Warnings: Swearing; Graphic Fantasy Violence; PTSD; Loki appearing as both male and female throughout the story.

Notes: This is an exercise in characterization for me. Be warned I pull Loki canon from here, there, and everywhere.

The appearance of Loki's female form in this story is based on the actress Erica Cerra.

This will be updated once every 1-2 weeks, sooner if there's interest.

No beta, so feel free to politely alert me to any typos.

On the Altar of Loki Liesmith

PART I: Wounds Are for the Desperate

Wounds are for the desperate, blows are for the strong.

Balm and oil for weary hearts all cut and bruised with wrong.

I forgive thy treason - I redeem thy fall

For Iron, Cold Iron - must be master of men all.

- Cold Iron, Rudyard Kipling

Loki does not expect to see his Tony again. Not while the mortal is still in Asgard. Tony was too angry when he left Loki's cell to make another visit, and Loki dares not use what little power he has left to spy where it might catch the Allfather's notice.

And yet, one day, perhaps two – it is difficult to mark time when Loki cannot measure it by the beings he watches in Midgard – and Tony Stark is once more standing on the other side of the thin line of volcanic ash that Loki allows to come between him and freedom.

"I asked Thor about the whole God of War thing," Tony says without preamble. Loki pulls himself to his feet, pushing his hair back from his face with one long fingered hand.

"And?" Loki prompts.

Tony purses his lips, a shrewdness in his expression that Loki has come to admire. On this day Tony is wearing another of his fine Midgardian suits. The cut of the jacket emphasizes his shoulders and the broadness of his chest. As always, Loki is fascinated by the mechanical heart that he cannot see. (Could he hold it in his hands? Would the light blind or burn?)

Tony's shirt is red.

"And Thor went on and on about the good old days, and Sif told me about being worshipped as Artemis, and then someone called in a minstrel, or a bard, or whatever the hell you want to call it, and he sang a song about Thor killing an entire army with one throw of his hammer and then taking the soldier's wives as prizes."

"That is a bit exaggerated."

Tony raises a brow, crossing his arms. "So he didn't kill an entire army with one blow from his hammer?"

Loki smiles, amused. "Oh no, I watched him happily slaughter them all. It's the part about the women that is the lie. Thor took only the willing ones to his bed. The rest were given to Sif as hand maidens. She, of course, disdained the gift and trained them to be warriors instead. I believe they eventually became known as the Amazons."

For a moment, Tony gapes, and Loki relishes the expression. It gives him no small joy to have put it on Tony's face. Then Tony groans and rubs at the space between his eyes with the edge of one finger. "Fuck me sideways," Tony mutters.

Loki is sure that he is not meant to hear, but he answers anyway. "Gladly. You will have to cross the line, however." He points at the volcanic ash that marches across the threshold of his obsidian prison. "I cannot reach you all the way over there."

And now Tony breaks into laughter, and Loki basks in it. Tony's laughter is different than Loki's. Just as brittle, perhaps. Sharp, certainly. But where Loki is filled with ice and daggers that yearn to draw blood, Tony is broken glass. He hurts only himself.

Interesting.

(How can one mortal be so, so interesting?)

"How is this my life?" Tony concludes at the end of his laughing fit. "Are we really doing this right now? I'm in Asgard, talking to the imprisoned God of Lies, and he's hitting on me."

Tony smiles, and Loki sees himself in the curve of those lips, the wicked flash of white teeth. He could love Tony Stark, he realizes. If he allowed himself, he could love this Man of Iron. He has ever been a vain creature, and Tony is as close a mirror as Loki has ever found, even Midgardian as he is. Never has he wished so much for the power to control time – to take back his first meeting with Stark, to make it something sweeter. (And yet even as he has the thought he knows he would not, would not, for he values Tony as an enemy just as much as he wants him for a priest, a sacrifice on the altar of Loki Liesmith.)

Tony clears his throat, and Loki is pulled from his thoughts. He has been staring too long at the line of Tony's neck, at the twist of his beard. He meets Tony's eyes – wounded mortal eyes that see and have seen far too much, more than any mortal should – and his breath catches. He is truly a sinful, evil thing, for if he was given a choice in this moment, he would take Tony as his own, damn his heritage, his monstrous nature, his honor and the rest. He does not expect to be loved again, but he wants it with a ferocity that frightens him.

His wife, Sigyn, long estranged even before Loki's true parentage came to light, has taken the news of Loki's race as reason to sever their union. It seems that staying tied to a prince for use of his title is no longer appealing when his kingdom is not Asgard, but Jötunheim. Her body has been sullied by a Jötunn masquerading as a man. She is disgusted by him. Loki has no cause to think others will not react the same.

He cannot blame them for it. He disgusts himself most of all.

As if he can read the trend of Loki's thoughts, Stark asks, "What's with the whole smurf routine? I've never seen Thor go blue and scaly."

Ah, of course. Tony is a Midgardian and may not know a Frost Giant when he sees one. The weavers of fate are cruel indeed, that they will not spare Loki this last indignity.

He must say it aloud then.

"I am of Jötunheim."

He braces himself.

"Bless you," Tony says.

Loki blinks, watching Tony. Tony watches him back.

"I do not understand you," Loki admits at last.

But he wants to. Oh, how he wants to. He would devote more years to it than Tony has left to live.

"That makes two of us," Tony says. He waves. "See you later, kitten."

And then he is gone.

