[Thor] What doesn't kill you
I forgot I had this for awhile...anyway, free day, figured I might as well put some fics up. :)
Title: What doesn't kill you
For: norsekink
Rating: PG13 (violence)
Prompt: Loki's been getting more than his share of abuse in this meme so far, however this time I'd love to see Thor as the one terribly injured...
-while both are a long way away from help (eg. adventuring in Jotenheim). Loki, the healthier of the two, is forced to look after Thor and keep them both alive as they try and get to safety/wait for aid.
Basically Loki being kind/caring, worried and badass for once and Thor being incredibly useless/helpless in his delerium.
Bonus if Loki is also badly injured and has a deteriorating condition he has to cope with/hide from Thor.
and double bonus if their whole situation is caused by Thor being reckless!
Anything else is totally up to the anon. =) Long prompt is very long. Apologies.
Originally prompted here:
**
“You are going on a diet when we get back to Asgard,” Loki told Thor, still breathing a bit hard from where he collapsed against the cave wall. His brother did not reply from his prone position on the cave floor, as was the norm for unconscious gods. Loki took one more breath, held it, and then released it in a sigh. He pushed off the wall to his brother’s side, contemplating leaving him there for a second - he was so tired, and hurt all over - but if leaving Thor behind was so easy, they wouldn’t be in this position in the first place.
He had the presence of mind to undo the ties that held Thor’s cloak to his shoulder armor before turning his brother over gently. It was difficult to discern blood on red cloth and the cave was not well lit, but Loki called a small orb of witchfire and examined the crude dressings he had wrapped around Thor’s shoulder and chest. They looked neither better nor worse than they had before, which was a minor comfort.
“No more venison for you, brother, or roast boar.” On some level, Loki was aware that he was rambling nonsensically, but even if Thor couldn’t hear him, it made him feel better to pretend. “I know how you and Volstagg love to sing it praises, but I am not sure I’ve the strength to haul you around Jotenheim the next time.” He was so, so tired, but while the dark of the cave was a boon, the cold was not. His brother had already lost too much blood to be safe, and Loki had a wide repertoire of magic that dealt out death or destruction or trickery, but not so much that involved healing.
He tucked both Thor’s cloak and his own around his brother, and stood up stiffly to the closest cave wall. He felt along it until he was satisfied that it was stone, not ice - like so much of this desolate landscape - and fed it as much of his fire as he thought he could spare. The space was small and the rock will retain the heat until he could get a bit of rest and build up enough strength to do magic again.
“On the topic of things you’re going to do once we’re back in Asgard,” Loki murmured as he knelt by Thor’s head, and placed it in his lap. Carefully he examined the threads of power he had holding closed the gaping wounds in Thor’s shoulder and chest, slapshod and crude magical sutures which were unbelievably inelegant. “I know it is too much to ask, but I would request that you not throw yourself headfirst into the first hint of trouble,” he knew what Thor would say to that - he would laugh and note that Loki had his own affairs with trouble that caused his older brother no end of headaches as well - but he shook his head. “I didn’t say to not throw yourself at trouble, merely to be more...graceful, in doing it.” Loki tightened the weave of his magic, feeding it what little power he had left, willing it to sink, disappear and bind the flesh it was holding. Healing might not be his forte, but improvisation certainly was.
And he had much to improvise - they had been separated from the battle by Thor’s folly and the overwhelming odds. Thor’s injuries were bordering on life-threatening and neither of them were carrying much in the way of supplies. Going back to the Bifrost site by themselves and hoping Heimdall will let them return had slim to none chances of succeeding - and Loki knew all about turning bad odds. The only option left is to wait for help or attempt the trip after Thor has recovered enough to move.
If their luck held and they were left alone until the fight was over and the warrior three and Sif were able to come for them, he would have to figure out how to keep them both alive in the meantime. If no help was forthcoming, then they would have to make for the Bifrost, as soon as Thor was stable enough to move or be moved.
“Bad odds, Brother.” Loki whispered, closing his eyes. The third option...but he had already considered and discarded the third option, hadn’t he? When Thor was first struck with that explosion of ice, crying out in pain and rage and falling - in the confusion and chaos, it would have been simple to leave Thor behind, to get himself lost along with the others. Asgard would mourn their golden prince, and …
But he had jumped after his brother, snapped out protective wards almost instinctively. Had done a horrid hack-job of healing magic to keep him from bleeding out and hauled his nearly-dead weight to a dark cave in the middle of Nowhere, Jotenheim. Was now talking about diets and contemplating options. It was ridiculous enough to make him laugh, and the sound prompted a soft groan from Thor and a restless stirring. Loki smoothed a hand down his brother’s brow while shaking his head. “Sleep, brother.” he said, and because he was a master of lies, he was sure he sounded sincere when he added, “tomorrow will be a better day.”
