This chapter picks up right where the previous one left off. If you didn't just read Ch. 82 "Kings," you might want to take a quick look back at the end of it to refresh your memory. Also, I'm typing this and the stuff at the bottom at 4 AM. So I hope it's, like, in English and so forth.

Beneath

Chapter Eighty-Three – Discovery

Jane sat there, speechless. There was something utterly raw in Loki's face and voice and even his words, something that left her with no doubt that every word he'd spoken was true. "They," whoever "they" were, disliked him, distrusted him, conspired against him. He'd been hurt and angered. He was angry now, but it was tempered, and he was clearly waiting for her response. She had the distinct impression he wanted her to extend sympathy. To take his side. And yet, compassionate as Jane could be, as understanding as she kept trying to be with him for so many complicated reasons, she was first and foremost practical. Loki had spoken in uncharacteristic earnest openness of a tale that pulled at her heartstrings, yet as little as she knew, she knew perfectly well he'd painted far from a complete picture. Loki hadn't spent his brief kingship sitting around innocently ruling Asgard and being persecuted.

"That sounds awful," she finally said. "They thought you…you just wanted to be king so you hurt your father somehow? Odin?" she clarified in hopes of avoiding further chilling statements about killing his birth father.

"Yes. And I did no such thing." He hurt me. Ripped me open and pulled me out and-

"Why did you tell Thor his father was dead?"

Loki's eyes snapped back to hers. Thor. His father. Of course it would come back to Thor. "If I was going to prove myself, that I was just as worthy of the throne as he was, more so, then I had to be free from his shadow."

"But he was already on Earth. How did breaking his heart help?" she asked quietly. Though she viewed his words as an attempt to manipulate her emotions, it was easy not to get angry with him. She wasn't angry. She hurt for Thor, for the weight she'd realized he was carrying the night they spent under the stars, though she hadn't known what it was at the time. And she hurt for Loki, because even if he was speaking only half of the truth, the half he did speak was sincere and reeked of wounds of his own.

"I took from him no more than what was taken from me."

"What was taken from you, Loki?"

Loki suddenly leaned far forward, across the low storage shelves that separated him, putting himself into her space; Jane pulled back, startled, but caught herself and then remained still.

"Everything," Loki rasped out between barely parted lips.

"I don't…" I don't understand! Jane wanted to shout, in frustration rather than anger. Always, always he spoke in these deliberately vague and elusive terms, sweeping statements that spoke of pent-up emotions but said nothing concrete, questions instead of answers, answers that deflected the question… For the first time, she thought maybe he actually wanted to tell her all the things that had led to what happened in New Mexico, to what happened in Stuttgart and New York. All the things that even Thor had spoken cryptically of… "He found out things. Things that confirmed what he already believed." Thor had told her that in her hotel room, but he'd never said what "things" he'd found out. "Everything," Loki had said. "Why did you tell Thor his father was dead?" "I took no more from him than he took from me."

Jane sucked in a quick breath as the pieces quite unexpectedly fell together so seamlessly it was hard to imagine they'd ever not formed a whole. Loki took Thor's father away. Loki's father, his family, was taken from him. "You found out you were adopted during that time, didn't you? They never told you, but somehow you found out."

Loki sat up straight again, frowned, then stood and took a few steps away, just enough to no longer be facing Jane. He hadn't wanted her to know that. You practically dangled it before her and waited for her to bite. He hadn't wanted her to know any of this. She used to ask you questions and you would ignore her. Or insult her. Or distract her. Or lie to her. He gave a short dark laugh. They each remain perfectly viable options. Why do you not avail yourself of them? There is no need for her to know any of this. She only needs to know that you won't harm these people without cause. That is all. His eyes drifted closed. Why? Because he did. He did want her to know. He did want her to understand. He did want her to say he was correct, that of course he'd done the right thing, that they were monsters, that… That I am not a monster.

A dark smile spread slowly across his lips as he realized just how far out of touch with reality he'd slid. Will you never cease with this sentiment? he asked himself.

"Loki?" Jane said behind him, her voice tentative, and closer than it should have been. She'd stood and approached him and he hadn't even heard her. He ignored her.

