The Allfather was learning. Loki couldn't keep the furrow of frustration from his brow as he sagged back against his chains. Closing his eyes against all distractions he took the three breaths and centered all his concentration on the latch of his left manacle. Magic crept cautiously from his hand to the metallic sheaf, tendrils brushing down into the mechanisms. He tensed as the buzzing began. The tiny, scraping hisses of a thousand spiders scuttling inside his skull. He ignored the itch, coaxing magic into the workings.

Another steadying breath filled his lungs as he caressed the latch. Simple. It only required a light nudge. His brow creased as he moved to lift the latch. The spiders' dance intensified, joined by the shrilling of nails upon glass. He retreated and the buzz lessened. Teeth clenched, Loki made a magical lunge for the lock. The noise returned, joined by the ghost of creeping insects on his skin. Wavering, the magic broke, running through his hands like water.

He gave a muffled snarl and hung limply against the chains. Beyond talent, magic was governed by concentration and will. And even Loki lacked the concentration to ignore the distractions of this cell. His cell. The Allfather had done well this time. Trying to drain or hamper Loki's abilities would have been ultimately useless or driven him even further from sanity, and so the Allfather had found another solution to imprison his wayward "son," one that kept him from being able to perform even a simple act of magic that he had mastered in childhood.

Physically restrained and unable to work his craft, Loki was far from helpless. He'd talked his way out of worse situations than this—and he'd been encumbered with Thor's "help" at the time. Being muzzled like a mad dog was rather a problem though.

How long will you make me wait? he thought vehemently. Do get on with it. If you wait for remorse, you will wait for eternity. Months had passed since Loki's trial before the throne of Asgard. How the court had whispered and stared. Murmurings of his madness and treason. He bared his teeth at the gasp of "monster." They had no idea: what he was capable of, what was coming. But Loki knew what awaited him, the things he would do. All of this was merely an interlude. What the king of Asgard might decide to do with him mattered little. His fate did not show him snared forever in the punishments of Odin Allfather, and with that certainty everything else became merely a waiting game. And Loki had ever been the patient one.

If only it weren't so sense-numbingly boring.

It had only taken a few days for him to memorize every stretch of his cell, analyze the restraints, count the links in his chains—one-hundred and thirty four—a further two weeks had been devoted to systematically testing the nature of Odin's magics. Toward the end of the sixth month he'd dabbled with flinging everything he had against the cell's defenses just to feel the stinging crack of a response, like worrying a loose tooth, not particularly pleasant, but something to do. He'd already stockpiled enough plans and counter plans to conquer the Earth and throw Asgard at his feet. One of them involved seducing that Jane Foster girl away from Thor—just because she was Thor's. Which was petty, but he'd run out of other viable scenarios weeks before. He'd also composed no less than half a dozen speeches to deliver to the Black Widow at various stages in possible encounters. The Avengers occupied his thoughts not out of desire for revenge, but because he had nothing else to do but think, and they provided diversion. Pitiful, uninspired diversion, but it was better than counting his chains again—if only just.

There was only so much pleasure to be taken from mere imaginings, however, when one itched to put them in motion. Loki had always required something to occupy his time. He was patient because he could nurture a scheme along for hundreds of years, all the while laying the foundations for a dozen more. He never carried only a single plan at once. Even as a child he'd been in need of constant diversion—a new spell to learn, book to read, secret to unravel. And woe to the court if boredom came because then he would make his own excitement.

And, after so much time in a holding cell, with all avenues of interest drained, Loki was beginning to grow bored. He could not even look forward to daily feedings or routine. His golden cell kept him alive without the need for food or drink—or sleep. Loki blinked. As he thought back, he realized he hadn't actually slept since before his fall. What need did one have of sleep with the scepter in their hands? And the void between worlds stretched the mind's eye wide, forcing you to watch, driving images through—his thoughts slid away. What he saw in the darkness between Yggdrasil's branches was best left undisturbed. Sleep was now an enemy.

The monotony of it all drove him inward, dulling his senses. And then came the voice.

"You are burdened with glorious purpose."

Loki's head snapped up as the familiar words whispered around the room. There had been no warning. He strained against the magics of the cell, trying to focus past the buzzing in his head. Where was it coming from? The harder he tried to form his will into power, the greater shrieking pierced his skull. The magic slid through his hands. The drilling behind his eyes subsided as he let his magic drop away.

"Such purpose." The voice came again, dry and rasping.

A sudden presence at his back nearly drove Loki to the ends of his chains. Nails bit into palms as he felt searing, brittle fingers ghost along the edges of his muzzle. The latches clicked. It dropped dully to the ground, ringing against the burnished floors. His tongue darted over chapped lips, lingering at the raw edges where the charmed metal had bit into tender flesh.

