Loki X Reader || Girl With The Gold Earring

31 | Glorious Golden Moustache

A damp essence of finality hung in the air as Y/N stepped into Loki's studio. She doubts that the prince will start a new painting once this one is completed---not before he leaves for the Vanir kingdom, anyway. Mentally, she tried to note the colourful scars bruising every surface, the view from the gaping windows, the sharp tang of dried paint.

The downward pull of Y/N's new earrings amounts to little less than a leaf, yet the lobes of her ears are extremely conscious of their weight. She still isn't utterly convinced she should keep the gift Loki has given her.

What paintings had he sold? Whose walls were they now adorning? Do they appreciate them? Do they know to frame them out of reach from children's sticky fingers, and far from the snarling sun that's eager to gobble up their vibrance?

Y/N would utter a small prayer to the Allfather---after the safety of their beauty---but she knew Odin would have few cares for such a matter. 

She chewed her lip.

Meanwhile, Loki settled on one of the plump velvet cushions tucked neatly below the low table, his long legs folding under himself like the organised sails of a frigate. He had given up trying to convince Y/N the earrings were now hers some time ago, pointing out that even if she did give them back to him, that would not change the fact that his paintings are gone.

His paintings being gone didn't seem to bother him. Presently, he's digging through her box-filled tote for whatever treat Y/N had bought from Aasta.

Y/N flopped down next to him like a wet rag. "What if someone sees them?" She released her chewed lip long enough to ask him worriedly, then clarified: "My earrings. Where will I say I got them?"

"You can keep them here with your dress," was the nonchalant reply, Loki's nimble fingers working the twine bow keeping him from his cake. When it was sufficiently unravelled, Y/N watched him ease open the wood pulp lid, a smile lighting up his pale, pointed face.

"What about when you leave?"

He shrugged. "Sell them. Use the money to buy a house. Put the dress in it."

Y/N squeaked, horrified: "I'm not going to sell them!"

"Then I'll buy you a house. Put the dress and the earrings in it."

Y/N pushed him, but it was like trying to playfully shove a deeply-rooted tree.

As if her assault had been little more than a gentle lap of the tide, he took his wedge of rocky road in finger and thumb and bit into it with a hum.

"You'll do no such thing."

A blasé rise and fall of those broad shoulders. "There's nothing you can do to stop me."

"Are you threatening to buy me a house?"

Loki lifted his attention from his food to gauge Y/N's expression."Well, would you not like a house?"

Yes, Y/N would like a house. She doesn't know a single person who wouldn't like a house.

One day she will own one---well a bungalow. She'll inherit her family's two-roomed, squat little building, and be free to rent it or live in it---whatever she prefers. She had contemplated selling it---seeing as she can lodge at the palace as an employee---but decided not to. The money wouldn't be enough to buy another bungalow; not nowadays. She could always move back home and live in it, but her parents had sent her to the kingdom's epicentre because of the lack of work available at its fringes---

Y/N tried to mask her interest with a glare, but she knew those chips of jade had already read the dreams printed all over her soul. "You can't just buy someone a house, Loki."