Thor Fic: "a burning in your heart" (conclusion)
Beginning and story information here.
*
Once again Loki sat alone in the dark, on the floor, unmoving and numb. Time passed and he had yet another visitor.
Thor had returned.
Even though for once he wanted nothing more than hold his tongue, maintain the protective bubble of silence, as if compelled by another force Loki found the words working their way up through his throat.
“You don’t give up easily, do you?”
Thor did not validate his taunt by responding in kind. Instead he kept his distance, sidestepping in a half-circle around Loki, close enough to get a look at him.
Shoulders drawn tight, legs folded almost against his chest and hands clasped before him as if forgotten, Loki turned his face towards his brother, enough to oblige his curiosity.
Immediately a frown, concerned but also exasperated, appeared across Thor’s visage. He recoiled.
“Are you so contrary by nature that you’d turn against any action of mine out of spite?” he demanded. “I bring you here in the hopes that you would heal, and instead you neglect yourself to this state?”
Loki could feel the dark shadows that’d formed under his eyes, the gauntness to his face, the lankness of his uncombed and unwashed hair. He said nothing as Thor continued. An acerbic smile twisted its way into being with his mouth, both amused and in pain.
“Why, brother? Why do you do this to yourself?”
Loki’s smile fell. He swallowed awkwardly so that he could speak. “Because I don’t serve your will, Thor,” he muttered. “I serve my own.”
“And this is what you want?” Thor said disbelievingly. He paused, self-assurance building as he commanded, “Look me in the eye and tell me that, if it is so. If you can.”
Loki stared at him, gaze haunted and sharp, but his voice remained stubbornly silent.
And as Thor’s words grew louder, Loki’s head dropped, eyes sliding towards the floor.
Not long ago he would’ve had the strength to argue. He would have mocked every word. But he was a serpent drained of venom, without fangs, without even the drive left to hiss and rattle its coils. He was sick without and within; he was a shell. All Loki wanted to do was bury his head in his hands and die.
“Why is it seems you aim towards nothing more than driving yourself to misery? For all your talk of superiority, and conquest, and amusement - all you ever do is ensure that you are alone.”
“Stop,” Loki protested in a hollow whisper.
“Do you even remember what happiness feels like?” Thor pressed, unrelenting. “Can you look at me, then, and claim that much to be true?”
“Stop,” Loki cried, giving Thor what he wanted at least in that he lifted his head toward him.
“What?” Thor said. “What’s wrong - why will you not even speak to me? Are you that afraid of my being proved right?”
“I do not wish to talk to you, because it’s the same argument, and I’m tired of having it over and over,” Loki retorted, shrill with desperation. His voice wavered, eyes tearing. “What does it take to convince you? Why can’t you listen when I tell you it can never be?”
Thor seemed moved enough by Loki’s distress that he dropped the more hostile part of his attitude. His eyes were wide, voice softer. “Why not? What’s to prevent you from trying? No one ever said it would be easy, but-”
Loki drew breath in a disbelieving laugh. “Oh no?” He found the strength in indignation to push himself with one hand to his feet.
He stalked past Thor, gazing across one shoulder before whirling around more sharply. “Isn’t that as good as what you said, when you carried me here? What you implied with every insistence that I was being a fool? ‘Everything will be right again, Loki - you’ll see!’”
Thor cringed, knowing he was right.
“But no. I would have to live every day surrounded by those who felt me a traitor, knowing what they thought of me. Having to be around constant reminders of my failings.” Loki inhaled, sneering. “Having to try and divorce myself from my shame, and guilt, and rage, when the symbols of it threatened to choke me. I would have to turn my back on my pride. Sacrifice what little remains of my self-worth.”
His expression fell, eyelids lowering with the defeated exhaustion of what he was saying. “No, brother,” he concluded, “it is impossible.”
Redemption. Succor. Satisfaction. Destined to be forever behind his reach. All could be washed and come clean, but not him; never him.
Thor was silent a moment before saying, gentle but insistent, “You don’t think it would be worth it? To not have to run anymore? Or fight those who would rather not fight you?”
Loki’s hand pressed to his brow, not so much massaging it as digging at his skin. “Why can you never make things easy for me?”
