Yang Luoluo froze for a second and instinctively tilted her head to look. Loki was standing right beside her, carrying the basket of books. He seemed to catch her gaze, because he shifted his eyes away with an almost imperceptible awkwardness.

The moment she saw him, the anger she'd only just managed to cool surged straight back up. She couldn't be bothered figuring out how he'd tracked her here. All she knew was that she absolutely did not want to look at that face right now.

She didn't bother snatching the basket back from him. She let out a cold huff, picked up another basket, and went back to browsing.

Loki followed after her, uneasy, lips pressed together. When he saw her drop a book into the new basket, he was quick about it, he took that one too.

Now Loki had a basket in each hand.

That little display was hard to call anything other than groveling, and it was effective. Yang Luoluo couldn't quite hold the cold act together anymore.

She calmly began sliding books into the baskets he was holding, and opened her mouth with a jab.

"Well, well. If it isn't the God of Lies who saved the universe. Funny how someone so gravely injured managed to turn up here."

The more she spoke, the more irritated she got. Yang Luoluo turned on her heel and strode toward another bookshelf, leaving Loki standing in her wake.

I'm done for.

That was Loki's first thought when he heard her put that particular weight on God of Lies. He let out a short, rueful laugh and hurried to catch up.

"...I was wrong."

He stepped up beside her and spoke carefully, widening his eyes as he looked at her, willing her to feel the sincerity in them.

By Odin.

The God of Lies had never been any good at apologizing, least of all sincerely. Since his resurrection, he'd probably apologized more times than in the entire thousand-odd years that came before.

It made no difference to Yang Luoluo. She knew this look far too well. It was the same routine every time: one apology, a bit of wounded-innocence theater, and he expected everyone to forgive him just like that.

He'd done the exact same thing after reading her memories without permission. Not this time. This time she was going to make it stick.

She ignored him and kept flipping through the book in her hands.

Loki was starting to worry. In his experience, this approach worked on everyone, Frigga, Thor, Yang Luoluo included. They always came around eventually.

It seemed he'd genuinely overplayed his hand this time.

"I shouldn't have lied to you," he said, steeling himself.

"Oh?" Yang Luoluo didn't look up. "What exactly did you lie to me about?"

She kept her eyes fixed on the page as though the story was riveting. But Loki could see clearly enough, she'd been on that same page for a while now.

He swallowed. Telling the truth still didn't come naturally, and his voice came out a little halting when he tried again. "I... shouldn't have put on that act. Shouldn't have made you think I was dying..."

Yang Luoluo shut the book with a sharp snap, dropped it in the basket, and walked straight to the counter. She tossed Loki a glance over her shoulder, bring the baskets.

The proprietor of Flourish and Blotts was a plump woman with short, brownish curls, and the customers nearby were calling her Madam Flores.

When two baskets stuffed full of books landed on the counter, Madam Flores's eyes lit up. She bustled over with visible enthusiasm.

"Hello there! These books come to 41 Galleons in total!" Madam Flores made quick work of tallying up the lot.

Yang Luoluo reached into her pocket. As an official Avengers member with a monthly salary, 41 Galleons wasn't going to make her flinch.

But before she could get her Galleons out, Loki's hand was already there, he grabbed a fistful and set them on the counter. Lucky he'd stopped at Gringotts beforehand and exchanged his Asgardian gold for a decent sum of Galleons.

Madam Flores swept a glance over the two of them, the peculiar atmosphere between them was hard to miss, then counted out 41 Galleons from the pile and pushed the rest back with a cheerful smile.

"And here's a complimentary bag — do come again!"

Madam Flores handed over a palm-sized brown cloth bag printed with the Flourish and Blotts logo. It had been enchanted with an Undetectable Extension Charm, so it could hold all the books with room to spare.

Loki got to it first again. He took the bag and slipped it into his pocket dimension. The little bag vanished from his fingers in an instant, and Madam Flores gave him a mildly startled look.

Out on the street, Loki stayed right at her side without budging an inch, and Yang Luoluo found herself at a loss for where to go. She wandered for a bit before eventually looping back to Florean Fortescue's Ice Cream Parlour.

