After a very difficult (and itchy) journey up the mountain, Sylvie threw down the sack of lemons, then plunked down on a rock to rest a moment.

Loki arrived a bit later, set down the donkey then collapsed face down in the dirt, exhausted.

When he opened his eyes again, he saw Sylve in front of some kind of vendor stand talking to an increasingly nervous Garbothian. The cause of the man's unease probably had something to do with the sword Sylvie was waving around. He tracked the gleaming tip with his eyes apprehensively as she used it to emphasize her many questions and concerns.

Loki picked himself up from the ground and brushed himself off, scratching several locations in the process.

Sylvie left the (very relieved) Garbothian in peace and sauntered over, carrying a tall drink filled with ice and a straw. "Good news! That very helpful attendant back there gave us directions to the Sage, and a hot mud bath – on the house – to deal with all these maddening itches," she aggressively scratched at the back of her neck.

Loki ran his fingers through his hair, digging his nails into his scalp and grimacing, "How much did you have to flatter him to get that deal?"

Sylvie tossed her sword up, end over end, and caught it again, "Didn't have to, this did the flattering for me."

"Effective."

"I'd say so," she took a loud slurp of the drink she carried, "I also found out what they use the lemons for."

They made their way to the warm mud baths, disrobed, and gratefully slid into the viscous pool of mud to sooth the vexatious result of their tiring trek up the aptly named 'Path of Many Itches'.

Loki groaned in relief, "I cannot believe how good this feels, I've never been so itchy in my life."

Sylvie sniffed, "Well — Your Majesty — I can see some of us have never been forced to spend the night in a fibreglass factory that was inexplicably also infested with fleas."

She placed the cold glass against her temple, then handed it to Loki who ignored the straw, tipped up the glass, and thirstily downed the remainder.

"I hardly think we can attribute that astonishingly specific situation to my charmed upbringing. Besides, that donkey's fur might as well have been fibreglass," he combed his fingers through his hair and came out with a tuff of the irritant in question. "I wouldn't be at all shocked to find out it also had fleas."

He fished an ice cube out of the glass and ran it over his forehead, then handed the glass back over to her.

Sylvie giggled as she took the glass, "I suppose you have a point. Luckily for me, the lemons seemed to help in keeping some of the bugs away." She tipped up the glass and let an ice cube slide into her mouth before crunching on it loudly.

"Ugh… if anything the donkey attracted them," he moaned, running the ice cube down over his throat."

"Just be glad flattery got us this bath for free, it's absolutely outrageous what they were charging." She popped another ice cube in her mouth and set the glass down on the stones surrounding the pool.

Loki huffed out a laugh, "Is that what you're calling your sword now?"

She thoughtfully placed a finger to her lips, then tossed a handful of mud in Loki's direction, "I might have to have that engraved."

He laughed as he caught the mud in the side of his neck, "Well, in that case 'Flattery' will get you everywhere," he smoothed the mud that hit him up behind his ears. "Still, I appreciate you making it this far without making use of it."

She smiled and ran a mud covered hand over her throat and up to her chin, "Oh, I'm quite happy to sit back and watch — within reason — it is your divorce after all. Until, someone calls for a fight to the death to restore their honour that is. That's all me."

"At this point I'm almost positive that's not going to happen," he gave her the side eye,"but I guess I should thank you for using it to cut us out of that patch of poison ivy," he lobbed some mud in her general direction.

She gave him a sheepish look in response, "Next time I'll make sure to get to it before the donkey gets the two of you tangled up in it."

"Next time?"

"I think I've known you long enough now to expect a next time."

He shrugged, "I really can't argue with that."

Giving her a suggestive look, he slid over to her side.

"Loki dear," she swiped a mud covered finger down his nose.

"Yes, Sylvie darling," he replied dreamily.

"I don't know what you've got in mind, but there are some places I'd rather not have mud."

"Oh — yes, right."

