#toh medieval au

[glupblorbo]

https://archiveofourown.org/works/46488946/chapters/120322345

new chapter of and all turns to silver glass! feat.: - hunter ace era! - birds :) - more hunter-amity friendship propaganda

#and all turns to silver glass #aattsg #this one's shorter but plot's about to get fuckin wild so #hunter <3 #toh au #toh medieval au #toh medieval #toh fic #don't worry we'll find out if belos is an ace ally or not soon :) #and yes that is a threat :) #happy pride month bitches #i have my own actual grom next week too lmao #glupblorbo writes #my fics

[lily-cmdier99]

025/365

#amity blight #the owl house #toh #medieval au is my jam okay #there's a reason why i love isekais lmao #there's gonna be a lot of renditions so look forward to that if you want

[3laxx]

Noble Pursuit - Chapter 6

Lilith studies the children's skills and Luz gets her first official swordplay lesson.

Hey guys! I know it took a while oof... I've been really busy. I've been looking for a new job, a flat to rent, and been organizing two class reunions, but I hope I'll have a bit of time this week!

Anyway, let's get right into this chapter! Luz has trained with Eda before but we all know Eda xD Now, the proper lessons start! And already, Luz is a bit closer to her dream of becoming a knight like her mentor and adoptive mom! And Gus is a little magic prodigy because honestly, had he not been limited by illusions, I believe he would have tried to learn every type of magic when he was younger! I hope you like this chapter! <3

Ao3 / FF.net

---

In the early morning hours, Luz and Gus were dropped off at the Clawthorne mansion, along with their sparse belongings, before Eda set off on her mission. For the first few hours, Lilith had not let them outside since it had been raining and they couldn’t master a shield yet to safely go outside.

Most of that time was spent by Lilith determining their reading and writing skills and being pleasantly surprised with both their abilities to read and write fairly well. Gus was almost at Luz’s level, even if he was still reading slower than her.

But at writing, they both had some trouble writing some words right, which Lilith of course immediately noted and moved on to test their simple mathematics skills. That was Luz’s weakness, especially because she had always been demotivated when Eda had tried teaching her, which was why she was lacking some patience with the tasks presented.

After their math lesson, Lilith tested their skill in identifying some vegetation home to their kingdom, presenting them drawings of various plants and animals to ask them what they were, and again, noted all the things she deemed necessary to know for further lessons. She would have to teach them a lot about biology, still, but she supposed that didn’t have to go as in-depth as she probably wanted.

After all, these children wouldn’t stay with her for as long as it would take to properly educate them, so she refrained from making a schedule for them. She tended to go overboard with things like these, planning ahead, especially since as of now, she didn’t have much to do.

The king had promised her a spot in the administrating senate of the city and kingdom, yet it wasn’t as far to say she could pick up some work, since she had quite a few voices against her. Including Adegast.

But she hoped her sister would uncover some dirt on him and allow her to take the spot in the senate.

After testing their critical thinking and abstract and philosophical understanding, which was not yet as much, she finally allowed them to take a break and watched as they settled to play a simple dice game with each other.

Their bond was strong, as strong as Eda’s and she had once been, and Lilith discovered she was somewhat moved by the love the siblings shared. She saw a lot of her past in them, like how Gus looked up to his big sister and how Luz always made sure to tag him along, show him all the things that interested her, and how respectful they acted around each other. She supposed that by being adopted, they had a different kind of appreciation for Eda and each other since they knew exactly how it was to live on the streets and have nothing but the certainty to die young.

Lilith felt something that felt an awful lot like sympathy towards the small children playing on the floor of her library.

Gus was merely a boy of five summers, and Luz was only two older than him. These two had already witnessed a lot of destruction in their tiny lives, much more than Eda or her had begun to imagine at the same age. Physical destruction as well as mental abandonment, Lilith was sure. She was amazed to see them both flourish with Eda’s help and to discover that they were both fairly intelligent, both in their own ways but nonetheless further than other kids of their age.

After the rain had stopped and the outside had cooled down enough for it to be safe, she let the children go outside again and play outside, for a while.

Eda had told her of her daughter’s wish to become a knight and even if Lilith was against this future, much like their mentor, she wanted to see what Eda had taught her. As she knew her little sister, she couldn’t resist teaching her children a thing or two about footwork and swordplay and she was curious if there were parallels to her sister’s fighting style.

The children were laughing outside and for some reason, Lilith could not bring herself to feel annoyance at that. It brought life and innocence into this house after it had been devoid of it for so long. She remembered the last few times she and her sister had laughed like this. They had been quite young at that, before learning of the seriousness of life. Before their mother had brought them along to political meetings, and before they had learned to fight in tournaments that were meant as entertainment for royals and rich aristocrats.

Lilith had never liked these tournaments, she had never enjoyed fighting in them, as opposed to Edalyn.

Her sister had enjoyed the thrill more than the seriousness of war, and while Lilith hadn’t enjoyed serving at the front, certainly not, she had at least felt that her duty made a difference, that her fight made sense, that she protected her kingdom and all the witches and demons in there.

Ah, to be a child again, and forget these worries.

With a sad smile, she tapped her hurting leg with her cane, before searching out a few wooden training swords and stepping outside, calling the children to her. She had a feeling they would like their next lesson, and she should be right because as soon as Luz saw the wooden swords in her hand, she felt her heart beating faster.

The young girl sprinted up to her, excitement already shining on her face as she dragged her brother along, the treasure hunt forgotten again.

They had run around a little at first and chased each other after having to sit for so long, then they had attempted to find a way up to the griffin to solve the riddle, but Lilith had interrupted them. Not that Luz actually minded.

“Children, what has Eda taught you about swordplay?”, the witch asked and Luz immediately piped up, feeling her heart beating fast in anticipation and joy for what was about to come.

“I learned a bit about sword fighting!”, she proudly stated, making Gus huff in annoyance. Lilith sent him a short glance but turned to Luz.

“I want you to show me some of the steps Edalyn has taught you and how you practice them.”, she instructed, handing the sword over to the little girl who promptly dashed over to the training area she had found the day before, followed by Lilith and Gus who were significantly slower.

“Say, Gus, you don’t like swordplay?”, she asked and he grumbled, shaking his head.

“I like magic better.”, he said and Lilith nodded.

“Then, I want you to show me what you’ve learned after Luz has shown me her skills in swordplay. Is that fair?”, she asked and the little boy almost skipped, grinning and nodding at her. He always enjoyed Eda’s and his magic lessons, most times when Luz was practicing her sword skills, and he knew he’d excel at these.

“Yes! I wanna show you my illusion magic!”, he exclaimed and Lilith gave a content nod, successfully having diverted having to deal with a grumpy child the whole afternoon. She preferred children obedient and motivated, that was the only state when they were able to learn. She didn’t know a lot about children, but she could teach quite well. Raising them was not a quality she could claim to have.

“Very well. You will be content watching your sister for a bit?”, she asked and the boy nodded, feeling justified with having her attention after, so she turned back up front as they arrived at the training site where Luz was already waiting impatiently.

“Alright then, Luz. Warm yourself up first.”, she ordered and the little girl looked at her quizzically, furrowing her eyebrows. Lilith merely managed a sigh. She had suspected Edalyn wouldn’t teach her children to warm up, as she had never been thrilled to stretch and warm her muscles before using them. “Very well. Warming up means that you stretch your muscles first, to avoid injury. Come here and give me the sword, I will show you some practices to stretch.”, she instructed and Luz planted her feet on the field.

“No.”, she pouted, holding the sword dearly, as if Lilith demanded a precious present back. At that, Lilith furrowed her eyebrows, not wanting to put up with her hesitance.

“Child, hand me the sword and I will teach you how to fight properly.”, she said, in a stricter and colder tone than before prompting Luz to tense her chin in defiance and hold the sword away, but after a glare from her mentor’s sister, Luz finally handed the sword over to Lilith.

The witch took the wooden training sword from her and sat down on one of the stone benches, dried by the heat of the boiling rain itself, before directing Luz to stand in front of her.

“How much has Edalyn taught you about fighting?”, she asked and while Luz felt hurt in her pride, she did answer, because Lilith was a lot scarier when things were not going her way.

“How to stand…”, she slowly mumbled, and Lilith nodded, prodding her to continue, “And uh… How to hold the sword. And how to hit someone.”

At her lame attempts of listing the techniques, Eda had supposedly taught her, which was completely uncharacteristic of the usual, quick responses of the chipper child, Lilith pulled up her eyebrows, before propping herself up on the two swords she had brought, nodding.

“Alright. Luz, fighting with a sword is about handling it like an extension of your arm. Do you know what that means?”, she asked and Luz shook her head, staring at the floor. She didn’t like being talked to as if she was stupid, especially when Eda hadn’t done that yet, “That means you have to accept the sword as if it was your hand. It becomes you, and you have to know exactly where it is, what it does, and how it is pointed once you go for a hit.”

Even when sitting, Lilith could move gracefully. Her upper body had not suffered under her leg injury, and she was able to show Luz some simple movements, circling the sword around her with ease and letting it cut through the air so quickly that it made a whistling sound, without even hitting herself once. Or without breaking eye contact with the child. In an instant, Luz was fascinated.

“Wow…”, she mumbled. Lilith nodded at that.

“You have to mind where your sword is at all times, and you cannot look at it. You have to keep your eyes on the enemy, and your sword has to obey your movements, as your legs and head do when you tell them so.”, she explained, ramming the point of the wooden blade down in the fine, red gravel before fixating on Luz again, “You have to adjust your movements so the sword will work seamlessly with you, so you won’t have to fear being hit by your own weapon.”

Luz already longed to hold the sword again, but Lilith shook her head.

“For that, you have to warm up. I don’t want you complaining about injuries after.”

Unwillingly, but more motivated than before, Luz followed Lilith’s instructions. She bent down to her feet while keeping her knees straight, she made side steps and felt her muscles burning, and did a few other positions as well, before Lilith made her run a lap around the training grounds, making sure the child was warmed up and flexible.

When Luz arrived back with the older witch, she was slightly panting but way too excited to care. After all, now she was warmed up, now she could show her footwork and swordplay!

Lilith handed her the sword and nodded at her, at which Luz beamed. She could finally show what Eda had taught her. And she could finally work off some steam she had been building up over the morning when she had to sit around and read and write and calculate stuff.

Enthusiastically, she grabbed the sword and stood as Eda had instructed her, keeping her whole body tense and her sword in a tight grip, before repeating some steps Eda had shown her.

One, two, three, some more, again. She jumped back and forth, keeping her other hand out of her way, and finally stabbed her imaginary enemy who had taken quite a few blows, making her grin widely.

“And that’s how Eda showed me!”, she finally turned to where Lilith sat and bowed, when the older witch got up, propping herself up on her cane.

“That was already a good understanding of the basics, although you lack the coordination, poise, and restraint to go too far.”, Lilith factually explained, and much to Luz's own surprise, she didn’t feel attacked. The teacher stood next to her as she gestured for her to go back into her basic stand, where she adjusted a few things.

“Your legs are too far apart. A gust of wind could knock you over. And if nature manages that, an enemy will have you on the ground faster than you can relax. Stand with a shoulder width, that should be enough to give you a proper and steady stand. Now, your sword should not be held as tightly. Remember, it must be flexible, it must be guided by you, but not forced. Here, try shaking your wrist out a little bit and keep it loose. If you hit something with such a cramped hand, you might break your wrist, that would not be desirable. Imagine if you hit some armored knight with a stiff wrist.”

Luz merely tilted her head at that and Lilith nodded, getting in front of her.

“Here, I’ll show you. Try and hit my sword with yours and hold it really tightly.”, she instructed and Luz tried, feeling the force of the impact run from the two swords up her elbow and to her shoulder, making her wince.

“And now try again, but keep your wrist loose.”, Lilith encouraged her and Luz tried again, this time not gripping as tightly. The hit on Lilith’s unmoving wooden blade wasn’t as hard, but at least her wrist didn’t hurt anymore.

“But what do I do if I want to hit hard?”, she asked and Lilith smiled.

“A sword is sharp, young one. It is meant to cut, not to hack. Hold your sword up.”

Luz did as she was told and held her sword sideways, the same Lilith had held it, and Lilith moved slowly.

“Look and observe exactly what happens. If I keep my wrist stiff, I hit your sword hard and don’t achieve anything but hurt myself.”, she held the sword tightly and Luz saw how it touched hers, unmoving. Lilith’s arm came to a stop as well and Luz understood how it had hurt so much when she had tried to be unmoving and hot something.

“And now look what happens when I slash, rather than hit with brute force.”, Lilith let her watch as she let her sword sink down on Luz’s in slow motion, her wrist loose this time. The blades connected and Lilith’s sword tilted back, her blade running down Luz’s before Lilith could smoothly transition by pulling it down and moving to motion another hit.

The young girl nodded slowly, before shaking her wrist out that still kind of hurt, and taking in her position again.

“I wanna try!”, she exclaimed and Lilith gave the littlest smile as she held her sword for Luz to hit it, at first instructed her to try the same slow method as she had shown her, before encouraging her to take a faster slash. Luz felt how much smoother her hits went when she didn’t hold the sword as tightly.

“Alright, now that you’ve understood the basics of slashing with your sword, you must learn to show restraint.”, she said and Luz tilted her head, furrowing her eyebrows.

“Restraint in a fight?”, she couldn’t understand that. Eda had always told her to be poised, which Lilith had also criticized in her technique. That she wasn’t poised enough. How was one poised and restrained at the same time?

Her teacher chuckled, then she tapped Luz’s sword that she had pushed on the ground, propping herself up on it. Luz immediately took her stance again and lifted her sword, furrowing her eyebrows, anticipating Lilith’s next move.

“First of all, a sword must be guided, as I said already. Sometimes, moving slower at first makes it easier to know the movements you can do. You remember what we just did with the different hits.”, she showed Luz a simple pattern of an eight, lying horizontally, as she crossed the sword’s line in front of her and drew long curves up and down on her sides. Luz observed her carefully before trying it out herself, quickly learning the organic movement and trying to keep Lilith’s pace.

The wooden sword bumped against her hips and thighs and even her shoulder, once, while Lilith’s kept close to her body but never hit herself.

“See, you have to feel exactly where the sword is, Luz. Look at me, don’t look at your hand, and try not to hit yourself for at least ten rounds.”

Luz quickly found that to be impossible. Most times when she tried speeding up along with Lilith, she lost control and with minding to keep her wrist loose, she hit herself quite often. Luckily, the sword was made of wood.

Lilith nodded, finally after the third attempt, and Luz stopped her sword, looking to the floor. The bruises that already started to form would be her lesson and her punishment, she supposed. But instead of chastising her, Lilith acted so much like Eda.

She leaned down to the child, put her hand on her shoulder, and nodded at her.

“Good work, Luz. You will have to practice a lot, still, but do not worry. I don’t expect you to excel at all practices within just a few minutes. It takes weeks, months to perfect the technique of the sword, and you have to invest many hours until you can lead your sword not to hit yourself anymore.”

The girl tried a smile, before looking up again and nodding at Lilith.

“What’s the next lesson?”, she asked and her teacher nodded at her.

“The next lesson is your footwork. You have to take care not to stumble over your own legs. What you showed me already is good so far, but you jump too much. You want your feet to be planted to the ground firmly, and you never want to jump, unless absolutely necessary. Here, see.”

She made room for Luz to walk in a straight line.

“Show me again what you showed me in the beginning.”, she encouraged the girl and Luz attempted to incorporate all the techniques she had already learned but quickly lost her rhythm and Lilith shook her head.

“Again, and don’t mind the techniques from before. I just want to see your footwork, for now, you can practice the other techniques soon enough once they’re automated.”, she smiled at Luz before nodding at her again, “Now, again.”

Luz did her line once more, three steps, back, then another three steps, and Lilith held up a hand, nodding at her.

“Yes, you move dynamically and smoothly, that is already a huge step, but you have to take care not to jump. And you walk fast, so fast that your knees almost hit each other. Move slower, with more determination, and try to keep your feet out of each other’s way. Just like you already do by crossing them, but slower.”

Luz tried her former rhythm again and Lilith nodded as she watched her, this time seeming pleased. “Yes, that is already better. You don’t move erratically when fighting. You always try to direct your energy from one side to the other, never stopping or balking. Do you understand?”, Luz furrowed her eyebrows in concentration, so Lilith now conjured up a spell circle. Immediately, both children looked up, Gus even sitting up straighter. This was the first time they saw Lilith using magic, and they were not about to miss it. She made a little mountain out of stone, just pushing it out of the field, and conjured a little water spring up on the top. The water made its way down the miniature hill, finding the smoothest way down, without stopping at a pebble in its way, “Here, see? Think of it as water. It moves smoothly, never stops, even here, where it makes a small lake.”

Luz watched in fascination as the water pooled in a little dip in the slope, but she could observe it spiraling, twisting, before searching for another way out. Lilith was right, there was no drop of water that was standing still.

She nodded slowly, not paying any mind to Gus who had watched her perform the spells closely, and turned away from them to practice what he had seen Lilith demonstrate just now.

Lilith smiled at her again, then she picked up her own sword.

“Do you remember the movement we made before, to practice the flow of the sword?”, she repeated the pattern of the lying eight again and Luz watched her closely, “You never see me stopping or slowing down. It’s the same as with this water. Even if I hit another sword, I stay in the movement, never lose any of my momenta.”

She gestured for Luz to present her sword again and the girl did as she was asked, watching with fascination as Lilith showed her how she fluently translated the movement of her sword into a hit, letting her blade slash against Luz’s, before letting it sink down, slash past her blade, twist it around and go for another hit. She never stopped or hesitated in her movements and they always stayed fluent.

Luz grinned in fascination, before readying herself.

“Can I try?”, she asked and Lilith nodded encouragingly, presenting her sword so Luz could practice. Meanwhile, behind her, Gus had already managed to make small pillars of stone from the grass, giggling to himself as he now attempted the water spell.

Lilith instructed her how to move her sword so it would hit accordingly, and watched her trying to slowly translate her movements from hit to swirling fluently, as Lilith had demonstrated. She couldn’t help but feel a little bit of pride in Luz demonstrating how well she could handle the sword after just an hour of practicing.

If she had observed anything in that girl, it was that Luz learned incredibly fast if someone showed her first, and all that she lacked was the automated movement, the muscle memory, that she could train for.

It wasn’t hard at all for Lilith to admit that she was impressed with Edalyn’s children.

They practiced for a little longer, Lilith showing her a few details about footwork, and sword positioning and even began explaining the basics of stabbing to her, before summoning a puppet for her to practice on. Luz began practicing everything she had just learned and while Lilith knew that she would never be able to combine all these things without at least some coordination and muscle memory that could only be trained in months of work, she was proud to see that the girl tried to mind everything she had just told her, concentrating and making sure to move slowly, as her teacher had advised her to.

When she turned to look after Gus, she was even more surprised, though. The little boy of merely five years was sitting on the grass of her lawn, little pillars the height of his knees, made out of stone decorating the ground around him, and as he was drawing a bright blue spell circle, a little spring of water was created on a pillar between his legs. He stuck his tongue out in concentration, yet the spring dried up within a minute.

She had always known her sister was an exceptional witch, and she had also known her magical abilities, as well as her fighting skills, were paralleled by only a few knights she knew, but her kids were even an exception from her.

As she saw it now, these two were insanely talented.

But it didn’t surprise her as much as she would have liked to admit. If Edalyn was already such a skilled knight and witch, who said the children she would choose to adopt wouldn’t be as skilled as her.

Luz showed a lot of potential as a knight, because even if her technique was still the uncoordinated slashing of a child, she showed a wonderful understanding of the basics, and was willing to practice with focus and determination.

Meanwhile, Gus was very skilled with magic, at such a tender age. He already showed more understanding of magic than any of the children of his age, and if he continued like this, he would grow up to be a powerful witch, maybe even able to be a king someday.

Lilith slowly made her way over to the chipper boy, eyeing all the stone pillars over her lawn that he had made, then she stopped by where he was seated, pulling up her eyebrows.

“Say, Gus, did you do construction magic before?”, she asked and the little boy grinned up to her, shaking his head.

“But you just did!”, he explained and Lilith tried not to splutter.

“You just created these pillars because you were able to observe my spell?”, she asked and the little boy nodded, grinning. Lilith gave him an approving nod, before conjuring herself a temporary bench to sit on since she had difficulties kneeling down to his level, and watched him creating another stone pillar to try the water spell again. Eda had told her he was already excelling at illusions magic, and she suspected that he might have been born in Illna, but she couldn’t be sure.

