Loki stared at his half-eaten breakfast plate, not really seeing it as his leaned on the palm of his hand, lost in thought. He touched two of his fingertips to his lips while his other hand lay limp on the table in front of him, and rather than fight the thoughts running through his mind, he let them consume it entirely.
He had come to Aemilia last night fully intent on showing her that there were consequences to be had for her behavior at the banquet. As enticed as he was by her unexpected little displays and play for power - as minuscule as that power was - he couldn't have her thinking that she'd gained any sort of upper hand in their arrangement. But then he came and retrieved her from her home for the night, and her unexpected breakdown threw his plans into chaos.
It would have been one thing if she had just finished her brief crying fit and then allowed the night to get on as he'd intended, but she hadn't. No, she had effectively pulled the rug out from underneath him and left him utterly out of his element with a simple kiss.
He could still feel the ghost of the kiss on his lips as he touched them lightly. He hadn't kissed a woman the way that she had kissed him in centuries, and a woman hadn't kissed him like that in... well, ever. He had learned early on to use kisses as tools to get what he wanted and keep them from taking on any level of intimacy, and it had worked perfectly well for him and his purposes.
Last night was a perfect example of why he stuck to such a philosophy. The moment she asked him to kiss her - only kiss her - his instincts had begun screaming at him to tell her no and remind her that she was here to warm his bed, nothing else. But, to his horror, she had so caught him off guard that words had uncharacteristically failed him, and then she had taken matters into her own hands and kissed him as she wanted to be kissed herself.
His eyes fluttered briefly shut as he allowed himself to fully relive that moment. He hadn't wanted to respond, hadn't wanted to let her get her way like that, but her soft and slightly clumsy way of urging him for a response had broken his resolve. It was stupid and it went against all of his rules, but it had felt too undeniably good to stop once he'd allowed himself the smallest of kisses back. The way that she held him closer in relief and joy when he had was the nail in his coffin, and from there, he couldn't remember how long he had simply held her and reveled in the kiss. He did remember being the one to resume it a few times during the fleeting times they'd break away to take a breath.
Then he'd reiterated his claim upon her. She agreed without hesitation, and he pretended for a moment that he'd only kissed her so intimately to strengthen her acceptance of his possession over her. That it had just been another kiss used as a tool, and one that had worked perfectly, but even a master of lies can't always lie to himself. His trembling hands and embarrassingly breathless lungs had been proof enough that he'd broken his own rule for the first time.
He opened his eyes and felt the warmth of the memory dissipate as he tried not to remember what had happened next. He felt no better about it today than he had during or after it last night, but he hadn't been able to help it. She had left him feeling open and terrifyingly exposed, and once the shock of it had worn off, he had opted to regain control the only way he knew how - by reasserting it over her.
She didn't utter a word of complaint when he wrenched her mouth away from his and flipped her over on her hands and knees, even though he knew full well by now that it was her least favored position. He didn't care - it kept their lips apart and prevented her from stealing anymore kisses while he attempted to erase those last few moments with the roughest sex he'd had with her to date. It wasn't like the first night, when he'd forgotten that he had spelled her to feel no pain and thus truly accidentally lost track of his own strength - this time it was all quite purposeful, and he knew he'd leave her bruised again, and he didn't care. Let the bruises be a reminder of who and what he truly was to her, he decided.
He still made sure that she came with him in the end, and he'd felt her cries erupt from her throat as he gripped it painlessly in his hand. It was a few blurry moments later, when he'd finally withdrawn from her and let go of her throat to let her collapse in a heap on the bed, that he realized he'd accomplished nothing. He sat on his heels, running a hand through his sweat-soaked hair, watching the girl lay limply on her stomach as she tried to recover, and he felt like a fool. This ridiculous, infuriating, sweet girl had shown him more affection tonight than any other lover ever had in his life, and he responded by taking her like some kind of out of control savage.
He was, in a word, an idiot.
To ease his sudden wave of self-hatred, he had then knelt over her - cringing when she tensed slightly at his proximity - and placed his hands on her already-darkening thighs to heal her before she had a chance to fully bruise. Then he'd turned her over, gently, to her back and traced his fingertips over her hips to prevent the inevitable hand-shaped bruises that would have appeared by the morning, and kissed her hipbone as she relaxed under the warmth of his healing magic.