After cleaning off and refreshing their clothing they set off down the path in the direction the attendant pointed out, feeling much more relaxed then when they had first arrived at the summit.

As they strolled along, Loki waved his hands around, making his best attempt at talking Sylvie's ear right off.

"…and jackass actually only refers to the male of the species."

Sylvie rolled her eyes, "Thank you for the linguistics lesson, Professor Jackass."

Loki pursed his lips and nodded, "See, there you go."

Finally coming to a large wooden gate blocking the path, they pushed open the unlocked doors. On the other side was a curious square platform with a ramp leading up to it. It was surrounded on three sides by horizontal bars supported by a tall pole in each corner; a large silver ball sat at the top of each one.

Sylvie tapped Loki with the back of her hand, " Ha! Told you! That must be where they hold the death match."

Loki gave her a doubtful look, "Seems a bit on the small side for a cage fight."

She waved him off with a gesture, "I'm sure I can make it work — now the Sage is supposed to be around here somewhere."

"I don't know about the Sage, but it seems our supposed transportation has managed to catch up."

The donkey limped haltingly but steadily past them.

Loki threw up his hand in disgust, "Ugh, if she had walked that fast before we climbed up the mountain I wouldn't have carried her!"

Flicking her tail, the 'talking' donkey named Harold made the arduous journey up the gentle incline and went to stand in the centre of the platform.

Sylvie crossed her arms, "There's no way I'm fighting an opponent that could be taken out by a stiff breeze."

Suddenly the silver balls on top of the four posts began to glow and pulse as a booming voice sounded in the air.

"Welcome, strong backed annulment seeker and terrifying tiny girlfriend."

"Fiancée", Loki corrected with finger raised, as he looked around for the speaker.

The voice boomed again, "I'm standing right in front of you."

Loki looked straight ahead at the donkey and sighed, "The Wise Sage of Calamitous Matrimony, I presume." Internally wincing at the many comments he made while climbing up the mountain path he decided to fall back on his silvertongue, "I must say, that is a very attractive hat you have on there."

The donkey snorted as the orbs of light blinked out the translation, "You presume correctly, God of Complaining and Abysmal Senses of Direction, but I'm afraid flattery will get you nowhere."

Sylvie gripped her sword, "We'll just see about that!"

Loki put a hand on Sylvie's shoulder to stop her forward motion. "Hey, it wasn't exactly easy to see with your hooves in my face the whole time. Besides, anybody could have missed that large nest of small spiders."

"Anybody could have missed it, the problem is you didn't."

"Forgive me, but avoiding the enormous nest of large spiders really seemed more pressing at the time!" He protested.

The voice responded in a more congenial tone, "No need to get huffy, you did an adequate job, I'm here, you're here, the small person running her finger threateningly down her large sword is here."

Sylvie smirked as she examined her blade, "Don't mind me just checking if I nicked it when I cut that large spider in half."

The donkey managed to eye her somewhat warily, "Now, I assume you've come because you have failed to complete the three tasks and now want me to consider dissolving your union?"

Loki raised an eyebrow, "Were there any other reasons people usually carry you up here?"

The synthesized voice of Harold echoed out almost cheerfully, "If you need a fishing license or flood insurance I'd be happy to accommodate you."

Sylvie held her sword upright, turning it back and forth, then tested the balance, "Just the annulment, thank you."

The lights flashed quickly with Harold's response, "As you wish — and how many of the tasks did you, God of Meandering Walks, attempt before choosing to seek an annulment?"

"Now that's just unfair, I was carrying a donkey on my back, for Norns sake!" He sighed, running his hand through his hair, "Ah… well, I just skipped to this last one."

Harold's voice boomed out, "How can you expect me to grant you an annulment when you haven't even tried one of the three tasks."

"Three impossible tasks! If you don't want people getting divorced you should probably just say so," he replied in exasperation.

