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#to be different or poor in the us is to know war
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That final line - Joe Liebgott x F!Reader
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Summary: Things have changed between Joe and Reader after bearing witness to the Concentration camp. They moved from being best friends to something more emotionally intimate. Now that the war in Europe is over will they cross the last line and become physically intimate?
Warnings: 18+ content (smut, p in v) angst-ish (mentions of war & concentration camp), comforting each other, tooth rotting fluff at end, she/her pronouns (no use of y/n or 1st person POV, but told from Liebgott's perspective sorta).
A/N: I have the biggest respect for the real life heroes of WWII (and all other wars, past & current), this work & all other works is based on the actor(s) and character(s) portrayed in the Band of Brothers series.
A/N pt 2: I love how this turned out. Basically this is just my own self-indulgence wish that I could have held and taken care of Liebgott after that scene of him crying in the truck. As always, let me know what you think! I tried a different writing perspective and I like it, hopefully you do too. Comments, likes, and reblogs make me happy and feel validated!
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Joe Liebgott would forever be a different man. Easy Company had just liberated Kaufering IV but that included locking the poor souls back up for the medics to be able to try and get them back from the brink of death. The whole thing had left Joe feeling broken and full of pure rage and despair he didn't know how to get rid of it. So he grabbed a bottle of wine and wondered till he found a tree isolated enough he wouldn't easily be found. He just needed space.
He'd been alone for hours, judging by how low the sun was hanging, bottle long since empty, and eyes sore and dry from tears when he heard a twig snap. Looking around the tree, his heart both swelled and shattered at the sight of the person walking towards him. She was his best friend, been that way since Toccoa and all through the war thus far. The only person that could calm him down when his hot-headedness got the better of him and always had his back in every combat situation. He never had to worry when she was around. She was also the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen and had long since accepted that his heart would always speed up a little when she was in eyesight. While his heart had the usual reaction at seeing her, he couldn't help but feel broken anew at the sadness on her face and emptiness in her eyes. He wasn't the only one tore up from their recent experience.
"I've been looking for you everywhere." She speaks barely above a whisper as she drops down next to him, already leaning against his arm.
"I'm sorry, I just had to get away for a while. I should have found you and brought you with me." He leans over to drop a kiss on the top of her head.
There's a beat of silence and then she speaks again, still in a low whisper, "Do you think they'll make it?"
The words are a dagger to his already bruised and bleeding heart. He gives a small sniff, trying to hold back the fresh tears.
"I don't know." He feels her turn her body towards him and knows she's taking in his appearance detail by detail.
"You can let it out, Joe. I know this is tearing you up. Please don't hold it in and let it destroy you." One hand grasps his while the other gently takes his chin and turns his head so their eyes meet. He tries to push the emotions back down and come up with something to say, but he loses all resolve when her hand moves to cup his cheek and wipe away a stray tear that falls out.
Joe is suddenly wrapping his arms around her, pressing his face in the crook of her neck and letting it all out. He feels her shift them so he's laying mostly on her, her back against the tree and arms tightly wrapped around him. One hand is gripping the back of his jacket tightly, holding him to her, the other is gently stroking his head, and when he feels the side of his face getting wet he knows she's crying too.
They stay like that for hours, until the sun is nearly gone and all tears have been let out. Even after the tears, they don't move, finding too much comfort in holding each other. The only thing that gets them finally moving is their stomachs growling. Joe gets up first, holding his hand out to help her up and starts walking them back to find some food. He looks down briefly when he feels her intertwine their fingers and give his hand a squeeze. The first smile he's had in days makes it way across his face and he squeezes her hand back.
As the days dragged on ahead, their bond grew even tighter. There was a new level of safety and vulnerability that blossomed. Hands would brush more often, hugs turned tighter and longer, if they were able to they'd often be found napping together tangled limbs and all. It was as natural as breathing to seek the other out and before Joe knew it, he was hit with the realization that he was head-over-heels in love with his best friend.
The popping of yet another champagne bottle drags Joe from his mulling and takes in the sight around him with a smile. They are in the Eagles Nest, the war in Europe is over and everyone is finally able to relax and celebrate. He's sitting by Webster and Perco, watching the other's talk and laugh, already more than a little drunk. His smile widens when he catches her eye, sitting next to Malarkey and they salute each other from across the room.
"You ever gonna make a move, Lieb?" Perco's question lands like a bomb right in his stomach.
"What the hell are you talking about?" He looks at the man next to him like he's crazy, but inside he's frantic. Is it that obvious?
"Oh come on, Liebgott. The two of you have been attached at the hip the whole war, even back at training. We've all noticed the stolen looks between you. The wars over, just go for it." Webster gives him a shove, pointedly ignoring the glare Joe shoots at him.
"I gotta take a leak." Joe abruptly stands and leaves before either of them can continue their pestering. They're right, he knows they're right. Since accepting his feelings, the only thing that's been holding him back has been the on-going war. Sure there's still Japan to figure out but right now, their immediate part is over and he doesn't have to worry about dying and leaving her or worse losing her any second to a bullet or bomb.
Not actually needing the bathroom, he finds himself wondering the halls of the Eagles Nest and randomly picking a room to go into. It's spacious with a sitting area, a large comfortable bed sitting against the back wall, a door leading to an adjoining bathroom next to it and doors to the right leading to a balcony. He heads to the balcony, throwing the doors open and leans against the railing taking in the mountains and open valley. It's so quiet and peaceful, he doesn't know how to reconcile it with the horrors the owner and occupants have done to the people of this land.
"Why am I always having to search for you?" A soft, happy voice speaks behind him. Joe turns around and feels his breathe catch in his throat at how beautiful and easy going she looks, leaning around the doorframe to the balcony. When he didn't respond, she stands up a little straighter. "What? Is there something on my face?"
Joe shakes his head and moves to stand in-front of her, raising his hand to trail a finger down her cheek. "You're beautiful."
"How drunk are you?" Her voice is playful, but Joe knew his words were having an effect on her based on the blush she now had.
"Not even tipsy. But drunk or sober, you're still beautiful." His hand cups her cheek, tilts her head up a little to fully meet his eyes and he decides to cross that final line. "I love you. I love you fully and completely; body, mind, and soul. I need you, more than I need to breathe. If you don't feel the same, that's fine. I will lock my heart away to keep you in my life however you wish to be. But the war here is done and I'm out of reasons to not tell you how I feel. Tell me you don't feel the same and I'll respect that, but if you feel even close to what I feel please let me know."
Joe see's tears form in her eyes and for a heartbreaking second he's sure she's going to tell him 'no' and walk away. Then he feels her hands on his face and holds his breathe as she rises on her toes, stopping when her lips are barely brushing his.
"I love you, Joe. I'm yours; body, mind and soul." And then her lips are pressing against his and Joe thinks he's died and gone to heaven.
Their kiss is passionate and slow, taking full advantage that they don't have to rush and can take their time exploring. Joe starts nudging her backwards, back into the main room and towards the bed. A line of clothes marks their path as they help each other be rid of them, kissing freshly exposed shoulders and necks as they go. Soon enough they've managed to be rid of everything and tumble onto the bed in a heap.
Joe leans back just enough to take in the site of her underneath him. Face flushed, lips swollen and glossy from kissing, hair spread out like a halo, chest rising and falling hard as she tries to catch her breathe. He leans his head down pressing kisses to her neck, trailing down her collarbone, around the swell of her breast and ending at her nipple. He takes his time delivering languid licks and sucks, making her skin pucker and rise. Not wanting to leave the other one out of the fun, his hand cups, massages and pinches a little on the flesh there, his other hand hasn't stopped caressing any part of her skin he can reach.
If he has any doubts of how he's making her feel, the gasps and moans falling from her lips dispel them quickly. Soon enough her hands are in his hair and scratching down his back as she wraps her legs around his waist pulling him closer. Joe stops his minstrations on her breast with a groan when his erection is pressed right against her wet core and he can't help but roll his hips into her again. This time they both moan.
"Joe, please. I need you." Her voice is ragged and the lustful look in her eyes almost has him finishing right then. He shifts to the side a little, giving him room to run his hand down her side and cup her core. She's soaking and his brain short circuits a little.
His fingers make quick work of making sure she is coated properly, detouring to her clit to rub until she starts to whimper and pull at him. As he meets her eyes, he raises his fingers to his lips and sucks her taste off of them.
"Goddamn, baby. Next time I'm spending hours down there." He rushes out as he positions himself at her entrance. "But if I don't have you soon, I might die." He looks at her for confirmation that she's ready and when she nods, he starts pushing in slowly.
They groan together at the feel of him sliding into place like a puzzle piece coming home. Once he's bottomed out, he drops down to his elbows, putting more of himself on top of her and rests his forehead against hers. Her thighs tighten around him as she turns her head to kiss him.
"Move. Please." She bites his bottom lip at the same time she scratches his back again.
"Yes ma'am." He presses his lips firmly to her, swallowing the moan she lets out as he pulls out and quickly snaps back in. He finds a steady rhythm, angling his hips just right so he's brushing that sweet spot within her. Her back bows, pressing her chest further into his and exposes her neck to his lips. He doesn't waste any time placing a hard bite where it'll be hard to hide the mark already forming. This spurs something in her and soon her hands are in his hair, tugging his head to the side as she returns the favor.
Joe can tell she starts to get close to her release, as her walls start fluttering around him and her moans start becoming more frequent. He raises himself up, gripping the headboard with one hand and dropping his other hand down to rub her clit.
"I know you're close baby. Look at me as you let go." His voice is deep and commanding. Her eyes immediately lock onto his and his movements pick up speed. A few more hard thrusts and a pinch on her clit and she's moaning his name and clamping down around him. The feeling of her combined with his name falling from her lips like a prayer has him falling right behind her.
As they come down from their highs, they exchange slow kisses and 'I love you's'.
Bonus scene:
Not wanting to waste a beautiful day, the guys had decided to have an impromptu baseball game. Joe stood in his spot, waiting to bat next, sending a smile and wave to the stands where his girl was watching and cheering. They were getting ready for the next play when Winters came strolling across the field. They all crowded around him, fully expecting to hear their deployment orders for fighting Japan. Instead he was giving them the best news they'd heard since VE day. Japan had surrendered. The war, all of it, was finally over.
All the guys started cheering, exchanging hugs and pats on the backs. Joe see's her coming towards them at an easy jog, a curious look on her face. He gives her the biggest smile and runs right up to her, lifting her in his arms and spins her around.
"Japan surrendered. It's over. We're going home." Her smile matches his as she fully takes in his words and hugs him back. Just as quick as it started, Joe stops spinning her and sets her down on her feet, then he's down on one knee, holding her hands.
"Marry me. Come back home with me. Or wherever you wanna live. I don't care. Just marry me, please." Everything dulls around the edges as he holds his breathe, waiting for her response.
"Yes, Joe!" She smiles bright enough to blind the sun and then starts laughing when he jumps back up and starts spinning her around again. The only sound is the cheering of their friends and their hearts beating in sync.
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#still not over the insane george orwell post that got reblogged onto my dash yesterday#i unfollowed the person who reblogged it#because either A) theyre a tankie or B) their criticial thinking skills are sub-fucking-zero#like 1) the OP of that post was just copying Hakims awful video on Orwell#2) to read animal farm and come out of it with the interpretation that Orwell was saying that the animals and hence the proletariat in the#USSR were just innately unintelligent shows a reading comprehension so bad its not even like piss poor. its piss impoverished#3) if a post is like ''also look X said Y Bad Thing'' without providing any of the context as to where that quote comes from theyre likely#being deliberately mishonest. it is easy to take someone out if context to make it look like they were saying something they werent which is#exactly what the OP of that post was doing. they took one sentence of Orwells writing on the nazis and Hitler to make it look like Orwell#thought Hitler was a swell guy when actually Orwells writing was about the dangers of charismatic tyrants like Hitler and their rhetoric#the entire thing was about how Hitler was able to amass such power and popularity and use that to his advantage#not every despot is so easy to pick out as dangerous or so easy to detest. hitler was hardly the first charismatic tyrant in history#OP also conveniently left out the fact that like the next sentence is orwell being like yeah no i would fucking kill this man which wow#thats a glaring omission. imagine if people decided to look up what OP was refetencing to verify irs veracity#4) OP does not mention that Orwell fought in La Guerra Civil alongside communists and socialists and anarchists etc.#he fought against the nationalists. he took a bullet to the neck during the fight. he was very much against francisco franco and his fascist#regime who were allied with Hitler and the Nazis#mentioning orwells participation in the spanish civil war really undercuts any of those arguments#5) you know who was actually allied with Hitler and Nazi Germany? STALIN#at the beginning of WWII the soviet union and nazi germany were in alliance. stalin and hitler did not have fundamental ideological#differences. if hitler had not betrayed stalin the soviet union would not have joined the allied powers#your uwu anti-fascist communist idol joseph fucking stalin was joseph fucking stalin. he was a fascist dictator whose actions deliberately#caused the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people. he like vladimir lenin before him did not care for the ideals of marx#marxism leninism is a meaningless political ideology#the soviet union was not a communist paradise. neither stalin not lenin cared about the proletariat#i said this in my tag ramble yesterday but if you want to see a leader who actually followed marxist ideals go look up thomas sankara#im just rambling in the tags today to get out the lingering frustration i have
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lucy-ghoul · 1 year
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Your point about the only thing Rey people being interested in was her relationship with Kylo and how that paralleled the Luke/Vader relationship is interesting. It would have added a lot of depth to the story if they'd been twins. Rey goes for the kiss. "No Rey, I'm your brother." lol. Awkward. Insanely awkward.
Hey, sorry but since I ship them and SW has already had enough soap opera-like "i'm your secret twin" last-minute revelations for my tastes I prefer them to be a romantic enemies to lovers pair - something that in SW (at least the movies; the EU was a bit different with Luke/Mara Jade and Revan/Bastila etc.) has never been seen before, so it adds an element of originality in what is basically Poor Man's OT. Same themes as Luke+Vader (love and compassion as a redemptive force) but not make it a family thing, please. That would have been uselessly redudant imo. What I meant with the Luke+Vader parallel is they're a similar brand of "the protagonist shares their most important relationship with an antagonist who turns to the Light thanks to their influence; said dynamic also challenges the main character's naive and black/white beliefs on evil&good, it challenges them to see the world under a different light". Rey didn't need to be a literal Skywalker, Kylo/Ben could have been enough for that as "one half of the protagonist/one side of the coin" - also because he has had to live with that legacy/lovable dysfunctional family for all his life while Rey struggled in a desert and Luke was "a myth" to her. She doesn't even know them; Vader&co. mean nothing to her (that's one of the many reasons the Rey Palpatine revelation feels so hollow - are we even sure she knew what a Palpatine was? lmao). The Vader Is Luke's Father plot works so well because he's the antagonist Luke has been fighting since Film 1, and Luke has been idolizing his dead dad since forever. This forces the kid to grow up - his world shatters, so he has to find a new sort of belief code. Similar to what her relationship with Kylo does (or should do) to Rey, but in a romantic key. Maybe a romance that redeemed the original star-crossed space lovers (Anidala) - this is all about Vader's legacy after all. In fact, it's all about that and how Leia couldn't (understandably) cope with it, and her son getting targeted by Snoke. Anakin's ghost should have definitely made an appearance in TROS and had an overdue talk with his grandson and his daughter but alas, "Palpatine somehow returned" but Anakin can't be bothered about his family I guess lol (that's deeply OOC of him - I'm saying this as a fan of the character).
But I agree with your point about Rey never failing/fucking things up/needing others' help. That's one of the reasons the audience feels like she's never really matured and changed. She needed to face her own demons, not someone else (specifically a man)'s. The angst about her parents abandoning her and treating her like shit should have sufficed: if she's shown her parents were Good People All Along and they were really coming back for her - well, that only reinforces her childish beliefs and never really puts her in the position to challenge them. Same as if Luke's dad had been a good guy, like he dreamed, and not literally Satan's right hand man. That's How To Write Protagonists 101 but I don't think Disneylucas ever cared about creating a somehow coherent story.
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osirisdefencesquad · 8 months
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snippet of Eîr and Vela, as Sanne is being integrated into the clan
Eîr was used to people being uncomfortable around him. This is what he tried to convince himself, at least.
And it was understandable. It really was! Whether they were uncomfortable because of his attunement to the Void, or the Hive mutations, they had reason. ...It never did hurt any less.
"This new one's an interesting find, for sure" Vela informed him as he climbed up to Eîr. Grateful for something to pull him out of his own head, even if it was talking about what put him there, Eîr lept for the conversation.
"Do you know how she's settling?" he asked the other hunter, shifting from the railing to the bed of cushions, accepting the coffee Vela handed him.
"Other than damn near losing her mind every time she comes into contact with someone void attuned?" Vela winced, offering up his scorched right arm for Eîr's observation "well, for where we found her."
"How is Wraith taking that? hasn't he been invested in the new lights recently?"
"Hard, from what I can tell. Kirach has him out on patrols until we give the all clear"
"...which Eva is working on now. do we know why she has such a strong adversion to Void?"
"Nope. Vias is prying at her -she seems more comfortable with other Awoken- but she's barely a month out the grave."
"So something from her past life. Is Zirne still hanging around Osiris?"
"Yep. they've found some new thing to throw themselves at. Saint projects about a week until Osiris takes a break, and I give Zirne 'round four days. She's already low from the strikes."
#i was just going to draft this but y'know what. i will never end up touching it again if i do that#also for those who have not had the misfortune of reading my little wip drops before:#i tend to set up the bare bones of the environment‚ write out the dialogue‚ then fill in all the actions around that#this is quite literally a first draft and also written on my phone#and yes I'm running with the ''hive can convert other races into hive via ritual'' thing. yes the guardian who was subjectedto that shares#a name with a worm god. THAT was unintentional#i named him thinking it sounded appropriately hive-ish and only later realized why#okay facts abt the actual scene:#They're talking about Sanne‚ who has Issues with void for (then) unknown reasons#Wraith is a relatively young Exo who was risen a couple months before the Red War. poor fucker#he's also strictly attuned to Void: he can barely use Solar and he can't use Arc. at all.#Vela strongly prefers Void‚ but is also a bladedancer. he can use solar but it holds no particular interest for him#(hence not being pushed from the clan house)#Eîr co-leads the clan with Eva‚ so he's not pushed out either‚ but he is keeping his distance#(like Vela‚ he prefers void over everything else‚ but solar is a comfortable secondary and arc is a little too fast-paced for his tastes)#Eva is strongly arc attuned and hasn't run a different subclass in decades‚ so she's fine to be around Sanne#this takes place sometime ambiguously after Saint is rescued‚ obviously. i still dont know when#the boys are hanging out on a balcony or something. idk#how did Vela climb up there while holding coffee? his ghost held it#Verdant has made it a challenge to figure out how to carry stuff out of inventory#she's figured how to hold two drinks on her shell and she's work towards three#i got interrupted and now i have no idea where this was going#vela's tag#eîr's tag#writing
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yanderenightmare · 2 months
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TW: yandere, classism, degradation, possessiveness, obsessiveness, blackmail
gn reader - feminine clothing (jewelry: earrings, necklace)
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Thinking about your rich boyfriend…
Rich boyfriend – who buys you clothes and jewelry every time you have a date, even when you tell him you feel bad receiving them all – that you have nowhere to wear such nice things – that a simple date is really more than enough. 
Rich boyfriend – who ignores you with a smile and shake of his head, asking you how you expect him to stop when you’re just the absolute cutest? Looking at him with those moon-big eyes, humble crinkle between your brows, and your lip tucked nervously between your teeth to keep from gawking. 
Rich boyfriend – who orders for you at all the restaurants he takes you to because he knows you’ve never been anywhere like it. Looking so adorably lost in your seat, flushed when staring at the menu written in a language you can’t read – knowing even if you could, you still wouldn't know what any of it meant. You’re so, so, so precious – eyes peeled like you’re a pet who’s just been allowed at the table for the first time.
Rich boyfriend – who plays four instruments, speaks five languages, went to an Ivy League institution, and will inherit his entire family’s business being the spoiled only child that he is.
Rich boyfriend – who just loves the messy household you grew up in – loves how you and your siblings interact with each other, looking like a bundle of pups all crammed in the same cage at a pet store – how your childhood bedroom is the size of his closet – filled with all sorts of trinkets you’ve kept growing up – stuff that would usually wind up in the trash at his house – polaroids of you as a teenager, past boyfriends in kissing booths, prom pictures, concert tickets, and old rusty friendship lockets. 
It’s all so… He scoffs. The word for it escapes him.
Suppose he doesn’t quite recognize the pricelessness of sentimental value as opposed to something actually sellable – but he finds it cute that you do. 
Though, it bothers him to some degree as well… that you would value an old pair of earrings gifted you by your grandmother instead of the actual antique diamond pair he’d procured for you. After all, one was a real historic piece worth a fortune a Russian duchess had snuck into England during the war, and the other was old junk made by a noname jeweler.
Rich boyfriend – who chokes on his spit when you sit him down and tell him you want to break up – who thinks he’s misheard – that you’re joking, playing some uncultured game he’s never been exposed to, some ill-taste past-time only poor people do to escape their bitter reality. 
But you’re not joking… 
You’re breaking up with him…You.. You… broke trash of worker-class scum… you’re breaking up with him?
You give him back all his gifts in a cardboard box – telling him you’re grateful but that you truly don’t have any use for such things – that you think your worlds are too different to coincide. 
Of course, you refrain from telling him you think he’s a classist snob. You have a feeling it would have gone completely over his head if you’d tried anyway, so there really was no point to it.
Rich ex-boyfriend – who’s never been told no in his entire life…
Rich ex-boyfriend – who buys your street and plans on scrapping it to make brand new mansions in a project he dubs “cleaning up the slums” – evicting and putting you and your entire family out of the home you’d spent your entire life growing up in.
Rich ex-boyfriend – who thinks you’re crawling back to him when you schedule an appointment at his office – who thinks you’re going to come in with bleary wet eyes and grovel like the lowly peasant you are – let him save you from poverty and homelessness, make you his charity case – his pretty diamond in the rough who’s never quite able to wash all the coal off.
