Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/11968581.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Underage
  Category:
      M/M
  Fandom:
      Thor_-_All_Media_Types
  Relationship:
      Loki/Thor
  Character:
      Loki, Thor, Laufey, Frigga, Original_Characters
  Additional Tags:
      it's_all_loki's_fault, The_better_part_of_valor, teen-equivalent_age,
      disguises, Smut
  Series:
      Part 29 of Silly_September
  Stats:
      Published: 2017-09-01 Completed: 2017-09-17 Chapters: 17/17 Words: 15850
****** Girls ******
by needleyecandy
Summary
     When Laufey finds out about the photographs Loki took, he comes to
     Asgard with an invasion force. The only sensible thing for Thor and
     Loki to do is disappear.
Notes
     Ah, September has arrived at last, and we all know what that means.
     Time for another month of ridiculous situations, character tics
     turned up to eleven, and, of course, a very clever Frigga.
***** Chapter 1 *****
It was all Loki's fault.
It was true that Loki seemed to draw trouble through no fault of his own, the
way honey draws flies, the way north draws a lodestone. More often than not,
family gatherings would end with a wide-eyed Loki proclaiming to their sighing
parents, I had nothing to do with this, and their parents would shake their
heads sadly and say,These things just find you.
This was not one of those times. This time it definitely was all Loki's fault.
"To your rooms, please, highnesses," urged the einherjar.
"But we can fight," Thor protested.
"We were ordered to see you to safety. The sooner you take your rooms, the
sooner we can join the battle to defend Asgard. We will be shamed if we do not
join in the battle," one answered.
"And so would we!" argued Loki. "It's not fair to make us hide in our rooms.
We're the heirs to the throne of the realm, and as such, we have more to lose
than any other amongst you, our honor more intimately tied to the results of
this conflict, so to substantialize the pinnacle of superfluous circumlocution
and perform the most duplicitous of sesquipedalian convictions, I insist that
you acknowledge, ratify, and acquiesce to my own insistence that we, ergo, ipso
facto, possess a greater necessification to engage the combatants than do any
other."
All the einherjar blinked in unison. Even with their high level of training it
was impressive. "Um," mumbled one.
"I suppose, when you put it that way," another said, doubtfully.
"Not at all," Tyr announced, coming up behind them. "Highnesses, you are brave
and valiant boys but this battle is for men."
"I'm no boy! I'm only a year from the age of maturity," argued Thor.
"And I got yet another chest hair, just last week," Loki added.
"How many does that make?" Thor whispered.
"Two. Shut up," Loki whispered back.
"To your rooms, please," Tyr said.
"Yes, sir," they said, staring at the ground.
He actually stayed there to watch them go, like they might sneak back and join
the fight if he didn't see the protective enchantments seal the door to their
hall.
"Let's sneak back and join the fight," Loki said when they were alone.
"The door is sealed. We'll have to go out the window," Thor agreed, striding
towards it. "The best way to the armory from this side of the palace is-"
"I can break the enchantments."
"You can?"
"It seemed like the sort of knowledge that belonged on a need-to-know basis."
"I didn't need to know that we could have been sneaking out at night?"
"I thought you might tell our friends. Fandral cannot keep a secret."
"But think of all the fun we've missed! I hold you responsible."
"I know," Loki sighed. "But perhaps we might discuss this when we're not needed
in battle?"
"You're the one who's not opening the door."
"Just give me a minute of quiet."
Thor stood with crossed arms, his weight slung to one hip, watching in silence
as Loki first smiled, then stared, and finally glared at the locked door.
"You can't do it?"
"I'm not used to doing it under pressure!"
"It's a weapon, Loki, not your dick, and if you can't do it we need to get out
the window."
"That was one time!" Loki said hotly. "It was one time, and that river was very
cold. I seem to remember you weren't at full... full fullness yourself. It was
a dumb challenge."
Thor decided to deflect before Loki could point out whose idea it had been to
have a jerk-off competition in a river of snowmelt."That's not the topic at
hand. Do you want to give it one more go before we follow my plan?"
Loki set his chin. "Yes, I do. And I bet you anything I'll make it work
perfectly."
Thor sighed loudly but he could already see that Loki looked different somehow.
Almost like a torch burned just beneath his skin. He breathed hard through his
nose, his lips white with tension, and then came the sound of metal rubbing
against oiled stone and the door cracked open.
"I told you," Loki said.
"You're being unnecessarily belligerent," Thor told him.
"Are we going to the armory or not?"
"Yes, of course we are."
Once outside of their rooms, they could hear the standoff outside. The Jotun
army stamped their feet to show how easily an Aes might be stepped on; the
einherjar, in turn, drummed their pikes on the ground to show their own
eagerness.
Thor and Loki were halfway to the armory to equip themselves with their favored
weapons (sword for Thor, for while he had been promised Mjolnir, he had not yet
taken possession; throwing knives for Loki) when – horror of horrors – over the
rhythmic thumping they heard the cold, cruel voice of Laufey himself. "Send out
the second son of Asgard," he intoned, the seidr-infused sound echoing and
growing through each hall until the force nearly sent them to their knees.
"He wants you? What did you do to him?" Thor demanded.
"Nothing! All I did was take a picture of him and send it to his girlfriend. I
swear."
"Loki..."
"He was just taking a bubble bath. Perfectly normal. No reason at all to get
upset with me."
"Everyone takes bubble baths, Loki. They're one of the great pleasures of life.
What aren't you telling me?"
"Fine. He was eating bonbons and weeping over pictures of Farbauti."
"He was? But she left him forty-seven years ago!"
"I know!"
"I can see how his girlfriend wouldn't like that..."
"She dumped him," Loki admitted.
"Wow. No wonder he has it in for you."
"It was just a bit of fun."
"Not to him, it wasn't. You know his reputation. He's not going to stop until
he gets you."
And so it was that as the army of Jotunheim poured through the front gates of
Gladsheim, its two princes were hurrying out the back.
***** Chapter 2 *****
They fled as fast as their legs could carry them, deep into the western woods,
until the hush of the trees grew strong enough that they could no longer hear
Laufey's voice booming its demands for Loki to be handed over to him. It was
impossible to tell how late in the day it was, for between the heavy canopy
shading the sun and the glow-ormurs clinging to the tall grasses, the forest
was in a state of perpetual twilight.
"I have never come so far from home before, not without a whole hunting party,"
Loki said.
"Nor I. I think we'll be safe enough if we make our camp a ways off the trail,
though."
Loki peered into the gloom. "I suppose we have little choice," he replied
doubtfully.
"There is enough fruit to keep us from going hungry, at least."
"Do we really want to eat what grows in here?"
"Do you know a spell to reveal poisons?"
"I do, but not toxins. Who knows what the trees draw up from the earth?"
"Don't tell me you're still afraid of the dark," Thor teased.
"If course I am. I'm not stupid, I know what lives in it."
"Hmm. Fair point. Would you rather continue on?"
"At least until we grow too weary."
"Very well." Thor caught Loki's hand in his own and swung them jovially as they
continued down the path.
"Stop trying to cheer me up, Thor."
"You're the reason we had to run away. I'll cheer you up if I damn well want
to."
"Fine," sighed Loki.
On they walked, and on and on, the trees growing thicker until their way was
lit only by the strangely glowing creatures that clung to the rough tree bark,
so long it felt as though the only way they might ever see sky or sunlight
would be to turn back and face the wrath of Laufey. Indeed, Thor was just about
to – reluctantly – suggest that very thing when the trees began to thin.
"Look! The forest is ending," Thor said.
"Oh, good. I can barely walk another step."
They made their way to the edge of the woods and found a town waking itself up
for the day. Carts driven by yawning drivers and plodding oxen made their way
towards the market setting up on the far side of the green. Their shadows were
long and narrow on the field before them.
“Perfect,” Loki whispered.
“Hmm?”
“Everyone will be distracted by the market. It’ll make it easier to steal
supplies.”
“You can’t mean to steal from our own people. We’ll go to the mayor and
introduce ourselves and request their aid.”
“Oh, I would,” Loki said earnestly. “I would much prefer that we not steal from
them, but just think in what danger they would be if Laufey’s troops make it
this far and begin to ask questions. These people are safer if we leave them in
ignorance. Or would you risk their lives to balm your conscience?”
Thor was far too accustomed to Loki’s manipulations to fall for them so easily.
Unfortunately, this time Loki made a good point. “We will make note of all we
take, and reimburse their owners the moment we are able.”
“Oh, yes. Of course.”
“But it appears some time before the market properly begins, and I know you
must be as weary as I am myself. Let us rest just beyond the first trees, where
we are safely hidden but still in the sunshine. You look cold."
Loki, who was every bit as weary as Thor had guessed, agreed easily. Their
light cloaks were rolled into pillows, and they had slept on worse beds than
this thick grass. They slept until the gentle sun had grown bold and demanding.
“Thor! Thor, wake up. Look at the market,” Loki hissed.
Thor sat up, rubbing the sleep from his eyes, and followed his brother’s gaze.
The market was packed with people; it had to be the whole town plus more
besides. “Clothes and food,” Thor ordered. “Nothing that we don’t need.”
Loki nodded. They crept forth from their hiding place to the back of the
nearest house. A line covered in clothes hung low, so low that were it not for
the staff holding up the center, the clothes would no doubt be on the ground.
“Those must have just been put up. There’s no way we can have them dry by
nightfall if we take them off the line.”
“Let’s try the next house.”
But at the next, and the next, all they found were clothes weighed heavy with
water. The house after that, though, had what they needed. Here the clothes
danced easily in the light breeze and when Loki reached out to feel a hem it
was as dry as the sunshine itself. “Well, we’ve found our new clothes,” he
said. “Do you prefer lavender or the darker purple?”
