#( she had no chance against seven‚ she knew. no chance and no choice

[heartpascal]

i was born waiting

▹— joel miller x daughter!reader

▹— summary: you’ve been looking for your dad for as long as you can remember, is this really him?

▹— a/n: hi! i started writing this september ‘23, so it has. it’s been a WHILE. so if this seems jumpy / not consistent then that is why! sorry!!! i have done my best!!!

▹— warnings: canon-typical violence and themes, weapons, parental death, witnessing parental death, aka insane amounts of trauma, death in general, she/her pronouns, reader is biologically related to joel but no mentions of appearance, no mention of her bio mother’s appearance either, fantasising about being dead (sorry), all hurt zero comfort, attempted murder, unrealistic expectations of someone you never met — please let me know if ive missed anything!

▹— taglist: @rhymingtree @sleepygraves @wnstice (everything), @auggiesolovey @just-kaylaa @evyiione @lemonlaides @fariylixie0915  @faceache111 @randomhoex @canpillowscry @pedropascalsrealgf @star-wars-lover @coolchick333 @soobsdior @rvjaa @sunflowersdrop @definitely-not-a-seagull-i-swear @miss-celestial-being @hqkon

MASTERLIST

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There are certain things from your childhood that you can remember vividly. Though, really, childhood is a bit of a stretch, isn’t it? It’s hard to find the right word to encompass the way you had grown up, because you didn’t have much of a chance to actually grow.

From the moment you had been born, your life was a battle of staying alive to see another day.

That’s not to say that your mother didn’t do her best for you, obviously. But it was hard to raise a child as a child in the midst of a global apocalypse. You were bound to end up the way you did — moulded and hardened by the world around you, by having to pick up a gun at seven years old and use it to protect your mother. By never putting that gun back down.

For the past few years, you had known your mother was suffering. The world had been anything but kind to her, and age was hitting her harder than she had expected. More than the physical aspect, you knew it had been destroying her, the fact that you were now the one protecting her and not the other way around.

But what choice did you have? Her aging body had left her fragile, prone to falling and breaking even more frail bones. You could see the strain on her muscles, as they slowly decayed and shrunk, until they were barely there at all. You couldn’t let her carry the burden for you anymore, because you knew her body couldn’t handle it.

You had been preparing yourself for that moment, though. Making sure that you were ready, that you were strong enough for the both of you, strong enough to shoulder the burden she had been carrying for years.

When you were growing up, your mother had told you tales of your father.

She had told you all about how strong he had been, how he had been the best man she had ever known. She told you how he had cared for his daughter before you, how he had been the best father to that girl. When you were old enough to comprehend these things, you’d asked what had happened to him. “Is dad dead?” You had asked her, watching the way her face fell.

“I don’t know, honey. I hope not.” She had responded, smiling sadly at you, and patting her hand against your cheek.

It was hard for you to let go of that.

The uncertainty had haunted you for the rest of your life since that very moment, leaving you wondering for hours at a time where he could possibly be, why he would ever leave your mother to carry this responsibility alone. And in your more selfish moments, you couldn’t help but wonder why he wasn’t here to care for you as he had his daughter before you.

For a long time, you had convinced yourself that he was dead, despite what your mother hoped. And sure, you felt that loss, something like mourning weighing you down, but it was the only way you felt you could accept his absence. He had to be dead, because otherwise, why wasn’t he here?

But as you grew up, getting taller, stronger, you felt like you could rationalise his absence even if he wasn’t dead. After all, the apocalypse wasn’t exactly family friendly. You figured that if your mother didn’t know whether or not your dad was alive, that the same could go for him. He might just think that you and your mom died, years ago. After all, how many pregnant women survived the end of the world?

You have a feeling that the answer would have to be not many.

So, really, you and your mother being alive by now was nothing short of a miracle. It was a testament to your mother’s strength, her ability. She had succeeded where so many others had failed, and she had managed to keep both herself and you alive.

It’s a bitter kind of irony that you can’t do the same.

The last dredges of autumn fall away, leading into the coldest and harshest part of the year. Winter is hard — it’s full to the brim with fresh Infected, the ones not yet frozen solid, and resources are more scarce than ever. And this winter feels like something tangible, something which sends unending waves of dread through you.

Your mother gets weaker by the day, spending more time resting than moving, and you spend as much time as you can keeping her warm, finding food and water and pain relief for her broken arm that didn’t heal right. She’s exhausted, you can see it in her face, in her every movement. And you’re pretty sure it’s not just from the lack of rest. She watches you with dulled eyes, something like heartbreak reflecting in them.

For a long time, you pretend not to notice.

You pretend that you don’t see the way she lags behind, just watching you move away from her with speed she can’t quite manage any longer. You pretend that you don’t see the way she hesitates before taking her painkillers, or her food, or the last sip of water.

This year, the winter brings something worse than the cold. A bug, spreading across the state in a way that was familiar to so many. Not quite the Infection, but still able to take out people with ease.

When your mother catches it, you physically felt your heart clench in your chest. You felt it squeezing all of the blood around your body so quickly that you became dizzy with it. There’s a panic so deep that you can’t climb your way out of it. For days, weeks, you’re certain that you’ve lost her. That after everything, everything you’ve done, everything the two of you have been through, a cold would be the end of it all.

But then, she gets better.

The little strength she had before the sickness returns to her, bringing some colour back to her skin, some ease back to her breathing.

Religion wasn’t a thing in the apocalypse. Not really. But if you had believed in God, you would’ve thanked every one that might’ve existed for giving you this. This miracle. This small mercy.

The two of you are in an abandoned barn when it happens.

You’re dozing away, not quite asleep, but not awake either, when you hear the sound of old hay crunching underneath boots. If you weren’t so familiar with the lightness of your mother’s footsteps, you might’ve passed it off as her wandering. But these boots are heavy. They’re purposeful.

The gun in your hand means nothing when you jerk upwards, eyes snapping open and squinting through the light let into the barn by the rising winter sun. It’s an image that has since been ingrained into the back of your skull, replaying each time you close your eyes.

There, right in front of you, is your mother.

Behind her, a man, a gun pressed to the back of her skull.

Your stomach lurched suddenly in that moment, the small rationed dinner you had before dozing off trying to rise to the back of your throat, trying to race the rapid beating of your heart to see which would kill you first.

“Put down the gun.” He said, voice cold, throat dry from the winter air. The sound of his voice is printed in the base of your brain, echoing every time things around you still, go quiet.

He could be bluffing, you thought in the moment. His gun could be unloaded. It didn’t take you long to notice that the safety was off, but in those few moments, he had pressed the end of it harder into your mother’s head. You dropped the gun to the floor without another moment of thought.

You were nauseous, waiting to wake up, to realise this was all some twisted nightmare.

But you could see a look in your mother’s eyes. Acceptance. Defeat. It was almost familiar to you, so closely related to the look she had been giving you for months.

All this time, she had just been waiting to die. Waiting for something to come along and kill her off, to free you from having to take care of her. She knew that if it was up to you, that you would look after her for the rest of your goddamn life. If she lived any longer, she might just live long enough to see you die.

“Slide it over.”

You barely registered the cold pinch of metal against your palm as you pushed the gun away from you, sending it skittering over the rough ground and into the side of an old hay bale.

“Now your pack.”

There was a numbness to you as you gripped the backpack you had been leaning against, and chucked it towards where he stood behind your mother. It hit the front of his boot, but his eyes didn’t stray from where he stared at you.

“Turn around.”

You stared at him, teeth gritted together.

“No.”

There was a beat where both him and your mother just watched you. And then the surprise flickered across his face, apparently not expecting any resistance from you.

“Turn. Around.” He told you, firmer this time.

“No.”

“Okay then,” He relented, after a moment of consideration. His eyes drifted down towards your mother, who stared forwards at you. “This your daughter?” He asked, jerking his head towards you despite knowing your mother couldn’t see the movement.

“Yes, she is,” Your mother said, voice shaking, her breath clouding in front of her face as it reached the cold air. “Please, just let her be.”

He hummed, dropping his free hand down to rest heavily on your mother’s shoulder, his fingers clamping around it and not helping the way she trembled.

“So, your momma, huh?” He asked you, a smirk drawing up his face, showing smile lines around his murky blue eyes. His hair rustled in the wind, a piece falling down across his forehead. He stared at you, and you stared at him, not daring to say a word, still hoping that this whole thing was a dream. Muscles in his cheek twitched, pulling his skin taut and showing a scar across his left cheekbone. “Good.”

There was a moment where the sound didn’t register. A moment where you didn’t even realise it was your mother when the body slumped forwards. A mere moment where you didn’t think about it being her blood that splattered across your face.

The moments after that though, become blurry, hazed over, and you’re not sure it actually ever hit you that the body before you was your mother.

You’ve always had a hard time remembering that bodies were once people, that they once had lives and loved ones and thoughts and feelings. That they weren’t just bodies. So seeing her like that, as a body, not her, was wrong on so many levels. It didn’t feel real. Nothing did.

You heard the second gunshot, just a moment later, followed by a snickering laugh that you would never forget, before the pain bloomed in you.

It was buried by the shock, the complete disbelief, and you only felt the pain for mere seconds.

His gun — the one that killed your mother — was whacked across the side of your head a moment after, and that was the end of that.

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Three months passed by, judging by the way the seasons turned, and you were on your own.

It was a strange feeling, really. Throughout the entirety of your life, you had never actually been alone. At least, not really. Your mother was always a small ways away, a mere shout from running to you. There had never been any true distance between the two of you until that day.

A sort of ache claws your throat each day, when you realise that it’s easier like this.

The only back you have to watch is your own, the only life you have to worry about belongs to you, and you have nothing to lose in this world. There was no terrible outcome if you were caught. Nobody else would be hurt, or suffer because of it. And you’re less likely to be caught now, when you don’t have your mother slowing you down. You don’t have to stop for the frequent rest breaks she needed, you can try to outrun Infected without worrying about someone lagging behind, and you only have yourself to feed.

If your mother had known how much easier survival was when alone, you hope that she would’ve abandoned you at birth. Because perhaps, without the burden of you upon her shoulders, she wouldn’t have fallen apart so quickly.

Sometimes, you like to think of a world where she was spared all of this. Never pregnant with you, for a start. So when the infection broke out, she would’ve only had herself to worry about. You think that maybe, one day, she would’ve been able to reunite with your father. If she hadn’t been carrying a child, she would’ve been able to manage the journey to where she believed him to be. You look at the picture that had been in the pocket of her coat for your whole life, the papers folded and clipped to the back of it, one word underlined: Boston.

You had reached a store in the weeks after that day, and when you found a map, it wasn’t difficult to notice that the direction the two of you had been heading in was to that very city.

It’s a long shot. More than a long shot, really, but you find yourself continuing in that direction regardless. You don’t know what you hope to find in Boston, whether it was your dad, or the man who had killed your mother, or perhaps just somewhere to take shelter for a while. You try not to hope for anything. You try not to focus on the fact that you might not even make it that far.

It keeps you up for days.

The uncertainty of it. The unknown. The fact that you’re walking your way to a city you know nothing about, almost certain that your mother’s killer was already there, and more than that, consumed by a fever that might kill you regardless of the where the journey took you.

The only sleep you get results in fever dreams, rippling, warping images that make your perception falter, feeling all too real until you notice that it’s not. And when you do wake up from them, it’s as if you haven’t slept at all. An exhaustion weighs heavily upon you, and your shoulders hunch over with it. There’s almost nothing you wouldn’t do to get rid of that endless feeling.

You hope—or wish, maybe— that if you reach Boston, the journey there will have tired you out so much that your body will have no choice but to rest. It’s a distant thought in your mind, though. You’re almost certain you won’t make it that far, because if the fever doesn’t get you, surely the Infected will.

It’s not as though you’re trying to get killed. But there is a kind of peace that comes with the thought. There’s an idea of rest behind it, hiding within the shadowy depths that make you scared. Would not having to fight in order to survive really be so terrible? You have this image in mind, of a never ending blackness, a void, somewhere that your thoughts and worries can just fizzle away. The small part of your fever-fried brain that has retained its rationality reminds you of the unknown. It reminds you that death could be worse than this.

You don’t like the thought. Not after that day. It’s a shuddering feeling, wondering if your mother is in some kind of unreachable hell.

By the time you’re even close to Boston, a few hours out at most, you’re out of ammo in the gun you’d found along the way. Out of food rations. No knife, no resources. You’re barely standing on two legs, kept up by the adrenaline, the knowledge alone that you’re this close.

When the tall walls of the QZ finally come into view, you start to feel some amount of hope. Which is a dangerous thing, but especially in a situation as dire as your own. You couldn’t afford any adrenaline fading, couldn’t afford to lose your cautious nature. You couldn’t make a mistake. One wrong move, one slight misstep, and you’d be as dead as your mother. Or worse, infected. Though this close to a QZ, you had some amount of relief at the knowledge that they should’ve cleared out any nearby infected. Runners, and clickers alike.

Your steps don’t falter for a moment. Partly because of your worry about the fever taking you out, but mostly because you’re certain that the FEDRA guards on watch on top of the wall will have spotted you, and you don’t want them to think you’re Infected, just because of your sickly appearance, and shoot on sight. Though, with FEDRA’s track record, it wouldn’t surprise you if they just shot you down regardless.

For a while, you’re not sure if you’re even awake, or if perhaps you were stuck in yet another fever dream. Everything felt so real and so not real simultaneously, it felt impossible to believe that you had actually made it.

Soldiers met you on your approach, calling out for you to get on the ground with your hands up. You called back some sort of response as you did so, practically collapsing to your knees and squeezing your eyes shut at the pain that followed. But despite all of it, despite the pain and the rough hands that grabbed you and pulled you forwards, through the gates and straight into a building, you had made it to Boston.

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It was maybe three weeks into being a resident of the Boston QZ that you caught wind of him for the first time. Or, at the very least, somebody who might be him. You didn’t know how common the surname Miller was, being a child of the apocalypse, but you kind of hoped the answer was uncommon.

“Goddamn Miller, again.” A man had muttered as you walked through the trading market. You paused almost instantly, pretending to peruse the feeble amount of clothes a woman had to trade. “Said we gotta go through him and Tess if we want anything, as if we gotta listen to them.” He practically spat out, glaring around as he spoke to the woman beside him.

“They’re the most well established smugglers in the whole goddamn QZ. Don’t have to tell you how, do I?” She asked, sounding more annoyed with her companion than she was with whoever Miller and Tess were. “Joel is as nasty as they come, Darren. Don’t get on the wrong side of him.”

Your heart practically stuttered to a stop in your chest, and you had to remind yourself to keep breathing. Could it possibly be a coincidence? Could there be another Joel Miller? One who wasn’t your father? Sure, it was possible. Plausible, even, considering the fact that you had absolutely no idea if he was here. Not any concrete idea, anyway. Your mother had believed as much, but who was to say she was right?

Besides, whoever this Joel Miller was didn’t sound like the man your mother had told you about. As nasty as they come didn’t have any relation to the heroic and kind and amazing father and man your mother always spoke about. Though, you knew as well as anyone what the apocalypse could do to people.

Darren didn’t say anything else to his companion. So, after a few more moments, you continued on your way, making the journey to the tiny box apartment that FEDRA had elected to you.

But even as you got there, sitting down on the poor excuse of a mattress, you couldn’t shake the conversation out of your mind. After everything you had been through to get here, what was it all for? Could you really make this journey and just never try to find Joel Miller? Your father? You could still remember the anxiety that had come when you first arrived, when you were strapped into a chair and scanned for the fungus that had taken over so many. You didn’t know what you were more scared of: the idea that it would flash red, and you’d be killed, or the idea that it would be clear, and you’d be sent out into the QZ, where you may just find the other half of your DNA.

You don’t even know if you want to find out anything about him. Don’t know if you could face that, especially after losing your mother. That’s been the hardest thing since being here, since having your own place, the fact that you’ve gotten it all without her. It feels… empty. For your whole life, she had been there at your side, making every short stay at whatever accommodation you could find feel like home.

Plus, even if you did consider trying to find him, and if it was him those people were talking about, then who the hell was Tess? What if she got upset at your appearance, your claim as Joel Miller’s surviving child? You’re not sure you can lose another parent.

Sure — Joel Miller wasn’t exactly your dad, he couldn’t be classed as a parent in the way that your mother was, but if you never met him, that could’ve been for any number of reasons. He could be dead. He could’ve thought you and your mother were dead, all these years. You didn’t want to face a reality where you met him, and he wasn’t present for you and your mother because he didn’t want to be. You’d rather live your whole life thinking him six feet under, than know he was out there, and just didn’t care about you.

The more you think about it, the more certain you are that Boston was a mistake.

It would all be different if your mother was alive. If she had brought you here, if she had been the one to hear the chatter about Joel Miller, if she had been the one to seek him out. But she was dead, and the only living connection you had to Joel was, too. Hypothetically, if you did seek him out, you didn’t know enough about him to prove your claim as his child, and without your mother, how could you make him believe you?

They had been a family, once. They being Joel, your mother, and your deceased half sister. You’d heard the tale of how Joel and your mother had met, of how it took months for him to finally feel comfortable introducing her to his little girl. Hell, you had heard almost as much about Sarah as you had about Joel. Your mother had certainly adored his daughter, and you’re somewhat sure that they had planned to have you, despite Sarah already being a teenager.

You don’t want to have to mourn a family you had never actually had. Perhaps, Joel and Sarah were out there, living their lives certain that you and your mother were dead, just as you and your mother had done.

Not that any of this even mattered — you didn’t even know for sure if it was the same Joel Miller! And even if it was, it’s not like Boston QZ was small. There’s absolutely no chance you run into the man who might just be your dad. No way.

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You find someone else, before you hear anything more about Joel Miller, and it immediately sends the thought of your biological dad to the very back of your mind.

After all, it’s not every day you see the man who murdered your mother.

It wasn’t exactly a surprise. You had guessed that this was the place he was heading, all those moons ago. But to actually see him, here, in the flesh, alive and well despite all of the pain and heartache and devastation he had caused you? It was surreal. You had to practically pinch your skin from your body to make yourself believe he was real.

And it only really hits you now, that this man killed your mother. You had been so focused on surviving, on living to see another day, on healing and moving and getting away from her body, buried in shallow dirt outside of some abandoned barn. You can vividly remember the strength it had taken to pry the frozen dirt from the ground.

Sure, you had felt the guilt over it, the guilt over the ease that came with surviving without her, guilt over your very existence, but you’re not sure you had ever actually grieved over her. Not sure if you had ever let yourself be sad, be angry, be anything about what had happened.

But now, seeing him, you feel… almost too much.

All of the rage and grief you had squashed in favour of surviving another day, all of the sadness and fear, all of it. It all comes rushing towards you at once, hitting you in the chest, winding you. You gasp for breath on the street, ducking away for a moment, gripping your chest like you could physically hold your heart steady.

When you look back out at the street, you see him as he nears the corner. Panic grips you at the thought of losing him, of never seeing him again, of failing to avenge your mother. You follow after him before you can think better of it.

It’s strangely easy. You fall back into the life of a hunter like it’s the most natural thing you’ve ever known — and maybe it is. You’re healed up, by now, or about as healed as anybody gets in this world, and your shoulder only bothers you when you move it too much. Even with that, you’re pretty sure that you could take the man on. Now that you’re not hazy with sleep, caught off guard, held back by any sort of earthly tether.

You’re strong. And despite FEDRA’s harsh reign, their dire consequences for rule-breaking, you have a switchblade stuffed into your shoe. You could do it. You could kill him.

There’s no question about it in your mind, especially as you follow him from a distance, and he remains none the wiser. He takes a left, and a moment later, so do you. He’s clueless. It’s almost painful that he was the one who managed to get the jump on you. How could you have let this man kill your mother?

He skids to a stop outside of a doorway, so you slide down the wall of the building opposite and listen. He pays you no mind as he knocks twice on the door.

“What d’you want, Colin?” The man who opened the door asked gruffly, seemingly inconvenienced by the man. He sounded tired, or out of it, maybe.

“I need the supply.” Colin answered, and the sound of his voice sent a shiver down the back of your neck. It echoed in your ears, the words he said that day. Good. Everything in you itched, like thousands of critters had dug into you and made a home scuttling around your insides. You wanted to kill him. You wanted to end his life, and you wanted to make it slow. Brutal. Painful. Even if it meant you were hung by FEDRA tomorrow morning. It’d be worth it.

The man at the door sighed, as if deeply bothered by getting Colin what he needed, and disappeared inside. He emerged a moment later, empty handed. “I’m all out. You’ll have to go across town tomorrow.” The man said flatly, saying nothing as Colin swore, before stepping away.

You ducked your head down as Colin passed, all too aware of the man in the doorway watching you suspiciously. After a moment, he sighed again, and retreated inside, slamming the door after himself. It took almost no time at all for you to push yourself back to your feet, and take off after the man who had left.

Despite your pounding footsteps against cracked concrete, he didn’t pay you any mind as you caught up to him. He seemed focused on getting to wherever it was that he was unknowingly leading you to, glancing up at the darkening sky every other step. FEDRA’s curfew would be coming into play soon enough.

To your disappointment, he walked into an apartment building, about three blocks away from your own. It seemed that, unless you were willing to risk being caught and stopped, today wasn’t the day you would be avenging your mother. You vowed that tomorrow you would do it. You would kill Colin. No matter what got in your way.

∘₊✧───── ───── ───── ─────✧₊∘

By the time curfew was lifted, you had been waiting by the exit of your building for an hour.

The switchblade in your shoe felt heavy with every step you took towards the home of your mother’s killer. It weighed almost as much as the picture in your pocket. All of it was heavy. But you acted as normally as you could manage, passing by patrolling FEDRA guards without them so much as glancing towards you.

You were waiting by his building when the door opened, when he stepped out, and headed determinedly in the opposite direction from which you had come. You followed without a moment of hesitation.

He made his way around town, trading with a few people on the side of the streets, handing them small wads of ration cards in favour of various items. Nothing dangerous, though. Not to you. He clearly was oblivious to your loitering figure, standing a few metres away, like some omen of death. Despite your shadow reaching for his shoes as the sun rose, he didn’t flinch.

It was irritating you, just how easy this was. You had been following the man for two days now, and he hadn’t even noticed. How had he gotten the drop on you? How had he managed to kill your mother? How had you allowed him the opportunity to do so?

There was nothing remotely special about him — no reason that he should have survived over your mother, no reason that he should have been granted mercy over the last twenty years. He didn’t deserve it. Not like your mother had. She had done the best she could, for years, for the only daughter in her care. And she had done it all alone. This man, Colin, he was alone, and he had no reason to hurt her. You were going to make sure he regretted it.

You loomed at the entrance of an alleyway as he walked down it, finally stopping at a dead end, leaning against the brick wall as if he was waiting for something. Or someone. You knew it wasn’t you he was waiting for, so you bided your time, cautious of someone happening upon the two of you. If they had business with him, they would care. If they didn’t, then nobody but FEDRA would care.

By the time you finally decided to move, almost an hour had passed, and Colin was facing away from you at the entrance of the alley, head pressed to the bricks.

It was strange, what the innate desire to hunt and kill could bring out in you, that it could make you move silently without thinking about it. It could make you reach for the blade in your shoe, without so much as a rustle of your clothes.

With a final glance back at the entrance of the alleyway, you grew impatient, and you attacked.

From an outside perspective, you probably looked like some kind of wild animal. You jumped at him, tackling him, pushing him sideways and landing on his back as his shoulder smacked the asphalt, and he howled in pain. It was like seeing a cheetah hunt an antelope, the way you bored down on him. If you could have widened your jaws, and ripped out his insides, you think you would have.

But without that ability, you could only press the cold metal blade to his throat, and feel him go still.

“Do you remember me?” You asked, voice flat and still, despite the way your heart felt as though it would beat out of your chest, and splatter down in front of his face. You were quieter than you had expected, too. You thought that the words would burst out of you, vicious and unending, but they were quiet. Calm.

Colin shook his head, as much as he could with the side of his face pressed to the ground, and a blade to the soft skin of his neck.

“Think about it.”

His eyes strained to try and get a look at you, and they widened as you leant sideways slightly, allowing him to gaze at your blank face. “Oh, shit,” He said, mouth fumbling around the words.

“Yeah, shit.” You repeated, waiting for satisfaction to seep into your chest cavity, waiting for the grief to fade away.

It didn’t.

Nothing changed, even as you pressed the blade closer to his throat, even as you watched his eyes dart back and forth, as you watched him try and formulate a plan to survive. “Listen, kid—” He started, throat bobbing against the knife, drawing the tiniest line of blood. You watched him bleed, and expected to feel more than numb.

He threw your weight backwards, sacrificing more skin on his throat to your knife. You went flying off of him, but you flung yourself forward faster than he could stagger up, and dug the knife into his calf as he tried to stand. His yell pierced the air, louder than any of the commotion yet, and likely drawing attention of people out on the street. You just hoped, distantly, that FEDRA wasn’t around.

His flesh and muscle moved as you pulled the blade free, and you didn’t flinch at the squelch of blood that left him alongside it.

Colin fell back to the floor, resulting in crawling along the asphalt without care for how the small stones cut into his palms, leaving streaks of blood. “You don’t gotta do this, man, chill out!” His voice had more emotion in it than it had back when he killed your mother, which was infuriating. “It wasn’t personal!” He insisted, crawling further as you got to your feet, prowling after him similarly to the wild animal you felt like.

You’d disagree with his statement, though.

He already had your pack, you had already relinquished your gun — the only thing you refused to do was turn so you could be executed. If you were going to be killed, you were going to look your murderer in the eye. Instead of that, though, Colin had decided to make it personal. He had decided to kill your mother, to spread her brains out on the ground in front of you, to cover you in her blood, rather than spare her. And then, worse, he had let you live.

That seemed pretty personal.

“You killed my mom.” You stated, getting closer as he turned so he was facing you, watching you get closer. “D’you remember what you said to me?”

He shook his head.

“You said good. You were glad that it was my mother. Admit it, Colin. Tell the world all about how not-personal it was.”

More than anything, you wanted to feel satisfaction for how badly he was trembling beneath you, for how scared you were making him. But you just didn’t. Fear wasn’t enough. Not for what this man had done to you.

“I’m—I’m sorry.” He said, shaking, still shying away from you,

“No, you’re not. You’re sorry that I’m here, that you’re going to die. And that isn’t something to be sorry for.”

“Pl—Please, I have a daughter—a son, you don’t need to do this.” He begged, tearing up as he watched your grip on the switchblade tighten, watched you continue to approach. He was pathetic. Everything about him was pathetic.

“She had a daughter, too.”

His eyes widened as you leaped at him once again, digging your knife as deep as you could get it into his shoulder, feeling it graze bone as you pushed the hilt firmly against his skin, until you could practically hear the blood vessels breaking. He howled, a wounded animal, prey. And he did nothing as your fist descended against his face, once, twice, a third time.

It was just as you were losing count that somebody grabbed you, hauling you up and away from the body sprawled out on the floor, the puddle of blood slowly expanding beneath him. His chest was stuttering, but he had stopped groaning minutes ago.

“Well, shit.” A woman’s voice said, not sounding particularly authoritarian, so you figured she wasn’t FEDRA.

The hands grasping onto your arms released them shortly after, and you dropped to the asphalt, watching Colin’s chest closely, waiting for his breathing to stop. It didn’t seem to be slowing much, and you could feel that unending wave of rage coming back to you, overruling the numbness, and enhancing your need to have him dead.

You moved the slightest bit, about to launch yourself at him, but as soon as your foot was pushing you from your spot on the ground, the hands wrapped around your arms again.

“Fuck! Get off of me!”

“We can’t let you kill the guy, for fuck’s sake. We got business with him!” The woman spoke again, sounding increasingly irate as she moved to get between you and your mother’s murderer.

“He deserves to die. He deserves to be killed. Get off!” You practically roared, resorting to a state not unlike a feral cat, spitting and hissing, spine curling, trying to claw at the hands holding onto you. They stayed steady, even when you managed to scratch one of them deep enough to break skin.

The woman swore again, “Everybody deserves to die, get a hold of yourself!”

“Tess, ‘s probably best if we get him out of here.” The man gripping you said, voice straining slightly as he focused on keeping you restrained. He couldn’t do anything but hold on to you and watch as Tess dragged the guy, by his ankle, down the alley slightly, banging on a side door that you hadn’t even noticed. It opened, and the man inside swore before helping Tess grab the guy and haul him inside.

As soon as the door was safely shut, the man released you.

You walked to the end of the alley, gripping at the back of your head, swearing the whole way. You were probably screaming, given the way your throat was grating on every word, but the sound didn’t register.

“Joel, you’d better get in here.” Tess called, poking her head out of the door. You could hear the irritation in her voice, but it was immediately sent to the back of your mind as you realised what she had actually just said. You whirled around.

He wasn’t exactly what you were expecting.

But he was… familiar.

You couldn’t help it — you laughed, almost hysterically.

“Are you kidding me?” You said, voice strained with laughter, “You are Joel? Miller?” You asked, wanting him to say no and be done with it all so badly, but you knew that he wouldn’t say that. It was ingrained in your blood, in your very DNA.

He stared uncomprehendingly at you, as if expecting a spark of recognition to go through him, but it didn’t happen. You saw Tess step cautiously out of the building, apparently prepared to have Joel’s back, no matter what your next move was.

“Who are you?” Joel asked, instead of answering your question, or even making a move towards where you had begun to cry. If only he fucking knew — he had just saved the man who had murdered your mother, who had murdered the woman who was, once upon a time, his wife.

You reached into your pocket, uncaring of the way they both reached for what you assumed were weapons, and pulled out the photo. The moment you unfolded it, revealing him stood next to your mother, it was certain. This man was your father. You held the photo out towards him.

“Joel—” Tess warned, as he stepped forward, but he dismissed her with a look, clearly communicating that he could handle himself. He wasn’t worried, despite the state Colin had been in when they had arrived.

He stared at the photo, brows creasing, face drawing blank, before he reached out and took it. His finger ran across the image of your mother, her bright smile, not a slither of grey to be seen in her hair. “How did you get this?” He asked, clearly in disbelief, denial, maybe.

You pointed to the woman in the picture. “That’s—was my mom.”

It could’ve been funny, months, maybe years ago, the way his eyes flickered between you and the image of her, as if trying to put together how much of the statement was true. You vaguely noticed Tess shift uneasily behind him, before approaching.

“Was?” Joel decided to ask, eventually, instead of whatever else was going through his head. He said nothing to Tess as she took in the photograph he was still holding onto.

“That man, he—he killed her. A few months ago.” You said, smiling, because you couldn’t do anything else. This was all too much. First, your mother is killed. And then when you finally find somewhere potentially safe, you hear about your father. And then before you could do anything about that, you see her killer! And then, before you could finish the job, your biological dad, Joel Miller, saved his life. It wasn’t funny, but you didn’t know how else to react.

You stepped back, sliding down the brick wall behind you until you were sat on the asphalt, and could hang your head between your knees.

“Oh fuck,” Tess said, connecting the dots as she looked between you and Joel rapidly, brows furrowed as she became increasingly concerned. “Don’t tell me that she’s—” She shook her head, turning away from the photo and Joel and you, running a hand through her greasy hair.

Joel was still processing, or at least that’s what it looked like to you. He was staring at the photo, strangely still, seeming blank of any and all emotions.

Tess paced for a moment more, before releasing a heavy breath. She walked past Joel, over to you. “Okay, c’mon.” She said, holding out a hand for you. When you hesitated, she waved her hand and barely refrained from putting it in your face. “C’mon, we’ve gotta get you out of here before Colin goes to FEDRA.” You take her hand, surprised by her strength as she hauls you to your feet in an instant, releasing you immediately. She shook her head again. “Joel, time to go.”

He looked at her, and then towards you, nodding once. You said nothing when he put the picture in his own pocket, instead of handing it back. You hesitantly followed after Tess, wondering what your next move should be, and Joel followed after the two of you, looking stricken.

∘₊✧───── ───── ───── ─────✧₊∘

None of you had said anything, the entire time Tess had hurried you through borders and to what you assumed was their apartment. It felt like it was miles away from your own.

The wallpaper was yellowed with age, slowly drooping down the walls, peeling away at corners, but it wasn’t the worst state it could’ve been in. The floral pattern didn’t really lend itself to the vibes of the apocalypse, though. Nor did it match either Tess or Joel’s stoic and tough demeanours.

You had no idea what to expect from this.

For as long as you could remember, your mother had told you tales of your father, of the great man he was, the great father he was. But here, on the other side of a worldwide outbreak of infection, you couldn’t quite match the image in front of you to the man in those stories. You had spent so long thinking of him as being dead, unable to do anything to find you or your mother from a grave, that to learn he was alive, and with Tess, it was a shock to your system.

Where was Sarah? Where was the half-sister you had heard so much about from your mother?

Despite Joel matching the name, and the photo that your mother had kept, it just didn’t feel like he was the man you had been imagining as your father. He didn’t seem kind or caring, he didn’t look like he had any love left in him. And maybe, you could have accepted that, if he had other aspects to him, if he hadn’t let your mother’s killer live.

“What happened the day of the outbreak?” You asked, finally, despite the way you ached to run away and cry, for your mother, for yourself, for the father you would never have. Joel just looked at you, rarely blinking as if you were a figment of his imagination, clenching and unclenching his jaw.

“No, we are asking you questions.” Tess responded, clearly taking the lead on the situation, despite having no connection to you. It really shouldn’t have been her business. You scoffed. “Where did you come from?” She asked you, unblinking in the face of your disbelief.

You shook your head, “How is that even relevant?”

“Because I said it is.”

“I don’t care what you say. He’s my dad. You’re not my mom.” You replied, roughly, angrily, and you’re only more irritated when Tess doesn’t even react. You become furious when Joel says nothing. “Are you going to say anything?”

Tess went to speak, but you spoke again before she could utter a word.

“Not even about how you let my mother’s killer go? You don’t have anything to say about that?” You questioned, stepping towards him where he had taken a seat on the couch in front of that god-forsaken wallpaper.

There was an awkward lull in the room, each of you waiting for Joel to speak. He seemed unsure if he was going to speak at all, his brows furrowing further, and he pulled the photo out of his pocket to look at once again.

“She died, years ago. My—my kids…” Joel swallowed, and shook his head. He placed the photo down beside him. The photo meant nothing. You could’ve been to his house, and brought it here with you, never having met the woman he hadn’t seen since the day the world fell apart.

“Did you even look for us?” You asked him, head tilting, eyes stinging, wanting desperately for him to say yes, to say he scoured the world but missed you somehow. But looking at him, covered with scars, you could see he was nothing like the man your mother remembered. He didn’t care, not like she thought he had. The man in front of you wasn’t your father — he was a disappointment. He was your father’s shell.

Joel didn’t speak, swallowing harshly, seemingly unable to form any words.

“You’re nothing like she said you were.” You told him quietly, shaking your head, reaching by his side and taking the picture. You wanted to rip his half off, throw it at him, denounce him, tell him he wasn’t your father, that he was never worthy of your mother, but you couldn’t. It was the only thing that you would ever have of the father you should’ve had. The man your mother had loved. She’d already had so much taken from her, you couldn’t, even after her death, take Joel away too. He could live on in the memory. In pictures.

