Chapter One: Loyalty Lost

Life in prison was… boring. There was nothing to do but skim through books he had already read a thousand times and think about how different his future could have been, if not for the Allfather's lies. There was nothing to see but the plain white walls of his cell and the darkened corridor beyond. There was nothing to hear but his own mind, screaming about his confinement in silence, although he kept his outward appearance as cold and collected as ever.

Once upon a time, Loki had been able to sit in the same spot for hours, so long as he had a book. The words had been enough to satisfy him, to give wings to his imagination and let it take flight, allowing him to live vicariously through the tales of Asgard's ancient heroes until that day when he could have real adventures of his own.

But now was different. He'd had adventures. He had seen all Nine Realms and traveled farther than most of Asgard's inhabitants could even dream of. He had fallen through the starry branches of the Yggdrasil and risen again, stronger than ever. He had held power, true power, in his hands. He had almost been a king. And now… Now he was expected to resign himself to a life behind bars? A life in prison, never again able to speak to his mother, or see his brother, or ride to another realm, or feel starlight on his skin, or play tricks, or run, or hide…

That was no life at all.

How could he endure months, years, centuries of this? He would go mad—at least, madder than they already thought he was. Yet the strange thing was, he didn't feel mad. Reckless, maybe, and angry, but those weren't really the same thing. And more than anything else, he simply felt empty. Odin had disowned him (not that he cared), Frigga was forbidden to see him (of course), Thor had left him to rot in the dungeons (which didn't surprise him), and she was in a different dungeon, one darker and deeper than his own.

Was this how she had felt, all those long years of her imprisonment? He could imagine her pacing back and forth along the rough stone walls of her cell, wearing the soles off of her boots, then continuing to pace until the bottoms of her feet were torn and bloody. She would twist her head and pull back her teeth to scent a wind that no longer blew, like a wild animal trapped in a cage, but she would never speak, never raise her voice. It was not her way to curse and shout—she was silent, like a ghost yet living.

Loki was stretched out on his cot which, while it was small and thin, was probably more comfortable than whatever bed the Allfather had given her. They treated him well enough in Asgard, if only because of Frigga. His cell was neat and clean, his clothes were washed on a regular basis, and his food was decently prepared. He certainly didn't lack for reading material. It could have been worse, much worse.

He grabbed the cup of water off his bedside table and drained it in one quick swallow, then proceeded to toss it over his head, catching it effortlessly as it tumbled back down again. Toss… and catch. Toss… and catch. Toss… He sighed, wondering what the sky looked like. He thought it was afternoon, but he had lost track of time days ago. Catching the goblet, he flicked it upwards again. What book to read today? Maybe that one over in the corner, but it was small, maybe a few hundred pages at most. He'd be done with it in less than an hour. The goblet fell back down again. After spinning it around in his fingers, he threw it once more, looking for a different option.

A sound came from further in the dungeon, but Loki ignored it. There was always someone grunting, or screaming, or crying, or trying to kill his inmate. At least Loki had a cell to himself.

Probably because no one would want to share one with me, he thought with a wry grimace, trapping the goblet and batting it away again. There was only one person in the Nine Realms he would even remotely consider being imprisoned for eternity with, and the Allfather had already jailed her somewhere even Loki could not go.

The sound came again, but this time it was different. It was a shattering, a crackling, like the breaking of glass… or a forcefield. A forcefield like the ones that sealed the cells.

A jailbreak. That was something new.

With a lazy, almost nonchalant air, Loki caught the goblet and set it back down on the table, then slowly stretched and rose to his feet. Folding his arms, he strode over to the window forcefield of his own cell and leaned up against the wall. Sure enough, something was happening further down the corridor. Guards were yelling and running, prisoners were banging on the walls, somewhere more forcefields were being destroyed…

Well, good luck to whoever was trying to escape. People had tried to break out of Asgard's dungeons before, and they had never succeeded. They were captured, brought before the Allfather's throne, and thrown into the Empty Realms—deserted, lifeless pockets of existence between the worlds. The Empty Realms were anomalies, things that should not technically exist at all. They opened once and closed forever, not even accessible by the Bifrost. You were thrown into the nearest of these realms, the cosmos shifted, the realm was sealed, and you were stranded there for eternity.