You think you've understood something? No, Jane. No. You have only scratched the surface, he thought, and part of him wished he could say it aloud. But that would simply be more of the same, tempting her to push harder, to look deeper. Had he already said too much? Enough that she could guess the truth? No, he answered himself. She is never going to know. Not everything. And she is never going to understand. And she is never going to think your actions against Thor were correct. And she is never going to be confused about who the monster is here.

Jane watched him, or more precisely his back, and waited for him to speak, to give him the chance to say whatever he wanted before she stepped in and almost certainly said the wrong thing, but the moment dragged on and on, and eventually she could remain silent no longer. "It must have been like having the rug ripped out from under you."

Loki took another moment to be certain he would betray nothing unintended, then turned to face Jane. "It was a surprise," he said in about the same manner that he might have remarked on the weather.

"How did you find out?"

"Odin told me," he said after a brief hesitation to consider his answer.

"Were you arguing?" Jane asked. Their relationship was pretty terrible, judging by how Loki had spoken of Odin, and she pictured the revelation coming out in the heat of an argument, much like some of Loki's revelations to her, maybe even in a hurtful and belittling manner that would have fueled his rage.

Loki took a bit longer to think that one over. It had felt like an argument. "Confrontation" was perhaps more appropriate, though. "Not particularly," he finally said.

Jane frowned, frustrated with yet another answer that said nothing and hid volumes. "I guess…I can understand why you resent your father, that he kept this from you for so long." It wasn't so unlike something Loki might say, she thought, in spirit, at least, for she too was trying to say little and hide volumes. She did understand resenting being deceived about something so fundamental. She'd burned with resentment against SHIELD when they lied to her about why they wanted her to go to Tromso, and that was nothing compared to finding out you were adopted when you were thirty – Jane swallowed – when you were a thousand-plus years old. But Loki didn't just resent Odin. He was furious at him. He hated him. And hadn't his mother also deceived him? But he'd never sounded resentful of her at all. One of the first things Jane had understood about Loki beyond his actions against Earth and against her was that he loved his mother, and his mother loved him. And Thor…

"I really-"

"Did Thor know all along?"

"That I wasn't really his brother? No."

"Then why do you-"

"Please, please, spare me from yet another interrogation about Thor. Do you never tire of it?"

"But I don't understand why you hate him so much. He didn't keep the truth from you. Did he…no. I can't imagine that he would have treated you badly because of it. He never even mentioned it to me. But you tried to kill him, Loki. Why?"

"It wasn't about that. He didn't even know about it then. There were plans in motion…" No. It is not her business.

"Plans? Plans he would have stopped? He wouldn't have let you try to destroy Jotunheim, that's why you tried to make sure he didn't make it back to Asgard?"

Loki gave her a tight smile. He wouldn't have said so on his own, but neither did he see any point in denying it, he realized with a sigh. "I didn't think he'd be quite so fervently opposed to it at the time – Thor always hated Frost Giants every bit as much as I, one of the few things we have in common, actually – but yes." In truth, as he thought about it, he hadn't been so sure that Thor would try to stop him, perhaps he'd thought Thor might even support him, but that was all theoretical because he hadn't really thought about that at all. He simply hadn't wanted Thor to be a part of it. It should have been his moment of triumph, his time to take all the glory and praise for himself, and to stand in no one's shadow at all. He was king; Thor was out of the picture and thoroughly irrelevant and he should have stayed that way. Saving Odin – how he scoffed at his folly and naivete in that now – personally erasing the Jotun king from existence, then capping off his heroic acts by ridding the cosmos of the entirety of the Frost Giant blight…his plan had been masterful, absolutely masterful. He should have had the Destroyer blast Thor to smithereens, so there would be nothing left for Mjolnir to return to.

