Alright, back again with chapter 7. Only two notices last time so thanks to:

CaptainShy
mandismaddness

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You guys are awesome and made me decide to continue this. I know this on a fair few follow lists so I would really appreciate some more reviews than just the one per chapter I've been getting (CaptainShy, you friggin' rock) but as always, no pressure and I'll keep posting so long as even one person is reading. Reviews are like inspiration for me (and most writers) so please please please LET ME KNOW WHAT YOU THINK! Anyway, obligatory apology for the delay, work and all that, and on to the chapter.

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An Understanding

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She shot to full consciousness with a gasp of pain. Her heart, previously beating sedately in her chest, rocketed into an almost arrhythmic speed in a matter of seconds as her conscious mind struggled to accept everything her subconscious had experienced during its hibernation. She remembered it all, the conversation, the warmth of the sand against her skin, the soothing cold of the god that had led her to the truth of her own power. But she also remembered the pain, the loss and trauma that had led to the need for the hibernation in the first place. She felt her heart, still beating far too quickly, convulse at the memory of James' face, still locked in a look of calm serenity, unaware of who had brought his life to an end or why. It was this image that drove her from the bed, moving blindly past the dumb founded god that had sprung away from the bed at her sudden movements to the small bathroom across the hall. She fell into the toilet, emptying what little was left in her stomach into the porcelain bowl, bringing a sound of disgust from the bedroom.

"Riley?" Jane had appeared at the doorway, the sound of movement drawing her to her friend's side. "Are you okay sweetie?" She knelt by the still shaking woman, rubbing small circles in the center of her back as she heaved.

"Can I have a towel please?" Riley hated how small her voice sounded. She knew she was in shock and that it would take her mind time to come to terms with what her soul had already accepted, but she wished she sounded even a fraction as confident and strong as she felt. Jane muttered some kind of platitude, she wasn't really paying attention at this point, and disappeared, reappearing a moment later with a wet washcloth and a fluffy towel. It was one of the purple set that her mother had helped her pick out when she'd first moved away from home and the sight of it brought on a kind of peace that helped her to focus. She began to wipe at her face, cooling the suddenly feverish skin with the damp fabric, feeling the chills radiate through her, soothing and familiar.

"Feeling a little better?" Jane's voice cut through the fog of shock and mixed memories, bringing her back and firmly grounding her in the moment.

"Yeah, sorry, not sure exactly what that was." She tried to grin, flushing the toilet and standing on shaky legs. She felt like she'd been sleeping for days, her body was heavy and weak and she knew she much look like a mess to the three people now staring in at her.

"I am pleased to see you are awake. You still appear weak, perhaps you would like to rest some more?" Thor's voice echoed oddly in the small room and it brought her attention to the growing pain in her head. It was like her body had been put through hell and glued back together. She felt strong and whole inside, but the physical form was still fragile. It was an interesting feeling from a scientific perspective, but not at all pleasant to go through.

"No, I think I've had enough rest. How long was I out?" She turned to Jane, knowing she would get a straight answer out of the woman.

"About two and a half days. We were getting a little worried honestly, I mean, after what happened and the kind of damage they did to you, I was afraid you wouldn't wake up at all. Your heart all by stopped a couple times." Her face drained of color as she spoke. Riley felt a new respect rise in her for the woman, she had already seemed sweet, but she seemed to genuinely care. She smiled softly, nodding and sighing.

"Well, after two and half days, I need a shower. I don't know if Asgardian senses are heightened or not, but I would imagine I don't smell too pretty regardless." She let the sentence hang in the air a moment, hoping the others would get the picture, but her stomach chose that moment to register its complaint at being empty, filling the tiled room with an echoing growl.

"And I'll make you some food while you get cleaned up." Jane smiled, forestalling any argument by sweeping almost gracefully out of the room. Riley wanted to call after her, tell her not to worry about it, that she could fix her own food, but two towels stuffed into her arms and a sneer as the door closed kept her rooted to the spot. She'd just been herded by two gods and a scientist. She laughed softly as she laid the towels on the counter, turning to put the water on when the room's temperature took a sudden nose dive. It wasn't frigid, but it was rapidly approaching icy.

"Hello Riley." The voice was so different from that of her dream. In that realm, he'd been sarcastic, true, but also gentle and almost playful with her. This voice was full of scorn and a very poorly concealed anger that set her teeth on edge.

