His
By Kirixchi
"Why?"
Loki hated the thin note of panic that shaded his voice. He attempted to compensate by holding his features rigidly blank when he spoke again: "It just seems rather sudden- your family's haste to marry you off."
"They said it was time." Sigyn didn't notice Loki's blank expression. She was staring into her own hands, nervously twisting the betrothal ring that graced her finger. "Past time. Theoric asked. Perhaps they decided that no one else ever would."
This time it was Sigyn's tone that communicated more than her words. Loki didn't like admitting that he had a conscience, but there was no other way to explain the curious pang in the center of his chest. He understood what she was saying. Sigyn's family had decided that Loki was never going to ask to marry their daughter.
They were absolutely correct, of course. Loki had no idea of ever marrying anyone- although he could see how they came by their hope. He did spend an uncommon amount of time with Sigyn. She wasn't bad, as females went. She was intelligent and perceptive. Sigyn always seemed to anticipate his tricks- but she never meddled. She watched from the sidelines, sending him smiles that were approving or chiding as warranted when his schemes unfurled.
Sigyn never judged him. She didn't test him. She didn't ask Loki to be more or to do less or tell her why. Sigyn was a pool of calm in the tumultuous world of Asgard. Of course, Loki did not want to swim in that pool forever…but he would miss his refuge. It pained him to think of a woman as rare of Sigyn being wasted on a dolt like Theoric Hermodor's son.
Sigyn might be a Vanir, but she was a princess all the same.
Loki said as much aloud.
"Well, I haven't found a prince who wants me," Sigyn answered. Her voice was unnaturally high and light, and she met his gaze at last.
Tell me that I'm wrong! Her eyes pleaded.
Loki looked away.
Freyja was horrified that her daughter had only two weeks to prepare for a wedding.
Sigyn was secretly relieved.
Two weeks meant only fourteen days of tortured hoping, only fourteen days of knowing that Loki was not the sort of prince to rescue fair maidens but wishing that he would be just one time.
She barely thought of handsome-courtly-honorable-bold Theoric. When she did, she despised him.
Sigyn knew that she was a ungrateful. She was stupid and deserved her fate. It was a just punishment for her self-delusion. Sigyn had always accepted Loki's lies, but imagined that she alone was smart enough to see through them. Perhaps that was his cruelest and most clever trick: letting her believe that she understood him, letting her imagine that she mattered.
It bothered him that he couldn't see her face.
With her features visible to the world, Sigyn would have made an effort to appear composed, but a deep blue bridal veil shrouded her face, forcing Loki to imagine the crumpled expression that she wore beneath the silk and to remember the desperation and despair he had seen the last time he looked in her eyes.
She couldn't see him either.
Loki had been careful to choose a disguise that Sigyn would never suspect. She didn't know that his eyes were upon her as she climbed the dias to stand beside Theoric's hulking form. She couldn't guess that he was close enough to touch.
He had almost put an end to this wedding. There were rumors of Jotunn incursions in Nifelheim (which, possibly, he had started) and Theoric's unit had been called to respond (which, possibly, he had arranged), but Loki abandoned his plan. It would only have meant a delay.
Loki didn't listen as the ceremony began. He kept his eyes locked on Sigyn's tiny form, hating the protective urge that he felt when he saw she was trembling. It shouldn't-didn't-couldn't matter that she was frightened and unhappy. It only mattered that she was his. His possession was to be bestowed on another.
Again.
Sigyn reached to take her husband's hand as the ceremony neared its end. She watched her tiny fingers sink into his meaty paw and thought: I'm disappearing.
The woman that she was in stolen moments- curious, restless, subversive- would be just another one of Loki's lies.
"I take thee as my husband, to be yours alone until the end of days…" Sigyn didn't feel the vows on her lips, and they sounded strange and distant to her ears, as if spoken by another voice.
Orders. Promises. Asgard's ceremony was merely words.
Sigyn said what they required. Then, in a voice too quiet for others to hear, she called on magic of her own people to seal her marriage.
I am bound to you forever, she chanted in the ancient tongue of Vanaheim, you possess my body and spirit and will…
Sigyn would not risk temptation. For as much as she valued her honor, one wicked smile on Loki's lips would surely lure her to ruin.
I give myself freely to your bidding…
Magic would serve where her own determination might fail.
I will serve you until the end of days and then follow you into shadows and dust.
Her husband's love might falter, his passion might dim, but her loyalty would never waiver.
We are a single thread in the tapestry of being.
Forces beyond her comprehension would meld her fate to her husband's.
Your pain is my pain. Your fear my fear. Your life, my life, never to be severed.
She was irrevocably his.
Forever. Come what may.
Sigyn was silent for a long time after her vows were spoken.
Loki thought he heard a whisper underneath her veil. His keen sorcerer's senses felt the shiver of magic in the air, but he couldn't guess what she had done.
