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English
Series:
Part 17 of The God Of Stories , Part 7 of The Princess Diaries
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Published:
2023-08-07
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4,271
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1/1
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High Magick

Summary:

Sometimes, a rite of passage can sneak right up on you.
(or, "Do Not Try This At Home")

Notes:

Loki's birth year is canonically 965 CE (Marvel); she is around 53 in this scene. I take Thor to be about a year or two older.

The characters and places in this work are the IP of Marvel. The writing is mine (2021, 2022, 2023).

Beta: https://archiveofourown.info/users/fadingintostarlight

Work Text:

 

 

Palace Upper Floors, Residential Suites
 Asgard, 1018

 

Loki sighed sleepily as she sank into the delightful softness of her pillows, a book propped against her knee and a small goblet of wine in her hand. It was nearly empty. Another few pages would do it for the night, she decided, then some sleep.

There was a knock at her door. It came softly at first, and again a moment later - more insistently this time. She pursed her lips with annoyance and let out a long sigh. If it were Father, he would have sent a guard who would have rapped loudly upon the door. If it were Mother, she'd have sent a signal ahead of herself. That left only one person who would perturb her at this hour. Loki rose and padded from her bed over to the door, grousing the entire way; she pulled her robes over her bedclothes and gestured the wall sconces alight. The door swung inward.

"Brother, I really do not have time for any more of your -"

It was not Thor. It was Sif, standing there in her plain clothes. For a moment, they looked at one another with mutual regret for the encounter.

"He sent you? What for?" Loki snorted and glanced down the hall at Thor's bedroom door.

Sif rolled her eyes. "He did not send me. He does not know that I have come to see you."

Loki raised a brow. "Oh, I'm afraid you are most definitely at the wrong door for that, Sif."

Sif stifled a gag and looked up and down the corridor. "No, not that!" she whispered angrily. "I need your help."

Loki gave her a pitying look. "Pray tell, what has His Majesty bumbled into this time? Too much mead again?"

"Not exactly," Sif said.

"Well, it must be something terribly embarrassing, or perhaps even unlawful, if you've not summoned the guards or gone to Eir's ward to get their help instead." Loki stared at her, waiting. Sif folded her arms and threw Loki an exasperated glare.

Loki smirked, tapping her fingers along the door frame. "I'm listening."

 

 

The cavernous chamber had been their collective hangout for so long that it had become known simply as The Den, with its smooth, honey-colored walls and exquisite furnishings wrapped around a generous hearth in the center of the floor. They had all spent plenty of nights partying and passing out in here together; it was not uncommon for every chair and bench to be host to a drunken comrade or three sleeping it off, and tonight seemed no different.

The entire room bore the ambient aroma of illicit indulgence, and not only that of alcohol - the familiar scent of medicinal flora wafted throughout as well, with something more putrid underneath it. Thor was on his back upon one of the couches, smiling up at the ceiling and mumbling to himself.

"Thor," Loki called gently, and he grunted in reply. She called his name again, grinning as she flicked his nose, and Thor flinched and swatted at her. She laid a hand to the side of his neck, then his forehead, and leaned in closer to inspect his pupils. At this, he roused slightly and tried to shoo her away again; instead, his hands flailed limply and he ended up smacking himself in the mouth.

Loki snorted and watched him flounder for a moment, and then turned to survey the rest of them, each splayed out similarly in a transcendental haze. Volstagg was whispering and chuckling to himself, staring at the wall; Fandral was slumped into the deep cushioning of another couch, studying the hearth fire with rapt attention; Hogun was already fast asleep upon yet another couch, snoring peacefully. None seemed to have even noticed the two of them moving about in the room.

Volstagg laughed heartily to himself and Loki stepped closer to find his face flushed and clammy, but his smile was genuine and so was his laughter. He did not even seem to notice as she checked him over.

"What is he laughing about?" Sif asked from across the hearth.

"I doubt that even he knows," Loki answered. She touched a fingertip to Volstagg's large neck and peered carefully into his eyes, noting his pupils. Suddenly his arm swung up and he clamped a massive hand onto Loki's shoulder, as though greeting a beloved friend at a banquet. Loki winced at his breath.

"Wherever he is right now, he is certainly enjoying himself," she remarked, peeling his hand from her shoulder and letting it drop back onto his lap. She glanced over at Hogun, who was looking the least affected of any of them.

