A Whole Bunch of Loki's

To Be Granted One More Chance

(Starting to wonder if this should be the last story once the next chapter or so is out.
I dunno, there's probably more in me but I'm not sure if it's getting too much and people are tiring of reading this at 150+ chapters.)

As I made my way towards my bedroom to retire for the night, I couldn't help but to let my eyes wander over the portraits that decorated the palace walls, more getting added over the many years with family additions and significant realm events that we were involved in.

The further along I got the more I saw how everyone had changed over the course of time.

How the portraits went from a happy family of two parents and two children, to two parents and two adults, to one parent and two adults and eventually just the two adults, mourning the loss of their family.

That wasn't including all the solo portraits of either myself or my brother, until he married and had children of his own while I, on the other hand, stayed alone and my portraits remained of a man, standing solo and only getting greyer as each portrait passed.

I stopped at the one just outside my room and frowned, staring at the haggard man who looked about ready to keel over.

Too thin, hair grey and thinning, milky eyes within a gaunt, wrinkled face.

I hated looking at these portraits and yet I couldn't stop myself from admiring who I once was and what I had lost each and every time I passed them.

The pain of my lost youth hurt more than I thought it would.

When you're young, you never imagine yourself getting old and it feels like a lifetime away, yet those years pass you by before you're even aware of it and one morning you find yourself waking up in bed, aching in places you never knew you had before and reminiscing for your days of debauchery and frolics.

Part of me wished I was more debaucherous in my youth.

That wasn't to say that I hadn't had any encounters with men and women alike, but it certainly was not as many as I was perceived to have, instead I chose to spend most of my time alone in my library.

Ironically, that is also where most stories of my flings are said to have happened and it amuses me to no end that they would think I would sully such a place in the name of sexual gratification when I had a perfectly good bed for that.

Now here I was, tired and weak compared to who I had been, even my magic was beginning to wane unlike the stories I had read as a child where power would grow as you aged.

My eyes narrowed as I glared in resentment at the portrait of who I had become.

Every day I had to withhold the temptation to destroy that constant painful reminder.

With a scoff, I forced myself to turn away and vowed to dispose of it the next day.

Not that I would, I never did.

Instead I'll mope, spend time wondering how different my life would have been had I taken a spouse and had children of my own, were I to follow closer in the footsteps of Thor rather than living the hermit life I had taken.

Sometimes I simply wished to be young again.

Vanity had never been something I considered beyond wanting to look presentable, so in my past I never imagined I'd see a day where I looked back and wished for a second chance purely because I hated seeing myself.

Giving a withered sigh, I opened the door to my bedroom and stepped inside, letting the door fall shut behind me so that darkness and silence of the empty room engulfed me once again.