But when Lilith softly kicked against one of his pillars, it didn’t puff up in smoke. She raised her eyebrows.

“Can you conjure an illusion that looks just like the pillars you just made?”, she asked softly, and the five-year-old boy nodded enthusiastically.

“Yes! That’s easy!”, he said, before conjuring up a stone pillar that looked identical to the one before him, and when he tried to touch it, that pillar vanished without a trace. Lilith nodded again, still not quite believing that he had figured out the spell immediately, but it seemed she had been proven wrong.

“Can you make them bigger?”, she asked and he furrowed his eyebrows, before conjuring up the next one, but it came out the same size as the other ones. He furrowed his eyebrows again, yet Lilith was still impressed with him. This was not an easy feat, to learn a completely new range of magic within a few minutes, and especially not common for a five-year-old like him.

“That’s not a problem. Someday you’ll make them taller.”, she reassured him and he nodded, seeming certain.

“Tomorrow.”, he said and Lilith furrowed her eyebrows, looking at him questioningly.

“Tomorrow?”, she echoed and he grinned up at her, letting off his most recent water spell.

“My magic gets better by day, Eda says.”, he proudly stated and Lilith almost couldn’t believe it. Edalyn had really found a little magic genius.

“Ah, I understand. And what about that water spell?”, she asked, making the little boy turn back to his attempts to make water sprout from his little stone pillar. He grumbled a little and pouted, before trying again, managing to keep it running for a few seconds, before it petered out again.

“It goes dry…”, he mumbled and she leaned down to him a little, drawing the spell circle again. He watched intently as she used the magic to create a water source on the pillar he had made.

“See, you conjure the water from deeper in the ground and let it bubble up. That way you have more ground to work with and to help you. And when you’ve managed to make a little water, you concentrate to reel it in, pull it out and let it flow.”

He observed as she made another spell circle and, once again, let water flow from a stone pillar before he tried as well. She watched him performing a nearly perfect spell, and now, he managed to hold the water source for a whole five minutes, before it dried out again.

Deeply impressed, Lilith sat straighter. She had seen exactly what little details he had done wrong in his conjuring, but those were mostly practice flaws, easily corrected by conjuring the spell time and time again. This was really impressive.

“… Can you show me some of your illusion magic?”, she finally asked and the little boy happily obliged, conjuring up some illusions that kids twice his age would have problems with.

To say Lilith was impressed was an understatement by now.

Gus showed her how he could conjure some flowers, growing all around him, yet when she touched them, they puffed up in the air. Tomorrow she would show him some plant magic to allow him to recreate his illusion for real.

She doubted Eda hadn’t already shown him some plant magic spells, but as she knew her sister, her spells were always a bit chaotic and wild, much like her spirit.

Lilith’s spells were a lot more structured and orderly, so she wasn’t that much surprised that Gus could read her spells like a book, but that he had been able to recreate them almost exactly at his young age was another story.

She supposed she would have a lot of fun with this boy and with teaching him magic. He could learn a lot from her and even when Eda had a lot of magic to perform as well, she supposed the boy could handle her pristine, perfectly practiced spells a lot better than Eda’s powerful, emotional ones.

After a while, Lilith was still practicing with Gus, Luz stopped training on the puppet and dropped her sword by the other one on the bench, before joining her little brother and her aunt, she supposed, to watch them have their fun.

She had always been fascinated by magic, even going so much as resenting that she didn’t have a bile sac, but it always made her feel better to watch Gus perform magic.

It was a joy to see her little brother giggling and grinning from one pointy ear to the other when he was performing spells and perfecting them, and she loved watching how he joyfully managed new spells or concentratedly made sure to practice a spell over and over to be sure that he could perform it whenever.

She joined Lilith on her makeshift bench, wiping the sweat from her forehead and encouraging Gus to hold the water glyph for longer, before gratefully accepting a water spring from Lilith so she could wash her face and drink a little, before hopping off and leaving the two witches to themselves.

She wandered through the garden, still hearing Gus’s giggles from afar, and visited the little pavilion. After making sure that Lilith had put back the treasure map in the hollow piece of the railing, she ventured on. Now, with Lilith in the gardens, she couldn’t dare to climb the house, so she merely wandered on, to visit the little garden gnome, the old wise one, to see if he was still there.

And so he was, she discovered as she found it, still covered in moss, sitting in the undergrowth of the little forest area of the gardens.

Now, finally, she also spotted the mansion across from the Clawthorne mansion.

There were big houses all around them, one bordering each side of the park around Lilith’s home, but the other two on the streets didn’t interest her as much. She had seen them through the fence the day before and they were similar to this one where they were living now, but the one on the backside was different.

It was bigger, way bigger than Lilith’s house, and its garden spanned two mansions, Lilith’s and her neighbor’s. It was massive.

She squinted her eyes to look through the gardens, but couldn’t spot much more than the rough dimensions and some of the back porch, which was more of a theater stage than anything. She had never been to an actual theater, but Eda had shown her the ruins of one, and she still remembered the massive dimensions of that one. If the back porch was as big as that, how big was the house, then?

Humming, Luz leaned against the fence and pushed her face against the iron bars, masterfully formed into leaves and berries. Lilith’s parents really hadn’t spared any expenses building this house. But if the Clawthornes already spent so much on their residence… How much had the residents of the mansion on the backside spent on theirs?

Luz tapped the iron bars.

Eda had said that the inn was too expensive to live in, and even if she had tried to gloss over that with a joke, Luz couldn’t stop thinking about it.

She knew she and Gus were expensive to dress, feed and entertain. She knew that because Eda had actually told her, she had to pay four times what she had paid before to get a meal because she had to feed herself, her two children, and the demon wolf now.

Finally scowling, Luz pushed herself off the fence.

If these people had so much money, it wouldn’t hurt them to give something to her mentor, she decided. She had often climbed into houses at night, and taken some of their belongings. And if she had learned something, then that the bigger the house was, the smaller was the chance of being discovered sneaking around in it.

Patting down her pants, Luz emerged from the undergrowth and directed her steps back to Lilith and Gus who were still practicing magic, her thoughts running quickly and wildly. She knew she had promised Eda not to steal anything while living with Lilith, and she knew Lilith wouldn’t like her stealing from her neighbors, but they had so much. Luz would never understand how some people could have so much and let orphans like her starve.

Adjusting her shirt, she finally sat down next to Lilith again and inconspicuously looked over to where she had spotted the giant mansion.

She would just sneak over at night and grab some stuff that they didn’t need anyway, and then she would be on her way. She would feel better about Eda having some money again, and she would stop stealing after that, she promised.

Besides. Eda had always said that it wasn’t stealing when they took from rich people. It was distributing their wealth evenly.

That was a difference, and as much as Luz disagreed most times, she had never seen a house as big as theirs. She couldn’t imagine they needed everything in there, especially when her mentor couldn’t pay their inn anymore. Her decision was made and she knew exactly, she was good enough to sneak over, get in and steal something without a trace. They would never know, Lilith would never know and Eda would have some more money not to worry about having children.

Or possibly giving them away.

Luz shuddered at that. She had had that thought a few times already, and it had never been pleasant. That Eda decided one day that her children were too expensive, and to get rid of them. Because she couldn’t care for them anymore. Shaking her head to herself, she decided to never let Eda have that decision. Before she would be given back to an orphanage, she would pull her own weight.

---

Let me know if you liked it! The aus I've been talking about have admittedly been on hiatus the past few days, but I am still determined to write them! Just, as soon as all the organizing is through in my life x) Moving 400km away from home is quite a stressful matter, as it turns out.

#toh #the owl house #luz noceda #gus porter #lilith clawthorne #eda clawthorne #medieval au #noble pursuit #fanfic #my work

[levshany]

Would Camila hit Philip with the chancla at least once

every self-respecting toh au must have a scene where Camila hits Philip with a chancla

I don't know if I'm going to put this scene into the plot or make an out-of-context picture but we always can speculate about stuff so. A lot of letters under the cut

If Camila would find out that her daughter has bonded with a giant bird, she would probably be shocked at first, but after they met, she said:

"okay, my daughter always had troubles with making friends and finally found someone who accepts her. And subconsciously, I always knew that it would be either a same crazy kid, or a troll"

I mean in the original show Camila very quickly accepted Vee even she was a salamander who used to pretend her daughter. And I think just one bird here wouldn't be a big deal for her. even if it's a medieval setting

So yeah Camila would quickly got used to Philip and grew bolder when she got to know him better. And she would start setting conditions for Philip, like if you try to steal food from the table, you get hit on the head with a slipper. and he would get these hits. because he thinks that stolen food is tastier than ordinary food, and getting hit in the head with a chancla is worth it

Another idea. Luz and Philip got caught in the rain while flying and returned home soaked to the skin. and Camila was afraid that Luz might get sick and die (and we know that in the middle ages it was not so difficult to die from a cold), and she yelled at Philip and slapped him with a chancla because it was his responsibility to keep the girl safe

#toh hamayun au

[azure-wolf-227]

TOH Werebeasts AU

It’s basically a Werewolf AU but with more than just Werewolves.

The setting is fantasy medieval/middle ages, with kingdoms, knights and magic. While most of the canon human characters remain as humans, the canon witch/demon characters are either humans or werebeasts depending on what role they play. The witch characters that are now humans still have magic powers, but are called Mages.

Werebeasts are a race of beings that can shift between a humanoid form and beast form. They also have and in-between form that’s mix of their humanoid and beast forms. Werebeasts in their humanoid form are recognized by their pointed ears.

Werebeasts’ are either based on a single animal or are a mix of several. What type of animal or animal-mix the Beast Forms are based on depends on family relations and the Werebeasts’ individuality. For example, all the Clawthornes have bird-based Beast forms, but the type of bird each member is it’s different: Eda - owl, Lilith - raven, Gwen - hawk, Dell - yellow cardinal.

All Werebeasts are quadrupedal in their Beast Forms and somewhat mammalian-like even if their are based on bird, insects, or reptiles. They are also much larger than their animal counterparts, even when the animal is usually small.

Although most Werebeasts are born, humans are capable of becoming Werebeasts by way of a magic ritual. The ritual itself is not common knowledge and many Werebeasts think it’s a legend (it’s not).

Werebeasts are often persecuted by humans, so many of them either live in isolation or try to blend in. There are towns and villages that happily accept Werebeasts living amongst them.

Philip/Belos is a powerful lord who seeks to exterminate all the Werebeasts because his brother fell in love with one. Although he only controls a single region, he has been known to secretly send mercenaries and bounty hunter into ‘Werebeast Friendly’ regions to hunt down any Werebeasts seeking refuge.

Eda's curse in this AU is a condition some Werebeasts have that causes them to suddenly give in to their animal instincts and become feral. The condition is often looked down by other Werebeasts despite it being manageable with the right medication. She lives in a house deep in the woods bordering a Werebeast Friendly town.

King is Beast-Locked, a rare condition that makes him unable to take on a humanoid form so he is locked into the form of a beast - though he can take on an inbetween form. Beast-Locked Werebeasts are also often looked down upon as defective.

Luz is the only apparent survivor of a village that was destroyed in a monster attack; she was found and adopted by Eda. Although Luz starts out as human, she would eventually become a Werebeast.

Raine is Eda’s ex who has been working to save other Werebeasts from being killed. They saved the BATTs (Derwin, Katya, and Amber) after their families got killed, and practically adopted the three. While looking for a new home, they reunite with Eda and join her “pack.” The two eventually rekindle their romance.

Hunter is not a Grimwalker, but rather, a Werebeast and the biological son of Caleb Witterbane and Evelyn Clawthorne (who is Eda’s cousin in this AU). His uncle Philip murdered his parents and kidnapped him when he was a baby. Philip then proceeded to use magic to seal away Hunter’s Beast Form and pass him off as a full-human, lying to Hunter that his parents were killed by Werebeasts. Hunter eventually finds out the truth and unseals his Beast Form.

Here is a list of some of the characters that are Werebeasts and what animal/animal mix they are based on:

Eda is an Own Beast like in canon, though her face in Beast Form is more animalistic.

Raine is a fox/bat hybrid in reference to their fox Palisman and to reference the BATTs.

Luz’s eventual Beast Form is a mix of otter, cat, and snake.

King is an undetermined canine hybrid. Instead of a skull head, the upper part of his head has white fur and his left ear has a the upper half missing.

Amber is a full on Bat Beast because she already had bat traits in canon; Katya is a bat/cat hybrid in reference to her name starting with ‘Kat’ and to reference the CATTs; Derwin is a bat/dog hybrid for not particular reason except that I wanted him to be that.

Amity is a Cat Beast to reference her cat Palisman. She resembles a housecat but is the size of a big cat like a leopard or a lion.

Willow is a Bee Beast, essentially a Bee-version of the Owl Beast. This is a reference to her bee Palisman.

Gus is a Chameleon Beast, in reference to his chameleon Palisman.

Hunter is a red cardinal/wolf hybrid to reference his (first) Palisman and his love of wolves. Evelyn was a Red Cardinal Beast while Caleb was a human who became a Wolf Beast.

Lilith, Gwen, and Dell are bird based beast in reference to their canon Palismen.

#toh werebeast au #the owl house #toh fanfic idea

[pmpkinns]

Enjoy my medieval beta Lumity au ^^ more to come from this AU!

My Instagram: _tiredleaf_

#lumity #the owl house #amity blight #luz noceda #the owl house fanart #beta Lumity #beta luz #beta amity #toh medieval au

[doesromandoart]

"I'll be your fearless champion!" lumity medieval au? lumity medieval au

painted over this screencap from Enchanting Grom Freight

#painting #screencap redraw #oof the lighting on this is wack #luz noceda #amity blight #lumity #lumity au #lumity medieval au #the owl house #toh au

[tri-chan]

TOH - Worth the Fight, Chapter 17 by @rohad93

Now that the chapter is published, I can publish that illustration! It was done shortly before Immortal Devotion started. Glad I can show it now!

#The Owl House #Lumity #TOH #Luz Noceda #Amity Blight #King #Medieval AU #Worth The Fight

[drabbles-of-writing]

Medieval AU in which monsters exist but are hunted. The blights are royalty known for the hunting of monsters & when each of them turn 18 they must go & bring back a part of a dangerous monster. Luz is one of those dragons who can turn into a human form & Amity tries to kill her for her wings. Key word tries. Amity gets her ass kicked by the flying adhd fireball. They end up in a cat & mouse situation until they find a middle ground & then gay™. -Punk Anon

Punk you can’t DO THIS to me I have SO FUCKING MUCH ON MY PLATE and then you give me THIS,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,and you expect me to IGNORE IT??????????

#asks #medieval au #the owl house #luz noceda #amity blight #luz #amity #toh #dragon #punk anon #hunting #storybook au

[elmiron-vanilla]

Just a wip of a comic of The owl house Medieval Au UwU

#the owl house lumity #the owl house luz #the owl house amity #the owl house #the owl house fanart #toh fanart #fanart #the owl house au #lumity #medieval #my art

[3laxx]

Noble Pursuit - Chapter 5

Luz and Gus go for a treasure hunt by day and Luz and Eda have a heart-to-heart by night. A job offer is accepted and a touch of fate clings to it.

I'm back on this fic! Oh man, I was at a festival and now I'm down with Covid. A lot is happening in my life right now! xD

But! I haven't abandoned this fic and I will of course continue uploading chapters for it! As you guys know it's very slow burn and I intend to keep it that way, so, it'll be a big fic in the long run x) I hope you'll be okay with that! Have fun reading! <3

Ao3 / FF.net

---

Almost jumping in joy, she looked back to Gus who was just as excited as her, running as fast as he could, with a big smile on his face. Soon enough, they had reached the back end of the fence, and just a minute later, they had found what the map referred to as the “Old wise one”.

Or, at least, what should have been. Once the kids had broken through the bushes and reached the spot they thought was marked, they were disappointed to just find more undergrowth. Had the map lost its meaning?

Was where the former treasure had been buried overgrown now?

She hummed in disappointment, before nudging Gus.

“You got a bit of magic around here?”, she asked and he shrugged, looking around.

“No…”, he mumbled and she could tell he was concentrating. Slanting her lips, Luz continued on until she reached the fence and patted down the corner post but it wouldn’t sound hollow, or be anything out of the ordinary.

Her shoulders slumping, she returned to Gus and handed him the map.

“The treasure’s gone already, then?”, she asked and he opened the map again, his dark eyes flickering over what was written. Suddenly, Luz perked up at the back side. She hadn’t even thought to check the back.

Turning the map around, the two children now saw a more detailed drawing of the area they were in.

The corner was still inhabited by a part of the house but the rest of the garden was gone. Instead, the trail of the treasure hunt now started at the corner of the house and there were numbers and directions on each path of the angular path.

Luz assumed it was supposed to be North and the number of steps to be taken with each cardinal direction. Boy was she glad Eda had taught them to read the sun and stars to know where they were, even if she still had trouble doing that.

Running back to the house corner, she was followed by Gus who sent a gaze towards the glass room where Eda and Lilith were still sitting.

“What are they doing?”, he asked and Luz looked back at him. He seemed concerned.

“Lilith wants Eda to do some mission for her, but I don’t think Eda wants to.”, she explained as she had understood it and Gus nodded slowly.

“What if Eda does the mission?”, he asked and Luz sighed, shrugging her shoulders.

“I guess we’ll stay for longer then.”, suddenly, it occurred to her that she hadn’t even told him about her morning, “Which won’t be too bad!”

Gus looked back at her with a question in his expression and Luz grinned.

“I made a friend! And I told her that I’d bring you along the next time I can go visit her!”, she proudly puffed her chest out and Gus grinned back.

“A friend?”, he asked, beaming. The two of them never had many friends. In the orphanages the children hadn’t really been friends, they had just slept in the same room. And outside of it, under Eda’s care, they were constantly traveling and busy with their jobs. They couldn’t just go to school or join the kids on the streets and make friends. It would make them attached, and Eda didn’t want them to be, since she had stressed multiple times that if anyone knew who they were, they could get caught and be sent to prison.

It had prevented any chance to make friends, and furthermore fueled the desire, but at the same time, it made them scared to be close to anyone.

The thing with Willow had just happened, though.

And besides, she doubted Eda would pull a big job here in the city. She wouldn’t even accept Lilith’s mission and they would be out of here sooner than later. Having a friend here wouldn’t hurt.

Nodding, Luz grinned at him and Gus gave a big smile before they focused back on the map and turned it to align with their position. When the corner of the house was on the same side as the map showed, they turned to the first cardinal direction, finding it much easier to just follow the map than to find their directions themselves.

The two children decided on one of them to count the steps, which was Luz because she had longer legs and since Eda was so tall, they had to make big steps. Following the instructions on the map, they took five steps North and three back South, before turning East and walking a whole lot of steps, thirty, until they reached the shrubbery again.

Gus pulled away from the bushes so Luz could take the last five of her East steps before they turned North again and followed the path as long as they could. Finally, Luz looked up.

“Three… Four… Five.”, she counted, “It should be here!”

Gus looked around and pouted, finding nothing but leaves, bushes, and all kinds of bugs, but not what they were searching for. Between all the young plants, nothing looked old or wise.

Pouting, Gus looked back at her, clearly searching for guidance from her. Luz merely shrugged, then she turned around herself and took another step.

“I can’t see anything…”, she mumbled, before looking back down to the map, “It could be that the old wise one isn’t here anymore.”

Gus followed her into the undergrowth before he suddenly stumbled and fall against Luz. She could barely hold herself up enough so they wouldn’t both drop into the thorns. Helping Gus back up, she looked back at him.

“You okay? What was that?”, she asked and Gus looked back to where he had placed his boot. Sure enough, a stone was poking out from under the moss, clearly ripped off the slippery surface of the polished stone where Gus’ shoe had slipped. He walked back around it and wiped at the stone, furrowing his eyebrows, before a smile lit up his face.

“It’s the old wise one!”, he announced and Luz was by his side in a heartbeat, squishing her cheek against his as she grabbed his shoulders.

Sure enough, it was a tiny statue of an old man, sitting there between leaves and smaller plants, covered in moss. Luz grinned as well, starting where Gus had stopped and freed the poor gnome from the moss around his neck and down his shoulders.

He looked old and wise, sure enough, and a small blessed smile decorated his carved face. The two children looked at each other with a smile, before Gus poked the gnome.

“So where is the treasure?”, he asked and the statue stayed as still as before. He gave a frustrated groan, but Luz shook her head.

