"Loki!", Tony screamed on the top of his lungs, reaching down from the edge with one hand as if there was any chance to catch Loki, who was falling impossibly, tortuously slowly. He leaned forward, he had to do something, felt himself losing his balance and the hand that had been holding on the the edge slipped. For a split-second, he believed that he was going to follow the prince down into the abyss, but then, an arm was slung around his chest and pulled him back from the void. Tony struggled and fought to be released. "Let me go, for fuck's sake, someone has to do something, you can't just sit here and watch this! Let me go, now, I have to –"
"Anthony," Fandral interrupted quietly, holding the engineer back firmly, "it's too late."
"It's not," Tony whispered, "it's not, it's not, it's not, let me go, please..."
"Anthony," the swordsman repeated, but didn't add anything else this time. There was a quiet, hollow resignation in his voice and Tony closed his eyes and went limp in his grasp, taking deep, shaky breath so he wouldn't begin to hyperventilate.
Blinking slowly, he watched as Odin pulled Thor back up onto the bridge. There were tears openly gathering in the prince's eyes and Tony felt Fandral resting his forehead on his shoulder from behind. He swallowed, staring at the vast expanse of stars and space in front of him while he tried to ignore the warmth of the body pressed against him from behind. The feeling made him sick. It had been okay with Loki, that had been different, but having someone else this close was freaking him out.
"Let me go," he rasped, struggling against the man's hold on him. When he didn't release him immediately, Tony snapped: "Look, I'm not gonna jump after him, for fuck's sake, just let me the hell go, I need to– I gotta get away from here. Get your damn hands off me, Fandral." He could feel Odin's eye on him and briefly wondered what the penalty for swearing in front of the ruler of the universe was, but he couldn't bring himself to care about that. Not right now. As soon as the swordman's grip relented, Tony scrambled to his feet and began to flee from the verge of the bridge. On his bare feet, he was permanently close to slipping on its wer surface, but he kept his head down and his eyes fixed on the ground before him, not stopping for even a second.
Fandral caught up with him after a minute, faster on his leather boots than Tony, who still didn't quite trust his sense of balance yet. Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw the blond reaching out to him and shook his head rapidly. He couldn't accept comfort now, not from anyone but Loki; if he did, he would have to acknowledge that this was something else than a crazed, fever-induced dream haunting him while his body adjusted to the changes that Loki had brought upon him.
Speaking of which: his chest fucking hurt. Every breath felt like it was setting the skin around the reactor on fire and Tony wrapped his hands around his middle and fisted them in the fabric of the tunic to keep himself from scratching the skin bloody until the painful itching disappeared.
He'd go back to his room, and Loki would be right next door in case he needed something. Asgardian painkillers, for example. Yeah, those would be a great idea. Loki would take care of that. He always took care of everything.
Tony drew a ragged breath and tried to not let it catch in his throat. Loki would be there. He'd come back and Loki would be there. He was always there.
He flinched at another touch on his shoulder and glanced up at Fandral, who had collected one of the horses they had used to get here. The second one was nowhere in sight, but the inventor silently nodded his thanks as he mounted the mare with Fandral's help and finally didn't have to fight to stay upright anymore.
The swordsman got into the saddle behind him, but only touched him as much as was necessary to steer their mount back towards the golden city. Black clouds were gathering above it; Tony had never seen the starry skies clouded before, apart from little, fluffy white clouds.
"They are more of a decoration," Loki stated with a shrug, leaning back against the wall behind the bench on his balcony. "Asgard is more of... how would you call it? It is a station. It's a city on a small world, a flat one, to cry that out loud. Actual planets do not work like that. It's all powered and run by magic, it wouldn't be close to being inheritable without it. There are no seasons here, it is always the same. Weather and clouds and the like are made for distraction and change, and since everybody is used to sun and warmth, why would anyone wish for rain or, Norns forbid, snow? Thunderstorms, we get those when Thor throws his tantrums, and apart from that, the weather is always good."
