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moonlitstoriess · 7 months ago

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Bound in Silence- Rhysand x fem!Reader part 1

Part 2 here

Y/n, Rhysand’s true mate, discovers their bond while under Amarantha’s rule. As they grow closer in captivity, Rhys remains unaware of their connection. When Feyre enters his life, y/n watches in silence as Rhysand falls for her, never revealing the truth of their bond, leading to a heartbreaking end.

Warnings: mentions of SA, abuse, character death, little fluff and too much angst

The first week under Amarantha’s rule was a descent into madness. What had once been kingdoms of power and grace now lay in shambles, High Lords stripped of their freedom, their courts brought to ruin.

Y/n, a lesser member of the Dawn Court, had survived the initial massacre, slipping through the cracks of chaos. She had always lived on the fringes, unnoticed among the more powerful, her quiet presence often overlooked. The beauty of the Dawn Court, with its pale skies and soft mornings, felt like a distant dream now. The dungeons were cold, oppressive—any trace of light long extinguished.

Word of the High Lords’ fates had spread quickly through the prisoners. Rhysand, the infamous High Lord of the Night Court, was said to be one of Amarantha’s most prized captives. His reputation as a cruel, cunning male echoed even in the darkest corners of their cell blocks. Y/n hadn’t expected to meet him, let alone stand face-to-face with the infamous High Lord during her silent wandering through the dim corridors.

Their first encounter was brief, in the murky gloom of a narrow passage. He was alone, his posture rigid, and his normally sharp features were bruised and weary, yet he still held that air of cold authority.

Y/n hadn’t expected him to stop as their paths crossed. But Rhysand’s steps faltered, his gaze locking onto hers. His violet eyes, piercing despite the fatigue, lingered on her face a moment longer than necessary.

“Dawn Court,” he said, his voice low and smooth, though roughened by days of captivity. It wasn’t a question—just an observation.

Y/n hesitated, her heartbeat loud in her chest. “Yes,” she replied softly, meeting his gaze, though her own voice was steadier than she felt.

For a long moment, Rhysand simply stared at her, his expression unreadable. There was no reason for him to notice her, no reason for him to care. She was just another prisoner, a face among many. And yet, something flickered in his eyes—something that made her breath catch, though she couldn’t name it.

They said nothing more, both of them knowing there was no safety in words here. But in that shared silence, a connection was forged—one neither of them could explain, and one that would only grow stronger in the long days ahead.

The second time they met was when y/n was in an injured state. Silently crying while trying to stop the gash on her shoulder blade from bleeding as she quickly made her way through the halls. Past the ugly laughters of Amarantha’s creatures, her loyal servants.

She didn’t know where she was looking or where she was heading as she entered a small washroom. But it was when she lifted her head and saw him, sitting down in the corner, all buttons of his tunic opened to display a toned chest with claw marks all over him, face devoid of any emotion, eyes staring but not truly seeing her.

They just stared like that at one another for long enough before the searing pain in y/n’s shoulder made her hiss and remove her bloody hand from the wound.

She was too busy with disinfecting her wound that y/n didn’t even feel Rhysand get up and come towards her, hint of worry slowly blossoming in his chest as he leaned down next to her sitting form.

“Naga?”

Slightly startled, y/n paused what she was doing and turned to look at his still haunted-looking face.

She shook her head. “Attor.”

He gave her a small nod before raising his hand towards the wet cloth she was gripping.

“May I? I do not believe that you will be able to reach and clean that wound properly.”

Y/n hesitated for a moment, clearly wondering if this was the cruel Rhysand everyone seemed to talk about.

He saw her hesitation and gave her the tiniest of smiles before going back to his indifferent expression once more.

“Don’t worry. I won’t bite you.”

Despite the pain, y/n smiled slightly as she handed him the rag. To say she was surprised with how gentle he was, would be an understatement. They said no words, despite the fact that y/n had questions of her own.

Why was he in such a state? Why did he have all these marks on him? Was he with Amarantha? It seems like he doesn’t get enough sleep either. There are dark bags under his eyes.

But she decided against speaking any of them out, still hesitant with her actions. Not to mention the eerie comfort their little moment provided for her. Y/n was sure that this would never happen again.

She was wrong; this happened again.

This time however, under the worst possible circumstances. In Amaranthas bed.

In the past weeks that they were all here, y/n knew that Amarantha would toy with attractive females and males. But she never thought she would one day be a victim to that cruel woman’s sinister desires.

Her greatest nightmare came true.

She did not even do anything out of the ordinary, always keeping to the corners, preferring to stay away from anyone’s gaze. But alas, it appears that y/n was not as invisible as she thought for it was during her moment locked away in the calm quietness of a small dusty bedroom, that she got dragged away by Amaranthas guards towards her bedchamber.

And you could only imagine the shock on her face when she saw Rhysand, half naked with only a towel wrapped around his waist, staring horrified at her while Amarantha, clad in her sheer robe, dismissed the guards and slowly came towards y/n.

Lifting her chin up with two fingers, the queen snickered as she said, “My my, you are even prettier up close, little mouse.”

Y/n could only gulp as she let the queen inspect her as if she was some sort of an animal. Y/n could feel Rhysands unwavering gaze on her as she stared at the ceiling, willing her tears to stay back.

Suddenly, she felt Amarantha's grip tighten as she was forced to look at the woman before her. The queen's gaze thinned as she inched closer to y/n.

"I suppose you are well aware why you are in here then, no need to waste time on explanations. Am I right, Rhys?"

That is when y/n's gaze slightly drifted towards the male standing next to the bed, his face a mask indifference, a relaxed smirk overtaking his features but his hollow eyes needed no explanation.

"Of course, it is a privilege for her to join us."

Amarantha smirked before dragging her towards the bed, marking the start of y/n's nightmares.

That night, she endured too much, did things she never wished to do, all to keep her head on her shoulders. And for some reason, y/n felt as if she was not the only one who suppressed her disgust and cries deep within herself. Rhysand may be a good actor but his stiffness did not fool her.

The fourth and most important time that they met was in a small, forgotten chamber tucked deep within the mountain--dusty, barely used. Y/n found herself there, seeking refuge from the chaos that constantly swirled under Amarantha’s rule. She didn’t expect anyone else to find the room, and yet, there he was again.

Rhysand stood near the entrance, as though he had only just stepped inside. They froze upon seeing one another. For a moment, neither moved, neither spoke. The silence felt almost too heavy to break.

She turned her back to him, focusing on her trembling hands. She didn’t want to meet his gaze, not after what they’d been forced to endure together under Amarantha’s cruelty. The air between them was thick with the unspoken horrors, yet there was an odd pull, a silent understanding that neither acknowledged.

“I thought I’d be alone,” she muttered, not quite sure why she felt the need to say anything.

“So did I,” came his quiet reply. His voice lacked the arrogant lilt she often heard when he spoke to others. There was something raw about him now, stripped of pretense.

A beat passed before she stood, avoiding his gaze as she brushed off the dust from her skirt. She intended to leave, to disappear before this fragile quiet shattered. But as she took a step, her body faltered, pain from her old injury flaring up again. She hissed through her teeth, clutching her shoulder.

Rhysand moved then, quicker than she expected, stepping closer without hesitation. “You’re hurt again.” It wasn’t a question, more an observation, but there was no pity in his voice.

“I’m fine,” she whispered, stepping back. Her pride wouldn’t let her show weakness in front of him.

He watched her for a long moment, eyes narrowing, not with judgment, but with something closer to understanding. He reached out slowly, carefully, as if giving her the chance to move away. When she didn’t, he gestured to the bench behind her. “Sit. I’ll help.”

She hesitated but gave in. She couldn’t bandage the wound herself—not again. Sitting down, she stiffened as he moved to her side, his presence too close, too intimate for comfort. His hands were steady as he inspected the gash. She tried to hide her discomfort as he worked, gently cleaning the wound with a damp cloth. The touch was too careful for someone rumored to be Amarantha’s most favored, the cold High Lord with a cruel reputation.

Neither of them spoke for a while. The silence was comfortable, though, more than it had ever been before. When Rhysand finally did speak, his voice was barely above a murmur. “We haven’t been properly introduced.” He didn’t ask for her name—simply left the sentence hanging, an invitation she could take or leave.

She glanced at him, a flicker of surprise crossing her face. “Y/n,” she said quietly, watching him closely.

“Y/n,” he repeated, as though testing the sound of it. He gave her the faintest hint of a smile, one that didn’t quite reach his eyes, but it was the closest she had seen to something genuine.

For the first time, she allowed herself to look at him, really look at him, beyond the mask he wore so well. She saw the exhaustion in his eyes, the weight he carried. The cruelty he endured, just like her.

“You don’t act like them,” she found herself whispering before she could stop herself. “Like the others.”

He paused, his hands still on her bandage. “Neither do you.”

It wasn’t a comfort, not exactly. But it was something, a crack in the armor they both wore.

Y/n remained still as Rhysand finished tending to her wound, his touch light and careful, the silence stretching between them. She couldn’t help but glance at him again—his face too calm, too composed for someone who had just been through hell. The weight of what had happened in Amarantha’s chamber hung heavy in the air between them, unspoken yet impossible to ignore.

As he tied off the bandage, she couldn’t stop herself from asking, her voice barely above a whisper, “Do you… endure that every day?”

Her words lingered, and she saw it—the brief flicker of something in his eyes. Pain, perhaps. But just as quickly as it had appeared, it was gone, replaced by the same detached mask he always wore. Rhysand straightened, his expression carefully neutral as he moved away, putting space between them.

“It’s nothing,” he said, his voice smooth, almost too smooth. “Amarantha has her ways of amusing herself.”

Y/n stared at him, not buying his attempt to brush it off. She had seen the claw marks, the bruises, the hollowness in his eyes. She had been there—seen the humiliation, the cruelty, the powerlessness they both shared. How could he call it ‘nothing’?

“It’s not nothing,” she said quietly, her voice trembling despite her best efforts to stay composed. “What she does… what we endure… it’s—”

“I know,” he interrupted, his voice a little sharper than before. He sighed, running a hand through his hair. “I know.”

She blinked at him, unsure of what to say, unsure of how to reach him through the walls he had built around himself. There was so much she wanted to ask, so much she wanted to say, but the weight of it all seemed too much, too heavy to put into words.

Y/n’s eyes flickered over his face, searching for something beneath the mask of indifference he wore so easily. His sharp retort had silenced her, but only for a moment. The silence felt too heavy, too suffocating, after what they had both gone through.

She took a deep breath, wincing slightly at the pain from her wound. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, though she wasn’t sure what she was apologizing for—maybe for prying, maybe for the awful reality they were trapped in, or maybe for the fact that she didn’t know how to help him, how to help either of them.

Rhysand’s gaze shifted, finally landing back on her. His expression softened ever so slightly, the hard edges dulling for just a moment. “Don’t be,” he said quietly, almost as if he regretted snapping at her earlier.

They sat in silence for a few more moments, both of them staring into the distance, lost in their own thoughts. Y/n thought of the nightmarish hours she’d spent under Amarantha’s cruel hands, of the helplessness that had consumed her. She glanced at him, wondering how he endured it—if he truly had to endure it every day.

“Does she—” she hesitated, her voice catching in her throat. “Does she make you go through that every day?”

Rhysand’s jaw clenched slightly, his eyes hardening once more. “What does it matter?” he said, his voice a touch colder than before. “We all suffer under her. It’s just… the way things are.”

Y/n frowned, the weight of his words pressing down on her chest. “It matters,” she insisted, her voice firmer this time. “You shouldn’t have to—none of us should.”

Rhysand didn’t respond for a moment. Instead, he looked away, his fingers tracing idle patterns along the stone wall behind him. His silence told her more than his words could. He was used to it, accustomed to the horrors that Amarantha inflicted.

She swallowed, her heart heavy. “I—I don’t know how you do it,” she admitted softly, her voice barely audible. “I don’t think I can survive this… not like this.”

Rhysand’s gaze returned to her, softer this time, almost contemplative. “You will,” he said quietly, his tone lacking its earlier sharpness. “You’ll survive because you have to.”

There was something about the way he said it—a quiet strength, a stubborn determination that made her believe him, even when everything around them felt hopeless.

Y/n didn’t respond. She simply nodded, grateful for the small comfort his words offered, even if they both knew there were no real solutions to their nightmare.

For a long moment, they stayed like that—two people trapped in hell, offering each other a sliver of solace in the aftermath of horrors too cruel to fully comprehend. Neither of them said anything more, but there was an unspoken understanding between them. It wasn’t love, it wasn’t affection. It was survival.

And, for now, that was enough.

After that moment, something significant shifted between them. Slowly, their random encounters turned into frequent secret meetups each planned with a sense of urgency and longing. They began to seek each other out, carving out spaces in the darkness where they could share their thoughts, fears, and dreams, knowing that, in this hellish place, they were the only ones who truly understood each other.

Y/n discovered that she felt safe with him in a way she hadn’t expected. In the quiet corners of the mountain, they would talk for hours, sharing fragments of their lives, their laughter echoing softly against the stone walls. Rhysand learned about her past life, about her love for creating things, about her resilience, how she had survived Amarantha’s cruelty by retreating into herself, clinging to the memories of a life before the darkness. In turn, she learned about his burdens—the weight of his responsibilities as the High Lord, the pain of leaving his people and his family behind, possibly to never see them again. They were both trapped, but in each other, they found a flicker of hope.

They often sat close, their shoulders brushing, sharing the warmth that lingered between them. There were moments when words felt insufficient, and they would simply sit in comfortable silence, allowing their thoughts to intertwine without the need for spoken language. Each small interaction deepened their bond, and soon they were exchanging not just stories, but pieces of themselves.

One evening, while hiding in their usual alcove, Y/n noticed the weariness in Rhysand’s eyes. She hesitated before speaking, her heart racing. “Do you ever wish you could escape?” she asked quietly, not expecting an answer.

Rhysand turned to her, his expression contemplative. “Every day,” he admitted, his voice barely above a whisper. “But I know it’s not that simple.”

Y/n nodded, understanding the truth behind his words. “It’s exhausting, isn’t it? Pretending to be fine when inside, you feel like you’re breaking.”

He looked at her, surprise flashing across his features. “You feel it too?”

“More than I care to admit,” she replied, her eyes meeting his. “Sometimes I wonder if it will ever end. If I’ll ever be free of this.”

Rhysand sighed, leaning back against the wall. “I think about that a lot. But then I remember the people who are counting on me. If I give up, what happens to them?”

She could see the heaviness of his thoughts weighing him down. “You’re strong, Rhysand,” she said softly. “Stronger than any of us realize.”

He chuckled, but it was devoid of true mirth. “Strength doesn’t mean I don’t feel pain.”

“Then we can feel it together,” she offered, a small smile playing on her lips. “I’d rather share the burden than carry it alone.”

He met her gaze, the corners of his mouth lifting slightly. “I think I’d like that.”

From that day on, they became each other’s refuge. They shared not only their burdens but also their dreams, hopes, and fears. Rhysand learned about the small things that made Y/n smile, the way her eyes sparkled when she spoke of the stars, the gentle way she held herself, as if trying to protect the light within her from being extinguished.

Y/n discovered Rhysand’s love for stories, how he could lose himself in the tales of distant lands and daring adventures. They created their own world within the confines of the mountain, where laughter could exist amid the pain, where dreams could be whispered even in the darkest of nights.

With each passing day, they grew closer, their friendship blossoming into something beautiful amidst the horror surrounding them. There was an unspoken promise that they would be there for each other, no matter what. And in that, they found the strength to keep going, to endure the trials that awaited them, together.

Days turned into weeks, weeks turned into months and months turned into years as they kept enduring the horrors under Amarantha’s reign, no one strong enough to defeat her. The passage of time blurred in the darkness, a relentless cycle of survival. Each day brought new cruelties, new horrors that left Y/n and Rhysand feeling more and more hollow inside. Yet, through it all, they clung to the solace they found in each other.

Their secret meetings had become a lifeline. Whenever they could steal a moment away from the prying eyes of Amarantha’s spies, they would retreat into the shadowed corners of the mountain, seeking each other’s presence. Their conversations had grown more comfortable over time, the once hesitant exchanges now flowing with ease. Y/n learned more about Rhysand’s burdens, about the sacrifices he made each day to keep his people alive, even at the cost of his own soul.

In return, Rhysand slowly unraveled the mystery of Y/n. She was no longer the quiet, invisible courtier he had first met in the halls. Her resilience and strength had revealed themselves with each passing day, though she remained ever-watchful, always cautious. The horrors she had endured were scars, both physical and emotional, yet she never let them break her. And Rhysand admired her for it, though he kept his thoughts carefully hidden behind his usual smirks and playful retorts.

They didn’t talk much about what happened in Amarantha’s bed that night. It was an unspoken thing, something that lingered between them, always there, but never addressed directly. It didn’t need to be. They both knew the depths of the hell they were living in, and acknowledging that shared nightmare in words would only make it worse.

Still, there were times when Y/n would look at Rhysand, her gaze searching, wondering how he bore the weight of Amarantha’s twisted games day after day. She saw the toll it took on him, even if he never spoke of it.There were days when he would return from Amarantha’s bedchamber with new scars, fresh wounds both seen and unseen, and Y/n could do nothing but offer her quiet companionship, hoping that in some small way, her presence was enough.

On one such occasion, after another brutal encounter with the queen, Y/n found Rhysand sitting alone in the dark, his usual mask of indifference slipping for just a moment. She hesitated before sitting beside him, the silence between them heavy with unspoken words.

“Why does she do this to you?” she asked quietly, her voice barely audible.

Rhysand didn’t look at her, his gaze fixed on some distant point. “Does it matter?”

“It does to me,” she said, her heart aching for him in a way she hadn’t expected.

For a long time, he didn’t respond, and Y/n wondered if she had overstepped. But then, in the quietest of voices, he said, “Because I am her greatest weapon that needs to be kept under control.”

The weight of his admission hung in the air, and Y/n felt a pang of sorrow deep in her chest. She reached out, placing a gentle hand on his arm. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, though she knew her words could do nothing to ease his pain.

Rhysand shook his head, brushing off her concern with a forced smile. “Don’t be. It’s the price we pay to survive.”

But Y/n could see through the facade. She knew him well enough by now to recognize the cracks in his armor, the moments when the strain of it all became too much. In those moments, she stayed close, offering her quiet support without pushing him to speak. She had come to understand that Rhysand didn’t need words—he needed the comfort of knowing he wasn’t alone.

As time passed, their bond deepened, a quiet understanding settling between them. They no longer had to speak to know what the other was feeling. A glance, a touch, the smallest of gestures—these were enough to convey the unspoken trust that had grown between them. Together, they weathered the endless torment of Amarantha’s rule, finding strength in their shared moments, no matter how brief.

But as the years dragged on, a sense of hopelessness began to creep in. Amarantha’s power seemed insurmountable, her cruelty unmatched. The courts remained shattered, the High Lords too broken to mount any sort of rebellion. The mountain felt like a prison, and escape seemed impossible.

Then, whispers of a new arrival began to spread through the court. A mortal girl, brought under the mountain to fulfill some kind of bargain with Amarantha. It seemed like just another piece of cruel entertainment for the queen, another pawn in her twisted game. But something was different this time. Rhysand’s gaze would grow distant whenever her name was mentioned, as if he knew something no one else did. Y/n noticed the subtle shift in his demeanor, the way his usual indifference was replaced with a flicker of… hope?

As Feyre’s presence in the court grew, so did the undercurrent of tension that seemed to ripple through Amarantha’s throne room. Something was happening, something none of them could quite understand. But Y/n couldn’t shake the feeling that this mortal girl—this Feyre—was important. That maybe, just maybe, the end of their nightmare was closer than any of them realized.

What y/n also realized, was that Rhysand was her mate.

It happened suddenly, during one of Amarantha’s night feasts, a regular, twisted event that Y/n had come to despise. This particular one, however, was the night before Feyre’s first trial.

Y/n stood in the corner, as usual, staying away from the crowd. She preferred to inspect rather than socialize, to keep her distance from the cruel games and manipulations happening all around her. Rhysand was on the opposite side of the grand hall, his mask of indifference and cruelty firmly in place as he entertained conversation with a few other high-fae, Amarantha’s loyal followers. He played his role perfectly, as he always did.

But then, in a fleeting moment, their eyes met.

Y/n felt it immediately—the rush of warmth, the pull so strong it almost knocked the breath from her lungs. It wasn’t just the connection they had built over the years or the understanding they shared. No, this was deeper. A primal force that surged within her, a tether she had never felt before, snapping into place.

Rhysand was her mate.

The realization hit her like a blow, sharp and undeniable. Her breath caught in her throat, and her body froze as the bond thrummed between them. She had heard of the mating bond before, of course, but to feel it, to know that it was him…

Her heart both soared and sank. She couldn’t deny it, couldn’t push it away, but looking at him—his cold mask in place, his focus elsewhere—made her chest tighten with an ache she didn’t know how to suppress.

Rhysand didn’t seem to feel it, didn’t react in any way that might indicate he knew. His gaze lingered on her for a brief second before turning back to the high-fae beside him, the moment passing without acknowledgment.

Y/n stood frozen, the world around her muted as the bond settled within her, painfully unreciprocated.

As Feyre passed her first trial, everything began to shift.

At first, Y/n tried to dismiss it as coincidence—Rhysand had his own burdens, after all, his own games to play. But soon, the cracks in their fragile friendship became too large to ignore. Where before, he would seek her out, find quiet moments in the hidden corners of the mountain to sit with her, to speak about everything and nothing—those moments became fewer and farther between.

The subtle change came in waves. Rhysand started missing their meetups. First, it was only one night, then two, then an entire week would pass without a word. Y/n waited in their usual spots, always hoping he would walk through the door, but instead, she was met with silence. The longer the absence stretched, the deeper the ache in her chest grew.

But the worst came during Amarantha’s nightly feasts. Poor Feyre, clearly not jn a right state of mind, was paraded around the hall, her limbs loose and her eyes unfocused, as Rhysand dragged her onto the floor to dance. Y/n could barely stomach it.

Night after night, she watched as his focus shifted to Feyre—the human girl who was just trying to survive, just like them all. Yet it was in those dances, in the way his eyes lingered on Feyre’s face, even behind the mask of cruelty he wore, that Y/n felt her heart begin to shatter.

She tried to tell herself it was all part of the act, a necessary facade to keep Amarantha’s eyes off him, to protect the bigger plan. But each night, as she watched them dance, watched Feyre’s body against his, her hope withered.

The bond that had once filled her with warmth and joy now twisted inside her, a cruel reminder of what he couldn’t possibly know. Of what she could never tell him. Rhysand had no idea that she was his mate. How could he, when his attention had shifted so completely to Feyre?

And Y/n—heartbroken, invisible—could do nothing but endure it, watching as the only person who had ever understood her slipped further and further away.

The nights dragged on, the darkness under the mountain becoming suffocating as Feyre moved through her trials. Each one more harrowing than the last, each step pushing her closer to death. And with each passing trial, Rhysand's attention shifted further away from Y/n.

Y/n had never felt more alone. Every night, she stood in the shadows, watching as Rhysand danced with Feyre, his hand on her waist, his voice soft in her ear. It had started as part of the game, part of his endless manipulation of Amarantha’s court, but Y/n could see it—he was changing. His mask, once a weapon, now felt more like a shield protecting him from the truth. And the truth was devastating: Rhysand no longer came to her. He no longer sought her out in the quiet corners of the mountain.

The bond between them, once so unmistakable, now felt like a heavy chain around her neck, pulling her deeper into despair with every passing day.

When Feyre passed her final trial and was killed by Amarantha, Y/n’s world collapsed. She had watched it all unfold—the moment the human girl fell, her chest stilling, her life snuffed out in an instant. And Rhysand—he was the first one to cry out her name. His voice, filled with anguish and desperation, echoed through the hall, and Y/n’s heart shattered into a million pieces.

He rushed to Feyre's side, his face twisted in agony, and without hesitation, he was the first to give a sliver of his power to bring her back. His hands trembled as he leaned over her, tears brimming in his eyes. His voice cracked when he whispered her name again, as though she was the only one who mattered, the only one who had ever mattered.

Y/n stood there, frozen, her own pain drowned out by the overwhelming scene before her. Rhysand hadn't even glanced her way, hadn't acknowledged her presence. It was as if she no longer existed.

And when Amarantha finally fell, when Feyre was brought back to life as an immortal by the combined powers of the High Lords, Y/n felt as though the final thread of her connection to Rhysand had been severed.

Afterward, in the aftermath of Amarantha's death and Feyre's new immortality, Y/n tried—she truly tried to speak with him, to make him see her again, to understand what had been between them before all of this. She sought him out in the quiet halls, waited for him in the places they used to meet, hoping, praying that he would remember.

Finally, on the last night, before they all left this 50 years of hell behind, she found him standing alone on a balcony overlooking the endless expanse of darkness. She approached him, her heart in her throat.

“Rhys,” she called softly, her voice barely above a whisper.

He turned, but there was no warmth in his gaze. His eyes, once full of shared understanding and adoration, were distant, hollow.

“I’ve been trying to talk to you,” she began, her words faltering as she took in the emptiness on his face.

Rhysand looked away, his jaw clenched. “I’ve been… distracted.”

“With Feyre,” she finished, her voice breaking despite her best efforts to remain composed.

There was a long, heavy silence before he spoke again, his voice so quiet she almost didn’t hear him. “I think… I think Feyre is my mate.”

Y/n felt the world tilt beneath her feet, the words hitting her like a dagger to the chest. She opened her mouth to speak, to tell him the truth, to scream that she was his mate—but the words wouldn’t come.

Rhysand didn’t notice her silence, didn’t notice the way her hands trembled. He kept talking, his voice growing softer, more introspective. “I’m falling for her, Y/n. I didn’t expect it, but... I can’t stop it.”

Y/n’s heart shattered all over again, the bond between them twisting into something unbearable. She had lost him.

The dawn was cold, a pale light creeping over the horizon, casting the mountain in a dim, unforgiving glow. Y/n stood alone in the shadows, her heart heavy with the weight of the last fifty years, the torture they had endured, the nightmares that would never fully leave them. But now, with Amarantha dead, it was all over. The chains were gone. The horrors were fading into the past, and everyone was finally going home.

Everyone except her.

She had known it was coming—the end of it all. She had prepared herself for the fact that Rhysand might leave, that Feyre might take him from her entirely. But no amount of preparation had lessened the crushing weight in her chest as she watched from the shadows. She hadn’t slept. She hadn’t even wanted to. The last few days had blurred together in a haze of pain, confusion, and heartbreak.

And now, standing in the pale light of dawn, she saw them.

Rhysand and Feyre.

They were on the balcony above, just as the sun began to rise, casting a soft glow over the both of them. Feyre, still recovering, stood close to him, her face soft with something Y/n couldn’t bear to name. Rhysand was beside her, his posture relaxed, a faint smile playing on his lips as he looked out over the horizon. His arm brushed against Feyre’s, the contact so light, so natural, as if it had always been that way.

Y/n’s throat tightened, her heart splintering with every passing second. He hadn’t come to say goodbye. Not a word. Not a glance.

Just silence.

She had spent fifty years enduring alongside him, had suffered the same horrors, shared quiet moments of solace when everything else was falling apart. She had been there when no one else had, and yet, as the dawn broke over the mountains, Rhysand was leaving—without a single word to her. Without a goodbye.

Her fingers gripped the stone railing as she forced herself to breathe, to stay steady, even as she felt herself crumbling from the inside out.

He didn’t know. He didn’t know that she was his mate, that they were bound by something deeper, something that should have been unbreakable. And he never would. Because in his heart, in his mind, there was only Feyre now.

As she watched him smile at the mortal-turned-immortal girl, Y/n felt the devastating finality of it all settle in her bones. She wasn’t just losing him—she had lost him. Completely. And there was nothing she could do to bring him back.

