Thor's eyes opened, but his vision blurred around the edges. He frowned hard, fighting to clarify, even as the muffled sounds all around him began to define. Golden light-but dimmed. The lustre had gone out. And a slight tipping sensation beneath his feet and around his shoulders reminded him of a ship rolling on the waves before a storm...

He suddenly focused. Stood still on the flagstones near a weathered pillar, hardly breathing, casting a slow gaze around the hall. For it was a hall he knew-one in Asgard. But it had not been used for a banquet since Balder's coming of age. In fact, it had been locked and sealed ever since his death.

Yet here it was, now, choked with revelers. They danced, they drank, they sang. Their voices, and the clatter of dining ware, rang around his head. But even as he desperately searched, he did not recognize a single face among them. They all wore black, and the women's necklines plunged. Some had even donned animal masks and pointed horns. They danced languidly, seductively, in a style completely unlike any to which Thor was used. All of it felt so familiar-and yet so utterly alien that it sent icy shivers all across his skin, making his armor feel heavy and cold upon him.

He wandered through the room, trying not to trip over the long trains on the women's scaly gowns, his heart pounding even as his muscles began to tremble. He couldn't stay long-he felt magic shuddering around him, wrapping its tendrils around his ankles, tugging on him...

The hammering in his chest intensified as the crowd pressed in around him, laughing too loudly, stumbling too close to him and swinging their wine goblets in front of his face, as if they couldn't see him at all. Thor staggered back, his muscles suddenly turning to lead as his left arm began to shake down to the bones-

Hands-they snatched at the shoulders of his cape from behind.

Yanked him, hard, and spun him around-

Shoved him violently back against a pillar. His back thudded against stone, and his teeth snapped together...

Thor lashed out and grabbed at the hands that pinned him...

Stopped.

His eyes widened. His breath stilled to nothing. The noise around him faded to the background.

He stared straight into the face of a young man hooded and cloaked, his wrap as black as the night sky, embroidered with the seals of a magician. Shadow hid part of him, but his piercing, brilliant emerald eyes captured Thor's. Thor could see every detail of those eyes, a mere handsbreadth away, the black eyebrows drawing together, hawk-like and intent as a December storm. The usually soft mouth was set, and the pallor in his face a striking contrast to the sickly, ruddy glow all around. In fact, this man was more solid, more sharply-clear, more real than anything and anyone else in the room.

And a sensation like cracking ribs traveled all through Thor's chest.

"Loki..." Stinging tears of confusion sprang to his eyes. Loki's hands clenched down harder on the cape edges at Thor's shoulders, and his jaw tightened as those vivid eyes flashed over Thor's face. Then, slowly, the tension in his cloaked frame eased, and his face gentled. He lifted his right eyebrow, just slightly, giving Thor a rueful look.

"Since when have you been brave enough to attempt water-wending, Brother?"

"You are dead," Thor gasped, his lip trembling. Hot tears tumbled down his cheeks. Loki watched him carefully, several unreadable thoughts flickering across his eyes.

"Perhaps I am," he murmured. "But we're not exactly in the realm of the living, are we?" he cast a dark glance out over the drunken guests. Thor couldn't pull his gaze from him.

"I don't understand," Thor managed roughly. "Where am I? What is going on?"

"I've come to tell you that." Loki returned his attention to Thor. "But I haven't much time. Neither do you. So I must-"

A flock of tipsy women blundered right into them, giggling wildly. Loki let go of Thor with his right hand and swatted one in the face.

She dissolved. Burst into tendrils of blackness, like ink spilled into still water.

Loki snapped his fingers. A little green light burst into being, and floated above his head.

In the same stroke, the rest of all the guests melted and swept away.

The hall stood empty, silent. Two torches burned. The little light glowed like a candle. Darkness draped the rest of the chamber. Thor's breathing rattled in his ears.

"That's all nonsense, anyway," Loki muttered, scowling.

"Loki," Thor choked. "I am sorry. I am so sorry. My plan failed-I misread how powerful Malekith was, what he could do-"

Loki faced him, reached up and firmly cradled Thor's neck with both hands, his thumbs resting against the sides of Thor's face. Warmth shot through Thor's whole body, and his shaking instantly stopped. The world solidified, quieted. Everything stabilized, and he finally felt as if he were truly standing on stone. Loki, his mouth solemn and set, pierced through Thor with an unblinking, brilliant, soft gaze. He raised his eyebrows, open and steady, and shook his head once.

