Does he know the way he makes her heart soar when he says such things? When he offers assurances so openly and with such earnestness they'd make so many blush? He must for how her expression shifts, the nervousness still there but held at bay with love and affection. He makes it so easy to set aside her fears and uncertainties for a while, and to find strength to face them.

Perhaps he doesn't know it, or know all of it, but someday he will. She'll tell him and remind him every day once she figures out how. Even if he doesn't think so, she knows how much he deserves to hear how his strong heart helps lift hers up.

"I don't want you to hold yourself back when I'm gone," she tells him, lifting a hand to rest on his cheek. "But I trust you'll not forget me, and that you'll love and care for any children we may have. If that's not to be for us, then I trust you'll care for our people the same as I have since they day I first met them."

She leans into the press of his forehead and nuzzles him gently, her smile warm if a little rueful. "I would never ask that of you. Those of Asgard are long-lived, and they need a king who is, too. They need you here to see them through the first dozen of many generations at least, and I would rather bolster you to face that than demand you follow me into the dark of death." She takes a little breath and strokes his cheek with her thumb. "I could never resent you for being who and what you are. Not as your friend, even less so as your love, and impossibly as your wife. I chose this life with you, and I know what it means for you to choose it, too. I need you to live after I'm gone, for me and everyone you've ever loved and will love."

For her. For Loki. For Frigga. For their people. For their friends. For their children. For the future they're about to make. Together.