“Because I won’t be driven to hate you!” Thor declared, hotly. “No matter how hard you try.”
Loki smiled in a feral way, eyes narrowing with a glint of ragged insanity. “I would be wary of making that a challenge.”
“Enough, Loki - enough! Enough of the declarations, and the cruel jests.” Thor moved in on him, and Loki’s smirk fell as he saw the look in his eyes.
“You can do all that you like, to me and my friends and any innocent you come against. And I will rail at your misdeeds, and be enraged that you have stooped so low, but I will never hate you.” Thor paused for breath. “I can’t understand why you would even try.”
“Because it would be so much easier,” Loki said feebly, miserable.
At that Thor smiled - a strained version of his usual grin. “No it wouldn’t,” he rebuked. “Because then only one of us would love the other, and you’d truly be alone.”
“I was meant to be alone,” Loki insisted, stepping back as if to duck an oncoming embrace. “If you have any mercy at all, I beg of you, just stop. Let me go.”
“I will never let you go.” Thor still smiled at him, eyes shining. “You are my brother, and I can’t stop worrying, or wishing for your happiness, any more than I could shake the many stars out of the sky.” His words grew impassioned. “Don’t you see? After all these years, do you still feel insult when I rush to defend you…when having others willing to fight on your behalf is not a sign of weakness, but of worth.”
Loki shook his head again. He moved farther away, bent forward as he covered his face with both hands.
He felt like he was waging a physical war. Every argument beat him down even further, until he was left hanging on by his fingernails. He was proud, he was hurt; he was so very lonely. Both hate and love caused him to suffer in equal amounts.
He couldn’t give in but neither could he make himself walk away.
And Thor kept on, as tireless and unwavering as the stormy winds he commanded.
“You’ve no idea how hard Father worked, to convince our people it was right he should spare you. And Mother never hesitated in her feelings, even for all the times she was brought word of what you’ve done. You speak of being ill-used by our family: but our parents love you, and want you back. The only thing standing in the way is you.”
Thor gestured forcibly with his fists, artless but no less sincere.
“I entreat you, on their behalf, on mine…and if what you’ve claimed is true, and the only interest you think to satisfy anymore is your own, then by all means, do it for yourself.”
Loki couldn’t face him. His head shook slowly as he tried to find some sense within himself.
“I can’t,” he tried, confused and wracked by anguish. “I don’t-”
I am broken. I am sick. Born a monster and raised a worthless second son. Destined to hurt everyone who ever loved me, and unable to trust because I cannot trust myself.
But the words refused to come and Loki was left gasping and pleading in silence. The most he could manage was, “You can’t begin to understand what it is you’re asking of me!”
Thor watched his brother struggle, watched the torment across his face. Finally he said, quiet and with unerring calm, “Not so very long ago it was I who was cast out, bereft of home and ally and left to wander, until I could face what it meant, knowing I was wrong. I paid the price of humility, dearly bought and unpleasant to suffer, to regain what I’d lost. Remember?”
Loki stared. He would have smiled were it not so horrible. “You,” he began slowly, “would actually compare-”
“And why not?” Thor interrupted boisterously.
He stepped close to lay a hand on Loki’s shoulder, and Loki had not the strength to pull away. Emotion and doubt had gutted him. He couldn’t understand how his legs still held up his body.
“For all that you and I are the exact opposite, so too are we very alike.”
Loki wrenched away from Thor’s gaze, fighting back the conspiratorial grin that against all odds wanted to rise to match his brother’s.
A lifetime of habits. For all he’d pulled away that piece of him would always belong to Thor. It wasn’t fair.
“We have the same determination,” Thor continued, oblivious or uncaring; it was always impossible to tell. “And though you’ve oft complained of me being so set in my ways, you are stubborn as well.”
Loki wanted to argue but in that moment was terrified that if he opened his mouth, what would come out was the playful bickering they’d exchanged so often as siblings.
Thor grinned, as if he could read his mind. But his mirth didn’t reach his eyes; still hurt and beseeching. “We have always been it seems like two halves to one whole.” His head shook faintly. “That’s why in spite of all that I have seen and done in my time on Earth, the things I have learned and the friends I have met, my happiness has never been complete. I can enjoy nothing when you aren’t with me to share it.”