“I don’t prefer either. I don’t want to wear girl's clothes.”
“Just think, Thor. No one will look for our faces above a lady’s frock. And
that means safety for the people among whom we shelter.”
Thor heaved a sigh. “Very well. But I get the dark one.”
Thor did not get the dark one. It was far too slimly cut through the shoulders
and chest.
“The lavender brings out your eyes,” Loki offered.
Thor grunted at him.
“Unfortunately, Thor… it also brings out your beard.”
***** Chapter 3 *****
Loki's dress fit well enough, clinging to his narrow frame, and he bunched his
hair up with his fists until the curls that he usually charmed away finally
returned. He pinched his cheeks to a bright fresh pink, and between their
warmth, the tumbling locks, and a weak glamour (which was all he could do) he
passed well enough for a girl. Almost.
"Your legs, brother! I have never seen a girl with hair half so thick. Almost
as dense as this forest. How are they so thick when your chest is so smooth?
You'll have to do something about them."
"Well then go steal me those stockings," Loki hissed, ignoring the question.
"And yours are no better, you know, even if the color makes it less obvious."
"It seems to me that is a deal better," Thor answered, but all the same he
darted out from the dense trees to snatch the heavy stockings that danced on
the line.
Loki grumbled as he wrestled himself into them from his seat on a fallen log.
"These are horrible. I can't imagine why anyone would do this by choice."
"How else could one have peacock-green legs?"
"Hmm. I suppose they do look quite well," Loki mused, holding them straight out
before him and contemplating their appearance with head tilted. "They make my
toes feel strange, though."
Thor squelched a sigh. "The sooner you go steal a razor the sooner you can get
out of them."
Loki sought for some way to talk Thor into doing their shoplifting but as he'd
just pointed out the prominence of Thor's beard, there really was little to be
done. "Wait here," he said.
"Get some makeup, too," Thor suggested helpfully. "Something to paint over the
stubble."
Loki turned back. "I know." He left his brother feebly trying to play a blade
of grass.
The market had gotten busy while they had slept, and now he had to shove his
way through, up one row of stalls and down the next, until he found a tent with
a brisk man selling all sorts of toiletries.
"Good afternoon, miss! Might I interest you in my latest product? A complexion
milk, absolutely guaranteed to keep the roses in those lovely cheeks."
There being no other customers, Loki had little choice but to accept. After the
complexion milk he was made to test a hair cream, a hand cream, a lash cream,
and an eye cream before a woman in a dress far more expensive than Loki's
appeared at the entrance of the tent, and Loki was dropped like an oozing
carcass.
The next question was where to put the things he stole; he couldn't very well
carry them in his hands and his dress had no pockets. "I can't believe I'm
doing this," he muttered to himself as he shoved foundation creams, powders,
eye pencils, and eye shadow into the tops of his stockings, followed far more
carefully by a razor and a box of blades.
He was halfway out of the tent to safety when his theft was discovered. "Hey,
you need to pay for-" the shopkeeper began. Loki didn't stick around long
enough to hear the rest. His confusion spell was just strong enough for him to
flee the market without anyone noticing which way he went.
Running with hard lumpy things pressed against his thighs was markedly
uncomfortable, and that was nothing compared to the alarmingly short distance
between the razor and things a razor should never ever be near. His foul temper
was not aided when he returned to their hiding place to find Thor lost in
blissful sleep.
“Wake up,” Loki said, kicking his brother in the shin.
Thor woke up, sat up, and grabbed his leg, all at once. “Ow! What did you do
that for?”
“For sleeping while I was busy trying not to get arrested. Now come on, we need
to find a stream.”
Thor clambered up, gave himself a very unladylike scratch, and ambled after
Loki. “What did you get us?” he asked his brother’s stiff back.
“Makeup and razor.”
“That’s all?”
“That’s what we agreed.”
“Oh. It’s just the wind turned for a few minutes and I smelled some pies…”
Loki’s stomach rumbled at the thought. “Once we're fixed up you can take a turn
stealing.”
It wasn't long before they found a stream, nor did it take them long to find a
reflecting pool once they began to follow its course. Loki gave Thor the razor.
"You'd best get started with that while I do my makeup."
Thor shaved his face expertly, turned to grin at Loki with baby-smooth skin
before Loki had even finished powdering his own hairless cheeks. "I hope you
got me my own color?"
"Of course, you'd look horrible in this shade. But I think you need to do your
legs as well. Just because it's blond doesn't mean people won't notice the
thickness."
It was with no little glee that Loki listened to Thor's shocked gasps and
muttered curses. "You don't need to enjoy this quite so much," Thor informed
him. "It shouldn't be any harder than doing my face. How are your healing
charms?"
"Serviceable, but there's no point until you've finished."
By the time Thor was done his legs were covered in cuts. "At least you had the
sense to tie your dress up before it got all bloodstained," Loki said before
casting the charm.
Thor groaned with relief as the pain was dispelled. "Let's see if you can do
better," he said, holding out the razor.
"Ehh. I've come to like my stockings."
Thor rolled his eyes but had sense enough not to scoff. Mostly because he
wanted a favor. "Would you do my makeup, then, since yours is done? I'm sure I
couldn't do it half so well."
"Fine," Loki grumbled.
Despite his dour mood, Loki's hands were light and skillful as they darted
across Thor's face, evening out the tone, smoothing a cream across his lids,
drawing gently along his lashes and shading above them. When Loki sat back,
Thor leaned over to study himself in the water. "I look pretty," he said,
surprised.
"What did you expect?"
"I don't know. I just don't think of myself as pretty."
"Well, now that you look so pretty, you can try out your feminine wiles on the
pie-seller. I'm famished."
They hurried back to the market, Loki doing his best to hide behind his
brother's bulk. The stolen goods were in his stockings again but with the razor
no longer threatening the line of inheritance, which was mostly what he cared
about. The scent of fresh-baked crust and rich meat drew them closer, closer,
until the stall came into sight. "Wish me luck," Thor whispered as they drew
near. He put on a flirtatious smile and caught the seller's eye, and all was
going well until a cry shattered through the bustle.
"Thief! There she is, in the purple!"
Loki grabbed Thor's arm and ran.
***** Chapter 4 *****
They fled as fast as their legs could carry them, just as fast as they had run
into the woods, but now they had no path to follow, nothing but gaps between
the people who milled about, visiting the stalls and tents. People did try to
grab at them, but between being hindered by their shopping baskets and the
bursts of seidr Loki kept casting to blur their motions, they somehow got free.
The streets on this side of the market were nearly empty, and after a few last
spells they were able to shed their most determined pursuers.
"Where now?" Loki panted.
"There's more forest if we keep going. Just keep running," Thor answered.
They reached the edge of the town and there before them it lay: another forest,
brighter, less threatening than the one they had left. And there was also
something even better. A transport, already humming to life.
"Sigrun and Brynhild?" asked a woman with a clipboard.
"Yes, that's us," Loki panted.
She made two marks on her sheet. "You nearly missed the transport. I trust you
will be more prompt in future."
"Yes, ma'am. We're very sorry," Thor gasped.
"Well, get on. Hurry," she said, jerking her head towards the open doorway.
Ansu's Scullery School, read the sign just above it. They climbed aboard with
her hard at their heels. There was an empty bench near the back and they
collapsed into it together, still gasping for breath.
"This is your idea of getting away? Going to a school for scullery maids?" Thor
hissed.
"We're getting away, aren't we?" Loki answered.
Thor's eyes narrowed. "We should have kept going into the forest. We would have
been safe there."
"And keep stealing from the villagers? I thought you were sooooooo against
that."
"Fine. But I get to be Brynhild."
Loki rolled his eyes. "Fine. I wanted to be Sigrun anyway."
"Well, fine, then."
"Fine."
"I got us a purse for the makeup."
"Good."
Thor leaned back in his seat and gazed out the window as the transport rose up,
higher, higher. He strained his eyes searching for Gladsheim, wondering if he
might see from here how the fighting went, but it seemed they were flying the
wrong direction to catch even a glimpse.
Once they had climbed into smoother airs, the woman with the clipboard rose and
came back to speak with them. "Is your luggage being sent on?"
Loki looked up at her with sweet, innocent eyes and spoke with the most
heartdrippingly earnest sincerity. "We don't know what happened to our luggage.
It was lost by our first transport, the one we took to meet you. That's why we
were so late."
She softened a little. "These transport companies aren't what they used to be.
I blame Reagnar-era deregulation. Don't worry, there will be plenty of things
at the school, and I'm sure you can borrow from the other girls until then.
Isn't that right, Asfrid?" she asked, turning to the girl across from them.
"Oh, yes, Ansu. Of course," she said. She seemed every bit as sweet as Loki
appeared and Thor wondered if it was any more genuine.
Ansu gave a nod. "Good." She went back up to the front and sat back down.
Asfrid gave them a demure smile and looked back down at her book.
It was not long before they were in the cold and void between the realms, and
it was this that made Thor notice the atmosphere aboard the transport. It was
quiet, the hush broken by nothing louder than the turn of a page. Thor sat up
in his seat to look around them.
There were girls of several realms here. Most were Aesir, all bouncing curls
and simple drapery. It made sense, their realm being the most populous.
Scattered about were Vanir, with their smooth dark hair and deep-dyed skirts,
and Alfs, with their silver-blue dresses and fine straight brows.
After skimming his eyes over the generalities he began to look at the
particulars. Asfrid's body was broad and lush, and she had the most perfect
shade of red-gold hair floating about her peaches-and-cream face. Her nose was
narrow but perfectly formed, as were her lips. Her lashes were dark and heavy
and her deep violet eyes were poring through a book about the potential
applications of soul forge mechanisms to inter-realm travel. Her seatmate was
an Alf and she was every bit as stunning, lithe and slender, her skin dark as a
winter night, emerald hair in a heavy braid down her back and cheekbones so
sharp they could cut ice. Her lashes were long and curled and her pale green
eyes were fixed on a volume of theoretical linguistics.