The bond between them, the one she had hoped he would feel someday, was nothing but a silent scream in her chest now. Unheard, unnoticed, unacknowledged.

A single tear slipped down her cheek, and she quickly wiped it away, not wanting to let herself break. Not here. Not now. Not when it was already too late.

She took one last look at them—at the male who had once been her solace, her anchor in the storm, and at the woman who had unknowingly taken him from her.

With a shaky breath, Y/n turned away, unable to bear the sight any longer. Each step she took felt heavier, like the weight of the entire world was pressing down on her. The corridors were eerily quiet now that Amarantha’s reign had ended, and the mountain had become a place of ghostly memories.

Rhysand would leave. He would go back to Velaris, to his Court of Dreams, to the freedom they had all been denied for so long. And he would do it without a second thought for her. Feyre had captured his attention, his heart, and Y/n was nothing but a shadow now, left behind in the wake of a love she would never know.

She found herself walking to the same small, hidden room they had once met in—the one where they had shared their darkest fears and moments of fragile comfort. But those days were gone. Everything was different now.

Sitting on the bed, Y/n let the silence engulf her. The ache in her chest was unbearable, but she welcomed it. It was better than the numbness she feared would consume her next. She had thought, somehow, that once Amarantha was gone, things might get better. That they could both move forward, together, maybe find peace in each other’s presence. But that had been foolish.

The truth was undeniable now—she was alone.

The mating bond, the one she had felt so fiercely, was not enough. Rhysand had made his choice, whether he knew it or not. Feyre was his future, his heart, his everything.

And Y/n? She would be forgotten.

The bitter taste of rejection burned in her throat as she closed her eyes, trying to will away the memories, the stolen glances, the nights spent in shared pain. Everything she had held onto was slipping away, dissolving like smoke.

For the first time in years, she let herself cry. She cried for the love she never had, for the bond that would never be fulfilled, for the pieces of her heart that would never be whole again. She cried for the girl she had been before all this, before Amarantha, before Rhysand, before the endless cycle of hope and despair had shattered her into something unrecognizable.

By the time the sun had fully risen, her tears had dried, leaving only a hollow ache in their place.

Rhysand would leave, Feyre at his side, and Y/n would remain behind, her presence a forgotten whisper in the chaos of everything else.

She rose from the bed, her movements slow, mechanical. There was nothing left for her here. The mountain, the memories, the unspoken bond—it was all gone. She had to leave, too. But not with him. Never with him.

As she walked out of the room, out of the mountain, her heart broke all over again. This was her ending—quiet, unseen, devastating.

Rhysand had left without a goodbye, but perhaps that was the greatest goodbye of all. A final, unspoken severing of whatever connection they had once shared.

Y/n wandered through the wilderness, aimlessly walking with no direction or purpose. The vast world around her felt empty—silent. She had no family to return to, no place where she belonged. Every step she took was heavy, each one pulling her deeper into the pit of despair she could no longer escape.

For years, she’d clung to the hope that she mattered to someone—that perhaps in Rhysand, she had found solace, a connection that could keep her afloat through the darkness. But now, after everything, it was clear. She had never mattered—not to him, not to anyone.

The night before, she’d watched him with Feyre, saw the way his eyes had softened, how he had stayed by her side, even after the final battle had ended. He had fought for Feyre, bled for her, mourned for her as if she were the only thing that mattered in the world. And Y/n… she had been invisible, a forgotten shadow in the corner, her existence as meaningless as it had always been.

She had seen him and Feyre on the balcony that dawn, the soft glow of morning casting a light around them as Rhysand whispered something only Feyre could hear. Y/n had watched as Rhysand came closer to Feyre, giving her a devastatingly charming smile that shattered her heart beyond repair.

Y/n continued walking, the cold wind biting at her skin, but she felt none of it. The ache inside her, the hollow feeling in her chest, drowned out everything else. She had no reason to go on, no reason to fight anymore. She had fought for years, survived the unthinkable, only to come out of it more broken than before.

There was nothing left for her. No purpose. No place. No one.

Her steps slowed as she reached a cliffside, the jagged rocks below barely visible in the early morning light. The sea roared beneath her, its angry waves crashing against the stones. She stood at the edge, staring into the abyss, the overwhelming emptiness pulling her in.

The bond she had thought was hers belonged to someone else now. Rhysand had chosen Feyre, had found his mate in her. Y/n was nothing more than a fleeting moment—a forgotten soul in a sea of others.

And now, she was ready to let go.

With one last breath, Y/n closed her eyes, stepping forward into the void, letting the wind carry her into the nothingness where she had always belonged.

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#acotar x reader #acotar #rhysand acotar #rhysand #rhysand x reader #x reader #fanfic #angst #acotar angst

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rainydayathogwarts · 2 months ago

Note

ok bestie I'm going to need neville x slytherin!reader where she defends him from a bully and he's like 😍😍😍 and then he brings her a special plant or something that can survive in the Slytherin dungeons as a thank you and then she sucks his dick in the greenhouse and absolutely blows his poor innocent mind

ilyyyyy 🫶

grim greenhouses - neville longbottom

summary: when you defend neville against your cousin, he is convinced he has to give you a little gift as a thank you. but what happens when you decide to thank him for his gift? wc: 2.1k+ cw: smut, oral (m!receiving), public sex (in an empty greenhouse), bitch draco

Neville knows you like arguing with your cousin. For entertainment purposes, to fulfil your family duties. But he definitely wasn’t expect you to begin an argument with your cousin by standing up for him. Nerdy, clumsy Neville Longbottom who had barely spoken three words to you all year despite being your charms partner.

“Why don’t you decide to pick on someone else, Draco? Someone who might deserve it?”

Draco scoffed, and you immediately knew he wasn’t going to go down without a fight, rolling your eyes in annoyance. “What, you don’t think Longbottom deserves to be mocked for his embarrassing failures?”

“What failures? Living?” You only realised your words had sounded more like an insult when Theo cackled next to you. You slapped his arm with a glare, and the boy apologised, but his giggles didn’t completely subside.

“Oh dear cousin, are you in loooove?” Draco mocked, a bullying grin on his face. You crossed your arms over your chest, raising your eyebrows sassily. “Maybe I am.”

None of the bodies in the crowd took your words seriously, rising with unanimous ‘Oooh’s’ to enrage your spoiled cousin. Draco broke out into a genuine smile. “Okay, I can’t take that seriously.” But you only stepped closer to Draco, gripping his wrist as you shot him a warning look. You lowered your voice, but Neville still heard you with full clarity as you asserted “I’m serious, Draco. Stop picking on him.”

Draco snatched his arm out of your hold, looking at you with a judging stare. “I’m starting to think you really do like him.” You watched Draco as he sped away with his goons by his side, spinning on your heels to look at Neville with an apologetic smile.

“I really am sorry about him, Neville.” You whispered, soothingly putting a hand on his shoulder before walking away. Neville was frozen in place, watching as you followed your friends out of the courtyard, heels clicking softly on the cement floor.

Neville was only torn away from his gaze when Luna put a hand on his arm, just below the area you had previously touched him. He shook her off, mumbling “I have to thank her.” But Luna was only surprised when he shot off running in the opposite direction, humming in wonder with a slight shrug of her shoulders.

Neville rushed over to the herbology greenhouses, walking past the intimidatingly large ones used as classrooms so he could nudge the door to the third greenhouse open. He welcomed the humid atmosphere of this greenhouse, shutting the door behind him. This one was different to the rest, harbouring more dangerous plants that thrived in dark atmospheres. Neville hummed, glancing up at the vines that wrapped around the windows and ceiling, shielding the delicate plants from the fatal rays of sun.

Throwing his jumper on the table, Neville loosened his tie and ushered his herbology textbook out of his book bag. He flicked over to a familiar page, reading over the description of a plant he already knew like the back of his hand.

The smitten boy didn’t need to read over the plant to know it would be his thank you gift for you. Neville rushed over to find an empty pot, adding soil, a few plant seeds, and just enough water to it before hiding it in the darkest corner he could find. Neville wiped the sweat off his forehead, leaving a streak of soil on his face, but at least he was satisfied.

In only a few days, the magical plant will have sprout, and it will be perfect for you.

The next time you found yourself packing your things up after an uneventful charms lesson, Neville shyly asked you “Are you busy now? There’s something I want to show you. Something I got you-well made you.” You smiled at Neville as he rambled on, shaking your head softly, but Neville already knew. You had mentioned enough times at the end of this same lesson that ‘I’m about the spend this free doing absolutely nothing.’

“Something you made for me? Like a gift?” You were grinning widely, following Neville out of the charms classroom and onto the hogwarts grounds.

“It’s not really much of a gift,” He started, clutching the strap of his bag tightly. “It’s more of a thank you, for standing up for me the other day. I know that he - Draco - is really important to you, so it means a lot that you stood up for me.” You slid your hand into Neville’s, tugging him back as you stopped in your tracks.

“Neville. That’s really nice of you. I don’t - I’m not nice for gifts. I genuinely think you deserve to be treated better. Draco can save his bullying for someone like McGlaggen.” The boy’s cheeks flushed a pale pink, and he ducked his head down, looking at where your hands held.

Neville glanced up at you, smiling softly before tugging you along the path.

“Come on.”

You began feeling uneasy as Neville led you towards the dark greenhouses, but you knew you trusted him. Neville wouldn’t hurt a fly. “You know, we tell the first years that Dumbledore is hiding a creature in here, like an acromantula or something. They dare each other to sneak in there and we follow them and make creepy noises. It’s really funny.”

Neville’s laugh shocked you, and you suddenly felt bad. You knew if he wasn’t in your year group, he would have been a victim of that poor excuse of a prank. “Don’t worry, I can confirm there are no acromantulas in there.”

“Even so,” You started intertwining your fingers with his. You saw the blush on his face darken. “You would protect me against it, wouldn’t you?” Neville nodded quickly, looking away from you to hide his shy smile.

His fingers untangled with yours, and he left you at the entrance of the greenhouse, rushing off to find the potted plant for you. You busied yourself with shutting the door of the greenhouse, then taking your jumper off.

Your shirt crinkled slightly as you pulled your jumper over your head, sighing quietly. “It’s quite warm in here, isn’t it?” But Neville didn’t reply, only appearing with a large purple plant that he had to peek around from the sides to see you.

“Oh Neville!” You gasped, reaching out to help take the plant from him. “Um, it shouldn’t really grow for a while. I didn’t realise it was so quick, but I guess it is quite dark in here. It’ll be slower in the dungeons, but it’ll survive.”

The plant thumped against the table as Neville dropped it and you giggled at the sight of the soil all over his uniform shirt. “You’ve got,” You started, wiping your hands down the boy’s shirt to get rid of the dirt. Neville’s stomach constricted underneath your fingertips. “Um it doesn’t matter.” You cut yourself off, pulling your hands off Neville’s stomach to throw your arms around him.

Neville stumbled back in shock, blinking quickly as he decided to return the hug, his hands lingering shyly on your waist. You pulled back, dragging your hands back over Neville’s shoulders to cup his face, bringing him closer to you so you could press your lips against his.

A surprised noise came out of his mouth, swallowed by your lips. Neville’s arms tightened around your waist, bringing you impossibly closer to him as he tilted his head to the side, trying to deepen the kiss. You parted your lips, running your tongue on Neville’s bottom lip, only for him to gasp, his mouth dipping open. Moaning quietly, you slid your tongue against Neville’s, who pulled away from the kiss slightly to push you back against the table, his eyes glued to your lips as he reconnecting them with his, kissing you passionately.

You pushed Neville away, lips separating with a wet pop. “Let me thank you properly, Nev.” You whispered, encouraging him back a couple of steps as you dropped to your knees. Neville gulped animatedly, shaking his head with a weak cry of “You don’t have to!”

“I want to… Do you want to?”

But your only response was Neville unzipping his trousers eagerly, his belt buckle clanging loudly as he pushed his trousers down his legs. You hooked your fingers in the elastic band of Neville’s boxers, pulling them down teasingly slow. As you wrapped your fingers around Neville’s cock, you glanced up at him through your lashes, wetting your lips with your tongue. Neville let out a shaky breath as you started stroking him, hand slowly pumping him up and down.

“Has a girl touched you like this before?” You teasingly asked at the look of his mouth agape. To your surprise, he shook his head no, making you gasp softly. “Better make your first unbeatable then.”

You licked his leaking red tip before wrapping your lips around him, humming when one of Neville’s hand came to the back of your head to steady you, fingers combing through your hair. You sucked softly on his tip, and Neville bucked his lips one with a broken moan, apologising for the movement as he pushed deeper into your mouth.

Taking it as a sign to move forward, you moved your head closer to Neville’s pelvis, taking his dick into your mouth inch by inch. You ran your tongue on the underside of his cock, watching amusedly as he shut his eyes tightly, throwing his head back with pleasure, mouth open in a silent moan.

Placing your hands on Neville’s thighs, you felt his muscles clenching. You began caressing him there as you began bobbing your head up and down, pushing yourself further down his cock every time you sunk down on him, causing loud moans to ring out in the humid greenhouse. His tip grazed the back of your throat and you felt tears gather in your eyes.

Neville’s hand closed gently around your hair, pulling you off his cock, and you gasped as both his hands gripped your collar tightly, pulling you up with as much force as he could muster. You whimpered as you stumbled up to your feet, placing your hands on top of his.

Neville pushed you back against the table again, pressing his body snugly against yours as he kissed you again, moaning softly when you reached between your bodies to wrap your hand around his cock again. “Please, I just - please.”

“Just want some kisses?” You teased, and Neville desperately nodded, pressing his lips against yours and forcing his tongue into your mouth as you sped up the pace of your hand on his cock. You squeezed the base of Neville’s cock before sliding your hand back up to the top, running your thumb over his tip.

Neville cried out loudly, his sounds swallowed by your kiss as you tugged him impossibly closer to you with your free hand. His hips thrusted up into your hand, cock shooting spurts of milky white cum all over your uniform as he broke the kiss, head dropping down to rest on your shoulder.

The boy took a long moment to recover, panting loudly as he caught his breath. You ran a hand through his hair, and he leaned into your touch, swallowing thickly as you moved your head to the side to kiss him softly on the temple. Neville finally lifted his head off your shoulder, placing both his hands on your hips.

His face was bright red, a shy smile finally finding its way onto his features.

“Thank you.” He whispered, eyes dipping down to look at your lips.

You grinned, leaning forward to peck Neville’s lips, giggling at the satisfied sigh that fell from his lips. The both of you stood there, embracing, until finally, Neville pulled away to tuck himself back into his trousers, finding himself suddenly unable to meet your eyes.

He found his bag, slinging it over his shoulder. “Uh, let me help you with that.” He mumbled, rushing to lift the potted plant off the table. “Don’t worry, I can handle it.” Neville nodded frantically, turning around to rush out of the greenhouse with a “See you around!”

“Hey Neville?”

The boy spun on the balls of his feet, looking at you expectantly as he clutched the strap of his bag tightly.

“Don’t be a stranger.”

And with that the boy was taking long strides towards you and cupping your face in his hands to press his lips against yours in a sweet kiss.

“I really will see you around.”

taglist: @ravisinghs-wife, @starry-remus, @pain-in-the-ashe, @hiireadstuff, @treefairy-28, @superlegend216, @kitkatkl, @juliet-017, @boromoony

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mahalachives · 22 days ago

Text

Part 8: The Soul That Fled

🕊️TW: This chapter contains graphic depictions of Non-consensual sexual violence involving multiple perpetrators, assault, forced magical suppression, torture, and psychological trauma.

It also explores the emotional aftermath of these events from both the survivor's and the witness's perspectives, including dissociation, soul trauma, and survivor's guilt.

This content is extremely intense and disturbing, even in fictional context.

If these subjects are harmful or triggering for you, please skip this chapter or engage with caution.

Your well-being matters. 💛

Pairing: Azriel x F!Reader

Genre: angst, romcom, humor, fish out of water reader, canon (ish)

Summary: Murdered after a late-night study session in the modern world, you awaken in Prythian—still yourself, but with Fae features and the infamous title of Beron’s cold-hearted and ruthless daughter.

Then, fate snaps the mating bond into place between you and the shadowsinger, Azriel—who rejects it so fiercely, even the magic recoils.

You died a healer. You woke up a villain. Now fate’s mated you to who wants nothing to do with either—you’ll prove them all wrong, one heartbeat at a time.

Between Two Fires - Masterlist

The poison sang through Azriel's veins.

He had known many darknesses in his long life. The pitch of dungeons where he'd spent his childhood. The velvet of night skies above battlefields. The quiet absence in the spaces between stars that he sometimes thought might be the truest reflection of his own soul.

This was different. This darkness had teeth.

He fought it with the stubbornness that had kept him alive for centuries, each heartbeat a rebellion against surrender. Five hundred years of discipline demanded resistance, even as the toxin wound its way through carefully constructed defenses, dismantling the magic that made him immortal, that made him himself.

As his consciousness began to fray at the edges, Azriel became aware of your hands moving over his wound. Gentle, despite everything. Purposeful, despite what he deserved. He had carved rejection between you with the precision of Truth-Teller, and still, you chose to heal rather than harm.

Why? he wanted to ask, but his voice belonged to the poison now.

His body grew heavy, anchored to the realm by pain alone, while something deeper, something golden and ancient, pulled him elsewhere.

The bond that he had feared, that he had rejected, now wrapped around his failing consciousness like a lifeline thrown to a drowning man.

How strange, he thought distantly, that the very thing he'd run from would be his salvation. How fitting, perhaps, that it would lead him not toward light but into another kind of darkness altogether.

Into memory that was not his own.

Into yours.

Time fractured as he slipped between the layers of your shared existence. The shadowsinger who had cataloged centuries of suffering, who had measured pain in careful increments, who had learned to read agony in the minute expressions of his victims... that shadowsinger found himself suddenly, terribly unprepared.

For shadows recognized shadows.

And yours were vast beyond measuring.

He had wandered the darkest corners of Prythian's history. Had memorized the architecture of cruelty across High Fae courts. Had both witnessed and delivered precise suffering when Rhysand's plans required it. Had stared unflinching into abysses that would have shattered lesser beings.

None of it, not one moment in five centuries of darkness, had prepared him for this descent into the quiet catastrophe of your past.

A flash of light—soul-light, memory-light—pierced the veil between worlds.

Azriel drifted through time like smoke through shattered glass.

His shadows, those faithful companions of five centuries, reached ahead as if tasting a forgotten sweetness. They had known darkness in all its forms: the crushing weight of dungeons, the hollow void of night skies, the cold absence between stars.

Yet this darkness was different; it held memory, it held you.

The clearing materialized like a painting rendered in firelight. Autumn in its purest form, not the bitter political machinations of Beron's court, but autumn as it was meant to be.

Leaves burning gold and crimson in their slow, beautiful death; the scent of earth preparing for slumber; sunlight filtered through a canopy of fire.

And you.

Oh, you.

Azriel had witnessed beauty across realms.

Had seen sunrise over the Sea. Had watched starfall from mountain peaks. Had observed the deadly grace of Illyrian warriors in flight.

None compared to you in this moment, fingers trailing lazy patterns in water, face upturned to dappled light, humming a melody that reached inside him and touched something he'd thought long dead.

He moved closer, drawn by an instinct older than training. His shadows flowed toward you like water finding its natural course, stretching across time to cradle what they could not touch.

What was stolen from you?

What was stolen from us?

The question formed unbidden, startling in its possessiveness. He had rejected the bond, had severed connection with cruel precision. Yet here, witnessing who you had been, something ancient and nameless stirred beneath his ribs.

Recognition. Kinship.

The terrible knowledge that you had been carved from the same wounded material as he, gentle souls forced into weapons by others' cruelty.

A deer approached through sun-dappled shadow. You stilled, becoming statue-perfect save for eyes tracking its cautious advance. Your patience spoke of understanding that trust, once broken, must be earned again through consistent gentleness.

Hadn't he learned that same lesson through centuries of careful friendship with Mor, with Cassian, with Rhys? The parallels between you struck him with physical force.

"There you are," you murmured, voice soft as ember-light. "I was beginning to think you wouldn't come today."

Your smile as the deer accepted your offering...

Mother above, that smile.

It transformed features Azriel had only ever seen hardened by calculated cruelty.

He knelt before you, shadowsinger become supplicant. His scarred hand reached through time to touch what could never be touched. If only he could have known you then.

"Sister! Are you talking to animals again?"

A younger Lucien emerged between trees, whole in ways Azriel had never witnessed: unscarred, unbroken, eyes matched and innocent of horrors to come.

You mock-glared at your brother. "You scared him away."

"He'll be back tomorrow," Lucien replied, dropping beside you with easy confidence that would later be beaten into watchful wariness. "They always come back to you."

"Not if you keep blundering around the forest like a newborn bear."

Your teasing carried genuine warmth. Another revelation. Another piece of a puzzle Azriel hadn't known needed solving.

During war councils, he'd seen only calculated distance between you and your brothers. Had assumed coldness innate rather than learned. How many other assumptions had he made, about you, about himself, about the bond that connected and terrified you both?

Lucien peered at your sketchbook. "More healing herbs? Father won't be pleased."

A shadow crossed your face, swift, suppressed, significant. The spymaster in Azriel recognized that concealment. He'd performed it countless times when Rhys or Cassian ventured too near buried wounds.

"Father doesn't need to know everything."

Secretive, even then.

Hiding gifts meant for healing rather than harming. The irony struck him like a physical blow, you, practicing concealment to protect tenderness; him, practicing tenderness to conceal deadly skill. Mirror images, reversed but matching.

"Your secret's safe with me," Lucien assured, bumping your shoulder companionably. "Though I still think you should show the healers. Your knowledge could help people."

Azriel's shadows stretched toward the sketchbook, trying to preserve that evidence of your true nature. They traced illustrations with the reverence of scholars discovering ancient texts, each careful line a testament to patience, to precision, to purpose beyond pain.

"Maybe someday," you said softly, closing the book. "When the time is right."

Lucien studied you, expression uncharacteristically serious. "You know, sometimes I think you were born into the wrong court. You have fire in you, yes, but not the kind Father values."

"Careful," you warned without heat. "That's dangerously close to treason."

"It's the truth," he insisted. "Your fire heals rather than destroys. There's no shame in that."

You smiled at him, gratitude warming your eyes. "Thank you for seeing me, brother. Sometimes I think you're the only one who does."

I see you now.

Too late. Always too late.

The memory shimmered, edges dissolving into golden light. Azriel's shadows stretched desperately, trying to hold together what was already fading. He recognized approaching tragedy with the intimacy of old lovers, had cataloged its patterns across five centuries of blood and battlefields.

But this was different.

This wasn't witnessing another's pain with professional detachment.

This was feeling the approaching horror as if it were his own, perhaps because, in some cosmic way, it was.

The bond connecting you had transcended time, had brought him to this moment not as observer but as participant.

"Get out."

Your voice, your subconscious, rippled through his consciousness. Not memory but imminent confrontation.

"These aren't yours to see."

His shadows recoiled instinctively. They recognized boundaries of pain; he had taught them such restraint over centuries. Never take more than necessary. Never violate another's suffering without purpose.

"Forgive me," he whispered to the dissolving scene, to the girl you had been, to the female you had become.

But the bond pulled harder, golden thread becoming golden chain. It dragged him deeper against both your wills, into darkness shot through with winter frost. The memory of what was lost gave way to the horror of its taking.

The golden bond between them trembled violently, a dying star collapsing in on itself.

Azriel had endured five centuries of war, interrogation, and depravity, but nothing—nothing—had prepared him for this.

The bond yanked his consciousness sideways, tearing him from the Autumn Court gardens. His wings instinctively flared to catch himself, but there was no physical space to navigate.

Only the golden thread connecting your souls remained, pulsing with ancient magic no shadowsinger's training could have prepared him for.

For a breathless, eternal moment, he was neither here nor there, suspended in a liminal space where time ceased meaning. His shadows curled protectively around him like children seeking shelter, sensing danger but finding nothing tangible to fight.

The disorientation was unlike anything he'd experienced... worse than winnowing gone wrong, more violating than even Rhysand's mind-walking.

Then, with violent clarity, the memory crystallized around him.

Winter Court's delegation feast, perhaps two centuries ago.

Azriel's soul wept before his mind could comprehend why.

Some deep, primal part of him already knew what awaited, even as his conscious thoughts scrambled to make sense of this displacement.

His shadows thinned and spread, seeking purchase in a reality that wasn't quite real, their agitation mirroring the frantic beating of his heart.

The Winter Court's great hall breathed frost with each collective exhale of its occupants. Ice sculptures depicting the hunt lined the walls: predator and prey frozen in eternal pursuit. Unlike most diplomatic celebrations, the atmosphere carried an undercurrent of tension that made Azriel's centuries-honed instincts scream in alarm.

His spectral form tried to reach for Truth-Teller, muscle memory responding to perceived threat, only to grasp emptiness.

His shadows writhed in distress, seeking the familiar weight of his blade and finding nothing but memory and mist.

The opulence was obscene.

The mingling of courts created a sensory tapestry too vivid for mere recollection. This wasn't simply remembering; the bond had made him a witness to something far more intimate than memory.

Each detail assaulted his senses with precision that bordered on torture: the warm copper-gold light of Autumn Court chandeliers battling the crystalline blue radiance of Winter Court magic. Heat and frost waged their ancient war in the very air. He could taste the conflict on his tongue: cinnamon and woodsmoke overwhelmed by the sharp, cutting bite of fresh snow.

His gaze found you immediately.

Like a compass finding true north, like a dying man seeking water, like a shadow yearning for darkness. As if his entire being had been calibrated to locate you regardless of time or distance.

You stood alone.

A rush of protective fury surged through him, shocking in its intensity. His heart stuttered beneath the phantom sensation of ribs.

Isolation in court gatherings was never accidental. Never safe.

Centuries as Rhys's spymaster had taught him to recognize patterns of predation across courts. His fingers itched for Truth-Teller, his oldest companion, his most faithful tool. Helplessness clawed at him, a suffocating weight pressing on his chest.

The shadows around him whimpered, actually whimpered, a sound he'd never heard from them before.

They sensed his distress and shared it, amplified it, until the feeling threatened to drown him entirely.

The golden gown you wore was a declaration of defiance, burnished amber and molten copper in a sea of Winter Court blues and silvers.

Your hair caught torchlight and transformed it, not merely reflecting but enhancing, as if you were the source of all flame in the room.

You were beautiful. And you were in danger.

His stomach twisted with dread, primal and overwhelming.

Was this what drowning felt like?

This crushing weight on his chest, this burning in his lungs?

Azriel's shadows condensed into dark ribbons that strained toward you, as if to warn or protect, before dissolving against the immutable barrier of time. His wings flexed, the phantom sensation of battle-readiness coursing through him. Every instinct screamed a warning his conscious mind was still piecing together.

"Please," he whispered to the uncaring void of memory. "Please let me be wrong."

The pattern revealed itself with terrible clarity: your position near the high windows, too far from Autumn Court allies; the subtle shifting of Winter Court nobles creating a barrier of blue and silver bodies; the way servants had stopped offering you wine, isolating you from even that minor protection.

You had been positioned precisely like prey before a winter hunt.

Separated. Isolated. Displayed.

The male who approached moved with a predator's grace that made Azriel's shadows coil and hiss. Snow-white skin with veins of palest blue visible beneath, like cracks in ancient ice. Eyes deeper than midwinter midnight. Lips curved in a smile that held no warmth, only the promise of devastation disguised as passion.

"Lord Kieraven," the name pulled from Azriel's spectral lips before he could stop it. Knowledge that wasn't his flooded his consciousness. Distant cousin to Kallias. Not powerful enough to rule but privileged enough to remain untouchable.

Known for his particular fondness for fire magic—specifically, for extinguishing it.

Memory fragments flickered through Azriel's mind. Intelligence reports he'd filed centuries ago about Winter Court power structures, snippets about Kieraven that hadn't seemed significant then.

