#pov3

                   𝕬𝖓 𝖚𝖓𝖚𝖘𝖚𝖆𝖑 𝖗𝖊𝖖𝖚𝖊𝖘𝖙.

˖ ࣪ ʿ                                      o chalé de afrodite andava com uma boa reparação, a parte das crianças era a área que recebia mais atenção antes mesmo até dos quartos dos mais velhos. o seu foi ficando para trás e voltava a ficar no seu antigo dormitório com devora; como não precisava dormir, não tinha tanta importância se arrumavam o seu ou não, aos poucos isso seria feito. a lista de prioridades era imensa. atualmente focava nisso de apertar parafusos dos beliches dos irmãos quando um deles entrou ali correndo. elliot, seis anos. deixado no acampamento verão passado e seus pais adotivos nunca mais apareceram para visitá-lo ou levá-lo para casa. sentia-se imensamente responsável por aquelas crianças que não tinham as famílias mortais e o fato do pequeno elliot ter um curativo na testa por causa do acidente no dia desta era algo que lhe atormentava. se tivesse ali, eles teriam se machucado? teria conseguido evitar os irmãos de se ferirem?

“elói, acho que você está em apuros.” a criança disse com os olhos castanhos arregalados para o mais velho. os cachos do pequeno estavam bagunçados, suas roupas manchadas de terra… e o chalé não consertou nada daquilo, a magia de afrodite ainda estava quebrada, pelo visto. “você está tão encrencado. o que fez dessa vez?” ele perguntou, a curiosidade vazando em seu tom infantil.

Tom returns home grouchy and exhausted from a cramped flight after four months away for work. Unfortunately, there’s already someone sleeping in his bed.

[Note: Losille began contributing her talents to the TH fandom in 2013 with “Picking Up The Pieces” and has since delivered excellent stories in both short and long form, as befits an author with her impressive education. in 2015 she rewrote and self-published the excellent 2014 work “Masquerade” to Amazon/Kindle. In recent years she’s been only slightly less active online as her real life teaching career has understandably taken precedence. She’s expressed that she is eager to return to writing, and I hold onto hope she’ll update “Home” before her Cavill or Evans works.]

- Read on Author's Tumblr | @losille2000 -

Tom unfolded himself from the black chauffeured car and lifted his hands over his head in a stretch that tugged the hem of his shirt away from his jeans. The stiff muscles in his shoulders and lower back groaned the further he moved, joints popping to illustrate his advancing age and how airplane seats weren’t getting any more comfortable, even in first class—especially after spending the better portion of a day travelling in one. However, he figured, the sore body was more than worth it so long as he was home for the foreseeable future.

Blowing a stream of hot air into the chilly spring night, he peered up at the two-story building to reacquaint himself with his surroundings. He’d been away for so long he barely recognized the slightly peeling exterior paint or the off-color shutters he never bothered to have repainted. What was the use in changing their hideous shit-brown hue, anyway, when he was hardly around long enough to enjoy them? The thought that he might actually have time to do something about them this time around made him sigh.

“Your bags, sir,” said a voice, demanding but professional, at his elbow.

Tom blinked hard at the little man who had interrupted his contemplation. The driver had met him at Heathrow with an iPad and his surname scrawled on the screen. Well, his decoy surname—the name he used when he didn’t want people to know where he was going to be. The name Luke made him use after that time at the airport where a crowd had gathered around and followed him to the car. Even though the only reason he needed a driver in the first place was due to the two girls before that who stalked him home on the Tube. Life seemed so convoluted these days, considering the process he had to endure just to secure his sodding bags at the luggage reclaim, only to go home to a place he barely recognized in the pale moonlight.

Tom bit his lip and balled his fists, trimmed nails biting into his palm. “Oh, yes, I’ll just take them up.”

“You’re certain, sir?”

Tom nodded and dug into his jeans pocket for the fiver he’d stuffed there earlier. After exchanging the banknote for his luggage and guitar, he waited for the man to return to his vehicle and drive away before climbing the front steps. He produced his key ring from the messenger bag on his shoulder and let himself inside the foyer to dark, comforting silence. His silence.

Five hundred years before Thor's coronation, Sif's a lowly page who can't move up in the ranks and Loki's a Royal Academy student trying to survive his last examination. The solution to their problems may lie in the legends they heard as children of the lost Tenth Realm. Now all they have to do is actually find it.

