#AND DECIDED THAT THIS MUSTVE BEEN THE THING THAT I SHOULD LOOK OUT FOR. LITTLE DID I KNOW

[stickar00s]

going through the great god grove tag is so crazy you mean to tell me that not everyone played this game for 6 hours straight to get to the ending as soon as possible because they needed to inject the plot into their veins?

[ackermonie]

sappy melancholic nanami fighting his raging crush on you as he maintains a painful distance between you two as he quits jujutsu sorcery only to eventually be reunited with you when he decides to go back.

and when he goes back, the first time you see each other after so long, he genuinely struggles to breathe for solid 5 seconds. you’ve always been so pretty, but age and experience seem to make you prosper in a way he’s never seen on you before.

going back makes him feel like all his efforts to move on were in vain. all the distance, all the times hes spent fighting the urge to just grab his phone and text you, theyve all gone to waste.

he thought you were just a high school crush. that mustve been it, since you two were in the same class, and you were so kind. you’d handle his grumpiness with ease he’s never seen, you’d nag him to take care of his health when he neglects it, and now that he thinks about it, there was no fucking way he wouldn’t have fallen in love with you.

“nanami?” he hears your voice before he sees you. “oh my god, is that you?”

nanami can only deadpan at gojo, who stands in front of him with the most punchable shit-eating grin nanami’s ever seen.

“grow some balls, kento.”

gojo raises his blindfold enough to wink at nanami as he simultaneously raises a goofy thumbs-up before the tall albino turns away and struts away from the room. nanami all but turns around, staying stuck in place, only listening to your approaching steps.

he turns around, slowly so, just in time for you to launch yourself at him in an embrace where he has to immediately wrap his arms around you to keep you wrapped around him like a koala, feet off the floor and al, given the height difference.

“oh my god!” nanami realizes just how strong you must’ve gotten when he struggles to breathe due to your lung-crushing embrace. “it’s been so long!!”

he struggles to react at first, ever so awkward and stoic in the face of your overflowing emotions, but you feel him relax under your touch soon enough. his grip on you turns from alarmed to gentle as he lets himself bury his face in the crook of your neck.

just those few seconds. he tells himself. i’ve earned them.

“how have you been?” your finger tips graze the hairs at his nape as he lowers you to the ground again, and the big strong nanami kento feels himself shiver at the touch. your eyes are starry as you stare up at him with way too much adoration than he can handle. “are you coming back to jujutsu high?”

“i’ve been good,” he says, and he soon realizes that the stars are a couple of tears that you’re trying to hold back, despite the bright grin you have plastered on your face. “you’re looking… well.”

“i am, aren’t i?” you giggle, posing a little in your fancy little uniform dress. it’s split all the way to your waist to show the matching shorts you have underneath, showcasing your legs just fine. “you’re looking good yourself too!!” you jump closer, and the big man freezes at the sudden proximity when you stare up at his face. “even though i’d like to say a thing or two about those eye-bags, but it’s nothing we can’t get rid of with some good night sleep and some products!”

we. did you say we?

“come on,” you grab his hand and pull him to walk with you, chuckling lightly at the reactions you’re getting out of the grumpy man. “i have a lot to show you.”

little did nanami know that his raging crush on you will only grow the more he stays around you like this, unbeknownst to the blush you try to hide every time your hands touch.

••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

should i write a part 2?

more?

[vanilla-vivillon]

"we're exes and we meet again" maybe?

Oooooooooh interesting!!! I decided to do a Genya Safin x David Kostyk one because I haven’t done that yet for some reason

Also college AU yes please.

Genya Safin knows what she wants

And what she wants is to get through her studies

Become a plastic surgeon

Support her friends

Maybe get a cat

What she doesn’t want is to meet her high school ex at a party

She doesn’t want to talk with him for hours

She doesn’t want to relive the hurt

But the universe never does care for what we want does it

“C’mon Nazyalensky it will be fun!” Nikolai was trying to convince Zoya to come to the party he was throwing in his dorm

Nikolai was throwing a party to celebrate the start of there third year at Stanford

“Nikolai there is a lot of studying we should be doing instead of drinking our cares away” Zoya shot back

“Genya, love, please knock some sense into Zoya?”

“It could be fun, plus the school year started two weeks ago. No profesor is going to assign a big test anytime soon” Genya said

“You have never met Proffesor Baghra” Zoya said Speeding up

They were all walking to the dormitories together

Zoya was studying law. She wants to be a lawyer

“Are you really gonna let some old hag with a stick up her ass ruin your fun?” Genya retorted stopping in front of them

After a long pause zoya finnally relents and says “Fine. I’ll go, but for you, that way your not stuck with Alina and Mals drama”

Ever since Alina started screwing the professor with the the dreamy dark eyes and looked far to good to ever be a professor, mal had been insufferable

Flashing his million dollar smile Nikolai turned towards Zoya “I knew you would see sense”

“Now leave my sight before I change my mind” Nikolai sped off towards his dorm no doubt to finish preparations for tonight

Genya typically enjoyed parties

Cool people, cool music, cool boys

The list went on

Reapplying her deep red lipstick Genya turned towards her roommate Alina

Alina Starkov was a foster kid bouncing around homes in a small town, Keramzin.

She and her friend Mal felt so out of place in California

Genya helped her a lot in the first year and after some drama in there second year friendship was finally back on track

“Okay how do I look?” Genya asked giving a little spin

She chose a short red dress with a black leather jacket and thigh high black boots

“You look Perfect” Alina complimented finishing up on her own eyeliner

“Of course I do”

Alina laughed that fluttery sound that had become far to rare these days

“Listen Alina, I’m worried about you”

Alina took a pause before answering “I’m fine Genya”

“Alina you’re sleeping with your professor”

“So what!” Alina snapped “We’re both adults! Besides I don’t want to talk about this tonight, let’s just go to the party”

Genya let out a sigh

Sometimes Alina could be the most stubborn woman on earth

“Fine”

Loud music was blaring through the speakers Nikolai borrowed from Mal

Genya was socializing with some of her friends

While Genya did like parties the constant people was always a little stressful for her

So after giving some dating advice Genya went to go grab some beer

Pouring it Genya reflected

She was doing well in her classes, most of her friends were okay, she personally didn’t have a cat but across the hall from her is some dude Harshaw who did

one thing was missing

Him

Journals and glasses and caramel candies

Genya had been in love once in her life

And it’s seemed once was all she would ever get

“Oh sorry!” Genya exclaimed accidently spilling beer on someone

Looking up she lost her breath

There he was

All brown hair and wide eyes and sunkissed skin

And all the memories came crashing back

Geny first fell in love with him in the sixth grade

Well not love really

More like awe.

Back then he was really into legos

He built this giant airplane that Genya thought was so cool

But they first talked in seventh grade

They were partners in a group project

David hadn’t been very interested in Genya then

But Genya even then loved the way his brain worked

But she never said anything

In there sophomore year of high school after years of being friends Genya finally got the courage and told him her feelings

David was so suprised then he had to leave the room and come back two minutes later to say he reciprocated her feelings

They started dating and were inseparable

Whenever David had been pulling an all nighter on some new idea she would go over to his house and bring him some Carmel candies

Whenever she raved on about this new surgery technique he would listen and give her that soft beautiful smile he rarely showed anyone

But there happiness came crashing down in senior year

David was going to go to MIT all the way in Massachusetts while Genya wanted to go to Stanford in California since she was a kid

At first they were going to do long distance

But it didn’t work out

They both got busy

And didn’t talk

And Genya hated having a boyfriend who was never there

There was never some big fight

Never some big cheating scandal

One day Genya posted a picture of her on a date with the cute classmate who winked at her and that was that

They never saw each other again

But that might change tonight where she met those impossible chocolate eyes again

“What are you doing here?” Genya said after her shock

“Genya, I…. I live here” David said stuttering

Clearly he was just as suprised as she was

“Hey Genya you meet my new roommate David!” Suddenly Nikolai appeared “He just transferred from MIT”

Transferred

He transferred

David Kostyk transferred to Stanford

The one who got away was standing right in front of her

“Do you two know each other?” Nikolai asked sensing the tension

Ignoring him, Genya said “would you like to talk outside?”

After knowing David for years Genya knew she should probably initiate conversation

David gave a slow nod ignoring his roommate’s bewildered face

Walking outside they turned to each other again

He had gotten cuter if that was even possible

“So…. You transferred?” Genya attempted to start talking

“MIT was great, but it felt kinda isolating. So when Nikolai suggested transferring… I took him up on the offer”

Oh

Oh

That made sense

David always had a hard time making friends

In high school Genya practically had to force him into her friend group

It mustve be hard all alone

Genya was the opposite

Although all through elementary school she was ruthlessly bullied and sophomore year of college was complicated, she had always been able to make friends

“Well I’m glad your here now” Genya said looking away to hide her blush

“I think I’m glad to”

David and Genya talked the whole night

About there studies and friends

Genya couldn’t way to introduce him to Alina

They had a lot in commmon

Things between the two weren’t perfect

But then again in matters of the heart it never was

Genya wasn’t sure of what she wanted

But if she had a Carmel loving genius by her side she might be able to be okay with that

Omg it’s finally done. This has to be one of the most difficult things I’ve written. I didn’t enjoy it at all but I’m really glad I went through with it. Thank you @ninamorozova and @confused-as-all-hell for encouraging me to complete this.

Thank you @wafflesandschemingfaces for the prompt

If yall really like this I might make a part two with David’s perspective

Please reblog. Likes are nice but te logs actually help

My ask box is open and I take any Grishaverse requests

[savnofilter]

It’s Raining Cats and Dogs

Bakugo x 『FEM』Reader

ᴡᴀʀɴɪɴɢ(s): teasing, mutual pinning, unexpected kith,

ᴡᴄ: 1.2k [4 mins, 50 seconds].

ᴀ/ɴ: anyways, i tried to keep myself from spilling this, but it mustve been sus anyways. 😂 happy birthday, @midnightmoonkiss​ ! youre one of the most amazing babes i have ever met on here, and i thank you so much for being an amazing, funny, and kind person. whats the best way to celebrate than to do a request youve sent? >:) behehehe i hope this is good for you, thank you fuji!

p.s it takes place at university. 

"Shit." He muttered under his breath, looking out the window at how it looked outside. He hadn't expected that after his final class today that it'd be absolutely pouring outside. 

Bakugo made no move to immediately get up. It was just his luck that the only day he had classes done early that he'd be caught in the rain; by the looks of it, he was the only one stuck without an umbrella. Now, it wasn't like he couldn't handle getting a little bit of wet -- but THIS? 

It took almost everything in him not to make an uncharacteristic whine, not in the mood to walk to the dorms. He glared as the other students at the prestigious university walked as if it wasn't pouring outside. After worrying too much about the rain, Bakugo decided he no longer would dwell on the unfortunate weather. He stood up and aggressively shoved his class's contents into his book bag in a surprisingly neat manner. He slung the heavy bag over his shoulder, shuffling out the class hall and heading down the stairs to gather himself. He was hoping that he had a spare coat in his locker to at least aid his situation.

To his great discovery… he did not have a spare coat. 

Flashbacks of having to dry and untangle his hair from how tangled it got when it gets wet starting to get at him, the odd feeling of having his clothes stuck to his skin because of being drenched just was not a thought that did wonders for him-

“You good?” A voice calls out to him, making him whip around with a glare. 

“The hell does it matter to you?!” Katsuki pouted. You didn’t hide back the teasing smile that comes across your lips, tilting your head as you walk up to him, still space away from that you wouldn’t be in barking range of him.

“You forgot your coat again, didn’t you~?” You asked, already knowing the answer. You blinked a few times, purposefully keeping that annoying smile you do to piss him off. 

Bakugo didn’t hesitate to give you one of the hardest rolls of his eyes he had ever done, snatching the umbrella that you held right in front of your head. “Just shut up so we don't stay here any longer than we have to.” 

You giggled at the small blush that was starting to form on his cheeks, your stomach getting butterflies when he holds out his hand for you to hold, happily taking the opportunity to have any type of skinship with your best friend. You decided to keep quiet to not ruin the chances, managing to keep up the step with his fast pace. It was pretty relaxing. The campus functioned almost like its own little city and the sight of seeing unfortunate people suffer with what Bakugo almost had to deal with made you both giggle cruelly to yourselves.

Your stomach rumbled in hunger as you had realized you hadn’t eaten for the day. You squeezed his hand, peering at him the same way you do to give him the signal. See, you two had mutual gestures for each other that you guys accidentally developed. The small physical habits just become your language that also sometimes translate to your other friendships.

The hand squeeze meant that you were hungry, and admittedly he also was hungry. He huffed as he peeled his eyes away from the almost hard to see rain in front of him. 

“Curry?”

“I could enjoy that right about now.” 

So it was unanimous. Both of your footsteps shifted to the direction of the food courts and restaurants, muscle memory in full play. The time between you two seemed too quiet and you decided you should break the silence by annoying him once again.

“Y’know you never thanked me for saving your life-”

“My LIFE? I could save your life ten times over without even breaking a sweat, brat.” He let go of your hand to push you away. You shrieked as your shoulder caught a plentiful splash that bounced off the surface of your raincoat and managed to splash your face and your hair. He cackled at your shocked face, at least stopping to let you process his act of terrorism.

“The audacity -- while you have my umbrella!” You complained to him as you quickly got back under the umbrella and wiped away the excess water with a glare. “Now you owe me "thanks" and an apology!”

“I don’t owe you shit.” Katsuki grinned at your distress. With how well he could play off being completely in love with you he still couldn’t hold back the strong bump in his chest when he managed to tease you back the same way you did to him. Somehow, he got you to finish the rest of the walk to the restaurant you two had in mind, completely disregarding your fussing at how the water managed to splash under your coat as well. Bakugo had completely ignored you the whole way, the same smug look stayed on his face that he had moved you like this. You shut up once you realized he wasn’t listening, crossing your arms and standing in front of the doorway. He quirked a brow at your defiance, shoving his free hand that he used to hold yours in his pocket. 

“Move.”

“Not until you apologize.” His other brow joined in raising with the other, your stubbornness unmatched to your other stunts. 

“Mm… Nah.” Katsuki responds simply. The look on your face was priceless! Although he knew you were being a nuisance on purpose it was still nice to see you being the shocked one in the situation. You bit your lip, pressing your fingers together as you exasperatedly sighed with feigned sorrow. 

“I’m sure, Izuku, would.” You grinned immediately after you said it, stepping back as you let your words sink into his brain. You were half ready for the poor male to start barking at you in defense like he usually did. But to your surprise, he didn’t.

“I’m sorry, happy now?” He growled and grabbed your hand dragging you inside despite your lack-luster resistance. 

“Very.” 

Bakugo scoffs stepping in and closing the umbrella, avoiding the splash off and closing it. He looks up at you ready to make a proposition before he can't. More specifically he couldn’t because of the pressure against his lips. The feeling of your soft hands on his cheeks is what set reality in -- you were kissing him. Your lips were so right, and the touch of your hands on his cheeks was so… breathtaking. You pulled away before he could kiss back, your cheeks hot with a sheepish smile. 

He blinked a few times before straightening up and clearing his throat. “You have some nerve fuckin’ kissing me after making a joke like that.” He mutters. 

“I know.” Your hands interlocked once again, the grip was a little tighter than the other moments you two shared. You pulled the scarf upon your face, hiding your face as he guided you to a seat to set your things down for your impromptu brunch date. 

Rainy days weren’t always so bad when you were around.

[verymuchimmortalcat]

Maribat March Day 4: Internet Friends

ao3

@maribatmarch-2k21 

Marinette looked up from her phone as she heard a notification go off on her laptop. She had just finished posting the pictures from the photo shoot for her first official line. After years of making items for mainly Jagged Stone and Clara Nightingale, she had released her first line under the pseudonym of MDC at the age of 17, a year after Hawkmoth’s defeat. One message from Arrow Girl, it was a message from Cissie, which given that she had just released a new line wasn’t that surprising it just meant that Cissie had stayed up past midnight again. It should be around 3 am for her right now. Opening the message, she laughs.

Arrow Girl: HAVE YOU SEEN THE NEW MDC LINE, M????????

ITS SOOO PRETTY

WHO AM I KIDDING YOU LIVE IN PARIS AND WANNA BE A DESIGNER YOU’VE DEFINITELY SEEN IT ALREADY

So, yeah Cissie didn’t know she was MDC and sue her, Marinette found it funny how Cissie ranted about her designs to her. It’s not like Cissie didn’t laugh when Marinette obsessed over the costumes on TV and the people wearing them.

Designs&Coffee: Ya, I did

Which one’s your favourite piece?

Arrow Girl: The second one

It’s a master piece

Designs&Coffee: I love that one the most too!!!!!

That was true, the only thing Cissie didn’t know was that she designed that piece.

“Marinette, Adrien’s here,” her mother called suddenly.

“Coming Maman,” she replied.

Designs&Coffee: I’ve got to go, my mom’s calling

Talk later. You should sleep.

Arrow Girl: Says the girl with Coffee in her username

Bye.

Closing her laptop, Marinette headed downstairs, grabbing the Black Cat miraculous on her way. Adrien visited from London once a month but he had left behind his miraculous saying that he’d rather put it all behind with everything his father did. But both him and Plagg missed each other so Plagg came along on their monthly visits. Marinette still wore her earrings and Tikki went with her everywhere but she was more of a pocket best friend at this point then a pocket goddess who gave her the ability to become a superhero. Both Cat Noir and Ladybug had retired after Hawkmoth, they dealt with a miraculous threat and if another arose, they’d be there to help, but for right now the two of them were focusing on their goals and dreams outside superheroing. That was actually how she had ended up talking to Cissie, some random person had started questioning young heroes retiring online, and Cissie and Marinette had both jumped to the defence and they had just continued talking. That had been about six months ago. Now, they spoke almost every day.

Marinette hugged Adrien as soon as she saw him, calling out a bye to her parents she dragged him out of the bakery and they headed to the park. They had a few hours to catch up before they had to meet Alya and Nino.

.oOo.

A week or so later, Cissie was stuck in the makeup chair when she heard the notification that she had set for M’s messages go off.

Designs&Coffee: DID YOU KNOW THERE’S A NEW CISSIE KING-JONES MOVIE COMING OUT IN A FEW MONTHS.

IM SO FREAKING EXCITED

Arrow Girl: I could tell.

Designs&Coffee: I feel like you should be more excited.

ONE OF THE MOST AMAZING ACTRESSESS WHO SHARES A NAME WITH YOU IS STARRING IN A MOVIE

Sometimes, Cissie wondered how M didn’t figure it out. Her username was Arrow girl, she knew her first name was Cissie and M knew that she was working in the movie industry. But then M treated her like a normal human being and not like those other fans and Cissie really didn’t want that to change that at first, she knew now that she would not treat her differently but Cissie had no idea how to go about telling her that I’m the actress you fangirl about.

However, before she could reply to M she was called so they could start shooting. Telling her that she had to go, she’d talk later and that she should take her own advice about sleep, she rushes out onto set.

.oOo.

A few months later, Cissie’s agent gets her an audition for a period drama set in the 1800s when women walked around with corsets and large skirts and Cissie for some reason agreed to audition. So, she auditioned and got the part. The first week on set was just them going over the beginning measurements for the costumes and other things like that. When she asked the director, who was going to be designing the costumes, he said that it was a rather high-profile designer who would be arriving in L.A. next week. That confused Cissie, this movie wasn’t that much of a big deal that they got a high-profile designer. She decided to ask the assistant director who seemed to be a boy around her age, so maybe seventeen or eighteen, who seemed to be always wearing a cap and headphones.

She went ahead and introduced herself to him, holding out her hand and saying, “Hi! I’m Cissie King-Jones.”

He laughed and shook her hand, “I know dudette, you’re the star in the movie. I’m Nino Lahiffe.”

He had an accent she thought was French but she wasn’t quite sure. “I was wondering about the designer, the director said it was a high-profile designer and that they would be arriving next week-“

“And then he asked you to talk to me?” he asked with a smile.

“No? Should he have?”

He chuckled, “The designer is one of my best friends, we’ve been friends since we were about five. She wanted to work on something different and when I suggested this she agreed immediately. Honestly, I think she only agreed because you’re on this movie but who knows with her.”

“Well then, I look forward to meeting her.”

.oOo.

Marinette had arrived in L.A. the day before and was now headed to set with Nino. She was nearly shaking with excitement; she was going to meet the Cissie King-Jones. Nino was laughing at her excitement, “you’re being mean,” she said.

“And you’re acting like a little child, when all of us know when you actually meet her, you’ll be too busy in your designing mode to actually say anything to her, so I took the liberty to do so for you.”

“You did what?” she screeched, earning weird looks from people around them.

“I told her that her being in the movie was probably the actual reason you agreed to work on it. Which is undeniably the truth. Feel free to thank me later.”

“I’m never going to thank you. She probably thinks I’m some crazy fan now.”

“You need to stop catastrophising, Mari. It’ll all be fine in the end.”

“Why am I friends with you?”

“We’ve been friends for too long and now you no longer know how to survive without me.”

She snorted at that, “keep telling yourself that, Nino. Keep telling yourself that.”

.oOo.

Cissie was talking to one of the other members in the cast, when she saw Nino walk in with a petite girl, with shoulder length black hair and blue eyes, who was carrying a few sketch books and a bag that looked really heavy to be carried by someone that small.

When the makeup artist told her she was done, Cissie headed in the direction of Nino and who was probably the designer. Joining the two of them, she held her hand out to the designer, “you must be the designer, I’m Cissie King-Jones.”

“Hi, it’s wonderful to meet you. I’m Marinette Dupain-Cheng.”

Cissie definitely didn’t know that name, her confusion must’ve been clear on her face because Marinette laughed, “I don’t go by that in the fashion industry, I’m MDC.”

Cissie took a bit to process that bit of information, she was meeting one of her favourite designers ever who was apparently a fan of hers. She was in heaven, she had to be.

“I love your work. Your new line was breath taking. I loved the second piece the most, the colours and design were amazing,” she blurted out, before she could think clearly.

Marinette just laughed, a clear sounding laugh, and said, “Thank you, I’m really glad to hear that. The second piece on the line happens to be my favourite too. And I think your work is amazing too.”

Cissie smiled, “Thank you.”

And then they proceeded to talk while Marinette showed her the designs and ideas she had.

.oOo.

Marinette and Nino returned to the hotel late in the evening and were hanging out in his room.

“I told you that you need to stop catastrophising and everything turned out fine.”

“Why yes, thank you Nino,” she drawled sarcastically.

“I thought you were never going to thank me?”

“Sarcasm, my dear friend. Sarcasm.”

“So, you were being sarcastic when you said you would never thank me ‘cause it sure didn’t sound like it.”

Throwing a pillow at his face and calling out a Good night Marinette ran to her room. She opened her laptop to check if she had missed any messages. There were 10 messages from Arrow Girl. Opening their chat Marinette wondered what Cissie had sent. What she saw left her feeling shocked and incredibly stupid. In hindsight it was extremely obvious but then again she didn’t know Adrien was Cat Noir until he detransformed in front of her.

Arrow Girl: M!!!!!!!!!!!

I MET MDC TODAY AND MADE A COMPLETE FOOL OF MYSELF

SHE’S DOING THE COSTUMES IN THE NEW MOVIE IM DOING

AND LIKE HER FRIEND TOLD ME YESTERDAY THAT SHE LIKES MY WORK

AND THAT WAS PROBABLY WHY SHE HAD AGREED TO WORK ON THIS PROJECT

AND THEN I GO UP TO HER AND INTRODUCE MYSELF AND SHE INTRODUCES HERSELF WITH HER REAL NAME AND I MUSTVE HAD A BLANK EXPRESSION CUZ THEN SHE SAID I GO BY MDC

AND THEN I BLANKED OUT

AND IF THAT WASN’T BAD ENOUGH I BLURTED OUT I LOVE YOUR WORK YOUR NEW LINE WAS BREATH TAKING AND I LOVED THE SECOND PIECE THE MOST AND THAT THE COLOURS AND DESIGNS WERE AMAZING

AND THEN SHE WAS SO SWEET AND NICE TO ME AND THANKED ME AND SAID THE SECOND PIECE WAS HER FAVOURITE TOO AND THAT SHE THOUGHT MY WORK WAS AMAZING

M!!!!!!! ANSWER ME PLEASE IM DYING OF HUMILIATION.

She thought about her reply for about a minute and the sent it off.

Designs&Coffee: I’m sure she didn’t think you were awkward.

She was probably concentrating more on the fact that she was talking to CISSIE KING-JONES

Her response was instantaneous.

Arrow Girl: How can you be so sure?

Also how did you finally figure out that I’m that Cissie

Designs&Coffee: I’m so sure because I’m that M

As in the M in MDC. Also how I figured you were that Cissie

Hi again! I’m Marinette. I’m 17 and sorta run a fashion empire

Arrow Girl: Cissie King-Jones. I’m seventeen too and currently an actress.

Marinette breathed a sigh of relief, she was worried that this might’ve ended badly

Arrow Girl: Wanna actually hang out tomorrow?

Designs&Coffee: sure!

.oOo.

Cissie woke up two mornings later to nearly a hundred notifications on her phone. About twenty of the notifications were from news channels, which was strange she was supposed to get those only when her name was mentioned in an article and 20 articles in a day were strange. There were another fifty from Bart, which happened occasionally. Ten each from Cassie and Marinette. And a few messages each from Tim, Kon, Greta and Anita.

Checking the news articles first because they would probably give some insight on the dozens of messages, she saw that someone had seen her out with Marinette yesterday and taken a photo which the tabloids had eaten up like starved wolves.

Bart had clearly lost patience fast, his messages were getting more and more pleading as she scrolled through all fifty. Laughing she told him that she had just woken up and would answer all his questions, and she and Marinette weren’t together it was just a misunderstanding, like the one Tim deals with all the time. Kon, Anita and Greta used to the several articles that came with Tim had picked out articles that had the most ridiculous theories and had sent it to her. Cassie had done the same along with several other questions. Choosing to answer Cassie first, she calls Cassie and spends nearly an hour talking to her even though it took Cissie only five minutes to explain the whole tabloid mess. Tim had sent a message saying ���welcome to the world where if you’re seen outside your house with someone, everyone is going to believe you’re in a relationship.” Cissie just responded with a laughing face emoji.

Marinette had apologised for her friends’ behaviour, strange as that was. Saying that if she gets e-mails from Adrien Agreste, Luka Couffaine, Alya Césaire or Kagami Tsurugi it would be best to ignore them. They were just over protective and annoying. Cissie pointedly ignored how Marinette had casually brought up four very prominent people in the world. Apparently Marinette’s friends not used to the whole invasiveness of paparazzi had decided to deliver Cissie a shovel talk over e-mail before Marinette could clear up the confusion with her friends. She had also added that they were supposed to apologise and to please tell her if they didn’t.