**
‘Tomorrow’ came early when Thor’s shivering woke him a handful of hours later. Loki bit back a groan when he shifted, feeling the aches and pains of a full-out battle and falling down a cliff AND dragging his brother’s very impressive dead weight come crashing back to the forefront of his awareness. At least he had been able to sleep a little, and felt well enough to heat the stones again so that things were more comfortable for Thor.
He left his brother there to do a more thorough scout of the area they had chosen. They were fortunate in that Loki’s desperate teleportation spell had dumped them somewhere deserted, and while Loki saw no sign of their friends, at least he saw no sign of frost giants either. Water was plentiful in the form of ice, and Loki brought back some to melt for Thor.
His brother’s eyes were open slightly and Loki hurried over, too relieved to hide it from his face. “Thor, you’re awake.” He held up a hand when Thor tried to get up, wincing in pain, “Don’t move, you will aggravate your injuries.”
“Loki,” Thor rasped, still trying to get up. Awake for one minute and already refusing to listen to directions. Loki rolled his eyes and prayed for patience. “Brother. Where are we?”
“The best accommodations that Jotenheim has to offer, of course,” he murmured, pushing his brother to lay flat again, silencing any protests by pressing a small piece of ice against Thor’s lips. “Hush. You need water, we’re safe for now.”
Thor’s voice was less raspy but still weak. “The others?”
Loki smiled a bit wryly at him. “They were not caught in the explosion and I believe many of the frost giants attacking them fell with us. The others are probably doing better than you are at the moment.”
Thor nodded. “...and you?”
Loki blinked. “...me?” Thankfully Thor appeared to be slipping a little and Loki managed to continue as if he hadn’t actually been caught off guard by the question. “I am also doing better than you are, which I think is pretty much descriptive of everyone we know.”
“...sorry,” Thor murmured, but when Loki asked him why, there was no response.
***
Thor woke a few more times as a few days passed, and Loki could tell that his condition was worsening by the progressively more nonsensical things that his brother insisted on saying, no matter how many times Loki tried to hush him. The cave was kept warm, but his brother was warmer still and Loki realized with a sinking feeling that infection probably had set in. If the others do not find them soon, he would have to attempt to move Thor himself, or...
Thor thrashed in his cocoon of blankets made up of their cloaks, and Loki weighed the benefits against the costs of hitting his brother with a sleep spell for the umpteenth time. He had been using his magic as quickly as it was recovering, sending whatever power he had into trying to heal Thor’s wounds as much as possible. With a tired sigh, Loki gave up on the idea - if he spelled Thor to sleep now, there was a good chance he would follow his brother into oblivion from sheer exhaustion.
Thor’s eyes were tightly closed and once again, those crazy words tumbled from his lips. “Leave me,” he gasped. Loki held him mostly still with one hand on his chest, on the uninjured side. It was too easy, he should not be able to pin his brother, his strong, powerful older brother, with just a hand. “Leave me...Save yourself.”
“What foolishness,” Loki replied, “after I made that herculean effort of dragging you here?” He kept his tone light and wry, even as he fought down a slight wave of panic. “You are feverish, so I will take this as the ramblings of a delusional mind.”
“Go,” Thor groaned. “GO.”
I could not leave you behind then, Loki thought ironically, so I doubt I could just go now. “I’m not going anywhere,” he said out loud instead. “And I would kindly ask you to not take that tone with me. You are not the king of Asgard yet, brother.”
“You cannot die here...” Thor murmured before lapsing into silence again, falling into the embrace of fitful unconsciousness. Loki took a deep breath.
“You cannot die here either,” he echoed, drawing up what magic he had left to try healing, one more time. ...I absolutely will not let you.
***
In his own version of insanity, Loki seriously contemplated letting loose a giant fireball at the sky to serve as some sort of signal flare, because if they didn’t get some damn help here RIGHT NOW, he really shouldn’t be held responsible for his actions.
In the end, the choice was taken out of his hands.
