Chapter Text
Upon returning home to Asgard, Loki was taken away by the palace guards. Thor did not see him again until his brother was being brought before Odin to receive punishment. Loki was forced to kneel before their father, though he lifted his head enough to glare at the king. Thor heard the charges as they were read, but he already knew them. He watched his shackled sibling more than he listened, for Loki’s eyes darted around the room like a crazed animal and he snarled from behind the muzzle whenever a guard adjusted their hold on him.
The punishment for his crimes should be death, the All-Father said, but at Frigga’s cry and Thor’s instant plea for mercy, the King of Asgard paused. Loki seemed to be laughing, but it was impossible to tell for certain with the gag still in place. Eternal silence and imprisonment was the decided punishment, and to a liesmith such as Loki it must seem very similar to death.
The trickster had the muzzle removed and his lips sewn shut by his adoptive father before the whole court. His every whimper of pain melting into a growl and his tears mixed with the blood that gushed down his chin. He dry-heaved in agony as soon as the last stitch was knotted. His cuffed hands pressed to his mouth to try and stop the bleeding.
Thor could do nothing for him. He looked sadly on as long as he could before it was too painful to watch. All he could think was that at least his little brother was being permitted to live. This part of the punishment would be over swiftly, and then it would be peace in a cell. Although Odin had stated that the imprisonment would be for all time, the golden prince knew it did not have to be so. Either Thor would beg, after an appropriate amount of time had passed, for his father to show mercy once more and release the wayward son of Asgard, or Loki would be freed when the thunderer became king. Then he would have his brother back and things could be as they once were.
His brother had to be dragged to Asgard’s prison, too weak after the forced-silencing to walk properly himself. Thor retired to his chambers to relax for the first time since before he’d gone to Earth to fetch the liesmith.
Thor did not know that Loki’s punishment was unfinished, even once he’d been put into his cell. He was entirely unaware of the way the trickster’s hands were being chained above his head, his clothes torn from his already too-thin frame. The golden price was oblivious to the fact that his brother was being beaten by the guards and raped while Odin walked sadly from the dungeons. Thor did not know of this torture, of how it was done to Loki daily in the prison when the criminal could not even scream. Instead, the God of Thunder went about his days training and hunting and laughing with his friends. A thought would be spared for his brother every day, though he dared never visit, for he knew Loki would still resent him for his part in the capture.