#in the breeze excerpt

[kyofsonder]

Find the Word

I was tagged by both @saltysupercomputer and @crossroadcrow to find select sets of words in my WIPs and tag more people with my own words to keep the game going.

My Words: liquid, weather, line, plant, pin, sorrow, breeze, fall, justice, hug

I’ll tag @on-noon, @thatwitchrevan (I tried to find your writblr, but it didn’t come up so I’ll tag your main), @mr-writes, @hannahactuallywrites, @the-inkwell-variable, @writingpotato07, and as always anyone who wants to join in can use the folowing words and say I tagged them!

Your Words: pressure, patient/patience, expectation, seldom, familiar

The excerpts are under the cut as usual, so nobody has to scroll endlessly -- especially since I went overboard on these excerpts.

I found liquid in my novel WIP “To Be Honest”, in a scene that mentions blood and (magic-related) self injury:

Without sparing a second more to think, he brings the knife down on his arm at whatever angle fate decides. If he's lucky, it won't catch any major arteries and he'll be able to bandage himself up later. If he's not... Micah ignores the thought and focuses on the feeling of blood in his own veins. The flow of it through his muscles. The pressure of it against his every atom, heavy with a substance that feels like contradiction itself melted into liquid form. Warmth, cold, weight, lightness, both the smoothness of a river and the sharpness of broken glass, painful and absolutely painless. Focusing on the sensation of magic always makes him nauseous, and he has to grit his teeth against the feeling. A little more. Imagine its extremes as a scale. Push the scale in the desired direction. The foundation of unstructured spellcasting, just like his mother had taught both him and David in childhood. Just like he and David had taught Asher, not long after.

I found weather in my dream journal, full of subconscious stories I plan to eventually rewrite into intentionally original works, specifically in a dream about a pyschic shapeshifter named Sophia and her variously psychic friends:

Only a few people on the baseball team really take notice of the newcomer, each for different reasons. He's a bald, fairly round person who looks like he should be doing judo or sumo professionally. He even has a scowling expression most of the time, whether he means to or not. He's a kind person, but he's not warm or cuddly by any means -- still, I'll call him Teddy. He prefers Ted. What Sophia, Mindy, and (somehow) Sam notice about Ted, however, is the fact that he has psychic powers. After a day or two, he even reaches out to Sophia telepathically. I don't remember what it is they talk about, but it feels disconnected from the sense of tension that's rising for the psychics in this school. The weather itself changes. Now, the afternoons they spend at this school are heavy with rain clouds or even wet with actual rain itself. The sun doesn't make an appearance anymore.

Life goes on like this for awhile. Sophia, Mindy, Sam, and Teddy talk about psychic things between club activities. Sophia and Sam act like an innocent high school couple. Things are fine. Ominous, but fine.

I found line in several of my WIPs, including my novel WIP “Apricots”:

He's known for years that Noah has a hard time explaining things, that words are difficult for him in more or less the opposite way that they're difficult for Kade, but right now he doesn't have the patience to wait for this scattered man to put his thoughts together. Ian will force them into something coherent if he has to, something he can actually understand. "You're dropping names I've never heard like I have any idea who they are, you're getting overexcited like you always do, and you just casually mentioned someone is actively trying to kill you? You can't just... assume I still get what you're talking about when you suddenly veer of like that! I'm not a mind reader! I'm not --" he stops himself, knowing what he'd been about to say but not wanting to say it even in his own head. It feels like a line he can't cross. Comparing himself to someone who isn't here to defend herself. Using Noah's own grief as a weapon against him. This isn't supposed to be an argument. Just a conversation.

I found plant in my short story WIP “Kiyo”:

I name the vines anyway, like the healthy living articles say you should to get the most out of raising a plant. To make that illusion of having a friend around feel more real. I call her Kiyo. It doesn't mean anything as far as I know. It's just a couple of syllables I can say out loud so it feels less like I'm talking to myself. A simple name for a simple plant. I only choose it because I like how it feels to say, so it's not like I'm putting any grand hopes into it either. No extra expectations. It's there to give her some personality. That's all. Though I have to admit, somehow it feels like she has personality even before I start using a name for her. She's alive, and there are times when I look at her and I can feel a sense of warmth that reminds me I'm the same.

I couldn’t find pin, so here’s a fun fact related to the earlier “To Be Honest” excerpt with a lot of blood mentions:

I’ve said it in tags before, but the way Micah uses magic in that excerpt is a last resort for bloodline/circle witches like him. While magic is stored in his blood, using it without some sort of focusing tool is extremely unpredictable and imprecise. It’s the equivalent of trying to perform surgery with a machete. It’s made to cut into things, but it’s not made for fine incisions or careful movements. It’s also extremely dangerous, since a witch that just tears the magic out of their own body is using more blood than they strictly need and risks bleeding out.

Every bloodline avoids this inefficiency and danger in a different way, and makes sure to teach each new generation their methods – even if they’re kept secret from everyone outside their circle of influence. Kilner witches both tend to process their blood into ink and write their spells out as words on paper – which they then burn so nobody can copy their work. Page and Barker witches tend to engrave their spells into wood or metal and then stain or etch the engravings with their blood. Both Jasper and Porter witches tend to make potions, mixing their blood with other ingredients that have significance to their respective bloodlines.Renner witches like Micah tend to turn their blood into paint and craft decks of spellcasting cards. Micah himself is trying to learn the Shepherd way of sewing and embroidering spells into cloth, using needles and yarn doused in witch blood to make enchanted clothes and accessories. There are as many ways to use bloodline magic as there are bloodline witch families/groups/factions that use said methods, but only a handful of them are shared with the general public or used to make enchanted items that even non-magical people can operate. The only thing commonly taught to everyone equally, no matter which circle they belong to, is the danger of doing what Micah does in that scene.

I found sorrow in a rough WIP of a song I’ve been trying to write for the world of Ryedenne where (most of) my novel WIP “A Place to Return” takes place – a folk song warning newly recruited mercenaries and would-be heroes not to fight victims of a certain rage-inducing curse:

Hear the Crows, bound in shackles, cry out

In their rage, Ryedenne's pain, Summer's sorrow.

Some try in cover of darkness to drive them out,

Yet such souls never live 'til the morrow.

If Saints are troubled by the troubles of Crows --

These cursed creatures they barely contain --

Then for mortals who'd call themselves heroes,

What hope of victory could ever remain?

The might of the Crow is the might of the sun

That burns with the rage of the Gods.

A fight with a curse is a fight seldom won

by these challengers facing slim odds.

Hear the Crows, bound in shackles, cry out

In their rage, Ryedenne's pain, Summer's sorrow.

There's Crows who from darkness try to crawl out,

Yet such souls never see light on the morrow.

I found breeze in my shelved novel WIP “Rebirth”, that I apparently last tried to revive in 2018:

I’ve never seen so many stars in my life. It’s dizzying, trying to keep track of where their light ends and the darkness of the night sky actually begins. The trees bend and sway slightly in the soft breeze. Have I seen any of these stars before? Is that even possible? I let myself slip away just a bit, searching for familiar constellations or any markers that might spark my memory somehow. Connect me back to the past.

“Seriously? You’re gonna lecture me over this, too? You’re not our goddamn leader, Mal!” Justin’s voice stabs through the night like a needle through fabric. I sigh. The air is so clear here. The air smells of moss and the campfire below.

“I never said I wanted to lead. I wanted you to listen to common sense. You can talk about right and wrong all you want, but the consequences won’t go away. We’ve still got a target on our heads, because none of you city kids could stop and fucking think before you acted!” the usual calm in Mal’s tone splinters into a hiss at the end, harsh and strained between her teeth. I close my eyes and breathe. The stars spin slowly behind my eyelids, blinking like they’re trying to tell me something. None of them look familiar at all.

I found fall in my Given oneshot fic “Present Tense”:

He taps the body of the guitar again, humming absently as he does. He's not even sure if he's matching the music in his ears. It seems removed from that. From anyone else's songs. From any of his own songs he's already sung. The sound melts into the warm afternoon sunlight, and he gently lets himself fall over onto the cool surface of the stairwell. It's a good spot for a nap. Maybe if he sleeps, he won't think so loud. So much. About things he can't understand or figure out on his own. The last thing he sees as he drifts off to sleep is the set of double doors between the stairwell and the gym. Uenoyama-kun will probably be coming through those doors soon. Sleepily, he wonders if this will count as seeing something from a new angle, or if it cancels out because he's napped here before.

I found justice in my Danny Phantom oneshot fic “Lingering Scars”:

Maybe he's not all that violent in his soul, as a person, if a kid this kind was cloned from him. She's the hero side of him, at least when it comes to personal values. Her priorities are crystal clear. Protect others, stay safe, and don't do harm. The things he likes to think he values, too. The things it takes to be a hero of justice. She doesn't see herself as someone capable of killing, and he's relieved to hear her put that into words. She doesn't see him as someone who could kill, either. It would be natural to assume that he's seen ghosts die this way firsthand, that he's possibly even been the person to make it happen himself. His little sister doesn't even consider that his knowledge or experience comes from destroying the cores of his enemies. Not even for a second. She believes in him, and it hurts in a way that digs ice into the sides of his neck.

I found hug in “Present Tense” again:

"The only way I could stop being hollow is if I stopped being myself. If I was left in silence. I told you. I'm a keeper of memories. I'm the place where temporary things are given a chance at permanence, but I can't keep things that aren't given to me. I can't hold on to things if they're never put into my hands in the first place. I can take as many things as you give me, Mafuyu. Don't think that I won't try. I can hold every moment you ever want to be able to revisit, or hide from, or see from a different angle. I want you to trust me," they pull Mafuyu into a hug this time, gripping him as if reuniting with a long lost friend, and he can't help but to idly wonder if the time in their hands is falling out now -- dripping down his back, maybe, blue and silver and red and white in turns.

This got a little long, even by my usual standards, but I found almost all of the words I was given this time. As much as I enjoy writing fun facts, it’s satisfying when I actually find the words like the game intends. I’m looking forward to the next time I’m tagged again!

#writing #find the word #sonder stories #sonder snippets #bonus fact #the reason none of the stars are familiar #in the breeze excerpt #is because the characters have traveled to the future #they've been frozen for so many centuries #that by the time they were thawed #the stars had changed entirely #it's a recurring thing in the Rebirth story #or it was #before I shelved the story #since it tackled too many things #that I probably don't have the right to tackle #let alone the experience #also #that dream #it involved Sophia turning into a lobster #at which point Sam took her home #in a water bucket #reassuring her that even if she stayed stuck #he would still love her #I loved that scene

[mistbornbaby]

“We’ll still be pretty short handed,” Ham said, rubbing his chin. “Spook isn’t supposed to be back for another week, and the Lord Ruler only knows where Breeze went. We haven’t had a message from him in months.”

This makes me sad; reminds me of when Dox used the Lord Ruler colloquially and how deep it stung at Kelsier to see that even his friend had it so ingrained in him.

#well of ascension #ch 1 #excerpt #Ham #spook #lord ruler #breeze #kelsier

[bookwomansoul]

midnight approaches, summer blows gently, peace by the window.

~a.

#haiku #mood #life #my pieces #tumblr #writers on tumblr #excerpt from a book i may write someday #world #alive #summer #night #breeze

[sagewraith]

The Gravity of Birds, Tracy Guzeman

#the gravity of birds #tracy guzeman #quotes #excerpt #books #breeze

[writerofshit]

For the fanfic writers post, 🥺,💔 and ✅?

🥺 Is there a certain type of moment or common interaction between your characters that never fails to put you in your feels?

I don't know that this will make a lot of sense, but I'm a big fan of Character A thinking a relationship is one way right up until the point that Character B spells it out for them. It's not even a romantic thing, necessarily. It's them thinking that it's a working relationship, just professional, maybe they're even being used in some capacity, but then here comes the other person to inform them that no, they couldn't give a shit about the job, actually. Fuck the money, fuck the power, fuck all of it. B only cares that A is happy. Did A not realize that they're family now? Because they are, goddamnit.

In other words, scenes that go like

A: You only care about [monetarily important thing]

B: Do I?

B smashes or otherwise destorys monetarily important thing.

B: I care about you, A

I just love characters being kind of blindsided by other people loving them both because of who they are, and in spite of it. I love giving them people they cannot make turn against them. I love letting them be loved unconditionally.

💔 Is there a fic of yours that broke your heart?

I think we all know that my track record for finishing stuff is less than stellar, and a majority of shit I did finish has since been privated, so I don't really have anything to point to. I think maybe anything thats been disclaimered as being personal to me in some way. That's less about the fic than it is my own self pity, though.

Some of what I'm writing now gets to me. I won't spoil it much, not that its anywhere close to done anyway. But part of the backstory is someone dealing with a loss and needing to be reminded that while loss is a part of life, it is not the only part. At one point they simply say "It's not fair." and everytime I re-read it I have to take a moment. Because they're right, and there's nothing we can do except live with it.

✅ What's something that appears in your fics over and over and over again, even if you don't mean to?

Dumb references that I'm pretty sure no one else catches. Current project is chock full of one-off quotes and sneaky reasons for stuff that probabaly only make sense to me. Yes, this is the same project that makes me cry when I think aout the unfairness of death. On occasion, I am multi-faceted.

Unrelated but I also always seem to end up with at least one scene involving deep conversations while lying in bed. It's generally platonic, too. There's something about the combination of intimacy, vulnerability, and anonymity that comes from sharing a bed with someone. Confessions come easier, I think.

---

This is all much longer than I'm sure anyone expected from me, for which I deeply apologize. Also pretty sure all of my answers boil down to 'love makes me cry'

#yeah im sticking with that as my tldr. love makes me cry. #love you never expected to be worthy of. #love you cant give anymore. #love that you share without risk. #in case anyone wants some insight on to why that is‚ please enjoy the following excerpts from a text i sent someone in MAY #'I feel both alone and lonely‚ that i just want someone to lean into and be ok‚ for awhile. Be happy‚ for awhile. #So i write about people who have the things i want‚ stupid things and silly things and comforting things #But i haven't gotten rid of the loneliness.' #anyway i think this concludes KS's therapy hour #though god knows a slight breeze could begin the next session #ks talks #ask meme #i dont remember my tag for stuff like this but sure lets go with that #anon

[shibaraki]

EXCERPT FROM EDEN ┊ AIZAWA SHOUTA

synopsis: the further you delve into the forest the farther you find yourself from your village's good graces—subsequently pushed into the arms of a creature you were warned to stay away from.

tags: NSFT, AFAB reader, fantasy au, naga aizawa, human reader, childhood friends to lovers, mention of violence (reader has bruises), reader is an outcast, bathing together, nesting, monsterfucking, mating bites (not A/B/O), aphrodisiac venom (so no prep needed), dubcon (for the venom) but v enthusiastic consent, non human genitalia (hemipenes), grinding, unprotected vaginal sex, multiple orgasm, creampie, aizawa carries reader (he is big n strong)

wc: 7.3K

There are monsters in the night.