“Wait, let me try something.”, she mumbled and gave the map to her little brother to try and lift the gnome with both hands. Sure enough, after a bit of shaking and pulling, the little statue came free and she held it in her hands, looking back to where it stood. A small pedestal was all that was left and nothing seemed like there was a treasure or another hint.

Looking back at the statue, she turned it around and discovered some writings on the foot of it, her face immediately lighting up again.

“Gus, there’s something written on here!”, she grinned, before spinning the statue accordingly, then she began reading, “What you seek is hidden, what you desire forbidden.”

Giggling, Gus dropped to his knees next to her.

“Sweets!”, he announced and Luz had to laugh at that as well.

“That’s true!”, she turned back to the gnome, “If you wish to go my path, be warned. I’ll be full of wrath, and don’t want you harmed. If you dare, come and glare, the griffin into its eyes, and don’t meet your demise.”

That’s where the poem ended. Humming, Luz turned the gnome over again and placed him back on the pedestal, before looking at Gus.

“What griffin, though?”, he wondered and Luz slowly nodded at that.

“I didn’t see any stables nearby.”, she shrugged, and Gus agreed with a hum. He hadn’t seen any stables either. Looking around, both children couldn’t see anything, so they got up and started wandering around. They had already explored one side, where the garden behind the wall and the pavilion had been. Now, they were walking down the side of the house where they hadn’t been yet, discovering a fountain and a small terrace, smaller than the one at the back of the house, with some stone benches and a chess table. Luz furrowed her eyebrows at that.

Who would want to play chess outside?

They continued along the house, looking around for a griffin, but they couldn’t spot one. There were no stables, no fences, nothing to house an animal like a griffin. When they reached the front of the house, and the fence bordering the street, Luz felt frustrated and disappointed. They hadn’t found a griffin.

Rounding the house, they passed the entrance area and walked farther, around the house, and starting again on the other side. It started with a big area of fine, red gravel, almost like sand but coarser, with a fence at the side of it and some old, rotten armor standing at the side. A training area, for knights, as Luz understood.

She immediately grinned, running out into the field.

She hadn’t even seen it from the backside, she had been too far behind the bushes and then occupied with the pavilion and ultimately, the treasure hunt, to notice.

“Gus, this is amazing! I bet this is where Eda learned her skills in fighting!”, Luz did some mock movements with an imaginary sword, before exploring the field. There was an area for different terrains, a terrace, a sand pit, and some smaller boulders, just about her size, over which Luz could easily jump. Gus was following close behind, trying to keep up with his sister, but her feet touched the sand first.

“This is perfect for training!”, she dreamed, looking around as she took in the field again. People could be training on the grass, on the red gravel, or on the different options for the terrain. Or the training could just happen in the bushes, between the trees, on the trees.

Luz giggled at the thought as she imagined Eda and her trainer jumping around on the big branches of the trees around this area, maybe even starting to fight on the roof!

Gus followed with big steps to get past the sand, then he accompanied her on the red gravel again and looked back to the fence.

“What’s that for?”, he asked and Luz grinned widely as she led him over.

“See, that’s jousting! It’s easy, you go to this side and I go to this one. And now imagine we both have a demon to ride, a hell horse, for example, and have two very long sticks. And then we run at each other!”, she ran along her side, Gus copying her on his, and she held out her arm to mimic the jousting spear she knew of since she had observed a tournament once.

They stopped in the middle and Luz laughed as she tried poking Gus over the high fence, way too high for a little girl like her to reach over.

“And then! Then we try to push each other out of the saddle! And whoever manages wins!”, she announced, pretending to be hit by Gus and falling back on her side of the fence, holding her ribcage.

“I’ve been hit, I’ve been hit!”, Gus giggled along with her, until she jumped up again and imagined a sword in her hand, “But! It’s not over yet! If the losing knight can get back up, they can challenge the standing one!”

Gus climbed under the fence to her side and they pretended to duel for a moment, until Luz fell into the sand again, grinning at Gus who threatened her throat with his air sword.

“Oh noo, you got me!”, she announced, but then grabbed his feet, “What if I do this, though!”

They both rolled in the sand for a bit, laughing and wrestling, until Luz was finally proclaimed the winner and they got back up.

Both shook the sand out of their clothes before continuing on, Luz leading her brother to the rotten stands.

“And that’s where knights get their swords! And their spears! That’s where they put them up and wait for their turn to be used. And here!”, she walked past the stands towards a circular area with a hole in the middle of a dirt circle, surrounded by tiles in arms range, “Here, you can put up a dummy and practice your feet, because you have to be fast and avoid stumbling, that’s why there’s a specific dance for that!”

“A dance?”, Gus chuckled and Luz nodded excitedly, positioning herself and imagining a wooden dummy in the middle of the circle, holding out her imaginary sword.

“Yes, and it goes like this. You gotta… Cross your legs like that, and you aren’t allowed to jump, and shuffle your feet! Here, you try!”, she put her brother on her spot and urged him to attempt the steps, his right leg over his left one, and pull the left one up front again, to sneak around the dummy.

“And now surprise him!”, she cried and Gus pounced, stabbing the air with his imaginary sword and Luz cheered.

“Yeah, I did it!”, Gus exclaimed, holding up his sword.

“You did! You surprised the enemy and you’ve slain him!”, she giggled, ruffling his hair, before remembering why they were here, “Let’s go search for the griffin again?”

Smiling, Gus nodded and followed her off the training track, trudging along the slightly wet grass, while they kept an eye out for a griffin, maybe a wild one to fly overhead, but they couldn’t spot anything. Soon, they reached the big terrace on the back again and Luz sighed, her shoulders slumping. Eda and Lilith were still talking and she hadn’t spotted a griffin. According to his expression, Gus hadn’t either.

Grumbling, the two kids sat down on the steps up to the porch, and Luz put her head in her hands, pouting to herself. It couldn’t be so hard finding a griffin, no?

She softly shuffled her feet, then she looked over to Gus who had seemed to rip off a little flower before, carefully examining it and ripping at its petals. She watched him for a while as he took great care to look at every single detail of the flower, before she leaned back and groaned, lying on her elbows as she looked up to the sky.

It was of its normal faded orange color that usually became much stronger in the evenings and mornings with the rising and sinking sun. She watched some clouds going by before starting to see shapes in them.

It wasn’t uncommon for her to stare up at the sky. She practiced occupying herself with stuff, and she had gotten good at entertaining herself when nobody else was available. In the orphanage, although she barely remembered that time, she was to herself. The other kids had been to themselves as well.

They had some short conversations, but they had all known it would be more likely to be adopted if they had no emotional bonds. Parents rarely adopted in a bunch. Come to think of it, parents barely adopted. She had never witnessed a kid getting adopted by anyone. Some ran away, to make their fate their own, and some had stayed into their teen years before getting sent off to work. Often, the orphanages had to throw the older children out, make new rooms, and feed the younger ones.

Some died.

Luz had seen many children die. It was a common thing in their orphanage, deeply in the countryside, that some starved children couldn’t make it.

Luz had been used to seeing children die. It was a day-to-day thing. She had seen them not getting up in the morning, their body cool to the touch, or she had seen them in the streets, already just skin and bones, too weak to return to the orphanage and maybe get their life-saving meal.

She had been lucky she was so resistant.

Luz had always been on the skinny side, she was fortunate she had survived and not ended like them.

Shrugging, the small girl shook her head.

She didn’t want to think about the unmoving comrades that wouldn’t get up from their bunks, even if their orphanage master came to yell at them and slap them. She had just cared about herself, gotten up in time, and never received slaps because she had always stayed to herself. It had been good and normal that way. It had been what every kid had strived for.

And then she had met Eda, who had told many stories and who had a sword and a big life and enough food to feed herself twice.

For Luz, who had listened and watched this otherworldly stranger, that had been fascinating. She hadn’t even noticed leaving the orphanage behind. She had just wanted to be close to this fascinating witch, shaking mind-blowing spells from her sleeve and seeming like the better option.

Humming, Luz looked over to Gus again, then she followed the house wall up towards the sky again with her eyes, observing how little birds nested in the gutter way up there, before something caught her eye. She knew some rich houses were equipped with waterspouts to keep the walls dry, but some had faces. Like this particular one.

On the far side of the house, just above the corner towards the pavilion, she spotted a gargoyle that looked just like a griffin.

Getting up, she stared at it while softly slapping Gus’ shoulder. He hummed but didn’t get up with her, still looking at his flower that he had ripped apart now, and had rested every single part on his small hand to look at it.

She approached the far corner and, albeit having to blink against the bright light from the sun above, she definitely recognized the beak and the feathers that had been etched into the stone. Its beak was widely opened, for the water to flow down its throat and away from the walls. She grinned at that.

“Hey Gus, I found our griffin!”, she exclaimed and within a second, Gus was by her side. He looked up with her and spotted the gargoyle as well, his mouth opened and his eyes squinted against the late summer sun.

“Wow!”, he breathed, then he patted her shoulder, “But how are we gonna stare in its eyes?”

Remembering the poem from the little garden gnome, she sighed.

“Uh… I don’t know, actually. Look the griffin into its eyes and don’t meet your demise, was it?”, she recited and Gus nodded.

“Does that mean we have to climb up there?”

Sending a testing gaze back to the room of glass, Luz shrugged. Eda couldn’t see them from this angle.

“But I don’t know how…”, she admitted, slanting her lips. There were no trees close enough for them to climb, and she hadn’t seen a ladder or anything. Looking back up to the griffin, she grumbled.

“Maybe we can climb the wall?”, Gus piped up and Luz inspected the corner of the house. Big stones jutted out the otherwise flat wall, like a ladder up there, but she doubted she wanted to be caught by Eda while climbing up there.

“Yeah, maybe… But what if Eda’s done while one of us is up there?”, she asked and Gus shrugged.

“Maybe she won’t notice?”, he asked, to which Luz nearly shot him a deadpanning look. He ducked his head.

“As if Eda wouldn’t notice…”, she looked back up again, “Maybe, now that we know the house has griffin statues, we can look around for a stone griffin somewhere in the gardens or around the house?”

Enthusiastically, Gus nodded, grinning widely.

“Oh, yes! That could work!”, he cheered. Quickly, both children set out to find any and all griffin statues they could find, yet after a few minutes of searching all around the house and even around the shrubbery and undergrowth around the fence, they couldn’t find anything. Luz, however, wasn’t ready to give up yet. Maybe the griffin was like the gnome, hidden and overgrown with moss, maybe it was right under their noses and they just had to look more closely!

Yet, just as she began her second round of the garden, Eda stepped out of the house and called for them. Gus was the first one back with her and Luz fought her way out of the bushes to come back to her mentor who was waiting for her with a tapping foot and crossed arms with her demon wolf puppy sitting by her legs and greeting Luz with a happy gruff.

Gulping, Luz drew closer.

“Sorry Eda, I’m here!”, she called and the witch merely huffed at that, before patting her children down and freeing them of any dust or leaves they had collected on their clothes. Luz scratched King behind his ears while Eda was busy cleaning up Gus to the best of her abilities.

Lilith watched from the glass room, pulling up her eyebrows. Eda shot her a glare when she giggled as she pulled a whole twig from Luz’s tousled locks.

“Where have you been, child? You’re wearing half the garden.”, she chastised and Luz pouted.

“We found a treasure map, Eda! And we searched for the old wise one, which we found, but the griffin is missing… We thought we could find it.”, the child explained herself before Eda chuckled.

“You found a treasure map, huh?”, she repeated and Luz and Gus both nodded seriously, big eyes looking back at her. Her gaze flickered up to the gargoyle and she chuckled.

“I’m afraid I have to cut your treasure hunt short now. We have to go because momma has some stuff to do.”, she mumbled, before softly ruffling Luz’s hair.

When they approached Lilith still standing in the frame, her body heavily relying on her cane to keep her upright, she spared a little smile at her sister and her kids, nodding at her.

“They won your heart, it seems.”, she teased and Luz could feel the sisters were on much friendlier terms now, and even if she was happy about that, it itched her to know how the treasure hunt would continue.

“They’re my kids.”, Eda somehow made it sound like she both explained and dismissed Lilith’s statement just now and Luz tilted her head at the older witch.

“You don’t have kids?”, she asked.

It hadn’t occurred to her yet that an adult could have no kids at all. When she had come here, she had automatically assumed Lilith had kids but now that she thought about it, Eda had never mentioned anything of the sort. Luz had only ever met adults who had kids or had raised them already.

“No, child. I do not have kids.”, Lilith replied, not in a chastising tone but rather in a factual one. She didn’t really care, it seemed.

“Oh, alright.”, Luz nodded at that information and pondered on that for a moment while Eda softly pushed Gus and her back inside, past her older sister and towards the staircase, with King always close to his master. Luz looked back to Lilith as she followed them, her footsteps always accompanied by the clicking sound of the cane on the wooden floor. She furrowed her eyebrows then she looked back up to Eda.

“Did you do the treasure hunt when you were a kid?”, she asked and Eda laughed, nodding. Somehow that joy seemed like it got a lot of history, because Eda suddenly had a very distant gaze, for just a second, making Luz wonder if she was just thinking about her childhood.

“Yeah, I completed it.”, she didn’t really answer Luz’s question so she tried again.

“And who made it?”, she asked, causing a little giggle from behind her. Turning, she looked at Lilith, when they had all come to a stop in front of the front door. A small smile was still showing on her face, indicating that it had been her who had giggled, making Luz scrunch up her eyebrows. She hadn’t taken Lilith for a person with a lot of humor if she was being honest.

“That would be me.”, she softly said, apparently being much more approachable now after talking to Eda than she was before. Luz noticed the short glance the sisters shared and pulled the map out of her pocket where she hadn’t noticed she had put it away until now.

“Then you will want this back, right?”, she mumbled, taking a few steps towards the older woman who gave a little smirk and leaned down, letting the child give her the map.

“Thank you, child. It means a lot that this found its way back to me.”, she said and Luz gave a little bow, eager to please the knight.

“My name is Luz!”, she repeated her name from before their talk, to be sure the older witch would know her name now since she had only called her child. Lilith nodded at her but didn’t say more as Eda called for her and ushered them out. When Luz came to the base of the stairs, she looked back, seeing her mentor still standing in the doorway. Lilith said another thing, and Eda nodded at that, before turning back to her kids with a smile.

“Alright, freeloaders! Who’s hungry?”, she asked with a grin and Luz and Gus threw their arms up while the big portal of a front door closed behind them, King giving a little bark at their excitement.

“Me, me, me!”, they exclaimed in unison and Eda laughed, nodding at them while picking up the pace. They followed right in her step and managed not to fall behind.

“Well then! Let’s get some dinner and get back to the inn! Momma needs some mead, beer, and paper.”, she announced and Gus tilted his head.

“Do you wanna draw a treasure map, too?”, he asked and Eda laughed, walking back down the road where they had come from.

“Something of the sorts.”, she replied to him and ruffled his hair.

Unbeknownst to them, a figure stood in the window of the mansion they had just left, looking after them. Her dark, long hair fell into her face and she softly pushed it away, her eyes fixated on her sister and her children bickering while the demon wolf pup jumped around them. She had never thought Eda could become so mature with motherhood.

---

Back in the inn, Luz settled in the pillows, a luxury for the small girl, while Gus was already blinking slowly. He was just about to slip away to sleep, exhausted from the treasure hunt today, while Luz was still wide awake. Much to Eda’s dismay.

“Eda?”, she asked while the older witch was still sitting at the small table, half a pint of beer standing by her elbow. The third this evening. Luz knew that if Eda drank this much, she was probably trying to forget something. For a moment, the witch tried to ignore the child, but after a second, she knew she couldn’t. Her parents had denied her their attention too often, she had vowed to never treat anyone like they weren’t worth her attention. Except for bad guys. And rich guys. And Luz was none of those.

“For the love of-”, Eda turned around and while her face showed annoyance, Luz knew she was not really mad, “How are you still awake, child?”

Luz nuzzled her nose into the blanket and looked at her mentor who sighed and ditched her paperwork, before joining Luz on the edge of the bed, sitting down. Luz felt the mattress going down with Eda’s weight and wondered what they had stuffed in there to make it as soft.

“What’s up?”, she asked, much softer now, and Luz got out of the sheets to crawl her way to her mentor, snuggling up to her side so Eda could drape the blanket around her shoulders again and take her into her arms, allowing Luz to start playing with her hand. Just a moment later, a very sleepy Gus rolled up in Eda’s lap and she was conquered by children.

“Okay you two, what’s the matter?”, she said and Gus merely shrugged. He just didn’t want to be left out from snuggling.

“Eda, has your sister always been this way?”, Luz asked, totally engrossed by Eda’s hand and her long, golden nails. Eda lifted her eyebrows at that when King joined their cuddles by plopping himself on her feet. She had never been the most cuddly person and she had never had that much of an interest to be involved in cuddle piles, but apparently, her children and demon wolf spoke for her now.

“How do you mean? Cold, apathetic, and a big pain in the-”, she interrupted herself when Luz looked back up to her, her eyebrows pulled together in something that was a mixture of worry and disbelief. Sighing, Eda brushed through her soft, silky hair and smiled when Luz closed her eyes at the petting.

“No. She was quite fun, back then, but the war changed her. When I left, she had already changed.”, she explained and Luz gave a small nod, before catching her hand again and beginning to play with it once more.

“What was she like back then?”, the kid asked and Eda sighed, shrugging. Memories started flooding in, flashbacks of hard times and unbroken support, of happy summer days and adventures. She closed her eyes, trying to push them back, before answering

“She was… Open, and she helped me a lot.”

The children stayed silent for a moment, Luz still fiddling with her hand while Gus had apparently fallen asleep on her lap. Softly brushing over his forehead and eyebrows, she let his face relax, smiling before Luz spoke up again.

“Because… She said she made the treasure hunt.”, Luz explained her question and Eda felt a sort of realization, nodding.

“Right. Because she made the treasure hunt she can’t be all bad, right?”, she asked and Luz shrugged helplessly, not daring to make a comment about that. She didn’t really know yet how to judge apart from black and white, she had never made any experiences with the grey tones in between and she couldn’t imagine that there were some innocent sides to a distant person like Lilith.

“Kid, I know it’s hard to believe sometimes, but people who seem cold aren’t always bad. Lilith saw some things that I’d want nobody to see. Sometimes… Sometimes she isn’t good at being nice.”, Eda slowly explained and Luz nodded, humming.

“Like you?”, Luz asked and Eda chuckled. The kid was bright, that much was clear, and she was very adamant about understanding everything around her. It was only natural that she had been perceptive enough to pick up the parallels between her sister and her.

“Like me.”, she agreed, and once again, her daughter fell silent. After a while, she piped up, while Eda had already wrapped her other arm around Gus and pulled him closer to hold him safely, so he wouldn’t slip off her legs. That boy was sometimes fluid, it seemed since his back had been bent over her skinny legs and his head had hung down onto the mattress, leaving his mouth open. She cradled him now so that he wouldn’t have to sleep and get a dry throat.

“What did Lilith mean when she said that she could trust you?”, Luz asked and Eda groaned internally, having dreaded that exact moment so much, and while she had hoped Luz wouldn’t pick up on it, here she was now.

“That-… That means Lilith really needs help right now.”, she tried evading the question, but her little girl was too smart for her. Luz looked up with a quizzical expression and Eda rolled her eyes.

“It means I’ll help her.”, she said and the girl nodded, furrowing her eyebrows.

“And what will you help her with?”, she asked, causing Eda to look away. Her kid leaned in, prodding, but Eda had to collect herself before answering. This was absolutely not something she had been wanting to discuss before she had come to terms with it herself and made a plan on how to deal with this.

“Well, it’s about politics.”, she finally diverted Luz’s question, before pulling her closer, “Point is, we’ll move in with Lilith and you two stay there over the day while I go do this mission. We’ll be here for a bit and the inn is too expensive to stay at.”

At that, Luz felt very confusing feelings, both excited and sad.

“We’ll move in with Lilith…?”, she asked and Eda nodded, teasingly rolling her eyes when Luz seemed disappointed, before brushing a strand of thick brown hair out of Luz’s face.

“It won’t be as bad. She’ll warm up to you guys and maybe she can even teach you a little.”

Luz suddenly grinned, turning to Eda, before making a fist with her hand since she propped herself up on her lap.

“You mean she can teach me to be a knight?!”, she asked and to her big disappointment, her mentor just laughed at that and shook her head.