-l-

Tony does not visit again.

Loki tries to pass the time by watching Midgard, but he finds himself easily bored by most of the humans that fall into his view. Tony is beyond his sight for the moment, as is his little wolfling, Natasha. The other mortals he knows of are all rather bland in comparison. Briefly he looks in on his former thrall, the one with Hawk Eyes, but the man spends an inordinate amount of time simply sitting and waiting. It isn't very entertaining.

So Loki takes to watching over Tony's empire for him. The red haired woman Tony has taken as consort rules Tony's subjects well. She is benevolent and competent, and Loki wishes such a companion for his own. He has observed her haranguing Tony, challenging him, but all with an eye to loyalty and service. If Loki had ever had even one friend or servant such as her, perhaps his lot would have gone very differently indeed.

He wishes to know her name, but the mirror of ice produces no sound. So he is forced to observe closely, to wait for it to be written down where he may see.

By the time Loki knows that the woman is called Virginia "Pepper" Potts, he has come to love her as one might love the maiden in a tale. She is not real to him, but rather an ideal. The perfect queen, full of poise and confidence. He may admire, but never touch her.

And then Tony returns to Midgard and passes into Loki's sight again, and he touches her. Tony touches Pepper, and Loki shatters his mirror with his fists, beating the pieces into the floor until black blood drips between his fingers.

No one hears him scream, or if they do, they pay it no mind. But why should they? He is an insane Frost Giant who could leave his prison any time, and yet chooses to stay.

For the first time, he accepts that the reason he stays is because he has nowhere else to go.

-l-

Loki watches Natasha after that. His wolfling is just as interesting as Tony, in her way, and twice as vicious. She is not a mirror image, but she is enough like Fenrir that Loki has come to think of her as a child of his spirit.

His other children have repudiated him now, rather than claim a Frost Giant as kin. (Their mother's doing, no doubt, no doubt.) He feels no remorse in bestowing his fatherly affections on this woman who successfully lied to the God of Lies.

Natasha spends much time pretending to be that which she is not. If she were a shapeshifter, she would be truly magnificent, a trickster to rival even Loki. In battle she is like a whip, sinuously sliding around her opponents, leaving a sting in her wake.

Once, when Loki is watching, she is almost found out by an enemy whose forces she has infiltrated. Loki causes the glass in a nearby window to break, giving her the diversion needed to get away.

She is his, and she will not die unless he wishes it.

-l-

Loki cannot avoid seeing Tony. So long as he watches Natasha, and the Avengers continue to be shield mates, Tony will pass into his sight.

Every glimpse reminds Loki of what he cannot have, and brings rage up to choke him. Not even the sight of Thor invokes such anger, all the more twisted for the fact that it is irrational. It is not jealousy of Pepper. No, it is not jealousy. He has never been as jealous as his fellows would paint him. (Loki Liesmith, Loki Silvertongue, what's the matter, silver tongue turned to lead?)

He is angry. He is angry at the Wheel of Fate, at the ones who spin it, at Odin who sees it, at himself for being unable to escape it.

He looks at the line of volcanic ash on the floor.

(Unwilling to escape it.)

And yet, even in his white hot rage, he is grateful too. He is grateful that Tony Stark, his high priest, his avatar, has all the love that Loki has missed.

-l-

It is inevitable that Loki starts watching Tony again. It happens quietly. There is no near death, no crash through the air to snatch his attention. Tony merely looks at Natasha and smiles the smile that says I am Loki Liesmith's, and Loki is drawn in.

He watches Tony drink, and he watches him create. He watches him eat and sleep, and tiptoes across his dreams. He watches him love Pepper, and does not turn away when they fuck, something harder and rougher than Loki thought the Queen of the Stark Empire capable of.

And two years, perhaps three (Loki counts by the number of things Tony has invented, the people Natasha has killed, and the times Pepper has signed her name) after Tony last stood before Loki, Loki watches Pepper weep and leave with a bag in hand, and Tony tear his workshop apart, a whirlwind of destruction.

Loki Liesmith once existed only to gather knowledge, to offer wisdom to his brother, to watch over Asgard, and to try to please Odin Allfather. (You see how Thor is, his arrogance. He doesn't think, can't let him be king. Wouldn't have to play tricks if you'd trust, it's the lack of trust that makes a trickster.)

Then he fell through time and space, floating, lost in a rift, and died a thousand times. His next purpose was given to him by a madman, a titan, a being of oblivion and power too great for Loki to oppose, and Loki's purpose then was to play the part he was assigned until an escape could be made.

In all things, who he ultimately served was himself.

And then nothing.

He sits in a cell, and he watches a handful of mortals stumble their way through their lives. But now his Tony is smashing all the fine works he has made, and Queen Pepper is gone. Natasha is fine, as she always is and always will be, but a wolfling needs company.

And he? He is Loki, and he is once more burdened with purpose. (Still self-serving. Always selfish.)

It takes a week to construct a statue of himself in ice, building it layer by layer as he once did with his more complex illusions. In that time, Tony has drunk himself into a stupor twice, and broken all his lab tables. It takes a full month to imbue the statue with enough of Loki's magic that it will fool Heimdall, and any others who might casually glance into Loki's cell.

He can only give it Jötunn form, but perhaps that will keep anyone from discovering his ruse. Their own discomfort will prevent them from looking too closely.

At last, Loki is ready. He goes to the line drawn in ash on his floor.

And he steps over it.