He had felt a vague, disturbing urge to tell her that he was sorry, and he didn't know why he couldn't bring himself to say it. He'd apologized the first time he'd made her bruise, but that time had been unintentional - this time he'd been aware of what he was doing, and even though he'd healed her almost immediately afterwards, it hadn't assuaged his current state of self-loathing and ridicule.
Then her hand had come to rest tentatively in his hair, and the simple touch was enough to make him relax just a bit. He kissed her hipbone again, then trailed his lips to her thigh, and in lieu of verbally apologizing to her, he found himself overcome with desire for her. He spread her thighs before him and set his mouth to her, and he didn't stop his work until he'd lost count of how many more times he made her fall apart. Eventually she begged him to stop, saying she couldn't handle anymore, and only then did he cease his actions, hoping stupidly that his now-numb tongue had made up for the pain he'd caused her.
Back in the present, Loki opened his eyes and lowered his face into his palm, cringing at all of the memories. If all it took from this girl was one single kiss to so derail him and make him act so stupid, then clearly she was far more dangerous than he'd given her credit for, and the wise course of action would be to immediately sever all contact with her, for his own sake.
"Loki?"
He opened his eyes and looked up, across the small table to his mother, and quickly schooled his features into his usual blank expression. He and Frigga were in her chambers, having breakfast in front of her balcony doors while Odin and Thor were off training together in a father-son bonding exercise that Loki hadn't been invited to. "Mother?"
"What's ailing you?" she asked gently.
"Nothing," he shrugged, and she inclined her head knowingly towards him.
"You haven't been sleeping well, have you?"
He stayed silent rather than answer. No, he hadn't gotten a decent night's sleep in nearly two months, mostly due to his own desires, but his two weeks in Alfheim had been even more horribly sleepless, for no good reason.
"You know that you can always come to me, for anything," she said softly. "What is spoken between us stays between us. It always has."
"I know."
His mother smiled gently. "Spend the day with me. Like we used to. I've not seen you practice your magic in some time. I miss it."
He nodded. "I will meet you in the gardens this afternoon, then."
She smiled again. "I look forward to it."
He gave her a tight smile, then rose and briefly kissed her cheek as he walked past her. He headed out of her rooms and directly towards his own, needing to get his head straight and decide what to do with his current problem.
If he gave Aemilia up now, as he knew was wise, it may backfire and cause his still-raging obsession to grow to such lengths that he wouldn't be able to control it. He'd never not allowed his obsessions to run their course, so cutting one off halfway was uncharted territory. But, if he didn't, and things like last night continued to happen in the future, that was also uncharted territory.
Which begged the question. What exactly was this maiden doing to him to cause such a dilemma in the first place?
He blinked when he realized he was standing in the middle of his bedroom - he barely remembered getting there. He then sighed and turned towards his bath, only to freeze in place when he suddenly felt soft lips kiss behind his ear and hands slide on top of his shoulders.
"Aemilia?" he asked automatically, eyes narrowed as he wondered how the girl would have managed to get here without his help.
"Who?" a deeper feminine voice giggled into his ear. A scent invaded his nose, vanilla and berries, not Aemilia's signature rose mixture, and he turned to look at the woman.
"Ilyana," he muttered, frowning slightly at the sight of one of his old lovers. She was tall, slim and had hair so blonde that it was nearly white, and she was one of the more promiscuous lovers he'd taken. It had happened during a time of great boredom for him, and it hadn't taken long for her activities with other men to turn him off of her. He was too greedy to tolerate that. "How did you get in here?"
"I have my ways," she shrugged innocently. "You didn't dance with me last night."
"Was I supposed to?" he asked, his tone bored. "I'm sure you found ways to entertain yourself."
"I always do," she grinned. "Doesn't mean I wouldn't like your help every now and then."
"I'm busy today," he lied. "Try your luck with someone else."
He moved to turn away, and she snatched his hand. "I do love it when you play hard to get," she purred as she pressed herself against him, and he scowled but didn't move. She pressed her lips to his neck and he lifted his hand to grab her and push her away before something occurred to him and made him stop.
