"What if I were not here?" he asks one dreary, rain-ridden afternoon. I've been curled up in a window seat in the parlor, watching the drops dew crystal-like against the glass. Though Loki has been in the corner, thoroughly engrossed in some massive, back-breaking text, he's also been carelessly wiggling his fingers. The magic causes the drops to create pictures – simple ones of animals, flowers, then complex patterns and intricate designs. Eventually, I tried my own hand at picture-making. Whether he follows my motions or lets the drops act as iron shavings to my magnet fingers, the forms come out.

"What do mean?" I turn, cuddling a pillow closer to me. "Like, gone…or never around to begin with?"

He waves his hand. "What would you do if you were alone and able to do what you wish without me getting in your way?"

I blink. "Um…I don't know. Get my cat back. Or maybe get a job. Why? Are you going somewhere?"

"Perhaps." His eyes turn back to the text.

"Forever?" I say this with breath, though I feel a little lightheaded.

"Temporarily," Loki assures me. "But most likely not. I've no real cause to go, have I?"

"I would not pretend to know."

His eyes scan the letters, but he hears me. "It was just a question."

I know better; nothing is just a question with Loki Laufeyson. Still, I don't press, and turn back to my window. A dagger of ice is now shining on the glass, and I quickly use my fingertips to transfigure its shape into that of a bunny. In the corner, Loki sighs loudly, flipping through a few crackling pages. For the moment, all is well.

-XXX-

They come to him in morning. He let Tati sleep in this morn, finally swayed by her muffled protests. He strode around the park, bought a bagel, and absorbed the crisp dawn air without his reader by his side for the first time in a long time. He had taken up residency at one bench with chipped green paint, sipping his cardboard cup of tea. That's when Fury sat beside him.

"Laufeyson."

"Director." The god's voice is as cool as the frigid morning breezes. "I thought you might never approach me."

"We were waiting for an appropriate time."

"You mean not around my charge." It is not a question.

The one-eyed man frowns. "She is hardly a child."

"Oh, I've never treated her as such," Loki assures him. "You certainly did. But I've never had such…reservations. Underestimations, really."

"You understand why –"

The god cuts across him smoothly. "I simply never comprehended why you decided to play about the farce of a truce. Once you took her, you knew this playacting could only lead about one direction. Come now, Director, you are far too clever to believe I would not think otherwise. I knew, as you did, that my initial refusal spelled out the rest of this show."

"You cannot stay here." Fury shook his bald head. No regret tinges his tone, but there is a slight rumble. "I'm not going to endanger the lives of several million people by taking a chance on you. No matter what Stark or Deror might say. We both know you could wipe away half this city with all the power in your pinky if you so dared."

Loki graces the director with a feral smile. "Then why don't I?"

Fury does not blink. "Because, what purpose would it serve? You don't kill without cause, do you?"

Another sip of his tea – some cinnamon and cloves blend he finds to be rather tasty, if a little sweet – and the once-prince considers. "I am no cold-killer. That would be my brother. The war-monger."

Fury shrugs. "I wouldn't know anything about that."

"No," Loki agrees quietly. "You wouldn't, would you?"

They sit, silent, for some time. The god uses the time to scan the street. Barton rests against the decorative molding of a bank across the street. The Widow browses one t-shirt stand on the corner. A few men in dark suits mill about at random. They're quite surrounded. He would expect nothing less from SHIELD.

"Where is your tin-soldier?" he asks casually.

Fury's brow furrows. "Out, for the moment. Big business in Greece…."

"Ah," Loki says interestedly. "With Stark? Yes, the riots…I see you're keeping them busy. But you let them miss this little soirée?"

"Oh, I think they'll forgive me, in time."

"I should hope so," the god murmurs. "Very well, Director. Shall we speak openly? I do not see my brother, though I would pay a king's ransom to say he is lurking about to carry me home."

"You would be right."

"Tell me, how do you plan on dragging me home?"

"With this, brother."

Behind them, Thor looms, somber and still. The hammer rests in one of his massive hands, his grip tightening on it even as Loki allows his gaze to scan the elder prince.

"My brother," he says softly, rising. "You have again graced us of fair Midgard with your presence."

"I never left, Loki," Thor looks his sibling dead in the eye, his own sapphire gaze steely. "I stayed for you. To bring you home."

"I have no wish to return," hisses the younger god. "So your time has been wasted upon me. Return to Asgard, to your glorious reign among the peoples of flame. Leave me here. I want nothing more than to be away from you."