"He frowns even in his sleep," Sif said, shaking her head.

Loki snorted, gesturing vaguely around at the others. "Wouldn't you?"

"Shhhh," Fandral mumbled, squinting at the hearth. Loki stepped in front of him, studying his face, grinning as she followed his eyes down to her chest and back up again. She leaned in against his shoulder and followed his gaze to the hearth.

"And what have we here?" she asked softly, and listened as Fandral whispered about a mysterious woman within the flames. She glanced up at Sif.

"He's fine. They're all fine," Loki reassured her, laughing. "How long have they been like this?"

Sif shrugged. "Nearly an hour, since the worst of it passed."

"Which was … ?" Loki looked at her curiously.

Sif gestured over at the row of tall potted trees decorating the far end of the den. Loki shook her head and sighed; she knew exactly what had happened. Many times throughout their earlier years, she and Thor had covertly dipped into the house supply of various libations and then snuck in here unsupervised to try them out. They were much younger than would have been advisable for such things, and their naïveté was swiftly rewarded with desperate retching into whatever receptacles they hoped would conceal the proof of their misadventures in the moment - which was usually the plants.

Some things had not changed at all.

Loki stepped past the edge of the furniture and peered over at the trees, finding their condition unsightly. She scrunched her nose and swiped a hand at them - and in an instant, they all vanished. Sif blinked at the newly empty space, and then at Loki.

"What just happened?" she asked.

"I've sent them away," Loki said absently.

Sif looked back at the wall. "To where?"

 

 

The night sky glimmered with activity as Heimdall regarded it from his observatory at Himinbjörg. Ten galaxies away, a moon was slowly forming from the debris of a violent planetary collision. He wondered what sort of life forms might take up residence there in a thousand millennia.

Just then, something much closer to home caught his eye: along the steep waterfalls that lined most of Asgard's edges, a handful of objects had just appeared, floating weightlessly above the rushing water. Heimdall looked more closely and discovered that the objects were four potted trees, and watched bemusedly as they followed the rushing water over the falls to Asgard's underside, locked in its gravitational pull.

He shook his head and turned his attention back to the dramatic beginnings unfolding out in the cosmos.

 

 

The den was smelling better already.

"How is it that you're the only sober one?" Loki asked.

"I grew tired of 'feeding the plants' years ago," Sif said dryly.

"Fair enough." Loki looked her up and down.

It was not often that Sif would allow herself to be seen in anything less than even the most rudimentary layer of armor - polished to perfection, of course, her eyes set in a fierce expression, hair neatly pulled back. Presently she stood, arms folded, in her soft house clothes and indoor shoes, hair braided back for the night, her tired eyes tallying the various explanations she would be owed in the morning. Loki guessed that she had probably declined to partake at all and left them to it, then checked in on them later. Or perhaps Sif, like Loki, had not been invited in the first place - and had come wandering in on the situation when Thor had failed to turn up at her quarters for the usual not-so-discreet visit. Either way, she did not look amused.

"Where is it?" Loki asked, casting a glance around the room.

Sif pointed to a rucksack on the floor behind one of the massive couches; inside, Loki found a kit containing several ritual pouches bearing the official crest of the Seiðr guild. She sighed loudly. She was all too familiar with these, and knew how meticulously they were measured and packed before they were handed off. The first two pouches appeared to be as yet untouched, but the third felt light in her hand, with only some remnants at the bottom. She held the open end to her nose to investigate and the pungent odor nearly made her eyes water, confirming her suspicions.

Given the quantity that was typically metered out per pouch for specific rites, Loki estimated that they had each taken in roughly twice as much as was recommended for a single sitting.

Casual consumption wasn't exactly forbidden, but it was hardly encouraged for anyone to partake of these outside of specific rituals with the vísendakona - and Loki guessed that her brother and The Idiots Three were about to arrive together at an epiphany as to why. Given what plans they'd made for that evening, they had clearly ignored whatever cautionary instructions they'd been given and had opened them out of the proper order, starting with the strongest of the offerings and consequently getting no further.

Lucky, that.

Had they sped their way through the whole of it, they would undoubtedly be in Eir's ward already, enduring a messy spectacle for their mischief. Loki couldn't help but smile to herself. Hardy as these four were, theirs was a tolerance for drinking; the sacred visionary plants of the temple were on another level altogether, and one they had not quite reached yet.

