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shuavez · 2 months ago

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litany 𓄧 k.mg

ii. evidence of absence.

summary 𓄧 every oath has a cost. every touch has a consequence. sent deep undercover into one of the city’s most illicit vampire clubs, two detectives must navigate the delicate balance between duty and desire — and survive the consequences when pretending stops feeling like pretending.

and some hungers, once fed, are impossible to starve.

tags 𓄧 detective!au, vampire!mingyu x human!reader. slow-ish burn. fake dating. friends/coworkers to lovers. ft. various svt members/idols.

warnings 𓄧 semi-graphic descriptions of blood, death. wc. 5.5k.

previous chapter ↜ i. tie a cherry.

The morning sky hangs low, leaden and bruised, casting shadows that stretch like spilled ink down the alleyway. Rain clings to every surface, transforming the cracked pavement into mirrors, reflecting nothing but gray. The body lies at the epicenter of all that grayness, starkly illuminated under the harsh beams of forensic lamps.

You stand silently near the crime scene perimeter, boots slick with rainwater, breath misting gently into the frigid air. Even beneath the thick wool of your coat, the chill seeps into your bones, lingering alongside an uncomfortable, gnawing tension.

Across from you, Mingyu rises smoothly from his crouched position near the victim. He crosses the alley in a few purposeful strides, his expression unreadable, and silently offers Jeonghan a small, sleek, familiar card.

Jeonghan frowns, squinting at the black and crimson lettering. “Velvet Eden…?”

Mingyu nods slowly, voice low and careful, almost apologetic. “She’s a regular. I do recognize her. She was new around six months ago, when I first started infiltrating.”

You shift slightly, chest tightening as the words sink in. It’s strange how quickly dread coils around the edges of familiarity, like ivy reclaiming an abandoned building.

“And last night,” Mingyu continues, eyes flickering momentarily toward you, guarded yet quietly protective, “right after we got there—a group of vampires arrived. Suits, expensive, polished. Different energy than usual. Hungrier, colder. Dangerous. I didn’t recognize any faces, didn’t catch names…but the vibe was off.” His jaw flexes briefly, tension visibly threading through his shoulders.

You remember the moment vividly. Mingyu’s silent shift at the bar, his shoulder brushing against yours just enough to signal caution, subtly shielding you from prying eyes. A flash of silver cufflinks catching the club’s low lights, the cold glint of predatory eyes tracking your movements. You swallow hard, the faint taste of last night’s amaretto lingering on your tongue, mingling strangely with the acrid aftertaste of adrenaline and unease.

When you meet Mingyu’s gaze again, understanding passes silently between you—a low, instinctive hum of tension. You’re not sure what exactly you’re walking into, only that whatever it is, you’re already deeply tangled in its grasp.

You exhale a slow, measured breath, peeling your gloves off sharply, fingers stinging briefly from the cold. “We need footage. Not from inside the club—they won’t give us anything unless we subpoena, and even then, they’ll wipe it clean.”

Mingyu nods curtly, gaze following yours to the surrounding buildings. “Exterior cams?”

“Exactly,” you say, eyeing the narrow brick apartment building looming on one side and the shuttered print shop tucked against the other. Their security cameras look cheap and poorly maintained, but anything’s better than nothing. “Check flank angles. We might get lucky and catch whoever brought her here. Move quickly, before the footage loops.”

Without another word, Mingyu departs swiftly, long strides eating up the pavement as he disappears into the hazy morning fog. Jeonghan watches him go, eyebrows arching in silent amusement as the tall vampire melts easily into the shadows between buildings.

Then, with a grin that somehow manages to be both teasing and empathetic, Jeonghan turns toward you, eyes twinkling mischievously. “So,” he drawls, deliberately playful, though you can sense genuine curiosity beneath, “tell me about last night.”

You blink at him, breath misting in the cold air. “What’s there to tell?” You shrug, feigning disinterest. “We were just establishing my presence.”

Jeonghan snorts softly, rolling his eyes. “Oh, I know that part, idiot. I want the real details. Like, why you and Mingyu are suddenly drowning in weird nervous energy. The guy’s practically glued to your hip.”

Your eyes drift briefly back toward the body, now carefully shrouded in plastic, forensic techs quietly murmuring as they move carefully around the scene. You sigh, relenting just a bit. “It was fine,” you say softly, voice barely audible above the distant murmur of radios and traffic. “We had drinks, established a cover…then went into a Red Room. There was a camera inside—very visible—so we had to sell it.”

Jeonghan leans in slightly, lowering his voice conspiratorially. “Define?”

You glance sideways at him, heart speeding uncomfortably. “We made out. Briefly.”

Jeonghan’s mouth forms an exaggerated ‘O,’ eyes sparkling. He chuckles softly under his breath, clearly entertained but trying—and failing—to suppress his amusement. “And?” he presses again.

“And then he fed from me.” You swallow thickly, throat tight with the admission. “That was the whole point, after all.”

Jeonghan tilts his head, expression carefully neutral but eyes gleaming with intense curiosity. “Painful?”

You pause, chewing the inside of your cheek, uncertain how best to convey the truth. “At first, yes,” you admit quietly. “But then…it felt—” Your voice trails off, embarrassment creeping up your neck in a hot rush. “I don’t know how to explain it in a way that isn’t…uncouth.”

Jeonghan smirks faintly. “Get to the point.”

“It was like the best orgasm I’ve never had,” you finally mutter, voice dropping to a whisper, cheeks hot. “Like pure ecstasy. I can’t explain it better than that.”

He blinks once, twice—and then bursts into low, muffled laughter, shoulders shaking with amusement. “Oh, interesting,” he says finally, grinning broadly. “And how do you feel today?”

You sigh, rubbing your hands together, staring at the wet pavement as you gather your scattered thoughts. “Everything feels…sluggish,” you admit slowly, “like my nerves are dipped in tar. But last night—I felt something I didn’t expect. It was exciting. I realized we’ll have to do it again, maybe multiple times…and that thought didn’t scare me. It thrilled me.”

“So you’re horny for him?” Jeonghan deadpans.

Your head snaps up, eyes widening with immediate horror. “Jeonghan!”

He laughs openly, teeth bright against the gloom. “What? I mean, I’m straight, but I’m not blind. Mingyu’s literally drop-dead gorgeous. Tall, dark, mysterious, ancient vampire charm? He’s got enough skin in the game. Hell, even I’d probably get flustered.”

You roll your eyes, irritated yet undeniably flustered yourself. “We were undercover, Jeonghan.”

“Uh-huh,” he chuckles. “Sure you were.”

Your cheeks still burn as Mingyu returns swiftly, slipping easily beneath the police tape and handing you a short handwritten note. “They’ll send the footage to the precinct before lunch,” he says quietly. His gaze brushes gently across your face, checking silently for distress, for damage. You soften slightly under his careful attention, heart stumbling traitorously.

Jeonghan slaps Mingyu cheerfully on the shoulder as he passes, smirking broadly. “You’re driving her, bloodsucker. She’s too cold to handle it.”

Mingyu doesn’t protest, merely nodding softly, his expression faintly amused yet somehow quietly pleased. You don’t argue either. The thought of slipping into the warmth and quiet of his car is too inviting to resist.

The drive back is heavy with silence—not uncomfortable, exactly, but thick and charged, your skin prickling with a strange awareness of him. You watch raindrops streak down the window, keenly aware of the quiet sounds of his breathing, the subtle flex of his hands gripping the wheel.

Inside the precinct, the warmth does little to ease the lingering chill in your bones. You pass through the maze of half-cubicles and incident boards, past the coffee station that always smells like burnt rubber and despair, until you reach the far end of the corridor. Your shared office is quiet. Dim, except for the gray light pushing in through the blinds and the faint hum of your space heater struggling to do its job.

Technically, it’s your and Jeonghan’s office. But since Mingyu’s temporary transfer from Organized Crime, you’ve cleared space at the other half of your desk—two monitors now sit side by side, paperwork stacked in tidy columns between. His things are minimal: laptop, notepad, one perfectly aligned pen. Everything else, he borrows. Including your charger, your stapler, and occasionally, your patience.

He doesn’t say anything as he sits, only exhales through his nose, tired. You do the same. The click of your chair wheels is the only sound for a while.

You try to work—really, you do. Your eyes skim line after line of log reports, flicking past duplicate aliases and half-scrubbed membership rosters. Your highlighter drags across familiar names in a haze of yellow, but nothing sticks. The words blur into nothing. It’s like trying to read underwater. Every sound feels muffled, distant. The warm hum of the space heater barely cuts through the chill pressing against your spine.

And then—you feel it.

Stillness. Not tension, exactly. But deliberate, settled quiet.

You look up.

Mingyu’s watching you from across the desk—not with the sharp, clinical scrutiny of an investigator, but something slower, more careful. Like he’s waiting. Not to be heard. To be understood.

“Can we talk?” he asks, voice pitched low enough that the heater almost swallows it. But you catch it. You’re already listening.

You nod once, the motion small. “Of course.”

He leans forward slowly, bracing his elbows on his knees. His hands flex in his lap—just once, then still. The weight in his posture is subtle but unmistakable. Something about him feels older in this moment. Like he’s dragging something from deeper down.

“It’s about your blood type,” he says, and the words fall into the space between you like a stone into deep water.

You blink, posture straightening, a flicker of something cold brushing the back of your neck. “Okay…”

Mingyu’s eyes flick to yours, steady. Apologetic. “It’s RH-null.”

The words don’t hit at first. You just stare at him, waiting for more.

“…Okay,” you echo slowly, cautious. “And?”

A breath leaves him—sharp, but quiet. Not frustration. Not impatience. Just the weight of explaining something he wishes he didn’t have to.

“It’s rare,” he says. “Exceptionally. One in six million. Most vampires will go their entire existence without even smelling it, let alone tasting it.” He pauses, throat working once. “It’s not just rare. It’s potent. Dangerous. Loaded.”

You blink again. The implications begin to ripple outward—slow at first, then faster.

“I didn’t want to scare you,” he adds quietly, gaze flicking down to the edge of the desk. “Fear, in a place like that is about as good as an open wound. I knew what your blood could do, and I knew what that room would feel like with you in it. I needed you calm. I wanted to be honest, but…”

“But you weren’t,” you finish for him—not sharp, not angry. Just quiet. Steady.

His jaw tenses faintly, the muscles flexing once beneath the clean line of his cheek. “I should have been.”

You lean back slightly in your chair, exhaling through your nose. It’s not that you’re upset—though the pulse behind your ribs has started to speed up. It’s more the ground shifting beneath your feet. Something you thought you understood—something you thought you had a grip on—suddenly redefined.

“You have to tell me these things,” you say, and though your voice is still even, it carries the weight of something non-negotiable. “Even if it’s scary. Even if you think I’ll panic. We don’t have room for secrets between us—not in there. It's too dangerous.”

His gaze snaps back to yours. There’s no defensiveness in it—only remorse. A soft, wounded kind of acknowledgment.

“I know,” he says. “And you’re right.”

The silence that follows is thick, coiled with the kind of tension that doesn’t come from anger—but from understanding. From the long, uneasy reconciliation between what’s been kept quiet and what needs to be spoken.

“So,” you say slowly, fingers curling against the hem of your sweater, “if I’m… if I’m this potent—this tempting—what does that mean for feeding? Is there a risk?”

The question hangs between you, and for the first time, Mingyu’s composure fractures—barely. A flicker. The barest bristle of offense. You hadn’t meant it that way, but the reaction is there before you can walk it back.

His voice, when it comes, is calm—but edged with something tight. “Not with me.”

You hold his gaze, steady. “I wasn’t implying—”

“I know,” he says again, softer this time. The tension bleeds off him like mist in the sun. “I know you weren’t. I just… I need you to understand that even at its worst, even if every instinct I have is screaming for more—I won’t lose control. Not with you. Never with you.”

You study him.

The way his shoulders have gone still again, the faint crease at the corner of his mouth. He looks… pained. Not because you doubted him, but because you even had to ask.

And you hadn’t meant it like that. Not really. You trust him. You do. But trust doesn’t erase instinct. Not yours. Not his.

“The first feed is always the hardest,” he says after a beat. “The bond hits raw. Unfiltered. It softens with time. You’ll adjust. So will I. It gets easier.”

You nod slowly. That makes sense. It tracks.

But there’s a part of you—small, hidden—that doesn’t want it to get easier.

You don’t want to lose the sharpness of what happened between you. The way it had caught you off guard. The way your body had sung under his mouth, his hands. The way your name had trembled in his throat like it meant something more than duty.

You don’t say it.

But the way his eyes linger on yours says maybe—just maybe—he already knows.

A long silence settles between you, thick and unspoken but not uncomfortable. Just… real. And then—

A voice from the hallway cuts through it, louder than necessary.

“Knock, knock, kids. I come bearing gifts.”

Jeonghan.

He bumps the door open with his hip, two plastic bags swinging from one arm and a coffee tray precariously balanced in the other. The smell hits immediately—spicy, rich, bright with chili paste.

“You two looked like you were about to expire,” he announces, dropping the bags onto your desk with a dramatic flourish. “Eat. That’s an order.”

He sets the food down on your desk with a flourish. Steam curls from the bags, rich and spicy, the scent of tteokbokki hitting the air like a punch to the senses—red sauce, rice cakes, something slightly sweet, and something burning just enough to make your mouth water.

“You didn’t,” you say, half-smiling despite the tension still riding your spine.

Jeonghan just grins. “I did. And I got real coffee this time. None of that precinct-sludge.”

Mingyu murmurs a quiet thanks, already tearing into one of the containers with the kind of hunger that seems too well-practiced. You’re pretty sure food does nothing for him, as a vampire. Mere indulgence rather than sustenance, perhaps. It makes the corners of your mouth curl into a smile regardless.

You’re slower to start, but when the first bite hits your tongue, the heat is like a defibrillator. The spice shocks you back into your body—the sauce sticky and sweet, the rice cakes chewy and warm. It spreads through your chest like thawing out from the inside.

For a while, no one speaks. Just the occasional scrape of chopsticks against the plastic container, the low sound of Mingyu swallowing beside you, the hum of Jeonghan’s laptop fan kicking into life as he checks something on-screen. The heater whirs steadily in the background, and the room is suddenly smaller. Warmer. Realer.

It’s almost peaceful. The kind of quiet that settles like a blanket, made heavier by exhaustion and the faint spice of sauce still clinging to your tongue. The lull of food and fatigue creates the illusion of stillness, of calm—like maybe, for once, everything can just stop.

Then Jeonghan’s laptop pings.

The sound cuts through the room like a blade. Sharp. Surgical.

All three of you still at once. Chopsticks freeze mid-air. Breaths hold. Jeonghan exhales, a sigh that sounds too steady to be anything but forced, and he swivels his chair with practiced ease. He clicks once.

Footage Received: 5 attachments.

You don’t realize how tight your grip on the container has become until you feel your knuckles ache on putting it down. Without a word, you rise, drawn toward the screen like gravity itself has shifted. Mingyu is already moving in sync, silent, his body casting a long shadow across the desk as he leans in beside you.

The first video stutters into life.

The timestamp blinks in one corner—barely three hours after you and Mingyu had walked out of Velvet Eden under the syrupy haze of red light and too many half-formed thoughts.

The alley appears first. Dimly lit. Unremarkable. Then—movement.

Seo-yeon.

She stumbles into frame, clutching herself like she’s trying to hold in something vital. Her gait is uneven, shoulders hunched. Every part of her screams discomfort. Vulnerability. And then—behind her—a second figure.

A shadow that glides more than walks. Sleek. Fast. Purposeful.

You don’t breathe.

Seo-yeon turns. Tries to retreat. But it’s too late. Her mouth opens like she’s going to scream, but no sound escapes before her body crumples. The figure is already on her.

The attack isn’t clumsy. There’s no wild grappling, no chaotic blur of limbs. It’s measured. Precise. The shadow descends with a kind of reverence—like feeding is a prayer, not a crime. There’s no blood spray. No mess. Just the steady, sickening intimacy of lips at a throat and a body going slack beneath it.

Then—black screen.

You’re left staring at the monitor’s dark reflection. Your own face stares back at you in the gloss of the laptop. Your features look warped. Pale. Drawn. The hollow curve of your mouth stays open a beat too long.

You look like someone who’s just watched a girl die.

But it’s not horror that sits in your chest.

Not really.

It’s recognition.

You know what it’s like now—to be the one beneath the mouth, the hands. To feel that sharp, electrifying prick of fangs, and then the drop. The sudden, inexorable fall into something vast and hot and bottomless. It doesn’t feel like death. It feels like drowning in pleasure so deep it defies logic. You’d felt it yourself. Still feel it, sometimes, in phantom echoes that hum beneath your skin.

You remember Mingyu’s mouth. The way his breath had ghosted across your skin before he bit. The way his hands had held you—firm but careful, like you were something fragile and treasured. The way your body had gone soft under his touch, your thoughts obliterated by bliss.

The figure in the video wasn’t careful.

But they were experienced.

You wonder, in some deep, sick part of you, if Seo-yeon felt it too—just for a moment. If, before the end, it felt like something else. Like being chosen. Desired. Consumed.

Your stomach churns.

You inhale sharply through your nose, trying to drown the thought in breath, but the taste of last night still clings to the back of your throat. Amaretto. Velvet. His mouth.

And then, the shame hits. Heavy. Crawling.

You’re standing here, mourning a stranger through the lens of your own memory. Not because you knew her. But because your body remembers how good it felt—and part of you hates that. Hates that you know.

“It’s clean,” Mingyu says, voice low and even, like he’s speaking from behind glass. “Efficient. Whoever did it… knew exactly what they were doing.”

His voice is close. You hadn’t noticed how close he’d gotten.

You swallow, the dryness in your throat like sandpaper. “It wasn’t just a kill,” you murmur. “It was a ritual.”

The words hang there, suspended between you.

Jeonghan mutters something—maybe a curse, maybe a prayer—but it sounds far away. Distant. Muted beneath the buzz that’s started in your ears. You can’t pull your eyes from the screen even though it’s blank now. Black as the inside of a coffin. But your mind keeps playing the footage on loop.

Seo-yeon’s stumble. Her turn. The way she dropped.

You shake your head once, sharp, like it might clear the images lodged behind your eyes.

“She hesitated,” you whisper. “Right before. Like she sensed something. But she didn’t run.”

Mingyu is already moving, sliding back toward his desk with the focused calm of someone trying not to let adrenaline short-circuit his logic. “We need names,” he says, fingers flying across his keyboard. “Anyone who left after us. Anyone unaccounted for in the hours after. Timestamps, aliases, everything.”

The calm from earlier is gone. The warmth of food, the easy jokes, even the sting of the pepper sauce on your tongue—it’s all been stripped away. The air is colder now. Hungrier. You slide back into your chair without thinking, the muscles in your body moving like they’re working from memory rather than command. You start parsing data. IDs. Door logs. Code scans. Anything that might offer a trail.

It feels like falling face-first into a blizzard—white noise, frantic movement, eyes that can’t blink fast enough.

And then—

“Captain’s in today, right?” Jeonghan asks, his voice quieter now, like he’s asking for permission he already knows he’ll get.

Mingyu doesn’t look up. “Let’s go.”

The captain’s office is a glass box at the end of the bullpen, lit only by the thin gray wash of daylight and the soft glow of his desk lamp.

Choi Seungcheol is exactly the kind of man you’d want steering a ship like this — calm, grounded, deeply competent. You’ve seen him lose his temper exactly once, and it was the kind of quiet that makes people start looking for exits.

No shouting. No slamming fists or storming down hallways.

He’d stood in the middle of the bullpen with a file in his hand, one that detailed a botched cross-jurisdiction sting—agents left hanging, one dead, two hospitalized—and just… stopped moving. Not a word for almost thirty full seconds. Everyone around him froze like animals in a clearing, instinctively bracing for something worse than fury.

