His hand is around his once-brother’s throat, fingers slowly tightening enough to perceive the flutter of a pulse beneath Loki’s skin.
“What are you waiting for, brother?” there’s a hint of a tease in Loki’s voice, and his green eyes shimmer with unspoken words that Thor can’t even begin to fathom. “Do it.”
Thor’s fingers tighten a fraction more and he clenches his jaw, battling within himself so as not to rise to the bait Loki has placed oh so clearly in front of him. It’s always difficult with the trickster, because Loki knows him so intimately. He knows exactly where to push and nudge in order to provoke a reaction.
Loki is dangerous, he has told himself that since aligning with the Avengers of Midgard. He is dangerous and he needs to be subdued.
But Loki is his brother. Ties of blood matter not when they have grown and fought side by side since infancy. Theirs is a bond deeper than blood.
The hand curled over his forearm flares blue and Thor hisses in response to the mild chill against his skin. Though he is indeed of the Jotun, Loki is not quite powerful enough to harm him this way. He could slay a mortal easily, but an immortal god has innate defenses against this side of Loki’s true nature.
Thor sighs, parting his lips as Loki slips a cerulean-tinged thumb past them in order to stroke his tongue, coating it with a thin layer of ice which melts instantaneously.
“Oh, Thor,” he whispers, and there is something unaccountably old in his voice now. “Sometimes I wonder if I should fear for your safety when I’m not around.”
“You are not a monster,” Thor bites back defiantly, already fully aware that Loki never truly believes him, no matter how sincere he is.
“But I am,” Loki murmurs in reply, leaning in to place a chaste kiss on the Thunderer’s mouth. “I am more dangerous than all of these insects your mortal friends face in battle put together. You know this.”
Unable to compete with his not-brother’s tongue when Loki is in a mood, Thor settles for silencing the trickster with another kiss, this one far less chaste. And when Loki chuckles against his lips, Thor considers it a victory.
The boys delight in being twins. Much of their so-called unusual behavior is written off as being “twin stuff.” Sharing a room late into their teens–twin stuff. Touching more than most siblings–twin stuff. Frigga reminds Odin that they were entwined during their very creation so often that Thor and Loki mouth the words along with her.
It’s unspoken, how much they hide behind this excuse. As if to acknowledge it would crack the fragile, secret world they share between them. Their closeness is becoming… something. Something deeper, darker. They’ve always slept like this, Loki’s finer limbs wound like ivy around Thor’s thicker build.
But Loki has woken several nights lately from dreamed kisses to tingling lips that tell him perhaps real lips had touched his.
Tonight he carefully studies Thor’s breathing and movements, down to every little leg twitch and the quick darting of eyeballs beneath the tissue skin of his eyelids. He watches the petal flesh of his lips part with each exhalation until he’s sure he can approximate the unconscious motions of slumber, and then allows himself to relax into his own real sleep. Long after the moon has risen and set, Loki half wakes to a breeze soft kiss.
The next night, Loki artfully manages his “sleep.” It’s an eternity before Thor finally approaches, but at last Loki is awake to feel those warm lips move against his. The touch is so hesitant and soft it wouldn’t disturb the powdered surface of butterfly wings, Loki thinks. He breathes out and he can feel Thor inhale, tasting his breath. The idea of this is so profound Loki makes a quiet little “oh.”
Thor startles, but Loki holds him in place, and opens his eyes.
“Why do you only kiss me when I’m sleeping?” he asks.
Thor cracked his eye open. His brother stood at the bedside with his hands on his hips and his mouth drawn into an exasperated moue.
“I was tired.” Thor closed his eye again.
“You have your own bed.”
“It was too far away.”
“And your clothes?”
Thor yawned. “Dirty from riding. Didn’t want to muss your bedding.”
He heard Loki huff.
“Did you leave your muddy boots on my rug again?”
“…maybe?” He yelped when Loki pinched his bare bottom, hard, then rolled onto his back and pillowed his head on his arms and gave an exaggerated glance down at the hard length jutting against his belly. “If you prefer, I can go warm Sif’s bed,” he drawled, “although you might miss my c–”
“Enough, you rotten thing,” Loki said, cutting him off, but Thor was already reaching for his hand and Loki let himself be drawn down to the bed willingly enough. “You think you can just pop in for a tumble whenever you like,” he grumbled, tilting his head away so Thor could mouth at his neck.
