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wolfstardaughter-jj · 5 months

Text

DENSE

Summary: Yule Ball is right around the corner and you still haven't found a date. Or at least decided on asking someone as a date. But your heart is set on a certain redhead who just isn't taking a hint and is as dense as a rock.

Pairing: Fred Weasley x reader

Song: Must be Love by Laufey

Warning: fluff, anxiety rant (reader stressed with school)

Word count: 4.8k+

A/n: honestly I started this around February this year and forgot about it... yeah that bad. I wanted to get it out of my system since it's been there for a while. This was actually meant to be part of my serendipity book but i still havent written the other chapters but I really like this chapter. Either way I hope you lovelies will enjoy it, Happy holidays<3333

~~~~~~~

Everyone was ecstatic from the announcement of the Yule ball. It was the first ever dance they were to have at the school and everyone was already starting off their plans on what to wear and who to go with. With the Triwizard tournament at hand, you were glad there was something to take your mind off the stress.

Training and helping Harry through all of the practices were starting to wear you out.

At the moment, all of you were in the Great hall simply studying. You were nearly done with your assessment when from the corner of your eye, you spot Fred throwing a piece of paper towards his younger brother.

Ron raised his head up in annoyance, wondering why his brother would want to disturb him. He opened the ball of crumpled paper and read the words "you better get a move on or else there won't be any girl to ask to be your date." Or something like that, he only skimmed through it.

Ron gave Fred an annoyed stare, "Who are you going to the Yule ball with then?"

Fred crossed his arms and sent Ron a smirk, "Well, I still have to ask them. I’m thinking on doing it really soon,"

Your ears prick up at his words. He's planning on asking someone else to the ball? Of course he'd be going with someone but you had always hoped it would be you.

Your heart sank at the mere thought he was going to ask someone else to the Yule ball.

Ron looked surprised, he thought that Fred had already asked you but he was wrong. He looked towards you, seeing you leaned over your assessment, looking like you didn't care to pay mind to what he and Fred were talking about. But in truth, you did care, you cared a whole lot.

"How about you Y/n? Who are you going with? Lots of guys have been asking you lately, it shouldn't be too hard to choose one." Ron asked, not knowing that this was sparking a little jealousy in Fred.

You looked up from your paper and looked at Ron. You saw the worried glances Harry and Hermione were sending your way.

"I won't tell you cause it's a surprise." You whispered back with a wink before looking back down on your activity.

Fred tensed up at your words, it sounds like you already accepted to be someone’s date. He didn't want to pry on who it was in case he might get his heart even more broken, but of course, curiosity got the best of him.

"Really? Why am I only hearing of this now?" Fred asked.

"Well technically they haven't asked me yet so I'm going to ask them instead." You replied courtly.

Fred seemed perplexed. They haven't asked her to the ball yet? What an idiot. Oh god wait, is she planning on asking that Beauxbatons girl? No she wouldn't, she would have told me.

"...so who's the lucky girl- or guy?" Fred stumbled on his words as he leaned in. He really wanted to know who it was, even if it was at the expense of his own feelings.

You look at him with a grin, trying to mask the slight nervous breakdown you were having within. It was ironic that he was asking about this especially since it was him you were talking about.

"I'm not telling you who it is, Freddie. Like I said, it's a surprise." You state as you finish up your assessment.

"Oh come on, you don't need to tell me their name. Maybe give me some clues? Like which school they're going to-"

You narrowed your eyes at him, knowing how stubborn he was going to be about this. "Well that would just narrow down your possible choices."

He started shaking your arm like a child asking their parents for a sweet in a sweet shop. "Come on, just tell me."

You shook your head and laughed at his dramatics. "Fred, you should finish up your activity."

"Hey, don't change the subject." Fred pointed out.

"You're not gonna do it till I tell you, huh?" You said with an unimpressed stare.

"Nope. Now can you at least tell me one thing?" He urged on.

You let out a sigh as you went deep in thought. Do you really want to help him in finding out who it is or leave him to his madness. You decided on the first choice. It wasn't like he was gonna figure out it's him.

"They're studying here at hogwarts."

"...Yeah, that totally narrows down the choices." Fred sighed. "Which house are they in?"

You chuckled, "like I'd tell you that. That would make it too obvious."

Hermione laughed from the other side. "Y/n, even if you say what house they're in, I don't think they'll be able to figure out who it is."

You thought about it for a second and realized she had a point. "Huh, you're right." You agreed with a chuckle.

"What's that supposed to mea- you know what, I don't wanna know. What I do wanna know is, who this person is." Fred was adamant at finding out who the mystery person was, and it was starting to make you nervous that he might actually figure it out.

He sat up once he found an alternative solution to his predicament. "Oh, I know, I'll name a bunch of people, and you tell me if they're the person. Okay?"

"What if I lied and said no even if they were the person I was going to ask to the ball?" You smirked, which was only returned with an unimpressed glare.

Fred was about to say something but decided against it. "I'll just do it anyways… is it Diggery."

You shook your head a no.

"Draco?"

You cringed at the thought, no offense to Draco. Besides you knew he had his eyes in a certain Gryffindor. "Godric no, he's already planning on going with someone else."

Both Harry"s and Fred's eyes seemed to widened at the statement, Harry seemed even more surprised.

They both yelled out in unison, "He is?!”

Snape went in to scold the two for their outburst. Removing 5 house points from each of them. Causing the surrounding students to send their glares towards the two.

“Yes he is! Now hush the both of you!” You scolded as you continued with your work.

“Right, I shouldn't get distracted… How about that Freya girl?" He spoke her name in doubt, scared that he might be right.

You chuckled at the mention of her name, "No, she's going with her girlfriend."

Fred's heart settled at the realization, abit shocked by the new information but he was delighted to have that thought settled in his mind. That means you weren't going to act on your childhood crush. But then the thought entered his mind that it meant you were planning on going with someone else, someone he wasn't aware of.

"How about… Neville?"

"Already going with someone."

"Dean?"

"He plans on asking someone else."

"Zabini?"

"Nice guy but no."

"Nott?"

"He's going stagg."

"I don't know why I'm even asking this but, how about Lee?"

You immediately shook your head a no.

Lee perked up from his seat at the mention of his name. "Huh? I heard my name, what's going on."

George leaned over and told Lee about the situation.

"Ohhh, I see." Lee chuckled, "this is going to be fun." He whispered back.

"Godric...well uh, is it Louis?" Fred guessed. At this point he didn't know who else could be the possible match.

"No. He is a good option but no." You simpered on, wondering where this conversation was going to take you.

"I give up on doing this, just answer my questions." Fred continued. "Do you talk to them everyday?"

The question seemed vague enough for him to not know who so it didn't hurt to answer him. “Yes,”

Fred went deep in thought, why did he even choose this question? "Who would you be talking to that I wouldn't know about...

You all chuckled to hear his words, he may seemed to be really observant when it came to you but completely oblivious at the same time.

"Oh wow Fred, you take note of who y/n talks to everyday?" George teased, though Fred didn't really see it that way.

"So what? I'm with her almost all the time, I would know who she'd be talking to." Fred explained.

"You aren't with her all the time. What about during class hours?" Hermione stated.

Fred looked dumbfounded, he didn't think of that.

Harry leaned over to you, making sure no one else heard him other than you, "I wonder how long it's going to take for him to realize it's him."

"Give it 2-3 business days." You replied with a chuckle.

Fred turned back to you with another question in mind. "What does their name start with?"

You shook your head with a chuckle. "I'm not going to answer that."

"Ugh, fine. Are they taller than you?"

You laughed at his question, "Yes." By a lot.

"That question doesn't even help. Lots of people are taller than Y/n." Harry commented earning a smack on the head from you. You caught Fred laugh at his joke which you used to your advantage.

You gasped and feigned an insulted look, "Okay, ouch. I was just thinking about telling you who it was but I changed my mind." You scooted away, with a false pout.

Fred laughed, trying to pull you back to him by pulling you by the waist. "I'm only joking, love."

You replied with an eye roll, trying to conceal the grin that slowly crept onto your lips.

You began packing your things before facing Fred again, "Seeing as you're not doing the activity, I'm going to go and spend the rest of the period outside."

“Oh come on, tell me who it is.” Fred stated with a pout as he theld onto your hand to keep you from leaving.

“Like I said before, no.” You replied with a teasing grin before grabbing the rest of your things.

You stood up from your seat and handed in your paper to Snape. He seemed to have been listening in on your conversation. He seemed to find your conversation quite amusing.

"If that Weasley boy doesn't ask you soon, I think it's better you accept Diggery's offer." He suggested in his usual monotone voice but there was this spark of interest in his eyes on the topic which surprised you.

“Professor Snape!” You laughed, surprised by this side of your professor.

“I'm just saying,” He simply shrugged before walking off with your work.

~~~~~~

The following day was hectic, more so than usual.

Most of the classes were finishing up their lessons so that during the holiday break you'd all be free from the burdens of school work. But it didnt help when they just piled more school work over the other to cram everything in one go.

Things seemed worse for you since you had decided to take up more classes this year. Not just that, but you somehow tangled yourself into becoming a some sort of charm fixer for the younger years whenever they'd mess up a spell.

And because Harry got himself stuck with being a triwizard champion for Hogwarts. You had to help him with spells and charms just so he could survive the challenges. You wouldn't be able to to live with yourself if anything were to happen to him under your watch.

As the holiday's were approaching, the only decent things about your schedule was the dance classes in between subjects. You had already learned how to waltz when you were a girl. Your parents weren't ones to host glamorous balls but your grandparents were. You had fond memories of your dance classes during your summers spent abroad. Twirling endlessly in studios till your head wouldn't stop spinning.

McGonagall appeared at the front of the hall and cleared her throat to call the attention of the crowd. "find your partners everyone, we will begin shortly."

Everyone began scattering across the room searching for their partners. You had the tendency to switch partners every now and then since the boys kept asking if you could show them the steps to the dance. You didn't mind, even if it meant getting your toes stepped on every now and again.

As you looked across the room, you wondered who you would be dancing with this time. Your own question was answered when your hand was suddenly grabbed and you were twirled around to be flush against someone's chest.

"Freddie!" You laughed, the wind was nearly knocked out of you from the sudden turn.

"You don't mind having this dance with me, do you love?" He asked with a tilt of his head.

You shook your head with a grin, "No, I don't mind at all."

Your hands were intertwined as your other hand rested on his shoulder and his hand grasped your waist. There was no tense atmosphere compared to the other boys who always seem to stray away from their confident selves when around you. But not Fred, no. He was always his true self around you.

The music began playing and echoed through the hall. Light footsteps pattered across the floor as people tried to find their footing. Some seemed to struggle more than others but that wasn't the case for you and Fred.

The two of you danced across the floor in sync. The two of you paid little mind to everything around you as you both were lost in your own world. Like your heart harmonised with the beat of his heart and that was the only rhythm you guys needed to dance.

"You've improved since the last time we've danced." You teased as you continued your steps.

Fred rolled his eyes at the memory of his poor attempt at trying to dance the waltz with you during one of your grandparents balls. He didn't exactly want to be there in the first place let alone dance a waltz he's never learned. But he didn't want to leave you there alone either. You wanted to dance, so he danced with you.

"Careful, I might step on one of your toes again." He taunted as he went along with your teasing.

You shook your head with a laugh. You had hoped that he would be your date for the ball. When he accompanied you to your grandparents' ball, it was like something out of a fairy tale. Though he stepped on your toes once or twice, it was all worth it. Especially when around the end, the two of you were left alone out in the gardens to stargaze the rest of the night.

Maybe, just maybe he would ask you to the ball.

Fred knew from your silence, you were stuck in thought. "You're still not going to tell me who it is?"

Your eyes snapped back to him, "Who?"

"The one you're taking to the ball." He replied almost in a whisper. At this point he wondered if he should still be asking about who it is. Is he really going to subject himself to this hurt?

Your eyes softened at his question. "Freddie..." you could tell him the truth. You could tell him that the guy you most desperately want to go to the ball with was him. But you were too scared to do so. Godric forbid you had any bravery left in you to tell him your true feelings.

You could casually ask him to the ball. Make nothing of it. To go as friends. But something in your gut told you that if you went together, things would be different. Things were different.

You weren't just little kids anymore. You were both at that stage in your life where love and relationships were the main focus of everyone's lives. If you screw up things with Fred, you'd probably spiral into a mess.

"You don't have to tell me. Just make sure to save me a dance, alright?" You could feel the defeat sink into his voice. But before you could do anything about it you were pulled away by another person to continue the waltz.