Harold somehow achieved a look of long suffering on her donkey face, "Did you even make a trip to the sun to see if-"

Loki cut her off, "I'd rather not be burnt to a crisp, thank you."

"And three hours may seem like a short time to give all your spouses their conjugal ri-"

He shook his head, "Yeah, I'm not doing that."

"Very well, but I fail to see how option three is impossible."

Loki rubbed his hand down his face, "It's literally called the impossible task! And anyway, they wouldn't even tell us what it was."

The donkey shook her head and stamped her feet. The voice boomed more loudly than before, "Is that birdbrain billy goat Byron still telling people that task is impossible?"

She let out a series of donkey noises and snorts that the balls of light seemed unable (or unwilling) to translate as they blinked red and buzzed in response.

Finally she brayed loudly as the orbs turned white again and sounded, "He's just bent out of shape because my sister wouldn't agree to a divorce! She's got five kids at home, for crying out loud!"

Loki pinched the bridge of his nose and growled in frustration, "Can you – please – at least tell us what we have to do?"

"Quite simply, all you have to do is get every one of your spouses to agree to the divorce."

"That's it?"

Impressively, the donkey accomplished a hee-haw filled with disdain, which the glowing orbs obediently relayed, "Correct – and I'm sure you'll have no trouble at all since you're not a cantankerous old goat who roped his family into running a lemonade and mud bath scheme after under-quoting on a government contract."

Loki stared up at the sky for a moment before dropping his face into his hands at the absurdity of it all.

Sylvie patted him on the back, "Look at it this way, at least I'll have a good story to tell at our reception."

Back at their tiny beach hut on Xandar, Sylvie hurriedly buttoned up the front of Loki's dress shirt.

Not because she was in a rush to get him dressed. Quite the opposite, she wanted to make sure he didn't get too impatient and just magically fix their attire.

She stood back a moment to take in her work, "Hmm, looks like I missed a button, you're all lopsided." She sighed dramatically and began undoing the buttons again, "Guess I'll have to start over. Unless you want a different shirt? Black at a beach wedding doesn't seem overly comfortable. "

Loki laughed, "It's perfectly comfortable… my wife."

He couldn't stop the wide grin that accompanied that particular word on his lips. It was about the twentieth time he'd used it (he was keeping count). Which, considering they had only been married for about an hour, was something of an accomplishment.

She sniffed, "Suit yourself, husband, but there's still time to break out the tank top and booty shorts that I picked out for you."

"I'll save it for the reception."

Sylvie's own outfit was much more practical for the hot sunny day it was, a pale green sundress that fell above the knee. It was currently draped over a chair in the corner, next to the sword that she'd had strapped to her back during the ceremony — just in case anyone decided there were any last minute reasons they shouldn't be wed.

Having matched the buttons correctly this time, she worked on getting into her dress while he searched around for his pants. He was sure he had tossed them in the corner, maybe on the top bunk? He really hadn't been paying attention when he'd taken them off.

They'd told Mobius and B-15 they needed five minutes to freshen up.

That was about half an hour ago — though he wasn't convinced they bought the excuse anyway.

Not least, because they had been passing by an active microphone when he had whispered to Sylvie that they should take a time out to 'consummate' their marriage.

Fortunately, the only ones within listening distance were Mobius and B-15…

and all the wedding guests…

and all the south side beach goers… but it was their wedding day, what did they expect, really?

"Find your pants yet?" Sylvie had her dress on by now and stood watching him.

"No and-" he turned to look at her, "I think you may want to turn that around."

Sylvie took a glance downwards at the front of her, which contained the back side of the dress, having put it on the wrong way. She shrugged, "Silly me, must be wedding day jitters, can't even dress myself properly."

Loki smiled and shook his head in disbelief, "At least you found it, I have no idea where my pa-". Just then he noticed a corner of black fabric peeking out from under the mattress. He pulled and, lo and behold, his pants had managed to stuff themselves almost completely under the mattress. He smirked over at Sylvie, "Now, how did that get there?"

