I'm writing a continuation of a one-shot and it's the first time for me writing a really bratty OC. I couldn't love it more 😂
Needless to say, Loki is kind of fed up with her bullshit after a while. But that just makes it even funnier 😌 have a little sneak peek:
"Stay," he said, tone a touch condescending as if talking to a dog. Valeria had trouble not succumbing to the nature he was reducing her to and bite his muscled calf.
By the looks of it she'd probably hurt her teeth more than his leg. So instead she growled at him, which - in hindsight - wasn't any better.
Rated M: Angst, tooth rotting fluff, love, some light smut,
Summary: Laek is a healer from Alfheim sent to Asgard to train under Eir. She is lonely on so alien a world, with no one to talk to and all her dreams of adventure on hold. When she begins to receive gifts from a secret source, she cannot begin to imagine who has left them, or why.
**Set before the events of Thor I, when Loki was still a sweet (if mischievous) untraumatized soul.
I have been feeling a bit blue this weekend, and wanted to write something angsty and tooth-achingly sweet. This was the result. I hope you like it!!!
*If I ever tag you and you want off a tag list, please let me know!
OFFERINGS
She did not belong here. The thought echoed like a silent scream through Laek's mind, try as she might to suppress it. Looking around her, at this strange world she'd been thrust into, it was all she could do not to weep. Laek knew she was being self indulgent and melodramatic, but she could not seem to help herself. What, after all, was a young woman like herself, born and raised to heal the injuries of men and gods, doing in a realm that celebrated war?
All around her, men and women dressed in armor, encased in and carrying the steel that was designed to do harm to one another. The air filled with the clang of weapons on a constant basis, accompanied by cries as blade edges found their homes in flesh. Even wielded as they were here in practice, mistakes were bound to be made, injuries acquired. They celebrated scars here, badges of honor for the noble race that elevated all that she had been raised to strive against.
It was not that she was a pacifist. Laek knew that there were things worth fighting for, causes that she would die to defend. It was just that the level of worship here accorded brute strength, the ability to maim and kill, was out of all proportion to her mind. Surely, surely, she thought, there were other skills of equal value.
She had been brought here to train in her arts, for it was on Asgard that the Goddess Eir, worshiped above all by healers such as herself, resided. It made sense, in its way. Where else would she be more needed than on this barbaric world. And Laek was learning much and more from the blessed Goddess. Her own powers and knowledge were still green, if great in latent strength. Laek was the strongest natural healer to be born to her people in generations, but at just 700 years old she had much still to learn. It was thought that 100 years under the watchful eye of Eir would be exactly what was needed to nurture her gift. 100 years. She had been here for one month, and already she wanted to throw herself off the much vaunted rainbow bridge to escape.
It would be easier, she often thought, if she didn't look so different on top of all else. She was smaller than most of these Asgardians, both in height and body mass, and her clothing was soft and flowing rather than hard and protective. Her pale gold hair she kept long, after the fashion of her Alfar people, braided across her temples and tied with ribbon woven through. Under a high brow, her wide, tilted eyes shaded different colors, from gold to green to crystal, depending on her mood, an embarrassment to her now that she found them so often a cloudy grey that gave away her discontent.
Laek was not mistreated, of course. Eir and her acolytes were kind to her, in their fashion. But the Goddess was old, dry, and set in her ways. The All Mother, Frigga, had pulled her aside upon her arrival in a most kindly manner, telling Laek that her door was always open, should the young healer need to talk. Occasionally she had thought of taking her up on that offer, but in truth she was more than a little intimidated by the regal Goddess that ruled Asgard at her husband's side, and her courage had failed her every time. Odin himself flat out terrified her, as did their two sons, the golden Thor and the sleek, dark but pale Loki. She watched them, but never dared approach.
And so Laek spent her time in a somber routine. In the mornings she would rise, bathe, dress, and report to the infirmary. Once there, she would spend the early half of the day tending to the sick and injured, attending on Eir and absorbing as much knowledge as she could at the healer's side. In the afternoon, she would head to the library, where all of the written knowledge of all 9 realms was stored in the pages of books and scrolls, a collection that had no rival in any universe. She would loose herself there for hours in reading, studying healing or simply learning about the customs and practices of other places, places she longed in her secret, adventurer's heart to see for herself one day.
She ate her meals at the end of a table in the great feast hall, alone amidst a sea of strangers. At night, she retired to her chambers to an early rest, often walking in the moonlit garden beneath her rooms, where she could pretend for a moment that she were home and at peace.
It was in the library one afternoon, in the beginning of her second month, that the first token appeared. She had found her eyes glazing over as she studied a text on blood transfusions, and in an attempt to rouse her mind had gotten up and wandered to the section that contained dwarfish riddles, pulling a book at random to bring back to her seat.
When she returned to her bench, her breath caught in her chest. There, lying atop the open tome that had so sedated her, was a pale blue crystal. The stone, smooth to the touch and oval in shape, had a pure clarity that made the sparkling fire at its depth shine so brightly it looked like the evening star. Laek had seen many such stones in her time, for they came from her home, from Alfheim, but never one so perfect, so incandescent.
Dropping the riddle book, she had picked it up with trembling hands, and then, unable to do anything else, had run to her rooms, thrown herself on her bed and wept, clutching it to her breast. It was home, a talisman of all that she missed in this strange land.
She had asked the next day, in a shy, anxious voice, if the librarian on duty had seen where it had come from, who had left it. In response, she had gotten a terse "no" and a lecture on leaving her books unshelved when she was finished with them.
Eight days later, she had been walking in the garden as the first stars rose, blue stone secreted into her pocket so she could feel it cool against her hand. When she reached her favorite bench where she always stopped to gaze up at an unobstructed view of the heavens through a circle of elder trees, she found a flower. Placed carefully in the exact center of the bench, it was a perfect red rose, a flower that she had only read of until then. It grew on neither Asgard nor Alfheim, but was prized on Midgard for its beauty. She raised it to her nose and inhaled the lovely aroma, a soft smile coming to her lips.
After the rose, it had been a snowflake, perfectly preserved between two pieces of glass found in her cubby in the healer's quarters. Larger than any she had ever seen, she knew it could only come from Jotunheim, home of the fearsome Frost Giant. How anyone could have gotten it, let alone why they would have left it for her was a mystery she couldn't begin to explain. Still, the gesture touched her deeply. Someone had noticed her, other than to sneer or pity. Someone was being kind. She only wished she knew who it was.
Laek began to hope for the small tokens, to take greater note of her surroundings in case some small item were to be slipped in. It was a good thing, too, as she could easily have injured herself had she accidentally sat on the twisted puzzle box made of small metal daggers that had obviously come from Nidavellir. She spent all that night unlocking it, to find a bright green gem set on a silver chain within.
The tokens made Laek's life exciting again. Oh, she knew how pathetic that sounded, but she didn't care. She had a friend, even if they didn't make themselves known to her. Every time she searched the area where a gift was deposited, there was the same result. No one had seen anything. No trace was to be found of the person who had left them.
When they stopped, she was devastated. Three weeks went by, and there was nothing. Not in any of the places she frequented. As time went on and no further offerings of friendship appeared, Laek grew despondent. Perhaps whoever it was had found a new game, a new way to pass the time that did not involve the strange Liosalfar who was all alone on Asgard. On the day that marked a month passing with no new token, Laek begged off early from the infirmary, pleading fatigue of her own, and returned to her quarters. She knew it was silly to feel so bereft, but she could not help it.
She was aware something was wrong the moment she opened the door to her outer chamber and her eyes shifted to amber. She had magic deep within her, at her very core. A warding over her rooms, her sanctuary, was a automatic outcrop of that magic. She could tell beyond a shadow of doubt when someone had breached that warding, no matter how subtle the magic the intruder had used. Tiptoeing silently, she made her way towards her bedroom, where a quiet rustling could be heard. Opening the door, her eyes went to a figure standing over her bed.
"Frjosa!" she said, arm twisting out towards the intruder, who instantly froze in place.
With a pounding heart, Laek pushed door the rest of the way open and gaped in stunned disbelief. There, next to her bed, was the frozen form of Loki, Prince of Asgard, Odinson. She had caught him just raising his head, his green eyes wide with surprise as the spell hit him. His hair, dark and straight, brushed against the collar of his green tunic ornamented with gold. One elegant, long fingered hand was extended towards her pillow, and in it was grasped a rolled up piece of parchment tied with a green ribbon.
"What in all the Nine?" Laek said allowed, staring at the frozen prince.
Why would he be in her room? It made sense in one way, only a strong sorcerer would have been able to break her wards and enter. She knew he was known for his mischief, had he had some prank in mind to play on the unsuspecting foreigner thrust into their midst? With his mastery of magic, he could pull any number of tricks on her.
Shaking her head in confusion, Laek made a small motion with her fingers, and unfroze his body, still, however, containing him within a parameter of limited space.
"My Lady," he gasped, a flush of red suffusing his cheeks. "I pray, forgive me my intrusion."
"You," she said, stupidly.
"I am Loki," he told her, sketching a courtly bow.
"Yes, I know," she replied with a little laugh, feeling her eyes shade to blue as she blushed. He was royalty and handsome as sin, she could hardly not know who he was. "I am Laek of Alfheim. But I suppose you know that, since you are in my room."
"I do," he admitted with a small nod of his head. "Again, a thousand apologies for my trespass."
"But why are you trespassing?" she asked, tilting her head as she stared at his handsome frame. She could feel his magic pulsing from him, attempting to find a chink in the stasis field she had him trapped in. Only in her own chambers would she be able to confine one as strong as he she knew.
"I don't suppose you would believe this is a shortcut to the armory?" he asked with a devastating smile.
"Through my bedroom? I think not."
"Ah, well then."
"What is that you have in your hand?" she demanded, noticing how he was attempting to hide it behind his back.
"Nothing," he said shortly, blushing again.
"It is not nothing!" she approached him warily, as one would a cornered animal. She knew he could do no magic, not bound as she had him, but that did not mean he could not use physical strength should she come too close. Against that, she had no defense unless she chose to freeze him again, and such a course would not yield the answers she sought.
"Your magic work is commendable," he praised her, sending a spark of something warm shooting through her. "Normally I could break a spell such as this in a matter of seconds, but your construction is seamless."
"You are in my nest," she shrugged, inching closer. "It is the way of our kind to protect our homes."
"Perhaps you could teach me," he smiled again, unleashing a lethal charm for one so young. She felt her own lips begin to tilt up, struggled to get them under control.
"Perhaps," she said non-committaly. "Once I know your intentions."
With speed that she knew surprised others not of her race, Laek's hand shot out and snatched the scroll from his hand. He made an unconscious noise of protest, but she had it out of his reach before he could grab it back. Was it a spell, she wondered? Some joke he sought to play on her? Biting her lower lip, she untied the ribbon and unscrolled the crackly parchment.
Her eyes widened with shock as she read the words written in an ornate, ancient hand. It was Vanir in origin and dialect, but the words were not a sorcerous incantation, but rather a poem; a rather romantic, lyrical poem set in a forest by night.
"I meant to be gone before you found that," he stammered. "I had no wish to embarrass you."
"You!" she breathed, realization hitting her. "You are the one who left all the tokens for me!"
Her left hand dipped into her pocket to grasp the blue stone, while her right flew to the green gem around her neck. Her eyes flicked to her bedside table, where the rose stood in a crystal bud vase next to the pressed snow.
"I did," he admitted, not meeting her eyes. "I ran out of locations to leave them for you. You go so few places. It took me weeks to breach your warding and make my way in here. I never expected you to return so soon. It is not your normal habbit."
He was babbling, she realized. As though he were the nervous one.
"Why?" she asked, at last. "Why leave them for me?"
"You seemed so lonely," he said, arms coming across his chest and head ducking down defensively. "Always by yourself, not really fitting in here. It caught my attention."