And that was when she remembered her own friends’ highly similar behaviour and sent a text in the Young Justice group chat that she’d use them as moving target practice if they decide to induct her into their group with threats, and then sent another message to Tim to stop whatever extensive background check he was doing. She groaned as she got a smiley face in reply. Then the notification she had set for Marinette went off.

Designs&Coffee: I’ve been meaning to ask you about why you had all the points you had for young heroes retiring???? so, uh, why did you?

Groaning she flopped back onto the bed, this was going to be one hell of a day.

So my thoughts on how it would go ahead:

Marinette and Cissie meet up to talk about her text but Cissie doesn't really tell her about Arrowette. She changes the topic, after all Marinette was also ready with several points on the same topic. Maybe they eventually tell each other maybe they don't, i don't exactly know.

Marinette's friends calm down pretty soon after, Alya takes some more time but eventually calms down too.

When Cissie says, 'Marinette had casually brought up four very prominent people in the world', Its because at this point Adrien's run as a model still hasn't died out with it being only a year after Hawkmoth's defeat. Kagami is a world famous fencer, Luka joins Jagged Stone on tour and becomes pretty famous too and Alya listened to Marinette, (It ends up being Marinette and Adrien after the reveal who get through to her), she ends up making a name for herself in the year after Hawmoth's defeat, though her work still focuses around heroes/vigilantes which is why Cissie knows her, she's not really that prominent outside France.

Sometime after Cissie finishes talking to Cassie and sees Marinette's text Bart shows up demanding answers. They don't actually know it's Marinette, as in they don't know her name. Marinette Dupain-Cheng isn't really well known, MDC is, and no one knows who MDC is. Tim would probably do a facial recognition scan find out who she is and continue on with his extensive background check and probably figures out she's MDC somewhere along the way. Traya asks about Marinette the next time she sees Cissie

[tangledbea]

I know that they couldn't show cassandra dying/being dead in the same way they did in the movie because of age ratings, but comparing how eugene died and how cass died just makes hers feel so flat and forced, which it was. eugene's death was a sacrifice, took a while, he was in pain and we could see, rapunzel desperately tried to save him and when he said his 'last words' it really feels like he's dying forever. with cass, it was just... "look! shes on the ground! I think she's dead! idk how tho lol she mustve bonked her head or something" and there wasn't any emotion or buildup, even when she was revived. You immediately know she'll be revived, whereas with eugene he stayed dead for a little bit. Again, a lot of it was probably age rating but if you're going to parallel the movie and make your character copy eugene, at least make it emotional!! I was more emotional when rapunzel turned into a bird than when they 'killed' cass

Cassandra was done a huge disservice by the series. Most of my disliking her came down to things they chose to do/have done to her. She had a lot of potential as a character, and they could have turned her into something great, almost universally loved.

Her death was shallow, hollow. They didn’t have to show her suffering for several minutes because, as you said, it’s a kids’ show. And, yes, we all knew she was going to come back. But her death didn’t mean anything. If her redemption had taken longer instead of being in the last quarter of the last episode, if her story had been streamlined and thought out, if they hadn’t thrown in curveballs for the lols (such as ignoring everything they’d said Zhan Tiri was up until that point because Ben doodled an evil goth girl and decided she absolutely had to be a character in the show, wouldn’t it be awesome if THAT was the great Zhan Tiri?), if those in charge had listened to people outside of themselves for how the overarching plot should be instead of insisting they were the only ones who knew how this was supposed to go...

Cassandra could have been great.

[sleepii-moth]

(ok so here is my fic its part of my hl2ai au you dont have to look over all that stuff to read this but i recommend it)

Capter 1

Time Goes on Even When You're Dead

summery:

Full of headcrab zombies and other dangerous creatures, the Quarantine Zone is the most dangerous part of city 17, and it just gained its newest member, who has no idea what the fuck is going on.

Benrey was dead.

There was nothing. He couldn't hear, he couldn't see, all he could feel was the suffocating silence of nothingness.

And he ultimately decided that this fucking sucked.

His conscious was still there, at least he could still think, however most of his memories didn't seem to exist anymore.

Benrey would be fine with that, if he hadn't forgotten everything but the one thing thing he so desperately wanted to forget. His friends. Benrey didn't blame them for killing him, it was justified at least.. but it still hurt.

And now he's stuck here, in this endless unfeeling void, alone.

He groaned and opened his eyes, above him was a broken light fixture attached to an even more broken ceiling. Sunlight flooded in through a nearby window,  illuminating the room.

Benrey slowly stood up and looked around. He seemed to be in a house, or at least what was left of one. The walls were practically falling apart, the few peices of furniture in the room were torn to shreds, and the floor near the window was littered with broken glass. 

He walked over to the broken window, stepping over fallen shards of glass, and looked outside. Benrey wasnt in Black Mesa anymore, he knew that for sure. In front of him was the remains of a city, pretty much every building seemed to be falling apart in some way. Giant cables were strewn about haphazardly, at if whatever put them there didnt give a shit about preserving the buildings around it.

Benrey tried to comprehend what he was seeing, was this a product of the resonance cascade? Where is he?? He backed away from the window, stepping over the broken glass. None of this made any sense, how long had he been dead for? It couldn't have been that long.. could it? 

Benrey gripped his stomach, his heart was pounding, something felt wrong. Suddenly the floor creaked from behind him, and he turned around to hear an all too familiar wail, a headcrab zombie.

He staggered back, unsure of what to do. He didnt have any way of defending himself now, no one was even here to save him. The zombie stumbled forward and swung at Benrey who somehow managed dodge. He looked around for an exit before sprinting out of an open door and into a stairwell. 

He stumbled down the stairs, avoiding a few barnacles, and making his way out of the building and into a wrecked plaza. He seemed to have evaded the zombie for now, but that didn't make him any less uneasy.

Tall, ruined buildings loomed over him, casting permanent shadows on the cracked pavement.

Was this really all that was left? Was he.. the only one left..?

Was everyone- everything.. dead? 

Benrey shivered, maybe he should just take things one step at a time. He looked down at his tattered security gaurd uniform and took a deep breath, trying to calm himself down.

'Okay.. one step at a time' He thought, making a mental to-do list in his head.

'First, get some new clothes. Second, find something to eat. Third, find somewhere safe to stay… seems simple enough.. right?' 

He looked around, at least one of theese buildings has to have some clothes somewhere in them. Finally his eyes fell apon a brick building a lot taller than the rest. Some hope swelled inside Benrey, maybe he could find some clothes- or at least food in there?

The headcrab zombie from before wailed in the distance. He looked back before deciding that he had nowhere else to go, and made his way into the building. 

Apon entering the building, Benrey quickly learned that this was in fact, a vodka distillery. Vodka bottles lined every shelf in sight, and natural light poured in through tall windows. Orange Xen growth had completely infected some areas of the building, making it almost impossible to tell what this place used to be.

Benrey groaned and stepped over a dead headcrab that had been incased in xen growth. 

"gross.." He mumbled under his breath before accidentally stepping into a cloud of spores.

Before he knew it he had fallen over onto the ground, coughing. His lungs burned as he desperately tried to catch his breath and cover his mouth at the same time. After a few seconds he managed to crawl out of the way of the cloud and into fresh air, before collapsing up against a wall. 

After regaining his strength Benrey slowly got up and silently made a mental note in his head, 'Okay.. so orange clouds of dust can kill you. got it.' 

He was glad that the spores seemed to be the only threat at the moment, he could at least evade those more easily than a headcrab. He still kept his gaurd up though, he wasn't sure if xen growth alone could kill a headcrab..

Benrey carried on through the building, this time making sure to avoid the toxic orange spores, or at least cover his mouth when he encountered them. The further he went the more dense the xen flora got, in some places it didn't look like he was even on earth anymore.

Something about this felt wrong to Benrey, he wasn't sure what though. He just had this encroaching feeling that something was here with him, something he didn't want to see. 

Eventually he made his way to a room where all the xen growth seemed to just.. stop. A container full of some sort of bright orange liquid sat in the corner of the room, the little xen growth that surrounded it seemed to be covered in a strange orange plasticy substance.

There was big black text printed on the front of the container that read: "INFESTATION CONTROL"

Light flooded in through a window, shedding onto a few empty vodka bottles laying on a nearby table, along with some miscellaneous tools. Benrey could see bloodstains on the almost broken window, and broken glass from vodka bottles littered the floor.

There were signs of people rushing out of the room. People were here, and they definitely left in a hurry. Benrey had a feeling that whatever was here definitely wasnt friendly.  

He picked up a broken off chair leg and slowly made his way over to a door at the other end of the room. Raising his new weapon defensively, he peeked outside the doorway. The tension in his shoulders eased and he took a breath of relief, nothing.

'Whatever was here mustve moved on' Benrey thought to himself, before turning around and bumping into a shelf, causing a bottle of vodka to fall to the floor and shatter. He sighed and moved the shattered glass out of the way of his foot when suddenly he heard a loud thump behind him, and the sound of large, heavy footprints. 

Benrey turned around to see what appeared to be a headcrab zombie covered in xen growth with a large, gaping mouth, and it was barreling right towards him. 

His legs moved before he could even think and the next thing he knew he was sprinting through the doorway as fast as he could.

The zombie seemed to be slower than Benrey, but he doubted it would take long for the monster to catch up. He recklessly weaved through shelves of vodka, knocking down bottles left and right. He didnt care about making a mess, only priority was to leave as fast as possible.

That however, was his downfall. 

It wasnt long before he reached a dead end. He gripped the chair leg in his hand and waited for the zombie to inevitably find him. His only option now was to fight. And sure enough, the zombie came stumbling towards him at full speed. It was even more terrifying up close, the xen growth on its back had melded into its skin, and was spewing out orange clouds of spores. 

Benrey covered his mouth and raised his weapon preparing to fight- but the monster just.. stood there.

Its mouth was wide open, it was looking right at him and could attack at any time- but it just.. stood there. Staring.

Benrey froze, was it.. toying with him?

After a few seconds the zombie seemed to loose interest and wandered away. Why didn't it attack him? Was it not able to see? He looked over at the bottles of vodka on the shelves, remembering what had caused the monster to appear in the first place. He quietly grabbed a bottle off the shelf and threw it in the other direction of the zombie, and watched as it immediately ran to where the bottle was thrown.

'Noise..' Benrey thought to himself 'so its attracted to noise.' 

He grabbed another bottle and slowly started to sneak past the zombie. He quickly and quietly made his was over to a doorway, and threw the vodka bottle as her as he could in the other direction, leading the monster away from him.

As soon as he was sure the zombie had been led away, he immediately sprinted into the doorway, closing it behind him as quietly as possible and blocking the door. 

Still holding his chair leg, he made his way through the rest of the distillery. This time making sure to avoid making noise.

Eventually Benrey reached an exit, and grabbed a bottle of vodka to take with him. He wasnt sure when he'd see any sort of clean water again. He wandered into an abandoned hotel and found a mostly in tact room. It wasn't much, but as least he managed to find some less destroyed clothes and a bed. 

As he layed down to rest in a broken hotel, in an even more broken city, he couldn't help but think about how much he wanted things to go back to normal, about how much he wanted to go home.

But there was nothing left of normal, or his home. This was it.

I guess time really does go on, even when you're dead.

[afterthelastreset]

Rules Of One’s Soul Ch 12 A Little Offer P2

(mak belongs to @wasted-church  )

"He was rude!"

"He was probably having a bad day. Everyone gets cranky. Hehe. Of course he might even be more cranky once he realizes you took that diamond. "

"He was mean to me....Shiny diamonds mine now!"

The cat chuckled and leaned back in the cushioned armchair as he watched the small child make their way around the room carrying an armfull of trinkets and jewelry they had collected overtime, the newest addition being the decent sized diamond they had somehow snuck out of the glass case from the Hip Shop. The earlier altercation mustve given them enough time to sneak it away. To be honest he was kinda worried about the duke at this point and that was saying alot since he hasn't really worried about anything since Jevil's imprisonment over a hundred years ago, but I digress. Maybe it was because of the whole soul connection or maybe anyone looking as crazy and desperate as the duke was would send anyone worrisome vibes. He shrugged at the thought. It didn't matter. It wasn't any of his business to begin with. If the Duke wished to eat..eck!..worms and candy for the rest of his time off and avoid him for the rest of his life, well then there was nothing he could really do about it. A small pang of sadness rang out in him from his soul at the thought but he shrugged that off. Wasn't really his place really any ways. Jevil was the one to find him first....But then again-

A small smirk appeared on his face. What fun would a game with Jevil be if he gave up this early into the game? It WAS the most fun he's had in a while, but you see there were many ways to play the game. One way were to force your way to the finish line and push your way onto the goal with a few tricks, much like Jevil. Or one could patiently wait for an opportunity and gently but smartly nudge your victory forward to a checkmate. He just had to wait if or when his next turn comes to him....Or a certain worm noble.

The mere thought of the high life stuck up duke on his hands and knees digging around for worms of all things made him chuckle now that the whole ordeal was behind them. He didn't remember the last time he laughed so much. It was fun watching the Duke's strange ways. One moment he was acting like a holier than thou stick in the mud and the next like a confused pup. And a few times a scared mouse. It was quite a sight really-

A small clatter of metal and glass sounded out as Mak clambered up one of the shelves by the fireplace. They disappeared somewhere at the top and didn't come out for a while after. But soon after popped their head back out again.

"Im hungry!"

"You just ate breakfast an hour ago."

"Im hungry again!"

Seam sighed before shaking his head. "Young ones. I will never understand their bottomless appetite."

"Get me food?"

He sighed and slowly leaned away from the softness of the armchair before standing up to his feet. Just as he turned towards the child to ask what they wanted, the familiar flap of the sheap entrance caught his atttention. His ear twitched to the sound and a chuckle escaped his lips. He turned towards the door with a smile like hes always had. Though he was certainly not expecting a visit this soon, but just in case it wasn't really him-

"I really wasn't expecting customers today, Ill be out in a moment!"

"WORM!!", A voice shrilled from the front. Seam smiled knowingly and began his way to the store front," Thou willst commeth out this instant! I shan't be kept waiting for the likes of you!"

He chuckled more as he pulled back the curtain. "I was expecting you, but Im not sure I can wrestle the diamond away....from.."

He stopped in his tracks at the sight before him. Staring back at him wasn't a duke at all. What was staring back at him was an honest to lightner regular-ish looking worm man. He wore the same scowling face as the duke he knew, but this man had his glittering white hair tied back in a messy bun with stray strands drapping around that scowling face. Surpringly he wore no fancy suit, just a plain white shirt with the sleeves rolled up and a dark blue pair of pants. He had to blink a couple times to actually register the sight before him but really focused when Rouxls cleaed his throat.

"Art thou done gawking at mine presence, Worm?"

"Uh....Sure. I just wasn't expecting you so soon...and in such.." He ran his one eye over him again. "Er...Common suit?"

Rouxls scoffed before rolling his eyes and pointing a hand at his face. "I came likest this-" He gestured to himself, "- to not ruin mine good wardrobe whilst in thine dust infected den."

"Oh. Then Ill be right back."

Rouxls gave him a questioning look. "Where art thou going?"

"Well I suppose you want the diamond back."

"What art thou speaking of? I have no need for nay diamond."

"Oh?"

Rouxls rolled his eyes again before pointing down towards the floor. Seam had to lean over the counter to see. By his feet was a decent sized bucket filled with what could only be described as Cleaning supplies and array of sponges and rags alike. He stood there silently for a moment before chuckling again and looking back up at the worm man.

"So you decided to actually take up my offer?"

He huffed. "Only because I amst in desperate needs of funds for mineself. Not because I needs thou's help."

In reality, it really was because he desperately didn't want to be stuck eating worms and fat inducing candy for a whole nother week. Buuuut in order to do that it would require for Seam to help him. Starving hinself was an option but hed rather not hurt himself before actually being able to get back to Lancer. His boy didn't need to see his lesser father desperate and a pile of bones. This was all for Lancer....It definitely didn't have anything to do with the way his soul kept thumping at the mere smile of the raggedy cat in front of him. Or his chuckling. Or the fact that the old cat may have been a pain but actually was the only one thus far to offer any help what so ever-

STUPID SOUL!! Stop!!

Seam chuckled but was glad none the less that the duke had decided to accept his offer."Of course not. "

"Good! Now thou shall standeth aside and lettest me do mine work!"

With a chuckle Seam gestured to the shop area before them and smiled. "It's all yours my friend. But please, mind the wares. Some are more old and brittle like myself."

"*hmph* Just keepest thineself and that little beast out of mine way!" He huffed and reached down to grab the bucket, but paused for a moment before looking back to the cat with a questioning look. "Speaking of which, where is that little menace?"

"Oh, Mak? They're probably eating that candy stash again-"

"N-Nay! I meaneth thee.." His eyes glanced around real quick. "-other one."

"Oh. You mean Jevil?" Rouxls gave a grimace and he chuckled. "You don't have to worry about him. He leaves early in the morning and doesn't return until almost eight o'clock.Hehe. Most likely entertaining the prince. By the speed in which you do things, I think you don't have to worry too much." He mumbled something to himself but went back to the supplies and picked them up. Seam tilted his head at him- "Would you like a hand there, friend?"

"Yes actually. Thou needs to vacate thine area immediately! I shant have any distractions!"

Seam hummed. "Are you kicking me out of my home? Isn't that illegal to do Duke?,

Rouxls shot him an annoyed look at the question. "Worm! I can't have thee waltzing around thine home whilst I cleanest it!"

"You're cleaning my whole home? I-...I hadn't really intended on that. Just the sheap front will suffice-"

"NAY!" The bucket was slapped down onto the counter making it's contents shuffled around inside it. A blue hand was pointed at his face inches away from his nose. "If I amst to clean mine mate's home correctly then thou art to gettest out until I amst finished. I tire of thine home's foul smell."

The cat didnt even flinch but instead remained frozen for a moment as the blue man still stood there staring intently at him. For a few seconds neither moved, that was until Seam blinked and slowly gave a chuckle. Making Rouxls raise an eyebrow.

"What tis thou fining so funny?"

"Oh nothing. I just wonder."

"About....what?"

A sly smile snuck across his face and he chuckled again. "Oh nothing you should worry about. But I do wonder what I should do in the mean time? Not alot for me to do anynore."

Rouxls groaned before placing one hand on the bucket. "I shant care." He then grabbed it into his arms. "Just leaveth and stay somewhere else whilst I getteth this over with."

"Are you sure about that statement?"

"Yes! Doth thou wantest me to do this or art thou stalling for amusement?"

Seam held his paws up in defence at the duke's angered and annoyed face. "Ok. Hold on one moment. Mak might be convinced by something, makes my job easier-"

"Yes, yes." Rouxls waved him off dismissively as he turned his attention to the rest of the, in his words, sloppy excuse of a home let alone a shop. He made a disgusted look not even trying to hide the fact of what he was thinking. "How can thou stand this filth?"

There wasn't an answer as Seam had already left for the back, leaving Rouxls to grumble to himself. It wasn't too long before the tall cat came out from the back with the small bat child floating about him. The two gave the already busy duke mumbling to himself and Seam had to grab the child as they reached their hands out for the shining white mass of hair-

"No. That's not what I meant."

"But I want the shiny stuff-"

"Not that." Rouxls gave a questioning look over his shoulder just as Seam was moving the bat creature over to his other side, before placing them down and nudging them towards the store exit. "Now run off and behave yourself."

Rouxls watched as with a huff the child stomped their way off to the front. The tent like cover making a flapping noise as they left. With a sigh Seam turned to the worm still staring at him.

"I dont suppose you would be willing to let me help you-"

"Uh...N-Nay! I wantest to finish and leaveth as soon as possible!" He again pointed to the door. "Now if thou please."

"Ok. I get the picture. But if you should change your mind-"

"Yes, yes." He waved off the notion and turned back to his work. "Leaveth mineself to thine peace worm!"

Seam chuckled again before turning his own body to the door, but not leaving without relaying a past notion. "Very well. Then I leave you to cleaning your 'mate's' home duke."

Rouxls mumbled to himself again but paused and turned to look back at the cat just as he ducked out the door. Leaving a mildly bewildered duke.

[wolferals]

🇪🇸ella es linda🇪🇸

finally fallin' chapter 2

<arón piper x reader>

(The spanish is all google translate, i wont take responsibility for mistakes)

chapter 2

„Hola" a tall, very handsome man with a silver hoop dangling from his ear and short brown hair spoke and got closer to the both of you.

His eyes were brown, light brown with a hint of green maybe. Plump, nice lips and a mole under his left eye.

He was wearing a loose blue polo shirt and some black jeans. Under the shirt you could see a silver necklace sparkling towards you.

You were startled by his appearance. He was really attractive to you and you had to do a lot not to start stuttering. „We talked before I think."

You shook his hand.

„Y/n, nice to meet you too."

He smiled brightly and gave you a long gaze before looking over to his friend.

It was quiet between you guys for a second until you broke the silence by saying:"Alright I wont bother you guys any longer, have a nice day you too."

Your „classmate" nodded and then asked:"Am I gonna see you in photography tomorrow?"

You nodded at him.

„Wait can I get your number so we can text each other if one of us is lost on campus or anything."

He laughed.

Excited you agreed and afterwards you put your number in his phone.

„Y/n ya?“ He asked as he read through it again.

„Yeah, and you?“

His friend Arón chuckled quietly and then replied for him:“His name is Itzan.“

Well at least now you knew his name.

„Alright.“ you laughed and pushed some hair out of your face.

„Okay see you tomorrow then." You put your phone back in your purse and said goodbye. „Hasta luego." He spoke as you slowly walked away, giving the tall handsome another glance, smiling.

He was really good looking, you'd already figured that and he seemed to be nice. He helped out his friend after all.

Since you had nothing else to do than get back to your place and unpack some last things that you hadnt gotten the chance to in the past week. Especially your clothes had to be sorted into your white wooden closet before they all got wrinkly and started to smell from your suitcases.

So you went on with it. After grabbing an apple you turned on some music and finally finished unpacking and decorating your place.

As you were about to turn on the tv and sat down on the bed you heard your laptop making a „ring" noise.

Email.

Who would send you an email nowadays?

You carefully grabbed your laptop, opened the mail service and started reading.

„Dear class,

I've had a good time today getting to know some of you and bringing you the fine arts of photography closer.

Due to the loose schedule we need to start soon with the practical work.

What I'd like you to do is, find yourself a group of other students in this course (2-4) and work on a photography series that expresses a certain feeling. The series should include 5 individual photographies that all somehow work together either in color moments, editing or background.

Find a nice location, take some shots and be creative with either photoshop or other photo editor programs.

You can be free in the choice of materials, if you'd like to use a professional camera, we can sort that out in our next class.

But using you phone would be enough for now.

I hope you're all having a wonderful day, see you in the next course.

Sandra Rodriguez"

Alright, you figured. No problem at all, you could ask Itzan if he wanted to work with you since he's the only person you've talked to so far. And it should be fun.

He was really handsome, maybe he'd be willing to be the model for this series.

He mustve gotten the email as well, so you decided to ask him the next day if he wanted to work on it with you.

So first things first, you wrote down some ideas you'd like to shoot and made some sketches on your iPad.

Afterwards you watched some shows for a while and then had a long phone call with one of your friends from back home.

You went to bed rather early this day just to feel good tomorrow for a rather long day. You had 4 different classes the next day. First course would be fine arts, starting at 9, then photography again and after that a class of media‘s. Then a 2 hour break and as a last class of the day you‘d have typography.

The class you were most excited about was media, you‘ve always wanted to design ads and stuff on medias.

And you were definitely going to talk to Itzan about the photography series project, but you were confident he‘ll say yes since he doesnt seem to be friends with anyone else yet.

*time skip to 2:45 next day*

„Hey.“ you greeted the dark haired boy who was sitting at a table in the middle of campus.

Itzan smiled at you. „Buenos dias.“

You smiled back and sat down next to him.

„How was your last class?“ You asked and took out the sandwich you had just bought.

Itzan leaned back and started telling you about his last informatics class that he already regretted taking.

„Aw man, i hope you can get out of it.“ you said with half your mouth full.

He nodded and replied:“Yeah i hope so too, how was yours?“

-„It was great! Media is fun, we were drawing some fruits on photoshop as a first practice.“

You guys kept on talking about your different classes until you decided it was time to brainstorm a bit for the photography project. Itzan actually had been the one to ask you if you wanted to work as a team which made you glad because that meant you didnt have to be awkward.

So first you showed him the ideas you had written down the previous night and he added some things he‘d like to do.

„Do you want to model this though?“ you laughed and looked up to him.

He gave you a disgusted look.

„No... Do I have to?“ he asked confused.

You started laughing from his reaction. „No you dont HAVE to, but i dont want to do it either.“

Just as he wanted to complain his phone rang.

„Its your boy.“ he grinned and picked up.

„Hola...“ he spoke into the phone and kept on speaking in Spanish so you didnt really understand.

„Maybe we could ask him!“ you suddenly exclaimed after thinking about it.

Itzan looked up to you and put the phone away from his ear for a second. „Arón?“ he asked.

You nodded.

He then laughed and seemed to actually ask Arón about it.

„He said no.“

You pouted and put your hand out to gesture you wanted the phone.

„Let me ask.“

Itzan grinned, said something to Arón and handed you the phone.

„Hey Arón.“ you spoke in your sweetest tone.

„I‘m not modeling for you.“ you heard his deep voice laugh.

„Come on, please, we need to do it and none of us wants to do it.“ you spoke and looked at Itzan who had just bitten into an apple.

„Y/n..“ you heard him sigh.

„Por favor.“

He started laughing. You immediately got concerned that he was laughing at your terrible Spanish pronunciation.

After a little bit of silence he answered:“Alright, when?“

You started cheering inside but just replied with a „ohh thank you, perfect!“

-„IF...“

he paused.

„You have to help me with something too.“

You waited for him to tell you what it was.

„Yeah what is it?“ you then asked since he didnt reply.

„Tell Itzan to give me your number, I‘ll text you tonight.“

You started smiling. A cute guy wanted something from you and said he‘d text you tonight.

„Will do! Thank you so much! Gracias.“

He laughed again and you symbolized Arón‘s approval by showing Itzan a thumbs up.

He grinned back at you.

„You‘re welcome, but i‘ll only do it if you help me with my project.“

-„Of course.“ you smiled and nodded. „Cant wait. Thanks, bye, ill give you back to Itzan.“

You heard him chuckle.

„Goodbye y/n.“

Smiling you handed the phone back and went back to eating your sandwich.

Itzan continued talking to Arón until looking at you for a second. He grinned and replied to Arón:“Lo se, ella es linda.“

[cryptidprimalslayer]

Precipice Pt. 2: Amh Areng

oh fun. a desert. i’m dressed just fine but i don’t know how Fray isn’t boiling in that armor, same as how anyone doesnt freeze to death in their armor in Coerthas. i was told Alisaie has been mainly down in this area so i made plans to come here next; Fray insisted on coming along. The Night’s Blessed didnt really like that idea despite the wary gazes i see him getting from them a lot. it’s so vast and empty, i mean a desert is a desert and somehow Ul’Dah is doing just fine but this.....this is like advanced empty.  now why in the Hells would someone wanna come here other then to die alone? cause that’s what you’ll get here. just you, the sineaters and the not kobolds. speaking of them just makes my stomach turn, that was some of the most disgusting food. “Are you gonna puke again cause if not we should keep moving before the sineaters surround us.”