He had already established to himself that giving Aemilia up was the wise thing to do. It suddenly seemed like the smartest idea in the world that he should now prove to himself that he could find satisfaction elsewhere, that he didn't need the object of his obsession to keep him occupied and sated. He could barely tolerate the woman who was currently sucking at the base of his neck, but, she was there, and now seemed as good a time as any to put his new theory to the test.
She trailed her tongue from his neck to his ear as his hands unfroze, one of them rising to unceremoniously grope her through her thin dress while the other grabbed her hair and pulled her head away from him.
He looked at her blankly for a moment, observing her cold gray eyes and the red pout of her lips, and he confirmed to himself that she would do. The hand in her hair moved to her shoulder, and he roughly pushed her down to her knees in front of him. She chuckled low in her throat at his acquiescence and quickly went to work freeing him from the confines of his pants, a moment later using her hand to ready him when she found him only barely aroused.
He stared down at the woman as she worked, his mind blank as he willed his body to be responsive. When he got bored of looking at her, he let his eyes roll shut, and a moment later he felt her warm tongue and mouth begin their work on him.
She started off too fast, so he grabbed her hair and set her at a slower pace. She followed his lead for a moment or two, then wandered off to her own pace, and he again grabbed her and changed it back. His eyes were still closed, but they opened when the thought crossed his mind that he never had to continuously guide Aemilia when she did this to him.
Ilyana may have known what men liked, but she was not tailored to Loki's tastes. She was teasing him too much, and watching her wasn't helping him along at all, so he let his eyes close again as he grabbed her hair one last time and decided to guide her somewhat angrily until he finished, because it otherwise wasn't going to happen.
He imagined that the woman on her knees was not someone he half-despised and considered to be little more than a common whore. He pretended that he didn't have to manually push her head back and forth to gleam any pleasure from her mouth, and he pretended that the odd sense of self-disgust welling up inside of him wasn't really there and that he would feel perfectly fine with himself when this was over.
It wasn't until he let himself imagine Aemilia in Ilyana's place that he felt a truly pleasurable jolt go through him. He thought of her her soft lips, her mouth that he'd trained to please him and him alone, the way she'd peek up at him and gently scratch her nails down his thighs as she worked, and he groaned as he clung to the image.
Then he felt teeth graze him - not enough to hurt but enough to make his eyes open in sudden concern for himself - and he realized that the entire point of letting Ilyana do this to him had just been rendered pathetically moot by his own traitorous thoughts. The disgust that had been slowly growing inside of swelled and then erupted. He grit his teeth and yanked Ilyana's head back by her hair and then shoved her away from him, and she stumbled down to her backside on the floor with a yelp. It had probably hurt, but he could not have cared less.
"Get out," he said quietly, fixing his clothes as he turned his back to the woman.
"But..."
"Get out!" he yelled, turning and wrenching her up by her forearm and hurtling her towards the door. She stared at him in disbelief but hurried out of his room, and when his door slammed shut behind her, Loki didn't stop his anger from manifesting in the form of a small burst of magic that reverberated around the room and knocked all of the furniture other than his bed to the floor.
This was not good.
Aemilia woke up maybe four hours after Loki had finally brought her home. She had no choice but to wake up early - she had singing to do today, and her instructor wasn't flexible with her hours. Ignoring the protests of her sleepy mind and body, she dragged herself out of bed and tried not to scowl too deeply as the previous day's events came rushing back to her.
She blamed her mother for all of it, she decided as she parted her window's curtains and let the sunlight warm her room. If it hadn't have been for her mother's cruel drunken words, she was sure that she wouldn't have felt so needy and drained when Loki brought her to his bed, and thus she never would have been foolish enough to kiss him the way that she had. And that kiss had made him snap so bizarrely that she was still confused and unsure of how to interpret his actions the morning after.
Yawning, she went to her bathroom and robotically began filling the tub before going to the sink to brush her teeth. She hadn't even expected Loki to return her kiss at all - she knew he had no reason to, it wasn't what he wanted from her - but then he went and shocked her by not only returning her kiss but savoring it. Then he gave her whiplash with the rest of his actions, and she had no idea what to do with any of it.
