Loki closed the door behind him and stood there for several seconds without moving. The silence of his chambers felt wrong. He had expected chains. Guards. The cold darkness of the dungeons beneath the palace. He had expected Odin to look at him and finally see nothing worth saving. Instead, he had been sent here as though he were still a prince who had merely misbehaved.
His fingers curled slowly at his sides. Why?
The question had been following him ever since Thor had pulled him from the edge of the Bifrost.
Why did Thor save me?
Loki could still remember the moment with uncomfortable clarity. The bridge breaking apart beneath them, the unbearable light, the certainty that he was falling and then Thor's hand closing around his wrist. Thor had been furious. He had every reason to be. Loki had lied to him, manipulated him, tried to take everything he believed was his. Thor had stood there and fought him as an enemy.
And yet, when Loki fell, his brother had reached for him. It made no sense. Thor should have let him go.
Perhaps that was what troubled Loki most. Hatred he could understand. Anger he could work with. Even revenge would have been easier to bear. But mercy from Thor was something Loki had no idea what to do with.
He moved towards the mirror and stared at his reflection. A battered prince stared back at him, green eyes tired beneath dark hair that had come loose during the fight. For a moment, he hardly recognised himself.
Then he remembered Odin. His father had looked at him with disappointment, yes. Anger, certainly. But he had not ordered the guards to take him away. He had not stripped him of his armor or cast him into the dungeons. Neither had Frigga. His mother had looked at him as though she were afraid for him.
Loki swallowed. They should have hated him. Maybe they did. And maybe this was simply some final courtesy before the punishment came. But somewhere beneath all the bitterness, a smaller and far more vulnerable part of him wondered if they still loved him.
That thought was almost unbearable. Because if they loved him, then he had failed them. And if they did not, then everything he had ever believed about his place in this family had been a lie.
He turned away from the mirror. Except it had already been a lie. Loki's eyes lowered to his hands.
Jotun. The word seemed to crawl beneath his skin.
He had spent the last few hours trying not to think about it. About the blue skin that had appeared beneath his fingers when the Casket touched him. About the way Laufey had looked at him. About Odin's silence when the truth had finally been exposed.
He wasn't Odin's son. He wasn't an Odinson. He was Laufey's son. A Frost Giant, creature Odin had taken from the aftermath of a war and brought home like some trophy he had decided to keep.
All those years. Every lesson, feast, and every time Odin had praised Thor and then looked at Loki with disappointment.
Had he known? Had everyone known except him?
Loki sank slowly onto the edge of his bed. A memory came back to him then, one he hadn't thought about in years.
Sif.
It had been years ago, long before any of this. Loki had enchanted her hair after one of his more elaborate pranks, expecting outrage and perhaps a chase through the halls. She had cornered him eventually, furious and humiliated, and when he had laughed at her anger, she had spat the words at him.
"You're pathetic, Loki. No one will ever love you."
At the time, he had laughed. He had made another joke. Told her that he would hardly notice. But he had remembered. He remembered every word. Very vividly. Now, sitting alone in a palace that suddenly felt less like home than it ever had, those words returned with cruel precision.
No one will ever love you. Perhaps Sif had been right.
Thor had saved him because he was incapable of abandoning his little brother. Frigga had spared him because she was his mother. And Odin had kept him out of the dungeons because even disappointed fathers could show mercy.
None of it meant Loki was worth loving. He pressed his palms against his eyes, trying to silence the thought. For the first time in his life, Loki wondered whether the problem had never been that he was not enough to be an Odinson.
Perhaps the problem was that there had never been anything worth loving in him at all.
Odin remained in the throne room long after Loki had been taken away. Frigga had returned to her chambers, though not before giving him one last look that made it clear she expected him to do something more than simply punish their son. The king stood in silence, looking out through the great windows at the damage scattered across Asgard. The palace was still recovering from the battle, and somewhere within its walls were two sons who had never needed their parents more than they did now.
"Send for Heimdall," Odin said.
A guard bowed and left. It was not long before the golden doors opened and Heimdall entered, his sword resting at his side. "My king."
Odin turned towards him. "We need to fix the Bifrost and react out to Vanaheim."
Heimdall's expression remained calm, though there was a flicker of curiosity in his golden eyes. "For whom?"
"The princess."
There was a brief pause.
"And her father," Odin added. "I wish to speak with the King of Vanaheim personally."
Heimdall inclined his head. "Shall I tell them the reason for the summons?"
"Tell them that Asgard has suffered a great loss and that I wish for their presence."
It was not a lie. Not entirely.
The loss of the Bifrost alone had left the realms uncertain, but Odin's thoughts were elsewhere. He had watched Thor return from Earth humbled in a way no battle could have achieved, only to be thrown into another kind of battle with Loki. His eldest son carried the weight of having fought his own brother, and Odin knew Thor would not speak of it easily.
The princess might help. She had known Thor since childhood. She understood his temper, pride, and the stubborn heart beneath both. If anyone could get him to speak without making him feel as though he were being pitied, it was likely her.
And Loki… Odin's expression hardened at the thought.
He had seen something in his youngest son's eyes when he was led away. Something wounded beneath all that anger. Frigga was right. Loki needed someone who could stand beside him, someone who could reach him where neither Odin nor Thor seemed able to.
The princess was perhaps the only person who had ever managed to do so without trying.
Heimdall turned to leave.
"Wait."
The guardian looked back.
"Do not tell the princess why I wish her here. Let her come freely."
Heimdall gave a knowing nod. "As you command."
Once he had gone, Odin looked towards the empty throne beside his own. The princess would come for Thor. At least, that was what he would tell her. What he would eventually ask of her was something far greater.