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pandoraslxna · 1 year

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Lost and found - Chapter 2

adult Neteyam x female human scientist

Words: 2.8k

Summary: Neteyam hates humans. One day, he finds you all alone and lost in the forest, but quickly decides against killing you. What might be the odd reason for that?

Warnings: explicit smut, oral, somnophilia, kidnapping, non-con elements, Na‘vi in heat, scent kink, size difference, semi-public, biting, fingering, p in v, language barrier

Notes: Here is the long awaited pt2 and I hope you guys enjoy it as much as the first one 🫶🏻 (check my masterlist to view all parts)

The tiny human looks so peaceful in her sleep.

With her chest evenly raising and falling, soft noises of dreams leaving her parted lips and hair in a mess.

Neteyam was lucky he arrived at high camp way past the eclipse and everyone was already sound asleep, otherwise he wouldn’t have managed to sneak her into his marui without anyone noticing. His parents would most definitely skin him alive the next morning anyways, when they find out his chosen mate was not only a human but an RDA scientist too. Maybe he could hide her for a few more days of peace, if he could somehow manage to make her understand that she wasn’t allowed to leave his marui and make any noises.

But that was something he didn’t want to waste a thought on right now. He would have to think about a solution for this little problem in the morning. Right now, he was entirely too busy watching her sleep.

Her sweet scent still lingers in the air. Usually it wears off after the first mating but he knew that his heat would probably last a while longer than that. A day or two maybe, he didn’t know. Maybe even longer, given how potent her scent was when it first hit him. Originally, Neteyam wanted to give her space and let her rest for a while, at least until he truly couldn’t bare it no more and had to mate with her again. But it seemed like this case didn’t even need to occur. He hadn’t even reached his physical limit yet, and already couldn’t withstand her any longer.

Neteyam made sure to be as quiet as possible, as he got up from his current position and moved over to her. Utilising years of experience in stealth as a warrior and skilled hunter, he pulls the thinly weaved blanket off of her, to reveal her bare limbs. She was still naked, no surprise after he had left her destroyed clothes behind in the forest. She wouldn’t need them anymore anyways. Tomorrow, he would make her some new ones. Some that didn’t made her look even more like the alien that she was.

Carefully, he repositions her to lay on her back, her soft thighs spread wide enough to make room for him. Neteyam places a gentle kiss on her inner thigh, both eyes fixed on her face. Her features are clam and relaxed, eyes still closed shut and he smiles to himself. He knows it’s probably not the best idea, knows he’s testing his luck but it’s just so hard to resist her.

He kisses her again, on her pubic bone this time. A quick look to her face –still nothing. Another kiss is left right on her core and when she’s still seemingly sound asleep, Neteyam knows he’s good to go. His tongue is gentle on her, sliding from her clit, leaving soft kisses here and there, to her entrance. She tastes as sweet as she smells and he can’t help the excited sway of his tail moving behind him when he realizes. A small gasps leaves her lips, when the tip of his tongue experimentally dips into her. Neteyam stills for a moment and musters her face before he continues.

He’s still gentle but there grows a force behind it, a need desperately restrained because he doesn’t want to wake her. He wants her so bad, yet he knows the human needs her sleep to fully recover. She’s just so fragile, he didn’t want to break his newly found mate.

Neteyam carefully spreads her open with one hand and finds her opening with the other. Deceptively small, but surprisingly elastic. She seems so tiny until his dick was splitting her open, swallowing him up, hugging him deep and tight. He traces his name over her clit with his tongue, marking her most sensitive part for himself, before he slowly slides a finger inside her. She moans quietly in her sleep, her cheeks now flushed red and Neteyam hopes her dreams are as sweet as she was.

She was getting wet –like, really wet.

He smirks as he laps up some of her slickness where it leaks around his finger and his eyes roll all the way back into his head from her taste. He’s getting hard, too. Playing with her like this was a lot more fun that he thought it would be. Neteyams eyes fall closed as he devours her, relishing in the sweetness of her arousal. He doesn’t even realize how her breathing increases until suddenly, her tiny hands find the crown of his head. She mindlessly brushes through his braids, not fully awake and aware of what was happening yet. But then she tugs on his hair, just as he sucks on her clit. She hums, a confused sound leaving her lips before she fully registers where she is and Neteyam opens his eyes to look up at her. "Sleep well?", he asks her, using the very few words in her language that he actually knows, with a kiss to the little nub that brings her so much pleasure and her hips jerk.

"What the–", her eyes widen in shock and she tries to close her legs around his head, but a pair of strong hands effortlessly keep them apart. Neteyam is quick to hush her. "Shh, be quiet", he whispers, "I‘ll make you feel good, but you have to stay quiet for me."

"Listen, I have no idea what you’re sa— ah!" Before she can finish her complain, Neteyam lowers his head again. Expertly, he finds her clit and sucks. He circles it with his tongue, but when a moan escapes her lips, he stops. His gaze flies up to find her face and he simply looks at her with his brows drawn together. No words are exchanged, until the only sound that‘s heard is that of her rapid breathing. Only then, Neteyam lowers his lips back down again, eating her out like a starved man.

Her thighs quiver in his hold and her hips jerk, desperately trying to get him where it feels best to her. At one point, Neteyams tongue slides over her entrance and dips inside, as far as he can reach and she moans again. And again, Neteyam stops. His eyes find hers, a stern look on his face and she swallows thickly.

"Okay, okay I get it", she murmurs quietly between breathless pants, "Quiet. I‘ll be quiet."

What a smart girl, Neteyam thinks with a grin. The second he closes his lips around her clit again and sucks, he could feel heat spread through her entire body, heralding her impending orgasm. With the way she squeezed her eyes shut, her lower lip sucked in between her teeth to prevent herself from making any noise and the way her hips bucked up —She was begging him wordlessly to make her cum and so he pushed another finger into her, pumping in and out of her wet center. When she starts to tug on his hair again, in an effort to get him exactly where she wanted him, Neteyam can’t help but grind his hard cock against the ground, desperate to get to his release himself.

He then forces another finger inside her and she throws her head back, whimpering quietly. "You’re doing so well, so good for me. Cute little human", Neteyam coos in a whisper, comforting her. A new wave of her sweet scent suddenly rolls off of her, as if she was reacting to his words or his actions, he didn’t know, but he wonders how she was even doing this. For a faint moment, he wonders if it was just his mind playing tricks on him, but then he feels his heart hammer inside his chest and it felt like he had been set aflame. His body was reacting to her scent instinctively. The sensation was particularly acute between his thighs, where an aching need throbbed, beating to the frantic tune of his heart.

He couldn’t take it anymore.

There was that yawning, aching void inside her, and her body needed something to fill it. Her body needed to be filled, Neteyam was sure of it. Her cunt pulsed, clenched around his digits and then a feverish wave of shivers went down her back, making it arch off the floor. Neteyam chuckled and the vibration against her core almost sent her over the edge. But then he draws away from her and sits back on his heels.

Her eyes fly open and it’s almost adorable how she looks at him, as if she was disappointed that he had stopped. Keeping eye contact with her, he licks his fingers clean of her slickness and watches her cheeks turn red– a quality his people did not possess. It told him that she was embarrassed. Flustered. She really was an adorable thing. Still a human, but a cute one.

Neteyam settled himself between her spread thighs, hooking her legs over his arms to fold her into a weird position where she was trapped, not only under his, but also her own weight. A soft whimper escaped her at the sudden closeness and Neteyam cursed the mask she was wearing, because he was close enough to kiss her like this but the thin glass hovering over her face prevented him from it. Instead, he choose to bury his face in the space where her delicate shoulder met her neck. He felt her pulse, rapidly beating, where he pressed his nose against her.

He kissed her soft skin there, while his cock, hard and already leaking pre-cum, glides between her wet folds. He grinds himself against her for a while, relishing in the feeling of her slickness covering him like a second layer of skin until he was nice and wet and ready for her. He draws back a little more, until his tip catches on her entrance and then he pushes himself inside. She’s still so tight, clamping down on him with enough force, it makes him hold his breathe in order not to groan out loud.

Neteyam was doing what his body was clamoring for. He kept filling her, his cock stretching her walls, making room for himself inside of her. She was tiny, but she was taking him. Even better than the first time, he remarked. Her body released more of her slickness to ease the way and finally, he was flush with her. Connected like two pieces of a puzzle. She was keening as quietly as possible but when he moved his hips and thrusted into her for the first time, a moan slipped past her lips.

Where he had left soft kisses earlier, Neteyam suddenly bit down on her neck. Not hard enough to draw blood or actually hurt her, but enough to remind her what she had learned earlier.

"Quiet, remember?", he whispers into her ear through gritted teeth and her breathing hitches. He feels her shift and quickly nod her head as if she understood what he just said. Not the words maybe, but their meaning.

Neteyam feels how she focuses on breathing, on getting air into her lungs. What had once been such a simple, effortless task was now a struggle. He could hear her whimper softly as she gulped oxygen in small gasps and when he thought that she was ready, he snapped his hips against hers. Every part of her tensed, her bottom lip sucked in between her blunt, human teeth but she kept quiet. "That’s a good girl", Neteyam says against her skin, kissing the marks his teeth had left on her.

Unfortunately, the only thing neither of them could keep quiet, where the slick, obscene noises at every stroke of his cock inside her pussy. Neteyam had to grit his teeth hard to keep himself from groaning, cursing and praying in his mind that nobody could hear what was going on in his marui.

The pace in which he was fucking her in switched constantly, trying to make the sounds less obvious just in case any of his family members would wake up. From short, deep strokes, to fast, rapid thrusts that had both of them panting into each others ears.

The little human was close again, he could feel it. She was trembling on the edge of it, squeezing around his cock painfully tight. Instead of the groan he wanted to release so bad, a huff of breathe escaped him. Just barely.

"You know, you really don’t make this easy for me, little one”, Neteyam whispered as she kept clenching around him. Her small arms had laid themselves around his neck and pulled him close, like she was trying to hide herself underneath him.

The little punched out noises she makes every time he thrusts into her and the mewling whimpers she can’t stop every time he pulls out are music to his ears, but she’s just too fucking loud like this. Her noises are barely above the sound of a whisper, but still enough to be heard by any Na’vi– thanks to their distinct hearing.

"Shhh", he coos, "I know it feels good, but you need to be quiet."

Neteyam knows he’s asking too much of her, yet it makes him all the more proud when she finally comes and not a sound falls from her parted lips. It’s a silent scream, like she’s choking on her vocal cords. But in exchange, he soft, velvety walls suck him and clench around him, squeezing tight enough until he’s unable to pull himself out. To him, it felt like she was trying to milk him dry and suddenly, it felt like the whole world came crushing down on him.

Neteyam couldn’t help it.

He buries his teeth in the crook of her neck, bites down onto her sweat slicked skin as he comes –because if he didn’t, he would’ve been moaning for the whole clan to hear. The human twitches below him, her hands clawing to his back as he fills her with his cum. It’s on the edge of overstimulation, but he keeps trusting into her a few more times just to make sure that every last drop of his pleasure was pumped into her pussy, before he finally pulls himself out.

They’re both covered in sweat, panting and trying to catch their breaths as Neteyam sits back on his heels to admire her. Her eyes are half lidded and she’s seemingly on the verge of falling asleep again, much to his amusement. He was going so easy on his mate, yet the little human could barely keep up with him.

For a moment, he doesn’t know what to do with her. It’s not like they could just sit there and talk, let him explain anything to her, so he quickly settles to lay beside her. He would let her rest for a while longer and then, in the morning, he would decide on how to handle the situation.

The sounds of her odd breathing mask were a little annoying at first, but at the same time strangely comforting. It reassured him of her presence, even when he closed his eyes. Thanks to this, he could pinpoint the exact moment where her breathing evened and she fell asleep. He curled himself around her smaller frame, his tail coming to rest over her thigh, gently swaying over her skin to comfort her in her sleep. She was so tiny and fragile, a very primal part of him made him want to protect her even more because of that. He pulled her closer until her back was flush with his chest, her head coming to rest on his arm.

Neteyam laid with her like this for a while.

He wasn’t sleeping though, still cautious of any noise that could imply that his parents or siblings were awake. But the only sound that reached his sensitive ears, where the ones coming from right next to him– the low grumble of her stomach. She was hungry.

Carefully, he slips his arm out from underneath her head. He redresses himself quietly, before he moves outside, in order to find something suitable for her to eat. Fruits would probably do, he saw Spider eat them once. If he could consume them without further complains, she could too. Neteyam didn’t want to let her try any meats or other things for now. Based on her blunt teeth, he wasn’t sure if humans were even meant to consume meat. He would have to ask her what food she preferred, once she had learned how to communicate with him.

A small smile spread over his lips by thought of that.

But when he pulled the woven cloth that represents the entrance to his marui to the side, his heart stops for a beat and his smile drops instantly.

The sight of his brother standing right there in front of him made him swallow dryly. With his arms crossed over his chest, Lo‘ak glances over his older brothers shoulder.

"You’re gonna be in so much trouble, bro."

Oh great mother help him.

#･｡ﾟ☆: *my works* :☆ﾟ.#avatar 2 #avatar #avatar the way of water #avatar way of water #neteyam sully #awow #neteyam #neteyam x reader smut #neteyam x female reader smut #neteyam x reader #neteyam x female reader #neteyam x human reader #atwow neteyam #neteyam x f!reader

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thisblogisaboutabook · 2 months

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Rainy Season - Part 3

Storm Warning

Azriel Eris x Reader

We’ve got a time jump and are swapping points of view for this chapter y’all.

Part 1 Part 2 Part 4

3 months later

Eris Vanserra hated the Summer Court. The humidity anywhere outside of the temperature regulated zones of Adriata, the way his hair clung to his forehead and caused curls to form in his otherwise immaculate hair, but most of all it was just insulting to be so bothered by the heat itself when he quite literally had fire in his veins. He couldn’t get out of here fast enough.

Tarquin strode alongside Eris through the open air lower levels of his keep, three of his guards and two of Eris’ own flanking them several feet behind, one could almost forget they were there if not for the “click clack” of feet echoing through the halls. Eris would be lying if he said he didn’t have to try very hard to focus on the mundane talk of trade routes and port authorities instead of getting lost to the sounds of crashing waves and gulls outside.

Tarquin broached the riveting subject of tariffs on imports from the continent as the first rumble of thunder boomed in the distance. Now that - Eris enjoyed that aspect of the court. Autumn had no shortage of rain but the turbulence of storms often mirrored his own inner peril - made him feel less alone in the world. And truthfully, there was nothing like taking cover from the rain and listening to the rumble outside, watching the lightning dance across the skies as the loud cracks of thunder commanded the attention of anyone within earshot.

“Have your people felt the same effects, High Lord?” Tarquin broke Eris from yet another drift of his thoughts. He really should have brought a secretary or advisor along for this meeting.

Sparing Eris from the embarrassment of asking Tarquin to repeat his last three minutes of speech a cry broke through the hall. The battle cry of a…. Child?

“AHHHHHHHHHHHHH!”

Followed by a yelp of “ow!”

Eris’ head jerked as he found himself drifting toward the action.

Turning a corner he found a woman laying on the ground, curled into a ball - a child of no more than 10 with a large jagged stick standing over her with his chest puffed out, pure smug joy on his face.

Eris looked to Tarquin who only grinned with satisfaction. Eris gaped before Tarquin quietly whispered, “just watch.”

The woman didn’t move. The child’s look of satisfaction slowly turning to that of concern as she lay there. He bent over the woman placing a hand on her shoulder, his brows knit together. “Lady L/N?”

So focused on the woman on the ground before him, the boy didn’t notice her arm slowly sneak around him and “Oof!” The kid let out a startled breath as she grabbed his ankle, ripping it out from beneath him, effectively leaving the child on his behind.

The female lept up into a crouching position. Her tanned, muscled thighs pushing her up to stand effortlessly. “And that, little ones, is why you never let your guard down with an adversary.”

Eris turned, wondering how he could have missed the group of children sitting on the other end of the room watching the scene unfold.

The boy remained on his behind, hands resting on his forehead in defeat.

“Hey-“ She reached a hand out to help him up. “You did a great job. You quite literally swept me off my feet! Nobody has done that in quite some time.” She paused, sadness twisting her features as if her own words struck her before shifting back to that of a proud instructor. “In fact - I have something for you.”

She reached into the pocket of her calf-length, flowy pants and reaching handing him a shell. “Add this to your leather strap.” She tapped a leather bracelet on his wrist, one shell already strung on it. “You did great, kid.” The boy gave her a genuine smile as he returned to the rest of his classmates.

Eris shifted involuntarily. How much had he wished for someone to say those words to him when he was a child?

Tarquin chuckled “An excellent motivator. Shells. Who knew?”

Eris gave a small smile - brief but genuine before adjusting back into his usual mask. The instructor turned to face them and cauldron damn him if she wasn’t the most gorgeous thing he’d ever seen. Radiant skin that came from plenty of time in the sun, silky hair that practically begged to have fingers run through it, a soft and curvy yet toned build. A body that told him she indulged herself in what she enjoyed but was active enough to define her plush features, likely blessed with great genetics - lithe yet perfectly squeezable in all his favorite places.

“High Lord.” Her voice carried to him like an ocean breeze. She bowed her head in a respectful greeting, long lashes fluttering. “How may I be of service?”

“Lady L/N,” Tarquin beamed. “It’s a pleasure to introduce you to Eris Vanserra, High Lord of the Autumn Court.”

Her brow puzzled for a brief moment before bowing her head again. “It’s an honor to meet you, High Lord.”

“A pleasure to meet you as well, lady.” Eris replied sincerely, meeting her bright eyes. “I didn’t realize Tarquin was hoarding such beauty within his keep.”

“We have many treasures in our court, High Lord. She is one of our brightest.”

Rather than blushing, the female held her head high, giving a polite “Thank you, High Lord.”

“We must be getting to lunch now. Have a pleasant rest of your class, Lady L/N.” He turned to the children with a stern look “And children, behave for her.” following the reminder with a smile and cheeky wink.

—————

It was hours later that Eris was released from meetings for the day. Unfortunately, there was still more to be discussed that would have to wait for tomorrow. Making the way to his guest suite, Eris found himself wondering about the instructor from earlier. Something about her felt vaguely familiar but he couldn’t quite place it.

After changing out of his stuffy clothes into something more befitting of the climate, Eris paced his room. He’d forgotten how much longer daylight lasted here than in his own court, with several hours remaining before dusk. He supposed he could brave the heat and take a stroll through the palace grounds, preferably without his entourage of guards.

Relieving the pair from their duties, Eris wandered through the gardens and toward a small grove of trees on the other side of the palace grounds. He could hear running water from a garden tributary that likely connected into the river that emptied into Adriata’s harbor.

Sauntering through the grove, he was pleased to find reprieve from the heat, the cool air wafting off of the stream and shade from the trees turning the grove into a private oasis. It wasn’t particularly trekked through. “Finally.” he thought to himself. A moment of peace.

Situating himself on an iron bench, Eris looked up, only to find that through a thicket of cattails, Lady L/N was standing on a rock upstream, eyes closed and balancing on one leg. Given her steady, intentional breathing he supposed she was meditating. It was odd - seeing her like this - strangely intimate to see someone in such an isolated state of catharsis, unaware of his own presence before her. The sun rays shone through cracks in the leaves, shrouding her in tiny fragments of light that made her tanned skin near golden. Her hair was wind blown from the breeze winding through the grove off the ocean, and she’d changed into a thin cotton sundress. Gods, maybe the Summer Court wasn’t so bad after all. The way it effortlessly flowed over her body perfectly accentuating her ample curves, and those tanned, toned legs - yeah, he should probably leave.

After momentary internal warring he began to stand but before he could sneak off, she gasped. Clutching her arms to her rib cage. “MOTHER FUCKER!” she screamed. Vulgar words coming from such a pretty mouth.