"It did?"
"Yes," he said softly. "I know a bit what that is like. Let us say, it piqued my curiosity. An easy thing to do, in truth. I watched you often in the library. I spend a portion of most days there. Tracked what you read. It seemed you had a desire to see the worlds."
"I do," she admitted. "I always have."
"I know a bit about that too. I know of course that you are here for study, and what a demanding teacher Eir can be. I trained under her for a century or so myself you see. I thought, if you could not go to the world, perhaps the world, or a small representation of it, could come to you."
"A stone from Alfheim, a snowflake from Jotunheim, a puzzle and gem from Nidavellir, a rose from Midgard, and a poem from Vaniheim. You went to all of those places? Found these things?"
"I did," he said, as though it were nothing. "It is easy enough if you know how. I admit, I was stumped as to what I would do when I reached Helheim on my list. Even I might have difficulty breaking in and out of there."
"Again, why?" she asked, staring at him with wonder. "It must have been so difficult. Why go to all that trouble? You might have just talked to me."
"I like a challenge," he said proudly, lifting his chin. After a moment though, his eyes dropped. "And I did not know if such an overture would be accepted. I am not... well liked or understood on Asgard."
"That makes two of us," she laughed, a bit breathlessly.
"I suppose it does," he replied, chuckling himself. "My dear Laek, do you think you might undo the stasis barrier? While it is causing me no physical distress, the wound to my pride is nigh on unbearable."
"Of course!" she said at once, moving her hand in a lateral swipe that dissolved magic.
"Thank you," he said with a deep breath of relief.
"I liked the gifts," she told him quietly, suddenly feeling shy now that he was free.
"Did you?" he asked, stepping towards her.
"They are all that has made these past months bearable on this planet."
"You are all that has made the past months bearable," he said, gazing into her eyes in a way that made her breath catch. "Before you arrived, I was miserable. Nothing changed, everyone was the same. Then you appeared, and I couldn't breath. I wanted... needed to know you."
"Me?" she she breathed in awe.
"You. Have you no idea how beautiful you are? And then to discover you were smart as well, gifted in magic, and curious to boot? For the first time in centuries there was someone in this accursed realm besides my mother who I thought I might understand. Who I wanted to know. To know in so many ways."
"You could have said hello," she said, feeling far out of her depth as he stood so near to her, took her hand in his.
"I could have," he said. "I chose not to. Can you forgive me?"
"Yes," she said simply, willing in that moment to forgive him any sin.
"Will you let me kiss you?" it was the uncertainty in his voice that touched her the most. He honestly didn't know if she would allow it.
"Yes," she said again, transfixed.
He was slow, gentle. His lips touched hers softly at first, brushing against her like silk. When she tilted her head towards him, he sighed into the kiss and gently lapped against her lips with his tongue. Laek opened her mouth willingly to him, inviting him to explore, to taste her. His arm came around her waist and pulled her flush against him as her fingers fanned out over his chest. He at last pulled away from her, leaving little nipping kisses on her lower lip as he did.
"Minn svass," he murmured as he gazed at her. "Your eyes are crystal."
Laek blushed crimson. She could tell from his smug voice that he knew what crystal meant. Her truest color. She wanted him. Wanted him desperately.
"Do not be embarrassed, sweetheart," he smiled. "Mine would be too."
As he took a step away from her, her eyes drifted downward and she saw the proof of his words, tenting his trousers.
"I would not disrespect you," he told her in a rough voice. "Would court you as your station deserves."
Laek bit her lower lip, struggling for words, always a problem for her when her emotions ran high.
"Could you not disrespect me just for one day?" she asked at last, flashing him a nervous smile.
A slow, wide grin spread over Loki's face as he stepped back towards her, pulled her into his embrace.
"I can do that," he practically growled at her.
He was kissing her then with a newfound ferocity, claiming her mouth, her neck, anywhere he could find flesh. Her hands fumbled at the hem of his tunic, and he raised his arms to help her pull it off. Her dress quickly followed, and he tumbled her down onto the obliging mattress just inches away.
"So beautiful," he groaned, eyes wandering her body where she lay naked before him. "Delicate as a flower and all for me."
"Loki," she panted as he devested himself of his trousers and stood before her in all his glorious nakedness.
She guided him into her, sweet and wet and open to his invasion. Her slim legs rose to wrap themselves around his hips as he buried himself within her walls. He had wanted her for so long, the beautiful, alien woman who had captured his interest from first glance. The reality was even more perfect than he had imagined. She was soft yet supple, molding around him as he thrust within her. He could feel the magic that was part of her very being, and it mingled with his own in a way that made their coupling more intimate than he had ever known it could be. When he felt her walls clamp down around him, felt his own release pump warm and strong inside her, filling her, it was with an intensity he had never experienced before. He cried out her name, almost as though in prayer, heard his own name called back with equal urgency and bliss.
When at last they could breath again without panting, Laek lay cradled in Loki's arms, head resting on his slim, muscular chest. One of his hands toyed lightly with the stone around her neck, and she smiled at the thought of him finding it for her.
"Promise me," he said to her, "that you will wear this always."
"I promise," she told him without hesitation.
"Tomorrow I begin to court you officially," he reminded her.
"I look forward to it," she smiled at him with a dreamy smile. The smile faded after a moment as her crystal eyes sought his green. "Loki, I have been so lonely."
"Think not on that, love," he told her, covering her with his body. "I am with you now, and you will never have to be alone again."
Summary: After Loki was captured by the Time Variance Authority, he thought he was immune to surprises. What he didn’t know, though, is that the TVA had one last card up their sleeve.
Pairing: Loki x OFC
WC: 5527
Warnings: violence, angst
A/N: hey folks! I haven’t published a MCU/Loki fic (not to mention a character x OC fic) before, so I’m honestly not sure how this will go over with the tumblr community. But I had fun writing this—and Nova is an original character that is very dear to my heart—so I hope you all enjoy!
* * *
The first time she visited him, Loki Laufeyson was confused.
The Time Variance Authority had managed to capture him a few weeks prior, locking him up in a dismal cell with too many security measures that he deemed unnecessary. Since then, it's been a daily routine: wake up, eat, change, and then be chained to a metal table and interrogated for the rest of the day. There, they only talked about the Tesseract and his faults in "creating too many timelines," and not much else.
It was mundane. Irritating, even.
That is, until the woman walked in.
The TVA had been quite brainless to give him the same few interrogators that they rotated through daily. All male, all spineless, and all too easy to intimidate. So when a woman walked through the doors to the interrogation room--if he was honest with himself, he was caught a bit by surprise.
Through the blinding light of the lamp overhead, he was able to tell that she was quite fair--well, she would have been, had she not have been adorned with purple beneath her eyes and a miserable expression upon her face. Frankly, she looked as if she had gotten run over by a Frost Beast, straight from the Jotunheim caves.
But still . . .
She looked familiar. Surely, he'd met her before.
He didn't know from where, though. Or when, for that matter.
"Hello, Loki." Her voice was soft, but her words were forced, as if she didn't want to speak to them at all. Loki really didn't know what to say to that--he wasn't fond of greetings, anyways. He resorted to biting instead.
"If you're here to seduce me into giving information, I guarantee you that your men have already tried--"
The woman, having pulled a metal chair up to the table, huffed a laugh. "Why am I not surprised you would say that," she said, more to herself than anything.
Loki waited, raising an eyebrow as she steeled herself. Then she leaned forward slightly, bracing her hands against the table, letting the light flash against something very familiar adorning her finger--
With the free hand not currently chained to the table, Loki lunged forward and snatched her by the wrist. Surely enough, it wasn't a trick of the light--it was his mother's ring, fit snugly upon her finger, and not on his own mother's hand--
Loki swallowed back the thickness in his throat.
"Where did you get this," he ground out. He clenched her wrist a little harder, just to get his point across. She winced, but oddly didn't react more.
"Let go, Loki," she breathed. Loki could sense the desperation in her tone, watching as her own hand began to change color.
But no. That was his mother's. Who was this pathetic little mortal to steal such a thing--
"Let go and I'll explain everything," she begged. For the first time, she matched his gaze, and something flashed in them that felt so strangely familiar--
Loki relented.
The woman snatched her hand back, rubbing it as blood rushed back into her fingertips. For a moment, she fiddled with the ring--but then retracted her hand, as soon as she saw Loki's pointed stare.
"Well?" Loki snapped, sweeping his hand out expectantly.
For a moment, he waited as she took a bated breath and closed her eyes--steeling herself, yet again. When she finally opened them, she stared directly into his own.
"My name is Nova," she said. "I'm your wife."
Loki paused. And then he dropped his hand.
That was new.
Back in his princely days, he'd often gotten ragingly drunk and done things he'd later regret. Women--and men--were often part of that equation. But lately, he hadn't touched a sip of mead, and there weren't many people to talk to in his excursions, let alone wed--
"I'm sorry," he said, "Last I checked, I don't recall courting a human."
Nova raised her hand, a playful fire alight in her eyes that he hadn't seen yet. "Let me speak, dear," she said--and then promptly retracted, biting her lip. "Sorry. Pet name."
Something twanged in Loki's chest at that. He chose to ignore it.
"I'm not your wife here, per say," she began, before pausing again and sighing. "Look--I know they've talked to you about what you've done with the Tesseract, and how that cube sliding to you in New York wasn't supposed to happen . . ." Loki nodded, and she continued. "Good. Well, what they didn't tell you about was what was supposed to happen, had you not taken the stone. What really happens to you."
What really happens to you.
Why did she sound so hopeless?
". . . Go on," Loki said.
Nova hesitated, her gaze flickering between his eyes. In her own, all he could see was exhaustion. Despair. Pain.
And then she began, telling him of everything that happened after New York. How his mother died during the Convergence, how he usurped the throne and became king, and how Hela, his sister, destroyed Asgard and the people escaped. How his brother became king, then, and their relationship finally began to mend. And then how, along that path, he found her. How they fell in love, hard, and how he palmed his mother's ring for years until he finally offered her his hand on Asgard's ship--
As she spoke, her face was soft, nostalgic. And then it dropped.
"We never got married, though. We planned to, after Asgard's people were settled."
Silence fell, swallowing up the room as Loki's stomach twisted.
What really happens to you.
"What happened, Nova?" he asked. Softly, quietly, as if approaching a timid fawn.
Shaking, Nova traced her ring. "Thanos," she said.
Loki's blood ran cold, trapped in his own veins.
Thanos. Thanos. Thanos.
"He was on the hunt for the stones, and he attacked the ship. He killed half of the people that were there. And you tried to stop him, to protect me--" She bit her lip, hard enough for it to bleed, and Loki could see how much she was fighting not to tremble.
But all that was running through his head was that name.
Thanos got to him. In another time, another life, sure--but nonetheless, the wretched, sadistic beast found him--
"Why are you here?" he asked, pushing it through his own fear clogging up his thoughts. He forced his face to remain impassive, calm. He felt anything but.
That, evidently, seemed like it was easier for her to answer. "The TVA found me, after everything. They brought me back, to try to convince you to fix the timelines you . . . messed up."
Of course they would.
Of course they would bring in this woman, his alternate self's wife, pulling her out of time and forcing her to clean up his mess--
"No," he said. He had already wreaked too much havoc, anyways. The TVA would likely kill him the moment he straightened it all up. And this woman, Nova . . . Though he didn't want to believe her, it made too much sense. And something deep inside him, slumbering and warm, knew she was telling the truth. And that truth hadn't been kind to her.
"Loki, please--"
"No," he said again, more flippantly this time. "If you are who you say you are, they shouldn't have brought you here nor gotten you involved in any of this. Besides, it's too much effort to slave after a bureaucracy that seems only fit to punish me in the end," he added.
Nova seemed desperate. "Loki, you don't understand--"
From the loudspeakers in the corners of the room, a buzzer sounded. A couple of guards filed into the room, lifting Nova up by her forearms and escorting her out. She protested the entire way.
