Aemilia woke up in her own bed, under her familiar bedroom ceiling, as if it was any other ordinary morning. The light of dawn was bright in her slowly opening eyes as it filtered through her white-curtained windows, and she stretched her arms and legs under her sheets as she did every morning upon waking. She was instantly met with a great ache that seemed to start at the top of her thighs and spread dully throughout her legs, torso and even her arms, and after grimacing in confusion, her eyes snapped open wide and she froze.
Memories washed over her like a sheet of ice-cold water, and her chest lurched as she closed her eyes and dropped her head down on her pillow with a groan. Her neck quickly protested the movement with a sharp burst of pain, apparently suffering similar soreness as the rest of her body, and she pulled her blanket up and over her head as her mind flooded with images of what she'd done the night before.
Her little act of defiance weeks ago at the palace had come back to haunt her, and she wondered how she thought she'd ever manage to get away with it at all. What had she been hoping to accomplish, anyway? Maybe it was all true, what Loki said, and last night was what she'd wanted all along.
Loki. The mere thought of his name sent a shiver down her spine and heated her skin. He had been everything she expected and yet so much more - he was indeed as dark and dangerous as she'd perceived him weeks ago. He was rough and demanding and domineering, intoxicating and frightening and beautiful and a thousand other adjectives that she couldn't think of in her mental haze. She could almost feel his touch even now, the burning memory of it lingering on her skin as she trailed her own fingertips along her stomach, underneath her nightgown.
He hadn't brought her back home until it was well into the dead of night. He seemed to be insatiable, having her at least twice more after the first time, or perhaps thrice more - it had all begun to blur together after awhile. No wonder she was so sore, she thought as she begrudgingly tossed the covers away and forced herself to sit up - she was lucky to be in one piece after last night.
Her muscles screamed as she slowly stood up from the bed, her legs wobbling slightly and thighs trembling as she took a breath and tried to pull herself together. Surely, she told herself, once she had been up and about for awhile, and taken a good long bath, she wouldn't be in such a wretched state. She quickly hobbled off to her washroom, eager to get this done before her handmaiden burst into her room and sensed something amiss.
As soon as she got into the washroom, she made a beeline for her bathtub and quickly flipped on the tap before dragging herself to her sink to brush her teeth. But, before she could even reach for her toothbrush, she did a staggering double take at her reflection in the large mirror above the sink.
Her lips were still swollen from Loki's brutal kisses, looking almost as if they'd been struck with a fist rather than merely kissed into oblivion. Her hair was tangled with huge knots that his fingers had created, and her eyes were puffy and red from lack of sleep. Her gaze dropped lower, then fell on the red, terribly noticeable bite mark on her neck. She scowled at that - it had been completely unnecessary, just a way for the prince to mark his new "territory" like the possessive fiend that he apparently was. Now she had to keep it covered and out of sight, and that was hard to do when she had a handmaiden who helped her dress and undress frequently.
Sighing, she walked away from the sink and turned off the bath tap. She was still mentally grumbling about the state of her neck when she pulled off her slip and suddenly realized why her thighs hurt so badly.
Aemilia stared blankly at the big, ugly purple bruises that started on her inner thighs and extended outwards, trailing off towards her hips where there were a few smaller finger-shaped ones. Startled, she quickly scanned the rest of her body and found a few more bruises - a few on the back of her upper arm, one on her side, and one on the small of her back.
She frowned deeply. Asgardian flesh did not bruise easily. How could she have sustained such injuries but not felt any pain while she was receiving them?
Then she remembered - Loki had cast some kind of pain-numbing spell on her, to ease the discomfort of her virtue being taken. That was the only explanation for how she was just now noticing the evidence of the prince's... zeal.
Aemilia winced greatly as she eased into the tub, able to relax only when she was fully submerged in the hot water, which worked wonders on her nerves and battered body. She knew the bruises would be gone in a day or two, and would cease to be painful in mere hours, but it was a small comfort. Seeing her skin and body in such a state had triggered a slight sense of panic in the back of her mind, and she felt it slowly creeping up her spine and heating her ears.
What have I done?
She hadn't once truly considered saying no to Loki at any point last night. She had wanted him, every inch of him, all of his titillatingly scandalous words and touches, every last bit of pleasure that he tortured her with, and she hadn't thought very far beyond that. She had assumed, with good reason, that it would be an adventure limited to one night's foolishness - one girl's youthful, pleasurable mistake and one prince's curious mischief, nothing more and nothing less. She realized that she'd been wrong when he'd spoken the words currently slithering though her mind, echoing until she thought she might lose her ability to breathe.
"You're mine... you'll always be mine, do you understand?"
He'd only further proven the meaning behind his words as the night progressed. When he'd finally teleported her back to her own room in her own home, he left her with a lingering, lazy kiss and a promise that he would see her soon.
It had been no simple one night affair. What would it prove to be? Had she made a far more serious mistake than she could have anticipated? What would happen if Loki wasn't discreet, and what happened did not remain private?
Just as she felt herself begin to fully panic, Aemilia closed her eyes and evened her breathing. She focused on the simple act of inhaling through her nose, then exhaling through her mouth, calming her racing heart and silencing the irrational voices in her head. She absolutely would not panic now. Surely the prince would soon tire of her and move on to other conquests, and as she'd never heard anything of his previous lovers, he would almost certainly remain discreet.
"No matter who you marry, where you go, or what you want... this part of you belongs to me now. You are mine."
She tried not to shudder, but the memory of his words made her skin crawl. It also made her blood pool between her aching legs.
