Author's Note: It will come as no surprise, I'm sure, when I mention yet again that I do not own anything at all. I barely own my own conscience. C'mon.

Happy reading - I hope you all like the story, as always!

Midgard slept. A slow and icy rain split the sky, a den of tired clouds. Distantly Loki could hear seedlings of Thor's thunder, like a woman's cackle, rigid and near-dead. Another memory.

Loki thought of dust-swirls, magic, sky-washed spirits in a livid dance. He thought he might be king of these, as well. He could see Thor: that scrambling prince who'd lost his most precious toy, now companying himself with mortals. (Anger.) Lightning cracked across Loki's vision, like dissent, like warrior's eyes.

Loki thought of other things, too.

She had fierce eyes. Eyes like laughter, clever and deeply dark. She was a shrewd mirage: steel bones, little drops of paint on his lips, and stark enough in memory to wake Loki's body.

She was the one who...

...who trained in the fields with the warrior-men.

Childhood. Beneath a willow tree, Loki sat with one of his books and grim face. The boys clashed swords, an orchestration for the power-gods; the girl-child fought with them, parried them, shared their meals and laughter. Loki watched her into evening, her golden hair alive in dusty starlight. She was a flurry of sandal prints in ordered wheatfields. A tiny chaos.

"I'll become a warrior. I'll fight for this land."

Loki found a book about love: a girl and a boy who danced. (No one knew he could.)

...who challenged him with a wooden sword.

Challenges. He thought the girl would stumble and fall, like a drowned kitten. He thought she would turn in her knives and her child's dream and submit to the roles of her sex. She did not. She inspired fear with her blades; prized soldiers sang her praises. The queen's eyes lit with mirth. Thor flitted about her like a songbird as she teased and teased, engaging Loki beneath his tree.

"Spar with me, Prince of Books, Prince of Cowards; and the winner may dance upon the other!"

Then, one night, he cut her hair. (Jealousy will drive you mad.)

...who walked with him into the dark.

Adolescence. They traded blows with their tongues. They played clever games. Loki squirreled things and broke them, caged feathers and stones, and laughed at the mischief. He made off with her trinkets: scabbards, rations, a crude metal shield. She left flowers in his path, red-stemmed stars that Loki could not destroy. The petals faded and bruised like lips, but would not tear.

"Your tricks are mere glamours. Won't you be the one to challenge me, my prince?"

Loki could not break her—not with magic, not with his hands. He kissed her instead. (Theirs would be a deeper destruction.)

... who whispered his name into her sheets.

Darkness. In her bed they stole sleepless and stormlit nights, her teeth silencing his liar's tongue ("where have your pretty words gone, shadow-prince?") and her armor stuck to his bare shoulders. Loki hissed when she palmed him, rough strokes; they whispered into each other's mouths, velvet and hateful things. Loki made a home between her thighs, counted each swallowed scream. They didn't speak of love, or power, or destruction.

"Loki. Loki."

They were a battlefield, his words in her throat and her flowers in his hair. (He'd forgotten she was goddess of those, too.)

...who addressed him as her king.

Glory. Loki preened upon his throne. Victory was a rush of flame; still, Loki's lips did not curl at the sight of her ("but oh, you've such a pretty pout"). She smiled like death at the prince-king, like spindly shadows, the end of the world. Loki watched her back; and when she was gone he sank cleanly into Odin's splendid chair. Waltzing wall-bound figures whispered reverence into his ears, draped in black and eyeshine, ready for Loki's word. A king and his court.

"My king. We would ask..."

She is yours now, said Loki's shadows, and you shall rule her. (She was a wicked-clever fox, she played unfairly; she was the true villain, not he, not he.)

"I'll chase you. I'll chase you into dusk, down all of Yggdrasil's roots and into hell. And I will bring you to your knees."

Loki submerged himself in the forests of a frozen Midgard, forests which grew glass and dull gray stone in place of trees, rising to the sky like a prophet or king. Earth's cities stood as grand as Asgard's palaces, rain-gold and impossible like the eyes of Loki's no-longer father.

Her hair had been gold, too, and it was a foolish thing—lovely covetous strands cool over his fingers and a laughing little knife. But darkness sosuited Sif.

"I'll chase you, Loki, thief, traitor, and I —"

They fought with glances and crude weapons, ones made from words and tongues and sharp minds. Loki tasted falling snow, dry and acrid like lightning. A river was made from the drowning sky; its tears burned on his lips. He found Thor in sheep's clothing and spun him lies. He sealed the Bifröst. She would not come for him now.

Once they were younger, and time flowed in the meter of magic spells and thunderstorms given life by Thor's temper; a time when Loki was no longer a child but not yet grown. He was Odin's son then. And Sif his mischief's plaything.

He could not remember the age at which they'd become gods.

The people of this world would bow to him, and she his queen—an arrogant and unruly people, who worshipped Thor because he appeared in their books. Loki would have this Earth, and his brother with it. And the girl—she would chase him to the end.

He extended his arm and watched as the skin marbled over—an icy blue, milky and flame-cold.

"And I, and I —"

(And I will have your heart.)