* Post-Thor: The Dark World

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Part 2

The King wove a path through the dark corridors, skulking through the shadows of his own domain. As midnight struck he emerged into a courtyard to be relieved by the sight of the magnificent monument to the All-Mother he'd had constructed there. He frequently felt the need to check it, to confirm the likeness of her features and inspect the sheen of the marble. The need for privacy during his visits had sent him nocturnal, and he did not attend court before noon most days – not that he was a popular presence in the great hall.

This time, though, he sighted a dark shape beneath Frigga's sculpture that gave him pause.

He drew closer in careful silence, until he could make out the form of a woman draped on the steps at Frigga's feet. His pulse rushed with outrage before his gaze snagged on the woman's hair, a strange shade that struck him as bloodstained brown.

In an instant he was revisited by an old, almost forgotten but unmistakable feeling of his chest splitting in two, rent by opposing forces of agony and ecstasy. He remembered, just – grasping for the memory like a dream after waking – a splinter of sweetness in the chaos of his revival, Thor's Coronation and banishment, Odin's betrayal, his own brief Regency, the destruction of the Bridge – and he could barely breathe.

For a second time Loki questioned her reality as he stared down at her. She had slipped through his blindly-grasping fingers once. She, who for some inexplicable reason had lured his instincts with a scent of seidr like heady perfume. Why she held such power over him, and why she was resting at the feet of his mother's monument, he intended to find out.

Loki took the steps and lowered into a crouch, finding her asleep. Her vivid hair was unarranged and left trailing across her face and over her shoulders, giving her the appearance of something left to grow wild. But whomever she was, her observance of the departed monarch was immaculate. She was gowned in strict black mourning dress that extended to her collar and tightly sleeved wrists, the material flaring at her hips from where it clung to her narrow waist. Even her nails were black, as though dipped in ink.

Loki seated himself beside her. He waited patiently, puzzling on the mystery she posed; pondering what manner of curse she might have laid over him ...

Her eyelids parted wearily and then flew open in alarm at the sight of him hovering above her. 'Sorry Your Majesty!' she gasped and scrambled to her feet beneath her skirts.

As she made to hurry away down the steps, Loki said, 'Stay.'

'– I won't disturb your privacy –' she muttered with a servant's politeness, ignoring his request and continuing her brisk retreat.

'Stay,' Loki commanded as he straightened.

She broke into a run.

Loki smiled. His reflexes were sharper now, honed by survival. His mind calculated farther ahead, slowing the moments around him. He caught up to her within two apparations, barely quickening his pulse.

In a flash of motion Loki caught her by the throat, and thrust her against a wall by one fingerless leather-gloved hand – and then she made a terrible mistake.

Her fingers flexed defensively into a claw and before he could snatch it with the other hand, wet warmth flooded his nostrils. She was dangerous, Loki noted rapidly, her seidr fanged as a venomous viper. Such talent could harm as much as heal; a sorceress like her could pull a man's blood like the strings of a puppet. He felt blood drain from his face as he grew suddenly light-headed. Only moments from blacking out, Loki slipped a small blade from his coat and planted it in her side.

She arched against him with a yelp and the dark spots immediately cleared from his vision. She would know to divert bloodflow from the wound, but the pain should pin her securely. He locked a knee behind one of hers for good measure, and her pale fingers clutched at his vambraces desperately as she was caged by his armoured frame. They were both breathing hard in each other's ear; Loki gulping for air to restore his consciousness and she drawing shuddering gasps against the bite of his knife.

Loki snorted blood from the back of his throat and spat it to his side. 'I pursued you once through these halls, seeking the source of some spellcraft laid upon me. This time, you will tell your King who you are, and what in Hel you did to me.' He relaxed his fingers on her throat incrementally.

'I'm no one –'

'The next lie that leaves your lips will sentence you to the dungeons.' Her eyes widened for but a moment before they dropped despondently, shifting in consideration. 'You're tempted?' he asked with incredulity. 'Have you nothing to lose?'

'Contentment's not in my nature.' The words were spoken with such bitter conviction he could taste them on his own tongue. She seemed frayed at the edges by the weight of some torment, and he surmised that he would need only pull at a thread and she would unravel.

'How do I know you?' he demanded, giving her a shake that drove a cry from her throat.

'I was – a handmaid to – Her Majesty.'

His heart was shielded to most threats of sentiment, but Frigga was his undoing. It was only his mother's mercy that tempered his hand now. 'What more than that?'

'I studied under her – we shared lessons as children.'

Her hair had splayed with the force of his rough handling and Loki now scrutinised her heart-shaped face. She was one of Freyja's. Unlike her mother's sumptuous lineaments, her own features were delicate, her complexion fairer, and her locks a darker auburn. His brows furrowed. 'S...'

'Lady Sigyn, Your Majesty.'

'And later?'

'H-haematurgist.'

'I gathered as much.' Now that made some sense. His symptoms had appeared after sustaining the injury on Muspelheim, when he'd lost most of his blood. He cocked his head to prompt her further, and she grew frantic.

