#sorry its shor

[anantaru]

— rejecting his cuddles

including dan heng, jing yuan, gepard, blade x gn! reader

꒰ genre ꒱ — fluff, crack, we‘re evil

— dan heng

"nope!"

you quickly place your hands on top of dan heng‘s chest to swiftly push him away— although tied with an eased and playful shove, your boyfriend was still left baffled and most of all, supremely confused out of his damned mind.

primarily— since when did you ever reject a comforting, cozy cuddle from your pretty man the moment he rushes straight home to come and see you, principally spoil you with all the bundled up physical affection he could possibly channel and provide?

one hundred percent, never. in point of fact was it you instead who would hug him first afresh.

"oh— i‘m sorry." dan heng backs away, as to not cross any boundaries with you. his voice shakes and creaks in the back of his toughened throat. it doesn't take a genius to figure out that he in fact, did not expect to have such a hard time being rejected by you.

"s-so.. uh, yeah."

dan heng corrects himself— or lets work something out to express it differently, at least tries to spell out a follow up sentence because you actually managed to make him speechless, at loss of words with nothing more than arbitrarily prattles bubbling past the tip of his tongue and leaving his lips.

there‘s a punch of cold silence, stolen by a deep sigh from your irritated lover— one might think that dan heng strongly thought about what he had done wrong or if he messed up in some way. yes, the possibility on you playing tricks on him was always there but this time you really put in all your acting skills into this one moment, carving it to almost perfection.

"can— can i ask why?" he nervously whispers, deciding that there, nothing was as gruelling as not receiving a hug from his significant other, "i don't know, can you?" which unbeknownst to him, was playing a devilish play with all expenses falling flat on top of his shoulders.

you smirk, your body moving on its own as you suddenly shelter his body into your frame, "surprise! it's a prank!" and nuzzle yourself into his chest, cheeks flushed on top.

granted, his facial expression was hilarious, but you could only go that far before the man would suffer from a heart attack.

"you're unbelievable." dan heng rolls his eyes while leaning his head into your neck, his nostrils slightly flaring at the pocketed entry of your signature scent welcoming him at last.

"you still love me though."

— jing yuan

to wholly fool someone, precisely form their running thoughts anew, was it wishful thinking or actually possible? what an absorbing charge to partake in, you figured.

but despite that, you were awfully aware that someone as hellishly meticulous and careful to their surroundings such as jing yuan was without question to be an utmost arduous task to accept— yet, who were you to give up so easily?

your heart had been softly pounding with a minuscule increased pace signalizing your nervousness the minute your boyfriend unlocked the door to your shared home. if you had been honest to yourself, the following sequences that would normally happen work as followed— if you didn't decide to be a little evil today, they never change, you greet the man in addition to embracing him in a warm hug, point blank, and jing yuan unreservedly savored such implementing like no other.

the man sought after a soothing embracement all day long, he thinks about it, and when closes his eyes he imagines it too. it's a crucial source of serotonin to him and he requires it each night before passing out into a deep slumber with you by his side.

"i'm home, my love."

your ears point at the all too recognizable voice dotting a comforting timbre into the living room as you silently moved up from your seat to walk towards jing yuan who had made it his own personal duty to part his arms the second he sees you saunter towards him.

"hello, love." you greet him with a smile, your voice had been soft and actually managed to fool him for the short duration of your prank.

but then, "oh, no thank you!" you skillfully dodge his attempt to wrap his arms around you, waving your hand in between the awkward space of your bodies, shaking your head.

"excuse.. excuse me?" that's a little less confident than how jing yuan would for the most part articulate himself— to underscore his brilliant irritation, he cocks up a brow in disbelief.

but he's cautious, your darling— so don't be fooled, the man had a sharp and blazing eye on remote sections that might go unnoticed to other people, to the innocent faces and crowds, it was jing yuan who was keeping the control interlaced in the palm of his hand.

"hmm?"

you play the guiltless, in the clear significant other a little too well and you applaud yourself for your very own performance— at this rate it makes you wonder if you should have actually pursued a career in acting after all.

while your boyfriend was now feeling a sense of dread in his joints and limbs, the color of his eyes had gotten hidden by a dusty darkness.

"ah, i understand." he smiles, but the way he approaches you was almost tactical, and that grin on his face— on the outside, modest and upright while on the inside, it concealed a bristling confidence that yes, figuring you out was easier than he thought.

"that's okay." jing yuan walks past you, slow, each step echoing and slipping past your ears, his hand too, was listlessly tapping your shoulder once twice, as he made you turn around to face him again.

"i do not need it anymore." huh, for him to not even utter a single complaint, something, anything would do, really.

your lips pucker into a pout when you realized it‘s over, when you noticed that your boyfriend was getting way better at this, as if he had you wholly figured out from the very start— did you never stand a chance to fool him to begin with?

"ugh." you cross your arms around your body, "you knew from the start, didn‘t you?"

"of course i did, love." he breathes his words featherlight, but his smile stays strong regardless.

"i always do."

— gepard

in the beginning of your comical scheme, gepard was convinced you didn‘t want to hug him because he had just returned from training the new recruits of the silvermane guards and fair enough— he didn‘t have the chance to take a shower prior to returning to you.

yet, keep in mind, in any other instances you did not care about said fact, more so was it you who‘d practically hug him for hours on end and pepper him with kisses all over. being the mighty captain of the silvermane guards of beleborg not unexpectedly came with a tightly shut package of both it‘s very own positives and jarring negatives.

while the positives would greatly outweigh the stormy negatives by a tenfold, having limited free time to spend on each other would sometimes be a strenuous obstacle you can only manage together, as a team.

"i can shower right away." gepard panics, he didn't think it was possible for his body to sweat even more than earlier when he fought against the new recruits and your poor boyfriend curses himself underneath the warm racks of his fastened breathing on why he didn't manage to be in the bestest shape for you tonight.

he adds on, "don‘t move, i‘ll be right back!"

the sides of your mouth twitch in an amusing snort and you carry on to gnaw down on your bottom lip to suppress yet another wave of laughter, "oh, i think you‘re misunderstanding me." and step back just a little bit more to accentuate your evil plan and push your boyfriend over the edge for good.

"i don‘t want to hug you tonight." you raise your brows while scratching the back of your neck.

this sentence alone was like a sharp stab into the blonde's heart as he sets his eyes to meet your own.

"like at all." and you finish him off with an indirect blow right against his handsome features, "at— at all?"

if you were aware of one thing, it was that gepard never wasted any time to talk things out with you— basically being transparent and working together, "okay, baby'" he pauses, "listen to me." and almost squeals in sadness, placing both hands on top of your shoulders.

"if you're still sad i had to cancel our dinner the other time, i can try to figure something out—"

how adorable, you realise.

pinching his cheeks with your fingers, you smile, a shadow of intense guilt poking on your heart, "i’m sorry!" you yell, "everything is fine, i‘m sorry." and abruptly lean into his warm body, arms crossed around his chest as you sensed the upping beat of his heart underneath his ribcage.

gepard couldn’t believe you this time, truly, and lets his eyes fall close before sighing out— in relief but also a slight bit of annoyance written across the rest of his heavenly features.

"i‘ll get back at you for this."

— blade

"hmm, you sure darling?" he acts innocent that's for certain but blade’s next look on you, fuck, if you didn‘t know any better you would've sternly stated that it entirely formed into a menacing demeanor— stone cold and fierce as you felt it wash over your trembling skin.

a followed sharp click of his tongue against the roof of his mouth is all it took for you to whole-heartedly regret and loathe even considering to work out a prank against your boyfriend, at all.

"yes, i pass."

notwithstanding, you couldn‘t back away now, quite obviously would it blow up in your face with you becoming the pranked one instead. at this graven point the entire situation had already been in great favor of blade instead of you— the most plausible solution would be to somehow make it out as a winner regardless while your lover thoroughly found delight in engaging in those games with you.

"what a shame." he sighs and tilts his head to the right— pending his eyes from your lips to your legs and up, then approaching you a step closer so your cheeks could immediately sense his warm breathing.

"and here i thought my significant other actually liked me." and slowly whispers his finishing line against the shell of your ear while idly leaving it to his gravelly voice to place a shivering thunder-like sensation on your skin, in this cold your body welcomed the flames of your flustering frame, the furnacing warmth and the fuel this man was capable to inflict on you was ridiculous, but so did you work wonders on his psyche.

you knew your boyfriend, entirely— his sweet perceptions, his personal views and his virtually scary attention to detail for bodily responses of his usual targets.

"ugh, cut the crap blade." you roll your eyes at him playfully, laughing out a frustrated heave with a deep scowl on your lips.

"me?" blade dramatically places his hand on top of his chest, his mesmerizing eyes growing at the size of saucers, what a pain in the neck, literally.

"yes you."

despite everything, you, with the kindness of your heart, attempted to silently move forward to cuddle him, practically leaving your failed prank in the past while blade, in his radiating confidence, was swift to dodge you.

"no thanks." blade says sternly, "i‘m rejecting this hug."

how unwelcomely, indecently, annoyingly typical for your boyfriend to turn this entire malfunctioning situation upside down and play it into his very own favor.

if only he wasn‘t so breathtakingly handsome when he greeted you and presented his confidence so tastefully, smiled so prettily at you too, his shining whites and canines poking from under his lips and greatly accentuating the rest of his bewitching features while his large hands slowly ran up and down your shaking arms.

"tsk." you avert your gaze, not being certain if you're more embarrassed that you lost or that he beat you so effortlessly too, "you‘re unbelievable blade."

okay, hold on— even though you started this game, now witnessing it in a different perspective on how it would‘ve played out the other way around was a little frustrating, to say the least— while you also made sure that you‘re calling yourself out for that sprinkle bit of hypocrisy climbing up on you.

"i‘m unbelievably funny." he drawls back at you with a wink and kisses your forehead playfully— then your nose, which he found adorable and lastly your cheeks before gently trapping your chin in between his thumb and pointer finger to make you look at him, "and i have to put you in your place sometimes, you know?"

as he at last, conveniently pulls you into a warm hug, both smiling and laughing into the comfort of the situation.

2023 anantaru do not repost, copy, translate, modify

#honkai star rail x reader #hsr x reader #dan heng x reader #jing yuan x reader #blade x reader #gepard x reader #honkai star rail x you #honkai star rail fan fiction #hsr fan fiction #honkai star rail dan heng #honkai star rail blade #honkai star rail jing yuan #honkai star rail gepard #blade x you #dan heng x you #jing yuan x you #gepard x you #hsr x you #hsr blade #hsr dan heng

[dawns-beauty]

Okay, to counteract all my complaining, here are some (lore friendly) mods that I just like a lot (no animals, people, weapons/armors, mesh/texture replacers, etc. because there's too many and it gets boring.)

-

Ghosts of the Deathbells: adds a really rare, somber event to picking a deathbell flower.

Falmeroon: adds Snow Elf ruins to some remote edges of the map. I've made an unofficial SE port here.

Snow Whale Bones: adds the remains of Snow Whales in some mountainous areas (iffy canon but sorry they are Cool.)

Windmills of Skyrim: adds windmills with unique, custom-painted sails to farms.

Scarecrows of Skyrim: adds scarecrows to farms.

Scribes of Skyrim: makes books and notes use a variety of typefaces (any fellow Pentiment fans out there?)

The Old Ways-Nordic Religion: adds totems representing the Nordic pantheon around Skyrim. Has patches for the next recommendation.

The Great Towns/Villages series: overhauls the smaller, worldspace towns in a really cool way, includes voice-acted NPCs. Personally, I like Kynesgrove the best because it actually adds to the lore about the Nordic pantheon. For Shor's Stone, I recommend this mod as well.

Redbag's Rorikstead: I like this mod over Great Village's version because the houses have sod roofs and I'm a sucker for sod roofs.

Capital Windhelm Expansion: adds some really thoughtful lore touches (Dunmer refugees outside the walls, an Arena, and a cool vampire quest)

Relic of Dawnstar: adds a Gehenoth skull to the White Hall (requires Cities of the North), inspired by the lore of the Travels game

Environs series: thoughtful additions that makes certain places change over time.

WiZKid's mods: especially Lund's Hut, Lively Farms, Icy Windhelm, Pinewatch, Hall of the Dead Stained Glass Windows, and Pavo's House. Sepolcri is also pretty good but loses immersion points for using celtic cross gravestones. You can pry Lanterns of Skyrim II from my cold, dead hands, though. Lux? Idk her, LoSII is my bestie.

Fancy Sleeping Tree Replacer: the Sleeping Tree is supposed to be a remnant of the sentient trees of the flying city of Umbriel (from the novels.) It should be weird, is what I'm saying, and this mod makes it alien and beautiful.

Unique Culture Riverwood: a mod that gives Riverwood its own style of farmhouse and a little more personality. The author has also made a mod for Falkreath.

Immersive World Encounters: adds more and edits World Encounters, including encountering faction NPCs out and about (ex. the Companions outside of Whiterun doing Companion-y things in the wilderness).

Glorious Doors of Skyrim: adds some really cool doors. 'nuff said.

Redbag's Dragonreach: adds some unique flair to Jarl Ballin's crib.

Cultured Orc Furniture: replaces generic furniture in Orc Strongholds with custom furniture.

Lavinia's Memorial: adds some gifts from her grieving parents to the little girl's grave in Falkreath. Ouch.

Nocturnal Moths: adds moths that spawn around lanterns at night.

Moons and Stars: fixes the positions of the stars and moons, as well as making moon phases consistent.

DK's Realistic Nord Ships: replaces Skyrim's ships with some gorgeous new models.

Morgenstern's Mushroom Circles: adds more fairy rings in the wilderness. Delightful!

Bloodmoon Brodir Grove: makes the grove in Solstheim a little more like it was in the Morrowind DLC. The mod author also has more mods that bring Bloodmoon details and locations to Solstheim.

Ships of the Horizon: does what it says on the tin.

EVG Animation Variance: the whole animation series by Everglaid is nice (haven't tried Traversal yet, but that is some incredible technology) but I especially like this one for the old people animations

jasperthegnome's houses: these are SO cozy and comfy.

Arctic- Frost Effects Redux: makes frost spells have cooler effects (including 3D ice spikes)

Northern Roads- Let Me Guess Someone Stole Your Sweetroads: a plugin that cuts down on Northern Roads, removing all the landscape changes and bridges and just keeping the clutter. Way more compatible than the original mod.

Skyrim Bridges: this is my favorite bridge mod. There are many, but I like this one best.

Edit: forgot two tiny mods in my original post:

Nightcaller Temple Unique Shrine of Mara: replaces the generic shrine with a wooden shrine Erandur carved

Broken Tower Redoubt Unique Shrine of Dibella: similar to the above mod, but Reachmen carved this one.

#skyrim #skyrim mods #mod recs #tes

[skzgene]

*MINORS DNI* Hyunjin X Reader One shor

Word count 2032.

Contents includes - smut, oral sex female receiving, praise kink, reader is slightly un-body confident.

