of shadows in darkness that i used to own

i. when the wrath comes

*Author's notes: This work has some important trigger warnings. At the heart, this is a story about love and power and two diametric forces, equal and opposite: endlessly chasing, bordering on the obsession. It is a story about the indefatigable attraction of souls bound together, for better or worse. If this is not your bag, no worries - just give this one a pass. But if you're intrigued, read on! Also, we now have ART! All drawn by me.

A quick but pertinent aside: this work contains both present and past occurrences within the context of the story. Events occurring in the present are written in the present tense; those which occurred in the past are written in the past tense.

Finally, *'Sif' is an Old Norse word which translates to 'wife' or 'bride'.

- x -

The kingdom of Asgard, rich in gold and resplendence as it is, plays paradise to shadow.

To the prisoner Loki, the shadows are invaluable tools—tools to gauge the passage of time, each shifting in seconds to be hoarded like precious gold, smelted into insight. The shadows are something which he, fettered and bound and stripped down to rags, can claim as his own.

He sits, spine arched against the unyielding crystal that encloses the small holding cell, hands clamped in metal bracers and held stiff before his body. He rattles the short length of chain connecting them, just to hear the sound. He releases a long breath.

Loki's retribution was decided even before his brother led him home.

His eyes trace the enclosure. The walls are lit in limpid rings by torches in stone brackets pointing cruelly to the ceiling. He watches them flicker with a kind of hushed malice, birthing an army of shadows. They flock to Loki as though he is their master, but he has not the sovereignty to bid them dance. Writhing their antipathy, the shadows circle endlessly. They whisper to Loki what he already knows.

(You have no power here.)

Friends to the shadows are the voices, low tones uttered by armored guards who stand just outside of the prison's metal doors. Loki thinks they, too, might be of use to him, if only their owners had something of importance to say.

During the long stretches he designates 'night', the voices hush. Sound diffuses into darkness, leaving only the snickers of fire and the hot throb of Loki's pulse in his teeth.

He measures five cycles of thrumming noise succeeded by stark-stretching silence, five days dissolving to nights, before the first disturbance deviates the pattern: an abrupt tinny screech of chrome and crystal; the groan of an opening door. Footsteps, rapidly approaching.

His loyal shadows storm the intruder with such a vehemence that Loki cannot authenticate its features. The door creaks shut. His intruder treads lightly to the enclosure and frees the lock with a soft click; then steps into the torchlight.

He freezes when he sees her: the warrior Sif, towering before him, her face livid in the aura of breathing flame. For a fleeting instant he thinks to move, to somehow resist.

(Futile, hiss the shadows.)

With a practiced flourish, she rips him from the wall by the neck and throws him into the ground.

Sif towers over him, curled on his side, bound arms uselessly bowed as if to protest. The plates of armor that are her usual herald have been abandoned for more practical nightclothes; Loki finds the will to curl his lips, behind the fetter that masks them, behind the fluorescent familiarity of pain. They are leveled in one way at least, here within this cell.

Yet Loki's hands remain clasped, while Sif's freely roam. Her fingers scourge the length of his sides, beneath the rags that hide his ribs. She presses vitriol in the base of his spine, trails her nails in deep and twists. Loki's breath pulses a curse in his throat. Their eyes meet.