"My name," The girl began, looking for all the world as if she was a schoolgirl reciting her lesson, save the fact that she was seated on Loki's lap, "Is Sigyn Iwaldisdottir. As you have probably already guessed, I'm Loki's wife."

I'm sure you can imagine my mother and I's shock at this declaration. Loki? Married? But… when? How? Why hadn't he told us? Why had we never even met this girl? And why was she suddenly showing up now?

It was obvious, though, that she wasn't lying, what with the adoring, moony stare Loki was giving her, and the way he clung to her hand like a lifeline. At the very least, they were in love, but… married? Since when was Loki even the type?

"You have questions." Sigyn smirked. "Go ahead, I'm not going anywhere any time soon."

Mother and I turned to each other in confusion. "I'm not even sure where to start…" Mother stated. "Um… how did you two meet?"

"He had his nose buried in a book as he walked through the village." Sigyn smiled in fond reminiscence. "Wasn't paying attention to where he was going, like usual, and I was walking backwards with a basket of apples on my head…"

"Why were you walking backwards?" I cut in. "Isn't that a slightly foolish thing to do in a street?"

"Well, yeah, but who ever said I was wise?" Sigyn giggled. "I do strange-yet-mainly-harmless stuff quite often for the fun of it. That's probably something you'll want to bear in mind. Anyway, we collided, and the apples went everywhere, and it was love at first sight."

Loki rolled his eyes, and shook his head.

"Fine." She amended. "That's not exactly true. It was certainly a mutual crush, though, you can't deny that. I followed him around for weeks, spying on him like the immature, and slightly creepy kid that I was, until one day, he confronted me, and demanded to know what I thought I was doing. I told him that I was working for the local news source, and was writing an article about him. I think you knew I was lying already…" Loki nodded cheerfully. "But he went through with my whole interview, and everything, and then offered to meet up with me later. So, we met at this one shop in the market, the next week, and he bought me hot cider, and we talked for about five hours, until he asked about how my article was going. Of course, I had to confess, then, and he told me that I was the only person he'd ever met who had taken an interest in him, simply for being him, and not for some ulterior motive. So he'd figured out who my father was, and had gotten permission to court me."

"Awww…" Mother smiled at the two of them, obviously no longer upset about the secrecy. I was a different story, though.

"Why didn't we know about you?" I demanded. "How did you wed without Father's knowledge?"

"Oh, the Allfather knew." She assured. "We didn't want to just elope, or something, so we got my brother, Sigurd, to be the witness, and held a private wedding, just the four of us, me, him, Sigurd, and your father, and kept it a secret from basically all the royal family who really didn't need to know."

Mother and I blinked in surprise.

"I'm his mother." The queen protested. "How do I not need to know?"

Sigyn smiled ruefully. "With all due respect, Allmother, if you knew, the whole royal family would know. And the number one person we didn't want to find out about us was him." She nodded in… my direction.

The room froze. All eyes were on me. "Loki?" I gasped in hurt surprise. "Why? What did I ever do to you, that you would hide something like this from me?"

Loki only stared down at his boots in, not shame, or guilt, but a slightly regretful sullenness.

"The manor… in the clearing, west of the palace." I deduced. "It's yours, isn't it?"

Loki silently nodded, glancing up nervously, as if wondering if I was going to pound him into the floor for the admission. Sigyn wrapped an arm around her husband (Her husband! It was still hard for me to think of my brother as someone's spouse.) and looked me dead in the eye, almost as if in challenge. "I heard from my servant that you'd attempted to pay us a visit, so I decided to pay you one of my own. Besides, I'd heard Loki was back, and…" Her words were cut off, as Loki pressed another fond kiss to her lips.

Despite myself, I gagged in disgust, and turned away, leaving Sigyn in peals of laughter. "You always did say he was a toddler in a man's body, didn't you?" Loki nodded cheerfully, with an impish smile. "Now, if that's all your questions, I'm afraid I have quite a few of my own."

I sighed in frustration, but supposed the burning query of "Why in the Nine did you decide to hide your happiness from me," would be better asked at a later time. "Go ahead."

"Why isn't he talking?" She immediately wondered. It was a little insulting to me that she'd picked it up that quickly, after only being in the same room as him for scarcely twenty minutes, while it took me all morning, the previous day, to realize.

"We don't know." Mother sighed. "It's not for lack of prompting, though."

Sigyn turned in confusion, and almost expectation to my brother. "What's going on, Dearest?"

He only shook his head miserably, and turned away.

"I think it was something Thanos did –" Before I could finish my statement, Loki flinched horribly at the name of his tormentor, and clung to Sigyn like a baby monkey clings to his mother, while shaking like a leaf.

"I wouldn't say that name around him, dearest." Frigga sighed.

I immediately got to my feet, and wrapped Loki in a warm embrace. "Don't worry, Brother." I soothed. "He's dead, now. He can't hurt you, anymore."

He looked up at me with silent tears running down his face, his eyes searching for something in my features. After a moment, he gave a wan, hopeful smile, and I realized… he hadn't known that I had slain the Titan.

"Who is that?" Sigyn asked quietly. "The one who we must not name in Loki's presence?"

My face darkened at the thought. "When Loki fell off the bridge, he fell into Tha – into his clutches. He did terrible things to him, and he's still recovering, physically, and psychologically. However, he won't speak to us to tell us why he's not speaking to us, so we really can't help him, there."

Sigyn nodded slowly. "Can you get up, yet, Darling?"

Loki hesitated, seeming to be evaluating his strength, then shook his head.