A photoshoot soon turns into something more.

Hyunjin x Reader One Shot.

‘Ready for the shoot’ hyunjin speaks calmly over the sound of the camera shutter clicking away.

‘Yeah of course!’ You reply excitedly.

Its been yours and his thing for a while, doing shoots together, that way you could get some really good pictures for your portfolio, as well as getting the chance to help him practice his skills. You Haven’t known him for too long, but there is a sense of comfortability there between you, the intimacy of being vulnerable and completely in his line of sight while he takes pictures of you makes you feel almost confident dare you say.

‘So today were going with simple and artistic right?’ You ask shyly.

‘Yeah ive bought a simple set up today, i just want it to be the lights and you.. if thats ok?’ He asks, smiling ‘im sure youll look like an angel regardless’

You blush as you pull your summer dress above your head and fold it, placing it on the couch. You wear a slick and simple nude underwear set, it doesn’t scream sexy, but this shoots not about that, its about embracing light and your skin textures. At least, thats what hyunjin wanted, so of course you obliged.

Stepping onto the backdrop a pool of golden light from the window hits your skin.

‘Hmm’ you hear hyunjin sigh under his breath.

‘Everything ok?’

‘Oh erm, yeah sorry, its just, you look beautiful in that lighting’ he mutters, looking down into the lens of his camera.

‘Ok ready?’

The camera shutter clicks over and over as he takes candid pictures of you.

A good 10/15 minutes pass by when you notice hyunjin is starting to look almost unsettled.

Looking at him with concern, you strike up a conversation.

‘So what was the aim you were going for today exactly? Is it all ok?’

‘No its honestly perfect’ he replies. ‘Honestly im just slightly in awe at how angelic you look’

You blush, looking down at your body. Youve never been super confident about it, but somehow sitting here nearly naked in front of him, he makes you feel almost on top of the world.

‘Im just going to fix your hair’

he stands up and walks towards you.

Kneeling by your side before tucking your hair behind your ear. Your eyes catch eachother for a moment, lingering for what feels like eternity. You havent realised his hand is resting gently on your shoulder at this point, so soft and gentle on your skin.

He brings his other hand up towards your face, running his thumb over your lips softly.

‘Your lips look so soft’ he whispers.

His breath is hot, so close to your skin.

You can feel the hair on the back of your neck stand up in angst of his touch.

‘Oh, i.’ you stumble over words, not finding a significant response.

‘Hahaha’ he throws his head back and lets out a laugh. ‘Cute’

You tap him jokingly for making you feel so embarrassed. ‘Stoppppp!’ You whine.

‘Sorry, but its something ive been waiting to do for a while’ he says.

inching his lips closer to yours until they eventually meet, his mouth is warm, smooth on yours, you eyes close from being in this moment with him.

He begins to run finger tips over your collarbone and down along your arms until his hand reaches yours, entwining into each others fingers, he stands up, pulling you from off the floor almost in desperation.

You stand in front of him as his gaze lowers onto your body, scanning your chest and torso before walking around to the back of you.

Your brain goes into overdrive before you feel his hands on your skin once again, this time removing your hair from off your shoulder to expose your neck to him.

‘I love how soft your skin feels’ he whispers into your ear.

Planting kisses along your neck and onto your shoulder. His index finger traces the sides of both of your arms, his lips still grazing your skin.

At this point you can feel yourself sinking in to the comfortability of how he touches you, but you cant help but want more.

‘Hyunjin?’ You whisper.

‘Yes’ he mutters between kisses.

‘Where is this going?’

‘Shhh’ he places his hand over your mouth, firmly but still so gentle. ‘Let me show you’.

He walks back to the front of you, lifting you up by your waist, you wrap your legs around his hips.

‘Eager’ he teases.

‘Shutup’ you laugh, wrapping your forearms around his neck.

He carries you over to the couch, sitting down and placing you on top of his lap.

You can feel him getting harder under his cargos as the tension between you rises.

He kisses you again, this times slightly harder and more needy than before.

using one hand to unclasp the back he slides your bra down off of your body.

Automatically planting his mouth over one of your breasts. His tongue twirls over and over against your now erect nipples as his hands slide scratches down your back.

You grind into him, feeling yourself get wetter, your longing to be touched by him and finally release the tension, but right now, Hes taking his precious time on your body.

Every touch lingering and leaving shudders on your skin.

He lifts his hips up to push his now fully erect member against your now throbbing pussy.

He lifts you slightly as he pulls down his cargos and boxer shorts, revealing the thing you want to fill you up so badly.

Flipping you over to sit you on the sofa he kneels in front of you, quickly sliding off your thong impatiently, revealing your now glistening lips to him.

‘Wow’ he gasps, lifting your lower legs and placing them on his shoulders. ‘Your so wet for me’.

You blush and take hold of one of his hands as he plants kisses along your inner thighs, getting closer and closer to where you really want his lips to be.

You feel strands of his hair run along your legs as he finally pressed his tongue onto your wetness.

‘Hmmm’ you sign as you push your hips upwards towards his mouth.

He slides his hands under your ass for grip as he runs his tongue along the length of your pussy, stopping at your clit before taking it in his mouth and sucking gently.

the feeling of his warm soft breath on your most intimate parts send you into overdrive.

You pick up the pace of your grinding against his mouth, before he removes his hand from under you, sliding two fingers inside of you.

‘Oh my god’ your eyes roll back as you feel his fingers curl inside of your tight hole, gently pushing against your sensitive spot.

‘Hyunjin’ you look down, grabbing a fistful of his now sweat drenched locks of hair. ‘Please, i cant take it, i need you’

He looks up at you from between your thighs, fingers still inside of you, his eyebrows raise and a smirk begins to form on his plump lips, which are now drowned in your wetness.

Without saying a word he pulls his fingers from inside of you and slowly manouvers you so you are lying flat on the sofa.

Hovering above you, as your faces are inches away from one another his chain hangs from his neck brushing your chin under the movement of his breath.

‘Ill be gentle’ he whispers as his hand searches for the waistband of his cargos, pulling them down slowly to finally reveal himself to you.

Your eyes wander down his body to where he now waits, fully hard, ready to finally give you what you have been yearning for.

He is a lot bigger than you expected, but you are determined to make all of him fit.

He pins your leg with his shoulder before pumping his pulsing dick a few times, placing it near to your entrance and slowly gliding it inside of you. You wince in pain as he stretches you, fitting himself just an inch inside.

‘Are you ok i-is this ok?’ He stutters.

‘Im fine, honestly, i can take it’ you smirk at him with a determined look swiping across your face.

‘Wow’ he licks his top lip before biting on his lower one ‘you look so beautiful with me inside of you’

His eyes prowl over your chest as he slides himself in deeper, feeling every inch of him inside of you, the pain soon turns into a pleasure you have never experienced, especially not this good.

His hips grind into you with slow strokes as his lips lock on to yours, your back arches with every stroke, it feels as though there is no limit to how deep he can go.

Your bodies almost are sinking into the cushions on the sofa when he reaches towards your waist, wrapping his one arm around your back to lift your pelvis slightly.

With the slight elevation he hits your sweet spot and you cry out his name.

‘Fuck, hyunjin’ you mutter under faltered breaths.

‘You look like an angel, taking me like this, how did i get so lucky’ he speaks with the softest but sexiest whisper.

You could almost cum right then and there with the praise he is feeding you. You always knew he would be more loving than rough, but this exceeded all expectations.

‘Your body looks so good underneath me’

His words fall over deaf ears as all you can focus on is you getting closer and closer to climax.

He removes your thigh from his shoulder, wrapping them around his waist as he wraps his arms around the top of your back, his head now next to yours, planting kisses onto your jawline and digging his nails slightly into your back.

His breath is hot and heavy on your neck, it grazes past your ear as low groans escape his mouth. Your body grinds underneath him as his thrust pick up pace. You can tell hes getting closer.

‘I want us to finish at the same time, you deserve to be worshipped’ he whispers in your ear.

‘Your driving me insane’ you reply almost abruptly.

‘Your so warm, i love how you feel around my dick’ he shudders.

His pace is steady, but faster and harder now, almost eager to make you cum all over him.

‘Fuck, I’m close’ you cry out under breathless moans.

He raises himself onto his elbows to hover over you.

‘Look me in the eyes’ he speaks, almost demanding. Beads of sweat dripping off his chin and onto your tongue, he is salty in your mouth, but it just makes you even more lustful for him.

Your eyes lock on his as you reach your climax, you feel your core tighten around him as you reach orgasm, just as you thought, the feeling of you tightening around him sends him over the edge and he pulses inside of you, throwing his head back, breaking the eye contact before filling you with streams of his warm juices

‘Urhhhh’ he moans out one last time as he slides slowly out of you. Flopping lazily beside where you lay.

He plants kisses over your shoulder as his arm wraps around your waist pulling you into his body covered in a mixture of sweat and your wetness.

He looks deeply into your eyes.

‘W-was that ok?’ He mutters shyly

You giggle slightly, a smile forms across your face as you swipe a strand of hair off of his sticky forehead. ‘It was amazing’

You both doze off into a light sleep, bodies entwined with one another, still naked and vulnerable.

An hour or so passes before you wake to him moving around behind you, his arm still wrapped tightly around your waist.

Your eyes take his features in once again, before he breaks your concentration with his sleepy sounding voice.

‘So much for the photoshoot, we should make this a regular occurrence so i can show you how beautiful you are’ he props himself up on his elbow.

‘Sounds like a plan’ you agree.

#straykids #hyunjin #stray kids #skz #stay #smut #fanfic #hyunjinsmut #hyunjinkink #fanfiction #hwanghyunjin

[ninapi]

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┊┊┊✧ ⁺ ⁺╚══ Snake Pillar ╝

Premise: Love isn't always something beautiful, wanted, expected. Iguro had always been in love with Mitsuri, but that didn't stop his Tsuguko from falling for him.

Word Count: 3686

Warning: Main character death, spoilers of the main manga timeline.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Spring, everyone’s favorite season was now here.

The Sakura trees were in full bloom in the capital, the streets filled with beautiful petals flocking around the chilly wind.

Animals and humans alike were now getting intimate to bring new life to this world.

The perfect season for demons to go rampage in town.

After a two weeks long mission along the fire pillar, you were summoned by Oyakata-sama and his wife, the reason was unknown to you but the messenger didn’t seem to be carrying bad news.

“(Y/N) my child. You’ve proven to be the best of your generation; we’ve both been talking, and we think you should be upgraded to Tsuguko. I believe you have the potential to be our next pillar.”

That caught you off guard, yes, the mission was very intense, but if it wasn’t for Rengoku-san you would have died, at least four times. You considered yourself just one more of the bunch, nothing special, besides your bond with the fire pillar that is. You both got more than along, were in complete sync, and everybody knew about this, even your master.

“That would be an honor, Oyakata-sama. If I may ask for something selfish, is it possible to…”

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

The pillars were summoned for a brief meeting a few days later, the crows didn’t elaborate on the reason, but it didn’t seem urgent, so they all arrived at their own pace.

Once Oyakata-sama arrived, they all took their respective place around the leader, excited to see their master.

“My beloved children. Sorry to call you with such a short notice, I have some good news that wanted to share with you.” this didn’t happen often, usually the meetings were about important upcoming missions or bigger troubles, but he looked awfully calm this time around.

“(Y/N) has proven her worth in countless missions and the last one was her last trial; she will be officially our new Tsuguko starting tomorrow.” Rengoku’s smile was so bright even Gyomei could feel it. He was radiating fire at this point, as proud as one could be.

“Sanemi, I think you’re the perfect match for our little (Y/N).” this caused said smile to drop to the floor in seconds, he was sure he would be the chosen one.

“With all due respect, Oyakata-sama. I can see the logic behind it, she does have great wind affinity, but I honestly don’t think she can withstand my harsh training, wouldn’t it be better to send her over to Rengoku?” Ah... Shinazugawa…such a lovely man, thought Rengoku as his smile was slowly returning to its rightful place.

“Yes, I thought so too, they do have amazing chemistry. But you know I always listen to my wife; she insists she’d be better off with you.” that left Sanemi speechless and a little bothered, he really didn’t want to train a little spoiled brat, he was already busy at it is.

“I can sense your discomfort, Sanemi. And let me lift those worries out right now, even if we both agreed you should be the one, (Y/N) herself came to us asking if it was possible to be trained under Obanai’s lead, she didn’t even know who she would be sent to by then, but she made her preferences known, and I respect that.” Iguro had a coughing attack at the news, having to place a hand on the ground to recover.

“She did what?” Rengoku was beyond heartbroken, he even forgot Oyakata-sama was the one delivering the news, he would never disrespect him in any way, but this was shocking.

“Rengoku.” Himejima clapped his hands loudly, making Rengoku realize what he had done, throwing himself on the floor at once. “I’m sorry for my behavior, Oyakata-sama. Are you sure…she said that?”

“Lift your head Kyojuro. She did, it sounded like she had a reason though. Why don’t you try asking her?” with a short nod, he went back to his seat, crestfallen.

“Obanai, I know you didn’t want a Tsuguko. But she’s the best we have right now, please make sure to train her properly and don’t be too harsh on her, she asked nicely, must really want to be under your care.”

Iguro was losing his cool. He wasn’t only getting a Tsuguko against his will, it was a girl at that. And not just any girl, the girl majority of the guys around the corps had a crush on, even the almighty fire pillar. He didn’t want this, not in the slightest.

“Iguro-san, Iguro-san! (Y/N) is so, so, so, cute! You’re so lucky! I envy you so much!” Kanroji was pulling from her braids in despair, she had been begging for a Tsuguko and had wished for a cute girl to dot on and talk about boys, you were the perfect candidate.

“Oyakata-sama, as I’m sure you know, I’m not good with girls. How can I have a female Tsuguko?” his breath was ragged, his head was spinning, he really didn’t want any of this. “Can’t you give her over to Kanroji?”

“My children,” his tone wasn’t as loving as it usually is anymore, sending chills down everyone’s spine, “This is not an auction, Rengoku and Kanroji might want her, I wanted her under Sanemi myself, but she wants you, Obanai. I’m being as fair as I can be, she’s the one who must be trained by you, the one who will suffer the consequences of this decision, and it has been made, there’s nothing more to argue about. You are all dismissed.”

They all got up from their seat, walking out to the garden as soon as he spoke, Sanemi collapsing on the floor with a satisfied long sigh, “Safe.”

Rengoku on the other hand was quietly sulking behind a wooden post.

Iguro was just there, trying to regain some air back to his lungs and to process what had happened, his loyal friend hissing on his ear trying to offer some sort of comfort.

“Iguro-san! Don’t doubt to call me if you need help! I’m a girl too, we get each other. Maybe I can even steal from time to time and smother her with love after your harsh training! Ahw! So exciting!” Mitsuri was swaying on her feet, daydreaming happily of who knows what atrocities.

