Sorcha's Secret World, Part one.

Chapter 24, Forever yours.

It sounds just like a fairytale, doesn't it? How I met my Prince Charming, how we met, how we fought, how we fell in love?

But life isn't a fairytale, and neither is this. There are no Happy Ever Afters, at least in my experience. Just big and little moments of pure happiness that become the most beautiful memories. And those moments with Loki, I wouldn't have wanted to miss them for anything in this world or any of the other realms.

At first, we were so happy. When Loki commits to something, he gives it his all and more. He was the most charming, dashing, passionate person I had ever met; everything he did was a grand gesture meant to sweep me off my feet, and more often than not he succeeded. I sometimes didn't know up from down, he'd have my head spinning, and I would barely get a chance to breathe, both in the bedroom and in all the other parts of our life that we shared together.

But the collar began to chafe more and more. I could not blame him, putting that horrid thing back on every morning was one of the hardest things I'd ever see him do.

Loki missed his freedom, and I was starting to get afraid he missed his old life as well. A life where he'd be partying one night in Milan only to be having brunch in Hong Kong the next day. A life where he owned mansions, yachts and a private jet. Where money was never an issue, and where he mingled with the rich and the famous.

The Council of Venice had confiscated Beaumont's assets and froze his funds when I defeated him, and did the same later again with Lucas Lefay, but I knew there had been other aliases. Loki never went into detail about those because it didn't matter anyway, he said. As long as his every move was tracked he could not risk accessing any part of his old life. And he said he was happy sharing mine. But it was hard to believe my simple little home was truly enough for him.

"I need to go back to Temple Hall tomorrow morning."

Loki was lying on his back, staring at the ceiling. He had his arm loosely wrapped around me, his finger idly drawing little circles on my shoulder.

"I'll come with you," I said immediately.

"You can't," Loki frowned.

It wasn't the first time he had been called back in recently. His mood would be dark when he returned in the evening, and he'd brood, or sometimes even snap at me and start a fight.

"I don't like what is happening at all," I tenderly stroked a finger along those beautiful cheekbones of his, trying to get him to look at me, but he avoided my gaze. "I wish you'd at least tell me what they are doing to you," I said, not for the first time.

'Further studies of an alien entity' it was officially called.

"And as I have told you before, I won't," Loki's jaw set stubbornly. "It is humiliating for me, and you'll only get angry and make things worse."

I sat up. "I can't help you if you won't let me."

"You can't help me at all," Loki snapped, sitting up too.

"I'll threaten to quit my job if they don't stop this," I said stubbornly.

"You've already played that card, my dear. You can't keep playing the same card over and over or they'll call your bluff! And then what? You are going to work for the Illuminati? Because you'd fit in so well there? The Phoenicians perhaps? And what would happen to me then? I'll be locked away and they'll never let you see me again!"

Loki rubbed his forehead, tired of having the same argument yet again.

"I can take the pain," he said softly, "don't worry about me, my love. I learned to bear physical pain with a smile a long time ago."