He refused the urge to face the eyes boring into his back. Instead he casually pressed his thumb into the corner of his mouth and pulled it away bloody. For a moment he regarded the smear of red in annoyance before testing his voice. "What do you know of me?"

"Much, Laufeyson."

He laughed bitterly. "You know nothing if you call me by that name."

"Odinson if you prefer."

Loki stiffened, "I do not." He didn't know how, but he could feel a hard smile coil through his visitor.

"Very well. Noneson the fatherless, brotherless, motherless—I have seen your purpose."

Loki couldn't keep from jerking a glance over his shoulder. His visitor was like nothing he had expected. Vaguely Aesir in shape, it had no real body. Rough, jaggedly torn strips of crinkled, parchment-like material crisscrossed loosely around its core and curled down into vague approximations of arms and legs. There was no body, though. Through the sizable gaps in its "skin" he could see only a swirling mist of oily runes. There was no true face, only a pair of deep, coal burnished eyes that held his gaze.

"Ah, then my starring role in things to come interests you?" he asked with a coolness he did not feel under those eyes.

"Greatly," the voice purred. Loki fought the urge to recoil as creaking fingers reached out and caressed his manacles. There was no sound as the chains merely fell away into nothingness.

Idly stretching cramped muscles, Loki searched through the archives of his thoughts for some idea of what he faced. This was no magic he was familiar with and the presence reeked of a musty power ancient in origin. Even when the Chitauri had fished him from the void, he had at least had a cursory knowledge of them. His visitor was a disturbingly unanswered question.

"And what kind of being takes such an interest in my destiny?"

"I consider myself a kind of…patron, if you will, of those who stand at the crux of history. You can imagine my delight at reading your wyrd in Urd's Well."

Delightful, thought Loki, only great skill keeping his derision from seeping into his glance, a seer. At Frigga's knee he had learned much about those who sought to divine the path of coming days. It took ability and a deft hand to unravel the fractured shards of insight a typical seer received. Most could grant little more than slivered foreknowledge of what was to come, often twisting it grotesquely in the process. In Loki's experience even a clear vision gained you nothing. Knowing the future did little more than shackle you to the inevitable, slaughtering hope on the altar of knowledge. And woe to those who tried to change their fate.

He shuddered. Having his psyche torn open and full knowledge of his fate seared into his mind while he fell had been far worse than any torment the Chitauri could offer.

A crackling like dry leaves drew his attention as his visitor shifted . "I see little hope of your destiny within these walls," said the voice.

"Ah, but if it truly is destiny, these walls will ultimately matter little," he said quietly, with just a hint of a smile. He didn't need foresight to know where this was headed. "You call yourself a patron?"

The runes at the thing's core curled together, sharpening with bitterness. "I see the turn of fate, the great and terrible deeds that will be and have been. But I myself have no appointed role." Tattered hands extended like grasping talons. "All this power and I have no fate but to be and watch."

The need to be seen—that was something Loki knew all too well. He cocked his head to the side. "And how does one obtain your patronage?" He didn't miss the predatory edge the black eyes took.

"Merely be…pivotal. The thing pressed forward, its presence causing Loki's gut to clench unpleasantly. "And accept my offer of aid."

"You have helped others?" He affected casualness as he put space between him and the unsettling aura surrounding his guest. He picked idly at the cuff of his simple tunic.

"How do you think Odysseus conjured up the idea for that wooden horse of his?"

Loki raised an eyebrow in surprise. Few knew that there had actually been a real man behind the Midgardian epic—moreover, there had been a horse. "And in return for your aid in accomplishing our destinies?"

"Merely a mention. Call me a muse, premonition, presence—I do not care. But mention me. Look across the realms, stretching throughout time and you'll see evidence of me, woven like a thread through the greater tapestry." The thing seemed to smile, "it is a small price."

And what of the price I do not yet see?

"Accept my aid and do not pay my toll, however—well, Yggdrasil said nothing of Odysseus having such trials on his journey home."

Such threats no longer phased Loki. He merely nodded and continued to stretch his limbs, reveling in the simple freedom of walking. While adjusting his tunic, he reached surreptitiously for his magic. The feeling of an itch he couldn't scratch intensified and he let the power drop.

The thing slid forward, almost eager. "This is no place for one such as you."

Indeed not. He pivoted on his heel, a conspiratory grin stretched across his face. "Nor to talk of destiny."

Again he felt that predatory smile as the creature moved behind him, hand-like shreds resting on his shoulders. The raw, alien magic made his own power burn where the husk rested, but he clenched down on the urge to flinch away.

"You are a prize," murmured the voice in his ear.

Magic workings coiled around him, weaving crystalline intricacies of power. A part of him longed to slow the process so that he might study it and gain a clearer understanding of how this enchantment worked. He took in what he could and stored the knowledge away for later use. Then they were moving.

