It’s one of those gorgeous lucid dreams — the kind where a part of her is awake, struggling to hold on to what she sees. She’s dreaming of a wood: unfamiliar, old growth, wide spaces beneath the tall trees. And there is Loki, on the edge of the glade.

She doesn’t know which Loki; she knows so many, now. He changes, in that way that dreams do; now heartbreakingly young, now subtly marked with the weight of millennia. Always tall, so tall. Long hair, short hair; armoured, casual.

She cannot see his face. If she could see it, she might know — is she here for love, or hate? To die, or live?

In a dream, it could easily be both. Or neither.

She calls his name.