Chapter Text
Anyone else, maybe, would have been grateful.
You could travel around all of Asgard, speak to all the other young men, and ask if they would have liked to have been invited along on an adventure with the mighty Thor, first son of Odin and young god of thunder, who lately had become the wielder of the hammer Mjolnir, along with his crew of doughty companions.
Probably anyone else would have jumped at the chance.
Loki is well aware of that, but he still cannot manage to quash down his own dissatisfaction as he plods along, trailing a little behind the others.
And it’s not exactly because of the actual adventure they’ve chosen. The mysterious cave on the border of Nidavellir, of which there were so many strange tales… it isn’t a place that Loki would have chosen to explore, but he could have worked up at least a little interest under other circumstances.
And it’s also not completely because of the company that is, well, accompanying them. No matter that he has really not been getting along with Sif in recent years. No matter that the Warriors Three, with their grating good cheer and their tendency to treat him like an afterthought, have lately begun to annoy him even more than before. Even if it weren’t for all of that, Loki would not be happy about this. He’s sure of it.
What is really bothering him is Thor. More specifically, how Thor had gotten him to come along on this journey, which was the way it always happened these days: by not even giving him the chance to refuse. Thor had swept up, brimming with plans, and had simply assumed Loki’s participation.
And this time, just like every other time in recent years, a sick feeling had risen in Loki’s throat, hot and acidic.
He’d wanted to refuse, hadn’t he? He’d wanted to make some excuse why he could not go along.
But this time, just like every other time, he hadn’t. He’d gone along with it all, helpless against Thor’s enthusiasm. The arm thrown round his shoulders and dragging him along the hallway back toward their rooms to swiftly pack a bag.
He’d wished Thor could just leave him be. He hadn’t wanted to be here. He would have stayed home, if only Thor would have let him.
He can tell himself that as many times as he likes, but it doesn’t dispel the sick feeling. The nausea that rises when Thor calls his name from a few paces ahead on the road. The way his heart races when Thor calls to him despite the abundance of other friends around them.
Loki bites it all back and scowls at the sky as if it were dark with clouds, irritation pulling the corners of his mouth down, even though so far it is a beautiful day, sun bright on the fields around them, cool winds in the leaves and grasses.
Thor notices, thumps him on the back with a grin. “It’s not so bad as all that, is it, brother? We have adventure before us; what could be wrong?”
Loki does not let himself relish that touch to his shoulderblade for as long as it lasts. He does not let himself imagine that they are the only ones here. He doesn’t care about any of this. He would have stayed home, if only Thor would have let him.
Loki tells himself it is so.
“They say monstrous beasts of all varieties dwell there,” Fandral muses while they sit around the campfire that night, partway to their destination and all (or nearly all) enjoying the journey and its opportunity to speculate upon what a courageous and magnificent task they have set themselves to.
Sif snorts in response. “I for one doubt it can be all it has been made out to be. Each tale speaks of a different beast—but how could such a cavern be home to them all? It does not make sense. Ravening wolves twice man-size living alongside great fire-breathing serpents in tunnels beneath the earth? Unlikely. I think some of the stories must just be tales.”
Fandral shrugs while he considers her words.
But Volstagg, who has up till that point been merely humming and tending to their supper over the fire, plucks out a crispy sausage with his fork and takes a pondering bite. “It only fails to make sense if one imagines small tunnels. I would hazard this merely means they are of far greater size and reach than anyone suspects.”
This causes Fandral to shrug again, and he accepts the second sausage from the sizzling pan. “It could also be that there is some strange magic at work. Couldn’t it? Loki, what do you think?”
At the question, Loki looks up, and he glances around at the other faces illuminated in the fire’s glow. Thor has stayed strangely silent throughout the conversation. Hogun… well, in his case that’s not so strange. But now Thor is watching Loki in return, eyes alight, waiting for his answer.
Something twists in the depths of Loki’s belly, and his mouth twists with it.