“Will do….” his voice was nothing but a whisper, his feet safely guiding him back to his state. Life wasn’t on his side, he’s always been aware of this since he was a child, but this, this was just too much.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

You were in the serpent state with your bags by sunrise, ready to fully immerse yourself in the experience, a bright smile on your face.

Iguro, who just woke up was definitely not ready for this, not even saying good morning he jumped right into the matter that barely allowed him to sleep last night, “(L/N) why did you ask to be my Tsuguko? Wasn’t Rengoku a better fit? I’m sure we can get Oyakata-sama to reassign you if we both go toge-“

“I want to be trained by you, Iguro-san. Is that a bad thing?” your eyes were glossy, disappointment painting your features. He wasn’t trying to make you cry, he was just not the right man for the job.

“Why would you want that? You know my training is rough right? I won’t slow down just because you are a girl.”

“I am not expecting you to slow down. I just thought Tsugukos were chosen by affinity. I think you are the coolest Iguro-san…I would like to inherit the snake breathing techniques one day…” this was the first time someone called him cool, this was specially surprising coming from someone who’s been near Rengoku for the longest time.

“Not everyone can do this. You have to have a connection with the species-“ your eyes were glued to the beautiful snake around his shoulders, a childlike expression on your face. “You just want to touch Kaburamaru, don’t you?” his eyes were full of realization, he caught you.

This made you giggle, the snake skillfully wrapping around your arm on its own, quickly enamored by you. “Maybe…”

The ridiculousness of it all made Iguro accept his fate, his snake friend seemed comfortable enough with your presence, he is always friendly but not to this level, you probably had potential for his breathing style by the looks of it, he had to give you a chance to prove yourself.

“Go drop your stuff in the empty room by the entrance, I’ll see you in the training grounds in ten.” He’s never seen such a bright smile before, Kanroji had the most beautiful there is, but your smile was different, it felt warm, you were probably rubbing on Rengoku for too long, it had to be that.

Throwing it to the back of his mind, he moved on with his day.

He had a Tsuguko now, training would be his priority for a while.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Rengoku was still in shock, even if an entire day had gone by. He was sure you guys had a thing, or was it just his imagination?

You don’t just hold hands with random people, right? He wasn’t the most experienced in the love department, but he was pretty sure it wasn’t just him, the longing in your eyes each time you saw him, the way you smiled at him so brightly, so tenderly, it couldn’t be all in his head.

He wanted to see it with his own eyes, so he headed to Iguro’s training grounds, he needed to hear it from you, the reason why.

You were exhausted, panting on the floor after a very long training morning with your favorite pillar. Kaburamaru was laying on you, sunbathing on your belly, making you giggle as you caressed his beautiful scales. Iguro was watching the interaction from up a tree, you didn’t know he was there, but you knew he had to be close otherwise the snake would have left after him already.

He was about to leave when Rengoku arrived, his worried expression made him want to stay a little more. In all truth, he was still wishing you would change your mind and go with the fire pillar, but after training you all morning he wasn’t as discouraged to train you anymore, you had more than enough potential to be a pillar and Kaburamaru loved you, it wasn’t easy to find someone so compatible with his own skills, it would honestly be a shame, even if he didn’t want to accept it.

“(Y/N) dear, is your training for the day over? I wanted to have a word with you…” getting up gently, you set the little snake down on a patch of grass before heading your way over to him. “Sure, Kyo-san. What’s up?”

“I…I was wondering why you chose to come to Iguro instead of being with me. We have such an awesome connection, having you teaming with him instead will be devastating for me.” he was more heartbroken than anything else, he couldn’t care less for the missions, he could do it all by himself, he just enjoyed them so much more since you started tagging along, he misses you already.

“We do, yes.. I just…well you know how everyone’s scared of him? I just think he deserves a chance; nobody wants to be his Tsuguko and I think we could potentially get along one day, he’s great with animals, and so am I. Don’t you think I could be a good serpent breathing representative? I don’t think I could do cool things with fire like you do.” your heart was so big, it was one of the things he loved about you, he couldn’t be upset anymore after hearing your reasoning.

“And what about good old Rengoku? He needs a Tsuguko too you know? I will miss you…” his voice dropped along with his hand which now rested on your waist.

“Good old Kyo-san has a cute little brother that will eventually come to be in his care, he doesn’t need me.” your cute giggles were music to his ears, he really did like you, a lot.

Iguro on the other hand felt uncomfortable watching this whole thing. So you felt pity? Was that it? You wanted to be with him so he wouldn’t end up being the only pillar without an apprentice? He didn’t know how to feel about this, it didn’t feel good, but it also made something fuzzy bloom in his chest.

“Oh? So he’s cute, huh? Is he cuter than me? Am in troubles?” a low chuckle rumbled in his chest, his hand tugging you closer to him.

“You might be~” poking your tongue out at him in a teasing manner, you ran away from him and headed inside the serpent state, “Gotta take a bath, see you later Kyo-san!”

Iguro came out of the tree to pick sleeping Kaburamaru up, Rengoku glaring in his direction. “Didn’t peg you as a stalker, Iguro.”

“Sorry to disappoint you, but this is my state. Now, I would like to make it clear from the start that I expect you to stop clinging to my Tsuguko. She needs to train hard; distractions are not welcomed.” he didn’t know why he was saying all this, words were just coming out of his mouth on their own.

“Weren’t you into Kanroji? Why does it matter to you if I cling to her or not?” raising one of his intimidating eyebrows up, he scoffed. “I well, what? No, I’m not. But she has nothing to do with this. I just don’t want you parading around my state all day, that’s all.”

“I’m not here to see you, so I don’t see why it bothers you this much. But ok, I will leave my time with her reserved for after training hours, then I get to have her all to myself.” without another word, he headed to his own state, his heart felt a bit lighter now that he cleared things up with you, but he’s never heard Iguro talk this much, it was a bit concerning.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

One thing about Obanai is that he wakes up early every morning, even before the sun’s up.

The reason why being he just didn’t want anybody to get a the slightest glimpse of his unwrapped self as he takes a bath, other members of the corpse share the space and he didn’t want anybody to be even more on edge because of him.

You were the contrary, always late, falling asleep was your worse flaw and he hated it deep down in his guts, but he was glad in a way as he never had to encounter you bright and early when he is most tense.

That was until this day.

You weren’t what you would consider ‘early’ you just didn’t sleep at all, there were a lot of things in your head and coming from a difficult mission with lots of death plaguing it would of course cause you to lose sleep. So you decided to take a bath and start stretching while you waited for your training session to start.

You bumped into him on his way out of the bathing area, making both of your towels fall to the ground. Crouching to pick both up you apologized profusely. “I’m so sorry Iguro-san, I didn’t know there was someone in the bath already!”

He was paralyzed with fear, his face out in the open for everyone to see.

You tried not to stare, but this was your first time seeing his face properly. “Don’t look, I’m hideous…” he tried to cover his face with a bucket nearby, your hand reaching over to stop him from doing so.

“There’s no such thing as a hideous person, Iguro-san. I can understand you being self-conscious about the scar, we all obsess over something in our body, I personally don’t like my thighs, that’s why I cover them, but people say they’re nothing out of the ordinary, even if to me they’re awful.”

Mumbling behind his sleeve, he peeked one eye out to look down to your succulent thighs, “They’re fine…why would you hate them?”

“And why would you hate your beautiful face? Makes no sense to me~” giggling past him, you went inside the bathing area, needing to hurry as your trainer was up already.

“B-beautiful? What-…” scoffing, he headed over to his room, quickly wrapping his face away from the world as he usually does. You were indeed a weird one, always seeing the best out of every situation, it was honestly refreshing, but difficult to handle for someone like him.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Time skip~

You’ve been under Iguro’s care for over a year now. You’ve perfected the first three breathing techniques, surprising him with your progress.

You were good, he was even fearing Kaburamaru would leave him and become your partner full time. Who can blame him though? After all this time seeing you around every day, he gets now what people see in you. Not only were you pretty, but you were strong, considerate, kind, selfless. Definitely a match for Rengoku, not him.

You were now sure of his undying love for Kanroji, she would visit him often, eat lunch together, he even bought stuff for her constantly, it was painstakingly obvious they both liked each other. As it was how much Rengoku liked you.

You on the other hand had mixed feelings.

Of course, Rengoku is lovely, he wanted to pursue you officially, but you had a hard time accepting his feelings. You spend all your day with Iguro, you’ve got to truly see him for what he really is, learned to accept him, entertain him, be in sync with him. You now made a great team. It was him you thought about before going to bed and as soon as you woke up. It was him who you wished to receive praises from, it was him you wanted to make proud.

Even if he was clearly in love with someone else, your feelings shifted his way without anyone’s consent.

The way he would bring you a cup of tea after a harsh training routine, the way he would sit quietly next to you eating sweets peacefully, you’ve seen his face already and wasn’t disgusted by it, he could eat around you comfortably.

The way he would let you hold onto his arm if the missions were tough. The way his eyes soften now in your presence.

You were deep in love with a man who’s heart belonged to someone else…

A mission came around for you two, a particularly tough demon had come out very near a village booming with tourists. It needed to be contained and destroyed as fast as possible.

You’ve seen the way his demeanor towards you had changed every time you talk, you know he didn’t think of you as a nuisance anymore, but you also knew he wouldn’t accept your feelings, and as hard as that might be, you decided to keep your feelings to yourself and treasure the relationship you currently had with him.

The demon was tougher than you two expected, even with a pillar there you were having a hard time killing him. Three women had already lost their life to his rampage, you needed to do something.

Since he seemed to like killing women, you were trying to devise a plan to lure him in and give Iguro time to cut his head off, but your head turned blank when you saw the demon sneaking behind Iguro and about to stab him right through the heart.

Panic surged through your body, inhuman speed possessing you as you rushed to his aid, receiving the blow instead.

Iguro saw it all in slow motion, how you fell to the ground, covered in blood, how the wound had pierced a vital organ dooming your recovery. His rage served as the means necessary to cut the demon’s head and send him to oblivion. But the cut was too deep, he didn’t know how to help you.

You could barely keep your eyes open when he gathered you to his chest, tears unexpectedly coming down his face slowly, one after the other, “(Y/N), no, why? Why?? You’re so stupid, how many times have I told you I’m stronger than you? I can take a blow like that! But you….just look at you….why, just why would you do this…?” your hand reached over to his face wrappings, undoing them so you got to see a glimpse of his face one last time.

“Because I love you. I couldn’t just let you die Iguro-san...” his hand came over to stop yours from fully removing the wraps, his entire being too shaken by the situation to comprehend your words.

“C’mon…let me see your beautiful face one last time…I don’t have much left…” your soft smile and trembling hand made him forgo his stubbornness, letting you remove the wraps.

“Thank you for letting me be your Tusuguko…even when you didn’t like me.” you chuckled slightly, coughing out blood while doing so, alerting Iguro and making him tighten his grip around your faint body. “I know you don’t like your face, but I will always think of it as the most beautiful I’ve ever seen. I hope you felt loved while being around me, even if it was just a little…” he nodded, collapsing to the ground fully with you in his arms. He really liked Mitsuri, everyone knew about this, but you had loved him like no one else had, openly, abundantly, and he couldn’t give you any of it back.

“Would you…remember me…?”

“Of course I will, what are you saying…you’re my only Tsuguko, I will never have another one, the techniques will die with us…” nuzzling his chest, you gave one last shaky breath, “Thank you…Igu-….” Leaving this world in the hands of a loved one has no price, makes time living among others worthwhile.

With a smile on his teary face, he bid goodbye to his only apprentice, the woman that loved him to her own demise.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

The serpent state was never to be the same and he made sure of it.

He made everyone leave and remained there on his own, never taking another Tsuguko as he promised he would.

He likes Mitsuri, everybody knows that, even her, and he did till his very last breath, but he always carried with him the load you left him, the unshared feelings, the overwhelming amount of love you had towards him and Kaburamaru and always lived within him, being his companions until his arrival in the afterlife.

▄▀▄▀▄▀▄▀▄▀▄▀▄▀▄▀▄▀▄▀▄▀▄▀▄▀▄▀▄▀▄

Masterlist

#kimetsu no yaiba #demon slayer #demon slayer fanfic #kimetsu no yaiba fanfic #demon slayer x you #demon slayer x y/n #demon slayer x female reader #demon slayer hashira #iguro obanai #iguro x reader #iguro x y/n #snake pillar #snake hashira #angst #unrequited love #love triangle #rengoku kyojuro #character death #why do i always have the need to write sad - happy endings #am i the only one that likes angsty stuff

[bitchwhoreofastorm]

gratuitous nord demon backstory. following the battle of kastav, 1E392. tw: imprisonment/kidnapping

They hadn't bound her hands. Thank Kyne, thank Tsun, thank Mara, thank dead Shor in the ground, they hadn't bound her hands. Even with the gag forced into her mouth, with her hands free Barfok is not without a voice: she can sign, she can make herself known, even if her protestations are witnessed only by the walls of the dungeon and the back of the half-dead boy they threw down here with her, but oh, by Kyne, by Tsun, by Mara, by dead Shor in the ground, doesn't it make everything better? She flips off her captor when he throws her in and it is utter bliss.

So, hours into being in this dungeon, she sits against the wall, practising her signs the way she used to when Ysmir first taught her how to sign it. Ahg. Aak. Ah. Bah. Bah, ah, rah, fu'u, og, kah. Yo, su, mah, ikh, rah. She finds herself keeping tempo with the dripping water coming from one corner. There's a bucket under the drip, and she realises, slowly, that's the Whiterun men's idea of water for a guest.

Yo, su. It's a slow drip, or she'd go bathe.

She hears a soft groan. Kah, eg, mah, ah.

She's not alone in this prison. Her companion, the boy, proves himself to be a little less than half-dead. He's lying on the ground with his back turned to her, not his fault, just how he landed when they tossed him in. Barfok watches with mild curiosity as he slowly rolls himself onto his back, cranes his neck up, gasping for air. He, too, is gagged. His eyes are closed, his hair is long and only red-ish and plastered to his face with sweat. His breathing comes very shallowly.

He'd lost the battle for them. His first battle, sorry luck, that. He'd been wielding the thu'um and cantering through a Whiterun wheat-field alongside her when they'd speared his horse and he'd gone flying and landed hard on his chest in a way that Barfok was surprised hadn't killed him. No wonder he now gasps like a fish. Su, tah, ug, hag, nah. The wheezy little breath he's making is profoundly annoying.

The dungeon is cold. The floor is hard beneath the sad clumps of rotten hay that line it. Barfok's hands are growing clumsy, so she tucks them into her armpits for warmth.

She settles back against the wall, listening to her fellow Tongue die. It is going to be a long night.

-

Her fellow Tongue does not die. His lungs learn a way to work despite whatever wreckage lays inside him, and his breathing steadies, and his throat stops its wheezing. After the first night (there's no window, but it feels like a night) he stops moaning in pain. He lies very still in a certain position after that, reluctant to move, but he is breathing deeply, and not moaning in pain.

