throne would be if he died without any heirs of his own.
That hadn't actually been meant to happen.
But now, he stood in front of the endless ranks, thousands of warriors capable of bringing to heal even the fiercest of realms, and it was him who was expected to direct them. To give the orders that would destroy those who had slain the prince.
It was him expected to tell them that the prince had been slain.
The one thing that stunned him the most was who was standing beside him. Sure, Hogun had defended him, and had assembled the armies to lead them, but he was wary and hesitant.
Lady Sif was standing beside him, just a step behind his right shoulder.
Loki would never pretend that what he had done to Lady Sif was even remotely okay. He had panicked almost immediately after successfully seducing her, and cutting off half of her hair had been quite possibly the worst thing he could have done with that panic. He had never expected her to forgive him. He still didn't, and he wasn't foolish enough to believe that this meant she had.
But she was standing beside him, and that was something.
There was a spell set over the diais on which he was standing, to amplify his voice so that all could hear him. He would only have to speak loud enough to ensure the spell could hear him. The first couple of times he tried, he failed. His voice barely made a whisper.
It felt impossible to talk about, much less to announce to the people of Asgard. It barely even felt real at this point. Loki was refusing to give himself the time to contemplate what had happened, because if he did, he would break. His brother's death was not yet a fact, not yet something he would contemplate.
“Warriors of Asgard,” he finally managed to call, “I bring news of tragedy. My brother, the Crown Prince of Asgard, has been slain by a Midgardian warrior.”
Technically speaking, Loki didn't know the particulars. For all he knew, his brother had been slain by an assassin in the middle of the night. But that would bring no comfort to the Aesir, those who believed it was only possible to enter the Kingdom of Valhalla if one died in combat. If Thor had been slain outside of that context, then the people of his realm would have no choice but to believe that The prince would be doomed to Niflheim.
Even with the reassurance that the prince would be honored in his death, chaos erupted at the news. No one had truly known why it would be Loki, the younger prince and second in line to the throne, addressing the army in the time of the Odinsleep. This was the first time either of the brothers had even been old enough to accept the Regency. Before now, Queen Frigga had assumed the throne during Odin's absence.
“We will have justice for my brother’s death,” Loki continued, frustrated that his voice cracked when he said the word brother. “The mortal who slayed our prince and Midgard as a whole will be reminded of their fidelity to Asgard. We will depart at once. When my father awakens, we will bring news that despite this affront and tragedy, justice has been served. It is a cold comfort, but one that we will extract for our King and our kingdom as a whole!”
He was certain there was more he should say. There were a thousand blessings upon his brother's soul but he could give, for the empty comfort they would grant. Thor was dead. Nothing was going to change that, nothing was going to bring him back. Loki had pulled his last trick on his brother, and it had ended in tragedy. There was nothing else he could do.
He had done enough, some might argue. There was blood on his hands, and although now was not the time to reveal it, he was going to have to. Despite how easy it would be, no one but Heimdall even suspected him, he would not be able to convince himself that it was okay not to confess.
He had killed his brother. His actions, however indirect, had led to the death of the Crown Prince. Something would have to be done.
The Einherjar took Loki's faltering to be out of grief, not out of guilt. He didn't correct them. They would learn of his treachery someday, but it would not be today.
“We leave for Midgard upon the morn,” Loki said, “and we will have the blood of all those who played a role in my brother's demise. This is not vengeance, it is justice and a cold reminder what it means to be a protected dominion of Asgard. They and any other dominion of ours will think twice before betraying the crown that safeguards them.”
Asgard had never attacked one of its own conquered realms. Once it was conquered, it seemed unnecessary.
But with the outrage of the crime committed, the warriors cheered when Loki finished speaking. No one was prepared to allow such an act to go unanswered.
“It is true that the mortals have never been considered a threat, but that was before the murder of the Crown Prince. We mustn't underestimate them. Prepare yourselves as though this were any other realm. Better a swift victory than an unprepared and unforeseen loss.”
As he stepped down from the dais, having said all there was to say, Sif flashed him a thin-lipped smile. “You haven't lost your silver tongue.”
“Now hardly seems the time to do so. It may not always be your first consideration, but shouldn't a commander be well spoken and persuasive?”
Sif nodded. “I wasn't critiquing. You and I have had our differences, and my disdain for you is well justified, I think you can agree.”
“Perhaps.”
“But I am prepared to put that all aside for this. Thor is dead and you need allies, because for all your charisma, you have very few true friends. I am prepared to be that for you “
“A friend?” Loki asked, raising an eyebrow.
“An ally. Don't push your luck.”
“Wouldn't dream of it, Lady Sif. I know enough about the force of your blows to know you are a good ally to have. Get some rest. I don't know when there will next be a chance.”
“You too.”
As if either of them would be able to sleep at a time like this.