Chapter Text
The red fabric was soft in his calloused hands, too. It reminded him a bit of silk, though without the slippery component that had always kept him from actually being much of a fan of silk regardless of its status symbol. He held it up for his traveling companion to see only to be disappointed that the other man had his back turned to him.
“Hey,” he said, further pestering the mage by tapping a toe against the side of his leg. “Hey,” he then repeated when the other man didn’t react quickly enough. “What do you think? Is it me? It’s me, right? It’s definitely me.”
Loki gave an exacerbated sigh as he turned around and beheld the sight of his familiar holding a bright red shirt up in front of himself and smiling like an excited, jubilant child. He set down the pair of trousers he had been inspecting to give the other man his full attention.
“Tony, you claim that everything you find in red is you .”
“Yeah, but this one really is!” he insisted, thrusting the sleeve at his magician. “Feel it! Come on, feel!”
Loki rolled his eyes, but did as he was told. He rubbed the pleasant woven threads between his fingertips.
“See?” Tony practically purred. “Told you. It’s perfect, right?”
The shirt really was well made, though Loki hated the idea of admitting it to Tony’s enthusiastic, bright-eyed face. Instead, the mage took the shirt with a tired sigh and draped it over his arm to more easily carry the decided purchase.
“You’ve had me waste a verified fortune in clothing already. I don’t know why I should be forced to entertain your hoarding tendencies for this as well.”
Tony couldn’t stop smiling, not when Loki’s lips kept trying to twitch into that soft, fond smile of his throughout his own complaints on the matter.
“Aw, come on,” Tony teased as he playfully jabbed his mage in the ribs. “Now that I’ve got my own closet, you don’t have to worry about me losing or ripping stuff apart anymore! It’s not a waste; it’s an investment!”
“It’s not a closet , Tony. It’s a pocket dimension. One I sometimes regret creating for you,” he complained good-naturedly.
“ Tomayto, tomahto . Point is, I have somewhere to put my stuff and—admit it!—you like spoiling me sometimes.”
“I do no such thing.”
Tony scoffed outright at that as he pretended to inspect a nearby satchel. “You call yourself the master of lies, but I can see right through that one, mister smarty pants.”
“And I’m sure you’re quite proud of that, aren’t you?”
“Honestly? Yeah, a little bit.”
Loki couldn’t help but let out a small laugh. “You know, Tony,” he warned with faux seriousness. “ Some mages would be appalled to see a familiar so readily speaking back to their spellcaster. No doubt they would insist that I remind you of your place.”
“What, you mean under you?”
The sound of a dozen or so belts falling to the floor all but echoed through the shop. Loki quickly righted the stand he had knocked over and scrambled to collect the scattered items. The mage could hear Tony’s smug grin behind him. Loki refused to turn around, quite content to keep his heated face private.
“Yeah,” the familiar continued in a wistful tone. “The split waterfall was nice. We should go back there sometime.”
Loki couldn’t tell if the man was being serious, or just trying to get a rise out of him. Knowing Tony, it was probably a balance of each. With the way the store clerk had been staring at them for the past few minutes, though, Loki was not about to rise to Tony’s obvious and childish challenge.
“I think we’re finished here,” Loki announced instead, gathering up his things and abandoning his familiar for the shop front.
The man waiting for them at the front counter did not appear to understand the concept of a welcoming demeanor. He gave the pair a hard, silent stare as they approached, and only moved to reach for an item after both Loki and Tony had finished arranging their selections on the counter. The man eyed them both suspiciously, as if expecting them to produce more from their pockets. After a few long moments of silence, he picked up the first item and began to tally the cost.
“You’re that magician, right?” the shopkeep asked in a gruff voice. “Where’s your vermin, off killin’ someone’s chickens? They say you have a pocket wyvern of all things.”
“Who the hell are you calling ver— Ow !” Tony yelped, jumping back when Loki’s heel abruptly dug into the top of his boot.