Adults would spin tales about them when you were young. You were warned not to go near the forest. To never stray from the path. If a voice calls to you, do not answer. Look at your feet and cover your ears. Thoughts filled with blood-steeped, ugly stories of such creatures: half man half serpent taller than an ogre swallowing impious people up whole. Naga, the true tempter, the harbinger of misfortune.

Children spent idle time feigning courage and taunting the so-called beasts in spite of it; playing at the treeline, skittering over the border and rushing back with a surge of adrenaline, as if the creature had been right there awaiting a meal. But above all they liked to frighten you, the runt of the litter. Snakes like to eat mice, they would jeer. Little mouse they would call you. Perfect bait.

It had been dewy that fateful afternoon. You were chased deep into the unknown. Petichor hung thick around the trees after a sun shower. Summer was drawing to a close. Shorter days, darker mornings. Your elders would call the weather ‘temperamental’ and you liked that. As though the Gods were children clinging onto those last dregs of heat, unwilling to let go.

Grass flattened wet under your bare feet, you ran from sharp stones and sharper words. Ran until the only voice left in your head was your own. Lungs tight and spasming for oxygen. You felt eyes on you the moment foliage snapped under another tentative step—but the figure before you did not move. He remained on his stomach, arms folded beneath his head, body stretched long and bare across the narrow clearing to bathe in the sunspot. Lower, right at the base of his spine, pale skin faded seamlessly into black scales that made up the thick, sinuous tail of a snake.

Your knees stung where small open wounds touched the air. A gentle breeze flowed in through the underbrush, took your slight apprehension and whisked it into the thinning redwood canopy. As a child you simply couldn’t connect something so non threatening and lazy to the monsters of old.

You approached the naga with slow, telegraphed movements. Thin pupils drenched in vermillion glow observed behind a half lidded stare. Closer then, trembling hands tugged and stretched the hem of your shirt, popping the old stitching. “Hello,” you said, voice small even to your own ears. “I—I’m not a mouse. Just so you know”.

Something flickered in his expression; a stifled inhale, a brief shift, the naga sighed. It rolled through his body, belly turning toward the sky. Sunlight reflected on the exposed underside and shimmered iridescent, stealing your breath. “That much is obvious,” he replied tiredly.

“Then, you won’t eat me?” before he had the chance to answer, you’d already been emboldened. You tottered toward him with a surge of energy and sureness. “Thank you. Can we be friends?”

“No,” he muttered, retreating into his coils.

A familiar sensation stung behind your eyes and your bottom lip trembled fiercely. It built up in your body and collapsed. Loneliness, shame, the incessant, throbbing ache in your limbs after sprinting so far. You tried again, a quiet warble. “Please?”

But a stern voice rumbled from the layers of muscle, uninterested in your swelling emotions. “Go away kid,” the naga demanded. “It’s not safe out here”.

“M’not a kid,” then you kicked the dirt in a burst of wounded anger. While bigger than you, this naga wasn’t even close to towering an oni, so you bluffed petulantly, “You’re a kid too”.

“While that may be true I am still older than you,” came the disgruntled remark. Then, faster than you could register, an arm shot out from between the dark coils and took you by the throat.

Reflexively, you gripped the naga’s wrist with both hands. But you didn’t flinch. Rather than fight his hold you waited, rabbit-footed heart beating in your chest. Violence was nothing new to a runt like you. The hand slid up to your chin and forced you to keep his gaze. His eyes flickered strangely there in the darkness. Red like fresh blood. The ire in them faltered at your spiritless reaction.

“Annoying human. Your lack of instinct will get you killed,” the creature stated. You said nothing. He continued, “You’re far from home. Follow the river to your settlement. Do not come back here”.

You recall how abruptly your senses sharpened at his mention and latched onto the distant sound of running water. He freed you from his grip, pale limb slinking back into the recesses of his twisted tail. He reminded you of a snail receding into its shell. Boring, lazy and slow moving. Naga were not so frightening, you concluded.

You returned with reluctance, following the riverbank until the end of your new world where it broke into a wishbone shape and wound around the village. Adults frowned at the dry mud caking your feet, ankles and calves. Their calloused fingers squeezed roughly around your wrists and dragged you to the springs to scrub you raw.

“Where on earth have you been?” one asked, mouth set in a frown. Another held you by the shoulders, thumbs pressed into your collarbone with intention to bruise. “Your stupidity is going to curse us all,” they shook you in place and their strength only grew the more you fought. “Do not provoke the naga. Understand?”

Faces twisted in disappointment haunted you all through the night. Eyes sore and puffy. Tears soaked into your shirt; you could taste them in the back of your throat. Oval-shaped bruises adorned your collar yet your throat and your jaw remained unblemished, if not a little tender. You were hurt, but not by the one you were warned against.

Your second excursion into the forest to see the naga was of your own volition. He was not where you first met him but nearby, curled up beneath an ancient tree, right where her bole has spread and warped to create a small depression in the trunk. The wind billowed. Branches swayed and bent their spindly fingers, pointed at you, almost accusingly.

He appeared to be sleeping. Again. Arms folded atop his tail, chin rested on the cradle it made. Perhaps there was something wrong with you—as the elders often stated—but you were not entirely stupid. You kept your hands to yourself, letting only your eyes wander as you crept close enough to see the soft curve of his jaw, the sloped nose, the youthful cheeks.

Long dark hair draped loosely over pale shoulders, expression serene while he rested. You thought he was lovely. Not at all beastly. Right down to the dip of his stomach, where skin vanished into bony hips and an obsidian tail.

A guttural hum startled you where you stood. Unmoving, the naga murmured, “Do you have a death wish?”

That voice untied every knot in your body. “N—no,” you held strong. “I told you, I want to be friends”.

“And I told you that’s not happening”.

When he peeked at you through dark curtains into those dim eyes there came a softness, as though atoning for his harsh words. Under that gaze your stomach started to rumble. “You’re hungry,” you shrunk, palms pressed flat as though to snuff out the sound. “Humans need to eat multiple times a day, do they not?”

“…Sometimes,” your agreement was barely a mumble. “If there is enough for me”.

The naga scrutinised you and your answer, displeased by it. After a long silence he unravelled and asked, “Do you want food?”

Hope filled you from root to stem. You bloomed. Stretched for the open sky like a flower seeking sun, bouncing on the tips of your toes. “Food?” you echoed excitedly. You trailed after him and nearly tripped in your haste. He caught you with the end of his tail and sighed. It coiled tightly around your middle and inched you along with him.

Having glanced surreptitiously in his direction, your warm human hand swept across the cool dark scales. They were glossy and smooth, unlike anything you’d ever felt. As he moved you sensed the power in his limb.

“What do naga eat?”

“Anything. Fish, birds, insects,” he told you. The coil around your waist flexed as if to check you were there. Hearing your trepidation his tone lilted as he added, “But what you’re really asking is if I eat humans, aren’t you?”

You rubbed where you thought his belly might be and pondered aloud, “Would you, if they deserved it?”

He scowled over his shoulder and came to an abrupt stop. “What kind of a question is that, kid?”

You wilted at the sharp verbiage, feeling scolded, though unable to understand his offense. After all, that is exactly what the villagers would say of you if ever he decided to.

That only seemed to fuel his frustration. You worried in the face of it, for a weak moment. Warnings you’ve clamoured in your conscience, soon chased by immediate guilt. Your new friend had offered kindness and there you were, assuming the worst of him.

Sensing your turmoil the naga cautiously brought his hand to your head. Front to back, pausing at a vulnerable, unmarked nape. He attempted to pet you. Wide eyed, you stared ahead until every leaf in the grove coalesced into a green blur. His touch had been deliberate, soft and soothing despite the tension set in his face.

Laid in the palm of his other hand was a pile of plum red berries. The coils relaxed to recline you into a comfortable position and wordlessly, you shared the small treat together. Teeth glinted sharp in the daylight, made to rend flesh from bone. They sank tender into thin skin until it burst and he hummed at the flavour enjoying a simple pleasure like any human boy would.

Their fruity tang clung to your tongue. You took your fill and more. “Thank you…” your voice lost strength, no name to fill the blanks.

“Aizawa,” he muttered. A rough swipe of his thumb across your lips wiped away the citrus. “It’s Aizawa Shouta. And don’t speak with your mouth full”.

The sky darkened on the eventide. Aizawa bid you a flippant farewell, your name at home in his mouth, and you erred on caution, changing course to wash the dirt and foliage from your body. Loud was the pounding of your heart against your ribs, a frantic beat. But nobody batted an eye at your presence, nor the absence of it.

Those short excursions continued for some time. Be it a stroke of boredom, or loneliness, you would find yourself treading back through the banks, to Aizawa’s territory. There was never a discernible path leading to him. Your legs would simply take you there, heart magnetised like the arrow of a compass. Whilst the village raised you with harsh, inattentive hands, he became your North. Years passed together and eyes turned as your insatiable curiosity grew, along with your carelessness.

And with that carelessness came consequences.

Fate is a funny thing. You are sprinting through the forest, feet pounding against the dirt alongside the ghost of your childhood self. The enraged shouts have long since tapered into silence yet you can’t allow yourself to slow. Your limbs ache, a bone deep permafrost, fatigued muscles clenching.

They’d followed you yesterday. Unexpected, given how deliberately people avoided the village border. Everything collapsed in one fell swoop. A single misstep and your life was upturned. You heard their plans to confine you in the shrine and knew—you’d never be able to see Shouta again.

Lost in your muddied stream of consciousness your foot is caught in a bundle of jagged roots. Mossy fingers coil around your ankle. You stumble, taking impact to the knees. The sting is muted as it knocks the air from your burning lungs.

You gasp, a wet and raspy breath; an apocalyptic spring fills your chest. The trees are in bloom. High above the blossoms are pale pink, like branches covered in snow. Ash flowers fell slowly to coat the ground. They get in your hair, your clothes and your eyes.

Shouta finds you there. He has always had the uncanny ability to sense you in his territory, as though the forest were an extension of himself. Your neck strains to lift your head, looking through lashes to see his silhouette. Red eyes flash in the distance, and in a mere blink he is at your side.

“Shouta—”

A low, guttural sound reverberates in the back of his throat. You’re scooped into his embrace. He is gentle with you, always aware of the difference in size and strength, and your heart beats harder for it. “You’re early,” he says. “What happened?”

You exhale through the fresh tenderness searing, “They know”.

Shadows shift above you. A curtain of hair hangs in your periphery. Shouta sinks until your eyes are level. Big. He hit a frightening growth spurt after his juvenile shed. A broad chest, shoulders corded with muscle, his long tail heavy enough to disturb the natural topography of the forest floor. Uneven scars littered across his skin from territorial disputes that you were not privy to. The most recent curves along his right cheekbone, fresh and pink.

Your gaze lingered as you took in his expression. Mouth downturned in obvious discontent but eyes dark, pensive. Beautiful even when he is doing nothing at all.

Shouta’s irises flickered in the softening light of the afternoon sun. Fingers drumming on lacquer scales. “They know?” he repeats. Irritation coated the words, as it often did when speaking of your village. “They should have realised years ago”.

Like him, you had shed your own urgent adolescence. The world became smaller and you preferred it that way. It spun around Shouta as if he were your own axis. When you were with him there was something much bigger than childlike wonder.

“That’s different. I wasn’t anything important. But now I’ve… been slacking on my duties to see you,” embarrassed, you tear up the thinning grass, seated at the foot of his coils. “I’m old enough to be of use, so my absence is noticeable,”

“You were a child. Running off God knows where. You’re lucky an orc didn’t decide to pick his teeth with you,” the snap in his voice almost hurt, but there was no bite nor true anger aimed at you. You’ve had these arguments before.

“I’m lucky because I had you to protect me,” you amended gently, a small smile curled at the corner of your mouth. It took a while for you to realise that he tailed you home each time you visited, just to be sure. His scales shift at your back, carrying the praise through his body. “I know it bothers you, Shouta, but this is just how things are. Don’t worry, I’ll be more careful from now on”.

“This is not about you being careful,” Shouta mutters, though you get the sense he has no energy to truly argue. You hesitate in the brief silence. He takes you by the wrist, not the hand, and you pout about it.

He encourages you to come. You tread through the thick, clammy air as the sun beats down on your shoulders. Shouta takes you up the valley. Where the treeline ends the mouth of the river funnels south, surface glittering softly as the currents part around a large rock in the centre; top smoothed down flat for sunning. You watched while he sunk into the water, tail disappearing behind him as it submerged and disturbed the silt.

“Come on,” he coaxes begrudgingly. You dither by the edge, picking at your sleeve.

“I can’t get my clothes wet”.

Shouta reaches the rock, bracing an arm against it. Draped in open sunlight he turns to level you with a flat look. “Then take them off. Don’t bother giving excuses. I already know you’re wounded, I can smell it”.

Shit. You wince, resting a hand over the marks across your ribs and hip. You were so sure he hadn’t noticed anything.

Anticipation churned in your stomach. You’ve never been nude in front of him before—though not for lack of wanting, and you suppose he himself has always been naked in human terms. You swallow down trepidation and lift your shirt over your head, gaze resolutely pointed away from the river, which rippled with every minute shift Shouta’s tail.

The currents are a cool caress against your body as you step into the river, soothing the bruises. Tentative, you wade further, arms folded over your breasts for some semblance of modesty. Once you’re standing in waist high water something hard, smooth—Shouta’s tail wraps around you and pulls you close.

“Deep water,” he mutters softly. You’re pressed skin to skin. His throat bobs and he looks away. “Can’t have you drowning”.

“Right,” you say, left breathless by the proximity. You can feel his chest rise and fall. Sinew and muscle expands. Rigid scales dotted along his navel press against your abdomen as he sprawled around the sunning rock. “Thank you”.

He hums in lieu of a response. Small waves lap up your spine as he adjusts his grip, holding you with one arm around your lower back. Shouta traces his thumb over the large mark on your pelvis, the claw tip catching. “You said they found out. So this is the result?”