And then he’d walked, slowly, to the whiteboard. Picked up a marker. Erased the entire operation detail by detail with clinical precision. Rewrote the command chain. Scrapped half the team and reassigned the other. All without ever raising his voice. That was the day you realized Seungcheol didn’t get angry.

He got surgical.

You reach his door first, knocking twice on the door before easing it open. The blinds are half-drawn, pale daylight slanting through the narrow gaps and striping the floor in sharp lines. Inside, Seungcheol is already looking up from the open file on his desk, one hand loosely curled around a black ceramic mug, steam still rising from the top. His sleeves are rolled past his elbows, exposing forearms marked by faded scarring, burnished skin, and the faint shimmer of a ward tattoo just beneath his wrist.

He doesn’t smile, not quite, but there’s something gentler in the way his eyes settle on you—something solid, like stone worn smooth by water.

“You look like you’ve been through hell,” he says, voice low but warm. “Come in. Sit.”

You don’t wait to be told twice. Jeonghan sinks into the chair to your left with a theatrical groan that goes unacknowledged. Mingyu takes the far seat, posture neat and precise, arms folding loosely over his lap. You ease down between them, suddenly aware of the weight in your shoulders, the cold still clinging to your sleeves.

Seungcheol takes a sip from his mug, then sets it down with the same deliberate quiet he does everything. No wasted movement. No performance. Just a man who’s seen more than most and carries it like a steady hum beneath his skin.

“Alright,” he says. “Walk me through it.”

Jeonghan starts. He always does. Sharp, efficient, fluent in the rhythm of command. The second victim. Same profile. Same cause of death. Same link to the club. He lays it all out in quick, clean lines, like pinning evidence to a corkboard with invisible thread.

You follow, adding detail where needed—the exterior footage, the shadowed figure, the precision of the kill. You don’t dwell on the emotional weight of it, but Seungcheol sees it anyway. His eyes flick to yours when you mention the time stamp, the bloodlessness of the scene. He nods once. Just once. Like an anchor thrown into deep water.

Mingyu rounds it out. He names the names TARU flagged, lays out the narrowed timeline, the roster shifts inside the club. And then, calmly, clearly: your plan.

Another appearance. No contact. No feeding. Just visibility. Presence. You’re not spooking the hive—not yet. The idea is to be seen again, to be remembered. To deepen the illusion that whatever bond they saw that night wasn’t staged.

Seungcheol listens without interruption. Fingers steepled loosely, elbows resting against the worn leather arms of his chair. His gaze flicks occasionally to the file, but mostly, it holds on each of you in turn—assessing, not doubting. Measuring for strain.

When the room quiets again, when the last thread of your plan has been laid bare, he leans back in his chair and exhales slowly. His mouth tugs downward—thoughtful, not displeased. His voice, when it comes, is calm. Grounded.

“I don’t hate it,” he says.

You catch the faint twitch of Jeonghan’s mouth—approval, disguised as smugness.

“But,” Seungcheol continues, “if we’re sending you back in, you’re not going in blind. I want wires this time. Low-gain. No ambient bounce. One channel only.”

Mingyu nods once. “I’ll get Soojin to prep the kit. Subdermal adhesive, low profile.”

“Good,” Seungcheol says. “Keep it tight. No chatter unless it’s urgent.”

He pauses, eyes flicking briefly between the three of you. His focus lingers longest on you—not questioning, just observing. There’s a steadiness to him that doesn’t ask for explanation. It just holds space for it.

“You think they’ll recognize her again?” Seungcheol asks, voice quieter now, his focus fixed on you.

You don’t answer right away.

Instead, your eyes flick to Mingyu. A silent handoff. There’s something careful in the gesture—not avoidance, but deference. You’ve already had this conversation once, in the hushed stillness of your shared office, with the heater buzzing and the weight of truth pressing in around your ribs. This time, it’s his to carry.

Mingyu straightens slightly in his seat. Not tense. Just composed. A breath drawn slow before he speaks.

“They’ll recognize her,” he says. “Not just her face.”

Seungcheol’s brow furrows faintly.

Mingyu continues, more deliberate now. “Her blood. It’s rare. RH-null. Most vampires go their entire existence without even smelling it. It’s… potent. Like walking into a crackhouse with a loaded needle in your pocket.”

Across the desk, Seungcheol’s expression doesn’t change immediately. It holds—curious, parsing, neutral—but there’s a subtle shift in the set of his jaw. The kind of movement that only registers if you’ve spent enough time learning the small ways he telegraphs disquiet. His thumb taps once against the ceramic of his mug, then stills.

“RH-null,” he repeats, slowly, like the words are shaped strange in his mouth. “That’s… not on any of our briefings.”

“It wouldn’t be,” Mingyu replies. “There’s barely any data. Less than fifty documented humans worldwide. It’s not something you screen for. It’s just… there. And when it is—it changes everything.”

You watch Seungcheol closely as he processes it. His eyes settle back on you, and for the first time since you walked in, something flickers behind them. Not doubt. Not distrust. But concern—clean and quiet, the kind that’s heavier than it looks.

“She didn’t know,” Mingyu adds. “Not until 20 minutes ago.”

A beat. Then another.

“And you still want to send her back in?”

Mingyu’s jaw flexes, but his voice stays steady. “I wouldn’t put her in danger. I wouldn’t let anyone else, either. But they’ve seen her now. Smelled her. If she disappears, they’ll start asking questions we can’t answer. It’s safer to move forward than to pull her out.”

He hesitates then, just slightly, and for the first time, there’s a note of something almost vulnerable in his voice—low and certain and close to a promise.

“I’ll keep her safe.”

Seungcheol doesn’t speak immediately. His fingers curl loosely around the handle of his mug again, but he doesn’t lift it. Just holds the weight of it in his palm like it anchors him.

You watch his gaze shift—once to Mingyu, once to you, then down to the edge of the case file still splayed open in front of him.

When he finally exhales, it’s slower this time. More thoughtful. But his voice holds.

“Then we stick to the plan,” he says. “You stay close. You don’t deviate. And if anything, anything feels off—”

“I pull her out,” Mingyu says.

“Good,” Seungcheol murmurs. But this time, there’s a crease at the corner of his mouth that wasn’t there before. The first faint outline of tension begins to settle. Not distrust. Just a quiet, unwanted understanding of how quickly the variables have changed.

The bullpen feels different tonight—less like a workspace, more like a staging area. Wires, tape, and surveillance equipment spread across the desk between you and Mingyu, while Jeonghan and Soojin busy themselves with last-minute checks.

Mingyu stands quietly under the fluorescent lights, expression patient, eyes focused ahead. Jeonghan circles him once, critically eyeing the loose silk shirt he’s wearing before sighing dramatically.

“Shirt off, Romeo,” Jeonghan says, flicking his fingers dismissively. “This’ll only take a minute.”

Mingyu shrugs easily out of his button-down without protest. The silk slides from his shoulders like water, catching momentarily at the sharp lines of his collarbones, down over the lean muscles of his chest and stomach. Your pulse stutters traitorously. Even under the stark overhead lighting, Mingyu looks carved from marble—broad shoulders, a defined chest, lean abs that flex faintly as Jeonghan presses cold adhesive tape against his ribs.

You blink and force your gaze toward Soojin instead, suddenly hyper aware of your sweater bunched around your ribs, her cool fingertips brushing gently over your skin as she secures the transmitter pack against your hip, hidden neatly beneath the waistband of your skirt.

Still, your attention drifts back to Mingyu. Just briefly. Just enough to catch him watching you, his gaze heavy but unreadable, something softer and warmer than professionalism lingering just behind the careful set of his mouth. You feel heat rise to your face, threatening your composure, and quickly glance away again.

Mingyu doesn’t say a word—he never does—but there’s a subtle, pleased shift in his posture. You have the uncomfortable realization he can probably sense exactly how much your heart rate just spiked.

“You okay?” Soojin murmurs, mouth curling knowingly at one corner. Her tone holds a touch of amusement, but you appreciate her discretion.

“Fine,” you whisper back, a little too quickly.

She only hums lightly, pressing the hem of your sweater neatly back into place before smoothing her hands over your miniskirt. “All set.”

Jeonghan clears his throat sharply, pulling you both back to attention. Mingyu tugs his shirt back on, buttoning it with methodical slowness, each movement somehow drawing your eyes back despite your best efforts. You clench your fists once, twice, focusing hard on Jeonghan as he holds up two slim earpieces and explains quickly:

“These are strictly one-way. Surveillance hears you, you don’t hear us. Less feedback—harder for the vamps to pick up.” He pauses meaningfully, looking between you and Mingyu. “Meaning you’re on your own in there. No audio cues from us, so pay attention to each other.”

Mingyu nods silently, securing the earpiece with practiced ease.

“Just one more thing,” Jeonghan continues, voice tighter now, losing its usual teasing edge. “Tonight you mingle, observe, eavesdrop. You don’t engage unless it’s absolutely unavoidable. If your gut says bail, then you bail—no heroics. And no splitting up without letting the other person know. If you feel like you’re in danger, your code word is ‘I’m feeling dizzy’, and if you need to abort, you’re ‘going for a cigarette’. Out clean, no breach. Understood?”

Your stomach knots briefly. Mingyu shifts just slightly closer to you, the warmth from his body pressing faintly into your space. His skin ran cooler than yours, but not cold. Not dead. Like marble left in the sun—still solid, still unyielding, but capable of warmth when you stayed close long enough.

Jeonghan hesitates, flicking his gaze quickly between you both, his eyes narrowing. “And absolutely no feeding tonight. I don’t care how much Velvet Eden pushes it, you decline. Clear?”

“Clear,” Mingyu echoes, low and steady.

Your mouth feels oddly dry, remembering the last time—the rush, the dizzy heat, the dangerous intimacy of it. You look up, catching Mingyu’s gaze again, and you see it reflected clearly there: he remembers, too.

“Clear,” you echo quietly.

Jeonghan hands Mingyu his jacket, and with a last careful look over the wires, gives a short nod. “Alright then, be careful. If anything feels off, signal to each other and get out. Good luck.”

Luck, you think ruefully, is probably the last thing you’ll need.

You fall into step with Mingyu as you leave the bullpen behind, the precinct feeling suddenly smaller behind you. His hand brushes lightly against your back, guiding you toward the elevators. It’s casual enough to seem natural—but it still makes your pulse jump, just slightly.

“You ready?” he asks quietly, once the elevator doors close behind you both.

You glance up at him, heart quickening again, and find his eyes steady on yours. Concerned, careful, warm—everything you shouldn’t be counting on right now.

“As I’ll ever be,” you answer truthfully, your voice tight with nerves.

Mingyu nods slowly, his gaze dropping briefly to your mouth before he looks resolutely forward again, jaw set, expression sharpening into something determined.

“Then let’s get this over with,” he murmurs, quiet and grim, as the elevator carries you down into the night, toward Velvet Eden.

next chapter ↝ iii. dizzy.

click here for tag list submission / removal.

#elle’s worx #seventeen #kim mingyu #mingyu #mingyu x reader #mingyu scenarios #mingyu seventeen #mingyu angst #mingyu x you #kim mingyu x reader #seventeen fluff #seventeen drabbles #seventeen imagines #seventeen scenarios #seventeen x you #seventeen x reader #the chapters get longer soon i swear #pacing was never my strong suit

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beatrixst0nehill · 6 months ago

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"Trying to stay healthy and positive although I'm a part of this dumb clinical trial. This sucks! I was all set to be the track and field star of my University, a bright career as an athlete, maybe I'd even go to the Olympics? Instead I get this email a few months ago stating that I've been selected to attend a clinical trial for a new breast growth drug. Like, there are a bajillion of these things on the market, why do they still bother with trials? It's ridiculous. I know, I know, horny wealthy men with an excuse to make pretty young college girls so big breasted it qualifies as a legal disability. Whatever.

Soooo as you might remember I had a perfect, flat chest, ideal for being a runner and now look at this. Look at these fat, sweaty udders of mine. They already started lactating. It's so hard to keep up with. Now I don't just run to the bathroom to pee or whatever, I run into the girls' room to remove my top and milk myself into the sink like a fucking cow. I stand there for minutes, the humiliation is excruciating. Other women come in and joke that that's what I get for sleeping around and getting knocked up over and over. I don't bother correcting them. I just agree, milking my breasts until they ache.

I'm apparently part of this trial for three years. I keep asking them how much growth I can expect by then and they just shrug, telling me if they knew they wouldn't need to do the trial. I looked up videos and joined a bunch of groups created by women who've gone through this. The short answer is I can basically expect my boobs to get so big I can barely walk, if at all. A common side effect, especially for really active girls who don't just cave and give into immobility, is for our spines to snap from the sheer weight of the breasts, leaving girls not just debilitatingly huge breasted, but paralyzed from the waist or shoulders down. Some of the girls act like it's this amazing goal to be jealous of, creating threads like, 'Guys it finally happened! After three straight weeks of intense exercise with my tits over 100lbs a piece, my neck finally gave out!' And it's them in the hospital, smiling and giddy, being hooked up to ocular software to post on social media.

I feel kind of insane for feeling the way I do. Almost all the girls love getting these massive, unwieldy breasts. I posted a thread talking about my future career and how I didn't want huge boobs and every post was just other girls (who're either immobilized by the sheer weight and size of their breasts or immobilized by paralysis) tell me to relax, not to worry, that I'm extremely lucky to be picked and I'll learn to love my new breasts, especially once they get to be over 50lbs each and I start having trouble doing basic things. A lot of girls told me I should remember that I'm just a womb with a pair of tits there for male enjoyment, and the bigger the more men love them. I can still fulfill my purpose and push out dozens of kids even if I'm paralyzed.

I guess I need to just give in and accept what I'm going to become. I'll still stay active, exercise and try to remain mobile as long as I can. But I guess it couldn't hurt to enjoy these things. Men already stare at them constantly and try to touch them. Maybe I should just let them grope me? Even though my clothes will be totally see-through from getting sprayed with milk. That's not such a bad thing, is it? It would be kind of hot, riding some guy's cock, seeing these fat, ridiculous-looking udders bounce and jiggle..... Perhaps I should even get pregnant? That would help my boobs grow faster and put more strain on my back faster..... Plus, all the other girls in the trial are pregnant so I feel a bit left out.

Oh well.... I tried to be an athlete and a role model to young girls that they can be more than the tidal wave of dumb bimbos and breeder hucows we see today...... But maybe I'm the perfect role model, though? That you should probably give up and embrace being a hucow anyway, it's futile to try and deny your body's destiny. Girls are meant to be dumb breeders with huge tits. It does make me horny, thinking about being completely stuck, unable to move cause my breasts each weigh 200lbs. I can only sit in whatever pen I'm being kept in at a government-run girl ranch. I sit there rubbing my big pregnant belly, playing with my sex, thinking back to when I used to be an athlete, running, winning awards, now I'm just cattle hooked up to milking machines, completely hopeless. Nothing but an object to be fucked, to make milk, and push out as many kids as possible until I wear out my usefulness. I can't wait until that's me, maybe my spine will even snap? Then I'll be truly helpless, I won't even feel my body go into labor or get fucked. I'll just watch myself be acted on, and all I'll be able to do is smile and offer lots of encouragement..... Kind of sounds like a dream come true. Once I'm done working out, nice and sweaty, I think I might 'accidentally' stumble into the men's locker room and see if these toxic gym bros can show me what my body is really for. ❤️"

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intimidating-fettuccine · 2 months ago

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Augh. Thinking about the demons being protective of the other residents. And I'm inflicting it upon you /silly

Hobo using his wings to shelter people from the weather. Even if it's just as simple as a slight change in the breeze, he'll use his wings to keep the cold/heat away from people. Maybe he uses them to help keep Pup steady on his threads as they talk on top of the mansion; maybe he uses them to make sure Tim and Kate can get from the car to the front door without being hailed on.

EJ using his hyper sensitive hearing to tell who's having a hard time sleeping for whatever reason. If it's Toby, or Sally, he knows it's likely nightmares keeping them awake. He'll offer his presence as a reassurance, or maybe offer to talk to them until they're at least calm enough to rest. Whenever there's a new resident, he takes it upon himself to keep track of how much they're sleeping, and how well. He's the doctor, after all. It's his job to keep track of these things.

The clowns (yes I'm lumping them together) existing in a consistent stream of making sure no one's depression and anxiety, seasonal or otherwise, sets in too far too quickly. Even if it's just by the nature of Candy and Jack making their existence a problem for Jason, or Jason and Candy busting in the door with new gossip and rumors, or the three of them collectively running in Looney Toons circles every other time.

Slender actively using his telepathy to level new residents out of flashbacks and the worst of the waking anxieties. Quietly, but not outright, nudging them mentally in the direction of making new bonds. A constant, reassuring presence in the back of one's mind who can and will show new people every place to hide and enjoy nature within the forest, when the underworld is overwhelming.

(The brothers would all be good at this, not just Slender. Trender would bust his ass to recreate textures for people without second thought if he felt it might help; Splendor's abilities might allow him to intentionally smother anxieties and fears and grief to allow one to live in the joy of moments. Fen is just a boon in his own right, with his connections and sheer experience with a variety of people)

Zalgo just existing is enough to make sure one's stressors are kept at the bottom of the fucking barrel; no one is pissing off the king.

I absolutely love and support all of these. I love getting rambles like this, because they are all 100% accurate. I do especially love the EJ one because mans is nocturnal so if anyone is anxiously wandering the halls at night they now have a companion because Jack is just mentally like ">:( You're not supposed to be up, something is wrong, I will fix this" and he just sort of follows you around and tries to do whatever he can with his social awkwardness to help you feel better

I do also really love the Hobo one because he would tooootally do that. Now I'm also imagining whenever it rains on a shopping day he carries the groceries in under his wings so none of the groceries get wet. He's a protective birb boy and if his wings can be of use to someone he's gonna put them to use

The clowns are also the circus of the mansion for a reason. It's hard to be down in the dumps when they're running circles around the mansion because they're winding each other up with their antics that don't make sense to anyone except themselves. They probably start arguments with each other just for the sake of having a silly argument and they're always so entertaining to watch and they WILL do it on purpose around people that have been feeling down and out of it

I do also love the idea of Slender helping newer residents (or honestly even older ones) through their minds when they're down and struggling. I cannot remember if I made a post about it, but Slender can also force emotions and feelings onto people if he focuses really hard, so I'm just imagining him in the fucking zone around the corner quite literally forcing good vibes onto you. He has an open door policy and frequently encourages people to stop by as well, especially if they're new, and I'm just imagining him sending them the mental image of his office to encourage them

And the Zalgo one needs little additions. It's just so true. Once people know you're close to Zalgo, life gets a hell of a lot easier in the Underworld. Nobody's gonna pick on you, nobody's gonna cause problems for you, and if they're dumb enough to try, Zalgo stomps them immediately. Once you have his favor you are basically set for life. He's the biggest, strongest guard dog of a friend/partner you can ever have, and he knows it

Thank you for the rambles :)))))

#slender mansion mayhem #creepypasta #creepypasta headcanon #creepypasta headcanons #creepypasta x reader #hobo heart headcanons #hobo heart x reader #eyeless jack headcanons #eyeless jack x reader #laughing jack headcanons #laughing jack x reader #candy pop headcanons #candy pop x reader #jason the toymaker headcanons #jason the toymaker x reader #slenderman headcanons #slenderman x reader #zalgo headcanons #zalgo x reader

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goddessinnerglow · 7 months ago

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Become Your Best Version Before 2025 - Day 14

Career and Purpose

After diving into financial planning yesterday, let's talk about something that's deeply connected to both our financial and emotional wellbeing, our career and sense of purpose. And no, I'm not going to tell you to "follow your passion and the money will follow" because real life is usually more complicated than that!