Her eyes fluttered shut, again feeling the phantoms of his touch ghosting along her skin as she let her head fall back. His hard, deep kisses, his maddeningly skilled hands, his tongue that she thought deserved to have monuments built in it's honor... she could almost, almost, feel it all even now, so close somehow and yet just out of reach...
She sighed and realized that she was staring sightlessly into space, replaying scenes in her head that she needed to shove away to properly function today. She forced herself back into reality and dunked her head under the water, but when she came back up for air only a second later, she found that the images and memories could not be so easily washed away.
It was going to be a long, long day.
Loki was positively, unabashedly, and quite oddly, in a fantastic mood. He may have awoken alone as per usual, but he awoke to an unmistakable scent lingering on his sheets - a hint of rose mixed with something else that he couldn't place - and it set his day off far better than he could say for his other recent ones. He was in such a good mood, he even entertained Thor's banter over breakfast, which was something that he usually couldn't bother with until at least the early afternoon.
Mornings were generally reviled by Loki. He would endure too-long, too-loud breakfast with his family long enough to pacify his mother, then oftentimes was burdened with tedious and loathsome tasks that would waste a day that he could have spent far more effectively. He was a prince, after all, and he had duties - duties that fell to him when Thor was not suited to them. He would assist in the receiving of foreign dignitaries, or dabble in diplomacy, which was an area where his natural persuasiveness made him the perfect ambassador to the neighboring realms. Other days, his mother would confiscate him for the day, and he had a pathetic lack of ability to ever tell her no. Then, on days where neither duties nor Frigga stole him away, it was Thor who would ruin his solitary plans and drag him off to join in whatever he had cooked up for them to get into that day.
He would generally know before breakfast had concluded which of those things would be hijacking his day. Then there were the blessedly rare days like this one, when Frigga would speak of her plans for the afternoon that only involved her own handmaidens, Thor would hurriedly stuff his face so that he could get to the training grounds - without Loki - quicker, and nobody would dump anything in Loki's lap that would take up all of the daylight hours. He was free to do as he pleased, and it only further boosted his soaring mood.
So grand was his mood that Loki actually spoke more during the meal than Thor did, which was nearly unprecedented. He and Frigga engaged in light small talk, he conversed briefly with Odin regarding state affairs, and teased Thor when the blonde warrior started on his third plate of food.
"Have you been spending too much time with Volstagg, brother?" Loki inquired, raising a brow at Thor as he swallowed down a huge mouthful of what appeared to be an entire biscuit. "I don't think gluttony suits you quite as well as it does him."
Thor narrowed his eyes and washed the biscuit down with a gulp of juice from his gilded goblet. "I have a warrior's appetite, brother. You would not be familiar with such a thing." When Loki merely chuckled, Thor added, "What has you in such an agreeable mood? You have spoken more this morning than you have in any morning of the last... century."
Loki shrugged and sipped his own goblet. "It is a lovely day, is it not?"
In those innocuous words, Thor apparently found the meaning he was looking for, and slowly a grin spread across his handsome face. "Aha. I know that look. You spent last night in the company of a maiden. That is why you're in such an agreeable mood."
Loki set down the goblet and didn't so much as twitch an eyebrow. Thor leaned forward and grinned even wider. "Do I know her?"
"As usual, Thor, your interest in the state of my private affairs is flattering in a... disturbing way."
"Oh, come on," Thor nagged, blue eyes alight with amusement. "Just tell me her name. Or," he wriggled his eyebrows, "describe her to me."
"Thor," Frigga quickly scolded from across the table. "This is hardly the time or the place for such a discussion."
Loki grinned at his mother's eternal squeamishness at hearing of either of her son's conquests, and Thor gave Loki a look that told him he'd be asking for more details in private later.
"But," Frigga then added, "I must say, whatever - or whomever - has brought about this pleasant change in your demeanor this morning has my full gratitude."
She said it warmly, and Loki humored her with a small smile.
"Perhaps," Thor said with another grin, "Loki is reluctant to tell us of her because she is not a her at all, but a he."
"And if it was?" Loki replied, not missing a beat. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Odin shift slightly uncomfortably and Frigga give a good-natured eye roll. "Would that make it any more of your concern, brother?"
"The ease with which you speak of it suggests that I may be on to something," Thor countered, thoroughly enjoying the banter.
"And your quickness to think it and lack of prejudice suggests that perhaps it is something you yourself think on, which in turn leads me to believe that I, in fact, may be on to something about you."
Thor laughed, a booming bellow of a chuckle. "Always talking in circles, brother, never answering a single question straight on."
"I keep expecting you learn one of these days, Thor, but you never do," Loki grinned.
"I'll get her name out of you one way or another," Thor vowed. "I always do."
He thought he always did, Loki corrected Thor in his mind, but he remained silent, glancing at Thor's goblet as the older brother brought it to his lips. Under the table, Loki's hand twitched, and instead of sweet juice, Thor took a big gulp of vinegar.
Loki laughed as Thor spat and sputtered, and Frigga gave her younger son a disapproving but admittedly resigned sort of look as Thor grabbed a pitcher of water from the table and poured it down his throat.
"That was worse than the time you turned my wine to sour milk!" Thor said miserably in between gulps.
"My apologies," Loki grinned, standing up from the table. "I'll make sure it's the sour milk next time, then."
He then nodded to Frigga before walking away from Thor's gagging and towards a day he'd have all to himself, a spring in his step that he could indeed attribute to a certain young maiden. Thor would not be getting her name, or any other details, until the day Loki grew bored with her. But he didn't anticipate that happening any time soon.
Now, the question was... what to do with his suddenly free time?