You grimace weakly at the subject. It was naïve to hope he would let it go. “It’s my fault. I was careless,” you tried, slumped in his embrace as though filled with wet sand. “They’re just afraid of what they don’t understand. I should’ve tried to explain years ago—”

“You and your misplaced guilt,” Shouta’s jaw ticks. He inhales deeply, his next words quieter on a long exhale. “Stop rationalising their mistreatment. They’re stuck in their ways”.

“Maybe. But I…”

The truth was that an ugly part of you had never wanted them to change for the better. You wanted Shouta to yourself for as long as he’s willing and their ignorance made it so. Fear kept them away. But it also stoked their anger.

“I can’t help but wonder why they're so against it,” you tuck your chin and smile despite the lump lodged in your throat, suddenly feeling naked in all manner of ways. “They treat me like a curse. And I know it’s natural to fear what you don’t understand, but if they just knew you—!”

“Humans should fear my kind,” Shouta interrupts, a bite to his tone. Your eyes dipped low, and you traced your fingers over the intricate mosaic of scales across his clavicle to avoid his sharp gaze. A short moment passes. “Your association with me doesn’t make you a harbinger of ill omen,” he murmurs, sweeping his hand along the planes of your back in silent apology. “If anything you’ve been protecting them from one”.

You lift your head. His pupils dilate, soften. “I have?”

A broad palm wraps around the nape of your neck, the other resting over your bruised hip. Shouta’s thumb brushes over your pulse. “If not for your insistence and naïve altruism I would have killed them for neglecting you,” Shouta admitted, bringing you tighter to his front. You’re taken deeper, until your feet no longer reach the riverbed and the cold no longer bites.

“When will you prioritise yourself?” he continues. “I’m starting to think you would pull out your own teeth if it could guarantee you’d never hurt anyone”.

You smile, a little dazed by how favourably he regarded you. His skin is cool under your fingertips. “That’s not quite true,” you trace the scar beneath his eye and he slows, turning into your palm. The pad of your thumb brushed the corner of his mouth. There you find those monstrous teeth, large and sharp behind his lips. The touch feels momentous, like something only lovers do. “And either way, I’d still have yours to protect me”.

Shouta rumbles at that. The vibrations loosen up the tension in your chest and satisfaction gathers warm in your belly. “Lean back,” he murmurs. Anticipation swoops through your belly as you recline in his arms, cradling you above the ripples to wash your body with his own hands.

“This water has healing properties. Further down the mountain the river splits and forms a hot spring,” Shouta’s claw-tipped fingers brush your nipple, pert under his attention. Your breath hitches. He pays it no mind, palm sliding over each breast and along your shoulders, wiping down the sweat and dirt. The pressure remains delicate around your waist, careful not to agitate the bruises.

Shouta kneads the soft parts of your body even after the filth is gone. You hum, allowing yourself to enjoy his attention. Everything feels heavier. Gravity bears hard on your arms as they lift to brush the wet hair back from his face and you marvel at how his eyelids flutter closed, one after the other. You comb through his roots, scratching lightly over his scalp before working loose the knots at the ends.

Something is beginning to swell beneath you but a quiet contentment overwhelms the reciprocal arousal stirring in your gut. Watching the tension in his face trickle away, eyes falling closed so dark lashes fan over pale cheeks. Your fingertips trace along the smattering of scales by his temple and notice a new vivid sheen to them.

“You look brighter,” you murmur, curious.

Awareness flies over his features. You almost miss it given how swiftly he buries it, taking on that familiar monotonous air. After years spent detailing the subtleties in every fleeting expression and spoken word you’ve become quite accustomed to Shouta concealing his embarrassment.

Turning away from your prying eyes, the line of his jaw becomes sharper as he swallows. “It’ll soon be my seasonal rut,” he tells you, feigning indifference. “My scales are more vibrant for the purpose of attracting a mate”.

“A mate?” you echo uselessly. Dread churns in the pit of your stomach. You knew well what having a ‘mate’ entailed. A white hot sensation prickles at your nape that not even the cool water can quell. In your naivety—and perhaps, selfishness—you’d never considered that he might find somebody else. Somebody suitable. “That’s… really great, Shouta. But who? I thought you chased off the last bed of naga that passed through?”

At this, a frown etched into Shouta’s brow. “You’re making a few unnecessary leaps in that head of yours,” he mutters. “At what point did I say my mate needed to be a naga?”

There’s something in his voice that gives weight to what he’s doing. It echoes an unspoken proposition. Unbidden from the recesses of your mind rose the wishful thoughts you’d imagined so often they were practically dogeared. A shiver trickled down your spine, caught in a gauzy yet comfortable silence as Shouta continued to clean your body.

The tip of his tongue peeks out to taste the air once he’s done. You fruitlessly will your body to temper its desire, to feign some semblance of control as you lift your head, no longer denying him the answer written plainly on your face.

“…I want that,” you confess, picking up the thread he left. You rub across his shoulders and bring your palms together in the middle of his chest, folded over his heart. “I can't go back. Take me home with you. Keep me”.

Shouta looks surprised—a microexpression, if anything; imperceptible to anyone but you—as though he hadn't expected you to accept. You’re warmed by the idea that he might’ve been hoping for more without expectation.

That’s all you’ve ever known, failed expectations.

A beat passes. You think he might be giving you a grace period—allowing time for a regret that never comes. When he realises you’ve no intention to take it back he sucks a hiss through his teeth, and you’re close enough to see his thin pupils spill into his irises until they’re inky black.

The river breaks around you, water foaming at the surface as Shouta unwittingly guides your knotted bodies to the shore. “I see you’re still as reckless as you were when we were children,” he says, sounding hoarse. “You have no idea what you’re agreeing to”.

“I’m saying yes to you, Shouta,” your voice strains, desperation creeping in when you feel his arms loosen and your feet brush the wet bank. “Teach me what I don’t know because I hate leaving. I hate missing you”.

The rough sensation of Shouta’s scales against your inner thighs rippled through your body, core tightening as he retained his grip around your waist. “This is not a conversation we’re having in the open,” he takes you both out of the water and you shy away from the cool air.

He bends over to collect your clothes and drapes them in your naked lap. You clutch the fabric close, “Where are we going?”

“To my den. No questions until then”.

The journey to Shouta’s den is long, deliberately so. Caught in his coils you go, without trepidation—like a willing little mouse, your mind whispers. Only on the third cycle do you realise that he is purposefully traveling in circles to cover his tracks. Aside from the occasional birdsong and cicada you don’t hear anything for miles. It’s so peaceful that you forget that a world exists outside of this vast, sprawling forest.

In time he reaches the den. The sky has darkened to an early dawn, the gloaming orange light casting shadows over Shouta’s face as he leans over you to shield you from the overgrowth to get to the entrance.

Arched tall and gaping, the bumpy outer walls of the cave are fissured with fingerlings of old tree roots. Shrouded in darkness, Shouta slithers around the stalagmites protruding from the floor with ease. Inside the air is thick, humid as he carries you deeper, metres further down, refusing to release you from his coils.

Meandering into a broader section, Shouta spreads out easily in the cavern. You blink around as your vision adjusts and notice narrow streams of light threading through the stalactites hung on the ceiling. Twinkling are various trinkets, tied around and dangling from the spikes. Jewels, chainmail, rusted daggers, cutlery.

When you were a young you’d spend sleepless nights imagining where Shouta lived, conjuring possibilities only a child could. Despite that curiosity you never asked to see his home—you knew, innately, as an avid observer of creatures big and small, that it would be an invasion of his privacy. But of everything you imagined it had been nothing like this.

There’s a wide alcove at the back of the cavern, housing what appears to be a nest near an extinguished fire pit, still carrying the faint scent of smoke. Shouta lowers you into it and slinks away for a moment to discard your clothes. Warmth engulfs you, insulated in the structure. There are branches both large and small intricately woven and padded with an assortment of pelts, lichen and moss. Most notable is the snakeskin used to hold together the joints of the nest.

You pinch a piece delicately between your thumb and forefinger. It’s thick, smoother than expected. “Is this yours?”

Though far off his voice reaches your ears, “Is that your first question?”

Shouta returns holding what looks to be a blanket. His tail drags behind him. The sound ripples around the space. When shaken out and draped over your bare lower half you discover that the blanket is actually the rest of his shed. It’s beautiful, inexplicably silky while being heavy and tough.

You tug the snakeskin higher up your body and note how fervently he tracks the movement. “Yes, it’s mine. It strengthens the nest,” Shouta explains, beginning a languorous dance circling the nest as though he were adding himself to it. Your attention does not stray as his tail coils upon itself, lap after lap until you’re entirely surrounded.

“You’ve been planning this,” you comment. How long had it taken for him to craft it? Did he imagine what you’d think? “It’s beautiful”.

Pleased with the height, Shouta’s upper body slinks down into the centre where you wait. Home. Not simply a place but an extension of his body, like the forest. You’re directly in the heart. A place that you alone have been allowed to see.

Your mind drifts to the feckless creatures and travelers who’ve wandered this way only to be killed. But rather than fear, or sorrow, a distinctive emotion welled up inside you. You felt special.

“It’s mainly instinct. Not much planning,” he says.

You reach to cup his cold face in your hands. Cheeks flush, like all the blood in him had rushed to the surface to greet you. He rumbles as your thumb traces an arc along his newest scar, tucking his chin to nuzzle into your palm. It’s cute, though you wouldn’t dare say that.

A content hum vibrates behind his ribs, “You’re so warm”. Then you feel the tentative press of lips and of fangs underneath. He kisses your heartline. You falter at the uncharacteristic show of affection, clutching his snakeskin tighter. His dark gaze falls to your partially covered chest. Low and supple he asks, “Do you know what it means to wear a naga skin?”

You slowly shake your head.

“Naga gift their sheds to be used in nests or as armour for their mates,” propped onto his arm Shouta presses closer, forcing your thighs to bracket the thick of his tail. “It’s viewed as a public claim,” he stops short a hair's breadth from your wanting mouth, sharing a shallow inhale.

Filled with intrepid awe, your fingertips walk the slope of his throat, hands laying flat to his chest. A hummingbird’s wing, a pulse belying his nerves. You reach for your voice, “Does this make me yours?”

Shouta blinks, pupils dilating. The distant trickle of water dripping from the stalactites echoes throughout the cavern. You feel his stomach clench where your touch slips lower, “Are you sure you want to be?”

“Since you fed me those berries in the east valley”.

“You were a child,” Shouta huffs, doing a poor job at appearing unaffected.

“Children sometimes imagine falling in love, you know,” a small, sad smile comes unbidden to your lips. “I never had anyone to play pretend with,” you tell him softly, meeting his eyes. “You always took care of me. Back then I wondered if that’s what it’d be like to have a husband when I came of age”.

With a furrow in his brow, Shouta cradles your jaw. He tucks his thumb against the corner of your downturned mouth, “A husband?”

“The human equivalent of a mate. A husband or wife,” you say. “Marriage is a promise to be together for the rest of your lives”.

“And you want that. The rest of your life,” Shouta’s words are hoarse, they sound thick in his throat. He brings your foreheads together, almost reverential, and dark tendrils of hair fall around you. “With me?”

You swallow. “Yes. I want…”

Your wandering hand stills at his navel, right in the bend where skin turned to scale. You’re reminded that he isn’t a human man. What you’ve been taught about sex and the parts that go along with the act—that knowledge is mostly worthless here.

Curious, you palm the growing bump where a cock would be, index finger tracing the thin slit along the middle, teasing him as you would tease yourself. Shouta grabs your wrist, arm braced above your head to rock into the touch, a frisson of iridescence rippling through his scales.

The airy groan in his throat quells your anxiety and feeds your longing. Chin tilted, your mouths aligned, a petal-soft brush that shakes him from his reverie and draws him back. You complain and curl your arms around his neck, missing him. He huffs a short laugh but doesn’t retreat any further.

“Careful,” he lifts his upper lip and pushes the tip of his tongue to his left fang. A pinprick of his blood wells there. “You’ll catch yourself”.

“Are you venomous?” and you pout, noticing the mirth flickering across his face. “What?”

“Not in the way you’re imagining. Pay attention,” he answers, and bends to tuck his nose into the hollow of your throat. His jaw unhinges, tasting you with a deep inhale. Oh. Your pulse rockets when he drags his fangs there in suggestion of a bite—breath held as they barely break skin and an abrupt heat tingles around the scratch.

“Wh—what does it do?” you gasp in wonder, poking the blooming mark as Shouta hums, descending to drag his lips over the peaks of your breasts.

“Humans call it a lot of things. An aphrodisiac, drug, relaxant,” he says. Each word is a kiss left everywhere but the one place you need it. Blood rushes to your ears. “A mating bite eases the burden. Makes sure your body ready for me,” you watch on with bated breath while he reaches lower, and jolt, ensnared in his half lidded gaze as he lightly drags his knuckles through your wet folds. His thumb finds your clit, massaging a few light circles around the swollen bundle of nerves. Your hips twitch, and Shouta grins at your soft whine, “Though you’re already doing that beautifully on your own”.

Desperate, you grapple at his shoulders. He rises with an indulgent smile and you lean to kiss him. A clumsy thing, open mouthed and needy, receding enough to make room for protest before kissing him again, and again, nipping the seam of his lips. Hair stands on end as the world suddenly tips on its axis and your positions are reversed.

You’ve no chance to mourn the loss. Shouta lay on his back. He sinks into the nest and draws your knee over his hip. A shiver licks up your spine as you sit low on his navel, entirely bare and wet; with him being so sensitive to his surroundings there’s no doubt he can feel the beat of desire between your thighs.

The flesh spills between his fingers as Shouta squeezes your waist. “I can feel you throbbing,” he murmurs. His own heat is swelling between you. Sticky arousal smeared on your inner thighs. Shouta’s vent pulses in time with his heart—and yours. You exhale a shaky breath, relieved and exhilarated that he wants you too. The growing pressure pushes against your clit and your hips twitch, a fleeting stutter to relieve the ache.

Shouta groans. Large hands find purchase at your hips, appreciating how your body yields to his touch, and encourages you to move. “Oh,” comes a soft gasp, feeling his swollen slit flower open beneath your cunt, leaking arousal. The friction, or lack thereof, is incredible, and you repeat the motion, seeking it again.

