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arealphrooblem · 1 year

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Kidnapped by the Boss Part 3

CW: drugged/sedatives, death threats

synopsis: Civilian is a secretary to the Prime Minster. But when the political summit between the city states goes awry, she finds herself kidnapped by the very boss she tried to protect and nothing is what it seems.

Part 1 here

Part 2 here

Civilian’s gaze darted from the face of the prime minister, to the driver.

“That’s not possible,” they said weakly. “He’s the prime minister of my city-state.”

The driver rolled his eyes. “Do you know who the King of the Hidden City is? Have you seen him?”

“No. No one has.”

“Then how do you know he’s not it?”

She glared at him. “How do you know he is the king by that logic?”

The corner of the Prime Minister's mouth twitched, the way it always did when he tried to hide a smile that wasn’t politically appropriate. It felt like a splinter in her chest. He slowly rose to his feet.

“Before the two of you can dissolve into petty arguments over logical fallacies, I will have to confirm his statement,” he said. He looked down at her kindly, like a doctor about to break some bad news. “I am the king of the Hidden City. I became Prime Minister as a way to infiltrate the political landscape of the other cities.”

“Why though? Why go through all that trouble? The Hidden City shut themselves off from the rest of the continent, not the other way around. You don’t need subterfuge to interact with the other ministers — they would have welcomed a meeting with you.”

It was easier to poke holes in his information, to use logic to deny this reality, than to face the truth.

The Prime Minister studied her for a long moment, as if weighing his options. Then from the medkit he took a syringe and a vial of clear liquid.

A knot started to form as he turned back to her, holding the syringe loosely in his hand. “I could tell you exactly why,” he said. “I could explain in great detail everything I did while under your care, right under your nose, in the service of my greater goal. Or you could take this sedative, and be none the wiser, while he and I confer about the next phase of our plan.”

As much as she both craved and rejected the truth, she stopped herself from asking for it.

“There has to be a catch,” she said instead.

The driver leaned forward. “The catch is that the more incriminating information you know, the less likely it is you will ever leave our sight again without being in a body bag.”

Fear lanced through her, and she instinctively flashed her gaze to Prime Minister, as if he could give her any comfort. But he stared impassively back, wordlessly confirming it, because he could not protect her. He was the one she needed protection from.

“What is your choice?” he asked her.

This time anger flickered to life in her chest. “My choice? You mean between learning the truth and becoming your prisoner or putting my unconscious body at the mercy of two men who threatened to kill me?”

“You’re a prisoner either way,” the driver pointed out, oh so helpfully. “One imprisonment is a shorter duration than the other.”

“No harm will come to you while under the sedative,” said the Prime Minister. “You have my word.”

She swallowed thickly. “Like I can trust that anymore.”

“Now that you don’t have much choice in,” said the driver.

She was really starting to hate him.

“May I remind you, darling, that you wouldn’t be in this situation at all if you had simply gone to the hotel room instead of the parking garage,” Prime Minister added pitilessly. “Now make your choice.”

“ . . .The sedative,” Civilian muttered eventually.

The corner of the Prime Minister's mouth tipped up. “A shame. I would dearly love to keep you.”

She should not swallow thickly at the sound of that. She should not feel oddly flattered by it either. It was a pavlovian response at this point, for the Prime Minister always praised her efforts and she always inwardly preened each time.

To her horror, the Prime Minister handed the syringe and the glass vial to the driver and him him her weight and height.

“He’s going to do it?” she yelped.

The Prime Minister blinked. “Of course. You think I know how to accurately determine dosage and administer it in a safe manner?”

“And he does?”

The driver smirked, as if in on a secret joke.

“I mostly deal in unsafe dosages for more . . . permanent effects,” he said. “But I do have the experience.”

She felt like a cornered animal, except she didn’t even have the luxury of lashing out. Not outnumbered and trapped like this. Maybe oblivion would be better than the terror churning and building in her gut.

The Prime Minster oh so helpfully pulled out a rubber strap from the med kit. “Hold out your arm, love.”

Love. She could count on one hand how many times he’d called her that and it made her blush each time. He had to have known. He had to be doing it on purpose now, as if that would trick her into cooperation.

Civilian held out her arm, not because he called her love, but because she had no other choice. The Prime Minister wrapped it around her arm and tightened it while the driver measured out a dosage of the sedative.

A spike of wild panic flared up in her as the driver took hold of her arm and brought the needle to a vein. She swallowed it down, refusing to cower in his presence. The driver paused and met her gaze. For once he did not look at her with a smirk or derision. His expression was soft and serious.

“I promise you will wake up again,” he said quietly. “This dosage will wear off in a few hours.”

“I don’t need your comfort,” she snapped.

He gave her a look of pity that immediately insulted her. “You’re shaking.”

At least they had given her the choice, she thought, and then her thoughts turned slow and murky and then there were no thoughts at all.

Civilian awoke in a beautiful blue bedroom. For the first few hazy seconds, it looked like something underwater, a mermaid palace in the ocean. Then rational thought slowly trickled in and she recognized the silk wallpaper and lush carpet for what they were. Gold trim lined the walls and accented the velvet furniture. All the five star hotels she had stayed in with the Prime Minister could not compare to the obscene luxury of this room.

