Infatuated with a God

Chapter One-Hundred and Thirty-Three

Kaya

I couldn't face him. I knew the moment I turned to him the weight of my deceit to him would come crashing down. And I wasn't purposely trying to keep it from him, it's just the time hadn't arrived yet. If Barnes did escape I'd always planned on telling him I was going after him. Of asking him to come with me. If I was going to be on the run on my own planet I'd want him there by my side. I didn't want to do it without him. Not because of the danger, or his skillset, but because I wanted to be with him. However, as the silence fell between us, as time elapsed since Tony and the kid left, I knew that ultimately my intentions didn't matter. The moment Tony began to push for an answer, nothing I intended mattered. Eventually, the weight of the silence was too much for me to bear, and I went to go join in on the other side of the room. As I stepped forward, some debris fell, scattering down the hole and echoing around the room like hail against a window. The sound caused him to almost spark into action, suddenly rising from the sofa. Once he had I backed away again. Before Asgard, and before the headache of this growing divide in the Avengers, Loki never wore his mask in private. Not around me. Sure, some emotions he may hide, but never them all. He'd left that pretence of an uncaring man behind, kept it firmly for everyone else. I never thought I'd see a day where it was kept on for very long. That changed in Asgard but not because of my actions. Now, as he stood tall in front of me, I saw the man who stood in the cell before me so many months ago. All his emotions were bottled inside for now, refusing to display what he considered weakness to anyone, to me.

His eyes didn't meet mine initially.

"Go pack a bag." His tone was strict, uncaring. And for a moment I was scared. Scared that he wouldn't respect my choice, that he despised my actions enough to prevent them from happening.

"Loki–"

"Even if you won't leave for Asgard we need to be in the main compound given the structural fault." I looked down at the hole between us and for a moment I saw another one as well, a growing divide between us that has been festering over time. We'd not done enough to heal yet and the circumstances around us only made it worse. For a moment I wondered how much could be healed given enough time away from any secondary source of stress. Maybe that's why he so desperately wanted for us to spend so much time travelling after our ceremony. Time for just the two of us, removed from any external influence. But I couldn't run from this. My hesitation to leave immediately only angered him further. "Do it now before I bind you in cuffs and drag you to an Asgardian prison cell before you could even think to conjure enough power to stop me." I jumped slightly at his harshness. All of this hurt both of us, every decision I made and every reaction he had. However for me, this one hurt the most. This is the one I couldn't excuse. Holding such a threat over me, the prospect of taking away my right to choose what I want, of confining me to a cell which I was always terrified of, destroyed me.

I didn't say another word, just silently retreated to the bedroom we had been using and pulled what I could see into the subspace. Once that was done, I sat down on the end of the bed and took a deep breath. I understood my actions had hurt him, but he also knew just how deep that threat would cut. He was the only person in the world I'd ever talked to fully about how terrified I truly was to go back to that place. When I found some more strength, I stood and teleported back down to the lounge. I had to hold my ground and just hope that on some level he could respect that for once this was my choice, even if it was wrong. He'd changed his clothes, to my surprise into a suit. As I arrived, the screens in front of him disappeared and he turned to face me. In complete silence, he walked over to me and took hold of my wrist. We landed in my room at the compound. With a sigh, I moved all of the stuff out of the subspace, trying to approximately place everything where it belonged. Most of it ended up on the chest of drawers or on top of my bed. Clearly, I still needed practice.