jaioes

[jaioes]

Favourite book you read this year?

the spirit that bared it's teeth by Andrew Joseph white !

I haven't had chance to read a lot but this one just hits different.

[jaioes]

End of the year Asks

Song of the year?

Album of the year?

Favorite musical artist / group you started listening to this year?

Movie of the year?

TV show of the year?

Episode of tv or webisode that defined the year for you?

Favorite actor of the year?

Game of the year?

Best month for you this year?

Something that made you cry this year?

Something you want to do again next year?

Talk about a new friend you made this year

How was your birthday this year?

Favorite book you read this year?

What’s a bad habit you picked up this year?

Post a picture from the beginning of the year

Post a picture from the end of the year

A memorable meal this year?

What’re you excited about for next year?

What’s something you learned this year?

What’s something new about your place of residence (room, home, or general location) now vs the start of the year?

Favorite place you visited this year?

If you could send a message to yourself back on the first day of the year, what would it be?

Did you keep any New Year’s Resolutions?

Did you create any characters (in games, art, or writing) this year? Describe one

[jaioes]

Just a bit of a sketch of my fav girls . Lets just imagine this was the ending 😔

[jaioes]

i was so scared for him

[jaioes]

I dont have nearly enough time or people yap about this show, it makes me feral

[jaioes]

[jaioes]

[jaioes]

Buying a new ipad using my old ipad feels like im betraying it somehow.

[jaioes]

The Black Wizard (Part1)

When Remus leaves his hometown, it’s not to seek his fortune, or adventure, or – gods forbid – love. He leaves because he’s a monster, and monsters do not belong in society. They belong in the Waste.

This is how it happens:

It’s May Day. The village of Hogsmead is abuzz with excitement. Revellers and drunks, lovely dressed up ladies and dapper gentlemen circling one another, for propriety's sake staying respectable distances away. The gentlemen whistling at the ladies, the ladies pretending to be aghast by the behaviour, covertly blushing and giggling.

It’s a perfect day. Sunny, warm, bright.

For Remus, it’s perfect for a different reason.

Everyone is too busy to notice their pockets getting lighter. Too buzzed to pay attention to the man dressed in ill-fitting clothes waking too close to others. A casual jostle is just this - casual. Nothing to worry about. Nothing to raise concern.

Remus has a few pilfered wallets in a hidden pocket he sewed onto a stolen vest, along with his favourite book of poetry he never parts from. Some small valuables nobody would notice missing until it would be too late to track it to him. It’s easy, this. He’s done it for years.

“My apologies,” he smiles at a man in a soldier’s garb, whose money pouch he just appropriated. This one feels good for more than one reason - the soldier was in the process of accosting a lady who did not seem pleased to be accosted. She takes the moment he gets distracted by Remus and ducks away. Remus would like to say that he makes sure to only steal from those who deserve it, but it wouldn’t be true.

Food is food, and money is money, and both are something he needs to live. Remus can’t get a job, on account of being a monster, on account of how many days he has to take out to recuperate and travel somewhere far enough to make sure he wouldn’t let himself lose on Hogsmeade. He’s tried: he worked in a bakery right after his parents’ passing, then in a post office, a fishmonger and a greengrocer. He tried his hand at hunting game and selling it at a market, but his aim was poor and he couldn’t stomach the job. Each time he had to take sick days talk begun: simple at first, concerned. That poor Lupin boy, they would say, all alone now and so sickly. But soon the compassion ran out in favour of annoyance (“you need time off again? It’s barely been three weeks”). Followed, unfailingly, by questions.

Questions he has to steer people from if he wants to keep himself safe.

He’s tall but can make himself look unassuming, his hair once golden-auburn now streaked with grey from the effect of too many full moons. It’s perfect for this job, being easy to look over and hard to describe. He’s young but looks old. Feels old, too, but that’s not something for people to see.

Remus makes mistakes in this work so rarely that he doesn’t notice he’s made one until it’s too late.

He’s following a well-dressed man, waiting for an opportunity to strike. The man is exceptionally pretty, with short black curls barely skimming the tops of his ears and a gait like royalty. Remus follows behind him at a stretch, slow and careful, until they round the back of a seedy pub and the man turns around like he is the one who set the trap.

Green eyes like poison.

“Trailing the Wizard of the Waste, that’s brave of you,” the man says with a voice that freezes Remus midstep.

Because he knows better than that. He knows not to go for the people who are dressed overly expensive, with rich black fabrics and shining peacock plumes in their hats. He knows chances are somebody is watching over the really rich. That the possibility of a greater payoff doesn’t compare to the risk of being caught.

And yet here he is: caught.

“Or maybe simply foolish,” the Wizard says. “You don’t look a fool, but such things can be so deceiving, don’t you agree?”

The way his eyes pierce through Remus: all he can think is he knows. Somebody knows. Remus has been found out.

“You would know all about deceiving looks, wouldn’t you,” the man finishes like a purr of a cat poised to kill.

Remus turns and runs, tripping over his own feet in his haste to get away. Remus remembers what the townspeople did the last time someone was found out. Remembers the stench of burning flesh.

He doesn’t look back once before he flees, not even when the Wizard shouts “my regards to Sirius!”, to his retreating back. 

