Notes: In which Loki gets back to work, everyone gets back to plans of all sorts, and we change the name of the deputy head teacher and retrospectively fix the previous chapters: I meant to name her after a character in Little Mosque On the Prairie, not a kind of cheese!

This is one of those transitional chapters. We are, finally, beginning to get somewhere!

Warnings: In case we need some.

Chapter Eighteen

Monday morning brought heavy rain, and with it wet, muddy footprints that must be mopped from the entryway- indeed, from all the halls on the ground floor, and the stairwells too, since the children tracked the wet everywhere. It was a matter of ongoing fascination to Loki, how beings with such small feet could carry so much water with them. Of course, much of it had dripped from their waterproof coats, which now hung on hooks outside each classroom.

Their doors were all closed now. From inside each room Loki could hear a murmur of small voices, and the larger ones of the teachers, humming away at their lessons. If he wished, it would take little effort to hear exactly what they were saying, but he respected the message of the closed door and permitted the voices to remain a murmur at the edge of his hearing as he worked.

The floors were now clean, but still wet, which rendered them hazardous to anyone walking carelessly upon them. Or running like something fired from a catapult, which was of course the normal ambulation of children. Loki was aware that running in the halls was forbidden, and therefore any child who fell in the course of such activity would have only him- or herself to blame. However, it was unlikely a parent would have much sympathy for such an explanation of how their offspring was injured. And besides, any means of protecting children which relied upon children refraining from behaving like children seemed doomed to failure.

Loki was under firm instruction from the head teacher, Mrs. Kingston, to refrain from using magic within the school. He was therefore very careful to ensure he was alone as he cast drying spells upon the floors and the children's outdoor raiment. The waterproof coats and boots were no longer dripping, it was true, but a little investigation revealed they were clammy, which would be uncomfortable and apt to cause a chill in any who wore them. There seemed no harm in using a very small, really almost negligible, spell to ensure they were entirely dry and cozy when the children put them on again at the end of the day.

He had begun with the nursery class, working his way methodically through the school, and was just finishing with Year Six when he glanced up and saw Mrs. Kingston walking down the hall toward him. There was a file folder under her arm, and a look of purpose on her face. Drawing on… certain skills learned in his previous life… Loki banished any consciousness of guilt from his own expression (really, what harm could come of a simple drying spell?) resisted the childish urge to hide his hands behind his back (no evidence of the spell clung to them anyway) and bent a glance of respectful interrogation upon the head teacher.

Who glanced at the neat array of boots and raincoats, and the dry and shiny floor, and smiled at him.

"I understand you spoke to Ms. Hamoudi last week," she said, following the school's convention of using formal address to refer to a fellow staff member even when no children were present. (Some of the children referred to Carol as "Mrs. Hart," but she did not insist upon it. When Loki arrived he had not understood these standard forms of address until it was too late, and so "Loki" he was and would probably remain. He supposed that if he did indeed become a teacher, he would find it necessary to convince himself as well as others that his name was "Mr. Odinson.")

"I did," Loki nodded, trying to decide what expression would be the most appropriate for this conversation. He settled on what he hoped was a trustworthy one, and waited.

"Well," said Mrs. Kingston, taking the folder from under her arm and extending it to him, "if you have any interest in the idea, this may be of use to you." Loki accepted the folder and she explained, "This is some information on the Access to Higher Education program." Loki must have looked blank, because she went on, "A lot of people leave school without taking the qualifications that would allow them to go on to university, but then later decide they would like to do so after all. The Access to HE program lets them take equivalent qualifications so they can go on to the course of study they want. I've printed out some general information on the system, as well as contact information for the Access program at City of Bristol College. If you would like to pursue this, you should make an appointment to talk to someone there.