He had stumbled outside, legs shaky with black spots dancing in his vision, knowing that he needed the blast of icy air to clear his head or else he would pass out - with the way their luck was going, if he did that, neither of them were ever going to wake up again. That part worked just as planned, as he sat there, collapsed in the snow and panting hard, he could feel some of the fog and panic leave his mind. The crisp air burned his lungs, and he looked up to see -
What was NOT planned was the huge Jotenheim equivalent of a wolf that suddenly appeared from behind a small landslide of snow. It was a hideous, twisted thing with fur the same slate blue as the rest of the landscape, eyes a cunning yellow. In the split second it took Loki to blink, it snarled and sprang at him in one move, all its sharp teeth bared.
Out of sheer instinct, Loki threw his hands up and called on as much fire as he could muster. It hit the wolf in the face and threw the creature off balance, roaring into the sky like a giant, orange dragon. Loki scrambled to his feet with a curse as the wolf rolled, growling and barking in pain, heart pounding so loudly in his chest that he could hardly hear anything over it. His knives fell into his waiting hands and he readied another spell, even though a detached, logical part of him pointed out that he had just burned all his remaining magic and anything else would probably knock him right out.
The wolf gathered itself and lunged again, and Loki dodged to the side with his knives flashing out, slashing and tearing at whatever he could reach. The wolf howled in outrage when the blades nicked its burnt ear, and turned with surprising agility. Loki gasped when the creature slammed him bodily against the outside cave wall, feeling all the air leave his lungs in a painful whoosh. He would’ve been concerned about the creaking (or cracking) in his ribs except he could not breathe, could only gag as the creature tried to keep him pinned and turn its head enough to use its teeth -
And Loki wouldn’t be more than an appetizer for something of its size. After it devours Loki, without a doubt it would turn to Thor.
With all his strength and a ferocity that surprised even him, Loki reversed his grip on his knife and plunged it into the nearest soft thing on the wolf’s body, which happened to be one of its golden eyes. The monster shrieked and shied away, and Loki shoved away from the cave wall to stab at the wolf’s throat, sinking the blade in to the hilt.
Then he called on whatever magic he had left and channeled it through the blade.
**
It felt like an eternity later when he heard shouts and looked up from the corpse of the wolf-monster, but it was probably only a few minutes. The figures resolved themselves into Sif, Volstagg, Hogun and Fandral, pale and frantic.
Well, the flare idea had merit, after all.
“Thor is in the cave,” he said when they came to a stop, gaping at the sight of the dead monster’s body, “Ask Heimdall to call the healers immediately.”
“My god!” that was Volstagg, at the cave’s mouth, with Hogun shouldering him aside to get into the small space. Sif immediately took up a lookout position as Fandral shouted for Heimdall to open the Bifrost here - the flare idea had merit only because their friends showed up first, and Loki really hoped they wouldn’t have to fight more frost giants NOW.
The slate gray sky was just starting to light with the electric white-blue light of the Bifrost when Hogun came out with Thor balanced carefully between him and Volstagg. Loki closed his eyes as they were bathed in light and energy. Finally, it was over.
**
He woke up feeling like an used and abused rag. Bemused, he stared at the unfamiliar ceiling, wondering how he ended up in a bed. Wasn’t he in a cave? wasn’t he being transported by the Bifrost? He was sure there must be something in between - there would have been questions about what happened, about Thor’s condition...
“Loki,” a familiar voice called and Loki turned his head to stare at Thor, sitting beside his bed. “You are awake.”
His brother was in a simple tunic and pants, his injuries neatly wrapped and his arm in a sling. He looked pale but was obviously coherent and as stupid as usual, since he was out and about after being nearly dead just recently.
“What are you doing out of bed?” Loki wondered. “Did the fever finally scramble your brains? I am sure ‘bed rest’ does not mean ‘walk around and bother Loki’.” He tried to push himself up into a sitting position and couldn’t quite hold back the hiss of pain when his entire torso screamed in protest.
“Don’t move, you are healing still,” Thor admonished, pushing Loki back down. The younger brother had the oddest sense of deja vu, and Thor mistook his expression as a demand for an explanation. “You collapsed when we exited the Bifrost, and the healers had to tend us both.”
Loki took an experimentally shallow breath. It hurt slightly less than burning. “...ah. Broken ribs. I can’t say I’ve missed this feeling.” He murmured.