“I’ll believe it when I see it,” he says, aloof, dismissive. “Personally, I think none of it is true. I think we’ll find nothing but dusty old caves.”
Jeers and guffaws sound out all around the fire, and Loki looks away, chin high, without glancing back at those bright blue eyes to discover their reaction to his words.
The conversation goes on, though, landing next on the other part of the tales: how it was said that, quite often, the parties that adventured there came out with fewer members than when they went in. Some fell prey to the cave’s monsters, of course, but others… merely disappeared. Perhaps lost to the dangers of the cave itself. Or perhaps those unfortunates became disoriented in the dark, in the twisting tunnels, and were separated from their companions... but these were experienced adventurers. It had even been said to happen to dwarves, who never lost their way below ground.
Loki keeps silent while the others speak of this in excited whispers, their eyes glinting in the firelight. Somehow, to them, this is merely one more mystery to be solved, and surely they are the ones destined to solve it.
Thor is the worst of them.
“It won’t happen to us,” Thor says with a sunny smile. “We will discover the truth and find what secrets are hidden there.”
Loki knows that this is why they’re on this adventure at all. Because Thor had heard of it and decided it was a worthy feat for him to achieve.
The twist in Loki’s belly turns tighter as he lies down, spreading out his bedroll at the edge of their cluster and slipping into it. He lies on his back, arm folded behind his head, staring up at the stars high above. If he glances over, he can just see Thor’s hair spread out upon his pillow, and beyond him the silhouette of Hogun where he sits, his back to the dying embers to keep his vision in the dark, taking the first watch of the evening.
Thor means to use this journey to prove himself above those who had made the attempt before him. Loki, on the other hand, will remain nothing more than Thor’s tagalong younger brother, the nuisance, the trickster, the seiðmaðr. And that has to be the reason he cannot stand the thought of it. He is tired, certainly, of being overlooked. Of not being wanted anywhere. Of not being appreciated and instead being only tolerated.
After a few restless minutes, he rolls so that he can simply stare at the faint glint of gold that is Thor’s hair, and he even lets himself sink down enough into the relaxation of sleep that he does not make excuses for it.
Thor made him come along on this journey in the first place. It wasn’t his fault he was here, on the edge of sleep, or that he just happened to be turned now to lie in the direction of the fire’s last glow.
When morning comes, they wake, pack up their camp, bury last night’s ashes, set off again under a sky dappled with low grey clouds that seem to skim the tops of distant trees. It is brisk and bracing weather, not too cold but with a feeling of tension in the air, and it speeds them along their path.
The country changes as they make their way downward, into the lowlands on the border of Nidavellir, and the weather changes also. No longer does blue sky shine out between the clouds; instead the clouds darken and draw in close as the air warms and grows heavier.
Sif tosses her cape over her shoulders and lets it stream out behind to make the most of what few breezes there are.
Volstagg cranes his neck to gaze up at the thick blanket above, while beside him Hogun walks with wary alertness, eyes scanning the horizon as it rises in the start of unfamiliar mountains.
Fandral calls out cheerily that according to his map, the cave’s entrance is only two hours ahead.
And Thor, at the lead, forges their path with a renewed intensity. The threatening weather has no effect on him, of course. It is hard not to watch him. Hard not to be entranced. Hard not to feel a growing sense of excitement, just because Thor feels it—Loki has always known why everyone seems to love Thor and follow him. No one can really help it, can they?
Loki bites down on the sensation and tries to distract himself with all the little sights. Rare herbs he spots in the fields beside the path, and many others he’s not sure of. Even the ground itself—Nidavellir is known for the abundance in its earth of many rare minerals and metals, and Loki wonders which ones are responsible for the way some of the stones here gleam, shiny as if they’d been polished. He stoops to pick up a black pebble, and when he rubs its surface with his thumb he finds it has a strange translucence, so that he can just barely see the shadow of his fingers beneath. And there are countless others just like it at their feet.