She also woke up alone. For a long moment she stayed down, eyes shut, trying to listen for the sound of movement, murmurs, footsteps.

Nothing.

Eventually she felt bold enough to sit up, and then to pad around the room, exploring. The ceiling was carved from dark wood, a chandelier bathing the room in a dim glow. A velvet sapphire couch sat at the foot of the huge bed. Dark velvet curtains hung over a floor to ceiling window, a little table and chair beside it.

Civilian investigated that first, peeking between them without disturbing them.

She saw nothing but darkness. That’s when she noticed the little golden alarm clock next to the bed. It was two in the morning.

No wonder she didn’t hear anything. Maybe they thought she would sleep through the night. A plan started to form. Hoofing it out of the Hidden City on foot was not great, but it was better than nothing and maybe she could steal a car on the way or call someone —

Her phone!

She hadn’t seen it since the parking garage. It must still be in the car . . . Back at the airport.

Well fuck.

Despair overwhelms her for a moment before she swallows that down as well. What’s one more thing to steal?

Two doors stood perpendicular to each other. The first one she tried swung open to reveal a luxurious bath, complete with clawfoot tub, glassed in shower, and a huge, lit mirror. A powerful urge to take a long depression bath gripped her.

God she could really go for a bath.

Focus.

With great reluctance, Civilian left the bathroom and tried the other door.

It was locked.

“Going somewhere?”

Civilian screamed, jerking hard enough to knock over the lamp next to her.

A laugh echoed somewhere to her right, but the room remained empty. Invisible hands picked up the lamp and righted it. Civilian stumbled back, her first wild thought flashing straight to ghosts. Maybe the Hidden City was full of ghosts and that’s why it never joined the coalition of the rest of the city states.

Then the air shimmered and the driver appeared before her, grinning wide.

“They might have heard you all the way back in Your City,” he said.

She stared at him. Powered individuals were exceedingly rare in her society. The war that splintered the country into the current city states killed many of the powered. And the rest were chased out, victims of resentment and suspicion. They had fled to the Hidden City, the only place that would accept them.

If anyone in her city was powered, they kept it a tightly guarded secret.

“How — how long have you been there?” she asked.

His grin melted into a smirk. “You snore when you sleep,” he said.

“You were watching me sleep?” she yelped.

“You’re a potential enemy in a hostile city,” he said. “You need protection for the length of your stay. Or at least, that’s what my king said.”

She crossed her arms. “And how long is the length of my stay?”

He shrugged. “Till he figures out what to do with you, I suppose. And until then, get used to seeing me around. Or not seeing, as the case may be.”

The thought of his invisible presence haunting her made her skin crawl. And she had almost taken a bath.

“Like a good little lapdog,” she said bitterly.

He gave her a flinty look before stepping forward until he crowded into her space. She refused to back up, jutting her chin up to meet his gaze.

“I’m the king’s right hand. I do whatever he asks of me,” he said softly. “I spy for him, I sabotage for him, I kill for him. Whatever he wants done with you, I will do it with no questions asked and no hesitation. Right now you’re lucky that’s only watching over you.”

“Well you can guard me from the other side of that door,” she whispered, trying to hide the way her voice shook.

A tiny smile lifted the corner of his mouth.“I’ll take it under consideration.”

Part 4 here

tagging: @rivalriotrenegade @sunyside-world @fishtale88 @those-damn-snippets @suspiciousmuffin

#hero x villain #villain x civilian #enemies to lovers #my writing #kidnapped by the boss #fantasci tumblr #writeblr #dark villain #villain x heroine

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darklinaforever · 21 days

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When I see people making entire posts and articles to defend the nice romantic interest in the love triangle where the heroine finds herself, with a villain / anti-hero, who also loves her, to explain that in fact morally the guy nice is more fair and normal and that the mean guy who is creepy and we shouldn't prefer him to the nice guy...

I always wonder what is in these people's heads.

Like... they think we're stupid ? That we are not able to see that the guy coding as a villain / anti heroes is problematic and sometimes downright creepy ? They really think they're teaching us the truth about the world with this kind of moralistic explanation / defense about a character who in the real world would actually be considered romantically good ? These people really have a problem with the difference in interpretation between reality and fiction ?

There's a very simple reason why in fiction, we sometimes prefers men with problematic traits. Because they are simply interesting. Especially compared to the normal guy the heroine will end up with.

Fact : Being a boring character in fiction is worse than being a character capable of murder.

And don't make me say what I didn't say. There are some very nice and very interesting characters in fiction too. Like Stiles from Teen Wolf or Peeta from The Hunger Games. They are simply written as real characters. And not just nice guys supposed to be a fairer path for the heroine to follow. They are interesting and convincing. Which sometimes “nice men” in love triangles just aren’t.

And sometimes there are villains who are not interesting because they have no characteristics other than wickedness or other negative aspects that can disgust us. A villain will often be appreciated for his intelligence and or certain human qualities that make him more complex than simply being evil.