You know that feeling when someone asks "What do you want to do with your life?" and your brain just goes blank? Yeah, me too. The truth is, finding your purpose isn't like ordering from a menu, it's more like cooking a meal from scratch, with lots of experimenting and adjusting along the way.

So how do we start untangling this career and purpose puzzle? Instead of throwing inspirational quotes at you, I'm going to share some practical steps that'll help you gain clarity. Take what resonates, leave what doesn't, and adapt everything to your unique situation.

Understanding Your "Why"

Take a moment to think about what lights you up. Not what looks good on LinkedIn or what your parents want – but what makes YOU come alive. Maybe it's:

Solving complex problems

Helping others learn and grow

Creating beautiful things

Building connections between people

Making systems more efficient

Notice I didn't say "become a teacher" or "be an artist." We're starting with the essence, not the job title.

The Values Compass Exercise

Grab a piece of paper and write down:

Three times you felt truly fulfilled at work or in a project

What specifically made those moments special

The common threads between these experiences

Bridging the Gap

Maybe you're in a job that doesn't perfectly align with your purpose right now. That's okay! Here's how to work with that:

Find small ways to incorporate your values into your current role

Start a side project that feeds your soul

Learn new skills that move you closer to your goals

Network with people in fields that interest you (coffee conversations can be virtual!)

The Purpose Puzzle Pieces

Your career doesn't have to fulfill ALL your purpose needs. Sometimes having a stable job that you're good at can give you the foundation to pursue meaningful activities outside of work. Think about:

Volunteer opportunities

Mentoring others

Community involvement

Creative hobbies

Personal projects

Taking Action (Without Quitting Your Job Tomorrow)

The Skills Audit: Make two lists

What you're good at

What you want to be good at Then pick ONE skill to develop this month

The Micro-Experiments Approach: Instead of making huge leaps, try small tests:

Shadow someone in a role you're curious about

Take an online course in a new field

Volunteer for projects that stretch you

Start a tiny side project

The Network Garden: Plant seeds for future opportunities:

Reach out to one person doing work you admire

Join online communities in your areas of interest

Share your learning journey on LinkedIn or other platforms

Offer to help others whenever you can

Remember, purpose is a Journey, Not a Destination. Your sense of purpose might evolve over time, and that's beautiful! The key is to stay curious and keep taking small steps forward.

The "Not To-Do" List

Sometimes knowing what you DON'T want is just as valuable as knowing what you do want. Give yourself permission to:

Say no to opportunities that don't align with your values

Let go of career paths that others chose for you

Change your mind as you learn and grow

Take time to figure things out

Your mission for today

Write down three activities that make you lose track of time

Think of one small way to bring more of these elements into your current work

Reach out to someone whose career path interests you

See you tomorrow for Day 15! Don't forget, your career is a huge part of your life, but it doesn't define your whole worth. You're already valuable, purpose or no purpose. We're just working on expressing that value in a way that feels meaningful to you.

♡ ☆:.｡ Keep glowing, babes! ♡ ☆:.｡ With love, Goddess Inner Glow.

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not-freyja · 1 year ago

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LU Write-A-Thon

This our second monthly LU Write-A-Thon, spearheaded by @hotcheetohatredwastaken and myself, will run on July 1, 2024 from 12 am to 12 am GMT (7pm to 7pm EST starting June 30). There is one goal in mind with this event---write as many productive words within that day as humanly possible.

Originally a fun game amongst friends, we are now opening this up to the general fandom-body-public (and happily so) by popular demand!

The event will be hosted on discord, and the link will go out via a reblog/reply/edit combo on this post a few hours before the event starts.

We're so excited to have all of you come and write with us, and the event rules are right here blow the cut:

What counts as writing?

Writing fanfiction or original fiction, leaving or answering comments, outlining, drafting, storyboarding, personal journaling, and (writing) homework---basically, anything that furthered yourself, the LU writing community at large, or your stories with a positive word count, can be included in your final word count.

(Editing previously-written works can also be included, but only if it produces a positive word count, and only those new words may be counted. The goal is to get new words on the page).

What CANNOT be counted as writing?

General chatting, talking about already written works, etc, will not count towards your final word count. Words counted must, as previously stated, further yourself, the writing community, or your stories. This does not mean that you can't chat with your fellow writers---the ⁠⁠chaos-chat thread was created for such a purpose!---but the main goal of this event is to produce and engage in writing in one form or another.

What is a sprint, and what is the schedule for the sprints?

Sprints are (voluntary) periods of concentration in which writers will write as much as they can within a time limit, with some friendly competition to be the one with the most words by the end of the sprint. These will be hosted in the ⁠⁠sprint-bot thread. Every hour, the times :00 to :15 will be dedicated to a 15 minute rest, and then a 45 minute sprint will run from :15 to :59. Moderators will start the sprints periodically---writers can jump in as desired.

Do you have to participate in the sprints?

No. You can write on your own if you wish, just make sure to keep track of your total and only count what is written in the window of 12am to 12am GMT (7pm to 7pm EST) on July 1. Additionally, you can write in the suggested breaks between sprints, but again, make sure to keep track of your word count on your own then.

How should I count my words?

There are two main ways that you can count your words---using the Sprinto Bot in the ⁠⁠sprint-bot channel, or keeping track of them yourself. If you are keeping track of them yourself, especially if you're counting words other than fiction writing where your word count is easy to find, please take care to be as accurate as possible---you can use an application like Google Docs or Word to give you your exact word count, even if you have to copy and paste your ao3 comments into them to get it.

If you're handwriting, this gets a little bit rougher to calculate, but we'll encourage you to give it your best estimate.

We'll be on the honor system here: play fair, and report as accurately as possible.

Where/When should I report my words?

Final word counts will be reported in the ⁠⁠word-count-total channel. We encourage you to make ONE post at the beginning of the marathon with your word count; then, as the event continues, you can edit your post and update your word count there.

You can update your word count at any point during the marathon in the channel mentioned above---in fact, the breaks between sprints would be a great time. And once the event is over, there's a period of grace of up to 6 hours for everyone to get their word counts in, but no more writing is allowed during this time. After 6 hours (6 am GMT; 11pm EST), the thread will be locked, and no more additions will be made. So be sure to get your final count in as soon as possible, once the event is over (or even before, if you must dip early).

What if I can only write a little?

That is fine. We are going to be playfully competitive, but it is not a contest---it is a group project. We are using teamwork to make the line go up. Every word counts, and any amount of writing is a fantastic amount of writing. The goal is to do better than last time AS A GROUP, not individually. So do what you can, and be sure to have fun with the rest of us!

WORD COUNT TO BEAT: 88,978

#lu fic #lu fanfiction #linked universe fanfic #fandom events #writing event #spread the word we are gonna get some words written #lu write a thon

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gav-san · 6 days ago

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Chapter Six

A Lineage of Red Masterlist here

One Piece Masterlist

Masterlist here

The Assassin’s Rule Word Count: 15K + This story is not a commendation of slavery, cruelty, sexual assault, or violence. It’s also held together with tape and war crimes. Read responsibly. 18+

Previous/Next

The men had taken refuge in one of the oldest upper terraces of Mariejois, in an abandoned office nestled behind a forgotten wing of the old warehouse. The lamps had long since gone out, leaving the room lit only by the faint glow of starlight filtering through cracked windowpanes. Ivy curled through the gaps in the glass, creeping over the frame like slow-moving fingers. A fine mist clung to the marble floor, softening the edges of old footprints, and the air was thick with the scent of damp earth and ghostly blooms.

Deronne was pacing again, his boots striking the floor in a restless rhythm, agitating the mist with every turn.

“So that old bastard of House Vauntierre just assumes you’ll quietly back away from the claim?” he asked, his voice cutting through the silence like a blade drawn half from its sheath.

“It seems,” Thorne replied, quiet and even.

Elias sat beside him on the moss-fringed stone bench, elbows braced on his knees, watching Thorne with the wary stillness of a man who had learned not to interrupt a fury still building. He said nothing, but his gaze flicked now and then to the door, to the windows, to the heavy velvet-lined case of weaponry they were not supposed to have.

The city’s upper quarter murmured somewhere far above them. Here, in this crumbling corner of the capital, the air was heavier, and time felt slower. Treachery could be spoken softly, and the walls would remember.

The map of Eden Park had been unrolled three times now, smoothed over a warped table marked with old water stains. Inked circles bled through the parchment: bottlenecks, blind corners, vantage points. Each mark had been laid with quiet urgency, and the scent of wax and cold tea lingered in the corners of the room like old breath.

Thorne did not look up from the case. His fingers ghosted over the rows of steel, testing the balance of a knife that hadn’t seen daylight in years.

“You’ll enter from the west,” Elias said, his voice clipped and calm. “The guards won’t expect a suitor to start so far out. It’ll buy you time.”

Deronne scoffed. “Time. As if time alone can outmaneuver Garling Figarland.”

His pacing halted for a breath, then resumed with more purpose. The mist stirred at his boots, pale threads curling around his steps like a warning.

“I don’t need to outmaneuver him,” Thorne said. “Just—I need to finish the plan.”

Deronne finally stopped. He folded his arms tightly across his chest, and the usual fire in his expression had dimmed to something colder. His face, sharp and usually brimming with bite, had gone pale.

“Lyonel said Figarland sent a coin to dress her for the Hunt. New gowns. High-blood styling. Something in his house colors, probably.” His voice dropped. “He’s mocking you.”

Thorne’s jaw tightened. A slight twitch surfaced at his temple.

“He doesn’t know for sure,” he said. “We still have time—”

“No.” Elias’s voice was quiet but certain. “He wants to hunt the Red Reader. The rest of us? We’re just debris. He’ll track us down and kill us for sport.”

The words landed like steel dropped on stone; blunt, final, impossible to ignore.

Thorne set the case down, not in frustration but with a strange, deliberate care. He closed it as one might close a casket, sealing something that would not rise again. The soft click of the latch echoed unnaturally loud in the ivy-wrapped silence of the ruined glasshouse.

“We just need to reach the final ball,” he said. His voice was level now, stripped of anything but focus. “Once we’re inside the inner sanctum at Pangaea Castle, everything else falls into place.”

Deronne stepped forward. The hem of his coat brushed against dry ivy leaves clinging to the floor. His voice was low, weighted.

“We’re not ready for this, Thorne. This is a real bid.”

He looked toward the map stretched across the table, where inked circles bled like bruises into the parchment. Then back to Thorne.

“He’s not performing anymore. This isn’t a spectacle. It’s war. Tailored, perfumed, and staged like theater, but war all the same.”

Thorne’s gaze moved again to the map, then drifted toward the tall, broken window. Beyond it, the first gray hints of morning touched the edges of the capital, smudging its spires into ghostly shapes.

Elias hummed, low and dry.

“Thorne’s right. We have no choice now. Especially if the Rocks Pirates discover—”

“Don’t say that name,” Deronne snapped.

The silence that followed felt ancient, older than the mist coiled at their feet. Even the ivy along the glass walls seemed to hold its breath. The weight of that name lingered, heavy as ash.

Elias only chuckled. It was a dry, bitter sound, more warning than mirth.

“You know the truth,” he said. “If Xebec finds out she’s been playing revolutionary—and that we were the ones enabling her? It won’t just be her. It won’t just be us. It’ll be all of Mariejois.”

He shifted, leaning back against the ivy-strangled wall and folding his arms.

“The whole Holy City would burn. And we’d go with it. Revolutionaries or not.”

He let that hang for a moment, then added, “Do you think Charlotte Linlin would pass up the excuse? Or that Whitebeard would hesitate if it gave him a clean shot at the Celestials?”

Deronne’s scowl deepened. “You’re assuming he’d care enough to avenge her. She’s not one of them.”

“She is protected under their flag,” Elias said, sharper now. “Whether she meant to or not. That kind of bond matters.”

He paused, then shook his head.

“And even if it doesn’t—Xebec is reason enough. The fact that he touched her fate at all? That’s all it takes.”

For a moment, no one spoke. The weight of even more unspoken names—Shiki, John, Gloriosa, Gill Bastar, and Stussy—pressed down on the ruined glasshouse like a storm on the horizon.

Thorne’s gaze hadn’t left the map.

“She’s running out of time,” Elias said at last. “So are we.”

Thorne didn’t reply. His hands were still, resting lightly on the edge of the table. He had already considered this, already followed it down to the bone and bled it dry.

“I can’t believe Alder was so short-sighted,” Deronne muttered, resuming his pacing. “Letting her here, of all places, like she’s not the most dangerous variable in the whole equation.”

A bitter sound escaped Thorne; half laugh, half sigh. He scrubbed a hand down his face.

“Short-sighted?” he echoed. “Or wise enough to plant a bomb right in the ballroom. If she breaks cover or if something happens to her during the Hunt, then Mariejois will be forced to reckon with the full weight of Hachinosu pounding at their gates. Xebec screaming for war. Half the world’s pirates waiting in the wings for an excuse to taste noble blood.”

“Don’t forget Marchfell Island,” Elias added, voice light, almost amused. “One whisper of insult and Rocks flattened it out of spite. Fifty nobles dead. Half the island is still sinking.”

Thorne’s voice thinned with restraint. “Exactly.”

“Exciting,” Elias said, his grin faint but sharp. “I heard a beast-man named Kaido joined the crew last month. Some say he’s the result of an old Marine experiment. Others claim he’s a surviving member of the Oni tribe. Either way, he’s built like a war crime.”

He tapped the hilt of his sword with the toe of his boot. “Maybe he’ll be the one to come after us. Once they’re done reducing the Holy City to rubble.”

“Wonderful,” Deronne muttered. “I’ll dress for it.”

Thorne didn’t answer. Outside, the banners of the Hunt were rising across the upper terraces; richly dyed flags snapping in the wind, their colors bold and ominous. Red silk. Gold thread. Warnings dressed as pageantry.

Inside, the weight of catastrophe had already arrived.

And it was wearing Figarland colors.

Thorne made the final adjustment to the plan, quiet and unspoken.

He wasn’t going in as a suitor.

He was going in as a revolutionary, risking everything to save a comrade.

The first delivery arrived before breakfast.

Velvet-lined crates. Lacquered mahogany boxes. A woman in pearls who carried a measuring rod so fine it looked more like a conductor’s wand than a tool of her trade.

“Saint Figarland has commissioned your wardrobe for today,” she announced, not asking permission. “You’ll be representing his interests.”

She said it like you ought to be grateful. Deeply, reverently grateful.

Her assistant unrolled bolts of fabric across the salon floor: rare emerald silk that shimmered like leaves catching shadowlight, lace so delicate it threatened to disintegrate under breath, beadwork imported from royal ateliers, each strand glinting like promises you didn’t make.

You stood barefoot on the marble tiles, sleepless and not yet fully dressed, watching a dozen women flit around your body like pale moths measuring a flame. They whispered in clipped, purposeful tones. Chalk dust ghosted the air. Pins were drawn like daggers.

You tried to object. Once.

The seamstress paused, arching one perfectly sculpted brow.

“My lady, I was paid for silence, speed, and precision,” she said. “Not your opinions.”

By midmorning, the next wave came.

Shoemakers. A perfumer with crystal vials and an expression like holy revelation. Hairpieces in sable and gold. Gloves in lengths meant for seduction and diplomacy alike. Ribbon trays arranged in every shade of court-sanctioned implication. One tailor brought three military-inspired cloaks “for theatrical balance,” as if you were being costumed for a war staged on velvet carpets.

Maria nearly slammed the door on the last jeweler.

“We don’t need diamonds shaped like moons!” she snapped.

“They’re not for need,” the jeweler sniffed, unfazed. “They’re for display. Lord Figarland was quite specific.”

“Of course he was,” Maria muttered, half under her breath. “Bastard’s dressing her like a dog in heat.”

It was late afternoon when the old Master of House Vauntierre finally wandered in, drawn by the racket.

He was mostly a ghost now, a soft-spoken relic in silk slippers and weathered rings, who rarely left the third-floor gallery. Since brokering your tentative match with Thorne, he had barely said a word. Most assumed he’d already retreated into senility, content to watch the world tilt from behind gauze-curtained windows.

Now, he beamed.

“Ah, so the magnanimous Commander Saint Figarland has shown prerogative. And what generosity from House Figarland,” he declared, nodding to no one in particular. “Wonderful news. A second bid always raises the price!”

You nearly choked. “He’s not bidding—”

“Nonsense,” the old man said, waving one liver-spotted hand through the air like dismissing fog. “Nobles don’t send seamstresses for charity, especially not on their own coin. He’s investing. A good sign.”

Just like that, the quiet agreement with Thorne became a fragile paper touched to flame.

Because even a half-senile patriarch understood what it meant when the Commander of the God’s Knights sent vendors instead of flowers.

He wasn’t courting you.

He was preparing you for a presentation. Gift-wrapping you like a challenge, meant not for you but for Thorne, because Thorne had dared to stand against him.

Maria stood off to the side, watching the old man hum as he prodded embroidered gowns and polished clasps, her expression a blend of horror and disgust.

You remained in the center of it all, laced tighter with every hour, surrounded by silk and strategy, perfume and implication.

And somewhere, far above this careful chaos, Garling Figarland smiled.

Because even without showing his face, he had arranged the board perfectly.

By the day of the Hunt, the court had rewritten your story.

You were no longer the secondhand debutante. No longer the girl with poor connections and questions that cut too close to the bone. No longer the quiet companion to a reformist noble or the regrettable misstep in Thorne Vaerlin’s otherwise spotless career.

You weren’t “wrong for the season” anymore.

No, now, you were the center of it.

Every slight they’d whispered about you was rebranded as grace. Your lack of flirtation? Mysterious restraint. Your plain gowns? Subtle, refined taste. Even your family’s modest standing, once a stain on your prospects, had been reworded with the breathless admiration of fools.

“Untainted by scandal,” they said now. “A clean bloodline. A poised temperament. Refreshing, really.”

You had become the perfect blank slate.

And Garling Figarland’s name was the gold leaf pressed against your edges, legitimizing you with the casual cruelty of a signature on a page.

The salon was held in the east wing of the Caelore Estate; a softly perfumed trap dressed in brocade and brandy. The air bloomed with gossip, thick as the hothouse lilies spilling from gold vases in every corner. You hadn’t wanted to come. Neither had Maria. But your guardian had insisted, loudly and publicly, that it was time you showed yourself “properly polished.”

And so you went.

Wrapped in the most expensive dress that Figarland’s house had sent.

It wasn’t blue, not quite, but the navy-toned silk shimmered like a fresh bruise when the sun struck it. The bodice laced high and tight, sculpting your ribs like a cage disguised as finery. The sleeves were sheer, and the embroidery cruel, tiny silver thorns stitched along the cuffs and collar like warnings.

Someone had pinned your hair back with military precision. Not to make you beautiful, but to make you visible. Unmissable.

You walked into the salon and felt the air bend.

It wasn’t that you were the most radiant woman there.

It was that no one expected you to be anything at all.

And now they didn’t know what to do with you.

The hush that followed your entrance was disguised as politeness, but Maria caught the flinch behind a fan, the sharp glance exchanged between minor heiresses. You saw how their smiles stuttered, how their courtiers leaned in just a bit closer, scenting tension the way hounds scent blood.

Because you weren’t supposed to be here.

Not like this. Not dressed in bruise-silk and blessed by a Saint.

You were supposed to be forgettable.

Now, you were dangerous.

The effect was sharp. Immediate. Conversations faltered. Eyes turned. Names were whispered after your steps like the rustle of silk. The ribbon at your wrist in Vauntierre colors, quiet and unmistakable, clashed beautifully with the silk wrapping your body like armor.

