For as long as he could remember, Yggdrasil has called out to Loki.
He wasn’t sure when it began.
Perhaps it was gradual, this obsession.
Perhaps it always was, his fate, a pull that simply got harder to resist.
He was only a few centuries old when he first found himself sneaking away from the palace to venture over the rainbow bridge. Thor’s new friends were mean, and his big brother laughed with them instead of sticking up for Loki like he used to. He followed the bridge to its end, the observatory. He didn’t know why he had gone there of all places but took the opportunity –curious child that he was- to ask the all-seeing gate keeper all manner of far fetched questions about the universe until guards arrived to return the wayward prince to the palace.
Over the years the bifrost became his safe place, where he could go when it felt as if the weight of Asgard would surely crush him. The questions became less frequent as the prince grew, his scholarly enthusiasm all but beaten out of him by the expectations –and sometimes the fists- of the Aesir. Instead he would sit quietly at the gate, looking out at the stars as Hemidall was wont to do, but where the seer watched the physical goings on of the realms as a seer, Loki would watch the fabric of Yggdrasil itself.
He knew no word for his ability as he had never found record of another who could see the things he could, and he had never been inclined to ask. This was something that was his, others could not tarnish or take if they knew not of its existence.
Eventually he realised that there was no need to disturb Heimdall with his presence in the observatory, he could see the twining of the tree through the cosmos just as well from the bridge. Also, there was a certain thrill to hanging his legs out over the void, and a comfort from knowing that if he ever chose to he could simply walk off into the ether and be greeted by oblivion. Nothing survived the void. He didn’t want to die, it was just calming to remind himself that going back to Gladsheim was his choice.
He didn’t belong in Asgard, for all that he was a prince of the realm he felt as if he were lacking some vital connection to the place and people. Yes there were plenty in The Realm Eternal who disliked the second prince, he didn’t fit the mold and they were quick to disparage him for it, but it wasn’t all bad. There were some lovely places of natural beauty outside of the golden city, and people who looked upon the quiet scholar fondly, even a few who called him ‘friend’. And his mother.
Yet there was a rope around his chest pulling him away, a whisper in his ear telling him he must go. He now spent his every night staring at the tree, searching for answers.
Over time Loki had learned not only to see Yggdrasil, but to walk the branches, and walk them he did, at every opportunity. He didn’t know what he was searching for, only that he could not find it.
No matter how many times he left he would soon be followed by the bifrost carrying either Thor or a messenger to summon him back to the All-Fathers halls. Each return left a little more of himself behind.
This time he had been exploring a small tropical planetoid in Alfheim’s system. He still had not found a cure for the hollow ache in his chest but he wasn’t by any means ready to move on -there were only so many places left in Yggdrasil to search- when Thor and his cronies arrived as usual to drag him back.
They arrived back in the observatory, considering their task complete Thor, Sif and the warriors three set off ahead already arguing over which tavern they were going to for the night’s merriment, leaving Loki long forgotten to go face the Allfather’s wrath. Everybody had long since lost count of the times Loki had been punished for wandering off without permission, it was all pretty routine at this point. Punishment, recovery, research, new destination, dragged back, die a little inside.
Loki walked out of the golden dome to his usual ‘brooding spot’ as everybody called it, but he did not sit. He looked out at the part of Yggdrasil visible from Asgard and begged for help, but as usual her only answer was go, but not where.
The problem at this point was that there was almost nowhere else in the realms to go, he has searched high and low for centuries on basically every realm, even the cooler –but still boiling- parts of Muspelheim! The only places left were more or less inhospitable to Aesir, lava pits or that frozen rock of a realm Jotunheim, and as a child whom grew up post-war there was no-way and no-how he would ever willingly confront the monsters of his every childhood tale and nightmare.
But Ygdrassil, she was calling, and calling, and calling. It never ceased now.
Heimdal behind him had returned to his post, Thor ahead had already forgotten him, but Yggdrasil was with him always. Loki stepped forward, not towards the city, but towards the edge of the bridge, towards the cosmos, the tree, the void, the call.
Perhaps the tree would catch him, direct him. Perhaps the void would embrace him with sweet oblivion. Perhaps it was Helheim that he had been searching for. Loki did not know but he did not fear.
Yggdrasil said he must go, so he stepped forward one last time and went.