Whew! This chapter is considerable longer than the others BUT I reveal Loki's reasons for falling to Earth ;) Also, to provide some background on the book I reference in this chapter, The Little Prince: The Little Prince yearns for exploration, and so, feeling unappreciated by his selfish rose, leaves his planet to go on a grand adventure. He visits many planets along the way, each highlighting a an undesirable quality of adults, until he arrives on Earth, where he meets the stranded narrator of the story, who is also the author. During his visit, the prince learns many important lessons about love and life, and soon becomes homesick, missing his rose. He meets a snake who promises to send him home, and the prince naively falls for his tricks, ultimately dying from the snakebite. It's quite a beautiful story, but sad.
As always, thank you to those who take the time to review. Please please review, people! It helps me have a clue what's going on in your minds ;)
As always, I own nothing.
Gentle birdsong floated through the window, peaceful and soothing despite the unfamiliar sounds of an already bustling city. Weak winter sunlight fell across the bed, an unearthly light in the dark room, and Loki gazed at it absentmindedly, vaguely aware of how the angelic light clashed against the sombre bedspread. Like Thor and myself, he realized bitterly, the angry thought surfacing from some repressed area in his mind. Thor was always the golden prince, noble and valiant and kingly. But Loki…Loki was always the dark prince, master of shadows and arcane arts and trickery, forever eclipsed by his brother's shining personality. It wasn't just, but Loki had decided long ago that life never was, not for him.
His seething anger soon turned to overwhelming despair and hopelessness at the thought. No, neither life nor fate was just; he couldn't even die properly. Despite his fear of death — it was seldom something an Asgardian typically had to fear — he was growing to desire it. A sweet, final release. It was a moment of weakness, begging the mortal to help him, and he begrudged Freyja for sending him back to Midgard. If they knew his plight, he was sure his supposed companions in Asgard would be mocking him - Loki, the god who couldn't even achieve death.
His self pity sickened him — it was distasteful, something he loathed in others, yet here he was, wallowing in it like filthy mud. Loki's self-loathing threatened to consume him like a vicious poison in his mind, when his thoughts were interrupted by soft foot falls outside his door. Loki quickly feigned sleep as the door creaked open and Margot poked her head inside. He sensed her gaze lingering on his face, but she left soon enough, closing the door gently behind her. Loki felt a pang of guilt over ignoring her so, but he was tired and his body ached, and his foul mood ruined his desire to keep up his mischievous and charming facade for the time being. Instead, he sank into the shadows, ever so quietly opening and closing his door and creeping down the hallway silently. Despite the dull ache in his gut and the pounding in his head, he was restless. Rounding the corner to the living room, he stopped dead. Margot was already there.
She sat on the worn wooden floor in front of the mirror, illuminated softly by the pale winter sun streaming through the large window. It caressed her delicate features and her dark golden hair appeared to glow softly, like a fragile halo. Loki observed her carefully, intrigued. She had wide, innocent eyes, steely blue like a pale sapphire and just as bright. Her nose was small and a faded smattering of freckles graced it, scarcely discernible against her pale skin, and her lips were flushed and not overly full, like two soft rose petals. Overall, she was a lovely creature, her delicate beauty so unlike the bold, fierce beauty of the Aesir women.
She currently had her slim fingers laced together, stretched high above her head as she sat cross-legged. Loki's gaze trailed down her back, noticing that despite her seemingly fragile frame, lean muscles hid beneath the skin, working over delicate bones. Margot's appearance clearly belied her strength, though Loki doubted it was anywhere near as much as his.
Her choice of dress shocked him as well; it was certainly not something the women of Asgard would have been allowed to wear. A pale pink garment, made of a skin tight material he didn't recognize, clung to her slight frame, help up by nothing but thin straps. It plunged low in the back, exposing the line of her spine. She wore loose, grey pants and her feet were wrapped in cloth shoes that closely fit to the shape of her foot. Loki decided the outfit was entirely unusual, but judging by her stretching, was meant for dance. A question burned on his tongue, and so he slowly pulled away from the dusky shadows like a wraith.
Margot started when Loki came up behind her in the mirror, taken unawares.
"Loki! I didn't hear you wake up, I - "
"What are you doing?" he asked, curious. "Is this part of your dancing?"
Margot stared for a split second, perplexed. She nearly forgot that he came from a world where ballet most likely did not exist. "No. Well, yes, I suppose. I'm stretching. A dancer always has to stretch thoroughly before dancing, to prevent injury," she replied, taking up a foot in her hands and rolling it in little circles to warm up her ankles.
