Unforeseen

The Casket of Ancient Winters

If Loki had not been with me, holding my hands as he was, I would probably have been super freaked out in this vault. These relics, they were odd and mysterious, and some of them, like the Tesseract, oozed a foreboding, almost evil aura. Strangely enough, some of them truly radiated some sort of power energy as well. With my powers I had sensed the Tesseract, it's energy sharp like static shock, but I also felt subtle swirls of other kinds of energy. I looked around, trying to find and distinguish the artifacts that were the sources to the barely-there curls of energy.

That's when I noticed it. At the very end of the hall, in front of a glowing white wall of cross-crossing bars stood a pedestal with another relic that glowed blue, a cold, blustery kind of energy radiating from it. It was different from the Tesseract though. It was much bigger, glowing a darker blue from the inside, the glow shifting and churning like a storm. On either side of it were curved silvery handles for carrying.

Loki's grip on my hands tightened as my eyes fell upon the relic, making me look back up at him questioningly. My confused expression was met with Loki's look of apprehension as his gaze flicked between me and the artifact. I got the distinct feeling that he didn't want me to look at it. He didn't want me to ask about it or wander near it.

"Loki..."

He wasn't looking at me, but instead over my head, his lips drawn thin, his brow furrowed. I'd never seen him act like this before, at least not that I could remember, and it sort of scared me. Loki rarely hesitated or exuded any self-doubt. He was often unwaveringly confident even through the hatred and self-loathing and guilt and shame I had seen in him before, but seeing him act this way...

"Loki... what-"

"Long ago, when I was but a newborn infant, Jotunheim threatened to plunge Midgard into a new Ice Age." Loki interrupted me, his voice mechanical and ever so slightly halting, "Their king, Laufey... my birth father... led the attack, wielding the Casket of Ancient Winters, the source of the Jotun's power. At the time, Odin and the armies of Asgard fought them to protect the mortal realm. Asgard won, and as recompense and a precaution, Odin took the casket from the Jotuns and kept it here where it would no longer cause damage."

My eyes shot over to the relic. That thing? That thing could cause whole oceans to freeze over and start an unending winter?

"I have told you before of my heritage and what I did when I discovered it. I was never good enough for Odin, I never fit on Asgard, I would never gain a throne for myself. I resented Thor and Odin for it and was cunning enough to try to gain Asgard for myself, but upon also learning that my life and lineage was a lie, and on top of that that I belonged to the race that Asgardians had long been told were nothing but monsters... and that their king was my father by blood and that he had discarded me as trash... it was too much. I hated everything and everyone and only wished for the power that I felt I had none of. I did terrible things, and with that casket and with the Bifrost I caused massive damage to the realm of Jotunheim and I murdered their king."

He'd told me all of this before. I couldn't condone his actions, but I'd forgiven him for them and accepted what he'd done. He wasn't that same man anymore. A tear welled in my eye as I watched Loki's face contort in a look of pain as he recalled his memories. There was so much pain there, and so much of it I couldn't reach.

"I'm not proud of what I've done," Loki glared over at the relic, "But whenever I see that... I cannot escape the facts of what I did." He chuckled ruefully, "And even now it reveals me for what I truly am."

I squeezed his hands, trying to offer reassurance, "You're not that man anymore, Loki."

"I know." His thumbs ran over the backs of my hands as he looked back at me, "It's all thanks to you. Without you... who knows what kind of monster I would be now."