Author's Note:

After this I'm slowing down the updates because I'm plotting the second half of Part II. Reading Turville-Peter's Myth and Religion of the North.

'-

XXVI The Continuation of Politics by Other Means, Part 1 (Best Laid Plans)

Darcy gets the day's breaking news. Lines are drawn. Maria Hill poses a question to Natasha Romanova. Loki is somewhere else.

'-

Darcy woke up to the sound of someone trying to pummel her apartment door into submission. She took pity on the poor slab of wood and got out of bed.

"Sheesh, I'm coming, I'm coming!" She grumbled something about people not letting her get enough rest. It was sometime at five in the afternoon, so she supposed she must've slept awhile after she returned from the labs with Tony and Natasha—must've been some really good sleep because she did feel better. She pulled a sweater over her tank top and stared blankly at her tiny shorts. Change? Don't change?

Darcy placed the bluish feather she was holding aside on some random surface. Light flakes of snow fell outside the window, huh, and here I thought the weather report only said cloudy this morning.

As interesting as it would be to get Tony to appreciate her legs if he happened to be the one knocking, she wasn't sure it would impress Natasha. Actually, wait, she'd just feel pretty insecure in front of the redhead super assassin with curves and legs like whoa if she was actually there. That clinched Darcy's decision to put on the first jeans she could find.

She marched to the door as the knocking picked up again and pulled it open.

"Jane?" Darcy said curiously, a little to the left and there was Thor too, sheepishly swinging Mjölnir over one shoulder. The brunette stared at her friends who were grinning awkwardly in the corridor.

"Wait, were you guys about to break my door down?"

"You weren't answering calls to your phone," Jane said in a hurry. "Or messages either. One of the crime scene people who came to apartment eight said that he saw people that looked suspiciously like Loki and you melting into walls. What was I supposed to think?"

"We were worried, Lady Darcy." Thor added.

"Ah, that," Darcy said, not sure if she should have said something else. Some part of her brain already knew what happened and wasn't the slightest bit surprised. She wasn't quite sure just yet what it was exactly that she knew, though. It was still…coming together, muddled and mixed with the strangest of dreams.

Jane seemed visibly put down by her apathetic reaction and Darcy sighed.

"Look, I've just woken up, okay? My brain's still booting up and everything. Why don't you guys come in while I wash my face or something and then you can tell me the whole story inside?"

She moved away and let her friends come in. She tried to remember where she dropped her cell phone before wincing at the number of missed calls and messages there. Yeah, definitely not checking that right now.

"Anyway, what's the fuss? I'm only gone from this morning. Why call the cavalry?

Jane opened her mouth to say something but no words came out and she closed it again. Darcy was only half aware of all this as she decided to brew some coffee. Who cares if it was five in the afternoon? She'd just woken up. She deserved a good cup of joe. She might even decide to make it unadulterated and almost as thick as the paint-stripper that Jane preferred to drink.

"Darcy, you were out of contact for more than twenty four hours," Jane said.

Darcy blinked. "I only slept this morning—"

"No," Jane said, gently this time. "If you slept as soon as you came back from the labs, then that would've been yesterday morning."

The spoon Darcy was holding clattered on the floor.

'-

Sometime between preparing a pot of coffee and mindlessly going through her fridge (she found a bunch of grapes on a bowl), she found that she could begin piecing her dreams together. From the nightmarish drowning scene—and how Loki threw her in, she remembered the new blonde singer at the speakeasy. She remembered guiding the blue, alien-looking All-Blind to a bleeding Loki. Then, there was the pretty memorable last part.

(This is a dream, hjartað mín. If you are aware that the world is yours to change…)

Darcy pinched the bridge of her nose. Alright, so she liked sleeping with Loki (or more correctly, all the other not-sleeping activities that can be done on a bed). What else was new? Though to be honest, having mind-blowing, lucid dreaming sex was new. She would be lying if she said she didn't welcome it.

"You really don't need to do that," Jane said, but she accepted her cup gratefully all the same. Darcy shook her head as she passed Thor his.

"It was more for me, anyway. My head's still half-lost in dream land right now."

She saw the glance that Jane and Thor exchanged. Darcy sighed.

"So, which of you guys want to start your story first? I went to sleep yesterday morning. Okay. What did I miss?"

