#I was so surprised during trespasser like “wait u like me???”

[chialattea]

My Inky pre-conclave + some doodles hehe

[pikapeppa]

Felassan/f!Lavellan smut: Starve

Chap 20 of The Love That Grows From Violence (post-Trespasser Felassan x Tamaris Lavellan) is up!

In which there is smut. And a little lore. And Felassan telling stories about being a fratboy one of Solas’s esteemed agents. 

Quick CW: a very brief mention of suicidal ideation.

~8200 words; read on AO3 instead.

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

Tamaris gazed at Felassan in a happy haze. They were lying face-to-face in her rumpled bed with the sheets twisted around their legs, and his fingertips were tracing a slow and careful path from her waist over the curve of her hip to her knee, then back up to her waist. 

She admired the softness of his faintly-smiling lips and the dark curves of his eyelashes. Then his lovely violet eyes crinkled at the corners with a smile. 

He lifted his hand and ran his fingers through her tangled curls. “You’re staring, avise. Maybe you should paint a picture. It’ll last longer.”

Brat. she thought fondly. Trust him to use her own snarky comment against her. “Can I ask you something?” she said.

“You’ve been asking me for things all night,” he said slyly. “Why stop now?”

She smirked. He wasn’t wrong. They’d spent the entire night twisted together in her bed, teasing each other both verbally and physically. When they’d begun to exhaust each other into dozing off, Tamaris had risen to get their nightly Fade-blocking tea, but by that time, it was late enough — or early enough, really — that birds were singing outside the window to herald the incoming dawn.

They’d drunk their tea and curled up together to sleep. As Tamaris’s weighted eyelids drifted shut, her last waking thought was one of relief: relief that she was comfortable with Felassan falling asleep in her bed, and that she was comfortable falling asleep wrapped in his arms.

It was close to noon now, and they’d only just awoken. Despite her rumbling stomach, Tamaris was very reluctant to get up. Being curled in bed with Felassan was so nice, and so… surreal somehow, like living inside of a dearly-held fantasy. She’d been mentally tiptoeing around this fantasy for weeks, growing accustomed to the idea of baring herself to him in more ways than one, and the way she felt right now — sleepy and loose and soporific with the love she was still too shy to admit: this feeling was perfect and idyllic, and she didn’t want to break that idyll by rising from this bed.  

Thankfully, Felassan didn’t seem in any rush to rise, either. He looked as languid and satisfied as she felt, and she savoured the feeling of his fingers sifting slowly through her hair as she replied. “I mean that I have a question,” she said.

“Ask away,” he said easily.

“It’s a crass question,” she warned.

His smile widened. “Even better.”

She huffed in amusement before speaking. “How come…” Almost immediately, she trailed off as she realized just how tactless her question was. But Felassan’s expression was expectant, so there was nothing she could do but to try and phrase this as delicately as she could. 

Unfortunately, delicacy was not Tamaris’s forte. “I’m kind of surprised that you don’t have fire or lightning coming out of your hands when you’re fucking me,” she said. “Your eyes get all lit up, but you don’t…” She trailed off once more: Felassan was laughing. 

She rubbed her face awkwardly. “That was rude. Gods, I’m sorry…” 

“That is a crass question,” he chortled. “But it’s a very good one. And you have to promise not to laugh at my answer.”

“But you’re laughing at the question!” she protested.

“You can’t blame me. It’s a funny question,” he said. “But if you laugh at my answer, you may injure my pride.”

She scoffed. “I doubt that very much. But fine, I promise not to laugh.”

He smirked. “The short answer is this: I’ve been practicing.”

She frowned slightly. “Practicing? Practicing what?”

He raised his eyebrows suggestively, and she blinked. “Wait. Have you… you’ve been practicing how to come without making fire and lightning? How have you been doing that?”

“Masturbating,” he said baldly. “I had to practice. It… didn’t go well the first time I tried.”

“What do you mean?” she asked.

He lifted one eyebrow. “I almost burned my own cock.”

She stared at him. Oh fuck, she was going to laugh. No, she couldn’t, she couldn’t, she’d promised she wouldn’t–

A snort of mirth escaped her. She clapped her hand over her mouth, and Felassan grinned at her. “You’re cruel. You promised—” 

“I know, I know, I’m sorry!” She rubbed her mouth until her face was under control, then widened her eyes. “Tell me. I want to know. I mean it.”

He chuckled, then went back to trailing his fingers over her hip and the side of her thigh. “I tried to masturbate the first night I was here, but I almost burned myself. I kept trying every night after that, but I was getting too frustrated, in more ways than one. It was only making the problem worse.”

Her belly writhed with sympathy. Now she really felt bad for laughing. “Fuck. I’m sorry,” she said in a small voice.

“No need to apologize,” he said lazily. “You helped, in fact.” He gave her a sly little smile. “Or maybe I should say that Fen’Harel helped.”

She wrinkled her nose. “What?” she said flatly.

“The mana-building exercises. The fundamentals that you reminded me of,” he explained. “I focused on my breathing and pulled the magic back from my hands while I was touching myself, and eventually it worked.”

“Oh,” she said in surprise. “That’s… But we only started doing those exercises a week before we had sex.” She peered at him with growing amazement. “You figured out how to control your magic during sex in a week?”

“I was extremely motivated,” he said dirtily. “And I’m not flattering you when I say that you helped.”

“How?”

“You kissed me.”

She gave him a quizzical look, and he tapped her hip. “You may have noticed that my magic is more out of control when I’m upset than when I’m content.”

“I might have noticed that, yeah,” she said gently.

He nodded. “The memory of kissing you was something positive to focus on while I was touching myself instead of the frustration. It was extremely helpful.” He propped himself up on one elbow and smiled down at her. “Would you like to know what I concluded from this?”

His palm was smoothing over her hip and belly now in a slow and languid circle, and Tamaris rolled onto her back and stretched happily under his hand. “Go on, then. What did you conclude?”

He slowly lowered his face toward hers. “The more you kiss me, the faster my magic will come back,” he murmured.

She quirked a playful eyebrow. “Is that so?”

“I think it’s a good deduction,” he said pleasantly.

She scoffed softly and slid her hand around the back of his neck. “I bet you do,” she said, and she pulled him down for a kiss.

His lips parted for her, and she savoured the heat of his tongue and the plushness of his lips for a blissful moment. Then he pulled away from her and tilted his head playfully. “What do you know? I feel more magical already.”

She chuckled, then gazed at him more seriously. “Seriously though, that’s really impressive. I’ve never even felt a hint of fire or lightning when you’re fucking me.”

He raised his eyebrows. “That would be insulting if you didn’t mean it literally.”

She let out a little laugh and stretched her arms leisurely over her head. “Are you fishing for compliments?”

“I’d never turn them down,” he said.

She relaxed into the mattress and patted his hand, which was still stroking her belly. “Fine. You make me come so hard that I can’t see for a few seconds while it’s happening. How’s that?”

His eyes flared with heat, to Tamaris’s delight. “It’ll do,” he said. Then he dropped his voice to a low and intimate pitch. “You, on the other hand, make me come so hard that I lose my words.” 