“It’s worse. it’s the feeling of needing to but nothing happens.” I held my stomach as we trudged through the sand. “Where even is this place he told us she was?” i pulled out my map and looked at what little remained of Norvrandt, the wind pushing sand onto it as i knelt. “I think we’re lost i swear i saw that pillar 5 minutes ago.” i heard a battle in the distance so i stood and shoved the map at Fray then took off. as i ran i heard the sounds of a female voice shouting. is it someone in trouble........or is it Alisaie? i get to the site and find a dead sineater as well as Alisaie. She was shocked to see me then looked over my shoulder so Fray mustve caught up to me. i looked over at him and was met with a glare. “You can handle yourself in a fight dont give me that look.” he rolls his eyes then gave me the map. “Oh this is Fray by the way Alisaie i don’t see why you two would know each other. i met him in Ishgard. don’t know why he’s here but that’s not the important thing right now.” she took us back to where was staying and it’s this little makeshift looking “inn” if i can even call it that; more a camp really. the people here look so desolate it’s a sinking feeling to see so much hopelessness. i learned they all were corrupted by Light and came here to die essentially. This was like some next level despair even Fray looked shaken. there’s a child here. as if i needed another reason to fight some Lightwardens. Alisaie brought us over to him and a caretaker here, this pretty young lady, said his name is Halric. there’s no cure i’m told for Light corruption or obviously it’d be distributed or mass produced. well that’s the hope anyways. 

later around a fire, the three of us and her, the air was still smothering with desolation but she tried to remain optimistic and told us about her mother. and about some of these people. She’s got such hopes for the future and a good head on her shoulders. Bold enough to dream in a crushed world like this. it takes guts to not immediately give into despair. i stared into the fire like it was the meaning of life, their conversation fading as i zoned out. if only fighting these SOBs would cure the corruption. i’d fight for this child here. everyone else is on their own, this kid looks like he cant be more then like 10. too young. i’m not getting any sleep tonight there’s too much to think about to sleep. I don’t think i’ve ever seen Fray sleep either yet he has the gall to come for my throat about sleeping. Alisaie i’m surprised was resting and the woman was tending to these people. i got to my feet deciding to go for a walk, just to get out of this enclosement. i walked a fair ways away from the camp and settled on top of a building looking at the wall of Light. 

“WE HAVE TO FIND HIM! AREN’T YOU THE LEAST BIT WORRIED ABOUT NEY?!” What a wake up call. what’s going on? i rubbed my eyes and sat up to see i had passed out on top of the building. whoops. after stretching then standing i looked down at the ground below searching for the tiny angry child. what’s got her goat? i don’t know but id better go find her and tell her i’m available to help. she could also be looking for me outta the kindness of her heart. if anyone else cited that as a reason i’d sock them in the jaw, but i’m inclined to believe Alisaie would do that. is he with her? she can handle her own but i trust Fray bout as far as i can throw him. i got to the ground level and ran back for the camp in search of her. “oh you’ve returned! she was awful serious about running out and searching for you despite us saying we saw you walk out last night. where were you if i may ask?” 

“I was on that building over yonder. mustve fallen asleep up there.” i rubbed my neck and looked around. 

“That man with you went out searching as well, though they went in different directions. if one shows back up we’ll keep them here till you return.” I thanked them then took off in the direction opposite the building i slept on. I also noticed that caretaker and Halric were absent as well. i hope they are looking for him over me, i can defend myself after all. Well we found Halric. the only good thing apparently that’s happened today. it took like all day but it happened. i wasn’t there to witness but apparently that caretaker is now a sineater and flew off. we’ll probably have to kill her later. Alisaie is taking it super hard. i hardly knew the woman but she deserved to go out a better way. all i can do is try to offer support. her brother would know better words then i on this matter probably. 

She’s hellbent on fixing Halric and finding some way to halt the corruption and like, i get that i understand it but that’s the tallest of orders and quite frankly impossible. maybe in this instance death is a mercy then becoming a monster. i stepped out again but this time Fray followed and we didnt go far, just to that building again. “Talk to me Ney. what’s going on?”

“Am i callous for wanting to just do whatever the fuck we were called here to do and leaving? of course i want the kid to grow up and be happy. and she had such hope in this broken world. but that’s not how life works. death may be the only mercy these people get. end their suffering before there’s nothing of them left to put at peace. quit looking at me like that you’re just as callous Fray.” he put his hands up then shrugged. 

“I didn’t say anything. but it’s nice to see a bit of how your brain works. detachment isnt the answer. i think the three of us here are proof you don’t actually want to be alone in life.” he pulls me back to the camp and went over to the table Halric was sitting at. don’t do that. dont act like you know me. i might do something stupid like trust you. 

[lovelythenabeana]

Meet me at the greenhouse

Part 5?

Rose pov

Its 2am. I have yet to fall asleep. A wave of depression hit me on the way back to the dorms, i feel so drained,  and i've felt like crap since. I think willow is sleeping now, after coming in at 12. I wish i was sleeping. Im so tired. Ive just been staring at this wall for so. Long. so many things are running wild in my brain. Is going to college the right idea? Is leaving everything behind worth it? Will willow even like me or will she end up hating me? Maybe this is hopeless, coming here expecting greatness. Maybe i….

*meeeooowww*

What the hell??

Willow toses around in bed

*MEEOOOWWWWWW*

Okay i should get up and see where that noise is coming from.

I open the bedroom door and walk to the living room

*meow*

The noise get faint so i head back to the bedroom

I open the window and

Oh my god

Theres a cat, a small cat on the ledge.

The cat mustve been on the roof and found her way to the window ledges

*meow?*

“Shhh be quiet people are sleeping” 

The cat walks into the bedroom

Ah shoot noo cat leaveee i dont think we are allowed cats

“Go back to where you came from kitty shoo” i whisper trying to not disturb willow

The cat rubs all over me and then decides to run around the room

I try to catch it but then it jumps on willow

Shit

Willow rolls over and cuddles the cat still asleep 

I tip toe over to try and get the criminal

The cat wiggles free from willow and comes over to me so i scoop it up and head to the living room

“Hmm did you show up knowing i was having a rough time cat?”

The cat tilts itd head at me curiously

I should stop calling it the cat

Oh its a girl!

Okay a name 

Well we already have 2 nature names lets add another

misty is a nice name

“Do you like misty?”

The cat shakes

Maybe thats a no

“Lilly?”

She rubs on me

Lilly it is i guess

“So why are you here little one? Has an angel sent you my way” i chuckle

The ca- lilly purrs

Hmm maybe she can be my new friend

She is making me feel a lot better already

I pick her up and lay on the couch with her.

“Youre adorable”

I guess i dozed off

The next thing i know i hear

“AAAAAAA ROSEEEE” willow yells

I bolt up

I run to the bedroom to see willow standing on her bed and lilly looking up at her

“WHY THE HELL IS THERE A CAT IN HERE” willow continues to yell

“Well you see she was meowing at the window last night so i let her in”

Willow stares at me blankly

“You let a cat into the room!? You dont know where its been it could give us a disease!” willow inches closer to her wall

“Youre the one whos gonna be a vet are you scared of cats??????”

Willow looks away from me

Oh my god

Shes scared of cats

“Willow…”

“Listen they have claws, sharp claws, and pointy teef, and they cant climb!” willow tries convincing me. That cats are scary. Im dying

I pick lilly up and show her to willow

“Do you really think this little fur ball is scary??”

Willow sits down

“I mean a little, yea”

I sit on the floor with lilly

“Look willow, shes harmless”

Lilly is rolling around the floor then finds a ribbon of willows and bats at it

“Aww shes cute” willow looks at lilly with basically heart eyes

“See lilly just wants to be friends”

Willow comes and sits on the floor with us

“Lilly? Rose you know we arnt allowed to have pets here”

She reaches to pet lilly and lilly rubs on her

“I know but i couldnt leave her outside. So shes here with us. I really like her. Can we please keep her? It can be our little secret.”

I look at willow beggingly

“Rose..i dont know, i dont want to get in trouble.”

Lilly sits on willows lap

“Oh come on you seem like someone who woud always take animals in we can do this please?”

Willow pets lilly and smiles

“I mean if we can keep her a secret somehow i guess we can try. BUT you are responsible for her and you have to buy me ice cream” she smirks at me

“Wow okay then”

Lilly checks out the bedroom sniffing everything 

She heads over towards my one untouched bag and starts batting at it

“She really likes that bag huh” willow laughs

“I guess so, theres nothing good in it, just some art stuff”

And my meds, which i have yet to take because i don't want willow to know.

[eekispyykes]

Mr Sparklepuff Feline Obituary 5.1.2020/Abridged

Mr Puffs 4-2002-  5-1-2020

by Michael Bench

Mr Puffs was an excellent friend and adventurous hiker. He loved to be outdoors. A ferocious mouser ; he did an arc'ing jump on mice and chipmunks from 2 clumps of brush away. The porch frankly stank from all his gifts. An amazing climber and very fast sprinter crossing a square acre in about 3.5sec. Some would ask why he was named as such and close friends know the whole story. A primary point was so people had a good vibe about him and would let him be. In the past two years  he had cancer of the face that spread. He had been treated with surgery to remove the tumor. At a shade over 18yo, he set to rest as every night he was shivvering in normal home temp and couldn't keep weight on; refusing to leave the couch; hating being put in pet clothes/infant flannel.

2017-2020 were tough years for him adjusting to a new stray friend we “adopted” from the wild. They were startingn to get along. It played into the stress.I feel bad about this. it split us up somewhat.  My younger cat was more forceful about claiming me. It weighs on me; Frankly it seemed like a few rape attempts also that difficulted the social cue of ‘normal cat spooning”.. Mr Puffs was able to get out on a van ride of Fogelsville,PA about three months ago. He also gave some love to his plush hedgehog toy. He gave it a consensual drilling every once a while or daily.

What you should know about Mr Puffs:

:My grilling deputy  and trout inspector

:Loved to play the mysterious thing under blanket or newspaper game

:Love to play the mysterious tapping fingers under the many basement stairs game

:Fine taste in music and loved being my karaoke fan. Love you buddy. Not very keen on Tv after Keenan Michael Keys left Animal  Planet's morning show.

:Enjoyed less usual faire like potatoes and adored bbq chicken pizza; he could handle medium wings. He WAS WARNED each time and kept him away from it till it was obvious he wanted it. Honey ham, turkey, .. and salami**. Mind you, he has never been overweight and was complimented by his first vet for muscle tone. It's his compliment to own.

:Enjoyed jumping apartment building gaps while in town: we had to rough it for a month in a storage facility after an unexpected eviction.. which we then would go for walks 1a-3a to get his exercise and water the landscape mulch at 11th street Fred Meyers. There's a little marsh back behind the store that became our little daytime haven.

:His Hiking career started in Eugene, OR. We would go night walking ,w/o a leash and whenever someone was coming he would detour off the sidewalk and into the nearest house’s bushes.. This was optimal because he would get back on the lit sidewalk and learn to keep course. This advanced to 5-7 mile hikes from U Oregon campus to Hendrix park and back. One trip such trip he was panting so he didn’t really want to run away anywhere or into traffic fortunately.. The sun had come out of the cloud cover and heated things up above the usual. We stopped at an icecream place on the way back on the edge of campus: Agate and 19th. Even though he was tired, he was a smart and collected guy. so he slinked to the back of the shop till I came back out..It was like escorting the supermodel of manly cats.  It was at this time I knew leashes or more distant locations were necessary.  

:While we were driving back to Pennsylvania, he decided to have a playfrenzy on the dashboard while I was in heavy traffic nearabouts of Nebraska/Rushmore on the interstate.

:Short story : Since he now had room in the yard to runaround Puffs tested his speed and momentum to get up tree trunks. Our front yard had a medium sized maple oak something. Mr Puffs ran up the tree and alarmed a family of nesting doves. The doves and Mr Puffs seemed to flee the tree foilage each in horizontal directions at about 8ft off the ground.  

:Other than a shoulder injury from a fight of somesort, he was very durable. His parent's owners had coined him 'Jaco” after the famous bass player.. A green -eyed Russian Blue tuxedo, angular white paws.  with little white hairs across his coat. At times I also referred to him as “Cactus Jack”. Massive front incisors like a miniature sabertooth. I pitied the rabbits who he caught which were still squealing.

:Another Short Story. I coaxed my mom to live a little and put that front addition on the house she always wanted. She got an enclosed porch. Theres an open porch on the back of the house also. When the framing was done.. I went out to the backyard to enjoy the night sky, I heard nothing. When I turned around I had two bright eyes scaring me  to the ground. From 9ft, the top of the roof porch he looked at me Apparently Puffs had climbed the 8ft of framing from the work table, crossed the rafters, crossed the whole house roof and decided to voyeur me on the other side of the house. I was very glad he didn't tempt the electric lines whose pole he had tried to climb other days.Stressing moments on me as well.

:Puffs became a pro at taking baths since 2017, and getting nails trimmed at the same time. The trim helped him jump (getting pad purchase)  and helped the furniture too.

:Another quick story. Cats can swim. I took him to go swimming in the creek and that went pretty good the first time. (Must always be on leash. And probably use partially inflated swimmy muscle). He was really comfortable in the water if it was shallow(2.5ft). The problem with the creek is its near a road so don't be near roads even with the leash on.  He was swimming a good crawl in about 4ft.  A fish mustve brushed his foot because he panicked and started jumping out of the water like a bass on a hook. I literally had to swing him in the air (with leash) and onto the shore into some leaves and grass. There's some fault in not being close enough to him to pick him up out of the water directly. He swam pretty good and at range.  To ease that trauma.. (nearly heart attack probably; that went sour) , I let him calm down. At a much shallower area no taller than his knees(5-6”) I set him into the stream without much resentment and just petted him to get him calm.  (He wasn't a lap cat before that either.) At that point the swimming  got shuttered for downhill walks and other casual stuff.

: On similar climbing points.. even till about 2015, he liked to jump the gap from the upright piano top (4ft) to the top of the entertainment center (7.5 ft) plus the hallway gap of  3.5 ft and he was really solid at it. Would stay up there for a while and then jump down onto the sofa table (3 ft tall).. He was always calculating a new feat. When that one item stopped being in his wheelhouse it was clear he was getting bothered/ annoyed and the stress of a cat territory issue wore him down.

If you were to be near him, you'd end up watching him. This statue of a male cat with really long tail. Not lemur-long but really long.. a gray panther. And, maybe you'd try to pet him since he looked inviting. Yet, you wouldn't get much petting done. He'd probably tolerate two brushes and then give your hand a carving with his claws, hiss at you and find a new place to observe the room,  That said, he would cruise the neighborhood looking which apartment I might've visited, slink in and check out how other people decorated. A very dignified personality, sometimes to the point of indignant.  He was  a cat you'd want to clone over and over because he was just that cool on himself. Cloning him was on the slate too until those type of businesses were closed with political force.. He actually inspired a jazz song  (currently in midi form) that I’ve yet to record. I was tore up about his first cancer surgery so I started writing. Hope that will be out soon enuff. I hope this can help you appreciate Mr Puffs. He was buried at a spot he chose. It was nearby a set of brush he would choose to hide in hours near the middle of  hikes.

.. he loved to hide.  Back in Oregon I'd take him  in the van with my mentally handicapped clients. He'd be set loose to get his relaxation in. By the time it was time to leave. he wanted to stay. He hid in bushes and culverts. I learned very quickly that such outings had to be local or I'd be driving back hours to go get him at night or worse. Once I knew that, we'd take rides on the bus to the edges of the bus line and just chill on hills overlooking boating lakes. Fern Ridge Reservoir had a nice pine overlook off Territorial hwy.  He really enjoyed outings and variety. Maybe thats what kept him interested as a matter of longevity. I want to end on that.  He showed me lessons in best intentions and good in the bad.. and murdering all my Egyptian spiny mice within hours of acquiring them and their replacements. Its not like I wouldn't have gotten him a feeder mouse but there were plenty stinking up the walkway as it was. I'm blessed to have spent that month sheltered in a renta-shed with him. It seems the alternative .. without having enough for a pet deposit elsewhere (that moment) was to lower my standards for the landlords daughter and by whatever 'influence' she had. 'evicted us for periodic renovations”. So, eventually we chose instead to leave and he got a brims of fieldmice, chipmunks and forest romping. I hope that was an appreciated choice. He liked city life too. Should you choose to tribute to Mr Puffs, I welcome it. He’d be the type of cat Dos Equis beer would be looking for if he actually drank it.

Hope you’re feeling better, Puffs; BFF 

[arkus-rhapsode]

Eden’s Zero Chapter 1 Review

Hey guys, now before I dive into this already longer than usual review, I did wanna take this time to mention something. Its been no secret that I turned on Mashima and FT pretty hardly after the end of FT and some of you may be aware that I was moderately active in the fanbase with putting out my reviews and such. That said some may liken that shift in mentality to me not liking how the story went and a common critique of fans is that when what they’re fans of doesn’t gel with what they want they wanna destroy it. As if the fan has ownership of the source of the fanaticism.

I admit there are times that I’ve question decisions on Hiro Mashima’s end and has posted rewrites, but that’s not me doing it out of a sense of ownership. I’m doing it because I have a standard. Being a fan of something and letting your disappointment get to you and fester into salty, bitchy purest is one thing, but being a person who’s judging what a series puts out and actually caring about the quality of what’s in the popular media is important. FT got negative reviews in its latter half because it was that bad. By the end of the series it was legit that bad. Now I don’t say that is someone who was in the fanbase and hated Hiro’s decisions cause they weren’t mine, I hated them because it was bad writing. I’m a reader with standards, as are all of you, and in the digestion of media we make distinctions between good and bad. I make this claim with more concrete surety now that I’ve been around longer and have reviewed more series than just FT, I think it be harder to believe if I made this case when I was just starting and all I was talking about at the time was FT.

Some of you might remember when I first started out on MHA, my second chapter I ever reviewed I had found it boring and mundane and to date its my least popular MHA review and I still stand by that assertion. I hold everything to the same standard, and that includes FT. The reason I write this is that while throughout this review I will mention comparison’s to FT’s first chapter (and yes, even ways Eden’s Zero improved on it), but I will be holding it to the same standard. So this entire review won’t be me holding a grudge against Hiro, but it will be me holding it to the same standard as I do everything I read. That out of the way lets dive in.

We open on a hill side and met our MC named Shiki. Beside him is the mecha demon from the cover page and what they see is a... dragon. Yeah, Hiro I thought you wanted this to be wholely original?

On the hand I actually like this scene in the sense robo demon here is actually encourging actual adventure (something FT lacked) and its kinda amazing listening to this demon looking guy talking about friendship, yet on the other hand, damnit Hiro. Is this the only thing how to write about? Like damn man.

We cut to the future where we see our main female Lucy-I mean Rebecca! Y’know I could make a Rebecca from One Piece joke, but she’s kinda already a bit of a decisivee figure so I’m not gonna bother.

I mean its okay. Its just castle theme park. Also Rebecca we find out is apparently a youtuber. Look if DBS can have GodTube then I can put up with Blue Cate (Aoneko) website. Also yeah Happy here, no sugar coating its just Happy. Also Rebecca here purposely made her skirt short. Just because you point out the sexualization in canon doesn’t make it better, ya still drew it, Hiro.

We see that the theme park is full of robots and each one acts as an assist in sending the guest through some kind of medieval simulator. And if anyone has seen Westworld you know where this is heading. To be fair I love worldbuilding so please, explore!

So we find out Rebecca’s dream is to have one million suscribers and now here’s where I gotta give props to Hiro because he actual made a dream for a character that doesn’t seem like it can be achieved a chapter from now. Granted this seems a bit hard to actually quantify, but this dream could potenially evolve into something of why she wants the suscribers and could be like Nami making the map of the world that getting video of unknown locations may actually be worth something to the general population.

We see that Rebecca chooses to go on a monster hunting quest and they encounter...

...This thing. Also it seems Rebecca’s character quirk is she really likes cats I guess? But this doesn’t last long as someone crashes down on mecha cat.

Okay that was kinda funny. I mean if this was FT would’ve actually gotten the panty shot so maybe Hiro has learned his lesson! Also note that wrench!

Oh god damnit Hiro. So this tarzan guy after acting like an animal is knocked out by Rebecca. Y’know it took about 60 chapters before Natsu got all up in Lucy’s chest, guess we’re cutting straight to the chase here.

Okay is joke with here just going be about here short skirt? Damning it with faint praise here, but at least he still hven’t flashed us them yet. Also Tarzan here is the only human on the island.

We get some scenes of Shiki here wanting to be friends with Rebecca cause she’s a human and Rebecca isn’t interested and she returns to the Granbell town where Shiki is there and the robots know who he is.

Shiki’s expressions and creepy advances really gives off this tinge of sci-fi horror, unfortunate Hiro doesn’t really go that route and we’ll get to it. Also that wizard looking robot from the color page is also here.

They then have a party where the robots all celebrate them having a costumer for the first time in so long they have a party being nice to Rebecca and lavishing her with stuff outside is robot that looks like Robin Hood and he reports to his boss this machine king.

Oh look, Hades if he was a robot.

We see Shiki trying to bond with Rebecca and it leads to him expressing he wants to leave the kingdom and see another country, but we also learn he’s in charge of fixing this and the robots are acting up lately. We find out that the one who was talking to Shiki and is his “Grandfather” was called the Demon King a robot designed for playing that role in the park.

Umm Rebecca... That’s being a dick. So you don’t like it, so you decide to cut it, cause it bothers you. You could’ve framed it like, “If he fixes you up then maybe he needs better vision” or “He’s been so nice to me, let me do something for him.” And what makes this worse s that Shiki is asleep, so she doesn’t even consult his feelings. Like seriously, that’s not being a good friend . But for contrivances sake I’m sure Shiki will wake up and love it, won’t he?

Huh? I was wrong instead we got shitty 80s comedy. I don’t know if that’s better or worse.

Y’know I said I’d give Hiro atleast two free fanservice moments for his first 3 chapters. He’s now used all of them up in a single chapter. Also Rebecca is tied to a stake while robots with torches surround her along with the machine king.

Shiki is also there and here’s something that did remind me of rave, the tightness of the first chapter. Everything seems to flow like one continuous story and doesn’t seem to do some dumb interlude like FTs first chapter did with that awkward moment where Lucy leaves Natsu and she’s just randomly in the park reading.

The King wants to use her ship to leave this world and we get som kind of motivation out of him.

Oh wow, for a first chapter villain that’s actually a really deep thing to unload. That as amusment park hosts they must’ve just been seen as pleasure tools and with no one around these robots who seem to be senstinent must’ve felt betrayed and...

Oooooor you cut out all moral ambiguity by just saying they have a virus. Sure. Trust me, this is where it gets stupid really stupid. And that’s the inconsistency.

So these robots I guess are like the ones from the Animatrix where they just kinda develop sentience out of nowhere. But unlike Animatrix it doesn’t seem to imply when they developed this sentience and that they began to think they were being abused.

Tired of Friendship already, it ain’t leaving.

So why do you hate humans? They abandoned you I guess, but there’s not other robot saying “hey our times were fun together” no everyone is like they left us to rot  so we hate them. Not like Humans did anything legitimate bad. We actually see that at the end of the chapter that there is some sort of central battery on the park that all robots are hooked up to. You could make their reason for hating humans that. That even though they left these sentiment robots still had a little kingdom to themselves, but realized that its all just going to end one day and humans didn’t even bother to unplug them. They’re existence is literally knowing when they’ll die, imagine that as why they harbor negative emotions and maybe Shiki actually fixing things might’ve actually been prolonging their lives so maybe that be why they kept him around. This whole sentience things just feels like Hiro wanted to do a trope of crazy robots and ended using multiple to fit the whatever story purpose at the moment.

You do run the planet, dumbasses. This entire plane, apparently for hundreds of years, has been solely controlled by you. Maye this should be rephrased as, going to the place that built you to get revenge or as I spoiled with the battery we’ll take the ship to get more power for our kingdom?

Shiki doesn’t do anything and kinda lets the robots just wail on him as he found out all things in his life were a lie. Then Rebecca gives a friendship speech. A stupid stupid friendship speech.

You’re right, Rebecca! Too bad we didn’t see that. I’m serious we barely see memories of Shiki with any robot outside of the demon king and Michael so there’s no weight to this conflict. We only get the vague sense they raised hm, but there’s no moments of Shiki really laughingg and enjoying their company outside of the party with Rebecca which rather is made more for getting Shiki to like Rebecca for this moment.

Shiki remembers what his Grandpa the Demon King said and just blows them all away.

We see Shiki’s hand and apparently he has these marks indicating he has Ether gear. The power system of this series.

You’re sentiment! You have out grown your programming! You can choose to have a concept of friendship.

So they fight with shitty action scenes (If I can give Horikoshi a hard time for how he draws his fight choreography, then I sure as hell will give Hiro the once over.) Happy manages to save Rebecca and like Happy from early FT, he basically spots off exposition on powers.

So is it like a literal gear? Because Happy afterward destincties as the Gear of Gravity, so is it like a devil fruit? Is ether in all humans, but this specific gear brings it out in a certain way? If its internal then I guess its like the magic circuits from Fate? And then every of has their own unique variation like Nen? Like cause Happy gives it the distinction of Gravity it doesn’t seem like Shiki gives a reason why he has this power. I’m hoping \its like devil fruits, literal gears you implant and then it brings out your ether in a certain way.

Shiki punches out the machine king and cause a massive collapse.

Credit where credit is due, Hiro actually did build up the reveal of this power throughout the chapter and its actually really well done. Kinda reminds of something Oda would do with subtly building up a devil fruit power without revealing it. Like Crocodile drying out a flower but it isn’t stated his power is specifically sand.

They then flee when the other robots rally and Shiki takes Rebecca back to her ship.

This scene would actually be really nice if we actually saw more young shiki actually having fun with the machines and not a being a creeper with them.

Shiki and Rebecca take off and we see the universe.

Not gonna lie, that’s a really pretty shot. Like damn, I could get behind this.

It seems like worlds in this universe are basically like kingdom hearts worlds. They’re not real “worlds” so much as they are islands in space.

Sure, keep the mystery alive why don’t you, no that be too much.

Well great place to end the chapter. Little dry of a first story, but I definetly see that has room for improvment and there is something-Wait this isn’t the last page? But what else is there to talk about. There’s nothing left-

Oh for fuck sake. That’s right they were trying to send SHiki away. Because apparently these robots thought there was no way to restore battery life even if stayed.

