14.

. . .

Loki knew he had flaws. Before the Gods themselves, he would admit he had some big ass personal problems, and he would cheerfully lay them out when it suited him, but if someone else tried to point out those flaws to him, well, it was a pretty good bet that the king flaw - denial most supreme - was going to kick in. His friends knew this, and sometimes they even won that rare bet against his problematic nature. That fight sometimes even made him happy, in a paradoxical way.

But regardless of that, one of his personally most beloved flaws, an issue he flatly refused to acknowledge as a problem, was an absolutely donkey-like stubbornness in the face of being told he was wrong or that he had made a major tactical mistake. Whenever faced with a solid and incontrovertible fact that he'd somehow munged up, he was inclined to go back and revenge himself upon the truth like unholy hell.

Which is why he was currently stalking around the private employee entrance to the main city library and its monastery of ancient Archivists, working on coming up with a sound but psychologically devastating attack that would get his target - whichever one - to break protocol and vouch before the Queen that, really, two Asgardian royals had in fact sauntered into town just to look at ruined genealogies and, with Mooar to assist, a box of forgotten silverware receipts.

This would break probably ten thousand years of established archive routine, and not a few psyches would have nightmares over what he wanted to do to them.

Loki didn't give a damn. He knew this wasn't his finest quality, but he also didn't care about that. Lady Adenium had tripped him up, made him mad. Mostly with himself, but, well, that was the old flaw in action. If he could swing it, someone was going to eat those receipts when he was done.

The truth might set you free, but in Loki's experience, it was just as often used as a whipping chain. His feelings about chains were on record. In all-caps.

It was going to be High Archivist Milkmane or the girl Ayelah, coming out that door at sunset. It would be easier if it was the assistant, but the idea of chewing up and spitting out a genuine ancient had a certain thrill to it.

It was probably going to be the girl.

The sun glittered, turned a rich coppery gold, and began to burn its way down into the horizon's edge as Loki drew deeper into velvet shadows. He waited, because he could be dangerously patient when he felt like it, and he watched that door, and he had a dramatic plan in mind, because he always did.

It was the girl.

. . .

Ayelah didn't go straight home. She went into a pub, a surprisingly cozy little nook on the edge of the city, where the woods crawled right up to the crystal towers to remind the Light Elves who was really in charge when the magic hit the skids, and Loki was glad of her choice of direction, because he was ready to be a bastard, but he had certain limits on what kind of a bastard to be.

Also he'd never seen this bit of the city before, and it was quite nice, really, another reminder that the layered bureaucratic nightmare was not all there was to be in the city of light, and maybe that would mean something in context of what he was prepared to do.

He slid into the seat across from the girl, deciding to not physically block her into her private booth, and when Ayelah realized she was no longer alone, she straightened up, stiff, as he lounged back with his hands clasped together in front of him like a job interview. "Oh, gods," she said, or rather gurgled in surprise. His reputation outside of SHIELD was still terrible, and that could be useful on occasion. "You."

"Me," said Loki, full of acidic good cheer. "How's work?"

"Work… is fine…"

"Any luck with those genealogies of ours?"

Her hesitation was a physical thing. "They… there's going to be some missives, sent to the All-Father. When, when the paperwork is cleared…."

"Which will take time." He was still grinning, all teeth and all darkling light. "A lot of time."

"Um."

"I have no interest in hurting you. It wouldn't help anything."

Ayelah didn't look comforted by his blunt statement, but her words became a little firmer. "The palace sent their intelligence man over, he questioned us as part of the routine, look, we've nothing to do with the trouble-"

"No, but nor did the Archive choose to help."

It didn't matter that he'd taken the seat across, didn't matter that he'd left no traps or tripwires, or brought a heavy to glower in the corner, some local redcap goblin with a face like a hatchet. Ayelah looked just as trapped as if he had. "We can't, we're supposed to be neutral, and-"

"Neutral my entire cracked arse, everyone knows what the Archive did to Paperwork Row in a fit of pique, and there's a dozen other dirty little stories like that one around every corner. They can't lie to a liar, Ayelah, not to me. But you. You actually care about the truth. You like to help." The grin widened, became the conspiratorial grimace of one who knows.

