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Sigyn is not weak, never weak, and Loki knows this.
Her hair hangs limp, the curtain of it shielding her face from his vision. Her knees are up; her attention focused on the book in her lap. Balanced. She does not yet see him standing there.
She shifts, just a little, and glances up. Her eyes glint for a moment before she realizes, before she really notices him standing there. “Oh,” she says. Loki just stares at her. Her chest rises and falls with each breath, no sound is emitted. Her night dress is off one shoulder, carefree, rustled. When he nears her he can smell apples; the reminder of how different she is than himself. He loathes it. He crawls towards her, wanting her to be the same as him -- to see things the way he sees them.
But she never will, because she is Sigyn.
Careful as a girl made of glass, Sigyn places her book on the floor beside the bed. When she leans down Loki has to stop himself from grabbing her shoulders and pulling her closer to him. Something in him believes that if he surrounds her with himself, she will change for him.
She rises, then, and Loki sits beside her, staring. She stares back. Her eyes are the spring, her hair autumn, her lips winter and her smile the summer. She overwhelms him in her complications, and also in her simplicity. She simply is. Loki changes, eyes clouding and trailing down her body. Sigyn shifts -- uncomfortable under his scrutiny. Loki catches it and savours it. His wife.
He moves to straddle her hips, pushing her knees down and placing his hands on either side of her head. He still doesn’t smile, and neither does she.
“Are you afraid of me, my love?”
“No,” she answers, and he cannot find the lie. She has developed the ability to fool him, he knows, but generally only when he is not paying close attention.
He tries again, “Are you lying to me?”
“No,” she whispers, and there it is. The tiniest fragment, crack, spreading across her features. She’s been caught and she knows it. The girl made of glass and he’s chipped her. Loki smiles then -- a slow, frightening grin, and brings his hands to peel the blankets back. To expose her to him.
She’s used to it. It’s another thing that Loki knows about her. He knows that she is an abundance of contradictions wrapped in a pretty package. He knows what she loves and loathes and her favourite foods and favourite people -- among which he does not rank -- he knows her well, just as she knows him.
But all that passes through his mind in barely a moment. His thoughts are instead fixed on the feeling of her skin under his fingertips; the soft breaths that pass from her lips. She is his instrument and he can be a master of the art. He can be; it doesn’t mean he wants to be. Not always.
His fingers dig into her sides; his head comes down to kiss her neck with what he tells himself is anger. He is angry that she remains who she is, and that nothing he does to her seems to change that. He bites her ear and she whimpers -- such a soft noise. He thinks that she was trying to hide it. He chuckles into her throat.
“My lovely wife. What is it that has you so afraid?”
“Nothing,” she says, and this time he can hear the impatience. He can’t taste the lie, for it is an honest answer this time. No thing. She thinks she can trick him. He pulls her gown down her shoulders, baring her to him, and continues to tug the fabric down and finally away.
Sigyn pulls at Loki’s armor, pushing it roughly, trying to peel it away. She is moderately successful in her attempts. She gets better every time. Loki grows impatiently and assists her, and when he is done, she digs her nails into his shoulders and brings him back, closer, to her. This is the part Loki likes; when Sigyn finds herself, finds her strength and uses it. This is the one time they can match.
Though if he tried, really tried, he suspected he could win.
And so he takes her. He wraps his arms around her and pulls her closer, closer. He puts everything he has into making her his own, but right before he reaches the peak, he realizes that all that is happening is that she is making him hers.
Loki doesn’t want to belong to anyone, not anymore.
-
He knows he has changed since he was a boy. He knows that his outlook has progressed from curious to possessive to controlling. He knows this, but he doesn’t care. Sigyn, on the other hand, has remained almost static. The same until Thor’s coronation. Since then, she has become quiet and almost, almost distant. She throws herself into being a mother to Narvi, and avoids Loki when she can.
She no longer seeks to please him like she once did.
And Loki has been so busy lately. He wants to spend time with his son; he really does. He wants to build something for the child, for his wife, for himself. Something better. Something grand and fitting of their value. This family -- his family -- is so beyond the common standards. This woman, flawless beneath him.
Their son is quietly sleeping in the room farthest from their own. Loki knows why Sigyn ordered it that way. He knows that she fears his predatory influence will take root in their son.
Loki can always sense Sigyn’s desire for Narvi to have a father. Sigyn did not know her father. She is in that way similar to himself; they are burdened with something lost. And so it is mutually known that Narvi is Loki’s just as much as he is Sigyn’s. She makes no attempt to keep his child away from him.
