by C. Gockel
Amy swallows at the empty space he’s glaring at. She reminds herself he’s magical and he sees things she can’t see; he is not having an episode of psychosis.
Hopping from the bed, he takes quick strides to the door of the walk-in closet. Opening it he mumbles, “I think that the elves probably let the trolls in to cause chaos while they retreat.”
All of his words tumble together. Evacuation. Troll sightings. Retreat.
Hopping from the bed, Amy grabs his robe from the floor, pulls it on as she runs to the door of the bedroom, and walks down the short hallway to the main living area of the apartment.
Loki’s living area is a wide open space, larger than four of her apartments put together. Two of the walls are floor to ceiling glass. The other two walls have books lined along the floor. There is a hardly-used-looking very modern kitchen directly to her left as she comes out of the hallway. Camping gear is lined up in front of the island counter that separates the kitchen from the living space. The gear doesn’t look like it’s been touched since last night when she made sandwiches. There is no furniture other than a desk and computer with three enormous monitors in the living room.
Suddenly needing to know for herself what is going on, Amy goes to the desk. In the background she hears Loki rummaging through his closet, cursing occasionally. Her purse is by the monitor, and she slips it on so she won’t forget to take her pill. The jostling from that simple motion causes the monitors to light. There’s no password prompt. Obviously Loki was just on his computer. A browser window is open to a website in French. She tilts her head. It looks like it is for a hotel. She looks at the tabs at the top of the browser. There’s CNN, and a tab to the window where she was researching Shiva is still open. Her eyes go wide—one of the tabs is for her email. She swore she had closed it.
Clicking to her inbox she sees an unopened message addressed to all “Support Staff and Non-Essential Personnel.” Opening it she finds a note ordering clerical workers not to come into work until “further notice.” There is nothing personal from Steve, or anyone else at the office. Maybe they don’t want her in today? Frowning, she clicks to a new email from her neighbor. It’s a little note telling her not to worry about Fenrir or her “special mouse” and makes her sigh with relief.
At that moment, Loki bursts into the room. He’s still blue, wearing jeans, a polo and the peacoat he wore the other day. His little white book is still poking from a coat pocket and his sword is slung over his shoulder. Seeing her at the computer his lip curls and he almost shouts, “What are you doing?”
Purse sliding awkwardly on her arm, she holds up her hands. “Checking my email. Don’t worry, I wouldn’t tell them where you are.”
He shakes himself and rubs the bridge of his nose. “Of course, I’m sorry...the police are coming to this floor—thankfully they don’t have magic detectors, we have to go.” Then he mumbles, “The airports are all full.” Turning to empty air he shouts, “Shut up, Cera! You brought this on yourself!”
Thor’s words from the day before come back to Amy. “Loki! Cera will control you! Thor told us she would!”
Loki smirks. “She doesn’t control me, and I can prove it.” Before Amy knows what is happening, he strides over, takes one of her wrists, and pulls her from her seat. Rolling his eyes, Loki says, “Cera thought she’d just ally herself with those elves and I’d be happy to see her when she popped back into my life...and thinks she can order me around.” Meeting Amy’s gaze again, he kisses her too hard. His hands go to Amy’s waist and then slip down so fast and wrap around her butt she’s barely aware of what’s going on. Lifting her up like she weighs nothing, Loki says sharply, “Wrap your legs around my waist.”
Confused, Amy does what she’s told, mostly to keep from falling. In the process, the robe she’s wearing falls open to reveal what she’s not wearing.
Glancing down, Loki gives a good natured smirk that’s mischievous and so him that she smiles.
Pulling her in tight, he whispers in her ear. “I’m about to show you how little Cera controls me. You like French food right? Because I could really use some foie gras and French onion soup.”
Amy blinks, “Wha—”
Leaning backwards, as though he’s executing a dive, Loki topples them both over. For an instant they are suspended in midair, and then they are in the cold nothing of the In-Between.
x x x x
Moving Amy through the In-Between is taxing, but this time Loki is refreshed. He’s able to pull them from the vacuum before the blackness and cold have even really registered. But even as the feeling of victory rises, another cold wraps around him. Opening his eyes he sees Amy, but she’s distorted and out of focus. He opens his mouth—and sucks in a lungful of water.
