The Lokistone

Lokistone 4

"What a gloomy thing, not to know the address of one's soul."

~Victor Hugo

Loki stood without moving, staring out the window at the black mountainside, and the sky beyond that glittered with distant, pinprick stars. His left shoulder leaned against the wooden window frame, one hand resting on the sill. He breathed evenly, purposefully. The constellations told him that dawn would arrive in half of an hour.

A few minutes ago, he had finally hauled himself to his feet and shuffled across the thin rug, around the couch, and into the dim, tiny adjoining space where he found a counter and sink. Using what little magic he could summon, he had coaxed a clunky metal hand pump in the wall to spill ice water over his bloody hands, washing the sticky, scarlet mess from his palms and down the basin. He had then given his upper body a brief and torturous sponge bath using several rags he found, and donned his long-sleeved leather tunic again. He had been unable to keep his fingers from shaking.

After that, he had returned to his pile of armor, knelt, and properly unconjured it to the space-between-spaces—that magic, unseen hiding place that only he knew about—tucking each piece invisibly beside a replacement helmet, a silver pen, and a small, glittering purple stone.

Now, Loki stood on a cleared floor, and his eyes unfocused in the darkness to the point of unseeing.

He listened.

The muted wind buffeted the outside of the hovel. Deep within the walls, the old wood creaked, softly. All else was silence.

Thus, Loki could hear his heart, audible in the motionless air, pounding against his breastbone. His pulse thudded upward in his throat and down to his gut, making it difficult to stand still.

He sharpened his vision again, and gazed out over the moonlit terrain—then again to the stars and sky. Unfamiliar. Cold. And opaque as a smokescreen that hides an advancing army.

Motion.

His eyes flew to it—his heart banged.

He focused...

And ground his teeth.

A gust had just tossed the tops of several trees outlined by moonshine.

He drew in a deep, uneven breath through his nose, and folded his arms tight against his sore chest. His pulse did not slow. Nausea pressed on his stomach.

He glanced back, around the little sitting room—the room as small as a mouse hole, yet walled in by a house as exposed as a bird nest on the ground. Loki's attention roved to the shadowed lengths of it. A cat in a corner had more room to maneuver.

His gaze lighted on the partly-open door of the bed chamber. His eyes narrowed. He couldn't see through the small gap. She wasn't moving—but he could sense her inside. Quiet and still. Fragile. His mouth hardened.

He turned back the other way and glared at the now-snuffed candle—he had extinguished the flame last night, the instant he had been able to cross from the front door to the mantel. No light would leak out into the night. He would make certain.

He closed his hands to fists and faced the window again, buckling down.

Control had escaped him since the moment he tangled with Banner—control of his own body, his magic, his thoughts. He must regain it.

He would regain it.

His lip twitched. He closed his eyes.

The scent of ash and wet stone overpowered his memory.

Frost on his skin.

A bandaged face leaning close to his. Gnashing of sharp teeth. Rancid breath.