They didn’t say anything when you turned your back on them, shoving the picture in your pocket, and walking out of their door. You slammed it behind you, felt the walls of their apartment tremble with the force, and kept walking.

Part of you, a big part, wished that Joel Miller would have stayed dead. At least that way, you could have kept pretending.

[loki-is-my-kink-awakening]

WIP Wednesday

Lokius. Loki corners a trans Mobius for a kiss and fumble in the archives. Angst and tension, but it will all work out.

Mobius whimpered, his mind whirring as Loki leaned over him, pressing his back firmly into the archive shelves with a firm hand against his chest. His breath caught in his throat at those darkened eyes burrowing into his, glinting with promise. “Is this really happening?” Loki asked, their breath ghosting across Mobius’ lips. “Uh, maybe.” He wanted this. Of course he did. The two of them had been dancing around their obvious attraction to one another since they’d started working together, squirreled away in the depths of the TVA hunting through reports to find something, anything, that would lead them to the variant. They’d found something alright. Mobius licked his lips, watching how Loki’s eyes tracked the movement. The air around them felt thick and it wasn’t like anyone was going to find them here. The archivist wouldn’t come through here for many units yet, and no one else was down here. He could so very easily give into temptation. Loki was offering, and Mobius wanted, by the time keepers he wanted. This was like a dream, something so perfect he should leap at the chance, grab the Loki by the horns, so to speak. Sure, Loki might be trying to manipulate him, to get something in return for their favor. It wasn’t like Loki hadn’t done that many times before; Mobius had read their file, after all. Sex was frequently the weapon of choice for the god of mischief to get what they wanted. He knew all that, and that still wasn’t the issue. His indecision etched on and Loki blinked at him, their forehead marred by a deepening frown. “If you don’t want to.” “No,” Mobius gasped, his voice sounding weak. “No, it’s not like that.” “Then what?” He wasn’t sure how to explain it. For all the time he’d existed in the TVA, he’d been told that everyone was made in the time keepers’ image. But the truth was, he knew he wasn’t. He’d seen what other guys in the showers had between their legs and he wasn’t the same. He lacked certain attributes they had, and he had no explanation as to why they’d made him faulty. That drunken fumble with Ravonna hadn’t helped, either. He’d seen the confused look on her face when she first slipped a hand down his pants, and if he had been more with himself, he wouldn’t have let the messy affair happen. Afterwards, they hadn’t said anything, and Mobius was frankly relieved not to talk about it.  While the war within Mobius rumbled on, Loki had obviously come to a conclusion. They moved back, creating space between them. “You don’t trust me." “No, it’s not that. Look,” he grabbed Loki by the lapels and pulled them back into him, causing the shelves to rattle. “Please, just kiss me.”

Tagged by @kcscribbler and @cha-melodius 💕💕

Tagging @elodiah @in-my-loki-feels @lokimobius @wolfpup026 @natendo-art @mobius-m-mobius @lgwilt @dewdropreader @starport-seven-five @starrose17 @insert-witty-user-name-here @mirilyawrites @faux-fm @doomed-spectacles @keepmakingtrouuble @boredintjqueen @sparrow-the-tired-lesbian @lettingtimepass @typewriterwolf @voulezvulcan @loki-us if you want to do it.

[cabin-3-counselor]

i have a confession, i really think that jason and thalia shouldn't have been siblings by mortal parent, and that they should have been a mirror to nico and hazel's relationship.

there are many inconsistencies in the pjo saga that never got well translated later on in the hoo saga, but one of them, that gets to me, is when we are told that thalia had a younger brother, that she knew of his existence throughout the entirety of pjo and that she wanted to or did look for him WHILE being a Huntress of Artemis, which it doesn't make sense cause Artemis, from the books, would never let her fuck off to somewhere before and after the war with Kronos, before because she lost two huntress and couldn't afford to loose another lieutenant and after because many other huntress died and they needed to get more numbers and Thalia would have to fulfill her role as lieutenant/general and seeing who is worthy of joining or not.

so, given that being a huntress would not help her out, why did she joined if she wanted to find her brother? a brother who surely wouldn't remember her and if he was alive, which was a shot in the dark given that she didn't even go to hades when she died because zeus stopped that by turning her into a tree and putting her in a coma therefore not given her concrete evidence that he was dead, there would be a big chance of him joining kronos's army given that he would've been the perfect choice for them, a son of Zeus (Jupiter) who did not get claimed and is utterly alone in the world.

if rick wanted to make them the grace siblings, related by mortal blood, a nice and interesting topic he could've gone with two routes (in my mind):

1. The Romulus and Remus

The brothers that helped in the foundation of Rome, who were nursed by a wolf, but eventually Romulus kill Remus because he doesn't want to share the title of Creator of Rome.

Jason being Romulus and Thalia being Remus, but instead of killing Thalia, he plays an active role in her choice becoming a huntress. He has been training years non stop in battle and politics, by the age of 14 he would've been an active menace, and he could've, perhaps out of respect for their dead mother, or perhaps to make sure that he would only have to fight with Percy and Nico, he played her, and heavily advised her to enter the huntress, solely to stay out of his way towards glory. It could be an interesting concept of having the Greeks idea of combat and glory rivalry the Roman way with them.

And it would be an interesting comparison to Hazel's and Nico's relationship, specially if it showed that they decided to put the roman vs greek side aside because they don't share any blood relation to anyone else.

2. Thalia choosing to disappear and stay as away from godly business even though she doesn't have a concrete answer as to where Jason is and having him confronting her and her decision after she is forced to fight in the war against Gaea

Thalia coming back from a comatose state seven years after what she thought was her death, and coming to the knowledge that no she didn't die, the choice of Elysium or Re-Birth being taken away from her by her father, a father who didn't interfere when she was in real danger, finding out that her closest best friend is using her and her "death" as an excuse to manipulate demigods into helping him bring kronos back from his slumber and take out the gods, and that he left Annabeth alone and that he stabbed a 12 years old kid because said kid called out his bullshit.

Rick could've shown a Thalia completely traumatized by the events that happened in the night of her death, she despising the sounds of branches and leaves crushing under her feet, because that's what she heard alongside her bones breaking in a fight against the ciclope, her being even more terrified and hostile of Tyson than Annabeth in The Sea of Monsters,when he entered camp for the first time after her resurrection, even being mean to Annabeth and Percy after she is told that they were the ones to take Tyson there, seeing Annabeth disappear and noone, no mortal parent nor godly one, only her, Percy and Grover getting worried and actually doing something.

And after everything she saw in the Titan's Curse, she chooses to not fight because she can't, she, at that point in life, realizes that she wouldn't stand a chance as a warrior, so she decides to turn her back to the mythological world, and she manages to stay away untill years later Annabeth knocks at her door and tells her that Percy is missing and that she needs help to look for him, and so Thalia is dragged back, and when she finally sees Jason again at the Grand Canyon she doesn't know what to do, specially because she didn't go looking for him and now he shows up but without memories of his entire life, and when he comes back to himself and he sees her he asks why she gave up, why he wasn't enough to make her want to fight, could be a very angsty scene that could help give Jason an actual personality.

so yeah, i have many thoughts on this thalia and jason siblinghood specially that it never made sense to me and that it was such a flashed out and boring arc that it would've been better if it didn't happen at all and if it did rick should've either introduced jason in the first saga or create a good reason for thalia not being able to find him.

[ghostiewriter]

summary: Riven is the last person Musa expects to show up at her doorstep, bloody and injured and in desperate need for help. Or, day seven of ghostie's spooktober spectacular.

read here on ao3.

.

Musa never really thought she would understand, let alone experience, the horrors of war before she turned twenty. 

But there were also a lot of things she had never considered. 

She didn’t think she would ever be able to handle large groups of people without going insane. She didn��t think she would ever find a group of people who would understand her powers and the control she had over them, let alone be able to call them her friends. And she didn’t ever think there would be a time where she would consider her powers more so a gift than a burden.

And now her powers seemed to play a vital part in a war she didn’t fully understand. A war that started long before she was born, that she feared would continue on after she died. A war that nobody should fight in, let alone children who didn’t think they would have to face anything this goddamn terrifying beyond missed assignments and strict teachers.

Musa knew that she could have returned back to Melody. She could have returned home and stayed with her father in what could be their last few months of normality before the war reached other realms, before the war corrupted everything they knew and loved. 

But she didn’t because she couldn’t. 

She couldn’t turn her back when she knew she could help, when she knew that her friends would be fighting for the same cause she believes in. 

The return of Rosalind had fucked a lot of things up for the Winx girls. They had very few people they could trust, even fewer people who could actually help them out and it was truly a miracle they had managed to escape Alfea considering the stronghold it had become as the war rose. 

They knew it would be best for them to split up, to hide between the remaining realms and to gain the supporters they needed to have a fighting chance against Rosalind and her army. They had limited contact with each other, not wanting to risk being found or caught. 

It was too much. God, it was far too fucking much but they didn’t have any choice when they were the otherworld’s only hope. 

Deeming it far too risky for Sky or Bloom to show their faces, Musa had taken the decision to hide away in the depths of Eraklyon’s woods, travelling between different cities and towns in hopes of gaining allies. 

It had been over three weeks since she had spoken to the others, over three weeks of no contact and no idea how her friends were doing. She didn’t know if they were alive or well or if they had even made any progress in their mission. 

But she just had to have faith they were okay, just like they had to have faith she was okay. 

Maybe it was the weeks of seclusion, isolation and no real human interaction beyond late nights in dodgy taverns and creepy, hidden settlements. 

Maybe it was her own comfort in being alone for most of her time and letting her guard down. 

Maybe it was the fact she was halfway through her dinner and the knock on the door was certainly not something she expected.

Musa reached for the dagger hidden under the couch pillow to her right, gripping the handle of the weapon with a familiar hold. She kept her eyes on the door, slow and precise steps making her way through the small cabin as she ran through her mind on the handful of people who knew where she was. 

Her mind came up blank with who could be behind the door. 

Her purple eyes shone through the dimly lit cabin, tendrils reaching out for any emotion she could feel beyond the wooden door. And all she could feel was a strong, suffocating and bitter feeling of agonising pain. 

When she ripped the door open, dagger still in hand and ready to use, she was not expecting to see Riven standing on the other side. 

She also didn’t expect to see him practically slumped against the side of the door, arms clinging on to his shredded torso and his face looking paler than any person’s should be. He looked exhausted, there was blood soaking his clothes and she wondered how close to blood loss fatigue he was. 

“I didn’t know where else to go.” 

Musa had seconds before his body slumped towards her, forcing her to drop the weapon and catch his sagging body before he landed on the floor. It was awkward and difficult as she manoeuvred them through the small cabin, her dinner forgotten on the table and her focus on the bleeding boy in her arms.

She had him on the bed, wasting no time in removing the rest of his ruined armour so his bare torso was on display. Her eyes widened at the sight of his wounds, deep and wide and still fucking beleeding. 

Musa rushed to the bathroom, returning with a bowl of water and the shitty first aid kit she had hidden under the bathroom counter. She made quick move of cleaning the wounds, trying to keep as much pressure on them as she could but Riven wouldn’t stop wriggling.

“It’s going to be okay,” she told him, words fast-paced and slightly breathless. “Just…stay with me, okay?” 

“Fuck!” Riven hissed, something mixed like a whimper and a cry. “I-I…shit, it’s too…too…too much.” 

“Just stay with me,” Musa repeated, gripping his hand and letting the tendrils of her powers reach out to him. She didn’t falter when his cries died down to soft whimpers, his body fell slack against the bed and his eyes closed as the exhaustion hit.

Musa bit her own tongue, trying to focus on the open wound that desperately needed her care instead of the pain racking through her, every inch of her body on fire. Her eyes welled up and her brain felt it was going to burst, but she didn’t stop. 

She couldn’t stop.

Musa was slumped against the bed, head leaning back and her eyes falling shut by the time she had finished patching him up. Yet, even in her own exhaustion and desire to sleep until the sun rose once again, she couldn’t get rid of the lingering voice in the back of her head on how Riven found her. 

And why he even trusted her to show up at her doorstep. 

There was no secret that Rosalind sunk her claws in the boy’s mind before they left Alfea, despite how hard Sky fought to get his best friend back. He became a shell of the person he was, a robot under Rosalind’s control. Even his mind was blank and lacked any real emotion when she tried to break through. 

But it was different now. 

His mind and emotions were loud and raging and erratic as they had once been before. He was like the Riven before, the one she meant at the specialist training ground months ago. But there was something else, a lingering fear with a stench so strong that even when he was fast asleep, it was still there. 

As she turned her head to look at the boy fast asleep on the bed, chest moving with slow and deep breaths, she knew two things for sure: Riven was back to the way he once was and he had purposefully sought her out. 

And yet, she couldn’t help wonder why the fuck he was in Eraklyon and if it was the same reason he showed up at the brink of death. 

Musa sighed as she leaned her head back, brown eyes focused on the wooden ceiling above her. She knew she wouldn’t get any answers until he was awake. 

So she sat there, confused and tired and unsure what other mysteries this war would throw at her.

.

[sezja]

Febuwhump Day 25: Assumed Dead Fandom: Final Fantasy XIV Characters/Ship: Sanson Smyth/Guydelot Thildonnet, Nourval, Original Characters Triggers/Content warnings:

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six, Part Seven, Part Eight, Part Nine, Part Ten

She's not stupid.

He's dead, Raicheille thinks, as her steps carry her through Gridania's quiet nocturnal streets by memory alone; her eyes are too blurred with tears. He's dead, and it's all my fault. If she hadn't told Captain Sanson about her uncle! If she hadn't convinced him Nourval could fight Uncle Astarnaix! If she hadn't convinced him to break Nourval out of prison! At least in gaol, he'd been safe, he'd been alive; no one was going to hurt him there.

She thinks about her uncle's lance plunging through him again; the way he'd collapsed into the grass, unmoving...

My fault. All my fault. And now everything's going to go wrong. Captain Sanson won't be able to save the bard, and they'll both get killed, and then there'll be a war, just like Uncle Astarnaix wants; just like Nourval doesn't want anymore-

Didn't want anymore-

She squeezes the badge in her hand so tightly it bites into her skin, and she keeps running. The Adders' Nest. Even if... even if there's nothing to be done, even if it's too late, she won't let it be said that she gave up without trying. Besides, maybe if she finds a healer, Captain Sanson will stand a chance against Astarnaix - at least long enough for someone else to hear the fighting and come to their aid.

And maybe... maybe it's not too late, maybe...

Nourval had always been the only one who liked her, growing up. Being a girl, her worth to the family lay in the hope that she might one day marry a boy from another wealthy old Gridanian family, securing ancient alliances and providing the Old Guard with sons who could be raised to cling to the same old beliefs. She had little merit in and of herself, naturally, and was therefore largely ignored - only Nourval had spent time with her, telling her tales of Vainchelon and his many acts of virtue, tales of how Gridania grew from a tiny forest settlement to the grand city it was today.

He'd taught her all she knew of heroism, of strength. When he sparred with the other lancers, she swore he was the best; no one could beat him. He even won a bout or two against Uncle Astarnaix, who had trained him...

But not today. Why not today? Why couldn't he-

When he'd left for Gyr Abania, only to return in chains, a criminal, Rai had been devastated. But when she began to hear - to overhear; no one would tell her such things - that he'd begun denouncing his long-held beliefs; that he'd changed his mind about war with Ala Mhigo; that he'd uncovered the truth of Lord Landrenel's choice to conceal Vainchelon's murder...

I won't let them start a war! She's nearly reached the Adders' Nest now, badge in hand. I won't let them! I promise, Nourval!

She runs into the Nest, calling for help. It's quiet this late at night; her voice carries, shrill and piercing in the silence. Several people emerge - some of them wearing coats like the one Nourval had been wearing; it meant they were officers, she remembers. Nourval had taught her that, too; the hierarchy of the Alliance Grand Companies. She wishes, briefly, that she could have found the man Sanson went to - the man even now still locked in Nourval's cell - if only to be certain there was someone she could trust... but the time for that has passed. She must rely on luck, instead.

"Captain... Captain Sanson Smyth requires... requires a healer," she says, choking between sobs. "Please! My brother is dying-"

"Captain Smyth?" A hyuran woman pushes forward, frowning. "Calm yourself, miss. What has happened?"

There's no time! "Please, you have to come with me! It's important! Ask..." Oh, hells, she thinks. Nourval won't be returning to his cell, anyway. "Ask... ask Commander Vorsaile Heuloix," she says, her frantic mind dredging the name up from memory. "He... he's in Nourval Lhorulgois' gaol cell. But you have to come with me; my brother is dying!"

Another man's eyes widen. "Lhorul- are you the missing girl? Raicheille?"

"No," she blurts. Hells! "Yes. But I'm not missing, I've been with Captain Sanson. The Commander can explain!"

The man opens his mouth to speak; the woman shakes her head. "Go check the cell," she says. "If this is a matter of life and death, the details will wait. Inform her parents she's in the Order's custody and will be returned home safely. Miss, I am a conjurer of-"

"Good," she says, already turning to run. "Come on!"

[a-dowryofblood]

Surprisingly, Prince Daemon agreed with his wife. “In the Stepstones, my enemies learned to run and hide when they saw Caraxes’s wings or heard his roar…but they had no dragons of their own. It is no easy thing for a man to be a dragonslayer. But dragons can kill dragons, and have. Any maester who has ever studied the history of Valyria can tell you that. I will not throw our dragons against the usurper’s unless I have no other choice. There are other ways to use them, better ways.” Then the prince laid his own strategies before the black council. Rhaenyra must have a coronation of her own, to answer Aegon’s. Afterward they would send out ravens, calling on the lords of the Seven Kingdoms to declare their allegiance to their true queen.

“We must fight this war with words before we go to battle,” the prince declared.

-Fire & Blood.

Idk just leaving this here. I'm not a let's erase Daemon's sins kinda girlie so I do believe he could choke Rhaenyra in fury, the same way he purposely took her to a place she should definitely not be at just so that when the gossip got back to the king he could marry her. He does things that aren't good for Rhaenyra but will get him something, that's in character.

Why was he choking her for being less than thrilled to launch the kingdom to war?? When he has actually lived war and knew how bad their chances were. The lives of his family and the people he loves are in the line here, he is also very much concerned with just launching straight into battle.

[theladyofbloodshed]

Part One ¦ Part Two ¦ Part Three ¦ Part Four ¦ Part Five ¦ Part Six ¦ Part Seven ¦ Part Eight ¦ Part Nine ¦ Part Ten ¦ Part Eleven ¦ Part Twelve ¦ Part Thirteen

Part Fourteen - Long final chapter but you will get a smutty epilogue soon!

They scoured the Spring Court as well as they could while the darkness still veiled them, but there were no signs of Nesta or the Vanserra prick. They had edged as close as they could to Tamlin’s manor, scoping the forests for any traces of either of them to no avail. If Lucien was like his slimy brothers, he could winnow – then he could have taken Nesta anywhere in the world. They knew little of him, only that his father had him exiled and mauled his face in one of his rages. They’d never deemed the youngest Vanserra worthy of spying on. Cassian prayed to the Mother that they wouldn’t regret that decision. If Lucien was anything like his brothers, then they had precious time to get to Nesta before she was seriously hurt. If he decided to return to his father, risk his exile, to present Cassian’s mate to the high lord of the Autumn Court then Nesta was as good as dead. There was only a sliver of a chance she wouldn’t be hurt in the Spring Court either.

‘We can’t just go barging into Tamlin’s manor demanding if she’s there.’

‘I know,’ Rhys snapped, eyes not wavering from Cassian’s tense body. Both of them were simmering away with only Azriel’s cool head holding them steady. Likely he was weighing up their options, wondering whether Nesta’s head was about to be presented to Beron Vanserra on a platter.

Cassian was half tempted to hammer on the doors of the Spring Court and demand Lucien be brought forwards. They were wise to be hesitant though. Tamlin was a force to be reckoned with. Beyond his raw strength, the male had legions of loyal soldiers at his command – ones who he’d bled beside in the war, that he’d grown up with in war bands. They would die for him without hesitation. It wouldn’t be easy to make it to the front doors. There was bad blood between them all and Rhys would love nothing better than to settle the score – or to ease his guilt over not coming for Nesta sooner. They didn’t need a war with Spring, even Cassian could agree to that.

‘We return to Velaris,’ Rhys said, voice nowhere near as calm as he tried to make it. ‘Check on the sisters and reconvene.’

‘I’m not leaving without Nesta.’

Azriel sighed with impatience. ‘The sun is almost up. There’s no sign of her. We can’t scent her. I can send my shadows in, but in all likelihood, she isn’t here, Cass.’

It was Rhys’ turn to block Cassian’s path before he parted Azriel’s head from his body. His chest heaved with every breath aching in his lungs. He couldn’t bear to think of Nesta coming to any harm due to their mistakes.  

Azriel went on, ‘We’ve dumped her two sisters with Mor and they need support too. I’m happy to keep searching with you, brother, but Nesta is not here.’

‘Send your spies into Spring. We’ll go to Velaris. Then return.’

What choice did Cassian have? His body was on fire, a rash had erupted all up his arms and he’d scratched the skin until it bled. He needed Nesta as much as she needed him. The bond was demanding their reunion. It burned fiery hot, angry that they had come so close to her then not met.   

‘Fine.’

Without a warning, he was free falling above the House of Wind. The cold wind rippled against his leathers. His wings splayed out on instinct, slowing the fall, but his knees still popped from the impact. Dawn was bleeding into the skies of Velaris; he’d have liked Nesta to have seen the night sky as her first impression of his home. But now he’d take her safety over anything. She could see Velaris pouring with rain for all he cared – he just wanted her in his arms.

Mor strode onto the roof, eyes wide. Her red dress billowed out behind her. ‘We have a big fucking problem.’

‘Don’t tell me a mortal has escaped,’ Rhys groaned.

‘Much fucking worse.’ She pointed a finger at Cassian. ‘You are so lucky that Amren needed something from the vaults in the middle of the night for whatever it is she is up to. Your mortal mate is knocking on the doors of the Hewn City with a fucking Vanserra in tow.’

‘Peace,’ Azriel said, clutching his hands into prayer, ‘Just one week of peace is all I ask.’

***

This was a city unlike any Nesta could have ever imagined. Carved into the black rock mountain were avenues, separate buildings with twisting spires, illuminated homes and bridges criss-crossing the glowing, green streams that ran through it. It was a metropolis carved into the mountain itself. All of it was inlaid with artwork of great, ancient beasts, faeries fornicating, of mortals dancing while fae whipped their bare backs. The pillars were carved to look like curling vines of night-blooming flowers. Silvery light glowed and bobbed in the air.

‘What is this place?’ Nesta asked, keeping her hand in Lucien’s and squeezing his warm fingers tighter. ‘You’ve table-clothed me to the wrong place.’

He had winnowed them to a central path that led to the massive iron gates then promptly tugged them from it behind a boulder out of view from the armoured sentries.

‘This is your beloved’s home.’

‘I never said he was my beloved,’ she replied hotly.

Her cheeks burned at the insinuation – but it was not the only part of her body that did. She needed the snow again to cover her skin; her muscles ached. She could not stop thinking of Cassian – of his body, of seeing him in the bath of her home, the muscles glistening in the fire light, of him guiding her hand to bring him to climax, seeing the hard length of him laying flat against his body, of how she regretted not seizing that chance of lying with him then.

‘Can you not think of sex with your beloved right now?’ Lucien scolded.

‘I never said he was my beloved,’ Nesta repeated.

‘That might be the only thing that could save you in this place. The Night Court is not good. I did warn you.’

Nesta scrunched up her nose as she peered from around the boulder at the still sentries on duty. Their black armour made them look bulkier than they likely were, but they were far taller than her. Their swords crossed over their bodies ready for any assault.

‘This isn’t Velaris.’

There was no beautiful night sky or rows of boutiques and bakers or clothes shops that stocked her gorgeous, fur-lined clothes that Cassian had bought for her. The buildings were supposed to be grey stone with green, slate roofs and a long, winding river was meant to run through the middle of the city where restaurants lined it.

Lucien’s eyes twinkled in the silvery light – both of them – and he murmured, ‘It certainly isn’t.’

This place felt wrong. Nesta couldn’t explain the feeling in her gut that had her wishing she could return to her cabin. There was a darkness to the Hewn City that made her afraid. She nestled closer to Lucien even if he tried to push her away. There was a voice telling her that she should not be here, a hand on her shoulder trying to guide her in the other direction.

‘Go and knock on the gates.’

‘I certainly will not. You said Cassian owes you something. Go and collect it, witch.’

Nesta shivered. Now that she was her, she wanted to go home. ‘They have mortals being hunted for sport on those pillars.’

‘How fast can you run?’

She clutched his arm, terror stilling the blood in her veins. ‘Someone’s coming.’

‘They can probably smell you and want to eat you.’

A small woman strode past the guards and was heading their way. Black, silky hair was cut about her chin, bobbing as she walked. Her clothes matched her eyes; swirling smoke that never settled. Beside her, Lucien tensed. He even pulled Nesta further behind him. Whoever this woman was, she didn’t seem to be good news if she made Lucien nervous.

‘Not Eris,’ she said. ‘Not Beron either. From that ugly disfigurement, the youngest Vanserra.’

‘How dare you!’ Nesta couldn’t help it. Every part of her was crying out not to speak to this woman, to stay hiding behind Lucien, but she wouldn’t hear such awful words said about his scar. ‘What a horrid thing to say.’

Her eyes narrowed. ‘A mortal mate for one of the most powerful Illyrians. Fate has a strange sense of humour.’

Lucien’s face leeched of colour. ‘The general is your mate?’

‘He’s a friend, I suppose.’

‘This is not the place for such conversations. Follow me and keep your hoods up. Especially you, girl, keep your hood up and face pointed at the ground.’

Nesta did not want to follow this strange woman into the city that made her skin prickle, but Lucien was already following with his hand reaching out behind him for Nesta to hold. He was afraid, she realised, by whoever this female was. She could not remember Cassian mentioning a high lady. And if she scared Lucien enough to comply then maybe Nesta had made a mistake coming here.

They were led to an obsidian stone room with a long table running through the middle. Some of the chairs, Nesta recognised as ones that could accommodate wings since Cassian had to spin hers around to sit comfortably. Did they all have wings, she wondered or was it only the men?

‘Remain here,’ the woman said before locking them into the room – as if they had any other choice.

‘Table-cloth us back to my cabin, Lucien.’

‘I cannot. There are wards on this city.’

‘I don’t know what that means,’ Nesta whispered.

‘Do you know who she is?’

‘The high lady?’

Lucien shook his head, his hand was still in her own, gripping it tightly. ‘Amren. Legend says she is a true immortal. A warrior serving a vengeful God. After millennia in the Prison, she yielded her perfect grace though her powers are no less bright.’

Nesta stared at Lucien. ‘I don’t know what any of that means.’

‘I am going to die with an ignorant mortal.’

They remained with their chairs huddled together. Nesta kept hold of Lucien’s hand in case he tried to table-cloth away without her despite his insistence that the wards – whatever they were – were impenetrable. His skin had not returned to its golden-brown and still his pulse was a racing song beside her.

‘Thank you for helping me,’ she whispered. ‘I won’t let anybody touch you.’

The corner of Lucien’s mouth tipped up. ‘Thank you, my lady, but I fear without your broom there’s little a witch in the woods can do.’

Maybe faeries were not so bad. Nesta had been a sacrifice, an exile, a witch, and now a friend of the fae.

As the key turned in the door, Lucien rose. ‘Stand with me,’ he murmured.

Nesta remained at his side, hand in his to weather the storm, but once the door opened, her heart shuddered. It felt like a piece was sliding into place, a piece that had always been missing. Cassian burst through, eyes wide with terror.

‘Nesta, has he hurt you?’

In one moment, Nesta was beside Lucien ready to break away from him to greet Cassian, and in the next, he’d hauled her in front of him like a shield, backed up to the wall, and pressed a knife to her throat.

‘Haven’t you ever been taught to never trust a Vanserra?’

‘Funnily enough, Lucien, your family isn’t thought of by mortals at all.’

Azriel had pinned Cassian to a wall over his yelling that he would rip Lucien into pieces and feed them to his father. They were a blur of magic and wings, both thrashing against each other. A blonde woman had entered, trying to instil calm too, then the small, silver eyed one who eyed the situation with disdain. Rhysand, the high lord, had black dust swirling around his hands when he finally entered the room.

‘Lets all take a moment to calm down.’

‘If you harm my mate, Vanserra, your mother will be sent your other eye amongst other organs.’

‘It’s nothing personal, Nesta. I had fun with you,’ Lucien replied smoothly, keeping the knife pressed to her neck. ‘I wanted to ensure Nesta made it here safely – but I want to ensure I can also leave this place in one piece.’

‘Then let her go and you can winnow back to Tamlin’s skirts.’

Lucien’s face was tight as he shook his head. ‘I can see the wards. I can only winnow past the gates and I know you will not let me walk freely. You’ll let me leave or else.’

The blonde one shook her head incredulously. ‘You aren’t in the position to make threats, snake.’

A long pause followed. Nesta tried not to move as Lucien kept his dagger against her skin. Oddly enough, fear didn’t greet her. It was more irritation with herself that she had been foolish enough to trust this annoyingly charming faerie. And, more unexpected, was how desperately she wanted to kiss Cassian. She was preparing herself to let the knife cut through her skin if it gave her the chance to touch him. Her body was alight with desire. There was nothing she wanted more than to get to him.

‘What is Velaris?’

***

‘You told your mortal mate too much – and yet not enough. Not enough for her to guard her words around me.’

Nesta’s face had gone white suddenly. The Vanserra had her chin tipped up to the air as he continued pressing the blade into the creamy skin. Each breath had her skin pushing closer to the blade’s edge. If Cassian saw a bead of blood, the last fraying instinct that he was clinging onto would snap entirely. And only the Mother knew what he would do then.

Rhys seemed to realise the same thing as Cassian struggled against Azriel and Mor’s hold on him. ‘Lucien,’ he said, voice low and urgent, ‘Nesta is Cassian’s mate. She has accepted the bond but they haven’t had the frenzy. You have a knife to the neck of the general of the Night Court’s mate. I have a male in this room who is about to go berserk and kill all of us except Nesta if you draw a single drop of her blood.’

Lucien’s hand tightened on the blade on instinct and Nesta screwed her eyes shut.

‘The other high lords will be interested to know exactly why you feel entitled to break a five-hundred-year-old treaty, Rhysand, and bring mortals to your court.’

‘I wish I hit you harder with my broom,’ Nesta hissed.

How many males had she hit with that thing? Oh, he already loved her.

Rhys’ grin was feline. He’d shared something with Amren, Cassian could tell by the smirk on her own face.

‘Alright, Little Lucien, you can see Velaris. And you have my word that you won’t ever be harmed be me or my council. I swear it on the Mother herself.’

‘I keep hold of Nesta until then,’ he said.

‘Not a problem. Mor and Cass first. Amren and Azriel. Then the three of us will go together.’ Rhys voice was placating like one a father might use to soothe a crying child.

He felt Rhys’ voice in his own head imploring him to trust his judgement in this.

Cassian wanted to fight against it. It was the same judgement that had left Nesta festering in a mortal cabin while he wasted away in Illyria without her. The judgement that had meant they went for Nesta last when she was the most important mortal in the world. But he had trusted Rhys for all of his life. He had to trust a little more.

Mor kept hold of him as they winnowed directly to the house. A sour-faced Feyre and a still-wailing Elain came scurrying out to the roof in their thin, scruffy gowns. Velaris would be a good home for both of them.

‘Did you find her?’

Cassian could not speak. It would not only be his heart breaking if Nesta was hurt.

‘She’ll be here soon,’ Mor replied. ‘Go back into the house.’

‘No.’ Feyre had planted her feet with the same stubbornness as her elder sister. Cassian wished the other one would stop her mourning cry or it would wake everybody in Velaris.

Azriel appeared above them, wings billowing out to land, with Amren in his arms. Neither of them looked particularly happy about the situation.

Finally, Rhys winnowed to the roof with his arms gripping both Lucien and Nesta.

‘Velaris,’ he said.

The sun was crawling ever higher into the sky, scattering light across the serpentine Sidra. It hit the frost lacing the roofs, making them shine. This city was beautiful. A city of starlight and wonder.

It was enough for Lucien’s grip to loosen on the knife.

Before any of them could react, Nesta had thrust her heel up to his groin.

‘That’s my mate!’

Nesta was in his arms in moments. That roaring voice in his head had grown louder. She was here. This was real. His mate.

‘I love you,’ he said in between kisses. ‘You stink of smoke and Day Court wine and Vanserras but I still love you.’

Nesta peeled her mouth from Cassian’s. ‘Did you see my cabin?’

‘You became the witch in the woods.’

Nesta’s smile was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen, so full of pride and satisfaction. ‘I wanted to make you laugh.’

And she did. She had. She was brilliant and a little bit unhinged, but in the most perfect of ways.

For a while, he just held onto her. Because he could. Because she was here. Because she was safe. And she always would be; even if the Mother only granted them thirty or forty years, Cassian would savour every minute of them. Time would always be their enemy, but time was never promised.

‘Don’t hurt him,’ one of the sisters cried suddenly.

Nesta thrashed out of Cassian’s arms to land on the roof. ‘Elain, what are you doing?’

The crying had ceased. The middle sister, in her tired, lavender gown was shielding Lucien Vanserra’s body with her own, protecting him. He looked as if he was sizing up the sheer drop from the ledge, debating whether he’d survive it. ‘Please, don’t hurt him.’

‘Elain, he just had a knife to Nesta’s neck,’ Feyre said, face wracked with disgust.

‘He won’t be hurt,’ Rhys said calmly, spreading out his hands. ‘I made that vow. But you won’t ever leave Velaris, Lucien. You know its secret now. You will remain here until you wither and die. That is the price you pay for daring to touch a female who is part of my court.’

Elain wrapped her arms around the male, her tears had been exchanged for an unexpected, fierce streak.

‘I dream of you,’ she whispered. ‘So many times, I’ve dreamed of your face.’

‘They’re called nightmares,’ muttered Azriel.

Cassian knew if he did not claim his mate in the next few minutes, he was going to combust on the spot. His siphons were ready to erupt with power. But Nesta remained throwing her arms in the air at a loss for words, then she snapped, ‘Elain, do not be so silly. This man has bedded witches and dryads, you can do far better.’

‘That was told in confidence.’

Nesta rolled her eyes. ‘It was a brag, Lucien. And a poor one. I might have kept your secret if you didn’t try to kill me.’

‘It was nothing personal as I said.’

Had these two been locking horns like this since they’d met?

The middle sister, kept her arms firmly around Lucien as if he hadn’t just threatened her sister. Then again, Cassian supposed she had also seen her mortal fiancée as part of the hunt to kill the same sister, so maybe Elain wasn’t quite right. Certainly, she was staring at Lucien as if he was the most magnificent male in the world.