Rich ex-boyfriend – who trashes that same office when you leave after having given him the address to the pawnshop you sold the one pearl necklace you’d kept as a token of your relationship – telling him he should feel free to go down there and get it back – that you’re using the money to buy a better house and you just wanted to come and thank him for that. 
Of course, you wanted to slap him too – spit on his tie or maybe just take a piss on his desk – but you left it at that.
Rich ex-boyfriend – whose next move is to buy your family business, who hires a private eye to dig up dirt on you and all your family, burying you in fines from age-old petty crimes, gets you kicked from your scholarship.
Rich ex-boyfriend – who goes to that pawnshop and reports the pearl necklace as a stolen item and has the police arrest you. Spinning a story about how he thought you were this humble sweet thing, only for you to rob him behind his back.
Rich ex-boyfriend – who comes to visit you in the custody suite where you sit cooped up with all the other wretched mutts on the cold concrete floors – scolding you for making him come down to a dirty police precinct, for having him breathe the same air as all the lowlives held up there.
Rich ex-boyfriend – who tells you he’ll make it all go away.
He’ll drop the charges, let your family keep their house – or buy them an even better one, whichever you prefer – he’ll even promote your family business and pay for all your siblings' education – he’ll give you everything. 
Anything you want, it’s yours.
But he owns you.
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BNHA – Bakugou, Shoto, Dabi, Hawks, Overhaul
JJK – Sukuna, Gojo, Naoya
HQ – Oikawa, Sakusa, Miya twins
BLLK – Reo, Rin
HxH – Illumi
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loaksbitch · 1 year
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this time it’s different, imagine neteyam knelt in front of you and begging you not to go after he betrayed you? c’mon now guys i can’t be the one who’ll only suffer with this idea that struck me 😕 — wc is 2.6k !!
warnings - vulgar language, neteyam cries you guys NETEYAM CRIES!! my poor baby. oc gets/feels betrayed, one slap mention, where neteyam who is the mighty future leader of the clan kneels in front of you and begs for forgiveness, he fucked up :(
like and reblogs are appreciated! i love you guys so so much and this is 1.2+ followers celebrating gift <3
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“i trusted you.” — neteyam sully (★)
part (two) — (three) — (four) of this series.
the na’vi females are gathered to spend time together and talk teas while their significant others and soon to be mate left for a war party. you on the other hand being one of them, or so you thought as you all laugh and bring the old moments or funny moments you all had
“…and that’s how i met tar’key” one of the female navi blushes as she tells her story of how she met her mate years ago.
“that’s so heartwarming, oh mother eywa!” the other females giggle and awe. you’re silently sat as you try to ignore some of the noisy na’vi’s whispering until they mention the soon to be olo'eyktan and your ears perk up
“have you heard about the first born of the sully family being set up for a mate?”
you’re somehow confused and excited when they mention about mating because you knew it was going to be you. neteyam was going to be mated with you.
“yes! and i’ve heard she’s so pretty as to very similar to her mother’s beauty.” the other whisper
her mother? you never had a mother growing up…
“she’s so lucky, honestly imagine being the future mate of the future olo’eyktan? so dreamy.” the girls sigh imagining it and let a soft giggle out. you’ve frowned as you try to thinking deeply and try to make sense in what just the na’vi girls said
the female clan keeps murmuring and talking as they make friends with huge circle and a wooden fire in the middle of the circle, while you’re trying to put pieces together.
what do they mean “beauty of her mother.” when you didn’t even have one? neteyam and you were soon to be mated, yes you knew that and he told you he only wants you in his future but what the girls talked about was another completely different person
you wanted to run to neteyam and ask what you’ve just heard but he wasn’t near by, he has already left to the war party right after he made love to you as a good bye the whole night, you were crying mess being of how you loved this man as he cradled you to his body and held you tight.
you’re confused and somehow trying everything but decide to eavesdrop to what the two females are talking. “i haven’t seen her here, did she not want to join us?” the one asks before the other scoffs,
“of course she won’t, after all she’s the future leader of the omatikaya clan.” the other states, now you’re feeling way too desperate to know about her but it’s breaking your heart to figure out it’s not you
and this means? neteyam lied to you.
“never mind, let’s just get back to what we were list– oh mother eywa! she’s here! she’s here!”
your heart starts to beat faster as your eyes look around to know which one is the so called future leader of the clan. “which one? i see two girls standing!?” the females arch their neck to see more and the other pointing out makes you know who exactly they’re talking about
your heart doesn’t just entirely break one piece following the other, everything around you was blurry. you needed to leave right now.
“excuse me,” you stood up as you made your way out. the na’vi’s asked if you’re okay but you just shrugged them and told them you’re feeling sick.
once you stumbled your way out and walked far enough from the na’vi’s, you finally find yourself on the trees of sounds. where your lover and you exactly made love. of course you two were gonna be mated and doing the deed didn’t bother you at that time but right now?
right now you’re feeling the burning of your skin where neteyam exactly placed kisses and his skin touched you. your whole body felt dirty right the moment you figured out you’ve been… played.
now everything started to make sense, why neteyam always feared of you both getting caught, why he didn’t want you to meet with his family, why he never… a soft sob leaves your lips as your eyes close.
of course that na’vi was better than competed to you.
beauty? her. body? her. has a family? her. everything? her. your jaw clenched as you feel so foolish for blindly trusting a man… a fucking man.
the pain you’re feeling doesn’t compare to when you felt right after your mother abandoned you. this was making you struggle with breathing, your lung tightening with every try you’re making to let air in.
what did you do wrong to deserve all of this?
you’ve really been fooled, you knew everything was too good to be true. you’re now realizing how stupid you were to think the future olo'eyktan mating with some abandoned and adopted daughter who only served as a professional arrow shooter.
“eyaw, it hurts.” you cry, tears freely rolling down your skin. you cry to your mother nature your heart out as everything of this place reminds you of him.
you want to hate him but no, it only keeps hurting to even think about hating him. neteyam was everything to you while you’re nothing to him, you were ready to throw everything from him but he only used you and backstabbed you
meanwhile you’re crying your heart out to eywa, the clan has returned from the war party with few people hurt and non dead. neteyam was happy and eager to tell you the war went so perfect like it was planned. no death and few people hurt but his eyes keep wandering trying to find you
a tint of disappointment settles in him when he realized you weren’t there, but you promised you would watch him from far so the na’vi won’t be suspicious about you two. at least until he makes it official, and today is the day he will make it official to his parents you’re the one he wants
oh how he was so late for this.
neteyam figures out you weren’t anywhere here so he just shrugs his parents and tells them he needs air for a while. obvious that they’re proud of him today, jake didn’t bother and already shrugged his son off
neteyam tries to hide his excitement when people greet him as he made his way to your hammock.
eyeing the na’vi’s and once he checked no one is watching, he slipped in but was greeted with no warmth or scent of your body. “princess?” he calls for you but nothing talks to him back
frowning, neteyam leaves you hammock and climb down to think where you could possibly be. it doesn’t take him long to figure out where you are and jogs to the destination he thinks you’re found.
and just like he thought your body comes to his sight as you’re stood in front of the tree of sounds, your back facing him.
neteyam chuckles as he walks to you before wrapping his arm on your body and pressing himself to your warmth.
you in other hand feel your body tense with his skin touching yours. “i’ve missed you” he groans to your hair as he place kissed on the back of your head then to your neck. you don’t even try to say it back or turn around to hug him.
neteyam does fail to notice your odd behavior and step back a little giving you space to turn around to him but you’re just frozen. “princess?” he calls for you but you just try your best to compose yourself from falling apart
the man in front of you feels his inside worry before he’s forcing you to turn around and face him.
but what he was met with was what he never expected. you eyes are swollen and puffy like you’ve been crying for hours, “who did this to you?” was the first full sentence neteyam utters and you ironically scoff at his words
it was him, he was the one who did this to you.
he tries to cup your cheeks to his large palm but you step back as if his touch disgusts you. and in fact, it does disgust you right now. you know you’ll run back to him if he touches you and you’re not allowing that
“baby?” his breath hitches when you avoid his touch and his brain instantly start to figure out you’ve already found out but neteyam chooses to ignore it until you say it yourself
he tries again by stepping close to you but you were fast to speak. “is it true neteyam.” it wasn’t a question and the way you called his name darkly makes his heart hurt and tell him you’ve definitely had found out.
but he chooses to play dump.
“what is true, princess?” those pet names makes your stomach irrupt in nausea and you shake your head. “don’t call me that, i’m not your princess, never have been your princess.” the way you say it calmly scares him
sure thing neteyam fell for your calmness and mature self but right now he wishes you could just punch him or yell at him.
you’re trying to stay calm before slowly opening your mouth to speak. “you have a…” you can’t even finish the sentence feeling your throat close in pain. he again tries to play dumb but this time you hiss at him silently.
talk about happiness? it can vanish in a heartbeat.
the atmosphere as changed to a heavy one as neteyam watches your broken self in front of him.
“yes.” those three letters were enough to entirely ruin you. you stumble on your own feet feeling dizzy, neteyam tries to hold you from falling only for you to slap his hands away.
“look at first it was just a rumor but then my parents and her parents set us up, set me up.” neteyam starts to try explaining but it only hurts you more. neteyam watches your tears fall and his heart bleeds out, he really wanted to tell you
“i never loved her, i never want to be with her, i never want äeya.” neteyam steps closer, “i want you and you only” you’ve heard the name before, so many times actually that you grew up wanting to be äeya so bad.
the daughter of the tshaik that’s the perfect daughter from the clan and it didn’t surprise she had to be mated with him. what hurt you was him lying and leading you to his great fucked up game.
“i fall in love with you princess, i love you so much it always hurts.” you’re painfully silent and it eats him alive as he desperately seeks for something in you. “i trusted you..” you back away, his touch bringing nothing but pain
if someone from yesterday came to you and told you that this would happen, you would’ve shot your arrow at them but again look at you desperate for things your lover was saying were to be lie.
“with you— princess please.” neteyam doesn’t know why he’s pleading but he knows he wants to wipe those tears and take your pain away. “don’t touch me.” you warn when his fingertips held your small hands
“DON’T TOUCH ME!!”
neteyam froze at his spot, his tail locked between his legs. this was the first time you yelled at him, the first him he heard your true pain through your voice. “i hate you! i hate you! i. hate. you.” neteyam’s ears flatten at your words that were like daggers to his heart.
“don’t say that, please don’t say that baby, please.” he was begging you now. neteyam always chose death than being despised by you.
“you knew the whole time, neteyam” you’re saying it so clam and softly it’s making him feel like he deserves death and every painful torture to be done to him. “i told you i have no one and you were the only person i trusted with my everything and you were the only one i have.” you’re now crying
“how could you do this to me?”
how could he do this to you?
neteyam licks his lips and sniffles, he nods agreeing with you. “i was gonna make it official, today i was going to tell them you’re mine and i’m yours” your eyes widen but you quickly shake them off, you shake your head disagreeing with him
“i’m not yours.” the way you said it was not with in an anger but pure honesty, hatred and disgust. neteyam’s breath hitches again and his eyes start to whelm. “i was never yours.”
you were his, you promised yourself to him last night as he did, you were his first time and first person in everything. you were his future and his own actions took his future away from him.
neteyam could only watch your broken self in yourself and did nothing, the little abandoned girl you’ve hidden coming out and telling him everything last night before making love completely gone. he was met with your side he never thought he would see
“i’ll never be yours.” you knew your words hurt him and you definitely wanted them to just like he’s hurting you
neteyam suddenly kneels in front of you and pulls you by your hips, wrapping his arm on your waist and pressing his face to your stomach to hide himself from reality. “i never wanted you to find out this way, please let me make it right. let me make everything right, please princess.”
he doesn’t care you warned him not to call you that, no matter how hard you try not to be? you’ll always be his princess. you’re just frozen there with the man you trusted giving your soul to just take everything from you wrapped around you.
“let go of me.” you tell him and silently pray he does or you’ll kneel and hug him back.
neteyam’s body shake as he is now violently crying himself in front of you and you’ve never seen him like this. “neteyam, please let me go.” you try but no answer, only whimpers and sobs from the man knelt and face pressed to your tummy are heard
you purse your lips and place your hands on his hands to pry them from you. “please don’t do this” neteyam was the one begging. “we both are promised to one another last nig–“ you cut him off.
“there was nothing last night, last night was nothing but a mistake i did.” your words not only emotionally but mentally affect neteyam. once you start to leave with no words, neteyam panics and get on his feet quick
“you’re not leaving me…” he didn’t know the damage he caused until he realize he’s losing you. you ignore him and walk away but neteyam was fast to hold you by your hands making you turn and slap him across the face
you hate yourself for doing that but you hate him most for making you do that. “i said don’t touch me.” you say coldly, you’re now the woman he never knew. “and if you dare to try to come close to me again, neteyam,” your soft voice he knew wasn’t there, “i will kill you.”
you’re not just threatening a normal na’vi but the actual future olo'eyktan and you don’t feel a slightest fear when you do. “and trust me when i say that.” your words were familiar just like the first time he met you.
cold and unbothered of anything.
neteyam doesn’t say anything when you turn and leave but once you’re slightly far, your face turns ugly mess as you cry.
neteyam’s ears are still flattened as his tail is locked between his legs. right the moment you were out of sight, neteyam felt his world darken and went grey and gloomy. nothing would be the same with out you every again.
it was his fault this happened, he abandoned you just like your mom and everyone else. you hate him now and nothing’s gonna be the same. “i’m sorry, i’m so sorry” he whispers as he’s standing right where you left him. right where you promised yourself to him last night. right where you gave yourself to him.
right where you trusted him.
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i might make this a miniseries? i don’t know lmk in the comments though i’ll depend on my creativity and flow of plot,, i love each and everyone of you!! like + reblog are appreciated and not pressured
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pandoraslxna · 4 months
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Luna love PLEASEEEEE HEAR ME OUT‼️ Dilf!Jake getting mad at human!reader when he catches her on her room in the science lab using toys instead of him (that are not even close to his length btw), and fucking her dumb. Like fucking some senses to her, with degradation kink pretty please?
Pent up and stressed out
Jake Sully x female human reader
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Words: 3.7k
Summary: Jake knows just the way to help you relief some of that pent up frustration.
Warnings: explicit smut, use of toys, caught masturbating, age difference, size difference, p in v, oral, degradation, praise, dirty talk, use of daddy (once), brat tamer dilf!jake
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It was the melting-pot of earths greatest minds, a central locus for innovation and invention, a modern day renaissance. It was where scientists went to work on the next next best thing, before the next best thing had even arrived. It was where everyone who was anyone in the scientific community would go to start a new life and get their hands dirty on real science. And of course, the science at the RDA’s Laboratories was very real –and very dangerous. But what's life without risks? If life gives you lemons, use the decaying remains of those lemons to invent the best damn anti-lemon device possible! (And maybe colonize the poor Lemon farmers home too, while you’re at it.)
Well, at least, that was the marketing for Pandora. And to be honest, in the very beginning it was this ideal (and quirky) view of how the RDA worked that you had fallen in love with all those years ago when you worked there as an intern. That was, before you figured what these limb dicks were actually doing here.
Of course they don’t tell you about that war stuff back on earth. They don’t tell you about the natives, the blood that will stick on your hands, the flora and fauna they promised you to study to be burned to ashes because apparently mankind needs apartments and streets and fucking beer on this exomoon.
You were tired of how things worked. You were tired of the long hours, of snappy managers, of being shuffled from lab to lab for no apparent reason, of working on projects for six months at a time and then being told they were cancelled –and sometimes finding out later that some of them had been handed to a different scientific team. You were tired of how cavalier some of the higher-ups seemed about handling dangerous technology and killing innocents. And you were tired of the secrecy about this insanely morally wrong war.
That’s when you had decided to switch sides. Of course switching to the human / na‘vi revolution might’ve been the morally correct way, but what they don’t show you in the contract is, that this path doesn’t come with the luxury of working at high technology laboratories with dozens and dozens of other scientists to share this massive amount of work with. It doesn’t come with unlimited food, water, electricity and other much needed resources. Oh and remind me, who was complaining about the long hours at the RDA earlier? Yeah, that was pretty much nothing, compared to the fact that you hadn’t touched your bed in forty-nine hours.
Life on Pandora had definitely not been what you had expected when you first arrived here. The only difference now was, that you now did it with pleasure instead of guilt.
Working in the labs at high camp was probably the best thing that could’ve happened to you, but doing the right things never comes easy.
Sure, it took a while to get used to the power running out every few days and having to bath in a river, eating whatever the forest gives and oh, let’s not forget the eight feet tall, blue teenagers lingering around in your work space accompanied by a half naked tarzan with painted on stripes, making it extremely difficult to focus on your work.
Speaking of concentration…
"Kid, why the hell are you still here?"
"Huh, w-what?" You awoke with a start, and for a moment you didn't know where you even were. Your neck hurt as you lifted it up, rubbing the sleep away in your tired eyes only to be met with a pair of blue, muscular thighs standing right in front of your desk. Immediately, your gaze shoots all the way up.
“I said, why the hell are you still here?", Jake furrows his brows as he glares down at you, crossing his arms over his chest. "It's almost 3 am and this is the second night in a row that I catch you in here. Go. home."
"Jake we talked about this before", you roll your eyes at him, pushing away from the desk to walk over to where some of the scientists lockers stand. "I‘ll go, once I get this shit done." You make a gesture in the air to point at the petridish on your desk, with five ar'lek seeds inside. The healing potential of those seeds was something you’ve always took great interest in, especially during times where more of this medicine was needed than the Na‘vi could even harvest.
"No, you’re leaving right now", the clans Olo'eyktan and former marine said sternly. "No damn plant can be this important you’re loosing two days of sleep over it."
"Oh tell me about it…", you mumbled under your breath as you fiddled with the lock, flung the door open and reached for a small blue container. You unscrewed the lid and tipped the container ever so slightly. Out onto your outstretched hand popped two capsules, their smooth surface reflecting the fluorescent lights placed far above you. Down you gulped them, and up reached a hand to grasp a bottle of water. You took a swig.
Another day, another pill, another length of sanity in a place of madness.
The na‘vi behind you quirks a brow, "What was that?"
"Uh, this?", you shake the blue container and the pills inside rattle demonstrative. "Norm bought them from the raid last week. It’s a food substitutes. Helps me concentrate."
Caffeine in a pill, basically.
Jake let’s out a heavy sigh as he circles the desk and approaches you, the equipment and furniture around him looking comically small.
"You don’t needs pills, kid", he says, taking the container from you and placing in inside the locker a little harder than necessary to bring his point across. He’s towering over you without even trying, and you have to crane your neck all the way up to properly look at him. "What you need is sleep and a way to relief of all of that pent up stress. You’re here all the time, do you even eat? Have some time for yourself? When’s the last time you took a shower, huh?"
God, this man was a dad through and through.
You didn’t know if it was the difference in age or just his general authority, but whatever it was that made him talk to you like you were nothing but a fussy teenager, it was getting on your nerves. Even more than usually.
"Ha-ha very funny. Next you tell me to go visit a spa over the weekend. Oh, thanks boss that’s so kind of you for giving me a couple of days off", your voice had turned into a mocking tone, which makes both of his eyebrows raise in amusement. He cocks his head to the side, waiting for you to keep going, but your gaze only drops in embarrassment. "Leave me alone, Jake. I’ve got work to do…"
"See, that’s exactly what I’m talking about", he chuckles and shakes his head, pinching the bridge of his nose.
"What?" You almost bark at him.
"You’re pent up. Quit acting like a little brat, go home and take care of it. Or I will."
Take care of it. Jake’s words whispered over and over and over in your head, a rolling loop that you thought might actually drive you insane. It’s not like you didn’t try, you really did. But as tempting as your bed might seemed to you, as tired as you were when you dragged yourself back to hells gate, you just couldn’t rest, couldn’t will yourself to sleep.
You’ve always spent your days with your mind full to the brim with various theories, studies and seemingly endless responsibilities, so much so that you often found it difficult to empty your mind for sleep. Sometimes you would recite the na’vi names of plants to yourself in your head ("Panopyra, Pamtseowll, puríhsa..."), over and over, like counting sheep, trying to memorize their names. You would take a quick jog around the building, read a book or sometimes even meditate. But some other times you simply preferred another method of relaxation.
Take care of it. Or I will.
He could be so insufferable when he was bossing you around, you thought to yourself with a heavy sigh as you let your hands run down your curves, feeling the soft swell of your breasts, over your stomach and the hem of your pyjama shirt.
"Is that an order, sir?", you grumble to yourself, mentally rolling your eyes at him as your fingers skim past the waistband of your shorts.
But eywa bless him to whatever heaven existed, this man was truly gifted with a body that served as material for your wettest dreams and dirtiest fantasies more than once before.
There had to be some rule against woman finding men around their fathers age hot. Men whose authority made them ten times more attractive, but just as annoying when they were treating you like a kid. Men that were exotic and alien and blue and tall and— There had to be some law that– that could protect you from the man that Jake Sully was. There had to be something in the books about dealing with this, with him. Especially if the only way you knew how to deal with whatever feelings you harbored for the much older ex-marine, was with busying your hands between your spread thighs.
Instantly, there’s this sensation, hot and burning and you allow it to rise within your core— allow it, and welcome it. You exhale softly, and the slick, wet feeling under your fingertips gives you a gratifying sense of accomplishment, fueling you to circle over your clit, gentle at first, but slowly adding more pressure over time. Your other hand clasps over your mouth, barely able to stifle a moan as the other finger that had been teasing your entrance slowly slips inside.
Breathlessly, you feel your head dip back further, as you recognize the heat slowly building, radiating from your core. Gyrating your hips, the feeling of wetness and pleasure builds within yourself, enough to make your hips buck up against your own hands. Thrusting your fingers in and out, you huff out a frustrated breath when you realize it’s not nearly enough to take the edge off.