So obviously, we're going to prefer this type of character for a ship, instead of the normal type who narratively barely contributes anything, and is barely a character at all.

And we're not even going to talk about the cases where the character supposed to be the bland nice man actually turns out to be a bigger asshole, objectively speaking and in reality, than the villain / anti-hero of the love triangle. Right, Malyen Oretsev ?

Anyway this is a post made out of the blue where I simply wrote down my thoughts as they came to me. I hope this is understandable. Anyway, these were my personal spontaneous thoughts. Don't hesitate to share your opinion on it.

#villain x heroine #heroine x villain #villains x heroines #heroines x villains #darklina #alarkling #anti malina #anti mal oretsev #reylo #kishigo #erikstine #daemyra #saurondriel #haladriel

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diaryofanobsessivefangirl · 6 months

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Ship Rec: Agatha x Dracula from BBC Dracula

I can't believe I've found, after YEARS, another story which is mainly focused on the villain/heroine and their connection. Not talking about all those other stories where a evil man desires/loves a virtuous woman, thought this my favorite kind of entertainment. I mean vxh where reciprocity is key, and their story speaks to not a particular love story, but as to love stories themselves.

Take away the carnage and different settings, and what do we really have in 3 episodes? Agatha, a curious fearless woman, eager to learn about a centuries long mistery of a man - to destroy him. And Dracula, out of equal curiosity and fascination, little by little allowing her in. Allowing someone in maybe for the first time, revealing himself. The parts that he exposes willingly and those he doesn't even know about, his deepest fear and his true nature.

A show that uses dark fantasy, vampires, supernatural elements as an allegory for a tale as old as time: a man meets a woman, and meets himself in the process.

#BBC Dracula #Dragatha #Dracula x Agatha #Villain x Heroine #THIS IS DOPE #I was not expecting to tear up in the ending

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hauntedheroines · 4 months

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Dark Ships from 2023

It's not the greatest year for villain/heroine or problematic ships I must say. It was really hard to find new juicy stuff but here is what I came up with by order of preference:

Homelander x Starlight (The Boys)

Homelander x Maeve (The Boys) - in a smaller scale

Agatha x Dracula (BBC Dracula)

Eren x Mikasa (Attack on Titan)

Debbie x Nolan (Invincible)

Ikaris x Sersi (Eternals)

Motoko x Puppet Master (Ghost in the Shell (1995))

Charlie x Charles (Shadow of Doubt)

Alice x Luther (Luther)

Gabriel x Michael (Star Trek Discovery)

Guts x Griffith (Berserk)

Happy holidays, everyone!

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my-complicated-pairs · 1 year

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For Reylo shippers

Here’s a friendly reminder that on my blog you may find lists of ships involving villains that had happy endings in canon and among them you may find some stuff that may be interesting for you~

List of canon villain x heroine ships with happy endings in live action movies

List of canon villain x heroine ships with happy endings in live action series

List of canon villain x heroine ships with happy endings in anime and manga

List of canon villain x heroine ships with happy endings in animation and comics (excluding anime and manga)

List of canon villain x heroine ships with happy endings in book series

List of canon villain x heroine ships with happy endings in standalone pieces of literature

List of canon villain x heroine ships with happy endings in visual novels and video games

List of canon villain x heroine ships with happy endings in music

#reylo #reylo vibes #list of canon villain x heroine ships with happy endings #villain x heroine

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tantive404 · 7 months

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Leia Organa as the Gothic Heroine

“Through a dream landscape, . . . a girl flees in terror and alone amid crumbling castles, antique dungeons, and ghosts who are never really ghosts.

She nearly escapes her terrible persecutors, who seek her out of lust and greed, but is caught; escapes again and is caught; escapes once more and is caught . . . [and] finally breaks free altogether, and is married to the virtuous lover who has all along worked (and suffered equally with her) to save her."

-Leslie A. Fledler, Love and Death in the American Novel

The gothic novel is a genre of literature that has grown increasingly compelling to me. Defined by its mixture of romanticism and horror— or “wonder and terror”, with a “loose literary aesthetic of fear and haunting”— these stories are known for their forbidden castles, ghostly mysteries, and, most centrally, their heroines, fleeing terrified into the night in a flowing white gown…

Over the years the gothic has become a genre dominated by the feminine and by women writers. And even though the first example of gothic literature, Horace Walpole’s The Castle of Otranto, was written by a man, the story is largely focused on its heroines. The central plot thread sees a corrupt tyrant prince pursuing a much younger princess for the sake of marriage and her desperate attempts to escape him, as she flees through his castle, through twisted corridors, trap doors, and all manner of danger.

I began to think of the relation between the archetype of gothic heroine and Star Wars’s female lead, Princess Leia Organa. After all, she is typically clad all in white and on the run from a dastardly Imperial villain of some sort. And it would not be so difficult for the Death Star to serve as an old manor, filled with secrets and danger… trap doors (garbage chutes), gaping chasms, masked phantoms (Sith Lords) and terrible, power-hungry old men.