They’re not mates too, are they?

Rhys, I don’t know or care. The frenzy is about to become a public spectacle.

‘Put Lucien into the room at the farthest end. Amren will be your companion today, little fox. Elain, you may keep your arms around him like a limpet if you so wish. He won’t hurt you in Amren’s presence.’ Vanserra didn’t seem overly thrilled by the prospect of a mortal woman staring up at him with her moon-wide eyes, which was likely why Rhys allowed it. ‘Feyre darling, has my lovely cousin shown you to your room yet?’

‘We’re just supposed to go to our rooms and pretend everything is normal?’ Feyre had her hands on her hips. ‘We are in a faerie city. One of my sisters is staring at that thing like its love at first site… Nesta, you’ve singed off your eyebrows!’

‘Have I?’

‘Just a little,’ Cassian admitted. ‘You look even more beautiful for it.’

At the compliment, Nesta rolled her eyes. She stepped away from him, and Cassian fought the urge to tug her back. He’d struggle to let her go again, he knew, but her sister needed her more. He'd have to suppress his instincts, just a little longer.

Nesta reached out an arm for Feyre and pulled her into an embrace. The younger one burst into tears the moment they touched.

Rhys’ voice came into their heads again, asking them to give the sisters a moment together.

***

‘I thought they’d kill you and you didn’t want to go then he came and said he could take us and I didn’t know if they’d find you and the cabin was on fire and the men were coming and Graysen would have killed you.’

‘You’re safe,’ Nesta hushed, stroking Feyre’s hair as she cried. Her sister had never wanted to share her battles, just like Nesta. Elain never minded who she cried to, but her and Feyre were the same. Private. Content to be alone. But it wasn’t always good to lock yourself away – she’d learnt as much in the cabin, learnt as much when she decided it was better to die than to accept Cassian and Azriel’s help. Something had snapped in Nesta, a desire to damn the consequences and seek out the lumbering male who’d nearly made a hole in her roof. It was not shameful to accept help. It would not be offered if it was a burden.

Through her tears, Feyre explained how they came to be in Velaris – and Nesta felt a sick sense of satisfaction that their father was not extended the courtesy. Nesta did not tell her sister about the Hewn City. For now, Velaris was a safe place. They would deal with whatever came next together. Even if that involved prising Elain away from Lucien Vanserra.

‘You did all that to your cabin to make a faerie laugh? I thought you were going mad.’

‘It must have been madness from the start when I hid Cassian from the villagers.’

It had been a long, long time since they had embraced each other. Feyre had been tiny the last time it happened. Nesta had blinked and Feyre had become a woman; her reflection in appearance and spirit. They had battled enough. They could try to be sisters now. With no poverty pressing down on their mood, without a father who was useless, with hope for the future, they could be sisters again.

‘This is a beautiful city,’ Feyre said, sniffing back her tears.

‘It is, isn’t it? We could try to love it. But if you want to return to the village then that’s where we will go.’

Feyre nodded, eyes still rimmed with tears. ‘I can’t tell if it’s the tiredness or hunger making me so emotional.’

‘Rest, eat, bathe then we could explore the city.’

‘I’d like that.’

Nesta watched her littlest sister be escorted to her room by the blonde woman, Mor, who chirped away happily despite the lack of sleep they were all experiencing. Before she had a chance to check to see if Elain had forced her engagement ring on Lucien’s finger, Cassian was dragging her down the hall by the hand.

‘Amren will kill Lucien if he tries anything. We have unfinished business.’

‘Unfinished? I recall you finishing.’

‘But you did not hence why it is unfinished.’ Cassian pinned her to the wall of his room, so Nesta had mere seconds to take in the racks of weapons on the wall before his lips were on hers again. He was surprisingly tender for such a large man. His kisses came with a dizzying intensity where Nesta felt as if the current might sweep her away.

‘You need a bath,’ he said, kissing her brow. ‘You stink of smoke, faerie wine, and dead animals.’

‘You have blood on your clothes.’

‘Then we are evenly matched. And,’ he led her by the hand through his tidy room, ‘the baths here can fit a handsome winged faerie and his beautiful mortal mate in comfortably.’

The bath had already been drawn for them. It was frothy with mountains of bubbles and scents of citrus rose from the steam rising from it. Candles encompassed the room and the curtains had been drawn.

‘Slow,’ Nesta whispered as Cassian tore off her clothes like a man starved.

He screwed his eyes shut for a moment then took more care to unlace her boots then remove her stockings. Her heart thumped louder with every layer he discarded. Despite following him to Prythian, this was still new territory. Letting a man touch her. Kiss her. It was still new.

Yet her body thrummed with energy. Nesta fought against her own urges to wrap her legs around his hips and kiss him until she starved of air.

‘Slow,’ she repeated to both of them.

‘Slow,’ Cassian agreed. ‘We have time now.’

@mis-lil-red

[sinner-as-saint]

Yours To Wield - 2.

Mob!Bucky x Reader

Series Masterlist

Run-through: With the enemy threatening to obliterate your family, you’re left with no choice but to take the hit just so he would spare your loved ones. Belonging to a mafia family requires sacrifices to be made at every step, and in order to save your family you make the ultimate one - you offer yourself up to the enemy. Bucky Barnes isn’t a man one negotiates with, he owns this city and whatever he says is considered law. But when you come to him with an irresistible offer, he bends his own rules for you. What starts out as an agreement becomes so much more, and the two of you find love where it wasn’t supposed to be. But rare are the love stories which don’t include some sort of war. 

Themes throughout the series: mob!bucky, smut, angst, language, (mild) soft dom/sub dynamic, fluff

“Where the hell have you been?” 

The minute you entered your father’s mansion, one of your brothers confronted you. You stopped halfway up the stairs and turned around and found Peter standing at the foyer. “Hi Pete.” You gave him your best smile. 

He just rolled his eyes and crossed his arms over his chest. “The guards said you disappeared with one of the cars. You weren’t answering your phone. I thought you were out clubbing, but dad and I called each and every club on our side of the city and no one saw you tonight. It’s two in the morning and you’re entering your own home like a thief.” He paused, glared at you then spoke, “I’ll ask you again, where have you been all night?” 

Oh shoot. A strange guilt took over you as you stared into Peter’s eyes but you had to lie. You absolutely had to. If you told him the truth right now, he would go crazy and wake up the whole house and just ruin everything, possibly more than he already had. You decided it’d be best if you told your family about the deal with Bucky tomorrow morning at breakfast. That would leave them with very little time to react, hence lessening the chance of your brothers fucking this up even more. 

So, you lied. And unfortunately you were really good at lying. 

“A friend of mine needed me, she broke up with her boyfriend a few days ago and had a pregnancy scare last night. I didn’t have time to explain all that to the guards so I just took off once she called me. I must’ve left my phone in the car in the rush.” You hang your head low to look as guilty as you felt, “Sorry.” You looked back up at him and gave him your best puppy dog eyes. 

Your brother melted immediately. Barely a year older than you, Peter still treated you like you were sixteen instead of twenty-five years old. He started walking towards you and you met him midway, at the bottom of the stairs. 

“Come here,” he opened his arms and you walked into his embrace and gave him a tight hug. You and him had come a long way from the orphanage, even back then he always acted like your elder brother, always protecting you and Harley from the mean kids. “I was worried. And you know how dad is these days.” He spoke, sighing. “Just give us a call next time, okay?” 

You pulled away and nodded. In the back of your mind you still remembered how Bucky mentioned that seven of his men had died, when Peter said there were only two of them. There was no way Bucky lied, so Peter must’ve done so to try and lessen the gravity of the situation. You loved Pete, but he was no saint and you knew that. 

“I know, I’m sorry.” You apologized. God only knows how he would react tomorrow morning. You stared into his hazel eyes and internally apologized again. I’m sorry, Pete. But this was necessary. “Can I go to bed now? I’m really tired.” 

He nodded and let you go, walking away and towards the study. You heard his footsteps getting further and further away as you rushed into your bedroom. You closed the door and leaned against it, taking in your bedroom for one last time. You glanced at the clock, it read 2:17 a.m., you then realized that the next night you won’t be sleeping here. You would be on the other side of the city, with the enemy in just a few hours. 

Right, you need to pack. 

You took a shower and instead of getting under the covers like you desperately wanted to, you grabbed two suitcases and began filling them up with your personal belongings. As you packed, your mind drifted off to Bucky. 

Bucky and his broody manner. His boyish smirk and sarcastic humor. His warm and cold touch. His shiny metal arm and his dark aura; like the perfect villain out of a story. You were certain that you’re not supposed to think of your family’s rival so much. But here you were, lost in the thoughts of the handsome man, remembering how it felt to be on his lap. 

---

You weren’t looking forward to having breakfast with your family this morning. You got very little sleep last night after you finished packing, and now at seven thirty in the morning, you were in the dining room with your father and brothers. You gripped the edge of the seat to keep yourself from shaking out of nervousness. Your fingertips felt numb and the lump in your throat refused to go away. 

Since you were awfully quiet, Harley pointed it out. “What’s up with you? Why are you all dressed up?” He asked, sipping on OJ, still with his bed hair, curly as always. 

“Are you going somewhere, honey?” Your dad asked and it pained you to look him in the eyes. But when you did, his face fell at the sight of the nervous look on your face. “What’s going on?” He reached over and placed his hand on top of yours, “Is everything okay?” 

Somewhere in the dining room, the grandfather clock ticked louder than ever before - a reminder that you didn’t have much time before Bucky sent a car, and his men to come and fetch you like he promised. Alright, now or never, come on. 

“I need to tell you all something.” All three men turned to look at you, their actions stopped at the sound of your shaky words. “Last night, I…” you exhaled loudly before continuing, your breakfast suddenly seemed very interesting as you lowered your eyes to your plate, unable to look at your family. “I went to see Bucky Barnes.” 

At your confession; cutlery were thrown onto porcelain plates, swear words were muttered along with threats and Peter seemed the most disturbed and upset. Harley just swore and checked to see if his gun was loaded, murmuring about wanting to ‘kill the son of a bitch’ while your father was quiet, listening, frozen in place. 

You turned to him. “I had to do something, dad. I couldn’t just sit here and watch him take my family away from me.” Seeing he remained quiet, you continued, “He finally agreed on not declaring a war against us, against all of Lowtown. It’s all going to be okay, you can stop worrying about war now dad, it won’t be happening.” 

His silence was heartbreaking.

“What the fuck? You went to Hightown alone? And struck a deal with our enemy?” Harley sounded disgusted as he asked, “What kind of a deal was it?” 

You didn’t answer. He asked again and you remained quiet. 

Peter spoke up, clearly irritated, “Answer the damned question.” His tone was as icy as his stare. And when you lifted your eyes and stared at him with defiance in yours, he pieced it together. He shook his head and said, “No. I won’t let him take you.” 

You scoffed and said, “You should have thought about all that before you two fucked up and then went on to lie about it.” 

At the sound of this your dad spoke up, “What lie?” He asked. One thing your father hated the most - liars. 

You had no choice but to let the truth out. “They both lied to us.” You pointed at your brothers then turned to your father, “They said only two of Bucky’s men died at the shootout they so foolishly started when in reality, they killed seven men out of spite.” You spat. 

Your father shook his head in disbelief, but remained silent as his fingers rubbed his temple. 

Your brother scoffed. “He’s turning you against us already?” Harley sounded even more disgusted than earlier. 

“He told me the truth.” You argued back. 

Peter spoke up, “So you lied to me last night?” 

“Yes.” You simply said. “I had to, I didn’t want you to go on another killing spree just for the hell of it.” 

Peter rolled his eyes and Harley shot up from his seat, his chair screeching against the floor, always the one to overreact the most out of all of you. “Is he coming to pick you up, the bastard? I’m gonna make sure he doesn’t leave this property alive and-,”

You cut him off, standing up from your seat and throwing the napkin down dramatically hard on the table. “You will do no such thing! I’m here trying to clean up the mess you made just so he doesn’t kill all of us because of your stupid antics, so let me do it!” 

Peter stood up next, throwing his napkin down even harder. “He can’t take you, you hear me?” He raised his voice. “Over my dead fucking body will he walk in here and just drag you all the way to his-,” 

You argued, louder, “I agreed to this! I went there willingly! I was all I could offer to him and thank fuck he agreed, otherwise we would have to-,”

Harley cut you off. “So what, now my sister is going to be his little plaything? You do realize he is our enemy, right? Or have you lost your fucking mind?” 

You were quick to reply, “If being his plaything is what it takes to keep my family alive then so be it! Besides, he sure is our enemy but he had never bothered us before you two fucked up recently!” Your father tensed at the sound of that. You lowered your voice and stared into your brother’s eyes as you spoke venomously, “You do realize that this is all your doing, right? Or have you lost your fucking mind?” 

“Are you-,” Harley began arguing back but your father cut him off. 

“Enough!” Your father bellowed. He looked at both your brothers and said, “I need to talk to her, alone.” 

The boys took that as their cue to leave, but not without sending you death glares. Once they were out of the dining room, you sat back down and turned to face your father. “Dad… please don’t hate me.” 

He surprised you when he said, “I don’t.” He seemed so heartbroken that it made your eyes water. “How can I… how can I just let you go?” 

You reached over and took his hand in yours. “Trust me, he’s not the monster we thought he was. He’s giving us a chance, please let me do this.” You pleaded. 

His eyes held a strange emotion as he looked back into yours. “I will get you out of there soon. I promise.” Your father looked more guilty than angry. 

You shook your head, letting the tears fall. “He promised that you guys will be safe here as long as I hold the end of my… bargain. I’m your daughter, you raised me to be strong. I will be alright. I promise.” 

Just then, the sound of a car honking outside cut you off. And your saw panic spread all over your father’s face. Honestly, you thought he would overreact like Harley, but he was weirdly passive. 

You smiled faintly through the tears and brought his hand up to your lips. “I have to go. Take care of yourself, and the boys.” 

You stood up from the dining table and walked away before you broke down even more. Fuck, your heart hurt like someone was literally tearing it into two inside your chest. You grabbed your luggage which you had left around the foyer and made your way to the front door. 

Your brothers were there before you, waiting; anger visible on their faces. You knew they would try to stop you, but with barely enough time, there wasn’t much they could do other than scowl. 

“If you walk out this door, I swear to God, I will-,”

You cut Harley off immediately. “What are you gonna do? Kill some more innocent people and lie to dad about it?” 

That shut him up. But Peter looked like he was about to explode. “Do you swear he’s not forcing you to do this? Did he threaten you?” He asked. 

You rolled your eyes at him. “No, I went to him. If anything, I’m forcing him into this.” 

To your surprise, Peter’s face softened. He walked over and wrapped his arms around you. “Take care.” He said.

You dropped one of your bags and wrapped an arm around him. “I will. You too.” You looked over Peter’s shoulder and saw Harley sulking. “And take care of this dumbass brother of ours as well.” 

Peter pulled away and leaned in to kiss your forehead. He whispered quietly against your skin so only you could hear, “I promise you, I will kill Barnes for this.” 

Your eyes widened as a cold chill ran through your body. “Pete, don’t-,” 

He cut you off immediately. “We’ll get you out of there soon. Okay?” He was so good at acting like he didn’t just promise you that he would end Bucky. 

“Don’t do this. Let me make this right, please. There’s no need to fight back.” You tried to reason with him. But Peter was hot-headed, he always was. “I’m doing this so there is no war, please don’t do anything stupid.” 

He scoffed but didn’t say anything. You knew deep down he felt guilty, but he was too proud to let it show. 

You shook your head and picked up your luggage again. You took one last look at your brothers, and you stepped outside where two shiny black SUVs were waiting for you. You wondered which one was meant for you so you waited. 

Then a man stepped out of the second one. He looked about Bucky’s age. Perfect hair, blue eyes, dark suit and very handsome as well. 

“Hi,” He said as he walked over to you with an ease in his steps, almost like he didn’t care he was in the enemy’s territory. “I’m Steve, Bucky’s second in command.” He introduced himself and gave you a dashing smile and a cheeky wink. “And you must be…” he frowned as he tried hard to remember, “Little diamond? No, little jewel?” You giggled at his words. He frowned harder for a second then broke into another dashing smile as he got it right, “Little pearl, yes!” 

“I’m Y/N.” You simply said as he reached over to grab your luggage in one hand and held your hand in the other as he casually walked you to the car as if he’s known you all your life. 

“Come on now, let’s get you home. Buck’s been impatient all morning.” Steve said. 

Something about him felt warm and it helped with your nervousness. You gave him a polite smile as he got the door for you. And once you settled into the leather seat you realized what he said. ‘Let’s get you home. Buck’s been impatient all morning.’ 

Home… that’s right. Wherever Bucky intended on keeping you would be your new home now. Also, he’s been impatiently waiting for you? 

You kept looking at your father’s house as the car drove away, and eventually out of the gates. You leaned back and settled comfortably into your seat, Steve sat on the other side of the backseat, focused on his phone. Two armed guards in the front, one of them was driving and another car - obviously also filled with armed guards - escorted you all the way to Hightown. 

You sighed quietly as you looked out of the window; it was quite a foggy and cold morning. You thought you would be more upset than this when leaving but the thought of your family being safe and away from war kept you strong.

You just prayed Peter doesn’t end up doing something incredibly stupid. 

--- 

Bucky was on the edge ever since Steve left with some guards to go and get you. To finally bring you where you belong, in Hightown. With him. 

He’s been quietly pacing in his study ever since the cars left through the gate. What if this was all a trap like Steve said? No, it couldn’t be. He couldn’t get any sleep last night, he was awake till five in the morning just thinking about how right it felt to have you on his lap. 

Barely an hour later, he heard the sound of the alarm go off as cars entered the gates of his property. He rushed to the floor-to-ceiling window of his study and watched how the cars came to a stop. And then he saw you stepping out of the first one and he smirked in triumph. 

-

You followed Steve’s lead inside Bucky’s lavish home. Your father’s house was extravagant enough, but this was something else. Grand, yet warm at the same time. There was something about this house which made you instantly like it. 

“How many people live here?” You asked as you stood at the foyer, looking around. 

“Just me and Bucky. Sometimes the guards will stay over if needed. My house is on the other side of the property but I’m here most of the time. You’ll be the third housemate now.” He answered casually, not looking up from his phone. 

You chuckled at the sound of that. Housemate… Steve spoke as if you were a guest rather than a pawn in this game. You looked around some more. And then a pair of deep blue eyes met with yours. 

Bucky. 

He walked down the stairs and stood right in front of you, hands in the pockets of his dark pants as he faced you with an arrogant smile on his face. You tried not to let it show that his stare was making you feel things you shouldn’t. This is still the enemy, you reminded yourself. 

You and Bucky just stared at each other until Steve spoke up, “As promised, I brought your little opal home.” He said to his friend, purposely messing up the nickname just to mess with Bucky. 

“Steve?” Bucky made sure he had his attention. 

“Yes?”

“Get out.” 

Steve laughed before giving you a little bow and turned to walk away. Once confirmed that Steve was gone, Bucky spoke up, looking right at you, “Welcome,” He extended his metal hand out for you to take, and once you did, Bucky led you over to the flight of marble stairs. “Your brothers behaved, I assume?” 

“They weren’t really on board with this.” You replied, noticing how he didn’t let go of your hand even as you two walked upstairs. “We argued before I left.” You chose not to tell him what Peter said. 

Bucky kept quiet as he walked you down another spacious hallway, one which ended at double, off-white French doors. Then he said, “This will be your room. Mine’s in the east wing,” He explained and pointed towards the other hallways which led to his bedroom. “Make yourself comfortable, you’ll find everything you need in there already.” 

You looked up into his blue eyes and for a second there, you didn’t see the beast they said he was. “Aren’t you supposed to be mean to me? I am your enemy’s daughter, you know?” You raised an eyebrow at him. 

He chuckled before speaking, “I’ll be away all day. Call for Steve if you need anything. And be ready by 9 tonight. We’ll be going out.” He turned around to leave but you called out for him before he walked too far away. 

“Where will we be going?” You asked. 

He turned to face you with a smirk. “It’s a surprise, little pearl. Now go on, make yourself at home.” 

The intensity of his stare had you frozen in place as you watched him walk down the hallway, and you only moved when he had disappeared from your sight. You turned to the doors and opened them, walked in and the sight surprised you for a second. 

A fully furnished, all neutral colored bedroom. It was about the same size as the one at your father’s house. A king-sized, four-poster bed in the middle of the room, plush carpet all around it. You noticed a lovely balcony as well. You immediately checked out the bathroom and it was just as lavish and dreamy as the rest of the room. 

This isn’t so bad, you thought to yourself as you walked over to the bed, ready to jump under the covers and maybe take a nap to recover the hours of sleep you lost last night. But as you approached the bed, you noticed a wrapped present in the middle of it. And a note attached to it which said: 

‘For tonight.’ 

Hmm, did he also leave you an outfit? Oh well, you took the box and placed it elsewhere for now. You desperately needed to sleep. You’d deal with wherever Bucky was taking you later. 

---

Bucky reached home in the evening, and saw Steve first as soon as he walked in. The latter seemed to be in his usual easy-going mood. 

“Where’s she?” He asked Steve. 

Steve simply pointed upstairs. “Slept all day.” 

“She ate?” 

“Yeah, we had dinner together. She’s nice, I like her.” 

Bucky smiled as he made his way upstairs, towards your bedroom. He knocked but you didn’t respond. He checked and found that the door was unlocked so he took the liberty of walking in. “Hello?” He called out and heard some shuffling in the bathroom. He kept walking cautiously. He stood in the middle of the room and spoke up again. “It’s almost nine, we have to go.” He called out softly, “Why are you hiding from me?” 

Your voice replied from inside the bathroom. “I’m not hiding.” He heard you groan, then you said, “This is very revealing.” 

He smirked to himself. “Come out, let me see you.” 

You sighed and then the bathroom door opened, revealing you in the outfit Bucky left you earlier on the bed. Barely an outfit, it was just lingerie. A dark red, delicate, lace bodysuit which hugged your body perfectly. A plunging neckline and tight lacing at the back. 

Bucky shamelessly took his time in taking in your appearance. Allowing his eyes to roam your body slowly. You felt hot under his stare; you looked good and you knew it but when a man like Bucky Barnes is admiring you in lingerie, you are bound to feel flustered. 

Meanwhile Bucky was at a loss of words. But he cleared his throat and forced himself to speak up rather than just stare at you like you were his favorite work of art. “You look exquisite, little pearl.” Bucky said as he walked over to you and gently stroked your cheek. “What are you complaining about?” He asked, noticing the way your chest pressed against his with each breath you took. 

You recovered from his words, touch and proximity and said, “Isn’t it a little odd for me to be walking around half naked?” You faked some confidence as you spoke. 

He chuckled. “It is, that’s why I brought this.” You hadn’t noticed that he brought something else with him until he handed you it. You took it and admired the soft fabric of the luxurious, red satin and mesh robe. Bucky casually wrapped his arms around your body and rested the palms of his hands against your butt, pulling you closer discreetly. 

You looked up at him and frowned, “Why not give it to me earlier?” You asked. 

He looked down at you and said, “Because I wanted to see you in this first,” he spoke as he gently rubbed his arm up and down your back, “And I must say, you look even better than I imagined.” 

You narrowed your eyes at him and noticed the playfulness in his eyes. “We’re going into one of your sex dungeons, aren’t we?” You acted like just the thought of that didn’t make you want to clench your thighs together. 

Bucky himself had anticipated this all day. He was dying to play with you. “Is that alright?” He asked. 

You answered him as you put on the robe. “Yes, whatever you’d like. According to our deal I’m all yours, remember?” You reached down to tie it around your waist but Bucky beat you to it. 

His… all his. He didn’t know what to do with all that power. He secured the cincture around your waist and pulled you closer again. “I need your proper consent.” 

You looked up at him, smiled and said, “Yes, Bucky. I would like to visit your sex dungeon with you.” 

He laughed. “Don’t call it that. It’s like any other club, except more…” he trailed off, searching for the right word. 

“Dirty?” You suggested, lips lifting into a smirk matching his own. 

He smirked and said, “Salacious.” He let go of your body and took a step back, admiring you yet again. He held his hand out for you to take again, “We should get going.” 

--

Bucky’s sinful lair was everything you imagined it being. 

At a first glance, it looked like any other luxury strip club. But as you took in the details, you noticed that it was not exactly that. The lights were dimmer than a regular club, more accents of black than red in the interior. And this one contained several, dark and more secluded booths. There were a couple of dimly lit play spaces, used for open scenes, scattered around the large main area - which were so discreet that you’d really have to look to see whether or not people occupied it. 

The club was more shadowy but tamer than you expected it to be. Most people either drank or mingled, or both at once. Few, you noticed, engaged in anything sexual at all. Barely anyone at all. There were clubs like these in Lowtown, and you had been once or twice and they were always overwhelming. 

But not this one. You couldn’t resist but comment on it. “It’s so nice and… tame.” You held on to Bucky’s hand as you leisurely made your way further inside the club. 

Bucky secured your hand in his metal one and said, “If you’re interested in more hardcore stuff you should visit Steve’s club.” He explained. 

That made sense. 

You smirked, “So basically everyone here is vanilla?” You could see how that offended him. You even giggled at the disappointed look on his face. 

Bucky chuckled as he stopped walking, circled an arm around you, pulling you into his chest before speaking, “People who frequent my club like their privacy. You see, this,” he pointed around the main area, “is simply where people mingle, get to know each other. But the real fun,” he leaned in and whispered seductively, “happens upstairs. In the private rooms.” He pulled away to study your reaction and added, “Which is where you and I are headed, little pearl.” 

His voice reverberated inside you. You held on to him, scared that your knees might buckle and you might just fall to the floor if you let him go. The things this man’s voice did to you… unreal. 

You followed Bucky up the stairs, which you hadn’t noticed in the corner of the main area, again due to the dimmed lights. And once you were at the top, you got a sense of déjà vu from the previous night, when you walked to the back of another club to go meet him for the first time. 

The private room was, again, more or less how you expected it to be. Only smaller, but more airy. All red and black interior, velvet couches, comfortable and cozy. You noticed the mini bar in the other end of the room and realized that this must be his personal play space. 

You walked in and took in more and more of the room while Bucky locked the door and poured himself a drink. Then spoke up. “Remember your colors?” He asked. 

“Yes.” You replied, thinking back to the contract. 

“Good.” He turned to look at you. “Do you remember your safeword?” You looked at him and nodded. He smiled and asked, “What was it?” 

A sudden confidence boost hit you and you smirked and replied, “Bum hole.” 

Bucky couldn’t help but chuckle out loud behind the lip of his glass of whiskey, he murmured something along the lines of ‘should’ve known’ and took a slow sip of the honey colored liquid before he smirked and said, “Take the robe off.” 

You straightened your back and untied the knot at the front of the robe, letting it fall and pool around your ankles. You kept your eyes on him as you await further instructions. Bucky walked away from the mini bar and towards one of the multiple couches, and took a seat. “Come here,” he pointed to the spot in between his legs as he made himself comfortable, manspreading as much as he could. “Kneel.” He instructed. 

You did as he asked, trying your best to ignore the way your core throbbed at the sound of his deep voice, and knowing he watched you intently as you moved. His stare was burning, adding to the desire which pooled in between your legs. 

“What’s your safe word?” He asked again. 

“Red.” 

The fiery look in your eyes, even as you knelt in front of him, was his undoing. He reached out with his hand and touched your lip, traced your mouth slowly as he murmured, “Sassy little mouth, isn’t it?” He tugged on your bottom lip with his thumb and you saw that as an opportunity to nip at his finger with your teeth. He playfully hissed and pulled his hand away from your mouth, “Bad little pearl.” He whispered. 

You watched him as he took another sip at his drink, you followed the way his Adam's apple bobbed when he swallowed. Without thinking, your gaze trailed down to the bulge in his pants. It was so prominent that there was no way you could ignore it. Nor ignore the way your body flushed just looking at it. 

You did that to him. And that thought only tormented you further. So much so that you fidgeted in your spot and he noticed. He would gladly tease you some more, but his hard cock was all he could think about at the moment, and he desperately needed you to take care of it for him. 

“Do you want it, little pearl?” He asked, pointing at the very obvious bulge in his pants. You nodded and he clicked his tongue, disapproving, “Speak up. Do you want it?” 

“Yes.” 

Satisfied, he smiled and leaned further back into his seat. “Go on.” 

You reached out, trying your hardest not to seem impatient as you unbuckled his pants and he helped you in lowering his pants and underwear just enough to free his cock. The sight of it, leaking with precum, hard and pulsing, had your mouth watering in need already. 

Fuck… this is not what you had envisioned yourself doing with your family’s rival anytime soon, but here you were not complaining at all. You parted your lips and inched forward; wrapping your hands around his cock, placing your mouth on him; your tongue slowly circling his tip. Bucky reached out and gently slid his fingers into your hair and grabbed a fistful of it; tugging on it and slowly pushed your head down and himself deeper into your mouth. You took him inch by inch until he hit the back of your throat.

You looked up at his perfect face as you sucked on his cock. He had his eyes closed, lips parted and gasping as he tilted his head back. He looked every bit of the powerful ruler he was meant to be. “Oh fuck…” he moaned quietly and you quickened your pace. 

He thrust his hips forward very gently into your mouth, and then looked down, loving the sight of your spit coating his cock. You looked magnificent on your knees, taking him perfectly, like he knew you would. “Such a good girl for me, aren’t you?” He mumbled. 

You felt all tingly at the sound of his deep, raspy voice. The slow gasps and quiet moans which escaped his lips made you squirm and it only added to the dampness which was forming in between your legs. He twitched against your tongue and you tasted more of his pre cum. You took him out of your mouth, licking his cock from bottom to top, watching him intently as you teased him. 

Bucky gently pushed your mouth back down on his cock, you struggled to breath for just a second but then you grew accustomed to it. You relaxed your throat and allowed him deeper into your mouth. That made him tilt his head back and moaned again, tightening his grip on your hair. He swore under his breath, smirking in bliss as you pulled him out and dragged your tongue over the slit on this tip lazily. 

“Fuck…” he whispered, looking down at you. “Make me come, little pearl.” He ordered, his voice surprisingly gentle. 

You obeyed, placed your hands on his thighs and sucked on his cock until he came; spilling his warm load down your throat. You focused on swallowing all of it. He came, growling in pleasure, closing his eyes and relishing the warmth of your mouth wrapped around him. You swallowed all of him, licked him clean once you were done, and zipped his pants back up again. You waited, watching him as he recovered and got his breathing under control. He opened his eyes again and reached out to gently stroke your cheek. 

“Come here,” he patted his lap and watched you as you carefully got off the floor and straddled him, making yourself comfortable on his lap. 

You placed your hands on his shoulders and bit your lip as you watched him, your own hunger growing with each passing second. The feral look in his eyes wasn't helping either. It took you everything in you to refrain from grinding your hips against his body to seek some sort of relief for the sweet pain in between your legs. 

“You did so well, my little pearl.” He whispered and given that your chest was now right in his face, all he had to do was lean in to bite your nipple through the flimsy fabric of the bodysuit. 

You wanted this thing off of you. You needed to feel his skin on yours. Now. 

But Bucky had other plans. He wrapped his lips around your hardened nipple and you arched your back, pushing further into his mouth, making him chuckle. “So eager,” he commented. 

A soft moan left your lips as he rubbed his hand higher and higher up along your exposed legs, and caressing your inner thighs as he went. He smirked when he made you moan out loud, finally. He kissed his way up till your jaw and then back down your neck; his stubble brushing against your skin gently. His lips warm and soft as they peppered your skin with kisses, making you instinctively tilt your neck to give him an easier access.

He smirked when you visibly trembled as his knuckles brushed against the front of the body suit. Just a thin, wet piece of lace shielded your body from his touch. But not for long. Bucky pushed the fabric aside and pressed his metal fingers to your folds, humming in satisfaction when he found out that you were dripping down there. 

His mouth brushed over yours as he spoke, “You want me to make you feel good, little pearl?” He asked. 

You nodded, gasping at the way his fingers stroked your wet folds. “Yes… please.” You whimpered when you felt his two fingers circling around your clit. 

“So wet and needy for me,” he whispered against your mouth as he pushed a finger past your entrance. Then another and started gently pumping them in and out of you. He placed his thumb on your throbbing clit and brushed it occasionally while he finger-fucked you; your warm wetness dripping and smearing all over his hand. 

Your lips parted as your moans left your mouth incessantly, but Bucky quickly shut you up by placing his mouth on yours; finally kissing you properly while his fingers were buried deep inside you, touching you in all the right places, curling just right and massaging your walls perfectly.

Bucky liked the sound of your moans so much that he decided to tease you even more by pushing two fingers into your mouth and slowly pumped those two as well while he finger-fucked you. Your mouth immediately wrapped around his fingers. And he swore under his breath again at the sight of you so… dirty; with two of his fingers buried in your pretty little cunt, slipping in and out of you rapidly while his other two fingers were buried into your warm mouth. 

He groaned just at the sight of you like this, on his lap, all for him to play with. “If only they could see you now.” He chuckled, “All messy and needy for me,” he leaned in closer and removed his fingers from your mouth; his own lips inches away from yours as he whispered, “My little plaything.” He smirked and sped up, noticing the way you whimpered through your parted lips as you stared into his eyes, your walls clenching around his metal fingers violently. 

You felt a rush and a warmth washing over you; intensified by his words. “Please,” you whimpered, thrusting your hips gently into his fingers, “Can I please come?” You asked with watery eyes. 

“Oh, my little pearl…” Bucky knew at that moment that come what may, no one was ever going to take you away from him from here on now. He wouldn’t allow it. Ever. “Go on baby, come for me. Come all over my fingers like a good girl…” he leaned in to kiss you as he felt you come undone all over his fingers; crying out loud in pleasure. 

You came all over his hand as he kept pumping them in and out of you, getting everything he could out of you. He deepened the kiss, and kissed you like there’s no tomorrow; there was nothing gentle about the kiss, just fiery passion. His tongue invading your mouth, his teeth tugging at your lips; just raw, burning desire. 

Bucky held you close as you recovered both from the orgasm and the mind blowing kiss. He kissed your forehead repeatedly and reminded you just how good you’ve been to him tonight. You nuzzled his neck and breathed in his cologne as he held you, rubbing his hand up and down your back while the other traced imaginary shapes on your thigh. 

“You okay?” He asked after a while.  

You smiled against his skin and pulled away to look him in the eyes. “I am.” 

He grabbed your hand and brought it up to his lips, placing a gentle kiss against your knuckles. Bucky asked, “Want me to make you a drink? And then we can go downstairs and chill for a bit before going home.” 

You nodded, liking his little plan. 

And that’s exactly what you did for the rest of your time there at the club. Some people came up to talk to him, some women complimented you. And each time someone even smiled at you, Bucky would tighten his grip around you or would lean in to kiss your neck or lips - reminding everyone that you belonged to him.

You didn’t mind it at all. 

---

By the time you reached home, all you wanted to do was to get in the shower and then climb into your comfy bed to get some sleep. 

