Chapter Text

--Loki: Aged 1821--

“Laufey announced that he is stepping down, and his adopted Aesir daughter is to take the throne?” Odin said to his court with disbelief, sitting high on his chair in the council chambers. Loki straightened out his papers next to his so-called father, trying to calm the flutter of his heart as their thousand-year scheme was finally coming to fruition. 

“They would announce a truce, and have extended a request to wed Prince Loki and Queen Sylvie together as proof of their commitment to peace.” The messenger carefully read the missive from their holographic scroll.

All eyes swiveled towards him, and he pretended to seem surprised. “Surely, they jest?” Loki asked, frowning in response to the news, but he was in fact, quite pleased. 

“...It is no jest.” The messenger said, paling a bit at the angry murmurs of the crowd. 

Loki took in a breath to respond, but as usual, Odin answered for him. “We will accept. This will work in our favor, as Loki is Laufey’s true son. We can bring peace to the realms at last.” Odin announced to the council, oh- how his father disgusted him. 

That this is when he would choose to break the news, conceivably to both him and the council. Little did he know, that Sylvie and he were the ones who had been deceiving them .

The First Kiss: The Meeting

“This is Princess Sylvie of Jotunheim. Princess Sylvie, this is Prince Loki of Asgard,” Frigga introduced them on the rainbow bridge. Loki looked out at this remarkably Aesir princess who barely came up to Helbindi, the Crown prince of Jotunheim’s, knee. He had been watching from a distance, how despite the difference in stride lengths between her and her adopted family, she still kept up with a light jog. Without so much as a flush on her face or a single exaggerated breath, she was calm as she stared at his family and him. Startling ice blue against little beads of red. 

“A pleasure,” Loki bowed, his voice small and high as a prince barely 9 years old, but courteous nonetheless. 

Sylvie stepped forward to bow as well, and Loki took a step forward to kiss her hand- but was shocked when instead he felt lips on his forehead. 

“You’re younger, so this is expected.” He heard her whisper in his ear. Not apologetically, but as a matter of factly. Loki looked up at her, knowing that his surprised expression was giving too much away. Yes, he remembered that his mother had mentioned something like this while brushing his hair. 

She was taller than him too, a couple of years older they had said. He took her hand and pressed a quick and courteous kiss to the back of it. “And you’re presently a lady. So this is also expected.” He said as he straightened up. 

Her eyes sparkled with something mischievous, something that Loki was surprised to see in anyone other than his mother, and they both took a step back at the same time. In sync, yet also different. 

“A pleasure,” they said at the same time. With him ending last, and her ending first. 

There were a few chuckles all around them as they walked back to the palace, “we’ll never know another peaceful day,” Laufey chuckled ahead of them as he spoke to Odin. 

--A few seasons later...--

“You’re younger, so this is expected!” Sylvie laughed as Loki tried to push her off of him. She shoved snow into her mouth and menacingly loomed over his head. “You have no class!” Loki shouted at her as he struggled against the hold she had on his arms. 

“Sylvie, Sylvie!” Loki’s voice had risen to a shrill scream as she all but spat out the snow onto his forehead with all the grace of a winter penguin offering food to its offspring.

“What now? Magician-” Sylvie’s remark was cut off when Loki promptly blasted her off with his magic and managed to get an arm lock on her. Her face buried in snow, spluttering at the magic keeping her down as he took a bite out of her hand. 

“You’re a lady, so this much is expected,” Loki’s voice was a bit muffled with her dirty hand in his mouth- but he didn’t care. Her splutters and angry threats were all he needed, even if she were to send him to Valhalla herself.

The vindication, the revenge- it was exhilarating. 

“It’s like this,” Loki summoned some wisps of his seidr for Sylvie as they waited for their parents to exit the meeting hall. Thor was off doing something for his warrior training, and Loki was still too young to do much of anything yet. Not until he grew into his adult Aesir body, at least. 

Sylvie watched with bright and curious eyes, faintly chasing the smoke-like consistency of his green magic with her hand. “Can you show me?” She asked, hopeful and excited. And, well, Loki saw no reason not to. It was the first time, he thought, as he saw Sylvie struggle to summon a single thread of seidr, that he’d ever had a peer who didn’t fear or mock him for his magic.

The Second Kiss: The Promise

“They didn’t tell you that you were adopted?” Sylvie asked as they sat on a bench in the garden under the cover of his concealment spell. 