“Loki!” he hears, as though from far away. He’s blinded by bubbles, her legs are sliding out from under him, and small hands are pulling him up by the shoulders. Hacking and coughing up water, with Amy raining blows on his back, he surveys their surroundings. They’re in a shallow rectangular fountain in the garden of his intended target. He winces and then coughs a bit more water from his lungs. The fountain wasn’t here the last time he visited, and it really should have been emptied earlier in the season. Amy is yelling at him. “What the Hell are you doing! Where are we? Why is it late afternoon?”
Wiping his mouth, in frigid water up to his stomach, Loki starts to laugh. Wrapping his arms around her, he pulls her in for a hug, oddly warmed by her ferocity.
This morning he’d woken to the mist of the World Seed hovering about his bed. “Well, you’d better kill her,” Cera had said. “She’ll let ADUO know where you live, and that you can teleport.”
For a frightening moment Loki had seen the convenience of that idea. He even envisioned quietly smothering her beneath his pillow and disposing of her body in the In-Between. He’d bolted out of bed and gone to his computer instead, telling Cera off for being a nag.
He checked Amy’s email—he’d discovered all her passwords months ago—and deleted messages from Steve asking her to call in, and from Brett, Bryant and other people at her office. Then he checked all his accounts, and finally, CNN. All that time Cera got more and more insistent. “Kill her. Go to Vanaheim. Kill her, kill her, kill her!”
It had been obnoxious.
Now it will take Cera hours to find them, and he suspects she’ll be properly chastised when she does. Loki lets out a happy sigh, even as Amy shakes his shoulders. “Where. Are. We!”
Grinning, he blinks the water from his eyes, checks to see that his hands are peach and not blue, and then shakes his head like a dog. “Paris!” he says, standing up and pulling her up and out of the fountain with him.
“What?” says Amy, stumbling as he pulls her along.
Nodding happily he says, “We can get food!” He needs food. And sleep. Again.
“I’m freezing!” Amy says, gesturing to his robe, wrapped around her shoulders, soaked and hanging open.
Loki runs his tongue over his lips as lasciviously as he can. “We’ll check in and warm up.”
Pulling back, Amy sputters. “Check in? I’m in a bathrobe and you’ve got a sword on your back!”
Loki stops and raises an eyebrow. “You’re right.” He winks. “I knew there was a reason I brought you along.” Concentrating, he uses the last bits of magical energy he possess to will his sword to invisibility, and Amy to appear dry and as though she’s wearing a cocktail dress with heels.
Amy surveys her imaginary attire and glares up at him. “The robe had more coverage.”
Loki opens his mouth to respond, but before he can she raises her hands and shouts. “Didn’t you say teleporting nearly killed us last time?”
Loki opens his mouth again, only to feel one of her fists connect hard with his chest. “And you should have asked!” she shouts.
Smiling, Loki pulls her in for a hug, effectively trapping her fists and muffling her mouth—and giving him someone to lean onto. “I just love to make things difficult,
” he says, dropping his head on top of hers.
“Greattffff,” Amy grumbles.
Loki’s smile turns rueful. He can kill for a lot of reasons, betray for a lot of reasons, but convenience apparently isn’t one of them.
x x x x
Loki and Thor are both on one knee, bowing before Odin’s throne. Thor holds the spear Gungnir in his outstretched hands as the court looks on. Admiring glances are being shot in Thor’s direction, suspicious ones are being leveled at Loki. He makes sure to meet such gazes with an irreverent smirk.
Inside he is fuming, partly at their servile position, partly because Thor is the one presenting the spear. Odin has become such a stickler for pomp and ceremony of late. Although Loki had as much a part or more in recovering Gungnir, it was deemed inappropriate for Loki to be the presenter. But most of all, Loki fumes because of the statue sitting behind him at the entrance of the great hall—a 30 man-high golden monument in the likeness of Baldur.
Loki’s finger nails bite into his palms, and his jaw tightens. Or the perceived likeness of Baldur: beautiful, fit, and wise looking—the way Loki never saw him and everyone else did.
