#-but i'm not going to tag him because I want folks who have his tag blacklisted to vote so i'm not cutting out a chunk one of the percents

[deiaiko]

#19.3 Unravel

It had been some time since Agni felt this nervous. Not even talking with Jinsung Ha recently had made him feel like this. He fiddled with the mask on his hand as he waited for Grace to come back. He had thought hard on how to deliver the news, but he knew that no matter how he phrased it, Grace would be upset. Velt nuzzled under his palm and Agni gave her a few pats, before deciding that she would be better inside her bowl in his lighthouse, just in case the shinsu acted up around Grace after he received the news.

Grace came back wearing the comfiest shirt and shorts Agni knew Grace liked to wear on lazy days. He joined him on the floor, and they ate dinner together. Agni always finished last, so while waiting for him to finish his meal, Grace told him about his day with Bam. Grace was intrigued by how much his way of thinking had changed, and how glad he was to be able to be by Bam's side when he was having a bad day. It reminded Agni of the hidden floor, when Grace faced his sworn enemy.

They left the used bowls on the coffee table and went to brush their teeth. Afterwards, they turned off the light and went upstairs to sit on their bed. Grace's curious gaze never left him, and Agni curled his feet nervously.

Grace was the one who broke the silence. "So…what is it?"

Agni's breath hitched. This was the part he dreaded most. "I talked with the crocodile earlier. Did you know that he could manipulate stone already?"

"Huh." Grace needed a few seconds to let the information sink in. "Didn't Rak learn it on the Hell train? How does he know it?"

"Turns out our crocodile also traveled back to the past like us. He found the young crocodile and taught him."

"What?!" Grace gasped, wide eyed. "That means our Rak is–!!"

"He's dead." Agni quickly snuffed out that hope. They had been in delusion for long enough; it was time that they faced the bitter truth. "He suffered a fatal injury from the explosion. He couldn't have lasted long without proper help." Agni omitted the actual cause for Rak's death, but still kept his words true. "I'm sorry."

"…Oh." Grace looked lost, just like Agni was. His lips parted a little, but they closed before any sound escaped.

Agni gently squeezed Grace's hand, encouraging and comforting as he let the silence stretch on, giving Grace some time to process the information.

"Agni…" Grace whispered, "do you think Hatz and Isu…?"

Agni bit his lip and avoided his gaze, as the nightmare of that day replayed in his mind. He witnessed Hatz get his arm ripped off when trying to protect him. He could still recall the clang of a sword hitting the floor, and Hatz's suppressed scream that gnawed deep at his guilt. He witnessed Isu get beheaded after being taken hostage, the memory of warm blood painting them both still vivid like it happened yesterday. 

Agni refused to acknowledge their possible deaths, because it felt like a nightmare that one day he could hopefully wake up from. He avoided the topic when Grace brought it up, so he wouldn't have to say it aloud and make it real. He had been so hard on himself, because he couldn't get rid of the feeling that he had failed Grace and everyone else involved.

Agni knew this had to change if he wanted to live better, now that they had gotten a second chance. So he swallowed down the lump in his throat that had built up over the years and asked mostly to himself; "What are the odds of their survival?"

"There's always a chance–"

"Grace." Agni looked him straight in the eye. "They were already severely injured before the explosion hit."

Grace fell silent and went still.

Agni felt a pang of guilt upon witnessing Grace's reaction. "Sorry. I didn't mean to snap." Agni fiddled with his hands. He realized that he didn't know how much Grace knew of what happened. "My scar…do you know how I got it?"

"I…was told it was from the family heads' battle." Grace looked thoughtful. Agni knew he was trying to be careful with his words. "A stray attack?"

"It could have been worse." The memory of the scorching heat on his skin felt like it had only happened yesterday. He passed out right when he was about to heal Isu, and only found out later that he also lost sweetfish at that time. The days he spent recovering from the burn, to withstand the excruciating pain every second he was conscious, and finally coming to terms that it'd be a permanent scar, was one of the turning points that had changed him forever. Were Grace not there to care for him, he might have ended up destroying himself even more.

Agni hadn't realized he had his left hand clawing on his cheek until Grace pried his hand off and frowned, "You're doing it again."

"Maybe I should wear the mask…" Agni muttered to himself. After all, Grace gave it to him less so he could hide the scar but more to prevent him from unconsciously hurting himself. The only time he could safely take it off was when Grace was around.

Agni bit his lip nervously when Grace didn't reply. He no longer had the courage to look Grace in the eye that spoke so much concern, so he leaned close and rested his head on Grace's chest. "Rak, Isu, Hatz and Hwaryun were trying to get me out of that damned place. But we were caught while escaping, and…it was a bloodbath. I was…too occupied to react to the incoming heat. Rak shielded us from the explosion. And when I woke up…"

"They weren’t with you," Grace finished it for him after Agni trailed off a moment too long.

Agni nodded dazedly, "I've been telling myself that they're still alive, after a blow that could kill rankers. But…who am I kidding? I was lucky enough to survive with just this little–" Agni vaguely pointed to himself– "inconvenience."

Agni felt a hand gripping his arm, and he pulled away to see Grace looking at him with a pained expression. His eyes were glossy and his lips were pulled into a thin line. Trusting his instinct, Agni reached out to gently trace and cup Grace's cheek with his free hand.

"I'm sorry," Agni muttered. "I'm sorry, for not telling you sooner."

Agni silently witnessed tears that streamed down on his love's face. It was a bitter sight that Agni wished he'd never have to see again, that he had tried to avoid for so long by not telling him. He pulled Grace in and held him close to his chest, as if Agni was trying to gather his own crumbled heart back together.

Grace mumbled their late best friends' names as he held onto him tighter, shaking from each breath he took between sniffles.

Agni felt his own eyes sting with unshed tears. He remembered the years he spent climbing the tower together with his old team. Despite their banter being his source of headaches, Agni knew he too had come to acknowledge them as his cherished friends. Only when they were gone did Agni realize how much he'd miss having them around. Seeing the younger them didn't exactly close the gaping hole in his heart, but at least the emptiness was more filled.

Agni squeezed Grace tighter. "We have their younger selves with us now. We will protect them better this time."

Grace only nodded and sank further into his embrace. And Agni planted kisses on his hair, relishing the thought that after everything he had gone through, Grace was still a constant in his life. As long as he had him, everything would be okay.

When Grace started shaking again, Agni caressed his hair and hummed a comfort song they had known by heart. Still, it didn't make falling asleep any easier for Agni, especially not after admitting that his nightmare was very much real. However, as he had been through grief…this, too, would pass.

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[cheapshrimpysheep]

Dating in a Dream - Jade Leech

SUMMARY: What would his dream be like, exactly the same as in the original story, but with the small detail that he is dreaming that you two are dating?

CHARACTERS: Jade Leech x Reader🐬🦐

TAGS: Fluff; GN Reader; In a Relationship (kinda); Kiss; Flirting

WARNING: Spoilers from Book 7 and Jade’s dream (Eng Server)

WORD COUNT: 3.390 words

COMMENTS: This was written as a companion piece to the original dream story, so the parts that are the same as the game are just summarized.

I hope you enjoy🐬

Dating in a Dream: Idia / Epel / Rook / Vil / Kalim / Jamil / Floyd / (Jade) / Azul / ...

“Aether signal tracking successful.” Ortho announces. “We have arrived at the designated coordinates.”

You, Grim, Silver, Sebek, Ortho, Jamil, and Floyd already appeared in the dream underwater and your aerospheres were working well by all indications. After a little chitchat about Silver's signature spell, Sebek and Floyd hear something, and then everything starts to shake like an earthquake.

“Surrounding water temperature rising sharply.” Ortho warns. “Immediate evacuation recommended!”

Floyd shapeshifts into his mer form and takes everyone away from that place quickly. You managed to came out unharmed from an submarine volcano eruption thanks to him.

After talking about how dangerous submarine volcanoes are, not only because of the temperature but also because of the toxic gases, you all decide to go look for Jade. Floyd asked if Idia couldn't give you all a mer-form too, but Idia explained that he didn't have data to do it and that, unlike him, you had no experience in swimming with mer-folk tails. Floyd understands because it took him a while to learn to walk on two legs so he assumed it would be something similar.

But before you set off in search of Jade, Floyd changes his appearance a bit and starts to glow in the dark. He says it's called counter-illumination and explains how it actually works as camouflage in deep, dark places like that.

You searched a lot without success and with your vision and smell limited by the gases. Until Ortho detects an aether signal 20 meters ahead.

“Look at this hydrothermal vent! Though it's spewing hot water nonstop, you can see it's actually home to a colony of shellfish if you look closely!” Jade says smiling. “How do they survive in a place like this? I'd be boiled alive in an instant.”

“If I might remind you, Jade, we're not searching for shellfish worth less than a sorcent.” Azul says. “We're looking for precious metals that settle in hydrothermal deposits.”

“I'm aware, Azul.” You see the dreamer's silver bird around Jade's head. “But it's still nice to take a moment to enjoy the mountain scenery.”

“Yup, that's Jade and Azul, all right.” Floyd confirms.

Azul talks about them looking for very valuable gold and him wanting to become a leading figure in the mining industry. And Jade seems to be enjoying following him.

Jamil says he thinks that Azul is just like the real one, but Idia and Floyd, who know him better, say there's something strange about him. Floyd even says he doubts that Azul would voluntarily go near a volcano.

The fake Azul sees something shining in a vent, he pluged up the vent for a moment with ice magic to then try to scoop up the gold while the flow's stopped. He puts his hand inside and reach for the shiny thing hoping it's gold, but the water redirected and erupt from another vent, right at him, which made Jade start laughing. The fake Azul didn't seem to mind having his arm a bit boiled to get the gold.

And suddenly, both the way Azul spoke and his facial features changed.

“So, uh...” Idia says through tablet. “Am I the only guy thinking Azul's acting like a sketch comedy actor here?”

Floyd and Idia (and maybe you too) are the only ones who really notice the differences between that exaggerated version of Azul and the real one.

Ortho mentions that there is an NPC version of Azul, but he is not seeing any NPC version of Floyd anywhere.

“Ah! Right near where Azul found the gold dust...” Jade says. “There's a school of small shrimp living in a rock fissure that's venting hot water! Floyd! Come over here and have a look.”

The NPC version of Floyd appears, but with facial features way oversimplified.

“It's like Floyd would be if he were drawn in an absurdist comedy manga...” Idia comments.

“Look at these tiny shrimp, living in such a harsh environment.” Jade continues telling NPC Floyd.

“Ooh you're right! They look delish! Eheheh!” NPC Floyd says in a more childish voice than normal. “Ahaha, lookit how cute and teeny they are! I could eat 'em right up!”

“My, my. What a bold gourmand you are, Floyd.” Jade comments with a mocking smile.

The fake Floyd grebes the shrimp and eats them. Idia comments that that Floyd is scary in a whole different way from the real one, and Floyd says that he's nothing like that, that Jade is the one who eats random stuff he finds on the ground in the mountains, not him.

“Heh heh heh. What fun Azul and Floyd are having.” Jade says amusedly. “I just love the mountains.”

“KYAAA! Poor little shrimps!” An abnormally cute voice says. “Floyd is so scary!”

A new NPC appears: You! Or rather, you in mer-form with a tail like a shrimp's, and you see your NPC quickly swimming up to Jade to hug his arm like a scared child.

“Don't let him bite me, Jade~” Your NPC begs cutely with a tear in the corner of their eye. And your face was also different from your real face, the eyes seemed bigger and brighter, but in a way that was almost pitiful.

“Fu fu fu. Worry not, my dear. You're the only little shrimp I would never let him nibble on.” Jade says, as he intertwines his tail with your NPC's.

“T-That (Y/N)...” Idia says. “C-could it be...?”

“Jade~” Your NPC continues to say, without letting go of Jade's arm and happy that he intertwined their tails. “You'll always protect me, won't you?”

“Of course, my love. You can always depend on me for whatever you need.”

“You make me so happy, Jade! I love you so much!” Your NPC smiles like a ray of sunshine.

“I love you too, my dear.” Jade responds with a cute smile and kiss your NPC's forehead.

But your NPC doesn't seem pleased and tilts their head a certain way. Jade chuckles and kisses their cheek affectionately, which makes your NPC finally smile in satisfaction.

“AH! IT IS! IT IS!” Idea continues suddenly.

“What? What is it?” Silver asks.

“(Y/N)'s NPC in Jade's dream is... is... A CLINGY, DEPENDENT DEREDERE!!!”

“Hm... Sorry, but what is a dere..dere?” Silver asks.

“An openly love-struck character who is continuously sweet, flirtatious and affectionate towards their love interest.” Ortho clarifies. “And it seems that (Y/N) and Jade Leech are each other's romantic interests in this dream.”

Everyone is surprised to find out that Jade has a crush on you. As for Floyd, he simply has no reaction.

“I assume you already knew, Floyd Leech.” Ortho says.

“Kinda. I mean, I wasn't sure, but I think it explains some things.”

“Like what?”

“Huh... Ortho, maybe we'll leave that to them.” Idia suggests and the subject returns to observing Jade and the NPCs.

“I was worried about what to do after climbing every single mountain on land...” Jade says. “But the ocean's far vaster, with a great many unexplored submarine volcanoes.”

“I'll never give up before I strike gold!” NPC Azul says.

“Ooh, ooh, Jade! These crabs are pretty tasty, too! Eheheh!” NPC Floyd says.

“Aw, these corals are so beautiful. Jade~, can we pick them? Pretty please~” Your NPC says.

“Heheheh. I'm delighted you're all enjoying yourselves.” Jade smiles. “May the four of us overcome every obstacle and conquer every mountain!”

“Hip hip, hooray!” Jade and the NPCs celebrate together.

“AAAUGH, I CAN'T TAKE IT ANYMORE!” Floyd shouts and charges them right in!

Sebek asks if you should join him, but Jamil says that you are at a disadvantage underwater and it could be dangerous for you all, so it's best to wait for a better opportunity.

“Hey... Jade.” The real Floyd confronts him. “Knock it off with this creepy dream. You're givin' me scale-bumps from gills to tail!”

“Huh? There are two Floyds?”

“Why, it's a perfect mirror image!” NPC Azul claims.

“How'm I a perfect mirror image of THAT? We don't look nothin' alike.” The real Floyd says.

“Who's this guy? It cool if I squeeze 'em and eat 'em? Ahaha!” The fake Floyd says.

“I knew you never paid much attention to other people, but I ain't buyin' this is the best your memory can dredge up.” The real Floyd returns to the subject. “There's no way I'd act all gleeful gobblin' up live shrimp wedged under rocks!”

“Floyd...?” Jade's dream world begins to distort. “You don't eat live shrimp...?”

“Don't let him fool you, Jade!” Fake Azul intervenes. “Look closer. Floyd isn't some menacing-looking gangster. He's more simpleminded and charming than that. Look at this endearing smile!”

“Hey, Jade? I'm bored.” Fake Floyd says. “Wanna ditch this guy and go eat crab somewhere else? Ahaha!”

“Yes... Right.” Jade agrees. “Floyd's always been the endearing type. Our relatives loved doting on him. This has to be the real Floyd.”

“Really, now. How could you ever mix up who your one brother is? Are you getting fatigued? Given your exhaustive knowledge of the mountains, you're essential for my gold search. Please, pull yourself together.”

“Heheheh... Of course. You, Floyd and (Y/N) would be helpless without me.”

The goopy darkness surrounds you and the figures of Azul, Floyd and you become dark silhouettes.

“Come, Jade, let's ignore them and move on.” Darkness Azul says.

“C'mon already, Jade!” Darkness Floyd adds.

“Please, come with me, my love.” Your darkness figure seduces him.

“Yes... Of... course...”

“Oh, is that how it's gonna be?” The real Floyd says. “In that case, you can keep pallin' around with your ‘real’ brother in dreamland. I don't want a brother like that anyway. I'mma knock ALLA you into the volcano!”

The real Floyd attacks all three NPCs including yours, and all three beg Jade for help.

“How dare you hurt them.” Jade defends them. “You will pay dearly for this, impostor. HAAAH!” and he attacks the real Floyd.

“I keep tryin' to tell you, I'M the real one!”

Floyd asks Idia if a good shock to the system wasn't supposed to wake someone up, but Idia realizes that in that case the pattern is different. In this case, Jade had extraordinarily high belief in himself to the point to refusing to budge in his opinion no matter what counterpoints others make.

You all wonder how you're supposed to wake Jade up, but Floyd suggests that you let him sleep forever since he liked that dream so much. He turns back to Jade.

“I'll cut you into chum so you never wake up again, Jade! GYAHAHAHAHAHA!”

“All of you, get back! I'll handle this!”

“Please, be careful, Jade~!” Your NPC tells him.

“He will pay for even daring to touch you, (Y/N).” Jade tells them before attacking Floyd. “*screech!*”

The Leech twins began to fight, attacking each other violently with their sharp nails and teeth, and their fight ends up whipping the water into a whirlpool.

