More than a week passed since Loki's revelation from his mother. After he had regained consciousness, he had forbidden the healers to permit her to enter the room again, and while the queen could easily have overridden his order, she did not press him. As for Odin, the king made no attempt to speak with him, but Loki found he did not care. He wanted to be left alone. In the wake of all he had learned, that was the only thing he seemed to be able to want.

When he realized he would not be released by the healers until he agreed to eat and drink, to move, to speak, he forced himself to do these things again, but the physical pain from the scars over his heart was nothing compared to the leaden weight of sorrow that lay inside his chest, dragging him down with every step.

At last, the healers declared him well enough to return home. Rather than return to his chambers in the palace, he walked out the doors of the Healing Room and directly into the city. He knew where his feet were taking him on instinct. Anthony had returned to his forge days earlier. Loki needed to go there. He needed to see for himself the damage that he had done.

For a moment, he stood outside the door, hand raised, poised to knock. He bit his lip, then rapped on the door.

"Enter."

It was Anthony's voice. That much had not changed, and when Loki opened the door and saw him standing by the fire, nothing looked different. Anthony's back was to him as he tended to one of the gauntlets that had apparently been salvaged from that day. Loki took a moment to revel in the color of his hair by firelight, the smooth line of his back, the broadness of his shoulders, the strength visible in his arms. He was wearing a simple tunic and pants, work clothes, already smudged with soot from the forge, and the scent of the place, a perfume he associated with a feeling of yearning and belonging, nearly made Loki dizzy with homesickness.

"Anthony," he said, and his voice cracked on the word.

The other man turned towards him, and the face was Anthony's, but his eyes seemed wrong somehow. Loki couldn't put his finger on the subtle change.

"Yes," he said, rubbing his hands on his pants, "I had thought you might stop by."

"Are you well?" Loki asked.

"I have some scars, but that's much better than being dead, of course, and without your help, that's what I would be," Anthony said. "I thank you for that."

"There is no need," Loki said.

"But you have been put aware of the other effects from the situation, have you not?" Anthony asked, not looking him in the eye.

"Yes," Loki said.

Anthony nodded.

"My memory is clear," he said. "It is not that I have forgotten you in any way."

"You remember our first meeting?" Loki asked.

"Yes," Anthony said, but he frowned, "but it is as though it happened to someone else. I remember working with you. I even remember you asking to court me, and the night before all this happened, when we…"

He paused and coughed, looking, to Loki's horror, embarrassed.

"When we made love," Loki finished, but he could feel the heart in his chest smashing in a thousand pieces.

"Yes," Anthony said, not looking at him. "You were an excellent partner in all ways. I believe we should continue our work together on armor for Asgard's warriors. It would be of benefit to them and to both of us as we would stand to make a good profit."

"Profit," Loki repeated quietly, watching as the man he loved efficiently put some of his tools back in their places.

"Nothing wrong with profit," Anthony said, smiling at him in the same vacant way that Loki had seen on the faces of countless courtiers who were schooled to be polite.

"No, no, of course not," Loki said. "I would be willing to continue our work."

"Fine," Anthony said, but Loki caught his gaze again, and this time, there was no escaping the cold difference. The man drew a breath, then sat on one of the stools at the worktable and gestured for Loki to do the same. "Join me?"

Loki sat, but his hands were trembling against his will, so he hid them beneath the table.

"I have no wish to cause you pain," Anthony said. "I do not mean harm to anyone, though I think that has already happened. Peter, for example. He's a good worker, and I will keep him on, but though I remember that I felt almost a father's pride in him, I see him now as only another apprentice in a long line of apprentices, one who will eventually move on to other things and leave and be replaced, and that will be fine. I know I do not treat him as I did, and I think he is made unhappy by it."

Loki's chest hurt from the thought of Peter being banished from Anthony's heart.

"He sacrificed his anonymity to save you, and he is a good, kind, brave lad," Loki said, his voice thick with emotion.