What an interesting method of meditation.

She took several breaths before resuming her position. Another minute went by when she audibly growled. “Bastard!!” She clutched herself again, keeling over. Finally she sat down on the rock, the hem of her dress soaking in the stream’s rippling water, and pressed her head into her hands. Eris thought she was crying.

He really should leave but - memories of his mother crying over the years flashed into his mind. All the years that she only had he or Lucien to console her, kindered spirits brought together by Beron’s casual cruelty. His other brothers being the emotionally void carbon copies of their father they were, paid no mind to their mother’s plight.

Yet still, he didn’t know her. She didn’t know him. She likely didn’t want him bothering her.

Against his better judgement, he found himself drawn in by her familiarity and approached. As he drew closer, he realized her sobs were not sobs at all. She was muttering the raunchiest, most vile slew of curses that he’d ever heard. Lucien would enjoy this female.

As he approached, she jerked her head up. The lovely, collected face from earlier twisted into one of contempt. He wondered if she knew that, that face was, well, adorable like a fierce little kitten. Although, something told him to tread carefully. She may look adorable but he’d bet good coin that her bite matched that of a lions.

“What do you want?” She spat.

Eris only smirked. “And here I thought you were a lady.”

Baiting her. Genius idea, Eris.

“Only within the palace.”

“You’re still on palace grounds.” Shrugging with the statement, Eris put his hands in his pockets - damn these Summer Court linens really were comfortable.

“Well, I was alone until you intruded.” she murmured, not meeting his eyes.

“Did you win Tarquin��s good graces with such manners?”

Her expression filled with ire as she looked up at him. “Did you take your throne by being such a prick?”

Eris couldn’t help but laugh at her bravado. This female either REALLY didn’t like him or truly didn’t care about consequences. “Ah, so you do know who I am.”

“You’re a High Lord. Of course I know-“

Her words cut off as she clutched her ribs again, tighter this time. A shudder escaping her. This time the pain seemed to last longer. And this time he could have sworn her voice cracked as she swore.

“Hey” Eris stepped into the creek, not bothering to step out of his sandals. Before he could hesitate he crouched down before her, placing a hand on her shoulder. “Breathe.”

The thing was, he recognized that pain well. It has been centuries but damn he remembered it so clearly.

“Breathe through it. Think of something that makes you smile.”

She clutched herself harder, shaking her head. “Think of the look on your student’s face when you gave him that shell today.”

She breathed in deeply this time instead of letting out another curse.

“Good. Hold for three beats.”

“Now let the breath out.”

She breathed out. “In again.” He instructed. She followed suit. “Now out.”

As her breath steadied, she met his eyes - momentarily soft, a little broken, before ire crossed them again.

“For fucks sake, High Lord.” She spat. “I came here to meditate. I know how to breathe.”

She sure as shit seemed to have forgotten how to for a moment there, but he kept that to himself.

He only let out a soft laugh.

“There she is.”

She scowled in return.

“So, Lady L/N” he began, standing and extending a hand to help her up.

“Y/N.” She interjected, taking his hand. “Call me Y/N.”

Y/N. Fitting, he thought. The kind of name a tropical storm would be given.

Wait. Y/N L/N. Oh, he knew exactly why she was so familiar now. No wonder she’d given him that puzzled look in the palace. And, if Eris recalled correctly, his brother actually was rather fond of her - in a friendly and platonic sort of way. Though in his tales of the Night Court he’d certainly never mentioned the fact that she looked like a gods damned deity.

He led her out of the creek, not quite ready to drop her delicate hand. “So, Y/N, tell me about this idiot mate that let the Summer Court’s brightest treasure go.”

She gaped, jaw dropping into a look of genuine shock. “How-“

“I had one too. I believe you know her.”

—————

Eris and Y/N spent hours talking in the grove. He gave her all the details of his mate, Morrigan. How it killed him to leave her that fated day. Had he touched her, his mate, Beron would have claimed her as Autumn Court property requiring a Blood Duel for the Night Court to retrieve her. Though, Beron would have ensured she never left unharmed. That aside, Eris didn’t want that blood on her hands, the blood of a blood duel or any battles over her. He didn’t want it on his hands either. It killed him to feel her pain down the bond starting from their forced engagement and through the torture her father had inflicted upon her, and the trauma that lingered thereafter. The gut-wrenching, immobilizing pain that only a mate could feel shooting through to them.

He never wanted her to feel that pain. If it hurt him that badly to only feel it down the bond, he couldn’t imagine the strife she’d felt. He wanted to run to her, to comfort her, to tell her everything he couldn’t risk saying. He was too young to face the ramifications from his father and he had his mother and Lucien to protect in those days. So he protected her in the only way he knew how to at the time. Through cold, calculated indifference. He still regretted it.

As time went on, the mask he wore became heavier and heavier, burying that bond deeper within himself. It took him until after the war with Hybern to finally lay it all out to her. Y/N never knew any of that part of the story. She knew Mor and Eris had made amends but nothing of their bond, and she knew that Mor was happily committed to Emerie, an Illyrian female now. He was happy for his mate, as happy as a rejected mate could be.

Eris never claimed to have been in the right. In fact, what he did to Mor was wrong. The way he spoke to her as if she was no more than a common whore when facing her in front of his father at the High Lord’s meeting. Yes, it was an act but it was never okay. He’d live with that for the rest of his days. His apologies to her since never felt like enough.

Y/N empathized with Eris. He could see that she was torn but her gaze toward him softened although, never into that of pity. He liked that about her.

She shared the story of her mating bond with Azriel. And how the waves of anger and grief down the bond had increased in strength recently as she had continued healing. She laughed bitterly at the typical trajectory of females in her situation getting better over time while unfaithful males seemed to spiral as it went on. She didn’t say who he had cheated on her with but Eris had his suspicions. The Shadowsinger apparently had a thing for Vanserra mates. She laughed and cried over the hours they talked. They’d eventually ended up back in a palace seating area for a drink.

Eris hadn’t been so open with someone like this in so long that it felt foreign. Hell, opening up always felt unnatural for him. Perhaps he was stupid for sharing with her. After all, mating bonds could make people do crazy things. She could always take Azriel back and share the details of his little sob stories with the Night Court.

She’d occasionally let out a sharp breath as small jolts of emotion came rolling in. It was nearing dusk when she finally huffed, slapping her hands on her thighs saying, “Enough! This tea is weak. I need something stronger.” Pouring them each a glass of brandy, and another, and another.

As the conversation shifted from the heavier topics to lighter ones, Eris let it slip that he wasn’t fond of the summer court and found all of the sand and humidity to be unpleasant at best.

Her inhibitions were down and if Eris were being honest with himself, his were too. He hadn’t drank much since becoming a High Lord though he often felt the need for a stiff drink. No, there was too much work to be done and he was still getting his own inner circle acclimated. Trust was harder to give in the Autumn Court, especially after being under his father’s rule for so long. There were plenty of good people in the castle but just as many were corrupted under Beron’s rule. Weeding them out was consuming more of his time than anticipated.

Somehow, after their fourth drink, Y/N dragged him out onto the beach, determined to show him all the merits of the crusty, sand-infested shores.

Admittedly, her joy was contagious but he was going to make her work for any positive reaction.

“Okay!” She eagerly squealed. “First - sand castles! Have you ever built one?”

“I live in a castle.” Eris feigned boredom, inspecting his nails. “It seems unnecessary to build one out of… that.” his nose scrunched up, lip curling into a sneer as he gestured to the sand surrounding them.

“Ughhh.” Her eyes rolled back into her head as her little sun dress blew in the wind. And damn if he wouldn’t love to see her eyes going back into her head like that in other circumstances.

He was a gentlemale but a male nevertheless.

“Being High Lord doesn’t mean you have to be such a bore, but fine… No sand castles. Maybe next time!”

Next time. He liked the thought of that. My how far she’d come from practically snarling at him just this morning.

“Look!” She squealed, bringing her hands to her chest and clapping with excitement. “Dolphins! Now I know you don’t have those in the Autumn Court, Eris Vanserra.”

Fuck, his name sounded so good coming off of her lips.

He couldn’t resist smiling at her enthusiasm and then at the dolphins. They swam so peacefully in a pod through the harbor. One even let a young water wraith trail alongside it as a hand carefully gripped onto its dorsal fin as the creature pulled her along.

“The wraiths and dolphins coexist well together.” Y/N mused wistfully. “There’s a common misconception that they are territorial due to food supply but they have plenty in the harbor.”

She smiled softly. “The younger wraiths tend to bond with them and the dolphins have even been known to protect them from certain dangers.”

As the pair continued walking along the shore, the conversation occasionally faltered as Y/N would stare off distantly, as if looking for something that wasn’t there.

His heart ached for her. From what he’d gathered during their talk, she’d left the Shadowsinger, but the heart is slow to heal after losing a mate in any capacity.

Eris nudged her with his shoulder. “Hey little minx, where’d you go?”

Coming back to reality she halted. “Oh! Oh my gods. The sun is setting and you have to come with me! Hurry.”

She grabbed his wrist and he didn’t hesitate to follow along as she all but dragged him down the beach. “Hurry! We’ll miss them!”

They ran until reaching a secluded inlet of the bay. They climbed up a small rocky ledge where she sat, dangling her feet over the edge. “There’s an underwater cave-“ she breathed heavy, catching her breath. “here, beneath us and every night-“ another pause to breathe. “something magical happens as the sun sets.”

Eris, catching his own breath, waited patiently for more details but she only dropped a small pebble into the water and as she did, a rainbow of luminescent fish rippled to life below the surface. There had to be thousands of them, leisurely swimming out of the cave as if they were just waking up. Shades of bright pink, green, blue, orange, and purple lit up the small inlet. Eris was awestruck, so awestruck in fact that he didn’t hesitate planting his ass next to her on the crusty sand-coated ledge.

With a wave of her wrist she pulled a bottle of rum out from the pocket realm, tugging the cork out with her teeth and taking a swig, then handing it over to him.

They sat in silence as the remaining fish left the inlet and the remaining colors of the sunset disappeared into night. Clouds began rolling in as they drank and began chatting again. Much like that morning, thunder rolled in but this time he was disappointed to hear it. He didn’t want the evening to end, wasn’t ready to let her go quite yet.

He wished he’d had a warning before the ocean winds blew this wild, beautiful storm into his life that morning. Something to brace himself against the inevitable fallout of the precarious situation he found himself in. It was a storm he was prepared to ride out and he had a feeling it would be worth whatever debris she’d leave him with.

The base of the distant thunder rumbling, the cymbal-like crash of waves on the shore, and singing of the creatures of summer nights blended together into a beautiful melody that flowed through Eris. Quickly he stood, extending a hand to her. “Dance with me, Y/N?”

She froze, that distant look crossing her eyes again for a second. He braced himself for her decline but the life returned to her eyes as a smile graced her full lips. She accepted his hand and didn’t hesitate as he tucked her into his chest, her warmth and scent lulling him into a state of bliss.

No, Eris Vanserra did not hate the Summer Court at all.

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This was a long one and I know it wasn’t from our girls POV but I hope you all enjoyed it 🥹 Stay tuned for more! Her story is not done yet.

Tags:

@going-through-shit @kalulakunundrum @lisanna2000 @fxckmiup @sheblogs @emryb @one-big-fangirl @historygeekqueen @isa1b2h3 @bigcreatorwombatdreamer @theravenphoenix26 @sidthedollface2 @i-am-infinite @caraaaaugh @evergreenlark @darkbloodsly @piceous21 @anxious-study

#sarah j maas #acotar #a court of thorns and roses #azriel #a court of silver flames #a court of frost and starlight #a court of mist and fury #a court of wings and ruin #azriel shadowsinger #azriel x reader #eris x reader #summer court #tarquin #eris vanserra #eris x oc #eris vandaddy #inspired by Hunter Hayes #storm warning Hunter Hayes

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physalian · 4 months

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Pacing your Story (Or, How to Avoid the "Suddenly...!")

Arguably *the* most important lesson all writers need to learn, even for those who don’t give a damn about themes and motifs and a moral soap box: How your story is paced, whether it’s a comic book, a children’s chapter book, a doorstopper, a mini series, a movie, or a full-length season of TV (old school style), pacing is everything.

Pacing determines how long the story *feels* regardless of how long it actually is. It can make a 2 hour movie feel like 90 mins or double the time you’re trapped in your seat.

There’s very little I can say about pacing that hasn’t been said before, but I’m here to condense all that’s out there into a less intimidating mouthful to chew.

So: What is pacing?

Pacing is how a story flows, how quickly or slowly the creator moves through and between scenes, how long they spend on setting, narration, conversation, arguments, internal monologues, fight scenes, journey scenes. It’s also how smoothly tone transitions throughout the story. A fantasy adventure jumping around sporadically between meandering boredom, high-octane combat, humor, grief, and romance is exhausting to read, no matter how much effort you put into your characters.

Anyone who says the following is wrong:

Good pacing is always fast/bad pacing is always slow

Pacing means you are 100% consistent throughout the entire story

It doesn’t matter as much so long as you have a compelling story/characters/lore/etc

Now let me explain why in conveniently numbered points:

1. Pacing is not about consistency, it’s about giving the right amount of time to the right pieces of your story

This is not intuitive and it takes a long time to learn. So let’s look at some examples:

Lord of the Rings: The movies trimmed a *lot* from the books that just weren’t adaptable to screen, namely all the tedious details and quite a bit of the worldbuilding that wasn’t critical to the journey of the Fellowship. That said, with some exceptions, the battles are as long as they need to be, along with every monologue, every battle speech. When Helm’s Deep is raging on, we cut away to Merry and Pippin with the Ents to let ourselves breathe, then dive right back in just before it gets boring.

The Hobbit Trilogy: The exact opposite from LotR, stretching one kids book into 3 massive films, stuffing it full of filler, meandering side quests, pointless exposition, drawing out battles and conflicts to silly extremes, then rushing through the actual desolation of Smaug for… some reason.

Die Hard (cause it’s the Holidays y’all!): The actiony-est of action movies with lots of fisticuffs and guns and explosions still leaves time for our hero to breathe, lick his wounds, and build a relationship with the cop on the ground. We constantly cut between the hero and the villains, all sharing the same radio frequency, constantly antsy about what they know and when they’ll find out the rest, and when they’ll discover the hero’s kryptonite.

2. Make every scene you write do at least two things at once

This is also tricky. Making every scene pull double duty should be left to after you’ve written the first draft, otherwise you’ll never write that first draft. Pulling double duty means that if you’re giving exposition, the scene should also reveal something about the character saying it. If you absolutely must write the boring trip from A to B, give some foreshadowing, some thoughtful insight from one of your characters, a little anecdote along the way.

Develop at least two of the following:

The plot

The backstory

The romance/friendships

The lore

The exposition

The setting

The goals of the cast

Doing this extremely well means your readers won’t have any idea you’re doing it until they go back and read it again. If you have two characters sitting and talking exposition at a table, and then those same two characters doing some important task with filler dialogue to break up the narrative… try combining those two scenes and see what happens.

**This is going to be incredibly difficult if you struggle with making your stories longer. I do not. I constantly need to compress my stories. **

3. Not every scene needs to be crucial to the plot, but every scene must say something

I distinguish plot from story like a square vs a rectangle. Plot is just a piece of the tale you want to tell, and some scenes exist just to be funny, or romantic, or mysterious, plot be damned.

What if you’re writing a character study with very little plot? How do you make sure your story isn’t too slow if 60% of the narrative is introspection?

Avoid repeating information the audience already has, unless a reminder is crucial to understanding the scene

This isn’t 1860 anymore. Every detail must serve a purpose. Keep character and setting descriptions down to absolute need-to-know and spread it out like icing on a cake – enough to coat, but not give you a mouthful of whipped sugar and zero cake.

Avoid describing generic daily routines, unless the existence of said routine is out of ordinary for the character, or will be rudely interrupted by chaos. No one cares about them brushing their teeth and doing their hair.

Make sure your characters move, but not too much. E.g. two characters sitting and talking – do humans just stare at each other with their arms lifeless and bodies utterly motionless during conversation? No? Then neither should your characters. Make them gesture, wave, frown, laugh, cross their legs, their arms, shift around to get comfortable, pound the table, roll their eyes, point, shrug, touch their face, their hair, wring their hands, pick at their nails, yawn, stretch, pout, sneer, smirk, click their tongue, clear their throat, sniff/sniffle, tap their fingers/drum, bounce their feet, doodle, fiddle with buttons or jewelry, scratch an itch, touch their weapons/gadgets/phones, check the time, get up and sit back down, move from chair to table top – the list goes on. Bonus points if these are tics that serve to develop your character, like a nervous fiddler, or if one moves a lot and the other doesn’t – what does that say about the both of them? This is where “show don’t tell” really comes into play.

4. Your entire work should not be paced exactly the same

Just like a paragraph should not be filled with sentences of all the same length and syntax. Some beats deserve more or less time than others. Unfortunately, this is unique to every single story and there is no one size fits all.

General guidelines are as follows:

Action scenes should have short paragraphs and lots of movement. Cut all setting details and descriptors, internal monologues, and the like, unless they service the scene.

Journey/travel scenes must pull double or even triple duty. There’s a reason very few movies are marketed as “single take” and those that are don’t waste time on stuff that doesn’t matter. See 1917.

Romantic scenes are entirely up to you. Make it a thousand words, make it ten thousand, but you must advance either the romantic tension, actual movement of the characters, conversation, or intimacy of the relationship.

Don’t let your conversations run wild. If they start to veer off course, stop, boil it down to its essentials, and cut the rest.

When transitioning between slow to faster pacing and back again, it’s also not one size fits all. Maybe it being jarring is the point – it’s as sudden for the characters as it is for the reader. With that said, try to keep the “suddenly”s to a minimum.

5. Pacing and tone go hand in hand

This means that, generally speaking, the tone of your scene changes with the speed of the narrative. As stated above, a jarring tonal shift usually brings with it a jarring pacing shift.

A character might get in a car crash while speeding away from an abusive relationship. A character who thinks they’re safe from a pursuer might be rudely and terrifyingly proven wrong. An exhausting chase might finally relent when sanctuary is found. A quiet dinner might quickly turn romantic with a look, or confession. Someone casually cleaning up might discover evidence of a lie, a theft, an intruder and begin to panic.

Whatever the case may be, a narrative that is all action all the time suffers from lack of meaningful character moments. A narrative that meanders through the character drama often forgets there is a plot they’re supposed to be following.

#writing advice #writing tips #pacing #writing tools

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em-dash-press · 10 months

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The 5 Most Essential Turning Points in a Character’s Arc

You spend so much time creating a character because you want them to feel real. You want to connect with them and use them to create an experience for your readers. Their character arc is how that happens.

Don’t miss out on these essential turning points that make an arc feel not only whole, but complete.

1. The Inciting Incident

Your inciting incident gets your plot moving. It isn’t going to be the first sentence of your story (also called your hook), although it could be if you crafted your first sentence for that purpose.

An inciting incident is a plot event that guides your character in a new direction. It’s the successful prison break, the meeting of instant rivals, or the moment your protagonist wins the lottery in your first chapter.

Without the inciting incident, your protagonist’s life would carry on as usual. They wouldn’t start the arc that makes them an interesting person for the reader to stick with throughout your story.

2. Introducing the Protagonist’s Main Flaw

Every protagonist needs a primary flaw. Ideally, they’ll have more than one. People aren’t perfect and they rarely get close enough to only have one negative characteristic. Protagonists need that same level of humanity for readers to connect with them.

There are many potential flaws you could consider, but the primarily flaw must be the foundation for your character’s arc. It might even be the catalyst for the story’s peak.

Imagine a hero archetype. They’re great and well-intended, but they have a problem with boasting. Their arc features scenes where they learn to overcome their need to brag about themselves, but they get drunk and boast in a bar right before the story’s peak. The antagonist’s best friend hears this because they’re at the same bar, so they report the hero’s comment to the main villain. It thwarts the hero’s efforts and makes the climax more dramatic.

