A/N: A very short addition to the series, but there had to be an installment like this somewhere. I've tried something a little different with the tone and structure here… I guess we'll see if it works. :)

(See A/N2 after the fic for more continuity notes, please. :D)

Series: Loki's Brood, Part IX

Betas: SkyTurtle

Music:
Missing You by Trentemøller (Recommended listening while reading.)

Disclaimer: I do not own The Avengers, Thor, Iron Man, nor the characters from them. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

…

Thrice the Fool

Raven Ehtar

…

Soaring high. Tony had become accustomed to soaring high, figuratively and literally. He was the highest of high rollers of his entire generation; none came remotely close to him either financially or technologically. He had also come to know what it was to see the cityscape, with its grid patterns and twinkling lights, laid out as a living map below him without the need of either plane or jet. High speed and dizzying heights, it was all day to day for him.

All a part of the routine.

Perhaps we are all creatures of our environments, he mused on occasion. We adapt, habituate and stagnate wherever we find ourselves… however bizarre that may be, at first.

But then Loki had come, and had shattered all of that apart. Loki had come, and nothing could ever be said to stagnate in his presence. Loki had come into his life, and every day Tony had to redefine what his life was.

If Tony had thought what he knew what it was to soar high before, Loki redefined that, too.

Even as high as they were, the air was still warm. High enough so the sounds of the city were left behind. High enough so that the stars were visible again. It was summer, reflected in the pattern of constellations and the mild breeze that fluttered across their skins. Below, the lighted city was its own moving web of constellations, dancing to an urban rhythm. Caught between were the two of them, unseen and secret in midair.

He was showing Tony worlds, mapped out in the stars hanging above them. Worlds he had seen, had touched and smelled and experienced for himself. Tony dreamed of it, of experiencing alien worlds, of feeling their grit and gravity, of exploring.

And yet, he had no eye for faraway worlds tonight. His vision was completely taken up with a single man. All of his senses were wrapped up in him, and not distant planets. Loki showed him new worlds that had nothing at all to do with space travel.

In fairness, the once-Asgardian had no attention for the stars, either.

They soared high, the two of them. Tony had brought them here, but the rumble of his suit had long since died away. Still they hung, suspended far above the ground.

...

"Trust me," Loki said, held in armored arms, his fingers spread over the arc reactor, the ghostly glow caught reflected in his dark eyes.

Behind the mask of his face plate, Tony smiled unseen. "You know I do."

After a pause, Loki laughed. The soft, single laugh that was so near to simply being a sigh. He looked down, his lips twitched. "Thrice the fool, you."

Tony tilted his head. "Why thrice?"

...

His body was slender, but muscled, and stronger than it looked. He could crush Tony with the strength in his arms if he had a mind to. Small by the standards of both Æsir and Jötunar, he was still taller than Tony. He could overpower him, a mere human, with so little effort it would be laughable.

Yet he never did.

Strength held him close but did not break him. Though Loki held every advantage, he never took them.

...

A shudder passed through Tony, but it came from the outside. As he watched, the HUD display dimmed and winked out, narrowing his vision to the thin slit in the face plate itself. Abruptly aware of how confining was the suit, Tony felt the scrabbling beginnings of claustrophobia.

Loki never once looked away from him, never once broke eye contact, and Tony made himself relax, even as he felt the thrusters die, one after the other.

"Once," he heard Loki say, voice muffled through the helm, "for daring come near one so universally despised."

...

Everything with Loki was intense. He was intensity personified. His hates, his loves, his passions, in insanities… never was anything by half measures. It was so easy to become intoxicated by him, drunk on the very essence of Loki, and still crave more.

Tony craved. In his very sinews, he craved, and he drank as deeply as he could.

...

Claustrophobia quickly evaporated as Tony's suit came apart in pieces. Something like green electricity crawled over the metal as the armor rapidly became a disconnected mass, a disparate shell orbiting them, and left Tony in only the a cotton shirt and sweats, held aloft by Loki's magic.

"Twice for your… affection. So imprudently placed."

...

He had a dagger grin, sharp and double edged. It made his kisses cruel.

Tony craved those as well.

...

"And three times for trusting a rogue."

...

Tony's suit was a cloud of metal, reduced to its smallest of parts by Loki's magic, not a single one allowed to touch another. Observing the metallically glinting fog that hovered around them, crackling with green energy, Tony thought of how much it was like what Loki had done to him.

"Don't let go," Loki's warm breath touched Tony's ear, making him shiver. Without the suit, he felt for the first time what it was to soar so high: the chill, the breeze, the odd absence of scent save for Loki… and Loki.

With no suit between them, Tony could feel the heat of the Æsir's palms gripping him tight, the curve of his biceps where Tony's fingers curled around them, the lean muscle all along where their bodies touched, the beating of his heart, the shivers along his skin… He could hear, with no filters, the amused lilt to his voice, and see the dancing glitter in his eye.

"Not likely."

With no suit to separate them, the outside worlds all washed away. Tony drew himself further into Loki and did not let go.

He became lost in the feel, the scent and the taste of Loki, and never once did he consider letting go. To let go would be to fall, to die. To lose his grip on Loki would be to plummet back into cold reality, and to shatter into pieces.

Perhaps he was thrice the fool. He knew Loki could let go at any moment. It was trust, and trust alone that held him aloft, with nothing between his feet and the pavement so very far down but open air. The risk should the mischievous Æsir even loosen his grip, literally or metaphorically…

Yet, it was all worth it. Even the threat of falling was worth the time spent in Loki's embrace.

He was an icy fire, so cold he burned, freezing as he consumed. Without doubt one of the most dangerous creatures Tony was ever like to meet, and yet the one he felt the safest to be near. He was a contradiction in every breath, in every touch. It was all Tony could do to hold on, enveloped in the raging storm of his being, and he could not imagine ever willingly releasing him.

Even if by holding on, Tony was falling.

Sometime in the quiet stillness of shadows, where none but Tony could possibly hear, Loki murmured to him, fingers digging hard into his shoulder blades, as though he were the one who needed to hold on for dear life. "You are precious to me, Tony."

Tony smiled. Gently, he pulled away enough to bump his forehead against Loki's, and to steal another kiss from his lips. "Same to you. You, and all of your crazy."

…

A/N2:Continuity Disclaimer: This is going to be a standard disclaimer attached to every fic I post that has to do with the Avengers, so everyone knows where I'm coming from in terms of characters and world canon.

For the most part, assume that I am coming from only the movies. Iron Man 1 - 3, The Incredible Hulk, Thor, Captain America, and Avengers – and any sequels that come after these unless mentioned otherwise. I realize that I'm missing out on worlds of story and character development, but I would be starting from square one and 50+ years of backstory, (each individual character's series(es), the team series(es) and any/all crossovers or notable appearances), is more than a little daunting. So as much as I want to know everything about everything – trust me, this is really frustrating for me – I just can't. I'm picking my battles and this one is a 'nope.' So as a result my Avengers fics will not have 'comic book depth' to them. Sorry. (I do intend to pick up some Marvel encyclopedias to hopefully get some more of the world down, hopefully that will help.)

What will they have? The movies, of course, one or two short comic arcs that I've been convinced to pick up that will have little to no effect on the continuity, Norse mythology – since I do read that – and any details that I can pick up from other fans or that I research on my own. The result of all of this is usually going to be a sort of fusion that hopefully works and isn't too confounding for anyone. :)

Thanks for reading, everyone!