There was thunder crackling in the distance now and Tony lowered his eyes, staring down at the horse's mane while they trotted back through the outskirts of the city towards the palace. He zoned out during the ride back and winced when Fandral nudged him gently, directing him off of the horse and towards a smaller entrance of the palace, near the stables. He let himself be led, but evaded any form of physical contact until they stood in front of his door.
Only then, he looked up at Fandral. The swordsman had a haunted look in his eyes and kept glancing towards the door to Loki's quarters as though he expected it to open at any second to reveal Loki, who would tell him to search yourself some skirt to charm your way under, Fandral, but stop invading my wing or I will set a bounty on your head before he ushered him away.
"Shall I collect you for the sending tonight?" he asked quietly. "There will be a feast in Loki's honour, most likely this eve. I doubt that they will delay it until tomorrow."
Tony swallowed, a sour taste in his mouth. "Yeah, sure," he replied, wrapping his arms tighter around himself as he tried to ignore the pain that each breath carried with it.
Fandral seemed like he wanted to say something else, but couldn't come up with any words to express whatever he wished to tell. Tony understood what he felt. The emptiness that started to spread in him, growing with each time that he expected Loki to round a corner or open a door or make a comment about something and there was nothing. Maybe that was what realisation would feel like when not only the logical part of his mind had caught up with what had happened, but also the one that waited for everything to go back to normal in a second.
He wondered how that must feel for someone who had loved Loki for centuries.
"Alright then," he eventually said, breaking the tense, uncomfortable silence that filled the empty hallway. "I'll just – I'll be in my room."
"Yes, of course," Fandral murmured, eyes downcast. "I will see you during the feast."
Tony nodded and took a step backwards, then another one, until he felt the door in his back and grasped for the handle blindly. With a last glance towards the swordsman, he leaned back against the door to push it open and slip inside. It clicked shut behind him and the engineer just stood in the room for a minute, not knowing what to do with himself now that he was here and alone with his thoughts.
He realised just how dependent on Loki he had been – still was. All his days here, different from each other as they might be, had had one fundamental constant; Loki. He'd worked himself from one meeting with the god to the next. Breakfast with Loki; working until Loki was back; spend the afternoon with Loki; go to bed when Loki went to bed; wake up when Loki woke him (or was there to calm him after a nightmare had done so). The closest he had to that now was Fandral's promise to get him for the sending.
The sending. The official farewell from Asgard to Loki. Because Loki was gone.
"Wait, so let me get this straight," Tony interrupted, pointing at the book. "Her husband dies and the first thing she does is throw a giant party and get drunk and dance and everything? How does that work?"
"The sending is supposed to remind those remaining ones of all the good sides of the deceased," Loki explained with the hint of a smile around his lips. "See it like this: if you died, would you want to see your loved ones perish in grief? The feast should help them to preserve the happiness they have experienced with the deceased ones." He paused, a thoughtful look in his eyes as the smile got lost somewhere. There was something unreadable in his eyes as he slowly continued: "You know, Aesir live for millennia. Your thirty-nine years are a heartbeat." His hand twitched as if he wanted to reach out for Tony but stopped himself. "Maybe that is why we are so intent on not being sad about death, because it is something we rarely see, because it just doesn't happen all that often. I'm a little over a thousand years old and I have been to two sendings so far. It is rare and that is why it's so scary."
Finally, he gave in to the pain in his chest and sank to his knees in the middle of the chamber.
Fandral didn't comment on his red-rimmed eyes when he came knocking on the door some hours later. Tony returned his greeting, tugging at the sleeves of his tunic. He had put away the blue one in favour of the dark green one with the golden inlays that Freyr hadn't stabbed through, had bathed and washed sweat, blood and tears off his body; for one so he would finally feel clean again, but mostly so he would have something to do and hopefully distract himself from his thoughts.
As it turned out, washing himself with something that smelled exactly like the hint of herbal scent that he sometimes had caught on Loki did not help him to think of something else.
"Wear this," Fandral instructed, holding out something black, leathery in Tony's direction.
"I'll stick with the green," the inventor responded, a hint of defiance in his voice. If the court knew the whole story, which he doubted, then Loki was going to be branded a traitor; but no matter if that was the case or not, Tony was going to take a stand there. He would either attend in Loki's colours or not at all.