Other potential flaws to consider:

Arrogance

Pride

Fear

Anxiety

Carelessness

Dishonesty

Immaturity

3. Their First Failure

Everyone will fail at a goal eventually. Your protagonist should too. Their first failure could be big or small, but it helps define them. They either choose to continue pursuing that goal, they change their goal, or their worldview shatters.

Readers like watching a protagonist reshape their identity when they lose sight of what they wnat. They also like watching characters double down and pursue something harder. Failure is a necessary catalyst for making this happen during a character’s arc.

4. Their Rock Bottom

Most stories have a protagonist that hits their rock bottom. It could be when their antagonist defeats them or lose what matters most. There are numerous ways to write a rock-bottom moment. Yours will depend on what your character wants and what your story’s theme is.

If you forget to include a rock-bottom moment, the reader might feel like the protagonist never faced any real stakes. They had nothing to lose so their arc feels less realistic.

Rock bottoms don’t always mean earth-shattering consequences either. It might be the moment when your protagonist feels hopeless while taking an exam or recognizes that they just don’t know what to do. Either way, they’ll come to grips with losing something (hope, direction, or otherwise) and the reader will connect with that.

5. What the Protagonist Accepts

Protagonists have to accept the end of their arc. They return home from their hero’s journey to live in a life they accept as better than before. They find peace with their new fate due to their new community they found or skills they aquired.

Your protagonist may also accept a call to action. They return home from their journey only to find out that their antagonist inspired a new villain and the protagonist has to find the strength to overcome a new adversary. This typically leads into a second installment or sequel.

Accepting the end of their arc helps close the story for the reader. A protagonist who decides their arc wasn’t worth it makes the reader disgruntled with the story overall. There has to be a resolution, which means accepting whatever the protagonist’s life ended up as—or the next goal/challenge they’ll chase.

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Hopefully these points make character arcs feel more manageable for you. Defining each point might feel like naming your instincts, but it makes character creation and plotting easier.

Want more creative writing tips and tricks? I have plenty of other fun stuff on my website, including posts like Traits Every Protagonist Needs and Tips for Writing Subplots.

#character arcs #creating characters #creating character arcs #character development #writing characters #character concept #plotting #how to plot #writing plot #creative writing #writeblr #writers of tumblr #writing tips #writing advice #writing resources #writing inspiration #writing community #writing help #writing

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sugar-grigri · 9 months

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Fujimoto answers you directly in this chapter (yes)

How about reading CSM differently? Or at least cut it up differently? Because the more the chapters progress, the more a certain pattern seems to repeat itself: Part 1 sounds as if Fujimoto is unveiling CSM in its purest form, then Part 2 sounds as if CSM is responding to its own reception by its fans.

I've already said many times that Fujimoto likes contrast in form and in writing, and this chapter, though brain-numbing, simply follows Fujimoto's own rules, only in an even more accentuated way.

To prove my point, I recommend you reread chapter 133 "Protest", which for me speaks directly to the divisive image represented by Fujimoto and his work Chainsaw Man.

I've already done an exhaustive analysis of it, but let's get one thing out of the way: Fujimoto answers his fans in part 2.

Whether it's by posing a heroine who seems incompatible with Denji, hating the figure of CSM which is nonetheless the work in which she's included, whether it's through the themes addressed by part 2, the question of dual identity, creating antagonists like Fake!CSM, setting up a church (us) around CSM

We're in a work that speaks for itself, as chapter 137 confirms, and for this very rule, we refer to the previous chapters (an eternal restart).

Chapter 136, entitled "Normal Life", refers to a more-than-CENTRAL theme in Chainsaw Man, the nerve that irrigated the whole of Part 1 Denji's disillusionment, a bargaining chip for the former antagonist, Fujimoto takes his fans by the hand and puts them back into the game they know.

We see what we'd all expected to see, a Denji who doesn't know how to fit into normal life, who's not cut out for

In my previous analysis, I explained how not only is Denji incapable of having a normal life, not only because of himself but also because of Yoshida, who offers him this life, and above all because of Fujimoto, who abruptly breaks the rhythm of his own chapter with this aggression, frustrating (I'm sure on purpose) his own fans.

What Fujimoto does is make you think you were reading in the right direction, showing you a Denji depressed by his normal life, and like a child amused by not wanting to be predictable, he breaks what would otherwise have been a logical thing to see. I mean… Who could have foreseen such a title?

Chapter 137 simply follows the same logic: Fujimoto has foreseen your frustrated reactions and knows full well that you've become attached to Denji, hoping that he'll break out of the cycle of manipulation.

He plays you in this chapter by setting up a confident, emotionally well-adjusted Denji who pushes this stranger away, reminding her of the rules of respect and consent.

It's not just Denji's thoughts, the way he would have liked to act, it's also the way YOU would have liked him to act.

Now I can explain why these chapters, which break with the previous ones in their absurdity, are surely the most important in CSM.

Many had pointed to the famous cinema reference in chapter 136, others had even noted that chapter 136 constituted chapter 39 of part 2, responding to Makima's date with Denji in part 1 in the same chapter.

But chapter 39 of part 1 wasn't just interesting for the cinema scene, it was the one that set the rules for understanding CSM.

In fact, it was this chapter to which chapter 93 responded, with Denji's ideology (in favor of bad movies) confronting Makima (against bad movies).

In the same way, the second chapter 39 (the 136th) also seeks to lay down rules

Chapters 136 and 137 have never been more responsive to CSM fans, stubbornly denying them what they want.

What Fujimoto does is to return to cinema in its purest form in the second half, using the codes of the middle-aged male slasher.

That's why the two high-school students go to Fujimoto's karaoke bar, because you're going to find yourself in its purest essence: having fun with the utmost absurdity.

It's no longer a question of representing cinema, as in the two chapters 39, but of making cinema.

But why a slasher? Think of the mythical slashers that traumatized a generation… Yes… The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is a work that has achieved cult status for having opened the door to a new trend in American horror cinema: the slasher movie. Nothing represents a slasher movie more than a chainsaw-headed hero?

Inspired by the Italian "giallos", slasher movies feature a masked killer, a gang of youngsters and the killings of the serial killer in question. Fujimoto takes up this theme in his own way: Denji doesn't kill with his iconic chainsaw, he's not masked, and it's the young couple who hold the beats and the shady men who get killed.

If we go back to the depression we all expected to see, it's actually more complicated to understand: Denji's depression at being trapped in a type of writing that's too serious for him.

Here Denji follows the rules of the game, enjoying himself by killing all those old people, saying ironically: "not bad this normal life".

Because this scene is perfectly normal in Fujimoto's karaoke.

In itself, Yoshida was right. Indeed, no, Denji is not the hero of the normal film that was unfolding before them. Because they're not in normal life, it's projected onto the screen. CSM's reality is an absurd slasher. It is in this slasher, in this false normal life, that the protagonist, Denji, is.

Denji is the protagonist of another film. And maybe in this one, the world needs Chaisaw Man.

#csm spoilers #chainsaw man #csm part 2 #csm #denji #csm 137 #csm 136 #csm 133 #csm 39 #my thoughts

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hannie-dul-set · 4 months

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HOME FOR THE BITCHLESS [8].

SYNOPSIS. wherein your friend offers a room for you to crash in while your dorm is being renovated, but fails to mention that your new housemates don’t know how to talk to women (oh, and they also have an ongoing bet about you, too).

PAIRINGS. choi soobin, choi beomgyu, lee heeseung, park jongseong, sim jaeyun, park sunghoon x female! reader. GENRE. housemates! au, rom-com, sitcom, reverse harem time baby. WARNINGS. swearing, vomit, heeseung is sick, tormenting said sick man, sex jokes, and loser hee backstory reveal. WORD COUNT. 3.8k.

NOTE. merry christmas. my gift for u all is the heeseung chapter. let's pretend that it's still summer for the sake of the fic yes thank u hope u enjoy.

MASTERLIST | NEXT >

CHAPTER 8 — hot, drenched, and sweaty.

“I THINK HEESEUNG IS IN A FIGHT CLUB.” That unprompted statement catches the interest of all the four boys currently in the living room. Soobin looks up from his half-finished crocheted bonnet, Jake and Jay pause their game of scrabble, and Sunghoon drops a rubik’s cube on your face because you gallantly decided to use his lap as a pillow on the lounge sofa.

“Oh god, I’m— I’m sorry,” he sputters out an apology. You take this as a sign to stop invading his space. “What do you mean though? Fight club? Heeseung?”

“Listen.”

You spring up from your position, sitting with a very determined look on your face which simply prompts their attention further. “Heeseung leaves the house at exactly 10 p.m. every Saturday night and comes back at like two in the morning. I asked him about is once, and all he said is that he’s doing ‘business,’ whatever the fuck that means. It’s suspicious as hell.”

The only reason why you were up at 2 a.m. to catch him in the act in the first place is because one time, you challenged Beomgyu and Jake to a no-sleeping contest and those two are the most gullible and have the most money from the lot. Little did those suckers know that you slept for fifteen hours prior to challenging them. They dozed off at the thirty six hour mark while you were still awake enough to catch Heeseung sneaking into the house at the devil’s hour.

After that, you had more money in your bank account, and a new curiosity that’s begging to be satisfied.

“I think he’s in an underground fighting club,” you declare. “There’s no other reason.”

“No, no,” Jay contends. “It might be something else. He could be a stripper.”

A silent moment of consideration.

Then you all release a unified, “Nah.”

“Maybe it’s private,” says Sungoon. “What—whatever it is, it could be none of our business.”

He has a point, but you’re nosy and bored. So are Jake and Jay because turns out, today’s a Saturday, and you have nothing to do, and you’re acquitted from any charges of instigating things because it’s Jay who announces, “Should we follow him?”

You grin. Sunghoon doesn’t approve of your expression. “We should follow him.”

“I’ll keep a lookout.”

“Text us when he’s about to leave.”

“You got it.”

Thus starts your mission of finding out whether Heeseung is secretly an underground fighter or a stripper. Sunghoon refused to be a part of it, but Soobin wasn’t strong enough to deny your puppy dog eyes, so it’s you, him, Jake, and Jay who might be charged for stalking and invasion of privacy because the moment you get a signal from Jake that “the target is out of the house, over,” the four of you, willingly or otherwise, start to tail him.

It’s disconcertingly easy to follow Heeseung without him noticing the four not so discreet people lagging behind him. When he takes off on a bus, you quickly hail a taxi for the four of you to jump inside of and continue the trail.

“I think—I think we should head back,” says Soobin, squeezing his arms against his torso because there are three of you cramped in the backseat. “The sky is glum. I think it’s gonna rain.”

“The sky is glum because it’s the fucking night. Mr. Sun has died. Wait, he just got off the bus. Let’s go, let’s go before we lose him!”

As you stalk down the sidewalk, you can’t help but feel a sense of deja vu because you swear you’ve crossed this same path before. You’ve been here before. You’re sure of it, and it’s not just because this area is just around your university, of which you haven’t stepped foot on since the beginning of summer and since living with Jake and his friends.

“Hey, he’s over there, he’s going to that cafe.”

Your deja vu is answered when the familiar facade of The Lounge shows up right before you. Heeseung enters the building. Sunghoon knew all along, that fucking rat. That’s why was so against this plot, that’s why he refused to tag along with you. “I’m going in,” says Jay. You postpone your revenge plan against Sunghoon for later and quickly follow behind Jay into the cafe. Once you enter however, it starts pouring.

The clear glass windows of the place get stained by an assault of raindrops. Crap. None of you brought an umbrella. “I knew it was going to rain…” Soobin laments, and you pat circles against his back to apologize for doubting him, further telling him that he has a knack for weather prediction and if he’s considering switching career paths.

“What now?” Jake asks.

“We can wait for the rain to stop or call Sunghoon to pick us up and bring us umbrellas,” you tell them. “For now, let’s find out what the fuck Lee Heeseung is up to here. This wasn’t part of any of our calculations.” The calculations being either violence or promiscuity. You didn’t make a lot of calculations.

The problem is, Heeseung is nowhere to be found. You end up ordering some drinks and food and decide to settle in a booth at the corner of the place so that you guys can have a full and complete view of the cafe’s entire interior, yet you still can’t find him, so you end up reminiscing the time Sunghoon dumped your lemonade on you which catapulted your hobby of messing with these guys because they become so nervous around you it’s funny.

“Did we enter the wrong building? Did he catch us tailing him and left through the back door?!”

You doubt Jake’s presumptions, and you’re correct to doubt him because right at that moment, Heeseung finally shows his stupid fucking face.

Not only does he show his stupid fucking face— he shows his stupid fucking face on the mini stage in the other corner of the cafe with a freaking guitar. What? So he’s not an underground fighter? Heeseung leans into the mic and a singular “ah,” resounds from the speakers mounted on the walls, muting down the muffled sound of the rain outside in that single instant.

When Heeseung starts to play the instrument followed by the sound of his voice, the rain is forgotten entirely.

This is a surprise. This is unexpected.

“This is disappointing,” says Jay, and you snap your head at him with eyes wide in alarm and disbelief because what does he mean disappointing? Disappointing where? You’ve been living with an angel all this time and you didn’t know?

“Yeah, it’d be cooler if he was in a fight club,” Jake adds, as if their friend isn’t putting the Billboard’s Hot 100 to shame right now. What kind of bullshit are they saying?

“Did you guys know he could sing like that?”

The three look at you, even Soobin, and respond with a yes, a nod, a hum. Your mouth gapes. But you don’t get why you’re surprised when these guys have known each other for years prior to you barging in unannounced— so, of course they know, of course you don’t, and in the midst of all this, your thoughts are interrupted by the sharp screech from the speakers, because Heeseung has stopped singing, and is instead now looking at your table, looking more alarmed than you.

You’re pretty sure your eyes met before he decided to bolt out of the cafe.

“Oh, he’s getting off stage. Maybe he’s going to greet u— why is he skipping our table? Why is he running outside? Hyung, wait!”

None of you end up chasing after him because it’s still pouring outside, and you can already predict what the aftermath of this is going to be. Thus concludes your mission of finding out whether or not Heeseung is secretly an underground fighter or a stripper, with the answer amounting to neither because Heeseung is a performer during The Lounge’s open mic nights, and you don’t get why he’s been acting so secretive about it all this time.

Heeseung wakes up feeling like shit. And not the regular kind of shit. He feels like Satan just chewed him up, only to spit him back out— slobber and the inferno’s of hell included because he’s sweating through his shirt, his blanket feels like a prison, but if he kicks it of, he gets attacked by cold flashes, so he’s in a sticky and uncomfortable limbo between overheating and freezing to fucking death.

His throat is dry. The only thing that escapes his throat is a guttural and inhuman rasp. He wouldn’t be this sick if he didn’t run out in the rain last night.

Rather, he wouldn’t have ran out if you weren’t there last night.

Heeseung rolls to his side with a groan of pain and anguish, muffled against the pillow as a different kind of fevered heat washes over his face. Seriously. Why the fuck were you there last night? He could give less than two shits if his roommates find out that he sings Taylor Swift every weekend at The Lounge, but you— you’re a different story. Because he knows you’re gonna use this information against him somehow, just like how you like to fuck around with his friends.

Too much. Heeseung has always thought you were a bit too much for him. The time you chased Beomgyu around the house in the dress(?) Jay made is the only evidence he needs to affirm that.

Then again, maybe he shouldn’t have bolted out like that immediately after meeting your eyes. You already suspect that you gross him out (which, by the way, couldn’t be more wrong) for always running away from the threat of skin-to-skin contact with you. Why was it raining when it’s still summer, anyway? It’s like that night was a curse made especially for him.

He curls up further into a ball, hoping you just forget about it all and don’t question him about it.

Yet the very opposite happens because what interrupts his spiraling thoughts is the sound of your voice— already threatening a wave of torment.

“Oh, god. You’re in a worse state than I thought.”

Heeseung regrets springing up from his bed because his head immediately gets slammed by the recoil of a headache. “Why...why are you here?” he barely scratches out. You’re by the doorframe, arms crossed and eyes laced with pity. He didn’t even hear the door opening.

“Jake told me about your illness,” you say, walking over to the side of his bed and Heeseung flinches back the moment you set yourself down on the mattress. “He said you have a chronic case of bitchless syndrome.

He looks at you. Your face is dead serious. Heeseung feels a drop of sweat trickling down his neck, then you break into that devious smile of yours and laugh out a grin.

“Kidding. Jake would never say that. He told me you were sick and needed someone to nurse you up, so here I am.”

Holy shit. Heeseung lets out a breath, nearly teetering off his bed to maintain a comfortable enough distance from your overwhelming presence. “Why—” some throat phlegm cuts him off. He lets out a violent cough before reclaiming his voice. “Why you? I—I mean, why did Jake ask you?”

“Ouch?” you remark. “No one else is around. Jake’s out hiking, apparently. Sunghoon’s covering someone’s shift. Beomgyu’s obviously still at his parents. Jay says he’s out on a mission, and Soobin left the house with a giant backpack. I was too afraid to ask. Anyway, I know my very physical presence disgusts you, but deal with it for now, you goober. You look like hell.”

“That’s— that’s not—” You take this opportunity to pull his sweaty blanket off in one swift movement. “That’s not it! You don’t— don’t disgust me, I’m just— you know—”

“I know, I just wanted to fuck with you.”

You’re grinning. You haphazardly fold the sheet before throwing it down to the foot of the bed, sitting over it. Heeseung feels the blood drain from his face— “Anyway, sit up and let me feel you up,” —only for the blood to shoot right back up and nearly knocks him out unconscious. “Feel your temperature up, perv. I’m not taking advantage of a sick man. C’mere, let me see how sick you are.”

Heeseung, however, still has enough marbles to quickly evade your incoming hand. He swerves to the right. You blink at him, arm reaching out to thin air, before trying again, only for Heeseung to swat your hand away with gritted teeth and fearing for his life. “S—sorry,” he chokes out. He sees the glint in your eyes. Crap. He shouldn’t have done that.

“For fuck’s sake, just let me check your temperature— Heeseung! What the hell?!”

“Just—just leave me alone!”

Earlier, Heeseung thought he was about to die. He didn’t think he had enough strength to fight for his life as he squirms underneath you on the bed, driven solely by the desire to protect his fucking pride because there’s no way in hell he’s letting you touch him when he’s all gross and sweaty and gross from the fever. There’s no way in hell he’s letting that happen.

“What are you—”

He yanks out his blanket from underneath you, causing you to roll of his bed and he throws the sheet over his red, hot, and burning face because holy fuck. Holy shit. That was a close call.

When he peeks out from the blanket, Heeseung instantaneously feels a threat to his life.

You’re glaring at him. You look like you want to skin him alive and he gulps and nudges himself away, ass nearly falling off the bed when you get up from the floor and dust yourself off. “Okay,” you huff. “Fine. Have it your way. Die from a heatstroke, or whatever the fuck. I’ll be downstairs if you need me, and if you do, I’m expecting you to get down on your knees and beg because every time you’ve swatted my hand away was an additional jab at my pride.”

Okay, damn. You leave his room, not without slamming his door close to emphasize your anger, and on top of feeling like absolute crap, Heeseung now also feels guilty as hell.

“Fuck,” he rasps out. It’s not like he’s doing it out of malice, or hate, or because he thinks you’re a germ that he cannot touch, like you always accuse him with. Heeseung still remembers how his whole no touching quirk started: sixteen years-old, when Heeseung finally mustered the courage to hold his first girlfriend’s hand, only for her to laugh and joke and pull away while saying, “ew, gross. Your hand is all sweaty.”

Twenty-two year old Heeseung has been traumatized to this very day.