"I am sure he is," Anthony said, "I just can't… I feel nothing for him except basic concern that he does his work and that I fulfill all parts of his training adequately."

Loki brought his hand to his own chin and rubbed it, trying to will himself to have the courage to ask the question on his mind.

"And what of your feelings for me?" he said.

"I am sorry for you," Anthony said, and his eyes, which still looked wrong to Loki, filled with the smallest bit of something that resembled the man he loved. "You did nothing wrong, and I am grateful that you saved my life, of course. I know I loved you deeply, with all of the heart I had, but I feel—"

"Nothing," Loki said, realizing at last what he saw in the other's eyes. "You feel nothing at all for me."

"I do not want to lie to you," Anthony said.

"Anthony, I am still in love with you," Loki said, and to his shame he felt tears burning in his eyes. "I meant every word I said to you that night. You are the dearest thing in this world to me, and I have given you my heart not just in flesh but in truth. Is there nothing at all that could reawaken what you once felt for me?"

"I know part of me is missing," Anthony admitted. "I just can't seem to care about it. However, if you like, I would consent to let you bed me again in the future. I recall that you are very skilled at it, so it would be no hardship for me and may prove advantageous to you."

Loki was horrified by the cold, business-like way Anthony made the offer.

"No," he said, "that I will not do."

Anthony nodded as though the answer made no difference to him, and Loki stared into his almost mechanical eyes, searching for another spark of his Anthony in them, but they remained coldly detached.

"I will give aid as far as any magic you choose to put into your designs," Loki said, then drew a shuddering breath and added, "and with your permission, I am going to search for a way to put this right, Anthony. There must be a spell or charm, something that will undo the hurt I have done to you."

"If you can find something, I would appreciate it," Anthony said. "I am truly sorry to hurt you in this way."

Loki hesitantly moved towards him, allowing his fingers to barely caress the other man's face, trying to memorize the feel of his skin, his warmth, the prickle of his beard under his fingertips. Anthony never moved to stop him, allowing it, though he did not lean into his touch.

"I love you," Loki swore, "and I will always love you. I promise you I will find the cure for this."

"You are a very powerful mage," Anthony said. "I believe if it is possible, you will, but if it isn't, well then, it isn't, and the stars will still burn either way. I will contact you about any future projects."

Loki's hand slid down Anthony's face in a final caress.

"This is my doing," Loki whispered. "Not yours. Know that I do not hold you in any anger for this."

"Thank you," Anthony said.

Loki rose, going to the door, but when he put his hand on the latch, he paused. Pain was cutting through him with every breath, and the possibility of never touching Anthony again filled him with a despair so great his heart threatened to split.

"I have a request," he said, not turning around.

"Name it," Anthony said.

"You gave me a promise," Loki said, closing his eyes and gripping the handle of the door so tightly the wood bit into his flesh. "Would you be willing to keep it?"

"A kiss each year upon the day of your birth?" Anthony asked.

"Yes," Loki said, looking at him over his shoulder. He knew how he must look, all but begging, his pride broken, his heart in tatters. "Would you consent to that?"

"I would," Anthony said. "I owe you at least that."

"I thank you," Loki said, then opened the door and went into the street without looking back.

From there, he teleported deep into the woods, far from any sentient eyes. For long moments he was motionless among the trees. Then his breath began to come in rough gasps, harder and faster each time, until at last a scream tore from his lips, one that threatened to leave his throat bathed in blood. Still screaming, he dropped to his knees in the dirt, tears pouring down his face, as he collapsed into the dirt and wept for the loss of his lover's heart.

Loki had no idea how long he stayed there. The animals kept far from him, and the cold of evening began to chill his frame. He didn't want to go home, to see the people who until recently had been his mother, his brother, his father. He didn't want to see the bed where he had planned to bring Anthony when they were at last married. Even the library, the source of solace to him in all other times of grief, loomed in his mind like a prison built of words, none of them capable of pointing the way to fix his sorrow. Instead, he began to walk aimlessly, the motion the only thing that gave him some tiny piece of solace.

