"AllMother," he acknowledged her entry.

She had visited him many times before in these past months, like this, coming into the cell to sit with him. She thought to come more often than she had made it her habit to do, but it was no bad thing, she considered, for Loki to feel the gravity of his situation. His obstinacy and pride were not appreciated by his father, and, for all her love of him and her concern, she often found his flippancy trying.

Not once had Loki made any move for the door as she came or went. He sat, as he usually did, on the low bed, and he watched the guard who stood without, until the man had turned and gone beyond his line of sight.

He viewed the man with a slight quirk to his mouth. Then he looked at her. "Are you afraid of me?" he asked.

It had all faded to some kind of odd normalcy between them.

"Afraid?" she asked, straightening her long skirts, "No. Not of you. I have never feared you, Loki, though I do fear what you might do, free of this cell."

He gave a soft, wry laugh, "Wise," he allowed.

"Might I sit?" she asked.

"Oh, be my guest," he gestured magnanimously with his hand to the chair she had had brought down for him, a few weeks ago. "It is not every day I entertain guests. I must apologize for the state of things. I wasn't expecting you today or I would have had it cleaned up."

Besides the bed and the chair, there was naught else.

She did not answer him, but coolly took the seat he indicated.

"How go events in the upper world?" he asked. "Word travels slowly, here, should it venture this far."

It was treason, to share political information with the prisoners of the AllFather. But not, she judged, with her son. "There is unrest," she said carefully. "Your father," she noted the way he grimaced, but she did not comment, "and brother are busy every moment trying to reinstate stability amid the Realms."

"Surely that must be where they have been this whole time, then." He gestured open-handed to her, as if by way of explanation. "I've seen nothing of either of them recently."

She gave him a pointed look. "A pity you haven't thought to visit them yourself."

"Well," his voice was still lazy, but she heard the strain running under it, "you see my current position."

"A position easily enough gotten out of."

"Yes?" he flashed, "and what if I would not do as you would ask? What if it is no more complicated than Thor would have you know? What then?"

"Then," she said lowly, matching the sharp rise in his anger with the steadiness of her own, "you will remain as you are."

His laugh was mirthless, as he stood. "You've always been so kind, so gentle." he spat the words. He paced to the back side of the room. "Does it never pain you? To think of all I've done? It hurts Thor so that he won't so much as look in on me."

"He has lost much faith in you,"

"Mm, and you haven't."

She smiled, "I am your mother. Ever have I seen you at your best, and your worst, Loki."

He sneered at her, "You still believe there's something to save," he paced to the far wall. "You see in me nothing more than the child I was," he rounded on her, "You think I didn't mean every action that I took on Midgard? You ought to fear what I would do free of this cell," he snarled, "for I would crush that favored realm to rubble without a thought."

"I know that you are angry, but this behavior is beneath you."

"And what of Thor?" he flashed, "What of the blood he's wasted? What of Odin's wars? They know, nothing of what it is they do. They know nothing of what's to come."

"Why will you not tell me?"

He leaned his arm against the corner of the cell, his eyes fixed on the world without, his hand fisted and all the anger pulled back and roiling within his eyes and the hard set of his mouth.

Involuntarily she took a step nearer him, "My son," she asked, "what is it that you know?"

"What is it that I know?" he looked at her and tears glittered in his eyes, "I know, that what remained of your son was slaughtered by the horrors churning within the Void. I know, that am every bit the monster your son would make me out to be. And I know that you should let me go, as Father," his breath snagged for just one moment before he recovered himself, "and as Thor have done. There is nothing left in me that is worth your labor."

Softly, she drew nearer him.

"I would contest that."

He gave a harsh laugh, "Of course you would. The Queen of Asgard, ever merciless in her very compassion." His hand traced across his forehead. "Your heart proves you a fool."

"Would you not hear what I have to say?"
His eyes were closed, and he looked drained as he drawled, "I'm all ears."

"You did not kill your brother," she said. "You let him return to me."

He laughed thinly, resting his forehead on his arm, "Since when have I posed threat to Thor?"

