The next day dawned bright, and Loki was up with the sun, arranging things in the middle room so that by the time Natasha's body woke her up not long after, likely used to the early mornings, he came knocking on her door just as she was standing up out of bed, stretching. She'd managed to get away without sleeping beside him in bed that night, and though she understood the necessity of it it didn't mean she was wholly comfortable right then and there with the idea. Not yet, a least. She'd have to be if she wanted this to work, though, she supposed.

"Time to get up," Loki reminded her, voice just loud enough to wake her up.

"I already am," she called back, voice cut off by a yawn. She needed coffee or something, something to help kick start her day, and with heavy feet and groggy eyes she padded out of the bedroom. not caring much that her shorts rode up perhaps a little too much, or that her tank top was askew and showing her midriff. What did that matter when she needed coffee? She stopped in the kitchen to brew herself some, struggling to read the instructions without yawning, finally managing to get the machine to work with her, rejoining Loki only after she'd doctored up her first mug of the hot drink. He'd cleared off a space for her to sit on one of the props he'd set last night, beckoning her closer when he caught sight of her, smiling to see her awake yet still too tired to catch the way his eyes roved over her body.

"Wh-at's on the agenda today?" She asked, the first word broken by a yawn before she took another sip of her drink. Was this ever going to wake her up?

"Well, first we need to establish some sort of base, some guides for which to go off of. You already asked for my honesty, which you will have, in exchange for your trust. Do you trust me?" He asked, sitting her down on a tall bed of some sort, one padded but raised up from the ground. It put them on equal levels, and as Nat sipped at her drink she nodded.

"Yes, I do trust you."

"Excellent. Then I need you to clear your mind and close your eyes for me," he said, voice going soft and sweet as melted sugar, one of his hands taking her left one. As she followed his orders, doing her best to keep her breathing even, her body steady as she felt his grip steady the left hand, his voice growing lower as he started to murmur in a language she didn't understand. Something sharp pressed into her palm and she shouted, but when she opened her eyes she couldn't see a thing, the blackness extending even though she knew that her eyes were open.

"Loki?" She asked, her voice higher pitched than normal as she felt her heart rate increasing. What the hell was going on? She could feel his hands on her wrists, the pain spiking up her nerves, but something cool pressed up against her cheek.

"You're fine, safe," he promised, his breath warm on her ear as he murmured into it, his lips pressing gently to the skin. "Trust me, remember?"

Right. Trust. How the hell was that supposed to work again when she couldn't see what he was doing? She bit her bottom lip as she tried to force her heart to slow back down to a normal, healthy speed, not that it went very well. At least the pain of the cut began to fade, though she felt what must've been blood pooling in the spot that she'd been cut. She closed her eyes, the organs useless to her anyway, and a hand smoothed over her left upper arm. Loki's voice kept mumbling in her ear, words that she couldn't begin to decipher where they began or end, barely drawing breath as something cold and wet was painted on the skin of her left forearm, what felt like an upwards painted arrow. She tried to resist asking what it was, not wanting to distract him too much from what he was doing out of fear of what it would do, but not knowing seemed even worse. What if it didn't help?

'Trust, Natasha. Trust.'

Right. She could do that, couldn't she? After all he hadn't given her any reason not to trust her. Not yet, at least. She hoped he never did. Forcing herself to relax, she tipped her head back slightly and tried to lose herself in the cadence of his words, the way that each of them had a certain rhythm, the comfort that she was almost able to draw from it. It was relaxing in its own certain way, how she assumed a familiar song or rhyme might be, even if she didn't understand what it all meant.

Tiwaz. He kept repeating that word over and over again, and with each repetition of it the mark on her arm seemed to twinge, the pain of her hand long since forgotten. What did it mean? She'd never heard the word before, or, rather not that she could remember, yet the power it held seemed to make her heart beat harder every time it came out of his mouth. Or perhaps that was simply their proximity.

She was jolted backwards, glad that she'd sat on the bed so that it was positioned full out behind her, the world around her seeming to shake away underneath her until she wasn't sure of anything except for Loki's presumed hand on hers and his words still ringing in her ear. For a brief moment she thought she could understand what he was saying. 'Return what has been lost, replace what once was here, allow again for balance.'

Her heart stopped for a moment, and she swore the air was stolen from her lungs, before it all came crashing back around her with the rest of the world, eyes snapping open to see the white, brightly lit ceiling above her. Nothing else, however, returned to her mind. No sudden, quick realization, no flooding of memories, and she felt regret and disappointment seep through her veins. She'd really thought, idiotic though it likely was, that it might've changed something. She whipped her head to the side, catching sight of a deep red-brown arrow painted on her upper arm, a stinging in her hand that had only faded out of her attention, and now came back with sharp promise once her gaze was drawn to it again.

"Nothing happened," she said, brow pulled tight as she turned to look at Loki, who simply shook his head.

"It was a preemptive spell. To ready your mind," he said. "The sudden recurrence of memories and thoughts, unlocking them, can be rather painful if you are not prepared for it. It's too sudden, too dangerous, and if you have not been made ready it can even lead to an overload of your mind, which will kill you," he told her in all seriousness. "This helps to expand your mind, to ensure it is willing to receive the memories that had been taken from you. I'd rather you didn't die, it looks very bad on the report," he said, and though the corners of his lips quirked up in a teasing smile she didn't return it, swallowing thickly. Well, that made two of them.