He recalled, with sudden clarity, dispatching the Winter lord himself during the war with Hybern. The noble's dying expression flashed in his mind—shock that the shadowsinger had chosen him specifically from the battlefield.

A fierce, vindictive satisfaction blazed through Azriel's veins. His shadows danced with savage pleasure. He hadn't known why he'd felt compelled to end that particular noble, but the bond was showing him now. Some part of him had sensed a debt needing payment. His only regret was that death had come too quickly, too mercifully, for what Kieraven had done.

"Lady of Autumn," Kieraven murmured, voice like a frozen river, smooth surface hiding killing currents beneath. "Your beauty outshines even your court's legendary fire."

Azriel's shadows thinned to razor edges, stretching toward Kieraven as if to flay him where he stood. Rage boiled through him, ancient and terrible. His carefully constructed walls of control crumbled with each passing second, shadows twisting into unrecognizable shapes that reflected his growing horror.

You replied with practiced diplomacy, your voice carrying the measured cadence of someone raised in political battlefields. "You honor me with such words, Lord Kieraven, though I suspect you offer them to all visiting diplomats."

The words themselves were forgotten the moment they left your lips as Azriel cataloged what others would miss.

The infinitesimal tightening of your fingers around your goblet, nails pressing white half-moons into your palms; the barely perceptible shift of weight to your back foot; the subtle scanning of the room for allies. Fight-or-flight instinct already activated while your conscious mind still navigated court politics.

Azriel recognized your fear—had cataloged such micro-expressions for centuries. But never had another's fear affected him so viscerally. His own heartbeat accelerated to match yours, his muscles tensing in unconscious mimicry of your readiness to flee. The bond between you vibrated with shared dread.

"Not flattery if it's true." Kieraven's fingers, long and elegant, tipped with the faintest blue that spoke of controlled Winter magic, brushed yours as he offered a goblet. The touch lingered, a deliberate invasion of your space, possession disguised as courtesy.

Azriel's awareness expanded, taking in the entire room with the tactical precision five centuries of spycraft had honed. Five Winter Court nobles had shifted positions, creating a subtle perimeter. Two Autumn Court guards who should have been nearby had disappeared entirely. Eris was engaged across the hall, deep in conversation with three Winter nobles, his back deliberately turned.

Not coincidence. Planned separation.

Understanding slammed into Azriel like a physical blow. This had been orchestrated. The separation from protection. The isolation. The calculated approach. Eris's convenient distraction.

A wave of self-loathing crashed through him, bitter as poison.

Recognition hit him with sickeningly familiar weight.

How many females had he witnessed in the shadows as they were cornered by powerful males? How many reports had he filed on violations when information was deemed more valuable than intervention?

Acid shame flooded his mouth, bitter and burning.

The taste of complicity. He wanted to vomit, to scream, to tear Kieraven limb from limb—but most of all, he wanted to erase his own culpability in centuries of similar predations, all justified in the name of intelligence gathering.

"Perhaps we might speak privately," Kieraven suggested, hand settling at the small of your back, fingers splayed possessively over your gown.

Even through memory, Azriel could feel the winter chill emanating from that touch. Not physical cold but something darker, an intent that frosted the very air between you.

His shadows lashed toward Kieraven again—a futile gesture against a memory two centuries old. Yet the violence of his reaction disturbed him.

His breathing came in short, sharp bursts, his vision narrowing until all he could see was the Winter lord's hand defiling the gold silk of your gown.

You attempted retreat, voice maintaining the careful neutrality of court politics. "I'm afraid I must decline, my lord. My father expects—"

The transformation was instantaneous. Charm to cruelty in the space between heartbeats. Kieraven's face hardened, frost literally forming around his fingertips where they dug into your waist.

"Your father expects you to secure Winter Court's goodwill." His voice dropped to a whisper meant for your ears alone, but the bond carried it to Azriel with perfect clarity. "Don't you think it's time you fulfilled your purpose?"

Kieraven's meaning crystallized with terrible clarity in Azriel's mind. The specific way he emphasized "fulfilled your purpose" carried centuries of entitlement, of females treated as currency between courts. A transaction Beron had clearly authorized.

The question burned like acid.

Now, seeing you—feeling through the bond your rising fear masked behind diplomatic composure—made him realize how hollow those justifications had been.

You lifted your chin, summoning dignity that made Azriel's chest ache with unexpected pride. "You misunderstand my purpose here, Lord Kieraven. I represent Autumn Court's diplomatic interests, not its... hospitality services."

The refusal was measured, diplomatic, final. Delivered with the poise of someone born and bred to navigate deadly courts.

Something that might have been admiration flickered through Azriel. A strange warmth blossomed in his chest, so at odds with the horror of witnessing what he couldn't change.

Kieraven's face contorted with quiet rage, "You'll regret that choice."

The memory shifted, the great hall dissolving into a more intimate scene.

You slipping from the gathering, seeking momentary solitude in a corridor adorned with Autumn Court's sigils. A place where you should have been safe.

Azriel recognized your tactical error immediately and wanted to scream a warning across time. No diplomat should ever seek isolation during hostile negotiations.

His centuries of training screamed at the vulnerability of your position—alone in a corridor, away from witnesses, in hostile territory. The terror of foreknowledge clawed at his throat, wild and desperate.

Please, no.

The sound of footsteps echoed against stone walls. Not one set, but many.

Azriel's body tensed, shadows coiling around him like armor as he braced for what he knew would come. He found himself at your side, unable to affect events yet unwilling to abandon you to face this alone.

Every sinew in his spectral form strained against the constraints of time and memory, his very essence rebelling against his role as helpless witness.

"Did you really think you could embarrass me before both courts without consequence?" Kieraven's voice carried a chill that frosted the very air between you.

You turned to find Kieraven blocking the corridor. Eleven other Winter Court males emerged from adjoining passageways. Surrounding you. Cutting off every escape route. The precise formation spoke of planning, of premeditation.

Azriel's spymaster mind calculated odds with the detachment of centuries of training—twelve against one, a female without combat skills, in a hostile territory with magic designed specifically to counter her natural abilities.

No possibility of victory. No chance of escape. The clinical assessment made him hate himself all the more.

"What is the meaning of this?" Your voice remained steady despite the fear-scent that filled the memory-space, so potent Azriel could taste your terror on his tongue. "My father will—"

"Your father," Kieraven interrupted, frost patterns forming on the walls around him as his control slipped, "sent you to us as a gift. One you refused to properly deliver."

The words hit Azriel like a physical blow, confirmation of his worst suspicion. This hadn't been opportunistic predation. This had been arranged. Sanctioned. Sold. The brutal truth of it cleaved through his composure, leaving raw, bleeding fury in its wake.

He fought against the memory's pull with everything he had, shadows lashing wild patterns against the constraints of time and space.

He cried your name, the sound tearing from his throat with such force it should have shattered the memory-walls around them. The scream echoed in the void between past and present, carrying five hundred years of rage and helplessness.

"STOP!"

Your voice, your subconscious, tore through the memory-space, desperate and raw.

Shadows that were not Azriel's surged between him and the memory, trying to block his view. The bond trembled violently, the golden thread connecting you stretching so thin it seemed it might snap.

"I don't want you to see this."

The memory surged forward, implacable as fate itself.

What followed unfolded with merciless clarity.

Kieraven struck first.

He grabbed you by the throat and slammed you into the wall so hard the stone behind you cracked. The impact forced the air from your lungs.

Your vision spun. Cold rolled off his skin in waves. Not the ordinary chill of Winter Court nobility, but something deeper. Something ancient. The kind of cold that settled into marrow, that crawled into the soul.

"The Autumn Court bitch thinks herself better than us," he spat, leaning close, his breath frosting the air between you. "But look how easily she burns."

You struggled. Your hands sparked, the fire in your veins instinctive, but it flickered once, then vanished.

A second male seized your wrist, another your ankle. Cold hands.

Magic laced through their fingers as they dragged you down, tearing your gown as they did. The fabric shredded under them, silk splitting like skin. Your scream followed, a raw, animal sound, but it was cut off too quickly. Kieraven's hand clamped over your mouth.

Azriel fell to his knees.

His shadows scattered like startled birds.

His heart didn't beat, it convulsed.

The bond pulled taut, a golden thread soaked red with what was coming.

His mouth opened to scream. Nothing came. Not your name. Not his own. Only air. Only silence.

Only memory that wouldn't stop bleeding.

Your body thrashed in their grip, but already you were surrounded.

Four males. Then six.

Then more.

Their bodies a cage of silver and blue. Their eyes glittered, not with lust, but with domination. With power. With ritual.

Ice magic bloomed across your bare skin, slow and creeping like frost over glass. It wasn't just suppression, it was invasion. It slipped beneath your skin, laced through your blood, calcified your flame. You writhed as your magic betrayed you, collapsed inside you, turned brittle and useless.

Your screams froze in your throat before they could even leave.

The silence wasn't still.

It screamed.

Azriel clawed at his chest, as if he could rip the bond out of his ribcage. As if he could stop feeling your bones break through his own skin.

His hands trembled. No grip. No ground. No breath.

Even his shadows refused him. They huddled in corners, flickering with grief. No blades. No barriers. No salvation.

Your limbs were forced outward. Your wrists pinned to cold stone. Ankles held wide.

Every inch of you exposed to their cruelty.

The chill on your skin was more than winter, it was shame. A shame so visceral it burned hotter than your fire ever had.

You tried to fight, gods, you tried, but they were prepared.

Each hand on your body was placed with precision. Each move choreographed. Your power suppressed. Your limbs restrained. Your mouth silenced.

One male took your face in his hand and turned it toward him. "The fire's gone now," he said with a grin. "Now we see what's left underneath."

The others laughed. That laughter echoed off stone walls like the shattering of glass.

Azriel's shadows clawed at the barriers of time until they bled smoke.

His skin split open in sympathy with yours, invisible wounds mirroring every violation. Through the ringing in his ears, he heard someone calling his name.

Rhys? No, it was you. Not present you, but the girl you were before they ruined you. Screaming, sobbing, begging, whispering his name like a prayer in a language he didn't know how to answer.

He reached for Truth-Teller, for wings, for any weapon, any strength he had ever possessed. His hands passed through memory, through time, grasping nothing.

Sweat beaded on his skin despite the cold. Bile rose in his throat. The room spun, reality fracturing around him while you suffered in perfect clarity.

He was a boy again. Hands nailed to stone. Blood in his mouth. But it wasn't his. It was yours.

His memories collapsed in on themselves until there was no line between past and present, between who had suffered and who was suffering now.

They touched you. Violated you.

Passed you from hand to hand like a thing. They didn't speak after the first, no taunts, no questions, no pleasure. Only duty. Only cruelty. As if this was a rite. A purge.

Each of the thirteen took something.

One crushed your fire.

Another twisted your arm until it snapped.

A third forced Winter magic into your mouth, through your teeth, until your tongue blistered.

One dislocated your hip.

Another froze your feet to the floor until your skin split open when you were torn free.

There was no dignity in this. Only desecration.

Pain was constant.

It had no beginning, no crescendo, no mercy.

And through the bond, Azriel felt it all.

As if it were happening to him. As if his own body were being torn apart while his mind remained intact, forced to witness, to experience, to understand.

Azriel's scarred hands trembled uncontrollably against the memory-floor. Sweat drenched his body, his leathers clinging to his skin as violent tremors wracked his frame. Blood filled his mouth where he'd bitten through his tongue, metallic and sharp. He couldn't feel his wings anymore, they'd gone numb with his horror, hanging like dead weight from his back.

The guilt wrapped around his throat like a rope, each second dragging tighter.

He should have known. Should have seen. Should have been there. He hadn't. And now it was carved into him, a sin that would never stop bleeding.

Your body shut down. Your mind tried to flee. He felt that too, the disassociation.

The split.

The moment when you began to float outside yourself, watching from somewhere above. The only defense left to you.

He could feel your soul splinter.

A thread snapped.

Something sacred was torn.

And he mourned.

His body convulsed. It wasn't a sob, but something more primal, a physical rejection of what he witnessed.

His stomach heaved, emptying itself onto the memory-floor. Shadows poured from his mouth with the bile, twisting into shapes of such anguish that they became unrecognizable.

His face contorted, veins standing out on his temples as he fought for breath against the crushing weight of your trauma.

He, the great shadowsinger. The killer of kings. The nightmare in the dark. On his knees in a memory he could not stop, unable to do anything but scream into the void and feel your suffering as his own. Five centuries of training.

Five centuries of killing. Five centuries of power. All meaningless in this moment. He could not save you. He could not even look away.

One noble bent to whisper in your ear. "This is what you were born for."

Azriel's shadows exploded. Darkness erupted outward from him in a tidal wave, tearing through the memory like a silent storm. He knew it would do nothing. He knew the past could not be touched.

But it didn't matter.

He would not let it go unanswered.

The scene shifted, a jarring transition.

Autumn Court guards discovered your body, their shock at finding you still breathing evident in their careful handling. Their whispers reached Azriel with perfect clarity.

"How is she still alive?"

"No one could survive this."

"Her pelvis is completely shattered," one guard reported, voice shaking. "Both legs broken. Five ribs puncturing her lungs. Her right shoulder and elbow dislocated. Three fingers on the left hand missing entirely. Frost magic in her bloodstream. And the... the internal damage..." He couldn't continue.

But you had survived. Somehow.

You survived.

Azriel fell forward, pressing his forehead to the memory-floor. His wings draped over you both, a shield against horror he couldn't escape. His shoulders shook with silent reverence. The survivor in him recognized something in you that transcended the breaking, a core of steel that even torture couldn't reach.

Where I might have surrendered, you endured.

Then Beron, standing over your healing table, face twisted not with fury at what had been done to his daughter, but with contempt at the political complication your assault created.

"Foolish girl," he hissed, flames erupting around his clenched fists, casting ominous shadows across your broken body. "Did I not tell you to behave appropriately? To represent this court with dignity?"

Something in Azriel broke.

A sound erupted from him, part growl, part scream, all predator. His lips pulled back from his teeth in a feral snarl.

His shadows solidified, taking physical form for the first time in memory. Truth-Teller appeared in his hand, conjured from pure hatred. His pupils dilated until his eyes were black pools rimmed with gold fire.

"I will end you," he promised Beron, the words a vow written in blood. "Father or not. High Lord or not. For this alone, you die."

The killing rage that surged through him transcended anything he'd experienced in five centuries of battle. His shadows lashed out with such violent force that the memory itself seemed to waver.

"She was found at the border," one healer reported quietly, hands shaking as they hovered over your wounds. "Impaled on a Winter Court tree."

"And the perpetrators?" Beron's voice held no concern for you, only calculation.

"No trace, my lord."

Beron's expression hardened further. "Say nothing of this. To anyone. Not even her mother or brothers."

"But my lord, she requires—"

"She requires discretion," Beron interrupted, voice deadly soft. "Heal her body if you can. But this incident never happened. Is that understood?"

The healers nodded, terror evident in their trembling hands as they resumed work on your shattered body. No one dared speak against the High Lord, though their expressions betrayed their horror at his callousness.

"You failed her," Azriel snarled, the words meaningless to ears that could not hear him. "You all failed her."

Azriel could only watch with mounting horror as the healers worked over your broken form.

Something in your eyes began to change.

The light dimming, the spark of the woman he'd glimpsed by the forest pool fading into nothingness. Blue frost patterns remained beneath your skin where Winter magic had taken root, refusing to dissipate despite the healers' efforts.

And then came the transformation that truly chilled him to the bone.

Over the following weeks, as your body healed but your spirit remained shattered, Azriel witnessed it.

The memory timeline accelerated, showing flickering moments across months, then years, to centuries.

Your eyes, once warm with compassion, grew cold and calculating. The curve of your lips, once quick to smile, hardened into a permanent sneer. Your hands, which had once healed with gentle touch, now dealt pain with mechanical precision.

You became what trauma had forged. A weapon.

Your first kill came three months after the assault. A servant who spilled wine on your gown during a feast. The room fell silent as you placed your hand against his chest and channeled fire directly into his heart.

His body crumpled to ash before it hit the floor. You didn't blink. Didn't flinch. Just returned to your meal while servants hastily swept away the remains.

Beron's smile that night was one of sick pride.

Azriel recognized the hollowness in your eyes. His own stared back at him from countless reflections after his own torture. The void where something vital once lived. He had almost become this, would have become this without his brothers. The knowledge settled in his gut like stone.

The second kill followed a week later. A courtier who dared mention the Winter Court in your presence.

His screams echoed through the castle for hours before he finally died, his body a testament to your newfound creativity with flame.

By the time another year had passed, your reputation had spread throughout Prythian. The Lady of Autumn, they called you in whispers. Cold as Winter but burning with Autumn's fire. A contradiction wrapped in cruelty. Beautiful and untouchable. Those who approached too closely vanished in screams and ash.

Through the bond, he felt it happen.

Your soul fracturing, tearing, one piece clinging desperately to your body while another fled, seeking escape from unbearable pain.

Azriel reached forward with trembling fingers, trying to hold the pieces together. His shadows joined his effort, stretching toward the breaking golden light of your essence. His face contorted with desperate concentration, as if by sheer will he could prevent what had already happened.

It wasn't instantaneous. The fracture began that night in the Winter Court corridor, widened during the hours on the tree, and continued to split during the weeks of physical healing.

Each new callous comment from Beron, each dismissal of your suffering, each night of untreated nightmares widened the crack.

Until finally, during a particularly horrific flashback, something broke completely.

One remained tethered to your Fae body, calcifying into something cold and lethal. The other fled, across worlds, across realities, seeking refuge in a form untouched by Prythian's horrors.

It felt like his own soul was being torn apart.

His shadows split into two distinct groups. One remaining with his spectral form, the other flowing toward you on the healing table, instinctively trying to hold the pieces of your soul together.

But they couldn't. Nothing could. The tear was too profound, the wound too deep.

His consciousness followed the fleeing half of your soul, pulled by the golden bond that connected you. The memory-vision blurred, reality dissolving into golden light that surrounded him, buoyed him, carried him across the boundaries between worlds.

The experience was nothing like winnowing, which merely folded space within Prythian. This was a shattering of cosmic barriers, a journey across realities that shouldn't have been possible.

The hospital room materialized around him with shocking clarity.

Sterile white walls, strange beeping devices, tubes and wires connecting the still form on the bed to machines he couldn't comprehend.

Your human form, so similar to your Fae body yet subtly different. Softer. More fragile. Untouched by the horrors your other half had endured.

Around the bed, human figures, family, he supposed, maintained their vigil. A woman who shared your human features wept silently, holding your unresponsive hand. A male, perhaps a father or brother, stood by the window, face haggard with grief.

"Come back to us," the woman whispered, and Azriel felt the words reach toward your soul across the void that separated conscious thought from wherever you had retreated.

But he could see what they could not, the golden thread that connected this human vessel to a Fae body in another world entirely.

You found a way to survive.

When there was no escape, you created one.

Azriel lurched awake with a strangled gasp, wings flaring violently in the pre-dawn darkness.

Shadows exploded from his skin, not with their usual controlled precision but in chaotic bursts that plunged the room into impenetrable night. His scarred hand seized Truth-Teller before his eyes had fully opened.

Then he felt it—wetness tracking down his face.

Tears. In five centuries of nightmares, of reliving his own torture and the weight of countless deaths, he had never once cried in his sleep.

"You were crying."

Your voice cut through his darkness like the first light of dawn. His senses, always razor-sharp, had failed to detect your presence—he'd been too consumed by the visions the bond had forced upon him.

His eyes found you standing at the foot of his bed. Morning light filtered through the windows, limning you in amber and gold, turning your hair to living flame. The sight of you stole what little breath remained in his lungs.

"Bad dreams?" you asked.

Something in how you said it—the understanding that only comes from walking through nightmares yourself—made his shadows curl back protectively around him.

"The bond shows me things," Azriel said, watching your reaction carefully. "Your world. The hospital room where part of you still dreams. The machines keeping watch with their steady, metallic heartbeats."

Your sharp intake of breath seemed to pull all oxygen from the room. Fear flashed across your face, not of him, but of truths you weren't ready to face.

"You've seen... my other life?" The words barely formed a whisper.

Azriel nodded once. His shadows coiled tighter, though rebellious tendrils still strained toward the answering golden light beneath your skin.

"I've seen your human family," he said, gaze never leaving yours. "Their vigil at your bedside. The prayers they whisper over your unmoving hands. Their refusal to surrender hope."

The color drained from your face as you stepped back. "How much do you know?"

His shadows reacted to his inner conflict, painting the walls with frantic, jagged patterns.

The bond had shown him everything, your assault, your soul's desperate flight from unbearable pain, but he could see those memories remained locked behind walls your mind had built to protect itself.

"I know enough," he said finally, voice gentling despite the rage still simmering beneath his skin. "I know you exist between worlds, suspended between lives, belonging fully to neither."

He watched your face for signs of distress, of memories threatening to surface. But he saw only confusion and wariness, and beneath that, desperate hope that someone finally understood.

"There are...gaps," you admitted, so quietly only Fae hearing could catch it. "Times I can't remember. Feelings that appear from nowhere, like I'm borrowing someone else's heart."

The admission seemed to surprise you as much as him, a vulnerability you hadn't meant to reveal. The bond pulsed in response, acknowledging the trust such words required.

"Sometimes the mind shields us from what we're not ready to remember," Azriel said softly. His wings shifted unconsciously, creating a sheltered space that included you within their span. "There's no shame in that."

Your eyes widened, understanding dawning like stars appearing one by one. "You know more than you're telling me."

Azriel's silence was answer enough.

A single tear escaped down your cheek. The mating bond flared in response, golden light seeping through both your bodies like twin flames fed by the same source.

"Why won't you tell me everything?" you whispered.

"Because some truths should be followed to their source, not poured into unprepared vessels," he said, his voice steady despite the storm raging inside him. "And because choice was stolen from you once. I won't be another thief."

Something in your expression shifted at his words, a wall crumbling, a door creaking open. Your fear softened to cautious wonder.

"You really mean that," you said, half statement, half question.

"I've had five centuries to learn the sanctity of choice," Azriel replied, the ghosts of his own trauma briefly visible in his eyes. "Of agency. Of deciding one's own fate when all other freedoms have been stolen."

Ember and Sizzle materialized beside you, their pink flame forms crackling protectively. They studied Azriel with suspicious intensity before Ember cautiously approached. The tiny creature hopped onto the bed, then settled near Azriel's scarred hand. Not touching, but close.

"I should go," you said finally. "The healers are expecting me."

Azriel nodded, making no move to stop you.

But as you turned to leave, something broke inside him, some final barrier between duty and need.

With a wince he couldn't hide, Azriel pushed himself from the bed. His movements betrayed the wounds still healing beneath his leathers. Shadows curled around him as he crossed the chamber in three swift strides.

Then, before you could react, he knelt at your feet.

The gesture was so unexpected, so contrary to everything you knew of the feared shadowsinger, that you stepped back. But Azriel remained where he was, head bowed, shadows spread around him like wings darker than those folded against his back.

"I make this vow to you," he said, voice raw with emotion he'd stopped trying to hide. "Not because the bond demands it, but because I have seen all that you are across worlds and cannot bear the thought of your light dimming."

Your breath caught in your throat. The weight of his words pressed against your chest, not crushing, but anchoring you to this moment.

He looked up, meeting your startled gaze with eyes that burned with such fierce devotion it stole what little breath remained.

Five centuries of controlled fury now focused solely on you with the precision of a blade crafted for one purpose.

"I vow that no one, not Beron, not the courts, not reality itself will ever again inscribe your destiny but you." His voice shook with the effort of laying himself bare. "Your choices will be yours alone."

His hands trembled at his sides, the effort it took not to reach for you written in every line of his body.

"Even if—" His voice faltered, and for the first time in five centuries, the shadowsinger struggled to master himself. "Even if those choices lead you away from me."

The bond between you flared, golden light bleeding through both your skins, responding to truth where pretty words would have fallen short.

The shadows around him deepened, no longer the calculated extensions of his will but raw manifestations of his soul laid bare. They created a living circle of darkness that surrounded you both, intimate as a whispered confession.

"I vow to stand between you and harm," he continued, each word carved from his very being, "not because you lack strength, but because you've already carried too much alone."

His voice dropped lower, until each word felt like a caress against your skin.

"I vow to be the silence that listens when you speak," he said, "the darkness that shelters when light wounds. To learn your silences, to honor your spirit in all its broken, beautiful glory."

His scarred hands—instruments of centuries of death—remained at his sides, making no move to touch you.

His fingers curled into fists, as if physically restraining themselves from reaching for what they had no right to claim.

"I vow to be patient as mountains, steadfast as stars." The tendons in his neck strained with the effort of offering everything while asking nothing. "To wait centuries if needed, to accept only what you freely give."

The chamber around you seemed to hold its breath as his final words took form.

"I bind myself not to you, but to your freedom," he said, the vow settling around you both like a constellation newly born, "your right to determine what you become."

You stood frozen, overwhelmed by what he offered. No male in your experience had ever placed a female's sovereignty above even a mating bond's demands.

"Azriel, get up," you finally managed, the word barely audible.

Azriel obeyed immediately, returning to his full height though he remained close enough that his scent—night-chilled stone and cedar—enveloped you like the promise of shelter in storm.

"Why?" The question escaped before you could stop it.

His gaze did not waver. "Because in five centuries of darkness, I never knew I was blind until your light showed me my own soul."

The simplicity of his answer, the raw honesty of it, nearly undid you.

"Can you..." you began, then faltered. Taking a deep breath, you tried again. "Can you help me find my way back? Home, I mean. To my real body."

For a heartbeat, everything showed on Azriel's face—the devastation of your request, the selfish desire to refuse. The bond between you spasmed as if in physical pain. His shadows recoiled, then coiled tighter as if protecting him from a blow that had already landed.

But then, deliberately, he mastered himself. His expression smoothed into something that cost him dearly to maintain.

"If that is your heart's true desire," he said, each word a river of emotion carefully channeled between banks of control, "then I will tear apart the fabric between worlds with my bare hands if it would grant you peace."

The promise clearly flayed him alive—you could see it in the tightening of his jaw, the subtle tensing of his wings, the way his shadows trembled, but he made it anyway. Honoring your choice even as it carved pieces from his soul.

"Thank you," you whispered, the words inadequate but all you could manage past the tightness in your throat.

Azriel inclined his head, accepting your gratitude though it must have felt like swallowing fire.

You took a step back, needing space to process what had just happened. The flame bunnies followed, though Ember cast one last look at Azriel before reluctantly joining you.

At the door, you paused, looking back. "I don't know what I'll choose in the end."

The hope that flared in his eyes was quickly banked, carefully controlled, but unmistakable as sunrise. "Whatever you choose," he said, voice steady only through centuries of discipline, "I will honor it as I would honor my own heartbeat."

Something that might have been a smile ghosted across your lips before you turned away. The sight of it made his heart clench in his chest, a glimpse of possibility where before he had seen only walls.

The door closed behind you with a soft click that echoed in the hollow space of your chest.

Azriel remained perfectly still for several heartbeats after you left.

The memory clung to him like smoke, seeping into his skin, his lungs, his bones. His scarred hands trembled uncontrollably as he tried to breathe through the aftershocks.

He made it three steps before his knees buckled. Truth-Teller clattered to the floor.

Then came the sound, not a sob, not a growl. Just something breaking.

Your screams still echoed in his ears. The cold of that corridor. The laughter of those males. The smell of your blood on snow.

The room was too quiet now. Too still. A silence that rang louder than your screams.

He lurched toward the bathroom, barely making it before his stomach emptied itself. His shoulders heaved as he retched, tasting bile and fury and impotent rage.

When there was nothing left to purge, he slid to the floor, back against the cold tile wall. His wings dragged awkwardly, joints refusing to cooperate.

The first tear fell then, sliding silently down his cheek. Another followed. Then another, until his face was wet with grief.

