Loki (fiorvalr) wrote in noexits, @ 2021-07-12 22:35:00 |
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Entry tags: | !log/thread/narrative, marvel (tv/movies): loki laufeyson, the magicians: julia wicker, → week 016 (disney world) |
Loki visits Julia. Despite the fact that he lost the bet, they still end up going on a little outing together. It goes pretty well until Julia drops the bombshell about her shade on him. Then Loki has to make a decision about whether or not to tell her he has it.WARNINGS There is one tag in this thread that requires multiple warnings. Julia reveals how she lost her shade. This reveal contains sensitive, potentially triggering material (death, rape, unplanned pregnancy and termination) as well as SPOILERS for the Julia storyline in seasons 1 and 2 of The Magicians. The rest of the log is sweet and kind of awkward cute. If you want to read everything except the difficult section, your warning is Loki asking "How did you lose your shade?" You can skip over the next response and safely go to Loki's reaction instead if you don't feel comfortable reading the spoiler.
But who wouldn’t be upset about a realm ruled by a mouse and filled with people so hopelessly devoted to him? Surely, Loki could have played that role as well. And, truth be told, he couldn’t even see what the mouse was doing for them. The people of Midgard all simply seemed to be in a sat of mindless bliss as they meandered through the various parks and played along with the pretentious pantomimes, drank the high sucrose beverages, ate the greasy food, and stood in hours’-long lines for thirty seconds of adrenaline.
And yet they still wouldn’t make Loki their new king, no matter how hard he tried. It was aggravating. It was frustrating. And he was tired.
Julia was laying out by the pool. Loki waved his hand and one of the lounge chairs magically propped itself directly beside hers. Then he sat down. Oh, yes. A quick outfit change for himself too. Tony Stark’s board shorts had been amusing, so he conjured a pair of those, only in green. And sunglasses, too. Even with his body’s natural Frost Giant coolness, the heat in this realm was excruciating.
Loki stretched his legs out in front of him and then gave her a quirky smile. Why? Because he used one of Julia’s portals to get him there. And he was quite proud. Almost boyishly so. “If you want to collect on your favor now is a good time. I’m in mostly an agreeable mood.”
Julia rested the book on her stomach, putting a crease in the spine in order to save her page. She thought nothing of this slight. It wasn’t her book but one she found in the house.
When she did look at Loki the once over was almost involuntary. He was attractive and she wasn’t blind. She did appreciate his trim form, even if his dark hair made him seem more pale than he was.
Beyond the initial sigh, she didn’t seem irritated he’d shown up uninvited. But then, Julia didn’t show much at all. He was there now, and Julia made no move to pick her book back up. Loki had her complete attention.
“Disneyed out already?” she asked.
It had been a very chaotic household.
He did, however, crane his neck to try and get a glimpse of the cover. Curious as he was. But then he sprawled back on the lounge chair and pushed the sunglasses down onto the bridge of his nose. Then he gave her a once over as well. Perhaps a little on the longer side than the one she’d given him. But that’s what the sunglasses were for. To hide too much interest.
“I really hope you don’t ask me for something when I’m in a foul mood. There’d be no fun in that for either of us. And even though I’ll go along with whatever you ask for, because I am nothing but a man of my word—” Grin. “—it will be a much more enjoyable experience if I’m not complaining during the entire process.”
Loki tucked his hair back behind his ears and gave a halfhearted shrug. “I’m a bit weary of the illusion of this place.”
She frowned slightly.
She needed to be more careful. Julia couldn’t afford to let down her guard.
“You can hang out here if you want. I’m not doing anything exciting, just not really feeling crowds.”
Julia picked up her book. Her eyes scanned the page, looking for her spot but she found she had a hard time focusing on the words with Loki right next to her. Even as she made an attempt to read, the words on their own made sense but stringed together in a sentence had become mostly meaningless.
Not to mention trite.
“Isn’t your friend at home? The other witchy one?” Loki glanced over his shoulder and back towards the house. He hadn’t properly introduced himself to Kady. Not that he had any intentions of doing so. He came to the party at Julia’s invitation. All others had been inconsequential participants of the evening. Background noise, as it were. Sure, Loki had mingled with others, but he’d really only been interested in letting Julia know that he was there.
Even if he hadn’t exactly tried to show her much attention while he had been there. It was supposed to be subtle. Perhaps it had been too subtle. But Loki still hadn’t quite figured out his own intentions where Julia was concerned. Only that he liked her and was curious about her. And he didn’t often feel those two things in combination, let alone over someone from Midgard.
