Just something little that I wrote. I hope it's okay, I'm not sure about it. But oh well ;) Thanks for stopping by, and I hope you enjoy!
He tugs his mother along, soft hands both wrapped around her fingers, blue eyes filled with tears. "It wasn't my fault," he says. "It wasn't my fault. It wasn't my fault."
Frigga isn't resisting. Thor being worked up about something is not news, but the fact that his shadow - little Loki - is gone puts a crease in her forehead and moves her through the halls and courtyards quicker than normal. Not to mention her experience that "it wasn't my fault" hardly ever leads to good things.
"Tell me what happened," she urges Thor as he pulls her along.
"It wasn't my fault," he determinedly repeats, sniffing a bit.
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing," Thor says, wiping his nose with his free hand. "Warriors don't cry."
"Warriors?" Frigga says. "Were you two in the armoury? Please, tell me what's going on."
"It wasn't my fault," Thor says.
oOo
The door creaks open to spill dusty light on the floor. The stone is littered with weapons, swords in the majority, and the daylight, peeking in, shimmers on the gold and iron.
"It was Loki's idea." Thor elaborates his excuse as they step inside.
"What have you done?" Frigga gasps.
It's a small shed, filled only with the choicest of her husband's weapons, and it isn't hard to see to the back. Isn't hard to see the little crumpled body bent around a blade.
"Thor Odinson, you will tell me what happened," Frigga says, kneeling down and touching the little blank face, so white.
Thor flinches at the command, barked in such a hard voice.
"Father said we weren't allowed in here," he says, as if that sums it all up.
"Tell me what happened after you came," Frigga says.
"We were playing," Thor says, voice very small. "He was being a Frost Giant, I was being a warrior." He looks down at his brother. "The sword was sharper than I thought." He sniffs again.
"Why would you make him be the Giant?"
Thor looks confused. "Well, because he always is."
"You are not to let him play a Giant again," Frigga says. She eases Loki's limp hands from where they're resting on his stomach, and gently pulls the blade from the boy's stomach, eyes filling with tears as she does so. "We have to get him to the healing rooms."
Thor bends down.
"Mum, what's wrong with his blood?"
Frigga looks down, looks at her fingers, looks at Loki's slack face. At the fingerprints of slate blue, shimmering with a metal look that doesn't belong somewhere so normal as a weapons shed.
And in the half light, it plays a note of fear in Frigga.
"It's just the sun tricking the eyes," she says.
"It's not," Thor says. "Look." He presses a finger to Loki's hand. "Here, it's red. Where he wiped it away. See. It was red before. Now it's blue."
Frigga flicks Thor's hand away, the child's capacity to state the obvious breaking her heart.
Thor's lip trembles. "Is he going to be all right? Did I do it? What is going on?"
Loki's head flops down on Frigga's shoulder - she settles him in her arms.
"Not now," she says.
But Thor won't stop asking. Up through the palace, to the healing rooms - pulling on her hand for attention when she's trying to explain what happened to the healers. He gets more and more worried through the hours of Loki's treatment, into the night. And Frigga can't get away, can't deny anything, because Loki's bandages are staining teal instead of scarlet.
It's late when she gives in, and they're still beside Loki's bed - Thor won't leave until he knows the truth. Hoping the low candle will cover for her if she cries, Frigga takes Thor's hands in her own.
"Do you love your brother?" she asks.
"He's my best friend in all the worlds," Thor says.
"What would you say if I told you that he was not the same as you?"
Thor just looks at her. "I would not understand."
"Thor, you have to see - I am about to tell you something, and you must remember the Loki you know, and not treat him differently after you know who he really is."
"Who is he?"
The candle splutters, drowning in wax.
"He's a Jotunn," Frigga says.
Thor laughs.
oOo
It's a long time before he gets to sleep that night.
His pillow's wet from crying.
But it's on the floor beside Loki.
He still won't leave.