Epilogue

Thor found his father in what was once his mother's study. Seated in a chair hardly grand enough for the king of Asgard, Odin was adding wood to the hearth when he arrived. No one had thought to touch her things. Her books, her daggers, her herbs… They all lay where she had last left them, as if they bore her touch. He understood why his father retreated here when the nights were quiet and the sun had set. He empathized far more than he would ever let on—Thor mourned her loss daily, as they all did.

He just had the decency to go on living in her absence.

It had all began as any war did. Thor led his men and women warriors into battle to settle the rioting realms, to calm the rebellious troublemakers. Asgard had always been good to its subjects. There were far worse creatures roaming the deep seas of space, and the kings of Odin's line had seen to the safety of thousands over the centuries. Battle eventually quieted the dissenters, the deluded who thought they might lead better. Did they not realize the great weight of a crown? Did they not know the discomfort of a throne?

The common people, once liberated from oppressive warmongers, thanked Thor and his men for what they'd done. They sang praises of Lady Sif's prowess in battle, and of Volstagg's impressive girth. They offered flowers and thanks as Thor silenced the outspoken, doing all he could to restore peace throughout the realms for his father's name. Never once did the fight venture to Jotunheim: there was no need to reconquer a barren wasteland. Laufey's kind had been muzzled years ago, with Loki to thank for that.

Loki. Oh Loki. He'd wanted to lead armies too. When he'd first returned to Asgard, he was as he once was. Unfortunately, the men wouldn't follow the old Loki into battle. He was the master of magic, not sword, and he begrudgingly left his brother alone with Odin and Frigga before taking his journey across the worlds.

"He'll be a strategist," Odin had insisted when Thor expressed his concern. He'd known of Loki's desire to fight, to be relevant after his lengthy absence. His little brother left Earth a war hero, but he'd come back to Asgard as a conjurer, a mischief maker—so said his reputation, anyway. His parents had done what they could to shield the common folk of Loki's wrongdoings, but the elite had their suspicions. They remembered the ruin that was left in the wake of his kingship. After all, his ruling led to the destruction of the Bifrost Bridge.

They didn't know it had been Thor's hammer that severed the ties between the realms and set off the chain of events that would lead to open rebellion against Asgard. They blamed Loki for the disaster, and Odin thought it best that he not correct them. Thor was to be king, after all. When the fighting calmed, he was to take his father's place at long last and rule Asgard—it was his birthright, his duty. A king did not have a sordid past. His banishment was long forgotten now, his father had assured him. He ought not to taint their minds.

Thor returned from the battles a hero, welcomed home by mother, father, and brother. But it was then that he'd seen the exuberance fall from Loki's features. With less enthusiasm, his brother followed him around the castle, half-heartedly requesting for stories of war. He then followed him right into conflict with the dark elves when the villains raided Asgard—when they killed Frigga.

He'd stood by Thor's side as they set their mother's body adrift, as all of Asgard wept for her. Murdered. Murdered protecting Jane, who'd been riddled with the Aether at the time. Jane Foster in Asgard. Jane Foster responsible for Frigga's death—so it was in Loki's eyes.

Light had triumphed over darkness once more. They'd destroyed Malekith, hidden the Aether away across the galaxy in trusted hands. Jane survived, their love rekindling over the ruins of his ancestral home. Once more, Thor was hailed the hero. When he'd returned, his father hosted feasts in his honour. The common people held parades in his name. Never would they know that Loki had plotted the scheme to deceive Malekith and his lieutenants in the first place, that he'd sustained a near life-ending wound in the process, or that Jane discovered a way to transport dark elves between realms during the Convergence.

The supporting players had no songs sung about them, no speeches made in their honour. And just as before, Thor had seen his brother slink back into the darkness. His mother's words hummed in his ear at that moment, murmuring of the shadow Thor cast, and of the light Loki needed.

The light Loki deserved.

But how was he to juggle Loki's needs when his father crumbled more and more with each passing day? How was he to attend to them both when Jane waited for him on Earth, when his human companions hoped he would join them in their conquest to keep the planet safe? How was he to care for any of them with his broken heart, so wounded with the loss of his mother that it burned him?

He hid the pain better than they did. He kept his grief private, masked away beneath a grim expression and a hardened look. He too was a fractured man, but he knew the lives of millions depended on his actions. As Asgardian royalty, he took his position seriously at long last. As an Avenger, he wanted to protect people, to save all those other mothers in dire circumstances.

Perhaps one day, if he saved enough mothers, the guilt he felt for the death of his own would ebb away.

