#Fall and break an ankle on the cobble stone

[goldenstarprincesses]

Where the Wild Things Are by Luke Combs is the number 1 older brother America/little brother Canada song

[sabraeal]

Get Up Eight, Chapter 9

[Read on AO3]

Written for @ccprovolomies, who won the Trope Madness kitty this year! AND LOOK I DIDN’T MAKE HER WAIT HALF A YEAR FOR IT. I’m so on top of this whole prompt thing 🤣 (Please don’t ask when I plan to get the runner up’s prompt out...)

It is an easier road to Odawara than Obi’s dire warnings prepare her for. Though the cobbles are worn, their hard edges rounded by the passage of a hundred years and a thousand feet, they are solid beneath her, ceding no ground no matter how nature has pressed its claim. Compared to Hiratsuka’s marshlands, hungrily claiming the road one stone at a time until all that’s left is a slippery arch, this might as well be a pleasant garden stroll.

And Shirayuki lasts hardly an hour on it before she must admit: Obi was right. Her feet will not make it to the shukuba.

It’s not that they hurt; no, that would be preferable. She is used to carrying the weight of her own discomfort. Certainly the blossoming bruise on her back, an open palm against the stretch of her spine, stands as testament to that.

No, her trouble is that they have gone far past pain, no longer aching and burning, but instead-- instead she feels them not at all. As if there are two square blocks strapped to her ankles rather than feet, growing more distant with every step. Shirayuki has not progressed far enough in her studies to diagnose with any authority, but, well-- a numbness of the extremities is hardly ever a sign of health.

Still, she cannot bear to admit it. To have to call out to all these road-wearied men and inform them that she cannot, after all, keep up with them. That they will indeed have to stop and accommodate her softness, her inexperience.

It is what an ojou-san would do with not a single thought. But Shirayuki-- Shirayuki cannot.

Children are not born walking; it is a skill they acquire through experience, through pulling up and falling down, from taking risks and failing. And that is what Shirayuki must do anew: learn how to walk, only this time without the use of her feet. A harder prospect in practice than she could ever conceive of in her own mind.

Her thighs bear the brunt of the work; she must lift up her leg farther, winning more space for her limp foot to drag before she sets it back down again. It cannot look natural, and yet, none of the men seem to take notice. Or, if they do, none seem to care. And the one who would--

Ah, well, he marches in front of her, shoulders tense, not sparing a single glance. It’s been like this since they left Oiso; Obi staunchly silent, sullen as he leads them down this winding road, and the rest of the men following suit, uneasy glances the only thing passed between them. It’s that silence she would have to break to tell him of her problem, that gap she would have to close, and she-- she--

She can’t. To admit that he’s right, to confirm that she cannot be trusted to evaluate her own ability-- she would rather her feet fall off first.

Thankfully, fate sees to it that she does not have to. One minute she is walking, and the next, she spills across the dust and stone, breath heaving out in a single great gasp.

“Jou-chan?”

It’s a broader hand than she expects to see reaching toward her, only a shade darker than her own, palm still soft when it fits around hers. Mihaya smiles when she meets his eyes, a chagrined cant that commiserates rather than pities. “Need a hand up?”

It’s reflex to push it away, to insist that she can stand on her own two feet, but now that she can hardly feel them, the foolishness of it galls her. Her pride may sting more than her bruises when she takes his offer, but those sort of wounds recover far faster.

Her knees get under her easy enough, but when she moves to raise to her feet, her ankles refuse to bend. Or rather, to hold; she puts her full weight on one to draw the next beneath her, and she drops painfully onto her fleshiest part, nearly dragging down her and her savior.

It’s the sort of spectacle that should garner a laugh, or at least a crowd. She can already imagine Obi’s knowing look, the self-satisfied glint marring his concern as he bends down to ask, are you ready to be carried now, ojou-san?

But when she dares to lift her eyes and face her shame, there is only Mihaya gazing back, this time with marked unease. He’s kept his feet somehow, both of them braced against the earth, eyes wide above them.

“Huh,” he manages, his mouth taking time to wrap around the whole of the sound.

“Sorry.” She ducks her head to hide the heat creeping up her cheeks. “I think maybe I’ve, ah, asked a little bit too much of myself.”

One corner of his smile dimples. “Maybe. Here, if I take this for you--”

His fingers wrap around the cloth tied at her shoulder, and with a firm tug, for a moment her burden lifts. For a breath, she only carries herself and nothing else.

It’s terrifying.

There’s a rational part of her that understands his meaning, that appreciates the service he is trying to do her, but that-- that is Ojii-san. “No!”

It’s too much, too loud for such a quiet space; her words leap from tree to tree until the whole road sings with her protest. If she hadn’t had an audience before, she has it now, every one of Mihaya’s men turning back to see her on the ground, tears welling in her eyes, her hands held up to stave them off.

It only follows: so does Obi.

His face sets stiff as porcelain, a mask cracked once and mended, forbidding in its cast. “Ojou-san--?” 

There’s no missing the way his gaze shifts to Mihaya, narrow brows striking down to shatter his calm into outrage. Obi plays at leisure and laziness, the classic sluggish servant making a fool of his master, but Shirayuki has not missed the tension in his limbs, the precise grace of his movements-- and now it rises to the surface, coiled strength in every muscle, begging for a reason to be expended, to be set free. His long fingers reach out, not for the hilt of his sword, but behind, and--

And Mihaya sets his back between them, smile guileless as he suggests, “Maybe I should carry you instead.”

It is a pity that Mihaya is made of flesh and not paper; at least then she might be able to see Obi’s shadow through him, might observe what shape his anger takes. Not that it would change her mind-- even as she tries to peer around the ronin’s hip, she is already reaching out, her hand grasping his once again.

“Maybe,” she says slowly, savoring the taste. “Maybe you should.”

Shirayuki anticipates disaster with each preparation Mihaya makes to lift her.

“There’s no need to fear, jou-chan,” he laughs, arranging her arms over his shoulders. “You’re light as a feather. All you need to do is rest your weight on me, and I’ll handle the rest.”

“But--” there’s Ojii-san to think of-- “it’s--” not possible that her only contribution to this operation is her weight, that he doesn’t need more from her--

“Up we go!” he grunts, and then there she is, higher in the air than she’s been since Ojii-san could carry her. “There, now squeeze your knees-- perfect.”

Perfect, he says, but she must look obscene pressed up against him, like one of the women in the back alleys, ready to earn their coin. True, it might be her front to his back, but her legs are spread just as wide, accommodating the narrow line of his waist, just the same as them. And when his hands reach down, she braces herself for them fumbling beneath the fabric, taking the invitation men speak of as implicit once a woman bares herself in any way--

But he simply places it on her knee. Not where the skin is but over the cloth, squeezing it once. A...comforting gesture.

“Not so bad, is it, jou-chan?” His head turns, just enough for her to make out the line of his smile. “Traveling the way a princess should.”

Her fingers knit in the cotton of his yukata, a faded orange bleeding through her fingers. “I’m not a princess.”

His mouth slants even higher. “Doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be treated as one.”

A reply sits on the tip of her tongue, but he hitches her up so suddenly she swallows it, too busy on holding on tight. Her gaze nervously flicks up to the road before them, searching for loose rocks and fallen branches, anything that might be an unseen hazard, but--

But instead she sees Obi, his hands clenched by his side. When he turns his back, he doesn’t look at them.

Or rather, not at her.

Not once.

The rush of running water burbles through the trees before Shirayuki can see a hint of it, clinging to the leaves as steadily as the sun clings to the horizon. “Is that a river?”

“The Sakawa,” Mihaya provides as easily as his own name. “We’ll have to cross it before we reach Odawara.”

Her feet tingle where they hang, the feeling pricking back into her soles, making her eager to move, to run. It’s impressive how far her mount has been able to carry her, but still-- Shirayuki can never truly be comfortable relying on another to shoulder her burden, not when she still has a perfectly good back all on her own. “But we’re close?” 

It’s strange to feel his nod rather than see it, the coarse strands of his hair brushing against her chin and scratching along her neck. But to look down is dizzying, and out beyond the bend in this road is a river, wide enough to hear from a handful of ri away. She squints into the distance, as if she might be able to see its shape through the trees, but--

But she’s distracted by a tall back. A tall back and shoulders set as straight as a beam, head rigidly facing forward. Unforgiving, Obaa-san would have called it, but he has no reason to be so with her. Not when he himself offered to carry her only this morning. Not when he’s the one who told her that that rest was just as important as progress.

If she looks away, it has nothing to do with guilt. Only-- only that she might see the river better a little to his left.

“You’re awfully quiet up there, jou-chan,” Mihaya muses merrily. “A young lady like you must have a lot on her mind.”

His arch tone implies ‘like your husband’ louder and clearer than words ever could. For that would be the concern of an ojou-san dressed as fine as Kino-san’s mother dressed her; the woman Mihaya believes her to be.

“Ah...” It would be a mistake to disabuse him of the notion, to imply that the behavior of her guard concerns her more than is seemly. “You are quite educated, are you not, Mihaya-dono?”

He puffs beneath her, chest pressing out to fill her hands. “Some would say so.”

Deception may cause her to stumble, but flattery-- that Shirayuki knows in spades. And like any man she’s had in her sake house, Mihaya seems particularly susceptible to it. “Not many could quote Saigyo as naturally as you.”

She certainly couldn’t; just recalling the name has her squinting into the horizon. There’s more certainly more of a chance she’ll find it there than her own memory.

“Well,” he hums, voice lowering into the timbre of confidence. “I was not always a ronin.”

And clearly, he was eager for others not to think of him as one either. Kino too had tutors, enough to make him the match of any samurai’s son, but even still, he had not talked her ear off about tanka and hokku. But then, numbers had always interested him more than words, and pragmatism rather than poetry.

She hums in reply, a placeholder for the much prettier response she composes in her head, the sort of flattery that keeps a man focused on his own achievements, rather than the knowledge she may or may not know--

But the river steals the words from her, tumbling them out to the sea. And behind it rises walls, and further yet--

“Oh,” she breathes, fingers tightening over his chest. “There’s a castle.”

The shore shifts beneath her sandals, each stone a knife’s point held against her soles, but still, Shirayuki does not ask to be carried. Not now that her own two feet will hold her, now that she can look out upon the Sakawa and take in its greatness. Its waters weave and part as if it were no more than some great braid, a kami’s hair ornament wrought in blue silk and studded with jade.

“Come now, jou-chan.” Mihaya turns to her, his long tail fluttering in the breeze. “You’ve seen a river, haven’t you?”

“I have!” She might manage a more commanding tone if her jaw would close, but it’s impossible in front of such a sight. “It’s just so-- so big. And we’re to cross it?”

Mihaya huffs out a laugh, shaking his head. “It’s not so bad. You paid to cross at Kawasaki, didn’t you?”

Across the sand, Obi stiffens. His eyes have not so much as wandered to her for hours, but now they peer over his shoulder, narrowed thin as blades. Not to Mihaya, but to her, coiled in wait of her answer.

He expects her to tell the truth-- no, to blurt it out, as uncontrollable and inevitable as the river’s current, to tell this man she has only known since morning the whole of her life story. Three days, and Obi believes he knows her the way a swordsman knows his palm, the way a brewer knows his sake.

It is, she admits, a pleasure to disappoint him. “I swam it.”

Mihaya’s mouth falls before it rises, head cocked in question. “You swam it, jou-chan? That’s some skill for a lady.”

“I grew up on the water.” Obi’s eyes bore into her cheek, his disbelief palpable against her skin. “My parents thought it prudent to avoid accident. Eyes can never be on a child all the time, after all.”

His friendly smile wavers, and when Mihaya speaks, it is arch, spoken as if he stood upon a hill and she below it. “So you mean to swim the Sakawa as well? You won’t find it so tame as the Tama.”

She lets her mouth curve, holding her smile tight as she replies, “Nor am I so tame as other ladies, Mihaya-dono.”

His eyes flash, lips pressing together as he glances away, watching the water rush out to sea. “Won’t be easy in that pretty kimono of yours, will it?”

Shirayuki blinks, her hand brushing against its smooth collar. Miyoko-san would weep if she ever heard of such a thing. “Ah...”

“Your hair covering too,” Mihaya presses, stepping closer, a strange light gleaming in his eyes. “No use in getting that wet either, jou-chan.”

She shuffles back, knives pricking her feet with every step, but still he reaches out, finger hooked to slip beneath its fold--

Until another bands around his wrist, a bronze shackle holding him in painful place. Or so she assumes from the way his hand spasms, fingers turning to talons before the fall limp, too far to grasp her.

“No need, ojou-san,” Obi says, so polite, despite the way Mihaya twists in his grasp. “You’ll ride on my shoulders.”

It is a proclamation that draws attention; at least that of the river porters, big men who make it their business to see that only those that slip them the proper amount of coin see their way across. They are happy to take Obi’s-- at least, after a few minutes’ hearty debate, they become happy to, though they scowl when he turns his back before moving on to harry Mihaya and his men.

Most of them have already stripped down to their fundoshi; it’s hardly a surprise to find thick, ropy scars tracing over their bodies, legacies of wounds poorly healed. A samurai’s life is not an easy one these days, and a ronin’s fate a far sight worse. What these men have done to survive...it would not do to speculate.

Mihaya, however, is smooth-skinned beneath his yukata, pale where the sun has not had its chance to press its case. These men may follow him, but it has not been a long arrangement, and he the least experienced among them. That, or the most lucky.

It’s not her place to speculate. Not yet, at least. Not unless...

“It’s done.” Obi crosses the sand to meet her, walking with such ease she wonders if he too was born by the shore, and given far more cause to walk its waters. “They’ll let us pass, even if they’re not too happy about those ones following behind.”

He chucks his chin toward where Mihaya and his men stand, voices already raised even if the words are lost to the river’s current. No one here looks like a government official-- but then, no one looks like an authority with only a single scrap of cloth to over them. “Have they done something to be barred from crossing?”

Obi snorts. “Oh, I’m sure they have, ojou-san. But that’s not what the porters worry about. They just want to be paid, and too many men crossing on their own is bad for business. Gives people ideas about how they might save their coin.”

“But--”

His fingers have never looked so long as they do tugging at his obi, sheath falling into his palm with the ease of a lover reunited. The rest falls away easily, hakama slipping down his hips, and-- and her words shrivel on her tongue, like petals left in the grass. “What...?”

“Ojou-san?” Gold rises to meet her, a question written in his eyes. Or at least, until he traces her gaze right to where his kimono parts, a deep vee from shoulders to navel, bronze as far as the eye can see.

“What are you--?” her mouth works, so dry words won’t stick to her tongue-- “Why are you--?”

It should be illegal how indecent his smile is, how low his voice drops when he rumbles, “Ojou-san. You can’t possibly want me to walk into the river fully dressed.”

His kimono slides off his shoulders, baring taut, sun-seared flesh, and she manages. “O-of course not. It’s only...”

She stares down at her hem, trying to find the words-- no, the thoughts to speak, but instead she remembers the heat of him in the tea house, the solid wall of his chest against her back; the flash of red beneath the moonlight in Yokohama, begging her to explore further--

Shirayuki has never been able to tie her obi with nearly as much precision as Miyoko-san, and it shows by the way it parts so easily in her hands, sliding across her palms with the ease of silk.

The noise that looses from Obi’s throat is half alarm, half...something else. A groan, perhaps, if she flatters herself. “Ojou-san! What are you doing?”

Her fingers fumble with her ties, tangled as firmly as the string itself. “I can’t possibly wear this in the water.”

“But, ojou-san...” It’s his hands that catch her kimono when she shrugs it from her shoulders, holding it as gently as paper between his palms. “I’m carrying you.”

There is little beside color to set her juban aside from any yukata, but it is enough-- she’s exposed like this, the shades of her body just barely obscured by the cloth. “I am well aware. But still, look, out there--” she gestures to porters only a few fingers shorter than Obi himself, wading up to their shoulders-- “it would be so simple to drench the cotton, and then what would Kino’s mother say to me, should we see each other again?”

Obi holds himself still for but a moment, a breath, and with its exhale he collapses, shaking his head.

“This is a pretty piece,” he tells her, folding it with an almost reverent precision; a ritual, instead of a chore. “But you need a more practical wardrobe.”

“I--”

“Jou-chan!” Mihaya jogs over, smile wide and stomach muscles flexed. Even in repose, Obi cuts a more impressive figure. “We’ve moved things among our packs to make the crossing easier, and I have a set of free shoulders. Do you have any-- ah, there, I see.”

She’s too late to stop him; his eyes fix on Ojii-san’s hiding place, and his hand reaches out--

A crack echoes across the bank, and it’s not until her palm stings that she realizes-- she did that. She slapped his hand.

“Ah!” she gasps, horror welling withing her. “Mihaya-dono! I didn’t mean to-- it was simply reflex--”

“Haah.” He shakes out his hand, palm opening but not quite closing. “No, no, jou-chan, don’t apologize. It’s my fault. I just thought, since you already have two between you, and Obi is carrying you...”

“Oh!” She stares down at the cloth in her hands before hastily stuffing it into the other sack. “Yes, here, my clothes. Thank you for the help.”

Mihaya’s lips twitch, not towards a smile. “I’ll guard it with my life.”

He walks away without another word, no spring left in his step, and no smiles-- uneven or otherwise-- for his men.

“Careful, Ojou-san,” Obi murmurs, suddenly by her side. “He might well steal that too. Good fabric sells for a pretty penny far enough out from civilization.”

Her cheeks puff out, annoyed. “You’re being unkind.”

“I’m being practical.” He glances down at their feet, at the bags still sprawled on the sand. “I should be holding that bag for you.”

Shirayuki shakes her head. “Mihaya’s right. You’re already carrying me. Besides, you know I--”

“I didn’t mean now,” he says, too serious, too close. When she looks up, gold is waiting for her, liquid as honey. “But some day, ojou-san, you will have to trust me.”

“I...I do.” She’s surprised to find how much she believes that. “It’s not that. It’s only...”

Duty. She’d told him that only a day ago. To tell him again now would only invite question. “Do you think Mihaya-dono and his men are truly traveling to Kyoto?”

Obi snorts, shaking his head. “They certainly are now. Unless a better opportunity finds them.”

“I was thinking...” Her lip slips beneath her teeth, taking the brunt of her worry. “If they are, perhaps I should pay them--”

“You’ve got to be kidding.” Obi stares down at her. “That monkey?”

“I’m not.” Her breath huffs from her. “If the roads are as dangerous as people say, then perhaps--perhaps it might be best to have more than just one man watching over me.”

“Ojou san.” Obi drops down to his knees, and a rush of heat follows him, settling between her legs as he meets her eyes. “I’m the only sword you’ll ever need.”

“I...” She can’t catch her breath. “I believe you, Obi.”

But he doesn’t, not by the way his eyes tighten. “Hakone. Give your decision until Hakone, ojou-san, and then...then I’ll hear you out.”

“That’s...” She swallows. “That’s fair. You can, um, stand, Obi-dono.”

He laughs. “No, I can’t.”

“Obi...?”

“Ojou-san,” he huffs, too amused. “You’re supposed to be getting on my shoulders.”

[zephyrcove]

Lol no, It isn't on you cause I should have just read it later, but I couldn't keep myself from it. Anyways the next prompt: "I'm sorry- will you just listen to me, please" I'm in the mood for angst lol. Ily 😘😁

One serving of angst for you K, freshly beta’d by the phenomenal @theroomofreq

------------

Trust

Lily tore down the corridor after him, first years jumping aside as she went forward, tunnel-vision in high gear. Following the tail of his cloak as he whipped around a corner, she just barely caught him slipping behind a Gryffindor tapestry on the left side of the hall, the heavy fabric hitting the stone walls with a thwap as he disappeared. Steeling herself, her brow creasing in determination, she sidestepped a Ravenclaw and glanced behind her before grabbing the embroidered Godric by the ankle and stepping into the secret passage.

Her hurried footsteps fell heavily in the echo of the tunnel until she paused, realizing hers were the only set she could hear. Closing her eyes tightly and letting out a sharp, frustrated exhale, she turned back towards the soft glow peeking through the edges of the tapestry and walked slowly back down the passage, trailing her fingers along the cobbled walls as she went. Halfway back, her right hand met the resistance of invisible fabric and her fingers grasped at it as James pulled out from under it, his pace frenzied as he stormed toward the exit.

“James!” The invisibility cloak limp in her hand, she chased after him, desperate to catch up before he made it back into the traffic of the main corridor. 

“I’m sorry––will you just listen to me, please.” Something in her tone must have struck a chord in him because his heavy footsteps halted about two feet from the opening. Lily looked on as James kept his back to her, hands in his hair, and heard the shaky sigh he let out before turning back toward her.

Lily’s eyes shone with a hint of tears as she stepped toward him gently, reaching a hand out to brush his shoulder. He kept his eyes on the floor but let her hand rest there.

“James, I’m–I’m so sorry love. I know we talked about… about not engaging with them when we’re alone––and you’ve been so good about it...” She shifted the cloak in her grasp and took a shuffling step closer before she went on. “I just––couldn’t let them get away with it. Again. I didn’t mean to keep it from you, I wasn’t hiding that it happened, I just knew that it would hurt and I didn’t want you to feel that way.”

He lifted his eyes to meet hers, glinting in the low light of the hallway. “Well I am feeling that way, so what good did keeping it from me do? What good did getting Remus to keep it from me do?” The hurt in his voice was clear and Lily held back the tears that were threatening to spill over her lashes as she listened. “I know it hurts to hear them say that shit, I respect you for protecting him and standing up for yourself but–– God, Lily, every time I think about you facing them alone––the things they could do to you on the off chance you’re too outnumbered to have a chance––it makes my heart stop. When Sirius told me today that they’d come after you again––that I wasn’t there to protect two of the most important people in my life––it wasn’t anger that crossed my mind first, it was fear. Fear for what could have been and for what could have happened to you.”

“I know,” Lily’s voice was quiet as she spoke, her exhale trembling as she met his eyes again.

“And then there was anger, anger at them for fucking thinking about laying a spell on you and Re, anger at Remus for keeping it from me, and anger at you for breaking one of the most important rules of trust that we have with each other. No matter what.” He paused to look right at her, his hand coming up to caress her hair and his forearm resting on her shoulder. “No matter what, we don’t engage with them without each other. Without backup. I know Remus was there and I know you can hold your own, but we promised Lily. And every day we get closer and closer to a world where we can’t just hide out in secret passages and wait for each other, where we’ll have to stand and fight and kill and die without each other and I––” His breath was shaky as he too had tears in his eyes. The burning behind his stare pierced her heart, all the feelings he had for her splayed out before her in one overwhelming look like light through a prism. 

“I’m scared of that world Lily. I’m not ready for it. I know I walk around like I can’t wait to get out there and take a stand, which of course I’m going to do but, I’m not really ready. To let go of you or Sirius, to not be with Remus when he needs me, to not be there for Pete? To put the Order and the war above my family? That scares the shit out of me. So while we’re here, relatively safe in the walls of school and childhood, I can’t risk anything happening. I can’t.”

Lily inhaled softly, letting the cloak fall to the floor as she brought her hands to cup his face, the warmth of his cheeks seeping into her chilled fingers as she prompted him to meet her eye. “I know love. I’m scared too. We all are. We’re just children, no matter what Dumbledore says, or the climate of the Wizarding World demands. No matter how brave you are J, you shouldn’t have to be a soldier this young.” She rested her forehead against his and breathed along with him, allowing them to feel each other’s presence, there and alive. 

“And I never meant to hurt you by fighting back. I know I could have walked away, let Remus whisk me into one of you lots’ secret holes in the wall. But the things they said cut me, and I was tired and mad and I looked up at him and his snivelling face and I––I couldn’t back down. I couldn’t let them have this one. So I swore and I hexed them and then I whisked Remus away and we ran back to the tower––and I knew I had broken our promise and I begged him not to say, begged him to give me some time to figure out how to tell you.” Lily’s hands trailed down his sides, ghosting over his shoulders and down his arms until their hands gripped each other desperately. “I love you and I trust you and I know today I broke your trust but believe me, I understand the fear. In more ways than you’ll ever know. And I love you and your exploding hero complex for wanting to save me now and after school, but this is something… something that we both have to work through. Something I want to work through.” 

James dropped their hands and pulled her into him, tucking Lily into his chest with as much gentle force as he could. She felt the wetness that had been lurking in her eyes stain his shirt as she hugged him back, but she didn’t care. Her arms tucked under his, gripping his shoulders like a lifeline, and his strong arms held her there, safe and protected. He tucked her head under his chin, and she felt his cheek press into the crown of her head as she held on.

They stayed like this for a moment before Lily pulled back just slightly, tilting her head to look up at him with her chin on his chest. “James it’s something we’ll have to work through, but it doesn’t have to be now.” Her voice carried softly up to him and his eyes shone. “I’m sorry I broke your trust. It won’t happen again.” 

His eyes fluttered shut as he pressed a gentle but passionate kiss to her lips. “I love you, you know that, Evans?”

Lily allowed a smile to tug at the corner of her mouth. “I know, love.”

“And I trust you. I do. I just can’t bear the thought of losing you.” He brushed hair back off her face with both hands as her hands clasped around his waist. 

“You won’t James. Not while I have any say in the matter.”

-

[yxlenas]

Zutara + “This isn’t who I am.”

Engagement, assassination attempt style. (Minor update; the prompt it was responding to was “You have my word” I clearly copy pasted to the wrong ask lol)

For all intents, Katara knows what she signed up for when she decided to stay in the Fire Nation after the war, and what she signed up for again when she became of betrothal age and she and Zuko made a commitment by Water Tribe standards, and what she’s signing up for as the world ends in fire and ash and blood around her at her own official Fire Nation engagement ceremony.