“Their roughhousing is destroying the fragile vents and sending hot water spewing out all over the place.” Jamil says.

All of you take shelter behind a boulder. Even the darkness NPCs are scared and hiding behind rocks. However, the boulder you were holding onto breaks and you are pulled into the whirlpool.

“(Y/N)!” Everyone shouts.

You scream and both Floyd and Jade hear you, making them pause the fight.

“(Y/N)?” Jade looks back, but his vision was limited by all the sand and smoke.

Your aerosphere bursts because it can't resist the heat and gases. Amidst the sand and smoke, Jade sees your silhouette with legs instead of a merfolk tail.

“(Y/N)!!!”

Jade abandons the fight with Floyd completely and rushes towards you. He gets you and sees you holding your breath.

“Did you not take your last dose of the potion? Doesn't matter! I have to get you out of here NOW!”

Jade quickly takes you away from the heat and toxic gases and consequently away from everyone else too. When he thought you were in a safe place, he used his magic to create a bubble around your head. You take a deep breath.

“(Y/N), are you all right?” He asks you calmly with his arms around you in a protective and loving way. “What happened?”

This is your chance to tell him the truth and try to wake him up.

“Jade, listen to me.” You cup his face with your hands. “Would the Azul you know really risk so much for a measly bit of gold?”

“What?” He is surprised that you seemingly completely change the subject.

“And Floyd, your own brother.” You continue. “Between the one who depends on you and the one who attacked you tooth and nail, do you really believe that your twin is the docile idiot one?”

“Floyd...? He... Hrk!”

The world distorts again and Jade's head starts to hurt, but he doesn't let go of you.

“JAAADEEE!” You hear a voice approaching, and then you see... you in mer-form arriving and clinging to Jade's arm. “Jade! What are you doing?” Your NPC whines. “That's not me! I'm right here.”

Jade looks between you and your NPC, confused.

“Is this how you see me?” You say. “Like a helpless and dependent weakling?”

“Wha- Why are they so mean?” Your NPC whines again. “Jade, darling, please leave this impostor and come back with me, my love. I need you so much.”

“You are a kind person.” Jade tells your NPC. “And your lack of magic makes you more vulnerable than me. But you are not that hopeless.” He looks at them with that rare serious face, a bad sign for them.

“WHAT?”

“If you were, you would never have been able to defeat us and Azul that midterms... Urgh!” The world distorts again. “Midterms... At Night Raven College... on land... Augh, I have a splitting headache! Urgh, augh...!”

Jade remembers what you're really like, what Azul and Floyd are really like too, and what you've all been through in Night Raven College. And the dream breaks.

“Jade! Are you all right?!” NPC Azul says, arriving with NPC Floyd. “Oh, thank goodness you're alive! I was afraid I lost my precious subordinate!”

“Your... precious subordinate?” Jade repeats, surprised.

“If we lost you, I'd cry, Jade.” NPC Floyd says. “Don't go anywhere again, 'kay?”

“...Don't go anywhere?... Indeed... The Azul and Floyd I know would never say such things. How could I have forgotten something so important?” He releases you and makes your NPC release him too. “Floyd is never so docile. He's far more unruly. And Azul would never willingly expose himself to danger. He's send someone else to do it instead. More to the point - neither of them would merrily tag along on my mountain expeditions. What was I thinking?”

“Jade! You would believe this imposter over us?!” NPC Azul inquires.

“Unfair! You said I was the real one, Jade!” NPC Floyd complains.

“I implore you to reconsider!”

The fake Azul and Floyd each grab one of Jade's arms.

“Could you please not touch me? It's sickening.”

Jade attacks both of them without mercy and the two turn into darkness figures and disappear in the goop. Jade looks seriously at your mer-form version.

“And you...”

“ME? Jade, my love” Your NPC begs in tears. “Please, stay with me. *sniff* You are my everything.”

“Do me a favor, dear, and shut your mouth. Your despair disgusts me.” And he attacks the fake version of you as ruthlessly as he attacked the false Azul and Floyd.

“But... my... love...” Were the last words of your NPC, before also turning into darkness and disappearing.

Jade looks at you and his expression softens.

“You... you are the real (Y/N), aren’t you?”

“After seeing what you did to the others, do you really think that I would deny it even if I wasn't?”

“He he he. Sounds like you, at least.”

“Heeey, Jade.” The real Floyd approaches you two. “You finally awake?”

“Yes, thanks to (Y/N) and you.”

The two laugh a little before attacking each other again. But this time, as brothers would do in a fight at home. The others finally catch up to you too.

“(Y/N)!” Grim goes straight to you to hug you. “You need to get stronger!” He complains with a few small tears in his eyes. It even reminded you of when he finally rejoined you in STYX.

Idia takes the opportunity to restore your aerosphere.

“Ah, everyone,” Jade says to your group, after another exchange of punches and words with Floyd. “What an embarrassing brotherly squabble you've witnessed. I'm terribly sorry you had to see that.”

“Dude, that wasn't a 'squabble.'” Idia says through the tablet. “That was a full-blown super kaiju brothers brawl.”

“Um... Anyway, I'm glad Jade's awake and the two of them mended bridges.” Silver says.

“You call that mending bridges...?” Jamil questions.

“Heh heh. Yes, we've made up.” Jade smiles reassuringly. “My apologies for giving you cause for concern.”

“Tch. Speak for yourself. I ain't satisfied yet, but we're not gonna get anywhere arguin' about it in a dream, se whatevs.”

“A dream? Floyd, what do you mean by that?”

“Mind if I field this one?” Ortho asks. “I've got an explainer video here that will help...”

“I see... What a fascinating tale.” Jade says. “So the false Azul, Floyd and (Y/N) were there to keep me anchored in the dream. Neither Azul or Floyd have ever shown any interest in my hobbies, and yet they joined me to trek through a multitude of mountains... And (Y/N)...” He looks at you and then back at the rest of the group. “Excuse me, could you give us a moment alone, please?”

The others look at you to see if you also want to have that moment alone with Jade and when they see your confirmation they let Jade take you by the hand a little further away.

“If my brother felt the way he did when he saw the Floyd from my dream,” Jade smiles kind of awkwardly. “I can only imagine how you must have felt when you saw your version.”

“So... is it true that that means you like me?” You ask.

“Well, thinking how pleasurable my dream with you was... It seems like I cannot deny my fondness for you anymore.”

“Anymore?”

“Oh, don't mind that part.” He smiles with his hands clasped in front of him. “I can only hope you weren't too uncomfortable with what you witnessed. My deepest apologies.”

You remember the dependent, loving fool you saw.

“Do you really like me, or that version of me?”

“You saw the Azul and Floyd versions. Do you really think I preferred those two poor unfortunate souls to the real ambitious and unpredictable ones? Oh my, you don't believe that my tastes are that... rudimentary, do you?”

In fact, you had already seen several dreams, and Malleus’ spell does not always fit with what the dreamer true wishes. Floyd's own dream, for example.

Well, you finding out, against his will, that he likes you, maybe it would be a good opportunity for you to admit that you like him too.

“Oh...” Jade's smile turns from his polite one to a smirk. “Truly...?” He still had his counter-illumination active, so him getting closer to you with that bright eye in the middle of the darkness gave you a nice, different type of chill. “You know,” He swims around you, “I agree with my brother that happy endings are often quite dull.” to stop in front of you again, but now with his tail blocking any escape you could make. “But in this case.” He tilts your head with his fingers on your chin. “Something tells me this relationship would be more... interesting... after these confessions.” He brings his face closer to yours and consequently his lips closer to yours as well. “I wonder what it would be like if we both stopped holding back.” He whispers with your noses touching slightly. “What do you say?”

He's not going to kiss you, he's teasing you to do it. And if you do kiss his lips, you'll feel his tail wrap around your legs, his arms go around your back, and you will feel him deepening the kiss before suddenly breaking it.

“Don't get me wrong, my dear.” He whispers to you. “But unfortunately, we have people waiting for us and I wouldn't like to be interrupted by third parties. Which is a shame,” He brings his lips close to your ear. “You are a delightful taste.”

If you would like to read more from me, you can find it in my pinned post: INDEX

[pennyserenade]

devil in his heart | jackson rippner x reader

summary | after finding out your long-time boyfriend's real occupation, you have to grapple with who he really is. rating | (explicit) tags/warnings | 18+, dark, dubcon (bordering on noncon), smut, explicit smut, fingering, degradation, violence word count | 1.9k+ a/n | i honest to god don't know what possessed me, but we are all grown ups here. read with caution! enjoy! love ya! also: i wrote this to devil in his heart by the donays and he's got the power by the exciters, if you're interested in a soundtrack. not beta'd

Truth be told, this is the best game of cat and mouse he's had in years, and he doesn't like that it's ending so soon.

As he gets on your level, crouching near your slumped form, Jackson almost feels a little sorry that you couldn't win. It's not that you weren't witty enough--you were. It's just that, well, he's better. This reminds him of when he was ten and had wanted to go to space only to figure out when he was twelve that he was too scared of the vastness of the galaxy. Some things are just out of reach, too good to be true. He mourns it all the same.

His fingers tenderly push back sweat soaked strands of hair from your face. You look up at him, blurry-eyed, but still so resolute--lips thinned, smoldering with anger. God. He swipes a finger across your lip just to know what it feels like, and likes it better for the fact that you jerk away so aggressively that you knock your head back into the wall.

His tongue clicks. "You should've known, after following me all those weeks, that I'm good at this."

Jackson wraps his fingers tightly around your jaw, forcing you to meet his eyes. You give in, mostly because you have so little energy to protest. His eyes look ominously glacial, lit up only by the moonlight cascading in from the window.

You look down at his lips; the flesh there is still swollen, broken from the harsh swing of your elbow earlier in the night. His tongue spears out to feel at the area. "You're a sloppy assassin, baby. My blood's all over this goddamn place. All over you--" he gestures down to your simple white tee shirt, which has been made dirty with dirt, sweat, blood. You don't care. You feel dizzy and half-scared to pass out, to even think of it, because you've never seen him look quite like this.

You think back to that first time you met him, how he had seemed so polite. He was traveling by train to visit his folks back home for Christmas (he said things like 'folks' in a crisp Midwestern accent, for God's sake). He had said he worked in life insurance policy, which made you laugh and caused him to say, "I know, I know--ironic, Jack Rippner dealing out life insurance." You had thought it was ironic. It is: ironically cruel.

He buys his ties from GAP, his dress shirts from Macy's, likes EggNog and celebrates the fourth of July with as much enthusiasm as any plain, good-hearted American man can.

He’s met your mother; he loves her breadsticks.

You spit on him. It takes the very last of your strength, but it's worth it to see the way his eyes ignite. His hand wipes it off, thumb running through the saliva on his fingers as his lips purse. "You know," he begins, voice eerily calm, "I always thought we'd make good parents. God knows we've come close to it enough times. You just can't help but beg for my cum in you, the slut you are." He chuckles darkly. "I always imagined that you'd be the good cop and I'd be the bad one."

Jackson pushes your head back into the wall, propping you there, almost choking you, but not quite. You let out a deep, wavering breath. He smirks. "But I see that's not the case now, is it? You don't seem to like very much when I play with my food before I eat it, do you?" His fingers press against your lips again, saliva coated. You let him. "Here I thought, all along, 'my baby's a goddamn pacifist. She didn't even like fishing!' It kept me up at night, the idea of you finding out what I did. But look at you!" His thumb tenderly strokes your neck, moving around a mysterious fluid--could be your blood, his blood, spit, water, anything. "I think if I reached between your legs now, you'd be soaked."

You choke out a sound of protest, wiggling beneath his gasp. He tuts, his fingers digging more tightly into your throat. For a brief moment, you can’t breathe. You find enough strength to claw at his hand, to widen your eyes and plead.

“C’mon, you’ll like this. You always do.” He loosens his grip on your neck.

As you gasp for air, Jackson knocks your legs apart. It doesn’t take much effort to get your cunt—you’d foolishly made the mistake of wearing a dress today—and he hums in delight when his fingers reach past your cotton underwear, confirming what he suspected to be true. His lips form into a mocking pout as your eyes begin to well with tears. It's not fear—you’re beyond that. It’s anger. The betrayal of this curdles inside you, eating you alive. Your eyes fill with ire.

“Don’t be that way,” he shakes his head, softening a degree. He holds your chin between his fingers again, the other hand rubbing wide circles over your clit. “I’m not going to kill you. How could I? I’m not sure what I’m going to do with you, truth be told, but it’s not that.”

Your hips jerk involuntarily, causing him to growl. “That’s the spirit, kitten. When you hit me earlier, I thought—after, of course, 'God she’s a bitch!’—that you might be a good asset. I know you’ve got a lot of morals holding you back right now, so I figure I’ll let you do the easy work at first. Let you think you’re doing some good in the world.” He presses down on your clit, his touch more intent, more focused. You squirm, hating the way he knows that you like it like this.

His fingers slip down into your cunt, wetting them. “Fuck, you’re soaking. If this is how you get when we do this, you might just reform me. I’m not opposed. We—“ he reattaches his fingers to your cunt. You whine, arching into his touch.“—could do good work. I freelance, if you couldn’t tell already. Though I’m sure you can. You’re a thorough investigator when you want to be. That’ll be helpful, too.”

Jackson picks up his pace, swallowing as he stares down at your lap. He can’t see anything, his hand hidden beneath the fabric of the dress and your underwear, but it seems to thrill him all the same. You too, admittedly.

“I—I couldn’t,” you retort, biting at your lip. “You—you kill!”

“Don’t be such a prude,” he deadpans. “It’s political assassinations and occasionally, though very rarely, an innocent bystander. And I do my best to make sure those cases are few and far between. I do.” He presses down more intently, watching with delight as you squirm, trying not to cum. “Oh, go on. It’s just you and me here. No one’s gonna know except me, and I won’t tell anyone. I’m good with secrets. You know that now.”

He’s near exultant, talking to you about this. The pitch of his voice is higher, and he’s looking at you like he’s won a prize of the highest degree. You’d spit on him again if he wasn’t making you feel so goddamn good.

“I won’t do it,” you shake your head firmly. Jackson takes the opportunity to slip a finger in your cunt, to press in and show you how much he has always—will always—know you.

“Okay, okay, I’ll bite,” he soothes, entering another. It’s a squeeze, but a welcome one, especially when he begins to thrust them against the spongy surface of your walls. Your toes curl, and you hate him, hate him violently. “If you want me to be rough, you really only have to ask, but since you like this game so much we’ll play it.”

As he fingers you, he begins to palm your clit. The sensation is overwhelming. Tears cascade down your face and he leans forward, licking them from your lips. The warmth of the orgasm rises in you alarmingly quick, his fingers deftly touching the inside of you, his palm lining with your clit each time you rut involuntarily. Your body knows him. It trusts him. He knows it.

The orgasm licks through you like a goddamn flame, igniting everything and leaving it all worse for it. When you cry out, Jackson smirks, so fucking pleased. But he doesn’t stop. He goes on, rubbing down harder, thrusting in quicker, until you’re wiggling beneath him.

“Please!” you say, trying to move his hand away.

He’s resolute. “No can do, honey. You’ve been a naughty girl, indulgent in the worst way. Gluttony is a sin, and I've been good–I’ve never punished you for it before–but you’ve hurt my feelings now.”

He slides in a third finger, his crystal eyes dark in the shadows. You feel impossibly full, and on the brink of another orgasm. You whine out. He knocks your head back into the wall with force. It doesn’t take your breath away, but it stuns you to silence. “That’ll be enough of that. This is for me now, got it? Getting you all wet so my cock will fit in that tight cunt of yours. Want you to hear it, your pussy taking me.”

As if to prove a point, he thrusts in again, and you do hear it—the way your body allows him in. An obscene squelch. You bite your lip, feel more tears fall down your cheeks.

“Jackson—“ you plead. You’re tired, achy, terribly confused. He works you open so well. You can smell the sour sweet smell of his body odor. You love it. You cannot help it. Your body trusted this man for so long. Still does.

You fool, you tell yourself, before your body gives way to his will again—you collapse into him, screaming out a silent whimper as the orgasm makes you convulse.

“That’s it,” he encourages, not stopping. “Be good for me. If you’re good, we’ll make this enterprise into a family business. If you’re bad—well, we’ll just have to make this our life, won’t we? You all weak, me with all the power. I don’t think you’ll like it, but you understand, it’s how it must be done if you don’t obey.”

He sighs, as if it’s putting him out too.

You know he’s serious. What’s worse is you know he’s right: that you won’t like it, that he’ll get his way eventually.

When you give in, he knows immediately, lips quirking up into a smirk.

“That’s my girl,” he whispers, pressing his lips to your temple. “I always knew you had it in you a little. You were always such a whore for me. I’m happy it worked out so well for us both. Now–” He pushes your legs further apart, moving in with his own hips. “Let’s play your most favorite game. It’s longer, requires more patience, but I like it just as much as you do.”