Loki remained curious. "We never need to do such a thing in Asgard. Are mortals really so…fragile?"
Margot smiled slightly, despite the slight. "I very much doubt the kind if dance I do is like what you do. I do ballet; it's a very technical and disciplined style of dance that demands a great amount of dedication and strength. But it can be so beautiful and graceful," she added dreamily, her voice almost reverent. "It's hard to truly describe in words. You'd have to see ballet to really get the whole impression."
"Can you show me, then?" Loki asked, wanting to see what Margot had described.
She shook her head as she switched feet. "I wish I could show you right now, but I can't properly dance in this room; it wouldn't do it justice."
She caught his gaze in the mirror, a perplexing look in his eyes. It unsettled her, but she didn't know why. Margot looked down swiftly, her body visibly tensing. Loki frowned slightly, still watching her in the mirror. Had he scared her? She always seemed so nervous, like a jittery little bird, though Loki could sense that this was, perhaps, her nature.
"Anyway," Margot spoke up, now carefully avoiding his face, "I need to get going. There's eggs on the stove for you. I'll be back in the evening." She stood up gracefully and picked her cardigan off the floor, pulling it on. He watched her as she donned her long coat and boots and wrapped a fluffy grey scarf around her swan-like neck. Picking up her dance-bag, she left the apartment in a hurry, closing the door without a backwards glance.
Lights flickered past in the pervading darkness as the subway sped along the tunnel. Margot clung to the pole, knuckles white and palms slick. Her thoughts were in an utter jumble. There was something subtly different about Loki this morning, and she was beginning to feel uneasy about letting him stay with her; she knew nothing about him, save that he had mysteriously fallen from the sky and died, yet miraculously came back to life. That, and he claimed to be a prince and the god of mischief and could to wondrous magic. She felt a sick lurch in her stomach with the realization that he was probably incredibly dangerous — but his charm had blinded her to that simple and now frighteningly obvious fact. But he had been so grievously wounded…Margot cursed herself for her sympathetic and sweet nature. He wasn't a harmless kitten; she had no idea what she had gotten herself into, but found that despite the unsettling feeling Loki gave her, Margot simply didn't have the heart to kick him out. He had the power to resist her anyway, of that she was sure. Chewing at her bottom lip nervously, Margot came to a decision. She would get this supposed god of mischief to tell her his story, one way or another.
Loki found he had been much too tired and sore to wander around Margot's apartment, regardless of how small it was, but his mind was too restless to simply lie down and attempt sleep. He yearned for a distraction, to keep the dark thoughts at bay. Returning to his small, dark room, his jade gaze fell upon the crammed book shelf. Reading had always been a wondrous distraction, something he loved. Books were a silent companion that never judged, yet simply invited one into their hidden worlds, vellum pages whispering invitingly.
He trailed a long finger along the spines, tapping his thin lips pensively, until a very small, slim volume caught his eye. Loki pulled the book off the shelf. On the cover was a little boy with messy yellow hair, dressed in a green, short sleeved suit. He stood upon what appeared to be a very tiny, pale purple planet, nearly the same size as the boy himself. Across the top the title proclaimed: The Little Prince, by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. It was clearly a children's book, but Loki was intrigued nevertheless. He settled himself on the bed, flipping to the first chapter. "Once when I was six years old I saw a magnificent picture in a book, called True Stories from Nature, about the primeval forest. It was a picture of a boa constrictor in the act of swallowing an animal. Here is a copy of the drawing…" Loki studied the somewhat childish drawing and continue on, curious about the adventure of this little prince.
Sometime later, Loki still sat with the novella in his slender hands, having read it through a few times. It left him with a feeling of profound sadness. Why had the Little Prince so naively gone to his death? He would never truly see his beloved rose again, nor watch the sunset from his little planet. What sort of children's story was this?
But in the bottom of his heart, Loki knew that what truly cut deep was his painful similarity to this naive little prince, who felt so lonely and lost and unwanted in the wide universe. Even sweet Margot, who had taken him in, looked at him as if he were a monster, and he couldn't understand why. Unlike the little prince, however, he didn't have his own rose to die for. His own family scarcely wanted him.
Margot marched up to her apartment door, trying to put on an air of confidence, even though her heart fluttered madly in her chest. She clutched two bottles of wine in her slick hands, one red, and one white. She hadn't even checked to see what kind she had pulled off the shelf. It would have been a useless action; Margot seldom drank and knew nothing of the intricacies of wine. She simply hoped it would loosen Loki's tongue, supposing gods succumbed to the effects of alcohol just as mortals did.