He stood, using a long stretch to hide his quick glance behind them. Perfect
beauties, all of them, and all of them busily reading the sort of books more
suited to dry academics than to people on their way to be trained in the most
efficient method of scrubbing pots and pans.
"Loki," he whispered, "something's up."
***** Chapter 5 *****
Loki gave Thor a slow smile and a tiny nod. His brother was far more perceptive
than he was generally credited with being. He wouldn't have minded one of those
books himself (though perhaps not the one on calculational trigonocalculetic
theory, in which the blue-skirted Vanir girl diagonally ahead him seemed far
too engrossed) as it didn't take long to get painfully bored. After he had
passed another hour in fidgeting, picking at the loose thread on his skirt, and
ignoring the growing discomfort of his empty stomach, he somehow managed to
fall asleep on Thor's shoulder.
The sound of a bell woke him. "Lunchtime, girls," said a voice behind them. The
books were set down and conversation sprang up as Loki yawned and blinked the
sleep from his eyes. He stretched, twisting, to find the door at the back open
and a delicious smell wafting out. He was halfway to standing when Thor caught
his wrist and he realized that the girls were taking turns, each row letting
the one before them out before they went.
"Manners," Thor hissed.
Loki glared. Thor was no more used to waiting his turn than Loki was; it made
his reprimand sting. "You've been awfully content to just sit there," he
sniped.
"Planning. We've got to start figuring things out."
Even with all the sudden noise about them it still seemed a dangerous thing to
discuss. These did not seem the sort of girls who missed much. "I'm sure our
luggage will be sorted soon..." he said for the benefit of the ears around
them.
"I don't know, that company has the worst reputation. I was thinking we should
write to Aunt Svanhild and ask her to send us some stuff." The smile he gave
Loki would have looked bland to anyone who didn't know him.
Loki's eyes narrowed. Thor was perfectly right about their Great- Great- Aunt
Svanhild. She was a kind soul but quite absent minded, and if they wrote in the
guise of two loving nieces having a spot of trouble, she would assume she'd
simply forgotten their existence, and send whatever they requested. It was one
thing for Thor to be smarter than people knew, but it was another thing
altogether for him to show Loki up like this. It was the sort of thing Loki
liked to think of first.
The girls behind them left their seats, and then the girls behind and across –
both Alvs, one clearly from the south, with her heavy black boots, the other's
golden sandals showing her to be northern – slipped out and then Loki finally
got to go.
The dining chamber had a long table along one wall covered with trays of food,
and the line of girls leaving their seats merged seamlessly into the line of
girls selecting things for their meals. Loki looked down the table, meaning to
see what there was on offer, but found himself distracted by how full the
girls' plates were. He was used to seeing girls their age eat tiny portions but
these girls seemed to have appetites like Volstagg's. It was peculiar but at
least it meant he and Thor could satisfy themselves without catching anyone's
notice.
Most of the offerings were simple, peasant food almost, but he was far too
hungry to care, and he piled his plate so high that his baked apples were
threatening to slip off.
The orderliness of the line broke up when it came time to sitting down. There
were little clusters of girls all over, laughing and talking with full mouths.
That was something else he'd never seen girls do.
Thor stood beside him as they helplessly surveyed the room.
"Brynhild, Sigrun. Come sit with Rannveig and me," said a voice behind them.
Loki turned to find Asfrid giving him a sympathetic smile. "You missed all the
icebreaker stuff, dealing with your luggage. The rest of us all got a couple
hours of getting to know each other."
"Thank you," Thor said. "We'd love to sit with you."
Rannveig turned out to be Asfrid's seatmate. "Hi," she said as she set down her
tray at the remaining spot. "I was reading and missing hearing how you got out
of the third degree. Whatever it was, I'm jealous."
"We come from a far province and had to take a transport to meet this one. Our
things were misplaced, and we were trying to find out where they had been
sent."
Rannveig winced in sympathy. "I've had that happen. It's a nightmare. I can't
even imagine how this will complicate it. Is that why you aren't dressed like
servants?"
"Yeah. We were going to change before we came here, and then... well," Thor
shrugged. "It's lucky we didn't get left behind."
"I'm loaning some dresses to Brynhild until it gets sorted out," Asfrid said.
"You look about my size, Sigrun, I'll find you some things," Rannveig offered.
"Thanks," Loki said. Both of them were friendly, but they both had the same
sort of quiet intensity that made him not want it focused on himself more than
he could help. "So what were the icebreakers?"
"Third degree," snorted Rannveig.
"It was fun," Asfrid laughed, giving Rannveig a playful slap. "We got sheets of
paper with different categories and we had to find people who filled them, and
there were trust falls, and we started to play Lost on a Desert Island but
after the first ten girls all said they'd take a switchblade disguised as a
tube of lipstick Ansu gave up and had us switch to I Never."
Loki kept his face studiously neutral when she said switchblade. He was proud
of himself for that.
"So," said Rannveig, popping a piece of carrot into her mouth, "What made you
two decide to be spies?"
***** Chapter 6 *****
"I've always wanted to be a spy," Thor answered easily. Childhood ambition
seemed a good a reason as any, and it seemed safest to answer before Loki could
come up with something.
"And I like secrets. We used to play with inventing secret codes, writing with
invisible ink, trying to figure out places to fit hidden passages into our
home," Loki added.
Rannveig nodded. "Girl stuff. I never grew out of it, either. I guess none of
us did."
"You're lucky to have had each other," Asfrid told them. "I grew up with three
brothers and they were hopeless. They couldn't even make it past a simple
alphanumeric substitution before they got bored and wandered off to play with
their toy swords."
The brothers cast a quick glance at each other. It was certainly the first
they'd heard of that sort of thing being girly, but then, the only girl they
really knew very well was Sif, and that was only because she was a tomboy who
crashed their trainings until her parents – reluctantly - agreed to let her
join.
One thing they were surer of was that girls like boys. At least, he hoped. "So,
your brothers... are they cute?" Loki asked.
She crinkled her nose. "They're my brothers. Who looks at their brothers like
that?"
"Yeah, that's gross, Sigrun," Thor said.
Loki shrugged. "Just curious."
"So, what do you think it's going to be like?" asked Thor.
"The recruiter made it sound really strict," Asfrid sighed. "Like this
transport is our last chance for some fun."
Rannveig leaned forwards. "Don't worry. I have enough mead in my luggage to go
around," she whispered. "Ten minutes after lights out, the slumber party
starts."
"What about Ansu?" Loki whispered back.
"She's got her own sleeping room, not like the rest of us stuck in bunks."
"Then it's settled," said Asfrid, getting up. "I'm going to get seconds. I'll
pass the word."
"Same here," Rannveig told her. "What about you two? Aren't you getting
anything else?"
Thor couldn't possibly have eaten another bite, and he said as much. "Me
either," Loki said.
Rannveig shrugged. "Saving yourself the line, anyway."
It was a relief to get back to their seats at the end of lunch. A couple girls
had kindly gone to the luggage room and gotten books to share with them, so
that they were spared both boredom (in theory, anyway) and dangerous
conversation until dinner. Loki was fortunate enough to be loaned a massive
tome on invisible inks, and while it had been a lie that he'd experimented with
them in the past he quickly found the subject engrossing. Judging by his
fidgeting, Thor found his book on face reading (volume one of a five-volume
set, the rest of which Freydis assured him he was welcome to read when he was
done) rather less engrossing.
Dinner was dominated by Loki talking excitedly about some of the more
unexpected ways to make liquids darken, which served both to buttress their
story and to spare Thor having to feign interest in his own reading, and then
it was back to their seats and more studying until it was time for bed.
"I've got some extra sleep stuff you can borrow, Brynhild," Asfrid told Thor.
"Yeah, Sigrun, I have stuff for you, too," Rannveig said.
That was the easy part. The bunk beds were set into the walls, each pair with
its own privacy curtain, but by the time they'd gotten their loaned
nightclothes the hall was full of girls casually stripping down to their
underwear and flinging their clothes onto the beds and down was the only way
they could look to avoid getting big eyefuls of nearly-naked girl, which in
principle seemed pretty great but in practice felt really gross.
"Where are you going?" Freydis asked as the brothers squirmed their way to the
door.
"To change in the bathroom. We're shy," Thor said.
"Oh. At least it's just a couple more nights. And I'm sure you'll be roommates
once we get to the school," she answered, sounding sympathetic.
They changed in a rush, wanting to avoid any unnecessary attention, and got
back to the bunk room to find the rest of the girls dressed and sitting on the
sides of the lower bunks, talking. Only two wore cute matching pajamas and none
at all were having a pillow fight. It was nothing at all like they'd been led
to believe girls' slumber parties were like and Loki cast Thor a look of
uncertainty.
Ansu had followed them in and now she announced that it was time for lights out
and everyone to go to sleep. She stood in the center of the hall, waiting until
each girl had slipped into her bunk and all the curtains were drawn. "That's
right. Good night, girls," she told them.
"Good night, Ansu," they chimed.
The dim band of light around the curtain went out and the door clicked shut.
There was a rustle of fabric and then Thor was whispering from somewhere near
Loki's head, the first chance they'd gotten to speak freely since arriving on
the transport. "I feel like I've been wrong about everything my whole life."
"Me too. It's like..." Somewhere beyond the curtain there was a loud fart
followed by a ripple of giggles. "See? I didn't even know girls did that."
"I know. Me either. Loki, I don't know if I can pull this off."