You caught a glimpse of Fred and you could feel your heart start breaking. You wanted to tell Fred but was it really worth the cost?

~~~~~~

It had been two days since Fred had questioned you about the mystery guy and you thought he just dropped the topic and forgot, but you were wrong.

Truth was, it was all he could think about. He didn't even try to ask you to go with him to the ball that day because he was scared he was going to get shot down.

And if you were being honest, he was all you could think about too. Not just on the fact that he was so adamant at knowing who the mystery person was, but also because he too had someone on his mind on who to ask for the ball.

If there was already someone he planned on asking, why even bother asking him to be your date to the ball? You felt hopeless and most of all, stupid for ever thinking you had a chance at asking Fred to the ball.

These thoughts consumed you to the point you didn't even want to try to sleep anymore. You just laid there on your bed, staring at the ceiling. Eventually you got hungry and tired of your own thoughts.

You got up from your bed and slowly crept away from the girl's dormitory, being careful not to wake anyone up, especially Stark. Godric knows how grumpy that cat gets when he gets woken up. You didn't currently have the map with you since it was with Harry but you didn't mind. You've basically engraved the school's layout in your mind.

You eventually reached the portrait and got out. It wasn't totally pitch black but it would help to have a little light help guide your way.

As you walked through the empty hallways, you couldn't help but think about all the things that were troubling you these last few days. I guess lots of things have been bothering you lately. You didn't exactly know where to start.

The thought that Harry was constantly being placed out into the line of danger and you not being able to help him is killing you. You have always been there to protect him and help him out but with the stupid Triwizard tournament rules getting in your way, you can't do anything about it.

Your stroll eventually led up to the kitchens, quickly grabbing a few snacks and bidding daisy and the other elves goodbye before going around the castle again. You missed these peaceful silences.

In all honesty you were suffocating from all of the school work and activities brought by the Triwizard tournament. You may not have been part of them but your professors seemed to have the impression that you were capable of handling lots of extra school tasks.

Like helping lead the class in dance classes in preparation for the Yule ball since you had experience in ball dancing. Assisting in charms classes in the lower years in your free time. Being a sort of ambassador for the foreign students seeing as you can speak French and russian. As if already having to deal with your normal studies and Quidditch wasn't enough.

You liked that they thought of you as a responsible student but you were juggling so many things that you rarely had the time for anything fun anymore. While your friends were off pranking, you were stuck helping second years undo charms that went wrong. While Kayla, Pansy and Mione were doing their usual "book club" sessions, you were busy helping Harry figure out how to do certain spells.

Your mind was so wrapped up in all your worrying that you didn't even realize that your footsteps led you to Monty. You grinned at the sight of the tree.

"Hello old friend." You greeted as you sat at the root of the tree.

You snacked on your food as you contemplated in silence. Though the tight feeling was still present in your chest, it felt comforting to be in a place that made you feel safe.

You leaned your head back on the tree and looked up at the star covered sky. You missed star-gazing. With all of the chaos, you haven't been able to star-gaze in a while.

Like a gush of fresh air passing you, you knew a presence was nearby. One that you were all too well familiar with.

You turned your head to look at him with a light grin. There he stood in his plaid pajamas and initial sweater.

"How come you always manage to find me?" You asked, tilting your head with a chuckle.

"I should be the one asking why you're always wandering off, in the middle of the night no less." Fred replied as he sat down next to you.

You both sat there quietly; looking up at the stars, mostly lost in thought. That was until Fred decided to break the silence.

"Why are you up so late? I know you don't usually sleep early but even 3 am is a stretch for you.” Fred stated as he pointed at his watch. ”What's on your mind, Carrington?"

A concerned look fell on your face, you didn't realize that much time passed already. You let out a sigh, you knew you were going to end up exhausted the next day.

"Honestly?" You inquired.

Fred nodded at you with sincerity, he had all his attention focused on you.

You sighed and suddenly the words just poured out of you, "it's just… so much is happening and I don't know how to deal with it all. I have to assist the younger years in charms, quidditch training, normal classes, foreign students and- il se passe trop de choses et j'ai l'impression que je vais pleurer et crier mais-" (too much is happening and i feel like I'm going to cry and scream but-). You paused, forgetting that Fred didn't know a lick of French.

"Fuck sorry, I didn't mean to do that." You apologized as you sunk your face into your hands.

"No, no, it's okay. Just keep going. I'll listen, even though I don't understand a single word of french. I'll be here to listen." He replied as he wrapped his arm around you and pulled you closer to him.

You nodded as you continued on in your rant, the words were all coming out like a broken dam. "It's just that so much is going on and pour l'amour de la merde, you'd think they'd give a 4th year a break. I feel like I'm on the verge of breaking down every minute but I won't let myself go because there's still so much meant to be done."

You haven't really told anyone about how stressed you've been feeling lately and it felt so great to actually tell someone. Fred nodded along as he listened to you. There was this look on his face, as though he hung on every word you said, regardless if it was in a foreign language.

"Oh darling, I'm so sorry you've been doing all that work. They should be paying you at this point. Is there anything I can do to lessen the load?" Fred asked as he brushed and stroked your hair.

You sighed and closed your eyes, "unfortunately, no."

He tilted his head, as if not believing what you said. “Are you absolutely sure? Cause you know me, I can give Minnie and Alby a piece of my mind.”

“Thanks for the offer but I'm sure I can handle it." You leaned your head on his shoulder in defeat.

"I know you can, but it doesn't mean you have to." He replied, rubbing his hand over your arm.

All these years, he's been by your side through it all. Through all the Voldemort nonsense, through the injuries, through the nightmares, everything.

"Freddie." You whispered.

"Yeah, love?" He replied.

"Thank you."

He faced you with this puzzled look, "For what?"

You gave him a simple shrug, thinking the answer was already obvious. "For just being there for me."

Fred's features softener and pulled you in closer to his side. "Anything for you, darling. You know that."

“I do…I hope you know the same applies to you.” You replied as you looked up at him.

“I do.” He nodded as he looked up at the stars. They were incredibly bright tonight, he wondered if you always wandered out here just to look at the stars to clear your head. That would explain why he would always find you here.

“When was the last time we went stargazing together?”

You grinned at the memory, “last summer when we went camping on the reserve.”

“We should do it again.” He replied, his eyes still glued to the stars.

You look at him with a cheek aching smile, “yeah, we should.” He may have meant the stars in the sky, but to you, it meant the freckles that were scattered across his cheeks like constellations. Those were the stars you were willing to spend endless nights studying.

“Can we just look at the stars while they're still out?” He laced his fingers between yours, gently rubbing his thumb over your knuckles.

“Okay.” You replied, snuggling yourself closer to Fred to get comfy as you looked up at the sky.

And that's what you both did till dawn came. The sky twisting in colors of peach and purple as the sun slowly rose over the grounds of Hogwarts. It was a quiet morning, and for once your mind was quiet too.

Maybe it had something to do with the boy whose shoulder you were resting your head on or the peaceful ambience the morning brought you. You didn't really care, you were happy and that was it.

You couldn't help but feel a sudden surge of confidence flow through you. It could have been your mind lacking sleep but everything that was holding you back from telling Fred about your feelings just flew out the window.

You wanted to tell him, and you wanted to tell him now.

You sat up and turned to Fred in a rushed motion. Your movements startled the boy but he was left waiting for whatever you were about to do.

“What's wrong, love?” He asked you, surprisingly not as sleepy as you expected him to be.

“Remember what I said about that person I was going to ask to the Yule ball?” You hesitated with your words. You weren't even sure if you were thinking straight. You prayed that whatever words formed in your head would be the right words to say to Fred.

Fred tensed at your words. He nodded slightly, hoping that the next words that would leave your mouth wouldn't hurt too much.

“Well…” You felt your throat go dry but you were already in too deep, you had to commit. “To tell you the truth, they're really really really dense. And honestly I don't even know why they would even want to go with me if the opportunity presented itself but-.”

Fred's forehead creased at your words, who wouldn't want to go with you to the ball? That would be like turning down the chance to enter heaven. “Why'd you think that, love? Anyone lucky enough to even be in your sights should be thanking God or whatever force for putting you on this earth.”

You felt your cheeks go bright red and your heart beat ten times faster. You weren't even sure if you could have controlled it with Fred's words just pouring out of his mouth like they just came to him naturally. He didn't even stop there. Once he started he couldn't stop.

“I mean look at you, I don't think I can think of anyone else in the whole entire world that could even come close to how perfect you are. I mean sure, you're basically a night owl with how little you sleep because you'd rather read than have a decent amount of sleep,”

You laughed at his little comment, shoving him slightly in the shoulder, but that didn't stop him from continuing his rant.

“You literally land in the hospital wing every week or so because you'd rather put yourself in harm's way than others. And you don��t even like sharing your cookies but you still do. You even ask your grandmother to send more cookies just so you can share more of them. All these things I just listed down are just more reasons why you’re perfect- and why I love you.” He let those words slip past his lips so quickly he barely even registered them. By the time he realized what he said he knew he couldn't take them back, nor did he want to.

“And yes, I love you… and not just in a friend way but the “I love you so much that if you're not around I can't breathe and the mere thought that you probably like someone else is killing me”... way.”

You were left speechless. You felt like a complete idiot at that moment. You both were fools from the start. How couldn't you have seen the signs?

He was the only one there for you when no one else was. That time you landed in the hospital wing after a full moon incident from helping your uncle moony, he was the one who stayed by your side all those nights.

When you got a cold after a snowball fight with the Weasley’s over the holidays, Fred visited you nearly everyday at the Manor to check on you before he too caught a cold. Then it was your turn to take care of him.

When you got detention from getting caught for a prank you pulled, Fred got himself detention so you wouldn't be alone.

Fred felt his chest tighten at the silence, you haven't said a thing in the last few seconds and it was terrifying. “I know you probably don't feel the same-”

Finally, you snapped out of your self inflicted scolding and reached over with one hand to keep you up and the other on Fred cheek. “My god you are dense.” with that, your lips crashed into his and suddenly everything fell into place.

All the years of pining. All the endless hours of you avoiding and hiding your feelings when all along, the both of you were just too scared of saying how you felt.

His hand slipped over to your cheek while his other hand gripped your waist. He couldn't even process his thoughts about what was happening. Was this actually real? Was this a dream? Was he even awake?

His thoughts were silenced when you pulled away just slightly to let out a small whisper, something that was meant for him and him alone, “I love you too.”

A grin grew on Fred's lips, going up ear to ear. It felt like hearing your favorite song for the first time. You loved him. He couldn't believe it. Fred pulled you in for another kiss but it was difficult from how he just couldn't stop smiling.

“Really?” He asked, his voice heavy with bliss and giddiness. It was like the whole world just lit up for him. He really couldn't believe it.

You let out a light laugh at the sight, “Yes, really.” Before placing a peck on his lips.

“Are you absolutely sure?” He asked again, this time with a smirk and his usual tone of arrogance. Sure he still couldn't fully wrap his head around the thought that you, the girl of his dreams, actually loved him back. But that still didn't stop him from teasing the living daylights out of you.

You pondered on the question further, knowing how Fred loved to play this game. Your silence only furthered the fun when Fred began to grow impatient. “On second thought…”

Fred let out a chuckle before wrapping his arms around you and pulling you up to his lap, “Nice try love. You've already said the words. You can't take them back.”

You rolled your eyes jokingly before facing him with a cheek aching grin, “oh no, what shall I ever do?” You replied with feigned fear before letting out another laugh.

Fred leaned over to your cheek, his nose barely grazing over the surface of your cheek. “How about I take you to the ball as…your boyfriend?”

You pulled away with a grin, "Are you sure?”

Fred looked off into the distance and tapped his finger over his chin, “Hmmm, you know on second thought-”

You let out a laugh before resting your hands at the back of his neck, “Nuh uh, you already said the words, Freddie. You can't take them back.” You repeated his words back to him with a smirk.

He pulled you in for another kiss to wipe away that smirk. But he then pulled away, just slightly, “You have my heart, love. I don't think I'll be able to take that back either.”

Feeling the blush rush up to your cheeks, you could only hide your flustered state in the crook of his neck. Now it was his turn to smirk.

“Don't get shy on me now, love.” Fred spoke as he hugged you tight. He thought that this was just too good to be true. He thought that maybe if he didn't hold on tight enough, all of this would cease to exist and reveal itself to be a dream.

You lifted your head out of the crook of his neck, only to feel the heat rush back to your cheeks. Seeing as the sun was rising up already, the blush was much more evident on your cheeks.

Fred looked at you with a soft smile, it was finally sinking in. He was finally yours, and you were finally his. And though the two of you may be dense, Godric knows Fred is never going to let you forget he loves you.

"I love you so much."

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the-darklings · 2 years

Text

──𝐭𝐨𝐝𝐚𝐲 𝐢 𝐛𝐮𝐫𝐲 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐢𝐧 𝐦𝐞 [𝐕.]

summary: "You look lonely, Dream."

pairing: dream of the endless x f!reader

wc: 3.5k+

warnings: dare I say it... soft, Dream is still Dream ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

notes: you're all actually insane. thank you so much for your support & I love you. enjoy perhaps the happiest chapter in the story : )

part one | series masterlist | ao3 |

PART FIVE: YEAR 522

“Enjoying yourself?”

You nudge the book from over your face, squinting at the tall figure looming over you. “I was till about two seconds ago.”

Your retort is lost in a sleepy yawn as you cover your mouth.

Corinthian’s tall frame casts a steep, hard-edged shadow over your body. He doesn’t move. Sighing, you unhook your legs to sit up, blinking up at him. “Where were you? I haven’t seen you in two days.”

“Performing my duty,” he replies smoothly, mockingly bowing. “As our benevolent ruler has intended. Even I get tonight off.”

“Right. Good dreams for everyone.”

Dreamfall is tonight. The inhabitants that call this realm their home—nightmares and dreams alike—have been prepping for the celebration since light first broke over the land.

Corinthian steps under the whistling willow, visibly amused by how the branches seemingly hiss whenever he draws too near. He sits down against the trunk without forewarning, grabbing your ankles resting in the shade. He lifts your legs before dropping them over his lap unceremoniously. His hat drops beside him, and you huff at his gall. Your shoe nudges his deliberately—a half kick—your sweet smile making an equally poisonous smile curl his mouth.

“Ow.”

“Sorry,” he drawls insincerely.

Rolling your eyes, you leaf through the book you were reading before your impromptu nap.

“Will you be at the celebration?” you inquire casually, not looking his way.

The nightmare clicks his tongue. “No.”

Your stare skims over the edge of your hardcover, “Why not?”

A thin, polished blade appears in his hand, looping between his long fingers. He seems too thoughtful for it to not spell trouble. “Taking a page from your book and running from things.”

This time your kick lands intentionally against his ankle. Corinthian doesn't react to it. Lately, he's been convinced you're running from things that have transpired in your extended life. It's true to an extent. You're not idiotic enough to convince yourself otherwise. Kernel of truth or otherwise, you would rather talk about anything else.

This is the longest you’ve ever stayed at the Dreaming in a single stretch. Almost a year. But this time is different. You can’t help but get a sense others don’t want you to leave. They’re concerned about you. After your last mishap in the waking world, no one can blame them, certainly not you. You were in terrible shape. If anything, you had forgotten how sweet it is: to be wanted and cared for, even if few ever express it through traditional means.

“Not this again,” you groan. “You don’t get it.”

"Oh, but I do." Corinthian's head tips to the side, facing away from you. You haven't noticed the miniature wooden piece in his other hand until his blade starts scoring through the wood. "You don't want to consider your existence. So instead, you shove everything happening to you to the side in some vain hope that it won't hurt you if you wait long enough. Tsk, tsk."

Metal scrapes on wood again; louder, with more force, small wooden shavings scattering near your feet. Corinthian turns to face you again, leaning closer, your distorted reflection visible in his shades. “But memories have teeth, Wanderer,” he continues playfully. “They always come back to bite.”

You offer him a flat, unamused stare. “Trying to freak me out? Or just being purposely annoying?”

He grins brightly, all teeth visible, one side of his mouth crooking slightly further than the other. “I’m a nightmare, darling. It’s in the job description.”

Rolling your eyes, you lift your book back over your face, his words swimming in your head.

“Annoying, it is.”

Silence blankets the clearing for a while. Miniature daisies curl around your palm where it rests on the warm ground. It doesn’t escape your heed that everything in Fiddler’s Green shrinks away from Corinthian. Everyone, everywhere, shrinks away from him. Even amongst other nightmares, he has distinct energy that separates him from the rest; bold, defiant, and destructive.

Frowning, you drop the book back over your chest, gazing up at him. Corinthian’s head rests slanted to one side, focused entirely on his work. You’ve seen him partake in woodcraft often in recent years, but only ever in private. It settles him. This way, he manages to keep his mind and hands busy. During instances like these, away from everything, Corinthian appears almost human. As if whatever cruelty he indulges in so often takes a rest during these times.

“Come with me to the celebration,” you say abruptly. “It won’t kill you to be nice for a change.”

The nightmare pauses mid-scratch. Corinthian carefully considers his handiwork, blowing away the wood dust with deliberate slowness. “I’m very nice,” he retorts. “See.”

He throws the object at you. You scramble, the wooden figurine almost hitting you in the chest. Shooting him a glare, you roll the smooth wood in your hand. It’s warm to the touch.

Miniature Corinthian stares back at you. With a gleeful grin stretched wide, glasses on, and a wooden hat over the nightmare’s head. The details are immaculate. Lovely. Somehow the thought he’s created this from nothing brings a smile to your face. So, not just a nightmare, huh?

You offer the nightmare a toothy, teasing grin. “He’s cute. Could use some friends, though.”

You toss it back at him. Unlike you, Corinthian catches the figurine smoothly, twisting it between his digits with a considerate hum.

“Friends.” There’s an abrasive edge to the way he articulates the word. “What a thought. Catch.”

You’re ready this time, but at no point did you catch him taking out a second figurine. Your mouth parts, speechless.

“This is…”

It's you. Your likeness has been shrunk to fit inside your hand—a tight knot forms in your throat. You've never had someone do something like this for you. The curse repeatedly destroys any traces of you. Fires, floods, diseases, wars. You've never been allowed to exist. Not in any significant way, anyway. But this is special—proof, as good as any, that you're real.

Wordlessly, you sit up, reaching over to hand him back the figurine.

“What?” he bites out. “Don't you like it?”

You want to smile at the prickly offence in his voice.

“I love it,” you insist. You nimbly grab the figurine Corinthian made of himself and shove it in your pocket, wiggling your brows. “But you hold onto mine, and I’ll hold onto yours. That’s what friends would do.”

You plop down on the ground, stretching your legs more comfortably over his lip. Corinthian doesn’t stir. Time glides leisurely, weaving a tapestry of tranquillity: you read, Corinthian whittles a new piece. When you’re out there in the universe, it’s memories like this one you armour yourself with.

“Can I ask you something?”

Corinthian doesn’t pause in his work. “You just did.”

You lift onto one elbow. “Why do you wear your glasses around me? You know your eyes don’t scare me.”

Even the mini replica of him has glasses on. Is he worried they make you uncomfortable? After five hundred years, few things can unsettle you anymore.

“I do. But I wasn’t born. I was made.” There’s weight to how he phrases it. Purposeful, premeditated. “The first time I became aware of my existence, I saw two things. Him, Dream of the Endless, my creator, and… you. The only one who never flinched away. Funny that.”

You lift a curious brow. “Funny how?”

A slight, mean grin edges Corinthian’s mouth. “Surely you’ve noticed? How many others around here look like me? Like you?”

Wind rustles your clothes, wrapping around your wrists and shoulders. Maybe it’s Fiddler Green’s approach in discouraging you from this conversation. But you’re not leaving. And you understand what the nightmare is trying to convey, what he’s suggesting between the lines.

That on some level—subconscious or otherwise—Dream crafted Corinthian in your image. The parallels are too significant. Your shared human attributes. A cursed human. A nightmare. Differing forms of misery. Forever.

You witnessed Corinthian's creation. He's been special to you ever since. Those jagged teeth for eyes or his corrupt nature never bothered you. At least not as much as others believed it should.

“Corinthian—”

“Hey kid, there you are,” a voice grouses through the clearing, striding hurriedly in your direction. “Geez. Do you have any idea how hard it is to track you down? Oh. Corinthian.”

Merv freezes the second the nightmare comes into view; branches and your body have kept him mostly from sight until now.

Clearing your throat, you raise your hand in a casual wave. “Hey, Merv.”

The pumpkin head balances on his heels, awkwardly looking around the clearing. “Uh, the big boss wants you back at the castle, kid,” the caretaker informs, pointing his thumb behind him. Back in the castle’s direction. “You’re the honoured guest tonight, so….”

Dream must be otherwise occupied if he didn’t come to collect you himself, considering he can pin your down in a mere second usually.

“Better run along,” Corinthian shoos, leaning back to get more comfortable. His hands are empty in his lap, and it doesn’t escape your notice.

You won’t be able to continue your conversation now; that is clear. Admitting silent defeat, you struggle back onto your feet, stretching. You tuck the leather-bound book under your arm, turning to go.

“Oh, and Wanderer?” You pause at Corihtian’s deliberately sweet call. In your peripheral, Merv’s features spasm with irritation. The nightmare grins when you turn back towards him. “Happy Dreamfall. May the Fates smile upon you.”

The nightmare’s hands clasp together lightly in mock prayer, and you shake your head. Leave it to him to ridicule human religion.

“You can’t bribe three-in-one for good fortune, Cori,” you tell him, equally as saccharine. “It doesn't work like that.”

“The veil between Worlds will be thin tonight,” he says lightly, all innocence, shrouding something darker beneath. “You never know.”

“You should be back at the castle, enjoying the festivities.”

Waves lap against the shores of the Dreaming, all things unstirring and still around you. It’s so quiet here. Even your breaths echo. Dreams and nightmares alike are celebrating. Tonight, their home is the centre of the cosmos. It’s dense in the air—that thrumming power raw imagination holds, building and swelling with the inky waves. You sit perched in the grainy, dark sand, your fingers dug in deep. A light breeze stirs beside you, and the Dream King’s dark coat whispers over your hand.

On this night, his overcoat is edged with glimmering golden flame at the hem, flaring brighter with each faint movement. Dream of the Endless at his true, unsuppressed power. The universe is paying tribute to his domain tonight. Your skin tingles at the oozing power radiating from him in such close proximity.

However, the answer to his reserved observation comes quickly: “Couldn’t miss this view.”

Light beams swirl in a multicoloured kaleidoscope through the inky sky above. Falling, falling, falling; swimming and floating. Dreams; pulsing and spinning through the lonely, silent universe to here. Their anchor place.

Dreamfall. An apt name indeed. You’re dizzy, stunned, and incredibly humbled just witnessing it. Has any other human been given such privilege?

“How many do you think there are?” you whisper.

“Billions.”

Dream’s voice is a gentle, deep caress beside you. Self-possessed as if he’s counted each one himself.

Your palm drags mindlessly through the dark sands, each grain sifting through your fingers. Dream Lord jolts at your side, breathing out deeply, but you don’t pay his odd reaction mind, settling into pensive silence.

“Can you see them?” you ask thoughtfully. “Individually?”

“See them, feel them,” Dream lists passively. His fingers outstretch slowly, aiming towards the boundless black water—no, towards the skies, towards living tendrils of joy and light dancing through the dark. “I need not take them. For they are all… right… here.”

A glow kindles in his open palm, muted, soothing light. It flutters; quivering wings of a scared bird, then settles, safe in Dream’s protective hold, forming a small sphere. A gasp climbs up your throat, but you swallow it down, jumping to your feet and brushing the sand off your palms as you go.