"Goodbye, Nova," he said. Her name felt . . . pleasant, on his tongue.
He hoped though, for her sake, to never see her again.
* * *
The second time she visited him, it was after hours and in his own cell. She appeared late in the evening, holding two green fruits up to the force field that held him captive.
Even in the dim light, he could see her timid smile. "I brought your favorite," she said.
It was true--he did have an uncanny fondness for pears. The fact that she knew that, though, settled in his stomach wrong.
Wife, he reminded himself.
He swallowed thickly. "You're not allowed to be here, I presume."
She grinned. "Nope." Something in his chest warmed at that. Pride, perhaps.
Slowly he stood, taking measured steps to the force field separating them. "And how, do tell, do you plan on getting inside?" He flicked the blue aura in front of him for good measure, burning the tips of his fingers in the aftermath.
Nova rolled her eyes at that. "You genuinely think you married an imbecile, Loki? Of course I know," she said, chuckling. And sure enough, as she pressed her hand against the force field, it didn't scorch her. Instead, the imprint of her palm flashed green, allowing her access.
"Hacked into the system," she said flippantly, stepping through the barrier with a wink. She tossed him his pear.
Loki hummed as she collapsed atop his bed, throwing his blanket over her thighs and setting the pear by her feet.
Green suits her, he thought, before instantly shoving it out of his mind.
"Why are you here," he demanded instead. He kept himself a few feet away--for her sake, at the very least.
Nova shrugged. "Couldn't sleep," was all she said. It was obvious that that wasn’t the reason, though--so he waited, staring at her until she slowly collapsed in on herself.
She closed her eyes, swallowing thickly. “Can you . . . come here? Please?”
If he heeded the common sense belting its chords within him, he would have remained where he was. He would have demanded she leave, saving herself from the grief that was likely consuming her in front of him. He would have ignored her entirely, detangling himself from her finger and forcing her out of his own mind.
But lately, Loki had been more in tune with his rash persona. Common sense was a title claimed by bland heroism, anyways--and Loki was far from heroic.
So he shoved logic to the wayside and sat by Nova, his pear long forgotten, watching as she seemed to slowly fall apart. But as she crumbled, she seemed to relax, too. As if her broken pieces gave her, uncannily enough, some semblance of comfort.
“Can I be honest with you, Loki?” she asked. Her gaze, though sometimes flickering to his form, remained on the barrier separating them from the outside world.
“Always,” he said. It was surprising how quickly the words came to his mouth.
Slowly, cautiously, Nova plucked one of his hands from his lap and placed it on her own. Her hands encased his, slowly tracing the lines and creases of his palm. She was oddly cool to the touch--something that Loki didn’t take lightly. Usually, humans radiated heat like a blazing furnace. But she was soft, and her touches were light--and strangely comforting, despite his distaste for human contact--so he didn’t mention it.
“I wish I never met you,” she eventually whispered. A stone-like weight fell into his stomach, but she didn’t wait until it landed to speak again. “It is . . . so hard to see you, knowing that you’re not . . .”
“Him?” Loki finished, allowing her to hold onto his hand like a lifeline. Loki was not him: the Loki she was in love with, the Loki she courted. The Loki that, if he assumed correctly, became as soft as Asgardian silks and as pliable as child-made putty. The Loki that, in his own form of heroism, had died.
No, he was not her Loki. And she had every right to despise him for that.
“I know what you’re thinking,” she said after a long pause. And one glance at her told him everything--a soft smile played on her face, betrayed by the loneliness in her eyes. “You’re not mine,” she said. “But you’re so much like him that it makes me sick.”
“Then why are you here?” Loki spouted, much too consumed in the way she held his hand to give much thought to his words. But his comment made her retract, and she leaned back slightly as if he raked his own hand across her face.
“I don’t know,” she eventually said.
Liar, he thought. She was visiting him because either she wanted to pry him open herself in some morbid version of curiosity, or if she simply loathed herself enough to enforce her own punishment. Either way, she wasn’t here to be healed.
Loki stared at her until she gave in. “Because I love you,” she said simply. And it didn’t sound joyous or romantic, the words dripping from her mouth like fresh honey. No, it sounded tired, and sad, and it fell out broken. As if the mere thought of it drove a knife into her chest and twisted it.
In some curious, depressing sort of way, Loki understood.
This woman--this wife of his--was damned, cursed by the gods to meet someone she loved but could not have. She needed healing, and Loki wasn’t the one to give it to her.
But he could dull the pain, if he wished. If only for a moment.
“Sleep,” Loki said.
Nova stared at him, as if not fully convinced of his words, until he spoke again. “You need to rest. Sleep.” And then he stood and stepped aside, lowering himself to the floor adjacent to the bed itself.
Nova didn’t need to be told a third time, kicking off her shoes and collapsing atop his blankets and pillows. In less than a minute, she was asleep.
And as she rested, Loki stared at her ring as it reflected moonlight against the wall, and he laughed.
How cruel it was, for the gods to taunt her with a mirage of her love. And how cruel it was, for them to play with his own childish hopes of domesticity and shape it into a slumbering woman at his side.
But Loki was a walking curse, after all. He should have seen it coming.
* * *
Nova visited him every night for a week.
The TVA still kept him to his interrogation schedule, sometimes including Nova herself to beg him to return the Tesseract. But her pleadings were bland, flat, as if she didn’t want to be asking him about it either, and she didn’t complain about his lack of a response.
At night, though, they didn’t mention the Tesseract.
Instead, they talked about each other--about her upbringing, her Loki, and the stories from his own past that she didn’t know already. And with each tale she told and each memory he shared, she seemed to become lighter. Happier.
Loki didn’t deny that he enjoyed her company, much more than he should.
That night, she had brought him a basket of pears, mixed with some other goodies that he fancied. Anniversary present, she told him. A week of mismatched friendship.
“I’ll never understand your love for these,” she was saying, sprawled amongst his pillows as if she owned the room. “They’re so . . . weird.” Overhead, she tossed her pear around, giggling as Loki consumed his stash at her feet.
“They’re the gift of the gods,” Loki snapped, swiping the fruit from her hands and placing it in his basket. She had long since voiced her distaste for pears, much to Loki’s complete horror.
“You’re so pretentious,” Nova laughed. Sitting up, she patted Loki on the head in playfulness--evidently something that she didn’t think through, as she swiped her hand back faster than she moved it forward. Loki brushed it off, instead running a hand through his locks to fix it.
“I used to joke about you having extensions,” Nova commented, eying the curls that framed his face. “Your hair was always so long and wellkept. Now I’m starting to think it’s true.”
Loki scoffed as she giggled. “You truly think so little of me?” he jested.
Nova stood, still laughing as she spread her legs. “Well, you were obsessed with your appearance, dear. One would think you would rather be caught dead than disheveled.”
Now Loki was intrigued, raising a brow as she rambled on. “You always wore the finest shirts, along with some weird version of leather pants that you claimed were Asgardian; I couldn’t get you in jeans to save my life. And don’t get me started on how you did your hair, especially when it grew past your shoulders--”
Loki was still fighting a chuckle as he snapped his fingers, lengthening out his hair and changing his clothes in the blink of an eye. “Like this?”
She turned around, still grinning from her speech. And then when she saw him, Loki instantly regretted doing anything at all.
Her face dropped and Loki could only stare as she froze in place.
“. . . Yes,” she said softly. “Just like that.”
Loki felt guilt pooling in his gut like spoiled wine. If his tongue didn’t feel like lead, he would have apologized. But then he saw her breathing catch and tears gloss her eyes as she blinked them back, and he walked towards her without a second thought. Words piled behind his lips--but his silver tongue did nothing to sort them out.
When he was close enough, Nova reached out blindly, grasping his arms as her eyes squeezed shut. “It’s not your fault,” she spouted, seemingly more to herself than him. “You didn’t know.”
Still doesn’t excuse it, he thought. Nothing ever really excused his actions.
He let her breathe for a while, clutching his arms like a lifeline and trembling like a newborn fawn. Eventually, though, she calmed, though she didn’t open her eyes.
“Look at me,” Loki said. He still hadn’t dropped the illusion--seeing him would be good for her. It would help her heal, help her begin to let her departed love go.
At least, that was what he told himself.
She swallowed thickly, audibly. “No,” she said.
“Why not?”
Squeezing his biceps briefly, Nova let out a strangled sound. “Because if I open my eyes and look at you, then I am going to kiss you, and I am never going to let you go.”
Loki paused.
Would that be so bad?
In that moment he nearly laughed again, cursing the Norns for bringing him her: his retribution, his downfall. And someone he wanted to keep so, so badly.
So slowly, he dropped his illusion, tilting her chin up and waiting until she looked at him again. She sagged in relief at his appearance.
“This isn’t fair,” she told him. But she stepped forward nonetheless, letting him slip his hand to the crook of her neck. Let him lean towards her, throwing caution to the wind as he rested his forehead against her own.
“No, it’s not.” Because it wasn’t fair, to either of them. It was torturous, and it was cruel, and it made him feel things he would much rather avoid.
But he kissed her regardless.
He brushed his lips against her own until she fell into him, slipping one hand into his hair and clutching the fabric on his chest with her other. He could feel her tears against his own cheeks and the trembling of her frame in his arms--but the only thing he could think of was her hand in his hair, and her lips against his, and how much she tasted, she felt, like home.
He didn’t know what to think of it.
Even when she pulled away, burying her head in the crook of his neck, he couldn’t shake it--the odd, nagging feeling at the bottom of his chest that begged him to keep her.
He couldn’t, though. She needed to go somewhere better, somewhere safer, and he needed to face the damnation that he reaped himself.
But that could happen later, after he finished kissing her and imagining things that weren’t meant to be his.
Later.
* * *
After that night, Nova stopped visiting.
At first, Loki brushed it off, considering how frazzled she had been over the past week’s events. So he allowed a few days of her absence. But then those two days shifted into three, then four, and then another week--and still, not so much as a wave, a glance, a presence. She hadn’t appeared in his interrogations, either.
After the second week, he began to wonder if she was dead.
Though he didn’t like it, it seemed plausible. The TVA were a clan of stone cold brutes, anyways; it was incredibly unlikely that they let her go out of her own volition.
The thought of her--cold, lifeless, at the hands of some twisted bureaucracy--didn’t sit well with him. It didn’t sit with him at all, really--so he pushed it off, forcing the image into the back of his thoughts and burying it under a lock and key.
And there it remained, until he was woken from his slumber three weeks later with an aggressive shove.
“Wake up,” a voice demanded, its source uncomfortably close to his ear. “Get up, Loki.”
It took him much too long to recognize the voice--but once he did, he shot up, and knocked into her in the process.
Nova leaned back on her knees, cradling her head with one hand. “Ow. Give a girl a warning, will ya?”
In his sleep-addled state, Loki managed to chuckle through everything that was plaguing him.
I thought you were dead, he wanted to say.
“Why are you here?” he said instead.
He blinked until her form cleared, revealing her wild curls and her disarrayed clothes--
And a bruise, sprawling across her cheekbone. Her knuckles were bloody, too.
His hearing slowed to a halt, and he didn’t notice she was speaking until he looked at her mouth. “We need to get you ou--”
“What did they do to you?” he cut off, the words leaking from his mouth in a hiss.
At his snap, Nova retracted a bit. Her hand instantly pulled at her sleeve, trying to straighten herself up.
What did they do?
Nova puffed out her cheeks, slowly letting the air seep from her lips. “It doesn’t matter,” she eventually said.
Loki ignored her, reaching forward and tracing the discoloration on her cheek. She didn’t so much as flinch--but still, Loki’s blood was still boiling. Other than chaining him up, the TVA hadn’t laid a finger on Loki since he arrived here. And yet they harmed her, of all people--
“What did they do,” he ground out again.