It’s slick where your bodies meet. The obscene wet sound of you rocking together leaves you dazed. Shouta’s lower half shifts as arousal zips through him and the nest creaks. “Fuck, feels good. More,” you demand breathlessly. Something else nudges against your clit with every pass, two heads budding from the vent, and your eyes screw shut—

Two?

A groan falls from Shouta’s mouth and your frantic realisation dissolves. You can hardly think. He licks the curve of your throat, nuzzling the barely-there-mark he’d left. Infinitesimal and yet it hasn’t stopped throbbing. An ache spreads through your hips, his hands rutting you against the swell with a desperate rhythm.

“Shouta,” you say, overwhelmed. “Do it. Bite me, fuck me, please. Please. I want—I want to—!”

The sharp pain is dulled so quickly you’re not sure it was ever there. Shouta sank his fangs into the juncture of your neck, a hand firm at your nape to keep you still. Vision blurred, your mouth drops open around a silent scream as your orgasm rips through you—the venom close behind, forcing your seized muscles pliant and stoking your arousal until it’s burning from the inside out.

Shouta releases your neck and trails his fingertips along the length of your back. You whine, a helpless and confused little sound, when the heat allays under his affections. Your thighs are trembling, slipping down his hips as you use the last of your inertia to curl into his chest.

He cradles your limp form amongst his coils, creating a protective barrier around you in such a vulnerable state. “I have you,” he says, the shaky baritone of his voice coaxing your eyes open. Half-cognisant, not quite in and not quite outside of yourself.

“…It’s too much,” you pant.

“I know,” Shouta kisses your temple, paving his way to the corner of your mouth, “You’re doing so well”.

You turn lazily into the kiss. Your thighs have fallen open further, and you subconsciously raise yourself up to better the angle. The blunt tip of one of his cocks nudges through your folds and a white hot sensation prickles over your skull. Shouta lowers you onto his cock with care, muscles corded tight in obvious restraint, wanting to ease you into the stretch. He’s thicker than a human, subtle soft ridges lining the sides, caressing you in places your fingers could never reach.

You begin to tremble and the air is pushed from your lungs with a gasping sob as he splits you open. The sensation is hard to decipher through the haze. Your ears ring, the sound high and metallic. It isn’t numbing—no, you can feel everything, every minute shift, pulse and ridge. It’s an intrusive, satisfying ache, an insurmountable pressure. There’s no part of you he isn’t touching. You consider, the thought vague and half-formed, that when Shouta bit you something in your brain must’ve rewired itself. Synapses crossed, addled by venom, convincing you of pleasure where there would otherwise be pain.

Your small world grows ever smaller. Shouta is all encompassing. His dark hair is tickling your face, smooth scales rippling under your cheek. He’s saying something—he must be, because his mouth is moving above you, murmuring what sounds like sweet incantations of your name.

An immaculate red glow pools into his irises as they roll skyward, brow furrowed in concentration. His second cock drools across his belly, where it lay trapped by your bodies. The slick underside of his cock wet and pulsing against your clit, fully sheathed.

“Do you have any idea how you feel—fuck,” Shouta’s jaw clenched as his cock recedes, leaving only the tip kissing your folds, before he fucks into you again. A shudder quakes through his coils. They constrict around the nest and Shouta pins you to his chest, thick arms held firm around your shoulders and back, tightening with every squirm. “Mine. Knew it had to be you,” came his hushed babbles, composure finally fraying at the seams.

With the surety that you’re not in pain, his pace grows, his rhythm earnest. Laved in shared arousal, you’re so wet every ingress is indelibly easy. To call yourself helpless would be to imply that you wanted to escape. You surrender to the unending, overbearing rapture, sprawled over your Shouta’s lap like a pile of loose skeins with a drunken smile. Chest heaving in exertion despite doing so little. The atmosphere is so oppressively humid that it’s hard to catch your breath.

It feels like he’s carving out something irreplaceable inside of you. A space that only he can fill, a craving only he can sate. Your hips stutter uselessly, grinding your clit against his other cock. Rather than building to a climax it feels as if you’ve toppled into one that never ends, only ebbs and flows without ever ceasing.

Shouta pulls you impossibly closer, so close your could feel the long stretch of his torso, every raised scar and curve. He nudges your temple until your head lolls back against his shoulder, and you’re looking at him. “Soft. You’re so—shit. You’re so soft. Human,” he rasps, pressing a kiss to your forehead. There’s a sheen of sweat on his brow, short tendrils of hair sticking to skin. You flutter around the flared head of his cock as it pulls out, “Look. I can feel you sucking me back in. Made for me, weren’t you?”

You follow his gaze, watching the dark, inhuman length of his cock disappear into your folds again and again, strings of moisture stretching between you. “Shouta,” his name feels thick in your mouth. You blink, air cool against your wet cheeks. “I need—I need you to—”

Nodding deliriously, his bruising grasp on you shifts. Shouta fucks into you feverishly, with an intensity that you fear might engulf you.“Fuck—!” a tremor quakes through his coils. Something audibly snaps in the nest. Shouta’s hips stutter, a long, breathy moan pulled loose deep in his chest, drawn out as a wet, sticky heat fills you—so much that it leaks between your thighs—and the immediate relief of his release has you clawing crescent moons into his shoulders.

Tipping over the crest, a final wave crashes over you. The convulsions force your eyes shut, so tight that pinpricks of light pierce the solid darkness, transforming into a kaleidoscope of vivid colour. The world falls away for a fleeting moment and you only feel yourself clamping around his cock, soaking his lap.

You resurface slowly, as does the sensation returning to your limbs. Venom remedied, easing in your system. You inhale, wince at the tenderness making space beside the contentment in your body, and Shouta runs a smoothing hand down your spine. It sweeps back up to your nape to gently trace the bite on your neck. “How’re you feeling?” he asks. “Did I hurt you?”

You press a kiss to his collar, another under his jaw, “I’m sore and sticky. I’ve never orgasmed that hard in my life. But you didn’t hurt me”. Shouta purrs at that. It’s a noise you’ve only ever heard in the golden hour, when he’s sunning himself. Pure contentment.

You cup his cheek and gently turn him to face you. You kiss him, mouth bruised, fangs peeking through parted lips. Dark eyes soften. He’s no longer inside of you, noted with a weak clench, and his second cock remains half hard between your stomachs. Free to move, you wiggle in his embrace until it lines up, the suggestion kindling to the now twinging emptiness.

Shouta huffs, a loving admonishment, and carefully guides his second cock inside you. You hiss at the sensitivity but it isn’t unpleasant. Satisfaction balloons in your chest and you curl up against him with a pleased hum; no urgency, together for the sake of closeness.

“I’ll feed you and help you wash after I’ve calmed down,” he says. There’s no sign of discomfort or regret in his voice as he stares toward the mouth of the cave. Just a primal need to be alert, to stay vigilant for his mate. “I’ll be a little overbearing for the rest of the night. Be patient with me”.

Your gaze too lingers at the maw, recalling those blood-steeped, ugly stories of monstrous creatures. Indeed there are monsters in the night. But none of them are here.

A wide smile pulls at your lips, “We’ve got all the time in the world”.

#bnha x reader #aizawa x reader #mha x reader #aizawa shouta x reader

[scarabesque-returns]

My Very Dear Wife:

...

I know I have but few claims upon Divine Providence, but something whispers to me, perhaps it is the wafted prayer of my little Edgar, that I shall return to my loved ones unharmed. If I do not, my dear Sarah, never forget how much I love you, nor that, when my last breath escapes me on the battle-field, it will whisper your name.

Forgive my many faults, and the many pains I have caused you. How thoughtless, how foolish I have oftentimes been! How gladly would I wash out with my tears, every little spot upon your happiness, and struggle with all the misfortune of this world, to shield you and my children from harm. But I cannot, I must watch you from the spirit land and hover near you, while you buffet the storms with your precious little freight, and wait with sad patience till we meet to part no more.

But, O Sarah, if the dead can come back to this earth, and flit unseen around those they loved, I shall always be near you in the garish day, and the darkest night amidst your happiest scenes and gloomiest hours always, always, and, if the soft breeze fans your cheek, it shall be my breath; or the cool air cools your throbbing temples, it shall be my spirit passing by. Sarah, do not mourn me dear; think I am gone, and wait for me, for we shall meet again.

As for my little boys, they will grow as I have done, and never know a father's love and care. Little Willie is too young to remember me long, and my blue-eyed Edgar will keep my frolics with him among the dimmest memories of his childhood. Sarah, I have unlimited confidence in your maternal care, and your development of their characters. Tell my two mothers, I call God's blessing upon them. O Sarah, I wait for you there! Come to me, and lead thither my children.

- Sullivan

Excerpt from the last letter of Major Sullivan Ballou to his wife, before his death at the Battle of First Manassas July 14, 1861

#og #love letter

[drak3n]

THE BEST FRIEND

ꨄ. SYNOPSIS: perhaps you shouldn’t have waited so long.

ꨄ. CONTENT WARNINGS: unrequited love, mostly angst, hurt & some sort of comfort? best friends trope, one mention of murder at the beginning, a little bit of baji x reader

bold italic quotes = letter excerpts

PROLOGUE. | SERIES MASTERLIST.

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷ ♡•°`.

“it’s impossible for anyone not to love you. has anyone ever told you that?”

there were times in which even a district like shibuya — always vibrant and full of life — was eerily quiet and void of people.

people you’d want to be around with, at least. people who made you feel safe roaming the streets at this hour. right now, you didn’t feel all too comfortable walking past streets with alleyways looking awfully sketchy.

every tiny sound made you walk faster than before, it be a cat scratching at a trashcan, a breeze howling against buildings, or leaves crunching under your shoes. you just wanted to get this over with and head back home into your trusted four walls.

you grunted as your ran face-first into someone you hadn’t seen, which you wanted to blame your terrible night vision for.

the figure didn’t move and you tried to stay calm. you uttered an apology and tried to rush past them, careful not to draw too much attention.

maybe they were just minding their own business. they didn’t have to be a murderer or anything.

“you shouldn’t be out here by yourself at this time,” the person suddenly called out. you halted. “someone got murdered right over there two days ago.”

the shiver that ran down your spine at the husky words was inevitable, your eyes darting over to where he pointed to show you the place was just a couple feet away from where you were standing. it didn’t help that the boy said it with so little emotion.

“thanks for telling me… i just really need to drop by at the nearest local duty pharmacy,” you responded. under the halfway functioning street light, you recognized a very tall boy, perhaps around your age, so 15 or 16 years of age.

the dragon tattoo on the side of his head drew your attention. it didn’t necessarily elicit bad thoughts, it just looked very unique.

“i’ll accompany you.” his offer took you by surprise; it wasn’t like you had been used to others being nice to you before. when he continued walking towards your destination, you quickly joined him, barely able to catch up with his long strides.

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷ ♡•°`.

“how could a person be a best friend, mentor, older brother and father all at the same time? you made the impossible possible.”

hanging out with the boys was exhausting, to say the least. there wasn’t anyone you particularly disliked, but they could be a lot. you didn’t really mind that they were all part of a gang, all that mattered to you was that none of them had ever made a move to hurt you or others.

“i’m saying, that’s not how you solve that question!”

rolling your eyes at the first division commander discussing with you, you threw your arms in the air. you were currently all lounging off in the warehouse, with you having joined them after they had finished a meeting.

draken always insisted on you never, ever joining a meeting of the tokyo manji gang. he would never want you to get involved with their business.

“baji, are you seriously telling me i’m in the wrong?” you shoved your purple flip phone out of the pocket of your school uniform skirt, unlocking it to click onto the calculator function. “you must be stupid if you think that three times 24 is 72–”

the whole warehouse went quiet after that. blood rushed to your face, your entire head and ears feeling steaming hot as the brunette started laughing at you. the others were too immersed in their own thoughts to listen.

“who’s the stupid one now?” bending down to your height, baji flashed you his cocky smirk, revealing sharp canines. your eyes stung with tears of humiliation.

before he could tease you a little more, because you were so easy to tease, a hand shoved the boy with long hair back to create a distance between you and him. it was him.

“baji, that’s enough.” draken’s firm voice made said boy shrug and back off. “it’s just a dumb mathematical equation.”

when you sniffled and crossed your arms in front of your chest, turning away deliberately to hide your embarrassed self from the others, a palm settled on the top of your head.

looking up, you saw draken grinning down at you ever so gently.

“don’t worry about it, everyone makes mistakes.”

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷ ♡•°`.

“i failed to tell you. i thought my actions would be enough to prove what i felt. perhaps you knew all along, but decided not to talk about it. you were always thoughtful and considerate. but i wasn’t special.”

it was a gloomy day for you today. you were excited to see draken, putting in a lot of effort while getting ready and wearing one of your best outfits, just to see that he hadn’t joined the otherd at the usual group hangout today.

“wasn’t it emma’s birthday today?” mitsuya recalled. mikey wasn’t there either. unbeknownst to you, baji’s eyes wandered to look at how you’d react.

as someone who wore her heart on her sleeve, you were terrible at masking how you felt. he didn’t miss the way your face fell.

draken and emma were always close to each other. of course they were, as her brother and draken have been inseparable since middle school. you couldn’t compare to her. you’d just met him not even two years ago.

you were slowly realizing that despite him doing a lot for you and always being there for you, you perhaps didn’t mean as much to him as emma did.

after all, draken was nice to everyone.

“someone’s grumpy,” baji commented slyly, and this time, you didn’t have it in you to bicker with him. this time, there was no draken to tell him to stop either.

the two missing blondes joined you hours later, with mikey nudging his taller vice’s side teasingly while talking about how sly kenny was for having found that plushie emma had wanted for the longest time.

it made your mood even more sour than it already was, and you pondered about an excuse to leave, wanting nothing more than to curl up in bed and forget about it.

forget about your stupid feelings for someone whose heart was already taken, and who saw you as nothing more than a friend.

“hey (f/n), that’s a pretty outfit,” mikey commented, “you going somewhere?” draken glanced down at you curiously while you forced a tight-lipped smile on your face. you inwardly thanked the leader of toman for saving you like this.

“yeah. i’ll see you guys.”

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷ ♡•°`.

“would things have been different if i’d just confessed to you while i still had the time? it would have been selfish. she was the first to know and love you, after all.”

ken and mikey had dropped out of high school at 17. they had big plans of opening a workshop for cars and motorcycles. by the time you graduated high school, they already had their small, cozy shop. toman was no more, and everything was well.

objectively speaking, it was. but subjectively? you weren’t too sure about that.

by the time you entered the italian restaurant, the table that caught your eyes was already pretty crowded. it wasn’t a surprise anymore, you were always late, after all.

too late. those two words echoed in your head as you looked at emma and draken sitting next to each other, her blushing feverishly when he removed something from her hair.

that could have been you.