“Not only that.” Thor looked agitated, “you nearly died.”
“From broken ribs?” Loki asked skeptically.
Thor shook his head. “...your magic. Sif and the others told me about your battle...the healers said you used more power than you had, than you could afford.”
Loki frowned. Yes, he had used a lot of his magic, but it should not have been any worse on him than any extended battles that he and Thor had to face before. “Brother, I am not so weak that tossing off a few fireballs would bring me to death’s door. Please cease looking like you’ve lost Mjollnir.”
Thor shook his head, Loki nearly flinched when he placed on large, warm hand on the center of his chest. “Not that.” his brother said heavily. “Your spells...the ones you used to keep me alive.”
“What spells...?” Loki breathed, head spinning. He had tried his best approximation of healing without knowing what he was doing, wasn’t that all?
“I was dying,” Thor murmured. “I would have died. I nearly died anyway, on the healing table. The healers did not know why I was not dead.” The warmth of his hand was seeping through the bandages, and Loki felt it spread. “They found your spell, tying my life to my body. It had given me your power while you still had some to spare, and when that ran out, it started feeding me your life.” The hand moved and Thor took one of Loki’s in both of his own. “If the healers had figured this out a moment later, brother, I would have been the one that killed you.”
For once, Loki’s silver tongue failed him. He had not expected - but no, he hadn’t thought it but he should have known. Magic was not merely bound by the words of a spell - it was pure will, in its simplest form. And Loki had willed Thor to live with all he had, back in that cave. So maybe it wasn’t that surprising.
Thor squeezed his hand. “You were stupid and reckless.” His brother said, his voice thick.
Loki sighed. “...you would have done the same for me if our positions were reversed, if only you could figure out how.” A pause, and he squeezed his brother’s hands and rolled his eyes, voice taking on a lighter tone. “I was trying to be more like you,” he said, a half-lie and a half-truth. “But now I see that being a stupid and reckless hero-type really doesn’t suit me at all.”
Thor laughed, finally, and now - NOW, it was over, because Thor was going to be all right. Both of them were.
**
Thor was on his way back to his own bed in the healing chambers when Loki called out, “By the way, brother.” he looked back with a questioning look to meet Loki’s smug grin. “After we are out of here, you are going to go on a diet.”
**end
Title: What doesn't kill you
For: norsekink
Rating: PG13 (violence)
Prompt: Loki's been getting more than his share of abuse in this meme so far, however this time I'd love to see Thor as the one terribly injured...
-while both are a long way away from help (eg. adventuring in Jotenheim). Loki, the healthier of the two, is forced to look after Thor and keep them both alive as they try and get to safety/wait for aid.
Basically Loki being kind/caring, worried and badass for once and Thor being incredibly useless/helpless in his delerium.
Bonus if Loki is also badly injured and has a deteriorating condition he has to cope with/hide from Thor.
and double bonus if their whole situation is caused by Thor being reckless!
Anything else is totally up to the anon. =) Long prompt is very long. Apologies.
Originally prompted here:
**
“You are going on a diet when we get back to Asgard,” Loki told Thor, still breathing a bit hard from where he collapsed against the cave wall. His brother did not reply from his prone position on the cave floor, as was the norm for unconscious gods. Loki took one more breath, held it, and then released it in a sigh. He pushed off the wall to his brother’s side, contemplating leaving him there for a second - he was so tired, and hurt all over - but if leaving Thor behind was so easy, they wouldn’t be in this position in the first place.
He had the presence of mind to undo the ties that held Thor’s cloak to his shoulder armor before turning his brother over gently. It was difficult to discern blood on red cloth and the cave was not well lit, but Loki called a small orb of witchfire and examined the crude dressings he had wrapped around Thor’s shoulder and chest. They looked neither better nor worse than they had before, which was a minor comfort.
“No more venison for you, brother, or roast boar.” On some level, Loki was aware that he was rambling nonsensically, but even if Thor couldn’t hear him, it made him feel better to pretend. “I know how you and Volstagg love to sing it praises, but I am not sure I’ve the strength to haul you around Jotenheim the next time.” He was so, so tired, but while the dark of the cave was a boon, the cold was not. His brother had already lost too much blood to be safe, and Loki had a wide repertoire of magic that dealt out death or destruction or trickery, but not so much that involved healing.