“No, she most likely won’t do that. Her fighting days are over. But she can teach Gus a lot about magic, and you two will be able to learn a lot about politics and nature. Lilith is really good at teaching.”, she pretended not to see her daughter deflating at that, before regaining her smile.

“Can I go to the city, then? I can take Gus with me, and we can get to know the city life!”, she beamed and Eda chuckled, nodding. She didn’t really have much against that, she knew both her children could at least look after themselves.

“Yeah, but you have to promise me that you’ll only go in daylight. And no stealing, Lilith made that very clear that while we stay with her, we have to be clean.”, grumbling, the older witch shook her head, “Party pooper…”

Luz shook her head. She hadn’t meant stealing or staking out rich people to rob them later. Ever since she had gotten to know Willow she had already yearned to go back to her friend and see her again, to chat about fun stuff and maybe do some things together.

“Can I visit a friend?”, she asked, and now that caused a reaction in Eda. She lifted her eyebrows and stared down at Luz.

“A friend? How on the Boiling Isles have you already made a friend?”, she asked and her daughter grinned widely. Now that hadn’t been something Eda had expected to hear from her kid, especially because they had only been here for twenty-four hours.

“Her name’s Willow and her dads own a plant shop and pharmacy by the market we passed when we came here! I met her today when I was out before we went to Lilith, she had cut her hand and I helped her! We became friends, then.”, she nodded determinedly and Eda gave a hearty chuckle. She knew her kid was fast, but she hadn’t anticipated her to be that fast.

“Yeah, you can go visit that Willow girl. But you have to promise me that you’ll tell someone here in the house when you go out, okay? A servant or Lilith. That’s important because if you get in trouble, I need to know where to search for you, okay?”

Luz immediately nodded at that and Eda gave her a little tap on her nose, smiling before stretching.

“Great. And now go sleep, you little night gremlin. Or the monsters will visit you in your sleep and gnaw off our toes!”, she chuckled when Luz yelped and crawled under the blankets, immediately cuddling herself in and hiding her head under the blanket. She definitely did not want any monsters gnawing on her toes!

“No thanks! I’ll sleep!”, she quipped and Eda laughed, before cradling Gus closer and getting up, almost stumbling over the demon wolf, before settling her little son next to her daughter, taking care that he wouldn’t wake up.

“Eda?”

She had to suppress rolling her eyes again. “Yes, Luz?”, she asked, looking over. She looked at her but seemed to struggle with what she was going to ask.

The girl stayed silent for a moment to give Eda a chance to go around the bed, making eye contact with her again while she kneeled down in front of the bed.

“Is the inn really too expensive?”, she asked and Eda hummed, shaking her head.

“No, I just want to annoy my sister. And I wanna save money because that’s what I like doing.”, she reassured her kid, and even if she didn’t seem completely convinced, it at least gave her some peace of mind.

“And… What will we do all day at Lilith’s?”, she asked, making Eda smirk. She had a few ideas about how Luz and Gus could spend their days with her big sister. After all, she believed she wasn’t completely traumatized from the war and Lilith had been pretty fun to be around when they had been smaller.

“You could finish the treasure hunt.”, she suggested and Luz nodded, a little smile sneaking on her lips.

“Yeah… Yeah.”, she sighed, before closing her eyes and yawning, “Goodnight, Eda.”

At her mumble, her mentor gave her a smile, brushing through her incredibly soft hair and nodding.

“Goodnight, Luz.”

When the girl had settled enough for Eda to believe that she would be going to sleep, she got up and went back to the desk to study the city maps she had bought. She could’ve just as well stolen them, but Lilith had been right. She should probably lay low and not get into minor trouble with the guards or any citizens, at least for the duration of her mission. It was always easier to stake someone out when having no name at all, and currently, Eda wasn’t recognizable to anyone.

Nobody knew yet that the youngest Clawthorne had returned to Bonesborough, the deserter, the knight who left the front. She was a face among the crowd as of now, and Lilith knew to use that to her advantage. Sitting back down by the desk, she took a swig of the beer and pushed the plans aside to stare at the name Lilith had given her, squinting her eyes.

Something about that name was familiar to her, but she couldn’t quite put a finger on it. Humming, she finally tapped the location on the map that was marked red, her target, and softly scratched the paper there, lost in thought.

That name, something was ringing, but she couldn’t quite decide.

Adegast… She furrowed her eyebrows again.

That name should be telling her something. Oh well. Lilith wanted him out of the way, so be it. She wouldn’t stop the mission just because he was some high-ranking wizard.

Humming, she started to plan out her stake out and how to approach her goal, to achieve it. Before Eda had adopted her kids, she had often worked as an assassin so it wasn’t unusual for her to do this work, and even if she was a little rusty, she knew she was the right one for the job. Especially if the payment was appropriate and that, it was.

---

I've started on the aus, by the way! But since a lot is happening in my life I'm not really quick in writing them x) Stay tuned for updates!

#toh #the owl house #eda clawthorne #lilith clawthorne #luz noceda #gus porter #king #medieval #aged down #fanfic #my work #au #noble pursuit

[scrabbleknight]

TOH Everything is Horrible AU

I was on Discord and due to a weird unpredictable mood, I wrote a bunch of stuff that I now dub as "Everything is Horrible AU” because it’s just a bunch of Discord chat stuff where The Owl House Future AU but everything is horrible. Bittersweet ending tho.

Before we continue, trigger warning here. The texts below are quite violent so this is not for the faint of heart. TW// gore, blood, death.

Btw, Red is me.

We start off with some background. Basically, Eda dies and Luz ran away. I didn’t put it here (photo limit) but Hooty also died.

Then, we get some character filler. A bunch of stuff happened while she was gone. That meant Willow, Gus and Amity. No King or Lilith bcoz I forgot.

So yeah, Willow the Broken, Gus the slightly-less-broken-but-still-broken and Amity the Dead.

This one I particularly about Amity. TW// gore and tragic. I was inspired by AC2 and Devilman Crybaby. You'll see why.

The good news is that Amity saved Luz. The bad news is that she died and her corpse was mistreated the same way people in the medieval ages would. It’s fucked up and I apologize.

As for the finale, Belos fight and Lumity stuff too but sad. In short, Ghost Amity is still gay for Luz in the afterlife.

And that's about it. I had to stop bcoz one of them was begging for me to stop so yeah. There's also two more parts about what happened to Matthelomule but photo limit and honestly, even I thought it was horrible.

Tldr; Belos did some fucked up shit and I’m never touching this again.

#the owl house #toh #bad end au #luz noceda #amity blight #lumity #willow park #gus porter #boscha toh #alternate universe #discord chat #may be triggering #tw death #tw gore #blood #trigger warning #ooc #emperor belos #edalyn clawthorne #lilith clawthorne #everything is horrible

[derpy-grey]

I really like your work. My favourite is the Medieval AU of TOH. I can already see Luz saving Amity from her Gay Panic

Oh she's 100% gonna have a gay panic 😂. I already have something in my mind regarding that scenario. Do plan on making more tho!

(Also I found out this exist....still getting the hand of this)

[azure-wolf-227]

TOH Werebeasts AU Setting

This AU is set in a medieval fantasy world, the kind that has magic, monsters, nobility, and stuff like that. Most of the action is set within the large Boiling Empire.

The Empire is divided into several regions ruled over by a Lord, and all the Lords answer to the Emperor/Empress.

(Philip/Belos is NOT the Emperor, just the Lord of a region though he plans to take the throne for himself. I haven’t thought of who could be actual ruler but they aren’t relevant at this moment).

Aside from humans, the other dominant race are the the Beastfolk or Werebeasts as they are better known.

While all Werebeasts are capable of using magic; Human Mages are less common, thought not rare. All of the Lords are capable of using some form of magic.

Humans and Werebeasts live in peace for the most part but there are humans that hate Werebeasts and wish to see them destroyed.

Monsters are magical beings that pose a danger to the intelligent races. They can either be animal-like or human-like (Goblins, Orcs, etc). Basically, any magical being that it’s neither Human nor Beastfolk is a Monster. 

Not all Monsters are dangerous, as many of the animalistic Monsters can Tamed, but all of the humanoid-looking ones are always chaotic evil. Werebeast haters often compare and linken the Werebeasts to Monsters.

Most of the story is set in or near the town of Bonesburough, located on the Deamonne Region overseen by Lord Darius Deamonne.

#toh werebeast au #the owl house #lore #setting

[pmpkinns]

For my new story on archieve of our own - “For Her I Bend The Knee”

https://archiveofourown.org/works/29565867/chapters/72663249

Feel free to follow me on my Instagram! _tiredleaf_

#lumity #the owl house #amity blight #luz noceda #the owl house fanart #theowlhouse #amity x luz #beta lumity #beta amity #beta luz #toh medieval au #medieval au

[t-anyasen]

aaranya au: an old fashioned affair

general notes; nsfw. set in medieval india, so probably around the time the mughal empire had started to rise. trigger warnings for death.

Tanya looked at her mother, who lay in an opium drenched haze. The same way she'd been ever since Tanya had turned fifteen and become old enough to dance in courts; she had replaced her mother, but the roving eyes were still the same. She was done with the attention though. She was tired of her beating heart, she was tired of these graceless men who had treated her mother so poorly, driven her beautiful mother to drugs. She was tired of their hearts too and was waiting for the right man: the man whose heart she would cut out. Pushing in the ​nath​, Tanya adjusted the large earrings she was wearing and twirled for the ​darzi​ who only gave her a nod, deeming her acceptable for the dance in the evening court. It was to be a grand event; it marked the inaugration of ​Rajkumar​ Aarav into the court. His father was still the ​Raja​ but this meant that Aarav would be sitting in on court which meant Tanya had found her mark. She was going to seduce the prince.

Aarav knew it was ridiculous but he hadn't wanted this inauguration to be such a big event; because really--it meant nothing. His father was still ​Raja saab​ and Aarav would always just be the spoilt ​Rajkumar.​ Nothing was going to ever change because Aarav truly believed his father had some special boon from some Gods up above. No matter how wounded the elder man would get in battle--he'd bounce back. Don't get Aarav wrong, he loved his father, but being an adult ​Rajkumar​ meant he'd be given some responsibilities at least right? But his father didn't agree. And so Aarav spent his days riding around, engaging in playful sword fights with some of the Royal Guard against his father's wishes. ​'Agar woh aapke saath aise matarghasti karte rahe, toh hum sab ko hifazaat kaise karenge?'​ He was right of course, but whatever happened when the ​Raja​ wasn't in the kingdom didn't need to be told to him. Aarav was dressed in his royal formal attire, complete with a turban upon his head as he walked into the royal court. He and his father had seats away from everyone else, and with a better view of the girls dancing for them. He just hoped it wasn't ​boring​ because really, Aarav would rather flirt with one of his mother's handmaidens, then watch some girls dance and play coy.

Tanya had been adjusting the ​jhumkis​ she was wearing when one of the dancer girls came rushing in, her cheeks flushed. "​Tumne sunna Tanya?​" Tanya only shook her head, she was usually far removed from the gossip, not by choice but out of force. She never spent long enough with the girls because of her mother's opium addiction and most of her time was spent worrying if the woman had killed herself from the addiction. "​Raja saheb ne aapko chuna hai! Unke bete ke liye​." Tanya's eyebrows furrowed before it struck her. She remembered a similar custom being around when she was a young girl, she'd seen the other girls who were around her age rushing out of the house at odd hours because the young princes had called them to their chambers. She was to be the ​rajkumar​'s personal dancer, available whenever he wanted. A small smile curled around Tanya's features, pushing out her dimples. This aligned with her plan perfectly; it was as if the ​Raja saheb​ had dumped him right in her lap for destruction. She was also the youngest dancer so she always entered the routine last, as if she were the 'centerpiece' so to speak. Tanya swirled in, gliding past the other dancers and bowing to both symbols of royalty before returning to do her part of the choregraphy.

Aarav had kept his eyes on the various girls dancing in the court. They were all wonderfully skilled in performing the ​mujra's,​ each one looking even more beautiful than the one before her but he wasn't really entirely interested in any of this. ​Only that was until he saw ​her.​​ This girl was absolutely stunning and the way she moved was absolutely fluid. It made him think of ​shayari​ and how he'd love to pen his thoughts against the blank canvas of her back. He cleared his throat to keep from staring too long and that's when he spotted his father gesturing something to him, and realized this was the girl chosen to be his ​private​ dancer. Aarav could only smile, he'd be quite happy with this arrangement, but he just hoped she wasn't one of those girls who acted all pricey with him. He'd dealt with a few of those during foreign tours he'd gone on with his father, and he really wasn't one to chase after a girl if she declined once or more. He raised his hand in appreciation once she finished her routine before throwing one of the nearby roses in her direction, wanting to ensure her attention was ​solely​ on him.

Tanya glanced down at the rose at her feet, before giving the ​rajkumar​ a coy smile as she nodded her thanks, lifting up the rose. She pushed into the waistband of her skirt, and gave him her thanks, her hand out in front of her face as she angled it slightly. Most of the girls in the court were Muslim, and Tanya certainly was no exception. There was only one dealbreaker, her father was a Hindu, and a member of this court of smug men. She sashayed out last, following the group who was already through the door. The smirk remained on her lips because she could still feel his eye on her back. Tanya turned back to give the prince a subtle wink before disappearing through the door. Of course it was a ruckus back in their quarters too with all the girls fussing over her as they teased at her hair, plucked at her eyebrows and spritzed her in perfume. She'd been changed into a much more ​girlish​ pink ​anarkali​, and her heavy ​jhumkas​ had been replaced by small dangling earrings. Tanya exhaled slowly, keeping the rose in her hand as she knocked on the prince's private chambers. She had a plot to accomplish but that didn't mean she wasn't nervous; especially considering she was ​barely​ seventeen.

Aarav had been pleased to see that while she was still respectful, she still took the rose and nodded her thanks before keeping the rose in a place he hadn't expected it to be. He'd seen most girls tuck it behind their ear but this girl was certainly ​very​ different. He couldn't stop staring at her even as she made her way out of the court, wondering just how it was possible for someone to hold his attention so intently in less than a proper meeting. Still he was about to look away when she turned and winked at him leaving him greatly amused. He had ​not​ at all expected that but he was pleasantly surprised, perhaps this could be a very good arrangement indeed. Aarav made his way back to his chambers, bidding his father goodnight. He knew what was ultimately supposed to happen in these private chambers with these women, but he didn't like the thought of being with someone against their will even if they were meant to serve you in any way. He'd let things progress however they did and leave it at that. When he heard the knock, he knew she was there and cleared his throat. ​"Andar aajaiye,​" another trait instilled in Aarav from his mother, he'd speak respectfully to ​everyone​ regardless of their social standing. But when she stepped into the room, he felt almost besotted with her simple look. She'd changed into more comfortable clothing it seemed, and looked more nervous than she had at the court which left him to believe she was here very unwillingly.

Tanya smiled in relief at the kind way he had asked her to enter; she'd heard horror stories from the other girls of how rough these men could be. Perhaps the only reason why she was nervous. "​Humne kabhi nahin socha ki humare rajkumar ji itne-- samman punye honge.​" She bit down on her lip, wondering if she'd said too much, if she'd been too disrespectful. The girls had chastised her about not speaking her mind too often in the presence of royalty - something that Tanya was notorious for. She placed the rose on the center table before bending down to pour the drink into the cup. She wrapped her hands around the cup before moving towards the prince, holding the mug out for him.

Aarav watched her step more in the room and was glad he'd chosen to sit on the armchairs by the window instead of on the bed like he'd been before; that would've made it seem like he was calling on her for one reason, and one only. He heard her words and had an amused smile on his face, surprised at how outspoken she was. "​Tumhare? Badi jaldi humko aapna bana liye aapne..​" he was speaking softly now, not wanting to startle her even more than she already was. She'd kept her gaze lowered and it made him wonder why she was so incredibly nervous when he hadn't even said anything to spark this reaction. He took the mug from her and drank it before keeping it on the table, telling her with his gestures that she didn't need to take it, and instead could take a seat across from him. That way maybe she'd raise her gaze to meet his once more; she hadn't been that apprehensive when they'd made eye contact in the royal court after all.

Tanya graciously took the seat he had offered and finally met his gaze. "​Hum toh aise hi hain, jisko dekha, unko dil deke apna bana liye​." If she played the part of the besotted courtesan perfectly, she'd have him eating out of her hand. He was already amused at the way she had spoken her mind, and hadn't chastised her the way that she was sure the older men would, so they were already off to a good start. "​Maaf ki jiye ga. Humne yeh pehle kabhi nahin kiya, toh hum jaante nahin hai-- taur, tareeqe.​" That much was true, but Tanya had another reason for telling him this; she was telling him this because she knew it would garner his trust, he would think of her as someone to be protected, someone to fall in love with. She played with the edge of her ​dupatta​, staring at him.

Aarav had to try something to wipe this smile off his face because she was having him remain amused for far too long. He nodded at her before rubbing at his chin gently. "​Sab ke saath aap aisa karti ho?​" He wanted to know if this was something normal for her, to becoming close with anyone even when they wouldn't have her best interests at heart. Because he knew the other men in the court and they were despicable at best. He shook his head at her words before looking away from her, this time out the window instead. "​Maafi ko koi gunjaazish nahi hai. Aapne kuch ghalat nahi kiya aur kaha.​" But when he heard her reasons, it made him wonder why someone like her would be forced into this place. "​Isme koi taur tareeqe nahi hai, aur hum aapse vaada karte hai, ke hum koi aisi baat ya harqat nahi karenge jise aapko zara bhi hitchkichahat ho.​"

Tanya shook her head at his words. "​Sabko nahin, sirf aap jaise logon ko-- saaf dil.​" She listened to his words and hid a smile behind her hand, perhaps getting him to fall in love with her would be easier than she thought. Forget the father, the son was eating right out of her palm. "​Par aap humko itne ache se kaise jaanoge? Ki aap jaano humari har harqat, har khwahish, har hitchkichahat se waqif ho?​" She had let her voice lower significantly as she stood from her chair, moving closer to him as she perched herself on the edge of his armchair. Tanya knew she had to do something; if their headmaster learned that Tanya had not been doing the job she'd been sent to do - she would be banished. Then she would have no way to care for her mother.

Aarav had to pride himself on the way she said he had a ​pure​ heart. It made him feel like he wasn't wrong in doing what he was doing with her. He wasn't being so horrible, and maybe she was realizing that and it would help them move things along--he just wasn't sure where this would lead. But before he could say anything else, he heard her words and was about to answer. But his train of thought was gone when he watched her stand to sit down on the arm of his chair. "​Waqt ke saath sab ek doosre ko jaan pate hai.​" He did end up taking her hand in his though, wondering why he loved the thought of her actually ​wanting​ this closeness rather than being forced into it.

Tanya stared down at their hands, and gave a soft smile. The smile of course was more for Aarav's benefit than anything else; it was the smile that she knew affected people deeply. Her dimples were showing, her eyes scrunched up and she wanted him to fall for her. Not because she had any semblance of feelings for him, but rather because it would make this task a lot easier if he was already ensnared in her trap - that way Tanya would not have to expose herself too him too greatly, narrowly avoiding falling in love with him too. The problem with these plans was that it was too easy to fall into it yourself, the lines between fake and real quickly ​blurring​. She turned to look at him with intrigue. "​Acha? Aap humein jaan na chahte hain?​"

Aarav felt his heart start racing when he caught her smile. God she could seriously ​wound​ people more than one could in ​battle​ with that type of smile. He took a deep breath, having to physically control the urge to stick his finger in the hole her dimple created but he succeeded in keeping his hands to himself. But when he saw the way she turned to look at him, he had to take a step back. Did he want to know her? ​Yes,​ but you still have to watch yourself. ​Rajkumar's​ were never allowed to engage in anything ​other​ than physical relationships with members of the dancing court. But If Aarav didn't watch himself, he knew he could end up falling into something a lot more with Tanya, and it was all because of that smile and hesitancy she showed him; along with her beautiful grace and the ability to always speak the truth.

Tanya could see his internal dilemma and really hoped that his father trained in him in the ability to hide his facial expressions, considering that she could read him like an open book. She could the conflict in his eyes, in the downturn of his lips and she nudged him gently with her shoulder. ​Aapne humare sawal ka jawab nahin diya? Hum bura nahin maanenge agar aap nahin jaan na chaste. Hum hain nachaniyan, aap hai rajkumar​." Tanya shrugged, quickly dropping the smile as she let go of his hand and settled it in her own lap.