Especially now when he’s all disgusting and icky and very much ew and gross because of his fever. Stupid, he knows, but the last thing he’d want to see is a disgusted grimace from your face the moment the back of your hand presses against his damp and sticky, sickness-induced forehead. However, it seems like he’s been inflicting to you the very injury he’s been trying to protect himself by constantly avoiding the threat of contact of your skin against his.

Stupid. It’s really stupid.

But he can’t avoid dehydration by simply ignoring the dryness of his mouth. With much struggle, Heeseung forces himself out of the bed, despairing the amount of stairs he has to climb down— and the suggestion of calling for you help does tease his brain for a split second, but decides against it with a shake of his head as he continues the awful trip to the living room, body weighing thirty times heavier, and skull feeling like it’s about to crack itself open.

The problem is, his skull does almost end up getting cracked open. Because as he’s finally nearing the bottom floor, he misses a step, causing him to hit the ground with a harsh thud.

“Ugh,” he grunts, pushing himself with his forearms, but he stops, nearly face planting into the floor once more because you’re there, you’re walking up to him, looking down at him, and holding a cold and refreshing glass of water above his head like some sort of fucked up display of powerplay against a sick and thirsty man.

“Need any help?” you hum.

“I’m fine,” Heeseung tries once more to get up only to feel the nausea rise up to his head, and he stops, pauses, and decides that the floor is more comfortable after all. He looks up at you. “Can I...can I get a sip from your glass?”

There’s a glint in your eyes. You crouch down. “Sorry, what was that?”

Are you enjoying this? Do you like watching him in pain? (Likely answer is yes because you yourself have admitted that you enjoy their suffering and torment). “Water,” he rasps out. “Can I drink some of your water?”

“This?” You swirl the glass in your hand, ice clacking against the crystal, before taking a long, tortuous sip on the straw (why does it have a straw?) Heeseung swallows down his spit. “Say please,” you say with a smile. Heeseung chokes on said fucking spit and hacks out a cough because you’re fucking insane.

He feels his face grow hotter. And it’s definitely not just from the fever.

“P—please, give me some of your water.”

You don’t prolong his agony any further and hand him over the glass.

“Need any help getting up?” you ask as you watch him agonizingly sit up against the bottom steps and toss down the water into his throat in one shot as if it was at a company dinner. He wipes his lips with the back of his hand and feels your disappointed stare pricking his conscience. “I can’t help you unless you ask me to, Heeseung.”

He frowns, deflating. “But I’m all gross and sweaty.”

The last thing he expects you to do is to roll your eyes at him and stand up with an arm stretched out.

And the next thing he knows is that you’re lugging him over to the couch, an arm around his waist, his around your shoulder, and you set him down the cushions with a grunt. “Jeez, I’m not made for manhandling men,” you say, very dubiously. “Lie down.” And when he doesn’t lie down, wide-eyed and unresponsive, you poke his forehead and he tips back, falling into the couch.

What…what is going on...

“You know, I’m very tempted to ask you to take your shirt off just to laugh at your reaction, but you actually look like you’re about to die, so I decided against it. Aren’t I sweet?”

You’re back with a basin and some towels (when did you disappear?) and Heeseung’s brain starts malfunctioning, growing dizzier and dizzier by the second when you touch his jaw, damp towel wiping off the sweat coating his face and neck and he feels his throat tightening. “Christ. I think your temp is over forty degrees, my guy,” you say, squeezing the towel over the basin. “Hello? Heeseung? What the hell, did you catch Sunghoon’s disease? Are you unable to talk to me now, too?”

“It’s—it’s not that,” he chokes out. He’s about to justify himself, but you press your palm against his forehead, cutting off all the oxygen pipes leading up to his brain, and he feels like passing the fuck out.

Shit. Shit. Holy shit.

“Ah,” you say. “You’re not running away.”

He’s not. He’s not running away. But he feels a different sort of problem coming up.

“I think I’m gonna throw up.”

You blink at him. This doesn’t help his case at all.

“Wow, this is an upgrade,” you say from the other side of the bathroom door while Heeseung pukes his guts out into the toilet. Heavy metal playing from his phone is trying to block the noises out. He’s heaving over the bowl and wants to kill himself from embarrassment. “Now my very presence makes you vomit. I’m sorry for everything so far.”

There’s a flush. The music stops. Heeseung cracks the door open and you pass him a glass of water without some bedroom-esque powerplay this time. “Seriously, why did you run off into the rain last night? Look where it got you.” It’s a shocker that you haven’t told him he’s gross yet. You’re standing there in front of the bathroom and in front of the mess of his post-vomit presence, and all you’re doing is looking at him in worry.

“I wasn’t expecting you guys to be there,” he says, still sounding like death, and you take the now empty glass from him and head over to the kitchen, pointing at his makeshift deathbed on the couch.

“I wasn’t expecting you to give Mariah Carey a run for her money, either.” After you place the glass into the sink, you’re back to the living room. He’s down on the sofa, eyelids heavy, unable to say or do anything when you push back his hair to place a damp towel on his forehead. “Like damn, I knew you guys have known each other for a while now, but I totally felt like an outsider when I was the only one surprised to hear you sing.”

You’re not making fun of him. You don’t make a comment about how sticky his skin feels or how gross his sweat-drenched shirt is.

“I like your voice. Too bad it sounds like shit right now, but you should let me hear you again once you feel better.” The doorbell rings. “Oh, right, I ordered some porridge. You can feed yourself, right? Hold on, let me get it.”

He hears your footsteps padding across the floor, unable to find the strength to open his eyes as the coolness of the cloth seeps into his forehead. Heeseung has always thought you were a bit too much— case in point, everything that just happened and all the other times you’ve teased, tormented, and actively tortured to the point of tears all the inhabitants of this god forsaken house.

Yet it is also your excessive nature that has let Sunghoon speak more than five words around you, that has stopped Beomgyu from hermitting in his room twenty-four-seven, that has helped Soobin and Jay in two very important instances this summer, and has allowed Jake to offer you a spot in their lives after leaving that room on the third floor empty for a good two years.

“Fuck, I can’t believe they left me behind with a sick man when I can barely even take care of myself.”

You’re back. He opens his eyes and tries to lift himself up but his body is way too heavy. “Uh,” he says. “Can you…please…open the container for me?” He doesn’t miss your amused fucking grin when he mumbles out the please.

“Ah. Open up.”

Heeseung has always felt you were too much. Maybe it’s his fever talking, maybe it’s not, but maybe too much exactly what he needs right now.

HOME FOR THE BITCHLESS. © hannie-dul-set, 2023.

#lee heeseung x reader #heeseung x reader #enhypen x reader #enha x reader #tomorrow x together x reader #txt x reader #heeseung x you #txt scenarios #enhypen scenarios #choi soobin x reader #choi beomgyu x reader #park sunghoon x reader #sim jaeyun x reader

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pikahlua · 30 days

Text

MHA Chapter 418 spoilers translations

This week’s initial tentative super rough/literal translations under the cut.

1-2 みんな嫌いだみんなきらいだ minna kirai da "I hate everyone."

tagline 1 デクが見つけたものそれはーー… デクがみつけたものそれはーー… DEKU ga mitsuketa mono sore wa--... As for what Deku found--...

tagline 2 No.418　小さな心　堀越耕平ナンバー418　ちいさなこころ　ほりこしこうへい NANBAA 418 chiisana kokoro Horikoshi Kouhei No. 418 A Small Heart Kouhei Horikoshi

3 群訝で感じたのと同じーーーーー… ぐんがでかんじたのとおなじーーーーー… gunga de kanjita no to onaji-----... It's the same as what I felt at Gunga-----...

tagline 3 コミック40巻4月4日（木）発売‼︎GETしてね！コミック40かん4がつ4か（木）はつばい‼︎ゲットしてね！ KOMIKKU 40kan 4gatsu 4ka (moku) hatsubai!! GETTO shite ne! Comic volume 40 release on Thursday, April 4th!! Get it!

4 しがっ Shiga "Shiga-"

1 モンちゃん？ MON-chan? "Mon-chan?"

2-3 ここで初めて「崩壊」が発現したんだここではじめて「ほうかい」がはつげんしたんだ koko de hajimete 「houkai」 ga hatsugen shitanda This is where the first Decay manifested.

4 転弧ーてんこー Tenko- "Tenko-"

5 あのね…… ano ne...... "You know what......"

6 あのね…… ano ne...... "You know what......"

7 そんな……そういう事か…！そんな……そういうことか…！ sonna......sou iu koto ka...! No way......So it was something like that...!

8 この後起きる事… このあとおきること… kono ato okiru koto... What happens after this...

9 ハッ HA "Hah" (Note: This is the sound of Tenko hyperventilating, which repeats all through the rest of the page.)

10 ここが核心ここがかくしん koko ga kakushin This place is the core [of it all].

11 やああ yaaa "YAAA!!"

1 ここで決着をつける！ここでけっちゃくをつける！ koko de kecchaku wo tsukeru! I'll settle this here!

2 記憶が具象化する世界…！きおくがぐしょうかするせかい…！ kioku ga gushouka suru sekai...! [In this] world materialized by memories...!

3 イメージしろ！ IMEEJI shiro! Visualize!

4 離すな‼︎ はなすな‼︎ hanasuna!! Don't let go!!

5 思い出し続けろ"手"を‼︎ おもいだしつづけろ"て"を‼︎ omoidashi tsudzukero "te" wo!! Keep recalling* [my] hands!! (Note: This word for "recall" also means "remember." I used "recall" because I thought it made for a good pun.)

6 & 8-9 OFAは全部ぶつけた！ワン・フォー・オールはぜんぶぶつけた！ WAN FOO OORU wa zenbu butsuketa! I struck with all of One For All!

7 なんで…！ nande...! "Why...!"

1 僕自身をぶつけろ！ぼくじしんをぶつけろ！ boku jishin wo butsukero! Strike with myself! (Note: I think Izuku is saying that he used all of the OFA vestiges to strike at Tenko, so now he's using himself to strike at Tenko too.)

2 だって datte "Because"

3 泣いてるないてる naiteru "you're crying."

4 違うよ… ちがうよ… chigau yo... "You're wrong..."

5 僕は… ぼくは… boku wa... "I..."

6 僕が… ぼくが… boku ga... "[It was] I [who]..."

7 選んだんだえらんだんだ erandanda "chose [this]."

8 転弧の感情が…なだれ込んでくる！てんこのかんじょうが…なだれこんでくる！ Tenko no kanjou ga...nadarekonde kuru! Tenko's emotions...are surging [at me]!

9 僕の意志で…この家を…家族を壊したんだ… ぼくのいしで…このいえを…かぞくをこわしたんだ… boku no ishi de...kono ie wo...kazoku wo kowashitanda... "By my will...I destroyed this house...my family..."

10 じゃなきゃ ja nakya "Otherwise,"

11 この手はなんなんだこのてはなんなんだ kono te wa nannanda "what are these hands for?"

1 僕がこうして生まれた事をぼくがこうしてうまれたことを boku ga koushite umareta koto wo "That I was born like this,"

2 誰が肯定できる⁉︎ だれがこうていできる⁉︎ dare ga koutei dekiru!? "who can confirm it!?"

3 最も繊細で柔らかいところもっともせんさいでやわらかいところ motto mo sensai de yawarakai tokoro It is the most delicate, soft place.

4 弾かれる…‼︎だめだ離すなーーーー！はじかれる…‼︎だめだはなすなーーーー！ hajikareru...!! dame da hansuna----! [He's] repelling [me]...!! No, don't let go----!

5 強い憎しみとカタルシス…… つよいにくしみとカタルシス…… tsuyoi nikushimi to KATARUSHISU...... Powerful hatred and catharsis......

6 そして同時にそしてどうじに soshite douji ni and at the same time,

7 悲しみと困惑…！かなしみとこんわく…！ kanashimi to konwaku...! sadness and confusion...!

8 この時まだ転弧は揺れていた…！このときまだてんこはゆれていた…！ kono toki mada Tenko wa yurete ita...! At this time, Tenko was still oscillating...!

1-2 手を離せ…！てをはなせ…！ te wo hanase...! "Let go of my hands...!"

3 殺して止める以外方法がないかもしれないころしてとめるいがいほうほうがないかもしれない koroshite tomeru igai houhou ga nai kamoshirenai There may be no other way than to kill and stop him.

4 具体的にどうすればいいのかもわからないけれどーーーー… ぐたいてきにどうすればいいのかもわからないけれどーーーー… gutaiteki ni dou sureba ii no kamo wakaranai keredo----... I don't know exactly what I should do, but----...

5 僕は手をぼくはてを boku wa te wo "For me, [my] hand..."

6 流れ込んでくるながれこんでくる nagarekonde kuru It's flowing [into me].

7 憎しみが……！にくしみが……！ nikushimi ga......! His hatred......!

8 壊れる…！こんな…！こわれる…！こんな…！ kowareru...! konna...! I'll break...! Like this...!

9 手を掴んでもらっててをつかんでもらって te wo tsukande moratte "when someone held my hand"

10 安心したからあんしんしたから anshin shita kara "I felt relieved, that's why."

1 だから……来たっだから……きたっ dakara......kita "That's why......I am here*." (*Note: Literally this means "I came/arrived," but it's the same word All Might uses that always gets translated as "I am here.")

1 みっくん Mikkun Mikkun.

2 ともちゃん… Tomo-chan... Tomo-chan...

3 じゃあ転ちゃんがオールマイトね！じゃあてんちゃんがオールマイトね！ jaa Ten-chan ga OORU MAITO ne! "So then, Ten-chan is All Might!"

4 ううん uun "No."

1 僕は敵だぼくはヴィランだ boku wa VIRAN da "I am a villain."

2 悪意を持ってあくいをもって akui wo motte "I carry malice,"

3 壊すこわす kowasu "and I destroy."

4 たとえ憎しみを…打ち砕かれようとたとえにくしみを…うちくだかれようと tatoe nikushimi wo...uchikudakareyou to "Even if my hatred...is smashed,"

5 からっぽになろうと karappo ni narou to "even if I become empty,"

1-2 敵のヒーローにならなきゃあいつらのヒーローにならなきゃ aitsura (kanji: VIRAN) no HIIROO ni naranakya "I have to become their (read as: the villains') hero."

3 …やっちまえ ...yacchimae "...Just do it."

4 こんな世の中こんなよのなか konna yo no naka "A world like this,"

5 ブッ潰せブッつぶせ BUttsubuse "crush it."

6 壊してくれよこわしてくれよ kowashite kure yo "Destroy it [for me]."

7 トムラシガラキ TOMURA SHIGARAKI "Tomura Shigaraki." (Note: This is spoken as though in a language like English where one's given name comes before their family name.)

8 指が崩れていくぞ…‼︎ ゆびがくずれていくぞ…‼︎ yubi ga kuzurete iku zo...!! "The fingers are going to collapse...!!"

9 中は…緑谷は一体ーーなかは…みどりやはいったいーー naka wa...Midoriya wa ittai-- "Inside...Midoriya, just what is--"

1 志村さんしむらさん Shimura-san "Mr. Shimura."

2 ああ！ aa! "Ah!"

3 甲賀建設の！こうがけんせつの！ kouga kensetsu no! "[You're the one] from Kouga Construction!"

4 腰痛ですかようつうですか youtsuu desu ka "Lower back pain, is it?"

5 なんだ？ nanda? What's this?

6 年々酷くなって参りますよねんねんひどくなってまいりますよ nennen hidoku natte mairimasu yo "Every year it's getting worse."

7 良い医者紹介しましょうか？いいいしゃしょうかいしましょうか？ ii isha shoukai shimashou ka? "Shall I introduce you to a good doctor?"

8 いやあそこまでしてもらうXでは iyaa soko made shite morau X de wa "Oh no, for you to go that far for me..." (Note: The last kanji/furigana in this speech bubble is illegible, but I think the gist of this line is pretty clear.)

1 なんだこの記憶なんだこのきおく nanda kono kioku What is this memory?

2 そうですね手は掛かりますが… そうですねてはかかりますが… sou desu ne te wa kakarimasu ga... "That's right, he's a bit of a handful, but..."

3 "個性"はもう？ "こせい"はもう？ "kosei" wa mou? "Still no quirk?"

4 それがまだ… sore ga mada... "Not yet..."

5 知らないしらない shiranai I don't know it.

6 …転弧のじゃない… …てんこのじゃない… ...Tenko no ja nai... ...This isn't Tenko's...

7 なんだ nanda Who

8 こいつは koitsu wa is this guy?

1 ああ…愚かな器…！ああ…おろかなうつわ…！ aa...orokana utsuwa...! "Ahh...foolish vessel...!"

2 何者でも無い少年に心をねじ伏せられるとはなにものでもないしょうねんにこころをねじふせられるとは nanimono demo nai shounen ni kokoro wo nejifuserareru to wa "To have your heart made to yield by some nobody boy."

3 弱いまま強くあろうなどああ愚かな志村転弧よわいままつよくあろうなどああおろかなしむらてんこ yowai mama tsuyoku arou nado aa orokana Shimura Tenko "Though you've become strong, you remain weak. Ahh, foolish Tenko Shimura."

4 おまえは今までおまえはいままで omae wa ima made "Even though until now, you"

5 何一つ選んでなどいないのになにひとつえらんでなどいないのに nani hitotsu erande nado inai noni "haven't chosen a single thing."

tagline 出づるAFO！死柄木、デクはーー… いづるオール・フォー・ワン！しがらき、デクはーー… idzuru OORU FOO WAN! Shigaraki, DEKU wa--... All For One emerges! As for Shigaraki and Deku--...

#my hero academia leak translations #mha 418 #bnha 418 #my hero academia manga spoilers #final arc spoilers #sorry it took a while #my dog got sick in the middle of translating

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lialacleaf · 8 months

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A Touch Too Personal

Chapter 2

Summary: You had a crush on Ghost since you started working for Price in communications, but the gruff, reserved Lieutenant only acknowledged your existence on the job. That starts to change with a simple, thoughtful gift. Warnings: Fluff, Simon is bad at processing emotions, past trauma

Imposter Syndrome is often described as feeling unworthy of good things. There’s no basis for this feeling, it’s simply a learned reaction.

It’s exactly how Simon felt after you’d given him that blanket.

He’d never gone out of his way to do anything nice for you. Hell, he barely regarded you when he dropped off his mission reports, which he now felt badly about. Being in that stuffy little office was probably bad enough, but being disregarded entirely by the people who counted on you was probably even worse.

After his most recent mission, he’d actually been too nervous to see you, and sent them in with Gaz. He’d fully intended to deliver them himself, and profusely thank you for the gift, but he had gotten stuck a few steps from your door, and aborted the mission entirely.

He felt like such a screw up, which lead him to his current predicament.

“You wanna do what now?” Soap asked as he sipped his morning coffee in the break room.

“I wanna get her a gift.” Ghost said, crossing his arms over his chest.

“Why?”

Ghost was silent for a moment, starring Soap down with his piercing gaze. “Just ‘cause,” he said stiffly.

“You mean ‘cause of your blankie?” Soap teased and Ghost’s eyes widened. “Ah man she was so proud of that thing, couldn’t wait to give it to you.”

Ghost felt his face grow warm beneath his mask. “Alright, yes. She got me a gift, it’s only proper I do the same,” he said stiffly. “What do you usually get her?”

Soap took a long sip of his coffee. “Nothin’ at all.”

Ghost glared at him. “What?”

“You heard me. She doesn’t do it for something in return. She does it for the smile, the hug, and the thank you.” Ghost felt his blood go cold. “You gave her a hug, right L.T.?” Soap asked.

Ghost stared at him for a second or two, before turning on his heel and rushing out of the break room. Soap simply sighed and shook his head.

He was awful. An Awful, stupid, heartless creature. He needed to fix this, and fast, otherwise you might never regard him fondly ever again, and such an idea was suddenly very alarming despite his general disinterest in you as of a few days ago.

You’d done something so sweet for him, and he’d responded callously. He didn’t deserve the gift you’d given him.