"Brother, our parents weep," Thor continues. "And all of court mourns. Return with me."

One mighty hand clamps down upon Loki's forearm. He stares at it, knowing that the time he has dreaded is now at hand. "So much sooner than I'd feared…." He was not yet done preparing Tati for his departure. She would not understand.

"This is what is best for you, brother," Thor pleads gently. "And her."

At the mention of his reader, Loki's eyes flash. "You know nothing of her –"

"Are you going to let this hang over your head always? Come home and accept your consequences, and then you shall be free to her and yourself. Otherwise…." Thor drifts off, uncertain. "Believe me, brother, you need this."

Without a word Fury nods. A pair of thick silver manacles appear in Thor's unoccupied hand, then find their way around Loki's wrists. The younger god strains, snarling. Calm, his brother steps away.

"We must go now," he says slowly.

"No," the younger god hisses, then staggers forward. "Brother, I – I cannot go without telling her – she will think badly of me…."

Thor visibly hesitates, but Fury shakes his head. "No. You knew this was coming. I cannot allow –"

The God of Thunder raises a single plate-sized hand to silence the one-eyed man. He peers at Loki uncertainly, trying to discern falsehood. But his brother has a silver tongue, and finding the truth is a difficult as discovering lies. He cannot tell if there is sincerity in his brother's stance.

"If we let you do this," Thor begins carefully, a few blond locks falling into his bright eyes. "You will come calmly? You will not flee?"

"I swear it," his once-brother murmurs, eyes locked onto the blue orbs of his sibling. "I will try nothing. Merely, let me say my goodbyes. Let her see me walk away as my own man, not as a caged beast."

Slowly, Thor considers. Then he nods, ignoring Fury's growing protest. "You shall say your farewells, brother. Come –"

All the while, the SHIELD Director argues against their intentions. Thor ignores him, leading his sibling by the elbow to the brownstone that sits only three blocks away. All accusations of irresponsibility and madness are brushed aside – the blond god has a singular focus for the moment. The matter is now between brothers, not SHIELD. When they stop before the stoop, Fury is arguing with the large man while Thor removes the restraints.

"And you trust him to return?" demands the one-eyed man.

Thor looks to his brother. The blue burns into Loki's green. The understanding found there, between their gazes is answer enough for Fury, who stops short.

"Yes," the elder prince says simply. He turns to his brother. "Say your farewells to your woman. We will be here. If you do not return in a timely manner, my brother, I will be forced to seek you."

Loki nods. "Thank you."

He lets himself inside with a flicker of fingers and soft murmur. Automatically he can sense her – still in bed, but being roused by the daylight creeping in from the crack in the drapes. Like a shade, he steals up the stairs. Without a word, he enters their room, closing the door while quieting the hinges (with a spell that might last long beyond the house), and stands back to observe her.

She lies on her stomach. The covers are up to her neck, and he can make out a frizzed curtain of dark hair. One arm is stretched out, resting in a bow on the pillow beside her head. The duvet rises and falls with her breath. He crosses quietly, then pulls at the fabric. Tati shifts, murmuring a moan, then curls into herself against the cold. Loki suppresses a smile with the memory of his motivation for disturbing her slumber.

"Loki," she mumbles, turning on the mattress to face him, blinking back the dawn light. "I really don't want to go for a walk. It's freeze-your-ass-off-cold out there. Actually, it's freeze-your-ass-off-cold in here, too."

He waves one hand carelessly to remedy that for the moment, then moves to sit in the armchair across from the bed. Eye level with her, he speaks softly. "I've already had my walk and come back, my love."

"Oh?" She shifts up, rubbing her eyes.

Now he smiles – it is slight, but present. Reassurance. "Tatiana…I want you to promise me you'll not be foolish."

At this she blinks. Then frowns. "Ever?"

"Ever," he confirms. "Promise me you'll be as insightful as I know you can be. That you'll get by. Properly."

"Uh." She is blatantly confused. He simply deepens the smile ("Humans are always so trusting. Easy to believe even when they are most aware."). "Yeah. I can do that. Why? Are you going away somewhere?"

His core aches. Looking at her with mussed hair and stunningly keen eyes, her lips parted and skin glowing in the dawn air, sleep still in her, he knows that he will miss this. More than anything on Midgard. His reader. Half-wit.

Loki does not answer her. "My dear half-wit," he sighs instead. "You've going to have to be very careful and very smart. But I know you. You're not nearly as stupid as I pretend you to be."

