"Perhaps," Loki allowed, with the ghost of a smile on his face, now. Thor, after all, did not conjure up quite so many good feelings as might be called up with Frigga or Sif. "He was decorating eggs for the fertility celebration. That takes up a good deal of concentration, it seems." He detected the unpleasant flavour to Sif's voice, lurking underneath her words, but did not comment on it, or needle her for it. Sif was in a good mood and he rather liked her that way; as of late, anything else was liable to set him off into a bit of a moody spiral.

"I compliment you all the time, Sif," he said, amused, brightening slightly. "You just seem to consider them insults, or you don't even notice. It's good. I can get them in without it being too awkward. Here's another one: I don't think you need to worry about being pale. If you're ever stranded you can just lift your shirt a bit and reflect the light, signal to any passing ships or caravans. The others have to build fires in order to do that. It's tiring work."

He glanced down at the book. "Something from Midgard, or similar," he said. "Last night I started picking authors and then working my way through their novels. I find myself less interested in more factual texts at the moment."