Now he was faced with the challenge of making things right, but he didn’t know anything about you. What was he supposed to do that would redeem him in your eyes?

Soap said you liked actions more than receiving things in return. He could work with that.

Your fingers clacked away at your keyboard as the sun began to set, casting an orange glow through your open office window. You were sulking, hiding in your office so you didn’t risk running into him at the mess hall for dinner.

You’d finished your work an hour ago, but you were hoping if you waited until the tail end of the meal he’d be gone.

You felt so stupid, like you may as well have painted a clown face on and paraded around base telling everyone that you were a joke.

It could have been worse, you tried to reason. He could have simply not accepted it. It would have broke your heart if that had been his reaction.

With a sigh, you closed your laptop and pushed it into your bag. You could sulk more comfortably in your bunk. There was no reason to prolong your suffering in your hard-backed office chair.

Your tired feet carried you back to your room as your mind wandered. Did you really think that the Lieutenant Ghost would take an interest in someone like you? You weren’t anything special. Not like him and the rest of 141. You'd been so mystified by him that your brain had completely thrown logic out the window.

When you finally arrived at your room, there was a small, tan sticky note stuck to your door, and your brow furrowed.

My room, 20:00 -Ghost.

You felt your stomach drop. Was he mad at you? Was he going to tell you off for inappropriately giving him a gift?

You let out a sigh, shaking your head as you opened your door. You were too tired to think too long on it and instead focused on stripping your work clothes off in exchange for a comfy pair of sweatpants and a sweatshirt.

You didn’t feel like going to the mess, even though you were starving, so you threw a package of noodles into your hot-pot and called it a day.

You didn’t bother putting on your work shoes when you slipped out to meet your Lieutenant, and slid on a pair of comfy slippers.

You knocked softly at his door, feeling awkward as a group of soldiers passed you in the hallway. You couldn't help but feel as if their whispers were somehow about you as if you were now the butt of a joke.

You hated feeling so anxious, so out of place. It was as if the rest of the world was laughing at you while you, emotionally speaking, tripped over your own feet.

His door opened with a creak, and your eyes flicked up from your feet to stare at the balaclava covering his face, not quite meeting his gaze.

You both stood quietly as you assessed each other, until he moved from the doorway and gestured for you to enter.

“Rough day?” He asked, taking in your disheveled state. His eyes seemed to linger on your slouched shoulders.

“Just long,” you stated, glancing around the room. You paused however when your gaze landed on his bed.

His blanket lay neatly folded at the foot of it, and you felt your heart jump to your throat. It was clear that he had been using it.

“Price said you’ve been working overtime.”

You jumped at the sound of his voice, and the feeling of his hand on your shoulders and he pushed you to sit on his bed.

“There’s been a lot to do,” you said, situating yourself comfortably. A lie, but you doubted he cared about what you did anyway. Your work probably didn't seem very important to him.

He hummed in response, cupping your cheeks as he gazed down at you. You felt your heart stutter as his thumbs gently dug behind your ear, rubbing soothing circles all the way to your collarbones.

“Lieutenant?” You asked in confusion.

“Hmm?” He hummed, massaging your biceps with his large, calloused hands.

You couldn’t help but let your eyes slide closed. “What…what are you doing?”

“Making sure you feel appreciated.”

You felt your face heat up at his words as he pushed you to lay on your back, massaging your calf muscles, before moving to your ankles and feet.

Appreciated didn't even begin to describe what you felt.

"You do an awful lot for us. Wanted to make sure you knew we see it."

You felt floaty, a soft feeling blanketing your mind as the day’s stress melted away. You tried to stay awake, but your body felt heavy, the intoxicating smell of Ghost lingering in your nose as a result of being in his space, and before you knew it you were softly snoring.

Ghost watched you carefully, pushing a stray hair out of your face and running his gloved thumb across your cheek.

You’d looked exhausted when you’d arrived, and he was glad to see you resting, even if it was in his bed. He couldn’t help but chuckle as he scooted in beside you. The blanket was big enough for the both of you after all. You'd made sure of that.

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#simon riley x reader #simon riley #ghost x reader #simon ghost riley #simon riley x you

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back2bluesidex · 8 months

Text

Where Do Broken Hearts Go (18+) - Masterpost

Pairing: Model, ex-boyfriend!Jungkook X Child psychologist, Fem!Reader X Lawyer, Single Dad!Hoseok.

Summary: Jungkook stripped your emotions naked, left you bare in the chilly wind of despair and self-doubt with an unending heartache. You tried your hardest to move on from him, to live for yourself but failed miserably. Each night you had to come back to your empty home where memories and broken dreams were scattered all around the floor, until one day a little angel and her unbelievably beautiful father came into your life. Finally, when you find yourself healing, maybe falling too, Jungkook had to show up! Again!

Theme: Angst, drama, eventual smut, fluff.

Warnings: mentions of infidelity, mentions of cheating, broken relationship, reader is suffering so bad, pining, more will be added to each part.

Word count: will be mentioned in each part. 476 for the prologue.

Listened to: Where Do Broken Hearts Go by One Direction

Taglist requests are closed!

Minors and karens are not allowed in this blog

A/N: First of all, Happy birthday to Jungkook. Secondly, I finally grew enough balls to start another legit series after a damn year. And obviously it had to be angst. Hope you guys like this attempt of mine.

Disclaimers: Pictures are taken from Pinterest.

Chapters:-

Prologue || Chapter 1 || Chapter 2 || Chapter 3 || Chapter 4 || Chapter 5 || Chapter 6 || Chapter 7 - Finale

Drabbles: Daydream, Incognito

Prologue under cut

“No. No. This is not true. This is not true.” Your murmur under your breath. Clenching your phone hard, you try to keep your breathing stable.

“Calvin Kline Ambassador Jeon Jungkook is rumored to be dating actress Han Jiwon.” you read the headline again and then dive into the article. It explains how your boyfriend had been seen leaving his hotel with one of the most popular actresses of the industry.

There is no mistake, it is Jungkook indeed. You would recognize his bunny features even in your deep sleep, no matter how many hats and masks he uses to conceal his identity. In the picture, he is tightly grasping the hands of the actress as both of them are caught by the camera.

The picture was probably taken last month during Jungkook’s overseas schedule. He didn’t mention having a “friend” over there. He never mentioned anything about meeting Jiwon there. But again, he hardly ever mentions anything anymore.

You put your phone upside down. Inhaling a deep breath, you shut your eyes.

Your body feels heavy, your heart twists in a fear of uncovering a truth that will leave you broken, will leave you stranded on a lonely island all by yourself.

You knew he was changing, you knew he was drifting apart, you know he doesn’t look at you with the same glint in his eyes. You know it all and yet you kept your fingers crossed.

A tear rolls down your cheek and you gulp the lump that formed in your throat overtime.

The door lock chimes in signaling someone has just punched the key-code. You know who it is but you stay in your place, eyes closed.

Soft thud of foot-steps echo in your otherwise silent apartment. You still don’t budge.

He slowly walks closer to your body, stands right beside you, and places a hand on your shoulder.

“It is not what you think it is, Y/N” Jungkook speaks with a barely audible voice.

“I know.” you reply while standing up from your seat.

“I didn’t cheat.” he explains again.

You come face to face with him. His face bears no sign of discomfort, pain or guilt. It’s just… blank. His eyes are so blank that you think he is actually sorry for not cheating on you.

“I know.” you offer again. Walking forward towards your boyfriend, you wrap him in your embrace but… he doesn’t hug you back immediately.

When he places his hands flat on your back, not totally wrapping you up the way he used to, you know it. You know it’s gone.

The familiarity of his warmth, his scent, the feeling of being home, is gone. Even if your body is touching his, you know he is actually miles and miles away from you. And you have doubts if he is ever going to return or not.

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#bts angst #bts smut #jungkook angst #jungkook smut #hoseok angst #hoseok smut #bts x reader #jungkook x reader #hoseok x reader #bts fanfiction #jungkook fanfic #hoseok scenarios #jhope angst #jhope smut #bts

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tripleyeeet · 7 months

Text

GO SLOW (12)

SUMMARY: Astarion figures out some hard truths. Also some easy ones.

PAIRING: Astarion & Female Reader

WORD COUNT: 3,665

WARNINGS: Spoilers for Act 2, depictions of a panic attack, brief mentions of past (sexual) abuse.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: SURPRISE SHAWTY!! Because I was home sick all day and now I'm apparently busy the rest of the week you get the chapter now! Hopefully you like it. :')

CHAPTER LIST / MASTERLIST / NEXT CHAPTER

You’re meant to be focused on the relic —on its discovery and retrieval and potential handoff depending on the item in question. As you walk across the cobblestone, tightly gripping the moonlit lantern, you’re well aware that you more than likely look a bit distracted. Lost in a world of your own as you glance around, knowing you should concentrate instead of allowing your head to fill with thoughts of him.

Embarrassingly though, you can’t help it. Not now, when Astarion’s practically glued to your side, brushing his arm against yours with every step. It’s distracting, to say the least. Creating a mess of thoughts within your mind. Shifting in and out of reality, you find it increasingly difficult to pretend you’re anything but elated over your previous private conversation.

As you continue your journey, feeling the coolness of his hand haphazardly make contact with your own, your heart swells twice its original size at the mere memory. How his voice, so simple and sweet, told you he loved you. Even now, hours later, you can hear it clear as day, echoing through the cavern of your skull. Taking its hold with each passing moment; enveloping you in a warmth like any other, laying a heated waste to every thought that may try to penetrate.

If you’re honest, it makes you feel a bit guilty knowing that the rest of the group is most likely feeling more anxious than anything else. Resembling a cluster of bundled nerves, trudging through the darkness, wondering what might be next, it’s as if you’re the only one struggling with something else.

Fully looking at Astarion, you can see the attentive scowl that rests across his face to prove this. The ever so slightly upturned nose, wrinkling in disgust at the rotting trees that line your vision. The angrily knitted brow that pushes together, revealing a lack of enjoyment as the shadows dance around the lantern. Even the frown that graces his lips appears almost too engrossed with the task at hand, making you realize that, despite your shared feelings, he’s more present than you are.

Upon realizing this, you force yourself away. Taking a half-step from his frame, you shake all thoughts of him, replacing them with whatever observation you find in front of you. Like the sound of a crow echoing through the air or the heavy wisps of wind that hit your ears a little too hard or the looming figure leaning on a nearby epitaph—

All of you stop in your tracks, watching as it emerges from the fog to reveal a smug looking Raphael sauntering towards you.

Greeting you with interest, despite the obvious lack of trust for one another, his eyes scan the line of your bodies, lingering on each for a moment before ultimately falling to you, smirking. “Through the dark he went creeping and awoke what was sleeping…”

His voice makes you shiver as he begins to recite some sort of riddle, reminding you of your previous conversation. The one where he threateningly spoke of his aid being the only way to release you from the tadpole's grasp. Assuring that with time you’d seek him out again despite all of you agreeing otherwise.

Even though the context of the conversation seems completely different, you assume it’s the same reason he’s here now, standing before you, rambling on about some terrifying creature through obnoxious prose. More than likely, he’s here to offer you yet another deal —another contract you know will only end in further misery if you so choose to agree to it.

It’s all devils like him seem to do.

“Strange way to warn us about something,” you comment when he’s finished, raising your brow as he chuckles under his breath.

“Well, you know, I’ve grown quite fond of you —in my own way.”

To your right, Karlach groans. “Is there an actual point to this fucking riddle or is this another opening to one of your shitty dealings?”

In response, Raphael tuts in her direction, subtly shaking his head as the grin across his lips only grows. “Such poor manners, tiefling. You’d think Zariel would’ve taught you better.”

Immediately, Karlach takes a step forward, her jaw clenching just as you and Gale hold her back, both of you staring with pleading eyes for her to calm down.

“And here I thought after all this time apart you might miss me.” Regardless of the obvious threat, he flashes all of you a fake frown, pouting his lips for a moment before changing the mood with another laugh. “No matter. I’m merely here to warn you of the dangers ahead.”

“Dangers?”

This time it’s Shadowheart who speaks, her tone quiet —cautious in the way that Karlach’s fails to be, causing Raphael to nod before going into some long-winded tale of a darkened stage with tired actors. Ones that, if awakened, will cause a great calamity.

Or, so he says. With Raphael, it’s hard to trust what’s being embellished and what’s not with the way he speaks, moving his hands through the air while he rhymes. Sure, there’s a bit of eloquence to the whole thing —an air of intrigue to his tales but ultimately, it only makes you and the others frustrated. Skeptical. A lack of trust rising through the air as he continues, pivoting the conversation to a lurking shadow.

Apparently, it’s of Infernal descent, something that piques both you and Astarion’s interest, sharing a look. As Raphael speaks, telling you to kill the creature before it can be released upon the rest of the world, your tadpole vies for your attention. Squirming violently, it makes you cringe with discomfort, trying your best not to let it show as you allow the call to enter your mind.

We should ask him about the scars.

For a moment you disagree. With Raphael being a devil and all, it’s almost certain that if you ask him a question he’ll only offer a bargain in return. Something big and shiny but worth hardly anything in the long run. But then you remember the timing. The lack of minutes and hours and days you may have left. Already you’re running on borrowed time and you can tell that Astarion’s desperate. Struggling to come to terms with the fact that at the end of all this, he might not get the ending you both believe he deserves.

Because of this, instead of denying you merely nod your head, making quick eye contact just as Raphael finishes his tale, using the short moment of silence to pivot the conversation.

“Now, enough about all that,” he says, waving his hand in the air. “Let’s talk about you. I sense there’s something you want to ask me.”

When his gaze hits Astarion’s face it’s as if the whole party turns defensive. Narrowing their eyes, their bodies instinctively lean towards Astarion, making sure it’s known that any sort of threat will not go unnoticed.

It makes Astarion puff up triumphantly as he clears his throat, glancing back at all of you with hidden thanks before returning his attention to Raphael. “I do. I have a proposal for you.”

“A proposal?”

“Yes.”

Chuckling darkly, you see Raphael shift. “If this has anything to do with you wanting to taste my blood, I can assure you vampling it’s hardly worth it.”

As you roll your eyes, Astarion scoffs. “This is serious, devil,” he retorts, a rather crisp bite to his tone despite who he’s talking to. “I have this scar —this eyesore of a creation carved rather deeply into my back. Someone wrote it all in Infernal and considering I’m neither devil nor demon I obviously can’t read the damned thing.”

Instead of responding, all Raphael does is hum. Low and slow, he takes his time mulling over Astarion’s words, stroking his chin most likely for dramatics as he paces the path, making you frown.

“Can you help him or not, Raphael?”

When you speak, he looks at you with offence. As if interrupting his thought process is a fate worse than death, prompting you to swallow in regret, trying not to look scared. Even though that’s exactly what you are.

Considering you don’t trust him in the slightest, watching Astarion so easily ask for this devil’s aid makes you anything but calm. In your mind, you can feel the anxiety brewing like a storm. Threatening to strike you down at a moment’s notice as this hellish creature disguised as nothing more than just a man, scolds you for your lack of patience.

“It’s something very important to your master,” he then says, smirking at Astarion —pulling him in with tempting words and more theatrics. “But what is it? A love letter perhaps? A warning of your impending room? A contract of ownership maybe?”

Every example he lists off makes you more and more uncomfortable, your stomach churning at the prospect of Astarion’s scars meaning anything at all.

“I could give you all the gory details. For a price, of course.”

As expected, Astarion sighs and looks towards you, searching your face for signs of reluctance only to find support.

“And what’s your price?”

Without hesitation, he tells you he wants the aforementioned creature dead. Slain on sight so that he no longer has to think about it. To which Astarion looks at him a bit confused, wondering how such a simple task could be deemed worth its weight in information. Especially when taking into account all the slaying you’ve all done already.

“Really? That’s your price?”

Raphael nods —humming again but this time in acknowledgement. “You slay the best and I tell you all about those beautifully crafted etchings. Sound good?”

It doesn’t. Not in the slightest. But regardless Astarion merely nods, prompting Raphael to finish his end of the conversation, telling you he’ll be in touch before evaporating into a thick fog of smoke.

As soon as he’s gone you can feel the breath returning to your chest. All the past anxieties slipping into something a bit more manageable as you reach for Astarion’s arm, earning yourself a look of frustration that everyone else opts to ignore.

“You okay?”

You see him swallow as he looks away, turning his attention to the entrance of the mausoleum you now find yourselves in front of. “I’m fine.”

“Yes, but are you okay?”

It’s obvious then he doesn’t know how to answer. Now that he’s one step closer to finding out the truth of this thing that’s haunted him for so long, you can tell he’s nervous. Apprehensive in a way that has him debating whether or not he truly wants to know. You can see it plainly in his eyes —the way they dart around in circles, searching for something neither of you has the answers to.

Sensing this, the rest of the party moves ahead silently, glancing at you from afar as they stop at the run-down building’s entrance, allowing you a moment to yourselves.

“It’s a lot to take in,” you remind him then, squeezing his arm.

Beneath your touch he tenses, signalling you to pull away as quickly as you can, fearing he may not like it.

“There’s always something in the way, isn’t there?” he grumbles, gritting his teeth in frustration.

Sighing, you nod your head. “Unfortunately.”

“I mean, honestly, you’d think for once the universe would allow me a moment of goddamn peace but no, I have to work for it —to become a slave and do the bidding of someone else yet again!”

His frustrations are rational. Justifiable even, when you take into account all that he’s suffered. After everything, he deserves to be thrown some kind of bone. Even one as little as this, and more than anything you wish you could do that for him.

Instead of merely supporting him on yet another perilous journey to earn the bare minimum you wish you could give him everything. The key to his past —the gift of his future. If you could, anything and everything under the sun would be plucked from its rightful place and put into his open hand without a second thought. You’d will the stars to fall without warning if he wanted them. Lasso the moon and drag it down just so he could see it clearer each night. Hell, you’d even rip the sky itself down if it meant you could prove to him just how much he deserves.

Unfortunately, though, you’re not nearly powerful enough to do anything like that, so instead you merely set the lantern down on the ground and offer your hand. Palm up into the air, you shove it between you with a sombre smile, watching Astarion glance between it and your face, inevitably taking it.

“I don’t need your pity, you know.”

“It’s not pity.”

“Fine, your sympathies then.”

“Alright.”

A part of you knows he’s being stubborn just to guard himself. A tactic he often uses so that his vulnerabilities may remain hidden. It’s something you’re often guilty of yourself —avoiding conflicts in the form of jokes or comments said only to distract.

Unfortunately, because of this, it means that you can see right through him. As you move your other hand to flip over his, trailing patterns across the lines of his palm, you can feel the fear that strikes his heart. The thoughts inside his head pulsating with all the potentials of where this newfound information can lead you.

Neither of you know, but it’s apparent then that regardless of what it is, it easily has the ability to change the trajectory of everything. Depending on the severity, the more unwilling you know Astarion will be to continue with the group. If it’s dire, more than likely, he’ll try to venture off on his own to solve the issue. Especially if it results in enacting some form of revenge.

Because despite his growing fondness for the group you find yourselves in, he’s still Astarion at his core. And you know that means there’s an inherent selfishness that sits dormant, waiting for the right moment to abandon the world to get what he wants.

You don’t blame him for it. Not after everything he’s been through. Not after countless years of seduction and starvation and a solitude meant only for the dead. At the bare minimum, he deserves the chance to erase all of that in the form of raw revenge. Whether it’s through betrayal or murder or whatever may linger in between.

Regardless of all that, he deserves closure. Even in its impurest form, he’s earned the right to do whatever the fuck he wants because it’s his choice. His decision. If he wants to leave —to abandon the party for greater things, so be it. You won’t stop him. However, you will offer him your hand.

“I’m with you. Whatever happens.”

As you speak, you continue to stroke his hand, repeating the routes of your index finger over and over again until you can feel him relax in your palm. Until you know that the frustrations that he feels are pushing themselves to the back of his mind, making way for your presence.