"Since you knew his every weakness."

"Moot." Loki turned from the wall and looked at her. It was as though his outburst had drained the will all out of him. His eyes were listless. "I could never have beaten him."

"Not alone."

At this, he laughed. Coming past her in the little cell, he looked back and smiled, "I had an army."

"Of brutes," she folded her hands. "And what of your war?"

"What of it?" he scoffed, sinking into the chair. "It failed in its object."

Slowly, she smiled, "But did it?"

"I don't know," he sighed, lifting his head out of his hand, "Why don't you tell me."

Frigga stood with her hand to the frame of the barrier, watching him.

Then, "The Chitauri were a mercenary force. There are those who can be paid to find out such things. You know this as well as I do."

She paused and his head lolled back, from which position he smirked at her, "It's hardly an argument, Mother."

"I am not finished. Sit up straight."

Rolling his eyes, he straightened, marginally.

"Mercenaries serve masters," she told him, "You were not he."

"I commanded them," he asked, lazily examining his hand, "Did I not?"
"You served another. And that unwillingly."

He stiffened and his tone was sharper as he said, "It makes no difference. He would have given me the Earth to do with as I yet will."

"In return for an Infinity Stone? Loki," she shook her head, "I taught you better than that. And why, if you were contented, did you call to me? I would never have found you in the Void had I not felt your call."

"And your point?" he demanded, eyes hard. "Not that it changes anything."

"You were found," she said slowly. She watched as he went slowly pale and his hands closed on the arms of the chair. "Found in the Void and taken, broken to some Other Power's will and placed at the head of His army, because you were expendable to Him."

His breath quickened barely perceptibly, and he turned away, looking out somewhere, beyond the confines of his cell.

She had known it was true.

Frigga lowered herself beside him, to better see his face. "Loki," she brushed her fingertips against the back of his hand. He jerked, but he did not draw away. She peered into his face, searching his eyes, "why did you not tell me?"

Beneath her fingers his hands opened and closed. He took a long breath, then answered, stiffly, "It changes nothing."

"Midgard would have been taken," she said lowly, "unawares, and our first line of defense truly broken, had Thanos moved without our seeing him."

He looked at her, "It changes nothing," he spat.

Closing her hand over the back of his she shook her head, "No, Loki, it changes everything. If you would only tell all this to your father –"

"That will not happen."

"Loki –"

"What of the thousands I killed?" he demanded, pushing past her and onto his feet. "Innocent lives, snuffed out in my rush for prominence. No. He will do nothing. And he need not. I will engineer my own escape and I will crush that realm and its heroes to dust beneath my boot ere I rest." He turned about, facing her, "You see only what you wish to see. I am a monster and the next time, I will not fail in my purpose."

"The agent whom you killed was right," she decided, at length. "I see none of what you speak beyond your eyes."

"Oh," he smiled as he looked at her, and it was one of those times she could see the madness he'd shown on Midgard. "So you've seen, then. How much did you see, Mother from your place on the Great Throne? Did it break your heart to see what I've become?"

"It grieves me to see the damage you've done –"

"I have done!" he hit the wall of the cell with the side of one fist. "What damage have I caused that my brother or Odin have not caused tenfold?"

"What they have done, Loki, they have not done out of the darkness of their hearts –"

He started laughing.

Her voice rose, angry that he should make of even her a mockery, "but out of a true desire for the betterment of the realms."

"What do you know of darkness?" he snapped.

"I know enough."

"Oh," he drawled, turning back from her, folding his arms before him and resting his shoulder on the wall beside him, "I'm sure you do."

Standing, she looked at him and she was tired to her very bones.

"Come back to the light, my son," she said, "Before the darkness swallows you."

He looked at her, and his eyes were too bright in his face, his smile mirthless.

"Too late."

She studied him. "Am I to give up, then, on my son?"

Resignedly, he folded his hands behind him. He said nothing. His eyes were black and very hard.

She gave a short nod, "So be it."

Leaving him, she thought that she would return in a day or two. But she would not prompt him. It was for him to better his situation. If he would not accept her help then she would not force him.