Good, Loki should’ve said. He should’ve laughed and told Thor that was exactly what he wanted, for him to suffer. But he didn’t.
He couldn’t become angry enough. He couldn’t make himself want to.
Pulling out from Thor’s touch he stepped backwards, as unable to turn away as he was to bear the closeness any longer. Loki’s arms folded, fingers curling around biceps.
Thor watched him carefully, waiting for him to say something. But Loki didn’t know what to say.
It was a terrifying experience for him - not knowing what to say.
“It won’t just go away, Thor,” he said at last, words harsh and choked out. “Things like this, they never go away. You can’t will them to be gone. It takes-”
“Time?” Thor finished. “That doesn’t prevent you from starting. The sooner it begins, the sooner it can be done with, one small step at a time. Is it not so?”
Whatever little control Loki had regained over his speech left again. He held his breath for fear of the sounds he might make.
“If you do try, could things become any worse for you than they are now?” Thor asked.
The stiffness in Loki’s shoulders vanished with fatigue and surrender. His head dropped.
“I am…so tired,” he murmured, barely aware of what he was saying.
He once had such disdain for mortals, whose lives paced only fractions of centuries and then were gone. And yet a year and half had drained him as if it waged on forever. This game, blood feuds and vengeance played out with armies and worlds, had made him sick and empty at heart. Was that how he’d wanted it to be?
“Then rest, my brother,” Thor offered. His tone was plaintive. “Do whatever it is you need.”
How could he make it sound so easy? Like all one had to do was give in.
Loki remained where he was; he didn’t approach Thor again but neither did he try to flee from him. He let his eyes fall closed and stayed completely quiet.
For once there was nothing more he could say.
*
When he was alone again, after Thor left once more, Loki went and stood beside one wall, leaning his back into it so he could remain upright without constantly having to focus and remind himself of the sensation. He pressed his thumb and the tip of one finger over his lips, tapping absently against pale skin.
His head felt feverish inside. Ideas and feelings flitted by too fast to be fully realized, following each other on spiraling paths that made no sense.
He couldn’t remember the last he’d had a choice to make: a real choice, versus something grabbed onto for spite.
Bow his head, take a knee, and be forced into the role of dutiful son and servant. But do so knowing that he could lay his burden down, release his grudge. That one day, possibly, he might feel happy again.
Or stay with head held high and turn his back on those seeking his forgiveness, walk out to the life he’d made. The life he despised and reveled in despising, where victory meant causing others pain, and at best could only be bittersweet.
The sacrifice for keeping his pride was placing his own heart on the altar and taking a knife to it.
And once Loki would’ve paid that price, and gladly. Done it with a sense of cold victory in his chest and a tight smirk on his face, and called it ‘freedom’.
Once…
Loki pushed away from the wall and called out, summoning someone to come attend him. He asked for water.
After his request had been met he ignored the chalice sitting on the tray left for him and lifted the jug straight to his mouth, drinking until his headache was gone and the vessel was dry.
Then he lay down on his bed, closed his eyes and slept.
He was unsure how much time had passed when he awoke, but he would be surprised if it was anything less than days.
His mind was quiet. He felt so much lighter but also empty, uncertain.
He pulled the curtains aside and went out on the balcony and put his hands on the rail, looking out across the familiar gleam of Asgard’s skyline. The sun felt warm, and a gentle breeze ruffled his hair and caressed the back of his neck.
It felt like he was still waking up, very slowly.
Eventually he became aware that there was someone standing behind him.
Loki slowly turned to look, knowing already what he would see. The All-Father waited patiently with his wife beside him, Thor standing behind them and slightly off to one side.
And Loki allowed himself to look at his family’s faces, to truly meet them in the eye.
Frigga’s arms were already opening as he ran to her, a gentle smile on her face as he embraced her, pressing his face against his mother as he sobbed. She stroked his hair, her other arm enfolding him tight. Odin reached to rest one hand firmly on his son’s shoulder.
“Welcome home,” Thor said again proudly.