Zuko has just lifted the covering from her face, golden eyes glinting in the noon sunlight, a smile breaking through his stoic “Fire Lord” decorum she’s so used to seeing on his face at official functions. She takes in his single crooked tooth on the bottom row, the glistening sheen of pomade in his dark hair, and the glowing gold of his five pronged crown, and holds out a hand to him delicately. Zuko takes the ring from a Fire Sage, and then they both stand and bow, and as Katara reaches out to him again so he can slide it on her finger, the entire pavilion seems to go up in smoke. Katara stumbles back from Zuko with a shout, holding her arms to shield her face from the sudden bursts of fire exploding around her. Katara holds her hands out and tugs, reaching for any water she can find and coming up with a glimmering ball of fluid, forming it into a thin whip and waiting. Her visibility is shot from the smoke, and while she can hear screams she can’t hear the sounds of fighting.

“Zuko!” She shouts, sheathing her fingers in spikes of ice and stepping toward where he should be. She comes up with only empty air, but the smoke is starting to clear and she can see splotches of something dark on the smooth stones of the plaza.

It’s blood. Katara bites her tongue in fear and starts to follow the trail, running but not so fast she can’t see the red droplets of her fiance’s blood on creamy stone. The blood trail keeps growing, streaks instead of drops like he’s being dragged. If he’s dead weight, they can’t be moving fast. Zuko is tall and heavy with corded muscle. Katara speeds up, swallowing back her panicked screams of his name.

She finds him sprawled in a narrow gardener’s path halfway from the plaza to their quarters, surrounded by smoking bodies. The awful scent of burnt flesh makes Katara gag harshly, and she spits a mouthful of bile onto the uneven cobbles and falls to her knees next to Zuko. He’s gasping for air around a knife in his side, slotted between two ribs. There’s a second stab wound to his right shoulder, blood soaking his golden robes.

“Zuko, Zuko, I’m here,” she gasps frantically, propping his head up on her shoulder. Katara fumbles with her robes and uncorks her waterskin, but the water isn’t clean.

“Fuck,” she snarls, and puts hard pressure on his shoulder. Zuko shouts, face contorting in a horrible twist of agony.

“You’re fine,” she tells him, “You’re fine.”

“Doesn’t-AH, Katara, Katara it hurts- doesn’t feel fine-”

“You’re going to be fine,” she tells him, “you have my word.”

Katara can hear the shouting of the guards behind her and the clamoring of the Fire Sages. Toph is calling out directions and she skids into the little nook seconds ahead of Sokka and Suki. Zuko spits a mouthful of blood onto himself and then moans in pain as Toph falls to her knees, reaching out to grab the handle of the knife.

“No!” Katara yelps, slapping her hand away.

“It’s hurting him! I can feel how his heartbeat goes up when he moves because of it, Katara!”

“It’s also keeping the blood in his body,” she yells back, “Sokka, I need you to help me get him on his side-”

“Why-”

Zuko starts to cough as Sokka starts to argue with her, blood spraying out of his lips and splattering on Katara’s face. She jerks back, stunned, and then she’s hyperventilating, screaming and wiping at Zuko’s blood on her cheeks.

“Katara!” Suki is holding her, rocking her gently, and the Sages are carrying Zuko away, “Katara, I know it’s awful, I know- Katara, breathe with me. Zuko needs you. He’s going to need you to heal that damage in his chest, so I need you to pull your shit together.”

It’s awful work. Zuko gasps and chokes and screams as Katara uses her water to at least knit the tissues of his lung back together. Sokka and his guard Mako hold him down as she works with the help of the palace physicians until he can breathe without drowning in his own blood, and then between her water and the physician’s stitches and bandages, they close up the wound to his shoulder. Zuko is deeply unconscious, between pain medication and shock, and Toph is curled into his undamaged side, head against his uninjured shoulder, both of them under the covers of Zuko and Katara’s bed. Sokka is sitting on one side of her, Iroh on the other, and Suki is helping with the investigation into the dead assassins. Iroh is reading a scroll quietly, and Sokka is holding Zuko’s ankle through the sheets.

“Did someone send someone to get in touch with Aang?” She asks, her voice cracking. Sokka releases Zuko’s ankle and squeezes his sister to his chest.

“Sent a letter to Dad, too,” Sokka murmurs, “He’s going to be fine, ‘Tara.”

Sokka kisses her temple as Katara crawls onto the bed, resting her hand over Zuko’s heart, Toph curled between them like a little Fire ferret.

Zuko wakes up around midday with a scream of her name and then a whimpered gasp of pain. Katara is massaging honey into the stitched up wound in his shoulder with one hand and twirling around a stream of water with the other and she startles so badly that the water drops into their bedsheets. She bends it out of the sheets and into a bowl on the bedside table and presses her hand to Zuko’s cheek as he blinks up at her with feverish golden eyes.

“You’re okay,” he mumbles, throat rasping dryly. Katara tilts a cup of water to his mouth and lets him drink for a few moments.

“I was worried,” he slurs, “They grabbed me before I saw what happened to you.”

“I’m just fine, love,” she murmurs.

“I lost the rings,” he tells her with a wheeze, a cough tearing through him. Katara eases him up, propping him against a few pillows and giving him a bit more water.

“I’m not worried about rings, baby,” Katara tells him, carefully soothing his irritated lungs with her healing water, “Rings can be replaced.”

“I’ll get you new ones,” Zuko yawns, “I promise.”

“I believe you,” Katara whispers, “You just rest now. And no more assassination attempts.”

“That I can’t promise,” he slurs, “I am the Fire Lord, after all.”

“And my future husband,” Katara murmurs, with a kiss to his soft mouth, “Don’t forget about that.”

[screpdoodle]

Duality - Chapter Nine (The Garden of Secretive Secrets)

“And stay out!!”

Kaos watched from the edge of his backyard as a band of Greebles scurried into the underbrush, yipping and chirping with their tails between their legs. He let out a sigh, wiping the sweat from his forehead off on the back of his hand, leaving a smudge of dirt in its wake. As the afternoon sun beat down on him, Kaos turned his back to the trees, returning to the task his father had so graciously bestowed upon him. Weeding duty; a chore that usually fell to him when his parents felt ‘eternity’ in the dungeons wasn’t fitting enough a punishment. It was usually saved for the yearly cleaning, but Kaos supposed this was a… special circumstance. And man, did the backyard need it. Kaos rolled his sleeves up as he walked, balancing across exposed roots and shallow streams that ran the color of mildew. Broken tiles protruded from the dirt in some sections, like a long forgotten pathway, or perhaps even a giant chess board. But now, the majority of it had become one with nature, with only remnants remaining. The very same nature Kaos had to push back, armed with an ‘arsenal’ that consisted of a pair of rusty pruning shears and his bare hands. A set of weapons that would make any creature quake in fear... as long as that creature was plant based and inanimate, of course. Kaos stumbled forward as his foot snagged on a tangle of brambles, the thorns slicing at his ankle. He hissed at the sudden sting, then pulled his ankle free, kneeling down in the crumbly soil with his shears at the ready. He waited for a moment, in case the brambles decided to leave on their own. When they didn’t budge, Kaos let out a huff, then began snipping away at the base of the tangle, squinting through the glaring sun and snippets of stem flinging haphazardly from the dull, rusted shears. He made quick work of the bush, or at least as quickly as he could manage, picking up the severed bundle of gnarled branches and carrying it over to the small piles he was accumulating.

Father had instructed him to organize the clippings; one pile of ‘salvageable’ material for Father and Mother’s out-of-work ‘hobby’, and another of junk. So of course, Kaos had made three. One for Father, one for the Greebles to scrounge through, and one for himself. Kaos dragged the bush back to the back wall of the house, using his free arm to shield his eyes, trying his best to ignore the definite sunburn he was going to get as he tossed the bramble into his father’s pile. The berries that grew on it could make a nice soda, though knowing his parents, they’d probably use the thorns or something. Kaos had always wanted to try the soda they made, despite the mixed reviews Dyskord had given it over the years. His favorite had been ‘radioactive suction eel’, though he had only given it a three out of ten before passing out on Kaos’ floor. Kaos had also seen flavors like ‘sand’ and ‘mud’ on the occasions he had snuck down into the cellar. Needless to say, the odd ingredients and off-putting side effects he had witnessed had dampened his curiosity towards actually sampling the carbonated concoctions. Maybe once he was a little older.

Kaos wiped the sweat from his brow, then looked up at the sound of the side door shutting, the squeak of its hinges followed by footsteps in the patchy dirt. Kaos craned his neck as his mother stepped into view, heading into the forest as she did practically every day. Some days it was early in the morning, others it was late afternoon, most likely heading to work. Kaos watched her walk briskly down the cobble path, the cloak she had wrapped around her shoulders flowing behind her, until she faded out of sight as the reaching branches of the trees swallowed her whole. Kaos shuddered, feeling a chill run up his spine as he turned away, needing to get back to work. Kaos grabbed his shears, beginning to pick and preen at the area around him. Pulling up leathery weeds and trimming back foul-smelling bushes that had been left to run rampant. As he worked, though, Kaos could feel his mind wandering back to last night and the mention of his mother’s ‘work’. Surely that’s what she was heading off to do. Kaos jammed his fingers under a particularly stubborn root, attempting to not so gently coax it from its earthy nest. He couldn’t help but glance over his shoulder from time to time, his eyes drawn back to the forest. He could no longer hear her footsteps, merely the slight breeze dancing through the autumn leaves, and the rustle of vermin in the underbrush. He shook his head, finally wrenching the root from the ground, the force sending him tumbling back; right into an unsuspecting Greeble. Kaos looked up as his vision spun, the Greeble leaning over him with a curious expression on its flat, flaxxish face. It ran its long tongue over one of its eyes before bounding onto Kaos’ face and then off towards the underbrush with a sharp tug. Kaos groaned, rubbing his forehead as he sat up, watching the pest scurry off on all fours, dragging something along behind it. Kaos paused as he watched the end of it get pulled into the bushes, feeling the breeze brush against the back of his neck…

In a panic, Kaos' hands flew to his neck, feeling around for any trace of his scarf. Instead he simply felt his skin, his eyes going wide. Quickly, Kaos glanced back over his shoulder to the kitchen window, checking to be sure his father wasn't watching, before breaking into a sprint after the Greeble.

Kaos lept over fallen logs and weaved his way around branches, his eyes quickly adjusting to the dappled light filtering through the canopy of off-colored leaves. Shadows twirled and twisted as he ran, the Greeble always just out of sight. A blur of yellow, the swish of a tail, a faint shrill chirping just loud enough to tell the general direction. The trees reached and grabbed at him, snagging his clothes and scratching his skin. All of his rationale had flown out the window, fear of those bark behemoths the least of his worries. Kaos could feel his lungs burning, every frantic step sending shockwaves up his legs; but he couldn’t stop. He couldn’t rest. He couldn't lose that Ancients-forsaken Greeble. Tearing around a corner and nearly falling flat on his face, Kaos watched the Greeble scurry up the trunk of a tree, ducking into a gnarled hole in its surface. The end of his scarf dangled out of the opening, swaying slightly in the breeze. Kaos paused, then practically buckled over, taking long, shuddering breaths as he tried to coax himself back into working condition. After letting the corners of his vision clear and the feeling of acid in his lungs settle down, Kaos turned his sights to the Greeble’s apparent home, glowering at it with enough force to melt through steel. (Or at least he hoped so, he had never actually been able to before). He stormed over to the tree, getting his foot caught on a root halfway there, before standing up on his tiptoes and peering inside the tree hollow.

Random trinkets and objects lined the sides, from rusted cogs, old jewelry, and even clumps of differently colored plants. In the center, the Greeble was curled up, though it opened one eye when it noticed Kaos peering inside. Kaos frowned, then reached inside, pulling his dirt covered scarf out from underneath the Greeble, brushing it off as he grumbled under his breath, before wrapping it loosely around his neck. Kaos turned on his heels, then looked back, locking eyes with the Greeble. It stared back, swishing its tail back and forth, large ears twitching. Kaos sighed, then grabbed his shears. With a deep breath, he lifted up the corner of his shirt and snipped off a lopsided square, shoving it in the hollow of the tree before starting the long walk back, muttering as many curse words as he could drum up on the spot. He trailed off after the first few though, feeling a chill run up his spine, a gust of wind nearly knocking him over. Kaos stumbled to the side, then froze, picking up on a sound carried by the wind. It sounded almost like a hum; a slow melodic thrum that seemed to resonate through him, making his skin prickle.

Holding his breath, Kaos turned towards the noise, walking towards it with slow, stilted steps, as if his movements weren’t his own. The song was getting louder, though the wind had died back down, the sound like a motherly hand carefully guiding him. Step after step growing faster, note after note washing over him, static blurring the corners of his vision until finally... the forest fell silent. Kaos came to an abrupt stop, letting out a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding.

He stood at the edge of a clearing, sunlight filtering down through a hole in the canopy, catching the dust that floated through the undisturbed air. A nearly perfect circle of nature encapsulated in a wall of trees, hidden from view, everything perfectly still. Kaos felt as if he was staring at a photograph. He reached his hand out, as if expecting to come in contact with a barrier, to prove it was nothing but a snapshot, but all he touched was air. He wiggled his fingers around a bit, then quickly stepped over the ring of small, mossy stones that surrounded the perimeter. He peered around, brushing himself off, before his attention was grabbed by something he hadn’t registered before. Offset to the center of the clearing was an old, stone structure. Grey tones of stone brick dappled with age and the muted greens of climbing vines, little flowers peeking their ways through the cracks. Kaos squinted, then crouched down, taking a tentative step forward. His shoes crunched against the fallen leaves as he walked closer, the only sound making its way through the silent air. Kaos tilted his head to the side, then carefully brushed some of the vines to the side, revealing old, worn-out markings etched into some of the bricks. At the sight, Kaos felt something tugging at the back of his mind, a familiarity he couldn’t quite shake. He got to his knees to get a closer look, the stone walls just a tad shorter than him. Gently, Kaos trailed his fingers over the edges of the closets engraving, the stone crumbling beneath his touch, tiny crumbs of stone falling to the ground, lost in the autumn grass. Kaos felt a tingle run up his arm, causing him to pull his hand away, his brow furrowing. He had seen these marks before, but he couldn’t quite place exactly where…

Kaos stood up quickly, peering over the side of the wall. He craned his neck to see, then raised an eyebrow when he noticed the wall dipped down, revealing a hole set in the center. His heart dropped slightly as he realized it wasn’t some ‘mystical structure’ like he had originally hoped; just some old, dried up well. Still, it was an interesting find to say the least. If only he had brought his journal; he could have added it to the map that he started last summer with his siblings. Kaos looked up to the sky, watching the red slowly starting to fade into a soft purple. How long had he been gone? Surely he’d have a sunburn after this. Just what he needed for the weekend he was forced to work outside. He always wondered how Dyskord and Mey were able to tan; whenever he was out in the sun for longer than a few minutes without the proper protection he turned as red as a Fire Elemental. Shaking his head, Kaos started back towards the way he had entered the clearing, hoping he could simply follow his tracks back home. That was, until a thought crossed his mind. Those marks had to mean something, right? Maybe the well wasn’t so ordinary after all? Maybe there was something at the bottom of it? Kaos turned back around, realizing garden duty could wait. This might be his only chance to figure out what this thing was here for. With a confident smile, Kaos pulled on one of the bricks, testing to see if it could hold his weight before pulling himself up onto the lip of the well, albeit with some difficulty. He sat on his knees, brushing the dust off of his clothes before peering inside.

Nothing but darkness stared back.

Kaos scratched his chin, squinting to try and make out how far down it went, before standing up. He took a moment to balance, then walked around the edge of the well, folding his hands behind his back. He looked down to the ground on one side, then into the gaping maw on the other, the stones shifting slightly beneath his feet, little flecks of sediment falling down into the dark. He stuck his tongue out, thinking, then knelt back down again. Throwing caution to the wind, Kaos stuck his hand down into the depths, feeling a chill run up it. It felt like he had plunged his arm into a bucket of ice water, the smell of dust wafting up. The air felt thicker, his motions lagging, up to his wrist now lost in darkness. Kaos wrenched his hand back, nearly tipping over onto the ground, before steadying himself on the ledge. Slowly, he lowered his hand back down, back up, then back down again, slowly testing where the temperature shifted. Kaos felt the stone shift beneath him, though he paid it no mind, just trying to reach further down, the chill nipping at his fingertips. How far down did this thing go? No matter how far he reached, Kaos couldn’t touch the bottom. It felt like it was just out of reach, despite it looking like it went on forever. Clenching his teeth and gripping onto the edge of the wall with his other hand, Kaos reached down further, straining his reach as far as it could go, until a noise made his blood run cold. A loud crack rang through the silent air as Kaos felt himself pitch forward, his head slamming against the side of the well as he tumbled down, his vision flashing white before going dark.

“Hello? Hello??”

Kaos opened his eyes to the light of the moon falling down upon him, a shadowy figure peering down at him, silhouetted against a familiar, starless night sky. Kaos groaned, rubbing his temple as he shifted into a sitting position, resting his back against the moss covered wall behind him. He looked up, slowly starting to make out features of the person above. Green skin, ragged clothes, large hands gripping the edge of the well as they peered down, large ears tilted downwards…

“Glumshanks?”

“Kaos?”

The two spoke at the same time, locking eyes. Kaos’ mouth hung open, brows raised as he tried to make sense of what he was seeing. Surely, his headache was making him see things.

“What- What’re you doing down there? How did you get here??” Glumshanks stumbled over his words, swinging a leg over the edge, then the other.

In horror, Kaos watched as the troll slipped off the edge without a care in the world, his bare feet touching down on the ground gently in front of him. Kaos blinked, confused, before slowly realizing the edge of the well was just above his line of sight, the fall nothing more than a few feet. The wall barely went past Glumshanks’ waist. With a concerned look on his face, the troll sat down, bringing his knees up to his chest. Kaos just stared at him, not sure what to say.

“So, uh, how are-”

“How was school?-”

The two spoke at the same time once again, then abruptly fell silent. Kaos snickered, then winced, holding his temple. Glumshanks reached forward, brushing Kaos’ hand away with a frown. Kaos looked down to the red that had coated his fingertips, glistening in the silvery light.

“You really got dinged up…”

‘Heh, this? This is just a normal afternoon for me.”

“...come on, I think my mom should have some disinfectant at the house.”

Glumshanks offered his hand. Kaos hesitated, then took it, the troll helping him to his feet and out of the old well. As Kaos touched down on patchy grass, he paused, his mind grinding to a stop. None of this looked familiar. The trees were sparse and looked like overgrown twigs someone had stuck into the ground haphazardly, dry grass and brown leaves littered about. Glumshanks glanced back over his shoulder, giving a slight tug on Kaos’ arm, which seemed to snap him out of it.

“Where… where are we?” Kaos asked as he followed along after Glumshanks, needing to walk quickly to keep up with his long strides.

Glumshanks raised an eyebrow, blowing a strand of ginger hair from his eyes. “The Outlands?”

“I know that, fool. Which island in the Outlands??”

Glumshanks paused for a moment, looking up to the sky. ‘...I’m not sure if it has a name that's in human...”

“Well, what’s it in Troll, then?”

Glumshanks hesitated, then made a few grunting and growling noises. He slowed his walking pace a bit, to give Kaos a chance to catch up. Kaos listened, meeting Glumshanks’ gaze as he fell silent.

“....so ‘Grumbletown’. Gotcha.”

“I don’t think that’s-”

Before Glumshanks could correct him, Kaos had gone up ahead, his short attention span now captured by something new. Glumshanks sighed, then followed after him. Kaos ran up to the edge of the island, keeping a wide berth from the miscellaneous trees scattered about, trying to spot any sign of his home. A familiar rock, a well placed plant, the remnants of a Chompy farm he cobbled together last summer; anything to give him a clue to where he was. Other than the familiar clouded sky, nothing seemed to ring a bell. It was then that Kaos spotted it - on a neighboring island was a bustling, rural village. He knelt down at the edge of the island, watching figures running along winding dirt paths that connected small wooden huts; the smoke from countless lit fires trailing up into the air in plumes, dancing along to the music that was being blasted through the streets. A heavy beat that made Kaos bob his head along, his mouth held agape. He looked over his shoulder as he heard Glumshanks’ footsteps approaching, a grin spreading across his face. Glumshanks just raised a brow, then sat down beside him, dangling his spindly legs over the edge. Kaos turned his attention back to the village, warm firelight flickering across the dead earth, long shadows cast from the houses, lit windows like wide eyes staring up at them.

“So this is where you live?”

“It is now, I guess.”

Kaos paused his bopping, looking over to Glumshanks in confusion. The troll’s expression was sallow, grey eyes looking down at the village. He swung his legs back and forth slightly, letting a sigh escape his mouth. It reminded Kaos of the first time they had met, the sadness in Glumshanks eyes, his slouched posture, all of it.

“What do you mean ‘now’?”

“We move around a lot.” Glumshanks started, finally looking back over to Kaos. “This is just the latest in a long line of towns we’ve… conquered. I suggested we at least barter for this one, but no one ever listens to me. It’s kinda like a celebration, every few years we find a new village and… sorry, I got sidetracked.”

“...at least the music’s pretty good?”

“I prefer classical...”

Kaos paused, then let out a laugh, his nose crinkling as he grinned. He bumped his hand against Glumshanks’ arm, coaxing a small chuckle from him. The two of them looked back down to the little hamlet below them, alive with laughing trolls and crackling fires, techno music blaring through the night air.

“...though seriously, Glumwad. Any chance you own a map?”

<- previous chapter | next chapter ->

[unicyclehippo]

Can you do "Take off your shirt" for Beaujester?

it’s early in the morning now; the sun hasn’t quite risen from its cradle behind the mountains but the sky is slowly bleaching to a pale gauzy grey, a rippled fabric roof that feels heavy and strange. maybe it’s just because jester is accustomed to the seaside, that burned blue sky that changes seemingly on a quick wind to storm tossed grey and back again. the sky in rexxentrum never seems to change. never goes entirely black with storm like it feels like it should. never clears. just...hangs there.

jester is staring out at it when a hand presses somewhat clumsily onto the glass pane, shoves it open. the latch strains and then pops open—not very strong, someone should tell the nice vaguely overbearing dwarven lady about that. hinges shriek faintly. a voice, probably belonging to the person whose hands those are, swears quietly.

‘you know,’ jester says, and watches those fingers grow white with pressure beneath the splattering of grime and blood, ‘you could have come through the door. it might’ve been quieter, beau.’

beau hangs a moment longer. then, with a long grunt of effort, lifts herself up onto the sill. she straddles it, inches carefully into the room and despite herself, jester is kinda impressed. if she hadn’t been awake already, she never would’ve woken up—and, and this can’t be forgotten, they are on the second floor.

‘very impressive!’ jester shuffles in the bed, sits up, applauses brightly. beau’s form is all in shadow, silhouetted by the rising sun, but jester sees her shoulders rise with a little shrug.

‘thanks.’

jester frowns. ‘are you okay? you sound weird.’

‘fine.’ beau pulls herself fully through the window. if jester hadn’t been watching closely, she would miss the way the other girl sways. puts her hand out on the end of the bed to steady herself. she wonders idly what she might have missed in the past, if she hadn’t been watching. ‘i’m gonna take a bath. wake myself up.’

‘oh, but, did you sleep?’

‘yeah. yeah, i slept,’ beau tells her. she doesn’t sound like she’s lying, but. jester also knows she’s good at it. ‘just went on a little, y’know, wake up run. some exercises. don’t wanna get flabby during down time, gotta keep in peak physical condish.’ her voice is typical beau: brash, harsh, over-confident, warm. pointed. like she’s talking right to jester. it isn’t so profound an effect when it’s just the two of them—and a sleeping yasha on the floor but she’s sleeping—but jester still feels it.

it’s distracting. jester pulls her knees up to her chest, wraps her arms around them. with a cheek pillowed on her knees, eyes tracking the way beau picks her way across the floor, jester wonders if maybe that means something. if maybe beau meant something, something real, when she talked about how good icky-thong and da’leth were at talking around something. how she had agreed when jester mentioned the details.

‘why do you have blood on your hands?’ jester asks, before beau can reach the door. ‘is that part of your morning exercises?’

beau stops. turns toward jester. not fully, but enough that she can eye the bed, and jester in it. enough that jester can see one corner of beau’s mouth as it twitches into a stretched smile.

‘yeah. sometimes, i dunno if you’ve noticed,’ she comments with a grin, ‘but i punch things.’

‘i’m not stupid beau.’

‘what? no, i know you’re not!’

‘i know you punch things.’ jester swings her legs out, touches her feet down onto the pleasantly chilly wooden floor. she wiggles her toes. ‘i know you don’t punch, trees and stuff,’ she insists. ‘not until you bleed.’

‘advanced monk techniques. always learning new shit.’

‘that lie,’ jester says, trying to keep her voice steady, ‘wasn’t as good as your others. turn around.’

beau stays where she is facing the door.

‘i’m gonna take a bath. i stink.’

‘turn around, beau.’

‘no.’

jester stares, confused, at beau’s back. ‘no?’ she doesn’t think beau has ever told her no before. not like that, not without suggesting something else, or, or saying hey i like the idea but it’s also the worst one i have ever heard, just sayin’.

‘i’m taking a bath. and i’m going to the archives afterwards. don’t wait for me. tell the others.’

