8.

. . .

Still thinking about the sisters and their ploy for Thor's attentions, Loki skipped the family's evening gathering and took a small meal alone, not far from the library. After, he went and found one of the reference texts he'd been studying, an old and dry elementalist treatise on the fundamental use of empty air in illusory crafting, and took himself off to an even more secluded area not far from Frigga's tower.

This was an area of small viewing pools and flowering gardens, another one of such curated sanctums where the Queen held sway and where the healers again often plied their hobbies. He wrinkled his nose at the strong but not unpleasant smell of the night-bloom irises as they wafted up to him where he used a broad gold marble windowsill as a reader's desk. With the night lit up diamond bright from the stars, he didn't need a candle, though a stubby one rested nearby just in case. His fine ears caught the sounds of the street parties only now revving up to last into the deep night. Not usually the sort of amusement fare he liked, but let them to it. Thor might slip off again to disappear into that stream of people, and he was just as welcome to do so. Leave Loki to the silence and his own grinding thoughts as better companions tonight.

The first few weeks of the festival were already past, travelers from around the Nine Realms surging into the city to celebrate and share tales and offer their wares to one another. During the day Loki sometimes went out to see if there were any sages and storytellers more to his interests. Not often did he find anything worth taking back to his private quarters, although once he did find an old Alfheim mystic with a shelf of sorcerer's focus stones that were of better value and power than the mystic was letting on. He bargained for two of them on the spot, one for himself and one to surprise the Queen with on one of the coming eves of the festival.

The sounds of the revels didn't distract him, Loki was used to that and more. And yet tonight he found his gaze drifting from the words of the page off into the depths of what space laid between the stars. He was restless, but he didn't know why. Sometimes there wasn't a why, certainly not one he could ever find. It was part of him to feel out of place now and again, a mystery to his life that he accepted, even if he was not contented by it.

Chewing on the inside corner of his lip, he tried to reassert his focus, re-reading the same ascetic line about the intricacies of harnessing null aether three times and then one more for good measure before his attention drifted off again into the black.

Suddenly, motion caught his unfocused eye in one of the Queen's gardens below. Loki leaned out a little more to watch the shadow of a fine, lithe figure in a dark and flowing dress move easily between a handful of flowering trees towards one of the ponds. He arched an eyebrow, watching the figure as they paused and then moved on to the edge of a different one fed with little streams of running water split fine and burbling between low, flat stones. Fallen leaves and lilypads dotted its otherwise mirror-calm surface, its outline ringed by blue vines, and all of its liveliness born of some of the rarest, most beautiful cuttings to be found in Asgard's gardens.

Loki gently shut the book he was actively not reading with one hand, the other still laid with his palm flat against the cool marble, and he watched as the figure stood like a statue of some forgotten goddess at the edge of the water. He saw their head flick around, looking for active watchers, and he ducked back further into the darkness just before that scan might have come across him.

Apparently satisfied with their solitude, the figure observed the water in front of them again, with its crystalline brooks and its damp stones, and then, born of a sparrow's quiet delicacy, a small jump carried her to one of those flat stones resting in the heart of the pool.

His eyebrow arched near to his hairline and he leaned out again as the girl perched there, balanced carefully at first on the pad of one bare foot. Then she began to move with confidence, the other foot coming down to share a stone too small for most. A strong twist of her legs carried her to another stone, her arms coming up in a slow and deliberate flow with her hands posturing fine and primly to frame herself like a butterfly on the wind. Then again to a stone smaller than the first, with a free swivel of her hips and a dip of her head to turn a stream of unbound hair into a dark tidal wave roiling out on that wind of her own making.

She danced, Loki realized, startled. Free, with no one to see her, someone was claiming the Queen's gardens for her own private supremacy. No one to stop her, to control her, to tell her what she must do. Just for a little while.

The girl swayed gently to whatever she secretly heard as her own music, picking up speed and moving from skip-stone to stone with enough elegant confidence that she may as well have been gliding along smooth palace marble instead. She began to interlace her dance with grander movements, hip-curving bows and rippling contortions of her torso that threatened to toss her into the water but never did. Her control was too fine. Instead, he watched the sleeves and hem of the loose silk she wore obey her almost sorcerous whim, a stream of controlled gliding taking her low, too low, and the fabric wafting close enough to the surface of the water to kiss alive the faintest ripple - only to then come away untouched.