"But…," Jane began, mind whirling with the avalanche of answers and emotion and what had to be truth, and trying to dig her way out from under it, "Thor went back to Asgard. And he did stop you. He told me about it, briefly. But Loki…it was…I mean…" It was genocide. He'd said it himself, before. He'd wanted to kill all of them. But she knew there was going to be no reasoning with him on that. None of her prior attempts at reasoning had really had any effect on him, she thought. To the extent that he perhaps thought a little better of humans than he once had – and she believed that he did – it wasn't because of any logical arguments on her part, or any stacks of papers to try to make him see the enormity of what he'd done. It was because he'd lived and worked here with her, among humans. She decided to skip beyond the question of Jotunheim. "When Thor came back, then…he became king? Because he's the oldest?" Thor had told her he was acting-king, but he'd never said he was king-king.

The oldest. As if that ever mattered. If I'd been older they would have come up with some excuse and Thor would still have been named the successor. "Thor never became king. Odin woke up from his little nap, probably because his precious son's life was threatened. You know, when I was a child, I was told that I was born to be a king. I still am a king, Jane. It was given to me by law. I never ceded the throne to anyone else. Ironic, isn't it?" Loki asked with a bitter laugh. "What they believed I'd done to get the throne was done to me – it was usurped."

Jane frowned and thought hard over how she should respond. She wanted so badly to be blunt with him, to tell him, of course they dethroned you, you'd just tried to murder your own brother and commit genocide! But Loki did not respond well to such confrontation, and regardless of how justified Odin surely was in not letting Loki keep the crown, she knew without a doubt that Loki's feelings were genuine, that this was part of his heart and soul he was opening up to her, more than he ever had before, and she wasn't going to trample on that to make a point. Making points, making him see the error of his ways, it wasn't her job, she'd already realized. If he was ever going to figure that out he'd have to do it on his own, and if he wanted to talk about it, she could listen to that, too. "I'm guessing they don't see it that way," she finally said, the most neutral response she could think of that would still keep him talking, she hoped.

Loki forced a breath out through his nose. "Of course they don't."

So much for talking. "Is that why you wanted Earth, then? You wanted somewhere else you could be king?"

Loki's brow furrowed slightly as he tried to think about it – not so much to answer, for somewhere along the line he'd decided he'd done enough answering, but rather to understand for himself. He felt tired now, drained by the outbursts he'd never meant to make, more things he'd never really meant to speak of, but had somehow ceased to care about keeping them from Jane. It was difficult to think; he felt as though he were encased in mud. Why had he ever wanted this mortal world, with its people full of illnesses, so unwilling to bend to his rule despite his superior power, unwilling to admit that they were better off without the freedom they so stubbornly clung to? Thanos had sent him here. But he'd gone willingly. He'd wanted something from it. To punish Thor, he remembered. And Odin. It wasn't just about Thor and Odin, though. It was about him. He'd wanted something from it for himself. He'd gotten it, too, if only for a little while, little moments of glory, thrills, control, power…

And where had it gotten him? Here, he answered himself with a dose of internal sarcasm as he fixed his eyes on Jane again, standing there so patiently waiting him to further lay his secrets out bare before her. Here, living on a Midgardian continent where no one was really meant to live, his ability to remain here in peace dependent on Jane Foster and now Tony Stark of all people. This was not the end, though. There was still time. There is always time, he thought, letting go of his darkening thoughts.

Jane had asked a question. What was it? he asked himself. She was still watching him quietly, but fidgeting now. Her patience was growing thin; Jane wasn't a particularly patient woman. Ah, he thought with a slight bob of his head. She'd asked why he'd wanted Earth. "I had nothing better to do at the time," he said with a small smirk. The irony of his flippant response was that it was also true. He'd needed something, and Thanos had given him the chance to take Midgard. It hadn't seemed like such a bad deal at the time.

"That's really crass, Loki," Jane said, keeping her voice quiet. People suffered and died…because you had nothing better to do? She thought it wasn't true, though. She wasn't the best in the world at reading people, but the raw emotion of a moment earlier was gone.

"I suppose it is," Loki agreed. And if she wants an apology for that she'll be sorely disappointed. "What brought us here, Jane? I feel quite certain we didn't come out here to discuss my recent past."

Jane drew in a breath, by now easily recognizing the signals from Loki that said this conversation is over. If she disregarded them and pressed further the signals would probably become rude. "Well…we were taking a lunch break. Sort of. Crinkly silver packages."