Note: (This is one of the last of the shorter Loki works I'd queued up to read. I've a few 100k+ works I mean to get through soon, but that's between me and my mental capabilites.) This work was written as a prompt-fill gift for the annually recurring "Mischeif and Mistletoe" exchange, I'd recommend browsing those collections if you're interested in the Loki/Sif pairing. Furthermore Margo_Kim has written for a variety of fandoms since 2013 so I hope they don't mind my featuring a work from [cough] years ago. The Tenth Realm brings us along an approximately six-month pilgrimage with Sif as she and Loki attempt to prove themselves worthy in their respective "professions". In my eyes the characterisation is fantastic and the unique touches in each realm add depth and curiosity to an otherwise brief story. (The Midgard chapter is incredibly funny; if you don't already know, look up Turtle Island before reading.) Against the context of Odin's impending "Partition" of the realms, it becomes clear to Sif that the effort of making this journey will be as important as the destination.

- Author's Tumblr | @andhumanslovedstories -

“Behold, ye warriors brave,” the goblins cried As brilliant shone, from within the cave, The secret light. Here lay the realm forgotten That Lady Ash, the woman-king of Asgard Had fought so long to see. She fell and wept At the beauty. “I claim my prize at last. I look upon my home—the Tenth Realm beckons And here, forever, I rest my head and sword.” —Excerpt from the final movement of Asgard’s epic, “The First Daughter of Yggdrasil,” Sif’s favorite poem as a child, as translated from the ancient tongue by Second Form graduate, Loki Odinsson.

The King’s Library was dead silent as Sif crept in through the skylight. It was always so hushed. She’d learned more of stealth skulking here after training than she’d ever learned actually in training. The King’s Library forbade women from entering, just as the Queen’s Library forbade men, and most maesters who ran them had ears and eyes to rival Heimdall’s. Sif crept through the stacks like a hunter stalking particularly flighty prey. Her feet made no thump. Her sword never clinked. Even her breath was silent as an absence. Shadows boomed louder than her.

It was either this or set fire to every damn book around her and when the maesters came to put the flames out, she’d set fire to them as well and any other man who ever came up to her again and said, “Pardon, lady, but you belong elsewhere.” But that wasn’t really a viable option at the moment, not unless she felt like killing nearly every man in Asgard, and since she wasn’t quite there yet, creeping silently took enough skill to keep her distracted and sane.

And the look on Loki’s face when you surprised him was always worth it.

A bargain to keep Loki from rotting on the Raft has not gone as either brother hoped. The Odinsons bide their time on Earth, uncertain of their allegiance and future, as Loki's ennui grows. Thor's quest for a fabled Asgardian relic brings the brothers to Norway, where they cross paths with a mysterious local archaeologist who turns Loki's relationship with humanity on its ear.

Note: (In honour of the impending release of the Loki miniseries and my sceptical optimism for it, I'm highlighting a few canon-adjacent Loki works that can pass the time between new episodes or, if you're like me, distract from new content long enough to miss the first wave of inevitable Discourse.) When mareebird said "character study," they weren't fucking kidding. This is a unique piece that diligently picks apart the tension and animosity cemented between the brothers, and within Loki himself. The Relic is a story of building love, examining the significance in the act of searching, and mareebird as an English graduate supplies enough narrative techniques to spoil a reader for other fanworks (as well as two spaces after a full stop, I spotted). The recency of its publication allows for scenes that feel as though they could have been canon, and though I have to appreciate receiving any new Loki content from Marvel, I wish a story like this would have been made into a miniseries.

- Story Tag on Author's Tumblr | @mareebird | Series on AO3 -

”Explain once more why you need me to tag along. This endeavor of yours, haven't you been at it long enough? Norway can’t possibly still hold any more secrets for you. I think it’s high time you gave up, Thor.”

Thor pretended not to hear that last part, as he adjusted his knapsack for what felt like the dozenth time since packing that morning. The wear and tear of the past year had taken its toll on everything. The straps had become prone to slipping free of their buckles. It was bothersome, but he had grown attached to the damned bag. It had been his constant travel companion and he kept his face impassive as he fixed it, perhaps so as not to hurt its feelings—inanimate objects were not always as inanimate as they seemed.

Moreover, Loki had a habit of misinterpreting everything he did, willfully at times, and that included a scowl directed at an unrelated thing.

“Brother, I want you to come,” he said. He did, whether or not Loki believed it. “Of course, I believe your talents will aid us in solving this mystery once and for all, but more than that… I think you might actually enjoy yourself."