They all saw it.

More importantly, Thorne saw it.

He was already there, standing with a knot of junior diplomats and soft-voiced courtiers, his posture too controlled, too still. But his face betrayed him.

He looked like a man watching a fuse burn beneath his own boots.

"You were supposed to blend in," he hissed later, voice low and tight as he pulled you aside near the tea service.

You met his gaze without flinching. "Vauntierre burned the rest of my modest dresses."

That silenced him.

Because you were not wrong.

You had already felt the shift. Eyes no longer passed over you. They caught. Nobles who had not spoken to you in years now asked after your family's health. A lieutenant with a crimson sash asked if you would save him a dance.

You were no longer hidden.

You were valuable.

Thorne exhaled through his nose, sharp and frustrated. "This is war paint."

"It's just a dress," Maria said from beside you, voice cool and even.

"No. It is an announcement. You walked into Mariejois carrying Figarland's intentions like a flag."

His voice was too harsh for politeness. The conversation nearby dipped again. Then it rose, threaded with new tension. You were no longer dismissed. You were being evaluated.

He stepped back, the perfect image of a suitor suddenly forced to fight for ground he thought secure. The room noticed. The room smiled.

Some of the smiles were sweet.

Some were not.

You passed Saint Marie Velique, who had once called you a charitable addition with the tone one reserved for stray animals. Now she beamed too brightly and asked who had styled your hair.

Saint Kel Linneus bowed too low when you walked by. He had never remembered your name before.

Even the musicians seemed to lean into their strings more carefully as you crossed the floor.

"This is madness," you whispered to Maria.

Maria did not look at you. Her gaze was fixed on the far end of the room, where nobles began to shift like chess pieces, gliding between conversations and glances, adjusting their positions with quiet calculation.

"No," she said softly. "This is politics. They don’t want you. They want the power of being near the girl Garling Figarland might marry."

"Might," you repeated, tasting the word.

"Exactly," Maria replied, voice sharper now. "The uncertainty is the sugar."

And Thorne?

Thorne returned to your side like a storm trapped in porcelain. Controlled. Polite. Unmoving. But the change was unmistakable.

The nobles watched him now too.

Not with dismissal.

With pity.

He was no longer seen as the favorite, but as the final obstacle. The last piece standing between Garling Figarland and what he had yet to claim. The suitor not yet broken. The man still beside you. Still speaking to you.

A God’s Knight passed behind him and muttered to his companion, just loud enough for the two of you to hear.

"He always did enjoy his prey with a little resistance."

Your pulse jumped.

Thorne did not move. He stood as if carved, still and unreadable.

Later, as you sat with a glass of sparkling cider that tasted too sweet, Maria leaned in.

"They’re calling you the wager now. Two of them have already placed bets on who wins."

You did not need to ask who.

You would bet the diamond clipped to your coat that it wasn’t Thorne.

The Hunt had begun centuries ago as a courting game. It had long since evolved into something else.

A political crucible. A vicious trial. A test of ambition disguised as flirtation.

Debutantes wore ribbons. Suitors gave chase through the Eden. Whomever caught them—by wit, speed, or strategy—earned the right to an expedited engagement. A prize on the arm, a claim in the eyes of the court.

The morning of the Hunt broke unnaturally soft.

A silk-wrapped dawn bloomed over Mariejois’ Sacred Preserve, the crown jewel of the city’s artifice. It was a false Eden, sculpted into reverent submission by centuries of curated excess. Dew glazed each sculpted leaf. Mist curled around marble columns and trimmed hedges. Birds sang at perfect intervals, each note too polished, too symmetrical. A recording, looped beneath the treetops.

Even the air betrayed itself: warm, perfumed, unnaturally clean.

You stood behind the ceremonial veil with the other debutantes, each of you arranged like offerings before a pantheon that preferred its sacrifices beautiful and silent.

Fine-boned girls stood on either side, dressed in heirloom silks and the ambitions of dynasties. Their masks were jeweled or feathered, veiled or ornate. Every detail was a whisper of bloodlines, wealth, or calculated novelty. No thread had been chosen for beauty alone. Matrons and sponsors chose the colors, political alignment disguised as couture.

You wore green and silver. It was a nod to House Vauntierre and a quiet rebellion.

The seamstress Garling had sent wanted you in rose-gold. To blush like prey. To gleam like soft temptation. You had refused.

Green was something else. Sharp. Watchful. Capable of vanishing into the trees if needed. It marked you not as an ornament, but as a strategy.

Your name had been called last.

Thirteenth.

Again.

You tried not to fidget with the moonlace gloves Maria had fastened to your wrists. They were new. Far too fine for your station. Pale as frost, patterned like spiderwork. Too telling in their origin.

Each girl around you had been groomed to shine. You had been groomed to disappear. But now, wrapped in silvered gloves and a ribbon that no longer passed for modesty, you had become visible. Your ribbon was green, but your scent carried Figarland's mark. And everyone would know it.

Somewhere beyond the veil, the Huntmaster was beginning the rite.

The drums began to sound: slow, heavy, and ceremonial. The kind of rhythm meant to echo in the spine and anchor itself there, like a warning disguised as tradition.

You exhaled.

Thirteen debutantes. Fifty registered suitors.

You stood beneath the veil with the others, the lace catching sunlight in fleeting patterns across your mask. The garden beyond was silent now, a false Eden waiting to erupt. Birdsong had ceased, as if even the artificial had learned to listen.

A court functionary emerged into the clearing, draped in the muted silver of bureaucratic neutrality. His scroll rattled faintly as he approached the marble dais, the weight of its seals dragging it slightly askew in his grip. The man was sweating, not from heat, but from fear. You could see it clinging to the edges of his collar.

He gave a shallow bow to the presiding matrons, then began to speak.

One by one, names were read aloud. A suitor’s name. Then the debutantes. Then the gift.

These were not the acts of romance.

They were declarations, political wagers wrapped in velvet.

A carved sapphire. A trained hawk bred for bloodline purity. A commission in the Southern Fleet. An original volume of The Fifth Concord. Even a writ of property transfer from the Cordaline vineyards. Each offering was read in the same even tone, but each one turned the heads of the watching court.

These were not courtships.

These were bids.

And then your name was spoken.

There was a pause before it as if the announcer needed a moment to steady himself.

“Saint Fiero Thorne,” he said, voice just shy of reverent. “Offering a matched pair of ivory pistols, inlaid with gold from the Ruet mines, and a formal vow of courtship upon success.”

The hush that followed was heavy.

There was no laughter this time.

Only stillness.

Heads turned. Fans paused in mid-motion. Several young nobles leaned forward, eyes narrowing not at you, but at the scroll.

Because it hadn’t stopped.

The parchment shifted again, unfurling with the soft sound of woven fiber in motion. The announcer faltered, blinked once, then checked the name.

“Second bid,” he said, with forced calm.

Name after name followed.

Each one was spoken in that same steady voice, but the cadence had shifted. The air had shifted, too. What had begun as a formality was now a spectacle, each bid a stone thrown into still water, rippling outward into gasps, glances, and the sharp of fans.

“Saint Corven. A chest of amber from the Southern Expanse.”

“Sir Bastien. A thoroughbred from the Riverline stables, bred for ceremony and sprint.”

“Saint Caulder. An offer of land near the coast of Virelle, and access to family shipping rights.”

“Saint Ezram. One diamond from the Aphel mines, presented in the teeth of a carved lion.”

“Captain Alric. A silver dagger forged from a fallen star. Wagered for cause and spectacle.”

Each name turned heads. Some earned quiet laughter. Others were met with calculating silence. These were not all expected suitors. Some had no business participating at all. That they had offered meant something more dangerous; an alignment, a signal, a dare.

“Lord Lyonel Carienne.”

The functionary’s voice caught, just slightly, on the title.

He continued anyway, his face blank as parchment.

“Offering a songbird carved of Onyx, and a vow of intent witnessed by four senior Lords of Accord.”

There was a murmur. Not whispered scandal. No one knew quite what to make of it.

“Sir Deronne Lewis. One banner taken from the Eastern theater, stitched by his own hand. Wagered with personal honor.”

The crowd reacted, if only because Deronne rarely attended anything without the scent of gunpowder and disdain. That he had entered the Hunt at all was an upset. That he had entered for you was something else entirely.

The scroll dipped once more.

“Elias Miscaviage. No formal title offered. One glass vial, origin unknown. Sealed.”

A pause followed. The kind that did not belong in ceremony.

Then came the sound. Soft, sudden, a flutter of gossip, rising like startled birds into the air above the garden. Fans twitched. Heads turned. A few voices slipped too loudly before being hushed by instinct.

You nearly exhaled.

Lyonel. Deronne. Elias.

Thorne’s allies. Revolutionaries in powdered wigs. Hidden blades wrapped in courtly smiles. Each of them stepping forward in plain sight, unprotected by bloodline but shielded by allegiance. Not to you, not entirely. But to Thorne’s vision. To the old, dangerous plan.

Bright minds. Loyal men. Useful cover.

And more importantly, still no sign of Garling Figarland.

Your heart steadied.

Lyonel caught your gaze and winked. Deronne gave you a shallow, ironic bow, one hand on the hilt of his ceremonial blade. Elias adjusted his gloves with theatrical care, his chin tilted, eyes glittering beneath the sunlight. His whole expression said, Of course we’re here, darling. Let’s raise hell.

It should have comforted you.

But the air had changed.

The functionaries on the platform had begun to shift. One of the stewards frowned down at the scroll with too much focus. Another leaned in to whisper. Their shoulders tensed. Their posture lost its rhythm.

Something had gone wrong.

There were too many names. Too many offers. Too many claims wrapped around your name like threads pulled too tight.

It was irregular.

Risky.

Political.

And everyone felt it.

Then came the real pause.

Not from breath or silence.

From power.

A steward stepped forward, slow and solemn. He carried a second scroll, shorter and darker than the first. It bore a thick ribbon, sealed in crimson wax and stamped with the crest of the High Table.

No one spoke.

He broke the seal.

“The Assassin title,” he said, voice flat with effort, “has been granted to Commander Saint Garling Figarland by majority approval.”

The words fell into the garden like a blade into water. Clean. Soundless. Devastating.

For a moment, the garden held its breath.

No rustle of silk. No murmur of commentary. Not even a fan moved.

Then the court inhaled as one, the sound collective and sharp, like a chapel congregation struck dumb at the altar. The announcement had landed not like gossip, but like a bell tolling; low, final, and ringing across the bones of the estate.

You saw it in Thorne’s eyes. Not shock, not confusion, but calculation. A narrowing of focus. The stilling of his shoulders. As if something inside him had just locked into place.

Lyonel shifted his weight. Deronne’s expression flattened. Elias blinked once and stood straighter. The theatre was gone from all of them.

Somewhere near the edge of the dais, one of the younger debutantes leaned toward her chaperone, voice thin and wavering.

"I thought the Assassin was just for drama… no one ever actually takes it."

Her chaperone did not speak. She simply stared forward, skin paling like pressed wax.

Maria’s expression changed. What had been sharp composure twisted into something tighter. Something closer to fear.

Because she, too, remembered what the title meant.

The Assassin was not symbolic. Not ceremonial. It was an old law. A blood-wrought loophole was carved into the Hunt’s sacred rites and rarely invoked. A relic of its brutal origins, back when courtship and conquest were interchangeable.

And now it was active. Its rules were few and absolute.

-He would enter last from any gate. No one would know from where or when until it was too late.

-He could pursue any debutante. Pairings did not protect you. Offers meant nothing.

-He could declare one rule. An absolute. For the duration of the Hunt, that law would override all others.

-He could be hunted in return, but only if another dared. And if challenged, he could defend himself.

And he would.

That was the essence of the Assassin.

He did not woo.

He stalked.

He did not ask.

He claimed.

And now Garling Figarland wore that right like a crown of thorns, invisible to most, but blindingly apparent to those who knew what had just been placed at his feet.

Few had ever dared claim it.

Fewer still had survived what followed.

Because the Assassin was never a suitor, he did not arrive at court or charm. He came to conquer.

He did not merely pursue a favored debutante.

He declared war.

You did not need to hear his name spoken again.

You saw it.

In the sudden stiffness of the guards stationed at the edge of the platform. In the way one adjusted his grip on his halberd without realizing it, knuckles pale.

In the shifting stance of the officials, their smiles stretched too tightly. In the half-step one took back from the scroll, as if the parchment itself might burn.

And most of all, in Thorne.

He stood like a man struck, not by surprise, but by confirmation. His jaw tightened. His hands lowered to his sides with control that was too careful, too practiced. Behind his eyes, you could already see it—the calculations spinning like blades. Exits. Timings. Possibilities.

He was not shocked.

He was preparing for impact.

Because he knew what the rest of the court was only beginning to realize.

Garling Figarland had not come to play the game.

He had come to rewrite it.

The officiant stood motionless for a moment, as though hoping someone might intervene. No one did.

He cleared his throat, the sound too loud in the stillness, and looked not at the debutantes, but at the suitors.

Then came the third scroll.

Smaller. Heavier. Bound in black wax stamped with the sigil of the God’s Knights. It gleamed like lacquered blood against the ivory silk of the officiant’s gloves.

There were no trumpets this time. No fanfare. Only the tightening silence of an audience that had suddenly realized it might be in the presence of something real.

“By the Old Charter of the Sacred Preserve,” the officiant intoned, voice steady but without strength, “a final clause has been invoked.”

He broke the seal. A flicker of hesitation passed across his face before he continued.

“The Assassin enters last. Unannounced. Without a partner.”

That much was expected. Ritual. Doctrine. But the officiant did not lower the scroll. Instead, he drew a sharp breath.

“Saint Figarland has submitted his Rule.”

A stillness settled over the garden like snow. Not the hush of reverence, but something colder. Anticipation. Unspoken dread. The kind of silence that formed just before ice cracked beneath the surface.

“The council has reviewed it,” the officiant said. His voice had lost its ceremonial rhythm. Now it carried weight. “It stands.”

He unrolled the parchment and read aloud:

“The Assassin shall not step upon the same path twice—nor shall he carry a blade. He says he finds both… unnecessary.”

For a moment, nothing.

No reaction. No breath.

Then the sound began; low, scattered, uneasy. Laughter.

Nervous. Muddled.

A baron choked on his cordial. Several noblewomen tittered behind silk fans, their expressions caught somewhere between amusement and disbelief.

Saint Eldryn muttered a prayer beneath his breath, eyes closed as if he wished to be elsewhere.

Lady Mour’s lips had gone pale. She gripped her cane harder.

Even the Mistress of Harlowe, usually unreadable, leaned slightly toward her steward, her voice carrying just enough to be overheard by those who mattered.

“Figarland is toying with his debutante again,” she whispered. “And now he’s dragging the others into it.”

Not the others.

You.

Because that rule was not a tactic.

It was a message.

A blade sheathed in velvet, pointed at no one but you. No weapon. No repetition. No need. He wasn’t worried about being outmaneuvered.

He didn’t consider the others rivals.

He considered them irrelevant.

Petty obstacles to be brushed aside: not fought, not respected, not even named.

Thorne’s jaw tightened, the movement small but brutal. His gloved hands folded behind his back, every muscle drawn into a line of stillness so precise it screamed restraint. A page leaned in to whisper, something urgent, legal, whether the clause could be challenged. Whether the Rule could be overturned.

Thorne didn’t answer.

Because he couldn’t.

Garling had invoked one of the oldest and most obscure clauses in the Assassin’s Charter. A remnant from the Hunt’s crueler beginnings. It had only been used twice in living memory. Both times whispered about in scandal, both times ending in something that was technically a victory and functionally a bloodbath.

And worse still, it was valid.

The Rule didn’t violate a single line of the Charter. If anything, it made the game harder for Garling. He had stripped himself of his weapons and vowed not to cross his own path.

But that was the point.

It was not a challenge.

It was a statement.

The other men needed steel. They needed routes, rules, and choreography.

Garling needed nothing.

And he wanted the court to be aware of it.

He would enter last.

He would not retrace a single step.

He would carry no weapon.

And still, he would win.

The insinuation was blistering. Not only were the other suitors beneath him—the rules crutched them like invalids. The other suitors were dependent on tradition, on tactics, on tools.

He was telling the court that they were children in costume.

That they were playing a game.

And he was not.

Maria had gone white. Her mouth pressed to a thin, furious line. When she finally spoke, it came out low, steady, and sharp enough to cut through silk.

“Arrogant bastard.”

It wasn’t anger. Not entirely.

It was recognition.

This wasn’t just a maneuver.

It was contempt made formal. A declaration of superiority so cold it burned.

A chessboard flipped not in frustration, but in quiet amusement, with the highest confidence that no piece on it ever mattered to begin with.

Your gloves itched, and the moonlace bit at your wrists. The bodice clung too tightly now, less like a gown and more like a cage. The silk rasped when you breathed. It was beautiful, yes. But so is a snare, when polished.

The first horn sounded.

Not a graceful fanfare.

A low, ancient note, dragged from the depths of some forgotten sea god, a sound drawn not from trumpet or brass, but from a conch-shell lacquered in gold. It echoed with the weight of ceremony, a tone that did not rise but sank, deep and hollow, reverberating through the Eden like a warning bell tolling across a battlefield.

It wasn’t music.

It was a summoning.

The gates to the Sacred Preserve began to open, groaning with theatrical slowness. Petals fluttered from above. Incense burned sweet at the threshold. Beyond the archway waited a forest too symmetrical to be wild, too perfect to be natural. Every path was placed. Every grove curated. Even the underbrush had been trimmed, arranged in tasteful disorder by a landscape minister who believed in symbolic chaos.

Twelve girls stood veiled and masked behind you, but you didn’t turn to look.

You knew what they looked like. Every one of you had been dressed to shimmer like prey. Your bodies had been wrapped in soft power and sewn into meaning. Brocade stitched with house crests. Silk dyed to match family colors. Pearls, feathers, and trailing ribbons were weighted just enough to flutter as you moved, catching the eye.

Daughters of dynasties, dressed for sacrifice.

You did not wait.

You ran.

You fled through the gates as soon as your feet touched gravel, ignoring the girls who lingered for the proper pacing, for the audience, for the moment to shine. You had no interest in shining. You wanted cover.

The shift from stone to dirt was sudden. Jarring.

Your shoes, carefully chosen for elegance, not speed, bit into the soft earth, and your gloves tugged uncomfortably at your wrists with every movement. The gown clung to your thighs, the silver-green silk heavier than expected, designed to ripple, not sprint.

It caught the mist as you moved, fluttering behind you like trailing ivy. Decorative. Visible. Vulnerable.

You darted into the trees.

Branches whispered against your shoulders. Leaves brushed your mask like fingers trying to memorize your face. Birds didn’t sing. The fake ones had been silenced for suspense.

You moved through arranged wildness, and still, your body knew.

This was not a garden.

This was a stage.

And you were no longer hidden.

Time lost form.

You could not tell if it had been minutes or an hour, only that your breath was rising too quickly, that your ribs ached beneath the bodice, and your heart had begun to pound in rhythm with something ancient and wrong.

The second horn sounded.

This one was sharper.

Not the low, ancient call that opened the Hunt, but a clean, resonant tone that sliced through the mist like a blade.

That was the suitors’ call.

All fifty of them would be released now, one by one through staggered gates, each bearing their tokens. Letters sealed in wax. Pendants set with ancestral stones. Trinkets meant to charm. Declarations of intent wrapped in silk.

Each suitor had the right to pursue a chosen girl. To request her ribbon. To offer an alliance. To recite a vow or propose a match under the prescribed rites of courtship.

Each one would operate under court protocol.

Under law.

Under tradition.

Except one.

Garling Figarland would not move by invitation or decree. He needed no permission to pursue. He had already named no partner and would take whatever path he pleased, once.

