Cleave | Loki x Reader

• two - tell me •

Present day, Asgard

Loki

I fail to recall how I got myself into the vault, but the moment I come to my full senses, my gaze travels across the Mirror of Mycha, standing on its pedestal before me. It taunts me and my past, but even more so, it taunts my lie of a future.
Last time I'd caught my reflection in it, that first sprout of hope of a future with her had blossomed somehwere inside me.
As my hands graze its surface, my breathing accelerates, the massive walls close in on me, and the silence surrounding me sets my skin aflame. When I can not take it any longer, I knock the pedestal over with a vigour unbeknown to me.
Yet, I revel in it, this force born out of pure, unfiltered wrath. It feels pure in the way it lets me feel comforted, and I let it take hold of me. It has the power to drown out hurt and despair, suffocating them under its weight, and it's exhilarating to witness the likes of it this up close and personal.

Next to fall is Mjölnir's pedestal, even though the weapon never actually rests down here. Today is no different.
That is Thor's force of destruction.
This is mine. I send a blast of seiðr towards the wall to my left, and three more pedestals crash onto the marbled floor. This marble may not break, however, this all-consuming noise of chaos that gradually envelopes me is nothing if not music to my ears.
In the corner of my eye, a blue light flickers distinctly, and I catch a glimpse of the Tesseract beneath all the wreckage I've just caused.
I flick my wrist once, quick and sufficient enough to send the blue cube flying across the room. I might consider taking it with me as soon as I'm done here, as a trophy perhaps, a reminder of how fickle Odin's empire truly is. Rising my gaze from the Tesseract, my eyes travel across the last pedestal standing, the one reigning over all the others from the far wall - the wall that is actually a door. Bright light shines upon it from the door's many crevices.
The Casket of Ancient Winters.
How he obtained it, my father once explained to me as follows: 'Our armies drove the Frost Giants back into the heart of their own world. The cost was great. In the end, their king fell, and the source of their power was taken from them.'
This Casket in front of me, this said source of power, it is capable of producing an infinite icy wind that can freeze whole landscapes and plunge an entire world into an ice age. Captured by his Einherjar it was then sealed in Odin's Vault, wherein it has remained to this very day.

Some kind of feral instinct makes me extend my hand, and I prepare myself for the piercing pain that is about to flood my senses. But it won't come. Not after five seconds, not after a minute. My hands should have turned a violent midnight blue from the cold by then, frozen and dead, but all is see is blue. A vivid and radiant blue. Cold but alive.
'Stop!' The forceful voice from my childhood ripples through every corner of the once so painfully silent room.

'How could you let this happen?' I say, voice even, my back still to him.
I let go of the Casket.

'Thor is my firstborn.' A statement rather than an answer.
'Not quite the way the prophecy foretold, is it not? You see, I overheard you and Mother that day after the dance. I know. I know our souls are connected,' I say. Then I pause.
'Whatever our souls are made of, hers and mine are the same,' I breathe out, the words barely a whisper as I recall her warm back pressed securely against my cool chest, book in hand, reading to me.
Emotions threaten to overwhelm me, and my chest aches for her being perfectly, tenderly engulfed by my body. I should be with her right now. Instead, I am here, with the enemy.

'We are meant to be together. Those were your words! Do you remember none of that?' My voice feels like a foreign substance on my lips. I'm certain, were I to face him, the burning that is clawing at my innards so relentlessly would spill out. Unforgiving and unfiltered.
'Sálufélagar can take any from of bond, not solely that of lovers, Loki.'
'So it is true. The trial dance,' I murmur, more to myself than to him. 'And if it is, then it stands above any prophecy we are aware of, and you know it.'
I sense my father taking agitated steps further down the stairs. 'Thor is the rightful heir to my throne; this cannot be altered!'
'It's not about us ruling together.' I cannot fight it anymore, so I turn. My father's golden eye patch reflects the light from the door's
door's crevices behind me.
'It's about us being together that would grant you the greatest force of seiðr in all the Nine Realms - on your side! Are you too one-eyed to see your benefit in all of this?'
'The prophecy binds her to Thor, son!'
A tense silence hangs in the air between my father and I. Turning back around, I touch the Casket a second time, confident that this time, it won't affect me. My grip tightens around it so that I can feel the relief of pain rising in my knuckles. But that's all it is: self-inflicted pain. No scars frozen deep into my skin will form on my palms, no matter the amount of time I'll be holding it for.
And of course, I knew its touch would affect me. I'm the God of Lies after all; I ought to be able to deceive myself too, no?