Aemilia's day went nearly as badly as she'd feared it would. She had almost - almost - been late to her singing lessons, due in large part to how deeply she'd had to dig in her supply of gowns to find one with a high enough collar to hide the bite on her neck. Then, once that crisis had been resolved, she'd learned at breakfast that her supposed new "suitor" was making arrangements to meet her later in the week, and she almost laughed out loud at the news. The timing alone was enough to make her want to throw a fit and lock herself in her room whenever the man decided to come around, but she kept her expression stoic and then quickly dashed off.
Her singing that day was off, and her instructor - an older woman who Aemilia had to thank for the palace's invitation those weeks ago - knew straight away that something was distracting her pupil. She was not a particularly patient teacher, so after only an hour, she sent her off for the day with the instructions to take care of whatever had her troubled. Again, Aemilia had to withhold her urge to laugh - she had utterly no way of resolving anything.
She then tried to spend her day as normally as possible - she met with some of her female friends from the theater, and they roamed the city as they frequently did throughout the week. She followed them into shops and engaged them in light conversation, all the while she was nearly bursting with the almost unbearable desire to tell someone - anyone - about the scandalous night she'd spent in their Prince's bed.
But she couldn't, so she didn't. She instead did her very best to act completely normal on the outside while she tittered with anxiety on the inside. When would he show up again, as he promised that he would? Would he appear in her room again that night, or perhaps "coincidentally" walk past her as she was out and about, and give her a subtle but unmistakeable look that would alert her to his intentions? Would it be today, tomorrow, or next week? Would it happen at all?
A fly landed on her nose and she jumped as she swatted it away. Her eyes focused from her obnoxiously repetitive thoughts and Aemilia realized that she'd drifted off again, this time while at dinner at home with her parents. They were discussing her impending engagement - apparently in their minds, it was a done deal - as if the person it most directly affected wasn't sitting right there in front of them, dazedly picking at her food and becoming more and more annoyed.
"... Yes, and I am quite relieved that it has all worked out perfectly," her mother, Ayre, said to her father, Haedir, as she delicately polished off a leafy green salad. She was a poised, elegant noblewoman, tall and blonde and regal to the point of making her own daughter sometimes feel inadequate next to her. Whatever grace Aemilia had - and she thought she had a decent amount - it was thanks to being raised by Ayre. "I am glad the family saw the benefits of the marriage quickly."
"Marriage?" Aemilia spoke up suddenly. "Mother, I haven't yet even properly met... the man."
"Dagr," her mother said sternly. "His name is Dagr, Aemilia."
"I have not yet even met him, mother," Aemilia repeated. "Yet you speak of the courtship as if it has already resulted in a marriage."
"Do you have any reason to think that it will not?" Ayre replied evenly.
"I have no opinion either way until I am actually acquainted with him."
Ayre sighed. "Darling, the marriage will strengthen our family in every way. He is a respected member of the Royal Guard, a son of a most noble family, and he will give you a wonderful life."
Royal Guard... that would explain how Loki knew of him, Aemilia thought, recalling the way he'd called Dagr an "uncultured swine" the night before. Then she inwardly swore - she'd managed to not think about the night before for nearly five minutes, then ruined her streak that quickly.
Her hand tickled, and she looked down to see the annoying fly as the culprit. She swatted it away again and looked to her father, hopeful that he'd somehow see her side of things. Under the law, he could give her away in marriage to anyone he wanted, and that also meant he could spare her as well. But he merely looked at her stoically and turned back to his meal. She sighed and did the same, making a face when she saw the damn fly had landed in the middle of her plate this time.
She retreated to her room soon after, walking into it slowly and apprehensively but closing the door quickly. She almost expected Loki to be sitting there in her bed or perhaps at her window, ready to whisk her off for another sleepless night, but her room was empty.
Exhaustion set in quickly, and she prepared for bed early. She was pleased to find the bruises on her body over halfway healed, and she hoped a good night's sleep would ease the lingering aches and pains. Assuming that she was able to sleep at all.
The last thing she remembered was climbing under her covers and looking up at her ceiling before a deep and dreamless sleep claimed her.
He watched her sleep from a corner of her room, torn between two very distinct urges. One told him to wake her, to slip under her blankets and curl his arms around her and kiss her until sleep left her and she was his for the night. The other urge was quieter, less impulsive, and it spoke to him as the voice of reason.
He could wake her and ravish her, yes. But he could also torture her. Stay in the shadows, watch as she waited for a sign from him and got nothing. She'd been on edge all day - what would happen in, say, a week's time?
Loki grinned, stepping closer to her bed, his footsteps silent as he watched the slow rise and fall of her chest under her blankets. He would enjoy watching her slowly fall apart, fighting but ultimately succumbing to the anxiety that would plague her mind in his absence. He would loom over her mind, the memory of his touch plaguing her every waking moment until she became desperate for something - anything - from him. And Loki, being merciful, would oblige.
Maybe he was cruel, just a little bit. He couldn't deny it. He liked these games. He relished watching a woman slowly come undone like she surely would, with minimal effort on his part. But he would reward her in the end. His games were never without purpose.
He ran the back of his finger over her cheek without her so much as twitching. She was truly exhausted. He allowed himself one more little smile before pulled his hand away, then turned and vanished.
Seven days passed. Seven days. And nothing. Absolutely nothing from the prince who'd taken her virginity and promised to be a constant presence in her life.
She tried her best to be relieved. Maybe it really had been a one-night affair, and if it had, surely that was for the best. No - it was obviously for the best. It shouldn't have happened at all.