“Don’t let me interrupt you. Please, continue with your book. I won’t say a word.” Except for all the words he’d just said. Loki lowered the backrest on the lounge chair and placed his hands behind his head, staring up into the gleaming sky.
Two minutes of distracted silence passed before Loki couldn’t help himself and started talking again. “Fandral disappointed me. He’s usually much more … robust than that.”
Then it was quiet. Julia found she was able to continue reading. She’d encountered some of David Hume at university, but not being a philosophy major, had never sat down with an entire book. An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding. She hoped it might be helpful to her, but she wasn’t so certain. The text was interesting enough that she kept reading.
Then Loki spoke.
Julia gave up and put the book down.
“If it had been a bigger party, maybe he would have. But he was drunk and they weren’t even one night stands. Not everyone is into that.” For Julia it had been a numbers game. She didn’t think the numbers had been in Loki (or Fandral’s) favor.
Which was a pity. The Midgardian realm might have found itself less on the verge of total annihilation every few years if it took a page out of Asgard’s book and just took its clothes off more often.
But Loki was a little upset that Julia had only wanted a favor from him. That sounded so blasé and pedantic. He appreciated the traditional undertones, of course. Favors were a classic betting option. They’d been all the rage among the gods when he was a younger man. And Loki found himself indebted to many a person — and god — back in those days. But he’d been hoping for something a little more interesting. A little more personal.
She set the book down and he picked it up, briefly flipping through the pages from start to finish with a raised brow. Then he placed it on the edge of her chair and rolled over onto his side to face her. He tilted his head so the shades would slide down the bridge of his nose and expose his eyes.
“I spent most of the evening practicing your portals. Added a little bit of my own flair to them after I got the hang of it. They just weren’t green enough for my tastes.” Loki waved a hand towards the pool and greenish black haze appeared at the edge of the deck. It wavered like static charge, the location on the other side partially obscured by the bright green hue. Then he waved it away and it blinked out of existence. “Do you want to go somewhere? The beach? London? The fjords of Norway? The moon? I haven’t tried other realms yet. I’d say the sky’s the limit, but between the two of us we could probably go anywhere.”
Anywhere but home, that is.
“Anywhere under this sky,” Julia cautioned him. She knew it was possible for a witch to go to the moon; one of her old safe house members had done it. But having a morta power limit made it difficult and probably dangerous.
Loki, on the other hand, wasn’t mortal. At least not that she could tell. Fandral had mentioned dying of old age which struck her as odd. And if Loki and Julia were working magic cooperatively, and she was powered up…
Maybe the moon wasn’t such a long shot. Julia didn’t know why anyone would want to go, but who knew.
She paused. Her eyebrows furrowed.
“Are you asking me out?”
Or, at least, Loki thought he did. He hadn’t asked Fandral directly, but he was fairly certain that should fate return them home, alive and well, that Fandral would pick up his old mantle. Return to his warrior status.
Loki, on the other hand, didn’t know who or what he was anymore. He didn’t believe they would return to Asgard or Midgard or any place they knew. He didn’t even know if he was truly still alive. Sometimes he didn’t feel like he was, which probably accounted for some of his rash and hysterical actions. It was difficult accepting that he’d lived a life unfulfilled, died heroically, was denied access to Valhalla, and now found himself here. In a place where he was neither alive nor dead. With no guarantees of any kind of future. Like the others who disappeared in the wink of an eye, so could Loki. And then what?
The answer terrified him.
He rolled onto his back and pushed the sunglasses up on his nose, concealing his eyes. “I don’t know. I don’t really do that. And I don’t really understand what that means. Logistically, yes, I understand it. But can’t two people who like each other just go and do things together? Without putting a name on it?”
Asking someone out. It sounded so pedantic. So complicated. So Midgardian.
“But if I was asking … would you say yes?”
But her tone wasn’t serious then, either.
She watched him carefully, trying to measure what it was he wanted out of her with his facial expression, and divine what he knew to be missing from her. She told him part of her soul was missing, but that didn’t mean he understood it. Was it lying to him to say yes? Leading him on? She needed him close.
Maybe. Assuming they ever got out of this place.
“But if we’re just two people doing things together,” Julia said, teasing him again. She was getting good at finding her humor again. It wasn’t even cruel (she didn’t think). “I mean, it’s not like you’re courting me or anything…”
Julia looked over at Loki and grinned.
