After Loki's lost bet with Thor, D.B. Cooper causes chaos on Midgard, and a war with Vanaheim rises in the East, so Odin proposes a wager of his own to his youngest son:
An arranged marriage, one for the public. If the terms of the deal are honored...
Warnings: fear, terror, magick spells, medical magick, pain and suffering
Summary: Loki races to find Milja while Adora fights for her life
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Loki tore through the hedges at breakneck speeds. He couldn't move fast enough, tearing apart bushes and cutting his hands on rose thorns in his terrorized dash through the gardens.
"Milja!" he called, his voice becoming hoarse. He'd been yelling for her for what felt like hours, though the rational side of his mind knew it had only been a half hour.
"Milja, it's Loki!"
Adora was bleeding up in the palace, clinging to life as whatever poison coursed through her veins. She might die, and he wouldn't be there. Milja wouldn't be there.
"Stop it," he warned himself, coming to a stop in the middle of a bunch of Stargazer Lilies.
The pink flowers swayed in the summer breeze, looking much too happy and perfect for a moment such as this. Loki gripped a handful of them by the stalk and ripped them from the ground.
He let out a wounded snarl as he threw them, his shoulder aching with the force of tossing something that weighed nothing in such a way.
"Milja! Come out, duckie!" he called desperately, his voice straining in the night. "Come on, love, I'm right here!"
His hands dropped to his sides as he spotted his mother's gazebo in the distance. He hadn't realized how far into the gardens he'd come to stumble across it. It called to him, this comforting place in the darkness.
Loki's feet dragged as he made his way towards it, the golden trellis looming ominously above him as he approached the steps. Bygul and Trjegul, his mother's giant cats that were gifted to her by Thor, were carved into the two pillars of the entranceway.
His knees buckled as he reached the top of the two little stairs, and he landed on them painfully, his chest collapsing onto the golden velvet cushions of the tiny seat. Tears of frustration and fear soaked Loki's cheeks as he struggled to hold back the sobs threatening to burst from his chest.
Just a short few weeks ago, he and Adora sat in this gazebo and exchanged their first truths. She'd been rightfully annoyed with him, and all he'd tried to do was make her smile.
It hadn't worked.
He was better at that now. He could make her smile and laugh and melt into his arms when the night they'd come here she stiffened with each of his touches. She trusted him now.
Adora trusted him to keep her safe, to keep Milja safe. He had failed them both, and now he was losing hope that he'd find Milja on the palace grounds.
What if she'd been taken? After Adora was stabbed and injured her attacker, could another assassin have taken the child and whisked her away to Vanaheim?