And this time, it was real.
*
Once again Loki sat alone in the dark, on the floor, unmoving and numb. Time passed and he had yet another visitor.
Thor had returned.
Even though for once he wanted nothing more than hold his tongue, maintain the protective bubble of silence, as if compelled by another force Loki found the words working their way up through his throat.
“You don’t give up easily, do you?”
Thor did not validate his taunt by responding in kind. Instead he kept his distance, sidestepping in a half-circle around Loki, close enough to get a look at him.
Shoulders drawn tight, legs folded almost against his chest and hands clasped before him as if forgotten, Loki turned his face towards his brother, enough to oblige his curiosity.
Immediately a frown, concerned but also exasperated, appeared across Thor’s visage. He recoiled.
“Are you so contrary by nature that you’d turn against any action of mine out of spite?” he demanded. “I bring you here in the hopes that you would heal, and instead you neglect yourself to this state?”
Loki could feel the dark shadows that’d formed under his eyes, the gauntness to his face, the lankness of his uncombed and unwashed hair. He said nothing as Thor continued. An acerbic smile twisted its way into being with his mouth, both amused and in pain.
“Why, brother? Why do you do this to yourself?”
Loki’s smile fell. He swallowed awkwardly so that he could speak. “Because I don’t serve your will, Thor,” he muttered. “I serve my own.”
“And this is what you want?” Thor said disbelievingly. He paused, self-assurance building as he commanded, “Look me in the eye and tell me that, if it is so. If you can.”
Loki stared at him, gaze haunted and sharp, but his voice remained stubbornly silent.
And as Thor’s words grew louder, Loki’s head dropped, eyes sliding towards the floor.
Not long ago he would’ve had the strength to argue. He would have mocked every word. But he was a serpent drained of venom, without fangs, without even the drive left to hiss and rattle its coils. He was sick without and within; he was a shell. All Loki wanted to do was bury his head in his hands and die.
“Why is it seems you aim towards nothing more than driving yourself to misery? For all your talk of superiority, and conquest, and amusement - all you ever do is ensure that you are alone.”
“Stop,” Loki protested in a hollow whisper.
“Do you even remember what happiness feels like?” Thor pressed, unrelenting. “Can you look at me, then, and claim that much to be true?”
“Stop,” Loki cried, giving Thor what he wanted at least in that he lifted his head toward him.
“What?” Thor said. “What’s wrong - why will you not even speak to me? Are you that afraid of my being proved right?”
“I do not wish to talk to you, because it’s the same argument, and I’m tired of having it over and over,” Loki retorted, shrill with desperation. His voice wavered, eyes tearing. “What does it take to convince you? Why can’t you listen when I tell you it can never be?”
Thor seemed moved enough by Loki’s distress that he dropped the more hostile part of his attitude. His eyes were wide, voice softer. “Why not? What’s to prevent you from trying? No one ever said it would be easy, but-”
Loki drew breath in a disbelieving laugh. “Oh no?” He found the strength in indignation to push himself with one hand to his feet.
He stalked past Thor, gazing across one shoulder before whirling around more sharply. “Isn’t that as good as what you said, when you carried me here? What you implied with every insistence that I was being a fool? ‘Everything will be right again, Loki - you’ll see!’”
Thor cringed, knowing he was right.
“But no. I would have to live every day surrounded by those who felt me a traitor, knowing what they thought of me. Having to be around constant reminders of my failings.” Loki inhaled, sneering. “Having to try and divorce myself from my shame, and guilt, and rage, when the symbols of it threatened to choke me. I would have to turn my back on my pride. Sacrifice what little remains of my self-worth.”
His expression fell, eyelids lowering with the defeated exhaustion of what he was saying. “No, brother,” he concluded, “it is impossible.”
Redemption. Succor. Satisfaction. Destined to be forever behind his reach. All could be washed and come clean, but not him; never him.
Thor was silent a moment before saying, gentle but insistent, “You don’t think it would be worth it? To not have to run anymore? Or fight those who would rather not fight you?”
Loki’s hand pressed to his brow, not so much massaging it as digging at his skin. “Why can you never make things easy for me?”