A woman’s figure moves in the smokey image. She’s cradling a tiny bundle in her arms, her nose brushing over the child’s nose lovingly. It’s a nurturing, beautiful scene. One to leave your heart aching with longing.

“That’s incredible.” Stepping closer, you reach to touch the glowing globe, but stop yourself last moment. No. There’s no knowing what it would do to this woman if someone like you infringed on her dream. Your fingers shrink backwards, falling back to your side, each digit curling loosely. Dream tracks the gesture intently, his features drawn, so you force lightness into your following words, “For all the splendours in this universe, the Dreaming still manages to delight me the most.”

Dream Lord’s thumb skims over the glowing sphere. Then he extends his arm and blows gently. Like his sand, the dream skips and floats away, soon all but lost in the infinite array of colours.

“On this night, all living things dream,” he murmurs, concentrating solely on the descending lights. “And those dreams all traverse the universe to find their way home. To the Dreaming. What is it?”

You blink, realising you’ve been caught staring. “It’s just… over five hundred years,” you begin with a small smile. “I thought I’d have you all figured out by now, but you keep surprising me.”

Dream’s chin slants in a slight nod—regal even in these tiniest gestures. For a second, you wonder if you glimpse a sliver of amusement, but you blink, and it’s gone. “Likewise, Wanderer.”

You stand side by side, observing the vivid display. Dream’s features are, for once, relaxed. Softer than usual.

“You love them,” you choke out, startled by the piercing realisation. “Humanity. Then why…”

He’s gone incredibly still beside you. “Why what?”

Despite the direct prompt, your mouth remains closed. A thousand thoughts swarm through your head. All this time, you had it so wrong. Dream Lord’s stoic, often cold, mien. Even his duty he so uncompromising places first.

“You look lonely, Dream.”

It slips out before you can give it much thought, talk yourself out of voicing it. You’ve seen how Dream handles such observations. How any label or implication sets his jaw and ignites an ancient flame in him. There’s a reason you’ve never defined your relationship or so much as tried to. Equal parts fear how he would take it—and more painfully—the thought he would admit you mean nothing.

But Dream Lord is lonely. It’s written in every corner of his handsome, imposing face. Displayed naked and vulnerable in the way he watches these dreams. Such fierce devotion and a need to understand them, even when he struggles with the complexities of humanity.

“I was wrong about you,” you rush ahead in a whisper, noting the slow spreading coldness painting over his features. “I once thought you didn’t care at all. That you’re above it all. But now I realise just how much you do care.”

Chuckling under your breath, you mentally reabsorb the years you’ve spent by his side. With such crushing responsibility, Dream acts a certain way for a reason.

“But to have the collective consciousness of all living beings resting on your shoulders… I can’t imagine it.” You shake your head slowly from side to side. A small, sad smile pulls at your lips. “Your sense of duty to them is stronger than anything else. So it’s easier to not show anything. To anyone. Easier to lock it all down.”

Dream displays no outward reaction to your comments. His stare, however, burns into you, simmering with some hidden, potent emotion you can’t decipher no matter how hard you try. “You created this for them,” you conclude fondly, glancing around you. “The Dreaming is your gift to life, to humanity.”

Your heart inflates, stray breaths escaping your parted lips. The coldness and the prickly displeasure have waned from his demeanour with your speech, leaving Dream Lord mute at your side. His quietude fills in all the blanks, melancholic as it is.

There’s nothing more lonely than endless existence. You’re starting to learn as much intimately.

"I'm merely abiding by the Old Laws," he says lastly. "Anything is possible here. Let me show you."

Confusion must show on your face because Dream inclines his head towards the pier to your right.

“What are we doing?” you question, following after him.

The hem shimmers with Dream's steady gait, illuminating the path ahead. He stalls at the edge of the dock, water beyond stretching as far as the eye can see.

“Creating.”

“Uh, what?” Understanding sinks in at his deliberate glance. “Dream, I… I can’t dream. I can’t create anything here.”

“You need only to imagine it,” he says. “I will do the rest.”

He gestures for you to take his place. Your feet brush over the pier’s edge hesitantly. You don’t dare to look below. Those depths are treacherous to anyone who isn’t this realm’s creator.

“How will you know what’s in my head?”

Dream Lord’s presence whispers against your back. His fingers are light when they settle on your shoulder. “When it comes to dreams, I always know.”

You huff. “Fine, show off.”

“Clear your mind,” he instructs promptly. Not like you expected him to humour you. “Here, tonight, anything is possible.”

Keeping one hand on your shoulder, Dream raises his other arm, digits extended; relaxed, elegant. With a soft rasp from Dream Prince’s lips, power surges in the air, “We begin… with a spin.”

Dream Lord’s wrist rotates, everything in sight ceasing for a heartbeat, and then the world shifts.

Water plunges inwards, forming a whirlpool, cool spray hitting your skin with a powerful gust. A startled breath wooshes from your lungs, peering down at the ravine wide-eyed.

You’re not afraid, though. You’re mesmerised. “What should I do?”

He hears you even over the roaring water. “Change the world,” Dream whispers behind you. The way he says those words makes you believe you can do anything. “Imagine you are free. Visualise it. What do you see?”

“There’s a small island.” The vision springs to mind instantly, shining brightly in your mind’s eye. “Grass that grows there is the greenest there’s ever been. And… it tastes like sour apples.”

“Are you, by any chance, hungry, Wanderer?”

If you didn’t know any better, you would presume he’s teasing you.

A breathless laugh escapes you. “Shh. I’m focusing.”

The island trickles back into your thoughts, fragments stringing together.

“The sun that shines on the island is never too hot. The air is sweet and light. The flowers never wilt, trees never shed leaves, and the sky is an endless periwinkle shade. There’s always food and drinks. Books and games. An old friend waits at the beach to greet you with a patient smile whenever you arrive.”

And as you speak it, Dream’s fingers trail over the horizon, weaving and creating what you’re relating.

“A friend.” He sounds contemplative, with faint curiosity lacing his timber. “Not family or a lover?”

“Not everyone has family, and not everyone needs a lover,” you clarify. Each word wobbles, caught in a spell of his creation. “But everyone should have a friend. The island will be there whenever someone feels lonely, lost, or desperate for an escape. It’ll be there to welcome you. To give you a corner to hide. There is no sadness there. No loneliness or confusion. There’s only…”

“... hope.”

You nod at his hushed conclusion in your ear. Dream’s palm closes gently, forming a fist. The Dreaming exhales, his other hand slips off your shoulder, and in the far distance, an island shudders in the water, settling. Waves slosh loudly, beating against the dock, smoothing into crystal clear moments later.

Your eyes burn as you stare unblinking at the unassuming island.

“Why do you weep, Wanderer?”

You tuck your face in your elbow instinctively, chuckling thickly.

"This, no, it's... uh… thank you." Each word cracks with emotion as you mumble the words. Scrubbing your palm over your eyes, you smile softly. "Thank you so much for this."

“You need not thank me,” Dream states, a wrinkle forming between his brows. “The island is now part of the Dreaming. And whenever a soul finds themselves alone or in need of that comfort, they shall find their way here. It came from you.”

Does he have any idea how precious this is to you? No words in any tongue could adequately capture how deeply this settles in your soul. You exist. You’re real. The figurine in your pocket and the island visible in the distance are indisputable proof of that. He’s been a constant, a terrible shelter, for so long. But with this, he’s knitted himself in your marrow until your dying breath.

“Sit with me?” You settle down without preamble, your legs dangling over the edge. You never want this night to end. “Just for a little while,” you add quietly.

Dream lowers his head in consideration. Much to your unspoken surprise, his limbs fold elegantly beneath him, the golden edges of his coat pooling around him.

Your head drops back, watching the falling dreams. He does the same.

You don’t speak, and neither does he. Neither of you needs to.

Everything that ought to be said is expressed in the comforting stillness between you.

an: personal hdc is that before Corinthian escaped into the human world to wreak havoc, he had other ways to keep himself busy heh.

also, be sure to savour the happiness because it sure isn't going to last : )

#the sandman #the sandman x reader #netflix sandman #sandman x reader #dream x reader #dream of the endless #dream x fem!reader #morpheus x reader #morpheus x fem!reader #the sandman netflix #tom sturridge #fic: today i bury you in me

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temunitu · 1 year

Note

Do you have any good Mike or Raph fic or anything? Could be any version but I think it would be nice to read about the other half of the turtle boys. That and I just want to read more Mikey fanfic…

here’s my list with a quick rating and summary to help you find exactly what you want! some of these are just on my reading list but i’ve heard good things about them, or they sound interesting.

this list is mostly mikey because that's my boy right there. i haven't seen many raph and mikey fics unfortunately. someday i'll complete mine.

as usual, if any of y'all have read any good fics and want to recommend some, feel free! we love and appreciate raph and mikey on this blog.

fics i have read:

(Rise Mikey) Going Under - 12/10 i was on the edge of my seat. the boys are facing a new villain and mikey gets trapped underwater. made me cry

(Rise Mikey) Sometime I Get Lost Under The Painted Sky - 12/10 post rise movie mikey tries out vent art for the trauma he got from the kraang. love the way the author describes the paintings of kraang and mikey's feelings surrounding it. sent chills up my spine.

(2003 Mikey) A Simple Act of Kindness - 10/10 very cathartic, also made me tear up. an accurate depiction of what the next battle nexus would look like and how mikey would react to losing.

(2003 Mikey) Better Genes - 9/10 i’ve been obsessed with this prompt ever since i found out about it. it’s a simple rewrite of if mikey was infected instead of don during the 2003 good genes arc. has a lot of references to 2003 and a few to 2012. the chapter “journey to the center of mikey’s mind” is beautifully described and really captures the mystic feelings 2003 has.

(2003, all) Dissection - 14/10 much needed talking through what happened after the space arc. very in character. made me chuckle AND tear up.

fics i'm reading:

(Rise F!Mikey) Mystic Hands - so far, the writing is so eloquent and rich. it's about mikey travelling back in time instead of casey jr. iconic peepaw, he travels back in time and immediately takes a nap. couldn't agree more.

(Rise F!Mikey) Too Lucky To Count - another future mikey goes back in time fic! (can you tell i have a niche interest?) so far, the writing is so gripping, talking about how each character died in the apocalypse. f!mike seems to have a dry, dark sense of humor from what i can tell which should prove hilarious.

fics on my to-read:

(Rise Mikey) Stranger Danger - rise mikey and 2012 mikey swap places! sounds like a really interesting concept.

(Rise Mikey) Portal Chaos - an au mikey (inspired by the last ronin) gets transported back in time. the author has a LOT of fun art for this one.

(2003 Mikey) Pretend That I Never Left - alternate fic where mikey is thrust into the world of horizon: zero dawn instead of reality check. i've seen the artwork and i'm excited to read this.

(2003 Raph) From Ruins - takes place in the SAINW timeline. looks exceedingly interesting, and the authors have illustrations to go with the story (can you tell i love art?)

(Rise Sunset Duo) Hold Him Tight (And Never Let Go Again) - "Mikey never realized just how much it hurt that he and Raph drifted away, until he ends up with an unconscious Raphael, trapped in a collapsing building, and unable to reach his brothers." i'm gonna cry so hard when i read this one, aren't i?

(Rise Raph) Elegy of An Older Brother - explores raph's feelings post-movie and how he's coping with no longer being leader.

(Rise Raph) Glass Heart - post movie, the others treat raph with more care after he got infected. i think it's a bunch of oneshots of raph bonding with various family members? sounds cute.

(Rise Raph) Unfavorable Ramifications - post-movie, raph dealing with the loss of his eye and getting comforted by donnie and mikey. skimmed through it and it seems in-character, like a fun read.

i'll add more whenever i come across them

#fic rec #rottmnt #rise of the tmnt #rottmnt mikey #rottmnt raph #sunset duo #rottmnt sunset duo #tmnt 2018 #tmnt 2003 #tmnt 2003 mikey #tmnt 4kids #fanfic recommendation #future mikey #rottmnt future mikey #post rottmnt movie #rottmnt movie

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go-river-flows · 1 year

Text

Forget Me Not (one shot)

Summary: What happens to that girl who tried so hard to be invisible for her whole life? Will she remain invisible on the face of Pandora? Or will she be part of something bigger?

(5379 words)

I'm a nobody. Or at least I think I am. Arriving on Pandora was supposed to be an exciting, thrilling, new chapter of my life. But what would a naive twenty-three year old, fresh out of university student know. Apparently nothing.

All the paperwork was tossed to me. All the reports stacked high on my desk. No acknowledgements from anyone as I sit at my table for hours. Sure I was a hardworking individual who spent half her life studying to be a Pilot. Whilst studying to be an Environmental Conservationist. But now I'm stuck in the barren lands known as Hell’s Gate, fantastic. I say with sarcasm. I want to be outside studying the flora, fauna and Na’vi. That's what I wanted to do. To be part of the science team. I studied hard to be a top student, and even harder to support myself through that. And to be offered a position in the RDA. But apparently, they only wanted me to be a damn administrator. Get someone else dammit! I don't know anyone’s names in the science department, and neither do they know mine. It's just ‘hey, you’ or ‘you girl’ or ‘paperwork girl’. At least I was helicopter trained, and had my own Aerospatiale SA-2 Samson that I can call home. My dad, who was an airline pilot, would be proud.

I stay at my desk for hours on end, the pile not getting any smaller. I need to take a different approach. Standing up, I pick up the pile, my water bottle and extra pens just in case they run out. Running off to a quiet spot where no one goes in the large facility. Slapping the pile on the wide ledge of the window, I plug in my headphones to my Zune (a music player). It had nearly eight-thousand songs on it, so it will last me hours. It is the only way to calm me as I listen to my favourites, tapping my foot as Iisten to them. I start separating the pile labelling them as important, not so important, denied, unfinished reports and WTF? Hahaha, I don't know how that happened. I laugh internally.

Starting with Important, I sit on the cold floor skim reading everything then confirming everything with a signature and stamp of approval, shit! I forgot my stamp! Um, I can do it when I get back to my desk. The Important pile was complete in a matter of twenty minutes to my surprise.

Moving onto the Unfinished Reports, this takes a little longer. About an hour, but that was no problem. My fingers were a bit sore from clutching the pen but after a while the pain dulled.

Next was Not So Important. This too was a breeze when there were no distractions. My foot tapping to Your Blood by Nothing But Thieves. Taking a quick water break, I look out the window into the tall green trees in the distance.

Moving on to Unfinished Reports, this one too much longer. Some were almost completed, halfway done, or haven't started. Urgh, I sigh to myself. Getting my head down, I think I finished two hours later. My ass was getting sore so I stood up and started stretching, doing a small work out routine, even started to attempt climbing the corner of the wall to see how high I could get before falling down. All in a day's work.

Finally getting to the WTF pile, I thought it was best to give it to another person who knew what all these papers were. Stacking everything back in different angles and tucking my water bottle under my arm, shoving the pens into my hoodie pocket, I grabbed the pile and made my way back to my desk. Still with my headphones on.

Turning the corner, someone who wasn't looking collided into me sending all my pile onto the floor.

“Shit!” I cursed, kneeling down to grab the documents. Luckily the way they fell was in a line which made it easier to pick up. The soldiers continued walking much to my dismay, not even batting an eye. After picking the stack I promptly returned to the science department, forgetting my water bottle in the process.

Nodding along to the music, I returned to my desk, now various piles stacked from edge to edge with paperwork, I closed my eyes in frustration just standing there brows knitted together. I think there are now permanent lines between my brows. Throwing my head back, I let out an exasperated sigh with all the weight of air in my lungs out sounding like a vuvuzela. People turned to stare, but I didn't care at this point. Turning to the person nearest to me, who happened to be a guy in a wheelchair, I plopped the completed stack in my hands onto his lap (sorry man), leaving without another word. Storming off to my bedroom.

For the next few days, I stayed in my bedroom, which thankfully had it's own bathroom, minifridge and kitchenette. No one knocked on my door thankfully and I had everything I needed within reach. I lay in bed, half covered by my blanket as the pitter pattering of rain beat down onto my window. But what was bothering me was the room next door, 215. The two horny kids (not really kids) had been going at it for hours. I could hear them moan, groan, yell, scream and pant the whole time. At least I know one who the guy is, “Miles”. I pushed my pillow against my ears, which helped a bit but I was getting irritated. I just reached for my Zune and put on Nirvana, increasing the volume to the point it was over my neighbours incessant horny noises, and maybe a little more, drowning them out. Sorry to the neighbour on my other side. But they could probably hear the sex sounds too so I'm just protecting them from that, especially the somewhat loud moan of pleasure when they came, I would applaud if I weren’t so irked by the noise. After five songs, I decreased my volume to check if they were still going, and they had finished. Thank god. Turning my music most of the way down, and turning it off. I could finally doze off into sleepy land exhaustion catching up sooner than I thought.

The next morning I was well rested, but still tired. My arms were numb from sleeping on them and my legs were feeling like static, all pins and needles stabbing from all angles. I did some light stretching and yoga in the small space of my tiny apartment. Brushing my teeth and washing my face, getting dressed in loose fitting trousers and short-long sleeve shirt combo. I opened the door just as 215 opened their’s, turning to look as a much older but attractive man stopped in his tracks, realised he got caught, but I acted faster. Taking a step back into my room and closing the door in my own face.

That must be Miles. I stood there for a moment, and after hearing 215’s door shut, I assumed he must have walked away, but to my surprise a sudden knock on my door startled me. What the fuck? My face contorted into slight horror as I took four steps back, mortified at what was happening. But in my sudden realisation, I forgot to lock my door. Lunging for the lock, I quickly turned it and tread back to my bed, the furthest point away from the door, the knocking persisted as I sat on the edge of my bed. Oh, I'm dead.

This ‘Miles’ person knocked on my door for five minutes. Before they decided to give up, but I didn't move from my position for another five, hoping they’d just leave. Calming myself down, taking a deep breath. I treaded lightly to my door, pressing my ear to it. I didn't hear any footsteps or hear a person on the other side. I just wanted to go to work dammit! A short quiet knock scared me, it sounded different to the harsh, firm and powerful knocks form earlier so I assumed it was someone else.

Unlocking the door, I opened it a bit and it indeed was someone else. My neighbour, Paz. I let out a sigh of relief.

“Hey Paz,” I meekly greeted through the tiny gap.

“Hey (Y/N), I just wanted to apologise for last night, didn't know you were still up,” she spoke softly.

“Oh no, it's fine,” it's not fine, “I wanted to give you this. As an apology,” I looked down in her hand, a cupcake with blue frosting with a ‘Y’ in white. “Oh, wow. Thank you. But you didn't have to do that,” I mirrored her tone as she took my hand, putting the cupcake onto it. She gave a small toothy smile as if she knew.

“Did you meet Miles?” my eyes darted to hers, twitching slightly. She stifled a laugh at that, “I'll take that as a yes then. Well, I've got to take off. See ya around.” She turned to leave, giving a small wave. I did the same.

I trudged my way to the science department, expecting the huge pile to still be there but surprisingly wasn't. Taking the white coat from the back of it, I put the cupcake down on the table before putting on the coat. Checking the pockets, I found a neon green sticky note. Sorry for stressing you out :(. And another one, Take as much time as you need :(. And another, this time a neon pink and in cursive: We’ve taken our workload off you. Sorry for dumping all of our work on you, we appreciate you. :(

I looked around the room, catching some people's gaze, others looking away hoping that I would stop staring. But no one actually came forward to apologise to my face. I scrunched up the post it notes. Shoving them back in my pocket, I took my cupcake and walked away. Finding myself back at the same window I normally go to. Sitting on the windowsill with my legs crossed, I munched down into the cupcake. Red Velvet, yum. It was really good too. I think maybe it was Paz’s birthday, since there was a ‘Y’ or maybe a promotion. Butwho cares, it's a cupcake.

Wiping the corner of my mouth with my white sleeve, I sighed. But I wanted a change in scenery. I trudged through the halls to where all the samsons are kept, I made a maintenance check, sitting in the cockpit, I double checked all controls, switches, lights and emergency exo packs. Then I moved to the weapons and attachments, making sure they weren't rusted or loose in any way shape or form. Even the two missile pods that aren't really my specialty. Finally getting to the propulsion system. Everything was in order as I checked down the list, a lone figure on the catwalk catching my eye. Turning to look at the stranger, I quickly whipped my head back after realising who it was, getting whiplash in the moment and somehow choking on air at the same time. Rubbing my neck and wincing at the sudden movement, whilst covering my mouth as I struggle to breathe properly. Miles. Moving out of his line of sight as I'm hitting my sternum to stop. I got out my samson, and sped away, unaware that the man was still staring at me.

I ran to the inspection office giving the guy there, I think his name is Markus, my inspection report and he gave his stamp of approval storing it in the cabinet behind him. He thanked me before I sped off again. Running back to the science department.

Luckily there were only four folders on my table. I sat down and flicked through them. Ignoring people around me, I put my headphones back on and turned my Zune on, playing the Unity album by Spiral Drive. My foot tapped to the beat of the songs as I made notes on the documents.

When suddenly someone comes into my peripheral vision scaring the shit out of me. I turn to look and make eye contact with the guy in the wheelchair. The guy I dumped all the completed paperwork on. Oh crap.

“Hi,” he extends his hand out, I genially take his hand to shake, “I'm Jake. Nice to meetcha.”

“(Y/N). Sorry about the thing a few days ago. I was having a bad day,” I pulled my hand back. He chuckled.

“Yeah, it looked like it,” I blushed a bit, “What’re you working on?” he raised his head a little. Looking down at the report in front of her.

“Uh, just double checking other people’s reports. All the boring stuff,” I shot an awkward smile.

It was all boring, all useless. My eyes trail on the paper in front of me, forgetting a little that the paraplegic is still next to me watching my shifting expression and eyes. What am I doing here? I ask myself again. A question I keep asking myself every single day since landing on Pandora. Jake puts a hand on my shoulder blade pulling me from my thoughts, jolting at the sudden physical contact my face flushed a little. I suddenly remembered the night before. Looking at Jake with wide eyes as he retracted his hand. I get a good look at his face, why does he look so familiar? My expression gives it away. That expression of familiarity, when you frown a little as the wheels in your head turn, my eye twitched.

A few years ago back on earth.

I was working at the bar taking orders, the patrons getting a little restless as I’m working as fast as I can. A head pops into view as one of the usuals is tapping his glass on the table for a refill. Sam the manager shoved me aside to take care of the usual customer, as I was grabbing drink after drink for customers. Eventually they disperse when they get their drinks and I get a chance to take a breather.

“Hey! Can I get a few shots?” A voice from out of view asks, I lean over the counter to see a guy in a wheelchair.

“Sure, I’ll get that for you,” Sam speaks up, tapping my shoulder and gesturing me away. Okay, then.

I walk into the staff room to get my textbook, and come back out as Sam puts the shots on a small tray, gesturing to me to take it for the guy. Putting my textbook on the counter and taking the tray of five shots, moving around the counter.

“Where'd ya want these?” I ask the guy as he points to the ledge of the pool table, I carefully put the tray on the ledge, balancing it on the corner shooting a short but tight lined smile. Returning to grab my textbook I found a quiet corner in the bar and started reading it, flicking through notes, and revising for a repeat test that I previously failed. Rubbing my temples in annoyance as I didn’t understand why it was so difficult to remember. I’m not dumb, but I’m not that smart. I prefer to just get my pilot's licence and pull out of school at this point, but my mother (who is divorced) would not be happy, nor would my step father who pushed me to get a degree in Environmental Conservation in the first place.

What a dickhead for being one of those hippie freaks that chain themselves to the last standing tree on Earth. That’s where they were right now, chained to the last standing camphor tree in the Amazon rainforest. Because they’d rather be there than here. I mean, I get it. It’s the last tree, but they can get someone else to chain themselves there, someone who doesn’t have family or children, but I guess the heart wants what the heart wants. So here I am supporting myself through school because they wouldn’t pay for it even though they forced me into getting a damn degree in Environmental Conservation. Yay me! I say with sarcasm. I guess that’s also why I didn’t make any friends in my class or contribute anything.

Heck, even my dad wants me to drop out after seeing how miserable I was, depressed was how he put it. Yes I was, no, I am depressed. Fuck this shit! And fuck the paper the professor assigned! I wanted to throw this piece of garbage in the garbage. My eyes were pricking with tears, as I tried to hide my reddening eyes.