“I assure you,” the mage said, giving Tony a stern side glance as he did, “My familiar is quite well-behaved.”
Tony glared at him.
The merchant apparently didn’t notice the exchange taking place in front of him because he kept talking. “Yeah, well, you should keep that thing on a leash and quit letting it flap about on its own. Folks here don’t much care for magic. They like people who use it even less . ‘Specially ones with fire-breathing pets.”
“Wyverns don’t— OW ! Would you stop that?”
Loki ignored the man at his side in favor of the one in front of him.
“Yes, well, they shan’t have to deal with us for very much longer. The most atrocious thing I desire of this minuscule hamlet is a replenishment of supplies” Loki set some coins down on the countertop between them. “I’m sure the lovely inhabitants of this town will be able to deal with the burden of a little extra patronage and a harmless pocket wyvern for another day or two.”
Tony let out an indignant huff at being called harmless , but he held his tongue for the sake of his still-throbbing toes.
The shop owner scowled at the pair. He pulled the money across the counter, quickly counted the coins, and slipped them into a purse. Loki watched the man with a dangerously neutral expression. Tony stood nearby and continued to pout.
“I don’t care much for your attitude, you know.”
“Imagine,” Loki said in mock surprise. “When we entered this establishment I didn’t think that we would have so much in common.”
The man’s eyes narrowed. “If any of this coin turns into rocks or something tonight, I’ll be seeing the sheriff,” he warns as Loki gathered their purchase.
Tony remained silent, though his eyes held daggers of his own now.
“I suppose I have no choice but to extend my stay should the gentleman need to get in contact with me, then,” the mage countered, his voice slowly lowering into little more than a growl. “It has been a pleasure doing business with you, sir.”
Tony gave the shopkeep one more glare before the pair of them headed toward the door. The familiar’s shoulders were tense, disgusted with the entire encounter by this point. What a piece of scum. It killed him that they had given that pig any money, no matter how nice his stupid shirts were.
“Don’t do it,” Loki hissed to him quietly.
“Do what?”
“You’re thinking of going back and picking a fight.”
Tony frowned. “I wasn’t going to pick a fight!” Not exactly, anyway.
“Trust me, you would end up in the middle of one regardless of your intentions, Anthony.”
The spellcaster’s familiar grumbled as they returned to the open streets outside. Tony shoved his hands into his pockets and glanced about at the store fronts as they went. Crowds were thin at this hour, but more folks were beginning to appear as the sun lowered and the men came out to relieve their daily tension in whatever form they could find. Tony was struck by a strange, almost sickening feeling of déjà vu as he recognized the familiarity in their behavior. It was hard to believe he had been just another face in the crowd once upon a time. At least he had never been as bad as Chuckles back there.
“Well he shouldn’t have treated you like that,” Tony groused. “Rude son of a bitch.”
“And being called vermin I’m sure had nothing to do with it.”
Tony pouted. “Sure as hell didn’t help ,” he admitted. “Gods, Lo, if I’d realized this place was so seiðrphobic I wouldn’t have suggested coming here.”
He had been here before. It had been years ago now, but once upon a time, Tony Stark had been a familiar face in Leifield. The place didn’t seem like it had changed much on the surface, but the more time he and Loki spent here, the less Tony liked it. Maybe Liefield had changed or, more likely, old Tony had just been too oblivious and self-absorbed to notice the prejudices that permeated too many of what used to be his favored establishments.
“It is getting on in the evening,” Loki said as they went. “We should begin to formulate some sort of plan for dinner and where we might bed for the night. And you must be tiring as well by now, holding that form for so long.”
Oh, right. The big inn in town had taken one look at them and decided that they didn’t want a magic user under their roof spinning spells, casting curses, or poisoning the locals with some demonic potion. Pure stupidity. Tony regretted ever giving them his patronage in the past.
“Yeah,” he mumbled absently. “Going wyvern in the middle of the street probably isn’t the best idea, though.” He really was starting to feel weak and worn now.