***

The road to the Waste is long and winding. The moon was not long full, and Remus still feels the effects it had on his body. He walks slow, using a stick he found in some bushes as a makeshift cane. Takes breaks. Bundles himself up tighter against the bracing winds. Admires the views. His hometown grows smaller and smaller, falls silent at the foot of the hill, lovely little toy buildings with their twinkly lights of windows.

He wonders if he’ll miss it. Can’t make up his mind, one way or the other. He should – right? It’s all he’s ever known.

“What do you think?” He asks his cane, because there is no one else to talk to, “will anyone notice we’re gone?”

The cane, of course, doesn’t answer. Only the wind blowing past him hears his question.

At the top, the hill becomes a plateau. Flat, green, peppered with clearwater lakes. Stretches for miles, in all directions. Remus remembers, from long-ago lessons, that the Capital is due North, and that to the East is the border with a neighbouring kingdom. It’s hard to believe when as far as the eye can see the Waste stretches, neverending and full of things ready to strike.

The sun is starting to set when he spots the Castle.

It moves towards him at considerable speed, rattling along the grass and shaking like it could come apart. By some miracle, or some magic, all of its various sticky-outy parts stay precariously attached where they seem to belong.

Remus thinks well, this is just my luck because the Black Wizard lives in the Castle, and the Black Wizard eats hearts. The heart of a monster is rumoured to give great strength, indulge the power, strengthen the spirit. Remus expected dying in the Waste – he just didn’t think it would be before nightfall on the very first day.

From Remus’ hometown the Castle could sometimes be seen far off in the mountains. It looked grand and stately, mysterious in how sometimes it was low in the hills and sometimes almost completely out of sight and far away, plumes of coloured smoke raising from its chimneys colouring the sky in reds and golds.

Up close, the Castle is ugly. Makeshift. Materials that don’t fit together, made to be imposing rather than reasonable. The embodiment of style over function. There are turrets where no turrets make sense, windows with no light behind them, and the whole front of it looks like a giant open maw. A lion’s jaw.

Remus stands still. “Now we’ve done it,” he says to the cane. Casts a final look back at the town. At the setting sun. At the lake some distance away, great and shimmering as it reflects the last rays of sunlight.

The Castle stops, the entrance at his feet. The door opens.

Remus walks towards it.

***

The Black Wizard isn’t inside. There’s only an abundance of spiders and one very chatty fire.

Remus is cold. His joints ache where they were broken apart and stitched back together not five days earlier. If the Wizard set a trap for monsters, then this monster walked right into it, with no fight.

“That’s a nasty curse you’ve got on you,” the fire’s voice is like crackling kindling.

Remus sits in a chair at the hearth. Lets the heat unlock his body. “Mmm,” he says, half in response and half in bliss.

“I could help you with that, you know. There are potions. Maybe spells.”

“Could you now,” Remus isn’t convinced. The fire sounds like he would expect – fickle, volatile, unreliable.

“Sure I could,” the fire answers. “But you’d have to help me out first. We’d call it an exchange.”

“Mmm,” he’s falling asleep now. The walk was long, and the warmth is so very pleasant.

“My name is James, not that you’ve bothered to ask.”

Remus doesn’t respond. He’s already asleep.

******

NOTES:

Hi! I’m back with another part-per-day fic. As it’s December I’ve gone with my ultimate comfort movie to make an AU from because who doesn’t like cosy ghibli vibes?

IM SO EXCITED to say this has a companion artwork by the ridiculously talented @jaioes go check it out and give them lots of love.

See you tomorrow and happy December!

@tealeavesandtrash

@hoje--aqui

@cocoabutterandbooks

@onion-sliced-apples

@prancingpony42

@digital-kam

@remoonysiriusly

@sweetstarryskies

@a-sunset-outside-my-window

@procrastinatingstuff

@annaliza999

@wannabelilybriscoe

@quiethauntings

@veganbutterchicken

@euripidestrousers

(let me know if you do/don’t want to be tagged!)

[jaioes]

A collab with @marigold-hills for this howl moving castle Au story!!

[jaioes]

an hour ago I was falling asleep sitting up. now I'm cozy, in a blanket filled bed, peak comfy.

yet I remain awake.

the horrors of existence persists.✨🫶

[jaioes]

Sketch warm ups of jinx

[jaioes]

C-crusty man

[jaioes]

[jaioes]

several screenwriter friends have been told by their management in the last 24 hours not to write queer main characters anymore. which is honestly an expected move from business-minded and risk-averse (see: cowardly) hollywood, but the self-censorship of self-preservation is already beginning, and it's beginning fast.

project 2025 is no fucking joke when it comes to queer art, so get physical copies of whatever you can while you can. financially support queer art and queer artists as much as possible in the next few months. and hoard that shit close.

[jaioes]

Part.8 and final 💕

Surprise surprise, I’ve been wanting to give closure to this lil story for so long, it has a big part of my heart because it was the first short story I made follow ups of it, definitely helped me with some art blocks and brought me comfort, and u guys interaction with it was the best thing ever 💕 ty so much for following along to this silly short story.

[jaioes]

Know that you are loved, supported and cared for. That there is always a space for you, and people here who will stand with, by and for you. That we have existed forever and will continue to love and to fight for as long as it takes.

Please keep yourself safe, remember there is no wrong way to cope or feel.

Existing shouldn’t be political, and your sharpest weapon is to stay alive.