"Sure you can. Just keep telling yourself 'I'm a girl,' and they'll believe it,
too."
"I'm a girl," Thor said. "I'm a girl, I'm a girl, I'm a girl."
***** Chapter 7 *****
The party was subdued until Loki let it slip that he had a little seidr.
"You do? Can you glamour the car to hide our noise?" Freydis asked excitedly.
"It's more of a shield than a glamour, and... well, I don't think I can hide
it, precisely, but I can make it less noticeable. If Ansu really focuses on
listening she'll hear us, but otherwise we'll be okay."
"We should be quiet for a minute while she works," Thor said.
"Of course." Asfrid went up and down the hall, whispering to the little groups
to give Sigrun the peace she needed.
Soon it was every bit as silent as Ansu wanted them to be and Loki was
concentrating, that pale aura dancing across his skin and when it faded he was
smiling. "Done. Where's that mead?"
His announcement was met with a rousing cheer. One girl got out a music box and
began splicing it into the transport's power system while several more bottles
than promised were produced from beneath pillows.
"I've got ingredients for cocktails. My sister attended four years ahead of me.
She told me what to bring to make friends," Inge explained. She set to work,
mixing drink after drink, while the rest of the girls clustered around.
"It worked. The friends thing," Thor said after a sip of his. "Anyone who can
make drinks like this is worth knowing."
"I'm interested in getting a job where I'll be placed in a tavern. People slip
so much valuable intel to their bartenders."
"That makes sense. I'd never thought about that as a possibility," Rannveig
said.
"Which is exactly what makes it so smart," agreed Loki.
Thor gave a hum and a nod and made a mental note that the Aesir needed to hire
her before anyone else got the chance.
"Hey, anybody want to play truth or dare?" someone asked.
Thor swallowed. "Um, Sigrun and I better-"
"We'd love to. Wouldn't we, Brynhild?" Loki interrupted, giving Thor a stern
look.
"Me, too," said Asfrid.
Rannveig nodded. "I'm in."
Nearly everyone wanted to play and they lined the hall, perched on the lower
bunks while those who didn't play were stretched out in the top bunks to drink
and laugh as they watched.
An empty mead bottle was spun to pick who would choose first and who would
challenge first.
"Dare," said Inge, tilting her head defiantly up.
"I dare you to finish your drink without coming up for air," said her
challenger, an Alf Thor didn't know.
"Easy," she laughed. They all fell silent as she put the cup to her lips and
drank and drank until it was drained and she was holding it upside down to
prove it.
When everyone was done cheering, Freydis chose truth.
"What's the most you've done with a guy?" Rannveig asked.
"My brother's friend went down on me last yule," she answered.
That was a good answer to top the cheers Inge had gotten.
"But did you go down on him?" someone asked.
"That's another question," she pointed out, eyes twinkling.
With half his mind, Thor followed along, for these were his companions for the
foreseeable future and they would expect him to remember this evening, or at
least the first few hours of it. The rest of his thoughts he turned over to
what in the world he would do when his turn came. So far the dares had been
fairly tame – drinking, or standing in the middle of the hall to dance to the
worst songs lurking on the music box – but they were slowing increasing in
daring as they circled the group. And what if Loki chose truth?
His stomach had gone from butterflies to fire-breathing dragonflies when
Freydis returned from the bathroom with the news that Ansu was on her way to
check on them.
The girls were a masterpiece of efficiency, flying into action the instant the
words left Freydis' lips. Inge stowed the drink fixing, the music was silenced,
the girls in the top bunks drew their curtains and the girls sitting below
piled into whichever bunk they were sitting on. Someone flipped the light out
and there was the sound of one last curtain being drawn just as the door
snicked open.
The bunks were small, never intended for more than one person. Thor's bunk now
held Thor, Loki, Inge, and Asfrid. Thor was next to the wall and Loki lay on
his side facing him, and thank the Norns he had the sense to do that because
there was no confusing the front of the body pressed against his own for
anything other than male.
When Ansu left, a Vanir girl (who, Thor told himself, he needed to learn her
name, address, and birthday so as to shower her with gifts for the rest of her
life) said that she was getting bored. "There's too few things we can use for
dares in here," she lamented. "Let's play I Never."
That was considerably safer. Thor even managed to be mostly honest with his
drinking while Loki was lying outrageously, but with such panache that no one
seemed to mind.
"I've never murdered three men with a single bullet," Asfrid said, somehow
completely deadpan despite being drunk and already looking at Loki expectantly.
He heaved a dramatic sigh and drank. His responses grew only more exaggerated
from there and three hours later, when everyone finally went to bed, they were
all telling him, in rather slurred speech, how hilarious he was.
"I just wish there were a boy as fun as you," sighed Rannveig.
"Impossible," Loki declared.
***** Chapter 8 *****
That first night used up all the mead. It left everyone with hangovers and a
burgeoning sense of camaraderie. The second and third nights were passed more
quietly, girls slipping through the dark to sit and whisper together. They
reached their destination, a humble outpost on a humble asteroid, not long
after breakfast on the fourth day. They landed in a broad field beside a drab
cinderblock building with untrimmed windows and plain doors. The vividness of
grass looked nearly unreal after days staring into space.
Ansu clapped her hands. "Alright, girls, here we are. No, Freydis, you don't
need to go get your bag, the staff is already coming out to carry everyone's
things. You'll have two hours to freshen up and unpack and orientation will
begin this afternoon."
The air scrubbers on the transport had been efficient in keeping it clean
enough for breathing but there was nothing like fresh air after days of nothing
but recirculated. The girls milled about, taking deep lungfuls, until everyone
was off and Ansu was - yet again - reading off her beloved clipboard, giving
out room assignments.
The laden staffers showed the girls where to find their rooms and after a few
minutes of running around and learning where everyone was, they all settled
down to unpack.
“I’ll bring you some things before bed tonight,” Rannveig promised.
“So will I,” added Asfrid. “Do you need more books?”
“No thanks. We’re fine,” Loki told her before Thor could get a word out.
“Okay, see you at lunch.”
“See you,” said Thor. The door closed behind them. “What did you say that for?
You know how boring the one I’m reading is. I’m in the middle of the chapter on
how eyebrow grooming patterns can reveal whether a person is more likely to
hide sensitive materials in a fake can of food or buried in the garden.”
“Because it’s our first time that we’re both safe and alone for more than five
minutes in almost a week and I don’t know about you but I have other needs.”
Thor’s eyes sparkled. “I’m going to win.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I always win. Remember that time in the river?”
“That was one time! And it was cold!”
“Okay,” Thor said smugly. “It’s your turn to challenge.”
Loki knew what his challenge would be. He had known since the last time they’d
competed, but he didn’t want to act like he planned for it any more than Thor
did and Thor always took a while to think, so he tried to look like he was
thinking for a while before answering, “The one who shoots higher wins.”
“Hmm. Good one. It’s the sort of thing I’d come up with.”
Loki closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “But you didn’t. I did. Does that
mean you’re in?”
“Of course I’m in. I can’t win if I don’t play.”
Once Loki had gotten used to wearing a dress he had come to find it quite
comfortable, but he was still happy every time he got to take off his
stockings. He had to be so careful of them that he was constantly aware of his
motions and everything around him and by the end of the day they sometimes left
his feet feeling clammy and now he rolled them off with a sigh of relief.
“I really think you’d be better off just shaving instead of having to deal with
those things all the time,” Thor told him.
“I watched you do it. You left the water all bloody.”
“That was the first time. Just look at them now,” Thor scoffed, lifting his
skirt. He did have a point; his legs were perfectly smooth, the nicks fully
healed and without any hair to distract the eye they could have been coaxed
from a piece of golden marble.
“Doesn’t it feel weird?”
“At first, but now I like it. They feel good,” Thor said, bending over and
running his hand up the length of his leg.
At least he’s getting into the role, Loki told himself. “Hurry up, we don’t
have all day. I’ll charm that mirror to remember. We can use it to judge.”
They pulled off their dresses and shoved back the blankets on the bed beneath
the window. They lay down side by side.
“So what’s your goal? The ceiling?” Loki asked, his voice dry.
“That’s ridiculous. I think I can reach the top of the window frame, though.”
Loki gave a snort. “On the count of three. One… Two… Three.”
They both grabbed their cocks and Loki closed his eyes, letting his imagination
dance over the past few days. At his age it was never difficult to get hard but
after the transport ride – with no opportunity to tend to himself – it was
easier than ever. Most of the girls had worn extremely short night clothes and
he couldn’t remember seeing so many great legs in his life. Long, shapely, so
smooth it must feel like heaven to touch them. One particularly divine pair
rose to the fore as his breathing began to race. He stroked himself harder,
imagining what it would feel like to run his hands all over them, even longer,
even more beautiful than the rest. He tried to summon the face that went with
them. The memory of it was right there, just out of reach, but he was getting
close and it was impossible to concentrate. It was only as he spilled that he
had a flash of gleaming flaxen waves.
“I won!” Thor crowed.
Loki rolled his head to the side to check the mirror. “By half an inch. A scant
half.”
“Don’t be so grouchy, little sister,” Thor teased. “Let’s check out our
bathroom. Ansu said we’re supposed to be freshening up.”
Thor sat up and his hair caught a ray of sunshine. That. The girl Loki was
thinking of had hair just like that.
He’d figure it all out at lunch.
***** Chapter 9 *****
Thor was having a good stretch, working out his joints from too much sitting on
the transport - he'd never done well with that, he liked to be active - when a
voice came, quiet and muffled, through the heavy wooden door. "Everyone into
the hall, please!"
"This better be for lunch," Loki said. 
"It must be. We'll eat and then have orientation."
Loki gave his toes a final dramatic wiggle before sitting up to cram his shoes
on. "Okay, come on."