"There actually is a specific course that would prepare you for initial teacher training, but it's very competitive. You may need to take some preliminary courses first, or get a certain amount of classroom experience before you apply." She smiled. "We can help you with the second part, if you're interested. You might not end in teaching at this school, and we really would hate to lose you, but we would hate it a lot worse if we felt your abilities were being wasted." A flicker of concern crossed her expression and she added, "The whole process could take several years, but if you're really interested in a career in education it will be time well spent."

It was only with difficulty that Loki resisted the impulse to laugh in Mrs. Kingston's kindly, well-meaning face. Only his respect for her, and his gratitude for what she was trying to do for him, enabled him to hold it back. Several years, she said, as though it was a hardship. As though he had not lived more than nine hundred of her years, and wasted well over half of that time with useless festering, and envy, and wishing for things he could not define, and did not really believe he would ever be allowed to have anyway. To spend five, or ten, or twenty Midgardian years working toward a prize he could have simply by earning it? Loki was not a patient creature, but he could hardly imagine himself becoming exasperated or losing interest over such a tiny period of time as that.

He maintained his composure, thanked her sincerely, then retreated to the custodians' room to put away his implements and tuck the folder into his backpack. It fitted in nicely beside the second folder, containing short student essays on Bulgaria and the Czech Republic. (Apparently, writing essays for Loki's edification had become something of a sport in Ms. Hamoudi's Year Four class. Loki found them fascinating, although he had sense enough to do some independent fact-checking before he believed all that was written in them.) (Such fact-checking had revealed, somewhat to his surprise, that one of the principle exports of Italy really was Fiats. Though, sadly, not spaghetti.)

By this time it was late morning, and Loki was beginning to feel hungry. He resisted the urge to begin on his lunch, although the turkey-and-dressing sandwich he had packed (George and Mitchell each had the same, which finished the turkey, and they would divide the apple pie tonight) was undeniably tempting. Saving the sandwich for later, he took an apple (not one of Thor's) from his lunch bag and ate it while reviewing his list of duties for the week and deciding what to do next. There were a variety of jobs that must be performed regularly, and Loki tried to get the heavier ones out of the way in the early part of the week, so that Carol would not feel compelled to do them.

Ordinarily, Loki was hard to sneak up on. However, his mind was occupied, the apple was crunchy, and (perhaps most importantly) he was far less guarded these days, especially here at the school.

So he was taken quite by surprise when there came a voice at the door of the little custodians' room:

"Loki?"

He did not start, or visibly show surprise- Loki was far too old a hand for that- but his stomach dropped violently even as he turned toward the doorway.

"Owen," he greeted the other man, setting down the apple and rising to his feet. He held up his hands a little, in a gesture indicating they were sticky with apple juice, and so he could not shake hands. Then he said, "I am surprised to see you: visitors to the school are required to check in at the office, and then are escorted wherever they need to go." He was in the school, intheschoolintheschool-

Owen offered a little shrug, and a smile he probably thought was charming. "Figured it wouldn't do any harm to just come find you."

The last creature who had made himself free to "just come find" Loki here at his workplace was the vampire Herrick, in his guise as a police officer. Now, of course, the rhinoceros charm protected the school from incursion by ill-intentioned supernatural creatures. Loki spent a fleeting moment considering how he might alter the spell to also protect the building and its grounds from malevolent humans. Surely it could be done. A spell of invisibility would probably have to accompany it, so the children would not be frightened by the sight of what happened to such individuals-

The whole idea was probably far too complicated to succeed. Still, the mental image of Owen being hurled across the yard, and then trampled, by a black rhinoceros was sweet enough to enable Loki to finally smile back at him.

"Is this regarding our boiler?" he asked. He did not wish to be rude- well, of course, he did wish to be rude, as well as accusatory and violent, but that was neither here nor there- but surely Owen had not sensed the similarities Loki had, and decided there was an affinity. This could not possibly be a purely friendly visit.

With an effort, Loki held his expression of friendly interrogation, and even Owen the great liar seemed to fall for it.