Stupid girl, he thinks at night. Though it would only be more foolish of her to try to keep him from the one thing he loves most in the world.
For Loki will always remain Loki, even through so many changes. And Sigyn, too, changes under him -- though never in the way he wants her to. Under his rule, under his touch, under everything that he stands for. Sigyn adapts and grows and if Loki has changed since he was a boy; Sigyn has died and been reborn. Slowly, yes, but truly.
Loki wonders who his son will emulate. Will he follow in the steps of his father and remain strong, willful, and greedy -- or will he follow his mother’s grace and stay stoically strong against so many odds?
The poor child. He had taken his first steps only days ago. Sigyn squealed in the ear of the child and praised him so wholeheartedly that Loki could hardly bear to watch it. But he did. He smiled at his son from across the room. Now, he suspects that he could shape Narvi into whatever he chooses, but Loki does not.
If he were to be honest with himself, he has no idea who he wants Narvi to be.
-
The conflict is simple.
If it weren’t for his brother, Loki would not be alive. If it wasn’t for his son and wife, Loki would be in a cell, in the dark, hidden away. He is supposed to think himself lucky. He does not.
He failed, and everyone knows it. Sigyn likes to pretend it didn’t happen, and sometimes -- just sometimes -- Loki wants to alter her memories and make it true, for her at least. He never alters Sigyn’s memories.
There is a cage around his mind. An electric cage, he thinks. His magic cannot stretch out, only sit, stand, roll over. A dog in place of a god.
(And somewhere in Loki’s mind the image of a wolf is formed. Two worlds collided in the sometimes gentle, sometimes ferocious being. He could be happy with a wolf.)
He’s already battled Thor. He’s tired of battling Thor. Now he battles his own sentiment, he battles becoming anything close to resembling his brother. Loki strives to assure everyone that the rumours are true: a frost giant lives and has lived among them. He wants everyone to know that he does not carry the blood of royalty.
Or at least not the blood of the right royalty.
This is not internal. This is Loki against society. This is Loki trying to prove them all right, for proving them wrong would be futile.
-
Asgard in the early fall smells of apples and sunlight, and every now and then the wind is warm with the scent of honey-flowers, its long fingers caressing the skin of all it touches.
It is everything that Sigyn is.
The leaves only yellow here, never brown, never dead until the very last moment when they drift to the ground. The edges of trees are laced and lined with gold, almost shimmering in the setting sun. Any water glows crimson with the reflection of the sunset-to-come.
It is the end of a day; the end of a season; the end of an era.
Sigyn is pregnant again. This time Loki doesn’t ask her. He doesn’t think she knows.
-
The room is a mess and Sigyn is not going to be happy about it.
Loki listens for the tell-tale click of the door, and when he hears it he sighs.
“What happened?” Sigyn asks as she enters, raising an eyebrow. He thinks he loves her in that moment.
“I was looking for a book. I seem to have misplaced it.”
“What book?”
“It does not matter.” Sigyn sighs at this. Loki cannot truly blame her. “I must have left it somewhere else.”
Sigyn’s eyes just flick around the room. She has no type. Not the overbearing wife, not submissive, just ... Sigyn. She almost looks afraid of the piles of belongings scattered throughout the room. Sad, perhaps.
“I will clean it,” Loki says. Sigyn nods once, the sadness - if that is what it is - still in her eyes as she turns away to go to Narvi. After a couple of minutes Loki gives up trying to comprehend the expression.
He finds out later as she sobs into his chest. He puts very little effort into trying to console her, he cannot bring himself to that.
“I was pregnant again,” she whispers. “I was pregnant but I lost her. Loki, I lost our daughter.”
Loki’s eyes shut slowly. He is glad that she cannot see his face from where she cries; it would not have helped her. Loki feels angry for a moment - not at Sigyn for losing the infant, but at Sigyn for not telling him in the very beginning. Even if he did know for the most part. Even if he suspected.
Loki says nothing in return, and eventually Sigyn falls asleep.
-
Today, Loki hunts.
He hunts on his own, though with the permission of Thor. His prey is nothing like the beasts that Thor and his warrior friends return with. Loki takes advantage of the rare instead of the large. He knows how to trick them into falling in his traps. He knows how to corner the fast, how to outwit the clever.
The hides he brings back are exquisite; patterned and soft, but smaller than Thor’s daily catches. He parades through the city with his bounty, proving his difference without demeaning himself in the process.