"Just a sec, I want to touch up my mascara."
"What mascara? I didn't steal us any mascara."
"Freydis gave me her spare tube. I wanted something to bring out my eyes," Thor
answered as he leaned in close to the mirror to inspect his work.
"Acceptable?"
"Better than that. I'd never realized what nice lashes I have."
"So we can go eat, right?" Loki asked, just as the voice in the hall yelled,
"Brynhild! Sigrun!"
"Coming!" Thor called.
The rest of the girls were waiting and as soon as they appeared the tall Vanir
woman at the far end began to speak. "Welcome, girls. I am Dagmar, and I will
be your hall mother while you are at school here. The rooms you are in now are
where you will be for the full course of instruction, so we will have time to
get to know each other very well. But I know that right now you must be
starving, so let's start that over lunch," she finished, smiling.
The food was plain, like on the transport, but there was quite a lot of it. The
dining hall was large and half-empty.
"Dagmar? Did the school used to be bigger?" asked Inge, gesturing at the
unfilled seats.
Dagmar shook her head as she finished chewing. "You'll meet the second years
this evening and starting tomorrow you'll all be eating together."
After lunch there was a tour of the building and the main thing Thor got from
all the turns and mismatched floors was confused. From the faces of the other
girls, he wasn't alone.
The tour was followed by a three-hour lecture from Ansu about appropriate
behavior, school rules and what she would do if they were broken, the
importance of their future work, and great spies in history with a particular
emphasis on the pivotal role played by the Alf spy Vigdis in the Jotunheim
grain war. That was followed by the teachers introducing themselves and then it
was time for dinner.
It was by far the fanciest meal they'd seen since boarding the transport. "I
bet the kitchens know what we had to sit through, and now they're making it up
to us," whispered Inge.
That was followed by the promised mixer where they met the rest of the students
and then they were shuffled off to bed.
"Go ahead, Sigrun. I want to grab another cup of punch, the meat was salty,"
Thor told Loki.
"I don't mind waiting. I want to see you safely upstairs, sister," Loki
answered sweetly.
That was strange, and stranger still when Loki insisted on following Thor up
the stairs, but sometimes Loki got strange notions in his head and it was best
to simply ignore them until he'd moved on, so Thor went first and said nothing.
Classes began the next morning, the two of them writing on loaned paper with
loaned pens. In the morning they had cryptography, cartography, and
cryptographic cartography; in the afternoons there was manipulation, covert
ops, and an elective. The real Brynhild had registered for charm offensives,
while the real Sigrun - who apparently had some seidr as well – had signed up
for optical distortions.
They met back in their room before dinner and sat very close together at Thor's
desk, writing the letter to their aunt.
"We don't need that many dresses," Loki hissed. "And we certainly don't need
gowns for the midwinter ball. We have to think about how we're going to get out
of here and go home. We have to get out of here."
"We can't do that until we know Gladsheim is safe for us. And I think I would
be heavenly in a sea-blue strapless dress, don't you? Maybe one with a mermaid
skirt. That sort of silhouette is so flattering."
Loki got an odd look on his face. "Yes," he agreed. "You would look nice."
The parcel came six days later, offering a welcome break from the hours of
study that normally filled their evenings. It was packed to bursting with
school supplies, dresses, underthings - some of them almost more lace than
cloth ("You can have those," Loki offered kindly), makeup, razors, and a box
full of little cardboard tubes with cotton rolls inside.
Loki opened one of them. "Is it for nosebleeds? Does she think we're going to
get a lot of those here?"
"No. They're tampoons," Thor explained.
"Oh." Loki blinked. "Is that a shading kit?"
Thor was already testing it out in the mirror. "It's called contouring. I asked
for one specially. I'm the flattest girl in charm offensives, and it's really
interfering with my work."
"You got a contouring kit for fake cleavage?"
"Yup." Thor turned around. "How does it look?"
Loki swallowed. "Good. It looks really... really... good."
***** Chapter 10 *****
There was something seriously wrong with Loki. He was disturbed. Sick.
It had been partway through lunch their first day at school that he realized.
He was quietly eating his food, casting studiously casual looks about the room,
searching for that same golden flash that glowed behind his eyes and set his
cock to stirring. Each furtive glance ruled out a few more girls until he knew
it had to be one of the latecomers sitting behind him. Accordingly, he dropped
his fork as the dessert plates were being passed out and cast his eyes over his
shoulder as he leaned down to pick it up. Nothing. And yet if anyone were
absent, Ansu would have commented on it. And then he sat up and the light was
gleaming off his Thor’s locks and he saw it and it hit him. He wanted to fuck
his own brother. He was a nasty messed-up perverted little sex freak and there
was nothing he could do.
Well, he could wait and follow Thor upstairs rather than going first. That much
was probably safe to enjoy.
Thor began the letter to their aunt like he'd completely forgotten the reason
they were here. "Ask her for news of Gladsheim," Loki ordered as Thor sat down
to write to their aunt. The sooner they learned what was going on at home, the
sooner they could figure out what to do. It was getting more obvious by the
minute that they couldn't stay here, sharing a bedroom, Thor looking almost
obscenely pretty. The risk of Loki talking in his sleep was way too high.
A package arrived for them almost a whole week later. "No letter?" Loki asked
when they had unpacked it. He shook it upside down, trying not to give way to
hysterics. "The one thing we needed most and she forgot it."
"She's pretty out of it these days. But look at this nighty!" Thor said,
holding up a gown that was made of about three square inches of lace. "We were
just discussing lingerie in charm class. I bet I could get anyone to spill
their secrets when I'm in this."
"Not me," Loki managed. It had been a moment of weakness, giving Thor all the
sexy things, and only now did he begin to consider the ramifications.
Thor laughed. "Of course not you. You're my brother."
"That's right. I'm your brother."
 
If he didn’t know better he would have thought Thor was doing it all on
purpose. The mascara he’d gotten from Freydis suddenly seemed intended entirely
to make Loki drown in his big blue eyes. The rollers from Aunt Svanhild to curl
his hair made it bounce so that Loki's fingers itched to tangle into it. The
contour kit that was supposed to make it look like he had more cleavage… well,
that did just make it look like he had more cleavage but since he already had
what Loki now realized were fabulous tits, that felt personal as well.
And then, as if Loki weren't already feeling attacked enough, Thor set him
another challenge. "Let's see who can take the longest," he suggested, all huge
eyes and bouncing ringlets and tempting bosoms.
There was no way Loki could hope to win that one, not with his abruptly hot
brother right beside him, filling Loki's ears with his roughened breathing,
filling Loki's eyes with the sight of him touching himself... "That's too
easy," he objected. "It's basically just a test of who can do a worse job when
they really try."
Thor shrugged. "Then we'll do each other. It'll be a double test, who can do it
better and who can hold out longer."
Loki knew he should say no. There was absolutely no way he could justify going
along it. It would be so easy to play it off, a light laugh and an eww, Thor,
gross would be enough. And there was no chance of him winning, not with the Sex
Kitten of Asteroid Bjarkan-Nine jerking him off. "You're on," he said.
"We have less than an hour until dinner. Quick, get your clothes off," Thor
told him, already stripping.
Loki's clothes melted away. That had to have been what happened because he
certainly didn't remember taking them off or climbing into bed beside Thor. It
was the need for haste that saved him; there simply wasn't time for him to get
hard in anticipation, which would have given everything away. And then Thor
reached over and wrapped his hand around Loki's cock and the world came to a
halt.
"You have to too, unless you want to give me an automatic win. Which would be
fine," Thor chuckled.
"No way," Loki managed. How he'd stifled his reaction beyond a sharp inhale
through his nose, he didn't know. Now he bit his lip as he settled his arm
across Thor's... and... touched it. Even soft it was a full, lush weight in his
hand and it was so warm and already beginning to stir beneath his attentions.
He himself had gotten hard almost instantly and now he was just praying that
the fact that his cock kept twitching a millisecond after Thor's wasn't too
obvious.
"That was easy," Thor chuckled.
You have no idea. "It’s a sign of youth and vigor. If anything, you're a little
on the slow side."
Thor gave him a harder stroke in retaliation and this time he couldn't hide his
response, a mortifying gulp of air that he almost choked on. Thor's cock got a
sharp stroke in return in the desperate hope that it might serve as a
distraction. After that Thor got hard fast and didn't mock him at all, so
clearly it worked.
***** Chapter 11 *****
Thor gave Loki a gentle dig about how quickly he got hard, just an innocent
friendly little dig, and then Loki turned on him and called him basically a
decrepit antique, so Thor's next stroke of Loki's cock was on the firm side
(which was only reasonable) and that should have been the end of things but no.
Because Loki gave the softest, breathiest sound Thor had ever heard and beside
it every erotic fantasy paled into nothing. Loki – tender, divine being that he
was – retaliated and Thor could have showered him with kisses of gratitude
because he was getting hard so fast and that gave him a cover.
For now.
Soon enough he'd have to figure out something else but for now, under the cover
of the game, he could close his eyes and savor the feel of his brother's hand
on his cock and dedicate his own attentions to working more delicious little
gasps loose from those perfectly curved, shell-pink lips. He couldn't stop
thinking about them, picturing them lilting into smiles, seeing them parted and
eager, imagining them reddened and swollen with kisses. With Thor's kisses.
How he had never noticed before, he couldn't imagine. Loki was the loveliest,
sexiest, most irresistible creature ever to exist and that radiant creation
whose every glance was Valhalla was jerking him off and he was in huge trouble
because now that he'd seen he couldn't unsee and Loki's hand felt incredible,
stroking up and down the shaft, smoothing over the head to tease at the slit.
