Loki steps up to the edge and looks down. It's a new habit and he's aware of it, finds it annoying but he cannot seem to stop himself from doing it. Below he can see the ground, a path leading through the gardens and the inner wall surrounding the castle.

"Thor said you fell", a voice says and Loki looks over his shoulder to find one of Thor's friends watching him. Although friend is the wrong word. He's a friend of one of Thor's friends, if even that. So far he's been keeping to himself, content to watch instead of participating. They were introduced of course but Loki doesn't remember any of their names. Except for Clint Barton, who has been ignoring him so far.

"Is that why you're afraid?" The man continues, looking directly at Loki as if he's trying to see something that Loki's hiding.

"I'm not afraid of heights."

"Never said anything about heights." The man walks up to him until they're side by side. In Asgard everything is bathed in a warm golden glow even mortals like Thor's friends. Not this man though. To Loki he looks like a cold winter night.

The man looks over the edge and says, "It's the abyss that's scary. Not knowing if and when you're going to land. If you're going to survive it."

"You obviously survived it", Loki replies dryly to cover that this man made a centre hit.

The man looks up and grins without a trace of humour in it. "So did you. Still changed you, didn't it?"

"Why don't you tell me? You seem to know all the answers already." Loki doesn't like the way this man is looking at him. As if he's seeing through all of Loki's lies and deceptions and glamour.

Suddenly he breaks eye contact and leaves, waving over his shoulder as he does. "I'll see you around."

/

For the first time Loki shows up for dinner with Thor and his friends. He is curious despite himself. The man sits next to Steve Rogers, watching the rest silently. When Loki enters the conversation dies and Thor's friends look at him warily. Thor himself smiles and grips Loki's arm for a moment to show he appreciates him making an effort. Loki ignores him. He sits down opposite the man who is the only one meeting his eyes without hostility.

Steve turns to the man next to him and asks, "Bucky, do you want some food?"

Bucky nods and Steve fills his plate. He gives Loki a cautious look but says nothing.

With a flick of his fingers Loki freezes everyone's food. There are a few painful muffles from people who were about to bite down.

"Loki", Thor says and for the sake of their barely renewed brotherhood Loki reverses the spell. He looks up to see Bucky grinning.

/

Heimdall still makes him feel uncomfortable. He too can see through most of his lies, his magic, his deceptions but other than Bucky Heimdall judges him for employing them in the first place. He didn't realise it when he was a child but now he knows that to Heimdall he always was and always will be an enemy of Asgard. It's the stain of his heritage, the inevitable fact of what he is and forever will be.

He hasn't been to the Bifrost since he returned to Asgard. If he wants to leave there are other ways. But if he's honest with himself he hasn't been to the edge of Asgard at all, Bifrost or otherwise. The roar of the ocean as it falls into the void has filled his nightmares for the past years. He hasn't thought about it until Bucky brought it up.

Loki walks up to the edge and for the first time since he returned to Asgard and looks down.

When he was a child Loki used to see the stars, the ocean falling, the secrets out there just waiting to be uncovered. The universe had seemed vast and exciting and he had wanted to see it as much as he had wanted his family to see him.

Now he sees the endless void, the biting cold, the cruel emptiness. Loki feels faint but he forces himself to look down into the abyss. Somewhere on the other side of the blackness the chitauri are waiting. Thanos and the Other are waiting for him. He sways but a hand curls around his arm and pulls him back.

Bucky looks out of place in Asgard golden light and warm sun but here against the dark and the stars cluttered through it he fits in.

"Is this where you fell?"

"Why does that interest you so much?"

Bucky looks over the edge and instinctively Loki holds him back. He lets go immediately when he realises what he's done. Bucky smiles at him over his shoulder and looks back down. "It was winter when I fell. It was cold and seemed to fall forever. I broke through the surface of a river and I couldn't breathe. Shredded my arm on the stones and the ice. The water swept me away. I don't remember how I crawled out of it. Everything was red and white. My enemies found me and made me into a weapon."

They were silent for a long time until Loki said, "It wasn't like that for me. Everything I did was my choice."

"Even falling?"

"Even that."

"Did you think you'd make it out alive?" No one, not his mother or his father or his brother have ever asked this question. They like to pretend nothing happened.

"I didn't care."

It is a truth that would hurt his family like a knife but Bucky simply nods as if he was expecting that. He takes Loki's hand and tugs him away from the edge. Impulsively Loki pulls him back so that they're chest to chest and kisses him, partly to unsettle him, partly because he found him beautiful. And Loki had never been shy about taking what he wanted.

When they part Bucky licks his lips. "I hope you didn't only do that to shock me. Not to get a second kiss would be a shame."

"Just a second one?"

"That and whatever you want to give me."

"You think you can take that?"

Bucky smirks "Try me."

/

When Thor's friends leave the next morning, Loki walks with his brother onto the Bifrost to see them off. Nothing has changed except that he didn't dream about the ocean and the void last night. And he meets Heimdall's eyes openly and unafraid as he takes his rightful place next to Thor.

Most of his brother's friend stand still like statues, wary of the Bifrost travel. Bucky finds Loki's eyes and winks at him. Loki smirks and sets Thor's cape on fire without him noticing. Bucky laughs just as the light engulfs him and Loki sets of quickly before Thor notices that his arse is getting hot.