When he lays the most beautiful of the pelts across Narvi’s now-empty bed, he feels a sense of pride. His son will always have this, and will always know his father’s talent.
The wolf skin is black and white in different streaks, with the occasional fleck of red.
-
He catches her arm roughly, spinning her to face him. He knows that it must have hurt. Sif doesn’t let it show. Loki smirks for a fraction of a second before pouncing.
“You dare spread falsities about my honour, Lady Sif,” he spits her title out as though it tastes fowl on his tongue. A few people gather to watch the scene. It is morning, the air is chilling in the city square.
“I know not of what you speak, your highness,” she responds in kind, the last two words are venomous.
“Oh, but I think you do,” he grants her a smile. “I think you call me ‘murderer’ behind my back.”
“Do you deny it?”
“I do in the context of which you suggest,” he says. Theoric. She had spoken of Theoric. Not to Sigyn, but words are known to travel in Asgard.
“Why, your highness. I do believe that you will have to elaborate.”
“I disagree.”
“Well I have nothing to offer you, then.” “And yet so much to offer my brother.” Sif’s eyebrows rise as if to ask, ‘do you really want to play this game?’ Loki’s expression matches her own.
“Why don’t you ask him.” Though she phrases it as one, it is not a question.
“What do you find so attractive in him, I wonder? Is it the glory of fucking the crown prince, no wait, acting King of Asgard? Or do you actually lust for him physically?”
“Are those the only two choices you can conceive of, Loki? I pity you.” Those are the wrong words. There is nothing Loki wants less in the world than pity. He jumps to attack her, she raises the dagger that he couldn’t see before and holds it to his throat. “Try me,” she says. And Loki wants to, but he knows his chances at success without his magic are slim. He does not want to die today.
So instead he leans in, slowly, very slowly, and whispers in Sif’s ear, “You will regret your words, dear lady.” And then he walks away.
It’s always been about who has power, and who does not.
-
Disconnect, connect, disconnect, connect.
Sigyn is pregnant again, and this time Loki is the one to tell her.
“Are you sure?” She asks meekly, her face pale.
“Yes.”
“Did you know last time?”
“Yes.”
“And you didn’t - ”
“It is in the past, Sigyn. You are pregnant now, again.”
“I don’t think I can do it.” “Of course you can.”
“Loki - ”
“You will be successful in this Sigyn, just as you are in so much that you do.” And it’s the nicest thing he’s said to her in months, but they both see the burden he places on her with his words.
-
A year since they lost their daughter and now it is cold again, and barren. Dead trees line the horizon, the kingdom shines faintly in its winter flames.
Inside there are always fires, for warmth, for light, Loki revels in it. Fire, he thinks, is one of his favourite things, or was, because of the sheer damage it can do without even trying. Now it only reminds him of what he is not, so much that he is not.
Narvi is fire, and ice, and everything that Loki wishes him to be. The child is so new to the world, still, and can so easily be molded. It’s enthralling.
Sigyn does not cry in front of him or Narvi, but Loki knows that she cries. Her eyes are often red-rimmed and her kisses taste of salt.
“What upsets you so?” He asks, bringing his lips to her cheekbones.
“Nothing,” she tries, but before he can accuse her of lying, she adds, “I miss her, and I do not think that I can go through that again. I know loss too well.”
“So do not lose this,” Loki says, and Sigyn nods and closes her eyes. Loki recognizes pain when he sees it. She lets him take her anyways.
-
Vali is born in the late spring. For the heat of the day, many believe it to be summer; Loki isn’t sure which one he dislikes more. Thor is a summer child, nurses tell Sigyn this when they think Loki can’t hear. Spring is for new beginnings. Such sentiment.
Vali looks more like Sigyn, with pale hair and pointed eyes; with irises that will haunt his enemies, Loki thinks. He does not dare speak it. Sigyn looks on at her child with something akin to bewilderment. Loki had always seen the thought in her, the belief that she would not carry Vali to term. If she hadn’t, Loki would have blamed her inability to accept the reality of the child’s life. He would have been cruel, and he knows this, and he is glad the child survived.
Narvi reacts to his brother with wonder. The same way that Thor reacted to Loki, supposedly. So the stories said. Such joy in his eyes to have a brother. Brothers.
Loki doesn’t know how to handle that. It seems to come naturally to Sigyn, and to the boys. Loki does not, and cannot favour one over the other. It makes him sick to know that Odin must never have seen him as anything but the monster he is, how else can you hate a child you yourself have raised?
Good, he tells himself. He wants to be different. He wants that now. He tells himself it’s what he needs.