"Of course," the swordsman nodded, not questioning him for even a second, and spread the garment out in his hands. It turned out to be a leather vest that would probably fall down to Tony's hip. "You can keep the tunic. Just wear this above it. It's a little more... formal."
"Ah," Tony made quietly. "Alright. Could you just..." He made a vague gesture around the room. "...set it down on the bed or something. I'm not good with being handed things."
Fandral gave him a short, odd glance, but didn't ask, just draped the vest over the back of an armchair so Tony could pick it up from there. He shrugged it on and tugged at the material to straighten it. Apparently, it belonged to Fandral, since it was slightly too big, but it wasn't large enough to feel ridiculous. There were no laces on the front, the stiff leather broadened his shoulders slightly and its black colour accentuated the gold in the tunic's collar without hiding the green.
"Thanks," he muttered. "Let's get going, then."
Fandral led him into the great hall that Tony had only seen once or twice before. Now, music and laughter could be heard even before they stepped through the open doors. Tony resisted the urge to wrap his arms around himself again; he may be not at home here, but he had learned enough about the customs here to know that showing weakness was never a good idea, and especially in the position that he was in, he needed to put up a strong facade.
He followed the swordsman through the whole hall to the front, keeping his gaze straight ahead and doing his best to ignore the eyes he could feel on him. That meant he had to look at the table they were heading towards, though; Odin sat at the head end, Thor on his right and Frigga on his left. Except for Fandral, the Warriors Three had already gathered there and since Tony was sure that he could hold none of their gazes, he ended up looking at Frigga.
There was nothing from the caring mother he had gotten to know before. She was smiling and laughing at the stories the others told, but Tony had seen the way her eyes lit up when she was honestly happy and her eyes crinkled when she laughed around Loki. Now, she was holding up the image of the queen that her people wanted to see, someone who was strong and reliable even when a wayward son wreaked chaos in the royal family.
He broke eye contact when he sat down on the wooden bench next to Fandral. Uncomfortably, he stared at the plate in front of him, his shoulders tense and his breath short and shallow because it still hurt like hell. The glances he got from the others made it more than clear that he didn't belong here; a slave at one table with the king, queen and the prince's closest friends? That was so many shades of wrong.
Well, then again, what did it matter? He could do whatever he wanted now, he'd be back on the slave market in a day or two anyway. After all, what use was a slave without an owner?
For the sake of courtesy, he murmured a quiet greeting and then began to pick at his food silently. He listened to the conversations around him, the stories told in honour of the fallen prince, the occasional remark thrown in by Fandral so he wouldn't appear too quiet. Thor's usually loud and booming voice had quieted down and a quick glance in his direction told Tony that he, too, looked like he had been crying.
He was glad that he didn't have to say anything, to let the people around him do the talking, and maybe, if he was quiet enough, they would just forget he was there.
Tony's head snapped up when he heard his name. He met Sif's nearly golden eyes and, since he hadn't actually listened to what she had said, asked quietly: "Excuse me?"
"I said, 'what was your relationship to Loki?'" she repeated with a slightly impatient tone to her voice.
The inventor looked around nervously and felt all eyes suddenly on him. He swallowed and straightened up slightly before he slowly replied: "I'm... not sure what you're asking here. You all should be more familiar with the slave system than me, right?" He sure as hell wasn't going to tell them anything about what he and Loki had shared, from sleepless nights over afternoons in the workshop to that one, tentative kiss. "I don't have any big stories to tell, unless you want to know about how I served him breakfast."
Volstagg scoffed. "Yes, right. Surely, Loki kept someone with your pretty face around, right next to his own quarters and showered with gifts, to serve him breakfast."
Tony recoiled and gripped his fork tighter at the heavy insinuation in the sentence. He felt the blood draining from his face, but fought to keep his voice levelled as he asked: "So what are you implying, then?" Was he allowed to look someone directly in the eye who was above his status? Loki had never cared about that, but then again, Loki hadn't exactly treated him in the way that seemed to be usual for Asgardian slaves.