He casts the little stone down again, irritable, and continues on.
Three hours later (owing to a wrong turning that left them retracing their steps across a particularly arduous hill) they stand before the mouth of the cave just as night is beginning to fall.
It is the obvious, sensible consensus that they will wait for the morning to venture in.
The fire, though, is oddly difficult to light; the wood, perhaps, is damp, or else the fingers that kindle it are unsteady.
In the end, Loki sighs and waves magic at the first flickers until the shaky little flame steadies and grows. Hogun nods at him in something like thanks.
Volstagg again takes the task of cooking their supper, this time spitting a pair of rabbits that Fandral managed to catch in the fading dusk light and serving the meat with thick slices of bread toasted over the fire. Yet despite Volstagg’s famed culinary skill, the meat comes out dry and tasteless, the toast overcharred. They all pick at it anyway, consuming it with practicality but without much savor.
The talk this night is more subdued as well.
Loki finds his mind wandering. In the hush, in the dark, he finds himself thinking how different this is from how things used to be. Remembering being the smallest of their group, the youngest—
It had been so long ago, it surely doesn’t matter. He probably isn’t even remembering exactly what happened. He only remembers having gotten frustrated with them all one time for always being there when he just wanted to play with his brother, and evidently he had told them so. And he remembers their laughter in response.
“What makes you think Thor wants to play with you? He has to. Your mother and father make him bring you along.”
He doesn’t remember what he said in response. If he said anything. He hadn’t yet gotten good at that.
He shrugs away the memory and tries instead to follow the scattered conversation occurring presently around the fire. They had all been children. It didn’t matter.
Still, unwillingly, the words echo in his mind, and they drift up starward on the breeze. They stay with him as he lays out his own bedroll and lies down upon it. Thor does the same, only just beyond arm’s reach away.
They always end up next to one another on occasions like this. It surely cannot happen by accident. Does Thor choose it? Does he do so out of obligation? Because none of the rest would take the spot if he didn’t?
Loki suppresses a sigh.
The cave’s mouth yawns beside them. It is a deeper blackness in a night filled with strange, subtle sounds, sounds Loki doesn’t quite recognize, and he’s not sure whether the strangeness is more than can be accounted for by the dark, the way everything is less familiar by night.
Foreign beasts, perhaps; something small shuffling in the underbrush for a moment. Distant calls of some unknown bird.
The deep rumble from the sky, when it comes, is so familiar it is almost comforting, except for the obvious hint of what it portends, and Loki glances over.
Thor lies deeply asleep, one bare arm thrown up over his head.
Loki doesn’t look at him long. Just shuts his eyes firmly, willing himself to sleep while the weather allows.
He is woken by wet droplets falling on his brow. Only half the night is gone, he would guess from the thin, uneasy sleep that never quite seemed to take him, and the wind has risen, rushed and nervous, thick with the scent of nighttime greenery and far-off seas. As Loki sits up he spies all the others awaking around him, stirring beneath their blankets, frowning up at the sky.
It’s going to get worse. Dread is suddenly heavy within him, and he can feel it all unfolding, what is bound to happen next. The rain will come down harder, and at any moment someone will suggest that they seek shelter in the cave for the rest of the night, and the rest of them will agree.
Rain pelts his arms as he hastily gathers up his things, nervous energy making him clumsy. Rain soaks into his hair, plasters it to his skin.
Thor, beside him, is looking toward the cave’s entrance, brow raised in a curious look, head tilted. Expression as if he barely notices the rain but is driven by it anyway.
Silently, Loki curses. And his only consolation is the certainty that his foreboding about it all will be proved right.
Moments later the skies truly open, thunder rending the clouds apart, lightning illuminating the landscape with bleak white. Loki can feel the rumbling in the ground, can taste the electricity in the air, but the torrent of drops is too loud to hear the others’ shouts as together they all dash for the cover of the cave.