Whispering Voices

030 • His True Face

Aella slapped his hand away from her face. She thought to hear bone snap, and a cloud passed across Loki's face. A muscle in his cheek vibrated while he shook his hand, grunting. 

Aella wondered if there was some kind of Loki defense system inside her. It was remarkable  she'd only hit Loki since she was so strong. Three times, by now. 

"Take it or leave it," he said. Something dark flickered in his eyes, as if his patience was running thin. "I don't offer my help to anyone."

"Bullshit. You'll be the one having benefit from traveling with my soul – or whatever is happening ."

"What benefit?"

She shrugged her shoulders. "You're to twisted to put myself in your shoes, but I know for sure something good will come out of it for you."

Loki gave her a piercing glare. Three deep wrinkles made his forehead look crumpled. "I'll wait. There will be a moment you can no longer bear their screams, and then you will get on your knees and beg for my help."

A cramping feeling arose in her chest. She felt an idiot for trying to find some sympathy, for putting hopes on a reasonable conversation. And it had been – until he showed his true face. 

"I will never kneel before you."

"Your pride isn't that great. Not when your sisters are screaming at the top of their longs while you are the only one who can ease their pain."

"Rota's sisters." 

He laughed mockingly. "Yeah, right."

In an instant he was gone. Aella stared at the place where he'd stood a second ago. Tears burnt in her eyes. She blinked them away and cursed them. She had answers, she should be happy about what she'd achieved. She knew who were whispering to her, and why. The only thing she still needed to figure out, was the location of the soul catcher. 

Maybe Loki was just fooling around, and wasn't he the only one who could enter her mind to help her with her visions. He was playing games constantly, he could have lied about this easily. 

. . . 

Unfortunately Loki turned out to be right. She told the others what the black haired god had said to her. 

"I don't know if anyone will be able to go with you," Thor said. "But if someone is capable of doing so, it must be Loki. Hypnosis is one of his, eh, not so popular talents. With help of the Tesseract it was a piece of cake, but even without a tool he's skilled at it."

Hypnosis... the word alone gave her goosebumps, even without Loki's name connected to it. She looked at Brunnhilde, who'd said nothing. "What do you think I should do? They are your sisters..."

It was hard to read the woman. She acted indifferent, although she'd shown a fierce temper earlier today. She blew a bright yellow gom bubble. "That motherfucker locked up the Valkyries in an object. You really think he'll free them for the sake of your pretty face? They will shred him to pieces, and he sure as hell knows that."

"But what else would he want?"

"Screwing around? Looking for a new kind of entertainment? The space trip was boring as hell, and we won't stay here for long."

Aella suppressed a sigh. She really wanted to unravel Loki's motives, but that was just a hopeless task. "Will your sisters be able to hurt him when they're just souls?"

The Valkyrie shrugged her shoulders. "Who knows? I have never heard about that object before. Whatever Loki's masterplan might have been, I doubt anyone but he would have benefited from it." Her eyes flashed to Thor. "We should get rid of him. As soon as possible."

"I rather keep him close, so I can keep an eye on him," Thor answered.

"And then what?" Aella sniffed. "I get the impression Loki is a jack of much more trades than you. Especially since your hammer is shattered."

Thor's face grew gloomy. He grunted something inaudible. 

Aella returned to the room she'd usurped herself and sat down on the bed. She didn't feel safe at all. A while ago Loki had been here and he could come back any moment. She leaned back. Actually she was longing for a warm bath, perhaps that would calm her down. The facilities were surely available, but she didn't think she would ever dare to take off her clothes here. Not with a maniac that could appear right under her nose at any given moment, and who'd already made too much ambiguous comments.