The next day I didn’t go to any classes, just stayed the whole day in Sam's bar. And the next, and the next. By the following day my EnviroCon professor stopped me in the hallway as I was leaving another professor’s office. Asking for the paper that was due in the next few days, just to read over any drafts. I sighed and explained that I was having a bad week and if I could just email it to him since I've finished my first draft, mailing it to him there and then. He opened it up in front of me on his holo tablet and skimmed it.

“This is fantastic! This is a draft? Man, you might as well submit it just as it is. Just add a few points here in this section,” he pointed out, he looked at me with slight concern, as I just nodded my head, “Hey, you alright? You look tired, have you been resting?”

“Not really,“ I leant against the wall, “I've been working all week and just trying my best,” letting out a deep exhale, “I don't know if I should just drop out. I'm so tired,” my voice cracked.

“Woah, woah woah. Hey, it's okay,” he put a reassuring hand on my shoulder, “You must be burning out. If you need more time to finish the paper, I can give it to you. If you're struggling, you can always come talk to me,” he calmed me down. For some reason, I felt like I was seen at that moment. Even when I tried so hard to be invisible. For every single day, the same guy in the wheelchair frequenting the bar.

Back to the present day.

That recognition whipped back to me, the guy in the wheelchair. The same one who repeatedly came to Sam’s bar. Getting drunk off his ass and getting thrown out, one too many times.

“You don't remember me?” I blurt out. He looked at me confused, “Of course you don't.” I stand up now no longer facing him, “Just like everyone else. I guess I have that kind of face,” I look down at him with tears in my eyes, but a sad but somewhat bright smile, I laugh a little trudging off to my window again. Hugging my knees as my feet propped up, I can't stop spilling tears. Remembering my professor's words “If you're struggling, you can always come talk to me,” like a distant memory. He was no longer around. The only person who actually saw me, despite me trying so hard to be invisible. I wish I could just disappear into the Pandoran forest. Pack up all my necessities and disappear. Like I've always wanted. Fading away into obscurity. I think about it for a moment. Oh wait, I can.

For days I prepare, make an emergency bag. I can go whenever I want, but I need to wait for the perfect opportunity. I learnt everything I needed. How to survive, the na’vi language, packing any foods that don't expire (non perishables), all that stuff. Hiding it in the ballistics storage in the rear of my samson.

That opportunity came when the human’s declared war on the Na’vi. The man who I now know as Colonel Miles Quaritch who destroyed Hometree. That was the day I saw what a monster looked like. I was one of the pilots who didn't shoot, my hand hovering over the red button as my co-pilot was yelling at me, but I couldn't do it. I'm not a monster like him. I turned the samson around, it's not my fight. But surprisingly I wasn't the only one. I had morals like the other person who turned around. As she flew back, she radioed me.

“Why are you turning back?” I could hear her through the isolated frequency.

“Because I'm not a monster,” was all I said. My co-pilot and the other trigger happy soldiers in my samson yelling at me to turn back around.

As we returned to Hell’s Gate, landing next to each other on the flightline, I felt a gun held to my temple, the soldier yelling profanities at me, calling me a traitor. A traitor to humanity.

“Shoot me! Go ahead! Shoot me!” I yelled back at him, he was shocked when I looked at him with furious tears streaming down my face, “If you want to commit alien genocide, then start by killing me!”

“PUT DOWN THE GUN! Now!” the same voice from earlier screamed. Trudy Chacon was her name I think. I never really asked before, she’d forget me too. She was pointing a hand held at the soldier taking my hand and pulling me away, back into Hell’s Gate.

“Are you on our side?” Chacon suddenly asked.

“What?” I questioned, tired, confused and exhausted with all the questions.

“Are you on our side? Because you turned around, and you didn't shoot any of your missiles,” she simply said, I’ll just nod so she goes away, “Okay then. You know how to throw a punch?” I sighed, nodding again. “Great! Then come with me.”

She dragged me with her as a scientist ran up to us. Patel, Dr Max Patel.

“They’ve put Grace, Norm and Jake in a cell,” he said frantically, shooting a glance at me.

“Great, looks like a rescue mission. Let's go,” we moved into that direction then slowed as Trudy picked up an empty food cart, “I've got an idea, just follow my lead. She gestured to us to stay behind the wall before she called for us. She walked through the door first, then ordered the guard to get down on the ground, hearing a thud after a loud smack she called for Max as I stayed behind the wall, just next to the door. When suddenly the elevator door opened, as someone was stepping out, I moved to kicked them in the gut, punching his throat and punching him in the face knocking him out, I removed his gun and knife that he had on him, turning to Trudy, Max, Grace, Norm and Jake who were watching in wide-eyed awe. I averted my eyes as Trudy gave me a thumbs up and we hustled. Getting to the door to the flightline. Trudy turned to me.

“Could you stay here? I need someone on the inside, can you do that?” I gave a simple nod, Trudy squeezed my shoulder, “Thank you.”

As they got away, Max turned to me.

“So you're on our side?” he asked.

“I guess so,” I made my way back to my room, passing by the medical ward. Glancing in I saw Paz, her belly swollen as she was 9 months pregnant, about to pop at any moment. Getting to my room, I grabbed my Zune and headphones. I trudged down the hallway, making my way to the science department. Passing by the medical ward again, this time fully stopping when I heard the cries of a baby. I turned a few steps back looking through the small window. There was a baby, a little boy. But the sound of machines droned into a flatline. Paz. I don't know why, but I pushed open the door. Walking toward the scene. The baby was wailing. The doctor who held him turned to look at me. He was frantic, not in his right mind when he put the baby in my arms, I held the baby as he cried making sure to hold his neck properly. The Zune still in my hand, I scrolled through my library finding a calming tune. Hitting play, the only calming song played out: Sweet Child by Simply Red.

Surprisingly the baby began to calm down. The doors behind me slamming open. Quaritch sped past me to Paz’s side, he was yelling for her. And as the song came to an end he turned to me. Baby in my arms. His wet reddened eyes fell on the baby as a small gasp escaped his lips.

“Congratulations. It's a boy,” I whispered, somehow sounding cold. But he didn't care, taking the baby from my arms I dropped my arms as my legs dropped out from under me. He doesn't get to be this. Whatever this is. Not after what he did. Not after he destroyed a home. But what can I do right? I have no right to tell him what to do. But my furious eyes and tears gave it away. But he only looked at his baby. My RDA shirt was stained in blood and bodily fluid. I slowly got up and walked out, wanting nothing but to wash it all away.

It was a blur but I made it back to my tiny apartment, stripping everything off, I stepped into the shower scrubbing everything off me. Turning the water temperature higher to melt away everything I was feeling.

For some reason I kept on visiting the medical ward again, looking at the baby in the incubator. The nurse was staring at me, trying to figure me out. Someone came to a stand next to me. His intimidating aura gives him away. The baby’s father. I didn't want to look at him, not after what he did.

“You're (Y/N) right? Paz told me. I think I ‘ave something of yours,” he held out my water bottle, my name hand written on it in front of my face. My eyes honed in on it but didn't reach for it, only closing my eyes and sighing heavily, genially taking it from his hand. He doesn’t deserve to have this. Even coming from me who spent her whole life trying to appease her mother, all for the sake of approval and love. Only to get it from my father who I found I loved even more.

“Fuck,” I mumbled, this is fucked up. Miles’ ears perked up at my curse. I rubbed my face, trying to not cry. I’m done with crying for others. But Miles misunderstood my curse, what it actually meant. He wrapped his warm arm around my shoulder, why did it have to be warm pulling me into his side. This is fucked up. I repeated in my head. Paz didn’t deserve this, nor did Miles, but by Eywa I would do anything for this kid, even though I’m not his mother or parent.

“You must have been close to Paz. She talked about you sometimes, she said sometimes she can hear you cry through the walls, and said they sounded heartbreaking. But she also said that you were kind to others and spoke softly, that you kept everything on the inside and put on a brave face,” his voice was almost kind, and I choked out a sob. Not realising that I stopped breathing for a moment. Stop, just stop. You don’t get to be kind. You don’t get to comfort me. You don’t deserve a child. I was weeping, my knees giving out again, I crouched as I covered my mouth wanting to vomit. He knelt next to me and brought me into his embrace, his rough hand rubbing my back as he tried calming me. Stop, please I’m begging you. Please stop! You don’t deserve to be warm! My tears were furious and shameful.

“Ssshhhh, hey it’s okay,” Miles’ raspy southern accent drooling out, in the massive difference to my stepfather’s tone. So similar to my fathers comforting voice. A tighter pull as I didn’t pull away. I’m a mess. I don’t deserve this. He’s a monster, he doesn’t deserve this. Eyes, why does it have to be this way?

I silently made a vow to myself that this kid won’t suffer the same fate. Some day the kid will learn the truth and I’ll be the one to tell him.

“What will you name him?” I quietly asked Miles. He looked at me with a bit of curiosity and paused to think..

“How about…Miles?”

I laughed a little, of course he would name the baby after him.

“Miles junior,” I chuckled, how fitting. “It suits him.” I laughed a bit more, not caring if he thought I was a mad woman. “Something bad is coming, Quaritch. I have a feeling that the baby won’t have a father soon.”

He looked at me with concern, the softness remained, “Why'd ya say that?”

“Because you’ve started a war. Nothing good ever comes from war. You have to take responsibility for it. You’ll die before you get to raise your child, I hope you see that before you make a mistake you’ll regret. And I’ll be here to raise your kid because I’m not fighting in your war,” my monotone voice sounded so cold, colder than I've ever sounded before. He didn't say anything, the silence was killing me more. I turned to look at him dead in the eyes. This was the most serious I've ever been. His adam's-apple bobbed as if he was holding in the air. He finally let go, standing and quickly walking off, I watched him go.

When Quaritch gathered the soldiers, effectively immediately ending the RDAs research and avatar programme, shutting the whole operation down. I sat in the chair as everyone started packing things into boxes. I had hidden an expensive bottle of rum that was given as a birthday gift from my father before being shipped out to Pandora. As the crowd quieted down I took it out, I poured some into mugs around the department, as scientists and avatar drivers silently sipped on the aged and smoky rum. As reality hit us that we would either be shipped off back to earth or remain on Pandora. Even Trudy was there as I passed the bottle to her.

“If anything happens to me, take care of my baby,” Trudy said to me, referring to her samson. Those would be her last words to me.

“Don't forget me if anything happens,” I returned to her. She simply nodded. Unfortunately Grace would die that night and we would mourn her.

And when the war started it was chaotic. The avatars decided to revolt against the Selfridge, nothing was holding them back any more, we were no longer a part of the RDA. In fact, I helped through unsympathetic anger and being used as a pawn in their schemes. Max sat next to me in my samson as I fired bullets to the communication tower windows as the avatar drivers wielding guns ordered everyone to drop any weapons and get down on the ground, effectively stopping any communication to their war party.

The promise I made came to fruition. The war ended in an hour and a half at most. The Na’vi won by a landslide, and I learn that Trudy died and her samson was destroyed into smithereens. Miles Quaritch died at the hands of a Na’vi. And I would be holding his baby in my arms. Miles Jr Socorro. The little boy cooed his hand reaching out, the noises he made melted my cold heart a little. To protect the innocence that I wished I had growing up. I would make a new promise. To take care of the baby, so that he is seen and never forgotten.

Jake asked me to stay on Pandora, and I accepted. Remaining at Hell’s Gate with Max, Norm and the other avatar drivers that remained. And I would raise the baby as if he was my own son. In the end I realised I was never forgotten, just left behind for something greater.

A/N: I know this is supposed to be a one-shot, but if you want a part 2, I'll be more than happy to make one. Also, Im changing the taglist from word doc to excel with multiple sections for different stories, so it'll make it easier to keep track. And also because Tumblr is a being a bit of an a**hole on my side.

Taglist: @drinking-tea-and-be-obsessed

#avatar #avatar x reader #avatar x you #avatar x y/n #avatar x human reader #avatar fanfiction #avatar fanfic

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eluvisen · 19 days

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All I See Is Fire Reflected In Your Eyes - Chapter 1

Fandom: Baldur’s Gate 3

Characters: Karlach/fem!Tav

Rating: E

Summary: She skims along Karlach’s skin until her lips meet the scarred skin spreading out from her breastbone. One of countless hurts, immortalised on her body. Not a part of her has been left untouched by Avernus.

By the time Rhodeia is finished, there won’t be a part of Karlach left untouched by her.

—

Navigating the complexities of physical intimacy between two people who haven't been touched in a long time.

The door shuts behind them with a soft click. The shadow-weary boards of the Last Light Inn creak around them, the scent of cold mildew burning away in proximity to Karlach. Her eyes are fixed on Rhodeia, hot as stars.

Karlach reaches out, then rocks back on her heels. Her fingers curl into a weak fist. “We’re sure I won’t hurt you, right?”

The tight anxiety in her eyes makes Rhodeia ache. “Quite.”

Reaching out, Rhodeia takes Karlach’s hands. How incredible—the bare tips of Karlach’s fingers glow a hot-pulsing orange, warm but not blisteringly so, and a thrill courses through every inch of Rhodeia’s skin at the touch.

Karlach stills beneath her touch, breath catching, while flames skitter over the tip of her horn. Still, Rhodeia doesn’t burn. She brushes her fingertips over Karlach’s wrists, lightly, lightly, tracing her way up over hard muscle and scar tissue to skirt around the vents in her shoulders. Cupping Karlach’s face in her hands, she pulls her down until their mouths meet.

Karlach shudders, her breath hot on Rhodeia’s lips. Her touch is careful, hesitant, hands settling oh-so-lightly on Rhodeia’s hips. The moment is quiet and fragile and precious, and Rhodeia is content to wait until Karlach shivers again, slanting her mouth to deepen the kiss. Rhodeia laces her fingers together at the back of Karlach’s neck, heart fluttering in her chest like a trapped bird.

When they part, their foreheads rest together. This close, Rhodeia can see the faint constellations of freckles across Karlach’s cheeks. The small scar slashing through one eyebrow and over the bridge of her nose. Rhodeia brushes her fingers over the curve of Karlach’s cheek, then kisses her again, just because she can. Karlach makes a noise low in her throat, hands rising to catch Rhodeia’s face in both hands. When they pull back, the slits of Karlach’s pupils are blown wide, black swallowing the hot amber glow.

Karlach is breathless with wonder. “Oh, gods. I don’t have to worry about hurting you anymore…”

Then she grins. Even with the darkness that curses the land, it’s like the sun is burning at midnight, and Rhodeia finds herself hoisted up, legs wrapping around Karlach’s waist as she spins them around. “Finally. Finally!”

[Read on AO3]

#writing #baldur's gate 3 #karlach cliffgate #karlach #karlach x tav #rhodeia whitebloom

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orlissa · 3 months

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January Reading Summary

I asked yesterday if people were interested in what I read this year so far, and they seemingly were, so... here we go. You only have yourselves to blame.

Agatha Christie: Cat Among the Pigeons I actually started this one last year--I read Christmas Puding around Christmas, finished it sooner than I thought I would, but enjoyed it (I generally like Christie), so I just picked up another Christie I found at home. Oh, boy. Bad idea. Yep, it didn't do it for me. The beginning was all over the place, because Christie was introducing all these POVs all over the place with a (technically) non-chronological storytelling, then we were almost halfway through the novel by the time the first murder happened, then in the conclusion there were elements so misguided and nigh-distasteful (and stupid) that it actually made me mad. Nope, do not recommend.

James Herriot: All Creatures Great and Small Ah, an old friend. For those who are unfamiliar with Herriot's work: he was a vetenarian working in rural Yorkshire who started practicing in the early forties (changed to 1937 in his books), who then wrote several (slightly fictional) memoirs/collections of short stories about his life in the 1970s. ACGaS covers the period from the time he arrives at Yorkshire until he marries his wife. It's like a big mug of hot cocoa in a book form (that will sometimes make you cry). Everyone should read Herriot at least once.

James Herriot: Vets Might Fly Another one of Herriot's works, this one *technically* covers his time spent in the RAF--I say *technically* because many of the chapters are like "so this thing happened during training that reminded me of one of my patients at home." Also lovely, but sadly my copy is fully of typos (I have his books in Hungarian, and my copy of ACGaS was published in 1980s, while this one in the 2010s).

R.F. Kuang: Yellowface I've talked about this one here before. Brillant (I'd call it) pschyo-thriller and satire about the current state of the publishing industry.

Soman Chainani: Beasts and Beauty Collection of retold fairytales which I DNF'd after three stories. In my defense, I went into enthusiastically, but the first story was... okay, the second was kinda eyeroll-worthy, and the third I couldn't make much sense of, so I just gave up.

Hannah Grace: Wildfire Pretty much the same as Icrebreaker. Grace is really good at writing engaging characters and cammaderie, and I'm grateful for how she handles serious issues, but she still has much to work on her plots--some parts of the novel felt really episodic, like it had nothing to add to the overall narrative, while she stressed several times how important this end-of-the-camp talent show is for the female lead, only then to skim over the event in like two pages, without showing her thoughts about.

Mark Lawrence: The Girl and the Moon ...Sigh. This was a translation project, and I really can't say anything nice about this. It might be just me, because the author is apparently pretty much renowed, but I couldn't find a single element in it that I liked. Also the female lead's ending pretty much rivalled Alina's in the books in how unfulfilling and disappointing it was. Not to mention that the male author, who until that point handled the female character pretty well IMHO, had her say/decide on something that was downright disturbing, especially from a woman.

I also started reading Jennifer Saint's Ariadne and Katharine and Elizabeth Corr's Queen of the Gods in January, but I haven't finished those yet.

#orlissa reads #books

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spockandawe · 9 months

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this might be a longshot but do you know any transmigration cnovels with trans characters in them? or just cnovels in general tbh transmigration is not a requirement

Oh man, this has been sitting in my inbox for a while because I really wanted to pull together some good recs for you, but it is.... a lot harder than I expected to differentiate between some of these books. The broadest catchall tag on novelupdates looks to be "gender bender," which isn't the most clear starting point. If I haven't read something, the tags on novelupdates aren't always clear on whether any given story is 1) crossdressing, 2) body change that will be undone eventually, or 3) body change that the character is at peace with. And if there are any characters who are trans and aware that they're trans, I could not find a relevant tag, and the book descriptions were not helpful. There are tags for "male to female" and "female to male," but like before, it's really unclear which of the above categories the book will fall into. I saw a tag for "genderless protagonist," but skimming the tagged books, it was hard for me to tell if that meant anything like what I would hope for.

That being said, I hate to leave this with a complete shrug. Let me start with some low-hanging fruit! Terribly sorry if you've heard of these examples before, they're not very obscure. From books I've read or bound: TGCF/Heaven Official's Blessing, the supporting character Shi Qingxuan has some gender things going on. There isn't a definitive answer as to what exactly that entails, I've seen a variety of headcanons including that SQX is nonbinary or a trans woman. I default to they/them myself, but I've seen some LOVELY thoughts about this. Then, in JWQS/Clear And Muddy Loss Of Love, the protagonist is born female, but is living life is a man, including irreversible body modification in order to pass more convincingly (for revenge reasons). The story uses she/her in the narration, but it could easily be something more complex if you wanted to read it through that lens. And then in 2ha/The Husky And His White Cat Shizun, there's a supporting character doing a similar born-female-living-as-a-man-with-body-mods thing. I can't say that it's a story about trans experiences, but it is definitely easy to read with an eye to gender.

And then, these are entirely unvetted, but here are some novels from my attempted NU search that looked like they maybe had potential. I think all of these seem to be 'I got dumped into this body that doesn't match my nominal gender, but it's cool', rather than trans stories, so please don't trust my recs too hard, but I can't believe how hard it was to search for this!!

Demon Sword Maiden

Reborn As My Love Rival's Wife

Fugui Ronghua (short, but complete)

Even If I'm Reborn As A Cute Dragon Girl, I Will Still Make A Harem

Dominion's End

Reborn, I Became A Male God (only three chapters translated, but MTL is out there)

it is shockingly hard to tell what I'm getting into from these tags and summaries, jesus. I hope those recs aren't all completely off the mark, but it's really hard to gauge their content without reading them myself. If other people have recs, I'd love to hear them in the comments! I feel like there must be authors who have tackled some of these themes, and I'm disappointed that the tagging conventions make it hard to identify who those authors are :T

#spock replies #cnovels

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separatist-apologist · 2 years

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Wonderland

Haven't you heard what becomes of curious minds?

Summary: In a kingdom where a Maiden is forced to be sacrificed to appease the monster in the woods, Elain Archeron is chosen out of spite by her spurned suitor, Graysen. Trapped in a tower with her beast, Elain must unravel if she can truly trust the monster promising not to hurt. She doesn't know he's freed every maiden he's ever been sent...but her? Her, he intends to keep.

Read More: Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | AO3

WARNING: MONSTER/ Breeding kink/Human men

11k words

Elain thought she woke to Lucien’s hands sliding up her legs. It had been an infuriating night. For a man so concerned about predators, he sure had no problem bleating their current circumstances about the meadow as he bounced from mountainside to mountainside, blowing fire and smoke everywhere he landed. She’d tried to drag him back inside but Lucien wouldn’t budge. She’d declared he could sleep in the rain, snapping the door shut loudly behind her in hopes he’d come trailing behind, proverbial tail tucked between his legs.

It took her a moment to realize she was still dreaming and the cold that was sliding over her was a strange blue-black mist that glittered like the night sky. She could see herself tucked beneath an appropriate amount of blankets given Lucien still had not returned, her hair wild about her face.

And then Elain was back in the city square, emptied of people but herself. It was the same moody, nearly rainy day it had been when she’d left in that wagon. Elain walked over the stone towards a massive fountain of a man, sword raised in the air, slaying a trembling dragon-like beast. It could have been her dragon, could have been Lucien’s golden body prone around that warrior. She touched the edge, surprised to find it was cold.

“How am I here?”

Clipping boots on the cobblestone drew her attention away from the carved image she’d never thought much of when she’d lived there. Elain turned, annoyed to find when she tried to look at whoever approached, her surroundings slipped into that inky abyss. It made her legs wobble, to be surrounded by nothing but darkness and stars and so Elain turned her back despite every instinct telling her not to.

“Terrible thing, isn’t it?” The man's voice was cold and smooth, like a winters wind whipping about her face. “My father had it commissioned to pacify the humans.”

“Why would he do that?” she asked, sitting on the edge of the fountain to skim her hand along the gray, frigid water.

“We’re hiding, just like the rest,” came his bored reply. As if she should assume as much.

“Are you offering me a history lesson?”

“A warning, lady.” His words were almost earnest, his presence hedging closer. Elain wished she could see him. “Your mate has warded your home and it is not so easy to leave things for you. I see he completed the bonding ritual…and you did not die.”

“Were you hoping I would?” she asked breathlessly, her heart pounding in her chest.

“No. I hoped you would survive…just as I am hoping you survive this babe.”

Dread pooled in her stomach. “Why wouldn’t I?”

He paused for a moment. “Before the extermination, our kind took mates of our own species. It would have been rare for a male to have a human mate. Now, with so many of us scattered—”

“There are more?”

He chuckled. “Many, many more. Just hidden, not wholly aware of each other's presence. With so many of us scattered, the great Mother Goddess has clearly begun to bless us in other ways. Perhaps, after centuries of fighting, she has decided it’s best to merge us back into one species. I cannot speak to her innate knowledge, but I do trust her wisdom. A lot is riding on you surviving.”

“Like what?”

He paused again. “I have my own human mate,” he finally admitted. “I have kept my distance…I am fearful I might harm her. Seeing you accept the magic so easily, it has given me hope. It will give the others hope, too. We could reunify, we—”

“The rest of the humans would never allow it,” Elain insisted, shivering at the thought of a male like Lucien stalking the city for one of her sisters. “If they find out, they’ll begin hunting your kind again.”

She heard him click his teeth impatiently. “People are tired of the swaggering males sending good females to die. Every year we lose another breeding female to the continent. There is discontent, restlessness. The males will try and stir up their usual fear believing there are very few of us left but Elain, there are many of us left. An army’s worth of males who remember the cruelty of the humans very well and who might be fascinated to see a hybrid child born to a female human mated to one of our own.”

