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“Tony.”
“No.”
“Tony.”
“I’m sleepin’, Lokes.” Tony whined it, burrowing closer into his husband’s side for warmth and hopefully snuggles. “Turn the music off and hushitup.”
“Antony. It’s your phone.” Loki’s voice was sleepy and impatient, as it well should be at the obnoxious-ass Captain America theme song bursting into their bedroom at- Tony squinted at the clock as he fumbled up onto an elbow- six in the morning. Also known as the ass-crack of dawn. This far north and up in the mountains, he strongly suspected the sun wouldn’t be up for hours upon hours. The theme song swelled and Tony groaned.
“‘M goin,” Tony garbled out, leaning across Loki to pick up the phone.
“We’re on vacation,” Loki complained, not moving in the slightest to make Tony’s reach easier. In fact, his arm tightened slightly, keeping Tony closer to him. “We agreed. They agreed. Vacation means that we’re out of reach for-”
“Mmhm.” Tony flopped on top of his chest, accepting the call and muffling a yawn into L’Oreal-commercial-worthy, raven-black hair. “Steve, ‘m on vacation,” he said without greeting. “Whaddyou want?”
“It’s noon, Stark, why are you asleep still?” Steve’s voice frowned. Bucky’s voice sounded in the background. “Oh, right. Time zones. I’m still not used to that.”
“I am going to curse him when we get back,” Loki growled into Tony’s temple, stroking along Tony’s back slowly, clever slim fingers finding the achy places from the hike they’d taken the day before and massaging them.
Tony sighed against Loki’s throat. God, his hands were amazing. “Steve, time zones were created in-” he squinted in the darkness as he thought. “Eighteen eighty-three. You can’t just use your geriatricness to get away with everything, not with me.” Bucky laughed loudly on the other end and Tony snorted. “Doesn’ matter what time it is in any zone though. I’m on my honeymoon.”
“No you aren’t,” Bucky protested, still laughing, on the other side of the phone.
“It’s the anniversary of the anniversary of the anniversary of the honeymoon, it counts,” Tony grumbled, and made a noise of displeasure as Loki paused in his massage. “God damn it. Where’s the damn fight?”
“Arizona,” Bucky called across the line helpfully, and Tony groaned against Loki’s skin at the concept of sunlight, sand, and the flight over from the mountains.
“No.” Loki took the phone, glaring at it balefully. “You have us for every other Norns-damned day of the year and this is the first vacation we have taken in three years. That is one-thousand and ninety-five days you have been blessed with our assistance.”
Steve sighed. “I know we said that we wouldn’t need you, but-“
“Call in Danvers or Rhodes or whoever else you want,” Loki grumped. “Call upon my brother, Barton, Romanov, or Peter. No. We are not joining your merry little band of do-gooders. We are booked.”
Tony thudded his forehead twice against Loki’s collarbone, then let out a sigh. “We’ll meet you in Arizona,” he informed the phone, then hung up on them. He propped himself up on his elbows to look down at his husband, who was scowling. “Lokes-”
“No, absolutely not.” Loki tossed the phone across the room where it cracked. “Absolutely no, no. We’ve been trying to have a date night for over a year and every damn time they do this. No.”
“Oh, come on.” Tony let out a laugh, leaning down to kiss across his jaw. “Not every time, you’re exaggerating. You love your drama.”
Loki glowered. “No, because last time they called us right when we got to the hotel. The time before that they actually crashed into the rental house. The time before that they led the enemies back to Avengers Tower and it was the pizza place before that.” He huffed. “It’s like Rogers has a sixth sense for when I’m happy and he decides to crush it.”
“You just admitted you’re happy.” Tony grinned down at him. “I’ll call the papers and send out a notice. Loki Stark, living with the Avengers, married, and admits it’s happily so.”
“I am not. I am a miserable person now and will always be a miserable person.” Loki pulled him down to kiss him with a grin. “I am filled with rage and ennui alternately, with a few bouts of sheer annoyance between those emotions and constant scheming sprinkled on top.” The phone buzzed again, probably with a location, and Loki groaned again. “My greatest regret is not killing Rogers when I had the opportunity.”
“I would love to just lock you guys in a room together and watch you bond.” Tony grinned down at him, then gave a yelping laugh when Loki tackled him, rolling them over to lay on top of Tony.
“I would think that our colorful history would prove what a bad idea that would be,” Loki informed him, looking down at him sternly. “Do I need to remind you of the last four years of dubious alliance? That time he hit me with the shield?” He leaned down, nipping at Tony’s throat. Tony’s breath caught involuntarily. “You and I always had a kind of sexy banter going, so it was fine when you blew me up or I tossed you off a building.”