His words sent a sudden ripple of heat through her body — heat that was stoked by his stroking hand, which was moving ever-so-slowly toward her breast. “You? Lose your words? I don’t believe it,” she breathed.

He smirked at her. “I had better prove it, then.” He peeled the sheets away from her legs, then laid a kiss on the underside of her breast.

His cheek brushed over the peak of her breast, and she shivered in response. Felassan brushed his lips over her nipple until it was a hardened little bud, then began slowly trailing his lips down over the bowl of her belly while easing her thighs apart with one hand, and Tamaris exhaled shakily and arched her spine. “You’re supposed to be proving that you can’t, um, talk when I…” She broke off with a shaky gasp: Felassan was gently kissing her sex, and every tender press of his lips was pulling a ripple of buzzing warmth to the juncture of her thighs. 

He pressed a hot open-mouthed kiss between her legs, then lifted his face to look at her. “What were you saying?”

“Um…” She gulped. “I… we’re supposed to see if you lose your words, not… not me.”

Felassan smiled slowly at her. “We can test the theory with you first.” He lowered his head once more and slowly swept his tongue along the length of her sex, and Tamaris lifted her hips toward his mouth with a moan. 

He continued to caress her with soft teasing kisses and firm sweeping strokes of his tongue, and Tamaris helplessly rolled her hips toward his mouth. The pleasure was rising through her body in a languorous and graceful wave until it almost felt like she was floating in the blissful ecstasy of his talented lips and tongue. When she finally hit her peak, it was just as blissful and languorous: a scintillating burst of pleasure that rippled down to her calves and up to a starburst of white lights behind her closed eyelids.

“Felassan,” she cried, and she mindlessly dragged her nails across her chest. 

When she was settled on the bed once more, Felassan lifted his mouth from between her legs. “Well, you said my name,” he said matter-of-factly. “You didn’t lose all your words.”

She panted for breath, then smiled at him. “I saw stars for a second too.” 

He smiled and bowed his head graciously. “That is high praise indeed.” To her dismay, however, he sat up and shifted to the edge of the bed. 

“Where are you going?” she asked. Maybe she was being greedy given that they’d spent the whole night twisted together in her bed, but now that she’d gotten a taste of what it was to enjoy him without the burden of her own uncertainties hanging over her head, she just wanted… well, more.

He shot her a smile as he stood up. “To take a bath. Come with me.”

She dragged her eyes away from the rise of his cock and propped herself up on her stunted arm. “A bath? Why now?” she complained. He was hard and ready, and she wanted him now.

His smile widened. “Because I can taste myself between your legs more than I can taste you, and I’d prefer it to be the other way around.” 

She pulled a little face. “Oh. You know what, that’s fair.” She pushed back the sheets, then followed him into her en-suite washroom.

He was already filling the enchanted Orlesian tub with water, and Tamaris eyed the tub with a hint of caution. She hadn’t bathed with anyone in years, not since she and Solas had snuck away in the Emerald Graves to swim in the silver falls one night. 

She instantly felt a bit guilty remembering that moment, especially with Felassan standing naked right in front of her and humming softly to himself as he combed his fingers through his long black hair. But then she realized something — something wonderful: she had no lingering wistfulness for that moment with Solas in the Emerald Graves. It was a nice memory with someone she used to love, but it was no longer tainted by longing. 

“Tamaris?” 

She looked up. Felassan was binding his hair into a neat bun at the nape of his neck, and his expression was quizzical. 

She smiled and shook her head slightly; this was one memory of Solas that Felassan didn’t need to hear. Especially since the beautiful sight of Felassan’s hard naked body was driving any other thoughts from her mind. 

She sauntered toward him, and a slow smile curled his lips. “You look like a woman with a mission.” 

“Maybe I am,” she said. She trailed her fingers down over his abs, then wrapped her fingers around his cock. 

His breath hitched, and when Tamaris squeezed him, he groaned. “Seeking proof of what I said before, are you?” he breathed.

“Exactly,” she said, and she dropped to her knees in front of him. He stumbled back slightly and braced himself on the edge of the bathtub, and not a moment too soon: Tamaris was nuzzling his inner thigh, breathing in the sharp scent of sweat between his legs before brushing her lips along the length of his cock and taking him into her mouth. 

He gasped and jerked his hips toward her, and Tamaris angled her head so his cock could slide further into her throat. He tasted like a melding of himself and her, of the pleasure that they’d been inflicting on each other all night and for most of the morning, and Tamaris savoured the salt of their sex while fantasizing about the sweet feeling of his cock filling more than just her mouth. 

He moaned and slid his hands into her hair, and Tamaris’s lust trebled as his elegant fingers stroked her scalp. He began carefully gathering her hair into a bundle at the nape of her neck, and with every sweeping draw of his fingers through her hair, her blood seemed to beat more powerfully between her legs where she needed him so badly. 

He held her hair in one hand and stroked the back of her neck, then began gently guiding her as he pumped his hips toward her mouth, and Tamaris moaned around his cock. His hands were gentle, but his cock in her throat was so fucking firm. The way he was guiding her to suck him was also both gentle and firm, and Tamaris was more than happy to let him guide her as his every careful thrust brought her own anticipation higher. 

She twisted her hips restlessly and dug her fingers into his thigh, torn between the dual wishes to swallow his seed and to feel him filling her up. But his hand in her hair just felt so fucking good, both soothing and stimulating somehow, and she could hear his breathing growing faster as his hips started to move a bit more quickly…

He gasped. “Tamaris…” 

She moaned her approval and began suckling him faster. His cock was becoming even harder in her mouth and throat, and his fingertips were starting to curl more firmly into the back of her neck, and the impending signs of his climax only made her more eager still. 

She sucked him hard and savoured the desperation in his gasping breaths. Then, when his pulsing cock was a rock-hard rod in her throat, she released him and grabbed his cock in her right hand instead. 

“Try and say something,” she gasped, and she pumped him with her fist.

Felassan cried out, and his climax announced itself with a burst that spattered across her throat and chest. “Ar isala’gara’seia’vallas,” he moaned. 

Tamaris stroked him again. He shuddered and gasped, and another drop of his seed landed on her lower lip and her chin. She eagerly licked his pleasure from her lip, then continued to pump his cock until he grabbed her hand.

“Mercy, avise,” he panted. “Have mercy.” 

She looked up at him. His cheeks and ears were flushed and his eyes were glowing with satisfaction, and he was beaming at her. 

She licked the seed from the tip of his cock, then released him. “You lied,” she said cheekily. “You didn’t lose your words. You just forgot the common tongue.” 

He laughed breathlessly and pulled her to her feet. “Let’s be precise: you drove the common tongue out of my head.” He wiped his seed from her chin with his thumb. “Would you like to know what I said?”

She nodded, and a slow grin lit his pleasure-flushed face. “‘I want to rub your come into my skin’.” 

She burst out a delighted laugh. “Felassan! That’s so filthy!” 

