"Where is Bucky?" Jak asked her father when he opened her bedroom door the next morning. She had crumpled up the clothes she'd worn to breakfast the day before and put on her shirt and jeans instead. Her hair was tucked in a messy ponytail and she didn't make any attempt to smile or bow when he entered the room. The night before, she had made a mess of her room by throwing clothes on the floor and knocking over furniture. She knew it was childish, but she figured that she was owed a childhood after hers had been filled with the misery of her parents.

"Sergeant Barnes is none of your concern, Jessica."

"My name is Jak."

"If you are not careful, I will erase every memory from your mind and start with a blank slate. It would be a great inconvenience, but I will not put up with your tantrums."

She clenched her jaw and glared at him. After some time alone to think, she decided that she had liked spending three years as an orphan. As soon as she found a way, she was going to make herself an orphan again.

"Your nose is bleeding," Uriah Fenice told her, "I suppose you stayed up all night trying to remember the things I've blocked off. I am your father, I know what is best for you and blocked off those memories for your own good."

"For your own good," she snapped, "You think if I can't remember what I lost then I won't want to go back to it."

"There is nothing at Avenger's Compound worth returning to," he told her, observing the damage to her room, "Other parents always complained about their toddlers, but you were a quiet baby. I suppose now you are going through your 'terrible two-hundreds', hmm?"

"Did you hurt Bucky?"

"It is improper for you to refer to him by that name. He is Sergeant Barnes or the Winter Soldier," her father stepped over the pile of clothes and picked up a pillow she'd tossed on the floor. He rolled his eyes and threw it back on the bed. "Clean up your room. If you do not have everything back in its place by noon you will not have lunch. Understood?"

"You didn't give me lunch or dinner yesterday either," she crossed her arms and raised a brow, "Will you starve me if I don't do what you say?"

"No. If you still haven't cleaned up your mess by dinnertime, then I'll take your memories. Do you understand me?"

"Yes sir," she mockingly saluted him and began picking up the things she'd thrown on the floor. She would obey him enough to keep herself safe, but she would not do it with the meekness she had practiced all her life.

"You are such a disappointment," Uriah sighed, sitting in the armchair and watching her as she picked up articles of clothing and neatly folded them. "What happened to my sweet daughter who treated me like a deity? You used to worship your dear old father."

The word "deity" snagged a sharp pain in her mind. She had known someone else recently who often referred to himself as a god. More blood leaked from her nose as she tried to remember who it was. All she could gather was that he was the one who called her "elskan mín". This surprised her enough to stop fighting the magical mind block.

She had never thought she could love anyone who thought of himself as a god. That sort of cockiness had never been attractive to her. Or had it?

"You're dripping blood on the carpet," her father called from his seat.

"Why are you still here?" She retorted, wiping her nose on a white blouse she'd just folded and soiling the front of it with red. "Surely your plans for world domination take up enough of your time that you shouldn't be wasting minutes watching me."

"I missed you," he replied simply, "My fatherly instincts are strong. I am glad to see you safe after so long apart."

"You have the fatherly instincts of a grizzly bear," she scoffed.

"Oh come now, I've only ever eaten one child."

She dropped the armload of clothing and gaped at him.

"I'm kidding," he smirked, smoothing his fine shirt, "It's what we call a 'dad joke'."

She resumed cleaning, but said nothing else on the subject of grizzly bears or fatherhood. The scary thing was that he'd been alive so long, she wouldn't have put it past him to have eaten a child. She could picture some ancient civilization offering him a human sacrifice and him politely dabbing his lips with a napkin and saying "well, it would be rude to refuse".

"You kept asking about the Winter Soldier," he said after she had put all of the dresser drawers back to their proper place, "I know he's pleasant to look at, but please remember that he is not a viable match for you."

"No, I suppose he's not wrinkled enough and he's never pinched my ass at a formal dinner. So he's not the kind of person you would choose for me, is he?" She moved on to pick up the pieces of a lamp she'd shattered.

"Your mother raised you better than to speak with such vulgarity."