Withdrawing your hands, you reach for your nightstand and pull the upper drawer open. It reveals a set of various toys, different colors and sizes, and you don’t need to think twice before you grab the biggest one and settle yourself back into the comfort of your pillow. It’s a blue dildo. Of-fucking-course.
It takes a few tries, the tension slips for a moment or two, but soon, you find the right angle to allow the slippery toy to slip inside and caress the spot you‘ve been seeking. More pleasure begins to wash over you, not unlike waves washing ashore, as you build up the tension your body craves you to chase. Your fingertips run in circles over your clit as you push the toy inside and angle it up, dragging the silicon tip along your soft, spongy walls and you moan, loud and wanton.
Your toes curl tightly as you approach what might just be the state of bliss you‘ve been seeking. The verge of Nirvana, quite literally, at your fingertips. Inhaling sharply, you feel that pleasure intensify and spread throughout your entire body. Your toes curl tighter, though you’re only vaguely aware of it for a moment.
Squeezing your eyes shut, your head lolls from side to side, before you pry your eyes open and glance between your spread thighs. The toy glistens in your arousal when you pull it out and your legs quiver when you push it back inside. In your lustful haze, it takes a few more thrusts, and then your eyes finally land on the door in front of your bed; widen open, with a big blue silhouette leaning against the metal frame, arms crossed over his chest and head tilted to the side in his telltale stance.
Your movements stop altogether.
"J-Jake!?" You shriek, clenching your thighs shut.
"Hey, sweetheart", he grins lazily, then pushes off the doorframe to approach you.
"What are you–"
"Thought I’d check on you", he cuts you off and the sway of his tail behind his back reminds you of a cat that just caught a mouse. "See if you arrived home safe and sound, and took care of that little problem how I told you to."
The mattress then dips as he puts a knee on top of it and reaches for your ankle. You squeak when he pulls your towards him with barely any effort, then spreads your thighs with his entirely too big hands on either one of your legs.
"Looks like you needed it bad, huh?", he chuckles and a deep flush of embarrassment settles on your face when he twists the toy inside you and then gently pulls it out. "But you could’ve just asked, you know? Instead of using these pathetic little toys. No wonder you’re always this pent up when that’s what you’re using."
The toys is tossed aside before you can open your mouth to object, your chest heaving in frantic pants as he kneels onto your bed with a creak of your old mattress.
"Jake..?", you whisper, the sudden, uncertain tone in your voice making him lick his lips in anticipation as you pushed yourself up on your elbows.
"Shhh, let daddy take care of you, yeah? Gonna relief some of that stress so my little brat knows how to behave again. That sound good?", he asked, with a fucking smug shit-eating grin. If only your face wasn’t bright red in flustered embarrassment, Jake would’ve taken the provocative roll of your eyes more seriously as you let yourself fall back against the sheets.
"Not a brat…", you mumble, but your eyebrows are only knit together for a second before they shoot up in surprise when grabs the underside of your knees and folds your legs so your ankles almost touch your ears. "F-Fucking, sh– ah!" The moan breaks out of you in a wheezed curse the very moment Jake’s tongue goes flat between your wet folds and his lips close around your clit.
He starts rather roughly, sucking hard on that little bundle of nerves until tears prick at the corner of your eyes. His tongue dips down to lap at your arousal, groaning against you as he pushes past your entrance and fucks you on his tongue. Your moans turn into wails, legs helplessly twitching as he keeps them bend to devour you.
You couldn’t hold out for long, not against the way he knowingly toyed with you, suckling and flicking over your clit, the strange growl he made between filthy slurps vibrating against it. You heard your own voice, a soft river of sounds, murmuring words that weren’t words, curses and moans as you felt the release start to pool in your belly, hot and tingling and restless. Until you couldn’t fight it anymore, thighs trembling around his face and you came with a gasp of his name.
But Jake doesn’t stop, doesn’t stop until your shaking from overstimulation, until your slick is running down his chin and even then, a desperate sound of frustration escapes you when he finally lifts his head up from between your thighs. The waves of your first orgasm had barely subsided, just to the point where your limbs felt heavy, your body drained and wrung out, but it wasn’t enough. You needed more, and it made him laugh, how needy you are.
"Noo", you complain, "don’t– don’t stop!"
"Ah, don’t worry sweetheart I’m only getting started", Jake promises with a dirty smile, shuffling his hips closer to yours before he pulls down his loincloth just enough to reveal his throbbing cock. There’s a certain glint in his eyes as he watches you swallow thickly at the sight. Fuck, he’s big.
"Been acting like such a desperate slut, rolling your eyes at me and talking back under your breath", he says lowly. Jake keeps you in this bend position, but takes hold of his cock at the very base before he drags his tip through your spit and arousal slicked folds. "Should’ve already put you in your place weeks ago", he goes on, "But I knew you just needed your needy little holes filled by a big cock, right?" He pauses for a second, and then you feel the mushroom-like tip prodding against your entrance. "Needed to be fucked like the slut you are. Don‘t worry, doll face. M‘gonna fuck you right to sleep, help you relax reaaal good." And then he pushes inside.
The stretch makes you choke on a scream that threatens to rise through your body and Jake groans at the suffocating heat around his length. "Shit baby, still so fuckin‘ tight, ain’t ya?"
Your hands reach out for his biceps, short nails digging into his skin, sinking crescents into the blue stripes on his arm, your whole body quivering, mind fuzzed with a long-forgotten drowsy sort of bliss.
"Feel me stretching you out? Those damn toys didn’t even loosen you up one bit." Jake grins. His lips are on yours then, his mouth claiming, and he swallows any sounds you might have made as you fit together like a hand in a too-small glove.
He moves, only a little, the springs groan and squeak as he rolls his hips, slow at first, then faster. Your lips are bruised by the time he breaks the kiss and his shoulders are scratched and he’s somehow even deeper, and then his thrusts turn harder.
He’s hot and heavy on top of you and it’s making you tingle and shiver all over.
Jake fucks you with precision, the tip of his cock hammers against your cervix, dragging along your g-spot on the way and it makes your eyes roll all the back inside your head.
"Yeah, that’s how it’s supposed to feel", he chuckles, the sound cutting off into a low groan as he licks away the spit from your bottom lip. "Look at my little slut drooling fr‘me."
Your wet, velvety-like walls are heavenly, warm and constricting him and getting even tighter when he increases his pace. In no time, you were all but melting in his hold, moaning out nonsense that was like music to his ears. Every time Jake’s cock brushed against your g-spot, your moans turned louder and your toes curled into your soles.
"Jesus, baby. You feel so good around me, perfect little cock sleeve."
The sounds he knocked out of you with the sheer force of his thrusts soon turn needy and higher pitched, as he was driving you over the edge faster than you could even proceed it.
"T-There, fuck Jake, right- right there", you mewl, sucking in your bottom lip between your teeth. The man above you groans, half a grin pulling at the corner of his lips before he aims his hips to hit that spongey spot inside you even harder.
"Where, here? That your special spot, hm?"
"Uh-huh, yes! Yes, fucking shi– oh my god!" Your walls pulsate around him, squeezing and clenching his shaft. God, you were so close it almost hurt.
"Hmh, can feel you clenching, baby. You like it that much?", Jake chuckled, and you could only muster the strength to nod weakly. "Gonna come fr‘me, yeah?"
His hips only increased their pace from there, taking you harder, hands holding you tighter, tail coiling around your ankle to spread your legs impossibly wider and you felt so full, it was hard to imagine that there was any more room inside you, not even for his cum. And that thought alone was enough to tip you over the edge with a full body shiver.
His name falls from your spit slicked lips in incoherent brabbles and moans, greedily pleading for more, more more, until—
"Coming! I‘m coming!"
"Look at you", Jake mutters and he sounds so wrecked, so reverent and pleased with himself. "Gorgeous, so pretty when you come on my cock, sweetheart. You needed this, didn’t you? Good girl, you’re doing so good.”
Jake certainly knows what he’s talking about because if only there was a mirror where you could see yourself– You looked completely obscene, folded like a little pretzel, skin flushed with exertion and sheened with sweat while your hair is matted on your forehead. There’s saliva pooling at the corners of your mouth from where you had been unashamedly panting, lips red and plump from kissing and sucking on his tongue.
“My perfect little slut.” Jake pants out, snapping his hips ruthlessly into you, helping you ride out your orgasm.
Jesus, you were a real sight. It makes his balls tighten up and his cock throb inside you.
He was drinking up every sweet little moan and gasp he elicited out of you like this, groaning, before he finally pumped you full of his hot cum, until it leaked out around his girth. "Oh, fuck", Jake murmured and he sounded so far away, thick and rough. Your pussy squelched as he continued to lazily thrust into you. He groans, shattered, hips fucking erratically until they still deep inside you and the tight walls of your cunt milk his cock until he’s completely spent.
It’s only now that you realize how god damn heavy this man was on top of you. Thankfully Jake rolled off before you had to start gasping too badly for air, leaving your front feeling impossibly cold.
"And? Feeling relaxed?" He chuckled, rolling over to pull the blanket over the both of you before he tugs you close against his chest.
"Shut up…", you make out roughly and it’s only then that you realize, you had screamed yourself hoarse. You want to roll your eyes at him, but they unwillingly flutter closed before you can even try to.
"Told ya‘ I’ll fuck you to sleep, kid."
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ichorai · 5 months
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thread ; coriolanus snow.
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pairing ; young!coriolanus snow x capitol!reader (gender-neutral)
synopsis ; “they’re all just copying us, you know,” he said, sounding almost bitter. 
“of course they are,” you replied, taking a drawn-out sip from your cup. “we showed them there’s no sharks in the water. obviously they’re going to jump in.”
words ; 6.6k
themes ; mild fluff/angst, action
warnings / includes ; themes of classism, violence/injury/death/drug misuse, coryo's paranoia, he isn't exactly toxic yet but the seeds are very much planted, i tried to keep him in character as best i could </3
series masterlist. main masterlist.
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Coriolanus came late to class. He rushed in, uniform only slightly askew, and hair messier than usual. You moved your bag aside so he could take a seat beside you. With a nod, he slipped into the row and began laying out his books. 
You wondered how Tigris reacted once he got back home. Probably worried sick for her cousin and her friend. Your father, of course, was furious with you once he learned about your tryst with Coriolanus in the Capitol Zoo, but there was little he could do when he was off working in the districts. During dinner with your mother, Lucretius Flickerman, and his wife, the tributes and the games were practically all the three could talk about. Lucky was going to be the first ever host, apparently.
How fun.
To neither of your surprise, Highbottom eyed the two of you with disdain. When you had strode into the hall, he remained silent. Coriolanus’ arrival seemed to tip him right over the edge.
“Both of your little excursions were in violation of about five different academy rules,” he grumbled. “Chiefly amongst them—endangering a Capitol student. Yourselves.”
“There were peacekeepers crawling all over the place,” Coriolanus retorted. 
The dean’s nose twitched angrily. Then, he fixed you with a harsh look over his spectacles, and drawled out your name. “Since you are the academy’s brightest, and your records have been… untarnished until now, I will let you off with a warning.” There was a pause, before the dean continued. “Mr. Snow, I’m moving for the gamemakers to disqualify you as mentor, effective immediately.”
“What?” the two of you exclaimed at once.
“You said we had to get them to perform, not stay away!” Coriolanus just about spat.
“I’ll add insubordination, as well,” Highbottom replied, tone venomous.
Raising your hand and ignoring the dean’s irritated exhale, you haughtily said, “It was me who went into the tribute’s truck. Coriolanus only followed. We didn’t know that we’d end up in a zoo enclosure.”
Arachne tittered with condescending laughter. “Yeah, and then you held hands with them. Made it seem like we’re the same as those animals.”
From your other side, Sejanus was quick to defend the two of you. “Coriolanus and Y/N didn’t show those people anything they didn’t already know.”
Stiffening, Coryo scowled and said, “I don’t need your help, Sejanus.”
He ignored him and continued on, “That the tributes are human beings, just like us. That’s why nobody wants to watch the games—because people know, deep down, that winning a war ten years ago doesn’t justify starving people’s children, taking away their freedoms, their rights!”
“Dean Highbottom,” you called, not bothering to raise your hand this time. “How is it fair that Coriolanus gets disqualified while I’m not? We did what you told us to do! We were just trying to get to know our tributes.”
“Would you like to be disqualified as well? I can surely arrange for that to happen,” he deadpanned. “But poor little Wovey would be left all on her own.”
Nausea coiled within your abdomen. You drew yourself up to your full height. “Well, that would be entirely unnecessary—” 
Before you could finish your sentence, the doors to the lecture theater swung open once more, and Dr. Volumnia Gaul crept in, footsteps completely silent. How she managed that, you weren’t at all sure.
With everyone’s eyes on her, she fixed her stare on the two of you. Her hair was wrangled back into a high up-do, tall and grey on her head. 
“Quite a show you two put on. You’re good players,” she said, voice booming throughout the theater. “The hunger games needs good players. Maybe one day you’ll be gamemakers, like me.”
The thought sent chills up your spine. Coriolanus kept his expression stoic.
“If the games continue at all,” said Highbottom.
Singular blue eye flashing, Dr. Gaul grinned in an unnerving manner. “Oh, they’ll continue. With performances like young Snow and L/N in that zoo? The people would never stop wanting for more.” She drew closer to the rows of seats, gloved hand trailing over a few of the desks. “I came here to ask the star mentors a question… what are the hunger games for?”
You and Coriolanus exchanged a quick glance.
“They’re to punish the districts for their uprising,” he said, as if it were obvious. “To commemorate the end of the war.”
Volumnia’s tongue darted out to wet her lips, in a similar fashion to a snake.
“And what would you say, Y/N?”
It was hard to maintain eye contact with her, especially because it felt like she could peer into your very soul and dissect you apart from inside out—but you managed. With your father being such an avid supporter of the hunger games, you wondered if your answer would be what she was looking for. “I don’t agree with the games. But I know it’s because—fear is power. Keep the districts afraid for themselves, for their children, and you’ll always have the upper hand.”
She smiled, wide and eerie. “You’re right. Fear is power. But punishment and fear can take many forms. They can come from bomb droppings, the cancelling of food shipments, stage executions. The question is, why games?”
Defensive, Sejanus spoke up, “Shouldn’t we be asking whether or not it’s right in the first place?”
“You have a problem with my games?” she asked, unimpressed.
“Some of those kids were two years old when the war ended! The oldest of them were only eight!” he exclaimed. “The Capitol is supposed to be everyone’s government now. It is supposed to protect all of us. I don’t see how making children fight each other to the death is protecting anyone.”
With a sneer, Dr. Gaul told him, “That sort of sympathy might be interfering with your mentoring assignment, Mr. Plinth.”
Finally, Highbottom said to his colleague, “Perhaps Capitol students are ill-suited to be mentoring tributes. Perhaps the games’ time has passed.”
Yes, you thought. It’s time to let it go.
To your surprise, Coriolanus abruptly stood up from his seat. “Dean Highbottom is wrong,” he asserted. “My classmates, too. Maybe Sejanus is onto something here. We should be viewing those tributes as human beings. You saw those kids at the zoo. They just wanted to get to know Lucy Gray. If we need people to watch, we should let them get closer to the tributes before the games. Make the stakes personal.”
“Who would watch the games if they care what happens to the tributes?” Dr. Gaul asked, as if the notion of caring about district folk was ludicrous.
“Everyone,” replied Coriolanus. “Especially if they thought the tribute they cared about had a chance of winning. People need someone to root for and someone to root against! And if we bend a few Capitol laws, we can even have them place bets.” 
You felt sick as you looked up at Coriolanus with a mildly disturbed expression. If he noticed, he didn’t give you any indication.
“I know Lucy Gray may not win in the arena,” he continued. “But if you give her a chance—I would bet the Plinth prize that she could win people’s attention.”
Dr. Gaul was effectively intrigued.
“I would like you to write up a proposal of these thoughts tonight, Mr. Snow,” she said. 
Clemensia, strong-headed as ever, stood up and said that she should be working with Coriolanus, as his class partner.
With an amused snicker, Volumnia bowed her head and made her way back to the door. “It’ll be an interesting test,” she ominously said before turning on her heel and exiting, her dark cloak billowing out behind her.
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During lunch, you sat down across from Coriolanus in the cafeteria, noticing that he had three sandwiches stacked on his plate, along with half a dozen cookies on another. It was a rare thing, seeing him with so much food. Usually he opted for just starving himself to save some money, despite your urges to get him to eat.
“Hungry?” you asked with an arched brow, but he shook his head.
“It’s for Lucy Gray,” he replied, staring down at the food. Then, he pulled out a red handkerchief and started wrapping the food up. “I’m going back.”
With a soft sigh, you started digging into your own lunch. “Hopefully not inside this time.”
He spared you half a smile, though it didn’t quite reach his eyes. “Are you coming? Everyone else is. I heard Arachne tell Felix she’s going to use food to get her tribute to do tricks for her.”
With a wrinkle of your nose, you glanced over at her several tables down. “Sounds like something she’d say.” You took a bite of your food and chewed thoughtfully.
“They’re all just copying us, you know,” he said, sounding almost bitter. 
“Of course they are,” you replied, taking a drawn-out sip from your cup. “We showed them there’s no sharks in the water. Obviously they’re going to jump in.”
He tied the handkerchief together so the sandwiches and cookies would stay put. “They’re all sheep. No original thought whatsoever.”
There it was again, your wind-chime laugh. Coriolanus smiled down at his plate, now empty save for a few bread crumbs. 
“It’s not that big of a deal, Coryo. Besides, I’m glad most of the class is going. The tributes must be starving in there,” you told him. “I’ll come and bring some food for Wovey.”
A voice from your right jutted into your conversation, Sejanus’ angry face coming into view as he slammed down his lunch tray in the empty spot beside you. “You guys going to fatten up your tributes so you can finally start taking bets?” he just about snarled.
“Do you think they’ll give those kids a scrap if we don’t give them a reason to do it?” Coriolanus responded defensively, leaning forward with narrowed eyes. “How do you think your tribute will have a chance if he can’t eat?”
“We can’t send them back to their homes,” you told Sejanus in a juxtaposingly calm tone. “The best we can do for them now is help them out here.”
The curly-haired man slumped forward, his shoulder stooping like an old wildflower. “He was my classmate,” he muttered. “Back in two.”
Though you gave Sejanus a sympathetic look, Coryo regarded Sejanus as if he was confused. He wondered why Sejanus even bothered to care this much when he was no longer a part of the districts.
“It’s not your fault that—” Coriolanus began, but was swiftly interrupted.
“Oh, yeah, I’m so blameless I’m choking on it!” he gritted out. Then, he let out a shaky breath, trying to steel himself. “My father bought him for me, you know. At the reaping. Just so he could show me that I could never go back to two.”
A frown marred your features. “He bribed Highbottom?”
“Something like that,” Sejanus told you, using the prongs of his fork to poke and prod at his food. “Morphling costs a pretty penny.”
Silence stretched over the three of you for a few seconds. Coriolanus looked annoyed, but Sejanus didn’t seem to notice. 
“Being in the Capitol is going to kill me,” he sighed.
This made Coryo scowl. “So do something about it.”
Sejanus’ dark eyes flitted over to the bundle of food in Coriolanus’ hands. “You’re quite the rebel.”
Coriolanus retorted, “Oh, yeah. I’m bad news.”
When he said that, he’d expected you to laugh again, but you kept quiet, staring down at your now-unappetizing lunch.
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There was a considerably larger crowd around the enclosure that evening. You had a small basket clutched in one hand, consisting of juice boxes (still grape, since you now knew it was a safe option), soft bread rolls, and wrapped leftovers from your dinner with Lucky. You hoped Wovey wasn’t allergic to anything—you’d forgotten to ask in the heat of it all.
Coriolanus still only had the few sandwiches he saved from lunch, but you assured him that you were more than happy to share with Lucy Gray if need be. 
She looked much more haggard tonight, most of her makeup smeared off, her lips chapped and bleeding at the center from what you assumed was anxious biting, and her hair was more unruly. Though her eyes still held the same fire, the same passion, lighting up when she noticed the two of you approaching. She asked if the food was for them with slight surprise—you often forget that they hadn’t much to eat in the districts, anyway—and took what was offered, before handing off a good portion of it to her district partner, Jessup. The larger man declined the food at first, claiming he wasn’t hungry, but eventually caved and took the sandwiches. 
When he turned to walk off, Coriolanus asked about the nasty wound on his neck. It was just behind his ear and oozing with blood and pus. A bat bite on the train, Lucy Gray told the two of you, looking awfully guilty on behalf of her friend. 
Crooning from a little way’s away drew your attention to Arachne and her tribute. She was dangling a cold bottle of water just inches from the tribute’s reach, urging her to beg.
Lucy Gray’s brows cinched. “One thing I learned in twelve is that hunger is a weapon. Your friend over there sure knows it.”
The two of you scoffed at the same time.
“She is not my friend,” Coriolanus told her. “She is poison with perfect teeth.”
“How such a vile tongue hides behind those pearly whites, I wouldn’t ever know,” you remarked, earning you a snicker from Coriolanus. Finally, you peered around for Wovey, eager to finally get her something to eat. However, curse your damned softening heart, your eyes grew gentle upon seeing her curled up by the very same tree stump, head resting on Bobbin’s shoulder, fast asleep. 
Lucy Gray casted a glimpse over her shoulder to see what you were looking at. 
“Could you give this to her?” you asked, slotting the small basket between the enclosure’s metal bars. “When she wakes up, that is. She must be famished. Feel free to take anything in there, but just… leave some for her.”
The girl nodded, taking the basket from you and handing it over to Jessup, who cradled it as if it were more precious than gold. You watched him carefully—not because you were worried he was going to keep all the food to himself, but because you were curious as to why he hadn’t reached in to take anything for himself yet, even after several minutes passed by. 
Coriolanus leaned forward, wrapping a hand around one of the bars as he lowered his voice. “Are you going to share everything with Jessup?”
Lucy Gray’s expression faltered. “Why? You think I oughta build up my strength to strangle him in the arena? Not exactly my forte.”