Here’s a tip, ifyou really care, and had such a close bond, maybe tell him to leave? Tell SHiki the truth that you guys are tied to a battery and instead of Shiki vowing to leave for the stars so he can make 100 friends (I’m not kiding that’s his actual goal here). Then this would be an interesting goal.

But no, you have to act like human hating jackasses and shatter the boy’s entire reality, just so you he would go out and “change the universe”

This would be a really nice scene with a very nice amount of character development starting point, if we actually saw their past. All we know is they raised Shiki, but its never really seemed like they’re loving or caring or Shiki openly gets upset if one of them had a problem. Again the biggest flaw with this chapter is that it sacrifices seeing one potentially interesting relationship (Shiki and the robots) for another one (Rebecca).

So we end on this page which reveals that Shiki’s goal is to have a hundred friends. Not going to say something snarky I just realized this is the same motivation as Yuki from future diary. Like before the crazy yandere shit.

Post Chapter follow up:

Lets be positive and look at the good stuff in this chapter. The first thing great about this chapter is it improved upon two of the biggest failings in the first chapter FT. Goals established and world building. Not only does this set up force Hiro Mashima to actually world build (literally) but each person in the first chapter has a goal that doesn’t seem like it can be accomplished quickly. It means we can have investment in the story.

Another thing I’ll give is Shiki is an okay MC. He has more personality than Natsu, but not as much as Haru and this first chapter is about him. Its easy to understand that Lucy is often considered the MC of FT because it literally focuses on her for the story than Natsu. But this chapter had a healthy balance.

Also the power system at least seems to have some definition. Unlike how anyone could have magic yet normal people just don’t choose to use it like in FT. Ether Gear seems to be a powersource that only a select few can use. Now we need to see first if there are ways of combating it like technology or such so a non ether gear person can still fight.

It also has its own unique aesthetic. Ft is a pretty generic fantasy world. It doesn’t have the bleakness of bereserk or the Japanese aesthetic of naruto. You could say Black CLover, Fairy Tail, and Seven Deadly sins all had their first chapter happen in the same world and I’d have trouble arguing it.

Now on to the crappy stuff. This series suffers from the usual Mashima foibles such as the sexual harassment, the stupidly way it tries to justify and give all conflict happy ending, not actually bothering to have a situation drawn out ad built up too, etc. I mean for the first conflict of the chapter its a heavy one, these guys raised SHiki yet their own mentality is against humans so Shiki has to choose, but instead of actually answering that question, it turns out there was no real conflict and the machines were just faking.

As for my like for Shiki, I flat hate Rebecca. She is so pointless and useless. Look I will defend Lucy and she actually can d things. First chapter she saved Natsu by using aquarius. But Rebecca? She’s just all of the bad traits of post timeskip Lucy. She is used for pointless fanservice, does nothing contribute, and becomes a mouth piece for friendship.

Speaking of friendship as a concept and goal here, Hiro just rewrite what you mean. Have deeper meaning than friends for once. There is ways you could take the motivation “I want to make 100 friends” in a compelling way. Prehaps Shiki is going out to make his own world where he can make a happy place for people where they can laugh and cry in harmony. Like story telling wise its pretty weak.

Like me personally, I would’ve taken the first chapter like this, the robots are sentinet and they are nice to Shiki and Rebecca and they have genuine fun together. They gradually reveal that they are shutting down maybe one starts acting wonky and tries to hide it and maybe the machine king is the real bad guy. He has sentinece and hates humans and he wants to eliminate SHiki and Rebecca and that’s because they’re shutting down. The other robots say they don’t care they were abandoned, they were mad at first but Shiki showed them that why they loved catering to humans. King and Shiki fight and they all reveal they’re shutting down and Shiki cries he doesn’t want them to go. The robots say its inevitable and they don’t hpw to recharge the battery and Shiki vows to leave the planet and search for a power source to bring them all back. Then that’s shiki’s goal and it even can cause questions like “Is it worth all this for machines?” or “who designed them maybe we can figure out the right substance to power them up?”

or if Hiro wanted to go a more darker route. Have the machines have no sentience and literally be dolls for the King who turns out to be a human who stayed here on Granbell and made his own little kingdom. Make it a bit meta on how Shiki’s only friends were just hollow imitations of people who were only friends because that’s what their programming dictated and they can all be switched off. It be meta as critiquing Ft and how all the guild characters basically had no conflicts, all got along, and were just friends with no depth or reason.

This all highlights the issue with Hiro Mashima and that’s he is not a good a writer. Hiro is an incredibly talented person and can come up with incredibly unique ideas and looks, which is why his cover pages are the best things he puts out because its him free forming. But writing. He has a limited scope on that and stuff like sci-fi and fantasy can be very morally grey things. But Hiro doesn’t seem to understand tragedy in the sense that its tragic because a person fails or dies unsatisfied. But he only seems to know how to write painfully obvious concepts like “save the world” or “friendship” instead doing a concept like “what it is to be a hero” like MHA does which can have a variety of answers to it.

So what’s the final verdict? Well I actually am going to do something different than usual. I’m going to say what I though the quality was compared to FT and then to what I’d consider this work compared to anything else.

In comparison to FT, Eden’s Zero gets a Final verdict of 8/10

Improves on a lot of FT’s first chapter flaws

Created a more unique environment for a story

And actually has a lot tighter narrative

But in comparison to everything else...

Final Verdict: 5/10

Even if it wasn’t Hiro, its a pretty generic start (some names aren’t even all that inspired like Machine King, Demon King)

Potential to grow into something better is there

Nothing is outright offensive

Cool concept

[nightmaretyrantvantas]

Gracie lucio writing wips if any of you were curious(to perhaps be posted soon)

Normal universe writings

She looked into Damian’s eyes uncertainly, briefly convince he was trying to prank her. There was no way he was deciding now, in a locked cell in a mission gone so wrong, tied together and both hazy from injuries, was the best time to talk about their feelings.

Even though his eyes were a little glazed over from either the pain of the head injury and stab wound or the small delirium of his slight blood loss, they were stubbornly determined and fierce as he leaned his face closer to hers. She caught a wisp of his shampoo from how close they were and ‘oh sweet moon goddess he’s fucking serious’  now was NOT the time for her to get all flustered this was a serious situation and she needed Damian to be more focused and maybe a tad more lucid.

~~~

“ Hey Dick?” The thirteen year old’s companion gave her his attention from his position beside her as her reading cushion, the two of them having curled up after a long patrol in the rain on a self made nest of blankets and pillows beside the lit fireplace. The bright blue eyed boy smiled and rested his chin on top of her head from where it was nestled against his shoulder. 

“ Yeah Gracie?” She took a small breath and glanced up at him while setting aside her book. She had been reading and re-reading the same sentence over and over again for the past half hour, deep in thought and decided to banish any negative ones right away. She reached out and found his hand, gripping it tight seeking a comfort he gave by twisting his body so she rested against his chest.

“ You’re always going to be my best friend right?” He smiled at the question and and chuckled softly.

“ Of course silly. Best friends forever. We promised after all.” She was quiet for a moment and looked ahead of her.

“ So...we’ll always be together right? You...you wont leave me like everyone else right...?” The only sound for a few moments was the sound of the rain pattering on the window and the snap and crackle of the fire. Dick’s other arm wrapping around her in a hug as he squeezed her hand.

“ I’m not leaving you. We’ll stay together...no matter what.”

~~~

I heard the safe house door open and I looked up tiredly from the couch, huddled up in the smoke scented leather jacket that was much too big for me to look at the tall man I considered my friend.

“ J-jason...” He gave a sigh and put out his cigarette in a nearby ash tray and sat beside me, ruffling my hair.

“ Dont worry kid, my buddy Roy is out there now diverting anyone who possibly followed us. From now on, until we hear the signal from Dickie, you are officially dead and off the grid.” I nodded and leaned into his hand almost desperate for affectionate physical contact. I was cold, tired, and shaken from the thought a silver bullet had almost pierced my heart a second time if it hadnt been for Jason and Roy. He didnt say anything about the way I pushed into his hand like he didnt mention the way I moved closer and curled into his side for comfort, trembling inside the warm confines of his jacket. All he did was ask what kind of take out I’d want for dinner so he could text Roy to pick some up on his way back, as he was starved but too lazy to go out himself at the moment. I shrugged meekly and stayed quiet, soon falling asleep in his scent and already missing my bed back in the tower...

~~~

“ aaaaachoo!” The ten year old lycran whimpered in pain as she shivered under her quilts and blankets, sniffling through her stuffed up nose pathetically. She felt like she was DYING even as the small relief of a cold rag was laid on her burning forehead. She looked up blearily expecting to see the tall grandfatherly figure of Alfred above her checking on her and gave a slow blink when she saw Bruce’s even taller, bold, blurry shape beside her bed. She felt his big worn hand against her cheek and leaned against its coolness gratefully, cheek scratching against his callouses soothingly. There was another hand that patted her messy, tangled mop of hair and smoothed it down a little. He was talking to her but she was so tired she barely caught any words. 

“ Bruce? Will she be ok...?” Dick’s voice floated into her ears and she opened her eyes, not even realizing she had shut them in the first place. Her eyes drooped and landed on on her concerned partner who now accompanied the large adoptive father figure, peering around his frame to look at her with wide worried blue eyes. She tried to tell him she was fine but the moment she opened her mouth a surge of fiery pain shot through her throat and made her hack and cough violently, leaning her now throbbing head further into her pillows with a miserable groan after.

“ Im not sure yet Chum...we cant have a normal doctor check her out so im trying to find someone trustworthy to examine her. For now, we should let her rest. If you’d like you can help Alfred bring her things while I go out looking for a doctor.” 

~~~

"Here."

She looked up at Damian a bit startled then down at the box he held in front of her. She blinked once, then twice as she examined the white box and the various holes in the side and the neat pale green bow keeping it tied shut before looking back up at the boy wonder.

"Um...this is sweet of you Damian but...my birthday is a few months away..." He grunted and stepped into her room, noting how it was a little disheveled and unorganized with case works and evidence and clues, just like the rooms clearly drained owner. As Damian looked at the shorter girl he held back from saying anything her extra messy hair or the dark smudges under her eyes from all nighters. He did sigh at her hesitance though.

"Im well aware. I just...i...just open it already." She rolled her eyes a little but obeyed his command nonetheless, undoing the ribbon and pulling the lid off.

She didnt know what she expected to be in there. The past two all nighters mustve been screwing with her to have not recognized the scent coming from the box. She dropped the lid to the ground and put a hand to her mouth in surprise.

"I...i found him wandering outside a shelter in Gotham...when i brought him back in they said he was an abandoned emotional support animal that had slipped out the door. I thought of you so i...filled out the papers and got him his shots and everything. I figured after all the hassle months ago and the extra work loads youve been taking on to help out Grayson and Father...perhaps a supportive companion would be beneficial to your mental health..." She looked up at him as he almost over explained his gift and she looked back into the box, slowly reaching in and lifting the year old black and brown Maine coon kitten from the box and into her arms. The movement awoken him and the kitten meowed at Gracie and sniffed her before purring contently and getting cozy again. The sound of the purring and the feeling of the cat's warmth and breathing body and soft fur made her heart warm and her stress ease away like the tide. She knew he didnt just find this beauty by chance, he likely searched shelters and adoption centers for him. She looked up at Damian and happily moved forward and kissed his cheek with a smile.

"Thank you Damian i love him! Youre too kind" he shrugged but smiled at the two as she cooed softly and cradled the fluffy beast kissing his little head. He knew the cat was something she needed to keep from falling into that dark place, a co.fort and a responisiblity that would keep her from restarting that cycle.

He cleared his throat a little and reseized her attention.

"What will you name him?" She hummed a little and got a playful little grin that made him narrow his eyes.

"I think...I'll name him Robin."

~~~~~~~

Young justice au story wips(The main ship for her in the young justice universe is Dick X Gracie) 

“ You cant just--Are you even listening to me?” Gracie dragged herself into a sitting position and leaned close to the half-kryptonian with a bitter but playful grin.

“ Nope. Not a word Connor. Im afraid I was much too busy staring deeply into your handsome eyes like in the scene of a romance novel. So I missed every single word.” He stared back at her but snorted out a laugh at her joke, rolling his eyes with a smile of his own. The smile made her relax, feel more at ease with the situation. She couldnt help it, and she lifted her camera up and aimed.

“ Connor look over here with that smile!” He turned his head still smiling, one eyebrow quirked curiously as she hit the button and the camera flashed with a beep and a blink. She lifted her head from the viewfinder with a much more joyful grin, looking rather pleased with herself.

“ Now THAT one is getting printed professionally, or else no one will believe its real.” They both shared a small laugh and she set the camera aside to lean against him, shoulder to arm while she fiddled with the photo settings. They settled into a comforting silence for a few long moments

“ She isnt that bad....or bad at all really. Under different circumstances we would be good friends by now...” She finally spoke up, not taking her eyes off her camera.

“ But?”

She gave a sigh and leaned her head against him in exasperation before looking up to him.

“ Its not her. Its...It’s all the conflicting and difficult feelings that arise when I see her and Robin together...getting so...close and dare I say flirty. Sometimes seeing it makes me downright sick to my stomach and I just need to leave the room.” There was a long silence and she opened her mouth to apologize for bringing up feelings. But she never got the chance.

~~~

“ Dont...you win...you win ok? I surrender.”

The words were resentful, but defeated as Gracie aka Alpha Wolf dropped her staff and utility belt to the ground and raised her hands in surrender. She stared at the tall armed man that stood a few feet before her, the monster that has haunted her every step and shadow since the death of her parents. She stared into his apathetic eyes with her head no longer held up proud, but hung almost submissively with hateful eyes. She ignored the any reasoning against her decision, ignored the sounds of her pained teammates coming back to their senses and realizing what was going on.

“ Alpha dont!”

“ A-alpha d-dont do it!” 

She grit her teeth and ignored their voices, ignored Superboy’s warning shout as he started to get up with difficulty. She kept all her focus on the monster in front of her, determined to protect her team, her friends, her pack. Just like she should as an Alpha. 

She never wanted this man to hurt anyone precious to her ever again. Not if she could help it. 

“P...please...you win. I give up. Kill me, capture me, do whatever. Just...please, let the others go free....its me you want not them...just let hi--them go...” The pleas burned her mouth like acid, as if she had swallowed silver and Wolfs bane.But she gave them, staring into his eyes and keeping her hands up in the air. She wouldnt let him take anyone else away from her again. Not this time. 

Not with Robin dangling in his steel grip with a gun to his temple. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Tadaaaa! A bunch of my DC and my Gracie writing wips! Im working on all of these at different paces but theyre getting done! 

If there are any particular ones of these you guys wanna see published soon please do tell me in my inbox! Itll motivate me to finish it faster! You can also send new writing prompts or story ideas for me to write too! I hope you guys enjoy these little sneak peeks of future oneshots!

[peaches-of-1]

(BTS) Golden Lover: Chapter 3

Namjoon x Black!Reader

High Fantasy, Magic, spells, gods and goddesses

Mstrlst in bio!

“Darling daughter?” Mother called.

“Yes?” You replied.

She nodded towards your plate, “Are you not hungry?”

You shook your head and set your utensils down, “Please excuse me. It seems that my sickness lingers. I’ll be turning in early.”

“I’ll walk you to your room, Princess.” Jimin stood from his seat.

“I can--” You began, but Father cut you off. “She’d quite enjoy that. Thank you, Jimin.”

You wanted a shower. You wanted to be alone with your thoughts and smelling salts and a few cats, but no. Jimin chattered excitedly about how beautiful your Egypt was. How warm and humid but irreplaceable it’s beauty was.

“Um, Princess? I couldn’t help but notice how you were during dinner tonight. You didn’t get some bad news, did you?” His voice softened.

The worst, “Of course not. I just...I haven’t had much time to myself today. I’ve been quite busy entertaining the guests, getting to know you all.”

“I wouldn’t lie to your future husband, Princess (Y/N).” He laughed.

You swallowed hard and his smile fell.

He looked down, “I didn’t mean offense, Princess.”

“I don’t wanna marry you. I decided that from the moment I met you.”

“I see.”

You looked at him, “Please don’t be upset.  I just...my father is making me choose a husband within the next two days, before the end of the festival.”

He looked at you, “We leave in three days.”

“Of course.” You sighed. “I just. I don’t wanna lose the throne due to my being stubborn. I want a good king to rule by my side, but I want to love him as well.”

“Marrying for love? You are a special one, princess.”

You scoffed and laughed, “Whatever do you mean?”

“As a royal, I would think that you would have given up marrying for true affections by the time of puberty. Often thinking instead who can help their country or prestige the most. However, you still hold onto the hope.” He looked up at the sky.

“Should I give up hope, though?”

Jimin shook his head, “Never. I believe love is powerful and one of the purest things on Earth. If you were to give up on it, then what would you have left?”

A small smile played no your lips, “You speak our language well.”

“Thank you, Princess. May I ask you a strange question? It’s something both Hobi and I were wondering.”

“You may if you tell me who Hobi is.” You replied with your arms behind you.

He didn’t know you were taking the long way to your room in order to speak to him more, but he spoke curiously. Kind but honest, and you could feel the amount of love he had in his heart. How he gave it to everyone and everything.

“Hobi is our nickname for Prince Hoseok.” Jimin smiled, “Would you like to prepare a dance with us? For the festival send off that is. We’re both proficient in dance, and your father was singing your praises at dinner. It’s ok if you don’t. Even if we cannot work as marriage partners, then I’d at least want to work as friends. Performers.”

“You’d want to dance with me?”

He nodded in ernest. It was true that you were often seen dancing in the square with your body covered in jingling gold. Oftentimes in the middle, you’d stop a robbery or something, but a princess had to know her people to serve them. That was your philosophy at least.

Back to the matter at hand. This Jimin was interesting, very interesting.

You nodded, “So, whose style would we do. Yours or mine?”

“I was thinking a fusion of our styles. Don’t you think that would be the most fitting?”

You smiled for the first time in hours, “I’d enjoy that very much. I know just where we can practice and teach each other the basics.”

This time, the prince smiled so big that his eyes disappeared, “Yes! Thank you, dear princess! Guide me, and then we can meet after dinner.”

Right, you were supposed to be unwell. You led him to the dancing spot in the garden where a stage would most likely be set up. The grass there was just growing back from last time you turned down a marriage. Then you both went to the door in front of your bedroom. As he returned to the eating hall, you snuck away for a quick swim.

A small meow was heard from the sideline, Qasab Alsukar. You told him to stay where he was and not to jump in. He walked to your pile of clothing and laid down in them. It was a stunning starry night. All your worries drifted away as you floated on your back, your twisted hair fanning out around your face.

You thought about the princes and were glad that you had been honest with them. Even if you wouldn’t be getting married to them, you could still be close to them. Having dueled with Jungkook, showed some artistic landscapes to Taehyung, Jimin and Hoseok had become your dance partners, and Yoongi was your fellow animal lover.

He had even asked you if he could take one of the cubs home, and you said yes once they were a bit older. Then there was Namjoon.

Why did your heart do that everytime you thought of him? It pounded in your ears, and you closed your eyes to shut out the sound. It didn’t work. He was gorgeous. His smile made you want to smile. The way he treated a pet that was not his. Qasab Alsukar could’ve been a street cat, but he still showed the kitten the same care as a house cat. Kim Namjoon. (Y/N) Kim. That’d be your name if you were to marry him...or his brother. The way Yoongi talked about his friend, it seemed as though he gave that kindness to everyone.

Mayhaps he’d be a good husband...maybe you did lo--

The splash of a rock to your left startled you, and you turned to see who it was. Your relaxed demeanor turning stern.

“What is the meaning of this?” You ordered before you recognized the person standing there was the man you had just been thinking of.

Kim Namjoon bowed low, “Pardon the intrusion, Princess (Y/N). There was a snake approaching you, and it did not seem you noticed. I threw the rock to hit it or at least scare it off.”

Looking around, you saw a serpent unmoving in the waters nearby. It most certainly would’ve killed you if it had gotten any closer.

You turned to him once more, “Thank...you...”

But he was gone.

Ah! Dinner must’ve been over. You put on your clothing after drying off quickly and then began walking towards the meeting place for you, Hoseok, and Jimin to begin practicing. As you got close to the archway, you realized. Kim Namjoon had seen you naked. Your breasts had been above water. How long had he been standing there silent? You made a note to speak to him the next time you saw him as your cheeks began blazing.

Alsukar mewed at your heels, and you picked him up, “Mayhaps I should get guard dogs since you did nothing to warn me, you little rascal.”

He licked your nose and meowed. Too cute. As you went into the dance room, the three of you and a drummer practiced until morning. None of you wanting to take too long of a break. Wanting to do your best to show unity and friendship and just in awe of how well you worked together and not wanting to break the flow of good energy.

You were woken up by a beautiful serving girl. Bahr. She called your name and said that she was relieved to see you. Groggy, you blinked and wondered what she was talking about. The kingdom had been worried about you and the princes since no one knew where you had gone and they had found a dead poisonous snake in the pool where you were known to sneak off to.

“We were just practicing for the festival. Where’s Iset?” You dismissed her worry with a smile.

“Her room.” Bahr replied.

“I apologize for the worry. Please inform everyone that we are fine. I’m sure father will be happy to hear me interacting with the princes.”

She nodded, “Does that mean you’ll be performing at the festival with them?”

You looked at her, “It does. I’ll be dancing with Princes Jimin and Hoseok. A fusion dance for the occasion.”

She couldn’t help but smile, “Does that mean you’ll be finding a husband this time around?”

“Maybe. I think I’ll have to if I want to be next in line.” You looked down.

Bahr had been here for many years but spoke formally, “Forgive me if I am speaking out of turn, but...I want to see you married. If you do not love your husband, then you can learn how to. Then you and your kingdom will be happy.”

She kissed your forehead and left. Breakfast had been left on a platter by your bedside. You must’ve missed it in order to sleep after dancing for so long. Iset showed up while you were eating and scolded you for disappearing. She called you a cat what with the way you went where you want when you wanted to. She went on and on with her heart on her sleeves and then asked you where you had been after all.

“With the princes…” You said. “We’re planning something for the festival and were practicing all night.”

Iset raised a brow, “For the festival or just for you? Which princes? What?”

You explained yourself and promised it was for the festival, “I’d never fool around like that...at least with nobles.” A small grin crossed your face from memories.

She sighed, “Well, I’m glad you’re opening your heart. Do you have a favorite? One you could at least learn to love once you get wed?”

Namjoon’s stern and focused face appeared in your mind once more. Ugh why him? You shook your head, ans Iset gasped.

“Who?”

“It’s nobody!” You bit into a slice of bread.

She huffed and crossed her arms.

“Fine, Namjoon! I...he’s kind and he’s the one I’m most interested to learn about. I’m lured to him. When I think about him, my heart races and I think about him when he’s not around. I don’t understand. I’m not interested in anyone but him.” The honest words tumbled out faster than you could hold them back. Your began hitting your head. “What’s wrong with me? Why does he plague my thoughts so?”

Iset couldn’t help but giggle as she held your hands, “My dear, you’re in love with him.”

“I...I could never!”

She grinned, “Whatever you say, (Y/N), but I felt this way when I saw my husband for the first time and for days after. Love at first sight is a rare thing, do not throw it away for your stubborn pride.”

“Anyways, are you doing anything during the festival? You’ll be leaving soon afterwards as well, won’t you?”

Your fellow princess and best friend gave a nod, “I am. We’re planning on having our first child and being more serious about ruling our people as a couple and securing the throne. All that joy.”

You looked out and saw Prince Namjoon and Yoongi on their way to the river behind the rest of the boys just talking. Taehyung had a large smile as he walked backwards with a towel in his clutches.

He noticed you and waved, catching the eyes of the others who turned around and did the same until Namjoon bowed. Then they all followed him by bowing as well. You rolled your eyes trying to ignore the glimpse of Namjoon’s smile and the skipped heartbeat it caused. Iset stood next to you as soon as you turned away. She waved as you missed Namjoon’s smile falling once he could no longer see you.

_____

“Namjoon-hyung.” Taehyung called. “Do you have feelings for the princess?”

“No!” Namjoon blushed as Yoongi replied, “Yep. He sure does.”

Jimin piped up, “ I think she might have feelings for you too.”

The prince’s ears perked up, “What? How?”

He disclosed how while he danced with you and Hoseok last night that you asked about him, what kind of prince he was. You had said that you wanted to spend more time with Namjoon but were nervous to approach him.

Hoseok added, “She wanted to know what plant you were talking about when you first met? Apparently you met her before dinner.”

“Ah, yes. In the market. Her father was quite strict and she was walking around without protection. Her cat followed me and...it’s the catnip.” Namjoon cut himself off when he was met with blank stares. “I brought some because I heard there would be a lot of felines here.”

A black cat with a golden ankh necklace rubbed at Yoongi’s ankles, and he picked her up, “At least you were right. I’m glad, too.”

“I’d be a good husband for her. At least, I’d like to think I would be.” Namjoon continued. “She’s cute and I enjoy her personality. I er...saw her in the pool last night...nude.”

The men all stopped and started to ask overlapping questions.

“I’m not telling you anything! I just noticed someone in the water, looked to see if they were ok. It was the princess, and there was a snake coming towards her, so I stoned it before it reached her.”

Jin replied, “Oh, Namjoon-ah! So heroic!” He laughed.

Jungkook smiled along. The boys all talked about how in love Namjoon was with the princess, and he was shy and blushed all through it. The black cat was nearby the whole time. She bathed in the sun and ate a fish Namjoon caught for her.

As a direct son of the King, Namjoon had a lot of land.  A lot of resources but he was not in line for his own throne. That was Seokjin, but the younger royal was in charge of training warriors. Jin was in charge of money. Taehyung was in charge of agriculture. All of them seemed like they were good friends. Marrying just one of them could ensure so much for your people.

All of them knew this, but only one of them could marry you. It was obvious to them who they wanted it to be. Fishermen were nearby, shirtless and wet with strong arms from constantly casting nets and lifting heavy loads of sea creatures for a living. Prince Jimin watched the tallest of them intently, head in his hand.

“I have an idea!” Said Jungkook when everything was quiet, startling the cat and Jimin.

Yoongi smiled at their reactions, “It’s ok, kitten. You should go home now. I’m sure (Y/N) misses you very much.” His eyes gave a silver glow.

The cat meowed, surprised he knew the truth. Namjoon offered to walk her back to the princess, so he dusted off his shorts, threw on his robe, and held the beautiful cat in his arms.

“What’s your idea, Kookie?” the quiet man asked.

“Well, we all know we’re not getting with her,”

“YA!” Exclaimed Jin. “We haven’t even spent much time together. How do you know--”

Jungkook spoke up, “Why do you think that is?”

The oldest stayed silent at that and pouted. So the youngest explained a plan on how to get the two royals together. It would happen the day of the festival. It sounded like a good plan to the other princes. Jin was a bit downtrodden that the princess hadn’t gotten any one on one time with him, but he hadn’t really gotten the chance. He’d try to know her true feelings and from there decide if he’d be a part of Jungkook’s plan.