"You know the portals we found, Darce?"

She nodded. "Yeah?"

"They connect to Jötunheim," Jane blurted out, "home of the frost giants."

"O…kay?" She still didn't get what the fuss was about.

"You saw the other side of the portals, right? The mountain range?" Jane asked.

"Yeah?"

"The tallest among them is Ymir's Fang. Thor recognised it. That was how we figured out that the one place that several of the portals connect at once to is Jötunheim."

The mountain range, the tallest mountain among the mountain range… Darcy's mind jumped hoops and ran loops to find it as her chest tightened with a foreboding familiarity. She still couldn't quite describe why it was so, so she didn't say anything as she got lost in thought. Jane looked worried.

"You know Thor's side of the story of what happened in Puente Antiguo, right?" the scientist asked.

"That there were some frost giants attacking, trying to get the Box of Winter to End All Winters?" Darcy asked, absentminded.

"The Casket of Ancient Winters," Thor corrected. "They have only managed to breach Asgard's defence because Loki had led them in."

There was something her friends were awkwardly trying to step around instead of outright saying. Darcy could see it in the way Jane was fiddling with her cup of coffee, passing it from one hand to another. It was there in the cautious grip that Thor kept on his hammer and how they both tried to avoid staring at her for too long. With the understanding came a strange calmness over her.

"You think Loki did it again, didn't you?" She asked.

"We have no true evidence that it is indeed what happened. We do know that the frost giants have made several successful portals." Thor said. "The Man of Fury believes Loki to be responsible for their arrival in the country around the city of Denver. We, the Avengers remaining on guard in the Tower, will join them soon."

Darcy nodded, trying to swallow everything at once. How quickly had everything changed in a day! She didn't know whether she succeeded or not. There was the unease she felt for Tony and Bruce and everyone else. She watched her two friends and noted their discomfort.

"Huh, and you're not trying to convince me that he's actually evil and everything? That I should stop being his friend?" She asked, curious.

There was panic somewhere at the back of her mind, but her partly-awake mind wasn't fully connected to all its parts yet and this time it was to her advantage as everything felt more muted to her. Something nagged about the mountain more than about this conversation. What am I trying to remember, dammit? At the Mountains of Madness? Darcy thought irritably before giving an internal scoff.

Jane shook her head. "We're still missing something. I mean, maybe it was Loki. Maybe he decided to attack earth again…but why use frost giants when frost giants have failed against the might of Asgard before? Thor could go into details better, but I could see what he meant. What little we know right now is not enough to base conclusions on, much less make plans."

The scientist sighed. "I'm just…worried for everyone, I guess."

"He would use frost giants if it served his purpose, but not without other forces to back them up and ensure his victory better." Thor continued for Jane, his voice grim. "Unlike then, I have heard nothing from the Allfather of the loss of the Casket, nor have have there any word of other forces from the Nine Realms to have been on the move. There is nothing about forces from further away either. I fear for our preparedness if there are indeed forces afoot that we are unaware of."

He let out a long sigh. "For if that is indeed the case, victory may be within our grasp for this battle or the next, yet how prepared are we to face possible reinforcements that may came later on?"

Darcy noticed that Thor didn't even try to defend his brother or say that he couldn't believe his brother would do it. All she saw was resignation, acceptance, and she had mixed feelings about it. It was good for him to be less stuck in the past, but she wasn't sure how she felt that he'd sort-of written Loki off as a loss this time.

Or was she troubled because this time, she was the one having an irrational attachment to Loki?

Thor took a steadying breath, unaware of the turmoil in Darcy's mind. "But I have sworn my arms for the defence of Midgard. If the Man of Fury plans for us to move, then by the Norns, I will not let the warriors of this planet fight alone, even if I have my own uncertainty about the plan of attack."

"Ah. Thank you for more fodder for my nightmares," Darcy said dryly between sips of coffee. Jane gasped.

"Oh, I'm sorry—"

"Nah, I'm just joking, Jane, really. Thanks for the update guys. Still, you haven't reached the stage of warning me off him. I mean, I could tell that Natasha was worried about me and what my friendship to Loki meant."

Jane turned to Thor, who was also looking at his girlfriend with some unspeakable understanding. Jane turned her attention to Darcy.