“Repeatedly. You tossed me off a building repeatedly. I only blew you up the once.” He leaned up, kissing him again. “I know what you’re doing, and you’re not gonna distract me with sex from a mission. You could, obviously. I mean damn, look at you. But we have to go.” He rolled them back over, kissing him again.
“Antony. You assured me I would not have to play a good person again for a full three weeks. It has been only four days. My villainy has not been properly appeased, it could resurface.”
Tony laughed, leaning down and kissing him slowly. “One quick run to Arizona,” he murmured, kissing down his throat. “I’ll grab the suit out of the back cabin, I’ll zip down there, zip back. You don’t even have to come.” He pushed up off the bed with no small amount of difficulty and took a moment to mentally pat himself on the back. Leaving Loki undressed and wanting in their bed was something he had never successfully done before. Tony Stark wasn’t exactly known for his self control.
He ventured into the front room, hearing Loki complain and say something rather foul about Steve behind him, along with something that sounded suspiciously like I knew we should have left the suit at home. Tony laughed, grabbing the front door.
“Come on, it won’t be-“ he pulled it open with a yank and fell silent, gaping at… well. What would have been the outside, but was instead a full wall of snow. Illusion? He reached out, poked it. His finger came away cold and wet, and little crumbles of snow fell onto the cabin rug beneath his feet. “Wh- I- Lokes, we’re snowed in!”
“What?” Loki appeared beside him, tying his robe around him as he stopped beside Tony and stared at the wall of snow, shocked. “What- what is this?” He reached out, curling a hand into the snow, and gave a surprised laugh as it cascaded into the living room, all over their feet. “It snows like this here?” He leaned up, poking at the top of the door, and yet more snow rained down, and he laughed at it.
Tony had seen Loki happy, of course, regardless of how grumpy he claimed to be. His husband had been around for a long time and they’d been married for three years, so Tony had of course witnessed Loki being happy before. But this pure, unadulterated delight was something entirely new on the Asgardian-Jotun’s face, making his eyes sparkle and the air around him dance slightly as he buried a hand in the fluffy snow.
It was a lot like the first time they’d seen snow together.
“No, Stark.” Loki buried himself in his book. “There is nothing more important, I promise you, than this particular set of rune circles at the moment.”
“Hey, everyone loves a good rune circle.” Tony leaned over the back of the chair, plucking the book out of his hands. It was a risky move. He’d been known to stab Thor for such things. “But you’re gonna have to come with me to get it back.”
Loki glared at him, clearly in a foul mood today. “I will make you an amphibious creature,” he grumbled. “You will not like it. And I will leave you that way and toss you out onto the pavement and someone playing on a cellular phone will step on you.”
“Now that’s pretty rude to someone who’s going to give you a present.” Tony chuckled as he headed for the elevator. “Come on.”
“I do not need a present from you Midgardians,” he drawled, but he followed anyway, glowering at the ceiling as they went. “Where are we going? Last time I left with one of you and no pre-decided destination, Thor made me wear a hideous crown and an ‘I Love New York’ shirt.”
“I know. I have a picture of it on the fridge in my apartment downstairs.” Tony grinned widely at the memory of Loki stuffed in a Statue of Liberty hat, looking aggrieved as he was crushed into a laughing Thor’s side. “It’s a work of art. And you know, you always wanted a crown, Lokes.”
Loki shot him a dirty look. “I should simply turn all of you into amphibious creatures and take over Midgard properly,” he grumbled as they stepped into an elevator. “And then I will destroy all of those carts.”
“But then your life would be so boring.” The doors opened to the rooftop helipad. “It’s just the best view in the house, we aren’t going anywhere,” he assured Loki, and stepped out into the blizzard swirling down thickly around them. “It’s the first snow of the year!” He called cheerfully, holding a hand up to the thick flakes. “Thought you’d want to see it!” He turned back to look at him and found Loki frozen, staring at the flurries around them.
They stood in silence for a few moments as Loki reached out to catch snowflakes and watched the snow. He slowly met Tony’s eyes. “You brought me up to see the snow?” His voice was not quite right, expression carefully even.
“Well, yeah.” Tony glanced at the swirls and eddies of snowflakes around them. “You’re a Jotun, that’s a frost being, right? Or is this like that time we took T’Challa to a cat sanctuary?” He felt his eyes widen in alarm.
Loki yanked him forward by the front of his jacket and leaned down, kissing Tony hard and bending him back slightly.
Loki had spent most the rest of the week outside, sitting blissfully in the snow and reading his books when he and Tony weren’t ripping each others’ clothes off. Tony had immediately invested in a variety of cold outerwear to be able to sit and work alongside him. It had been worth the cold of the reactor in his chest to be able to watch Loki look up at the snow around them every few minutes with those delighted eyes.