But it only held for a few moments.
“You know I’m kind of limited, in what I have to offer…”
That seemed like a fair enough warning, right? That night in Fillory they’d spent together. Julia had enjoyed it. Why did it need to be much more than that?
Then she mentioned courting and even his sunglasses couldn’t hide his rolling eyes.
“I don’t court people. People court me and then I disappoint them when they realize I’m always going to be myself.” Loki grinned. It wasn’t something he was proud of, but it was true. Not that he expected her to believe him. Half of the things he said were lies anyway. Or, at least, they had been in the past. He wasn’t sure anymore. Ever since he’d died he found himself being more and more honest.
Julia grinned. He liked that. It felt like a fleeting glimpse into the person she might have been if she were whole. And again he wondered why she didn’t work harder to be whole again.
Loki took off his sunglasses because what he was about to say was equally as important as her warning. “I’m limited, as well. I don’t have any expectations and I’m not offering anything. I’m just asking if you want to go somewhere. You won’t hurt my feelings if you don't want to. It just seems silly to go to the beach by myself if I can take someone with me. And, as you said, I like you.”
But when Loki said like it had multiple meanings. It didn’t have to be anything more than what they already had, which he enjoyed as well. And truthfully he didn’t know if he was capable of more than that. But he was curious. And he was trying to figure out who he was in this new reality.
The words were not chosen with any particular care. Love. She still had that, perhaps. Or maybe the memory of it was enough to sustain her. She was still in the long process of inventory and self reflection. She didn’t believe Loki for a moment when he said he was similarly limited, but she didn’t feel like challenging him in that moment either.
So she didn’t. She slid her legs over the side of her lounge chair and sat up. Julia had assumed he meant now and while she would have preferred the privacy of a small pool, she would deal with vacationing beach crowds if that was what he wanted.
Her look, her body language, all said now?
But sometimes he wondered if he wasn’t wrong. Sometimes he considered experimenting. But was that something a person could learn? Or was that something one had to be born with?
Perhaps Frost Giants were destined to have hearts made of ice.
Julia agreed. Loki smiled.
“Good.” Then he stood up and reformed the fuzzy green portal at the edge of the pool deck. “I’ve always preferred walking and talking anyway. But you can bring your book if you want.”
Just as he had the night of the pool party, he offered her his hand.
Knowing that she came back next week, the prospect of a trick didn’t even bother her. Maybe it should have.
She left her book on the lounge chair, took his hand and taking a leap of faith, walked through the portal with him to the other side.
Massive limestone cliffs ran parallel to the narrow stretch of beach — sand but also mostly stones making for a more rugged walk for bare feet — for more than a mile. In the distance a rock formation with a naturally occurring arch dipped into the sea. It was warm, but a cool breeze rushed in from the coastline.
Most importantly, and most significantly, it was empty.
Normandy. Étretat, to be precise.
“Oops.” Loki smiled and gave a sheepish shrug, but there was something in his eyes that suggested this destination was no accident.
Combined with the strange static tickle of the portal, Julia’s skin was covered in goose flesh. Her arms immediately wrapped around herself in a hug and she shivered.
It was a stunningly beautiful location, one she had never seen in person, but even as defective as she was, she could still appreciate it. She just wasn’t part Frost Giant to cope.
She stepped in closer to Loki, but he was not particularly warm either. The low sixties would have been a comfortable temperature in almost any other circumstance, but the shock of the change kept her shivering. Still, she didn’t complain. Midgardians we’re just a bit more fragile.
It didn’t feel like a cruel prank. Julia nodded, rather than seem unappreciative. Maybe she’d adjust in a few moments. She was trying.
When he glanced over at Julia and her complaint-less shivering, however, he quietly regretted his choice. That was the consequence of only thinking about one’s self. Loki was always failing to properly provide for the others in his company.
Perhaps that was why he was so often alone.
“Here,” he said, conjuring a new attire for her. Something more appropriate to the lower temperature and the rocky ground. Then he did the same for himself. Nothing too fancy though. No elaborate Asgardian garments. Just a simple pair of tailored slacks, a button-up shirt, and loafers. The ground didn’t really bother him. Neither did the cold.
He could have been just another tourist wandering the French coastline.
He led her closer to the water, watching as the blue waves rolled into foamy white against the shore. “I always forget how beautiful Midgard can be.”
Loki paused. “Assuming this even is Midgard.”
