Cleave | Loki x Reader

• XIV •

I closed my eyes, pressing a kiss to her hair. 'Yes,' I murmured. 'We'll wait for her together.'

Her eyes shone as she jumped down my lap. 'Good. Because I wanna be strong like you. So I need to watch you for ever! And one day, I'm gonna be even stronger.'

The words were so confident, so certain, that I felt something in me crack - not in pain, not quite.

'I doubt that,' I whispered, winking at her as I bent down to her level.
Then, without warning, she flung her arms around my neck, clinging to me as if she never intended to let go.

I held her just as tightly, burying my face in her curls. There is something overwhelming about the warmth she excudes, something breaking and mending in the same breath.

'See? I'm already so strong that you can't let go!'

A tear slipped past my cheek, almost unnoticed by me. But that was it. Only the one.

I couldn't know yet that it would remain the last for a long, long while.

Then, grabbing for my coronet, her little hand slipped.
When I looked at her surprised face, I caught something golden twinkling in her small palm.
Bewildered, I reached up into my hair and tried cupping the horns there - though my left hand held nothing but air.

Strong indeed, I thought to myself, my eyes wide and unbelieving.

'Oops,' she mumbled, her features so acutly changed from the overload of emotions that I couldn't help but laugh. Loud and fully.
By the time the waves of mirth began to subside, I was already flattened on the grassy ground, rolling. The tiny girl right next to me, overjoyed by nothing but the simplicity of my joy.

Mother. Sister. Protector.
I will be whatever she needs me to be.

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My darling Mischief,

Randi has begun copying the way I tie my hair before I enter the training ring. She says it makes her 'look like thunder'...
I haven't had the heart to correct her-to tell her what exactly and how much it means to her people.
I believe she means she looks like the thunder Thor can produce. She is obsessed with my stories of your brother.
And yes, I know you'll have a remark about that waiting on your sharp tongue. Save it for when I can hear, not read it.

She insists on staying throughout all of the four hours I spend there each day. Whenever I let another take over for me, she runs off with Ilsa to pick daisies a few feet off the course. Where she can still look out for me when I continue with my sparring.
I must say I find myself holding back more and more - The brutality... I don't want her to see so much blood yet.
So I train at our pond now too - Remember the conjured dummies? That's what I do.

But the pond distracts me so... for I see your reflection each cursed time I dare a glimpse into the wretched pixie's waters.

Aching for you always, even in the 60s,
Your Yngri Hetja
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1975
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It started with a fox.
We were near the river Framhjá, the air thick with the scent of damp earth, when we found it - small, russet-furred, its leg caught in one of Tyr's traps.
I heared it before I saw it. The quiet, pained whimper that sliced through the afternoon stillness.

I stopped abruptly, heart lurching at the thought of Randi having to see something like this.
She was still so young, no more than what could be seen as seven or eight.
And of course Randi, who had been bouncing - distracted by anything and everything - behind me, nearly collided with my back.