He went harder in, just like he planned, not giving the wide-eyed and slack-faced Ayelah an opening to protest. "It's not what you wanted, the Archive, is it? You saw the palace of knowledge when you were young, where supplicants come to learn, and when you got older they gave you your robes and taught you your prayers before those walls of books, and it's all a big joke. A circular hell of paperwork, and it's like that because someone with power decided it should be like that, and now all that wonderful knowledge isn't a sacred tool of the mind, it's a moneylender's bludgeon. Out of reach, out of touch, lost to most. The restrictions are there to be sure of it. Unless they have power. Or unless they can pay the fare to cross into the promised land. Money can be perfectly neutral, someone might tell you, but it's always said by someone that has an awful lot of it."

Ayelah looked stricken, the steel shine of her face going matte and grey. He'd dug the knife in hard. It wasn't her he wanted to hurt, it was that truth. If he got his way, he'd turn her into the weapon he needed, and by proxy help her in the long run deal with that truth.

But she was going to have to agree to it.

By that look on her face, it was going to be easier than he expected. She'd told them the truth about the genealogies when she had the chance, and how their magics worked, and the brothers hadn't had to sign a single waiver. She'd gone a toe over the line, when by rules she should have kept her mouth shut.

Loki hadn't been in Alfheim the way Thor had needed, but he'd been there for that, and he'd been there to see the girl jump forward, wanting to be helpful. He'd seen her face then, and it matched what he saw now. Ayelah shifted in her seat, and something in her was trying to fight. Plaintive and small, but she hadn't withered yet the way men like Milkmane had. "Why is your brother being picked on for this? He's only ever been a hero. All the stories I've ever seen, he tried to do the right thing, fight for others."

"The oldest gag in the book, I expect. Wrong place at the wrong time, and someone thought they'd be extra clever, pulling that joke behind my back. It was probably a bonus for the field agent returning to whoever is benefiting from this. 'I pulled one over on Asgard, behind Loki's own back!' I know my reputation better than anyone, it's going to be resume fodder for bastards."

Leamhan, of course. Leamhan, the Queen's untrustworthy intelligence officer, who thought he was sly, getting to Thor behind Loki. He started to grimace again at the thought, stopped himself.

Oh, yes. He was going to destroy Leamhan personally. "I need your help. The one thing no one is going to expect is the truth, the honest truth, backed by the Archive. The palace can't say we spoke untrue if truth itself vouches for us. I would never ask someone like you to lie. Leave that to me."

Ayelah leaned forward, her brows knotting together over dampening eyes. "But the protocol-"

"Is itself a lie, a weapon, and built on the very un-neutral concept of leaving people to hang when knowledge itself knows different."

"I'm not the person to break the rules, I'm sorry." There was a waver in her voice, a weakness.

Loki stayed ruthless, seeing the cracks and wedging himself into them. "If not you, who? Who do I go to for help, to try and get them to see it my way? An old man who's benefitted richly from his age and his place and those very rules for thousands of years or more?"

"An old man who could destroy you."

Loki grinned at the little bit of spitfire. She was recovering. Good. "He could try, Lady Ayelah, and he might succeed at first, but he'd bleed trying, and it only takes a little blood off a body like that to leave me standing by the end of it. I even hoped it would be he to leave the library first tonight, not you. I'd ruin him and get what I want, but it wouldn't leave the situation any better than how I found it. And the strange thing is, mistress, I like improving things. I do it my way, which can be upsetting to many, and sooner or later I'll tear up that library for their part in fucking with my family, but if you help me do it, starting now, we can make it happen in such a way that it can be made better. The way it ought to be."

She watched him, and her eyes said she was starting to believe.

"Over his old, dry corpse and all the others like him, if it comes to that. I'm not a particularly good person, mistress, not like the tales of your mighty Thor, but I'm still a prince, and I've got rules and benefits of my own behind that title. I like knowledge, Ayelah, very much, and I don't like prisons. These things we can prove for true."

"Truth again."

"It's freedom, or it's another weapon, and sometimes it's both. Tell them in the palace the truth when I need you to, nothing more, vow your life to that honesty just the way you would if Archive protocols weren't chaining you, and I'll see to it you weather the consequences. All of them. You'll come out of this safe, and, in time, you and your honesty will stand tall among those left when I go after this entire nonsense bureaucracy."

She was staring at him now, and her eyes were huge. "You really are telling me the truth. Someone has your brother in trouble, and your response is to not only prove his side of things, but destroy the entire system that helped get him there. You'll go after the city."

He was grinning again, not his sanest look. "It's a hobby. I think long term, when I think of revenge."

"I've heard you're mad."