He still wasn’t certain if everywhere was merely Derleth in disguise.
Sure, she was shadeless but that didn’t mean she was impolite. The spell was curious. Had he picked the clothing or had she from her subconscious? She would have to ask about it later.
“It’s Midgard,” Julia said. “Or a version of it.”
Once she was comfortable, Julia slipped her hand back into Loki’s. He never seemed that much taller than her, especially from a distance. But standing next to him, Julia was reminded that he was over a foot taller than her. When she tilted her head, it rested against his shoulder. It was surprisingly comfortable.
“I told Fandral, if we figure this place out and how to get back home, he should come with me. You could too, if you wanted? I could use your help.”
Julia looked up at Loki.
“That’s not my favor. I know that’s too big of an ask. Just think about it.”
Julia might not have had her shade, but she still seemed to remember what it was supposed to feel like. Loki had a soul, but he didn’t know what to do with the feelings he had. What a hypocritical pair they were.
But he didn’t shy away from her leaning into his shoulder. If anything, he did a remarkable job of making it appear normal. But to anyone who knew Loki, they would recognize that, for him, it was anything but normal. Loki wasn’t supposed to be kind to people. Not without a reason. Not without a motive. And he certainly wasn’t known for his outward affection. He was the God of Mischief. Everything was supposed to be a trick. Loki, however, was a little tired of tricks.
It was hard to top dying and coming back to life in a new realm. Of all the tricks he’d experienced that was probably the best. And the worst. It left him feeling a little impotent in the mischief department.
Loki raised a brow when she mentioned taking Fandral to her world. “You’ve spoken to Fandral about his—” Loki paused. “—about him not being able to return to our realm?”
Loki didn’t know why that surprised him or why that bothered him, but it did. Maybe the answer was simple. Maybe because he wasn’t ready to be so open about his own situation. A frown tugged at his lips. “Fandral should go with you if he can. He deserves better than what he got in our world. But me? What could you possibly need my help with?”
She frowned, thinking about what to say next.
“I don’t think Fandral can win. Not without heavy coaching. He’s a warrior but, warriors can be tricked.” Julia looked up at Loki. “If the two of you had to kill the other, who do you think would win?”
Her tone conveyed who Julia would put her bet on. It wasn’t just flattery. Julia knew the importance of wit and trickery because it was the only reason she was still alive against a foe that was far more powerful than she was. Out foxing a fox was all she had.
But it wasn’t quite enough to finish him either. Julia frowned. “Sorry, I know it’s not the most pleasant thing to think about.”
Her eyes returned to the sea, which was a pretty gray color. Not quite silver, but it seemed to match a mood or perhaps inspire it.
Assuming, of course, that Loki had to kill Fandral. If it came down to who they were and what they were capable of, then Loki would win against Fandral every time. That was sans the emotional component, of course. Which, sadly, probably also played in Loki’s favor. Because it would take a lot to convince Fandral to kill him. Whereas Loki, on the other hand, well, Fandral wouldn’t have been the first important person to him that had died on his account. And Loki was a survivor. He refused death at every turn.
So, if he had to kill Fandral, he would. The only thing that could possibly stop Loki from murdering his friend would be guilt. Because technically Fandral’s death was already his fault. It was Loki who’d set into motion the events which led to Ragnarok. Which led to the destruction of Asgard and the deaths of so many of their people. So in a battle of wit and combat? Loki would most assuredly win against one of Asgard’s mightiest warriors.
But he hoped it would never come to that.
Loki watched Julia as she stared out to the sea. It was beautiful; shining and boundless. But Loki didn’t really notice it. He was looking at her face and the way the breeze twisted through her hair. “Is there someone you want me to kill for you, Julia? Is that what you want from me?”
Originally, Loki was her test subject. A trickster god she could master killing in preparation for the next one. But things hadn’t really worked out that way. She was glad she had given her book The Art of Killing Gods to Tony for safe keeping. She didn’t trust herself not to obsess over its pages.
“I’m just trying…” To do the right thing? Sometimes. When she remembered. Ending the sentence at trying seemed more appropriate. She was trying her best. Some days it was harder to know what that was than others.
Her thumb brushed over her hand, more to reassure herself than anything else. It would be foolish to admit the truth of things to him, right? Was that what he was trying to do? Wear her down? Make a play to the ghost of her guilty conscience?