"Do you remember what you told me when I asked you why you chose political science?" she asked.

The assistant had to mull over that as it had clearly been a while. "I think so?"

"You said 'politics in general may suck, but it's much, much better than war'."

"A most noble sentiment that does you credit, Lady Darcy," Thor concurred solemnly. "You are clearly the stateswoman that Jane says you are."

Darcy blushed and awkwardly tried to wave it away. Thor seemed so damned earnest that all her efforts to make a joke out of it simply deflated.

"Um, thanks. Jane made it sound so much better than what I actually said."

Darcy could remember garbling to her boss-slash-friend some ages ago. She was mostly trying to find something to salvage her pride after the nth CV she sent out did not end up with a call for interview. She ended up pouring her heart out to Jane who just wanted to get a one-sentence answer. She had to scoff inwardly—verbal vomit might be closer to everything I told Jane.

"Well, I don't know what you can see in Loki, but it's your right to pursue your friendships, especially when no one came to any harm from it. You're an adult." Jane took a deep breath.

"I also know what you believed in Darcy. I choose…I choose to trust you. You taught me something about people and now I can say that I honestly believe that you'd make the right choice when it's your turn to save the world. You're not as shallow as most people think," Jane finished. It was clear that it wasn't something easy for her to say, but now that she'd said it, she actually looked relieved.

"We should not taint with our suspicions what came from genuine kindness. You mean well and so far you have been careful about it and have given us no cause to think otherwise." Thor said. "It would be remiss of us to keep to ill humour out of habit."

That scared the crap out of Darcy more than if Jane was going to go on and on about how befriending Loki was a bad idea. Jane, genius astrophysicist Dr. Jane Foster, trusted her to not actually let everything go to hell in a hand basket if she had to choose between the world and Loki. Thor who had known his brother for, like, centuries actually thought she had a point. Darcy didn't even trust herself that much and desperately hoped she was never asked to choose between the weird trust she had in the wayward son and averting whatever flavour the apocalypse of the day took. Hell, considering the way her hormones acted up around him, she might even be distracted at the wrong moment!

"Really, it's no biggie, guys."

She cleared her throat, pretended that she didn't feel like she had a bunch of marbles stuck there for some reason.

"I don't know how you could believe that much in me, but thanks all the same. For good friends," She raised her mug in a toast to them.

Jane had a tiny smile on her face while Darcy still hadn't gotten over the deeply thoughtful and understanding look Thor was sporting. They raised their glasses in unison.

Darcy drank the warming brew down. She was an assistant, for God's sake. Hardware jockey, code monkey and poli-sci graduate. And okay, she was also maybe an unexpected magic container for now, but it wasn't as if she could do magic herself. She was as useless as a bottle of Red Bull on a battlefield, except she was Darcy-flavoured—and on that worrying note she wondered whether she had to start dodging shady sorcerers who probably wanted to take a sip from her or even finish her in one drink. She didn't even know what it was that Jane thought she could do.

Why does it seem like the universe keeps forgetting that?

"You know what? Screw the coffee. I need something stronger."

Jane eyed her with a shrewder eye than usual. "Oh no you don't. When was the last time you ate, Darce? We're going to go out eating first. I'm game if you want to drink after that."

She groaned. Of all the times that Jane could've picked up the observation habits of normal people, this was not an ideal moment.

"Oh fine, be a mother that way," Darcy groused. Jane stood up primly and started looking around the room. Thor had stood up as well to help, because he was nice like that.

"Right. I'll just bring over the menu stack I know you have somewhere around here and—"

"And you guys could tell me about the technician who thought he saw me going ghost?"

Jane paused, "how did you even know about that?"

"You said he saw me going through walls, and I have to tell you," Darcy smacked the table lightly a few times, just to make the point. "I can't go through solid objects, see? And I think I remember the guy. The first time he met me, he asked me if I was dead."

Jane's eyebrows shot up. "Rrriiiiight."

Darcy nodded. "Uh huh. Exactly what I thought the first time I heard it."

Thor frowned. "We have not heard of your account before, Darcy."