“Then we should perhaps make camp before pursuing dinner,” Loki responded, unperturbed. “Do you recall if there are any portions of the woods or countryside that may be best to avoid?”
Ugh, no. Tony’s whole point for diverting their trek to this stupid town had been so that they could do something besides sleep outside for once! Well, that and his secret plan that didn’t feel so exciting anymore after a day of being kicked out of every establishment in town. Stupid discriminating asshole inn. Tony wished he could breathe fire—that place would be a pile of cinders by this time tomorrow. Hell, maybe he didn’t have to breathe fire. After all, he’d been learning how to summon energy to his palms. Maybe he could just blast the place to—
“Anthony?”
“ Hmm ? What?”
“You’re upset.”
“What do you mean I’m upset? I’m fine.”
“ Anthony ,” Loki said, stopping and turning to fully face his familiar. “You have a terrible ‘poker face’ when you’re inside your own head—”
“I should have never taught you that phrase. Or that game.”
“—and it’s plain to see that you are distraught. And when you are distraught, you’re distracted. And when you are distracted, you’re liable to do something stupid. Usually something incredibly stupid.”
“Hey!”
“And so I ask you again,” Loki pressed. “What’s wrong?”
He let out a long breath, glancing away from his magic-user as he tried to suppress the urge to let himself bounce on the balls of his feet. He was never good at staying still when agitated. Loki stood and waited, annoyingly patient as ever. Tony shrugged and shook his head.
“The guy was an asshole. He had no right to treat you like that. Neither did the idiots at the inn. It’s stupid, it’s not fair, and I don’t like it.”
Loki’s brow softly drew together in concern. “Anthony, this is far from the first time this has happened. May I ask what makes today so different?”
Tony shrugged as he spoke, practically mumbling his words as he looked anywhere but Loki’s face. “It’s just…I used to think this place was great, you know? I…thought it’d be fun to show you some of my old stompin’ grounds since we were so close, and…I mean, look at what you’ve seen. These are… were my people. So…yeah, I’m kind of upset about it.”
He felt a long-fingered hand rest tenderly on his shoulder. Tony felt himself relax under the familiar touch, if ever so slightly. He forced himself to look up at his companion as Loki began to speak.
“It hurts to see those you considered your own hurt someone you care about,” he translated. “Perhaps even to the point of guilt?”
Tony shifted his weight uncomfortably. “Yeah…li’l’ bit,” he admitted.
“The first step, Anthony, to growth and reparation is to become aware of and acknowledge the problem.”
“Yeah, well, me realizing the town I liked is full of assholes doesn’t really help anything.”
“On the contrary,” Loki said with a warmth in his eyes that made Tony feel an odd tingle in his chest. “It shows just how much you have grown yourself that you can now see it.”
Tony shrugged, though that did make him feel at least slightly better about a shitty situation.
“And,” Loki continued, “As much as I do enjoy our chats, I’m afraid time is continuing on and we’re still in need of shelter for the night. We can continue our conversation after we set up camp, but I suggest we prioritize that above everything else right now. There’s a nip in the air and I’d rather have everything set before it gets worse.”
Oh yeah. Sleeping outside. Well, Tony’s mind had certainly come full circle, hadn’t it? If only there was a safe haven in this town where anyone would be accepted regardless of their station or occupation. After their string of dirty looks and outright hostility throughout the day, it was a little hard to believe some place like that existed around here. You would think that anyone with some coin to spend would be able to find—wait. How had he not thought of that before?
“Hey Lokes!”
The mage turned back to his familiar again.
“Actually...I think I might know somewhere we can spend the night without getting kicked out. We have money left over, right?”
Loki eyed him suspiciously. “Yes,” he said slowly, clearly not liking the look of excitement on his familiar’s face.
“Good,” he said, shuffling past the mage and giving his robe a good yank for emphasis. “Follow me.”