“I’ll see you tomorrow.” Bucky kissed you goodnight at the bottom of the stairs, telling you he needed to have a chat with Steve before going to bed. “Sleep well, little pearl.” 

He stood at the bottom of the stairs and watched you as you made your way upstairs. The smile he had all night was new to him. He was never usually this content with everything. Normally he’d brood in the evening, the day’s work weighing down on him. But not today. 

Steve even pointed it out once he entered the study. “You look like you had a great night.” He commented, pouring two glasses of whiskey and handing one over to Bucky. 

Bucky nodded. “I did.” He took a sip of his drink and faced Steve, “Now tell me why the fuck you’ve been blowing up my phone all night?” 

Steve took his phone out and turned the screen towards Bucky as the two stood by the mini bar. “What’s this?” Bucky asked as he watched the short, blurry video of a group of people walking into a dark building. 

“That,” Steve tapped on the dark building, “is our warehouse. And these,” he tapped on the group of people, “are Stark’s men.” When Bucky raised his eyebrows at his words, Steve continued, “They were seen snooping around. They didn’t carry much with them, just handguns probably.” 

“Did we catch them?” Bucky asked. 

Steve shook his head. “Some of our guys chased them down, but they made it to the other side of the city before we could catch them.” Steve paused. “I don’t know, it just doesn’t add up.” 

Bucky placed his glass down, no longer in the mood to drink. “What doesn’t add up?” 

Steve exhaled loudly. “If they were Stark’s men, they were surely here for her. And if they were, then why waste time searching the warehouses? Why not show up here instead? I mean they know where we live, so why not come for her directly?” 

Steve did have a point. However… “What if they weren’t her father’s men?” Bucky proposed. “And what if they weren’t here for her?” 

Steve frowned, “Her brothers’ men?” 

Bucky nodded. “Maybe they were indeed just here to snoop around. To take a look, see what they’re up against should they choose to, you know, confront us in the near future.” 

“Hmm,” Steve assessed the situation, “Maybe you’re right.” 

“I want more security around the house.” Bucky ordered. “And make sure we have eyes on the Starks at all times, I want to know about each and every move they make.” Steve nodded, already tapping on his phone screen. Bucky then asked, “Do we have any news on her brothers?” 

Steve nodded, still typing. “Our spies have reported back saying they have been suspiciously quiet about this whole thing.” Steve finally put his phone away and said, “You know, they aren’t going to be quiet for long.” 

Bucky smirked at the thought. “I know. Let them come, we’ll be ready when they do.” 

Steve chuckled, “Yes we will.” 

After a few seconds spent in silence, Bucky sighed and decided he had enough for today. “I’m going to bed, you should get some sleep too.” 

“I’ll stay up another hour or so, I need to go through the camera footage and see if I can track any of them down.” Steve replied and went back to take a seat at his desk. Bucky nodded and turned to leave. Just as he reached the door, Steve called out again, “Hey Buck?” 

“Yeah?” 

Steve cleared his throat, hesitated a little before asking, “Does she know about that night?” 

A wave of mixed emotions hit Bucky at the sound of the simple question. He knew immediately which night Steve was talking about. He tried to shake off the sudden weight on his chest as he replied, “No, she doesn’t.” 

Steve nodded slowly. “You plan on telling her?” 

Bucky knew why Steve was curious to know. A lot had happened that night, and a lot changed. 

“I don’t know.” 

 ---

a/n: i can explain- 

[hylialeia]

there is something incredible to me about the development of Daenerys’s relationship to power from AGOT to where she is in the current story, because despite GRRM’s consistent dedication to showing the “ruling is hard” side of fantasy (which I appreciate immensely, don’t get me wrong), the narrative still makes it clear that Dany’s ultimate motives are genuinely good and, not only that, but it shows that yes, that good intention matters.

“Why do the gods make kings and queens, if not to protect the ones who can't protect themselves?” (Daenerys III, ASOS)

Dany starts the story in such a position of powerlessness, but every move she makes as she strives forward is made with the goal of remedying the injustice and cruelty that she herself endured and making sure it doesn’t become a reality for others.

it’s why we see her so shaken by Drogo’s methods of preparing for war, why she can’t buy the Unsullied, why she can’t abandon the freedmen on the road, why she can’t abandon Meereen after what happened to Astapor. Daenerys’s journey shows her making mistakes and struggling, like anyone in a position of power would, but something I think gets ignored because it sounds too “cheesy” for the series is that, at every turn, Dany tries to do better for the sake of the people around her.

and the thing is, I think a lot of people get swept up in ASOIAF’s reputation of not pulling its punches, even for main characters, and showing how difficult and messy actual leadership can be, that they forget that--at its core--ASOIAF never says it isn’t worth it to try and do good. it’s not a “the road to hell is paved with good intentions” type of story, no matter what the show adaption tried to pull; it’s not nihilistic, not by a long shot. Daenerys trying to be good, succeeding and failing and learning and doing it all over again, is the whole point.

Seven, Brienne thought again, despairing. She had no chance against seven, she knew. No chance, and no choice.

She stepped out into the rain, Oathkeeper in hand. (Brienne VII, AFFC)

the story is telling us that it’s not easy to do the right thing; it’s hard, it hurts, and a lot of the time it’s not even rewarded. but Daenerys tries to do it anyway. in a world where it seems hopeless, where sometimes it doesn’t work, where it feels like it isn’t enough, and even when it backfires, she keeps trying. that’s what resonates and what matters, and what places her in the same league as other fantasy heroes who seem more successful at first. it’s not easy, and that’s why it means so much.

[viviehnne]

tag dump !!

[btsqualityy]

Assuage: Chapter 18

Yoongi x Reader

Genre: ABO (Alpha/Beta/Omega) dynamics, angst, fluff, smut, enemies to lovers

Warnings: Multiple threats of violence and threats to kill people, and heartbreak lol

Within ten minutes of Hobi coming to tell Namjoon that Seo-hyun was on his way, Namjoon was stationed near the front of your territory which was right in front of the Head Hall. You, Yoongi, Jungkook, Hobi, and several other Alphas and Omegas were standing right alongside him as well. 

“Alright, you guys will let him talk and none of you will throw any blows first,” Namjoon instructed you all.

“Oh, throwing blows isn’t all I wanna do,” Hobi scoffed.

“Agreed,” you muttered.

“I know that but this pack doesn’t start wars, we only finish them if need be,” Namjoon stated firmly and everyone knew from his tone of voice that the best thing to do was to not argue. As you all waited, you reached out and grabbed Yoongi’s hand, intertwining your fingers with his as you bounced up and down on your tip toes.

“God, I feel like vomiting,” you whispered to him.

“It’ll be ok baby, I’ll be right here with you,” he assured you. “Me and Namjoon and Taehyung too.”

“I know,” you nodded, sending him a small smile. Just then, the loud sounds of hooping and hollering made you turn your head back to face front, the frown on your face immediately appearing when you saw a large group of people walking towards the Head Hall.

“Remember what I said everyone,” Namjoon said and you all nodded. As the group got closer, you had to will yourself not to either turn and run away or try to run forward and murder the man who was leading the group. 

“Well, well, well, look’s like we have an audience waiting for us!” Seo-hyun cackled happily as he stopped to stand right in front of Namjoon, the rest of his pack standing behind him. 

“Well, when you decide to just show up on someone else’s territory, this is what you can expect,” Namjoon shrugged.

“Don’t you mean my soon to be territory, Namjoonie?” Seo-hyun smirked.

“That’s Pack Alpha Kim to you,” Hobi corrected him. “You disrespectful waste of space.”

“Aw, is this your Head Fighter?” Seo-hyun asked Namjoon before turning to look at Hobi. “You know, you are a dead ringer for your mother.” Hobi immediately tried to walk towards him but Namjoon stuck his arm out, stopping him. 

“Keep it together,” Namjoon whispered to him and after hesitating for a moment, Hobi nodded and stepped back to his original spot.

“I guess the little Alpha does have control over his pack,” Seo-hyun chuckled.

“What do you want Seo-hyun?” Namjoon questioned him firmly. 

“What do I want? Well, it’s very simple really,” Seo-hyun replied. “I want your pack and the territory that comes with it.”

“Don’t you remember what happened the last time that you decided that you wanted to take over other packs and their territories?” Namjoon asked. “Your Alpha pride caused you to lose not only the war but also your territory and most of your pack that you obviously had to spend the last seven years rebuilding. Don’t ruin your second opportunity to be a decent Pack Alpha for once in your life.”

“You know what, you don’t need to concern yourself with that because I’m a better Alpha than you’ll ever be, little pup,” Seo-hyun seethed. “You’re weak.”

“And what would make him strong?” You spat, anger laced throughout your voice. “Starting unnecessary wars just to satisfy his own bloodlust?”

“Oh, it’s the ever elusive Prime Omega,” Seo-hyun smirked as he looked at you. “You know, since it seems like your big brother is gonna be too stupid to just give me your pack, I do hope I get the pleasure of feeling your body up against mines on the battle field. That is, before I pry it from your brother’s cold, dead hands.”

“You threaten him one more time, you’re gonna have your own cold, dead hands to worry about,” Hobi snapped.

“And you don’t fucking talk to her like that,” Yoongi spoke up, not missing how Seo-hyun’s eyes widened when he looked at him. “She’s spoken for.”

“I see you took in my weak little Prime Alpha,” Seo-hyun said. 

“Yours?” You echoed, turning to look at Yoongi. “What is he talking about?”

“Oh, don’t tell me that you didn’t do your research on a lone wolf before taking him in?” Seo-hyun cackled. “He was in my pack until I kicked him out for being a weakling. Actually, he’s just like you Namjoonie, so I can understand why you took him in.”

“What?” You whispered and Yoongi could literally hear the hurt in your voice as your hand slipped out of his. 

“Look, let’s just make this easy on everyone, huh?” Seo-hyun suggested. “Namjoon, you can just step down and give me the pack and territory, or I can kill you before taking it. Your choice.”

“I guess you’ll have to try to kill me, because I’ll be damned if you take this pack from me while I’m living and breathing,” Namjoon stated firmly. 

“It’s your death,” Seo-hyun smiled. “One week from today, I’ll be back to claim your territory.”

“Yeah, we’ll see,” Namjoon scoffed and that’s the last thing that was said before Seo-hyun turned around and walked off, his pack following closely behind him. As soon as they were out of sight, you turned and ran away, not even giving Yoongi the chance to say anything to you. Knowing that he needed to talk to you, Yoongi immediately ran after you, only hoping that you wouldn’t hate him too much.

...................................

When Yoongi finally found you after looking around almost the entire territory, you were near the stream, sitting on top of your favorite rock as you looked down at the water.

“Y/N-ah,” he called out as he walked over to you and you lifted your head, scowling when you saw him. 

“Go the fuck away Yoongi,” you grumbled. 

“I need to talk to you,” he insisted. 

“Oh, now you wanna fucking talk?!” You exploded as you sat up straight, hopping down off of the rock. “Unless you can tell me that Seo-hyun was lying just now, then I don’t want to hear it.”

“He wasn’t lying but it’s not what you think,” he tried to say. 

“It’s not what I think?” You chuckled in disbelief. “What I think is that I fucking trusted you and all this time, I’ve been sleeping next to and with someone who is from the pack that killed my parents and so many others from my pack.”

“Baby, it’s not like that,” Yoongi tried to explain and he moved forward, his hand reaching out to touch you but you quickly stepped away from him. 

“If you try to touch me right now, I can’t be held liable for what I’d do to you,” you  fumed.

“Ok, I’m sorry,” he apologized, holding his hands up in mock surrender. You then began to pace back and forth, doing your best to try and keep your anger at bay. 

“Is this what you were trying to tell me earlier?” You asked as you looked over at him. 

“Yes,” he nodded. “And I’ve been trying to figure out how to tell you for days now.”

“Obviously not hard enough,” you huffed. “I accepted your gift and let you spend my heat with me. Don’t you think this is something that I deserved to know?”

“Of course, which is why I was trying to tell you,” Yoongi repeated. “I respect you Y/N-ah, I really do and I don’t take you accepting my gift or letting me spend your heat with you lightly. You have to believe me when I say that.”

“Well, forgive me if that’s a little fucking hard right now,” you scoffed. You continued to pace, trying to work through the jumble of thoughts that were currently buzzing around in your head.

“Baby, I’m sorry,” Yoongi said. “I didn’t know.”

“You didn’t know? Then what the fuck were you trying to tell me?” You demanded to know. Before Yoongi could open his mouth to answer, you held your hand up.

“You know what, I just have one question,” you said as you stopped pacing and looked at him. “Did you know he was the one who killed my parents? Like, him specifically.”

“Y/N-ah,-”

“Don't you dare lie to me,” you ordered. “Not while I have your gift around my neck.” Yoongi then looked down at the necklace that rested against your skin, which had basically become a part of you ever since he had given it to you, and Yoongi hated himself because he knew exactly what was going to happen after he let the answer to your question slip out of his mouth.

“Yes,” he replied and the tears that had been welling up in your eyes spilled over onto your cheeks. 

“I can’t believe you,” you whimpered. 

“Y/N, I’m sorry,” he told you. 

“I’m sorry too, sorry that I fell in love with a lone wolf,” you spat, reaching up and snatching the necklace off of your neck, throwing at him afterwards. “I never wanna see you again.”

“Y/N,-” he tried to call out but you were already running away from him, back to where the cabins were. Knowing that there would be no good to come out of going after you this time, he decided to walk back towards the front of the territory. 

Just as he made it past the Head Hall, a hard punch to his jaw knocked him down onto the ground. Before he could even react, there was a body on top of his, holding him down with an elbow to his throat.

“Joon-ah, get off him!” Hobi shouted as he tried to grab Namjoon’s arm and when Yoongi was finally able to focus his eyes again, he saw Namjoon glaring down at him.

“Joon hyung, he could kill you!” Jungkook hollered as he tried to grab Namjoon’s other arm, and Namjoon turned his head to look at them over his shoulder.

“Either of you touch me again, I won’t hesitate to give you exactly what I’m going to give this dumbass,” he growled, referring to Yoongi and with a lot of hesitation, both Hobi and Jungkook slowly left him go and backed off. 

“You might want to listen to them,” Yoongi mumbled and Namjoon looked back down at him. “I could kill you.” As soon as the words had registered, Namjoon didn’t hesitate to raise his free hand and punch Yoongi dead in the eye. 

“I’d love to see you try me right now,” Namjoon snarled, putting more pressure on Yoongi’s throat and Yoongi’s eyes widened, realizing that Namjoon was deadly serious. “Now, did Seo-hyun send you here?”

“What?” Yoongi huffed. “No, he didn’t.”

“Because it’s real convenient that you were ‘kicked out’ of your old pack near our territory,” Namjoon continued. “Have you been giving him information?”

“I’d never do that,” Yoongi insisted. 

“I smell bullshit,” Namjoon hissed. 

“He beat me and left me for dead,” Yoongi reminded him. “He’s treated me just as badly as anyone else.” 

“Listen to him hyung,” Jungkook spoke up.

“Shut up and let Namjoon deal with this,” Hobi snapped at him. 

“You were just trying to get him off Yoongi a minute ago too, you know?” Jungkook pointed out.

“Because he just punched him out of nowhere and I didn’t know why he was doing it but his reasoning makes sense,” Hobi responded. 

“Let me go Namjoon,” Yoongi grumbled as he began to struggle underneath him.

“Do you realize that I could genuinely kill you right now?” Namjoon sneered. “Not only did you put my entire pack at risk, you fucking hurt my sister and betrayed the trust of both her and my brother, who’s the only reason why I even took you in to begin with.”

“I understand that.”

“Do you?” Namjoon questioned harshly as he pressed down harder on Yoongi’s throat. “I understand that coming from Seo-hyun’s pack, you probably don’t relate to the concept of loyalty but this pack lives by it and you went against that.”

“Joon hyung, you’re gonna choke him out!” Jungkook exclaimed. 

“That’s the point Jungkook-ah,” Namjoon replied. 

“Hobi hyung, don’t let him do this,” Jungkook pleaded as he turned to look at Hobi. “He’s just angry right now but he’ll hate himself for it later.”

“The kid’s right Joon-ah,” Hobi sighed as he stepped over to them, reaching down and gently setting his hand on Namjoon’s shoulder. “You shouldnt kill him, let me do it.”

“Hobi hyung!” Jungkook exclaimed. 

“Please Namjoon,” Yoongi whispered, his breathing not coming as easily because of Namjoon’s elbow. Namjoon glared at him for a little while longer before taking his elbow away from Yoongi’s throat, standing up off of his body. Yoongi coughed as he sat up, holding onto his throat. 

“You get the fuck off of my territory and away from my pack,” Namjoon commanded. 

“N-no,” Yoongi mumbled. 

“Hyung,” Jungkook gasped but Namjoon held up his hand, silencing him. 

“He’s too close to them, so he’s untrustworthy,” Namjoon explained before looking at Yoongi again. “Get your things and go. You’re no longer welcome here.” Namjoon then turned and walked away, Hobi following behind him. Jungkook hesitated, mouthing ‘sorry’ to Yoongi before running off behind Namjoon. 

As Yoongi sat there, taking in the gravity of everything that had just happened in the last hour, his eyes widened in horror when he realized that he had just lost his family again; for the third time in his life and that realization hit him like a ton of bricks. 

...................................

Tag List: @jikook-enthusiasts @veryuniquenamegoeshere @seolarsyj @littlrmills14-blog @preciouschimine @kt-rny @copenhagenspiritQueuePost

[timetravelersdoctor]

Minimus Ambus in tfa Au

So I've come across a few Minimus Ambus in tfa au's and I decided to make one of my own. Hope you enjoy! (this au doesn’t really follow the series but it is set in the animated universe.)

In this universe Minimus was chosen to be the next magnus as Minimus magnus but he was attacked and was going to die however the council couldn't afford to lose him so they decided to put him in a suit they called ultra armor. (My brain can't come up with anything better right now)

As soon as he was placed in the armor he came back from the brink of death. He was alive but due to the fact that it was the armor keeping him alive he couldn't leave it. The council convinced Minimus not to tell anyone he was alive and they created a new identity ultra magnus. Only a few people knew the truth about ultra magnus.

Then the war happened and even fewer people knew the truth only ultra magnus and one council member ( because the others had perished in the war) the truth was also written down but only council members were allowed to read were it was recorded. Of course they had no reason to look at the file since they trusted the older council member ( I don't know who to make the council member I was thinking Tyrest let me know what you think)

Ultra magnus has been running cybertron as best as he can then he meets three primes ( I'm assuming Elita was also a prime or at least the equivalent of one) he grows fond of them and keeps an eye on them. Then the archa seven incident happened. It broke Minimus a little to send Optimus away as he was going to pick him as the next magnus and tell him his secret.

Ultra magnus and the the elite guard shows up on earth. At first magnus is very weary of the organics but after watching them decided they're interesting and safe to be around. Sentinel is still xenophobic though, he doesn't even hide it. Before talking to Optimus and his team privately without sentinel around (because Magnus doesn't want sentinel to get jealous at what he wants to tell the repair crew) he watched some of the battles the team has had against the decepticons that the humans had recorded. He was very impressed by what they had been able to do.

When he gets the chance to talk to the team he tells them that they are impressive and should they choose to after Megatron is captured they could begin training to join the elite guard. He also tells them they don't have to if they don't want to and that they can get help in beginning a new career of their choice.( he may or may not have made them swear not to tell sentinel anything.)

In this au sari found out she was a techno-organic pre series but she hasn’t upgraded herself. she didn’t tell Optimus or his team until she knew they could be trusted. her and ultra Magnus's first meeting isn’t great mostly because he doesn’t know how to act around humans and sentinel’s xenophobic crap.  (Sorry about the sudden shift I didn’t know where to put this) after seeing sari heal one of the bots with her key he decides to get to know her much to sentinels dismay.

Magnus finds that he enjoys some earth music that sari shows him and in turn he shows her some cybertronian music. Occasionally he will catch himself humming the music. After getting on better terms with sari Ultra Magnus quickly grows annoyed at sentinels xenophobic words and confides him to the ship under the guise of needing him to keep the ship safe.

Now on to the good stuff:

During a battle with the decepticons (The elite guard on a mission away from earth leaving Ultra Magnus behind)  Megatron attacks Magnus and hurts him pretty badly. The decepticons flee and Optimus’s team is left with a dying magnus. Sari with her quick thinking uses her key and tries to save Ultra Magnus. Everyone sees her use the key and are relived until the light dies down and the armor is still grey. sari seeing it not work tries to do it again but the panel that covers the key hole refuses to budge. She starts crying and the group rush to her. Right as soon as they take her off Ultra Magnus the armor pops open to reveal Minimus Ambus (Magnus).

Minimus sits up and looks at himself in surprise then he looks at everyone around him and immediately says “I can explain”. Optimus being the history buff he is immediately recognizes who this green bot is and tells Minimus “the records said you died... they said Minimus Ambus had been killed by those that didn’t accept him as the chosen Magnus” Minimus takes a deep breath and explains the truth he emphasizes the importance of it being a secret.

After the explanation and getting promises that Optimus and his team won’t say anything Minimus turns to sari and thanks her, he didn’t think that he could ever be Minimus again after being told that the Ultra armor was the only thing keeping him alive. Minimus decides to get out of the armor and it snaps shut color coming back to it and it opens up again waiting to be entered again fully repaired.

He (Minimus) takes a short walk around before telling them he needs to get back into the armor and become Ultra Magnus again so that he can inform the council (specifically the council member that knows) of this change. Minimus returns to being Magnus and the elite guard return. Magnus tell the guard they they must briefly return to cybertron to inform the council of what is going on at earth. he tells Optimus that he will return to earth.

that's all my brain can think of right now but I want (and wiil) to add more to this au. so to be continued... (hope you liked this!)

[percabethfeelsfandom]

Writing Prompt: Home

Percy stood by the bulletin board in the Big House, fingers tracing the edge of a photo of him, Annabeth and Grover. His sixteen-year-old face smiling widely at him with his arms thrown around Annabeth and Grover’s shoulders.

Seven years later, Percy still remembered taking the photo. The day before he was set to go back to Goode, his first time going to the same school two years in a row. The happiness that was in their features hadn’t lasted long. But it was nice that this moment was immortalised.

“Feeling nostalgic?”

Percy found a smile rising to his face as he saw Chiron duck his head to avoid hitting the doorframe, joining Percy to look at the other photos of campers that had accumulated over the years. Faces that Percy had grown up with, and new ones.

“Can’t help it. Every time I come here...it’s like travelling back in time.”

Percy removed his hand from the photo and let it drop to his side. Chiron gave him a small smile and looked fondly at the collage of photos. In the corner there was even a faded photograph of Chiron smiling smugly while Mr D held a goblet disapprovingly.

“Does it feel different coming back?” Chiron asked. Percy stepped away from the photos and went to stand in front of the window glancing out to look at the fields outside.

“Yeah. In a good way, but…” Percy sighed and ran a hand through his hair, trying to flatten it, “I feel bad I guess. That I left. This was home for so long.” His fingers itched to move so he brought them to the necklace that still hung around his neck. All the years later he still tried to wear it every day, even sometimes underneath his work clothes. The beads had a permanent place around his place and sat perfectly in the hollow of his throat, a constant familiar presence.

“You didn’t leave, Percy,” he reassured. Percy thumbed his first camp bead, staring at the glowing trident.

“Didn’t I?”

“No. You deserve a life outside of here. It’s because of you that you have a world to go to, you deserve a chance to live in it. It’d be foolish of you not to.”

“You make it sound like I did it alone,” he gestured to the photo collage, “Each of those people played a part. Every person that steps foot into camp played a part in that. They deserve to be out there too.”

“When they know what they’re up against then they can. Until then I will train them.”

“Don’t you ever wish we could do more?”

“Every day.”

“I feel like I ran away from the fight.”

“Every hero yields in the end. And yielding is not always a bad thing.”

“So why does it feel like it?”

“Why are you so full of doubt? You seemed so sure, so happy with your decision before.” Percy thought back to when he had finally managed to graduate high school, and made the final decision to go to college and move away from New York. The sharp pain that had settled in his chest when he had watched Camp grow smaller and smaller the further they went. The pain hadn’t eased till Annabeth had gripped his hand, reassuring him that they’d be back. That this wasn’t forever.

Percy sighed deeply and reached into his pocket to press his fingers against Riptide for comfort.

“Things have changed. And I guess- I’m scared,” Percy let out a choked laugh. Things had definitely changed if he was able to admit he was scared.

“Is everything okay?”

“Annabeth’s pregnant.”

Chiron’s eyes widened before his face broke out into a smile.

“Congratulations!” He reached down and patted Percy on the shoulder. But Percy didn’t mirror his smile. Slowly Chiron retracted his hand and gave him a questioning look.

“Are you not happy?”

Percy rushed to correct him, shaking his head wildly.

“Oh gods, I’m ecstatic, don’t get me wrong. But...Annabeth and I always said we wouldn’t have kids unless we were positive we’d be bringing them into a safe world...and now that we are- I don’t know if it’ll ever be safe. Like we’re demigods for Hades’ sake.”

“Is that why you came back?” Percy nodded.

“I don’t know anywhere safer than here. It’s like I never want to let her out of my sight.” Almost to prove his point Percy looked out to the fields again, trying to get a glimpse of Annabeth who was at her cabin, catching up with family members and any of the campers they had once trained with. Though he knew exactly where she was, Percy could feel the edge of anxiety heightening his senses, hyper-aware of any possible dangers.

“And I guess, I wanted advice. I know you don’t have kids of your own, but, you have this camp. When I wasn’t with my Mom and Dad, I had you. I already asked my Mom how she did it; how she lived with the fear of having a child in our world.”

“What did she say?”

“She said she loved me too much to ever feel scared.”

“That’s all a parent can do Percy.”

“That’s not very helpful,” he huffed. Chiron laughed and gestured to the doorway, leading the two of them out of the Big House and to the centre of camp where the cabins were.

“You asked me if I wished we could do more, to help them,” he nodded in the direction of campers in their orange shirts, playing volleyball, their laughter drifting in the wind. “Each day, for the years I have been alive, I give them my knowledge about protecting themselves, I teach them our history so that they may one day learn from our mistakes. I love them and watch them grow. Sometimes they leave and sometimes they use the knowledge I’ve passed on and they create a life of their own, and save the world along the way. Sometimes they come back. Sometimes what I’ve taught them isn’t enough...and they don’t. It’s an endless cycle when you think of it, this role I chose. But what more can I do when I have dedicated my life to this. The world still needs heroes, and as long as those heroes need guidance I will give it to them. What more can I do when I’ve given them a chance?”

“You were raised by a brilliant woman, Perseus, she gave you the best chance she could by loving you. The best you can do for your own child is the exact same. And with Annabeth by your side, I have no doubt you’ll achieve that.”

~

“Did you have a good talk with Chiron?” Annabeth asked as she pulled the blanket over her legs. Percy helped her adjust the sheets, tucking her in and sitting next to her. They’d been given the Poseidon cabin to stay at for the meantime; Percy’s two half-siblings on a quest together.

Though they visited every summer, being back in his old cabin, even in his old bed, was giving Percy an odd sense of deja vu.

Percy nodded, but his attention was elsewhere, noting all the new scratches and the weapons hung on the wall that didn’t belong to him. His heart went out to his siblings, the call for a quest, taunting him after so many years of him wishing it would be someone else when he was younger.

“Seaweed Brain?” Annabeth said softly. Percy turned to her fully and shook his head, trying to clear it with thoughts. Annabeth’s face was etched with concern, and Percy placed his hands over hers, which laid over her stomach that was starting to show.

“I’m okay.”

“It’s weird, isn’t it? Coming back after all this time,” she said looking around the cabin as well. Percy nodded again, readjusting himself in the bed so he could hold her closer.

“We visit every summer though,” he pointed out, but Annabeth shook her head and then leaned against his shoulder.

“It’s different, we’ll be here for a while, we don’t need to leave at the end. We don’t need to always look behind our shoulders, at least not for now. It’s nice.”

“Chiron said something today...I’ve been thinking about it a lot.”

“Hmm?” Idly, Percy traced circles on her shoulder as he brought his arms around her.

“Something about giving heroes a chance, that’s what it all comes down to. Doesn’t it? No matter how good you are, powers, training, knowledge, all of that goes out the door, because it’s up to the Fates isn’t it?” Annabeth sat up straighter turning to him.

“I like to think we play a part in it as well, just because the Fates have a say, doesn’t mean all choices are taken away from us. We chose to leave camp. And I don’t regret that.” She said firmly.

“How’d you know I was thinking about that?”

“Because I know you, Perseus Jackson.”

“No matter what the Fates have in store for us, Percy, I’m willing to go through it. If it means I’m by your side. I know we didn’t want to come back to Camp, but is it so bad when it ensures our safety? This was our home growing up. It’ll be a great place for our child to grow up, then we can leave when it’s safe again.”

“We left because we thought we’d be safe. Now I’m wondering if we should’ve stayed so that we could’ve avoided coming back...does that make sense?”

“Perce.”

“Yeah yeah. I know. I’m not upset about being here exactly. But after everything, I just thought we’d done enough for the Fates to believe we could get a break from this world. Let us live in ignorance for a bit. It’s selfish but maybe we deserve to be a bit selfish?”

“I know.” She leaned forward and pressed her forehead against Percy’s, closing her eyes.

She pulled back and pressed a kiss to his cheek before laying down, signalling that she was finished with this conversation. The pregnancy was constantly leaving her tired, and even now, Percy could see the purple beneath her eyes despite the excessive amount of hours she was sleeping. Carrying a demigod child was taking a toll on her, and it was slowly killing Percy. He made sure he tucked her in tightly before leaving his cabin and making the familiar trek to the water where his thoughts finally began to calm.

He looked out into the deep blue of the night, and the seemingly bottomless ocean.

“I know you’re listening, Father...I don’t think I want to talk. But if you could listen? I think I just need that,” Percy paused, waiting for a reaction. When he didn’t get one, he eased himself onto the sand and rolled up his pants so that he could dip his feet into the low tide.

“After the war, it was so hard for me to leave camp. Especially after Gaea took me. I felt that every time I left I’d come back and see my home in ruins. Everything I’ve done since I found out I was your child has been to preserve this Camp. It means more to me than a location probably should, but it was always there for me to come back to. But after Jason, I needed to leave. I was so tired of coming back to a camp and seeing one less face. I know it wasn’t my fault, but it felt like I was being taunted, that I couldn’t save him...because I was somewhere else. Leaving after college was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. And now coming back, I’m scared that once I leave something bad is going to happen again. It’s not just Annabeth on the line anymore, I could risk it with her because she can protect herself but if our child is at risk? What do I do then?” The words were rushing out of Percy like a dam breaking, and he was stumbling and gasping over his words as tears welled up inside his chest, demanding to be released.

“Coming back means leaving. And I don’t think my heart can take it.”

There was a soft breeze and Percy felt the water at his feet grow colder. He looked up from where he had buried his face in his arms.

“You cannot let fear rule your life. Or you will forget to live.”

Percy scoffed at his Father and shook his head, not bothering to stand up. Other gods would have been offended, but Poseidon looked down sympathetically at Percy and sat down, lowering himself to Percy’s level.

“Let me rephrase that. Fear will always be a part of your life, it will always be there because you are my son and Annabeth is Athena’s daughter, you are Heroes of Olympus, and with that title, someone or something will always be hateful-”

“Is this meant to make me feel better?” Poseidon let out a chuckle and Percy rolled his eyes.

“Let me finish. Fear will always exist. But there are things that are more powerful than that. Think of your mother, her fear of Gabe, and her fear of monsters finding you when you were young...neither ever stopped her loving you, it made her fight harder to protect you. Your own fear of your prophecy didn’t stop you from fulfilling it, because you cared too much for your city and your friends. My own fear of my brother when you were accused of stealing the bolt didn’t stop me from claiming you. The same applies here. Your fear of coming back and leaving Camp Half Blood doesn’t make it any less your home. It will always protect you.”

[mountainvroyce]

♛ → THE VALE presents AXELL ROYCE, the LORD of RUNESTONE. when the dragons danced in the sky they thought the BLACKS  would still fly, but in the blink of an eye, they would all die. the TWENTY NINE year old MALE who was RESOURCEFUL & DETERMINED before they saw the first of the flames, is now CRUEL & ABRASIVE  after seeing the last. through the ash, now they struggle to find THE ROAR OF A BATTLE CRY, THE ANTICIPATION OF THE HUNT, AND THE SMELL OF PINE AND SMOKE instead of the remnants of the war of succession.  ( jacob elordi )

BIO

→ axell was the secondborn son of lord royce from his second marriage. from a young age there was nothing axell loved more than having a blade in his hand. not only were the royce's known for their abilities in battle but his mother's family the templeton's were as well. there was a lot to live up to and he wanted to exceed any expectation that was put in front of him

→ when he was fourteen years old he was traveling with his family through the vale when they were attacked by the mountain clan. he was still a young boy but he did his best to hold his own against the attackers. but he saw thier violence. he saw what happened to his mother. she died not long after the attack. that day he swore he would would personally see all the clans burning at his feet. he would see them all killed.

→ he devoted himself to his skills in battle. fought in the war at the first chance he was able to. a young man still but he didn't care. he needes somewhere to get his anger out.

→ time went on and eventually he found himself as lord commander of the vale. something he was proud to have. something he knew his family, his brother could be proud about. for a moment maybe that was going to be enough for him. he could settle into his life and maybe be happy. but no. there was work to be done and a plan that needed to be made

→ he spent months searching out a man who looked like him. until finally he found a baker in a vale city. poor. no name. no one would really miss him right? he was sure to donate some gold to the family to make up for it. he kidnapped the man and brought him up into the mountains. he said a quick prayer to the warrior god (the only one of the seven he actually liked) and killed the man, cutting off his head. no one could know who he was. everyone needed to believe it was him. he dressed him in his clothes and left him where others would find him.

→from there the next part of his plan was in action. he let himself be taken by the clan of the burned men. allowing them to believe they captured a mighty lord of the vale. in truth this was all going accoridng to his plan. it took time but after some time he gained their trust. he let them believe they had persuded him. that he hated the other lords. that he wanted to see the king die. everynight he would lay awake in his bed next to some girl or guy and he would think over his plan. think over why he was doing this. think over what they did to his family. remind himself of his hatred for them. swallow it deep down and ready himself for the next part.

→ he lead them to believe he was returning back to his family as a double agent, ready to betray the king. in truth he had gathered more information on the clans than anyone else ever had. he knew their numbers, their plans. who was the leaders. where they liked to camp. where they liked to raid. he had it all memorized so that when the time was right he could kill them all. he has returned back to his family, ready to take on the next step of his challenge

HEADCANONS → his time with the clans has warped his sense of self in some ways. he is gruffer. crueler. more harsh. he says what is on his mind even if it isn't what people want to hear. he doesn't care about that. he cares about getting what he wants and doing what he has to do.

→ he's always been a bit morally grey. he knows he has a courage to make the choices that other people would never want to make. he thinks himself as brave for being able to do the tough things in life.