"Something I can do for you Loki?" She turned, letting the steam circle around her as it rose from the tub's floor.

"I believe I am owed an explanation." He took a step forward, crowding her back toward the tile wall.

"Oh? What for, might I ask?" She winced inwardly, wishing she could come up with a better come back.

"How did you come by such a formidable power?" He put a hand on the wall beside her head, a small web of frost beginning to spread around his hand.

"I'm sure I don't know what you mean." She smiled, moving to turn away, only to be blocked by his other hand.

"Oh I think you do. I think you know exactly what I mean, little mortal, and I think you know exactly how much danger you have put us all in." He all but growled the last few words, leaning so close she could feel his breath, a cool breeze against her face.

"Loki, please, menacing is the last thing I need right now. I know what you are talking about, but I don't know the why or the how and am in no state of mind to figure out either one right now. Please just go away and let me get cleaned up." Once again her voice had taken on the quiet weak tone that she was quickly learning to hate and she cursed herself as she watched a grin spread across his face, the frost reaching out and touching the skin of her arms.

"Come now, Riley, this is hardly the fire I have come to expect from you. Where is the woman who tossed a bottle of wine at me? Perhaps I should steal something from you again?" His hand moved, grabbing the strap of her tank top in a vice like grip.

"Don't you dare." She felt her blood start to rush, the temperature of the room no longer seeming to worry her.

"Oh, I think I shall dare, my dear." His grin turned almost evil, his arm jerking, taking half her tank top with it. Her arms flew up to cover the skin left bare by the removal, her mind buzzing with anger. How dare this bastard torment her like this, after all she'd been through. She growled, the sound resonating low in her chest, ignoring the look of sudden shock on Loki's face as she slowly lowered one hand. She didn't see the frost spreading from her own body. It wasn't until he had been pushed back against the opposite wall, pinned there by a fine layer of ice, that she realized what she'd done. The door burst open just as she was sinking to the floor, arms circled around her middle, the wound in her hand broken open and freshly bleeding. Thor leveled a look of pure anger at his brother, taking a few swift steps across the room, breaking the ice with ease and hauling the man bodily from the room. Jane rushed in after him, shutting off the water and kneeling beside the now openly weeping Riley.

It took a few minutes for her to calm down, her body still shook as she recounted the conversation with the trickster god, but at the end of it, Jane was ready to kill him herself. Riley shook her away as she tried to bring her into an embrace, pleading exhaustion and a desperate need for a shower to back out of the conversation. Jane sighed, giving her a look of clear disbelief before rising and leaving the room. Riley took a moment to make sure the door was locked before turning the water back on. She shucked out of her clothes quickly, vowing to burn them the first moment she got and stepped into the almost steaming hot spray. It felt like heaven.

Loki paced the length of the living room, ignoring the berating that both Thor and his woman were trying to level at him. Honestly, did the mortal thing he would listen to her? His brother should know better by now. He would nod and look his approximation of contrite, appease his brother's ridiculous honor code and then resume his plan as if he had never been interrupted. Riley, that insufferable witch, had taken a piece of him. He ignored the small voice in his mind that said it was a part he didn't particularly like and settled instead on irritation. Not only had she invaded his mind and stolen a piece of it, but she had bested him at his own game. He had never been hit with one of his own attacks before and he would be damned if he would let a mortal get away with embarrassing him in such a way.

He growled out an apology when the two mother hens had finally stopped talking, promising to never do it again and everything else they asked, fighting the urge to simply end them where they stood. Neither believed him, he could tell. They knew he meant to continue on as if nothing had changed but seemed content for the moment that the words had passed his lips. He waited a moment, giving them time to speak again, should they wish to, at their continued silence he bowed and turned, walking quickly down the hall to the bedroom and closing the door. He had tried the bathroom door on the way and found it locked, he would have to wait for her to return here if he wished to get the answer he needed.

The shower water felt like liquid peace. It seemed to suffuse her being, bolstering her rapidly flagging stamina. She sagged against the wall, tears welling up and being washed away before they had time to fall. She knew this part would come, knew it was natural and even healthy, but she hated it none the less. Crying was not something she did, it never had been, yet the tears came. She had tried to hold them back, ignore the pull of the muscles around her mouth, forcing them down, but the pressure began to build in her chest, like a dam had broken inside her and she felt she would drown if she didn't let it out. She fell against the wall, a strangled sob rising out of her as her body crumbled to the floor. It took several moments of chest wrenching, angry grieving before she was able to regain her feet, but finally she could feel the weight ease until, at last, it was just a silent stream of tears against the spray of the shower.