The jingle of his belt buckle makes a shot of fear, mixed with arousal, shoot up your spine. You think: God, no.

He laughs darkly. “Don’t worry, baby, I’ve been making sure you’ve been taking your birth control. I’m not really ready for that, either. It’s just the idea that thrills you, isn’t it anyway? And that smallest, tiniest chance that it could happen.” He smirks, loosening his belt. His fingers exit you, leaving you empty, feeling scandalized and ruined. Jackson rubs them on the cloth of your dress, uncaring.

“I hate you,” you spit out, venom lacing your words.

He looks thoroughly amused as he releases his weeping cock from his underwear. “No you don’t. You’re just ashamed of yourself. But fear not–” he wipes a tear off your face, “--when we’re done here, you’ll be glad for this. Just remember, baby, that I’m on your side.”

[acid-ixx]

Hiii, I have read all your work and it is very good :D!! I've read it several times and never get bored.

Can I ask about something? I'm curious about the characteristics or signs of yandere appearing in Tim. Will he be the last family member to become a yandere? Sorry I asked like this because I feel like he's not getting enough attention in drabbles, questions from other readers, or anything else. So I'm curious.

I hope you understand my question. Because English is not my first language.

— masterlist !

don't mind me using the tags here, i want to clarify a lot of things.

hi anon!! don't worry about your english, i understand perfectly and it's also not my first language too hehe. and to all the others who have asked about tim's (or any other characters') appearance in the series: fear not, nobody is getting ignored at all, i intend for everyone to have their designated events/moments that trigger yandere characteristics for the reader for each chapter. it's my plan to make them each as unique as possible with their intentions, motives and goals, not just them being simply "obsessed" with you, so i'm trying my best to add depth to the story.

that means the entire series will stretch out quite a lot (i already have outlined multiple arcs, flashbacks, and all the characters' individual traits and significance). it's not just going to be ten chapters, i want to remind others that there's more lore to just the neglect, your mother's dark past, and characters that haven't even been introduced to the plot yet, so if you guys prefer one-shots or something shorter, then the series is not for you folks, sorry 😭

as for tim, he is quite literally my favorite character (surprise!), so of course he's going to get special treatment. he's not going to be the last to become yandere, but his spiral to becoming a yandere takes quite a lot of time since compared to others, it's him who spends the least amount of moments with you. even in the non-neglected au i wrote, what triggered his obsession was mere curiousity.

though just because there're lesser events with him, doesn't mean there will be none. he certainly plays a major role in the "wild goose chase arc where the family tries to negotiate (kidnap) you whilst you try to escape to multiple cities/end up in a completely different country". he may not express his love for the reader well, but he most definitely knows the most about you.

oh! and the traits that he does have as a yandere looks tame when you compare it to others, but it's also because it manifests through his personal dialogue (as i reckon he's keeps most of his thoughts about you to himself most of the time (gatekeeper archetype) and he's the character with the most internal dialogue/thoughts too). he's the worst stalker you could have, the one who you should look out for the most with just how much he knows about you in such a short period of time. tim's intelligence and detective skills knows no bounds, and he won't stop exhausting himself until the very knowledge of what the blood pumping under your skin feels like and the exact temperature of your body— is extracted and stored into the terabytes of data he has into his personal batcave.

and spoiler alert: he's also the one who uncovers your mother's past and alongside bruce, what had happened between the period of time when you were dragged out of the closet and the other time in elementary when you were nearly kidnapped, which completely leads to another arc wherein it's where their obsession drives off to a completely different plane of existence, exalting vengeance on the people who tormented you; but tim's pettiness is just on a whole nother level.

and i have to stop here before i (excitedly) spoil the entire series' plot LMAO. my answer to this is a bit more casual to the other asks, so i hope it doesn't irritate anyone.

so thank you for asking this! i also have a question for you people too:

how is the current progression of the plot? i get that it isn't even 10% finished and some moments feel slow, but i try to be as immersive as possible to the readers. so for those who have read the entire thing, what do you want me to possibly add, or does anyone have other clarifications? can anyone tolerate a fanfic that can possibly lead to more than 250k words??? 😭

[starry-bi-sky]

DPxDC Masterpost

Almost all of my DPDC posts have the #Danny Fenton is Not the Ghost King tags, barring perhaps my earliest aus like my Thomas Wayne Au (which will be included in the post). This tag includes art i've made, asks i've answered, and non-fic au posts I've created. This is my main tag!

DPxDC posts under the main tag that don't have their own tag: Danny's Life-Changing Cross-Dimensional Roadtrip with A De-Aged Batman Danny is also Bruce Wayne (Starry goes back to their middle school roots) Danny being the first batkid (if i can get the creative juices flowing I will expand on this. mark my words) There is a Damian clone LOOSE in Amity Park. Oh wait, Danny's got him.

My Biggest DPxDC Aus #Danny Fenton is a Clone: all my posts talking about clone!Danny.

Clone Danny Masterpost: previously my pinned post. A no-powers au where Danny is also a clone of Bruce Wayne, also includes some clone^2

#Clone^2: Clone Damian + Clone Danny au combined, explores themes like identity, found family, and growing into your own as a person. Starting post Here.

#Childhood Friends Au or #Cfau: A childhood friends dead on main au that explores grief, how it may change a person, and how growing up in Crime Alley changed Danny. Contains heavier themes like smoking and mild violence.

#Danyal Al Ghul Au: No longer just my "older brother danyal" au, instead it hosts all of my Danyal Al Ghul aus! An excuse for me to delve into the psychological effects that growing up in the League would have on Danny that I don't really see in other DAG aus. Putting the 'assassin' in 'raised by assassins'. Now with a secondary masterpost listing all of my DAG aus!

My Minor DPxDC Aus Danny Fenton is Thomas Wayne: an oldie but a goodie! An reveal gone wrong au where Danny decides to go by his middle name 'Thomas' shortly after the events of TUE, and leaves Amity Park two years later. He finds out that Vlad cloned him again and finds an infant in the lab. Danny takes the baby, names him Bruce, and ends up adopted by the Waynes.

#Danny Fenton is Jason Todd au: An au where Danny is Jason Todd! He was adopted by the Fentons shortly after the events of the carjacking.

#Older Brother Danny: contains all of my aus where Danny is an Older Brother. This currently includes only my DAG posts but it's not limited to Danyal Al Ghul.

#Changeling Danny: a half-ghost? oh, wait, no. that's a changeling. even worse! Danny's got latent fey blood from a Fenton getting freaky with a faerie some dozen generations ago, and it reactivated with a fervor when he had his accident! Instead of a halfa, he became one of the Fair Folk.

#Blood blossom au: currently the name for the time being. A Nightingale/First Batkid au where Vlad poisons Danny with blood blossom extract, and it results in Danny running to Batman! Currently only one post, but it has a lot of branching pathways in the reblogs. Batdad centered! Now comes with its own fanfic!

#tales of the passerine: the official au name for my "Danny being the first batkid" post! This au is what inspired changeling Danny. It's the idea that Danny was the first to be adopted by Bruce, and features me favoring batdad over "lmfao Danny goes fuck you bruce and adopts the other kids" au. Because I want batdad.

(Nightingale is, so far, the official vigilante name for the Eldest Batkid Danny concept on my blog.)

#mother of monsters danny: specifically its mother of monsters dan but i digress. I was messing around with my fem!Danyal au and boom! Her evil timeline self is Layal, the terrifying Mother of Monsters who raises any manner of monstrous beasts. I love her <3

#martha knight au same song, different dance! This is a fem danny version of my aforementioned "Danny is Thomas Wayne" au. Except this time around, Danny is Martha! Arguably my favorite between the two, I feel like I'm able to do more with her than Thomas. Her au's vibe is After All by Christine Ebersole

Bonus Excerpt: a ficlet I made in response to a DPxDC Dead on Main prompt! It's not under the main tag as I didn't make the post, however it can be found if you search #fem danny fenton on my blog. I actually really love this idea so I may make it its own tag in the future.

[leashybebes]

tentatively excited for this fic 👀👀 gonna take a little while because work (ugh) and i need some time to actually plot it out and figure out the structure and whether i actually wanna bite the bullet and do the more complicated version. basically we are looking at a long term fic where they find each other again a way down the line so I'm not sure how much of what i have so far will make it verbatim into the final thing but for now, have some sal!!

The first time Tommy's aware of waking up, the room is dark - as dark as hospitals ever get, anyway. He can't feel much of anything, just a sort of full-body ache that speaks of the good drugs. His right leg looks suspiciously bulky under the covers, so definitely in a cast, from his ankle up past his knee. The mask on his face is annoying in a dull, distant way, and the longer he's awake, the more his head hurts, making itself known above the general thrum of dull pain.

He can feel sleep already threatening again so he takes the time he has to look around. He's in an individual room, there's a drip going into his hand, and he can hear the low-level hum of hospital noises - staff talking quietly, machines beeping. And - and Sal's asleep in the chair next to the bed, third day stubble on his face, snoring quietly. Tommy feels a rush of affection for his old friend as sleep tugs at him.

The next time he wakes up, it's to the sound of Sal talking on the phone.

"Okay, I gotta go, sweetie," he says, as soon as he realises Tommy's awake. "Be good for your mom. Uncle Tommy says hi."

Tommy wiggles his fingers in an attempt at a wave. Sal rolls his eyes and hits the call button, tossing his phone onto the table at Tommy's bedside.

"Jesus Christ, Kinard. Drive much?"

Tommy rolls his eyes, gestures at the mask on his face.

"Nah, that's staying on," Sal promises. Tommy rolls his eyes and gives Sal the finger.

"Happened?" he manages.

"Lady coming the other way lost control, sounds like you tried to swerve, over-corrected, rolled a couple times."

"Well, shit. She okay?"

"Couple scrapes," Sal says with a shrug.

"Truck?"

"Oh, completely fucked," Sal says cheerfully. "You want me to call the kid?"

Tommy blinks, confused. "Kid?"

"Buckley," Sal says, like it's obvious.

Tommy gives him the best stink-eye he can muster. "Broke up, asshole."

"Yeah, but like. Two weeks ago. I know you, Kinard. You get your lil claws in deep. Dontcha think he'd wanna know?"

He probably would, Tommy thinks. He'd probably call out from work and jump in the Jeep and gun it all the way up to Sacramento.

"Don't, Sal."

"Yeah, yeah," Sal grumbles.

"Hey. Promise."

Sal rolls his eyes. "Okay, okay. Swear."

Tommy nods, closes his eyes. The last thing this situation needs is Evan Buckley's particular brand of chaotic, full-on care.

"How - how bad?" Tommy manages, gesturing down towards his leg.

Sal's pause says it all, really. "Think they're more worried about your big, dumb head for now."

"Sal."

"Let - let me get a doctor, okay?"

Tagging some folks who requested it. Let me know if you want in (or out! I won't be offended, this is v definitely not a quick fix-it fic and they're gonna miss a lot of each other's lives so I know it won't be everyone's thing!)

@silversky9 @typicalopposite @my-ari-fan-blog1

[firenati0n]

wip wednesday <3 :)

hello friends :) last time i did one of these was november oops so I'm happy to get to share some words :) i have been through some SHIT the last few months, but slowly making my way back into my body. thanks for your patience! <3

here's a snip from my upcoming multichap, two years from tomorrow! it is an au of the sandra bullock x keanu reeves early 2000s romantic drama The Lake House. if you have never seen it and want to read this, DON'T GOOGLE IT JADSFJLASDF stay ignorant! if you HAVE seen it, don't worry—i have made some changes. :) my second multichap just HAD to be another sandra movie...except this time, unlike ice queen henry in the proposal au, sandra is ALEX. because everyone deserves to be sandra bullock at least once.

been a HOT MINUTE since i wrote a multichap BUT i am going to fully write before i post. i promise.

here's a split pov taken from diff points in the chapter...roommates with a twist...

january, alex:

Alex Claremont-Diaz deserves some fucking peace and quiet and rest, and this lake house is moving him one step closer to outrunning law-related burnout of epic proportions. Or at least, that’s what he hopes; he’s not quite sure yet what this house will hold for him. Year after year of relentless caseloads and emotionally draining yet fulfilling clients will do that to a person—fills them up, but at a steep personal cost. And Alex’s wellbeing is here to fucking collect. Luna was pretty clear about the whole thing: “A three month sabbatical, kid. No arguments. Better not see your ass darkening Luna & Associates’ fuckin’ doors until April.” So. Lake it is. Peace and quiet. No stress. His lease was up anyway, so he crashed at June’s and diligently searched for housing near but not in Chicago. He’s going for serene, here. Goodbye, high rises and pavement. Hello, waterfront views and enlightenment. 

january, henry:

Henry Fox-Mountchristen is bloody terrified of moving into this place, with its memories and sadness and joy attached, and this lake house is forcing him one step closer to confronting a final piece of the grief puzzle he’s been avoiding for years.   Or at least, that’s what he’s afraid of; he’s not quite sure yet what this house will hold for him.  The past was full of laughter echoing in the halls, late night sketching at the threadbare dinner table, secrets and fears whispered into the nooks and crannies. The present, however, is full of running. From his fears, from his demons, from laughter and sketching and secrets.  But Henry’s tired. Year after year of agonizing pain and subsequent expensive therapy will do that to a person—drains them, builds them up, then drains them again. Rinse and repeat, hope eternally on the horizon, fears loitering on his doorstep. And those aforementioned demons have finally caught up and are knocking rather insistently. 

xoxo roop

+ open tag and tagging back folks who got me over the last few months! thank you so much <3

@sherryvalli @cha-melodius @run-for-chamo-miles @porcelainmortal @suseagull5914

@anincompletelist @wordsofhoneydew @caterpills @onthewaytosomewhere @orchidscript

@14carrotghoul @alasse9 @thighzp @zwiazdziarka @miharaikko

@tailsbeth-writes @kiwiana-writes @stereopticons @getmehighonmagic @clockwrkpendrxgon

@sophie1973 @eusuntgratie @rmd-writes @dumbpeachjuice @blueeyedgrlwrites

@fairflowered @theprinceandagcd @incalamity @rockyroadkylers @saturntheday

@judasofsuburbia @onward--upward @saguaroblossom @anchoredarchangel @myheartalivewrites

@seths-rogens @indestructibleheart @everwitch-magiks @clottedcreamfudge @tintagel-or-cockleshells

@celeritas2997 @cricketnationrise @smc-27 @cheesecurdsgravyandfries @leaves-of-laurelin

@welcometololaland @ninzied @freneticfloetry @smugvillanelle @springrainbloom

[space-mango-company]

Stranger | Chapter 5

← CHAPTER 4 | ✦

TW: Descriptions of Violence, Mentions of Cannibalism

Tags: Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen x Atreides!Reader, Arranged Marriage, POV Second Person, No use of y/n, Original Characters, Canon What Canon

Word Count: 2.3k

A/N: Not proofread!! Holy moly. Here it is, folks. The scene that inspired this whole fic. I had fun writing this so I really hope you enjoy it. Once again, I appreciate everyone who likes, comments, and/or leaves kudos so much. I really started this fic for myself but good golly, that dopamine rush whenever I get a notif might be more addicting than spice. I'm glad to be part of the bald man brigade.

Also, I can't believe I'm only now questioning why I decided to write this in the second person? I guess maybe I thought this fic would be a lot shorter and not that deep, lol. At this point 'y/n' probably has enough personality to just be a straight-up OC. It's funnier because I don't even find second-person or y/n fics any more engaging either. I always detach myself by giving 'y/n' her own name and only seeing her as a character in the fic.

ANYWAY, sorry to ramble. Stay safe and have a good one, ya weirdos.

You step out into the dark cul-de-sac of the guest hall, illuminated only by the large suspensor lamp in the middle. Feyd-Rautha looks you up and down, seemingly entranced by how the dim light casts his shadow on your modest dress. Atreides green, he recognized.

"Trying to sneak into my rooms again?" you say arms crossed, leaning on your door. "I didn't appreciate the last time, by the way."

"It's my house," he says cooly, "and I did knock this time."

You stare at him indifferently.

"Quite the display from you yesterday morning, using The Voice on me." His voice low and raspy, "I should have you drawn and quartered."

You scoff in his face. "You almost choked me to death. Are you trying to start a war?"

He takes a step closer and his face is inches from yours, you can feel his breath on your cheek, "I didn't think I'd like you this much, little hawk."

"What do you want, Feyd-Rautha?" you had no patience for him right now.

"Ah," he steps back, a dark smile on his face, "I've been waiting to hear my name from your tongue." His hand reaches for your lips. "I've grown quite tired of 'na-Baron'."

You grab his wrist before he can touch you. "If you're only here to toy with me, I would rather be left alone to prepare for bed." You release his hand and turn to open your door.

Feyd-Rautha props an arm against the doorway to block you. "We're to be married in three days," he says, "and I just can't seem to bring myself to let go of my 'harpies', as you called them." He meets your gaze. "You said you'd kill them. Did you mean that?"