Loki nodded, then stepped smoothly past Jane and returned to his seat. "I see you ate yours as though you hadn't eaten in a week," he said, picking his up again, never having gotten past the first bite.

"Hey," Jane said, giving his back a dirty look before going back to her seat as well. A bite of hers remained; she'd planned to nibble but instead fixed her eyes on Loki's and popped the rest into her mouth. To her surprise, Loki actually chuckled a bit at that.

"Shall I tell you something…gentler about Asgard?" he asked, taking another bite.

Jane sat back in surprise, then swallowed as quickly as she could. "Please do. I'd like that."

"On Asgard, these," he said, pausing to hold up the oat snack, "are called 'sweet logs.'"

"'Sweet logs?'" Jane repeated, her lips pulling into a lopsided smile. "Kind of small for a log."

"They aren't exactly the same, obviously," he said with disdain, mostly for effect.

"Obviously," Jane agreed with a solemn nod.

"They're larger, and cylindrical. They're served on a small wooden stick, because they're too sticky to eat with your fingers – not that that stops some. When you buy them fresh, they're kept heated just a touch above room temperature, and the vendor drizzles more warm honey over them. They're especially well-liked in winter but they're eaten year-round."

"They sound delicious," Jane said, trying to picture it and coming up with something that looked like a hot dog street vendor, with granola bars drizzled with fresh warm honey over them in the metal cart instead of hot dogs. "I hope I get to try one someday."

Loki pursed his lips for a moment, picturing a sweet log vendor on the edge of Central Market, buying one for Jane. He squeezed his eyes shut for an instant, little more than a long blink, at the incongruity of the image. If Jane ever made it to Asgard again, and if she ever did get to sample a sweet log or some other Asgardian fare, it wouldn't be with him. "They were sold when I was a child, and they were still sold the last time I was free to walk the streets of Asgard, so perhaps you shall."

Jane nodded, looking absently at the computer for a moment, then turned back to Loki. "Loki…I don't know everything that went on in Asgard, of course, but…I'm sorry that they treated you badly. That they thought you'd stolen the throne. That wasn't fair."

Loki sat there, still, looking back at Jane, conscious of his breathing, conscious of his blinking. No one had ever apologized for that. No one had ever admitted an error in judgement. Not Sif or the Warriors Three. Not Heimdall. Not the clerk who hadn't hidden her look of suspicion. Not the servant he'd needed to repeat his orders to. Not the anonymous owners of the stares he'd felt on his back everywhere he went, the whispers he'd heard even when no one was around. And now Jane… You're right. You don't know everything that went on, he thought. But if she wished to extend him kindness – kindness! he thought, the word leaving him at a loss – then he would accept it. This time. He could think of no response, though. You're welcome to address me as "Your Majesty" to compensate for it, he thought, but knew she wouldn't appreciate the humor he saw in it.

He set the snack beside his computer and sat up a little straighter. "Perhaps we should get back to work?"

"Okay," Jane agreed easily. It was going to be hard to concentrate on particle data after everything she'd just learned, and everything that she'd seen. She thought back to the earlier days, when Loki would sometimes tell her some tidbit about Asgard or his life before the South Pole, usually either to taunt her or in a burst of rage, frightening her sometimes to the point of shaking hands and shivers. The things he'd told her then were nothing compared to what he'd told her last night and today, yet they'd both kept their cool and she'd never been afraid – not for herself, anyway – even once. In some ways, it was hard to believe it was the same person.

Jane stole a glance at Loki, and found him doing the same. She gave a resolute nod and jiggled the mouse to wake up the computer. "Right, then, where did we leave off?"

/

/

Over a thousand years of roaming Asgard, free to do as he liked most days, now served Loki well. He crept through the underground labyrinth that made up the high-security cells of the dungeon perfectly visible, not having used any magic at all to get him where he was.