Perfect control and grace. He realized his face was surprisingly hot, knowing that of all the things he had spied on in the palace over these last few years, what this girl was up to was not meant for him - nor anyone else - to see. Still, he watched as the private dance sped up, becoming something more than freedom. Primal, like some near-forgotten rite.

She stayed balanced on her toes, skipping from stone to stone and bringing her hands together in the silent claps that punctuated this ritual dance that had meaning only to her. A rondel meant for gods and the stars alone, her feet teasing the skin of the water but never making contact. A fingernail tracing along the petiole of a lilypad as she swept past, like the bare back of a lover. The silent whisper of promise past her lips.

Loki knew to his bones he should not have been there, witness to this. His palms were cold with sweat as he watched, stunned, unaware of how long the girl danced there with only starlight as a partner. It might have been only seconds. It might have been an hour. He would have liked to watch for a year.

And then she stopped, freezing atop a stone near the edge of the pond as if she might have been alerted to intruders. Her skirt settled calm around her legs and she looked around again, finding nothing and no one. Not him, pulled deep into the shadows again with only his wide and staring eyes to give him away. If he were caught now, he would owe more than an apology. Blood offering, perhaps. He might have granted it. But whatever had caught her attention, it had been enough to break the spell. The gloaming she'd stolen was over.

He realized as she left, padding away fast and silent back into the depths of the palace where she belonged, that he knew exactly who she was. Had seen it the moment the dance began, in the curve of her narrow, youthful face and the quickness of her eyes as she searched for spies like him, but his thoughts could not congeal her name until the moment was over. Then he understood what he'd seen was a kind of private revenge against those who'd done her wrong.

It was Kara, the Queen's beleaguered young handmaiden.

. . .

Loki woke to the low, gravelly sound of someone clearing their throat with insistent deliberateness, his fingers still dug deep into the afghan draped across him. He froze, fingers worming for one of the three knives at his thigh.

"You're awake," came the muted voice. "You were better armed this time, which is understandable." A dry snort punctuated the next. "And dressed. Which is preferable."

His fingers found the thin leather sheaths still strapped tight - and no blades inside them. He jerked upright to stare at the black figure, not even attempting to be coy about it.

A leather glove hand flicked out, casually. His three blades dropped to the out of reach end table by the window with a soft clatter - the small window itself filled with that almost hazy profile from the night before. They were lounged along its brim as though it were one of the low chaises within the room itself, balanced casually with a soft-soled boot dangling from the ledge. "Won't need to worry about the guards for a little while yet. They've got a fifteen minute overlap on this particular shift change, and even then they won't see me for an extra five or so if I skip around a bit." A single finger came up to tap at the mask where lips might be. "Oh, but there are at least three in the hall right now, courtesy of that same change. You could scream for them, but, well. I think you established last eve that it's a less than optimal outcome… for you."

Loki studied the shape, picking at the voice, trying to find something, anything to wedge into. As Heimdall had newly retaught him, his best option was to stay silent and wait for a better opening. Eat away at that fifteen minutes or more, at least.

"If you want to play the silent game, which is, I confess, a smart enough choice, I remind you I have all the knives in this room. You will scream, if I should choose to force the issue."

Good threat. He'd gone cold all over, the sort of chill that masked the calm of someone ready to fight and die if need - but he had no plans for the latter. "It costs me nothing to dress my face and scream, regardless. Your plan has a flaw."

"It costs you plenty, prince." The figure tilted their head as they punctured through his lie, seeming to study him. "Magic costs. It's got you in its debt. How long have you been wearing these masks? A few months, a little longer?" Their voice trailed in the air like smoke, going quiet and soft. "Since not long after the death of the queen?"

He said nothing. Listening, the shell of his ear prickling as he searched for what he could. Almost feminine, just then. Not wise to wager it all, not yet, but that was a softer grief. It told him nothing else, just the first needle to slip a thread of suspicion onto.