Or possibly Owen was not interested enough in other people to pay any attention to whether they were telling him lies. Loki's interest in falsehood had always gone both ways, because his lies had always been largely defensive in nature, and an element of that defense had been careful study of any who might wish to hurt or manipulate him in turn. (Which had, of course, led to a screaming breakdown when he learned the only creatures he had trusted never to lie to him had in fact been, by his definition, doing so all his life.)

Owen, however, appeared quite supremely confident that nothing could hurt him, and no one would ever find him out. Loki wondered what other people even looked like to Owen. Did he literally see them as ants beneath his notice?

He jerked his mind back to the present as Owen said,

"Yes, it is, I guess. I was passing the school and remembered you worked here. I just wanted to let you know I should be able to get the new parts for it by the weekend- " Loki spared himself a moment to wonder what new parts were these, when Owen had given no sign of noticing that some of the old parts were in the wrong places- "and I'll get the repairs done then."

"Thank you," Loki said, using every bit of his talent as a liar and cheat to get the words out. "We will all appreciate that."

Owen now gave a most convincing portrayal of guilt. Or, perhaps, since his tenants were men, he truly felt they deserved a little consideration. "Look, I really am sorry about not getting back to you before this. My... partner... and I have been having a little trouble lately and my mind hasn't been on everything it should." Again, the would-be charming smile. "You know how women are."

"Intrepid, loyal, and worthy of trust?" Loki replied, with a charming smile of his own. Owen laughed, as though Loki had not spoken the exact truth with regard to the women of his acquaintance. Loki, in turn, restrained himself from incinerating Owen where he stood, and politely but firmly escorted the man from the school.

His hands were shaking a little when he returned to his list of tasks, and his apple no longer held any attraction. Even his turkey-and-dressing sandwich no longer tempted him. He added the loss of that pleasure as a footnote to his list of grudges held against Owen as he carried his lunch bag upstairs to the staff lounge, to put in the refrigerator for tomorrow.

Matters would have to be settled with Owen, and soon. That was certain. The only question still left was the all-important one: how?

~oOo~

This was a day when Loki both arrived at and left work early, and ordinarily he would have gone directly home. However, a thought had occurred to him, and so before Carol arrived he sent a text message to Annie, asking her for particulars on Janey Harris's workplace. He then used the map function on his mobile to find directions to the place.

At the end of his work day, Loki bid Carol a good afternoon and set out in the direction of his usual bus stop. As he walked down the street, however, he cloaked himself in one of his favourite glamours, so that no one he passed would notice him, and applied a small, partial shapeshifting spell to alter his appearance when he allowed himself to be seen again.

The shift was extremely minor, a matter of adding a little colour to his complexion, slightly altering his eye colour from grayish-green to grayish-blue, and turning his hair into a mop of blond curls. The disguise took very little effort to maintain, and ensured that no one would connect this frankly harmless-looking human with the black-haired sorcerer who rented the pink house on the terrace.

Thus disguised, Loki consulted his mobile again, orienting himself to the location of the tanning salon where Janey worked. Then he made one of his short local "jumps" from one known location to the next, and allowed the concealing glamour to slide away as he walked along the street toward the salon.

There was no sign of Janey Harris as he stepped through the door. Instead, he was greeted by the other young woman, the blonde of whom Annie had spoken. She glanced up with a bright professional smile, and Loki smiled back as he entered.

"I wonder," he said, with a carefully calculated air of self-deprecating friendliness- and also a hint of an Irish accent rather like Mitchell's- "if I could ask you for some information about your, your services." His smile was brightly innocent as he went on, "My girlfriend and I are planning a trip to Majorca, in the spring, and she's been a little fussed about looking pale in her swimsuit. You know, after the winter?"

In the back of his mind, Loki felt pleased at his ability to sound so human. It would be taxing to maintain for very long, but he was sure he could get through this interaction without requirement of a spell to make this young woman ignore his diction.

The blonde smiled again, a more human and friendly smile this time. "Well, you've come to the right place to do something about that. We do gift certificates, if you're thinking of giving them to her as a present."