You look up at him with steely eyes. He towered over you but your heart felt no fear, "Yes."

His coy smile returns. "Good. Come to my training hall tomorrow," he says, walking away.

"What?" you call after him.

"Dress to fight," he says over his shoulder. "I want to see what you can do, Atreides."

You needed no help from Zora in putting on a loose shirt and long pants. The plain beige outfit certainly wasn't as elegant as the dresses you had been wearing so far. But it was comfortable and you could fight in it, which was all that mattered. Still, you look yourself in the mirror. The soft, airy fabrics draped over your figure well but perhaps you were not in the best shape as you once were. Your muscle mass is much less than your brother's and he wasn't particularly built himself. You admit you did wane off your training sessions with Gurney and Paul leading up to your departure from Caladan. Nevertheless, you were still a skilled warrior. Another secret you've been keeping from the Harkonnens.

You were 14 when you started learning the blade. Watching Paul, 2 years your senior, practice with the Atreides Warmaster lit a fire in you. You didn't hesitate to pester your father to let you train with them and of course, there was nothing he could deny his darling daughter. You were a fierce and determined student. Gurney Halleck was a man you genuinely believed to be one of the best fighters in the Imperium, along with Duncan Idaho. Gurney would train you and Paul on even days. On odd days, your mother would teach you the Weirding Way. These lessons, much like the rest of your mother's teachings, your father wanted to know nothing about. After becoming decently adept at Prana-Bindu and gaining almost complete physical control of your body, Lady Jessica insisted that you also be skilled in the Bene Gesserit style of combat.

You were far from mastery in either but the combination of both trainings made you a formidable fighter. Despite this, you could never seem to beat your brother in a sparring match. A fact that frustrated you to no end, though you appreciated that Paul never went easy on you. You'd always blame it on him having trained for longer than you have. But in truth, you knew there had just always been something special about him.

"Are you ready, my lady?" Zora's soft voice wakes you from your thoughts.

"Hm? Right. Yes, let's go." You quickly tie your hair out of the way and grab your father's dagger from atop your dresser.

There was no fanfare when you entered the hall. On one end, the na-Baron's concubines sat chained on the steps of the shallow recessed pit in their leathers, their glares piercing through you. Your eyes linger on them as Feyd-Rautha and his Warmaster greet you.

"I was starting to think my lady bride was bluffing," Feyd-Rautha says as you approach him. The older man beside him offers you a polite bow.

"Perhaps she wasn't so keen on your brutish games," you bite back. "Your lord uncle won't be joining us?"

"No," Feyd-Rautha crosses his arms, "but he'll be hearing about your victory. Or your demise."

"Right. Well, I assume you'll be releasing them from those chains," you nod towards his pets "Not sure why they're necessary."

"Oh, trust me, little hawk. They're necessary." Feyd-Rautha motions to a servant.

"Your blade and shield, my lady," they bow, presenting you with a knife and a small device you recognize as a Holtzman shield.

"I've brought my own," you unsheath your father's dagger. You contemplate taking the shield but remembering that the na-Baron forwent it during his gladiator fight, you decide to do so as well. "They've no weapons anyway, the shield seems pointless."

Feyd-Rautha shrugs, "If you insist."

You take a deep breath, "Let's get this over with."

You lightly stretch as you walk down the steps of the shallow pit to stand opposite the na-Baron's concubines. You had come into this on the pretense of righteousness. For Iassa, you told yourself. But you've known her a mere two days. A part of you wanted to show off. You were good and you knew it. You could probably kill anyone in this room, even Feyd-Rautha. You craved the respect of the people here: the Harkonnens, the people of Geidi Prime. You figured this was one way to get it.

Feyd-Rautha walks around the pit to one of his concubines and kneels to whisper something in her ear. You assume a fighting stance when he moves to release her from the chains. When you meet her eyes, they are filled with feral bloodlust.

Suddenly, you weren't so bold. The veil of courage you have maintained since you arrived, even when Feyd-Rautha had your neck in his grip, is torn apart when you face this woman. You could tell no part of her would hesitate to rip your throat out with her bare teeth. You were almost relieved they were unarmed, but you weren't sure if that would make them any less lethal.

Fear grew in your chest and you had less than a moment to recite the Litany in your head before the concubine lunged at you.

You crouch down in time and slash at her abdomen as she approaches you. You turn to face her on the other side of the pit and she wastes no time in attacking you again. She attempts to grab your armed hand but you take hold of her wrist first and move to pin it behind her back. Quickly, your blade drags across her throat and she falls to your feet.

The kill has not yet registered in your mind but your heart is racing. You can almost hear your blood coursing through your veins. You held your arms outstretched, your eyes focused ahead, ready for the next one.

Across the pit, Feyd-Rautha licks his lips, smiling as he releases his second concubine. This time, you walk toward her while she moves to attack you. You clock her head with the pommel of your dagger and knock her a few steps back. She reaches a hand to wipe the blood beginning to drip out of her nose. After examining it, she snarls and bares her sharp teeth at you. Your mind is blank now. She dodges your first slash then manages to land a blow to your jaw. You seethe from the pain. You spit out the mixture of blood and saliva filling your mouth. The anger at the hit drives you to rush at her. Seeing an opening, you duck down to her waist and stab her twice. As she falls to her knees, the look of determination doesn't leave her eyes until the very last moment.

When you turn around, Feyd-Rautha has already released the last concubine. The ruthless scream she lets out disorients you. She pounces and knocks you over. She straddles you and pins your arms to the ground, your blade sliding inches away. She screams again in your face at the death of her sisters. You wedge your right knee between you and her abdomen, the only thing keeping her teeth from reaching your throat. You grunt as you struggle to free your hands. In your periphery, you see Feyd-Rautha, wielding his own blade, take a step into the pit.

"GET BACK," you roar, and he is powerless to refuse.

You turn back to your opponent still on top of you and you butt her head with your own. She loosens her grip and you kick her off to hastily crawl to your weapon. When she reorients herself and attempts to grab you again, you hook a knee under her arm and flip the both of you over. With your weight on her chest and both your knees pinning her arms down, she thrashes underneath you, claws digging into your right ankle. You take your blade in both hands and her screaming is silenced when you sink your knife deep into her heart.

When you rise, the room is quiet. Your chest heaves. The stark white ceiling lights don't help the lightheadedness that begins to wash over you in the post-adrenaline rush. Feyd-Rautha says something from behind you but his speech is garbled as you reel from the thrill of what just transpired. You were electrified. You almost... wanted more.

Then, the realization of the revolting scene you are in settles upon you and you are knocked off your high. You look at the leather-clad bodies scattered around you, the grotesque way they lay on the floor, the red blood pooling around them made brighter by the sterile grayness of the room. You did this.

A hand on your shoulder snaps you out of it. In reflex, you turn and raise your blade at the offender.

Feyd-Rautha holds his hands up, "Whoa, easy, Atreides. Trying to kill me? Don't want to start a war, do you?"

You yield your weapon. Your eyes dodge his as you look to your feet and try to steady your breathing.

"Enjoy your first taste of blood?" Feyd-Rautha says, the look in his eyes indecipherable to you. He raises a hand and swipes his thumb on your cheek. It comes away covered in crimson.

You gasp and reach for your face with your own hand. You don't even know if it's your blood or theirs, or when it got on you. Your heart pounded, unable to decide whether you were repulsed or proud.

"Look at you," he says licking the red off his finger. You could not help but stare at him through the strands of your hair that had come undone in the fighting. "You're beautiful like this," his hand reaches for your face again.

"No," you say low and quiet when you swat his hand away, "you're sick." You didn't know if you meant him or yourself. You calmly turn to leave. No one stops you when you make your way up the shallow steps of the pit. As you pass Iassa—no, Zora—by the doorway, you tell her flatly, "Prepare a bath."

You had never taken a life before. Today, you took three. You were glad you didn't know their names. You decided you'd never find out.

After Zora pours a final pitcher of hot water into the bath, you tell her, "You may go. I'll dress myself later, thank you."

She bows and makes her way out of your rooms.

In your solitude, you bring your knees to your chest. You had been quick to wipe the blood off your cheek before you even reached your quarters. Now, you cup the water into your hands and rub it into your face, the slight sting of the heat comforting you.

He was a cruel man, your betrothed. This is what you've decided. Having you kill the concubines he claimed to want to keep so much. But wasn't it you who threatened to kill them? He started it, you argue with yourself, when he had Iassa killed. You felt like a child.

When you used to hear of Feyd-Rautha's exploits, you had to mask your disgust. And yet now, you had killed so easily in that pit as he had in the arena. What was this place doing to you?

When you left Caladan, Paul had never killed anyone either. You wonder if he ever does, would he feel the same exhilaration you did when you slit that first concubine's throat. No. Your brother was fierce but, like your father, he had a good heart. You beat him by three. You hoped it would stay that way.

You think about your future here, marrying Feyd-Rautha. Producing heir after heir under the Baron's watchful eye. You were a broodmare. Despite all your fancy training and education. Despite your little demonstration earlier. It was the bitter truth.

You missed home. You missed walking along the beach at night with your father. You missed your mother's gentle hands brushing your hair. You missed the banter and teasing with your brother. You missed Gurney, and Duncan, and the cold breeze on your balcony, and getting to roam free and going anywhere you pleased. When the tears come, you sink deep into the bath so they might fade away in the water.

← CHAPTER 4 | ✦

Taglist: @torchbearerkyle @austinswhitewolf @dreamlandcreations @emeraldsgirl @strawberryfieldsforevermore @bornslippys @vexis-world @aoi-targaryen @alexandrainlove @mamawiggers1980 @sstardussty @aboutthenabaron

[deaddovedecadence]

I NEED MORE BATCEST HEADCANONS!!!! Or a story??.👉👈

okay headcanons are what I'm interested in rn so maybe some more of those

the bats see civilians as sheep and they are flock heads. By that I mean, they don't civilians are all that capable and are in need of protecting and teaching

All of the bats have really good rhythm. one of their main ways of bonding with each other is dancing (specifically dirty dancing or learning folk dances from dick).

Jason is Mexican and loves Folkorico with all his heart. Tim makes an active effort to take him whenever there's a performance in town because he knows it makes Jason happy. Cass also likes to tag along because she loves dancing.

Damian has so many portraits of his siblings that it's not funny. He and Tim team up to track them with stalkerish intensity.

Dick and Damian are obviously really close so dick was there for all of Damian's firsts (like the weirdo dick is) but it was a random that got Damian's first kiss because he wanted to practice before doing anything with his siblings. (severe jealousy was involved)

Besides Dick, Duke is Damian's favorite because he gets to teach Duke everything about the bonds of their family and how everything works.

Duke is manipulative as all hell. Will not hesitate to bat his puppy eyes at Jason or Cass or Dick to get what they want. Damian thinks it so cute but warned Duke early on that it wouldn't work on him.

Cass finds her brothers so cute. Gets Cuteness aggression from looking at them sometimes and has to go work it out on a dummy. The only one who knows about this is Steph.

There are so many bets going on in wayne manor at all times. Loss can usually mean something sexual or dressing up in some way though they do all like to embarrass each other by making each other wear the disco wing costume.

The hierarchy is complicated. Dick kind of keeps everything in order but it's Duke and Damian as his seconds, not Jason.

[ellewritesalright]

The Ward

Aemond Targaryen x fem!reader

Masterlist - Part 2

Synopsis: Aemond has a fascination with you, his mother's pious ward from a vassal family of House Hightower, but he has a peculiar way of showing it.

A/N: Hi!! this is set in and around the last few episodes of season 1. Reader is unnamed but comes from a noble house from the reach. I made up a Tyrell lord because I just wanted a name to throw about, but it's not that serious :) I wanna do another part of this, so lmk if you're interested and would like to be tagged

Warnings: mentions of the war, burning, Aemond being a flip-floppy bitch to reader, Aegon being a bit of a creep, and pls lmk if I've missed anything

Word Count: 3900

The halls of the Keep were quiet, despite the impending ruling of Lord of the Tides and the huddles of highborn folk who were visiting for the occasion. You walked through the grand passageways, a shawl over your shoulders for your journey outside the castle walls.

"Where are you off to this afternoon, my lady?" You heard Aemond's smooth voice from an alcove you'd just passed. You took a step back towards the sound as he made himself known, his tall frame coming out into the corridor.

"To the Sept, Prince Aemond. I'm going to pray," you answered.

He gave a slight nod and echoed, "Going to pray."

"Yes."

His eye was so focused on you, so attuned to your face that you felt he was trying to read your mind.

"You're aware that your presence is required at dinner this evening?" He inquired, folding his hands behind his back. “Rhaenyra and her brood will be in attendance.”

"Yes, your highness. I'll be back before the festivities begin," you assured him. "I only wish to say a few prayers on holy ground, several of which will be for the royal family."

Aemond's lips twitched into the smallest smirk. "You would pray for us?"

"Of course," you nodded. "I pray for everyone in this house. I always begin with King Viserys and pray for his health, then I thank the gods for Queen Alicent and her kindness in making me her ward, Ser Otto for his unending wisdom, I pray for Prince Aegon, Princess Helaena, and their children that all of them prosper, then I pray for you, my prince."

"And what do you ask for when you pray to the gods for me?" He raised a brow, complete curiosity on his pretty features.

"For the gods to protect you," you answered.

He let out a quiet laugh, one you almost mistook as a scoff. Perhaps it was a scoff.

"You think I need protection, my lady?" He smirked.

"Everyone needs protection."

"But I most of all?" He raised his brow again. "Do you think I'm not strong enough to protect myself?"

"I never said such a thing. I only said that I pray for your protection."

"Hm, well, how considerate of you, my lady," he appraised, a foreign glint in his eye. "Take a guard when you go out."

You nodded softly. "Yes, of course."

He looked at you for a moment longer, then he turned and walked away.

……….

The conversation before dinner was dull, even despite the tension among the family members. No one mentioned lord Vaemond, the dead man in the bowels of the Keep being cared for by the Silent Sisters. Though the lack of mention for his severed head was not the root of the ill mood this evening; you had only known this group to dislike each other.

You didn't fully understand why the family had splintered so, since you became Queen Alicent's ward only after Princess Rhaenyra and her family had moved to Dragonstone. You knew it happened after the funeral of Prince Daemon's second wife and had something to do with Aemond's missing eye, but you had never been given the full story from either side.

The tension in the family was only exacerbated by the king's poor health. King Viserys should have been resting, not hosting his entire family to dinner, but alas, you were all gathered at the table waiting for his guards to carry him in.

Across from you, Prince Aegon was expectedly fidgeting in his chair, prisoner to his boredom and wishing the night would end so he could sneak off and do something depraved. Beside you at the head of the table, Prince Aemond, ever the calm and dutiful brother, sat back in his seat, his lips pursed in that unknowable way he seemed fluent in, especially as he stared down the table at Lucerys.

You made polite conversation with Otto Hightower where he sat to your left. He had always liked you, seeing as he had been the coordinator of your guardianship under Queen Alicent. Ser Otto was even the one to bring you on the carriage journey from the western lands of the Reach to King's Landing when you were just fourteen. You had learned much at court since then, growing to be whispered about as a fine young lady.

"Lord Denton Tyrell sent his regards to you, my dear," Otto turned to you, ignoring the smalltalk between Rhaenyra's group.

Aegon scoffed into his wine across from you.

"Did he?" You smiled kindly, though you were not sure it reached your eyes. Lord Denton was fifteen years your senior, and quite a lumbering fool.

"Mentioned you in a letter I received from Highgarden. Seems you made quite the impression on him at the last hunt."

You reached for your wine. "I barely spoke to him during the hunt, I wasn't aware I made any sort of impression."

You felt a stare on you, and you didn't have to look to your right to know that Prince Aemond was watching you, as he often did. But another prince was watching you too.

“We know what he's interested in, don't we, my lady?” Aegon smirked at you.

“Not another word, grandson.” Otto leveled him with a look across the table.

“Marriage,” Aegon said in an innocent tone, holding his hands up. “He is sure to be interested in a union with our lovely, pious ward. A coupling, if you will.”

Otto gave him another look, and Aegon looked as though he wanted to continue his impish teasing, but just then King Viserys was being carried into the room. Everyone stood beside their chairs as he was brought to the empty spot at the middle of the table.

The family sat back down and dinner proceeded. After a moment of heavy air, King Viserys began to speak to his family, addressing them as equals and not as their king. Rhaenyra spoke, then Alicent, and it seemed any animosity had disappeared from their memories. Dinner progressed further, and you watched Rhaenyra's sons--mostly Jaecaerys–butt up against Aegon and Aemond as the three stood and seemed square for a fight. But then, finally, the three of them sat again, and a temporary peace was made. The musicians returned to playing, and Ser Otto began engaging you in casual conversation again, both of your stares straying to Jacaerys and Helaena as they danced.

