Page 26 of Loki

Wait, hang on...handfasting? Wasn't that a sort of Viking wedding ceremony?

"Are you sure about this?" Lara asked, looking at Sibyl.

"I have never been more certain of anything in my life!" the blonde blustered. He had to be Thor.

Sibyl didn't look so certain, though. She muttered something about getting more mead.

"Don't let them leave!" Loki hissed from outside.

Jorunn pasted a fake grin on her face. "I'll go get the rest. Be right back," she said, slipping back out.

Loki grabbed her arm and pulled her toward the nearest tent. "Which one belongs to the thief?"

Jorunn pointed. "That one. But did you know Thor was planning on marrying my roommate, who he's only known for a matter of days?"

Loki shrugged. "They both must agree to the handfasting. If she does not wish to have him, she can refuse. Thor is many things, but he would never force a woman against her will. Or is this because I did not agree to a handfasting with you before I bedded you? You were certainly willing, so I did not consider it necessary at the time, but if you wish me to say the words that will make you mine..."

The way he growled that last word sent tremors right through her core. Almost enough to make her agree to this madness.

Jorunn yanked her hand out of Loki's. "I'm not going to marry you! Bad enough that my roommate's insane enough to do it. Like you'll even remember I exist after we find this brooch. You'll vanish, like you do every morning, and I'll never see you again!"

Loki looked hurt. "I promise you, Jorunn, no matter how long I live, I will never forget a moment spent in your company. We must find the brooch, and Thor's hammer, and Odin, but afterwards...when this is done, if you wish to be handfasted, my pledge is yours. In fact, any other man who touches you, I will find it very difficult not to kill him."

Jorunn closed her eyes. The world had gone mad, and Loki was crazier still. "Loki..."

"I do not need your answer now, sweet shieldmaiden. Right now, I need your help searching for a thief's hoard, and a hammer."

Yes. Searching Nik's tent, while he was stuck in that insane ceremony with everyone else.

Loki did most of the actual searching, while Jorunn opened things or identified items that left Loki perplexed. No hammer, no brooch...they didn't find a single artefact in Nik's tent, even after Jorunn had patted down his pillow and sleeping bag.

Where had he hidden them?

Then she flipped over his bed, and hit paydirt. A bulging pouch had been taped to the underside, but when she looked inside...

"Just a satphone," she said in disgust, wanting to smash it against the rocks outside out of sheer frustration.

"What do these things do?" Loki asked, poking a button.

Loki and buttons. At least it wasn't a vibrator.

"That's it!" Loki exclaimed. He turned the satphone over. "Now, how do I get it out?"

Jorunn blinked. On the satphone screen was a picture of the brooch, sitting on a record card. Nik had stolen it!

She flipped through the pictures. The brooch, other items of jewellery, heaps of coins...and Thor's hammer, glinting like it was brand new, instead of buried in the ice for a thousand years. She kept scrolling, but that was the end of the artefact pictures. The rest were just waste containers, like the one they transported the toilet waste in. The sort of thing no one noticed or opened or cared about when they were loaded up to take back to civilisation...

"That's how he's doing it," she whispered.

"What?" Loki asked. His eyes darted around the tent, desperately searching for somewhere they hadn't looked yet.

"He's getting the artefacts out by pretending they're waste. Hiding them in the waste containers. Nothing's here because he already shipped them out with the supply run. It's all headed back to the lab." Jorunn stared at the screen. "We need to call the lab, or send someone after Jakop and the packhorses..."

"Thor will go. Go back into the feasting tent, and tell him you could not find what you were looking for. He will understand, and come find me," Loki said.

Reluctantly, Jorunn pressed the satphone into Loki's hands. "Don't lose that. It's all the proof we have."

She headed back into the mess tent, babbling at Thor and Sibyl that she hadn't been able to find...whatever it was they'd sent her to get.

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