The Aesir warrior crossed his arms in front of his chest and shrugged his shoulders. "Merely that I believe you served Loki – Norns rest his soul – something different than his meals."
"Volstagg!" Fandral hissed before Tony had a chance to respond.
The red-haired warrior threw his arms up defensively. "What? Would it be that unlike Loki to hold himself an argr slave boy?"
Tony stood abruptly, only just managing to catch the drink he had almost knocked over. He clenched his shaking hands to fists by his sides and had the mind to bow in Odin's and Frigga's direction as he announced: "I think I will be going to bed now. I hope you all enjoy the feast."
He didn't look back as he climbed off the bench and hurried out of the hall, as fast as he could without breaking into a run. God, these people were disgusting. He would at least have expected Thor to intervene when someone was slandering his brother like that – then again, what did they know of Loki? Tony had known the prince for little over a month and he felt like Loki had told him more than his brother or his so-called friends.
Maybe it was because of his status. Tony was a slave, it didn't matter if he judged Loki. Nobody listened to a slave. He stood lower than the goddamn kitchen personnel.
But it hadn't been just that, had it? Tony had actually listened. He had wanted more, had asked about the things that no Aesir warrior would care about. For the first time, it occurred to him that it wasn't just that Loki was next door when Tony had needed him; Tony had been right there for Loki, too, when the mage needed anything (fuck you, Volstagg, that was not what I meant). When he wanted to rant over the stubborn ignorance of the Aesir or Thor's latest idiocy, or when he just felt like talking to someone who would listen in fascination when he told them about his magic instead of brushing him off with a remark about women's craft.
He only got lost about twice on his way back, and never lost enough to be forced to talk to someone. The great hallways were eerily empty except for the silent guards, whose eyes followed his every movement. Everybody else seemed to be at the feast in the giant hall that he had just left.
"They are impossible," Loki murmured, shaking his head as they looked after a pair of warriors, drunkenly leaning on each other as they stumbled through the courtyard. "No matter what happens, there is a feast. Coronation? Feast. Someone dies? A feast. A wedding? A feast, and don't forget the mead. Ragnarök could be on its way and they would get drunk in its honour before they do anything."
Again, he found himself in his chamber with no idea what to do next. He stripped out of the leather vest, draped it over the back of an armchair and, on second thought, changed into the dark red pyjamas.
"Red is a wonderful look on you, but I'll admit, I do love the green," Loki stated with a smile as he looked down on Tony, who fiddled with the sleeve of the dark green tunic as he tried to suppress a blush.
He caught a look at the reactor and the skin around it. It hurt with every heartbeat now and he began to see the reason: dark purple bruises had formed around the reactor's rim and Tony quickly closed the buttons of the pyjama top so he wouldn't have to look at it anymore. Maybe he could get Frigga to take a look at it before he had to return to the market.
With a shudder, he looked towards the bed. This might be the very last night he spent on it. Well, better catch a good night of sleep then, right? Yeah, because it was so damn likely that he'd be able to sleep now.
Still, he curled up under the blanket, his hands pressed against the reactor as if that would make it hurt any less. He had no fucking idea what was happening, although he figured that it had to do with the damn apple that Loki had made him eat.
Maybe, if he was lucky, that thing would kill him.
Immediately after thinking that, he bit his cheek. No matter what had happened, he had never been suicidal. He wasn't about to become so after Loki. If you died, would you want to see your loved ones perish in grief? Loki wouldn't want it. He'd been possessive, protective; he wouldn't want to see Tony harming himself.
Except that Loki killed himself, so he can't really be considered a role model, can he.
A quiet knock on the door interrupted the spiralling of Tony's thoughts and he sat up on the bed, wondering who could possibly be out there. The only possibilities that came to his mind where Frigga, which was highly unlikely, or maybe Fandral. Possibly a squad of guards to drag him back to the market.
"Yeah?" he called out nervously. "Come in." Guards wouldn't have knocked, right?
He was proven right when the door opened to reveal Fandral in the doorway, an actual small barrel under his arm and two jugs in one hand. "Hey," he greeted carefully. "Do you... want to talk about it?"