Hand in hand with her husband, Sigyn descended the altar and the couple led the way to the dining hall.
The bride's grandfather, Njord, was not a wealthy man, but he was still an exiled king and he gave a fitting feast. Tables groaned beneath platters of meat and fruit and every delicacy that could be imagined. Minstrels roamed the chamber. There was laughter and dancing and boisterous voices that quickly melted together into a too hot-too loud-too close buzz. Loki hated it- but he didn't leave.
The veil was stripped away now, putting Sigyn's features on view. She reminded Loki of a flower blooming in the snow: beautiful and cold and doomed. His eyes never left her face while she didn't eat and didn't talk and didn't smile and the hours slipped away.
Dawn began to streak the sky when one of Theoric's comrades banged his fist on the wooden table and bellowed that it was time to escort the bride and groom to bed. There was a great deal more pounding and raunchy shouts, and then the great drunken rabble moved like a wave to sweep Sigyn and her new husband off their seats and up the stairs toward the rest of their lives.
Sigyn didn't lift her eyes as she undressed. She didn't know if there was approval or disappointment in her husband's eyes. She didn't care.
The binding spell was cast. Her body went willingly to Theoric's bed, but her treacherous heart would not submit.
She kissed and touched and murmured soft words into golden hair and hoped it would be enough. He coaxed her onto the mattress, more gently than she had expected and pinned her beneath his weight.
Sigyn opened to her husband, resigned to what would come. She gasped when he cupped her chin and forced her to meet his eyes.
"You're thinking of him," he hissed. His voice seemed confused and angry and tender all at once.
Sigyn bit her lip in hesitation. A lie would be a kindness. And yet-
"Yes."
Battle roughened fingers curled painfully into Sigyn's shoulder and she struggled to contain a cry. For a moment, Sigyn wondered if her warrior husband would break her neck, but he steadied.
He was rough when he pushed thighs apart.
"You're mine!" he growled as he claimed her.
"Yes," she whispered again as pressure-more-than-pain swept through her body.
She was grateful that Loki had taught her to lie.
Sigyn awoke to the sound of wailing.
For a moment, she thought she was trapped inside a dream. She was in an unfamiliar bed, in an unfamiliar house with a masculine arm around her waist. There were voices drifting through the thick walls of the chamber.
"THEORIC!" a woman screamed.
Fists pounded on the bedchamber door.
The sound shocked Sigyn back to her senses so that she remembered the night before.
"THEORIC!" the voice called again.
Somehow the soldier was managing to sleep through the commotion, leaving Sigyn to investigate alone. She wriggled out of the embrace, donned a shift, and hurried toward the door.
A crowd had gathered in the hallway. Theoric's mother, Laga, was there. Her eyes were wild and tears streaked down her face. Sigyn's grandfather, Njord, was also present. His expression was grave and disapproving. There was a nervous clutch of soldiers with their captain standing in the corner. Finally, she saw Loki's brother, Thor.
"What has happened?" Sigyn asked, baffled by the conclave.
One of the soldiers stepped forward and held up a leather strap. Tied at the end was a betrothal ring- a mate to the one that Sigyn wore. She reached to touch it, and recoiled when she saw that the leather thong that dangled from was stained with blood.
"My son is dead!" Laga wailed, clawing at the relic.
Sigyn gaped: "But how can that be?"
Her heart began to hammer as her eyes roamed from face to face.
"We saw him at the wedding," Njord interjected in a soothing tone. "He had ale and meat in my hall!"
"No," the Captain said firmly. "Theoric was under my command. He fell at the hand of a Jotunn chief and I burned his body myself. That was three days past. We have ridden night and day to bear his armor home."
The Prince dipped his head. "I witnessed these sights as well."
Laga sobbed again, sinking to the floor.
Njord shook his head. "But that is impossible!" he pronounced, still shaking his head in disagreement. "Isn't it?"
Sigyn glanced over her shoulder and then fixed her gaze on Thor.
He wouldn't meet her eyes.
Suddenly, she knew the truth.
Horror. Joy. Loathing. Relief. Shame. Wonder.
Sigyn wasn't certain what she felt, she only knew that it didn't matter now.
Njord's voice broke through her musing.
"But…if Theoric is dead…then who was in your bed last night?"
"My husband," Sigyn answered softly.
Forever. Come what may.
A/N: For those who find this storyline more than a little familiar- yes, I did crib the basic plot from the Loki/Sigyn origin story in the comics. For those of you who didn't recognize it...please go ahead and think that I am great at thinking up plots ;) The "Don't you hate all the Loki/OC Stories" thread in the discussion forum challenged me to come up with a scenario in which movie!Loki might realisticly (relatively speaking) find himself married...I don't think for a second that Sigyn is going to let him out of it! At least this half-baked scheme turned out a bit better than the Sleipner debacle did!