At length, he found himself walking towards the Bifrost, the luminescent colors of the bridge echoing his footfalls, and he let his gaze fall on the countless stars that spilled across the sky, overhead, underfoot, glittering to his left and right. Once, as a small child, he had asked his mother to teach him to walk among them, and she had laughed and caught his hand, telling him she would show him the secret paths of the galaxies, and she had. The memory hurt. Everything seemed to hurt now.

It was at that moment when a weight slammed into him from behind so hard that he nearly toppled forward onto his face.

"Brother! You are well again!" boomed Thor's voice as his arms went around him in a hug that would crush a mortal's bones and that was rather painful given Loki's recent injuries.

"Get off me, you great hairy oaf!" Loki yelled out of force of habit, but Thor only laughed as he let go.

"You must indeed be in good health. You sound like your old self," Thor said

When he turned to face him to continue complaining about his clumsiness, only then did Loki notice Peter standing at Thor's elbow.

"I understand this brave young man is at least partially to be credited with your continued existence," Thor said, clapping Peter on the shoulder with a gigantic paw of a hand. "He has waited many days to see you."

Loki took one look at him and realized how hard the time had been on the apprentice. His face was drawn, and circles were prominent beneath his eyes. While he held himself with dignity, Loki noticed tension in his shoulders that spoke of worry.

"Hello, Peter," he said quietly. "Are you well?"

"Not especially," Peter admitted.

"Honesty," Loki said, giving him a sad smile. "In all the lies that have surrounded me, I nearly forgot what it sounded like."

Thor looked away for a moment, then said, "Mother has spoken to me about the circumstances of your birth. Truly, I did not know."

"I believe you," Loki said, "but I would rather not discuss it just now."

"As you wish, brother," Thor said laying heavy emphasis on the last word, and Loki understood from that alone that Thor saw no difference. He was not sure yet whether he could say the same for himself.

"Are you going to see Tony?" Peter asked.

"I already have," Loki said.

"He's not…" Peter paused, uncertain. "He is as good a teacher as ever, and his work is still marvelous, still perfect."

"But he is not the same," Loki said.

"No," Peter said, dropping his gaze to the shifting colors of the bridge. "He is not."

Loki nodded, putting a hand on the lad's shoulder.

"You did nothing wrong," he said. "Thor is right. You killed Obadiah, then stopped the two of us from bleeding to death and brought help. Nothing was your fault."

"It feels like it is," Peter said. "I was… I was five minutes late. I had stopped in the street to speak with… someone. If I had been there earlier, maybe I could have stopped him before he hurt Tony."

"Or maybe you would have been stabbed too into the bargain," Loki said. "No, the Norns decided your path that morning. You did exactly as you should have."

"Then so did you," Peter said.

Loki grimaced, but Peter's earnest expression was so without guile that he couldn't help realizing that, had he done anything else, Anthony would indeed be dead. Even though the hope of bringing back the Anthony who loved him was frail, it was still there so long as he was alive, and if it existed, Loki would find it.

Loki quickly changed tactics, pasting on a grin he didn't feel yet and adding, "So, what is the lady's name?"

"Who?"

"This 'someone' you were speaking with," Loki said, and perhaps there was just the smallest bit of mischief kindling in his eyes.

"Michelle," Peter admitted, and a blush tinged his face.

Loki truly grinned, and Thor shook his head.

"Peter, you have handed him ammunition that I assure you he will use at the first opportunity," he said, stifling a laugh.

"You wouldn't," Peter said, suddenly several shades whiter.

"Of course not," Loki said too smoothly as he began to walk back with them towards the city.

"Liar," Thor said, giving him a knowing look.

"That's a very impolite accusation to make, brother, particularly with no evidence whatsoever," Loki said. "Now, where does she live and what is her favorite flower?"

He felt almost normal for a moment. Some things were still good in the wide universe. And there had to be a way to heal Anthony's heart. In doing so, he knew he would heal his own.