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stellari-s · 18 days

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a promise i want to keep . . .

request; it was a prompt from @judejazza hehe ✨✨ and requests are currently open!

wc; 1 958.

tags; jude jazza x gn! fairytale keeper! reader, injury fic, slight presence of blood, may be kinda ooc (this is my first time writing for jude and ikevil), pain inflicted on reader, best to assume pre-established relationship, jude is softer if you squint a bit 👀

summary; you had gotten injured after a mission because you took a hit for jude, but roger is out right now, and so who ends up treating your injuries? well, who else is there but jude?

you had made a mistake — except that you hadn’t. that is to say: you didn’t think you made a mistake, but in the eyes of the man before you, he apparently seemed to think otherwise.

“ow ow ow, jude,” you hiss, gritting your teeth together in an attempt to distract yourself from the sharp sting on your arm inflicted by a certain ruthless fairy. “be more gentle—please.”

“gentle?” jude repeats your words, albeit with a more cold tone and wicked grin. “i betcha you’re hopin’ for that quack of a doctor to come and treat your wounds so ‘gently’ right about now, but what a shame he’s out. the goddess of luck just ain’t on your side today.”

actually, you don’t mind being with jude... not that you’d admit such a thing to his face.

that, and you could find it in your heart to, i don’t know, be a little more nice.

despite that, though, you know that jude very well could have just left you there. if he was a truly harsh, truly cruel person that others may make him out to be, that would be exactly what he would’ve done. when you think of it like that, you really can’t bring yourself to mind.

that alone was enough to give you a sense of comfort.

you start to retreat into the confines of your own thoughts, and for a while, that is enough to withdraw you from the pain of the wound, letting it fade into a throbbing ache in the background.

that is, until another sharp pain brings you (unpleasantly) back to your senses. “ack, jude, really, if i wasn’t watching you, i would’ve thought you were out to reopen my wound, not treat it, i swear.”

“aw, does it hurt? what a shame ya won’t be protectin’ me next time.” his voice drips with sarcasm, but the next moment his smirk drops into a more serious, or maybe angry, expression. “if ya got the time to complain to me, ya got the time to sit and reflect how much of an idiot ya were back there. should i maybe look at your head first? or if ya prefer to reflect, you can sit on your knees to reflect yourself.”

“i don’t need to be on my knees for you to treat my arm,” you manage to talk back, your shoulders raising and eyes narrowing in a defensive posture.

you had responded the way you did in a somewhat sore attempt to hide how hurt you had felt by the words that pierced through your heart like a blade lathered with a generous coating of poison.

to your surprise, though, you see the silver-haired man before you grin. “oh? seems at least you got some guts.” jude then narrows his purple eyes, which reminds you of a field of violets in a moonlit night and makes you feel strangely calm, as he clicks his tongue in exasperation. “but talk ‘bout a joke goin’ over the head,” he mutters, though his hands continue to clean the wound. it seems he is no longer interested in pressing on the wound purposely for his own amusement.

“...it doesn’t hurt as much.”

the comment was meant for yourself, but it seems it had reached jude’s ears as he directs a glare in your direction. “yeah? want me to do it again?”

you feel a shiver rush up your spine like a spider crawling upwards, causing you to stiffen in place.

“n-no thank you.”

you two fall into a silence after this, letting jude focus on your wound. occasionally you hear him mutter how he was going to make roger pay tenfold for increasing his workload, but it doesn’t escape you how he still pays close attention to your wound.

as he does, the weight of your actions from the mission finally settle in your mind.

at first, when jude had called you an “idiot,” it really did hurt your feelings. you know his words are intentionally harsh, and if he wanted to be nice, he would find a way to twist those words to make them sound mean. but thinking back on the incident that had landed you two in the basement of crown castle as “doctor” and patient, you know the words he had spoken are the truth, even though he had casually waved it off as a “joke.”

— some time ago.

“jude, are you sure we should just walk back? we can always hail a carriage.”

“nah, the mission from queenie’s officially over, but there’s something i gotta check first. goin’ by foot’s faster in this case. if ya going to stick with me though then don’t get in my way.”

as a fairytale keeper, you don’t have an obligation to stick with jude any longer. if you wanted, you could simply go back to the castle, write the report, and submit it to victor. but there is a miniscule feeling tugging in your chest.

perhaps it was an innocent curiosity. a sudden, maybe “idiotic” feeling bubbling inside you urges you to nod your head, say “yes, let me come with” regardless of any rationale. it threatened to overflow.

outside of missions, what was jude like? you knew he ran another business, and that he has made a sea of enemies by now, but what else?