‘oh. okay.’

jester hates the way her voice sounds—small and confused. hates the way beau’s shoulder twitches before she reaches out for the door to the hallway and slips out, out of sight.

she waits there a moment, tail curling and uncurling around her ankle. she listens to the sounds: yasha’s deep, even breathing, so nice to hear after she had been gone for so long; foot traffic and the wooden tap of wheels over cobbled stone from the one or two wagons moving around so early in the day; the silence like a held breath and then the distant rattle and hum of pipes from the bathroom.

jester’s eyes drop from the doorway to the floor. there’s a pool of blood where beau had been standing. small, maybe a good dozen or so heavy drops. jester’s stomach squirms at the sight of it. too much to have come from scraped knuckles.

‘oh this is a bad idea,’ she tells herself, but pushes open the door and follows after beau.

//

the washroom is lovely. small, only intended for one or maybe two occupants. the bath itself is only big enough for one adult, though feasibly if one wasn’t particularly concerned with comfort, two or three could cram into the space. the bottom one might drown, of course, but it’s only a hypothetical.

the room is filled with steam but beau is still dressed, leaned over the hand basin in a pose jester has never seen her in. slumped. tired. one hand is braced on the wooden tub and she stands a pace or two back, most of her weight on the one arm. her head hangs down, hair loose and falling like a curtain down around her face.

her other hand, jester sees—in the instant between breaking the handle to burst in and beau whirling around to face her—her other hand is curled arojnd her waist. no, a little higher. around her ribs.

‘what’s wrong with your ribs?’ jester demands.

‘what the fuck?’ beau hisses back. the steam isn’t enough to hide the damage to her face—the rapidly swelling cheekbone, obviously broken, the split in the same eyebrow. ‘jester, i’m in the fucking bathroom—i could have been taking a shit—‘

‘but you aren’t taking a shit!’ jester accuses, and kicks the door shut behind her. ‘you’re in here being weird and bleeding and not telling me what’s wrong! i know there’s something wrong beau, i’m not stupid!’

‘why do you—has someone called you stupid?’ beau half asks, half demands. ‘why do you keep saying that? who was it?’

‘no, no one, it’s just—ah!’ jester almost screams, jabs a finger toward beau. they’re close, not quite face to face but the room isn’t terribly large. ‘don’t try to distract me, it won’t work!’

the steam has wafted away from their faces, largely escaped out the door and now curls around their feet, building again, pouring from the bathtub as the water level rises slowly. with no filter, nothing hiding beau’s face, jester sees the flicker of something in dark eyes—fear? annoyance? upset? as soon as she sees it, it’s gone again; jester pours over beau’s face, her stance, but she’s gone still and silent and there’s nothing to pluck, nothing to catch.

‘bad training session,’ beau lies. out and out lies.

jester huffs, scowls across at her. ‘you don’t have to lie to me, beau. i don’t care what you were doing—well, no, i care but you know if it was a bar fight i would think that’s really fun, and if it was dairon i would kick her in the teeth because wow-a, you’re fucked up,’

‘thanks. i held my own pretty good, though.’ beau smirks. chucks her chin up in that infuriating smug way she does. there’s still nothing behind the unblinking eyes.

‘i just mean, whatever it is, beau, i just want to make sure you’re okay. you know that, right?’

‘of course.’

‘of course,’ jester repeats, brow crinkling. she can’t figure out why it sounds so weird, so off. shrugs it away uncomfortably. ‘so?’

‘so what?’

‘are you gonna let me heal you or what?’

there is a long, long moment where jester has no idea what beau is going to say. it’s strange, because they’ve been through storms and fights and people nearly dying and getting kidnapped and being pirates and shopping and rescuing people and jester was pretty sure that, if not an open book, beau was fairly easy to read. that she got the gist of what beau was saying, or what she wanted to say. but here, in a cramped steaming room with very little space between them and a pressing weight of a lot of very important very scary things bearing down on all sides, jester looks for the face of her friend in the woman across from her and finds nothing but a smooth mask. and who is standing behind it, she can’t quite say.

‘beau?’

‘i don’t mind a scar or two,’ beau says. smile ticks up at the corner, crooked, charming in a very roguish kind of way.

‘i think you’ll mind when your broken cheek stops you from eating. or gets infected and your brain swells and you die.’

‘sexy. the way i’ve always wanted to go.’

‘beau.’

finally. beau’s eyes cut away from her. it isn’t much, but it’s enough. almost a flinch.

‘have i—done something wrong?’

‘no,’ beau insists, instantly, the word spat between them. her eyes are back on jester, burning hot. ‘no.’

‘then what is it? because first you’re not wanting to sleep with me and then you’re not talking to me and you’re sneaking out in the middle of the night to go i don’t even know.’

‘fight.’

‘well obviously,’ jester mutters, accent thick with upset.

‘in a fighting pit.’ beau breaks her harsh stance a bit. steps over to the bath and twists the tap off so it stops filling. it’s at about the halfway mark now and she busies herself with sniffing at a few of the bottles on the counter, nose wrinkling at the heavily perfumed ones. she tips in a few drops of something that smells of wood notes, lets the oil diffuse into the water.

‘i get to fight,’ she tells jester, and lowers herself down onto the small stool beside the bath, one arm resting on the lip of it, the other curled around her middle. ‘until i win, or until i’m fucked up.’ she grins. tired. more of a baring of teeth.‘same thing, kinda.’

‘oh.’ jester looks around for another stool. there isn’t one, so she perches on the edge of the bath. ‘so. you’re, like, not okay then.’

beau’s grin widens. she laughs a little, disbelieving. shakes her head. ‘i guess not.’

‘is it because of caleb?’

‘what?’

‘you were super pissed the whole time we were at—at that place. and every time caleb mentioned icky—‘

‘don’t. say his name,’ beau breathes. squeezes her eyes shut tight. winces at the pressure on her cheek. ‘yeah. i hated that.’

jester narrows her eyes. ‘but is that really why? or are you letting me think it?’

‘i’m not that good of a liar, jester.’

‘but are you really not, or are you just saying tha—‘

‘jes.’

jester huffs. arranges her skirts.

they sit for a few long moments in silence. then beau bends with a groan to start to remove her boots. jester slides to the floor to help, batting beau’s hands away.

‘jes, no, you don’t have to—‘

‘you’re hurt, beau. just...let me.’

the laces hiss out of their hoops, loosen from around beau’s ankles. jester tosses one and then the other into the corner of the room, peels beau’s socks off next and throws them soon after. it might be the heat of the room but beau is flushed, embarrassed, and the hand on the bath comes up to cover her face.

‘thanks,’ she grunts.

‘you’re welcome.’ jester glances up from beneath lowered lashes, catches the exhaustion written over beau’s face when she thinks jester isn’t looking. ‘beau?’

‘mn.’

‘are you okay? for real?’

‘i mean, i’m beat to shit but that was kinda the point.’

‘no, i know,’ jester says, though she doesn’t think she does know entirely. not in the way beau seems to be implying. ‘but. everything with caleb and the beacon and, and yasha, and,’

‘right. yasha,’ beau sighs, sounding ten times more exhausted. ‘i need to talk to the soul.’

‘about yasha?’

‘nah. i mean. sort of.’ she tilts her head from side to side in a half nod. ‘about the way da’leth fuckin’ lied to them about who yasha was.’ beau shakes her head, seeing jester’s worry. ‘i’m not gonna let them do anything to her. i’m not mad—i’m relieved as hell we got her back, trust me.’

‘i do,’ jester says instantly.

the tightness in the corners of beau’s eyes loosens a fraction. enough that jester notices.

‘yeah. i just can’t—i can’t side with the assembly on lying to the soul just because my friend is caught in the mix.’ beau sighs. stands. ‘anyway. fuck. i need a bath. gotta soak and—not think. for a second, anyway.’ jester stands when she does and for a moment beau looks at her expectantly and then sighs. ‘i don’t mean to be rude but like, alone?’

jester rolls her eyes. ‘i’m not leaving until i’ve healed you.’ discomfort slashes across beau’s face like the cut of a knife. ‘you didn’t think i would seriously follow you and let you get away with not getting healed, did you?’

‘i mean...’

‘no. take off your shirt.’

‘not the way i’m used to hearing that said,’ beau jokes. she turns around. grips her shirt at the waist and pulls it up and over her head.

jester stares. she can’t help it. she’s seen beau get changed in their shared room before, shared excursions to bath houses before, but not like this. maybe because it has been a while, maybe because beau has gotten stronger and harsher on their travels, maybe because beau is holding herself tight and tense with pain or worry or vanity, but beau’s back is sculpted—layer upon layer corded muscle and scar, make up the planes of beau’s back, holding tight to the column of her spine, taut muscles of her shoulders leading to the notch of her neck where it meets the spine. her scapula shift, probably out of discomfort, but it looks mesmerising to watch the muscle and bone move beneath her skin.

and the bruises. the imprint of knuckles, of dull bootprints, the too-perfect ring of knuckledusters, paint purples and reds over beau’s skin, breaking the surface now and again in red scratches and contusions.

jester reaches out.

‘i’m—going to heal you now.’

‘yup. cool.’

she lays her hand flat on beau’s back. it falls of its own accord, seemingly, to curl around beau’s hip and the magic doesn’t burst out of her or sparkle like it sometimes does but instead jester, maybe because she’s so entranced so focused on beau and healing her, that jester feels beau. feels her like her magic is touching her, like she’s seeping into beau, the edges of herself and beau merging for a second. it’s weird and scary and jester whips her hand away quickly.

stares as beau rolls her shoulders out, the movement exaggerated by being so in her face.

‘thanks, jes. that—that feels better.’

‘good.’

‘can i have my bath now?’ beau asks.

jester hesitates. tries one more time. ‘are you okay, beau?’

‘i mean, you healed me so never better.’ she waits a moment. ‘i’m kinda half naked, jes.’

it’s not the answer she wanted. or, it is—she wants beau to be okay—but it was casual, easy. another lie. she leaves, feeling like she has seen more of beau than she was prepared for. and not the naked skin part.

jester focuses a minute on mending the handle and lock of the door she had broken. that, at least, is straightforward. that, at least, she can fix.

[abarbaricyalp]

In A Hundred Lifetimes (i'd find you and i'd choose you)

@pynchpromptweek

Pynch, Prompt: Reincarnation/Historical AU, Rated: G

No Archive Warnings apply

You know you weren’t getting out of a prompt week without at least one thing that went multi-chaptered. More later ✌

AO3 Link

It was a bright spring Friday and Ronan Lynch was not in school because Richard Gansey III was not in Henrietta to annoy Ronan into going. He was in DC at some Gansey approved missed-school-day event, a rare occurrence for a family that didn’t even let Gansey take a day for his Grandmother’s funeral.

Ronan, for his part, was cheating on his day off because normally a missed school day would earn a lecture from Gansey about responsibility and education, but Ronan was exploring an old map he and Gansey had re-cobbled together that may or may not lead to a clue about Glendower, and Gansey couldn’t yell at him for that. He was much like his family in that regard--Ronan also got Gansey sanctioned skip days.

It was already late in the morning, the church’s ten o’clock bells had chimed half a mile ago and the scenery was beginning to look familiar, though Ronan couldn’t tell why. The map he and Gansey had been re-working  had taken them in an opposite direction from the ley-line and their previous endeavors. It was most of the reason that Gansey hadn’t given as much energy to it as he did to throwaway lines in journals and folktales.

Ronan came around a bended line of trees and realized with a start why these woods were familiar. He’d been skirting the property line of the Lynch Estate half the morning. As children, he and his brothers had never been allowed this far back in the wild forest surrounding their home, but a handful of times they hadn’t been stopped. The last time Ronan had been this far back had been the day he and his brother had been taken away from the Estate for forever, per his father’s will.

He also realized there was a tomb lid thrown across the clearing he was staring at.

Which was weird because there was no graveyard on the property and Niall Lynch certainly hadn’t been left at his murder site.

Ronan crept forward, hand slipping into his jacket pocket so his fingers could curl around the pocket knife there. He followed the deep scoring left by the lid in the dirt, though another thicket and out to a stream that eventually crossed through the Lynch property.

Hunkered over the water was a body.

They were facing away from him, but Ronan was pretty certain it was a man. He was tall and built, but still slim, bent over like he was on his knees, hands on the river bank, face almost in the water.

Stranger  still was his outfit. It was dusty but not really dirty and it looked like something out of a fantasy show, all brown robs and billowing shirts and tall boots. He was absolutely anachronistic.

Jesus, there was a psychopath right outside of his childhood home.

Or, worse yet, they were doing ren-fairs in the forest.

He stepped forward to confront the guy, because he was an idiot. But when a branch snapped under his foot, the man barely reacted, no more than throwing his arm out behind him. Then Ronan realized he couldn’t move. HE looked down and found vines snaking around his ankles, climbing up his legs

He yelped, tried to step back, fell flat on his ass.

“The water here is too fast for scrying,” the man said, like Ronan should know what the fuck that meant. “Why did you put me here?”

“I didn’t put you anywhere, you fucking weirdo,” Ronan snapped, struggling back to his feet.

The man turned and Ronan almost fell over again. Despite all the cobwebs hanging form his curly hair and the dust that covered his skin in a fine sheen, he was devastatingly handsome, all fine bones and striking colors.

“Who are you?” the man asked and had the gall to sound confused.

“Who am I?” Who the fuck are you?” Ronan demanded, shifting his feet in the vines.

“Even knights aren’t that stupid,” the man scoffed. “You woke me. You must know who I am. You must have found the king.”

“I didn’t fucking do anything to you. And I’m no fucking knight. What are you tripping on, dude?”

The man frowned at him and Ronan frowned back harder. He jerked away when the man reached a hand out, but it wasn’t like he could go very far. The man pressed his calloused, knobby, tanned hand over Ronan’s head, palm flat against his forehead, making Ronan self conscious of a scar right under it.

A sharp zap shot through Ronan--not quite electricity, more like the force that woke him before nightmares, like the feeling of Cabeswater falling in love with Gansey, like holding something dangerous and impossible when he awoke--and the man must’ve felt it too because he stumbled back.

“What are you?” he asked, wide eyed. “You’re...drowning in magic, but you’re no magician.”

Ronan’s eyes widened too and he repeated, “Who are you?”

The man was already rushing by Ronan and taking his vines with him. “My name’s Adam. I am a magician,” he said over his shoulder as he tore through the thicket again, making his way in a stumbling zig-zag back to the tomb.

Studying it now, Ronan realized why he’d never seen it around before. Dirt and soil and roots were still falling off of it and the ground around it was a breathing mound and sinkhole at once. The tomb had come out of the ground.

Adam had kneeled over the lid briefly, long fingers tracing over what looked like just stone to Ronan, before he was jumping up again and running to the tomb. He climbed into and Ronan’s stomach turned over when he realized the tomb had been made for Adam’s body exactly.

“What the fuck kind of shit are you into?” he asked, horrified.

Adam shot him an unamused look and went back to looking for what he wanted. “My name’s Adam Parrish,” he repeated.

“First son, house of God,” Ronan said. “Real subtle.”

“I’m the King’s magician. I’m supposed to wake the king when he’s found. I’m supposed to be brought back by a knight who has found the King in the world’s hour of need. I’m supposed to scry for his location, which begins the process of waking the King and his magic. The King and I are soul-bound. My magic is the only thing that can wake him.”

Ronan frowned deeply. His eyebrows even frowned. “Glendower shares a reincarnation mythos with King Arthur?”

Adam frowned deeply back at him and his eyebrows could do it too. “We based the soul-spell on King Arthur, yes, but I don’t know who Glendower is.”

“If you’re not looking for Glendower, who could you possibly be--” Ronan started, but Adam was climbing back out of the tomb and stumbling away to hold his hands against the trees around them. “Wait, wait, wait, back up. How do I know you’re not just some guy tripping out here?” he asked. Because only him and Gansey were crazy enough to search for dead Welsh kings without any kind of substance abuse involved.

Adam shot a disbelieving look at him. “I know you felt my magic, but fine.” He crossed over to Ronan on long legs and grabbed Ronan’s hand, turned it over, ran his calloused fingers over Ronan’s palm. “Your wisdom line is hidden by the rest. You don’t show your intelligence very often, but you’re very smart. Your life has been extremely hard. It breaks at one point, you almost died. But even before that, something terrible happened to you that changed you forever. You changed track entirely,” he said, following a bend in a line on Ronan’s hand. “You love deeply, but in secret. You’re hiding something. You hide your feelings all the time, but there’s a bigger secret you’re hiding when it comes to love.”

Ronan snatched his hand back and shoved it back in his jacket pocket. “Lucky fucking guess,” he muttered.

Adam rolled his eyes and went back to the trees. “This place is somewhere special to you, but I can’t figure out what. You’re disconnected from it now. Someone took it from you.”

“Enough, you circus-tent freak.”

“What is a circus?” Adam asked, sounded just as lost as ever.

Ronan brought his hand up to his face and let out a suffering groan. “Listen...just...what king are you looking for if not Glendower? My friend and I have been searching for him for years. We haven’t found anything about any other kings being buried out here.”

Adam held his hands against the trees for a moment longer before apparently not getting an answer he wanted. “What do you mean what King? Haven’t the stories survived? Someone woke me. Someone found him.”

“Who woke you? Who found him? Found who?” Ronan demanded.

Adam ran a hand through his hair and looked at the middle distance. “King Richard Gansey. Someone found Gansey.”

[fandomsnerd]

Familiar Pains

(cross posted AO3)

He is used to pain. It’s not unusual, given his lifestyle to be in pain. He’s used to the ache of overworked muscles, tired and screaming as they rip themselves apart, slowly stitching back together, making him stronger.

Used to stiff shoulders and knots in his back, bruised and battered from sleeping rough. Burning calves and aching feet from walking hours on end, blisters burst and bleeding long before he stops.

Used to cold toes, frozen fingers, hands shoved into his armpits in an attempt to warm them, keep them functional.

He knows how to take a punch, been in enough bar fights to prove it. Dealt with everything from black eyes and split lips to bruised ribs and broken bones.

He knows it doesn’t always look that way, it doesn’t seem obvious to many on the outside. He knows he can look soft. Look delicate, breakable.

They see the instrument, his flashy clothes, and they assume that is all there is to him.

They assume the only weapons he knows how to use are his sharp words and witty remarks.  

 Words they underestimate, not realising the strength those words alone afford him. The ability to shape the land, shift favour, enough to make a hero or destroy a bloodline, all with just a few, carefully placed lyrics.

 And if they underestimate his one publicised power, the one he wears branded on his sleeve, making clear to the world that he is a wielder of words; then is it really such a surprise when they assume he has no other ways to defend himself.  

 They assume he’s breakable, an easy target, so soft and fragile.

An idea he often doesn’t fight. He can’t help it, he likes to indulge, enjoy the finer things in life. He knows how it looks, how they see his love of showy clothes and fine wines and assume he is as soft as the feather pillows he favours.

Because that is all they see, the soft pillows, sweet wines, and good food. The showy bard, purposefully playing up his delicacy, soft, cheeky and charming.

And utterly unthreatening.

 They don’t realise how much of it is purposeful. A carefully crafted act, making sure that his harsh and twisting words and cheeky flirtations are well hidden under the facade of comfort and security. It makes them more amenable, more agreeable, welcoming. More likely to part with their coin, share a warm meal, perhaps a warm bed, and let him be on his merry way, no trouble caused.

Well, most of the time.  

Most decent people have no issues, letting him ply his trade and be on his way.

And for others… well there word of mouth did much to help. Reputation follows you, wrapped like a thick cloak around your shoulders. And over the years he had built himself a fine one, for when your looking to avoid a fight.

For the bard this meant a reputation forever branded by the Witcher, travel with him often enough and it soon doesn’t matter if he is at the time alone or not, they see him and they see the Witcher. He finds that plenty took one look at him and decided even if they could break his skull, run him out of town, it wouldn’t be worth it once the fierce guard dog comes calling.

 But then there are the other few, the ones who by some happenstance haven’t heard of his favoured travel companion, or sometimes they have, sometimes that’s the point.

Sometimes his connection to the Witcher is the only reason they decide to go after him.

They decide it’s worth the risk, worth the risk to hurt the man, the monster, hurt him in a way that won’t hurt them. They know they can’t touch the Witcher himself, so they go after the bard. The delicate, breakable bard. Looking to break the Witcher by breaking him

  He assumes that’s what these gentlemen had intended. They were careful, he would give them that, making sure he was alone, Witcher away for the evening on a hunt, waiting until he stepped out of the pub, trailing him down the dark and winding streets. They must have done a fair job of it, that or the ale in his veins was strong enough to mask their presence.

 He barely even noticed them until they approached.  

Then he noticed. Thank the gods he heard them coming, quiet and swift feet, rushing across cobblestones set his mind into motion. Adrenaline kicking in, he ducks more on instinct than anything else, wooden plank sailing clear over his head, hitting the wall with a concerningly heavy thump.  

He spins, low on his heels, tugging free the hidden blade from his waist.

He can make out three of them, one with a club, the others carrying nasty looking blades.

 He doesn’t have much time to absorb the information before the one with the wooden club takes another swing at him. The man is mercifully slow, uncoordinated. He ducks aside with ease, directly into the path of one of the others.

A large, burly man, face half hidden by a cloth. The man takes a slash at him, knife glinting in the moonlight as it swings at him.

He jumps back, just barely making it out of the way, knife slicing through his doublet.

 The blow to the back of his head catches him off guard, head pounding, ears ringing as he swings around, digging his short blade into the man’s chest, letting out a satisfied snarl when he feels blade connect so easily with the flesh.

He doesn’t have long to enjoy it, before another blow from one of the other attackers stuns him, sending him reeling.

He manages to regain his footing in time to sidestep another swinging knife, He slashes back, ducking down to avoid the man’s wide swings before raising and slashing the knife along the man’s gut, intestines spilling out. He revels in the resulting scream, stepping aside to let the man drop to his knees, knife slipping from his fingers and clattering on the cobblestones as the man desperately clutched at his spilled guts.

 He doesn’t have time to watch the man cry, the other two coming at him again. The one with the club, blood dripping from the open stab wound, takes another hit at him, landing a blow against his chest, sending him stumbling back against the wall.

The other dives at him, driving a knife down towards his chest. He manages to move in time, blade instead digging into his shoulder, digging in deep.

 He lets out a cry, diving forward when the man pulls the blade free and back, lifting it to strike again. Instead he tackles the man, sending them both crashing to the ground. He rolls quickly to the side when the man under him takes another swing, unfortunately having managed to keep hold of the knife in the fall.

The action turns out to be doubly helpful, the bleeding man behind him having swung down towards him, now striking his friend square in the chest with the club instead.

The large man roars in anger, turning to take another swing at him as he moves to stand. This one hits, swinging into his ribs and knocking the breath from him, he hunches over, only just having mind enough to duck the next blow, headed for his head.

 He dives forward between blows, knife in hand, slashing at the man’s already injured chest. He man stumbles back with another roar, bloodied but still standing.

He hears the other start to rise behind him, turning in time to catch the man half up and vulnerable. Without giving himself time to think he digs his blade into the man’s neck, blood spurting out freely onto the dusty street.

The man falls with a gurgle, eyes wide with shock, clutching at his throat; he will not stand again.

 The echoing roar from behind him is enough to rattle his bones, swinging round once more to face the last of his attackers.

The man once again swings high, as he ducks low, but he’s slower this time, worn out and bloodied himself, the hard wood managing once again to connect with the side of his head, sending him stumbling to the side, one hand out to steady himself against the wall.

 The man pauses, eyeing him, now more than aware of what he is capable. He bares his teeth, waiting, challenging, ready for another attack.

 He doesn’t have to wait long, the final attacker diving forward with one more roar, club swinging down towards him.

He dives out of the way, intending to dance round the man, knife sliding into flesh as he goes. He doesn’t get the chance, feet failing to find purchase on blood-soaked cobble stones. He is sent sprawling, blade dropping from his fingers and scattering out away from him. He cries out again, a sharp pain shooting up his leg, his ankle twisting unnaturally in the fall.

His attacker lets out a triumphant laugh, club raised high to strike him.

But luck has once again shifted to his side, fingers curling around the handle of a knife one of the others had dropped, swiftly driving the large blade into the man’s leg.

The man screams, rearing back, giving him the opening he needs to pull the knife free, and, ignoring his screaming ankle, surge up and drive the blade deep into the man’s chest.

 He yanks the blade free, before driving it again, twisting, listening as the mans scream becomes a desperate rasping gasp, blood spilling from the man’s lips.

He yanks the knife free one last time, letting the man fall back, mouth open in a silent scream.

  He falls back himself, leaning against the wall and panting as the final dregs of adrenaline quickly give in to exhaustion.

His arm has gone cold, the gash in his shoulder still sluggishly bleeding, slowly soaking through his now ruined shirt.

He pushes himself up, pushing through the oh so familiar pain, knowing it would be unwise to stick around for too long, given the mess of the scene around him.

 He limps the rest of the way to the inn, various aches and pains slowly revealing themselves and setting in as he goes.

He makes it back undisturbed, trying not to draw any more attention than absolutely necessary as he quietly sneaks into the inn, quickly climbing the stairs and stumbling into his room.

 He collapses, heavily onto the bed, lets himself breathe, feeling the exhaustion settle further into his bones.

He wants to lie there, let himself drift off to sleep, body tired and heavy, the last of his adrenaline having completely worn off.

But he knows he can’t. Can’t pass out yet, shoulder still bleeding, now soaking out onto previously clean sheets.

 He pulls himself up, tugging off the ruined doublet, tossing it aside. He pulls his undershirt open and off with much more care, having to carefully tug the ripped fabric free from his wounds.