Aarav reached for her hand once more when she let go of his. He didn't like losing that warmth. He reached for her hand again and shook his head at her words. "​Woh hum dono ki pechaan hai, usse koi mita nahi sakhta,​" he took a deep breath before giving her another smile and shrugging. "​Lekin aapke sawaal ka jawaab haan hai, hum jaan na chahte hai aapko, agar aapki ijazaat ho toh,"​ Now he was trying to be teasing mainly because he needed her to feel comfortable even if this was their moment together. Plus he didn't even know her name yet. "​Naam kya hai aapka?​" She couldn't have been too old, maybe eighteen, but he still found it right to talk to her with respect until she decided otherwise.

Tanya let out an inconspicuous sigh of relief and nodded. "​Mera naam Tanya hai. Hum aapka naam jaante hai-- sab jaante hai. Aarav ji​." She looked around, mildly afraid that somebody would pop out to slap her for using the prince's name. She had no status to be calling him by name, even if she ​was​ his private dancer, free for him to conduct a physical relationship with. Her heart however fluttered at the way he seemed so adamant that their titles would never matter enough for them to get to know each other. Part of her felt a little bad for doing this to him, especially considering how kind he was. She slid slightly off the arm of the chair - except that meant Tanya was now in Aarav's lap and her cheeks colored with real embarrassment. She would have gotten up except his hands were keeping her there, holding on tightly to hers.

Aarav raised his eyebrow at the way she said his name. It was in a different tone and he found himself loving the way she was being so coy about it. It made him wonder about just what else she knew about him. But when she slid off the armchair and into his lap, he wasn't complaining. It wasn't as if he hadn't had that before with other women, but with Tanya--it felt different. The reason was because she was being shy in a way that the others hadn't been; almost as if they'd assume that Aarav preferred the girls to be brazen and bold--in reality, he wanted them to be real without putting on a pretense. "​Aapka naach bahot acha hai,​" his voice was so much softer because of their close proximity and the fact that he wanted to kiss her but controlled his urges so far.

Tanya lowered her head slightly in appreciation. "​Shukriyah​," she thanked, playing her coy nature to the fullest. There was something comforting about being in his arms this way, the way he held her as if he would not force himself upon her was the complete opposite of the horror stories all the other girls had told her, and her own mother's story. "​Aapko sach mein rajkumar ban ne ka shauq hai kya?​" She'd heard whispers from around the courtyard and amongst the courtesans that the king was not exactly pleased with the actions of his eldest born son. She wanted to hear it from him, as a pretense to know him better.

Aarav gave her a small smile at her words and contemplated his answer. He didn't want to be a ​Raja​ that had to be watched by everyone's eyes. He wanted to be a king that could run his kingdom in his own way. He didn't want to be a king if that meant he'd have to be only someone ruled by everyone else's rules. But what startled him the most was how Tanya looked and seemed genuinely interested in knowing his thoughts and virtually his deepest fears. He rubbed at her back gently, almost soothing himself in a way. "​Nahi,​" the admission was soft and barely spoken aloud but he knew she'd heard it. "​Raja saab ko nahi lagta ke main Raja ban ne ke layak hoon.."​ He gave her a tiny smile, almost feeling as if the mood for the evening was gone.

Tanya internally smiled at his admission. ​Bingo​, she'd found his weak spot, the chink in his armour so to speak. Her own arms came around him, her hand rubbing soothing cirlces into his back. "​Aapko kya lagta hai? Aap acche Raja ban sakte ho kya?​" She wouldn't ask him just yet why his father thought that he wouldn't make a good king. There were of course whispers floating through the palace: the ​rajkumar​ was too rowdy, too impulsive, too volatile and her personal favorite - he thought with his heart, not with his head. Tanya continued rubbing cirlces into his back, and felt a sudden flash of very ​real​ sympathy for this boy in front of her.

Aarav looked down when he felt her arms circle around him. He ended up resting his head against her shoulder, surprised at how the intimacy didn't scare him. He felt her soothing him and realized that she was doing the same thing he'd been doing. But he at her question, he ended up looking up at her and frowned. He wanted to ask ​her​ what she thought, but then he realized--she didn't know him well enough to make that opinion but he still wanted to ask her. "​Shayad,​" he shrugged. "​Lekin hume sach mein kitna pata hai? Aapko kya lagta hai? Hum Raja ban sakhte hai?​" He wished he didn't ask her, because that would be putting her on the spot but he still wanted to know.

Tanya pursed her lips at his question, her hand slowly travelling up to gently pat at his hair. "​Humein lagta hai ki aap acche Raja ban sakte hain. Raja saheb ache aadmi hai par unko logon ki zyada fikr nahin hai. Unhe sirf jung se matlab hai, aur Hindu se. Aapko dekh ke lagta hai ki aap logon ki bhi kadr karoge.​" Tanya suddenly quietened, wondering if she'd given away too much. She wasn't supposed to delve her honest opinion at all, it would make it so much more difficult to betray him - to pull away from him. Except every word she'd uttered had been true; she genuinely thought that this man in front of her would be a good king, a ​great​ king even.

Aarav didn't know how much his expression was giving away but really, he was surprised at her words. Each thing she said led him feel incredibly strong because he wanted to be that. He really ​wanted​ to be that type of King that she mentioned. "​Aapko sach mein.."​ He trailed off before looking at her own expression, this time his one hand resting against her cheek, wondering if he could kiss her and so he took his chance and leaned into her. He had never had such a chaste kiss before and this felt so different. He pulled back from the kiss, his eyes opening as he rubbed her cheek gently. "​Aap beyhaad sundar ho,​" he whispered before pulling back, praying he hadn't jeopardized this whole thing.

Tanya kept her eyes shut for a few more seconds, trying to recover from her racing heart. She could feel it beating loudly in her chest, making its presence more than obvious. It was so hard to control herself around this man, something that could present itself as a problem. She finally opened her eyes when he complimented her, two splashes of color appearing in her cheeks as she looked down, her dimples making a reappearance. "​Aise sharminda mat karo, rajkumar ji. Aapne bahut khoobsurat ladkiyan dekhi hongi, hum unko muqable main kuch nahin hai​."

Aarav loved her flushed cheeks, ​whoa--​love?!​​ That was too soon. He ended up shaking his head at her words and smiling. "​Aisa sach nahi hai. Aap mein kuch alag baat hai. Khaas kar ke aapke jo yeh gaade parta hai na?​" This time he did raise his hand to poke her dimples before he ended up laughing. Why was this so incredibly easy with her? He didn't feel that tension that he thought he would when he was meant to be with some woman. But the problem was--he knew she was in his chambers for a reason, he just didn't feel comfortable in pressuring her into anything more than they'd just done. He'd done other things with other girls, but those were relationships that were starting into something else, but with this girl, he knew that they'd never been given a fair opportunity to exist in their world and he didn't want to be one of those other men who took advantage like that.

Tanya squealed when she felt somebody lift her up into their arms and her arms automatically wound around Aarav's neck. "​Aarav ji, aap kya kar rahe ho?​" But there was a teasing note in her voice, giggling, dimples visible. She was smiling a lot more around him, a glow on her face that even the courtesans had noticed. Her mother remained oblivious, as usual; she found her opium a lot more interesting than her own daughter's life. A daughter whose earnings as a dancer in the court were mostly spent on her mother's addiction. She'd tried to wean the woman off once, but it had ended drastically forcing Tanya to give up. Her cheeks were flushed once he had let her down and she kept her arms around his neck, on her tiptoes as she pressed a soft kiss to his nose. Tonight, she was dressed in a sheer white ​malmal ki salwar kameez​, the ​dupatta​ carelessly slung over her shoulders. She'd taken to wearing the tiniest red ​bindis​ on her forehead, even though she knew full well that the courtesans weren't allowed. A ​bindi​ represented their fidelity, represented that they were married and courtesans never got anything like that. She wore it for Aarav, knowing that he liked it on her, liked that she was his.

Aarav had heard the ​cham cham​ of her ​payals​ when she'd entered his chambers and now it was routine for her never to knock but just enter whenever she deemed fit. She had a key of course, if anyone asked what she was doing in the ​mahal​ so late at night, it would be her bargaining chip to explain but thankfully such a situation had not presented itself yet. Aarav was close to her now and so he quickly scooped her into his arms and twirled her around, laughing when she squealed and slipped her arms around his neck. "​Hum? Hum toh kuch nahi kar rahe,​" he murmured before letting her down so that he could see how she'd chosen to deck herself out for him today. She was wearing as simple ​salwar kameez​ but it was the ​jhumka's​ he'd given her in her ears, and the tiny ​bindi​ she sported that reminded him of how far their strange yet loving relationship had come. Aarav had not imagined feeling quite so besotted with her, but from that first ​mulaqat​ itself, he was hooked and considering she reciprocated her feelings, at least she seemed to--he knew it was okay to shower his money and jewels on her as he deemed fit.

Tanya shyly dropped her gaze when he had set her down, admiring her. She knew that he had noted the ​jhumkas​ he'd given her; ​jhumkas​ which she'd learned were made of pure gold. The ​dupatta​ of course hid the small necklace he had given her too, a plain gold chain with a pendant made of emeralds and rubies. Something far too rich for a mere courtesan. It was why she kept it on her person at all times, knowing that if she even took it off for a second - it would get stolen. Something she could not afford. Tanya didn't understand herself what she was beginning to feel for this man, a certain sense of belonging. When she was with him, in his arms, his gaze on her the way it was right now - she wanted nothing more than to bask in it forever. "​Vaise aaj aap bhi bahut ache lag rahe ho Rajkumar​," she whispered, her arms wrapping around his neck once more as she sidled closer to him, pressing her lips to his. ​This is just a ​game​. You can't develop feelings for him. You need to get more information out of him,​ Tanya repeated to herself as a mantra, knowing she couldn't fail. The Muslim army camps were beginning to get anxious due to the lack of information Tanya had been providing. She couldn't forget her real mission, couldn't let the lines between real and fake get blurred.

Aarav knew it was silly but he'd spoken to one of his father's advisors, asking about how if he chose to get his ​courtesan,​ in this case Tanya out of the Royal court, was it possible? Evidently it was, but the advisor told him that Tanya had chosen to stay like this because she needed to keep earning money and that was something that made Aarav curious. He knew she'd allowed him to buy her gifts and jewels but he also wondered if she'd allow him to give her whatever money she needed so that he could break her free from this life she was forced to lead. It was true that because she was with Aarav, she wasn't made to dance ​as frequently​ but there were still moments it happened and Aarav was growing to detest it. He smiled though at her words and shrugged. "​Acha? Aapko pasand aaya hai?​" He looked down at his simple green ​kurta,​ having chosen it because he recalled her saying she liked him in that color. "​Suno, hum aapse kuch poochna chahte hai,​" he cleared his throat before taking her on his lap, but this time on the bed instead of the chairs.

Tanya nodded, her eyes attracted to the green color. It suited him she decided, made him look extremely regal - even if it was just a simple ​kurta​. It was in moments like this that Tanya wished she wasn't a courtesan, that she wasn't trying to dupe him because as the days grew longer and their time together much more frequent, the more Tanya's heart grew attached. She followed him to the bed, easily settling into his lap as she took his hands in hers, resting them in her lap. "​Poochiye​," Tanya allowed, content in distracting herself by playing with his fingers, entangled in hers. Part of her wished this could be their reality, that there wasn't the proverbial sword hanging over the cord of their relationship. One that would sever once he learned how she had betrayed him. He wouldn't understand, not when he had everything handed to him. Aarav wouldn't understand Tanya's plight: to learn that you had a father who was a member of a Royal Court, to have a drug addict for a mother, to be forcefully thrust into the courtesan business to support your mother. He wouldn't know that the Muslim camps who were currently supplying her mother the opium would ​kill​ her if Tanya did not bring information on how to destroy the ​Raja​.

Aarav had noted the way her eyes darted to his ​kurta​ and smiled, loving that she was acknowledging his outfit even if she wasn't saying the words about it. He loved that about their relationship, things could be unsaid and still be conveyed. "​Hume pata chala hai ke aapko paise ki zarooraat hai,​" he cleared his throat before wondering why he was feeling so apprehensive asking about this. He knew she could say no and that would be it, but instead--he just really didn't want her to say no because he knew how much this could both help her, ​and him.​ "​Aur hum aapko paise dena chahte hai,​" he whispered before looking down at their intertwined fingers. Aarav had always been the one oversharing in their relationship because he trusted her completely but she never told him anything and that worried him immensely, especially considering he didn't know why she was so scared of telling him things.

Tanya knew that he was only trying to help her, that he was asking her from the goodness in his heart. She wished at times he wasn't so kind, it would make it a lot easier to hurt him the way she was currently. Yet the headstrong proud teenager fired up in her chest and she froze in his embrace. "​Humein nahin chahiye aapke paise Rajkumar saheb. Koi ehsaan mat karo hum pe - khudh paise kama sakte hain hum​." Her conscience told her to simmer down, that her anger would blow her cover but she didn't know how to explain it. She couldn't tell him that the reason she worked her was because of her mother, of her mother's addiction. He would never want to be with her if she told him the truth. They would kill her mother then, and Tanya's life would be in shambles.

Aarav frowned at her, feeling the way she tightened up in his arms. He loosened his grip on her and let her move away if she needed to. Because the way she reacted told him that she wasn't at all comfortable with him, no matter how much she pretended to be. That made him a bit upset because she had gotten lucky with him. If she'd been handed to anyone else--she'd have been treated ​so much worse.​ Still he sniffed and cleared his throat. "​Ehsaan nahi tha, sirf madat karna chahte the hum, taa ki aapko aur logon ke saamne naachna na paare, lekin agar aapko woh karna acha lagta hai, toh kijiye."​ His tone was harsher now and it shouldn't have been but he was worried about her and that's why he didn't want her to leave him but ultimately someone else could decide he wanted her, and could pay the ​Raja​ any amount of money to have her and he couldn't let that happen.

Tanya flinched at the harsh tone he was spitting his words in. ​He loves you​, her conscience whispered smugly. It made sense: the way she noticed his fists always clenched when she was dancing in the court in front of all of the other royal subjects, or the way he would glare at anyone else who stared at her appreciatively. It was only confirmed now, the way he'd spat out how she could continue dancing for other men if she enjoyed it so greatly. This entire conversation was going south and Tanya couldn't let it. She had him in her grasp, he loved her; she just needed to continue to extract information from him despite how much it made her heart ache. "​Rajkumar ji​," Tanya whispered, taking his hands in hers once more while she waited for him to look at her. "​Humara woh bilkul matlab nahin tha. Humein kaunsa shauq hai ki aise naache.. Sirf satra saal ke hain hum, aap hi batao - humein acha lagega kya? Aise khator aadmiyon ke saamne naachna? Unki gandi nazar ko apne jism pe behne dena?​" She shook her head, surprised at the tears that had started to drip down her cheeks at an alarming rate. Was she finally opening up to him? "​Bilkul pasand nahin hai, par yeh karna padta hai humein. Apni Ammi ke liye...​" Tanya pulled her hands away from his then, wiping quickly at the tears. "​Unko nashe ki lath hain, aur humein unki jagah leni padi yahan pe. Jitne paise bante hai, unke lath main lut jaate hain. Chahe bhi toh hum yeh kaam nahin chod sakte."

Aarav had been looking at one the books that lay on his side table, feigning interest in it, as if he wasn't even aware that she was right there with him. He knew it was stupid but every single day and night he was falling more in love with her. And it seemed to him that Tanya was appreciative of his attention but otherwise she enjoyed her life the way it was and that ​hurt​ him. Because when he spotted the other men applauding her dance or appreciating her beauty, he hated it. She was ​his.​ But his anger died quickly when he felt her take his hands, it was in the soft way she'd said his name that left him feeling warm inside. Except at her words, he only felt helpless. She was dealing with so much at such a young age but she still refused to take his help and that's what bothered him. "​Aise rote nahi hai,"​ he murmured before wiping away her tears and holding her close. "​Hum unko madat dilvayenge. Aap humara yakeen kaare,​" he whispered praying she'd agreed but something told him that her body language was saying no--she wasn't going to let him help her.

Tanya shook her head, her eyes wide and brimming with tears. "​Kab tak aap madat karte rahenge humari Rajkumar saab? Hum sirf aapki-- aapki veshya hain. Ek din aapki shaadi hogi, kisi rajkumari se... Hum aapki zindagi main sirf thodi derr ki ahemiat laate hain.​" These were all the lies she would feed him, to see how deeply he loved her; if he would refute her claims. She hated referring to herself as a ​courtesan​, knowing that she was definitely much more than that. Tanya had already informed the Muslim camps about the small kingdom just west of Delhi that the ​Raja​ was riding this weekend to acquire, and they had rewarded her with a little gold of her own, something to spend on herself. THe guilt of betraying Aarav hurt, it pinched but she knew this was what she had to do. This was her plan to avenge her mother, and how she'd lost her life to the heartless men in the royal court - it didn't matter what she broke in her warpath.

Aarav felt his heart break at the words she'd uttered and shook his head furiously fast. "​Aisa bilkul nahi hai. Aap humare liye uss se kahi baarke hai. Aap nahi jaanti ke aap humari zindagi mein kya ahemiat rakhti hain."​ He took a deep breath, wondering how he could tell her that none of that was what he wanted. He didn't want to marry someone else, and he certainly didn't want to let ​her​ go. "​Tanya, hume aapse pyaar hogaya hai, isiliye hum yeh sab keh rahe hai aapko. Aap sirf veshya nahi hai humare liye.​" He looked away from her then, wishing he had some way of making her believe him but instead he could see the way she was feeling so incredibly broken down at the reality she was facing.

Tanya felt her heart clench when he admitted that he loved her. She had finally got what she had wanted, for the prince to fall in love with her. So why did she not feel as victorious as she imagined she would? ​It's because you love him too​, her conscience whispered and Tanya shut her eyes, a single tear dripping down her cheeks. "​Hum bhi aapse.. behadh ishq karte hain​," she murmured quietly, her gaze snapping up to look around his room; she was afraid that somebody would overhear and flog her for even having such a thought. He was a prince and she was a mere courtesan. Indulging in anything but a physical relationship could have dire consequences for Tanya - most of which included whipping. She'd seen it happen to one of the other girls when she was much younger. It had scarred her for life. Instead of saying anything though, she took his hand and placed it against her chest, allowing him to feel the rhythmic thump of her heart, a rhythm which only sped up erratically when she pressed her lips to his. Tanya would allow herself this much; she would give herself to him tonight, the one night where she turned off everything else in her brain except her love for him.

Aarav felt like the words she said back, soothed over his aching heart, making him believe that maybe he wasn't the only one thinking there was more here than there was. But when he saw her say the words with a tear, it made him wonder why she was feeling so much pain at reciprocating his love. "​Tanya,​" he cupped her cheeks once more and pulled her close, his forehead against hers before he saw the way she took one of his hands and pressed it against her chest. He could feel her heart beating and could only smile at how it sped up when the kissed. He loved kissing her, it was like every time was different, every kiss told a different story. The one right now--was telling him what he wanted to hear, that she loved him with her entire heart and she wanted everything with him. He did as well, he wanted to tell her everything too, how he'd imagined a wedding, both a ​nikaah,​ and a Hindu ceremony if she allowed and that's when he knew he was getting too ahead of himself. His father, would ​never​ allow that to happen, but Aarav would ​never​ let her go either. He pulled her closer to himself, allowing her one hand to be placed against his chest, right where the knots of his ​kurta​ were.

Tanya looked up at him in surprise when she felt him take her hand and placed it against his ​kurta​. Her heart sped up in pure anticipation, unable to believe that she would finally get what she had been dreaming of. Her hands were shaky as she undid the knots of his ​kurta​ and allowed it to slip off his person. She settled comfortably on the bed underneath him as she shut her eyes. She wondered if he would notice how inexperienced she was. She hoped he didn't, as did her frantically racing heart. For a split second, Tanya desperately wished that they were in a different setting, that their social classes were not so far apart that she could never envision a future with him. Not only that but she was a ​Muslim​, something that would never make their relationship plausible even if they were of similar social standing. She would allow herself this night, this night to give him all of her emotions, all of the love she'd forced in her chest. "​Aarav​," she whispered his name finally when she felt his lips down at her neck, his hands expertly undoing her ​kameez​. It was the first time Tanya had uttered it the way a lover would, the way an ​equal​ would.