“…please take me with you, jude.”

a smirk graces jude’s lips. “just remember ya asked for it, so don’t come runnin’ to me if ya end up cryin’.”

the meaning of those words would sink in soon after, when apparently someone who is within this vast “sea of enemies” charges head-on toward jude from a blind spot.

jude starts to turn around, but when you see the silver gleam of a knife, your body moves on your own.

he could have protected himself all right. you know that well in your head.

so why did you take a blow for him? for jude, of all people? was it some attempt to cling onto any sense of justice in this dark world that muddled your sense of morality, maybe?

by now, jude had started wrapping gauze around your arm. you simply watch the bright red of your own blood spread like a flower blooming on the white of the fabric.

“…jude?”

“yeah?”

you had thought you were ready to confess your thoughts to him, but much to your chagrin, once you actually open your mouth to speak, the words come out with a slightly trembling, hesitant quality.

“about what you said before. i think… you were right.” you suck in a breath to try and recompose yourself (to little avail). “what i did back there was… idiotic, as you say. i’ll admit that.”

jude doesn’t respond, but you can tell he is listening, even without making eye contact with him.

you take his silence as a cue to continue — or rather, to finish your thought. “but, i don’t think that makes me, as a person, an idiot.”

jude scoffs. “a person is defined by their actions, whether they like it or not. if ya got good intentions but the way ya go ‘bout it is shitty, there ain’t no one who’ll give a damn.”

“that’s quite funny coming from you,” you blurt out before thinking, earning yourself a sharp look from those stormy violet eyes of his.

“ya know that’s besides the point, smartie. if ya really want me to think otherwise, i hope you’re prepared to pay back the debt ya owe. if not… well, at least ya ain’t idiotic enough to not know.”

he finishes wrapping the gauze around your arm then, though he doesn’t let go without giving your arm another squeeze, a threatening motion in its essence.

“ouch! okay, alright, i get it! i will pay you back, so stop squeezing my arm and pressing on the wound!!”

“next time don’t go dawdlin’ around tryin’ to protect me if all ya gonna do is get hurt and give me more work on my plate.”

you see jude’s eyes glare at you, maybe even gleaming slightly due to the lighting. his expression doesn’t bother to conceal his annoyance either. but once again you had come to the realization that — twisted as it was — this was his way of warning you, as one may arguably remember best through pain.

it was his way of protecting you.

his words were mean, but he never once abandoned you; he never left you behind. hell, here he was, probably having better things to do right about now, treating your arm (though that was only because roger was out).

the thought tickles your mind and makes a smile break out on your lips as you try to stifle laughter. jude, on the other hand, doesn’t seem so amused.

“ah? the hell’s so funny?”

“nothing.” more stifled laughter.

“aw, ya can’t be that much of a freak.” jude once again has that wicked smirk playing on his lips, glowing in his eyes. “how ‘bout i sew your mouth shut first for lyin’ through your teeth?”

“say what you want, but i know you won’t actually go through the pain of doing that.”

when you see jude’s eyes widen slightly, you can’t help but let out a small victory cheer in the depth of your heart for catching him off guard, even a little bit.

it was a small victory indeed, though, for jude managed to recover quickly.

“well if ya can go ‘n talk back to me like that, guess ya feel better.”

now it is your turn to feel surprised as jude suddenly lets go, turning his back on you and walking back upstairs in long strides. you lift your arms to reach out for him, unable to move more than that due to surprise for a brief moment. when you can move, you jump off the table on which you sat while jude was treating you to follow after him.

“ah… hey, jude! wait for me! would it kill you to walk a little slower?!”

though you can’t see his expression from where you are (and so you could be completely wrong), you have an inkling at least he isn’t wearing as harsh an expression as he had when he was facing you.

[jude seemed a little mad today.

i do get where he is coming from, too, i really do. that said, a part of me felt that if i hadn’t taken the hit for him, then he would have taken it for me. i’m not sure if he respects me at this point (maybe he just finds me annoying) but still, i’m convinced it’s in his nature to protect others.

like a guardian fairy, he can’t… not protect others. even if it’s in his own, jude way.

that’s why i couldn’t help thinking if jude is the one protecting others, then who is there to protect him?

maybe that person isn’t me, and i think i ended up in jude’s debt rather than earning any semblance of thanks. but even so, i can’t help but feel i want to become that person someday.

perhaps it’s simply naïveté, but that’s why until that day may come, i hope i can at least stay by his side.

“what a shame you won’t be protecting me next time…”

i know you probably won’t see this note, jude, but i just want to say that unfortunately, i don’t think this will stop me from trying in the future, nor do i really regret it.

——after all, just like you have your own promise you want to keep, i, too, have one of my own i do not want to break.]

(found on a crumpled notebook page, ripped neatly out from the book)

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