Their captors realise that as two Tongues of Morrowind they might be worth keeping alive. In the morning they're brought bowls of cold gloopy porridge and glasses of milk. The gag is narrow enough that, with some effort, the porridge and milk can be crammed around it, so Barfok eats inelegantly, smashing porridge through the fabric with lusty grunts of undignified gusto. She's used to being starved, thank Ysmir for his diligent tutorship, and the breaking of a fast never loses its thrill.

The boy half-dead watches her. He's finally opened his eyes and tilted his head to the side to look at her; he has very blue eyes, pretty in his fine features, even bloodshot and puffy-red as they are. Just for fun, Barfok locks eyes with him as she crams fully half of her porridge-coated hand into her mouth around the gag. His eyes narrow, and he looks away from her again, the expression of disgust unmistakeable-- prudish nobility!

Still, she doesn't touch his food. And some time in the supposed afternoon he rises unsteadily, shuffles the cell door, and eats with his hands, just as absent of dignity as she was.

-

There's an old fire-pit in their cell. In the fire-pit, there is charcoal. Some of the charcoal is in sticks. The sticks are long enough to write with.

Barfok thinks the other Tongue broke his ribs. It's in the way he keeps one arm folded over his chest, his shoulder stiff and raised. He favours one side in movement, holding the left, the one he fell on, very rigid. When he accidentally folds his abdomen he hisses and whimpers and then his breathing gets shallow again. Barfok signs to him, and he clearly understands her, but he never replies. He refuses to move his arm from his side. He lets the pain drive him from conversation.

Drawing, however, he can do. When Barfok sits next to him and writes: 'I am Barfok' on the cell floor in Dovahzul, he leans over awkwardly and writes, beneath it, unsteadily, 'Kema.'

So they talk like that. They just write to each other. There's nothing else to do down here, and he can manage it well enough with one hand. They switch to a wall when they run out of accessible floor. They sit close together so that passing the charcoal is easier.

They write to each other about the battle. They write about Morrowind and Monahven. They talk about Ysmir. They talk about his horse-riding. They talk about her home in Whiterun. They talk about their families, and her massacred hometown, and his assassinated mother. They ponder to each other if they'll be ransomed. They ponder to each other if they'll die.

She makes him laugh, by accident. The way he groans she worries it will kill him again.

-

There's no window in the cell. After long intervals a guard comes down to give them food-- porridge and milk, or bread soaked in milk. Mushy food that can be eaten around a gag. Not enough to sustain them but enough to prevent immediate death. Despite the cold, Barfok starts to sleep a lot, out of boredom as much as exhaustion. She does the trick she learned on Vvardenfell, where she curls up with her knees squishing her stomach to make it smaller, to make herself feel less hungry. It helps. She doens't have a choice but for it to help.

When she's awake, Kema draws for her.

(That's not his name, she recalls Ysmir using one with more vowels, when planning for that stupid, stupid battle. But she likes the simplicity of Kema. Kah, eg, mah, ah. She's so glad he's in too much pain to write out the extraneous letters.)

Kema is a good artist. He draws her pictures of his childhood home in the elf-land, a marvelous palace with a strange shape. He draws the Queen of that palace, who Barfok finds very beautiful. He draws Monahven, and Barfok stares at it, squints at it, pretends she's looking out of the window in her own childhood home.

Barfok cannot draw. Nonetheless, she tries: she copes his drawings of Monahven, and then adds her own of a stone circle and of a baby goat she once owned. She draws Red Mountain and an implausibly rotund Ysmir with a scraggly beard before it. She draws a bunch of leeks, because it's the only thing she can think of that she knows how it looks.

The drawing of the goat is so bad it makes him laugh again, and then their fun ends, because he goes back to lying very still with his arm bent up.

Later, once he runs out of chapters of his short life, he starts drawing horses. Barfok adds horns to them. Unicorns. A stick-figure Hircine with a spear in the background. He draws guars for her, round fat shapes sharing a banquet of hay. She adds another stick-Hircine, scratching his head in confusion. Did Hircine ever go to Morrowind? He spends a long time drawing a dragon, and Barfok, lying on her belly beside him, adds in a veritable feast for it: homesteads, fleeing figures, hawks, bears, squids, a whole army succumbing to its flames. Lying flat, her stretched-out stomach growls.

-

A few hours after their fifth meal-- or is it a few days, or a few minutes? Is it weeks? Is it years?-- after their fifth meal, as Barfok is trying to doze, the door is slammed open.

Barfok scrambles to her feet, raising her balled-up fists. A string of drool slips out of the corner of her gag.

There is no meal for her.

Here, instead, is Jarl Olaf in the flesh.

She might have lunged. She balls her fists, she prepares for it. But he, unlike they, has no gag in his mouth. The fus he breathes is not enough to send her flying, not enough to even send her stumbling, but it is a warning nonetheless.

Olaf stands in the doorway and surveys his spoils of war. His gaze on Barfok is so loathsome that she worries she might vomit around her gag. She cannot stop shaking, not with fear but with an animal desire to fling herself upon him, to tear, to rip, to maim, to hurt--

And then he is no longer looking at her. "Kul-se-Chimarvir," breathes Olaf towards his other prisoner. "Son of Chimarvir of Mournhold. No?"

When Barfok turns she sees that Kema is folded up against the back wall of the cell. He is sitting. He has not moved. He glares resignedly at Olaf.

"Perhaps not," drawls Olaf. "Mournhold has refused to ransom you."

Then Olaf turns to Barfok, and he says, "And you. None from Monahven know of you. Who do you belong to?"

Barfok's hands refuse to be unclenched from their fists. She takes several short sharp breaths, as if this will make her bloodlust less. She cannot even think for her own rage.

"How feeble Kjoric has become," drawls Olaf. "The Tongues he sends against me, unwanted children and nobodies. Tell me, at least," he addresses Barfok, "Give me the name of someone who will cough up a few coins for your safe return, won't you?"

Thank Kyne, thank Tsun, thank Mara, thank dead Shor in the ground they've left Barfok's hands unbound.

Barfok flips him off.

-

Olaf must think she's of some value to somebody out there, because the beating the guards give her is comparatively light. She ends up with a bloodied nose and a swollen lip and a swollen-shut eye and a few big boot-shaped bruises around her stomach, but her bones are pleasantly intact, and she's not coughing up blood, so she feels a smug sense of satisfaction, like she's gotten away with something.

Nonetheless, the aching starts up a while later, and it sets her in a foul mood. So, after she's washed her face the best she can with her filthy sleeves, she lies down in her corner, grumbling under her breath at every little ache. For not the first time she realises how unpleasant the gag is getting in her mouth, crusty and stinking pungently of curdled milk and her own rancid breath. Her clothing is scratchy for the sweat and dust caked into it. Her joints hurt from lying on the hard floor for so long and the beating hasn't distracted from that. At that dark moment, she feels very sorry for herself.

Kema, too, has been lying very still in his corner ever since Olaf's visit. He hadn't even stirred during her beating-- not that she can blame him for that, really. But lying there in the dark she hears him breathing in a weird way. She hears him shuffle around, then gasp in pain, and then he sucks in some hoarse breath, and moves against the ground again. This goes on for quite some time.

He's trying to puncture his own lung. Barfok realises this with a dim disinterest. This thought comes moments before she falls asleep.

-

Herma-Mora appears to her. She's sitting very still against the wall when the blackness before her blossoms into a thousand emerald eyes. A staring fractal descends upon her, infinity's watchfulness coalescing on a prisoner.

She thinks that he'll have the usual offer: he helps her and her soul wears away a little bit more. But he doesn't say anything. She can't say anything, either.

So she hangs there in a miasma of swamp black and forest green, being blinked at.

After a million years, or three hours, or a minute, or a second-- was she asleep?-- she blinks and he's gone again. The torches have been lit in the hallway again. She wonders if Herma-Mora would pay a ransom for her.

-

One day, the jailor throws in a blanket, so now Barfok and Kema sleep side by side, Barfok pressed against his back so as not to harm his broken-up front. They don't really talk any more, they've run out of charcoal and he still won't move his arm. Barfok paces around the cell sometimes, and washes daily from the water-bucket, and signs poetry to herself, but Kema seems to have given up. Most of the time he just lies there. He seems to like staring at the old drawings they did together, of the horses and the dragon with its feast. When they wrote to each other, Barfok had offered condolences about his dead horse, and he'd said that he was sad about it, too. Krosis. Geh, Krosis. Men love their horses.

One day Barfok tries looking for more charcoal-- she wants to tell him about the Herma-Mora vision, she wants to confess to someone before she's dragged into Apocrypha the moment they die down here-- but they've used it all up. There's no word for Herma-Mora in Nordic Sign so she's forced to keep the secret.

On a different day, Barfok offers in sign to bathe him. He doesn't agree but he doesn't refuse either, and he doesn't fight when she unbuttons his now-crusty tunic and pulls it aside.

Below the fabric his chest is a tapestry of blue and purple and yellow and black. When he breathes the movement is asynchronous, the two sides of him rise at different times. His eyes are closed and he is breathing very shallowly, as if he's trying not to breathe at all, as if he's willing himself to be elsewhere.

Barfok uses a corner of his the blanket to clean the dirt away from his chin and his neck. It must have been trapped there since the battle, since he fell from his horse. There's even still strands of straw in his hair. He blighted all the wheat in the field. She'd never seen a thu'um like that; she found it-- finds it-- so horrifying it doesn't bear thinking of. But her own stomach remains empty, and she cannot help but feel just the tiniest bit gleeful, at the thought everyone up there will be going as sad and hungry as she is.

Barfok is not the caring sort. After a half-hearted attempt to clean him up, she braids his hair for him instead. He has very long, very pretty hair, and now that it hasn't been washed for a very long time, the colour has gone from flirting-with-blond to a definitive rusty red. Like an old wagon's axle, like the half-eaten blade of the sword her little brother found in the forest once. She puts it in very bad braids and then she leaves him to his sulking, overcome with her own misery.

He looks so dumb in those awful braids. They don't suit him at all. But he falls asleep with a peaceful comforted expression, unaware of the violence she just wrought upon him.

-

They are sitting on opposite walls and Barfok signs a question to him:

"When we get out, do you want to keep being friends?"

He's holding his arm rigid by his chest, the way he always does. She's surprised he's even sitting up. He's been growing more and more quiet over the past few-- what unit of time are they in, is it the next era already?-- and she thinks he's looking paler, that he's not breathing very well.

She is more surprised when he uncoils both arms and signs back to her:

"If."

-

The door is thrown open. Barfok had been asleep, and she's barely realised she's conscious again when the jailor barks: "Up."

For some stupid reason Barfok obeys; she's on her feet before she's even fully awake. Flustered with surprise, she flails both hands at the jailor, the universal Nordic sign for "What?"

"You've been ransomed," the jailor tells them. "I'm to take you to Dunmeth pass. Get up, come on, it's a long trip."

There's a drumming in Barfok's ears that she only belatedly realises is her own heart. She signs, "Who?" And then she raps out a series of letters: Yo, su, mah, ikh, rah? And then she signs the symbol for dragons. The symbol for king. She's babbling with her hands before she realises the jailor doesn't read sign.

"On your feet, now," the jailor barks again, and Barfok hears her friend also struggling to his feet. She does not go to help him but she doesn't hear him fall.

Then the jailor is leading them out, and they're walking through the hallway, walking together, walking… out of the cell, up the stairs, out of Oblivion, back into the world of mortals. They're crossing from one plane to another, treading over a billion stars.

Every step hurts. Her muscles feel very weak, the bruises from her beating are groaning with protest. She can hear Kema breathing through his nose in a way that suggests he's fighting back sobs. But the jailor walks before them, leading them boldly out, and he pays no notice to their agonies.

In fact, he's self-absorbed-- he's complaining to himself, though saying it as if he's addressing him. "Primitive heathens," he's spitting, "Imagine leaving your child to languish in an enemy dungeon for a week. A whole week!…"

-

They make it to Dunmeth pass, though Barfok does not recall the trip. Ysmir is there with the ransom, and the elven Queen is also there, and she is much prettier than she was in the charcoal drawing. And then, like wheels of cheese at a farmer's market, two young prisoners of war are passed off to their loved ones, and they're free, and they're safe, and they're home.

… There's a healer from Kogoruhn who sees to them. There's a special knife to pull away the gags, and there's Barfok, yelling, screaming at the top of her lungs just to get it all out. It's a gleeful sort of screaming, the delighted raucous of a goat kid learning to use its lungs for the first time-- incoherent hollering until Ysmir gives her a gentle slap about the head to shut her up. Then there's food, food, food! There's a cup of very strong flin with some sort of medicine in it, there's a clean tunic to get changed into, there's Ysmir, steady as a rock beside her, beside her, here, here. Barfok babbles through her mouthfuls of food, gleeful to be speaking aloud even more than she is for the nourishment and the rescue. She swears to Kyne, Tsun, Mara, Shor, all she wanted to do was talk. All she wants to do is talk and talk and talk. She's never loved the sound of her own voice so much.

They get on the road as soon as they can. There's a whole caravan that's come for them, carts and soldiers, a small army Ysmir's brought, he doesn't trust the Alessians. There's a second army that Barfok is told belongs to Mournhold. Reveling in her regained voice, Barfok hangs off of Ysmir's arm and chatters to every soldier that comes her way. Ysmir pretends not to approve of this display, but he lets her hold onto his arm, and he's never done that before, so she knows he must be pleased to hear her voice again. Ysmir's arm is terrifically warm.

And finally, after she's talked at Ysmir until her throat sounds like a frog croaking, after her lungs are burning and her head is swimming with flin, Barfok wanders off to find her newfound dungeon friend.

She finds him in a cart in the Mournhold half of the caravan. They've made a bed for him, he's lying in a nest of soft wool blankets and silk sheets. His filthy clothes have been changed for some soft-looking elven robes, and the Queen of Mournhold is sitting near his head, studiously untangling his hair from the horrid braids Barfok had put it in. A healer sits at the other side of him, preparing some pungent mixture to slather on his deformed purple-black chest.

In the light of day he looks closer to death than he had in the dungeon. Barfok even thinks he might be asleep, resting so peacefully in this decadent cart-back bedding. But when the Queen stops her work at Barfok's approach, he opens a single eye. He tilts his head very slightly and stares down at Barfok, half-lidded, his bloodless lips drawn into a thin line.

Barfok is half-drunk from medicated brandy, Barfok has an eye swollen shut from being beaten and is wearing an old ill-fitting tunic from Ysmir. She is not fit for an audience with nobility. She greets them nonetheless.

"Wow." Barfok says. And then, "You look like shit."

Now he opens both eyes, and he raises his head from his pillows to stare down at her.

"I'm Barfok," Barfok follows up, her voice unsteady. "And you're, eh, you're Kema, right?" She feels herself sway a little. "Kema of Mournhold. Yeah. Of Chimarvir."