He didn’t know his hands were clenched until Nova grasped at his fingers, slowly pulling them from his palm. “Don’t worry,” she chided. She tugged at him until he was standing before releasing him and backing up towards the barrier.
“We need to leave,” she said, the barrier’s blue aura lighting her skin as she stepped through. “I found the Tesseract. We need to get you out.”
Loki stopped.
Though he wanted to leave and bury this compound in the dirt, he knew it wouldn’t be that simple. The TVA had cameras on every corner and guards in every hall, and mountains upon mountains of intergalactic weapons at their disposal--
If he had access to his full magic capabilities, he would whisk the both of them out at a moment's notice. But the TVA had found a way to drain him, leaving him as powerless as any other Asgardian. Attempting an escape like that would be too risky--especially for a mortal.
“No,” Loki stated, coming to a halt just a hair’s breadth away from the barrier. The wall thrummed with energy, nearly biting at him.
One wrong move, and you’re dead, Nova.
He wouldn’t have an innocent’s blood on his hands.
Though Loki forced impassiveness onto his face, Nova seemed to read right through it. Her face softened. “I need you to trust me, Loki,” she whispered.
Loki didn’t budge until a quiet laugh bubbled through her.
“I have a distraction, and I found a few employees that hate this place as much as we do. You’ll be fine,” she swore.
Loki paused for a moment, considering.
It wasn’t until he glanced at the ring on her finger that he surrendered. Wife, he reminded himself again.
His other self trusted her. What kept him from doing the same?
“Fine,” Loki muttered eventually, steeling himself as he crossed his arms. “When do we start?”
Nova snickered, pressing her palm flat against the barrier as she pulled a peculiar device from her pocket. “Now,” she said, much too nonchalantly--because with one squeeze of the device, the barrier fell and all the lights turned to a bleeding red. In the corners of his cell, he noticed the cameras grow dark. The sirens began to blare not long after that, and Nova giggled again.
Stepping through where the barrier once was felt freeing--much too freeing than what he would have preferred, given the circumstances, but it didn’t matter. He was already running.
“Past the interrogation room,” Nova called, a few steps behind him as he sprinted down the hall. At that, Loki scoffed--the TVA had always blindfolded Loki as they transferred him from room to cell, but it made little difference; Loki wasn’t a dimwit.
And so they ran, avoiding the shouts of sentries for as long as they could until confrontation was inevitable. They made it a few turns away from the interrogation room when a handful of guards spotted them--surprisingly later than he expected. Loki took no thought to pounce on them before they could draw their weapons, slamming one’s head against the wall and kicking another’s knees out from under him. In a few strokes, three more were down, collapsed in a pile at Loki’s feet.
He didn’t fight the grin that pulled at his lips.
In front of him, Nova pulled a gun from the waistband of a sentinel’s slacks, checking the magazine and cocking it before turning to him. Her eyes went wide.
“Duck!” she yelled, not waiting for him to crouch to the floor to shoot two sprinting guards. Another one rounded the corner behind her--but Loki didn’t need so much as move before she was pivoting on her heel, shooting the third one down.
“Clear,” she called. She picked up another gun by the barrel and handed it to Loki before speeding up into a run again, Loki following close behind.
A few more sentries tried to block them along the way, but it wasn’t more than they could handle--and soon they were running past the interrogation room, the dim overhead light still shining through the window.
Loki shot the glass as he ran by, just for good measure.
In front of him, Nova leaned left--but abruptly stopped, sliding on her heel and slamming herself up against the wall. Loki soon followed, hearing the shouts of a group of soldiers coming their way.
At his side, Nova cursed--but then here eyes lit up with an idea. “Crouch down,” she demanded, ignoring Loki’s scrunched brows. “When they get close enough, I want you to throw me.”
Loki nearly laughed, but did as she said nonetheless. Well, I suppose that’s one way to catch them off guard.
And true to her word, she spun on her heel, jogging down the hallway a bit and sprinting towards him when the guards came close enough. She stepped onto Loki’s intertwined hands and he shoved her foot up, sending her leaping over him--and, subsequently, onto the shoulders of an oncoming sentry. She twisted herself around as she fell, bringing him down by his neck and shooting a few others along the way. She managed to roll out of the way of a few oncoming bullets--but not before Loki slid in, grasping both guards’ guns and squeezing until they snapped in half.
“Evening, gentlemen,” Loki simpered, giving them both a wink before reaching up and knocking their heads together. They collapsed instantly, giving Loki enough time to flip around and down the last guard. Nova stood a few feet away, grinning.
“You obviously didn’t end up changing your fighting commentary,” she teased, dropping her now empty pistol and replacing it with another. Loki scoffed.
They didn’t encounter much after that as they twisted and turned throughout the halls, eventually stumbling upon a stairwell.
Nova yanked open the door. “Down to the basement, and then it’s a straight shot there,” she said, quieting down as her voice began to echo.
Loki stepped through and trotted to the railing, looking down to see over seven floors worth of stairs below. Nova was already sprinting down them--so he soon followed, picking up his pace as a door a few floors above ripped open. Floods of sentinels came through--some sprinting down the staircase in hopes to catch them both, and others lining the railing and shooting. Loki managed to yank Nova to his side as a bullet very nearly sliced through her.
They managed to make it down three more flights before a door below them--the main floor, from what he could gather--burst open with a clang. Even more guards piled through, arms at the ready. They were surrounded.
That is, until Loki lit up with an idea.
He swirled around, backing up until he and Nova were both against the wall, and then, before Nova could protest, he scooped her up, swiveled on his heel, and sprinted for the railing.
Then he was falling, and the soldiers from the main floor became a passing blur as he dropped.
The concrete below him cracked as he landed.
Nova, still clutching at his neck, was breathing heavily as Loki set her down. “Warn me,” she snapped, hands on her knees. Loki shrugged and yanked her through the door as bullets began to rain down the stairwell.
She wasn’t exaggerating when she said it was a straight shot down the hallway, much to Loki’s surprise. At the farthest end of the hall resided two large doors, painted a bright red, cracked open slightly. A bright, familiar blue light shone through. Four sentinels guarded the doorway--that were quickly shot down, collapsing in front of the entryway.
Loki managed to kick the doors open and push Nova through before more sentries flooded the hallway, slamming it closed behind him, twisting the metal handles together, and breaking the hinges.
“Hands up!” Nova yelled, aiming her gun at the few people in the room that still resided--all scientists, presumably, given how much they were poking and prodding at the Tesseract in the center of the room. One in the far corner tried to shoot them with a nearby pistol, but was quickly shot down. The rest seemed far too compliant for Loki’s tastes--but they all dropped their devices and kneeled on the floor, so he didn’t bother questioning it.
Loki was already climbing the steps of the pedestal the cube sat on before Nova lowered her gun. He didn’t fight the grin that broke out on his face--nor did he stifle the dread that simultaneously spread through him.
He loathed the Tesseract--every sin that it made him do, every trauma that it conjured up. But still, it was the one thing that saved him from a lifetime of torture from the hands of a titan.
It was his redemption, but it also was his downfall. How ironic.
So, suppressing both his terror and delight, Loki grasped the cube and opened up a portal. To where, he didn’t know. Just . . . somewhere else was all he needed.
Nova stepped to his side, her gun still at the ready, when he looked to her.
She matched his gaze. “Go already,” she chided. “I have an escape route. Go.”
He didn’t question her and stepped forward, clutching the Tesseract between his fingers as he put one foot through the portal.
He paused. Something in his chest began to twist--something that didn’t sit right with him, though he hated it.
“What are you waiting for?” Nova called, looking over her shoulder long enough to show how confused she was. “Go, Loki!”
And then he was spitting the words out before he could think twice. “Come with me,” he said, retracting his foot from the portal and spinning on his heel.
Because the idea of leaving this woman, this wife of his, in a building full of people who would rather hurt her than help her . . . he wouldn’t do such a thing. He was corrupted, and he was unredeemable, but still. He wouldn’t abandon the love of his life.
Even though it wasn’t his life, exactly.
Nova was staring at him blankly as he held out a hand. “. . . What?”
“Come with me,” he repeated, slowly backing towards the portal, “before I change my mind.” He winked, just for good measure.
And he watched as Nova paused, swiveling her head back and forth between his hand and the people still kneeling on the floor. Distantly, he could hear the door slowly collapse from the banging on the other side, shifting under pressure.
Slowly, she breathed, closing her eyes. Steeling herself, once again.
And when she opened them, she dropped her gun to the floor, and she took his hand.
“Okay.”
* * *
Tag List (let me know if you want me to tag you in my future Loki fics!):
Warnings: Fluffy, Big Brother Hjalmar, angst, fluff, just general feelings
Name Pronunciations: Hjalmar: “He-all-mar” | Aaldir: “All-deer” | Ephinea: “Eh-fin-ee-uh”
Summary: Aurora.
A/N: Thank you all so, so, so much for reading <3
Tagged: @teddyboobear @alledeglyfunny @xletmetaste-yoursmilex @itsknife2meetu @mynameisyara @j-j-ehlby-writes @jillilama-blog (anyone who wants to be tagged can message me and ask. It’s not a problem at all)
We were nearing her first nameday, but Aurora had already grown significantly. At only a few months old, she was running around as if she were a child, and after almost an entire year, it seemed as if we were preparing to celebrate her 12th nameday instead of her first. While Asgardians had a much different youth than humans, we tended to age much slower; however, our youth passed us by just as quickly until we reached our later “teen” years. Then, the process would slow to a crawl. Everyone who knew of her existence-my father, Hjalmar, Sif, Ephinea, Heimdall, Thor, and Frigga-had all tried to make reason of her strange aging pattern. The accelerated nature of it worried me because I couldn’t bear to outlive her. I refused to live a single day without her. It was a discussion that plagued many of my conversations with Heimdall, who spoke of the possibility that the occurrence could have been linked to the nature of her birth. She had been kissed by death but was given the essence of life, which could have caused her to age abnormally. Still, I couldn’t think of it for too long without the unknown nature of it bringing about sorrow.
I sat beneath the tree of life and death, watching her run through the tall grass of the meadow surrounding it, her raven hair flowing behind her. It was wild and untamed, just as her father’s had once been. She reminded me of him more and more each passing day. Each time she laughed, I could hear him. She looked at me with the same admiration that he once had. She would sit with me beneath the tree and allow me to braid her wild hair back, and all the while, she would sing to me the same beautiful melodies that only Loki and I had known. There was something within her that just knew him, and I loved her all the more for it. She latched onto every single story I told her, and she was never afraid to ask questions about him, her vocabulary being just as colorful and beautiful as his had been.
After a few weeks of me discovering motherhood, Thor and Ephinea sat down to tell me what had transpired with Loki. They told me everything from the devious plotting and the betrayal to the madness that seemed to swallow him. I didn’t believe a single word of it until Thor allowed me to look into his mind and see his last memories of my trickster. The man I saw was nothing like the man I knew. He was crazed-thirsty for power and control. He was desperate, and it pained me to see the man I cared so deeply for in such a light. That wasn’t the Loki I loved for a millenia. The man in Thor’s memory was a stranger, and Aurora would never know of him. Instead, I told her often about her father, the man I fell in love with, the man who whispered words of love and support directly to my soul, the man I knew Loki was.
She was exactly what I imagined. Her fair skin held only the smallest imperfections-a light dusting of freckles across her nose and cheeks that matched the pattern of my own. However, while I was often self-conscious because of mine when Loki wasn’t around to silence those insecurities, I saw those same imperfections as some of the most glorious, beautiful pieces of my daughter. They made her all the more beautiful. Her eyes became even more vibrant in the months following her birth. It was like I could see the very essence of life in her eyes. When I looked into them, I saw myself reflected in them, and I felt invincible. I felt like the woman she saw me as. In her eyes, I witnessed a version of myself that I never had before. I was her hero. I was her strong foundation, and she looked at me as if I were the most powerful force in all the universe. She looked at me like I was the most beautiful part of every day, like I was the sun that lit up her world, and I saw her in the same light. We shared the deepest connection possible, and Frigga noted that it was likely due to the gift I had given her.