"So now what, now that I've been properly prepped?" She asked, trying not to sound as worried as she was, leaning back on her hands as she surveyed him.

"Now the real work begins. You'll want to lie down again," he said, moving to the side and summoning herbs into a bowl, using his magic to grind them while he worked at something else she couldn't see. As instructed, she laid back, staring up at the plain white ceiling tiles above her, trying to guess at how many there were before she got bored.

"So, why're you on Earth if you're like Thor and from outer space?" She asked after some time. "I mean, it's not like we're all that exciting. You've probably seen more than I ever have." Especially now, she considered with the quickest quirk of her lips.

"I was not fond of my foster parents," Loki murmured, voice so soft that she had to strain to hear it, turning her head in his direction, eyes trying to decipher what it was he was doing. His arms moved swiftly and with ease, obviously well practiced at it, shoulders and stance relaxed as he looked to be stirring something, though what it was was hidden by his body. In front of him, he raised one of his hands to draw what looked like the same symbol, an upwards pointing arrow, into the air, and the symbol actually burned red for a moment before it collapsed into a fine, brick red color and he collected it in a small bowl he'd had in front of him, granite grey and thick.

Nat tipped her head to the side, confused a little. "Your foster parents? I thought you and Thor-."

"Did he not tell you of my parentage?" He asked, his lips tight as he turned away from her, shoulders tense and the movements less graceful and fluid than before. Interesting.

"No," she said simply.

That seemed to please him, if the way that he relaxed half an inch or so was any indicator, though he didn't say anything for some time, his arms moving quickly as he combined ingredients without seeming to stop and consider what he was doing. She wondered how often he'd been asked to do this, or something like it, but kept from asking him in favor of watching him work. There was something oddly mesmerizing about it, her head tipping to the side as she considered him. He was intent on his work, focused in a way that she wasn't sure she could even begin to appreciate without knowing what it was like to be so purely interested and invested in doing one thing. Perhaps it was strange to her only because of the lack of her memories, but Loki's sureness and obvious knowledge about how to do whatever it was he was doing?

She wasn't sure there was anything more interesting to watch than watching him work.

"Enjoying the show?"

She flushed, and though he didn't turn around to look at her she could hear the smile in his quiet, private laugh, the noise hitting her hard in the gut and wishing she knew how to make him make more of it.

"You just look really intent. How many times have you done this?" She couldn't help but ask. Was that rude? Maybe.

"This spell?" He asked, turning his head a couple inches so one of his eyes could catch her gaze and the pink flush that still covered her cheeks. "I studied the mind for a couple decades, attempted to learn how it worked and how it held memories and thoughts, emotions and dreams. Upon realizing that there was little one could do that wouldn't affect the head I considered it a victory and gave it up. So for this spell I've only done it a few times," he admitted. "Though each time has been positive."

She thought it over. That wasn't bad, as far as assurances went for whether or not something was going to work. She was sure she could think of worse ways that this could've gone down. Like the fact that, when he turned to finally look at her, she could see him hard and pressing against the fabric of his jeans. She swallowed as quietly as she could imagine, quickly turning her eyes away as the heat intensified between her legs and on her face. How did she even have enough blood to do that?!

"Do I embarrass you?" He asked, voice quiet and amused and far too close for her, but when she looked over he was mere inches from her face. One of his fingers had the red powder in hand and now that her head had turned he dragged a couple fingers down her face, writing something from her left cheek to her neck, then repeating the process on the other side.

"No."

"So why are you so flushed?" He asked, eyes flicking up to hers, and she tried not to scowl.

"Because you seem hell bent on trying to make me so. And my mind wanders." They'd promised to be honest to one another, hadn't they? Well she supposed it was better for her to set an example.

"Oh?" He grinned as he finished painting whatever it was on her skin. "It must be such an interesting place for your mind to have taken residence there. What were you thinking of?"

"It's not really any of your business," Natasha couldn't help but mumble as he closed his eyes and put his hands on either side of her face, holding her gently.

"Close your eyes," he murmured. She did.

It only made sense, she supposed, for him to take her entirely by surprise and press his lips to hers. She guessed, based on how he tensed up immediately, then relaxed, that he hadn't anticipated her returning the favor.

A burst of something white-hot and painful hit her hard on the back of the skull, and she pulled away from Loki with a groan as a flash of a young child, red curly hair in a messy ponytail, crouched in front of a dead body, the girl's hands stained with blood and her eyes determinedly blinking away hot tears as they threatened to stray down her cheeks. Nat's own eyes flew open, destroying the image, or memory or whatever it was, and swallowing thickly as she looked to Loki, who looked just as surprised as she was sure she did.

"Was that?"

"Your past. Yes," Loki said, voice quiet. He looked to the door. "I need a word with my brother. You stay here. Order breakfast or something, but please. Don't leave."

She gave him three minutes after he'd stepped from the room to follow after him, not having any interest in following the rules.

A/N: Oh wow, I'm so sorry for how long that took for me to get updated. I've been getting this chapter written piece by piece, but I think I've got a clear idea where I'm going from here on so hopefully it gets finished pretty quickly. As ever thanks for reading!