The others were here to charm.

He was here to claim.

Another ten minutes crawled past like insects beneath skin. You moved deeper into the trees, breath shallow, footsteps careful.

Then the third horn sounded.

But this one didn’t echo.

It didn’t soar.

It pulsed: low, deliberate, and final.

Then came silence.

You didn’t need to ask what it meant.

You knew.

The Assassin had entered.

And the game was no longer safe.

You stopped moving for a moment, the weight of that knowledge settling over your shoulders like a wet cloak.

All the elegant rules. All the rehearsed gestures and symbolic offers were nothing now. A curtain pulled back. A polite performance exposed for what it was.

You were no longer in a ceremonial garden.

You were in a field of sanctioned predation.

You moved again, slower now.

Each step was calculated, measured.

Your vision narrowed beneath the filigree mask, silver pressed cool against your skin. The air felt heavier. Fragrant. Still too warm from the artificial weather controls. The perfume of arranged foliage clung like a film to your dress.

The trees had been chosen for beauty, yes, but also for spectacle.

Pearlbark. Ghost elm.

Their leaves were engineered to reflect just enough light to make silhouettes shimmer as they passed. It was a clever design trick, romantic under lanterns at the Harvest Ball. Haunting here.

Every time you glimpsed motion, you had to decide whether it was a suitor... or something else.

The branches above filtered light in fractal patterns. Too perfect. Too clean. Every leaf had been brushed, every vine trimmed, every hazard controlled. But it didn’t matter.

They had designed the forest to frame beauty.

Now it framed danger.

The trees no longer stood as decoration. They watched. The filtered light scattered across the ground in fractured patterns, turning every movement into a shadowplay. Your shape flickered across trunks and moss in pieces. Elegant. Exposed.

Somewhere ahead, leaves shifted.

You heard footsteps.

Not hurried. Not clumsy. Intentional.

Two men crossed into view through a break in the trees. One wore storm-colored livery, his house sigil embroidered in fine metallic thread across his chest. The other moved like a soldier shaped by war college. His posture perfect, his movements too controlled to be anything but trained.

They saw you.

And they bowed.

Not to you. Not to your family name.

To the title.

Target.

Their gazes lingered only long enough to acknowledge your presence. Then they moved on, gliding between branches, eyes constantly scanning, minds set elsewhere. They weren’t your suitors, and wouldn’t dream of crossing Garling Figarland.

That, at least, was a relief.

You returned the gesture with a slight smile. It did not reach your eyes. You kept walking, deeper into the trees, letting the forest swallow you again.

Behind you, the sound of their passage faded.

The Sacred Preserve had been divided into paths, each one color-coded and bound to a house crest. They had claimed this was for fairness. An elegant system to ensure every debutante had space to be found. Predictable. Controlled. Girls were told to stay within their zones. Suits were encouraged to follow.

The tradition had been dressed in language like a ritual. But it was theater.

And you were not fooled.

Tied to every girl’s waistband had been a ribbon, threaded through with a single bell. Silver, delicate, just loud enough to chime with motion. The bells were meant to help the suitors locate you.

That was the story.

But you knew better.

The bells made you easier to catch.

More appealing to pursue.

A prey that cried out as it fled.

Your ribbon had no bell.

Maria had cut it off herself that morning. Her hands had been steady, but her voice held a quiet edge as sharp as any blade. She had slipped the bell into her own belt, fingers closing around it like a charm or a curse.

“Let them follow noise,” she said. “You’ll run silent.”

And so you had.

Thorne’s allies were out there somewhere. Elias. Deronne. Lyonel. They had sworn to run interference, to scatter the field, to drag attention away from your trail. They would buy time, just enough for Thorne to find you first, if the plan held, if the court’s rules held, if anything still held.

But the moment you stepped into the glade, you knew.

There were too many suitors.

And one of them was him.

The Assassin.

He could enter from anywhere. He wasn’t bound to color-coded paths or numbered gates. He had no ribbon to match, no bell to follow. He didn’t need to speak your name or offer a token of affection.

His presence was his declaration.

You were already being hunted.

The trees around you breathed too evenly. Their symmetry was precise, unnatural. The kind of arrangement meant for stagecraft. Everything beautiful was suspect.

Your gloved hand caught slightly on the bark of a fallen archway, slick with mist. The silk snagged for just a heartbeat, enough to jolt your senses awake again.

A rustle.

Behind you.

You turned too fast, heart in your throat, breath caught half-formed.

But it was only Lyonel.

He stepped through a curtain of silver-leaved branches, moving without sound. His mask hung loosely around his neck, his hair damp with effort. He looked like he’d run far, fast, and not entirely for sport.

His smile was brief. Tight.

“I saw three heading your way,” he said, voice low. “I led them toward the water path. Deronne’s already started a fight near the orchard.”

He didn’t ask how you were.

He didn’t need to.

You nodded once, the gesture small and sharp. Grateful. Shaken.

“Three men are tracking you directly,” Lyonel murmured, glancing over his shoulder. “I’ve pulled four into the hedge maze. I’d claim you myself, but I suspect I’m already under suspicion for treasonous tendencies, so I’ll just make it worse.”

His smile was faint and fleeting.

“Two left?” you asked.

“One near the observation garden. Thorne says hello,” Lyonel added, almost too casually, “and to run like hell to the checkpoint.”

You didn’t respond.

You didn’t need to.

He offered you a wink: quick, boyish, reckless. “Go northeast. Deronne’s watching the exit. We’ll hold off the rest.”

You nodded again, then turned and slipped into the trees without another word.

Your gown hissed over wet leaves, catching the mist like a whisper. The silver-green silk no longer felt beautiful. It clung to your legs, damp and heavy, but you moved fast anyway.

Somewhere behind the veil of engineered breeze and hollow birdsong, a voice called out.

A suitor.

Probably searching for the girl he had been assigned.

Another voice laughed.

Too smooth. Too rehearsed.

Then a scream—high, sharp, almost too real—and a giggle chased after it like ribbon in the wind. A girl playing her part. Letting herself be caught.

Performance.

Of course.

You pushed deeper into the trees.

The Hunt had only just begun, and already you were off to find its end because this wasn’t a pageant. Not anymore. You were no longer one of thirteen girls in brocade.

You were the top prize.

And the man most interested in you… had just begun to move.

The Assassin’s Rule, as submitted by Commander Saint Garling Figarland:

“The Assassin shall not step upon the same path twice, nor shall he carry a blade. He finds both unnecessary.”

Let this stand as his binding clause under the Old Charter of the Sacred Preserve, witnessed and approved by the Council in full.

He didn’t run.

He didn’t stalk.

Commander Saint Garling Figarland moved through the Sacred Preserve the way a king walks through a palace he already owns. Not one that welcomed him, but one he had taken. One who knew resistance was futile.

His steps were deliberate. Measured. Not slow from hesitation, but because speed was unnecessary. The forest itself seemed to yield. Branches bent slightly away from his path. The carefully misted air curled tighter around him, drawn not by wind but by weight. Even the false birds, engineered to sing at intervals, fell quiet as he passed: sensors glitching, or silenced by something older than programming.

He wore no ribbon. No livery. No house color. No weapon.

He did not need one.

He was the Assassin.

And unlike the suitors still tumbling through illusion trails and rose-fringed corridors—boys running for a prize they hadn’t yet earned—Garling had already made his selection.

There would be no declarations. No vows. No gifts.

She was his.

He had chosen her before the horn sounded.

He had chosen her the moment Thorne looked twice.

And now, the rest of the field existed only to be outmaneuvered, outrun, or discarded.

He didn’t chase.

He closed.

Every step he took was laid with precision. He never crossed a path twice, not even by accident. His route twisted through zones forbidden to others, bypassed coded trails, and used elevation and reflection to triangulate movement. He had studied the landscape not for its beauty, but for its patterns. Every angle was already mapped in his mind.

Garling moved like strategy made flesh.

The kind of man who didn’t swing a sword because he’d already removed yours.

And the forest knew it.

It dressed him in silence.

Wrapped him in dread.

Even the light, filtered through the glass canopy above, softened against his shoulders like a blessing or a warning.

His siege began quietly.

Not with fanfare. Not with confrontation.

With precision.

Lord Ezram was the first to disappear.

He was fast, famously so. Handsome, too, with the kind of smile that won over matrons and debutantes alike. A cousin to the House of Harlowe, trained in theater fencing and political seduction. He had come dressed in cobalt and silver, confident and perfectly scented. Ezram had not expected to win the girl, but he had expected to impress.

And then the vines closed.

He had just passed through one of the mid-tier grove gates, chasing the silver blur of a debutante’s trailing sash, when the entrance behind him sealed with a hiss of hydraulic pressure.

He turned back, confused.

The gate was overgrown now.

Too overgrown.

The vines had not been arranged that way before, he was sure of it. He had memorized the map. This was supposed to be an open path, part of the circuit that circled the southern orchard.

Ezram stepped forward, and the vines hissed again, curling inward like slow-moving snakes.

The lattice beneath them gleamed for a moment, and that was when he saw it, embedded in the framework was a seal.

A code lock.

Military issue.

The kind used during the war games ten years ago, when noble houses still trained their heirs in battlefield maneuvers under controlled conditions.

No one used those anymore.

Except someone just had.

Ezram reached for the latch and found no give. He tried to call out, but his voice vanished into the ambient noise of the forest.

The engineered birds were chirping too loudly.

Their frequency had changed: sharper, faster. A cascade of artificial birdsong filled the air like static lace. From the outside, it might sound beautiful.

Inside, it drowned him.

Ezram shouted again, louder this time, but no answer came.

Somewhere far beyond the wall of vines, the Hunt continued.

And Garling Figarland was already crossing his next path.

Next came Caulder.

The priest-endorsed suitor. Favored by three chapels and one minor sanctum. Son of a moralist house, garlanded in old favor and perfumed humility. He had walked into the Sacred Preserve with a prayer on his lips and a velvet ring box in his pocket, certain the gods were on his side.

He vanished entirely.

There was no struggle. No cry. No sign of pursuit. He had last been seen following a gilded path toward the water mirrors, reciting verses meant to bless his courtship.

Then nothing.

It wasn’t until much later—after the third horn had faded and the garden’s lower quadrant had begun its soft dusk simulation—that one of the officiants found him.

He had been tied neatly to an ornamental tree near the conservatory gate.

Not brutalized. Not harmed.

Arranged.

His hands had been bound behind him with silk rope in a pattern used by old guard ceremonial stewards. His mouth was gagged with a length of pale ribbon, the kind typically used in engagement declarations. It bore the faint imprint of his house crest.

Pinned to his chest was a small ivory card.

The handwriting was immaculate.

A man of the cloth should not hunt.

That was all.

No name. No threat. No signature.

But everyone knew.

Caulder was cut down with quiet efficiency by two red-faced attendants and ushered into a service tent. He would not rejoin the Hunt.

And he would never speak of it again.

Captain Alric was next.

He had caught sight of you, just a flash of green silk vanishing down the moonwell path, the flutter of lace like a bird winging into shadow. That was all it took.

He surged forward without thought, instincts sharper than his strategy. His boots dug into the loam, churning up damp leaves as he broke into a sprint. His breath came hard. Sweat gathered under the collar of his polished coat. He did not pause to consider if the trail was too perfect. Too visible.

He was chasing prey.

That was the point.

But Garling Figarland appeared.

Not emerging. Not stalking. Appeared.

In front of him.

As if he had been there all along, simply waiting for the moment Alric would come too close.

There was no sound. No rustle of movement. Just one figure, suddenly, impossibly, blocking the path.

Captain Alric skidded to a halt. His pulse slammed into his throat. He nearly lost his footing. His hand went to the hilt of his ceremonial sword, fingers trembling with adrenaline.

Figarland didn’t move.

He stood like the forest had grown around him, like the mist coiled at his boots because it recognized its superior. The filtered light from the high glass canopy struck his shoulders just enough to crown him in pale gold. The air tasted different in his presence: sharp, electric, wrong.

Garling tilted his head slightly, as though examining something unimpressive.

“Captain,” he said, with the calm indifference of a man pointing out a stain on white silk. “Your laces are undone.”

The words barely registered.

But Alric looked down.

Instinct.

Stupid.

In that instant, Garling moved. Not with mere speed, but with inevitability.

Alric’s world turned sideways. His foot caught on something. His knees buckled. And then he was flat on the forest floor, his sword arm pinned at an impossible angle beneath him, the hem of his sash twisted around his elbow like a snare.

His coat was gone.

Cleanly stripped from his shoulders mid-fall, cast aside like excess weight.

A branch—thick, heavy, and absolutely not there before—lay across his chest, anchoring him to the damp earth. Not enough to break anything.

Just enough to hold him still.

To make him look up.

Garling crouched beside him, unhurried, untouched by the chase, his expression unreadable behind the soft curl of his lip. His eyes were the same color as old steel; polished, functional, deadly.

He leaned down, close enough for Alric to see the faint sheen of moisture on the leaves in his hair. Close enough to smell nothing at all. Not sweat. Not earth.

Nothing.

His voice was velvet drawn over a garrote.

“Next time,” he murmured, “try chasing a rabbit.”

Garling tilted his head.

A beat.

“You’re not ready for a fox.”

And then he stood.

The branch was gone.

So was he.

No footsteps.

No retreat.

Only the sound of Alric’s ragged breathing and the awful realization that he had been chosen, not as a threat, not even as an obstacle.

As an example.

Captain Alric did not rise again.

Whether from injury, humiliation, or sheer understanding of his own dismissal, he remained where he had fallen, pinned not by force, but by certainty. The Hunt had moved on without him, and there was no place left in it for pride.

Garling Figarland never looked back.

He moved forward, each step precise, as if the ground itself had been informed in advance of his route. Not once did his footfall land where another had. Even when the terrain looped, when mirrored paths tempted repetition, when low-hanging branches forced lesser men to duck or double back, he simply moved.

Always forward.

The forest did not challenge him. It deferred.

The vines leaned aside. The artificial mists drifted after him like servants. Even the sound of birdsong, rigged through hidden speakers and motion sensors, fell mute in his wake.

One suitor, clever, ambitious, watched him pass from the shadow of a carved arbor.

He saw an opportunity.

A shortcut.

A path carved clean through the chaos.

He stepped after him, placing his foot where Figarland’s had landed only seconds before. Heel to toe. Measured. Careful.

He vanished behind a false hedgerow, a wall of curated ivy and scent-spiked jasmine meant to mask transitions between sectors.

He never came out the other side.

No scream. No crash. Just silence.

Later, much later, an official tasked with recalibrating the map found the trail.

Not of a body.

Of ribbons.

A line of court tokens lay out with eerie care across the moss. Each one folded with ceremonial precision, arranged like forgotten prayers or trophies too meaningless to keep.

At the end of the line was a note.

Small. Uncreased. Cream parchment. Written in Figarland’s unmistakable script, elegant, slanted, exact.

It is a courtesy to leave the path untouched.

Not a kindness.

That was all.

No signature. No explanation.

None needed.

The message, like the man, was absolute.

Elias was the first to try to kill Garling.

The only one foolish enough—or loyal enough—to break the code and go for blood.

It was not a decision made lightly. Elias knew what it meant to violate the sacred rules of the Hunt. But the moment had arrived, and with it, the understanding that no one else would stop the man who moved like inevitability.

He waited near the northern bridge.

Stone arched elegantly across a shallow stream designed for court-approved chase scenes and photogenic hesitation. Water lilies bobbed, untouched. Above them, the mist hung low, curling like incense around the carved balustrades.

Elias waited in the shadow of the arbor, his blade drawn.

Not ceremonial. Not symbolic.

Real.

Simple steel. Perfect balance. A gift from Thorne intended for use only in emergencies.

And this was one.

He heard no footsteps.

But Garling stepped onto the bridge.

Just appeared there.

Midway across, coat unbuttoned, gloves tucked into his belt, no visible sign of threat. He looked like a man on a stroll. No rush. No hesitation.

Elias moved.

His strike was clean. Silent. The kind of motion drilled through years of hidden training. His feet barely touched the stone. The dagger came forward with flawless precision, aimed just beneath the ribs; deep enough to kill, quiet enough not to leave a scream.

Garling caught it with his fingers.

Two.

Just two fingers.

He didn’t flinch.

Didn’t draw a weapon.

Didn’t even blink.

Elias felt the stop in his own body before his mind caught up. He couldn’t move. The dagger remained suspended in the air, held between the Assassin’s index and thumb like a teacher halting a child’s tantrum mid-swing.

Garling looked at him.

Not with fury.

With something colder.

Stillness.

Dominance wrapped in silence.

And then he spoke.

“This is your only warning,” he said, voice smooth and steady, like a priest offering a final absolution.

“You try again, and I will end your engagement to the living world.”

Then he let go.

Just like that.

The blade dropped. Elias staggered back, caught somewhere between adrenaline and disbelief.

But Garling moved.

Not with flair. Not with rage.

Just one step forward, measured, inevitable.

And then he struck.

No windup. No warning.

A single punch.

Sharp. Precise. Bone-deep.

It landed beneath Elias’s jaw with the weight of a judgment passed, clean and cold. There was no echo, no theatrical sound. Just a sickening crack as the force sent Elias reeling backward, body snapping into the balustrade.

His legs buckled.

The dagger slipped from his grip and skittered across the stone. His breath caught in his throat and did not return. For a moment, he didn’t move at all.

The bridge behind Garling shimmered in the filtered light, soft as silk. His golden hair caught it briefly, burnished and bright. Around him, the mist drifted like reverence.

As though the moment had never happened.

Garling adjusted his sleeve, calm as ever.

And walked on.

Elias crumpled against the curve of the bridge, eyes wide, chest heaving, breath finally finding its way back into him in a ragged wheeze.

Alive.

But shaken.

Broken at the hinge where pride had once held steady.

His heartbeat roared louder than the horns.

And still, you turned.

Not because you heard it, but because the world had gone still around you. A wrongness prickled the back of your neck, quiet as snowfall. No birdcall. No breeze. No voice. Just the eerie hush of something watching.

You looked.

And there he was. Elias.

Across the break in the trees, on the bridge, doubled over and breathless. His pale fingers trembled at his sides. His knife lay at his feet like a dropped illusion. He wasn’t bleeding.

But he was ruined.

No bruises. No broken bone. Just the hollow echo of defeat.

His spine curled forward. Shoulders drawn. Not from pain.

From fear.

You had never seen Elias afraid.

And now you did.

You forced your gaze forward, down the path, toward the lilywalk where the mist clung low and soft.

That was when you saw him.

Standing on the far side of the clearing.

Garling Figarland.

Still. Centered. Waiting.

And looking directly at you.

The breath caught in your throat like a blade pressed edge-first.

He stood not in shadow, not veiled in fog, but exposed, calm and upright, as if the entire forest had bent to let him pass untouched. Even the light around him seemed wrong, golden at the edges like something holy, but cast upon a man with nothing sacred in him.

Your limbs refused to move.

His hair was immaculate. Not a leaf was disturbed. His gloves remained pristine, and his coat was unwrinkled. Not a scratch. Not a speck of dust. He hadn’t so much as ducked a branch.

And yet.

Elias had fallen.

The birds had stopped.

And now your legs didn’t feel like yours.

He didn’t shout.

He didn’t move.

He simply… waved.

A smooth, deliberate raise of his hand, fingers loose at the wrist. Elegant. Performed. The kind of gesture a king might offer to someone already conquered.

It was not flirtation.

It was not acknowledgment.

It was a claim.

A message written in posture alone.

That you were already his. That no one would reach you before he did. That not even the rules, the carefully gilded cage of tradition, could protect you now.

Your gown felt too tight. The corset too sharp. The scent of lilies turned sickly-sweet. Your throat closed like you were being led to a stage you hadn’t auditioned for.

