For Pity

Mercifully, no more nightmares came that night

The nights had been rough. Sigyn had woken many a time breathless and covered in sweat, looking to her left and seeing an empty spot where Loki would usually be. She had realised that she had come to need his comfort in her sleep and had grown used to his arm draped casually around her waist. She needed him simply for sleep, and such a dependancy scared her. It had taken her years to form such a bond with Amora, and even sometimes now she was taken aback with by how close they had become, and to have such a bond with someone who was a stranger but a couple of months ago scared her.

The last couple of nights, her nightmares had become all but unbearable and she had resorted to taking herbal remedies to help her sleep properly. Even then, one night she awoke screaming, begging for them to stop and leave her alone, to stop hurting her mother and yet, even in her state of consciousness she couldn't shake the tears that fell freely from her cheeks.

She reached out, looking for Loki as a form of comfort, only to yet again find a completely empty bed. Completely lost, she stayed frozen, tears still falling freely from wide childlike eyes, completely enveloped with fear. She hated this, being alone again after forming an attachment, especially one she valued so. It was just as it happened, people left and eventually found themselves unwilling to return.

She had seen Loki within the past few days, he had been at breakfast, lunch and dinner, he had followed her dutifully through her meetings and tried his best to seem pleased, however that was all that it was, a duty. She was sure that if she hadn't offered him the place of 'consort' he wouldn't even leave the library, which he seemed to spend all his time nowadays.

She let out a sob, the images of the past almost consuming her mind completely, and making her entire body shake in fear. Those nightmares, as common as they were to her, still struck her in the most painful way possible. It always reminded her that no one was ever constant. Everyone has to leave at some time, and right now wasn't a good moment to be reminded of that.

Sigyn took in a deep breath, composed herself and wiped away the tears, refusing to acknowledge the fear which simple memories struck into her heart. Yes she was terrified, but no-one else needed to know that.

She pulled the blanket from her, threw on a robe over her nightgown and padded towards her door, before slipping through it and making her way through the halls. Ironically enough, within the moonlight, Sigyn found that she found the shadows less large, and the shapes softer, less imposing on her. Of course, many would argue otherwise, but by the light of the moons, it seemed that not much could go wrong.

She took a turn towards the palace gardens, wanting to be surrounded by something other than wood and the occasional cobblestone, and made her way down the steps to be engulfed by the foliage. When she said garden, it was more of a somewhat tamed forest. Often if one was quiet enough, you could see the creatures dancing around within the trees.

One of the trees had far more smoothed out trunks and limbs than others, often people could see children climbing them due to ease of access, however Sigyn had a specific tree, she liked to think of it as her tree, which she found not many a person could climb.

Eventually, she found it, with its towering mass, lack of footholds and high branches. Its flowers still there, left over from spring and giving it a ghostly beautiful atmosphere in the best of ways. One petal fell down and brushed against her cheek, landing on her shoulder, before sliding off gently.

She sighed and jumped as high as she could, hoisting herself up onto the thick branch, before repeating the action. The higher she climbed, the lighter she felt, every branch pushing her further away from her problems and closer to the heavens which she looked up to in so many instances. When she finally made it almost to the top, the last branch that would support her, she sat, and stared up at the galaxy's which surrounded her, and made her feel inexplicably small. And as a queen, a ruler and the holder of the worlds weight, she had found at a young age that was a comforting feeling.