He knew where and when to arrive unseen, for even during war the rear gardens of a popular tavern would be empty in the early post-dawn hours. The gardens were large, giving him enough margin for error in calculating coordinates to enter into Pathfinder's program. He wore his own light armor over one of his ruined tunics and his leather pants – no green in sight – and kept his head down. He slipped inside the tavern, where, to his surprise, one patron actually remained, but he was passed out on the dark wood floor, snoring loudly, and of no concern to Loki at all. He'd hoped to find a forgotten cloak there, for such a thing wasn't uncommon, and indeed there were two. One had a definite feminine look; the other was a charcoal gray with signs of wear, which suited him fine. He slipped it on and pulled up the hood, then made his way back outside.

From there, the next step was child's play. Almost literally. He'd known even in his childhood about the room in each of the towers that housed Einherjar, the room where armor was left for repair and later returned. He and Thor had come across it one day and had a merry time trying out as many of the pieces as they were able to get on, all in front of their Einherjar minder who could not interfere. Now it was simply a matter of ensuring he did not directly cross paths with an actual Einherjar while collecting pieces of armor. With a war underway, it was unlikely to happen anyway; no Einherjar were loitering about.

And so, head angled down in the dim corridors, he passed deeper and deeper through the tunnels and stairways and cell blocks unquestioned, the subtle but unmistakable – to an Einherjar – engravings on his shoulder armor marking him as an inspector. Inspectors reported directly to the First Einherjar on whatever it was he tasked them with, and thus came and went anywhere and everywhere as needed. Loki had only two concerns – there were few inspectors, so it was unlikely but possible that he could run into a real one who would raise an alarm upon seeing an unknown supposed fellow inspector, and the somewhat more likely possibility that he would run into the Chief Jailer who had seen him every day while he was held in a cell here after he was brought back from Midgard in chains and was thus more likely than anyone else here to recognize him even with the helmet covering much of his face.

Thus far, though, he'd encountered no inspectors, and the Einherjar patrolling the dungeons showed him no more interest than a quick look and a nod. He'd seen overcrowded cell after overcrowded cell and allowed himself to stare out of the corner of his eye. He'd already passed two cells full of women, each of them Fire Giants. His eyes widened for a moment before he remembered himself as he approached a cell that was much less crowded, and in which he could make out the basic shape of a woman who could not be a Fire Giant, but as he drew closer he realized she – and her seven cellmates – were Light Elves. Sif must be pleased, Loki thought sarcastically, continuing onward.

He reached the last cell on the lowest level of the dungeon, positioned himself in shadow and from there nodded to the two nearby Einherjar, then began to retrace his steps. Vigdis was not in a prison cell. It was not definitive proof of anything, but it suggested that Thor had noticed the book, read the underlined passage, and acted on it, leaving Vigdis to live in relative freedom while meeting Brokk under Asgard's direction. Of course, she could have simply been executed for treason, but she'd looked young, possibly not even of age. There was no way to be certain; this was, he thought, the best he could do to determine if his plan, such as it was, had worked.

Time now to check on the war effort.

He'd left Midgard on Wednesday May 19, and arrived on Asgard only about a week earlier, on May 11. The date was essentially arbitrary, chosen simply because it was precisely one month after he'd rearranged Thor's book display, enough time for Asgard's use of Vigdis to have brought results, if they'd used her well, even if the likelihood of him being able to observe those results from nothing more than a stroll about Asgard was very low. It was also relatively recent, and would give him an idea of how well – or how poorly – Asgard fared.

It was now approaching midday, and Asgard was busy, but not in the normal way. In a realm where there was little need to hurry, everyone was hurrying. Women far outnumbered men; those who did not normally work had probably stepped in for men who'd donned warriors' armor. Many shops were closed; others had lines out the door. He came to a bakery with a particularly long line, observed the Asgardians waiting, and selected a girl, perhaps twelve or thirteen, with a baby held on her hip and another child of perhaps five or six held by the hand. She would be too distracted by the squirming baby and bored child to scrutinize his face. Taking careful stock of his surroundings with his peripheral vision, he approached her.

"Is there enough bread, child?" he asked quietly, positioning his face toward the sun so that the glint on his freshly repaired and polished helmet would further obscure his features.

The girl turned her face toward him with a sharp look – he'd called her a child when she was already considered a youth – but her expression changed immediately when she saw who was talking to her, or rather who she thought was talking to her. "We have enough. They're just controlling how much of it is sold. We want to make sure there's enough for our Einherjar and all our other warriors. Please don't worry about us. We don't mind standing in line."