“I’m not going to help you start a war,” Elain whispered, still staring into that reflective pool. The presence behind her crept closer, revealing the body of a man…but not his face. He was dressed finely, like a great lord in his tailored black pants. His onyx and silver jacket was buttoned to his neck, likely hiding whatever marked him as other. He might have blended in entirely, were it not for the massive, shadowy wings at his back.

“War is inevitable,” he murmured. “It has been for centuries. Your males went looking for you and returned with your bloodied clothes, satisfied you were dead. Your sisters are not so certain. They’re out for blood and I have it on very good authority that if they do not settle, one of them will go next year…and the third will take a husband to avoid the same fate.”

“I wrote them,” Elain whispered.

“Yes,” the male voice murmured. “A terrible mistake on your part. It has made the males suspicious of their insistence that you are alive. Even,” he interrupted her protest, “If you had died like you should have, the males are restless. War has been brewing before they were born. They are emboldened by their attacks on their own females. They crave the taste of blood.”

“Why are you telling me this?” Elain asked, wanting to return to the safety of her bed.

“They’ll come for you first,” the man murmured. “And I want you to be prepared. Move higher into the mountains…travel to the Illyrian Steppes. There is a rather large collection of us still living together. Their leader will help you, if he knows you are mated to a male and carrying his child.”

“What’s his name?”

“Cassian,” the man murmured softly. “I have been unable to reach him…perhaps you could tell him that we spoke?”

“And do you have a name?”

Another pause, and then— “Tell him the Prince of Nightmares is looking for him.”

Elain woke with a loud gasp, back in bed just in time to hear footsteps pounding on the stairs. Lucien burst into the room, slick from the rain and coated in a fine layer of ash, his eyes a burning gold. His nostrils flared. “I can scent the male,” he growled, looking around the room. Elain sighed.

“Good morning, Lucien,” she grumbled. “It was nice to wake up in your arms. I had the most terrible dream my mate spent the evening flying about the valley looking for threats when he should have been warming my bed.”

Her sarcasm did not deter him. Lucien paced the room as if he might find the man who had snuck into Elain’s dream hiding beneath the bed. She kicked off the blankets with exasperation. “There is no one here, Lucien!”

He stilled, catching the anger in her tone. Golden eyes shifted back to russet and finally he had the decency to look a little shamed.

“And even if he had been, what good were you all the way out there? When another of your males can slip into my mind and talk to me?” she demanded, shoving past him for the hall. “Good thing he only wanted to talk about your kind being hidden and not carve out my mind or—”

“There was a male in your mind?” Lucien interrupted, padding after her into the bathroom.

“Yes,” she said, rounding on him. “Talking of the Illyrian Steppes and a man named Cassian that he wants us to go meet.”

Lucien considered that. “And…and you trust he was not trying to harm you?”

“He says he has a human mate, too,” Elain explained, softening only a little. Only because Lucien was towering over her with his big, golden body utterly unclothed. She had such a weakness for him stripped to nothing, vulnerable and soft before her. “He is watching us, to see how the baby will fare.”

Lucien’s hand immediately flew to her stomach, his pleasure immediate. “Our baby,” he murmured, reminding her why she was angry with him. Elain pushed at his chest, shoving him into the hall so she could use the bathroom without him hovering over her with his big, happy eyes.

Lucien was still waiting in the hall when she emerged, towel wrapped around her body. He yanked the edge, barring her body to him while she squealed, darting back into their bedroom. Lucien was just behind, catching her gently about the waist and setting her just beside the bed.

“Now you want to be affectionate?” she complained when his hand slid over her wet stomach.

“Warning away males from my pregnant mate is affectionate,” he protested, sinking to his knees to press a kiss to her skin. “I have bathed the valley in our scent to keep you and the baby safe. I am sorry you had to sleep alone and dream of other males.”

He paused for a moment, ear pressed against her stomach. “What did this male look like?”

“He was hidden in shadow,” she murmured. “I don’t think he wanted me to know who he was.”

Lucien nodded. “It’s just as well. I might be tempted to find him.”

“Do you want to see if there are others like you?” Elain questioned, some of her anger evaporating at his obvious adoration. “It might be nice to know…”

“I will think on it,” Lucien finally murmured, kissing her stomach again. “For now, I have other things to consider.”

“Like what?”

He looked up with worshipful eyes. Elain’s toes curled at the sight. “My mate is pregnant and winter is approaching. There is much left to do.”

“Oh?”

Lucien pushed her back to the bed with a wicked smile. “I left her unpleasured last night. It would make me a poor male if I did not rectify that.”

Elain meant to remind him he had pleasured her quite well the night before right until Lucien put his head beneath her dress.

It could wait.

~*~

Elain bounded into Lucien’s wood shop mid-afternoon two days after he’d pieced together his mate was carrying his child. If he had it his way, Lucien would have tied her to the bed and kept her there for the duration of the pregnancy. He did not have it his way as Elain was feisty and very good at aiming her heel so she caught him in the jaw. Lucien didn’t dare ask her to rest again, not unless she was so sick she couldn’t stand. Then he was allowed to sweep her up in his arms and make a big fuss.

She deserved to be fussed over. He wanted her to lay back down, to snuggle beneath the blankets and let him take care of everything. It was Elain that was the problem, always moving, too curious to stay in one place and certain everything she did was good for the baby. Lucien didn’t know enough about infant care to contradict her, though he was growing suspicious she wasn’t an expert, either.

“You shouldn’t be in here,” Lucien said, eyeing the nails scattered about the straw laden floor. She was going to pierce her foot and get tetanus and then he’d have to take her to the humans for care.

“Why not? The baby wanted to see you.”

Lucien eyed her flat stomach. “How can you be sure?”

“I just know these things.”

Elain and her knowing.

“I wanted to see you,” she huffed, which was all she had to say. Lucien, covered in sawdust, grinned.

“I am building the baby a bassinet,” he explained, rushing forward to sweep nails off the floor with a booted foot. “For when he is small, that way he can stay in our room while we sleep.”

Lucien only had the pieces but in his mind it would rock gently like the wind when he flew. He imagined himself sitting on the floor mimicking the feeling while Elain slept soundly in their bed. The whole scene made his chest ache.

“He?” she teased, letting him wrap her up against his chest. “You’re so sure this baby is a boy?”

Lucien frowned. “My father had seven sons.” Another male just seemed natural. He’d given very little thought to a female and yet when he imagined a babe with Elain’s pretty eyes and soft golden hair, Lucien felt like he might cry.

“My father had three daughters,” she reminded him, unaware of the emotions roiling through him.

“A female would be good,” Lucien acknowledged gruffly. “Now go back inside before you get hurt.”

“You think the whole world is dangerous,” she complained as he all but shoved her back into the biting autumn afternoon.

“Because it is dangerous,” Lucien agreed. “And you are small and soft. Why not eat some cheese and take a nap?”

“I resent that,” she grumbled. “Have you thought anymore on going to the Steppes and—”

“No.”

Elain’s disappointment was palpable. She wanted him to see if her dream visitor was truthful and there truly were more of them than Lucien had imagined. The problem was Elain had a sense of how badly he did want to do this. Until recently, Lucien had been alone for centuries. Even with her, she didn’t entirely understand that sense of loss, of the belief that he really was the last. Even the thought that more like him had survived somewhere bolstered his spirits.

And terrified him all at once. Maybe if he’d been alone, still. Maybe if he wasn’t so terrified of leaving his pregnant mate by herself. Or worse. Elain, he knew, wanted to join him. Lucien could imagine every terrible thing that might go wrong. Even if the beasts were friendly and kind, the Illryian Steppes were brutal and cold. Elain didn’t heat herself the way he did, had only her clothes and skin for warmth. Too much could go wrong.

“We’ll talk about this later,” he added, catching how her mouth opened to argue. “In bed tonight.”

Her eyes narrowed. “You can’t distract me with your mouth, Lucien.”

He grinned. “Why not? It’s always worked before.”

She wasn’t smiling back.

“I know what you’re thinking,” Elain began, the pull of her eyes dragging him out of his little shop and away from his bassinet. His mate was unhappy and Lucien loathed when Elain wasn’t happy. Especially now, when she was giving him everything he’d ever hoped for with no complaints, only soft smiles and parted legs. He heaved a sigh.

“Elain–”

“I want you to go. Even if you leave me behind. I’ll be fine,” she added, as if Lucien had any intention of leaving his pregnant mate anywhere but in his bed.

“Let’s wait,” he tried, desperation edging his words just a little. “When the baby is born—”

“Then you’ll be fussing that the baby is too small, too fragile, that we should wait until she’s older and stronger—”

“She?” he questioned, wondering if this was more of her knowing. Elain breezed right past that.

“And there will be another child, and then another and before you know it a decade will have passed and you’ll still be here. Alone.”

“Not alone,” he protested, crossing his arms over his chest. “It sounds like you're promising to give me a brood. I’ll be too busy–”

“Lucien!” she snapped. “You’re doing it again. I want to go before winter. Either you go by yourself or you take me with you.”

“Or what?” Lucien asked, padding towards her until he all but towered over his little mate. She didn’t cower. Elain merely put her hands on her hips, eyes blazing with defiance.

“Or I’ll have this baby in the woods without you,” she whispered, her words a knife to the gut. “You’ll come home one day to the smell of my blood and a new baby swaddled in bed.”

“That’s cruel,” he whispered, not bothering to hide his hurt. Elain threw up her hands.

“You make all the rules and I don’t like it! You promised me freedom,” she reminded him. “And now all you do is keep me shut away in the house.”

“Because I know what could happen,” he murmured, reaching for her face. “How am I supposed to live without you?”

“You’re not,” Elain reminded him with exasperation. “Nothing is going to happen. You’ll get your brood and your people. Truly, Lucien, you could have it all.”

She turned on her heel, in no mood for his affection, which was just as well. Lucien didn’t appreciate her threat to hide the baby away or to give birth somewhere he couldn’t find her. He didn’t doubt Elain wouldn’t try. She was feisty and stubborn and so utterly frustrating because she didn’t understand. She was still so blithely human, so unaware of how the centuries of being alone had ground Lucien’s bones to nothing. She was the first bright spot, the first scrap of light he’d had since his mother died.

She was asking him to gamble the future he’d dreamed of on the chance he wasn’t alone and Lucien was not willing to do it. He wouldn’t risk leaving his pregnant mate alone to face the world, to raise their baby among the very people who might one day rip those wings from their fragile little body.

Lucien was miserable by the time he plodded up the steps. He avoided her with a bath, shedding himself of the itching clothes he hated. With wet hair and bare skin, Lucien opened up the bedroom door, expecting more of Elain’s wrath. She didn’t need fire to bring him to his knees though he could imagine, had she been one of the Fae, she would have been utterly lethal.

She was also dead asleep, worn out from the simple, yet difficult task of growing the baby. This, he thought, was what she didn’t understand. The sight of her in the dying firelight, curled around a massive pillow she’d once told him reminded her of his body. Golden hair spread gently around her flushed face. She was warm again, buried beneath too many blankets. Elain thought the baby had raised her body temperature though Lucien couldn’t be sure.

Lucien gently removed the pillow to the sound of her sleepy protests, sliding his body beside her until it was him she clung to. “I’m still mad at you,” she whispered, her mouth moving against his neck.

“I was alone for a very long time,” Lucien told her, twisting until their foreheads were touching. “Even when your kind sent the females, we weren’t friends. We didn’t speak. No one but you ever saw my two-legged form. I made my peace with it. I accepted my life for what it was. It was small but I was helpful. It made me feel less alone to take those females over the sea, to know they were safer, out of reach of the people who’d hurt them. And I meant to do that for you, too.”

Elain’s fingers brushed over his cheek.

“You are my mate,” he breathed. “My whole life. I only just found you and now you want to rush off into danger and all I can think about is how empty life would be if I was given this time and it was my own carelessness that stole you away.”

“You can’t protect me from everything,” Elain reminded him, those same fingertips ghosting against his lips.

“We’re happy here. Isn’t that enough?” It was one last desperate plea. Lucien knew, looking at her earnest, hopeful gaze, that Elain could not be persuaded.

“And what when the baby learns she has your form? Your magic? When she wants to play with other children? Or if she realizes she has a different sort of power? Wouldn’t it be nice to know there are others who can help? That if anything ever did happen—to either of us—that she wouldn’t be lost and alone like you were?”

He had to choke back his words. It was the way Elain spoke of the baby.

Her. She. A daughter, a living breathing little girl.

Lucien knew what happened to girls alone in the world. Had seen centuries of them chained up in a tower to slake male lust for violence. Lucien practically shook as he imagined a little girl with the same banded gold and her mothers soft eyes trying to flee those males, alone without either him or Elain.

He shuddered. “Okay. We’ll look for the others.”

Elain pressed her lips to her mouth. “I love you, Lucien. Nothing is going to happen to either of us.”

But Lucien wasn’t sure she was right.”

~*~

Lucien agreed to go and, true to his word, was agreeable just as soon as he finished between her legs. She hadn’t complained—it was a wonderful way to wake up, all things considered—though he didn’t want to be touched in return. He was antsy and anxious, his dread practically palpable as he bundled her in a coat and scarf and hat. His eyes all but pleaded—change your mind, change your mind—but she wouldn’t and she wasn’t. Elain didn’t pretend to understand Lucien’s fear but she did think some of it was unwarranted. After all, his father could have taken his son and fled. He’d chosen to stay. How much about what Lucien believed was even true?

Bundled until she was merely a pair of eyes, Lucien pressed a kiss to her gloved hands. “If anything even smells wrong, we’re coming back,” he warned. Elain nodded, stumbling forward for a clumsy hug. It amused him, tugging the first smile she’d gotten all day.

“When we get home, I’m putting my cock in your mouth,” he added, draping one last blanket over her shoulders. “I will be cold.”

She had a scarf pressed to her lips, keeping her from enthusiastically endorsing his plan. Lucien gave more often than he took and Elain jumped at the chance to make him feel as good as he did when he woke her with his rough tongue against her sensitive body. It wasn’t the time to think about it—if Lucien caught even a whiff of arousal he’d call the whole thing off to keep her trapped in bed. Letting Lucien think he could continue to use his handsome, muscular form as a distraction was a mistake. He won too many arguments simply by standing in front of her without a stitch of clothing on.

Lucien shifted in the early morning gloom. Had autumn always been so wet? She knew Lucien didn’t like it and yet she refused to be deterred. Snow wasn’t soon behind if the dropping temperature was any indication and by the time spring rolled around she’d be far too heavy to fly. It was now or it was never.

Lucien took off, the woosh of air stealing the breath from her lungs. She’d never get used to it though admitting to Lucien she didn’t like being so high in the air or clinging to his body as he rose into the atmosphere was tantamount to never leaving their home ever again. Lucien wouldn’t forget, was too concerned with ensuring she never felt a moment of discomfort and so Elain kept her hands tight against his raised scales, grateful for his careful grace.

She’d thought the clothes were an overreaction until the wind began to scream around her, its brutal kiss stinging beneath the layers of wool. The valley beneath them vanished to nothing, leaving only snow rolling snow drifts stretched for miles like a vast, endless sea. Elain had to close her eyes and focus on breathing through her nose when Lucien plunged into gloomy cloud cover, the once soft, drizzling rain shifting to frigid ice and snow.

It seemed to go on forever. Lucien doved from beneath the cloud cover, circling mountain sides and pointed peaks until Elain was practically breathless from the altitude. There was nothing—no life, no trees, just the ever present ice she was certain would never thaw. Beneath her, Lucien’s tension seemed to mount the longer they searched. She felt awful. Maybe it had been nothing more than an incredibly vivid dream. Perhaps she’d gotten his hopes up for nothing. He was a good mate and she wasn’t, she thought, cheek nuzzled against his back. She tried to kiss him through the scarf wrapped around her chapped lips, her gloved hands stroking what she hoped translated into an apology.

Lucien whipped his head to the side, she thought to look at her. Elain leaned to the side, hand outstretched to pat his snout when she saw his usual russet eyes slide to gold. A streak of black and red seemed to burst from the clouds below, slamming so hard into Lucien’s body he couldn’t keep her on his back. Elain just narrowly avoided being hit with Lucien’s heavy spiked tail as she plunged to the ground, hitting the relatively soft snow below. She’d been right to think it was deeper than she was tall. Elain had to dig her away out among the furious, screaming bellows overhead.

Lucien screamed violently to the earth like a bolt of golden lightning, his tail thrashing violently. The other dragon—larger, with what Elain though were curious red eyes, flapped huge, leathery wings just overhead. She couldn’t get close to Lucien without risking harm and he clearly couldn’t hear her over his own snapping and snarling.

So Elain, looking at the other creature, decided to wave.

We won’t hurt you, she hoped her body was saying. Don’t hurt us.

Lucien blew a furious cloud of steam and flame as the beast crept closer, his dark scales shifting red in the gloomy, filtered sunlight. She beckoned him closer until a beast no longer stood before her. This man shifted in pants. It was a revelation not to see another penis–which hadn’t occurred to her until she’d seen the rippling of his body shimmering in the air—and a face that was so eerily similar to Lucien’s.

Not in appearance. This man’s skin was a shade browner and instead of the lovely gold ribboning Lucien wore, he had a line of whorling red tattoos that streaked over his neck, his bare chest, and across his arms. His wings had shifted, folded and been made smaller but where will bunched against his back, the taloned tips nearly grazing his tattooed shoulders.

“We didn’t come to harm you!” Elain shouted over Lucien’s insistent fury and the rippling wind. “We were sent to find someone!”

He grinned, running a broad hand through his tangled, shoulder length hair. “Who are you looking for?” his booming voice replied, hazel eyes sparkling with mischief. She knew who he was.

“Cassian.”

He threw out muscular arms, striding towards her as if he might give her a hug. Only Lucien’s furious, spiked tail slamming between them stopped Cassian from coming any closer. “You found me. How lucky.”

His teasing smile told her he’d already known she was coming, that he’d been out waiting. Elain cleared her throat. “The ah…the Prince of Nightmares—”

“Is that what he calls himself now?” Cassian asked, eyeing Lucien just behind him. “Hiding in opulence, having a human do his dirty work? You should tell him to come face me himself.”

“I don’t exactly have a direct line to him,” Elain grumbled.

“Will your male let me take you somewhere warmer? I don’t want to die today,” he added with amusement.

“He doesn’t have pants,” Elain explained with embarrassment. Cassian looked into the golden eyes of Lucien.

“He seems wild. I haven’t seen one of his kind in centuries…where did you find him?”

Elain pressed her lips together, ignoring the ache in her body now that the adrenaline had begun to wear off. She’d fallen far, and though the snow was soft enough, she was certain she’d bruised something.

“I don’t mind his nudity,” Cassian finally offered. “Though I doubt he wants to shift. He can wait outside for all I care, so long as he doesn’t frighten off the younglings.” That captured Lucien’s attention. He snuffed, eyes raised.

“Very wild,” Cassian murmured. “Follow me, then.”

His body rippled, shimmering red against the hazy fog. It wasn’t like the violent shift Lucien often gave into—as if his skin were replaced by the scales just beneath. Cassian moved with fluidity, with a sort of magic that allowed him to remain two-legged even when his terrifying wings flared around him.

Elain plodded through the snow. “You hurt me when you dropped me,” she murmured, pressing a soft kiss against his nose. “So now we do what I say. We’re going to follow him and you’re going to behave.”

Russet eyes blinked back to life, only to shift back into the gold. It was assent, or as close as she’d get. He lowered himself, nosing her ass as she clambered back onto his back until she had to swat him away. Cassian watched overhead, hovering like a terrifying creature of the night. The Prince of Nightmares. That was what the terrifying man of shadow had called himself. What did that make Cassian, then? He was massive, a thing of pure muscle and flesh.

He took them deeper into the mountains, skimming close to the ground until snow gave way to a city. Lucien reared back, clearly startled by what he saw. For a moment neither of them moved, hovering in the air as they gazed down at the pointed, thatched roofs attached to brick houses. Not just houses, either. She saw shops and other buildings nestled among the mountainside. Their roads were clear and made of dark cobblestone, the sides lined with little fences and pine colored shrubs.

He stilled entirely at the sound of a shrieking child. Not fear. It was joy that cut through the howling wind. Elain rubbed his back, wishing she knew what he was thinking. Why hadn’t he been brought here? Why had Lucien been left to fend for himself in the wilds?

Lucien deposited her on the outskirts, tail flicking nervously. Cassian, who’d already shifted back to his leather armored pants, glanced over. “He can come into the city. Our streets are wide enough…but if he loses his temper he’s gonna get hurt.”

Elain knew Lucien wouldn’t stay. “I understand.”

Lucien’s eyes remained nervous but russet as they stepped onto the streets. His head swiveled back and forth, watching people in very normal clothing walk about. They weren’t like him—massive, taloned wings remained pinned at their backs even in their two-legged forms. Just like Cassian’s had. Not all of them bore any marks on their faces at all. Some of the men were tattooed and shirtless but the majority might have been human, had they not bore those leathery wings.

“You stay out here,” Cassian ordered when they reached one of the little thatched homes. “I want to speak with your female. She will explain…and you will not harm anyone in this city.”

Lucien snuffed in agreement but there was fear in his eyes, radiating in waves. Elain pressed a reassuring hand on his nose before gesturing towards a large, green shuttered window. “I’ll stand right here so you can see I’m not being harmed.”

Lucien nuzzled her with his massive nose while Cassian opened the rounded wooden door. “Is it usual for his kind to be so…affectionate towards mortals?”

Elain stepped into the cozy little cottage, delighted when Cassian raised a tattooed hand and lit the fireplace at the far end of the room. Much like her own, there was a rather inviting living space that branched into a kitchen before spiraling upwards into what she assumed must be bedrooms. True to her word, Elain took the squashy sand colored chair just be the window, though Lucien’s head was still turned towards the city.

Cassian leaned against the mantle, watching intently. She’d almost forgotten he’d asked a question. “We’re mates,” she admitted, tugging off her scarves and jackets and coats to show him the golden band ribboned around her neck. Cassian went still for a moment. She wasn’t sure he drew even a breath as he stared.

“Mates? With a human?”

“Yes,” she agreed. “It was why your prince–”

“He is not our prince,” Cassian interrupted hotly. “He’s a coward.”

She’d come back to that in a moment. “He sent me because he said more of you might have human mates. He—”

“Wants us to fight another war for him,” Cassian interrupted again. “The human males are encroaching, are wondering how many of us are left. I’m sure your beast doesn’t hide away like he should and draws attention—”

“He was left in that forest,” she snapped defensively. “All by himself. If he doesn’t know your ways he can hardly be blamed.”

Cassian exhaled a breath. “So I am being promised a mate for my help?” he asked.

“I didn’t come here to ask you for anything but community. We’re having a baby and—”

Cassian’s sharp gasp of air silenced her. “A baby?”

She pressed a protective hand over her bundled stomach. “Yes.”

He looked to the window with unmistakable longing. “We have not had a child born here in three decades. There are so few females left…we are too closely related, now, even if the humans had not killed so many.”

“I heard a child laughing as we came in,” Elain protested.

“Our kind age much slower,” Cassian explained. “Our babes take nearly seventy years to reach maturity. That little boy you heard is…perhaps…ten? In human years? He will grow for another forty before he is an adult male ready to live out on his own.”

“And my baby? Will they age so slowly?” she questioned. Cassian’s eyes softened.

“I couldn’t say. You would be the first mortal I’d ever met to carry a Fae child. How did he convince you? Humans detest us.”

“Not all of us,” Elain murmured. “He did not have to try very hard. He’s not like the men in my village back home. Lucien is kind–”

“He is your mate,” Cassian agreed impatiently. “To harm a mate is to harm oneself. I understand why you were sent, though I resent that our terrible monarch used a pregnant female as bait.”

“I don’t want a war,” Elain protested gently. “I just want my baby to be able to live somewhere safe.”

“You are always welcome in Velaris,” Cassian swore. “You and your feral mate. We protect our own. I will need to discuss this with the others…perhaps I could visit you?”

Elain glanced back to Lucien, still watching the village with near hungry appreciation. “We’re in the valley at the base of the mountains.”

“Hardly safe,” Cassian snorted. Elain suppressed an eye roll.

“I don’t like the cold and he—”

“His kind once lived by the western sea. Some still do, I’ve seen his golden coloring before. I’ll send out a messenger. Perhaps he has kin. I ah…” Cassian rubbed the back of his neck. “The males will be interested in knowing more about you. About your females.”