“I might have a chance to help you,” he told her, watching her keenly. “To make some suggestions to the gamemakers. I might even be able to get the audience to send you gifts in the arena. Food, and water, to keep you going. You just have to try singing again.”
Firmly, Lucy Gray said, “I don’t sing when I’m told, I sing when I have something to say.”
“And you have nothing to say?” you asked her, head tilting. “The whole world is watching, Lucy Gray. Now’s your chance.”
A myriad of emotions crossed over her face. “It doesn’t matter much now, does it? I’ve seen the arena—there’s nowhere to hide. What’s the point?” Her gaze traveled from you to Coriolanus. “The guards say you get money if you get more people to watch and you say you want to help me. Which is it?”
“Both?” he offered. 
It didn’t satisfy her, but it was enough, for now. 
Then, she grabbed a sandwich from the red handkerchief and took a large bite, a muffled noise of appreciation falling from her lips. 
“Bread’s soft,” she said around a mouthful. “Softer than in twelve.”
Then, she offered a cookie to Coriolanus. He began to protest, but she insisted he take it.
“I saw you staring,” she said. “I always thought there was plenty of food in the Capitol.”
Coriolanus laughed, a coarse and unrefined sound. “One time during the war, I ate a whole jar of paste just to stop the pain in my stomach.” 
A match of pity struck within the confines of your chest, but you remained quiet. Coriolanus told you stories of his times during the war often—usually after the two of you laid together, sweaty and naked, bearing your souls to one another. Pillow talk made him quite emotional, you found.
“And how was it?” Lucy Gray queried, eyes round.
Coriolanus took a bite of the cookie, humming in though. Then, he shrugged. “Pasty,” he said.
Lucy Gray laughed. She looked back to you, appreciative. “Thank you, for the food. I’m sure the little one’s going to be happy.” Your eyes flickered back to Wovey. She stirred a bit on Bobbin’s shoulder, but remained asleep. “She’s so sweet. So young. Something about her reminds me of my cousin, Maude Ivory. I can’t stand to think of them without me like this.”
“I’m sorry,” Coriolanus whispered.
You nodded in agreement. “They’re waiting for you, I’m sure. You’ll see them again.”
Lucy Gray smiled sadly. “I won’t hold you to that.” Then, after she took another bite, she blew out a gentle sigh. “You two seem like… genuine folk. It sure would’ve been nice to meet you under different circumstances.”
Coriolanus leaned his head against the enclosure’s bars. “One of your shows, maybe.”
Somehow, her smile grew impossibly wider, but her eyes shone with unshed tears. “Yeah. Yeah, I would’ve liked that.” With a light sniffle, she asked the two of you, “You two keen on dancing?”
You thought back to all the dance lessons you were forced to take as a young child. It was never your strong suit. “Not really, no. Coriolanus is much better than I am.” 
“Not your fancy Capitol dancing,” she told you, waving a hand in the air. “Dancing like you’re free. Dancing with no rules. Just the music, to guide you.”
Both you and Coriolanus exchanged glances. “Can’t say I’ve tried,” you replied. “But it sounds fun.”
Lucy Gray nodded, showing more enthusiasm than you’d ever seen in her before. “You’d have the time of your life. If you ever visit… I’d love for you to come. Both of you—we’d have a drink. Share a dance or two. We’d have all the time in the world. People always say our music shows are the best places for romantic dates. It’d be perfect for you two.”
It was a pleasant fantasy to entertain. But that’s all it was—a fantasy. When you looked at Coriolanus, his expression was simultaneously strained and distant, as if he were far away, thinking of other things. You reached out to place your hand on his shoulder.
But before you could, screams erupted from around the enclosure, followed closely by shattering glass. You whipped your head away from Lucy Gray, seeing Arachne’s tribute jabbing the broken glass bottle straight into her jugular. Coriolanus yelled something—you weren’t entirely sure what, but he jumped up to grab Arachne, applying pressure to the wound.
It wasn’t enough. 
Blood, dark and viscous and filling the air with the smell of copper, began to pool around her neck, down her shoulders, filling the crevices of her collarbones. She was blubbering something, gargling through blood, but you couldn’t quite hear with the loud static buzzing in your ears. 
You glanced to the side, catching sight of peacekeepers lining up their guns to shoot. You rushed forward to get to Coriolanus, yanking him down just as several shots rang out. He was whimpering, telling Arachne to hold on for him, but when you frantically reached down to feel for her pale wrist’s pulse—it wasn’t there.
Arachne was dead. 
You clambered off of Coriolanus, away from the dead girl, backing away. You only barely registered Sejanus calling out your name in concern, but you didn’t pay him any mind. Instead, you turned your eyes to the tributes, all ducking and cowering behind trees and tires. To your relief, Wovey was now awake, eyes wide as she crouched behind the tree stump with Bobbin.
The relief was short-lived, however, because peacekeepers began urging everybody away from the enclosure. You reached out for Coriolanus, taking his arm. He was shaking, eyes as large as saucers and visibly distraught. 
The two of you walked to his estate in tense silence.
Once there, Grandma’am and Tigris fawned over the two of you, though in far different ways. Grandma’am dove into a lecture about rebels and how lucky the two of you were that your tributes hadn’t done the very same. Tigris wrapped a warm shawl over you and a patched blanket over her cousin, telling Grandma’am that Lucy Gray and Wovey weren’t rebels, just innocent girls. 
“Trust me, that one hasn’t been a girl in a long time,” Grandma’am bitterly retorted. “Outside this Capitol, they’re savages, however they may smile. She will use you, Coriolanus. You must use her or you’ll end up dead in the trees, like your father.”
Coriolanus stiffened. 
An hour later, he tugged you into his room and kissed you hard and desperate, as if he wanted to distract himself from his own thoughts. You were the one to pull away, even if everything inside you was screaming to stay. You almost caved, almost, when his head dipped forward in an attempt to capture your lips again, but you placed the tips of your fingers over his mouth with a soft, sympathetic smile. You hugged him tight until he stopped trembling, and reluctantly drew yourself away from him. After embracing Tigris goodnight, you walked home alone with your thoughts, wondering if the games were going to continue in lieu of the evening’s events.
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There was an assembly held at the academy for Arachne’s death, followed promptly by a proper funeral. Though, it didn’t quite feel proper with all the cameras and reporters hovering around. You wondered if people were expecting to see you cry. You were incredibly shaken, sure, but were you sad?
It’d be a lie if you said yes.
They made sure to zoom in on you and Coriolanus when you kissed him on the cheek and squeezed his hand just before he was appointed to go on stage and sing the national anthem. Why he was the one to do so, the two of you had no idea. It’s not like Arachne was friends with him, despite what the reporters wanted to think. It was a ridiculous waste of breath, he thought, singing for a girl he barely knew.
After Coriolanus’ performance, President Ravinstill gave a rather monotonous speech about courage and bravery. How Arachne was going to be sorely missed. Right—of course she was.
And the very next day, life moved on. As if Arachne’s death had never happened.
Soon after, they had all the mentors and tributes gathered into one of the academy halls— with the tributes shackled to tables, of course. It wasn’t like there was anywhere for them to run. You’d seen all the peacekeepers lining the hallways outside.
“In spite of yesterday’s tragic events,” Highbottom said, not a shred of sincerity to be found in his tone, “our President has decided that the games must go on. Show everyone that the Capitol is unafraid of such acts of terror. To which end Dr. Gaul wishes you to preview the arena this afternoon with your tributes. Later this evening, there will be a special, televised presentation of each tribute to our audience so they could… get to know them.”
A glorified show-and-tell, you dryly thought. How wonderful.
You and Coriolanus looked at each other for a brief moment—he’d ask Lucy Gray to sing again, you were certain. Then, you turned back forward, where Wovey was fiddling with her thumbs, sniffling a few times.
“You’ll have an hour to discuss strategy,” said the dean, before whisking himself off to the shadows of the room to down another vial of morphling.
You sat down in front of your tribute, trying your best to offer her a warm smile.
“Did you like the food I brought? Was it okay?” you whispered, making sure to lower your voice.
A nod, a scuffle of feet. Her bottom lip trembled.
Gnawing on the inside of your cheek, you moved on to the pressing matter at hand. “Okay, Wovey. I need… I need to know what you’re good at. Are you a fast runner?” 
She thought for a moment, but then shook her head.
“I know you can climb?”
She let out a shaky sigh. “I used to climb in my mama’s factory all the time. Trees, too.”
“Good. That’s good,” you murmured, pulling out a notepad so you could jot some things down. “Are you good at hiding? Staying still?”
“I think so,” she said, looking awfully uncomfortable. “Will I go back home if I win?”
A sharp pang hit you square in the chest. You tore your gaze away from your notes on the paper to look at her. 
“Yes,” you hesitantly replied. “They’ll take you home.”
This seemed to satisfy her for the time being. Gave her hope that you perhaps shouldn’t have instilled.
You swallowed the lump in your throat. “So—for your televised presentation. We need to win the audience over so they send in donations—I’d be able to send you things. What do you want to do?”
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After quite a bit of back and forth, you managed to get Wovey to agree to talk about her family on stage. How much she missed them. It wasn’t much, but perhaps the youngest tribute sympathy card would push the odds in your favor.
Halfway through the hour, however, Coriolanus and Clemensia were called away by Highbottom—most likely to discuss the proposal Coryo had written up once you left the estate. You made a mental note to ask him how it goes once you saw him again. You felt bad, seeing Lucy Gray sitting all alone, bound hands lightly rapping against the table’s wood.
By the stroke of four in the afternoon, they gathered all the mentors and tributes in front of the arena. Coriolanus came bounding up to the group just seconds away from the gates opening, appearing breathless and mildly frazzled. 
“You okay? Where’s Clemmie?” you asked, resting a hand on his elbow, brows kinking with confusion.
“She’s… not going to make it.” He winced, appearing distinctly torn. “I’ll tell you later.”
There was a brief silence where you scrutinized him, eyes wide. Something bad happened when he was with Dr. Gaul, and you weren’t too keen on finding out.
You walked alongside Coriolanus into the arena, with your two tributes in front of you. Lucy Gray was saying something comforting to Wovey in that sweet voice of hers, and for that you were grateful. The last thing you needed was Wovey to break down in an anxious mess. 
The arena itself was spacious but incredibly rundown, crumbling under the weight of its neglected upkeep. The glass roof was stained and dusty, rusty slants creaking as they parted to filter sunlight into the dome.
“Welcome to the arena of the 10th annual hunger games,” a distorted voice echoed through the arena’s shoddy speaker system. “Tributes, mentors, you have fifteen minutes to survey the space and discuss strategy.”
With one final squeeze on Coriolanus’ shoulder, you parted ways with him, stepping beside Wovey to urge her into a lap around the arena. Staggered rows of dusty seats lined the edges high above the ground—Wovey was a good climber, wasn’t she? 
You tried your best to give her advice. “Hiding in the seats is your best option. Climbing over the rows whenever someone comes to attack you should buy you time. You’re small, too—I think you’d be able to crawl beneath the seats to get away. As for weapons… maybe grab something small from the center. A knife or a dagger. But only if you have time, and only if you know you can make it. If not, just make a break for the seats, as fast as you can. Got that, sweetheart?”
Wovey stayed silent. But she nodded. Nodded and nodded until you worried her head was going to pop right off. 
You bent down at the waist slightly so that you were eye-level with her. “I’ll be watching you the whole time. I’m there if you need m—”
Sudden explosions rang out about the arena. Plumes of dust flew everywhere, blinding you almost instantaneously. With your eyes squeezed shut, you felt the ground shake and split and rumble until another closer explosion flung you a good few feet off the ground. You landed on your side with a strangled scream, though the pain only registered a few seconds later. Cracking your aching eyes open and squinting through the haze of dust, you caught sight of shattered glass thundering around you like crystalized rain, nicking your skin with sharp pin pricks. 
Your right side buzzed with warmth. Something damp. You dazedly looked down.
Oh.
It seemed you’d landed right on a broken metal pipe, sticking right out of your abdomen. Blood was pooling down your academy uniform, soaking the fabric a far more sinister shade of red. You choked out something akin to a dry sob, before screaming out for help. You heard dozens of similar cries echo back to you.
With a grunt, you pushed yourself up, 
“CORYO?!” you screamed as loud as you could. Faintly, you could hear his strained voice echo your name back—somewhere across the arena, you’d wager. 
The pain was starting to grow worse. Searing, almost, as if you were being laid over an open fire. You staggered through the rubble, pressing a hand to your side in a terrible attempt to staunch the bleeding, careful not to jostle the pipe. It was probably the only thing keeping you from bleeding out right then and there.
As you kept moving, you caught sight of a large, gaping hole at the opposite end of the arena. There were tributes running out. Peacekeepers shooting them. The explosions had been so loud that your ears were ringing with terrible white noise—you couldn’t even hear the sound of the rifles blasting.
You glanced around wildly. 
You spotted the small little girl near the edge of the arena. Running with Dill, you realized, mind still lagging a second too late from shock. Another explosion rattled through the arena—this time, crumbling the roof away completely.
With a mangled noise, you began limping as quickly as you could.
Another call of your name, echoing and rattling about your skull, and Coriolanus materialized right beside you out of seemingly nowhere. There were two of him, you realized. He appeared fuzzy. 
You reached out for him, but he suddenly pulled you forward, yelling something. Something you couldn’t hear. A flash of rainbow by his left, and you saw Lucy Gray just barely escape being crushed by a large stone support column. 
More crumbling ceiling. Coriolanus’ hands were cold when he urgently shoved you forward. So hard that you went tumbling down, screaming with the sudden painful jolts the metal pipe sent shooting up your spine. A second later, you blearily looked around for Coriolanus—realizing that he’d pushed you into the clear when you found him pinned down under heavy foundational slants—and they’d caught on fire. 
Numb panic shot through your mind. You barely registered your own voice croaking out his name. You tried to crawl towards him, but he only seemed to get farther away. 
The last thing you saw before your eyes rolled into the back of your head and you went careening backwards was the rainbow dress, and wild, dark hair. 
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The hospital bed was far from comfortable, but you’d been so tired you were knocked out for half of the day. Though, Tigris told you that you did sort of wake up at some point in the night, mumbling Coriolanus’ name with half-cracked eyes, before falling right back asleep.
He’d startled awake before you—rushing to your bed (right beside his) and taking your limp hand in his cold, clammy one. Brushed the hair away from your forehead and muttered apologies and please don’t die like they were a mantra.
When you finally stirred, you nearly burst into tears upon seeing Coriolanus.
“I thought you died,” you dry-sobbed. Your side ached considerably with the effort. “I thought I was going to die.”
He drew you into a loose hug, careful to avoid your bandaged midriff. He pressed a kiss to your forehead. “I’m here. I love you—I’m not going anywhere, okay? Lucy Gray saved you. Saved us.”
“She did?” you croaked, voice soft. Yes, you sort of remembered. It was all a blur.
“She caught you before you could crack your head open on the ground,” said another voice. You turned your stiff neck to see Sejanus at the foot of the other side of your bed, next to Tigris, who was running her hand up and down your arm in a comforting manner.
You blew out a shaky sigh. Your head pulsed, and you suddenly felt nauseous. “What… what happened?”
They took turns explaining. Rebel bombing. The dead tributes. The president’s son, Felix, in critical condition. Sejanus’ tribute missing. How the games were still commencing regardless. The pipe that had been lodged in your abdomen missing any vital organs. How you were lucky to be alive.
“Wovey?” you whispered. “Is she okay?”
Coriolanus smoothed a hand over your head. “She’s okay. Not one of the ones that died.”
“Lucy Gray?” you whispered. 
“Alive. She could have run. She stayed back to help you and me,” he said as his hand traveled down to gently cup your face. There were dark circles under his eyes. “I owe her now. She saved the love of my life.”
“Oh, Coryo—are you okay? Are you hurt?” Your gaze roamed all over his form, clad in an identical hospital gown. 
“A few burns and bruises. Nothing compared to you.” 
You drew in a staggered breath. Every muscle and tendon in your body screamed with even the slightest movements. 
Tigris squeezed your hand. “We were so worried for you. Coriolanus couldn’t sleep all night. Your mother came by earlier but she had to leave—a spill in the lab, or something. And your father sends his love from district two. Your mother said he was furious. Military is doubling down.”
“Typical,” you whispered, supplying the three with half a weary smile, glad that they were there for you. “I can’t believe they’re going on with the games tomorrow. This is absurd.”
“They don’t want to seem weak,” Sejanus bitterly replied. “But you woke up just in time. The televised presentations are starting soon.”
Nearly an hour later, Sejanus switched on the television set hanging in front of the beds. Tribute after tribute went by, most of them appearing gaunt and exhausted. True to what the two of you had discussed, Wovey got on stage and talked about her family back in district eight, despite looking rather shaken. The audience crooned and sighed with pity. Donations were sparse, but still more than you had expected, to your bittersweet relief. You watched from the hospital bed, curled up with Tigris at the head of it, your head on her shoulder, whilst Sejanus and Coriolanus were standing far closer to the curved screen. 
Lucy Gray was the last to go on. She had a guitar with her. And she sang a beautiful song—one about a boy back from home, she said. The audience cheered and sniffled. Even the nurses stopped their bustling to watch, some of them discreetly wiping away tears.
Once visiting hours were over and Tigris and Sejanus were shooed out of the hospital, Coriolanus sat beside you and slung an arm over your shoulder. He slotted his fingers beneath your chin and kissed you deeply. It was a slow embrace, with not a hint of sexual intentions—he just wanted to hold you. Remind himself that you were still alive, still here, still his.
Your nose nudged his when he laid his forehead over yours. The two of you breathed in each other’s comforting presence. Just the two of you. It reminded you of when times were so… uncomplicated. Before all the mentoring came along, the only things you had to worry about were grades and Coriolanus’ refusals to eat properly.
Then, he told you about Clemensia. How she was probably somewhere in this very building. How she screamed when she was bitten by the snake muttation. Your mind raced with questions, but you yawned instead and leaned against his chest. 
“I love you, too, Coryo,” you whispered into his hospital gown, realizing you hadn’t said it back earlier. 
A few minutes later, you were back asleep. Coriolanus was careful not to wake you when he laid you back down. Tucked the blanket up to your chin. He kissed your hairline once more, regarding you with a fond expression, before straightening, trying his best to ignore the aches blossoming over his back and legs.
And then he left the ward, assuring the doctors that he was fine and he could be discharged. They reluctantly agreed after a brief check-up, and had him sign off for himself. Once he was out, he immediately set off for the arena, trying to search for something, anything to keep his tribute alive.
Tunnels. The ground had collapsed into them, giving Lucy Gray a perfect place to run and hide. He went back home, making sure Grandma’am and Tigris were asleep—before pouring a copious amount of powdered rat poison into his late mother’s compact. 
It was cheating. But you and Sejanus had both said it before—he was a rebel by nature. Bad news.
He visited the zoo enclosure and gave it to her then, informing her of the tunnels. Wiped her tears with a handkerchief, then told her he owed her his life and more. That you were okay, and it was all thanks to her. Lucy Gray looked overwhelmed for a moment. She did what any decent person would, she thought. He promised her that she’d get out. Return home to the Covey. False hope whispered unrealistic dreams into her ears and she let herself listen. 
“We all do things we’re not proud of to survive,” he whispered when Lucy Gray attempted to protest, not wanting to poison anyone. He pushed the compact firmly into her hands. “Do it for your family.”
Conflict warred across her features. She nodded once, then twice. 
Coriolanus' expression set with determination. “We are going to win this, Lucy Gray. We’re going to win this together. I’m going to get you home.”
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unfriedough · 3 months
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Hey sorry if your request aren’t open but I had a thought about Zuko x water tribe/bender reader!Like three years after the war he wants to propose to reader and So he ask Katara and Sokka about marriage traditions within the tribe and he carves a betrothal necklace for her?? And the readers reaction!! Thank you
An: HEY. Sorry this took like, so long I think you requested last summer, however I’ve kinda lost most of my determination to write and this account became more of a chore than what I had initially wanted. Either way, maybe somehow I’ll be able to be more consistent soon but I also don’t wanna make myself hate writing so :(
Thank you for requesting, I really do appreciate it, hope you enjoy :)
Zuko’s nose twitched as the cold nipped away at his extremities, huddled up in a few too many jackets. There’s a striking difference between cold and cold and right now he wished he was on fire.
Your gloved hand was intertwined with his as you lead him off of the fire nation ship and onto the white snow of the southern water tribe. This trip was planned as a way to visit Sokka and Katara, but Zuko had another plan in mind.
Finally, after three years of struggling to settle down, the fire people finally relaxed and he was able to make more time. In that time, he realized he’d wanted to marry you more than anything. So here he was, in a nation far too cold for someone like him, with a goal in mind.
He had exactly 5 days (and a half if you’re counting from now) to get ready a betrothal necklace. Why a necklace? Well, Zuko had watched you for days on end in the castle library, a book bigger than your head on the table being analysed by your eyes. You’d smile brightly when you locked eyes, and call him over. He’d sit next to you, shoulder to shoulder, attempting to read with you. The books were always about old water tribe traditions, tales, legends, history, everything of the sort. You’d wanted to stay connected to your culture and upbringing - it made you who you were today.
And so that brings you to today, here, the water tribe.
“Katara!” You squealed, running forward and pulling her into a hug. You two squeezed each other tightly, excited noises being expressed.
Zuko and Sokka nodded to each other, trying to be kinda nonchalant but Sokka couldn’t hold it much longer, he sprinted at Zuko and tackled him to the ground into an oh-so-warm hug. You laughed at the site, Katara too. Zuko felt a twinge of pink on his cheek, from the cold or embarrassment he couldn’t really tell, but he still wrapped his shaking arm around his buddy. After a few more ‘I missed you!’s and giggles, Zuko and Sokka got back up. Katara grabbed your hand and pulled you deeper into the village, you laughed the entire way, giddy from being back home here with your family. You threw a glance backwards at the fire lord, there was something very slightly off about the way he was smiling, you brushed it off as just the cold getting to him.
It was most definitely the cold getting to him.