His touch was as graceful and delicate as his perfect cheekbones and when he
took it away Thor whined and his hips curled upwards, chasing it.
Loki's laugh was low and Thor allowed himself a shameful instant of imagining
that it was for him, for Thor, not just at his desperation. "That greedy for
it, are you?" Loki asked.
"Instinct," Thor muttered.
"Ah. I see." Loki said nothing more, but he could not be said to have fallen
silent, not with those dizzying moans and breathy gasps, so quiet Thor could
hardly hear them over the beating of his own heart.
His own desire must have gilded his (perhaps embarrassingly well-honed, but
then, he was a healthy young specimen of Asgardian vigor) technique, because
just as he was gritting his teeth and squeezing his eyes, muscles taut and
trembling with anticipation of what was going to be the most perfect ending to
a hand job ever to grace the nine realms, Loki stiffened and cried out.
In the blur of ecstasy that followed their bodies mingled in Thor's mind. The
cock that spit and pulsed within his grasp could just as easily have been his
own, for Loki's hand was racing now, giving Thor the same rhythmless frantic
pace he needed for himself. Thor drank it in and matched it stroke for stroke,
coaxing out another burst of spend to cover his stomach and spatter across his
knuckles. The feeling in his hand and the hand about his cock matched so well
that were it not for Loki's rough gulping gasps Thor might almost have thought
himself alone.
"Fuck... mmm, oh, Thor, that was..." Loki blinked to clear the glassiness from
his eyes. "That was alright, I guess. Who won?"
A lump came out of nowhere to block Thor's throat. He swallowed, hard,
endeavoring to chase it away. "I think it was a tie," he answered roughly.
Loki rose up on his elbow and fixed Thor with a curious gaze. "Are you okay?"
"I'm fine. Don't be weird."
"Fine. Fuck. You just sounded a little strange, is all." Loki flopped onto his
back.
Strange. If only. If only he were just a little strange, and not a giant
perverted incest monster. But that was what he was. An incest monster who
wanted to have sex with his own brother and it was wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong.
Immoral and shameful and dirty and depraved and filthy and oh Norns he had to
get dressed before Loki realized he was getting turned on again just thinking
about it.
"We have to get out of here. We need to find out what's going on at home," Thor
said abruptly, sitting up.
"I've been saying that since before we even arrived," snapped Loki. "Ansu likes
you, can't you get it out of her somehow?"
"Lemme think about it. Right now I have to go to the library." He began
rummaging through the pile of dresses draped over his desk chair, trying to
find the red one. It fit him beautifully and he knew that he shouldn't let his
appearance affect his emotions but really with the way this dress made him feel
like he could take on the world, maybe it wasn't so bad.
"What are you doing?"
"I forgot I have a paper due tomorrow. It's fourteen pages on the stereotypes
about blondes and on methods for using them to make people tell their secrets."
At least their classes were genuinely interesting, Thor reminded himself as he
dressed. He was learning all sorts of things that his tutors back home had
never mentioned. Those lessons had focused on things like diplomacy and trade
theory and military tactics, and they were good too, but these new subjects
opened up a whole new world. His new friendships had, as well. Perhaps it would
have been different if he'd had a sister, but as it was, he had grown up
thinking of girls as something mysterious and exotic, almost as though men were
from Ginnungagap and women were from Blóðstjarna. It was fascinating to
discover that they were actually people, more like him than not.
Although, he decided as he turned back to look at Loki one more time, most
girls probably weren't so messed up.
***** Chapter 12 *****
Loki did everything he could to avoid seeing Thor naked after that. He threw
himself into his studies so he'd have excuses to be at the library, study
group, practice club. Days became weeks and neither he nor Thor had been able
to find out anything about Laufey's attack on Gladsheim, or, indeed, anything
at all.
"We don't get much news out here," Ansu said when Loki finally asked her,
point-blank, what was happening in the realms. "When the transport comes to
take you all home for Yule break, the pilot will fill us in. Until then,
there's not much point."
"Wouldn't it make more sense for us to learn everything we can about the powers
out there? How can we do our jobs when we don't have a solid grasp on the
context?" asked Thor.
"It's impossible to report the news without some level of bias. I want you
girls to do your studying here with no distractions and when you take your
positions you'll go into them with any preconceived ideas."
"Ah. I see," Loki said.
Days passed into weeks and it was really starting to look like they would have
no choice but to wait for Yule break, and hope that the transport would not be
carrying them to a Jotun-held Asgard. The only consolation Loki could find was
that he was getting slightly better grades than Thor. True, it was only because
Thor was left-handed and kept smearing his maps in cartography, but the fact of
the matter was that Loki was coming to realize that he was not only in lust but
in love with his own brother and there was nothing but heartbreak in his
future, and so for now, he would take what he could get.
It was on a day that had been looking much like every other that everything
changed.
“We have a special guest today, girls,” Ansu announced over lunch. “It is not
my usual practice to place my students until they have finished the full two-
year curriculum, but when I receive a visit from no less than the king of
Jotunheim, I am prepared to make some allowances. Afternoon classes are
therefore cancelled for a welcome assembly and a chance for him to interview
those candidates I have suggested as most suitable for his particular task.”
Loki raised a trembling hand.
“Yes, Sigrun?”
“What is his particular task, if I may ask?”
“Well, without going into confidential details, he is looking for an agent who
can help him find a person who has offended him and has since gone missing.”
Thor raised his hand. “May we know who it is?”
Ansu’s lips went tight as she thought. “You’re all good at holding your
tongues. Now, what I am about to tell you must never leave this room…”
Sixty heads nodded in unison.
“He is seeking the younger Aesir prince, Loki. Apparently, the prince behaved
in a shoddy and undignified manner and he fled when Laufey-King approached
Gladsheim, simply requesting an apology.”
The girls gasped. “I’ve always heard that Loki was a snake,” said one.
"Completely untrustworthy,” agreed another.
“He’s not that bad,” Loki said hotly.
Every pair of eyes turned towards the two of them.
“…or so we’ve heard,” Thor added.
That only unleashed a torrent of disgusting and disgraceful slander.
“I heard he tied his balls to a goat!”
“I heard he fucked a horse.”
“I heard he let the horse fuck him!”
Loki rose to his feet. "I cannot in good conscience remain here while such
scurrilous talk about my prince is bantered about so freely," he proclaimed.
Thor was still sitting.
Loki looked down at him. "Neither can my sister."
Thor jumped to his feet. "No, I cannot."
Loki strode with stiff-backed dignity out of the meal hall. There was no other
sound but Thor's dainty footsteps behind him until they left the hall and it
erupted. The two of them did not speak until they were safely in their warded
room.
“I had good reasons for all those things,” Loki hissed. “It’s not like I did
them for fun.”
Thor tilted his head. "Really? Not even-" Loki's eyes blazed and Thor snapped
his jaw shut.
"None."
Thor stepped closer, instinctively drawn as he had been ever since childhood to
soothe Loki's pain and anger, and Loki melted into his embrace.
It took him a moment to realize that those twitchings down in the groinal area
were not from him alone.
***** Chapter 13 *****
Thor found himself incredibly happy about two things at once. First off was the
evident fact that Loki was enjoying the sensation of their bodies being
squished together every bit as much as Thor liked it. Second of all was the
relief in finding out that the horse thing wasn't based in personal preference.
Thor had always thought his cock was of a perfectly respectable size but he
could hardly be expected to compete with a full-grown stallion. But now, it
seemed, he wouldn’t have to.
Loki’s fingers twined into Thor’s hair and pulled him down. "Thor," he
breathed, and then their lips were together, the first brushes hesitant, as
though neither could believe it was real.
"Mmm. Oh, Loki," Thor sighed into Loki's open mouth.
"Thor?"
"Yeah?"
"Thank you for not getting the onion soup."
"You're welcome."
Even talking like this was bliss, lips ticklish against each other. So very,
very near Valhalla.
"Thor?" Loki said again.
"Yeah?"
"I'm sorry I got the onion soup."
"It's okay."
"You're sure? I can go brush."
"Oh. As long as you really don't mind..."
So he did go brush, and when he came back... yes, that was Valhalla.
Dresses, it turned out, were practical for more things than a pleasant breeze
and a fast pee when one was in a hurry. There was nothing at all in the way of
their hands except the underthings their aunt had sent and those were nice,
too. Thor wished now that he hadn’t taken all the lacy ones until it struck him
why Loki had insisted that Thor be the one to wear them. He likes the look of
them on me, he realized, and somehow the thought made him even harder than
before.
When we get home, I'll insist he get some of his own, he resolved. But first
they had to get home. “We need to get out of here,” Thor said. “I can’t imagine
they’d let us skip an assembly and you wearing a dress won’t keep Laufey from
recognizing you the second he sees you.”
“I know. But… Oh, Thor, just a few more minutes. You don’t know how long I’ve
wanted this. Anyway, waiting for the assembly to start is probably our best
chance of getting away without him spotting us."
"That is true," Thor allowed.
"Then give me more." Loki could have said absolutely anything in that tone of
voice and it would have worked equally well. He could have said, "The rose-bush
is wilted," or, "Look at that camel in pointe shoes," and as long as it had
that vein of hunger rippling through it, Thor would still have been kissing him
and sliding his hands down Loki's little white cotton panties.
Loki's breath caught just as Thor's fingertips brushed against it and Thor
could have swooned. Even though he'd touched it before, knowing that Loki
wanted this for something more than bragging rights was delicious. He watched
his brother's eyes fall shut, lush lashes dusting across his cheeks like
delicate snowflakes upon the sleeping earth, if only snowflakes were black and
also kind of curvy.
"Mmm, yes," Loki murmured, tilting his head for Thor to more easily trace the
thudding pulse in his throat.
