As with the initial three days since the apple had been consumed and Tony and Sigyn had both collapsed, Loki and Pepper regarded one another with neutral hostility when she entered the room where Tony and Sigyn had been sequestered where Jarvis could monitor them. Sigyn was slowly declining in vitals and general health. Jarvis had reported that the reservoir of energy the seemed to flow through her was circulating faster than it had even as part of it seemed to be draining. Tony, on the other hand, seemed to be betting better. As far as Jarvis could tell, the scars that he had accumulated over a lifetime were fading and his muscle density was shifting somewhat.
Pepper moved as she had the last three days and strode to the bench that acted also as a windowsill where she tucked her feet under her, pulled her tablet out of her bag, and began flipping through the work related items she had downloaded at the end of the day. Loki, as usual, ignored her and maintained the spot where he had been located for the last three days at Tony's side where he was also within reach of the twin bed that had been brought into the room for Sigyn.
Though she would never admit it, she was glad someone other than her and Thor were standing these silent vigils for Tony and Sigyn, glad that someone else cared. Tony had been an integral part of her life for most of her adult years and Sigyn…she still wasn't sure how she felt that the other woman had collapsed in her company out in Central Park. Even if only to herself she could admit that Sigyn was beautiful, engaging, and charming when she was in the middle of a story that had meaning to her. Her gaze flicked briefly to Loki as she flicked through another page of another contract proposal and paused when she caught him studying Sigyn, his expression torn somewhere between despair and hope.
"You're a bastard, you know," she said conversationally, gaze returning to the contract.
Loki's eyes narrowed when he looked at the small human. "How so?"
"You want to keep them both," she commented.
"I…do no desire to keep them both. Anthony is my Soulmate."
"And Sigyn is, or was, your wife of a thousand years. Yet you married Tony and never said anything to her," Pepper replied, glancing at him and flicking an eyebrow up. "What did you hope to accomplish with that? Keep them both in the dark and hope that no one else ever mentioned anything to the other? Would you have kept them both in separate realms? All things considered, you're an idiot and a bastard."
There was no good answer to that. He had wanted to maintain both relationships. Anthony was human and would have lived a mortal lifespan had something miraculous not happened and Sigyn has always been the one he had fallen back to, the one he had orbited for so very long. Her loyalty and love had come without concession, without requirement. Were he to lose the bond…to lose Tony…it would destroy him. Unless Sigyn were the one he fell back to. Was it a perfect situation? Far from it. Selfish? Very much so. And yet she had always been there when he needed her most since he had murdered Theoric and stolen the future she might have had. And now, now, she had still managed to give him…her life.
He looked at her. Named by Odin as a goddess of Fidelity. She had been loyal through everything, including the deaths of their sons, something he had inadvertently caused. She had been the one to try and hold them together. He had been the one to run. "She has ever been more than I deserved," he told Pepper.
Pepper glanced at him in the course of marking something on the contract. "Tony is more than you deserve, so do endeavor to be worth all of this," she commented.
Idunn stood on the bridge, studying the tree that had been her responsibility for so long. There had been so many to seek the apples, but only ever a few had been courageous enough to accept the full weight of the bargain. Few survived and even fewer were worth stirring herself to even look at when the apple had been consumed. The first, the one who had ruled Asgard so long before Bor and Odin, he had been worth the bargain, but had not been worth saving. Too much arrogance, so certain he was doing right for his people by giving them immortality at the expense of his own.
Now, though, there was the Healer. She had known from the first time the little Healer approached with kindness and curiosity that she would be memorable. It hadn't been the apples that drawn the Healer, but rather want of conversation with someone far older than anyone else she knew. There had been no trickery to the desire for stories and experiences of times long past and things Idunn refused to speak of hadn't been pressed at. She remembered every small kindness Sigyn had done for her or the nights when they had simply stood under the stars to watch the night pass.
That kindness was killing the little Healer. Idunn had felt when the apple had taken root in the mortal, had felt the first pull of the bargain settling between the mortal and the Healer. Sigyn was powerful and fighting the slow death, but the drain was too fast. There wasn't enough power and life flowing back into her body for her to sustain herself.
Now, this time, when there was one worth saving, she was glad to collect the imbalance of immortals and correct it. When she looked to the sky, the little bag on her waist shifted with her. "Heimdal!" she called. "Send me or I will find my own path!"
There was a long pause, as if the other Guardian were weighing the demand. Then, there was a flash and the energy of the Bi-Frost struck down to sweep her away and leave nothing but its runes as evidence of her presence. When the light cleared, she was face-to-face with Heimdal for the first time in almost a millennia. The two Guardians studied each other for a moment.
"You would leave your post for this?" he asked.
She quirked an eyebrow and a half-smile at him as she untied the little sack at her waist and withdrew one of the objects before retying it. With a casualness that belied her strength, she started crushing the object in her hands. "Any fool who tries to steal from me deserves the nightmares that the apples will beget them," she answered.
"As well they should," Heimdal agreed and then there was nothing left to say as Idunn turned towards the gate once more and he sent her to Midgard.
The Bi-Frost's light touching down on the Avenger's tower had everyone coming to full alert. Thor was the first to reach the landing pad with Steve and Clint barely a hundred paces behind him, but he stopped short at the sight of ancient, amber eyes that regarded him with a coldness he was unaccustomed to. Her armor was similar to that of Heimdal's though she lacked the helm.
