The Last Shifter (a Loki romance)

Chapter 100

When winter came, I was reminded that illness was no laughing matter. I took ill three times during the cold months, just as my belly began to grow in earnest. It seemed the effort of growing the fetus was pulling energy away from my immune system, as I had not been sick in at least fifteen years. It was a similar thing every time, a few days before I'd wake up with a scratchy throat that faded before noon, but stuck around a little longer each day, and then a day would come when it didn't go away. The more unpleasant symptoms of infection would appear the day after that, stuffy nose, loss of voice, and sore throat stronger than ever.

Loki, who had never actually encountered these 'common colds' before was utterly disgusted the first time at the amount of stuff coming out of my nose, but my misery was evident to him, so he endeavored to keep me as comfortable as possible. Since his old room and ours shared part of a wall, we decided, the second time I got sick, to knock it down. Loki's old room was much more homey than ours. Since ours had been mine, I hadn't ever really furnished it with comfortable furniture, just a bed, a desk, a wardrobe, and a couple things out on the balcony. It was also very open, with an entire wall being made of glass, it was hard to keep light out. In contrast, Loki's old room was very dark. The only source of sunlight came through a pair of balcony doors, and only when the black, sun-blocking curtains were open. In terms of furniture, it featured a massive four-poster bed, a large mahogany desk, as well as a sofa and three chairs surrounding an ottoman huddled around a huge fireplace. His room had a separate room for closet space, as well as a private bathroom with an onyx in-ground tub. Bookshelves lined would-be bare space on the walls and there was a display case for his ceremonial armor.

Since we had quick, private access to Loki's old room, instead of staying in bed all day during my second cold, I went into Loki's old room during the day, opened the balcony curtains, lit a fire, and read all day. Also, since Asgard didn't exactly have tissues, I fashioned myself several handkerchiefs from a couple of his older, casual, silk shirts. He said he was fine with it, of course there wasn't much he could do about it since it took him a couple days to figure it out. I offered to try and put them back together, but he'd wrinkled his nose and declared that he would never touch one of my 'snot rags', as he so lovingly called them, again as long as he lived. He'd accidentally brushed against one of them and his reaction to the damp cloth had been akin to a cat with water. He'd wiped it on his tunic, and once he realized what he'd done, he disrobed, threw the tunic in the fireplace, and scrubbed his hands nearly raw with hot water.

"Loki!" I protested. He just laughed and the tunic reappeared on his body, "I hate you." I blew my nose on the handkerchief he'd touched and Loki's mirth vanished.

"I'm sorry. I know you're not in the best of spirits." He sat down on the arm of the chair where I was sitting. One of his hands went to my bump and the other to my forehead.

"You still feel warm to me, but I think you're getting better."

"Well, I've been like this for a few days, so that's probably it."

"Good." He rubbed my belly, "You need to start sleeping through the night again. My offspring needs their mother strong." I raised an eyebrow.

"Our offspring."

"Has she been moving a lot today?"

"Not so much, she's been dozing." It was kind of an unspoken agreement to call our unborn child a 'she'. I'm not entirely sure why, it just kind of felt right to both of us.

"Seeing you like this...." He murmured, "Even ill...you are more beautiful now than ever." I snorted and coughed.

"You can lay off the butter, you're not Thor." It was Loki's turn to snort.