Loki looked at his blue hand curiously, feeling something although he didn’t know what that emotion was. He looked up at Sylvie, at her terribly bleached locks of hair, and twisted some of the frayed ends with his blue hand. “No,” he said, his voice cracking. No one had told him, they had been ashamed of him. 

“Terrible job, by the way,” Loki said, his voice evening out in the end as he receded the blue in his fingertips and back to its familiar paleness. 

“Yeah, well I don’t have fancy magic like you do to keep my hair perfect ,” Sylvie said, ruffling his combed-back hair in the process. 

Loki batted her larger hand away with a huff and pushed her larger body away. “Hey, that’s rude .” Loki sniffed before he ran his hand through his hair. He wove his magic between his fingertips and returned his hair to its state of refinement. 

Sylvie raised her eyebrows and glanced up at his hair. 

See? 

That gesture seemed to say. Loki rolled his eyes as they settled shoulder to shoulder in companionable silence. “How old are you turning today?” Sylvie asked although they both knew the answer. 

“14. I’m becoming ancient, I don’t know what I’d do if I was, I don’t know. 16. I’d be withered and shriveled like a dried prune,” Loki said as if it were a fact of life, and he was unsurprised when Sylvie playfully shoved him away. “You’re an ass. I’m going to tell the Allmother what you think of her age.” 

That had a tingle of danger run up his arm. “What? No, that’s not what I meant.” Loki protested when Sylvie hopped off the bench, she was a good couple inches taller than him- something that she endlessly teased him about. 

“Oh? Well, if 16 is ancient, what do you think about 2,004? That must be… derelict.” Sylvie easily dodged the projected splurt of magic Loki threw her way and threw a fistful of soil at his face. 

Loki blocked that with his hand and chased after her, dropping the concealment spell as they ran amok. 

“I’ll tell her that you used her precious fertilizer as ammunition!” 

“I’ll tell her that you think she belongs in a museum!”

“I’ll tell her that you ate the strawberries from the bush before they were ready!” 

“I’ll tell her that you know you’re Jotunn!” 

Loki froze in place, coming to a complete halt in gravel. Sylvie ran a few more steps before she slowed down to a stop as well. She threw her gaze back, and Loki tried not to show how terrified he was of that fact. Frigga knew he was adopted, that was for certain. But what would change, if she knew that he knew that he was not her true son? 

He was so engrossed in the possibilities. Rejection, disappointment, disgust, flippancy, the possibilities were endless-

There was a slight touch on his shoulder, and he focused on the black leather boots in front of him. 

“I’m sorry, that was too far. I won’t ever tell anyone,” Sylvie said, her tone was uncharacteristically soft. He hated it, he hated how it brought tears to his eyes and how she wiped them for him. She pressed a quick peck to his forehead, nothing but the firm press of slightly chapped lips that was closer to his hairline- but it brought peace to him. 

Everything between them was still perfectly normal, their friendship intact. 

Loki leaned his forehead into her shoulder for a moment, letting his tears soak into the fine furs of her outfit, and let out a long shuddering sigh. 

“Thank you,” his voice was barely audible above the ambient chatter of insects. 

Sylvie patted his head, an awkward habit she had developed throughout the years when she had few words left for comfort. 

“Yeah, you’re welcome,” she mumbled a bit awkwardly as she mechanically patted his back.

Loki took a deep breath and dramatically sighed to try and clear the heavy atmosphere. He pressed his nose into the fur and wiped his snot and tears into her clothes in one smooth movement for good measure and didn’t miss the angry gargle in the back of her throat. Immediately bending backward to dodge the slap to the head and gave her a wide, albeit a bit watery, smile. 

“Missed me?” Loki challenged, enjoying the play on words. 

Sylvie narrowed her eyes and looked at her shoulder with disgust, “you better clean that up.” She growled, and Loki merely shrugged. “I would apologize, but I’m dreadfully busy at the moment,” he said as he began to clean up the garden with his magic. 

“Loki!” 

“Sylvie!” Loki mockingly parroted back, narrowly dodging a kick to the ribs. 

That was how Frigga found them, covered in dirt and mashed berries. They both got an earful for that, but they endured it with barely concealed smiles. 

This wasn’t the first time, after all. It certainly wouldn’t be the last.