But what he was trying to or for he couldn’t say. That was a revelation he’d yet to experience. Or maybe more accurately, one he’d yet to face. Loki wasn’t a king of any realm. But he was a king of deception. Particularly when it came to his own thoughts and feelings. And a king of burying truths deep within those dark, cobwebbed spaces of his subconscious.
Loki gave her hand a gentle squeeze. Then he eased the conversation back to a more comfortable topic. “If you asked Fandral for his help though, he would give it without question. And I would support him on your behalf. But if we do find a way to leave this place and go wherever we want without consequence, and if he does decide to go with you, I do hope you’ll look out for him for me. He’s a strong warrior. But he has a fragile heart.”
And Loki didn’t think Fandral would be upset with him for saying so.
He turned them towards the water, leading them right up to the shore line. Then Loki slipped off his shoes and stepped onto the damp sand. It was softer closer to the sea, the ground seeping between his toes. “We have—had—beaches like this in Asgard. Except the fjords towered much higher than these cliffs. And the water was more reflective. It shimmered. And in the winter the ice would be clear enough to see your own reflection in.”
He smiled. Nostalgia wasn’t a bad look on Loki.
But there was a part of Fandral that seemed to accept his death, that this time on Derleth was the only extra time he would be receiving. If Julia tried to pin down how she felt about it, the emotion that came up was somewhere between infuriated and annoyed. Derleth had given them all an opportunity, time to assess their situations and plot a course of action. But then, Julia was likely a much more stubborn person than Fandral was.
When Loki spoke of Asgard, however, Julia listened quietly. It seemed important not to interrupt him. His home was past tense, which meant it didn’t exist anymore. She could ask him about it, or wait for him to tell her.
It did leave her at impasse. So far her gestures had been as sincere as she could muster. Julia could try for affection, but this time it would be an act, buttering him up to get him to talk more, earning his trust. Hold him around his waist and let him know she was there.
But so far honesty had also been working for her. Honesty came with risk, especially when it meant telling him more about herself but… She wanted to say she was doing the right thing, but Julia began to question if both methods really boiled down to simply getting the result she wanted.
“I’m sorry,” she said. Mere condolences were all she could offer. If he wanted to tell her more, that was his business.
Loki was still on the fence about being alive. For all he knew this was a peculiar kind of limbo and everyone else was there to cause him more suffering. That was a narcissistic view of things, wasn’t it? That he was the only real resident at Derleth and everyone else was created by the Powers of Derleth to force him through endless agony and emotional torture. It was a working theory. There was also the theory that even if Loki tried to go anywhere, he’d end up dead. That Derleth was the only place he could exist. He didn’t like that idea, at all.
And then, of course, there was the obvious. That there was no other place to go. Which meant that the people who disappeared simply ceased to exist. Poof! No more.
Loki didn’t like that option either.
Regardless, Julia would have been correct in her assumption. Fandral was coming to terms with his death relatively well. In a calm and composed manner of acceptance. Loki, on the other hand, was slowly unraveling. Fortunately he had his illusions to hide his descent into self-destruction.
Julia apologized and Loki raised a brow. “Yes. Ragnarok. The apocalypse. Very sad. Anyway…” He stood close enough for the water to rush over his feet, burying his toes completely in the wet sand when the sea rushed back. He let go of her hand in order to crouch down and draw a few lines in the sand. It resembled a tower connected by a long bridge. “Doesn’t matter now, I guess. Just a memory.”
The sea swallowed up his drawing and Loki stood upright again. “Nothing lasts forever.”
“Guess not,” she said.
She didn’t have a particularly good arm. The shoes didn’t really make it an impressive distance. She couldn’t really say why she did it. Just that she wasn’t to do something and there was something satisfying about chucking something that didn’t deserve it.
“If you want to talk about it more, you can. I can’t do much more than listen.”
She offered him a small shrug.
Even talking to Fandral about it was difficult. And Natasha. Although, at least with her there wasn’t any judgment. Maybe because she didn’t know Asgard. Maybe because she was dead, too. Loki didn’t know. He just knew that talking about it didn’t make him any less responsible.
Besides, what good would telling Julia do? She’d nod her head or stare at him with those discerning eyes and Loki wouldn’t feel any better. If anything he’d feel worse. Because he would have revealed one of his vulnerabilities. And he still didn’t know or trust Julia well enough not to use that against him somehow.