“I told you we came up to the mountains because of the snow,” Tony told him now with a laugh, wrapping his arms around him from behind. “Granted, I didn’t think we would get this much… Jarvis, why didn’t you tell us there was a snowstorm coming?” He shot an accusatory look at the tablet he’d left on the couch the night before.
“Because you are on vacation, sir, and I thought it would be a pleasant surprise,” the AI informed him primly. Tony snorted, pressing his lips to the top of Loki’s shoulder for a moment with a smile as Loki continued running his hands over the wall of snow in fascination.
This would make it much harder to get out to Arizona- to get out of the house at all, much less to then dig his way into the back cabin and retrieve the suit. Loki could undoubtedly help some with magic, but if he was willing to (he was almost certainly not) was a separate matter entirely.
“Well, I guess you get to win today, Lokiloo,” Tony reflected with a chuckle. “I don’t think we’re going to be able to go much of anywhere.”
“Oh no.” Loki gave a theatrical sigh, leaning back into him. “I do so wish I could take credit for this to piss off Captain Not-So-Wonderful. Jarvis, can you inform the Avengers that we have been snowed in and have no chance of arriving with our meager resources? Send them contact information for the other suited idiots in the area.”
“Yes, sir.” Jarvis’ voice held amusement and Loki smiled at the snow.
“I have not seen snow such as this this since I visited Jotunheim when I was young,” he said, pleased as he picked up a handful. “I did not know that Midgard snowed like this. Have you seen snow like this before?”
“Pictures of it,” Tony agreed, poking at the wall trapping them indoors. It would be somewhat claustrophobic if Loki didn’t look so utterly over the moon about it. “Places like Wisconsin, Colorado… Canada too, I guess. Some places like this get snow this heavy during storms. I didn’t even think about it being this much up here but it makes sense.” He rested his hands on his hips, considering. “Well. To really appreciate it, we do need to get out. To get out, we gotta tunnel. To tunnel, we need to put the snow indoors. So.”
So they removed buckets of snow at a time, piling it into the bathtubs first, then the sinks, then a large tarp in the middle of the living room. They got bored halfway through and took a break to eat and reform each of the snow piles into snowmen of the Avengers, complete with uniforms made out of towels and random articles of clothing. Tony sent Steve a selfie with his snowy counterpart, and Steve sent back a photo of a blown-up car that looked like it had a killer robot perched on top. Tony replied with a photo of a snow-made Redwing as a peace offering and got back middle finger emojis.
“Sam musta taught him those,” he muttered as he went back to work sculpting the snow into a likeness of Mjolnir.
Loki cackled and continued shaping a large portion of snow into what Tony hoped was not a real monster but suspected was something from some realm somewhere. Either way it had too many teeth and arms and Loki made the eyes sparkle dangerously. His version of Thor was cartoonish and he seemed to very much enjoy making the cape sway.
“My cape is shorter, and made of heavier material, so it flows properly,” he explained to Tony as they worked. “His is nonsense.”
He must have enchanted the snow, Tony decided after a while- so much handling should have made it all melt, but the snowmen stayed cheerful and perfect as Loki made somewhat rude additions to some of them (namely Steve’s nose and Stephen Strange’s height). He was laughing, snow in his hair and crusted in his robe, enjoying this far more than Tony would have expected, if he’d anticipated such an event.
It was a beautiful look on him, and they had to take a break halfway through so Tony could drag him over to the couch and kiss him senseless.
Tony strongly suspected that the tunnel could have been achieved in minutes with magic, but again, he had no proof of this, and it was so much more enjoyable to watch Loki have fun so Tony said nothing. It was much more pleasant to just spend the morning shoveling their way to the surface.
“Do you think the kid’s doing alright?” Tony studied the snow-spider he was making and carefully pinched at one of the legs until it was a better shape.
“I left him with seven knives and a few protection spells he can trigger.” Loki spun a snowy Mjolnir in his hand, then tossed it with relish, sending it through snow-Steve’s head. “And perhaps a few he does not know about that will trigger anyway. He is at school this week, yes? And then off next week for Yule?”
“Christmas,” Tony corrected with a chuckle. “But Pete’s Jewish, so it’ll be Hanukkah for him anyway. The school is just off for Christmas break.” He took a picture of the decapitated Steve to put on their fridge for later as Loki repeated Hanukkah, Hanukkah. “You know he’s not gonna use the knives.”
“Well maybe the Jotun one doesn’t need him to use it to work,” Loki said under his breath, grinning at the snow-form of Thor. Tony chuckled to conceal the rush of fondness that washed through him at that. He’d gotten lucky- Loki was just as attached to and protective of their pseudo-son as Tony himself was. Loki considered, ignoring his laughter. “We should send the boy off on a vacation for Hanukkah. Somewhere he cannot get into trouble but enjoy himself. We could send his friends. I like the one. The girl.”