She was feral, just as I had hoped for. She was a princess by right, but she had a wildness about her. Instead of descending the stairs of our home, she would find herself swinging off the railings and jumping down to the ground floor of the cottage before bursting out the door and running through the woods. She had a wild spirit within her that brought me back to my youth, a wildness that shone in her eyes. She climbed trees and made friends with the animals in the forest. Whenever she called out to Eldfinn, the wolf with eyes that matched the fire in his soul, he came to her. He was a massive beast-much like the ones I often made friends with-and donned a coat that danced with the colors of a fire long dead-blacks and greys-but his eyes were truly captivating with hints of gold, red, and orange mixing together. She called him her “wandering fire” and named him thus.
She wasn’t lacking human contact, but her wild nature came from her constant need to explore. The only restrictions I had for her were that she wasn’t to leave my sight without me, and she wasn’t to leave the forest no matter what. I knew what Odin would do with her if he learned of her existence, so I kept her hidden with me. He would never know of her. He would never know her face or her name because if he did, he would try to take her from me. She would be charged with the crimes of her father, and I would commit the greatest treason. I would spill blood in the throne room, and I didn’t feel guilty saying it. If anyone tried to take her from me, they would be met with fire. She was my secret, a treasure that didn’t belong to anyone, not the world...not even me. She was as free as the wind that blew through her hair. She blossomed like the life around her.
The mornings were met with beautiful songs because of her. Even though I would often find my way outside in the early hours of the morning to sing to the trees, Aurora had woken up every morning before the sun rose over the horizon, and she stood outside, watching the horizon through the trees. The moment before the sun peeked over the horizon, she would begin her sweet call, a melody that awoke the day. It was like she brought about the very dawn itself, singing out the song that the bright star knew, a song she seemed to be born with the knowledge of. In those early hours, when the world was just waking up, life blossomed in her presence. The flowers bloomed, the birds sang their sweetest songs, and the branches of the trees seemed to dance in tandem with her airy melody.
Upon finishing the crown of flowers and leaves I had been constructing for her as I sat beneath the tree her father and I fell in love beneath, I gazed back over at her, watching as the dress Frigga had made for her rippled in the light breeze. She looked like a little princess. She was the girl I used to be. She worried about nothing. She feared nothing except the occasional storm that would leave her crawling into bed with me, nestling her body as close to mine as possible until she fell asleep. She never slept during a thunderstorm unless she was with me, and that had been unchanging all throughout her life. She was the girl I missed, but that girl came to life in her eyes. She looked at me like I was still that girl, like she knew who I was deep down inside, “Aurora!” I called out to her, catching her lighthearted gaze with my own. I gestured her over to me, watching every move she made as she pranced over to sit between my legs, her back facing me. She knew exactly what I was requesting.
Setting the crown of flowers onto the ground beside me, I picked up the brush and raked it through her hair, careful to not hurt her. She was strong but sensitive all at once. She felt the pain, but she rarely voiced her discomfort. I could vividly remember every scrape, scratch, bruise, and cut she received from playing too hard, and she would shrug it off. I knew that they were painful because as I transferred them over to myself, they would sting, and I couldn’t imagine how amplified that was for a child. Gently brushing through her raven black hair, I envisioned my Loki again. This was something we partook in countless times over the millennia we were together. He would sit in front of me, his back facing me, and I would brush his hair and braid it back to give me a better view of that beautiful visage, features Aurora seemed to inherit. She reminded me of the gentleness I saw in Loki, and I found myself shedding tears at the moments of remembrance. She would say something or do something-the light could catch her in just the right way-and it would remind me of her father, a man I still felt inexplicably connected to. It was like the flame in my heart didn’t die out like I thought it would if he made the journey before me, which he did.
Once every tangle was brushed from her hair, I braided two strands from her temples to meet at the back of her head where I tied them together with a blue ribbon that matched Loki’s eyes. Her hair was long, reaching the middle of her back. She liked to keep it long after I told her how fond her father had been of my long hair. He would’ve been so impressed with her, so infatuated with every little thing she did. She would’ve been his light when I was unable to be. Dragging the brush through her hair once more to ensure the tangles were completely gone, mindful of the braids I had already created, her voice emerged from the silence, “do you think that we could perhaps...go into town today?” she asked, her voice just as soft and sweet as she was.
The question pained me each time she asked it, but it wasn’t because it was hard to hear, it was because of how hard my response was to formulate. She wasn’t allowed into the world outside for my fear that people would uncover the secret I had kept hidden away. She was a gift that I desired to share with the world, but it was a gift that could be tainted so quickly if people knew of her origin. It took some time for the Asgardians to see me as more than just another orphan girl. I had to prove myself, and my mistreatment ended in my youth when I began to blossom into a young woman. Loki, however, continued to suffer the mistreatment until people saw how taken we were by each other, which took much longer than I liked. People began to realize how willing I was to argue on his behalf, how offended I became when they spoke ill of him or toward him, how angry I was when they even looked at him the wrong way. They saw how deeply I loved him, and in time, their opinion of him changed. He was no longer cast aside as much, and the people began to love him when they saw how much he loved me.
Even though the people of Asgard came around, I saw how their actions and words had affected him in the centuries that followed. He didn’t feel worthy of anything he deemed to be good, and I was at the center of it. He looked at me as if I was an unattainable gift even when I promised my heart and soul to him. The words of others had torn him apart, and I was left picking up those pieces, trying to rebuild the boy I once knew, a boy who loved freely, a boy who sang to the trees with me, a boy who kissed me and didn’t feel ashamed of the blush that overcame his cheeks and nose, a boy who drowned out the world that said we weren’t meant for each other. He was a boy who knew his worth, but as we grew, he questioned it because of the years of being mistreated. I wouldn’t allow our daughter to experience the same thing. I wouldn’t allow them to prosecute her because of her father’s actions. I wouldn’t force upon her the pain of feeling unwanted, unloved, or unappreciated when her reality was so different in those woods. I stroked her hair back with my hand as she turned to face me, “oh, my sweet little wolf, you know you mustn’t explore the world outside this forest,” I murmured, pulling her closer to me.
“But why mustn’t I?” she asked that similar question. It was the one that always followed my insistence that she couldn’t travel into town with me. She often asked Hjalmar and my father, but they gave her the same answer, knowing that it was for the best that she remain a secret. Her big green eyes cut through me and shattered my heart, “Hjalmar and Grandfather get to explore all the time! You go out into the world all the time! Why is it that I’m kept hidden away in the forest? Why can’t I see the world as you do? Why am I not allowed to do as you do?”
I pressed a kiss to her forehead before nuzzling my face against hers, “you have no idea how badly I wish for you to be able to explore as much as you desire, Aurora. I want you to be as free as anyone else, but the world outside these woods can be cold and harsh. The people of Asgard won’t understand you,” I explained once more, sounding too much like my father.
“But they’ll never understand me if I’m locked away,” she replied, her voice filled with so much sorrow. Those words. I knew those words. I spoke those words as a child. I could vividly remember my burning desire to explore the villages outside the forest. I wanted to know what the world had in store for me, but my father kept me hidden away like I had done to Aurora. I remembered how devastating it was each time he would deny my request to venture too far from the house, how disheartened I would become when he would deny my request to go into town with him and Hjalmar. I had been kept a secret once, too, so the pain that came with it wasn’t lost on me. I knew what she was feeling because I felt it myself at one point. I had hoped for so long that I’d be able to give my child a different life, a life without constraints. She shouldn’t have to understand the injustices of the world, but she was forced to.
I sighed, swallowing back the lump in my throat. I had to remain strong for her sake, “the forest and our home is the safest place for you, little one. I know that it’s unfair. I want you to explore more than my own desire to explore the universe itself, but it’s just not the right time for such things. Perhaps when you’re older, we can discuss it again,” I spoke the harsh words as gently as possible, holding her close to me as I felt the very heart within her breaking at the unfair truth. Odin was the one I was truly afraid of. He was the one who could tear my life apart. It didn’t sit well with me that Loki and I had a beautiful relationship up until the point that he spoke to his father, so whatever that conversation had been about, I blamed Odin for the fate of our relationship. I also blamed myself. Perhaps if I had told Loki that I was pregnant before he left to speak with his father, which was something I was on the brink of telling him before he left, he would be here to witness his daughter’s beauty, grace, and wild nature.
Hjalmar’s unannounced presence beside me startled me, but he didn’t catch me completely off guard as Aurora’s eyes locked on him before he spoke in my defense, “the outside world is a big place with small people who don’t know how to treat those who aren’t...dull like them!” he noted, a grin playing on his lips that seemed to bleed onto Aurora’s. They were close. They were just as inseparable as Hjalmar and I had been as children and harbored a love for one another that was only strengthened by their protective instincts over each other. When Hjalmar readied himself to ride out into battle, she would fight him to stay, shedding tears as she begged him not to leave. I saw myself in her. His words in that moment, however, shocked me, and my jaw hung slack as I processed what he said. My eyes locked with his blue ones, and he shrugged his shoulders, feeling my playful judgement, “what? I speak the truth!” he defended himself, raising his hands to surrender.
I snickered before turning my gaze back to the emerald eyes that matched mine, ones I regarded as far more beautiful than any sight I’d ever had the honor of gazing upon, “Asgard can be a dangerous place for people who go against the grain. You didn’t choose your name or who you were born to, but people can hold prejudices against others for who their parents are,” I murmured, knowing those injustices firsthand. It was a difficult concept to grasp, one I still couldn’t understand. Too many nights, I’d lay awake and wish for the ability to create a world just for her, but wishing never brought me anything in life. I would have to change the world for her, and I was prepared to do so.
Her voice pulled me from my feelings of guilt, “but I want to be like you! I want to be like father!” she insisted, her voice cracking as it often had when she brought him up. We spoke of him, and I knew that she had an innate love for a man she never even met. She loved him so deeply and so freely that his loss hurt her just as much as it hurt me, a woman who was in love with him for a millennia. Hearing her speak of him, hearing how eager she was to be like us, brought tears to my eyes, “I would never do anything to taint our family name, and if the Asgardians hold prejudices against me for who my family is, it will be clear to me that they don’t know you well enough. I just want to be someone who would make you proud, someone my father would be proud of,” she sniffled, a few stray tears streaming down her cheeks.
“Oh, Aurora,” I whispered, wrapping my arms around her and pulling her close. Hjalmar lowered himself onto the ground beside me as I held her to my chest. I fought back the tears, finding my strength in my brother just as I had for so long, “I am so proud of the little woman you’ve become. I am so proud of the woman you will become. I’ve loved you since before you were born, since before you were even conceived. Your father and I spoke of our future children all the time, and you’re exactly what we always dreamed of. If he could see you right now-” my voice cracked as the tears stung my eyes. My bottom lip quivered as I thought of the future we had planned, a future I was living without him. I pulled away just enough to tilt her head up to look at me, “if he could see you right now...he would be so proud,” I murmured, pressing my lips to her forehead as her bottom lip continued to tremble. It broke my heart that she was hurting. If I could take that pain away, I would have done so in a heartbeat. I would take on every ounce of heartbreak if it meant she experienced none of it. That was the truth, though. Loki would have been enthralled by her. I thought I knew what love was with just him. He showed me a romantic love that I was still learning to live without, and I never imagined I could love another living thing more than him, but she came along and opened a new window into my soul. She was everything, and he would’ve loved her more than he ever could’ve loved me. She would’ve been our pride and joy, but I was forced to value such a beauty all on my own.