That's what she told herself, but on the inside, she was filled with an anxiety and disappointment that she couldn't admit to. To make it worse, the final day of the week marked the day that she would finally meet her new suitor.
By then, the bruises were long gone, and all that remained of the bite mark on her neck was a tiny little line that was unnoticeable to anyone else. Memories, however, didn't fade as quickly as the physical evidence, and even as she sat down at her parents' dinner table, with Dagr at her side and his own parents on his side, she found it hard to think of anything but Loki. And that made her want to punch herself in the face.
She decided then and there, as they all ate and drank and barely acknowledged her existence amongst them, that she would stop being pathetic. So she made a mistake - big deal. Everyone made mistakes, and she wouldn't sit idly by and fret as her fate was being decided for her. She would at least participate in her supposed courtship, whether she had a legal say in its result or not.
She turned to the man at her side and gave him a good, critical look. He was not terrible looking. He was blonde and short-haired, tall and well-built, everything she would expect from a Royal Guard. He had a square-ish face, light brown eyes and lips that she thought were a little too large for his face, but he was... average. Her suitor could have been much, much worse physically, all things considered.
He noticed her looking at him, perhaps for the first time that night, and he gave her a small smile. She returned it, then suddenly slapped her face - the same damn fly that had been stubbornly buzzing around her house for the last week had landed on her face, in between her eyes, and she responded with a hard slap before she had a chance to think about it first.
"I'm sorry," she half-laughed, realizing how foolish she must have looked.
"No apologies necessary," he assured her.
She had been courted before, and it had always held a degree of awkwardness, but this was ridiculous. She tried to think of something - anything - to say, and then the fly landed on the tip of Dagr's nose. He smacked his face as she had smacked hers a moment ago, and the undamaged fly then headed her way. She grimaced and swatted at it, and then squeaked when the obnoxious thing then dove directly into the neckline of her dress.
Suddenly, she was in a dilemma - in the present company, she couldn't reach in her dress and fish the insect out, but she also couldn't sit there with a fly buzzing about her breasts, especially not when Dagr had witnessed it all and was now staring at her chest. She gave him a quick glare, and he caught himself and looked away as she hurriedly excused herself from the table.
Cursing the utterly bizarre nature of what had just happened, Aemilia stomped off to the nearest bathroom and locked herself inside. She turned to the mirror and pulled on the neckline of her dress, peering into it and seeing nothing. She then felt around, trying to figure out where the pest had gone, but she found no sign of it. She furrowed her brows and then tugged harder on the neckline, pulling it as far out as possible as she looked one last time. Then, three things happened at once.
A hand clamped down on her mouth, an arm snaked around her waist and pulled her into a hard chest, and a velvety voice whispered hotly into her ear, "You look as if you might be in need of assistance."
She would have screamed had the hand not muffled her voice, and she wasn't sure if she'd ever been so purposefully terrified in all her life. But then she'd heard that voice, and her urge to scream died in her throat.
His hand slowly fell away from her mouth, sliding down over her neck as she sucked in a deep breath. She looked up into the mirror and saw the face of her dark prince next to her own, looking at her reflection with an open hunger that made her knees weak. His lips grazed her ear as he said, "Remarkable how one little fly can be such a nuisance."
His hand then ran over where hers had been before his sudden invasion, and he gently groped her through her dress. His lips descended upon her neck, and as much as she wanted to throw him off of her and yell at him for having the audacity to show up like this, right now, after seemingly ceasing to exist for the past week, her voice was frozen in her throat. She simply stared at him, suddenly breathing heavily through her mouth as his tongue ran down her neck to her shoulder.
"But, you see," he said in a low voice as he trailed his lips back towards her ear, "a fly on a wall can see everything."
Suddenly, her lagging mind caught up and realized what had just happened and what he was trying to tell her.
Master of magic. Shapeshifter. He was the fly. He'd been the fly all along.
Her eyes widened and she found her voice again. "Why?" she demanded. "And why are you doing this right now?"
"Shhh," Loki grinned, turning her around and holding her against the edge of the sink with his body. "We wouldn't want your suitor and his family to hear us, now would we?"
"No," she said, shaking her head, not saying the word in reply to his rhetorical question but as her own statement. "No, I will not do this. Not after -"
He cut her off with a searing kiss to her lips. Her hands rose to his chest to push him away, but he caught her wrists and used them to pull her closer as he dominated her mouth with ease. Her hands may have fought him but her lips parted for him immediately, and he didn't suppress his groan when her tongue began a futile fight with his for control.
In the wake of her very quick, almost laughable defeat, he let go of her wrists, and she quickly moved her hands to his hair and held him desperately close as her response to him became ever more frenzied. She was disappointed in herself but she couldn't stop, didn't want to stop, and progressively became less and less capable of rational thought the longer he kissed her.
She gasped when his lips left hers and latched to her neck, then gasped again when he lifted her up and left her nothing to do but wrap her legs around his waist and hold on to his hair and shoulders as he ground against her. He turned them and pushed her up against the opposite wall with a too-loud thud before drawing back to look her over.
"Look at you," he grinned, watching her breath come in ragged gasps and her heated eyes narrow at his words. "You would let me have you, right here, as your family and suitor dines in the next room. Do you know what that makes you?"
Her eyes flashed, as if reality suddenly washed over her in a curtain of anger, and she tried to shove him away. He didn't budge, so she slapped him. He barely flinched, aside from the smallest of jerks from his head and a grin that made her think he'd enjoyed it. He kissed her again, and she moaned woefully into his mouth.
One of his hands slid the skirt of her already-skewed dress higher up her leg, and he ended the kiss only when the same hand had snaked up to her center and gave her the lightest of touches. "Ah... so ready for me, just as I knew you'd be."
