Delusion

The attendants were running into the large hallway terrified. They were trying to protect their faces with their arms from flying objects Loki angrily threw at them to dispose of their presence.
"Go away”, the god shouted. "Leave me alone!"
Angrbodas servants hurried away. Actually, they had only wanted give him new clothes and fresh laundry. Of course they were also curious. They already had heard much about the former husband Angrbodas, who once also lived here before their time. He was known as good looking, but also as fiery and impetuous from the mind. Now they knew that both were true. When they had entered his room he was sitting at the window, looking into the distance of Jotunheim. They had been polite and had told him that they brought him new clothes and linen for the bed. Embarrassed, they had asked him to get rid of his outer garments, so that they could wash them. Loki had been staring silently.
They also announced to him that Angrboda would take care of his under garments by herself, because they were not authorized to release his shackles. But then the god suddenly, literally freaked out. He insulted the attendants to the worst and chased them out of his chamber by throwing everything at them, what he got between his fingers.
But now far way enough from Loki`s anger, Angrboda`s servants began to giggle. Was the powerful Loki really that much terrified of Angrboda stripping off his clothes.

"It is not my servant`s fault," Angrboda told Loki when she entered his chamber. "No need to treat them like that."
Loki sat motionless on his bare bed and did not answer. He avoid looking at her by staring to the opposite direction. But the giantess went further and stopped right in front of him, gently she stroked his hair.
"My Loki, how long will you endure this?" She bent down to him. "Nobody wants you to make you suffer here." After a short pause she added. "At least, not unnecessary." The giant grinned.
Loki groaned and twisted his mouth scornful when Angrboda hugged him tight. He did not like their vicinity. He indeed hated it.
"Do you miss her?" She whispered mischievously into the God's ear as she nuzzled her cheek at his. "Her beautiful pale skin, her flowing red hair." Angrboda watched Loki's facial features closely with each of her words. "Her scent, her lips, her taste .... her soft skin."
With a jerk, Loki pushed the giantess away from him to the ground. At first shocked by his power Angrboda stared at him with wide eyes until she recovered herself and her lips were formed to this sinister smile again, Loki despised so much.
She knelt in front of him. But this was not a kneeling of a subordinate. On the contrary now she appeared more menacing to Loki. She grabbed his chin with her hand and fixed it. Furious Loki stared at her, unable to turn away his head.
"You know that we share the same abilities, my dearest Loki." Anbrodas voice was of  strange gentleness, almost lovingly. "If it's her face, which you desire so much, it will be easy for me to comply. If you want, I can look like her. The red, curly hair, her slender body, her soft, pale skin, her eyes .... I can adjust her shape in complete. I can feel myself the way she ... "
"That's not why I chose her, you stupid woman," Loki hissed.
"So?" Angbrodas lips were pointed. "Why then, Loki? Is it because she couldn`t give you any contradiction. "
Loki's eyes glittered with anger. With a sudden movement, he got rid of Angrbodas handle and wanted to smash her face, but before Loki could complete his bat, the god suddenly looked into the face of his Sigyn. Unable to move, he stared into the lovely face before him. Of course Loki knew that it was  only a mirage. This face, which smiled at him lovingly wasn`t truly Sigyn`s.  Angrboda just used her shape shifter abilities. It was not real and yet Loki broke his thumb, which he had just collected. For a brief, fleeting moment, the god looked at her longingly, before his face hardened again. But Angrboda had already noticed his way of looking at her new face before he once again turned his head away from her.
"Once you have viewed like this at me, Loki," said the giantess. "Every time our eyes met, I saw that hope and longing in yours. The hope of getting all answers you need to escape of your miserable life."
"That was different," growled Loki without Angrboda view. His fear was too great, the face of Sigyn could confuse him too much.
"The reason was different, certainly, but it was the same hope," Angrboda continued. "You have seen your future in me. The future after you had longed all the time and I was willing to give you all. Asgard, and your victory over this miserable race of gods. I have done everything for you, my love. Everything you have asked for. "
Loki felt Angbrodas voice began to tremble. "But then you whore around with that woman, an Aesin!"
"She is not Aesin," Loki replied in a whisper. Meanwhile, he kept his eyes tightly closed.
"What do you know about her? Nothing, Loki! Absolutely nothing! You even could not have called her name while making it with her.  Not even that you knew at that moment and then you're telling me that you've chosen her for very special reasons? Maybe just the same reasons why you came to me long time ago. The same reasons, whose turned out to be wrong for you in the end? The reasons why you left me alone? "
Loki said nothing. He felt Angrbodas anger and frustration in her voice, but suddenly it changed. The giantess began to speak gently and very soft to him, while her hands caressing briefly Loki's legs before grabbing his hands.
"My poor, confused Loki. No one knows you as well as I do. I am willing to forgive you. I am even willing to help you, to protect you in your distress. I just demands one thing…. "
Angrbodas hand grabbed Loki's chin and turned his head back toward her. She smiled by seeing how the God tried to keep his eyes closed clenched. The giantess saw his fight deep inside himself, not to succumb to the illusion in front of him.
"My dear, time of your life you lied and cheated to others." She gently stroked his cheek. Loki believed to feel Sigyn's soft hands touching him. Knowing that this was not really her, it still filled him with a good feeling. "Perhaps now it is time you start lying to yourself." After a short pause the Giantess added. “You just need to open your eyes"