"Reckon you're in a harsh debt about to come due, prince. In more ways than one." Genderless again, damn it. His fingers dug and tore into the afghan instead of his attacker. "Anyway. Looks as if you've been asleep half an hour, maybe a touch more. Not exactly going to light up the night with sorcery on that worn out little candle of your spirit."

"You talk an astounding amount for a hired killer."

A short, brittle bark of a laugh. "You're digging for information. Never were a fool." The dangling leg came up to match its bent partner. Absurdly, arms reached out to hug them, like a little girl might. "Oh, but, that itself might be a clue for you! How silly of me, Your Highness!"

Then the hunter tittered. Loki swallowed, realizing that the absurdity of their actions gave him nothing again. They were willing to make themselves into anything and anyone. Formless. Shapeless. Just a small death waiting for him in the window, like a magpie after the rain. "And all you want is Odin."

"All I want, smart prince, is Odin."

"Why?"

"The man that stole the throne for all his unknown reasons and his knowable strife asks me why. Gods bless and Gods save. For that alone I ought strike." The mask leaned in, for a moment letting him see clearly where the leather parts of the mask was burned with blacker shapes of twining vines and leaves, a paradoxically pretty thing. In death, the hunter wore symbols of life. "Do you need a why? Do you care why?"

"I asked why."

"You were always good at angling for time, and here I am carelessly giving it to you." The figure sighed and leaned back again, audibly annoyed with him. "Is he alive, yes or no, and if yes, where did you stash his miserable old form?"

"And if no?"

"I will be heavily disappointed, but I suppose I will struggle on." It came out with an odd, flat neutrality. "Which is it? I'll know a lie, prince. Even from your serpentine mouth."

Loki studied the shadow, saying nothing, giving away nothing. Maybe it was indeed a woman. They were lithe and small enough - but trained killers were often selected for such traits. It gave him no guarantees.

"I can see you need a certain amount of motivation. All right. Here's this, then - if your ruse gets flushed out, you're deep in the dip and the Nine Realms transform into a singularly busy hive to find out what exactly did, in fact, happen to the King. They'll take what they want from the strips of your skin if they need to, and then all I have to do is sit back and wait for my answers. And if he's alive and found… I'm patient, prince. I can be terribly patient." The mask tilted again. "Up to a certain point. We do not want what lies after that."

"And here I dimly thought this might not end in blackmail."

"You're the one in blackmailable position. Look at you, the way you're dressed. One might think you've got something to lose." Taunting him again. He felt the blood rush across his face. "Oh, that was a bit mean of me. Certainly I wouldn't like it said to me, though I'm not the one that pretends to be the king. All right. You've got a little time to think, Prince Loki, because that's what you do. And when I think you've started to realize you don't have many options beyond the most elegantly simple - answer my godsdamned question - I'll come by again."

"You just might be disappointed, hunter."

"The walls will begin to tighten all around you not long after, if so. Think on that clue, Prince. I can make it happen, unstoppable, dooming you, and you'll never see the trap's teeth coming until it's far too late. You'll live in dread till they tear you from the throne. I'll give you that for free. You can think about it all you like until you see me again." The figure unfolded from the windowsill, soft heels touching the floor. "Don't move. It'll be worse for you than for me if you do."

Loki didn't move, but he did speak, angry. "Is this a hire for you? Is this Lord Eirund's doing? Or something else? Fine, I've dug for what clues I can. Give me another one. What's the shape of my enemy here? Who are you? What is this about?" He doubted some of his own possibilities, but it was an attempt to lay out a shape of the field, something to fix his position.

Something cold laid against his throat, an edge of metal so sharp it felt like it could have been frozen. The voice hissed into his ear, a haunt all its own, still possibly feminine, all hostility. "This is personal, prince. This is deeply personal, and you won't be able to bargain or trick your way through it. Bear that next clue in mind."

His teeth baring in frustration, he watched the figure then casually open the door and walk out into the lighted hall, to the sounds of distant booted feet and no alarmed shouts from any guard. Then it shut behind the hunter, leaving him in silence, and with his knives still splayed on the table by the window, useless.