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ghouljams · 9 months

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I was just stalking your fae au and was reading the moose-creature-mimic posts, and I saw you mention that witch can feel when the mimic is trying to break her wards.

Whenever I hear about Fae, my mind immediately goes to the magic system from one of my favourite book series in which people who make wards have to develop wards for specific creatures, and if a creature that they haven’t warded against tries to enter, they can break through, if not break the rest of the wards.

Let’s say for a moment that something like that happens in the Fae AU, where some kind of unfamiliar creature from a foreign civilization comes a knocking on witches doorstep, and is able to break through her wards.

What do you think would happen? If Witch is connected to them, would Witch ‘break’ too? How would Price react to the pure panic and pain shooting through the tethers as an unfamiliar creature breaks through his darling’s wards?

I feel like she would be absolutely broken afterwards (if she survives that is-) Her wards are her safe space, she had never had that happen, she didn’t know what happened.

Would price still trust her to be safe in her own home?

Would SHE still trust her to be safe in her own home??

Just some thoughts 🫣

Oooooooooh. Ok yeah I can do some horror with this. Love the concept. So the Canon answer is that warding in this magic system can be as broad or as narrow as the caster wants. Wards can be weak and they can be broken, but it isn't going to harm the caster, maybe it'll give then a bad feeling but not any actual harm. Not a very good ward if it harms the wrong target IMHO.

For the Witch's home these are wards that are basically generations of people enforcing and reinforcing an all purpose boundary. It's an iron wall that nothing(save humans) is getting through without a permit, and it's tied to Witch both through her magic and her blood. She can feel when things mess with it, but it's like getting asmr, it isn't actually affecting her. She's mentioned before that her wards are threats, so anything that isn't stopped by a simple denial of entry is going to have those threats enacted upon it.

But let's say something broke her wards, let's throw some rocks through the windows and bust shit up. I am going on record to say, this isnt canon:

You feel something crack in the air before you feel it break. The splintering spiderweb of intangible bonds being pushed too far hits you between the ribs and you have to clutch the kitchen counter to stay standing. Something is deeply, desperately, wrong. You don't know how or why(or what) but something is working very hard to get in to your space.

It shouldn't be possible in the first place, you have known this house, these wards, your whole life and you've never felt it give way. You've felt it change, felt it ripple, felt it pop and fizz when it doesn't like what you've let in, but never this. Never the creaking pressure of it bowing inwards and splitting under its own tension. Your fingers wrap tight around your athame as you go to check your back garden, peaking through the curtains. There's nothing.

But you can feel it, you can feel it splintering like a pain in your chest. Tight and radiating out from your sternum. It tingles down your arm, makes your grip feel looser than you know it is. You grab your back door's handle, take a few breathes to give yourself strength, and open it to shoo away whatever is pressing your wards. And very suddenly the splinters give way, like a hole punched through a window.

It feels like all the air has been forced out of your lungs. A cool breeze blows through your door, wrong so very, very, wrong. The smell of moss invades your nose, burdened with the scent of decay. Slime mold oozing against your desperate breaths. You tug your shirt to cover your nose and mouth as the battering ram that had been beating your barrier steps through.

The horns of it scrape your ceiling, actually that bothers you more than it should, you're the one that has to fix it later. Velvet hangs from its antlers, freshly scraped and red, gory and divine. It stands on two clover hooves, and looks at you with malice. If you can even discern an expression from the thing. It's face is completely smooth save for its eyes, or it was smooth. A crack forms along the bottom of its smooth surface, splintering and chipping as it rips its mouth open and screams at you.

The sound is overpowering, dizzying, you feel your ears pop and then the noise is gone, replaced by a persistent dull ringing. You truly wonder when your life got so interesting. You hate interesting. You blame Price.

You cough, gag. You have to drop your makeshift mask to retch against the stench of rotten decay on this thing. It smells like death, weeks old bodies left to fester where no one will find them. You gag again, fingers curling around your throat as you try to keep you athame raised.

Your wards are silent, you home is silent, and you realize that you've never actually experienced true silence. Something is always buzzing or humming with magic, you always have music playing or bottles clinking, you're always surrounded by sound. Now it's all stopped. Even the ringing in your ears has settled into a cottony muffle. You can't feel any of your magic. Your numbed to it.

You drop your hand from your throat to your chest. You can't even feel the tethers there. Your fingers move over the fabric of your shirt without catching, there's not tightness to pull, not warmth to catch. You feel cavernous, empty past empty. What the fuck is that thing.

Whatever it is it seems to have finished its evaluation of you. Finished working whatever spell it was weaving. It takes a step towards you. You don't wait for it to take another before running. Scrambling away from the broken seal of the door towards whatever is heavy and throw-able.