From the throne Odin mumbles some uninspired words of appreciation. Muscles going stiff, mouth threatening to go slack with boredom, Loki scans the room. Everyone in attendance is in black. Even Thor wears a black armband over his armor. It has been nearly a year since Baldur’s death and Baldur’s glamour has only grown stronger. He is revered now more than ever and Asgard still mourns for him. When Loki complained of it to Thor, the big oaf had said, “Everyone always thinks the best of the dead. Now shut up before someone suspects you played some part in it.”
The cold stone floor is biting into his knee. Loki is close to sighing loud enough to be heard, just to give Odin the hint that now is the time to declare the feast and celebration, and to let Loki stand up. He opens his mouth and then catches a flash of green from the corner of his eye. He looks up and sees Nari and Valli slipping through the adults of the court to get closer to the throne. They’re dressed in their ‘play clothes’ and it will be obvious to anyone who looks that they’ve snuck in. Despite himself, Loki smiles. Catching his grin, Valli starts jumping up and down and yells, “Father!” his face alight with pride.
Loki feels his smile soften. His boys are monsters, but not so bad.
There are murmurs among the crowd, most in consternation, but beside Loki, Thor gives a friendly chuckle.
From the throne Odin’s silence is ominous.
“Escort our guests out,” says one of the guards sourly.
Some guards move in and the boys try to dodge them, stepping on toes and elbowing dignitaries in the process. Still, they’re quickly apprehended. As the men drag them off by the elbows, Nari shouts. “That’s our father! He found Gungnir and Thor helped!”
Loki bites back a cackle. Beside him Thor gives him a gentle nudge in the ribs and a good natured grin. When Loki looks up, Odin is scowling.
The great hall quiets again. Odin mumbles on a bit more. And then the king nods down at Thor. One of the members of the Diar, the council that helps Odin manage Asgard, descends the steps, takes the spear from Thor, and carries it up to Odin. Loki blinks. Odin won’t even take a gift from his son? That is a new layer of formality. He feels his skin start to heat.
Scowling, he waits for the king to finally declare the order for the victory feast. It never comes. Instead, Odin stands, bangs the butt end of the spear on the floor, and wearily declares the court dismissed because, “Now is still not the time for revelry.”
Loki gets to his feet with Thor, watching Odin and Frigga slowly leave the great Hall. Loki doesn’t exit the throne room—despite Thor’s entreaties to go to the mead hall. Instead, as soon as he finds himself alone, Loki makes himself invisible and lets himself into Odin’s chambers. He goes to the room where he, Odin, and Hoenir played chess so long ago.
Settling on one of the chairs he sets up the chess pieces and waits.
Loki isn’t invisible when Odin enters, but he is covered in shadow. Nonetheless, as soon as Odin comes into the room, he raises Gungnir in Loki’s direction, even before the torches in the wall sputter to life.
Smirking up at the king, Loki says, “Thank goodness. I was beginning to think you were as dead as Baldur.” Looking at the point of the spear he adds, “I’m glad you like the souvenir.”
Thrusting Gungnir’s point a little closer to Loki’s neck, Odin says, “I should kill you now.”
Loki blinks up at him. This isn’t an idle threat. Odin is telling the truth. Loki feels a flare of fear rising in his stomach. The pieces on the chessboard abruptly burst into flames. Both Loki and Odin’s gaze go to the board, now glowing under the light of 32 improvised candles. Odin waves Gungnir in their direction and they go out.
“What do you want, Loki?” Odin asks, sounding suddenly weary again.
“Why, just to chat,” says Loki, spreading his hands and trying to affect an air of nonchalance.
Odin glares at him. “I should call the guards on you.”
Placing his feet next to the burnt chess pieces and tipping the chair back onto two legs, Loki sneers. “It’s been so long since we really talked. Why, not since...since my daughter was poisoned by your son.”
“I gave you your chance for revenge,” Odin growls.
Loki sneers. “You gave me the chance to solve your problems. You were right. If Baldur had taken Nanna, my frost giant relatives would be flooding Midgard, probably to set themselves up as gods...after they attacked Asgard. Double blows to the Aesir’s pride.”
