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lokimostly · 5 years

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Polaris (Ch.4/?)

Loki x Reader, Pirate!AU Word count: 3,043 Warnings: mild violence Summary: Your life has always been set in stone. Born to a wealthy merchant family in the Caribbean, you’ve spent your years as an heiress in the daytime, escaping at night to wander the streets of St. Thomas. Now, on the eve before your life settles into mundanity for good, you discover someone who could change everything– if you choose to trust him, that is.

A/N: I know I’m using mostly Thomas Sharpe and character-absent gifs. I’m picky. We’ll get some Loki gifs in here eventually.

Chapter One ~ Chapter Two ~ Chapter Three ~ Chapter Five ~ Chapter Six ~ Chapter Seven ~ Chapter Eight ~ Chapter Nine ~ Chapter Ten ~ Chapter Eleven ~ Chapter Twelve ~ Chapter Thirteen ~ Chapter Fourteen

You were elated.

And your father, of course, was furious. You barely paid any attention to his rampage, trying your best to keep a straight face while he demanded to know what had happened and who was responsible. The poor dock workers scrambled to placate him. They knew who he was, of course -- the man who practically owned St. Thomas. And so they fell over themselves to explain what went wrong and offer some recompense.

“They left not ten minutes ago, sir–”

“there’s a storm coming up from Barbados–”

“–yes, and they weren’t keen on gettin’ caught.”

“They left?” Your father spluttered, face flushed with anger. “Well, send a boat and catch them!”

This gave them pause. One of the dock workers made eye contact with you and you shared a mutual glance of sympathy.

“With– with all due respect, m’lord, they’ve left the harbor already.”

“Then FIND ANOTHER SHIP!” Your father roared, looking like he might go into orbit at any second. The veins in his neck popped and his face was entirely flushed. The dock workers and valets scattered– while you, deflated and more than a little ashamed of his outburst, merely stared at him.

He cleared his throat and adjusted the collar of his suit, like smoothing out the wrinkles would soothe the atmosphere somehow. “It’ll be alright,” he muttered, mostly to himself.

This drew you out from your silence. “Oh, it’ll be alright, will it?” you asked. The familiar bubbling of anger started to fizz in your stomach again. “Are you that desperate to be rid of me?”

“I am not desperate,” your father corrected, straightening the scarf around his neck. “I am merely determined to secure your future.”

You clenched your jaw. “I think you mean your business venture.”

Your father turned on you and took a step forward, but you didn’t retract. You stood your ground and stared him in the eye, allowing your pent-up frustration to come through your face for the first time in too long. If your encounters with Loki had taught you anything over the past week, it was what intimidated you – and what did not.

He opened his mouth to respond, but was interrupted by one of the dock workers. “Sir, there’s one other ship bound for the same destination – but the accommodations are hardly –”

“That will be fine, thank you,” your father snapped, keeping his eyes locked on you. At his imperious beckoning, the valets took your trunks and headed down to the docks.

He opened his mouth to speak again, but you weren’t having it.

“My mother wouldn’t have done this.”

You could almost hear your father’s thoughts as he travelled through several degrees of anger at once. He reached out and grabbed your chin, turning you sharply to face him. His lip curled venomously, baring his teeth.

You winced and tried to pull away, but he held you in an iron grip. “Remember your place, daughter,” he snarled, in a voice so cold you felt like someone had dumped ice water over you. “I have been patient with you, but you will not test me any longer. Do you understand?”

You could only nod.

Your father released you and you stepped away, both hands going up delicately to touch your face as if to make sure that he hadn’t left marks there. Your chest shook with emotion. Tears pricked on your waterline. You blinked them away hastily, pressing your lips together and keeping your eyes low, when you heard one of the dock workers approach.

“The ship is ready for you, sir.”

Your father shook his hand. “Good lad.” He paused, waiting for you. “Daughter?”

You swallowed your tears and calmed your shaky breath. “I’m coming.”

You picked up your heavy skirts to descend down the steps and followed them across the wooden dock. The sound of waves gently breaking against the aged pillars that held up the boardwalk kept you in your thoughts – until you nearly ran into your father and stopped short, looking upwards.

Your new ship was hardly a luxury vessel. It wasn’t even a halfway-decent merchant ship. The name – The Bella Notte – had been painted so long ago that it was beginning to crack. The hull itself was covered in barnacles and half-rotting. The sails were yellowed, patches sewn over patches, and the crew themselves hardly looked trustworthy. If your father cared in the slightest about your well-being, he wouldn’t let you within a mile of this ship or its crew. He, of all people, was accustomed to a certain uncompromised standard of living.

But it was obvious to you now that he didn’t care – not really. He had only tolerated you up until this point, because up until this point it hadn’t mattered. Now, with a tie to the wealthiest shipping merchant in the Caribbean at stake, he wasn’t going to give you an inch.

If you did escape this marriage somehow – and you were determined to do so – you knew one thing: you wouldn’t be coming back to your father. Wherever your new life took you, it wouldn’t be here. You doubted that your footsteps would ever walk St. Thomas’s streets again. The night you’d snuck out your window, infiltrated the tavern, met Loki... that really had been your last night of freedom. Your life would never be the same.