He'd acted mildly horrified with how roughly he'd taken her, much more horrified than she herself had been. It had been rougher than she'd ever remembered, yes, but he had never been exactly gentle with her, so it wasn't such a stretch from the norm. She'd been expecting him to be slightly off the rails after she'd teased him at the banquet anyway - he really didn't need to make it up to her the way that he had, not that she would have dared complain. It had just been simply dizzying to watch him ping-pong from one extreme to the other.
But then there had been the manner of how he left her for the night. After she'd tended to his needs one last time after his marathon between her legs - which she, not he, had insisted upon - he hadn't looked her in the eye once before he'd vanished her back to her room. He hadn't said a word, either. It seemed like he was ashamed or embarrassed of something, and it was beyond strange to see him like that.
She sunk into her bath with a sigh and immediately closed her eyes. She shouldn't have worn that dress. Shouldn't have kissed him like some lovesick girl looking for affection.
She also should have never gotten into his bed to begin with, but that was neither here nor there.
Still, she would rather think about Loki and all of his oddities than let her mind drift back to her mother. She groaned and sunk further into the water, knowing she'd have to face her within a matter of mere minutes, and most likely, Ayre would remember nothing beyond the banquet.
Slowly, though, even while she tried not to, Aemilia was putting the pieces together in her mind of the fragments Ayre had confessed. She had been infatuated with another man in her youth, which was her sober revelation from the day prior, and she also held a bitter resentment towards Aemilia's very existence due apparently to how motherhood had changed her life. This coming from a woman who touted duty and sacrifice above all else.
It was all connected somehow, she knew. Perhaps Ayre still held a candle for this mystery infatuation of hers and perhaps thought if she were childless, she could have been granted a divorce and been free from Haidr. Aemilia couldn't really see that being the case though, as society-obsessed as Ayre was. Divorce was as rare as disease in Asgard, and the few divorced women in existence were universally shunned. Such a thing was Ayre's worst nightmare.
Aemilia realized she was staring off into space and shook her head to banish the odd thoughts. This was why she'd rather focus on Loki. He was her distraction from the unpleasant side of life that she couldn't fully escape no matter what she did. There was hardly even a point in discovering Ayre's truth - did she really want to know why she held secret bitterness towards her own child? It would only make matters worse, Aemilia was sure of it.
When she could linger no more, eventually Aemilia dragged herself from the comfortable bath and dressed herself for the day. Then she begrudgingly went down to the dining room to get it over with, and she unsurprisingly found her mother sitting half-slumped at the table with a glass of her preferred hangover remedy in her hand. Ayre raised bleary eyes to her daughter when she heard her footsteps, and quickly groaned, "Did I embarrass the family?"
"No," Aemilia rolled her eyes, taking a seat at the opposite end of the table. Haidr wasn't out to breakfast yet, which wasn't too odd a thing. He was older than Ayre and not as early to rise. "No, I got us home before that happened."
"I'm so sorry," Ayre sighed, leaning on her hand. "I didn't mean to get so drunk. Really, one minute I was fine and the next, I was -"
"It's okay," Aemilia shrugged. "Really. I'm used to it." It was an unnecessary jab, but she was feeling extremely annoyed at having to act like everything was fine.
Ayre took the slight with dignity and opted to pause before changing the subject. "I saw you dance with both of the Princes last night. That's exciting."
Aemilia nodded, quickly but delicately eating a pastry and not saying a word in response.
"You and Prince Thor would have made quite the couple."
Aemilia let herself look at Ayre in slight confusion. Ayre shrugged and added, "You looked good together, is all."
She and Loki had been color coordinated - how had they not looked good together? Now Aemilia just wanted to be annoying out of spite, and she didn't care that it was childish. "Prince Loki is a better dancer."
Another pause went by, and then Ayre sighed, "You would favor the lesser prince."
Aemilia took another bite and chewed it as she swallowed an unwise retort. "I try to judge a person on their merit, not the order or manner of their birth."
"Then you may be the only citizen of Asgard who does."
Aemilia took the last bite of the pastry and got to her feet. "I am nearly late. I must go."
She was halfway to the door before her mother's voice stopped her. "Aemilia?"
She paused but didn't look over her shoulder. "Yes, Mother?"