As Namjoon got closer to the palace, the black cat stayed close to his chest. She was adorable and the Prince thought about asking to keep her as Yoongi had done with the lion cub. Then the cat looked around and began to freak out as RapMon (affectionately called Mon-ie) ran up to his owner. The cat jumped out of his arms and ran as Monie barked and chased her into the Princess’s room!

“Mon-ie, NO!”

A strange flash of light came from the room, and Mon-ie ran out of the room and into his owner’s arms with his tail between his legs. Namjoon then worried for (Y/N) and ran into her room.

“Princess!” He called as he entered.

She looked at him. Princess Iset was there as well. The prince bowed, “Sorry for the intrusion, princesses. I just thought I saw...um. Did a cat come in here? I was trying to return her. Yoongi said she belonged to you, so I came from the beach, I mean river, to--”

“Yes, she ran out the window.” Iset replied, “She’s quite an outdoor cat. Can’t stay in one place for too long.”

She took a slight glance at you, and you blinked and looked around as if you had just returned to your own body, “Namjoon?”

“Yes, princess?”

“Please prepare something for tomorrow’s festival. I want you to show off your talents yourself instead of hearing about them from your friends.”

He blushed, “W-What would you like me to prepare?”

You looked at him, “Do whatever you think will win me over, Princey.”

The man bowed, “Yes, Princess. I do hope you feel better.” He then moved to leave, stopping mid turn. “Oh, right. Catnip.”

“What is it?”

The prince motioned to the plant in the windowsill that had cats swarming around it and soon lying down here and there.

“Cats really like it. The plant that I brought for you.”

“Oh…” You said, looking at the plant then back at him. “Thank you.”

He gave a flash of his dimples as he smiled, “You’re welcome, Princess.”

“I seem to be thanking you a lot.”

“Your presence is all the thanks I need.”

With that, the Korean prince left and closed the door behind him. Namjoon was worried. What could he do to impress the Princess in just over 24 hours? He went to the room that was prepared for his stay. Several cats had fallen asleep on his now relaxed white dog. At least they seemed to have figured each other out.

The prince stood on his balcony and looked out upon the scene before him. Sandy browns and tans that matched his golden skin helped to contrast the green of trees and blue of the ocean. Darker browns of people dressed in whites and gold popped out here and there. Namjoon wanted to write. He grabbed a notebook from his luggage and began writing, his hand struggling to keep up with his mind.

He wrote about Princess (Y/N). Her black twists like snakes around his heart. Snakes he loved, the tail of a cat. The ears as well, perking up to every creature. No. No. It was so messy. So unclear. It matched his mind. He was never good at showing his feelings towards those he was attracted to. Then again, it was a rare occasion. The last time he fell in love with Princess Wheein, and she was married off and sent away without him knowing.

They spoke through letters until she had her first child. That was years ago, but it still stung from time to time. Her sister was currently pursuing Taehyung, but everything had been put on hold for this trip, this chance to marry a foreign Princess. More beautiful than any of the words people had used to describe her.

Namjoon took a deep breath and remembered her in the market. That tattoo on her list. Remembered her at dinner that same night. He wasn’t sure why his heart hurt when he saw her conversing with his friends. Like when she and Taehyung were leaving to go on what he later found out what was a boat ride on the nearby river. It was for his little brother’s artistic inspiration. The deepthinking Prince recalled how his heart soared when, one by one the boys announced that she had only wanted friendship from them.

The word was on the tip of his tongue. The only logical explanation for his feelings. Love. But it couldn’t be. There was Wheein. There were all the girls at home and...he didn’t feel like this towards any of them. Not since he had seen (Y/N).

Before his eyes flashed the woman floating in the pool after she excused herself from dinner. She had seen so upset during the meal, so he was glad that she was smiling with her face towards the stars. His heart did a funny little tingle.

Prince Namjoon began to write once more.

Is this love Is this love Sometimes I know Sometimes I don’t The next line What should I write? So many words are circling me But I don’t like a single one I just feel it Like the moon always rising after the sun Like nails growing, like trees shedding their leaves When winter comes You’re the one To turn my recollections into memories Before I knew you My heart was only in linear motion

Yeah. That was a good start. It was the truth about his feelings. This was what he’d perform for the Princess at tomorrow’s festival.

[olivertreespirit-blog]

the elven chronicles

**so maybe if anyone likes this it’ll actually get published some day.. it’s i suppose my first real jab at writing, here goes then**

the elven chronicles

by oliver treespirit ~

the elven chronicles prologue the journey of the queen olympia

chapter 1 limberdore

in limberdore the eldritch drarves carve thistlewood into woven hearths and dip them in the golden waters that are enchanted by the goodess eldra whose temple is at the edge of the woods this allows them to be lit as torches and burned for all time until extinguished; any that have her blessing within the city have this gift it is not the only reason many travelers come to limberdore; the shops are known for their fine craftsmen merchants of all from weapons to worldly delicacies and this place attracts all kinds as they say from eccentric collectors to hodgepodge peddlers as well as some nasty sorts the eldritch dwarves and their children live in the wooded city; so it is of course the city center and the pubs and shrines that gather odd bits and pieces from across the strange and magnificient nine realms like some sort of cosmic tub drain it is in this bizarre centre that we meet our players

the tall bearded man is marko; his ship has been wrecked after a pirate attack in the serpent seas though his crew has abandoned him as is the natural course in these businesses to easily find work in a centre as bustling as limberdore, he has managed to pick up a stray- a small girl who insists that her father told her to talk to him, but also that her father is dead the dejected captain is of course convinced the girl is mad but thinks better than to hand a mad child over to just anyone in the centre of limberdore so he's decided to table this problem over the issue of his ship the girl, who claims her name is elexa, continues babbling on enthusiastically about chasing butterflies in the forest and times her father would sing to her old elven folk songs it was drifting in and out of marko's consciousness that it was strange that her father knew elven folk songs, but it would be even stranger if her father had been elvish or even something of the sort, because elves and humans had not coexisted since the days of magic marko's father had been a child in the days of magic; he told enthralling stories of battling dragons and falling in love with enchanting sirens in the forest

it was as they approached the pub a new player entered the scene; a rather broad and staturely gentleman was, rather painfully shyly, being thrown out of the tavern and the situation was somehow escalating marko saw a pair of men in uniforms that were not official to her sovereign district of limberdore and looked as if they'd just lost badly in a game of shufflebout and were out for revenge against the world, draw their sabres on the man towering over them who appeared to be pleading like a child, only to hurdle them across the center of the street and into the carts of the merchants on the edge of the road, who each had their own men in out-of-jurisdiction uniform who proceeded to chase the baffled previous men off the fellow who seemed to have caused all the trouble was by this point in tears what's the matter big guy? markos attempted. elexa was more successful. that mean guy try to overcharge you again taiga? every time, taiga managed between sniffles this time i tried to trick him by ordering the same thing but he said it went up you shouldn't come here i know, but the stuff i make at home doesn't taste good i'll help you next time you know this man? markos interrupted you know elexa? taiga countered not really.. markos needs new hands for his ship. how would you like a job taiga? i promise this guy seems nice taiga looked contemplative we could get a new raincatcher yeah!... the thought briefly crossed markos' mind that taiga and elexa were roommates of some sort, a thought which he found even stranger than elexa's father being involved with elves or taiga's restraint against men he was head and shoulders taller than which meant ultimately that markos had more issues to table in preference to the ever-more pressing issue of his ship, wandering in a strange town and having picked up apparently two children- an issue which at this time decided to release itself from his head, perhaps if only in a desperate attempt to clear up space for all the new and complicated thoughts and problems that were entering it how the bloody hell am i supposed to get a new ship!? i thought you said he was nice nice people still swear sometimes having found no answer to his quandary in the sky, markos turned at last to his new traveling companions do either of you know where to find a ship in this centre? or how im supposed to pay for it if i've been robbed by pirates?! i'm sorry, that's awful- taiga blurted elexa watched the space between them solemnly; she had already expressed her condolences to markos tirelessly over the beginning length of their long journey from where he had washed up on the shores of limber grove markos seemed to breath heavily for a moment, with the look of a man who has realized he has been accidentally carrying a strangers purse from the journey depot a look of realization seemed to creep across his face, perhaps spurred on by what he was beginning to consider might be an attempt by these new involvements in his life to drive him to madness or else defeat him entirely why am i going to limberdore?... my ship hasn't sunk.. it's only all banged up, but there was timber and birch to repair it in the groves ...what am i doing here?!? elexa chose this moment to break the silence i told you to come to limberdore, remember? it's my fault i'm sorry you asked me where to go when you woke up; but you didn't tell me the ship was okay taiga looked interested of course it's okay! i remember now i mustve... fallen overboard when i blacked out after it washed up on the rocks it's only a little ways from shore! will you hire taiga then? and can i come too? markos looked for a moment like he was in the path of a noble's grand wide carriage taiga.. seems like he would make a good hand, of course taiga smiled i need to get you home to your parents little lady taiga frowned a little, sympathetically i told you, my father's dead and what about your mother? where is your mother? taiga looked at elexa, as if he knew she thought for a second candlethire that's why i need to come with you on your ship the look in taiga's eyes told markos the girl was telling the truth he paused, then sighed heavily i'm not going to candlethire where are you going? i... don't know... i have no shipment... i suppose anywhere i can send a message to my freelancers and tell them to file with the crown for the standard piracy cushion can we go to candlethire please? it was painfully obvious taiga wanted to go too it is... the other side of the world can we stop somewhere to tell your bosses you're sorry and then go to candlethire? please? ... it was at this moment markos felt something that he had not felt since the last day he had spoken to his father before he died a sense of... peace in the face of those things which are beyond our control happening as he looked out over the ocean of silsivar, he wondered where the feeling had come from i... will recieve my pirates insurance when i send the misage, while my freelancers will have to wait the day... so if i receive no work by the time we reach a port we can send the misage, i will have time to take you to candlethire markos was surprised and almost horrified that the words had come out of his mouth, but a small familiar.. trustworthy voice told him it was alright taiga certainly seemed pleased; for a second in fact he almost looked markos in the eye to candlethire then! aye!! elexa screamed enthusiastically yes sir, taiga sounded off proudly markos couldn't help but smile, and then wonder if he had hit his head on the way being washed up on shore do any of you know anything about repairing a boat? my daddy taught me how to make toy boats, elexa offered i'm good at making things, i make all sorts of things dogs fish cats trees groundhogs dragons airhoppers frogs funny faces... it was at this moment markos realized that taiga would probably continue at least until they reached the ship and had something else to focus on elexa was watching silently with the look of a patron who knows every word by memory, beaming proudly lobsters, electric fish, sea serpents, toads (which kind of look like frogs but they're different) rats, squirrels, kittens... markos could not remember even remotely how long it had taken to walk to the city centre from the shores of limber grove

chapter 2 limber grove

within two hours the good ship queen olympia looked better and more elegant than it had the day markos bought it markos had spent most of the time bringing wood vines and other supplies to taiga elexa had provided the cheerleading section in everything you listed on the way here from limberdore, markos panted, you never mentioned ships taiga beamed what he had done was not only mended and reinforced the broken structures, but the entire ship, and added a few decorative flairs that markos could tell were gathered from more than one local culture markos was in actual fact most proud of the medalion that now hung from queen olympia herself's wooden neck, bearing the ancient insignia of limberdore- not the new one the duke merchant was putting on all the carts it was considered a proud relic throughout the world and have random berries custard for breakfast! elexa interrupted the two's silent bonding moment absolutely, markos blurted, realizing after the fact what he'd agreed to but to his relief the other two seemed to let him get away with it are we going to candle thire now? just as soon as we stop at a port with a royal misage station... i have to check my map in the cabin but if i recall, the nearest to this isle is the island of darmwort, and should be about a day or two's distance than what are we waiting for ?! yay! taiga agreed neither of you have anyone to say goodbye to or anything to collect from the village? a look of silent understanding seemed to pass between elexa and taiga we could say goodbye to the raincatcher... she offered we have to find your mom, taiga answered elexa looked resolved. and we'll get a new raincatcher, she volunteered yeah, taiga agreed, one that doesnt leak the beginning of the journey until sunset was rather quiet, when taiga and elexa managed to find rooms that suited their unique tastes in the now vacant crews quarters and retire for the night, and markos stayed awake to watch the helm, as well as the stars as he was fond of doing he knew he was tired from the chaotic day, and he figured maybe it was just him but he felt as if the entire evening elexa and taiga had shared in some kind of... mourning for a lost love in the face of duty he hadn't thought much about their raincatcher, he had one on the ship he'd had to replace just the other weeks'time

chapter 3 lagoon silsivas

markos had encountered winds as good as the ones that bore them to the port of darmwort by noontime the next day (which was around the time taiga and elexa were each waking up) but not for many a long while, and as he passed the marker island in the morning he muttered a prayer of thanks to the men's god of his childhood village, seamor. are we there yet? elexa mumbled sleepily while taiga amused himself cooking eggs on the cabin stove we will be quite soon actually, we're early, said markos yay and then candlethire! the epic weight of the word seemed to hang in the air markos thought to himself candlethire was literally the opposite side of the world- the world of acaemia was in fact flat, or rather the flat bottom surface of a dormant volcano the size of a small celestial body acaemia's creation fables tell of its atmosphere and cooled oceans coming from long past volcanic eruptions some of some past world but you get the idea markos and his former crew had navigated the pace streams around the edge of acaemia to reach limberdore early at his freelancers' request, though that trick was still sometimes used by pirates he could use a similar approach to reach candlethire at latest by the end of the week, as opposed to the weeks at least it would take to sail through the middle he needed only to cut the distance to the inner edge winds from darmwort of course, the same stratagem had lost him his ship to pirates only the day before, and now he was traveling with a crew he wasn't sure would be about themselves in a fight on the high seas however... he felt that same strange feeling he had felt when he originally agreed to take them to candlethire he was also becoming more and more aware of a sense of urgency about reaching elexa's mother he was beginning to unspokenly share with her and taiga he couldn't place his finger on it, but it made him wonder why she hadn't reached out to anyone else in the village or perhaps she had anyway, the answer he gave was that after the station at darmwort they would sail toward the inner edge winds, which would take them to candlethire in four to six days, maybe seven elexa was so overjoyed she began leaping and dancing around the deck, and markos found himself surpisingly impressed at her seemingly intuitive sealegs taiga dropped an entire tray of eggs in sudden delight at the news, and was almost let down before he proceeded to emerge from the kitchen with three remaining or extra trays of eggs breakfast!

chapter 4 darmwort

the station at darmwort was no trouble, and markos even received extra pirates compensation because he had had to repair his ship out of port he knew that it wouldn't hurt his business in the future either because the goods he'd been carrying through potentially pirate waters were replaceable at best; teas, burning oils, tobaccos, spices, casting sands... perhaps that was why he felt strangely at peace about the idea of sailing back into the inner edge winds with a crew comprised of a lumbering jack-of- all-trades who probably couldn't hurt a fly, and a sparkle-eyed little girl who probably would take on the world it was on the way out of the port of darmwort that the first vibes of tension began to creep into the air- a black sailed ship, with no flag, after some amount of time it became clear had been following them from the harbor at first markos thought nothing of it, they could easily be taking the same path he was from port to reach the inner edge winds and after it became clear, at least in everyone's emotions that something was amis, there wasn't anything he could really do about it no one spoke as the suspense hung in the air, and the black-sailed ship drew ever-slowly closer in the distance it was about the time they could make out the faces of some of the crew the ship finally raised a flag markos froze elexa, taiga, get below deck, he muttered absently pirates

chapter 5 the inner edge winds

on the high seas, each man is responsible for his own weapons; and since markos usually sailed with a properly fitted crew, that meant that he had one, a silvered blunderbuss enchanted by an eldritch shaman to almost never miss it didn't do much good if he was outnumbered and the ships cannon wouldn't do too much good either at this point; debris might even hit the queen olympia so markos held his ground, shaking, as only one pirate stepped onto the deck of his just-repaired ship we've come to give this back, he moaned, it is our right; we have made sacrifice to the pirate goddess she-ra it is once again your burden with that, he handed markos what to his memory was a cheap trinket from one of the shops at his last shipment port, bowed, and retreated back to the black-sailed ship, which hastily sailed away after an unknown time of stunned and confused silence, markos called elexa and taiga back on deck you're alright! what happened?? taiga seemed to silently agree they... returned what they had stolen, as pirates will sometimes do, according to their mythology... it has happened to me before, with a shipment of royal gems that a price was then placed on... but i don't know what this is tabby! elexa blurted who? she seemed to correct herself. it's not.. but.. it looks like a toy i had when i was little, i named her tabby markos was not quite sure what to make of that statement do you have any idea what this is or where it came from? my daddy got mine for me in candlethire an untraceable silence seemed to hang in the air it was broken when the ship suddenly accelerated, causing all on board to almost lose their footing hold on, markos assumed his captain's role instinctively, we're entering the inner edge winds in what seemed like perhaps a minute the ship was practically skimming the surface of the water, a thrill markos knew as an experienced sailor of acaemia but which taiga and elexa had never experienced whoooooo!!!!! elexa stretched her arms outward at the top stern of the ship, like the figure of the good queen olympia riding the same surf below her taiga seemed troubled that they were going so fast you know where we're going right? it's mostly sea until candlethire, we might pass a few islands.. smooth sailing, we're well prepared having stocked up in darmwort taiga was not reassured i don't like when things around me are changing too quickly markos nodded, ponderingly; elexa announced from her proud vantage point that an island was approaching do you think it has monkeys? it might, markos volunteered, but we have to get to candleshire i knowwwwwww, elexa retorted, i've just never seen monkeys, my father said they live on islands they do, markos agreed, but only some islands and i don't know if that one has any monkeys than it's not worth stopping anyway elexa concluded right then markos saluted next stop candleshire at this taiga smiled, then seemed to think for a second and resolvedly returned below deck this left markos to keep elexa company, as she gazed out over the ocean flying beneath her feet so how long do you think until we reach candleshire now? she asked we've only been sailing a day, markos defensively countered but how far are we? i don't know, we could see if that island was on the map what do you remember about it? you didn't know if it had monkeys right, markos agreed, we'll check if we've passed the island without monkeys yet elexa silently agreed

do you think we'll find my mom at candleshire? markos realized that the thought had not until this point crossed his mind why shouldn't we? he asked. you told me that's where she was yeah, but i don't know where. i only know that she's in candleshire and daddy's.... she trailed off i'm sorry don't be sorry, he's in a much better place, was all she had to say markos began to wonder who or what exactly he'd brought aboard his ship, on a free journey no less he decided to change the subject and attempt to answer those questions which he felt were his place to ask so all you know about this little... trinket is that it reminds you of a toy your father got you from candleshire? uhuh, tabby, my best friend what can you tell me of candleshire? it's where mommy is don't you know anything about candleshire? don't you? i... don't really... i've never been to candleshire, in fact i can't remember if there had been anything from one of the ports there in that shipment i know mommy and daddy met in candleshire oh? yes but that was before they had me ... where were you born? i don't remember you don't remember? because i've never known, my mommy and daddy wouldn't tell me where i was born, but i lived and grew up in hodgebridge, near limber grove where i met taiga uhuh... and... what happened? if... you don't mind my asking... mother went to candleshire... when my father died. she said she would come get me or send for me when she found a home there... a startling reality slowly began to sink in upon markos you're... you're half-elven, aren't you, elexa? ..yes, i am... my mother... candleshire is an elven village that's true, at least, it was.. before my mother and father left to have me there was another deep and thoughtful silence those hired thugs' swords at the tavern.. you did that my mother taught me what else can you do? i can tell you what you're thinking right meow did you just say right meow? right meow? yes right meow! you mean just meow? meow?!?!? i did not say right meow just meow you did that on purpose didn't you mhm~ ...okay, so what am i thinking right now? you're thinking that it's just your luck you've managed to find a couple of crazy kids to give a free ride to after losing your shipment to those pirates. you'd rather just take the insurance and have your rightful island vacation how did you do that? my mommy was better at it than me, i could never lie to her... no, i imagine not, markos laughed at a moment, elexa suddenly smiled at him, which took him off guard i'm glad you're taking us to candleshire, she said gratefully of course, i couldn't have you wandering the streets of limberdore looking for some other total stranger to follow around all day this time elexa laughed so when will we get to candleshire? markos sighed lightly at morning light we'll be able to scout for landmarks that should tell us how much of the distance around the edge we've covered so far yay! thank you again markos ~ with that, she followed taiga downstairs with a yawn, and markos suddenly realized that the sun had set since they'd been talking he shrugged to himself and quietly resumed his vigil by the helm and the stars when he was young, markos' father had always watched the stars with him, pointing out the constellations of course now as a sailing captain markos knew them all by heart, but he still remembered them as if his father were teaching him that was why he never felt lonely on those nights watching the helm

chapter 6 the isle of floating rocks

when elexa and taiga sleepily wandered out of their rooms the next morning, markos was beaming we had exceptional winds yesterday to get us to darmwort, but this takes all of the cakes! i told you the best we could do candleshire in was four days? well we are half-way there! elexa was brought to the point of tears by this news, and markos felt himself become all the more proud of his ship taiga reacted with a look of horror, which was immediately versed that's not right! he shouted. how did we sail two days in one night? we didn't taiga, we sailed most of yesterday too, but we have made really good time nooo nooooo noooooo nooooooooo noooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!! taiga ranted can't anyone see we're not where we're supposed to be!?!?! elexa's eyes were still wet, but a look of concern began to spread across her face as she looked at taiga taiga, what's wrong? markos attempted look around us!!!!!! taiga shouted desperately i am, i'm a captain, remember, we're in the sourdritch vicinity, we passed elmer island a little while ago; these waters are friendly and safe to swim in no no no no no no no no noooooo!!!!!!!!!!!! taiga ranted again, and at this point it was clear that he was having some kind of emotional breakdown he suddenly caught markos' gaze firmly, which made markos realize that taiga had not made eye contact with him since he came on the ship i asked if you knew where we were going, not where we were markos paused for a second then they both turned and looked at elexa, who was still in tears, but the look in her face had grown from one of surprised joy to fragile madness  she was trembling of course i know.. where we're going... last night while you two were asleep, we passed the isle of floating rocks, which lies under the constellation hysteros... elexa... taiga pleaded she answered him, finally, in a terrified whisper i wanna find my mommy taiga markos suddenly felt as if someone were standing right behind him the isle of floating rocks isn't beneath the constellation hysteros... we use it to set our compasses by the north star. the isle of floating rocks lies under the north star... taiga and elexa both looked at markos, silently someone sailed under the constellation hysteros as they passed the isle of floating rocks... in a myth... a myth my father told me... the question that hung silently in the air was shared on all three faces the island of living dreams

chapter 7 the island of living dreams

living dreams don't sound so bad, elexa offered, shakingly not dreams, markos responded, not like daydreams or fantasies, or only good dreams... in the myth, hysteros found his dream, because his only pure intention was to be reunited with a lost love... but his entire crew perished at the hands of their worst nightmares elexa looked like she wasn't sure if she was laughing crying or screaming at this time everyone suddenly realized that she was clutching the mysterious trinket from the night before tightly in her hands taiga broke the silence taking everyone off guard you did this elexa! he shouted no i would never!!! than it did!!! i think... you're right... she barely whispered markos all but slapped his hand to his mouth as he realized the words that he let escape it land sighted taiga rushed to the edge of the ship no.... he murmered. it's coming... don't think about it!!! markos screamed whatever it is don't think about it!!! just think happy thoughts!!! it's too late it's here!!!!!!!!!! a massive sea serpent, almost equal in diameter to the ship itself, and easily six times as long, slithered out of the water beneath them, ever upward, towering taller and taller above them no taiga! fight it! markos pleaded desperately how can i fight it it's right there?!?!?!?! the serpent lowered it's massive head to simply glare the three trembling sailors in the eye it grinned, evily as if some sort of mist had begun to pour unsensably from the creatures nostrils, the vines and birch embraiding the good ship queen olympia began to warp stretch and break, as if they were shriveling in a matter of seconds no! taiga pleaded, sunkenly my ship!!! markos screamed as taiga's hard work vanished, the ship itself began to warp and twist, it's wood colors darkening and massive splinters seeming to grow from the planks the ship began to rise out of the water, growing into a terrifying jagged peak, or perhaps it was being held aloft by the watery dragon the sails now bore jolly rogers markos whirled on taiga you're doing this!!! no!! it's the monster!!! taiga gasped no it's you!!!! this is your worst fear!!!! oh what your worst fear is my ship getting wrecked?!?!?! mine too!!!!!!!! no.... taiga, how could you? there was a look of ominous darkness in elexa's eyes the two had never seen before you said you'd help me find my mommy. you said you'd help me find me mommy!!!!!!!!!! the sky rumbled, and taiga fell to his knees you're not real, he whispered nothing lasts forever, the serpent whispered back including my fears!!!!!!!!!!!!!! taiga lept from the edge of the ship, just beneath the towering dragons mouth it was at this moment markos and elexa managed to snap back to reality or out of the dragon's spell long enough to follow, and find taiga, of all places, in a field of wildflowers how did you know we'd be safe if we jumped overboard? everything was changing. not just my new home... everyone... people i thought i could trust or who would never hurt me the place that had been the scariest had to be the safest place now their moment of peace was broken by a voice from across the meadow a feminine voice markos, it called is that... your mother? he asked elexa then why would she be calling you? she whispered the lady who emerged from the forest was beautiful, like a drawing out of a book of mythology or poetry she kept eye contact with markos the entire time, as she strode effortlessly across the prarie- strewn meadow markos, it's me. the one you love taylia i've come to take you home markos. we'll be together again taylia... i really can't... i have friends over... c'mon my love, let's go home taylia... we parted ways back in barldoor... i'm willing to forget the past if you are my love you know there are still times you miss me markos suddenly had to admit to himself that there were still times he missed her, but he suddenly realized that taiga and elexa were nowhere to be seen he whirled to catch sight of them far back in the clearing where they had been resting, and realize that he had unconsciously followed his former lover to the edge of the glade they were shouting to him but he couldn't make out what they were saying he felt his gaze pulled suddenly back into the eyes of taylia, who was standing on the other side of the trees now come, my one true love, she purred, be mine again markos suddenly stumbled forward, struggling to catch himself on the branches and finding himself stuck within moments he realized that he could not move at all, and the branches were not normal tree branches but actually the massive strands of a giant spider's web he turned to face taylia's body mounted upon the legs of a giant spider, its claws wrapping him into the webbing i want to mate with you, she crooned to him, and i want to eat you, because you're mine!!!! her fangs pierced the sides of his neck, growing as his vision became more blurry to appear more like massive jaws, and everything went black