The gothic heroine is a young woman often characterized by her virtue, innocence and beauty. She may be born into a position of high social status, with a wealthy or aristocratic family, or even be full-fledged royalty. Some time early in the story, however, she loses her privilege and power… orphaned, imprisoned, or otherwise inconvenienced. In Ann Radcliffe’s The Mysteries of Udolpho, for instance, our protagonist Emily St. Aubert lives an idyllic life with her well-to-do parents, only for both to die and her fortune to be lost in the first act, where she is then given into the power of her aunt and eventually her villainous uncle-by-marriage, Montoni. Leia, too, was a happy and beloved child as the Crown Princess of Alderaan, even with the shadow of the Empire looming overhead… but is captured on a fateful mission for the Rebellion and sees her planet destroyed for her troubles.

And while a gothic heroine may be physically frail she has the mental fortitude and agency to be the one who drives the plot forward. Leia, too, subverts being placed the box of “damsel in distress” with her strong will and her active fierce participation in the rebel cause.

The consistent pattern of “escaping and being caught” is another that Leia follows quite clearly throughout the original trilogy… when we first meet her, she is fleeing from her Imperial pursuers, only to be overpowered and captured. She’s taken aboard the Death Star, endures torture, and gets rescued… only for the next movie to involve yet another game of pursuit between her and Vader where she’s eventually caught yet again at Bespin. After another escape, she opens the subsequent film with an attempt to rescue her (not-so) “virtuous lover” from his prison… and she is made a slave. She escapes with her own ingenuity to rejoin the Rebellion, is nearly defeated in the perilous final battle at Endor, but with the help of her allies, wins the day and all is made right. A typical fairy tale ending.

And then there are her villainous persecutors, of which there are primarily three— Vader, Tarkin, and Jabba.

The gothic heroine is often menaced by a powerful man,?usually bearing misogynistic or patronizing sentiments. He is dark and threatening, yet can also be alluring… and the heroine strives to escape his oppressive power. So too with Leia, as representative of the Rebellion, seeking to destroy the oppression of the Empire.

In short, Star Wars is a very melodramatic, archetypal tale, and Leia’s journey both illuminates and subverts that.

#star wars #leia organa #wilhuff tarkin #darth vader #gothic heroines #villain x heroine #tarkin x leia #willeia #leia and vader #star wars a new hope #terrible analysis by tantive

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pianotuna · 2 years

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Characters: Bog King and Marianne

Media: Strange Magic (2015)

Voiced by: Alan Cumming and Evan Rachel Wood

Setting: Dark Forest / Fairy Kingdom

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

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beyond-far-horizons · 10 months

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Having won Mortal Kombat, Shang Tsung gives the imprisoned Sonya a way to save her friends and Earthrealm - by becoming his lover and queen. But the sorcerer isn’t going to get everything his own way…Exploration of Shang and Sonya’s power dynamics. Rated M for explicit content in later chapters.

Birthday gift for @twinsand!

#shang tsung x sonya blade #sonya blade #shang tsung #mortal kombat #mortal kombat 1995 #mortal kombat 2021 #mortal kombat 11 #my fanfic #enemies to lovers #heroine x villain #villain x heroine #villian shipping #my writing #so friends I've finally taken the plunge - eek #I'm gonna write something spicy but no it will not be called smut cos I hate that word lol #Sorry this is a bit late Sandy hope you like it!#Gonna crosspost on FFnet tomorrow

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thefudge · 11 months

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while i always want a different ending when it comes to stories like stoker (2013) and cerdita (2022), is there something to be said, narratively, about these young girls [REDACTED] the men who would relish in their darkness with them? is it meant to be a rite of passage after which they must then accept and live in their newly explored darkness but alone?

uuu yeah, i think so. it's definitely a rite of passage. those men are a stepping stone. they give the young girl what she craves most which is attention and significance. they make her feel important and like she matters and could be an actual agent of change. they make her feel wanted and seen as a budding woman in all her weirdness and clumsiness. once this is achieved, the young girl has to sort of complete the journey by not needing validation just from attention. she has to be able to bear solitude, like you said, to be alone in that darkness and inhabit it like a second skin. to be confident in her power, especially when it's not given by men. the bad man releases the girl from her chrysalis, but she has to fly; otherwise, there wouldn't be a point to him either.

i think there's also something here about killing the man as erotic penetration; as the young girl fucking the man

that being said! i want the alternative ending too sometimes haha that's what fanfic is for

#replies #my thoughts #villain x heroine #rites of passage

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minayuri · 7 months

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Rudolf Klein-Rogge and Gertrude Welcker in Dr. Mabuse, der Spieler (1922) - Part II | dir. Fritz Lang

#rudolf klein-rogge #gertrude welcker #dr. mabuse the gambler #dr. mabuse der spieler (1922)#dr. mabuse #countess dusy told #dr. mabuse x countess told #1920s #fritz lang #classic film #silent film #german cinema #weimar cinema #german expressionism #screencaps #dailyworldcinema #villain x heroine #my post

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fabledinflowers · 1 year

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Mask of Shadows chapter 1: the meeting

orignal villain x heroine story

TWs: grief, fantasy violence, sleep drugging, genre-typical leering and dubcon-ey implications (tame for now)

· · ─────── ·𖥸· ─────── · ·

The soldiers deposit you inelegantly on the throne room floor. Just hours ago you walked here arm-in-arm with Lysander, heads high, crowns glittering. Now the carpet is blackened with bootprints, the room dark and reeking of ash, the screams of your people ringing in the distance.