For now, it kept him grounded, gave him focus. There was no time for open despair, not when the royal palace still lay in ruins, and thousands of average Asgardians felt the loss of their loved ones, taken both from the wars between the other realms and the invasion of the dark elves. Even if the light had won in the end, a dark cloud still hovered over Asgard, and he felt the stare of a thousand eyes looking to Odin, to him, for relief.

"Father."

His voice felt like an intrusion. He'd never felt like he belonged in his mother's study—he'd been prone to knocking things over as a boy. She always smiled when he'd made a mess of things, gently chastising him for his clumsiness before cleaning the disarray herself. Thor grew out of his awkwardness in time, moving as elegantly as any warrior might, but his mother continued to smile gently at him, and Thor honoured her privacy.

"I have not decided whether I ought to remove her things," Odin mused, his eyes on the flames flickering in the hearth. "Where would I put them? Should I burn them, as we did her?"

"I see no reason to alter them," Thor remarked as his gaze flickered around the room briefly. "It harms no one that this room remained untouched."

The silence that followed hinted at his father's distraction. Clearing his throat, Thor shut the door and strolled toward the fire.

"We must discuss Loki."

"Must we?" Odin asked, his white eyebrows inching up his forehead.

His father's distaste was palpable, and Thor was glad Loki was not around to see it. Still, something glimmered in the old man's eye at the mention of his brother's name. "What happened in my absence?"

He waited patiently, even pulled up a chair to sit across from his father. The shadows made scenes over their faces, a story for someone else to decipher.

"He sought to counsel me in kingly business," Odin said at last. It was then that he looked away from the flames, engaged for the time being. "He tried to teach me about war and conquest… Me."

"I'm sure he was only trying to help."

"Loki is still as headstrong as he once was," the man sighed. His cheek twitched. "He overstepped his boundaries, and I put him in his place. It seems I must always do that."

"Father—"

"And I see a darkness in his eyes these days," Odin continued, gesturing to the door as if Loki stood behind it with his ear pressed to the wood. "He is retreating, growing quiet… Scheming."

"Mother's death has hit him hard," Thor told him, hoping that Odin might see the similarities between them. "He is mourning."

"We are all mourning." Thor watched his father rise, still an impressive figure in his old age, and wander to Frigga's abandoned desk. His fingertips ran along the wood, a wood free from dust and dirt, before stopping to flip through one of her books. "He is scheming."

"I'd know if he was scheming."

"Would you?" He looked back to Thor with a surprised expression. "No one can ever know him. He might have been raised here, but he holds secrets inside. He carries his father's malice… I've seen it."

Thor's hands tightened into fists. Malice. He'd noticed no malice in his brother—not for a long time. "You don't give him enough credit."

"And you give him too much. Have you been so blind as of late not to notice?"

Thor bit down on his back teeth, jaw clenched as he leaned back in his chair. Perhaps he had been ignoring the signs that something was amiss with his brother. Loki had been quieter, more reserved. He'd stopped socializing with the others at evening meals, and had spent a lot of time wrapped up in old texts. Frigga's death was the trigger, Thor was sure of it, but he knew something more had happened while he was away restoring peace throughout the realms. Loki and Odin's interactions had deteriorated lately, and Thor suddenly couldn't remember the last time he'd seen them in a conversation.

Perhaps Asgard was toxic to him.

He shook his head. "I will speak with him."

"No." Odin closed the book abruptly and rested his hand atop it. "No, then he will suspect we have noticed the changes in him… He'll grow more secretive."

"But—"

"Loki still lusts for power," Odin argued, his voice growing stronger. "He wanted an army, but I would never allow that. He wanted to dictate troop movements during the pacifying of the realms, but he reached too far again."

"Loki has changed," Thor said slowly with a slight shake of his head. "Midgard changed him. I'm sure he was trying to be helpful, to be a useful son… Perhaps you can only see the past when you look at him?"

"I see the present and the future… Never the past."

He tried not to roll his eyes. Thor had noticed a change in his father too since his mother's death, but he assumed they would never dissect him as they did Loki.

"That woman… His human…" Odin returned to his seat, leaning forward to address Thor. "She made him happy, did she not?"

He replied without hesitation. "Very much so, yes."

"Bring her here then," the old man said, much to Thor's surprise. "She can distract him from whatever plots he is hatching."

