A/N: Loosely based on today's Sifki Week prompt: myths (Norse). Also, minor trigger warning for self harm.
1.
"You're just a girl!" the firstborn prince says the first day they meet, his young countenance indignant. "You cannot possibly be a warrior."
The younger prince – with his dark hair, and his blue-green eyes – simply smirks at her.
She pushes them both into the fountain behind them. They sputter to the surface, soaking wet, but laughing in delight at her strength – and her trick – despite the cut on the younger prince's forearm from the fountain's stone base.
When it heals, Loki is left with a short, thin white line of a scar in the same spot, a constant reminder of Sif's presence in his life.
4.
Odin reprimands him, but says not a word to Thor. They are only children, and he is only seeking attention from the father who brushes him off like he does not matter.
Like he is nothing.
9.
"Your tricks are but a coward's defense," Thor shouts in anger one day. They are older, though not yet men, and Loki is quickly perfecting his mask of indifference.
"A coward's defense it might be," he replies, voice eerily calm, "but it has saved your life more times than it ought."
Only Sif notices the way his clenched fists shake as he walks away.
28.
She'd known that he was hurting – that he could hardly hold himself together, some days – but she had thought that she was helping. She'd thought that, if she could make him feel as if he was enough, then he would stop looking to his brother and father for what they simply would never give.
She certainly never expected to find him like this, on the floor of his darkened chambers, a dagger in his hand and a gouge in his wrist.
"Loki." She rushes to his side, ripping the dagger from his grasp and tossing it to the floor.
"Sif," he whispers, his tear-filled eyes meeting hers. "Sif, I – I'm sorry – "
"Don't apologize," she commands, gently but sternly, as she tears off the edge of her sleeve to make a bandage.
"I didn't mean to – I wasn't trying to –"
"I know, Loki. I know."
29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34.
The stitches holding his mouth shut are neat and clean; the scars along his lip will be the same.
87, 88.
She stays to the shadows just beyond his cell.
The bottom of his foot is caked in dried blood, stemming from the large cut he received from the glass strewn across the floor. Sitting there, his back against the wall, he looks just like the monster he has claimed to be these last few years.
And that's before he screams.
She flinches, then hurries away without ever revealing her presence.
89.
"The beast ran me through," he admits quietly, and her hand hovers over the barely-healed, ugly gash in the center of his chest. "Thor held me as I succumbed to the pain on the plains of Svartalfheim. I never expected to survive."
Blinking back tears, she whispers, "But I am grateful that you did. It is good to see you, Loki."
He grins, and the familiar sight warms her heart. "It's good to see you too, Sif."
97.
Battles have always left him with scars, but this fight – this stand-off against the grip of a mad titan, crushing his throat and stealing his breath – feels different than all the rest.
He wonders, as his visions fades, if they will live to count the marks left by this day.