“Your father was one of my closest friends growing up, and I can tell you something right now, princess, he would have been your best friend, too,” Hjalmar grinned, trying to lighten the mood, “he used to create these illusions and place them around the cottage in order to scare me. He even shapeshifted into grandfather at one point to find a way to get your mother out of the house. Your father was a ball of mischief, but he was one of the kindest men I knew, and I know how proud he would be to have a daughter like you. Wherever he is, his heart is full because of your mere existence,” he continued, tears appearing even in those blue eyes that had been so strong through all of this. Hjalmar mourned Loki just as my father did, but there was a special connection the two of them share. I could still vividly remember Hjalmar’s threat to Loki that should my love hurt me, he’d be dead by dawn. If Loki had been anyone else, Hjalmar would’ve kept his promise, and I had no doubt in my mind, but when I came home crying that day, Hjalmar held me all through the night and shed tears with me.
I pressed one more kiss into her hair before placing the crown of flowers and leaves upon her head. It was so similar to the one Loki and I used to make for each other. He would spend hours putting together the perfect crown, telling me that it must be suited for the queen of the forest. He placed so much love and admiration upon me. Every moment we were together, he looked at me as so much more than just an orphaned girl with no name, no home, no claims. He called me a princess, a goddess, a queen, and he treated me like a woman with such power that even I doubted. I didn’t see myself the way he saw me, and he never saw himself through my eyes, either. I always believed it was because love blinded us, but he was aware of my flaws, too, just as I was with his. He was too cold sometimes, and when he was angry, he would become much more calculating. He would bottle up his frustrations until he began bursting at the seams, and there were moments when it lead to arguments between the two of us. He had flaws-just as we all did-but they were met with such beautiful, perfect parts of him. He could be cold and calculating in his frustration and anger, but the rest of the time, he was sweet and warm. He could bottle up his frustrations until they burst out of him, but he knew how to apologize, and he always meant it.
The crown I made for Aurora was fitting for a princess, which she was by right. She had a claim to the throne, but it would’ve been passed along to Thor at some point, and should he have children, they would be his successor. Still, she was a princess. As she stood up and took off toward the woods, calling out for Eldfinn, Hjalmar and I continued to sit by the tree in silent remembrance of the pieces of our hearts that had been lost in Loki’s absence. We both watched as the massive wolf emerged from the tree line, his grey and black coat shimmering in the sunlight. He made his way over to Aurora, and she pressed her forehead against his, running a hand through his fur. He stood just as tall as she was, just a bit smaller than some of our horses, but she was never afraid of him. The were close friends, much like the wolves I surrounded myself with growing up. They never caused me any harm, and Eldfinn wouldn’t hurt Aurora. The animals of the forest understood me, and they understood the boundaries of their wild nature. My family wasn’t their prey, and neither was I. They were peaceful to us, and with time, they became our protectors.
“You two are so similar,” he mused, catching my gaze. He watched her play with Eldfinn, and I watched as his eyes sparkled with memories that seemed so long ago. His words were a compliment for me. She was the most precious thing in my life, and for him to compare her to me brought me so much pride, “every time I look at her, I see you. It’s not just because she has your eyes, either. It’s because she has your heart,” he added, his blue eyes finally meeting mine. It was the similar clash of when the land finally met the sea. There was a gold ring around his pupils that bled out into the blue of his irises that matched the shores of Midgard, so his eyes looked eerily similar to the beaches Loki and I would frequent. Hjalmar had occasionally accompanied the two of us, but it often took much convincing, since he didn’t want to intrude on my time with Loki.
The smile that pulled at his full lips was contagious, and I found myself grinning up at him, “I look at her, and I feel like I’m a boy again, watching you run through this same meadow, playing with the wolves you named against Father’s wishes. It’s as if I’m reliving my most precious memories. She looks at me the way you do, too, like I’m somehow I man worthy of the world even after all the mistakes I’ve made, after all the lives I’ve taken in battle. You two look at me with a love I’ve never deserved but one I could never turn away no matter how guilty I feel accepting it. She reminds me of the girl that never died within you. That girl, the one who’s still curious, the one who still wishes to explore, the one who is capable of bringing about change, she’s still there within you. She never died. She never even retired or cast herself into the deep recesses of your heart. She’s always been at the surface, and I see her from time to time. I see her when you smile, when you laugh, when you admire the branches of the trees because they look like arms reaching out to hold each other, when you tease me for being clumsier than just about any other Asgardian, and when I watch you love. I still know that girl so well,” he smiled, leaning over to bump me with his shoulder.
“And what of the boy within you?” I asked, cocking an eyebrow.
He snickered, “he’s still alive and well. That’s why you and I are still best friends. You keep him alive,” he confessed, his eyes dancing with words that remained unspoken. Hjalmar and I had always been closer than anyone else. My father and brother were the first men I loved in my life, and they both taught me what love should be like. Love wasn’t painful, and love didn’t break your heart. Love was gentle, peaceful, and kind. They were the ones who taught me that, and then, they hoped that I would carry that knowledge and that ability to love out into the world with me. I did. That was how I met Loki, and that was how our love spanned over a millennia; it was all because of the love my family instilled in me. Hjalmar’s sparkling, world-brightening smile bled over to me once more, “and the only reason why she’s my favorite person is because she’s the product of the two people I’ve loved the most in my life: you and Loki.”
I could sense the bittersweetness in his voice, so I reached out and grasped his hand in mine, intertwining our fingers. It seemed as if my hands were lost in his. He had the strong hands of a warrior, and while mine had seen just as much time on the battlefield, my fingers were slender-those of a lover, not a fighter. It seemed as though we both contradicted our own hands. Mine saw far more war, and his saw far more peace. I forced myself into his spot on the battlefield, afraid that he would be taken from me too soon. I would force Odin’s hand on many occasions, telling him that he could have only one of us, that it wasn’t fair for our father to send away both of his children. Many times, the Allfather bent to my will, but many times, he sent both of us, and there had been the rare circumstances that he sent Hjalmar instead of me. Still, I became one of Asgards most proficient warriors to keep the ones that I loved safe, to keep them out of harm's way. Hjalmar’s hands were built for war, but I refused to lose him to it, so instead, my hands lost themselves in his, “I have faith that the man who broke my heart wasn’t the one who filled it with love for a millennia. I think he still harbored so much love for us, and I know it’s no consolation, but...you were one of his favorite people, too,” I promised, recalling the countless times that Loki looked forward to seeing my family, to being around us as we sat in front of the fire, to speaking with Hjalmar about the things they had in common. Loki had just as much love for my father and brother as he did for me, but it was because they treated him as one of our own.
Hjalmar’s eyes filled with tears that he rarely let fall. It was the closest he came to crying most of the time, “I was supposed to go before him. That was my plan. My biggest fear in life has always been losing more people I love. I still have a vague memory of the last time I saw my parents,” his voice trailed off as the memories he only spoke of twice crossed over his eyes. His father had perished in battle, and his mother took her own life in the night after she put Hjalmar to bed. The sight was one he witnessed the next morning. He hadn’t even reached his third name day at the time, so the scene was both confusing and traumatizing. He didn’t have a good relationship with death, though, but his words were shocking to me. He continued, “I never wanted to lose someone I was so close to again. I loved my parents, but as I grew up, there were other people in my life who I loved just as much if not even more. Father was one of those people, and when I first met you, I loved you from the moment you looked at me. Then, there was Loki and Thor. There was Ephinea and Sif. There have been others who have fallen on the battlefield along the way, but I wasn’t as close to them as I am with the small group I’ve kept close in my heart, so my plan was always to go before any of you. I couldn’t face that pain again, but here we are,” he murmured, gesturing to the meadow that knew our presence, the one that felt Loki’s absence.
His words broke my heart, “you are still here for a reason, brother,” I spoke, reaching up to stroke my fingers through his full beard, “you are here because fate wouldn’t allow me to lose everyone all at once. I love you, and if I had to lose you after already losing Loki...if I had to lose you ever, I don’t know what I would do. I’d be lost,” my voice cracked at the mere thought of having to face my life without my best friend.
“You’d be strong,” he insisted, nothing but admiration in his eyes, “but you don’t get to die before me,” he teased, a grin overcoming his lips as he tried to lighten the mood as always.
I smiled up at him, giving his hand a light squeeze, “I suppose we’ll both be forced to live forever, then, because you don’t get to die before me, either. I won’t let you,” I replied, almost as if I was challenging him. Then, there was that alarm that carried from the Bifrost all the way to the middle of the forest where I sat. It was one I only heard a small handful of times. I had charged Heimdall to watch over my Midgardians, and when they were in danger, he would make the alarm. This was it. Before Hjalmar could stop me, I scrambled up to my feet and sprinted in the direction of the cottage, “look after her!” I yelled back to him, my words seeming to echo through the meador. The branches of the trees made way for me as the fearful tears stung my eyes. I ran as fast as my legs could carry me, so there was no way Hjalmar would’ve been able to catch up. By the time I had reached the cottage, passing by my father in the stables, my sword and shield were waiting for me by the door. With one quick glance, I knew it was my father’s doing. All I had left was to dress myself in the armor that was crafted specifically for me.
When I entered my room, my armor was already laid out on my bed, almost as if he knew that I would be leaving as soon as he heard the alarm. It took me almost no time at all to reach the cottage, so I knew he must’ve worked quickly. I pulled on the armor, strapping it securely to my body. It was similar to Sif’s, but mine was a bit lighter to allow for quicker movement. I tied my hair back and gave a quick glance at myself in the mirror before exiting my room and holding my hand out for Soulkeeper. Within seconds, the sword moved itself through the air, the hilt of it landing securely in my palm. I strapped the sword to my back along with the intricately designed shield and hurried out of the cottage. In the distance, I saw Aurora running toward the cottage with Hjalmar close behind her and Eldfinn even closer behind him. Hjalmar continued to call out for her, but she ignored every desperate plea for her to stop.
Knowing that they would arrive before I left, I turned my attention to the stables right as my father emerged with a rope in his hands, leading Aria from the stable. I didn’t like riding her with reins, and it was perfectly safe for me. It felt constricting to put such a wild beast in captivity. She stayed with us on her own terms. She was never locked away in the stables, and if she desired to leave, she did. She had often disappeared in the night and had returned in the early hours of the morning. She was still just as wild as the day I found her, but she always found her way back to me. I could bring myself to restrict her all the time. When she saw me, those deep black eyes seemed to glimmer, and she broke away from my father, trotting over to me. She used her nose to nudge me toward her as if she was pulling me in for an embrace. I stroked a hand over her coat before breaking away when I heard Aurora approach, “where are you going?” she asked, her green eyes boring into my own.
“I’m going to Midgard. Heimdall made the alarm that there is a need for me there,” I answered, having no other details to give her. Even if I did, I wasn’t sure if I could.
Hjalmar finally stopped once he reached us, and he heaved, trying to catch his breath, “I tried to stop her, but...she’s fast,” he noted.
“I don’t want you to go,” Aurora interjected, her voice small and filled with fear. When I met her eyes again, I saw the unshed tears in them. She was terrified of me leaving her, and I knew that feeling. Whenever my father rode off into battle, I would beg him to stay. I would beg and plead with him to take me with him, showing him that I could potentially hold my own on the battlefield even when I was still just a child. No matter how much I tried to convince him, though, he always left, telling me that one day, I would understand. This was the day. My heart broke as I thought of having to break the heart of a princess. She continued, “please, don’t leave me!”
“I won’t be gone long,” I promised her, unsure of whether or not I’d be able to keep that promise. There was always a level of risk that was involved in my trips to Midgard. Oftentimes, I was going there in dangerous circumstances, so I was sure this would be no different. Still, I would fight death all the way. I pulled her close to me, holding her as tightly as I could without breaking her, “I’ll be back before you know it, and I miss you already, little wolf,” I smiled, pulling away from her and pressing a kiss to her forehead. She couldn’t see me cry before I left. It would only serve to worry her more.
