I remember scrolling through your page and seeing an ask where someone claimed they’d sell their soul to satan for a snippet, and I can’t help but relate…any new snippets for Tideswept👀 that last one was super juicy
That Satan is really getting his money’s worth off my writing! Meanwhile, I’m just delighted someone wants a snippet<3 This fic was going to be my New Year’s Eve update, but unfortunately it’s not quite ready, and since I don’t want to rush it just to post it on the day, it will be a new year update instead. But in the meantime, have another snippet!
(Follows the last one, just in case there was any fear I’d leave you hanging this chapter, communication-wise ;))
He looked so surprised to see her, if she hadn’t been so nervous, Makino thought she might have found it more gratifying.
Taking off his glasses, “What are you doing here?” Shanks asked, before he froze, as he seemed to get a proper look at her, his wide eyes raking across her, and she saw the moment he recognised the oversized coat she’d pulled over her nightgown, and didn’t seem to know which detail to focus on, before he finally settled for an incredulous, “Did you walk here by yourself?”
She couldn’t tell if he sounded more shocked or angry, but then wondered if even he knew. But at least the answer to that was explained by her presence; as for his first question, that was slightly trickier, but while she wasn’t rightly sure what she was doing, before she could lose her courage, Makino let it take her.
Shrugging off his heavy coat, it fell to the planks around her ankles, before she toed off her boots, and his eyes widened when she reached for the ribbons holding the nightgown closed.
“What are you doing?” Shanks rasped, taking a step towards her. “Stop.”
She didn’t, the lowest ribbon coming loose, before she reached for the one above it, and his voice scraped from him, firmer now as, “Stop,” Shanks said. “Makino!”
But she didn’t stop, the second ribbon yielding, and the third, but as she reached for the last, a big hand seized hers, stopping her.
Her eyes shot up to his, sharpened steel under his scars now. She could feel her heart pounding in her breast, but didn’t look away, and this time it was pain that roughened his voice as Shanks asked her, “What are you doing?”
Holding his eyes, she didn’t care that her voice wavered. Her heart was steady. “What does it look like I’m doing?”
Shanks didn’t answer, but then in that moment Makino wondered if he could have managed.
His hand hadn’t released hers. Makino felt how it shook, the veins in the back pronounced, and thin silver scars covering his fingers. The intimate candlelight deepened his colours, the red of his hair and the dark scruff of his beard. It danced over her skin, flushed under her freckles where the nightgown hung open, held together by the remaining ribbon between her breasts.
His eyes searched hers, as though trying to root out the reason for her behaviour from them. Makino only met them, her battle strategy offered and her armour shucked. But then with all the advice she’d been given, to go to war, to think like a swordsman, she’d failed to account for herself. And so here she was, not as a queen or a warrior, but as the person she’d always been, since long before the Fates had bound their threads.
Taking his hand, she coaxed it to loosen its grip, cradling it between hers. And if she had carried a weapon, it would have been across the palms of her hands, lifted in offering.
“Shanks,” Makino said. Not my king. Not even Captain.
She felt him tense as she brought his hand to her waist, the broad span of his fingers covering it easily, a shock of warmth through the sheer fabric of the nightgown. The tendons under her hands were taut, the spread of his fingers bunching in the fabric, but he didn’t pull it away.
Eyes like grey steel bore into hers as she lifted them from their hands, her smaller one spread over his. It barely covered his knuckles.
“Why are you here, my girl?” Shanks asked her, the deep pitch of his voice on the verge of breaking.
Makino met his gaze calmly. Her voice when she spoke was gentle, not a shiver in it now. “I’m here for my husband.”
Something passed through his eyes, a flash of feeling, there before it was gone.
The broad hand under hers lifted from her waist, but just as she thought he’d pull away, Shanks raised it to her cheek, brushing away her hair where it tumbled around her shoulders.
She watched as his eyes lowered, hooded under his scars as he took her in, the way he had on their wedding night. He towered above her, but this time she met his observation without cowering, her chin lifted and her own eyes gentle.
A crooked knuckle brushed the peak of her breast through the nightgown, her breath catching as she shivered, and saw his hand where it paused.
“You’re nervous,” Shanks said, and she wondered what he’d expected her to say to that, because it wasn’t the huff that left her.
“Of course I’m nervous,” Makino snapped. “I’ve never done this before!” And before he could catch up, said, with every ounce of prim defiance she possessed, “That doesn’t mean I don’t want to.”
She was running at the mouth now, but then in terms of battle strategies, she hadn’t planned further than stripping off her nightgown, and since that hadn’t worked, plain speech would have to do.
“I want this,” she said, and heard how her voice wavered now, her tears spilling over, but didn’t stop. “You. I’ve been trying to make it clear, but short of bringing an accompanying chorus, I don’t know what I have to d―”
His mouth caught hers, seizing the words and her breath in a kiss so fierce it lifted her toes off the planks, a big hand reaching to cradle the back of her head, pulling her close, and her relief was so fierce she might have sobbed.
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In mine and many other east Asian cultures, the dragon traditionally symbolises things like power, wealth and strength (imperial symbol and all)
I think we often forget that in the story of the Great Race, the dragon came in fifth because it'd stopped to give people rain. Then it'd stopped again to push a rabbit adrift on a log across the wide river so it reached the shore safely (that's why the Rabbit year comes before the Dragon).
Dragons aren't meant to just be powerful - they are meant to do good with such power, and to help those in need.
So in this lunar new year, I hope you gain more power, so that you might be able to help others. I pray you have abundant resources so you may give to yourself and those around you. I wish you courage, endurance, kindness and generosity, for yourself and your people.
I hope you, and I, will be rain givers, life preservers, joy bringers.
I hope we will be dragons.
Extremely belated postscript that should have been here far earlier:
Free Palestine, Free Sudan, Free Congo 🇵🇸🇸🇩🇨🇩
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