'Please – I swore an oath to the All-Mother to keep it from you, to keep away from you –'

A maiden his mother had forbade him? Interesting. 'She's dead,' Loki growled. 'And you've failed.'

The Lady Sigyn sagged with defeat. She took several aborted breaths before she began, her honeyed voice hoarse with grief. 'When you returned from Muspelheim, you weren't revived with donor blood. Yours was too rare – I know why now ...' The dangerous flash in his eyes warned her to drop the subject of his heritage. 'You were dying. I brewed a potion ... with my own blood, that your body wouldn't reject.'

At last, the puzzle pieces slid into place. 'Sanguine,' he deduced in a faint rasp, and she hung her head as he released her throat, recoiling.

That brief mania that he had felt was –

Love. Hers, for him.

How such a thing was possible he couldn't imagine, but he knew it was real – he'd felt it. The ghost of it still haunted his veins, and he felt it stirring now, so close to its origin. Dread gripped him. There was nothing so terrifying as someone's love – it was an infection, a folly, dulling the wits and softening the skin. He wanted to hate her for tampering with his mind and toying with his heart. But this stranger felt as familiar to him as Thor once had, and had saved his life, even.

'I didn't do it for myself – I did it for Her Majesty. F-for you. It was a gift; you'd become so sullen, and she was so worried for you – I know I didn't have the right. It was a mistake, it ruined you – I ruined everything ...'

It was at the sight of the tortured tears spilling down her cheeks that Loki remembered the briar patch, and a Vanir girl's fey-like face marred with bleeding cuts and scratches to match her hair, her amber eyes red with tears. He recalled the impression that her helpless dependence on his mercy had made on him as he teased her, painstakingly from the vicious clutch of the thorns while crooning cool assurances that I'll get you out and you'll be alright; her comforting weight against his chest as he carried her torn, limp form to the healing halls.
She had been pushed into the rosebeds by a band of noble youths, who had fled when Loki retaliated with an illusion of a giant serpent bursting from the bushes. But she wasn't their target – they'd been taunting him, like they always did. She'd put herself between them. He played alone after that. Studied alone. Trained alone.

By the Nine, she was a relic.

And an alluring curiosity. She'd loved him once, only that he knew. Her sympathies might have faded, but she was the closest approximation to an ally that he had in all the Realms. Slouched upon the throne Loki had coveted his whole life, his victory condemned by the Aesir who had expected to celebrate Thor's ascension; motherless, fatherless, brotherless; he was lonely. Maddeningly, piteously lonely. He couldn't hate her.

Sigyn flinched as he drew the blade from her flesh and cupped her waist, placing his thumb over the wound. He healed it in an instant, asking quietly, 'You truly think me ruined?'

She choked on a whimper and hung her head once more to hide another wave of tears. She sniffed and steadied her breath. 'The things you did …'

His glare hardened on her. 'As Odin decimated Jotunheim, and Svartalfheim, before me? As he subjugated the Nine Realms before I took a single Midgardian city? The things I did following in the footsteps of the All-Father, who was commended for conquering Asgard's enemies and enforcing the unification of the Realms?'

She stilled at his words, pulled between what she had come to believe and his persuasion. Then she shook her head, saying, 'I'm so sorry. For everything I put you through, everything.'

'There were betrayals greater than your blood in my veins to blame for my grief, I can assure you.'

Still, she'd cursed him, and it gave him a moral right to exact a price. Loki considered how he might turn the situation to his advantage. His weakness was still hers, a vulnerability too tempting not to exploit. He was no stranger to impaling himself to twist the blade in another. His eyes wandered over her. Even raw with torment, she was delectable. Especially so. If she'd made herself known to him previously, she wouldn't have needed a potion to ensnare his attention. With a twisted thrill the King decided that he could do with a pet.

'I'm satisfied of your penitence, Lady Sigyn,' Loki announced. 'I'd like to offer you the chance to atone for your sin.'

She straightened. 'I would gladly devote my life to doing so, for Asgard, and the memory of her late Queen.'

Now that he had her in his clutches Loki was loathe to release her, but suppressed the urge to lure her to the palace this moment. He had to trust that she would return to him, and decided to rely upon her curiosity to draw her back. He let a smile spread across his face. 'Dine with me. Tomorrow night.'

Sigyn gaped.

'Companions are in short supply these days, as you might imagine,' he added.

After another pause she spluttered out, 'I only convinced the Queen I wasn't trying to bewitch you by swearing to stay out of sight!'

'Again, you've failed,' Loki informed her smoothly.

Even as colour tinged her cheeks, she peered up at him in disbelief. 'Any affinity you might feel for me isn't genuine –'

'Nonetheless.'

He saw her hope lose to cynicism as she grew exasperated. 'I belong in the dungeons, not at your dining table.'

Loki hissed a chuckle, growing bemused. This was a most peculiar creature, crippled by her own sense of honour. She was trying so hard not to manipulate him, though by branding his very blood with her own, she had forged a leash of seidr on his heavily armoured heart. 'If it satisfies you; I, King Loki of Asgard, hereby sentence you to dine at the table of the most hated ruler in the Nine Realms.'

At last she conceded with a solemn bow of her head. 'As you wish, Your Majesty.'