Aarav nodded at the unasked question in her eyes. He knew what she was doing when she let him feel her heart beat while they kissed and how she'd professed her love to him. Until now, Aarav had never once expressed desire to take their relationship further, being content in their kisses and moments together. But he could feel his heart asking for it now, to become one with the only woman he'd felt this strongly for. He watched her undo the knots and slip his ​kurta​ off revealing the white undershirt that he donned underneath. He kept that on still, drawing the curtains around his bed so that they were hidden even if they were disturbed in case of any emergency. Aarav pressed his lips against hers while he unbuttoned her ​kameez,​ her ​dupatta​ already laying discarded on one side of the bed. His lips lowered now, exploring her exposed skin until he heard her say his name. It caused his heart to speed up and him to even look back up at her, in surprise by also adoration. "​Aaj se aap humko sirf Aarav bulayengi,​" he murmured against her stomach before undoing the ​salwar​ as well and letting it fall to the floor. He reclaimed his position over her, supporting his weight with his hands while he simply stared at her, almost surprised at how innocent and yet ​in love​ she looked.

Tanya avoided his eyes shyly, her cheeks flushed once more. She always seemed to be flustered around him, out of breath too. It was as if whenever she was around him, he took over all of her sense, claiming his hold on her. "​Theek hai​," she whispered, her heart cracking at the same time because while she would agree to what he had asked of her, it would only be tonight when she would mean the love in her heart. She felt her fingers clench at the sheets when his lips moved down to her stomach and a soft roll of pleasure washed over her, never have been touched this way: with love and admiration. He respected her; Tanya knew this of him. Aarav not only loved her, but he also respected who she was, despite her profession. It was precisely why her heart ached whenever she thought of betraying him such a way.

Aarav had always known that he'd end up getting married to some princess from some faraway land, in order to form an alliance with their kingdom. That was why he'd never believed in receiving or giving this love that he shared with Tanya. This was special and he knew it. His mother had often told him when he was younger that he'd just know when something was right. She was, of course, telling him in matters of ruling his kingdom but right now, Aarav knew it applied to Tanya. Everything about her, everything ​with​ her was always so right. He could feel the way her body stiffened but in a way that showed her nervous feelings rather than her dislike for whatever he was doing to her. His fingers and his mouth were his tools and her body was his canvas. And yes, he finally got the chance to ​write​ his ​shayari​ against her bare back while she lay on her stomach and simply stared at him.

Tanya shivered when she felt his fingers trace along his back, writing nonsense words and she watched him with a keen interest. "​Kya kar rahe ho tum?​" She paused then, realizing that she'd stopped calling him ​aap​, that she finally believed him to be her own. She shut her eyes then, resting her head on the pillow as she tilted her head to the side so she'd still be able to stare at him. Tanya then wished things were different between them. She wished that this was their reality, that she was allowed to be in his chambers without the stamp of a courtesan. She wished that she could tell him the truth but Tanya knew what would happen if he learned of her betraying nature. He would have her banished, the love in his eyes for her would all disappear and Tanya would be left holding onto the shards of their broken relationship.

Aarav smiled at her before shaking his head, not yet ready to answer her. He continued to write in the words of ​Mirza Ghalib,​ loving how every line of his poetry seemed to be made for her. Once he finished, he inched closer, his lips pressing against her forehead before he whispered his words, "​Shayari likh rahe the hum, aapki tareef mein,​" Aarav had heard how she'd uttered the less formal way of addressing someone but he deemed that as in her letting him into her heart. He gave her the respect in his words because she'd never told him otherwise, and he'd never wanted her to think that he could call her whatever he wanted because she was ​his.​ He could see her smile and wondered if she'd had any regrets of what they'd just done, but she wasn't hurrying away or scared to be around him which told him that he was merely overthinking everything.

Tanya shook her head in disbelief at the sheer love he was expressing for her and she inched closer to him, closing the distance between them before pressing her lips to his. "​Aap nahin, tum kahiye humein​," she whispered against his lips before pulling away slightly, keeping their foreheads pressed together. For as long as this night lasted, Tanya wanted to be his. She wanted to be his in the way she had imagined in the late nights of her broken home. She wanted for him to give her all the love she could bear, even love she couldn't. Tanya wanted him to break her with his love, to fill her with enough love to last a lifetime. She knew that if he ever found out, it would be ​that​ love which would keep her alive. For all the times she'd reminded herself that this was just a ​​game​​, that she wasn't allowed to fall in love - she had disregarded it, and fallen in love anyways. A fact that would now prove dangerous for her as it laid her loyalties on the line.

Aarav felt her whispered words and couldn't help but smile. "​Tum--tum bahot khaas ho humare liye, aur hum tumhe kabhi khona nahi chahte.​" But somehow saying his fears out loud made him wonder just how real they could become and in that moment, he tugged her closer almost so that they were was no space separating them. He could feel her thinking about something even if he did not know what it was. She was dealing with something inside, perhaps her mother's worries were plaguing her. But Aarav had already made the decision to go against her wishes and attempt to get her mother the help she needed. After all, Tanya had said that she loved how much he ​cared​ about everyone in his kingdom and not just the wealthy affluent ones; this was his chance to prove that yet again.

Tanya had been waiting in Aarav's chambers for the past half hour, the ​thaali​ of ​rang​ in her lap. She shut her eyes, trying not to think of how she'd betrayed him just a few hours ago. He'd told her of his father's plans to take over another kingdom, a small campsite of Muslim people. Tanya had reported it to the Muslim warriors who had thanked her for her services, placed a packet of opium in her hands for her mother and another packet of gold for her. ​Holi mubarak​, they had sniggered as they told it to her, forcing Tanya's heart to break further. It was only when she heard the door open that she wiped at her tears quickly, setting the ​thaali​ down on the bed and pressing her hand into the ​laal rang​. She stood up then, waiting for Aarav to appear in front of her. "​Holi mubarak​," she whispered, her hand pressing against his cheek as she colored him in red, as she colored him in her ​​love​​.

Aarav had spent the day dodging every one of his advisors and other friends and soldiers trying to color him for ​Holi,​ choosing to have them give him just a ​tilak​ and wiping it off almost instantly. He'd never really been a fan of the festival, mostly because his father had kept him away from participating. Still he was dressed in a complete white ​kurta​ when he entered his chambers after listening to his father's advisors telling him of how ​Raja saab​ should be back fairly quickly since this mission of his wouldn't be too hard of a battle. When he entered though and spotted her, he ended up smiling. But it was when she pressed the color against his cheek that he realized he had no problem with ​Holi,​ as long as he was being colored by someone he loved. He gave her a quick kiss to her forehead before looking down at the ​thali​ of colors she'd brought. His fingers still dipped into the red color before he raised it to her cheek, and pressed his fingers against her skin. A split second decision told him to place the color against her forehead too, in her parting but he knew she wouldn't appreciate it, and so he used the remaining color on her other cheek. "​Holi mubarak--tumko bhi.​"

Tanya smiled when he placed the color on her cheeks. She had seen his hand hovering and wondered if he was going to spread the color in her ​maang​. Her heart deflated slightly when he decided it against it and instead placed it against her cheeks. "​Tum aaj itne khush nahin lag rahe, kuch hua hai kya?​" She knew already that the king would be fine. This fight was meant to be simple, and the people had given her their word: their word that the ​Raja saab​ would not be hurt in their battles, nor would Aarav. Her heart still raced in her chest however, in the fear that something had happened. It had been happening often, the strange feeling in her stomach - one that would force her to run to the bathroom, spewing up the contents of her stomach. Tanya had her own suspicions but would not voice them.

Aarav wasn't happy, but he hadn't had anyone else ask him, mainly because he was a good pokerface except when it was in front of Tanya. He supposed it was because of his level of trust in her. "​Raja saab aaj ek jung ke liye gaye hai,​" he frowned before wondering just how much to burden her with. "​Pata nahi, aaj ek ajeeb sa darr hai humare mann mein, lekin aur koi baat nahi hai. Aur hum ko aisa shobha nahi deta, ghabrana.​" He cleared his throat before looking back at her, deciding to allow himself a chance to be distracted but before he could even lean in to Tanya--he had a soldier rush into the chambers. ​"Rajkumar ji! Rajkumar ji! Jaldi aajaiye! Raja saab ko gheri chot aayi hai, aapko bula rahe hai.​" Aarav stared at the soldier who decided to retreat after announcing his news before he turned to Tanya who was looking extremely apprehensive and nervous all of a sudden. "​Tumhe kya hua? Paani pee lo,​" he murmured before standing and straightening out his clothes. The thoughts were all plaguing his mind, how his father had failed missions one after the other lately, there had to be some common factor that Aarav just couldn't see yet.

Tanya waited for Aarav to leave before she too disappeared from his chambers. Her heart hammered in her chest; they had promised, promised that there would be no harm coming to Aarav or ​Raja saab​. How could they go against their word? ​Did you really expect them to be trustworthy?​ Her conscience sneered and she knew it was right. Tanya rushed home, her ​dupatta​ over her head, cheeks colored in the red color. Her hand had been at her cheek so that when she entered the house, her hand running through her hair, some of the colored powder had dropped into her parting - a fact unknown to her. It was then the same bubbling feeling rose and Tanya felt herself weaken as she collapsed on her knees, throwing up again. Her mother appeared in front of her. "​Tujhe uss se prem hua na? Iss liye aisi bewakoof harqat ki​." Tanya stared at her mother in confusion, unsure of the correlation. "​Beta, teri khok main ek bacha hai​." The words that made Tanya's head spin; she'd tried so hard not be her mother, to avoid all the mistakes she'd made in the past. She'd forgotten the biggest one - ​falling in love​. She needed to tell Aarav, he needed to know. It was why she made her way to his chambers the next day, dressed in a sombre white; he needed to know that he had a child, a child in her stomach. It didn't matter that she hadn't bathed since she'd seen him last, that she'd barely washed the color off her cheeks, the red in her parting ​still​ there. She rushed into his chambers, the ​chamm chamm​ of her ​payals​ alerting him that she was here and yet he didn't turn the way he usually did. Tanya's heart dropped to her stomach, something was seriously wrong.

Aarav had been walking towards his father's chambers when he thought about everything that had been happening in the last few months. Every mission his father had gone on had resulted in the worst way. Everything would go wrong, and his father would return empty handed, almost as if they'd been tipped off about his father's attack prior to everything. And it had only been happening when one thing changed in their inner workings; Tanya had come into his life. ​​No.​​ He couldn't even think of Tanya being a mole for the ​muslim​ groups that were threatening terror on their kingdom. She'd never do that to him. But her hesitancy with him in the first little while, and then the change in her when she decided he was falling in love with her. Her adamant behavior to not accept any help from him, all of that was just making him wonder about everything and suddenly it all ​clicked​ into place. Tanya was the one who'd been selling him out. Only things he'd told her were somehow being conveyed to the other groups, which only made him wonder if anything she'd said to him was real. Now he stood there in his chambers, the ​Raja​ turban sitting on the pedestal on the side because that was Aarav's new title. His father had died from the attacks made on him and now Aarav would have to claim the throne and all the responsibilities that came along with it. And none of it really made any sense to him considering how broken he still was over the betrayal he'd been dealt by the one person he'd given his heart and soul to. When he'd heard the ​cham cham's​ of the ​payal's​ on her enter his room, he'd stiffened up, unable to understand what was right and what was wrong. He closed his red-rimmed eyes tightly before turning to face her. He'd seen the white on her, and knew she was aware of what had transpired in their kingdom; something she'd helped transpire. But as he dragged his gaze up to meet her own, he spotted the red color in her parting and froze, ​when had he done that?​ ​It doesn't matter! She betrayed you and your kingdom.​ "Aapko kuch kehna hai humse?​" He couldn't call her ​tum​ anymore, not when he felt so distant from her.

Tanya stiffened when she detected the chill in his voice. Her gaze fell on the turban sitting on his bed and she shut her eyes. He was the ​Raja​ now, whatever dreams she'd crafted of them together, of raising this child the way he'd promised to get her out of this mess were now shattered. He would never want to be with her; the coldness in his tone only made sense if he'd figured it out. "​Aarav...​" She shut her eyes, knowing he would chastise her for using his name. It was still worth a shot, especially when heart beat in rhythm to his, when every breath of hers was now tied to his - a concept she wouldn't have been able to fathom a few short months ago. Still she inched closer to him, trying to reach for him and not at all surprised when he pulled away. "​Hum... maafi chahte hain.​" There was nothing else she could say any longer. Her hand rested instinctively on her stomach, knowing that she had become her mother. In her quest to be nothing like her, Tanya had ended up ​exactly​ like her: in love with a man way beyond her social standing, raising his child all alone, a child of mixed religion.

Aarav pulled away from her, ignoring the light thumping of his heart telling him that this wasn't what he wanted to do. He wanted to give her the chance to explain but instead he simply just stared at her. ​"Maafi? Aap maafi kyun maang rahi ho? Zara woh bhi batao.​" He wanted to hear her say it, he wanted to know if she even felt a smidgen of guilt for the betrayal she'd done to him. Everything seemed to make sense, Tanya had nothing to say to him, because she wasn't sure how to say anything that could explain anything. She'd been the reason his father had died and now all the love he felt for her--was almost dying. ​That was a lie,​ because seeing her in front of him with that ​laal rang​ in her ​maang​ left him feeling as if she was still his.

Tanya shut her eyes, as if the thought pained her. She knew that he wouldn't make it easy for her to admit the truth, but he wouldn't believe her even if she told him that she really ​did​ love him. It had started as a game but she'd completely fallen for him. "​Kyunki-- humne... hum aapke Raja saab ke maut ke gunegaar hain​." Tanya slowly opened her eyes then before moving away from him. She knew what would come next; he would expel her from his chambers, forever. And Tanya would have to raise this child on her own. She just hoped, no she ​prayed​ it wasn't a girl. She didn't want the same fate for her daughter, like the one she'd been dealt.

Aarav closed his eyes at her words, he knew what was expected of him right now. He was to slap her because she'd betrayed the kingdom and ​him.​ But he couldn't do that. Not to her. That's why he merely stayed there as she moved away from him. He couldn't stop her, he couldn't make her leave but he still had to. He had duties and responsibilities now to uphold. "​Aapki yeh sazaa hai abse, ke aap kabhi bhi is rajya mein phirse kadam nahi rakh sakhti."​ He frowned before remembering about her mother and how the older woman needed care. "​Aur aapki aami ki dekh bhal hum karvayenge. Aur jab woh theek ho jayegi, tab hum aapke pass bhej denge. Aaj ke baad yeh kabhi yaad bhi nahi rakhna ke humare aur aapke beech mein koi bhi rishta kabhi tha."​ Aarav frowned, feeling his voice cracking as he said his final words. ​"Aapne hume dhoka diya hai, aur hum nahi jaante kyun, lekin hum jaan na chahte bhi nahi hai.​" He turned then, wanting to watch as she left him--for good.

Tanya felt a sob rip through her throat at his words. She had been expecting the banishment but she hadn't been expecting his harsh words that followed. How was she to forget the soft moments they'd shared in these chambers, when he'd kissed her for the first time, when he'd given her the ​jhumkas​ she was wearing, or when he'd placed the necklace on her. A necklace which she would now have to return; she would return the ​jhumkas​ too but she couldn't. Not when it was the first present he'd ever given her. Her hands shook as she undid the clasp and set the necklace down on the table. She turned away from him, tears dripping down her cheeks at a steady rate. Why wouldn't he stop her? Didn't he ​love​ her, the wya she loved him? Wiping at her tears furiously, she stepped out of his chambers only to be greeted by the guards. She knew this part too, she'd seen it happen to other courtesans who'd stepped out of line, who'd been banished. Tanya followed them quietly to the dungeons, to her punishment. She bore it all silently, all the lashes that were given for committing treason against the kingdom: a hundred lashes against her back to be exact. Tanya never cried out in pain though, not when she'd already faced the worst pain in her life. The pain of knowing that she'd broken the heart of the only boy she'd ever loved. When they finally undid her arms from their restraints, Tanya collapsed on the dungeon floor, her once pristine white ​kurti​ now completely slashed and covered in her blood. She needed to leave and she tried voicing this to the guards who only nodded. They knew of her banishment orders and so loaded her into a ​palki​ before depositing her outside the kingdom, in no man's land.

Aarav felt like it was just yesterday when he'd learned of her betrayal. A part of him always regretted letting the other guards handle her banishment and punishment. He should've been the one to command that she not be hurt. If he had--then he'd never have heard that one ​​piercing​​ scream that haunted his dreams every single night for the past twelve years. He'd never gotten over losing Tanya. He'd told her to forget everything but how could he ask that of her when he himself was unable to let anything of their relationship go? Her necklace that she'd given him back still hung attached to one of his own chains that he wore inside his clothing. That was his way of being close to her. He'd also helped her mother through a drug recovery and had sent her off to be with Tanya wherever she was, but Aarav had chosen to stay removed from everything, knowing that if he found out where she was--he wouldn't be able to stay away. Even now he was galloping into his next battle, and her thoughts were on his mind. Aarav had been a great warrior in all his battles following his father's death but that was only because he had chosen those moments to lock away Tanya in his heart. He hadn't done that this time. He'd been fighting against the camps that were nearby their kingdom when out of nowhere another horse had come in his direction, slitting him across the fleshy part of his neck and torso, leaving a deeper gash there. When Aarav fell to the ground, he expected his attacker to come back and cut his head off considering he was now at his mercy, but instead the other warrior came closer and lowered his scarf revealing his face before uttering the one sentence that was sure to haunt Aarav just as much as Tanya's scream did. "​Ammi ke liye,​" and Aarav had watched him mount his horse and ride away leaving Aarav there to bleed out, until unconsciousness took him over.

Tanya called around for her son multiple times, pushing the hair away from her face. "​Prem, khana lag gaya, kahan hain aap?​" Her son was so much like his father, in almost every way: in the way he enjoyed sparring with his sword, the love he had for her, how much he cared for the other people in the village. Of course not to mention that every time she looked into her son's eyes, she was reminded of similar brown eyes that bored into hers with equal honesty. Even if she had never married Aarav, her life was still in name. The red in her ​maang​ from ​Holi​ proved that enough; she'd placed the ​sindoor​ in her parting every day after that. "​Ya Allah, Prem yeh aapke chehre ko kya hua hai?​" Tanya asked with worry, noting the cut on her son's cheek and the way he was avoiding her gaze. Her heart sank, worrying if he'd involved himself in the world of war and religion, the world she'd tried so hard to keep him away from. "​Ammi maine kardiya. Unko sabaq sikhaya humne. Unko bhi aapki tarah zakhm diya​." Tanya stared at her son in confusion before it clicked. Her son had sought out his father. She shut her eyes, pulling away from him. "​Khana andar hain​," Tanya told him before disappearing into the bedroom. Even to this day, laying straight on her back brought her pain. Gone were the days where she was as white as milk, where she looked like a princess in every right. Her face was now dusted tan because of her long days in the sun. She groaned in pain when the fabric brushed the scar the wrong way. It was a phantom pain, a representation of her pain with Aarav.

Aarav could hear the young boy's words in his head over and over, making him wonder what exactly it meant. Of course, Aarav had plenty of enemies so this child could be avenging anyone really, but something told him it was more personal than that. The truth was--he knew in the back of his mind what this meant, and who the little boy was but his heart as refusing to admit that it was a possibility. Instead, he used his advisors and guards to seek out Tanya's mother, he'd heard from his men that the woman hadn't been living with her daughter and was back in the royal court but stayed away from the opium now. He'd asked for her to meet him in the conferring chambers and when she arrived, coughing but still looking better than when he'd first seen the woman. "​Namaste, hum aapse aapki beti ke baare mein jaan na chahte hai,​" the woman looked bewildered slightly and Aarav knew it was probably out of shock because while he never ​stopped​ thinking about Tanya, he never spoke her name in front of anyone. "​Woh ab kahaan hai? Hume pata hai ke aap unke saath nahi rehti..​" Aarav listened as the elder woman told him about how Tanya hadn't wanted her to stay with him and that left him confused. She'd done ​all this​ for her mother and now that her mother was clean and healthy--Tanya had nothing to do with her? Still, he took her address, surprised to learn that Tanya was living in the nearby town that was part of their ally's kingdom, one that Aarav was allowed to freely travel to and from. That's when he decided that he had a short visit to pay, for his own sake. Ther was more to this encounter on the battlefield with that boy than he was understanding, and the sinking feeling in his stomach told him that he'd only get his answers when he faced Tanya after all these years and that's how he found himself inconspicuously on her doorstep; not wanting everyone to know that the ​Raja​ was there.