“It’s rather foolish of you, you know.”

You raise your brow at him.

“To fall for a vampire. To promise him things you may not be able to fulfill.”

Despite knowing he’s right you merely smile and look back down at his hand. “I never claimed to be smart, did I?”

“No, I suppose not.”

You move your thumb across his palm, gripping it gently with your other hand as you pull it up to your face. “I’m pretty good with a sword though,” you offer, kissing the centre, feeling it curl around your chin, his own thumb trail past your cheek.

“I know, I’ve seen you.”

“So you’re aware of my talents.”

He snorts and leans in without another word, capturing your lips in a soft kiss that has you humming against him until suddenly it’s over far quicker than you’d like.

“You know, the plan was never to have this happen.”

His hand remains firmly on your chin. Thumbing your bottom lip it pushes it down to reveal your teeth before springing back up when he moves his digit elsewhere.

“Have what happen?”

“This,” he says. “Us. We —I was meant to merely seduce you. Manipulate you into trusting me so that you’d never turn on me.”

There’s an awkward pause that quickly fills with nervous laughter. Ripping through his throat, it’s there and gone before you can even react to it, making you swallow hard as he continues his confession, telling you how easy it was supposed to be. How instinctive it felt to flirt with the idea of you while you fully fell for his charms.

“All you had to do was fall for it. And all I had to do was not fall for you,” he tells you, earnestly —looking at you with eyes so heavily filled with guilt that, as he confesses further, all you can do is stand there, panicking. Praying to whatever Gods may hear you that at the end of this, he doesn’t retract all the words he previously said just to spare you from helping him accomplish the impossible.

“I swear if you—“

“That’s where my plan fell apart, you know,” he cuts you off, leaning in to press his forehead against yours. “When I realized how incredible you are. How caring and funny and—and smart you are. I didn’t stand a chance. Not with the way you take the time to listen. Or the way you defend my honour even though I never ask. Or how you have the ability to make me smile when all I want to do is scream.”

All you can feel is the breath of his words hitting your face. The sensation of air pluming across your skin, forcing you to blink and breathe and carry on as silently as possible.

“You deserve to have the kind of love you selflessly offer me every day.”

Slowly, his hands move to cup either side of your face, pulling you further in despite how close you already are.

“I want to give you that —to give you something real. But I’ll be honest, I don’t know how to do that.”

There’s a part of you that feels like you’re shattering then, hearing those last few words, unaware of the implication. Considering it’s such an open statement, as you remain still beneath his touch, trying to explore his face for clues, the only thing you can think of is the worst. How instead of loving you, he’ll leave and die by Cazador’s hand. How as a result you’ll be one member short and fall to the Absolute. How everything will have been for nothing.

Breathing hard, you assume his next few words will be the worst words you’ll ever hear, so when he eventually opens his mouth, preparing to speak further, you can’t help but close your eyes.

“Being close to someone —experiencing intimacy— it’s something I did to lure people in for him, so it’s tainted in a way. Still brings up those feelings of disgust and loathing, despite what we have being different,” he confesses, forcing your eyes to reopen and see the almost wild look in his eyes.

“I don’t know how to be with someone else. How to offer them what they need —how to let them in the way I know I should. No matter how hard I try.”

At that point, it feels like he’s searching for answers. Begging for you to tell him what to do next —knowing it’s all he’s ever known.

Because of this, all you do is offer him a smile, reaching up to grab his face back, tentatively feeling the skin through the nerves that shake beneath the pads of your fingers. “So, what happens next?”

“Next?”

You nod, watching his expression change, telling you he doesn’t quite understand the question as he blinks back tears, glancing away while clearing his throat.

“I, uh, I suppose I don’t know. It’s been so long since I’ve had to decide what I wanted.”

“That’s okay.”

He opens his mouth to respond but all that comes out is a soft crackling of sound, signalling even more uncertainty until he’s pulling away and avoiding your gaze, panicking at the prospect of having to choose. A newfound agitation flowing throughout his features as you attempt to call him back in, whispering his name like a prayer.

At first, he’s completely hostile, pushing air rapidly through his nose as his eyes flicker through the trees. At one point he wobbles from side to side, shifting the weight of his feet so carelessly that you move your hands in front of you, waiting for him to drop.

Thankfully, he doesn’t though. Instead, all he does is ride the hysteria of his emotions, eventually looking to you for the kind of guidance you’re more than willing to give him.

Once again taking his hands —cautiously this time— you etch those same patterns into his hand, using your thumb to trace every line you see, telling him he’s okay. That you’re here and he’s safe and that you love him, despite everything.

Barely above a whisper, you tell him that his feelings are valid. That he’s allowed to take the time to process. That admitting that he loves you doesn’t mean there has to be this automatic shift into something new.

“We can just love each other,” you tell him, smiling. “We don’t have to do anything you don’t want. We can take it slow.”

That seems to calm him down enough for him to nod his head and reciprocate the contact of your hands with a short squeeze. Both of which make your heart swell in a sort of sad understanding as you silently offer him a hug, feeling him roughly wrap around you as he tells you he loves you again.

@poohxlove @gaiasmight @sassy-stupid @novarex @v-gremlin @sapphiccloud @lipstickghoulie @kuroitsukyo@jjfchk@idiotsatan@bluestuesday@bloopthebat@art-by-greenie@heneralmoon@sukunababe@dreamingaboutyousworld@ranfithegood@haniscrying@liadamerondjarin@the-lake-is-calling@marina-and-the-memes@rookieoftheyear@zraloci-cpr@kaetmo@snickerdoodle-daydream@wowowwild@d1anna@raswiet@conniesbbymama@venus-wrts@demonicthorns@kihten@deadglamsheep@sanscas@spammypasta@leighsartworks216@rose-gold-blue@p1ssmagg0t@hellish-writes@ghostinvenus@otayz@sexysquatch@sleepyeclair@colorful-anxieties@alina-exe@ilana-the-lasagna@lillifer@girlwiththepapatattoo@y2cade@acelin-ginsberg@pinkuranium@catrad0rable@scarletrosesposts@qwnamidala@itsrosebabe@bunnyperi@queenofcarrotflowers-s@tatumadams20@spkyxszn@chlort@f3v3rs@awkwardwookie@joy-the-reader@warm-milk-with-honey-blog@vertigocrime@iyis@wildpiper@pebblethestone@tillywasneverhere@bex-03@kaetmo@revemiya@staticspouse@itzagothamcitysiren@djarinsmixtape@when-the-night-came@epicy0n@bababahannah@sleepyred1703@lotus-99@lofcompass@r4d10h34d5@vampninjaz@itsmekalou@offbrandhand@yikes-buddy@konenichi@rainonarden@oceanbluesixeyes@bodtyworship@maydayitsjay@greasyslimebucket@yeeteth-the-raven@fantasyfairysworld@allexthakatt@flowersaretheshit@morglyne@thespectacularspaceace@cephiss0@use-your-telescope@furblrwurblr@kloverfield@angelofthorr@writervaul-t@starved-kitten@minixluvr@crowley--aziraphale@sapphicwren@alionera-blog@jennithejester@dezedrol@thisisew@saladalpaca@applepiewithbacon@httpbiohazard@aurasyn@nerdoodles@kingpinthedevil@itzkawaiix@domainoflostsouls@silverskylan@uminootome@helpidkwhatimdoingwrong@deadlyinfernos@blackbirdswhispers@sarahskywalker-amadala@writingmysanity@f3v3rs@jayjones03@quietlyebbie@optimisticprime3@eyes-for-daze@sunnytalia3@megoshh@maddiedott@cappsikle@mostbeautifulnightmare@lynnlovesloki@simpytheshrimpy69@astarion-archive@smaranshakthi@autistic-deer@shadowfeart@freckled-petals@candied-lavender@hp-art-studio@ghouligan@satelliteapotheosis@waywardwitch-hel@pandimoostuff@mythoughtsofinsanity@ilovelovelylove@oneandonlyizabelle

TAGLIST NOW CLOSED!

#go slow #astarion #astarion bg3 #astarion fan fic #astarion series #astarion x female reader #astarion x reader #astarion x you #summer writes

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celestialwhoree · 2 months

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𝐒𝐚𝐲 𝐆𝐨𝐨𝐝𝐧𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 𝐧 𝐆𝐨 - 𝐓𝐡𝐫𝐞𝐞

More Nik just 4 you🫵😚 Trying to make this reasonably slow burn but I just want them to fuck😔

Pts 1 & 2 here!

Nikto is shitting himself. In his enthusiasm to make amends with you, to spend time with you, he completely disregarded his greatest issue. He can't eat with his mask on. He can't very well show you his face when you look like the human embodiment of Tinkerbell, and he looks like - he doesn't really know what he looks like.

Whilst your neighbour is in crisis, you're perfectly happy to flit about your house, debating whether to wear your favourite pink miniskirt or a lacy white dress. The white would compliment the pretty satin kitten heels you're wedded on, and the virginal, snow coloured lingerie set you hope is finally seen by someone who's not you, or your mirror. Your hair is perfectly styled, lipgloss applied with meticulous precision. The outfit is the only spanner in your otherwise beautifully constructed works. You're so giddy that you feel sick.

Your neighbour shares a similar struggle in selecting his outfit, realising that he hasn't taken a woman on a date in a long time, and since then, his muscles have outgrown the sleeves of the suit in the back of his closet, and the pants to match are as moth eaten and neglected as his heart. Of course he wants to look as though he's making an effort - doesn't want to make you feel anymore unwanted by him than you already do, and yet most of his clothes make him look more monolith than man, no decent fit for a woman so soft and feminine as you.

You'd never have expected him to turn up on your doorstep with flowers. Peonies with fluffy pink petals, gently wrapped in a sheet of brown paper, tied up with blush lace. Kind of like you. He would never have dreamed of the way you fling your arms around his neck, tits straining against the thin alabaster fabric of your little dress. "You like them?" He rumbles thickly into your ear, flowers hanging at his side as he wraps his free arm loosely around your back, pushing the thoughts of how the plush skin of your ass would feel in his hands. "They're wonderful." You breathe, taking a sudden step back at the realisation that you've just entirely invaded his precious personal space.

"I need to tell you something." He murmurs, words coming thick from his throat, his confession trapped down in his chest, safe where no one can find it. "Of course, anything." The gentleness in your tone only makes him hesitate further. Why should he corrupt such a soft thing like you? Tie you down to a beast like him? "I am - I need to tell you something, and I understand if you do not want to spend time with me anymore. I am deformed."

Biting your tongue feels practically impossible. You so desperately want to reassure him. How do you tell him that you can see his laundry room window perfectly from your kitchen where you spend most of your time. How do you tell him that you've seen the scars he hides when he puts his mask in the washing machine.

"That's okay." You nod reassuringly. Why is there so much care in your eyes?

"You're sure? I am not handsome." You just want him to let you in. So desperately.

"I promise."

I'm so sorry for writing such short chapters but I need these two to get down and dirty rn💕

#cod mwii #cod mw2 #cod #call of duty #call of duty modern warfare 2 #cod modern warfare #call of duty modern warfare #modern warfare #Nikto #cod nikto #Nikto x reader #nikto x y/n #nikto x f!reader #nikto x you #call of duty nikto #mwii nikto #celestialwhoree #say goodnight n go

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alavestineneas · 12 days

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and if you are there, why do i feel alone in this room?

pairing: Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen x fem!reader summary: The woman—a siren, some kind of sea beast lurking in deep, salted waters—sits near him with the ottoman under her feet that still seemed to deny her the comfort of rest, her eyes glinting with mischief when she notices his stare. Taunts, even, forge obliviousness to the spells she casts. Strange, otherworldly—redundant. Everything about her, down to the light gown and a headdress that showed little of her face, Feyd-Rautha was not used to seeing. warnings: mentions of death, violence, implied/referenced child abuse, religious symbolism, mentions of sa (!), blood and other parts of body, very non-healthy relationships chapter 1 - chapter 2 - chapter 3 !this work is part 2 to the i can feel the soil falling over my head; no people are here, just the void in my chest! word count: 7,3k

author's notes: hi beautiful people! today, I have finally finished this chapter and am thrilled to say that this fic requires part 3! be aware that this piece of literature is explicit and touches on some very heavy themes, including sa and child abuse. Please be mindful of it! As always, your opinions, suggestions, and critiques are welcome in the comments. Love you, and have a tasty read!

There are a lot of books stored in her memory, locked in the neurocytes safely. They are tucked into the cortex with love and tenderness that YN otherwise taught herself to suppress as a sign of her weaker self. But papers were non-living, so she felt like it was less dangerous for her to show warmth towards them; after all, if the objects can not acknowledge your love, does it really count as real? She read everything, mostly in an attempt to prepare herself for something she did not know the face of; she read to build the shield around herself, in desperate hope to be able to help at least her future self. YN read even now, although her foolish childhood desires were long gone, just to get a glimpse of the girl she was before the monsters escaped the pages.

The book she re-read the most was nothing special, nothing suiting the image she moulded herself into—a giant, relatively old encyclopaedia of animals inhabiting the furthest corners of Known Imperium. The letters inside, although faded a little, were left almost untouched by eyes—maybe it was what drew her in in the first place—to cherish something seen as unneeded. YN learned the small paragraphs almost by heart; she liked the idea of someone taking enough time to observe something as small as a roden to know its habits. She liked the idea of it happening to her one day. As it always is, it did not.

She chose her favourite animal without that much thought. Although even the notion of having something beloved was foolish, YN was made to choose; she and her sisters played the game of forest most often. The game was simple: pretend to be a creature you are not, forgetting the countless rules they had to follow. Pretending they have claws and teeth; pretending they can protect themselves not through intrigues and hidden motives but through open, bold force. Irulan was always a Katanga Lioness; she liked it because of the proximity to their house's symbol. YN did not; the grey pages of her beloved book described them as "observed to also scavenge on carrion of animals that were killed by other predators or died from natural causes''. What king of the animals steals the work of others simply to feed themselves? She did not tell Irulan that, of course—why would she?

YN chose a mountain lion for herself. Sure, she may have made a mistake thinking it was just another type of lion, but the game went too far to change anything, so she stuck with that. She even grew to love it—the drawing of the mountain lion on her character sheet, the way it prowled through the forest in her mind's eye. It had many names and many homes. Adaptive. Captivating.

She does not know why it came into her mind suddenly—maybe it was the dim light of the closed arena. The air circulated here freely, cooling through the complex systems of vents, even though it seemed to be deprived of any life—just a mechanical circle of the same molecules moving around her seated figure and returning to the hidden openings again and again. YN looked straight ahead; the two men were still sparring.

From her bench, they looked like one—two bodies moved so swiftly that one was unable to differentiate where the lines of their limbs ended. YN squinted her eyes; she was alone in the seating area, and still, she dared not move closer. The taller, thinner figure possessed skin so white it looked almost translucent underneath the cold light—YN wondered if she would be able to see the structures in his body through his clothed stomach. He moved well, almost too well for her not to press her lower row of teeth to the top one, hiding the tongue in a cave of pearl bones—she had hoped he was worse with his bare hands. YN had counted four hundred and five seconds before he made a mistake in his steps; it was a lot more than her own results, but for a man, he was good.

Feyd-Rautha had style; she had to give him that. He fought like a serpent would: calculated, precise. His fists knew the most effective targets, and his legs knew how to escape the blows of his opponent. If YN was to guess, he relied on muscle memory less than a usual fighter would, preferring to dwell in the moment instead. It made for a good show, sure, but it was not practical. She smiled to herself; of course, the na-Baron could not know what the real battle was like. How unfortunate for him—how delightful for her. YN still can't believe he let her watch his training every morning—was he really that stupid not to realise her motive? Was he too confident to consider having weaknesses?

Regardless, she saw what she needed to do - for three hours every day, she set unmovingly on the third bench in a small fighting ground, imprinting his every move in her mind. There are so many moves you can use and so many tricks you can do before she learns them all. YN did not care for the cold gaze thrown in her direction when Feyd-Rautha collapsed on the ground, taking a moment to rest before lurching onto his opponent again. She can wait.

Mountain lions are stealthy predators.

The days she spent here changed into months, their slow steps morphing into each other until time became a blur, a concept she did not grasp. Feyd-Rautha was a hard one to warm, but before she would mould him into something she wanted, YN needed to heat his DNA to a certain magnitude; otherwise, he would simply break. She would've gladly accepted this turn of fate too, but right now, keeping na-Baron alive is far more convenient for the Bene Gessarit. For her.

A concubine. A slap in the face: it seemed like life was determined to dissolve the small bits of her dignity in its endless pool of secrets. She was not a wife to Harkonnen na-Baron; no, she was to be his whore. If she was not too tired, she would've felt a pang of fear on her rising with oxygen lungs; a concubine's position is even lower here compared to one of a lawful wife's. YN remembers the words of her teacher as she prepared her for the union: Harkonnen concubines are killed after their first night in a position; if one is lucky enough to escape the fate by being with a child, she bears him until it's time for the baby to be born. One of the greatest honours for a Harkonnen is to take the life of his mother as soon as he enters the world.

She was to join na-Baron for breakfast today—a proposal YN waited long to receive, but part of her wishes she never did. It was worded like an invitation; YN knows it was not. Harkonnens rarely spoke when they did not give orders—a creature of habit, she supposed. So, she did what she had to: follow the slave to the chambers designated for the meal. The hem of her dress shone with a colour so foreign to the fort around her; YN needed to make herself stand out. Men are much like children, she learned—the more colourful the toy, the more likely they will want to play with it.

The walls were heavy here. They didn't bend in the shapes she was used to, preferring to stand tall. They didn't have to hide their strength underneath a complicated facade—quite the opposite. They paraded it, wearing it like the honour it is. Staying unremorsefully unbending. Maybe it's the air or a different measure of gravity; maybe it's her habit of soaking up the surroundings and letting them poison her insides, growing rotten in between the folds of her stomach tissue, but her legs are metal, stone-cold, pulling YN deeper and deeper into the floor. She tries so hard to ignore the three creatures in the corner.

They are hairless, much like the man in front of her, and dressed in matching black. YN would've mistaken them for Harkonnen royalty if it were not for the iron collars on their necks and the glowing black eyes that seemed to follow her every move. She would've been happy to have some company and not be forced into solitude with na-Baron if it were not for a still convulsing body on the floor. A body she did not recognise, but it could've easily been her own.

The creatures seemed to enjoy the involuntary moves of the soon-to-be corpse; they closed their eyes in delight and bared the sharp, black-coloured teeth in sheer pleasure as they lurched into the white flesh. They ripped it apart with only their hands, not bothering to use the prepared knives for more than a big incision from head to stomach. The sounds of chewing and gnawing filled the room, echoing off the walls and sending electric impulses down her body. YN was used to the metallic smell and the bright colour of arterial blood, but this was not a simple death. It was a show, and she was the long-awaited watcher.

Feyd-Rautha seemed unbothered by the sight near him. His hands, covered in thick streaks of blood, were deep to his elbows in the body. He dissected the corpse with precision, his eyes focused and his grip steady. He looked calm, even peaceful. Na-Baron was in good humour today. ''I must say, your arrival has graced us with much more than just the dowery; nothing could've made this union more auspicious—such a rare bird you are, daughter of our generous Emperor. A princess, yet treated no better than a common slave.''

Here it was: the thing she was thinking about all the way to this strange, garbage planet in the dress that pokes bleeding holes in her abdomen with each glass she downs. From his lips, it sounds even more bitter; even savages found the way the Emperor sold one of his daughters so easily strange. "Both of our houses have traditions far beyond our understanding," YN shrugs, scaring her thoughts away like annoying flies. Here, in a room so far from the comfort of her home, they moved too fast, bringing nausea to her throat.