"Asgardian Prince," she said by way of greeting as she strode around him and into the tower.
"Guardian," Thor returned, watching her as she entered the doors, cupping her hands like she was holding something. He waved Steve off when the Captain moved to intercept her. She barely broke stride as she wove around Steve and Clint, who had trained an arrow at her. "She looks after the bargains that are struck for immortality as well as the apples when they are given to my kind. It is rare for her to leave her post for any reason." Idunn vanished around a corner as the light Jarvis was using to scan her cut off.
"Your visitor carries two of what Sigyn first brought with her," Jarvis informed the present Avengers.
Steve gave Thor a careful look and then followed after her with Clint on his heels, more interested than on alert now.
Idunn studied the small human female that stood her to block the doorway and path to Sigyn and the mortal, lips quirked in amusement. Whatever else might be said of humans, this one had spirit. "I am Idunn of Asgard, Guardian of the source of immortality. Sigyn is dying while your mortal grows stronger. There is an imbalance that I am here to correct. Does that satisfy you, human?"
She was half-aware of the spells that Loki had set, but it was the ebb of life within the balance of mortality and immortality as it flowed between the two unconscious forms beyond the woman that held her attention.
"Your hands?" Pepper asked, steel coloring her voice and holding her where she stood. She might have only just met Sigyn, but Tony had been her friend for a long time and anyone there to hurt them would go through her.
Idunn's smile turned from amused to sharp as she opened her cupped hands just enough to show the human the crushed innards of the golden apple that she had reduced to a pulp. Pepper's hand flew to her mouth as she realized what it meant. For a long, dizzying moment, Pepper remained where she was before she retreated.
She was almost interested by the way that Loki's features appeared to be warring between hope, despair, and guilt. Just as well, she thought, that Sigyn will soon be beyond his reach. Her gaze centered, then, on the small Healer who was paler than she remembered and too damn still. "She did this as much for herself as for you, Trickster," she said softly, hands closing on the apple again as she stood over Sigyn's bedside. "Letting her go is the least you can do for this last gift you have given her."
Loki might have had something to say, but was forestalled when Thor strode into the room and demanded, "Do you truly carry two apples, Guardian?"
"Yes," she answered as she knelt with on knee on Sigyn's bed.
Darkness held her hostage and pressed tight over her mouth and nose, denying her breath. Hands scrabbled uselessly at her face as she tried to scream and found that she couldn't. Shock after shock after shock struck at her and raced through her blood as the Firebrand had, but it was different this time. There was no pain. The pressure over her mouth and nose released her and she could breath again. The swirl of magic and power grew faintly stronger as life settled back into her blood and bones into the places where the bargain had dug it out. She slept peacefully for the first time since the mortal had taken the apple and her immortality for his own.
Clint stood in the doorway with Steve and Thor, still half tempted to shoot the strange woman who had practically choked an apple down the throat of the other strange woman. Still, polite manners were called for when not in one's own home, so…
"Does this mean I get to shoot her?" Didn't matter which one. Both of them were trouble as far as he cared.
"No," at least three voices told him.
"Damn," he answered and then vanished up the hallway back to his hiding spot. No one was dead, dying, or in need of being shot. So, unless Tony died due to the magic hoo-doo, he didn't care.
Idunn wiped the last of the slime from the apple against her trousers as she observed the color in Sigyn's face almost instantly improve. She ignored the Trickster as she focused inward for a moment and hummed contentedly at the even pull between the once-mortal and the immortal. One bargain struck and an imbalance partially corrected. Her part was done. She untied the small bag from her waist and dropped the remaining apple at Sigyn's side. The Healer would understand well enough what to do with it.
She made it as far as the doorway before she paused in the face of the Asgardian and Earth warrior blocking her path with their bulk alone. They weren't poised to fight her and she frowned momentarily as she tried to work out the frown and intent concern that they both wore, their gazes flicking between her and the two beds. Oh. Right. An explanation. Maybe they didn't deserve one, but-she glanced at Sigyn-the Healer did.
Loki was weaving a spell over Sigyn's unconscious form, looking alternatively relieved and confused by the results. It was easier for her to speak to that confusion than the others in the room. "My reasons are as selfish as they get, but understand this, Trickster: Sigyn will not lose anything for the gift that she bestowed to you. She is worthy for the sake of worth."
Loki cut off the spell and fixed her with a glare. "Why put her through the risk at all, then? Why put Anthony at risk if the end result would have been the same?"
She made a sound that was something between a snarl and a laugh. "An apple gained without the striking of a bargain gains only nightmares. Yes, there was an imbalance created in the number of immortals when Narvi and Vali were killed before their time, but the bargain had to first be fulfilled. None can now say that she gained these three apples without suffering and without payment. How she spends the last is up to her, but no ill will befall her for the use of it." Then, she turned her gaze to Thor and the human warrior. "You are free to move yourselves or be moved." Thor and the human fell back just enough to let her pass and she took full advantage, passing back the way she had come and leaving by call of the Bi-Frost.
Those within the room were still staring at the two unconscious individuals with something close to disbelief, except for Loki. Loki, satisfied that Sigyn was fine, had turned from her bedside to that of his Soulmate's as the realization settled into him. A thousand years, or better, would be their's. There was nothing that was perfect about the situation, but the future was there and waiting to be held.