"It wasn't your fault."

"But-" Thor tried. Loki's fingers tightened.

"I chose to go with you, I chose to save you. And I chose to die," Loki cut him off, his voice rough and unstable. But his hands did not waver. "And at the moment it's rather inconvenient for me to be here, so I need you to listen."

"Loki-"

Loki shook him. He pressed even closer.

"For once, Thor, just listen to me," he hissed. "This is a tangled web you are caught up in, and you have only discovered the barest edges, not to mention the spider that waits in the center."

Thor grabbed Loki's wrists. Loki shook him again, his eyes blazing.

"It is a game. A deadly game, but a game nonetheless," Loki breathed. "And you must understand the rules if you have any hope of winning."

"What are you talking about?" Thor demanded, his brow twisting so hard it hurt.

"I have no time to explain," Loki answered. He released Thor with his left hand and snapped his fingers again. Light flashed. And a small, oval violet stone, glittering with the light of the galaxies, rested in his palm. It pulsed and glowed and shimmered-it almost seemed...alive. Loki gave a crooked smile.

"It is a good thing we're here rather than there," he mused. "Otherwise, I'd have to cut you open."

"What-?" Thor blinked-

Loki set the stone against Thor's breastplate, right above his sternum, set his thumb against it and pushed.

The stone went through the metal.

Thor sucked in a sharp breath. Heat seared through his armor and into his skin and then...

Into his heart. Straight into it. Like the shaft of an arrow. And then it swelled and swam around his heart-a writhing swirl of hot and cold, light and dark, thistles and thorns cut through with morning sunshine.

"What...What is this?" Thor rasped, more tears spilling as helpless vulnerability filled his blood. Loki just gazed back at him, smiling softly. Then, he reached up and touched Thor's forehead with his finger.

"Now look," he whispered.

FLASH.

Thor's mind exploded-exploded with lights, with nebula, rushing wind...

Stones. Different colors. Light lived within each, and they whirled through the galaxies, bursting and shattering...

And aligning.

Understanding flooded him. Overwhelmed him. Strangled him.

THUD.

Loki thumped him on the forehead sharply with one finger.

Thor's eyes snapped open. His whole frame shook. Loki, standing before him once more, pressed his palm to Thor's heart with one hand, and gripped Thor's neck with the other.

"You see?" Loki asked earnestly, watching Thor. Thor could only nod.

"You must release the one lying in the cradle," Loki reminded him. "He's sent to you, to guide you. An angel. All you have to do is open the door for him."

Thor nodded again, grasping Loki's hand at his chest and holding it there, white-knuckled. Loki glanced back over his shoulder. The torches in the room guttered.

"I must go," he said. He started to pull back.

Thor snatched at Loki's cloak shoulder and took a fistful. He would not let go of his hand.

"No," he gritted. "No, don't leave me again."

Loki's expression twitched, and he stared at Thor. Suddenly, tears glittered in his eyes, too. But he smiled.

"I'm always with you."

He stepped back, and slipped out of Thor's grasp. He lifted his chin, and gave him a fiery look.

"Now go, Brother. And batten down the hatches."

He waved a hand.

And he, the chamber, and Asgard vanished.

Thor thrashed-came up out of ice-cold water...

Sucked in a tearing gasp and blinked as he found himself within the black cavern of the Water of Sight, Erik Selvig standing uncertainly at the lip of the pool. Thor closed his hands into fists, his breathing unsteady, as water ran in rivers down his skin, and a fire burned in his heart unlike any he'd ever known.

VVVVVV

Loki sat on the edge of his Looking Glass pool in one of the highest towers of Asgard. Moonlight glimmered against the water. Icy liquid ran down his face and soaked his clothes. He rose to his feet, turned, and faced the rippling water. He took a deep breath.

"...and I shall do the same," he whispered. He gazed up at the hole in the ceiling, up at those swirling nebula, feeling the darkness press in around him. He waved a hand again, and watched his reflection shimmer as the likeness of Odin enveloped him once more. Then, drawing in another bracing breath, he strode out of the tower and locked the door behind him.