“We prefer the two-legged form,” she admitted. “Although my sister might like to take on a massive dragon.”

There was an edge to Cassian’s eyes. “I would be happy to spar with any female who thinks she could take me on, mortal or not.”

“I think she might win,” Elain all but teased. “She has talons, too.”

Cassian came forward, his broad hand hovering over her stomach. “You have given us much to consider. Take your mate and rest easy. Tell him you are safe here. Even if you hate the snow, the humans cannot reach us. Your baby would be safe.”

Elain smiled. “That means everything to me.”

~*~

Elain was practically buzzing with excitement when they returned, stripping from her layers while Lucien paced nervously across the floor. Had he not seen it for himself, he might have thought the Illyrian community was nothing more than a very vivid dream. Beron had sworn there were no more of them. He and Lucien were the last, chained to that forest and the mortals with no hope for anything else.

He’d seen a child. Winged and strange and yet a child had run through the snow, kicking up powder and making a mess of things while his annoyed mama watched with amused eyes. Those people, that city—Lucien was coming apart even as Elain chattered.

“—baby will be safe and can learn—” “No.”

Elain froze, hand on the tail of her silvery blue scarf. “No?”

He shook his head, overcome with a wild fear. “We should leave. Leave this whole place. Go to the continent, perhaps, somewhere—”

“Lucien!” she interrupted, crossing the room to put her hands on his bare shoulders. “What is going on? Why are you trembling?”

His knees buckled and Lucien, who should have been stronger, fell to his knees. He gripped her body, pulling her soft body until he had his face buried in her stomach. He could hear the baby's fluttering heartbeat beneath her skin mingled against the steady beat of her own. Alive and safe…and not alone. Lucien inhaled sharply to keep himself from weeping while Elain threaded her fingers through his hair.

“You don’t have to do everything by yourself anymore,” she murmured.

“Why didn’t my father tell me?” he asked, his voice ragged even to his own ears.

She slithered to the ground, cupping his face in her hands. “I don’t know. Maybe he was scared,” she murmured, pressing a soft kiss to his cheek. “Cassian said he’d seen others with your coloring on the western coast. Maybe relatives–”

Lucien sucked in a soft breath. “It will all go wrong.”

“It won’t,” she insisted because Elain believed the world was good and fair. It must be so simply because she willed it. As if she hadn’t been brought to him in irons, as if she hadn’t expected to die. Elain, who had pulled a spear from the gut of a wounded beast even when she thought he’d kill her. Who knelt before him carrying his child, his mark, his scent.

“I will go where you tell me to go,” Lucien whispered, pressing his forehead against her own, nose nuzzling her face. “I will do what you tell me to do. I am yours.”

“We don’t need to do anything right now,” she murmured, kissing him again. Lucien knew where she was going with this. Her mouth was a distraction he wanted to lose himself in. “We can stay here until the baby is born.”

“And if I want to stay forever?” he questioned, tongue darting forward to trace the line of her lips. “I am a jealous male. I don’t want the others to see you.”

She rolled her eyes. “You don’t want them to see me huge and disgusting—”

Lucien gaped. “Disgusting?”

Elain’s cheeks bloomed with heat. “It is well known—”

“Among human males, you mean. Well known among human males,” he prompted, his anger already too hot. More of their nonsense, more absurd statements from males who did not know a good thing when they saw it.

“That once a woman becomes heavy with child she’s no longer…you know.”

“I don’t.” He suspected he was about to find out.

“He doesn’t wish to have sex with her,” Elain finished, squaring her shoulders. “Because she is no longer attractive.”

Lucien leveled a stare. “From the same males who are afraid of blood, I assume?”

Her flush deepened. “Your body changes—”

“I cannot wait,” he declared with relish, pulling her into his arms. Lucien licked the length of her neck. “I intend to keep you very, very naked. I want no more talk of what human males find appealing. I am beginning to think they do not like females at all, given their list of revulsions.”

“You’re just saying that,” she murmured, her fingertips reaching for his already hard cock. Lucien scoffed.

“I wouldn’t lie.”

“You think everything I do is appealing.”

“Because it is. You are my heart,” he reminded her, sighing when she stroked him gently. “And I pity your females left unattended while they’re pregnant. You have never smelled more appealing to me.”

“You make me sound like a meal,” she complained. Lucien tried to push her back, to spread her out but Elain was far too quick, dodging out of grasping range.

“You are a meal,” he complained when she moved to the edge of the bed, hands on her knees.

“Not tonight. Tonight the only thing being licked is you.”

His whole body went tight. “You don’t—”

“I’m well aware I don’t have to,” Elain interrupted primly. “Can’t I just want to?”

Lucien nodded, clambering to his feet. It felt strange to walk to her, cock jutting nearly straight ahead, and pointing it at her face. Disrespectful, in fact, to get as close as he did hoping she’d open her mouth…even when that’s exactly what she did.

“Elain—” he tried again, a half-hearted and yet valiant attempt given the way her soft mouth sucked him between her lips. His head lolled back on its own accord, his breath punched from his lungs. It was all Lucien could do but reach down and gather up her hair so it didn’t get caught against her face. It seemed polite given she had half his cock pushed into her throat and was bobbing her head, cheeks hollowed, tongue sliding up and down the ridged bottom of his length. It was maddening, her slow rhythm and the way her hand and lips created a different sort of friction.

“Please,” he whispered, unsure what he was even asking for. It encouraged her, a smile curving that he could feel against his too-hard cock. He wanted more, wanted her to move faster, to take all of him until he could feel the back of her throat the way he could feel her cunt. Lucien pushed his hips, holding her head still to see just how much she could take. Elain’s eyes widened, her hands coming to his thighs to shove. She gagged and Lucien withdrew entirely to the sound of his gasping mate.

“Too much,” she breathed, wiping tears from the corners of her eyes. “That was too much.”

“I agree,” he replied, hauling her up in his arms. She was so delicate, so lovely and beautiful and so, so unhappy when he all but shredded her clothes with little more than a slice of an elongated talon.

“Lucien,” she complained, wiggling against his grasp. Lucien merely adjusted his hold until one of her legs was slung over his shoulder, the other parted, her foot pressed against his pectoral.

“What are you doing?” she breathed, as if it weren’t obvious. Lucien guided her onto his still wet cock, exhaling at that first slide of her cunt.

“I’m fucking my mate,” he replied, pushing her onto him until her round ass was flush against his abdomen. “I’d like you to make a mess of me.”

Elain’s eyes rolled backwards, head going limp in his hand. He understood why–the changed angle made it seem as if he’d gone deeper, was practically invading her body, her senses. His arms trembled, not from her weight but just touching her. She was everything, his whole life draped against his body, drawing him so tight he felt truly connected.

Elain kicked gently against his chest, straining in her effort to get him to thrust the way he knew she wanted. He couldn’t truly fuck her while he held her and just for a moment, Lucien wanted to enjoy the sight of his pretty mate in his hands, her tight cunt wrapped obscenely tight around his cock. Elain whined, rolling her hips until she’d slicked her own arousal through the trail of hair just beneath his stomach, soaking the sparse strands. Lucien lost his tenuous control then, bringing her to the bed so he could pound into her relentlessly, thumb rubbing her clit until Elain came with a breathless sob not once but twice. He quite liked the hormones she was always bemoaning—while they might make her queasy, they’d also made her breasts more generous and perhaps more importantly, her cunt seemed wetter.

She reached for him, nuzzling her head into his neck. “Are you happy?”

He could still feel the rolling thrum of her climax against the skin of his cock. Lucien knew Elain wanted to know if he was happy about the others. He peered down at her.

“Yes.”

She was his happiness.

~*~

Cassian returned the day Lucien finished the bassinet. Elain was fussing over it in the living room when she heard Lucien’s furious bellow, his screaming snarl cut against the cheerful autumn afternoon.

“I haven’t come to harm her!” Cassian’s voice shouted with irritation. “Your scent is all over her, I couldn’t have her if I wanted!”

Elain went to the door as Cassian muttered, “Which I don’t.”

“A hello to you too,” she murmured with dry amusement. Cassian’s head snapped to Lucien, prowling in the grass.

“You need to teach him manners.” Cassian grumbled. “He’s too territorial.”

Elain wasn’t going to apologize for Lucien even if she sometimes agreed. When Cassian said it, she felt defensive—protective. “He’s a good mate,” she said, glancing towards the dragon that would almost certainly shift into a male to menace the other Fae.

“Yes. With a pregnant female,” Cassian agreed, eyes falling on the mahogany bassinet sitting in the living room. “I spoke with the others. They want to see you.”

“No.” Lucien’s voice cut through the conversation, drawing both Cassian and Elain’s attention to his half naked form. Lucien was jamming his feet into pants in the doorway, his eyes never leaving Cassian’s face. “No strange males around my pregnant mate.”

“They don’t believe me,” Cassian explained. “No one thinks it’s possible to impregnate a human even if you could get close to one.”

“They’re not going to hurt the women, are they?” Elain asked suddenly, her fear overwhelming her. Lucien, too, looked at Cassian with expectant eyes. Cassian sighed.

“No. No one is going to abduct females and force them to bear children. The hope is for a mate, and mates are equals.”

Elain breathed a sigh of relief. “What’s the harm, then?”

Cassian winced, as if he knew exactly what Lucien would say. “The harm is you,” Lucien snarled furiously. “You are so….so….so casual about your safety!”

“You can’t be serious,” she grumbled, crossing her arms over her chest. Lucien stared her down. “We’re not doing this here. Not now,” she added, embarrassed for Cassian to witness this argument.

“I don’t see why not,” Lucien, blissfully unaware of the social norms that dictated such things, seemed bound and determined to just plow through every edict on manners Elain had ever been given. She was burning angry all the sudden.

“Of course you don’t!” she shrieked, her temper overwhelming her good sense. “You just push and push and push until you have your way! It is just me making compromises! You are not the only person afraid, Lucien! You, at least, have your wings and talons and scales and what do I have? A body that is easily overpowered by practically everyone, a child I am now responsible for, and a mate who thinks he should be allowed to decide what I am and am not allowed to do!”

“You are making my point–!”

Elain cut him off.

“I was the one dragged through that forest, shackled and chained. It was my neck they restrained against your bed! You don’t ever think about what any of that was like for me! What it felt like to see you fly into that room and hope and pray you weren’t going to draw out my death!”

Lucien had gone very, very still. Elain was crying, not from sadness, but anger. She couldn’t help herself, half embarrassed by Cassian’s uncomfortable shuffling beside her, half furious Lucien had brought them to this point.

“You aren’t the one being left gifts,” she reminded him, wiping at her face. “Or dealing with the dreams. You weren’t thrown to the ground, you aren’t a pawn. You keep saying mates are equals and yet you treat me like you are above me because you are stronger. That I’m somehow to stupid to make a good choice for myself and need you to protect me. You’re angry about the men from my village but you’re not any better!”

Lucien’s eyes went wide, his hand flying to his bare chest. She knew, in that moment, she’d gone too far. Lucien was better in every conceivable way. It was too late to take back those words and in her haze of fury, Elain wasn’t entirely sure she wanted to. Let him stew, she decided. Elain shoved past him, elbowing him out of the doorway to step into the cool autumn air.

“Elain,” Lucien called miserably. “Elain, don’t…”

Fury gave way to shame and embarrassment as Elain marched down the sloping hill towards that too cold lake. Each step filled her with regret. She wished she hadn’t told him he was no better than the human men. Elain knew Lucien was going to internalize that long after she apologized. Fingers spanning her still flat stomach, she took a breath.

“I want our baby to grow up around people who understand her,” she murmured. Lucien, who’d been trailing behind her the entire stomp towards the lake, put his hands on her shoulders and pulled her against his chest. “I don’t want them to suffer like you did.”

He buried his face in her hair. “My mate is too sweet,” he said, his voice ragged. “And I dread the thought of what could happen to you.”

She didn’t turn to look at him, well aware she’d break if she saw the anguish she heard so plain. “Who protects you, Lucien? Who keeps you safe?”

She could feel him trembling, gripping her so tight he was likely leaving bruises. “I am not important—”

“You’re wrong!” she interrupted hotly, tears flooding her eyes. “You’re important to me, to this baby! Sometimes…” her voice cracked. “Sometimes I feel like you’re doing all this preparing so you can leave. And I can’t stand the thought of it.”

Lucien tugged, forcing her to look up at him. It was a mistake. Every inch of him radiated misery. “We will go to see the others,” he said, russet eyes searching her face. “Tomorrow. Cassian knows to expect us. And…and you can do what you need to do. I will not be in your way.”

“Lucien,” she whispered but he shook his head of hair, the braid she’d placed just that morning shedding some of the little orange marigolds.

“You were right. I am no better—”

“I’m sorry,” she gasped, rising up on her tiptoes to kiss him before he could finish that thought. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, Lucien—”

His mouth slanted over hers, arms wrapped around her body. “Don’t apologize,” he moaned, pulling her to the grass so she was in his lap, legs straddling his waist. “I–”

“Am perfect,” she kissed, tongue sliding against his own. Lucien groaned again, his body so warm, so hard even in the cool kiss of air. “I love you,” she added for good measure, delighted when he nipped at her bottom lip, rolling her to the ground to have her among a bed of grass. It had been so long since they’d last come together beneath a peaceful sky and yet this was right.

He was right. If she lived a thousand years, it would never be enough.

Lucien didn’t bother to undress her, didn’t bother with the slow seduction of his mouth, or dragging her out. This was a hasty apology from them both, a begging of forgiveness for their callousness, their unintended cruelty. He pushed aside the fabric of her clothes, sliding a finger over her cunt just to be sure she was ready before his was sliding into her, somehow freed of her trousers without her ever noticing.

Lucien didn’t break the kiss and neither did Elain. The point of this coupling, she knew, wasn’t the sex so much as it was the joining. The touching, the connection, the radiating love. The pleasure was only secondary and still she took it, legs wrapped around his waist until they came together, trembling and sweaty and still kissing, over and over, that desperate hunger never leaving, never fading.

She didn’t think it ever would.

~*~

He didn’t like it. Didn’t like how beautiful she looked in that pretty pink dress, didn’t like the care she’d taken with her hair, her face, her everything. He disliked even more the way every male in the room had stilled when she walked in, their nostrils flaring to drink in her scent. It was hell to keep himself dressed and still, to not shift as he’d promised Cassian. Lucien let Elain take a comfortable seat, one that a male yielded when she floated in, scrambling upwards and gesturing for her towards the chair nearest the fire.

He understood their awe. She was so very obviously mortal and yet not, her skin marked by him. She reeked of his cock—Luicen hadn’t told her they’d be able to smell him all over her skin when he’d insisted on fucking her that morning, withdrawing to paint her breasts and face in his come. She’d washed but it lingered, a warning for any male who might think about getting too close. Being too friendly.

Cassian was the only male in the room he trusted, standing just beside Elain’s chair with his bright, hazel eyes. “Tell them what you told me,” Cassian prompted, cutting a glance at Lucien. Don’t fuck this up, his expression seemed to warn.

Lucien didn’t acknowledge that at all. He’d follow their rules so long as they came no closer. Elain was perfection, glowing and smiling, one hand resting against her still flat stomach. They could scent that, too. She smiled, taking the time to learn their names, to ask after them. He was proud of how good she was at making people feel at ease, at settling the males until they were seated, no longer bristling and spoiling with tension.

Elain spoke so sweetly that it was easy to forget the story she told was one of horror. There were things Lucien didn’t know—of this world she came from where women were pushed to mate too soon, too young with males twice their age in order to avoid being sent to the dragon. He knew he was not the only one bothered by that cruelty. All of the males blanched, revolted at the trickery, at the callous disregard for what was sacred to them.

Her story began far before the tower, winding through a culture of fear. She had sisters, she explained. She wanted to get them out, wanted to offer a place for any mortal female that was tired of being ground to dust. Lucien could have told Elain every male in the room would agree even when they murmured their appreciation for such a plan.

The problem was Elain. She thought they ought to return, to explain the entire thing. With force, of course. Cassian caught his eye as Lucien’s fingers dug into the chair, nearly splintering the wood below. Elain twisted to look up at him with her shining eyes and he knew he’d be outvoted on this.

“Elain,” he whispered, ignoring the excitement of the other males. Cassian, too, grimaced.

“To go back risks the safety of our home,” Cassian added.

“They can’t reach us here–” one began but Lucien cut him off.

“Yet. They can’t reach you here yet.”

And Lucien knew, from the slant of their eyes and the set of their jaws, what would happen next. Elain, for all her optimism, had hoped to provide a place of safety for their child but the males were thinking differently. They were thinking of how they’d been denied what Lucien had, not because they were inept but because the human males killed children and females first when they invaded villages. The males that survived, that managed to defend their homes were left to carry the grief and guilt. He could see that hurt, that rage. If they came for human females, the males would merely slaughter whatever they could not hoard, would cut apart children that were half their own kin.

“Then it’s war,” the male called Azriel declared. “Just as the Prince of Nightmares has decreed.”

Elain gasped. “That’s not—”

“You will leave my mate from the fighting,” Lucien interrupted, knowing full well she would be angry with him. “And I will help you through the forest.”

Cassian smiled. It was exactly as Lucien had expected and clearly as the General had hoped. Elain twisted, looking at him with pleading eyes. Betrayal. Lucien shifted, reaching for her and settling her into his lap as he took over her chair. Fingers stroking over her arm, he murmured, “I tried to warn you not to come.”

She looked so sad, her hurt so apparent. “We will try and spare as many as we can, lady,” Azriel told her when her disappointment and disapproval was too much to be ignored.

“Your sisters especially,” Cassian added, as if he wasn’t interested in the line that Elain came from. “No one wants to see innocents be harmed.”

“But they will be,” Elain protested. “You can’t avoid it.”

Lucien pulled her against his chest at the stifling emotions roiling through the room. “She doesn’t know,” he said, trying to calm their tempers. “She was not alive for it.”

“When they came the first time, we did not attack them,” Azriel murmured, speaking for the ground. He came from the shadows holding a glinting knife. Lucien didn’t like the threat of violence or the blade wielded so casually. He tightened his grip on Elain who studied the dark haired males blue markings that trailed over his bare shoulders. “We merely defended. They came in the night. They hid, they ambushed, they drove our females and children into traps and cut them down one by one. We would defend, drive them back, but…”

Elain trembled in Lucien’s arms. She needed to hear Azriel tell this story, needed to understand why the eager males could not abide the thought of more humans coming with their weapons.

“Are you any better if you invade?”

“We do not go to eradicate,” Azriel snapped when Cassian stepped forward. “But to warn, to reestablish ourselves. If you cannot understand the difference, well…”

“Watch yourself,” Lucien warned. “She has been harmed by those males, too.”

“We should have done this centuries ago,” Cassian murmured. “We were too afraid to diminish our numbers. I have written to the west and they are coming. We will be united for the first time in centuries—”

“If we can find the Prince of Nightmares,” Azriel added, eyes shifting back to Elain. “Can you find him?”

“I…” she looked as if she might cry. Things were not going as she’d hoped.

“She will,” Lucien said for her. “Give her some time. He is tricky.”

And that was that. Lucien left Elain to rebundle, meeting with Cassian just outside the door. “Your female is displeased with us.”

“She has a soft heart,” Lucien replied with affection. “She wants a place to raise our baby.”

“You should leave her here,” Cassian cautioned. “There is a home at the edge of the village. Smaller than your cottage but it could see you through winter. I would not leave her in that valley no matter how much she loves it. In the spring, take her west where it is warm and there are fewer humans.

“When do you plan to attack?”

Cassian shrugged. “It will take time for the west to arrive, to study the maps and decide where is the safest place to set up a camp. We want to keep them from looking too closely at the mountains, from the relative safety we already have. Perhaps spring, perhaps sooner. If the Prince of Nightmares shows his face…”

Lucien only shrugged. “He only shows himself to her.”

“A curious thing. Keep a careful watch on her. I will come in three days for an update and to try and coax her up north.”

“We will talk more,” Lucien agreed as Elain ambled forward, her eyes—the only part of her not covered in cloth—openly miserable. “In three days. I hope to have good news for you.”

Cassian nodded. “Things will work out as they are supposed to. Trust in that.”

Lucien didn’t. He only trusted the female coming towards him, hand outstretched. “Don’t be sad,” he murmured.

“Take me home, Lucien,” she mumbled, her words mumbled.

And Lucien could do nothing but obey.

~*~

She was dreaming. Elain knew she was and still she looked around that city square and it’s curious, burning pyre with interest.

“Why are we here?” she asked, not bothering to look at the swirling mass of shadow just beside her. Golden brown hands held a letter with familiar writing, dressed in the elegant black and silver from before. Only his face was unknowable, obscured in starless darkness she didn't dare look at.

“You were not careful,” his voice murmured. “And your dragon even more careless.”

“What has he done?”

“Besides defy the orders given to him?” the Prince of Darkness asked, turning his gaze on her. Elain didn’t know how to explain it, how she knew his eyes studied her. Only that she did, just as she knew he would not hurt her. “Or destroy that tower until only the rubbled remains were left?”

“They can’t prove that,” she murmured, even when he placed her own letter to Ferye into her hands.

“You told your sisters too much,” the prince murmured. “And the woman from last year has returned, telling of the most unbelievable tale. The humans are coming for you, Elain Archeron. They’re coming for you both.”

She looked back at that pyre. “What a coincidence. Your kind is looking for you.”

“I am where I need to be. What did they decide?”

“War,” she said bitterly, hating the way his body seemed to ooze with delight.

“Good. I am ready to see fae and mortals merge again. Tell Lucien he needs to leave,” the prince added. “I don’t want to watch you die.”

“Why would you—” Elain gasped, sitting up in bed. Light poured into the room nearly blinding her for a moment. Infuriating, she thought, kicking the blankets from her body. Elain strode to the bathing chamber where warm water waited just as it always did. She turned the dream over and over in her mind, wondering how long her and Lucien had before Graysen and the other figured out where they’d gone. Days? A few weeks at most? She heaved a loud sigh, disappointed and most of all, exhausted. She had to force herself from the water, to put on the velvety orange dress, to pull her wet hair from her face in a braid.

“Lucien?” she called once her shoes were on. It was unlike him to be gone for so long and not so unusual she felt any panic. “Lucien, have you eat—”

“Is that the creature's name, then?” Graysen asked when Elain rounded the corner at the bottom of the stairs for the kitchen. “Or did you give it to him?”

Elain took a step backwards on instinct. Graysen, dressed in a blue dress uniform, examined his nails for a moment. “What are you doing here?”

“I came to rescue you,” Graysen replied sarcastically, looking around at her little home with his ugly eyes. “Women are returning from the continent telling of a dragon who frees women…and yet you’re here cooking it breakfast.”

“Where is he?”

Graysen chuckled, taking a step towards her. Elain stumbled back, careful to keep her hands from flying to her stomach. He couldn’t tell, didn’t know, didn’t—

The living room had been picked through, she realized when she swept inside. Cushions overturned, chairs moved…and her little bassinet kicked to its side. Graysen came right up behind her, chest pressed to her back, his hands on her hips. “Will you tell me what it was like, Elain? Fucking that monster? Did you cry? Or did you bend over willingly—”

A furious bellow in the distance punctuated Graysen’s taunts. Hands skimmed up her body, tangling in her braided hair. “I’ll bet you liked it, you fucking cunt.”

His other hand squeezed around her neck, so tight Elain scrambled to push him off, clawing and writhing until her elbow connected with his gut hard enough to make him wheeze.

“You gave up a life with me for this?!” he demanded. “For this poverty, to raise some deformed beast like child?”

He was staring at her neck, at that ribbon of gold that marked her. Panting and wild, his usually coiffed hair falling in his empty, ugly eyes. “I would have given you everything—”

“You can offer me nothing,” Elain whispered, her voice trembling in her throat. “Nothing I want, nothing I need.”

“Is this what you need, then?” he asked, reaching for the bassinet Lucien had spent so much time working on. In one swift move, Graysen threw it against the wall, splintering it violently. Her hand flew to her mouth to hide her gasp. “This beast?” he roared, turning from the living room for her kitchen, the one place Elain loved almost as much as their bedroom. Graysen raged, ripping her plants from their hanging pots to shatter at her feet. He tore the curtains from the window, flung her dishes at the wall, at the floor, at her.

