How sweet is the day, I'm craving a darkness [open]

[sorcerous]

WHO Loki and OPEN
WHAT Moping, but what else is new.
WHERE The stables, in the stable of his horse.
WHEN RD12
NOTES None so far.

He'd shouted at the palace servants. Sent one of them cowering and quivering, sobbing in fear. Find her, he'd cried, but none of them had been able to. Frigga is gone. Returned to Asgard, perhaps; perhaps to return here later without any memory of what's already come. Sif, missing, though there are some who swear she has fled to the forest.

He storms away to the stables and dismisses the stablehands with a snarl. Slips inside the stall of the horse they'd given him, the little dark-colored mare. She is lying down, her forelegs curled. He collapses next to her. Leans against her, heavily -- such is his exhaustion.

He sleeps, on and off, for the rest of the day. Perhaps she senses in him kin, of a sort, for she stays with him, not standing, not wavering.

Comments

[thoreal]

It has been Thor's turn, these last two days, to avoid Loki; he's not actively hiding the way his brother might, but for once, he's not actively seeking him out or trying to talk, either. He's still stinging from their fight, from what was said more than what was done. Or from what wasn't said, perhaps.

When he hears that their mother has vanished, he honestly feels a sense of relief. This is not a good place for her: she should be back on Asgard, at Odin's side, ruling their people, not facing the world-eating thorns. But he knows, maybe, in the back of his mind, that Loki will not feel the same way, and that's why he's not entirely surprised to see his brother's ravaged face when he passes by to collect his own horse.

The plan is to go to the forest after Sif, for the fight against the Hero restored some of their camaraderie. He pauses, now, taking in Loki's weary expression for a long moment. "I would look for Sif," he says quietly, eventually. "You could join me."

[sorcerous]

His fingers brush through the mare's mane. He does not lift his eyes to his brother, but he closes them, leans his cheek against her neck, tired beyond tired. His defenses are down. He is not angry; he cannot summon the energy. "The exertions of yesterday have left me weak." Best for Thor to go alone.

Magic has not so tired him in hundreds of years. The force of Cho's sorcery pouring through his body had burnt him, inside. He needs time to heal.

"Who is to say she is not gone?" he asks. "The same as Mother is gone."

[thoreal]

"Mother was never meant to be here," Thor supplies immediately, and with conviction. "Her place is in Asgard. But Sif... there is much Sif can do in this place."

And some of it, he admits to himself, a little grudgingly, may be for Loki. He still can't call himself happy about that... or, at least, not happy that they chose to hide it from him. But the love he has for the both of them is great enough that he softens now, moving to sit next to his brother.

"There is a chance she would come to your voice where she would not come to mine, is there not?" he asks, a little gruffly, but not unkindly.

[sorcerous]

"Her trust runs deeper for you; I cannot fathom her affections for me." But he will take them. Greedily, voraciously, jealously. If he were not so tired now, he would turn Sif's choice into an insult to Thor. A slight to his attractiveness.

His cool blue skin brushes Thor's arm, and he makes no move to pull it away. If he even notices.

His voice goes quiet, and tight: "I did not have the chance to truly speak with her." One small comfort, stolen away before he could take it. Before he was willing to take it. He misses Frigga's voice, her calm. He has as good as chosen to seek his path, to become what dark hero he can be, to reconcile but remain distant with his family. But, as ever, his hopes turn to bitterness, and he wishes nothing more than to take power back into his own hands.

[thoreal]

Thor most certainly notices, the cold tolerable but briefly shocking against his bare skin. He glances down, and again, feels that regrettable rush of suspicion: is this where the trick comes out? The knife, the illusion, whatever Loki has planned...

But he says nothing, and he looks back up at the pain in his brother's voice, and brushes those suspicions aside as he has done before. The moment passes; he softens. "I know she missed you," he tells him, genuinely. "As did..." I. Father. "You were much missed, my brother."

[sorcerous]

"So you mourned." His tone is caught between mocking and doubt. It seems that he should hurt Thor, now. That he could hurt Thor now. Confessions of sentiment, touch, the two of them side by side as though they were brothers.

"Everything is different now." This is his attempt to impress upon Thor that it does matter. His lineage is a part of him. It isn't something that can be tossed away in favor of Thor's ignorance, his brutish and clumsy kind of love.

[thoreal]

"We did," he agrees softly, and it does hurt; it hurts that they've had that exchange before, even if Loki knows it not. It hurt him then that his response was snide cynicism -- is it any different now? He looks down, again, at their touching arms.

And then he's uncharacteristically quiet again, because he knows this is true: everything is different. It's just that he's still not sure how that came to be, and he does not want it to be. "It does not have to be," he tries. "Not forever."