Five centuries of discipline shattered like glass as sobs tore from his throat. Each one painful. Each one raw. His shadows recoiled from him, terrified by this display of emotion from their master who had taught them control above all else.

I failed you.

The thought crushed against his ribs like a physical weight.

Mother above, I failed you.

He wrapped his arms around himself, trying to stop the violent trembling that had overtaken his body. The scars on his palms caught on the leather of his fighting clothes as he clutched at his own shoulders.

He had never broken like this. Not during his imprisonment in that lightless cell. Not in the centuries of blood and battlefields that followed. He had built his reputation on control, on emotionless precision, on perfect, deadly calm.

I should have been there.

I should have known.

Gods, I failed you.

The thoughts repeated, blades twisting deeper with each iteration. The tears wouldn't stop. They flowed as if an ancient dam had finally broken, carrying centuries of suppressed emotion. He buried his face in his hands, shoulders shaking with the force of his anguish.

His shadows finally approached cautiously, curling around him like concerned children. They had never seen their master like this, utterly broken open, utterly vulnerable.

They will pay.

The thought formed with perfect, crystalline clarity amidst his grief.

Every one of them still living.

Every one who touched you.

Every one who watched.

He saw it again, the moment your soul tore in two. Remembered the sound, like silk ripping, like a star dying. The terrible beauty of that golden light splitting, one half fleeing across worlds, the other calcifying into armor around what remained.

This understanding only made him crumble further, made his chest heave with sobs that felt like they might break his ribs. He tried to regain control, tried to force the tears to stop, but they continued to pour down his face, dripping onto the tile floor beneath him.

In this moment, he wasn't Rhysand's shadowsinger. Wasn't the Night Court's most feared assassin. He was just a male, kneeling alone on a bathroom floor, heart breaking for suffering he couldn't prevent.

The shadows tried to comfort him, wrapping around his shoulders, his wings, his trembling hands. But they couldn't reach the wound that had been torn open inside him, the raw, bleeding awareness of his failure to protect something precious.

I'll guard what remains.

The vow formed somewhere beneath the tears, solid as stone.

I'll never fail you again.

He rested his forehead on his knees, arms wrapped around his legs, making himself as small as possible, as if he could somehow contain the devastating grief that poured from him.

For the first time in five centuries, Azriel, shadowsinger of the Night Court, cried until there were no tears left to shed. Until his throat was raw and his eyes were swollen. Until his shadows had gathered around him in silent vigil, witnessing this transformation, this breaking, this rebirth.

His shadows, once wild and frantic, began to still. As if recognizing the shape of a vow. As if honoring it.

Finally, when the tears subsided into occasional shuddering breaths, he lifted his face. His eyes were bloodshot, his features swollen with grief.

I will find them all.

The oath settled in his bones with cold finality.

And when I do, death will seem a mercy.

He pushed himself up, movements stiff and pained. In the mirror, he barely recognized himself, face ravaged by tears, eyes red-rimmed and swollen, shadows still curling protectively around his shoulders.

He looked like what he was: a male who had witnessed something unholy and been forever changed by it.

He splashed cold water on his face, the chill a shock against his heated skin. Then he straightened, squared his shoulders, and faced his reflection. Not to check the damage, but to look himself in the eyes.

To bear it. To earn the right to one day bear your gaze again.

I am yours, as you are mine. Whether you want me or not.

The vow settled in his bones with finality. This was his purpose now. Not Rhysand's missions. Not court politics. Not ancient vendettas.

You. All parts of you.

The broken and the healing. The cruel and the kind. The fragments across worlds.

His to protect. His to avenge. His to guard.

He picked up Truth-Teller with unsteady hands.

Not a weapon tonight. Just a reminder.

He opened the bathroom door, shoulders set with new determination.

The grief would come again, he knew. The images would haunt him. But they would also drive him.

He wasn't healed. He wasn't whole. But something had cracked open. Like stone split by frost. And through it, something new might one day grow.

His tears had washed away something old to make room for something new, a shadowsinger with purpose beyond court and war. A male who had finally found something worth fighting for beyond duty and brotherhood.

You.

You stumbled back to your chambers, Azriel's vow reverberating in your mind. Each word had carved itself into your memory with the precision of Truth-Teller's edge.

"Is kneeling and swearing eternal oaths what passes for flirting in Prythian?" you muttered, pressing fingers to your flushed cheeks. "Whatever happened to awkward small talk over wine?"

The bond pulsed in response, a golden thread beneath your skin that sent warmth cascading through your veins.

Ember and Sizzle materialized in twin pops of flame, immediately launching into a dramatic reenactment. Ember dropped to his tiny knees, paws clasped in supplication, mimicking Azriel's intensity with such ridiculous devotion that you snorted despite yourself.

"I'm glad someone finds this amusing," you said, collapsing onto your bed. The mattress sank beneath you, cradling your exhausted body.

Your fingers brushed against the leather journal in your pocket. The worn cover felt warm against your skin. You hesitated, then pulled it out.

"I shouldn't read this," you told the bunnies, already turning pages. "Major invasion of privacy."

The first entry made you choke on a laugh.

"What is a submarine? Some underwater house? Why would anyone put a door with holes in it underwater? Filed under: Makes no sense but I understand completely."

"He's been documenting everything!" you exclaimed, fingertips trembling slightly as you flipped through more pages.

A knock interrupted your reading. A servant bowed when you opened the door.

"My lady, Lords Eris and Lucien request your presence in the eastern gardens. The meeting with Lord Thesan and the shadowsinger has concluded."

Your heart stammered against your ribs. "What meeting?"

"I believe it concerns the Autumn Court," she replied carefully. "They asked for you specifically."

You hurried to the gardens, journal still clutched in your hand. The eternal dawn cast long shadows across the carefully tended paths. As you rounded the final corner, you spotted Eris and Lucien standing with Azriel beneath a blooming tree.

The shadowsinger's back was to you, his wings folded tight against his spine, but his posture changed the moment your scent hit the air.

Lucien looked grim, his metal eye whirring faster than usual. Eris's face was a mask of cold fury, lips pressed into a bloodless line, until he saw you. His expression softened instantly.

Azriel turned, and the raw emotion in his eyes knocked the breath from your lungs. His shadows stretched toward you before he reined them in, but not before one tendril brushed your ankle.

"What's happening?" you demanded, heart pounding. "Why wasn't I included?"

Eris's gaze flicked to Azriel, sharp as a blade. "Shadowsinger, leave us. This is a family matter."

A muscle ticked in Azriel's jaw. His shadows darkened, coiling tightly around him. For a moment, you thought he might refuse, but then he bowed his head in a gesture of surprising deference.

"As you wish," he said quietly. His voice was midnight stone, cool and impenetrable. The words were for Eris, but his eyes found yours. "I'll be nearby if needed."

With that, he dissolved into darkness, though the bond tugged insistently in the direction he'd vanished.

Once he was gone, Eris's shoulders dropped a fraction, the knife-edge of his posture dulling just enough to reveal something more human underneath.

"I've declared the northern territories of Autumn Court in rebellion against Beron," he said, his voice precise as a surgeon's blade. "Dawn Court has granted sanctuary and military aid."

Cold shock washed through you, the bond trembling with your fear. "You're starting a civil war?"

"A war that's been brewing for centuries," Eris replied, each word cut from ice. "Beron's time has ended."

"Why now?" you asked, stomach twisting into knots. "What's changed?"

Lucien moved closer, his expression gentling. Before you could respond, Lucien closed the distance between you. His arms wrapped around you in an embrace so unexpected that you froze, the journal pressed awkwardly between you.

"I'm sorry," he whispered, voice breaking. You could feel him trembling. "I'm sorry for failing you. For not being the brother you deserved."

You stood shocked, uncertain how to respond. Over his shoulder, you saw Eris watching, his amber eyes burning with an emotion you'd never witnessed there before.

"I'll protect you," Lucien continued, pulling back to meet your gaze. His metal eye whirred, focusing with fierce intensity. "I swear it on the Mother, on my blood, on whatever remains of my honor."

"We protect our own," Eris echoed. Unlike Lucien, he maintained his distance, but the vow in his voice cut deeper than any blade. "Whatever the cost."

You looked between them, Lucien's open emotion, Eris's restrained intensity, and felt something shift inside you. Not the mating bond, but something equally profound. The bond of family, forged in shared purpose.

"Beron will retaliate," Eris continued, voice hardening until it could have shattered stone. "You can't stay in Dawn Court. It's not defensible enough."

The bond reacted to your rising concern, pulsing beneath your breastbone. It felt like warning, like protection.

"The Night Court has offered sanctuary," Lucien said, his metal eye gleaming with determination.

"The Night Court?" Your voice rose slightly. The bond flared, golden warmth spreading through your chest. "With Azriel?"

Something that might have been amusement flickered in Eris's eyes, there and gone like a spark from a fire. "Despite my personal feelings about the shadowsinger, his protection is... formidable."

"You'll have choices there," Lucien assured you, warmth infusing his words. "You'll have freedom."

The word resonated within you. Your fingers tightened around the journal, its leather warm against your skin.

"Do I have a choice now?" you asked. "Or has this already been decided?"

The brothers exchanged a look laden with centuries of understanding.

"The choice is yours," Lucien said, his voice gentle. "Always."

"But we strongly advise Night Court protection," Eris added, amber eyes never leaving yours.

Ember and Sizzle materialized on your shoulders, sensing your uncertainty. Ember nuzzled against your cheek, his tiny flame form surprisingly comforting. Sizzle puffed herself up, growing to twice her size as if preparing to defend you from your own brothers.

"I'll go to the Night Court," you said finally. The bond hummed in approval, sending warmth through your veins. "But this isn't forever. When Beron is dealt with, I decide where I belong."

"Agreed," Lucien said immediately.

Eris nodded once, the gesture somehow more binding than any oath. "We'll send word when it's safe."

As arrangements were made around you, a shadow tendril briefly touched your hand. Azriel, listening from the darkness, acknowledging your choice without intruding.

The bond responded instantly, golden light briefly visible beneath your skin where the shadow had touched. Not rejection. Not possession. But recognition.

Looking at your brothers, one openly protective, one fiercely reserved, you felt something you hadn't expected. Belonging.

Whatever awaited in your future with a certain shadowsinger, you wouldn't face it alone.

The Dawn Court servants had packed most of your belongings. All that remained were your personal items and deciding which of Azriel's gifts to bring. You stood over the drawer containing them, his journal warm in your hands, your fingers tracing the worn leather cover.

A whisper of darkness gathered at your balcony, like night itself had taken form. Shadows curled and danced in invitation before Azriel himself appeared, moonlight silvering the edges of his wings.

"May I enter?" he asked, his voice deep velvet in the twilight. He remained outside, waiting with a patience that seemed etched into his very being.

You stiffened, heart betraying you with a quickened beat. "Why are you here?"

"Your brothers asked me to check final arrangements," he replied, but something in his eyes, a vulnerability that belied his warrior's stance, suggested another reason entirely.

You nodded, placing the journal back in the drawer. "Fine. Come in."

He stepped inside, wings tucked tight against his back, not the predatory male you'd first met, but someone humbled, careful. You moved to the opposite side of the room, pretending not to notice how the bond between you brightened at his nearness, golden light briefly visible beneath your skin.

Silence stretched between you, fragile as spun glass. Ember and Sizzle materialized, their tiny flame bodies casting warm light across your face. They stayed beside you, but their eyes remained fixed on Azriel with unmistakable longing.

"Are you prepared for tomorrow's journey?" Azriel finally asked, shadows betraying his nervousness, reaching toward you before he pulled them back.

"As prepared as one can be when shuttled between courts like a parcel," you replied, your tone softer than intended. Something about the night, about his presence, made your carefully constructed walls seem suddenly transparent.

He didn't flinch, but his shadows curled inward, as if absorbing your words. "Your world," he said unexpectedly, eyes finding yours across the distance. "What was it like?"

The question caught you off guard. "Why do you want to know?"

His gaze didn't waver. "Because it made you," he answered simply. "And that makes it important."

Your breath caught, the raw honesty disarming you more effectively than any practiced charm. "Is this small talk? Because you're terrible at it."

A smile, rare and beautiful, touched his lips. "Is it working anyway?"

Despite yourself, warmth bloomed in your chest. "Maybe."

"Tell me," he said, voice falling to an intimate murmur that seemed designed for secrets shared in darkness. "Please."

You moved to the balcony, gesturing for him to join you beneath the stars. His scent, night-chilled stone and cedar, enveloped you as he drew near, careful to maintain the space you needed.

"Submarines are vessels that travel underwater," you explained, watching wonder transform his severe features. "Like ships, but beneath the surface."

"And screen doors?"

Your answering laugh surprised you both. "They're mesh doors that keep insects out while letting air in, useless on submarines, hence the saying."

"Your world sounds fascinating," he said, gaze lingering on your smile.

"Says the immortal shadowsinger," you countered, noticing how starlight caught in his eyes, turning them to liquid gold.

His attention fell to your mouth. "What about...yeeting?"

"Oh god." Heat rushed to your face.

Laughter bubbled up from some long-forgotten place inside you. Ember and Sizzle suddenly formed tiny flame balls and flinging them while squeaking what could only be their version of "yeet."

"No, no!" you exclaimed through giggles. "No yeeting fire indoors!"

Azriel's shadows darted out, catching the flame balls before they could cause damage. What happened next stole your breath, darkness and fire merged, spiraling together in a dance of opposing elements that somehow created something new, something beautiful.

"I didn't know they could do that," you whispered, momentarily forgetting the distance you'd imposed.

"Neither did I," Azriel replied, watching the interaction with wonder. "Looks like we create something beautiful together."

The implication hung in the air between you, not a challenge, but a truth offered without expectation.

"What do you miss most about your world?" Azriel asked, his voice a caress in the darkness.

"Coffee," you admitted, leaning against the balcony rail, face tilted toward stars you were beginning to recognize. "And the people who'd make it for me on bad days."

His hazel eyes lit with genuine curiosity. "What is this coffee? I've heard you mention it before."

"It's a drink made from roasted beans. Bitter, but in the best way possible. People get addicted to it."

One of his shadows curled forward with interest. "Your world has recreational poisons?"

You laughed, the sound startling in its genuineness. "We have so many. Coffee, alcohol, sugar, social media..."

"Social... media?" His brow furrowed, shadows mimicking his confusion in swirling patterns.

"Imagine if everyone in Prythian could instantly send messages to everyone else, at all times of day, and also show pictures of their breakfast."

A rare smile tugged at his lips. "That sounds..."

"Horrible? It absolutely is," you grinned. "I was completely addicted."

"You miss things that are horrible for you?" His shadows danced with amusement.

"Humans are complicated like that." You gestured to the night sky. "We also had metal contraptions that flew without wings. Cars that moved without horses. Tiny devices that held all the world's knowledge in your pocket."

Azriel leaned closer, completely enraptured. "Tell me more about these... cars?"

"Metal boxes with wheels and engines. They go really fast, but also kill thousands of people every year."

"Your world sounds terrifying," he said, but his tone conveyed fascination, not judgment.

"We also had medicine that could cure most diseases. Buildings that touched the clouds. Devices that let you talk to someone across the world instantly."

"Yet you say 'yeet' when throwing things," he noted with unexpected dry humor.

You burst out laughing. "Did you just make a joke? The terrifying shadowsinger made a joke!"

For the next hour, you described smartphones, internet, airplanes, and television. Azriel listened with increasing amazement, his shadows occasionally forming shapes that resembled what you described—tiny cars, miniature airplanes, even a crude approximation of a smartphone.

"Your world sounds interesting," he said finally. "Creative. Innovative."

"It's also polluted, overcrowded, and constantly at war," you admitted. "No place is perfect."

His expression grew serious as he reached into his leathers. "I have something for you."

From within his leathers, he produced a small object wrapped in midnight blue silk. His scarred fingers barely grazed yours as he placed it in your palm, but even that brief contact sent warmth cascading through your veins.

Inside lay a delicate silver charm—a tiny flame crafted with remarkable detail, suspended on a fine chain. Within the flame swirled what looked like living shadow, dancing and pulsing with quiet life.

"I asked Amren to bind your flame to my shadow," Azriel explained, his voice rough with emotion. "It'll grow warmer the closer I am."

His shadows caressed the charm as if reluctant to part with this piece of himself.

"And if you ever need me," he continued, eyes meeting yours with fierce intensity, "break it. The bond will bring me to you, across any distance."

You held the charm against your heart, understanding the gift's true significance—not possession, but protection. Not demand, but devotion.

"I know your path is yours to choose," he said, voice breaking slightly. "But if you ever need someone who will come without question, without hesitation..." His scarred hand hovered near your cheek, not quite touching. "Let it be me."

Before you could respond, a commotion erupted below. Azriel's shadows instantly darkened, stretching toward the sound as his body tensed, warrior replacing poet in the space of a heartbeat.

Lucien appeared at your door, face grim. "We have to leave. Now. Beron's forces breached the defenses."

"How?" Azriel demanded, wings flaring protectively around you.

"Betrayal," Lucien answered. "Someone inside let them through."

The charm burned warm against your skin, its promise suddenly vital.

"Get her to Velaris," Lucien commanded. "I'll hold them here."

"And Eris?" you asked, heart pounding.

"Captured."

Azriel moved toward you with predatory grace, the tender male of moments ago transformed into living shadow. His fingertips finally brushed your cheek, the touch so gentle it made your eyes burn with unshed tears.

"Stay behind me," he said, voice midnight steel. "Always."

As he cradled you against his chest, you felt his heart beating in perfect rhythm with yours, the bond between you no longer a chain but a lifeline.

Through the windows, orange flame bloomed in the distance. Velaris lay ahead, but behind you, everything you'd begun to trust was burning.

As Azriel launched into the night, wings unfurling like destruction made beautiful, you slipped the necklace over your head and pressed the charm between your bodies, where fire and shadow already danced together, creating something neither of you had imagined possible.

Author’s Note: This was one of the hardest chapters I have ever written. It deals with trauma, helplessness, and the echoes of pain that linger in love. Nothing here is for shock value. It is about survival, silence, and the grief of watching someone you care for break.

If you have lived through something like this, or love someone who has, I see you. This story does not claim to define that pain, but it does seek to honor it.

Please take care while reading. Step away if needed. Your peace matters. 🕊️

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#acotar #azriel #azriel x oc #azriel shadowsinger #azriel x reader #azriel x you #rhysand #feyre acotar #cassian #nesta acotar

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feyascorner · 1 year ago

Text

before my nails dig

summary. in which one of Astarion's especially vivid nightmares results in him waking up to Tav at the mercy of his own hands...and the shame that comes with it.

warnings. angst, fluff, comfort

pairing. Astarion x GN!reader

a/n. someone pls get this man therapy that's all i ask,,, also this takes place sometime during act 3 before you confront cazador!! first post too so pls forgive typos

Had breathing always been this hard?

It's not like he had to breathe anyway. The undead have more perks than one would think, and having no need for air was one that became particularly useful in unexpected ways. Yet as he stands in Cazador's dungeon again--a place he longs to rid from the darkest corners of his mind--all he can do is stumble over his own breath, crimson eyes darting around frantically in search of an exit.

And suddenly, his siblings are at the mercy of the ascension, floating helplessly in the chains of a red aura--Cazador's aura. Despite the chaos, Astarion's eyes narrow in on the one pedestal with no occupant, and he realizes it's his own designated place.

It's getting harder to breathe now.

A breath creeps up behind his shoulder, sending pure dread throughout his entire body as he hears Cazador's voice far too close than he ever wanted it to be.

"Wake up, child. This is all you've ever been meant for."

Astarion whips around and lunges at the man, his hands wrapping viciously around the throat he's fantasized about ripping apart for the past two hundred years. His nails dig into the flesh of the vampire lord's neck, leaving indents in the shape of crescent moons, just enough to cause panic but not enough to draw blood. But Cazador only cackles, his eyes staring right into Astarion's as he hollers over and over again.

"Wake up."

"Wake up!"

"--Astarion!"

The spawn's eyes snap open, recognition finally flooding his expression as he finds himself staring down at you. The very face he sees in the softest of dreams, the lips he longs to kiss at every waking moment, and the eyes that gaze at him with the love and adoration he's been missing for most of his wretched eternal life. Though he'd never admit it, you saved him. From the moment he'd threatened your life at the nautiloid crash to the moment he held you close to his chest in the confines of his tent, he would be by your side until you tired of him and threw him away.

All he wanted--all he could wish for--was only a fraction of it in return. And you'd given him that, and so much more.

But now, you're scared. Terrified, even. Of him.

With horror, he realizes his fingers are digging into your throat. Your precious, tender throat that you offer him not for something in return, but simply because you care for him.

All at once as he tears his hands away, he wants to cut them off and bury himself in his own grave again. He doesn't meet your eyes, afraid of what disgust might be held in them, but he knows you're too kind for that. Too kind to see the kind of monster he is.

You're gasping for your breath, and his stomach knots in a way that would have sent him hurling if it weren't for the fact that he's too occupied drinking in what he's done. To you.

"I'm okay, I'm okay, Astarion," you choke out, perching on both your elbows as you struggle to recover. Even now, all you seem to care about is him. He almost hates you for it--hates you for not stabbing a stake through his heart the moment his hands met your neck. "Astarion-"

"Your throat," he croaks, despising the slight crack of his voice as he reaches for your cheek, but stops before he even gets close. He doesn't trust himself to open his mouth again.

"It's okay, really, I can just get Shadowheart to heal me," you shake your head, and he finds himself in disbelief as you crawl toward him, tossing the sheets to the side. He shifts the slightest away and you understand, immediately sitting back down. You look like you want to say something, but you close your mouth and watch him patiently, as if waiting for him to make the first move.

After a suffocating silence, he turns his back to you. "I'll be sleeping elsewhere tonight."

He intends of never sharing a room with you again, in fear of what he could possibly do to you as a result of his selfish desires to keep you close, and you seem to pick up on the tone of his words. You always do. "Astarion, please."

"I do apologize, sincerely. I'll form a better apology tomorrow, but for now, I'll fetch Shadowheart or that damned wizard and-"

He fights the urge to shiver when he feels your hand on his. How you manage to have such an impact on him with a simple touch he does not know, and does not care because all he wants is more. To pull you close, to beg you to keep him, to use him, to punch him, strangle him for all he cared, in hopes you'll even consider ever speaking to him again. Instead, he turns to look at you.

Gods, you're beautiful.

Even with those terrible bruises he'd go to hell and earth to take back, your beauty in unmatched with anything he's ever seen. Even with the bed hair and the anxiousness pursing your lips, he can't bring himself to look away again.

"Please stay. I'm not mad, nor afraid."

The words sound like honey on your tongue.

"Please," You say again, slowly this time. "Stay."

His chest feels tight, threatening to tear itself apart as his voice comes out in a crooked whisper. "I could have killed you."

"You didn't."

"If you died too, I don't know--what would I even do with myself? What would I-" He hates it when he sounds like this. Vulnerable, or as Cazador liked to call it: pathetic. But he can't help the words tumbling out his blasted mouth with the way you're gazing at him with nothing but worry. Somehow, with you, it feels strange.

Refreshing, almost.

Your hand squeezes around his as if to remind him you're still here. He meets your eyes again and it's all it takes to break what little will he has left, as he lets you pull him close in a crushing hug--one that's all too welcomed.

And as the two of you lie awake in each other's embrace, he thanks all the gods he doesn't worship for putting you on his path.

#baldur's gate 3 #astarion #astarion ancunin #astarion x tav #astarion x reader #baldur's gate astarion #fluff #angst with a happy ending #light angst #bg3 #bg3 astarion #bg3 x reader

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rosesareredrosa · 9 months ago

Text

Love notes

Theo Nott x fem reader

Summary: Theo giving Love Notes to y/n in class

w/c: 1289

The dimly lit dungeon classroom buzzed with whispers as Professor Snape droned on about the intricacies of potion-making. The flickering candlelight cast long shadows across the room, creating an almost ethereal atmosphere. You were seated in your usual spot, diligently taking notes and trying to ignore the curious stares from your classmates. You had noticed the glances directed your way for the past few weeks, but the reason behind them remained a mystery.

A gentle tap on your shoulder drew you out of your concentration. You turned to see a small, folded piece of parchment on your desk. Your heart skipped a beat as you recognized the familiar, elegant handwriting: Theodore Nott. With a quick glance around to make sure no one was watching, you unfolded the note.

Y/N, your beauty outshines even the brightest of potion ingredients. Meet me in the library after class?

A soft blush crept up your cheeks as you read the words. Theo had been sending you these notes for weeks now, each one more romantic than the last. You sneaked a glance at him, finding him already looking your way with a mischievous glint in his eyes. He smirked, clearly enjoying the effect his words had on you.

Pansy Parkinson, seated a few rows ahead, turned around and raised an eyebrow. "Another love note from Theo, Y/N?" she whispered loudly enough for several students to hear, causing a ripple of laughter to spread through the room.

Mattheo Riddle, sitting beside her, chuckled. "Merlin's beard, Theo, you're going to turn Y/N as red as a Gryffindor."

Lorenzo Berkshire, lounging lazily in his seat, grinned. "I'm surprised Professor Snape hasn't noticed all these notes flying around. Or maybe he has and just enjoys the entertainment."

Blaise Zabini, always composed, smirked from his seat next to Theo. "Our dear Theo does have a way with words, doesn't he?"

Draco Malfoy, leaning back with his characteristic smirk, added, "Careful, Y/N, or you'll start getting howlers from his fan club."

You rolled your eyes, trying to suppress a smile as the teasing continued. Theo, however, seemed unfazed. He leaned forward, resting his chin on his hand, and watched you with an amused expression. "Let them tease, Y/N. They’re just jealous they don’t have someone as wonderful as you."

The blush deepened, and you bit your lip to hide your smile. Despite the teasing, you couldn’t deny the fluttering feeling in your chest every time you received one of Theo's notes. It was like a secret game between the two of you, a stolen moment in the chaos of Hogwarts life.

As the class ended and students began to pack up their belongings, you felt a gentle tug on your sleeve. Turning, you found Theo standing there, his eyes warm and inviting. "Shall we?" he asked, offering his arm.

With a nod, you slipped your hand into his, ignoring the wolf whistles and laughter from your friends. Together, you made your way to the library, where the shadows of the ancient bookshelves provided a perfect hiding spot for young love.

In the quiet corner of the library, Theo pulled you close, his eyes searching yours. "I meant every word, Y/N," he whispered, brushing a strand of hair behind your ear. "You make even the darkest dungeon feel like home."

Your heart swelled at his words, and you couldn’t help but smile. "And you make every note worth blushing over, Theo."

With a soft laugh, he leaned in and kissed you gently, sealing his promise with the sweet taste of young love. And in that moment, surrounded by the whispers of ancient magic and the teasing of friends, you knew that Theodore Nott was the one who made your heart sing.

As the weeks passed, Theo's love notes became an anticipated part of your daily routine. Each one was carefully crafted, a blend of poetry and genuine affection that made your heart race. Even amidst the relentless teasing from your friends, you couldn't help but look forward to the next note, the next glimpse into Theo's heart.

Love Note #1

Y/N,

Your smile is like a potion, intoxicating and sweet. Every time you laugh, it’s as if the sun has risen in the dungeons. Meet me by the Black Lake after dinner?

Yours, Theo

You glanced up from the note to find Theo watching you from across the Potions classroom. He gave you a small, almost imperceptible nod, and you couldn't help but blush as you imagined the quiet, secluded spot by the lake where the two of you could talk uninterrupted.

Love Note #2

Y/N,

The way your eyes light up when you talk about your favorite book is enchanting. I'd love to hear more. Shall we meet in the Astronomy Tower tonight?

With all my heart, Theo

The Astronomy Tower was a favorite spot of yours, a place where you could see the stars and feel like you were a part of something bigger. Theo knew this, and his suggestion filled you with a warm, comforting feeling. You looked forward to the serene evening that awaited.