“Hardly,” he said. “You’re clearly of the same mind. Look what a mess you are.” He leaned back and admired her chest, which was liberally painted with the evidence of his pleasure. “You know, I quite like you like this.”

“Like what?” she said. 

“Covered in sex from head to toe,” he replied smoothly. He pulled her close with one hand on her hip, then reached between her legs and smoothed his fingers over the slippery moisture that coated the insides of her thighs. 

Tamaris dragged in a shaky breath. He was petting the inner margins of her thighs without touching her pussy, and it was such a deliberate tease that she couldn’t decide whether to laugh or beg or to play along. 

She settled on playing along. “I thought you wanted to take a bath,” she panted. “Which is it? Do you like me all dirty, or do you want me clean?”

He chuckled, then tipped her chin up and kissed her, and all the while he was stroking the tender insides of her thighs. “I want you every way that you present yourself to me,” he whispered against her lips. “But for now, let’s get you clean.” He released her and stepped into the tub, and the abandonment of his hands made her so fucking eager that she was actually rendered dizzy for a moment. 

She took another deep and bracing breath, then shot him a mock-resentful look as she stepped into the tub. “You’re mean. A mean, horrible tease,” she accused.

“I’m well aware,” he said complacently. He pulled her between his legs so her back was resting his against his chest. “Now relax while I clean you up.” 

She settled herself cozily against his chest, and Felassan began rinsing his seed from her skin. He smoothed the bathwater over her throat and chest, and she blissfully closed her eyes and relaxed into his touch. 

When his palm began smoothing down her chest toward her breast, she smiled faintly. “I don’t think there was any come there,” she said.

He turned his head slightly so his lips were brushing against her temple. “I’m just being thorough,” he murmured. “Trying to get you as clean as possible. It’s a very selfless act.”

“I’m sure,” she drawled. Then she let out a slow and pleasured sigh; Felassan was cupping her breast, and his fingers were playing gently over her nipple. 

He slid his other arm around her waist and down to her thigh, and Tamaris allowed him to pull her legs apart. He smoothed his palm over her inner thigh, then gently pressed two fingers against her swollen clit, and a fresh surge of excitement stopped her breath for a moment.

He pressed his fingers against her sensitive bud with the perfect degree of indirect pressure, and Tamaris moaned and arched her spine. The firm cradle of his body behind her, his hand between her legs, his fingers rolling over her nipple… She could hardly wrap her head around how good it all was.

“You’re spoiling me with all this attention,” she whimpered. 

“I’m spoiling myself,” he told her quietly. “Do you know what my favourite sound has been since I was cured?” 

“What?” she said distractedly. His fingers were so gentle between her legs, with just the perfect sweet pressure to feel good on her sensitized flesh, and his fingers playing over her nipple were just making her pleasure rise all the faster. 

“Hearing you call my name when I make you come,” he murmured. Then he lowered his voice to an intimate purr and started speaking to her in Elvhen.

She gasped and twisted her hips; she didn’t know how or why, but the unfathomable words rolling over his tongue made her all the more desperate and desirous, and it was just the kick she needed to hit her peak. 

She cried out and grabbed the edge of the tub, uncaring about the splash of water spilling onto the floor. “Felassan, f-fuck!” she gasped, and then she was shuddering and whimpering as the rapture buzzed from his nimble fingers straight down to her toes.

When the waves of pleasure finally waned, she slumped back against his chest, and Felassan chuckled. “My favourite sound. Thank you for that.” “Anytime,” she breathed. The hardness of his cock was pressing into her back, and she couldn’t decide what she wanted more: to encourage his erection further, or to just lie bonelessly in the bathtub for a minute. 

Her body seemed to know what it wanted, however; she was already shifting in the tub to rub back against him. He sighed against her ear – a lovely growly sigh that lifted a fresh thrill beneath her skin — then gently nipped the edge of her ear. 

“We may starve to death if we keep this up,” he whispered. 

She let out a breathless little laugh. “I was just thinking that. I’m so hungry, but I don’t want to go downstairs.”

“Hmm,” he murmured, and he smoothed his hands over her thighs.  “I can make something quick, bring it back upstairs.”

He was curling his hips toward her, and the hardness of his cock riding against her back was enormously distracting. She forced herself to find an answer. “No, that’s… that’s not fair to you,” she stammered. “I’ll come downstairs with you.”

He nuzzled her cheekbone. “Perhaps I’d rather keep you naked up here.”

She smiled and squeezed his hand. “You can get me naked again as soon as we’re finished eating.”

“Is that a promise?” he asked.

She laughed. “You’re such a fucking rogue. Yes, it’s a promise.”

“Veraisa,” he purred. “All right, let’s go find something to eat.” 

With no small amount of reluctance, they got out of the tub. Even so, Felassan’s plan to fetch some food was easier said than done. He kept touching Tamaris as she was towelling off, skimming his fingers over her body and brushing himself against her as though he couldn’t keep away, and by the time her left arm was strapped on and her hair was combed, she was so wet and eager that she couldn’t be bothered with smallclothes.

She didn’t have a robe, though, and she couldn’t wear trousers with no smalls. She opted instead to wear Felassan’s wrinkled shirt from yesterday as an oversized tunic.

Felassan laughed smugly as he led her downstairs. “No smallclothes? Either you’re trying to torture me, or you’re adopting the ways of ancient Elvhenan.”

“Shut the fuck up,” she grunted, but in truth, she was feeling very cheerful. Felassan was positively chipper, and her borrowed shirt was infused with his lovely sleepy-soapy scent, and aside from her hunger and the soreness in her thighs from all the sex, she really had no complaints.

He started pulling ingredients out of the cupboards and the icebox, and Tamaris hopped up to sit on the kitchen island as always. Felassan started putting together a salad, and as he sliced strawberries and diced a ripe avocado, Tamaris shamelessly admired the veins in his forearms and the droplets of bathwater still clinging to his bare shoulders and back.

She swung her feet idly and didn’t speak, and eventually he looked up with a smile. “You’re so quiet, em. What are you thinking about?” 

You, she thought goofily. As much as she hated to admit it, she was feeling exactly like one of the vapid heroines in Cassandra’s romance novel collection: fuzzy-headed and infatuated and foolish, with no thoughts in her head aside from the man who was making her feel this way. 

This was way too soppy for her to tell him, however, so she shrugged. “Tell me something,” she said. 

“Tell you something? Like what?”

“Anything you want,” she said. 

He smiled and continued chopping vegetables and fruit. “Are you looking for embarrassing stories now that you’ve softened me up with sex?”

“I’m looking for any kind of stories,” she replied. “Tell me whatever you want.” In truth, she didn’t care what he told her; she just wanted to hear the melody of his voice.

He shook his head in amusement. “All right, let me think. I believe the next big event I’ll be reading in This Shit Is Weird is your adventure to Mythal’s Temple, is that correct?”

She nodded, and he chuckled. “I know what will amuse you. I can tell you how I know Abelas.”

She raised her eyebrows, interested despite herself. “So you knew him well, then?”