Loki knew the instant they cleared the cell walls. The incessant buzzing vanished and he could finally bend his mind fully to his magic. He smiled. He had no intention of being used a second time. Let someone else grow the legend of his mysterious visitor. Odin's cells stood empty, and that was all that mattered—even if this wasn't one of the scenarios he had envisioned would result in his freedom.

His guide slid through the fabric of the world tree with an ease that surprised him. They slipped around gnarls and flowed between tight-knit roots that had always confounded him. His conviction wavered for an instant. There were few who could world-walk the way he did and Loki was no mean sorcerer—but even he kept to the shadows, gliding over the surface of the world tree. His guide, however, dove into the tree's core, melding into it like water that pulsed through the very wood of its branches. What power allowed such knowledge?

Coward, he thought. His magic pulsed through him as they crested the apex of one of the limbs. A realm glimmered just outside his ken. Alfheim. It had the scent of the light elves about it. One of Loki's own well-worn shadow paths lay just alongside the branch. With a twist of magic, he jumped. His guide's presence fell away and he was thrown somewhat violently from Yggdrasil's veins. A less experienced sorcerer would have tumbled into the nothingness. But Loki snatched at his own path, snarling the shadows about him, angling into them like a diver from a high cliff. He plunged headlong toward the realm itself, the shadows slipping away as Alfheim's green burst upon his senses.

A sudden, wrenching howl of wrathful power tore through his flesh and latched into his essence, everything that made him alive and himself beyond the basic dictates of biology. Alfheim hurtled away as his guide ripped him from his path, his body lurching painfully after his soul. Panic clawed at him as he realized they were too far from Yggdrasil and only the great gnawing void stretched before them. Falling again, falling for centuries, endless cold. Alone, so utterly alone.

But they weren't falling. They were flying, flung through the void as his guide catapulted them from one branch to another. For the briefest of instants, Loki was a child again, scrambling through the limbs in Idunn's orchard, angling for a particularly glittering fruit. Adept though he was at climbing, he couldn't reach the limb and the gap was too far to jump. Urged on by Thor's taunts from the base of the tree, and his own stubborn pride, he launched himself from the safety of his perch. For a glorious moment he knew true freedom. His hand grasped for the other branch, only for the bark to rasp through his clutching fingers. There was no freedom in falling.

Loki latched onto the presence, unable to do anything but blindly will them to safety. He felt an unpleasant jerk, not unlike knocking the wind from his lungs when he was a boy. His liberator caught hold of another branch and used their momentum to hurtle into another realm.

The speed of their entry flung Loki scraping across the ground in a tumbling mass of limbs. For an instant there was only darkness as his eyes adjusted and his organs finally caught up with the rest of him. Unpleasant. His encounter with the green beast had been worse, but he still took a moment before trying to move.

"Treachery!" hissed the voice. Loki could vaguely make out a tattered figure with eyes of pitch. "I, who would help you!"

Staggering to his feet, he absently brushed back his hair, taking in his surroundings at a glance. Blacktopped road crumbling into weeds on either side, thick trees overgrowing strips of rusty thorned-wire, and snatches of folded pasture criss-crossed with livestock trails. He took a sniff of the air and sighed in distaste. "Midgard."

He suddenly found himself shoved backwards against one of the twisted oaks, slamming hard into the knobbled bark. His patron's swirling runes seethed with rage, bearing down on him.

"Is this how you repay your debts, Asgardian? Would you prefer to rot under Odin's stare?"

"I am a god, what do I owe you or anyone else," he asked, flicking his gaze upwards in disdain. "I am Loki. I serve no one's ends but my own."

The contemplative silence surprised him. He had expected more anger or tiresome threats.

"Is it any wonder that you stand alone," said the voice quietly, almost gently. "If you ever hope to grasp your destiny, you will walk in my paths, Loki Son of None."

A chill danced across Loki's skin as the shadow-filled husk drew near him, voice still soft but promising dark things. "You will rue your defiance."

A mad smile split Loki's features. "You are nothing but words. I do not fear you."

The voice chuckled deeply. "You of all people should know the power of words, Liesmith."

Loki chose that moment to strike, a dagger of sparking green energy slicing through the apparition. As the ragged edges wove back together, Loki reached out for Yggdrasil, sliding through world fabric and shaking the dust of Midgard from his feet. As he stepped into the light of another realm, he started. He was back on the road with his patron, sooty runes fading from the air in front of him.

"That was an error. You owe me a debt, little godling. One which you cannot shirk so easily. Your destiny will be my greatest legacy." The voice hummed with anticipation. "But it seems you are unwilling."

Drawing himself up, Loki gestured sharply, a sneer across his face. "I command, I am not commanded."

The voice sighed. Not in weariness or frustration, merely the sigh of someone dealing with an intractable child. Loki bristled at the condescension.