“I love you, mother,” she whispered, wrapping her arms around me and holding me as tightly as possible.
I smiled, reminding myself of how lucky I was to have this type of love even if it was just for a while, “I love you, little wolf,” I replied, repeating the same words my father had all my life. I was his little wolf, and she was mine. I gave a short glance at both Hjalmar and my father, the latter giving me the nod of approval that I needed to leave her with them. He had made countless promises to keep her safe and raise her with love should anything happen to me, but I just needed to know that I was making the right decision. The simple gesture was more than enough for me. When I pulled away from her, she scurried over to Hjalmar who scooped her up into his arms.
I pulled myself up onto Aria’s back, straddling her body with my legs and finding that familiar, perfect balance. My eyes locked with Hjalmar’s once more, “remember, Eva, I’m first,” he reminded me with a contagious smile before waving me away, knowing that I was needed elsewhere. I clutched the familiar section of Aria’s mane before riding off through the forest along the path we always took. I was unable to look back at my family for fear that my love for them would stop me from leaving, for fear that her loving eyes would keep me from fulfilling my destiny, which had always been to protect the ones I loved so deeply. Instead, I poured every insecurity, every ounce of fear into Aria, and she pushed herself faster and faster with every passing second. She knew how fearful I was, and she wanted me to have answers to the questions that threatened to burn through me. I was always at a breaking point, and she felt that within me. If I wasn’t fearful of taking her to Earth with me, she would’ve accompanied me. However, I already had more than enough unwanted attention as it was, and she would only pull more of it.
When we arrived just outside the Bifrost, she knelt to grant me an easy departure from her back, the magnificent beast standing taller than even Hjalmar, who was massive. She was huge, but she was graceful. Once I retreated from her back, I gestured for her to run back home where she would either return to the stables or wander through the forest until I was close to returning home. Father claimed that she seemed to know when I would be returning, as he wouldn’t even have to announce that I was coming back. Instead, she would leave the comfort of the stables and return with me. She took off back toward the forest, and I turned on my heel to enter Heimdall’s observatory that had been rebuilt in the time between Loki’s fall and this moment. Entering it, I saw the man I often watched the stars with, but he looked like he had seen a ghost, “what happened?”
He swallowed hard, fear and disbelief clouding his amber eyes, “it’s Loki.”
The ride back to the cottage from the palace felt both excruciatingly long and far too short all at once. Thor insisted on accompanying me back to my home, especially after the trauma we both experienced on Midgard. We thought Loki to be dead, and the man I saw, the man I looked upon...wasn’t the man I fell in love with. He was different. He was overcome with madness. I declined Thor’s invitation to see me back to the cottage, knowing that I needed time to think. The ride back would help me sort through the various emotions I didn’t have time for on Midgard. My emotions had run rampant from the moment Heimdall told me of Loki’s presence on Midgard to being betrayed by him in New York to escorting him back to the palace and didn’t stop even in that very moment. Leaving him at the palace was both the most difficult thing I had to do and the easiest thing I could think of doing. Seeing him hurt me in ways I couldn’t think of.
He wasn’t Loki anymore.
His presence on Asgard threatened everything I had built in his absence. I had a daughter, a life that I was meant to protect from every horror in this world. Her safety was of utmost importance to me, but what if...being with me was the most dangerous place for her to be. Loki’s mood had shifted multiple times from the time we met on Midgard to the moment I left him in the palace. In New York, he nearly killed me, but his words of love and guilt kept me from giving in completely. Then, when we finally brought him back to Asgard, he was screaming at me, telling me that it was my fault that he was in chains. If I hadn’t interferred, he wouldn’t be Asgard’s newest prisoner. Instead, he’d be a King on Midgard. He threatened me that should he ever escape, I would be the first one he would pay a visit to, implying that he would finish what he started on Midgard. He threatened to end my life, and should he truly wish to hurt me the way he did in New York, Aurora would be the first person he went after.
Aria felt my need to grapple with my thoughts, so she slowed to a swaying walk once we entered the forest. I didn’t want the people of Asgard to watch me struggle with my emotions. The people knew me as a strong leader, someone who lead many of Asgard’s battles. I wasn’t supposed to fall apart. This wasn’t the person they knew. Aria, with her keen ability to sense everything about me, all of my doubts and fears and concerns, gave me the time I needed to understand my own mind. Loki was a danger, and I saw that firsthand in New York. If it wasn’t for Tony, the city would’ve been decimated, including all of us, and that was because of what Loki had brought upon. He brought the Chitauri to New York with the hopes of laying waste and taking control of the planet we had both loved so dearly at one point. He proved himself to be dangerous, and that was especially true when it came to me.
He was my weakness, and the other Midgardians could see it. It was no surprise to Steve, since he knew the history I had with Loki, but no one else was aware. They saw the difference between when I was fighting the Chitauri and when I was with Loki. I was a warrior, but I became nothing more than putty in his hands. Should he escape from the dungeons, which was a very real possibility, I would be his first target, of that I was sure. Should he find me, what would stop him from hurting the rest of my family? What would stop him from killing my father and brother? Would I be able to stop him? Would I be able to fight him...kill him? I was uncertain of the answers, which only made me more fearful. What would I do with Aurora? Would I run away with her to Midgard? What if he found me there? What if he hunted me down and hurt her in an attempt to bring about the most pain imaginable for me?
The questions flooded my mind until Aria and I made came into view of the cottage. The moment I saw it, the moment the tears threatened to spill from my eyes. I cried the whole way back from Midgard. As Thor and I trailed behind Loki and the guards that met us at Heimdall’s observatory, I allowed the tears to fall. I wouldn’t let Loki see me cry, though. I refused to let him watch me as I cried because he didn’t deserve to win like that, not after all he had done. He wanted to hurt me. Every word was dripping with hatred, a burning anger that left cuts on my very soul. Asgard wasn’t my home anymore, or at least it didn’t feel like it. Loki’s fall took my happiness, but I found it again in Aurora. I found a purpose in her, but having Loki back in the state he was in made me fear everything that I’d never been fearful of. I was afraid of falling asleep because I didn’t know if he would find a way out of his cell and kill me or hurt my family. I was afraid of raising our daughter because I didn’t know if she would be taken from me at any second.
Loki took away my security.
The sky was nearly black as I rode toward the cottage, Aria continuing to walk as slowly as she could. I could see that my father was busying himself tending to the garden, the torch still lit. It would be lit until I made my presence known at the house. It had been lit since the day Loki fell. He would light the torch and leave it lit throughout the night as a sign that our home-like our hearts-was still awaiting his return. It was our way of paying homage to him. It symbolized that our home would never be complete without him. He was still in our hearts, and I still couldn’t bring myself to cast him out even after everything on Midgard. I smiled lightly at the sentiment. Hjalmar stood beside one of the trees that lined the path, staring up at the branches. When my eyes followed his, I saw her up amongst the branches. She stared down at him, and I found that I was finally within earshot. Hjalmar’s voice was stern as he spoke to her, “it’s getting ready to storm, Aurora!” he called up to her.
Loki and I used to climb the trees in the forest when we were younger, and we’d often do so as children, watching as my father returned from battle. Hjalmar liked to stay grounded, so he would call up to us with worried voices, telling us that Father didn’t want us up in the trees for too long. He would often tell us that we could get hurt should we fall, but we didn’t. The secret to not getting hurt while falling was to not fall in the first place. In that moment, I wished someone had told me that before I fell for the God of Mischief. Aurora’s voice rang out, pulling me from my sorrow and adding that bittersweetness into my heart, “I’m not coming down until she gets back or until you send me with her,” she argued as I finally got close enough to see the frown that looked so unnatural on her lips. Aria stepped on a twig, pulling her attention, and I watched as the frown turned into a wide grin, “mother!” she beamed, hurriedly scrambling out of the tree, jumping down when she was still a bit too high up, causing Hjalmar to lunge for her and catch her in his arms. She pushed herself away from him, running over to me, that smile filling my heart with joy that had been pushed so far away in New York.
I slid off Aria’s back, and ran a hand through her mane before she ran off into the woods to take some time to be alone. Without a single word, I bent down and lifted Aurora into my arms, holding her close to me. Even though she had grown exponentially since her birth, she was still my baby. I held her tightly against my chest, wishing that things were different, wishing that our lives had been different. She deserved the world, and I couldn’t give that to her. I was failing her. She wrapped her arms around my neck, and every catastrophe, every life that was lost, every heartache I experienced on Midgard just fell to the wayside. All that I could feel in that moment was the sheer amount of unconditional love she harbored for me. She didn’t know the woman who failed the children in the orphanage. She didn’t know the woman who had nearly been killed because she couldn’t bring herself to fight the man she loved. She didn’t know the woman with the weaknesses. She knew me as her mother, and I felt that love so profoundly in that moment.
Casting a stray gaze at Hjalmar, I brushed past him and walked toward the house as the thunder began to roll in. It wasn’t Thor’s doing. It seemed as if the world could feel my heartache, the conflict within me. She wanted to grieve with me, and the thunder symbolized her cries. The droplets of rain that began falling, catching themselves in Aurora’s hair, were her tears. She felt this with me. I carried Aurora into the cottage, Hjalmar and our father following close behind. I didn’t speak a single word as we entered the cottage, the only noise from the creaky front door opening in front of me and closing behind Father. I sighed as I sat on the chair in front of the fireplace, listening to the rain begin to fall on the leaves outside. Hjalmar and Father sat in the other chairs opposite me as Aurora situated herself on my lap, keeping her arms wrapped around my body, “why are you sad?” she asked such a simple question, but it seemed so profound in that moment.
I didn’t know how to answer her question. I couldn’t tell her the truth. I couldn’t explain to her that the man I believed to be dead all this time-her father-was alive and just laid waste to a city. I couldn’t explain to her that her father was no longer the man I knew, was no longer the man I fell in love with or the man she envisioned him to be. She had the most beautiful words to speak about him. If I told her of the horrible crimes he committed, he would’ve turned from a dream into a nightmare. It would have been worse than mourning him, which was something we had done together. I had to both mourn the man Loki once was and experience the pain and fear of the man who had the same face and voice, the same pained look in his eyes, but he was cruel, which was something my love was not. I couldn’t tell her of what happened on Midgard, so I settled for a vague answer, “I saw someone I didn’t think I’d see again,” I replied, catching the eyes of my father and Hjalmar, which filled with confusion.
Before I could respond to their looks of confusion with a cryptic answer, Aurora piped up again, “who?” she asked, pulling back just far enough to catch my gaze with her own. She looked so concerned, so protective. It was similar to how I had looked at my father when I was a child. I had always been willing to take on the world if it meant that he was safe. I could still recall the countless times I readied my childhood horse, ready to escape in the night to ride into battle for him. I would pack up my sword and shield that I could barely hold upright at the time, and I would pack a few days rations into the saddle bag. He would almost always catch me right before I rode off, though, and if he didn’t, he caught me on the path leading away from the house. Each time, though, I would see my protective gaze mirrored back at me in his dark brown eyes, and I saw the same look in that moment with Aurora, “Grandfather says that he’ll show me how to wield a sword tomorrow, so I’ll be able to protect you from them,” she promised, looking proud.
I cast a concerned glance over at my father, surprised that he would allow her to wield a sword at such a young age. It took some time before he allowed me to wield a sword, but I also knew how persistent she could be. He shrugged his shoulders, a lighthearted smile forming on his lips that made my heart hurt. I glanced back at her, “why would you want to wield a sword?” I asked, glossing over her question of who the person was. There was no way I could explain it without opening up a can of worms that neither of us were ready for. Father and Hjalmar looked confused, but they left they remained silent, knowing that their questions would be answered in due time.