“Quite well, yes,” Felassan said. “He worked closely with Fen’Harel.” He quirked an eyebrow at her. “Abelas is an elgar’venathe, you know. He took a corporeal form some few hundred years after Fen’Harel, but still long before I was born.”

She raised her eyebrows. “He was a spirit of sorrow?”

“No, actually,” Felassan said, to her surprise. “For most of his bodily life, he was called ‘Shivan’un’ — ‘one who does his duty willingly and with joy’. Abelas is the name he took after Mythal’s death.”

At these words, a little pang of worry twisted her gut. She leaned toward him. “Felassan, I — there’s something else I should have mentioned before. Mythal isn’t dead.”

He stopped chopping and looked up. His eyes were wide, but he didn’t look as surprised as she thought he would. “You’re certain of this?”

“Yes,” she said. “I — Morrigan and I, we encountered her in the Fade when she was trying to do something to Kieran.”

He gazed intensely at her. “You encountered Mythal? And she acknowledged Morrigan as her daughter?”

“Yes,” Tamaris said. She was starting to feel a little nervous about his serious expression. “She called Kieran her grandson, too. Why?”

“Where is Morrigan now?” he asked.

“I have no idea,” she admitted. “After we killed Corypheus, she left with Kieran. She told us not to track her, and since she helped us take Corypheus’s dragon down, I let it go. No one’s heard from her since.”

He nodded slowly but didn’t reply. He set the knife down and rubbed his chin, then burst out a little laugh. “Mythal ma ghilana.”

Tamaris’s sense of misgivings deepened at this. “Yeah, she seemed pretty fucking shady to me too. Solas was all, ‘she was the voice of reason’, but… I don’t know. She’s not what I imagined. But I mean, none of the Evanuris are sounding like how we thought—”

Felassan suddenly squeezed her knee. “Tamaris, can I… can we wait until I’ve read this part of Varric’s book before we talk about this any further?”

“Of course,” she said, but he was really starting to worry her now. The worry must have been obvious in her face; Felassan’s serious expression softened slightly. “I will tell you what I’m thinking, I promise,” he assured her. “But if I have all the information first…” 

“It’s okay, Felassan,” she interrupted gently. “It can wait. I really don’t mind.”

He nodded and released her knee, then went back to chopping lettuce, and Tamaris cautiously eyed the crease between his eyebrows before speaking again. “Did you want to tell me anything else about Abelas, though?”

His expression returned to his usual half-smile, to her relief. “Ah, yes: Abelas. As I mentioned, he worked closely with Fen’Harel. It was Fen’Harel who recommended him to Mythal’s service, in fact, and he was one of her first warriors to master the dirth’ena enasalin.”

Tamaris snapped her fingers. “I knew that’s what you meant when you first mentioned that! The Sentinels all practice the dirth’ena enasalin, don’t they?”

“They do indeed,” Felassan said. “Abelas was one of the first and finest of Mythal’s committed warriors. He was absolutely loyal to her, and to Fen’Harel by proxy as her dear companion.” He glanced at Tamaris. “He was also no fun at parties.”

She smirked; his eyes were dancing with mischief. “What do you mean?” she asked.

Felassan placed the chopped lettuce in a serving bowl. “He always acted as though he was on duty. He occasionally came to Fen’Harel’s gatherings, but he always ended up guarding the door. He rarely spoke to anyone, and he almost never drank.”

His tone was carefully neutral in that specific way that meant he’d done something pranky. Tamaris tilted her head playfully. “Almost never? What did you do?”

He widened his eyes. “Me? Nothing.”

Tamaris gave him a deeply skeptical look, and he sighed musically. “All right, I confess. I may have planted the idea, but Fen’Harel was responsible for carrying it out.”

His voice was bright with suppressed laughter, and Tamaris couldn’t help but smile. “What did you do, Felassan?” she drawled.

He shot her a quick grin before pouring some pecan halves into a dry pan. “I may have expressed a concern to Fen’Harel that Abelas ought to let loose once in a while, or he would go mad and smash his spirit blade through the wrong person’s head.” 

Tamaris snorted a laugh, but Felassan wasn’t finished; he turned the stove on beneath the pan of pecans, then turned to her with a grin. “I may also have made a subtle suggestion that Fen’Harel’s parties were becoming a tiny bit stale.”

She laughed again, this time with disbelief. “And he rose to that bait?”

“You must remember that this was an earlier time,” Felassan reminded her. “The Solas of my youth wasn’t the subtle and mild-mannered man you knew. He was…” Felassan shrugged. “He was pride. He was confident and bold and… well, proud.” He smiled wickedly. “And he wasn’t fond of the idea that one of his friends might not be enjoying his parties.”

“Uh-huh,” Tamaris said drolly. “So what happened next?”

Felassan turned to the stove and shook the pan of pecans to toast them evenly. “I procured some special wine from a contact of ours in Sylaise’s household — very strong wine that doesn’t taste nearly as strong as it is. Fen’Harel persuaded Abelas into having a glass, and, well…” Felassan smirked at her. “He got completely inebriated from one and a half glasses of wine.”

“You’re fucking kidding,” Tamaris exclaimed. She couldn’t imagine Abelas — stern, huge, forbidding Abelas — getting shitfaced on less than two glasses of wine.

“I would never kid about something so spectacular,” Felassan said. “He carried on with some rambling boring speech about Mythal’s virtues until Fen’Harel persuaded him onto the dance floor, and that turned out to be the most wonderful mistake. He danced terribly but with so much enthusiasm that half of the party were in a frenzy for him by the end of the night. He bedded two women and a spirit of curiosity, and when he came to the next morning, he couldn’t find his right boot or his left… what’s the word?” He tapped his shoulder and gave Tamaris a quizzical look. “Ama’tarlavin — armour for your shoulder?”

“His pauldron?” she supplied.

“Yes, thank you,” Felassan said. “He was missing a boot and a pauldron.” He removed the pecans from the stove and spread them out on his cutting board. “He was mortified, of course. Which he expressed by not coming to one of Fen’Harel’s parties again for over three hundred years.” He shot her a long-suffering look. “Somehow he blamed me for his dreadful behaviour, if you can believe that.”

Tamaris laughed. “You orchestrated it! Of course I believe it!”

Felassan grinned, then started roughly chopping the pecan halves. “Sadly, Abelas never forgave me. Possibly because I never stopped reminding him about it, but that’s just a guess.”

Tamaris eyed him fondly. “You’re such a fucking brat.”

“Thank you, Tamaris,” he said graciously. “I try my very best.” He whisked together the dressing and assembled the salad ingredients in the serving bowl, and Tamaris watched him fondly as he tossed the salad.

He slid the bowl toward her and handed her a fork, and she smiled at him before spearing a bite of salad. The dressing was sweet and tangy with honey and lime, and Tamaris savoured the combination of creamy avocado and crunchy pecans before swallowing. 

“Tell me something else,” she said. She took another bite, this time of lettuce and strawberry.

He shot her a smile and popped a bite of salad in his mouth. “You’re in an inquisitive mood.”