“Your grace,” a cool, masculine voice announces. “Welcome. I apologize for the crudeness of the circumstances, but I’m afraid I couldn’t wait for an audience.”

On the throne — your father-by-law’s throne, one day to be your husband’s — lounges a tall, lithe figure, cloaked in darkness. You can’t make out his face.

It doesn’t matter. You pull yourself up from the floor with as much authority as you can muster. “Call off your army at once. Whatever your demands, we can come to an agreement without this— this atrocity.”

He laughs, high and clear and ringing off the stone walls. Tears fill your eyes. You glimpsed the devastation yourself, as they dragged you across the courtyard: the smoke rising from the city, the wailing children and bloody cobblestones.

“Please,” you say, quietly.

The laughter stops.

“Do you know who I am, princess?” The figure asks, cold and imperious.

You do know. Or at least, there’s only one person he could be. “The Lord of Shadows.”

He rises from the throne, and it’s clear, now, how the shadows move around him unnaturally, almost like smoke, obscuring the details of his figure in the dark room. The rumors of his power are true, then. He’s haunted every report from the front for years, the subject of a gruesome children’s rhymes and hushed old soldiers’ tales alike. He summoned an army of demons out of the pits and bound them to his will, or so the stories say.

It’s no wonder the city garrison was no match for them. Men against monsters.

“Please,” you say again, trying to stay steady, “Where is my husband? And the king? They’re the ones you seek an audience with, not me.”

“I’m afraid that’s impossible. They’re dead, you see.”

Your breath freezes in your chest. “Dead.”

“My men slayed the king in his sleep,” he croons, descending the dias towards you. “A pity, really, that he missed all the excitement. Your prince performed quite admirably, rallying his guardsmen, leading the efforts to keep us from breaching the palace walls.”

“No,” You murmur, horror threatening to overwhelm you.

“But he was no match for my shadows.” The man lifts a hand and the shadows swirl around it, almost affectionate.

“No,” you repeat, your vision blurring, your pulse rushing in your ears. Your knees buckle and you fall again, crumpling to the carpet.

Dead. Lysander couldn’t be dead, he was so lovely, so strong and bright and full of life, already a king in the eyes of his people. You picture his gleaming gold hair, his brilliant smile, and a sob threatens to break you in half. “You’re lying!”

“Why would I?” He retorts coldly. “If he wasn’t dead, he soon would be. The city has fallen and the kingdom with it.”

“Why are you doing this?” You cry, caught between hate and sorrow. “What you do you want?”

The shadows obscure his face, masklike, as he comes to stand before you. “I want what all men want. A kingdom. Wrongs righted. A pretty little wife. I’ve worked very hard, for many years, to take what’s mine.”

You barely hear his last sentence, your mind halting at the list. Surely he couldn’t mean—

“What do you want,” You say slowly, trembling. “With me.”

The grief is too crushing to feel anything else, but you are aware, suddenly, acutely, that you’re alone with him and his armored men. There is no one who could help you, no matter how loudly you screamed.

“You’re a smart girl. I know you were listening,” he says. There’s a smirk in his voice. “Now, tell me —” He kneels, lowering himself to where you’ve collapsed on the carpet. “Which of the things I want have I not yet acquired?”

A pretty little wife. Loathing so hot it burns courses through you.

“My city burns and my king is dead.” you glare at him through tears. “You’ll have to spell it out for me, my lord.”

“How right you are,” he says, slick and pitying. “Thoughtless of me to not consider what a difficult ordeal you’re going through. Let me be quite clear, then.” He leans further in, and takes your chin in his hand, wrenching your face up towards his where you both kneel. His fingers are pale and slim, deceptively strong. “I want you to marry me.”

“Never,” you spit, more on instinct than anything, wrenching yourself from his grip. It’s too much. You can feel yourself verging on hysteria, dizzy with shock. The palace taken, the king dead, Lysander gone. You so vividly recall the last thing he said to you: I’ll be to bed soon, Cressida darling. I just want to make a round with the patrols. There’s been unrest at the north gate.

Perhaps if you’d begged him to stay with you, he’d still be alive.

“You—” It’s a struggle to speak at all around the emotions choking you. “You wage war on my kingdom, you kill my husband, and you expect me to marry you?”

Though you can’t make out any of his features through the writhing mask of shadows, you can somehow see his grin.

“You monster,” you hiss, hands fisting in your nightgown.

He laughs again, low and harsh. “Coming from your lovely mouth, I’m afraid the insult doesn’t have much bite.”

“I’d rather die than marry you.”

That, finally, raises his ire. His shadows flicker dangerously. “I’m afraid that’s not an option, my dear.”