"What? You don't like hearing the truth of the men you chose for me?" She gripped a sliver of glass, focusing on the pain of it cutting into her skin so she wouldn't spiral into a rage. "The shipping magnate couldn't keep his hands off my ass and I know Mother noticed but she never stopped him. Another charming old man you picked 'accidentally' dropped a piece of dried fruit down the front of my dress and tried to fish it out. That Austrian prince couldn't keep his hands from roaming when we danced together."

"And you tolerated all of their inappropriate behavior because you knew it was for the greater good. You knew that you were securing alliances for me," her father had the decency to look at least slightly uncomfortable as she told him of the various assaults she'd suffered through the years.

"And still none of those alliances ever went through, did they? They always either turned me away or you decided they weren't worth enough to you," she gripped the glass even tighter and it cracked, leaving two large shards embedded in her palm. "You played with my emotions, manipulated me, made me think I was never going to be married at a time when a woman's worth was determined by if she were marriageable."

"If you were so eager to get married-"

"I was only eager because you and Mother told me I had to be!" She yelled at him.

He stood up and then saw her bloody hand. With a frustrated sigh, he crossed the room to her and pried her palm open. With a flick of his wrist the glass was out and the cuts healed themselves. He gave her palm a soft pat and took a step back to look at her.

"Fine. I will admit that I never allowed for any of your matches to follow through," he pinched the bridge of his nose.

She thought for a moment he would express actual fatherly love and tell her that he saw the way those vile men treated her and realized they were not worthy of his daughter. But she should have known that her father would never care that much for her personal well being.

"I kept putting off your marriage because I knew I could secure a more powerful husband for you. You are one of my greatest tools, Winn- Jessica. An heir that I can marry into a powerful family and a magic user as well. I could not hand you over to just any prince."

The word "prince" drew another sharp pain in her head.

"I don't care," she told Uriah, "My point is that you have mistreated me my whole life. And now you expect me to go along with whatever machinations you have willingly?"

"Mistreated, hmm?" He frowned, "I think your time with the Avengers has corrupted your mind, daughter. You used to be so well behaved."

She did not respond. It was pointless to try and get him to acknowledge his faults. He considered himself the most important person in all the galaxy and he would not be corrected. So, instead she finished cleaning her room and then came downstairs to eat breakfast with him. With every bite she glared at him, but he seemed content that she was no longer arguing and ignored her hatred. He rambled on about various businessmen and politicians he'd been involved with in recent decades and even ventured to say that he knew a few powerful men who might make a good husband for her.

After everything they'd just talked about, the only thing Uriah had gotten from the conversation was that, at one point, she had been eager to be married. And now he was plotting matches again. All Jak could think about was Bucky, trapped somewhere in the house, probably in pain.

.

.

In the cellar of the house, Bucky was, indeed, hurting. Uriah Fenice had used magic to torture him. He was surprised that he hadn't put him back under mind control, instead leaving him weary and worn behind bars, his metal arm just out of reach.

Bucky Barnes did not have all of his memories back. In fact, he really only had a few. He knew Steve Rogers was important to him and that he had not always been a killing machine. He knew that he was from Brooklyn, because for some reason his mind had decided that was important information to keep. He knew he'd fallen in a cold, snowy place and that someone evil had found him.

There wasn't much else from the past seventy years or before that he could remember, but when he'd seen Uriah Fenice about to hit Jaklyn Baker with a cane, another memory surged to the surface. He remembered that very same woman smiling at him somewhere in Siberia. As Uriah had threatened to hurt her, Bucky remembered her sneaking him bread and holding his hand when scientists messed with his mind and filled him with drugs. And when that woman's father had lifted the cane to hit her again, a crystal clear memory came to Bucky. He remembered her lips gently kissing his before they completely scrubbed his mind and she disappeared.

He might not recall the circumstances entirely, but he remembered his feelings and he knew he would protect her as best he could. Somehow, they had to get away from Uriah Fenice. Partially because it would be better for both of them, and partly because Bucky dearly wanted to see if she remembered kissing him as vividly as he remembered kissing her back.

A note from the author: Smooooochy smooooch! What does this mean for Jak and Loki?! It means we get a bit of a love triangle with protective, possessive, long haired heartthrobs on both sides! Oh dear, whatever shall we do? :D

Thanks for reading!