She sat down and ordered a Devil's Chocolate. Loki shamelessly took the seat across from her and had the audacity to order a Vanilla Caramel Pie, eating it with an expression of complete satisfaction.

The two of them sat there in silence, face to face over their desserts. The atmosphere was deeply strange.

"...How did you figure it out?" After a long stretch, it was Yang Luoluo who broke the silence first.

Loki blinked, then understood, she was asking how he'd seen through her and Tony Stark's plan.

His mouth curled up at once, eyes bright with smug satisfaction. "Ha. That Tin Man actually thought a looping video could fool me — truly too stu—"

He caught himself halfway through. The girl sitting across from him had also been part of that plan. He shut his mouth quickly.

To be fair, the surveillance feed had actually fooled him for the first few days. But the longer he watched, the more something felt off. Everything in the footage seemed to be on a loop.

The leaves of the potted plant on the windowsill swayed at the same angle in the same direction at the same intervals. A tiny sparrow's wing kept reappearing in the lower-right corner of the window like clockwork. The heartbeat curve on the monitor cycled through the same pattern over and over.

Suspicion took hold. After a brief hesitation, Loki decided to ignore Tony Stark's warning about not entering the room — you might infect the patient, and quietly slipped an illusion inside.

Sure enough. Exactly as he'd suspected. The room was empty.

Yang Luoluo gave a small eye-roll.

She'd never expected the plan to fool him for long. What she was more curious about now was how he'd tracked her down here.

"I mean, how did you find me?"

At that, Loki's eyes shifted. His whole face gave him away. He glanced, almost involuntarily, at the necklace around Yang Luoluo's neck.

Yang Luoluo caught the look and glanced down.

It was a teardrop-shaped emerald pendant, the color a near-perfect match for Loki's eyes. He'd given it to her after Bellatrix Lestrange destroyed the previous one.

"You put a tracking spell on it." Yang Luoluo poked the pendant with a blank expression, phrasing the question like a statement.

Loki stared at his dessert and didn't look up. He gave a small nod.

The memory of Yang Luoluo being kidnapped by Death Eaters was still vivid. If the tracking spell had been on the old necklace, he might have reached her sooner. She wouldn't have had to fight her way through that group on her own.

So when he'd made this new one, before giving it to her, he'd deliberately woven a tracking spell into it. Whenever he wanted, he could sense exactly where she was.

"...I'm sorry," he said, his voice quiet.

Yang Luoluo didn't actually mind. Every Avengers member had a location tracker built into their Stark phone. And with the spell on the necklace, her safety was that much more certain.

That didn't mean she was going to let him off easy.

She ate her ice cream in silence, not giving Loki so much as a glance. To Loki, it was an unmistakable signal.

The hand around his spoon had gone tight without him noticing. His palm was damp. His heart was thudding.

"I... I'm truly sorry. I shouldn't have faked a serious injury to deceive you."

The first sentence was always the hardest. But once it was out, the rest came easier, and then easier still, until Loki was talking in a near-continuous stream, working through everything he'd ever done wrong, from startling her the first time they met to the whole staged near-death performance.

He looked at her with something hopeful in his expression.

"So... can you forgive me?"

Listening to all of that, most of the anger in Yang Luoluo's chest had burned itself out. But there was still one thing she didn't understand.

"I still don't get it." She leaned forward slightly, absently running her thumb along the handle of her spoon. "Why did you have to fake a serious injury in the first place?"

Instantly, a flush rose to Loki's face. He cleared his throat. His eyes slid away, searching anywhere but her face.

He cast around frantically for an excuse.

Then he looked at the wreckage his last lie had made of things, took a slow breath, and gave up.

"I just... ahem. You kept refusing to say yes to me. I'd genuinely run out of options. That's why I resorted to something so desperate..."

!

Yang Luoluo stared at him.

➤ Next: Reconciled

Chapter 126 - Reconciled

Loki's expression was thoroughly displeased, and this was the first time Yang Luoluo had discovered he had the makings of a chatterbox.