Love Note #3

Y/N,

Every time I see you, it’s like my own personal Felix Felicis. I feel incredibly lucky to have you in my life. Can we take a walk in the Forbidden Forest this weekend?

Forever yours, Theo

The Forbidden Forest was mysterious and full of hidden secrets, much like Theo himself. The idea of exploring it with him was thrilling. You could already picture the two of you walking among the ancient trees, finding solace in each other's company.

Love Note #4

Y/N,

Your presence is a Patronus in my darkest times, chasing away all my fears. Would you join me for a late-night snack in the kitchens tonight?

Always, Theo

You chuckled at the thought of sneaking into the kitchens with Theo. The house-elves were always kind and eager to help, and the prospect of sharing a secret feast with Theo was too tempting to resist.

Love Note #5

Y/N,

Like the rarest of magical creatures, you are a wonder to behold. Your kindness and intelligence are unmatched. Let’s study together in the Room of Requirement tomorrow?

Yours eternally, Theo

The Room of Requirement, a place that adapted to your needs, was perfect for a quiet, intimate study session. You knew that with Theo by your side, even studying could become a cherished memory.

The constant flow of notes did not go unnoticed by your friends. They found endless amusement in your budding romance.

"Another one, Y/N?" Pansy asked, pretending to swoon. "Theo, you’re going to make the rest of us look bad!"

Mattheo smirked. "Yeah, seriously, Nott. How are we supposed to compete with that level of romance?"

Lorenzo grinned, nudging Draco. "We should take notes, Malfoy. Maybe then we’d have a chance."

Draco rolled his eyes but couldn't hide his smile. "Just wait until his fan club hears about this. They'll be devastated."

Despite the teasing, there was an underlying current of support and happiness for you both. Even Blaise, who was usually more reserved, gave you a knowing smile. "Looks like Theo's found his muse," he said quietly.

One evening, as you sat by the Black Lake with Theo, the gentle sound of water lapping at the shore, you turned to him and said, "You know, Theo, your notes mean the world to me."

He smiled, his eyes soft with affection. "I’m glad, Y/N. You mean the world to me."

And as the sun set over Hogwarts, casting a golden glow over the two of you, you realized that these moments, these notes, were just the beginning of a beautiful love story.

#slytherin x reader #theo nott x reader #theodore nott #theodore nott x reader #theodore nott imagine #theodore nott x you #drabble #slytherin boys #fluff #one shot #draco malfoy #mattheo riddle #lorenzo berkshire #pansy parkinson

675 notes · View notes

magicalmutants · 3 months ago

Text

God Loves You, But Not Enough to Save You

Demon!Sukuna x Priestess!reader

wc: 2.3k

Warnings: true-form!sukuna, dark themes, religious themes, suggestive, mentions of blood + bloodsucking, implied madness/psychosis, MDNI!!

A/N: happy Valentine’s Day to the FREAKS!! This is my first foray into something a little bit darker so pls lmk if I missed any warnings and also it’s my first time really actually writing for sukuna so pretty pls be nice to me 🥲👉👈

Devotion was sweet. Warm. It was candlelight flickering along the temple walls and robes sweeping along stone floors. It was the smell of herbs as they burned in offering pyres. It filled the air of the stone temple on the hilltop like incense curling in soft tendrils around the altar at which you laid the bowl of sacrament. The sounds of devotion, the smells. seeping into the stone, into the skin.

Your devotion seeped out from your very being, like honey. Smooth and sweet, heavy and golden. Your devotion lived in the sound of your whispered prayers, in the gentle press of your hands and knees as you knelt at the altars of your Gods.

Devotion was pure. Cleansing. It was the feeling of the cool waters with which you performed the ritual of sanctity. It was the way you moved through the small temple like a ghost of your own making, light footed and reverent. Your devotion was steadfast, it was unquestioning. It wove its threads into the very fibers of your being. You worshipped like you breathed; your devotion was unwavering. Constant.

And yet devotion was also silent. It did not answer when your prayed. It did not reach back when you raised teary eyes and trembling hands up to the heavens. The Gods received, but they did not offer anything in return. They did not give. They watched from up high, distant as the very stars, content in their silence.

(If they watched at all)

Sometimes in the stillness of the night, crouched in worship by the light of the moon, lips forming so sweetly and reverently around your prayers, hands clasped before you, head bowed, you wondered if they cared for you. If they saw you.

So you closed your eyes, priestess’ veil fluttering about you, and prayed harder. Your knees ached from the harsh stone of the floor and the incense at the altar had long since burned out. Still you prayed. You prayed until the first glimmers of sunlight streamed in through the windows and cast a golden glow on the statue you knelt before. Worshippers from the nearby village came to make their offerings of fruit and tributes, asking for blessings in return. Still you prayed.

———————

Sukuna watched from the shadows of the dawn as it turned to early morning, and then to high noon. His red eyes never strayed from your form as you knelt there, hour after hour, so pure in your devotion, the light of your faith burning with a desperate beauty.

It had been centuries since Sukuna had been so captivated by the faith of such a devout little thing as you. To the Gods you offered everything, happy to waste away in the service of those who remained cold and distant, ungrateful as they were. They did not know as he knew, how their silence had begun to grow deafening in the growing hollow emptiness of your soul. Perhaps they did not care.

Sukuna knew what you whispered into the dark when the long nights closed in and you felt utterly alone. He knew what your heart silently yearned for. He knew what lay in the deepest, darkest recesses of your soul. He knew what lived in the dungeon where you condemned all the ugliest parts of yourself. He felt the yearning that even you did not have the words to describe. He felt a hunger there, carnal and gaping. One that matched his own. You were made for him, and he would have you— of those two things he was sure.

———————

Sleep rarely came easily to you these days, and when it did it was a feverish torment of low, aching whispers in the night, threatening—no, offering— to devour you. It was filled with the ghosts of touches that lingered on your body and a shadow that lingered in the back of your mind long after you woke with a sickening revulsion in your stomach and a shameful dampness between your legs.

You had begun to feel a presence nearby when you prayed, sometimes so stifling that it made the rites catch in your throat. Still you prayed, your devotion unwavering. Constant.

(If not a little tainted)

———————

Sukuna seethed from his place in the shadows. He watched as you lit pyres, recited hymns and laid offerings at the altars of the undeserving with fervent hands. With every passing night of being rebuked his appetite only grew. Why did you continue to lay your soul bare to beings that cared nothing for you? Why did you refuse him so? Why would you not offer the sweetness of your devotion to one who could reward it tenfold— nay, a hundredfold? Have his tempting promises to satisfy your desires not been enough? My, my. You were a pious little thing, weren’t you?

———————

Night fell and once again, a troubled sleep claimed you.

(Troubled, and yet no longer altogether unwelcome)

Something was different tonight. Your dreams, usually formless shadows of temptation and desires forbidden, took shape when you closed your eyes this time. His figure flitted in and out of your mind, waiting at the corner of your eye and disappearing when you turned you look.

Vague pieces caught your eyes. Hair the color of a cherry blossom in spring and eyes the color of flesh laid bare. How many eyes were those? How many arms? Rippling muscles, broad shoulders, black markings leading from his arms and torso to a face handsome and yet unworldly. Gleaming teeth behind plump lips. Fangs bared in a large mouth. Two mouths? A wolfish and terrible beauty. Striking and petrifying. He held you in a realm between waking and slumber. Nothing was real, and yet everything was.

Then, a voice. Reverent and seductive. Sweet and sickening. It reverberated all around you.

“You are beautiful when you pray,”

Fear grips your heart, and yet something deep inside you stirs and reaches towards the shadows where he was hiding.

“Show yourself!” You whip you heard around, peering into the darkness, as tendrils of shadow caress you, leaving a feverish heat on your body in their wake.

“Tell me, little saint, do they truly deserve your devotion?” The voice whispers from behind you.

You turn around and there he is. Smiling. Predatory. The maw in the middle of his torso gapes, its tongue running over the fangs therein. He reaches for you, taking hold of your waist and shoulders as he pulls you towards him, lifting you up towards his face.

You thrash and turn your face away. This is a test. You are being punished for giving shape to the wretched desires you bury deep within.

“Look at me,” he growls, his third hand coming to grip the back of your neck. His hands are massive, fully restraining you as he holds you against him. You feel the mouth of his torso move against where the heat pools in your lower abdomen, as if restraining itself from tasting you.

He forces your head to tilt up towards him, the fingers of his final hand coming to stroke the side of your face, ever so softly. You stare at him, completely immobilized and refusing to speak.

(A voice in the darkest corner of your mind tells you to submit)

“Will you let me taste you, little saint?” His lips ghost over your skin, hot breath tickling your jaw and neck as he presses closer.

Your devotion is unwavering. Constant. No temptation is worth more than that. You are being tested.

You wake. The sun shines on your hot skin and you feel sticky and befouled.

(And more than a little disappointed)

You felt unseen eyes track your movements around the temple that day. You arranged the sacred fruits in their silver bowls, traced the carved sigils with practiced fingertips, and knelt before the altars with the ease of someone who had done this a thousand times before. You rang bells and performed blessings for the villagers. But the voice refused to leave.

It lingered in the silence between prayers, in the evening stillness of the temple halls when all the villagers had left. It lingered in those fragile moments between wakefulness and sleep. Sukuna spoke your name like a secret only he knew, hungry for devotion.

(You began to crave the moment you could close you eyes the end of the day)

You no longer slept in your bed, favoring instead to sit trancelike at the foot of the goddess of protection until you slipped into the realm of waking dreams.

The long nights had begun to blur together into a long fever dream of half remembered whispers and touches. A series of shadowy passages in the labyrinth of your mind where your resolve had begun to slowly wither.

And yet you prayed, hungry to devote yourself. You performed the rites and knelt before the altars of the Gods, reverent eyes cast upwards through the translucent material of your veil, hands clasped and lips reciting hymns and prayers up into the heavens as they had done for years. Your devotion was unwavering. Constant.

(The villagers had long since abandoned the temple on the hill where the priestess whispered the name of the Demon King of Curses during her prayers instead of the Gods’)

Night after night and day after day, your resolve crumbled further with every stolen moment of sleep. Every whisper of your name that slithered into your mind. Every touch that set your skin ablaze. Every corrupted prayer, every hymn.

And then finally, when the sun had begun to chase away the chill of winter and the cherry trees outside bore blossoms the color of the Demon King’s hair, on that perilous cusp between nightmare and waking, the veil between worlds tore open.

There, emerging from the darkness in the shadowy reaches of the temple, stood Sukuna. His form as fluid as smoke and as hulking and predatory as in your dreams, yet every bit of him was tangible. You turned from the statue of the goddess you were kneeling before and stood up.

The moonlight danced over his features, his eyes promising unholy devotion. He moved towards you with a languid certainty. You watched, unmoving. Every step he took was a silent declaration of his triumph over your piety and reserve.

“Will you not kneel before me, little saint?” His steps reverberated on the stone floor. “I have heard every secret plea, every silent yearning. I have walked into your realm to claim you. Do I not deserve your devotion? His voice echoed in the empty temple, deep and possessive.

He stopped in front of you, and watched your glassy eyed stare with a dark, triumphant amusement. He reached down towards you and lifted your veil, folding it over the top of your head.

“Show me your faith,”

You stared up at him, taking in the unobstructed sight of him. Here he was, standing before statues of beings who had never given an ounce in reciprocation for all the years of devout piety you had given them. Here was someone who listened. He had heard. He had answered. He had come for you.

Slowly, with graceful, trancelike movements, you lowered yourself onto your knees with the ease of one who had done so a thousand times before. Your hands clasped in front of you, eyes never leaving his face, even as the mouth on his stomach bared its fangs in a wicked grin.

He gazed down as you prayed not for your Gods, but for the consuming promise of his presence. Slowly, he reached for you.

“Will you let me taste your tender devotion, little saint?” His voice was sweet and thick like honey as it slides down your throat before it chokes you. All you can do is nod.

He lifted you up, holding your body horizontally, one hand supporting your head and neck and one each under your back and legs. The fourth caressed your body, the feeling sending electricity crackling in its wake. He swept away the hair from the side of your neck and watched as your throat was laid bare before him, bathed in the glow of the moon. He lowered you to the mouth at his torso, which salivates as it makes a hole in your neck before greedily licking and sucking the blood that begins to seep from it. You gasp at the feeling.

As he feeds from your neck, somewhere between the realms of loathing and ecstasy, you wonder what you had done. Had you let yourself fall into the thrall of a creature that would consumed you?

(That would love you)

Is it better to be devoured or to be ignored? What is devotion, if not the desire to be remade in the image of that which you love? That which you would give yourself over to completely? That which you would become one with?

In a moment of clarity, the sanctity of your vows as priestess comes back to you and you find yourself stricken. What had you done? Maybe it isn’t too late. You glance up towards the statue you had spent the night kneeling under but see only red eyes and glinting teeth smiling down at you. Perhaps now that you have tasted that which you craved, your desire can be banished backed to the unholy dungeon from whence it came and you can still be saved.

His large mouth detached from your side, and his tongue slides out to soothe the punctured skin of your throat. His four large arms continue to shift around your body, pulling you upright and closer, ever closer. His touch is cold, your body hot. Desire, and devotion. He brings you up to his face, lips ghosting over yours as scarlet droplets slide down your neck. You shiver.

(There is nothing left of you to save)

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fuyuu-chan · 4 days ago

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the sun have never shined this bright like yours - ft. solo leveling men

Pairing: Sung Jinwoo x Reader & Liu Zhigang x Reader (Separate) - also this is sunshine x sunshine protector trope (i hope i portrayed it well)

Fuyuu-chan: i feel like this was a bit of a mess, but i just really wanna write even tho there's no thought process :')

✧⁠◝⁠(⁠⁰⁠▿⁠⁰⁠)⁠◜⁠✧

Sung Jinwoo:

• he's the embodiment of darkness and you being the literal definition of sunshine?

• perfect pair

• in his most darkest times were he thought he became the most horrible person (he felt guilty or is he? lol but it always goes through his mind when he killed those people), where he thought he lost his humanity completely

• you came in his life

• like a light shining, showing him the way

• you supported him and stayed with him

• he got to confide in you, rest in your arms where he felt the safest, and he wouldn't trade it for the world

• this is his most treasured and precious moments, with his beloved

• whether you're a hunter or not, he would protect you with his entire life

• he wanted you out of harm

• if you're not a hunter, that's better

• you can be safe, and be away from the dangers those dungeon has to offer, the horrible things that happens inside the dungeons too and he can be assured for sure about your safety

• it would be better for you to keep your innocence away from those, and can be happy and healthy all the time

• he promised to himself to never let your light or shine fade away, to not let anyone or anything change you the way you are

• and his children shadow soldiers are also more than willing to protect you too, you are their queen, mother, their king's most important person he treasured

• that jinwoo was willing to risk or sacrifice anything, anytime, for you

• he would always be your protector along with his soldiers

• and if you're ever away, he would always be a call away

• yes, his children is there to protect you, but he prefers to do it himself as he wants you to know just how much you are important to him

• he would never be too far to follow you, as one sign from his children he would be by your side in no time

• that's one of the reasons you are not afraid of the things that terrified you before, especially at night

• for you, nighttime, has never been this peaceful

• maybe bcs you know jinwoo would always be there and your babies who is there accompanying you while you enjoy your time

Liu Zhigang:

• all this man had ever known in life is being a hunter

• he never really thought of doing other things, other than his work and his hobbies

• but that's when you came in (out of nowhere, in his opinion he's not complaining tho)

• you caught his attention the moment he met you in the hunter's association

• he was intrigued, because you were literally smiling, so cheerful, greeting everyone who passed by with a small "hello" "hi" or a nod of acknowledgement

• he rarely sees that on hunters these days, normally they don't really bother with such trivial things unless its coming from an important person

• you were also very optimistic

• he was amused and interested to say the least

• he kept his eye on you for the next few days that passed

• you just never really seemed to run out of kindness or that cheerful personality of yours

• like sure some people smile all the time, but most of the time they were fake, only putting a facade to make a good impression

• but yours ... it was far different, it looks genuine

• like you actually pay attention to people, like actually being interested to them and giving some time to listen to them

• that's a first...for him anyway

• he got to talk to you here and there in short moments when he had free time, but he got to know you little by little

• it started off like that anyway

• liu just grew to adore you, care for you and such (you seem to always lit up his mood too, and put up a smile on his face, a genuine one (like mirroring your expression but of course he never really got to, as you shine more and more each day))

• bcs suddenly the moment he fell for you, all the soft songs out there about love that he don't used to like before, was suddenly all about him and you

• but when he saw you so down one day, so sad, he felt his blood boil

• what happened? who did this to you?

• but that didn't matter right now

• he comforted you, took you in his arms where you lean on him, just crying as he whisper comforting words, while he pats your back gently while his other hand brush your strands softly

• in the end you fell asleep

• he didn't let go of you, he just wanted you to rest and wants you to feel his presence, to let you know he would always be there to protect you

• that he would always be there for you, for you to confide to him, for you to run to him whenever you might need someone

• as for what happened on what made you sad ... he would either ask you the next day, or if he saw you don't wanna talk about it

• he would contact someone, and make sure to find out about what might had happened, he wanted to take care of whatever had made you have that pained expression

• he doesn't want to see you sad again, it pains him (probably more than you) more than he'd like to admit

• he only wanted you to be happy, for you to shine brightly like how you usually do

• liu only wants the best for you and it would always remain like that

• ....

• and since the two of you are famous as hunters, there would be reporters/paparazzi following the both of you whenever you are out in public

• this man would either ignore those bcs he don't wanna waste his time on them and just wanted to focus on you

• but if it makes you uncomfortable this man would sent a glare to those reporters/paparazzi who was hiding, thinking they wouldn't be seen

• and if that won't do, he would threaten them (he would have done smth more but you were there and he would hate to ruin your mood and your date) and the same goes to jinwoo in this situation

ฅ⁠^⁠•⁠ﻌ⁠•⁠^⁠ฅ

Please do not copy, translate, repost to any other social media, Thank you.

126 notes · View notes

kagamesayu · 1 year ago

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laois x reader

c/w . gn!reader reader, fluff wc: 375 a/n . this himbo has my heart in a tight grip reblogs and comments appreciated ✧*.

laois who is your beloved boyfriend and dungeon partner. your rock and your reason for adventuring.

you'd met when looking for a party to join. the moment he set his eyes on you it was like something awakened in him.

he'd done everything he could to get you on his party, and subsequently by his side.

you'd been so enamoured by him and his quirkiness that you agreed.

and the rest is history.

laois who almost always has one hand on the handle of his sword and the other in yours. his thumb writes his name into your skin, and he wishes it was there permanently.

definitely the type to have your name tattooed on him - probably on his wrist so when he fights he remembers you're with him.

laois who kisses you good morning and good night. who kisses you as a greeting and goodbye. who kisses you for...any reason really.

he just loves it - loves kissing you.

loves the soft pecks that reassure each other that you're okay, loves the long loving kisses you share when you sneak off, and he especially loves the messy, wet make-outs that he can only periodically indulge in when he knows that you, him and the party are safe.

laois who - after every encounter - looks for you and asks whether you're okay.

yes, he should care for the entire party, but he can't help the deep carnal need to make sure you are safe first.

you are special and precious to him, and though everyone revives, he refuses to see - and even let - you die.

he let it happen once and watching the life leave your eyes is something he will always see in his darkest of nightmares. the fear and agony on your face, right before you'd been impaled and taken away from him.

never again.

laois who spends almost all his free time out of dungeons with you. you're usually seen hand in hand in either hanging out in your shared rooms in inns or in libraries reading about monsters.

you have your own notebook about monsters, with personal little doodles and facts.

when laois first brought up the idea, he was worried you'd think it'd be boring. he was taken aback when you agreed with as much enthusiasm as you did.

he was even more surprised when you showed how eager you were in helping him.

he thinks he fell even more in love that day.

#✧. dungeon meshi #x reader #dungeon meshi x reader #delicious in dungeon x reader #laois x reader #dungeon meshi #laois touden #laois dungeon meshi #laois imagines

824 notes · View notes

sparklingblu · 1 year ago

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Atonement

Giselle x Male Reader

TW: blood, choking(not the hot kind), death, self harm, a lot of dark stuff

"Truth or Dare?"

"Truth"

"If you have the choice to fuck anyone in this room, who would it be?"

The moment these sinful word leaves Giselle's lips, you realize you have fallen right into her trap. And without a doubt, Giselle is aware of it. You can see it from the way the corner of her lips twitch like she's trying desperately not to mock at your loss for words, the way her eyes bore into yours as if challenging you to give the answer that have been on your mind for far too long. She tilts her head, urging you to response.

But even if you don't, she would have already known the answer. Anyone would. Giselle, the perfect example of teenage royalty. Giselle, who can make any men bow down before her with a flick of her finger. Giselle, who always act like she owns the world. And that's not so far from the truth. The world doesn't revolve around Giselle. The entire solar system does.

And she has every right to act that way. Money? Popularity? Charisma? There isn't anything Giselle can't check off on that list. Her parents being the main contributor to the university's funds, she's practically untouchable here. A goddess, you may even say. That's not a metaphor, because metaphors are a figure of speech. And Giselle is a long way off from it.

She has the type of aura that can turn heads wherever she lays her feet on. A vixen. A siren who pulls men in to their deepest, darkest fantasies they have never even realize existed till they have seen her. The worst thing? She takes pleasure in it. The thought that these men will fantasize about her, giving in to their carnal desires that she has awakened just by being in their presence. The amount of sperm that will be wasted on thoughts of her and her only before they are even given life. All those reminds her that she's Giselle. The untouchable. The unbothered.

If you start thinking you can beat Giselle in at least some aspect, think again. Because that will be your last thought before she shows you she's on the top of the food chain. What you are good at, she does it better. If not, she will make sure you are no longer good at it. Because she's Giselle.

People might ask, if she is that ruthless, wouldn't she be hated? Wouldn't she be an outcast? It's the total opposite. Her twisted and cryptic demeanor is what lures people into her dungeon, hoping to find a way through, hoping to get to her core, to get even the slightest idea of who she really is beneath these layers of her indifference, only to end up as another victim that has fallen to her arctic charm.

No one would be stupid enough not to recognize her deadly allure. The poisoned apple. The evidences lie all around them. Men, who would trade their soul just to have a chance with her. Women, who would die to be her. And in some cases, to be both. Yet, they follow the footsteps of those before them. Because she's that irresistible. A living embodiment of lust and pride. Tempting and tempting until you give in and take a bite of that forbidden fruit.

And you are not so far off from becoming one of them. With every passing second, it gets harder not to lay your eyes on Giselle. She has your undivided attention like an insect caught in a spiderweb.

You try averting your eyes to the far far wall, anywhere you will be freed of Giselle's pull, only to be greeted by the maniacal smile of the human skull, grinning like crazy, as if saying "You can't escape from her. Not now, not then"

You shouldn't have even come to this Halloween party in the first place. This whole night have been nothing but a mistake. You should have stayed in your room and finished up your assignment like you first intended to. Halloween is nothing but an excuse for people to get wasted and imitated things they aren't without the judgement from society for one single night. It should have dawned on you back then. You don't even have a costume. What do you want to dress as? You have no idea. A mummy? A wizard? A vampire? A fucking vampire. Out of all the cheesy options of pop culture icons, you have to choose the cheesiest one. With a trench coat a friend of yours borrowed, your swept back hair and your fake fangs, you looked like a handed down Edward Cullen.

Nevertheless, your desperation to fit in: to talk to real people rather than strangers online, ultimately lead you to your despair. Saying the party is lively would be an understatement. It has surpassed liveliness, it has a life of its own. People poured into Giselle's dorm, The Coven, from every direction. The eerie tunes of Halloween carols and artificial screams filled the air, which are farther complemented by the paper bats that hang from the ceiling an the fog machines hissing in the corner. On the dance floor, students move in hypnotic synchrony, their costume ranging from classic monsters to familiar icons you see everywhere. Bodies entwining and intertwining beneath the luminous glow of the string lights that scatter the ceiling.

Being the loner you are, the first thing you do when you arrive is look for someone you know. Anyone who can help you in the quest not to be the odd one out. You sigh in relief when you see one of the familiar face near a drink table, which is exceptional just like everything in this party. A champagne tower stands on the far end, which you are surprised someone wasted has not knocked it down yet. All across the length of the table lies buckets holding different type of bottles, a different kind of magic in each one. And if you are not a drinker, worry not because an ice bucket full of every known fizzy drink known to man is just up for grabs in one corner. Everything is designed to fit anyone's need. Only a fool would not give a second glance to this playground for taste buds.

And you are no fool, so you grab a glass of champagne and head to where your friend is, if you can call someone a friend after talking to them once during a lecture. He's cosplaying Pennywise but with his crumpled jumpsuit and the white makeup which is horribly done, he looks more like a circuit clown who just got fired. You don't expect him to recognize you but much to your surprise, he does. Offering a hand to shake, he says his formal greetings.

"This party is probably the best one I have ever been to" he says in awe. "I heard Giselle organize all of this, must be nice to have your parents paying your bill"

Hinting the envy and jealousy in his voice, you don't blame him. Because it's Giselle you are talking about. There's no one else here who can turn a party into a masterpiece. You should be thankful you got to be a part of it regardless if her parents pay for this or not.

So, you just nod in agreement and change the topic. After a while, you realize listening to a heartbroken guy/clown talking about his exes is not exactly the best thing to do at a party like this. This is not a chance you get everyday and you are not going to let it go to waste by tragedies.

"Excuse me for a moment" you cut him off, chug down rest of your champagne and wander farther. If the party was lively before, now it's on full swing. The dancing has escalated to make out sessions among some of the couples, fueled by the heat of the moment. Much to your disgust, a pool of vomit litters a spot on the floor, the work of someone who have had too much to drink. As you tear through the sea of people, either horny or drunk, you start to wonder if the whole university have been confined into one large mass of bodies here tonight. You bump into Frankenstein, nearly get knocked out by a drunk Darth Vader and hear a curse (not that kind of curse) from a Harry Potter , who's probably high.

You have already failed your initial plan to socialize, there's no way you can make conversation with these people who have transcended to the peak of bliss. Dancing is an option, if it isn't for the fact that you are a horrible dancer and your moves will be worse than those drunkards wilding without a care in the world.

Part of you want to leave, this place is starting to suffocate you with the stench of bodies that cover every inch of this hall, the euphoric faces that appear and disappear with each flash of the lights overhead and the worst of all, the make out sessions happening at any spot you lay your eyes on.

It's such an absurd idea to feel disturbed by the sight of lips against lips, tongues entwined with tongues. Afterall, it's just one of the many ways humans express their desires, the need to touch, to be touched. Yet, combined with this vague atmosphere of the party, the act becomes unbearably explicit.

You feel like a fool for seeing it this way but whatever this party is composed of, it's starting to affect you. What seems like a glamorous spree looks like a maze of skin and more skins to you now. The music, once perfectly fitted with the event, sounds like a broken symphony.

What you should do is indulge yourself in this moment. Just become one of the bodies that make up this sea of bodies. But regardless, you have to turn the whole thing into an illusion of madness and badness. Just to make an excuse to leave this damn place. Just because you don't want to admit you are never mean to be at social events.

And you would have lied to yourself and leave, if it isn't for the music that suddenly dies and the lights that dissolve into shadows. Apart from a few gasps that slip out, the entire room goes dead silent, save for the white noise of a humming fan in the background.

Your impulsive thoughts take this as a sign to re enter your mind. Is that it? Has the party ended? Maybe something went wrong with the electronics? Just more excuse to make yourself believe you don't leave this party because you wanted to. It has to be something else.

Thankfully, you are too caught in the abrupt halt that you are more curious to see what will happen next rather than act on your impulses. For a few seconds, the room remain still, swallowed by darkness. It seems to go on forever until light showered on a spot at the top of the spiral staircase, descending from one corner of the hall. Another glow pierce the gloom then another, until the whole staircase has been light up.