→ he will sleep with just about anyone who he fancies. doesnt matter who. peasent, rich, lord, lady, girl, guy. doesn't matter to him. he only cares about one thing and that's the thrill of it all. the thrill of getting someone new in his bed. the chase is the best part.

→part of him longs for rest. he knows when this is all done he can finally rest. but there is too much to do, to much at stake to stop now. rest will come to him one day in one form or another. until then he can't stop himself

→ he deeply loves his brother and father but he has no idea how to express himself. he has been taught from a young age to bottle up those feelings, not to show it. he has little idea how to express to them what he is feeling.

[unstoppableforcce]

ghosts

—CHAPTER FOUR: sour guilty sickness

pairing: Javier Peña x f! reader

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a/n: well it took a while but here she is ! things are turning a bit of a brighter corner here but don’t worry, the angst will be back soon enough !! thanks for waiting yall, I’m so glad to finally get this out !! hope you enjoy !!

The version of him that you photographed was the man he wished he could be.

Unburdened. Happy. In love.

That man, that version of him, didn’t exist. Not really. Not for any longer than it took you to take the photo in the first place.

Reality was darker. Blurrier. Emptier.

The man in the photos was never suffocated in darkness or stalked in shadows, yet he spent his days drowning in the deepest depths of humanity’s darkest days. The water was at his head, every breath was a fight, and there never seemed to be a light at the end of the tunnel. Another day, another massacre. Another mission, another mistake, another man who didn’t get to go home, another family left with a hole that no rousing speech, commendation, or memorial could ever fill.

The man in the photos was never out of focus, yet Javier couldn’t remember a time when things had been clear, when the line between good and bad wasn’t an indiscernible mess he had no chance in hell of ever making sense of. There was blood everywhere he looked, it stained his hands and everything he touched, he could scrub for hours and he still felt wrong holding you close. The horrors he witnessed, the horrors he executed, all of it lined the uneven, narrow passageway that separated the good from the bad. It was grey, blurry and messy. Not sharp edges, no clean cuts.

And the man in the photo was never alone. That just wasn’t fair, because all Javier ever felt was alone.

The photos always captured him as a man of the world around him: gently examining tomatoes on your instruction as the two of you moved through the market overflowing with life, laughing shoulder to shoulder with Murphy in the packed booth of a bar with his fingers cradling the neck of his beer, holding your hand or touching you someway even if you were out of frame. The photos painted him as a man who was never alone, but he was, he was so painfully alone. In the darkness surrounding him, in the blurred alley that existed between the lines, even in bed as you slept beside him, he was alone, trapped in the horrors that haunted his lonely mind.

There were moments when he could forget, moments where the hot press of your mouth along the length of his neck lit a fire of warmth in his chest and kept him on fire for hours while his hands clung to your skin, moments where the soft hold of your hand found his, your linked grips swinging between the two of you as you walked through the humming streets as the golden glow of the setting sun settled over the two of you, moments where the two of you felt like the only two people in the world and he could never imagine ever being without you. There were moments, plenty of them, but it was never enough.

He felt empty in a way your photos could never capture, alone in a way he never shared with you. In a way he never shared with anyone.

The man you photographed was the man he wanted to be. The man you photographed was the man you deserved.

Waking up to that man staring back at him was plainly mocking and exactly what he deserved.

The photo had slipped from the mess of photographs stacked in your lap and found itself a place to rest against the flat of the bed between where you sat up, already awake, and where his head rested on the edge of his pillow as the morning finally woke him. It was a photo of him, unburdened, happy, and in love.

As aged as it felt, he knew it had only been a few months ago. A Sunday. A simple Sunday.

He had lost you in the street, or at least, he thought he had. Not intentionally, but in the excitement of the crowds pouring out of every church that lined the streets of the neighborhood, it was relatively easy to do. His attention was pulled one way and yours the other. A small cart of flowers had been his hook, catching him out of the crowd and reeling him over. Buckets and buckets of beautiful flowers bunched together in bountiful bouquets, the aroma itself could have kept him there for hours.

“For someone special?” The older woman sitting beside the cart asked, her accent thick, as soon as she spotted his interest and he had no chance in hell of hiding his smitten smirk, even as he replied with a short nod of his head. “A beautiful girl?”

“The most beautiful.” He conceded.

She gestured towards a particularly large bundle but he shook his head, pointing to a different collection, smaller but no less beautiful.

“Ah… simple, good choice.”

He handed over a few folded bills and she nodded graciously, wishing him luck as he pulled the bouquet from the cart.

For just a second, maybe even less than that, he lingered. He brought the flowers to his nose and took in a deep breath of beauty, the same smitten smile still sitting on his lips as he gave one last nod to the woman and moved back into the crowd. He hadn’t seen you through the crowd, just a few yards away, capturing the moment. You had caught back up with him seconds later, intertwining the fingers of one hand with his and accepting the flowers with the other, a surging smile stuck on your face as the two of you continued your walk.

It was a good picture of him. Not of Javier, but of the man he wanted to be. Unburdened. Happy. In love.

If only he could be. If only it were that simple.

You turned as you heard him rustling in the sheets beside you, a soft smile sitting on your lips as you watched him pick up the picture and admire it for a minute. “Good morning.”

“‘Morning baby…” He hummed back, returning the photo to your lap.

There were at least twenty photos there, a couple of him, a few of Connie and Steve, both separate and together, and a couple duplicates of photos you had taken for work, streets lined with people, small cultural centers and jaw-dropping landscapes of the gorgeous Colombian nature. This wasn’t exactly a regular routine of yours, but every month or so, you’d assemble a collection of your favorites and find a place for them among the pages of your worn leather journal. Your private worn leather journal.

That wasn’t to say he never saw inside it, but it was yours to let him see. If you weren’t there to open it, it was never opened, no matter how overwhelming the affliction of curiosity could be sometimes when you left it out on the counter, he knew better.

There were six or seven of them in total, but the oldest ones typically stayed tucked away. This was the one you had kept for as long as he had known you though, your affectionately termed Colombia edition. In between the photos and their detailed descriptions scrawled beneath in your unique script, you filled the journal with general descriptions of your life, of the culture around you, and everything you’re feeling. Part of him has always wondered what you had written about him, a separate part of him, the part that always won out, never wanted to know.

“You slept in…” your words trailed off once your stare moved back to the selection of slices of your life in your lap. “You haven’t done that in a while…”

“Yeah.” He huffed, rolling onto his back as he rubbed the last of the sleep from his eyes. Lulling to the side, his head turned and his eyes stayed on you, admiring every inch of your profile as you worked.

Your smile stayed soft. Gentle. Miraculous. “That’s good…”

You deserved better than him. You deserved the man in the photos and he wasn’t that.

He needed to talk to you, to tell you why life had been hell for the two of you for the past few months, to tell you why he was keeping you up at night tossing and turning, terrified of his own mind. There were things he didn’t know how to talk about, things he didn’t know how to tell you, but that just wasn’t fair. He loved you and that meant something. Day after day, you begged him to talk to you, and he owed you that. He owed you more than the fear of losing you.

He just wasn’t ready yet.

Rolling back over, he positioned his head by your lap, laying a gentle kiss to the skin of your thigh. “How long have you been up?”

“Just about an hour or two,” you bit the end of your pen cap off to write something on the back of a photo of Connie in her scrubs getting back from work, and continued on, your words garbled by the cap between your teeth. “Whenever the sun came up.”

By this time on any other day, you’d already be out, either exploring every corner of the city or out as far as the soldiers would let you get into the surrounding jungle on your own. It had been a long time since he woke up beside you. He pressed another lazy kiss to your thigh. He missed you.

Another kiss. And another kiss.

“Javi…”

Another kiss. He’d take as many as he could get before things came to a painfully inevitable head.

He wasn’t naive, he knew you had seen bad things before. Colombia was far from your first rodeo when it came to nations in disarray, be it war, genocide, drug trade or dictatorships, he knew that. You weren’t a photographer, you were a photojournalist. He knew that.

There were things you left out when you told your exciting stories at the bar, parts of your cultural escapades in South East Asia or the Middle East that didn’t come with chuckles and smiles. He saw the way your stare absconded when Steve pressed too hard in a direction you weren’t quite willing to go and the chuckle you offered as cover as you reached for your drink and changed the subject skillfully. He listened to the things you told him beneath the blanket of darkness in his bedroom, before it became your shared bedroom, hushed whispers covering for your voice cracks as the details caught you. And he had read more of your journals than anyone else, he read passages you didn’t typically share and he saw some of the photos folded between the pages while others were showcased openly.

One was just a little girl. The folded half of the photo had caught his undeniable curiosity when a phone call interrupted you while showing him some of your older work. He hadn’t asked, he had just opened it. It was a little girl. Big smile, beautiful brown eyes. Just a little girl. There were hundreds of photos filling your journals, many of them children, but this one was folded. Hidden.

And when you returned to the table, you folded the picture shut and he knew better than to ask.

Just like he knew better than to ask when he first noticed you shying away from his gun. He never thought twice about leaving it out openly before you first showed your hesitancy and he never thought twice about putting it in a drawer after you had. He knew it wasn’t a typical civilian gun-shyness, he knew there was a reason for it.

He knew you had seen bad things before, but this wasn’t just that. He hadn’t just seen bad things in his line of work, he had done bad things. Too many bad things.

Another kiss.

Eventually, you stopped writing and recapped your pen. “Javi…”

“I know, baby.” He laid yet another kiss along your skin, actively avoiding your stare as he felt you shift to look down at him. “I know.”

“You’re going to have to talk to me…”

A rough sigh escaped his tight chest as he pressed his forehead into the curve where your thigh met your hip. Muffled, his words vibrated against the fabric of your loose-hanging tee, baggy around your hips. “I know, baby.”

He did know. He really did. But that didn’t make it any easier.

As his eyes clenched shut, buried in the warmth of your side, he could feel you shuffling around, stacking up the photos and abandoning your work by the foot of the bed. He thought it was just so you could turn all your focus to him, but you kept moving, adjusting until you laid back against a carefully constructed mountain of pillows. He readjusted almost automatically, resting his head in your lap as your fingers wove themselves into his hair.

“I miss you, Javi…” your hand brushed the flattened mess of hair back out of his eyes, carding through all of it strand by strand. “You’ve been here this whole time but I… I miss you.”

“I know.”

“I don’t want to leave Javi, that’s the last thing in the world that I want to do, but you’ve gotta work with me here. This is new for me too, alright, staying in one place is new for me…” he pressed a kiss to the indent your skin had made on itself while you were sat up for so long, urging you on as your voice grew weaker. “I want to stay here. With you.”

He could hear every word you weren’t saying just as clearly as the ones you were.

Don’t give me a reason to leave, you said. This is your last chance.

He owed you more than the fear of losing you. He owed you the truth.

“Things are bad here, baby. They’ve been bad for a while, I know, but they’re getting worse.” Still, he couldn’t find the words he needed to. Vague wasn’t what you deserved. You deserved answers. “I’m doing a lot of bad things. Bad things that I can’t… I can’t bring home to you.”

“But you do.”

He sucked in a sharp breath, dipping his stare from yours and instead settling his eyes on the stitched hem of your shirt where it rucked up across your stomach. “I don’t want to,” he corrected himself and you seemed to accept that for now as his breath released in a ragged cascade across your lap. “There are parts of me that I don’t want you to see.”

“You mean parts of your job.”

No. He didn’t.

He had grown too comfortable pulling a trigger to separate himself from his work anymore, the guilt never went away but he stopped hesitating. If a man pointed a gun at him with the intent to kill him, then he did the same. It didn’t matter that he was doing things for the right reason anymore, at some point, a line needed to be drawn. Doing bad things for good reasons sounded just in theory, but he was doing more and more bad and coming out with less and less good.

Carrillo. Los Pepes. How much was too much? When was he going to be able to look at himself in the mirror again?

“Javi…”

“I know that the guys I’m fighting are much worse than me, but the lines keep getting blurrier, and what I’m willing to do to stop them… at some point…” He lost his breath, and no amount of gentle strokes through his hair could get him to keep going.

“Baby…” you cooed, dragging your nails along his scalp as his eyes fell shut. “I’ve known my fair share of bad men, you aren’t one of them.”

With his eyes shut, his mind had free reign. Over and over again he watched Carrillo line the boys up in the alley, over and over again he watched the kids talk back to him. They didn’t think he would do anything. They were just kids. Over and over again he watched him level the gun to the kid’s head and pull the trigger. Over and over again.

Extracting your hand from his hair, your warm palm moved down to his cheek. “Bad men don’t think like that, Javi.”

His head shook but your touch remained constant.

“Javi, baby, what is it? What do you keep seeing?”

Your touch was too soft, your gentle hold bordering on suffocating. He couldn’t breathe. Over and over again, the trigger pulled, the gunshot echoed, and the kid dropped.

He left a numb, barely there kiss to the hem of your shorts where they laid on your thigh, and pulled himself up. It was a weak promise he made to you, to cut back on his smoking, you knew that when he made it, yet he still felt guilty rolling over and reaching for the half-empty pack he pulled from his pockets last night and left on the nightstand. He could feel your eyes lingering on the tension held taut between his shoulders, he could feel the concern smothering your stare, he could feel the weight of it chilling his spine.

“Javi…” he could hear you sitting up behind him but he didn’t stop, he threw his legs over his side of the bed and lit his cigarette with an effortless flick of the lighter. Your hand found his shoulder and he flinched. “Javi, I—”

“He was just a kid.”

He could feel the comforting confidence leave you, your grip losing all its strength where it lingered on his shoulder. You didn’t pull back, but you might as well have, your touch was numb. He inhaled a deep breath of smoke, but the warmth was nothing compared to the chill emanating from you the second the word ‘kid’ left his lips.

“Javi, what happened?” There was an edge to your tone, a careful cut.

“Carrillo he… he told me that he wanted to send a message. I didn’t ask what that meant… I trusted him so I didn’t ask…” He coughed out, wiping over his face with his hand as he folded even further in on himself. Again and again, he watched the kid drop. Again and again, the echo of the shot rang through the alley and became all he could hear. “Escobar, he uses kids as spotters, to keep an eye on the military. Just boys, maybe as old as fourteen, and young as seven, maybe eight. And Carrillo, he wanted to round them up, he wanted to send a message.”

This was as quiet as the room had ever been.

He could hear each of your stilted breaths, every rustle against the sheets as you shifted carefully behind him, every beat of your heart.

He sucked in another breath of smoke. “He lined them up in this alley, he was talking to them, he was trying to scare them but… but one of the kids wouldn't shut up. He didn’t think… I didn’t think…”

Your grip found itself again as you started pulling the rough puzzle pieces he choked out for you together.

“I just stood there watching when he pulled the trigger. Everytime I close my eyes, I see it again and I can’t…”

“Javi, baby—” Tighter and tighter, your grip grew as you held his shoulder, fingers digging in as he slipped further and further away. Each flash of memories in his mind took him deeper and deeper down, until the darkness of his guilt began to swallow him whole.

“I just stood there, I let it happen. I knew something was different with him, I knew and I just let him do it—”

Your other hand ran up his back, your body heat pressing closer in behind him as the chills settled in his spine grew constant, a cold wind swirling in his chest. “Javi—”

A violent breath of smoke fell from his lips as he scoffed, disgust bubbling up from deep within his gut. “I didn’t even try to stop him.”

“Could you have?”

The brutalized scene playing behind his mind froze. “What?”

“I only met him a few times but he wasn’t a man to compromise. If you had tried, do you honestly think you could have stopped him?” Your voice was closer now, right over his shoulder as you tentatively wrapped yourself around him from behind. Every inch of your touch was timid and hesitant, like you thought one wrong move would shatter him into a thousand pieces.

Maybe you were right.

He smashed the butt of his cigarette into the ashtray on the nightstand as his tone grew deeper, rough with a tone he never took with you. “I was standing right there.”

“You just said you didn’t know what he was planning to do, Javi—”

“I should have known.”

“Javi—”

“I watched his men march them into the alley, I stood there when they lined them up on their knees,” he cursed, rubbing rough over his face, incapable of looking back at you. “I should have stepped in before it ever got that far.”

Your lips pressed weakly to the back of his neck. “Okay.”

He shook his head and stubbornly fought, “I should have—”

“I’m not placating you, Javi, you’re right.” You sighed, leaning forward to rest your head between his shoulders. “It’s okay.”

“Things are bad here, baby… I do bad things and I don’t want to…” curse you with it.

One of your hands scaled up the treacherous landscape of his back, winding your fingers into the short bits of his hair hanging down his neck. “Hiding things from me isn’t going to keep me here. I don’t need you to protect me.”

Again, his head shook, with the last of the strength he could muster. “That doesn’t stop me from wanting to.”

No, you pressed a soft kiss between his shoulders again, you knew that.

Wrapping your hand from the back of his neck around to his cheek, pushing his face towards his shoulder where yours met him. “You’re not a bad man, Javi, it’s just a bad situation.”

His voice broke, weaker than you had ever heard him as his hand reached up to pull yours from his face. “Then why does it feel like this…”

“Because it does,” you sighed. “Because when bad things are happening and you can’t do enough, that kind of sour, guilty sickness is all you can feel.”

There was a knowing bite to your words, a telling drop of your stare from his.

“That and anger.” your chuckle broke through your solemn resolve. “I don’t know, I spend a lot of time as a bystander, I can’t speak to what you do. But I know about seeing a lot of bad and not being able to do enough good to make a difference, I know a lot about that anger.”

The years he had under his belt in Colombia were nothing compared to the years you had on him. Before moving here, before picking up this fight against the narcos as his own, he had been a low-level agent in the States. That wasn’t to say he didn’t see his fair share of violence, but it wasn’t this. It wasn’t a day to day struggle for humanity. The same couldn’t have been said for you. He asked once, how long you had been traveling for, and you had answered mainly with the shrug of your shoulders.

When he pressed on for an actual answer, you shrugged again. “I don’t know, I was in school for journalism and bored out of my mind. A friend suggested a trip to Mexico and I didn’t ever really go back to the States after that.”

Whatever he was feeling, god, it must have been nothing compared to the years of compounded anger settled in your bones. And still, your touch remained the softest thing and your work the most beautiful. You could take the horrible city around you and find a way to highlight the glorious humanity afflicted by the shadows of reality. You could take the ghost of a man he was and capture the unburdened levity of his smile, the happy crinkle of his eye, and the loving center his job forced him to bury deep.

He loved you more than life itself, but more than that, he cherished you. Because for you, he wanted to be better. For you, he wanted to be the man you photographed.

At the very least, he owed you that.

The two of you stayed like that for a while, not knowing how to move from there, but when you finally got up and pressed a gentle kiss to his forehead, he at least knew Brazil was off the table.

For one day, one quiet morning, it was enough.

-

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[opaljm]

blood runs pure (m) – pjm

➻ written in collaboration with @fitaelity

➻ female reader x jimin

➻ harry potter!au + death eater/pureblood/slytherin!jimin + half-blood/gryffindor!reader + enemies to lovers

➻ genres: minor fluff, tons of angst, minor smut, romance

➻ length & status: 28k words ; complete

➻ rating & warnings: 18+; brief mentions of death, violence (there’s dueling/fighting/killing scenes), torture (Cruciatus Curse; in one scene: chains/starvation/captivity/etc.), smut (steamy kisses, cunnilingus/light nipple play/fingering/multiple orgasms/penetrative sex)

➻ summary: The 2nd Wizarding War was underfoot, with you and Jimin falling on opposite sides. This however, was not enough to stop the two of you from falling in love with each other over the course of your final year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft & Wizardry. AKA this is a story of Jimin’s transition from the Death Eater’s perfect Pureblood poster child to the more redeemable man that you fell in love with.

➻ disclaimer: Also, I’m pretty sure we never made Jimin use the word “mudblood” but I’m sorry in advance for any of you who might get offended by the toxic and discriminatory behavior that Jimin sometimes exudes, but please keep in mind that this is a redemption story that is meant to follow and explore the growth of Jimin’s character and that he ultimately does realize the wrongs of that kind of behavior. um this was too long to edit rip, so we didn’t yolo.

⋆ my masterlist ⋆ interview ⋆

It was only to be expected that Park Jimin would have been the unlucky person to get that unfortunate letter, which essentially cursed him, delivered to him on that stormy August day by a completely drenched and sad looking gray owl. He had shown his worth, he supposed, shown that he could be trusted and put in that position of power. Perhaps the Lees, a pair of brother and sister Death Eaters who had been given positions on the Hogwarts’ staff by the Dark Lord, had whispered in Headmaster Snape’s ear that Jimin had spent the entire summer finishing an internship at the Ministry of Magic, a job which had been painstaking acquired by his father through transferring huge sums of money and exchanging many favors, under the tutelage of Jimin’s Fifth year’s Defense Against the Dark Arts professor, Choi Jonghoon.

Perhaps the Lees, knowing how Jimin had reacted emotionlessly to the Muggleborns stripped of their Wizarding status in the courtrooms while he transcribed the trials during his wretched summer internship, had thought that Jimin would be an excellent choice to keep the students in line during the school year.

Or perhaps, the decision had been made by the Dark Lord himself, after he had met with Jimin and declared him worthy of championing the Cause. That meeting had ended with Jimin facing the long and painful ordeal that had ended with him getting branded with the gruesome serpent, that was the infamous mark of the Death Eaters, on his left arm. It appeared that that event and his new title had awarded him yet another one, the position of Head Boy at Hogwarts under the Snape administration.

In any matter the deed was long done; Jimin was now tugging his trunks across a train station which was much emptier than it had been the past few years that he had been studying at Hogwarts, fully aware that he had to play an important role in how the school year unfolded. His trunks were half filled with things Jimin was sure would have been contraband had this been any other year: books on the Dark Arts (and on torture), vials filled with disgusting potions with torturous and sometimes painful effects, and the Hand of Glory which allowed Jimin to spy and get around without being detected.

After Jimin heaved his trunks onto the Hogwarts’ Express and pulled himself up as well, he was pushed unceremoniously by a girl who was not looking where she was going. She was pressed against his chest, in the narrow hallway of the train, and looked up to gaze into Jimin’s dark brown eyes with her sparkling ones. He recognized her to be you; your name was Y/N and you were a Gryffindor in his year. He had never bothered interacting with you or acknowledging your presence before, but he knew that you had a Muggle father and a witch for a mother. His lips curled into a snarl, “Get off me you disgusting Half-Blood, before I transform you into the vermin that you share your blood with.”

“I am— I am sorry, Park. It was an accident,” you whispered, removing yourself from Jimin as quickly as bodily possible. You turned around to head back in the direction you had come from, deciding that it was better to hold your bladder until you finally arrived at Hogwarts than to risk running into more terrifying Purebloods who could scare you into wetting yourself, and no doubt thought they had free reign to do as they pleased now that the Dark side had taken over.

Once back into your train compartment, which was empty since the people who used to be your only true friends at Hogwarts were Muggleborns who had both had gone into hiding, you sank down into your seat to and dropped your face into your hands as you sobbed. The only reason you were attending school was because you and all of Hogwarts’ students were being forced. Under a new law, a Hogwarts education was now mandatory for all witches and wizards between the ages of eleven and seventeen in Great Britain. This was a poorly constructed scheme, by the Dark side, that would allow them to grab the Muggleborn students as soon as they arrived at the station to strip them of their wands and throw them into prison. For this reason, many of your Muggleborn classmates had chosen to ignore the law outright and elected to go into hiding. Your own father, whom you had not seen since you were five and whom had remarried another Muggle, had been forced by your mother to go into hiding with his new family. You hated being here since you doubted that you would learn anything at all to help you pass your NEWTs, which you thought were going to be rigged and ripe with cheating now that you were living in He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named’s playground, or anything that would help you become a better witch who was more adapt at performing magic and living in the Wizarding world as an adult. You wondered if the two new professors at school, the Lees, who were in charge of teaching the new Dark Arts class, that was replacing Defense Against the Dark Arts, and, the now forced graduation requisite: Muggle Studies, would be throwing you into detention at every possible opportunity, not only because of your so called ‘tainted’ blood but because you were a Gryffindor like most of the insurgents who supported the Chosen One’s cause.

At that very moment you made a promise to yourself. It was not a promise to succeed nor was it a promise to enjoy your last year of Hogwarts; it was a promise to survive and get the hell out of there as soon as possible and to escape to America where the Dark Lord’s reign had not yet quite reached.

…

The next time you interact with Park Jimin, it was because of what had happened in a Dark Arts lesson. You had honestly promised yourself to slip under the radar as much as possible, but there were just some things that you were not willing to compromise on: your morals, for one. The professor, Lee Seunghyun, had brought into the classroom a group of ten First Years on whom, he declared, you all would be practicing the Cruciatus Curse. You, knowing the ill effects that mispronounced and improperly casted spells could have, refused to utter the curse at all and stared at your First Year sullenly for the entire duration of the lesson, with your wand hanging from your right hand, as the child burst into uncontrollable and unstoppable tears in front of you. Professor Lee, being outraged by your act of defiance, said, with a dark scowl, that you would have a month of detention where the Unforgivable Curses would be practiced on you instead. He gave you the options of a month of detentions where he would use the Imperius Curse on you or a month with the Head Boy who would practice the Cruciatus Curse on you, which you had so valiantly refused to cast in class. Given the lecherous stares that Lee was sending your way, you knew you did not want to be placed under the Imperius Curse by him as that would allow him to control you like a puppet so you decided to take your chances instead with Jimin and the promise of torture.

On the unblessed Saturday that you had detention with Jimin, he stalked into the, otherwise, empty classroom at seven in the morning instantly throwing a venomous glare at you for ruining what would have otherwise been the first morning he could have slept in instead of having to run around the castle punishing students and being forced to keep them in line. “Y/L/N,” he barked, “I see that you have refused to use the Cruciatus Curse in class. What exactly did you think we would be learning in that class?”

“I didn’t know that we would be practicing on people,” you muttered. Jimin gave you a look that suggested that he thought you were an idiot of the highest order. You were inclined to agree, after all it was the Lees who were teaching, was it not. “I thought it might have all just been us studying the theory and not practicing anything.”

“Did you think, perhaps, that we were still getting taught by Choi Jonghoon?” Jimin laughed hollowly, “At best you could have hoped that you would be practicing on rodents or spiders and not humans. But as you can see, that is not the case.”

You stared at Jimin in surprise, “I thought you were a fan of Choi. You were in the Inquisitorial Squad and I know what you did this summer.” You wondered how Jimin could sleep at night after enduring trial after trial where Muggleborns were treated like vermin and stripped of their wands and Magical status as he stood by emotionlessly and was, all the while, transcribing the details of the cases in meticulous detail.

Jimin scoffed, “No one is a fan of that ugly toad. He pretends to be a Pureblood, related to the Kangs, and makes up lies about his father being a former member of the Wizengamot, as though my family has not worked at the Ministry for centuries. We know he has a Muggle mother and a Squib brother; her father used to scrub the floors at my grandfather’s office. I got that internship because she cannot afford to make enemies of the Parks. There is no lost love between us.”

“Are— are you going to be practicing the curse on me now?” you asked, kicking yourself in your head for sounding terrified.

Jimin stared at you; his dark brown eyes felt like they were piercing through your soul, “You are terrified of me.”

“N— No, I am not,” you protested half-heartedly.

He ignored you, “You are afraid of me and yet you chose to have detention with me. Why is that Y/L/N?” His eyes bore into yours as a thought about Lee Seunghyun being a disgusting piece of scum flitted across your mind. Jimin’s face contorted with disgust as he said, “Never mind. I’ll practice the Cruciatus Curse on you now.”

You moved to the center of the room, standing there uncertainly as you shifted your weight from one foot to the next. Meanwhile, Jimin enchanted the desks and chairs to be pressed against the walls. Though you did not expect him to, he spelled a dozen cushions to appear out of thin air and pad the floor. “Y/L/N do you remember our fourth year Defense Against the Dark Arts class?” he mused.

You had forgotten that you had shared classes with the Slytherins that year, which had also been the year when the Triwizard Tournament had taken place. “What about it?”

“You will see,” Jimin muttered before he pulled his wand out of his pocket and raised it in front of him, “Crucio!”

Immediately, the most excruciating pain you had ever experienced filled your body. You felt as though every single one of your bones was being splintered into a million shards. Your blood felt like it was on fire and like it was going to burn through your body and drip down to the floor before engulfing your seemingly melting body. You vaguely wondered if this must be what being in hell would feel like, if you were a Muggle who believed in a single superior deity, as you just wanted to die so that you no longer could feel the pain.

When you came back to your senses, you saw that Jimin was staring at you from where he was sitting cross-legged on top of a desk, his hand was on his cheek and he muttered, “You have a very low pain tolerance, Y/L/N, that will have to change.”

You croaked; your vocal cords were abused from you screaming your lungs out when you had been under the spell, “Why will that have to change?”

He gave you another look to suggest that you were an idiot, “How will you survive Y/L/N if you cannot withstand the pain? You need to build your tolerance up. And then perhaps one day, you can make your mind strong enough to resist and convince yourself to throw off the spell.”

“Why are you helping me?” you whispered.

He stared at you, “Am I helping you or am I telling you what you should have realized already? It is common sense, Y/L/N. There are a lot of times that you will be forced to endure things you do not wish to, but it is up to you to use those experiences to shape who you are. In any case, I highly doubt you will succeed since you were only under the spell for ten seconds, yet you screamed like the world was lit on fire. I find no harm in telling you anything; I highly doubt that you will be able to use the instruction I give you to your benefit.”

…

A few days after your first detention lesson with Jimin, you were reminded of the lesson you had in your fourth year with Professor Jung Jihoon. Well, he turned out to be a Death Eater named Baek Yoonchun according to The Boy Who Lived, but you digressed. There had been a lesson where he had covered the Unforgivable Curses. In the first lesson, Jung/Baek. had brought out three spiders on which he had used an enlarging spell so that you would all be able to see the effects of the Unforgivable Curses on the doomed creatures as he performed them. In the following classes, he would use the Imperius Curse on classmates until they could throw it off. Only two people had been successful, and it had only been for a few seconds; one of them had been the Chosen One, and the other, although it had been for a split second in contrast to the long interminable minutes the Chosen One had held it off,— the other had been none other than Park Jimin. Something told you though, that if anyone tried to place the Imperius Curse on Jimin now, they would not be very successful unless they were a very powerful individual or one who had used the Dark Arts to increase their magical prowess.

For the second detention, you showed up early with extra padding on your body because last time, even with Jimin’s precautions, you had ended up with bruises. This time, Jimin was even later than before, skidding into the room with an incorrectly buttoned shirt and hair that was drenched from his shower. “I am surprised you came back for more pain,” Jimin gasped, out of breath from his sprint, smirking sardonically to reassert his dominance. “Are you a masochist Y/L/N?” he asked as he magicked the blinds to open so that the morning’s light could be let in.

“No,” you answered. “But I hardly have the choice of not showing up, Park. This is detention. And there will be far worse penalties than this if I were to not show up.”

“I suppose,” muttered Jimin as he took a step into your personal space, “Have you prepared?”

“How am I supposed to prepare for the pain?” you asked, tilting your head upward to look Jimin in his dark stormy eyes.

“Strengthen your mind Y/L/N,” Jimin replied, “Your control over yourself has to be stronger than the person’s ability to perform the curse. You see, they have to really mean it when they utter it. Perhaps you will get lucky and they will utter it carelessly, in which case it will be easier for you to throw off the curse. But perhaps, they are a formidable witch or wizard who is extremely good at performing the Unforgivables; your mind and control over yourself has to be stronger than their ability to execute magic.”

“I don’t understand,” you murmured.

Jimin stepped even closer which caused you to take a step back; his eyes scanned your face, stopping on your lips for a brief moment before returning to your eyes. He finally responded; “Are you able to cast a corporeal Patronus?”

“I did. Once,” you answered.

Jimin looked momentarily stunned before he was able to collect himself, “In theory, if you have a memory that is so inexplicably happy and bound to your mind that you would never forget it, you could even scare off an army of Dementors with your Patronus.”

You felt like you were beginning to understand Jimin; you needed to be so attuned to yourself, have such strength and control over your mind that you could shake off even the strongest mental spells on yourself. “I see.” You said, “I am ready to be Cruciatized.”

Jimin scoffed, “One is not ‘ready’ to get Cruciatized but, fine, I will perform the curse on you now.”

…

On your last detention with Jimin, he was distracted; it had to be rescheduled to a Sunday, and he had arrived past ten. Jimin looked worse for wear with the bags under his eyes looking more prominent than ever, his cheeks appearing to have been hollowed out to the point of no return, and his collarbone sticking out sharply from underneath his sweater. And perhaps it was because Jimin’s mind was not entirely on making you endure the Cruciatus Curse, that you were finally able to throw off the spell for twenty seconds, screaming out, “Jimin! Jimin! I did it!”

Jimin’s control on the spell was snapped as his wand hand jerked at your unexpected outburst. He glanced down to where you were sprawled inelegantly on top of the cushions, your legs were still twitching slighting from the onslaught of torture, “And so you did,” he said monotonously, before his eyes shifted to the windows where he appeared to be looking for some type of disturbance in the skies.

You sat up. Your sides were screaming at the movement. You, then, braced your hand on the ground as you moved to go on your knees before you were slowly able to contort your body until it was able to stand upright. Your entire form was aching in response to the constant shifting. “For some reason,” you gasped breathlessly, “I presumed that you would be more excited about my success.”

Jimin’s eyes cut back to your shape, “Well you presumed incorrectly,” he answered coldly, “We are not friends; nothing you do excites me. However, it does not surprise me that you thought our relationship was changing to anything more than executioner and victim, given your background,” the last part was said scathingly, “but at least something was able to get into your thick skull before you went back to living your meaningless existence.”

There was a sudden rush of hot unwanted tears flooding your eyes; they were probably a delayed effect from the Cruciatus Curse you had been forced to endure, you tried to convince yourself. “I see,” you mumbled thickly, trying to hide the fact that you were now in tears from your voice, “Well, I will be going now. Goodbye, Park. If we are fortunate, we will not be crossing paths anymore now that the detentions are over.”

As you left the classroom, the door shutting after you with a loud click, Jimin finally looked behind himself and let out a heavy sign before unceremoniously grabbing his left arm and pushing up the sleeve roughly to look at the snake emblem that was throbbing and pulsating across the stretch of skin that covered his forearm, the sight of it making him want to upend his breakfast. The Dark Lord was angry and Jimin feared that a summoning was near in his future.

…

You did not see Jimin again for a very long time. When it happened, however, you were grateful for it. You had turned to spending all of your weekends at Hogwarts wandering around the place. Visits to Hogsmeade village had been banned while all clubs and sports teams had been coerced into disbanding after Headmaster Snape had reinstated Educational Decree no. Twenty-Four: “No student organizations, societies, teams, groups and clubs may exist without the knowledge and approval of the Headmaster.” He even went so far as to forbidding students from residing in each other’s companies in groups of three or more. It was like Choi had taken over Hogwarts, once again. And after dealing with the mess that Choi had left behind on your OWL examination year, you were less than enthused to deal with it while studying for your NEWT examinations

With so much being forbidden to the students, you took to spending your time looking for hiding places in the castle; the less you were seen by the new Professors, and the new wave of students running around with badges from the reinstated Inquisitorial Squad pinned to their chest, hell-bent on punishing students and making their lives miserable, the better.