He tucked both Thor’s cloak and his own around his brother, and stood up stiffly to the closest cave wall. He felt along it until he was satisfied that it was stone, not ice - like so much of this desolate landscape - and fed it as much of his fire as he thought he could spare. The space was small and the rock will retain the heat until he could get a bit of rest and build up enough strength to do magic again.
“On the topic of things you’re going to do once we’re back in Asgard,” Loki murmured as he knelt by Thor’s head, and placed it in his lap. Carefully he examined the threads of power he had holding closed the gaping wounds in Thor’s shoulder and chest, slapshod and crude magical sutures which were unbelievably inelegant. “I know it is too much to ask, but I would request that you not throw yourself headfirst into the first hint of trouble,” he knew what Thor would say to that - he would laugh and note that Loki had his own affairs with trouble that caused his older brother no end of headaches as well - but he shook his head. “I didn’t say to not throw yourself at trouble, merely to be more...graceful, in doing it.” Loki tightened the weave of his magic, feeding it what little power he had left, willing it to sink, disappear and bind the flesh it was holding. Healing might not be his forte, but improvisation certainly was.
And he had much to improvise - they had been separated from the battle by Thor’s folly and the overwhelming odds. Thor’s injuries were bordering on life-threatening and neither of them were carrying much in the way of supplies. Going back to the Bifrost site by themselves and hoping Heimdall will let them return had slim to none chances of succeeding - and Loki knew all about turning bad odds. The only option left is to wait for help or attempt the trip after Thor has recovered enough to move.
If their luck held and they were left alone until the fight was over and the warrior three and Sif were able to come for them, he would have to figure out how to keep them both alive in the meantime. If no help was forthcoming, then they would have to make for the Bifrost, as soon as Thor was stable enough to move or be moved.
“Bad odds, Brother.” Loki whispered, closing his eyes. The third option...but he had already considered and discarded the third option, hadn’t he? When Thor was first struck with that explosion of ice, crying out in pain and rage and falling - in the confusion and chaos, it would have been simple to leave Thor behind, to get himself lost along with the others. Asgard would mourn their golden prince, and …
But he had jumped after his brother, snapped out protective wards almost instinctively. Had done a horrid hack-job of healing magic to keep him from bleeding out and hauled his nearly-dead weight to a dark cave in the middle of Nowhere, Jotenheim. Was now talking about diets and contemplating options. It was ridiculous enough to make him laugh, and the sound prompted a soft groan from Thor and a restless stirring. Loki smoothed a hand down his brother’s brow while shaking his head. “Sleep, brother.” he said, and because he was a master of lies, he was sure he sounded sincere when he added, “tomorrow will be a better day.”
**
‘Tomorrow’ came early when Thor’s shivering woke him a handful of hours later. Loki bit back a groan when he shifted, feeling the aches and pains of a full-out battle and falling down a cliff AND dragging his brother’s very impressive dead weight come crashing back to the forefront of his awareness. At least he had been able to sleep a little, and felt well enough to heat the stones again so that things were more comfortable for Thor.
He left his brother there to do a more thorough scout of the area they had chosen. They were fortunate in that Loki’s desperate teleportation spell had dumped them somewhere deserted, and while Loki saw no sign of their friends, at least he saw no sign of frost giants either. Water was plentiful in the form of ice, and Loki brought back some to melt for Thor.
His brother’s eyes were open slightly and Loki hurried over, too relieved to hide it from his face. “Thor, you’re awake.” He held up a hand when Thor tried to get up, wincing in pain, “Don’t move, you will aggravate your injuries.”
“Loki,” Thor rasped, still trying to get up. Awake for one minute and already refusing to listen to directions. Loki rolled his eyes and prayed for patience. “Brother. Where are we?”
“The best accommodations that Jotenheim has to offer, of course,” he murmured, pushing his brother to lay flat again, silencing any protests by pressing a small piece of ice against Thor’s lips. “Hush. You need water, we’re safe for now.”
Thor’s voice was less raspy but still weak. “The others?”
Loki smiled a bit wryly at him. “They were not caught in the explosion and I believe many of the frost giants attacking them fell with us. The others are probably doing better than you are at the moment.”
Thor nodded. “...and you?”
Loki blinked. “...me?” Thankfully Thor appeared to be slipping a little and Loki managed to continue as if he hadn’t actually been caught off guard by the question. “I am also doing better than you are, which I think is pretty much descriptive of everyone we know.”