She closed her eyes and tensed, waiting for whatever he was going to do next to happen. Then he shocked her by setting her down on her feet.
He took a step back, and she stared up at him in confusion. He merely smirked and smoothed down her newly mussed hair with one hand as he said, "I won't keep you from your guests any longer."
"But-"
"Once they have gone, however," he leaned in close and she closed her eyes as his lips tickled her ear, "you are mine."
Then he vanished. Aemilia gritted her teeth and cursed his name.
Aemilia was almost relieved when Dagr asked to accompany her on a walk when she'd finally emerged from the bathroom. The cool night air sounded far preferable to her parents' dining room, especially since her skin was still burning from Loki's sudden intrusion, and she hoped that it would help set her mind right.
It didn't. Her mind raced with Loki's promise of what the night would hold for her as she walked down the cobblestone path with the man who aspired to be her intended, but she did an impressive job of not letting it show. She knew that Loki wanted her to tremble and stutter through the remainder of the night, and she wouldn't give him the satisfaction. She schooled her features and again prepared to wade through Dagr's awkward attempts at conversation.
"I hear you were received very favorably at the palace not more than a week ago," Dagr said as they walked slowly. Her home was on a large, sprawling bit of land, closer to the western mountain range than to the shining city, and the pathway was full of the sounds of nighttime wildlife. "I would have loved to see your performance, but I was assigned to guard the weapon's vault that night."
She nodded. "It was nerve-wracking, but it did go very well."
"And you also are involved with the theater?"
"Smaller productions, mostly," she replied. "But yes."
"Surely singing for the King and his court will arise new opportunities for your career," Dagr said.
She raised a brow at this - a potential suitor who spoke favorably of her ambitions? This was nearly unheard of.
"Time is sensitive, after all," he continued. "I do believe in the importance of a maiden achieving her own aspirations, if she has them, before she begins bearing children."
And just like that, Aemilia's very short-lived hope that Dagr was different from the typical Asgardian male went up in smoke. Of course he wasn't different - why would he be? The men were all the same, living it up in their long-lived youth with whomever they pleased before taking a wife who would give them an heir and run their home - and do very little else. Sure, she could have her little "aspirations" now, but once she was married and settled, those would simply have to fall by the wayside and be forgotten.
Dagr noted her silence and attempted to change the subject. "Your home is lovely. Did you grow up here?"
She sighed. He really was trying to keep the conversation flowing, but she simply had no energy or care to genuinely participate. It didn't mean she wouldn't force herself to, however. "Yes. This estate has been in my family for a millennia."
"Your father's side?"
"Actually, my mo-"
A soft hoot from directly over her head stopped her short. Aemilia looked up into the branches of a large tree that loomed over the pathway and saw a large, jet-black owl sitting proudly on the longest branch and watching them intently. The owl's strikingly, and unnaturally, green eyes gave its true identity away, and Aemilia suspected that was the point. She glared at the owl before clearing her throat and finishing her sentence. "The estate has been passed down through my mother's side."
"Ah. Would you be sad to leave the mountainside?"
She frowned slightly, listening to the flutter of wings overhead as the owl followed them. "I choose not to contemplate such matters until they are imminent."
"That is fair."
Hoot hoot. Aemilia looked up and again glared stonily at the owl as it hopped gracefully between branches. Then it winked at her. She nearly picked up a stone and hurled it at the not-bird in response.
She couldn't deny the propriety of Loki's owl persona. Owls were intelligent, calculating hunters of the night, and she could suddenly relate to how a mouse must regularly feel.
"I suppose we ought to head back," Dagr said, and Aemilia could not have been happier to turn back.
The walk back was largely silent, punctuated by soft little hoots until Aemilia was safely back inside her home. Dagr and his parents left soon after, and she dutifully endured the uncomfortable goodbyes and Dagr's even more uncomfortable kiss to her hand. Once he was gone, Aemilia turned to her mother and nearly gagged at the happiness etched on her beautiful face.
"Is he not a lovely man?" Ayre smiled, placing a hand on her daughter's shoulder.
"He is exactly as I thought he would be," Aemilia answered vaguely. "I'm sure you are very pleased."
"I should hope that you are as well," Ayre said, her tone a fraction more sober as she took in Aemilia's expression.
Aemilia smiled and brushed off her morher's hand, heading towards the staircase. "It matters not if I am."
She ignored the calls of her mother as she raced to her room, craving solitude and knowing that she would find nothing of the sort. She yanked her door open as soon as she reached it, barked at her handmaiden to leave her task of tidying her room, and then slammed the door shut behind her. She then stood there and huffed, "I know you're here."
In response, she felt a swift, soft kiss pressed to her neck from behind her, and her stomach flipped traitorously in response. She turned quickly and glared at Loki's always-smirking face. "Take me elsewhere."
"Why?"
"Because I wish to raise my voice to you and I do not want my family to hear."
His smirk grew. "As you wish."
He took her hand, and a blink later, she was in his palace chambers, right in the perfect middle of his enormous room. She yanked her hand away and tried to ignore the fact that it was shaking as she steeled herself. "I demand that you stop this... game, or scheme, or whatever it may be that you're doing and leave me be."
He raised a dark brow. "Oh? You demand this?"
"Yes!" she said, already exasperated. "What are you hoping to accomplish?! I do not want to be followed by you, and I certainly do not want to be your plaything. There is quite enough that I must endure without the added stress of you and your..."
"My what?"
She frowned. "Your mischief."