when markos came to, he was walking along a dimly torch-lit tunnel, in what he could not tell if was a man-made or natural cave. his hand was held by a tall lady in a dark robe who was guiding him for a second markos started to run, then realized when he looked the women in the eye that she was not taylia in fact- she was elvish i can only guide you a short ways longer, her voice seemed to reassure him just remember to trust in love to overcome your fears it was then that they came to a brighter lit clearing in what seemed to be the center of the cave, and markos saw elexa and taiga gathered around a warm fire mommy! i'll see you soon love, she all but whispered, and was gone

markos joined taiga and elexa by the fire is it safe here? he asked uhuh, taiga volunteered, no neat-freak attacks markos chuckled, slowly relaxing onto the floor of the cave

chapter 8 the coastal drifts

when markos awoke, he realized, first of all, that he had not gone to sleep since he had been shipwrecked and secondly, that he was in his cabin, aboard the good queen olympia he was relieved for a second, then rushed up the stairs frantically to find elexa and taiga in the kitchen, having breakfast he rushed past them to the front of the ship, which was once again skimming along the suface of the inner edge winds water way, and climbed over the stern to the headpiece, queen olympia- which still bore the ancient insignia of limberdore markos entered the kitchen, partly relieved but still shaken. taiga and elexa met his gaze enough to let him know that it was them how'd we get back on the ship? he asked aimlessly i guess we must've had good dreams, elexa offered where are we? according to your map we're passing through the coastal drifts, taiga volunteered, -now- we're halfway to candleshire markos smiled

a sudden look of concern fell across his face where's the trinket? taiga and i looked all morning, we can't find it anywhere on the ship, elexa answered maybe we left it behind ... you still have no idea what it was? tabby was my best friend, but i don't know what that was, no, she answered i see, markos replied the room once again fell into silence

elexa finally broke it taiga doesn't know which islands have monkeys either, she dejectedly stated markos all but burst out laughing. monkeys are a rare and illusive breed, he countered like good sea captains! hey! at this the room burst into laughter, to once again fall into silence but a noticeably more peaceful one the ship continued to skim its way along the inner edges toward candleshire

chapter 9 memories of hodgebridge

that evening once again found markos entertaining elexa at the stern of the queen olympia, as taiga was adding something to the helm that he said in his theory would give markos a sort of auto-pilot only enjoyed by much higher-end ships after he had confessed that the only island he knew of which might have monkeys was one a traveling old sea peddler told him he had gotten a pet monkey from, but the man might've gotten the monkey on sale at another stand, and they concluded they would go to that island after they found elexa's mother at candleshire, markos rather awkwardly approached the perhaps rather awkward question  elexa... what can you tell me about... your mother, or your childhood, or candleshire, or, anything... i feel ashamed that i don't understand anything, he managed elexa nodded not many know much of the elves, she sighed, there are so few of us my parents said that's why lots of people believed breeding with humans was one way to save them, even though it was becoming... frowned upon even before the end of the days of magic my mother and father loved each other; they just wanted a life for our family markos nodded in return my childhood was... lonely... hodgebridge was between a few human and elven settlements, so for awhile i would have friends that only knew one or another of my parents... but that couldn't last when i started to show ...show? she pulled back her unnaturally long (beautiful) tangled, messy hair to reveal the perfectly pointed ears of any elven princess mhm, markos nodded so even my elven friends became suspicious when they could never meet my father... markos listened ...people treated me like there was something wrong with me. my whole life people have treated me like there's something wrong with me. it's the same way with taiga; i think that's why we're friends... what other powers do you have? markos realized after he asked it how silly the question was and that now he would only make it worse if he added anything elexa smiled if i were a pure-blood elf, like my mother, i would have telekinetic abilities... as me i can only tweak things a little bit, like someone's grip or footing or maybe the needle of a compass -have you ever tried it? no, my mommy said that was what i should try if i ever wanted to try to hone my telekinetic abilities.. she said magnetism was the easiest force to overcome uhuh, markos continued listening you know i can read your thoughts, i'm almost as good at that as my mommy that's kinda weird actually, markos stammered no it isn't, elexa insisted, because you're a good guy i didn't like limberdore markos understood why this girl who had apparently lived on her own or with her friend taiga had followed him from limber grove that day now i don't know what to say, he struggled i knew my mommy could rescue you in the cave, she interjected how?.. ..your worst fear was love, because you'd experienced love that wasn't real markos was silenced i've experienced love that is real; my mommy and daddy's love for each other and me, no matter what anybody thought that's how i knew she could rescue you markos finally spoke i think you rescued me, he managed, tears in his eyes elexa smiled again no, i just called for my mommy markos laughed at himself, teary-eyed, as the words once again escaped his lips do you have any other powers? i have one that only half-elven children have... oh?... yes... but it's silly and? sometimes... i can predict the future... but i'm no good i can never tell for sure until it happens, she stammered to explain markos was floored you can tell.. the future? have you done this before? once when i was really little, i said the milkman was going to come early because of some aldrevian holiday they would be taking off, and my parents didn't know or remember, but the milk came early... i just knew that it would, the milkman explained the holiday to all of us but my parents were more convinced than me that i had told the future, i thought i just liked milk ... have you had any... thoughts like this, about our journey? to candleshire? that's how i know i'll find my mommy there wait a second... i thought you said she went to candleshire yes, when my father died. i haven't heard from her but i know she's there now. and i knew you could take us there when you washed up in limber grove markos wasn't sure quite how to respond to that, but he resolved that by this point he should trust the girl and i knew we had to find her, she finished why? markos asked before the full weight of what she had just said hit him because i feel like she's in trouble... elexa suddenly whimpered markos was shaken when she went to candleshire... it was a keystone in the rising war between elves and humans ..is that still going on??? only in some parts of the world, but i'm afraid yes.. it says enough that there's no safe place for someone like me markos nodded understandingly what about candleshire? i don't know. i only know we'll find my mother there. markos drew a deep breath in sharply. then we have to get to candleshire. it's almost morning now. we'll be there tomorrow really? have we been up all night? i guess so, we did sleep pretty late yesterday.. it gets harder to tell day from night in the coastal drifts mhm, elexa understood i did a terrible job, taiga rushed up and blurted, frustratedly what's the matter? nothing's wrong with the ship is it? no, but you were supposed to be able to steer it from anywhere taiga that's not what- now, for some weird reason, the ship is steering itself, and i give up on inventing with that, taiga stormed below deck to his room, leaving a stunned markos and elexa to enjoy the just dimly emerging stars together

chapter 10 candleshire

it was the morning the crew arrived at the shores of candleshire markos was feeling the same sense of instinctive pride he always felt when his ship had safely completed a journey; although he was brought down and concerned a bit because elexa seemed only worried about something taiga was glad to almost be back on solid ground, but he clearly shared whatever sentiments elexa was silently expressing markos broke the silence we're almost there, he announced, where do we find your mum? elexa seemed to think for a second if we explore the city, we may find her or hear something about her, or i may feel something about where she is when we get close... i used to always be able to find my parents when we'd be out wandering in the woods alright then, markos continued to debate, the problem with that is none of us know anything about candleshire it's unwise for any crew to enter territory they're unfamiliar with elexa and taiga answered with silence so... markos struggled to think you could tell them you're our father, elexa managed what? you could tell anyone who asks you're taiga's and my father, and we're in town to find our mother how will that... we have to go in, markos markos was taken aback by the girls sudden insistence alright, we can try that.. should we give them a name or? elexa looked truly caught off guard she used a number of human names.. and her elven name was... maybe it's best to not even bring that up unless we have to elexa and taiga agreed at least until we find out where we are. but i suppose we could pass as a family... it makes more sense than the crew of a pirate ship why are we pirates now? taiga joked i don't know, we're not merchants, i don't have anything in my storeroom except eggs and maple syrup apparently at this elexa and taiga laughed warmly, and markos found himself joining in

alright then, he finally interrupted we are now reaching the shores of candleshire

to be continued in the elven chronicles part ii, tales of candleshire

the elven chronicles book i tales of candleshire

chapter 1 the everyever

the everyever is a creature residing in the misty mountains of candleshire, told in ancient mythologies to be somewhere between a dragon or a spirit, or some breed of both; it will answer anything you wish to know, providing you say its name correctly upon first meeting its gaze of course, elexa knew about this mythological creature from a dream "how would we even find this creature if it does exist in legend as you say?" markos debated "elexa's dreams have been right before," taiga volunteered "we just have to go into the misty mountains," she answered, "i feel like.. we'll find it, or it will find us if we do" "i don't like the idea of it will find us," markos countered. "i'd rather we find a nice port with a decent tavern" "but it's a way to find my mommy," elexa pleaded markos could not by this time in their journey bear to see elexa despair "well, 'tis morning light; there is no better time to set out scouting. we're sure to find a place to moor the boat it won't be bothered and perhaps we'll find a way to the city..." "thank you, markos!" markos caught when he had a second to think about it that elexa was beginning to talk about the everyever as a kind of imaginary friend, or moreover a friend she had to find, who had become just as important as finding her mother the city of candleshire, as it appeared from a safe neutral distance, was a towering stone beige castle set in the center of a hollowed-out mountain that had been a long-since dormant volcano the glistening city was now older than the volcano itself had been when it was built off the shores of candleshire naturally were strewn folliage and trees and even a few little volcanic islands at the edges that you could very well use to cross over into candleshire if you had landed or lived on one of these islands that was the idea at least; it was much safer than trying to directly enter the city, from an unmarked sailing ship no less now the idea had become to make land in this general vicinity, in the forests that were at the edge of the mountain of candleshire itself, inward they would arrive in the misty mountains

in fact, having made it past all that they ended up finding the everyever before they realized they were in the misty mountains elexa found it first, as she was gazing out across the edge of the cliff trail at a grand majestic waterfall; she suddenly felt almost as if someone in front of her were breathing heavily she stepped back to refocus her glance and saw that the everyever was exactly half dragon half spirit; a blue misty watery dragon that was all but transparent, like a ghost in the sky "guys, i found it," she chirped "where is it??" "you can't see it?" "no.." elexa thought for a second "try this. do you notice how this waterfall kinda looks like a dragon?" "yeah... is that.. it?" "uhuh," the everyever smiled, observing its new visitors "we want to find my mommy in candleshire," elexa blurted markos winced, and taiga continued to squint in awe, but the creature smiled "i know my child, but first one of you must call me by my true name." "we have more than one chance," markos jumped in, "let's each try. I'll go first." he approached the phantom dragon "everyey-" he stopped, having faltered, and whirled with a look of only slight disdain "it's a tongue twister," he informed the group like any captain taiga thought "may i practice?" "you may," was the dragon's answer taiga turned his back on the fantastic vision and repeated to himself under his breath, "everyever, everyever, everyever..." he turned around finally, and proclaimed, "everyever." the dragon paused "i'm sorry, that is not my true name." taiga looked defeated, and markos looked for a second as if he were about to actually fight a dragon for elexa, when she interjected, "wait, i know your true name, from my dream. it's spelled everyever.. but it has an elven pronunciation..." she spoke it like the name of an old friend "yevyre"

chapter 2 have you seen my mother

the dragon smiled "that is correct my child; your mother is now in timberscrawl, in the village tavern; but she is on the run you see, i cannot say where she will be when you find her." elexa seemed perplexed, then thought "is there any way we can be sure to find her?" markos paused. he had assumed for some reason that they would only be allowed to ask one question, or three or something like that but the dragon spirit thought, too "i cannot forsee a future in which you, for certain, find her... but i can tell you, that she is on the run from the city officials of candleshire; the prop empire in place of the ancient eligacy is not friendly to elves. perhaps that will help you." "thank you, my friend" elexa answered without thinking, and turned to face markos and taiga "ready to go?" they seemed perplexed. "go where? candleshire? we don't know where to find your mother," "yes we do," elexa interrupted "she's on the run from the city officials," she stated, "so she'll end up wherever's safest from them. my mother has good instincts like me. we just have to find that place" the dragon spirit raised its head to call out to her, like a parent calling to a child that's forgotten their lunch, in what appeared to markos and taiga to be the foam at the peak of the waterfall suddenly all but rippling "i can tell you where the safest place in candleshire is, even though i do not know for sure if she will arrive there." elexa turned back and her jaw dropped "the safest place for elves in candleshire is a small borough in the center of the city that still holds some of its ancient enchantment, making it harder for officials to find elves or deserters who live there, called holvesbriss"

chapter 3 holvesbriss

in candleshire, elexa's mother had learned of holvesbriss in the timberscrawl tavern, and was trying to make it there without anybody especially officials questioning her hood it wasn't that hoods were uncommon fashion in candleshire, but unfortunately it was also common for the empirial officials to engage in "hood inspection"

she remembered when the empire had been handed control over candleshire, at its conception, without so much as an election among the due citizens already living in the ancient city; it had been a compromise, because candleshire was a strategic military location, that was supposed to end what had become the secret war on elves. that hadn't happened

she was rounding the corner of an alley toward what she felt in her heart must be holvesbriss, when her heart stopped as she was interrupted by an empirial official, clearly off- duty slunken in the shadows on the edges of the alley "hey there little lady," he crowed, "i don't see any reason you ought to be opposed to a hood inspection" the official was in turn interrupted by the voice of a young girl from across the street "that's my mommy!!!"

markos and taiga barreled toward the official, seeing red, with elexa in hot pursuit he staggered backward, and seemed as if he were feeling around for a weapon he didn't have or didn't remember what he had done with, before he was pummeled into the ground and subsequently restrained, to tones of the concepts of social ettiquette and manners espoused amidst harsh cursing by markos

elexa reached her mother, and clutched her hand, without slowing down, as their eyes met, pulling her into the very center of a paved circle that had been just inside the alley, where they suddenly disappeared

"what just happened?" taiga questioned out loud "i don't know," markos answered, "but i do know a few things. we made it to candleshire. we helped elexa find her mother. and now, we're deserters"

chapter 4 the fog

elexa and her mother didn't have time to worry about where markos and taiga had gone, because they were suddenly preoccupied with trying to figure out where they had gone the main challenge to that was that it was hard to tell where they were; it seemed as if they were outside, and it was foggy, only instead of seeing landscape or buildings through the fog as they gazed deeper into its swirling layers they seemed to find only more fog in front of them stood a man whose hood was also drawn over his face, only his was certainly human crafted, and it was long and red with gold trim, some kind of strange red satin that actually seemed to glow through the fog elexa didn't have a chance to be frightened "have we met?" her mother greeted the strange man "you met my father, during the original war" elexa seemed to suddenly understand the gravity of their new companion "i am mage, and i am a deserter. i cast a spell to draw you from the city centre when i saw you approached by that official, i recognized you. i had been looking for you" "go on," elexa solemnly watched her mother answer, with shared curiosity

after a moment to collect his thoughts, mage did "actually, it.. cost me something very dear to find you. a gift from my father." "is he..?" elexa started without thinking "yes" there was a sorry silence "a wish.. from the everyever." "we met the everyever on the way into the city!" elexa suddenly volunteered "you did??" her mother responded, seeming half surprised "well that only sounds right," mage answered, "but my wish was to find someone who had known my father. you see... i lead the deserters. because of my power, inherited from my father, not because i am anything more than self-taught or because i am anything of a leader... but because i might have a chance... and i don't have a single friend in the entire village of candleshire"

"you know that we can both tell that you are not lying," elexa's mother broke the silence, calling to mind the abilities elves have to read the thoughts of humans and each other "tell me your father's name" mage paused, as if for the first time doubtful, then proudly answered, "hal merrick" elexa's mother froze; then turned to elexa "i am the reason this young man lost his father.. he sacrificed his life to save my village in the war" a look of understanding seemed to pass between them then she straightened her back, and turned to look mage in the eye "i pray you will not think the everyever's wish wasted, my friend," she adressed him "now you have two friends in candleshire"

chapter 5 the borough centre

with that, the fog dissipated outward, somehow revealing a room barely wide enough for elexa and her mother and mage to stand across from each other as they had, on what must have been the second or third floor of a shabby old stone-clay hut in the centre of the room on the floor were some etched runes, obviously mystical and obviously improvised, but now elexa thought she recognized those seemingly random scratches from the paved centre on the outskirts of holvesbriss the room looked like rooms she had had growing up in hodgebridge and later surrounding regions; decorated in a way with the kind of sparse everyday objects a poor or traveling family or individual manages to hold onto, sparsed with a few seemingly very special artifacts of decoration, such as a few tapestries on the walls, only everything in this room seemed otherworldly and as if it definitely had some mystical design

meanwhile, markos and taiga had finally decided between themselves that it was best to stop running, in large part because they were now certain that they had fled through some parts of the borough of holvesbriss two or three times, and the only officials they had seen had seemed to just wave at them. no, it was time to figure out how to find elexa after much critical hypothetical and exasperated debate wandering the streets of holvesbriss, taiga finally offered, "why don't we go back to where they disappeared?" "that's where we all ran into that official remember," markos pointed out "yeah, but i think we're okay now. i mean.. he won't still be hanging out there, right?" "i mean, i guess probably not..." markos quietly didn't like that all his years of experience with leadership and knowledge of being a captain of the high seas of acaemia had not at all prepared him for being on odd sides of the law in a strange city that he knew very little about; he was slowly beginning to take reassurance more and more in taiga, who seemed far wiser than he had before let on, especially when he would take a moment to think things through as a matter of fact, they did run into the official again, who had naturally resumed his favorite off-duty slouching spot in the shade of the alley "hey, i am sorry about earlier," he jumped up to offer as he saw markos and taiga catch his gaze "i didn't mean nothin', i just thought your friend was pretty..." "more than you know," markos answered solemnly, as they walked past him

standing in the paved centre, markos and taiga looked around themselves, hopefully "well, they're not here," taiga finally dejected, "of course they wouldn't be stupid enough to come back to the same spot" with that, he angrily kicked a rock that was lying in a broken-up scratched part of the pavement

the rock, or a rock, suddenly found its way harmlessly against all odds into elexa's hands "what the they who what now?" she managed "it came from the window," was mages only answer the three turned to glance down at the street, where taiga and markos were standing, wandering in circles, as if they were debating one to another standing there all day or going someplace else

chapter 6 the deserters

part ii

taiga and markos and mage had taken rather nicely not only to each other but to an old card game mage had that had been his father's, although strangely markos kept winning "it's because i've played cards to meet friends all over acaemia," he insisted, "sea captains always become experts at cards, and then find that the rules and strategies are about the same throughout the world." "i'm just glad we aren't playing for money," mage offered "that's what everyone says, and then you've made a friend or two in a new port town."

elexa and her mother were reconnecting, to both of their bittersweet delight, though it was undercut by one or a few oddities that just were a bit hard to explain to normal humans; elexa's mother had felt instantly relieved, like a breath of fresh air, upon finding herself inside holvesbriss, owing to the ancient enchantment of the old elven city that had not completely faded away; but the turmoiled city of candleshire surrounding them was like a case down over the vibe of comfort, and the affect that this had on her was strange and crossfading; she spoke slowly, as if thoughtfully, and seemed often at times to be off somewhere else elexa's reaction, being a half elven child, was all the worse; she had begun seeing things, and her mother had talked her through it as well as the imagined voices that would come with them and being in the noisy center of holvesbriss

the revolution, or rather the desertation, continued on, and as the everyever had said would not affect the centre borough of holvesbriss

their first involvement in the revolution was to pivot solely on the performance of markos

"it's a rule among the deserters," mage explained, "nobody can introduce new members, they have to introduce themselves." "well, then since i am a captain, i'll be the unofficial leader of our group, unless someone else wants to volunteer... i'll invite them to a game of cards," markos all but quipped "they might not have a deck, but that is a respectable way to approach this," was mage's answer markos approached the cluster of men in the storehouse room who seemed to carry themselves as if they were the sort of appointed, well captains, under mage in his resistance, but at first glance not to share any of that respect on to him he thought for a second about ports he had frequented that were neighboring to candleshire "do any of you gentlemen play... hobb's cribbet?" was what he managed to come up with the man in the center of the group seemed for a moment to grimmace, then replied, "no, nobody plays hobb's cribbett. where are you from?" "i was born in the setlands," was markos honest answer, "i'm a sea captain." at this the man seemed to smile slightly at himself, and replied, "then that's forgiveable. mage seems to like you, but we know that any one of us may be fooled by one of the empire's spies, but maybe, not all of us will be." markos tried to explain that their only involvement so far with the empire had been with the official on the outskirts of holvesbriss, but the man cut him off "just tell us what good you are to the deserters," seemed to mirror the thoughts on the faces of every man standing in the room markos paused for a moment, to think he knew that he trusted mage, because elexa and her mother trusted mage, and this was mage's group- so all things considered, he felt maybe it was best in this scenario to be as open as he could, and perhaps even try to sell himself a little as he would do when taking a breather offering site seeing cruises he glanced across the room to elexa, who seemed to tell him that he should go ahead with what he was thinking "with us are an elf and her half elven daughter," markos insighted, "being from candleshire perhaps you know better than i what good they may be to the deserters," the leaders seemed to give a doubletake. "you didn't tell us some of them were elves," one of them said to mage "it doesn't make an exception to the rule" it was as fate would have it at this moment that elexa, perhaps in part from the tension, gave in to one of the side effects she was still having from being in holvesbriss "shut up you stupid mutt!!" she screamed, springing across the room and causing the shadows on the wall, which peculiarly bore the perfect silhoutte of a massive hound, to dance before the room had a chance to respond, elexa's mother stepped forward "i'm from candleshire too. the empire's officials can't do this trick" with that, she raised her hands outstretched at her sides, and a series of tapestries with presumably deserter symbols painted on them that were hung across the four walls of the storeroom rose up on their hangers, as if in a strong breeze, then flew off them entirely to meet in the center of the room above their heads, proceeding to dance and swirl about like fish swimming in a pond before settling together in the rigid shape of an elven crest, then all at a sudden going limp and fluttering lifelessly to the floor and into the arms of the deserter leaders "mage can do one pretty close," "yes, but i've told you, if i tried to finish it with an elven crest that spell would strike me dead." a few of the men in the group seemed to remember that mage had said that before finally, the man who had originally been the first to adress markos stated, "alright, on the virtue of mage's trust, and, talent, only with the fact that these two do appear to be elves... we accept you to our group. second?" actually, the decision was carried unanimously

the first mission of the deserters, now having added taiga and markos to their ranks and with the aid of elexa and her mother, was one which they had been forced to table for a long time - finding another deserter leader who had gone into hiding somewhere in the city; a girl named melvrose

chapter 7 melvrose

the first phase of this mission was conceived on the walk home to mage's house from the meeting with the deserter leaders "guys, i think i know a way we can try to find melvrose," elexa suddenly volunteered "how?" was the obvious answer "you know i can sometimes tell the future, like with dreams," she went on "what if i try to dream about melvrose?" "that could work," mage immediately jumped in, excitedly "i'll tell you everything i remember about her, and i have some pictures of her at home, too" the rest of the group caught up to what had been said, and seemed to share in a close silent agreement

as they approached mage's home they were met, allbeit to anyone's surprise, by the empirial official who was fond of lazing around in the alley on the outskirts of holvesbriss when he was off-duty "milady," he started she jolted to make eye contact with him "please let me apologize for yesterday, i certainly had not meant to embarrass you," he continued, "some of the young ladies around candleshire think it a compliment when an empirial official asks for a hood inspection..." he seemed sheepish, then naturally more mature "i should know better." he paused for a moment, then seemed to have a realization which he kept to himself "especially around holvesbriss, but hey that's why i love this neighborhood" with that, he all but winked at elexa's mother, but not in a way that would imply a downslide from the maturity he had arrived at earlier in the conversation, and wandered on to his slumping alley

the rest of the evening was spent in regailing elexa with memories of times spent with melvrose, which ranged from her initiation into the deserters to missions she had gone on with mage to a time when she and mage had briefly dated, after they met, as well as sharing old pictures and drawings and letters off in the corner markos was teaching taiga techniques and strategies for winning at cards, though neither of them could pronounce the name of mage's particular card game melvrose was a very young woman with short hair, who was fond of coloring it, both in natural representations and the traditional festive colors of candleshire, and wore a blue cloak with gold lining similar to mage's red one "alright then," elexa finally chimed, "if that's everything you remember about melvrose, i should go to bed right away" mage nodded "mommy?" she asked "hm?" her mother softly answered "would you make me some warm milk, like when i was little?" "of course," was the teary-eyed answer elexa was all snuggled up and sound asleep before her mother arrived with her warm milk

chapter 8 the dream

she awoke, or rather found herself seemingly awake, in a strange sort of desert dreamscape with massive hollowed out obelisks in the natural landscape towering around her in the distance, all either catching the elusive sun or stained with varying bright otherworldly sand colors she remembered suddenly that she was looking for someone.. a girl she knew.. no, a girl a friend of hers knew... with that, she suddenly caught sight of a figure standing off in the distance she approached it, at first hurriedly, then hesitantly, but the figure turned to meet her gaze it looked like melvrose- elexa had never seen melvrose in person, but it looked like melvrose "don't come close!" the figure suddenly screamed elexa was frightened "who are you?" "not melvrose!" it screamed in return "not melvrose!" "alright," she pleaded, "but who, or what?.." "melvrose does not dream.." the figure answered "melvrose does not dream anymore, melvrose dreams are haunted so i haunt melvrose' dreams, and she need not remember" elexa suddenly understood "a soul spirit, given to those of the world so weary that they wish only for sleep to be their escape" the spectre seemed to answer without a sound or movement "where can i find melvrose in the real world? i want to help her" the creature surprised elexa by seeming to gaze off in the distance and think "before i came, she had nightmares," the spectre recalled "nightmares of a place called... elvesbridge"

with that, elexa jolted awake, remembering at first all that had just happened but slowly fading down to just the one word- elvesbridge her mother was by her side "what happened? what did you dream about?" she asked, comfortingly "elvesbridge," elexa answered solemnly, but still with a slight tired look of terror on her face "all i remember is that melvrose went to elvesbridge" "then that's where we're going," mage interjected before the others had a chance to say anything "there's more you should know.." elexa answered him "i don't remember much about the dream,.. where i was which was nowhere and talking to someone who looked like melvrose... but i remember, it was a nightmare. i think.. she was in trouble after she went to elvesbridge..." this time markos interjected "what do you know of elvesbridge?" he asked mage mage had not changed in his resoluteness nor his frantic packing about his room "a place that is not at all as friendly to elves as the name implies," he answered, "and melvrose may not be a half elven child like you elexa, but she does have some elf in her lineage"