“...sorry,” Thor murmured, but when Loki asked him why, there was no response.
***
Thor woke a few more times as a few days passed, and Loki could tell that his condition was worsening by the progressively more nonsensical things that his brother insisted on saying, no matter how many times Loki tried to hush him. The cave was kept warm, but his brother was warmer still and Loki realized with a sinking feeling that infection probably had set in. If the others do not find them soon, he would have to attempt to move Thor himself, or...
Thor thrashed in his cocoon of blankets made up of their cloaks, and Loki weighed the benefits against the costs of hitting his brother with a sleep spell for the umpteenth time. He had been using his magic as quickly as it was recovering, sending whatever power he had into trying to heal Thor’s wounds as much as possible. With a tired sigh, Loki gave up on the idea - if he spelled Thor to sleep now, there was a good chance he would follow his brother into oblivion from sheer exhaustion.
Thor’s eyes were tightly closed and once again, those crazy words tumbled from his lips. “Leave me,” he gasped. Loki held him mostly still with one hand on his chest, on the uninjured side. It was too easy, he should not be able to pin his brother, his strong, powerful older brother, with just a hand. “Leave me...Save yourself.”
“What foolishness,” Loki replied, “after I made that herculean effort of dragging you here?” He kept his tone light and wry, even as he fought down a slight wave of panic. “You are feverish, so I will take this as the ramblings of a delusional mind.”
“Go,” Thor groaned. “GO.”
I could not leave you behind then, Loki thought ironically, so I doubt I could just go now. “I’m not going anywhere,” he said out loud instead. “And I would kindly ask you to not take that tone with me. You are not the king of Asgard yet, brother.”
“You cannot die here...” Thor murmured before lapsing into silence again, falling into the embrace of fitful unconsciousness. Loki took a deep breath.
“You cannot die here either,” he echoed, drawing up what magic he had left to try healing, one more time. ...I absolutely will not let you.
***
In his own version of insanity, Loki seriously contemplated letting loose a giant fireball at the sky to serve as some sort of signal flare, because if they didn’t get some damn help here RIGHT NOW, he really shouldn’t be held responsible for his actions.
In the end, the choice was taken out of his hands.
He had stumbled outside, legs shaky with black spots dancing in his vision, knowing that he needed the blast of icy air to clear his head or else he would pass out - with the way their luck was going, if he did that, neither of them were ever going to wake up again. That part worked just as planned, as he sat there, collapsed in the snow and panting hard, he could feel some of the fog and panic leave his mind. The crisp air burned his lungs, and he looked up to see -
What was NOT planned was the huge Jotenheim equivalent of a wolf that suddenly appeared from behind a small landslide of snow. It was a hideous, twisted thing with fur the same slate blue as the rest of the landscape, eyes a cunning yellow. In the split second it took Loki to blink, it snarled and sprang at him in one move, all its sharp teeth bared.
Out of sheer instinct, Loki threw his hands up and called on as much fire as he could muster. It hit the wolf in the face and threw the creature off balance, roaring into the sky like a giant, orange dragon. Loki scrambled to his feet with a curse as the wolf rolled, growling and barking in pain, heart pounding so loudly in his chest that he could hardly hear anything over it. His knives fell into his waiting hands and he readied another spell, even though a detached, logical part of him pointed out that he had just burned all his remaining magic and anything else would probably knock him right out.
The wolf gathered itself and lunged again, and Loki dodged to the side with his knives flashing out, slashing and tearing at whatever he could reach. The wolf howled in outrage when the blades nicked its burnt ear, and turned with surprising agility. Loki gasped when the creature slammed him bodily against the outside cave wall, feeling all the air leave his lungs in a painful whoosh. He would’ve been concerned about the creaking (or cracking) in his ribs except he could not breathe, could only gag as the creature tried to keep him pinned and turn its head enough to use its teeth -
And Loki wouldn’t be more than an appetizer for something of its size. After it devours Loki, without a doubt it would turn to Thor.
With all his strength and a ferocity that surprised even him, Loki reversed his grip on his knife and plunged it into the nearest soft thing on the wolf’s body, which happened to be one of its golden eyes. The monster shrieked and shied away, and Loki shoved away from the cave wall to stab at the wolf’s throat, sinking the blade in to the hilt.
Then he called on whatever magic he had left and channeled it through the blade.