“Who, MJ? Yeah, she’s a cute kid. She and Shuiri have a pen pal thing going on.” Tony considered. “Maybe they could go to Wakanda. T’Challa might let Pete in on Avengers credentials and the princess might bully her way into her friend coming with him.”
Loki’s lips twitched. “You just want in her lab, and you’re hoping when we go to pick him up she will let you play,” he informed Tony, leaning down to kiss him with a laugh. “You are utterly shameless.”
Tony gaped at him. “You wound me. It’s about an exchange of cultures and strengthening of Wakanda-Avengers ties and friends connecting over long distances in a safe environment where he won’t have to be a superhero.” He laid a hand over his chest. “Their vibranium labs and incredible, bleeding-edge tech have nothing to do with my pure intentions.”
“Of course not.” Loki laughed and went back to work on a very large snake, carefully shaping its head-fins. “I do think that is a very good idea, however. He needs to be a boy. There are few places where he would feel less inclined to be a hero.”
Tony nodded and eyed the snake. “Fictional?”
“No.” He looked at it affectionately. “This is Jormungandr. The species died out long ago, but I was always fond of them.”
“Huh.” Tony studied it, then clapped Loki’s shoulder. “Woulda eaten me in one snakey gulp,” he predicted, and returned to shoveling out more snow for their creations with a grin as Loki went back to work on it, whistling.
When they finally did tunnel up to sunlight, Loki was gone like a shot, abandoning his husband to scramble up the tunnel effortlessly. Tony stared up through the hole for a moment, hands on his hips, and cocked his head as he listened to his husband laugh and run about beyond. “I’m married to a Siberian Husky,” he surmised to himself.
“Antony!” Loki appeared again in a spray of snow, dumping several large portions of snow all over Tony and the house. His husband laughed and effortlessly reached through the tunnel, pulling Tony up as he tried to wipe slush off of his face. “I have never seen such snow! Jotunheim is indeed cold and icy but look!” He spread his arms, looking around as the sun glittered on the crystals, making the plain around them shimmer like it was encrusted with diamonds. Tracks cut around them all over where he’d run around in his excitement. “Jotunheim is always storming, dark and gloomy, regardless of the actual amount of snowfall. I have never seen sunlight on so much.”
Tony grinned up at him, drowning in a surge of affection for his beautiful partner, so happy and thrilled by something as simple as a fresh snowfall. “It’s gorgeous,” he agreed, catching the front of his shirt and drawing him down for a kiss. Loki’s lips were cold, his body thoroughly embracing the freezing temperatures he was so often without. “Could use a Jotun to improve the scenery,” he reflected, fingers finding the grooves in Loki’s skin that always existed beneath his Asgardian mask.
Loki leaned into him, letting out a breath, and the illusion fell away. His pale skin faded into a beautiful blue, the shade utterly unique to Jotunkind, his eyes a vivid red against the cool shade, the grooves of his skin that all Jotun wore striking and beautiful and utterly comforting. Tony smiled, tracing said grooves slowly and leaning up on his toes to kiss the corner of Loki’s right eye.
It had been a fight to get Loki to show him his real form. Tony had found out quite on accident and Loki had refused for the better part of a year, informing him that he had no desire to live in that skin for any length of time. Once he had broken down and let Tony see him, he had been belligerent, clearly imagining that Tony would think he was ugly or repellant.
Tony had never thought it was anything less than striking.
“You’re breathtaking,” he informed him, because Thor never had and Odin never would, and because it was so true that Tony could feel it carved into his bones. “Perfection, Lokes.”
“I could not, in all my years, have imagined one like you,” Loki murmured against Tony’s lips, resting his head against Tony’s. Tony stroked down the grooves, tracing them with cold fingertips and a smile. The sweet moment drew out a little longer, and then Loki grinned. “You can interpret that however you like,” he teased, and pulled a scarf out of the air, wrapping it around Tony’s neck and picking up a handful of snow to dump in Tony’s hair.
Tony gave a shout of protest and laughter, ducking away and grabbing up clumsily-formed snowballs. He flung them without much real aim or hope of success- he was starting a snowball fight with a frost giant after all and he didn’t have to be the genius he was to know that his odds of success were absolute nil- and he ran for the snowy tree line for some form of cover.
Being snowed in definitely beat fighting murder robots in Arizona, he thought as he was tackled into the nearest snowbank and kissed until the world grew soft and languid and fuzzy. A snowball was shoved under his shirt before Loki darted away again and Tony grinned at the sky for a minute before pushing himself up and giving chase.