After a few more moments, she actually began to get herself clean. She shampooed her hair, repeating the process, just to be sure, and working conditioner through the tangles. She must've been thrashing in her sleep, at least at one point, she only ever got knots like these when she had nightmares. Just to have clean hair made her feel so much more human, but the steam had heightened her sense of smell to the point that she could smell exactly how dirty she was. She grabbed her bar of soap, ignoring the sting of the raw skin on her palm. She lathered up quickly, scrubbing her skin until it was a bright pink, setting the soap back in the dish, wincing as it came away red. She looked down at her hands, dreading the damage she would see there, but it seemed that it was either too minute to see, or something that it simply hadn't left a mark because other than a single cut, something she must've gotten when she fell, there were no marks, just blood. She shivered, rinsing it and the soap away and stepping out of the shower. The water was tinged pink as it drained and she groaned when she saw the faintly bloody palm print on the towel. That would never wash out.

She wrapped up quickly, one towel around her dripping hair and the other barely clinging to the damp skin of her breast. She didn't know where in the apartment everyone was so she opened the door and bolted as quick as she could to her room, hoping to avoid flashing everyone on the way. There were no gasps or giggles from the living room so she assumed she had succeeded. It wasn't until she heard the quiet gasp from behind her that she realized she wasn't alone. She turned slowly, holding her towel firmly in place, dreading what she knew would meet her gaze.

Loki stared at her, a mixture of shock, appreciation and anger on his face. His eyes traveled up her freshly washed form, stopping at the blood stains on the white cloth with a moment of concern before leveling with her own hazel orbs. She clutched the towel closer to herself, hoping she wasn't inadvertently giving him a show, feeling the anger rise in her once again.

"My, Riley, I didn't know you felt that way for me." He grinned, that smug bastard was actually grinning at her right now.

"You have exactly five seconds to make yourself scarce before I find out exactly how cold I can make you." She growled, her hand tightening almost painfully around the fabric.

"And if I do not wish to leave?" He began to walk forward, his steps calm and measured. Riley moved, thrusting her hand out, only to have it caught and pinned against her side. "Do not play at power with me mortal, you will lose. As to how cold it can become, well, if you really wish to know." His voice lowered to a dangerous base, his breath misting between them as the room dropped to sub arctic temperatures. "Remember, I am of Jotunnheim, the cold does not bother me." He inhaled slowly. Riley seethed inside, fighting for every breath, the air feeling like ice inside her lungs. She saw the edges of her vision beginning to blacken, her brain struggling for oxygen and losing, rapidly. Just as the blackness was closing in, the room returned to normal, the air suddenly warm against her skin and air rushing into her lungs so quickly it made her head spin.

"Ass." She wished the words had come out strong and unaffected but she knew how weak she sounded, all but sagged against him, lacking the strength to stand on her own. She expected him to push her away, but felt, instead, the soft strength of his arms supporting her, holding her against him as she recovered her strength.

"Let this be a lesson to you Riley. You may have taken a portion of my power but you lack the will to use it to its full extent and your body is not prepared to handle its...side effects. I do not wish to fight you. It would do us no good. But I must know how it was done. Why, though it should be impossible, your soul fled to me when you were in need. I must know if it is a weakness. Do you understand?" He lifted her chin, forcing her eyes to meet his own. She felt the towel slip between them, falling dangerously low along her back, held in place precariously by her chest and his armor. If he moved much more, it would fall.

"I told you, I don't know. I didn't even know it was you I found until it was too late. All I know is that I needed help and there you were." She saw his eyes flicker, something behind the sarcasm and classist racism brightened.

"How is it possible? What are you that you could wield power such as mine and live?" He lowered his face to hers, gazing into her eyes with an intensity she could almost feel. She felt herself falling before her mind could register she'd slipped, the towel finally giving up the battle with gravity and tangling at her feet. Loki's hands closed around her waist, holding her up, his gaze averted from her now naked form.