[sorcerous]

"It does." His eyes close. It does have to be different. Thor has to let it be different, or it means that the role Loki filled in his life means nothing. It means that Thor will cast Loki aside, as ever, see only what he wants to see.

"I am not your brother," he says, softly, "and if you will not acknowledge how this has changed me, then I cannot be your friend, either. We will be enemies, Thor. Dread enemies, until one of us is dead."

[thoreal]

"Why?" he growls in response, head turning sharply to glare at his, yes, his brother. "You say these things, Loki, yet you never say why. I live not in your head; or if I do, the me that lives there is not the me that sits here with you now."

[sorcerous]

"Because you do not know my heart. And I will never forgive you for it."

If there is any person who he wishes would know him, who he would give himself to -- ah, but Thor does not, and Thor never can. He is too simple for a creature like Loki, and for Loki, love is never enough. Love will always be riddled with doubt.

Violence -- violence is simple. Then, they can meet on equal ground.

[greatsquirrelhunter]

Faolan knows nothing about Frigga leaving, but he does know that he wants to play with Loki. Even if Loki is in the stable, and horses don't like werewolves much.

But Loki looks sad. Faolan collapses next to him, whimpering in sympathy.

[sorcerous]

Loki's skin is still blue, and he radiates an aura of cold. His red eyes are half-lidded, closed.

"The danger is over," he tells Faolan, softly. "The Hero is defeated." He reaches out and strokes down Faolan's tousled hair, and again, as ever, he sees the children he failed. The ones he abandoned in selfishness -- the ones who didn't want him in the first place. It is one who isn't even his flesh and blood who would accept him as a father.

[greatsquirrelhunter]

Faolan cuddles closer, looking up at Loki. "Then why is Loki sad?" he asks plaintively.

[sorcerous]

How easy it is to let the boy have his closeness. How difficult, to push him away.

"The Queen of Asgard has come and gone," he tells Faolan. "I wished that she would stay."

[greatsquirrelhunter]

Faolan whimpers. He knows what that means. "Loki's Mutti is gone?" He throws his arms around the man, ignoring the cold, because Loki must be so sad.

[sorcerous]

Loki twitches, flinching away from the touch, relenting to it only reluctantly.

"And what do you know of it?" he hisses. "You are nothing but a child."

[greatsquirrelhunter]

"Faolan's Mutti is gone too," the boy answers, eyes down in sadness. "Is sad without Mutti."

[sorcerous]

"You are a boy," dismisses Loki. "And I am not."

Yet he acts as one, as a wounded infant, abandoned and hurt.

[greatsquirrelhunter]

"Doesn't matter," Faolan says firmly. "Mutti gone is sad."

He reaches out, clutching Loki's arm as he snuggles, face turned into the man's shoulder. "Even for Loki, even for Hawk, is sad."

[retrieverchef]

Eliot makes his own way into the stables. He's ready for a ride. No real destination, just get out into the open country and enjoy the feeling of being on horseback. He stops by the other stall when he notices both horse and man lying on the floor. "You okay, man?"

[sorcerous]

"Well enough, and it is no business of yours." He waves a blue-skinned hand, dismissively. He recognizes this man, distantly, from the hero's meeting. Can't remember what it was that he favored, as far as the options went. And he can't quite make himself care. It feels as though the inside of his mind has been scorched, has burnt away.

[retrieverchef]

"You sure?" he offers quietly. "You look like you feel like crap. You sure you don't want me to grab ya something?"

[sorcerous]

"Exhaustion has no cure but rest," he tells Elliot. "Exhausted is what I am." In mind, body, heart.

The horse makes a whuffling noise. Loki looks to her, and there is a gentleness in his red eyes, a tenderness towards the creature. She is the most loyal he has.

"If you could find an apple, or a carrot, or a few oats...?" he asks. "She deserves more care than I have given her."

[retrieverchef]

Eliot nodded with a small smile. "Sure. She's a darlin', that one. You sure ya don't me to grab you anythin' while I'm at it? Somethin' to drink, at least?"

[sorcerous]

A darling. She is, at that. Loki looks to her, and, if it's possible, there's a softening in his red gaze. He appreciates the simplicity of an animal. Appreciates and resents, when the animal dislikes him, but he has a way with horses.

"I will take water." Phrased as an order, but his tone is soft, a reluctant and vulnerable request.

[retrieverchef]

Eliot nods and leaves. About fifteen minutes later, he comes back a leather satchel slung over his shoulder and a pitcher in his hand. "Here," he says, opening the stall and stepping inside. "Water, a few apples, some sugar cubes for the mare. And I threw in a couple meat pies they had in the kitchen. In case you want them later."

He strokes the mare's mane gently. "So have you named her yet?"

[sorcerous]

"No."