"Thank you for taking care of me."
Aemilia nodded stiffly and then left.
"Impressive, darling."
Loki allowed himself a small grin as he stood in the middle of the sprawling palace gardens, just one in a sea of a hundred copies of himself. Frigga's own smile gave away how impressed she truly was, and Loki kept up the illusions for as long as he could before he felt himself stretched too thin and let them dissolve.
"To be fair," he said, taking a breath and walking towards the bench she was seated at, "I did have a very, very good teacher growing up."
"Only the best for my son," she said cheekily, watching the smile slowly fade from his face as he glanced up towards the sky. "A hundred visual copies is impressive indeed, but can you make a solid one?"
His brief faraway look gave way to sudden interest as he met his mother's gaze. "The copies are only illusions - I thought -"
"They are," she nodded. "Do you remember how I first explained to you the trick of projecting an illusion?"
"You told me that it's like a dream," Loki recalled. "An extension of consciousness."
"Yes," she smiled. "A dream is an illusion of its own. And sometimes, in dreams, we can feel touches and sensations, even pain. Yes?"
"Yes," Loki nodded.
"Illusion isn't purely visual. It can be physical as well. Just like a dream."
Suddenly Loki felt a hand take his, and he looked say from Frigga to his other side to find a double of her sitting there, and her hand felt entirely real, even warm.
Loki laughed appreciatively, knowing what he'd be spending every moment of free time practicing for the foreseeable future. "Oh, Mother. Just when I think I've finally surpassed you as the family master of magic, you go and show me this."
She smiled and the double vanished. "You will, Loki. By the time you have reached my age, you will have abilities that I cannot yet fathom. I've known that since before you could walk."
He gave her a small smile. "Only time will tell."
"Do you know why I taught you my tricks, Loki?"
He shook his head lightly.
"I knew from the first time I held you in my arms," she smiled, "that you were different. In a beautiful way. Where I saw so much of Odin in Thor, I saw myself in you. I still do."
"I'm glad one of you does."
Frigga sighed lightly and took his hand in her own. "Darling... Odin loves you as dearly and strongly as I do, you know that."
"And yet today is another day for he and Thor to bond, I suspect through rousing conversations of the joys of being the chosen heir to the throne, while I am relegated to my usual place in the shadows."
Frigga didn't flinch at her son's bitter tone. She simply let him continue.
"I don't want the throne," Loki clarified. "I only want... wanted... equal consideration. I was owed that much, Mother."
She nodded lightly, then inhaled softly before speaking again. "When your father made the decision to have Thor chosen to ascend the throne, he did not do so lightly. Thor may be heir, but you have a much greater role than you realize."
"How?" Loki asked.
"When Thor becomes King," Frigga said, "he will need you by his side. Where he is weak, you are strong. You will be his greatest ally and advisor, Loki."
Loki's eyes widened slowly, his head inclining as his mouth dropped open slightly. "Advisor. I am to be Thor's brain?"
"His conscience. His common sense. His most trusted source of honesty when few others would dare tell the King what he doesn't want to hear."
Loki's gaze was hardening as he stared angrily at the grass beneath his feet. "So I am expected to stand by and babysit him, making decisions and doing the work that he cares not to do while he basks in the glory of the throne and I stay in his shadow?"
"Loki..."
"Do you really think that he will be a wise King, Mother?" Loki asked, daring her to be honest.
She paused. "Yes. In time. As would you." When Loki scoffed, Frigga added, "If it were you on the throne, Loki, you would need Thor by your side just as he will need you."
Silently, Loki disagreed, but he wouldn't bother arguing the point.
"Son," Frigga said gently, "do not let rivalry or envy get between you and your brother. You both have a great gift in one another that cannot be underestimated. Either one of you would make a great King, but together - even Odin himself cannot hope to accomplish what the two of you could."
Loki didn't doubt that. It simply made his blood boil to know that no matter what, regardless of of any of it, he would forever be the lesser son.
Old words belonging to Odin floated tauntingly through his head. Only one of you can ascend to the throne, but... you were both born to be kings.
And they called Loki a liar.