At the thought of it, your heart broke inside your chest and you did your best to stave off the tears that kept welling up in your eyes. The valets took your luggage aboard, and you turned around to say goodbye.

You gave your father a watery smile, which he responded to by extending his arms for a hug. His embrace, as warm and comforting as it would have seemed moments ago, now felt like wrapping your fingers around the bars of a former prison cell.

A tear fell from your eyes, but you didn’t wipe it away. Instead, you let your father pull back and notice it, watched him click his tongue and brush his finger over your cheek to wipe it away. Let him think the tears are for him, you thought vacantly. This is the last time I’ll ever see him. Let it be a good memory.

“I’ll see you soon,” He said, squeezing your arms before letting go. You merely smiled – that same performative muscle memory – and turned around, heading up the gangplank.

You didn’t look back.

The Bella Notte set off and kept a steady course northeast. The captain – a respectable fellow, you decided – had assured you that you would reach the coast of Europe in around three weeks. Longer than a normal voyage, but time had to be allocated for avoidance of the hurricane.

Either way, it was plenty of time to think of a way to get out of your current situation.

You mingled on the deck for the first hour or so, but the crew made you uneasy. It wasn’t like you hadn’t been around sailors before. Quite the opposite. Your nighttime excursions had led you to some of the most unsavory persons, and merchant sailors weren’t usually included in that description. These men, however, wouldn’t take their eyes off you.

You heard more than a few mutterings about who you were, and why you might be here. The general consensus was that it was bad luck to have a woman on the ship. Others, more curious about your personal history, suggested that you were a bastard child. Some speculated about your marital state: that you were carrying some reprobate's spawn and being sent away to save your family’s honor.

Funnily enough, none of them seemed to consider that you were actually decently wealthy, or engaged to a merchant heir. This ship attracted people of low-quality, and if you were here, you must be one too.

So you retired to your cabin.

The Captain had been paid to give up his quarters for you. It was a nice room despite the exterior: a narrow bed, heavy oaken desk and hanging lanterns to light the darker corners. A small, paneled window above the bed showcased the cerulean sky outside.

You picked up your skirts and sat down in the desk chair, setting your elbows on the armrests and letting your chin fall into one hand. Hardly afternoon and this day was already exhausting.

Your eyes drifted lazily over to the desk and you spotted a quill and inkwell. There was paper in the drawers, no doubt. Perhaps you should write a letter to Loki.

You scoffed aloud and stood up, discarding the idea. How ridiculous, you scolded yourself as your face heated up. What could you possibly have to say that he’d want to hear?

But he had told you to write to him.

Had he been serious? Or merely joking? For the life of you, you could never tell. Still…

By the third hour of your self-inflicted confinement to your cabin, you had picked up the pen half a dozen times, found paper and set it out, and ruined one sheet by blotting the ink on the page.

You couldn’t think of a single thing to say.

And yet, here you were again: you crossed the floor with a newfound determination, sat down at the chair, picked up the pen, and––!

“Oh, hell,” You swore quietly, glaring at the blank parchment. “What am I supposed to say? ‘Dear soon-to-be brother-in-law, could you please help, I am perishing of boredom and I’ve half-decided to drown myself because your brother and I don’t suit each other,’” You recited mockingly, setting the pen down once more. You leaned back in the chair and put your hands over your eyes, groaning at the headache which had been steadily growing for the past half hour.

Your hands fell and you let your head loll to the side. You blinked tiredly. Maybe sleep would do you good. According to your window, it was around nightfall, anyway.

With a sigh, you heaved yourself out of the chair for the umpteenth time and practically fell onto the bed. There was no point in discarding your outer dress– no one here would care if you wore the same dress twice in a row. No one cared about you at all. Not your father, not Thor – though perhaps he did try – and certainly not the sailors.

You shifted onto your side and pulled a pillow towards you. The garnet on your finger glinted red. You stared at the gem for a moment before reaching out and spinning it slowly around your digit. The metalwork was finely crafted, securely wrapped around the heart-shaped gem. That didn’t make it less unappealing to you, but at least you could admire its quality.

When you did fall asleep, staring at the ring from your fiancé, it wasn’t him you were thinking of.

You woke with a start.

The lanterns in your room glowed brightly against the blackness – it was barely dawn, and the pale light of the sun had scarcely started to lighten the starlit sky outside your window. Your heart pounded with adrenaline at your sudden awakening. Why were you awake? The vague memory of more obscene dreams was falling from you like sand through your fingers. No, it wasn’t your dreams. something had happened outside your mind and pulled you from your slumber.

You could feel it. Something was wrong.

You sat up and swung your legs off the bed, setting your bare feet on the wooden floorboards. Your blood roared in your ears, making it difficult to hear anything that might be happening outside.

Then, footsteps above.

You barely had time to think of it before the doorknob rattled and shook, and the old oak door gave way with a splintering crack.

A shriek escaped your lips and you grabbed the closest thing you could find – a candelabra – and swung it blindly. It connected with shocking force, and the intruder dropped unconscious to the floor.