She is here to secure the bloodline of House Harkonnen, to ensure the balance needed in the Imperium. YN does not notice how suddenly her gaze darkens or how tightly the hands that rested on the chair are now holding the pleated velvet of her ruby-red gown. Oh, the baby. The tiny creature inside her womb, the future head for the Baron's crown to be placed upon. The yet unconcieved child she could not feel love for. She was given no other choice but to risk its life before even giving it a chance to obtain its gift.

''Then you will find my present to be quite fitting.''

YN watches in silence as na-Baron reaches inside the rib cage of the corpse. He reaps out an organ with one swift motion, almost like plucking a harmful sprout from the garden. The organ is broun and rosewood, a weird mixture of shades that make it harder for her to focus on anything but the thing in his large hand. The gift he meant to give was a human heart.

She feels his walk long before she sees a figure departing from its place at the table; she guesses the end point of his manoeuvres too easily. It's almost funny—a cruel, senseless joke; how obvious the slight tremor in her hands is; how heavy her eyes become at the sight of Harkonnen black. The body positions itself near; if she squints, she can hear the hot breathing somewhere between her shoulder blades. His hand snakes around her neck quickly, positioning the organ right in front of her mouth. YN can detect the smell hitting her nostrils before she closes the receptors in them. She wants to scream, but the notes die in her throat. Who would she scream for? She hears the creatures hiss and whisper—the heart is a good part, from what she can make out. It did not need to be wasted on people like her.

''Will you not accept it?'' Feyd-Rautha's words are mocking, but his dark blue eyes stay virgin to the laughter. They drill small spots on her neck from behind with such force that YN can almost feel the burnt smell of her sweat-covered skin.

She takes a breath. Her own heart shrinks, its vessels beating with intensity twice as much as needed. Still alive, she notes absently. Still breathing. The feeling is natural and easy; the forced calmness in her body tingles the muscles, braiding her nerves into a pattern similar to the netting. Then, she opens her mouth.

"If I shall lick the blood of your hands, Feyd-Rautha, dare to make it your own."

That's it.

Maybe the Emperor was right to spare her none of the Sardaukars and a quarter of her dresses. She did not need more; she was not expected to survive long enough to use half of her clothes. YN chucked under her breath. Dead over diet preferences—how profound.

After a moment, the pale face behind her also twists, allowing the blackened teeth to escape the grip of thin lips. Like this, na-Baron looks less human and more like the evil he was said to be. He throws the heart to the creatures—they catch it greedily—and places a bloodied hand on her shoulder, the droplets of crimson going unnoticed on the brightly coloured cloth. ''Very well, then. Let us eat.''

YN nods. She looks around almost instinctively; nothing could make her eat a thing after the sight she just witnessed, but she refuses the na-Baron once; she is not about to do it again. The food is a lot, but her plate is almost empty: only a small amount of salad is here, sadly staring into the hunger in her eyes and a now featherless creature in an unnatural pose, suggesting its non-poetical death. The bird is small, almost delicate; its wings are pitifully glued to the body. YN does not want to let her mind draw the comparison, and does not allow her brain to admit a direct analogy; she dissects the bird with a dull knife and puts a piece in her dry mouth. The creature tastes good—almost too good to be expected in this brightly lit hall.

Most often deer is the mountain lion’s staple diet. However, they can survive preying on small animals as well.

The night covers Giedi Prime rather quickly; it never lingers, politely waiting for its masters to finish their daily affairs; it hits like a coward, from behind, trapping those not careful enough to hide before its arrival. The harsh, toxic waves of lazy winds hit the walls of the halls coldly lighted with a few sphears; they look like deep forest clearings, forming a system of endless options, ultimately leading to one, inevitable, end. His work chambers aren't big; he does not visit them often for them to be. The solitary metal desk before him is filled with letters, drafts of laws, and official documents, all waiting for his approval. It exhausts Feyd-Rautha to no end, the sheer stupidity of most of the advisers here; almost half of the documents were riddled with errors and inconsistencies. The forever present in his head dull migraine grows stronger when he opens the shortest letter; he almost busts his skull open when the pain heavies.

He ponders too much—the type of thoughts you can feel running on your tongue but never escaping. He is not used to being in the mist; all of his life is so painfully contrasted that no doubt of its nature can survive the sharp edge of his mind. There are things he can escape—forget, even—but some linger in his ribcage too long for them to vanish. Soon, they grow into his lungs with small, unbreakable threads, becoming him. He used to try to get them away from his heart, as if it held some value. Now, he is smarter, older, and more indifferent, he lets them pierce yet another piece of human flesh with no sorrow.

Of course, he remembered her face. The same face that haunted his sleep ever since she dared to appear before his eyes. Feyd-Rautha, naturally, found her little frolic that day. He spent an entire evening studying her work, analysing every move she could've made with her blade to achieve such outcomes. Sure, some things he would've done differently, but the sheer brutality of an animal he would not have guessed the girl possessed charmed him. Feyd-Rautha was a proud man, but he, too, held a love for beautiful things. For that, he hadn't told the Baron of the sight he discovered in the reading room. For that, he is now willing to pretend to believe her eyes when the fear fleshes in them.

Feyd-Rautha curses; she sickens. Like a bone stuck somewhere down his throat, not letting him live without a pang of mocking. She lurks, and whispers—Feyd-Rautha wants to smash her pretty head against the wall just to reveal the secrets she hides from him so he can finally understand the hold she retains. He is no stranger to the desire to own, or devour, but the fear in the back wall of his stomach is an alien in his body. He tries to hide it—to paint over it with anger or violence—but it remains a constant presence, gnawing at him from within. It's no use; the woman is a shark, designed to sense the fright. Maybe that's what brought him in in the first place—the steel eyes so similar to his own in a narrow hall all those years before. Maybe he was so used to the danger that he craved it subconsciously, looking for it to make him feel like himself again. A reoccurring childhood nightmare he can't escape; he doesn't want to escape.

Feyd-Rautha finds the chair to put his weight on and waits until the tingling, spinning sensation spreads from his temples down his neck, finding its way into his bloodstream and passing his organs one by one, until none are left uncorrupted. Of course, he expects it. The woman slipped into his brain and now chews her way into it like a parasite downs the rotten body. He knows he should be terrified, but instead, he feels a strange sense of relief. Feyd-Rautha can hear the whispers of his own mind fighting to remain the only owners of the secrets and desires buried within. He feels his eyelids heavy; a second later, the whites of his eyes are staring at the ceiling, the blue eye lenses dissolving in light.

Water. The first thing he feels is ice-cold water dripping onto his face, filling his lungs, and sending a shock through his arms. This body does not feel like his; it's too small, too narrow. His eyes are trying to adjust as fast as they can, jumping from one blurred spot to another until finally catching a glimpse of the surroundings. His brain does not have time to process the picture; his nose is filled with fluid again, and his open mouth is gasping for air but only taking in more liquid. He tries waving his hands around, but the stronger grip is firm on his nape, pulling him further down into the depths. The hand yanked him out just as he was about to fall into darkness again, the sound of water changing to loud screeching.

''How dare you hit me, devil child? Let the water wash away your dirt. Repent; beg for forgiveness for all of your rotten nature.''

The voice is unknown to him; it is harsh and filled with fury. The woman's face is twisted in anger; splashes of water on it match his. He can't tell if they are from his antics or tears. The woman's grip tightens, her nails digging into his skin. The black clothes on her figure make her status known - a Bene Gessarit witch. Feyd-Rautha tries to lurch forward and hit her back, but her strength is overwhelming. He feels panic coursing through his veins instead of oxygen—a sensation he did not think he could experience anymore. He wants to bark a response to show her that he is not afraid, but his voice catches in his throat.

Feyd-Rautha has no time to wonder what the woman wants; she brings his face to the bathtub again, and he opens his mouth involuntarily, frantically begging not to do it anymore. He says everything she wants to hear; he cries out and promises to wash his sins away. The voice does not sound like his at all. He is desperate to end this nightmare now, but some force holds him here. The woman is not satisfied; her ears are deaf to his pleas.

His face ends up on the water surface a moment later, his nose hitting the wall of the bathtub as the woman holds him down. He feels his body go limp with utter horror; this time, the shouting woman won't stop. Her voice grows quieter, replaced by the sound of small waves hitting the brim and spilling; from right to left, the water turns red, and his tongue tastes the iron he knows from sliding blades into his mouth.

''Echidna, what the fuck are you doing? Let her go; she is going to choke!''

''Get that spawn to me, for I will not let her ruin my life anymore! I must finish what I have started!''

Feyd-Rautha's head is filled with oxygen once again; his lungs take a desperate breath in, sending too much air to his blood system. He falls on his back, the world spinning. He does not care for the weeping woman in black or the chaos unfolding around him. His only thought is that everything is finally done and that the white floors are a magnificent place for drops of liquid to fall from his normally bald head's waterfall of hair.

He wakes up suddenly, the sensation long gone. His steps are heavy again; the body he inhibits no longer feels like a cage. The voices have left him for now, and the only thing on his forehead left is small drops of sweat and a pathetic, frightened, beating heart. The cold breeze from the darkened sands surrounding the city wishes to prove otherwise—it heavies and plants its spikes into his reddened cheeks. The horizon gleams at him, almost taunting; not a single star is to be seen under the imposing clouds. He will kill her; maybe he will even enjoy it. Feyd-Rautha can handle a lot, but not the shame of being seen. Not the guilt of being caught wanting.

There are only three ways to hunt a mountain lion: tracking, waiting in ambush, and with dogs.

The gliding motions of heavy fabrics across the wooden floors created a strange pattern of a song now centuries old. Here, in a room so long that the wind travelled through the hollows, her careful steps seemed to almost fall silent. Nothing was there for the preying eyes to see. YN closes her eyes; with that, even for a moment, the world stays still. She knows where the hollow staircase will lead her; she feels it in her stomach with every step she takes. YN knows nothing about the future, but the past lives deep in her memories, haunting her every move. She knows she shouldn't have done it. Travelling through one's mind is a sin she can't escape; she will pay the price for it in her blood, but the Bene Gesarit did not send her here to survive, so it's of no use to be afraid now. It makes no difference for the dead if you weep at their grave or not.

The burning sphere of light in the hall stops spinning; the doors open without any noise, although if the pounding eardrums had not stunned her hearing, she could've noticed the faint thuds. YN waits; there are no flashes of her happiest memories or the faces of her loved ones in her drained mind. No, in what seems to be her last moments, she thinks of what she could've been if the world had not given her a sword to turn into.

Feyd-Rautha appears in the hall; his steps aren't rushed, and his expression is stone-cold. She eyes him shamelessly: nothing. She sees nothing; she senses it deep in her crying bones. He drags her by the hair like a mother would with her misbehaving child; roughly, he pulls her towards the exit, his grip tightening with each step until the door behind them closes and her knees meet the cold ground with a nasty thud. The bruises will stain them soon, not that it matters now.

''You should've known better than to cross me,'' he hisses, his voice gruff. It's cold, chilling—the way his lips part to reveal a sinister smile. ''Now, you can think yourself vanished, little witch.''

YN does not answer—what fool would beg the deaf? The blade against her chin is sharp; she knows how attentive he is when it comes to inflicting pain. It pokes right into the Omehyoid muscle, a dull pain shooting through her body. If she has got to die, it may as well be from his skilled arms. How beautiful he is in the twisted pleasure he finds in her suffering. Unearthly, almost too perfect to be made of simple flesh and bone. Something was unnerving, unforgettable in the net of veins under his pearly skin; it was as if he were a work of art, meticulously crafted to bring physical pain and optical pleasure in equal measure. A silver glint under the defined cheekbones, a redness of lips filled with blood vessels. For a second, YN wonders what it would be like to bite into it, like an apple that lay too long under the golden sun; would the blood slip as generously as the sweet nectar? Handsome as poison, as a black sun on his forsaken planet, as death.

''Go on. Kill me, then; let me escape you once and for all.''

Under the deep sea of his eyes, something moved; his eyes dipped into her, part by part. Like the slow, deliberate dance of a predator stalking its prey, his gaze lingered on her, calculating and intense. YN lowered her head to push the knife a little deeper into the flesh. A strange thought lingered in her brain; she found herself on her knees in front of him, almost willingly. She has worshipped God all her life; who, if not her, can recognise his creation? The Devil. Lucifer. Satan. The man with horns so big they once touched the skies; a corrupt angel, fallen from grace so long ago he couldn't remember way back if he tried. They have warned her about him, but is it her fault that God has disowned her earlier than she could? Did it really matter to her, before whom to kneel, as long as she felt a sense of power and control in her submission?

All that mattered now was that he wanted to hurt her. He wanted her.

She sees the recognition flicker on his face. Caught. The blade slides quickly across her exposed neck, the blood sprouting out in a weak, painfully quick stream. Feyd-Rautha kissed her, biting her bottom lip till the stream of boldly coloured blood trickled down his chin. He did so like an animal would, baring his teeth and dragging them across the pulsating vein on her neck. YN's laughing cry echoes in the empty room; she is forced to admit that he felt good.

Never approach a mountain lion; most mountain lions prefer to avoid confrontations, so never approach them and make them feel cornered.

The woman—a siren, some kind of sea beast lurking in deep, salted waters—sits near him with the ottoman under her feet that still seemed to deny her the comfort of rest, her eyes glinting with mischief when she notices his stare. Taunts, even, forge obliviousness to the spells she casts. Strange, otherworldly—redundant. Everything about her, down to the light gown and a headdress that showed little of her face, Feyd-Rautha was not used to seeing. The beautiful substance of her hair caught the light from the sun like a mirage in the desert, reflecting in his eyes with painful hits. The jewels, too, have found their way onto her clothes, but they were hidden beneath the layers of fabric. They shined brightly, impertinently, framing her figure in a glow that seemed to come from within.

To his surprise, the skills woman possessed spread out to politics as well, with her witch training proving useful in court. Feyd-Rautha did not miss how his advisors grew more uneasy when she entered the room, her careful eyes scanning their faces for even a hint of betrayal or deceit. Like a proud discoverer, he ached to share his new-found wonder with the blind audience, but something in him protested in a mare thought of showing the precious jewel of his eye to the cluster of unworthy. So, Feyd-Rautha did the only thing he knew how— all of his secret observations were done from afar, masterfully hidden behind the facade of casual indifference.

As he drags yet another blade across the surface of the whetstone, he thinks about her delicate hands on his neck, her ringed fingers tracing the lines of his jaw. Harkonnen men rarely wed; they just take what they capture—men and women—and turn them into slaves. Some, if particularly sweet, are reserved for fucking. There are no special songs for that; there isn't a specific word in their native tongue for wife, either. It doesn't matter; YN is nothing of the sort. A concubine, a possession, a tool for pleasure and procreation—the Harkonnen way was simple.

''Are you done eye-fucking me now, or do you need more time with your blade?'' she sneers, her voice mocking. Only she could get away with such bold defiance in his presence, but she does not seem to care for the unusualness of it.

YN motions for him to come closer, her eyes studying the way his legs move. Feyd-Rautha has no control over them; the steps make themselves. She plays the game very well; the chase fuels something primal within him. Thirst. Hunger. It was the Harkonnen training talking to him—the wild, ancient sensation taking over his insides and imprisoning his mind in a cage of helpless desire. It spread its tentacles down to his fingertips, nesting in his abdomen. He positions himself in front of her, his body betraying him as he leans in closer, drawn to her like a moth to a flame. Feyd-Rautha's hands repeat the ritual almost instinctively, rolling the hem of her deep purple dress up to her waist.

''Stop for a second,'' she whispers against his ear, her breath warm and inviting. ''Can I give you a piece of advice?''

Feyd-Rautha can feel the anger creeping into his body; he does not like to be refused. ''No,'' he grumbles, turning her around forcefully. "I don't need your advice," he snaps, his grip tightening on her arm.

YN does not seem to care for it. ''Don't do it. It will only lead to trouble.''

''What?'' He stops, his eyes narrowing as he absorbs the woman's words. The doubts that had lingered in the back of his mind suddenly grew louder, echoing through his mind. He releases her arm, his expression stoic. ''You are insane, woman. What are you talking about?''

''You know what I mean.''

The unease boils in his stomach. How could she know? He was careful not to slip anything; she wasn't able to cast her spells anymore either. But her knowing gaze tells him otherwise. ''You can not know the future,'' he pronounces.

''I don't need to know the future to see the truth, Feyd-Rautha. Your judgement is clouded by rage, and your mind is not as sharp as it usually is. You are not as invincible as you think you are.''

She is bluffing, he thinks. He hopes she is. Feyd-Rautha almost wished there was no cloth covering her face, nothing to hide her expressions as she lay beneath him. He catches her flamed eyes and the way they circle his face in one swift motion before settling on the ceiling above. It unnerves him, but he refuses to show it. She is no master here; she is simply a servant. That is not what power looks like, if he ever recognised one, and Feyd-Rautha knew power.

''Get out, now.''

Nothing was portrayed on her face as she curtseyed; nothing was there when she turned and walked to her rooms, leaving nothing but the ghost of the human body's warmth.

Mountain lions are more at home in brushy areas than in open prairies.

And then, he disappeared. Like the sound of the morning birds falling silent in the cacophony of voices of the city on her home planet, there was no trace of na-Baron in the entire Harkonnen fortress. YN thought she was slowly but surely going mad; no one but her noticed the usual place by the window empty, and no one but her seemed to care enough to know where he went. She caught strange looks from a few, and frankly, she thought they were right. She looked like a mad woman, her hair quickly plated and her dress hurriedly laced, her eyes darting around the room in search of any sign of Feyd-Rautha's massive figure. Noon was dragged into the evening, and then night, for three, long days until she heard the long-awaited news: na-Baron Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen had tried to usurp his uncle and had failed.

She has told him so. A fucking brainless ram, with stubbornness bigger than his cock—why did he think he could outsmart the Baron? He will pay for his dumbness with his blood, perhaps even his limb—the thought brought nausea to YN's throat. She was lucky the Baron did not consider her important enough to be knowledgeable of such schemes; she lowered her head in the desert, hiding from the sand storms of Harkonnen politics; she waited for two long weeks until the announcement was made; Feyd-Rautha was forgiven. The celebration in honour of this news is to be today; she is to attend it. Not like his concubine, YN supposed, but more like the princess she still was.

Now, she took her time. YN chose a gown she wanted long enough to make even a tireless slave yawn, savouring each moment before their meeting. She was a victor now, in their small game of cat and mouse. He was a cat, but the mouse could still outwit him with grace and style. YN smiled at the wondering attendants; she looked good, and she was going to meet him.

The walk from her chambers to the Grand Hall wasn't too long; she would've walked a thousand more stairs if it was needed. The doors opened without a sound, revealing nothing but a mere celebration of yet another year under the reign of Harkonnens. The lines of slaves changed one another, the uneven circles of people dancing appearing and fleeing to the cheerful tone of strings. She was set somewhere between two Harkonnen lords she had no chance of knowing; she felt a sense of unease creeping up her spine as she tried to maintain a polite smile. Their gazes didn't look right; something sinister lurked inside them—hiding a secret she had no chance of knowing.

One of them turned to her, a chilling smile spreading across his face. "How are you finding the evening, lady YN? Or, what should I call you?,'' he mastered a fake confusion. ''Perhaps, darling? Concubine has a cheap wing to it; quite unworthy of a face so lovely as yours, don't you think?"

Dirt. The thing that crawled under her skin at his words was like dirt, making her feel unclean and exposed. She forced a laugh, trying to brush off his comments, the crown of her hair moving with muscles underneath her skin. "I am a princess, my Lord. Address me as such."

It would be enough every other noon, but today. The man's face twists, as if he just remembered something; he turns, the wine in his goblet splashing on the tablecloth. ''I think na-Baron wouldn't be too angry if I stole a princess for the night," he sneered, his eyes darkening with malice.

''Does it matter to you either way?''