By the end of the day, Aemilia fell into her bed and prayed that Loki would give her the night off. She was so, so tired, and all she wanted to do was sleep. She needed to sleep - her auditions were creeping closer, and she needed to be in top form for them. She also needed to stop being so damn irritable around her mother, and it was hard to do that when she was irritable at everything due to the simple fact of being awake.
Still in her dress that she'd worn all day, she curled up in bed and lay on her stomach with her head on her pillow, closing her eyes and wondering if Loki would just let her sleep if he came to retrieve her and found her unconscious.
She got her answer just as she started to nod off. He materialized out of thin air, sitting on the edge of her bed near her feet. She felt his weight dip into the mattress but she didn't move, pretending to still be asleep. He didn't buy it.
She groaned as his cool hand ran over her bare foot poking out from under her skirt. "I'm tired."
He didn't reply, but his hand rubbed gently up to her ankle and back down again. She enjoyed the simple touch for a moment before she shifted to glance his way, something inside of her stirring at the quietly intense look on his face.
He looked as tired as she felt. Maybe a bit angry too. He wore just a dark green tunic and black leather pants, and his hair was loose behind his ears, just as she liked it. She rolled to her back and his hand stilled on her ankle while his eyes bored into hers.
Aemilia wondered how she was supposed to act now after last night's events. She also wondered why she was still in her own room and not his.
As if to answer her second thought, Loki glanced at her door, and it glowed a deep violet for a strange moment. She looked at him questioningly, and he stated simply, "I want to have you in your bed tonight. That will keep anyone from hearing or entering."
The simple change in scenery was enough to wake her up. This was her room, her territory, and the thought of sleeping with Loki here felt different somehow. It also seemed especially scandalous, to do so while the rest of the house slept.
"Take off your dress," he said, interrupting her thoughts.
So it was back to normal, she thought somewhat in relief, as she sat up to oblige. Maybe he'd act like last night never happened, never mention it and let it be forgotten. It was both a relief and a disappointment.
He only removed his tunic as she bared herself to him. Once everything she wore was on the floor, he said, "Come sit on my lap, straddle me."
He was still sitting on the bed's end, one of his feet on the floor and his body curved in her direction. She crawled to him obediently and did as he said, meeting his eyes fully once she was on his lap. He only held her gaze for a moment before looking down at her lips, and she knew then that they were certainly not back to normal after all.
His hands were at his sides, and hers were on his shoulders. His expression was unreadable. He looked like he was a million miles away, and he only looked back to her eyes when she lifted his chin and forced him to.
"What's wrong?" she whispered softly, searching his green eyes for something - anything - that she could decipher, and finding nothing. He was looking at her as if she were a puzzle that he was trying to piece together, and she couldn't say that she felt entirely comfortable with that level of examination.
Needing to do something to break the tension, she leaned in to kiss him. He pressed two fingers to her lips to stop her, and when he let them linger there, she kissed them much like he had kissed her thumb the night before. Something flashed in his eyes, and she jumped on the small reaction by taking it a step further, kissing his fingertips again before parting her lips and sucking them into her mouth. She made a show of it for him, and at last his blank expression changed to one that she did know well.
She released his fingers when he tugged them back gently, and then they were moving between her legs. She exhaled sharply and then went to work on getting him ready along with her, doing all of the little things she knew sent jolts through his blood - a nip to his ear, a swipe of her tongue on a certain spot on his neck, a soft scrape of her nails through his scalp and then down his back. More than anything she knew he enjoyed her responses to the pleasure he gave her, so she didn't bite back any moans or spare him any well-earned mewls as his fingers played with her. He never lost that intense look about him, though, and when she reached between them to pull him from his pants, she could have sworn that she saw a flash of guilt in his eyes. But as quick as it appeared, it was gone, along with his fingers, and he'd lifted her up and slid her down his length before she could so much as blink.
He only kept them like that for a moment before Aemilia found herself down on her back, his lips and teeth on her neck as he moved urgently within her. She gripped his hair and rocked up against him, knowing from the way he was moving that he wouldn't last terribly long. It only meant that he wouldn't be satisfied and would do this probably twice more before the night was over.
He knew it too, and reached between them to coax her to her own end while he still had the chance. He let go only a moment after she did, groaning into her neck and burying himself into her as deeply as he could on his last stroke. She ran her fingers soothingly though his hair as he calmed down, then squeaked in surprise when he rolled to his side and took her with him.