Chests bare he winces at the scattering of harsh red marks, knowing that by tomorrow he will be covered in a number of large, ugly bruises.

A problem for tomorrows Jaskier, for now he has an open wound to deal with.

He has plenty of supplies, a necessity when traveling with a Witcher.

 He digs through his supply bag, yanking out the necessary items, and settles down to work on cleaning out the wound with a cloth and clean water. He is grateful they had already called for a tub, a necessity for whenever Geralt goes out for a hunt.

He can’t hold back a gasp when he first brushes the cloth against the wound, raw nerves flaring up at the contact. He doubles over, clutching the wound, sucking in a breath, trying to get the pain back under control.

 He’s still hunched over, breathing when he hears the door swing open, looks up to find Geralt watching him from the doorway, back early and covered in the remains of his own battle.

Geralt frowns, head cocked as he studies Jaskier.  He stares back, challenging the man to say anything.

The Witcher remains silent, walking past him to wash his hands in the tub before retuning to pluck the cloth from Jaskier’s hands.

He lets Geralt take it, looks away as the man presses the cloth to his wound, biting back against his pain. Geralt hums, wiping the wound clean.

He’s unable to hold back the gasping whimper when the Witcher douses the wound in spirits to disinfect it, gasping at the sharp burning pain. He quickly stuffs his fist into his mouth to hold back any further sounds.

He watches Geralt out of the corner of his eye, watching as the man carefully thread up the needle, ready to stitch up the wound. He is once again unable to hold back a whimper when the needle first pierces through skin, the sound slipping out around his clenched fist.

The Witcher watches him closely, carefully tugging the torn skin back together, it hurts, as it must, but Geralt is careful to cause no more pain then is necessary.

 He shutters when the final knot is tied, he’s always hated stitches, hates the feeling of his skin being tugged and pulled on, yanked back into place.

 Geralt uncorks the spirits, pausing to give Jaskier a moment to steady himself before poring it over the stitches, washing away the remains of the man’s blood.

He hisses at the burn, biting back curses. Geralt carefully dabs away any remaining liquid, he hums quietly, raising a hand to gently nudge Jaskier’s face towards him, eyes meeting for the first time that day.

Geralt leans in, pressing a kiss to Jaskier’s forehead. He lets his eyes fall shut, leaning in, feeling his shoulders drop, properly relaxing for the first time sense the attack. He all but colapses forward, weight falling against Geralt’s chest.

He feels more than hears Geralt’s resulting hum, the Witcher carefully tugging him up, guiding him over to the bed. He lets out another hiss, clutching at Geralt’s chest when he feels his ankle twinge at the movement.

The Witcher tucks an arm around him, taking most of his weight, gently helping Jaskier down onto the bed.

He sits, Geralt helping him slide off his boots, the Witcher taking this as a chance to examine his admittedly swollen ankle. He lets out another whimper when Geralt rolls the ankle around in his hand, making sure it was only twisted and not broken.

Satisfied Geralt lets him lie down, settle back and try to get comfortable despite the many aches and pains growing more and more obvious all over his body.

The Witcher leans across, steals a pillow from beside Jaskier to tuck it under the bruised and swelling ankle.

 He pays Geralt little mind, settling back and letting tired and heavy eyes fall closed.

The stillness letting him reflect on the itching tug of his shoulder, the radiating ache of his sore ankle, and the other assortment of injuries and aches throughout his body.

He feels a slight pressure, a breath ghosting over his head, Geralt pressing one final kiss to his forehead before stepping away.

 He breathes out a sigh, feeling the tension bleed out of him, exhaustion beating out discomfort, letting himself rest, letting himself be.

He is in pain.

But he is used to pain, he knows pain. He can handle it, adjust, overcome.

His skin will stitch itself back together, twisted ankle slowly settle back into place, body repairing itself, a chance his attackers would never get to have.

They had made the mistake of assuming he was weak, fragile. Breakable.

A mistake he insured they would never be able to repeat.

Because he knows pain, and he will not let himself be stopped by it.  

[lost-eternity]

Matchup requests: CLOSED

Match up request for: @ theslytheraniwolf

Okie dokie. I match you with...

Severus Snape!

Sorry this one is so short, hun, it’s only three pages. Usually the more description I have, the more I can write because I have more to go off of.

Snape would initially have been very interested in you

You're super mysterious 

Some people claim that you are secretly a werewolf or something along those lines

Seriously. Everyone is just a little bit fearful of you. No one has any idea who you are. They just think that you are weird. 

I feel like he would have been very interested in the macabre just as you are

And he would have loved to start a conversation with you about it

But he is too shy and reserved 

Both being in Slytherin puts you had a great advantage due to the pride Severus feels about his own house

If you were in Gryffindor he may have just ignored your presence altogether 

But since you're a fellow Slytherin... that means you are interesting 

You would keep him grounded, especially later in his life when he is tempted by the darkness

You would remind him of his own humanity 

And I think Snape really needs that

~

There was no one specific instance where you two "met". You have been acquaintances from the beginning of the first year but never had a real conversation until around your 5th year

This was the first year you shared a class with him

It was potions 

You were told to partner up for this but you consciously decided not to

You work better on your own,  anyways

You were breezing through the potion whereas the rest of the students appeared to be struggling.  Having finished it to the desired effect, you sat back and pulled out a book. It was a murder mystery. 

Professor Horace Slughorn seemed to notice your behaviour and attempted to scold you on disobeying orders and working under your own discretion 

But he could not say much due to how exemplary your potion turned out

Sighing in resignation, he moved on

And you returned to your nice book

But not for long

The feeling of eyes on you attracted your attention towards a dark-haired boy who also appeared to be working alone despite classroom orders. He, like you, had completed his potion to the same degree of perfection. And he was just... staring.

You raised an eyebrow at him questioningly and he immediately looked away

Oookay. That was... weird.

~

After then as you were packing up your things and heading to your next class, someone crashed into you 

Gasping, your supplies clattered against the cobbled floor

The sound of haughty laughter echoed down the halls. "Oops. My bad." A voice mocked disingenuously

You did not need to look to know the owner of the voice and rolled your eyes. "That was so funny I forgot to laugh, James." You responded in a clipped tone. 

You made to gather your supplies when a foot kicked one of your books out of the way.

"Why aren't you looking at me?" James jeered. 

You sighed and looked up. Per usual, the antagonist of the school was flanked by his friends. Their steely glares taunting you.

"What are you reading?" James purred with fake interest, plucking a book from the stone tiles. "Hmm... ‘A Study in Scarlet’? What kind of daft name is that?"

You rolled your eyes. "A quite ingenious one if you read it... assuming you have the mental capacity to do so."

Mistake.

Your quip infuriated James who raised his wand

You made a grab for your own but he was faster

"Expelliarmus!"

Your wand tore itself from your grip and went flying across the room

Just now realising the shit hole you had gotten yourself into, you made a break for it

"Levicorpus!"

You yelped as you were suddenly yanked into the air, dangling upside down by your ankles

With his friends egging him on, and passing schoolmates beginning to watch, James hoisted you higher 

Until the bottoms of your feet grazed the rafters

You glared down at him indignantly, unable to activate any countermeasures against the jinx without your wand

That was when a voice cut through the laughter

"Let her down!"

There was a quick silence before all eyes turned to poor, small Severus Snape who was shaking a bit. "I said, stop it."

"What are you going to do about it, Snape?" James challenged 

Sirius tilted his head, boasting a charismatic cheshire grin as he spoke. "Awe, I think someone has a crush."

"Liberacorpus!" Snape flicked his wand at you and you plummeted towards the ground. 

He did not have enough time to cast a spell to break your fall before James once again used expelliarmus to render him defenceless.

You came crashing to the hard stone floor, pain flaring up along your elbows and knees where you caught yourself

Blood dripped down your knee caps as your mind swayed.

You could vaguely hear the jeering laughter of the kids as they redirected their malice onto Snape who seemed to be taking the brunt of the humility 

Creeping forward, you fumbled around briefly, trying to collect your breath and locate your wand. 

A warm hand touched your shoulder as you looked up, noticing a red-haired girl standing before you. With a sympathetic expression, she extended the wand towards you. "Are you looking for this?"

You nodded faintly and grasped the wand

You clawed your way up the wall, bracing yourself against it to stand on your feet. Your eyes narrowed, glaring daggers at the back of Jame's head as he levitated Snape once again into the air 

"Flipendo." You murmured

A burst of red shot forth from your wand and collided with James. He flipped forward, landing roughly on his back with a pained cry 

The silence that ensued was deafening 

Sirius and Lupin seemed quick to Jame's defence, Peter, per usual, cowered in the back

James stopped his friends and climbed to his feet, a cocky smirk spreading across his face. "Is that how you want to play it?" He raised his wand

"Expelliarm-"

"Protego!"

His spell bounced harmlessly off your shield. You immediately rolled underneath it, "immobulus!"

Jame's limbs froze up mid-spell cast, his mouth parted and his facial expressions twisted into one of wrath 

Sirius was quick to take his place and began flinging spells at you in defence of his friend

You probably wouldn't have survived another duel if a shrill but commanding voice hadn't interrupted 

Newly appointed head of Gryffindor Minerva McGonagall stood in the hallway, arms folded and a stern expression written across her face. "Explain this."

Well... shit

~

Needless to say, you were in a lot of trouble after getting out of the hospital wing

House points were deducted from both Gryffindor and Slytherin. Although you seemed to face a slightly lighter punishment due to your acts being pure self-defence.

You and Severus served detention together, being forced on cleaning duty of the mess hall after meals. You had hours to talk and get to know each other. Well, and the house-elves.

From then on, you and Severus have stuck together, knowing that you could protect yourselves easier that way

And the house-elves

They showed you some rather unconventional methods of sneaking around the castle unnoticed 😉

I hope you enjoyed, my dear. Let me know what you thought :)

I couldn’t resist the Sherlock reference in there oops.

[agrinsosardonic]

Wicked Little Thing

A/U: CloudxReno 

Also on: A03 and Fanfiction.net

Reno wasn’t like the other boys. 

He solidified that when he showed up at Cloud’s window in the early morning hours on the first day of his 18th summer. He had something to show him. Of the utmost importance. Cloud, with half opened blue eyes stared at the boy smirking in the window. The heat of the sun already suffocating despite just breaking through the dark clouds of night. Cloud’s skin felt like rubber. Sticky wet. Like something was crawling through the little blonde hairs on his arms. 

But still, he dressed in shorts and a t-shirt, and snuck out of the sleeping house to join the other boy. Reno didn’t say much, but it’s rare for him to use any words. Follow me. Died in the humid air right as it grazed Cloud’s ears. And Reno already walking towards the forest. Cloud thought about arguing. Or bitchin’, as Reno called it. But arguing with Reno was as useful as fist fighting a brick wall. The brick wall always wins. Cloud laments this fact, silently of course, as he steps through mud and sticks towards an undisclosed location. 

The trees like statues as they provide minimal relief from the ball of flame in the sky. 

The air smelled stale and wet.

Like the mold that grows in the boys home, where Reno lives. 

The stench that sticks to their clothes; a tell-tale sign of the abandoned.

But Cloud noted, the one time Reno allowed him close enough he could take in his smell, the other boy reminded him of flames. 

They come upon a clearing. And Cloud gagged when death crept into the air. 

Rotting eggs and sulfur.  Cloud pulled his shirt over his nose to filter the smell, though even his mother’s soap proved to be a pathetic barrier. Nothing really prepared Cloud for the stench of a floating dead body baking in the hot sun. At the edge of the swamp, half of the blue flesh bobbed in the water. It’s clothes tattered and torn; button down and no pants. Bloated beyond recognition. Veins like a road map twisting along milky skin. 

Cloud darts blue eyes towards Reno. The other boy stared at the body; his face like stone never acknowledging the pungent stench. 

“Gotta get used to dead bodies if ya gonna be in SOLDIER,” he said in a thick accent that Cloud could never place, but was one more thing that separated him from the other boys. Reno’s lips tugged into a smirk. 

Cloud tried breathing through his mouth; but it tasted like spoiled meat. And he knew if he threw up, Reno would never let him live it down. He swallowed the bile that burned in his throat. And didn’t say another word. 

The sounds of summer embraced the scene. The animals that lurk in the swamp send ripples of waves crashing to the surface as they feed. Birds squawk overhead. Breaking twigs in the distance. Mosquitoes and flies buzzed too close. The hum pierced Cloud’s ear drum as he tried to swat them away. 

The heat had them both sweating through white shirts. Reno pulled his over his head, revealing the lean muscles and faded bruises. Like dying fireworks in a peach skyline. And Cloud couldn’t help but gaze along his body. Taking inventory every line and freckle until tattooed to his brain. Reno cast his two pearls of lake colored eyes upon the other boy, curious like a fox.

“Comeon,” he drawled, “we’re pullin’ it out.”

“Uuh,” Cloud stuttered, dropping his shirt from his mouth, “What?”

Reno walked closer to the body- Cloud impressed that the other boy could handle the smell- and grabbed a swollen ankle. “I wanna burn it.”

“W-what?” Cloud repeated.

“Fuckin’ what,” Reno snaps, “I ain’t speakin’ a different language.”

Reno hated speaking at all. This was the most string of words he’s spoken in a while. Cloud liked the sound of his voice. Rough like coal. Bitter like whiskey he pretended he didn’t drink when the sun went down. Not like the other boys with their clean grammar and smooth inflections uttered through pearly white teeth. Not like Clouds, who flumbles through words like he’s running through boulders. Getting caught up. Tongue too big for his mouth. Swollen. 

Cloud huffed. And followed the order. The smell only grew impossible to handle. The smaller of the two boys coughing and hacking as he tried fruitlessly to shield his nose with his shirt again. Reno watched him the whole time with hooded eyes that darkened under the mess of red hair. Cloud tried to focus on the task. And not how Reno scanned his body. Resting on the bit of skin exposed from pulling up his shirt. 

Cloud hesitated. The flesh that held together the foot to ankle looked diseased. Black. Putrid. He didn’t want to touch it, not at all. The amount of bacteria eating away at the stinking flesh was enough to make Cloud sick. But he could still feel Reno’s burning gaze. And he doesn’t want to look like a coward in front of him. He wrapped his fingers around the skin- and it feels like wet, slimy, clay. He pulled and the flesh peeled away from worn bone. Slipped from his hands like thick water. 

He yelled and jumped back, tripping over a rock. 

Reno’s laugh sounded like razor blades. He’s pacing around the clearing, holding his stomach. And if Cloud had an ounce of courage, he might swing at him. 

“Fuck you!” He shouted instead. 

“Poor lil bird.” Reno regained his composure. His toothy smile revealed two sharp canines.

Cloud scrambled back to his feet. “You’re sick, man.”

The red-head shrugs, wiping his hands on dirty blue jeans. He pulls out his crumbled pack of smokes and places a cigarette between his thin lips. 

“Can I bum one?” Cloud asked. 

Reno ignited the match, the flame orange and yellow casts haunting shadows across his face. “No.”

“Why?” 

He took a drag, “Waste.”

Cloud knew what he meant. “I heard everyone smokes in SOLDIER. I got to learn right?”

“Who told ya that? Zack?” Reno scrunched his face like the name tasted like poison on his tongue. Cloud nodded and Reno just shook his head. “Zack has half a brain and it ain’t in his head.”

Cloud doesn’t respond. Eyes wilted to the dirt ground; a large centipede crawled over his shoe and he kicked it into the lake where it can be a gators snack. 

“You can’t burn the body, by the way,” he said. “It’s too wet. It won’t catch.”

Reno grimaced in response. Cloud admired the scowl on the other boy’s face. How it compliments the rest of his rough edges. He watched him take slow drags of his cigarette. How the black smoke slowly escaped his lips, obstructing his features except for those two eyes that glow against smoke. Like the stars in the midnight sky. 

Reno was a house fire. 

And maybe Cloud felt that way because the first time he saw him Mrs. Fost house was engulfed. Glowing orange embers fell from the sky like rain. Hissed and singed when they landed on the cobble stoned street. Everyone watched. Some helped. The good  ol’ boys, like Zack, rallied each other and grabbed water from the well to put out the fire. 

Cloud stood hypnotized by the dancing reds that ate at the flimsy wood, which scorched the air. And he thought it was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen up to that point. He wanted to feel as powerful as a fire. Eat away at the things weaker than him. But Cloud wasn’t a house fire. Cloud was the wood structure collapsing like a dying star. 

He heard the striking of a match. Turned towards the sound. 

Saw a boy, with hair the color of blood, bringing fire to the cigarette between his lips. 

He looked like danger. Cut from metal. Sharp like the switchblade in his pocket. 

And then, like now under the muted morning light, in a swamp that reeks of death, Cloud can’t stop staring at the boy. Who appeared a year ago like a phantom under the flames of destruction. Cloud gravitated to him like he was the sun. And found only darkness. A red dwarf. Two minutes from midnight and ready for armageddon. And that’s all he knew.

Reno’s past a mystery but everyone tried predicting his future.

Boys like that end up in the gutter.

The mothers whispered. 

Filthy monsters. Wicked little things. All end up dead before eighteen.

Zack and the rest of the boys warned him much the same.

You hang out with trash you start to smell.

But Reno smelled like burning wood, nicotine, and pomegranates. 

Reno was fire and Cloud wanted to burn.

Thunder cracked. Cloud looked into the darkening sky. “It’s going to rain.”

“So?” Reno grabbed a long stick and stomped back towards the body. “Afraid of gettin’ wet?” He winks, “Little birds can’t fly in rain?” 

He plunged the stick into the bloated stomach of cadaver. Black ooze pushed out. Cloud swore he heard a wheeze before another boom of thunder. He flinched as Reno dug the wood deeper until it stood on its own. 

“Wh-why did you do that?”

Reno snapped his eyes at Cloud. And shrugged, again. Cloud pursed his lips looking for words. But found vacant expressions. Reno didn’t need to explain himself; he’s red hot anger. And everything he does is a result of that. 

“You gotta learn to stab shit if you wanna be a SOLDIER.” Reno said and revealed a switchblade from his back pocket. “Comeon.”

Cloud hesitated. “W..Why?”

“I just said why, fuck.” 

The sky opened and cold rain cooled the hot earth. The drops slammed against the bloated body; singing through the dense forest and murky swamp. Tap tap tap. Rapid like bullets. 

“I won’t be stabbing something that’s already dead, right?” Cloud shifted. 

Reno removed the dead cigarette from his mouth, flicking it into the swamp and approached Cloud. His feet sunk into the mud with every step; but as if blessed, he doesn’t stumble. And the blonde can’t seem to move, even though Reno’s giving him this look; like an alligator lurking below the surface of the swamp, ready to bite his head off. He stopped too close. Cloud could see the gentle rise and fall of his chest. The bones of his rib cage that peek through the skin. The small cuts. The large black and blues. From one too many fights with those good boys. 

To Cloud’s surprise, they’re the same height. Blue green meets slate blue eyes. Reno always gave off the impression of being impossibly larger than life. Cloud crushed under his gaze. But in the pouring rain, in the morning light, with the smell of rotting flesh and still water, they were equals. 

Reno grabbed Cloud’s wrist, with a sudden movement that it stole the blonde’s heartbeat, and placed the hilt of the blade in his wet palm. 

“Stab me.”

“What!?” Cloud didn’t stutter this time. He blurted the words from his mouth with a frantic tone. He tried to move back but Reno held him firm. Rooted to the ground. “No w-way!”

“Gotta learn.” Reno grinned something vile. He closed Cloud’s fingers around the worn wood, and pressed the sharpened knife against his own side. Guiding the other boy. His skin tickling the blade like a dar. “Right here.”

“Y-y-you’re fucki-in nuts, Re.”

“You think this my first time bein’ stabbed?”

“No, bu-t-” Cloud could only shake his head, “I ain’t stabbing you. No w-way.”

Reno frowned, bringing Cloud and his wrist and the blade to his neck. “How ‘bout here?”

“That’s w-worse!” Cloud panted. “You’ll die.”

“You can’t kill me, lil bird.” And Reno laughed. A devastated laugh that sounded more like the lightning that flashed overhead. Blinding Cloud for a moment. But only a moment. And he saw electricity in the redhead eyes. And felt his skin rise towards the cement sky. And he didn’t know if the shock was from the angry god above or the boy before him, yanking him closer. Stumbling over feet. His collision with Reno- skin to skin- proceeded the thunder. 

“Hm,” Reno purrs, and Cloud felt his breath against his lips. “Ya never gonna make SOLDIER.”

Cloud growled, “F-Fuck you, Reno.”

Reno squeezed Cloud’s wrist. Tight. Until he was forced to drop the knife. “Ya finally gettin mad, huh?” 

But Cloud stared into Reno’s eyes- too busy to get mad. Trying to focus on anything else besides Reno. Not his lips and how they were slightly opened and just slightly inviting. And that he smells of smoldering flame that eats at an entire forest. And his hand feels rough around his wrist. And Cloud’s aware of the lack of blood traveling to his fingers that they are going numb. 

Reno relaxed his grip. Moving his hand up Cloud’s, over the scars that littered his calloused fingers. Burns. “I like it when ya mad,” he whispered, “ya more interestin’.”

And he’s giving Cloud the same look he flashed him at Mrs. Fost’s house fire. When the smoke around his face cleared. And Cloud saw the dramatic curves of his face. His slanted auburn eyebrows that clashed against the red hues of his hair. Mesmerized by the way his eyes glowed- literally glowed- brighter than the fire that consumed the wood house over the old women’s feverish cries. And Cloud was, himself, engulfed by Reno’s gaze that he didn’t acknowledge how the strange boy traveled from Cloud’s face, down his chest, to his bandaged right hand that blistered underneath the cloth. 

Not until the red-head curled his lips into a wicked little smirk. 

Under the rain, the hot rain that stuck to his body like grime, Reno had the same look, Curiosity mixed with bloodlust. 

Or…

Just regular lust. 

And Cloud couldn’t stand another minute not knowing if Reno tasted like he smelled-

Pressed his lips against the red-heads, snaking his fingers into his wet hair to pull him closer. Impossibly close.

He expected a fist in his face, rocking him from this earth. Instead, Reno returns the kiss twice as forceful and with more practice. Wrapping his lean arms around Cloud’s small frame. Gliding his nails through the white fabric. 

Cloud opened his mouth so their tongues can meet,

And he tasted like tar. And electricity. And sulfur. 

They managed to get off the shirt that clung to Cloud’s body like suction cups. And they were back to skin and mess of limbs and lips. 

And teeth that bit on Cloud’s lip; and he moaned from his throat a sound that rushed through Reno’s body like a shockwave. Then fall to the floor. Cushioned by the mud. 

They tarnished their bodies in dirt and filth. Rough hands digging into flesh. And Cloud couldn’t keep track of how many times Reno’s name left his bruised lips through harsh breathes. 

And he didn’t stutter. 

He memorized that name. Branded it in his brain. 

The only word he knew. 

The red-head sat up, straddling Cloud’s hips under him. Pressing his hand firm on his chest to keep him on the ground. And blue-green eyes stare at Reno. Flushed with pleading desire. But he’s preoccupied with the scars on Cloud’s chest. 

And if Reno was faded fireworks during the sun set.

Cloud was the scorched woods during sun rise.  

Old burns splashed over his pale skin. Some still pink and angry. Other’s that blended into his flesh.  

And Reno smiled.

His first real smile. 

And Cloud thought he looked like the devil. 

He dropped down, their torsos meeting. Lips just barely touching. “I knew it,” he whispers. 

And he figured it out the night they first met. That Cloud was a match that needed a spark. 

Their lips met again. Clothes torn off.

The rain and mud made their bodies slick. And Cloud dug his nails into Reno’s back while he hissed into the blonde's neck. Nipping and biting skin, adding crimson to muted colors. 

It was the tangled limbs- how Cloud didn’t know where he ended and Reno began- that had raw breathless gasps clawing at his throat. 

And they were gripped in euphoria that they forgot about the body decaying next to them. 

--------------------------

The rain stopped. The heat rose from the soil and the earth felt like an oven. Reno stood over the body; his jeans stained with mud and shirt over his shoulder. Cloud walked next to him, still trying to adjust his shorts, with his own shirt balled in his pocket- his mom will have a word with him when he gets home, for sure. But that would have to wait. Right now, he relished the tingles that touched every part of his body, while he watched the red-head. New scars painted his canvas. Long streaks of red that matched the ones on Cloud’s body. And the blonde felt the throb of the bite on his shoulder; and it burned like the fire that decorated his flesh. 

He didn’t even care that Reno had marked him-

Like the house fire, Reno was the most beautiful thing he had even seen in eighteen years on this dying planet. And Cloud wanted every bite, and burn, the red head could offer him. 

Reno grabbed his pack. Placed a cigarette in his mouth and lit it with his last match. 

He turned to Cloud, removed the stick and gently placed it between Cloud’s partial opened lips. The other boy blinked several times in confusion, as Reno replaced it with another one, and leaned into Cloud’s ember to light it. 

The sound of searing fire touched his ears.

His whole body twitched. 

Cloud smiled, couldn’t help it, and took a sharp inhale. Blowing the smoke right at Reno, who smirked. 

“Thought you said it would be a waste?” Cloud sing-songed.

“Heh, ya ain’t gettin’ into SOLDIER anymore. Don’t matter.”

“W-why do you say that?” Cloud cocked his head, and in mid-morning light, he looked like an innocent boy filled with naivety. 

But Reno knew better. “They don’t care for wicked little things like us.”

They shared a look under the heat of the sun that burned their skin. A look they shared against the warming flames. Where Cloud saw him for the first time and knew he needed to understand as much as he could about the mysterious boy who appeared from thin air. Who was filthy. Abandoned. A discarded trash.