Sokka led him to the ice on the outskirts of the village and brought some chairs along. They were gonna go fishing while they talked. As they both sat, another shiver ran up the poor fire bender’s back.
“How do you guys survive the cold?” He groaned.
Sokka chuckled, handing him a rod, pushing the bucket of bait closer to him, “You get used to it… I could ask you the same thing about the heat,”
“I’m a fire bender it’s in my blood,”
“Yeah well you learn a thing or two when your lovely sister starts learning how to bend and suddenly you’re always wet,” he cast the line, leaning back, putting one leg over the other.
“I guess,” he laughed.
They sat in a suffocating silence for a minute, Zuko just awkwardly holding the pole and Sokka staring into the sky.
“Are we going to address the camelephant in the room?”
Zuko looked to him from his peripheral, “I’m kinda nervous I guess, I don’t know what to do,”
Sokka sat up a little straighter, getting up to help Zuko with his fishing issues. He stood behind him and helped his arm into the correct place, slowly to be sure he understood.
“Just like fishing, you have to be precise and confident to get what you want, and if you cast your line just right, you’ll catch the fish,” he winked once the bob hit the water, stepping back to admire his own work.
“Not sure that’s the best metaphor,”
“Say you love it, he's been working on it ever since you wrote to him,” Katara rolled her eyes, holding your hand as you both struggled to not slip on the ice.
“KATARA.”
Zuko couldn't help but laugh, then he was met with the puzzled look on your face.
“I thought this was a surprise trip, when’d you write to them,” you tilted your head, eyes narrowed suspiciously.
“…needed to make sure they were free,”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah…”
“That totally checks out,” you rolled your eyes, getting a serious case of FOMO.
Sokka coughed to try to clear the awkwardness, “So fishing…”
“What’re you trying to catch anyways?”
“Does it matter, it’s about the process YN get with the times,”
“Since when did you fish for fun?”
“Since now.”
“I thought you hated fishing,” you were all standing up by this point, including Sokka and Zuko.
“Only because Miss Katara always splashed me,”
“And I won’t hesitate to do it again!” She bent a small stream into his face, giggling when he stumbled back.
“Oh it’s on Katara,” he paused, “As soon as I get snow,” he waddled away to get to the snow on shore.
You laughed when the waterbender used more ice to cause him to slip.
“I’ll go help him up,” you laughed, moving towards him as he laid helplessly on the ice, not even bothering to get up anymore.
Zuko watched your figure, missing the way Katara turned to look at him.
“I think you should do it here,”
“What?”
“The proposal,”
“That’s not enough time, it’s barely enough for me to learn how to carve the necklace,”
“Lucky for you, Sokka’s pretty efficient with plans, he’s been plotting since you told him,”
The fire bender smiled, shoving his hands into the pocket of his jacket. “Okay, maybe, but how can I get started when she’s with us all the time?”
“Don’t worry, I’ll handle her,” she smirked.
-
“Are you sure this is safe?” You shivered, standing in your bathing suit on top of a huge rock, below it freezing water.
“No!” Katara, “But let’s do it anyways,”
“I don’t know, what if I freeze?”
“Good thing we have a fire bender with us,” she pointed to Zuko, who was in the distance learning about what tools to carve and what stones to use, he’d settled on one that reminded him of your eyes, and the band matching the deep royal blue usually used. He wanted to alter the pattern as a way of commemorating both elements. Currently, he and Sokka were doodling designs on the snow with sticks.
“Look at those dorks, I wonder what they’re doing,”
“You know Sokka, they’re probably drawing,” she laughed nervously.
“Hmm, that kind of looks like a-“ you were cut off as she pushed you off of the rock. You shrieked as you first dropped, then as you got more air time you changed into a more streamlined position with your head downwards. Instant regret when you hit the water though.
You resurfaced, drenched and in pain from the cold. Your fingers felt like they were gonna fall off any second now. Before you got to dwell on it, Katara joined you, also screaming in fun-agony.
“WHY’D YOU PUSH ME?” You splashed her.
“You were talking for too long…” she giggled, going under and pulling you down.
You inhaled a large amount of air before going under, making sure to keep her under with you as well. After a few seconds of freezing cold, you resurfaced, feeling pain in all your joints from the water.
“Why did I ever think this was a good idea?”
“I’m honestly not sure,” she shrugged, waterbending herself back up to the ledge so she could jump again, “But it sure is fun,”
Sokka and Zuko heard a splash in the distance.
“I think Katara is torturing your wife,”
“What?” he mumbled, looking at where you were very clearly lecturing her about something, “What’re they doing?”
“Ice bath, Katara tricked me into doing it once… I never fully recovered,”
Zuko chuckled, using his stick to doodle another design. Which he then stared at for a while.
“This is it.”
“Oh?” Sokka glanced at it, “It’s perfect.”
The men stared at each other proudly, as if they’ve just completed a super hard mission.
Immediately, Sokka took him inside a tent, quickly teaching him methods of carving with different tools. A few more splashes could be heard and you and Katara had fun.
“I wonder what he’s doing to Zuko,”
“Boy stuff,”
You furrowed your brows, “what does that even mean?”
After a lot of time (and a few cuts) Zuko finally had a necklace ready. Sure, it needed to be refined, but his hands were tired and shaky. Sokka patted him on the back, watching the fire bender weave the blue band into the loops.
What they failed to notice was you approaching, now covered in a warm coat.
“What’re y'all up to?” You breathed out, still cold but beginning to gain your senses.
Zuko panicked, hiding it under his leg. You looked at him weird.
By this time, Katara had joined the group, and behind her the sun fell into a pink and purple type hue. Zuko didn’t miss the way your breaths were so laboured, and he took it upon himself to lead you back to where Sokka said you two were staying. You changed into some clothes while he surveyed the room, moving around nervously.
“You’ve been acting weird all day,” you pulled a sweater over the thermal shirt, reaching over to grab an undercoat.
He walked up to you, fingers working shakily to button up the buttons. “Just cold,”
“No, the cold doesn’t make you avoid me.”
“I’m not avoiding you,”
“Really? It feels like Katara and Sokka are trying to keep us apart.” He grabbed another, heavier coat and draped it over your shoulder, you inserted your arms in the holes.
“I didn’t notice,”
“You’re lying,” you stepped back, putting your boots back on and tucking your pants into them.
He frowned, reaching out to you, but you stepped back.
“It’s weird, the letter thing as well- why didn’t you tell me you sent it to them? I thought it was last minute?”
“It was!”
“You’re lying again,” you frowned, folding your arms.
“I promise it’ll all make sense soon,”
“How soon? What’re you hiding?”
“I-“
“Actually. Don’t tell me. I don’t wanna know.” You huffed, storming out of the room, leaving a different kind of cold lingering.
Zuko sat down on the large bed, dropping his head into his hands. He sighed deeply, reaching over multiple layers of clothing to his pocket to pull out the carved stone. Truly, it was mediocre at best. And after this misunderstanding, the sinking feeling of impending rejection poisoned his thoughts. He couldn’t help but trace his finger over the patterns, wondering what could’ve been- he was half sure he was single now.
“I forgot-“ you gasped as you walked back in the room, catching a glimpse of the rock in his hand.
“Yn!” He quickly shoved it behind him.
“Zuko… what was that?”
“What was what?” He said, looking so suspicious it was stupid.
You took a few steps closer, inching towards him slowly, “In your hand,”
“My hand’s empty…”
“Liar…” you dragged on, standing right infront of him now.
“Zuko,”
“Yn,”
You tried pulling at his arms, but he wasn’t budging.
“Cut it out! What’s behind you?”
“Nothing!”
You sighed, walking away in defeat, just as he let his guard down, you pounced, having to grab it and rolling onto the bed. He barely had time to process it when your face immediately changed.
You sat up, moving on your knees towards him on the bed, patting his bicep, “Zuko light,”
The fire lord frowned, embarrassed that he was about to get rejected, although that’s no foreign feeling. A small, dancing red flame illuminated the carved necklace.
“It’s…” you covered your mouth with one hand, tears welling in your eyes.
“Tacky- I know, I just thought- you don’t have to do a-“
“Beautiful…” he glanced sideways at you, “Zuko…”
“This isn’t at all how I wanted this to go…” he sighed, dropping his head.
“No… probably not,” you sniffled, “but it was perfect,” you laughed, he chuckled as well.
He got up, lighting an oil lamp for better lighting. Zuko circled the bed and stood next to you, still nervous and fidgety.
“Yn,” he breathed out, shakily.
You nodded, glossy eyes meeting his.
“The years you’ve spent by my side, against me, with me- those have been the best years of my life. When I’m with you, I feel like I’m truly myself. I’ve never,” he swallowed harshly, “I’ve never felt more at home,” he paused again, looking up at the ceiling, “then when I’m with you.”
You let out a small noise of excitement, bouncing your legs.
“I’ve made so- so many mistakes in my life, every single day of it, but I think… I think letting you go would be my biggest mistake, Yn-“
“YES!!” You pounced on him, hugging him so tight as your heartbeats both skyrocketed.
You giggled as he looped the necklace around your neck, it was simple, and dainty, but most of all it was so Zuko. The more someone could stare at the imperfections in the craftsmanship, the more they’d love it. A man carved it with love and intention.
You held each other for a while, just swaying in the dimly lit room. You leaned back, cupping his face in your hands.
“Is this why we're here? You wanted to carve the necklace?”
“Yeah, pretty much, you ruined my plans though,”
“I did, didn't I?” You giggled.
“I had a lot planned for us, with the help of Sokka of course,”
“Ohh now that makes sense,”
“What makes sense,”
“Literally everything, you were being so weird,”
“I’m not great at keeping secrets,”
“Good, never keep one again,” you kissed his cheek.
“I suppose we should tell Katara and Sokka,”
“Yeah, I suppose we should.”
And so, hand in hand, you walked out to the bonfire, where the siblings sat.
Sokka was so mad his plan foiled.
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alllgator-blood · 15 days
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I s2g if you add the layers of these comic pages together, it's over 350 layers. THIS is why I don't do full color for my comics lmaooo- ANYWAY EVERYONE HERE HAS AN AU APPARENTLY, SO THIS IS A BRIEF GLIMPSE INTO MINE. I don't know what to call it yet but I'm thinking of calling it "famous prophets" because 1. I like that car seat headrest song, 2. it's about shamura who is prophetic, 3. it's about trying to outrun fate with the Power of Love (and failing. Like the song!!!). It takes place when all the bishops were teens/kids during the age of hundreds of gods at war, and were trying to survive as a family.
I'm really excited to work on stuff for it but it's all gonna be drawn out of order. Maybe I'll write a full explanation of what it's gonna be about when I have a better idea...I want to channel my eldest sibling angst in a productive way, and maybe establish a QPP between shamura and a completely random npc everyone forgets about <3 also kallamar is trans too cause I said so. I'll do a comic about it eventually. Instead of an absence of gender he has TOO much gender. It simply cannot be contained.
I like that nonbinary genders are normalized in cult of the lamb to the point where nobody singles anyone out for being a they/them, it's not like "THIS IS MY SIBLING SHAMURA. THEY ARE NONBINARY AND USE THEY/THEM. ALRIGHT BACK TO KILLING YOU", it's just like "don't you fucking dare make my poor sibling wake up from their nap to kick your ass. Cause they deserve better than this."
But at the same time I like having the freedom to be more specific, and say "shamura is voidpunk and their gender is best described as the feeling that overtakes you during the first snow of the year, when everything outside is deathly quiet". This comic is actually derived from the time I was walking through a forest that's been torn down for a few years, and came out to my little sister as trans. I must've been like 13 or 14 and she didn't really get it as a 10 year old, but it was better than my mom FREAKING OUT about me coming out. So it was a nice little bonding moment between just the two of us. I don't have a good memory so I don't recall how it went unfortunately...
Now, the climate is a little different. My sis tried out transmasculinity for maybe 5-6 years before feeling happier as a woman, my mom is trying to be Based and flaunt her Woke trans children, and my dad remembered "oh yeah trans natives have existed before colonization. Maybe me being transphobic is a product of my culture being erased" and has gotten better about calling me the right thing. I have a mustache (thanks pcos!!) and wear skirts and am not a repressed "tomboy" teenager anymore. But I can't help but wonder what would've happened if I could've been like shamura and just...been nonbinary without people being fucking weird about it. Or been born as a badass war god who will tear you to shreds before you can perceive my birth sex. I know they're fictional but they are my ultimate gender envy GRRRRR BARK BARK BARK
Here is the secret image for this post- I listen to mostly EDM when I draw cause it keeps the energy up, but as I was finishing up shamura's poetry part, I was like THESE ARE JUST KMFDM LYRICS so I made this
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wri0thesley · 6 months
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legally binding - neuvillette x reader (8.4k)
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monsieur neuvillette will ensure that he finds your brother not guilty at trial. for a price.
cw: not sfw, minors dni. DARK CONTENT. extremely dubious consent/non-consent. clothed neuvillette, naked reader. cunnilingus, threats of caning, blackmail, fingering, piv sex, coming inside. neuvillette refers to reader as "little one". reader is afab and is described using language such as 'breasts' and 'cunt'.
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“If the terms of our arrangement are not agreeable to you,” the honorary Iudex says to you, his gloved hands steepled before him as he sits calmly behind his desk, “you do, of course, have the right to say ‘no’ at any time. I shan’t hold it against you. It merely means that the particulars of our little entente need not be fulfilled on my end, either.” 
You press your lips together as frustration and anger war within you. You would like to explode at him; you would like to pull the books lining his office walls down and use them as projectiles to hit him straight in his infuriatingly calm and peaceful face. 
That he has the nerve to keep talking to you like this - his voice perfectly even, almost calm, his tone soothing and bordering on paternal (like you’re a little child who he’s telling the ways of the world to), when his proffered ‘agreement’ is so heinous . . .
“You’re utterly abhorrent,” you seethe to him, but the Iudex does not react to being called such a thing - merely tilts his head to one side.
“So you’ve said,” he agrees mildly. “But it does not change your position, does it?”
He is right in that. You stand there awkwardly for one moment more, debating if this is really the hill you are willing to die on; if you are indeed ready to trade away your dignity for the price of your brother’s freedom.
He seems to take pity on your floundering. 
“You agreed to this,” he reminds you, his tone unerringly gentle and patient. “But it does not mean you have to go through with it. I will keep the terms of our pact, my dear, as long as you uphold your own - but I will not hold it against you if you decide you are not . . . brave enough to follow through.”
You wince despite yourself at the deliberate emphasis of the word. You know that this is not bravery; you know, too, that what Monsieur Neuvillette is asking you to do is nothing short of corruption of the highest order. 
And too you know that the only person ranked higher than him you could conceivably go to is Lady Furina herself. 
“I’m sure that a guilty verdict for your brother would not be so bad,” Monsieur Neuvillette continues, and despite the mild tone he uses he must know that he is hitting you exactly where it hurts. “Incarceration is not the be-all and end-all, nowadays - why, many enjoy the Fortress so much they choose not to leave even once their sentence has been finished--”
“Don’t,” you squeak out, and Neuvillette stops speaking. You take a slow breath to steady yourself, and when your voice comes out this time it sounds far more certain than before. You’re proud of yourself, even, for the way that it quavers for only an instant at the end of your next sentence. “I’ll follow through on our agreement.”
“Lovely,” Neuvillette lowers his chin so that it rests atop of the steeple of his gloved fingertips. “I’m glad that you understand the position we’re both in. Well, then, shall we begin?”
You give him a jerky little nod, and he smiles at you like an Archon receiving a prayer of benediction. You stand there awkwardly for a moment more, before Neuvillette lets out a soft chuckle.
“Oh, you poor thing,” he murmurs, more to himself than you. “You really haven’t done any of this before, have you? Let me make it easier for you. Why don’t you disrobe and show me what you have on under your clothing, hmm?” 
You take a slow, calming breath. This is not so bad; you had known you would have to take off your clothes for this bargain. You suppose, if you had been a different kind of person, you might even have felt a thrill at the thought that it would be Monsieur Neuvillette who would be the first man to see you bared - but instead, there is just a cold thumping terror as you work at the buttons and catches of your outfit. 
You are dressed smartly but not prettily. You have never had much time for the fripperies that many Fontaine citizens prefer to indulge in - and especially for your meetings as a desperate petitioner with the Iudex, you had thought sombre was the way to go. This has carried through even to your undergarments - the chemise you wear is plain, without even a trimming of lace. Your brassiere is equally simple, as are the plain cotton bloomers that hide your most intimate place from his inquisitive eyes. 
You swallow as your thumb and forefingers fasten about the hem of your chemise - and then, thinking it better to rip off the bandage from the wound rather than pussyfoot about it, you pull it off and drop it in an unruly pile with the rest of your outer clothes by the Iudex’s desk. 
He sits there in silence for a moment that seems to stretch out for an hour.
“Not much for decoration, hmm?” He asks, after what seems like forever. You shift there awkwardly from foot to foot. You have never been looked at before like this by a man - and though you do not want him to find you attractive, the idea that he’s disappointed in what’s before him is equally horrible. He chuckles softly beneath your breath at the expression that must flit across your face. “Ah, please don’t mistake me as unappreciative. There is very little as lovely as simplicity, I find.” Your cheeks heat. “On that note - I think we ought to lose this layer too. Let me see you as nature intended, my dear.” 
You had thought that once the first layer of your clothing had been stripped, it would get easier, but you find now that it is much the opposite. Your hands tremble as you reach behind you for the clasp of your brassiere. It is cool in his office, but a bead of sweat rolls down the nape of your neck and sets your palm sticky and wet, and it takes you three attempts to unclip. 
You have never been shy before - you had certainly not been shy when you had barrelled up to the Iudex in public and demanded an audience with him, much to the distaste of all around him - but this is enough to make you feel awkward. 
The fabric falls away from the swell of your chest, and Monsieur Neuvillette makes a pleased little noise almost like a purr in the back of his throat.
“Ah,” he says. “Very nice. The underwear too, if you please.” 
Your nipples stiffen in the cool air of his office, the buds puckering and hardening under the twin problems of the temperature and Neuvillette’s stare. It is even harder to convince yourself to hook your thumbs into your underwear, but eventually your body agrees to your demands and you find yourself rolling the plain cotton down past your thighs and your knees and down to your ankles--
You fuss for a moment, putting them with the rest of your clothes, if only to delay the inevitable for a moment longer - that time when you will have to stand and display yourself in your full nakedness for the Iudex. But there is only so long you can conceivably push his patience, and sooner than you like you straighten your spine and try and jut your chin out and pretend that there isn’t a wash of humiliation drowning you as you wait for his next pronouncement. 
You’re surprised when he stands, leaving his cane leaning against his desk, and strides towards you with purpose writ clear in his eyes. Surprised enough that a soft, startled noise falls from your mouth as he reaches for you, and suddenly his gloved hands are palming the weight of your breasts. He lets out a slow, measured breath as his fingertips dig into the soft flesh there. You squeak again as his thumbs brush over the hard nubs of your nipples, and this time he laughs.
“Don’t be so surprised,” he murmurs. “Our agreement involved touching, did it not?”
“I-it involved more than touching,” you whisper, as poisonously as you can manage - but his thumbs are still slowly swirling about your nipples and the sensation of it is making you feel dizzy, little electric shocks of surprise zapping through your synapses. 
“Mm,” Neuvillette agrees. “But I am not so much of a villain that I would simply have my way with you without ensuring you were properly prepared, my dear.” 
You don’t know if this is worse, actually. If he had chosen the latter option, perhaps it would have been easier to close your eyes and grit your teeth and pretend to be somewhere else. But the way he is looking at you, the way he is touching you . . . those things make it far more difficult to separate what is going on from yourself. 
“I’m going to kiss you,” Neuvillette says to you - and you almost protest, until you remember the terms of the agreement once more. 
(“You will give yourself to me intimately,” Neuvillette had said. “I will have my fill of your body, and in return I will find your brother not guilty in court. Is this agreeable to you, little one?”
You had wanted to scream and shout and spit. It was certainly not agreeable to you; Neuvillette was a corrupt pervert, taking advantage of his position. How many other desperate petitioners had done this for him? 
“Oh,” Neuvillette had said, when you’d been unable to stop yourself biting out the last thing. “None at all. I’ve never been quite so intrigued by any of them or wanted to have any of them bent over my desk quite so much. I suppose that makes you special - and isn’t that nice?”)
You feel at his mercy like this, bare in his office, when he hasn’t so much as taken off his gloves - and indeed, the cool silk of those gloves against your heated cheek as he pulls you up into a kiss reminds you of who exactly has the power. He sighs softly into your mouth, teeth nipping at your lower lip. They’re sharp, and you gasp in surprise and win a low growl from Neuvillette himself. His kiss is wet and messy, and he seems almost disappointed when he pulls back from you with his eyes half-lidded. 
“Mm,” he says, “How many others have kissed you like that, little one?”
You press your lips together in a show of defiance, and he chuckles.
“As I thought,” he murmurs, lowering his head again - this time, the kiss he gives you is pressed to the top of your cheekbone. Slowly, carefully, peppered down your jawline. “Ah, don’t worry - you did perfectly well.”
You let out a noise of wordless disbelief and embarrassment that he could tell, which is quickly cut off when he tugs at your earlobe with his teeth instead. It is his canines that are sharp; you give a hot intake of breath at the scratch of them on your sensitive lobe that in turn makes him shudder. 
You hate the shivery feeling of pleasure that the bite sends zipping down your spine; a heat that settles firmly between your thighs, that mixes with the pounding of your heart. 
“Give in,” Neuvillette says softly. “You have no choice if you want me to uphold my word; you may as well enjoy it. I have no wish to be cruel to you, little one. If you like it too, so much the better.”
“I--I won’t--”
Your voice is reedy; it wobbles and shakes in the air. Both you and Neuvillette know that it is a stubborn and hopeless task, when his kisses and his tugging at your nipples and his soft nipping bites against your most vulnerable parts have already made a slick drip between your thighs you do not want to admit to. 