"That's too bad." She sighed, and rested her head against his shoulder. "The peach trees in the orchard are in bloom, and I had hoped you would want to see them."

Loki's gaze turned a little pained, and he closed his eyes miserably, and stroked Sigyn's dark, wavy hair as he leaned back against the mountain of pillows.

Sigyn stayed with me, and didn't even leave my side, that night. It was comforting to be able to wake up with nightmares in the night with her familiar presence by my side. Until this point, it had only been Thor and Mother, but truth be told, I had missed Sigyn more than both of them put together.

For some bizarre reason, she still acted as if I held her heart, still. As if I was, somehow, still worthy of, not only words, but her, as well. She, too, didn't understand why I refused to speak. It was simple, really.

I was a monster.

A kinslayer.

A traitor.

A liar.

A savage beast.

Who in the Nine would care anything for what someone like that had to say? I didn't deserve to speak. Any chance I had, I had wasted long ago. Whatever reason they wanted me to speak for, I wasn't sure, but it couldn't be because they actually liked what I had to say. Perhaps they only wanted me to speak so that they could have an excuse to kill me, for a liesmith could never have anything worthwhile to say. All that spewed from my mouth was unmanly spells, lies, or barbed, cruel words meant to cut, slice, and kill.

Sigyn ought to know this better than anyone. I couldn't count the number of times I'd inadvertently said something that had hurt her, and I loved her more than anything. Of course, I had always apologized, once I realized how I had wounded her, but you simply can't take words back once they've left your mouth. I was never going to be able to return those words back to where they came from, so the best I could do was make certain that I would never say such awful things, again.

Or anything.

Everywhere I went, there was war, ruin, and death. It was only a matter of time before people realized that everything they poured into me was going to waste, and they put an end to me. I'd already tried to do them that favor, but it only resulted in my falling into the hands of the Master. I was selfish, but I never wanted to go through something like that, again.

"You're wrong, you know."

I nearly jumped out of my skin. Sigyn was supposed to be asleep! I turned to her in confusion, the flickering candle lighting up her lovely face, and my heart fluttered in my chest at the expression in her eyes as she gazed at me.

Wait a minute… what could I be wrong about? I hadn't even said anything.

"I'm reading your thoughts." She chuckled, and laced her fingers into my hair fondly. "Don't give me that look." She chided. "If you won't tell us where it hurts, someone's going to have to find out how to help you in a different way."

I nodded, with a tiny smirk. Sigyn was the sweetest, kindest person I knew, so if she really wanted to know what I was thinking, that was her loss. I wasn't going to say no to her, after all.

"Loki, you know it's not true." Sigyn murmured, resting her head on my shoulder. I can't imagine it was very comfortable since I was still basically no more than skin and bones. "I love hearing you speak. Whoever taught you your words are worthless is more of a monster than you could ever dream of being."

The Master? A monster? But… he'd plucked me from the void. He'd saved me from the burning freezing emptiness of the cold heart of space. He had…

"He tortured you." Sigyn cut me off. "Don't start getting it into your head that he did you a favor. He took advantage of your desperation, and that is the work of a monster. If he had cared for you, or at least returned you home, then you could be grateful, but not now."

I supposed she was right… but still. Didn't I owe him something? At least for saving me?

"He's dead, now, so there's no way you could, even if you did owe him anything." She seemed very relieved by this, actually. "But like I said, he was wrong. He lied to you, Loki. The realms are better with your voice in them, even if you make mistakes with it, sometimes. Everyone says things they regret. Would you want me to be silent forever because of that time I said you were a bit of a nerd? And I didn't realize that had a negative connotation in your mind? You were so hurt… Should I never say any words because I sometimes hurt you with my words? "

That would be ridiculous. And entirely different; Sigyn wasn't a traitor and a liesmith.

"That doesn't change anything." Sigyn contradicted. "Those are just names. You know, the Midgardians have a saying: a rose by any other name would smell just as sweet. Your names don't define who you are. They don't define what you do. If you are actively choosing to use your words to make people's lives worse, then we have a problem. But you don't. Loki, you're a good man. Yes, you've used your words incorrectly, but think of all the times you've used them for good."

I quietly sighed. She didn't understand. People don't focus on the good in the world. They naturally focused on everything wrong. If I began speaking, again, I would inevitably mess up, and everyone would forget anything helpful I said, if I could think of something helpful to say at all, and hold the wrong thing over my head like they always did.

"Then don't let their opinions define you." Sigyn ordered. "You do the right thing, no matter what everyone thinks of you. It's what you've always done. You never give up, Loki, even when all the odds are stacked against you, even when everyone thinks you'll lose. It's your best quality. Don't give up, now."

A silent tear traced down my cheek. She… She was right. But the notion of speaking now… it was terrifying. Every time I'd opened his mouth on the Sanctuary, every time I tried to make myself heard, the Master would always make my life a living hell. I couldn't speak, even now, as the mental block I made against noise was too strong. It was force of habit, and though I opened my mouth, nothing could come out, for my throat choked with horror at the fear of the agony sure to follow.

I was safe, I was with Sigyn, I knew this, but… my mind still had yet to adjust.

"I understand, my Love." Sigyn whispered, and softly brushed away my tears, and I could feel her presence retract from my mind, leaving my thoughts only to myself. "I'll be ready, though, the moment you are. Sweet dreams, then. I love you."

And, at that, I shook with mute sobs, for I couldn't force myself to tell her that I loved her, too.

This be muy depresso... *sigh*

TheOnlyHuman.