A commotion sounds from the door far behind you: a sword colliding with shields, a grunted curse that makes your heart clench dangerously. You know that voice. Alayne.

One of the lord’s shadow guards staggers towards you, haggard from battle. “My Lord, a woman— was in the palace— broke through our ranks—”

The Lord of Shadows rises with the grace of a cat and holds up a hand to silence him. The scuffle at the door grows louder.

“Cressida!” Alayne yells, just before you can make her out— pale, bloodstreaked face, dark hair that matches yours, sword in her hand. A soldier brings the pommel of his sword down on her back hard, and you shriek, unable to stop yourself. She goes limp, falling to the floor. Her sword clatters on the stone.

“Alayne!” You cry helplessly.

With the tiniest nod of the Lord’s head, guards move to pluck her unconscious body from the ground. Tears escape your eyes freely, now, and you can’t stop them, even as his attention turns back to you.

“Your sister.” He’s detached as he considers you, still on the floor, helpless.

“Yes,” You manage. Your strength fails you in the face of your terror— Alayne, still alive. You had barely dared hope. How hard she must have fought to find you only to fall now. “Please don’t hurt her.”

He makes another motion, and the two guards who tore you from your bed and brought you here step forward.

“You’ve had a trying day,” he says, too patiently, “And I have much to attend to. Spend some time resting, and we’ll speak again after.” Addressing the guards now, he adds, “Take her to the tower.”

“No,” You object, not thinking clearly. “No, my sister—”

“Will be quite safe in my care, I assure you, so long as you don’t do anything foolish.”

The guards close in on you, one reaching for your arms, and you try to shove them away. “Let me go—Alayne!—”

You manage to hurt one, elbowing at his unarmored joints, and he grunts. “Bitch.” He aims a kick at your side, his armored foot sending a sear of pain through your ribs, and you cry out.

Suddenly, the man emits a strangled sound. You look up, and shadows wreathe him like vines, circling his neck. The lord of shadows has a hand extended, controlling them.

“I thought I was clear,” he snarls, and the shadows tighten. There’s a cold depth to his voice that isn’t human. “That she was not to be harmed.” The man chokes, clawing at his neck, but it’s a useless effort. His hands pass through the shadows.

You scramble backwards on your hands as the man drops to his knees, the other guard backing away. The one who kicked you lets out a final sputter and goes limp, his armor clanking where he falls.

For a moment, silence envelops the cavernous room. The Lord lets out a breath, tension slowly leaving his form. The shadows on the guard dissipate, though the ones near their Lord remain, restless.

“My apologies, princess,” he says at last, seemingly composing himself. He looks to a man in leather armor who stands near the throne. “Find a healer for her. Have them sent up.”

Your head swims. You realize that there’s a sticky heat blooming at your side where you were kicked— blood seeping through your nightgown. The armor on his boots must have had a sharp edge.

The pain setting in, your terror and shock drowning you, you feel only numbness as the Lord crosses to you and bends down. His shadows brush your skin, cold and vaporous. They almost seem to make a sound — a distant whisper.

He pulls you upright, gentle but firm, and you can do nothing but comply. For a moment you’re afraid you’ll fall again, but he circumvents the worry by hooking his arm beneath your knees and sweeping you into an effortless carry. As if you truly were his bride.

“Have that one put in a holding cell. See that she wakes.” He’s talking about—

“Alayne,” you croak, and he hushes you gently. His closeness is wrong, strange, nauseating, and he bears your weight too easily for someone so slender, his strength unnatural.

He carries you through the dark palace. Screams and shouts echo in the distance. “Stop this,” you beg. “You’ve won. Stop them.”

“I have. It’s over, I promise you. Merely the dying embers of a flame. You slept through the worst of it. I had your maid slip you something.”

“You —” You want to scream. You want to sob. You want to tear at his eyes and run a sword through his heart. You can’t breathe. The tower, he said to take you to. That’s not where your rooms are. How did he have you drugged? How does he know his way around the palace?

“How?” You get out.

He doesn’t answer you.

You can’t think any further before you realize you’re shaking uncontrollably, one side of your ribs on fire. You must let out a whimper, because he does speak, now: “Just a bit further, darling.”

“How dare you call me that,” you get out through chattering teeth.

The shadows must open the door for him, because there’s no interruption in his pace at the top of the stairs. He places you on a large, unfamiliar bed.

“I don’t understand,” You mutter, feeling delirium tug at you. “Any of this.”

“You will. In time.” Something cool touches your cheek. A shadow. As if it were caressing you. “Cressida.”

Something about the way he says your name is familiar. The sobs you’ve held back threaten to break free. “Who are you?”

The shadows still cloak his face and cling to his frame. He reaches out and touches a finger to your temple. “In time.”

You can taste the cold of his shadows, and everything goes dark.

#mask of shadows #villain x hero #villain x heroine #original fiction #villain romance #yes i am aware that mask of shadows is an existing YA book however: I do not care

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arealphrooblem · 1 year

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Kidnapped by the Boss Part 2

CW: gun mention, threats on Civilian's life, blood mention

Part One Here

The driver had seen too many action movies, Civilian decided. That’s why he sped like a maniac down the streets, swerving between cars, skidding down right turns at the last second like he was in a spy movie. One such sudden turn flung Civilian hard enough into the side door that she cracked her head against the glass window. Pain exploded against her head, and nausea in her gut. For a moment she could hear only the ringing in her ears.