But stunning. Like a god. 

He was right.

Reno wasn’t like the other boys.

And neither was Cloud. 

[blueroseblaze]

The Bookkeeper (V + female!reader)

Request: I forgot 😓

Word count: 2006

Warnings: none

Summary: V enters a bookshop owned by a shy and nervous young woman but she is not as she appears

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

The tip of V’s cane ticked against the cobblestone street as he walked underneath the dim street lights. The brisk night air didn’t bother him much. Unlike the reason he was out here so late at night. That part did indeed bother him

“That idiot,” V growled to himself and he scrunched the loose sheet of paper in his fist.

One of V’s more important books had been destroyed when Dante decided to use it as a shield against a demon that found itself inside Devil My Cry. Shredding the book into ribbons of paper and cover. It took a great deal of strength in V’s part not to stab Dante through the chest with his cane.

Finding a replacement for the book, or at least something similar, would be near impossible. However, venturing out to find one have V the opportunity to clear his head and find his composure.

Off in the distance a faint light came through one of the windows that lined the empty streets. V approached it if nothing but out of sheer curiosity. Literally every other store front on the block had been blacked out and locked up tight. The shop keepers most likely trying to protect themselves from any looming creatures of the night looking for foolish prey.

V continued down the street growing closer to the lit window. As he reached it he peered inside. Seeing piles and shelves of books filling the space inside. From his view he could see that many of the books were old. Worn and antiquated. This gave him a glimmer of hope he may come close to what he was searching for. He tested the door handle which he found unlocked and let himself inside. A jingle came from above his head as the top of the door creaked open and knocked into the bell fixed above it. As he opened the door the smell of aged leather and antiquated parchment filled his senses. A warm and welcoming musk overwhelmed him giving a homely feel.

Stepping inside V took note of how the warm colored lights in the ceiling illuminated the stacks and shelves of books, he saw how the dust floated and danced in the air when the light made it visible, how the darkness of the street through the store front window only made the aesthetic of the inside more appealing.

V was snapped out of his thoughts as he heard the creaks of the floor boards coming from the back of the shop. He readied himself for a old crotchety and cynical shop keep to yell at him that they were closed and to get lost. However his ears were met with a much more pleasant sound.

“I’ll be with you in just a minute,” a timid yet clear voice rang out from behind the towering shelves. The voice was feminine, sweet and musical yet soft and gentle.

V stood patiently as the presumed shop owner came into view. A young looking woman dressed in a comfortably large sweater and simple pants and boots. Her hair was tied up and away from her face and her eyes were adorned with a thin wiry pair of glasses that clung to the tip of her nose. Which she corrected by pushing them further up her bridge.

“Hello, can I help you find anything this evening?” She asked.

V stood still for a moment while still looking over her form. She grew visibly flustered at his silence and asked him again.

“Sir? Can I help you?”

V was snapped out of his thought and answered her question.

“Oh yes. Though I’m pretty positive you won’t have exactly I’m looking for.”

The woman let out an adorable giggle.

“I can most certainly try. Now what is it you were looking for?” She asked.

“A demonology book. First edition, bound in demon hide and written in demon blood. No particular author, main subject is summoning and vanishing spells,” he explained. V’s voice held an air of humor, fairly confident that she did not have what he needed.

The young woman looked down at the floor boards as her brow knit together and he bend of her index finger found her lips as she slipped into deep though. Her glasses once again fell down to the tip of her nose as she tapped her foot. V smirked at her amusedly as his adjusted his grip on his cane. He tilted his head as he waited for her to continue.

The girl snapped her fingers as her face lit up with remembrance and joy.

“I think I have exactly that,” she declared as she turned away from him to walk back into the maze of shelves.

“You... you do?” V asked in shock. Taken aback by her response and her confidence in it.

“Yup, just give me a minute,” she replied.

V followed her from behind and watched as she pulled out an aged ladder and hooked it to the top of one of the higher shelves. The ladder roles down rail as she pushed off. Reaching the end of the books much faster. She climbed up the ladder, the old rungs bending underneath her feet and the sides darkened and worn from her grip on them. She ascended the ladder her eyes trailed on a particular book on the highest shelf.

“I’ve been waiting for someone to come in looking for this,” she said as she pulled the book from where it was nestled. A cloud of dust rose from the tops as it was disturbed.

She descended the ladder and walked past V to the front desk gesturing for him to follow her. He did and he stopped at the front counter as she moved behind it, placing the heavy text on the glass counter. She brushed away more of the dust and pulled the book open. The satisfying crackling of old dry adhesive as the pages separated after who knows how long of no use. She flipped through the pages, making sure they were all undamaged before regarding V once again.

“Demonology: The Summoning & Banishment of Unholy & Otherworldly Entities. Volume 2 of the set. Is this it?”

V stared at the book before him in utter shock. This was the exact book that was destroyed. As he flipped through the pages reading the text he found it to be exact. Word for word. This was a find he’d never even hoped of obtaining. This book probably cost a fortune.

“I’m sorry it’s not the first edition. Not many copies of these books exists at all, I’m surprised I even have this one,” the girl said.

V was still speechless as he gawked at the book and then at her. Accidentally making her slightly visibly uncomfortable. He saw her visible shrink back timidly.

“This is incredible. You actually have this,” V said, “And it’s in pristine condition for its age. You take great care in preserving your collection.”

The girl behind the counter relaxed slightly and smiled as a pink dust crept its way up her cheeks. She adjusted her glasses before responding.

“Oh, why thank you. Yes, books are a passion of mine. Especially antique occult books.”

“Are you by any chance selling this one. It was on a high shelf after all?” Asked V.

The woman looked down at the book again.

“Yes I can definitely sell you this one. Although it would be a pretty steep price. A book like this is so rare and with its condition. I don’t want to extort you but I-“

Her sentence was cut off by the smashing of glass from behind her. Tiny crystalline shards shit through the air as a winged he’ll heat crashed through the window. Both V and the woman immediately hit the deck as the demon rampaged through the shop. Knocking over stacks and shelves with reckless abandon. An ear bleeding shriek rang out as the creature continued its assault on the place.

Upon locking its eyes on them the demon dove for the woman behind the counter. Latching its talons into her shoulder it lifted her off the ground with ease and made its escape out the shattered window. The woman’s cries of pain met V’s ears as the demons claws dig deeper into her skin which was pulled down by her weight and gravity. V stood at attention and without a second though he leapt out the store front window and followed them into the night.

His eyes didn’t break from the creature as it soared through the streets dragging the screaming shopkeeper along with it. V was about to ready one of his familiars. Perhaps Griffin’s flying ability would even the odds. However, before he was able to summon any of them he watched as the young woman hoisted herself up by grabbing the demons ankles. With a a tug and a swing she was able to concert her foot with the beast’s underside. Stunning the creature as it began to make a fast descend.

The demon had crashed into a pile of garbage that had been sitting on the cobble stone street, but it’s former captive had managed to tuck and role as the thing hit the ground. Breaking her fall and keeping her on her feet and at the ready. As the creature slashed around trying to regain its standing amongst the debris, the woman had grabbed a metal rod that had been lying with the garbage. Grilling the staff with two hands she readied herself for the hell beast to attack again.

The creature lunged for her, it’s massive jaws extended, ready to clamp down on anything within its reach. The claws at the end of its leathery fleshy wings ready to read any fabric and flesh.

The woman waited patiently, her stance not wavering once as she winded her arms back and shot them forward bringing the metal rod with them. With a loud pang and sickening crack the metal connected with the monsters face. It’s head reeled to the side as the force of the swing through its whole flight pattern off course. The demon flew to the side of the street, landing within another pile of garbage. However it’s seemed to only shake off the attack. It made another attempt to lunge at the girl, only for the girl to step aside and out of the way with the most perfect of timing.

With the creature distracted it was her turn to go on the offensive. With her metal rod in hand the woman vaulted herself towards the demon, leaping high into the air with a flare and a spin she impaled her trusty metal rod straight through the beast’s back. The sound of breaking flesh and snapping bone rang out into the dark accompanying the demons last gasp of life and it shrieked its final hellish cry.

The woman grabbed the rod with both hands and pulled it out of the demon’s corpse. Letting a sickening sound of viscera full the space. With panting breath the woman turned her attention towards V who had hobbled over to see what had happened.

With an embarrassed smile on her face the woman said, “I’m so sorry you had to see that. I get targeted by demons quite often.”

V was utterly speechless as he stared at this woman who was now covered in demon blood.

She awkwardly rubbed the back of her neck and adjusted her glasses which somehow didn’t fall off in the chairs that just occurred. She dropped her metal rob and began walking away from the beast’s corpse. She turned to V who had pried his eyes away from the scene and turned to face her. He smirked as she asked, “Now... do you still want the book?”

He began limping towards her, his cane jabbing into the stone street as he caught up with her.

“Oh I never caught your name,” she remarked.

“You can call me V,” he realized.

“Pleasure to meet you, V. I’m (Y/N).”

[acehotel]

Naked Boys Reading Presents: Short Serials With Season Butler

Photo by Christa Holka.

In the journalistic heyday of Victorian-era fiction, the serial was a place to feast on the literary prowess of the writers and cultural denizens of their time — a place to bear witness to a writer's creative process in episodic installments, from Charles Dickens in The Pickwick Papers to Harriet Beecher Stowe in The National Era.

Naked Boys Reading (NBR) — a literary salon presented at Ace Hotel London Shoreditch every other month — is curating a set of serialized fiction by some of their favorite queer authors and allies. "Short Serials" began in March with “AM” by Season Butler. The journey of Gwendolyn MacAurthur continues with “Between Three and Four” this month.

"Between Three and Four” by Season Butler

I map my steps, finding the flattest spots on the way, the broadest stones on the cobbled streets. My ankles still hit funny angles and threaten to turn and twist but do not fail me. I roll my eyes against the chill that has settled in the air; I make them water, which cools them more and allows me to imagine the redness dissipating. I picture fresh oxygen reviving my cells and bathing my muscles. I see the darkness hiding the shameful droop to my forehead and cheeks, willing a projection of sobriety, of mundane invulnerability, out to the others sharing this street, making their own ways to or from trouble, or loitering in wait for it. I hold my shit together and do not think about how badly I just want my bed. My toilet, then bed. With the knuckles of my right hand, I liberate tiny cakes of white crust from my nostrils. I checked my pockets several times for the tissues I was sure I had, but I will not find them until tomorrow morning. Simple experience tells me this. 

My hearing recalibrates in the alternate layers of darkness and light from signage and headlights and streetlamps. As I pass pubs, bottles drop and sound louder when they break than they do by day. Whispers echo through streets lined with sleepers. I can hear the wheels in your head turning. I’m attuned to the din of your intentions. Our attempts to be small and quiet amplify every mistake. Sneaking is louder, hiding is louder. We have to find different ways to disappear if we’re going to stand a chance of making it out intact. 

People fuck at night, but not tonight. I am not in the mood, the wit’s too dry, blood’s concentrated in cocaine noses. I’m flaccid in all the right places, hard about the biceps and the balls of my feet. People go for it anyway, with gadgets and the urgings of dirty talk. People pretend to be their twins to sneak in bed with their in-laws to indulge a kind of incest fantasy, but their guilt makes their birthmarks glow and they get caught out. (The twins forgive but break up with their partners within a matter of weeks on flimsy pretexts.) People force and fix and lie. But not me, not tonight. 

People sleepwalk and disavow their actions in hasty, misspelled tweets in the morning. People feign sleep. People genuinely don’t remember, which is the only kind of innocence they need. Between three and four pm.  

People aren’t listening, aren’t paying attention. People drop their guard. People die. 

Front door. Top and bottom locks of the door of my flat. My office. The lock for my bike. The longest and straightest are stationed silently between my knuckles. I close my fist into a claw, allow your footsteps to fall in line with mine. Slower now until I can feel how close you are, until I can pick you up with the hairs in my nose and on the back of my neck.

I trust my anger. I am in love with it as the space between us closes. 

Season Butler is a writer, artist and dramaturg, based between London and Berlin. She is interested in the opportunities and traps of hindsight and hope, coming-of-age into unprecedented change and what it means to look forward to an increasingly wily future. 

Her recent art work has appeared in the Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art, Latvian National Museum of Art, Barbican Centre and Tate Exchange. 

Her debut novel, Cygnet, is out now from Dialogue Books in the UK and Harper Collins in the US. 

[torialeysha]

Cold Feet.

A/N This is just a little idea I had about our favourite baker. This is my first little ficlet so be gentle. It’s short and (not very) sweet. I’ve left it on a sort of cliffhanger so if you’d like me to carry it on let me know. I apologise in advance for any grammar/spelling mistakes. 

Enjoy x

It’s your wedding day.

You are waiting in the room where you have been getting ready for your big day. Admiring your reflection in the oval mirror while your 2 maids comment on how gorgeous you look. “He don’t know how lucky he is” and how “You’re going to blow him away.” You smile taking a moment to think about ‘him’ and how special he has made you feel since that fateful day when you first met. How tough and hard he is on the outside but how he reserves a soft sweetness just for you. And now you get to spend the rest of your life with the love of your life. “I’m the lucky one.” You correct them, swishing your skirts from side to side enjoying the way they dance around your ankles. ‘Mrs Y/N Solomons.” you smile proudly. It must nearly be time to get going surely. you glance at the clock already 20 minutes has passed but no one has yet fetched you. almost half an hour behind schedule. A frown mars your brow as a feeling of uneasiness begins to settle in your stomach. A knock on the door startles you from your thoughts and excitement replaces the nerves “it’s time.” One of your maids exclaims excitedly, handing you your bouquet of roses and forget me nots. Alfie’s favourites.

One of your maids pulls open the heavy door with a a loud creek, as you all prepare to exit the room. You are instead pushed backwards by a pasty white slip of a boy. You’re surprised to see Ollie as he shuffles nervously through the door. Looking at the floor. “Ollie?” Your greeting is more of a question, he doesn’t look up. “Is it time?” You ask trying to study the boys demeanour. “Ab..ou..t tha...t.” He stutters wringing his hat in his hands, an action you know all too well. An awful feeling of dread comes over you again. “Ollie! What is it? Is Alfie ok?” You manage to get the words out through the forming lump in your throat and the anxious twisting of your stomach. He doesn’t answer. ‘Ollie?’ You press again. He finally looks up at you his nervous gaze shifting to one of admiration. His mouth a gape at the sight of you in your wedding dress. “Ollie, is Alfie ok?” You ask again, frustration now lacing your usual soft voice. “You look beautiful.” You’re taken aback by his compliment, a blush creeping to your cheeks. “Thank you...But what news do you bring me of my soon to be husband? Please tell me he’s ok and not hurt.” You wonder if Ollies been drinking, it would explain his strange behaviour, maybe he’s still drunk from Alfie’s Stag party last night. A flurry of awful thoughts of what could have happened during the nights festivities of Alfie’s last night as a ‘free man’ flash through your mind. You’re now fiddling nervously with the beads on your beautiful ivory wedding gown as you push the poisonous thoughts away. You trusted Alfie implicitly, he wouldn’t do anything to hurt you. As long as he hasn’t hurt himself though. “He’s fine.” Ollie says confidently, dispelling your fears. “oh thank God.” You breathe a sigh of relief. “Then let’s go, we’re already half an hour late.” You move to push past Ollie but he stays put, blocking you from the doorway. You eye him irritably, you like Ollie but you’ve had just about enough of his silly games. “Alfie’snothere.” He blurts out the sentence as one word. You look at him as if he has spoken to you in a foreign tongue. A stunned silence fills the room. “What did you say?” You ask, you’re voice barely a whisper,m. The brief feeling of relief is now overtaken again by a sickening anxiety and feeling of disbelief “Alfie, he..he..he’s not here. I don’t think he’s coming. I wanted to let you know. I knew you’d just be waiting for him.” The gasps from your maids stab your ears as you feel the blood drain from you’re face. The lump in your throat is back in full force, feeling as if you’ve swallowed a cobble stone. You turn away from Ollie as the tears begin to fall down your face. You dab them away quickly but they still continue to fall. Your maids begin to fuss around you, still shocked speechless they try to comfort you by putting an arm around your lace decorated shoulders. you look in the mirror, a stark contrast from the glowing image you saw there previously. Mascara rivers lightly stain your cheeks You let out a heart breaking sob as realisation sets in. Alfie doesn’t want to marry you.

Next part

[formerlyrunephoenix6769]

Reflections.

Summary.

After a successful mission on King’s Row, Widowmaker lays low at Castle Gulliard whilst contemplating her next move. 

Prequel to Shattered

--x-- 

Between Numbani and Kings Row, she was too hot to move freely.

The sign of a job well done.

She grinned inwardly at the irony of the words as she lounged in the heat that as a child had seared her veal like skin, causing her to retreat to the cool shade of the alcoves offered in the grandiose and sweeping architecture. Such childish impulses no longer afflicted her, now she basked in the tendrils of flame that licked her skin and warmed her muscles.

She had intended to take a moment of respite, in this place that held gossamer whispers of a past life, but for Sombra, a well-stocked wine cellar had been too good of an opportunity to miss. The French woman was not naive enough to believe that her ‘friend’ had just casually dropped by, like an annoyingly over eager neighbour, with fresh pastries and cheeses, from the cobble stoned village that skirted the edge of the Gulliard lands.

Such was the illusion of her sanctuary.

It was an intrusion Widow was willing to tolerate, for now.

Keeping a mask of indifference, she was loath to watch, as in passing the Mexican hacker had flicked the wedding photo of a spectre and Gerard, stating “Nina, no esta mal.” followed by a playful knowing smirk and blink heralding that the image had been stored to memory, before routing through the bottles of the extensive collection within the cool cavernous arches in the bowels of the castle until she found something to her liking.

For now, Amelie Lacroix was intent on enjoying a glass of wine even with the annoying interruption.

The lake was still, save for the ripples of the bobbing fish and the concentric circles caused by her acquaintance trailing her toes in the cool waters that surrounded the Gulliard ancestral home. Silence occasionally broken by the hooting of some bird far off in the distance that Widow knew, if the urge took her, she could skewer out of the sky.

To the untrained eye and ear there was no wind shear to speak of. Perfect conditions for a kill shot.

She coolly observed a mallard alighting from the mirror like surface, counting in her head the wing-beats, the distance, and the trajectory. It was hardly a challenge, not worth wasting a high calibre bullet that would no doubt reduce the creature to little more than soft tufts often found within the pillowcases of the wealthy.

One,

Pump,

Two,

Pump.

Amelie closed her eyes, embryonic pinks mixed in with flashes of purple and blues, trailing her fingertips across the baked granite beneath her as she imagined caressing the trigger of Widow’s Kiss. A deep intake of breath through her nose and slowly out through her mouth, that could be akin to a sigh, as in her mind’s eye the bird faltered in mid-air before pin wheeling to the earth below. Widow felt a sense of peace.

A tentative slap on her ankle brought her out of her reverie,

“Mi amiga, no me oiste?”

“Je ne t’ecoute j’amais!”

They both shared a look before laughing.

An acquaintance out of necessity, not a friend, the annoying wisp of Amelie reminded. Widow leaned forward offering the wine bottle, remnants of dust upon the label written in a language that was almost obsolete in the later part of 21st century stave for those few that knew it. Like taffeta clinging to a Madame, a sign of prestige and fashion long passed but no less regarded. Sombra waved off the advance.

“No , no, I have what I need here.” As she pulled a small net from the waters, “You can keep your pigs swill.”

Sombra continued to reel in her delights. The bottles of clear liquid, that in the 20th and early 21st century had been available over the whole of Europe which was now difficult to come by and it had once been claimed was capable of running cars, staving off cold, the elixir for fighting bears with AK47’S and eventually Omenics, clinked off each other.

Widow watched as her acquaintance retrieved her preferred beverage from the cool depths, the bending of her back showing off the cybernetic hardware grafted to her skin. Curiosity got the better of the sniper,

“Does the water not short out your circuits?”

Sombra looked nonplussed, “Are you living in the 21st century, me amiga?” Dipping her legs further, she submerged her thighs as if to prove a point, “What good would it do if every time I took a shower I had to worry about such things?” Using her hands, she dramatically made a splash as she triumphantly claimed the bottle she was looking for.

She grinned whilst pouring herself a lavish dram, necking it back in a way that Amelie would cringe at but Widow understood. “Only the best for Sombra!”

“There is no accounting for taste.”

“The Russian’s knew what they were doing. “

“Unlike now?”

“Mi amiga, in this fucked up world nobody knows what any of us are doing anymore!”

Widow tipped her head in agreement before lapsing into a comfortable silence. Toying with the stem of her wine glass, she ran through her head how each glass receptacle was either a concave or convex shape. Each glass shattered or broke in its own unique way. Each different type of tempered glass and liquid within bringing its own variables.

Sombra spread her hands showing a light screen video, the glare of the water making it almost unintelligible, she cursed under her breath. Between her delicate fingers and technological nails, the Talon operative tapped until she was satisfied with the contrast of the footage showing the exact moment of Widow’s triumph; the decommissioned Overwatch agent recognisable by the bright colours of her signature uniform, blinking in and out of existence, as the bullet slid like a needle through her chronal accelerator continuing into the forehead of the target.

One shot, one kill.

“Did you know she was going to do it?”

“Do what?”

“Her Marty McFly thing.”

The footage of Tracer patting her chronal accelerator with panicked fervency continued to play.

“Oui, I was counting on it.” Swilling the glass in the palm of her hands, she noted how the liquid briefly coated the sides, reminding her of venous spray. “Nobody wants to die, not even Heroes.”

For a brief moment in free-fall as the red brick buildings gave way, the sniper hadn’t been so sure, as she aimed through Lena’s sternum. In a split second where her and her rival were suspended in the air that had seemed to last for eons, she squeezed the trigger. Widow had found herself wishing for the British agent to blink as the recoil propelled her backwards. The tight feeling in her chest only abating as the exquisite moment of defiance gave way to broken resolve, before Tracer blinked out of time, only to come back with the pained realisation that she had somehow failed.

The youthful innocence that no one in their line of work had any right to possess, shattering into a thousand pieces. The lithe body of the ex-RAF pilot slamming her into the rooftop, as she demanded to know “Why?” The glossed coral shell coloured lips pulled back over gleaming white teeth, the flurry of expressions causing the smattering of freckles to chase each other across the bridge of her upturned nose and her huge doe eyes brimming with a myriad of emotions Amelie recognised but Widow was not meant to feel.

The memory brought goosebumps to her skin and a luxurious shudder down her spine.

Olivia Colomdar slyly watched her through long dark lashes.

“What if she hadn’t?”

The thought reached into the recesses of her sternum, catching her heart in a vice like grip. Knowing every part of her behaviour was being catalogued and at some point could potentially be used to betray her. Widow remained aloof as she took a languid sip of her wine.

“Then ce la vie. I clinched an Overwatch agent.”

Like a gnat intent on committing suicide, the hacker pressed further,

“Why didn’t you finish her off?”

“I flung her off a roof.”

The hacker played grainy footage taken from a nearby surveillance drone, showing Widow making her way up the ramp into the VTOL as Tracer stood below.

“You had plenty of opportunity to finish the job.”

“She wasn’t the objective!”

“All former Overwatch agents are the objective.”

Those snatched, precious moments of life Tracer elicited in her, Amelie was not willing to trade and she often wondered just how much Sombra suspected about her strange fascination with the Overwatch poster girl.

Would it come to a point where she would have to be eliminated? She could do it now and have done with it. Sombra broke into a toothy grin, raising another shot of clear liquid, “One shot , one kill.” She guffawed. “Should be more like, what do the English say? Two birds with one stone?”

One shot, one kill indeed.

Widow remained silent as Amelie asked, “Have you ever flipped a stone?”

The smaller woman rolled her eyes, shaking her head, “I had better things to do than throwing rocks into what little uncontaminated water we had. “

Widow uncoiled, feeling her bones crack and her muscles stretch in an altogether familiar way. Gracefully alighting from her perch, picking up a pebble, she weighed it in her hand. Her other hovering over the soft, exposed neck of the unsuspecting woman.

It would be so easy to push the smaller woman under the water, gripping her by the back of the neck, holding her down as she thrashed uselessly until bubbles ceased to break the surface. The French assassin could dig out the cybernetics in case they contained any tracking devices and discard them at her earliest convenience. She could wrap the body in a tarp and net, secreting her former acquaintance in the dark waters underneath the house.

But much like her first kill, it would be messy and lacking finesse.

The coding extraordinaire had her uses, that maybe one day the sniper would have a need for. Maybe for now Widow would sit back, safe in the knowledge that she was aware of the Los Muertos former member’s double dealing. In the Mexican hacker’s own words, “Information is power, mi amiga, and no one can hide.”

A small reprieve.

Olivia would live to see another day.

Taking a stance, Amelie flicked the stone out, watching it as it curved before lightly kissing the surface, skimming the mirror of her childhood before disappearing into the inky depths.

One shot. One Kill.

(All Overwatch fanfiction will be tagged under formerlyrunephoenix6769 ow fanfiction, )

[runephoenix6769]

Widowmaker one shot fic

  In the aftermath of “Alive.” Taking some down time at her ancestral home, Widowmaker and Sombra discuss Tracer. 

                                                                        ‘Reflections ‘

Between Numbani and Kings Row, she was too hot to move freely.  

The sign of a job well done.

She grinned inwardly at the irony of the words as she lounged in the heat that as a child had seared her veal like skin, causing her to retreat to the cool shade of the grandiose and sweeping architecture that the alcoves offered.  Such childish impulses no longer afflicted her, now she basked in the tendrils of flame that licked her skin and warmed her muscles.