“let’s go.” hearing baji’s voice behind you surprised you, and even more did it to feel his hand on your back, guiding you towards the table. as much as he was a jerk, you didn’t believe he did it out of ill intent to humiliate you.

the hours went by, and you had all eaten to your hearts’ content, now exchanging light jokes and future aspirations to one another. emma mentioned wanting to be a housewife, and the ken getting married to her made you want to throw up everything you’d eaten today.

“how about you?” mitsuya asked you, who had talked the least tonight. “any plans for college?” you smiled awkwardly when you felt draken’s eyes on you.

he had always wanted you to go all the way with your education, having supported you whenever he could. you were more than thankful for that.

“i actually got an admission for law in osaka.” the blonde sitting right across from you smiled so brightly, and you were sure it would have made you melt if emma didn’t have her head on his shoulder.

it was almost childish how you had tried to interpret every single of draken’s actions as a possible chance for something to develop between you two. your chances were long gone.

you had never stood one to begin with.

“i knew you could do it! you were always a smart girl.”

his compliment made you feel worse than it should have.

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷ ♡•°`.

“you told me to go and pursue my dreams. i knew that if you had told me to stay, i would have. how idiotic of me, right? i ended up leaving and letting you slip from my grasp without you ever having been in it.”

after moving away for college, you hardly visited tokyo anymore. and to be quite honest, you preferred that. it was good to stay away from the source of what had drained you for so long.

draken hadn’t taken advantage of your feelings for him, no. he was the last person on earth who’d be willing to do that. but that didn’t mean it hurt any less to be trapped in a web of unrequited love.

you were in your fourth year of law school when an invitation laid in your mailbox. you just knew from the second you looked at the envelope without even opening it. it was exactly what you’d anticipated it to be.

a marriage invitation, for you to join ken ryuguji and emma sano for the most important day of their lives. you stood in front of the mailbox, staring at the piece of pretty paper for at least twenty minutes, as if it was ever going to change.

he was going to get married. not to you.

all of your dreams of walking down the aisle in a pretty, white dress, approaching him with his sweet smile, crushed to bits and pieces.

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷ ♡•°`.

“i have never wished you anything else but happiness, and i still do. she makes you happy, and that’s all i could have ever asked for. i saw it in your eyes that day. you never looked at me like that.”

the wedding reception was nothing short of beautiful. catered to everyone’s tastes, it left nothing to the imagination.

the wedding of your dreams had always looked like this.

it was bittersweet how another woman was going to live that dream to the fullest, with the man of your dreams, at that.

thankfully, you weren’t left alone with your thoughts while you waited for the couple to come to the rented hall after they would get lawfully wedded. mitsuya and his sisters kept you company, making sure to recommend you everything they had tried at the enormous buffet.

“pretty sure they’re coming now,” mitsuya informed you as he stared at his wristwatch. you gulped and looked into your glass of soda.

oh what you wouldn’t have given to be in her shoes, taking on his last name… waking up next to him every single day, having his children.

you felt absolutely and utterly horrible. like all those years you’d spent away from this had caught up to you, leaving you to drown in your unrequited feelings.

before you could excuse yourself to the bathroom and ruin your perfectly done makeup by indulging in a five-minute breakdown, you were stopped by a hand finding your shoulder. it felt as if life was sucker-punching you in the gut once again.

“hey, baji.” your voice was low, and you didn’t notice mitsuya leading his sisters away from the table. his formerly wild, brown hair was much shorter now, tied up in a ponytail, and he wore a dark gray tuxedo.

when he opened his mouth, you shook your head. “i can’t take any teasing today. i mean it.”

your words weren’t even harsh, you just sounded exhausted. his grin disappeared, soon replaced by a frown. “i’m aware,” baji stated, “i couldn’t have attended if i was you.”

with a raised brow, you stared at him to explain what he meant. “i’ve known since back then.” you looked down, pursing your lips to stop them from trembling and giving it all away. you were asking to change the topic until the two would enter through the door and make your mood plummet entirely.

baji knew you better than you could have guessed. so this time, instead of poking fun at you, he actually tried to make you feel better

“by the way, i’m moving to osaka for med school for the next semester. i finally got in.”

it still stung when you saw draken and emma entering the hall hand-in-hand. you couldn’t compare that sting to any other kind of physical pain you’d endured in your life, it felt worse than broken limbs or a cut that needed to be stitched.

but he was happy, the way you never saw him be. he had never smiled as purely as he did when he danced with his wife, kissing the back of her hand that now adorned a ring to bind them to each other forever.

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷ ♡•°`.

“i’m sending this letter even after it all. even though i know i’m too late. don’t get me wrong, i have deliberately not added your new address. you will never get this letter. this is just for myself, to liberate what i’d held onto for multiple years.”

you picked up the call after one shrill ring, holding your phone against your ear while your eyes were plastered on the tv. it was your episode today, dealing with your letter.

the show was muted so you could hear exactly what you’d hear on the phone. with a deep breath, you spoke first. “hello?”

“good evening, miss! we are very excited to be hosting you on today’s show for TO ALL THE MEN YOU’VE LOVED BEFORE!” on the screen, you saw the main host move her mouth with a smile plastered on her perfect face.

you sat down on your couch, taking another deep breath. “thank you for having me,” you responded, “i can already guess what you are going to ask me.”

you heard sweet laughter from the two hosts while you were busy picking at a dried scab on your thumb. this was making you more nervous than you’d wished it to.

“if that’s the case, then we would love to hear your thoughts,” spoke the co-host, “our audience is very excited to learn about your motives and what exactly has made you not put an address for the letter to be shipped to!”

the camera angle was switched to show multiple rows of people of all ages sitting and awaiting your response. it made your throat go dry.

“i have made this decision because,” you looked away from the screen, “they have found someone else. and they are very happy.”

the hosts showed faces of surprise. for a second, you wondered why you’d even done this to begin with. but it felt too relieving to speak about this for a bunch of strangers to listen. it felt too relieving to hang up now when you were so close to just letting things go.

“which was why i just wanted to send this letter to… get rid of it. to be able to live on and stop holding onto those feelings that are never going to be reciprocated.” you had no idea if the words you were saying made any sense to them, but to you, they did. they made perfect sense to you, and they described exactly how you felt.

“that is very mature, and we admire you for having collected the courage to take this step.” the host clapped her hands, obviously looking moved. “love isn’t all about having happy endings together, right? sometimes, it means to let go. for their, and for our own happiness.”

hanging up not long after, you sank back in your couch and chuckled to yourself. this wasn’t so bad. in fact, you haven’t felt as good as you did right now in a while.

when the door to your apartment unlocked, you watched a mop of brown hair appear in your peripheral. the smile on your face only went brighter.

“i’m home. did i miss it?”

“just did. let’s rewatch it together, kei.”

“i wouldn’t have it any other way, because it was thanks to you that i found my own happiness, too.”

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷ ♡•°`.

#tr x reader #tokyo revengers x reader #draken x reader x baji #baji x reader #draken x reader #ken ryuguji x reader #ken ryuguji #ken ryuguji x y/n #tokyo revengers angst #tokyo revengers #tokyo revengers x you #tokyo revengers x reader angst #draken angst #baji x you #baji x y/n #draken x you #draken x y/n #tr x you #tr x y/n #tr angst #tokyo revengers imagines #tokyo revengers fluff #tokyo revengers fanfiction

[antiquatedplumbobs]

Spring 1916

~an excerpt from Elsie Sewell's private diary~

Spring has arrived! The calendar has been saying it had been here for weeks, but today it really and truly made its presence known. The east field is awash with flowers and I simply had to stop and pick a bouquet, they had the sweetest scent and the most delicate yellow petals. Mamma was rather irritated that it made me a bit late coming home, but I can't very much see why. I was back with plenty of time to prepare supper (she had an Aide Society meeting) and the house smelled ever so sweet as I did. No one complained about my victual offerings either.

I am quite pleased to be done with the schoolhouse; sums and grammar were always ever so boring and pointless. It is ever so much better to spend the day with work that actually has to be done, rather than made up to torture us. I enjoy most housework, cooking and sewing in particular, but laundry... There's something about that specific task I have not yet resigned myself too.

I think we all have that particular chore that we dislike more than the others, though none of the adults will admit so to my face. Laundry is a necessary evil though, or we should all go around naked, as Adam and Eve did in the garden of Eden, and the climate her could never allow such an indulgence, so laundry we must do. 

It does feel good to be helping around the house more and take some of the burden off Mamma; I can't imagine how she did all this work on her own for years, it's quite a lot between the two of us. Despite my continued propensity to "dawdle" as Mamma puts it, she still sends me on all the errands, I think she likes having the house to herself just as much I like the walk into town. Sometimes Lydia accompanies me if her mother also needs something fetched.

The general store is the best store in town, it's filled floor to ceiling with everything you could ever need. Dottie's always mighty pleased to see us and if she's busy Mr. and Mrs. Greenfield are always so sweet to me. Sometimes Mr. Greenfield slips me penny candy in with my orders with a little wink.

Dottie, Lydia and I don't see each other as much as when we were in school, but now that we're older when we're finished with chores and housework we have so much more freedom to go on walks or sit down by the inlet. The sun hits the old dock down there in the afternoon and it's so pleasant, especially if there's a breeze coming off the water.

We chat about anything and everything; Dottie always has all the news of the town since she talks to just about everyone at the general store. Mamma says it's wrong to gossip, but she always says that after I've given her all the news. Lydia is such a hoot, she has the strongest opinions on everything and everyone. Just the other day she was informing (lecturing one might say) us on the proper etiquette for accepting a proposal; according to Mrs. Parr proper young ladies should never accept their first proposal, they must refuse and wait for the man to ask again, that's how she'll know he's serious and will make a good husband. Apparently she turned Mr. Parr down thrice. Dottie and I both thought that was completely silly. Mamma said yes to her first proposal and she seems quite content with her lot.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

next / previous / first

#ts4 #sims 4 #sims 4 decades challenge #decades challenge #ts4 story #sims 4 story #ts4 historical #sims 4 historical #simblr #ts4 legacy #sims 4 legacy #elizabeth sewell #sewell legacy #sewell 1910s

[zylev-blog]

Excerpt from a fic I’m thinking about writing. Danny is the god of space, Clockwork is the god of time, with Danny being his biological son. Danny can see through time, but it’s limited, so Clockwork still sends him out to fix time

———-

“Barry Allen.”

Barry turned, completely unprepared for the being that stood in front of him. Brilliant white hair that moved without a breeze, light blue skin with the smattering of freckles across his face, vivid, neon green eyes, sharp, pointed ears, and brilliant white teeth that had fangs. The being wore royal blue robes that covered from his neck to his feet, and were free of any logo. On the beings shoulders sat a cape of a vivid black, darker than any fabric Barry had ever seen before. On the inside of the cape were stars and galaxies, along with planets that moved around the cape. Barry didn’t know if the cape was a projection of the galaxy or if it was it’s own seperate galaxy housed inside a cape.

“You have messed with the fabric of time.” The being continued.

The man was around Barry’s age, perhaps early to mid twenties. He stood several inches taller than Barry, who stood at 6”1.

“I—“ He found his mouth as dry as cotton. The being, whoever he was, radiated power unlike anything Barry had ever seen before in his life.

Barry was terrified.

“I’m sorry.” Barry said lamely.

The being tilted his head just slightly, looking at Barry as if he were an animal. “Everything is as it should be, Barry Allen,” The being continued, “However, the fabric of time will become unraveled if we do not correct your anomaly before it solidifies.”

Barry had no idea what the fuck that meant. The confusion must have shown on his face, as the being continued to speak.

“Time is like a river,” the being said, “if you throw a pebble in the stream it will change the surface of the water until the ripples dissipate. We are riding the current, but the ripples through time are becoming more unstable.”

“How do we fix it?” Barry asked.

“Simple. I reset the timeline to the original course.”

Barry frowned. “My mother would go back to being dead though, wouldn’t she?”

“Yes.”

Barry’s eyes narrowed. He knew he didn’t have his metahuman abilities and would likely be killed by this alien if he challenged the man, but he did it anyways. “No.”

Much to Barry’s surprise, the being smiled. “I knew you were going to say that.”

It seemed as if the being was messing with him now. Barry didn’t know what to think of that.

“I don’t want to lose my mom.” Barry said, sadness creeping into his voice.

“Your life has been altered by another being who should not be altering the time stream.” The being responded.

Wait, what?

“I will spare your mother if you assist me in catching this man.”

“Yes!” He agreed immediately. “I’ll do whatever it takes. Just save my mom.”

“Be careful what you wish for, Barry Allen.” The being warned. The being turned to leave, but was stopped by Barry.

“Wait. How do I contact you? And what do I call you?” Barry asked.

“I will contact you when the timeline resets.” The being said, pulling a medallion in the shape of a gear out of thin air and handing it to Barry. “Call me Phantom.”

“What’s this for?” Barry questioned.

“Place it around your moms neck. It will save her from being wrote out of existence.” Phantom replied, then dissappeared into a bright beam of light.

#barry allen #dp dc crossover #dp x dc prompt #dp x dc writing prompt #the flash #flash fiction #flashpoint #danny phantom #ghost king danny #danny is ghost king #Danny is a god #dp x dc fanfic #dp x dc #dp x dc au #dp x dc crossover

[bythepen98]

N/ purely self-indulgent hhh, plus I always wanted to do something like this when I read a good fic. First attempt at making a webcomic.

Based on @rayshippouuchiha's ShikaNaru fic "The Brightest Flame (The Darkest Shadow)" :D

Rated: M

Tags: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Crack Treated Seriously, BAMF Uzumaki Naruto, Genderfluid Character, Yandere Shikamaru Nara, Smitten Shikamaru Nara, Naruto with Tsunade's Strength, Love At first Chakra Enhanced Strike,.... etc.

Chapters (so far): 2/?

Summary:

Shikamaru’s never felt chakra so vibrant and warm before.

The log that Naruto’s been punching shatters clean apart, reduced to little more than splinters under the devastating force of his chakra enhanced blow.

Shocked and more than a bit startled, Shikamaru wheezes loudly, the sound carrying across the clearing and causing Naruto to abruptly turn and look in his direction.