Banging Gungnir’s shaft on the floor, Odin hisses. “Have you no compassion? I and all the realms weep for my son.”
Loki rises fast from his chair. “No one mourns for my daughter or my wife!”
Taking a step towards Loki, Odin snarls. “Your wife was weak, your daughter was deformed. My son was different. He was perfect.”
Loki’s eyes go wide. “He was a lie! His perfection an illusion—even you knew that!”
Odin takes a deep breath. He’s so close, Loki can smell mead on his breath.
Straightening, Odin laughs. “Isn’t that what all princes are?”
Loki stares at him, unable to find words for his anger and rising dismay.
Odin smiles, and it isn’t at all nice. “To maintain order people need myths of perfection. They’re grateful for their illusions.”
“That’s not what they tell me when I’m using magic,” Loki snaps.
Narrowing his one eye, Odin snarls. “I don’t have time for this. Get. Out.”
Loki cannot bring himself to move. He just stares into Odin’s one ice-blue eye. His skin goes hot, he hears a crackle, feels heat, and sees light as the chess pieces and the table they sit on burst into flames again.
Scowling, Odin points Gungnir in the fire’s direction. The flames quiet, but then Loki hisses. “Do not dismiss me!” and the flames rise again.
Odin turns his head sharply. “You still have two sons and a wife to go home to Loki,” he snarls.
Loki’s mouth drops and he steps back at the implicit threat.
“Get out of here.” Odin says again. He bangs Gungnir on the floor and the flames flicker out.
Loki’s body goes cold. He nods differentially at Odin, but can’t keep a twisted smirk from his face.
He’s just leaving when Odin says, “And Loki...”
Loki turns to see Odin smile at him. “Thanks for the spear.”
x x x x
It has been nearly one rotation of Earth’s axis since Loki and the female human disappeared from Chicago. Cera is in a panic. Has he gone off world? She can’t follow him there if he has. Not only is she stuck within the Promethean Wire, she doesn’t know how. Also, she doesn’t have feet. The bodies of the denizens of this planet are awkward, prone to inconvenient cravings and incompatible with large amounts of magic, but how she envies them for their powers of locomotion. She can only travel in her non-corporeal form, and
although she knows theoretically she could transverse realms non-corporeally—Odin can do it—she doesn’t quite know how to manage it. Odin used his corporeal form to open the gate. And even if the gate was open, maybe her non-corporeal form would get separated from her physical form? How long can the energy of her non-physical self be apart from her physical self? And what if she went the wrong way? What if she got lost?
When Loki rescues her, Cera will be able to use his physical form and his mind and knowledge to open all the world gates, and go wherever she wants...with or without feet. If Loki rescues her. For an instant Cera feels the shell of the Promethean Sphere closing in around her corporeal body. Loki doesn’t need her. She felt it when Odin the one eyed one touched her. Loki has been winning against the One-Eyed Preserver for the past 4 billion years when the universe’s expansion began to accelerate. Cera’s not sure how long 4 billion years are. She has difficulty comprehending linear time, but she thinks it’s slightly further back in time than her landing in the Siberian Tundra in 1908.
Eventually, Loki will win. The universe will reach its outer limit, contract, and bloom again anew—his greatest revolution accomplished! All Loki has to do is wait. And he has so much more patience than Cera....but Cera has things she must do before then, things she must do even before the sun explodes and destroys the Earth and all the humans on the planet. Things she must do for Josef—but doesn’t know how to do on her own.
In her cage of Promethean Wire, Cera concentrates and sends her non-corporeal consciousness out over the Earth again, a little to the east of the land that was Josef’s. She is about to head north, to Visby, to see if Loki perhaps is transversing the world gate when she feels a tug—a feeling of fraying and disintegration—in the south.
It’s Loki! Cera speeds southward. He’s in a metropolis of some sort. Within minutes she has found him. She is instantly put out. Speak of inconvenient cravings. Loki is sitting in a bathtub filled with the molecules the humans call soap; it’s blooming in bubbles of hydrophillic and hydrophobic abandon. Between Loki’s legs, back to his chest, is the female.