"I do!" the little boy at her side piped up.

"Shush, Miki. This man is defending us. I'm sorry," she said, turning briefly back to Loki before focusing on the baby who'd begun to fuss.

"That's all right. Thank you," Loki said, quickly turning away from the girl and the rest of the line, carefully keeping his head down as he went. Defending them, he thought. Hardly. It was a strange sight, though. Children tending children, Asgardians standing in line for bread. Bread possibly made from Midgardian grains, he realized, eyebrows lifting.

Loki continued on, heading east toward an area where there were smatterings of small woods and rocky terrain and low cliffs, places where he could – he hoped – conceal himself without magic and observe the fighting. He knew fighting was taking place somewhere in this direction, for once the Healing Room was behind him, a steady trickle of warriors whose paths he tried to avoid were walking or being carted by horse in the opposite direction.

He heard it well before he saw it. Shouts and dull clashes of metal, familiar in its roiling indistinct cacophony, though he'd never heard it be so very loud before. The wall was still far in the distance; Loki could picture the broad plain they would be fighting on with the wall almost a mile beyond its perimeter. It was, generally speaking , more dangerous for the enemy inside the wall. There was less room to maneuver, it would be easier for the defenders to bottleneck them, and well-trained Asgardians controlled the heights of defensive towers and any other physical structures in the area. Inside the walls, however, lay the prize – every symbol and source of Asgard's power. To take such a fight directly inside the walls as they must have, instead of waiting to bleed Asgard dry outside them, suggested the enemy was confident. Eager. Perhaps overly confident, overly eager. Asgard could perhaps find a way to use that to its advantage…

Loki frowned at himself. This was neither his battle nor his war, and he was here neither to fight it nor to direct it. A rocky outcropping with a perfect overhang was around a quarter of a mile to the south; Loki crept toward it, staying behind the gentle swell of the earth that kept him out of view of those fighting, should anyone happen to look his way.

As the ground sloped upward Loki dropped lower in his stance, until as he approached the edge of the overhang he lowered himself onto his stomach and continued his forward progress with little pushes of his knees and elbows, something he'd learned from the stealth Einherjar many centuries ago. He took off his helmet to avoid reflecting sunlight and drawing attention to himself, and squeezed into the crevice between two waist-high boulders.

At last the fighting was visible before him. Loki's jaw fell open, and with no one around to see it, he didn't bother with trying to hide his reaction. There were thousands of them, perhaps twenty, twenty-five thousand. And he surmised from his earlier visits here that there were likely other battles going on elsewhere. Hundreds of separate or loosely connected battles were underway all across the plain. In most of them the Aesir were severely outnumbered. It was difficult to follow any specific match-up at this distance, amidst constant movement and all the dirt and dust kicked up into the air, but Loki knew the capabilities of the Asgardian fighters, and the capabilities of those from the other realms. The Asgardians were on the whole superior – it was in their culture, their training, their understanding of what it meant to be of Asgard, perhaps even in their very blood – and thus they could withstand the unfavorable odds, but they were not invincible. As Loki watched, a portal opened – the kind enabled by Svartalfheim's talismans, the kind Brokk himself could control – and Vanir warriors poured out of it. Shouts went up; nearby battles reconfigured as the outnumbered Asgardians tried to counter the newly arrived attackers on top of the ones they were already engaging.

Loki's jaw now clenched tightly. Watching this unfold wasn't easy. As much as he hated Asgard's people, as much as he felt betrayed by every single one of them whether or not they had personally acted against him, he'd once believed those beleaguered warriors to be his own people. He'd trained with some of them, sparred with many more. He'd believed his entire life that one day Asgard could be drawn into war again and he would be fighting alongside these men. Alongside…

Thor. Amidst the burnt orange of the Einherjar capes, the teal blue of the Vanir capes, and all the other motley colors against gold and silver metal on the field, Loki caught a glimpse of red. It was on the western edge of the battles, to his left, and this confused Loki for a moment, made him think he was mistaken. Thor would never place himself on a battle's edge – he would want to be right in the thick of it, the precise geographic center of it if he could somehow identify it, or at least in the middle of the largest group of enemy fighters.