Tony shot him a look that probably made the "Seriously? No" completely unnecessary.
Fandral nodded as if he hadn't expected anything else. Raising the hand with the two jugs, he asked: "Do you want to drink and forget about it?"
"Hell yeah."
Alcohol was as good of a painkiller as anything else. They sat on the bed for what felt like hours while Tony discovered that, for one, he had been sober for almost a year now and, second, apparently really underestimated Asgardian mead. Also, he had apparently turned from the silly party drunk he had been before all of this started into an emotional wreck, because somewhere into his fourth jug, he found himself uncontrollably sobbing on Fandral's shoulder, craving someone who would take him and just hold him tightly and at the same time despising anyone who wasn't Loki.
He let Fandral do it because he was drunk enough to convince his brain that it didn't matter.
The next morning, he woke with nausea crawling in his stomach and his head pounding with both the hangover and the kind of headache you got when you cried for hours on end. The worst, though, was the burning pain in his chest.
With a groan, Tony curled in on himself and squeezed his eyes shut tightly, freezing when he heard a quiet snore. He blinked a few times, trying to ignore the too-bright light, and spotted Fandral next to him on the bed. The view made him even more nauseous. Oh God. They hadn't – nothing had happened, right? Tony didn't remember anything much except for having cried embarrassingly much, but they were both fully clothed and although Fandral was splayed out over half of the bed, laying on his back, he wasn't in any actual bodily contact to Tony.
Slowly, the inventor sat up and bit his lip to suppress a whimper at the flare of pain the movement caused. He stumbled into the bathroom, where he practically ripped open the top buttons of the pyjama top.
The sight that greeted him, together with the residual nausea of the hangover, made him collapse on his knees in front of the toilet as he heaved up what little he had eaten in the past few days. Again, tears were welling up in his eyes, and he squeezed them shut tightly while he retched.
He flinched when there was suddenly a hand on his shoulder. Taking a deep breath, he looked up at Fandral. The blond was apparently hungover himself, even though it was apparently nowhere near as bad as Tony felt.
"What in Hel's name is that?" Fandral blurted out when he caught sight of Tony's chest.
The inventor struggled to get to his feet, trying to suppress the nausea churning in his stomach, and bent over the sink to rinse out his mouth several times before he replied hoarsely: "I have no fucking idea." He turned towards the full-wall mirror again and carefully ran a finger through the bloody mess around the reactor. At a sudden spike of a pain, he stopped and tried to close his shaking fingers around the sharp edge he had felt. Gritting his teeth, he held his breath and pulled it out in one swift motion, crying out in pain. Incredulously, he stared at the tiny, bloody shard in his palm. He felt about ready to faint then and there. "Oh God," he choked out, dropping the piece of shrapnel to the floor as he swayed dangerously on his feet. "Fuck. Fuck."
Fandral's hands came up to steady him as he repeated: "What is that?"
Tony swallowed rapidly. "Shrapnel," he managed to get out. "I got – I got metal shards in my chest. After an explosion. Hence this thing." He pointed at the reactor, the glass plate slightly bloodied in some places, dimming the blue light. "And now, apparently, that fucking apple is rejecting them and – oh fuck, what if it tries to get the reactor out, too? I can't – that wouldn't – I don't have a damn breast bone and I'm missing a good third of my lungs, I'm pretty damn sure that even the apple can't repair that." He was hyperventilating and it fucking hurt, but he couldn't bring himself to calm down. If already these tiny shards hurt like this, what would it feel like if his body actually tried to force the reactor out? Not even mentioning the unpleasant death by internal bleeding or whatever was going to follow.
"Anthony!" Fandral snapped, in a tone that suggested he wasn't saying his name for the first time. "Breathe!"
"Breathe, Anthony, come on. Deep breaths. For me? Just a few more."
Tony gasped for air, trying to count to four on each inhale and exhale. Fandral's hands were firmly clenched around his shoulders, not hard enough to hurt, but grounding.
"Okay," he wheezed, "okay, I'm okay, I'm sorry. I'm just – that's not how I want to die, really."