"Yes, exactly," Loki nodded, pleased at her understanding. "I was thinking for Christmas." Then he permitted a shadow to fall across his face. "Only... I have to admit, I am a little concerned about... I worry about the affect it might have on her skin? I've heard it's not necessarily good for you?"

The young woman frowned and nodded, with an air of taking his concerns seriously. Truly, as far as Loki was concerned, the overly-cooked appearance of her own complexion was all the warning any reasonable person should need. However, clearly some humans found this appearance attractive.

"Is she very fair?" the blonde asked.

"Yes," Loki replied immediately. He had not given much thought to this fictitious girlfriend, but now he instinctively separated Annie from any connection to this place. "Very fair. She has red hair," he explained, and the blonde nodded.

"I'd definitely recommend caution, then, but there isn't any reason she shouldn't do a reasonable amount of tanning." Professionally self-serving as the answer was, Loki still appreciated her acknowledgement of his- or, rather, his character's- perfectly reasonable concern. The blonde woman looked under the counter, saying, "We have some information brochures here, that explain the potential problems and how to avoid them." Loki rather felt the best way to avoid such problems was to refrain from enclosing oneself in a box lined with bright lights, but pasted an expression of sincere interest on his face and held his tongue.

Loki had not come here with clearly thought-out plan. Instead, it had occurred to him that he wanted to see how Janey interacted with the coworker Annie had mentioned. He had hoped the other woman would prove sympathetic, and willing to offer support, if Janey decided to rid herself of Owen.

The fact Janey was not here at the moment meant he was probably going to have to return, perhaps in disguise as his own fictitious girlfriend. Well, if that was what it took...

And then the blonde straightened, with a handful of folded pamphlets printed from a computer, and laid them on the counter. Loki picked one up, glanced at the printed defense of cooking oneself in a tanning bed, and then focused on the photograph on the cover, which showed the blonde standing next to one of the tanning beds.

Suddenly hopeful, Loki examined the pamphlet more closely. And there, on the back, was another picture, this one of the entire staff, which consisted of half a dozen people. Second from the left was-

"Wait, excuse me, this is going to sound weird but- is that Janey Harris?" he asked, injecting a note of naïve surprise into his voice.

The blonde woman looked up in equal, though of course in her case genuine, surprise. "You know Janey?"

"Not well," Loki said quickly. "She knew my girlfriend when they both lived in London." He frowned thoughtfully at the image, at Janey's silly-looking, smiling little face, while at the same time gently pushing a spell toward the blonde woman that would cause her to forget to ever mention this supposed friend to Janey. (Loki knew it was wrong to alter people's memories or place controls on their minds, but if this lie was revealed it might undermine the blonde woman's belief in the whole situation. All things considered, the spell seemed the lesser evil.)

When he was sure the charm was set, Loki went on, with artistic hesitance,

"Do you happen to know whether she's involved with a bloke named Owen?"

The blonde's attention suddenly sharpened. "Yes. What do you know about Owen?"

"An- gela, my girlfriend, met him a few times in London. He was engaged to someone at the time, and... look, you know how it is, when you know people in common and hear rumours, but... his fiancée died."

"Yes," the blonde nodded. "Janey told me about that."

Loki took a deep breath and, with an air of forcing himself to speak, said, "Well- and take this with a grain of salt, it really might only be talk- ever since then, there have been rumours that he... that Owen was somehow involved."

The blonde's eyes widened. Loki, however, noted that she did not truly look surprised. She was startled to hear the words come out of someone's mouth, but they were words she had thought of.

Lowering her voice, though as far as Loki could tell there was no one else in the salon, the blonde woman asked, "What makes you- makes people- think that?"

Loki shrugged, a picture of embarrassment. "There is no- there isn't any proof. Just... the fiancée... my girlfriend says she always had that watchful look, like she knew she had to keep Owen happy at any price. And- " he gestured at his wrists- "long sleeves. Always. And she'd flinch a little if he made a sudden move. She'd pretend it was funny, but... it always made my girlfriend, made Angela, uncomfortable, but she didn't know the other girl well enough to feel she could speak up. And when we found out she'd died..."