And in that single moment Shikamaru is lost.

[excerpt]

...because Shikamaru is a Nara to the core, is the strongest they've seen in generations, and the Nara have always been a clan of Shadows after all.

and what does the shadow crave more than the light?

Naruto, with his ocean blue eyes and his golden hair swaying in the breeze his attack had created, shines as bright as the sun itself.

And Shikamaru intends to have him.

(edit: forgot to add this)

..."so much for that quiet wife and two ordinary kids idea."

"Time for a new plan." Because, really, there's no way life with Naruto is going to be any form of quiet or normal.

....Shikamaru's entire life plan has to be thrown out the window and then redrawn from scratch.

Either way Shikamaru's not actually all that upset about his entire life being thrown into an abrupt upheaval.

After all, convincing Naruto to marry him as soon as possible will be well worth the effort.

Naruto's pretty sure this is the closest they've ever actually been to one another outside of the few times they've been paired up to spar in class.

"What're you doing after this?" Shikamaru asks, one hand coming out of his pocket to reach out and play idly with the dangling sleeve of Naruto's kimono.

"After training?" Naruto keeps one eye on Shikamaru's hand...

"More like for the rest of your life," Shikamaru says. "But sure, we can start with training."

Naruto blinks.

.....[Naruto's] not really sure what, exactly, is happening here but he thinks this might mean Shikamaru wants to be his friend now.

Ah my sweet summer child.

Not an exact play by play of what was written in the fic, only the gist I guess and the moment that rly stuck in my head and got me giggling in my pillow.

My love for the "oblivious pure(?) mc and their darker, possessive s/o" trope has struck again. Couldn't've stopped myself from finishing this even when sleep-deprived, which I currently am right now. Had fun challenging myself with this too and might attempt it again with a future chapter or other works depending on my schedule. I'm occupied with studying this month so making something time extensive like this won't happen for awhile yet.

Excitedly waiting for updates :D

#myart #fanart #naruto fanart #naruto uzumaki #shikamara nara #shikamaru fanart #shikamaru x naruto #shikanaru #shikanaru fanart #shikamaru x naruto fanart #au #yandere #tw yandere #yandere fluff #?? #lol #webcomic #comic #my attempt at it anyway #fanfic #naruto fanfic #naruto fancomic #fancomic #digitalart #character art #artists on tumblr #future uzumaki-nara hhhhh

[hiraeth-sonder]

Dulcet Embers - Recuerdos

Boothill x Reader

A melody found in the rubble of the past, reminiscing is often the bane of the survivor

//Very very short thing while I work on a really long yan fic that is not only sucking my soul out rn but probably going to flop/j. Definitely spoilery and has stuff from the leaks (also a rewrite because I hated it). Lyric excerpts from Huellas by Adolescent's Orquestra.

Y pasó y pasó, y tu vientre palpitó

‿︵‿︵‿୨ ୧‿︵‿︵‿

As the sun lowered ever more in the horizon and bathed the world in warmth, you hitched your daughter onto the crook of your arm to sit as her wide eyes stared in awe. Her tufty hair wild as a pudgy hand holding onto your finger, you hummed a familiar tune, swaying along with the melody. The warm wind breezed past and kissed the tender skin of her ears, eliciting a mirthful giggle that sung just as sweetly.

“Síntomas de amor, no es una ilusión,” You cood, lightly bouncing her on your hip. The words fell off your tongue easily, years and years of learned experience making it more than familiar. She brought your thumb to her nose, pressing the appendage against it as she inhaled. Smiling, you continued crooning, “Así te conocí.”

From behind you, a familiar set of spurs clicked as a voice, slightly raspy and drawling, finished the melody. Just as gentle, if not more, he sang, “Me enamoré de ti.”

You did not even have to turn to know who had come up behind, and when a hand rested at your hip while the other patted down your daughter’s hair, your smile only deepened. He brings your forms closer so that he may rest his chin atop your head. As the sun waved its final goodbye, she rested her head against your shoulder, still holding onto your thumb with great adoration.

With her clear fatigue from the afternoon, you kept your voice low. 

“I didn’t think you’d still remember the lyrics,” Murmuring, you adjusted the position you hold her so that she may rest against you more comfortably. 

He took a while to respond, the whistle of the wind filling the silence as your ears picked up the slight hitch of his breath. When he finally answered, it was quiet, whispered, “ ‘s not hard to when you keep singing it to her.”

You could only let a strain tinge your smile, your eyes softening as you let him continue holding the two of you. This song was one you had somehow remembered, somehow dug out from the depths of your childhood, he remembers. Though you had not the musicality your partner did, he sure knows you didn’t, such a sweet child was hard to not adore. You always sang to her at all hours of the time, though he was not wrong when he said that song was all you sang to her. He didn’t know why, he still doesn’t know. 

“Music is good for children, stimulates their brain.” As you said that, her little features furrow as a soft whine escaped her. 

Behind the attempt at annoyance, he still couldn’t fault you, “It doesn’t mean you gotta sing the same song to her all the time.”

Quietly, you had only insisted, “It's a good song.”

He remembers at that time, he had been still making that small guitar for her. Before she learned to walk, before he had screeched for you to come over and see. 

As though to distract him, you asked him, “And how’s the guitar coming along?” 

“Good, just gotta sand down some parts,” He notes, a little hesitant and seeking some kind approval. “You think she’ll like it?”

“I’m sure you could give her a lock of your hair and she’d still like it,” You murmur, nuzzling your head into his shoulder as he rests his onto yours. 

When you met his gaze, he remembers your affectionate gleam, your eyes filled and seeping with nothing but adoration. Pray tell, he may not be the best with his words but he can’t deny that when the world grew quiet and all that was left were the two of you, singing and swaying with no worries to be had, it was nothing but joy that swelled in his heart.

“You’re right,” He hummed, that lopsided grin pulling across his handsome face once more. 

You respond with one of your own, your voice louder in the sands of time, “Of course I am.”

With nothing but the memory of you, he could only smile bitterly as that song played through his head once more. If he could even have a lock of hair, he is certain that at the very least, he wouldn’t be left with only that song.  

“You always were.”

‿︵‿︵‿୨ ୧‿︵‿︵‿

Y pasó y pasó, siempre tu recuerdo me entristece

#honkai star rail #honkai star rail x reader #hsr #hsr x reader #hsr boothill #boothill #boothill x reader

[crumbledcastle28]

Azriel Shadowsinger: Young God

Pairing: Azriel x fem!reader (afab; she/her)

Request: “Okay I’m annoying you with these now hehe sorry. But I have another idea/request. You know how in angst Azriel x reader oneshots it’s always the reader who’s in love with Azriel and he’s in a relationship? How about we switch that and make it so Azriel is in love with an unavailable reader?” @aroseinvelaris

Excerpt: “He looked up at you like a boy, a little boy, who had been pushed too far. And yet, at the same time, the Azriel who quickened your heart with only a glance was still there, giving his face and body the look of what you could only describe as a young, bleeding god. Covered in sweat and tears and blood, his hair soaked with the same alloy, he was a fallen angel, begging for mercy.

His eyes said to you make it stop. Please, make it end.

“Az,” you whispered, and he fell into your arms.

Your brain instantly tore you in half. You had never felt so overjoyed and crestfallen in the same moment.”

Warnings: illyrian!reader, jealous!azriel (so yummy), idiots in love, reader has sex with someone else, heavy swearing, kind of toxic reader and az, drinking, mating bond, punching bags, blood, kissing, and our lord of bloodshed and high lord make an appearance.

Word Count: 3.7k 

A/N: I have been sitting on this request forever, and I feel I am finally capable of doing it justice. I hope you enjoy @aroseinvelaris, thank you again for your request.

A/N 2: I’m a lot a little rusty with acotar vernacular and Azriel descriptions. so please be kind. This is also incredibly not canon.

SJM Masterlist 

If you would like to leave a like, comment, ask, or reblog, it would be much appreciated :)

The last thing you wanted to do in the infamous, disreputable Windhaven War-Camp was drink, but with the presence of its current war lord, you were really fucking tempted to.

You could hear his remarks from a multiple tables away. 

 Training females, a waste of resources if you ask me.

What the fuck else does Rhysand expect of us? To put bitches in our camps? On our front lines?

Rhysand’s dogs wish they could prove what we do to with them after their training.

He was a cocksucking pig, and that was enough of an excuse for you to bring a cup of wine to your lips and practically guzzle it down.

“You hear him too?” said the Lord of Bloodshed to your right, or as you knew him, just Cass.

You nodded, taking another sip despite the sour grapes coating your tongue, and his leathers squeaked as he leaned forward on his chair. He was gripping his own glass like a sailor dangling over a hull.

“Mother help me,” he replied.

“Mother help us all,” you countered, and Cassian chuckled.

“And Rhysand most of all,” he replied, gesturing across the crowded dining area.

Rhys was elbows-deep in documents, going over how exactly Windhaven was functioning under his rule with the other war lords. You didn’t blame him. With Ironcrest continuing to defame him and grip onto their dissent, Rhysand couldn’t afford to lose anyone else.

He would never admit that, of course, but after over a century of spying for him, you had your ways of reading him; shoulders tight, back hunched, eyebrows creased, and chin resting on his palm. Yeah, he was a bit stressed out.

If only you could read another Illyrian in the room’s body language so well.

You and Cassian sat and drank for some time, grateful Rhys trusted you to be his backup but simultaneously regretting ever joining him in the first place, before the rest of your backup arrived.

You begged your heart not to quicken. The alcohol was already fucking with your head enough.

Azriel sat in the seat to your left, his distinct musk of cool air, leather, and shadows breezing by you as he did, and poured himself a glass of his own.

“Notice anything?” Cassian asked him as he poured, well aware that your heart was in fact quickening, but Az shook his head.

“Nothing out of the ordinary.”

You nodded as he sipped his drink, leaning back into his chair. His wings and chest widened, giving your peripheral vision the perfect angle of his leathers. Him and Cassian had gone all out - adorned with every dagger, cuirass, pauldron, and gauntlet you could think of, in addition to their shimmering siphons bouncing off every metallic object in the hall. You blended in with them as best as you could.

Except, of course, the fact that you were a female.

Az’s voice ripped you from your thoughts. “I would feel more confident if Y/N did my route over again after dinner is served. Would you be okay with that?” 

You nodded without looking at him, and were surrounded by silence once more.

The three of you continued to keep your eyes open, scanning the room for any sudden movements, suspicious glances, or unnecessary walks towards your High Lord. Your body besieged you to get up and get away from the male beside you. Escape the nervous energy he always seemed to coat you with made especially worse given the fact that you were surrounded and outnumbered by enemies, made your fight-flight-or-freeze response ache with strain.

The alcohol wasn’t helping the feeling at all. You needed something else. Right then and right there to make your heart pound and sweat pour from your pores.

With one glance to your right, you spotted your solution.

“Is that who I think it is?” Cassian asked, following your line of sight, and you grinned.

Ozia. A name perfect for his image in your mind.

Azriel followed your gaze as well, his spine straightening and his eyes squinting, and looked back to you with a look that could only be described as a mix of puzzled and panicked.

The male’s hazel eyes met yours across the hall, and in that moment, you knew exactly where your night was going to end.

The male was tall and chiseled, skin tanned and freckled, and his hair was brown and curly. It hung over his eyes slightly, etching his curved nose and pouted lips perfectly. He was quiet, reserved, but one of the few Ilyrian males you had ever found yourself able to trust. You had met him the last time you had visited Devlon, enforcing Rhysand’s rule of training before chores with an iron fist, and Ozia had backed you up completely. He explained that he had even started taking the females back to his home to teach them proper stretching and breathing techniques, and his support made your trip infinitely easier.

Maybe that was the reason you had ended up in his bed, or maybe it was because of his borderline piercing resemblance to the male on your left. Either way, Cassian had never teased you as relentlessly as he had the day he had found out - you still had no fucking idea how - and with the look in his eye as his gaze bounced between you, Ozia, and Az, he was not going to let this one go either.

Not a morsel of you cared. It was infinitely better than sitting in the want of a male you could never have.

You finished off your wine before standing up, scraping your wooded chair against the floor as you did. Azriel looked up at you and, likely having put the two pieces together, asked, “What about dinner?”

Your excitement to escape him caused you to overlook the venom in his tone.

“I’m not hungry,” you responded, and made your way towards the male you knew, and away from the one you wish you did.

                                                          ~*~

Azriel willed himself to remember a word of what Cassian had said to him from the moment you left to the moment he finally made his escape, but as he trekked up the creaky, circular stairs to his dust-ridden bedroom for the evening, he could not recall a single word.

Not after the look in your eyes as you looked at the male across the room, the grin tracing your teeth as you eyed him, and the way your hips moved as you walked to him. Not after Azriel could not eat more than a few bites of the chicken soup provided for them without becoming queasy at the thought of what that male - Ozia - was doing to you, what you were doing to him. Not after the blow to his heart after waiting for you to walk his route with him, as you had agreed to, and you never showing. 

And especially not now, as he prepared himself for the necessity of passing your room in order to get to his own.

With the alcohol muddling his mind and the exhaustion in his muscles from one of the longest days he had experienced in recent memory, he thought he could pass it by without a second thought. He was in the clear at the top of the steps, throat closing and head pounding, but as he made his way past your door, his hope dissolved like a sugar in tea.

He didn’t hear you, or him, or have any proof that you were together in your room in any way...

... except for the smell of it.

He had never hated anything more..

The smell of you - you - that he had gotten to know so well. Vanilla and green tea with just a hint of rose, a mixture true to who you were at your core, mixed with the smell of someone else. It was sex and sweat and spit and sheets and you so much of you and so much of him.

It was acrid, pungent, and so fucking heart shattering that he had to put his hand to his chest to ensure his heart was still beating.

He wanted to keel over in pain, rip his heart out of his chest, shatter every window in the cabin, and rip you away from him all in the same moment.

But he just kept on walking, ignoring the tether in his chest pulling him back to you more than anything else.

                                                       ~*~

If Azriel thought that night was long, he was not ready for the morning after.

At breakfast, you reeked of him, yet the smile on your face was what burned Azriel to a crisp. As the four of you traveled home, you and Cass snuck glances at each other like two females who knew something Azriel didn’t. When you finally reached the House of Wind, you immediately went up to bed, mumbling something about how you hadn’t managed to get much sleep anyway.

He hadn’t either.