"Then it is a contest of wills. You will accept my aid, Asgardian. Until that time, you have merely exchanged one kind of cell for another," said the voice as it gestured to the world around them. "And Odin has no idea of how to build a prison." The thing slid forward. Its shredded skin tore away from its arm to leave a coiling nest of runes vaguely shaped like a hand. "I, however…"

It lashed out. Needle tipped fingers dug into Loki's sternum, disappearing through flesh and bone. A muffled shriek hissed through his teeth as the creature flicked its wrist and started to draw the spectral talons up his throat. Something gave in an awful tearing sensation as he arched away. The pain was physical, but whatever the phantasmal talons had torn away wasn't. His voice rasped as the husk paused, its hand resting almost caressingly underneath his chin. A terrible gash of a smile opened across its face. It knocked back Loki's head and jerked its hand up and out, a thready silver mist trailing after it, hanging in limp shreds from the claws.

Staggering, Loki collapsed back against the tree, his breath coming in ragged snatches through his raw throat. He felt as if he had swallowed glass. He opened his mouth, but the question on his lips never came. A thousand tumbling words choked in his throat. All he could utter was a pained whine. Fists twisted in his tunic, he clenched his eyes shut against the rising bile and panic. An image of golden thread dripping red and a hidden childhood anguish flashed before him.

The figure watched impassively, the silvery swirl of his voice nestled in its palm. "What a prison I will make of you."

He made it two steps before pain slammed him to the pavement, grinding pebbles into his hands and knees. A hundred thousand needles pierced his skin. Clutching for his magic, he thrust outward with a vicious shard of power. The smoky runes latched onto the shard, spiraling down into the wellspring of his magic, cascading through every fiber of his being. A scalpel slice at his very core shot tremors through him. His mouth gaped wide in a wordless plea. He buckled. Tears seeped down his cheeks to drop onto the dusty ground. He was unraveling, the thread of his magic picked out, stitch by stitch.

He was being unwritten.

Darkness crept upon the edges of his vision as he fought to focus on the being before him.

"Now, little princeling, you will know what a true prison feels like."

What did…magic…my magic. He could barely force the words to form in his mind.

"You have no magic. Not anymore. You have no voice, no strength, no power. And until you embrace your destiny, you will remain so." The glittering eyes narrowed. "Mortality does not suit you."

Loki managed to lever himself upright, having to lean heavily against a fencepost. A rancid hollowness settled in his gut. He coughed against the bile that forced its way into the back of his throat. It was as if his lung had been carved out, or a piece of his heart. Worse. Magic had poured through every part of him—like blood, or air, or life itself. The specter had sliced away part of his soul. Like it was nothing.

The fog boiling through his mind confused every notion and glimmer of thought. Words tumbled over themselves, letters breaking away in panic as even meaning slithered through his grasp. He shuddered. Death…

"This is no death sentence, Asgardian. You will survive. With little pleasantness." The voice sounded almost pleased. "Do not fear. I do not leave you unarmed." A smile split the ragged face as burning fingers caressed his temple.

The ground rushed up to meet him as Loki dropped into the long grass, body wracked with tremors. He had the vague sensation of a hand brushing back his hair and a searing kiss being pressed against his forehead. It was almost tender.

"Accept my aid quickly, child, and all this will pass away," whispered the voice as Loki's mind and body finally gave in to the blissful embrace of unconsciousness.

Author's Note: I can't believe I'm finally posting this. I started on this story before The Dark World came out and I've been working on it and nit-picking at it ever since. In many ways it started as a writing exercise to help me practice writing other voices that didn't sound like my own. It might have...um...gotten away from me a bit. The goal was always to try and study the characters and write their personalities and voices as truly as I could to the MCU interpretations (at least as they existed at the time I was writing). I feel I succeeded with some more than others. In many ways I wanted these to be the characters we know as they might exist or interact if the films were a different genre than they are. Writing almost entirely from Loki's perspective has been an absolute blast (he is one of my all time favorite characters), getting to explore his psyche and imagine what his interior monologue might be like. He's also clearly got some issues to work out.

The story is pretty much finished and the goal is to post a chapter (or two if they're short) every week. So, rest assured, you'll get the end of this story. I also delight in constructive criticism and comments. As long as you're not cussing me out, we'll be fine (trust me, you won't be more nit-picky or brutal than my grad school writing class where the rule was "don't cry." And if you did you had to step out of the room and continue to listen to the class rip your work apart from the hall).

Quick note about the rating: this story is action/adventure in places, so there will be violence. I don't think it is overly gory, and anything more than you'd see in a PG-13 movie for the most part. I have a pretty high tolerance for violence (if not gratuitous gore), but I don't think this story will be graphic enough to warrant an M rating. There are only the mildest references to anything sexual (and not involving the characters in the story) and only mild language.