As they talk, Leraye seems to find a comfortable grip on the back of the horse and starts dragging it back and forth across the table, wood skidding on wood.
"...Who was her father?" he asks slowly.
"I don't know. I never got his name. We met at a tavern."
"In Fhirdiad?"
"Hm...maybe?" Byleth says. Then, "Oh."
"He was blond, I suppose?"
Her eyes fixed on his, Byleth nods. "He was."
"Caught up in his own troubles? Stumbled out afterwards without so much as asking for your name?"
"Something like that," Byleth murmurs. She's pulled Leraye protectively into her lap, but she's watching him with curiosity. Interest.
A Closer Look by Ammeh
LERAYE IS BACK 🙌
I am a big sucker for Long biblical fics but this 1.7 k words fic is so tasty and short I can eat up like candy anytime, anywhere, not much time invested and it's perfect. Living in my mind and heart since 2023 🫰. And of course, had to draw these scenes that has been haunting me since that year And tbh I am not done yet LOL I NEED TO DRAW MOOORE
Attaching the whole page to show the references used for this practice.
My original ideas were slightly different in color settings, but I went with the vibrant colors of the references in the end because i can't make bold decisions T__T (and also i love using EVERY COLOR / I struggle using a limited color pallet tbh C': ).
Check the first post here
195 notes
·
View notes
Someone makes a choked, shocked sound. Someone else yelps. It occurs to Ace, somewhere between the howling in his ears and the ache in his lungs and the taste of salt and iron flooding his mouth, that this is probably pretty surprising for his brothers to witness. Maybe even downright upsetting.
The thing is, Ace was wading into the jungles on his own as early as four years old. Dadan taught him how to do basic shit like talk and wipe his ass, but he honestly didn't have a ton of human interaction before meeting Sabo. And the thing about Sabo was that he had more than enough human interaction for the both of them. Ace learned some manners from Makino, but while Sabo was still around, there wasn't really any reason to get... good, at people.
But then Sabo died, and Ace needed to teach himself not only to talk his way out of trouble but also how to be the nice brother, how to treat Luffy with the softness he needed and deserved, how to gentle his hands and his voice and his words. So Ace did that, because he needed to, and it turned out to actually be pretty useful for dealing with people when he wasn't actively looking for a fight. So he stuck with it.
Which is all to say that by the time he'd joined up with Whitebeard, Ace was as close to tame as he had ever been. Almost downright domesticated.
Ace snaps his head to the side, putting some real momentum into it, heaving with all his weight until something tears. When he drops to his feet he springs right back up again, lunging. He spits out his mouthful as he goes, lets his jaw drop open.
The thing is, Ace is a child of the wilderness. He raised himself among that wilderness, and then he raised Luffy among that wilderness. He's a son of the jungle at heart, no matter how good he's gotten at pretending to be a person.
The sea-stone cuffs are chaffing his wrists. He feels tired and heavy, but he doesn't need his fire to be dangerous. Doesn't even need his hands.
Teeth find an artery. Body-hot blood sprays his face as Ace bites down, lock-jawed and snarling. Rears back and rips.
Another marine goes down. Ace spits out a chunk of the man's throat and is already rounding on a third. Notices, with a vague annoyance, that he's gonna need to find a toothpick -- there's a scrap of tendon or something caught in his teeth.
Mmm. Boar. They had pork for dinner, ah, the other night? Three days ago? Something like that, but it doesn't taste the same as wild boar does. And anyway, meat on the Moby is always overcooked. Ace is allowed to eat blue steak, but everybody always yells at him when he tries to steal bites of poultry or Sea King or whatever else while it's still tender and bleeding. This fight is giving Ace a real craving!
Duck. Lunge. Bite down, hard, thunder of a rabbit-quick pulse against his tongue, bulge of tender flesh against his soft palate. Iron and salt in his mouth.
Fear has a flavor. It is bitter and acrid, reminiscent of char, and Ace hadn't liked it much when he was young and still learning how to hunt. It stiffens up the meat, too, makes it kinda chewy. Somewhere along the line, he'd acquired a taste for it, though. He still marks it as a point of pride, his ability to hunt and kill prey without it ever knowing he was there, roasting something that is tender-sweet and gives easily under his teeth -- but the taste of fear isn't so bad either. Sometimes he even prefers it, gets a craving for it. Like wild boar, he hasn't had it in a while. Maybe he'll chase down his own dinner tonight.
Ace rears back. Muscle fibers split, skin stretches until it snaps. A heave, and a body crumples to the ground, gurgling. He gnaws kind of idly on his mouthful while he catches his breath, snorting blood out of his nose and straining his ears. Sounds like the fight's over, then.
Another lump of trachea gets spat into the dirt. Ace turns to face his brothers, counting heads -- good, it looks like nobody got hurt too bad, everybody is still standing! He grins. Ah, they're all pretty pale though, that's a little bit concerning, he hopes nobody's in shock. He learned from Marco that that can happen to anybody, even if they've been in a whole lot of fights.
"Hey!" Ace chirps. "Is everybody okay?" His wrists are killing him. Also, he really needs a shower. He's got blood in his ears, how the hell did that happen? But first he jogs over to where the others are all standing, clumped together, still just. Kinda staring at him.
Okay. Concerning. "You guys alright?" He asks again, lower. "Is anybody hurt? What happened?"
"Ace, man," Deuce says. His voice sounds kind of shaky. He drags a hand through his hair, fucking it up even worse than it already is. "What the fuck was that?"
114 notes
·
View notes
((listen y'all i know i missed sinday but lordy
i have been listening to/watching this on loop for the last few days and the song is such a childe anthem, not to mention that the combat animations are 👌👌👌
needless to say this has resulted in childe being 10000% FERAL in my headspace asdflkjdsf he wants to absolutely destroy somebody so goddamn badly, he's losing his mind guys askfjsd
and he's not picky, either—he'd happily take "destroying" someone in the "screaming in agony" way OR the "screaming in pleasure" way (preferably both tbh)
so uh
y e a h
that's it that's the post asddlfkds i just had to share this idiot's Ultra-Unhinged(TM) mood with you guys 😔💦🔥 please carry on and have a nice day))
2 notes
·
View notes