You caught Aemond glaring across the long table at Lucerys, and your eyes flicked down to his hand in his lap, how it clenched into a fist. Without thinking, you lowered your hand beneath the table and reached for him. Your fingers settled over his knuckles, and he broke his glaring at Lucerys and instead looked over at you, his eye losing its hard edge. The bones of his knuckles rippled under your hand, and you felt a chill run down your spine as he flattened his fingers then folded them around yours. Aemond gave you a slight nod, then looked over to his sister and nephew dancing, his hand still in yours.

From the corner of your eye, you could vaguely see King Viserys being carried to his room again as dinner trays were being brought in. You let go of Aemond's hand as servants approached your end of the table with a suckling pig. Above the music, you could faintly make out laughter, and you looked all the way down to the other end of the table to see Lucerys smirking at Aemond and the pig.

Before you could take his hand again, before you could so much as look at him again, Aemond had slammed his fist on the table and rose to his feet.

“Final tribute,” he called, eye intent on Lucerys and Jacaerys. “To the health of my nephews Jace, Luke, and Joffrey. Each of them handsome, wise… strong.”

You went rigid in your seat as the ensuing tussle broke out. There was nothing civil about how Aemond shoved Jace to the floor as soon as he stepped closer, and how Aegon pinned Luke to the table when he tried to join Jace. Ser Otto rose beside you, and you watched as guards tore the Velaryon boys away from Aemond and Aegon.

Queen Alicent and Princess Rhaenyra seemed to admonish their respective children--though you weren't sure how effective the scoldings were considering the glares their children still sent one another–and then the Velaryons and Daemon's daughters were sent to bed. You watched as Aemond squared his shoulders, then stalked away.

“I shall also take my leave for the evening,” you said to the Hand. “Goodnight, Ser Otto.”

You kept your pace steady as you left the room, but once you were in the hall you were hurrying.

“You shouldn't have done that,” you said as you caught up to Aemond.

He didn't even look over at you. “I was complimenting them, my lady.”

“No one at that table took it for a compliment, your highness.”

“It is remarkable how when you speak, my mother's voice comes out.”

You frowned at him. “You know I'm right, you just won't admit it.”

“I know you believe yourself to be right.” He stopped in front of you, his eye narrowed to a knife's point. “Does your arrogance stretch so far as to think I should heed your wisdom?”

You buckled under his cold eye. “I only meant–”

“You meant to belittle me for my behaviour and tell me I am in the wrong for not taking the righteous path the gods would have me seek. If you didn't lack the worldly understanding of so much as a dormouse, I might be inclined to listen. But as it stands, I am not obliged to heed you."

You had no time to respond, as he turned on his heel and stalked down the royal family's wing. You stood in bitter silence, thoroughly lashed, as you watched him leave.

……….

The library was empty this morning. None of the maesters were hanging about as they often did, all busy after Aegon's crowning yesterday. Barely twenty-four hours had passed since you were informed that King Viserys was dead, yet the world felt upturned. Your warden, the now-Queen Mother Alicent, had brought you a dress to wear for the coronation, and you wore it again today, just without the ornamentations of jewelry. It was a deep green, a departure from the usual grays and blues you often wore, but you were grateful to her for it. It was difficult to not appreciate all she had done for you by bringing you to court, even if her son had scorned you.

You huffed and closed your book, setting it on the small stack you'd accumulated. You heard the far door open, but no footsteps. When you looked over your chair at the other patron of the Keep's library, you hurried to stand.

“Your highness,” you nodded at Aemond, watching him come further into the room. He seemed light on his feet today, not as angry as you had seen him as of late.

“Why the forlorn expression, my lady?”

“It is nothing, your highness.”

Your words lost their conviction the longer he stared at you, his eye seeming to peer into your soul. Aemond had stood beside you at Aegon's crowning, not looking at you the entire time. Whether that was due in part to his harsh words for you the night of the dinner, or more because his envy forbade him to look away from Aegon, you could not tell. But right now he was staring at you like you were the only thing in the room.

You let out a small breath and prepared yourself for a second round of insults today. “I was merely wondering how the Princess Rhaenyra must be feeling this morning.”

“Why?” His response was quick.

You struggled to keep your fingers still and indifferent to tension as you clasped them together in front of you. You glanced away from his hard stare.

“Why, my lady?”

You pursed your lips. “It just seems unfair, is all. It couldn't be easy for her, hearing what happened yesterday.”

“King Viserys changed his mind, my lady. Would you like to take it up with the queen mother?”

“No.” Your eyes snapped up to his face. “No, my prince, I would not dare.”

“And yet, I detect dissent."

"Not dissent, your highness," you shook your head lightly. "I have always known your mother to be the most trustworthy of figures. If she says King Viserys changed his mind, then I believe her. It's just that I feel some remorse for princess Rhaenyra; this has been her life's trajectory for some twenty-odd-years."

Aemond looked at you, his eye piercing. “My half-sister is not fit to be queen.”

“And his grace, King Aegon, is?” You said it quietly, but you knew after they had slipped out that your words could be interpreted as dangerous. “I only meant… King Viserys didn't ready his grace for the throne, not like he did with Princess Rhaenyra.”

Aemond looked at you with measurement in his brow. He leaned in slightly, looking at you with that veil in his eye, the one that hid him from any discernable emotion.

“Perhaps your thoughts are best kept to yourself, my lady. Do not speak to any other how you have spoken today.” You felt his breath on your face. “They may not be as forgiving as me.”

You nodded, closing your lips and taking a quiet inhale through your nose. He raised a brow, as though prompting you to respond, and you did, “I won't repeat myself to anyone, my prince. I'll stone the sentiment from my mind.”

He looked at you a moment longer, then pulled back. “Don't leave the Keep, my lady. Not even to visit the Sept. You must pray from inside these walls for the next few weeks.”

“Why?”

You could tell he didn't want to say at first, his shoulders tensing just a modicum. “It is for your protection, my lady. Who knows what Rhaenyra's side would do to you?”

“I have no part in this conflict among your family.”

“You do.”

“I don't, your highness,” you said more firmly. “I am a mere ward, there is no cause for any harm to befall me.”

“Rhaenyra's Council will see yesterday's events as an act of treason. Everyone who was on the dais yesterday, including you, my lady, will be treated as committing such treason.”

You closed your mouth.

“So,” he spoke with a slightly softer tone, “for the love of the Seven, stay inside.”

He once again prompted you with his brow, and you nodded, “I understand, my prince.”

……….

The evening had been strange for you.

After your library run-in with Prince Aemond that morning, you spent most of your day with Helaena, helping her care for the twins as she worriedly stitched. You had dinner in your chambers, feeling uncomfortable about being near most of the royal family right now. They were all busy, anyway; word had traveled yesterday with Rhaenys on the back of Meleys, informing Rhaenyra of Aegon's ascension, and your ward's family would undoubtedly be fortifying themselves, shoring up support for the crown in whatever way they could. An inkling whispered to you that they would surely marry you off to some lord to gain favour or loyalty, though you prayed that would not be the case. There was not a lord in the kingdom you'd met thus far whom you felt compelled to wed.

You did not prepare properly for bed that evening. All you did was take off your dress and collapse on top of your sheets, only your shift covering you as you quickly passed out. You had meant to just rest your body before you prepared a bath for yourself, but you did not rise again.

You dreamt of Aegon's coronation; all came to pass in the same way as reality, except as Ser Criston put the crown on his head, the people began to stir in outrage. Angered screams filled the dragon pit, and by the time Rhaenys and Meleys rose from the ground the crowd seemed to praise her for interrupting the ceremony.

Prince Aemond stepped in front of you again, as had happened in reality, except this time Meleys had opened her throat and fire had torched all in her path. You felt the heat of it, and as the line of fire came towards you and Aemond, your body jolted awake.

You gasped, moving to brace your hands over your face and save yourself from the flames. It was then you realized there was a warm weight on your stomach, something your hand had knocked against as you startled. Adrenaline returned to your veins and you pushed at the weight, but it pushed back, hands coming out to stop you at your wrists.

By the gods, it was a person.

You started to scream, terror taking reign as your mind raced with the possibility of who could be about to harm you. Was it an assassin sent by Rhaenyra to kill you in your bed, or a thief who had somehow crept into the Keep to defile you?

A hand quickly covered your mouth, and your jaw trembled so that you bit down, but there wasn't enough force to truly harm your assailant.

“Shh,” a voice came through to you in a quiet tone. “It is only me, my lady.”

Familiarity struck you, and you noticed the outline of long hair and the strap for a patch running over it. Your eyes caught on a lit carrying candle across the room, sitting on the dresser near your door, and you saw the way its light bounced softly off of white-blond hair. Your body stopped struggling.

“Aemond?” You murmured into his hand.

“Tis I.”

He removed his hand and you let out a breath with the realization it was just Aemond. But you weren't able to settle completely, especially not as he snaked down your body again, returning the weight of his head to your stomach.

“My prince, this is entirely inappropriate,” you muttered, your muscles freezing as he clung to you.

"I would never defile you, my lady," he whispered into your thin shift, his voice strained. "I only sought you for your familiarity."

Despite his arrogant behaviour towards you as of late, the weakness in his voice appealed to you, and you hesitantly set your hand on his head, your fingers lightly stroking along his scalp. You noticed then that his hair was damp. It was not raining outside the Keep, and Aemond looked too disheveled to have just cleaned in a bath. He must have been on dragonback this evening. Thinking this, you could smell traces of Vhagar on him. A sigh escaped you as you looked down at him.

"What is wrong, Aemond?" You asked lightly.

He would not say for a moment, then he pushed his face somehow closer to you, as though he wanted to burrow himself inside your body. “I have sinned.”

“What have you done?”

He shook his head slightly. “It is grave. Too grave for your ears.”

“Speak it.”

He shook his head again.

You sat up, trying to move out from under him as you huffed quietly. Aemond would not let you move more than this, his hands on your thighs and head having slipped down to your lap as you sat forward. You let out a soft scoff.

“Speak it, my prince, or I must ask you to leave.”

His fingers gripped your thighs, and you were reminded of how near he was to your skin despite your shift, his breath warm along the apex of your thighs. He loosened his hold again, and took in a deep breath.

“I was in Storm's End. Lucerys was there as well, and we quarreled in the sky. Vhagar… she… his dragon was so small in her jaw.”

You felt your heart drop in your chest.

“Aemond, tell me you didn't,” you whispered.

“I cannot lie to you.”

The resignation in his voice did you in, and you ran your palm along your face to stave your anxieties. You felt his nose pressing to your lower stomach but you weren't in a state to push him away, not when he'd all but admitted to slaying his nephew. You set your hand on his head, not stroking his hair but simply putting some weight on him in hopes it may provide comfort. When you next spoke, your throat was dry and you had to swallow your fear in order to make a sound.

"All you can do now is go to the Sept and pray to the gods for forgiveness."

His head shook on your lap. "There is no penance or prayer for what I have done."

You huffed, running your fingers through his hair. Aemond shifted, his hand on your thigh flexing as he tilted his head to the side to look up at you.

"Forgive me," he said. "Absolve me of my sins so that I may continue my life and end this conflict for my family."

"I'm not the one you need absolution from," you shook your head.

"It wasn't a request, my lady."

His lips were pursed and his eye was trained on you, assessing your face with scrutiny. You felt his hand on your thigh gripping just slightly too tight.

"Aemond, I…" you started, feeling your throat dry again. "Your highness, I am not comfortable with you here any more."

"It is not my wish to impose." He spoke as though he didn't see anything wrong with his actions. He made no move to get up.

"It is late, your highness. You must go."

He reached up, palming your cheek with a gentle but assertive touch. "You're warm."

"Prince Aemond, please," you muttered as you tried to shift him off of you. "You mustn't be here any longer."

"Just say it. And I know I will have the strength I need to end the rest of them."

"The rest of who?"

He shook his head yet again, pressing his face into your stomach once more. "I need you to say it. Tell me you forgive me."

"Aemond, you must leave."

As you moved to lean back against your headboard, trying to shake his weight, he sat up and braced his hands on either side of your lap. His slender, callused fingers dug into your bed sheets with a tense ruffle. His face was so close to yours, his breath warm on your cheeks. The look in his eye was impassioned, wide, and with a blown out pupil. His shoulders rose and fell with a heavy motion. Warm air puffed in and out on your face. You couldn't escape the feeling of his breath, or him for that matter.

The next breath you drew bordered on a gasp, however hard you tried to contain it. His eye dropped down to your lips, and you saw his mouth twitch before he could steel his expression and slip back into that impassive Aemond you knew best. You felt another breath on your skin, warm from his parted lips.

He pulled back, his eye losing that feral quality as he steadied himself before standing.

"I am sorry," he murmured, "for disturbing your evening."

His head dipped almost indistinguishably in a soft nod, then he left without a word.

You were still on your bed, crowded against the headboard despite being alone now. You blinked, looking at the candle on your dresser. It was the only evidence that Aemond had been in your room. You watched as the wax dripped in the dish, the wick burning nearly to the bottom. It was hard to say how long you watched the flame burn, but by the time the wick ran out, you had tucked your knees up to your chest, holding yourself as securely as you had Aemond.

……….

A/N: Thanks for reading! Feel free to like, reblog, and comment--I really appreciate the feedback! I'm gonna do more parts of this dynamic so please lmk if you wanna be tagged in them. Also if you want to request a fic for hotd, I will write for Aegon, Aemond, and Jacaerys, so please feel free to send in an ask. Otherwise, I hope you have a great day/night :)

[mikibwrites]

In the garden of evil, honey

Hello all, please have this as a token of my apology for taking almost two years to post it lol. I'm still working on Trueblood Tarlos, don't you worry, but this has been sitting in my wips for FAR too long :) Tags at the bottom are folks who showed interest, please let me know if you don't want to be tagged! <3

7.4k | Rated: M | Supernatural AU | Read on Ao3

The first time Carlos ever saw TK Strand, he was playing honeypot for a vampire. 

Carlos didn’t know this, of course, at the time. He’d simply caught sight of the most devastating green eyes he’d ever seen in his life, blinking innocently up at a tall, thin man with greed in his smile. What gave away the vamp himself was the smooth, lascivious way he’d run a finger delicately down this pretty man’s arm, full of possessive intent. Vampires just had a way of asserting their aura in a room: look at me, you can’t touch me, but I can own you. 

The thought, coupled with the sight of the pretty man’s sweet, naive smile as he threw back the last of his drink and got up to follow the vampire out of the bar, made Carlos shiver in disgust before he had the wherewithal to jump up and follow them. He was not about to let some innocent person become dinner on his watch. 

Carlos stealthily made his way out of the bar and around to the alley in back, gleaming 10-inch Bowie knife already in his hand. It wasn’t the most efficient way to behead a vamp–the only way you could kill them–but he wasn’t in the practice of bringing his machete on nights out to drown his loneliness. He’d make do, he’d have to.

Turns out, he didn’t have to use it at all.

The scene that greeted him in the alley stopped him short. The tall, thin vampire laid on the ground in two pieces, his head still rolling before catching up against the dirty brick wall on the side of the building. The pretty man was there, looking bored. There was another man in the alley with him, older but still ridiculously handsome, holding a…sword? The blade was bloody and dripping, and the man holding it looked absolutely delighted. 

“See? I told you it would work! Best purchase I’ve ever made with someone else’s money!” the older man said, gleeful and bright. On further inspection, the resemblance between the object of Carlos’ attention and this other man was uncanny. Unless the younger one was an accident of extremely late in life birth, this was a father and son. 

And, obviously, they knew what they were doing. So, hunters, Carlos surmised. 

At the moment of his realization, as he started putting away his knife in relief, the younger man turned on him with a confused and slightly irritated expression.

“What the hell are you doing here? Did you follow me?” 

“Well, I thought you might be in danger, and–”

“Do I look like a damsel in distress to you? What the fuck were you thinking? You were just gonna stare at me all night, then as soon as I left with another guy you’d come after us and, I don’t know, lay claim for my hand or something? And you could have been killed for it–”

“I wouldn’t have, I know what I’m doing,” Carlos said, a little indignantly because really, did he look like an incompetent idiot? 

“Son, calm down. Look, he’s one of us.” The older man, still holding his ridiculously large sword–and really, did he carry that around everywhere? Just out in the open?--began walking toward his son and Carlos, who had unconsciously moved closer to each other amid their snarking. 

Carlos saw the son take in his whole appearance, including the knife still dangling in his hand, and scoffed.

“You expected to kill a vamp with a pig sticker?” This was accompanied by a derisive laugh that really should not have been as ridiculously attractive as it was, considering Carlos was the object of said derision. But the heart and the dick want what they want. 

Still, Carlos wasn’t going to not defend himself. “Trust me, I can slice off a bloodsucker’s head with a butter knife if I have to. Not all of us carry medieval weapons with us to the goddamn bar.” 

The father looked offended for a moment, admiring his sword once again before directing his attention back at Carlos. “Please excuse him, he doesn’t work well with others. I’m sure you understand, being a hunter yourself. We’re not exactly a sociable bunch.”