But there it was again – another flash of red in the same general location. And then, though he was still surprised, Loki understood. Instead of placing himself in the heart of the battle, where the greatest glory was to be found, he'd placed himself on its periphery, with the heart of Asgard at his back to ensure that no one slipped past. Asgard's last line of defense, Loki thought. What wonders that must do for your sense of self-impor-

All thoughts of Thor and the battle before him disappeared the second Loki heard the skittering of a small stone behind him. The gentle breeze wasn't enough to have caused it, and an animal was unlikely to have come so close. Loki grimaced. He was wedged on his stomach between two rocks. Speed was his forte, but he would not be able to move quickly from this position. He would have to rely on one of his other fortes.

With slow, steady movements, and keeping his hands in clear view the entire time though it made things more difficult, Loki wriggled out from between the rocks while also twisting around, so that by the time he was free, his back was on the ground instead of his front. Four Vanir warriors had formed a small semi-circle in front of him, swords drawn and extended in his direction, preventing him from rising. The two on the left wore their surprise plainly; without his helmet and with no disguise at all, they'd recognized him immediately, Loki realized. The one on the far right did not seem to, and it was he who spoke.

"Where are your other watchers? And who are you reporting to?" the man demanded.

Loki wondered if they would hesitate to harm an unarmed man. No matter, he thought. I'm hardly unarmed. "Them," Loki said, fixing his eyes on a point over the shoulder of the Vanir who'd spoken.

Four heads turned – the two who'd recognized him clearly didn't know him – to see the famed Warriors Three brandishing their weapons angrily. The startled Vanir lifted their swords toward the greater threat and Loki yanked two knives free from the slits in his leather vest, sitting up as he hurled them at the hearts of two men in the center.

It was less effective than he'd hoped. The knives were ones he'd crafted from Midgardian metal, and while one of the men staggered back in pain, the other simply brushed aside the knife that had not pierced his armor, much less his flesh. His illusions were poor ones, hasty and hampered by the cumulative effects of Odin's curse, yet the false Warriors Three had still drawn the sword of the closest Vanir, and under that pressure they dissipated entirely.

They'd done their job though. Loki was back on his feet in the second it took the Vanir to realize they'd been fooled, the sword he'd taken off an Einherjar guarding the hidden route to Svartalfheim drawn from his back and in his right hand. Loki was prepared where the others were still regaining proper balance, and the one on the far left crumpled to the ground after a weak, failed attempt to block the thrust of Loki's sword.

"It's Loki Odinson!" the second one on the left said, the other one who'd recognized him, the one whose chest he'd only lightly pierced with repurposed Midgardian metal.

Loki snarled and turned his attention to him next. This warrior and the one left in the middle both advanced, while the Vanir on the far right, the one who'd spoken to him, held his sword out in a defensive posture and stepped back, reaching into a pouch at his hip with his left hand. Let's aim for efficiency, then, shall we? Loki thought, parrying an attack from two blades. He was not at his best with a sword, certainly not at such close quarters with little room to maneuver, but he'd trained with the best, and these Vanir did not compare. Keeping one eye on the man who was now removing a smooth metal disk from his pouch, Loki found the pattern in the moves of the other two, feinted toward one of them in the direction they would expect, then once they were committed to a countering response, he attacked on an entirely unexpected line, forced one sword off hard to the side, and thrust with all his strength up into his enemy's chest. Loki struck the man in the chest with his left fist and pushed to get him off his sword, and the dying man's enraged fellow warrior came at Loki with plenty of emotion but insufficient thought and control. Their blades clashed and Loki let the Vanir make his attacks, parrying them easily and subtly guiding the lines of attack where he wanted them. The Vanir finally struck high; Loki did not try to deflect the blow but only pivoted and felt a stinging on his cheek. Before the Vanir could withdraw for his next attack, Loki had struck low, sinking his sword through tough leather and deep into the man's belly, and ripping a scream from his throat.

