Lower Your Eyes (A Loki Romance Fanfic)

Chapter Ten: Feather of a Reminder

I avoided eye contact with Loki in the weeks that followed my dismissal.

Hel, I treated the Prince as though he were a total stranger. At first, it was difficult—anger and guilt had warred within me for the first week, but forced apathy set in a time later. With careful rationalization, I embedded within myself that this was a stark reminder of where we stood—as Loki had put it—that he was a Prince of Asgard, and I was a slave. Nothing more.

Though of course, that didn't leave me a bitter fool. I understood why Loki did what he did. Driving me away from the would-be source of all the 'misfortunes' that had befallen me, as he put it.

"Ask me questions when they arise..." he'd offered the last time we spoke. True enough, I continued with my practices with the seidr, but I didn't bother him with questions. In truth, I had no desire to speak to him at all. There wasn't a single thing that I could think of to be exchanged between us, that would remedy what happened. The onset of intense sadness was also telling—I hadn't realized just how much I'd grown to care for the Prince until that day, when I faced the reality of being expelled from his presence. I hadn't cried harder than I did that first night.

One thing he had accomplished, at the very least, was that his promise of protection had created ripples throughout the period that followed. Among the guards, at least, I'd seen it out of the corner of my eye—one stopping the other stepping toward me when I dropped a heavy crate. It did not preclude me from harsh punishments, but minor things were now forgiven. It was a small piece of the burden removed, at the very least.

Loki's protection at work.

My distancing from the royal family also did me a favor at least, as it'd become marginally less difficult to avoid Astrid like the plague.

Marginally.

I simply didn't travel in the same circles anymore. Though on nights like this, it was difficult to gauge who I would and wouldn't encounter.

Three of Asgard's central families had reserved a night in the palace—a categorically small number, but their members managed to fill the entirety of the second largest banquet room in the palace. It was neither an extravagant event nor a modest one, since the royal family was not formally obligated to attend, so several slaves were assigned to work the event itself.

The evening cemented a suspicion that had begun to rise in the time that passed. That Davos and I—among some of the other younger slaves—were carefully selected by pleasing appearance alone. We were the approximate height, figure, and age of most of partygoers these days, as were the other servants. It was a strange system to my mind, and if proven correct, had me wondering what would become of me when I finally aged—many, many hundreds of years from now.

I sighed as I looked down at the food tray in my hands.

To spend hundreds of years in this state...carrying food I could never touch, to serve someone I had no obligation to—it wasn't a life I'd wish on anyone. Never mind the fact that I now had some protections over the other slaves, I still wouldn't want this for a single living soul.

Just as I set the tray down onto the counter, a slew of laughing voices drew my attention to the right, toward the doorways. Thor and his entourage scampered in with several the noble ladies, with Loki mingling among them. My eyes lingered on him for a time, observing his classically polite smile as he listened to whatever the woman beside him was saying. Jealousy threatened to rise, but I swallowed it down as I turned away—ignoring the sound of laughter emanating from Loki's direction, which may or may not have come from the woman.

Damn... I sighed, shaking my head a bit. 'Prince' Loki's direction. There could be no familiarity between us anymore—though this was most difficult to remember.