He proclaims the meal in honor of Thor's prowess as a warrior. And when Father calls attention to the assembled throng to give a speech for the occasion, he does not mention Loki at all. And the music is not harp music but the blaring of horns. Except this year the foods are not the ones he prefers, after all, but those favored by his brother. This, he thinks, is as it should be: this is as it is every year, with lively music on the harp, with men and women dancing, with all his favorite foods. On the anniversary of Loki's birth, a feast is held in Father's hall. Tony thought he was going to be sick again. The man shouldn't have been alive, much less moving, and yet he was- was thrashing weakly in his bonds, turning his head as far as it would go to avoid the white liquid as it dribbled down. The man's face, directly below the snake's mouth, had gotten the worst of it it was raw and red, glistening with blood and exposed muscle and the slick of poison. He was all ribs and sharp ridges of bone, all too-thin pale limbs, all open sores on top from the places the venom had splattered and on the bottom where the rock had rubbed away the flesh. This time, when his eyes darted in search of the source, the darkness did not block his sight: the naked figure of a man lay stretched beneath the snake, bound to an outcropping of rock. And almost as though in response to his own voice, the sound from before came again, long and trembling- midway between a moan and a sob.
The snake, however, did not move- did not even seem to be watching his teammate approach. "Are you out of your mind? That thing's going to take your head off!" Tony's voice echoed in the cavern, hollow against the walls.
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