She had intended to take a moment of respite, in this place that held gossamer whispers of a past life, but for Sombra, a well-stocked wine cellar had been too good of an opportunity to miss. The French woman was not naive enough to believe that her ‘friend’ had just  casually dropped by, like an annoyingly over eager neighbour from the cobble stoned village that skirted the edge of the Lacroix lands, offering fresh pastries or cheeses.  

Such was the illusion of her sanctuary.

It was an intrusion Widow was willing to tolerate, for now.

Keeping a mask of indifference, she was loath to watch, as in passing the Mexican hacker had flicked the wedding photo of a spectre and Gerard, stating “Nina, no esta mal.” followed by a playful knowing smirk and blink heralding that the image had been stored to memory, before routing through the bottles of the extensive collection within the cool cavernous arches in the bowels of the castle until she found something to her liking.

For now, Amelie Lacroix was intent on enjoying a glass of wine even with the annoying interruption.

The lake was still, save for the ripples of the bobbing fish and the concentric circles caused by her acquaintance trailing her toes in the cool waters that surrounded the Lacroix ancestral home. Silence occasionally broken by the hooting of some bird far off in the distance that Widow knew, if the urge took her, she could skewer out of the sky.

To the untrained eye and ear there was no wind shear to speak of. Perfect conditions for a kill shot.

She coolly observed a mallard alighting from the mirror like surface, counting in her head the wing-beats, the distance, and the trajectory. It was hardly a challenge, not worth wasting a high calibre bullet that would no doubt reduce the creature to little more than scraps often found within a pillowcase.

One,

Pump,

Two,

Pump.  

Amelie closed her eyes, embryotic pinks mixed in with flashes of purple and blues, trailing her fingertips across the baked granite beneath her as she imagined caressing the trigger of Widow’s Kiss.  A deep intake of breath through her nose and slowly out through her mouth, that could be akin to a sigh, as in her mind’s eye the bird faltered in mid-air before pin wheeling to the earth below.  Widow felt a sense of peace.

A tentative slap on her ankle brought her out of her reverie,

“Mi amiga, no me oiste?”

“Je ne t’ecoute j’amais!”

They both shared a look before laughing.

An acquaintance out of necessity, not a friend, the annoying wisp of Amelie reminded.  Widow leant forward offering the wine bottle, remnants of dust upon the label written in a language that was almost obsolete in the 22nd century stave for those few that knew it. Like taffeta clinging to a Madame, a sign of prestige and fashion long passed but no less regarded.  Sombra waved off the advance.

“No , no, I have what I need here.” As she pulled a small net from the waters, “You can keep your pigs swill.”  

Sombra continued to reel in her delights.  The bottles of clear liquid, that in the 20th and the 21st century that had been available over the whole of Europe which was now difficult to come by and it had once been claimed was capable of running cars, tanks, staving off cold, fighting bears with AK47’S and eventually Omenics.  

Widow watched as her acquaintance retrieved her preferred beverage from the cool depths, the bending of her back showing off the cybernetic hardware grafted to her skin.  Curiosity got the better of the sniper,

“Does the water not short out your circuits?”

Sombra looked nonplussed, “Are you living in the 21st century, me amiga?” Dipping her legs further, she submerged her thighs as if to prove a point, “What good would it do if every time I took a shower I had to worry about such things?” Using her hands, she dramatically made a splash as she triumphantly claimed the bottle she was looking for.

She grinned whilst pouring herself a lavish dram, necking it back in a way that Amelie would cringe at but Widow understood.

“Only the best for Sombra!”

“There is no accounting for taste.”

“The Russian’s knew what they were doing. “

“Unlike now?”

“Mi amiga, in this fucked up world nobody knows what any of us are doing anymore!”

Widow tipped her head in agreement before lapsing into a comfortable silence. Toying with the stem of her wine glass, she ran through her head how each glass receptacle was either a concave or convex shape. Each glass shattered or broke in its own unique way. Each different type of tempered glass and liquid within bringing its own variables.

Sombra spread her hands showing a light screen video, the glare of the water making it almost unintelligible, she cursed under her breath.  Between her delicate fingers and technological nails, the Talon operative tapped until she was satisfied with the contrast of the footage showing the exact moment of Widow’s triumph; the decommissioned Overwatch agent recognisable by the bright colours of her signature uniform, blinking in and out of existence, as the bullet slid like a needle through her chronal accelerator continuing into the forehead of the target.

One shot, one kill.

“Did you know she was going to do it?”

“Do what?”

“Her Marty McFly thing.”

The footage of Tracer patting her chronal accelerator with panicked fervency continued to play.

“Oui, I was counting on it.” Swilling the glass in the palm of her hands, she noted how the liquid briefly coated the sides, reminding her of venous spray. “Nobody wants to die, not even Heroes.”

For a brief moment in free-fall as the red brick buildings gave way, the sniper hadn’t been so sure, as she aimed through Lena’s sternum. In a split second where her and her rival were suspended in the air that had seemed to last for eons, she squeezed the trigger. Widow had found herself wishing for the British agent to blink as the recoil propelled her backwards. The tight feeling in her chest only abating as the exquisite moment of defiance gave way to broken resolve, before Tracer blinked out of time, only to come back with the pained realisation that she had somehow failed.

The youthful innocence that no one in their line of work had any right to possess, shattering into a thousand pieces. The lithe body of the ex-RAF pilot slamming her into the rooftop, as she demanded to know “Why?” The glossed coral shell coloured lips pulled back over gleaming white teeth, the flurry of expressions causing the smattering of freckles to chase each other across the bridge of her upturned nose and her huge doe eyes brimming with a myriad of emotions Amelie recognised but Widow was not meant to feel.

The memory brought goosebumps to her skin and a luxurious shudder down her spine.

Olivia Colomar slyly watched her through long dark lashes.

“What if she hadn’t?”

The thought reached into the recesses of her sternum, catching her heart in a vice like grip. Knowing every part of her behaviour was being catalogued and at some point could potentially be used to betray her. Widow remained aloof as she took a languid sip of her wine.

“Then ce la vie. I clinched an Overwatch agent.”

Like a gnat intent on committing suicide, the hacker pressed further,

“Why didn’t you finish her off?”

“I flung her off a roof.”

The hacker played grainy footage taken from a nearby surveillance drone, showing Widow making her way up the ramp into the VTOL as Tracer stood below.

“You had plenty of opportunity to finish the job.”

“She wasn’t the objective!”

“All former Overwatch agents are the objective.”

Those snatched, precious moments of life Tracer elicited in her, Amelie was not willing to trade and she often wondered just how much Sombra suspected about her strange fascination with the Overwatch poster girl.

Would it come to a point where she would have to be eliminated? She could do it now and have done with it.

Sombra broke into a toothy grin, raising another shot of clear liquid, “One shot , one kill.” She guffawed. “Should be more like, what do the English say?  Two birds with one stone?”

One shot, one kill indeed.

Widow remained silent as Amelie asked, “Have you ever flipped a stone?”

The smaller woman rolled her eyes, shaking her head, “I had better things to do than throwing rocks into what little uncontaminated water we had. “

Widow uncoiled, feeling her bones crack and her muscles stretch in an altogether familiar way.  Gracefully alighting from her perch, picking up a pebble, she weighed it in her hand. Her other hovering over the soft, exposed neck of the unsuspecting woman.

It would be so easy to push the smaller woman under the water, gripping her by the back of the neck, holding her down as she thrashed uselessly until bubbles ceased to break the surface. The French assassin could dig out the cybernetics in case they contained any tracking devices and discard them at her earliest convenience. She could wrap the body in a tarp and net, secreting her former acquaintance in the dark waters underneath the house.

But much like her first kill, it would be messy and lacking finesse.

The coding extraordinaire had her uses, that maybe one day the sniper would have a need for. Maybe for now Widow would sit back, safe in the knowledge that she was aware of the Los Muertos former member’s double dealing.  

In the Mexican hacker’s own words, “Information is power, mi amiga, and no one can hide.”

A small reprieve.

Olivia would live to see another day.

Taking a stance, Amelie flicked the stone out, watching it as it curved before lightly kissing the surface, skimming the mirror of her childhood before disappearing into the inky depths.

One shot. One Kill.

[amymel86]

A Siren’s Curse - Jonsa

I don’t think that I’ve ever posted this one here (part of a Jonsa series called Love Bites that I participated in a while back with some other fantastic authors - you should totally go and check it out HERE and leave them all some lovely comments!)

Born with the blood curse of the Siren, Sansa is dangerously irresistible to men. Some want to possess her, some want to hurt her, most want to fuck her but there is one who wants to love her. How will she be kept safe from the desires of men?

Some girls fancy it to be a blessing, would even yearn for it themselves sometimes, but now Sansa Stark has had her sixteenth nameday, she knows it for what it is - a curse.

Even though it’s well documented, many still do not believe in the existence of Sirens. The original, pureblood enchantresses reported to have stepped forwards from the salt and spray of the sea. They were beyond beautiful and maddeningly desirable to all men who looked upon them. The nature of that desire being decided by the nature of the man’s heart - lust, love or violence, the Siren would bring out the dominant trait to a degree of insanity.

Over the years the blood of the Sirens have been diluted, a strong-blooded beauty being born every now and again who manages to bewitch and beguile the menfolk around her into a stupor.

It is said that many a mistress has a trace of Siren’s blood in her veins to be able to inspire someone else’s husband’s infidelity - although Lady Catelyn fancies that it is a tall tale spun to assuage the man’s guilt - Ned never tried for that excuse at least, when he brought home an infant Snow.

Catelyn herself has been accused of housing a streak of the temptress about her - with stories of a young, weak boy being driven mad enough to challenge her betrothed to an ill-fated spar for her heart. That was all a long time ago now and Sansa forgets his name or what became of him.

Yes, there had always been rumours of the Tully lineage carrying some Siren’s blood with it. Sansa’s father’s house too, was not deaf to the whispers that a certain wolf girl - the one that sparked a war of Stags and Dragons - must have held a streak of the Siren along with the ice in her Stark veins.

So it should not have been a shock that a daughter of those two great houses would possess the cursed blood with such a strength that she worried her mother and father so.

Legends of the Sirens were told and retold - stories of girls who could inspire such passion and love that men would fall upon their own swords should their Siren bid them to. An unsuspecting Sansa too, had found the tales fascinating and romantic - that is, until the first incident.

It was the day directly after her nameday, Robb had promised all the younger Stark children a refreshing ride out to the river on the clear, warm day. Arya had already stuck her scruffy head into Sansa’s chambers and threatened to tell Robb to leave without her if she didn’t hurry and stop fussing with her hair. Sansa huffed at her sister and carried on perfecting her braids.

Robb wouldn’t go without me.

Sansa almost stomped her boot on the cobbles once she realised Arya had gotten her way, and had persuaded the others to go ahead and leave her behind.

Probably told some big fat lies about me not coming, she quietly steamed.

Sansa glanced around at the near enough empty courtyard, dusty and bathed in summertime warmth. She beamed as bright as the sun when she saw Jonquil, her grey mare, still tethered and already tacked up.

Perhaps I can catch up with them, Sansa thought as she leads her horse to the mounting block to get seated in the saddle.

“Let me help you my Lady”! Calls Jarvis, one of the oldest of Winterfell’s stable hands as he jogs across the yard.

“Thank you Jarvis but there’s no need, really” Sansa chimes, eager to get going and find her siblings.

“Well let me at least make sure her girth strap is-” Jarvis stills, his words dead on his tongue and he just gapes at her. He gapes and he gapes until Sansa starts to grow uncomfortable under his maddening stare.

“Jarvis?….are you quite alright”?

After a long moment of stillness, the only noise encroaching the courtyard being the slight creak of Sansa’s saddle and the soft whicker and huff from Jonquil, Sansa starts entertaining the idea of searching out Maester Luwin for Jarvis when he lunges for her.

She shrieks and her horse skitters about as the man grabs her ankle and begins to push his hand up her skirts, his palm pawing at her calf, then her knee and thigh. His hands feel cold and clammy, angry and wanton.

“Come here pretty” he growls.

“Jarvis! What…what are you doing?! Get off me”!

“Get off tha’ horse girl, come down here an’ ride my cock instead pretty”.

“Jarvis!!…Get off”!! Sansa yells and begins kicking wildly when the stable hand started yanking at her ankle and biting his fingers into the flesh of her thigh.

“You! Get your hands off of her”! Came a cry from the other side of the yard and suddenly Theon Greyjoy was sprinting towards them.

Jarvis seemed to pay him no mind however, and carried on pawing and clawing, tugging and grabbing. That is, until Theon broke his jaw with his fist and rendered him unconscious and unmoving on the dusty cobbles.

“Theon! Thank the Gods!…. what…what do you suppose came over him”?! Sansa asked whilst trying to calm her mare.

Theon was breathing hard through his nose from the short burst of violence and staring down at the puddle of a young man on the floor. He lifted his head to answer but no words came. Instead, Sansa saw him widen his eyes and sweep them up and down her figure before he too lunged for her in a flurry of hunger and greed.

“THEON”! Sansa shrieked as he managed to seize her small waist and yanked her from the saddle, near enough twisting her ankle in the process as it became entangled in the stirrup.

“THEON WHAT ARE YOU DOING”?! Sansa screamed as he hauled her small frame over his shoulder as if she were a rag doll, and strode into the nearest stable block with Sansa’s perfected braid swaying towards the ground and her legs kicking about frantically.

“PUT. ME. DOWN”! Sansa demands as they enter the musty straw laden stables. Theon complies by throwing her to the ground, some sawdust and straw thankfully breaking her thud of a fall.

He stared at her wildly before wetting his lips, his hands fly to the lacings of his breeches, violently pulling and tugging at knots and cord.

“This might hurt my Lady, but just the first time” he babbles quickly, trying to free himself of his clothing.

“Theon no”! Sansa breathed, her eyes growing wide with realisation

“It’s for the best Sansa, your father might consent to a hasty match should you be soiled”.

“Theon! This isn’t funny! Stop! STOP”!

“We’ll marry and be the next Lord and Lady of the Iron Islands. You’ll be mine. I’ll have you…and…and you’ll give me many sons. We can start now”.

Theon’s words are a flurry along with his hands - hands that had just then managed to complete their task at freeing his hardened manhood. It looked red and angry and altogether quite frightening to Sansa who had never seen a man bare before. Sansa felt fear clawing at her insides like a fever, her limbs started trembling and she could swear that her throat started to close up.

“Please Theon” she whimpered, begging him to cease his madness.

“Come here, wife” he growled, his face decorated with a grin as he began to stalk towards Sansa whilst she scrambled backwards desperately.

“Please, no”!

There was a sudden dark blur that sped towards and tackled Greyjoy to the ground.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing to Sansa”?! The dark blur shouted as it rained fists down upon the Ironborn heir.

“She’s mine bastard”! Theon growled after spitting out blood and a couple of teeth.

“She fucking well isn’t”!

The scuffle lasted only a few seconds longer, Jon having dealt Theon with a powerful blow that seemed to have rendered him immobile for now. Sweaty, panting and bloody, Jon tried to regain himself as he still sat atop the now motionless battered young man.

“Sansa, are you-” he finally started saying, not looking at her, instead opting to try to catch his breath. His voice died however, as soon as he turned to see her. Jon’s eyes widened, he got up slowly and began numbly allowing himself to be drawn forward.

Oh Jon, not you too!?

“Jon”? Sansa croaked out from a voice about to crack into a sob as she pulled her knees up to her chest defensively.

Jon shook his head as if shaking himself awake from a dream. “Sansa”? He blinked rapidly at her and cleared his throat. “I…I…are you hurt”? He asked, only breaking his stare briefly to glance back at the unmoving Greyjoy.

“I want to go back to my room” Sansa whispered almost to herself with a sniffle.

Jon walked with her through the halls, making their way to her chamber. They did not speak, Sansa’s hasty clip of boots on stone were words enough. Jon could not seem to help but throw glances her way every few steps beside her, his blood-caked hand every now and again reaching to sooth the small of her back, only to flex and retreat back to his side.

********* Sansa kept to her chambers after the incident that day, and it seemed as though that’s where she stayed for a few moons after.

“It’s for your own safety” her Mother had said after listening to Sansa moan and gripe whilst brushing out her copper locks so that they shone like spun silk.

“Is this it then?…. I’m to stay tucked away in rooms out of harms way for the rest of my life”?! Sansa snarled as she began pulling out the loose strands of hair caught up in her soft boar bristle brush.

“Sansa” Lady Catelyn warned. Sansa rolled her eyes in return. Her Mother huffed in annoyance before carrying on “you know we can’t risk anything happening Sansa….Besides, your Father is looking into this rumour about blood magic or some-such, but until we can find out if it’s true - that we can break the Siren blood curse, you’ll have to stay put I’m afraid…..I…I just couldn’t bare it if something happened…if…if HE hadn’t have stopped Theon, then….”

“Jon….his name is Jon, it’s not a sin to use his name Mother” Sansa put the brush down and crossed her arms over her chest, raising her eyes to look defiantly at her Mother’s reflection in the mirror. Lady Catelyn’s lips pressed together into a hard line.

Ever since the incident, Sansa had quarrelled with Lady Catelyn more and more frequently. She was so terribly tired of being cooped up and hidden away, under a protective lock and key - it made her eager to snap and rile what with all her pent up energy and thoughts.

Sansa also softened somewhat towards her bastard half brother, her saviour from that awful day. He would often look up to her window while down in the yard, seeing her wistfully watching the goings on below like a fair maiden trapped in a tower. Jon would give her a small wave and sheepish smile.

Sansa was never one for risking the hem of her skirts in the dust and muck of the courtyard but how she wished she could do so now.

Ever since a raven came declaring a visit from the royal family, Winterfell was in the midst of a hum of energy and preparation, not many people found enough time or inclination to pay the trapped fair maiden a visit. Some days she felt maddened by isolation, as though the only human interaction she experienced was one of Jon Snow’s bashful smiles.

She had been confined for almost a moon the first time Jon felt compelled to stand vigil outside of her door.

“Who’s there” Sansa called tentatively through the thick wood when she had heard someone approach and stop outside her chambers.

“It’s me, Jon” came the soft sounding reply.

“Wh-….what are you doing”? “I….I noticed Theon looking up at your window…wasn’t sure if he planned on paying you a visit”. Sansa heard him shuffle his feet.

She paused before responding quietly “the door is locked” she said, memories of that awful day flooding back to her.

“Aye…but I wouldn’t put it past him to try shouldering it open to get to you”.

Sansa didn’t respond. She watched Jon’s shadow move from the small gap below the door, the sconces in the hallway making it dance and flicker. She heard the scrape of his body as he sank down against the door to what Sansa assumed was a seated position.

“Do you want to come in”? She asked. Jon’s shuffling stilled, there was a few beats of thick silence.

“I’d better not Sansa” he replied hoarsely.

“You’re my brother” Sansa furrowed her brow. Her Siren’s blood never affected her close kin, Father was still able to visit her to bid her goodnight and Robb still thought her nothing but an annoying prissy little sister.

“…..only half of me is….” Jon answered in a strained voice. Sansa stared at his shadow, letting his words sink in. She sighed and sank to the floor to mirror his position on the other side of the door.

“You would think being desirable would be a good thing….I hate this…I hate the Siren’s blood” Sansa almost sobbed.

There was a pause, as there often is with Jon, always careful about his words and actions. “I’m sorry” was all he managed. He sounded like he meant it though.

Sansa noticed out of the corner of her eye the very tips of three of Jon’s fingers appear from under the door, she placed hers over his. The small amount of contact felt comforting and like something she had been lacking for days.

Jon kept coming back to stand outside her door from time to time, after a while he stopped naming who ever it was he’d caught staring up at her window. Sansa didn’t ask - she got to talk to someone who wasn’t Mother or a maid and that was enough. Arya, Bran and Rickon were busy with their lessons during the day, and Father had taken to including Robb with any of his activities that might aid his Lordly education. So Sansa was grateful for Jon’s visits behind the door, whatever pretence he used to make them.

“I’m going to the Wall” he blurted in the middle of a conversation one day.

“The Wall?….you’re going to join the Watch”?

“Aye…aye, I mean to take the black”. Jon’s fingertips moved to lightly stroke against Sansa’s under the door.

“Oh”

“What the fuck are you doing here”?! Sansa heard him yell abruptly.

“I beg your pardon”?! She retorted, taking her fingers away from his before they disappeared and sounds of Jon hastily rising to his feet came through the door.

“No…sorry…” Jon said apologetically, “Greyjoy’s here” he growled, Sansa could practically feel him bristle through the wood.

“I came to apologise to Sansa” she heard in Theon’s voice, the memory of it saying other, more unsavoury things caused her to scramble to her feet and back away from the door.

“I’ll pass it on…..LEAVE” Jon hissed.

“What’s the harm in talking to her through the door Snow”?

Jon was silent but Sansa could imagine the warning glare he would be throwing at Theon with all his might. She could see the shadow of his feet still stood squarely at her door - Sansa wasn’t sure she had ever thought of a shadow as determined, unmoving and resolute before, but Jon’s was.

“Fine”! Theon snapped “just…just tell her that I’m sorry about what happened…that I know about her blood curse but I can’t stop thinking about her…that I still want her” Theon’s words fell out in a rush and stumble.

“I will not”

“She would be mine by now if you hadn’t have interfered Snow”! The Ironborn snapped back “I’d have her, she’d be mine…and wouldn’t that just drive your bastard heart crazy”?

You’re the one that sounds crazy, Sansa thought as she listened to their conversation.

“Well you don’t have her and she will never be yours Greyjoy…she is Sansa Stark, Daughter of the Lord Warden, Blood of Winterfell and Princess of the North - she is not something for you or anyone to possess”!

“We’ll see about that” Theon grunted.

“No…we won’t”

“Why are you here anyway?! Trying to break the door down to have a go on her yourself Snow”?

“Im her brother, and I’m protecting her from the likes of you”.

“Aye, you’re her brother, and a bastard one at that! There’s no way you haven’t thought about that sweet wet little cunt on the other side of that door whilst fisting your lonely cock at night”.

“Leave now Greyjoy, before I break that nose for you again”. Sansa could practically hear Jon’s teeth grinding together.

There was a pause in the conversation and Sansa wondered if Theon had already retreated when he finally left his parting words.

“Be a good bastard and give the ‘Princess of the North’ my love” he spat at Jon.

Once Sansa was sure Theon was gone she tentatively approached the door again.

“There’s no such thing as the 'Princess of the North’ you know” she calls softly.

She hears Jon chuckle. “Aye…There is, just no one else knows about it is all”.

***********

It was only perhaps seven or eight days after Theon had been sent away to lodge with the Bolton’s at The Dreadfort that Uncle Benjen arrived from Castle Black to escort Jon back to the Wall. Sansa didn’t get to see her Uncle, no-one quite sure how close a kin one needed to be to be immune to the Siren’s blood.

“You go in the morning then”? Sansa asked, already knowing the answer. She dragged her forefinger over the knuckle and then up to the fingernail of Jon’s ring finger as it peeped under the door.

“Aye…At first light” he responded softly. Sansa heard a quiet thud against the door, she imagined his head leant back against it.

“Who will guard my door now my noble Knight will be gone”? Sansa teased. She heard Jon snort in response.

“I am no Knight Sansa…..and…and I am not noble” Jon said quietly.

“Nonsense! Of course you are noble Jon! Your 'Princess of the North’ won’t hear anything to the contrary”! Sansa argued with a proud smile on her face, not that Jon could see it.

He did not respond but pulled his fingers out from under hers.

“I will miss our talks” Sansa commented as if it would bring his touch back. 'I will miss you’ is what she wanted to say, she’s not quite sure why those words won’t dislodge themselves from her throat.

************

Sansa’s Mother seemed a lot brighter once Jon had left Winterfell for good.

He’s gone to never come back and here I am trapped forever as if I were a stone within these very walls.

For all that Lady Catelyn rejoiced in the absence of Ned Stark’s bastard, Sansa grew bitter - bitter at her long formed notion that her Mother had a hand in Jon Snow’s leaving and bitter at her own situation of captivity. She snapped and snarled at almost all of her infrequent guests until they became increasingly more infrequent.

Sansa felt like yanking all her pretty copper locks out from their roots, for who would visit to admire her anyway? She was growing mad from hours upon hours of embroidery - all her clothes were covered in intricate thread and beading and hardly a soul would see it. Books soon lost their appeal too, Sansa quickly grew jealous of the romance and adventure depicted within the pages. She often wondered what adventures Jon might be having.

“I think it best that we might move you my dear” her mother commented with downcast eyes as she was braiding Sansa’s hair in her own chambers one morning.

“Move me”? Sansa blinked at herself in the mirror.

“Yes, your Father is worried about the number of men that will lodge at Winterfell when the King and his retinue arrives in a few days time”.

“But no one will see me….I only frequent three rooms within the castle now….who will bloody see me”?! She snapped nearly breaking the comb she was fiddling with in her hands.

“Sansa”! Her mother scolded, then sighed. She was getting more and more used to her daughter’s unladylike outbursts. She couldn’t exactly blame her. Her perfect little lady had become something of a kin to a caged bird it seems.

“You could do with a change of scenery”.

“So I can sit scowling at four different walls”? Sansa snorted. Lady Catelyn rolled her eyes.

“Actually, your Father was thinking you might stay with Berta, Old Nan’s sister”. Sansa furrowed her brow and carried on twiddling with the comb in her hands. “She lives quite alone and far from the nearest village or road…..the cottage, it’s isolated…Berta hasn’t seen a soul for over a year Old Nan says”.