“Mmm,” Thor agreed, parting the neck of Loki’s tunic to lick at the dip between his collarbones.
“But you can’t.”
“Uh-huh.” Thor silenced him with a kiss. Loki sighed into his mouth as Thor palmed him through his leggings.
“It’s…not…ahhh.”
After that there were no more words for a long while, and Loki put his tongue to better uses than lying.
The chains dug into his wrists, but Loki barely registered the pain. There were more immediate concerns.
Such as how Thor had him pinned down and prone. Or the shredding of his clothing by each of Thor’s fistfuls. Or how his baleful threats went ignored even as they later diluted into desperate pleas and much later resigned silence; interrupted only by the painful sound of tearing fabric and his sharp sobs, muffled by the pillow he’s burying his face into as he half-hoped to suffocate himself dead faster than Thor could strip off his diminishing layers.
Loki lashed out with an infuriated kick as Thor’s weight shifted to discard the tattered remains of his breeches; but being able to see nothing from his position the kick maimed only air and his blistered pride. ”Stop resisting,” Thor commanded, pinning his flailing legs down again. “I rather fancy your legs and it would be a pain to break them.”
“Charming, Brother,” Loki managed a breathless snarl. “Is that how you persuade your wenches to lie still long enough for you?”
Thor chuckled darkly as he ran coarse fingers along the mouthwateringly pale skin of his brother’s backside. “I treat my women with reverence. As for my wench…” Bending down, he sunk greedy teeth into the soft, succulent buttocks and lapped wildly with a ravenous tongue at the already very moist crevice between them; smugly pausing when a long, shuddering gasp escaped Loki. “I don’t think he needs persuading at all.”
Loki would usually shoot mocking praises to such a rare display of wit from Thor, but now was a particularly unusual moment and he had naught but silent curses. “You will pay for this,” Loki hissed through clenched teeth, each syllable coated with as much venom as he could muster. “I shall remember this day, and by the sharpest of the Gjöll I will make you pay tenfold.”
Thor growled in retort–all business now–and roughly clasped the back of Loki’s neck in a massive, choking grip; effectively silencing the smaller brother as he shoved those endless legs apart with an impatient knee.
“You will remember only the arc of my length and the heat of my seed when I’m done,” Thor’s voice had dipped alarmingly low and Loki felt a feverish chest pressing against his cold, damp back before a heated breath caressed his ear. “They will be sternly taught to you until you’re well learned.”
I hope you don’t mind that it’s really tiny, anon. It’s been only half a day since I’ve seen it and today is a busy holiday, so this is all I could come with for now.
Thor doesn’t acknowledge him when Loki enters the room, although he must have heard the quiet whoosh of the door and the heavy thud of Loki’s boots. He’s still standing where Loki left him barely an hour ago in front of the enormous glass wall, gazing up at the huge starship, his shoulders rigid.
“Banner’s made some progress, but we’re still in stasis,” Loki says and joins him at the window. “The people are waiting for you,” he adds, quiet, as if he’s talking to a small child instead of the newly crowned king. But then, it’s somehow fitting. They survived Ragnarok, both reborn from the ashes of their former lives.
“I don’t know how to do this,” Thor rasps, slapping his palm against the glass, his head bowing in defeat.
This could entail so many, many things. After everything that’s happened Loki doesn’t need Thor to list them all to know that his brother has reached his limit. Even gods can break.
“Yes, you do!” It’s hard to keep his voice firm and not let it crumble under the enormity of both their losses, but Loki can’t let Thor break. Not now, not ever, he knows that now after he’s almost lost him. Asgard needs its king and Loki—Loki needs Thor. Even with their world in shambles, some things will never change. “I’ll help. If you’ll have me.”
“Why, Loki? Why now?”
“They’re my people, too. You are my king, too.” It doesn’t hurt to say it like Loki once thought it would.
“Is that what I am?” Thor lets out a harsh breath. His face is grave when he turns and takes Loki’s hand, his thumb stroking over his palm. “We’ve both lost everything that’s dear to us, I would—”
“Not everything,” Loki interrupts him, his gaze steady as he threads his fingers through Thor’s and presses a kiss to his knuckles. Yes, he’s still the god of lies and mischief, but there’s a time for all of that and today is not that day.
Loki is the Philosopher King 