He shrugged, not offended. "I go through streaks. They made me angry, Lady Ayelah, and I'm not on Earth, where I keep to a certain peace. The rules, these guards, whoever it is behind this rigged game that's got Thor in a cell. I am not kind when I'm angry, but I pay my debts well, and no one goes after my family but me - and really, I've given that up. It's shite loyalty, but it's real enough. Help me, or best get to the safety of the countryside when I find another way to do this. You'll have time. A few days for some of it, at the very least. A few years for the rest. But someone's going to pay out blood."

"I'll help you."

"You better say so for certain, Lady Ayelah, because when I make an oath, I'll see it through 'till my teeth grind down."

"Prince Loki, I'll help you. I'll help you, because you're being cruel and you're also right. The way we sell knowledge is horrible. All I ever wanted was to teach." Ayelah leaned forward, and she looked absolutely terrified, but also brave. He liked that, too. "You send your word when you need me at the palace to bear witness, and I'll even try to get the ledger out of Milkmane's desk for real proof. He goes to sleep early, and that's why you didn't see him first. He sleeps in the archive these days, in the back with the rare finds like a bloody dragon and his hoard, but he likes me because I'm pretty." There was a specific bitterness to the way she said the word, and Loki was glad he hadn't been too cruel to her, only to the system itself. The girl deserved none of it. "I can get that ledger, he barely does any of the real work anymore."

"You do all that, and you won't fear anyone in the years to come, and you'll never need to fear me. On my word." Loki put his hand out, and he knew it would feel cold because he made sure it would. It would be one more small thing to frighten her, and by odd virtue of that, be less afraid of him later.

She took it, and she didn't wince, and that told him she'd bought in. Better to have the bogeyman on your side than leave him an enemy.

Loki knew his own reputation very well indeed.

Ayelah took her hand away. "One more thing, Highness." She glanced around, as if their last several minutes of collusion hadn't been treasonous enough to the balance of the city. "I think it might be important to your brother, and to you. The genealogies. I took another look after you both left. I was curious, and old Milkmane bade me to stand guard while they sorted out the damage paperwork. It took them hours, of course, so I looked." She bit her lip. "I… don't think there was any damage, not exactly."

Loki blinked. "What?"

"I-I mean that someone seems to have simply… stopped updating the genealogies. Before even His Highness Thor was born. Well before. There was a listing for the All-Father's wedding to the good Queen Frigga, and from there someone should have tied in a new bundle of parchment. You know, new era, new section of the book, as clean a symbol as that. Not a surgical removal, sir, but a history entirely ignored."

"What in hel?"

Ayelah shook her head. "I couldn't even begin to speculate, Your Highness. I'm sorry, I don't have more answers than that."

He leaned back, ordinary and calm again, no threat at all. Loki kept his promises. "No, but you've given me more damn good questions." He shook his head. "This ridiculous mess. By rights I should be focused entirely on that mystery, but first…"

"So who's behind this? Do you know? I assume you've a target."

"I've got dead to rights the agent who put this into action, but who he's working for?" Loki was still looking away, trying to think. "Less certain. He works for the Queen, but he's not a loyalist."

"Watchman Leamhan?"

That got his glance back to her, sharp and immediate.

Ayelah laughed, already not as nervous. "That annoying little man is the one that came to question the Archive. He's city watch, and he strutted in to prove it was his case, arresting a prince of Asgard. We see him all the time. Of course he gets access to the library as he likes. I assumed he had palace sponsorship."

"Do you know anything about Leamhan personally?"

"No, but as I say, he's here constantly. Always alone. He reads, he meets one of the other archivists for sup once in a while, he goes off again. He's in regularly, oh, once or twice a week at least."

Loki watched her. Every once in a while, despite his mistakes and his past evils, the universe gave him a gift for free. He, no fool, knew when those showed up and was properly thankful. The girl leaving the archive instead of the old man had been the greatest boon he could have asked for, and now he was glad he'd given her his vow. Ayelah was earning it in buckets. She was never going to have to pay city rent again. Hel, he'd buy her a house in the pristine countryside if this worked out the way he wanted. "How regular? Soon?"

"Tomorrow night, like as not. Once early in the week, once later, no matter what's afoot. I think he only skipped his routine once, and that was because there'd been a murder in the palace. That was ages ago. He still came by the next day. I remember he was tired, but he took his time here, same as ever."

Loki leaned forward. "I am very glad to have met you, Lady Ayelah, and I will keep my promise. I'm going to be lurking the archive again tomorrow, but on my word, you'll never know and I'll cause no trouble for anyone there."

She giggled, a small and young sound, still a little frightened of him. "But you're going to cause trouble for Leamhan."

"Oh yes."