She snorted at the feeble pun. “Are you not in a sharing mood?”

“I’m always in a sharing mood with you,” he said.

His tone was faintly suggestive, and Tamaris smirked. “Keep it in your pants. For now.”

He chuckled. “You really are a minx. All right, what else can I tell you?” He took another bite of salad and chewed thoughtfully. “I can tell you something that surprised me when I woke up in this time.”

“All right,” Tamaris said, and she bit into a pecan piece with a satisfying crunch. 

Felassan lifted his fork to his mouth, then hesitated. “Hm. Now that I think of it, I hope you’ll find this humorous and not infuriating.”

She gave him a quizzical look, and he pulled a little face. “It’s about the Templars. I know you have little fondness for them.”

She sobered and lowered her fork. “I think the Templar Order shouldn’t exist, if that’s what you mean.”

Felassan nodded an acknowledgement of this. “They did not exist in ancient Elvhenan, obviously. When I woke up in this time and was trying to get my bearings, it took me a while to understand what their purpose was.” He took another bite of salad and swallowed before going on. “The Templars frame their abilities as though they are the antithesis of magic, but that’s…” He huffed. “It’s essentially the opposite of the truth.”

Tamaris recoiled slightly. “What do you mean?”

“Templar abilities are a type of magic,” Felassan said baldly. 

Tamaris froze in surprise as Felassan went on. “The human Chantry doesn’t recognize it as magic because… well, they’re the Chantry,” he said with a wry smile. “Getting things completely wrong is their greatest tradition. But the source of Templar magic is not the Fade, so the Chantry doesn’t recognize it as such.”

The source of Templar magic… Lyrium, Tamaris thought dumbly. He was talking about lyrium. And now that he’d mentioned it, she remembered Solas once saying that lyrium was the source of all magic aside from the Fade. 

“But mages use lyrium to enhance their magic,” she said faintly.

“Yes, they do,” Felassan agreed. “Lyrium matches and enhances a mage’s ability to pull magic through the Fade. But for Templars who have no innate magical ability…” He sighed. “It’s tricky to explain. The lyrium gives the Templars a form of magic that… resonates in a different way than our magic. I think this is why they get addicted to the lyrium. It makes something in their blood resonate in a way that it’s not meant to do.”

Tamaris put her fork down. “So… so you’re saying that Templars use magic to cancel magic?”

“It’s ironic, I know,” Felassan said wryly. “The spells they learn are all tailored toward tamping down another’s magic, but they are still spells.”

Tamaris sighed and shook her head. “For fuck’s sake. That really is ironic.” She dragged her hands through her hair. “Fucking hypocrites.”

“Have some salad. It’ll make you feel better,” Felassan said. 

His expression was sympathetic despite his jocular words, and Tamaris managed a weak smile and picked up her fork. She took another bite of the undeniably delicious salad and swallowed it before speaking again. 

“So is lyrium essentially a poison that only mages can safely tolerate?” she asked. “Or safe-ish, at least?”

“Mages and dwarves,” Felassan said. “Dwarves in the past, at least.”

“Dwarves nowadays still have a resistance to it,” Tamaris told him. “Or some of them do. I think the ones who are born in Orzammar are more resistant than the ones who are born on the surface.” She speared another forkful of avocado and lettuce. 

Then something odd occurred to her — something she’d wondered about ever since her foray through the eluvians and into the deep roads, but hadn’t had the chance to address in detail. 

She looked up at Felassan. “Did you know any dwarves back in the olden days?”

To her dismay, his face took on that anachronistic melancholy that made her stomach lurch. “I met some, yes,” he said. “But I don’t think that’s what you’re really asking about.”

The Titans, Tamaris thought. She nervously licked her lips. This look on Felassan’s face… it couldn’t possibly herald anything good. “Maybe we should save it for when Varric is here,” she said tentatively. “He’s not… he’s not really into dwarven history, but I still think he should hear it.”

Felassan nodded. “That’s reasonable.”

They ate quietly for a moment. The mood was subdued now, as though the worries of the world were finally bleeding into the comfort of Tamaris and Felassan’s home, and Tamaris couldn't help but wish she and Felassan had stayed upstairs in bed after all.

Felassan broke the silence, as he was wont to do. “I’m sorry to keep ruining your attempts at pillow talk,” he said. 

She shot him a little smile. His thoughts were clearly running along the same lines as hers. “You really are ruining it,” she said. “Stop talking about real-world shit and tell me something good.” 

He grinned at her, and his beauty made her heart do a somersault in her chest. “Something good? Like what?” he asked.

“Like…” She shrugged. “I don’t know. Tell me something you’ve never told anyone else.”

Felassan chuckled and shook his head. “You and your love of personal secrets. I will if you will.”

She scoffed. “You and your trades. Fine, then. But you go first.”

“Excellent,” he said. “Let me think, now. Something I’ve never told anyone else…” He tilted his head and thought for a moment, then sighed. “All right, I have something. But it’s not particularly light-hearted.”

“That’s okay,” she said. “It doesn’t have to be.”

“All right,” Felassan said. His expression was serious now. “I told you before that Fen’Harel made me Tranquil while trying to kill me. But I didn’t tell you that I allowed him to find me in the Fade.”

Her eyes widened as Felassan went on. “I had the herb mixture that blocks the Fade; I could have used it then and gone on the run. But instead of running, I presented myself to him.”

“Why?” Tamaris asked. Did he think that he could defeat Solas in a fight?

“Because I was ready to die,” Felassan said.

Her rib cage froze with shock. She stared at him silently for a second before speaking. “Why?” she breathed.

He leaned back against the counter in a gesture that looked far more casual than his sober expression implied. “I couldn’t remain with Briala,” he said. “Staying with her would have made her a target for Fen’Harel’s wrath. I’d purposely failed my mission, so there was no other reason for me to remain in this time. I had done my piece, and I was ready to die.”

Arguments were fulminating at the tip of her tongue, but she bit them back; Felassan was alive and well, so he’d clearly changed his mind. 

He was still speaking. “When Rhys reversed my Tranquility, I thought about ending my own life. I couldn’t do magic, I could barely function…” He shrugged and folded his arms. “I didn’t think there was anything in this time left to live for.”

He sounded so casual and matter-of-fact, but Tamaris’s pulse was racing at the thought of him trying to kill himself. She took a slow breath to calm herself. “What stopped you?” she asked.

He looked up at her. His eyes were serious but warm, and the look on his face made her heart skip a beat. “Cassandra told me she was going to send me to Kirkwall to meet you,” he said. “Frankly, I was curious to meet the ex-Inquisitor who was Fen’Harel’s ex-lover. I couldn’t exactly sate my curiosity if I was dead, could I?”

His tone was still matter-of-fact, but his expression was so tender now that it was making her throat feel thick. She swallowed hard and shot him a little smile. “Yeah. Dead people aren’t very curious.”

Felassan smirked, but the warmth in his eyes remained. “The Nevarran mortalitasi might disagree, but generally speaking, you’re right. So I spared my own life and followed Rhys and Evangeline here, and…” He bowed his head in a playfully polite gesture. “Here we are.”