As you headed upstairs, Azriel headed down, vibrating with an energy he could not describe. All he knew was that he wanted it off of him. He needed everything he was feeling inside of him off and away it was cutting him so deeply - 

“Hey,” came a voice, the arm attached to it finding its place on Azriel’s shoulder. He turned, startled to finally feel his body after living solely in his head, and was met with violet.

“What’s going on?” Rhys asked, and Azriel softened a bit from the look of concern in his eyes.

After centuries of having brothers - real brothers - he still wasn’t used to being loved.

“I’m fine,” Azriel replied, and Rhys raised his eyebrows. “Honestly, I am. Just overtired, and sick of Illyrians.”

As if on cue, Cassian walked through the house with a dagger in one hand and an even bigger bottle of liquor in the other, likely headed upstairs to bring said items up to his mate.

He turned to look at his observers as he made his way up, exclaiming proudly, “I picked the dagger out myself.”

Rhys and Az looked at each other after he reached the top, and Rhys chuckled, patting Azriel on the shoulder. “You and me both, brother.”

                                                     ~*~

 Azriel couldn’t remember how many punching bags he’d sent flying across the training room’s floor. He didn’t fucking care.

All he knew was that the feeling inside of him was not stopping.

He had done pushups until he collapsed, a plank until he dropped, crunches until he puked, and now he was punching the bags without any wrapping protecting the skin of his hands. He would take anything else - anything else - in place of this anguish. He could still smell it, couldn’t stop picturing it, and every time his brain seemed to release him from the torture of its vividity, it would snap back in almost instantly like a punch to his stomach.

He’d been hit many times, but nothing that felt like this. It was a feral, dirty, venomous beast inside of him tearing him apart with its nails and teeth. His arms were jelly, his hands were spilling clumps of blood, but it still wasn’t enough. The beast was relentless, beating Azriel no matter what he did.

His chest ached so badly. The thought of you kissing Ozia.

Punch.

Tasting him. 

Punch. 

Feeling him.

Punch.

Laughing with him.

Punch.

Smiling at him. Enough to crinkle your irises. While Azriel waited for you.

Punch.

And possibly even loving him.

A punch, a crack, and a scream echoed through the chamber, and Azriel smiled with victory as his body finally gave out on him.

                                                          ~*~

You woke covered in sweat, an unidentifiable scream echoing through your mind like a stone in an empty cave, and a searing pain etching its way down your right hand. Tears coated your eyes as you sat up, hissing as the throbbing made it down to your fingertips.

The scream continued to reverberate all the while.

“Fuck,” you whispered, your hand laying limp by your side. You felt stupid for crying. You had broken your hand before.

But your hand wasn’t broken.

You attempted to wiggle it around, flexing your fingers and widening your grip, and the pain slowly faded to a dull ache. You wiped your eyes as you pushed down onto the mattress with it, attempting to gauge how harsh the pain was engrained your bones.

The searing sensation returned.

“Fuck,” you whispered again, and scooted off the bed and onto your feet. The sun had begun to rise outside your window, illuminating you with gold as you walked into the hall and down to the kitchen. 

Your mind muddled with pain and sleep so harshly that you relied on your body to navigate for you, allowing it to think for you. You didn’t even know why you were going to the kitchen. You just needed to move the rest of your body to distract you from your hanging hand.

As you blinked the sleep out of your eyes, you realized that, instead of the kitchen, your body had begun to take you down further. 

“What the fuck am I doing?” you questioned, but still walked down, down, down.

Maybe your body was telling you that some training would do you good. Maybe your hand was just stiff and sore, and needed renewed blood flow. You had been skipping out on your morning routine due to your guard duty. Maybe your body was itching for it back.

You yawned, whispering, “Whatever.”

You began rolling your shoulders as your feet hit the ground, warming up your back and neck. You rubbed your eyes one last time with your left hand, allowing your still aching right one to remain hanging at your side, while simultaneously becoming overwhelmed with the scent of sweat, rubber, and blood. For a second, you smiled, content with the feeling of walking into a space you knew so well - that knew you so well. You were excited, your adrenal gland suddenly pumping you with adrenaline and dopamine.

You were home.

That euphoric pairing was suddenly doused with cortisol as you turned towards the punching bags, only to be met with nearly a dozen lying flat, and a mass of dark wings kneeling on the hard ground.

A mass of dark wings that you could recognize with only the sound of them.

“Azriel,” you whispered, watching as he breathed heavily, clutching his bleeding hand. He was surrounded by small sprays of crimson blood and clear sweat, painting the floor a muted color. His expression was...pained, haunted.

It was his right hand he was clutching.

“Azriel,” you said again, a bit louder that time, and picked up your stride. He hinted at no recognition.

Your own pained hand was long forgotten.

You reached him quickly, kneeling down beside him and touching his shoulders gently. You turned him to look at you, tempted to finally understand the exact feeling of his face slightly stubbled, but his head remained low.

“Azriel, what the fu -” you began, but were unable to form another syllable when his golden eyes connected with yours.

He looked up at you like a boy, a little boy, who had been pushed too far. And yet, at the same time, the Azriel who quickened your heart with only a glance was still there, giving his face and body the look of what you could only describe as a young, bleeding god. Covered in sweat and tears and blood, his hair soaked with the same alloy, he was a fallen angel, begging for mercy.

His eyes said to you make it stop. Please, make it end.

“Az,” you whispered, and he fell into your arms.

Your brain instantly tore you in half. You had never felt so overjoyed and crestfallen in the same moment.

His face was pressed against your collarbone as he began to weep, and his arms wrapped around your waist. He was timid at first, waiting for you to push him away, but you didn’t. Your body molded him to you, pressing him against you and holding him like glass. He was shaking, sweating, and bleeding all over you, enough that blood dripping from his mouth had begun to soak through your shirt. You closed your eyes and held him impossibly closer, and brought your still throbbing hand up to the back of his neck.

Every part of his body that you could feel was warm - too warm.

“Azriel,” you whispered, your voice suddenly cracking at the effort to speak, “what happened?”

He said nothing.

“Why are you down here, Azriel?” you asked, beginning to rub your fingers along the top of his spine. “Tell me why.”

He inhaled shakily, his hot breath mixing with the heat of his blood still staining you, and tried to speak. Nothing escaped besides another quiet sob.

This Spymaster, Illyrian warrior, the strongest there had ever been, was shattering in your arms.

“Please just tell me,” you whispered again. It was your own way of begging him to get up again, be the male who never cracked, never crumbled. He was a rock - he was always a rock - and seeing him like this was scaring the living shit out of you.

He had to have caught on, because after a few shaky breaths, he whispered quietly enough for only you to hear. “Because I can still smell him on you.”

Your eyes widened, and a copper taste coated your tongue.

“You...” you whimpered, “you smell him?”

Suddenly Azriel pushed himself off you and looked at you with something other than pain and hurt.

It was...you didn’t know what it was.

“Yes,” he replied, his bloodied, broken hand trembling, “that’s all I can fucking smell and see. I can’t stop it. No matter what I do, I can’t stop it.”

You recalled Rhysand’s words from the past, about Feyre.

When I would feel her on Tamlin, he said, it was all I could see. I couldn’t stop it.

“I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” Azriel continued, “my chest...it hurts.”

It was all in my chest, Rhysand had said, the pain was, at least, The rest was somewhere deeper, like it was engrained in me. The wrongness of it was inside of me.

“It’s inside of me, Y/N.” Azriel’s mouth was dripping blood now, adding to the mural he had painted on the floor, “I don’t...your hand?”

You looked down at your limp one, and back up at him.

“You...you felt it?” he asked, referring to the shattering of his own bones.

You nodded, tears streaming down your cheeks, but from something other than pain. Your voice was breathy and perfumed with triumph as you traced the pattern in both Az and Rhys’s words. “Yes.”

Azriel’s defeated eyes suddenly lit with curiosity. “How...how is that possi -” 

“The pain’s right here, isn’t it?” you interrupted him, putting your left hand on the area right beneath your breasts. “Right here?”

You moved your hand to the same area on his chest, and he nodded. 

“It burns, doesn’t it?”

“Everywhere,” he agreed.

You nodded. “It’s deep, like in your bones it feels -”

“- wrong.” He completed your sentence for you.

You smiled, big enough to wrinkle your irises, and kissed him.

He was bloody and hot, but you kissed him anyway, hard enough for drops of it to begin to drip down your lips as well.

You pulled away and took his injured hand in yours. “Why do you think I was with Ozia in the first place?”

Azriel’s voice was quiet and unsure. “I... I don’t know.”

“Because he was as close to you as I could get,” you said with a chuckle. “I thought, after a century, there was no hope. That the Cauldron destined you for someone else. I figured, if I couldn’t have you, I would drown the grief in someone who I could pretend was you.”

His eyes widened, and he licked his bloodied lips before asking, “Did it work?”

You chuckled back and kissed his cheek. “Not even close.”

With your lips still buzzing, he pulled you in for another kiss, and finally - finally - the cracks in your chest bloomed into a bond. It was soothing, spreading itself over all the wounds that remained open from a century of festering, and replaced them with a garden of roses. The feeling stretched itself around your body, wrapping you in a cocoon of solace. You had been carrying the ache of an untethered line in your body, and it had finally found its dock.

He kissed you softly, holding back enough to prove to you of his uncertainty, before you pulled away and mumbled, “I feel it too.”

He swallowed and smiled, enough to crinkle the skin around his eyes and accentuate his dimples. With his blood still dripping from both of your mouths, he said with full confidence, “You’re my mate.”

You wiped the blood from his chin and brushed back the strands of hair sticking to his forehead as you replied, “And you are mine.”

With eyes only filled with love, Azriel said, “So that’s why I wanted to tear his jaw off.”

You smiled and pressed your foreheads together, rubbing your thumb along his cheekbone. Your shattered hands were placed on top of each other on the ground.

“I didn’t mean to hurt you,” you said to him. “I thought the pain I felt was merely jealousy, and I was with Ozia to escape from it. If I knew you were experiencing it too, or if I was honest from the beginning, you never would have gotten hurt.”

You leaned back to look him in the eye as you said, “I am sorry I hurt you. I am sorry I left you to do the route alone. I am sorry for all of it.”

He only smiled. “I had every opportunity to be honest too, and I didn’t take it. This isn’t your fault.’

You nodded, but he kissed you again. “This isn’t your fault.”

 You kissed him back, showing him you believed him through your tongue and teeth.

You had dreamed of this moment, internalized every spat of poetry Rhysand and Cassian had iterated about the feeling of it, but nothing could have prepared you to know the feeling of being honestly, rawfully, and purely loved.

 Taglist (if you’d like to be added please let me know!)

@leahkenobi  @notquitehero @lovelyladymayyy @seraphqueen @em---r @azaideen @katiebellf @llovelydove @tinasbookishlife @xxpeachyxo @evlyncelia @icarusave @forever-paramore28 @peachyxlynch @feyretopia @wingedmiken @moonslattes @hollyismentallyillhelp @esposadomd @redhighlady @bsenpai-blog @buttercake2234 @perssepeony @whor-3-crux @avengerswhre @mystic-sculpture @wolfyland7 @are-y0u-serious-blog @hilism @tooobsessedsstuff @simplysensual @hernameispa @ladylizzieofdarbyshire @i-am-fascinated @seraphimluxe @just-living5 @saphiraprince22 @azsazz​ @thatonespriteobsessedbitch​ @moisyinfluencerstrawberry @bigcreatorwombatdreamer​ 

#Azriel #azriel x oc #azriel x reader #azriel shadowsinger #azriel smut #cassian x reader #rhysand x reader #acotar #acowar #acofs #acomaf #acofas #acotar fanfiction #sarah j maas #tog #crescent city fanfic

[acommonanomaly]

Maedhros and Maglor for @feanorianweek.

Inspired by a scene from my fic, What Fades Away.

Excerpt:

Maitimo swallowed hard. It was disconcerting to be so near one of the Powers. Though he had been taught that the Valar loved Eru’s Children, he could not help but be aware that such a being could reach out and crush him or one of his family if it so desired.

Oromë’s head turned to Maitimo suddenly, as though he knew his thoughts, but the Vala only blinked his bright yellow eyes, watching Maitimo curiously for a long moment before turning back to Atar and Amil.

Makalaurë had squeezed his hand hard when Oromë glanced over, and Maitimo looked down to see that his little brother’s face was pale with fear. Despite this, Makalaurë moved around so that he was standing in front of Maitimo, as if to shield his older brother with his slender frame. Maitimo wanted to whisper reassurances to him, but he did not want to draw the Vala’s attention again, so he settled for lifting Makalaurë into his arms.

Makalaure’s thin arms wrapped firmly around his neck, nearly choking him, but he could feel the frantic beat of his brother’s heart against his own chest, so he did not try to loosen his hold.

“What is his name?” Oromë asked in a voice that was both as deep as thunder and as soft as a breeze. The air shook with it but quickly settled.

“He will be called Turkafinwë,” Atar said, an arm now around Amil’s shoulders.

Maitimo was amazed when Oromë stooped down and lifted a hand toward Amil’s belly. He glanced between Amil and Atar and asked, “May I?”

Atar gave a curt nod, holding himself proudly, but Amil smiled when she nodded her consent.

Maitimo took a step closer, but he stopped when Makalaure twisted around with a fearful lurch to see what was happening.

The Vala spoke again, his voice quieter this time, so that it seemed as if whisper wound around whisper, only hinting at words beneath the hiss of the sound. Then the Vala smiled wide.

“His spirit is fierce and bright like wildfire,” Oromë said, looking pleased as he stood, towering above them again.

Amil looked like she did not know what to think of this pronouncement, but Atar raised his eyebrows a little, and Maitimo wondered what he would say.

“He is my son. My fire burns in him as it does in my other sons, and as it will in all of my children.”

“Yes,” Oromë said. His smile did not fade, though his eyes changed somehow, as though seeing something not here. Maitimo had seen this look on his mother’s face before, and it always unsettled him when she fell into solemn contemplation afterward.