Carlos conceded the point. He was used to other hunters being tight knit with their own, and distrustful of almost anyone else. It came with seeing the things you saw in this life. 

“I’m Owen, and Mr. Grumpy here is my son, TK.” Owen put his hand out, and Carlos shook it. 

“Carlos, pleased to meet you both,” he said politely. His own hand came away a little bloody, and Owen looked chagrined for a moment. 

TK, for his part, was finally relaxing in Carlos’ presence, accepting the fact that Carlos hadn’t been barreling headlong into a suicide mission as TK had obviously first thought. His irritation was turning, wildly, into admiration by the minute, judging by the not exactly covert once–and then twice–over look he gave Carlos while his dad’s back was turned. He said nothing, though. 

“Well, I think we best be on our way,” Owen said as he bent down to begin picking up the body. “A hand here, son?”

TK gave Carlos one more look, then shuffled over to help Owen pick up the dead weight and toss it into a nearby dumpster. Carlos took it upon himself to palm the head, lifting it up and casually tossing it in the open container before Owen let the lid slam down over their gruesome quarry. 

“Was nice to meet you, Carlos. See you on the flip!” Owen called, already making his way out of the alley. 

“Likewise, sir,” he answered with a small smile. TK made to follow his father, having to walk close by Carlos in the small width of the alley. Carlos just couldn’t resist the words that came next, the magnetism from TK pulling at him to not let this man get away, even knowing it was fruitless. “So, that your type?” he asked, gesturing vaguely back to the dumpster. “Tall, possessive men with evil intent?”

TK didn’t miss a beat, and what he said next sealed Carlos’ fate even though he didn’t know it at the time. 

“Nah, I like my men tall, dark, chivalrous, and good with butter knives.” He smirked devilishly, looking up through his eyelashes, and pushed past Carlos out of the alley. 

Carlos had never swooned in his life, and he did his best not to start now, but he couldn’t have said if he was successful. 

–

They met again, as fate or luck or destiny would have it, three weeks and four states later at a bar called Ryder’s. It was run by a hunter couple who, for all intents and purposes, were retired, but no one ever left this life completely. It was a nice place to be amongst like-minded people, people who had seen and heard and survived the same horrendous things, and you could unwind knowing no one was going to judge you. Hunters, as a general rule, had very specific neuroses that didn’t sit well with normal people most of the time. 

Carlos entered the bar at 3pm on a Tuesday, and walked right into Owen as he was stepping out. 

“Carlos! Nice to see you again. Been staying out of trouble?” he smiled.

“Not at all, sir,” Carlos joked. 

Owen chuckled.“I know all about that. I heard about that djinn den you broke up last week. Hell of a job, son.” Hearing the approval of a father, even if it wasn’t his own, was sobering and it took Carlos a moment to respond. 

“Oh, that was all Iris, sir. My partner. She’s the mastermind.” It was true. Iris was the best hunter Carlos had ever met, and he’d met plenty over the last three years. She had her struggles, but the way her mind worked in twisty bends and blunt reality at turns was truly an advantage in their line of work. Carlos was just the muscle most days, but he kept up. 

“I’d love to meet her,” Owen said, “pick her brain sometime.” 

“You can, sir, if you’d like. She’s meeting me here.” 

“I look forward to it. Just gotta grab something from the truck.”

Carlos bid Owen a temporary farewell and made his way to the bar, eyes unconsciously searching. He would be lying if he said he wasn’t hoping the son wasn’t far from the father. He was right, it turned out, and he found TK at the end of the bar, chatting with Grace as she wiped out a pint glass. 

“Hey, Carlos! Long time no see,” Grace greeted him with a smile. It caused TK to whip his head around to stare before his face cracked into a grin. 

“Well, well. Fancy meeting you here and not in a dark alley.” Carlos got lost in his beautiful green eyes for a moment before he could respond, and TK was still speaking. “To be fair, though, I wouldn’t be opposed to meeting you anywhere.”

Carlos coughed a bit, his eyes cutting to Grace as she laughed and moved over to a pair of women flagging her down. 

“That so?” Carlos finally said as he slid onto the stool next to TK. 

“Mmm.”

Carlos roughly turned the conversation into something resembling small talk, and they chatted for a long while before a familiar song lit up the jukebox, the down and dirty guitar riffs sinking into Carlos’ veins. He steeled his resolve, and took a chance.

He cut his eyes over to the dancefloor and back to TK. “Hey. You wanna dance?”

TK contemplated for a moment, the music suffusing into the room and filling their ears with a sultry energy. Finally, he answered, “No.”

“No?” Carlos was taken aback, but TK’s expression had shifted from good-natured into something else entirely. It sent shivers down Carlos’ spine in the best way.

“No, I don’t wanna dance. I wanna meet you in a dark alley.” TK raised an eyebrow at him before getting up and sauntering across the room, pausing at the back door and looking back at Carlos, frozen on his stool. TK jerked his head, and that finally got Carlos moving. 

When Carlos found him, TK was leaned up against the battered wood siding, one foot propped up against the wall, smirking. Carlos strode up to him and immediately placed his hands on TK’s waist. 

“So. You lured me out here. What now?”

“Well, we don’t exactly have much time before someone finds us out here, and I share a motel room with my dad so that’s out.” He quirked an eyebrow, silently asking if Carlos had any ideas. 

“I’m afraid Iris and I didn’t mean to stay long, so I haven’t got a motel room of my own at the moment.” To be fair, Carlos also wouldn’t leave Iris here at Ryder’s to satisfy his lust anyway, he wasn’t that kind of guy. However, TK was making him seriously question a good number of his morals. 

“Back alley blowjob it is, then,” TK said simply, before dropping to his knees. 

–

After that, Carlos and Iris ran into TK and Owen more frequently than he could’ve predicted, which he’d later learn was all TK’s doing. His husband would admit this much, much later as in the early days, TK did his best to seem aloof and hard to get–despite their second meeting resulting in mutual orgasms. He’d rock Carlos’ entire world and leave without a trace, only to turn up a couple of months later to nag Carlos about his knife collection, the way he staked out a mark, or–on one memorable occasion–the type of beer he was buying in a roadside gas station in Pennsylvania. 

“You’re really gonna drink a Keystone Light after that?” TK asked from behind him, startling Carlos more than he’d care to admit. ‘That’ referred the days-long job in which Carlos and Iris had weeded out a particularly adept shapeshifter and finally brought her down. Carlos didn’t ask how TK had heard of a job he’d completed less than six hours ago, because he’d learned over the course of the past year that TK just knew these things. Especially about Carlos. “I thought you were a Texan. Not gonna go for the Shiner?”

Carlos, too smitten at this point to do any kind of arguing, made the switch just to see the way TK’s eyes danced knowingly under the dim strip lighting. 

“What are you drinking, then? You drove all this way from Ohio just to berate my beer choices, I might as well buy you one for your trouble.” Carlos himself was also unusually abreast of where and what TK was doing at any given moment.

TK raised his eyebrows at Carlos’ knowledge of his whereabouts, but simply said, “I don’t.”

And Carlos…had noticed that over these past few months. It was strange for a hunter not to self-medicate, with the things they saw and did, but he’d never begrudge anyone their coping mechanisms, whatever they were. Clearly either TK was into harder things, or he had some other secret way to unwind. 

Carlos learned later that it used to be the first option, that TK would do his best to numb his body and mind with whatever he could get his hands on in the years after his mother was killed, but that over time his father had brought him back from the brink and he’d turned a new leaf right around the time they’d met for the first time. To this day he still struggled, but Carlos was there for him every step of the way. 

They met and fell into bed together nearly every chance they got over the next two years. When it came time that Owen decided he could better serve the community by teaming up with Judd to increase the knowledge base hunters worked with, and when Iris’ sister Michelle came back from England and convinced Iris she wanted in, well. It made sense for Carlos to bid Iris a tearful–not permanent, they promised–goodbye and he and TK packed their combined arsenals into Carlos’ flashy Camaro–

“So fucking impractical, oh my god! It’s tiny, it doesn’t hold nearly enough in the trunk, and it’s distinctive as hell! How in the fuck do you manage to keep a low profile with this thing? The cops are bound to know you!”

“It’s fast,” was Carlos’ smug answer. 

–and headed out on their own. They made a name for themselves quite quickly, taking out whole vampire dens and weeding out shifters and werewolves and djinns up and down the highways of every US state. They had ins with local groups based on Owen’s name, but soon they were holding their own among the hunter community as a formidable team. TK was a skilled marksman, one of the best snipers Carlos had ever met, and a talented con man, smiling and charming his way into anyone’s good graces, especially their marks–not unlike he was doing when Carlos first met him all that time ago–and Carlos had taken everything Iris had ever taught him about research and planning and waiting for the precise moment to heart, able to suss out patterns and motives TK was continuously impressed by.

Also, he was still ‘disgustingly talented’ with a knife. TK’s words, as he’d kissed him deeply and wholly inappropriately three feet from a dissolving corpse in the middle of an abandoned schoolhouse. 

They’d encountered more than their fair share of demons, with the mounting numbers of them clawing their way up from hell, but Carlos had a sigil carved into the back of his watch and TK had a medallion around his neck that his father had given him when he was 17 that he never took off. They were safe, they were skilled, and they were efficient. 

Six months into hunting together and nearly four years into their dance of knowing each other, TK proposed with a piece of wire he’d nicked from a hardware store, folded into a ring shape and presented on one knee in the alley behind Ryder’s. Carlos would swear to his grave, in every retelling they recounted for their friends, that he hadn’t cried, but they both knew better. 

Their romance was like hunting itself: wild but precise, loud but stealthy, adrenaline followed by the calm after the storm. Guaranteed to keep going long into the unknown. 

–

It happened on an innocuous Tuesday, no job in town but they’d stopped because they heard the ice cream shop on main street in this tiny town had a boysenberry flavor and TK couldn’t be reasoned with when he wanted something, and Carlos couldn’t be arsed to tell him no. 

They enjoyed their ice cream while walking up the nearly deserted street, when something crawled across the back of Carlos’ neck. A warning. A sixth sense. He didn’t need to turn to TK to know he’d felt it too, in his own way. 

“The general store over there,” TK said lowly, his hand creeping into place at the small of Carlos’ back, a silent reassurance that they were in this together. 

Carlos glanced across the street, not seeing anything out of the ordinary, but still getting that persistent feeling in his gut that something was wrong. “Let’s go.”

The bell rang cheerily as they entered, and there was an older man with a thick beard standing behind the counter. His voice shook when he greeted them, and Carlos’ hackles raised higher. 

“Hi, fellas. W-What can I do you for?” 

TK immediately slid into charm mode. “Just looking for some twine, sir. Our trunk won’t seem to shut, the latch is broken, gotta get that looked at,” he rubbed the back of his head self-deprecatingly, smiling bashfully, “you got any strong stuff we could use?”

The man didn’t relax, but smiled as best he could. Carlos, meanwhile, was casing the store looking for anything out of place. When he circled toward the back, near the door marked Staff Only, he found a few seed packets that had fallen from their display on the wall adjacent. It wasn’t until he heard the pained gasp from behind the door, faint but audible, that his instincts fully kicked in. He glanced at TK and the older man, nearer to the middle of the store where the man was showing TK a few rolls of twine. They locked eyes, and Carlos tilted his head toward the door. 

“You wouldn’t happen to have anything stronger, would you? Maybe in the back?” TK asked innocently, gesturing toward where Carlos was standing. 

The man’s face paled. “I-I don’t know, I-”

Carlos strode over to him as calmly as possible. He wasn’t as good at the con game as TK was, so he led with the straightforward truth. “Sir, are you in danger?” The man paled further, but didn’t seem inclined to talk. “If you’re not, then is someone else?” He again tilted his head toward the door at the back. 

TK had dropped his act as well. “We can help you, trust us.” His eyes bore nothing but truth, and they seemed to soften the man a bit. 

“M-my…my wife. She’s–my son and daughter are–oh god…” the man said in a pained whisper.

“Sir?”

“When we all came in today–we own the place, we all pitch in–my kids were…not themselves. They told me to stay out here and they took her back there and…and sometimes I hear screams.” His voice cracked on the last bit. “This isn’t them, I swear they aren’t like this! It isn’t them!” He was whisper shouting, clearly still afraid of what was behind the door. “They said they’ll kill her if I go back there.”

Carlos placed a hand on his shoulder. “What are their names? Your kids.”

“Lindy and Zach. My wife’s name is Melissa.” When TK and Carlos immediately started towards the front door, he grabbed both their arms. “Wait! Where are you going? I thought you said you’d help us!”

“Just gotta get a few things from the car, we’ll be right back,” TK assured him. 

When they returned, carrying a book and a bottle of holy water, the man eyed them wearily. “You got any salt?” Carlos asked. The man just pointed at a far shelf, and Carlos helped himself to three pint containers. “Wait here, no matter what you hear, do not come back there, okay?”

He looked at them incredulously. “What are you going to do?” 

“We’re gonna save your wife and kids, sir, but we need to be quick about it, otherwise they’ll get away.” 

The man was still looking at them like they were crazy–which they were used to from the general public–but he apparently wanted any kind of help at this point so he let them go. 

When TK opened the door to the back room, Lindy and Zach were standing over their mother, tied to a chair, looking like they’d used her for knifework practice. Slices and cuts littered her arms, legs, and neck, and her head was hanging limply as blood flowed out of every wound in a steady trickle. Considering they didn’t know how long this had been going on, Carlos erred on the side of caution and assessed she’d need medical attention pretty quickly. 

Upon their arrival, the two teenagers turned to look at them, their eyes gleaming black, and Carlos’ heart lurched. 

Demons. 

“Come to join the party, hunters?” the girl said. 

“Come to give you an express ride back downstairs,” TK said with a grin as Carlos dropped down to line the exit with salt. 

TK ripped the cork out of his bottle of holy water and splashed them both with it, hitting the mother but clearly not causing any harm. They both screamed, and the girl hit the ground but the boy made for the back wall. 

“Shit,” Carlos muttered, watching as the possessed Zach kicked open a back door leading out into an alley between buildings before he kicked into gear and followed. He paused at the door to look back at TK, who already had the book out, flipped open to the quickest exorcism text they had.

“Go! I got it here.”

Carlos spared one more moment to take in his husband, then bolted. Demons were strong, sure, but they had limitations based on the body they possessed, and Zach was a stringy, short kid who couldn’t be more than 14, so Carlos was on him in under a minute. They grappled to the ground, and Zach spit some choice words in his face before Carlos took the container of salt still in his hand and emptied it down his throat. 

The black smoke hurled out of the boy, shaking his body and causing his eyes to water before he finally went still, the occasional ragged cough racking his frame until he calmed fully. That lasted for about five seconds.

“Oh my god, where’s my mom? Where’s my sister? I remember–oh god.”

“Hey, hey, it’s okay, it’s okay. You’re okay,” Carlos cooed as he took the boy in his arms. Even though he was a stranger, Carlos had just saved the kid’s life, so Zach folded into his arms readily. “My husband is with them, and he probably dealt with it a lot more elegantly than I just did. Sorry about that, by the way,” he murmured, gesturing to the kid’s mouth still spitting salt.

“Whatever you did just now–was fucking brilliant. No notes. Thank you,” Zach said in a hoarse voice. 

“Come on, let’s go see your mom and sister. I bet TK has it all wrapped up by now.”

“He that good? You sound pretty confident.” Zach got up off the ground and brushed his pants of gravel. 

“Oh yeah. He’s good,” Carlos smiled to himself. 

When they arrived back at the back room of the general store, it was apparent that TK had, in fact, not dealt with things elegantly at all. The chair the mother had been tied to was in pieces, the mother thankfully still whole, but tossed to the far side of the room where she lay still, but breathing. The daughter was also unconscious, but breathing deeply in TK’s arms. TK himself had two cuts on his cheek, and there was blood steadily seeping into his shirt from a wound in his shoulder. 

Carlos’ eyes went directly to it, but TK shook his head. “I’m fine, just a scratch. She wouldn’t give up the knife,” he shrugged. He turned to Zach, “She’s okay though, the thing that was in her is gone.”

The father ran to them just then, nearly sliding across the floor and scattering the salt barrier they’d laid down earlier, putting his hands on his daughter’s face before crawling over to his wife. 

“You should get them all to the hospital, and soon,” Carlos said. “What was there is gone, but they’ve still got wounds.”

“Yeah, I had to clock her over the head a little so she’d stop coming at me. Couldn’t read the book. I should memorize it like Iris,” TK said with a roll of his eyes, supremely confident in a job well done. Carlos just smiled. “We’ll lock up the store, you go,” he said to the father as he gathered his wife in his arms. Zach took his sister’s body and the four of them were out the door and into a waiting pickup truck. 

“This is kind of embarrassing. I sang your praises, told Zach you’d deal with it elegantly.”