chapter 9 the inn of elvesbridge

part iii

to everyone's overshadowed relief, they actually found melvrose in elvesbridge, without any trouble with any officials or otherwise; she was working as a waitress in a tavern they had wandered into when markos confessed that he felt he could not go another step without a drink and elexa stammered that she had a good feeling about this place the wall murals inside reminded her of her lucid dream they caught sight of melvrose across the room - she was wearing an outfit that was perhaps deliberately casual in an instructed way but certainly nothing you'd mind wearing in public, and a pair of novelty elf ears unfortunately melvrose didn't end up being the elf-eared waitress who served them, so they were left to try silently to think of something else while markos made conversation with the waitress and ordered a few different glasses and some small appetizers for everybody after markos had gotten his drink in his system, he was the first to come up with a plan "you're the one who has the best chance of making contact with her without anything too obvious happening," he told mage, "she'll probably recognize you" "you think i should just walk across the room to the business house and try to catch her in passing and ask say if i know her from somewhere?" "yes, be very subtle and non-suggestive about it," he murmured mage took markos' advice gingerly "i beg your pardon.. have we met somewhere, you only look familiar" melvrose' eyes went wide when she caught sight of him, enough that he noticed, then she seemed to catch herself and then seem relieved that no one other than mage had "well if that's sincere and not an invitation mister, we can talk about it when i'm off in about an hour's time," so after mage had used the business house they were left to order an actual dinner, which no one especially elexa really objected, and eat it as slowly and casually as possible waiting for melvrose to be off work

chapter 10 to those who want to dream

the conversation they ended up waiting about an hour and one half's time for, which they were only allowed to stay again to everyone's overshadowed relief when mage instinctively confessed to their waitress that he was waiting to talk to one of the other waitresses, whom he knew from somewhere, was in actual fact very brief "i know why you're here mage, and i miss you," she began "i don't suppose i could convince you to leave the deserters and make a little life out here with me" she half laughed at herself "what happened melvrose?" mage answered "what happened is, i blurted about my lineage and it got me this job - elven things are kind of.. "popular" in this part of town" she seemed to struggle over the words "and because i was smart and haven't said anything about it to anyone since,.. when i get off work, i'm able to go home, smoke, maybe have dinner if i haven't eaten here... and it's not a bad life, not as bad as holvesbriss" mage seemed to quietly understand elexa wasn't so convinced "i had a dream about you," she interjected, "i thought.. i don't know that you weren't happy, or you wanted more out of life, even if it was with this..." melvrose seemed puzzled by the child's statement "that's quaint," she finally offered, "when i was little i used to have the coolest dreams and always remember, but now i guess because i'm older i never seem to remember them; i guess that's kinda normal" she finished, and the look in mages eyes told elexa that she was not coming back to holvesbriss with them

chapter 11 all's well that ends well

part iv

with mage's mission to find a friend he could confide in on his calling that wasn't the everyever and the deserters' again tabled mission to recruit melvrose out of the way, the cause as it were was back to doing well normal deserter things which in the great city of candleshire meant mostly sharing a home and a helping hand with anyone who might need it, as more and more of the people grew tired of the new empire this of course left elexa to stay with her mother, who had chosen to stay with mage and the deserters, and taiga and markos to well decide what to do "i do feel as if i want to stay with elexa," taiga murmured, "we've been friends for a long time, but i've really loved working on your ship, and i would miss you..." markos was all but brought to tears by taiga's honesty "i would miss you too, both of you.. all of you... in fact," he smiled to say, "i'd go so far as to say you're all my crew now. so what better is their for a captain on vacation to do than join up with the deserters for a while?" he laughed "it's settled then," elexa answered, "from now on, we'll stick together, no matter what" nobody took the effort to point at elexa's statement had been premature, or for that matter anywhere about untrue

chapter 12 precursor

it was after a moment of somewhat satisfying silence that one of the deserters whom other than mage they had not met rushed into mage's room, out of breath "the empire has been dissolved," she blurted, "dissolved." the look on elexa's mother's face spoke to how she caught herself getting her hopes up, as she asked, "then... the eligacy has been returned control?.." "no, the eligacy is still dissolved," was the frenzied answer, "because the situation in candleshire has done nothing to aid the political interests of the people who were behind the empire... candleshire has been given over to the rule of unlawed land" "did i hear you right?" markos answered her, the wild look in his eyes telling he knew the phrase from his years on the high seas of acaemia "yes," was the now soft and distant answer "candleshire has been given over to the rule of unlawed land"

the league of candleshire preface

book ii preface

the rule of unlawed land when a local government in acaemia was not, as it were, making ends meet for the people, or in some cases its invested interests (this was often in the case of colonies of the grand empire, which thanks to a dishonest treaty in what was now the secret war on elves is what candleshire had been) it could be given over to the rule of unlawed land, which meant that any governing bodies had been officially dissolved and the people were left to, hopefully, amidst whatever chaos may ensue if the land was already in political turmoil which was often the case, establish and elect their own government that may better suit their needs all this time, the league of candleshire, or the unofficial leaders of the deserters from the now dissolved empire - a boy with an heriditary magical talent, named mage, whose father had been a leader on the side of right in the original war on elves a sea captain of acaemia, markos, who was finding when put to the test he could navigate each new city of their adventure like a new sea a young genius inventor, taiga, who is quiet but thoughtful when it counts, and the best friend of the real leader of the group, a young half elven girl named elexa; who, together with her elven mother, made up what had become on this day the league of candleshire, minus one previous member whom they had just managed to find living in another part of the city; a deserter girl named melvrose - had only served to protect the good people of candleshire from the incumbent empire and its officials now it seemed, the new and greater task which lay before them was to achieve some sort of order in what was now a lawless land; easy as that may have sounded at first, in actual fact the people the deserters and the league represented were at best a smaller majority in candleshire; despite the fact that the empire had abused just about everybody; there was an entirely new faction of empirial colonists who had descended upon the once small ancient city, and whose loyalties would be completely and totally in question there were also those of the empirial officials still living in the city, and it was unknown what their collective or individual reactions would be there were even those who had lived in the city before the empire who had been led to believe that the sovereignty of the eligacy had been in part responsible for the war on elves no, even if candleshire had probably become much safer for deserters; it had not become any safer for elves - and now it desperately needed to, before it was too late

the elven chronicles book ii the league of candleshire

chapter 1 the rule of unlawed land

after some ititial debate as to the structure of a course of action, the league was finally rolling; melvrose would show up when she felt like it, now that she knew where they were; perhaps her tavern was doing extra good business in the midst of a complete political collapse in what was now a bustling trade and tourist city markos, taiga, and elexa's mother had been hold up with the leaders of the original deserters for days, discussing the situation throughout candleshire the overrall gist seemed to be that people seemed comfortable gravitating toward the parts of the ancient city that suited their tastes (easy to do when candleshire was divided rather fairly perhaps even generously between a colonial district and the lands of the original citizens, whose political opinions were mixed and reticent anyway), a practice which was beginning to form a series of hubs around what was long since an ancient and royal city the task at hand seemed to be to rescue as it were any elves that were still in hiding in the city, as elexa's mother had been, and regroup in a sensibly fortifiable hub they would establish of their own in holvesbriss to that end, mage and elexa had been hold up on their own, reporting any dreams elexa had she felt might have some meaning and focusing on helping each other hone their individual talents, those of a born wizard and half elven child

katantra was a beautiful young woman, in her twenties or perhaps even teens, who liked to dress in floral and natural colors and long elegant flowing dresses and gowns that was to outside appearance - allbeit with the exception of a pair of long pointy clearly elven ears she no longer tried to hide, because she hadn't seen other elves or especially people since candleshire had been given over to the empire from where she lived in a nice little grove by the brook that humans would've found it far too difficult to navigate the woods and briars to, she could still just see the flag atop the grand turret of candleshire - and today, for the first time in what seemed like eternity even to an elf; the flag of the empire was not flying in fact no flag was flying which meant that the facetious prop anti-elven empire had finally collapsed and candleshire had been given over to unlawed land, a possibility katantra had been dreading more than a few others that was why she had chosen to call in an old favor as it were - and the flute at her side which had now begun to whistle as she passed through the windy sunbeams of a meadow near her home as if it had a mind of its own was the key part in that plan; it had not left her side since she had left the city with the swift motion of a prodigy who shall play from the heart no matter how rusty, she called the flute to her lips, running its oddly uneven lengthed ember pipes from side to side in an entrancingly flowing serpentine motion, producing a sound that was otherwordly though definitely musical the peculiar dance that accompanied was equally otherwordly, and would almost certainly have had to have been rehearsed, except that it seemed to rely on instinct after a few vast moments that would've seemed to anyone watching like a girl either mad or drunk out of her mind in the woods alone having the time of her life, the bizarre regale was answered by, well; how best to explain it - every kind of weather that existed in acaemia and somehow all localized within the tiny shady meadow, clustered around her like a personal performance in another matter of vast moments the various isolated weather patterns had clustered into themselves and begun to resemble humanoid shapes; the one that most clearly resembled the weather they were having that day in candleshire adressed katantra the voice was unnaturally shrill, like a musical prism played at the wrong speed, but at the same time it was as if every note without intending to be was musical "we are the weather pixies of candleshire; and we know you, katantra, for we are in your debt and have given you this song of all seasons" "thank you, my friends; i want to find those like me living in the city; i fear we may be in our gravest danger now" "if you travel to the borough centre of holvesbriss, you will find those who share in your quest; we will seek out and use our powers to aid any elves who may still reside in the city" "thank you, my friends" "when you aided us in a time of need, we gave you something in return - this song of all seasons which you have used to summon us. if we help your people in their time of crisis, we ask in return that you will help our people, the fae also residing in hiding in candleshire - for the pixies and nymphs can escape into the forests and even the elements, as even some elves have done, but the fae are like humans in form as elves and must dwell among the forests and among mortals" "i would think to do nothing less" "then we will use the guided flute to contact you when we have found someone you and your soon-to-find friends may be able to help" "thank you, for all of us, friends" with that, the shady sunset-watered meadow returned to its regularly scheduled forecast

chapter 2 katantra

the embrace that katantra and elexa's mother greeted each other with when first their eyes met was on par with one of lovers who've been apart for a long time, in form, but the kiss, or any kind of clutching that would have jostled the gentle affection, was replaced with a meeting of the foreheads which was even more ceremonial while obviously still affectionate markos, taiga and mage had seen elexa greet her mother with a gesture that was similar but included a side-to- side bobbing motion of the heads or maybe both as elf-hugs were shared, mage began to behave as if he'd become suddenly aware of something shifting in the weather he turned, instinctively, of all people to elexa "it's the fae, isn't it?" "you mean the pixies, but yes; i think an elf living in candleshire might have called to them for help, maybe even katantra"

"can you feel it too?" her mother asked their new-joined member "yes; it's like morning light" the elven sisters were speaking of the affect which the ancient enchantment the elven city of candleshire still held in its very heart had on elves, especially who had been apart from elven air; elexa, being half-elven, had been having an in fact hallucinogenic reaction, spurred on by the thick vibes of tension and chaos near the end of the collapse of the empire; now, even though all three were aware of a kind of... swirling anxiety or apprehension that seemed to float across the skies of candleshire, like ripples on a pool catching sunbeams... she was finding that anything unmanageable or even unpleasant was gone, and further that it had enhanced her elven and half-elven powers to a remarkable degree in case of point she had already had a dream about a hidden elven settlement in the outer forests, which they hoped to scout as soon as they felt things had settled down reasonably in the outside city

although he never let on to the other members of the group- and although he knew that elexa and her mother knew anyway, but never said anything- mage was quietly becoming more and more concerned, even frantically worried, for any elves or fae that actually were still living in the once elven city of candleshire - unlike the deserters, and markos' seafaring party, mage had read the official statistics put out by the empire before it collapsed - and the statistics said that there were no elves or fae living in candleshire. they could have been propagandized by the empire, but that wouldn't have served to stir up anti-elven popular sentiment; so mage figured that any elves or fae who had survived and not fled the city when it was given over to the empire had been, rather well considering candleshire was in-between size as port cities go, in hiding all this time, as he had only recently learned elexa's mother and katantra had been therefore his hopes were bleak for anyone who had managed to escape both the war and the statistics, especially now in the grim state of the city they were in given that anyone on any side with any political inkling would also know that the statistics could be lies

"now that we have a new member to our league, as well as the aid of some of the local nature spirits; i think we should make to scout the outer forests at morning light, unless elexa has any revelations otherwise" he nodded at her quite respectfully despite his all-men- at-arms tone "i agree," elexa's mother answered, after a considering pause among the group "do you have any talismans or artifacts that may aid us in navigating the outer forests?" "i do," markos was the one to answer her, "a compass, as well as a spyglass for sighting our path if we can reach highground- and a map the upper-footnote corner of which contains a cursory representation of the outer forests of candleshire" "very good then; morning light it is" "if morning light finds you snuggled in tight, rise and shine to see the sun cast glowing lines" elexa volunteered "huh?" "you remember, mommy?" she asked "when i was little?" "i do remember," she nostalgically answered "besides, i sorta felt like i hadn't said anything funny for awhile. i thought we could all use a little cheering up" with that, they all collectively agreed she had succeeded

chapter 3 the outer forests

part ii

markos, elexa, her mother, taiga, mage, and katantra had not considered the flowing illustrations of strange monsters on the map which barely alluded to the outer forests of candleshire to be literal, as opposed to embroidered artistic expression - until now in fact, almost in the way a hologram seemed to appear when you turn it a certain way to look at it, as soon as they were out of reach or out of sight of the outskirts of the city of candleshire, they were surrounded by a miriage of the most fantastic sparkling flickering glowing swirling flashing tessalating flourescing creatures one could imagine without having sailed to the centre of the earth and seen the clear eye of the waters of acaemia, and all the majestic deep-sea life it offered the creatures, though almost impossible to look away from, did not make a move toward the newcomers, and in fact eyed them neutrally in the way lesser-territorial animals will do in the woods "are they.. spirits?" markos wondered out loud "nay, spirits do not usually produce light which casts reflections, and these creatures do" mage hypothesized "then.. they are.. animals?" "yes.. enchanted animals of candleshire, thought endangered or extinct" the strange league of questers and the strange ensemble of glowing chamelesque creatures eyed each other, curiously "do you think they can help us find the other elves?" elexa wondered "i mean.. they probably don't speak.." she almost seemed perplexed at the obvious statement, then thought and countered, "yeah but,.. if there are so many of them all together out here at the edge of the forest, they must feel crowded further in the same way they do by the city - so that's where the hidden elven settlement must be, in the centre of the forest" mage was impressed and taken aback by her deduction "by the way we came in, we can reach the centre or ought to reach it if we simply keep going straight," markos offered, "and that means we have to keep north"

chapter 4 keep north

in the forest settlement of candlebridge - as it was called by the handful of elves and fae living there - no one had received word that the empire colonial had been dissolved, until the water pixie had risen to tell them that a band of heroes was on their way to search for them, and bring them to the new settled hub of holvesbriss as exciting as the news was after so long in the forest (which was comfortable, even if it didn't offer enough running room for the fae, but elves preferred the mystically crafted cities and castles that they made their own) they could not set up a flare or try to signal in any way, for fear of attracting attention to their hiding place from the city so they had posted lookouts on the perimeter of their several-odd tent camp, which ultimately left a few members to hold down the fort as it were in the centre - a young fae girl named tigera, and an elven boy named meirk "do you think they'll find us? what if there are other parties looking for us from the city?" she spoke the thoughts on both of their minds as the fae will be inclined to do with their friends and companions meirk, being elven, though nervous smiled at the fact that he could read her thoughts anyway "it's not like we can't defend ourselves," he countered, "we've made it on our own out here all this time" "yes, but nobody's ever found us before, now somebody's looking for us... what if they're followed?"

the thoughts were echoed around this time, as fate would have it, by markos "the animals would tell us if someone were in the forest," elexa hoped "they didn't seem bothered that we were in the forest," markos replied "it may be different, we are elven.." her mother offered "i can cast a spell to tell us if we are being followed, and where those we seek are from here;" mage began "but it may be visible to any with magical abilities in the city and eyes on the forests" "a risk that may be worth taking at this juncture, but we should enquire of elexa," her mother concluded elexa thought, and seemed to try to take in the gist of her emotions then she responded, quite carefully: "i don't feel like we're being followed.. but i do feel worried about attracting attention from the city.. so i feel like.. we should just keep going" "then that's what we'll do" mage answered immediately for all of them

in another hour less-than half hour's time, they actually reached the settlement of candlebridge, as the flourescent hand-painted sign spread over the tiny camp informed them the elves of the camp ran instantly toward katantra elexa and her mother "thank you so much for coming; is it safe in the city now?" "i wish i could say so; we don't quite know for sure yet, or where, but the deserters are fortifying a hub in holvesbriss, which still holds some of candleshire's enchantment" was elexa's mother's answer "that's where we're all going," markos chimed in only then did it sink in upon all of them the gravity of the plan markos had just restated traveling with a group that was evenly half elves and half people, no less when one of the group was a mage, had been unexpectedly easy going through the restless in-dispute outskirts of candleshire from holvesbriss traveling with a small brigade of refugee elves and fae accompanied by three humans, from the outer forests to the center of the city, sounded comparatively impossible mage was the first to offer an answer to the question hanging in the air "i can put upon an enchantment that will make us appear.. well.. not worth bothering with, until we make it to holvesbriss... it just might be a little... silly..." without questioning what mage's plan might be, the group agreed to the quickest and safest way to holvesbriss possible, and began making preparations to leave

chapter 5 coming into candleshire

as they reentered candleshire, they were stopped in fact, but this was no surprise as they were going through a main-road gate that led directly to the center of the city "name and business in candleshire?" the empirial guard uniformed-man asked drolly, giving markos the impression that his opinion of markos' answer would be more important than his official or unofficial business in candleshire "coming in from port, markos helmsbridge, sea captain of acaemia, sir, with this delivery of circus animals" in fact, in addition to markos and taiga, proudly displaying the first mates badge markos had made for him on their journey to candleshire, there were eleven various animals of natures that were mostly native to candleshire as well as other parts of acaemia; mostly horses, ponies, and camels, a few more exotic animals like giant tortoises, and goats, and one red-and-gold crested falcon which rode like a prize on taiga's gloved hand "circus animals? why i haven't been to the circus in a long time" the guard seemed half excited and half skeptical "our customer hasn't had much of a circus to run," taiga volunteered, "but he says nothing brings people together like a good old circus. he thinks it's just what candleshire needs" this seemed to touch a soft string in the empirial guard's heart "now, i don't think that's a bad idea," he conversed, "alright then, animal delivery, just need to document what you're bringing in" "right," markos butted in, "two camels, for rides, three horses and three ponies, to be the stars of the show i've heard, two giant tortoises, two goats, and this priceless red-and-gold crested falcon which is a treasure to both the grand empire and candleshire" the guard seemed to simply jot things down, agreeingly, then paused - that's twelve animals; i only see eleven markos started, but only for an instant "i don't usually deal with cargo that moves around on it's own; what'd i say, two goats? it was two tortoises, only one goat" markos didn't have a chance to safely glance behind him to confirm his statement, but fortunately his instincts had been correct "right, i like that," the guard laughed "what kind of cargo do you normally deal in?" he went on conversing as he signed markos' papers "oh rather just cargo - cargo, the easier to stock and the more profitable the better, i prefer daily goods like tea and spices, tobaccos, they usually aren't too much trouble, and when i can i love to get my hands on some fine tapestries, or even silks.. well worth the small risk in traveling with them, anyway it's no conquering effort to pirate a man's crew of a silk" the guard nodded, smiling, and handed markos the small stack of papers "you're all set, enjoy your time in candleshire" "thank you sir," markos and taiga chimed, but for a second the guard thought he heard at least some of the animals murmur in answer as well he decided thereupon that it was because markos and taiga had begun herding them into the gate, a process which was very long and slow-going due to the fact that two of the group were in fact giant tortoises, and which was carried out amidst many long and awkward smiles between markos and the uniformed guard when they were finally out of earshot at least, markos breathed a sigh of relief, only to have it cut short by the voice of a falcon that had flown onto his epauleted shoulder in his ear squawking, "you called one of us a goat" "i did no such thing," markos blurted, then suddenly could not help feeling like the guard's eyes were on his back until they were finally out of sight as well as earshot at this point, of course, possibly because the entire group breathed the same sigh of relief that markos had tried to, everything collectively collapsed most of the horses and ponies were fae, who of course had been horses before, but being a camel would find frustrating to anyone, as they are rather slow and... wobbly animals being a giant tortoise was all the worse the only member of the group that was really enjoying mage's enchantment was, naturally, elexa "brahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaa!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" she bleated, galloping circles around the struggling caravan "i wanna chew on something sweet and fibrous, like reed grass or a metal can!!!!!!" "we don't have time for that," taiga volunteered "we have all the time in the world, you guys are turtles!!!" "hey!" the turtles in the group interjected elexa the goat missed their argument, because she had found an abandoned toy in one of the house-groves nestled in the outskirts of the city- a rubber tarp stretched across a metal-cast hoop without a second thought, she ascended the springy surface as she had done as a child, only to find that with four hooves and a long neck it was not quite the same experience "eh-wuhp" she galloped and jolted about on the stretchy mat completely uncoordinatedly, causing taiga to eventually burst out laughing, and markos to retain a look on his face that implied he wasn't sure if he needed to use the business house finally, she collapsed safely to the ground at the edge of the toy, proclaiming that was fun and she wanted to try again, but taiga insisted despite their turtle pace they keep moving

it was dusk when they reached the now proclaimed hub of holvesbriss, to the warm sight of golden-cast lettering which pronounced its name upon the gate that had once been an open alley fortunately, after the guard by staying on the main road and traveling as a procession they had managed to avoid any further investigation, and taiga had only been forced to shyly regail a few passers-by with tales of a circus that was supposedly coming to town in candleshire when they were safely inside the hub, and mage had unworked his enchantment, it was of all people melvrose who greeted them "hey, i thought you went and got a dayjob," mage shyly approached her "the elvesbridge inn is doing more business from incoming tourists who want to see what will become of candleshire than we've ever done in the time i've worked there..." she answered "i was making double my paycheck after tips... i had all my wildest dreams come true... but it just wasn't what i wanted" she glanced, warmly, at a painting in the corner of the room she had done for the deserters "well, i guess you're back then..?" "yeah... i'm back" she smiled, and hugged mage warmly, a human hug

short of waiting for any more of elexa's dreams, which lately seemed to just serve as defcon markings, the group agreed there was only one way to determine for sure where if any elves or fae there may be still hiding in candleshire - and that was to enquire of the everyever since they made a formiddable and swift team together, and since both knew the everyever, mage and elexa were chosen to make the quest "we'll leave in the morning," elexa proposed "agreed, but we should wait until the sun is high, or we may become lost in the mists of the misty mountains," mage went along "agreed" with that, they began packing what few things they would need for a journey through the forests and mountains of outer candleshire, and, after repeating an incantation which they had co-authored in the hopes of helping elexa have prophetic dreams... they were asleep

chapter 6 felrae

part iii

when they awoke, they were, in a way that was oddly familiar but in a good nostalgic way to elexa, within some sort of strange multi-colored dreamscape actually, after closer thought elexa realized it reminded her very much of the strange multi-colored phosphorescent animals in the outer forests of candleshire mage seemed right at home

after some silence, he announced, "i think our arriving here is some sort of sign from or about the everyever.. i'm not sure it's a good forboding..." he looked at elexa with the expression of someone returning to a troubled but beloved home; elexa knew it well "how can you seem so.. sad, and dreamy in this beautiful place?" she asked "this place is home to me," was all mage replied she thought for a second "what is holvesbriss?" "that's where my room is," mage laughed, "right now i have about fourteen guests sleeping over" elexa had to smilingly agree

when they had walked together across the sprawling neon dreamscape, for a length of time that was very difficult to judge because they were in fact in a dream, talking to each other to pass the time, though they knew not always about what, sometimes the other would sound as if they made sense but be hard to understand, and it was possible they talked about many of the same things over again - they arrived at what, somehow, in this sprawling desertesque neon landscape, was a clearing - in the center stood a figure, clad in dark blue he turned to face them, smiling, with the look of a child that reminded elexa of the first time she had met markos "oh hello; are you lost too?" "lost?" mage asked, suddenly "oh yes, lost in your dreams," the boy cheered, spinning about like someone enjoying a first snowfall

upon closer examination, elexa realized the boy was obviously fae, though there was something.. off about him his skin seemed pale, the kind of pale that would imply dim indoor lighting, but it wasn't, it seemed as if it were actually his skin after another moment mage spoke up again "we're not lost, we've come looking for you, my friend" he began "if you'd like, we've come to take you to holvesbriss, where there is an established hub friendly to elves and fae, now that the empire has collapsed" "holvesbriss?" the boy questioned the word, as if it sounded only slightly familiar "yes, holvesbriss, in the centre of candleshire," elexa answered him "candleshire?" the boys eyes lit up, as if he wasn't sure if he recognized the place because it was home or frightening "will you come with us? especially if you are lost as you say?" mage finally asked "the places you speak of... sound like... home..." the boy answered, slowly "but my home is a place... a place called.... " he struggled for a long moment, then seemed at peace with his realization "odds grove"

with that, the dreamscape dissipated in a way that reminded elexa of the mystical fog when first she and her mother had met mage, and the two of them were standing in a very dim, dusty, dim; old wooden shack sprawled in a rustic old bed in front of them, and seeming to just now be waking up, was the boy from the dream "mmmmhhhh hello, i'm felrae, have we met somewhere before?" the boy greeted them, shuffling up out of the covers with what elexa had to admit was the cutest bedhead she had ever seen on a boy, except maybe for taiga's, whose reminded her of the monkeys she dreamed of one day finding on the islands of acaemia "we've come to take you to holvesbriss, where there is an established hub friendly to fae and elves, now that the empire has collapsed," mage answered him the boy seemed to pause and stare off for a long time into space, taking in what had been said as if it were all coming back to him after a while, he spoke "yes, that sounds.. so nice, thank you.. i only have a few things..." with that, he retrieved a bold robin's egg blue canvas knapsack from beneath his seemingly antique bed, and went about filling it with the few belongings and clothes elexa and mage had seen scattered about the tiny falling down shack when they got outside, they were greeted, by what was for the first time to elexa and mage, by a sight that brought tears to elexa's eyes, and gave felrae a look of realization all the more deep and resolute than he had had when they informed him of the fall of the candleshire empire "my woods," he started indeed, it looked as if someone had intended to build another hub or city where a small outcropping of trees had once stood that must have been odds grove, but the small forest had long since been leveled, leaving only a flat labyrinth of tree stumps which was every bit as barren, though it shared none of the other qualities, as the landscape in elexa and mage's dream "i remember," he went on "they came and took my woods, shortly after i found this nice unwanted out-of-the- way home... and.... i was so sad, i must have just gone to bed, and.... " he trailed off "we understand," elexa answered him mage had to admit that he finally did understand

fortunately, it is much easier for the fae to travel and live among humans than it is for elves; instead of pointy ears, which are an obvious giveaway, they only had to worry about accidentally attracting swooning attention from the locals which they had dealt with by felrae and elexa holding hands on the way back to holvesbriss, which to mage it seemed as a fae and half elven child they were oddly comfortable doing; felrae was still a little downfallen about his home in odds grove but they made it into the centre safe and sound, greeted in turn by everybody who had managed to comfortably settle within the newly established hub