And then, he smiled.

Just a flicker of it. The kind meant to disarm strangers and devastate empires. He raised his voice; not loud, but low and clear. It cut through the trees.

“Run, little fox…”

He let the words stretch. Unhurried. The smile sharpened into something terrible.

“…run.”

A pause.

His head tilted, ever so slightly.

“Make it a challenge,” he added, voice honeyed with mockery. “I’d hate to think you were easy.”

Your breath shuddered in your chest.

You ran.

Not because it was strategic. But because there was no other option.

Because Garling Figarland was not hunting you.

He was escorting you, step by step, toward your surrender.

So you ran faster.

Your gown snapped at your heels with every stride. The embroidered hem snagged on thistle, the moonlace along your sleeves fluttered like a creature in distress. You could not hear him behind you, and that was the worst part. There was no breath, no footfall, no evidence of pursuit at all.

But you knew he was moving.

And he was, though he had already walked your path once, and could not double back.

Somewhere behind the curtain of curated trees and filtered sunlight, he was closing the distance, not with speed, but with certainty.

The northern aqueduct appeared ahead. A collapsed ruin from last season’s rehearsal. They had never repaired it, assuming no one would choose such a route. The Assassin’s path had never led this way before.

But now it did.

He emerged from the shadows beneath the ghost elms. The clearing opened before him like a broken altar. The ruined colonnade stretched across the glade, its shattered columns lying scattered like rib bones, tangled in dry ivy and sculpted debris. The ground ahead offered no clear path forward. A toppled statue sealed the westward trail. The eastern fork twisted into a fallen trellis choked with vine and thorns.

The marble had cracked in three directions, none of them passable.

The forest curved neatly behind him. The world had narrowed.

A lesser man would have paused. Another might have doubled back.

Garling stood at the edge of the wreckage and looked at it as if it had failed him personally.

Then he moved.

His left hand gripped the lip of a fallen urn, while the right reached for a piece of warped iron left hanging like a crooked railing. There was blood on the metal. Some unfortunate suitor had tried the same route earlier and failed. But Garling’s coat did not catch. His footing did not falter. His breath did not change.

He scaled the ruin as if the broken terrain had been laid out for him.

He reached the top in three controlled motions, the lines of his coat clean, his shoulders steady. He did not pause to rest. He did not look behind him. With perfect balance, he stepped from the highest stone and dropped into the lilyfield below. The petals barely stirred as he landed.

Not even a sound.

From a high balcony, hidden in the lattice above the false forest, one of the officiants had been watching. The words left his mouth in a hush that barely moved the air.

"Is that allowed?"

No one around him responded. They could not. There was nothing to say.

“Are you going to tell him otherwise?”

And that was the point.

Garling did not defy the system. He simply made it irrelevant.

And somehow, even without seeing him, you knew that.

You could feel it in the soil beneath your shoes, in the sudden weight of the air. He was near. You did not know his exact position, only that the forest seemed to fold around his movements, reshaping itself to suit his purpose. No part of this Eden felt safe now. Not even the parts behind you.

The voices came before the figures.

Lyonel’s low curse broke the silence first, followed by Deronne’s sharp whistle.

You slowed instinctively, crouching behind a hedge of silver-leafed ferns. The garden mist clung to your skirts, soaking through the delicate embroidery. Your breath came shallow. Above, the engineered light of the mirrored glade danced over leaves that glistened with artificial dew. Even the birdsong warped now, sharp as a blade drawn across glass.

They had found the wrong place.

Deronne had tried to outmaneuver him, relying on familiarity. He had chosen a shortcut marked by those low granite walls and fern-laced borders. He had expected the path to hold its shape.

But it was too quiet.

And then he saw them.

The footprints.

Pressed into the damp earth, leading through the moss and disappearing into the marble grass. Heavy. Precise. Untouched by panic.

Garling had already passed this way.

Which meant, by his own rule, he would not return.

Deronne stopped, his jaw tightening as the realization struck.

He had misjudged everything.

“He’s already circled us,” Lyonel called down from a branch above, voice sharp. “He isn’t hunting in straight lines.”

“No,” Deronne muttered, his eyes narrowing on the empty path ahead. “He’s walking a spiral.”

His tone turned grim.

“And we’re standing in the center.”

You didn’t wait.

At Deronne’s shout of “Run, red,” you bolted past them both. Lyonel dropped from his perch and fell into step behind you without hesitation. Deronne followed close behind, forming a loose, mobile shield.

Your breath came hard now, your legs burning as you tore through the narrow trails. The paths were blurring, the colors bleeding together. But you could feel it. You were close.

Thorne was near.

It wasn’t romance that told you that. It wasn’t magic or instinct. It was the sheer force of strategy, the pattern of his timing, the tempo of his steps. You had studied him, the way he thought, the routes he would never take, the moments he would choose to intercept.

You could almost hear the scuff of his boots on the gravel behind the water gate. He would be there in a minute. Maybe less.

But that was precisely when the path curved, and Garling stepped into it.

Not from the side. Not from above.

He was already there.

Standing in the center of the path, still as a statue and just as sure of his place.

“Keep running, fox,” he called, his voice light and almost amused. “I’m enjoying the view.”

You didn’t look back.

Lyonel and Deronne stepped in front of you without needing to be asked. Guards. Shields. Two men against a force that should not have come so close so fast.

“You,” Deronne said, drawing his blade with the crisp elegance of a seasoned court duelist, “are in the wrong place.”

Garling tilted his head slightly, as if considering whether to bother answering at all. He looked like a man inconvenienced by a servant blocking his path with a mop bucket.

“Am I?” he replied, voice smooth. “I could have sworn I was standing exactly where I meant to.”

Lyonel didn’t give him the satisfaction of silence. He lunged without a word, all muscle and fury, his body crashing forward in a shoulder-slam meant to knock Garling off his feet. No sword. No tactic. Just the raw force of a man who refused to be decorative.

It might have worked on someone human.

Garling moved with the slow, effortless grace of someone bored by the entire ordeal. He pivoted neatly, a half step to the left, letting Lyonel’s momentum sail past him like a gust of wind brushing off a coat.

Lyonel hit the ground hard. His shoulder cracked against the stone. Garling didn’t even glance down.

He clicked his tongue softly.

“My, my,” he said, not really to anyone. “If that was swordplay, I’m unimpressed.”

Deronne struck. His blade flashed, clean and true.

Garling didn’t flinch.

He caught the steel mid-air, flat-palmed.

The sword shuddered in Deronne’s grip. Not from resistance. From the silence of it. The insult. No power braced it. No Haki shimmered in his hand. Only confidence.

“I know it’s difficult,” Garling murmured, looking Deronne in the eyes. “Being the lesser suitor.”

His tone dropped like velvet wrapped around a blade.

“But please. Don’t embarrass yourself with craftsmanship that dull.”

He didn’t shove. He didn’t strike.

He pushed the blade aside with the quiet disgust of a man brushing lint off his sleeve. The force caught Deronne off balance. His foot slipped on the moss-slick stone, and he fell backward, his head knocking sharply against the curve of the pathway wall.

Unconscious.

There was no magic. No sorcery. No trick.

Only Garling Figarland, perfectly still at the center of the trail.

Just physics. Training. Violence shaped into precision. A blade too sharp to be seen. He hadn’t struck, not really. He hadn’t needed to.

He let them see how little it took to break them.

“You’re angry,” Garling said, voice almost gentle. He stepped over Lyonel with the disinterest of a man crossing a puddle. “Predictable. And not particularly effective.”

Lyonel made a low, furious noise and tried to rise.

Garling didn’t kick him. He didn’t stomp or lash out. He simply stepped down, heel planted between Lyonel’s shoulders. Calm. Casual. Not cruel, only indifferent.

Lyonel collapsed back to the earth with a breathless grunt.

With a smooth motion, Garling reached down, took Deronne’s fallen sword, and drove it cleanly through the edge of Lyonel’s cape. The fabric pinned instantly to the earth, speared like a butterfly in a glass box.

Not flesh. Not blood.

Just the insult of stillness.

A man trapped not by strength, but dismissal.

Garling adjusted the cuffs of his sleeves, then glanced toward the woods. His gaze swept the brush without urgency, like someone considering where to walk next, not who might still be watching.

“I know I said I liked the chase,” he said mildly, as if to the trees, “but I didn’t mean by half-trained Labradors.”

He sighed. Not for pity. For boredom.

And then he turned in your direction.

Deliberate. Certain.

Still unarmed.

And you ran.

Fog slicked the path beneath your shoes. Trees leaned inward like voyeurs, too deliberately placed, their leaves brushing your shoulders with rehearsed intimacy. Your breath rose in sharp bursts, but you heard nothing behind you. Only the echo of mockery.

While Lyonel and Deronne gasped behind, broken but not beaten, you tore through the fern corridor. Your fingers scraped across the bark of false trees, grasping for balance. You felt it then, not the ground or the air, but the weight of presence behind you. It pressed forward without sound. Without pity.

Then you saw him.

Thorne.

Just past the glass archway, standing on the far side of the ravine like a fortress carved from willpower. His coat snapped behind him, boots braced, sword drawn. His eyes met yours the moment you broke into view.

He turned instantly and ran toward you.

You surged forward.

One step. Two.

It was the place you both had chosen, the rendezvous. The safe mark.

You leapt the last root, nearly catching your foot on the trailing hem of your gown. The air snapped around you like a warning. Behind you, cold breath coiled down your spine, laced with words you did not hear but felt.

Hesitation was death in silk gloves.

Garling’s voice again. Or memory. Or curse.

You were one breath from sanctuary.

One jump from Thorne.

He reached out, sword in one hand, the other stretched forward. His expression held nothing of fear. It was quiet. Focused. That expression you had only seen in moments of near-failure or mortal stakes: when the smile vanished and all that remained was the calculation of survival.

His gaze wasn’t on you.

It was fixed behind you.

You didn’t look.

You didn’t need to.

Your lungs tore themselves open in an attempt to keep pace. Each breath scraped like parchment in your ribs. The filtered air tasted artificial, dry, and bitter. Your gown dragged like it had grown heavier with each heartbeat. The roots twisted beneath your shoes, sudden and new, as if the forest was reshaping itself to stop you.

Then the arch ahead groaned.

Not wind. Not decay.

A sound of decision.

The engineered ivy, meant to bloom at dusk, dropped in a curtain. Ornamental stone followed it, shattering across the path in a perfect arc. Not a collapse. A curtain call.

Too clean to be an accident.

Too timed to be a coincidence.

You skidded to a halt. Dust filled your nose. The gap between you and Thorne stretched into something unbreachable. He was still there. Still reaching.

Then a shadow broke the top of the wall.

Not from behind.

Not beside.

From above.

Garling landed on the broken colonnade with the silence of something divine. His coat flared like a banner, like a mantle of some ancient order. His boots kissed the marble with a sound that seemed final. Not force. Not violence. Only inevitability.

He looked down at you as if you had been walking toward him all along.

Your stomach dropped as you stared up at him, taking in the ghastly colors of his coat, the faint imprint of crushed stone on his sleeve, and the green vines clinging to his boots like offerings. A path had collapsed that Thorne should have crossed. Yet he had rewritten it, just like he’d rewritten everything else.

Garling Figarland stood above you on the crumbled archway like a sculpture meant to unsettle the gods. Then, with the ease of inevitability, his boots landed on the gravel at your feet.

“You’re nearly there,” he said softly, amused. “One more step.”

His eyes flicked past you to the ravine. To Thorne, still reaching, still waiting on the other side. Then back to you.

“How inconvenient,” Garling murmured, glancing over the shattered stones as if disappointed in their audacity. “That the old paths keep breaking.”

He wasn’t winded. He wasn’t armed. He wasn’t even particularly interested in the game. Only the outcome.

The way he looked at you wasn’t triumphant. It was worse. Mild.

“Well done,” he said lightly, offering a slow, theatrical clap. “You almost made it.”

Almost.

The court had already claimed your name, your body, your future. Garling hadn’t just won the Hunt—he’d rewritten it.

And now he stood between you and the only path left to freedom.

You clutched your ribbon. Green and silver, still pinned beneath your collarbone. It was the last piece of you untouched. The symbol of your House. Your claim. Your right to choose.

Garling’s gaze drifted to it like a scholar admiring a relic.

He didn’t move fast. He didn’t need to.

“You’re nearly there,” he said again, pacing closer, voice still wrapped in silk. “One more step. But, how boring would it be if I let you win?”

Your fingers curled into your skirts.

You could still smell the stone dust in the air, still feel Thorne’s presence across the bridge like a beacon; sharp, unwavering. He hadn’t moved. He was waiting for you to try. Watching. Coiled. Ready.

If you got to Thorne, the Hunt ended.

But if Garling reached you first, the story would belong to him.

A cough and Thorne pushed back from the stone, and you breathed in relief. He hadn’t been crushed in the rumble, just nearly so.

Garling followed your gaze and saw Thorne waiting. Then smiled. Faintly. Indulgently. As if your efforts amused him.

“You may hand it over freely,” he said at last, voice dipped in mock courtesy. “I’m not without manners.”

And then he extended his hand.

Palm open.

You took a step back.

Garling didn’t flinch. He didn’t frown. If anything, the curl of his fingers softened further, as if coaxing a dove from a branch.

“I don’t need to chase you,” he said, soft and sure. “We both know that. You’ll wear my mark one way or another. Better this way. Cleaner. More elegant.”

Your lungs were tight, like the air itself had become a snare. One wrong breath, and you’d be caught. You could still feel the broken tremble of the archway behind you, the dust clinging to your lashes. The forest smelled like stone and false lilies. It looked like a painting gone sharp around the edges. Too quiet. Too still.

You stepped back.

Garling’s expression didn’t change, not really, but something shifted. A flicker of something colder beneath the charm. Not annoyance. Not a threat.

Just interest.

Like a man wondering how long it would take a clock to shatter if dropped from a great height.

“No?” he asked, the word soft as silk. “Good. I prefer a little defiance.”

You turned and ran.

Fast.

But not fast enough.

Because he moved. Effortless. Silent. A shadow slipping into place. No rustle of fabric. No crunch of gravel. One moment, you were ahead. The next, he was there.

Thorne struck.

He came from the side like a storm, coat flaring, blade already slicing through the space between you and danger. His face was carved into focus, fury tamped beneath control.

Garling didn’t recoil. He didn’t retreat.

He shifted.

A breath to the left. A dip of the shoulder.

Steel missed skin by inches.

Thorne struck like a blade drawn too fast: sharp, decisive, a crack of fury aimed straight for Garling’s throat. His boots cut deep into the soil, every motion fueled by discipline and desperation. But Garling didn’t backpedal. He didn’t even brace.

He caught the blow in a single pivot.

One step, one turn, and he was inside Thorne’s guard. Their feet shifted across the gravel, but it was not a duel. Not anymore.

Garling turned the grip of Thorne’s sword with surgical precision. The blade drove into the earth with a muffled thud, stolen cleanly from its master. Before Thorne could recoil, Garling placed his free hand over the man’s chest, lightly, almost soothingly.

"Careful," he murmured. "You’ll wrinkle your pride."

There was no cruelty in his tone. Just amusement. Absolute. Inevitable.

Thorne gasped, choked back a curse, but the damage was done. His balance slipped. His knees buckled.

Garling didn’t let go.

He lifted.

Thorne’s boots left the ground.

Your heart lurched.

A moment later, Garling’s knee slammed into Thorne’s ribs with a sickening crack. No excess. No waste. Just force applied exactly where it would end things.

The heir of House Thorne crumpled like parchment, breath gone, sword buried, mind shunted into darkness.

Garling lowered him gently to the path, as if setting down something that had once been valuable.

Then he looked down at the unconscious form and said, almost kindly, “The game is already over.”

And you ran.

Your skirts gathered in your fists, shoes slipping over packed dirt. The trees blurred past. Mist clung to your legs like lace spun from fear. You ran toward breath, toward escape, toward the edge of something still yours.

Behind you came the sound you feared most.

A laugh.

Low. Confident.

Unbothered.

Garling Figarland was not chasing you. He was letting you feel the illusion of choice.

And still, you ran harder.

Your hand reached for the pistol at your thigh, the metal damp and slick with panic. The world narrowed. A single shot. A single chance. One breath to aim, one to survive.

You turned, pivoted, leveled the barrel.

Your finger clicked.

And nothing happened.

Not because you had missed.

But because your wrist had stopped moving.

Fingers encircled it like silk cords drawn tight. Not with violence. Not with heat. With calm certainty, like someone stopping a leaf before it hit the ground.

He was there.

Garling stood beside you now, no rustle of leaves, no warning sound. Just presence.

As if the world had moved to let him in.

He didn’t look at the gun. He looked at you. Not in hunger. Not in cruelty.

The trees held their breath. The birds did not sing. The officiants said nothing. Even the gun trembled in your hand, its intent stripped away like bark from a branch.

Garling looked up at it; the barrel now pointing harmlessly toward the canopy, and smiled. Not with delight. With ownership.

In claim.

"You should have fired faster," he said softly.

You couldn’t speak. Couldn’t breathe. His hand held yours without force, but you knew, he had you.

He leaned in, slow and deliberate, until the only air you breathed was the one he allowed.

The forest went quiet. Even the birds refused to pretend now.

His eyes dropped to the weapon, then rose to yours. A gloved hand lifted, slow as a falling petal, until it reached the clasp at your throat.

Click.

Your ribbon unfurled. Green and silver silk tumbled from your collarbone and into his palm like it had always belonged there.

He didn’t raise it. He didn’t boast.

He simply turned his wrist and let the light catch it, long enough for the world to see.

The officials.

The suitors.

The court.

You had been claimed.

Garling turned, lifting the ribbon into the light like a herald might lift a fallen enemy’s banner. It fluttered in his grasp, no longer a symbol of your House, no longer yours. Not a prize. A proof. A warning.

No cheers followed. No officiant dared speak.

The debutantes watched in silence. The trees seemed to lean inward. Even the artificial birdsong choked into stillness.

Because everyone had seen.

You stood frozen, breath shallow, chest tight, as if the air had turned to glass around you. Your hands trembled at your sides, stripped of the weapon, the ribbon, the path. The world had changed shape in a single motion, and now there was no forward. Only him.

Garling turned his gaze back to you, head tilted slightly, as if admiring a particularly fascinating portrait.

“You truly do look best when you’re radiant with hope,” he said softly, voice like velvet drawn over a blade. “It gives your face a specific color I’m growing fond of.”

Then, without warning, his grip shifted. Just enough for pressure to bloom down your wrist, subtle and surgical. You flinched.

Your fingers went numb.

The pistol slipped from your hand and struck the mossy ground with a muted thud.

He didn’t look at it. Not even once.

Only let you go when it was too late.

“Quite a good aim,” he murmured, amusement flickering cold behind his lashes. “For a debutante.”

And then, as if this had all been the prologue to a dance, he offered his arm.

A gesture of tradition.

A gesture of control.

It gleamed like a blade beneath silk.

You didn’t take it. Couldn’t. Not from pride. Not from rebellion. But because your legs felt hollow beneath you, and you no longer knew where to step. Because after this, after him, no one would call you Thorne’s fiancée again.

Garling Figarland’s touch hadn’t bruised. It hadn’t pleaded.

It had claimed.

Because absolute power did not require violence.

Only inevitability.

And his smile had the elegance of a crowned executioner; handsome, treacherous, and final.

They would speak of it for weeks. In salons and sanctuaries, in whispers behind gloves and under fans. How the Vauntierre girl had been hunted like a fox in silk. How her suitors fell like frostbitten flowers. How Garling—commander of the God’s Knights, untouchable by law or blood—had stepped down from the polished altar of politics…and made courtship a performance.