"Oh, how did what get where?" She said, head obscured as she fought to twist her dress around, in the most awkward way possible.

Loki sighed, "I know you'd rather just spend the rest of the day in here, but we can't leave Mobius and B-15 hanging, considering this whole mess was my fault."

Sylvie pondered that for a moment, "Well, you did have some help, I kind of insisted you get that divorce." She put her hands on her hips, "I guess it's time to go back and face the music."

"I guess so," Loki said, pulling on his trousers, and picking up two matching horned crowns. The horns were smaller than anything he normally wore, but slightly bigger than Sylvie's one horned crown.

He handed one to Sylvie as soon as she had finished adjusting her dress and placed the other on his own head.

She looked him over for a minute, "Presentable, how do I look?"

Loki looked her up and down, "Almost perfect, but I think you forgot something."

"And that is?"

"Our first kiss as husband and wife," he leaned in and claimed her lips, pulling her hips into his in the process.

She ran a finger over his jaw as he pulled away and smirked, "We had our first kiss at the ceremony — and someone had to blow an air horn to get us to stop."

"I need to ask Mobius where he got that, and why he thought he'd need it at our wedding."

Sylvie laughed, "He knew exactly why he'd need it, taking his best man duties seriously."

Loki hummed, "I suppose. Now, where were we? Oh, yes, first kiss." He leaned in again, kissing her more deeply, running his tongue under her top lip.

Sylvie laughed into his mouth before pulling back again, "Now who's stalling, if we don't finish our first kiss soon, B-15 is going to be dragging us out by our ears."

Loki sighed, "No, you're right," and with that he wrapped his arms around her and kissed her again.

"Like now."

"Absolutely," he said kissing her again.

"Oh well I tried," she said, kissing him five more times before they finally disappeared in a flash.

They reappeared next to Mobius and B-15 who were standing in the receiving line, welcoming their guests.

"About time you two decide to grace us with your presence." B-15 raised an eyebrow at them.

Mobius agreed, "Yeah, another few minutes and I would have been standing outside with the air horn." He fully expected to be needing it several more times that day.

Loki released Sylvie from his embrace, "I hardly think that would have been necessary, but thanks for holding down the fort for us."

They took up positions in the line and began shaking hands, or hugging, or politely nodding as each guest passed by.

Soon a familiar blue face came limping their way, and shook Sylvie's hand — with the hand that was not immobilized in a shoulder cast. " Congratulations you two! Looks like we did it!"

Sylvie took his hand carefully, as he seemed to be in rather rough shape. His hair was all singed off and he was missing several teeth in addition to the broken shoulder, "Yeah, we completed the ' impossible' task, imagine that," she laughed.

Gom shook his head (or tried too) and held out his hand to Loki, "I still can't believe all you had to do to convince the Garbothians to divorce you was to invite them all to your wedding."

Loki looked back sympathetically, "We did also have to agree to invite all their children."

Sylvie sighed, "And their children's spouses."

Loki raised his head and looked out at the massive line of Garbothians waiting to congratulate them, "And all their grandchildren."

Loki furrowed his brow, "We'll likely be here all day, but it could be worse considering. Did you actually manage to retrieve your stone from the centre of the sun?"

"That's what I'm telling people," Gom replied evasively, before hobbling off.

Sylvie nudged Loki's side, "Looks like you dodged a bullet there," she said with a smirk.

Loki rolled his eyes at her, "I choose to believe he broke his arm carrying the donkey."

"Hey, Loki," Mobius whispered, "Doesn't that one look a bit like you?"

Loki looked down the line at a somewhat unique looking Garbothian in the distance, "I don't see the resemblance."

Mobius shielded his eyes from the sun, "He's 15 feet tall and blue."

"Could be a coincidence?" Loki suggested nervously.

Sylvie rubbed his hand reassuringly, "Don't worry, we're in this together now."