You stared down at him in horror and dropped your weapon. You didn’t recognize this man. His striped shirt, bald head, tattooed forearms – sure, all sailors looked somewhat similar, but you would’ve wagered ten guineas that this man wasn’t a part of the crew.

Before you had time to do anything about it, however, another man appeared in the doorway, heavyset and bearded. With a sword.

It clicked. “Pirates,” you said weakly.

The man saw his unconscious mate and roared, reaching out for you with large, calloused hands. You shouted, trying to escape, but the confines of your quarters were suddenly much smaller when he was in them. He grabbed your hair and yanked you back painfully.

You cried out and gasped, trying to think quickly. Your bare heel slammed back against the bridge of his foot. He shouted and his grip on your hair loosened, just enough for you to slam your head back against him – and he lost his grip entirely. His calloused hand ripped the fabric of your dress in a last-ditch attempt to hold on, but you pulled away and left him with only a piece of pale satin in his fist.

You wasted no time. While he staggered back with one hand wiping at the blood that dripped from his nose, you snatched up your candelabra, and swung it as hard as you could.

Two pirates on the floor.

You stared at them with wild eyes, your chest heaving, and let out a little squeak. “Alright,” you breathed, trying to calm yourself. “Pirates.” You swallowed. There would definitely be more on deck, and you couldn’t fend them off with a candelabra.

You set down your blunt weapon and knelt down, shoving the man over enough to reach for his sword. The thin rapier rang when you pulled it from its sheath, long and sharp and glinting in the lantern light. It was cold and heavy in your hands.

Footsteps on the stairs alerted you and you whirled around, holding the sword out with both hands. “I’m armed!” You shouted – it was the first thing that came to mind – and did your best to grip the hilt with your sweaty hands.

The intruder stopped short in the doorway, and your jaw dropped.

It was Loki.

You gaped at him in pure shock, staring into his sea-green eyes. This is a dream, you thought. It has to be.

But you could feel the blood pumping in your veins, the sweat prickling on the back of your neck. No, this was all too real. And for the third time, you were brought face-to-face with the man in your dreams, who was staring at you now in pure and genuine confusion.

“You’re not supposed to be here,” he said.

Like the night in the tavern, he was dressed in black pants and a puff-sleeved shirt that showed far too much of his toned chest. But for once, that wasn’t what you were looking at. His face was currently the most shocking thing about him. His genuine emotion was unmasked before your eyes, like seeing a glimpse of an actor instead of the character they played.

Loki shook his head and his brow quirked. He licked his lips, struggling to form a sentence, when footsteps above alerted you both.

Fear rose in your throat like bile and a distressed noise escaped your throat. “Loki–” you began.

“Do you trust me?” He asked abruptly.

You stared at him for a second longer. Your hands were shaking visibly. “No,” you said, a little hysteric.

“Smart girl.”

Before you could protest, Loki crossed the floor and grabbed you by the waist, snatching you up and dragging you up the stairs. The sword dropped from your hands with a yelp. “Hey!” You wriggled and fought against him, but his grip was even stronger than you’d anticipated, and he pulled you up with him onto the deck.

The pale light of dawn illuminated the merchant crew and captain being tied to the masts, bound and gagged at the hands and feet. The captain stared at you, wide-eyed, and made a sound that sounded vaguely like ‘help!.’ As if there was a think you could do.

“Check those knots!” a red-haired man shouted – the first mate, you assumed numbly – and the pirates obeyed.

You tried to move again, and Loki’s grip tightened painfully as he pulled you flush against him. “Play along,” He ordered through his teeth, in a gravelly voice that sent shivers down your spine. Loki’s fingers dug into your waist, tangled in the thin fabric where your dress had torn, one less layer between your skin and his.

Not the time, you thought desperately. If only your mind could obey.

The first mate reached up to stroke his beard and turned around, seeing you. And when he did, he found. “Cap’n. Who’s this?”

Captain? You wondered, before the cold metal of Loki’s sword was at your throat and you froze. You could hear Loki’s silky voice like it was submerged in water.

“The precious cargo. This little debutante is worth keeping alive. All you need to know,” He added, and you could hear the smirk in his voice, “is that she’s off limits.”

The first mate seemed to find this answer satisfactory, nodding and turning back to his task at hand. Your eyes flickered to the east, where the ocean was beginning to turn pink and yellow in anticipation of the sun. Were it not for the fact that you were currently being held against Loki– no, a pirate –with a sword to your neck, you might have found it beautiful.

You should have run away, on your last night in St. Thomas. You should have packed a trunk and ran.

“And what about the rest? The ship?” You heard the first mate ask.

You felt Loki’s chest swell against your back when he inhaled. The cold metal of his sword pressed lightly against the skin of your neck – nowhere near enough to hurt, but it frightened you nonetheless – and his deep, melodic voice sent a cold ripple through you when he spoke.

“Burn the ship.”

A/N: Did you see it coming? I mean, this is a pirate AU, but still. I’d like to think SOME of you were surprised. ;)

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