"I originally planned to fake it for only a day or two, but that Iron Man insisted on pinning Thor and me down in the recovery room, ran a whole load of instruments just to conclude I needed quiet rest. I knew that fellow was doing it on purpose!"

"Vile ant— Midgardian!"

"And besides, I felt my performance over this period had been quite decent, yet you just refused to say yes to me. Having no other choice, I came up with this plan—"

"Wait." Listening to him ramble on and on, Yang Luoluo couldn't hold back any longer and cut Loki off.

"You never asked me either!"

It was true she'd told him before to show her how he performed, but that didn't mean she was going to walk up to Loki and say, "I think you've done well, so I agree to be with you."

How humiliating would that be! She could never bring herself to lose face by taking the initiative on something like this!

So when Loki snapped his fingers and looked like he was on the verge of death and asked if she would agree, Yang Luoluo nodded without a second thought.

Although Loki's playing-pitiful routine softening her heart was part of the reason, the truth was Yang Luoluo had been waiting for this chance for a long time. She'd been waiting for the day Loki would actually ask that question.

Loki's expression went blank for a moment. Then his eyes flew wide open, looking as though his entire worldview had just collapsed.

So... there had been no need for that act at all? He only had to ask directly and he could have gotten what he wanted?!

"Heh." Seeing him completely stymied, Yang Luoluo was in high spirits. "You're a god who's lived over a thousand years. Can't you just say what you mean?"

Clearly speaking directly would've worked fine, yet he insisted on beating around the bush, or else bottled it up entirely. Yang Luoluo knew full well this was born of both Loki's personality and his divine nature as the God of Lies.

But if this problem wasn't resolved, even if they truly got together, it would probably be a source of no small number of conflicts down the road.

Better to deal with it now.

Loki lowered his gaze and pressed his lips together.

He knew his own flaw. Whether before the people he loved or complete strangers, he had always been accustomed to hiding behind a thick mask, never exposing even a sliver of his true feelings.

Facing Frigga when she showed him care, Loki would go against his own heart, despite the heartache, and say, "You're not my mother";

Facing Thor, who still looked after him despite sharing no blood, even though Thor's words that their paths had long since diverged cut straight through him, Loki would still pretend nothing was wrong and acknowledge it with a smile.

It was precisely because of this that Loki had chosen to use that self-inflicted scheme at such a moment, to see clearly just how much he truly mattered to Yang Luoluo.

The good news: he'd won the gamble.

The bad news: he'd made her furious.

Stealing a glance at Yang Luoluo, who wore a complicated expression and seemed at a loss for words, Loki had a sudden stroke of inspiration. He raised a fist to his lips and cleared his throat.

"Ahem... I recall that when I brought you all to the new base, you also promised me one request."

Loki was now profoundly grateful to his past self for thinking ahead. That request had finally found its moment.

Hearing this, Yang Luoluo hesitated a beat. "...Go ahead."

She'd hear it first and decide whether to agree afterward.

The words had barely left her mouth before Loki blinked rapidly, leaned forward, and fixed her with his most innocent and earnest gaze, staring so steadily that a wave of awkward self-consciousness crossed Yang Luoluo's face.

"In that case, forgive me." Loki's voice was crisp and clear, with a faint undertone of hoarseness, faint smiles playing at the corners of his eyes and brows.

"All right? Girlfriend."

!

A foul. An absolute foul.

Feeling his cool breath brush across her cheek, Yang Luoluo instinctively shrank back.

She looked up, and found Loki gazing directly into her eyes. Those eyes seemed to hold something bottomless inside them, like stars in a night sky, mysterious and shimmering.

Yang Luoluo's heart slammed into a gallop.

"I, I..." Loki had hit her with a combo she hadn't seen coming, and she couldn't hold her ground. The words came out in a stammer.

"Lo— Loki, back up a little first..."

Hearing her flustered voice, the corner of Loki's mouth curved up slightly. He obediently sat back.

He propped his chin on his hand, gaze unhurried and warm. "Made up your mind, girlfriend?"

Another direct hit.

The situation had completely reversed. The initiative was entirely in the God of Mischief's hands now, and that guilty look from moments ago had evaporated without a trace, so quickly that Yang Luoluo genuinely wondered if that had been a performance too.

