Author's note: Thank you to all my beautiful reviewers. You all rock. *hugs* Here, have another chapter before the weekend. :)
Disclaimer: Loki is, sadly, not mine. This incarnation of him sort of is, but also owes a lot to interviews I've seen with Tom Hiddleston talking about his thoughts on the depth of the character.
Loki stood at the rail of the ferry beside Grainne and watched the coastline slip by. Greg and Liz had retreated inside out of the cold, but he found it invigorating and had wanted to stay. He felt ridiculously glad that his tiny companion had elected to stay with him despite the bright colour the wind had whipped into her cheeks and the way it tossed and tangled her hair around her. Glancing down, he noticed her knuckles were white around the rail and with a smug smile had his chance to ask the question he felt he'd heard all too often lately: "Are you all right?"
She looked up at him with a strained laugh. "You've been waiting for this moment, haven't you?" she asked. He gave her his most innocent smile, earning him another laugh. She shook her head. "I'm not a fan of boats. Never have been. Was a huge disappointment to my father, since he adored them."
He raised one eyebrow as he realised this was the first time she'd spoken about her father. Hesitantly he said, "You've never mentioned him before. When you and Greg speak about your childhood, it's always been about your mother." He let the sentence trail off into an implied question, suddenly wary. Some of that wariness was of probing further than he was welcome and being pushed away, he knew, but some of it was deeper and more inexplicable. He was starting to recognise that feeling as a topic that was skirting close to something that ought to be important to him.
Grainne sighed and shrugged. "Most of the stories involving Dad aren't as happy," she admitted. "We had a... complicated relationship. It was fine when I was little and thought the sun shone out of his every orifice." Her laughter this time was a flat, bleak sound. "It was only when I got old enough to start developing opinions that didn't match his that it all fell apart. He and Mum went their separate ways when I was a baby, so I used to go and spend weekends with him regularly. It got to the point where a good weekend was one where we didn't end up screaming at each other."
Shifting his hand to cover hers on the rail, he gave it a gentle squeeze. "What sort of things did you fight about?" he asked.
"My imperfections, mostly," she replied with a bitter twist of her lips. "What it boiled down to, and what I eventually had to come to terms with, was that I was never going to be able to make him proud of me or gain his full love and acceptance unless I became someone else entirely. Someone I didn't want to be. And it was made harder by the fact that I did truly love him, and I wanted nothing more than for him to just love and accept who I was instead of constantly finding fault and pointing out who I wasn't. And because I loved him, I couldn't bring myself to just tell him to take a running jump, no matter how much I often wanted to."
Silent tears were running down her cheeks and he felt his throat constrict. Remembering how reassuring he had found her embrace after a nightmare, he turned and gathered her against him. She slipped her arms around his waist and buried her face against his chest. While part of him was very definitely aware of her closeness, another part was turned inward. Her words had moved him, not just in sympathy for her, but for himself as well. A succession of disjointed images flashed through his mind: a small boy - no, two small boys - walking along an open walkway with a tall, imposing man; himself, older, always off to one side watching, slightly outside everything; another young man, surrounded by cheers and laughter and people seeking his attention; himself again, confronting the older man with a wealth of pain and anguish. He couldn't make out faces clearly, nor hear words, but the emotions hit him like a tonne of bricks.
"And I couldn't become that person either, because it was already someone else." He spoke the words softly, intending them just for himself, but the figure in his arms stilled.
"You had a sibling." He barely caught the soft exclamation that was almost a question, but not quite.
He nodded, despite the fact that she couldn't see him. "A... brother. Father's favourite." He wished the images that had come to him had been clear enough to see faces. He thought his brother had been fair, but nothing more. Did they look alike, apart from colouring? And what did his father look like?
Grainne looked up at him, her eyes red but full of wonder and sympathy. "I can't even imagine what that must have been like," she murmured, lifting one slim hand to lay along the curve of his jaw. "Competing against an impossible ideal is bad enough, but to be compared to another real person and found wanting..." She trailed off, shaking her head. "Ah, Loki, I'm so sorry."
"It's not your fault," he replied, surprised. Her hand was warm against his cheek and he struggled to resist the urge to turn his head and nuzzle her palm. "You couldn't have known."
"But I'm still sorry there was such pain in your life." She smiled up at him, a beautiful, sad smile that made his throat close up again. "You deserve better."
His arms tightened around her convulsively. "I think I've found it," he whispered. His mind was reeling, both from the partial memory and the sudden upswell of emotion. "You've been so good to me. All of you, but you especially."
A sudden flurry of activity as the ferry reached the dock broke the spell of the moment, and they drew back from each other a little sheepishly. Greg and Liz emerged onto the deck and hailed them, then frowned as they drew near enough to see Grainne's tear-stained face. Greg scowled at him, but before he could speak in his defence, Grainne shook her head. "We got onto talking about Dad."
Greg's expression cleared. "Ah," was all he said as he closed the remaining distance and gave her a fierce hug. Liz stepped up to her other side and wrapped them both in an embrace. Loki shifted awkwardly, feeling he had no place there, until Liz grinned at him and held out one arm.
"Come on, since this has turned into a group hug!" With a self-conscious laugh, he allowed himself to be drawn into the knot. Three arms immediately wrapped around him.
When they finally broke apart, he added diffidently, "I also remembered that I have a brother. And... a father..." He paused, uncertain how to express the complicated emotions the fragmented memory had brought up.
Grainne came to his rescue, saying, "Who sounds depressingly like mine."
Greg and Liz both winced and Liz darted forward to give him another brief hug. "Poor bugger. This doesn't mean you're going to be splitting just yet, does it, though?" Greg asked in concern.
Loki shook his head. "I remember they exist, that's all. Not who they are, or where they are, or anything at all useful. So if you'll have me..."
Before he could finish the sentence, Grainne and Liz had each slipped an arm through one of his and started towing him towards the stairs down to the car deck. He grinned. Whatever demons might lie in his past, here and now he felt a warm glow of acceptance.