"Of course you haven't. What am I supposed to say? 'Dude, there's this cuckoo technician that dropped in just now and thought I was dead'? I mean, how important was that compared to all the mini-crises everyone in this tower has to face every day? I didn't give it much thought."

The scientist sighed, a pile of menu printouts now firmly on her arm. "You're right. It doesn't sound like it meant anything."

"Yes, well, if he'd said he saw someone who looked like me floating through walls, I might've thought to tell people about it. I don't wanna get charged when some doppelganger ghost of mine starts peeping on people bathing. I mean, if I was going to get arrested for peeping people, I damn well should've seen some nice view myself for it."

Jane blinked. She opened her mouth several times but no words came out in the first several tries. "Darcy?"

"Yeah?"

"I don't think I really want to know what goes on in your head most of the time."

Darcy grinned. "Aww, thanks Jane. Now you're embarrassing me."

"And I have no idea why you're proud of that." The astrophysicist said flatly. Her friend kept the wide smile and even added an evil overlord cackle into it on purpose. At the end of the night, once Jane and Thor returned to their own apartment and accidentally talked about it, they would agree that Darcy's grin was disturbingly similar to Loki's.

'-

It really shouldn't surprise anyone who knew her that Jane Foster was in her lab in the middle of the night after having dinner at her friend's place. She rechecked her machines for the third time.

"Nothing out of the ordinary! I can't believe it. Maybe if I try one more—"

"Jane," Thor held her hands and gently guided her away. "Does the lights herald the arrival of a Bifrost?"

She sighed. "No, it doesn't. Still, I might be wrong, you know? There is something weird about them, I'm sure of it."

Fortunately, the Thor of today was certainly not Thor of last year, or two years ago. He knew better what he needed to ask. "What are the odds that you are wrong?"

Jane bit her lip. "Well, less than two percent?"

She squeaked in surprise when Thor picked her up easily in a bridal carry. "Can you forgive me for wishing to return home, dearest Jane?"

Thor's pectorals was a solid warmth under her palm and Jane couldn't help but let her hand wander. It was hard to concentrate when his complete focus was on her. His blue eyes were unwavering in following her features, enraptured with the smallest detail of her rumpled shirt. To him, her imperfections were the things that made her real instead of being an impossible ideal—and even now Jane still had trouble believing that someone could think of her that way. She wondered if this was what it felt to be a star that ensnared another with its gravitational field, to have someone to exchange warmth and light with.

He carried her easily, and she knew he would wait for her answer forever.

"Um…" She wavered.

Thor smiled at that. It was so bright with hope and her resistance crumbled instantly with one faltering breath.

"Yes, let's. Let's go home, Thor."

'-

The evening ended with a surprisingly comforting dinner between the three friends. It seems that the only maxim Darcy could remember from von Clausewitz—that war is the continuation of politics by other means—had a strong kernel of truth. Thor could indeed comment on the state of the Nine Realms, though all of his observation has a martial bent (or was mostly threat-level assessment for Asgard), but hey, they actually have something in common that they can talk about. That was more than Darcy even expected, so it was a definite plus on her books.

So, she got a quick primer to the Nine Realms. She already knew Asgard and Earth, and there was the Evil Elfland (Svartalfheim, but seriously, Evil Elfland is easier to remember), Alfheim (The Other Elfland? Shinier Elfland?), Jötunheim (Here Be Frost Giants), Nidavellir (Dwarves Dwell Dere, sorry, There), Niflheim (Really Cold, Harsh and Creepy Place) and Muspelheim (Here Be Fire Giants).

Jane surprised her by being able to rattle off the size of the immediate standing forces of each Realm and gave them prompt comparison stats.

Though for your information, all of this isn't as useful as it sounds because I haven't even touched about the higher-end magic users. The Nine Realms hadn't even standardised the categories of magic and power, much less keep a detailed record about it the way they do for the warriors! Jane complained, missing Darcy's flabbergasted expression.

Jane certainly suggested that such record-keeping needed to be done to Thor, who was looking at his lady love as if she was a genius of the first order.

"Wow, Jane, that was the most interest I've seen you show outside physics!" Darcy commented.

"That's not true! I borrowed Downton Abbey from you! And your Pride and Prejudice novel!" She defended, but there was a high colour on her cheeks and there was no way to mistake the pride in her eyes for having pulled a fast one over her friend. Darcy would've commented that it's impossible to dislike P&P before she saw where Jane's gaze had wandered. Aha! You're distracted by your Mr. Bingley! Darcy crowed in her mind.

