#“its her fault that loki is stuck in that tree” now just ask yourself if this would have happened if the tva didn't exist 😭

[shivieroy]

just came here to say that people blaming sylvie for everything is weird af since that's what right-wing people do to blame the victims 😭

[thebifrostgiant]

If You Know Where to Look - Part 20 (1/2)

Summary: in which something unexpected is found. A fire burns

Part 1 / Previous

Read on Ao3

Word Count: 2,980

Rating: T

Pairing: Loki/Reader

*

Chapter 20: ... If You Know Where to Look

As you come down the winding stairs, giddy and nearly running in your haste, you realize that there are a few other guests in the sitting area, and you slow down a bit, lower your voices. Loki’s hand immediately comes up to rest against your back, a familiar, comforting gesture that has you taking a little step closer to him, glad of yet another way he’s taken it upon himself to protect you, keep you safe.

You smile up at him, gratitude snugly curled up in your chest, and he grins back in that toothy way of his, and you’re glad of that too. Excitement has stolen away the hurt, the anger, the fear, from both of you it would seem.

[[MORE]]

Outside, the air is cold, but the day is clear and bright, and the sun has melted away the morning’s frost from the tips of the grass stalks. You don’t seem to mind the chill in the least now, not with thoughts of cozy fire to keep your feet gliding across the path, with Loki by your side. Finally, you’re beginning to understand why he seems to like the cold. Just a little.

The tree is just as lovely now as it had been when you’d left it, strong, lean trunk in its ring of fiery leaves. You run your hand over it, murmuring your thanks, your earnest respect for the magic within, the soul and lifeblood of the ash. Loki steps up aside you and does so as well, his elbow brushing against your jacket sleeve as he moves.

Your eyes meet for a moment, and he’s watching you, waiting for you, lips still curled in his little smile. And surrounded here as he is by the beginnings of winter, with the endless pale sky and the bare branches of the trees behind him, his deep black hair catching in the soft wind and his eyes, so green and shining with encouragement, he looks... he looks beautiful. Utterly beautiful. And you feel warmed just by his nearness.

You hold out your hands, cupped so delicately, just like Loki had shown you. You close your eyes and think of smoke, the thick white trail of it leading to the gully, the hot ash scent of Loki when you’d first arrived on Midgard, the little curl in your palms just a short while ago. Warm and bright and wonderful, light and energy and joy and life.

But there is no fire in your hands now. There is no smoke, no touch of heat. Once more, nothing. But you had done it, you had managed before. You could do it another time.

Determined, you try again. And again. But yet, there is still nothing, just like it had been for weeks on end.

“I don’t... understand,” you whisper, shoulders slumping as you stare at your empty hands. “I did it not even an hour ago. Really, I did do it.” Because you had, for all that you can’t prove it now.

Loki puts his hands over your own, pushing them back down to your sides.

“I know you did,” he says, voice as soft as your own.

You look up at him, feeling the pang of dejection a little bit less.

“You believe me?”

“Why wouldn’t I?” He swallows. “You have no reason to lie.”

And there’s a bit more weight there than those words implicitly deserve, and your words from earlier come back to you, reminding you of their bitter taste.

“Forgive me, Loki,” you say, searching his face. Your chest feels tight with contrition, because you realize now that you have hurt Loki. And while no one could fault you for trying to protect yourself, there is no excuse. “I should not have snapped at you.”

He looks at you, surprised, and the coil around your heart tightens further.

“But you-” he starts, but you do not want to hear him defend your actions.

“No,” you say, quietly but resolute, cutting off the protest. “If you do something that bothers me, you at least deserve to hear about it in a civil manner. I was frustrated, and disappointed, but none of that was your fault.” Truly, Loki has been nothing but patient and composed the whole while, and you don’t know how to tell him how much you appreciate that. “I should not have hurt you either. And I’m sorry.”

***

Loki blinks, taken aback by the sincerity in her face, the anguish in her eyes. For him. Because she truly is sorry. But, truly, there is little left to forgive.

He bumps his shoulder against hers gently as they begin walking by habit the trail they’ve grown so used to wandering one more time.

“I hadn’t realized the name bothered you,” he says after a long moment, staring out over an empty field of tall, dead grass, thoughts in his head circling like crows over carrion.

Certainly, he would not have persisted with it if he had known. But he hadn’t known, hadn’t noticed. Maybe he should have. He had known the scar was a sore spot for her, one she had every right to protect with tooth and nail. But he had not considered how it might seem to her, dragging up the memory of pain and fear like it was still fresh. It seems obvious now. He cannot blame her for lashing out in the wake of it.

A mistake, she had said. A stupid mistake. But Loki cannot make sense of that.