"Welcome aboard, gentlemen," Loki sang under her breath, turning back to Sif. "Any idea how they got hold of this?"

Sif shrugged. "I assumed they'd gotten it from you."

Loki snorted. "Well, they certainly could have, had they bothered to ask." She repacked the kit and pulled the drawstring tight. "I am securing this, and will be back shortly with some necessary things," she said on her way toward the door. "Keep this room closed, and send away any nosy staff until we've finished."

The door thumped quietly as she pulled it shut behind her.

Sif stood silently beside the hearth, looking around herself at the state of her cohorts. Volstagg, still staring upward vacantly and whispering war stories excitedly to no one she could see, shifted his mountainous form on the couch and let out a long, rumbling note of flatulence.

"Shhhh," said Fandral from his slouch, his brow furrowed with frustration as he narrowed his eyes to focus again on watching the fire. Thor, still on his back on the other couch, snorted and launched into an episode of childlike giggling. Sif groaned and dropped her face into her hands.

"I should have just stayed in bed."

 

 

Loki stole past the various guards in the corridors and made her way back to her rooms, gesturing at the wall sconces to illuminate her way into her private ritual chamber.

She stood amidst a series of tall bookshelves, a long altar, a heavy cabinet, and a series of carefully crafted shelves displaying hundreds of bottles of various sizes, shapes, and colors. She whispered a phrase as she touched a fingertip to the outermost lock upon the face of the cabinet and it clicked in response, releasing the latch; she reached inside and ran her fingertips down the various drawers and trays within until she found the one she was looking for, and drew a secret bindrune lightly across the wood with her fingernail, unlocking it.

She expected to find her personal kit missing, but the entire drawer was exactly how she had left it. She took the kit from the rucksack and added it into her inventory, locking it up again with another runic marking. However they had acquired their stash, it had not been from this room. She sighed and turned to the wall of bottles, bringing her hands together to summon a thick leather-bound journal. She thumbed through it, occasionally looking up to select a particular bottle or two.

As she packed various roots and leaves into correlating pouches, Loki found herself absently wondering why her brother and his entourage had not simply made the rounds at all of the usual haunts down in Capitol City, where they had spent decades getting themselves into the more traditional sort of trouble. More concerning still was how they had gained access to such potent botanicals in the first place - she imagined they had probably just bribed a star-struck acolyte at a tavern.

It was quite impressive that they had even managed to keep any of it a secret, if so.

"You are quite fortunate that I love you enough to be so helpful," she said under her breath as she worked, brushing aside the sting of not having been considered. She returned the bottles to their places in the shelves, gathered her materials, and swiped the journal away. As she passed back through her bedchamber, her eyes fell on her abandoned goblet, and a smile crept across her face.

 

 

After pacing the floor for a bit, Sif made her way back over to Thor. She leaned over the arm of the couch and looked down to find him humming to himself and tracing his fingers along the seams of the couch leather. She snorted.

"What are you doing?" she laughed, leaning down onto her elbows.

"Sif!" Thor smiled placidly up at her, then furrowed his brow in vague confusion. "Why are you upside-down?"

She shook her head and brushed his hair out of his face, resting her chin in her hand. She had seen him passed out drunk countless times after taking in an impossible quantity of ale, but she had never seen him anything like this. Though he was clearly unable to walk at the moment, his senses did not appear to have been dulled - in fact, they seemed to be heightened as he gazed up at her, studying her face with almost boyish delight.

"So beautiful," he said softly, tracing his fingertips along her profile as if drawing her onto a canvas. She smiled and cupped his face in her hand, absently tickling his whiskers. The door clicked open and Sif looked up to find Loki sauntering gracefully back into the den, having changed from bedclothes and robes to something slightly more decorous. She tossed the rucksack back onto the floor where it had been, and gently set a bag of her own down beside Fandral. She withdrew a handful of bright green pouches as she turned to Sif.

"Loki!" Thor called buoyantly, raising an arm to greet her. "You've returned!"

"Oh, I would not miss this for all the worlds, Brother," Loki said slyly and handed Sif one of the little pouches. Inside, she found a small bundle of long roots wrapped in a thin, aromatic leaf. She looked back up at Loki.