It was on one such weekend that you were wandering around the sixth floor of the castle when you came across a space that looked like it used to be a medieval torture room. However, it looked as though it been recently been put to service again since, when you scanned your eyes around the room for a second time, you noticed that there were three students tied to stakes with cursed chains that were covered in black ichor that was turning their skins greenish and diseased. Bile started to rise up in your mouth as you watched the unconscious forms writhing and twitching intermittently. An overwhelming sense of horror and disgust overtook you as you immediately began to wrack your brain trying to figure out how to release the poor students from their bindings.

You decided against pulling at the knots that held them captive; you knew better than to let your bare hands come into contact with the chains since you had grown up around magic your entire life and had been taught better. You decided to, instead, test out all the spells you knew that would normally work in situations like this: concentrated unlocking spells, targeted explosive spells, and advanced transfiguration spells that would hopefully transform the harsh metal cuffs into something softer and more harmless, like putty, that you could easily break them out of.

The students did not notice your growing despair as you began to wonder if they were dying, after all, you had no idea how long they had been in that state or how many days they had gone without food or water, or even access to the facilities. After close to half an hour of struggling, wracking your brain for everything you could possibly think of, you sank down onto the dirty and dusty floor of the formerly unused room. You wondered if perhaps, you could come back here with food to simply keep them company until they woke up, if they woke up, and then you could offer them the food to see if they could keep anything down.

As you hastily got up to hurry along to the Kitchens and then return to the Sixth floor with a cornucopia of food, you belatedly realized that you never thought to ask the other Professors for help: not the head of your house, Professor Kim Taeyeon, or even the Headmaster, Snape. It was probably for the best, you decided; you did not know how much authority or sway they had over the Lees, even the Headmaster, and you did not want to get them into hot water with the Dark regime. A visit from the Dark Lord, or any of his followers, was the last thing that the students at Hogwarts needed.

The school’s kitchens were located on the basement floor of the castle, near the Hufflepuff common area although you did not know where the exact location of the Hufflepuff’s dormitories was. However, you did know where the Kitchens were; in your Fourth year, you had had to sneak down to the Kitchens with your best friend Im Nayeon to get food for the party the Gryffindors were having after the Chosen One had saved his best friend from potential drowning during the second Triwizard tournament. You had used it in your Sixth year, too, when you were always too busy completing the assigned coursework from your NEWT classes to go to the Great Hall during the assigned mealtimes.

You had not visited them once, however, since the current school year had started, and you did not know if there were now watchdogs watching the entrance to the Kitchen to stop students from sneaking extra meals. Thus, you decided to play it on the safe side and be a little more cautious as you used the castle’s most deserted hallways and secreted shortcuts to get down to the basement level. The password to enter the Kitchens had not changed as you quickly found yourself watching the painting of the bowl of fruits swing forward to reveal the portrait hole for you to climb through after you had tickled the plethora of fruits in a specific order to gain access inside.

Inside, however, the house elves were more subdued than you had ever seen them. They worked quickly, and efficiently, without conversation and did not pay any heed to your intrusion. In fact, they ignored you so blatantly outright that you began to wonder if they had been forbidden from communicating with the students. You still needed food, despite the setback, so you approached one of the elves and asked for a basket of food: fruits, bread, cheese, slices of meat loaf, chicken strips, roasted potatoes, and flasks of orange and pumpkin juice. The elves went to work hastily preparing your basket, piling up food in the hamper so high that you did not see how it would be possible for you to drag it up seven floors. You asked one of the elves, the one who looked slightly nicer than the others, and had been the first to spring into action, fixing up the food for you, if he could transfigure the basket for you so that it would be small enough for you to slip into the pocket of your black school robes. You figured that a simple enlargement charm later would be enough to return the food to its normal size later.

As you passed the head of the hallway that had led you to the Kitchens, you did not notice that there had indeed been a watchdog that was guarding the entrance. Fortunately for you, that person had been Jimin. And as he watched you traipse up the stairs, with a suspecting scowl gracing his face, he decided he had nothing better to do than to follow you to your destination.

Jimin burst into the room where you were watching over the three unfortunate students just after you had transformed the basket of food back to its normal size. “What are you doing, Y/L/N,” he panted breathlessly at your back; he had not known that following you would mean he would have to trek across half the castle. You jumped in surprise at the intrusion.

“Oh, hello Park,” you said glumly. “I don’t know how to free them,” you sighed as you gestured towards the captive students whose names you did not know. All you could see were the badges pinned to their school robes and their ties that dangled limply from their throats. They were two Gryffindors and a Hufflepuff, so you did not expect Jimin to care like you did. “I don’t understand what they could have possibly done to merit this punishment.”

Jimin strode towards you, his gaze flitting between the students who were chained to the crosses like some sort of pagan sacrifice to the gods. “You should not be here, Y/L/N, you will only get into trouble if you are caught. You cannot afford to be on the Lees’ radar.”

“I know that,” you muttered bitterly, “But I can’t just leave them here. I don’t expect you to understand. You probably don’t even have a fully functioning conscience. But I can’t, in good faith, leave them here like this. I have to try to help.”

“Leave the food here,” Jimin said abruptly. “Leave it here. I will ensure that they receive it. But you simply cannot be here Y/L/N. You are making it worse for everyone. If you get caught trying to free them, which I doubt you know how to do successfully, it will have disastrous consequences, not only for you but for them. And what of me? The castle is alive, Y/L/N. There is not a thing that happens within these walls that can be kept a secret. Once it is revealed that I found you here and did absolutely nothing about it, I will be in a heap of trouble as well. So, I am begging you, Y/L/N, use your brain for once. Don’t think with your goddamn heart, which is all you thickheaded Gryffindors know to do, and leave the situation to me. I will deal with it. And I know how to cover up my own tracks.”

“Why can’t I stay and help you?” you asked, feeling suspicious of Jimin and not trusting him to actually deal with the situation adequately.

“You cannot be my accessory, Y/L/N,” Jimin sighed exasperatedly, “Especially since you cannot cover your own tracks. How else do you think it is that I was able to follow you up here without your knowledge?”

“Fine,” you relented, “Get the job done Park, I am– trusting you,” you muttered, uttering four words you never thought you would use in relation to Park Jimin.

Jimin waited five minutes after you left to summon his house elf, Chimmy, into the room. “Master Park,” the house elf, in the pale-yellow pinstriped pillowcase, greeted, bowing deeply, “How may I assist you?”

“Go to my dormitory and bring the spell book with the purple leather cover and the silver gilded pages. Bring two of the potions in my potions case too. The pale blue one with the aluminum stopper and the lavender one with the rose quartz screw,” Jimin said, furrowing his brows deep in thought.

Once Chimmy was back with the potions and the spell book, Jimin grabbed them from the house elf swiftly. He slipped the potion vials into his pocket and flipped through the spell book rapidly; he was looking for the section on magical entrapments and bindings. He soon found the spell he had been looking for, four pages into the section, and marched towards the first unconscious student. The spell was a nonverbal one, so Jimin pointed his wand at the cuffs that were entrapping her, stiffly and recited the spell in his mind. The spell miraculously worked and freed her left hand from the chains. He then went to perform the spell at the bindings at her feet and other hand, moving to catch her when she fell forward after being freed completely. He sat her down, propped against the wall, before he went to do the same thing to the two boys.

It was then that he brought out the lavender potion from the folds of his robe. It was a healing potion, one that he had brewed in Professor Kim Heechul’s class last month. Most days Professor Heechul did not give them any real instruction anymore and instead told them to feel free to make whatever they desired; Jimin used the opportunity to brew potions that would be useful in a variety of situations, especially since Professor Heechul had made the all of the supplies in the Potions’ cupboards available to them. With a few drops of his potion on the surfaces of skin that had been affected by the black ichor, they began to rapidly heal before his eyes.

The pale blue potion was a rejuvenating one that would hopefully wake the three from their stupor. But before that, Jimin had to figure out what to do with the students; he could not just free them to send them back to the masses that roamed the castle when they were wanted personnel. They would only be brought back here or transferred to even worse holding quarters. Not only that, but with the Headmaster’s potion-making prowess, they could be force-fed Veritaserum and reveal that it had been he, Jimin, who had freed them.

He was thinking about how to get the three of them out of the school grounds without being undetected when he remembered the story that Kim Hanbin had told him of being trapped in the Vanishing Cabinets in the Room of Requirement in their Fifth year. He was pretty certain that that had been the way that Min Yoongi had gotten the Death Eaters to storm the castle the previous June, although he had not exactly been privy to his plans. He wondered if there were other methods of escape that could be sought in the Room of Requirement.

With his mind made, he took out the final potion from his pocket and dropped it underneath each of the three’s tongues. When they all awoke to see their Head Boy glaring at them for being put in this situation, they were all understandably a little scared. Jimin shoved the basket of food in one of their arms and told them to follow him through one of Hogwarts’ abandoned passages to the Room of Requirement that was located one floor above them.

In front of the Room of Requirement, Jimin strutted across it three times thinking, “I need a way to get out of the castle,” resolutely. The door that appeared, was one that Jimin was unfamiliar with, a small one made completely of brass with engravings of fairies and other woodland creatures covering it that seemed to be moving across the planes of the door as though it were enchanted. He unceremoniously pulled the door open and shoved the three of them into the Room of Requirement before sealing it and falling to the floor in exhaustion, his back pressed against the now empty stretch of beige wall behind him.

…

It would be too much to hope that no one had noticed what Jimin had done. Two days after he had led the insurgents to freedom, he was called into a meeting with the Lees and the Headmaster.

They asked him what he had been doing on that Sunday, more specifically, why had he left his post in front of the entrance to the Kitchens. They did not believe him when he said that he, feeling that he was going to collapse from exhaustion had felt that the best course of action for him would be return to his rooms to get some, what he felt was very deserved, rest.

They asked him if he had been anywhere near the sixth floor on Sunday. Jimin determined that the Lees were bad at interrogations as he skillfully waded through their questions. Even worse, they were far too impulsive, making rash decisions as they got exceedingly angry from their poor control of their tempers and their inability to get Jimin to revealed what they desired. They wanted to perform the Cruciatus curse on him to torture him into giving up what they thought was the ‘truth.’ When they were told that they could not perform such a spell on Jimin by the Headmaster, who reminded the Lees who Jimin’s family was and their power, they wanted, instead, to shove Veritaserum down his throat. This was also ruled against by the Headmaster who refused to supply the Lees the potion to use on any of his students.

The Headmaster instead suggested that he should apply Legilimency on Jimin and navigate through his mind. With a smirk at the Lees, Jimin readily agreed to have the Headmaster search through his mind. He insisted that he had nothing to hide and that he felt more than comfortable with the Headmaster probing his mind for the truth.

As he stared into Headmaster Snape’s eyes steadfastly, Jimin attempted to clear his mind and paint the scene of him walking from the kitchen straight to the opposite side where the dungeons were and where the Slytherin rooms were located under the Great Lake. He began to add in details: the temperature getting lower, the air feeling increasingly muggy, the gray of the stone walls as he passed through them, his black leather shoes with wooden soles making an echoing sound every time they hit the cobbled floor. He painted the picture of him stepping in front of the entrance to the Slytherin Common Room, of him uttering “Ophiuchus,” under his breath so that the stone wall in front of him was split in half, revealing a gigantic room.

The Common Room had seaweed colored walls; it was decked out with heavy leather furniture with iron arms, large side tables and ornate chairs. There was a truly massive silver chandelier hanging from the ceiling that looked as though it was made of nothing, but ropes of silver wrought snakes tangled with each other. Jimin stopped to stare at a tapestry in the vision that he was painting. He gazed at the woven masterpiece that has Salazar Slytherin, himself, directing a monstrous Basilisk into battle, before swiftly cutting across the room to climb up the stairs on the boys’ side to go to the uppermost landing, letting himself into the special dormitory reserved only for the school’s Head Boy. Jimin smirked as he imagined himself undressing and slipping in between his bed sheets while he was completely nude. For a moment his brow was furrowed, in the present; his gaze stopped on his bedside dresser, in his mind, where there was a piece of paper. It was a schedule of his Head Boy duties; Saturdays are clearly marked to oversee Y/N’s detentions in the morning.

He felt the Headmaster’s foreign presence retreating from his mind, and then heard Snape say snidely, “Mr. Park is telling the truth. Now if you two are done wasting my time, please excuse yourselves from my office.”

The Lees, chastised, rushed towards the doors, no doubt in a hurry to complain to the Chos or the Mins, someone higher up than they were, to report on their behalf to the Dark Lord a complaint about Severus Snape. Jimin moved towards the exit himself, his legs woodenly shifting towards the Lees when the Headmaster’s voice interrupted his thoughts silkily, “Mr. Park I would like to talk to you about your Head Boy duties.”

Jimin stopped in his tracks, and turned back to Snape, “Of course, Headmaster.”

“Take a seat Mr. Park,” Snape drawled, as he swept through the room, his hands tinkering with small magical artifacts. Jimin sat sullenly in front of the large desk Snape had left. His eyes traveled the space in front of him which was decorated with portraits of Hogwart’s previous Headmasters and Headmistresses. Majority of the paintings were empty, with only a murky backdrop remaining in the portraits that their owners had vacated. He saw that the previous Headmasters, including Lee Sooman and Park Jinyoung as well as Albus Dumbledore, were still in their portraits. The last wizard in question was smiling kindly at Jimin while he waited for the current Headmaster to lecture Jimin about how he had known Jimin was lying.

When Snape opened his mouth however, Jimin was surprised: “You need to become more proficient at Occlumency, Mr. Park. A Squib could have waded through your mind and discovered the truth with ease,” he snarled.

“I am sorry Headmaster,” muttered Jimin inclining his head in shame.

“You are entirely unprepared to ever go against the Dark Lord, should he ever seek to look in your mind Park. It is fortunate that you are not against the regime I suppose. But you still do have secrets you want to keep in under the wraps,” Snape drawled, tapping a long forefinger against his jaw.

“Severus, stop being so harsh,” Dumbledore’s voice rang out from the portrait, “I am certain that Jimin has an aptitude for Occlumency.”

“If he does, I have yet to see it,” sniffed Snape. “Park, you are now required to come to my office every Friday at 8pm, unless otherwise specified, for Occlumency lessons. Do I make myself clear?”

“Yes Headmaster,” Jimin replied quickly, as he inclined his body into a fast, respectful 90 degrees bow.

“You may now leave,” Snape said, waving his hand in a careless gesture of dismissal, prompting Jimin to stand up and swiftly exit the room without a backwards glance.

…

It was November when you and Jimin crossed paths again. You had been, once again, on the hunt for the perfect location on the school grounds where you could seek solace and hide from the horrid conditions that had befallen on the inhabitants of the castle. You knew that Quidditch had been banned and thought that this would mean that the Quidditch pitch would be deserted and unkempt since it was no longer being maintained regularly.

The weather on that November day was a little chilly and you decided to seek refuge in the commentator box from the harsh and biting winds. When you had finally reached the top of the steps and swung open the worn-down wooden door to the little office, you found that it was already occupied. The Slytherin Head Boy that you were becoming too well acquainted with, despite your best efforts, was crouched on the messily nailed wooden beams that made up the floor to the office. His nose, red from the cold, was almost pressed against the glass wall he was looking into, out at the Quidditch pitch. His silvery gray hair was a windswept mess on top of his head, and he was bundled into a thick winter coat in Slytherin green, his Head Boy badge was pinned to his chest, and a well-used and well-loved Firebolt laid next to his booted feet.

“Sorry,” you muttered when he looked up at your intrusion, a sharp blast of wind entering the room notifying him of your entry. “I did not think that anyone would be here right now.”

Jimin straightened up and brushed off the dirt and dust from his charcoal gray pant legs. “Were you, too, looking for some place to seek solace?” he asked, not unkindly.

“These days I don’t feel welcome anywhere in the castle,” you admitted, “I had hoped to find some place that I could be alone for a bit and seek respite.”

“It has been hard,” Jimin agreed, “And you feel so entirely alone in the world. You don’t see a point of continuing to move forward.”

At that you turned your head sharply to face Jimin and gaze into his eyes, searching for you don’t know what, in his expression. You had not thought that Jimin could have also been having a hard time. He was a Pureblooded Slytherin was he not? His parents were even rumored to have Pureblood fanatical inclinations although they had never been tried for being Death Eaters themselves. The people who shared the same beliefs and principles with him were the ones that were in power.

But then you thought of the Jimin who had taught you, though unwillingly, how to throw off the Cruciatus Curse and to make the most of your punishment instead of treating you like you were less than human and just torturing you mercilessly for the hell of it. You thought of the Jimin who had helped you free those students. Perhaps there was more to Park Jimin after all: more to the Head Boy than the mask that he had chosen to don for all of the castle to see.

“It would be a shame if we had to give this place up,” you replied looking around the tiny mostly wooden and glass room, “I am content with sharing this place with you Park, for us to escape to when we have nowhere else to go.”

…

The winter holiday meant that on the first week of December, Jimin found himself packing up his school trunk with a large stack of textbooks in order to stay on top of his winter coursework over the holidays. He also put in his trunk a bundle of clothing and an odd amalgamation of things he was no longer regularly making use of to drop off at home in exchange for the new crap his parents had likely bought him to replace them.

Dragging his trunk with him to the front of the school, he boarded a Thestral drawn carriage. After the events of the spring and summer, he could unfortunately see the ghostly skeletal winged horses that pulled the school carriages.

The carriages could fit four but when Kim Taehyung, Jeon Jungkook, and Choi Yeonjun tried to enter the one Jimin was cozied in, he kicked the door shut in their faces and rapped his knuckles against the roof of the carriage to urge the Thestrals to a trot in the direction of Hogsmeade Village.

Jimin was not looking forward to patrolling the halls of the Hogwarts Express or conducting a meeting in the Prefects’ compartment with his co-Head Jennie Kim. He was exhausted and in no mood to talk to anyone. All he wanted to do was to get a little shut eye on the train ride before his parents picked him up to take him to the Mins’, where they had been invited for dinner, no doubt with countless other Death Eaters, and left his luggage to be dealt with by their house elves.

Dinner had been nothing special. The Dark Lord had not been there but his devoted servants Cho Sanghee and her husband, Cho Haseul, had been. Jimin knew them to be related to the Mins through Yoongi’s mother but as he watched the Chos strut around the Min Manor with satisfied expressions, that hinted at their cruel manner, on their decidedly ugly and inbred faces, that were a result of marriages amongst the 28 Pureblood families of England for the past 1500 years, Jimin thought he caught glimmers of contempt on the facades of Yoongi’s parents. Their son Yoongi sat blank faced throughout the dinner, much like Jimin, not joining any of the Death Eaters in conversation, and spent the entirety of the meal mindlessly prodding his dinner with his silverware.

Fortunately for Jimin, this was the most contact that he had to make with the Dark Lord’s most fanatical supporters for the duration of his winter holiday. His parents had apparently convinced the Dark Lord that Jimin was too busy with his NEWT studies, Head Boy duties, and post-graduation preparations to be of any use to him in the hunting down and capturing the outlawed protestors and vigilantes. But the Dark Lord took that to mean that Jimin was ready for even more grooming for a position in the Ministry of Magic after his culmination from Hogwarts. He wanted Jimin to follow Yang Hyunsuk, the Imperiused former Head of Magical Law Enforcement that had replaced Seo Taiji as the current Minister of Magic, around and keep watch to make sure he was not acting out of order.

It was two days after Christmas Day, that Jimin, who had flopped down in his bed at two o’clock in the morning after a long day of observing the Minister at the Ministry, had received your Christmas present. The owl that came to his window and rapped not five minutes after Jimin had finally been able to rest his eyes, reminded him of the owl that had intruded into his life that rainy summer night a few months ago and had changed his live irrevocably. This owl like that one had plumage that was a mixture of dark gray and black feathers, and unlike its long-lost cousin who had been drenched from the rain, had only the barest coating of snow covering its coat. Tied under its talon-ed feet, was a beautifully wrapped gift in black paper with silver stars that was tied together with a thick ribbon of Slytherin emerald green. The ribbon had a card attached to it. There was no name of the sender, but on one side the return address in Ilkley was visible. On the other side of the card, all that was written was, “I hope this gift finds you well. Happy Christmas, Jimin.”

Somehow, Jimin had instantly known that the gift had been from you. He supposed that you had omitted your name and entire address because you had been wary of the gift falling into his parents’ hands. Carefully pulling apart the wrapping paper, Jimin found a thin golden box within, the kind of box that typically used to hold jewelry inside. His guess had been correct: within the box had been a thin silver chain with a tiny circular disc that was maybe a tenth of the size of a Knut and had a J engraved in the middle and one emerald stone next to it.

He immediately took the necklace out of the box and unclasped it to adorn his neck. It fell to the top of his sternum and was low enough that it could be hidden by the collars of most of Jimin’s shirts. He wanted to Apparate to you immediately and ask you why you had given him a Christmas gift when he had given you nothing but the pain from more placements of Cruciatus Curses than either of you could be bothered to count.

His gaze dropped to the golden watch adorning his left wrist. It had stars instead of clock hands and had been given to him by his parents on his seventeenth birthday. Time had gone by swiftly as Jimin had examined your gift and it was now three in the morning. There was no way that you would be awake at this time if he had gone to bother you. Jimin could not find it in himself to rouse you out of bed to answer his questions though they were pressing him. He simply gave your pet owl some treats before ushering it out the window and going to bed himself. He would go visit you after he had arranged someone to take his place to trail the Minister and had secured a few days off for himself. Hopefully, if Jimin was successful, he would be able to have a real vacation until school started up again after the New Year began.

…

Apparating to the Ilkley parish in West Yorkshire, Jimin appeared out of thin air to stand on a meadow in the Northern English countryside. A thin coating of snow covered the field that Jimin was standing on and across from him, he could see a wooden fence caging in sheep to keep them from wandering over his way. It was likely that your mother was the Secret Keeper of your home so Jimin would be out of luck in trying to find you unless you went outside your home. He was confident in his belief that you would; after all, instead of staying cooped up in the Gryffindor dormitory, where you were undoubtedly the safest in the castle, you always chose to wander around.

After walking around the village for a bit, where it appeared that both wizards and Muggles lived together, Jimin noticed that everyone was rather subdued and stuck to themselves. The wizards were wary of interacting with the Muggles they shared their community with, fearful of being looked upon as Muggle sympathizers. And the Muggles stuck to themselves, suspicious about strangers after the increase in missing persons and inexplicable rise in deaths and murders all over Britain. Walking into a small but tidy ice cream shop, Jimin was reminded of Florean Fortescue's Ice Cream Parlour’s in Diagon Alley. The ice cream parlor had been boarded up and remained closed since the Dark Lord had gotten his followers to drag off the owner, but in Jimin’s youth it had always been his favorite place to grab a cold treat with its extensive collection of eccentric and tasty ice cream flavors before he rushed over to Quality Quidditch Supplies to stare at the window displays of the newest professional broomsticks.

This shop did not have the multitude of flavors that Fortescue's did, so Jimin asked for a two-scoop cup of basic vanilla and plain chocolate. With his purchase made, he walked out of place to go find a seat at the park he had passed by earlier. Sitting on the slightly damp black iron bench, Jimin realized that getting ice cream on such a cold day was probably counterintuitive. However, as the creamy vanilla dessert dissolved on his tongue, and he tasted its rich and sweet flavor, he realized that sometimes good things have to hurt for you to understand and appreciate their value.

The park was not entirely deserted and as Jimin sat there watching families of Muggles build snowmen with their children and create snow figures on the ground with their bodies,  he saw a lone female figure wearing a fluffy white Sherpa coat with a scarlet and gold scarf wrapped around her neck.

For someone who had Muggle blood, you certainly did not know how to blend in with them. You stuck out to him so obviously, with the crimson and gold of your Gryffindor scarf acting like a beacon amidst the white of all the fallen snow that was surrounding the village. He doubted that you knew he was here now, in West Yorkshire, looking for you. He stopped twenty paces away from you, indistinguishable from the other patrons of the park with his dark long overcoat and his black hair that was tucked under a dark gray newsboy’s cap. You looked so peaceful, sitting on the icy metal bench as you took in the view of the frozen lake before the two of you. Unfortunately, Jimin could not let you remain in your serene state of tranquility. He had pressing matters to tend to that concerned you.

Hearing the loud crunch of snow beneath boots coming towards you, you looked up curiously and let out a quiet gasp when you saw Park Jimin standing before you. He stood wordlessly before you, glaring at you intensely as he took you in from head to toe. Clearing your throat nervously, you stammered, “What are you doing in West Yorkshire Park? Somehow, I imagined you living somewhere more refined and stylish like Surrey or Buckinghamshire.”

“Oh,” murmured Jimin letting out a low throaty chuckle, that made your face pinch with anxiety, “I’m visiting.”

“I wasn’t aware you really had living family outside your parents,” you muttered almost inaudibly.

Jimin raised an eyebrow at that, “Oh I am not visiting family, Y/L/N.” The same low snarky chuckle came again, “I am visiting the girl who thought it would be appropriate to give me the Christmas gift of an engraved locket.”

Your face burned so hot that not even the biting cold of the winter day could soothe your flushed cheeks. “My apologies Park. I did not mean to make a big deal out of it. I just wished to thank you. That is all.”

Jimin’s face hardened, his facial muscles tightening until there was a severe and harsh look on his face that had nothing to do with the weather, “You wished to thank me Y/N? For performing the Cruciatus Curse on you more than a hundred times? How unusual.”

Looking down, focusing your gaze on Jimin’s waterproof expensive Chelsea boots, which were undoubtedly steel-toed given Jimin’s personality, you forced yourself to reply to his needlessly cruel words, “N-Not for that Jimin. For what happened after.”

Jimin frowned, “Everything I do, is to save my own hide, Y/N. You can’t.”

“I can’t what?” you asked, your eyes watering from the sting of the cold weather, and something more, “I know what I can’t do Jimin.”

“Then why did you send me the gift?” he asked rudely.

“So, what if I did, Jimin?” you bit out, “Why did you come for me afterwards?”

“You know why,” he grated out, “I had to find out why.”

“Are you sure?” you asked looking defiantly at him, you gaze locked to the hollow of his neck, “Is that why you are wearing it?”

“You are a masochist,” Jimin whispered coming towards you, answering the question he had asked you at the beginning of that first detention. As you moved to stand up, he grabbed you behind the neck pulling your face close to his. As you moved towards him, your eyelids flickering shut and your lips moving towards his expectantly, you felt the most unpleasant sensation of everything pressing at you from all directions all at once. The pair of you were enveloped in darkness as your body felt like it was being compressed into a narrow tube with your limbs contorting to fit inside. Within seconds it was over, and you found yourself with Jimin standing outside of some place that was definitely not West Yorkshire, as you were standing on the cobblestones in a rather untidy alley.

“You,” your voice was filled with rage, “Where did you Apparate us to?” You could not believe his audacity. Immediately, you were reminded of how he was a Slytherin and in the back pockets of the Death Eaters that ruled over Hogwarts presently. Giving him the gift had been a mistake. Had he Apparated you to your doom? Was he going to turn you over to the Ministry and claim that you were an Undesirable? You had tried your hardest to slip under the radar and hide your sympathy for the Chosen One and his cause.

Jimin appeared unaffected by the caustic bite in your tone, “Paris. You wanted to be romanced by a man who is clearly not right for you. You’re obviously a glutton for punishment,” his voice rang out as he started walking.

You could not control your feet to keep from following him. You could have just as easily Apparated home, but for some reason you did not. “I’m not a MASOCHIST!” you protested as you chased after Jimin.

When you caught up to Jimin, the Slytherin looked more at ease and more carefree than you had ever seen him. He had tucked his dark gray cap into his coat’s pocket and had let his usually severe hair, that was normally stiffened by gel, get ruffled by the wind. His hair looked so soft, and there was a rosy flush on his cheeks that made you notice for the first time, the light scattering of pale freckles across the plump planes of his face. His thick plaid scarf dangled loosely around his neck instead of being meticulously wrapped around his neck and tucked into his coat. He raised an eyebrow at you roguishly when he noticed you staring at him with your mouth open in amazement. “What?” he asked lightly, “Close your mouth Y/N. You don’t want a Doxy to fly in it.”

“You look–” you paused, stopping before you had almost blurted out beautiful. “Different. When did you dye your hair back to black?” you said instead.

You tried to convince yourself that you were imagining that slight look of disappointment that appeared on his face before he opened his mouth to reply to you, “Apparently silver is an unprofessional hair color.”

“Is it?” you murmured, sneaking your hand around his right one and grabbing a hold of it.

Jimin stopped so abruptly in the middle of the sidewalk that the other passersby had to step around the two of you. He looked down at the joined hands, seeming to wrestle with something within the confines of his mind. After a moment, he seemed to have come to a decision. His hand tightened around yours and he picked up his pace, pulling you gently along with him. You thought he had forgotten that you had asked him a question until he answered five minutes later, “My parents want me to work as a Junior Assistant for Minister Yang when I graduate from Hogwarts.”

You frowned, realizing the harsh reality of the world the two of you were currently living in. Jimin was expected to go to work in the Ministry of the Magic after Seventh year was over. You did not think that he was a Death Eater, but as a Pureblood he would have to undoubtedly keep up certain appearances. Would Jimin be helping the Ministry pass even more laws that ensured the disenfranchisement of Muggleborns and other magical beings? As for you and what you would be doing in the spring after graduation? Your father had gone into hiding in North America, although your mother would not tell you where exactly, fearing that you would break down under one of the Lees’ extreme punishments and reveal it. You thought your mother would want the two of you to join him and his family; to create a new life for all of you there, where the effect of Europe’s warfare was still minimal.

“Do you want to go to the Louvre?” Jimin asked.

“I didn’t know that you were interested in Muggle art, Park,” you replied.

Jimin rolled his eyes, “I’m hardly going to take you to the Museum of the History of European Wizardry, Y/N. The point of this trip was to feel free to be ourselves without having to constantly look over our shoulders. Unfortunately, that means that we have to surround ourselves with Muggles. But I didn’t think that you’d mind.”

Your face tightened, a fraction, in displeasure. Park Jimin was such an asshole. He probably was not even aware of it half the time. You tried to convince yourself that this part of his character could be worked on and fixed. He had been raised to be an annoying bigoted asshole. You knew there was more to him, or else he would have never ‘debased’ himself to spend time with you and to see you as a romantic interest.

As you two walked closer to the Musée du Louvre, its glass pyramid structures came into view. You sighed wistfully, when would you have another chance to be in Paris again? If Voldemort’s plans moved on to France after he was done razing England to the ground, there was no saying that the impressive and centuries old structures of France would remain standing afterwards. You were just wishing that you could take a picture of yourself in front of the museum as a permanent record of this day when Jimin pulled his hand off of yours to reach into his front coat pocket to take out a small black pouch. You looked at him curiously. What was Park up to now?

He pulled his entire arm into the tiny pouch which made you gasp in mild horror before you realized that he most likely had bespelled it with an Undetectable Extension Charm. One would think that by now you would be used to sights of magic in front of you, but it still managed to surprise you every single day. From within the cavernous confines of his bag, Jimin pulled out a clunky Polaroid camera that made you stifle a small giggle when you thought of your father and his impressive Canon cameras. “Do you want a polaroid of you in front of the Louvre?” he asked.

Reaching for his hand and dragging him to a place where you were sure you would be able to capture both the massive building and the impressive pyramids behind you, you replied, “Only if we are both in the picture.”

Hours later when you were lying in bed at your mother’s cottage, able to hear her tea kettle making a loud whistling noise that carried its way into your room, you recounted the events of the day. You thought of the wine Jimin had stolen, since the two of you were still not adults in the Muggle world (you had left a 20 euro note at the register without him noticing) and the warm cheesy corniottes wrapped in newspaper you two had shared as you stared at the self-facing Polaroid he had managed to get the two of you in front of the Lourve. The tiny Y/N in the image was smiling brighter than you had in the past two years and the tiny Jimin’s smirk in the image could almost be mistaken for a smile if you squinted. Jimin had written in his spiky tiny handwriting on the white border of the Polaroid, “12/28/97 – I long to feel this calm for the rest of my life.”

Sighing, you sat up in bed and turned to tuck the photograph inside your pillowcase. You did not see how you and Jimin could ever have more than that one magical day in Paris, without magic, between the two of you. When the term started up again and the two of you returned to classes, you would have to pretend that the other did not exist for either of you, once again.

…

 You were a fool in love. That was the only thing that could explain why you had helped Jeon Jungkook graffiti the castle walls with red paint. The rebellious Gryffindors and you had taken to seeking out in the middle of the night to inscribe Dumbledore’s Army, Still Recruiting and other incendiary remarks that had irritated Headmaster Snape to no end. Sometimes you felt a little guilty. The others were putting their lives on the line because they truly believed in the cause and were fighting for all magical beings, no matter their background. And while you did believe the same, you were not as passionate or outspoken as your House mates. You were doing it to get the attention of the antisocial Head Boy who had gone back to pretending that you did not exist the moment the two of you had stepped back on to the Hogwarts’ grounds after the New Year’s holiday.

It was like Jimin no longer cared about you; that one miraculous day in Paris was so buried in the deepest fissures of his subconscious that he could not call it up to the surface. You had half the mind to Stupefy him and drag him to the Headmaster’s office where you had heard that Snape kept a Pensieve. Perhaps when he was forced to watch your memories with you, he would finally be forced to admit that what the two of you had shared on one of the last days of 1997 had been something special.

When it was finally time for the Easter holiday, you were forced to admit that perhaps you had to give up on Park Jimin. The war still waged on and the Light side was losing badly. You tried to keep up to date with the current events by listening to Goldenwatch radio broadcasts but the punishments for conspiring against Voldemort kept escalating. Kim Yerim had never come back after the Christmas holiday, taken because her mother, Irene, was a journalist who had become too outspoken on her publication, Red Velvet. With radio frequencies being controlled, the magazine Red Velvet being out of print, and every way of communication being watched, it was hard for anyone to keep up with the war in real-time. News of the Light side was hard to come by; the Dark Lord and his followers were doing everything they could to have their opponents scared, ignorant, and divided.

Every time you took a stand against the Headmaster or his minions, you were afraid for your mother’s life. What if the army of Snatchers, the wizards and witches that were not given the distinction of being worthy enough to be Death Eaters, which included the likes of the werewolf Kang Jihwan, came for your mother? You would never forgive yourself if your mother was attacked by werewolves, giants, or other dark creatures because of you. Furthermore, when the Lees started to chain students again, like the ones you and Jimin had saved, a Ravenclaw had gotten caught trying to release them. The torture they had put the male through had terrified you, even more so because his fate had been so close to being yours.