"Ah," he grinned. "I think that perhaps you are using myself as an outlet for anger that is not truly directed towards me. If it is your desire to relieve yourself of that anger, I can think of a far more effective method."
Her shoulders sagged slightly and she let out a humorless laugh. "Can you not see things from my perspective? I have already worsened my lot by making my first mistake with you. I do not wish to make a second one."
"Tell me how I worsened your lot," he said casually, strolling around her towards a small table. She turned and watched as he began to pour two goblets of what she assumed was wine as she spoke.
"Is it not obvious?" she asked. "I let my curiosity get the better of me, and now I am nothing more than a fool of a girl whose future husband will know that she is impure and will treat her accordingly. Beyond that," she said, adding a bite to her tone, "I must also endure the whims of a prince who apparently thinks that I am his to command, even as I am being courted."
As she finished, he turned and offered her a goblet. She crossed her arms over her chest and shook her head. "Is that all?" he asked with a slightly bored tone.
She blinked. "Is it not enough reason for me to be angry?"
"There is more," he said simply, taking a long sip of the wine. "You've yet to address the true reasoning behind your actions at the palace."
"Oh?" she said defiantly. "Then perhaps you know more of my motivation than I, so please, enlighten me, my Prince."
He chuckled lowly - he rather enjoyed her sarcastic mouth. "In my time spent... observing you, I've come to realize several things about you that I don't believe you yourself are aware of. First and foremost... you are an utterly rebellious little creature."
She widened her eyes in a gesture meant to tell him to hurry up and elaborate. He went on, "You are not content with the life that you will be forced to live. You despise the ways of Asgardian society with respect to courtship and marriage, yet you rightfully believe that you have no choice other than to unhappily abide by it. So, what does a woman such as yourself do as she senses the end of her freedom drawing ever closer?"
He was circling her now, and Aemilia listened to his words with rapt attention. She couldn't help it - he could have read her the entirety of Asgard's texts regarding agricultural bylaws and she still would have listened just as intently.
"She takes a once in a lifetime opportunity lent to her to sing for the King himself. At first that's all she thinks the night will hold. But then something catches her eye... something a bit darker than what she is accustomed to. Something frightening and exciting. Something she finds herself craving a taste of."
His voice was lower now, and his hand reached out and slid along her waist as he walked around her.
"So she takes a risk. She teases a Prince and provokes his interest. She knows what her actions will bring about, and she does it purposefully. Why? Because as her own personal statement against the terribly unfair position that she finds herself in, she exerts control of the one thing that is, as of now, still hers and hers alone - her body."
He accentuated his words with his hand as it slid from her side down her hip. Aemilia kept her eyes on the floor, feeling his breath on her neck and trying desperately to not shiver.
"You know what will happen when you marry, when your husband beds you and you do not shed so much as a drop of blood. He cannot punish you for your past indiscretion, or publicly scorn you, but he can talk, and he can be sure that his noble new wife feels the shame of her mistake from her peers. You've seen this happen to others, have you not?"
She nodded miserably.
"And yet, you risk that shame anyway. You risk it to spend a night in your Prince's bed. You risk it because you would rather face the shame of your lust than live your life knowing that you were too much of a coward to take what you wanted when you had the chance. You risk it and relish the way it feels to break the rules for the first time in your young life, and you cannot contain your excitement at the thought of breaking them again... and again."
With every word he spoke, his voice took on a more and more lascivious tone, and Aemilia didn't realized that she'd closed her eyes until they popped open at the sudden sensation of a tongue sweeping along the edge of her ear. She felt herself being pulled closer, into the heat of his body, and his voice melted into her ear again. "You say you don't want to be my plaything, but we both know that you've spent the last week in a state of utter obsession, crawling into your bed every night and praying that I would come to you, only to wake up alone and disappointed."
She let out a sound of despair and trembled as his lips kissed down her jaw. "I don't... I shouldn't want this," she breathed. "I am no fool... I know that nothing good can come of this."
"Perhaps your definition of 'good' needs to be broadened," he replied, fingers playing with the tops of the sleeves of her dress. "But, think of it this way... you've already given yourself to me once. You cannot get your virtue back by denying your desires. What harm is there in taking advantage of my interest in you?"
She laughed hollowly. "A body full of bruises, to start with."
Slowly, she felt his breath fade from her skin, and he turned her around to face him. He looked confused. "What?"
She looked away as she answered. "They healed quickly, of course, but... you left me quite bruised."
For a moment, he seemed at a loss for what to say, and she could hardly believe she was witnessing such a thing. "I... was not aware when... forgive me. I did not intend to cause you harm."
Aemilia simply stared for a moment at him as he tripped over his words. Perhaps he truly did feel badly about it. "Well, at least the bruises faded far quicker than your bite did."
His lips quirked. "But you look so lovely in a high collared dress, darling."
She rolled her eyes. "You can dance around me with your wit all night long, but it changes nothing."
"No," he agreed. "You are correct. I suggest that we come to an agreement."
She narrowed her eyes slightly as he turned and headed back towards the small table that held his refreshments. "What sort?"
He grabbed a small glass and began speaking. "You will agree to continue to come to me when I call. As often or as little as I please. You will share no other man's bed so long as you are sharing mine. You will speak not a word of our... arrangement to anyone."
He turned, the small glass now full of what looked like tea, and began walking back to her. "And what of your end of the agreement?"
"What would you prefer my end to entail?"
She was a little surprised, but she quickly answered. "Would it be unrealistic of me to request the same of you?"
He raised a brow. "How do you intend to call upon a Prince of Asgard?"