Sansa stares at the brushes, combs, pots and bottles on her Mother’s dressing table without saying a word.

“She lives in the only cottage for miles and miles around, on one of the moors of The Gift….you could at least enjoy some fresh air there without fearing coming face to face with any man” Lady Catelyn said, patting Sansa’s shoulder.

Outside? I could go outside?

Sansa gave her Mother’s reflection a small smile whilst she allowed a spark of excitement ignite deep within her belly.

***********

Berta’ stone cottage was indeed quite isolated, the grasses and heathers of the moorlands surrounding it being the lonely building’s only friends. The landscape was open and seemed endless until the horizon in all directions save for the odd small copse of trees. Certainly, if anyone were to approach the cottage, Sansa would have enough time to hide herself away as Berta instructed in her cellar.

The cottage itself was small and cozy, a single story stone building accompanied by two outhouses, a well and a small yard for chickens and goats.

Berta herself shared many a trait with her sister Nan, except that of warm hospitality. Sansa supposed it was the many years of isolation that had weathered her to become so. She was barren, her husband had passed from a fever some ten years ago and Old Berta felt no need to secure herself a new one.

Although Berta was a little frosty towards Sansa and made it quite clear she was in no dire need of company, Sansa supposed that the old lady was glad of the help about the small house. Besides, Sansa preferred the open air these days, so found herself spending more and more time walking and riding about the moorside. Some of her favoured activities became taking parchment and charcoal out and trying her hand at sketching the flora to then return to the cottage and look up what she had found in her botanical book. The most beautiful flowers that grew there were the wild violets that were rare, but she sometimes happened upon in the copses. She had even pressed a few in her book.

It was lonely but it was a freeing kind of lonely, not like the girl locked away in her rooms feeling like her only friend was the boy on the other side of the door. I’m closer to The Wall now, closer to Jon… not that I’ll ever get to see him.

The cottage only received one infrequent visitor - Martha, the wife of the Innkeeper at the nearest village. Every so often Martha would make the day long trek from the village to deliver some supplies and bring any news from Winterfell. She was a large, friendly woman who looked somewhat precarious perched atop her mule laden down with sacks of grain and other preserves for Berta and Sansa. Sansa pitied the poor beast.

It had been almost two moons turn since Martha’s previous visit when Sansa spotted the woman approaching on her wobbly steed through the long grasses.

Perhaps she has news from Winterfell about my returning, Sansa wondered as she watched the figure slowly making its way towards the lonely cottage.

How wrong Sansa was.

The large woman stumbled off of her tired looking animal. Her cheeks were red from windburn and her long thin mousy brown hair was a mess from being whipped about in the breeze.

“Martha”! Sansa greeted her warmly, glad to at last have conversation with someone who has friendly eyes and a kind smile - for that night at least.

But that kind smile never materialised and instead of the feeling of friendliness in her gaze, there was pity there instead.

“It’s your brother my Lady….there’s been an accident at Winterfell”.

Martha retold the information she had been given about Sansa’s father being made Hand of the King, leaving Winterfell in Robb’s hands as well as her brother Bran’s fall from the Broken Tower.

Sansa had so many questions for the poor woman, but Martha was only in possession of the facts she had been given. She was overly apologetic and didn’t even flinch when Sansa took out her frustrations on the poor woman by near enough grabbing her by her cloak and shaking her - as if more information would fall out of her by doing so. Berta tutted from her seat in the corner.

Sansa waited and waited for word that she could return home. During that time they only encountered one lone wandering man whom Sansa hid from and Berta begrudgingly fed a bowl of broth and a crust of bread before insisting he be on his way. Sansa wonders what Berta could really do should the next wanderer have a mind to turn violent and take Berta’s cottage from her, or her life.

Martha’s visits turned from being something Sansa looked forward to, to events that she dreaded after news of her Father’s execution in King’s Landing and Robb taking up arms against the crown.

She had wept and wept at the information Martha kept bringing, so much so that even Berta softened and often took her in for long embraces for comfort. Although the old woman meant well, Sansa longed to be embraced by her Mother, knowing that being held by the woman who gave her life would bring her more comfort than anything else in the world.

But her Mother never came, never visited. Sansa supposed she must be getting word of her own wellbeing through Martha and prioritising Robb’s war over her own need to be held and cooed over and sang to, of course.

More news eventually came of yet more death and betrayal against House Stark. Robb and Mother murdered and her younger brothers lost to the kraken, still no word of Arya. Sansa didn’t eat or rise from her small bed for days on end. Berta forced small sips of soup passed her lips more times than Sansa could actually remember.

Sansa slipped into those bouts of numbness and despair from time to time over the following year. The clawing feeling of darkness overtaking her natural instincts to survive, to keep on going. She lost track of time, not knowing if it had been a few days past, a week or a moon between Sansa crawling into bed and then crawling back out again. It was any wonder that Berta didn’t just leave her there to rot and be rid of her once and for all, returning to that solitude she liked so very much. But no, Berta wouldn’t do that, she was loyal to House Stark - even if there are now Bolton’s at Winterfell - and she will care for the Stark she has under her roof.

Sansa rose early one morning after a melancholy day or two abed to find Berta slumped in her armchair, deep in slumber.

After grabbing a chunk of cured ham and a couple of dried spiced apple slices, Sansa decided to load her satchel with her parchment and charcoal and head out to do some walking and drawing. Perhaps she’ll see some of the morning larks or find some more wild violets.

The chilly morning air was crisp and refreshing, the sky had a tinge of lilac and pink. Sansa drew for a little over an hour, finding a couple of beetles she’d drawn a few times before but studied them anyway. After that, she made her way to one of the nearest copses to see if there were any young trees amongst the thicket that Sansa could manage to chop herself for their dwindling supply of firewood. She spotted a few and made her way back to the cottage to get her small axe and Griffin, her pony.

Sansa poked her head into the cottage to let Berta know what she would be doing. The old woman was still slumped in the exact same position that Sansa had left her in a few hours ago.

That’s strange, Sansa thought before approaching Berta and calling her name, shaking her a little by the shoulders.

Berta was buried in an unmarked grave that Sansa blessed with a splash of the old woman’s favoured wine and a small posy of violets. It had taken Sansa the whole afternoon to dig the grave, the ground being tough and riddled with roots.

She drew herself a bath by the fire that night and allowed some tears to come forth and fall to the water for her only companion now lost to The Stranger. The wind howled like a wolf against the small stone building as if paying its respects to the elderly woman in the dirt and offering its condolences to the young woman left behind.

Four days later Sansa ventured back out to the copse to chop the young ash trees she had found the day she dragged Berta’s body out of the cottage.

She hadn’t meant for it to happen - the crying. She thought that the task at hand would take her mind off of her situation for a time, whisk her away back to Winterfell, before she had the cursed blood, before everyone left or died. But what did she know? Nothing. She knew nothing whilst she brought down her axe on the small trunk, chipping away at it, not as proficiently as she would like. Each blow marked a sadness she had endured, chop…chop…chop… Jon leaving, Father’s execution, Mother, Robb, Bran and Rickon’s murders, chop…chop…chop….the desecration of her home, her missing sister and the reality of her own life - destined to be alone, to never be loved - truly loved that is no trick from a blood curse….chop…chop….chop.

Sansa thought that the tears would never dry, but they did. The feeling of hopelessness remained like a millstone crushing her chest though, and she wasn’t entirely sure when she had stopped chopping and had sunk to her knees in the dirt.

She stared into oblivion, not thinking of anything in particular, just flashes of memories, not fully formed thoughts. Mother brushing out her hair, Bran climbing to the highest branches of the weirwood tree, Robb running around with Rickon on his shoulders, Arya teasing her, Father putting a whetstone to his blade, Jon’s shy smiles and pushing his fingers under her chamber door.

The sky began to bleed into darkness as Sansa found herself laying on the ground, pushing one hand into the dirt and debris of the moorland floor. She surrendered herself there on the frosty ground - if the cold of the night decided to hand her over to death, then so be it. Sansa would not fight its claim on her, what did she really have that was worth fighting for anyway?

An icy numbness lulled her to sleep only for a calming warmth to wake her. Sansa had not really thought about what dying might have felt like but she supposed that The Stranger would be kind to her since she’d willingly given herself up. Death seemed to smell like sweat and dirt and home and was murmuring her name in her ear as it held a strong arm about her waist. She didn’t know when the flames had started but they danced hypnotically in front of her.

Sansa…..Sansa…please wake up….my Sansa…my Sweet Girl…wake up my love…please….

The Stranger’s voice was familiar and she tried and failed to place it before the blackness of sleep took her again.

The next time she awoke the sky was painted in its colours of dawn, streaks of lavender and orange. There was a fire that had dwindled to a smoking smoulder in front of her and she was covered in someone else’s cloak. She felt the warmth of someone unknown behind her, holding her about the waist, stroking her stomach and kissing the back of her neck.

It wasn’t The Stranger after all.

Sansa blinked, trying to clear her mind. Someone was with her, holding her. She sensed it was a man - she’d not seen a man for nigh on three years, and even then he had been a speck on the horizon.

She wasn’t sure how she felt about it all, She should be scared, her Siren’s blood surely meant she would be raped if he hadn’t done so already whilst she had been unconscious. Sansa found that she wasn’t scared though, she had been prepared to perish only a few hours ago after all. Perhaps this man was one of the very few whose heart spoke of love before lust? Of care before gratification? She certainly didn’t feel like she had been violated. Sansa stayed absolutely still, not quite sure what she should do next.

“Please wake up my love” the unknown man murmured his hot breath into the skin at the nape of her neck as he nuzzled into her hairline. Sansa could feel the soft downy hairs there stand on end and goosebumps begin to trickle down her spine.

“Sansa….my Sansa…” he said next. Sansa knit her brows together in confusion. This man knew her name and his own voice was achingly familiar and yet new, deeper and more rugged. There was a scratch of beard each time he pressed his lips to her skin and his hand splayed possessively about her waist. That same hand seemed to be inching its way higher up her bodice until it cupped her breast and squeezed. He let out a growl behind her ear that made Sansa shiver and his hips started pressing and grinding into her rear whilst he carried on kneading at her chest.

The man’s breathing soon became heavy in her ear and Sansa wondered if this was when he was to push her onto her back, lift her skirts and take her virtue. Her pulse raced at the thought - from fear and a fraction of excitement, not that she would admit to that.

But the man didn’t lift her skirts and claim her maidenhead, instead he cursed, relinquished her breast and rolled away from her. Sansa listened intently to the goings on behind her, his breathing was still uneven and there was a lot of shuffling and rustling. It wasn’t until he began to grunt and groan, only to finish by calling out her name in a strangled cry and another curse, that Sansa realised what he had been doing to himself next to her.

He continued to pant as his body came back to hers, his mouth and nose against her shoulder and his arm reached around her middle once more. Sansa fancied that she could feel the rapid patter of his heart in his chest as it pressed tightly to her back but surely the layers of wool and leather prevented such a thing.

“Sansa….please wake up sweetling” he began pressing more tender kisses to where her neck meets her shoulder and Sansa felt that now was as good a time as any to turn and face the unknown man.

As she turned in his arms, she was rewarded with his sharp intake of breath. His face was close, so close to hers. Familiar grey eyes met her blue ones and she knew instantly who he was.

His curls were now long enough that he wore them tied back, his face framed with a manly beard, his skin was more weathered than when she had seen it last, he had crows-feet at the sides of his eyes as well as a few distracting scars. She ran the pad of her delicate forefinger down the large scar that ran through his brow and continued down his cheek.

“Jon”?

He answered her by quickly ducking down and passionately kissing the lips his name had fallen from, his tongue hungrily licking into her, swallowing her surprise. She was frozen in shock at first but his wonderful attentions soon thawed her as he shifted his body to be on top of her. Sansa’s arms felt foreign as they lifted up to link behind Jon’s neck. He answered her with a deep satisfied throaty hum before pulling away with a gasp and staring into her soul as he caught his breath.

“I thought you were dead when I happened upon you….what were you doing out here”? Jon asked huskily as he pressed his forehead to hers.

“Trying to die”.

*********

“About what I did…..Sansa, I’m sorry” Jon murmured behind her as they shared his horse, making their way back to the lonely cottage, Griffin in tow behind them.

“It was the Siren’s blood” Sansa answered matter-of-factly, not knowing if he had meant kissing her or pawing at her till he fisted his cock.

Jon sighed and lightly nosed at her hair.

“I never thought I’d see you again….I didn’t know what had become of you….I almost swallowed my own tongue when I found you and realised who you were”. Jon’s grip on Sansa tightened and he began placing soft kisses behind her ear.

Sansa stared ahead at the slowly approaching cottage. These weren’t the actions of a brother - although it has been years since she’s been in the presence of one, she half doubts that she remembers what it was like - no, Jon wasn’t acting like a brother, he was acting like a lover. Her Siren’s blood was working it’s dark magic on him. She should try to stop him she thinks, but it feels too good to be touched and held and kissed.

Once inside, Jon set to work on the fire at the small hearth to warm them. They sat, with ale and food as each took it in turns to tell tales of their time apart. Sansa’s heart was heavy at the realisation that Jon had so, so many more tales to tell than she - the cursed isolated girl.

Jon told her of the Wall, his friends who helped guard it and the expansive and dangerous land beyond it. He told her of ranging and wildlings, becoming Lord Commander and of the very real threat of the dead. Jon couldn’t seem to stop absentmindedly touching Sansa as he spoke - shakily tucking a wayward strand of her hair behind her ear, brushing her arm with his knuckles or nervously tracing the fading pattern on her skirts with his fingers.

As if all of what he was saying wasn’t hard enough to believe - and if it had been anyone else but Jon telling the tales, she wouldn’t have believed a word - Jon then went on to recount his betrayal, death and resurrection.

“She told me things, The Red Woman, the one who brought me back” Jon said solemnly, staring into his pewter tankard, his hands shaking and fidgety.

“What things”?

“She said that I needed to join with the Dragon Queen to fight during the Long Night….said it was the only way we could win”.

“Is that where you’re going”? To find the Dragon Queen"?

“….Yes and No..” Jon smiles down at the floor. “I stole away from Castle Black in the night….didn’t want anyone coming with me…too many different voices telling me what I should and shouldn’t do….Before I knew it, I just began to wander….figured I’d probably end up at Dragonstone eventually but for a while I was just happy to drift by myself, with my own thoughts…and then I stumbled across your body on the moorland…Sansa, you were so cold…I feared I was too late”. Jon’s voice sounded desperate and fearful.

“But you weren’t” Sansa said quickly, grabbing his shaking hand with both of hers. Jon stared down at their conjoined fingers with a small smile on his face. He looked as though he wanted to press her for answers as to why he’d found her out in the cold. Instead he took a shuddering inhale and placed his tankard down on the small table so he could commit his other hand to their jumble of digits.

“Sansa…The Red Woman….she told me something else…about my Mother…and my Father” Jon gulped as he studied Sansa.

The pain at what Jon told her next was evident on his face. His features pinched with an ache that Sansa couldn’t begin to understand.

“You’re a Prince then” Sansa said with a small, kind smile, breaking the silence that had settled on them after his revelation.

“Aye…but still a bastard…not like the Princess of the North” Jon responded, returning her grin. Sansa rolled her eyes but couldn’t keep the small smile from her face.

“And we’re cousins now”.

“Aye”.

Sansa sat and stared at the fire, letting all this new information sink in, she felt Jon’s eyes on her.

“You’re still close enough kin for my blood curse not to affect you” she said, still staring into the flames.

“I wouldn’t say that” Jon mumbles nervously and looks away only to slowly bring his eyes back to Sansa, as if she were a magnet.

“But…” Sansa starts, noticing that Jon’s hands are still shaking, his knee keeps bouncing as if he’s agitated and he seems to wet his lips a lot. “..but….you haven’t done anything about it…not really…you’re able to ignore it” she thinks back to the way Jarvis and Theon had lunged for her, wanted to claim her right there and then, to have her, to fuck her. They had scared Sansa so much that day. Jon didn’t scare her, not in the slightest.

“Sansa…” Jon said in a strained voice “it’s taking all my strength not to….” he trails off, dragging a hand down his face and looking away only to again be drawn back to her. Jon seems to be trying to say a thousand words with one heated look.

“Not to what, Jon”? Sansa swallows. The weight of Jon’s stare and the way his eyes seem to leave her skin scorched tells her everything she needs to know.

“I think you know Sansa” Jon says low and huskily. He sounds dangerous and hungry and his voice sparks something low in Sansa’s belly. She decides that she wants him to say it, the thought of hearing those words from his lips making her squirm pleasantly in her seat.

“Tell me”.

Jon sighs. “It’s taking all of my strength not to… kiss you, touch you….” he swallows and licks his lips again “…to make love to you”.

Sansa knows he’s watching her for a reaction and she can’t help but give him one. She feels her cheeks begin to heat and colour, she knows her breathing is picking up its pace, her chest rising and falling under Jon’s gaze. What he can’t see is that her sudden imaginings of Jon throwing her down on her small bed, licking at her throat and spreading her legs is having an effect on her intimate areas. Sansa squeezes her thighs together, feeling herself growing slick between her legs. She bites down hard on her lower lip.

“You could….if you wanted to” Sansa said quietly. Jon closed his eyes and took a long inhale and exhale through his nose.

“You wouldn’t want that” He croaks almost to himself like a prayer, his eyes still closed, brows creased in concentration and restraint.

“Don’t presume to tell me what I do and do not want Jon Snow” Sansa says in a shadow of the haughty voice she used to use as a child. Jon opens his eyes to her teasing grin “even if you are a Prince”.

Jon briefly returns a watery version of her smile before casting his eyes downwards towards the floor, although not fixing them on anything in particular as he speaks. “Sansa, I…I love you…not how someone who was raised as your brother ought to love you…but how a man loves his woman…how a man should love his wife”.

After Jon’s confession had escaped and settled in the air between them like a heavy cloud, he tentatively raised his gaze to look into her eyes, trying to gauge what she felt.

Sansa would be lying if she were to deny that the patter of her heart was now dancing to a frantic rhythm, trying desperately to escape the confines of her chest and make its way to Jon. But deep down she knew it wasn’t true, she couldn’t trust these sweet words and it pained her to point out the obvious. “It’s the Siren’s blood making you think that Jon” Sansa stated quietly, staring down at her own hands, now in her lap.

Before she knew it, Jon was on his knees before her, cupping her hands and ducking his head to catch her eyes with his. “It’s not Sansa…what I feel…” he pressed one of his palms to his chest “…it’s real…I know it is”.

Sansa shook her head. It would be all too easy and yet dangerous to believe him. Jon noticed her gesture and sighed.

“I can’t deny that perhaps your blood curse puts a maddening edge to what I feel, making me desperately want to….to do things to you, with you” Jon blushes and stutters “…and maybe it was the trigger to it all, but it’s genuine…it’s you…it’s not some magic or blood curse or trick…it’s you sweet girl…it’s always been you”.

Jon’s words are pretty and sweet, like a sticky honey luring a bee only for it to get stuck and engulfed in its sweetness. They sound like they resemble some form of truth, but Sansa could not just let go of her long held belief that no one could truly love her. Love her for herself - purely and simply Sansa. She tries not to let that show though.

“Kiss me…like you did out on the moorside Jon” she says, raising her head and giving him a coy smile.

Jon makes a strained throaty noise and stares at Sansa’s lips before he leans in deliberately slowly “it’s real Sansa, what I feel for you is real” he says to her mouth. The hunger in his eyes whispers to Sansa, telling her not to believe him but urging her to give into him all the same.

The curse, it’s just the Siren’s curse Jon.

“Do them…do the things you want to do to me Jon…I want you to” Sansa whimpers when his mouth is but an inch away from hers, his hot breaths brushing across her own lips.

Jon groans loudly and drops his forehead to weigh heavily on her shoulder. “You wouldn’t do…if you knew the vulgar things my mind conjures up” Jon says to her collarbone.

“Tell me”.

He huffs and Sansa can feel it travel down her cleavage.

“Tell me Jon”.

There’s a silence between them before Jon begins to confess, not lifting his head from where it nestled in the crook of her neck. “I want to bury my face between your legs and lap at your sweet cunny, until it’s only you I can taste for days after….I want to stroke and squeeze, lick and suckle at your perfect teats….Gods! I want to fuck you so much” Jon’s hands find their way to Sansa’s outer thighs and gives them a squeeze on his last confession only to then let her go and ball some of her skirt fabric up in his fists instead. Sansa whines at the back of her throat, a needy, wanton sound. Jon couldn’t possibly miss the way her breath hitched at his words or how her hips swivelled in her seat like she was chasing some friction.

He looks up at her, a little dumbfounded “you….like me talking like that”?

Sansa can’t seem to find her voice so she nods.

Jon’s breath becomes laboured like the answer to his next question would decide whether he lived or died. “And you want me to do those things”? His voice is low and his eyes are alight.

“Please” Sansa whimpers.

*********

Moments later, the door to Sansa’s small room slams open against the wall as she leads Jon, walking backwards and clawing at his clothes as she goes, not letting one second pass where her mouth is not on him. Jon had already surrendered his leather jerkin to her eager hands whilst he had been busy hungrily tasting the hollow of her throat, back when they were by the hearth. Sansa is down to her undershift and stockings as she reaches down Jon’s stomach to untuck his shirt from his breeches. Jon’s muscles twitched at her touch, Sansa giggles and Jon growls a feral sound in return, nipping at her neck.

Jon seems oblivious to the small single cot in the room as he instead turns them to push Sansa up against the wall, bunching her shift up and grabbing her thigh urging her leg to hitch over his hip.

“Seven Hells Sansa….is this real?….I’ve wanted you for so, so long” Jon mumbled between kissing and lapping at her skin. “I love you…oh Gods! I love you so much”.

No you don’t sweet man. It’s the Siren’s blood.

Sansa hums throatily in response with her eyes closed, thoroughly enjoying the feel of Jon’s solid body pushed up against her, trying to chase away unbidden excuses for his actions by counting the ways Jon was making her feel good.

She liked his broad shoulders and the way she could feel his muscles coil and shift under her hands. She liked the firmness of his chest and the warmth that radiated from him when he pressed into her. She loved whatever he was doing with his mouth, whether it was leaving a trail of kisses and licks across her skin or murmuring low, filthy and sweet endearments in between nips and scrapes of teeth.

His hands were another thing altogether, they were strong and calloused but they could do wonderful things, like caress and stroke as well as squeeze and knead. His well-muscled arms were loaded with energy as if they could hold up anything at all with little strain.

After going for so, so long without another person’s touch, Jon being everywhere on her, all at once, was a beautiful heady sensation to Sansa. Her head began to spin like that time she’d snuck too much wine away from Berta’s own stash. Her skin tingled warmly wherever he touched and yet she felt the prickle of goose flesh start to rise too.

She’s reminded of those times where she touches herself at night when Jon starts rubbing his clothed swollen cock against her silk-clad cunny. It feels the same but different. She likes it and begins to move her own hips in turn. Both of them moan in unison.

Sansa remembers when Theon bared himself to her on that terrible day when she was scared and confused. Would Jon’s cock scare her too? She suddenly felt naive and unpracticed - she didn’t know what Jon wanted, what she was supposed to do. She only knew that so far, Jon could do no wrong and everything felt wonderful.

“Jon” Sansa tries weakly, eyes still closed, enjoying the sensations Jon is giving her. He’s currently latched onto one of her teats, suckling her into a stiff peak through her shift.

“Hmmm”? He mumbled into the wet cotton, not leaving her breast.

Sansa swallows and tries again. “Jon…oh!..” he starts gently using his teeth on the soaked cloth around her nipple. “Jon….Jon I’m still a maid” she confesses. He growls around her teat before suddenly stilling and pulling away, dropping her leg in the process. “What is it”? Sansa asks confused and worried.

“I’m sorry Sansa, please forgive me” Jon backs away and ducks his head whilst cursing under his breath. He looks back at Sansa and sees the confusion on her face as well as her kiss-swollen lips, disheveled hair and wet patches on her teats from his own mouth.

“It shouldn’t be me taking your maidenhead” Jon says lowering his gaze to the floor, balling his fists at his sides and clenching his jaw.

“Then who, Jon”? Sansa starts to feel something rile within her. “Who should I give it to? A wanderer who happens upon this cottage to rape me”?!

“No”!

“Or perhaps I should seek out a Lord to keep me under lock and key as his”?

“No Sansa! You are m-” Jon sucks in a shuddering gasp to mask his last word.

“I am what Jon”?!

He makes a resigning huff before boring his eyes into hers as he speaks, “you’re mine Sansa…you’re mine now”.

“Then make me yours Jon…please” she almost whines. Jon groans and squeezes his eyes shut.

“I’ll hurt you…I’m….I’m not strong enough Sansa…..I’m not sure that I could hold back”.

“Then don’t”

“I don’t want to hurt you”

Sansa took the two steps forward to close the distance that Jon had put between them and began tugging at the lacings of his breeches. “If you truly love me as you say you do, then you never will…you’ll never hurt me Jon”.

It was only a few moments later that they were both situated at Sansa’s little bed - Sansa laid back with her legs spread wide while Jon made good on one of those things he wanted to do so much.

And Gods! Did it feel good! Obscenely good! Sansa felt like the whole of her skin was alight and burning from a body-wide blush as she looked down between her spread legs to see Jon’s face - his mouth devouring her cunt like a starved man, his nose pressed into her copper-blonde maidenhair and his gorgeous grey eyes intent on hers.