"Perhaps we could continue this conversation once I'm not nude?" She tried to make it sound casual, joking, like it didn't matter that he of all people had seen her sans apparel, but she knew her face must be as red as a damn cherry. He sighed, setting her back on her feet and turning to face the wall. It took a moment for her to get her bearings, thoroughly thrown by this change in him that seemed to come out of nowhere. Once her mind and body seemed to be once again functional, she walked quickly around the room, gathering up under clothes and a simple outfit, keeping her back to him as much as possible as she pulled on first underwear then jeans. She fumbled with the bra strap a little, her hands still shaking, but finally managed to get herself mostly covered. She slipped an old t-shirt on, a faded band name just visible in the surrounding black. She walked over to him, tapping him on the shoulder as she gathered her hair back. "Listen, I know you want answers, and, for once, I'm willing to cooperate. But I am starving and exhausted and, honestly, I don't know how to deal with you right now. Can you please leave me alone for a little while?" She hoped that at least some part of him was like the man she'd known in her dream, desperately needing to see some compassion from him.

"Very well, I will wait until you have eaten and rested, say, five hours, and then we will continue our discussion." He swept past her, not waiting for her to agree. She sighed, walking out a few minutes later, hair in a messy braid, hand bound up in an ace bandage and head thoroughly aching. Jane greeted her in the kitchen with a bowl of soup and some crackers and instructed her to sit at the table and eat, offering to redo her hair while she devoured the food in front of her. It was good to be full and warm again. She felt clean and calm for the first time since this whole fiasco had started and when Jane tossed a pack of cigarettes and a lighter to her, she almost cried. Maybe she would be able to deal with all of this after all.

The five hours had gone too fast for her liking. She'd smoked a good fourth of the pack Jane had given her, researched far too much about the after life and trance states and was just beginning to formulate an idea about what had happened to her when a shadow fell across the book she was reading. It was some trashy dime store romance her mother had given her when she'd moved into the apartment. She laughed at the time, taking her mother's advice to "just unwind sometimes" with a grain of salt. But she'd been right, nothing like a little suspension of disbelief to let the brain mull over deeper things. That time, it would appear, was up now, because Loki was standing beside her, a look of determined calm on his face.

"Are you quite finished? We have things to discuss." He turned, marching off toward her bedroom, trusting her to follow. She groaned, marking her place in her book and grabbing the pack of cigarettes and the ashtray, lighting one on her way down the hall. Two confused pairs of eyes followed them down the hall, but neither Jane nor Thor felt like kicking that particular hornet's nest and kept wisely silent.

Riley closed the door behind her, settling on the bed and setting the ashtray down in its customary spot on the bed side table. She didn't miss the look of irritation that crossed the god's face, but decided that if he was going to out right assault her, he could deal with a little smoke in his face. "So, where do we start?" She looked over at him, tapping ash off her cigarette.

"What do you know of what happened to you?" He was sitting on her grandmother's hope chest, something else she'd inherited in the move. It struck her, just how much of her stuff she'd received from the women that had gone before her and wondered, for a moment, if they didn't know more than they'd let on.

"Well, I've actually been doing a little research and have come up on a couple theories. One of them is completely stupid and will be called theory B. Theory A goes a little like this. You stole my rune stones, don't argue, you did. Now, those stones have been on my altar for a long time, more than long enough to form a link between my energy and their physical location. When you stole them, you took a little bit of me with them, forming a kind of road. When I was put in danger, shot by whatever the hell those elves carry, my soul fled to the first source of power it could feel secure in, you. Carrying the stones made you a kind of...way station, you opened yourself up to me just by carrying them. Once I was with you, my energy melded with yours, absorbing what I needed to defend myself, but I got caught up in your memories and couldn't get out. I guess when I broke out of your subconscious, I took a little more of you with me that I could handle, hence, what happened after." She left out the part where he was still with her and had helped guide her through her grief stricken mind and back to consciousness, that would just further complicate things and make this all even weirder than it already was.

Loki, for his part, looked shocked. Clearly he'd been expecting some half assed argument about how she didn't know anything and to just leave her alone. He had not expected her to so accurately sum up and understand what had happened. But she was not treating it with the concern it deserved. She either didn't know, or didn't care about what the implications of their merger would do to them both.

"Yes, it is as you say. I admit to a grudging respect at your comprehension of the situation though there is an aspect you have either missed, or ignored. We are, as you say, linked. A piece of my power, my soul, as you put it, is still within you, just as a piece of you is still within me. This is not something to be made light of. Allow me to demonstrate." He took out a dagger, pulling it seemingly from nowhere and pricked the palm of his right hand. A sharp pain radiated up her arm and she hissed, looking down at her palm where a small drop of blood had begun to swell to the surface.