"Thank you, I think. Loki, what are you saying?" She is properly sitting up now, swinging her legs out of bed. Tatiana crosses to him, one hand outreached to touch his cheek. The warm fingers trace the lines of his face. Worry etches the pale planes, he knows. Worry, and creases he cannot even begin to name. She smoothes all of these, murmuring softly as his eyes drift shut. Once closed, she kneels to become level with him, then presses her lips to his. He inhales her scent, and she his, and for several minutes they simply are. They let themselves be at peace, just for the moment.

No tears are shed, but as she takes his collar, hungrily pulling the god closer, he recognizes desperation and fear and uncertainty in her every breath, only because it's reflected back in him.

Finally he pulls back.

"Know that I do not leave you of any will of mine," he whispers. "Know that this has never been my choice, and that if the fates were kinder – if I were –"

A finger to his lips stops him.

"I'll be right here," she promises. It's then that her voice catches. It is slight, but enough to slice through the stoic Trickster. "I'll be right here…but I can't wait forever, Loki."

He knows. He cannot expect her to.

One hand rises to her jaw, thumb stroking her chin. "My reader. Tatiana." His eyes raise to meet hers, glazed and deep. "I intent to not make you wait long. I will return to you. For you."

Loki can practically see the words echo in her mind. Their private pact against the world. A lover's bond. "I will return to you. For you." Always.

She takes his lips again. Then he feels the threads of his Asgardian bonds tug – Thor beckons. For a brief moment he tastes her lip.

"I must go," he pushes her back an arm's length.

She honors him; no tears, no wails of want, Tatiana removes herself from his arms and stands back. He rises, then crosses to the door. As he passes, he takes up her hand – the one bearing the ring.

Tapping the green stone, he tells her serious, "Keep this on."

"Like I can take it off," she says wryly.

His silence is enough of a response. Before speaking again, he closes his eyes briefly. In a focused rush of power, he summons forth every protective charm he knows, every spell and every speck of goodwill. It goes into her, sinking into the ring for those requiring physical, non-living anchors, and into her skin for those that sought flesh-and-blood in their work. After they swell around her, Loki opens his eyes. The mass of magic is a huge sum – following today, she probably wouldn't be able to run the pads of her fingers against the blade of a common kitchen knife.

Once again, he strokes her jaw. "Tati."

And then he's down the stairs, and out the door, into the silver fox's mask, into the shackles, the SHIELD car, the bifrost, and beyond.

-XXX-

Gone.

"What if I were not here?"

Gone.

"Promise me you'll be as insightful as I know you can be. That you'll get by. Properly."

Just…out the door. Calmly.

"Tati."

No fight. Simply… departed.

"I will return to you. For you."

"To you…."

"…For you."

In the vast silence, I gasp, then sink to the floor. A new pain blooms in my chest. The blossom of ache consumes me as I gape, clutching my chest, trying to absorb the happenings of the last half-hour. Loki. Gone. Loki. Vanished. Loki. Leaving. Loki. Loki.

I surge to my feet. Where – to where? Where must I go to see – I've sought him before, I'll seek him again.

But he is so beyond me down. To places where I cannot follow. Asgard.

There is nothing I can say or do.

Will this be our life, always?

-XXX-

The dreams do not come that first week. But they arrive in the next, swift and sparkling of the empty hall of pillars. My mind reels forward, darting through the stone trees, until it halts and everything in thrown into focus. I stand before a cage of some forbidding dark metal. The space around the box is lit by several flickering torches. The foremost surface of the box flickers, developing a sheen similar to frosted glass. In the center, beyond the glass, is a figure, dark and solid. The surface shifts again, and the image grows clear. A reed-thin person, with dark hair, dark cloak, back to glass.

I move forward on quick strides. My fists hit the glass that is not glass, and feel an unpleasant jolt of foreign energy. The figure turns slightly. Green eyes meet my own panicked orbs.

I sag against the surface. The person moves to mimic me, hands were my fists rest. Loki's eyes are dark, his entire figure tensed as a deer ready to run, a serpent reared to strike, and his mouth sealed by a silver half-mask that reminds me of a fox's muzzle. Staring, I reel back slightly. His fingers stretch against the barrier. Shaking his head, the silver melts away, and he moves his lips, testing his jaw.

"Loki," I breathe, and before I even know it I've pressed myself to the glassy surface. His gaze is bright with amusement.

"Mourning me already?"