**
It felt like an eternity later when he heard shouts and looked up from the corpse of the wolf-monster, but it was probably only a few minutes. The figures resolved themselves into Sif, Volstagg, Hogun and Fandral, pale and frantic.
Well, the flare idea had merit, after all.
“Thor is in the cave,” he said when they came to a stop, gaping at the sight of the dead monster’s body, “Ask Heimdall to call the healers immediately.”
“My god!” that was Volstagg, at the cave’s mouth, with Hogun shouldering him aside to get into the small space. Sif immediately took up a lookout position as Fandral shouted for Heimdall to open the Bifrost here - the flare idea had merit only because their friends showed up first, and Loki really hoped they wouldn’t have to fight more frost giants NOW.
The slate gray sky was just starting to light with the electric white-blue light of the Bifrost when Hogun came out with Thor balanced carefully between him and Volstagg. Loki closed his eyes as they were bathed in light and energy. Finally, it was over.
**
He woke up feeling like an used and abused rag. Bemused, he stared at the unfamiliar ceiling, wondering how he ended up in a bed. Wasn’t he in a cave? wasn’t he being transported by the Bifrost? He was sure there must be something in between - there would have been questions about what happened, about Thor’s condition...
“Loki,” a familiar voice called and Loki turned his head to stare at Thor, sitting beside his bed. “You are awake.”
His brother was in a simple tunic and pants, his injuries neatly wrapped and his arm in a sling. He looked pale but was obviously coherent and as stupid as usual, since he was out and about after being nearly dead just recently.
“What are you doing out of bed?” Loki wondered. “Did the fever finally scramble your brains? I am sure ‘bed rest’ does not mean ‘walk around and bother Loki’.” He tried to push himself up into a sitting position and couldn’t quite hold back the hiss of pain when his entire torso screamed in protest.
“Don’t move, you are healing still,” Thor admonished, pushing Loki back down. The younger brother had the oddest sense of deja vu, and Thor mistook his expression as a demand for an explanation. “You collapsed when we exited the Bifrost, and the healers had to tend us both.”
Loki took an experimentally shallow breath. It hurt slightly less than burning. “...ah. Broken ribs. I can’t say I’ve missed this feeling.” He murmured.
“Not only that.” Thor looked agitated, “you nearly died.”
“From broken ribs?” Loki asked skeptically.
Thor shook his head. “...your magic. Sif and the others told me about your battle...the healers said you used more power than you had, than you could afford.”
Loki frowned. Yes, he had used a lot of his magic, but it should not have been any worse on him than any extended battles that he and Thor had to face before. “Brother, I am not so weak that tossing off a few fireballs would bring me to death’s door. Please cease looking like you’ve lost Mjollnir.”
Thor shook his head, Loki nearly flinched when he placed on large, warm hand on the center of his chest. “Not that.” his brother said heavily. “Your spells...the ones you used to keep me alive.”
“What spells...?” Loki breathed, head spinning. He had tried his best approximation of healing without knowing what he was doing, wasn’t that all?
“I was dying,” Thor murmured. “I would have died. I nearly died anyway, on the healing table. The healers did not know why I was not dead.” The warmth of his hand was seeping through the bandages, and Loki felt it spread. “They found your spell, tying my life to my body. It had given me your power while you still had some to spare, and when that ran out, it started feeding me your life.” The hand moved and Thor took one of Loki’s in both of his own. “If the healers had figured this out a moment later, brother, I would have been the one that killed you.”
For once, Loki’s silver tongue failed him. He had not expected - but no, he hadn’t thought it but he should have known. Magic was not merely bound by the words of a spell - it was pure will, in its simplest form. And Loki had willed Thor to live with all he had, back in that cave. So maybe it wasn’t that surprising.
Thor squeezed his hand. “You were stupid and reckless.” His brother said, his voice thick.
Loki sighed. “...you would have done the same for me if our positions were reversed, if only you could figure out how.” A pause, and he squeezed his brother’s hands and rolled his eyes, voice taking on a lighter tone. “I was trying to be more like you,” he said, a half-lie and a half-truth. “But now I see that being a stupid and reckless hero-type really doesn’t suit me at all.”
Thor laughed, finally, and now - NOW, it was over, because Thor was going to be all right. Both of them were.
**
Thor was on his way back to his own bed in the healing chambers when Loki called out, “By the way, brother.” he looked back with a questioning look to meet Loki’s smug grin. “After we are out of here, you are going to go on a diet.”
**end