A waver in his voice betrayed fear, fear that Loki, so filled with resentment over their ongoing detention in New York, would still find doing nothing preferable to the suggestion there was anything in Midgard worthy of his attention. With a mirthless laugh, Loki tilted back his head with renewed interest in the ceiling, as though it was far more compelling than Thor’s invitation. He took his time, lifting his chin as he traced the cracks, putting on a show.

This script of theirs had grown tiresome: he would extend the invitation and Loki would snidely decline; it was like a checkpoint before every departure.

During the events of The Avengers, a woman finds herself in the hands of an arrogant god that she can't seem to comprehend.

Note: (In honour of the impending release of the Loki miniseries and my sceptical optimism for it, I'm highlighting a few canon-adjacent Loki works that can pass the time between new episodes or, if you're like me, distract from new content long enough to miss the first wave of inevitable Discourse.) For a handful of little reasons I hadn't the slightest interest in reading Loki works unless I was moderating for THF, and for the longest time TFB was the only exception. Theology for Beginners gently expands and extends the frantic 2012 Avengers tiemline to something comprehensive and realistic, and adjusts canon scenes to build relationships between the OFC Leah and existing characters. MissVioletHunter's deliberate effort to avoid rote novelisation of the film makes her plot more effective, and the work is made more impressive by knowing her first language is Spanish.

- Masterpost on Author's Tumblr | @missviolethunter - - Series on AO3 -

May 15. Stuttgart.

"What person can know for sure when his or her life is going to change? What wouldn't we give for the ability to manipulate our destiny, to go back to the moment of an apparent trivial choice in our lives and be able to choose the other option...?"

The woman's voice could be heard, loud and clear, by all the attendants in the meeting room. The international law firm Ulrich & Malcolm, in Stuttgart, owned a state of the art meeting room. To begin with, it was so big that the company always held the Christmas party there; if they wanted, they could have invited all the neighbours and they would still fit in comfortably. It had the acoustics of a concert hall, so no microphones were needed. Furthermore, it wasn't located on the top floor of the U&M building, like any other normal meeting room would be. Instead, it occupied a good part of the ground floor, and one of its sides was entirely composed of several huge french windows that opened towards the zen garden. Under Mr. Malcolm's orders, those windows were always open, so that anyone passing through the garden could hear and see everything in the room. The President of the firm was very proud of his open door policy, literal and figurative. What very few people realized is that, by virtue of this policy, he knew everything that was said and done by anyone on the company. He pretended to accept suggestions and ideas from his team, but he never acted on them. Everybody wasted their time exchanging ideas that would at some point be stolen by one of the senior partners, but the junior associates never complained. In time, some of them would be partners and it would be their turn to have the upper hand in the game.

There were a dozen partners and some junior lawyers and clerks in this particular meeting. The woman delivering the speech was the newest partner at U&M, and she was playing the game with considerable skill. In an short period of time she had been promoted from the Boston office to the London one, and finally to the head office in Germany. Mergers and Acquisitions, which meant swimming in a pool of sharks, but she was good at smelling blood in the water. Right now she was suggesting that the firm took an aggressive position in a merger between two banks. It was a big account and a bold movement, but, if everything went according to plan, by the end of the year she would be one the star attorneys of the firm.

"...and that is why I'm asking my fellow partners to approve my proposal and allow me to assemble a team to set the merger in motion", she finished.

When Loki turns up demanding Thor's help on a quest to retrieve the All-Mother from Valhalla, Thor isn't about to say no. But that doesn't mean he's forgotten anything, and what better time than a road trip through the backwaters of the universe for trying to talk things out?

Note: (In honour of the impending release of the Loki miniseries and my sceptical optimism for it, I'm highlighting a few canon-adjacent Loki works that can pass the time between new episodes or, if you're like me, distract from new content long enough to miss the first wave of inevitable Discourse.) AO3 counts that Loki features in 228 of 506 of Lise's works to date; though I've not read their full catalogue, it's evident the amount of care and attention they devote to digging through and understanding not only Loki's character but the dynamic between the brothers as well. No spoilers: Road to Nowhere compiles one unique, compelling scene after another, including a beautifully tense taste of psychological panic. I haven't come across a story quite like this from anyone else and I'm excited to read more from them.