He blinks very slowly. The Queen who sits behind him looks vaguely unimpressed.

"It's pronounced Chemua," he says, hoarsely. "And you are the most annoying woman I've ever met."

#i'm on a temporary hiatus from the TES fandom while in the throes of a much dumber hyperfixation #but here. drivel from my second dumbest hyperfixation: my awful ocs #this was originally posted on my other acc i'm just putting it here because somehow i still like it

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Freddie deBoer

Published: Nov 8, 2021

You know personally I’ve been achingly specific about my critiques of social justice politics, but fine - no woke, it’s a “dogwhistle” for racism. (The term “dogwhistle” is a way for people to simply impute attitudes you don’t hold onto you, to make it easier to dismiss criticism, for the record.) But the same people say there’s no such thing as political correctness, and they also say identity politics is a bigoted term. So I’m kind of at a loss. Also, they propose sweeping changes to K-12 curricula, but you can’t call it CRT, even though the curricular documents specifically reference CRT, and if you do you’re an idiot and also you’re a racist cryptofascist. Also nobody (nobody!) ever advocated for defunding the police, and if they did it didn’t actually mean defunding the police. Seems to be a real resistance to simple, comprehensible terms around here. Serwer is a guy who constantly demands that he and his allies be allowed to do politics on easy mode, but he’s just part of a broader communal rejection of basic self-definition and comprehensible terms for this political tendency. Also if you say things they don’t like they might try to beat you up. Emphasis on try.

If you ask these people, are you part of a social revolution?, they’ll loudly tell you yes! Yes they are! They’re going to shake society at its very foundations. Well, OK then -what do I call your movement? You reject every name that organically develops! I’ll use the name you pick, but you have to actually pick one. You can’t just bitch on Twitter every time someone tries to describe your political cohort, which again you yourself say intends to change the world. Name yourself or you will be named.

The basic stance of the social justice set, for a long time now, has been that they are 100% exempt from ordinary politics. BlackLivesMatter proponents have spent a year and a half acting as though their demand for justice is so transcendently, obviously correct that they don’t have to care about politics. When someone like David Shor gently says that they in fact do have to care about politics, and points out that they’ve accomplished nothing, they attack him rather than do the work of making their positions popular. Well, sooner or later, guys, you have to actually give a shit about what people who aren’t a part of your movement think. Sorry. That’s life. The universe is indifferent to your demand for justice, and will remain so until you bother to try to change minds. Nobody gives you what you want. That’s not how it works. Do politics. Think and speak strategically. Be disciplined. Work harder. And for fuck’s sake, give me a simple term to use to address you. Please? Because right now it sure looks like you don’t want to be named because you don’t want to be criticized.

Edit: I might not have underlined this point enough - I sincerely am asking for a better term and would happily use one if offered. If woke, political correctness, identity politics, etc, are inflammatory terms, I'd be happy to substitute something that's not. But surely something is happening in our politics, and we have to be able to talk about it. So I'm asking for a name.

[ Via: https://archive.is/ytzJc ]

==

It's a mistake to think this is accidental. It's not. When it's undefined and unnameable, it's harder to refute and reject, and they don't have to resort to an obvious No True Scotsman.

#Freddie deBoer #ideology #woke #wokeness #cult of woke #wokeism #wokeness as religion #religion is a mental illness

[dalamusrex]

Shor's Stone

(Content warnings for: abuse mention; descriptions of blood, gore, and corpses)

“‘Hop over to Shor’s Stone,' they said. ‘It will only take a couple hours,’ they said,” Dalamus grumbled to himself atop his horse. The palomino mare below him ambled along the cobblestone path, tired from a short skirmish with a small pack of wolves. The Rift’s woods were full of them, and Opal was not a warhorse. Thankfully, the wolves had been easily dissuaded with a well-aimed horse kick. The rest immediately fled in a panic. Hopefully they would tell the rest of their brethren not to bother with this adventurer.

“I am sorry, girl. I will be sure to get you a treat once we are back home, hm?” He reached forward and petted the side of her neck in an attempt to calm her. Just a bit longer and he would be able to get out of this blasted sun…

During a routine visit to buy alchemy ingredients, Elgrim had asked Dalamus a favor. The miners of Shor’s Stone had fallen ill, and they needed medicine. Elgrim is too old to be traveling, and hardly trusted a soul. But he has known Dalamus long enough to know that the mer could handle himself should trouble arise. Not that trouble will arise, of course, Elgrim assured. The mer was given a box full of elixirs to deliver, which he balanced before him while seated in the saddle.

Shor’s Stone--a mining village just North of Riften, between the Velothi Mountains and the mountains which contain Redbelly Mine. The mine from which the village makes its income. Unfortunately, mining is a dangerous job in many ways. If one did not get crushed by collapsing tunnels, they risked being choked by fumes of unearthed gas, or accidentally set aflame by torches lit in gas-heavy chambers. The constant chipping of stone and ore fills the lungs with dust, often causing breathing issues. Such is the issue this time, as well. Without the miners, their income has slowed to a crawl.

It will only take a few hours, Elgrim said. Just drop off the medicine and come back. Simple as that!

But when was anything as simple as that…

Another half hour passed and Dalamus finally saw the peaks of houses appear before him. Filnjar, the blacksmith and unofficial leader of the community, stood at his forge staring distantly into the embers. It was not until he apparently heard Opal’s hoofbeats that the Nord looked up. Filnjar did not smile, but some tension leaked from his shoulders in relief when he noticed the box of medicine.

“I presume you are the delivery man for Elgrim.” Filnjar spoke as Dalamus carefully dismounted his horse, attempting to keep the box level as he did so. Once on his feet and the box secure, he could face Filnjar.

As much as Dalamus hated being thought of as a ‘delivery man,’ he could hardly argue. He handed the wooden medicine box to the Nord. “For today, I am. Here are the elixirs. Give each miner one elixir to drink over the course of a week. Hafjorg sends her well wishes.”

Filnjar took the box from the Dunmer’s hands and placed it on his workbench. Grabbing a nearby tool, he pried the box open to inspect its contents. Sure enough, at least eight peach-colored potions sat inside, compartmentalized with thin wooden slats and wrapped in parchment to prevent breakage during transit. Filnjar smiled, shoulders sagging with relief. “Thank you for coming all the way out here, lad, even though I suspect it’s not your day job. Before I set you off with your coin, may I ask.. Are you a mercenary? A blade for hire?”

Dalamus’ hands hesitated on Opal’s reins, anticipating a new request if he were to answer affirmatively, and inwardly groaned. He just wanted to get home. The heat of the sun was thinning his patience. And yet… “I can be, for the right price. Why?” He turned his piercing glance back to the blacksmith, and could have sworn the Nord shrunk a little.

“Well…” Filnjar began. “We haven’t seen the guards from the nearby watchtower in quite a while. They’re probably just in a drunken stupor and sleeping it off, but if something has gone wrong, no one here is equipped to deal with it. Since you’re already here, would you mind checking on them? I will give you what money I have left to spare, plus what I owe you for the delivery.”

Dalamus mulled it over for what seemed like an eternity. Even Opal nudged him impatiently, as if asking him to make a decision already. He did not want to do more. He had already done the job he promised. He wanted to go home. But.. if the guards were just being lazy, it would only take a moment. And he had not yet been paid. “...Fine. I will check on the guard tower.”

“Thank you, lad.”

Dalamus scoffed. This was supposed to be a quick delivery job. Deliver the medicine, Elgrim said. Now he was trudging off to a watchtower to investigate. Hopefully, the guards would be completely fine, and he could leave.

But as he approached the tower, he quickly realized that the worst had happened. The smell of old blood and active rot filled his senses and immediately placed him on alert. He approached with caution, hoping that perhaps the guards were not the source. Perhaps they had gone hunting and this was the smell of their kill. Judging from the pit near the entrance which had not seen fire in at least a week, this seemed unlikely. The mer scrubbed his face with frustration.

“Hello?” he called out towards the tower. This was stupid. Why did he have to do this? Anyone else at the town could have called up to the tower just as easily. But the lack of response was concerning…

...No, it was not! Dalamus did not care about these people. He was not invested in their safety. He was delivering the medicine for money. He could assume the guards were dead, and return. There were many ways he could lie.

...But what if townspeople come looking for bodies to bury?

Why did it matter?! It was not his problem! He did not owe anyone this investigation. Except, he had agreed to it. And his payment might get withheld if it was discovered that he lied one way or the other. And he was already here.

...Fine.

“Hilye,” he said, ordering Opal in Dunmeris to stay put while he approached the tower. The smell of rot hit him like a wave once he reached the abandoned fire pit. It had not been lit in many days–no smolders, no fresh ash, no trace of food or utensils nearby.

As he turned towards the tower, he spotted a guard. Or… what used to be one. Leaning against the side of the tower’s entrance was the corpse of a guard, pale and rotting. A sword wound split the man’s chest nearly from shoulder to hip, and various insects clung to the putrefying form.

One guard found… Two to go.

He made his way to the tower’s entrance and onto the stairs. With each step, the stench of decay grew greater, straining even Dalamus’ sensory tolerance. He could not hear any heartbeats, nor sounds of movement, and could only conclude that the worst had happened.

Two Riften guards lay slaughtered on the top floor, one with an arrow through the skull, the other stabbed in the back multiple times with a bladed weapon. Their armor appeared ill-fitting, their corpses filled with putrid gasses causing bloat. Judging by the lack of a struggle, the guards were likely attacked at night. Perhaps the guard meant to keep watch had fallen asleep, himself, allowing their quick demise.

A letter sat on the table next to their last meals, now molding.

Akar,

We’ve word of a band of Legion soldiers advancing on your position. Reinforcements are on their way. Talos guard you.

A black brow rose on the vampire’s face. So they had had a warning, yet still fell? Filnjar had implied that the guards partook in revelry if not frequently then consistently. Perhaps they really had imbibed too much on the night of the attack. Fools.

The sound of rustling in nearby trees froze him. He kept low to the floorboards and crept over to the ledge to peer down. Were the soldiers back? Had a brigand come to loot the bodies? No… It was much worse.

A large troll had followed the scent of the blood and rot--and possibly Dalamus’ yelling--straight to the tower. It grabbed the corpse at the side of the tower, picking it up with the ease of a child lifting a doll. In a gruesome display of strength, the troll ripped a limb off the body with a sickening crack and squelch. It put the arm in its mouth and peeled the metal armor off with its teeth before spitting the inedible material aside. The wet sounds of chewing were occasionally punctuated by the loud crack of a bone.

“You must be fetching kidding me.” He cursed under his breath in disbelief at his rotten luck. Dalamus dragged a hand down his face again. What now? He could wait and hope the troll leaves once it had its fill. What if the body out front was not enough to satisfy its hunger? It might ascend the stairs to consume the two corpses here. He could drop down the other side of the tower, but would still need to cross the troll’s line of sight to get to Opal and return to town.

The sound of Opal’s nervous whinnies pulled him from his thoughts and into action. The troll had noticed her and was advancing towards her, hoping for a large, fresh meal. Opal, Divines bless her, was dutifully waiting for Dalamus to return despite her terror.

“Miraga!” he yelled from the top of the tower, commanding Opal to flee and find somewhere to hide, giving her permission to escape by whatever means necessary and get to safety. “Miraga!”

The mare turned and ran, and the troll attempted to follow but was stopped by Dalamus landing upon its shoulders after leaping from the tower, and sending them both tumbling. Dalamus immediately rolled to his feet in time to dodge the swipe of a massive clawed hand. The troll roared, sending spittle and loose food flying, enraged that its meal had been interrupted.

Another swipe from the creature aimed to take Dalamus’ head clean off his shoulders, but he ducked and thrust a dagger upwards into the troll’s arm. Its skin was thick and leathery, extremely difficult to cut or pierce. Even his ebony-steel could not find purchase in the troll’s arm. Dalamus leaped backwards to avoid the second hand, but misjudged the length of the creature’s arm and was snagged by sharp claws and sent off-balance.

A backwards roll brought Dalamus to his feet again, adrenaline coursing through him and allowing him to temporarily ignore his wound in favor of strategizing a way to either win or escape. Trolls were generally slow but persistent. There was no guarantee it would not follow him back to town should he turn and run. The miners were in no condition to defend themselves, and he did not want the guilt of a town massacre on his hands. He was not heartless.

One slip up and Dalamus knew he would end up in two pieces on the ground. And, of course, this battle just had to take place in the middle of a beautiful sunny day–his wounds would heal slowly, if at all. Bumps and scrapes were the least of his worries though.

For once, Dalamus wished daggers were not his weapons of choice. Normally he enjoyed getting up close and personal with his enemies in combat, but not when it involved getting within grabbing distance of a troll with rancid corpse breath.

He kept the troll at a distance, circling the small space behind the tower. Dalamus could feel the troll’s eyes sizing him up, possibly mulling over which limb to separate from his body first. Vampire flesh tasted terrible, but trolls were not picky.

The troll lunged, and Dalamus ducked, bringing a dagger straight down into one of the beast’s feet. It roared, but before Dalamus could pull away, he was lifted from the ground by his middle and forced to leave his dagger embedded in the troll’s flesh. The giant hand surrounding him threatened to crush his rib cage. He felt a bone crack in his side, then the troll’s other hand grabbed his left arm and began to pull. A scream tore from his throat as another rib cracked and his left arm dislocated from the socket. Through tears and searing pain, Dalamus reached for his second dagger still in its sheath at his hip, and with as much force as he could muster, he thrust the ebony steel dagger straight into one of the troll’s eyes.

It dropped him immediately, clutching at its face and roaring, stumbling backwards in agony. Dalamus had only fallen a few feet, but he felt as though he had been tossed from the top of the watchtower to crumple to the ground. Everything hurt, but he could not afford to stay still. He was now entirely unarmed, and his left arm mostly useless, not to mention the sharp pain which bloomed in his side with every movement. Though he needed no breath, mild panic brought the habit back, and to his detriment. Every gasp invited stabs of pain.

The troll, now finished with its anguished bellows, pulled the dagger from its eye and tossed it aside far too distantly for Dalamus to ever dream of reaching. If he got caught one more time, he would be killed.

So, Dalamus kept his distance once again, he and the troll circling the small clearing. Even the brutish creature was hesitant to step within fighting distance, the dark blood spilling from its eye a grim reminder that this Dunmer was no simple prey. Drips of crimson began forming a circle as they strafed their small battlefield. Normally, a troll might leave this battle. Wounds severely diminished its ability to hunt. Certainly losing an eye did. But there were three corpses here, and it was not about to let so much food go to waste. It drooled with anticipation and frothed with anger.

After the dripping blood had created three quarters of a full circle on the ground, the troll lunged. Dalamus dove to the left, landing on his shoulder and the pain forcing a cry from him. Red eyes searched for his destination, one of the fallen guards’ corpses. Another hasty leap had the vampire practically landing in the stinking corpse’s lap. Putrid flesh and offal smashed under his weight and stained his clothing with rot.