“A pity.” Neuvillette pulls back, and your body misses him - you find yourself making a soft noise of displeasure as his weight moves from in front of you and beside you, before he goes to stand beside his desk and takes his cane back into his hands, leaning on it almost casually. “Come here, little one. Bend over my desk.”
You flounder there, unsure now if you really are willing to go through with things the way that you had agreed to. Your throat feels dry. Disrobing had all been very well, letting him touch your chest had all been very well, but . . .
He taps his cane gently on the ground and makes a soft chiding noise with his tongue. 
“Come now, little one,” he murmurs, his voice perfectly agreeable. “It’s not so large a thing, is it? For the price of your brother’s reputation?”
You shake your head and take a slow, nervous step towards his desk - a large, terrifying presence in the room. How many people has he held the fates of in his hand as he sat here in the Palais Mermonia and read their files?
The reminder that you are indeed in the Palais Mermonia - that only down a hallway is a whole group of gestionnaires utterly unknowing of what their honourable Iudex is doing with the young citizen he has an appointment with - makes your heart beat faster, nervousness rise up in your throat like a tidal wave. One foot in front of the other.
You wish the walk to his desk was shorter at the same time as you wish that you would never make it to the end. 
It is not to be. Your bare hip bumps against the desk’s edge and you let out a slow, steadying breath. 
“That’s it,” Neuvillette says agreeably, and his cane taps on the ground as he comes to stand behind you. “Brace yourself on the table now; palms down. I’m not going to hurt you. Bend over and show me what I shall have the pleasure of conquering, hmm?”
You burn with humiliation as you do exactly what he asks; place your hot palms down directly upon the table and bend at the waist. Neuvillette sighs as if he’s terribly pleased with what he’s seeing. You start as you feel a gentle nudge against your bare ankle, and you realise that he’s touching you with his cane.
“Spread these apart a bit further,” he murmurs, and you comply despite the way you feel utterly debased by the treatment. “Ah. Very nice. Lovely, in fact.”
If you have one thing to be grateful for, it is that he does not mention what you both know; you are wet. The way he had touched and palmed at your chest, the kisses . . . you can feel the beads of slick on your inner thighs, the dampness of the folds of your cunt. The position he has put you in means, too, that you can feel the cool air on your exposed clit - the little button swollen and standing to attention. 
Neuvillette’s gloved hand gently comes to rest upon the back of your thigh. Slowly, slowly, he maps a path over your bared skin; the round curve of your ass where it’s presented to him, down and--
A hiccup of surprise escapes you and you almost rock back into him, but manage to stop yourself at the last moment, as those silken gloved fingers brush feather-light over the soft mound of your cunt. He does not press down yet; merely lets himself get accustomed to the shape of you. Your hips cant forward against your will as his fingertip brushes against the sensitive bud of your clit, a whimpering gasp falling from your lips. 
You have never been touched by anyone before - and the fact it is Monsieur Neuvillette doing it, under these circumstances--
You squeeze your eyes closed, willing yourself not to cry. You are grateful at least that he cannot see you; in fact, he seems rather preoccupied now, those long silken fingers spreading the plump lips of your labia further apart so that he can see your entrance.
“My,” he says, a smile apparent in his voice. “We’re going to have to do rather a lot of preparation, aren’t we? Sweet little thing, you look tight as a vice.” 
“I don’t . . .” You don’t understand quite what he means by preparation, but the soft rustle of his clothing still sets your teeth on edge. You’d known that he would disrobe too, of course you had, but it somehow all seems to be happening so quickly--
A strangled gasp escapes you.
The rustling was not him disrobing. Instead, he has knelt down - and his mouth is hot when he presses it to the sensitive places on the backs of your knees, his tongue wet as he trails it up the back of your thighs.
“Th-this isn’t what we agreed!” You say, panicked, as his mouth inches ever closer to the place between your thighs. Despite the heat of his tongue, the puffs of breath that escape him with his dry little laugh are cool. 
“Isn’t it, little one?” He murmurs, in between the wet kisses; you keen softly as he digs teeth into sensitive flesh of your inner thighs, fangs sending confused shockwaves of both pain and pleasure directly to your sex. “Let me see . . . Did I not use the terms ‘have my fill’? Why, little one - whyever did you think that would begin and end with my cock?” 
It’s too intimate. You have to be too present for it all, and the tears that have been threatening to spill out do so at the same time as his tongue oh-so-gently prods against your folds in interest. If Neuvillette notices that you’re crying, he doesn’t say anything - and you are grateful for that, as he presses his mouth fully against your cunt with a horrifically wanton wet noise and you realise that you are crying in no small part because his mouth against your heated core feels good. 
He merely mouths against you for a moment, his tongue delicate as it travels across your folds and drinks in your wetness. You shudder as he finds your clit, and his tongue flicks against it playfully. Despite what he had said about not having done this to any other desperate citizens, the way he works his mouth against you belies that he has at least some experience--
You know absolutely nothing about the Iudex’s private life, much like the rest of Fontaine. 
He pulls back from you to murmur against your thigh.
“You’re so wet, little one. It’s very charming. I think I shall use my mouth on you until you are glad to have the desk to keep you standing. It would be a hard-hearted creature indeed who would not want to feel you come on his face, under his tongue--”
You whimper out some kind of horribly embarrassing noise, as he returns hungrily to his former task; he licks at you and suckles at you like a man starved, and your body reacts with hot little shivers and shudders and jolts of pleasure. You make an attempt to curtail the pleasure - try to tell your body that it ought not to be enjoying this - but pure animal instinct wins out, and you are bent double over the desk whimpering helplessly, tilting your ass up to give him more room, and grinding your cunt into Neuvillette’s face despite all of it.
Neuvillette does not seem to mind at all. He groans into you instead, using the flat of his tongue to stroke as much of your cunt as possible, to work through your folds and suckle on your clit until your entire body feels aflame with strange new feelings. Every so often, he teases his tongue over your entrance, the tip circling the ring of muscle - but he does not push into it yet. 
His grip on your thighs is iron-tight. You don’t know when he let go of his cane, but both hands dig into the soft pudge of your inner thighs now, keeping you spread for him despite how the twists of pleasure make you want to squeeze your thighs together. 
You don’t know how you’re still breathing, as Neuvillette’s tongue continues to lay claim to you. You can feel your inner muscles clenching around nothing; slick accumulating around your entrance, just begging for something to be inside of you (though, in truth, you’ve never had anything more than your own finger and even then had felt hot and unsure of it). He growls, tongue flicking out against your clit in a rhythmic drumming that makes you whine.
“O-oh,” you manage, through the lump in your throat. “Archons--”
He gives your inner thigh a warning pinch, just enough to make you stutter, as he pulls his soaking wet mouth away from you and murmurs;
“No, little one. No archons here. Remember who it is, who's here with you.”
You are almost tempted to throw his own words back into his face; to tell him that you’d made no such bargain that you had to acknowledge that he was there. That, according to the legalities of the agreement you’d both made, you only had to let him use your body - not your voice, not your head, not your heart. But the lack of his mouth on you now feels like a peculiar kind of torture. You want him to stop. You want him to carry on. The whimper falls out of your mouth to a groaning purr of satisfaction from Neuvillette himself;
“M-monsieur--”
“That’s better.”
His mouth is back on you, hungrily working his tongue between your folds. Hungrily suckling and stroking and working you over until you feel hot and boneless, trembling on the edge of something - your entire body is a taut string, pulled to the point of snapping. Your cunt is wet and messy with drool and fluid and slick, sliding down your thighs - you cannot see Monsieur Neuvillette, but you’d wager that his cheeks are wet and shiny with the same, if only due to the utter eagerness he was still displaying. 
It’s too much. 
With a whine and pitiful jerk of your hips, you feel yourself slide down into some dark abyss; the thread that’s been threatening to snap finally does exactly as it was always going to do, and a wash of shameful pleasure crashes over you like a stormy sea. Neuvillette lets out a pleased groan as you feel yourself let another gush of arousal out, hungrily drinking you in with lewd, wet noises that have your face as hot as any Natlan springs. 
He carries on using his tongue on you; licking, sucking, lapping like a man parched for water - just to the point where your over-sensitive body begins to complain that you are still too raw for such hunger, and then he pulls his mouth off of you. You stay there, bent double over his table, wheezing softly as you hear him dust off his clothes and the click of his reclaimed cane as he comes around to the other side of the desk so that he can look you in the eye. 
He really hasn’t disrobed at all. 
It’s a callback to the power imbalance between you both; a reminder that, no matter what, you are entirely at Neuvillette’s mercy. You are glad, at least, that he has a reputation for being honourable in his agreements - you have only the very vaguest flutter of a fear that giving him your body will be for naught and he will go back on his word. Everybody knows that the Chief Justice values that same standard he is entitled to embody. 
“You were crying,” he says, leaning forward and cupping his hand about your cheek, a thumb sliding over the apple of your cheek. “It suits you. I’ve never quite understood this human urge not to cry - you look terribly pretty with those diamonds on your cheeks.”
He leans in closer and closer, closing his eyes - and you go stock-still as he kisses the tears from your cheeks and pulls back, licking his lips as if he is savouring the taste of something special. 
“I-is that all?” You ask, a hopeful tone to your voice - but Neuvillette simply smiles at you kindly, as if you’re silly for even asking. 
“Of course not, little one,” he murmurs. “That was merely a precursor to the main event, to ensure you’re . . . sufficiently ready. As I have already said; I am no villain, and I have no desire to hurt you physically. I want to ensure your body is primed to accept me, for the sake of both of our pleasure. And it was pleasurable, wasn’t it?” 
You press your lips together, hot shame rising up your neck.
“No need to get shy,” he says to you, that soft, kind smile not leaving his face. “By the way you were grinding against my face, and how prettily you came for me . . . Mm, I’d wager you enjoyed it very much. But it’s alright if you are not ready to admit it; your body doesn’t lie, sweet one, and I know it will accept my fingers and my cock far more readily than you’d like it to.”
. . . You had enjoyed it. You had felt that pleasure that he was so willing to give to you, and the thought that you were actually deriving some enjoyment from this thing that was supposed to merely be about procuring assistance for your brother . . . You don’t quite know how to feel, as Neuvillette presses a paternal kiss to your forehead and you hear the slow click of his footsteps as he returns to the other side of the desk, where your nakedness and your readiness for him are far more pronounced.
“You really are quite lovely, you know,” he murmurs, letting his gloved fingers slide down the arch of your back, from the nape of your neck and down your spine. “Ordinarily, I’m not too fond of ostentation - but ah, you . . . You could benefit from a little more ornamentation.”
A palm, cupping your ass - giving it a slow, considering squeeze, almost too hard to be painful but not quite. 
“This, for example,” he murmurs, “would be lovely with some discipline. Imagine; how pretty you would be with welts from my cane.”
“Monsieur Neuvillette--!” It comes out in a panicked little gasp, but Neuvillette merely chuckles.
“Now, now, little one - settle down. As sweet as it would be - I am still aware of the legal terms of our arrangement. I won’t force you to give me any extra - and whilst caning you would be terribly satisfying for me . . . it doesn’t count as satiating my desire in that legal sense that is so important to us both.”
You let out a breath you hadn’t known you’d been holding. Somewhere inside of you, your heart pounds at the thought of letting him do as he wishes with you - but you squash it down, holding to the comforting lie that you are getting absolutely nothing out of the arrangement you had made with Neuvillette. 
His hand curves over your ass and slips between your thighs.
“A-aren’t you even going to take your gloves off?” You seethe at him, through clenched teeth, as a fingertip slides between the plump lips of your sex once more, to find the wet mess that he had left there earlier. 
“I fear it would be most unprofessional of me to undress in my office,” he says, and you hear the smile in his voice. “Forgive me, little one. I think I will stay as entirely clothed as I am able.”
His tone does not broker any argument, and you bite your tongue as he - slowly, maddeningly slowly - slides his finger through the valley of your cunt, approaching your clit with a near-torturous pace. Your breath stutters in your chest as his silk-gloved finger finally brushes over the delicate nub, and he increases his pressure from feather-light to something firmer as he begins to make slow, small circles on the pleasure point.
Your hips don’t know whether to shy away from the certainty of his manipulations or to lean into them, so you do the only thing you can think of and let loose a soft whine into the charged air of his office. 
After he has played with your swollen clit for a few more agonising moments, his fingers drag back through the soaking wet valley to toy with your entrance. You feel yourself flex as he comes near, as if your cunt is begging him to finally put something inside of you - and though he gives a soft chuckle, he does not tease you any further.
“I’m going to put a finger inside of you now,” he murmurs - again, you are not sure if it would be worse if he had not told you. With this knowledge, you have just enough time to catch your breath before he slides his finger into you with one quick movement.
It punches the air out of you. If you had not been bent over the desk already, you’re sure you would have lost your footing - but as it is, Neuvillette goes about opening you up with a kind of determined certainty. The finger inside of you gives a few lone pumps, working your tight insides open - you are wet and pliable enough that it does not hurt near as much as you had thought it would. 
“Good,” Neuvillette murmurs, “Are you ready for me to add another?”
Again, you want to whimper and scream and bite - but as he continues to pump his finger in and out of you, you realise with that same shame that the feeling of him inside of you is good and could only be improved if he filled you more thoroughly.
“Yes, please,” you whisper, your throat dry - and you are rewarded with another low murmur of praise, and the feel of a finger joining the first at your entrance. You take another steady breath, but you do not need to; two fingers fit inside of you with only the barest modicum of resistance, your body silky wet and tight and welcoming. The silk of his gloves rubs against your inner walls curiously, making you feel utterly dizzy with sensation. 
There is a purpose to this that there hadn’t seemed to be when he was using his mouth on you. When he was using his mouth, though he had said it was in order to make the final result easier on you both, you had gotten the distinct impression he had rather enjoyed the process - the sucking, the wet noises, the lewd sound of his tongue against your soaking cunt. But here, Neuvillette crooks his fingers inside of you and pumps them in and out and scissors them slightly in a way that leaves no doubt that he is ensuring you will be able to take something even bigger and wider than his fingers when we have done. 
He still does it all with a trademark thoroughness; he rests his other hand on the small of your back to keep you still as those digits plunge in and out of you. You dread to think how soaked through with your slick his gloves will be when he is done--
But he does not use his fingers upon you to completion. 
You feel it building up inside of you with the way he curls them just so, rubbing against a spongy spot inside of you that makes your thighs tremble - but he doesn’t follow through on the promise that begins to build, dizzying, between your legs. 
He pulls out his fingers with a slick pop and a wet clicking noise, giving your cunt a gentle pat on his way out.
“There, my dear,” he says. “It will still be a tight fit, of course . . . but I should cause you no undue pain. And, if I may be so bold, little one - I’m absolutely certain you’ll feel exquisite.”
This time, there is no question that the rustling noise you hear behind you is him partly undressing; that the soft pop is the sound of buttons being freed from the confines of his placket. He lets out a pleased sigh - you assume at the feel of his hand on his own cock. 
“I’ve been longing to touch you,” he murmurs, as he slots himself between your hips. “I had to prepare you, naturally - oh, but little one, I’ve been hard since the moment you walked all trembling and righteous into my office.” 
“D-do you say that to all of the poor hopeful people who come into your office hoping you’ll grant them justice, Monsieur?” You manage, and he chuckles. His hips fit neatly in between your own spread thighs, and you feel the heavy, silky, hot weight of something as it slaps against the meat of your inner thigh and leaves a sticky wet trail upon the skin there. His cock. His pre-come, on you--
“As I’ve said before, little one,” he murmurs, and he readjusts himself and you hiss yourself as his cock presses softly against the pudge of your outer lips. He doesn’t move it yet; merely lets it rest there, letting you get used to the size of him and the knowledge that he is going to put it inside you. “I have never been so intrigued by any of them to want to. But you . . . ah, this human quality of resilience! You’re utterly darling. There’s even still fire in you now, when I have you naked and at my mercy. Tell me, little one . . . what would you do if I went back on our agreement now and still fucked you?”
You half rear up, and the way your body moves has his cock nudging at your clit, against you - you find yourself half-enveloping the thick shaft of his cock with your labia. It makes you breathless that it doesn’t even come close to disappearing inside you; indeed, the stretch of it reminds you of just how big he is.
“You wouldn’t!” You say, a tone of petulant fury edging your words - Neuvillette makes a hum of agreement even as his gloved hands travel up, over the curve of your hips and then your waist, until he is cupping the weight of your breasts in them and your nipples are once more trapped between the silken pinch of of his thumbs.
“You’re right,” he says, calmly. “I value justice too much for that - but oh, you’re quite something when you’re full of moral fury, aren’t you? Justice . . . a funny thing, isn’t it? One might say that having you right here, in my office, naked and hot and wet and exactly where I want you is a just reward for my years of service, wouldn’t they?”
You don’t respond, and he chuckles; nips a bite into the sensitive part of your throat where the curve of shoulder and neck meet that sends another electric zip down your spine.
“I’m going to put it inside of you now,” he says, still as calm as a placid lake. “And then I’m going to fuck you, little one. Are you quite ready?”
He tilts his hips forward as an urge for you to do the same; to lower yourself back down over the desk. You hiss as his cock slips and slides between the folds of your cunt, but it is nothing compared to how it feels when he pulls back and the wet head of his cock nudges almost impatiently against your entrance. He does not let go of where he is still pinching and rolling at the buds of your nipples, sending light-headed little thrills right down to between your legs - your sex clenching at the emptiness, missing his fingers.
“As ready as I think I’ll be, Monsieur,” you manage, hoping the title comes out as barbed as you want it to - but then he is pressing inside of you, his cock opening you up, and you bump against the table and go utterly blank of thought at the sensation of being claimed.
It feels like all of the air inside of you deflates as Neuvillette pushes himself into you. He had been correct on one count - he had prepared you well enough that there is only a light sting, the feeling that is to be expected when something large fits itself into a tight hole. You wheeze over his desk, your eyes rolling into the back of your head, as he seems to keep pushing and pushing and pushing--
You don’t think you’ll possibly take all of him, and then he stops and you feel his pelvis pressing against your ass, and you realise he is fully inside of you now.
“There,” even Neuvillette sounds a touch breathless. “Didn’t you do well, little one? Are you ready for me to begin moving?”
His only answer from you is a huff, as he pinches your nipples again and you feel yourself clench around the cock buried inside of you. He laughs softly, and with a wet drag you feel him pull out of you - and then drive back inside again with a wet pap, the sound indecently loud in the quiet office. Neuvillette had already established when he had made it clear he expected you to fulfil this arrangement in his work chambers that the walls were thick enough no gestionnaires would come running no matter what, but you still have a vision of it happening.
Some poor underpaid Palais Mermonia worker, coming in to ask the Honourable Chief Justice some question or another, only to find him bent over a shivering whining citizen, naked on his desk. The thought of someone seeing you, at such a powerful man’s mercy--
You clench around Neuvillette again, whining softly into the polished wood of the desk, your body wanting to welcome his cock inside and keep it for yourself. It feels so good - you can barely stand knowing how right and full and warm you feel, how you know that if Neuvillette stopped fucking you that you would have no choice but to beg him to carry on and let you come. 
“Good,” he murmurs, as he finds himself a rhythm that makes you quake. Every drag of his hips sets your body aflame, every twitch of his cock makes you huff and whimper. You’re moaning, you realise, as if you are somewhere very far away. “There now, little one - doesn’t that feel good?”
You don’t reply, but you do not need to. The sound of him fucking in and out of you - the wet sticky slap of his cock as his hips bounce against your spread thighs, the obscene feeling of your own arousal drooling out of you, and the noises that keep escaping your mouth unbidden all do that for you. Your body does not even try to push him out; merely pull him in tighter. 
He stops pinching your nipple with one hand, dragging it back down the curve of your body to curl around your thigh, sneaking between you and the wooden drawers of his desk - and you keen a high-pitched little noise as instead of your nipple, he roughly pinches at your clit instead.
The sensation of that silken fabric, sodden already with your slick, and the mean little pinch pushes you over a precipice that you didn’t realise you’d been hovering on. You cry out this time, a moan that you feel certain that everyone in the whole building must hear - but that doesn’t matter, as you spasm helplessly on Neuvillette’s cock and you give him your second orgasm of the night. 
He fucks you through it, even as you feel your cunt flex and flutter around him. You feel dizzy, panting, whining - but Neuvillette’s thrusts have more purpose now, and a low groan that sounds almost inhuman comes out of him as you weakly try and push your body back at him to hurry it along. 
“I’ll come when I’m ready,” he practically growls, and you whine as his teeth fasten into the meat of your shoulder so that he is utterly bent over you - the rasp of his silken clothes against you, fine fabrics and adornments. The satiny brush of his hair over your heated skin. “And you will take every drop, little one - as you agreed to do--”
You nod helplessly, and he groans - and then his cock is twitching inside of you wildly, and he’s biting at you again and huffing and groaning and the plunge of his hips seems to hit deeper inside of you with every thrust.
You had never imagined the Chief Justice like this in all of your life, but there is something animal to him now; some latent kind of primal instinct you had never realised that the kind, fatherly Monsieur Neuvillette possessed. You know now he is not as kind as you had once supposed, but it is still something else entirely to see him and feel him fuck you like a man possessed.
He snaps, his hips wildly gyrating into you, slapping against your ass so hard you fear you will bruise - and then you feel his cock jump and he comes inside of you, thick ropes of his release shooting directly into your insides and coating you, viscous and full of him.
He gives another almost animalistic growl against your skin, letting his cock judder and shoot out a few final spurts of his own seed - and then, there is a brief moment of quiet. You can hear yourself and your own shuddering breaths, your heart pounding in your ears - and then, the slick, wet noise of him pulling out of you. He catches hold of his own breath, and when he speaks again his voice is smooth and kind as ever as if nothing more has transpired here than a meeting of minds.
“Marvellous, little one. You did so terribly well. Of course,” Neuvillette murmurs against your ear, his breath a cool brush against your heated skin. There’s the faintest scent of saltwater in it; you shiver despite yourself. “You do realise that the final decision does not lie with me, do you not?”