"Twist it to snap the roots open, and then get the whole thing under his tongue," Loki instructed. "Have him keep it there for as long as he'll tolerate the taste."

Sif smelled the bundle and grimaced. "What is this?"

"Just a little something for the hubris," Loki cracked as she approached Volstagg. She leaned against the back of the couch and gazed down into his face; he was smiling wide, his hair and beard in disarray, eyes focused upward on something only he could see.

"Oh hello, Volli," she said, withdrawing another bundle from a pouch. "I've something here for you, for the headache." She held out the medicinal bundle and he squinted up at it with a look of dread, shaking his head.

"But … I've no headache," he protested. Loki smiled primly down at him.

"Oh, you will soon enough," she cautioned. "And you can tell Guðrún yourself that you've refused her remedy." Volstagg contemplated this, and quickly concurred that his wife would indeed be highly displeased to hear of it. Before long, he had forgotten all about the terrible taste of the roots and resumed his hushed storytelling to an adoring imaginary audience.

Loki took to Fandral's lap and playfully tapped him on the nose. He smiled, languid and charming, and she studied his eyes - ice blue, like Thor's, and framed by golden hair and a short, meticulously kept beard. There was a daring twinkle of mischief in those eyes, even now. She could certainly see why so many Asgardian women - and some of the men - fancied him so much, herself included.

"Your turn," she grinned, holding up another pouch. His expression soured at the smell of it.

"Oh, gods no," he mumbled, turning his face aside. "Not that again."

"You will want this far more than the headache you're due in the morning. Now open up," Loki said coyly, "and don't swallow." Fandral smirked and obliged her out of habit. Sif rolled her eyes and looked back down at Thor, who was turning his bundle over in his fingertips, slowly scrutinizing it with childlike fascination.

"Put it in your mouth," Sif reminded him.

Thor frowned and shook his head. "Smells awful," he muttered.

"Yes, and so do you at the moment," Sif smirked. "Put it under your tongue."

He stared at it in his hand for a long moment, and then flashed an impish grin as he tapped it against her chin. "You first."

Sif smiled and guided his hand back toward his own mouth. "It's not for me, it's for you." He snorted and turned his face away from her hand, but then froze as he stared upward in awe.

"Sif, do you see … " he trailed off, pointing up at several small orbs of light spinning around one another. Sif looked up and reflexively leaned backward into the cushions at the sight. She shot a glance over at Loki.

"Distraction," Loki said casually. Sif smirked and looked back down at Thor. His eyes were fixed upon the illusion hovering overhead, lips parted, utterly entranced by this twinkling thing of beauty. Sif took the bundle and gently slipped it beneath his tongue, pausing to gauge his reaction; incredibly, he hadn't even noticed. She stretched out and laid her head beside his, gazing up with him at the twirling lights.

Loki smirked over at the two of them and settled herself in beside Fandral, laying her head on his shoulder. "Now, tell me all about your lady of the flames," she said softly and pulled a bottle of wine from her bag. As Fandral spoke quietly of the hearth fire's arresting gaze, Loki glanced idly over at her brother, watching his carefree and happy expressions as he and Sif lay admiring the orbs.

"Like moons," Thor said.

The lights were lovely enough on their own, but to Thor, they must have looked like pocket-sized stars. Loki wondered what else he saw in this heightened state of awareness, and an idea began to form.

She narrowed her eyes and concentrated on her illusion, attenuating its brightness, colors, and speed, and slowly blossomed it into a swirling, luminous galaxy. As it expanded, she incorporated a deep backdrop of distant stars that twinkled brightly within the layer of inky blackness that spread across the upper surfaces of the room. A brilliant, colorful nebula began to slowly spin across the sky as the stars arranged themselves into familiar constellations. Here and there, she set off tiny suns and planets, some with moons, others with rings, and sent a long tailed comet hurtling through the mix.

She dropped her gaze back to Thor and found him blissfully transfixed, eyes darting around at the universe which had suddenly filled the ceiling of the den. She couldn't recall the last time she had seen him so serene, so happy, and she smiled in spite of herself. Even Sif looked pleasantly engaged as she nestled into him and absently stroked his beard.

"I wonder," Thor pondered aloud with amazement. "Is this what Heimdall looks upon every day?"