“Are you glad you came?” she asked softly.

His smile widened, and he pushed away from the counter. He stepped between her legs and gently squeezed her thighs. “Are you really asking me that, avise?”

His expression, the warmth in his eyes… gods, she could feel her stupid face flushing just like some idiotic romance heroine. 

She awkwardly tucked a lock of hair over her ear and shrugged. “Stupid question, I guess. I know how much you love this gaudy fucking mansion.”

He laughed softly. “Yes, of course. The mansion is the thing I love.”

His tone was playful, but his words brought a sudden rush of blood to her head. The implication in his words, the… oh Creators, was he saying—? 

He ran his palms along her thighs in a soothing caress. “Your turn,” he said quietly. “You tell me something you’ve never told anyone else.”

She exhaled shakily. She couldn’t quite decide if she was relieved or disappointed that he hadn’t continued that terrifying — and wonderful — train of thought.

She nibbled the inside of her cheek as she tried to find something to tell him. The first thing that came to her mind was the exact thing that his words had implied, and it was also the exact thing that she was still too timid to say.

Coward, she scolded herself, but with no real self-recrimination; her newly-acknowledged love was there, coiled at the back of her tongue and waiting for the right moment to be confessed, and Tamaris knew she would tell him eventually. 

She would tell him she loved him eventually. Just not today.

She said something else instead. “Remember how I almost stabbed you when we first met?”

He grinned. “How could I forget?”

She smiled faintly, then stroked his forearm. “Not killing you is the best thing I’ve done in years.”

He laughed. “I’m glad to know you don’t regret sparing me.”

“I mean it,” she said. She shuffled closer to the edge of the counter and draped her arms around his neck. “Meeting you is the nicest thing that’s happened to me in years.”

Felassan’s humour-laced smile melted into something far more tender and sweet, and Tamaris’s heart fluttered. A mere few weeks ago, this tender expression had prompted a rising of panic in her chest. But now, with the warmth of his hands on her body and the weight of her own affection in her chest, this look on his face was the most beautiful thing she’d seen in longer than she could remember. 

He stepped closer to her and slid his hands beneath her borrowed shirt to caress her bare hips. His chin was lifted in a silent entreaty, and Tamaris answered it with a kiss.

She kissed him slowly, savouring the shape of his lips and the tang of honey and lime on his tongue, and Felassan kissed her back in kind. His mouth was soft and his kisses slow, and the firmness of his lips made it clear that they were of equal mind in their languid enjoyment of this embrace. 

Without breaking from her lips, he gathered the hem of her shirt in his hands and began to pull it up, and Tamaris lifted her arms so he could pull it over her head. Then they were kissing again, kissing more firmly and urgently as his hands slid over her naked body in a slow and careful caress from her thighs to her waist, then up over her breasts to settle on her neck. He cradled her neck and licked her tongue, and Tamaris gripped his waist and petted his chest, and when she whimpered into his mouth, he abruptly lifted her up. 

She hungrily traced his ear with her tongue as he carried her to the dining table, unable to stop her ravenous mouth from tasting some part of his body. As soon as she was seated on the table, Felassan was kissing her again, hungry deep kisses that only served to prove how closely aligned their passions were.  

Felassan kissed her as he eased his breeches down, and he kissed her as he caressed her breast and tilted her hips closer to the table’s edge. When the hard ridge of his cock was rocking against her slickness and spreading her slippery heat over them both, he continued to kiss her until she broke from his lips with a gasp.

“Fuck me,” she begged. “Felassan–!”

He sealed his lips over hers once more and thrust inside of her, and her pleasured cry was muffled by his heated tongue. He fucked her in a deep and steady rhythm, one hand braced on the table while the other tilted her hips to his in such a way that Tamaris was mewling with rapture, and still he continued to kiss her, stroking her tongue with his and permitting her to nip his lip, then nipping at her lower lip in turn when she broke away from him to gasp for breath. 

She whimpered and curled her hips to meet him, and Felassan gasped against the corner of her lips. “Tamaris,” he moaned.

She cradled his flushed cheek in her palm and pressed her forehead to his. His rocking hips were filling her up in such a perfect relentless rhythm, and they were gasping together so their pleasured breaths were melding between them with the same heat that was ratcheting through her blood. Felassan’s breathing was quickly becoming an erratic storm of breathy moans, and when the exquisite hardness inside of her became even harder still, she mewled with pleasure and kissed him hard.

He dug his fingers into her hip and groaned into her mouth. The rapture took him with a full-body shudder, and Tamaris twined her arms around his shaking shoulders. She held him tightly and kissed him hard, and when the tension of climax left his body, she kissed him still, unwilling to relinquish the plumpness of his lips. 

They kissed slowly and languorously until Tamaris’s sweat had cooled. Then Felassan finally leaned away from her lips. 

He released her hip and slid his hand into her hair instead, then gently pulled her head back and placed one last sweet kiss on her lips before speaking. 

“We didn’t finish our food,” he murmured. “We really are going to starve to death.”

His voice was husky with pleasure and his smile was brimming with heat, and Tamaris gazed adoringly at his handsome face as she replied. “I can think of worse ways to go,” she said.

He chuckled and stroked her neck. “I think I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“You should,” she whispered. She tipped her chin up to tempt him in for yet another kiss.

He smiled and kissed her once again, then broke the kiss to laugh softly against her lips, and Tamaris smiled helplessly at the perfect lilting sound of his mirth. Their meal was sitting half-eaten and forgotten on the kitchen island, and if Tamaris was honest, she was hungry still. But with Felassan’s laughter in her ears and his body flush to hers, she had never felt so full. 

[bloodmoon24]

Meet the OrcaTrolls Part Four

It’s now morning, and the SharkTrolls are slowly started to wake up, but doesn’t see anything through the blindfolds the strangers had put on them last night

Torrent: *waking up* *groaning* Huh? *gasped* Zips? Tide? Tank? Are you guys alright? Are you here?

Zips: Yeah, Bro. I’m here

Tide: Right here, Captain

Tank: Same. W-Where are we? And why can’t we see anything?

Torrent: More importantly, what happened and who did it?

???: You trespassers are blindfolded, that’s what

Tank: ?! Who’s there?

???: Whoa! There are SharkTrolls here? That’s so cool!

???: Fascinating. And not only that, they’re also males

???: Can you two shut up? *sighed* *to the SharkTrolls* Look, tell us who you are here and why you’re here

Torrent: Show is who you are, first!

Then they felt a hand taking off the blindfolds, revealing themselves. And what they saw, they were in shocked. They see a bunch of black and white female Trolls. They’ve never seen anything like them before in the ocean. Then they noticed that they had been tied up in chains to piece of coral so they can’t swim away

Tank: Who are you? Where are the men that ambushed us?

Stormy: There are no men. We ambushed you. Now, I’ll ask again. Who are you and why are you here?