He couldn't believe his ears. Bring a human to Asgard? Odin had barely tolerated Jane's presence, and she was in the kingdom out of a necessity for her survival. His father didn't care that Thor felt something for the woman—he equated her to an unwelcome goat at a feast, if he wasn't mistaken.

"Loki will see through that," Thor insisted after a moment's consideration. Max. He hadn't thought of Loki's lover in quite some time, not since they left Earth behind. "We both know your rules… No humans on Asgard, and no Asgardians on Midgard."

"Except you," Odin said softly. "Your fondness for the realm surprises me."

Thor sighed. He wasn't about to debate the merits of cradling Earth to his chest like a wounded creature—Odin merely saw the place as another realm under his dominion, and there was nothing Thor could do to change that.

"Bring your girl back too," his father told him, and by the tone of his voice, his words were not suggestions. "She and Loki's human may stay in Asgard so that Loki will not be suspicious. Tell him it's a surprise… or a reward for his aid in destroying Malekith."

"I don't want to trick him." Nor did he feel comfortable dragging a poor human to Asgard under false pretenses. He hadn't the slightest idea where Loki and his lady love were in their relationship, but he knew they hadn't seen one another since they were separated on that beach in New Jersey. Years had passed—two, at the most.

"It's not a trick." His father's voice had finally softened. "If he is mourning your mother, the human's presence may help him. If his darkness is temporary, then she will help it pass. Bringing her here will help him."

He disliked being manipulated by his father now as much as he always had, but these days he had no strength to fight him. His time and attention went to other things. Earth had been unattended since he left Malekith's destruction in England. A part of him suspected his father sought to bring Jane here for the same purpose as Max: she'd keep him grounded in Asgard, too interested in their society to have any interest in returning home. Jane would welcome the opportunity to come back, with her books and measuring kits and scientific instruments, but her presence in the realm meant Thor too would be grounded there.

"I make no promises that she will agree to this," Thor said as he stood, his mind made up, "but I will ask."

"And I make no promises that I will not hold him accountable for the trouble he causes," Odin told him in turn, his gaze wandering back to the fire, "when he finally does get into trouble."

Frowning, Thor strode toward the door, their conversation coming to a natural end. As he grasped the handle, he heard his father utter a few parting words.

"And he will wander back to trouble, Thor." His voice was distant again, as if his mind had already started to drift into the beyond. "He's slipping away again… Catch him before he falls."

Thor closed his eyes, his hand tightening around the doorknob. Must he be the net for all of them then? Every single one of them was falling, in this realm and the next.

Did no one notice Thor losing his grip too?

AUTHOR'S NOTES:

Hello my darlings!

We've come to the end of Ghost Town at last. The prologue for The Long Winter will be posted momentarily, so keep an eye out for that!

Just a note: I didn't feel it necessary to explain every single piece of what happened in The Dark World's plot. The dark elves still came. Frigga still died. Loki almost died. He didn't take over—he's not pretending to be Odin. Cool? Cool. I'm sure you're all aware of just how AU this series is, so there you have it.

I wanted to thank those of you who stuck through this story right to the very end. This felt like an experiment in storytelling for me, and I think I've taken a lot away from it. I wanted to include every single little detail that I could, whether it helped move the plot along or not, and I've now learned that that probably isn't a great thing. I mean, this story is well over 300,000 words, which is insane to me. I spent roughly 13 months writing this, and you guys have been troopers for taking that journey with me. Not everyone liked what happened this time around (hellooo abortion sequence), but you can't make everyone happy. I'd like to think Max and Loki have made great leaps since the start of this story, both as a couple and as individuals, and I'm excited to continue that growth in the next story.

Last time, I tried to message each individual reviewer to thank them for taking the time to leave some feedback. That took months, and I didn't even get a chance to message everyone. So, I'm just going to say it here. You guys are partially the reason I keep going with fanfiction. The more I get into the "real" writing world, the easier it would be to stop writing these stories and focus on ones that will make me money. But you guys are just as invested in these characters as I am—and that makes me so fucking thrilled beyond belief. Whenever I'm feeling down or worried about an update, there's always someone who brightens my days in the reviews.

I have a core group of reviewers who leave me feedback with every chapter. You guys are amazing. People ought to thank you, because you guys genuinely help me find the motivation sometimes to update as often as I do. So, thank you. From the bottom of my heart, thank you.

Now, I'm not going to get too emotional… because in 30 seconds I'm going to write the AN for the prologue for The Long Winter, and I'm just too excited.

Know that you're all amazing. I love you. Max loves you. Loki loves you. SEE YOU IN THE LONG WINTER, BBIES!