Graysen lunged again, a knife in hand. He shoved her towards the door, the blade curved against her throat. Elain gasped at the sight of the valley, once green and lush and dotted with little flowers she spent each morning plucking so she could braid into his hair. It had become a wasteland of charred earth and fire. Lucien was covered in heavy iron chains held on all sides of his massive, golden body and still he fought, his spiked tail thrashing violently. She could see he was injured, could see the bloodied gashes over his broad chest, his sweet snout. Elain balked, dragging her heels into the ground but Lucien had seen. His fury ripped through the air at the sight, wings beating against his restraints.

“End your fight, beast!” Graysen snarled, digging the sharpened, jagged end of his blade against her throat. Blood slid down her neck, stilling Lucien instantly.

“Don’t,” she whispered, for all the good it did. He shifted in an instant, naked before the human men. Coated and blood and dirt, Lucien panted, one hand thrown out.

“Let her go,” he ordered as Graysen dragged her closer. She could feel his fury digging against the arm that held her, drinking in the sight of Lucien no longer a dragon…but practically a mortal.

“You fucking whore,” he whispered roughly, pushing his knife so hard she could barely breathe.

“Let her go,” Lucien said again, all of his worst fears coming to fruition. “You don’t need to harm her.”

“Does it…does it care for you?” Graysen asked incredulously. “And here I just assumed you liked being spread apart but this thing loves you, doesn’t it?”

“Let her go,” Lucien repeated, his jaw tight.

“Alright, beast. I swear not to harm your pretty little toy if you come on two legs.”

He’s lying,” she gasped. “Lucien—”

“That’s enough, I think,” Graysen clapped his hand over her mouth, digging the point of his knife against her cheek. “Women are so chatty, am I right? I would stay a beast too, if it meant avoiding their noise.”

Lucien didn’t respond, his eyes never leaving her face. She knew what he was trying to silently say when his eyes fell on the house behind them, on the carved path he’d been working on. Find the others. Elain poured her pleading into her gaze.

Don’t make me leave you with them.

But Lucien knew Graysen would never honor his promise. That if they both came quietly, if they both complied Graysen would merely use her to secure Lucien’s cooperation before he killed Elain in front of Lucien as a means of torture. And who knew what he’d do to her in the meantime. Elain had to think about their baby.

Cassian had promised to come in two days. She couldn’t reach him any faster but she could hide herself away, could wait and hope and pray the Prince of Nightmares, who was somewhere in the city, would keep Lucien safe.

Lucien, hands restrained by the soldiers just behind, reared his head forward as Elain twisted, letting Lucien smash his face into Graysens'. Lucien was still bigger, still stronger.

“RUN,” he ordered, his words a terrifying snarl. “Do not come back for me.”

Elain took off, just as Lucien ordered. She would run and she would hide, just as he wanted. Just as she knew Lucien would walk the other way through the forest, would let them parade him through the city streets and make a mockery of everything lovely about him.

But Elain had no intention of leaving him.

The Prince of Nightmares wanted a war?

Elain would give them a war

#elucien #elucien fic #elucien fanfic #how will i ever recapture the magic that is this fic?#i love it so much #wake up girlies elain is smashing the patriarchy #elain x lucien #oops all plot

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matchbookarmy · 11 months

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😭 A fic that ripped your heart out (but it hurt so good)

Thanks so much for the ask!

Castaway by AzureTiger

Rating: Teen

Summary: Fury must be out of his mind to send Tony and Steve together on a mission where spies would surely be better suited to the job. But here they are, stuck on an island together, running an op. It's hard to say what might kill him first, Steve annoying the hell out of him, or the disaster that's bound to happen when you throw two clashing personalities and practical strangers into a dangerous mission.

But that's the best way to make friendships, isn't it? When your lives are on the line, and all you have is each other? Sometimes your best resource is the good company, and the inspirational posters are right: it really is about the journey.

Why I'm Reccing: This fic. I love this fic. This is definitely one of my all time favorite fics. Though I do think it's one you've got to give time to and allow the story to develop. It's tagged as slow burn and hurt/comfort and those two tags are not misplaced. This is definitely a slow burn, and there is a lot of hurt/comforting happening.

I don't know, this fic is I think underrated. It only has 36 comments on 10 chapters and 233 kudos, and I think, from my own experience, there's a tendency with fanfic to not always allow the story a chance to breath, that if things aren't immediately happening (in terms of romance/pining etc) readers can abandon a fic quite quickly, and I just want to say, if you give this fic your time, it will be worth it, I swear.

This is post Avengers, where the team never really formed after that. Like, they exist in this sort of nebulous way, where Tony isn't part of the team anymore, but the team hasn't had a reason to come together again after the battle of New York, though Steve is working for Fury and SHIELD.

And Tony and Steve don't get a long. If you're feeling nostalgic for that 2012 era fic where Tony and Steve need to come together and work their shit out, this is the fic for you.

There's also a lot of story here. Like, a very well thought out plot that goes beyond just the two of them falling in love. Some terrorists (I haven't read this in a while, but I think it's maybe Hydra) have gotten ahold of blueprints for Tony's old weapons and are manufacturing them again. So, he and Steve are sent to this remote island to shut it all down.

So, I said this is hurt/comfort, and what I like about this fic is the hurt/comfort goes both ways. Tony is suffering from ptsd from his experience in Avengers, and the role that plays in this fic and how it is portrayed is exceedingly well done.

But but.... that is not why this fic is going to rip out your heart. Because I said the hurt/comfort goes both ways. And something happens to Steve that made my heart drop into my stomach. It was only the fact that I was reading fic and knew that everything would work out okay in the end that kept me going. The hurt/comfort portion of this fic that revolves around Steve is top notch h/c. And that's where Tony and Steve really start to come together.

Also the battles in this! I'll be honest, I usually tend to sort of skim over battles in fic (look, I don't watch the big super hero movies for the big super hero battles...) but the battles in this are really well done, and I found myself really enjoying them. Bonus for Steve fighting in one of Tony's suits.

AzureTiger is mostly a ThunderShield writer (or they were back when I read this) but when I commented on this fic, they said they had other Stony fic ideas they were toying with. So.... go, read, comment if you like, and maybe we can tempt them over to the dark Stony side.

#stony fic rec #getting together fic #hurt comfort #that 2012 era type fic #tony has ptsd #underrated fic

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stetervault · 1 year

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Heya! Is this the lost fic queue? I've been digging for this one and just can't find it.

Scott bites Stiles against his will

Spends the weekend (?) in a cage

Finally gets out, goes home and sheriff mouths off

Turns into a fox and runs off

Found by Alpha!Peter and his pack

Angst

He eventually turns back to human

more angst

Lol not a fic finding blog, it's just that most of the asks I get for it are for fics I recognize so it's not hard for me to link. For steter fic finds, you'd have better luck going to the steternetwork blog, I think they do actual fic finds. That being said, I haven't read this fic but I did read a summary of one that seems like the one you're looking for, and a skim of it seems to match most of your points, so you can see if it is:

Finding Safety - Chapter 1 - DarkJediQueen - Teen Wolf (TV) [Archive of Our Own]

#ask #anonymous #teen wolf #fic find #steter

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angelinaheartshapedbox · 2 years

Text

A Slapshot To The Heart

eren jaeger x gn!reader <3

college au/smau. hockey player eren<333. musician/dancer reader.

summary: y/n l/n is a sophomore at paradis university with a scholarship in music. while taking a necessary technology course to complete their major, they meet the infamous hockey player, eren jeager. y/n does their best to avoid him, but their efforts fail as they continue to run into him everywhere. they soon find that eren isn't the douche bag every depicts him as, and grown very fond of his company.

WARNINGS: swearing, lower case intended, reader uses they/them pronouns, reader is attracted to all genders, eren is a huge himbo dork, any major trigger warnings will be given before each chapter.

this series is entirely sfw. mild suggestive themes, but nothing explicit.

☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆

point four!

"i'm glad the last seat was next to you."

wordcount: 834

chapter tws: um eren gets anxious about school but that's kind it?

i knocked on the door of mikasa and armin's apartment, armin opened the door for me. he told me i could set my bag anywhere and wait for the others, then he disappeared into the hallway.

i put my bag next to the couch, where eren was lying flat on his stomach with his face in a pillow.

"hey, how ya doin', beer pong champion?" i ask, sitting on the floor in front of the couch.

eren groans dramatically loud, "i want to die."

"you big baby," i laugh, "you act like you've never been hungover before." i dig through my bag to find what i'll need for the study session.

"i haven't" he says, his voice muffled by the pillow. "i don't normally drink like that. it's not good for the body."

"i forgot you've got that whole "full-ride hockey scholarship" thing goin' on."

i hear shift his body on the cotton couch, "yeah, kind of important. you should care too. you act like you don't have a scholarship."

"it's just a tuition scholarship. it just pays for my books and a few courses. it'd pay for my housing if i lived on campus. i'm grateful for it, but it's really nothing."

"damn," he murmurs, "that sucks. i'm rich, and got a full ride scholarship."

i throw a pen at his face and he lets out an "ow". i stifle a laugh, returning to my textbook.

"what're you looking at?"

i'm in the middle of flipping through the pages. i show him the page i was looking for, and he leans down to read it.

"did we learn that?" he asks as he skims through the page about encryption.

i look up at him, "eren, we learned this last week."

he shrugs and leans back on the couch. he takes his phone out of his back pocket, he starts scrolling through it. i just sit there and stare at him.

"eren."

he perks his head up, "hm?"

"this is gonna be on the test tomorrow."

"what have a test tomorrow?!"

"oh, my god."

a few hours later, and we've gotten eren caught up enough that he gets the gist of it. for the last thirty minutes we've been sitting in a circle on the floor, talking.

eren had slid down off the couch next to me, ymir on my other side with historia. annie, mikasa, and armin complete our little circle.

eren is talking about things mikasa did to him when they were young.

he held up his left index finger to show us his flat finger tip, "when we were, like, seven we were chopping vegetables, and mikasa sliced my finger. i still think she did it on purpose."

"i did" mikasa said flatly.

eren purses his lips and vaguely gestures to mikasa. ymir finds it funny how mikasa torments him. we're not allowed to make fun of him without her getting mad, though. i think it's really cute how close they are.

"y/n," armin begins, "how long have you been living with those three?"

"i moved in with sasha right before the semester started. we were living in a dorm together, but connie and jean called us saying their roommates had moved out. they couldn't pay rent, so we moved in to help out" i told him.

armin smiled, "that's sweet. you guys have a lot of fun?"

"i don't think they'd let me not have fun." then, my phone vibrates, and a message from my group chat is on the screen, "speak of the devil."

this was fun," i say, grabbing my bag, "thanks for inviting me. see you all for the test tomorrow." i smile and wave at everyone.

"bye. don't forget we have the studio booked tomorrow, don't be late" annie said.

"if you're late, i'll kill you!" ymir shouted.

"got it!" i replied as i exited the apartment.

when i arrived at my own apartment, my roommates were sitting on the couch waiting for me. they had, not one, but two buckets of popcorn, the sourpatch watermelons, soda, and other candies. sasha gestured me over to the couch with a mouth full of popcorn.

"jean! jean, turn the movie on, they're here!" she reached over connie to smack jean repeatedly.

"hello, my loves," i squeezed under the blanket in-between sasha and connie, "sorry for the wait."

"it's alright. 'm glad you made it back" jean told me as he flipped through our rented movies.

"we pay a lot for movies," connie points out.

i look at him, "no, i pay a lot for movies. the rental service is on my card."

"oops."

i hit his head before we settled down, and the movie began.

sasha and connie both fell asleep on my shoulders, jean and i looked back and forth between our phones and the movie. a message appeared at the top of my screen.

"what're you smiling at?" jean asks, his brows furrowed.

"none ya" i reply with the biggest grin on my face.

he sighs, "goodnight."

"goodnight, j."

previous next

masterlist!

a/n: GYM BRO/HEALTH NUT EREN‼️‼️🗣🗣🗣 I LOVE HIM YOUR HONOR. next chapter will have some hockey player eren and jean🤭 thanks for reading. <3

character info! armin made the group chat to bring all of his friends and his friends' friends together. then connie changed the group chat name and it went down hill. armin works hard to make this house a home.

#college au eren #eren jeager x reader #eren jeager x gn!reader #eren yeager x reader #eren yeager x gn!reader #gn!reader #aot fanfiction #snk fanfiction #aot smau #aot #smau

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andiinaraethtash · 1 year

Text

Ta-da! A Star Wars fanfic! Betcha didn't see that coming! And on May the Fourth, too!

Summary:

There has been a great disturbance. Ripples through the Force lead the Jedi to the planet Moraband, where the 501st, the 212th, and their Jedi go to find the source of the disturbance. A Sith planet, Moraband holds more danger than they know…

Notes:

SO! There is a very long story behind this fic. It is my very first Star Wars fanfic, and the first fic I wrote with the intention of publishing. I started it back in… gosh. 2018? Maybe late 2017. My point is that it's been a hot minute. But I wanted to post something for May the Fourth, and I've been chatting about this fic with my sister and some friends on Discord, and I'm finally confident enough to start publishing it! I'll try to alternate between publishing this and my other fanfic Can't Escape the Fallout, which is in an entirely different fandom, don't worry if you haven't seen it. But, well. My history of having a consistent upload schedule is spotty at best. That being said, I'll do my best. I will warn you, though: this chapter may be fairly light, but it gets heavy pretty quickly. If character death triggers you, this might not be the fic for you. With that, let's get on to the chapter!

Chapter 1

Moraband, Ahsoka decided, was now her least favorite planet, beating out Tatooine, which had held that place of honor since her first mission with Anakin. Tatooine, at least, wasn't actively trying to kill them. The sand had been only been kind of coarse, even if it did get everywhere. And the natives could at least be reasoned with. Well, most of them.

Moraband was a different story. Even from orbit, the reddish sand and craggy cliffs looked dangerous. Between what Master Kenobi had called k'lor'slugs and the wicked sandstorms that sprang up with no warning, Ahsoka was fairly certain Moraband would be actively trying to kill them.

Oh, and the pervading Dark Side presence. Couldn't forget that.

“C'mon, Snips, it isn't that bad,” Anakin joked weakly beside her on the LAATi, where he was leaning heavily on the strap hanging from the ceiling, his entire body rigid with tension. She glanced sideways at him, glaring slightly. He could feel the overwhelming Dark Side presence just as well as she could, if not better. He really wasn't fooling anybody.

Behind them, Captain Rex shifted uneasily as the transport ship made its approach to Master Kenobi's temporary command base on the surface of the planet. “I don't like this, General. This whole planet feels… off. What exactly are we looking for here?”

Anakin sighed, staring ahead at the doors of the transport, waiting for them to open. “This planet used to be a stronghold for the Sith. A couple days ago… why are you asking?” Anakin finally turned to look at Rex, confusion evident on his face. “I sent you the briefing. You always read the briefings.”

Rex shifted again, this time in discomfort. His embarrassment was palpable in the Force. “In all honesty, sir, if the mission briefing says ‘Jedi artifact,’ ‘Force disturbance,’ or ‘Sith holo-whatsit,’ I tend to just focus on the needed personnel and equipment, and the location. I won't understand anything else.”

Ahsoka bit back a laugh, glanced at Anakin's blank expression, and bit back another. After a moment of incredulous silence, Anakin shook his head and returned his gaze to the door.

“Alright, well, a couple days ago, the Council- well, the entire Order, really- felt something shift in the Force. Given that that usually means something bad in our experience, the Council decided to send us to investigate one of the focal points of the disturbance. Which led us here. Obi-Wan and the 212th were already in the sector, and they sent us as backup. Seriously, did you just skim all of those briefings? How in the world have you survived this long?” His voice had shifted back to an incredulous tone, as he glanced back at the clone Captain.

“By following your lead, sir,” was Rex's immediate response. Anakin grumbled under his breath as the ship finally slowed to a stop, turning as the doors opened to let the troopers within disembark.

Ahsoka hopped lightly to the ground, grimacing at the way the coarse sand shifted under her feet. The LAAT's engines kicked up a dust cloud, sending grit into her mouth and eyes. Anakin shot her a commiserating look as she spat out the offending sand before leading her and Rex both to the command tent.

Master Kenobi looked up from a holo table, which was displaying a map of the area. “Ah, Anakin, you're here. Good.”

“You sent for us, didn't you?” Anakin snarked at his former master as he strode toward the table to get a better look. “What're we looking at?”

Obi-Wan sighed and crossed his arms over his chest, his mouth pressed in a pensive line under his auburn beard. “Nothing good. Between the local wildlife and some barely functioning droids, there's a fair bit of resistance that will try to keep us from getting to the old temple.”

Ahsoka straightened in alarm. “Droids? Here? But we beat the Separatists here! How can there be droids?” She met Anakin's eyes, and he reached over their training bond to offer reassurance.

On the opposite side of the table, Commander Cody huffed slightly. His helmet hid his expression, but she could feel his amusement in the Force. “They're not clankers, Commander. At least, not Seppie clankers. They've been here too long.”

Obi-Wan nodded. “As near as we can tell, they're old guardians left by the Sith to protect their temple. They're old enough that most of them have broken down, but those of them that are still functioning are armed and dangerous.” He gave her a wry smile. “Don't worry, Ahsoka. Dooku won't be here for another few hours, which should give us enough time to find what we're looking for and get out.”

Behind Ahsoka, Rex coughed awkwardly. “Sir, what exactly are we looking for?”

Obi-Wan gave him a perplexed look. “A Sith holocron.” Turning to Anakin, he demanded, “Did you not give him the mission briefing?”

Anakin raised his hands defensively. “I did! Apparently he tends to skim over briefings that have to do with the Force.”

Obi-Wan shot Rex a disbelieving look over Ahsoka's shoulder and sighed. “Why am I not surprised?” He muttered, pinching the bridge of his nose.

Ahsoka smirked. “So what's the plan, Master? We just run in, find the thing, and get out?”

“More or less.” Obi-Wan shrugged. “Now that we've narrowed down where the holocron is, I've got my men loading up. We'll take a small squad into the temple, find anything useful, and clear out, hopefully before the Separatists arrive. If not, I've ordered my men to create a perimeter around the temple while yours, Anakin, hold the blockade. They need to keep our exit strategy intact. Think they can do that this time?”

The last question was said playfully, causing Anakin to straighten. “Hey! That was as much your fault as mine!” His indignation, however, was undercut by his equally playful grin.

Ahsoka pursed her lips. “I dunno, Skyguy, you were the one in charge of that mission.”

He turned to her, opening his mouth to deliver what was no doubt a stunningly clever retort, but Cody cut in first.

“If we want to complete this mission before the Separatists arrive, we should move out now. Clock's already ticking, sir.”

Obi-Wan nodded and sighed, returning his attention to the map. “Of course, Cody. Ahsoka, would you fill Admiral Yularen in on the plan? I need to fill Anakin in on what we're going to do.”

Ahsoka nodded and exited the tent. As she did, she heard Anakin mutter, “I don't know about this one, Master. I've got a bad feeling…”

________

The approach to the temple definitely could have been worse, Ahsoka decided. Most of the k'lor'slugs attacked one at a time, and they only encountered two droid patrols as they neared the temple.

Looking at it, Ahsoka could definitely tell it was a Sith creation. The imposing (and ridiculously excessive) stairs were mostly covered in rust-colored sand. The few spots that weren't were a dark grey, which didn't appear to be the result of sun bleaching, but rather, the original color. The entrance to the temple itself was a tall arch that, in Ahsoka's opinion, looked way too much like a mouth. Inside was dark, and surprisingly cold considering the blistering desert around it.

Obi-Wan was leading the small squad (Ahsoka hadn't heard their names) with Cody at his back, while she and Anakin brought up the rear. The only lights were the troopers’ headlamps and Obi-Wan's lightsaber, which he held over his head like a high-tech glow rod. As the group marched into the temple, they had to duck to avoid a series of fallen beams and hop over several headless statues. Tattered remains of banners fluttered eerily in the shadows above them. Ahsoka shuddered, but less because of the chill in the air and more because of the soft whispers that emanated from every shadow. Anakin glanced at her, noticing her unease.

“Probably the shades of long-dead Sith. They can't hurt us.” He whispered softly, but it was still startling in the otherwise near-perfect silence.

“Hopefully.” She muttered back. “This place gives me the creeps, though, and I don't think it's just the ghosts.”

One of the troopers huffed. “Sith. Everything they built was designed to scare the kriff out of you.”

Ahead of them, Obi-Wan stopped as he entered a large chamber. The rest of the squad filed out and flanked him, eyeing their surroundings warily. Ahsoka inhaled sharply as she entered, feeling that the Dark Side was… not stronger, but thicker, here, to the point that she could almost see it twisting in the air.

A pair of ruined staircases were on either side of the chamber, and a walkway circled above them in equal disrepair. Several collapsed doorways led out of the chamber, although she couldn't tell where they led. In the center of the room was an obelisk, the tip of which pulsed faintly with red energy. Looking at it, Ahsoka simultaneously wanted to either shudder, gag, or punch something and scream. As most of the clones muttered and shifted uneasily, Obi-Wan pursued his lips.

“Something wrong, Master?” Ahsoka asked as her Grandmaster stroked his beard and stared pensively at the tip of the obelisk.

“I'm not sure,” he replied slowly. “I'm fairly certain that the capstone on the obelisk is the holocron, but… it's not strong enough to have caused the disturbance we felt.”

Cody started. “Not strong enough? Sir, I can feel the energy from that thing, and I'm sure as kriff no Jedi.”

“No, Obi-Wan's right.” Anakin stepped forward. “That thing is powerful in close proximity, but the disturbance was powerful enough to give Master Yoda a migraine all the way in Coruscant. Maybe if it was more than one holocron activated, but just the one? No way.”

“Regardless, it's here. We can't just leave it for Dooku to steal, right, Master Kenobi?” Ahsoka asked, eyeing the obelisk with a calculating gaze. Maybe if I climb up to the walkway and jump….

“Correct, Ahsoka.” Obi-Wan kept his eyes on the holocron as he paced back and forth, obviously trying to come up with a way to safely get it down.

Cody sighed, also trying to come up with an idea. “I'm guessing using grapnels to pull it down is a bad idea.”

“Yes,” Obi-Wan said distractedly. “As is using the Force to bring it down.”

“Could we use the Force to topple the obelisk?” Ahsoka asked, looking back and forth between her Master and her Grandmaster.

Anakin shook his head. “Same problem. If we let the holocron hit the ground, it could break, and nothing good ever happens when a holocron breaks. Using the Force on a Sith holocron? It'll sense us using the Light Side and lash out. Sith protect their artifacts very carefully.”

Obi-Wan stroked his beard. “We could Force-lift someone up there to grab it.”

Anakin snorted. “Well, you're not Force-lifting me. Not that I don't trust you...” The comment earned him a mock glare from his former Master.

“You could lift me,” Ahsoka volunteered before this could devolve into an argument. “I'm the smallest, so you'll have the least problems.” Anakin and Obi-Wan glanced at each other and shrugged simultaneously.

“Better than any of your suggestions,” Obi-Wan drawled.

“Ha-ha.” Anakin huffed and beckoned his Padawan over to the base of the obelisk. Nervously, she followed him and braced herself for the unsettling sensation of being suspended in the air like a puppet.

She took a deep breath before nodding to Anakin, who reached out- both with his hand and with the Force- and lifted . Ahsoka squeaked involuntarily when her feet left the ground, making Anakin's focus falter ever so slightly. The disruption caused her to plummet about half a foot before he recovered and lifted her the remaining distance to the holocron. The moment she got close enough to see it, however, a jolt of fear ran through her.

“Snips? What's wrong?” Of course Anakin had felt her reaction. Between the strong bond between the two of them and his incredible sensitivity, there was no way he hadn't felt it. She really needed to work on her shielding.

“Um,” she gulped. “There's a teeny, tiny problem. By which I mean there's a giant crack in the holocron.”

“What?!” Obi-Wan and Anakin exclaimed simultaneously, their shock and fear palpable in the force for a split second before their mental shields slammed into place.

Ahsoka glanced down at them. Force, that's a long drop, she thought. “Yeah, this thing's split right down the middle. Think the disturbance did this?”

Below her, Obi-Wan tensed. “Possibly. If the holocron was one of the focal points, that much power could have damaged it. But that means that the energy-”

As he was talking, Ahsoka reached out to touch the holocron. The instant her fingers brushed the edge of the jagged crack, an explosion of Force energy lashed out at her. Sparks of pain ran up her arm through her body, lighting her nerves on fire, and she screamed. Her vision went black and she sank into unconsciousness, grateful to escape the pain.

When she woke up, she was lying partially in someone's lap. Beneath her she could feel fabric, which meant robes, so she was resting against either Obi-Wan or Anakin. She opened her eyes with a groan to see her Master kneeling in front of her. Which meant she was lying in Obi-Wan's lap like a child. That was embarrassing.