"You're so sweet, Loki," Thor breathed against his glowing skin.
"I need to see you. I'm so sick of trying not to look." Loki's hands reached
for Thor's hem and began to tug it upwards and Thor raised his arms. Up it
slid, up, Loki's hands so soft and cool against his skin he could have wept for
the bliss of it-
"You need to stop licking my neck for a minute, Thor," Loki panted.
"Okay. Just-" Thor gave one last slow pass of his tongue, broad and flat,
before shifting back. Loki pulled Thor's dress over his raised arms and tossed
it carelessly aside and then Thor stood before him in nothing but his lacy red
knickers and-
"Oh!" Thor began rubbing frantically at the contouring on his chest.
Loki caught hold of his wrists, stopping him. "Hey, hey," he soothed. "I don't
care about that."
"It looks ridiculous without a neckline to disappear into."
"It doesn't matter. Thor, you're the prettiest girl in the whole first year and
you're not half as flat as you think you are."
"Really?" Thor bit his lower lip, worrying it between his teeth.
Loki cupped them, rubbing his palms lightly against Thor's nipples. "Really.
See how perfectly they fit? What would I want with bigger?"
"That does feel nice," Thor sighed, relaxing into his brother's touch.
"So nice. So will this," Loki promised, sinking slowly down with his hands
trailing down Thor's sides and his lips down Thor's chest. When he reached
Thor's hips he hooked his thumbs in the sides of the knickers and kept going
after meeting Thor's gaze and winking. Even when Thor's cock caught in the
waistband and then sprang free and hit Loki in the eye, Loki just kissed his
thigh and slid them down to the floor. When he stood up Thor returned the favor
with equal tenderness and an equal disregard for his future eyesight.
***** Chapter 14 *****
It was better this time, far far better, with no competition, no challenge but
the one he set himself to make Thor feel good. Thor seemed to feel the same
way, his eyes never leaving Loki's face as his hand ran down Loki's flank and
he didn't even breathe as he reached for his brother's cock. They lay in Thor's
bed facing each other, sharing a single pillow, bodies just far enough apart to
reach between them and stroke the other into delirious pleasure.
Loki came first, his cum bursting forth in a splattering torrent of glistening
pearlescent love juices that clung to Thor's skin like a moonstone necklace
from a hyperbolic novel. He never stopped in his attentions to Thor's cock and
the whole time he was spilling Thor kept whispering to him how radiant he
looked, how glowing, how Thor never wanted to see anything else ever again.
Loki was still kissing Thor with all the passion his sated body could muster,
and Thor was getting close, his body trembling with the intensity of it all,
his cock leaking a steady stream down the side of Loki's hand. Thor was about
to come for him and because of him and Loki was going to savor every moment of
it. Thor's breath was hot on Loki's face but it was intimate and smelled of
cake and Loki wiggled closer, craving more.
He wanted more of everything: the feel of Thor's cock, just beginning to throb
in his grasp; the scent of Thor's breath, so sweet against him; the sight of
Thor's face, all wrinkled up like a gassy baby only sexy; the sound of Thor's
moans, trapped behind a bitten lip to guard their secrets; the vibrations of
military boots marching down the corridor and they both realized at the same
time but it was too late for Thor to stop. He came with sharp jerks of his body
and helpless sounds and panicked eyes darting between Loki's face and their
closed door. Loki just hoped and prayed and kept on stroking because Norns only
knew he'd fantasized about it way too long and way too hard and damned if he
was going to rob himself now.
"Jotuns," Thor gasped, body still twitching like a demented weasel.
"I know! What are we going to do?"
Thor's breathing was rough and choppy as he answered. "We have... we have to
get out... before we're all... summoned to the hall."
"But that means..."
They turned to look at the window. It was framed by huge, blowsy red flowers
growing on vines that crept up a sturdy wooden trellis.
"We don't have a choice," Thor said. He was recovering quickly. Panic will do
that, Loki figured.
"You're right. It's really convenient that we just happened to be in the room
with a safe and easy method of escape. None of the other girls have trellises,"
answered Loki.
"I'll go first," Thor offered nobly.
"How noble."
Thor shrugged. "If you go first, I don't get to look up your skirt."
"I take it back."
"Hey," Thor said, wounded.
"Come on, get up. We need to dress and get out of here."
"As soon as you get off me, I will."
"I am."
"Okay, well, hurry up."
They put on everything they had taken off and swung open the window, wincing
together at the squeak of the upper hinge.
"Don't start down until I reach the ground. I'm not sure how much weight this
thing can take," Thor warned.
"I know, I know. Hurry up, would you?"
Thor swung one leg over the sill, his face intent as his foot searched for
purchase. "Got it. It's more to the right than you expect."
"Wait! Thor!"
"Yes?"
"A kiss," Loki said, claiming it.
Thor nodded. "Here I go."
Loki leaned out the window, watching fearfully as Thor descended. A few slats
of wood were old and groaned frightfully when Thor set his weight upon them,
but none broke, and after what felt an eternity Thor was safely on the ground
and waving at Loki to follow.
Their room felt much higher up when one had one leg out the window and resting
upon nothing. Even once Loki did find the first step – even more to the right
than he'd expected from Thor's warning – it felt like he was hanging onto thin
air.
His second foot swung out to meet the first and he peered down to find Thor
beneath him, holding the trellis and squinting upwards. "Oh, Thor," he chuckled
to himself, and started down.
It wasn't so bad once his face was in front of a wall; as long as there was
nothing to see before him, he could pretend that he was only a few feet up. As
he continued down and his eyes came level with the room below theirs a wave of
dizziness washed over him. He paused, focusing on his breathing, and while he
was telling himself, "in... out... deep breath in..." the door to the room in
front of him opened. Red eyes met green.
"You!" shouted Laufey.
"Shit!" Loki yelled. He scrambled down, lowering himself just fast enough to
dodge Laufey's arms reaching out from the window, grasping at him. Laufey
disappeared back inside, no doubt to summon his army and run for the stairs,
and Loki redoubled his efforts.
"Come on," Thor said, grabbing his wrist the instant his feet touched the
powdery ground, and together they took off running.
***** Chapter 15 *****
They raced towards the launch pad, lungs and legs working too hard to discuss a
plan. There was the school's huge transport and Laufey's shuttle beside it and
if they couldn't get into one and take off fast enough they were going to have
what felt like – from the thundering of their feet – half the Jotun army on
their heads.
Ansu knew the girls too well to let the school's transport sit there unsecured,
so by silent accord they veered to the left, towards Laufey's. Thor reached out
and slapped at the release and the door, miraculously, slid open. The shouts
from behind them grew even louder and the instant both of them were inside Loki
was pounding on the sensor to close it behind them. Thor was already feeling
his way around in the dark, patting every surface he could find in his search
for the controls.
"Do you know how to fly?" Loki panted.
"How hard can it be?" gasped Thor. Something gave under his hand and the cabin
filled with pale blue lights. There was a large button to his left and he
pressed that because it was the only thing that was red and surely it was a
special color for a reason. Alarms began to sound.
"I thought you said you could fly this thing!" Loki shouted.
"I said how hard could it be? I just said it ten seconds ago, how could you
forget?"
"Well turn it off!"
Thor hit the red button again and the sirens quieted. Thor pressed more things
while Loki put his hands over his face and whimpered. "Is that really all you
can do?" Thor asked.
"It's no less useful than what you're doing!"
"Try to find a manual!" Thor yelled, and it was most definitely a yell and not
a shriek, not even at the end when his voice went up really high.
Anyway, it didn't matter because Thor found the button before Loki even figured
out how to open the glove compartment ("it's clearly designed for Jotun-sized
hands," he snapped when Thor made a mild comment) and they were rising into the
air. Loki rushed to peer out the window.
"That was way too close, Thor. They're all on the launch pad and it looks like
they're swearing at us."
"They'll be in the school transport and coming after us as soon as they get the
key," Thor said. "We need to head straight home and find out what's going on."
"How about you get into the glove compartment while I steer. There must be some
way to set this on automatic."
Thor – who whose hands were nowhere near Jotun-sized, just nice large Aesir
ones that Loki had certainly not been complaining about ten minutes earlier –
managed to wrangle the door open. There was, indeed, a manual, and once he
found the right page it was easy as pie to set a course for Asgard. They heaved
twin sighs; the shuttle was swift enough that even if Laufey's guard had taken
the school transport and left the asteroid just minutes after them, they would
still arrive home with almost a day to spare.
"Now what?" Loki asked, turning to him.
"Now we have a week to do whatever we want."
Whatever we want wasn't precisely what they got. A determined search of the
cramped galley resulted in a grand total of no oil whatsoever. After another
two days of talking about how they really wanted to be doing more than hand
jobs and oral they bucked up the nerve to rummage through the trunks in the
barracks of Laufey's personal guard. It didn't take them long to regret it.
"Look at this, Loki!" Thor giggled.
Loki leaned over to see where Thor pointed. It was a copy of Playjotun, several
years old and laden with scraps of paper to mark favorite pages. "I dare you to
open it," Loki said. Thor opened his mouth to refuse and Loki swiftly added,
"Double-dog dare you," and then Thor had no choice.
He flipped it open to one of the marked pages. The picture they found there...
well, the fact that the pages were partially stuck together was the least
horrifying thing about it.
"Eeeewwww!" they squealed in unison.
Thor slammed it shut. "Is that what Laufey looked like when you photographed
him in the bath?"
Loki looked at him with wide eyes. "I don't know. I couldn't see anything
through the bubbles." He glanced back down at the cover and shuddered. "Thank
the Norns."
"You'd have been scarred for life."
"I would. Umm... do you mind if we give up the hunt? I think I'm okay with hand
jobs and oral for a few more days after all."