With the radiance that contrast the staircase and the rest of the room, it looks like a stairway straight from heaven, materializing only for the divine. But the one who descends from those steps is anything but divine. Depraved is too weak of a word to describe her.

Down from the stairs comes the queen herself, Giselle, with the faintest clue of a smile on her lips and her eyes, scanning the crowd the way a queen would do to her subjects. No one complains because everyone here is in debt to her. If it's not for Giselle, they will never achieve the felicity of this night, that they have happily surrendered to, unknowingly becoming just one of Giselle's pawns. And you are not excluded.

Giselle isn't wearing a costume, she's just in a different layer of skin. Why would she try to be someone else when she's already Giselle? If the darkness has been eliminated by the light, it is soon going to be reabsorbed by Giselle, whose entire frame is coated in a layer of black sheath dress. The long sleeves of her attire leave no room for skin except the opening at her collar bones, displaying her radiant milky skin. A stygian veil loom over her long hair that falls on either side, as if she's an Oracle going to mutter a prophecy at any moment. Nothing about the outfit makes Giselle stand out more. At a glance, another pretty girl of your fantasies. However, her eyes tell a different story. These pools of cerulean blue that pull anyone who dare to stare right into them like a tide, gripping their core, leaving them breathless.

She's too pretty to be human, you think. Maybe she isn't. Maybe she's send from the higher powers to test the homo sapiens of their real nature, to expose their deepest desires. If that's the case, everyone had already failed ,evident by the way their eyes follow her with each step she takes.

Giselle stops right in the middle step, regarding the horde of flesh stunned by her appearance.

"I'm sure you are having a blast" Giselle speaks, though her voice isn't thundering, it cuts through the crowd like ripples.

Everyone cheers, a cluster of voices competing to be heard. When the silence returns, Giselle speaks again.

"Let go of your worries tonight! Drink! Dance! Get wasted! Party like there's no tomorrow!"

Anther roar erupt from the crowd. A handful of people start dancing without music, overwhelmed with bliss. This time the noise don't cease, chatters of conversation amplify until the whole room is bustling with activity again, even with the lights gone.

A shrill like nail scratching on metal shrieked from the sound boxes, causing everyone to cover their ears, shutting their mouth. When the crowd is silent again, Giselle's voice appears once more.

"I'm glad to see you all are enjoying yourself but there's one last event of the night to top this entire party. I promised you have never ever experienced anything like this"

The crowd remains hushed, eager to hear the next words Giselle will say. Excited to be even more euphoric than they already are. Giselle, who seems to notice it, smiles with satisfaction. And that's the first time you have seen her truly smile.

The corner of her lips will twitch from time to time but they never bloom into a pure smile, quickly ceased before it's given life. But when she does, you become even more sure that she's not human. When people smile, they mean it as a way to show or act like they are glad, content or happy. But Giselle's smile contains neither of these emotions. It's like a work of art, superficially it's nothing but a bent in the line of her lips. But when it is studied closely, you realize she's not smiling out of pure bliss, but rather the joy she gets from seeing how the others cower before her. How easy it is for her to bend their wills without even trying.

However, your astonishment is short lived as Giselle's face returns back to her neutral expression again to continue her speech.

"Unfortunately, only a chosen few will be given the chance to experience this event. And to give everyone a fair chance, I decide to leave things to luck. Are you ready?"

The crowd agree in unison, anxious with anticipation. A shriek comes out from a girl concerning with someone spilling drink on her dress. But everyone is too focused on what comes next to care.

Giselle reached into her cleavage and pulls out five black roses, how she manages to fit all of them in there, you have no idea. Nevertheless, she raises her hand so that everyone can see the flowers.

"I will throw these roses into the crowd and the five person who manage to acquire them will join me in the event. However, there are rules. No one is allowed to move, shove or try to steal it from the ones who caught it. If anyone breaks these rules, they will be banned from this party. Get it?"

Everyone nods in agreement, though you notice some people secretly trying to shove the person in front of them to be closer to the front. One even acts like they trip just to claim that few extra inches.

"Ready? Here they go"

Giselle launches the roses into the air, which spirals into the crowd, admiring the sight with unblinking eyes. Your position isn't the best. You are not at the far back but you are not in the front either. You are in the center , where the bodies are the most compressing. You barely have any room to move.

But much to your surprise, a rose lands right on your hair and the horde around you turn to you, the envy and spite unfiltered on their faces. That should have been me, they would be thinking. You snatch the rose from your hair, twirling it from the stem.

You are still dazed by what had happened. Getting chosen for an exclusive event of Giselle? You must have used up your whole year of luck. Cheers erupt from the other four who share your fate. The rest of the crowd groan and murmur in disappointment.

"Seems like we have our winners!" Giselle announces, a mischievous glint in her eyes. "For the rest of you, the party will carry on. Enjoy yourself. The chosen ones, follow me up the stairs"

The light flood the hall again. Music starts blasting from the speakers. The party has returned back to its full swing. People departs heading back to carry on what they were doing. Drink, dance or get wasted, like Giselle had quoted.

You look up to the staircase and see Giselle already climbing back up, the other four following her steps. You are amazed to see that the Pennywise guy you talked to earlier is one of them. The other three are females. One dressed like Harley Quinn, the other a hybrid between Ariel and Aquaman, holding a trident and the last one looks like she just cuts up holes in an old blouse and put it on, hoping to look like someone.

Not wanting to be left out, you follow them. The stairway curves into a single door, which surprises you because you expect it to open up onto the upper floor. On the door, a strange symbol is curved. A thin upside down heart, almost identical to a tear drop, but this one have two bumps. Maybe another creepy Halloween decoration.

Without giving it much thought, you follow Giselle inside, who pushes the door open. You are left breathless by the sight before you. There isn't a room beyond the door. It's a whole chamber. A circular space encircled by shelves of books, vials and items you have never seen before. A small creature that looks like a fusion between a snake and a butterfly floats in a flask of green liquid. The other holds the skull of a cat, or so you think. Nearby, a strange liquid bubbles in a cauldron. The mixed smell of wood and rotten meat doesn't help. The one single window have been closed shut so that the only light source is the lamp on a nearby desk. If Giselle set all this up for tonight, she has gone way over the top.

"Welcome to my chamber!" Giselle says, her voice dripping with glee. Her blue eyes seem to hint the oncoming of something big. "Tonight, we are gonna play a special game. And trust me, you have never ever played it before"

From a drawer, Giselle pulls out a thin bottle, identical to the ones that hold wine. But it isn't an ordinary bottle. On the surface, strange symbols are curved, shapes and words of languages you don't understand. Another Halloween prop?

"We are going to play 'Spin the Bottle'!"

Giselle announces but no one replies. This is the special game? A party game every high schooler knows. Maybe the only difference being it's a Halloween themed bottle.

"Oh, I know what you are thinking" Giselle raises an eyebrow. "It's a game everyone knows, right? What's so special about it? Well, you will see"

She reaches into the drawer again and this time, she pulls out two decks of card. One looks freshly bought and the other worn out, the card corners bent. Giselle extend her arms, displaying the decks to the others.

"This is what makes it so special. I'll show you. Sit"

Giselle points to the floor. Seriously? But no one argue and take their places. You sit down, the Pennywise guy on your right and Harley Quinn on your left. Giselle sits right in front of you, Aquaman(or woman) taking her right and Ms. Tattered Clothes on her left. A circle is formed.

"Ehmm.... can you put that away?" Giselle asks Aquawoman, who's still holding her plastic trident. The girl's face lights up with a blush.

"Oh, sorry" she apologizes, quickly shoving her weapon onto a desk.

"Now, I will show you how to play" Giselle sets the bottle earlier in the middle space, putting each of the decks on either side. Everyone's eyes follow her moves intently, dying to know what makes everything so special. "It's very similar to a normal Spin the Bottle. Someone spins the bottle, and when it points to a certain person, they have to kiss, or choose one, Truth or Dare. But there's no kissing here. It's either Truth or Dare. Unlike the original game, you can't just ask or dare someone whatever you want. You have to pick a card" Giselle points to the new batch of cards. "This is the deck of Truth, if someone chooses to be honest, the spinner have to choose a card from here and ask them the question on the card" She points to the other worn out deck. "This is the deck of Fate, the deck for Dare, you can say. Choose a card from here if someone is feeling adventurous" Giselle looks each of you carefully. "Got it?"

You still doubt this game is anything but special. It's still Spin the Bottle with a couple extra items thrown in. There isn't anything that makes it stand out. Still, Giselle seems to think otherwise.

"Why no kissing?" Mr. Pennywise asks, the grin on his face makes him look even more abominable. You are thankful you are beside him so that you won't see his face constantly.

"Because I say so" Giselle says firmly. Again, showing everyone who's in charge.

"Oh...alright" Pennywise replies, disappointed. And you somehow feel glad to see him that way.

"Ok, let's begin. I will start first" Without a warning, Giselle spins the bottle. It rotates and rotates until it finally points at Mr. Pennywise. He grins again and you feel like throwing up.

"Man....if there was only kissing" he groans in disappointment. Giselle's expression remains unwavered.

"Truth or Dare?" she asks, tilting her head.

"I'm shy so...Truth!" he strains his voice on purpose and it's not funny, not at all.

"Very well" Giselle takes the top card on the deck. She raises it to read and you notice a symbol of a scale on the back, representing justice, or in this case, the truth.

"What's your greatest insecurity?" Giselle asks, looking at the guy straight into his eyes.

"Ehm....that's.." Pennywise scratches his head, seemingly baffled by the question. The whole points of insecurities is that you keep them to yourself. No one would spill it in a party game. Or would they?

"I...don't know" he tries for an awkward smile. "I'm always happy with myself so...."

"Is that so?" Giselle's voice is smug, as if she knows he's lying. "What do you think guys?" she asks the others. No one answers except the girl in the torn blouse. "Maybe....?"

"We will see soon" Giselle puts the card back into the deck, shuffling it. "Is your answer final?"

"Yeah, why not?" Pennywise answers, though he looks uneasy. "You are really hyping up this Halloween vibe, huh?"

"Oh, you flatter me. But you should have put your words to good use elsewhere" Giselle sounds almost delighted and the rest of the people in the room shifts uneasily, including you.

For a moment everything was silent. You could have heard your heartbeat if it's not for the popping sounds the boiling cauldron is making. Then it happens. Pennywise starts making sounds like someone have stuffed his throat with a rock. He clutches his neck, trying to scream. But the only sounds that come out are muffled whines like a deer getting run on by a truck, again and again. His eyes start to bulge as if they are going to jump out at any moment. His face white as a sheet of paper.

Everyone stares in shock, yet no one tries to help, too shocked by the scene before them. No one makes a sound except Giselle, who makes a note. "See? That happens when you are not honest"

"Make it stop! He's going to die" Harley Quinn cries, her eyes wide with terror.

"Oh, I'm not doing anything to him. He's being punished for his own mistake, being dishonest" Giselle muses lightly as if someone isn't dying before her.

Pennywise falls to the ground with a loud thud and his body goes limp. Aquawoman and Ms. Tattered Clothes screams. Your breath hitches. You hate this guy but you don't want him to die. Not like this.

"What have you done?" Harley Quinn screams in horror, covering her mouth with her hands.

"Nothing. He dug his own grave" Giselle says with indifference. Her face shows no sign of remorse.

"This game has gone too far! I'm leaving" Harley Quinn screams and stands up, trying to walk away. However, she falls back as if an invisible barrier has been put up. "Let me go!" she cries, tears already flowing down her face.

"Now now" Giselle looks at the girl. "No need to be afraid. You just have to be truthful if you don't want to end up like him. It's that easy. Once the game is over, you can leave"

"Let me go, please...." Harley Quinn pleads but Giselle's eyes are no longer on her. When her begging goes unanswered, the girl sits up, sniffling. The others silent as they were.

All this time, you are staring at the lifeless face of Pennywise. His mouth hangs open in an unfinished scream. The terrors in his eyes accentuating his pale lifeless face that you have no idea how it gets even whiter over his clown makeup. His fingers crooked, trying to cling on something. Anything that will keep him alive.

He's dead, you think. He's really dead. This is no longer another Halloween prop. It's a real corpse. Is Giselle the one who did it? She didn't even lift a finger but isn't she the one who starts this game? Maybe it's the cards. Maybe they are magic.

The sense of pride and joy you had had earlier is gone. This is one deadly game. All you want to do is get out of here as soon as possible. But Harley Quinn had already proved it's not a choice. You must stay here.

"Shall we continue?" Giselle asked, handing the bottle to Harley Quinn, maybe out of pity, if she even feels pitiful.

The girl takes the bottle with shaking hands and before she spins it, Giselle raises a hand. "Oh, wait. We have an inactive member"

You instantly realizes she's talking about the lifeless body beside you. She points to it and asks. "You, Mr. Vampire. Can you shove that body somewhere?" she asks it the way someone would ask for a pencil, without a trace of loath in her voice. Like she's asking you to get rid of a dead fly.

"Yeah..sure" you complies. After seeing what happens to Pennywise and Harley Quinn, you are not feeling rebellious. Giselle isn't the one to mess with. You hold the body up by the arms and drag it to a nearby shelf, propping it.

Suddenly, a thought enters your mind. You are away from Giselle. There's no invisible barrier when you stood up. This is the chance to get away. To get out of this mess that has just begun once and for all. You cast a glance to the door and instantly, Giselle's voice flows through your ears. "Don't even think about it"

Without further words, you return to your initial space, now between Harley Quinn and Aquawoman, who had took the vacant spot.

"Let's begin" Giselle orders and Harley Quinn spins the bottle without hesitation. It whirls and whirls, finally slowing down before you.......no, it's Aquawoman.

"Truth or...Dare?" Harley Quinn asks, her voice still shaky from crying earlier. For a moment, Aquawoman is silent. Then she makes her choice. "Dare"

"Oh...this one is feeling adventurous" Giselle compliments. Her eyes fixed on the girl so intently it looks like she's going to burn a hole through her.

Harley Queen picks up the card from the old deck. The symbol on the back of this card is a scythe, a symbol for punishment? Not really a good idea. She gulps after seeing what's written on the card. "You....you have to..." she stutters.

"Say it dear" Giselle urges. "Say the words"

"You have to paint your name....with your....your...blood..." Her words thin to a whisper at the end.

Aquawoman looks like all the blood in her body have been sucked out. "What..?" she asks, although there isn't a need. The instructions are clear.

"You heard her, dear. You have to write your name in your own blood. Doesn't it sound fun?" Giselle asks. If she's trying to be funny, now is not the time.

"I can't......please ask me to do anything. Not this...please, I beg you" Aquawoman begs but Giselle simply shrugs her shoulders.

"You have to do what yo are asked. Or else, you see what happened to Mr. no insecurities. You want to follow him?" Giselle's words seem to snap the girl back to her senses, though nothing about this makes sense.

"How do I do it?" she asks. Her voice so small you have to focus on every words.

"Simple" Giselle stands, takes a dagger from a drawer and hands it to her. "Paint it on the floor right in front of you. By the way what's your name?"

The girl swallows. "Penelope" Not a good time to have an eight letter names, you think. You wonder if her blood is enough. There are nearly six liters of blood in a human body but even if less than half of it is lost....You shut your train of thoughts. Not another corpse. It can't happen.

Aquawoman takes the dagger with trembling hands and sits down, staring at it as if it's a foreign object. Slowly, she pulls up the sleeve, raising it to her forearm, setting the edge on her flesh. It sinks in and a trail of blood starts to pour from the opening. Grimacing, she collects it with her forefinger and writes the first letter on the floor, P. But it isn't enough as half of the letter only formed.

The girl sinks the blade deeper, her lips pursed, trying to seal away a scream. More blood pours. The first letter is completed. You watch the gruesome scene as the girl paints her name. E, then N, after that L. Halfway but she's already trembling. Her whole arm is soaked with blood.

Giselle watches it with a hint of amusement in her eyes. Now you know what's beneath that cold face everyone tries to decipher. It's a sick, twisted mind. Ruined beyond repair. And she likes it that way.

"I can't do this anymore..." Aquawoman mutters in a hoarse voice, setting the dagger down. "It hurt so much"

"Just use your other arm" Giselle advices. "You are nearly there"

"But...." the girl reconsiders and takes the dagger with her bloody hand, raising it to cut another opening in her other arms. She slices and more blood flows. More paint.

The girl continues painting, her temples beaded with sweat. If her eyes can speak, they are screaming for help. The name gets completed one word after another. O, P, then she stops.

"Please......it...it hurts....I'm nearly done, please...can I.." she pleads and begs. Her hands trembling, both covered in red.

"One last letter" Giselle muses. "Complete it"

"I can't....please...?" she asks for mercy. But Giselle isn't known for being merciful.

"Are you saying you can't do it?" Giselle insists.

"No...no....but I can't-" She drops her dagger and stumbles forward, propping herself on her palms. She has lost too much blood.

"Very well then" Giselle says, her expression solemn.

"I...I don't want to.." The girl can no longer speaks. Not because she is choking. But because blood starts to pour from her eyes. A waterfall of blood, enough to write her names a hundred times. You back away in disgust, a few drops staining your coat. The other two cover their eyes, unable to comprehend the horror of the scene. Gisell watches the never ending flow of blood with interest. Not even caring the droplets hitting her dress.

"What a pity, she was so promising" Giselle sighs as the body lands on the floor with a loud thud. "Another one eliminated. Mr. Vampire, would you be so kind to..?" She points it a the corpse. Damn this, why does everyone around you have to die? Without complaint, you grab her from the waist, the only part unstained with her blood and put her next to Pennywise.

Two down. Two corpses. Who's next? You should have left when you had the chance. You should have continue being the loner you are. Stay in your room and spend Halloween watching Dracula. At least it won't be real. At least you won't die. Your desperation have lead you to your demise. There's no way out of here.

Regardless, this game that's nothing but sick must go on. Because Giselle says so. All of you are nothing but pawns on her chessboard. Disposable. Weak.

You expect Giselle to take the spot next to you but instead, Harley Quinn takes it. Giselle is still right in front of you. Those pools of blue still piercing into your soul, inch by inch. Now the circle, or rather a rhombus, consists only of four.

No one complains. They have already seen two examples. No one's eager to become another. The bottle is now in the hands of Ms. Tattered clothes, who stares at it like it's an explosive. You have no idea about the order the bottle is being passed. But it just one of the many thing that doesn't make any sense.

The bottle spins, pointing directly across from the spinner, at Harley Quinn.

"Truth or Dare?" This question, these words that have reaped two souls.

"Truth" Harley Queen makes her choice, at least she won't be cutting her vessels open. That's not exactly a reassuring thought. You have no idea about the other questions in that deck.

A card is pulled. The question is read.

"If someone here is to die, who do you wish it is?"

A simple question, yet the answer a double pointed sword. You know her answer because you would have answered the same. It's 'Giselle'. If she's dead, you all can leave. You all can stop playing this deadly game. But if the truth is spoken, who knows what Giselle will do?

"It's..eh..." Harley Queen stutters, debating with herself. Tell the truth, she risks facing Giselle's wrath. Lie, she dies. Neither's a good choice.

"It's ok dear, speak your mind" Giselle encourages. She pulls her veil farther below and the shadows it cast pale the blue of her eyes. Yet, they are as intent as ever.

"You" Harley Quinn makes her decision. She lowers her head like she's scared of what comes next.

"Eh....honest..." Giselle muses, a faint smile forming on her lips, the exotic kind. "Your courage is admirable, dear. The truth is good. But sometimes, it must be twisted to fit the situation. Afterall, the Truth is bitter"

Giselle smiles and again you are baffled by its arcane amidst the chaos. You would have forgotten you are on the verge of dying had she not sheathed it.

"I'm sorry dear. Such honesty should be rewarded but this time the stakes are high" Giselle sighs, blowing air.

"This is unfair! I spoke the truth! I'm going to die either way, why are you doing this?" Harley Quinn bellows in rage. Her face so red you think it's going to explode.

"You are correct. Lie or Truth, both leads to the same end. But I'm doing this because I find it fun. Because I can" Giselle admits and you have no doubt that she is ,in fact, enjoying this. Her smile had said it all.

"You can't do this! If others know..." her words are cut short by the flames that engulf her. You back away in shock. Thankfully, you don't get to move another corpse as the flames consumes everything in one swift blast. Ash, the remnants of what was once human rain to the floor.

"She talked too much. It's a good thing she went quick" Giselle says lazily. This dead seems to be the least interesting to her.

The nature of the game has become obvious. Truth or Dare, you die either way. It's inevitable. Everyone here must meet their end to satisfy Giselle's hunger. But of course, the game must go on.

"Your turn, pretty boy" Giselle says, handing you the bottle. You take it. Even before spinning, you already know who it's gonna land on. And of course, it does. The deadly little container point rights towards Ms. Tattered Clothes. Another vicitm. The second last.

"Truth or Dare?" You say the three deadly words.

The girl is silent, seemingly struggling to say the right words. Except that there isn't one. Her whole face is frozen in fear, staring into space.

"Hurry up, dear" Giselle says. "We don't have all night"

The girl raises her head to look at Giselle, pleading with her eyes.

"I don't want to die. Please....I will do anything..." she cowers before Giselle, begging for her life. Giselle seeems amused at the fragile creature bowing before her. The idea of having someone's life to do as she wishes filling her with delight.

"Now, don't be scared. Nothing lasts forever afterall. The least you can do is make a choice. Truth or Dare?" Giselle repeats your question.

"I...I'm..." The girl sits back up, realizing there's no way to escape. "Truth"

Giselle looks at you and you pull a card from the deck of Truth. You flip the card to the other side, only to be greeted by a strange sight. The other side of the card is blank. No letters or questions, just a white space.

"What's the meaning of this?" you asks, showing the card to Giselle.

"Oh dear, I'm really sorry" Giselle says with false compassion. "Seems like you have landed on the empty card, which means there's no questions for you to answer"

"What do you...mean?" the girl insists. "This must be a mistake, maybe he can pull another card"

"That would be against the rules" Giselle set the card down in front of the girl. "And I like to follow them"

"So what? If I didn't answer, I wouldn't be lying right? That means I won't be punished" The girl insists once more. And in a sense, what she says make sense. How could she lie if there isn't even a question?

"You are not wrong" Giselle replies. "But it also means you wouldn't be telling the truth either. And that would be lying"

"That makes no fucking sense!" The girl screams, letting her anger gets the best of her. "You are just finding an excuse to kill people!"

"I thought you already know" Giselle sighs. "You are a slow one"

The girl turns to you. "Please, help me. You are going to die too, you know that right? Maybe if both of us can-"

And then she is no more. Her whole body dissolves into a whirlwind of colors which gets sucked in to the blank page of the card like a vortex.

"A shame" Giselle puts the card back into the deck. "Seems like it's just us now"

You have never thought much thought to what happens after death. But now, you start wondering if you have done enough good to get into Heaven. You surely haven't done anything catastrophic but you haven't accomplished anything remarkable either. You just have to hope the good outweights the bad. Because soon, you will be nothing more than another soul reaped for Giselle's amusement.

What was left of Giselle's facade as the perfect human being has gone. She's anything but that. A demon that indulges herself in the suffering of others. Plucking a life after another like fruits.

Giselle takes the bottle. "My turn" she muses, her voice eager to conclude the act. You being the one to close it out.

The bottle doesn't need to be spinned. The result is clear as day. Giselle does it anyway. The compass of death spins and spins, inevitably pointing towards you.

"Truth or Dare?" The last question for this night, the last question you will hear.

"Truth" you reply, surprised at yourself for how quick your respone is. Have you accepted your end?

"If you have the choice to fuck anyone in this room, who would it be?"

Giselle asks, not pulling a card from the deck. Doesn't it break the rules? No, Giselle makes the rules.

The question seems so odd compared to the others you have heard tonight. The other ones are designed either to force you to lie or mix you up so thoroughly you can't answer. But this question? The answer is simple but not without risk. Giselle, the only other human being here, the sole female, that's the answer, the truth. But you don't want to go up in flames like Harley Quinn did nor you want to choke to death like Pennywise. There isn't a way out. You accept your fate.

"You" you answer. "I would do it with you"

Giselle's face shows no emotion. Her eyes staring into yours, unblinking. You start repenting the sins you might have done. Sooner or later, you would end in a horrible way.

"I think so" Giselle finally speaks. She pulls down her veil to let her hair fall freely around her shoulder. Without it, she looks even more sinister. A wolf in sheep skin.

"End me already" you requests. "Let's finish this"

Giselle chuckles. The voice that comes out is frozen, like she hasn't laughed in a millennia and she's just trying again right now.

"What a brave man" Giselle praises. "But you won't escape me that easily. What you will face is worse than death"

You curse under your breath. Death is not the ideal option but at least it will release you. Now, that chance has went up in smoke.

"Lie down" Giselle orders.

"Why?" You questions. If you are not going to die, at least you want to know what you will be facing.

"Lie down" she repeats. Knowing there's no point in defying her, you obliges. Giselle walks up to you, setting a foot on your chest, looming over you. She smirks and that's when you get a crazy thought. The others were lucky. At least they escape this in a way. You wouldn't.

"Good boy" she compliments. You feel a sense of joy despite the state you are in. It feels so wrong. "Lose your fangs, I don't want you to bite"

You pull of the fake fangs from your mouth. Though you still looks like a sleep deprived vampire with the rest of your attire.

Giselle pulls back her leg, regarding you with her blue eyes like a predator ready to pounce. If she starts skinning you alive, you wouldn't be surprised. However, what she proceeds to do is the exact opposite.

She kneels beside you, her fingers trailing along your chest. The touch left you craving for more. With each movement, she sends a shiver down your spine. At this moment, the only god you will worship is Giselle. You will devote your soul to her if it means she will keep doing this.

Her fingers trail across your chest, down to your waist and then land right on your crotch. She squeezes your clothed mamba, which is already rock hard from her gratifying touch. A smile forms on her lips once more. This time from the joy of seeing how badly you need her.

"Oh, you are already so hard" Giselle mocks and squeezes your dick over the fabric once more. The agony from her harsh grip merges with pleasure and you can no longer distinguish which is which. All you know is you want her to keep doing this. Keep hurting you because with pain, there's pleasure.

"Are you enjoying this?" Giselle gives one final squeeze and let go, leaving you throbbing. You could have cummed from her hands alone if she repeats the motion one more time. Nonetheless, you want her to keep going. To find comfort in the hands of your reaper. The very thought shames you but it gets clouded by a stronger emotion, lust.

Giselle presses her upper body against your chest and you would have put your hands on her waist if it isn't for the fact that she could kill you in a heartbeat. Her black hair streaked with blonde sprawled out on your torso, a curtain of silk. If it isn't enough to drive you wild, the rosy smell of her perfume mixed with the faintest scent of her sweat does the job. Diamond is no longer the hardest material on earth because your cock is already pushing through your pants, trying to escape its boundaries.

Giselle moves further up, lining her face with yours. Under the glow of the lamp, you get the full view of her boobs, which are pushed upward with how hard she's pressing into you. The trench of her cleavage is a dark pit without a bottom, which you will eagerly jump into. Just to get more of her. To indulge in her.

Her fingers move along your ribs, your neck, ending on your face, cupping it, holding it like something tender. "Vampire doesn't suit you, you know?" she asks. Just a simple remark but it deprives you of your common sense. All you feel now is regret. Regret for cosplaying as this stupid creature. Regret for not being good enough for Giselle. "But outfits can be removed, hmm?" Giselle starts unbuttoning your shirt and in this case, literally unbutton. She pulls off the first button. Then the other. Then the other.

A fire has been lit inside you and with each button you lose, the flames rose higher. Giselle's touch is electric and even if it's deadly, you will happily surrender. Because you crave for it too much to care.

