Choices

Chapter 32
Entering the castle seemed boring to her now. She once thought the castle held many wonders inside it and she would gain greatness within its walls. She, Amora, had been wrong. Amora took the job for teaching the youngest prince magic thinking she might get her hands on knowledge not found outside the secret walls of the palace, and instead she got nothing.
All her years tempting, teasing, luring Loki into fawning over her yielded her nothing. Perhaps, she should have fucked the prince after all, she might have gotten more for her troubles. She'd left to seek other treasures, her 'family trip' made her some very shady, but valuable allies. She was done with Loki, done with Asgard.
To save face and keep her name clear of suspicion, she'd come back to officially declare to Loki that he was unable to learn anything else from her, he's truly a prodigy. She'd thank the King and Queen for such a honourable opportunity and give a humbling act of feeling unworthy but thank them for recognizing her talent all the same. Amora was a great actress when she needed to be, but she cared little for the royals.
She had a feeling where Loki would be. She had allies among the palace inhabitants who frequently told her of his, and his families daily activities. He'd grown close to the foreign princess, but surprisingly enough friendship is all they had together. She thought it was laughable that he'd stuck with his first promise to himself to not get involved with either girl sexually. To the young princess's defence she was drab and boring compared to the woman Amora was.
Finding the open room and peering between the pillars, Amora spotted Loki and then Cephera across the room. She was channeling arcane magic between her palms and Loki was watching with his arms crossed and a very serious look across his face. He wasn't horrible looking, he'd changed a bit in her time away. His face was losing that boyish look, and moulding into a mans. He'd be a handsome man.
Cephera had also changed and Amora was looking her over. She'd become a fine woman. Blossoming out of her youthful round face, although she still held an air of whimsy, childishness about her.
Amora strolled inside, her shoes tapping along and alerting the two of her presence. Amora contained her smirk as she observed Loki's eyes grow wide, darkening in excitement as he took in the sight of her. He hadn't changed in ten years, not in his adoration of her. Though with the amount of time they lived, change was slow, it didn't go by the same way mortals weighed it. Really, her last 10 years felt more like a month, it was rare that one missed much in such a short time period.
"Cozy little lesson." She coo'd stopping only a foot from him, eyeing him with a smile playing on her lips. Every expression she made was carefully thought of. Amora was always the queen of manipulation. The right smile, the right tone of voice and which ones worked best on whom. Her and her sister had done quite a bit of competition to see who could manipulate best, and it most often was Amora.
"I hadn't known you were returning." Loki replied. "How was your trip?" She shrugged and turned her gaze to Cephera.
"You know family, boring." She swayed toward the princess who was visibly uncomfortable. She either felt very self conscious in Amora's presence, or she remembered that kiss. Amora hoped it was a mixture of both.
To the princess's credit, she stood her ground as the blond approached her. Amora reached out, tracing her fingers over Cephera's softly curved face. "Beautiful, you've changed." She told her giving a fake fond smile, not that Cephera would know it was fake.
"I came of age." Cephera replied. "It's very different from what you refer to it as." She added.
"It suits you." Amora trailed her fingers lower touching the defined collarbone, "the dress I mean." Cephera finally stepped back her cheeks running scarlet.
"I'm sorry, I...,"
"I know. Loki told me it's only your sister who likes both sexes, you don't know what your missing." She coo'd and turned back to Loki, who looked amused. "I'm here to...," Amora paused in her speech catching sight of something on the table behind Loki. A thick, leather bond spell book that Amora recognized. Licking her lips she schooled her shocked expression. "I came to say that our training cannot continue."
Loki nodded. "It had come to my attention that we had been going in circles." He replied trying to look bored instead of disappointed. Silly boy.
"Yes. What they say is true, you truly are a prodigy." She complimented. "It was an honor training with you."
"Likewise," he said. "I do hope this is not the last I will see of you." Loki looked her over, he was a little brazen today with those brilliant green eyes.
"I'm sure it won't." She replied her mind forming a plan. Amora always got what she wanted... and that book was on her wish list.
***
Cephera knocked on Loki's room door, unlike him, she didn't just walk in. Hearing him call her in, she entered. She'd been on her way to his room for a quick logic game he'd just purchased, when a servant had ran up to her with a letter from Krystoff. Cephera wasn't surprised. She got one monthly. She red the letter on her walk to Loki's room and now it was clasped in her hand.
Loki greeted her by waving a hand eagerly at the chair to the table, where his game was set up. He was standing near the table in his casual pants and top. His eyes landed to her hand and his eyes drooped in curiosity.