She considered that for a moment and decided that he was right, that probably wasn't terribly possible while discretion was imperative. "But as for discretion and lack of other lovers?"
"You want me all to yourself," he observed with a small grin.
"If I am to entertain the foolish idea of agreeing to this," she sighed, "I would prefer the terms to be equal. Although I can only imagine how much more of a fool it makes me to request such a thing."
"Is there anything else?"
She paused, thinking hard and quickly. "Yes. Your 'calls' will not interfere with my daily life - my singing, my theater work, my time with my family. You must respect my work and my commitments."
"And?"
She blinked. Her next words tumbled out before she had a chance to stop them. "Please do not be cruel."
Loki's gaze became blank. A moment passed before he spoke. "Do you agree to the terms I described to you?"
She nodded. "Yes."
"Then I agree to yours."
He held the glass in his hands out to her, and she looked at him questioningly.
"Contraceptive potion."
"Oh," she said, quickly taking the glass. She blinked as she looked into the light brown liquid, suddenly painfully shocked at what had just happened - had she really just agreed to this affair when only moments ago she'd been yelling and bemoaning the stupidity of her choices? The sight of the potion made it all very, very real very quickly, and her head began to spin.
"Last time I used a spell," Loki said absently. "But I wouldn't be so foolish as to trust myself to remember to cast it each time. I'll show you how to make the potion yourself after this night."
Aemilia nodded absently, still staring at the potion as if it was the line that she was about to skip across. A point of no return, perhaps. She looked up at Loki, who was studying her with his ever-calculating green eyes.
She didn't trust him for one minute to hold up his end of their agreement. There is no more skilled liar in all the realms than I, he had boasted on that fateful night only a week ago. She knew this would not end easily or without some degree of disaster. He was already far too obsessed with her, and she seemed to be unable to say no to him and mean it. It was a match made in Hel.
But... every word he'd spoken to her a few moments ago had been excruciatingly true. Simply due to the gender she'd been born with, she faced a future decided upon by others who thought that they knew best and cared little for her opinion. She did indeed want to rebel, and she couldn't have dreamed of a better way than to do what she was about to do, but she still knew that it was foolish.
Then again, once she was married and settled, how many chances would she get to ever be foolish again?
Would she ever feel anything even remotely comparable to what the prince had made her feel?
She swiftly brought the glass to her lips and drank. It tasted like herbs and citrus, not at all unpleasant, and she drained it in one gulp. She then held the empty glass out, and Loki took it wordlessly.
He vanished the cup with a lazy motion of his hand. Aemilia met his eyes once more and squared her shoulders as he chuckled quietly. It was annoying - he was always smirking or laughing.
"Why are you doing this?" she asked softly. "Surely you have your pick of maidens - why this... interest in me?"
"Why not?"
She sighed. "I want you to truly answer me."
"And I did," he replied. "Why should I not want you? Do you think yourself unworthy?"
"No," she answered truthfully. "I just... did not not expect a Prince of Asgard to bed me and then spend the next week disguised as a fly, watching me from the walls of my home."
He grinned. "I've not stopped watching you since the moment I watched you sing."
"But why?"
"Because I do as I please," he replied before making her yelp a tiny bit in surprise as he grabbed her hand and yanked her against him. "Do not question your Prince."
She accepted the fact that he wasn't going to answer and closed her eyes as he pressed his lips to her neck. One of his hands tangled in her hair at the back of her head and gave it a tug, earning a him another little yelp as he ran his tongue over her pulse.
"My parents," she said, eyes still closed and voice breathless, "if they notice my absence -"
He jerked his head up and quickly said, "They will not. Your door is bewitched."
"Bewi-"
He kissed her lips and cut her off, and she felt her feet leave the ground as his arms scooped her up effortlessly. A moment later, she was tossed nearly carelessly into the glorious silken luxury of his bed, and she looked up at him with darkened eyes as he stood and took in the sight of her in his bed once more.
"Take it off," he said, his gaze gesturing to her dress.
"I need help," she half-smiled. "It laces in the back."
She then turned in the bed so that she faced the headboard, and she rose to her knees, pulling her dark hair to the side to show him the laces. She tried to breathe steadily as she felt his weight shift the bed beneath her, then felt her stomach flip when he kissed the back of her neck as his fingers began plucking at the laces.
"You ask your lover to help rid you of the dress you wore to meet the man who would be your intended," he said lowly against her ear, and Aemilia nearly blushed at the word lover. "You would have let me have you right there, as he and your family dined in the next room, wouldn't you?"
She closed her eyes and shivered as his lips kissed teasingly along her ear.
"Answer me."
"Probably," she admitted, feeling pathetic and daring and aroused all at the same time.
She felt the material at her back being pried apart, and then Loki's hands were grasping her skirt and pulling up. She raised her arms and let him remove the dress, leaving her only her slip underneath, and then his arms pulled her back against his chest. One of his hands then grasped her by the jaw and wrenched her face up and to the side so that he could kiss her, hard at first and then deeply as it went on, and his other hand began to reacquaint itself with her body.
She grasped his hair as he touched her, both under and over her slip, holding and squeezing her breast and then moving down to quickly push up the thin fabric and feel her skin against his palm, all as he kissed her into a stupor. She came back to life when she felt his fingers tickling under her navel, slowly trailing down to the hem of her underwear before sliding beneath it.
He broke from her lips to breathe as he touched her, resting his forehead against hers as he grinned. "So little effort makes you so ready, my lady."
She gave a soft groan as he started gently rubbing her. "I've been at a constant state of readiness for the last seven days," she said, almost surprised by her own words.