Beneath her, Obi-Wan's chest rumbled, and Ahsoka realized he was speaking. Focusing hard, she managed to make out what he was saying.

“...see, Anakin? She's waking up. She's going to be fine .” His tone was part amused, part exasperated, and part concerned, a combination he'd mastered in the two years she'd been Anakin's Padawan.

In front of her, she saw Anakin scowl. “She was just attacked by a Sith holocron. Forgive me if I'm a little worried!”

Well, she couldn't have that. As touching (and kind of amusing) as it was when he got worried, it quickly became suffocating because he wouldn't let her do anything on her own. Clearing her aching throat, she managed, “Quit worrying, Skyguy, I'm okay.”

Anakin visibly winced at the sound of her voice. “You screamed yourself hoarse and passed out for almost half an hour. I'm allowed to worry! You're my Padawan, and my respons-”

“Your responsibility, I know. You say that every time I get hurt.” Ahsoka reminded him as she tried to sit up. Her body wasn't cooperating. She was exhausted, like she'd just done five hundred katas back to back.

“Easy, Commander. Rex and Kix'll both have my hide if you hurt yourself worse.” Cody reprimanded her from behind Anakin. She glared up at him, but with almost no heat, as he shifted his gaze to Obi-Wan. “Admiral Yularen just contacted me. Separatist fleet just entered the system. He's scrambled the fighters, but they arrived much sooner than we predicted. We need to get out of here, sir.”

Ahsoka finally managed to push herself to her feet, wobbling slightly as her sense of balance tried to right itself. “Wait, what about the holocron? Did we get it?”

Anakin shook his head as he reached out to steady her. “No point. After it attacked you, it just… died. Like it used up all its power in that one attack.”

“Which is worrying, but right now we've got bigger problems.” Obi-Wan stood up behind her, making a show of brushing the dust off of his robe. “My men should already be evacuating. We need to reach the landing zone now, or they'll have to retreat without us, and I don't know about you, but I've had enough of Moraband's hospitality.”

The end of his statement was punctuated by an explosion, causing the temple to shake and sending everyone inside reeling. Ahsoka closed her eyes and clung hard to her Master's arm, trying to keep from falling over or outright passing out again. From the hallway they'd come in through, a trooper ran in, panting hard.

“General! They're landing troops! Fighters managed to get past the blockade, the 501st weren't ready for them!”

Obi-Wan straightened and nodded. “Alright, then. I guess it's a good thing we had a plan B.”

#Angst #heavy angst #anakin skywalker #tcw #the clone wars #obi wan kenobi #ahsoka tano #no beta we die like battle droids #How Do I Tag

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chromochaotic · 3 months

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How do you feel about the current arc in MHA? If you've been keeping up to date that is

hello!!! It's been a minute haha

I haven't really been keeping up at this point. 😅 Or, I mean, I read a few sentence-long summaries of the chapters, but I'm definitely skimming/missing a lot of the details.

Based on that, though, it seems like the art has been popping off—like I saw something about a double-spread of Katsuki doing a big attack, and the panels themselves were arranged in the kanji for "explosion" or something? That's some pretty satisfying design work... So, it's cool that the big final arc is getting good highlights!

I've always been a Katsuki fan (unfortunately. I'm also a fan of Monoma, I sort of have a type)—so, again, just from the summaries, I really like the way his arc has played out. Seems like he came into his own!! The only other thing I've really been aware of is, it seems like All Might got a well-done, meaningful sort of final battle... and Deku's up to... something?

I'm sort of confused about whether I missed something with Aizawa and the ones sent to the hospital (?)—that trio seemed really important, but I don't know if their story got resolved yet. I guess that's the danger with any big story like this! There's so many loose ends to tie up, I wouldn't be surprised if a few side characters or plotlines were left unresolved/rushed.

ohhhh one last thing I was reeeeeallllllly hoping for was for my ship to interact one more time, but it doesn't seem like that'll happen. monoshin......... your tag team would've been so sick............

#that said they did both get very cool stand-out parts to play in the end #sorry haha #like everyone on the internet i have opinions even on things i'm not reeeeally caught up on lmao #curious if people generally agree tho #like are most fans happy with how the series is going #or do other ppl think it's too slow or something #hi my name is chromo

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polarisbibliotheque · 3 years

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Dante, Vergil & Nero training their s/o (feat. Kyrie) - Vergil Chapter

Pairing: Vergil x Reader

Summary: For different reasons each, they realize they need to help training their s/o and making them battle ready - in Vergil's case, an incident during a job made him decide it was time for you to know how to handle Yamato. He never knew when you'd need it for your own protection

Word Count: Vergil - 4k (I lost track while writing, that's why I cut it into individual chapters for each, do apologize T-T)

Author's Notes: Blame Vergil on this one. I'm trying to get through the Bloody Palace with him on DMC4 SE and the thought "Imagine how much he would've trained to pull this off - probably as much as I am right now to master going through all those demons". So now we have them training their respective s/os :)

Also: I'm gonna indulge in lazy bathtime fanfics with Dante and I see no reason why not do it with Vergil as well. I think I'm FINALLY getting at something more lighthearted with him.

Age Restrictions: There's a lot of sparring, nothing we haven't seen on DMC, honestly. The only restriction is: there are too many words because I have a compulsive writing problem apparently :D

Dante and Nero (with Kyrie) chapters are up with the same name + "Dante Chapter" and "Nero Chapter", respectively.

Vergil

Learning to handle the Yamato was not only an art form – it was a privilege.

Vergil was more than protective with his sword. He had it taken away from him once and he wouldn’t let that happen again – after all, his father gave him the power to control the gates of Hell. Now, he was older and understood it better, so Yamato did not leave his sight.

He had to admit Nero did well with the sword with no training and knowledge on it. Unlike Dante, his son hadn’t mastered the skill to everything he touched – Vergil always dedicated himself in achieving perfection with a few weapons, being Yamato his main, but that didn’t stop him admiring the way his brother could use any type of arms that landed in his hands. It wasn’t a style fit for Vergil, but it was impressive, nonetheless.

After the Dark Slayer was able to put his hands on his birthright sword again though, he never let it go. It took Nero some time – and a few talks with Dante – to finally ask Vergil to teach him. And none of them would admit how much they liked the time they spent together, weirdly bonding even if Vergil sometimes was too strict and Nero too much of a wildfire.

It was during one of your jobs that the Dark Slayer realized he might have to teach you the ways of the Yamato as well.

You were both researching in a library, surrounded by books and silence. Vergil read ever so patiently, while you skimmed through a few books, trying to find the subject you once were certain to have read – you just couldn’t remember the book. The crew needed information on a demon you were currently hunting, and no one better than you and Vergil to do the job.

But he could get to another world while reading. You were used to that: Vergil would zone out, completely in a different dimension, as if time and space itself were nothing more than a societal construct. You knew how that was – having had more than a few moments unconsciously smiling or reacting while reading, something he always found so endearing – so you never bothered Vergil during his time out.

That was probably the reason why he didn’t hear a telling noise of a demon approaching through the halls of the library, running faster than a human could register – you did what you had to do. When Vergil raised his head from the pages, you were holding the Yamato, having unsheathed it and used to quickly block the impending attack of vicious claws. Before he could say anything, you risked a few moves against three other demons, managing to kill one of them – it wasn’t as gracious as he used to do it, yes, but you had to do something.

The crisis was averted when the other demons were killed by sets of glass blue summoned swords that cut the air like ice on a cold morning.

“I’m sorry. I had to do something; my scythe was too far away.” You immediately sheathed the Yamato, respectfully giving it back to its rightful owner. “I hope I haven’t unsharpened or hurt its blade.”

“No need to worry.” Vergil didn’t seem angry, though. He was more annoyed at the fact that you felt like you had to apologize and explain yourself for doing the right thing. “We should worry more about your technique then having to use the Yamato. This is not a sword to be taken lightly.”

“I know. I wouldn’t have used it if I didn’t have to.” You rubbed your eyes tiredly. Although you adored reading, researching like that was exhausting. “Although…”

You let your phrase die in the air. Somehow, it felt like asking too much. You knew what the Yamato meant to Vergil, and you didn’t want to take advantage of your relationship with him. At some point, you felt like it was something he’d have to offer not something you had to ask.

“Although…?” He raised one eyebrow back, sitting on his chair one more time and keeping the sword between you – that way, you could reach it easier if you needed to.

“There’s a lack of wings to my words. Do apologize.” It was your way of expressing you forgot what you were going to say – something you learnt while reading the Odyssey.

That little reference, though, made Vergil smile instead of being annoyed at your obvious avoidance. He could give you some time until you felt comfortable enough to say what you wanted to say.

You never ended up talking about it, though. The job was over, days passed, weeks went by and nothing – until you forgot that even happened. Vergil had kept it on the back of his mind, but you never seemed comfortable talking about it and he never found an opportunity to ask properly.

The image of you handling Yamato came back to Vergil’s head while training one night. He was on the rooftop of the Devil May Cry, swiftly moving under the moonlit skies in the darkest hour. He didn’t wear his usual coat while training, in order to have more freedom with his movements.

You were searching for him, for he would be the only person at the shop to know where your latest read was. Vergil wasn’t particularly good at remembering basic human living rules, but it always seemed like he could easily find all your lost books. And glasses.

You found the blue devil at the rooftop, his hair and skin faintly glowing under the moonlight. Vergil didn’t seem to notice your presence, focused on the task at hand. His movements were carefully controlled and planned, a dance of death you could watch forever. He knew precisely when to hold the power of Yamato’s blade and when to release it; how to grip it so graciously.

Sitting by the edge of the roof, you figured the book could wait. Vergil’s focus was obvious in his eyes, as if nothing in the world could ever distract him. You didn’t want to bother him, but to you, it was like watching a deadly ballet in the shadows.

Part of Vergil’s training, though, was to be aware of his surroundings. He sensed you when your first steps hit the stairs to the rooftop. He had rules against Dante watching because, in his own words, ‘that pestering demon can’t keep his mouth shut’.

It was just part of their stupid sibling rivalry – if you could even call it that. It always seemed like part of their training was taunting each other and seeing who could come up with the best comebacks – it was foolish but so entertaining to watch, Nero, you and Nico couldn’t ever get tired of that.

Trish and Lady were already so fed up with their idiotic sibling antics, they would bet on who they thought would impale the other first – and when Dante would end up with his own sword through his chest, a classic.

“Enjoying the view?” Vergil’s voice echoed in the darkness as he sheathed the Yamato, after using it to void-cut his imaginary enemy. You were a little startled at first, but softly smiled right after: of course, he knew you were there.

“I don’t always have the chance to watch such a handsome devil at work.” You quipped back, barely able to read the expression in Vergil’s eyes. He was doing his best not to show how much he didn’t know what to do when unexpectedly praised like that. What you could read was a faint smile glimmering under the moonlight. “Jokes aside, your technique is a work of art. You must’ve spent a lot of time perfecting it and it’s so endearing to watch.”

“Indeed. Yamato cannot be properly wielded without practice.” He took his time to examine the blade, shining like a star in the dark of the night. It was truly the work of an artist and you thought it was fitting that wielding it had to be an art form as well. “I think it’s time you start practicing with it.”

You just raised one eyebrow, thinking at first that he was joking – but Vergil would never jest with something like that. When it came to Yamato, he always meant every single one of his words.

“Are you sure, Vergil? I do have a lot of occult knowledge, but I don’t even know where to start with Yamato.” You got up from your spot, slowly approaching him. Vergil did the same, meeting you halfway. As always.

“It will be easier with a master to guide you. I had my father once, but after… Everything… I had to train on my own.” His tone was different than the one he always used. Vergil sounded cold and stoic by default, but sometimes – on very rare occurrences – his voice seemed softer and even nostalgic. After watching the Yamato on his hands, he turned his silvery gaze to you. “Every skill you’ll need to handle the Hell’s Gate key will be properly explained. I can assure you that.”

You felt the rough grip of the Yamato under your fingers as you grabbed the sword Vergil offered you. It was heavier than one would expect, and you seemed pleased on being able to handle it – that, Vergil could read in your eyes.

“Hey, Vergil…” As you called, his gaze went from your hands to your face. “It is truly an honor. Thank you for trusting me.”

Your voice was barely audible, but enough for both of you – no one else but him needed to hear that. His face brightened up in a proud smile, even raising his posture a little bit. Vergil couldn’t be more pleased with the fact that you understood what Yamato meant.

Having Vergil as a sword master, passing all his knowledge to you, was indeed what you’d expect: he was harsh and always wanted perfection. Vergil would tell you to repeat a movement again, and again, and again until he thought it was average so “you could train more by yourself later” and show him during the next session.

Training at the rooftop of the Devil May Cry became a serious date between both of you. Three times a week, you’d meet and perfect your movements or learn something new. You came to realize Yamato was not only draining on physical strength, but also on your energy: you needed to harness a lot of it to properly do everything the sword allowed.

No wonder Vergil could use summoned swords at the same time he physically used the blade. He had already mastered a kind of power you were only beginning to dip your feet into.

“Keep your focus. Don’t take your eyes away from me.” Vergil was teaching you the fundamentals of summoned swords while fighting with Yamato. It was the first time you used that kind of occult power, but you had to admit it was very satisfying to put your knowledge at work. “You have to be aware of your surroundings by energy. If anything feels off, you know something is wrong – but your eyes must remain on your enemy. Focus, and you will find the proper time to attack.”

You both walked slowly on a circle, like predators stalking those foolish enough to bother them. Vergil couldn’t complain on your feet work: he already thought it was perfect. That was probably the reason why you had such synchrony and grace when fighting together.

“That focus will help you summon swords from your own energy. You have to harness it, feel it, visualize it and make it real.” His voice sounded like velvet under the night sky, and it was the perfect recipe to keep you concentrated on your target – him. You had been training and reading all occult books you could find on metaphysical weapons, so you had not only a master’s guidance, but your own skill as support. “Look into my eyes, y/n. Focus.”

Taking a deep breath, you did exactly what he commanded. One of your hands held the Yamato sheath, while the other wrapped delicately against its grip. You had been training how to unsheathe it as fast as you could and realized keeping a masterful grip wasn’t the same thing as applying strength. It was one of the first things Vergil taught you; “this sword requires dexterity, not brute force”.

Your eyes remained on his silvery gaze while you turned all your energy to visualizing the swords by your side. It required a lot of focus and harnessing energy you’d need for other occult activities, but you’d have Vergil to do those tasks if you needed later – something he assured you when the training sessions had started. You had managed to summon a sword before, both of you discovering yours were a gleaming silver, like the moonlight itself.

With some time and effort, two swords materialized by your head. A slight, smug smile appeared on the corner of your lips. You commanded them to pierce Vergil right in his chest, unsheathing the Yamato as fast as you could while you charged towards the blue devil.

During your training, you learnt not to give Vergil time to think: he was much faster, and every second counted when trying to hit him.

Vergil masterfully disappeared in a flash of blue light, only to reappear right in front of you while avoiding your moonlit summoned swords. You had to change your grip on the Yamato, modifying your attack to a sudden block, doing your best to stop his Mirror Edge less than a meter from your face.

On his face, though, Vergil had a proud smile.

“Well done. You not only managed to summon perfect swords, but to change your attack to a block in a fraction of second.” His voice kept the same velvety tone, something Vergil was careful enough to help you with focusing. “Your hand is too far from the hilt, though. Keep in mind to keep it lower.”

With that, the Mirror Edge vanished, making you lower the Yamato, sheathing it again, exactly like he showed you – gliding the blade on the very edge of its sheath, until you could lower it safely into protection. It took some time, and it should be done carefully. When void-cutting, that process could be extremely important, as the timing of the cuts would be in synchrony with the blade being back at its sheath.

“Thank you. I wasn’t really expecting the teleporting and Mirror Edge to make an appearance.” You bantered back, raising an eyebrow. To your amusement, Vergil chuckled back.

“Demons aren’t really the predictable type, are they?” He crossed his arms, standing aside to watch you, meaning the class would continue for a while.

“Hmmm, I dare say the Sparda types are top tier on the unpredictable list.” You sighed, moving your head from side to side in order to dissipate the tension and pain from your neck. All that concentration and energy work could get your body a little too tense.

“You little brat.” It was his turn to quip back and you felt like laughing – settling for a chuckle. Vergil was quite playful that day and you came to observe, during all your training sessions, that teaching all he knew regarding fighting was something he genuinely enjoyed – making an usually hidden part of his personality gradually blossom. “Remember the last two sets of movements I taught you? I want to see how you’re doing.”

“Ok. I do have some questions on some movements, though.” You got in position, kneeling on the floor with your hands resting on your thighs, Yamato carefully wrapped by your fingers. He taught you more than five sets of movements, but the last two were the most challenging.

“Show me what you’ve been training. Feel free to ask me when you have questions during it.” Vergil raised his head a little bit, faintly narrowing his eyes – that was his analyzing look, and you knew he was about to assess your performance like a teacher.

It was something you had talked about before. Vergil was big on evaluating you as a student, always striving for perfection, but you were also a perfectionist – with everything you’ve been through, performance anxiety took a toll on you.

After discussing your issues, he made it very clear: Vergil would always observe and analyze as a teacher, focusing only in polishing you so one day you could shine like the brightest diamond. He’d never have the intention to bash and humiliate you – and whenever you felt uncomfortable, you were always free to talk to him.

That made you confident once more, at least before his eyes. Taking a deep breath, you unsheathed Yamato once again, keeping only the blade in your hands and placing its case by your side. Moving your legs to get up from the floor, you coordinated your feet with attack and block movements, just like he had showed you.

Vergil felt the golden warmth of pride spread through his chest. You learnt fast – and you learnt it perfectly. Not everything you did was perfect, but you strived for it. He couldn’t ask for more and it made him revel in how much you had discovered in such a short span of time.

Your hands moved carefully, your feet, delicately. It was the same dance of death Vergil engaged from time to time when training on his own. A lethal ballet, focused on his energy and Yamato’s only – and now, you knew how to do it too. It was easy to enter a meditative state and you understood how he could zone out while at it. At the same time you were training your proficiency at a weapon, it was also particularly soothing to the soul.

“Hmmm, here.” You said suddenly, your back at him. You had both of your hands on Yamato’s grip, close to your cheekbones, pointing menacingly at your imaginary opponent – just like Vergil used to do. “Yamato feels too heavy. It doesn’t usually feel like that, and I can’t figure out what is wrong.”

“Hmmm… Keep that position.” As he spoke, you heard his steps right behind you, feeling as he approached. As you trained, you could feel anything and everything that happened around – not needing to look at him. “May I?”

You felt Vergil right behind you, his shadow blocking the light from the moon. You nodded, giving him permission to touch you if he needed to – allowing the Dark Slayer to wrap his arms around you until his hands where over yours on Yamato’s grip.

“You’re keeping your hands too far apart. See?” He asked quietly by your ears, while you felt him rearranging your hands. With Vergil, you learnt not to rely too much on your sight and attune even more what you could feel – although he was impressed with how far your internal senses could take you before training. “You won’t be able to balance the blade’s weight properly if you keep your hands in the wrong positions. Remember: they can always change, but for this pose, this is the best grip.”

“Ok. Noted. Thank you for correcting, it feels much better.” You slightly nodded again, not needing to look at him. You could sense Vergil’s gaze on you. “From this, my best option is to charge in, right?”

“Yes. But it can change with how much weight you keep in your back leg.” One of his hands lowered to your waist, in order to guide you alongside him. Both of you kept your gaze locked on your theoretical enemy. “Right now, there’s too much weight. Your best option is throwing your body forward and using that momentum to powerfully stab your enemy.”

As Vergil described, he guided you to do exactly that, holding your hand and your waist as if you were both dancing a waltz. After the successful ‘attack’, he guided you back to the initial position.

“But if you keep your legs closer and divide your weight equally…” His voice explained as you both fell into position. “You can focus on a hit or block to the right. It will depend on the actions of your enemy.”

And once again, he guided your hands in the movement he described, as his feet encouraged yours to follow him. Vergil would deny it, but he did get somewhat carried away, guiding you through a few more movements he hadn’t explained yet. As you both stopped, you couldn’t hold back a smile – even if it was a contained one.

“I can assure you I will not forget this lesson.” You had to make that statement. Not you or Vergil were big on touching and entering each other’s personal space, but that didn’t feel alien. It was the opposite: having Vergil teach you like that felt familiar, like dancing. “I even go as far as saying all my sore muscles from relentlessly training will be more than worth it today.”

Vergil felt a sudden urge to kiss you – something that appeared in the depth of his soul; something neither he knew very well. It was foreign to him, but maybe it had to do with the admiration and care Vergil kept close to his heart when dealing with you.

“I think you can learn one last new trick tonight.” He had a mischievous smile that, although you couldn’t see it, you could hear – but, most importantly, you could sense it. “Remember the focus we trained with summoned swords? I need you to do it again.”

“Hmmm. Should I aim to summon swords or only harness the energy?”

“Aim to summon. I need you to do your best.” As he answered, you started working on it.

Vergil had Yamato’s sheath on his hand, placing it on yours in order to put the blade back into its cover alongside you. He kept on the ritual, taking his time to help you glide the blade onto the sheath – but, as the hilt was about to click with its usual metal sound, Vergil gripped your hand with a little more intensity, abruptly guiding you to put away the Yamato.

And that’s when you saw: thousands of blue and moonlight white lines crossing the skies in the blink of an eye, enveloped by the dark blue aura of the void – it was a judgment cut. A perfect one even, mixed with your and Vergil’s energy. It broke the air in pieces of glasses, that dissipated like thousands of little stars.

Something so deadly shouldn’t be that beautiful to watch.

“Did you just trick me into judgment cutting…?” You were baffled, at a loss of words. As you turned around, Vergil just smiled back, keeping the Yamato by his side again. Practice was over and both of you needed a shower.

But what made you slightly in awe wasn’t the fact that Vergil was once again without his coat – that was a given whenever he was teaching you – but the few strands of hair that fell over his serene and content expression. It wasn’t like Dante’s hair – that was something you had yet to see – but it wasn’t perfectly slicked back as always, either. It was so… Foreign seeing Vergil so human.

Although it was most definitely a welcome sight.

“I could only do it because you are already powerful enough for this sort of lesson.” And it was his turn to stretch his neck, feeling the tension himself. “Now, I’m afraid we need a proper shower.”

“I thought you’d never ask. Let’s go.”

Vergil hadn’t asked – but you offered it freely. It wasn’t something he was able to say no: he enjoyed showers with you, being the ones after training his favorites. It was the perfect opportunity to massage your sore muscles and receive it in return, relaxing on bed later until you fell asleep.

Vergil was not strictly a harsh professor – he also knew how to be kind and attentive when you needed it. He just needed a chance to let it show.

#vergil x reader #vergil x you #vergil imagine #devil may cry imagines #devil may cry fanfiction #dmc imagines #dmc fanfic #devil may cry #vergil sparda #dmc vergil #here I am posting Vergil's chapter #because I lost control over words #and now I'm doomed to post in different chapters

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