You do your best not to let blind panic take over, to not just run wherever feels safe. You've always thought it was silly when people in horror movies don't do the smart thing, but you've never been in a horror movie before. You bolt towards your bedroom. It's the best guarded room in the house. Even if you can't feel your magic it should still be there. Right?

You feel the swip of the things claws through the air as it tries to grab you. You run straight past your front door without a second thought, sure you don't want whatever that is to be unleashed on the general public. It's claws dig deep gouges into the plaster of your wall, and you pray it doesn't do the same to your bedroom door. You know it will, but it can't hurt to pray. You're not in the mood to be picky with magic right now.

You get your bedroom door closed just in time to hear it splinter as the creature throws itself against it. You don't bother with chalk, digging your athame into the door and scratching sigils and circles as quickly as you can. When you tap them they sit absolutely dead. You smack your hand against your messy circle, willing the magic to respond. You smack it again as the creature throws itself against your door. The circle stays as it was, motionless, silent, still as a drawing.

You are suddenly much more comfortable allowing panic to overtake you. If you're powerless there's really no reason to keep your emotions in check. Your breath heaves, short and quick as you back away from your door and look towards your window. No magic swirls, no books rip themselves from your shelves, your panic heightens and nothing happens. How mundane.

One of the creatures claws punches a hole through the center of your circle, then another, and another. You back towards your window as it grips the wood of the door and attempts to pull it from its hinges. Your fingers push at your window, try to find the seams of it, try to get it open. It doesn't budge, it feels like it's been painted on. You bang your fist against the glass without so much as a crack. The wood behind you splinters. The crunch of it deafening over the silence.

"Price, Price, fuck I am not fucking around Price please," You beg pressing yourself back against the window as the creature drops pieces of the door onto your floor. Even if your magic doesn't work his still must. You've never hear of a fae not responding to their name. Granted you don't know the full thing, you don't know if that's really his name and not just a nickname. It might hold no power without the tethers between you. That doesn't stop you from saying it like a prayer, hoping if you speak him into existence enough times he might come and save you.

Your shoulders are grabbed by an invisible force as you are physically shaken. Your ribs shake, muscles tensed too tight to even take a breath.

There is a wet ache spreading over your stomach, you begin to tilt your head down to see what's wrong and Price catches you. His hand holds the back of your head, pulls it back up and shoves it against his shoulder. "Don't look," he tells you just as quickly as he'd stopped you. You nod against his shoulder.

He pulls something from you, rips the proverbial bandaid off, and you bite him at the pain. It feels like your heart has been knocked out of place, like your ribs have been played as a xylophone. Your stomach twists on itself. Suddenly you are back in your kitchen staring at the cabinets, the space where the creatures antlers had scraped the ceiling. The scratches are still there.

Then the shaking starts. Every muscle in your body starting to unspool in a violent shudder that must quake the very earth you stand on. It's loud. The house is so loud. The wards are practically screaming at you, you threshold wails and sobs where it has been brutalized. Your back door is still swung open to red and orange leaves, a lovely autumn day that leaks the smell of wet earth into your home. Price turns to follow your shaking gaze and kicks the door shut behind him.

"What-" You can't get anything more out around the aftershocks of panic. You're sure your house must look like a war zone.

"Probably some American invention," Price mumbles, "You weren't under long, deep breaths."

You suck in a breath, press your know into his shirt to smell the cool tobacco. It helps. Price keeps a firm grip on the back of your head, keeps you looking where he wants you to while his other hand does something. He touches you in a way you can't explain. It's almost metaphysical the way he zips you up, just on the right side of freezing. You can almost feel his fingers moving muscle and viscera out of the way as he does whatever he's doing. Fixing whatever just happened.

"Fucking hell your wards shredded that thing, surprised it even had the strength to touch you," There's something at the edge of Price's voice, fear your think. You're not sure what he's scared of, it isn't a comforting sound.

"How're you-" You try to focus on the important questions, like why Price hasn't been shredded.

"You lit up like a damn Christmas tree, thought I was gonna have my own attack with the panic you shot my way," He draws his hand away from your stomach, apparently finished with his fussing, "wards were too busy to notice me slip in."

Makes sense, even now they're too busy with repairs to pay attention to your regular.

"It broke my door," It's funny what you latch onto once shock starts to set in. "What did it want?"

"Same thing we all want," Price tells you, and you hate hearing him say it(we), because he doesn't mean it kindly, "you."

#the way i gotta nerf witch to put her in danger #genuinely her wards cannot be broken #youre trying to breach fort fucking knox my friend #oc: witch #1fae1 #fae!Price #it feels very ooc writing witch with broken magic #idk if i like this one #very off the cuff and what not #the words simply pour out of me if im writing past 10pm #a ghost possesses me and compels me to write #anyway this is more creatures tryin to eat Witch #what a tasty snack she is no wonder price wants her all to himself #american myths genuinely scare me so bad #but this is a hannibal inspired monster

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