He could hear the thuds of the troll’s feet stomping in a rush towards him while his back was turned.

In a decisive movement, Dalamus grabbed the fallen Nord’s sword, pivoted, and stood, bringing the blade straight up, right through the troll’s lower jaw and into the skull. Its rage ceased instantly, but momentum brought it forward to collapse on top of Dalamus, and the corpse. Pain exploded everywhere at once as he was pinned to the ground between two stinking masses. He did not know which was worse, the rank troll drool and dark blood now dripping to stain his front, or the faint sensation of slimy rot and wriggling creatures against his back coming from the corpse below him.

After what felt like an eternity, Dalamus managed to wiggle his right arm free to lift the shoulder of the beast off him. Then he continued to wiggle until he could get his knees up and kick the troll body away from him. He crawled to a clear area of ground and laid back down to process what had happened and assess the damage. Two, maybe three ribs broken, left shoulder dislocated, an open wound on one side of his abdomen. Blood stained every inch of his shirt, and he was pretty sure some degloved corpseflesh clung to his back and maggots were crawling into his hair. Somehow, it was the best case scenario after a fight with a troll in the middle of the day. He would not heal if he continued to lay in the sunlight though, and after all this, he deserved his damned payment. Oh, and the villagers would probably like to know what had happened to their guards. But first he had to at least take care of his shoulder.

“Opal?” Dalamus called, hoping she might be within earshot. After a painful moment of waiting, he heard the crunch of leaves under hooves, much to his relief. She had taken refuge in the nearby trees, waiting for the battle to subside.

With more than a few winces and grunts, Dalamus got to his feet and all but hobbled over to his horse, taking her reins and leading her to a tree with a fork at his chest level. He put the tree between himself and the horse, and the reins over the fork in the tree, wrapped around the wrist of his dislocated arm. The goal was to have Opal help him relocate it.

“Bivi. Re’aldis.” He told her to back up, and slowly. Opal obeyed, moving backwards step by step, slowly lifting Dalamus’ arm up and over the fork in the tree. He clenched his jaw to tolerate the pain and braced himself against the trunk. Opal continued until he was pressed up entirely against the tree, but once there was resistance in the reins, she stopped.

“Bivi,” the mer ordered again, too tired to remain patient. Opal was reluctant.

“Bivi!” he shouted, and the horse, startled, pulled backwards as commanded. All his frustration evaporated as pain rushed to fill its place. A shout was forced from his chest, and Opal rushed towards him in concern.

Reins no longer taut to hold him up against the tree, Dalamus fell backwards onto the ground, white hot pain ricocheting up his side and shoulder as he caught himself with his now relocated arm. The reins were relinquished and his horse snuffled at him from above, disheveling his hair in a supposed attempt to soothe or perhaps apologize. Dalamus was too exhausted and in too much pain to care about his hair, or his ripped clothes, or the corpse jelly that clung to him, or the maggots on his shirt, or how he reeked, or how much blood was oozing from his side.

Although he would not die of blood loss, at least not any time soon, the more blood he lost, the sooner he would need to feed in order to replenish it. And with the sun still high in the sky, his wounds would not close. The longer he sat here, the more of a danger he was to the people of Shor’s Stone and Riften when he returned. Perhaps it would be best to feed from an animal between here and there. With a groan that eased into a whine, the mer slowly pushed himself to his knees, and then his feet, placing a hand on Opal to steady himself.

“Juli, Opal,” he rasped out in praise, giving her neck a stroke. His hand left a smear of dark blood on her coat. Whoops.

Dalamus trudged slowly over to the troll’s corpse, a sneer lifting his lip to reveal a threatening fang at no one in particular. Despite thirst scratching at his throat, the dark, stinking blood pooling around the dead creature was anything but appetizing. He was here for something else…

The sword he had used to impale the troll was still seated firmly in its skull, blood seeping out of either end of the wound it had created. With a few shoves of his foot, Dalamus managed to roll the hulking creature onto its back, then braced the foot against its chest in preparation to remove the sword. His muscles protested and burned, broken bones sending electric jolts through him with every strain. Through gritted teeth and a whimper of pain, Dalamus pulled the sword out, the flesh squelching as it released the steel.

He grips the sword hilt in both hands, brings the blade up over his head, and swings the sharp edge down hard into the throat of the troll. Again. And again. And again. Blood and odd slivers of corpseflesh flung into the air and onto Dalamus himself. Swords made for terrible chopping tools, especially once it reached bone–but perhaps he would get an extra reward if the townspeople knew the trouble he had been through for their ‘simple’ errand. With every swing of the weapon, his body screamed at him. Even more so when his arms absorbed the shock each time the blade bit into the ground.

Once the majority of the flesh had been hacked away from the spine, Dalamus changed to a more delicate approach. He used the point of the blade to try and slip between the segments of neck bone, stabbing the rubbery disk until finally it gave. Then, with a final chop, the troll’s head rolled free of its body.

Dalamus grabbed the troll’s head by a fistful of fur—hair?—and lifted it to peer into the dead eyes of his enemy. The jaw fell slack, still oozing foul saliva and stinking blood. If he did not get compensated for this… He sighed in exasperation, triggering a jolt of pain in his side.

Dalamus glanced at his horse and his shoulder throbbed in response. The mere thought of pulling himself up into the saddle caused discomfort in his shoulder, and the slowest of gaits would still jostle his broken ribs as he kept balance and time with the horse's movements. Walking, it is.

The only consolation—if one could call it that—was the sun still hanging in the sky. It meant he still had time before the vampirism began knitting his body back together. If it were to heal back wrong, such as during physical activity with the body in motion, it would have to be re-broken. Such was a fate he wanted to avoid if at all possible.

After gathering his daggers from the area and placing them back in their sheathes, blood and all, they began the trek back to Shor's Stone. Opal walked diligently beside him, allowing him to lean against her flank when pain halted their progress. If paused for too long, she would reach back and snuffle him with her big soft nose and remind him they still had a ways to go. Walking the path uphill was surprisingly laborious, but he knew it meant they were close.

As they crested the small hill, Dalamus could see the miners of Shor's Stone lining up to get their medicine from Filnjar. They looked and sounded terrible, a step away from draugr. Constant coughing had left them completely exhausted, their entire bodies sore, evident in how they shuffled forward. Darkened eyes and unkempt hair spoke to their lack of sleep. One face in the line stood out to him, and he felt the hairs on his neck bristle and his posture stiffen.

A scarred older Dunmer with greasy black hair falling to his shoulders stood halfway down the line of miners. His eyes were tired, barely open, and trained on the ground in front of him. He did not see Dalamus approaching, and this gave the vampire confidence.

Leaving Opal's side, Dalamus strode past Filnjar towards the line of sick miners. The Dunmer in line glanced up at the commotion, locked eyes with Dalamus, and all exhaustion in his body was replaced with terror. Drevain was flung to the ground before he could get a single word out—not that Dalamus would have listened to anything he had to say.

The vampire's previously dislocated arm threatened to fall out of its socket once again, the joint screaming at him, but the pleasure of landing a perfect punch across Drevain's face was too good an opportunity to pass up. The world around him ceased to exist and all decorum dissolved once he saw Drevain on the ground, frightened of him. The sick older mer was weak, thinner, exhausted, and Dalamus drank it in like ambrosia.

The vampire grinned, a flood of victorious adrenaline surging through him and pushing his own pain to the back of his mind. It could be dealt with later. But right now? He had Drevain at his mercy, and his head swam with the possibilities.

He knelt over Drevain like a sabre cat over a felled elk. His fangs caught in the light, and at this angle only his father could see. Dalamus' arm came down again, this time gripping Drevain's throat tight, pinning him against the ground. With every movement, every attempt to escape, Dalamus squeezed tighter. His fingers bit into Drevain's flesh like a blacksmith's vise; he could feel a pulse under his fingertips, struggling against the pressure. The vampire's lip quivered with barely restrained rage, his father's gasps and whimpers music to his ears.

Then, betrayal! He was being pulled off of Drevain! He struggled against the weak hands and arms, but it reminded him of his own pain and exhaustion. It took at least four people, but he was thrust back into Shor's Stone, where his revenge could not take place. Where he was surrounded by witnesses who did not know of Drevain's atrocities. Who only knew him as a miner now being assaulted.

He resisted the urge to spit and hiss and bite, to fight back, to throttle the closest person for daring to come between him and the revenge he had dreamed of for years. Instead, while being restrained and questioned, he explained himself, his words dripping with venom. “That mer, that fetcher, is my father! He is filth. Rot. Liar. Abuser.”

Stunned speechless by the accusations, all the restraining hands left Dalamus, although they remained close just in case intervention was necessary again. Dalamus moved to stand over the fallen Drevain, the rest of the townspeople hovering around him like a cage ready to close.

Dalamus' face twisted into a contemptuous smirk, and his voice lowered to a growl. “Look at you. Feeble old mer. I could kill you right here, right now. It would be so easy.” The townspeople tensed, ready to leap into action, but such was not Dalamus' plan.

“But I will not. Because I am not you. I am better than what you made me. I even brought medicine.” His voice darkened and his red eyes seemed to glow with malice. “I hope you choke on it. I hope it burns. I hope it sits heavy in your stomach and nauseates you, knowing that I saved your life. I hope it eats at you for the rest of time knowing that. You. Owe. Me. That you live because I will it. Because I am better than you.”

Dalamus turned his red eyes to Filnjar, who visibly startled. Only after recovering was he able to hand the injured Dunmer the money he was owed--and he seemed more than eager to get rid of it, all but flinging it into Dalamus' hand. Dalamus weighed the heft of the coin pouch and, satisfied, nodded. “Unfortunately, your watchtower guards were killed by passing Imperials. I killed the troll that had begun feasting on their bodies. It should be safe to reach them for burial, if you wish, but I warn you the sight is.. not pretty. Oh. And, Father~” he called, locking eyes with the other mer for a final time, his sing-song tone not enough to disguise the venom on his tongue.

“If I see you anywhere near my family, I will tear you into so many pieces that every animal in the Rift will get a bite.” It was Drevain's turn to live in fear. He tossed the troll's head towards the downed mer as proof of his prowess in battle, proof of his strength.

Dalamus then pushed himself up into Opal's saddle and they began their trek towards home. Every broken bone in his body screamed in time with hoof beats, but it was important to Dalamus that Drevain see him leave strongly. He had to make an impression, even if it meant searing pain. He had to appear strong. Triumphant.

It was only after he was certain they were out of eyesight that Dalamus curled in on himself in the saddle, gripping at his side, sucking in air through his teeth in a vain attempt to somehow stabilize himself. The adrenaline was wearing off and the pain came rushing back. He felt as though he had been run over by an entire herd of horses. Twice. And the sun was getting low. He needed to get back to Riften quickly. The sooner he could lay in a bed and get everything stabilized, the sooner he could heal correctly.

But it was not just the physical pain that engulfed him. The confrontation with his abuser left him trembling despite his own clear upper hand. He had felt so powerful in the moment, but now he was wracked with fear. Were there going to be consequences to this? What if Drevain did not believe his threats? Had he just endangered his family rather than protecting them? He slumped in the saddle and fought the urge to sob, clenching his teeth to prevent any sounds from escaping. Nothing could prevent the sting in his eyes. He had come so close to killing Drevain. So why did it feel like Drevain had still won?

When he got back to Riften, he would warn his loved ones of Drevain’s presence in Shor’s Stone.

“Ruhn,” he told Opal. The word for “home”. He just wanted to get home. Everything hurt.

Everything hurt.

#missy writing #dalamus story #shors stone #aka Dal and the Terrible Horrible No Good Very Bad Day #copy/pasted directly from LibreOffice so please for the love og god Tumblr don't mess up the format lkjdhfg #drevainrex #abuse mention #not described just mentioned #descriptions of blood and gore #descriptions of corpses

[barfok]

wrt last post fuck it. gratuitous nord demon backstory. after the battle of kastav

tw kidnapping/imprisonment

They hadn't bound her hands. Thank Kyne, thank Tsun, thank Mara, thank dead Shor in the ground, they hadn't bound her hands. Even with the gag forced into her mouth, with her hands free Barfok is not without a voice: she can sign, she can make herself known, even if her protestations are witnessed only by the walls of the dungeon and the back of the half-dead boy they threw down here with her, but oh, by Kyne, by Tsun, by Mara, by dead Shor in the ground, doesn't it make everything better? She flips off her captor when he throws her in and it is utter bliss.

So, hours into being in this dungeon, she sits against the wall, practising her signs the way she used to when Ysimr first taught her how to sign it. Ahg. Aak. Ah. Bah. Bah, ah, rah, fu'u, og, kah. Yo, su, mah, ikh, rah. She finds herself keeping tempo with the dripping water coming from one corner. There's a bucket under the drip, and she realises, slowly, that's the Whiterun mens' idea of water for a guest.

Yo, su. It's a slow drip, or she'd go bathe.

She hears a soft groan. Kah, eg, mah, ah.

She's not alone in this prison. Her companion, the boy, proves himself to be a little less than half-dead. He's lying on the ground with his back turned to her, not his fault, just how he landed when they tossed him in. Barfok watches with mild curiosity as he slowly rolls himself onto his back, cranes his neck up, gasping for air. He, too, is gagged. His eyes are closed, his hair is long and only-red-ish and plastered to his face with sweat. His breathing comes very shallowly.

He'd lost the battle for them. His first battle, sorry luck, that. He'd been wielding the thu'um and cantering through a Whiterun wheat-field alongside her when they'd speared his horse and he'd gone flying and landed hard on his chest in a way that Barfok was surprised hadn't killed him. No wonder he now gasps like a fish. Su, tah, ug, hag, nah. The wheezy little breath he's making is profoundly annoying.

The dungeon is cold. The floor is hard beneath the sad clumps of rotten hay that line it. Barfok's hands are growing clumsy, so she tucks them into her armpits for warmth.

She settles back against the wall, listening to her fellow Tongue die. It is going to be a long night.

-

Her fellow Tongue does not die. His lungs learn a way to work despite whatever wreckage lays inside him, and his breathing steadies, and his throat stops its wheezing. After the first night (there's no window, but it feels like a night) he stops moaning in pain. He lies very still in a certain position after that, reluctant to move, but he is breathing deeply, and not moaning in pain.

Their captors realise that as two Tongues of Morrowind they might be worth keeping alive. In the morning they're brought bowls of cold gloopy porridge and glasses of milk. The gag is narrow enough that, with some effort, the porridge and milk can be crammed around it, so Barfok eats inelegantly, smashing porridge through the fabric with lusty grunts of undignified gusto. She's used to being starved, thank Ysmir for his diligent tutorship, and the breaking of a fast never loses its thrill.

The boy half-dead watches her. He's finally opened his eyes and tilted his head to the side to look at her; he has very blue eyes, pretty in his fine features, even bloodshot and puffy-red as they are. Just for fun, Barfok locks eyes with him as she crams fully half of her porridge-coated hand into her mouth around the gag. His eyes narrow, and he looks away from her again, the expression of disgust unmistakeable-- prudish nobility!