With worried eyes Odin looked over the roofs of Asgard from the huge terrace of his palace. He lowered his head slightly as he noticed Frigga walking to him and softly put her hand on his shoulder. "You're worried, are not you?"
Odin nodded.
"You will act wise, my dear. Just as always”, Frigga said in a soft voice.
"I do not know if all of my decisions had been so wise." He talked to her. "We all know the nature of the giants, but I took care of one or her sons here, in our halls, at our tables. I should have sent him away. Just like I would have sent away every other giants as well. "
"You had your reasons."
"But in relation to his actions they are void."
Frigga sighed. "But didn`t he also protect you and even Thor more than once from a wicked fate, when you were out of Asgard, meeting giants and witches?  I would not call this void, my dear Odin. "
The All-Father looked to his favorite wife: "All of this is set off after he also planned to destroy us all. The cruel wolf and the huge sea serpent, even Hel, they all are not created by an accident. As if our enemies were not already big enough, he created even bigger ones. Loki wanted to destroy Asgard and so us as well. "
But "He did not. Fenris is gone, just like his sister and Hel seems to have also broken up with Loki's plans. "
Odin's eyes were staring fixedly into the distance again. "I should have sent him back to Jotunheim. Maybe then he would not have become like this. A boy is a boy. "
"Odin, my love, but at that time you have seen something in him, a chance to do something good."
"Something good” Odin replied. “Yes, but just for us. A little giant as protection against all other  giants. But what has this made of him? "
"It was his decision. You have not forced him to stay. He wanted it, he begged for it and you received him with kindness and grace, while all others would have chased him off because of his origin.” Frigga stood in front of her beloved, hugged his hips and clung to him, but Odin just remained rigid.

"The decision of a youth, a child."

Angrboda stared at Loki. He still sat on his bed and looked back at her motionless gaze, but his eyelids were heavy. The giantess was watching his efforts to keep his tired eyes open.
"Why do not you lay down yourself to sleep?" Angrboda asked him. Her voice was clear and sweet, but this was just as phony as her appearance which she used. Loki replied with a tired smile: "I do not feel comfortable with the idea of ​​closing my eyes and pass out in front of you."
"You surely do not have to be afraid of me, my dear Loki".
"I'm not afraid of you. I'm just cautious, "Loki said, sardonically.
Angrboda laughed: "You should not always judge others by your own standards. I'm just worried. You haven`t sleep for days. Even a god needs a little sleep from time to time. "
Loki could not suppress a yawn. He was indeed tired and it became harder and harder to stay awake with every moment, even for sitting upright. He watched Angrboda got up from her seat and sat down beside him. With Sigyn's slender hands, she grabbed his shoulders and pulled him closely to her. Loki sighed as he felt the red curly hair around his cheeks. Actually now he could have fall asleep perfectly in the arms of his Sigyn, IF it really would be his Sigyn, who were holding him so closely in her arms, but it was Angrboda and Loki didn `t her in any way.

But the god had to admit that he was trying to surrender this mirage. Just to persuade himself it would be his flame, not the giantess he smell. This would not even be too hard with his gloomy, tired sense. But this was also exactly what Angbroda wanted and Loki didn`t want that she would win her game.
The Giantess in lovely stroke through Loki`s dark hair and laid her head on his while she was holding him firm. She hugged him tightly and began to sway back and forth with Loki in her arms like a mother would do, if her child wasn´t able to fall asleep. Her lips softly humming a tune.  Loki's anger grew. The rage over Angrboda using Sigyn's shape and so abused her in awfully way, by being treated like a child, who needs to be lulled to sleep. But most of all Loki was mad with anger with himself because all of it worked perfectly. He was simply too tired to squirm out of her arms and the god had to admit that it just felt so good to be hold tightly, listen to the melody and just surrender fatigue.
Angrboda felt the body relaxed in her arms. Deep and calm breaths pressed against her chest. The giant smiled smugly. The first step was done. Surely tomorrow Loki would be in rage about his own failure not to be able to succumb to her. But it was exactly this rage that Angrboda wanted to inflame in Loki.