You had lost weight due to all the duress you had been under. All the students at Hogwarts were looking worse for wear. Easter could not come soon enough. And when it did, you were careful to leave the things that you could live without behind in your dormitory so that the Lees did not get suspicious of you leaving Hogwarts forever. The moment a student left, they were hunted down like a criminal. The crime? Not complying with the compulsory school attendance that the Ministry had decreed. When the time came for you to lug your trunk onto the Hogwarts Express, you found yourself reminded of the first day of the school year, when you had run into Jimin and almost pissed your robes. How things had changed so drastically in only a few months, you thought wistfully. Now you would do almost anything to run into him, to grab his attention.

Jimin was right, you thought bitterly, you were a glutton for punishment and absolutely a masochist. He was a pureblood enthusiast though he appeared to be mellowing and not so steadfast with retaining the Death Eater’s fascist ideas anymore. But it was embarrassing the way that you had fallen for a male who had literally compared you to vermin not so recently. To be fair, it was not like you used to have a good impression of Park or had held him to a high standard either. But sometimes you hated yourself for falling for someone who was literally associated with people who murdered people like your father for fun. It was a game for them. They got off on Muggle-baiting.

With your thoughts spinning around your mind like a turbulent tornado, and upsetting your stomach, you thought that maybe it was for the best that you had not caught a last glimpse of Park before you left him forever.

…

While you sat in a train compartment towards the end of the scarlet Hogwarts’ Express trying your best not to remain calm and nonchalant, so as not to raise suspicions about your intentions to drop out of school, fearful of getting hunted by the armed wizards that would be guarding Platform Nine and Three Quarters, Jimin sat alone in the Prefect compartment behind the teachers’ cabins. He had long kicked out the other Prefects and the Head Girl, removing them at the beginning of the trip, with them knowing better than to argue with Jimin and against his actions. Although it was rare for the Head Boy to lose his temper, it had been known to happen a few rare times in the past, and everyone at school was aware of how dangerous and volatile an enraged Park could be.

Jimin had spent the last two months going over to the Headmaster’s office late at night to practice Occlumency. Although he had thought he was improving, every lesson had ended with the headmaster snarling at him and calling him incompetent while throwing jabs at Jimin’s family tree. And if Professor Snape truly was right and Jimin was no better off than he was when he had started, then it had all been for nothing. Even more so for naught, because Jimin had been having a growing sense of unease and unsettlement, as the Lees whiffed around him every single day with increasingly harsh attitudes that were revealing of their suspicion surrounding Jimin.

He had no idea what was making them watch over him so carefully. He had no way of knowing if he had done anything to cause them to be wary over his motives, but it was exhausting trying to keep up the façade. The Dark Arts and Muggle Studies bored him, and although he could have gotten away with skipping half of the lessons earlier in the school year, citing boredom as his excuse, that was no longer the case as the Lees expected him to show up promptly to each lesson and put a hundred percent of his concentration into their teachings. The siblings also did not believe that he had prior knowledge of necromancy or curses like Fiendfyre, and thus felt that they were teaching him things that were truly worth knowing. That part was debatable; no one needed such an extensive overview of the Dark Arts. Every lesson left him feeling worse for wear mentally, physically, and emotionally. He would often find himself ducking into the girl’s bathroom on the second floor, where only the Moaning Myrtle could be found, to throw up the contents of his breakfast or lunch hunched over one of the many porcelain bowls. The Dark Arts were disturbing and criminal. No wonder they were outlawed, thought Jimin bitterly as he remembered the ordeal that was the winter term. Even more so than that, he remembered the portrait of Albus Dumbledore telling him, after one of his many Occlumency lessons, that every time Dark magic was used, it left an irremovable stain on a person’s soul. The previous Headmaster had cautioned Jimin’s usage of Dark Magic, telling him to only use it in the situations where he saw no other options. Jimin had scoffed at his providence at the time, but with every lesson with the Lees, he grew further apprehensive about the state of his soul and its uncontrollable deterioration. It was a little reminiscent of Dorian Gray who Y/N had told him about during their momentary bit of solitude away from the War a few days before the New Year.

Speaking of the two irritating nuisances in his life, before he had boarded the Express, Lee Seunghyun, the Dark Arts professor, had slipped a sealed, presumably cursed, envelope into Jimin’s hand. The note apparently contained directives from the Dark Lord on how Jimin was to spend his Easter holiday. If anyone other than Jimin broke the seal, they would be inflicted with whatever curse or hex the Dark Lord had bespelled it with. And with the Dark Lord being such a formidable and powerful wizard, even the Lees had not risked it and tried to see what was within the confines of the envelope. Now, Jimin bitterly took it out of the folds of his black school robes, slipping one of his fingers underneath the triangular flap to break open the dark green seal with the Dark mark imprinted on it. Within it, Jimin found a curt missive detailing his duties for the spring vacation which included rushing off to the Min Manor the second that he set foot on Platform Nine and Three Quarters. Apparently, the Dark Lord would not be there, but Mins would give Jimin further instruction.

Because Jimin was loathsome to ever fall asleep in a public space and leave himself vulnerable to threats, he decided instead to rest his forehead against the cool glass of the train and watch as the trees and hills went by in a heavenly green blur and slowly turned into the gray and polluted landscape of London. Once at the platform, after he had transfigured his luggage to be a size that he could easily slip within the deep pockets of his coat, he Apparated a tenth of a mile away from the Min Manor. The narrow lane that lead to the entrance of the Min Manor had on one side of it, the formerly neatly manicured hedges that made up the perimeter of the Min property and on the other, wild low hanging brambles. As he approached the wide driveway at the end of the lane, thick high iron wrought gates suddenly became visible. With hardly a sidestep, Jimin confidently rose his left arm, the one disfigured with the emblem of the Death Eaters and went straight through the metal as though it were as thin and vaporous as smoke. The spell that the Dark Lord had casted over the entrance was similar to the magic which made up the protective barrier at the King’s Cross station.

The air within the manor was stiff with an almost grim and hostile silence surrounding it. When it was broken by the shrill cry of what Jimin thought was a screaming infant, he almost jumped in the air at the unpleasant intrusion. As he walked towards the magnificent dining room that the Mins had used to hold extravagant gatherings in the past, where Purebloods used to dance and rejoice in their wealth and magical abilities, he was once again struck by the change to the formerly grand home. The centuries old stunning furniture that furnished the room were pushed against the walls, harshly stabbing into the soft gilded silk wallpaper. The giant fireplace was unlit, and the room was filled with an uncomfortable chill. At the head of the table sat Min Yeonsoo, cradling a baby bundled in a clean swath of fabric with a spiteful look on her face. Jimin’s classmate Yoongi was nowhere to be seen. He had had a higher position with the Dark Lord than Jimin had and had stopped attending classes after Christmas. Jimin had to wonder however, if the reason Yoongi was not at Hogwarts was because the Mins had let the Golden Trio escape, and the Dark Lord had wanted to exact his wrath and displeasure on them.

Before Jimin could clear his throat to reveal his presence, Cho Sanghee entered the room in a furious flurry of billowing dark robes. She looked gaunter and more maniacal than ever, causing Jimin to take a step back. He quickly uttered a prayer begging the heavens that Sanghee was not the one who would be telling him why he was at the manor, but luck was not on his side.

With a crazed screeching laugh that raised the hairs on Jimin’s neck and instantly put him on guard, Sanghee crooked a long filthy fingernail at Jimin, gesturing at him to come closer. Stifling a shudder, he obliged her, stopping well over five feet away. “The Dark Lord wants you to take of a delivery for him little Park.”

Jimin clenched his teeth in response to the address but did not retaliate, knowing better than to antagonize the Dark Lord’s most devoted servant when he himself held such a low position in the Dark Lord’s eyes. “Of course, Mrs. Cho,” he murmured, “And where is this package I am to deliver?”

“I’m so glad you asked little Park,” cackled Sanghee flicking her unruly black curls away with an indolent sweep of her wand, presumably this was a wand that Sanghee had repurposed, or rather stolen, away from one of the Snatchers after the Golden Trio had absconded with hers. “The Dark Lord wishes for you to look over this package and deliver it to Snape at Hogwarts at the end of the week. It is right behind you, little boy.”

With sinking feelings of apprehension and doom, Jimin turned around and swallowed the scream that was struggling to escape from the confines of his throat. Nagini, the Dark Lord’s massive serpent, was slinking towards him through the air, trapped in a giant magical orb of her owner’s creation, no doubt. Jimin was not terrified of snakes. How could he be, as a Slytherin? That being said, there was something unnatural about Nagini that held Jimin back from ever relaxing in her company. The snake had an unignorable intelligence that seemed to be far greater than all the other snakes that Jimin had ever seen. And with the Dark Lord’s ability to converse with his pet in Parseltongue, Jimin had no doubt that Nagini often acted as a spy for him.

He felt trapped within his own skin; this was no ordinary task that was being asked of him. The Dark Lord wished to spy on Jimin and then to spy on the Headmaster. “How is it that the Dark Lord wishes for me to transport Nagini to Headmaster Snape,” Jimin murmured, “I can already imagine the panic on the train platform if I tried to board the Hogwarts’ Express with her in tow.”

A sharp voice cut across the room, “You will not have to deliver Nagini to Severus at Hogwarts,” Yeonsoo bit out acidly, “you merely have to deliver Nagini to his home.” She looked down at the child in her arm with contempt before maneuvering the babe around so that she could use her right hand to write down the Headmaster’s address on a scrap of loose parchment. The question clung to the back of Jimin’s throat, but he bit it down. Whose child was that? Did Yoongi get into even more trouble than Jimin had previously thought?

Jimin walked towards Yeonsoo so that she could easily slip the note into his open palm. After he retrieved it, both sisters walked away from him, leaving him alone in the formal dining room with Nagini. Furrowing his eyebrows as he thought of how to transport her to his home, he decided to just walk out of the manor for now. Nagini had been able to glide through the air of her own volition before, so he hoped that the snake would choose to follow him as he left the room. In times like this, it would have been convenient to have been a Parseltongue, he supposed, but as that was a mark of the noble house of Slytherins, and the Dark Lord was all that remained of the ancient house, he highly doubted that there would ever be more Parseltongues. The thought of someone procreating with the 72-year-old dark wizard made bile rise up in Jimin’s mouth.

Once he had made his way back to the outskirts of the Min property, he finally had the chance to look at the address that was on the now tightly crumpled ball of parchment due to his clenched fist. The Headmaster lived in Spinner’s End, which was unusual as Jimin had never come across the name once in his studies of the magical geography of Great Britain. Deciding to worry about that later, Jimin stood in place with his right arm wrapped tightly around his wand as Nagini slowly glided to a stop right beside him.

“I hope this works,” Jimin muttered to himself, before raising one arm to place his hand flush against the wall of Nagini’s cage before attempting to Apparate the two of them to the edges of his family property in Surrey. Fortunately he was successful in his endeavors, and as he slowly walked up to the front of the mansion, he was trapped within his swirling thoughts as he worried over not only Nagini watching over him, but owling the Headmaster to arrange for a time that he could drop by with Nagini, and most importantly, how to warn you to stay away from Jimin and maybe to escape from England and not come back. He could convince you that he would follow you after graduation, but you had to get away. Now, more than ever, Jimin knew with a sense of deepening doom, that the Dark Lord’s takeover of Britain was almost complete. It would not be long before he attempted to off The Boy Who Lived to end their wretched tango and moved on to extend his control and reach over the entire European continent.

He delegated Nagini to the empty bedroom at the end of the hall from his. The two rooms were both on the west wing of the house but far enough apart that he had a little privacy. But even that was not enough to shake away Jimin’s fears. Sometimes at night while he laid in bed, he thought that he heard the serpent’s heavy slinking body moving down the hall past his bedroom. His fear grew that one day he would happen upon his owl’s carcass or that of Chimmy’s.

…

The one weeklong break from school felt both unendurably long and ephemerally fleeting both at once. He had penned two short missives to both you and the professor but thus far had received no reply from either of you. The unbearable monotony of his days, as Jimin was fearful of Nagini reporting to the Dark Lord about his whereabouts if he ever left the Park mansion, were only punctuated by the meals that Chimmy served to his room (his parents were both off gallivanting across the countryside torturing Muggles or something of that sort so he rarely met them in the formal dining room for meals together), him taking out Nagini to the manor’s extensive gardens to hunt for her meals, and the unending revisions and studying for the NEWTs Jimin was currently preparing for. It seemed catastrophically ridiculous that the NEWT and OWL examinations were still taking place while the entire country as a literal warzone.

Unfortunately for Jimin, you responded to his letter before Jimin could drop off Nagini at the Headmaster’s. With your letter, where you had told him you would meet him near where he had eaten ice cream last time, you had included three chocolate eggs that, were closer to the size of dragon eggs than chicken’s eggs and, had on them messily scribbled icing depicting Firebolts, Bludgers, and Beater’s bats. You were always surprising Jimin with your gifts and generosity. For someone who had never received anything without stipulations, it was a welcome change for Jimin to receive your presents which did not have any strings or conditions attached to them.

Thus, midway through the holiday, Jimin found himself taking his neglected Firebolt out of its case and electing to fly out of the windows framing his bedroom’s walls rather than to come across Nagini or his parents (who would occasionally show up as mysteriously and unexpectedly as ghosts) in the hallways, if he had chosen to leave through the front door.

The brisk breeze was a welcome presence to Jimin, after being stuck indoors for a majority of the week. He swept through the air on his Firebolt, taking sharp dives and turns, whooping spiritedly as he flew by miles above the buildings in the uncongested sky that was wide open and free, aside from a couple of birds that flew by doing their own thing.

He once again stopped at the long open meadow he had Apparated to last time. As this was a Muggle neighborhood, he decided to transfigure his broomstick to the size of a matchstick he could slip into the breast pocket of his light linen shirt before he took off on his walk. He found the ice cream shop much more easily this time around and decided to get a cup with a single spoon of vanilla ice cream for himself. For you, he got a two-scoop cup of peanut butter and berries n creme ice cream. Once he reached the park, he sat again on the same iron wrought bench from last time, placing your cup besides his thigh as he splayed his legs out and took a bite of the rich vanilla ice cream. He was not going to focus on how he was recreating the last time the two of you had spent time together and how he was making slight changes so that this time would be better.

Like clockwork, you once again appeared in front of him. Stifling a wince, he noticed how you looked at least a stone lighter than you had been last time. Your face was sharp with harsh angles and your cheekbones were jutting out making your face lose the soft round planes that it had had previously. The chocolate eggs you had included with your letter had made Jimin hopeful, but now, looking at you and the hard glare you cut across his figure, he realized that he had to make up for more of his mistakes than he had realized.

“Why are you here Jimin?” you bit out caustically, “What was so important for you to say that you could not say it with a letter.” You were surprised with how easily his owl had found you in Austria. Returning to an empty cottage and a letter from your mother that she was running off to Asia to hide, you had been country hopping to places your mother had not been to confuse the Snatchers that were no doubt tracking your every move and attempting them to prevent them from figuring out your final destination, or capturing both you and your mother. You were mad at yourself for being swayed by Jimin’s letter and coming back to England. But in the end, you had decided to meet up with him if only to convince Jimin that you were still living in West Yorkshire and to throw off the Death Eaters from your trail. Casting a casual look around the park, you attempted to quiet the furious beating of your heart, although no one had realized it yet and raised any alarms, you were technically on the run and you felt very unsafe being back within the borders of England.

Jimin stood and placed the now slightly melted ice cream in your hand, the creamy brown, purple, and white colors were already running into each other and muddling the appearance of the dessert. With a bemused furrow of your eyebrows, you curled your hand around the cup and stabbed the plastic spoon through one of the scoops, dipping a spoonful of sweet, warm, ice cream into your mouth. “Perhaps we should have this conversation somewhere that is not as crowded,” Jimin murmured, walking away without pausing to see if you would follow.

He led the two of you to one of the communal fields that the sheep were grazing on before he turned sharply to gaze deeply into your eyes and say without so much as a preamble, “You need to leave England now.”

You stopped dead, choking as the melted ice cream went down the wrong pipe. That was certainly not what you thought he was going to say. You had thought, after the chocolates and notes were long gone and all you had was your regret to accompany you, that Jimin was going to lay into it today and detail all the reasons the two of you could not be together. After all, he had ignored you pretty thoroughly for all of 1998 thus far. You had thought that had meant he had changed his mind. “I beg your pardon Park?”

Jimin frowned when he noticed you using his last name, distancing yourself even further from him. “I am worried about the future Y/N,” he mumbled.

“You want me to leave? Right now?” you asked, seeking for more clarity.

“As soon as possible Y/N. I don’t want you to get hurt. You have to stay safe,” Jimin bit out vehemently.

“And why is that?” you asked, not giving into him so easily. You wanted Jimin to grovel. You were tired of always being the one who felt out of sorts when the two of you were together.

Jimin sighed. His dark brown eyes fluttered shut as he whispered, “I think I am falling in love with you. I don’t even know that I know what love is, and yet, I am convinced that it is the emotion I feel for you. I know we cannot be together, but all the while, I still long for a possibility that would allow for us to be together.”

Your cheeks felt like they were burning as your blood surged into them, making them a mottled red. You had thought you were infatuated with Jimin. Or perhaps, suffering from some type of Stockholm’s syndrome because like it or not, all of you were forced to attend Hogwarts and Jimin, outside of the few Gryffindors you talked to, was the only person who had noticed you and was kind to you, at times. But never had you considered that it might be love, anytime you got close to feeling anything of the sort, you had thought you were getting brainwashed. Not by Jimin per se, but you had thought that Jimin had had an unreasonable power over you when you contrasted him with all the other Purebloods and Slytherins that inhabited Hogwarts. But now that you knew how he felt about you, you were inclined to believe that you had also fallen in love with him. After all, it was being reciprocated, was it not.

Perhaps the reason why you took that step towards Jimin and tiptoed to meet his lips had a lot to do with you being a Gryffindor. After all, a move like that required a lot of courage, it was perhaps misplaced, but all the same it was courage. The male inclined his neck to make the kiss easier for you to lose yourself in, and you felt yourself getting swept away in his full pink lips. Jimin was a marvelous kisser, he met every swipe of your lips with his own thoroughly, even if he was moving at a patient pace. Slowly though, you felt him get bolder, wrapping his muscle corded arms, bulky from playing the Beater position, around your waist and pulling you deeper into his hold. When he bit your bottom lip to trick you into opening it so that he could slip his tongue into the kiss, you got daring as well. You tiptoed even further, pressing into the warm glorious heat emitting from his body, and reached up into his hair to do what you had always longed to do: to slip your hands into the long straight strands of his dark hair and luxuriate in its softness. You fisted his hair in your grip, your nails raking against his scalp, causing a pleased sound of contentment to escape from Jimin, as you tried to kiss him more soundly. When the two of you finally broke apart minutes later, Jimin was running his tongue over his swollen reddened lips as he looked down at you with want and you were leaning against his solid, reassuring frame, pressing your forehead against his chest as you attempted to catch your breath.

“Do you want to go for a ride on my Firebolt?” he asked abruptly.

You raised an eyebrow as you bit back a laugh, “Very forward Mr. Park.”

Jimin flushed crimson, “I actually flew my broom here instead of Apparating. I wanted to experience the freeing feeling of being in the air rather than getting suctioned into nothingness as I reappeared in a different location.” He patted along the front of his pale linen shirt, feeling around for something before he took out a tiny matchstick from the breast pocket triumphantly. Laying it flat on his left hand, he poked at it with his wand, uttering an enlargement spell as the stick grew to be the full-sized Firebolt you had seen only once before.

Quirking an eyebrow at you daringly, Jimin smirked as if to say, “So? What are you waiting for?” Unfortunately, Gryffindors had never been ones to ignore the ribbing of Slytherins and so you found yourself easily sliding behind Jimin as he sat on his broomstick, waiting for you to get comfortable before he kicked off into the afternoon sky.

You sat on the Firebolt with your arms wrapped tightly along Jimin’s waist and your chin resting on his shoulder as he expertly flew the two of you across the long expanse of cloudless British skies. Striving to impress you, Jimin would often take swift turns and break into complicated moves, maneuvering the two of you into various types of dives and even asking you if you thought you could hold onto him tightly enough for him to attempt a Wronski Feint. You had thumped him soundly on his back and told him you would immediately Apparate off the broomstick if he attempted any more dangerous Quidditch formations.

Subdued into submission, Jimin took you two on a relatively peaceful ride as you were left to wonder why he played the position of the Beater on the Slytherin Quidditch team when he was obviously qualified to play one of the positions that required more dexterity like Chaser or Seeker. When you asked Jimin why he had not played as Seeker he laughed and said that the Mins had paid for Yoongi to be given that position and it would never have been so easily relinquished to him. He also had bitterly added, that by the time Sixth year had rolled around, and Yoongi had left the team to work on his plan to have Death Eaters invade Hogwarts, the team had become accustomed to having Jimin be their star Beater who would always give the Gryffindors hell and did not wish for him to change positions.

You clung to him even more tightly after his admission, feeling sorry for Jimin as he was always surrounded by people who would not allow him to truly be himself. You also were a bit surprised at how readily Jimin had admitted Yoongi’s hand in the events that had led to Headmaster Dumbledore’s death. As Jimin felt your tightening grip around his middle, a soft smile graced his face and he slowly declined the Firebolt as he prepared for the descent to your destination. He stopped in an alley besides a row of townhouses that went down the entire length of the street.

Raising an eyebrow as you attempted to fix your windswept hair, you asked, “Jimin where are we?”

With a smile Jimin responded, “Give me a second,” as he searched his pockets for a scrap of parchment and a self-refilling quill. After biting at the nib of the quill to free the ink, Jimin quickly scrawled down an address in his thin spiky handwriting. “Memorize it,” he muttered, “I’m the Secret Keeper.”

You quickly memorized the lines: Park Jimin’s residence is 0613 Amaranthine Street, London. As soon as Jimin had seen you wordlessly mouth the sentence twice over, he set it on fire with a small incendiary spell. As the two of you made your way out of the alley, Jimin took your hand in his and gently pulled you along to the front of the houses. In front of the two of you, you could see 0612 Amaranthine with its beige exterior and 0614 Amaranthine with its gray walls, however, as you visualized the words on the paper that Jimin had written, 0613 began to materialize between the two homes, pushing them out of the way until it stood before you in its shining white and navy glory.

“So, this is where you live,” you muttered, following Jimin up the walk to the front door. As soon as Jimin’s hand touched the door handle, he was able to push it open with ease since the door was opening as though Jimin himself was the key.

“Not yet,” he uttered, looking back at you as he toed off his shoes at the entrance. Apparently Jimin liked to have a no shoes allowed household, which surprised you. You had always thought of him as the severe type of person who was meticulous about everything right down to the clothes that he worn. “It’s the bachelor lodgings my parents got for me for after graduation. But since I’m still splitting my time between my parents and Hogwarts, it’s been empty for months. Apologies in advance if it’s a little dusty.”

“No this is fine,” you answered him, stepping out of your own shoes and walking deeper into the foyer. You liked the welcoming airy style the house was made up in. The pale colors and expansive windows everywhere provided the home with tons of light that made it appear spacious and inviting.

Jimin let you go through the rooms of the house without interruption. He knew you were touring it trying to gain further insight about him but unfortunately, the home did not have a lot to offer. When his mother had asked him for his opinion on the furniture and décor, Jimin had delegated Chimmy to furnishing the place. You seemed to come to the same realization as Jimin after you finally paused your tour in the master bedroom, turning to face him with a wry expression.

“Are you hungry?” Jimin asked, not knowing how to make things move smoothly for the two of you.

While that day in Paris had been amazing, Jimin could not recreate it by being in public with you now. He was certain he was getting watched by the Dark Lord, although he did not know to which extent besides that of Nagini, but he knew he would be safe here at Amaranthine Street. The home had the same level of protection and security that the Park mansion did; it had been historically used as the first-born Park’s bachelor pad until they got married and moved back to the family mansion. Perhaps the two of you could play Wizarding board games or something, Jimin did not fucking know. He had never really dated anyone, choosing to spend most of his time with the opposite sex cozied in broom cupboards or deserted classrooms for heated make out sessions.

With a mocking laugh, you pulled Jimin into you, “I hardly think you brought me to your home when there’s no adults to sit around and eat together Jimin,” you murmured, threading your fingers through his thick black hair and pulling him down for a kiss.

With slight groan, Jimin deepened the kiss, his teeth nipping at your warm plush lower lip as he strove for the dominance that you, as a Gryffindor would not give him so easily. You fought against Jimin’s warring strokes of tongue and lips against your mouth, not wanting to relinquish your control, as he roughly held you up to elongate the length of the kisses. You were sure that without Jimin gripping you, you would have sunk to the floor as you felt strangely boneless.

Deciding to give you a respite and a chance to catch your breath, Jimin moved his lips to trail heated open mouthed kisses along your jaw and throat with firm pressure from his plush lips as he maneuvered the two of you so that you were pressed up against a wall. Your eyes closed at the pleasurable nips and pecks, the warmth from Jimin’s form taking over you as your senses his scent washed over you. The slightly bitter and sharp scent of orange blossoms that was so quintessentially evocative of Jimin filled your lungs as you ran your hands over his muscle corded back. Playing as the Beater had bulked Jimin up; he had enticingly broad shoulders and thick veiny arms that were holding you up while he did not even break a sweat. As your fingers slipped under his linen shirt and fluttered against his back, Jimin stilled. Shaking his head slightly, he accidentally scrunched his nose at you when he attempted to wink, rather, both of his eyes shut close for a second. Fixing his grip on your thighs, he pushed you even higher and tighter against his body as he maneuvered the two of you towards his bed, which fortunately had clean sheets due to Chimmy coming back and maintaining the house weekly.

As you toppled onto the bed with Jimin falling over you, you gasped, your breath getting knocked out of you although Jimin tried his best to keep from crushing your frame with his body. You had been wearing a pair of white jeans shorts and a pale blue baby-doll T-shirt to battle the early heat of the English spring, and Jimin was now taking advantage of your easy to slip off clothes to unbutton your shorts and slip them down your thighs as he caged you underneath him. The shorts hit the hardwood floors with a resounding thud when Jimin tossed them behind the two of you.

You started to blush when you realized that you only had your daisy printed cotton panties and T-shirt, that had already been sliding up your stomach, to shield you from Jimin’s gaze. With a light laugh, Jimin murmured, “Come on Y/L/N, don’t get shy with me now. You wouldn’t want me to tie your hands up so that you wouldn’t cover yourself now, would you?”

You glared at him, his palm was lying comfortably on top of your clothed mound, hardly realizing the overpowering effect he had on you. If Jimin crooked his finger into the juncture between your thighs, he would find the crotch of your panties soaked from your want. “Aren’t you going to take off your clothes Park?” you bit back.

Jimin scoffed, “That’s a little too easy isn’t it?”

Instead, he hooked his forefinger to the ribboned edge of your panties, pulling it almost entirely off your body. At the last moment, he had gotten distracted by your glistening rose petaled folds and had left it dangling from your left foot. He took out his wand to summon a large selection of cushions and pillows for you to prop your ass on. It was weird having your head resting against the bed’s mattress while your ass was elevated to be level with Park Jimin’s mouth. In fact, just now, he was propping your thighs on his shoulders as he moved closer to your heated core, wanting the sopping wetness of your femininity to be flush against his eager mouth.

As his tongue stabbed through your highly responsive cunt, brushing against the nerves that lined the walls of your hypersensitive core, your nipples stiffened against the cups of the built-in bra of your shirt. In frustration, you found yourself pulling off the material entirely to let the cool air in the bedroom wash over your hardened nipples. Jimin paused in his overzealous adoration of your cunt as he stared at you writhing against his cream-colored bedsheets. “Touch yourself, Y/L/N,” he murmured silkily, “Do it Gryffindor, or I won’t let you come.”

Hesitantly, you moved both of your hands up to cup your breasts. They were heavy and swollen from desire, spilling out of your palms. But staring Jimin down, you rolled your nipples in between your thumbs and forefingers, letting out a loud moan when you pinched them both simultaneously. Deciding to reward you, Jimin added a finger into the mix as he continued to eat out your pussy enthusiastically. You had never had anyone pay such fervent attention to your own pleasure before. The Gryffindor boys that you had usually hooked up with were all focused on the main course. And not only that, but they were all the “one and done” type, never checking to make sure that you had come, much less bothering to give you multiple bouts of pleasure.

After Jimin had brought you to your first screaming orgasm, he knocked the pillows out of the way so that you were in a more comfortable position. He made his way up your body with deep punishing kisses that were full of teasing love bites that you knew would leave your body dotted with bruised purplish hickeys and marks afterwards. Having finally reached your face, he threaded his fingers through your messy unbound hair, pulling your mouth tight against his for a kiss with a deep growl. His body pressed against yours, his heavy cock finding your hidden softness easily, pleasurably unyielding against the juncture of your thighs. He rocked his hips as he deepened the kiss, your lips meeting his feverishly as the two of you battled for domination, your tongues intertwining frantically as moans and pants slipped out both of your lips. His hard, persistent erection had your pussy aching for it, and you found yourself rolling your hips and grinding your enlarged and overly sensitive clit against the hard metal zipper of his pants, eager to have the thick throbbing length trapped against the zipper within you.

Deciding to ignore Jimin’s snarky comment about it being too easy from earlier, you found yourself unbuckling and unlooping his leather belt from his pants so that you could free his cock. You could feel Jimin frowning into your kiss, so you distracted him by sucking his tongue in between his lips as you clenched your fingers around his pants and underwear to push it down past his hard ass cheeks so that you could finally free his monstrous cock. You immediately put your hand on it, wrapping your fingers around it, eager to finally feel the warm heat of his long smooth length. His balls felt huge in your palm as you gently tugged on them causing Jimin to let out a loud moan that had him instantly grabbing your hands and quickly pulling them over your head as he held them tightly in the grip of his left hand. With his dominant hand, he pushed off his pants completely, kicking them off the bed. “Don’t test me Y/N. Or I’ll take my pleasure and not even think about giving you yours.”

You protested loudly at that, causing him to let out a husky laugh, “Okay, okay, vixen, I’ll let you have your pleasure and take it too.”

Still holding your arms above your head, he sank to his knees in between your widespread thighs. His dark brown eyes sought yours as he fought to hold your gaze, staring into your eyes resolutely while he gripped his reddened cock in his hand and maneuvered it to the entrance to your pussy. The head of his cock was glistening with precum as it sought the slit that led to your empty womanhood. After a moment, he succeeded, his thick unyielding cock forcing you to surrender as he easily slipped in between your folds. He started slow, with shallow pumps, testing your limit before he increased the force, jackhammering you with hard, vehement thrusts.

Your lovemaking had been a zealous and passionate affair that had left the two of you breathless in rapture besides each other after the tingling aftershocks of your orgasms had subsided. You played absentminded with the cuff of the left arm of Jimin’s long sleeved shirt as he rested beside you with his other arm thrown over his eyes. Unlike him, you were not exhausted after the sex. If anything, you felt even more energized. Your mind was running a mile a minute as thoughts flitted across your head with incredible swiftness. For one, you kept coming across a number of questions that you wanted to ask Jimin now that you two had irrevocably changed the nature of your relationship. Your eyebrows furrowed as you grew stuck on what Jimin’s middle name was. Your eyes flitted across his form, getting caught on the bit of his forearm that had become exposed after you had been fiddling with his shirt’s cuffs. The pale skin was marred by a dark inky tattoo that you could not fully see since the majority of it was still covered by his sleeve.

Growing curious, with a sinking feeling of premonition that you did not understand fully, you reached once more for his left arm. You paused with your hand wrapped around his wrist before you decided to bite the bullet and shove up the arm of his shirt all the way up to his elbow. The tattoo that was revealed had you gasping in horror and backing away from Jimin in a rush. Jimin’s eyes snapped open at the sound and he stared at you in confusion when he saw you backing up against a wall with your shirt clutched to your chest as you attempted to find the rest of your clothes and wand so that you could get out of there.

“Y/N, what’s wrong?” he asked getting up and trying to approach you. Your eyes inadvertently flickered to his left forearm, where his sleeve was still pushed back, as you moved away even more, your eyes sweeping across the room desperately seeking your wand.

“What are you looking at?” Jimin asked, his gaze following yours until he caught sight of his revealed Dark Mark. “Y/N,” he whispered, pleadingly.

“No!” You shouted, when he once again tried to get closer to you. “Stay away from me, you Death Eater! I can’t believe I trusted you,” you cried hysterically, as you finally found your shorts and quickly stuck your legs through them, slipping them on over you, sans underwear.

“Y/N, I can explain,” Jimin begged, holding up his palms in surrender.

“No, you fucking cannot!” You grated, slipping your hand into your shorts’ pocket, finding your wand in the back right pocket. Before Jimin could blink, you let out a roaring scream, belting out “Stupefy!” to stop and Stun him in his tracks. As Jimin quickly went down with a thud, you could not find it within you to be remorseful.

You hurriedly slipped your T-shirt over your head as you ran down the hallway and down the stairs to jam your feet into your shoes. You opened the front door with a resounding bang and thought that Jimin should have just been thankful that you did not have an evil or vindictive bone in your body. It was a good thing that you were not a pyromaniac like Choi Soobin, because in all honesty you had been two seconds away from setting the entire house on fire with the FiendFyre spell, the Lees had taught, with him still in it.

You ran down the street until you made it back to the alley that Jimin had landed his Firebolt in earlier and quickly uttered the Apparition spell once you were fully enmeshed in the shadows of the buildings making up the alley. This time you would be running away to somewhere that no one could find you, not the Snatchers, nor the Death Eaters, and especially not one Park Jimin, whom you now considered to be dead to you.

…

It took Jimin four hours to wake up from the powerful Stunning spell you had hit him with. He had found himself lying on his back on the hardwood floors of the master bedroom to 0613 Amaranthine Street with a pounding headache and a large bump on the back of his head. Although he was disoriented, the memories from before slowly came back to him and his heart sunk with devastation when he recalled your reaction to the Dark Mark that was marring the length of his left forearm.

He stayed on the floor, with his knees up and tucked under his chin, resentfully suffering through his splitting headache until Chimmy came to him long after night had fallen with a bowl of kimchi fried rice and eggs for dinner. Sullenly, he asked Chimmy to Apparate them back home, not in the mood to fly the massive distance when he still felt so queasy. Once at home, he bitterly walked past the room that housed Nagini behind its door, and rushed towards his own bedroom, in no mood to make conversation. For a second, he was tempted to take his wand to his arm and use it to cut through the mark and destroy it, but something told him that the Dark Mark was more than just a tattoo, that the Dark Lord had somehow bound all his servants to himself, and that his control over them would linger even after the Dark Mark was cleaved. The only thing that brightened Jimin’s mood was the folded letter waiting on the top of his bedsheets. Written in the Headmaster’s spidery script was a missive that told Jimin to bring the giant serpent, that was currently slithering around the Park Mansion, to Spinner’s End tomorrow at noon.