Still, she doesn't touch his food. And some time in the supposed afternoon he rises unsteadily, shuffles the cell door, and eats with his hands, just as absent of dignity as she was.

-

There's an old fire-pit in their cell. In the fire-pit, there is charcoal. Some of the charcoal is in sticks. The sticks are long enough to write with.

Barfok thinks the other Tongue broke his ribs. It's in the way he keeps one arm folded over his chest, his shoulder stiff and raised. He favours one side in movement, holding the left, the one he fell on, very rigid. When he accidentally folds his abdomen he hisses and whimpers and then his breathing gets shallow again. Barfok signs to him, and he clearly understands her, but he never replies. He refuses to move his arm from his side. He lets the pain drive him from conversation.

Drawing, however, he can do. When Barfok sits next to him and writes: 'I am Barfok' on the cell floor in Dovahzul, he leans over awkwardly and writes, beneath it, unsteadily, 'Kema.'

So they talk like that. They just write to each other. There's nothing else to do down here, and he can manage it well enough with one hand. They switch to a wall when they run out of accessible floor. They sit close together so that passing the charcoal is easier.

They write to each other about the battle. They write about Morrowind and Monahven. They talk about Ysmir. They talk about his horse-riding. They talk about her home in Whiterun. They talk about their families, and her massacred hometown, and his assassinated mother. They ponder to each other if they'll be ransomed. They ponder to each other if they'll die.

She makes him laugh, by accident. The way he groans she worries it will kill him again.

-

There's no window in the cell. After long intervals a guard comes down to give them food-- porridge and milk, or bread soaked in milk. Mushy food that can be eaten around a gag. Not enough to sustain them but enough to prevent immediate death. Despite the cold, Barfok starts to sleep a lot, out of boredom as much as exhaustion. She does the trick she learned on Vvardenfell, where she curls up with her knees squishing her stomach to make it smaller, to make herself feel less hungry. It helps. She doens't have a choice but for it to help.

When she's awake, Kema draws for her.

(That's not his name, she recalls Ysmir using one with more vowels, when planning for that stupid, stupid battle. But she likes the simplicity of Kema. Kah, eg, mah, ah. She's so glad he's in too much pain to write out the extraneous letters.)

Kema is a good artist. He draws her pictures of his childhood home in the elf-land, a marvelous palace with a strange shape. He draws the Queen of that palace, who Barfok finds very beautiful. He draws Monahven, and Barfok stares at it, squints at it, pretends she's looking out of the window in her own childhood home.

Barfok cannot draw. Nonetheless, she tries: she copes his drawings of Monahven, and then adds her own of a stone circle and of a baby goat she once owned. She draws Red Mountain and an implausibly rotund Ysmir with a scraggly beard before it. She draws a bunch of leeks, because it's the only thing she can think of that she knows how it looks.

The drawing of the goat is so bad it makes him laugh again, and then their fun ends, because he goes back to lying very still with his arm bent up.

Later, once he runs out of chapters of his short life, he starts drawing horses. Barfok adds horns to them. Unicorns. A stick-figure Hircine with a spear in the background. He draws guars for her, round fat shapes sharing a banquet of hay. She adds another stick-Hircine, scratching his head in confusion. Did Hircine ever go to Morrowind? He spends a long time drawing a dragon, and Barfok, lying on her belly beside him, adds in a veritable feast for it: homesteads, fleeing figures, hawks, bears, squids, a whole army succumbing to its flames. Lying flat, her stretched-out stomach growls.

-

A few hours after their fifth meal-- or is it a few days, or a few minutes? Is it weeks? Is it years?-- after their fifth meal, as Barfok is trying to doze, the door is slammed open.

Barfok scrambles to her feet, raising her balled-up fists. A string of drool slips out of the corner of her gag.

There is no meal for her.

Here, instead, is Jarl Olaf in the flesh.

She might have lunged. She balls her fists, she prepares for it. But he, unlike they, has no gag in his mouth. The fus he breathes is not enough to send her flying, not enough to even send her stumbling, but it is a warning nonetheless.

Olaf stands in the doorway and surveys his spoils of war. His gaze on Barfok is so loathsome that she worries she might vomit around her gag. She cannot stop shaking, not with fear but with an animal desire to fling herself upon him, to tear, to rip, to maim, to hurt--

And then he is no longer looking at her. "Kul-se-Chimarvir," breathes Olaf towards his other prisoner. "Son of Chimarvir of Mournhold. No?"

When Barfok turns she sees that Kema is folded up against the back wall of the cell. He is sitting. He has not moved. He glares resignedly at Olaf.

"Perhaps not," drawls Olaf. "Mournhold has refused to ransom you."

Then Olaf turns to Barfok, and he says, "And you. None from Monahven know of you. Who do you belong to?"

Barfok's hands refuse to be unclenched from their fists. She takes several short sharp breaths, as if this will make her bloodlust less. She cannot even think for her own rage.

"How feeble Kjoric has become," drawls Olaf. "The Tongues he sends against me, unwanted children and nobodies. Tell me, at least," he addresses Barfok, "Give me the name of someone who will cough up a few coins for your safe return, won't you?"

Thank Kyne, thank Tsun, thank Mara, thank dead Shor in the ground they've left Barfok's hands unbound.

Barfok flips him off.

-

Olaf must think she's of some value to somebody out there, because the beating the guards give her is comparatively light. She ends up with a bloodied nose and a swollen lip and a swollen-shut eye and a few big boot-shaped bruises around her stomach, but her bones are pleasantly intact, and she's not coughing up blood, so she feels a smug sense of satisfaction, like she's gotten away with something.

Nonetheless, the aching starts up a while later, and it sets her in a foul mood. So, after she's washed her face the best she can with her filthy sleeves, she lies down in her corner, grumbling under her breath at every little ache. For not the first time she realises how unpleasant the gag is getting in her mouth, crusty and stinking pungently of curdled milk and her own rancid breath. Her clothing is scratchy for the sweat and dust caked into it. Her joints hurt from lying on the hard floor for so long and the beating hasn't distracted from that. At that dark moment, she feels very sorry for herself.

Kema, too, has been lying very still in his corner ever since Olaf's visit. He hadn't even stirred during her beating-- not that she can blame him for that, really. But lying there in the dark she hears him breathing in a weird way. She hears him shuffle around, then gasp in pain, and then he sucks in some hoarse breath, and moves against the ground again. This goes on for quite some time.

He's trying to puncture his own lung. Barfok realises this with a dim disinterest. This thought comes moments before she falls asleep.

-

Herma-Mora appears to her. She's sitting very still against the wall when the blackness before her blossoms into a thousand emerald eyes. A staring fractal descends upon her, infinity's watchfulness coalescing on a prisoner.

She thinks that he'll have the usual offer: he helps her and her soul wears away a little bit more. But he doesn't say anything. She can't say anything, either.

So she hangs there in a miasma of swamp black and forest green, being blinked at.

After a million years, or three hours, or a minute, or a second-- was she asleep?-- she blinks and he's gone again. The torches have been lit in the hallway again. She wonders if Herma-Mora would pay a ransom for her.

-

One day, the jailor throws in a blanket, so now Barfok and Kema sleep side by side, Barfok pressed against his back so as not to harm his broken-up front. They don't really talk any more, they've run out of charcoal and he still won't move his arm. Barfok paces around the cell sometimes, and washes daily from the water-bucket, and signs poetry to herself, but Kema seems to have given up. Most of the time he just lies there. He seems to like staring at the old drawings they did together, of the horses and the dragon with its feast. When they wrote to each other, Barfok had offered condolences about his dead horse, and he'd said that he was sad about it, too. Krosis. Geh, Krosis. Men love their horses.

One day Barfok tries looking for more charcoal-- she wants to tell him about the Herma-Mora vision, she wants to confess to someone before she's dragged into Apocrypha the moment they die down here-- but they've used it all up. There's no word for Herma-Mora in Nordic Sign so she's forced to keep the secret.

On a different day, Barfok offers in sign to bathe him. He doesn't agree but he doesn't refuse either, and he doesn't fight when she unbuttons his now-crusty tunic and pulls it aside.

Below the fabric his chest is a tapestry of blue and purple and yellow and black. When he breathes the movement is asynchronous, the two sides of him rise at different times. His eyes are closed and he is breathing very shallowly, as if he's trying not to breathe at all, as if he's willing himself to be elsewhere.

Barfok uses a corner of his the blanket to clean the dirt away from his chin and his neck. It must have been trapped there since the battle, since he fell from his horse. There's even still strands of straw in his hair. He blighted all the wheat in the field. She'd never seen a thu'um like that; she found it-- finds it-- so horrifying it doesn't bear thinking of. But her own stomach remains empty, and she cannot help but feel just the tiniest bit gleeful, at the thought everyone up there will be going as sad and hungry as she is.

Barfok is not the caring sort. After a half-hearted attempt to clean him up, she braids his hair for him instead. He has very long, very pretty hair, and now that it hasn't been washed for a very long time, the colour has gone from flirting-with-blond to a definitive rusty red. Like an old wagon's axle, like the half-eaten blade of the sword her little brother found in the forest once. She puts it in very bad braids and then she leaves him to his sulking, overcome with her own misery.

He looks so dumb in those awful braids. They don't suit him at all. But he falls asleep with a peaceful comforted expression, unaware of the violence she just wrought upon him.

-

They are sitting on opposite walls and Barfok signs a question to him:

"When we get out, do you want to keep being friends?"

He's holding his arm rigid by his chest, the way he always does. She's surprised he's even sitting up. He's been growing more and more quiet over the past few-- what unit of time are they in, is it the next era already?-- and she thinks he's looking paler, that he's not breathing very well.

She is more surprised when he uncoils both arms and signs back to her:

"If."

-

The door is thrown open. Barfok had been asleep, and she's barely realised she's conscious again when the jailor barks: "Up."

For some stupid reason Barfok obeys; she's on her feet before she's even fully awake. Flustered with surprise, she flails both hands at the jailor, the universal Nordic sign for "What?"

"You've been ransomed," the jailor tells them. "I'm to take you to Dunmeth pass. Get up, come on, it's a long trip."

There's a drumming in Barfok's ears that she only belatedly realises is her own heart. She signs, "Who?" And then she raps out a series of letters: Yo, su, mah, ikh, rah? And then she signs the symbol for dragons. The symbol for king. She's babbling with her hands before she realises the jailor doesn't read sign.

"On your feet, now," the jailor barks again, and Barfok hears her friend also struggling to his feet. She does not go to help him but she doesn't hear him fall.

Then the jailor is leading them out, and they're walking through the hallway, walking together, walking… out of the cell, up the stairs, out of Oblivion, back into the world of mortals. They're crossing from one plane to another, treading over a billion stars.

Every step hurts. Her muscles feel very weak, the bruises from her beating are groaning with protest. She can hear Kema breathing through his nose in a way that suggests he's fighting back sobs. But the jailor walks before them, leading them boldly out, and he pays no notice to their agonies.

In fact, he's self-absorbed-- he's complaining to himself, though saying it as if he's addressing him. "Primitive heathens," he's spitting, "Imagine leaving your child to languish in an enemy dungeon for a week. A whole week!…"

-

They make it to Dunmeth pass, though Barfok does not recall the trip. Ysmir is there with the ransom, and the elven Queen is also there, and she is much prettier than she was in the charcoal drawing. And then, like wheels of cheese at a farmer's market, two young prisoners of war are passed off to their loved ones, and they're free, and they're safe, and they're home.

… There's a healer from Kogoruhn who sees to them. There's a special knife to pull away the gags, and there's Barfok, yelling, screaming at the top of her lungs just to get it all out. It's a gleeful sort of screaming, the delighted raucous of a goat kid learning to use its lungs for the first time-- incoherent hollering until Ysmir gives her a gentle slap about the head to shut her up. Then there's food, food, food! There's a cup of very strong flin with some sort of medicine in it, there's a clean tunic to get changed into, there's Ysmir, steady as a rock beside her, beside her, here, here. Barfok babbles through her mouthfuls of food, gleeful to be speaking aloud even more than she is for the nourishment and the rescue. She swears to Kyne, Tsun, Mara, Shor, all she wanted to do was talk. All she wants to do is talk and talk and talk. She's never loved the sound of her own voice so much.

They get on the road as soon as they can. There's a whole caravan that's come for them, carts and soldiers, a small army Ysmir's brought, he doesn't trust the Alessians. There's a second army that Barfok is told belongs to Mournhold. Reveling in her regained voice, Barfok hangs off of Ysmir's arm and chatters to every soldier that comes her way. Ysmir pretends not to approve of this display, but he lets her hold onto his arm, and he's never done that before, so she knows he must be pleased to hear her voice again. Ysmir's arm is terrifically warm.

And finally, after she's talked at Ysmir until her throat sounds like a frog croaking, after her lungs are burning and her head is swimming with flin, Barfok wanders off to find her newfound dungeon friend.

She finds him in a cart in the Mournhold half of the caravan. They've made a bed for him, he's lying in a nest of soft wool blankets and silk sheets. His filthy clothes have been changed for some soft-looking elven robes, and the Queen of Mournhold is sitting near his head, studiously untangling his hair from the horrid braids Barfok had put it in. A healer sits at the other side of him, preparing some pungent mixture to slather on his deformed purple-black chest.

In the light of day he looks closer to death than he had in the dungeon. Barfok even thinks he might be asleep, resting so peacefully in this decadent cart-back bedding. But when the Queen stops her work at Barfok's approach, he opens a single eye. He tilts his head very slightly and stares down at Barfok, half-lidded, his bloodless lips drawn into a thin line.

Barfok is half-drunk from medicated brandy, Barfok has an eye swollen shut from being beaten and is wearing an old ill-fitting tunic from Ysmir. She is not fit for an audience with nobility. She greets them nonetheless.

"Wow." Barfok says. And then, "You look like shit."

Now he opens both eyes, and he raises his head from his pillows to stare down at her.

"I'm Barfok," Barfok follows up, her voice unsteady. "And you're, eh, you're Kema, right?" She feels herself sway a little. "Kema of Mournhold. Yeah. Of Chimarvir."

He blinks very slowly. The Queen who sits behind him looks vaguely unimpressed.

"It's pronounced Chemua," he says, hoarsely. "And you are the most annoying woman I've ever met."