"Yes," Thor said. "I'm okay with those, too."
***** Chapter 16 *****
Their first sight of Asgard was as a gleaming pearl, faintly golden even at
this distance. For so long their thoughts had focused on getting back to aid in
the liberation of their realm that the homesickness hit even harder now that
they faced it. The following day it close enough to make out the land masses,
the oceans, the vast river valleys. The day after that they woke to find that
they could see the spires and towers of the palace.
"Do you know how to land this?" Loki asked.
Thor shrugged. "What does the manual say?"
Loki opened it, flipped to the back, and dropped it with a recoil of horror.
"What?"
"I don't know. But it's fuzzy and I think it winked at me."
Thor's nose crinkled becomingly. "Never mind. We can land in the ocean."
"Works for me."
By 'land,' it turned out that Thor meant 'crash down really hard but not die.'
It felt as though everything happened at once, but of course it did not: first
their craft hit the surface of the water, then they were flung to the ceiling
by the force of the impact, then the craft began to sink beneath the waves, and
then they fell back to the floor. Everything hurt at once and it took a minute
to catch back the air that had been knocked from their lungs but none of that
mattered because the light from the windows was rapidly dwindling.
“Shouldn’t we start to float back up at some point?” Loki asked nervously.
Thor’s answer was drowned out by a terrible groaning from the hull and he swore
under his breath. “This craft was built to contain to pressure. Not to resist
it.”
“So we’re about to be crushed?”
“We’re going to have to swim for it.”
“How will we open the door now that we’re so deep?”
“I am mighty,” Thor reassured him.
“Oh. Yes.”
“We should make ourselves hyperventilate first.”
“I know how to make you breathe harder.”
“Mmm. I know how to make you breathe harder, too.”
Their hands were just sliding up each other’s skirts when the hull groaned
again and they sprang apart. “No distractions,” Thor panted. “Later.”
“Okay,” Loki agreed, but he did end up getting somewhat distracted by the sight
of Thor forcing the door open, muscles trembling with strain. The high hem of
his dress put his legs on magnificent display but that only served to get more
oxygen into Loki’s blood so it all worked out.
Loki held on to the edge of the control panel to avoid being pummeled deep into
the belly of the ship when the water came barreling in. Thor resisted it with
nothing but his own strength, his body a bulwark against the onslaught. There
was no thought of swimming out until the icy water had filled the craft, so
that by the time Thor grabbed Loki’s arm and tugged him through the door his
head was already spinning. Up they swam, fast, fast, past the strange creatures
of the deep, up towards the light.
They broke through the surface spluttering and coughing and would have been
content to float there, sucking at the air, but there was no hope of their
descent going unnoticed and they had to reach the shore as quickly as they
could. They struck out, taking turns with who was in front so the other could
have the ease of swimming in his wake and also get a few upskirt views when the
waves were just right.
When they reached the shore it took every last morsel of energy to drag
themselves up onto the beach. “I must look like a drowned rat,” Thor said as he
lay sprawled on the sand.
Loki rolled his head to the side and looked. “Yes, but your dress is really
clingy now, and kind of see-through.”
Thor gave him a wasted grin. “You like it?”
“You know I do.”
Thor chuckled. “But how much do you like it?”
Maybe Loki had some energy left after all. Yes. Enough to climb on top of his
brother, at least, their bodies fitting together like they’d been made for it,
one of Loki’s slender thighs fitting between Thor’s broad ones and moving, up
and down, just enough to make Thor’s cock stiffen against him.
“Mmm, Loki, that feels nice."
“You like it?” Loki teased.
“You know I do.”
Loki increased his efforts, shifting his hips as well now, rubbing himself
against Thor’s firm stomach until their cocks were pressed together, each
motion drawing matching gasps from their lips.
“Mmm. Oh, kiss me, Loki,” Thor whimpered.
He leaned down and drowned his brother in kisses, passionate and greedy and
tender and everything in between. Thor's hands slid down his narrow sides to
take hold of his rear, one perfect globe in each, pulling him tighter and
grinding against him as Thor rolled his hips in rough and hasty waves that
carried them closer, closer, until they reached the foam-covered peaks and
moaned as they spilled together.
"At least we can rinse off in the ocean," Thor said when he seemed capable of
speech.
"It's cold," Loki complained.
"We need to hurry up and get to Gladsheim. You know, now that I think about it,
maybe it would have been better if we hadn't stopped for sex."
"There's no use crying over spilt milk. Or, uh, come. So let's rinse off and we
can figure out our plan while we walk."
They shivered as they waded back into the water and splashed it over themselves
until the stickiness was gone. They weren't that far from the palace and if the
worst were true – if Laufey had seized it and now held it – it wouldn't take
long for a branch of the Jotun guard to make it to their location.
They trudged the winding uphill path, whispering their plans, until the sharp
snap of a branch warned of someone just beyond the bend ahead of them. They
darted into the forest and took cover. Would it be a deer? A host of Einherjar?
A legion of Jotnar?
It proved to be none of those things. What came around the bend before them was
something far, far more terrifying: their mother.
***** Chapter 17 *****
Chapter Notes
     I'm having a death-march weekend, I promise I'll get to comments on
     Monday! Enjoy!
Frigga was at her loom, reading the future as she wove. There were times when
she wished it might speak more clearly, but between Heimdall's reports of her
sons' current safety and the loom's promise they would remain so, she was
content. It was peaceful, sending the shuttle through, back and forth, drawing
out the beauty of the threads as she drew out knowledge, and she could happily
have remained there all day did not one of her ladies come to tell her that the
watcher was in her hall.
"They're back," Heimdall told her without preamble.
She shook her head. "It took them long enough. Where are they?"
"They crashed into the sea and swam to shore in Mannathr Bay."
She looked at him. "Are you blushing?"
His blush deepened. "Certainly not."
"Very well," she answered, keeping her face determinedly neutral. "Thank you,
Heimdall. I will find them."
He bowed and withdrew and she turned to her waiting ladies. "Would one of you
find me a wrap? The forest will be chilly."
"Would you like some company?" asked Hilde while Gudrun scurried off to find
something warm.
"I prefer to go alone. But I thank you."
The wrap, a soft blue wool, was settled about her shoulders and she left the
palace by way of her gardens. The path into the woods lay on her right and her
heart gave a thud of excitement as she set foot into the shadows. She had
missed her boys.
How she was going to scold them - well, Loki - with a straight face, she still
wasn't sure. He both deserved and needed it, but when she thought about those
pictures...
The crack of a twig alerted her to their presence, but when she came around the
bend, they were hidden.
"I know you're here," she announced.
They crept out from behind the trees, offering her sheepish smiles. They both
looked very pretty in their dresses, and she noted with a touch of pride that
Thor had made a particular effort with his makeup in preparation for his return
home. "Hello, mother," Loki said.
"It's good to see you," Thor added.
"It's good to see you as well. Nice of you to drop in."
"You saw us arrive, did you?" Loki asked, lips quirking.
"Heimdall did, and reported it to me." They both paled at Heimdall's name.
"What?" she asked, suspicious. "What didn't he tell me?"
"That's impossible to say without knowing what he did tell you," Loki tried.
She shook her head. "He didn't tell me whatever it was that made you go white
at his name and you know it. Spill."
"It was Loki's fault," Thor said.
To Frigga's eternal delight, Loki's voice cracked just as he whirled on his
brother with an indignant, "What?"
"The... you know. Photos," Thor whispered more loudly than he meant.
"Oh. Those." He turned back to face her. "I take it Gladsheim is safe? We were
worried."
"It is. Laufey was most disappointed to find you away when he came to call."
"To call?" Thor said. "He brought an invasion force."
"An attempted invasion force. Once he got a good look at the number of
Einherjar opposing him he decided to claim that his army was simply his
personal guard. Would you believe that in trying to play it down, he asked me
if I might brew him a pot of tea?"
"But you're the queen," Thor gasped.
"What did you do?" asked Loki.
"Overlooked his rudeness and invited him to dinner. He drinks quite a lot, it
seems. Talks a lot when he's in his cups, too."
They both went tense. "Whatever would he want to talk about with you?" Loki
asked cautiously.
The moment she had dreaded. She pursed her lips to suppress a grin. "He had
some photographs with him that - apparently - you had taken. Does this ring a
bell?"
"You know, I had been talking to Thor about possibly finding a gallery to show
my work. Get a nice catalog printed up. Juvenilia is an important part of any
artist's oeuvre. Perhaps he had my prospectus? The Royal Gallery in Utgard is
very highly regarded."
"You don't have a prospectus, do you," she said. There was no hint of a
question in her voice.
"Perhaps an enthusiast..." Loki mumbled, trailing off as she shook her head no.
"I've never seen any photos," Thor declared. "I mean, I've seen photos, but
nothing that might get us into trouble." There it was, that fierce loyalty to
his brother. That was what she had wished to have told Odin so long ago, the
day after the terrible battle when he brought her a tiny babe and whispered
that no one must ever know. Loki's birth would never matter to the one who
would matter most.
“And yet I feel you know what was in them,” she informed him. He bit his lip.
She turned to Loki. “Do you have any idea what an ordeal you have put us
through? Imagine how your father and I felt, sitting there at the dinner table
with Laufey showing us those photographs and knowing that we couldn’t show even
the faintest trace of amusement without it starting an interrealm incident?”
“You… umm… you thought they were funny?”
“Possibly the funniest thing I’ve ever seen.”
His face brightened. “Does that mean I’m not in trouble?” he asked hopefully.
That earned him a snort. “Of course you’re in trouble. There’s an important
lesson to be learned here and I would be a terrible mother if I didn’t at least
try to make you learn it.”
“Yeah?” he asked weakly.
“When you do things like this, you must never, ever, get caught.”
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