Giselle spread open your shirt, the sides parting to reveal your bare chest. She lays a finger and trace it down to your stomach. Her eyes lit up with thrill when they land on your bulge. "Oh, nearly forgot him" Giselle grabs you waistband and pulls it down. Your cock springs up, finally escaping its confinement, throbbing with anticipation.

Giselle holds it from the base and gives it one single pump. And you realize that is all you have needed in life. Your mind is screaming 'Keep going. Don't stop' but you don't utter a single word. Either you are paralyzed from her touch or you don't need to. Because Giselle already knows.

"Look at you, all pumped up. Do I turn you on that much?" She doesn't need to ask. The evident is before her eyes. Another pump. A groan escapes your lips. She smiles. "But it would be unfair if you get your release so quick after everything you went through, hmm?" You want to scream. Tell her to let you cum. In any way. Even her hands are enough. Just let you out of this beautiful prison.

She stands and your dick aches, yearning for her touch again. Giselle stands right above your face, her feet set on either sides of you. You get a glimpse of her pussy. And you swear it's the most perfect thing you have seen.

"How's the view down there?" Giselle asks. "Do you like my pussy?" Yes, you would have answered. Absolutely. But as usual, your vocal cords lose their ability.

"You wanna taste it?" Giselle lifts up the hem of her dress, just enough to expose her full round ass. Skin snowy white just like the rest of her body. "I don't hear an answer"

"Yes..." You manage to utter one single word through the invisible chokehold.

"Very well.." Giselle lowers her ass, taking her rightful throne right on your face. No sooner you feel the pressure than you start licking her pink cavern like there's no tomorrow. Your nose is squashed between her buttocks, cutting off your supply of oxygen. But you don't care. Because this is all you have ever wanted.

"Mhmm yes....just like that" Giselle words encourage you to continue your service to her, treating her like the goddess she is. There is only one goal in you mind at the moment. Make her cum. So that she will praises you. Just one single word would be enough.

So you channel everything you have into your tongue. Slurping her pussy, eating her out. Each time your tongue runs across her velvety flesh, you extract a moan from her. You twirl your tongue on her clit and Giselle tense up, another impure sound betraying her lips.

"God, yes....don't stop..." You don't plan to. Your face is drenched in the juice already spilling out of her and your own spit. This is just a small price to pay to taste the delicacy between her legs. The taste can only be described as otherworldly. Because you are sure there isn't anything that taste like this on earth.

Giselle starts rocking her hips, making your tongue catches up with her pace. She's fucking herself on your tongue, just another object to appease her. Your flesh and blood, all hers. And she will use it as she sees fit.

You hold onto her thighs for support. You are drowning in her elixir, the juice that's suffocating you yet empowers you to keep going. Giselle had said this is worse than death. But maybe it isn't so bad afterall.

However, being deprived of oxygen for so long have its consequences as you start feeling your consciousness slowly drift away, although your tongues move as vigorously as ever. Giselle is still rocking on your face, feeding you the nectar you crave so bad. You are starting to think this is how you will die when a waterfall of the clear liquid pour out of Giselle's cavern, soaking your face whole.

You gasp, your lungs filled with air again after Giselle stop using you as a meat chair. One last drop of her juice falls onto your lips. Instinctively, you lick it up.

" You did well, pretty boy" Giselle praises, her voice hoarse. "You deserve a reward" Those were the sweetest word you have ever heard. She walks slowly back to where your legs lay sprawled on the floor. Sitting down, a hand of hers wrap around the base of your stiff cock. "Miss me?" she asked, giving it a pump. Your body tense from her lethal touch. Giselle takes this as a sign to keep going.

She starts moving her hand up and down, stroking every inch of you. The fire in you burn brighter than ever. Waves after waves of pleasure course through your veins and you drown in them happily. With the other hand, Giselle fondle your balls, giving each one a gentle squeeze. "Look how full they are. Is it because of me, hmm?" Not wanting her to stop, you answer briskly. "Yes, yes...." "I think so" Giselle move her remaining hand from your balls to your shaft, now pumping it with both her hands. There isn't a single inch she misses and from time to time, she would rub your tip with her thumb, delivering extra fatal blows.

All you can do is take in the feeling. But you don't close your eyes because it would be stupid to miss the sight of a goddess giving you a handjob. All it exists in the world for now are Giselle's hands, your cock and the flames inside you that dance wild.

"Are you feeling good? You like my hands, huh?" Giselle asks, picking up the pace even more. This time you are too lost in bliss to answer. Not daring to miss the feeling of one single pump because it could be the last. Giselle is giving you a handjob not because she wants you to feel good. Just like everything else in her world, your dick exists to entertain you. She's rejoicing in the sense of superiority, the ability to deliver or deny you pleasure.

She's being generous at least. Her hands don't seem to be stopping time soon. However, your end is near. The flame inside you have turned into a volcano, ready to erupt at any moment. The tingling sensation starts to grow into an amalgam of throbs and pulses. Giselle, who undoubtedly feel it, smiles. "Are you going to cum?" Another unnecessary question. "Cum, cum all over my hands"

And that's all you need to hear before you erupts, spewing globs after globs of cum. Some land on Giselle's dress, the others spill down her fingers. She keeps pumping you until your climax finally subside.

"That's a lot. It would be a shame to let it go to waste" Giselle licks your cum off her fingers and the sight alone is enough to get you hard again. She sucks the last drop off her middle finger and her eyes rest on yours. "We are just getting started. I hope you have a lot more"

You nod and that's not a lie because your dick is already up again like a spear. But this spear will impale something else.

"I want that cock stuffing me full, now" Giselle orders. "Come on, you have been on the ground for so long" You stands up and follow Giselle's lead, who bends over on a desk and spreads open her lips to reveal her pink insides. An invitation. "Just fuck me already"

Instantly, you shove your pole into her wet folds. Giselle lets out a gutteral moan, her back arching. "Oh, yes.....stuff me with that huge cock" If her hands had felt phenomenal to you, her wet cunt feels a thousand times more. You thrusts into her wet hole again and again, already lubed up by her juices earlier.

"Oh god, yes....just like that" Giselle moans and you gives her ass a slap, unable to resist the sight of it rippling each time your cervix meets her buttocks. More juice flows and Giselle moans louder. You knead the soft flesh of her ass, the touch of her skin like cotton in your grasp.

"Harder! Fuck me harder!" You are already putting every ounce of your strength but if Giselle orders, who are you not to oblige? You slam your hips harder. Your cock is already soaking from her juice and the friction no longer matters. It moves with the speed you desire.

Right at that moment, your eyes fall on the two corpses you have lined up against the shlef. Pennywise, with his bulging eyes and midway scream seems to be telling you "Is this what we die for? So that she can fuck you?" The other one, Aquawoman, with her blood soaked body seems to ask the same thing.

But the sickest thing is you wanna answer 'Yes, this is what you die for, so that I can fuck her' How corrupted have you become to put your animalistic desire above the life of others? But it no longer matters because the feeling of Giselle's cunt on your cock is the only thing you need.

Your attention reverts back from the lifeless bodies as Giselle's walls clench you hard. She was tight before. Now she's even tighter. You give your all to penetrate her tight folds but after going for so long, your strength is starting to waver. Giselle, however, is as energetic as ever. She pushes her ass back to meet your thrusts halfway, impatient to wait even for a split second.

You can only take so much as the second spiral of tingles start working their way down to your pelvis. "Fuck, Giselle, I'm gonna cum.." you warn. "Give it all to me, babe. Fill up my cunt. Yesssss..." Giselle hisses as her tight hole get pumped with the next torrent of baby batter exiting your shaft. Despite cumming earlier, the second orgasm hits you with the same euphoric wave, you start seeing the stars.

A steady drip of cum pours out of Giselle's pussy as you pull out. You are panting and all your limbs feel like jelly. Giselle has sucked out every bit of strength left in you. Pushing a finger into her pulsing hole, Giselle scoops out some of your cum, tasting it. "Mhmm...creamy.." She mutters as though she's testing out a new dessert. Maybe to her, it is.

"Are you already tired? Awwww....poor boy. But you know you can't stop until I'm satisfied right?" Giselle's words wash over you like a tide. Suddenly, you start believing you can go again. Afterall, your sole purpose is to entertain her.

You nod and you no longer knows if it's you or whatever is possessing you in this moment. All you can think is how you want to serve Giselle. Even if someone try to give you the escape you have been seeking desperately earlier, you would have refused it. Because now, you are Giselle's.

"Good boy" These words. How you crave them. You would do anything just to hear these words. "Sit" Giselle points to a wingback chair nearby, red just like the blood flowing from the corpse. You obeys. Giselle stands right in front of you, her arms folded. "Here's a little treat for you" Giselle pulls off her dress from the hem, making herself bare. Her body is a work of art, sculpted by the creator himself. Your masculine urges lead your eye right to her tits, which is as perfect as the rest of her body. The round globes that you can suck on for the rest of your life. "You like my tits?" Just one of the many redundant questions of the night. "Yes..." You mutter dreamily. "Taste them" Giselle grips the arms of the chair and leans in, her milkbags only an inch from your face. Instantly, you rises to put your lips on her tits, the other hand kneading the supple flesh of the other. You suck on her nipples ad even an infant can't rival your hunger. You need this.

"Do you like them that much?" With your mouth stuffed with her nipple, you can't answer. You don't need to. You move the attention of your lips to her other tit, switching positions with the first one. As you slurp and lick her tits, blood start to flow to your dick again. Not as hard as earlier but enough to do the job.

Suddenly, Giselle moves back and you are greeted by the emptiness. Sensing your disappointment, she chuckles. "Oh, babe. Don't be so upset, we have better things to do" She kneels, the shadow of your fully erected cock darkening her features. "I wonder how you taste" Giselle licks the underside of your shaft. One single movement but nonetheless, you bask in the sensation. "Not bad.." Another lick. This time on your tip. She twirls her tongue, collecting the remnants of cum from the earlier session. "Delicious...." And just like that, she swallows your shaft all the way down to the base. Her nose presses against your plevis but her eyes remain focused on yours.

You throw your head back. The walls of her throat are no less talented than her pussy walls. Gag reflex seems to be a joke to her as she impale herself on your cock over and over, barely making a sound except the occasional gurgle of spits flowing from the corner of her lips. Her plump lips seal around you perfectly, tracing every vein with each bob. Giselle ways to use you doesn't seem to be running out anytime soon and you like it that way. You want her to keep using you until you are no longer human but a vessel for her pleasure.

And her eyes. If her mouth is sucking the physical strength out of you, they are draining your willpower. There is no present or future. There's only Giselle.

Giselle releases your cock from her mouth with a pop, her hands now stroking your cock, drenched in her spit. "I must say...I'm impressed. No one have last that long" Is she talking about 'lasting' as in not dying yet? You couldn't care less. Her fingers glide over your pole smoothly with the lube her spit provides. She twists her fingers, cockscrewing you. The hunger in her eyes never dim and it never will. She will never be satisfied. Not by you, not by anyone else. You are just another toy, thrown away when it gets boring.

Another spiral of twists and turns, her hands work like magic. Not a single second goes to waste because there's nothing else that can cut off your attention. You moan and you hate yourself for it. But if Giselle likes it, your emotions can be thrown away.

"How cute. You are whining" Her movements turn swift, determined to milk you of every last drop. "Are you gonna cum again? Hmm? It's ok, cum on my tits. You have been a good boy. You deserve this" Words have powers and you believe it. As soon as her lips stop moving, your body jerks, spraying spurt after spurt of cum on her tits. Most of it find their way to the canvas of her boobs but a few land on her face. "Yes, babe...let it all out" Giselle hands leave your shaft.

Once again gripping the chair arms, she leans in, this time to your face. "Goodbye" She presses her lips to yours. A sense of calm flows through your core. Her lips that just sucks you off press harder and harder. Her tongue enters your mouth and you return the action, a ballad of muscles with the symphony of breaths. You can't stop. She won't stop.

Suddenly, you realize. You can't breathe. Air wouldn't enter your lungs. Does it matter? Breathing, is it as important as Giselle? No, it isn't. You are well aware you have gone insane. Ever seen a mad man and wonder what's going on in his mind? Don't. He knows himself more than you ever will. So you don't need to be questioned. You have accepted your fate. If it's a curse, you will gladly embrace it because all you can think of is Giselle, Giselle and Giselle until your last breath.

●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●

(I have never written something this crazy before. But who isn't for Giselle?)

#kpop smut #giselle smut #aespa smut #male reader #girl group smut

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fanwarriorfictions · 1 year ago

Text

Not Again- Part Three

Azriel x Rowaelin daughter reader

Summary: The inner court has many questions about Y/n and her world. Missing home even more, all she wants is to fly and clear her head, luckily, her babysitter indulges her

Series Masterlist

-Part Three-

Azriel knew this was going to be a long day from the moment he woke up. Surrounded by his shadows who would not shut up for three gods damned seconds. She’s awake, awake, awake, upset, won’t eat, upset. The little busybodies had snuck off while he slept, and apparently they were very concerned about the state of the female next door for whatever reason.

He found himself dressed and in the hallway waiting for any sign of her, when he didn’t receive one in the ten minutes he’d stood there he’d finally crossed the hall and knocked three times on the door.

She was still in there, he knew that from the way his shadows kept trying to slip through the cracks towards her. And he could feel the shield of air she’d placed around the room, hiding the sounds of her approaching footsteps.

The door swung open and Azriel couldn’t explain why his breath caught in his chest. The house had gifted her new clothes, the traditional night court style that Amren preferred to wear, in the deepest darkest night court black. The silk cropped shirt hugged her curves, and the flowing high waisted pants left a small sliver of skin on display. Beautiful, pretty, black suits her. His shadows whispered again and again and again, he was about ready to lock them away for a moment of peace.

“Here to take me to the dungeons yet?” She asks, lifting her arms towards him as if expecting cuffs, amusement glittering in her eyes as she watches his eyes lift from her waist, “what’s on the table today? Just some light interrogation? Maybe a bit of torture?”

“Breakfast actually,” he replies dryly, “the others will be here shortly.”

“Well that’s no fun,” she pouts, dropping her arms to her sides, “lead the way then, shadowsinger.”

The title rolls off her tongue, that accent swirling and dripping with charm. A small smirk on her lips as she notices his hesitation, turning his back on her still felt like a bad idea, even though he didn’t glimpse a single dagger on her, he’s sure she wouldn’t need it.

She seems fine, less tense than the night before, a mask of cool amusement and charm, yet his shadows seem concerned, upset, they’d whispered all morning. As they walk he keeps one eye on her, taking in the way she examines every surface, every turn, every nook and cranny. She was mapping out the halls in her head, memorizing the ways out, smart. If she wanted to she could shift into that magnificent hawk form and fly through the halls and off the balcony before he could even try to catch her.

They turn into the dining room, Rhys and Feyre already sat at the table. The table set for several people, Azriel assumed the rest of the court would be here soon, Cassian flying them up from the River House. Elain would stay back with little Nyx, her mate there to protect them both.

“Good morning,” Feyre says, voice reserved yet kind, “I’m Feyre.”

Y/n grants her a small smile, bowing her head slightly in greeting. She doesn’t say anything, opting to examine the room around them like she’d done in the halls, nervous. She didn’t let it show on her face, but Azriel could tell, could see the tension in her shoulders.

“Please, sit,” Rhys says, gesturing to the seats across from them, “the rest will be here shortly.”

“Should I be worried about that?” Y/n asks, her tone is light, that cool amusement hiding the faint look of panic that flashes through her eyes.

Azriel’s shadows writhe at his sides when he sees that look, something about it settles wrongly. She had nothing to fear from them, but how would she know that? Strangers who had found her vulnerable, who had tried to look into her mind, who she knew next to nothing about.

Feyre laughs lightly, “no, no, of being talked to death perhaps, but I swear, no harm will come to you.”

That seems just good enough to Y/n to coax her to sit across from Feyre, her eyes glance warily at the foods laid out between them and instead of filling her plate like the High Lord and Lady across from her she simply leans back in her seat and watches. Azriel takes the seat beside her, pointedly filling his plate with mounds of eggs and bacon and bread with jams.

She won’t eat, eat, eat, eat, she needs to eat. Shadows angrily whisper in Azriel’s ears but he forces them away as he hears the sounds of his family grow closer down the hall, Cassian’s booming laugh echoing into the room. He can see the moment Y/n tenses, her body readying for a fight that would not come.

“A rambunctious lot you’ve got here,” she says coolly, that mask of indifference slid into place.

“You don’t even know the half of it,” Rhys sighs.

Cassian is the first to come through the door, followed by Nesta who rolls her eyes at her mates back.

“Is this the female who handed Azriel’s ass to him?”

The tension in Y/n’s shoulders slip every so slightly and Azriel feels himself relax too. He was prepared to leap inbetween his family and her, to protect which one he wasn’t sure.

“You say that like it’s such an impossibility,” Mor says as she and Amren step through the doorway, “I’ve seen plenty of females hand you your ass, Cassian.”

“But it’s Az,” Cass laughs, “Mister dark and broody spymaster caught off guard by the second female falling on his lap.”

“She did not fall into my lap,” Azriel sighs, “she was in the-“

“Whatever,” Cassian interrupts, waving his hand, “close enough.”

Azriel rolls his eyes at his brother’s antics, recognizing them for what they were, a way to break any tension, to make this seem like a simple breakfast instead of the interrogation it was sure to become. One glance at Y/n told him she wasn’t buying it for one second.

Her eyes travel over them all, stopping briefly on Nesta as their eyes lock. Both females had that cold stare that could freeze oceans. Though she’d given back a majority of the cauldrons power, it still lurked behind Nesta’s steely eyes, that silver fire rolling in warning. Y/n looked just as lethal, those cold eyes almost glowing with the power lurking below her skin, wether it was ice or fire, Azriel wasn’t sure he wanted to find out which she’d use first.

Nesta seemed satisfied with whatever she saw in Y/n’s eyes, grabbing her mates hand to drag him to their seats beside Feyre. Mor slipped into the seat beside Azriel, Amren taking the seat beside her.

“Well,” Rhys says with that charming grin, “now that everyone is here I’d like to introduce our lovely guest, Crown Princess of Terrasen, Y/n Ashryver Whitethorn Galathynius.”

“Now that’s a mouth full.” Mor whistles as she piles her plate full of sweet pastries and fruits, “lovely to meet you, Princess.”

“Y/n will do.”

“Wow, you weren’t kidding about the fangs,” Cassian says when her sharp canines peak through her lips.

Azriel keeps one eye on the female next to him as he pretended to be interested in the food on his plate. Her arms were crossed over her stomach, her mask not slipping despite the eyes weighing her down.

“What is this place?”

Rhys raises a brow at her, “would you like to eat first before we get to the nitty gritty?”

Y/n nods towards the food, “I’d like to know exactly who and what I’m dealing with before I accept food from fae I don’t know. Didn’t anyone ever teach you stranger danger?”

Eat, eat, tell her to eat. Azriel tries to quiet the shadows, getting annoyed with how insistent they were. As if she heard them, Y/n glances at him, frowning at the little wisps that stray to close to her.

Rhys looks ready to give her a sarcastic response but Feyre rolls her eyes and butts in, “you are in Velaris, the heart and soul of our territory, the Night Court.”

“You’re the leaders of this place,” Y/n states more than asks.

“High Lord and Lady, few of many on this continent,” Feyre nods, “how’d you know.”

“I’ve dealt with plenty of royals,” Y/n shrugs, “Queens and Kings, Lords and Ladies, Emperors and Empresses.”

That peaks everyone’s interest, Azriel can feel the curiosity in the air. When Quinlann had arrived, she’d been at war with the Asteri, the ruling power of her world, despite having kings and queens, they all answered to the immortal, intergalactic parasites, as Quinlann had put it. She and her mate had succeeded in ridding their planet of the monsters, but who knew where else these creatures lived.

“What is your home like?” Mor asks, the question seemingly harmless, but depending on the answer could bring a whole world of consequences.

Y/n examines her, not missing the hidden question beneath is your world a threat to our own, “much like your own it would seem. We’ve been at peace for the last 25 years. Until a gate opened up and ripped me away from my family.”

There’s the briefest change in her then, that mask slipping just enough that Azriel recognizes it, grief. She’s upset, homesick, won’t eat. It made sense now, she’d said she’d been with her father when the gate had taken her, when she’d been dumped onto a foreign land surrounded by strangers she couldn’t understand. She must have been terrified.

“Before you ask, I have no idea how or why the gate opened, or why it took me,” she continues, “it shouldn’t have been possible. None have been opened since the lock was forged during the war.”

“War?” Cassian’s brow raises in question, “what lock?”

It seems to set her back into a memory, her eyes not entirely focused on the male who’d asked, “the war against the Valg. Demons from another world who liked the taste of ours. The fight against them spanned over centuries, over multiple wars, my ancestor was able to lock the King away with a stolen object not meant for her to use, but for that there was a price demanded from the gods who’d made the lock in the first place, an heir of her blood to forge a new lock, to open a gate and send them to their true home, my mother. Queen Aelin Ashryver Whitethorn Galathynius, she almost died paying their price, and in the end they betrayed her anyway.”

Anger simmered in her eyes, Azriel could feel heat radiating off of her, that fire under her skin wanting to come out.

“What became of them?” Rhys asks.

She takes a moment to rein that fire in and then she meets the High Lord’s eyes, “she killed them all.”

A silence ripples through the room, her mother had killed her world’s gods. Were they like Midgard’s asteri, Prythian’s daglan, or maybe their own kind of nightmare.

“She locked the gates, fell through time and space, through hundreds of worlds, guided back by my father who would not let that mating bond slip through his fingers. When she’d come back, she had a fraction of her power left, the power that could end the valg Queen and King and save them all.”

“How did they win?” Nesta asks in the quiet that follows.

A smile, not a smirk finds Y/n’s lips and Azriel’s shadows dance towards her. He barely keeps them in check, one resting on the edge of her chair before it was reined back in. He catches the curious look sent his way by Rhys. He’d surely hear more of that later.

“My Aunt Yrene,” she says, “a healer, the valg were vulnerable to their touch, she took the evil shriveled soul of the valg King and turned him to nothing but a black stain on the floor. We put a rug over it.”

A surprised laugh slips out of Mor, “please tell me it’s hideous.”

“The tackiest thing I’ve ever seen, they let me paint on it as a child. It’s covered in bad stick figures of my uncles.”

They’d asked her questions until it was nearing lunch time. Cassian had about fallen out of his chair when she’d told them of the witches and their wyverns. From the look in Amren’s eye, Y/n knew that if she’d ever met Manon, the world would tremble in fear.

Rhys had been particularly interested in her mother’s journey through worlds, he had an uncanny feeling about it that he couldn’t quite explain. Feyre and Nesta had been shocked to learn that her mother was half human. Mor had asked her millions of questions that she could barely keep up with.

During it all, Azriel had been silent at her side. No questions on his lips but she could see the wheels turning in his head, could almost hear the whispering shadows that danced closer and closer to her every chance they got. She’d felt one drifting over her elbow for a moment before Azriel had glared right at the curious little shadow and it flew back to his side.

They’d slowly stopped their questioning and then they left one by one, Amren had left to look into this worlds knowledge on Wyrd markings and gates, Cassian and Nesta had said something about a training session, Rhys and Feyre needed to go relieve the third Acheron sister from babysitting duty and Mor had desperately wanted to see her nephew.

And just like that, it was down to Y/n and Azriel. She assumed he was still on babysitting duty, despite their apparent trust in her. She didn’t blame them for being cautious, Wyrd knows she’d not let a single one of them out of her sight if the roles were reversed.

Y/n stood stretching out her sore muscles, an involuntary groan slipping past her lips as she lifted her arms above her head. They’d been sitting there for hours and her body still aches from the events of yesterday.

“You didn’t eat anything,” his cool voice startles her, deep and slightly gravely.

She glances down at him, noting the way his eyes drag up from that small sliver of skin at her waist. The clothes we’re comfortable, yet much more revealing than anything she’d been used to. She can’t help the smirk that rests on her lips as she looks down at the handsome male, she could get used to clothes like this.

“I’m not hungry,” she shrugs, moving through the room, glancing towards the huge windows that showed the vast city far beneath them.

“You haven’t eaten since you’ve been here,” he says, eyes tracking each of her movements.

“Oh? And how would you know that,” she looks pointedly at the shadows, “I thought I told you to keep wandering eyes to yourself.”

He simply shrugs, “they do what they want.”

“Clearly.” She turns towards the door, “are you to play babysitter all day? Don’t you have anything better to do?”

She’s out the door before he’s has the chance to reply. The place was massive, she’d memorized the walk from her room to the dining hall, but the amount of halls that laid around told her she’d only seen a small portion of what the place had to offer.

“Would you care for a tour?” Azriel’s suddenly standing to her side.

“Babysitter and tour guide,” she snarks, exploring down the hall, “A double threat.”

“I’ve been told to keep any eye on you.” He looks down at her, “and that’s what I plan to do.”

“Oh I have no doubt about that.” She turns into a large living space littered with comfortable looking couches and chairs, a doorway leading to a balcony against the far wall. “I’m sure you’re a male who takes his duties very seriously.”

She moves towards that door, towards the open air beyond, Azriel following close behind. She could feel the wind beyond, begging to caress her wings, she’d shift and fly for hours and hours, maybe she could fly home.

“You could make this easy for both of us,” he says, letting a shadow block her path, “and quit trying to run away from me.”

“Now who said I was trying to run away,” she flashes an overly sweet smile over her shoulder, one that she can tell gets under his skin.

“You’re not a prisoner,” he almost growls, “but if you choose to make this harder than necessary, I have no problem tying you to a chair.”

She snorts, “Kinky, but no thank you, I’m not interested.”

He doesn’t respond, that carefully crafted expression not shifting an inch, though his shadows give him away. They writhe around him, reaching for her and pulling back over and over, like he was trying not to strangle her.

“Tell you what,” she says, “I’ll stick around you like glue if you let me go for a quick flight.”

She doesn’t hide the longing glance she gives the balcony, whenever she was stressed or upset her and her father would go flying, they would fly until she was ready to talk about what was eating at her, or until she tired herself out and he would take her home and tuck her into bed just to go fly the next morning. Y/n couldn’t think of a time she’d been more stressed than now, stuck in a foreign world with no way home, surrounded by powerful fae who she didn’t trust not to bury a dagger between her shoulders the second she turned around, depsite how kind they had been.

“Fine.”

Her eyes meet with warm hazel, surprise not hidden on her face. She would’ve thought he’d fight back harder, keeping her here, where she couldn’t fly away was safer, easier. But he’d agreed, and she gives him the first genuine smile she’d had since she’d arrived and says, “Thank you.”

He nods once, “after you.”

She’s out the door in seconds, shifting with a flash of white light, and diving over the edge of the balcony towards the city far far below.

Azriel was regretting his choice to let her fly, simply due to the fact that she was so damn fast. Despite the chill in the air, she flew over Velaris with such speed, the air biting his wings as he tried to keep up. She zigzaged over the city, following streets up and down, from the cliffs of the house all the way to the open mouth of the Sidra. They flew over the bridge into the Rainbow, the artists quarter and almost like an invisible string tugged her towards it, they ended up at one of the many amphitheaters.

Music of practicing artists flowed out, preparing for a concert later that evening, there was no single melody, a mesh of different tunes that somehow melded together into a new song of its own.

Y/n landed on a high wall of the amphitheater, that flash of light, and then she was sitting precariously on the edge, as if there wasn’t a steep drop directly behind her to the streets below. Azriel landed next to her, carefully sitting down with a comfortable distance between them. It felt wonderful to rest for a few seconds, letting the sun warm his wind chilled wings.

He watches her, the way she leans towards that music as if she couldn’t help but be drawn to it. There’s a longing look in her eyes, a sadness that cracks that carefully constructed mask to pieces. Azriel wants to comfort her, he’s overcome by the sudden need to fix whatever is wrong, but he was never good at that, so he just sits beside her, mouth firmly shut.