“Because I won’t be driven to hate you!” Thor declared, hotly. “No matter how hard you try.”
Loki smiled in a feral way, eyes narrowing with a glint of ragged insanity. “I would be wary of making that a challenge.”
“Enough, Loki - enough! Enough of the declarations, and the cruel jests.” Thor moved in on him, and Loki’s smirk fell as he saw the look in his eyes.
“You can do all that you like, to me and my friends and any innocent you come against. And I will rail at your misdeeds, and be enraged that you have stooped so low, but I will never hate you.” Thor paused for breath. “I can’t understand why you would even try.”
“Because it would be so much easier,” Loki said feebly, miserable.
At that Thor smiled - a strained version of his usual grin. “No it wouldn’t,” he rebuked. “Because then only one of us would love the other, and you’d truly be alone.”
“I was meant to be alone,” Loki insisted, stepping back as if to duck an oncoming embrace. “If you have any mercy at all, I beg of you, just stop. Let me go.”
“I will never let you go.” Thor still smiled at him, eyes shining. “You are my brother, and I can’t stop worrying, or wishing for your happiness, any more than I could shake the many stars out of the sky.” His words grew impassioned. “Don’t you see? After all these years, do you still feel insult when I rush to defend you…when having others willing to fight on your behalf is not a sign of weakness, but of worth.”
Loki shook his head again. He moved farther away, bent forward as he covered his face with both hands.
He felt like he was waging a physical war. Every argument beat him down even further, until he was left hanging on by his fingernails. He was proud, he was hurt; he was so very lonely. Both hate and love caused him to suffer in equal amounts.
He couldn’t give in but neither could he make himself walk away.
And Thor kept on, as tireless and unwavering as the stormy winds he commanded.
“You’ve no idea how hard Father worked, to convince our people it was right he should spare you. And Mother never hesitated in her feelings, even for all the times she was brought word of what you’ve done. You speak of being ill-used by our family: but our parents love you, and want you back. The only thing standing in the way is you.”
Thor gestured forcibly with his fists, artless but no less sincere.
“I entreat you, on their behalf, on mine…and if what you’ve claimed is true, and the only interest you think to satisfy anymore is your own, then by all means, do it for yourself.”
Loki couldn’t face him. His head shook slowly as he tried to find some sense within himself.
“I can’t,” he tried, confused and wracked by anguish. “I don’t-”
I am broken. I am sick. Born a monster and raised a worthless second son. Destined to hurt everyone who ever loved me, and unable to trust because I cannot trust myself.
But the words refused to come and Loki was left gasping and pleading in silence. The most he could manage was, “You can’t begin to understand what it is you’re asking of me!”
Thor watched his brother struggle, watched the torment across his face. Finally he said, quiet and with unerring calm, “Not so very long ago it was I who was cast out, bereft of home and ally and left to wander, until I could face what it meant, knowing I was wrong. I paid the price of humility, dearly bought and unpleasant to suffer, to regain what I’d lost. Remember?”
Loki stared. He would have smiled were it not so horrible. “You,” he began slowly, “would actually compare-”
“And why not?” Thor interrupted boisterously.
He stepped close to lay a hand on Loki’s shoulder, and Loki had not the strength to pull away. Emotion and doubt had gutted him. He couldn’t understand how his legs still held up his body.
“For all that you and I are the exact opposite, so too are we very alike.”
Loki wrenched away from Thor’s gaze, fighting back the conspiratorial grin that against all odds wanted to rise to match his brother’s.
A lifetime of habits. For all he’d pulled away that piece of him would always belong to Thor. It wasn’t fair.
“We have the same determination,” Thor continued, oblivious or uncaring; it was always impossible to tell. “And though you’ve oft complained of me being so set in my ways, you are stubborn as well.”
Loki wanted to argue but in that moment was terrified that if he opened his mouth, what would come out was the playful bickering they’d exchanged so often as siblings.
Thor grinned, as if he could read his mind. But his mirth didn’t reach his eyes; still hurt and beseeching. “We have always been it seems like two halves to one whole.” His head shook faintly. “That’s why in spite of all that I have seen and done in my time on Earth, the things I have learned and the friends I have met, my happiness has never been complete. I can enjoy nothing when you aren’t with me to share it.”