"So, what does the letter say?" Loki asked her, eyeing the paper in her grasp. Krystoff spouting the same old stuff inside it wasn't unusual to her, but there was no way she wanted Loki seeing it.
"Nothing." Cephera said quickly, trying to brush it off and make Loki ignore it.
"By the way you denied its interest, right down to the flush on your face, I'd say it's something embarrassing," Loki said a wicked smile curving across his face. Cephera cried out when he appeared behind her and his hand latched onto the letter. She turned quickly pulling it from him.
"It's nothing, stop that." She ordered cradling it to her chest. Loki tickled her sides, she squealed and tried to run, but failed. He had one arm around her waist and the other trying to pry the letter from her. "I'll hurt you." She warned him, but couldn't help smiling. Moments like this she saw the fun loving Loki instead of the always so serious Loki.
But moments like this also made her heart pound relentlessly within her chest, a deep longing developed across her whole body and a yearning so deep settled within, it cut her.
"I'd like to see you try," he said back. She turned quickly and only succeeded in slipping on the unsecured rug, and falling backward. Loki was taken off-guard as well and as she fell the letter flew from her hand to float to the floor nearby and Loki fell on top of her. She landed with an 'oof'. When Loki used his hand to push himself up his eyes caught hers and something in them changed. They darkened and his breath hitched.
It wasn't just his expression it was the atmosphere around them. Her heart was hammering and she couldn't find words to speak; then he kissed her. It was so quick she barely had time to register the act when then Thor came barging in. Loki's lips left hers as quickly as they had landed on them. He was on his feet in seconds. Thor paused and looked almost sheepish.
"Was I interrupting?" He asked looking between them.
"No!" They both declared in unison.
"I fell." She explained hastily.
"I fell with her." Loki added. It was then Loki turned and offered his hand down to help her up. She took it giving him an awkward smile. She picked up her letter and her hand made a fist around it. Her nerves were shot and she was struggling to straighten out her breathing.
"I'm gonna go to my own room and fix up a response to my letter." She told them and practically dashed through the room doors.
When Cephera reached her destination, she sealed herself in and took a deep breath. Even though it was quick, it still had been her first kiss, well, not counting when Amora kissed her. Her heart was threatening to burst from her chest. It had happened to her before, this feeling. But never had he been directly the cause by putting himself against her person in anyway.
She felt confused and conflicted. A part of her ached to know he felt something for her stronger than friendship, but she still feared ruining everything she had with him. Loki was her closest and dearest friend and this kiss could change so much between them, but she didn't want it to change.
She feared what this might do to them, but at the same time she was excited for the prospect that there could be more between them aside friendship. Not once had he shown a sliver of affection for her beyond friends, so this kiss was not just unexpected, it was cause to question what was going on between them.
Cephera sat down at her desk. Hours went by as she sat there in a trance like state before she decided she wanted to talk to Loki. She needed to talk to him. She needed to know what that kiss was all about. He started it and only he would have the answer to why he'd done it.
She left her room once more and made her way back toward Loki's. On the threshold of his hallway, she stopped. She could hear odd noises there and instead of walking down it she peeked around the corner.
Loki was lip locked with Amora against his room door and there was no question as to where it was leading. Her hands were all over him. Their kiss broke and he looked more excited then Cephera had ever seen him. She quickly retracted her head and listened to his bedroom close. She stood there, her back against the wall trying to make sense of the passed three hours and how it went from him kissing her, to him with Amora.
It had been no secret he fawned over her. She teased him often about it, but he never indicated that himself and Amora had become intimate in any fashion. Until that morning, she'd been absent for years to stay with her family, or so she said. Cephera took a deep breath, shaking off the stifling feeling moving its way up through her. A feel that was making it hard to breath and burning her eyes with tears she felt silly to even have.
Perhaps, it was for the best. He had been pinning over her for a long time, even before Cephera met him, and if she was now choosing to show him her full attention then good for Loki.
Cephera found herself running down the hall, she hadn't realized she'd begun to run, nor cry.
She fiercely pushed back the tears with the sleeve of her dress and stopped to breath. She all but hyperventilated in the middle of the hall. It was for the best. She kept reminding herself. This way she didn't have to worry about anything changing between herself and Loki. They could continue life as it was. She would pretend the kiss never happened. It was probably just a mistaken moment of fun. Maybe he'd meant to kiss her cheek.
She straightened and closed her eyes, steadying her breath and nodding her head affirming her own thoughts and trying her best to forget the kiss and turn her attention to being genuinely happy for Loki.

Notes