“One of the first things my mother did after the war was rebuild the theaters,” she says quietly after several minutes, “my earliest memory is sitting in the Queen’s box, they’d written a symphony about the final battle, it was the most beautiful thing I’ve ever heard. I can still hear the horn that signaled my mothers arrival.”

Azriel listened carefully, “Your mother seems to be a brave warrior.”

“She didn’t have a choice but to be,” Y/n whispers, “Most of my family didn’t.”

“You seem to be a warrior yourself,” he says, “were you given a choice.”

Her eyes don’t stray from the players below, “Yes and no, my parents insisted I train, they wanted me to be prepared for anything, I wanted to anyway, mostly because I wanted to grow up to be just like them. My father is one of the strongest fae warriors in the world, Rowan Whitethorn, soldiers talk about him around camp fires like he’s a myth. He and my uncles, his cadre, oversaw my training. My mother too, she’d once been a renowned assassin, I’d begged and fought with her to teach me everything she knew until she got sick of me and relented.”

He could see that, the way she struck fast and quietly during their first encounter, she moved with the grace of a dancer, struck with the strength of a warrior.

“Quite the family,” he says, searching for anything to lighten the mood, something Rhys or Cassian would say, “I’m sure bringing home boys was interesting.”

She laughs, and he can’t help but enjoy the sound, “you have no idea, not only do you have to impress my parents, but also the kings and queens of several nations. I made the mistake of bringing a boy home when Manon was visiting from the witch lands. She tried to introduce him to Abraxos, I don’t think I ever saw him again.”

From what they’d heard of the witch Queen, Azriel hoped the boy had just fled the kingdom, instead of becoming dinner.

She goes silent, and a shadow whispers in Azriel’s ear, she wants to go home, sad, very sad.

“Would you care to eat now?” Azriel asks, raising to his feet, “I know flying works up my appetite.”

She flashes him a saccharine smile, one that does its best to hide the pain but it can’t hide her eyes, “are you asking for a date? I thought I told you I’m not interested.”

He rolls his eyes, but he can’t help the slight twitch of his lips, “Trust me, Princess, you’re not my type either.”

She climbs to her feet, and Azriel finds that stretch of exposed skin at her waist as she turns to him, the scent of pine, snow, and embers drifting towards him on the wind.

“I’m everybody’s type.” Her tone lowers, dripping with charm, the kind that could make men and women crawl on their hands and knees. “Think you can keep up this time?”

Without warning she jumps off the back of the tall amphitheater. Azriel has a brief moment of panic, shadows whipping out to try and catch her, wings flaring as he goes to dive after her. Then, brilliant white light blinds him for a second, and that red tinged hawk shoots past him, letting out a cry that sounds suspiciously like laughter.

He swears, jumping off that ledge and shoots into the sky behind her.

#the shadows are my favorite characters by far #I like the term busybody to much #Azriel doesn’t know how to deal with feelings properly #I need them to banter more because it gives me life #acotar x reader #acotar #azriel x reader #azriel #rowaelin daughter #rowaelin

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ldrfanatic · 6 months ago

Text

you should be

theodore nott x dead!reader

sorry not sorry abt this. based off of "who's afraid of little old me" by taylor swift.

synopsis - theo's father had beaten it into him to be ruthless despite theo's inherently soft nature. after you're killed in a death eater attacked lead by theo's dad, theodore finally learns to be ruthless.

my bookcase slytherin boys masterpost

all his life, theodore nott had been forced to hide the softest parts of himself. he was a spitting image of his father, which often earned him odd looks and sneers. it was well known in the wizarding world that cantankerous nott murdered his wife. and with a face just like his father's, everyone assumed theo would turn out just the same.

in fact, theodore found the only time he could truly be himself is when he would run away in his dreams. run to be with his mother again. as he got older, his dreams turned to nightmares, and the softness he held inside was buried even further.

and then he met you.

it was third year at hogwarts when theodore nott quite literally ran into you outside of the dungeons. theodore knew he shouldn't like you. he knew it was wrong. you were a slytherin and came from a pureblood family that was vehemently outspoken against blood prejudice.

so theodore knew better. but then he kept running into you. and he just couldn't stop himself from falling for you.

the first time you told him you loved him, something unlocked in theo. it was something that he'd buried a long time ago. the last pure piece of his soul that longed to break through the darkness towards you, the shining light in his life.

that's how you'd always been. you shined light in the deepest darkest corners of theo. for once he hoped that he might make it through the war. when fourth year passed, he grew more certain that good would win and that you could have a life together. fifth and sixth year passed and theo was certain good would prevail.

theo should've known better. he should've known when a sinking feeling settled into his stomach at the beginning of seventh year. voldemort was starting to regain power, but so was the order. still, theo hoped that you would be safe inside hogwarts walls.

theo felt like an idiot.

the familiar feeling of apparation twisted theo's stomach inside out. he held on tight to the bouquet in his hand and tried to picture your family's home as clear as he could in his head.

theo knew as soon as he landed that something was wrong. the smell of smoke hung heavy in the air and his eyes stung from the ash floating in the air. abandoning the flowers, theo took off in a run towards what used to be your house.

the sounds of your mother's wails started to reach theo's ears as he ran. no, no no no. not this. anything but this. his mind caught up before his heart did.

your mother was sitting on her knees in front of a burning house. three bodies lay twisted unnaturally in front of her. your father, your sister, and you. theo felt his throat begin to close up.

"I'm sorry. I just--" a heaving breath. "I just went out for a few things. it was supposed to be quick." thedore let his head tip back as he bellowed his rage and sorrow into the thick dark clouds above him.

in the days that followed, theo found himself leaning into your mother. it was hard. it was hard to look at her face, so similar to yours, without his heart breaking all over again. but he had to put himself to good use. so, once a funeral had been had, theo used some of his money and connections to get your mother as deep into hiding as he could.

you'd never forgive him if something happened to her.

the end of the war was near. theo could feel it in his bones. since your death, he'd joined the order. there was no more bending to his father's will. not after he'd found out that his father was the one who lead the attack on your family.

theo knelt onto one knee in front of a large headstone. reaching up, he gently brushed the leaves and dirt away. his fingers ghosted over the curves of your name, gently carved. theo felt his anger and grief rattling in his bones. he should be able to hug and kiss you when they finally won this fucking war.

"It's happening today." theo paused. "I know you don't condone violence, so I need you to look away for this next part."

his lips pressed into a cold stone, and he allowed himself a few more tears before he promptly locked the softest part of him away for good. this would be his last time visiting you.

theo's footsteps sounded across hard wood floors as he marched into what he assumed was one last meeting before the assault on hogwarts. since your death, theo had painstakingly played a double agent for the order. it was hard to face his father without wanting to rip him limb from limb, but today would finally be a culmination of his unbridled resentment.

in the last meeting, theo had learned that his father was supposed to lead a third assault from the woods and through the dungeons while the other two attacks were directed head on. it was meticulous, and cantankerous nott was the only person that could be entrusted with such a task.

sucks he'd never have the chance to enact it.

a cold, loveless smile greeted from his father greeted theo. but he could see the surprise in his eyes. he wasn't supposed to be here, and everyone in the room knew it.

theo's grip tightened on his wand in his pocket. finally, he'd be with his love soon enough.

"it's fitting father," theo stalked a few silent steps closer to cantankerous nott. "afterall, everyone knows the nott family is cursed to destroying itself."

"what the hell are you doing, boy?! Get out!" his father's voice bellowed through the room.

"not this time father. you," theo gestured lazily. "you fucked up." noting the confusion, theo continued. "you should've left it alone. i was tame. i was content. and then you made me mean. you killed the only soft part left of my soul."

"you wretched boy!"

theo laughed humorlessly at his father's insult. "You caged me and then you called me crazy. I am who I am because you trained me."

with one smooth wrist movement, theo incapacitated the other two death eaters in the room. then, like a tiger after it's prey, he approached his father.

"Are you afraid yet father? You should be. You did this."

then, in a swifter death than his father really deserved, theo ended his life. avada kedavra.

and with his father no longer around to stop him, theo finally achieved a dream he'd had since the death of isabella nott. he didn't even attempt to be quiet as he trashed his father's study. once the rage had settled, theo closed his eyes. a quick incendio should be more than enough to end it all.

the pain that should've followed flames licking at your skin didn't find theo. in fact, as the smoke surrounded him, theo swore he could smell your perfume.

—

oops 🤭

#slytherin boys #slytherin #theodore nott #theo nott #theo nott x reader #theodore nott x reader #slytherin boys x reader

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r0-boat · 8 months ago

Text

Yandere Sitri headcannons

Aishite, Aishite, Aishite! Motto, Motto!

Cw: yandere themes, NSFW, baby trapping, Somnophilia,

Yandere!Sitri x reader

As a being who studied in Hades, perhaps maybe even lived in Hades at some point no matter how long he has lived and served under the king of wrath He will never get rid of is that true deep feeling of envy that gnaws at his stomach like a venomous green-eyed beast. As he stared with eyes full of cold, callus hatred watching all of his colleagues and even other kings fun over you and fight for your attention.

Even Satan would not be safe, as Sitri a loyal Butler and follower his adoration for the King of Gehenna slowly being consumed by his envy of him.

He self-proclaims as himself being the closest to Solomon before his death. And not only that he falls deeper in love with you everyday. It was not just love It was borderline worship. Something that only angels could notice since this deep twisted feeling of loving something to the point of insanity was all too familiar to them.

Sitri was a devil. He couldn't lie to you directly, but he could still deceive. He could still manipulate you in another way, spin half-truths, and try slowly but surely to gain your trust to have you in his arms finally. He knows he'll have a lot of competition to win someone as precious as Solomon's daughter, But he feels confident studying in Hades. That is ruled under envy. He felt as though he had been training for this moment.

As the right-hand devil of a king so possessive as Satan, he has to work in the shadows. He does not have the luxury of being so public with his true desires. And how he thinks of everyone as savage dogs getting in the way. He must ensure that he should be your only choice in the end even if He needs to twist your mind to make you think lies.

However as a devil. The hardest thing he has to do is hold back every aching desire he has in him to not grab you hold you in his arms and drag you to the darkest depths of Gehenna's dungeon so no one, not even the king can find you. Scaring you away would be a death sentence or worse being pinned as a threat to not only your safety but the safety of hell itself.

So he bites his time patiently, waiting patiently, patiently! and patiently laying every card just right so he could snatch you up in the end. Occasionally, his mask does slip, something he could only do when he's giving you his "devil's energy" where you can write it off as some kind of kink. Or filling you up and hoping it takes. He knows very little on human anatomy but he does know that you would never want to leave if you knew you had a baby with a devil.

Hopefully by that time he'll have all his plans would be meticulously drawn out. And hopefully if all goes well after the war he will confess his true love to you and if you don't accept him you won't have a choice He will not leave you He will not let you leave him like last time.

Sometimes he will indulge in his desires sneaking into your room to listen to that soft low drum of that precious heart of yours. By that point he would be slipping more herbs in your tea to help you sleep deeper as he climbs into your bed to feel your body. Pressing his bare skin against yours he feels his cock hardening. Your name not your nickname, Your name slips from his lips like a silent prayer as his cock fucks your plush thighs.

Other times, he will keep notebooks filled to the brim with information about the type of toothpaste you use. He will know you and your body down to the kilogram. And, of course, Sitri will use that information to try to gain your favor.

And oh, how he would worship you; serve you like royalty and a lover. How he dreams of waking up to you snuggling against him so close that the only thing he can hear is the sound of your hearts intertwined, beating as one as you snuggle into his chest.

He's as intelligent as he is delusional, Don't even attempt trying to manipulate him He will see right through you. He will not punish or break you.

#smut #yandere men #male yandere #whb #whb sitri #what in hell is bad #wihib #whb x reader

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chlorinecake · 2 years ago

Note

If it's possible, could you make a yandere enhypen story, where the reader usually goes out late at night to a convenience store for some late night snacks, but some pervert tries her, but one of the members had been following her and help her, I'm sorry if it doesnt make any sense but yeah...😀 (recently my delusions have been getting to me)

“convenient chances” 🎱

pairing: stalker!yandere!enhypen x afab!reader

cw: harassment, violence, mentions of smoking, paranoia/anxiety, language, kidnapping, bad-ish ending lol

wc: 3.1k — read part ll and lll here

LIKE A DUNGEON with fear cementing every corner, you struggle to savor the silence in your waking life.

Doubting all and believing none, your close friend Sunoo convinced you that your nervous aches and night sweats were a mere result of paranoia. He always judged the way you’d peek over your shoulder in public as if waiting to be attacked.

Clicking sounds from your window startled your rest during the night, with nightmares of seven tall hooded strangers blinding your judgement.

You're sure everyone's experienced the phenomenon of “gaze perception” at least once in their lives, in which a person might sense or assume that a pair of predatory eyes are stalking them from afar.

You didn’t like to use the word trauma to define your past experiences, but this wasn’t your first time feeling like a cloud of trouble waited to pour down on you. At this point, all you could do was hope that your intuition wasn’t right this time.

It was only a few months ago when you broke up with your abusive ex-boyfriend, Jay. The memories still linger as if they occurred yesterday, freshly cryptic in your mind. From your point of view, he started off as a charming casual acquaintance, which soon developed into a crush and then a toxic relationship. He outlined a list of rules for you to follow when he was away, ordering you around like a child. Anytime you even came close to breaking one of his orders, he’d beat the shit out of you, saying that his rage was out of love.

From Jay’s point of view, you weren’t just an obsession, but a belonging—his favorite humanoid toy to play with. He threatened that if you ever left him, he’d come back for you one day, saying that he’d never stop watching you.

And so, you moved. Not far, but a good distance away. You didn’t feel protected anymore in your usual environment. Though, there was one place in which you felt completely safe—free from watchful eyes and hostile hands. It was the tatty old convenience store a few blocks from where you live. The place hadn’t developed much since what appeared to be a decade or two ago, but they always supplied the most tasty, high quality snacks you could get your hands on.

As silly as it may sound, the fallout shop was your haven, and you grew particularly fond of shopping there late at night when it was less crowded.

You walked passed the familiar electronic doors, the fluorescent ceiling lights sparkling off of the bleach-mopped tiles. The usually uplifting radio station was replaced with the chilling whoosh of air circulating through the vents.

“Hello! Welcome to Goldman’s 24-hour convenience,” a friendly accented voice chimed. “Hello,” you returned with a nod, a bit confused by the new face. The usual cashier was an elder women by the name of Mandy. Her laughter alone could make some of your darkest nights glimmer again.

The young man wore a name tag on his dark blue collared shirt: Jake. You couldn’t help but wonder why Mandy wasn’t working her usual night shift, but you didn’t care enough to interrogate the seemingly content boy.

Picking up a hand basket, you explored the aisle's shelves in search for something savory or sweet to snack on. Your gaze swiveled ahead of you before landing on the sight of two hooded strangers blocking your path. This time, a bit of their faces showed, revealing the devious smirks that spoke so many silent words through their sealed lips:

You can run, but you can’t hide from us, ____. For as long as we live, you’re not allowed to feel safe anywhere.

Goosebumps sprouted on the surface of your skin, nerves dancing around in your fingers until they became wobbling rods. It’s almost like you forgot to breathe due to the overwhelming terror, feeling frozen from within as the plastic basket slipped from your grasp, a loud clatter echoing throughout the store.

You remembered all of the horrible things Jay said he would do to you once he found you again. The bruises you concealed with makeup that Jay referred to as his "strawberry kisses” would have nothing on what you felt was coming your way.

“Are you okay, miss?” A kind male voice asked, snatching you from your trance and back to reality. You turned to meet the man behind you, revealing his concerned yet warm features. He picked up the basket you dropped, still processing that your mind successfully tricked you into seeing something that wasn’t actually there.

“Yes, I’m alright, t-thank you,” you smiled but it didn’t reach your eyes, looking more awkward than reassuring.

He pressed three finger's against your forehead, “I don’t think you’re being honest with me,” he frowned, your hot and damp forehead telling him that something was wrong. “I’m sorry, I haven’t even introduced myself yet,” he stuck out one hand for you to shake and the other to pass you back your basket. “My name is Heeseung,” he smiled, “I’m new in town with an affinity for convenience stores.”

“____, with an affinity to drop flimsy baskets in public,” you replied, suddenly feeling at ease from the humor. You started trailing to the ramen section and Heeseung was walking behind you. If it wasn’t for his kindness earlier, you’d probably be freaking out about how close he was. You reached for a spicy udon noodle pack that came with dehydrated tofu and seaweed sheets. Meanwhile, Heeseung grabbed a can of Spam and chicken flavored ramen.

“Speaking of your liking for convenience stores, I come here almost every night and I’ve never seen you before.“

“Well, yeah, I’m usually here earlier in the day. I just happened to need some gas and got hungry while waiting, so I decided to stop by for my favorites,” he peered into your basket, "You might wanna get some milk with those, too. It's ungodly how spicy they are!"

"I know, right? They're just so delicious, I can't resist them..."

"Still, Sapporo Ichiban instant noodles are the best! They always cook perfectly. Never too soft or too firm. It's my comfort food, honestly. I wanna hug the person who created them," he replied passionately.

"Eh, you're just gonna ruin 'em anyways."

He gave you a double look, "Are you passively judging my cooking skills or fat shaming me?"

"Neither. I'm shaming that pink block of salt you're gonna punish your organs with."

He scoffed, "This anti-Spam movement is outrageous! I'm starting an online protest where you'll be the number one convert."

"As if I'd ever try that...stuff," you rejected.

"Welp. More for me, I guess," he mumbled, digging into his jacket pocket.

“Dammit, I forgot my wallet in my car,” he said, placing his basket high up on the shelf. “If you see anyone try to take my stuff, kick ‘em in the shin for me,” he said before running out of the shop.

Analyzing your surroundings, you noticed that a few groups of shoppers and some solo snackers began raiding the bread aisle. You distracted yourself by heading to the refrigerator section, considering Heeseung’s recommendation of getting a smooth beverage to accompany your spicy noodles, tossing in a pack of strawberry flavored Pocky's on your way.

That’s when you felt an arm wrap around your waist, pulling you in before giving your head a sniff, his nose was wet and cold like a dog as he inhaled your scent. “What the hell are you doing?” You barked, pushing the creepy stranger away.

He was a middle aged man with a receding hairline and a few scars decorating his thin chapped lips. You wondered how many of those scares came from women he tried that “arm around the waist” shit on.

“Sorry, doll. I’m a hugger and figured you might've needed one,” he grinned, revealing the gnarly set of teeth that lined his grey gums. You couldn't tell if it was his foul breath or filthy clothes that smelled more like smoke. Either way, you were thoroughly disgusted by him.

“Well, you should learn to ask before throwing yourself on people,” you retorted, reaching for a container of banana milk.

“You like swallowing bananas, cutie? I bet I could force four of 'em down that pretty mouth of yours,” he slithered while adjusting himself in his pants.

What the hell is wrong with this guy, you thought to yourself.

You tried to ignore his lunacy, only for him to grip your ass like a stress ball, landing a harsh slap across the curve of your jeans. You yelped at the sting, your own words being caught in your throat from the shocking act. You couldn’t believe that this freak actually just did that to you.

He met your eyes with a wink, smelling his hand as if you just provided him with an expensive perfume sample, "You got a lover at home, sweetheart?"

Tears dared to pour from your rage-ridden eyes as you balled your fists so tight, your bones might break. That's when a protective figure filled your blurry peripheral vision, stepping in front of you to block the man off as he tried grabbing you again, pushing him with such a force that he lost his balance.

“The hell do you think you’re doing, y'scrawny mother fucker,” he growled, pulling up is pants.

“You can’t do that kind of sick shit to people, pervert! Now get the hell outta here or I'll call the police,” the younger boy fought back.

“I was just trying to have some fun, kiddo. Ain’t nothin' wrong with that. I bet honey doll misses me already,” the older man went on, licking at his lower lip.

“I’ll knock every last rotting tooth from your mouth if you don’t leave in the next five seconds-"

“Hey, what’s going on over here?” Jake asked in the middle of the commotion, the older man already fleeing the scene. Jake looked at the younger boy first before eventually meeting your eyes. You wish you could hide how shaken up you felt. The container of milk was bleeding out its strong banana scent on the once spotless floor, tears finally streaming down your cheeks.

“Oh my God, Jungwon, what happened,” Heeseung came running over, asking the boy who defended you. “It was nothing,” you interrupted before Jungwon could answer, the three boys standing dumbfounded around you in a puddle of banana milk. “Do you need a ride-" “Don’t worry about me,” your voice cracked in embarrassment.

Is there any way to explain how the world made you ashamed of your own tears?

You left your basket behind, apologizing to Jake who had to clean up the sticky mess. You didn’t wanna leave just yet, afraid that the older guy might be waiting for you outside, so you went to the ladies restroom instead to call your friend Sunoo.

“____?”

You cleared the lump in your throat before answering, “Sunoo,” you began shakily, “I need you to come and pick me up from Goldman's.”

“You sound terrible, is everything okay? You’re worrying me, what happened?”

“I’m sorry, Sun. Everything’s okay, I just really need you right now.”

“____,” he sighed. You suddenly felt guilty for even calling him.

“Sunoo, if you can’t make it, I won’t be mad at you,” you said in between the silence, trying to encourage him to make a choice.

“I-I can’t, well, I can, but, not soon, at least. I’m only an hour away, if you’re willing to wait that long.” The pity in his voice made you wanna cry all over again. Looking at the time on your phone, it was six minutes til midnight, and you refused to haul your best friend out on the road this late. “No, that’s alright, Sunoo. I’ll just call an Uber.”

His side of the phone fell quiet for a moment. “____, I know how much you hate Uber's. Don't do that to yourself because of me."

"I'll be okay, Sun, just get yourself some rest."

He paused before asking, "Are you sure?”

“Yeah. I’ll talk to you later, okay?”

“Of course! Call me when you get home!”

You finished up in the bathroom, mentally preparing yourself to face the strangers beyond the not-so-comforting walls of the restroom. To your surprise, Heeseung and Jungwon were still in the store. Huddled around Jake at the checkout counter, the three of them took loud sips from steaming cups of ramen. “Hey, ____,” Heeseung began, resting his snack on the counter. “We could help you file a report against that guy, if you want.”

Jungwon met your eyes with his own sincere ones, “He should pay for the way he treated you.” Jake put your basket from earlier on the counter, dry items taking the place of the previously wet ones.

“Do you still want these," he asked shyly. After everything that happened, you felt empty in more than one way. Some warm broth and noodles is exactly what your body needed at the moment. You nodded, handing Jake a $20 bill. Beeping sounds immediately met your ears as he scanned your items with a strange haste. You looked back to Heeseung and Jungwon.

“Getting the police involved will only make it harder for me to forget this ever even happened. Thank you for your concern, though,” you smile at the humble pair before they took the final gulps from their ramen cups before discarding them.

“Here’s your change,” Jake chirped, handing you the plastic bag of goodies. “Thank you,” you bowed, heading to the exit.

“Y'sure you don't need a ride?” Jungwon asked. You flashed him your phone screen. “Uber,” was all you said before walking into the black of the night, the sliding doors closing behind you.

According to your smartphone, you should expect your chauffeur, Sunghoon, to arrive shortly in a black truck with tinted windows. The vehicle came speeding through the parking lot, a chill wind hitting your features. The truck was so dark, that it almost blended into the night. He rolled down the window, looking you up and down.

"Name?"

"Uh, ____," you said, his blunt question catching you off guard.

"Get in," he replied, directing a thumb to the back seat, unlocking the door as you slid in, bumping into another passenger. Immediately caught by his dark eyes, the boy waved slightly, muttering a deep “Welcome aboard,” before fixing his gaze out the window again. The truck sat idly as Sunghoon delayed taking off, exchanging a few hushed words to the guy sitting in the front passenger's seat.

Click.

The backseat doors opened from both ends, Heeseung, Jungwon, and Jake joining you in the black vehicle. "Scoot over, Niki," Jungwon complained, trying to get comfortable in the crammed space. That's when you saw one last person join you all in the truck, his face capturing the moonlight like a thief.

"Sunoo?! W-what are you doing here? I thought you were an hour away!" All he did was frown in response. He always made that face whenever he was hiding something from you. "Sunoo," you pressed, nudging his shoulder.

"Oh please, would you just shut the hell up already," the hostile driver growled at you.

You screwed your eyes brows in confusion, "What's going on here," you inquired, now feeling anxiety start to creep up on you.

"The very thing I warned you about before you abandoned me," the front passenger bit back.

That voice. You knew exactly who it belonged to.

It was Jay, your looney ex-lover, sitting right in front of you. An angry yet pitiful scowl contaminated his handsome features.

You pushed through Heeseung, reaching for the door handle, only for Niki, the quietest yet scariest one, to snatch your wrist, pulling you into his tantalizing grip. "Let me go," you yelped, only for Jungwon to harshly cover your mouth.

Screech.

Sunghoon pulled off at a dangerous speed, causing your bodies to shake in the truck. Heeseung crossed his legs cooly as if he wasn't just casually talking with you in the store, “So when do we get to have fun with her, again? It’s not like she did any good entertaining me through conversation.”

Jake rolled his eyes at Heeseung, “I could’ve used your enthusiasm when I had to stuff that fat old chick in the freezer. Alone. On top of that, I had to mop the floor quintillion times before the blood stains got out.”

“At least you’d make a good house husband,” Sunghoon joked.

You felt your heart sink to the pit of your stomach at Jake’s confession: He killed Mandy.

"I'm sorry, ____," Sunoo whispered, fighting back tears as he hid his face from you.

Everything was starting to make sense now.

The visions of seven hooded boys.

The clicking sounds you'd hear from outside your window at night.

The way you could never shake the feeling that you were being watched.

Jay’s past words echoed in the back of your mind:

"If you ever decide to leave me, don't ever think that you'll get very far before I catch up. I'll always be watching you."

You bit Jungwon's hand, causing him to retreat his palm from your flushed face. "Sunoo, you betrayed me! You told me that I was paranoid when you knew exactly what was going on behind my back! I felt safe with you...I trusted you! And you fucking lied to me!"

"God, I've had just about enough of her nagging," Niki said, landing a fisted blow across your face. As you faded out of consciousness, Jay tried to soothe your daze.

“Even though I betrayed you and beat you, it was only my funny way of expressing how much I love you. Can’t you see that I did all of that out of love?”

You could still hear Sunoo pleading for your forgiveness in the background as you held onto the last strand of your consciousness.

"I've been watching you for a long time, love. You always try to escape me and I never understood why you just wouldn't listen to me. All I've ever done is love you and try to protect you. This time, I’ll make sure you’ve learned your lesson.”

And that was the last thing you heard before retreating to the vacancy of your mind, floating around in the silence of your oblivion. Left in the hands of seven reckless boys who’d successfully lured you into their cat trap, you didn’t know what to expect once you’d open your eyes, but you knew it wouldn’t be anything good.

In that time, you came to the unsettling conclusion that broken toys were Jay’s favorite, and if you weren’t already broken upon being found, you would be by time he’s done playing with you.

☆ ᴀ/ɴ: in no way, shape, or form does this fanfic intend to romanticize unhealthy relationships or abusive behaviors. i simply write for entertainment and creative purposes. thus, reader discretion is always advised.

☆ ᴘ.ꜱ: special thanks to the fabulous anon who requested this piece! i played around with the plot a bit, but I hope you all enjoyed reading it! if you guys would like a version of this story with a happier ending, let me know in the comments!

☆ taglist (based off of users that personally requested to be on my taglist, my faves, and people that I've noticed interacting with my yandere content) ~

@fanficfactoryfoxxx @ashgonedash @yourmomscuntis2tighy @yngwife @03sunoos @kaykay11sworld @maryismad @gigiramirezsblog @hoonsyo @en-thralled @haechansheart @night-en-shining-armor @cutiejseong

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