"Loki?" she called, frustrated with herself when her voice betrayed a slight tremble. She was greeted by stifling silence. She tried again. "Loki? I brought something home for us."
She waited again, but no reply came. Instead, Loki appeared at the head of the hallway, silently as usual, his lean figure partially shrouded in shadows. He seemed slightly pale and drawn, but smiled at her nevertheless, though it seemed strained. Swallowing her nervousness, she set the wine down on the kitchen table, giving him a determined look. "We need to talk. You have to tell me what's going on, why you're here. I'm going to guess it's painful. But you have to tell me." She lifted her chin defiantly, hoping she didn't look as meek as she truly felt.
He stared at her with those piecing, emerald eyes, then looked at the wine. "That really won't be necessary," he said, gesturing to the wine, "It would take a great deal more wine than what you have here to make me drunk."
Margot made a move to take the bottles away, but he interrupted her. "I said it wouldn't be necessary to loosen my tongue, not that it wouldn't be appreciated. Why don't you pour us a glass of that merlot? I'll wait for you in the parlour."
She stared confusedly at the bottles, reading the labels carefully. Right, merlot. The red one. Unfortunately, she had no wine glasses, and had not thought to pick any up, and so she poured the scarlet liquid into a couple mugs, wincing at the lack of class. She wasn't doing much to give the so called mortals a refined appearance. Margot padded into the living room to find Loki already sitting on the couch, hands clasped on his lap, no expression on his face. Like all life had left him.
"Here," she murmured, passing him the mug. "I had no wine glasses, so this'll have to do. Sorry."
"That's quite alright," he replied, a ghost of a smile tugging at his lips. She really was such a sweet girl. He took a sip of the wine, savouring the rich flavour. A good guess on her part, picking this wine. Margot watched him expectantly, not even touching her own mug.
"Well?" she prodded, "Start from the beginning please."
Loki sighed, avoiding her gaze. He struggled to find the right words. Where was the beginning? When had everything begun going wrong? He heaved a pained sigh, and began.
"There are a few things you must understand about Asgard first. I come from a warrior's culture; to Asgardians, there is nothing more glorious than battle, and nothing more honourable than dying in war. Though many have a degree of magic, it is not regarded as something that should take preference to skills such as swordplay and head-on combat. Another thing you must understand is that, in all the Nine Realms, no race is more feared, nor more hated, than the Jotuns - the Frost Giants, who hail from Jotunheim."
Margot nodded silently, drinking in his words. "Alright. What more, then?"
"As I told you before, I am a prince. Supposed son of the Allfather, Odin, and younger brother of Thor, the future king of Asgard. I have always been…different, despite my family's efforts to convince me otherwise. The other Asgardians sensed this, I believe. Thor was always the golden child, in both personality and appearance. He is valiant and relishes a good battle, and loves nothing more than to wield his mighty hammer Mjolnir. He may be rash, but the kingdom loves him." At this, Loki's face contorted into an ugly mask of bitterness. "But I…I was never like Thor. My black hair and pale skin was unusual among the Aesir, and marked me as different, dark. I was never as big as Thor and his companions either, which was another desirable feature in Asgard. And I never loved battle in the way that he did, nor did I favour the fighting method he did. I preferred magic and wit, speed and evasion. Many made it no secret that this was undesirable in their minds, that it was supposedly cowardly and unheroic. And I believe that my skill with magic terrified them. I can do things some Aesir couldn't possibly dream of, and this terrified them. Even gods fear what they do not understand. Being the god of mischief and lies does not help things much either; no one is willing to trust me with that sort of reputation. But it is my inherent nature, I've no more control over it than the sun does to shine. I am the sort of person who will start a fire simply to hear people scream, so to speak."
Margot shivered at his words, fearing her uneasiness was slowly becoming justified. Yet she leaned in closer, drawn in by his story.
"At any rate, this easily made Thor the preferred prince among the Asgardian population. It stung, but it was something I grew accustomed to. They were strangers, their opinion mattered little. But as I grew older, even my own father showed signs of favouritism. It became plainly obvious that Thor would be given the crown, that he was much more loved than I. Only my mother remained neutral. I became desperate to prove I was just as worthy, an equal to Thor. I so badly wanted my father's approval, and couldn't understand why I did not seem to be receiving it."
He shifted uncomfortably on the couch, draining the last of his wine. Without even asking, Margot rose and fetched him some more, filling the mug right to the brim. He nodded slightly in thanks.