Zips then noticed the red-haired Troll, then suddenly remembered that she’s the one that he spotted the other day

Zips: *gasped* You. You’re the anonymous stranger I saw outside of our training arena

Stormy: *sees Zips* ?! What? *starts to remember* Oh, yeah. I was scouting around the ocean and then I saw this other reef and…Wait a minute. *swam up to Zips in anger* You followed me?!

Zips: *already feel scared* U-Uh…

Torrent: HEY!! Leave my brother alone! He was just curious on what you are!

Stormy: *looked over at Torrent* Ooo! *to her OrcaTrolls* You hear that, ladies? *looked at Torrent again* We got ourselves a loud mouth, here *grabbed Torrent by the hair* Looks like we know who gets to have their head chomped off first *puts a blade near his neck*

Torrent starts to sweat a bit when he heard her say that, but he still kept his confidence. But then…

???: Stormy, back down!

The SharkTrolls and Stormy looked at the owner of the voice. Stormy immediately let go of Torrent’s hair and puts her blade back in her gauntlets and swam back to give her a look at the SharkTrolls. They see a bigger Troll swimming towards them with an interested look on her face. She then introduced herself

Katina: Greetings. I am Captain Katina, leader of the OrcaTrolls

Tide: OrcaTrolls?

Tank: So that’s what they are. That’s pretty cool

Torrent: Well…Hello. I’m Captain Torrent, leader of the SharkTrolls. We’ve come a place called Techno Reef and one of my main men had spotted one of your OrcaTrolls

Katina let surprise face to know that there’s another captain here. She’s never seen another Troll species captain before, or have heard of a place called Techno Reef

Katina: Hmm. Release them

SharkTrolls: Huh?

Stormy: What?? But, Captain, they’re trespassers, and one of them followed me back to OrcaTroll Territory! I don’t know if we should trust them

Katina: They were just minding their own business, Stormy. Plus, you, Swirly, and the Twins had ambushed them in their sleep. And you have been spotted during your patrol, did you not?

Swirly: Ooo, she’s got a point there, Storm

Twins: We told you this would happen

Stormy: *defeated sighed* Yes, Captain Katina. *went up to them to untie them* *glares at Tank* But I swear, if you had any funny business going on and you guys lied and tricked me and my OrcaTrolls, your heads are mine

Tank: *felt a little scared* Uh…You got it *smiled nervously*

SharkTrolls belongs to @sparklijam

OrcaTrolls belongs to me

[lesbiansforboromir]

I am really curious what you think Boromir would make of the show. I think the soulmate AU is making me imagine Boromir meeting the Thain and how that would go. Like and just generally how the Camelot meets Regency Era vibe goes down? IDK TL;DR do u have feels abt Boromir meeting Pippin's parents/exploring the Shire in general? :)

I’m such a fool, there IS no topic I won’t have too much to say about- anyway to begin with... the concept of Boromir first hearing of the Shire and THEN seeing it lots later after he’s gotten all these second hand accounts is very important to me. Perhaps best explained by the instance of Boromir asking Pippin about his family and him hearing ‘Well I’m a Took you see, we’ve lived in the Great Smials for generations and we’ve always held the office of Thain of the Shire. My Da’, Paladin Took the second, he’s the Thain at the moment.”

And Boromir, hearing Thain and thinking ‘oh Thane, like the Thanes of Rohan, lords of fiefs and fielding armies and such’, creates a complete picture in his mind of a proper lordly princely fellow but just smaller. And then he meets Paladin Took who ties his neckerchief in a heart bow about his collar and conducts what Boromir would have considered a diplomatic meeting alike to a luncheon party. He asks Boromir if he’s a sporting man. Boromir has no idea how to answer that. He leaves utterly perplexed and with a golf club he didn’t know how to refuse. Pippin absolutely knew this would happen and purposefully did the LEAST he could to prepare his expectations. 

So in essentials Boromir just did not at all think about what the Shire would be like when Merry and Pippin invited him. At the time he has a lot on his mind and whilst he’s asked them about it quite a bit and listened with interest, a lot of what they say goes through filters of his own experiences and assumptions. When they say their homes are all holes in hills, he just... doesn’t take it all that literally. When they say they don’t really have cities, he just assumes they mean they aren’t as big as his own. The sheer lack of vertical real estate in the Shire is somehow one of the first things Boromir finds truly... not disturbing but it keeps nagging at him. Space is always a concern in Minas Tirith these days, but the Shire is just rolls and rolls of hills and valleys, much uninhabited or given up to fields or pastures. Everyone has a garden, even the poorer folks. It seems understandable for a country based people but Boromir would always assume that meant there WAS a city somewhere else. But no! Tuckborough is barely a town in his estimation. Michel Delving too! 

And truly, their political structure really throws him for like... A WHILE. Every now and then he’ll just give up on trying to understand what the Thain does vs what the Master of Buckland does vs what the Mayor does, only to pick it back up again when some new piece of information rises to the fore. “Wait- if the Mayor is the head of the Watch, which- I kNOW to be the only thing close to a military that you have- then- Isn’t the Thain your military leader?” “Oh no, he’s just the protector of the westfarthing.” “What... how is that different” “Well he protects us.” “You mean from trespassers??” “Oh no the Bounders do that and they’re part of the watch.” “SO WHAT DOES THE THAIN DO?” “He protects us! :)” 

It’s difficult for him to grasp because the concept of these things being kind of grey and part of ancient systems that’ve had no real need for maintenance just does not compute. He’d say that the Shire was shoddily run, except it obviously isn’t, things work out pretty well, they have a post office, clear laws of land and succession, proper manners of dispute settling, no one’s really going hungry and most folk can feed themselves and their massive families. It doesn’t help that he WANTS the Thain (as the hereditary position) to be the general master of all, since that’s the system he’s most comfortable with. “Oh no the mayor does more than the Thain I’d say.” “But the Mayor is elected.” “Yes.” “And you still trust them to do what’s right?” “Of course!” “But if a new mayor is elected every seven years, couldn’t someone just bribe folk to vote for him?” “Now why would someone want to do that?” Hobbits have a concept of power that is just so foreign to Boromir that he keeps missing the point in these conversations. 

I went off on a tangent- there never comes a point where Boromir thoroughly understands hobbit life. But there is a point during his long visit where it becomes more of a funny jesting conversation topic. Because he realises he doesn’t necessarily need to understand it all in order to do diplomacy and business with the Shire and Gondor. Realistically Aragorn is already making inroads into rebuilding Arnor by now, so it’ll be his job to do most of the work on that end. At some point Boromir decides to enjoy this visit to his friend’s homeland and that’s the point where he really starts noticing the stuff he’s more interested in. Like he gets a massive kick out of how gossipy Hobbits are. Everyone’s surprised by how well he slips into happy warm pub conversations. He’s so taken by the gardening fever that takes any hobbit when their personal area of expertise is mentioned that he not only learns a great deal about it but in fact starts his own garden when he gets home. 

He doesn’t come away with any ideas of which system is better ect ect, mainly because the idea that Gondor’s whole system might need rethinking doesn’t even enter his wildest DREAMS (can you all see how he might not be the best suited to a Stewardship). But he develops a healthy amount of respect and, more importantly, a deep affection for the shire that keeps him coming back years afterwards. 