As Jimin got ready for bed later that night, his chest ached with a resigned sense of emptiness. Although he had not exactly come to terms with losing you, he did get the feeling that the end was near. There were no seers or oracles in Jimin’s family; the gift of foresight was not one that was passed down in Jimin’s family, yet he could feel with clarity and conviction that the culmination of the war was coming rapidly. He knew that Kim Namjoon would not be content to remain in hiding for much longer, and that when he was ready (and Jimin sensed that that might be soon if the events that had taken place at the Min Manor were anything to go by), he would come for the Dark— no for Voldemort, and end the wretched limbo that the entire country was stuck in, waiting for the two to finally kill each other.

After breakfast the next day, Jimin found himself Apparating to the address that Yoongi’s mother had written down. As Jimin found himself walking through the riverside town, that was slightly modernized from the time that the city had attempted to gentrify it and then left abandoned, when no one new moved in, and was now broken down and depilated, he found himself wracking his head around the oddities of Apparation. Nagini floated besides him covered by a Disillusionment Charm cutting through the air easily while Jimin had to watch his step on the loosened and upturned pieces of gravel and stone on the cobblestoned street. It had been plaguing his mind all night as he drifted in and out of a fitful sleep, it was strange that wizards could Apparate to locations they had never been in as long as they could imagine the destination with excessively detailed clarity, and Jimin was wondering if the laws of Apparation would still hold true if he attempted to Apparate with a person in mind as his ultimate destination and not a physical location. His musings eventually brought him to the row of houses where the Headmaster lived. The bricks were old and worn down, the iron fences rusty and bent, the board of governors that set the salary for Hogwarts’ instructors were obviously not paying Snape a livable wage.

As Jimin walked up the steps that led him to the front doors of the Headmaster’s home, the disgusting stench from the filthy river went under his nose as a gust of wind carried the smell with it. At his knock, the door opened up a crack, so that Jimin could see a sliver of Professor Snape’s face and soulless black eyes looking back at him. Hidden behind the door, Jimin knew the man was armed with his wand in his hand. With furrowed brows, Snape threw open his front door wide enough so that Jimin and Nagini could pass through.

Expecting this to be a simple drop off, Jimin did not step too deep into the house, lingering at the entry way. As Nagini freely floated through the air in her bulbous entrapment moving deeper into the home, now visible as the professor had removed Jimin’s Disillusionment Charm with a simple sweep of his wand, Snape turned back to Jimin.

“Thank you for the delivery, Park, but your job is now complete,” he murmured. “You should focus on your studies. The NEWTs are coming up. Stop running after the Death Eaters’ coattails, hungry for approval and admiration. Leave the tough jobs for the adults, boy. Enjoy your youth while you can.”

Jimin glared at him, “Focus on my studies? I don’t think good grades will serve us well now Professor, not while the Ministry is under his control. He already had me keeping watch over Yang Hyunsuk. I think my future has already been decided and is far from under my control.”

Snape’s eyes sought Jimin’s, hard inky black ones seeking his warm chocolate brown eyes. Jimin could feel the Headmaster prodding through his mind, invading it. He tried to put up a wall to keep Snape from learning too much, but he was still weak from being Stunned the previous day. Snape’s presence in his mind felt overpowering and unwelcoming but the Headmaster did not linger in it for long, only sharing a thought that could be heard with a booming resonance within the walls of Jimin’s consciousness. You are a fool if you think that the Dark Lord will win, Park. Stop now before you ruin your future irreversibly. He left Jimin’s mind as quickly as he had entered, cutting their shared gaze and walking deeper into his home, following in the path Nagini’s aimless drifting. “Do you wish to stay for lunch?” his voice rang out to Jimin as he walked into another room.

“No thanks, I’m good,” Jimin grunted, still clutching his abused head. Suddenly, why Voldemort had chosen to watch over Snape with Nagini made sense to Jimin. There were larger things that were afoot than Jimin had the privilege of being privy to. It was better, like Snape had said, for him to back off while he still could. He would just ask his parents to plead his case so that he was no longer deeply enmeshed with the goings, comings, and doings of the Death Eaters. “I’ll just be going now,” he called out, exiting the home speedily.

Perhaps he could move to South Korea and find work in the Department of Mysteries in their Ministry of Magic. If he became an Unspeakable, he would never be allowed to leave the country as well and he would be guarded at all times both by the spells that bound Unspeakables from ever revealing confidential information and by the country’s Department of Magical Law Enforcement from ever leaving the country. Although Jimin would never be getting his happy ending with you, he would be damned if he was going to let Voldemort or the Death Eaters rule his life anymore. He would study the Asian magical archives until he found the way to get rid of Voldemort for good, if Namjoon failed to be up to the task.

…

For all its glitz and glamour, America was boring. You came to that realization by your second week in Brownville, Nebraska, a small town that was home to about 500 muggles. Your mother and you had settled in the same large farmhouse that your father had rented out for his new wife and your half-siblings. But even the tension between the two great loves of your father’s life, past and present, did not provide enough diversion from the boring mundaneness that encompassed life at Brownville.

There had been several rules that your parents had both implemented once you had joined them. Amongst them were absolutely no speaking of magic or life in England, no performing of magic, and no use of magical objects. Your pet owl had been moved to live in the barn that took up the back of the property your father had rented, and you were only allowed to visit her with treats in the dark of the night. As it was, you thought your pet was already diverting back to her more undomesticated side as she was preferring the small rodents, she could hunt on the property, to the owl treats you placed out for her.

You were grateful that the adults had given you the large open structure of the attic to be your room, where you would often stay up for most of the day, only coming down for meals, avoiding everyone else in the house. Your half-siblings, who were much younger than you were confused and resentful of the move to Nebraska and blamed you for it although they did not know the details as to why. Your father had never felt the need to tell his Muggle family that once upon a time he had fallen in love with a witch and, with her, had had a daughter who was also a witch. After all, being a Muggle himself, the chances of one of his newer children being able to perform magic were minimal to zero.

As April came to an end and May began, you had resigned yourself to fully living a life as a Muggle and had even considered the benefits of such a lifestyle. For one, the Muggles had increasingly advanced as a society and had come up with inventions that were, in your opinion, just as magical as the things that witches, and wizards could come up with. In fact, you were highly impressed by televisions and telephones. One evening, in between looking through catalogs for different tutoring services you could pay for to acquire a GED, you were trying to set up the black box television set your parents had surprised you with in your attic bedroom. You were struggling with the antenna when you felt a burning sensation the size of a Galleon against your chest. The DA coin you had attached to a chain, to dangle from your neck, was warm to the touch, lightly heating your skin with its summons. Jeon Jungkook, the de facto leader of the group since Kim Namjoon, Jung Hoseok, and Kim Seokjin, the three members of the Golden Trio, had gone on the run, was using it to summon members of Dumbledore’s Army to fight.

Immediately jumping up, you grabbed your wand where it was hidden, tucked inside one of your many pillowcases. Before you could get too excited, you noticed that you were still in your pajamas with a robe hanging off your frame haphazardly and mismatched socks covering your feet. As you hurriedly threw off your clothes to pull a pair of jeans over your legs and a sweater over your pajama shirt, you searched the top of your messy desk to find a scrap of paper you could write on, to let your mother where you had gone. Knowing that there was a chance that your note would fall into the hands of your half-siblings, you were careful to be vague. You wrote quickly with your pen running across the page, blotching the sheet with spots of ink. You wrote: Mother, I had to do it. I had to leave to show the strength and perseverance of Godric’s friends. I’ve gone to meet Hogwarts to do what has to be done. It is my time now to do what you had done 20 years ago. I love you Mother, never forget that.

Blinking back tears, you prepared yourself to Apparate straight into the Hog’s Head pub, as you tried to resign yourself to the idea that there was a chance that you would not be coming out on the other side, alive. But you had lived the entire year as a shade. In all honestly you were a little embarrassed of yourself. Proud, brave Gryffindors did not act like this. It was time for you to stand up for what was right. It was time for you to defend all the Muggleborns and everyone who had been persecuted and treated like vermin as He-Who-Must, no, Voldemort forced his will upon everyone throughout all of Britain.

If you died, you hoped that your mother would be able to sleep at night knowing that she had raised a strong and fearless daughter who defended and protected those who could not fight for themselves. As you hurried through your room, looking for what else you might have needed, your eyes got caught on your Gryffindor House badge tittering on the edge of the nightstand. Grabbing it swiftly, you stabbed it through the fabric of your sweater before raising your wand in front of you and Apparating to Hogsmeade Village.

Once you found yourself in the bar, you were immediately pushed to the side as the large group of people that had congregated tried to squeeze everyone in the small space. As your gaze flickered over the wizards and witches who had all come together to help Namjoon fight Voldemort, you thought you even saw members of the Order of the Phoenix and students who had already graduated in the mix. As you stood there awkwardly and alone, watching Kim Kibum get tackled by Lee Taemin as the two of them started to talk over each other, you thought you heard Kibum yell when Taemin announced that he did not have a wand. Further away, you saw Bang Sihyuk quietly talking with Kang Hyowon and Kwon Dohyeong, who had gone by PDogg and Slow Rabbit on the Goldenwatch broadcasts, about how to get the younger students safely away before the main fighting began. Adora was talking to Shin Donghyuk about how to defend the castle and block off the exits and entrances to the school, waving her wand around to cast a three-dimensional diagram that floated above their heads and changed to depict her plans.

You were so overwhelmed, taking in everything that was happening all around you at once, that you did not notice your best friends Nayeon and Jeongyeon until they both barreled into you, hugging you tightly. The tears threatened to overtake your features once more, but you held it in, knowing that you had to stay strong so that you could fight with a clear head. “I’ve missed you two so much,” you mumbled into their hair.

“We’ve missed you too,” Jeongyeon said, grabbing your hand and squeezing it tightly in hers.

“But it’s okay,” Nayeon declared, “We’re together now. And we’ll fight together too.”

You nodded energetically at that moving towards Mr. Bang who was gesturing you all over to get into orderly groups to go upstairs and exit into the castle, one group at a time. Once you were rushed up the stairs to a room, the likes of which you had never seen before at Hogwarts, since it had been designed by the Room of Requirement, you all were furtively pushed out into the corridors to make your ways down to the Great Hall where everyone was gathering so that Hog’s Head would have enough room for all the wizards and witches that were traveling to Hogwarts to fight.

The Great Hall was looking more haphazard and disorganized than it had looked the night that Azkaban’s prisoner had escaped onto the school’s grounds and the Dementors had been dispatched. All the tables were filled, there were First, Second, and Third Years who had been pulled out of bed in their pajamas sitting only feet away from battle ready, hardened witches and wizards who were all still holding up their wands up in a fighting move. Even the castles ghosts had all congregated at the Hall, looking at Professor Taeyeon who was speaking at the front of the room, on a raised platform where the Professors’ table usually was. Behind her, the other Professors could be seen, Kim Heechul, Eric Nam, Lee Sumni, and Tiffany Young, with the members of the Order standing behind them.

Professor Taeyeon was explaining that the evacuation of the students would be taking place immediately, “If you are of age, you are allowed to stay behind and remain to fight if you desire,” she continued as Nayeon pulled you down to sit next to her at the Gryffindor table.

As you stared at the Deputy Headmistress who was speaking about how the Headmaster had taken a permanent leave of absence, her voice was drowned out by a terrible inhumane voice that rang out through the space, chilling and clear: “I know that you all are preparing to fight. But you must know, your efforts are in vain. It is futile to go against me. You cannot fight me and expect to win. I do not wish to kill you. I respect the institute of Hogwarts greatly, the instructors and what they teach and represent. I do not want to spill any magical blood. I have a great love for our kind.”

Screams had erupted across the Great Hall, as panic-stricken students clung to each other in fear, their fearful gazes darting across the room trying to make sense of where the voice was coming from. Voldemort continued, “Give me Kim Namjoon and no one will get hurt. Give me Kim Namjoon and the school will be left standing and whole. Give me Kim Namjoon and I will reward you for your labor. You have until midnight to give him up, after that I will offer no mercy to a single soul.”

Silence overtook the entire Hall, broken minutes later when Jennie Kim stood up on the Slytherin table and shouted, “He’s right there,” pointing to the entrance to the Great Hall where Namjoon stood next to Yeri. “Get him! Someone quick! Before we all have to die for his actions!”

All at once, there was a rush of sound as people began to push up against the House tables. You stood up with the Gryffindors, reaching for your wand as you all stood to face Jennie face on to defend Namjoon from her. The Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws had stood up with you all, also reaching for their wands, targeting the table that was at the far left of the room who all had students that were stiffly sitting down. You tried to see if Jimin was with his mulish Housemates, but you could not see him anywhere. Now that he had gone back to his natural black hair, it was no longer easy to spot the Head Boy in a crowd.

With an acerbic, tight bite to her words, Professor Taeyeon grated, “Miss Kim cease your foolishness. You will be the first to leave the Hall, if the rest of your House could follow. Ravenclaws, once the Slytherins leave, follow them.”

The tables were slowly vacated, with only the adults who wished to fight remaining behind. To the absolute surprise of no one, the Slytherin table was completely deserted. The Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff tables however had about half of their Seventh Years still staying seated. However, when it came to the Gryffindor table, everyone was reluctant to leave their place, with even the First and Second Years putting on a brave face as they nervously clutched at their almost brand-new wands. Professor Taeyeon had to abandon her post at the platform to come and deal with her house, shouting, “Huening Kai, Kang Taehyun! Get going! You two absolutely cannot stay!” when the two were reluctant to part with the Chasers of the Gryffindor quidditch team: the Choi’s, Soobin, Yeonjun and Beomgyu.

As Professor Taeyeon took care of the Gryffindors who were leaving, arranging evacuation protocols with the Prefects, Mr. Bang took the stage to order you all to take up post all over the castle. You listened to him with your mind drifting wondering about Jimin. Would he be allowed to leave with the students or would Voldemort force him to return to the castle to fight after midnight when the school inevitably did not give up Namjoon.

…

As you were getting ready to fight, Jimin was getting ready too. He had slipped away in all the ruckus, casting a Disillusionment Charm over his form. He had to find the Headmaster. He did not believe what Professor Taeyeon had said. He needed to find the Professor to know if there was a way for him to get rid of his Dark Mark. He had no idea the magnitude of its power but he knew that if he wanted to make a break from the Death Eaters, it would have to be a clean one. He could not risk being in the fray, getting attacked by both the Light side and Voldemort’s followers who would both be seeing him as the enemy.

He stalked through the halls, walking through the halls determinedly, seeking the Headmaster’s studies where he knew that Professor Snape would be, licking his wounds after his brawl against Professor Taeyeon. Soon, he was in front of the gargoyles that would split to reveal the way to the Headmaster’s rooms. But what would the password be? Surely Snape had changed it after Taeyeon had attacked him to keep her from accessing it. Wracking his brain, Jimin’s memories paused on the portraits of Headmasters, past, cheering him on as he struggled to fight against Snapes attacks on his mind, striving to improve his Occlumency. His focus kept lingering on the portrait of the Albus Dumbledore with the sparkly vivid blue backdrop. “Dumbledore!” Jimin shouted, hardly pausing to feel the full extent of his astonishment before rushing up the stairs, into the circular chamber, where Professor Snape was slumped over his chair like a comic book villain, rubbing the pads of his fingers into his temple.

“Professor!” Jimin blurted, “You have to help me. Please. You’re the only one who can.”

Snape’s gaze flickered to Jimin distractedly, his eyes were glazed and unfocused, “I am a little busy Park. You could not have come at a more inopportune time,” he grated, standing up and clutching at his left arm, which must have been burning as hotly as Jimin’s if not more so.

“Is there a way to get rid of the Mark? Please Professor,” Jimin begged.

For a second, there was the cunning clarity, that Jimin knew Snape to have, taking over his person as his beady dark eyes focused on Jimin. “Come here Park and roll your sleeve up.”

Jimin rushed forward, swiftly shoving up the left sleeve of his school robes to expose the Dark Mark that stood out against Jimin’s pale skin with its black ink to Snape. Wrapping his clammy pale hand around Jimin’s wrist, he pulled Jimin’s arm forward, and with a whispered, “Sectumsempra,” cut a controlled gash over Jimin’s arm, going over the path he was tracing with his wand. The pain was blinding. It lacerated through Jimin’s flesh, cutting right to the bone, creating hemorrhages and causing Jimin’s vision to go white at the blood loss. As it cut through the ink of the Dark Mark, however, with the pain Jimin felt a sense of release as though his link to Voldemort was finally being broken. As quickly as he inflicted the curse on Jimin, Snape muttered a songlike chant, incanting the counter-curse. His wand was tracing the same path it had made earlier, only this time it was in reverse. The blood flow seemed to stutter and stop and then Snape was repeating the counter curse a second time and a third to stitch the flesh back up.

A disgusting mottled patch of flesh took up the entire length of Jimin’s arm, it looked like someone had dipped a sword into acid and ran deep horizontal lines through his skin, with the healed lines standing up in ridges against his arm, but the mark was entirely gone. The pain however lingered. If he was to fight in the war after this, he would have to be careful not to reveal that he was already nursing a wound.

“I can give you Dittany to ease the pain, however it is unlikely that the scar will fade. I had to use a dark spell on a mark that was already created by dark magic. We are just lucky it worked,” muttered Snape, getting up to go to the potions cabinet at the opposite side of the room where he kept his stash of powerful and intricate potions.

As Jimin stood still staring at the long white scars that had the heterogenic patterns of chemical burns, waiting for the Dittany to kick in, Snape rushed to the window on the far side of the chamber. Instantly he flung the two panels of glass open and stood at the sill, peering down eight floors to where the green of the Hogwarts’ lawn was still visible in the dark of the night. Without so much as a pause, he instantly stepped off of it, causing Jimin to yelp, thinking that he had just watched his Headmaster plunge to his death after a suicidal jump. Rushing to the window, Jimin could see in the distance a huge bat-like figure flying through the air, rushing towards the darkness that laid beyond the outer perimeter walls of the school grounds.

However, Jimin could not stay here forever. He had to get out to where the fighting was taking place. He had a job as the Head Boy of the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry to serve them to the best of his abilities. And that meant, that whether the Lees or Voldemort had intended when they had given him the title, that Jimin had the duties of being a good leader for the students, along with protecting the castle and its inhabitants, and doing anything else that was asked of him. As he made his way back into the fray, he saw Death Eaters fighting with students half their ages, some of their hoods and masks having come off in the heat of the moment.

The corridors were filled with a rainbow of brightly colored bolts as each side hurled defensive spells at each other. The Death Eaters fought with no compunction, having the Unforgivable Curses spill from their lips, with each wave of their wand. Jimin went through the crowd, running swiftly, sending targeted Stunning spells through them, aiming at what could have even been his own parents under those disguises. But suddenly, the air exploded with a deafening blast. The corridor cleaved itself, the walls shattered into a million fragmented pieces and the roof began to cave in. Jimin coughed at the sudden explosion of kicked up dust and plaster. He did his best to get out of the rubble, pitching his arm under the shoulder of a struggling student with a cut on his forehead and a tear in his black school robes. The boy’s red tie looped around his neck, tightening like a noose.

Once they had made it to the edge of the corridor that had not been impacted by the explosive spell, he was finally able to look at the person whose life he had saved. Kim Taehyung stared back at Jimin in confusion, wiping the back of his left hand across his mouth to wipe away some of the blood from a cut lip. As his brows furrowed and his mouth opened with the beginnings of a question painting his lips, a terrible scream from a female could be heard as a gigantic spider, the size of a Volkswagen beetle crawling in through the monstrous new hole in the wall that made the outside of the castle visible.

Sprinting away from each other, the two shot spells over their shoulders at the spider. None of the spells seemed to have an effect, as the spider crawled its way in, however when it was struck by both of their spells at the same time, it flipped in its back, struggling to make itself upright again. Jimin dared to look back into the direction of the hole. He yelled, “It brought its family,” as he sprinted away.

Soon, both students, members of the Order, and Death Eaters were all running, all attacking the spiders with jets of red and green lit spells, as they ran to save themselves. As Jimin reached the end of the hall where the staircases were, he took flight, leaping over the railing of the walkway to the moving stairs that were shifting ten feet below it. As his heart jumped to his throat, as he made himself a vulnerable target flying through the air for both Death Eaters and Hogwartians, he wondered if you were here too, or if you were long gone, hidden wherever it had been that you had fled to, making a new life for yourself away from war and political uprisings. He thought maybe it would be safer for him to fight out in the open on the Hogwarts’ grounds where there were not as much landmarks that could be weaponized to explode or collapse, crushing and hurting everyone in its path with its debris.

As Jimin made his way towards the ground level of the castle, running and leaping from staircase to staircase, He crossed paths with several Death Eaters who would give him a nod of acknowledgment before turning their backs and targeting Jimin’s classmates. Was it unchivalrous of Jimin to attack them when they had their backs turned? Perhaps. But Rome was not built in a day and Jimin could not unteach everything he had been taught. After all, he was not a self-righteous Gryffindor, he was a cunning Slytherin who took the chance when he saw it.

Jimin had finally neared the bottom floor, he took the stairs four at a time as he hurried to get out of such a vulnerable position. The staircase that connected all of the stories of the castles were death traps for not only the people using them, but the ones underneath or nearby them. After direct hits from powerful spells, they were liable to collapse into giant pieces of stone and marble that could crush the crowd below it or plunge the ones on it to a painful death. His mind’s musings came true a moment later when someone screeched “Glisseo!” causing the stairs under his feet to flatten to a smooth ramp, making Jimin who had been rushing down the steps to hurtle down it so quickly, unable to control the momentum his body had gained, that shots of red and green light went over his head, narrowly missing his body by a hairsbreadth.

As Jimin lay at the foot of the staircase, resting his weight on his hands as he struggled to get the feeling back in his legs, the shattering sound of glass being blasted erupted to his left. With a quick glance, Jimin was able to see that the Slytherin hourglass that kept track of their house points had exploded with only part of its bottom half remaining. The tennis ball size emeralds were spilled, the gems rolling around haphazardly, causing everyone to trip and slip over them. Jimin could not help but think of the previous June when the previous Headmaster had died, and the Gryffindor hourglass had gotten shattered in the carnage that the invading Death Eaters had left behind. The magic of Hogwarts worked in mysterious ways, often revealing omens that had grim outcasts. Had Headmaster Snape fallen and died?

With his heart pounding so furiously that he could not hear anything but the rush of blood moving behind his ears, Jimin ran towards the front doors of the castle. Everywhere he looked, there was chaos and destruction. There were enormous spiders climbing the walls freely, their pincers snapping erratically as they looked for victims to envenom and eat. The giants that Voldemort had created alliances with had come now, to play. They were attacking the castle with their monstrous clubs, sending the stone bricks that shaped the castle flying.

As soon as Jimin stepped onto the grounds, an unearthly chill entered his body. The air was frozen around him. His heartbeats slowed and quietened until he could no longer hear them, feeling leaden and immobile. Dementors. Those malevolent wraiths glided through the open sky of the castle, their multitude covering the brightness of the full moon that shown over all of the grounds. Already, the dark morose thoughts began to permeate Jimin’s minds. He was never going to be able to gain penance for his sins. He would never be able to make up for what he had done, and for what he had not done as he stood by and let terrible things happen. Headmaster Snape was most likely dead. There was no way that Kim Namjoon could beat Voldemort. It was futile, it was all futile and perhaps Nagini was the key. But as long as she remained in her enchanted protective cage, there would be no saving for the rest of them. They were all damned and doomed to die in this pointless futile fight. Voldemort would soon discover that Jimin had forsook him and would torture him until he could break into Jimin’s mind with ease and destroy everything that Jimin loved or cared about. And what about you, Y/N, Jimin would never be able to ask for your forgiveness or be given the opportunity to make up for his mistakes. His breath came out in smoky white vaporous streams, he tried to raise his right arm to create his Patronus, but it would not move.

He had resigned himself for the Kiss from the Dementor that was closest to him, and seemed to be targeting him specifically, when a massive silver tiger, soared over his head, joined by its mercurial companions, a silver squirrel and hare. The Dementors scattered, backing away from Jimin, but they still caged him in.

“Come on Park!” came the shout of Jung Hoseok from his right. “I know you can do this. You are easily the most brilliant wizard in our Year, excluding Namjoon.”

“Just think of a happy thought,” murmured Jeon Jungkook, coming over to Jimin’s left. “Come on, I know you’re not as bad as everyone paints you out to be. I saw you targeting those Death Eaters back there. You can do it Jimin. We will fight and we will win.”

A happy thought? A memory, uninvited, came rushing forward.

“Are you able to cast a corporeal Patronus?”

“I did. Once,” you answered.

Jimin looked momentarily stunned before he was able to collect himself, “In theory, if you have a memory that is so inexplicably happy and bound to your mind that you would never forget it, you could even scare off an army of Dementors with your Patronus.”

The memory of you had a bitter sting to it. Jimin knew that he would never have his happy ending with you; he was undeserving of it. And yet, it was you and the memory of that one magical day in Paris that had the silver stream of magic shooting out of the end of Jimin’s wand, casting a fully corporeal swan to join the others. As the four Patronuses glided through the air, protecting their owners. The dementors finally dispersed, fracturing away from each other.

Jimin turned back to his classmates, people he had barely spoken to over the past seven years. “Thank you for saving my life,” he muttered gruffly.

“Yeah well,” said Kim Taehyung casting an unimpressed glance at Jimin, “An eye for an eye and all that. But I’m not convinced, Park. So, don’t expect me to save your life again.”

…

The fighting had continued for hours. Voldemort’s voice had come once again, bodiless and macabre, thundering across the space. An unwelcome and unnerving sound that licked the ears of everyone, making them shudder, as it spread the news that he would be giving them an hour to dispose of their dead and to heal their injured before he would be entering the fray and fighting himself, killing everyone in his path until he got Kim Namjoon.

You had been patching up Kim Seokjin’s arm with bandages. There was only so much your healing spell could do and the school Healer, Madame Shin Suran, was being stretched thin, having already enlisted a group of students to help her take care of the wounded. The healing and rejuvenating potions had long run low, even after Professor Heechul had added to the infirmary’s supply. That had been when it had happened.  

The Death Eaters were lining the edge of the Forbidden Forest. Accompanying them at their backs were the Dementors and giants. They walked with Voldemort in the middle, it was the first time that you had ever seen the terrible evil that he was. The sight that met your eyes was far worse than you could have ever dreamt of him to look like. He made a tall figure in his voluminous dark robes that revealed a rail thin figure as he cut through the lawn, sweeping forward. He could have been seven feet tall and was entirely deserving of his boogeyman status with his bone pale skin and demon red eyes, the glint of which you could still make out 20 yards away. As he neared, you were able to see that he was completely hairless, with not a strand on his scalp or even his brows. The hairlessness and slits of his nostrils made him look terribly similar to a frightening serpent.

When Voldemort had crossed to be what he deemed was sufficient amount away, he stepped to the side, revealing the school’s groundskeeper Hagrid to be holding a bundled figure in his arms. Your heart stopped as your eyes cut on the tear tracks that had been left on Hagrid’s cheeks. You had the terrible feeling that it was Namjoon in his arms.

“NO!” bellowed Taeyeon letting out an unearthly cry of anguish, “NAMJOON.”

“Namjoon!” you heard the shouts of Mr. Bang and Mr. Kang, who you knew were like fathers to Namjoon join in. Hoseok was being restrained by Seokjin and Taehyung, yelling desperately for the male he considered to be as good as a blood brother to him. You could even feel tears streaming down your own face. With Namjoon dead, all hope seemed to be lost.

“SILENCE!” bellowed Voldemort. “The Boy Who Lived is finally dead. And at my hands. Hagrid, why don’t you put the boy where he belongs, at my feet.”

Hagrid placed Namjoon’s crumpled form on the ground. He looked so broken and small that bile was rising up in your throat. You had to swallow it down as you bitterly sniffed at the injustice.

“Do you see this?” Voldemort asked, circling Namjoon’s body, prodding it with the toe of his shoe and a maniacal smile painting his face. “Do you finally understand, you deluded fools? He was never anything more than a boy who counted on others to sacrifice themselves for him! But he, himself, never had any skills or strength. No, that is why I was so easily able to kill him with a simple snap of my wand.”

“You’re lying! He beat you!” Seokjin yelled, grabbing his bandaged shoulder with a wince as he talked back to perhaps one of the most vile and deadly wizards in existence. However, Seokjin’s retort was able to do the job. The Silencing Charm Voldemort had casted over the castle’s inhabitants broke and they were able to shout and protest once more.

Voldemort once again hit them with a Silencing Charm, this one more powerful than the last. His voice got even louder, “Kim Namjoon was killed while he tried to escape the grounds like the coward that he is, leaving the rest of you to die for him. He was killed while his self-preserving ass tried to flee for safety…”

Voldemort’s voice trailed off as a figure burst out from the line of Hogwartians, charging towards him. It was poor Jeon Jungkook who had idolized Kim Namjoon and seen him as his best friend. None of the other Gryffindors had thought to restrain him as well. With a laugh and a sweep of his wand, Voldemort easily disarmed Jungkook. “Ah, young Jeon Jungkook. How poorly misguided you are. Why do you defend that dirty Half-Blood whose blood is tinged with the filth that comes from his Mudblood mother? You are a Pureblood yourself, young man. We could do with your kind, Jeon. Brave, spirited purebloods.”

“I would never join the Death Eaters,” Jungkook bit out caustically, “Dumbledore’s Army forever!” His call was meet by shouts from the crowd, including yours, who Voldemort seemed unable to control with his Silencing Charms.

Angered, Voldemort turned to Jungkook, “If that is how you want to play things, young man. We will do it your way.” With a powerful wave of his wand, Voldemort incanted a nonverbal summoning spell. A deformed brown bundle swept through the air, falling onto his outstretched arm. It was the Sorting Hat, “There will be no more Sorting at Hogwarts. You all will be united under one House: the noblest one of them all, the House of my ancestor Salazar Slytherin.”

He then pointed his wand at Jungkook, instantly immobilizing him in a rigid, upright position, “Jungkook here will show you all what happens when you attempt to go against Lord Voldemort.” The hat was shoved onto Jungkook’s head forcibly with another snap of his wand, and then with a third flick, Voldemort had caused the Sorting Hat to burst into flames while still atop Jungkook’s head.

Just then, there was a disruption from the Forbidden Forest when two giants seemed to be attacking each other. All at once, commotion reigned and pandemonium struck. The giants laid into each other, hitting each other with powerful punches and kicks that shook the ground with so much force it felt like unnatural earthquakes were occurring. The castle’s protectors were no longer held by the power of Voldemort’s spells and both sides rushed towards each other. Voldemort had lost his grip on the situation and now everyone was attacking each other.

From the sidelines, Jimin had been watching impartially, but when Voldemort’s focus was no longer on Jungkook, he rushed forward. It felt like he was the only who saw Jungkook break free from the Body-Bind Curse that had been placed on him. The enflamed Sorting Hat fell off his head as he shifted, falling with its pointed tip facing downwards, and Jimin was able to watch as Jungkook thrusted his arm into the hat pulling from within its depths the glinting ruby encrusted handle of the Sword of Gryffindor. Jimin rushed forward towards Jungkook, staring at him with panic-stricken widened eyes. Jeon, look at me dammit, he thought as he ran forward. There was still ten yards between them when Jungkook’s eyes met Jimin’s and Jimin hit him with the powerful burst of his own thoughts, Behind you. The snake. Use the sword.

Jungkook swung the sword around purposefully, he caught sight of the snake that was now slithering around freely since Voldemort had thought that Namjoon was dead. With a single powerful stroke, Jungkook brought the sword down, beheading Nagini with one fell swoop. Voldemort let out a shrill unhuman cry at his pet’s death. Charging forward towards Jungkook and Jimin purposefully.

All at once, the two of them were fighting the evilest and most powerful wizard that was alive, struggling to hold their own even in a two on one match. When a killing spell narrowly missed Jungkook, singeing the top of his already static and burnt hair from earlier, a voice bellowed behind them.

“Stop, Voldemort!” shouted Namjoon, who apparently was not dead after all. Jimin did not take the opportunity to check where the voice had come from since Voldemort had not ebbed his assault on the two boys. “It’s me that you want so why don’t you come and finish the job!”

…

At the end of the duel between Kim Namjoon and Lord Voldemort, only one of them remained standing. Fortunately for everyone, that had been Kim Namjoon. As the people of Hogwarts dealt with the aftermath of the battle, rushing to put the remaining Death Eaters who had been alive into custody, Bang Sihuyk had been temporarily instated as the Minister of Magic; apparently Minister Yang had fallen during the battle which Jimin could not feel himself feeling at all torn about.

Jimin’s parents had been amongst the ones who were being rounded up. They had attempted to implicate him along with themselves when Jimin had scoffed and said, “Me, a Death Eater? Hardly, Mother. Why on earth would I have dueled against Voldemort himself then?”

His mother had been shocked into silence while his father had sputtered at his disrespectful tone and how Jimin had had the audacity to call Voldemort by his name. But now, Jimin was wondering throughout the castle looking for someone. He needed to see you, to make sure that you were alright. His new friend Jungkook had assured him that you had returned to Hogwarts to participate in the battle. And according to Jungkook and his friends, the last they had seen of you you had been alive. However, they had all seen you before the second bout of fighting had started. However, Jimin had made his way through all of the fallen bodies, from both sides, that were laid out on the courtyard, both as a type of penance and to make sure that you were not among them. Jimin would remember the faces of all of the dead for the rest of his life, taking care to never be prejudiced or intolerant ever again.

He was finally making his way into the Great Hall, where the separation of the Houses no longer persisted, and everyone was sitting at whatever space was available next to their family members, strangers, or even other magical creatures who did not have a drop of wizarding blood. It was a strange but welcome sight of equality and tolerance. After his rounds about the tables had taken him past Yoongi and his parents who were sitting in a corner all to their own feeling awkward and distant, he finally found you. You were sitting in between two girls and talking to them animatedly.

Clearing his throat nervously, Jimin asked, “Y/N can I talk to you?”

You turned around, your eyebrows almost disappearing into your hairline at your surprise. After debating about it, for what seemed to Jimin had been long interminable moments, you nodded and stood up. The stroll the two of you were on led you eventually to through the castle out towards the Quidditch pitch.

Jimin finally spoke up after the lengthy silent walk. He stopped in his tracks and turned to you, “Y/N, if I could. I would redo everything, from our first meeting. I’m so truly sorry for everything I put you through this entire year. I hope you can feel the depths of my sincerity.”

You stared at him wordlessly. After a moment you parted your lips and said, “I wouldn’t.”

Jimin stared at you in shock.

“Jimin I wouldn’t change a single thing about our history, as painful as some of those moments have been. The moments we shared cannot be undone, the things we said cannot be unsaid. But I understand what you are hinting at. You want us to have a fresh start,” you carefully gauged Jimin’s reaction to your words.

He had been initially panicked when you had started to talk. But now, he bit his lip before saying softly, “Yes please, let us start anew once more, Y/N.”

With a soft smile gracing your lips, you reached out your hand towards him, “Hi, I’m Y/N.”

Jimin met you halfway, his arm stretching forward, and his fingers wrapping your hand in his grip. “Hello, Y/N,” he murmured, “I’m Jimin. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

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