He watched as her shoe landed unceremoniously into a small wave. Then he placed a hand to his chest where, somewhere deep beneath the illusion, he was hiding something that didn’t belong to him. Something that had started whispering to him in the night, although he’d yet to recognize those whispers as being anything more than the result of restless sleeps, idle thoughts, and paranoia. Maybe he should just give it to her now. That would have been the right thing to do. The moral thing. Maybe that would make him feel better about all of the horrible things he’d done.
But he didn’t. And he didn’t know why.
Loki watched as the shoe sank into the depths of the water. Then he turned to her. “How did you lose your shade?”
She took a breath and exhaled, and then spoke very matter of factly.
“My friends and I tried to petition a goddess. I didn’t need anything, I just wanted to help them and do something not shitty with my magic for once. Instead, we summoned Reynard, a trickster god who had been banished until we undid it.
“He slaughtered my friends and then he raped me. I found out later I was pregnant. Tried to get an abortion, but the doctor at the clinic I went to killed herself in front of me instead. So I went to a couple of witch doctors, who likened it more to an exorcism? They managed to do the procedure but apparently nicked my soul in the process and my shade went with.
“Managed to locate my shade in the Underworld, even managed to travel there with a friend. But we found someone else’s shade there as well and I only had room to smuggle one out with me, so I took hers so we could bring her back from the dead, which we did.”
Julia then looked at Loki.
“The goddess we tried to summon is his ex. He’s been slaughtering her followers ever since. It’s my fault he’s back on Earth, so, it’s my mess to clean up. So much for trying to do something good with my magic, right?”
Julia wanted a cigarette and was annoyed she hadn’t brought any with her.
Was her lack of a soul what made him attracted to her? Was that where he saw the connection? Was his sick sense of kindred spirits an illusion built from the fact that she was only half herself? And, if so, what did that say about him?
Loki suddenly felt a little nauseous.
“I’m…” But he didn’t finish whatever he planned to say. He just turned, stone-faced, to the sea. How could he keep it now? If he held onto her shade after that story then was he no better than the god who assaulted her? “Gods are assholes. Tricksters are the worst.”
Loki frowned. “But if you were to get it back. If someone were to find it and return it to you. Would that help? Would you be more content? Or is it easier this way?”
At his What If remark, Julia rolled her eyes , however. “Persephone is gone. She never cared. Hades, too. I was so stupid to think that what? Some nice female god was just going to show up like, here you go.”
Julia shook her head and then stared off into the water with Loki.
“I had my shot. I don’t regret my choice. I’m literally not capable of it. At least the things that happened to me can’t hurt me anymore or distract me from what I have to do.”
Julia glanced at Loki.
Was it wrong of him to feel a little envious? Was that sick and disturbed?
The tide began to flow further inland. It rushed against his ankles, soaking his legs halfway up the calves, before sliding back out to sea. He didn’t look at Julia even though he wanted to. He just followed the line of the water to the horizon and stared at a single point long enough until it blurred together with the sky.
What would that feel like? He tried to imagine himself without the pain of his past weighing heavily on his shoulders. Without the distraction of things he’d done and things done to him constantly drilling in his mind. He wouldn’t be happy, because without a soul there was no happiness. But he also wouldn’t be sad or depressed or angry. He wouldn’t have those great, unyielding bouts of emotion which constantly dictated his life and his actions. In a strange way there must have been something peaceful about not having all of one’s soul in tact.
And the fact that he couldn’t hurt Julia by keeping her shade — in truth, the fact that by not giving it to her he was protecting her from pain — was the reason why he didn’t say anything about the small box he had buried beneath layers of tricks and illusion. Maybe his logic was flawed. It wouldn’t have been the first time. But if he took her words at face value then he could convince himself that he was doing the right thing by keeping it. Which was what he decided to do.
For now.
Loki reached out and took her hand in his. “You never know. Maybe one day, if you decide you want it, a nice goddess will show up at your doorstep and give it to you.”
“I think I’ll settle for a god or two not actively trying to kill me.”
Her hand slid into his and weaved their fingers together. She didn’t need to kill Loki, or anyone else at Derleth. She had thought about it, about the consequences, mostly what others would think of her after, what Quentin’s face would look like if she’d gone through with it.
This was better.
Even if she couldn’t convince Loki to go back to her Earth, he could still help her here. That was making assumptions that they could go back home of their own accord, retain their memories, perhaps even take things or people with them on the way back. So far those things weren’t possible but Julia knew there were others trying to figure it out.
Rick had tried to patch things up with her. It seemed maybe she should check in with him and see what he was up to lately. Especially if she could help.
As long as no one got in her way, this could work.