Cleave | Loki x Reader

• X •

'The spell won't last long, so you ought to be quick about it.'

'How about you task me with an actual challenge next time, Lady Y/n,' I teased, my voice a deeper, raspier sound, as I brushed past her.
A tiny gasp I likely wasn't meant to hear escaped her throat.
A pleased grin formed on my lips as I reached the kitchen door. Then I turned to face her.

Her features were a mix of unbrittled shock and subtle amazement, a foxy smile rising.
In all honesty: I knew my conjuration to be near flawless. Knew the hairs on my face to be as flaxen as can be, the patch over my now blue right eye shimmering the most golden in all of Asgard.

Did I exceed your expectations, m'lady?

Very much so, my King.

I felt my insides twitch deliciously. Where she had refrained from calling me All-Father she had instead decided for King - and here I was, all burning pleasure from her voice in my head declaring me her king.
By the Norns, I've become a fool for...

As I focused on her features from afar, I could discern on them that she was now likely hearing exactly what I was hearing.

She's coming, she whispered, regardless that she was saying it in the privacy of our minds' link. Endearing, really.

'Your Majesty?' Madame Agnetha's voice echoed from the walls.
'Forgive the impertinence, but what brings Your Grace to our humble kitchens? Does slumber yet elude you? Shall I prepare a cup of your favoured tea of the magnolias to help ease Your Grace's restless mind?'

She bombarded me with questions, and I realised how very unusual it must appear to her having the king down at her kitchens. Once I had collected my thoughts, I called to mind the plan Y/n and I had devised.

'Oh, fret not, dear Madame Agnetha. I did slumber rather well these past hours. That is, until I recalled that the morrow brings Prince Loki's name day. Thus, I must impose upon you a task of grave importance. I request that you may prepare a grand cake for the occasion. Let it be pistachio and vanilla, his favoured sort! Will you assist me in this, Madame?'

For a moment, Madame Agnetha seemed at a loss, and I feared that our plan had tremendously failed. But then she spoke up, flashing me her widest of smiles.

'Oh dear me! Indeed I shall, Your Grace! I shall be most delighted to prepare it. I even dare say that the pistachio vanilla is my specialty!'

'Great!' I exclaimed, regretting my choice of words the instant they had fallen from my lips. 'Splendid, that is. Then I shall leave you to it!'

Ahem. Y/n sounded in my head, and I remembered.

'Oh, and not to forget: the cake must be presenatble in no more than two hours. I uh- plan on taking the Prince on a venture to the cliffs of Sigyn at first light.'

Madame Agnetha swallowed a lump in her throat before agreeing to Odin's - my - conditions. With a deep curtsey and care not to turn her back on me, she inched backwards into the kitchens.
As I returned to the end of the hallway I found Y/n barely able to conceal her joy.

'So, Odin plans a trip to the cliffs of Sigyn with you, does he now?' She raised an amused eyebrow.

'Of course he does not,' I scoffed. 'I've just always wondered whether he one day would. He took Thor there on the day he first lifted Mjölnir.'