And performance a conquest.

He hadn’t followed the rules.

He had replaced them.

And left the world applauding in silence.

(Continued in part 6.5) Tumblr won't let me post the entire thing.

#gav story #one piece #figarland garling x reader #garling figarland #figarland garling #dark romance #mariejois #one piece x reader #one piece au #rocks pirates #rocks d. xebec

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insert-random-account-name · 6 months ago

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Crappy Character Analysis, part 7

part 1 (Broken) part 2 (Skeptic) part 3 (Cold)

part 4 (Paranoid) part 5 (Stubborn) part 6 (Contrarian)

part 7 (You are here) part 8 (Opportunist) part 9 (Cheated)

part 10 (Hunted) part 11 (Hero)

VOICE OF THE SMITTEN

This is another voice I liked (as a person, not as a character) less after the Pristine Cut was released. In his original dialogue, he was a comedically unhinged simp. Although he made some weird comments, and killed you on one occasion, he was still loved by the community. (I don’t think there’s a single let’s-player who gets him and doesn’t instantly start imitating him.) In the Damsel, where 75% of his content lies, Smitten is endearing by sheer ridiculousness alone. This theme continued in the (burned) Grey, the Razor, and the MoC. In the Thorn, Smitten comes through with an unexpected tenderness, making it the most romantic route of the game. And then there’s the new Chapter three he features in: The Happily Ever After. In the lead-up to the chapter, he forces you to rip your heart out, manipulates the threads of your body, and takes over the construct. In the chapter, he traps you and the Princess in the cabin, making you feel like you can’t resist, and tries to keep you there forever, in the name of your happy ending. This chapter is one of the most emotional ones in the game, and it’s clear how unhappy and scared the Princess is throughout. This adds a new disturbing filter to not only his character, but to everything else he’s previously said that could’ve been brushed off before.

Before I start my thoughts on him, I want to emphasize that I am not excusing Smitten’s actions, but explaining them. The whole point of this analysis is to understand why these characters do what they do, and I want to make it perfectly clear that I do not condone his actions. That out of the way, I don’t think the Smitten had malicious intent in the HEA. But first, let’s unpack him in general. I don’t actually think the Smitten’s “purpose” is to love the Princess. I think his purpose is to be The Hero of your story. It’s already been discussed how the voices don’t really match up with the personality traits attributed to them, so I won’t go into that, but I think the means through which you get him are not necessarily the most romantic, but instead are the ones that correlate the most with the traditional ideas of a hero and a princess. Rushing into the cabin unarmed and sacrificing yourself to save her? Pretty typical of a fairy-tale hero. Treating her with love even when she threatens to stab you? Also a “heroic” thing to do. Smitten even talks like someone out of an old adventure tale. If this is true, why does he love the Princess? Because that’s how the story goes! You find the cabin, rescue the Princess, fall in love at first sight, and live happily ever after. This is also why he loves the Princess regardless of her form or actions. Those are mere setbacks in the tale of your undying love and persistence. Because of this worldview, Smitten goes into the cabin already expecting the ending he knows is coming. The dark side to his character comes out when this expectation is subverted. Slaying the Damsel shifts the narrative in a way he hadn’t thought to predict. In a desperate attempt to steer the story back on track, Smitten plunges your blade though your heart, because that’s how the story goes. One lover perishes and the other, wracked with grief, quickly follows suit. However, when you find yourself back in the woods again, he quickly tries to restore the narrative that was tossed aside. Finally, in the HEA, when you suggest staying in the cabin, Smitten leaps on the idea. Even if it’s not the typical idea of a happily ever after, it’s still romantic, and that’s what counts. However, when the Princess shows discomfort and apprehension at living with a virtual stranger, Smitten starts to panic. Isn’t this love at first sight? Why isn’t she as happy as you are? Is the story wrong? No, he just did it wrong! This place isn’t welcoming enough, or you aren’t dashing enough, or the torches don’t burn as brightly as they need to! If he just changes things, she’ll be happy. Everyone will be happy. He can’t accept anything else. This is what backs his actions in HEA. His thoughts are that if the Princess leaves, that means he failed. He failed to achieve the happy ending he longed for. He failed to show her how much he loves her, for if she loved him, she wouldn’t leave. This logic is obviously flawed, but Smitten is so obviously deranged that it makes its own kind of twisted sense. Smitten doesn’t mean to be abusive, but that doesn’t stop him from pushing the Princess to a breaking point as she tip-toes on eggshells to avoid his wrath.

Of course, there are other sides to Smitten. In the Thorn, he recognizes the Princess’s pain, and understands that there is forgiveness on the horizon, as long as you’re willing to put in the effort. In the Burned Grey, you see more of his wrath (or wroth, as he pronounces it) first-hand, with his iconic back-and-forth with Cold, and you see his madness as he insists you burn with a lover scorned. While Smitten is one of my favorite characters, if I met him in real life, I’d get a restraining order. Those are most of my thoughts on him, anything else would just be something that’s already been said many times over.

(To the person who tagged this as read later, I added more links >:))

#slay the princess #stp #stp voices #voice of the smitten #opportunist will probably also be posted by the time anyone sees this :3

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sonicenvy · 6 months ago

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[Megapost] Online Resources For Fiber Arts

Hi y'all! Local crazy lady librarian n' crafter here! I am one of those people who loves collecting resources and to that end I created my Weird Wonderful Web spreadsheet many moons back (which is an ever updating project btw) which is a spreadsheet of useful, interesting, wacky, old school, unique, or just plain delightful gems on the internet. For the purposes of this post I decided to pull out all of the fiber arts related resources (+ I added some new stuff just for this post that will make it on the sheet eventually)

Today, I am here to share with you collection of useful resources online for embroidery, cross stitch, sewing, knitting, and crochet. If you have any useful sites that you know of that I didn't share here I'd love to know! Reblog or comment and share!

Without further ado:

Sewing

@fatmasc’s google drive of sewing resources –– lots of sewing resources in one gDrive folder

Dagraeve’s Jedi Robe Pattern –– sew a simple jedi robe for a costume!

Vincent Briggs’ tutorials on making fabric covered buttons (18th century style!) –– what it says on the tin. These are very thorough video tutorials on this topic from a dude is extremely knowledgeable about sewing 18th century men’s clothing. Check out his whole YT channel for more 18th sewing content and his blog @ vincentbriggs.tumblr.com for more excellent content!

@wastelesscrafts basic circle skirt tutorial –– learn how to design and sew a basic circle skirt

Google WeWearCulture Project –– browse a huge collection of images and information about fashion around the world and throughout history.

Embroidery/Needlepoint/Cross Stitch

Sarah’s Hand Embroidery Tutorials –– a complete visual dictionary of embroidery stitches with tutorial videos for each stitch. Super thorough and informative!

Lord Libidian’s Cross Stitch Blog –– lots and lots of useful resources for cross stitch and embroidery, including the extremely handy downloadable DMC thread color chart spreadsheet for helping you organize your thread hoard. Lots of reviews of products and free patterns as well.

ThreadColors –– DMC thread colors to html hex codes. Excellent resource for selecting matching colors from your reference image to color block your next project. Note that some of the color names on this site are older names that DMC no longer uses, but the number codes and the colors themselves remain unchanged.

Faimyxstitch’s embroidery blog posts –– embroiderer Kseniia Guseva, who is well known for her stunning embroideries of scenes of various cities around the world has a variety of freely available posts with information about getting started with embroidery, including a very thorough post on the supplies you might need. She also sells patterns on her etsy and teaches a class (paid).

Free Patterns on the Official DMC site –– DMC has a lot of free to download patterns for cross stitch and embroidery.

DMC thread conversion charts –– convert DMC colors to other brands and vice versa using these handy charts.

reddit’s embroidery community r/embroidery –– lots of great, talented people, many of whom very kindly offer tips when asked!

Needle n’ Thread embroidery tutorials –– lots of posts and videos for beginners!

Knitting/Crochet

Ravelry –– if you’re not new to crochet or knitting you probably have already heard of Ravelry, but I figured I’d stick it here because if you’re brand spanking new you might not have heard of it. You need to create an account but you can download free patterns or purchase patterns on Ravelry. The other main thing you can do with your Ravelry account is to use it to keep track of your projects in your “journal” where you can put notes, a list of the yarns used, the hooks/needles you used, etc. and continue to update the project as you go along. Because I am a person who starts a project and completely forgets about it for like 2 months, I love my Ravelry journal because I put down the yarn I used, the hook I used and the stitch counts for the last row that I crocheted. Nifty!

Left handed Knitting from LeftyKnits –– short, sweet videos on knitting for lefties posted 16 years ago. All are less than 2 minutes long and cover a single micro topic!

Rowbot’s Knitting Videos –– similarly old knitting videos that are short, sweet and to the point from 10+ years ago.

thecrochetside crocheting videos –– short, sweet and to the point crochet videos from 15+ years ago. Right handed mostly.

Internet Archive’s Collection of Knitting Magazines –– collection of knitting magazines that can be viewed online via IA from a variety of time periods. Some magazines also contain crochet and a few crochet magazines are buried in the mix. Magazines contain patterns and project ideas.

Bella Dia’s “vintage” style vertical stripe crochet blanket pattern –– photo tutorial for crocheting a vertical striped multi-color blanket.

General:

findoldvideo.com –– for those who weren’t on YouTube 12+ years ago, you might not know this but there were a TON of super useful fiber arts tutorial videos that were short, sweet and to the point that were all over YouTube, but since the YT search algorithm heavily weights new content you’d never be able to find them now …. unless you use this site! findoldvideo allows you to search YouTube videos from a particular year and sort your results chronologically. A good example search would be “crochet” year: 2008 Boom! Now you have tutorial videos that are less than 2 minutes long and have no promos, random extra talking, title cards, or other fancy shit because they were posted 17 years ago before YouTube was awash in “content”. You’re welcome.

Degraeve Color Palette Generator –– generate a color palette from any image on the web and get hex codes. Good for graphic design, but could also be useful for coming up with “inspired by” color palettes for your projects.

Kleki –– digital painting in your browser for free. Includes a wide range of brushes and the ability to use layers. If you need to do some drawings for your project, Kleki is a good free alternative if you don’t have paid software on your computer or tablet.

Library of Congress Digital Collections –– Free to use reference images of a wide range of items, including images of historical fashions!

ManualsLib –– did you just buy a second hand sewing machine, digital embroidery machine, or knitting machine that doesn’t have a manual? You might be able to download a free copy here on the internet’s most comprehensive catalog of product manuals.

Stitch Fiddle –– A site/tool for designing patterns for knitting, crochet, cross stitch, needle punch and more.

The Smithsonian Image Archive –– Free to use images of a massive amount of things! If you like designing embroidery or cross stitch images of botanicals, insects, animals, etc. you can find high quality images of these here and download them for free and use them for anything.

Encyclopedia of Needlework by Thérèse de Dillmont (1890) –– Dillmont’s Encyclopedia of Needlework contains tutorials for sewing, embroidery, cross stitch, lace making, knitting, macrame and more. Originally published in 1890, it was an extremely popular work on the topic and is still being reprinted today. The link takes you to a free online copy on Project Gutenberg. It unfortunately doesn’t seem to have included the Table of Contents so you’ll need to pop a ctrl + f (cmd + if you’re on mac) and search your desired terminology. If you get it in print it is HUGE!

The Dictionary of Needlework by Sophia Frances Ann Caulfeild (1885) –– Read another popular book stitching, with the delightful subtitle: “an encyclopaedia of artistic, plain, and fancy needlework. Dealing fully with the details of all the stitches employed, the method of working, the materials used, the meaning of technical terms, and, where necessary, tracing the origin and history of the various works described. Illustrated with upwards of 800 wood engravings, and coloured plates. Plain sewing, textiles, dressmaking, appliances, and terms”

Volunteering Opportunities:

Project Linus –– Project Linus seeks to “Provide love, a sense of security, warmth and comfort to children who are seriously ill, traumatized, or otherwise in need through the gifts of new handmade blankets and afghans, lovingly created by volunteer blanketeers.” Knit, crochet, or quilt blankets that will be donated to NICU babies, Peds Oncology kids, and more. My grandma quilted for Linus for many years. I think that this post is a great encapsulation of the impact of Linus and similar orgs that donate blankets to kids in need.

Loose Ends Project –– “Loose Ends is an everyone-is-welcome movement that aims to ease grief, create community, and inspire generosity by matching volunteer handwork finishers with textile projects people have left undone due to death or disability.”

#fiber arts #crochet #knitting #embroidery #sewing #resources #masterlist #megapost #reference #mine #help #please please tell me what resources YOU know about! I'd love to hear about them!!!

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strawberry-daiquiris · 6 months ago

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AO3 Wrapped!

nobody tagged me in this hahahah i just wanted to keep a record like i did last year so this is a mash up of a couple of different versions (not figg as i first posted lol)

Works Published: 26 (including 1 anon fic)

Comment Threads: 791

Word Count: 222,139 (took jump right in out of the total because most of it was written/half was published in 2023 but ao3 includes it in the latest updated year for stats)

Top 3 Kudosed Fics:

(again... ignoring jump right in... sort of)

🏆 hard on the brakes

🥈 lay your open hand

🥉 something dumb to do

Top Word Count:

🏆 lay your open hand (51k)

🥈 still reserved for me (35k)

🥉 girls just wanna f1 tumblr fics (15k)

Top Ships:

🏆 landoscar

🥈 🥉 a tie between piastrell and piastrella, as it should be <3

and then some additional questions, cutting this for dash length purposes...

What work are you most proud of (regardless of kudos/hits)? this one is so hard... last year i had a stand out because jump right in was (and still is) such a huge accomplishment. i guess i'm proud of still reserved for me because it's a continuation of a world i feel so happy in, and even though the readers have dropped off a lot i feel like i'm writing for a group of people who really Get and Love the two of them. it makes me proud to have managed to build something like that!!!

i'm also just proud of the sheer word count... insane... stupid... get a grip.

What work of yours got more feedback than you expected? oh 100% the piastrells... really didn't think anyone else apart from about 4 certified fellow freaks were going to be into them as a pairing, but i've had some lovely, insightful feedback about them and their relationship that makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside!!!!

What work was the quickest to write? just like last year i've got a few fics that were one session wonders. sun down and i'm feeling lifted aka help i think i fancy some driver's sisters, this (maybe not so now) anon when i was hit by the Future of F1, the tarkov nortrell and all of the andrea/oscar fics that were basically me working through my sport emotions, lol.

What work took you the longest to write? i started the gdoc of what became lay your open hand in april and posted it december, but i was only properly working on it from some point in september. still reserved for me took the best part of two months as well. next year i have 3 wips i'd lke to actually finish that could steal the title tbh.

What’s your most common “Additional Tags” tag? rule 63 babyyyyyy!!!! closely followed by age difference and magical realism, which tracks.

Your favourite character to write this year? toss up between oscar and max fewtrell, which explains nicely why the brittle fics are my highlights of 2024.

The character that gave you the most trouble writing this year? lando still stressing me out to this day... i think i am nearly there with the voice (although frightened of over using in case i fall into it sounding forced) but the rapidly changing state of mind on that man... i think i love him so much it's hard to feel like i ever capture him properly, the wriggly little wormy thing.

What’s one pairing you want to explore next year? i think there's a jendo in me bubbling below the surface.

Favourite work you wrote this year? oh i think i have already answered this by going on and on about it, but brittle it shakes, closely followed by something to sink your teeth into and a podium finish for float away like vapour.

ok sorry if you read this because it was LONG... i'm also going to make a few new years resolutions...

i'm going to get better at replying to comments and not feel shame if i go back and respond to ones from a while ago

stop being hard on yourself, stop deciding a fic is rubbish and then hate it/want to delete it, stop holding yourself to DEADLINES... it's not that deep, it's not a job, it's supposed to be FUN

i'm going to read more - i will stop saving fics for 'the best time for them' and start reading them when they come out so that i don't miss my chance.

#ao3 wrapped 2024 #fic stuff #not going to lie there has been points this year i have considered quitting entirely soooo keeping it fun is the rules for 2025!!!!!

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bomberqueen17 · 6 months ago

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how it's going

I am delighted so far by the responses to the post about signing up to beta/cheer-read the solarpunk tallship bisexuals novel I've decided to really give a go this year-- if you missed it, this is the post-- I have gone through and added everyone who signed up so far and it's a lovely mix of names I know and names I don't, not so many people it'd be hard to keep track and not so few that I'm worried about burning somebody out or totally winding up relying on one poor reader to keep my sanity going. I am also always pumped to get a lurker to de-lurk and say hi, not that there's anything wrong with lurking, I've got a few spaces where I lurk because that's what I need from that space. But it's always nice to be able to like, relate to somebody, y'know?

Not that you can really talk a lot in a google doc. I admit a lot of what's kept me going on Witcher has been having various little Discord threads where I can paste in whatever line I'm smug about, or that I'm stuck on for workshopping, and having a conversation about it, and not having that (I have a thread going in a Witcher discord but since it's off-topic it's kind of... well, low-traffic). I don't know if it's feasible to make a new Discord so I probably won't. But.

Anyway I will at some point turn that form off, but it seems to have worked pretty well so far as a method for adding people specifically to the doc, and I will leave it open and keep checking it for a little longer if any of y'all reading this were on the fence about signing up. I just can't rattle around alone in that doc and still keep my momentum. I'm only up to chapter three or so and the main plot hasn't even started but there's thusfar been at least one really confusing action sequence and I've realized that I've got a serious case of zero visual information being conveyed, so that's been helpful. Even with only a couple of readers-- ha, even the last couple of hours before I started adding people to the doc it had already done a lot of its job because I started proofreading with an audience in mind, which in my case tends to improve readability, which is what I want.

Listen, there's a noble purpose in telling stories for their own sake to yourself, but the idea of telling a story so that others can understand it is important to and I value it highly. So. That's what this is about.

So I've got a few people poking around in there with me and I feel much better about life and have some hopes I might make it over the hump into a real plot now, LOL.

But I think I'm gonna snippet post, which I haven't much with this work yet! (Have I? I forget. I started it in the fugue state of pre-holiday fuckery last year so who knows.)

bah i can't find a good snippet. well, here's a recently-composed one anyway.

As they approached the ship, Tom said, “You’ll tell the others, yeah? Simmons didn’t know. It ain’t his fault.” “I don’t know as it’ll help,” Keller said. “They’re mighty displeased about how you been treated. It reflects on them, y’know?” “It’s not so bad,” Tom said. “I’d rather be here than escorting the Barka convoy back to Subia in Jeanette all by my lonesome knowing damn well Righteous is waiting there for me with a bone in her teeth. No thank you, I’d rather not be set up on a suicide run like that. And you know if I got killed in a fourteen-gun sloop facing down a bloody-minded forty-gun privateer they’d tut-tut and say a proper Subian gentleman could’ve won.” “Oh sir,” Keller said. “You know they’d say that,” Tom said. “You know they would. No thank you, I will take my lumps and stick with Haines and I’ll thank you not to force me to defend poor Simmons the entire time. It weren’t none of his doing, Henry Keller, but that don’t mean I want to have to argue with the rest of you lot about him every blessed day of this commission.” “He’s also an ignorant sod,” Keller pointed out. “It don’t signify,” Tom said. “You know me and Yardley won’t let no harm come to the ship.” “Oh, Yardley,” Keller said. “I forgot he’s aboard. He’s been scarce.” Tom rolled his eyes. “He’s taking it well, too,” he said. He rummaged through the few parcels he’d brought back, and pulled out a bag and handed it over to Keller. “Share that out with your mess-mates,” he said. “And tell them-- it ain’t his fault, at all.” Keller took the bag with pleasure-- it was candy, Tom knew they’d have liked liquor better but he didn’t dare risk them being found with it and punished, with Simmons and not him in charge, so candy was safer. Keller looked back up at Tom, weatherbeaten face crinkled with a grin, and said, with a wry, grudging concession, “I’ll tell them.”