"Wha-" I glance down to see my corporal form wrapped in a smoky, gauzy sort of sort fabric, which has silver threads running through its length, giving off a faint shimmer in the torch light. Not exactly mourning dress, but it is black. "No, I –"

"Do not mourn?"

"Oh, shut up," I snap at his mockingly sad expression. " Of course I am. But it's not like you're dead. You know that's not how people mourn nowadays, anyways."

Huffily, the god crosses his arms. Even in my dream, he is an arrogant bastard, which is further proven by the smug "How do you know?" that follows his sigh.

Unable to describe the sensation, I say simply, "I would feel it."

This pleases him (which only serves to irritate me), and Loki brushes a hand against the barrier, where my cheek would be. I can almost feel the energy pulse. Does it bother him as it does me? I don't ask. We stand, quiet. Not a word passes between us, but it is nothing that troubles me; I don't know what to say, what words I might speak to sooth the pains of separation. I still do not fully comprehend the circumstance, yet asking after that feels premature. So we gaze upon one another.

After nearly ten minutes, I speak.

"Where are we?"

"Ah." He backs away from the barrier slightly. "The Pavilion of Secrets. A chamber in the palace of Asgard."

"You're home, then."

"Well," he snorts, gesturing delicately. "This is hardly what I would describe as my usual suites."

"You mean they don't always lock you up in a big metal box and gag you? I would; I bet you're a horrid house guest."

"And you would be the one to know," he points out in false cheer.

I lower my lashes. "Then I had no clue what I was getting into. Joseph warned me…taking a Renaissance Festival freak in…."

"…who turns out to be the Trickster God?"

A sigh. "It was not what I would claim to be my brightest decision."

Loki grins. "And yet it brought you to me!"

"No," I correct. "You to me. Why are you so cheerful."

The god shakes his head. "Haven't I cause to be? You're sleeping, you're dreaming…all is well. I've missed my half-wit."

"Oh, how I've missed those terms of endearment," I say wryly. "Your overwhelming affection, my lord, has been so greatly yearned for. My heart grieves, alas –"

"Very funny," he says loudly. "If only it were not true."

"Indeed."

His smirk is wide. "Tatiana Deror. Your wit is ablaze this evening."

"I apologize. It's had little stimulation over the course of the week."

"Oh yes…I can see that."

Had there not been the barrier between us, I would have smacked him. The words are harmless enough, but the expression that follows makes it clear he's not referring to my wit being stimulated. In a mocking scandal, I move back from the glass, teasing. Loki's foxlike eyes follow me, and I am reminded of the mask.

"What were you wearing?" I ask, peering up at him.

An unhappy look crosses over his features – tight and strained. With a gentle wave of his long fingers, the silver melts back into place, strapping his lips and jaw tightly together. Those ever-green eyes stare out at me, vast, miserable (though he would never say a much), cold. In that look there is more said than in one thousand words. My fingers trace the shape of the mask in the air. From the darker places of my mind comes the cool murmur: "Silvertongue. Liarsmith. Tangletongue. Snake…fox. Loki Liarheart."

A gag. To trap his clever tongue. I blink.

"Loki…." I reach up to touch the barrier. My heart aches for him. For an artist of words, to be silenced. What of his defense? And who had left him in this cage, a savage prison in the midst of such refined beauty? An ugly eyesore in the middle of loveliness. The Pavilion of Secrets…to keep Laufeyson hidden?

The mask disappears again. He steps away from the glass. Loki doesn't speak, but stares at me openly, allowing me to absorb the realization.

"Who did this to you?" I ask.

A cruel humor quirks his lips. "My family, of course."

I recoil in horror. "Your family?"

"I did stand against them," he answers wryly. "If you recall."

I do. Oh, gods, I do. That day in New York is still clear in my mind, seven months later. To this day it still stuns me Loki was the cause of this terror. But then again, knowing him, it's really not.

"You're going to wake soon," he says softly.

But I still have so many questions! I open my mouth to protest, but find no sound can exit. A heavy weight falls upon my lips. I lift my finger tips, and find cold metal encasing my mouth. A mask. Just like Loki's. Panic surges in my chest. He observes me, unperturbed.

"I cannot promise you more dreams," he tells me seriously. "But know that you are safe."

Before I can protest, the image fades. Everything blurs, and I am tugged away from the dream. Just before he disappears from my sight, I can see the silver fox mask melt back into place. He turns away….

-XXXX-

Yeah. I'm super tired. Editing sucks, I know.

Saw Avengers for the third time. It was lovely.

Thanks for the continued support. Imma gonna go sleep now...