#ill delete this in a hot minute i just like it too much not to let it cool on the windowsill

[magnoliamyrrh]

@osmanthusleaf djdks im so sorry for replying in post i didnt wanna cut this up into a million bits, uve not even got to read all this cuz its long ive just got a lot going through my mind and im bad at shutting up once my brain starts going sorry 😭

for sure & well said. i fully agree, and understand having more care and knowledge for your own peoples issues, its natural; like u know example apart from ur own ex., i do know and have looked into the sex trafficking situation in the rest of the world and it horrifies me just as much and it is all connected, but end of the day, i understand most and focus most on the issues in my area and thats what i can give my two cents on more than anything. or, yea, i know abt plenty of things going on around the world, but theres also Tons that i have no clue on and overall i end up knowing more and spending more time on mostly things that i have some sort of personal connection to, like even this thing which i spend time on cuz of my own trauma; were all bound to be more immediately concerned if our own house is burning down w us in it than if the house a mile away also is, and were bound to be more interesting in why our own house burned down and who burned it down than the one a mile away, especially if the two arent connected directly. its past a point impossible for the psyche to b up to date w so much info, especially so much info on bad shit, to keep track of all of it and to feel something about all of it all the time.... if anything, i think the constant info on bad stuff everywhere happening which,,, for the most part we can do little on, is part of whats made our generations more doomful, hopeless, and lost - end of the day its good to care, but weve just got to pick some things in particular to rly care abt and if we can, try to understand them and do something about them, and hope if enough ppl do that for enough things they care about while working together, things may get better...... but also, if u say u care abt some issue, i reckon its important to care too abt other ppl caught up in it, even if its not a main focus and not dismiss it bc its not ur own shit directly 🤷‍♀️

i guess yea, the lack of knowledge isnt what bothers me at all bc god knows we all lack knowledge of plenty of things and frankly we kinda have to for our sanity. its the attitude that does and we all do it too often. like some while ago i was telling my mom u know, we (in broad ethnic&national terms) have some sort of responsability to the ppl that have been opressed in our lands and still deal w the consequences and weve got to care abt that history and struggle, not even in a sins of the ancestors way but in a we all have to try to be better way, and her first reply before we talked more was, well, whose going to help us and pay us back for communism, or serfdom, or imperialism, or slavery, or poverty? and havent we got enough of our own issues? and its like yea 😭 the world isnt fair and theres endless cycles of ppl fucking each other over and its a lot, which is why we have to try to just be kind and decent and help each other and rise each other up and come together as hard as it may be and as endlessly annoying this species may be 😭 and weve got to spend more time on how were similar and can understand each other, rather than always predominantly looking at differences, or pointing fingers, or giving in fully to our good old tribalistic mentality. theres gotta b a balance and id like to think and hope, if we tried, we'd indeed find out in many regards we are more similar than we are different, and all more connected than apart ..... if anything, i think thats something that the loss of spirituality in the "modern" world hasnt helped, bc it was one of those things which bound us to universality and connection

and yea, part of it definetely is social media and also current academia and the general cultural mindsets floating around, theres a whole lot of boiling down of super complex shit into short tidbits or black and white things, bc its easier to digest and faster (also, that overboard american centrism that goes beyond being concerned w ur own stuff, while the rest of the world has to know abt the us). i think too, were all bound to have reactionary and defensive attitudes to things especially when dealing w years of shit from ppl, and when we hold a lot of pain and anger, and it leads too to ppl taking things in bad faith which is something ive dealt w too and had to learn to hold myself back on, bc ive definetely got a tendency for it for sure... and its frankly a whole lot easier to point fingers endlessly or to play the opression olympics than look at the god awful messy complexity of it all and how were all caught up w it,, and frankly, i reckon that it feels better to an extent too... it feels/safer/ and simpler i think, than to say, oh god, has truly this whole species been capable of so much hororr? is there nowhere that was or is good, and pure, and untained, and truly a lot better?.. and its i reckon nicer too, to think of things in terms of purely victim and victimizer, than to think abt how plenty of us, most ppl throughout histoy actually if looking at it systemically, have been as u said, a messy contradiction of both....and uhh what's that bible quote, why are u pointing out the spec in your neighbors eye, but not the log in your own? take the log out of your own, and then you may help your neighbor w the spec. and yet, we just dont like doing that much as humans cuz its harder and uncomfortable, its something we have to force ourselves to do and train ourselves for. and unfortunately its not something that is taught very much either

,,,, and yea on top of that too youre definetely right, ethnicity and race and even culture especially in regards to opression and historical and current day dynamics (especially on an international scale) are so incredibly messy, changing, and mostly a whole bunch of stuff weve made up and keep making up and changing all the time and choosing to define ourselves by or to oppose or imposing on other ppl, that it is hard shit to keep track of and detangle. ur example is a good one and in some ways the same sure can be said for the balkans, the question of if were white or not and to who and where and why and when could go on forever, and our history sure has been when taken as a whole, as both opressed and opressor. america too in particular focuses a lot on race (where u could say other parts of the world might focus more on ethnicity, tribe, religion, or class, even nationalism etc, and as far as ill say, i think we need to focus more on class here), and its had a particular kind of rigid understanding of it, and i know from talking to ppl born here in academia and outside and online and whatnot, that a lot of ppl are surprised to find out how ethnicity and race and racism xenophobia and all that shit are different in even south america for a closer exmaple, but in the whole world in general 🤷‍♀️ which aint an issue at all cuz again theres shit we all dont know, but ive also seen plenty of ppl b past surprised or confused, trying to impose us understandings of shit elsewhere... and also, yea, we get focused on things here to the point where its forgotten in a lot of things what it means that were also living in the imperial core at the same time, especially in america

,, , , , i guess w my complaining abt this sort of stuff broadly speaking, it mostly bothers me tbh when i see it come from ppl who do position themselves as like,,,, social thinkers, social activists, or ppl who look into all this and care and speak about it, as self proclaimed educators for others especially, or as some form of academic. not neccessarly like random ppl who occasionally talk on things or vent frustrations or whatnot (cuz also, we all talk abt things casually we havent spend idk how much time on thinking abt or knowing extensively abt)....,,, bc when u say ur that or hold urself up to that, or say u know youre talking or doing whatever to teach ppl or try to help society be better then... welp,,,,, theres a certain responsability (?) and need to try to hold urself up to that ... and i guess yea, its also my personal thing bc after idk a lifetime of always being fascinated w messy complexities and years of cultural anthropology, my brains very focused and fascinated by complexity and contradiction and endless webs of connections 🤷‍♀️ and it does bother me when ppl want to throw around their degrees or education (which dont even matter all that much, plenty of ppl with degrees who dont think too well, and plenty of ppl without them who could run circles around me when im having a good day) or even their own self taught info, and they want to say theyre ppl who generally care abt opression or theyre caring ppl or theyre better than others or whatnot, as a way to say ppl should listen to them and they know better dont uhhh,,,,, , , take the time to really,, think too much abt what theyre saying and educating on and if its actually helpful

#im sorry i hope this doesnt come across as some preachy shit or something im just. i ended up in a whole train of thought

[cheeseandstrawberrytartlover]

Honestly Talos shouldn't even be in the Nord pantheon. The Nords completely abandoned their old gods in favour of the Imperial pantheon! If anything, Talos is an Imperial god, but they're the ones agreeing to the Thalmor and banning his worship!

A beastrace Dragonborn is more of a true Nord than most modern Nords are! The Dohavkiin is much more closely tied to the old gods that have been abandoned by their own people!

All these Nords nowadays, their true gods being nothing but terms of speech. What of Shor? Or Kyne? None of the Nords worship them anymore, instead they worship the bastardized and Imperialized versions.

The Nords don't deserve Talos and honestly? Its because he doesn't belong to them in the first place.

-i routinely think about this lore and I need to get it out there v sorry uncle sheo, please add your thoughts.

This is an incredibly correct take, in my opinion at least, mortal.

Talos has never been for the Nord people, you are very correct. Just like most things the empire had to get their grubby, little fingers into everyone else's business. In this case, religion.

Even though, I do not often put my nose in the business of Aedra.... It is a shame that the other gods' worship has declined, especially during the time they need it. I understand why the eight have not been with them during the time the Nords themselves needed them most.

But oh well!

[rabbits-of-habit]

Challenge for mod havoc to grab his favorite writing he did for each character he writes for and share with the class

OK here we go!-Mod Havoc

Nex: This one isn't in the masterlist due to the fact I forgot to put it there when I was cycling through the last time it was updated. But It is one of my favorite Nex writings. (AND IT HAS LORE)

HABIT: This is part one of the angst fic that I am writing. Part two is linked in it but I love these more than anything.

Evan: The Evan needing a hug ask was my favorite because I thought it was a really sweet idea.

Vince: I have not written much for Vince but I really like the hcs I wrote about him being with someone and hiding the slender stuff from them.

Jeff: I dont write much for him either. But I do enjoy this one.

Noah: General Noah hcs my beloved.

Prebrand: I made this a super long time ago but I still think its cute. Perhaps I should rewrite it one of these days.

Firebrand: I also made this so long ago its labeled in the Tribetwelve section of the masterlist. Giving me rewrite ideas honestly.

The Observer: I dont write very much for him. I totally should though. Heres some hcs for an idea I liked a long time ago.

Milo: THE AMOUNT OF STUFF I HAVE ON HERE FOR MILO IS A CRIME AND I NEED TO WRITE FOR HIM MORE BUT HERES SOME HCS.

Sadly I can only put 10 link blocks per ask but I can make a part two to this is wanted and asked for!

#mod havoc answers

[creepy-bi-day]

Can I request a matchup?? I’m 19, I’ve got reddish brown-ish hair, blue eyes, pale skin. I’m a bi girl hehe, I wear glasses and have my nose and ears pierced. I’m really short, and pretty curvy ngl. I’ve got a big butt and big boobies lol,, and I’m a bit chubby. Oh also I have like a very femme kind of goth aesthetic.

I’m pretty into creative stuff. Like I like painting and writing a lot, and I like reading. I’m very sarcastic, and I can be mean even if I’m not trying to be. Im always trying to be nice but sometimes it doesn’t come out the way it’s intended. Im a Leo lol, and I act like I take no shit from anyone, but I am soft.

(NSFW coming up)

I’m a bratty sub. 100% degradee. Ideally I’d be matched with a pasta who’s really rough and really dominant. Who doesn’t really take no as an answer (obviously consensual). I like being manhandled and because I’m so short, I’ve got a bit of a size kink.

I tend to go for asshole-exterior guys. Also kind emo if I’m being honest. Like if a guys an ass, is a wee bit emo, and tall? I’m into it. So basically I’m into toxic guys lol. I just like guys that are mean to everyone but me (mostly).

Sorry if this is too much! I just find this stuff really cool and I really love your writing!!

This one was difficult tbh.

I was already stuck between Jane and EJ, but then you mentioned liking someone who's very dominant, and having a size kink...

So, because of that, I ship you with

Eyeless Jack

sfw

He likes to hear your voice, so please read to him.

He likes how warm you are, and how perfectly you fit into his arms when he curls around you

Will protect you from mean words and when people pick on you

He can't see your clothes, he can kind of see but more echolocation type thing. He likes how soft they are though

TBH he's probably woken you up just to cuddle you because he's pissed and needs your scent

He loves the way you smell, you smell perfect to him, and it can calm him down easier than anything

He wants to share his knowledge with you, please let him teach you medical stuff

NSFW

Dominating? Check

Big? Check

He loves to throw you around and use you while he's in his ruts

He is a big boy that loves your body, especially how perfectly you fit around him

Please be loud, the louder you are the easier he can see those pretty expressions you make

I hope you like breeding kinks, because he's going to try to fill you up until you're dripping

When he can smell how turned on you are? He's not going to stop (as long as it's still consensual)

He loves it when you beg him

Please call him Sir or Master

Shit gets him off. He loves it, it gives him a rush of power

overall? horny boy with soft heart

#sorry its shor #eyeless jack #lems #lemons #matchup #match up #my writing #ej

[nvertoolate]

In die neue Zukunft

Es war immernoch ein etwas komishes Gefuehl - wieder im Team zu sein und so zu leben als ob nichts passiert waere - als ob sie nie Slade entkommen war.

Doch zum Glueck war das nicht ein Traum.

Terra war hier als ein Titan und war zurzeit beschaeftigt mit ihrem Sandwich dass sie selbst zubereitet hat und zum Sofa ging und sich auf es fallen lies und anfing an ihrem Sandwich zu kauen.

Aber es war Heute etwas langweilig und sie schaltete den Fernseher an und ging durch all Kanaele bis sie sich entschied einen Thriller zu schauen.

Vielleicht ist einer von Cyborg’s Horror Filmen gut?

@starfirechan

#starfirechan #rp #teen titans rp #german rp #in die neue Zukunft #sorry this took so long #and sorry its shor #i feel so rusty T T #i bet I have tons of mistakes lol #starter

[songbirdies-blog]

Galaxy- Do you have any nicknames? What are they?

Space Ask Meme!

“Unfortunately, I don’t,” Sonja replied. She was pouting, but no one really could make a nickname out of the name ‘Sonja’. And not enough people knew her middle name was Seraphina so they couldn’t make a nickname out of that either.

“I wouldn’t be opposed to having some though! If you make some nice once up, let me know~”

#confelicitous #p. ic #p. answered #m. space #Well I'll let you in on a little secret #she will have one #itll be shortcake #because she likes strawberry shortcake and is shor #sort #short #sorry its 1 am #13.

[acidic-glow]

HELP.

I JUST LISTENED YO MUSOC AND IT LIKE STOPPED WORKING.

LOKE THE DIFFERWNT LAYERS WERE OUT OF TIME AND THEY DIDNT FIT LIKE THEY WERE SUPPOSED TO. I DONT KNOW WHAT I DID BUT MY BRAIN HURTS AND IT WOMT STOP PLEASE ITS MY ONE RELEASE OH HOG FICK NO.

#dlspdnebsodne #im sorry #pleaae #why #warlier today sidter of pearl shor through me like a god fickinf guided an arrow through my hearr #and now its stopped working #im gonna fight the sun if it comes to it

[theirrationalist]

I’m at a point where I’ll find a plot hole in a TES game and I can’t tell if it actually contradicts the lore or if it just contradicts the version of the lore I came up with for my own amusement

#tesv #skyrim #tes #morrowind #I’m finally doing stuff with the CoW (im. so bad at playing a mage. h e l p) and im doing arniel’s quest and??? no ? ? ? #firstly this is a me thing but my nerevarine is still VERY MUCH ALIVE and would ABSOLUTELY NOT have given up keening so jot that down #sorry arniel your dagger’s a fraud and so are u #but also from a legit lore standpoint the soul gem/heart of lorkhan thing? MAKES FUCK-ALL SENSE #soul gems are used to store souls condemned to the soul cairn right? #and the soul cairn is effectively a plane of oblivion but not in oblivion and also its not daedric or whatever but thats besides the point #what im getting at is that their power comes from a non-nirn/non-shor/non-lorkhan/DEFINITELY NON-DWEMER plane of existence #so then how the everloving fuck is it a suitable approximate for the heart of a god? what did u do trap an ideal master in there?? #and dont give me that ‘ooh its warped’ shit bethesda #shut up crow #WAIT I HAVE IN-GAME PROOF ITS NOT THE REAL KEENING #HE GRABBED ONTO IT AND WAS ABLE TO HIT THE SOUL GEM WITHOUT WEARING WRAITHGUARD #HA