- View on Author's Tumblr | @veliseraptor -

Thor woke up in the middle of the night with Loki standing over him and looking powerfully displeased. “Wake up,” he said, snappishly. “I require your assistance. Regrettably.” Thor stared at him, helplessly. Loki made an impatient noise. “Yes, yes, I’m alive, can you skip the hysterics?”

Thor swallowed. “This is no dream,” he said. Loki rolled his eyes and smiled, sharp and nasty.

“Have you been dreaming about me that much, brother?”

Thor reached out and grabbed his arm. He could feel a pulse under the skin, solid flesh under his fingers, and let go, drawing back. “You’re alive,” he said, a little hoarsely.

“I thought I said to-”

Thor hauled back and punched Loki in the face.

It dawned fair and clear, the day they sewed Loki's lips shut.

Note: (In honour of the impending release of the Loki miniseries and my sceptical optimism for it, I'm highlighting a few canon-adjacent Loki works that can pass the time between new episodes or, if you're like me, distract from new content long enough to miss the first wave of inevitable Discourse.) Whipstitch investigates a different avenue of consequences for Loki's failed invasion, both from Asgard and from Thanos. Most countries had Avengers playing in theatres by the first week of May 2012. Kaasknot had the sixty-eight thousand words of Whipstitch published before the end of July. To build a world accurate to Norse culture and mythology is an accomplishment in istelf; to integrate the Marvel infrastructure into an original storyline, in less than four months, is remarkable.

- Read on Author's Tumblr | @kaasknot -

It dawned fair and clear, the day they sewed Loki’s lips shut. Curiosity and ill-will made it into a spectacle: a prince of Odin, a traitor and genocidal megalomaniac, humbled before Hlidskjálf. It was the event not to be missed.

So it was the throne room was full to bursting as the Þing met to declare the prince’s fate. The crowd of onlookers overflowed the aisles, pouring out between the columns into the plaza beyond—a veritable sea of greedy eyes eager for a show. The prince came quietly enough, by all reports, and it was true: there was no mewling or cowering. He strode to meet his father with his head held high and no sign of fear upon his face.

Had he been better-liked this might have endeared him to his people. Had he the boisterous, effulgent disposition of his brother—but Loki had been distant before his crimes and subsequent disappearance, and now he was as untouchable as Ragnarök, and just as sinister. The look of the wild man hung about him, in the untamed length of his hair, in the wear showed upon his armor, in the fey gleam in his eye.

The people stared at him, then looked to Thor, Asgard’s Golden Son, and it was as looking from night to day.

It begins in a prison with a monster driven to madness. It ends in much the same way.

Note: (In honour of the impending release of the Loki miniseries and my sceptical optimism for it, I'm highlighting a few canon-adjacent Loki works that can pass the time between new episodes or, if you're like me, distract from new content long enough to miss the first wave of inevitable Discourse.) It's evident miraellie loves the character and the ancient myth of Sigyn by the care they've taken to depict her across multiple works and universes. The two installments of Discrete are particularly heartfelt and more than a little bit sentimental. In a surprisingly accurrate prediction of The Dark World, Descrete begins by examining Loki's trauma through his limited point of view, and its sequel Escape the Day pivots to examine Sigyn's determination to overcome her own. Between their uncertainty and distress we are treated to scenes of tendernesss and budding fidelity without slipping so far into fantasy as to betray the grief that forever defines Sigyn's legend.

- Author's Tumblr (Inactive) | @victorybringer - - Series on AO3 | Author's Page on FF.net -

He sees her when he returns to Asgard.

It’s only a few fleeting moments as Thor and some guards take him to his dungeon cell but she’s there, she truly is, standing by a window, her black hair pulled away from her face, so different from how he’d seen it before where it was long and free for him to run his fingers through and she’s so close all he’d have to do is break away from his brother and the guards and reach for her hand, and her name is on the tip of his tongue but the muzzle cuts into his skin as he tries to open his mouth to speak, to whisper her name, to get her to just look at him--

But she doesn’t because her gaze is drawn towards an Einherji who takes up all her attention and he’s slowly, clumsily brushing a strand of hair behind her ear and she shifts away from him, doing it herself and saying something Loki can’t hear and he’ll kill this damn Einherji, how dare he, how dare he touch her like that--

Her focus shifts and finds his gaze and the world stops because she's looking at him and every single vision the Tesseract showed him comes back to him, both of them by the fire and under the night sky and watching two boys laughing as they run through a field of flowers while she holds his hand and leans up to kiss him and--