He made no effort to disjoin their bodies, and she didn't either, more concerned with the return of his unreadable look as he stared into her eyes. It was even worse than it had been before, and her brows knit slightly as his eyes dropped down to her lips again. She was almost too distracted by his gaze to notice his hand moving up and down her side, a daringly soft caress that she wasn't accustomed to.
"Loki," she breathed softly, placing her hand on his cheek. "Tell me what's wrong."
He didn't answer her. Instead, he kissed her.
He was surrounded by her, literally and figuratively, and he felt like he was drowning. The sheets under his body smelled just like her, the ends of her hair fanned on her pillow and tickled his shoulder, and he never wanted to pull himself out of her. She was looking up at him with those big green and brown eyes of hers, her lips calling out to his own, and he'd held out as long as he could. There was no going back to the way things had been - he'd had a taste of deeper intimacy and now he wanted it all, like the greedy, spoiled prince that he was.
He kissed her just as she knew she wanted him to, slowly and deeply and thoroughly, and he didn't know how he could have gone for so long without this. It made his chest feel uncomfortably tight and his head spun a bit, reminding him almost of being drunk as she kissed him back with abandon.
On it went, a twisting and tangling of tongues with no greater motives than to taste and savor one another, and only when it became too much and he had to pull away did he realize how gently he had been cradling her entire body to his the whole time. She was pressed so close to him, one of her hands in his hair and the other on his chest, and she looked so utterly beautiful to him in that moment that he couldn't not tell her.
"You beautiful creature," he breathed against her mouth as his eyes drank her in. She let out a surprised little huff at his words, and all he could do was kiss her again. "You've made a fool of me."
She seemed too stunned to ask what he meant, and he was glad - he'd rather continue to taste her mouth than listen to her talk. Still, he couldn't understand - how could this girl, out of all the others that he'd had in the near-thousand years of life, be the one to make him lose control like this? How could he be content to just kiss her, just feel her lips against his, when the rest of her was bare and at his command?
How could he ever live without this again?
He was shaken from his thoughts when her leg snaked around his hip and pulled him as close as she could manage at the angle. She arched and her breasts brushed softly against his chest before she pressed them fully against him, biting his bottom lip as she clenched around him. He twitched within her, not missing the irony of her being ready for more before he was, but he was eager to please her.
She rocked her hips against his and clenched again, and an indistinct low growl of some kind left his throat as he nibbled her lip. She kept it up, rocking and grinding against him, and he matched her each time, and they remained that way until it was no longer enough for both of them.
"On your other side," he purred into her ear before giving her a gentle push. She whined when he slid out of her but then her back was against his chest and his arm held her securely to him by her waist, and one swing of her leg backwards over his later, he sheathed himself inside of her once more and she sighed in contentment.
At first she lay her head on the pillow with her eyes closed while he kissed her neck, thrusting against her at his usual brisk starting pace - he had no idea how to do this part gently and he didn't want to anyway - but then he gave her outer ear a nip and a lick and ordered, "Look at me."
She craned her neck to do as he said, and he took one of her hands and placed it in his hair and added, "Hold on." She clutched a handful of his dark strands and then moaned as he covered her mouth with his and began to take her significantly harder. Their kisses became the rough, dominating ones that he was far more used to, and it suited them both just fine as they moved carelessly hard against one another.
He was so caught up in it all, so lost in the passion of it that her voice against his lips took him by great surprise. "You're too quiet, you're never this quiet."
He had been groaning with increasing volume since they'd began so he knew she meant actual words rather than just general sounds. He smirked and kissed her again. "Is it not the same without my words spurring you on?"
"It's..."
He pushed her hip upwards a bit and hit a new spot within, and her entire body shuddered with pleasure. "It's what?" he grinned.
"It..."
Her voice died and was reborn as a ragged gasp when his hand delved between her legs. "I'm listening."
"I can't... just..."
"Shhh," he hushed, kissing the corner of her mouth and drawing her into a long kiss. "You're close, yes?"
She nodded frantically, and he placed his lips to her ear, increasing the speed of both his hand and his hips as he let just one more moment pass before he commanded somehow both gruffly and silkily, "Say my name."