"I know," he said, kissing her jaw and making her wonder exactly how much he'd observed during his time as a fly. "Did you relieve that tension yourself?"
"No," she answered truthfully, gasping as he slowly increased the pace. She knew she wouldn't last long. "I was too angry at you... I wouldn't..."
She felt his smirk against her cheek. "You must understand... I could not resist the chance to watch you slowly become so crazed with desperation that you would act as you have today."
Barely hearing his words, Aemilia tried to blindly shift one of her hands to his leg behind her for balance, and instead brushed his own clothed arousal with her palm. She didn't correct herself, instead taking hold and teasing him, feeling his body tense behind her but his fingers didn't falter in the slightest. She tilted her head and kissed him herself before she moved her hand inside his pants, finding nearly no room but making it work as best as she could, moving along his length at the same pace as he was taking with her. He stopped mid-kiss to let out a strained huff, and she smiled against his lips.
He answered with a sudden change in pace that left her scrambling to keep up her own efforts, and she abandoned them altogether when the sudden, mild pain of his teeth on her neck set off the first wave of her release. She arched and shook helplessly in his arms, and he didn't let go until she slowly went limp and sagged with satisfaction.
He laid her down gently on the bed, and she watched through her mild haze as he did away with his clothes as well as the slip on her own body. Everything else was a million miles away, irrelevant and unworthy of the slightest bit of thought, incapable of breaching the moment as she felt his cool, bare skin cover hers. His weight upon her was light and controlled as he dipped his head down to lavish attention to her breasts, and it reignited her passion within an instant. She twisted her fingers into his impossibly soft black hair and drew her legs up around his hips, and he lifted his head to grin down at her flushed face. "Eager, are we?"
Aemilia responded by pulling him up for a kiss, wrapping her legs around his waist and then letting out a squeak of surprise when he suddenly rolled them over. She found herself straddling his hips, brushing softly against his hardness as he held her firmly in place. "Ride me."
She paused, looking him in the eyes and holding her hands on his chest for balance, just a moment's hesitation passing before she lowered herself down upon him. She moved slowly, wincing at the slight sting as he filled her and closing her eyes as it grew into a pain that made a flash of unpleasant heat come over her.
"Relax," she heard him say when she'd slid fully over him. "It will fade as you move."
She nodded, having not expected the sudden pain, but she slowly raised up and then lowered back down, then again, and the pain indeed faded with each new movement. When the last trace of discomfort had gone and been replaced by little sparks of pleasure, she moaned softly, then felt Loki's hands grip her hips tightly in his hands. He then guided her movements, rotating her gently around him rather than simply bobbing her up and down, and she followed his lead beautifully. Soon she had figured out her own rhythm, sitting back slightly to better angle herself for her own pleasure, and she suddenly felt a rush of an unfamiliar feeling - power.
Naturally, it only lasted for a moment before Loki suddenly sat up, hoisting her up in his arms and then tossing her on her back, her head down at the foot of the bed and feet up near his pillows as he plunged back inside of her. Power wasn't something he liked to share, clearly, but the change of position allowed him to kiss her into oblivion, and she didn't protest.
He drove into her, his mouth on hers and on her neck and at her ear, and as her second release built languidly, his came hurtling towards him far more quickly. He lifted his chest from hers and shoved a hand between them with a growl, holding himself up with a forearm next to her head as he whispered harshly into her ear, "Come, Aemilia."
She almost screamed at the sudden added sensation of his fingers, then reeled when he repeated his command in a desperately lustful tone, and it was all far too much - she could do nothing but oblige, in fact beating him to the end, clenching down around him so tightly that he bit her shoulder to keep from biting a hole into his own flesh.
In some vague part of her mind that still functioned in the moments that passed after, Aemilia wondered if she would ever get used to this. She had lived now for nearly three centuries - making her still quite the young Asgardian maiden - and in those years, had never been passionately kissed. She had never been spoken to salaciously, never stepped a single toe into a bed that wasn't her own. Now, however, she found herself staring through heavy-lidded eyes at a Prince's palace ceiling as he lay over her, still inside of her, breathing contentedly against her neck as she ran her fingers gently through his now-messy hair. She was now his lover, officially, and he hers.
She knew she might look back one day and cry with anger and frustration at her current actions. She knew that Loki had all the power. She knew that she was a long way from truly knowing or understanding him, if she ever would. She knew that she shouldn't feel as safe as she did in his bed.
And yet, despite all of that, as of that moment, she regretted nothing.
Eventually, Loki rolled to his side, taking Aemilia with him, and she looked up into his green eyes as his his thumb rubbed over her hip absently. He met her gaze and let a few moments of silence pass before he asked softly, "What are you thinking about, dear Aemilia?"
"Would you answer me truthfully if I asked you the same?"
Slowly, a smile spread on Loki's face. His lover was not foolish. He'd chosen well. "Right now, yes I would. Because truthfully," he said, briefly kissing her lips before turning to her neck, "at the present moment, I can think of little else but how deeply I want to taste you again."
Aemilia gulped against her will and closed her eyes as he slowly kissed and slithered down her body, giving in fully to the truth of her new reality and finding that, all things considered... maybe it wasn't so bad after all.
A/N: so! This is officially not a oneshot, but an incredibly long work in progress! Which is exciting and terrifying for me all at once! Lol, but anyway, so much thanks to reviewers and those who alerted/faved. I do hope you'll pl stick with this story as it develops. I plan to cover the entire established timeline (including TDW which I saw tonight, holy crap, no words, I'm in a fangirl coma, gahhh asdfghjkl) Thanks for reading and please do leave your thoughts, good or bad, it does help the muse a lot :D