He shrugged again, and the blonde woman nodded. Annie's description of the blonde had left the impression she was a great deal less silly than Janey, and not at all helpless, not like the foolish regretful characters he was spinning. It had made Loki hope Janey might not be quite alone after all, despite Owen's best efforts. The expression on her face was cause for cautious optimism.

And now he must not linger. He picked up the brochure on tanning safety, and another on rates and services, and stuffed them in his pockets.

"Do you know what, I don't think this is the kind of present I should give as a surprise. I think I'll show her these and ask her what she thinks. Thank you very much- ?"

"Tracey," the blonde automatically supplied her name.

"Tracey," Loki said. She did not seem to notice him not identifying himself. He smiled again and left the salon.

Halfway up the street, he gathered the glamour around himself, let his appearance return to normal, and transported himself home.

~oOo~

By tea time, Loki was sufficiently recovered to be able to enjoy his apple pie, and to tell the others about his encounter with Owen. None of his friends thought he was overreacting to the threat posed by Owen inside the school, although they all agreed on consideration that the rhinoceros charm might not be entirely adaptable to the task of driving away nasty humans.

"What if a school inspector with a bad disposition showed up?" Mitchell asked. "Wouldn't do you much good if he got himself hammered out into the street."

"No, I suppose not," Loki admitted, licking a fingertip to pick up the last sweet crumbs of pastry.

"I don't quite see why you didn't tell the Avengers about Owen," George spoke up. "Surely they could do something about him?"

Annie sighed. "Not within the law, they couldn't. There's only my word for it, and even if ghosts were allowed to be witnesses, there's the whole business of my not remembering anything about it until a few days ago."

"And that would stop Natasha how?" Mitchell inquired.

"It would stop Steve. And Tony," Annie said. "Their job is to deal with threats from other worlds, emergencies that affect everyone or that are too big for the regular police. Not ordinary murders that are a matter for the law." Even Loki looked dubious, and Annie said patiently, "Loki, what happened last summer, to you and to Agent Coulson, the whole horrible mess at SHIELD- that went on partly because everyone at the agency thought they could do anything to carry out whatever mission they decided on. They replaced Director Fury and made it look like some back-room decision nobody was expected to explain or to question. They made you disappear, the way death squads do in totalitarian countries.

"And nobody except Agent Coulson had the guts to do anything about it, because even before SHIELD started really acting above the law, they probably believed they were above the law. As far as they were concerned, rules about due process, and torture and, and national sovereignty- none of that applied to SHIELD. They didn't expect anyone to question their actions, and they didn't even question themselves. That wasn't just the agency, that was the people in the agency. They didn't question what they were doing, just followed the Wraiths into evil because they told themselves that whatever they did was right, just because they were the ones doing it. And after a while, it was really hard to tell the difference between the heroes and the villains."

"I seem to recall Tony telling me of an impassioned speech Steve made, on that very subject, after Tony and Coulson rescued me," Loki admitted.

"Yes," Annie said. "That doesn't surprise me."

Mitchell shook his head. "I don't think they always live up to those standards even when they're not under the control of Dire Wraiths."

"No," Annie admitted, "I suppose not. Not when the fate of the world really is at stake. But this isn't the fate of the world, this is some grubby little git who hurts women. And I mean- obviously, that's serious. But not fate-of-the-world, vital emergency serious."

"Suppose we were to ignore the law?" Loki asked, quite seriously. "Suppose we were to take vengeance? Because I have to tell you, Annie, I am increasingly worried about Janey, and Owen's future victims. You know there will be future victims."

"So am I," Annie admitted. "But I still don't want to ask the Avengers to get their hands dirty for us."

Loki was rather glad they had waited until after pie to have this conversation.