Then she felt hands clenching at her dress, at her waist, dragging her across the seat until she sprawled into the Prime Minister’s lap. His arms wrapped tightly around her, their chests pressed close enough he must have felt her raging heart against his own. He buckled the seat belt over both of them, the click of it like a key in a lock.

Dazed by pain and shock, she did not fight him. Her face pressed against the crook of his neck, the warmth of his skin, the intoxicating smell of his cologne filling her nose. She focused on the warm, woody notes of it as he barked something harshly to the driver in that foreign language.

“I can’t shake the tail!” The driver snapped back. “The fuck do you want me to do?”

She felt the sharp inhale from the prime minister against her chest, before a muttered curse. Fingers dug out her ear-piece; it was unceremoniously tossed out the window.

“There was a tracker in her ear-piece,” he said. “I took care of it. Now get us to the plane — in one piece preferably.”

Civilian’s stomach dropped at the sound of the plane. But what could she do — fling herself out of a car moving at 80 miles an hour?

In front of her the driver let out an impressive swirl of curse words from both their languages. “You should have fucking shot her in the parking garage.”

The Prime Minister responded in the other language, tone gently rebuking, almost sounding like the person she had thought he was. Whatever he said, gentle tone aside, was enough to shut the driver up for the rest of the ride.

Face pressed into his neck, his hand cradling the back of her head (a seemingly comforting gesture used to keep her blind), Civilian couldn’t see their journey or destination. She ran through all the airports around the city they knew of — both public and private. But if they suspected the Prime Minister of getting kidnapped or running away, wouldn’t the airports be the first place they look?

Maybe then, if Civilian could run, she could find some help. Or at least blend in with the crowd if they could get off the runway and into the airport itself. It sounded like an insane plan at best, but she knew if she set foot on that plane, no one would ever see her again.

For the rest of the car ride she counted her breaths. In for four counts, hold for four counts, out for four counts. The same trick she had taught the Prime Minister for his first major televised speech. Her nerves felt like one stray thought away from completely shattering and she could not afford to shatter.

The smell of the Prime Minister's ungodly expensive cologne both distracted her and grounded it. It was a scent that she had associated with the fond glow in her chest when she heard his voice. Despite everything she thought she knew about him laying crushed at her proverbial feet, the smell still comforted her.

How many times had she daydreamed some wildly unrealistic event that would lead to this near exact position? How many times had she imagined rolling her ankle in heels and limping until he swept her up and carried her so she could press her nose in this exact place on his shoulder, feel his arms around just like this?

How twisted that she got her wish in the worst way possible.

The car stopped so abruptly the seat belt tightened like a vice against them. Before the key could slide from the ignition, the Prime Minister unbuckled them and flung the door open.

“Come,” he said against her ear. “Fast and quiet, darling.”

Even in such dire circumstances, Civilian could not stop the hard swallow from imagining a different context for those words.

He nudged her ahead of him out the car door. The second her feet hit the ground, she ran. Even before she took notice of her surroundings, she ran. She saw the plane looming before her and took off in the opposite direction.

Nothing but a wide open field stretched before her. Night was rapidly descending. Logically, running away in a strange place in the dark was the kind of decision the head of security would rake her over the coals for. But panic had well and truly set in. She couldn’t do nothing and she couldn’t set foot on the plane.

So she ran.

Scraped footsteps followed behind her. The sound of it kick-started a rush of energy like nothing she felt before, the kind a prey animal feels at the sound of the hunter. She ran faster than she ever did on her high school track team.

But it wasn’t fast enough. In seconds, arms grabbed her roughly from behind and yanked her to a hard, unforgiving chest. They both stumbled backward for a second, but the person behind her recovered first. Before she could lunge from their grip, the cold steel of a knife rested against her throat.

“If you were as smart as he always bragged about, you would stand very still right now,” came the voice of the driver against her hair.

And just as movement had exploded from her before, stillness locked her limbs up just as suddenly.

The Prime Minister walked briskly towards them, until he stopped just a few inches shy of her, his polished loafers nearly brushing up against her filthy toes.

“As admirable as your spirit is, we do not have time for it,” he says, eyes dark and somber. “So allow me to make something very clear to you: you are alive and breathing right now because I allow it. That could change at any moment, with just a snap of my fingers. So if you value your life as much as I do, you will cooperate. Do you understand?”

In two years of close quarters, Civilian had seen him giddy, anxious, hangry, pouty, serene, and frustrated. Before today she had never seen him so commanding, cruel, or dangerous. It felt like witnessing a demonic possession, seeing this side of him. It couldn’t be real. It couldn’t be him.

“Civilian — do not make me ask again.”

She nodded, slowly, because what else could she do? His gaze softened, his hand reached up and brushed his thumb across her lower lip. The salt of his skin stung the cut on her lip as he wiped the blood away.