She let out an indecipherable sound in response, and bit her earlobe before rasping again, "Say it, Aemilia, say my name."
She obeyed mindlessly as her climax washed over her, almost shrieking it, and he shut his eyes tight and let the sound take him down alongside her. Even in that moment of physical ecstasy, listening to this bewildering creature moan his name in the throes of her own release, it wasn't enough to fully satisfy him. He still wanted more. He wanted everything and nothing else, nothing less, all of her, all for him.
But he was alone in this, he knew as he felt her fall limp and happy into his arms. She was the very picture of satisfaction, flushed and loose and dripping with sweat - some hers, some of his own - and she smiled shyly at him when he rolled her to her back and stayed on his side with his arm around her waist. He wondered how she could do that, be so open and bare and enticing to him and still manage to smile shyly. He also wished he could be as blissfully and utterly sated as she so clearly was.
Maybe satisfaction simply wasn't in his nature.
He watched a single bead of sweat drip down her neck towards her collarbone, and with little preceding thought, he dipped his head down and licked it off. She giggled - really giggled - and he lifted his head to look at her in mild confusion.
"That tickled a bit," she said softly, touching his cheek.
"You're ticklish?" he asked skeptically. "I would have noticed by now if you were."
"It's only sometimes, in some places," she shrugged.
His lips quirked at the corners. "Where?"
"I'm not telling," she smiled back.
"Then I'll have to find out myself," he said mischievously, dropping his head back down to her chest. She protested light-heartedly but didn't really try to stop him as he searched for her weak spots, distracting her with touches that she loved while running fingertips over her experimentally. He got a very slight giggle and jerk from her when he reached her upper ribcage, then absolutely nothing until he reached her legs and started touching down the back of one. She tensed and he looked up at her with an eyebrow raised. "Am I getting warmer?"
She shook her head, but her smile told him otherwise. His fingertips danced down the back of her thigh and then brushed softly over the back of her knee, and she immediately laughed and covered her face with her hands.
"Aha," he grinned before launching a deliberate assault. She only laughed and squirmed for a moment before she shot up and tried to fight him off, and he let her, finding her laugh and smile contagious. He couldn't remember the last time he'd smiled just to smile.
And so they sat there, only an inch away from one another, tension clouding the terribly brief moment of ease as Aemilia looked openly into his eyes. He knew that she was trying to understand him, trying to piece him together as much as he had been trying to do the same to her earlier. All he wanted was to touch her again, wrap himself up in her and breathe her in until he understood what it was about her that had so ensnared him.
When she gave up on on trying to read him, she leaned in and pressed a soft kiss to his lips. He let the simple sensation wash over him, then felt his insides freeze as an unpleasant thought suddenly seized his mind.
"Has he kissed you?" Loki asked in a whisper against Aemilia's lips. She looked up at him and he added more harshly, "Has he?"
"No," she replied quietly. "He tried, but... I didn't let him."
"Good," he breathed in relief, kissing her again as he wrapped his arms around her and brought them both back down to the bed. "Good girl."
He needed this to run its course, quickly. The rage he felt at the thought of her being kissed or touched by another terrified as much as astounded him, and yet he couldn't control himself from slipping further down the downward spiral he was on. He needed to reach the bottom, to let himself burn for her until the flames died and he was free to move on, because he knew this would not last.
For now, there was nothing left to do but bask in the mystery of this strange, innocent little creature, and push away the nagging and uncharacteristic guilt of what he had allowed to happen that morning in his chambers, all the while pretending that what he was doing wasn't at all self-destructive or counter-productive.
She was his obsession, his fixation, his escape. He held her, kissed her, teased her, touched her, and smiled with her until he could handle none of it any longer, and he vanished from her bed without a goodbye and left her to sleep.
The poor girl had no idea what she'd done to him.
A/N: hopefully nobody hates me too much for the first section of this update :p Thanks to all the reviewers and new followers, you guys have surpassed my expectations greatly with the response to this story! I value any & all feedback, so keep it coming :) my usual thanks to the lovey midnightwings96 as well, she's responsible for lots of awesome ideas that are coming chapters, so keep sticking with me! :D