"I would imagine so." Loki took a long drink of wine. "How are you feeling?"

Thor stretched his legs and rubbed his eyes. "Yes."

Loki chuckled from behind her wine bottle. "Welcome to a new plane of awareness, Brother."

 

 

The following morning …

 

Sif awoke to find herself curled up beneath a fur, head resting on one of Thor's massive forearms. She rubbed her eyes with a yawn and sat up to survey the condition of the den, finding Volstagg asleep still sitting up, as though he had winked out in the middle of one of his grandiose stories, and Hogun exactly the way she had last seen him. The remaining couch sat empty: Fandral's overcoat and boots were on the floor beside it, but he and Loki were nowhere to be seen. Sif wrinkled her nose at the implication and turned back to Thor, brushing a lock of hair from across his face.

Thor always had been one to sleep like he had just fallen all the way down the side of a mountain, and this occasion was no exception. He had somehow managed to get himself turned around, barefoot, his legs thrown across the arm and back of the couch, one arm hanging off the edge of the cushion and the other curled beneath his head, where Sif had slept on him. He was snoring with a thin line of drool running down one side of his otherwise perfectly tranquil face.

There came a grunt from across the hearth as Hogun sat up, squinting over at them with a look of sleepy bewilderment. Sif lifted her hand and gave a small wave, and he slowly waved back, eyes moving across the other couches until they fell upon the empty wall.

"Where are the trees?"

 

 

An hour later …

 

Thor leaned his head against the cool, soft leather of the chairback. He had been awake for exactly three minutes and was already deeply resenting it.

Loki smirked as she flopped herself down beside him, bouncing the cushions as much as she could.

"And how is the mighty son of Odin feeling this morning?" she asked blithely.

Thor winced. "Shhh. I am trying to think."

"I am honored to witness such a rare moment."

Had Thor been capable of anything but precariously holding still, he'd have paid her back for the remark. As it was, just opening his eyes gave him a swirling dizziness that nearly launched his stomach again.

"Do not imply that I am stupid," Thor mumbled, rubbing his temples.

"I imply no such thing," Loki grinned. "I've outright told you." She brought her hands together and an apple appeared between them. She bit into it, loudly. Thor glared at her.

"Must you do that?"

"What? You're making us late for breakfast. "Loki shrugged at him. "Father is rather impressed, by the way," she snickered.

"You told Father?" Thor grumbled.

"I've told no one, nor did I even need to," Loki scoffed. "Honestly, Thor, do you actually think that anything you do around here escapes either of them? You may as well leave an itinerary upon your door every day."

Thor groaned as the pain in his head drummed up again. Loki laid her head against the leather chair back, so that they were eye to eye.

"Do you remember any of it?" she asked.

Thor rubbed his eyes and gave it some thought. His memory of the night before was in dreamlike fragments. He glanced at the hearth, and his eyes brightened at the recollection.

"I remember something small and bright dangling over us, like the flames of little candles," he said, smiling wide. "Volli was entertaining everyone, telling his stories. And the sky was so clear, I could see everything. It was so close that I wanted to reach up and touch it all."

Loki watched as his expression softened to one of childlike wonder again. "And what did you see, when you looked out into the universe?" she asked.

Thor gazed upward, as though he could still see everything. Perhaps he could. "A thousand worlds, and all of their stars, Loki! The skies were opened up to us, in brilliant colors and forms, all moving about at once. It was the most beautiful thing I have ever seen." He paused, contemplative. "It reminded me of when we were younger and we would visit Heimdall out on the bridge."

"And bring him apples," Loki added, smiling briefly at the fond memories.

Thor turned to her as something else occurred to him. "And Sif … she was upside-down!"

Loki looked at him skeptically and took another bite of her apple. Thor twitched his face at the sound of it, and she smiled at him with smug delight. "Oh, I'm sorry. Am I being loud?"

He side-eyed her, and then leaned forward and glanced past her, looking baffled. "Weren't there … trees over there?" he asked, gesturing to the wide, empty area on the far wall.

Loki shrugged. "They served their glorious purpose and took their leave," she deadpanned.

Thor thought a moment, then grinned. "Took their leaves." He snorted, cracking himself up until the hangover headache had him holding his head again. Loki cast him a sideways glance and sighed into her apple.