"A few weeks ago, I believe it was, I found out why." He swallowed hard, all colour gone from his handsome face. "Many, many years ago, in the time of your ancestors, the Frost Giants attempted to take Midgard for their own. My father and his army defeated them, but in the temple, he found a Jotun babe, abandoned and oddly small for its race. He brought it to Asgard, determined to raise it as his own in the hopes of uniting the two realms in the future. That babe was me. It explained so much, in retrospect. Why I was always so comfortable in the cold, why I was so adept at magic, why the other Asgardians sensed I was different. It all became clear, why father did not want me on the throne," he spat, fury dripping from every word, his brilliant eyes blazing, "He could not possibly have a Frost Giant sitting on the throne, not when golden Thor was such a superior option. He swore to me I was still his son, that I was just as loved, but it seemed to me a lie. I withdrew. I speak truthfully when I say I was too hurt to know what to do. I thought I would go mad, truly, and that it would not matter, because I was unwanted. They needn't lie to make me feel as if I am."
He paused, a myriad of emotions passing across his typically controlled face, the dominant among them pain. Margot began to feel a strong pang of sympathy for him, though she could tell he wasn't finished.
"A few days ago, it came to our attention that the Frost Giants were planning an attack on Asgard of massive proportions. It is doubtful we would have survived. Now, I will tell you that normally, the only way to pass between realms is by way of the Bifrost, or the Rainbow Bridge as your ancestors called it. I found alternate routes, ways to slip between the realms through secret passages. A few knew of my abilities. A few Jotun had managed to worm their way into Asgard, though they escaped the all-seeing gaze of Heimdall, the protector of the Bifrost. Again, I was the only one known to be able to hide from his gaze. Whispers soon began that I had helped the Frost Giants into Asgard as part of a more sinister trick. You must believe me when I say that I did not do it. I was terribly hurt, but I would never do such a thing."
Loki gazed at her pleadingly, begging her with his eyes to believe him. Margot could feel her fragile, mortal heart slowly breaking against her better judgment. So sue me for being sympathetic…she thought defensively to no one in particular, as hot tears pricked at the corners of her eyes.
"Anyway, they were slipping into our realm, and even I knew not how to stop them. We knew that the whole army would not be coming through these secret pathways; they planned on manipulating the Bifrost, though that was all we could gather from the prisoner we managed to capture. We knew not how they planned on accomplishing this. But we knew if we did not stop them, they would succeed. It was out of the question to storm into Jotunheim and initiate a war; they were much better prepared, and the advantage would not be ours. The losses would have been great. And so Thor, in his eternal brilliance,"-here, his words dripped with sarcasm-"decided that the solution would be to destroy the Bifrost with Mjolnir, thereby taking away their direct route to us. Surprisingly, Thor managed to keep his plan a secret from everyone, but out of my chambers' window I saw him riding out to the Bifrost, and I knew whatever he was about to do would not be good. So I pursued him, scarcely making it in time. I could not let Thor sacrifice himself. Asgard needs him alive, to be their future king. Though his death would be honourable, it would be a waste."
And then, Loki, the god of mischief and lies, allowed silent tears to slip down his pale face as his voice broke, becoming terribly hoarse. "Though I was so jealous of him, I love Thor more than life itself, and could not stand back and watch as he died. I was so sure destroying the Bifrost would kill him, and so I beat him to it. Before he would reach the bridge, I got there first, and I destroyed it with all the magic I could possibly muster. It shattered into many thousands of pieces, and a shard became lodged in my stomach, as you saw. And I fell. I was so sure the initial explosion would kill me, but it hadn't. And so with the very little strength I had left, I pulled myself into one of my secret passageways, simply seeking to fall anywhere but Jotunheim. And that is when I crashed to Midgard, and in my moment of weakness, called to you for help."
He now sat with his head hung, ebony hair falling messily about his head. Despair seemed to weigh him down, and something seemed broken inside him. "I know not if they believe me dead or not, but I do not think they care," he whispered miserably, "I do not think I will return to Asgard; it will be a better place without my mischief and lies." Glittering tears dripped into his now empty mug. His soul was simply too weary to keep up this facade; the realization of everything that had happened came crashing down upon him, finally breaking the last of his typically steel will.
Margot sat with the mug of wine clasped in her trembling hands, her heart aching as if it were her life's story Loki had just recounted. A passage from a long-beloved children's story fluttered at the edges of her memory, seeming oddly appropriate for this lost and lonely prince, and the events that had transpired…
"I shall look as if I were suffering. I shall look a little as if I were dying. It is like that. Do not come to see that. It is not worth the trouble…"