It is on his lips to thank the other for his kindness, but the silence stretches, and then it is past the time when Loki could have. He presses on. Takes one of the apples, and brings out his knife, slicing it in half, and half again. He gives the first slice to her, and makes a strange sound in his throat. She bobs her head, returns it, as though they'd truly spoken.

"No, she has no name."

[retrieverchef]

"Amira would fit her, if you're looking for a name," he offers quietly. "She looks like a princess."

trololololo?

[canistricari]

It is boredom, as usual, that pushes Coyote to wander. The villagers don't seem particularly shocked by him anymore, which is a disappointment, but he'll have to utilize that later. He's so bored, in fact, that he wanders in his coyote shape rather than becoming human. Perhaps if a particularly clever idea struck him he would change.

And so it was that he happened upon Loki, sleeping so happily by the mare, and began laughing raucously.

"Ohohoho! What have we here?"

[sorcerous]

The horse makes an alarmed noise, tenses and neighs nervously. Loki touches a hand to her neck, blinking his way from sleep.

"You make her anxious," he tells Coyote. His eyes narrow. "What business have you?"

[canistricari]

He grinned widely, showing all of his razor sharp teeth.

"No business! None at all! Can't I go for a leisurely stroll?" Which was to say he was about his usual business - the business of having fun at the expense of anyone and everyone else.

[sorcerous]

"You can," says Loki, shifting to his feet and ineffectively attempting to brush away bits of straw. "Elsewhere." Disheveled as he is, this doesn't quite come out as intimidating as he wants.

[canistricari]

He walked around to Loki's other side, giggling the whole way.

"What about over here? Is this alright with you?"

[sorcerous]

Loki sighs.

"If I outwit you with a riddle," he says, "will you go?"

Surely he has one that would defeat the coyote.

[canistricari]

"Probably not!" Coyote declared cheerfully. "But you're welcome to try." He did so love riddles.

[tenuefarfalla]

The stall next to Loki's mare is occupied. By a rather gigantic Clydesdale. One who knows this small blue thing cuddled up to the pretty mare and practically radiating sadness. Charlie, saturated in magic since birth and used to Cho and her pathetically fragile little heart, stretches his long neck over the divider and nuzzles the top of Loki's head. After a moment of light affection he blows a gust of warm air in Loki's hair. Right before he starts chewing on it.

[sorcerous]

Another horse, it seems. He recognizes his patterns -- the cart-horse, the one ridden by the little sorceress. Recognizes the hair-chew for the affection and reassurance that it is, and he is strangely comforted. Svadilfari had been a comfort too, before the disaster that happened between them. He reaches up, scratches the horse's nose.

"I'm not food, little one," he murmurs. "And I have none for you."

[tenuefarfalla]

Charlie doesn't want food from Loki. Cho feeds him more than he needs. She brings in baskets of large tart apples and they sit and she talks and he eats. But he hears Loki mention food, sees that he has none, thinks how happy food makes him.

He snuffles at Loki's hand, and then withdraws, goes to the window in his stall that lets in fresh air. There is an apple tree just beyond his reach, and he strains at the wall until he cracks the frame around the window, until he can reach out and grasp a branch in his teeth. And then he yanks it from the tree. Half a dozen apples fall to the ground, but three or four don't yield, and are still nestled among the leaves when Charlie returns to Loki, offering in his mouth, stretched out to him. Food. Be happy now.

[sorcerous]

Loki stares at the basket, for a moment, bewildered. And then he laughs. Laughs shrilly, unexpected and cathartic, but not entirely pleasant, either.

He takes the branch.

"Thank you," he tells Charlie. Takes the branch. And then, in a rough approximation of horse-language, he huffs a thank-you.

[tenuefarfalla]

Loki's comment gets an excited snuffle from Charlie. Sometimes he thinks that he and Cho can almost speak to one another, but they never actually speak. For all her skills, she does not know his language. But this one seems to. How wonderful it is.

Happy, now? Full and happy. No reason for sadness. Yes? Laugh more. Enjoy life.

He goes back to nuzzling Loki's hair, his best approximation of a hug. Sometimes Cho wraps her arms around his neck and stretches up on her toes and buries her nose in his mane. Then she sighs and Charlie feels her relax. Loki just needs some of that.

[sorcerous]

Not exactly fluent, but he's better than nothing. He's run with horses before, and of course, it's easier to communicate in the moment. And when one has the proper vocal apparatus.

The mare cranes her neck up, investigating the newcomer. Nickers at him, and takes one of the apples between her teeth, accepting the gift.

[tenuefarfalla]

The nameless mare is still pretty, and he still likes her, is happy she took the apple, but she's not sad. Loki is.

Under the weight of Charlie's bulk the wall between their stalls creaks. He's determined, and he has an animal's single-minded intensity. Right now, it's focused on Loki almost entirely.