“How is this not elegant?” TK asked, gesturing to the carnage of the room–supplies pushed off shelves, the splintered remnants of the chair, what was probably–hopefully–cleaning chemicals spilled onto the floor. His smug smirk melted Carlos’ bones, though. 

“Come on, we gotta get that looked at, too,” he said, gesturing to TK’s shoulder. 

“This? Nah. Just a scratch, I promise.” He moved his arm up and down leisurely, not a hint of pain on his face. “See?”

“Mmm. Still gonna want to bandage it back at the motel. You’re just gonna have to bear my miserable sewing skills.” 

“The tragedy,” TK rolled his eyes but smiled up at Carlos. Carlos, used to how these things usually went, sauntered over and placed his hands on TK’s waist, pulling him closer. 

TK simply pecked him on the lips, smiling indulgently before muttering, “Let’s go. I’m beat.” Carlos watched him walk out of the room, tiptoeing over the scattered salt line before flicking his head that Carlos should follow. “You coming?”

Carlos stood for a confused moment before following him out, his eyes catching on something glinting in a corner of the room. He stopped and bent over, unearthing TK’s medallion from a pile of individually packaged toilet paper. He slipped it into his pocket and followed TK out to the car. 

Back at the motel, TK went straight to the shower and came back out in sweatpants and a t-shirt, a bandage clearly wrapped around his upper left shoulder under the sleeve. Carlos watched as he went about his nightly routine, moisturizing his face and combing his hair. He watched as TK folded up his jacket into a trash bag and put it into his luggage, presumably to be cleaned of the blood later when they had proper facilities. He then slid into bed next to Carlos, pecked him on the cheek, and bid him goodnight. 

Carlos never saw his wound. 

Over the next few days, they made their way towards Tennessee where they were supposed to meet up with the Blake sisters for some much needed time off to relax. TK was his usual chatty self in the car, and Carlos laughed at his stupid puns just like he always did. Carlos texted Iris as soon as they hit town, and she suggested they meet at her motel, and she and Michelle would be waiting. Perfect. 

When Carlos knocked on the door of room 318, he could hear the excited shuffling through the thick wood before it was flung open and he had an armful of Iris. He enveloped her in his arms and breathed in her comforting scent; he hadn’t seen his best friend in nearly a year as their jobs had taken them to different ends of the continent–and then to different continents–but coming back together was like breathing. 

“We’re all set,” she whispered in his ear and he tensed slightly before nodding imperceptibly and letting her drop back down to the carpet.

TK was hugging Michelle and chatting amiably, and Michelle was slowly ambling their conversation across the room toward the small dining table. “Come sit and have some coffee, TK. I got that stupid oat creamer you like, with the honey that doesn’t actually taste like honey,” Iris chirped as she and Carlos followed the other two across the room. 

Michelle poured a generous cup for all of them, and she and TK sat down at the table with theirs. Carlos watched her emit the smallest sigh of relief as TK took the seat across from her. As intended. 

“How have you guys been?” she asked him, tone cordial. 

“Chelle, come on. Let’s just get to it,” Iris interrupted, looking bewildered that Michelle would attempt small talk now that their mark had taken his seat. Carlos put a hand around her shoulders and squeezed. 

“She’s right. I want this over with,” he said. 

TK darted his eyes in between all of them, looking increasingly confused. “Get what over with?” His voice was small. Innocent. 

Michelle sighed and got up from her chair, coming to stand next to her sister. “Fine. But make it fast. I don’t want to give him a chance to–”

“What’s going on?” TK asked, his gaze still flitting between everyone else in the room. “Carlos?” The bewilderment in his expression couldn’t be faked. 

Except it was.

“You’re not my husband,” Carlos said flatly, staring into eyes he’d dreamt about for months before he’d even gotten up the nerve to ask TK on a proper date. 

“Carlos?” TK’s voice was incredulous. “What are you saying?” Carlos thought to himself that he was playing it rather well. However, there was a simple enough test to prove Carlos was right.

“If you’re really my husband, the love of my life, then come over here and kiss me.”

Carlos had seen it once or twice over the last few days: he’d go in for a kiss and TK’s face would screw up just slightly, only for a split second, before he’d allow the affection. It turned Carlos’ stomach every time, especially after he’d made his ultimate conclusion.

TK–not TK–being none the wiser, seemed to steel himself before taking a step toward Carlos. 

Except he was stopped by an invisible force, unable to walk even a foot away from the table. His face was confused for half a second, holding onto the act, before it dropped and a truly enraged scowl took over his beautiful features.

He turned to Iris and Michelle. “You fucking cunts,” he spat, looking up to the ceiling where the Blake sisters had painted a demon trap in black chalk. 

“Shut up,” Carlos spat right back. “You’ve got one chance here before I start in on the reading and the holy water. Get out of my husband and go back where you came from.”

The demon just laughed. Hearing the evil edge to his own husband’s voice turned his stomach. “You know what? I don’t think I will.” He sauntered back and plopped down into one of the chairs again, leaning back with his legs stretched out in front of him like he didn’t have a care in the world, like Carlos wasn’t about to unleash holy fire on him for daring to defile his husband. When he looked back up, his eyes were fully black, and Carlos had to fight the nausea that instantly threatened to take him. It was abhorrent, seeing TK’s gorgeous green eyes give way to hell’s dark pits. 

“Fine, have it your way,” Carlos said with disgust, walking over to where he’d dropped his duffle by the door. He grabbed the old, beaten leather book and a plastic water bottle, taking a moment to level out his breathing. TK was still in there, and no matter how much Carlos wanted to wreak havoc on the hellspawn for daring to possess him, he couldn’t hurt TK in any physical way. The holy water would have to do, along with the salt Michelle was now brandishing in her left hand. 

“Just,” the demon started, a sinister look of curiosity on his face, “for shits and giggles…what gave it away? I thought I was doing pretty well there. Especially with the stupid puns, my god this guy has so many stupid puns saved up in here.” He tapped his temple. “Between the screaming and the pleading it was hard to get to some of them, but I did it. You even laughed. It was cute.” 

“I’m not going to indulge you no matter how much you want me to. You’re going back to hell, so sit tight and shut up, asshole.”

“Was it because I wouldn’t kiss you? Because I gotta say, I think I did pretty well playing at being a f–”

Screams erupted from the demon’s throat as his skin started smoking and burning, the uncapped bottle of holy water clutched in Carlos’ hand. The demon tried to rush at him, rage on his face and in his black eyes, but he was brought up short by the invisible brick wall of the trap. He looked like he was fighting against it with everything he had, to no avail. 

“I said, sit tight and shut up,” Carlos growled. He set down the bottle and opened his book, flipping to the right page. “Don’t worry TK,” he whispered under his breath. “I’m gonna get you back. Don’t worry, baby.” He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and started chanting.

It was hard to watch TK’s body writhe and scream and cover his ears in agony, but Carlos kept on. Occasionally he’d have to stop for a breath, and the demon would taunt him some more, but he did his best not to listen to it. He got through two-thirds of the ritual before he paused just long enough for the demon to spit: “He hates you, you know. Can’t stand you. You’re too controlling and you nag every damn day about the way he washes clothes and the way he stocks the weapons. The sex has just been good enough that he’s stuck around. He wishes he could leave you. He’s tried to, sometimes, just trying to pack up in the middle of the night, but you always wake up when he moves. Throw your arm over him and cage him in. He hates it.”

Carlos stopped cold for a solid thirty seconds. He was shocked enough that he forgot himself until Iris punched his arm, hard. “Hey, don’t listen. He’s just trying to get you to stop, TK doesn’t think those things at all, and you know it. Don’t be stupid, Carlos.”

“Really? I’m the one in his head. Continuous line to all his thoughts. Who you gonna trust?” the demon snarls with a smile. In that moment, it had never been harder to remind himself that it was TK’s face, TK’s voice saying these things, but it was not TK. 

Carlos shook himself, glared at the demon who was now cackling with glee despite the burns on his arms and face, and deliberately continued his chant. 

“Okay! Okay, fine! Damnit, you son of a bitch! You motherfucker! Stop! Stop! Please, it hurts!”

“Good,” Michelle snapped. 

“It hurts him, too, you know. He’s screaming for mercy in here,” the demon said to Carlos, trying for a smile and failing through his pain. 

“He can take it. I’ve seen TK take two stabs to the back and keep going. You don’t scare him and you don’t scare me.” Two passages left and this demon would be gone. Carlos raised his book again.

The screams and cries grew louder, louder, until they were cut off completely. TK’s body seized up, his fingers going crooked and mangled, as black smoke poured from him and rippled to the floor, disappearing out of sight. They all held their breath for the smallest sliver of a moment before Carlos rushed forward to catch TK before he fell to the floor like a ragdoll. 

He was unconscious, so Carlos started rubbing his sternum and calling out to him. “TK, come on, baby, come back to me. I know you’re in there, you have to be, please come back.” As Carlos continued trying to revive his husband, Michelle rushed over to her duffle for medical supplies in case they’d injured TK somehow during the exorcism. Iris stood by Carlos for moral support. 

“He’ll be okay, just give him a minute,” she said softly, rubbing her hand through Carlos’ curls. 

Just when Carlos was starting to panic, TK’s eyes fluttered open slowly. Carlos felt like his own strings had been cut as he collapsed down on top of his husband in relief. The only thing that pulled his attention away from holding TK tight and never letting go was the small, pained gasp. He sat back up and looked TK over frantically, trying to decipher where he was injured. He didn’t think they did anything damaging to an actual human, but... “Baby? What’s wrong? Where are you hurt?”

TK was barely conscious, now that the demon animating his body was gone. This wasn’t normal, once a demon was exorcised, the person went right back to normal. Usually. 

“A-arm,” came TK’s strained, quiet reply. He tilted his chin to indicate his left arm, which was lying limply at his side. 

Carlos rushed to rip his jacket off, trying not to cause further pain but finding it difficult to go slowly. When he could see the shoulder, he nearly choked. The sleeve of the shirt was distorted by the makeshift bandage underneath it, but the material was discolored with old blood and something else Carlos didn’t want to contemplate. 

“Michelle!” he cried as she came rushing over. “Oh god, he got this days ago. He said it was a scratch, he…” Carlos knew now that it was the demon talking. The demon himself didn’t feel any pain from the host's body besides holy water and salt, but TK had been trapped in his own mind with a hellspawn and this pain for days. Carlos felt sick. 

Michelle was right next to him, cutting away the ragged strips of old t-shirt the demon had covered up the wound with. It’s no wonder he hadn’t ever come to bed shirtless. “Looks like he just covered it enough to hide the bleeding, he didn’t clean it at all” Michelle observed. The wound itself was ugly. Festering, swollen, and leaking as Michelle prodded at it. “It’s definitely infected.”

“Come on, we gotta get him to a hospital!” Carlos begged her.

“Yes, we do, but hang on. I’ve got some antibiotics in my bag, I’ll give him a dose to hold him over before we go.” She worked quickly and efficiently, though not quickly enough for Carlos. He kept his eyes on TK’s face as Michelle cleaned the wound with the items Iris brought her on command, the sisters working like a well-oiled machine. TK was in and out of consciousness, wincing in pain and clamping his mouth shut when it got too intense before passing out again. 

It felt like ages but Michelle finally finished up and Carlos carried him out to the car and held him all the way to the emergency room doors. As they placed him on a stretcher, about to wheel him away, his hand reached for Carlos one more time. Carlos grabbed his hand, placing kisses on his knuckles, stroking his hair softly. “I’m here baby, I’ll be with you again soon, I promise.”

TK’s eyes fluttered but he was clearly working hard to stay conscious. He looked up into Carlos’ eyes, his expression pleading. His voice was cracked and withered, barely able to make a sound. “Don’t hate you, don’t hate you,” he repeated, shaking his head minutely and still looking at Carlos with a plea in his bright green eyes. Carlos squeezed his hand as tightly as he dared, and leaned down to kiss his forehead.

“I know that, I know. I promise I know that. I know you love me. Even if I nag you about the clothes,” he said, smiling and trying to lighten the mood. 

“Love you,” TK sighed before being whisked away by the nurses.

“He’ll be fine, Carlos,” Michelle said, putting an arm around his shoulder. “It’s infected but they’ll fix it. He’ll be good as new, I promise.”

Carlos could only nod as the adrenaline finally hit him and he sagged into a chair, flanked by both sisters as they sat vigil until they could see TK again. 

He was still furiously twirling his wedding ring around his finger hours later when a doctor came out to tell them TK would make a full recovery. The sigh of relief that left him settled his bones in a way he hadn’t felt in over a week, and he was suddenly exhausted beyond measure. 

“Come on,” Iris prodded, tugging on his wrist as she rose from her chair. “Lets go ream him for getting himself possessed.” Even though Carlos knew she was at least half-joking, he couldn’t help himself from wanting to yell a little at TK losing his medallion in the first place and causing all this mess. 

However, the moment he walked into TK’s hospital room, he was bombarded with a barely coherent TK spouting apologies and pleas at him anyway. God, Carlos and I’m so stupid, and I’m sorry, baby, can you forgive me? Before Carlos could get a word in edgewise, TK had worked himself up to near panic now that he was more conscious than he had been all day.

“Baby, baby, shh. I’m not mad.” TK’s eyebrows raised up into his hairline. “Okay, maybe a little mad, but not at you. I’m just glad you’re okay.” He pushed a hand through TK’s greasy hair, humming a little and thinking of when they could get out of here and share a shower back at the hotel. 

“The chain broke. I felt it break, but I was kind of busy, and then all of a sudden I was—” He choked up a little, shaking his head. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you like that.” 

“I know you didn’t. Not your fault, okay? We made it through, like we always do.” 

“Yeah,” TK said with a soft smile before his eyes went curious. “By the way, what did give it away? I know the demon asked and you didn’t answer, but…”

Carlos was silent for a moment, weighing whether or not he should tell him because the answer was…well. But ultimately he decided, fuck it. 

“I knew before we left the general store that day. Well, maybe I didn’t know, but I was suspicious. The rest of the night confirmed it.”

“What made you suspicious?”

“When the fight was over, you only pecked me on the lips and left the scene immediately. Even though the family had left, and we were alone, you wanted to leave straight away.” Carlos left it there, hoping TK would get it. His face said that he didn’t, like his husband wasn’t self aware enough to see the issue. 

Carlos sighed. “TK. When have you ever, in our entire acquaintance, dating, and marriage, not been extremely horny after a successful hunt? I usually have to pry you off of me until we’re somewhere decent.” He tried to ignore the disgusted groans from the sisters who were still in the room with them. “The fact that you didn’t try to jump me right there in the store room was pretty much a dead giveaway.”

TK blushed but didn’t deny it. “Mmm, yeah. Okay, I see your point,” he grinned. “You’re just so hot when you kill things,” he whined. 

Tagging some folks who showed interest as I was teasing, and some who tagged me in wip games over the years lol: @heartstringsduet @welcometololaland @altsunthinkable @basilsunrise @jesuisici33 @reyesstrand @louis-ii-reyes-strand @tailoredshirt @carlos-in-glasses @lemonlyman-dotcom @bonheur-cafe @strandnreyes @carlos-tk @herefortarlos

[tinydeskwriter]

LOVE HOLD| ⟮private⟯

lando norris x wolff!reader | f1 grid x wolff!reader (mostly)platonic

A/n: just a little peak at y/n private ig account...

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liked by lilymhe, landonorris, susie_wolff and 43 others

noty/n.wolff it all started when my mom met my dad, they fell in love, and they had me! hi, i'm ryan... dude, those are my parents, I came from them, talk about winner genes...

view all 18 comments

alex_albon you did not inherit they height though...

↳noty/n.wolff your opinion is irrelevant...

↳charlesleclerc midget😊

↳noty/n.wolff i going over there to cry on my many grand slam trophies from my many wins, comforted in the fact that I'm still number one in the world, not that you guys know what this feel like...

↳charlesleclerc uncalled for...

↳noty/n.wolff don't come for my height and I won't come for your lack of wins🙂

↳landonorris ankle biter

↳noty/n.wolff i am going to ignore you

Aug 12th 2022

liked by lilymhe, landonorris, francisca.cgomes and 65 others

(tagged: francisca.cgomes; charlottesiine; elizaabrams; cassandra.blanchard; benshelton)

noty/n.wolff men ain't shit, like the goddess cher once siad, man are like dessert, you don't need them... stick to your girls (+benny)

btw pierregasly, thank u for introducing me to kika, i think i am keeping her😘

view all 23 comments

francisca.cgomes you can keep me😍

↳pierre gasly wait a minute...

↳noty/n.wolff💍alexa play boyfriend by dove cameron

Oct 30th 2022

liked by lilymhe, francisca.cgomes, landonorris, susie_wolff and 52 others

noty/n.wolff go shawty, it's your birthday, we gon' party like it's your birthday... congrats landito! you manage to survive for 23 years, and i am so proud of you! there were a few close calls(at least a few that i witnessed) but you made it! i hope you feel blessed and special, not everyone gets a appreciation post from yours truly🤍

jokes aside...happy birthday lan, i wish you a world of happiness, because you deserve it, thank u for making my life happier by being in it 🤍 we have been in each others lives for nearly fifteen years now, here to more fifteen, i hope you know, through thick and thin, i will always be by your side 🤍😘

view all 30 comments

lilymhe I love the third photo, who took it??