The smile on Thor's face could light the whole room with his delight. He was even more handsome than usual with his warmth.

"I am sure that Jane has can master anything she sets her mind to," Thor praised. He only had eyes for her.

"I'm just good with numbers," Jane clarified.

For half a minute, Darcy was sure that both of them had forgotten that Jane's assistant was there on the table with them. She had to hold back from snickering. Yeah, sure, she thought, she's set on understanding and impressing you, big guy.

It was understandable considering that Jane had been a little insecure and felt that she'd never measure up to Sif—never mind that no one else was doing the measuring but Jane inside her own head.

Darcy bid Thor and Jane good night after they've finished tidying up and was left to be alone once more in her apartment. There was one near-miss when Jane almost wandered into her bedroom looking for a book she wanted to borrow from Darcy—luckily, she knew exactly where every single one of her books are and told Jane to just stay put.

She really didn't want to explain the apparent Asgard aesthetics of her bed, particularly the tastes of the God of Mischief and Lies (what could she say? She fell in love with the high thread count).

In the silence of her apartment, Darcy stared out at the occasional gusts of snow that she could see from her window, transfixed by the reddening night sky. The city was highlighted with ochre and old blood. The aurora is back? Wanna bet that it's still as weird as the previous one? A drunken person would've thought the sky was burning while Darcy wondered that maybe she and Jane really needed to follow up Abe Mosby's heebie-jeebies. She didn't have a good feeling about this either.

The weight of Jane's revelations hit her as her thoughts wandered.

The mountain range beyond the portal. The same mountain range she had warned Jane of for possible Mongol Orc Horde attack or something straight from Conan the Barbarian. Turns out that even her guesses had been too conservative—there were frost giants there.

Ymir's Fang, Jane had said. Thor recognised it.

She would bet that it was the same craggy mountain she had seen in the distance when she guided All-Blind to find Loki. I need to find him, the visitor had said. He needed a guide because Loki wouldn't survive for long in the wilds with his wounds. Her memories was bringing up more and more details about her dreams, so much that they came at her with all the power of a tidal wave. She just had to sit down and stare at the falling snow for a while without thinking as the images and scenes rush together at dizzying speed. (Snow, so much like the weather that she found Loki in). She managed to connect the details of her dreams completely now and the uncomfortable conclusion crystallised in Darcy's fully awake mind.

He was about to die in the wilds of Jötunheim and the dream mirrored that. All-Blind was looking for him…so it would seem that he'd expected Loki's arrival and was concerned when he didn't show up? How did I even find him when All-Blind couldn't anyway?

Wait, she was following the cause-and-effect all wrong.

She didn't find Loki—he found her first.

He had suddenly dropped in at the Two Queens, looking for all the world as if he belonged in that world instead of a mere visitor. She had no idea how he did it—maybe she should ask. (Then, there were her friends there. She didn't wonder why Sarah was even there because, eh, if her imagination had made up Thor, Jane and even Natasha, why not an old college friend too?)

Speaking of Sarah's phantasm, she'd said that she'd noticed the movements of frost giants close to her corner of the Dreaming, searching for some portal or another. Did it have anything to do with Denver?

What was Loki up to in Jötunheim, again? She had asked him that question earlier, hadn't she? Only that she'd forgotten that she'd asked it and had yet to receive an answer. She had been distracted about the whole issue of 'how did I have magic?' And then he had taken his time to sit her down and explain the whole mess. She was of two minds about it because clearly Loki had done her a favour when he didn't have to.

Why?

She had no answer. Loki hadn't given her any explanation about why the hell he was in Jötunheim… though she hadn't asked about it either. That was probably the lame-ass excuse he was going to use if she confronted him about it.

What the hell are you planning, Loki?

She hoped to hell or high water that he wasn't dabbling in another fricking world-conquering spree. The more pragmatic part of her, the one that was raised on Machiavelli and studied Watergate reminded her that whatever he actually did, the best thing she could do was prepare as if he did. It was especially true when the odds that he was behind this one were pretty significant. The last thing she wished was to be caught off-guard. It was better to have an umbrella in sunshine than be without one in the rain, and all that.