Tanya had sent her son to help the neighbors with something or the other. They were carpenters and Tanya was sure that there would would something or the other to do that would keep Prem busy. So when she heard the knock on her door, Tanya frowned. She lifted the dupatta over her head, the ​sindoor​ in her parting fresh. Pulling open the door, she froze once she recognized who it was. Her hand immediately pressed to her back, a reminder of her betrayal; a reminder of how she was to stay away from him. "​Aap yahan kaise Raja saheb​?" She gestured for him to enter, not meeting his gaze for longer than a millisecond.

Aarav hadn't realized that seeing her again after so long would stir up the same feelings he had way back when. Because see, despite her betrayal--his love hadn't died and now seeing her there in front of him, looking so tired and worn down, tore at him. "​Hum, hum aapse milne aaye hai,​" Aarav wondered upon seeing the ​sindoor​ in her parting if she'd perhaps married someone else from this kingdom and had lived a happy life after being shunned from their world. Maybe it had done her some good, gotten her out of that horrid cycle she'd been stuck in. She of course had to be aware that he was the only ​Raja​ who'd chosen to remain unmarried and appoint someone as his successor rather than marry solely for the sake of an heir.

Tanya furrowed her eyebrows at his statement, unable to make neither head nor tail of it. He had been the one to command her to forget that he ever existed, that they'd ever had a relationship of a romantic nature. It was then she saw the bandage peeking through his royal garb and shut her eyes. This was what her son had meant when he claimed to have avenged her: to scar his father the same way the father had scarred his mother. "​Ji Raja saheb, andar aiye. Maafi chahte hain, humara ghar koi Rajmahal nahin hain.​" She shook her head before wiping her face with her dupatta as she sat on the floor, having given the straw mattress to Aarav. "​Bataye hum kya seva kar sakte hain aapki​." It pierced Tanya to behave so aloof with a man whom she loved so deeply but they were his orders - she was never to remember that they had ever been in a relationship. And Tanya would follow it no matter how painful it was.

Aarav felt the distance in her words so easily, and how could she not behave that way? After all, he'd been the one who told her to forget everything about him, to forget that they ever shared anything. Yet every word she spoke, acting like anyone else who was meeting him for the first time--it pained his heart. He entered her home and took a seat on the ​khatiya.​ He hadn't worn his ​turban​ or any of his extremely formal garments but it was still enough to remind her of who he was and the difference in their stature. But then why was it that in his heart, he still couldn't form a real distance between them? ​Stop it Raja saab, she could be ​married.​​ ​"Aapne shaadi ki hai?​" He cleared his throat, gesturing to the ​sindoor​ in her parting, trying to forget the moment he'd seen ​his​ ​laal rang​ in her parting. That wasn't what he'd come to ask her, but right now--he couldn't say the other words, he couldn't ask her if that boy who'd come to attack him had been her son, because as much as Tanya may detest him now for what he'd done--she couldn't go to such lengths. ​Couldn't she? Isn't she the one who betrayed you in the first place? Selling you and your father out to the enemy?​

Tanya looked up in surprise at his blatant question. She wondered as to why he cared; he was the one who had told her to move on, to forget that they had ever shared anything. Of course it was a different story that Tanya had been unable to comply with his wishes; her every breath was still tied to his. "​Nahin ki​," she murmured quietly, before pulling the ​dupatta​ tighter over her head. She couldn't believe she had ben so foolish to believe that he would remember the color in her parting, color that he had applied. She had been a fool to think that she loved him, that he still loved her.

Aarav felt as if ​uski jaan mein jaan aayi,​ when he heard her say that she hadn't married anyone else. This meant that ​laal rang​ was still from him. She applied it diligently every day for the past twelve years even if he was the reason she'd been punished in such a ruthless manner. He wanted to touch her, to reach for her, to hold her in his arms again but he knew how unlikely that was considering she probably hated him still for what he'd done; even if it had only been because of her betrayal. He'd been about to say something more when he spotted a small photograph in a frame on the side table, it was Tanya with that same boy who'd given him his wounds. "​Yeh naujawaan--kaun hai?​" Oh Aarav already knew, he could feel the words she was about to say before she even said them but he couldn't believe it was true. Why hadn't she come to him then? ​You banished her, why would she come to you?​

Tanya followed his gaze before shaking her head, a small smile on her face. Just thinking about her son managed to do that; he was a breath of life in her otherwise extremely dreary existence. Tanya shrugged before giving the answer Aarav wanted to hear, "​Prem, mera beta​." She'd wished she could say it was their son because it was; that was what she had rushed to his chambers to tell him, only to be banished from Aarav's life forever.

Aarav could see a hint of the smile he'd fallen in love with on her face but it still wasn't nearly as bright as it once was when she'd be light and cheerful in his chambers. That was his fault, he'd snatched that and everything else from her life. When he heard her response though, he knew what she was implying even if the words weren't said. ​Prem wasn't just her son, he was Aarav's as well.​ Closing his eyes, he let his head fall into his hands. He'd made such a mess of his life all because of her betrayal; she always told him she admired how much he cared for others--but he'd proven her wrong now considering how he hadn't cared enough for her--the woman he was still madly in love with. "​Aap hume bata sakhti thi, ke aap--Ammi ban chuki thi,"​ he was frowning now, wondering why she'd have remained so adamant to keep his son from him. So many years had been lost out on in their relationship andconisdering how Aarav had treated his mother, he doubted Prem would even ​want​ to acknowledge him as his father.

Tanya shut her eyes as she leaned against the wall at his words, at the unspoken accusation she found in them. She ​knew​ that she should have reached out, should have said something but she couldn't. Not when his words were still so fresh in her mind, not when he hadn't even wanted to give her a chance to explain herself. He didn't even try to understand the bind that she was in; he didn't even listen to how she'd begged them not to hurt either member of the royal family. How was she to know that they would go against their word? "​Hum bataane aaye the aapko uss din. Jis din aapne humein apne rajya se nirvaasit kardiya tha. Par phir--unhone humein maara... Aur humein laga ki hum aapke maafi ke liak nahin hain, ki shayad humari yahi saza thi ki hum bhi apni ma jaisi zindagi jiye, ki humara beta bina baap ki bada ho."

Aarav was frustrated even though he hated hearing that she was hurt, all it did is remind him of that piercing scream that haunted his every night till today. He would never forget the sheer pain and anguish in that scream. But he still wished she'd have tried. "​Tum phir bhi keh sakhti thi Tanya,"​ unconsciously he jumped back into that lack of formality with her because she was still ​his​ no matter what. "​Koshish toh kar hi sakhti thi--itne saalon tak tum sab kuch akele sehti rahi..​" his voice trailed off, unable to believe how much strength this woman carried inside of her. ​She still sold you and your father out,​ and while Aarav knew that was true, it made him wonder if she'd have ulterior reasons for that--her mother and financial reasons to be precise. ​"Kyun kiya tha? Dhoka kyun diya tha hume? Humare prem mein kya kaami thi ke tumne aisa kiya...​"

Tanya felt her heart flutter when he used her name again, when he used the informal tone with her. It made her feel, even if only for a split second, that they were alright again. She was living in a fool's paradise; there would be no ​them​ ever again. "​Kaise koshish karti? Aap Raja saab hain, aapne humein nirvaasit kar chuke the. Bhool gaye hain kya aap? Nirvaasit ka matlab? Agar hum aane ke koshish bhi karte, humein mar diya jaata​," Tanya snapped. How dare he accuse her of not trying? How dare he think she would want to keep their son away from him? She quietened however, her chest still heavy with anger at his question. "​Humari ammi ki lath... unhone unn logon se udhar liya tha, aur lath main gir ke karza wapas nahin chuka payi. Iss liye hum nachaniyan bane, par phir woh paison se khush nahin the-- unhe... unhe jankaari chahiye thi. Humne mana karne ki koshish ki, par unhone dhamki di - ki woh humari ammi ko jaan se maar denge." She wiped at her tears then. "​Aisa nahin tha ki hum chahte the Raja saab ko kuch ho, ki ​aapko​ kuch ho. Bola tha humne, unhone ne vaada kiya tha ki aap dono ko kuch nahin hoga... Jhoot kahan unhone ne humse."

Aarav frowned at the way she was almost forgetting all that had passed between them with the way she snapped. "​Chabi thi na aapke paas? Uss chabi ka matlab aapki suraksha thi. Woh dikhane se koi aapko kuch nahi kar sakhta tha. Kher chodiye, ab un sab baaton ka koi faida nahi hai.​" He got off the ​khatiya​ and knelt down where she was, wanting to take her in his arms and wipe those tears but he knew he'd lost that right when he'd banished her without listening to anything she'd wanted to say. "​Tum ro mat, tume pata hai ke hum tumhari ankhon mein ansoon nahi dekh sakhte,​" these words were said in a whispering tone, almost as if he were afraid of how she'd react to him. He didn't want to say anything about how she'd still betrayed him and the kingdom and so he merely shook his head. "​Hum jaante hai ke ab kehne se kuch nahi hoga, lekin jab hume pata chala ke tumne unhe sab bataya--aisa laga ke jaise tumhari taraf se jo bhi tha--woh sab nakli tha, aur woh bewafai ne hume tod diya tha..​"

Tanya didn't know what had taken over her when he came close to her, the way he had abonded the ​khatiya​, almost as if he was abandoning his status to be with her in this moment - that she surged forward and pressed her lips to his. The second she did, it was as if she finally realized the starvation she had been in for the past twelve years; as if she'd been living in a coma for the past twelve years and his lips against hers had finally woken her up, it had set her free. The ice in her veins thawed over, blood rushing to her ears but she pulled away all too soon, ashamed of what she had done. Tanya was no longer a courtesan, she was just a ​commoner​ and he was the ​Raja saab​ - there was no way they could indulge in this anymore. She had no right over him, not even in a purely physical relationship the way she would have if she had her previous status.

Aarav had to hold her to keep himself from stumbling back especially at the force in which she kissed him. He couldn't help but kiss her back, the familiarity in that moment was too much for him to let go off. Aarav had abstained from any type of relationship in these twelve years, even when he was so angry at her betrayal he still couldn't be a traitor to his love and the feelings they'd shared. He felt her pull away from him and shook his head, tugging her back. "​Humne tumhe bahot takleef di hai na? Ek takleef aur deh sakhte hai?"​ It wasn't going to be that easy, just because she kissed him didn't mean she forgave him, and even if she did, it didn't mean that his little ​Rajkumar​ Prem would forgive him for hurting his mother either but Aarav had to try. "​Humne hamesha tumhe humara kaha, kabhi nahi kaha ke hum aapke hai, lekin sachai wohi hai, itne saalon mein, hum tumhare hi rahe.​"

Tanya wished he hadn't said that; it pierced through her heart. Especially because she knew that he would leave, and would never return. Then Tanya would be left alone in this house with his words echoing in her mind, and no way to ease the pain they brought. "​Aapko kehne ki zaroorat nahin thi, hum mehsoos kar sakte the​," she murmured, talking in past tense. It would be easier on her heart if she treated this as something of the past, as if he didn't ​​still​​ love her. If Tanya acknowledged that his love was still fresh, that he still loved her - she would drown in the pain of her own feelings, because they would be able to do nothing about it. They could never be one; not even when she had been a courtesan.

Aarav frowned at the words she said, wanting to understand why she was still so adamant to keep him at a distance. ​"Tum mehsoos kar sakhti ​thi?​ Ab nahi karti?​" He inched a bit closer, this time lifting his hand to cup her cheek, not at all surprised by how she leaned into his touch. "​Ab bhi kitni khoobsurat ho tum,​" and she was. To him, she'd always be the most beautiful woman he'd laid eyes on. He knew she didn't believe anything he said, when in reality--it should be him with his doubts, but he still knew his life was incomplete without her and that needed to change. "​Tum--tum wapas aaogi na? Humare saath? Prem ko leke?​" He might've been pushing it, but this was Aarav--ruled by his heart and never his head.

Tanya let her eyes close when he cupped her cheek, the warmth filling her pores. She wouldn't believe him of course, not when she knew she was no longer as beautiful as she used to be. Still she smiled at his words, a little reassurance blooming in her chest, dimples showing. It was at his request however that Tanya froze. "​Wapas? Aapke saath... Raja saab, hum... Hum ab maamuli ho chuke hain, aapke raj gharane main rehne ki aveshakta nahin hain ab.​" Her eyes however told a different story; they spoke of how badly she wanted to take up his offer, to be the family she often dreamed of late at night.

Aarav saw her dimples and felt his heart start racing once more, it's like she didn't realize how much of an effect they still had on him. He loved the way though that she kept her smile there, reminding him of the first few time she met her and found her smile so incredibly intoxicating. But when he heard her words, his own smile fell. He hated hearing her call herself just a ​commoner​. "​Tum humare liye kabhi maamuli nahi ho sakhti, humne tumko kaha hai na? Tum bahot khaas ho, woh badal nahi sakhta.​" He nodded at her, reassuring her through his gaze that he would make this happen. It would be difficult yes, but he wasn't going to let her go this time. "​Suno, hum Raja hai, aur humare faisla hi sabse ucha hota hai. Agar hum tumko aur humare bete ko, humara rajya ke waaris ko ghar lejaana chahe, toh hum kar sakhte hai,​" he took a deep breath, completely aware of just how difficult it was going to be to make this happen. But he would not let anyone cause a hinderance this time; this was his family and they deserved to come home.

Tanya nodded at his words slowly, wanting to believe in him this time. "​Theek hai​," she whispered. "​Hum aapke saath wapas aayenge, jab aap kahoge​." She stood up then, wiping at her tears even though her body ached and protested at the loss of his arms around her. She knew that her son would be home soon too and he would not take too kindly to her talking to his father, the same father whom he'd tried to hurt. Tanya would have to explain a lot of things to him, if she were to convince their son to move into the royal palace with his father.

Aarav wanted to tell her then, to stop calling him ​aap,​ but he knew he'd lost that right the moment he'd banished her. It would come with natural progression whenever she wanted it to. He felt her move away and sighed before nodding at her, telling her quietly that he'd be back, and she should trust him. But as soon as he returned back to his palace and ran into one of his advisors, he knew it wasn't going to be easy. The other man had him followed which meant he knew exactly where Aarav had been and was very unimpressed by it. "​Aap aise nahi jaa sakhte Raja saab, yeh sab theek nahi hai.​" Aarav gave the man a smile before raising his hand and telling him to stop talking because he wasn't going to pay any heed to his advice. "​Hum Raja hain, aur humne yeh faisla kiya hai ke Tanya aur ​humara​ beta, dono yahaan aayenge, raj mahal mein rehne.​" The advisor continuously told him about how that would be frowned down upon and how people wouldn't want to ally with their ​rajya​ anymore and so then and there, Aarav made a significant decision. He'd make a new home, just for them. It would be in the same courtyard, but it would be a place she lived, protected from all these people who'd want to see her and taunt her. Aarav would ensure she'd face no more disgrace or humilation; she'd already suffered enough for her entire life.

Tanya stared in surprise at the ​palki​ that was currently situated outside her house and clutched her plain satchel closer to her chest. She hadn't been expecting him to send for her and her son in such a grand way. Tanya's gaze fell to Prem who looked completely awestruck at the sheer force of people who had been sent to bring them home and nudged her son's shoulder. "​Abhi bhi shikayat hain kya aap ko apne Abbu se?​" At the hesitant shake of his head, Tanya sighed; she understood that sentiment. Her arm wrapped around his shoulder as she bent down to press a kiss to his hair. "​Chaliye, aapke Abbu humara intezaar kar rahe honge​." Which was why Tanya was surprised when the ​palki​ did not stop at the ​rajmahal​ she knew but an even grander palace right in front of it. "​Yeh kya hai?​" "​​Aapka​ rajmahal​." And Tanya understood this was what he had meant by ensuring her safety and his own pride in the kingdom. It stung a little but she pushed it down, following behind her son who rushed into the palace.

Aarav had arranged for Tanya and Prem to both be brought home when the palace was finished, which had also happened in record time since Aarav had waited twelve years and wasn't sure he could handle any more time away from her. He knew her, though, and he knew how affected she was by their difference in social standing and him building her a palace away from the main, would hurt her--he just hoped she understood why he'd done it, and the fact that her's was now even more beautiful than the one he was meant to reside in. He heard the sounds of her arriving through the gates and made his way with his entourage to go greet her, happy that his few ​dai ma's​ were there to greet her traditionally and welcome her into her new home. Aarav stood just behind them, his eyes on the mother-son duo, waiting for everyone to be gone so he could happily take the both in his arms.

Tanya stared in disbelief as the mean old ladies who'd always glared at her whenever she would skip into Aarav's room as a young girl because he'd called on her, were now greeting her with smiles and coloring her forehead with the ​tilak​. She turned to look back only to find Aarav there, smiling at her and she looked down in embarrassment. The palace was grand; that was a definitve. Except in her drab clothing, Tanya felt as if she didn't belong here either. The only expensive item on her person were the ​jhumkis​ he'd given her all those years ago - she'd never taken them off. Once they all had left, Tanya turned to meet Aarav's gaze. "​Yeh aapne humare liye banaya?​"

Aarav didn't know if her averting her eyes this time was because she was shy under his gaze or for another reason. He really did hope it was the former though. Still he stood there in the doorway, leaning against one of the pillars until the ladies left, leaving him with his little family to explore what would be their new home. He heard her question and nodded. ​"Pasand aaya tumhe? Aur nanhe Rajkumar, aapko aapna nahi ghar kaisa laga?​" He was still nervous around Prem, not because his son had used the sword on him but because Aarav's experience around kids of any age was very limited at best. But while Prem went ahead in the palace, Aarav took Tanya's hand before stepping into their new home. ​"Hum jaante hai ke tumhe ajeeb lag raha hoga, yahaan rehna--sabse door..​" he trailed off, unsure of how he could attempt to make this seem better than it was.

Tanya wished she could tell him that she loved it every time he addressed her as ​tum​, or that she was mildly jealous of how easy it was for him to slip back into their relationship as if nothing in the past twelve years had ever happened. She wished her heart was that ​pure​. She wished that she could go back to using his name in that soft hesitant tone she would use in his chambers, or the way he'd declared that she could only call him ​tum​ - she wished that it could be her reality again. Yet it was harder for Tanya, every time she tried she would remember the way he hadn't wanted to listen to her, how he'd allowed her to be banished despite knowing the punishment was a hundred lashes. If he had loved her, would he have done that? ​It's the past now Tanya. It's time to let it go, he's making amends.​ So Tanya intertwined her fingers with his before smiling. "​Aap rahenge na humare saath? Aur Prem bhi toh hai... akele thodi na hain hum.​"

Aarav could see her thoughts running over time in her head but he didn't press to find out what she was thinking. He knew she didn't trust him yet, and he didn't fault her for it. Aarav didn't find it easy to entirely trust her either, but decided to leave it up to fate. If she was meant to betray him again, she would but somewhere he knew it was very unlikely and he liked believing in her more than he'd care to admit. He felt her intertwine their fingers like they used to once upon a time and found himself smiling back at her. ​"Bilkul rahenge, aur haan humara beta bhi toh hai humare saath,"​ he brought their clasped hands up to his lips and pressed a soft kiss as he led her inside, showing her the different rooms and areas for her to call her own. He'd also built a prayer room, one side with a few idols that represented their Hindu side, and one side with the ​Quran​ so that she could be close to her own faith as well. Once they both arrived there, he stepped inside, this time picking up the ​sindoor​ and placing it against her forehead, ​"jab tum Holi pe aayi thi na, mujhe sindoor lagana tha tumhari maang mein, lekin--mujhe nahi laga tha ke tumhe acha lage ga. Lekin itne saalon tak tumne--aapni maang sajayi rakhi, toh ab pehli baar hum khud karna chahenge.​"

Tanya shut her eyes at his words, feeling her tears drip down her cheeks, the relief stuttering in her chest. Her heart ached, chest constricting once she felt him place the ​sindoor​ in her parting. It was only when his hand pulled away that she burst into tears, burying her face in his chest. She remembered a similar time when they had been much younger, when she had cried about her mother, about how she didn't want to be doing what she did. It had been the most honest Tanya had ever been with Aarav, when she'd let him into her heart. She remembered what had come after that too; she remembered how that had been the night when their love had been consumated, when they had conceived the symbol of their love - their son. "​Humein maaf kar dijiiye..​" she whispered into his chest. "​Hum kabhi aapko... dhoka nahin dena chahte the. Aur uss din... jab aapne humein dafa kiya tha, humara dil toot gaya tha Aarav​," Tanya admitted, looking up at him with red rimmed eyes brimming with unshed tears.