"is that everybody?" markos greeted them, along with the new member "i think so," mage answered him "i feel like... it is," elexa agreed "good"

the night was spent in nostalgic elven and fae celebration, to commemorate the establishment of the new hub of holvesbriss, which to markos and taiga's delight included higgilty-fidge candles, the human or non-mystical name of the card game mage had introduced them to

the elven chronicles book iii dragons of acaemia

prelude

from her perch on the back of a great serpentine sky dragon, high above the clouds of acaemia, elexa smiled at mage, as they soared toward candleshire together he smiled back, the way friends who feel inside as if they've known each other longer than they really have would, then suddenly caught the look of something in his eye as he glanced ahead of them toward candleshire for a second elexa felt as if something was.. off about the city... darker... then it sunk in what mage had seen, in the distance were two massive flying burning catapult missiles, coming at them from the city the winged dragons instinctively swerved just as she caught it, but she could still feel the heat from the rocky oily projectiles whizzing past them "mage, what's happening?!" she screamed he tried to answer her, as they struggled for their seating on the backs of the twisting dragons, but then everything went black

and she woke up

mage was sitting in front of her, and so was her mother, who seemed to instinctively appear at her side whenever she would have bad dreams although as her mother accounted for the elven part of her heritage that was not really surprising "what was happening?" he asked her "i-" she started, and looked almost despairingly mad at mage, as if his making her think about it had caused her to forget as she was still waking up "i.. just remember.. it was about dragons again, and, i feel like... candleshire isn't safe anymore"

the words hung in the air like the heavy smoke of a hookah pub

chapter 1 the beginning

part i

"candleshire isn't safe anymore??" her mother and mage mirrored her words questioningly at the same time "no... i think we should go as soon as possible..." "markos says that the nearest city still in elven hands is the port of hobbles creek... is morning soon enough?" "i feel like it might not be... since i woke up, i feel, as if something's changed since i went to sleep... like something's happened..." mage thought about the project taiga was working on to try to create an "antenna," like the ones of insects for his local music and dissertation broadcast talisman that would allow them to hear news from around acaemia as he watched their conversation, solemnly "then we should go, now.." her mother answered her "how do you feel.. about markos ship?" she looked at him with a shocking sudden wide look of terror "i.. don't have any idea why, but i feel like we can't go there..." "the deserters have already made backup arrangements. you and mage get your things, i'll get the others" mage could not share thoughts with his companions like the elves could, but he had keen senses as a wizard one of which was empathy, and he could sense that elexa's mother had directed the parting at him as well as for elexa's benefit, almost speaking as if mage were a brother to elexa in her voice, and he took both the compliment and the hint and went about helping elexa make sure she remembered to pack everything, in a way that would at least a little help keep her mind off the impending fear of what was happening

they rushed, satchels in hand, down to the main living room of mages stone clay hut, met by other of their elf fae and deserter friends about the same plan "IT'S ALMOST WORKING!!" elexa caught the look of desperation in taiga's eyes as they glanced past his room "elexa says we have to go, now," markos answer was deeply compassionate while firm, like a true sea captain "when you put it that way," elexa could just still make out the change in taiga's tone, and what sounded like he had somehow managed to perfectly pack his tinkerer's laboratory in all of about two seconds

when they made it out of port, she saw that he probably in fact had, because he had indeed constructed and or arranged himself a sort of portable tinkerer's workshop in the time they had been staying in holvesbriss with the help of which he was just now, and true to his word, picking up a signal from what a few of the group interjected was a broadcast of the hall of gilmrod, in the colonial district "sdfhogwand the refortified empire troops are on their way to holvesbriss as we speak, to finally bring some order to what people are calling, 'the anarchist hub.' should be nice for local trade, which we've been hearing has been doing great since the hubs were established, under the firm generous guidance of the empire, but word is it's about to do a lot better if traders finally don't have to worry about elves and fae," the tone in the man's voice would have reminded elexa of a propaganda newscaster in the early 1900's, if she had the ability to read your thoughts it was all mage could do not to break the device which taiga had spent all this time quite literally inventing "right, let's all just respectively glance over the fact that you are possibly the smartest man in acaemia, or somehow on par with elexa, and uh.. change the channel" he used the words as a sea captain of acaemia would, but he somehow felt the phrase fit "right! well, i.. intended that the way to do that was with this..." he toggled with the compass which had been markos' contribution along with mage's local broadcast talisman "svilsloblibbityglopbsolutely correct on that, but we have to be fair here, candleshire was an elven city.. we have to be fair to the empire in that it was unfamiliar territory, and we have to be fair to the citizens or the original citizens of candleshire who may have felt that what tried to replace the eligacy treated them unfairly.." elexa could tell from the tone of the man's voice that he was elven the man who answered him however was not "so that's a justification for war then? after they signed the peace treaty? you just said they knew their way around candleshire better than the empire if there was a serious problem they could have worked it out" "there was no declaration of war, the empire declared war first, remember? it was only answered because, as was stated, there had been a secret war on elves going on this whole time.." "secret war on elves, more like a made up war on elves, everybody knows elves are hallucinatory beings and as a result they're dangerously paranoid and delusional" "my brother was killed by a raid party, mr tinsmith, with empire insignia on their cloaks" "my son has an empire insignia on his sports' cloak, mr eldroheimasomething- boogledybiggledy elf name," taiga changed the channel again "iufgiahkjsfu;giafjli agree it's absolutely unthinkable, expecting to register us, like they'll have us at their beck and call?" "mh, they're telling stories of elves in the colonies being taken and locked in hospitals, as if they were both crippled and dangerous" "is that where we're going?" elexa chimed in markos looked at his compass which taiga had just adjusted "actually.. it is, most likely, i don't know just how taiga's invention works but the compass is pointed toward hobbels creek" "that's about how it works, and you said hobbels creek is the closest so yeah," taiga seemed proud but an exhausted kind of weary, and a charming kind of droll

the ship sailed on toward hobbels creek

chapter 2 hobbles creek

when elexa awoke, she felt more afraid than she had ever felt in her entire life, as if she knew for certain that she was about to die but quite bizarrely, the feeling filled her with a sense of... homesick pride? she knew instantly what was happening "mother, mother.." she called her mother was sleeping on a bunk nearbye "what is it.?" "we're sailing an empire ship.. we have to let hobbles creek know we're carrying elves..." her mother's eyes went wide, as if she couldn't believe she hadn't realized what elexa had just said "you're right, we need to tell markos.. markos.. markos!" she raised her voice only slightly to call for him, but somehow very firmly, and almost as if in magical answer markos was just then rounding the corner "what's wrong?" "we need to signal hobbles creek that we're carrying elves, and friendly" the look on markos face mirrored the one elexa had seen on her mothers a little bit ago "do we have anything with an elven crest?" markos replied after a second to think intuitively "yes, i'll get it," "meet me on deck" as soon as they left, elexa suddenly felt a tremendous rush of relief, as if the impending doom she'd felt coming around had resided

when they arrived at port in hobbles creek, they were greeted by a heralded salute, which was heartwarming and deeply nostalgic to elexa but which made her wonder, until she saw a friend she remembered from childhood, a friend of elexa's mother, and realized that their family crest must be what markos and she had raised coming into port she greeted elexa's mother with the customary greeting of long-parted elven friends "you've brought refugees from candleshire?" "elves and fae, we travel with a number of humans but they are far more loyal to us than the empire," elexa's mother answered, confirming "they will be housed as refugees, of course, but any who are willing to join our cause may prove useful, being human.." an elderly elf who was wearing a politicalate's robe cut in "i would of course," markos immediately stepped forward, followed silently by taiga "i think i may speak for mage," elexa smiled, "he's been on the side of good since the original elf wars" "very well then," elexa and her mother's friend smiled, and elexa realized that she was also wearing a politicalate's robe "in addition to the refugees of candleshire, you've brought us a genius human inventor and human sea captain, and a human wizard!" it took taiga and markos a second to remember that elves could in fact share thoughts or read minds

the evening was spent in celebration, as it was of course customary in any elven city or village to do, but that did not mean work wasn't accomplished toward bringing the new heads at the table up to speed on what was happening the second war on elves had been declared - to nobody's surprise - because, of all things, the empire claimed that elven spies had landed in candleshire - the propaganda was laughable, given that despite statistics there had already been elves still living in candleshire, but that only served the more to illustrate that the humans of the empire had, to use a human phrase, lost it the task at hand was for the elven cities and villages strewn at ports across acaemia to unite, and of course to determine which non empire affiliated human settlements in acaemia would take the elves desperate side so far only a few but a good few allies were known

by the bonfire, mage and elexa were sharing glasses of elven eggnog, talking about what elexa should try to dream about that night, and about the fact that she had been so often dreaming about dragons lately markos joined them, cheerily, with a glass of normal human beer "the party is grand, and we deserve it, so take it in folks! for tomorrow, as we fight, remember that this party may be our last thanks, but what a thanks it is, for we are heroes!" he cheersed elexa and mage, and wandered on to the rest of the party, proclaiming, "we are heroes!" in true captain mode

meanwhile up in his new temporary workshop, taiga was going through "channels" as markos had coined the phrase on his new cross acaemia music and dissertation broadcast device at long last, he settled on one he was sure would give a fair and neutral report - a broadcast from his and elexa's melting pot port town home of limberdore he listened in somber silence - and what he heard, after it had long enough to all be said, was deeply dissatifying to him the sides had been settled - to be realistic, a fair proportion of human towns had sided with the elves and the empire, respectively; it sounded as if some of the contenders had been swayed by geopolitical vicinity, but nonetheless allbeit, that news was not good facing the empire, the elves and the now global deserters were hopelessly outnumbered

taiga entered the room where the elven politicalates along with elexa's mother were dining, a sort of open challay where they could easily join or be joined by the rest of the party, to share the news, and was joined in funny coincidence by markos "taiga... we are heroes," he grinningly greeted him "indeed, my good friend, but i have bad news from my broadcast receiver" "what are you going to call that, by the way? you already used channels, so... you have to come up with something on your own... i wanna see.. if you're good at inventing... words" markos brilliantly answered him taiga thought, then seemed resolute, with the look in his eyes of a man truly ahead of his time "an elexa"

chapter 3 contacting the everyever

part ii

when she awoke the next morning, elexa had dreamt about dragons, again, and the everyever, and mage was now resolved "we have to seek out the everyever," "but he lives in candleshire..." the everyever did reside, as best a spirit dragon could, in the outer forests of candleshire whence they had just left "don't you a know a way we could contact him, if you really think about it?" elexa could tell what mage meant after much thought, she answered "in the dream, i remember, there was music... there hadn't been before, which makes sense because we were always outside..." she trailed off mage thought for a second "i remember, katantra told me she used a song of all seasons to summon the pixies with an elven flute.. could you do something like that with the everyever?" "i've never tried it, but maybe..."

as it was it turned out explained to them by katantra, she just might be able to - the song of all seasons she had used to contact the spirits of fae in a time of need had been given to her, but it was an intuitive performance, like all enchantment working elven songs, so if the everyever had reached elexa in her dreams before she might already know it "then i'll try," she agreed after a command performance for katantra and mage that was both similar and dissimilar to the accompanied dance katantra had done in the woods of candleshire the ship suddenly swayed as if it had hit a bit of rough water or a sudden wind they rushed to the stern, to find the everyever, floating above the water as he had above the waterfall in candleshire in front of them, though only the elves and fae in their number and mage could see it elexa approached the phantasmical dragon spirit "we need your help, if you have any..." she started "i know," was the almost rehearsed answer "the dragons of acaemia will be glad to aid the elves and fae in their plight" with that he disappeared

the dragons of the underworld - fantastic creatures which nested in what some legends told were caves on the under facing side of the flat heavenly body of acaemia because they could fly, of course they could reach whatever must be down there without sailing off the edge of the earth

and now they were coming to the aid of the elves and fae

of course, nobody really knew what that meant the everyever had said dragons - one dragon the same size as the everyever, which was tangible and not ethereal, would be a menacing monster, but how many were coming to aid - two? more? dragons were beyond endangered, they were legendary

chapter 4 sides forming

when elexa told mage of her dream that morning, he seemed to share her allbeit curious relief that the elves and fae had some aid in the second war katantra had confirmed it, and smiled when elexa told her the part about her flute in a way that didn't quite let mage know if she were smiling at some heart kept elven secret or a little joke of her own

of course, other than waiting for dragons to show up all there was to do at present was go with the elven and fae refugees of candleshire and their friends to a grand ceremony with the eligacy that was to welcome diplomats from the human outcroppings of acaemia that had declared allegiance with the elves one topic of the evening was a fae stand-up comedian, or perhaps he could have been called a jester if he was human but since he was not "...and has anyone noticed that the fae haven't really even gotten involved officially?" his quip was greeted with roaring truthful laughter "it's the second war on elves - and waged by humans - no fae" the audience was by this point on the point of exploding, and elexa was laughing half at the non political jokes she was getting and half sympathetically "you know why that is, it's because the fae are so lazy. i should know, i haven't combed my hair in 123 years," more catterballing roars of laughter "and that's why the fae have sided with the elves too, not because our ancient sacred birthrights of nature and magic are entertwined, or because humans who aren't friendly to one are never friendly to the other anyway.. but because that's easy, how many fae live among, in fact raise your hands if you live with an elf? 'hi roomie!'" the crowd was catatonic the performer paused, smiled, and announced, in what was somehow obviously a "human accent", "now taking any questions, any questions from the audience?" to more laughter a very, but utmost forgiveably as the spirit of an elven ceremony is celebration, drunk allied deserter called out, "does your mother know you've dated a human?" to warm light-hearted laughter "i mentioned in the story about telling her," the performer smiled back, "but it might be worth mentioning that yours does, though i'm not sure if our mothers are friends" at this the crowd all but literally exploded

with nothing to fill the evenings now that elexa and mage had decided to give elexa's dreams another rest from mystical underlying in the hopes of perhaps a truly prophetic dream getting through, they had taken, at their surprise to taiga's fond agreement, to joining him at the elexa listening to world broadcasts "...the empire is massing together one main massive assault from home, and a series of others at each of its outpost colonies, but the problem will be having to split our forces because there are so many little elven settlements nestled through the waters of acaemia... *slblogajeha rhiau*...coming in from our elven allies is that they're badly outnumbered, and our valiant brave boys need all the help they can get.. *ajghiaubhglajh* ...personally think it's outrage, an absolute outrage, and all but genocidal, what can humans possibly take from us they haven't already anyway? do they wish to take all of our land, so that we may have nowhere safe to live? elves are not violent creatures, but we are ancient warriors..." with that, taiga flicked off the elexa "what do you guys think?" he asked, both conversationally and deeply as taiga or anyone as gifted or profound as someone like taiga would of a mage and half elven child "i think... i wish we knew what was happening with the dragons," elexa thoughtfully answered him "i agree" mage joined in "what do you think, taiga?" taiga looked at her "i think i don't understand the problem.. or rather, i do, but there isn't really a problem... elves have never threatened humans, have they?" "not since the war on elves, which had been started by humans a long time ago and fought in small scrimmages throughout the ages, cold..." elexa spoke as if she knew the acaemian histories on instinct, rather than from learning "i don't know why this is happening," she pleaded out loud to them "i think i do," taiga answered "i don't know what caused it exactly, maybe some other elusive political tension, maybe the decadence in the citizens of the decaying empire, it's not like, all the elves... but they're acting like they're afraid, really afraid, like, people are afraid of things they don't understand? could it be as simple and.. stupid as that?.." "i.. think it could," elexa finally realized "well, it doesn't solve our problem," mage finally resolved out loud, "and i'm going to do something about it" "oh?" elexa questioned, as she was left in the agreeable company of taiga "yes, i'll see you in the morning, good night" with that, mage was gone, and taiga and elexa were left to talk about things some of which they hadn't talked about since they had left limber grove for candleshire, and listen to the elexa

chapter 5 war

part iii

when elexa awoke, in the middle of the night, the unlit walls of the castle seemed to glow with a strange kind of bright color stained, yet dirty, light in fact, looking out the window, it seemed as if the entire world was glowing with the same worryingly unwordly light she wandered, like a child awaking from a nightmare, instinctively down the hall to mage's room what she saw was mage, suspended in the air as she had only seen the everyever achieve, quivering as if he weren't quite in control the same way the everyever was, in a kind of standing falling pose, with a look on his face that spoke as if it could not contain the madness which had been invited into the mind within open on the table in front of him was a very old looking book, the pages of which were black, and written in a language elexa could not read in what must have been blood, which was somehow red but also black as well "mage... what are you doing?" she asked, half with a tone of fear and half one of a mother who hears something she shouldn't be able to explain coming out of her child's bedroom mage seemed for the first time to notice her "i'm casting a spell," he glared and grinned "alright.." elexa nudged him "a spell.. to damn humans!"

elexa couldn't believe her elven ears "what will it.. do?" she asked "it will close the demon gates of the world," he growled, "so that whenever untalented man sets foot upon a new land he has not been verbally invited to, he shall die in flames," despite the clutching for even comfortable madness expression on mages face, he spoke as if his statement made absolute perfect sense elexa had to admit that would all but win the war "you can.. do, that?" she seemed to know instinctively to ask him "not alone, but a wizard is never alone," mage answered awefully, seeming to glance at the black book "did you.. have help with this idea?" "of course i did! the demon gates are not surface side upon acaemia! of course i cannot tell you from whom!" though it did not appear at all in his voice, elexa could tell in his face the look of someone crying out for help her face shared it "mage... what can i.. do? you know... there has to be a better way..." the look in his eyes told her all she needed to know, and with one swift motion she closed the book when she did it, she felt an electric shock, like someone had been rubbing their hozzysocks on the birshire rug, and there was a deafening boom like thunder out of clear skies which seemed to come from all around mage fell like a lifeless puppet into her arms "thank you," he whispered "what were you... thinking?" she asked softly, but compassionately "it wasn't the spell i was looking for.. it stood out in the book.. by being redwater, rather than blood... a wizard can tell, but the light, was so dim in here..." he seemed to come into a tone of sudden realization as he finished "i don't think.. you should try that book again..." she managed "no.. perhaps we'll save it for a rainy day," mage half-smilingly agreed elexa nodded at the realization that the rainy day he'd been saving it for had been the second war on elves

chapter 6 strategy

the eligacy had finally met with all the allies of elves across acaemia, and plans were under way for divying up troops to the various elven cities when the strike finally came down, and they had still not heard from the dragons of acaemia but they finally knew what had started off the second war on elves, from what had become to no one's approval the secret war on elves, and the realization was in fact harrowing markos and taiga had been followed when they led the forest-dwelling refugees of candleshire into the established hub of holvesbriss disguised as circus animals in fact, there was even one account of a goat ascending a trampoline - which was not normal to the people of candleshire and the empire (if you could believe the propaganda) it seemed as if about a dozen elves and fae, which was easily a lot more than the statistics showed had been living in candleshire at the time, had come into candleshire in disguise from an unmarked sailing ship moored off the coastal islands, to set up camp in a newly established anti-empirial hub amidst the collapse of the candleshire prop empire which... actually made sense

allbeit, knowing this did nothing to help their situation or perhaps it did "we have to go back to candleshire," markos stated the entire assembled group looked at him "that's my ship, that started a war, a ship that was made for me in the empire," he finished as only a captain could "i'll go with you, and so will mage and taiga," elexa spoke for all of them as only an elf could "very good then, and, when we get there, what are we going to... do?" he was answered by a long pause taiga, with a knowing tone that surprised everyone in the room, thoughtfully and finally answered "we're gonna put on a circus"

chapter 7 approach

part iv

elexa and mage gazed at each other, silently, finding that their goodbyes were harder than the ones they had exchanged with markos and taiga, for the opposite reasons of knowing the two more and less well than they knew each other finally, elexa spoke "we'll see each other again," she assured him "i know.. and it's not that, even if worse comes to worse, i don't have some beautiful memories with you, new friend.. it's just that.. well we've never really just made memories together, you know? i suppose you and your friends have, hobbles i have with the deserters, but you and i... well... it's always been an adventure," he smiled, and knew that elexa could tell he was smiling at what had just become their little shared joke that for an instant, mage was sharing their thoughts out loud the way elves or fae could "i kinda miss your mum too," he laughed elexa smiled "we all do," she comforted him, "and we will meet again, i promise" with that, she hugged him, in an impromptu way was which was neither entirely elven nor human, and set foot off of the stern of the ship they had taken back to candleshire, joining markos on the shore where his ship had been, though it had long since been - probably not easily - confiscated as contraband evidence of the empire it was of no matter, because the queen olympia was not what they were looking for

"ladies and gentlemen, may i have your attention please," markos announced, in a grand and flooring tone that could easily have been that of a traveling ringmaster as well as a sea captain of acaemia "presenting, for your absolute entertainment," taiga followed him, well rehearsed, "and after much of an.. ordeal with a few misarrangements of our arrival," his joke was greeted with, allbeit nervous, laughter markos followed him just as rehearsedly, with a sweep of his broad matching brightly colored sleeve "the enchanted elven animals of candleshire!" the performance that shortly followed was not one you would expect to see at a circus; the beautiful and endangered luminescent animals which the friends had encountered in the outer forests searching for the everyever, walked or shuffled or whatever they would do out onto the stage of their own accord, in a bizarre unison the torch lights inside the circus tent were dimmed, and the crowd breathed a collective breathtaking gasp of awe at the beautiful colored glowing creatures "these beautiful creatures were once abundant in candleshire, as abundant as dogs and cats," markos started "but since so many elves and fae left candleshire, the effect their magic had on the city and its local nature has caused their numbers to dwindle to near extinction" taiga finished the crowd seemed to sympathetically murmur, as the magical creatures looked out at them with all but tears in their eyes then they turned and left the stage, once again of their own strange accord "next, and we promise, we tried our best to keep this a surprise," markos joked, "the performing elves wizards and fae of acaemia!" taiga finished for him grandly the tapestries at the edges of the circus ring, embroidered with all the most regal colors of every nation of acaemia, rose suddenly into the air as if born on mystical winds, dancing about in the air above the audience illuminated by bright finding lights shone up on them from the ground by deserter uh circus crew, and a small group of elves and fae that exactly matched the number which had traveled in secret into candleshire stepped out onto the stage, led by mage, dressed in matching uniforms similar to the ones markos and taiga were wearing but different colors as the elves moved in unison in a bizarre but entrancing side-to-side arm stretching very official dance, the fae accompanied the dancing tapestries with songs that sounded like no human should have been able to sing them, and otherwordly beautiful, that caused visions of wild animals and nature spirits to appear above their heads and the center stage, to even more awe and surprise from the audience at the height of it all, mage, center stage like the star of the show, began what to anyone would have looked like just ordinary, though definitely not novice fire dancing but then, the flaming staffs he was spinning about began to glow with changing colors, first the seeming natural colors of fire and then completely unnatural colors, bright neon, growing brighter and brighter, until he was dancing not with fire but swirling piercing liquid neon light blobs, and the crowd had erupted in a standing ovation "and finally," markos started, "after all this, we've somehow managed to save the best for last... for ladies and gentlemen, alas we must confess, for -some of us- (he inserted with a laughing tone) the circus isn't a prime occupation, as my young compatriot has now to share with you all, an invention soon to be in the homes of every family in candleshire, nay in acaemia.. i give you, ladies and gentlemen.. the elexa" "and i couldn't have done it without the inspiration of my best friend whom it's named for," taiga once again joined in "a half elven child who lived in candleshire" with that, the contraption was produced by the same deserters who had been operating the casting lights, and taiga proceeded to adjust the compass on its mantle and produce the local music and dissertation broadcasts of every settlement in acaemia, one after another, through the strange magical gibberish caused by changing channels human broadcasts, and elven, about the war that was happening

there was not a dry eye in the audience

chapter 8 victory

it was at that moment as fate would have it the performance was cut short by the entrance of an empirial guard ensemble headed as if to make a point to the people gathered in the circus tent by the president of the empire himself, and the announcement, "the first strike has been launched. the second war with elves is officially underway"

and it was at this moment, as if fate would have it to make a point, that what sounded like a terrible wind storm descended upon candleshire everyone ran out of the tent outside, to the sight of thousands- no, millions of dragons, it looked as if they filled the sky like stars, flying in still formation over the ancient once elven city elexa felt her and everyone else's breath taken away by the sight an huge, even for dragons, very brilliant and apparent royal violet dragon alone landed in front of the president, and nodded at him, causing his hair to blow as if in a sudden strong breeze "you may speak for the empire, little human, but you do not speak for all humans, and you do not speak for the dragons"

after a considered pause, the president and his royal procession silently retreated, and it seemed rather gladly understood among the crowd that similar confrontations were occurring throughout acaemia

chapter 9 peace

part v

elexa and mage walked together down the sandy beach shores of candleshire, hand in hand, as he had seen her walk with a newmet fae friend once, laughing together about elexa's promise that they would see each other again things throughout acaemia had finally settled down, even if it meant that for now elves fae and humans were residing in their own lands, respectively - simply because that's where everyone had wound up humans as a whole were certainly not unfriendly or even unappreciative of elves and fae, and magic, and it was beginning to turn out the empire wasn't really either - mayhaps they had just needed a new election

"you know, we're really weird," elexa commented "yeah, we are," mage laughingly agreed "i don't know if we even belong in the same time or.. world together..." she trailed off "nothing makes sense," mage stepped in for her "it doesn't make sense how we met, and it certainly makes no sense that we're alright and having this conversation now" "i suppose you're right," she answered him after a pause, mage continued "even the way our abilities counteract with each other.." she nodded, agreeingly "it's like, as rare and strange and to some ways of thinking even new as a half elven girl is... i.. want you in my life, every bit as i want my own magic," he couldn't believe the words that came out of his mouth, and turned shy as he remembered that elexa could read his thoughts anyway "mage.." she looked him in the eye mage saw looking back at him a girl who possessed a beautiful timeless childlike innocense and wonder with the world that he had always secretly wished he had gotten to experience more growing up even more so, he saw in her eyes the look of magic, beautiful and sacred and bright, mirrored in his own he thought about the day he had met the at first only silly and whimsical young half elven girl who'd accompanied markos and taiga to candleshire

"the world will always have elves, however rare," she resolvedly stated "and fae, and magic, and dragons..." "yes, the world needs those things, it can't very well make a move to get rid of them without realizing what it's doing" they walked together a little longer in silence

suddenly, elexa spoke "what do you think.. the world has for us, mage?" he was taken aback by her profound question as she continued "a half elven girl and a wizard.. we're not even elves, or humans, or fae.. we don't belong," she almost seemed to despair "maybe we shouldn't be asking what the world has for a half elven girl and wizard.." he answered her, to his pleasant surprise wisely, "maybe we should be asking.. what the world has.. for dreamers"

she suddenly turned to him, smiling, tearily, and all but softly whispered, "i'll always have you"

then mage remembered that he could not read her thoughts the way she could his, when she kissed him, a kiss that was neither elven nor human nor even fae it was simply magical