(Does he have any regrets about it? Was one of the few questions she never dared to even think, pushing it far to the back of her mind the moment it might even exist. Would he even apologise?)

Darcy covered her eyes with her hands when she felt tears beginning to fall and the smallest, quietest sobs found its way from her throat. The stupidest thing about it, she thought, is that I have no idea why I'm crying. What was it for? For Loki's apparent foolhardiness? For herself? For Thor and Tony and all the other Avengers that were now going to be stuck in Denver?

It was just…everything. Everything was too much.

Tomorrow, Darcy Lewis will wake up refreshed and would prepare herself for a possible war by collecting as much information as she could use. Tomorrow she would make plans, keep up with the news, strategise with Jarvis and maybe even contact Pepper once more. She might even, dare she say it, leave Jane's lab earlier (and she knew her friend wouldn't even mind about it).

But tonight she will do none of those things, because tonight was for regrets and lost might-have-beens.

'-

As the SHIELD meeting dispersed, Natasha Romanova was among the last to leave the meeting room. She did this on purpose, because she was aware that not a few of the junior agents were intimidated by her presence and for all her unflappable persona she still had a smidgeon of pity for them. Maria Hill fell into step with her. Whether it was by accident or not, the redhead didn't care to think about, as she knew Maria to be a dependable colleague. Even when she was still a green agent, she had a steady head on her shoulders.

"Congratulations, Acting Director," Natasha said. "It is not hard to see that the choice is a foregone one as you are his deputy all this time."

Her tone implied that it was fair game to ask about the intelligence of whomever it was that had doubted the outcome. Nicholas Fury would lead the SHIELD operation in Denver and because of that he needed to choose his proxy to hold the fort in New York. That Maria was the person was obvious to Natasha.

"Thank you," Maria nodded. "It did take me by surprise."

"Really, Director?" Natasha raised an eyebrow.

"Maria," she corrected. "You've known me since I was in basic."

"And people need to get used to hearing your title. Apparently it would not penetrate the sluggish minds of some people otherwise," Natasha replied smoothly. Maria successfully held back her snort, though her lips still twitched at the corners. They walked side-by-side to the elevator. It was a companiable silence, but something was weighing on the Deputy Director's mind and after a while she voiced her thoughts.

"I have to ask, Natasha. Why me?"

Natasha frowned. "Why not?"

"If we're talking about seniority, then you should be the one to take it."

Natasha did snort then, shaking her head. "I'm the most senior by default, other than the Captain. It does not tell you anything important. Besides, I'm more of a field agent. You should know that."

"Your expertise and experience would be invaluable as director," came the quick answer.

"Then you know just as well that I will give my advice anytime you ask. Possibly several other times when it is not asked as well." She answered dryly. Maria's brows furrowed.

"But—"

She stopped and placed a hand on the other agent's arm. The hallway was quite empty except for the two of them. "Maria, I will tell you this because you're a friend. Nick had offered me to be his deputy once before. I refused. I told him why. He understands my reasons, he respects it and he hasn't offered me again. Trust me, you're the Director SHIELD needs in New York right now, not me."

The younger agent was clearly still troubled about it.

"I don't understand why not."

Natasha closed her eyes. She didn't pinch her nose, nor did she rub her hands together or betray any other idiosyncratic gestures of nervousness. They had all been trained out of her a long time ago and she had always religiously shed any she had lightly acquired on purpose for any disguise just as she shed her other costumes and skin. A spy should aim to be colourless and faceless, as forgettable as necessary. This was a habit sunk into the marrow of her bones.

"Because you have the people in mind, the opinion of Ward and similar young idiots notwithstanding. As for me, I've been doing deep cover assignments for too long." Natasha finished.

Maria sighed. "You could spot several secrets at once a few minutes into a meeting."

"If I had a good handler who could actually provide proper dossiers."

"Still, why wouldn't you—"

"Because you think of the people in SHIELD. It's not merely about the top agents, but also the junior ones as well as the people behind the scenes. You do care." Natasha answered.