Annie made a gesture as though pushing something away with both hands. "Let's forget about Owen for a minute. There's something else I need to do."

"And what is that?" Loki asked, setting his plate on the coffee table and permitting the kittens to pile into his lap.

Annie looked uneasy. "I've said before, that I want to talk to Catherine about... about talking to my mother and father. I haven't contacted her yet, but I think... I think I need to."

"Yes," Loki said. "I am sure it will be of great comfort to all of you."

The bookshelf beside the door began to tremble, books sliding forward and then back into their places. Loki, George, and Mitchell turned toward it, but nothing flew from the shelves.

As he turned back to Annie, Loki found himself remembering something that had occurred to him before, but which he had never felt able to follow up.

"It occurs to me," he said gently, "that comfort may not be what is needed between you, at least not at first. Because these... outbreaks... of your powers. They do not seem only to happen when you think of Owen, and what he did to you. They seem to be a great deal worse when you think of- "

Annie's mouth twisted, and Loki had to suppress the urge to put his arms around her and tell her never mind, everything would be all right. Instead, he waited while she struggled for words, and finally said, haltingly,

"Those things they told you, in the cemetery. About worrying about me. About not knowing why I kept picking the boys I did... as if it was nothing to do with them."

"And it was," Loki said quietly. Annie nodded.

Loki leaned over and put his arms around her.

~oOo~

Although he had the script firmly in his mind, Loki still felt surprisingly nervous as he punched in the numbers on his mobile. Annie, on the other end of the sofa, was just as tense as he was, and both Mitchell and George practically hugged themselves in their efforts to keep quiet.

Three rings on the other end, and then a woman's voice said,

"Hello?"

"Hello," Loki said, grateful that his part permitted him to sound a little hesitant. "Am I speaking to Mrs. Sawyer?"

"Yes." The voice was guarded, prepared to tell him she did not wish to purchase anything he wanted to sell. Loki hastily went on,

"I hope you remember me- we met at, at the cemetery in Bristol, just over a week ago? I was... a friend of your daughter, Annie." There was a pause. It drew out painfully before Loki prompted, "Mrs. Sawyer? Are you there?"

"Yes. I'm just wondering... why you're calling."

"I apologize for being so... for overstepping in this matter. I do not mean to cause hurt or offense. It is only... I am still in Bristol, and a day or two ago I happened to stop into a tea room here in the city. It belongs to a woman named Catherine Bennett, who is... a medium."

"A what?" Annie's mother demanded.

Loki burst into hurried speech, which suited his character in this interaction, but also reflected his genuine fear she might hang up on him. "She is a medium. I apologize if speaking of such matters offends or disturbs you, but after I talked to her I could not help thinking of you and your husband. Catherine Bennett believes she can contact Annie, so that you can, can have a last conversation with her. If you think it would... help."

"You've already asked this woman to contact Annie?"

Loki squirmed. "No. I only... I thought of it, but... Annie was more important to me than I was to Annie, I think, and so it would be... inappropriate for me to call upon her. But... I have her telephone number. Ms. Bennett's. You could call her, if you wished, and arrange a meeting- "

"How did you get this number?" Annie's mother asked.

"The London directory," Loki replied promptly. "At the cemetery, you and your husband spoke to each other by name, and I remembered them. Max and Carmen. I could not stop thinking about Annie, and you, and so I looked you up. I promise I will leave you alone, I will not pester you, but... I was unable to come to Annie's assistance, when she needed someone to help her. I cannot tell you how much I regret that. And so I thought I would at least offer you this. It is all I can do for Annie, to give you this number and let you decide what you would do about it."

There was a very long silence on the other end of the line. Loki was unsure whether anyone was there. A trickle of perspiration slithered down his spine and he suppressed a shudder.

Finally, from very far away, Annie's mother spoke.

"That's very... it's kind of you. Thank you." Another long pause. Then: "Please tell me the phone number."

Loki swallowed hard, and did.