↳francisca.cgomes I thought the same when I saw the fourth photo

↳noty/n.wolff 😘

alex_albon just friends, she says

↳georgerussell63 the best of friends, she says

↳alex_albon we are being ignored

↳georgerussell63 I noticed

landonorris❤️❤️❤️

↳noty/n.wolff 🤍🤍🤍

Nov 13th 2022

liked by carlossainz55, francisca.cgomes, landonorris, susie_wolff and 49 others

noty/n.wolff last trip of the year before going home for christmas, touring with local carlossainz55, Madrid may have become one of my favorite cities in the world, thank you the Sainz family for welcoming me and for the 5⭐hospitality, congrats on the newlyweds, beautiful wedding a wish you guys a long and happy life together🤍

view all 10 comments

carlossainz55 come back whenever you want

Dec 9th 2022

liked by lilymhe, landonorris, susie_wolff and 43 others

noty/n.wolff Merry Christmas folks🤍

view all 32 comments

Dec 25th 2022

noty/n.wolff half a century + 1 looks good on you🤍 the man who always encouraged me to follow my dreams and do twice as much to make them come true, who never let me give up, and who, even though he couldn't physically be present, never lost any of my matches. #1 dad in the world, best team principal in F1, a example to be followed, I honestly could not wish for a better father.

love u daddy. happy birthday🤍

view all 29 comments

susie_wolff you made him emotional

elizaabrams girl sometimes I forget that your dad is the king of dilfs...

(liked by lilymhe, susie_wolff and francisca.cgomes)

noty/n.wolff 👀

Jan 12th 2023

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taglist:@myescapefromthislife | @kapsylia | @biitch-with-wifi |@vicurious28 | @minkyungseokie | @asfaraslifegets

[lovelytsunoda]

gonna have a good time tonight // lance stroll

part of the welcome to wherever you are verse

summary: it’s time for lance and y/n’s annual canada day party. as an australian, y/n never really got the hype, but any excuse to get her old men in a room with lances old men was bound to create chaos

pairing: lance stroll x hutchence! reader

authors note: just in case anybody missed it, I added to the masterlist with a masterpost of some links to learn more about the real life lore behind the series

y/n.hutchence just posted to her private story!

y/n.hutchence just posted!

lake muskoka, ontario, canada

tagged: lancestroll, yourbestie, aprilrosepengilly

liked by yourbestie, yourmom, kirkpengilly and 203 others

y.nhutchence boys will be like ‘I know a place’ and then whisk you away to their cabin the woods

see all comments

yourbestie yeah but he gets a pass because HAVE YOU SEEN THE CABIN? i love your sugar husband. tell him thank you for the awesome weekend!

-> y.n/hutchence sugar husband?

-> yourbestie sugar daddy just sounded wrong

lancestroll ❤️

(liked by y/n.hutchence)

garrygarybeers for all the shit you talked about kirk's tacky shirt collection when you were growing up, you married someone with a collection much much worse

-> y.n/hutchence garry no collection is as bad as kirks

chloestroll gotta live it up before the old men get here!

-> timfarriss the next person to call me old is getting drop kicked to new zealand

-> fernandoalonso agreed. i'll help

kirkpengilly the real question is who won at poker? i taught you both so well

-> aprilrosepengilly neither. we were practicing to beat you

-> y.n/hutchence with both of us together, we should be unstoppable

-> kirkpengilly why is everybody ganging up on me today?

lailahasanovic thanks for the invitation! i'm having such a great time with you guys

y.n/hutchence posted to her private story! (and texted tim)

(The text messages got away from me here, tap to read and enlarge 😭 )

y.n/hutchence posted to her story!

seen by chloestroll, yourbestie, yourmom and others

lancestroll why is it that y'all are making fun of our margaritaville performance but fernando and paul are getting no flack at all for ruining the human league?

y/n.hutchence because fernando and my stepdad can actually hold a tune? oh and the fact that paul was SOBER

y/n.hutchence do you want me to bring you a hangover cure smoothie?

lancestroll ...yes please

lancestroll just posted!

lake muskoka, ontario, canada

tagged: y.n/hutchence, mickschumacher, aprilrosepengilly, scottyjames, chloestroll, estebanocon, lailahasanovic

lancestroll great weekend, greater people

see all comments

y.n/hutchence cinnamon rolls on the campfire was the best idea i've ever had

-> lancestroll the strangest, but one of the best

garrygarybeers notice how the old folk haven't been tagged in the campfire picture?

-> lancestroll its because you made fun of my tacky shirt collection

user jfc how big is this lake house?

user don't be shy, leak the karaoke video

-> scottyjames there are half a dozen old men who would be very cross with me if i did that . . . so no

aprilrosepengilly i'm going to miss that view so much

-> y/n.hutchence agreed

mickschumacher killer weekend bro. same time next year?

-> lancestroll of course!!

user the way she holds him in the boat.. they're so in love nobody speak to me

-> fernandoalonso trust me theyre worse in person

-> user KING NANDO REPLIED

jonfarriss we’ll always have margaritaville

-> andrewfarriss that’s no joke mate, my head is still killing me

-> lancestroll ditto. I’m still washing the smell of tequila out of my clothes

kirkpengilly added to his story!

(next part)

[himluv]

I agree with you on the Solavellan ending. I love the angst and tragedy and I'm eating the idea of Solas and Lavellan having a lot to unpack once in the fade. Dramatic confrontations, tears, breakdowns and a slow road to forgiveness,. Delicious food. But I'm really annoyed with a portion of the fandom that seems to just gloss over the fact that Solas killed Varric, someone who was always kind to Lavellan and was even her friend. And even if you don't like Varric personally he is in canon a relatively decent person who tried to reach out to Solas on a compassionate level. Then he used a blood magic puppet of him to manipulate Rook... IDK the way that seems to mean little to nothing to a lot of Solavellans kind of bothers me. I'm not here to tell anyone how they can or can't play but the takes have been so bad. The infantilization, excuses and woobification of our boy are so egregious. Solas is complex and morally gray. Why would we be going through the effort of redeeming him if he wasn't doing things that would require redemption in the first place? I've felt really disconnected from the rest of the fandom because of all of the softening of his character people have been doing and it's refreshing to hear a take from someone who loves Solas but doesn't want to defang him.

Thanks for this thoughtful reply to this post! Sorry this took awhile, but I've been thinking of what I wanted to say. Long and spoiler-riddled reply below, and I don't even know how relevant it is to your reply, Nonny. Sorry!

I think A Lot of folks have spent the last 10 years rotating him in their heads like one throws a clay pot, molding him into something he could be based on what we knew about him. But, we didn't necessarily account for the other forms he could take. And some folks are very resistant to who he's canonically become by Veilguard. Because it's not a good form, he got Worse™ in his decade away from friends and love (shocker!), and it's hard to reconcile this version of him with the ones we may have made.

I get all of that. But I also LOVE that. It means he could still surprise me, and I got to experience this weird duality of love/hate I didn't expect to feel toward him. I got to see his lies in real time, know he was lying because I KNOW HIM, and go, "oh, you little shit (affectionate)". Like, that's just FUN! Which, last time I checked was in fact the point of video games.

I love that he is unpredictable and dangerous in this game. That we finally see him go all out, and use every skill and trick he has. That is THRILLING, especially because he's more dangerous and lethal and ruthless than I personally expected. Which... Is my fault. I should have expected it, because look what he did to Felassan. Look how he so easily killed all those Qunari in Trespasser. Look what he did with those spirits of chaos and disruption. Look what he did to the Titans! I should have known better, the games and books showed me time and again what he was capable of. I just didn't want to believe it.

I've seen some posts talking about how Lavellan approaches Solas at the very last confrontation. How carefully she goes up the stairs towards him. I've seen several interpretations of it, but there's one I haven't seen (which could be because I'm not hanging out in the Solavellan tag much these days).

She takes those stairs slowly, as if approaching a spooked horse, because the last time someone climbed a set of stairs to talk him down from his ritual, he killed them. And I don't think for one second Lavellan believes, if she handles this poorly, he won't do the same to her.

And I think she is 100% right. He would, perhaps on "accident" as he claims to Neve was the case with Varric (debatable - seemed pretty intentional if maybe a bit impulsive from here). But I firmly believe there is a world where Solas would stab his vhenan if he had to and certain conditions hadn't been met (and yes that would utterly destroy him).

She walks up those stairs to him, her vhenan, knowing this is it. Their final stand. She will save him from himself, whatever it takes, and she is prepared to die at his hands if it comes to that. And it so easily COULD HAVE.

I don't know. I just think that Veilguard gave us SO MUCH more insight into Solas and there's so much there to chew on. I think we're going to be able to go back through all the games and codices and so many little details are going to fit together and complete a puzzle we didn't even know we were making.

After all of this, I still have so much to think on 😂. I'm going to be living in Thedas for another decade at this rate!

Good. I don't ever want to leave.

[skyrim-forever]

Thank you so much @lathez and @sulphuricgrin for the tags <3

This week Sujamma wants to hear all about your big ideas. What’s a new story idea or OC idea you have? Maybe you haven’t fleshed it out yet - this is a great opportunity!

Tagging: @theoneandonlysemla @dirty-bosmer @labskeever @scholarlyhermit @changelingsandothernonsense @pocket-vvardvark @bougainvillea-and-saltwater @pyre-of-pages

So I've had a pretty big idea for a few months now but as there were no Altmer men involved my brain considered it less of a priority :P But it's something I definitely want to work on and could be my very first proper longfic <3

It focuses on a new Dragonborn character who is actually the older sister of another oc I have who I wrote about in Summer 2023 and haven't touched since. Originally she was Dragonborn but I am going to rework it because Rochelle doesn't make sense as LDB, but her sister Colette does... it would take place following this silly fic where Colette goes to visit her sister in Solstheim. It would take place after when she hires Teldryn Sero to take her back to the Imperial City and she is pretty and pays very well so he does :P They get caught trying to cross the boarder and you know how it goes :P

Colette and Rochelle have a Reachman mother, a wise woman specifically and a Breton noble father. Their father lived among the Reach folk after his carriage was attacked by bandits, him and their mother fell in love (ish, he's in love, their mom is... complicated). they have the girls and eventually his family finds him and takes him back to evermore. The girls stay with their mother and live traditionally until she sends them to live with their father for reasons the girls do not understand at the time, Colette is 14 at the time. Their father is now married with a son. He works really hard to cover up the girls Reach hertiage and they spend a lot of time learning noble customs to which Rochelle struggles with and Colette works overtime to be the perfect daughter their father wants. She is a perfect noble lady, marries a rich man in Cyrodiil and lives a "civilized life" burying all traces of how she was raised to the point her husband doesn't even know where she's from.

The story would follow her growing into her power and finding her way back to her mother's people, undoing the conditioning to become her true self. She'll also fall in love with Teldryn who is brudgingly going along with her for the money, he starts to fall for her when she sheds the "princess" persona. They'd be a slow burn which is very new for me. I've also wanted to write Teldryn forever and have so many ideas!!! Thinking of doing slight Nerevarine Teldryn, probably won't dive too deep in but it'll be there. This is already long af but I'm really excited to talk about it so here's a snippet from the beginning:

Colette was a good liar. When they were little girls, running through the wilds of the Reach while their mother was communing with the forces unseen; her sister and her would play pretend. They would act out what they understood of the Hagraven rituals, Rochelle was the witch for she possessed the gifts their mother did. Gifted in the arcane arts. Colette would be the Briarheart, the seed of the tree placed in a pouch around her neck: imagine her heart carved out, the briar replacing it.Their ritual was not that different from the ones the elders did, her sister would speak with Lord Hircine and make her anew. A warrior. 

But she would not get to become a warrior, the spirits had other plans for her. That was the reason their mother gave throughout the journey west, to a land she would learn was called High Rock. The land of their father, a nobleman in Evermore. His efforts to cover up the girls origins were through. Many months studying dancing, literature, and learning to be proper noble daughters before anyone outside his closet circle could know of them. It was difficult, so different than the life they lived among the trees, dancing in ballrooms instead of around the fire. And when Rochelle struggled, failing at being a perfect Breton daughter, Colette knew she had to succeed. Molding herself into exactly what he wanted to not only spare her sister, let her focus on her magical study. She was good at it. Everything done perfectly down to marrying a very wealthy suitor. Father had been so pleased, her new husband brought direct ties to the East Empire Company and the chance of being an heir should Juillen be unable to take over. The next Lord of Evermore, her younger half-brother had been plagued by disease his entire life, the healers helped the pain but they could not help him walk. His legs began to fail before she got married and Colette would carry him to the top of the castle walls, he didn’t like being trapped inside. Nearly fifteen years between them, he was small enough that it was doable. A good thing as he did not feel comfortable when the guards offered the same, nor his mother; he only trusted Colette.

[aziraphales-library]

hiii omg first of id like to say that yall are absolutely amazing and i love ur recommendations

secondly if its not too much trouble id like to ask for holiday fics because i definitely want to get into the holiday fic spirit rn :)

I'm bumping this up because, once again, the holiday requests are coming in too late. As stated in the pinned masterpost, it take us months to answer and queue asks, folks! We do have a #christmas tag. Here are more to add to the collection...

Secret Santa by AppleSeeds (T)

On the advice of his therapist, Crowley signs up to be a 'Secret Santa', an anonymous gift-giver for a community initiative aiming to bring some Christmas joy into the lives of people going through a hard time. He's partnered with Aziraphale, a librarian who has lost his home and bookshop in a fire. Through the power of Christmas Magic, Crowley ends up meeting Aziraphale in person when he takes his nephew to the library and is immediately smitten. He becomes determined to use his expertise and influence to give Aziraphale the only Christmas present that could really make a difference, but are some things too important to be kept secret?

it's lovely weather for a sleigh ride together with you by thealienmeme (T)

crowley is a journalist at the top of his game. he asks hard questions and never lets a story slip through his tight grip, but he's also never taken a vacation. with encouragement from his boss, he books a cabin on the outskirts of the small town of Tadfield to rent out for the month of december so he can finally relax and maybe work on his book. he doesn't have any family anyways and he isn't really a fan of christmas or the holidays... then a snow storm hits. stranded in Tadfield proper, he meets a fussy bookshop owner and learns that maybe christmas just needed a little more love.

Ships in the Night by tishae (G)

Aziraphale did not want to head home for Christmas. Spending the entirety of the holidays with his Mother and siblings seemed, if you asked him, like a special version of Hell carved out just for him. Making up a boyfriend that he was spending the season with seemed like a perfect excuse (and no, he wasn't going to think too hard about why he had provided Crowley's name), until his Mother had insisted they should both come. "It'd be great to meet him!" Aziraphale had no idea how he was going to explain this to the coffee shop owner he'd had a crush on for the last two years, much less convince him to take part, but he was about to find out. or It's Christmas time, and our ineffable idiots are faking a relationship while definitely not being totally, completely head over heels for each other.

Meet Me Under the Mistletoe by IneffableToreshi (E)

Earlier this year, popular romance novelist Anthony J. Crowley met the love of his life when his agent booked one "A.Z. Fell & Co." for his most recent book signing. Aziraphale is a huge fan of Crowley's books, and they become fast friends. Unfortunately, Crowley let's his nerves convince him that it wouldn't be right to initially pursue a fan romantically, and by the time he feels it's alright, they've become so close that he's terrified of the possibility of failure. But now it's nearly Christmas - a time for miracles, right? - and Crowley has a plan to, hopefully, make Aziraphale fall in love with him the way he's been dreaming of.

The Anon Before Christmas by foolishlovers (E)

When Crowley’s friend, blogging buddy and business partner Anathema announces her annual Secret Santa Exchange on Tumblr, she is very adamant Crowley should join this year. The old-fashioned (but admittedly compassionate) man he gets assigned to send anonymous messages to every day until Christmas sounds awfully similar to the fussy bookseller that his friends adore, yet Crowley tries to avoid at all costs. But surely his friends would have mentioned if Aziraphale had taken an interest in the Bad Omens fandom as well… right? Or: An Enemies to Lovers Secret Santa Tumblr AU.

Any Foolish Thing by Caedmon (E)

Crowley is an overworked divorce attorney on the brink of burnout in London. He's irascible and mean to everyone, on the verge of verbally abusive, until his law partner, Fergus, gives him an ultimatum: He can rusticate in the small town of Tadfield for a month and come back rested in the new year, or he can be fired. His choice. Grumbling, Crowley takes off to Tadfield, eager to get it over with - and to skirt Fergus' rules. But all of that changes when he has a chance encounter with the gorgeous man who runs Mr. Fell's Books and Bonbons...

- Mod D