Loki steadied his breathing as the Vanir's eyes met his, blinking heavily. He heard a sword clatter to the ground at his feet, and felt the pressure against his own sword grow. He released his grip on the hilt, and the Vanir in front of him fell gracelessly to his knees, then onto his side in an awkward position.

The whole thing had taken no more than a minute, but it was enough time for the fourth Vanir, the only one still standing, to press his thumb into the center of the engraved disk their warriors used for communication, and to begin speaking. Loki ripped his one good knife from its hidden sheath along a leather strap over his chest.

"-Aurikson. Get up here now. We've got Lo-"

Loki pressed forward, long knife sinking into the Vanir's throat and cutting off his words. The Vanir had tried to defend himself, but he'd been backpedaling, focusing more on calling for reinforcements than the proper use of his sword, and Loki had easily overpowered him. With a firm grip on the warrior's wrist as his strength faded with blood loss, Loki continued pushing forward, soon toppling them both over. Loki kept the knife in place as they went down. The sword slipped loose from the Vanir's hand, but Loki still kept his own hand wrapped tightly around the man's wrist and forced it to the ground. The Vanir struggled beneath him – he was strong, stronger than Loki probably, and would have put up a much better fight had he not been so insistent upon communicating his discovery – but the struggles rapidly faded.

Loki stayed in place, breathing hard again, his whole body beginning to tremble as he realized it was over. He didn't know how long he'd stayed like that, staring blankly into glassy eyes. No more blood flowed from the deep wound he'd made; there was none left to flow, he presumed. With a shaking hand that was entirely coated in red, he withdrew his knife.

The sounds of movement to his left, immediately followed by a moan, stilled his trembling. Not over, then, he thought. He pushed himself up off the dead Vanir, first to his knees, then to his feet. The man who'd had his stolen sword in his belly had managed to pull it out and roll onto his back while Loki was subduing the fourth man, and he grasped in his right hand a healing stone. When his gaze shifted upward to Loki, he began squeezing at the stone. Loki pressed his right foot down, forcing the hand away and grinding the wrist into the ground with his boot. He couldn't let anyone know he was here, or that he had ever been here. He couldn't let them know he had the ability to be here.

The Vanir's face twisted up in pain. "Finish it, then," he grunted out in gnarled pronunciation.

Loki stared down at him. He'd once watched a man die from a wound to the gut like that. It was the visual definition of agony. And it was not quick.

Hadn't he wanted this, though? Loki asked himself, as his gaze grew unfocused again. He hated them, hated all of them. He'd stood in Jolgeir's private chamber of the Healing Room and imagined them all burning. Aesir, Vanir, Svartalf, Jotun…why couldn't it have been Jotuns? he lamented, his attention returning to the here and now. He would have ripped them apart limb to limb. But no, fate had put a Vanir wrist beneath his boot, a Vanir warrior who desired mercy. What mercy would you have shown me? If you'd been able, you would have put me in chains and dragged me to Jotunheim and left me.

"Please," the man begged.

The first sounds of the word were entirely indistinct, but Loki easily understood. Without emergency intervention the Vanir was going to die. The only question was how long it would take. His gaze traveled down to the man's middle; the wound was fully hidden by the pool of blood. "I am not a torturer," he remembered telling Jane, the memory coming unbidden and terribly out of place here amidst this carnage.

He looked back into the man's desperate eyes, nodded, and plunged his knife into the Vanir's heart.

/

Thank you as always, dear readers! You are a constant source of encouragement to me. I hope you're still enjoying it!

Teasers for Ch. 84: Loki has to make some fast decisions, and has a couple of experiences he would never have predicted (but you might, at least if you, like me, had a document titled "Dates by Chapter"); Jane shoots down a theory she really shouldn't; Loki figures something out he really already should have by now.

And the excerpt:

Loki quickly considered his options. He couldn't go back to where he'd started from. He was covered in blood. He had a nasty cut on the right side of his face and one on his left arm he'd never even noticed getting and he also wore the blood of the Vanir, particularly the fourth one. He could leave from here, counting on the rocks to mask much of the flash of his departure, but Pathfinder's next recall signal could be up to five minutes away, and five minutes was too long to linger in this vicinity. Invisibility, he decided, was his best option, even though it would cost him.