Better to rot in Asgard, where at least there were books and the chance of seeing Frigga, than to spend eternity in an Empty Realm. Unless, of course, it was the same Empty Realm she had been thrown into.

Loki turned his back on the skirmish raging through the dungeon and slumped down against his cell wall, wrapping his arms around his legs and resting his head on his knees. What use was it trying to escape? Where would he go? What would he do? The Nine Realms didn't want him—none of them did. Jotunheim had cast him out long ago, Asgard held no promise of a future, Midgard would not bow before him… Did he really think Vanaheim would take him? Or Alfheim? Or even Nidavellir or Svartalfheim? Niflheim belonged to the dead, which for all the hopelessness of his situation he was not yet willing to join, and Muspelheim was a world of fire, no place for a frost giant…

His hand trailed listlessly along the floor, feeling the smooth white tile. And then, all of a sudden, it wasn't tile beneath his fingertips. It was the battered leather cover of a book. A small, worn, water-damaged book.

Maybe reading would help him block out the flashes of light beyond his cell. He scooped up the thin manuscript and flipped it open to a random page, not even bothering to glance at the title, and began to read.

Loyalty… What a useless thing. The servant is loyal to the king, but does the king return his faith? When there's money to be gotten, or lands to be conquered, does it bother the king what price the servant pays? The son is loyal to the father, but what does the father care? He lies with every breath he takes, leaving his son to fend for himself in the cruel world, so long as he prospers. The lady is loyal to her lord, but what happens when he goes off to war? He leaves her behind without a second thought to sit and sew and weave, while he sees the worlds.

What is the good of loyalty if it has only one side? Would it not be easier to make no commitments, take no vows, swear no oaths? If people do not listen to the voice in their heads, what's the point of having a conscience in the first place?

I tried to be loyal. I tried to keep my faith, I really did. But the worlds are fallen and darkness risen, and look where loyalty got me. A pit of a cell in an empty world, forever in darkness, forever in silence, with only my thoughts to keep me company.

Loki skimmed through the rest of the book, his brows furrowing in confusion. Why would Frigga give him a book like this? All the others were about magic, or adventure, or history…

He flipped to the front cover, but the leather was smooth and blank, declaring neither a title nor the identity of the author. So he turned to the first page instead, only to find that that had no words either.

Useless, he thought, about to throw the book across the cell and go back to watching the guards running back and forth through the dungeons, when something caught his eye.

Thin grey lines were tracing their way across the paper, spreading out from where his thumb rested on the tattered vellum page. They ran like water, dancing and leaping, twining together until they formed a simple passage of runes:

Identity confirmed: Loki Laufeyson.

Okay, books weren't supposed to do that. The words were supposed to already be written, not magically appear out of thin air. And they weren't supposed to know his name either. He was on the verge of throwing it away again, this time wary that it was some new scheme of Odin's to trick him into confessing his crimes, but then the runes melted back into fluid grey lines.

He watched, hypnotized, oblivious to the fighting taking place mere feet away from him. Pictures began to form—a galloping horse, dancing feet, stars sparkling in the night sky, hands touching, a feather tumbling slowly downwards…

Then they resolved themselves into words once again.

Hello, love.

Author's Note:

Hey there, thanks for reading! This is me being bad and not working on my NaNoWriMo because of Thor 2 feels, so it could end one of two ways: either I get my motivation for NaNo back and this doesn't get updated until December, or I don't and this gets a new chapter every day. We'll see.

Oh, and to the extent of my knowledge, 'the Empty Realms' don't actually exist in Norse mythology or MCU...