#tolkien #feanorianweek #the silmarillion #maedhros #maglor #my art #feanorianweek 2024 #what fades away #I'm disappointed I only managed to get 4 drawings done #i might still try to make some more before feanorian week is over #but I'm so drained and so busy #I guess we'll see #i love these boys so much #i really want to start writing What Fades Away again #i'm just wondering if anyone is still interested in reading it #as it's been a long time since i posted the last chapter #i need motivation

[justalittlebitbored]

late nights - remus lupin

willow tree: part three excerpt

pairing/au: marauders era, remus lupin x reader

summary: you wake up to knocking on your window in the middle of the night on the night of the full moon. who else could it be but your werewolf best friend covered in blood.

warnings: angst, unrequited love, sadness, fluff, friends to lovers, childhood best friends to lovers. no use of y/n.

wc: 2.3k

a/n: RIGHT, this is an excerpt from my series willow tree, I wrote this in May when I was properly writing and sadly I started this series and I love it so much but I honestly don’t have the effort to keep writing. This scene however is such a pure wholesome scene and I’m sure those who have read the series will love it but I also think it can be a really good oneshot concept so enjoy!!!

To those who haven’t read willow tree, I don’t think u need too to understand this but I shall give context in case:

Reader and remus = besties. Reader realises she loves him, ‘unrequited’ love high jinks ensue, so she distances herself a little bit. Remus hasn’t come to reader during a full moon in a while as the marauders has started to care for him, in this one shit he comes to reader instead of

series masterlist main masterlist

Hearing a loud banging noise at your window was not quite the surprise you were expecting in the middle of the night.

Your curtains were closed but the motion sent them fluttering towards you. A million thoughts crossed your mind. What if someone was breaking in to rob you, what if you-

You heard a loud groan and then a vague, deep voice said your name. Was that Remus? Your name was said a bit louder this time. Yup that was definitely Remus. What on earth would he be doing here at this time of night?

You ran to the window and pulled the curtains open.

His bloodied body hung outside, his face leaning again the window ledge. Crap. Your fingers pulled the latch open before you could process your actions, the breeze caused the window to fly inwards nearly hitting you in the face.

"Remus!"

You grabbed his hands and attempted to drag his heavy body through the window. With his help you managed to pull him in. His body immediately slumped against yours and your knees nearly buckled under his weight. He was definitely heavier since the last time he had climbed through that window.

Managing to drag his body over to the bed, you led him down as gently as you could.

"Fuck. Remus what happened?"

Whilst running to close the window you nearly tripped on your clothes that you had taken off earlier that night and couldn't be bothered to put in your wash basket and nearly slammed your head on the radiator. Managing to close the window you immediately turned around and headed towards the bed and knelt down to grab the first aid kit that you were sure was under there somewhere.

"Come on you're here somewhere I know you are."

Although pleading with the first aid kit probably didn't do much it was more of a way to calm you down.

The boy on the bed let out a large groan and you could feel the sweat on the back of your neck begin to form and your hands beginning to clam up. Your fingers brushed against something hard. Aha, you found it. You curled your fingers around the handle and pulled it out whilst quickly standing up and placing it on the bed.

Remus let out a large groan and his arms curled around his middle as he looked like he was writhing in pain. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

You had forgotten it was a full moon, you usually kept track of it but this month you must have forgotten, this wasn't a job you had done in a long time, the marauders mainly looked after him now. You hadn't seen him on a full moon in nearly two years except this one time in sixth year where he had ended outside your dorm under the willow tree by your window. By the time you had gotten out of bed and looked outside his friends were carrying him away.

Although James did shout a goodbye at you waving his hands fervently, apologising loudly.

"Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god." You hadn't done this in a long time and were quite out of practice. He had long deep gashes on his chest and shallower ones on his arms.

What do I do? What did he want me to do? Fuck.

"Remus, I don't know what to do. What do I do?" You asked, your hands shaking as your hovered them above his abdomen.

"I trust you. Just-" He grunted loudly. "-clean me up or something." He said loudly as he began to turn over onto his side.

"Okay? Okay. Right, should be easy enough?" You let out a long breath.

It's fine, it's going to be fine, you done this plenty of times before. What's the difference between now and then.

You quickly got to work cleaning his wounds with a wet rag, apologising as you went along every time he groaned.

You apologised a whole lot more when you had to apply hydrogen peroxide so that it didn't get infected. He let out cries of pain and your eyes stung with tears, you hated seeing him this way.

After quickly working for about twenty minutes you were finally finished. You walked over to your chest of drawers and pulled out a new t shirt and joggers for him. They were his that he had left round at yours before during movie nights. You would help him put the shirt on but you weren't so sure about the trousers, so you decided to leave those on the chair by your desk for now in case he had enough energy to get up and change into them himself.

"Hey, Remus." His eyes opened and he blinked at you softly so you continued. "Hi. Can you sit up for me for a moment so I can put this on you?" His attention was drawn to the top in your hands, he shuffled forward to edge of your bed and you attempted to get him into it.

His head leaned against your chest as he weakly lifted his arms up, eventually after a struggle you managed to get him in it.

He slumped back and you stood awkwardly at the side of your bed, you didn't know what to do now.

You let out a big breath you didn't realise you were holding in as your eyes began to close from how tired you were. You began to walk away to sit in your chair before you heard Remus call your name.

"Stay."

"I'm sorry?" You were confused.

"Can you stay? With me... in the bed." You blinked.

"Please?" He said with a tired chuckle. You could see him give you a meek smile, he looked exhausted, dark circles lining his eyes.

"Sure, yeah. Okay."

You slowly walked towards the bed unsure of where to go. He moved forward, opening a space behind him. You slowly climbed in, your back leaning again the pillow. He was sat up against the wall obviously in pain.

Hesitating for a moment, you placed your hand in his limp one and gently tugged, pulling him towards you.

You hoped he wouldn't say no or look at you funny.

Without saying anything he instantly fell forward, his head on your chest. You could feel his body immediately deflate. You hadn't done this in a long time; before fifth year this would happen every full moon, it was almost a ritual. You would clean him up and then he would lay his head on your chest and you both would cuddle until morning.

"I'm sorry. I don't like it when you see me like this." The words gently left his mouth. Your hand instantly flew to the back of his head, your fingers scratching at his head in a comforting motion. It was instinctual and you didn't realise you had done this until he left let out a soft whimper.

"It's okay, I don't mind." You whispered.

"I do. You don't need this burden on your shoulders." He said with a harsh tone, not directed at you though, you could tell he was aiming it at himselt.

"Hey, my shoulders are yours to use." You smiled softly at him. "Listen to me okay, I don't mind. I would rather you come to me and be safe than lie out there in those woods by yourself. Anytime you need me I will be there."

A harsh exhale left his mouth.

"Thank you. I don't know what I would've done tonight without you." He looked up at me.

You had lied before, saying you had never seen anything as beautiful as the sunset. You had, and you were looking into them right now, Remus' deep golden brown eyes.

For a moment you think he's going to kiss you. His eyes dart to your lips before flickering up to your eyes again. Before he could do anything he smiles, almost sadly before resting his head on you, his head eyes dart to your lips before flickering up to your eyes again. Before he could do anything he smiles, almost sadly before resting his head on you, his head nuzzling against you chest.

"You were asleep, I'm sorry I woke you." He apologised.

"It's okay, I was awake." You lied, you were asleep but he already felt guilty enough you didn't want to make him feel any worse. He said okay quietly into your chest. After a couple minutes of comfortable silence he spoke again.

"I've missed you." He whispered into your chest.

You hands paused for a moment from its action of scratching the back of his head before promptly continuing.

"I'm right here."

He whispered again in a low voice. "I know, I've just missed you."

You didn't know how to respond to that so you just kept running your hands through his hair and after a while his breathing became steady and you assumed he'd fallen asleep.

You had missed him too, even with all of this weird tension and distance. You had missed him too. Your birthday was the only time recently where things had felt normal.

The way you were both led on your bed was anything but platonic but you didn't mind, he hadn't been this close to you in so long. You leant down and pressed a long kiss to the top of his head before leaning your head backward with a loud sigh. Eventually your eyes began to droop and before you knew it you had fallen asleep too.

You woke up in the morning to Remus shaking you softly. Your eyes fluttered open in confusion as your vision began to clear.

"Hi sweetheart." He smiled at you gently. "I need to go, thank you for looking after me. I'll see you later today okay."

Your brain wasn't functioning and your groggy mind couldn't bring you to do anything but produce a soft whimper, you were not a morning person.

His hand cupped your cheek and you leant into it, your lips almost brushing his palm in a soft kiss, whilst his other hand brushed your hair out of your eyes gently. Although you were in a state you could still make out the soft smile he gave you. He let out a shaky breath before leaning down and pressing lingering kiss against your forehead.

He moved away towards your window, you turned to your side to watch him turn around and look at you again for a long moment before turning and climbing out the window. You heard a soft click soon after.

You wish you had more time to think about what had happened but you were too tired to think and the next thing you knew you were out like a light.

After god knows how long your body jolted upright.

Remus was here last night, right? You looked to the side where a bloody rag led on your bedside table along with an opened first aid kit. He was here last night, you hadn't imagined it so you certainly didn't imagine him waking you up to say goodbye.

He called you sweetheart. God, he called you sweetheart. A small involuntary smile was on your face as you pushed your covers away and got out of bed. Your mouth was dry and you desperately need a glass of water so you walked out of your room with a stupid smile on your face and no matter how hard you tried you couldn't stop.

You walked into the kitchen hoping to get a glass of water when you saw Lily sat at the counter eating some toast. Your quietly wished her a good morning as you headed towards the cupboard to grab a glass.

"What were all those sounds last night?" Lily asked.

You froze, you didn't know how to approach this really since you knew that she would read into this situation and give it a deeper meaning and you really couldn't be asked for that right now.

You slowly turned around, grabbing a glass leaving the forefront of your mind.

"Umm... nothing it was just-" She raised her eyebrows and you knew there was no point in lying about it.

"It was Remus. It was the full moon last night and he just turned up, I didn't know what to do so I just cleaned him up."

Her eyebrows shot up to her hairline.

"Oh. So is he still here or?" She questioned, an innocent look on her face.

"No. He's gone now."

She hummed. "So did you guys-"

"No!" You exclaimed cutting her off. "Nothing happened. Don't look at me like that Lily. Nothing happened, it was just one friend patching up another friend."

You really thought that she was going to ask more questions but she didn't say much but look at you with a knowing smile. You didn't know what game she was playing at, but you were glad she wasn't asking any questions.

"Okay."

"Okay?"

"Okay."

You cleared your throat. "Right I should probably go and shower, you know aet ready for the day."

"Okaaay."

You turned around and hurried to your room, she knew what she was doing. If you spent a moment longer with you she would work her magic and make you spill all of your feelings to her. She was weirdly good at that.

You slammed your door shut and stood with your back pressed to it as you took a deep breath.

Okay.

enjoy yall!

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[slashingdisneypasta]

Captain Hook x Reader || Excerpt

Plot: ⬇⬇⬇

'You should have met me in 1984. You would've liked me.''I like you now.'

(From The Vampire Diaries)

Warnings: ... softness???...

Tagging: @asperol-with-izzy , @disney-android-foundation , @lady-love88 , @marinerainbow , @miss_understood , and @ryantryan6969 . Hi, I hope you are all ready for some romance featuring one Captain Hook! ^^ Have a great day, and I hope you enjoy ^^

"My dear, you are beautiful... tonight, and always." He speaks quietly, looking thoughtful as he uses his hook to gently release your hair from under the collar on his coat and carefully arrange it over your shoulder. His eyes are on you but they're far off. You're not sure he's really here, right now, truly. "... You should have met me before all this madness... before this blasted land. Before Peter, and my hand... You would've liked me. I would've- I would've been sure to deserve you, then." Hook's fingers on your face, knuckles gently brushing your jaw, feel like complete heaven to you as well as his dark romantic eyes on your face. His coat around your body is warm and makes you feel loved and cared for, and the breeze in your hair makes you feel like you're on air but his words are all too wrong and it makes you feel suddenly confused; Eyes round and eyebrows furrowed and head tilted to the side at him.

"... Hm?" You've just had the loveliest night with him. He made all of his men leave the ship for the night so you could be alone together and watch the sky get dark. You watched the sky turn a pale blue first, then yellow, and orange, and pink... then blue again and now its black- its night, and it cold, and you have a charming man's coat on. Its a perfect night... but now he's saying some things you just don't understand. You? Would've liked him?? Would've???

"I was a gentleman, back then... I would've taken you on the grandest dates, shown you sights almost as beguiling as you are, taken care of you, and your family... made you happy. ... Unfortunately, all I can proffer you now is the chill in the damn Neverland air and this old coat." His hair is silhouetted by the lamp behind him and you can see the breeze ruffling the messy locks so you reach up and run your fingers through it.

"Grande dates? Hm... could've sworn we were on one of those right now." You flash a gentle, hesitant grin. He cant be serious about the things he's saying, can he?

Chuckling softly, Hook shakes his head. "This is nothing, dear. I wish I could give you so much better... A treasure like you is supposed to be spoiled. And once upon a time, I was a better man- I would've made that- you- taking care of you, and making you happy, my entire life."

To this, you don't know what to say. Your mouth falls open as if needing to say something- but no words come out. Closing it again, you lower your hand from his hair let it slide down his hook arm; Squeezing gently. An attempt to comfort.

"Which is not to say that I wont try, now... " As he takes in a deep breath, he closes his eyes for a moment and furrows his brow's, the lines in his forehead getting deeper. "But unfortunately, my dear, you are looking at a broken man. I can only offer half my heart, to you- the rest is taken by an infernal desire for revenge. And I... I'm sorry, but I'm not good enough, to overcome it. Not even for you."

... Oh... That's what this is about.

You see.

Squeezing this sad-sack's arm a little more firmly, you take a step into him, so you truly need to crane your neck back to see his face. "... I don't care. I'll take what you can give me."

His eyes pop open again, and he looks at you with a surprised expression. "What?- "

"I like you now, Hook." Sliding your hand back up his arm and to his shoulder, you use him to balance you as you get onto your tip-toes and give his cold cheek a kiss. "So, you take your revenge on that Peter... or you try. You can try every single day, if you want to. You two can chase eachother back and forth all day, every day. But just come back to me at night and have dinner with me, okay? Have dinner with me, and kiss me, and hold my hand, and I'll be happy. I'll be over the moon."

"My dear- "

"James." He gulps, hearing you pull first-name on him. "Just kiss me, okay? And think about what I've said; Let it sink in. I want you, I need you to understand that."

"... th- think? That's rather hard to do, while kissing you; You know?"

Giggling, you curl your hand around his neck and gently guide him down. "I believe in you, Captain."

"Alright, my dear; I will try." With a bemused, pleased smile - like he's the luckiest bastard in the universe, - Hook does so.

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