She paused for a moment, looking for the right words to say, the quiet crackling of the firewood filling the silence in the room that was left with the absence of her voice, “well...you wield one,” she finally answered, her eyes locking with mine. It was at that very moment, that small, inconsequential moment in, that I realized just how much she loved me. We were connected by more than just the star we were forged from. We were connected through the life force that I shared with her. My very soul had bled into hers on the day she made her grand entrance into the world, and we had been inseparable since. However, it was in those little words that I realized how pivotal my role was in her life. She looked at me as if I was the world. I was her hero, the stars in the night sky, the very foundation she stood upon. I was everything to her, and she was everything to me.
When that finally dawned on me, I wished to cry out for mercy, but I couldn’t. All I could do was swallow back the lump in my throat as I gave her a pat on the back, “go get ready for bed, and I’ll meet you in there in a moment. Leave us to speak,” I insisted, pressing a kiss to her forehead before she crawled out of my lap and wished a goodnight to the two men in the room who put on convincing smiles for her sake. She would sleep with me that night. As I gazed out of the windows and listened to the rain pour down against the roof of the cottage, I knew that she would be taking over the bed. She couldn’t sleep alone during a storm. Since she was born, she would crawl into bed with me before the first raindrop even fell, almost as if she could sense the storm in her bones. That night, I would be thankful to have her in my arms. After all that happened on Midgard, I needed the security that holding her would bring me.
Once she disappeared into the other room to change, I stood up from my chair and closed the space between my father and I. Resting myself on his lap, I wrapped my arms around him, needing to be held by someone. I needed my father. I needed my protector. I’d never grow out of that, no matter how many battles I fought, no matter how far I roamed, no matter how many places I saw. He protected me from the horrors of the world and only let me see the good that the world had to offer, which played a part in how deeply I loved everyone and everything. I saw death and destruction, but I forced myself to believe that it was done by people who hadn’t been given the same love and patience that I had been so lucky to receive. They had witnessed too much misery in their lives, and they knew nothing but chaos. I tried to see the good, and that part of me wouldn’t have been as strong had I not known so much acceptance and mercy from the people I surrounded myself with. My father was the greatest example of that mercy. Hjalmar and I were not his blood, but he treated us as nothing less than that. After what I had seen on Midgard, after what I witnessed and what I’d been through, I became a child again. I needed my father.
His arms wrapped around my waist, and I melted into his embrace as my eyes locked onto the fire. I watched as the flames licked the cobblestone, dancing with each other in perfect sync with one another. It was how I envisioned Loki and I for a thousand years. We were two wispy flames connected to the same raging fire, dancing in tandem with one another. We knew we couldn’t burn each other, and I had faith that he wouldn’t burn me. Every now and then, our individual flames would bleed into each other, the joining of two souls that had been connected since the beginning. We were the eternal twins, our love symbolized by the fire. However, when I saw him in New York, I realized how wrong I was. We were suddenly fire and water. We were detrimental to each other, no longer able to dance as we had since the beginning of time. Fate twisted us so that we were given the ability to ruin the other, but he was the one who took that opportunity. I would never.
“It was Loki,” I whispered, my voice cracking the moment I said his name. They were both silent, and I knew that it was because they understood that I wasn’t finished explaining. They wouldn’t pester me with the questions because I didn’t leave any stone unturned with them. Finding the strength I needed to continue, I took a deep breath, “he survived the fall from the bridge, and he was on Earth. I was...he wasn’t Loki, though. This was a man with his face, his voice, his name, but the things he did...the chaos and destruction he brought with him was...on an otherworldly level. I almost didn’t return,” I confessed, feeling the way my father tensed up. Loki was like a son to him, but I didn’t even have to tell him what happened for him to know that it was Loki’s doing. My father would’ve sacrificed his own life to ensure that Loki was safe, but I listened to the way his breath hitched in his throat, almost like breaking glass, “he killed nearly one hundred people, and the army of Chitauri he brought with him...took the lives of hundreds more. I...did everything I could to stop him, but I couldn’t kill him. I couldn’t do it,” I trembled, my voice giving way as the tears betrayed me and streamed down my cheeks.
I thought of the children in the orphanage. I thought of the way Loki looked at me like I was nothing. I thought of how it felt when he plunged the dagger into me-one of twin daggers that I gifted to him. I thought of the anger and madness in his eyes when I told him that I still loved him as he pressed the same dagger to my throat before he ruthlessly attacked me. I thought of the conflict when he crawled over to me, holding me in what he thought were my last moments. I thought of how he begged me not to leave him, how he wept when he thought I was about to fade into the darkness. I thought of how he pleaded with me to stay with him as my body healed just enough for me to head into the battle. He was afraid that I would be killed if I left, and I could vividly remember that fear in his eyes. I thought of how quickly he turned against me once more when we finally captured him. Thor had to be the one to put restraints on him, and after Loki mocked Steve and set his sights on me, Thor covered his mouth with the muzzle, knowing that Loki would only have snarky comments to make at me. Thor understood just how deeply the situation in New York was hurting me. Loki didn’t even understand the depth of it because he didn’t know about Aurora.
Hjalmar rose from his chair next to my father and sat in the same spot that he did when we were younger. When I was sat atop our father’s lap, Hjalmar would position himself on the floor at his feet to be closer to me. He would rest his head against Father’s knee, and he would reach up to hold one of my hands. As our palms met in that moment, I felt my burden lighten. I continued to weep, though, as my father held me tightly, keeping me pressed against his chest. His voice cut through the soft sobs that were muffled by his strong torso, “breathe, little one. You were made strong enough to weather any storm. You will make it through this one, too,” he whispered, rubbing my arm.
I took a deep breath, trying to work through the heavy emotions. Seeing him again, especially in the state that he was in, was like cutting my heart apart along the same scars that it received when he left me or when I thought he had fallen to his death. Those were the most sensitive spots, so it hurt even worse, “what of Aurora?” I asked, voicing the only concern on my mind. As soon as I mentioned her, the fire seemed to silence its crackling as the walls absorbed every sound in the room. The silence was deafening. Hjalmar’s hand tensed in mine, and no one even dared to breathe. I spoke as the silence began crushing me more than the various scenarios had, “when we were escorting him to the palace, he promised to escape, and when he did, this would be the first place he would visit. He wants to kill me. He wants to finish what he couldn’t on Midgard. He’s angry with me, and...what if he hurts her? What if he escapes and comes here?”
“We’ll be prepared,” Hjalmar interjected, his voice cutting through my panic. I lifted my head and caught his supportive gaze, “if he comes here and tries to hurt her, I will bury him in the ground. Family or not, he’ll meet my axe if he comes here with ill intent for either of you.”
I shook my head, knowing that his words were born of nothing but the unconditional love he felt for the two of us. He had always been my protector even when I didn’t want him to be, but it had only been amplified when Aurora came around. She was a father figure to her, and he acted like one. He protected her the way he did when we were children, even from things that weren’t even threats. When it began to rain, he would pull off his jacket and hold it over her head until they returned to the cottage. He kept us safe, and with my father and him close, I understood that Loki would only get to Aurora and I should he kill them, and he would have to kill me to get to her. Still, I saw how powerful he had become in New York, and the madness only opened up new abilities for him. He was stronger, faster, and more fearless. Should he arrive at our home, I couldn’t risk the lives of my father and brother, “I don’t want him to be killed. He’s still...I still...” my voice trailed off as I shook my head in disbelief that I could still harbor such deep feelings for the man who hurt so many people, for the man who tore apart the fabric of what we built our love upon.
Sensing exactly what I was feeling, my father spoke, “the most broken hearts are those that have experienced the most love. You hurt so deeply because you have been loved so intensely, little wolf. We will figure out what the next steps must be, and we will do it together. No matter what, though, you and Aurora will be safe,” he murmured, the creak of the door pulling our attention away from each other and causing me to collect myself quickly.
Aurora bounced out of the room in her nightgown, her black hair sweeping over her shoulders. I knew that the storm was distressing for her. She was afraid, but she wouldn’t tell me that she was anxious for me to finish my conversation so that I would retire to the room to keep her company. She wouldn’t voice those fears, but I knew by the way she shifted her weight from one foot to the other, that she was growing restless. I smiled at her, standing up from the safety of my father’s arms before walking over to her. I cast a glance back at them and nodded, silently wishing them goodnight. Reaching down between us, I held my hand out for Aurora’s, and when she grasped it, we walked into the room together. Like clockwork, she crawled into bed before me and sat upright, waiting for me to sink myself down and become comfortable. Only then did she curl up with me, resting her head right beneath my chin.
I smiled up at the ceiling, feeling her try to pull herself closer to me. If I had known the night before I left would be our final night of security-our final night of happiness-I would’ve made the most of it. I would’ve held her like our worlds weren’t about to fall to pieces. I would’ve tickled and listened to that laugh until she was too fatigued to prance around the woods anymore, begging to return home to sleep. I would’ve cradled her closer to me than I ever had before, but we never know when the last of something was. We could never know which one was our final heartbreak, or which one was our final smile. We never knew which moment would be the last with joy and love. In that moment, I realized that the safest place for her was as far away from me as possible. The mere thought made my heart shatter, but it was true.
I choked back the tears, my grip on her tightening, “the morning you were born followed the hardest night of my life. It was the night this world lost your father,” I murmured, feeling her eyes on my face as I glanced out the window, hearing the thunder and rain, “the sky opened up, and it rained all night. Thunder and lightning rolled in across the horizon, and I knew that it was because the universe felt his absence just as deeply as I did. She cried with me, but I didn’t have time to mourn him as much as I should’ve because you decided that you needed to mend my broken heart. You decided that it was time for me to hold you because when your father...died...I felt my world slipping away, and I was lost. It turns out that I was lost because you were meant to find me. It was as if you knew what your presence would bring to me: a lifetime of joy, love, and beauty that I’d never known before,” I reminisced, my voice becoming thick with tears.
Clearing my throat, I continued, “and when our eyes met for the first time, the storm cleared, and the sun began to rise on the horizon, chasing away the clouds. There was nothing but clear skies and light from that moment on. We have both known the storm, but we’re strong enough to weather whatever comes our way. I remember that day like it was yesterday. The light from the dawn filled the room, and it felt like it was rising just for you. I felt invincible the moment you looked at me, like I could take on the world, and I felt more love than I’d ever felt before. I never knew how deeply I could love until I met you, and within the blink of an eye, my world changed for the better. The girl I used to be, the one who had known nothing but heartache in the months prior to your birth, she disappeared into the background the moment I held you, and I returned to the girl I was when I shared my heart with another,” I mused, as my heart ached with what would come tomorrow. She would no longer be my little girl, and my life would lack the laughter and joy-the love-she brought into it.
My eyes connected with hers, and I saw my reflection in them, but I didn’t feel like the warrior or the goddess or the queen that she saw me as. I felt like a failure. My decision was to fail her, and in doing so, I would keep her safe. I fought back my tears, forcing a smile on my face as she yawned. She didn’t need to worry, and my tumultuous emotions would only lead to her becoming more and more anxious. This would be her final night of peace, and I would bear the burden of knowledge until I was forced to forfeit my love and happiness the following day, “you were and will always be...the greatest gift life could’ve ever given to me. You are my favorite, favorite thing,” I whispered, pressing a featherlight kiss to her nose as her smile brightened the darkness in my heart, “get some sleep now, little wolf. I will still be here when you wake.”
She nodded her head, another little yawn escaping her lips, “I love you, Mother, and I miss you already,” she whispered as her eyes closed, ready to accept the sleep I knew she hadn’t been getting with my absence. She slept far more soundly at my side than she did without me, and she couldn’t sleep at all during the storms without me.
“I love you more,” I responded in typical fashion, listening to the way her breath steadied. She fell asleep within minutes of hearing my final profession of love to her, and I just watched her, drinking in every feature and committing it to memory. All I would have left of her would be memories. When I knew she was finally asleep, the tears began to cascade from my eyes and down my cheeks. I held back the sobs as I thought of how true our typical parting words rang in that moment, “I miss you already.”