"What?" She looked from her hand to his, held before her like some kind of grave sign.

"Yes. Now you understand. I know there is more to this than you are telling me. This would not have occurred simply from what you described. The power you took from me, what little was left after your assault, would have dissipated in a rather painful fever and our link would have broken. I know I have not bonded with the power your stones left in me, so it must have been you. When did it happen? What did you do?" He rose, walking slowly forward, plucking the rapidly dying cigarette from her fingers and snuffing it out against the glass wall of the ashtray.

"I..I don't know." She felt suddenly threatened, like a wrong word would be all that was needed to end her.

"Do no lie to me." He leaned down, a hand coming to rest against her neck, a silent promise. She felt tears rise up in her eyes, feeling a chilling sensation race down her spine, the image of the kind god she'd come to know in her mind slowly dying, killed by the icy hatred in Loki's eyes. She turned away from him, scrambling across the bed to rest her feet on the floor on the other side of the bed, the tears splashing silently on the legs of her jeans. "Speak mortal, my patience grows thin." His voice was steely and cold, like the dagger he still held. She took a breath, turning to face him, her face still wet and stained with tears that fell unhindered down her cheeks. She loathed to tell him what she'd experienced, hated to sully something so perfect and peaceful with the mockery she knew would come, but he wouldn't let her leave this room alive unless she explained so, taking a calming breath, she launched into an explanation of the dream she'd lived and the god she'd met there.

Loki, for his part, was no less conflicted. He'd felt a burgeoning concern for the woman ever since he'd seen her laying on the floor, cold and limp as a fallen warrior. He'd tried to fight it, hoping against hope that it would fade, only to have it freshen with every breath and glance she cast his way. It was maddening to feel such tender emotions for so low a creature. He knew with a certainty he couldn't explain that she was to blame for it. He knew of the link, he could feel it like a physical tether, pulling him to her no matter how he struggled, but the cause was still mystery. He saw the fear and pain in her eyes as he issued his final ultimatum, saw something break and go dark and should have thrilled at his victory, but instead, he felt pain, a lurching, halting kind of pain. He knew it well, guilt, guilt and sadness at having caused her such profound pain. He watched her scramble away, fighting down the urge to follow her, trusting instead in his tried and true methods of intimidation to settle this matter for good and all. It wasn't until she turned, tears still coursing down her cheeks that he felt the determination drain from him.

She was so small to him then, so sad and pitiful that he felt every inch the monster he had been named. He had taken something strong and powerful and reduced it to a weak little woman, cowering in fear and sorrow in her own bedroom. He was about to speak, to apologize or sooth,if possible, the wound he had opened, when she began to speak, unfolding a recount of the dream she'd had while he sat at her bedside, trying to figure a way to reach her. It was something too beautiful to touch, to pure to sully with his cutting remarks and it explained everything. She had accepted his power as part of herself, incorporated it into her being as fully and completely as if she had been born with it. There was no separating the two now, not without killing them both. The link was permanent. He tried to speak, words, for once, failing to come to him. All he could do was stare at her as she swallowed down another round of tears, waiting for the mocking belittlement she no doubt expected.

He settled instead for simply nodding and standing, gliding from the room like the icy creature he was, leaving her to break down in peace. He could hear her sobs from the other side of the door, a truly heart breaking sound that pulled on the newly formed link. He almost turned around. He almost went back in, took her in his arms and explained it all. But he was not to be used in such a way. He would not be made the play mate of a mortal, no matter how unique and, though he was loathe to admit it, beautiful, she may be. He took a breath, blocking the sound of her tears from his mind and walked down the hall, settling at the table and selecting a book from the large pile to busy himself with until he could think a way out of this.

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Well, there you have it, finally some psuedo romance between Riley and Loki. Sorry if this is going too slow for you guys, but I didn't want to Mary Sue it and have them sleeping together by chapter 3 ya know? LET ME KNOW WHAT YOU THINK! If I am going to slow, let me know and I'll speed things up a bit. Already have the next chapter written and ready, gonna wait and see the feedback I get on this one before I post it so if you are enjoying this story and want more, REVIEW!