Aarav was startled when she started to cry, especially when he wasn't sure why it was happening. "Tanya," he whispered before wrapping his arms around her, trying to soothe her, his hands were rubbing slow circles around her back, trying to comfort her when he heard her words and shook his head. ​"Tumhe maafi maangne ki zarooraat nahi,​" he said honestly. Aarav had been angry, he'd been very upset when she'd betrayed him but with time, her reasonings, her motives--all became clear to him. But yet, he'd believed that she'd have moved on post her banishment and that was the main reason he never seeked her out. Aarav felt his own heart break again when she told him how she felt when he banished her, plus the way she said his name only brought back all their memories from the past. "​Tum hume kabhi maaf kar sakogi?​" He asked softly, wiping away her tears before taking a deep breath. "​Hume pata hai ke tumhare liye mushkil hoga, aur hum umeed karta rahenga, lekin zabardasti nahi hai..​"

Tanya looked at him, once he had cupped her cheeks tightly. How was she to tell him that she had forgive him when he had come back for her, that seeing him outside her doorstep, looking so shy and nervous had been enough to thaw the ice in her heart. She nodded, a small smile breaking out on her features, coupled with a sob that ripped through her throat. "​Hum koshish zaroor karenge Raja saab. Par uske liye, aapko woh hare rang ka kurta pehen na padega​," Tanya teased, pulling away from him as she furiously wiped her tears once she heard her son's footsteps coming down the stairs.

Aarav was about to lean in to kiss her on the forehead when he heard her words and had to move away to burst into laughter. He wondered if he should tell her he'd kept that ​kurta​ but had never worn it after her banishment. That and so many other things had been locked away in a room that was in his chambers because everything in it reminded him of her and the relationship they shared. Aarav had gathered all those items to burn them but his heart hadn't allowed it and so now all of that was being used to decorate their new home. The same curtains, the same paintings the two of them spoke about during some of their lights nights, everything was back there. Once he spotted their son, he held his hand out for him to join them, smiling when he did so. "​Aur aap? Aap hume maaf kar payenge, jo humne aapke saath aur aapki Ammi ke saath kiya?​"

Tanya sat up in the bed when she heard noises coming from the ​aangan​ of the palace. She stretched her arms up, wiping the sleep from her eyes as the sunlight filtered from the ​zardosi​ curtains and splattered against her face. She smiled, pushing away the sheets and stepping out of the curtained bed, her feet pushed into the slippers. Tanya picked up the shawl from the ottoman and wrapped it around herself to hide the plain ​salwar kameez​ she had worn to bed with Aarav as she made her way out. Looking down the balcony, she smiled at how the father and son were sparring with their swords. This was all she wanted, a true family. And now she had one, with the man she loved. ​Isn't it too late?​ Her conscience asked in regards to the years they'd spent apart, and Tanya shook her head. She had been fearful of that too but last night had proven her wrong. It had been the first night since she'd come to this palace that he'd spent here, and they had spent most of the night talking, the way they used to before. It had been so easy to fall back into their patterns, and Tanya made her way down the stairs, leaning against the pillar as she watched both father and son spar, a small smile on her face while waiting for either one of them to notice her. She wouldn't mind if they didn't, perfectly content in just watching them.

Aarav believed that if all of this was a dream, it was one he didn't want to wake up from--maybe ever. For the first time in more than twelve years, he was ​​happy​​. And that was all due to this family he'd brought home. His ​Rani sahiba,​ Tanya was everything he remembered, if maybe a little quieter and guarded than before but he understood it. A bit of distance would exist between them, but it was a distance that Aarav would diminish even if it were the last thing he did. But his son, his Prem was everything he'd imagined his son to be. The boy loved everything Aarav had grown up with and that's how he found himself engaging in a sword fight with his son, both of them laughing and shouting happily. That's when he noticed Tanya standing near the pillar and without warning, Aarav ran in her direction--taking refuse behind her. "​Bas bas Yuvraaj Prem, hum thak chuke hai, aur ab hume aapki Ammi ko waqt dena hai. Aur jahaan tak hume pata hai, aapki padhaai ka samay bhi ho raha hai? Chaliye jaaye, baaki ka khel wapas aane ke baad.​" He watched Prem head back inside before h wrapped an arm around Tanya and tugged her closer. "​Tum kab uthi? Aur chori chori chup ke se hume dekh kyun rahi thi?"​ He was teasing her of course, but Aarav was still worried mainly because he was ​​so​​ happy that he wasn't sure what bad news was on its way.

Tanya rested her head on his shoulder, sighing contemplatively. "​Bas thodi derr pehle​," she whispered, shutting her eyes. "​Dil bhar gaya tumhe aur Prem ko dekh ke​." It was true; seeing them both so happy, so full of life and filling this entire palace with happiness had only made her heart grow warmer. Her fingers tightened around the loose white ​kurta​ he was wearing and reached up to kiss his cheek. "​Vaise aapke naashte ka samay ho gaya, abhi tak aaya nahin? Humein bhi bhook si lag rahi hai..​" She played nervously with the necklace: the same one that he had given her all those years ago, feeling a strange sinking feeling in her stomach, a sense of foreboding as if something awful was about to happen.

Aarav hummed at her words, wondering why it hadn't arrived yet as well but they'd have to first prepare it in the main kitchen and then someone would have to bring it over. He was yet to employ staff for this palace, because a part of him wondered whether or not she would prefer to have this home be just hers, without any outside interference. "​Aata hoga, lekin hume aapse kuch poochna bhi tha,​" he took a deep breath before sitting her down outside in the swing while he sat next to her, both of them moving with the light breeze. "​Kya tum chahti ho ke uss mahal ke jaise, yahaan bhi har waqt tumhari seva ke liye log ho?​" This was ​their​ home which meant all decisions would be taken collectively.

Tanya pursed her lips at his question, pondering it with genuine seriousness. "​Chaubis ghante ke liye nahin​," she murmured quietly. "​Sirf ek ya do sevak rakho har waqt ke liye, agar humein kisi cheez ki sakht zaroorat ho, aur tum doosre mahal mein hoge. Par haan hum chahte hain ki yahan pe bhi bawarchi aur naukar ho. Humein bura lagta hai ki unko wahan bhi banana padta hai, phir aur mehnat se yahan laana padta hai​," she admitted, her hand holding his as she traced the veins on the back of his hand quietly, letting him swing them.

Aarav wrapped his arms around her once more, this was why they were a perfect match. She cared about people and their lives, the same way Aarav always did. But he let her take his hand and swung them both quietly before leaning close to her and pressing his lips against her forehead. "​Tum hamesha aur logon ke baare mein sochti ho, kabhi khud ke baare mein socha?​" Aarav was one of those people though who knew how difficult it would be to convince some of their ​sevak's​ to come and work here for a ​Rani Sahiba​ who hadn't been formally introduced to the ​rajya​. But that's why Aarav was convinced that's what he needed to do. Somehow, he had to convince his advisors to allow him to give his wife the respect and position she deserved.

Tanya had been moving through the palace with ease, making her daily rounds before she would go to her son's study, check up on him and how he was faring with his studies when she paused in front of a slightly ajar door. She knew this was Aarav's study, where he held meetings sometimes (when he was allowed to) and had been about to close the door fully when she froze at the words being spoken. They would echo in her mind forever. It was how she found herself seated up on the roof, shelling peanuts quietly when she heard footsteps. Her hands quickly wiped away at the phantom tears before she exhaled. ​Another wife​, she'd have to be the other wife now. No matter what Aarav would say, she would always be the other wife because she was of a different faith - a faith that his court didn't approve of.

Aarav had his fists clenched together, needing to ​control​ the urge to physical assault his advisors who were trying to convince him against something he deemed unimaginable. They all thought he should be married to someone more ​suitable​ to be the ​Rani Sahiba​ but Aarav wouldn't let that happen. He couldn't. He was in love with Tanya, and he couldn't just move her aside because his court wanted him to marry a Hindu princess for strategy purposes along with the point of having an heir. But Aarav's heir was always going to be his ​first born​, Prem. The papers had already been written and stamped with the royal stamp indicating as such. But he had to give this idea some thought because it was necessary for his kingdom to prosper. People were revolting because of his relationship and marriage with Tanya, something he'd never understand. With a deep breath, he closed the doors on the advisors and went off in search of his wife, needing to discuss it with her first. He had let the anxiety get to him when he hadn't spotted her anywhere until he was directed to the door by some of the ​sevaks​. He pushed open the door there where he caught her sitting there with peanuts in front of her. She'd been crying, he could tell from how she wiped away at her face. Had he made her unhappy? He knew it was still hard for both of them but he'd given her everything that was his and in his power ​to​ give her. "​Tum yahaan kyun behti ho? Akele aise--kuch hua?​"

Tanya looked up when he sat down next to her and gave him a smile, forcing the dimples out so he wouldn't be alarmed. She shouldn't have bothered, not when he knew her better perhaps better than she knew herself. Tanya offered him the bowl of peanuts before shrugging as she let the ​dupatta​ fall from her head onto her shoulders. "​Aise hi, yahan se suraj ko doobte hue dekhne ka kuch aur hi maaza hai​," she lied; her heart thudded in her chest and she knew that she would have to tell him how she felt, it would eat her alive. "​Humne suna.. jo woh log keh rahe the. Ki aapko ek aur shaadi karni chahiye, ek ​Hindu​ rajkumari se​." She shut her eyes, the words paining her as she forced them out, "​Humein bhi lagta hai ki aapko karni chahiye... Aapke rajya ke liye. Log khush nahin hai-- aur agar woh khush nahin hai, toh aap kaunse maineh main ek ache Raja hue?​" Her lips pursed then, voiced choked and jaw clenched. She didn't want him to marry another woman but she couldn't be so selfish; maybe this was her real punishment for betraying him all those years ago. Her punishment was that she could never ​truly​ have him to herself.

Aarav loved that he could sit with her, not needing to be touching her at every moment, but instead relish in the fact that their relationship was joined by everything, their minds were connected just as well as they were physical. Even now he could feel her sadness vibrating off of her and onto him, making him wonder what was going on until she started speaking. He reached over for her hand as soon as she spoke about overhearing everything. He rubbed small circles on the back of her hand before taking a deep breath when he heard her voice choke up. He hadn't wanted to hurt her and that's all he was doing yet again. ​"Unke kehne se kuch hota nahi hai. Faisla humara hai..​" but his voice lacked the power of a proper king and he knew she'd be able to tell, just like he could always tell when something was wrong with her. "​Yaad hai? Tumne pehle din poocha tha, ke kya hum ek acha Raja ban payenge ke nahi? Ab hume nahi lagta ke hum ek ache Raja hain. Raja hone ka matlab yeh toh nahi--ke hum Rajya ke liye khud ka hi maan marde..humne ​aapse​ prem kiya hai, shaadi ki hai, hum kisi aur se nahi karni..​" And that's when he scooted over in his ​kurta​ and held her from the side, wishing there was some way they could escape whatever the future was set to bring. He knew he'd have to ultimately do what was asked, and she'd have to come to terms with it--but it would never be fair to her not matter what, not even if Aarav would ​​never​​ give the same importance to his new wife.

Tanya rested her head against his chest, pulling her feet up to her own as she sighed. "​Aur hum yeh bhi jaante hain, kis uss din jab humne kaha tha ki aap ek ache Raja banoge - hum sach bol rahe the. Yeh sach hai ki hum aapko itne ache se nahin jaante the tab, par humne aapke aankhon main pada tha aur hume lagta hai ki aapko unki baat mann ni chahiye.​" She exhaled slowly, squeezing his hand tightly as she turned to press a soft kiss to his cheek. "​Hum bhi tumse behadh pyar karte hain Aarav, aur yeh baat humse koi nahin cheen sakta. Na koi nayi Rani sahiba, na koi munim."

Aarav gathered her closer and sighed when she spoke, smiling because of the memories it brought back to him. He could still remember how he'd been so hopeful when she'd told him he could be a good ​Raja;​ it was still something he thought of because when he was first forced to take on the throne, her words had gone through his head for the first little while. Yes, even when he was trying desperately hard to ​hate​ her for what she'd done. But when she spoke about him agreeing to the advisor's advice about getting married again, he stiffened up. Didn't she understand how much it repulsed him to think of betraying his love for her that way? But he felt her kiss and looked in her direction, a small smile on his face at her love confession before sighing. "​Vaada kariye humse, ke tum hamesha yeh yaad rakhogi. Humari zindagi mein tumhare siva koi aur nahi hai, na aa sakhta hai.​" He held her close before pressing his lips to her temple. "​Humari Rani Sahiba sirf tum ho,​"

Tanya shut her eyes at his words, knowing that she wouldn't be able to keep that promise. Even if she was putting on this act of being selfless, Tanya was anything but. She also knew that her son wouldn't take too kindly to the fact that his father was getting married a second time, for a wife who would be the ​Rani Sahiba​ for the entire kingdom. It made her wonder if it would start to seem as if he had shut her away in this palace, to keep her away from public eye: almost as if she were a dirty little secret. ​Stop it Tanya! You know its' not like that​. And she did know it wasn't like that but it didn't stop her from wondering. "​Vaada karte hain​," Tanya whispered, fully aware that it would be broken because of her doubting heart.

Aarav hadn't realized how the moment he'd agreed to his new marriage, the ​rishta's​ would start lining up. He'd left the decision up to his advisors, making sure they told the princess that the relationship would be for name, would be strictly in the public eye and he'd be living with ​his​ wife and son in their palace. It was during this whole time that Tanya had gotten pregnant for the second time, and due to the proper customs, she was to deliver their child in a place that wasn't this palace and so now that she was arriving back home, Aarav had been pacing their palace ensuring everything was in place to welcome her and their newborn baby into their home. He'd felt Tanya become more and more distant since his marriage to Suhasi, the ​rajkumari​ he'd been forced into marrying but he hoped that with the arrival of their new baby, things would get better. It was wishful thinking.

Tanya hadn't been sent too far to live out the last three months of her pregnancy. It had been a house full of ladies in waiting who flitted from the main palace to this ​haveli​ that Tanya was made to stay at. They liked to talk ​too​ which meant that Tanya would hear every single piece of gossip floating in the palace. Most of what she heard was harmless: aimless talk about relationships between staff. Except when she did hear something of substance, it always seemed to involve the ​Raja saab​ and his new ​Chotti Rani​. She'd heard that he'd been staying at the main palace for the entire duration of Tanya's leave, that he spent a lot of time with her, made public appearances - and every single piece of information tore at Tanya's heart. Holding her baby tightly in her grip, Tanya made her way up the steps to the palace, her entourage of ladies behind her and looked up to meet Aarav's eye. Despite her pain, her heart skipped a few beats at the sight of him - the way it always would.

Aarav could barely contain his excitement when he spotted her walking up the steps to their palace. His heart was racing and it wasn't just because of his new baby, but because of ​her​. They'd spent twelve years apart and then these three months just felt like too long now, and if he was honest--he was worried that she wouldn't want to come back. Call it an irrational feel but he was petrified that she'd decide to stay away from him and he'd be forced to live without her. "​Dekhe toh, humari nayi taqaat?​" And it was true, his new baby would be his new strength to deal with the rest of the world while this palace remained his haven. He was smiling at Tanya but her expressionless face left him distraught. Something was wrong and he couldn't understand. But as she handed him their new baby girl, he felt his heart melting. ​"Hayye kitni sundar hai yeh nanhi si jaan? Aur inki aankhein, bilkul tumhari tarah hai Rani Sahiba,​" he looked up at her, about to make a comment about whether their little daughter would have dimples but he quieted seeing the way Tanya chose to stare at him still as blankly as before.

Tanya had shut her eyes when Aarav cooed at their daughter, unable to get the image of him with his newer, younger and perhaps even more ​beautiful​ wife out of her head. It was only when he started talking of how their baby girl's eyes were just as big and brown as hers did Tanya felt her heart crack. She knew she should have stayed put, should have put on a facade the way she was expected to but she wasn't ​really​ the ​Rani Sahiba​ was she? She was just a Muslim girl, a ​courtesan​ whom he'd fallen in love, and who had betrayed the entire kingdom. What would he possibly want with her when he had somebody so pure like his ​Chotti Rani?​ With these thoughts swirling through her mind, Tanya moved past Aarav, the soft ​chamm chamm​ of her ​payals​ echoing through the courtyard of the palace as she entered the chambers, not even a single glance to her son or his father.

Aarav had watched her walk away from him, unable to understand why. He'd locked eyes with his son as well who'd told his father with his eyes that he'd go check on his mother. Aarav gave him a small nod before dismissing the rest of the ladies around the palace, thanking them for his service before directing them to the side where one of his ​munim's​ would give them each a gold chain as ​shagun​ for his newborn baby girl. Aarav turned, still holding the calm little girl in his arms, gently rocking her before entering their bedroom. There he spotted Tanya with Prem in front of her. ​"Ammi, kuch boliye na, aapko kya hua hai?"​ Aarav was nearly sure she hadn't seen him and so he paused and waited, hoping she'd at least answer their son and tell him what was wrong and what was going on.

Tanya took her son's hands in hers and exhaled. "​Aap humein sach batayenge na Prem, ki aapke Abbu aur uss... uss aurat ke beech main kya hai?​" Although something told Tanya that why would Aarav even tell his son that he was embarking on a new relationship with somebody other than his mother? She sighed before looking down. "​Humein bas darr lagta hai... aapne dekha hai usse, woh humse chotti hai aur sundar bhi. Aur woh Hindu hai, bilkul ek Rani Sahiba ki tarah​." Perhaps it was unfair of her to dump her troubles on her son but she knew he would take them, and he did, taking a seat next to her. "​Ammi, Abbu aapse pyar karte hain. Woh sirf doosri rani ke paas iss liye the kyunki unko bola gaya tha munim ji ne." Tanya nodded, before letting her son go, ashamed that she'd let her jealousy take the best of her.

Aarav shut his eyes at his wife's worries. How could Tanya think that because Suhasi was younger that he'd automatically gravitate towards her? Didn't she understand that he ​hadn't​ married for twelve years because she was the only woman he'd wanted to be with? And besides even if Suhasi was perfect to the outside world, for Aarav it would always be Tanya. He watched Prem head out of the bedroom and entered it himself, setting their almost asleep baby girl in her little swing. ​"Agar tumhe humse shikyat hai, toh humse kaho..aise chup chup na raha karo. Hume acha nahi lagta. Waise bhi aap itne mahino se door thi humse aur ab bhi--door hi ho."​ He didn't turn though, he just kept swinging their little girl in that little swing, not wanting to face Tanya to admit how much it hurt to face her distance.

Tanya despised the way he had slipped his tone from informal to formal in the span of two seconds and Tanya felt as if she was watching her entire relationship with him disappearing through her fingers. She stood up then, rushing to where he was and wrapping her arms around his waist. She pressed her face against his back and shut her eyes. "​Humein sirf darr tha, pata nahin kyun.. Woh teen mahine, kitne mushkil se guzre aur hum jaante the ki ghar main aapke liye ek aur patni thi...​" Tanya felt a fat tear squeeze its way through her shut eyes and drip down her cheek.

Aarav turned around and held her close before taking a deep breath. "Tanya, ​ek aur patni ka matlab yeh nahi hai ke humara pyaar tumse hat ke uske paas jayega.​" He closed his eyes before opening them to wipe away her tears. "​Hum na kabhi usse pyaar kar sakhte hai, na karenge. Humara parivaar tum ho, humara beta hai aur yeh nanhi si rajkumari hai. Hume aur kuch nahi chaiye.​" He lifted up their daughter once more, gesturing for Tanya to come closer as well before he hummed quietly and turned to her. "​Iska naam kya rakhenge hum? Aur hum tumhe pehle hi bata dete hai, yeh humari aankhon ka tara ban chuki hai, aur iss khoobsurat tofe ke liye shukriya.​"

Tanya peered at their daughter fast asleep in her father's arms and smiled. "​Zaira. Iss ka naam hum Zaira rakhenge​," she whispered, unable to look away from the flushed pink cheeks of her daughter, reminding her too much of roses. Just like the rose Aarav had given to her the first time they had ever met. It hadn't been red; Tanya remembered that. It had been a soft pink rose, one which Tanya had cherished ever after it had wilted and died.

#ᴀᴀʀᴀɴʏᴀ ᴀᴜ ↳ chatzy