●part 2: 2026●
'"It shall be with great pleasure that I, Odin, King of Asgard and protector of the Nine Realms, announce the royal engagement of my firstborn son, Thor, scion of Asgard," Odin's mighty voice booms through the crowds, making it nearly...
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▪︎ sálufélagar ▪︎
1903, Asgard
Y/n
To start with, the late eighteen hundreds were mostly spent glued to the lips of the second born prince. A lot. Kissing at seiðr practice; kissing after accidentally tackling him in the pond at seiðr practice. At times kissing even was the practice.
You see, Loki had grown particularly fond of demonstrating his mastery over shadows and taken to utilizing them for pulling his adversary – me, for that matter – towards him. The reason for a kiss to follow after? Well, let's just say that he'd developed a taste for claiming his prize in the form of a proper snog.
Whenever we managed to steal a break from our respective practices, we'd spend it locked at the lips. Oddly enough, no one seemed to notice much to be amiss. Due to our aligned schedules I spent far more time with Thor, so no one ever questioned the thirty stolen minutes I'd sneak away to meet Loki by the pond and... select my payment.
Perhaps our seiðr was lacking in those times, and maybe the shreds that were left of our lips ached for time rather spent with jinxes than with caresses. But in my head... we had so much to make up for; so much to rectify.
For centuries, I had denied myself the bliss of his embrace, thinking I simply wasn't meant for the kind of normalcy that comes with true affection – that this tiny little thing was somehow the one thing I wasn't fated for. But Loki gave that to me – that sense of normalcy. With him, I was but a shield maiden adored, the only thing interesting about her being whatever it was he saw in her. None other's opinion held any weight, as long as this ebony-haired, emerald-eyed, silver-tongued princeling wished me to be the one warming his cool chest.
But there were riskier kinds of kisses too. Kissing before parting at night. Kissing in dimly lit halls with guards only a stone's throw away. Hel, even on Odin's throne. Once! Both of us relished the challenge, the thrill of it nothing if not intoxicating.
However, as the years rolled by, hiding our truth became increasingly harder to do. Especially in matters of good old Thor. There was a time when I almost ruined everything, mistaking the Thunderer for my Mischief – but that's a story for another day. For my deathbed, most likely. Norns, what a disaster that had been.
Still, the hardest part of it all proved deceiving my dearest friend. It quickly became the worst feat about me – the ugly lies. But if Loki and I wanted to keep our youthful bliss, no one could know. Not yet.
'I hope you realise,' Loki noted one night in the halls before my chambers. He was smirking so savagely I might have evaporated into violet mist if not for his icy touch at my waist, 'that even though your physical age progresses faster than mine, my spirit's superiority over yours will always remain.'