He watched the girl in front of him with quiet amusement as the tips of her ears went red.

Yang Luoluo gave up entirely and buried her face in her hands. After a long moment, a muffled voice emerged from beneath them: "Fine, you're forgiven..."

When she lowered her palms again, as if giving shape to her own feelings, a hand appeared before her eyes. Fingertips shifted slightly, and brilliant fireworks bloomed in Loki's palm, bright flames sparkling like a scatter of stars across a midsummer night sky.

Yang Luoluo couldn't help it. Her attention was completely stolen by those dazzling fireworks. She stared unblinking at his palm, the vivid colors making her eyes look even brighter.

"Do you like it?"

One hand holding fireworks, the other propping his chin, Loki watched her with total focus.

Yang Luoluo nodded quickly.

...

Walking along the path, Yang Luoluo cheerfully tugged at Loki's sleeve, still completely wrapped up in the fireworks from earlier, chattering away and asking Loki to conjure them one more time.

Loki walked in excellent spirits, raised his hand and released the fireworks again, and quietly felt very lucky deep down.

All those years, he'd picked up quite a few spells that the Aesir found delightfully pointless and utterly useless, including but not limited to making fireworks bloom in his palm and making frogs, the kind Thor turned into, dance. At present, those spells had finally proven their worth.

Still, just to be safe, he should find time to make a trip back to Asgard and visit the royal archives to learn more of that kind of spell. Otherwise, if the day came when he'd used every last one and Yang Luoluo lost interest in him, what then?

At that thought, Loki glanced sideways at Yang Luoluo, who was intently studying his palm as though she could figure out exactly how the fireworks worked, and the corner of his mouth lifted without him noticing.

Looking at things right now, though, that day seemed very far away.

His gaze drifted lower and settled on those non-stop chattering lips. She still hadn't noticed he wasn't really listening.

"Loki, how do you do it? Can you change the color? I want to see orange..."

The fireworks in his hand obediently shifted color.

Since, he meant, seeing as the girl in front of him was already his girlfriend, taking a small advantage for himself... shouldn't be unreasonable, right?

"Orange is really pretty too. I also want to see purp, mmph—"

Yang Luoluo froze.

The man beside her suddenly pressed close. Loki raised a hand to cradle the back of her head, and his cool lips followed the line of his breath to cover hers completely, sealing away the words she hadn't finished.

Yang Luoluo was so startled she forgot to close her eyes. All she could do was stare at the face that had taken over her entire field of vision.

In a daze, she thought she heard Loki let out a soft laugh. The next second, her vision went dark as a broad palm came to rest over her eyes.

The darkness made every sensation on her lips sharper. Warm breath settled over her in a gentle drift, as though plucking at something deep in her chest.

The kiss started gentle and restrained. But with his breath gradually deepening, the kiss deepened too, and it wasn't until Yang Luoluo was very nearly out of air that Loki finally, mercifully, let her go.

Yang Luoluo's head was spinning, her mind gone blank. She clearly hadn't come back to herself yet. Her legs had gone weak beneath her, and with nothing behind her to lean against, she could only brace herself against Loki's shoulder and catch her breath.

Loki was in an extraordinarily good mood. Even when he'd banished Odin from Asgard and seated himself on the throne, he hadn't been this happy.

He settled an arm around Yang Luoluo's waist, teasing with obvious relish, "Looks like you should start going on morning runs with that captain in tights, actually, never mind. Run with me instead. Your lung capacity really isn't anything to write home about."

Yang Luoluo heard every word. She came back to herself and looked up to glare at him, completely unaware that the rims of her eyes had gone faintly red, her gaze hazy beneath a veil of moisture, her lips noticeably pink and swollen.

Seeing her like that, something in Loki's eyes darkened. His fingertips moved on their own, tracing lightly along the soft curve of her waist.

Just as he was contemplating claiming another round of benefits for himself, Loki suddenly frowned, snapped around to face the bushes behind them, and in the same motion raised an arm to shield the bewildered Yang Luoluo behind him.

"Who's there!"

The leaves stirred.

➤ Next: The Mysterious Visitor