“Wh-what do you mean?” You’re too breathless to speak, still - laid out across Monsieur Neuvillette’s desk, on display like the most wanton of creatures. You can still feel his come rolling down your thighs, spilling out of you with every pant of your breath - you were so utterly filled and claimed by him that you fancy you can feel his come inside of you even now, in thick ropes and dripping pearls. 
“Well,” Neuvillette moves away, and you  turn your head, cheek cold on the desk, to watch as he re-fastens the placket of his trousers, the tails of his coat swishing about him. You remain utterly debased; your clothes still in a haphazard pile to the side of his desk. You do not yet think your trembling legs could even hold you up, and you have no choice but to let Neuvillette continue to drink in the sight of you akimbo over his office furniture. “Surely you understand it is the Oratrice who will make the final decision, my dear?”
Your heart beats double time in your chest. Your breath comes out in a panicked little gasp, and you rear up before you’re quite ready for it, staggering towards him to clutch at his lapels.
“But it always sides with you,” you say to him, hating that your voice rises in pitch pathetically. “You’re always in agreement--”
“Yes,” Neuvillette agrees with a low hum, and you hate him as one of his thumbs gently comes up to caress your cheek like a lover. “It will be greatly novel for Lady Furina to witness the disagreement, I’m sure. Still - the Oratrice does have the final word, as it always has.”
“But you promised!” You don’t care about dignity now, as you feel the hot splash of tears across your cheeks. Neuvillette takes in a shuddering breath, far too reminiscent of the noise he’d made when he’d pressed himself inside of you. His thumb slides under a tear now, to catch it upon the pad; you watch in mute agonies as he lifts it to his mouth and his tongue flicks out to taste you.
“Really, my dear,” Neuvillette says, with a sigh of satisfaction. “I thought you were better educated than this; you were so very charmingly certain when you first came to see me after accosting me in public. All of those carefully laid out little plans and charts as to why your criminal brother couldn’t possibly have committed the felony that everybody knows he did--”
“But you agreed!” You’re desperate now. He hums again, and one of his arms settles around your waist, keeping you pinned against him. “You said you would find him not guilty! You said he’d be freed!”
“I said one of those things,” he corrects you - and then he sees that you’re very much hovering on the edge of hysteria, and he sighs. “You poor little creature. When I asked you if you were certain and that you’d thought everything through properly . . . you hadn’t really, had you?”
“I . . . I thought . . .” You sniffle desperately, trying to grasp onto the threads of your righteous anger as the cool sting of foresight settles over you once more. Monsieur Neuvillette is correct; he promised that he would find your brother not guilty, and you had taken it for granted that the ruling of the mighty Iudex would be enough to see your brother free.
Not a word about the Oratrice had passed his lips.  
You’re shaking. It is only Monsieur Neuvillette’s arm around your waist that stops you from falling to the ground. You fear if that grounding limb left, you would drop to your knees and hug at his legs and rub your sobbing face against his knee and beg. The fact that you had . . . that you’d given yourself to him, and he must have known that he could not truly give what you were asking for . . .
“And what then?” You whisper, your throat dry. Neuvillette makes a considering noise in the back of his throat; a throaty hum. A hand gently scoops your chin up to force you to look him in the eyes.
Neuvillette’s eyes are blue-grey-violet, boring down into you. There is something ancient and terrifying that lies behind them, but as they look into your own they seem to almost flash possessive. 
“I happen to know the administrator of the Fortress of Meropide,” he says, after a long moment. “Of course, I’m sure you understand that it is not the most . . . welcoming of places. Your brother’s confinement will lack creature comforts. But . . . it doesn’t have to be quite so dreary.”
Against your will, hope rises like a soft flame in your chest. 
“You would do that?” You ask the Iudex. “Make sure that he’s . . . that it’s not so bad?”
“You misunderstand,” Neuvillette tells you, with a small smile. “I have fulfilled my end of our agreement now. I will find your brother not guilty. Legally, there’s nothing else that you need of me.”
“I could tell someone--” You start to say, but Neuvillette only lets out a soft little huff of laughter.
“Poor thing,” he says, “do you truly believe that anybody would take your word - the sibling of some no-good criminal, desperate to save him - over mine? You must understand that I have, as Iudex, a long history of doing only the best for Fontaine.” He lets go of your waist, and you are thankful that you manage to keep your balance even as he turns and sweeps away towards his desk. “I am also aware that I’m the subject of some . . . romantic fantasy, in the hearts of the ever-theatrical people of our homeland.” He seats himself in the great chair behind his desk, and looks back up at you with that damnable smile playing around his lips - small enough you could not call it mocking, soft enough you could argue it was an attempt at sympathy. “Why would I give that up, just to tumble some know-nothing worth-nothing young upstart in my office?”
Your mouth opens and closes a few times in speechless anger, before that cool foresight settles over you once more.
Because he’s right.
Why would he? Why would anyone believe you? 
“. . . How can I ask for your aid again?” You manage to grit out, through clenched teeth.
“You could fill out a form from the Palais Mermonia,” he says, rifling through the paperwork on his desk as if you have already left the room. “Talk to one of the gestionnaires about aid for those incarcerated, once your brother has officially been sentenced. The working time for a response is currently . . .” He tilts his head to the side again, as if thinking. “Ah, yes. Only a year and six months. I’m sure nothing untoward could befall your poor brother in that time--”
“Monsieur,” you step towards him imploringly. “Please--”
You remember your nakedness only when Neuvillette looks up from his desk and lets his eyes critically sweep you again. Your nipples, stiff and sore from his pinching fingers. Your thighs, wet with his release and your own slick. The bite marks from his fangs that litter your bared skin. 
His eyes narrow; the face of a man taking in something that already belongs to him. A dragon considering his latest addition to the hoard. 
You realise exactly what he is going to ask you for, in return for his continued aid, before he opens his mouth. 
“Well,” he says, with a small smile upon his generous mouth. It is a mouth many would describe as kind; at this moment in time, you cannot think of it as anything other than dangerous. “You did such a good job of convincing me to aid you today . . . why, we could make these little meetings more regular, don’t you think?”
You swallow thickly. 
The Fortress of Meropide. Under the sea, with no sunlight, for who knows how long. Who knows where he would sleep, or what he would eat, or what other comforts would be denied to him in his imprisonment? 
“Yes, Monsieur,” you whisper, your throat bone dry. 
“Excellent,” he smiles at you in clear dismissal. You feel . . . used. Cheated. Hollow. Utterly owned and laid claim to and conquered, your spirit deadened inside as you look at the corrupt official you had once held in such high regard. “Next week, then. Wear something prettier, please. I’m partial to blue. Now - you don’t mind, do you? I have cases to review.”
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peachdues · 5 months
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anyways have some Levi angst from my upcoming secret pregnancy fic Coalescence
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But Levi’s threat did not appear to ruffle Zeke in the slightest. “It must be difficult for you,” he said offhandedly. “All this time spent in service to an organization that’s synonymous with a death sentence —“
“I wasn’t under the impression you gave a particular shit.” Levi interrupted, bored. “Given your commitment to slaughtering us all.”
Zeke waived his bound hands dismissively. “Whatever our differences, Captain, I can appreciate the toll constant fighting and war can wage on a man.” He took a swig of too-thin coffee. “I’d say we’re more similar than you might realize, wouldn’t you?”
“The day I have anything in common with you is the day I stick one of my blades through my skull.”
With that, Levi rose and turned away, eager to put space between himself and the insufferable sack of horse shit he was forced to drag along with the rest of the Corps.
“No need to be so dramatic, Captain,” the blonde groaned. “After all, what would poor Y/N do, if you left her to deal with the trials of birth and child rearing all by herself?”
Levi froze mid-step, his heart skipping several beats.
“I can’t imagine how difficult it must be, leaving your pregnant girl every few days for hell knows how long,” Zeke shrugged. “Never knowing whether you’ll get to go back at all.”
Levi’s fists were clenched tight enough that his nails broke through the skin of his palms, his shoulders rigid as he worked to control his breathing. With his back turned away from deadly Beast titan, the Captain could not see the breezy smile which graced his lips, Zeke relishing his obvious stiffness.
“But do you know what I think the worst thing would be?” He continued, pulling a beaten, battered book from the lining of his jacket, idly flipping through its dog-eared and water stained pages. “I imagine it would be the constant worry of something horrible happening — not to me, but to her.”
Zeke shook his head, mournfully. “Or, god forbid, her and the child.”
Levi pivoted slowly on his heel back towards the blonde where he sat, pretending to read the very book he’d complained to Levi of having already read too many times just days before.
“What.” His voice was flat and harder than stone.
Zeke didn’t bother to lift his eyes from the pages of his novel. “Pregnant women are so vulnerable, you know. Not much they can do to protect themselves from harm that may come their way — even when they’ve trained under the brutal Scout regimen.”
“It must be torture for you to know that something could happen to her, and you would be unable to stop it,” Zeke finally looked up to behold the cold violence in Levi’s eyes. “To be utterly out of control.”
An poisonous smile unfurled across his lips. “I guess that’s why you’ve had her staying back at your old headquarters, no?”
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diejager · 4 months
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if you don't mind can i ask for your take on civilian s/o and yandere makarov? i wonder how he behave around an s/o who's like the opposite of him (like they're kind, gentle and has not known violence ever). hcs or short scenario or anything depends on you i don't mind (there's a drought of makarov content tbh 😮‍💨).
thanks for considering this and please take your time. have a good day 😚.
”Love” Cw: manipulation, obsessive behaviour, delusions of love, humain training, forceful taking, verbal abuse, tell me if I missed any.
Makarov doesn’t love. He knew how to, but he never truly did. He couldn’t with the heart and mind he grew up cultivating, to build his empire and strength, dwindling his heart’s empathy. Ironically, such ignorance towards love only increased his obsession, the amount of it that would only climb higher and higher, because in a sense, the loss of such emotions lead to a loss of a limit, driving him to insane lengths to achieve what he had his mind on.
He only knew death and bloodshed, the destruction of the mundane and corruption of the innocent, being the source of the rot and decay in the cells of a flower, to make it wilt and dust. Perhaps that’s where his interest in the normal stemmed, that curiosity that would someday bloom into obsession. He searched for an object of obsession, something - someone - to put all this attention on, something tangible, solid under his hands and malleable to his intentions. Despite his lack of time to dawdle, to spend on meaningless affairs, he found the perfect subject, someone so starkly different from him and his world.
There was a dichotomy in Makarov’s world, the harshness of war, battle and conquering of countries, and the deceptive softness in his eyes, the gentle touch of his scarred and calloused hands, and the coo with his sly tongue. You were the only softness in his life, a civilian he -one day - decided to pick up from the streets, bright-eyed and innocent to the horror he saw and spear-headed. Your tired eyes untouched by his mind and your scarless body free of any conflict that he could start with a simple wave of his hand.
There’s a need in his mind to see this innocence wilt away, to pry your mind of any autonomy and freedom you’ve lived with. Makarov wanted a doll, something soft and precious he could corrupt with words and ruin with his hands, deceptively gentle and loving, a poem spilling from a cruel smirk and eyes gleaming darkly. He has his ways to turn you into a thing of his imagination, to make you into his willing Russian doll, layer over layer of maliciousness and subservience.
He’s a man of culture, letting the people under him do all the dirty work. Despite all the viciousness and madness in his being, he doesn’t hit, he doesn’t abuse the object of his obsession, that was reserved for men lower than him, poor and mindless men. Rather, he preferred manipulation, well-thought words used in right situation to have you crawling back to him for safety, protection and comfort. He wanted you to come to him on your own, to make your pliant and uncaring of the wider view. He, after all, took you for himself, to endure himself in a second source of power.
Makarov has a silver tongue, whispering words into your ears that take root, your doubts and fears growing in the depth of your heart, bringing you closer to the man who promised to protect you. His fingers wiping away your tearful cheeks, pearly gems rolling down your cheek as he teases you about being worried. You shouldn’t be so fearful with him beside you, he’s your warden, your all-powerful and dependable lover.
He won’t let a shred of suspicion towards him fester, it’ll be dealt with swiftly with the call of your name, breaking down your vulnerable mind and building it back up in his image, his opinions were yours, his thoughts were yours, his goals were yours. So much so that you were his, knowing fundamentally that whatever he said goes.
”мой маленький цветок,” he mumbled, pressing his lips against yours, hands soft but wandering, laying down chains over your waist, around your dainty wrists and tightening the collar around your neck, keeping the hold on your mind, “You did so well, I’m proud of you.”
Positive reinforcement. He often used positive reinforcement to deepen his hold, to sink his teeth into your clean soul. Sweetened words with a voice he taught you to crave and possessive touches of bloody hands with intentions that he blinded you of, finding a way to make you want them.
“What do you say?” His hand traveled up your jaw, featherlight fingers cradling your ear and cheek until it stopped under your chin, tilting your head to look at his narrowed eyes, proud and dark.
“Thank you, Vladimir.”
He smiled, a thin-lipped grin.
Taglist: @sae1kie @yeoldedumbslut @bvxygriimes @distracteddragoness @vxnilla-hxrddrugs @konigsblog @havoc973 @im-making-an-effort @daisychainsinknots @0alk0msan @danielle143 @dont-mind-me-just-existing-sadly @tuttifuckinfruttifriday @kaelysia
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piracytheorist · 3 months
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The Briar Siblings' Lies
It's very interesting that in the family of lies and secrets, the lies of the Briar siblings are included, and I'm pretty sure that will play a role whenever they find out about each other.
I expect Yor to be heartbroken and angry at Loid when she'll find out his lies, but I'd also expect her to be heartbroken and disappointed when she finds out how much Yuri lied to her.
Yor might have kept her own very dangerous secrets, but there are huge differences in their circumstances.
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Yor took up her assassin gig when she was just a teenager, orphaned and with a little brother to take care of. Amidst the cold war brewing, there would be various criminal organizations looking for people to drag in, and a poor, desperate, kind, and almost supernaturally strong teenage girl was the perfect recruit for Garden.
Whether this is Garden's initiative or not, Yor has a strong determination to kill her targets as quickly and as painlessly as possible, along with avoiding unnecessary bloodshed. She has studied human anatomy specifically for this very reason, to be able to kill her victims with mercy. She's realistic about the situations she's in, but if talking things through is even a tiny bit possible, she'll give it a try.
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Though her morals are slightly skewed for the average civilian - it's understandable to kill someone in self defense, but her main targets are situations where she plays judge, jury and executioner - she's still retained a lot of her humanity that allows her to be a kind person and a caring sister, mother and wife.
And then you have Yuri.
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Yuri fell victim to a more sinister kind of indoctrination - extremism and bigotry. Having grown up in poverty caused by the war and the deaths of his parents, and having an overwhelming wish to protect his sister, he was the perfect target for Ostania's nationalistic propaganda.
But the tragic background leading up to this choice and the want to protect his family is where his similarities with Yor's case end.
Yuri wasn't left with no other choices. Yor was already supporting him financially when he started working for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and that was a job that he could stay at and be independent. He was older than Yor was when she became an assassin. I can assume that some underhanded methods were used to lead him into the duties of the SSS, but even so Yuri had more control of the situation, more choices to choose from, and more information at hand. It's directly opposite to Yor's circumstances.
Yuri tortures people. The SSS specifically want him, despite his young age and lack of experience, exactly because he won't hold anything back, even when it makes him feel conflicted.
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The SSS may be taking advantage of the ease with which he tortures people, but it's still something Yuri willingly participates in - and again, considering the fame of the SSS among civilians, it's almost certain Yuri knew what he was getting into. He's giving up his own humanity, going down a path of "us vs. them" and while Yor plays judge on who gets to live, Yuri plays judge on who gets to be treated like a human being.
While two similarly dangerous and demanding professions, and (at least according to what Franky says) following the same government's orders, it's two highly different cases. I think Yuri will be mostly horrified to learn what Yor went through for his sake, but Yor will be very understandably heartbroken. Yuri could understand that Yor had no other choice, but Yor will know that Yuri had all the best choices right in front of him, and yet he chose this.
And it's why I believe this is the revelation that will hurt Yor more. She could explain Twilight's lies by the fact that they didn't know each other before, she could explain Anya's secrets by her young age and innocence, but there will be very little for Yuri to stand on - and the thing is, Yuri knows that. He knows that what he's chosen to become isn't what Yor raised him to be.
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Currently he may be seeing himself as a martyr for his cause, that he needed to potentially break his sister's heart in order to protect her and "the country she lives in". He'd rather have her feeling heartbroken and betrayed by him than with her life and safety in danger. He'd rather her hate him than get hurt.
How will it hit him when he realizes she's already been doing the same for him, and has already been endangering her life for over a decade for not only his sake, but for the world in general too? When he realizes all the work he's been doing to protect her was in vain because she has been walking into danger herself all along?
It's a really interesting dynamic, because the revelation could either break them or make them. They both have a very heartwarming background together, they both love each other deeply, but it's a trial they'll both have to go through at some point.
(Anime only fan here, don't spoil me for the manga)
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wormtoxin · 8 days
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ok. Narrative obfuscation in House Of Leaves. It’s a relatively simple story about a man who moves into a house with his wife and kids, and the house is haunted. That’s it. The core themes are very transparent.
Except, that story is documented by a famous war documentarian, then published as a series of rare tapes, which are discoursed by film buffs, then interpreted from viewings and reading film critique by a blind old man, then his thoughts are transcribed into a manuscript by a series of young women, which is then compiled from scattered notes by the most mysoginistic, damaged, toxic pothead drop-out who won’t stop talking about his life, which is THEN edited and published by some vaguely nefarious agency who soberly refuse to provide any clarification or context.
It’s not simple, but there are so many different hands on the wheel with wildly differing opinions that you can’t discern the truth.
Johnny Truant is such a miserable hopeless fuck up. He has no sense of academic rigor or archival professionalism. Any interference he provides only muddies the waters and taints what would otherwise be a gripping piece of metaphysical film criticism. His neurotic rambling and personal anecdotes cloud an otherwise reasonable story.
If he wasn’t in it, if we could read Zampano’s manuscript directly, WE would be able to understand the truth. We would get it completely, and we wouldn’t have to encounter so much violence, so much miserable graphic detail. It would be a better story.
And fuck it, if we didn’t have to read all of Zampano’s tangents and analyses and interpretations, if we could just find a copy of the famous “five-and-a-half minute hallway” vhs, if we could SEE it, we’d understand. We wouldn’t need endless pontification of what Navidson and Karen’s marriage might entail, or recitations of what a director once said in a Rolling Stones article. We’d see the hallway itself, stretching out into what should be the backyard, and we’d get it. Hell, Zampano is blind in his old age. He can’t even watch the damn movie! But we could. We’d know instantly, the second we saw it. The impossibility of it, the gravity of it, the weight of that dark abyss.
And well, the VHS recording is a little dark, and the quality is poor, and maybe the white balance isn’t so perfect. And actually, VHs tapes could be manipulated. We can’t be sure that Navidson isn’t just using clever videography tricks to invent a hallway. If we were there, if we found the house (it’s in virginia, isn’t it? we even have the address). If we GO there, we could look down that hallway. And it’s dark, so if we just brought a flashlight, maybe took a few steps inside-
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daycourtofficial · 5 months
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Use Somebody
Summary: you and Lucien have to pretend to be together, causing a fight between you and a certain shadowsinger. You discover too late that you’re a wanted aspect to an evil plot - can Azriel save you in time?
“We could have (y/n) and Lucien do it.” You overheard Rhysand saying as you walked into his study.
“You could have me and Lucien do what?” You ask, biting into your apple.
Rhys turns to you, tutting so you don’t bring your apple too close to his desk, “we need someone to attend a ball in the winter court. Azriel’s picked up some rumblings, and Kallias has asked if we could help. We’ll all be attending, but we need you and Lucien in particular to do some recon.”
You stop mid bite of your apple, still confused on the plan. “But Lucien and I aren’t spies, we’re just court nobility.”
“Which is why you two are perfect - you’re nobility to two different courts, autumn and dawn, so the two of you mingling wouldn’t be too suspicious. Plus the two of you are very good at socializing at these events.”
“So you want to send us to go to a ball to do what exactly?” The idea still making zero sense to you.
It’s Azriel who speaks up, “he wants you and Lucien to pretend to be together and get close to a few targets, see if you can find anything out.”
You look at Azriel, and he looks pissed. You’re not sure if it’s because he just returned from the war camps, at this plan, or if he doesn’t think you and Lucien are capable of spywork. The idea of disappointing Azriel made your stomach drop to your pit.
Rhys interjects, “you and Lucien have been friends for centuries - it’s a believable cover. And you’re talented with glamours - you could even glamour a mating bond scent over the two of you.”
You reply, “We attended tons of events together when we were younger - but anyone from one of those events would know we were lying.”
“It’s been hundreds of years, anything could have happened. Besides, I can provide you with a guest list to look over, ensuring you don’t know any of the guests.”
“I don’t know, Rhys…” you drawl.
Rhys sighs, “it’s one night. Do you think you could do this or not?”
You think it over for a moment and decide that you can, Azriel’s hesitation at your involvement be damned.
-
The irony wasn’t lost on you. You and Lucien pretending to be a couple when the two of you are pining over Azriel and Elain, who seem to be a couple. Cassian disagrees with your assessment of the situation - he’s convinced that Azriel has feelings for you and that Elain is just a friend, but you’re not so sure.
Lucien’s voice stirs you from your thoughts. “Wouldn’t our lives be so much easier if we were mates instead?”
You laugh, the idea having crossed your mind a time or two. “It certainly would be. We’d also have adorable babes.”
Lucien laughs, “those poor, beautiful babes, shame they’ll never exist.”
You two laugh, trying not to think of the heartache too much. Your own pining aside, all you want is happiness for Lucien. Pushing it aside, you two begin crafting your story: you’ve been married for two years, living in dawn for the time being, but you two want to explore all of the courts before deciding where to settle down permanently.