She wondered why this was one of the things he wanted to do to her. As far as she could tell, Jon wasn’t getting any gratification out of the act, although the hungry noises he was making brought that into question. When he muffled a few moans into her cunny Sansa wondered if he was pleasuring himself as he knelt at the foot of her bed, licking at her most intimate areas.

The Sansa of old may have thought that what he was doing was perverse. The present day Sansa knew it for what it was - an act that brought her the most intense feeling of pleasure she had ever experienced. Jon’s hot breath coasting over her made her whimper, his warm tongue made her want to weep and when his fingers tentatively started pushing in and pulling out she couldn’t hold back the loud groan or full body shudder that took over as an intense pleasurable tingle exhausted her entirely.

“Can I see you”? Sansa panted as Jon rose to his feet, licking his lips clean of the remnants of her.

His already loosened breeches were rid of quickly and Sansa gaped at his tented smallclothes.

She felt the pulse in her ears continue its galloping race with her heart as Jon bared himself completely to her.

Sansa suspected that Jon’s manhood was fairly sizeable but she had only the panicked glances at Theon’s to use as comparison. Jon’s seemed thicker and Sansa considered that yes - with that girth, he probably would hurt her a little after all.

The strange thing was that as she regarded him in his entirety, whilst also remembering what he’d done for her with his mouth and tongue - she wanted that pain, she would gladly welcome the stretch and sting that she imagined would occur for it would only be the first time and her first time just simply must be with Jon.

“Please don’t look at me that way Sansa” Jon whispered hoarsely.

“What way”? Sansa blinked herself out of her reverie and focused on Jon’s pained face.

“Like you want me just as much as I want you”.

“Why shouldn’t I look at you that way”? She whispered.

“Because….because you shouldn’t encourage me…I’m having a hard enough time as it is and I need to go slow or I’ll…I’ll hurt you my love…Seven Hells! The Gods only know what I’ll do if you excite me any further”!

Before Sansa could do anything about it, she could feel the wickedness of a smirk creep upon her lips. She hated that it was her Siren’s curse affecting Jon so and not her. That it was but a magic trick and not real, but she couldn’t deny that having this affect on him at all was rather delicious and emboldening.

She watched the way his muscled chest rose and fell, the way his fists balled at his sides and how he clenched his jaw making the muscle there tick.

Sansa could feel the energy thrumming throughout Jon’s body above her once she finally convinced him to come and kiss her on the bed. She hummed and wiggled beneath him, clawed at him to try and pull him closer and closer - not that there was any space between their bodies to start with. Jon often had to break their kiss with a curse and eyes screwed shut, to concentrate on his breathing - working hard to steady it. Sansa knew she was not helping him by kissing his neck and rolling her hips but she did so anyway.

“Fuck Sansa, I want you” he cursed, bucking his cock against her cunny.

“Then have me Jon” Sansa breathed.

Sansa braced herself for the pain that didn’t truly come as her slickness turned Jon into a slow glide inside her. Sansa gasped and Jon groaned and cursed. There was a sort of sore tenderness between her legs with her cunny now full of Jon, but Sansa welcomed it as he began to carefully pull out to then glide back in again. She found she liked it best when he was fully sheathed inside her, the base of him pushing against the pearl that Jon had licked and sucked at earlier.

Sansa moaned and wrapped her legs around him, always trying to bring him closer, to get him to touch her more, everywhere.

“Did it hurt”? He asks placing soft feathery kisses on her cheek and along her jaw to her chin.

“No”. It wasn’t the complete truth but she wasn’t about to tell him that.

Sansa was getting used to the deliberately slow thrusts Jon was giving her as she looked up at him hovering above her. He was breathing heavy out of his nose and had his eyes closed in concentration. Sansa leant up and stole a sweet kiss from his lips.

“Sansaaa” he said in a warning tone making it known to her that it wouldn’t take much to push him to give into his urges. So she stole another kiss…. and another… and then moved her attentions down to his neck

Jon emitted a throaty growl and started rocking into her faster and faster, until her bed began to creak with his movements.

“Fuck!….Sansa…uuunnn….Gods”! Jon chanted in her ear, the bristle of his beard bumping her cheek.

He reached down and hooked an arm behind her knee, guiding her leg to come higher - almost to his shoulder. Sansa gasped at the new angle and sensations. Jon stilled.

“Am I hurting you”?

“No” Sansa huffed and bucked her hips up to encourage him “I’m not made of fine glass you know”.

Jon actually allowed himself to smile at that. “No, you’re much more precious”.

Sansa rolled her eyes at his ridiculous proclamation making Jon laugh. Sansa couldn’t help but grin in return as she felt Jon’s stomach muscles jump and contract against her.

“I love you” he whispered before capturing her lips and resumed his thrusting. Sansa knew that this wasn’t the first, and would not be the last time that she desperately wished she could believe him.

As if sensing her thoughts, Jon tore his lips from hers and set his eyes to bore into Sansa’s fiercely. Pleading with her to see that she wasn’t just a cursed girl, she was his everything.

Sansa watched curiously when Jon’s breathing became heavy and harsh, his whole body stiffened, his face pinched and then went slack as he reached his peak. He mumbled something of an apology for not pleasing her. Jon then shifted to her side where he nuzzled into her hair and busied his hand at Sansa’s cunny.

With his fingers, Jon made her feel that wonderful full body tingle and shudder again quite quickly. Once her own breathing evened out she noticed Jon’s was not that of a man relaxed and that there was something quite hard poking her at the hip.

“Sansa” Jon rasped as he planted kisses behind her earlobe and at the crook of her jaw. “Sansa, can I have you again”?

***********

Over the following days they make love everywhere. Nowhere seems to be off limits - the kitchen table, the armchairs, the yard, the bathtub, all over the moorside, even poor old Berta’s bed (Seven save them).

Jon’s appetite for Sansa never seems to abate - which is to be expected considering her Siren’s curse but what surprised Sansa is that her own level of desire matched his.

Perhaps Jon has something of the Siren about him too, she muses one day whilst straightening her skirts after Jon had just taken her against a tree in the copse where he’d found her. He is very handsome.

On the rare occasions that they are not intertwined, panting and rutting against one another like animals, Jon helps out in the yard and sets about fixing long overdue failings about the cottage. He rides into the village to replenish their food stores - both being able to journey there and back faster than Martha on her mule and being able to carry more too.

Jon even accompanies Sansa when she takes a fancy to go out drawing again. He sits behind her on the moorland floor, wrapping his body around hers tight, allowing Sansa to lean her weight back into his chest as his legs splay out bent on either side of her. He plays with her hair and kisses her neck as he watches her draw. Jon even attempts a sketch of Sansa’s favourite wild violets himself but they both soon descend into fits of laughter at his terrible efforts.

“I’m not sure how Jon, but you’ve made these beautiful little flowers look like tiny grumpy faces on stalks”! Sansa giggled. Jon feigned outrage and silenced her laughter with a kiss that soon led to Jon’s drawing being crumpled beneath two writhing bodies.

For the first time since her sixteenth nameday, Jon makes her feel safe, and that it is a fine thing to be wanted and desired. Even though she sees it - that mad heat in his glare as he watches her go about her chores, waiting for an opportunity to pounce and claim her again - Sansa can feel herself begin to believe those sweet words he chants in her ear when they’re making love, or when she sets down his meagre bowl of broth in front of him, or when he’s staring at her by the fire - I love you, I love you, I love you.

She finds herself reminding her heart of her blood curse less and less as the days meander by and knows she’s on the cusp of telling him too - I love you, Jon. I think I’ve loved you since that day you saved me.

Her words never come to fruition.

“You’ve been awfully quiet lately Jon” Sansa enquiries as she brings his drink out into the yard. Jon’s stern solemn look had returned after he had seemed so happy and carefree over the past half a moon.

He paused and studied Sansa carefully before answering. “I have to leave Sansa” he says, shirtless and sweaty from chopping a rather large pile of firewood, wiping his brow with his forearm.

“Leave”?! Sansa’s jaw drops.

“I have to join with the Dragon Queen….I have to protect you from what’s coming, I have to stop it…..The Red Woman said-”

“I don’t give a shit what the Red Woman said Jon, you’re not going… you’re not leaving me!…not again”! Sansa yelled, angry tears threatening to make themselves known.

Jon’s features soften and he devours the three strides it takes to get to Sansa and gather her in his arms. He’s all bare chested and sweaty but Sansa doesn’t mind as she clutches onto him, as if that would stop him from going.

Please don’t go! Please don’t leave me! “I love you Sansa” he says, like he has so often before. Sansa tilts her head up and catches his mouth hungrily, trying to answer him with her kiss, pleading him to stay with her desperate lips.

Before she knows it, Jon has backed her towards the stone well.

“I love you” he says again between kisses before he swiftly lifts Sansa up and seats her on the stones, clutching onto her should she feel too precarious sat atop the well.

Jon makes quick work of the lacings at his breeches as he mouths the tops of Sansa’s breasts greedily. Sansa hooks her arms under his shoulders, her hands splayed across his back, anchoring him to her. She parts her legs to allow Jon to push aside her smallclothes and thrust into her desperately.

Jon groans and stills momentarily to capture her lips again. “Sansa, I love you” he repeats before setting a hard and steady pace against her, gripping onto Sansa’s rear, his fingers biting at the flesh even through her skirts.

“I love you so much sweet girl” he says once more as they stare at each other during Jon’s relentless thrusting. Sansa knew right then and there that he was already gone, he was already leaving her once more. She silently pleaded for him to stay as he implored her to understand.

It was one of the only times that Jon hadn’t been able to make Sansa reach her peak as he spilled inside her, shouting obscenities and huffing repeatedly into her shoulder. “I love you” he whispered again, but all Sansa could hear was 'goodbye’.

**********

It had been a moon gone since Jon had left her and Sansa still won’t allow herself to think of that day. The day she watched him slowly getting smaller on the horizon as she prayed to anyone who would hear her that he’d turn around and come back. He had promised her he would return as he wiped away a tear upon her cheek. She wanted to believe him but everyone leaves her, nobody stays.

And so, with almost constant tear tracks etched onto her cheeks, Sansa Stark was alone again - at least she thought she was.

Martha had barely dismounted from her tired mule when Sansa welcomed her warmly and blurted out her request.

“I need a woman to come and stay with me, someone with experience of the birthing bed” she beamed, clutching at the tiny swelling of her belly. Martha gasped and placed her hand on top of Sansa’s.

“You’re with child?!… who?…did someone violate you my dear”? Martha asked full of concern.

Sansa shook her head.

“But I thought….your curse…”?

“It was a man I loved” Sansa replied, her smile losing some of its vigour.

“Where is he now lovey”?

“Gone”.

*************

Little baby Violet burst into the world screaming - and she hasn’t stopped making a ruckus ever since, Sansa thought at she chased her squealing two year old around the kitchen table.

Her little girl gave her reason to carry on after Jon left, her hope that he would return after the war was quickly dashed by one of Martha’s visits.

“Your brother…the bastard…”

“He’s my cousin now” Sansa corrected, trying to stay calm to hear what news of her lover.

“Oh yes, that’s right…yes, him…he’s done quite well for himself I hear” Martha pauses to take a chunk of bread and dip it into her soup. Sansa wants to slap it out of the woman’s hands. “Well he’s with the Queen now you see, gone down south with her, part of her regular advisors they say - how’s about that for a bastard ay”?!Martha chuckles warmly and completely misses that the woman across the table is shattering into a million pieces.

“There’s a rumour that the Queen is like you my lovey” Martha mumbles through chewing teeth.

“Like me”?

“Yea…says she’s got the touch of the Siren’s blood” the woman then leans forward, pointing her piece of bread at Sansa “I reckon that’s why she surrounds herself with those cockless soldiers of hers” she elaborates as if whispering a conspiracy before grinning proudly.

Siren’s blood? Stronger than mine I’ll wager - to keep Jon with her for almost three years when I couldn’t make him stay but a moon.

“Yea…well…what with your cousin being a dragon now, people have been wondering when they might be wed….they’ve been back in the capital now for nye on a year or so…I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s very soon” Martha mused but Sansa wasn’t really paying attention.

Perhaps she’s not a Siren, perhaps he loves her truly? She wondered with her heart like a millstone, as she stroked Violet’s dark curls where she sat happily on her mother’s lap.

********

It had been nearly four years since Sansa watched Jon leave her. At first a war keeping them apart and now a silver haired beauty, a Targaryen Queen.

Sansa sometimes catches herself imagining Jon touching his royal bride with the passion and reverence that he did with her.

Would she make him growl and groan the way he used to with me? Would he stare heatedly into her eyes while they made love? Would he do that thing with his tongue for her?

“Mama…what’s that over there”? Violet said, shaking Sansa out of her unpleasant musings.

Oh Gods! Someone is coming!

There was a small dark mark on the horizon that was undoubtedly someone on horseback, maybe two people. It definitely wasn’t Martha as they were approaching from the wrong direction. Sansa hasn’t had to hide from a wanderer since Violet was a baby and panic began to set in.

She gathered her daughter up in her arms, and doused the fire in the hearth with a pail of water, it hissed into submission as she found the cellar door under the well worn rug and descended the stairs with Violet, trying to pull the rug back into place as she closed the door.

Once in the dark of the cold cellar, she fumbled around to find the small wooden box she had placed down there when her daughter was born.

Violet complained loudly that she didn’t like the dark and that it smelt funny.

“I know darling, but we’re playing a game…here, Mama needs you to try this magic potion!…it will make you into a princess”! Sansa tried to keep her nerves from fraying and sound excited about her ruse as she dipped her forefinger into the glass vial of Sweetsleep and offered it to her daughter.

Sleep my darling, we need to be quiet.

Sansa could feel her pulse racing as she clutched at Violet’s curls, holding her sleeping daughter’s head to her shoulder. She began to hear the intruders sooner than she thought.

“She’s not here…you’ve held me captive and dragged me across the Narrow Sea to bring me to an abandoned shack”! A man’s voice grunted in a thick accent amongst the shuffle and scrape of boots on the floor.

“What are you doing’”? The same man said.

“Someone’s here, the hearth is still warm…she must be hiding” came a familiar voice that made Sansa freeze in hopefulness and anger all at once.

Jon!

“Clever girl” said the other man.

Why would Jon bring someone here? Bring a MAN here?!

“Come on, I’m going to check the outhouses” Sansa heard Jon command, the other man grunted.

Jon knows she’s here, she can’t hide forever - even if there are plenty of provisions down in the dank little cellar. Slowly she creaks open the door and ascends the steps, clutching her sleeping daughter. With her heart in her throat, Sansa makes her way out to the yard to face him.

Jon freezes when he sees her, his eyes grow wide when he takes in the precious sleeping bundle Sansa is carrying. Sansa gives the other man a cautious flick of a look but it’s Jon she stares at, her breath hitching at the sight of him.

His hair and beard are longer and unkempt, he looks a little thinner and he’s wearing some new scars about his face. Jon’s companion is bound at the wrists and is tethered to Jon by a thick rope. The stranger has been staring wildly at Sansa and growls loudly before making to lunge at her, only for Jon to yank him back forcibly by his rope bindings.

“Let me go!..LET ME HAVE HER”! The man screeched and Sansa flinches back, holding her daughter tighter as she once again wonders why Jon brought a man with him. In a move that looked cold and unfeeling, Jon unsheathed his sword and struck the man at his temple with the pommel. The unknown man was a pile of flesh and red rag clothing on the dusty floor.

Sansa’s eyes were back on Jon, she could see he was staring at Violet’s inky curls as she cupped the back of her head and held her close.

“Is…is she…”? Jon stammers with a look of shock and awe about his face.

“Yours? Well no one else has visited to fuck me then leave Jon, so yes, she is from the seed you left me with” Sansa spat. The look of pure pain that flashed across Jon’s face wasn’t nearly as satisfying as she thought it might be. He opened his mouth to speak only to close it again.

Sansa sighed out an exasperated noise. “You left me Jon”.

“I had to fight…I had to protect you” he argued.

“Yes and how long since the war with the dead ended? Almost two years?…Where have you been? What have you been doing?! ….no wait, don’t answer that because I don’t want to know about your new Queen bride”.

Jon creases his brow in confusion. “I love you, Sansa”.

Sansa takes quick long strides towards him, half wanting to smack those lying words right out of his mouth, half wanting to kiss him for saying them. “Well which is it Jon? You did not return to me as you promised…instead you went South with your Queen… do you tell her that you love her too whilst you fuck her”?! Sansa was shaking now and she noted Jon was too, although she suspects his unease is more to do with her blood curse and less to do with anger.

“Sansa”! Jon grabs both her upper arms but she shrugs out of his grasp violently, jostling little Violet in the process. Sansa lets out a single sob and turns her face away from him.

“You left me” she whispers.

Jon takes a long drag of air into his lungs and wets his lips before speaking. “Sansa…..Sansa look at me, please”? She concedes begrudgingly with unshed tears glimmering in her eyes. “I was injured in battle” he paused and patted his thigh, “for some time after, I was treated with Milk of the Poppy….I honestly cannot tell you one thing about the journey South, only that before I knew it, we were marching under the gates of King’s Landing”.

Sansa continued to glare her stony expression, not allowing him to crack her defences.

“There were those who expected me to marry Danaerys but I would never do that Sansa, you have to know that”! Jon implored with upturned palms.

“Still doesn’t explain why you haven’t come back until now”. Sansa cocked one of her legs out to the side, only just resisting tapping her foot like an impatient nag.

“I had to convince her to let me go…to help me…it wasn’t easy….she-she wanted me to love her, to lay with her but I couldn’t - I would never!….I needed her help - I didn’t know where to begin looking…I needed information that only her backing could give me….” Sansa just stared at him, anger and now confusion on her face. “I’ve been searching for him” Jon gestured to the man on the dirty floor with his hand still grasping the rope.

“Him? Who is he”?

“He’s a Red Priest….Sansa, he can break your blood curse, he’s done it before….I sent a messenger to you to let you know - a woman…did she not make it to you”?

Sansa shook her head and stared at the motionless man on the ground with awe.

He could break the curse? I could be free of it?

"I know you never fully believed my love for you…this will prove it, you’ll not doubt my words…I swear it”.

Sansa stayed silent, not willing to let her heart soar just yet.

“If I had known…” Jon stared at the back of their daughter’s head and makes a move to reach out and touch her hair. Sansa shrugs her away from him and holds Violet tighter. Jon’s eyes flicker with hurt. “I would have come back sooner…. I would have abandoned my search for him”.

Sansa glances back at the Red Priest and wonders which would be better - to have waited as long as she has, but have the chance of knowing that Jon’s love is true, or having him with her sooner but doubting his proclamations?

She honestly didn’t know.

“You could have guessed” Sansa huffs and shifts Violet to her other hip “you….we….we coupled many times…it wasn’t a huge surprise when my moonblood didn’t come”.

Jon swallowed and stared at the little person in Sansa’s arms. “Aye…you’re right…of course you’re right…I didn’t think…I just…” he shook his head at himself. “I just wanted you to know that when I tell you of my love that it is nothing but truth…and…the Queen, once she accepted that I would only ever be with you - only you…she offered me Winterfell…her Unsullied, they took it back from the Boltons, they hold it until I return… but it’s yours Sansa…I wanted for you to be able to return there and be able to walk the grounds without the fear of men…it’s much changed from what we remember I’m told…it needs restoration, but I wanted to give that to you…it’s yours Sansa”.

Sansa scanned the face that has been burnt into her heart before turning to go back inside. “You must be hungry, I have some stew if you want some” she calls back over her shoulder.

“I’ve secured the Priest in the outhouse, he won’t be gettin’ loose” Jon said as he passed over the cottage’s threshold and stood watching Sansa lay their little girl down on the armchair and arrange cushions and blankets around her. “What’s her name”? He asked in a strained voice.

“Violet”.

Jon smiled to himself at that. “What is she like”?

Sansa began smoothing back her daughters unruly curls as she spoke with warmth and adoration. “She loves the outdoors, hates being cooped up inside…she is inquisitive, never quiet…just when I think she’s run out of questions she’ll come up with ten more” Jon’s smile widens behind her. “She’s braver than she should be, hardly bats an eyelid when we go galloping upon Griffin”. Sansa turns to Jon then with a smirk and an arched brow “even at this young age she’s much better at drawing than you are”.

A bright grin lights up Jon’s face, his eyes glimmer with joyful tears and are framed by crinkles in the corners.

I’ve missed so much" he whispers as his face falls and Sansa stands up to turn to him.

“You have” she nodded in agreement “but you’re here now”.

“Aye, I’m here now” Jon repeated as Sansa began slowly walking towards him, his eyes intent on hers.

“And you’ll never leave me again…you’ll never leave us again”?

“Never” he breathed. Sansa reaches up to cup his cheek as his eyes close, they open again as Jon repeats his vow with a serious and solemn face. “Never, Sansa….Never”.

**********

Sansa had retired for the night, taking Violet with her to her bed. Jon had been disappointed but not surprised that she hadn’t woken from the drop of Sweetsleep - they didn’t expect her to wake until the morning. Sansa had warned him that she didn’t know how Violet would react to Jon once she does wake, what with her not ever seeing a man before in her short life.

They agreed to persuade the Red Priest tomorrow to perform the ritual that should break Sansa’s Siren’s curse, making her blood no more enticing to men than any other woman. Jon was tense and his jaw tightened as he explained that Sansa would need to lie and claim to the priest that she would allow him to have her, but only after he performed the ritual.

Sansa’s not sure if the man’s magic will work but she prays that it does and Jon’s time away searching him out would not be in vain.

Jon is here now. That’s all that matters, Jon is with us.

She suddenly hears a shuffle and a scrape outside of her door and can see the flicker of candlelight creep in from beneath it.

Jon tumbles backwards down on the floor with a grunt when she opens her door to see what he’s up to.

“Jon”?

He smiles and sits up. “Can you close the door again and humour me a little my Lady”?

Sansa obliges and only realises what he’s about when she sees Jon’s fingers appear at the gap under the door. She smiles and seats herself on the floor as she did all those years ago back in her childhood chambers at Winterfell. He only begins to speak when Sansa brushes her fingers over his.

“I have something for you” Jon’s fingers disappear briefly and are replaced by a piece of parchment slid beneath the door.

Sansa takes it and grins at the terrible drawing on it. There is some sort of beast with wings, another with sharp teeth and a grumpy little face on a stalk. A giggle escapes her.

“Incase you can’t tell” Jon says through the wood, “it’s a dragon, a wolf and a violet”.

Sansa can’t hold back her laughter “you have not improved Jon” she chuckles. She can hear his deep murmur of a laugh behind her.

“Turn it over”.

Sansa complies and holds her breath momentarily when she reads words in Jon’s own hand.

Sansa Stark, my beloved Princess of the North,

Not a day has gone by that I have not thought of you, missed you, adored you.

You think it is the Siren’s blood ~ it is not.

I am not as gifted with words (or drawings) as you are my Lady, but please know this, although my words are not eloquent, they are true. I love you.

You think it is the Siren’s blood ~ please believe me when I say it is not.

I will see to it that you are restored as the Lady of Winterfell, Wardeness of The North. I would be the father that our daughter needs, if she’ll let me. I would fight a thousand wars should it make you both happy, I would fight a thousand more should it keep you both safe. I would take you as my wife, if you’ll allow it.

You think it is the Siren’s blood, trust me my love, it is not.

Forever yours

Jon

Sansa rises from her seated position and promptly yanks the door open. Jon tumbles backwards again where he had been leant up against it.

She stares down at him where he lay flat on his back for a while. Jon silently pleading with her to answer him, to accept him.

“Yes” Sansa says in a cracked whisper.

“Yes”?

She moved to sit on him there on the floor, straddling his waist. “Yes” she repeats with tears threatening to fall before she leans down to give Jon a soft kiss.

******* Sansa’s belief in Jon’s love did not come to her overnight after the ritual. It was but a few days into their travel back to Winterfell that she whispered those words back to him as she gripped his shoulders while he moved above her, touching, tasting, caressing and loving every inch of her. I love you too Jon, so so much.

Winterfell was indeed not at all how they left it. It needed much repair and Jon had managed to secure extra coin from the crown to do so.

Jon’s royal Aunt allowed him to stay in the North as long as he took the Targaryen name. All of the North knew it were dragons now that hold the seat of Winterfell - that did not stop them from referring to Jon and Sansa as Lord and Lady Stark, herald them as 'The Wolves Returned’ or making sure that the number of grey and white banners that flew atop the ramparts outnumbers those of black and red.

Even though Sansa knew the castle was the largest in the Seven Kingdoms, after the freedom and expanse of her beloved moorside, she felt a little like that trapped bird in a cage again. It would take a few years for her heart to finally feel utterly calm within the walls. It would take even longer for the Lady of Winterfell and Wardeness of the North to feel comfortable in the presence of men - but Jon was with her at every step of the way, making sure no man got too close to his bride even though they both knew they would not be driven mad with lust - Not like Jon still was in their bedchamber…or in the hot-springs….at an abandoned stables….and that one devilish time in the kitchens at the dead of night.

Jon’s loving relationship with Violet blossomed quickly. She was a plucky little thing and did not shy away from the first man she ever saw. Instead, she was bursting with curiosity and launched a million questions at him that just kept on coming as the days and moons went on - just as Sansa said she would. Jon was more than happy to answer each and every one of them. Well, apart from some of the queries she would have about the new brother or sister growing in her Mother’s belly.

In the years to come, all nine sons and daughters of Jon and Sansa Targaryen are happy and cherished. And at some point or another in their lives they have each wondered why their mother keeps with her at all times an awful drawing of what they assume is a bat, a dog and a grumpy little face on a stalk.