"When a person plays the Tournament of Shadows, every play meant sacrificing something. Always. The best players make sure you gain more than you lose most of the time. Let an agent play for too long and become too good at it, you will have an excellent asset." She said all this with a clinical detachment since she had seen it all before, paid her own price in blood. Yet to most people who didn't know her, her voice was colder than arctic. "I will not, however, recommend that person for any significant positions of power. The skills are…very particular to the line of work. To practise them too often when one is in command…"

"There are only so many sacrifices an organisation can make before it loses its soul, no matter the gain."

'-

Loki stirred from his sleep with an arm automatically reaching out to his side only to find it empty. Underneath the furs his half-sleeping mind insisted that he wake up and find a presence that obviously should be there and that it was not going to accept the disappointment until he corrected it. He sat up with a curse as he found himself very much alone. He leaned back against his travelling chest.

The embers of the hearth keeping but little light in the cave, yet it did not matter for one with sufficient night vision such as him. There was a storm outside and even Helblindi seemed to be fast asleep on a different side of the cave. He supposed they would move once the snowstorm was over—and war will begin.

He could still taste Darcy.

He could still feel her curves whether they were under him or over him, pressed closely enough to blur themselves within each other. Her insatiable lips had drunk from him so endlessly that he was almost certain he was still intoxicated with her. You've hurt me, she had laid herself bare and also accused him in one sentence. Yet she admitted again that she still trusted him, would still willingly give herself to him and held him as if she would prefer nowhere else to be.

Why? He ran a restless hand through his hair and cast his gaze around, trying to find some ways to distract himself before the enigma that was Darcy Lewis trapped him in her golden web again. Every time he thought he had taken her measure, she would find a way to surprise him, to slip outside his expectations as easily as a mongoose avoided a cobra.

On that random note, he wondered how she came up with the idea to involve goblins, out of all things, part of the lesser wights, in her establishment. He himself knew that the little critters are resilient and had a surprising degree of cunning for one of their intellect, but most people would've been intimidated by their chaos and unruly behaviour to look deeper. That she could take a leap of faith on them had amazed him.

The binding he had placed over her dream memories would have been undone by now as he had finished his explanation on the origin of her magic. After this…

He was resolutely not thinking about what happens after this. Perhaps she will find him again, perhaps she will not. What does it matter? He had made his plans for some time now and had weaved all the significant realms through it as well if he could manage it. She had a sharp mind—he had no serious concerns on her ability to survive and he could put her out of his mind most of the time. This was the third act of the play, the culmination he was waiting for and there was no reason for him to discard it now with success so near.

If Darcy finally found a reason to fault him, it wasn't as if it was entirely unexpected either. He had foreseen it, hadn't he? The same way he had foreseen dozens upon dozens of maidens turning away from him once they saw Thor. Would it be unexpected if she chose to abandon him now? No, not at all.

There was a particular inevitability to it akin to the weave of souls and fates in the Tapestry, or every turn of the galaxy.

Even if he could not promise to himself to never visit the little corner of In-Between she had unwittingly carved for herself.

'-

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Author's Note:

Sometimes ambition and career just interferes with your social life. It's been known to happen.

I recommend listening to My Chemical Romance's 'The Light Behind Your Eyes' and Nightwish's 'The Crow, the Owl and the Dove' while rereading the scenes of this arc if you don't think your heart's being crushed enough. I also worked on it with Apocalyptica (ft. Lacey)'s 'Broken Pieces' (Darcy's side) and Apocalyptica (ft. Matthias Sayer)'s 'Hope' (Loki's side).

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Author note on trust and friendship (mini rant ahead):

Reading too many stories with either Jane or Thor (or both) doesn't trust Darcy just because she's close to Loki annoys the heck out of me more than I expected, especially when I feel their reasons are weirdly immature instead of something solidly grounded in reality. The personal and professional doesn't have to mix if you don't want it to.

I don't know whether I've read too much manga (with its concept of nakama) or if I was too used to the whole band-of-brothers feel people get in the armed forces or other organisations with a distinct organisational culture (Google, anyone?), but I want more examples of easy camaraderie between Darcy and the people she works with. After all, the Avengers are going to fall apart really fast without trust, including the support staffs like Jane and Darcy, and this is my take on it.

Jane and Thor trusts her because she doesn't let them down, and in return she feels comfortable trusting them.

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