"You won't," Fandral immediately responded, but even in the state he was in, Tony noticed the difference between his you won't and Loki's. Fandral's was a hastily spoken reassurance, with good intent, no doubt, but it lacked something. With Loki, these two words would have been an order and a promise at the same time. It was different, and there was no way it would ever have the same effect.
Still, he forced himself to breathe in deeply, cringing at the pain in his chest. Alright. Breathing wasn't too difficult. He could do that without Loki's help.
"Come back to bed," Fandral said quietly. "Lay down for a bit. I will fetch Eir or one of the healers."
Tony nodded, letting the other man lead him back into the main room. He collapsed back onto the mattress, his knees weak and his stomach still churning unpleasantly. The pounding of his head was a fitting addition to the mixture. Weakly, he smiled up at the swordsman, murmuring an apology.
"Don't worry," Fandral replied with a small smile. He did an admirable job at covering up that he had no idea how to deal with the situation; Tony would almost have been fooled. "I will just –" He was interrupted by the door opening and turned around while the inventor pushed himself upright on his elbows with a wince. "Y-your highness?" Fandral stammered and Tony flinched. Did he have to leave now?
"Fandral," Frigga's voice greeted, just a small hint of well-controlled surprise in her voice. "What brings you here?"
"Um," the swordsman uttered eloquently. "Well. That's..."
"You're making it awkward, idiot," Tony groaned from behind him. Frigga sidestepped Fandral and froze for a second when she caught sight of the inventor's chest. Seemed to be a common reaction by now. "G'morning," he greeted with a weak smile and, with a glance towards Fandral, added: "Your majesty."
She actually rolled her eyes at him as she stepped up to his bedside and sat down on the edge of the mattress. More in her mother-voice than the Queen of Asgard-tone, she demanded: "What happened?"
Tony grimaced and sank back into the pillow behind him. "Where do you want me to start?" he asked back and ran his fingers through the blood on his chest, wincing as he felt for the next shard.
"At the beginning, of course," she responded, taking a hold of his wrist and pulling it away from the reactor's rim. "I can heal that," she offered, frowning down at the cuts, oozing blood, that were starting to form where the shards were trying to break the surface.
Tony flinched and shook his head, immediately regretting the movement as it made his headache even worse. "Please don't," he responded hurriedly. At her questioning glance, he elaborated: "They'd just open up again. I'd rather just let it happen at once than keep healing it and letting it open again." He swallowed, his throat feeling dry, and began to recount what had happened since the coronation. He tried to keep it as neutral as possible, giving Loki as little fault in the events as he was able to, although he couldn't quite hide the bitterness in his tone as he told her about the apple and what it was causing now.
Although he had done his best to keep it short, his throat hurt by the time he was finished and he took a moment to just breathe – it didn't do his composure any good to talk about Loki to this extent, he felt like he might break out in tears again if he mentioned his name another time. After a while, he carefully cleared his throat, avoiding Frigga's eyes as he forced himself to say: "I'd like to... to ask for something. If that's – if that's okay."
God, he was going to be lost on the slave market. He'd been belligerent and defiant before, but now? Loki had made him soft, had spoiled him and that was how he had managed to keep Tony from fighting – he hadn't had to. There had been nothing he had had to fight for. And now? He was asking whether it was acceptable to ask for something.
Maybe, his next owner would manage to keep him.
"Of course it is," Frigga replied, a thumb stroking over the back of his hand that she hadn't let go of, not caring about the blood that it probably got on her. "Ask, dear."
Tony swallowed again, staring out of the window while his free hand fiddled with the bed sheets. "I'd, um. I wanted to ask, because... because of this now." He gestured towards the reactor vaguely. "If it would be alright, I'd like to... to stay until it's, well, done with whatever it does there before I go... back to the market. I don't think damaged slaves sell very good and the traders usually cull those who're unlikely to bring profit. 's not the way I'd want to go." He managed a forced little smile, but still didn't dare to look up at Frigga.
The movement on his hand had stilled somewhere during his sentence. Quietly, he heard Frigga say: "Speaking of the market. That is what I came here to talk to you about."