“It’s not that it bothers me, it’s just that...” She frowns, trying to find a way to explain. “I just... I don’t understand.”

Her quiet voice pulls him up from his thoughts.

“What?”

“What do you mean by it?”

She’s chewing her lip, looking lost, and Loki stops walking, and turns to her, wanting to keep that look from befalling her face again.

“It is fitting,” he begins, trepidant, and reaches a hand out before he can think better of it when her eyes tighten around the corners. His fingers barely touch her shoulder, but she does let him speak, willing to hear him out. “But not for the reasons you think,” he hurries to say, “not because of this.” His eyes flick to the scar, and she tenses. His hand squeezes gently. “At least, not as such.” He pauses, searching for words to make her understand, and lets his hand slip to its familiar spot on her back, pulling her to walk with him as he speaks softly. “I was never trying to mock your pain. Not even... back then. I just meant...” He breathes out a long breath through his nose, frustrated, and tries again. “You must have been so brave.”

She stares at him in open-mouthed incredulity.

“Brave?” she repeats, like the idea is unfathomable.

He gives her a half smile, a bit sad because as much as he admires that about her, it does not ease the pain of why. She does not fear him, does not hate him now, but she had, once upon a time, and that ache won’t settle.

“Very.” His eyes run over her scar again before meeting hers softly. “You survived. Let it be a reminder of that, and only that.”

“But you said-“

“I know what I said.” And he has to look away, because his eye are beginning to sting. “And I should not have. That was a lie.” The confession is not an easy one to make, but the words fall from his lips anyway, because he needs to say them. She needs to hear them. “You were clever, you figured out a way to get out of Einvald’s clutches and free yourself. And you were brave enough to put it into action despite knowing what it would cost. I was angry, and hurt, when I said what I did, but it was never true.”

Silence hangs between them for a long while as she lets his words wash over her, to sink in or roll away he does not know.

“Hurt?” she says at last, and it takes Loki a second to remind himself of what he had said, what part of it she was inquiring about.

“I thought...” he says so quietly, so unsure, that the words are light as air, and nearly soundless. “I had thought that you were afraid of me.”

And yet... a stupid mistake.

“What?”

“You... you would rather maim yourself than marry someone like me.” His voice wavers, and her eyes go wide. And before she can do something foolish, like take that wrong, as if he’d been blaming her, he adds, “I know I do not have the best reputation, not like Thor-“

“Loki,” she says, in a voice so plaintive, so choked up, and she grabs his hand in her own and holds onto it tightly, beckoning him to look at her. Her face is stricken, raw devastation and horror mingled there. “That is- that is not what happened!”

He stares at the fingers clutching his, warm and soft, and he does not understand. He blinks rapidly, trying to make sense, but it’s a few moments before his mouth can even form the words he so desperately needs to ask

“What do you mean?”

She pulls him to the side of the path, to a crumbling wall of venerable stones stacked to thigh height, and they sit together on the cold rock, sheltered among the trees, because this is not the sort of conversation to have whilst walking.

“I didn’t know,” she says, eyes running over the gaps between the rocks where moss and lichen cling and hold it all together. “Any of it. I didn’t know. What Einvald’s plan was, what he wanted with me I... I had no clue. He certainly never mentioned marriage. All I knew was that he had — or made it out that he had — some deal with the prince, which I was, apparently, desirable for. I thought that... I thought I’d be...” She doesn’t finish. Can’t.

But Loki knows what she thought. A whore. And he feels his stomach roil with the knowledge, acid thick in his throat, revolted.

“I hadn’t realized the rumors of me were quite so terrible,” he whispers eventually, shutting his eyes against the sudden blurriness that fills them. He tries to breathe, but his lungs seem stuck. “I would not have, not ever.”

“I know. I know that, Loki. But... but I didn't even know who they were talking about. It could have just as easily been about Thor.”

“Thor would not have done that either!”

“It was a stupid thing to be afraid of.” Her fists clench in her lap, tense and fidgety with an air of wretchedness. “But I hadn’t heard any rumors about you. Any at all, let alone what you would or wouldn’t do, what kind of person you were, or people thought you were. I heard about Thor all the time, but no one ever talked about you. I know now that I was so terrified for no reason, but how could I have known?” She sounds desperate, like she’s pleading with him, the shine of tears in her eyes, running down her cheeks.

“You-“ he gets out, fighting through the choking feeling that’s taken hold. “You thought I was a monster.”

“No,” she’s says, sudden conviction like steel behind her words. “You could have been anyone. But you’re not.” Her hand covers his, an almost frantically tight clutch. He stares at it. “You are no monster. You are smart, and strong, and resilient.” Her grip on his hand softens along with her voice, until her fingers are wrapped sweetly around his own, and her words are nearly a whisper. “And kind.” Loki’s eyes flick up at that, surprised beyond measure. She smiles through her tears, and there’s an amused, almost teasing quality to it. “When you want to be,” she adds with a little huff of breath, a tiny laugh that turns the air it touches white in the cold.