-
Months pass. Loki is not allowed to leave Asgard for long. Sigyn seems happy for this, though she never openly shows it around him. So much hidden, too much hidden.
Today he pins her against the wall, his fingers encircling her wrists in a grip that he knows will bruise her. Her dress is soft, green, and long. A hassle. He brings her hands, clasped together in his one hand, to his lips and trails kisses along her knuckles. His eyes look up at her through his eyelashes. Her own eyes are closed and her head is thrown back against the wall.
Loki’s free hand moves to her thigh, hitching up the dress centimeter by centimeter until the hem is in his fingers. He brings his hand under, letting the fabric fall back over his hand, hiding the act as Sigyn whimpers and shudders. Loki lets his instincts take control and Sigyn is appreciative, pushing towards or trying in desperation to move away from his fingers; it never works and he continues until she breaks.
His favourite part is when she tries to free her hands to brace herself, or to grasp something, but forgets that he still holds them within his own. He never lets her go; he never allows her anything to hold onto and she crumples onto him breathless.
And this time she’s crying.
Loki releases her hands after a few minutes in order to hold her head in both of his hands. He stares into her eyes before wiping a tear from her cheek with the back of his hand. He does not ask this time.
-
“Narvi?”
“Yes, father?”
“Have you been watching Vali?” He refuses to say the word, the other word. He has not yet spoken it.
“Yes, father.”
“Did you have a good day?”
“Yes, father. I went to my lessons and then I came home and helped mama to mash the vegetables for Vali.”
“Good child,” Loki says, smiling. Sigyn enters from behind him. He can sense it, though she was soundless. A soft noise alerts him that she has Vali in her arms and he turns around to face her. Her face is as blank as the fresh-fallen snow.
“You were gone.”
“I had something to do.”
“Were you fighting with Sif again?”
Loki’s eyes flare fire, red and blazing. “No. I would not approach that wench again if I had to.” He has a few ideas for spells to place that would make her life nothing short of hel, though. Another thing to keep to himself.
“Loki,” Sigyn warns. “Narvi, perhaps it is time for bed?”
“Sigyn,” Loki spits right back. “This conversation is over anyways. It is fine.”
“Fine,” Sigyn states, but there is the hint of a question in the last second. Loki gives her a sidelong glare before leaving the room entirely, retreating to his own office.
-
When Loki walks through the kingdom, whispers follow him, and he washes himself clean of anything resembling sentimentality in them. Finally. It only took a spell in the armory; a weapon enchanted and used by the Lady Sif.
Two had been injured - Sif herself and Baldr - no fatalities, and no way to prove that Loki had anything to do with the fiasco.
Thor had picked up a few practices from Midgard. Democracy. Innocent until proven otherwise. Such mundane, pointless and easily exploitable rules. Especially with a mind as clever as Loki’s.
And so Loki is a free man, still. But everyone knows. Everyone knows exactly who had threatened Sif and who had not yet made good on it; everyone knows who has access to the armory and sufficient talent to cast such an enchantment.
And so the whispers follow him, and Loki feels changed. Darker. He has achieved this one small thing, even when his world is so full of failure. Everything is looking up now, and Loki is already setting his sights further ahead.
-
The relationship grows cold around Sigyn and Loki, in terms of emotions. For so long it has been morphing, freezing; ever since the wedding, each day brings only the cold. There is lust and passion and heat in the nights, and though they cannot feel it at the time, they both know something is not there, something that is supposed to be.
Neither of them can bring themselves to long for it.
Narvi and Vali were supposed to help this, to bring the two together again, but Loki has no intention of being part of a whole. He forgets how to be anything less than a world unto himself.
He needs to be accepted, but he can’t remember how.
Sigyn is always strong, and never weak, even when she seems it. Loki is always weak and rarely truly strong, though he puts everything that he has into appearing that way. And he would never admit to this.
Most of the time, he does not, or can not, admit it to himself.
He is becoming what he feigns, and nothing pleases or frightens him more. The change is overcoming him and always has been. Even if he wished to stop it, even if he wished to return to a place where his persona was something, something resembling well-intentioned, to a place where Sigyn was in love and where he was closest to being the same - even if he wished to stop this and go back, he wouldn’t be able to.
And at least he is succeeding now, slowly, piece by piece.
He looks out; he looks for an indication of the time. He wishes for more of it, or better control of it. Loki loves the idea of control. Some way to do more, to accomplish more. He searches, and searches, but it’s too late. The night has already begun.