#my writing #the process etc.#solarpunk tall ship bisexuals

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wavesoutbeingtossed · 1 year ago

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Screaming from the crypt (or how the past haunts the present on Midnights)

I know it's been discussed so much since Midnights came out but just.

I love how there is such a clear narrative throughout the album (and perhaps especially on the 3am/Vault tracks). About questioning and regret and choices and coming to terms with all of it. It is one long story about how we're all a mosaic of the choices we make, each one taking something from us and leaving something else in its place.

(And now a disclaimer: I'm looking at this mostly through a narrator/subject lens, and trying not to dive too deeply into real-life events or speculation except for in a general sense. For this purpose I like to look at the body of work as art, like literature, because I find it makes it easier to see the common threads in the different songs and cohesion in the narrative.)

In looking at the 3am+ tracks in particular, it's fascinating how some turns of phrases or themes repeat themselves in different songs, in different contexts. (I'm only focusing on the non-standard tracks because there are too many songs and I'd be here all day but I bet I could do a part two lol.) I know many people have pointed out the parallels throughout her discography already and I’m not saying anything groundbreaking by writing this, but I love how these parallels run through in the same album, because it makes it seem like it's one long story, or at least, one long rumination on many different stories that are coalescing into a single narrative.

Battle (let’s go)

For instance, the one that jumped out at me when I started writing this post the other week was, "Tore your banners down, took the battle underground," in The Great War and "If clarity's in death, then why won't this die? Years of tearing down our banners, you and I," in Would've, Could've Should've. It's a story about staying stuck in the same cycle of reliving trauma and coping mechanisms and bad habits over and over again and fantasizing about how taking the “antagonist” out and gaining the upper hand for good would bring closure (WCS), but the truth is that nothing ever will. All that cycle does, though, is repeat itself in other situations, and in this case pushes someone away the narrator cares for (TGW). The difference is that the imagined battle in WCS is a two-way street in her mind (that is ultimately unwinnable because it was never a fair fight), but in TGW it's one-sided -- she's the one fighting dirty, taking shots, the way she'd been doing in her imagination (or nightmares) all these years. But the person in front of her isn't fighting back the way the person in her mind in WCS would, because their intentions are honourable instead of exploitative.

And that's paralleled in another pair of lyrics from the two songs, "And maybe it's the past talking, screaming from the crypt, telling me to punish you for things you never did," (in TGW) and "The tomb won't close, I fight with you in my sleep," (in WCS). In both cases, the funeral imagery makes it seem like this past event should be dead and buried in WCS, but it keeps rising from the dead, haunting her no matter what she does and in TGW, another (or perhaps the same?) tomb that won't close keeps unleashing new ways to hurt her and in turn the new person in her life. In other words, the trauma from the past continues to bleed into the present.

(Again from a literary point of view, I'm not saying the events of the two songs are linked IRL, but they're fascinating textual parallels on the album as a string of chapters, which is why Dear Reader is so compelling, but that's a whole other essay.)

To keep the battle motif going, there’s yet another parallel, this time between TGW’s "[You were a] soldier down on that icy ground, looked up at me with honor and truth," and You’re Losing Me’s "All I did was bleed as I tried to be the bravest soldier, fighting in only your army.” In the former, the subject is laying down his armour in the war she’s projecting onto him, waving the white flag, and she realizes that she’s about to destroy something if she doesn’t put her sword down too. By the time we get to YLM, the roles are almost reversed; at the very least they’re supposed to be on the same team, but in this case she’s doing all the heavy lifting, fighting for their relationship in contrast to his apathy killing it. It’s also pretty interesting (if not outright intentional) that one of the 3am+ editions of the albums starts with The Great War, where they find themselves in conflict (even if it’s in her head) that ends in a truce, and ends with You’re Losing Me signalling the end of the relationship, evidence that the resolution in the first song wasn’t an ending but merely a ceasefire before the last battle.

Putting the rest under a cut because this is waaaaay too long now ⤵️

(There’s also another metaphor there in The Great War with its battle imagery: World War I, aka The Great War, was supposed to be the war to end all wars, because loss on its scale was never seen before and when it ended, most thought never again would the world embroil itself in such battle, the horrors and implications were so devastating. Two decades later, the world found itself in WWII, with an even larger scope and more horrific consequences, the intervening time between the two a period of festering conflicts and resentment leading to some of the worst acts the world would see. Bringing real life into it for a second, there’s something a little poetic, though sad, about The Great War the song being about a fight that could have ended the relationship that they ultimately resolved and was meant to be evidence of the strength of their love, but so too did it end up being a period of détente, the greater battle coming for them years later. But that is not the point of this post.)

If one thing had been different

Another major theme in these editions is pondering the "what ifs?" of life, but I think it takes on even more significance in the broader context of the album in the lyrics of "I'm never gonna meet what could've been, would've been, should've been you," in Bigger than the Whole Sky and the repetition of would've/could've in Would've, Could've, Should've (I would've looked away at the first glance, I would've stayed on my knees, I would've gone along with the righteous, I could've gone on as I was, would've could've should've if I'd only played it safe, etc.) In both songs, the narrator is mourning an alternate course their life could have taken* and questioning what they could have done differently, in the aftermath of trauma and loss, and the regret that comes with that loss, and with the loss of agency in the situation because ultimately it was never in their hands. In an album full of questions, wondering about the path not taken, or the forks in the road that have led to a different version of your life, it's digging deeper into the contrast of choice vs. fate, action vs. reaction, dwelling on the past vs. moving on. When you're supposed to let go of the past, what do you do when it is holding your future hostage?

(*I know there are different interpretations/speculation about BTTWS which I am not getting into on main. I'm just saying that whatever the song is about, it's grieving something that never came to be. The literal origin of the song is less important to the album than the sense of loss it portrays. Whatever the inspiration is, it's crafted to tell part of the story of Midnights of ruminating over how, to borrow from her previous work, if one thing had been different, would everything be different?)

(Also I was today years old when I realized that the words are inverted in the two songs. Apparently I've been hearing BTTWS wrong this whole time.)

There's also an interesting tangent in the role of faith in both songs: in WCS, the events of the story cause her to lose her faith (e.g. "All I used to do was pray," "you're a crisis of my faith,") and question all the things she felt had been unquestionable until that point in her life (e.g. "I could have gone along with the righteous"), whereas in BTTWS, she questions whether that very lack of faith is to blame for the loss in that song ("did some force take you because I didn't pray? [...] It's not meant to be, so I'll say words I don't believe"). It's like pinpointing the moment her life changed and upended her beliefs (WCS), but as a result then leaving her unmoored in times of crisis because ultimately there's no explanation or comfort to be taken from what she used to hold true before that (BTTWS). The words she once relied upon to guide her have long since lost their meaning, but in times of trouble it leaves her wondering if that faith she once held then lost could have prevented this pain.

(Shoutout to WCS for being Catholic guilt personified lol.)

To keep on with the vaguely faith-y notions, an obvious parallel is the line in Would’ve Could’ve Should’ve about, “I damn sure never would've danced with the devil at nineteen,” and, "When you aim at the devil, make sure you don't miss," in Dear Reader. All of WCS is about her fighting with an antagonist who haunts her, with whom she wholly regrets ever becoming involved. DR could be seen as a reflection on that fall from grace, warning the audience that if you choose to go after the person (or thing) haunting you, make sure you do so clearheaded enough to be decisive. Again, these “devils” may not be related in real life: the IRL devil in DR could be speaking about her naysayers, or Kim*ye, or Scott & Scooter B, etc., meaning not to cross your enemies until you know you can win. But taking real life out of it and looking at it textually, I am intrigued by the link between WCS and DR, so that’s what I’m going with here. And perhaps that’s even the point in a wider sense; there will be multiple “devils” in your life, or threats to your well-being. If you’re going to commit to taking them down — whether it’s an actual person, or the demons inside you that refuse to let you go — make sure you have the right ammo so that they can no longer hurt you. (Of course, one lesson from these experiences is that sometimes you can’t win, and you have to live with the fallout.)

(Sidebar: I know that “dancing with the devil” is a turn of phrase that means being led into temptation and engaging in risky behaviour, as opposed to describing the actual person. Given the religious metaphors in the song, that could very well be/is the intention, particularly when it’s preceded by, “I would have stayed on my knees” as in she would have continued to follow her faith — in whatever sense that means — had she never met this person, which could also be a more eloquent way of saying she would have continued to be live her life in a way that was righteous (even naive) and seen the world in black and white. Either way, it’s a force she wholly rejects. Like I said, multiple devils, same fight.)

Regret comes up too: in WCS, she says, "I regret you all the time," obviously directed at the person who manipulated her and led to her perceived downfall, citing him as the one impulse she wished she'd never followed, because it won't leave her no matter how hard she’s tried. In High Infidelity, she tells the person to, "put on your records and regret me," and on the surface, it’s like she’s turning the tables, painting herself as the one now causing the regret in someone else, the one inflicting the pain this time. Yet the verse preceding it and the lines following it in the chorus depict a partner who is also emotionally manipulative and vindictive like in WCS (“you said I was freeloading, I didn’t know you were keeping count,” “put on your headphones and burn my city,”). It’s not so much that she’s intentionally harming the person (the way the person in WCS does to her), but rather that the venom in the subject’s feelings towards her seeps through; she’s imagining the way he’s going to feel about her when she leaves, hating her just for by being who she is. (There could be another tangent about how in both songs she’s there to be a “token” in a game for both of the men, who play her for their own purposes.) The regret is dripping with disdain. It’s as though she’s picturing how the person is going to hate her for doing what she’s thinking of doing the way she hates the person who first hurt her.

Sadness, unsurprisingly, shows up in a few lyrics. In BTTWS, “Everything I touch becomes sick with sadness,” sets the scene of a person so overcome with grief that it permeates everything around them; they cannot see their way out of it and feel like the fog will never lift. In Hits Different, it’s, “My sadness is contagious,” the result of a breakup where the person’s grief again touches everything and everyone around them, pushing them further in their despair and loneliness. The reason behind the grief in either case may vary, but regardless of the source, the feeling is overpowering and isolating. They may be different chapters in the story, but the devastation is hauntingly familiar. (As is a recurring theme in Midnights as a whole: there are situations and feelings that present themselves at different points in her journey and colour in the lines in different ways along the road. Like revisiting an old vice and realizing the hit isn’t quite the same as it was in the past.)

Death by a thousand cuts

She also writes about wounds on this album, which isn't surprising I suppose given that the whole conceit is that these are things that have kept her up at night over the years. WCS is perhaps the driving narrative on this never ending hurt when she sings, “The wound won't close, I keep on waiting for a sign, I regret you all the time,” suggesting that no matter what she does, the pain of this experience has permeated everything she’s done afterwards. (Not unlike the overwhelming grief in BTTWS, for instance.) Elsewhere, in High Infidelity she sings, "Lock broken, slur spoken, wound open, game token," and in Hits Different, "Make it make some sense why the wound is still bleeding.” Again I'm not suggesting they're about the same events; the line in HI is about a situation where a partner crosses a boundary, hits below the belt, picks at an insecurity (or creates a new one) and treats the relationship like it's transactional, opening the floodgates in turn. In HD, the wound seems to be more self-inflicted, where she's pushed the person away. (Over a situation real or imagined she feels she needs distance from.) But again, something has picked at her like a raw nerve, and just like in the past, she's hurting, even in a different time and place and person. Almost like the wounds of the past break open over and over again to create new scars. If one were to extrapolate further, it wouldn’t be the biggest leap to wonder if the wound open in WCS, then torn apart in HI makes the one in HD hurt even more.

(I once wrote a post about how I think as time goes on, WCS is going to turn into one of those songs that will be found to drive so much of her work, because it’s just… kind of the unsaid thesis statement of so much of her songwriting.)

Another repeated theme is that of the empty home and loneliness. In High Infidelity, she sings, "At the house lonely, good money I'd pay if you just know me, seemed like the right thing at the time," painting a picture of someone who may have everything they'd want to the outside world, but in reality feels metaphorically trapped in their home (or at least alone amidst abundance), a symbol of a relationship gone sour and a failure to build connection. She just wants someone to understand her, want her for her, but as she's written earlier in the song, she's just a pawn in the game, a trophy from the hunt. Home, in this case, is lonely, isolated, an emblem of her fears. In Dear Reader, she continues this thread, then singing, "You wouldn't take my word for it if you knew who was talking, if you knew where I was walking, to a house not a home, all alone 'cause nobody's there, where I pace in my pen and my friends found friends who care, no one sees you lose when you're playing solitaire." It's the same idea, admitting to listeners that the gilded cage she lived in kept her distanced from her loved ones and real connection, keeping her struggles close to the vest but feeling desperately lonely amidst her crowning success. She's pushed people away and it may have felt like the right thing at the time, but in the end maybe felt like she was trapped. And when you push people away, eventually they take you at your word and stop pushing back; you’re a victim of your own success at isolating yourself. What starts out of self-preservation then further perpetuates the underlying problems.

(There's another interesting link about "home" also feeling unsafe with HI's "Your picket fence is sharp as knives," which further leads into the theme of marriage/domesticity feeling dangerous, which is a whole other thing I won't get into here because it's another discussion and may derail this already gargantuan word salad.)

In a slightly similar vein, we have the metaphor of bad weather for a rocky road or unstable relationship, in High Infidelity again with, "Storm coming, good husband, bad omen, dragged my feet right down the aisle" and You’re Losing Me’s "every morning I glared at you with storms in my eyes.” They aren’t speaking of the same situation or even same kind of breakdown, but it is pretty interesting how the idea of clouds/storms/floods/etc. play such a role in Taylor’s music to signal depression, apprehension, fear, uncertainty, etc. In HI, I think the “storm” coming is the looming threat of commitment to a partner who makes the narrator uneasy (if not fearful). In this case, the idea of making a life with this person is not one that incites joy or comfort, but instead makes the narrator feel that dark times are ahead if she continues down this path. Perhaps in some way, the “storms” in YLM have made good on the threat in HI in a different way; it’s a different home, a different relationship, but the clouds have settled in regardless, and some of her fears have come to fruition in ways she did not expect. The person she once trusted no longer sees her or her struggles (or worse, doesn’t care), and the resentment and pain build with each passing day.

Coming back to heartbreak, one of the obvious "full circle" moments is the beginning of a relationship in Paris, where she says that, "I'm so in love that I might stop breathing," clearly enthralled in a new love that allows her to shut the world out and grow in private, capturing the all-encompassing nature of the relationship. This infatuation has consumed her in the most wonderful way (in contrast to the sorrow of some of the previous songs), and it feels like a life-altering (or even life-sustaining?) force that is so strong she may forget what it’s like to breathe. (Metaphorically speaking, of course.) By the end of the album, though, in You're Losing Me, that heart-stopping love has become a threat: "my heart won't start anymore for you." In the former, her racing heart is full of excitement, but by the latter, her heart has given out completely under the weight of the pain she bears. (YLM is full of death/illness imagery which I already wrote about awhile ago so I won't hear, but needless to say that song deserves its own essay for so many reasons.) She's gone from the unbridled joy of the beginnings of a relationship to the unrelenting sorrow of its end, two sides of the same coin.

Love as death appears elsewhere in the music too, for instance, in High Infidelity’s, “You know there's many different ways that you can kill the one you love, the slowest way is never loving them enough" and You’re Losing Me’s “How can you say that you love someone you can't tell is dying? […] My face was gray, but you wouldn't admit that we were sick.” Though not completely analogous situations, they both tell the tale of one partner’s apathy (or at least denial) destroying the other. In the former, the partner’s actions (or inaction) are more insidious, if not sinister; in the latter, the lack of momentum (or admission of a problem) is passive. In both cases, the end result is the narrator’s demise; it’s a drawn out affair that chips away at her morale and her health and her sense of self. (Breaking my own rule about bringing in alleged actual events into the discussion, but the idea that the relationship in High Infidelity, which was obviously fraught with unease and even fear, ended in a similarly excruciatingly slow and hurtful death by a thousand cuts as the relationship in You’re Losing Me almost did at that time must have been so painful. It almost feels like YLM is wondering why what used to be a source of light in her life was mirroring a situation that caused her such pain in the past.)

From the same little breaks in your soul

I said early on that part of what is so compelling about Midnights is that it feels like an album about ruminating — on choices, on events, on people — and the two final “bonus” tracks of the album depict that as well. In Hits Different, she sings that, “they say if it’s right, you know,” an ode to the confusion of a breakup and struggling with the aftermath of calling it quits. It’s a line that has always intrigued me, because the typical use of the phrase is in the sense of, “you’ll know when you meet the one,” but here it seems to have a double meaning, a reassurance perhaps from the friends (who later on tell her that "love is a lie") that she’ll know if she’s made the right decision in calling it off, but could also be her wondering if the relationship is right, she’ll know, and want to reconcile. In the final bonus track, You’re Losing Me, she sings, “now I just sit in the dark and wonder if it’s time,” this time leaving no doubt about the dilemma she faces, though it’s no less fraught. She’s wondering, perhaps for the last time, if now is finally the moment to end the relationship for good. They say that if it’s right she’ll know, and now she’s wondering if that feeling inside her (that once told her her partner was the one, which is why it hit differently), is telling her that it’s time to go for good. Wait Alexa play “It’s Time To Go.” These are not only the things that keep her up at night, but the things that play over in her mind like a film reel in her waking hours.

Midnights as a whole is a deeply personal album, as is most of Taylor's work, but the 3am+ edition tracks seem to dig even deeper to a lot of the issues raised on the standard album. Almost like the standard tracks are the things she wonders about on sleepless nights, but the bonus tracks are the things that haunt her in the aftermath. The regret, anger, sadness, grief, relief, even joy— they’re the price she pays for the memories she keeps reliving. Midnights might be the most cohesive narrative of all her albums, and really does feel like we’re watching someone work through her journal over time, stopping short of outright naming those giant fears and intrusive thoughts (except for when she does) but making them plain as day when you connect the songs together, and perhaps never more clearly than in the expanded album. It’s incredible how the songs stand on their own to relay a specific moment in time, but that they are also self-referential to each other (whether thematically or overtly) to weave a larger web over the entire work. We’re so lucky as fans to have these stories and to keep peeling back these layers as time passes. (And my literature-analysis-loving ass loves her even more for it.)

This is obviously by no means an exhaustive list, and I know there are more parallels and probably even stronger links (particularly when you add the standard version into the mix), but these were the ones that particularly struck me and I’m just glad I’ve had a chance to sit with this and think it through. ❤️

#writing letters addressed to the fire #me thinking too hard about taylor lyrics #taylor swift #midnights #long post #lyrics analysis #song parallels #Gabby this one is for you friend <3 #here goes nothing #Happy Friday or something idk!#(also i know i said there are things i wouldn’t discuss on main but my dms are open lol)#this is not as structured or well plotted out as I wanted it to be #and turned out to be more stream of consciousness than legit essay #but whatever at least i got my thoughts out there and it can release some plot of land in my brain for other stuff to think over lol #If anyone ever reads this thank you! And I’m sorry?#The best compliment i ever got in school #was when we were doing an analysis of a poem in English lit in college #And i brought something up casually #and my prof went ‘I’ve been teaching this class for eight years and that’s the first time anyone’s ever brought it up like that’#’and that just blew my mind’#and i was like ‘who me?’#so that’s all you need to know about me lol #Midnights: The Great War #Bigger than the whole sky #bttws #Midnights: Paris #Midnights: high infidelity #would’ve could’ve should’ve #Midnights: dear reader #midnights: bigger than the whole sky

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