“Good girl. Now walk onto that plane and give us no further trouble.”

The private jet was by far swankier than any the Prime Minister had taken before. Lush carpet hugged her aching feet as he led her towards one of the wide, squashy leather armchairs with a firm hand on the small of her back. A wide screen television sat before her, mounted on a divider wall, a glimpse of a large bed peeking out on the other side.

The driver headed straight into the cockpit, exchanging foreign words with the pilot. The Prime Minister bent down and opened a small fridge off to the side.

“Water?” he offered. “Or perhaps something stronger?”

As tempting as the offer was, Civilian shook her head. The pit in her stomach had eased somewhat, but the pain in her head and now her feet had not lessened. She would probably puke whatever she ingested.

“Perhaps later, then.”

He took a bottle of water out and set it on the small wooden table next to her chair. His eyes darted over her face, taking in her undoubtedly ragged appearance. Other than his hair, which the car ride had mussed, he still looked as immaculate as when he stepped out of the hotel room.

“You’re bleeding,” he said.

Civilian didn’t notice and didn’t care. She had other, more pressing, concerns.

“What’s going on?” Her voice, so strong-willed in her head, came out shaky and weak. “What’s going to happen to me?”

Instead of answering, he walked to a small overhead compartment and pulled out a first aid kit and a rolled cloth napkin. Then he returned and knelt down on his knees before her. Civilian’s heart stuttered in her chest in both fear and twisted longing.

He pulled the ring out from the napkin and set it on the table. Engraved into the gold was the crest of the Hidden City’s flag, unchanged for the last one hundred years. Her eyes fixated on it, a puzzle piece she couldn’t make fit.

Meanwhile, the Prime Minister opened the bottle of water and wet the cloth. He raised it to the side of her head and gently wiped away the blood that had dripped down her cheek. For the first time she noticed the small spot of blood on his shirt collar, from her lip.

A kiss.

“Sir?” she dared ask again.

He dabbed more water onto the cloth, ruined now by smears of red. “We are going to the Hidden City. As for what happens to you there . . .that depends on you. The more cooperative you are, the less likely it is that I will have to hurt you.”

Once again, the clashing dichotomy of such a sweetly familiar face saying such terrifying words makes her head swim. The Prime Minister used to rescue spiders and stink bugs from hotel rooms rather than kill them. Now he threatens violence as easy as breathing.

“Who are you?” she demanded, throat tightening with unshed tears.

“That’s the King of the Hollow City,” came the driver’s voice, stepping out of the cockpit.

tagging: @rivalriotrenegade

Part 3

#hero x villain #villain x civilian #villain x heroine #enemies to lovers #fantasci tumblr #dark villain #boss x secretary

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darklinaforever · 20 days

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@aleksanderscult

youtube

“But what no one knew is that the king of the goblins had fallen in love with the the girl, and he had given her certain powers.”

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diaryofanobsessivefangirl · 1 month

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3. Oh!! Also Alfred Hitchcock’s Shadow of a Doubt. There’s a film called Stoker which is loosely based on it too. Ok sorry now I’m done lol

Have I already told you guys I've failed you??? Like I've received this more than THREE YEARS AGO and I'm only answering it now

Both anons: thank you so much for your recommendations. Shadow of a Doubt was a fascinating watch. I've always considered edgy vintage movies like this a finding, really puts you into perspective art and entertainment was provoking even at it's earliest stages and people have always been aware of the darker shades of human experience, even in 50s when entertainment seemed so whimsical.

I think it's even more edgy then today's media because the censorship at the time demanded this secrecy and subtext that makes you feel like you're watching something forbidden and wrong. The more explicit-to-be-shocking movies are, the more normal the taboo themes presented seem to be. I loved Shadow of Doubt way more than Stoker for that reason. Sue me.

As for the ship itself, I don't consider it very shippable because although they always speaking about their connection, there is nothing in their personalities that seen to connect. Stoker tried to fix this by making the main girl a potential killer like her uncle, but it created a whole different problem which was I don't understand the character at all nor consider the ship villain/heroine.

However, things begin to look more shippable when seen through another perspective. What if, because of censorship or just an artistic choice, the serial-killer uncle was simply an allegory for a darker theme: the molester uncle. Instead of murder which results in a major personality difference between him and Charlie and kind of diminishes the presumed connection between them, the creators wanted to tell a different story? One in which the crime that tears them apart is not contradictory to, but rather a direct consequence of their unconventional bond.

Suddenly the main girl having a platonic crush on her uncle before the reveal seems a lot more relevant to the plot. Her uncle manipulating her to keep it a secret by using her mother (his sister) mental health as leverage too. It still makes sense in a serial killer plot, but this way just feels more real, something that could and does happen, when relatives cross the line of fraternal love.

Also ready a lovely theory about how the protagonist's mother relationship with uncle Charlie was probably emotional incest when they were young and when Charlie (main girl) is born, her mother unconsciously assign her daughter to be her substitute - to be for him something she could not be. It's canon in my opinion. Makes everything a lot more interesting.

#Shadow of Doubt #Villain x Heroine #Wincest

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