Enough Already (tag: Loki)
It was a trek Hel had not made many times over the long years, though one would have expected such a devoted daughter to have done so. Truth was, Hel couldn't stand to see her father like this. Bound, unnecessarily, for all this time. It was gross, which said a lot as an opinion of someone who spent their entire life with half her body rotting. It was unbefitting. And it was irritating. There was no reason he should still be there, as far as Hel was concerned.
Yet, occasionally, she made the journey regardless of how much it might make her bile rise. He was still her father, and she felt the need to remind him that she loved him every now and again. And there was still that small spark of hope that one of these times she might convince him to leave. The possibility that maybe this time Loki would have come to his senses. That it had been long enough. That he was still needed elsewhere.
So far she had been met with nothing but failure.
Hel stood outside the cave trying to steel herself to the all too familiar sight that would greet her. The serpent. Her Fire Giant father bound in what remained of his son, her half brother, whom she had never gotten to know before his death. Her stepmother, if she was here, which Hel knew she wasn't. She had waited until she knew Sigyn was gone.
It wasn't that she hated Sigyn, exactly. It was more that she hated what Sigyn represented. Besides, when she came to speak with her father, he was who she wanted to see, without worrying that anything she said might offend the goddess. That would not further her cause with Loki. And she always went in her true form, hoping to remind him of who she was, trigger something in his memory of her childhood. It was manipulative, sure, but Hel was willing to pull out all the stops if that's what it took. That didn't mean she necessarily wanted to subject Sigyn to that. Hel preferred her stepmother remember her illusional form. Death and decay typically did not endear people to her. And the woman was married to the only man who really mattered in Hel's life. With that kind of influence, she wasn't about to estrange the woman any more than necessary.
Taking one last deep breath, Hel stepped into the cave and made her way back to the horrific scene she had been expecting. Acting as naturally as possible, she greeted her father.