THE GREEN CLOAKS

Written for Sifki Week 2018, Day 3 - "Objects"

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Loki, as a prince of Asgard, naturally had many cloaks. Most of his were green. A few were black. He even had a blue one. None were red.

Thor, who all but haunted Loki's rooms in his spare time after Loki's fall from the Bifrost, now found the colour telling. In their boyhood, they hadn't had much say in the colours of their outfits. Frigga chose most of them. But later on, while Thor professed a liking for red, Loki had developed a preference for green. Jane, when trying to explain something about how light fractured into colours and how that might relate to the Bifrost, had mentioned in passing green being a complimentary colour to red.

Complimentary. Or opposites? Jane had shown him something she called a "colour wheel." He vaguely recalled seeing similar diagrams when he was a boy, still under the tutelage of the masters. Why had it never occurred to him then that green, the direct opposite of red on this wheel, was perhaps a sign that Loki wished to stand apart from him and not in his shadow?

He took a cloak from Loki's wardrobe, feeling the weight of it in his hands, and the weight of regret in his heart.

If the servants, tidying Thor's wardrobe the next day, noticed a green cloak that was certainly not his hanging in it, they said nothing.

… … …

In Loki's cloaks, Frigga saw her boy, grown into a tall man. He had stood before her on day he would receive the medals that declared his schooling complete, with his ceremonial helmet and formal armour, and said, "Well, Mother, what do you think?"

"Such a handsome young man," she had said with a smile.

Loki had bent to kiss her, saying, "If I am handsome, then it is because I have the most beautiful mother."

"I don't know if I should cry or if I should be alarmed that you have such a way with words."

They had laughed together, and she had helped him put on the cloak – green, specially embroidered with golden thread for the occasion.

Now the cloak hung in his wardrobe, hidden amongst several others. Frigga removed it carefully. She would have it cleaned and kept in a special place in her rooms.

… … …

Sif's first inclination had been to toss the cloaks into the fire and burn them out of spite. Loki did rather like fine things, and his cloaks had been some of his finest possessions. But the Queen had shown up, and she had to refrain from burning Loki's cloaks. Later she was glad of it, for she found that the cloaks were all that she had left of his embrace. To wrap herself in a flowing green cloak was to feel Loki's arms around her once again. To nuzzle her nose against the rich, smooth cloth was to smell the scents that were so familiar to her. It was almost as if he was still there with her.

Why, she asked, had she never seen that he was so very, very troubled? How could that have gone unnoticed? She had known for a long time that he thought himself as second to Thor in everyone's eyes, and she had tried her hardest to make him think otherwise.

Perhaps Loki was not so troubled at first. Perhaps he had only become so after that horribly unwise expedition to Jotunheim when his heritage came to light. Perhaps that was the tipping point, the thing that sent Loki into near madness. Sif wanted to believe that was so. She did not want to think that all the time they had spent together or that all the things he said to her had been lies.

Sif pulled a cloak around her shoulders, buried her face in another.

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A/N: Reeeally quickly done because life suddenly got busier than it was supposed to be this week. D:

And this turned out to be a lot less "Sifki-esque" than I would've liked, but oh well...