Boltedfruit Archive

They knew each other. They would seek each other out.

Should one be in a room alone, he needed only raise his head in question, searching. Then the other would be there, as if there had not been space between them. As if the other had been there all along.

Loki would smile at Thor and Thor would feel love for his brother bloom bright and large in his chest, aching with the stretch of growing ribs and more. He might have felt his lungs expand too far, too full of breath for the joy the sight of Loki brought him. That his little, clever, tricksy brother would stand at his side, aiding him when he most needed it, being there even if he didn’t know he did need him.

Thor knew Loki thought him dumb, sometimes. A brute his brother would say, scowling viciously. But then Thor would nudge him, prod at him with tickling fingers and wrestle him to the floor of wherever and usually it ended with Thor sitting on Loki’s chest, both of them breathless and laughing.

Loki would always punch him after, usually bruising his arm terribly for a week or two. But Thor did not mind. Loki would find his fist caught between Thor’s hands, Thor’s arm still stinging.

Thor would lean forward and knock his forehead against Loki’s gently, smile growing content. The happiest brute in the nine realms, Loki always thought.

Loki would slowly extricate himself, offering a small smile in way of farewell. Then he would slink off, craving time alone and not wanting his heart to race any more than necessary when around his brother.

His cheeks and ears would flush and he tried to leave before Thor noticed.

Thor would always watch until Loki rounded a corner, or vanished under the shade of seidr.

“Clever, wily thing,” he’d murmur to the empty room.

Years later they will hunt together. It will be the first time for either of them, for they share a nameday within a month of each other. Odin says it will be good for them to learn to work together for a common enough goal; feeding your family.

Loki’s chest feels too tight but he keeps it well hidden.

They bring back a large bison from just beyond the borders of Asgard’s outer lying lands. The country dedicated to fieldfolk who speak tongues too old for either of them to know.

The beast is large and sultry, quartered and salted on a spit as it’s been laid out. Blood seeps to stain the wood pink beneath where the meat roasts, and Loki knows even then he will always remember the way his mouth watered at the thought of the first bite.

Thor is a pleasant warmth beside him, their sides pressed together where they sit, their knees knocking. It is a casual, silly game they play all throughout the long night.

It is Thor who carries him back to his room after he falls asleep beside him. Thor mocked him, not unkindly, for drooling on his furs. Loki remembers hardly any of it, the food had been too lovely. The weight of Thor pressed beside him even lovelier.

He remembers he could pretend, back then. Live a lie he only ever dreamed was a reality. His subconscious being the only place it was safe to experience it.

But the nights they hunted, which grew to be many and often, were respites both from himself and the secret wonderings his bird-heart craved so vastly.

Loki found comfort in the woods, when he only had to worry about Thor.

The days when Thor felt no shame in holding Loki tight to his breast as they slept, night sweat making their skin and hair stick to each other. It was normal to gather each other up, wrapped in their linens and furs and sleep huddled together, arms at each other’s waists.

The days when Thor could plant wet lips at Loki’s neck and tackle him to the grass after bathing in an icy river. When Loki laughed so hard he started hiccupping. When Thor would then rub his shoulders, his neck, all the way down to the small of his back, until Loki could breathe again.

The days when easy touches meant nothing. For they were forest-children, belonging only to each other and the sun and the moon and the rivers that flowed or froze with each new season that came.

The days when it was easy to leave on a hunt but each day harder than the last to return home, to separate beds.

The days when Loki could speak his love for his brother without feeling hatred in his heart for the admission.

The last hunt they take together, Thor kisses his mouth. Softly. Warmth spreads through Loki and he feels a knot boil in the pit of his stomach. Something inside him goes loose, a thread unraveling.

Thor laughs softly when Loki kisses back, long fingers carding gentle through long golden hair.

The days Thor still called him brother.