Good, Loki should’ve said. He should’ve laughed and told Thor that was exactly what he wanted, for him to suffer. But he didn’t.
He couldn’t become angry enough. He couldn’t make himself want to.
Pulling out from Thor’s touch he stepped backwards, as unable to turn away as he was to bear the closeness any longer. Loki’s arms folded, fingers curling around biceps.
Thor watched him carefully, waiting for him to say something. But Loki didn’t know what to say.
It was a terrifying experience for him - not knowing what to say.
“It won’t just go away, Thor,” he said at last, words harsh and choked out. “Things like this, they never go away. You can’t will them to be gone. It takes-”
“Time?” Thor finished. “That doesn’t prevent you from starting. The sooner it begins, the sooner it can be done with, one small step at a time. Is it not so?”
Whatever little control Loki had regained over his speech left again. He held his breath for fear of the sounds he might make.
“If you do try, could things become any worse for you than they are now?” Thor asked.
The stiffness in Loki’s shoulders vanished with fatigue and surrender. His head dropped.
“I am…so tired,” he murmured, barely aware of what he was saying.
He once had such disdain for mortals, whose lives paced only fractions of centuries and then were gone. And yet a year and half had drained him as if it waged on forever. This game, blood feuds and vengeance played out with armies and worlds, had made him sick and empty at heart. Was that how he’d wanted it to be?
“Then rest, my brother,” Thor offered. His tone was plaintive. “Do whatever it is you need.”
How could he make it sound so easy? Like all one had to do was give in.
Loki remained where he was; he didn’t approach Thor again but neither did he try to flee from him. He let his eyes fall closed and stayed completely quiet.
For once there was nothing more he could say.
*
When he was alone again, after Thor left once more, Loki went and stood beside one wall, leaning his back into it so he could remain upright without constantly having to focus and remind himself of the sensation. He pressed his thumb and the tip of one finger over his lips, tapping absently against pale skin.
His head felt feverish inside. Ideas and feelings flitted by too fast to be fully realized, following each other on spiraling paths that made no sense.
He couldn’t remember the last he’d had a choice to make: a real choice, versus something grabbed onto for spite.
Bow his head, take a knee, and be forced into the role of dutiful son and servant. But do so knowing that he could lay his burden down, release his grudge. That one day, possibly, he might feel happy again.
Or stay with head held high and turn his back on those seeking his forgiveness, walk out to the life he’d made. The life he despised and reveled in despising, where victory meant causing others pain, and at best could only be bittersweet.
The sacrifice for keeping his pride was placing his own heart on the altar and taking a knife to it.
And once Loki would’ve paid that price, and gladly. Done it with a sense of cold victory in his chest and a tight smirk on his face, and called it ‘freedom’.
Once…
Loki pushed away from the wall and called out, summoning someone to come attend him. He asked for water.
After his request had been met he ignored the chalice sitting on the tray left for him and lifted the jug straight to his mouth, drinking until his headache was gone and the vessel was dry.
Then he lay down on his bed, closed his eyes and slept.
He was unsure how much time had passed when he awoke, but he would be surprised if it was anything less than days.
His mind was quiet. He felt so much lighter but also empty, uncertain.
He pulled the curtains aside and went out on the balcony and put his hands on the rail, looking out across the familiar gleam of Asgard’s skyline. The sun felt warm, and a gentle breeze ruffled his hair and caressed the back of his neck.
It felt like he was still waking up, very slowly.
Eventually he became aware that there was someone standing behind him.
Loki slowly turned to look, knowing already what he would see. The All-Father waited patiently with his wife beside him, Thor standing behind them and slightly off to one side.
And Loki allowed himself to look at his family’s faces, to truly meet them in the eye.
Frigga’s arms were already opening as he ran to her, a gentle smile on her face as he embraced her, pressing his face against his mother as he sobbed. She stroked his hair, her other arm enfolding him tight. Odin reached to rest one hand firmly on his son’s shoulder.
“Welcome home,” Thor said again proudly.
And this time, it was real.