YN watches as the smirk, so similar to Feyd-Rautha's, appears on the men's lips, although it doesn't feel the same. She fights back disgust as the man nods, biting into a hefty chunk of prey. His eyes, once focused on her, drifted away. YN chose to follow them; the string of fat streaming down the man's mouth onto the silver tablecloth made her nauseous. She looked from one unfamiliar face to another, until the cold feeling in her abdomen crept its way onto her chest.

There he was. His figure is unusually crouching as he sits on the podium reserved for members of the dynasty. The dark blue eyes are red now; the thin blood vessels in them are torn and emptied. His body seemed to suck the light out of the hall inside, casting a shadow over the room. There are no scars on his smooth face, but the sunken cheeks and hollow eyes spoke of a suffering that went beyond physical wounds. YN almost wished she saw him dead; whatever this was, it was surely much worse. He raised his eyes slowly to meet hers; something flickered in them before turning back to their empty state. Feyd-Rautha parts his dry lips to say something to her—she can't understand a word he draws with his breath.

From the place nearby, the Baron's voice booms, his low, almost whisper-like vowels mending into one. His face, covered with layers of skin and dead cells, twists into what was meant to be a welcoming smile—the corners of his paper-thin lips dance, lowering themselves only to jump higher, and his eyes travel from one corner to another, unable to be still even for a moment. He speaks of things YN knows nothing about court intrigue, power struggles, and alliances that shape the fate of their world, heavy with hidden meanings and unspoken threats. She does not listen until he gestures towards her, a scent of spice and decomposing flesh lingering.

''Sergeant Voss has served me well, and his loyalty at the right time is not to be forgotten. Here, I bestow upon him the highest honour of all; what was once mine, is now his. Do not let go of her if she screams, Sergeant; the girl is a fine one.''

No. YN almost does not recognise the hand as her own as the man drags her to the bed that appeared out of nowhere, freezing with horror as the people around her continue to watch in silence, their eyes devoid of any emotion or empathy. The tradition, she notes, is the one she learned so much about bedding in front of the entire court as a symbol of unity. She choked on her own tears as the man smiled at her pleas for help; they seemed to make him even more pleased.

YN looks, frantically, to the place she saw Feyd-Rautha sitting just a moment before. He would help; surely, he would not let them do it to her—his servant, his concubine, his. But the seat is empty. The scream echoing through the hall does not register as hers right away; he has sold her. For his own freedom, for a chance to be free from the consequences of his own stupid actions. Surely, the Harkonnens could not get rid of her openly—it would mean war—but she was not immune to the man who now owned her. His hands travelled her body with such audacity that YN wanted to cut them off—to cut her chest just so she could not feel the fingers digging into her skin. A sole reminder she was a woman first and a human second.

Mountain lions are solitary hunters.

The man undressed himself quickly; all of the soldiers were trained to do so. She should run; she should fight back, but the pair of unmoving hands pinning her wrists down was a stark reminder of her helplessness. The man lowers himself closer, his hot breath against her neck making her shudder in fear. She can feel him against her skirts; she can feel the weight of his body pressing down on her. The adrenaline is pumping through her veins; she will survive. Whatever it fucking takes, even if her body is bruised and broken, she will survive.

They prefer to ambush their prey from behind by swiftly and cleanly breaking the neck.

She bites—her teeth launch towards his cheek, feeling the warm flesh give way beneath her. She sinks them deeper, making holes big enough to draw blood. It's hot, and sickening on her tongue, but she does not have time for these thoughts; her next blow is in his stomach, with his knee jammed into his gut. She can feel his body convulse in pain, giving her a chance to throw him on the bed, his broad back facing her.

If they haven’t broken the neck, they will suffocate the animal.

There is nothing around that could serve as a knife; her captors made sure of that, and the sheets are too thin to wrap around his neck. She looks around the room, desperate for something to use, but the space around her is empty. YN curses as the man regains his composure and begins to struggle against her hold. Her elbow meets his nose with a sickening crunch, causing blood to spurt out. She takes a breath in; her hand wraps around his neck, forming a tight hold as she goes into the headlock. She chokes him, so desperately trying to live. And the man trashes against her grip, his white face turning a deep shade of purple before finally going limp in her arms.

Shame.

A thing that followed her after every life she took is now absent. Maybe the Giedi Prime's cruelty did have its effect on her; YN feels nothing but a sense of emptiness as she stands over the lifeless body.

''Do you have any more men to gift me to, Baron Vladimir? The night is still young.''

Her voice has changed. It holds a certain hiss now, a rasp that wasn't present before; it has matured and bloomed into half an octave deeper tone. It bites through the noise easily, cutting sharply.

The Baron laughs. His eyes gleam with amusement as he gestures towards the door. "Plenty more where that came from, my dear, but it's enough for today. Here,'' he throws something in her, a smirk ghosting on his lips. ''You've earned it.''

YN catches it and inspects the object in her hand. A small, golden broche catches the light, glinting in the dimly lit room. A head of the Bighorn ram stares back at her, the symbol of House Harkonnen. The taste of victory mingled with the metallic tang, leaving a bittersweet sensation in her mouth. Joy courses her veins—she isn't afraid. Finally, she is not afraid. Finally, she can look at her blood-stained hands without humiliation. Is it her fault she was born a better knife than a person?

Bighorn sheep are not a primary food source in most areas. However, when a lion does kill a sheep, they typically will continue to do so over and over again, until the herd is depleted.

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lurkinggirlie · 1 month

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Elain & Azriel are EndGame

Azriel’s bonus chapter: semi-essay on my thoughts

This post will be a long one. The shipwar has been going on for far too long, and there's a possiblity that we'll be getting closure soon. So, I want to put my thoughts out there. For Obvious reasons, I could be very wrong, but this is what I think based on canon text: (Ignore any errors..I haven't edited this, and I'm sure there are many posts like this that are way more articulate)

Elriel are endgame. If they’re not then Azriel is kinda pathetic and having him end-up with anyone else is bad writing and character assassination. (Which we sadly won’t put past sjm but I don’t think she would..at least I hope)

1- Elain has no other love interest. Yes, Lucien is her mate but we have hinted at a broken/rejected mating bond for the longest time when it comes to these two so having them accept it eventually is going to be quite underwhelming, repetitive and boring. Even Lucien seems to have given up/isn’t interested in bridging that gap between them, which we’re told in both acofas and acosf. Unless you want to count the longing pointed out by Cassian, although Cassian also pointed out that Lucien was also uncomfortable when he mentioned his mate. To add on, there is no sexual tension between the two, and we know how important that is for sjm’s couple. You can't keep whining "but Elain isn't giving him a chance, if only she gave him a chance, then maybe this and maybe that" Elain is not a seprate entity, she is what SJM writes, Sjm could have written that but she did not yet and I'm not sure if she will. It feels too late at this point, she had already shown us that Elain has feelings for someone else aka Azriel. The author doesn't have to spell everything out for us to understand to what's going on. Sarah usually makes it clear who's endgame. and she literally is. So, it would be very sudden and out of the blue if Lucien and Elain were to end up together when she had never shown it before. When even Azriel pointed this out “I think Lucien will never be good enough for her, and she has no interest in him, anyway” people can say Rhys killed elriel, that the bonus chapter ended them. But this line right here tells us otherwise! First we know Azriel and Elain can read each other so well that they don’t need words, and then Azriel tells us this. He’s literally telling us that Elain does not want Lucien.

We also cannot compare elucien to Feysand or Nessian in the “enemies to lovers" department, because these two seem to hardly care about each other. For obvious reasons she wouldn’t accept or reject Lucien in a book that isn’t hers. But if they do end up together I’d feel robbed that she had more sexual tension with Azriel than she did with Lucien. And we know that Nessian and Feysand had sexual tension before getting together. Most of what we got from Elain and Lucien was awkwardness, and discomfort. Not a single spark. Furthermore, it would feel like Azriel was just leading Elain own. Plus their romance (Lucien and Elain) would not feel organic, only getting with Lucien because she felt rejected by Azriel, which doesn’t give epic romance no matter how sjm tries to spin it. It would always make Lucien seem like the second choice.

2- Azriel regifting the necklace was a dickhead move, and offensive to both girls. Anyone thinking the regifting of the necklace ended elriel or started gwynriel is delusional and clearly doesn’t know how the romance genre works. (should’ve thrown the gift in the Sidra like Cassain did) I can’t believe Rhys isn’t paying Azriel enough that he felt the need to return the necklace to the shop instead of throwing it. Senstive Illyrian baby indeed.

3- Rhys saying stay away from Elain (can we take a moment to appreciate how sexy Rhys was for pulling rank, he really made the ship more interesting now) and Azriel actually listening to him?? When he told him you can’t order me to do that. shit would be underwhelming if Azriel actually stayed away? Hello? Secret relationship potential ? Hello? Forbidden romance potential ??? The tropes would be epic. Sjm had never done that. And I’m not saying she will, but this is how I see it playing out. + Azriel saying it was a mistake to Elain, and Elain apologizing?? The fact she was confused/hurt and probably thought she misunderstood the whole situation? SHE IS BABYGIRL?? Regardless, Azriel saying it was a mistake and it being a mistake is NOT it. This is not how romance works most of the time. This is such a basic romantic trope, why are a lot of people misinterepting it? Elain deserves better, and sjm isn’t about to hurt Elain’s feelings without making it up to her. And she’s definitely not making Azriel end up with another girl before he fixes that shit. I will be needing a proper apology to Elain.

4- Whenever people think of the bonus chapter they weigh in Azriel’s feelings far more than Elain’s. It’s clear that Elain and Azriel’s feelings are MUTUAL, ignore the bonus chapter and it’s right there in the actual book. I don’t think Elain got the memo that Azriel had a conversation with another girl after he hurt her feelings which made him realize he’s in love all of a sudden. *sarcasm* that would be very out of character for Azriel.

5- His chest sparkling at the thought of Gwyn getting the necklace was so??? I have been saying he’s for the streets and yes this was out of pocket. So, I understand people shipping them. However it could mean anything really, you can't continue saying that Gwyn in the bonus has to mean something, and that that spark must mean somethig but continue to disreagrd every single Elriel interaction like they mean nothing. Because for it to be taken as romance we’d have to ignore the beginning of the bonus, the feysand’s bonus acosf/acomaf/acowar and acofas. + we could easily take this in a platonic way, which is how I viewed it when I read the bonus. Not everything has to be romantic. And sjm will NOT introduce a new guy to make him end up with Elain since we already established Elain doesn’t want Lucien and Lucien doesn’t want her either.

6- I know that a lot of people have theories about Gwyn being a lightsinger and all of this happening because of her powers (While I do think this is very smart, it wasn’t something I thought of so I won’t talk about it). I do think it’s possible, and all the theories I saw were really cool but idk where sjm is going with this, so to make it simple I do think it could be because she’s his student, she went through a lot it could simply be platonic happiness that a girl who went through so much is going to be happy about something. Even if it was a secondhand necklace specifically picked with ANOTHER girl in mind PLUS I do think sjm wanted drama, and for people to doubt elriel cuz now they have all these obstacles, so Gwyn would be the easy choice, but the second choice regardless. The relationship would feel icky and I genuinely cannot see the potential gwynriels keep talking about. I would take the ship a lot more seriously if a) he didn’t regift her another girl’s necklace b) there was more to them in the actual book. c) he wasn’t still upset about it 3 days later…

7- There’s a high possibility Gwyn never even got the necklace..

He gave it to Clotho not Gwyn, he didn’t want his name mentioned, and then said if any other girl would like it to give it to them: the aim was to get rid of Elain’s necklace. It’s sort of a parallel with Cassain throwing away Nesta’s present.

I think it’s possible that Azriel went there because he knows how much the girls in the library have suffered, especially since his mom did too, it's possible he thought "okay this is a pretty necklace, I don't want to hold onto the reminder of what could've been, so instead of throwing it let another girl be happy about it. At least it won’t go to waste”

Clotho could tell there was something wrong, like maybe she sensed the energy and decided ayeee let me keep this aside for him, he might come back and ask for it.

The bonus did not happen at the end of the book

If Azriel was truly in love with Gwyn now /or he wanted her/ or more between them was going to happen/ or they were mates according to some theories we could have AT LEAST gotten more after the bonus.

We know the bonus happened after solstice.

Nesta mentions that Azriel was stone-faced and more aloof than usual, he wouldn’t even give her a smile. That was 3 days after the necklace situation. I think it would’ve been a great opportunity to highlight any attraction between Azriel and Gwyn.

Maybe he sees the necklace around her neck, maybe Nesta and Emerie compliment Gwyn’s necklace, or Gwyn telling them she doesn’t know who it’s from, maybe they tease her that someone might have a crush on her. Nesta could’ve pointed out that Azriel was looking at Gwyn’s necklace.or looking at Gwyn in some sort of way. Literally anything.

Anyone pointing out the way Azriel and Gwyn looked at each other. A charged glance perhaps. Literally ANYTHING. We only got him looking at her with admiration which is very teacher coded.

If sjm hadn’t made Nesta realize Azriel had a thing for Elain then maybe gwnyriel would’ve been more appealing to me. But no, Nesta noticed. This doesn’t mean nothing people.

aside from that we got nothing romantic, but a part of the fandom still acts like we need to exile Elain because she’s coming between Gwyn and Azriel’s epic love story.

Not everyone has access to the bonus.

The Azriel chapter was only in ONE store in the US, but Feysand’s bonus chapter was in 3 stores in the US and UK. I don't know but something tells me it’s more important. Soooo if SJM would do a love interest switch she would not do it in a bonus chapter, and wouldn’t be highlighting the Az/Elain interactions in ACOSF as much as she did.

Feyre’s chapter focuses on Elain, it literally tells us Elain is next once we’re done helping Nesta. EASY MATH. and the Azriel bonus also focuses on elriel/Azriel’s feelings. ENDGAME MATERIAL RIGHT HERE.

But the girls swear up and down that Gwyn and Azriel’s book is next because of a secondhand necklace.

Let’s assume elriels are the delusional ones (like so many of them say), how do we explain these.

Casual readers who usually read books and aren’t on the internet and aren’t looking for bonus content (wish that was me) (lord knows I skipped every bonus chapter in throne of glass and crescent city and I wasn’t confused about anything. Not even once) so they’d expect answers for

The Charged glance between Azriel and Elain

Azriel following the sound of Elain’s laughter.

Elain looking away when Azriel smiled at her during family dinner, Cassian god bless him that idiot could NOT piece all of that together. BUT it was still highlighted through his POV ???

His secret to tell never hers (and we do learn of that secret in the bonus but people who didn’t read it could only guess so they’d want a confirmation) and sjm did say in one of her lives that Nesta learns of one of Azriel’s secrets (she looked all giddy about it)... and that Azriel is going through some shit right now…and we learn why from the bonus chapter.

Cassian being confused that it seems like Azriel moved on from Mor

Nesta pointing out that Elain moved on from Graysen

Cassian wondering why Elain is lying about where she’s going. (I viewed this as her avoiding Azriel but idk)

Azriel’s protectiveness of Elain. He gives mate behavior without the mate part. (I will hit him on the head though omg let my girl do something)

Elain willing to look for the troves even when Nesta wasn’t, the girl wants to do something (her journey is coming next)

Nesta wondering if Elain is training with Azriel or the twins (who are spies that were trained by Azriel !!!)

Feyre telling Azriel that Elain got him beat for secret keeping. Sure it might sound delusional but Elain keeps being compared to Az/being a spy and maybe this could be a thing.

Elain speaking back to her sisters about them treating her like a child?? Hello finally

The way Elain’s mother only treated her like a pretty doll which shaped up Elain’s whole life??? I want this from Elain’s POV sooo bad

In conclusion, we’re not pausing Elain’s story so Azriel can end up with a side character in a spinoff about an og side character, we’re sticking to our og side characters for now.

Azriel being over Mor because of Elain, and Elain moving on from Graysen because of Azriel only for Elain to get over Azriel to be with Lucien (who we got nothing from aside a mating bond..) and for Az to get over Elain and questioning fate for her…only to end up with gwyn…like I don’t think anyone could take Azriel’s feelings seriously if this happens. Shit will be too goofy. Because if he ends up with Gwyn who says he won’t move on to the next pretty girl he sees afterwards.

To add to that, what plot would we have for Azriel and Gwyn. We'll get more Valkyries training, more healing journey so the plot would have to be paused for this. Nesta’s book was mostly about her healing journey and friendship, while it was nice I don’t want a repeat for the next book. Especially since we know the Rite took a toll on Gwyn, she went back to the library, wasn’t even sure she would make it to Nessian’s mating ceremony. This doesn’t give the protagonist of the next book to me. Or "I thought it was pretty obvious"

Elain’s healing journey had started in ACOWAR, she got her friends in ACOWAR. Now is their TIME to do something!! She is next.

Closing thoughts on what I think would happen based off each ship happening:

If elriel happens = new sjm couple dynamic/interesting plot. Fresh sjm protagonist that is unlike sjm's others + we don’t ignore all the foreshadowing and hints. We follow the love triangle we set up in the og trilogy + finally get a rejected mating bond. And instead of warrior training we might get spy training and instead of physical power (as far as we know) we get something more mental. Again this is very new for sjm + there’s a lot to Elain’s power that we don’t know and since Azriel was the one who found out what she was, I think it would make more sense for him to know how to help her. Imagine the sexual tension during training..yes please. I hope sjm doesn’t rob me. Elain is really mysterious, we got Nesta’s inner thoughts before her book but we still haven't gotten a peep about Elain’s inner thoughts and I’m just dying to know more. AND THE STAKES!

1) Rhys forbidding Azriel from Elain, 2) Elain’s mating bond,3) Azriel’s self doubt and how he doesn’t think he’s good enough. 4) The blood duel and the political mess we could get into. (Lucien probs won't but what if Beron would, the breeding potential, A seer must be a powerful thing she can see things others can't and I think that’s valuable. If Eris thought Nesta was valuable as cauldron made and there was no potential there, so The Autumn court probably feels even more entitled to Elain) We have high inner and outer stakes. I have a feeling SJM will fumble all this potential but a girl can dream

If elucien happens = another successful mating bond + “enemies” to lovers sort of but they won’t ever be mean to each other so maybe not enemies, just dislike and awkwardness to friends to lovers? We ignore the hints about a rejected bond and in mating bonds we trust. We also ignore all the elriel hints, and their mutual feelings. We follow the love triangle set up in the og trilogy. I don’t think Lucien could train her in anything? Maybe self defense, Idk Sarah could pull something, but I don’t see Elain leaving her circle of friends but neither do I see Lucien settling in the night court and leaving his own friends. There are no stakes but Elain’s and Lucien’s awkwardness around each other + Elain’s feelings for Azriel. Elain’s and Lucien’s plot connects though so at least there’s that, SJM could ship them off on a mission together and make them get closer. Forced proximity sort of thing.

If gwynriel happens then = we lost the whole plot, ignored the foreshadowing and hints found in the actual book. Mentor to lovers, civil with each other. Azriel has to move on from Elain first though and that could be icky. Healing journey, more Valkyries training. So we pick up from where we left off in acosf, and we’d see Azriel trying to get her to come out of the Library, or he goes to visit her there until she agrees to come out again. Maybe if Gwyn is a lightsinger then idk more training with Azriel? Again, no stakes but Gwyn’s trauma and Azriel’s self doubt oh and also his feelings for Elain. But that’s it, Gwyn as of now does not connect to the overall plot with the troves (she’s not made therefore she can’t use them) or koschei. So I don’t see us making her go on a mission like that. I’ve seen a lot of gwynriles saying Gwyn has spy potential idk where, but she could barely keep a secret for Nesta so I highly doubt she’d be keeping secrets for the IC.

Ps: the original koschei plot is 3 sisters marrying 3 very powerful wizards and like idk 3 sisters 3 brothers…we can have a retelling ya know

#elriel #pro elain #azriel shadowsinger #acotar #a court of thorns and roses #Azriel's bonus #anti g*ynriel #anti el*cien #elain archeron #acofas #acosf

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