Loki, too stunned for words, simply lets his own fingers curl around hers, a touch of warmth against his skin, feeling something shift into place, something dangerous and wild, like a spark catching in the wooden rafters of a roof and sending it all up in smoke.

***

The hand in yours is soft and gentle, contrasted against the way Loki is staring at you with a mixture of shock and awe, staring at you like you’d just given him the world, and it’s so much, too much, that burning, intense look.

His eyes squeeze shut and his hand falls away from yours.

“I treated you so terribly...” he whispers, countenance a grimace of shame.

“And now I see why,” you say just as softly. All the hurt and anger you’d been holding the whole while, even if it had become lighter over time, sunken deeper, drifts like a leaf floating downstream, carried far away and lost forever. In its stead, a seedling of peace sprouts, tender and young, but growing. Asgard’s second prince could have been anyone. And yet... he is Loki. You smile at the thought.

“You are far too forgiving.”

You nudge Loki’s shoulder with your own.

“Just don’t do it again,” is all you ask, and he laughs, easing the last of the tension from you with how much lighter it sounds.

Silence save for the rustle of branches in the wind surrounds you for a moment. But there is something you want to know.

“Can I ask you something?”

“Of course.”

“When you...” you pause, chewing at the corner of your lip as you try to phrase the question properly. “When you decided I should be Ülle’s servant... Was that just you being a bastard, or was there more to it than that?”

Loki snorts at your irreverence, because it’s not something he can deny, but he’s giving you that sort of satisfied, shrewd look again, but there’s more to it, something almost admiring therein.

“Would you have felt safe coming and going from your home, through the forest, knowing Einvald and his men were still within, when they knew exactly where to find you?” he asks, the question a roundabout answer to your own.

No, you realize, not particularly having thought of it like that before. Not particularly needing to, having spent the days after that inside the palace, too busy to think about making the trip home and being ambushed again. You shiver, more than just the cold rock and air seeping beneath your bones, the chill of imagined dread making you feel shaky. No, not even slightly safe.

But you had been safe, tucked away in the palace, hidden and surrounded by guards and many other servants, where Einvald would not think to find you, where a man like him would not dare tread. Or at least, as safe as you could have been while in close proximity to Ülle. Loki would not have known about that. And even still, even then, he’d been protecting you, in a convoluted, shifty manner that, with the benefit of perspective, isn’t so surprising. Subtlety and plots, an art just like magic that Loki possesses so consummately.

“That’s what you were doing, spending all that time in the forest,” you realize, amazed. “You were looking for him. For them.”

And you wonder if Loki will ever cease to surprise you. Truly, the only reason there can be that praises for Loki are not sung unending as they are for Thor is that people simply are not aware of the depths of gratitude they owed him, because he was never one to be overt in his actions.

You take hold of Loki’s hand once more, and bring it to your lips to press a kiss filled with all your gratitude, as well as your own thorough admiration, to his knuckles. To your absolute delight, you have the privilege of watching Loki’s cheeks turn the faintest shade of pink — and it’s not from the cold, you know it’s not the cold — even as his own mouth forms a smile. Little dimples show at his cheeks, and a rush of affection fills you head to toe. Your prince of shadows, brave beyond measure. And kind.

“Even when you don’t want to be,” you say, as if that makes all the difference in the world. It does. Yeah. Definitely not a monster.

***

The gentle breeze of the afternoon fades to stillness, thick, woolen clouds rolling over the sky. As you stand in front of the tree, trying to bring the touch of fire to your hands once more, it begins to snow.

You don’t realize it at first, not until tiny points of cold start landing on your open palms, your closed eyelids. You open your eyes and watch the delicate flakes of ice fall, settling over the dry earth and leaves without a sound. The hush of winter, beautiful in its solitude and tranquility. Or, nearly solitude.

Loki is watching the snow as well, drifting ever downward, and he is smiling.

“Are you sure we have not been on Jotunheim this whole time?” he jokes, and you laugh lightly, not wanting to break the peace that’s wrapped around this place, soft and thick as a quilt.

You try again for fire, but it is a lost cause when all your focus is on ice, on the steady spread of white underfoot, the freshness in your lungs, the snowflakes scattered across Loki’s dark hair like stars in the depth of night.

“We should probably head back before it gets too cold,” you say, wiggling your toes in your boots.

Loki nods, but makes no move, still looking around in breathless wonder. You aren’t particularly inclined to leave either, and merely come to stand beside Loki, marveling as well at the blinding world of white being revealed.

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