-
“You look lovely, dear,” Lucien tells you. If you two were going to pretend to be in love, you wanted the both of you to look incredible. Lucien’s wearing a green jacket with brown pants, and you’re wearing a deep green dress, with exposed boning and a thigh slit practically at your hip, exposing your entire left leg. You had gone a step further, embroidering a tiny fox onto Lucien’s jacket’s lapel and a matching one onto the shoulder strap of your dress.
“Thank you, you look very handsome as well.” And he did. The shade of green you selected for both of you matched both of your complexions and honestly, you two looked hot.
“What should our mating bond smell like?” You ask him.
The two of you think about it, ultimately deciding on a combination of smells: apples, fresh tea, and honey, the scent filling the room.
“Incredible work - I must say, you are a fantastic fake mate, darling,” he says, offering his arm to you. “Likewise, fake mate,” you say, tipping a pretend hat in his direction and placing your hand in the crook of his arm, walking out of your room.
-
Rhys had given you one main objective: talk, mingle, dance, drink. The hope is that you and Lucien can overhear something or that someone will inadvertently tell you two lovebirds something they don’t mean to.
The two of you take the dance floor, the band playing a slower song, one you and Lucien have danced to thousands of times, the rhythm ingrained into your mind over a centuries worth of balls.
You loved dancing with Lucien, the two of you fell into easy rhythm and garnered a ton of attention whenever you found yourselves on the dance floor. The two of you made a striking couple, and your dress looked incredible as he spun you around the floor.
Through the dips, the turns, and the spins of the song, you made sure to keep eye contact with Lucien as much as possible. You looked into his russet eyes, but all you wanted to find was hazel ones staring back at you. You’re sure Lucien was hoping the same about Elain in your stead.
The song ends and the two of you garnered more attention than you thought you would, and all the attention made you blush. You stepped away from your friend to get some wine, almost crashing into someone.
“Saffron?” You ask, incredulously. Rhys had been able to provide you with a full list of everyone attending, to ensure no one you knew was attending, but you didn’t see Saffron’s name anywhere on that list.
She looks at you, wrapping you in a hug. “It’s been so long! Of all the people to run into at one of these things, I’m not surprised to see you!”
She pulls back, looking you up and down, noticing the fake wedding ring on your hand. “And who’s the lucky male?”
Saffron knew you and Lucien when you were younger, so she knows there’s nothing between you two. You could either lie and try to skirt away from her, or tell her the ‘truth’ of this mission.
“It’s Lucien - we got married a few years ago actually!” You say, not sounding totally convincing.
“Lucien? The red head you were always with?” She asks, almost laughing. “You two always seemed more like siblings than lovers.”
You swallow, worried your entire night is unraveling because of her presence. “It was a surprise for us too! But one day the bond just snapped-“
“Wait, you two are mated?”
“Yes,” you reply curtly.
“I had heard he was mated to another girl and she rejected it.”
Her knowing that has definitely thrown a wrench in the plans. “Um, the rumor mill must have been working overtime. There’s no other girl, it’s just us.”
She looks at you, something odd flashing in her eyes, before she decides to leave it be. “Anyway, it was great running into you - congratulations!”
You thank her before she walks away and you can let out a breath of relief.
-
After running into Saffron, you spent hours dancing, mingling and drinking. You walk outside onto the balcony, telling Lucien you need a moment of fresh air. The noise level of the room was getting to you, so you thought you’d step out for a moment.
The moment the door shut behind you, Azriel emerged from the shadows. You startled, not expecting him to pop out.
“Hi Azzie,” you say, your nickname making him recoil. “Should I be seen talking to you, since.. ya know?” You ask, unsure of how spywork worked completely.
“So you don’t want to be seen with me, but you have no problem being seen all over Lucien?”
His question catches you off guard, and you look and notice just how angry he looks, anger directed at you.
“That’s not what I said at all, besides you know why I’m all over him tonight,” you reply, looking to make sure no one can hear this conversation.
“Yes, but you sure jumped at the chance to spend the night wrapped in his arms, didn’t you?” He moves closer to you, the two of you less than a foot apart, facing each other.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about - he’s my friend and he’s mated!”
“But she hasn’t accepted it yet,” he states.
“So?” You ask, “to me he’s mated, he’s off limits. Besides, I’m not in love with him, I don’t have feelings for him!”
The four glasses of wine weren’t a problem in the ballroom, but they’re a problem out here, making this conversation even more confusing to you.
“If the two of you want to parade around about how happy you are, why don’t you find another court to go do it in, and stay out of mine,” Azriel practically growls at you.
Your soft, sweet Azriel is growling at you. You’ve never been on the receiving end of his anger, but it terrified you.
He wasn’t getting it, he wasn’t getting that you didn’t want Lucien, you wanted him.
You sighed, trying not to let his words sting too much when you say, “maybe we will.” and storm back into the party.
-
After your fight with Azriel, you got considerably more drunk. At the end of the night, you and Lucien walked back into the palace together, laughing, him holding you up from the excessive wine you drank. You’re about to tell him something, when someone catches your eye.
“Hi Elain!” You say, pointing out Elain to Lucien.
“Hi,” she says to you, but she won’t stop looking at Lucien, “is it okay if I have a moment alone with Lucien?”
“Yes, absolutely, excuse me,” you say, brushing past Elain. You turn around giving Lucien a thumbs up and a smile, showing him it’ll be okay.
You walk into the kitchen, looking for more wine, when you bump into Cassian. “Owww,” you say, rubbing your arm where you bumped into him.
He laughs at your obviously drunken state, and tells you, “you did good tonight, doll.”
You look up at him, “yeah? Do you think Lucien and I could be spies now? Do you think Azriel was proud of us?”
Cassian’s caught a bit off guard by your question. “Why wouldn’t he be proud of you?”
You sigh and look at your feet, “because when Rhys asked us to do this assignment, he looked so upset, like he didn’t think we could do it.” You’re not sure why this is spilling out of you, but it’s started pouring and it won’t stop. You look Cassian in the eyes and ask, “what’s wrong with me, Cass?”
Cassian can almost hear his heart shatter at your question. “Why would anything be wrong with you?” He asks, grabbing your wine and going to get you a glass of water in replacement.
You slump your head down on the kitchen island and mutter into your hands, “why am I in love with someone who hates me and loves someone else?”
Cassian starts to panic. He’s good at consoling when you’re injured, but you’re heartbroken. This is uncharted territory. Usually you talked about these things with Mor or Feyre, not the giant Ilyrian next to you. “Who?”
You lift your head up, and he can see tear stains running down your face, “your dumb handsome brother.”
If you didn’t look so sad, Cassian would laugh at how you said that. “Wait, what did he tell you? Did he make you think he doesn’t care about you?”
“I thought we were friends, Cassian,” you choke back a sob, “I don’t know what I did, but he hates me now. He wants me to leave the night court… and maybe I should.”
Before he can say anything else, you get up and tell him, “I’m done, Cassian. It was hard, but I could bottle my feelings if we were friends.” You look up at him, and Cassian doesn’t think he’s ever seen such heartbreak on a face before. “He hates me now, and I still love him. Maybe I should leave the night court for a while, leave his precious court like he asked me to.”
Grabbing a bottle of wine as you pass him, you head upstairs for the night.
Cassian was a violent man. He’s been in countless fights, multiple wars, several battles, but seeing you so upset over his idiot brother made him rage in a new way. He stomped up to Azriel’s room, flinging the door open, and pulling the sheet out from under him, causing him to fall to the floor. “What the f-“ Azriel starts to say, but he’s cut off.
“Are you in love with Elain?” Cassian asks.
“You woke me up to grill me about my love life?” Azriel asks, more confused by the second.
“Answer me,” Cassian practically growls at the shadowsinger.
“No, okay! No. I’m not.” Azriel says, still sitting on the ground where Cassian hurled him.
“Are you in love with someone else? Someone who just spent the night pretending to be in love with someone else in the hopes that you would approve of her?”
Azriel blinks in confusion. “You had me. Then you lost me. It doesn’t matter - I saw how she looked at Lucien.”
Cassian did not have time for Azriel to begin wallowing. “Have you ever thought that while she was looking at Lucien, he wasn’t who she was seeing?” He pauses for a moment, then says, “you better talk to her before morning.” He kicks his brother for good measure then storms out.
-
Azriel got the courage to go to your door half an hour later, but you didn’t respond. At first he thought he had just gone too far, but when his shadows whispered gone, gone, gone to him, he knew something was wrong. The room was empty, and he could smell blood on the duvet covers. He told Rhysand mind to mind what was happening, and decided the best source was the last male he wanted to see: Lucien.
He started banging on the door to Lucien’s room, when the redheaded male finally opened the door. Half-dressed, with Elain hiding under the duvet, Azriel gets to the point, “did anyone tonight give you the impression they wanted to hurt her?” Lucien opens the door a little wider, asking Azriel a question he doesn’t want the answer to.
The shadowsinger sighs. “She’s missing, and her room shows signs of a struggle.”
Lucien begins asking a million questions, when Azriel stops him. “Rhys and I want to talk to you about every person you met with tonight.”
-
Lucien walked them through your night, including when you had left for a few moments to go on the balcony. Azriel flinched at the memory, his jealousy getting the best of him in the moment.
Rhys was about to ask him to go through a few people again, when something catches Rhys’s eye.
“Lucien,” Rhys says, “your fox is glowing.”
The fox you had embroidered on his jacket was glowing. It glowed for a moment, and then they heard your voice, confused and drunk, and another voice, projecting from the fox.
“Clever girl,” Lucien whispers.
-
You woke up in a dirty cell, Hybern shackles adorning your wrists. Your head was throbbing, the blow to the head really rattled you, and you’re still drunk. There’s a small window, and the moon is still high in the sky, so you don’t think you’ve been out for too long. You do remember the fox you had embroidered on your clothes, and you hope that, since the magic was sewn into it, it would still work despite the shackles. You place your palm over it for five seconds, and you just hope and pray that your enchantment will actually work.
The door to the cell opens, and in comes Saffron.
“Saffron?” You ask, confusion over your features. “What is happening?”
“Everyone always talked about how smart you were - why don’t you put the pieces together?” She asks, her disdain for you icing every word.
“Okay, I’m still drunk, and someone hit my head, but let’s see.” You pause, thinking about everything you know about Saffron. “We went to school together, you liked… magic classes. You liked knowing what magic could do.” You pause for a moment, something wanting to come to the surface of your thoughts. “You were interested in my powers. You once called Lucien weak. You like oranges - okay I’m getting a bit off track.”
You start thinking again, your head pounding from all the thinking.
“I saw you at the one hundred year reunion, and you worked for Kallias, documenting the magical capabilities of fae….” You trail off, your head still pounding, begging for you to go to sleep.
Your eyes snap up, “you got in trouble in school for using arcane magic on the grounds, but you were only suspended for a while. Then fifty years after the reunion Lucien told me he had run into you and you were with… uh.. that guy..” you start snapping to remember, “Wren! You were with Wren!”
Your mind is whirring, so many thoughts swirling around in your drunken haze. “Wren was that ugly guy who.. you dated him.. and..” there’s something there with Wren, but what is it?
“Wren always wanted to eat at that place on the corner that served soup. Wren wanted to be an arcane magic scholar, but they wouldn’t let him,” you pause, slurring a bit while you point at Saffron, “and you two got in trouble, but he was expelled!”
It didn’t matter that you were drunk, the wheels in your brain were turning. “You once told me after a break up that you don’t want love, you want power. And Wren was obsessed with ancient power rituals. He talked about them all the time.”
The idea hits you as you say it out loud, “it’s a full moon tonight.” Your thoughts have sobered you up instantly. “It’s the summer solstice, the strongest night for arcane magic,” your voice gets really quiet as you say, “and you’re going to do something. But what?”
She looks at you, egging you on to realize what she wants. But what does Saffron want? Power. Power. Power.
“You told me I was the most powerful of our year.” You swallow, realization hitting you to your core. “You’re going to take my powers.”
The silence hangs in the room. If your fox communicator worked, then you imagine the room is dead silent there too.
Saffron slowly claps. “There she is, brightest of our age. Oh how all of our teachers adored you,” she says, crossing the room to you, “it was incredible running into you at the party. Once I heard you were attending, I had to swoop in so I could see you. I slipped some faebane into your drink while we were talking so I could subdue you. My sweet, there’s one thing about the ritual you don’t know.”
She leans in closer to you, when she says, “we won’t just be taking your powers, we’ll be sacrificing you, which is a bit more extensive, but it allows for us to also take your knowledge and your memories.”
Your eyes snap up to hers, “no, no!”
“Your memories will teach us all we need to know about your little night court companions,” she laughs, walking towards the door to leave you alone with the revelation. Right before she’s out the door, she wants to tell you one last thing, “I always thought your powers were wasted on the likes of you. You could have been a queen, you could have given the high lords a run for their money.”
-
Everyone was dead silent, waiting for more news from the fox, but it seems like your captor left you alone. By this point the entire inner circle was in Lucien’s room, and tears were streaming down Mor’s face. She approached Azriel and said, “you have to find her, don’t you usually keep a few shadows on her at all times?”
Mor talking to him broke his concentration on the fox stitching, embarrassment flooding his senses. “No, I don’t, not tonight.”
“Why the hell not? You don’t even let her go down the street without a few extra shadows, but you let her do mission work unguarded!”
Lucien looks up at Azriel, realization coating his features, “She was upset about something after she came back in from the balcony, and she got plastered. You got in a fight and called the shadows off, didn’t you?”
Heat creeps up Azriel’s face, at both the mention of your incredibly dumb fight and the fact that his entire family was looking at him, aware of how badly he messed things up.
Rhys is the one to break the silence, “you told me you could behave, Azriel!”
“And I thought I could! I just.. I had a moment. A lapse in judgement.”
“A lapse in judgement!” Cassian cries, “she was crying to me because she thought you hated her! She thought you’d never want to see her again. She told me she might leave because it’s what you want from her!”
Mor gets to Azriel first, swatting him on the chest after every word she says, “what” swat “did” swat “you” swat “do?” swat.
Azriel lets her hit him, he more than deserves it. He can’t believe his stupidity in calling his shadows away from you, something he did out of pure anger at watching them dance around you on the balcony.
He starts to respond, when a shadow comes barreling in through the window, hitting Lucien on the head as it comes to inform Azriel of what it just found out.
-
You had been hopeful that the fox would be more helpful, but you’re thinking the magic didn’t work. Still in your party dress, you move around the cell a little. The witching hour is getting close, so you know they’ll be coming for you soon.
The cell opens and in comes Saffron and two huge males. “I brought some back up in case you tried to run,” she practically purrs at the idea, likely imagining them beating you half to death.
“Great,” you say. You follow them down the hallway, and the thought does skirt past your mind, but you’re shackled at the wrist and the ankle, you won’t be able to run fast or far, especially without your magic.
They open up two doors to the outside - it’s a nice, cool night. The moon is glowing brighter than you’ve ever seen it, distracting you from seeing the wooden logs surrounding a giant pole. You breathe in deeply, wishing, willing your friends to come rescue you. Now is the time, you think.
One of Saffron’s goons leads you to the pyre, and you take this opportunity to swing your shackles at his face, hitting him right in the cheek. The other one grabs you from behind, allowing the one you hit to face you.
He grabs your face, “such a pretty little thing. Too bad we didn’t have more time, I could have had a lot of fun with you.” His insinuation makes your blood run cold, and he pulls back his fist and punches you squarely on the nose, and you can feel it break, the blood pouring down your face already.
He nods to the goon that’s holding you in place and he lets go, giving you a second of repreive, until the one in front of you grabs you by the neck, and holds you up in the air, cutting your lungs off from the night air. You start clawing at his hands, desperately trying to be able to breathe. Just as your vision starts going a little spotty, he releases you, and you fall to the ground, gasping for air.
The other goon grabs you, lifting you up onto the top of the pyre, tying your hands to the pole. You take one last opportunity and kick him in the knee. He goes down for only a second, when he comes back up he just looks at you and spits on you. You gasp, anger fueling you.
“Enough,” Saffron says, “enough. It is time, call everyone here.”
Within a moment, ten other fae come into the clearing, all staring at you. “We’re here today to take power that we rightfully deserve!” The crowd cheers. “We will take this power and use it for a better tomorrow!”
The crowd erupts in applause, honestly you had no idea a dozen or so people could be so loud. Saffron begins chanting in an ancient language, and despite the shackles, you try sending out an emergency message to Rhys and Feyre, if you’re going to come rescue me, please do it now.
She brings a lit torch to the bottom of the pyre, lighting it. You can feel the heat as more of the pyre catches. The fire is getting closer to your feet, and you start coughing at the smoke.
Their chanting continues, getting louder, and you can feel parts of you draining, even with the shackles around you. You start yelling, trying for any distraction to break the concentration on their chanting. If you’re going down in an ancient ritual, you are not going with grace.
“Hey fucker! That’s right! You, Saffron! Not powerful enough to subdue me on your own, you have to use these stupid shackles from Hybern! You fucking coward - I bet you couldn’t even handle my power! It would consume you and burn you alive!”
Saffron faltered a bit at your taunts, but the rest of the crowd continued, persistent. “Is she supposed to be your new leader? what has she promised you? Power? Money? Land? I have all of those things, and look where I ended up! She’s crazy! She isn’t going to help you, she’ll steal your powers too!”
The flames are skirting up the pyre, getting awfully close to the fabric of your dress. You pull your legs, trying to climb up the pole you’re tied to.
“She’s weak, I’m tied up like a roast pig because she’s nothing!”
The chanting falters for a beat, enough for you to feel some of your power seep back in. You’re still shackled and can’t use them, but that doesn’t mean you want them gone.
You start coughing, excessive smoke inhalation perhaps, but you keep going. “My friends are going to be so pissed when they find out you killed me!”
Saffron allows the group to continue chanting, while she looks at you and says, “The unwanted Vanserra boy? I promise you, dear, he doesn’t scare us.”
A darkness creeps into the clearing, and a voice speaks. “I promise you, I’m much more terrifying than the fox.” Azriel steps out of the shadows, darkness radiating off of him in waves.
You’ve seen Azriel angry before, but never like this. He is almost feral with his emotion, he’d still be terrifying without the mass of shadows rolling off of him.
A few shadows come to you, circling around you, as if assessing you.
Rhys, Feyre, and Cassian step out at other points of the clearing, circling around the fae gathered.
Cassian makes a break for you amidst the chaos, and their arrival momentarily made you forget that you are moments away from being a filet mignon.
“Cas, I’m drugged! No powers!” You yell, as he approaches you. The smoke is growing stronger underneath you, forcing you to cough.
The general had no idea what to do, the fire was growing rapidly by the second, so he did the only thing he thought to do and didn’t allow himself a moment to reconsider: he ran, charging straight at you. Running up the pyre, ducking down so his shoulder makes contact with your hips, his momentum is enough to break the pole you’re secured to, the two of you tumbling off the pyre. Your head hits the grass with a hard thud, but otherwise you’re unharmed.
Cassian pulls himself off of you, checking you for injuries, and stands up and starts stamping out the train of your dress that had caught fire.
Coughing, and still tied to the pole, you thank Cassian. He moves to the top of your head, pulling the pole out from behind you, allowing you to at least stand up, even if you are still shackled.
Your ordeal with Cassian didn’t allow you to see the fight, but the remnants lead you to think it was quick and incredibly painful for the fae that captured you.
Saffron and one other are missing, assumingly already being taken by Rhys or Azriel for interrogation.
Feyre comes over, crouching down next to where you sit. “Are you okay?” She asks, placing both of her hands on the sides of your face.
The weight of the night begins settling, and you look at her, “I almost died. They wanted my powers, my knowledge, my memories.”
“We know,” Feyre says, hugging you. You’re not sure how but as she hugs you she undoes your chains, freeing your hands. You use the freedom to wrap your arms around your high lady’s waist.
“If they had taken my memories and come after you all, it would have been my fault.”
“But you were so so incredibly clever with that charm on your and Lucien’s clothes, we were able to get here just in time.” Your head turns to see Azriel crouched next to your and Feyre’s embrace, having come up without your notice.
Your eyes meet his, the tone of his words working to calm you down. At least, to make you feel less guilty.
“Do you want to return home?” He asks, holding a hand out. You nod, and he scoops you up, the shadows enveloping you as you realize you never specified which home to go to.
You were relieved when Azriel’s room at the House of Wind comes into view, afraid he’d take you straight back to your familial home in dawn after the last words he spoke to you.
“I’m sorry I failed you.”
Azriel wasn’t a man of many words, so he liked getting straight to the point whenever he could. He kept you close to him, still holding your hands from winnowing.
“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. I was dumb, and jealous, and you were looking at Lucien like how you usually look at me, and I got scared.” He sighs, “I shouldn’t have told you to stay away from my court.”
You nod, trying not to think too much about him calling himself jealous, especially saying he’s jealous over Lucien.
“I just,” he sighs, running his hand through his hair, “seeing you with him, it brought up all these feelings of inadequacy. I’m not court nobility, but you are, and I’ve never felt good enough for you for a million reasons, and that’s one of them. Not that I think Lucien deserves you, hell no, but you deserve someone that’s your equal.”
Your mind is still reeling from the wine and the concussion you’re most likely sporting, but you’re hoping you’re gauging Azriel’s words correctly. Otherwise this will be really awkward.
You take one of his hands, “and you are not my equal? I’m the princess of the dawn court, truly no one could be as equal to me as a shadowsinger. Or is it too on the nose for a princess of the sun to be in love with the man in the shadows?”
His grip tightens on your hand and he pauses before asking, “are you saying you’re in love with me?”
“Yes,” you reply, with all the tenderness this moment deserves. “And as for how I looked at Lucien,” you clear your throat, “I was thinking about you, not him. I spent the night pretending I was dancing with you.”
He looks at you, really looking into your eyes, trying to memorize your face, as he raises his hands to cups your jaw.
“Is it terribly cliche for the man in the shadows to fall in love with the woman who radiates sunlight?”
“Maybe a little,” you reply, “but I’ll allow it.”
You’re not sure which of you leaned forward, perhaps it was both of you. The kiss was full of night cool air and the feeling of the sun on your bare skin, his mouth enveloping yours.
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