I Know I Shouldn't

Part 12

Loki POV

I could hear them talking, gibbering back and forth at each other around me. I couldn't move by body, I couldn't even twitch a finger, but I could hear every word they said.

I'd heard Dreyna, her whispering and begging me to wake up, that she had to tell me something. I already knew what it was, and that's what made this situation so much worse. I was dying, and I would never get to tell my bride or my  child that I cared about them.

I wanted to sigh, I wanted to get up and throw things --- I was torn begin anger and misery, just like every day of my life. I missed seeing her face, her blonde hair falling from my fingers as we lay in bed together. I could see her in my mind, smiling, her eyes crinkling at the corners as she reached forward to caress my skin so gently.

She loved me, falsely, and I owed her more than that.

If I ever woke up this cursed coma, I'd rip that necklace from her throat and destroy it! Damned be the consequences! She carried my child, I owed her honesty!

If she'd even still have me.

Oddly, though, it had been a while since I heard her voice. Where was Dreyna? She had been at my side for so long, had they finally coaxed her to sleep? She needed to rest, keep her strength up.

I could hear Mother, talking softly to Eir, her hand clutching mine. Through all these years, she still had not given up on me. She was always there for me, holding tightly to me, occasionally brushing at my hair. She talked to me some, told me of all the changes I'd missed while I'd been away, as if on some vacation and not imprisoned below her feet.

I didn't care.

None of it mattered now.

I was dying, and nothing could change that. My body was frozen, it felt as if it was encased in ice and I could not move a muscle. I'd tried numerous times, just to even twitch, but to no avail. My strength was beginning to wan, I couldn't keep holding on like this, it was too much.

I just... I just wanted Dreyna to return to me, to feel her touch against my skin one last time before I disappeared to where I should have been ages ago.

Hel awaited me.

"Odin?" I heard Mother's voice say in alarm, her hand suddenly clutching mine. Odin? What was he doing in here again? I knew he had gone to the Frost Giants to seek aid, and had failed; I wasn't surprised, I wouldn't have helped him either. "Did you find them ---?"

"Heimdall cannot see her nor Thor anywhere in the realms," I heard Odin reply, his voice dark. "Somehow they are shielding themselves."

"This is unlike them both, you know that. Where could they have gone?"

"If they went to Jotunheim, Heimdall would have been able to see them. It's as if they are nowhere."

"That's impossible."

Her?

Who was her?

"But what if Loki wakes and we cannot find her?" Mother fretted. "What if she isn't here if he ---?"

"Dreyna will return when she comes to terms with herself," I heard Eir interrupt Mother, the old crone had a tendency for that. "She is pregnant, and the father of her child is dying. She needs time to herself to process."

"That doesn't explain Thor's disappearance." Mother sighed. "They've gone somewhere together, that's the only explanation."

"But where would they go?"

"I don't know, but I suspect Thor went with Dreyna to keep her safe in her condition. Has Heimdall checked Midgard?"

"He has checked all the realms, they are lost to his eye." Odin sounded grim.