[ashesandhalefire]

we had it (almost)

michael guerin x alex manes canon compliant pre-1.09

---

As a rule, Michael tries to avoid injecting himself into the business of the town beyond the property limits of Sander’s Auto, the Wild Pony, or Foster Ranch. If he can’t earn himself a paycheck, get a stiff drink, or find somewhere quiet to hide out during the long hours of insufferably lonely nights, he figures he shouldn’t let the problems of Roswell weigh on his shoulders.

 That’s been his policy for over a decade, so when he notices a strange light in the window of a closed storefront on his way home, he has every intention of minding his own business. The town’s rising larceny rate is only partially his fault, and he has no responsibility to look after the vagrants he comes across at two in the morning. Leave that to Max and his badge and his hero complex. Michael has a mattress and a pillow and a second bottle of acetone calling his name.

 The traffic light turns red at the end of the block, and he drums his fingers as he waits at the empty intersection. Glancing back towards the window is mostly an accident. Honestly, it wouldn’t surprise him to find the old members of Wyatt Long’s high school posse breaking and entering. They have enough money to buy their ways out of whatever trouble they land in, and they’ve been fidgety since Long took a bullet to the leg. They rove like hyenas, slobbering and mangey and stupid. Destruction of property would be very on-brand for them. But when he looks, he doesn’t see anyone in the shadows. It’s a cool, clear night, but the only thing illuminated by the large swaths of moonlight is the marque on the building.

 Roswell’s UFO Emporium.

Grant Green’s perpetual construction project has sat untouched in the center of town for just under six years. Town supervisors had been livid when construction began just before the height of tourist season, but Grant had assured them everything would be settled in a few months. Bigger and better, he had promised. At the time, Michael had bitterly hoped an electrical mishap might burn the place to the ground, so he’s more than a little confused when he instinctively pulls into a quick U-turn the second the traffic light turns green again. He parks at the curb and takes a deep breath.

 The museum was defunct by the time Grant got his hand on it. Even on its best days, it hadn’t turned much of a profit. It was the kind of place people wandered into when they were looking for a way to escape the triple-digit temperatures, but it hardly received glowing reviews. No doubt Grant planned on using it more as a recruitment center for his delusional followers than anything else. Now, it’s only a matter of time before the town claims the property rights from his estate.

 In a few months, after fresh paint goes up over a new layer of drywall and somebody replaces the old incandescent lightbulbs, the museum will open, lazily refurbished as a more lucrative tourist trap. Any damage done by a few trespassers will be patched and forgotten.

 Still, Michael idles his truck at the curb.

 With a scowl, he reminds himself that sentimentality has gotten him nowhere lately. It got him a couple of decent kisses and a few nights of sex that didn’t end with bloodshed or an acetone binge, but the net gain at the end was heartache and disappointment. He should go home.

 He looks over at the building, twisting his hands mercilessly around the steering wheel. The stupid sign still hanging in the window of the ticket booth says “I’ve been abducted! Back in 5.” One of the chains that should be holding the front doors closed dangles uselessly from the metal handle.

 Michael swears, ripping the keys out of the ignition, and shoves his way out of the car.

 The UFO museum never inspired warm and fuzzy feelings. Most of the exhibits were grossly inaccurate, and the display descriptions all took on alarmist tones that made planet-wide invasions sound inevitable. He still gets a particularly troubling feeling in his stomach when he thinks about the room with the interactive dissection display. The dummy was six feet long and bright neon-green with three fingers on each hand and a head shaped like a spade, but the way its foam flesh had been peeled away from its chest cavity still sends shivers down his spine when he thinks about it. Children, two at a time, had been allowed to reach inside and squeeze the fake organs, coating their hands with green blood the consistency of papier-mâché paste. The first time he saw it, on a middle school field trip, he had run to the bathroom to throw up. Isobel told everyone it was because he ate too many chicken fingers at lunch, and one of Kyle Valenti’s friends joked that foster kids always got too excited about free meals.

 But there was one day—one hour—when it was his favorite place in the world.

 Tucked away in the back room with hands on his face and his shoulders and his back, he had felt potential stretch out infinitely in every direction. There was a whole summer to plan, and it wasn’t difficult to imagine sitting in the alleyway behind the building to share sandwiches on lunch breaks or loitering in the empty exhibits on slow days or riding out into the desert after closing and taking time to pick out fake constellations in the real stars. For the first time, his future wasn’t about escape.

 The room is probably an empty shell of damaged drywall and scratched floors now, all the exhibits taken out and moved to Grant’s warehouse, and the energy of that afternoon had burned out and died by nightfall of the same day. Potential scattered in the breeze like ash. Everything changed. Still, the idea of Wyatt Long’s drunken friends littering the place with beer cans and pissing in the corners to cure their boredom makes his jaw twitch. The museum doesn’t belong to them.

 When he slips inside, everything is darker and quieter than he expected. There’s no sign of anybody having been in the deconstructed lobby, and an eerie silence seems to inhabit the rest of the building. Drunken vandals wouldn’t be nearly so stealthy, and that should be enough to satisfy him, give him leave to turn around and go home, but the curiosity wins out. Somebody wanted to get inside badly enough to risk standing on the street to pick the chain lock. The only thing Michael thinks might be worth stealing in here is the copper wiring, which would require breaking open the walls, and that wouldn’t be this quiet either.

 Listening for any signs of movement, Michael creeps forward, working his way between the forgotten sawhorses, and checks the room on the right that used to be the gift shop. A faint bit of moonlight streams through the front corner of the window where the newspaper has peeled back with age, and he runs a fingertip over the dusty glass countertop. It used to be filled with poorly-designed plush and cheap plastic necklaces with almond-shaped heads on them. Now, it’s just empty glass cabinetry waiting to be demolished.

 He should be glad to see the kitsch go, but he isn’t. It leaves him feeling unsettled.

 The old manager’s office on the other side of the foyer is undisturbed in its abandonment, and Michael drums his fingers lightly against the wall as he makes his way deeper into the building. The first exhibit room is completely empty, and it’s swallowed in shadows without the light from the front windows. He presses forward, gently nudging obstacles out of the way with a jerk of his chin. The second and third rooms are crammed tight with piles of garbage that was never removed, and he tries to ignore the way that gnaws at him. He works his way past the broken drywall and splintered two-by-fours, careful to avoid the exposed nails and razor-sharp remnants of display cases, and then a soft click echoes from through a doorway on the left. A soft glow from inside guides him the rest of the way across the room.

 When he peers around the corner, two thoughts occur simultaneously: it isn’t who he was expecting, and it never would have been anyone else.

 “Remind me again which one of us is supposed to be the criminal,” Michael says after a deep breath, and it’s a little satisfying to watch Alex startle. His crutch hits the side of an overturned spackle bucket, sending it skittering loudly across the floor, and he winces at how the sound echoes in the empty room. Alex has his own phone sitting face-down on a crate, and the flashlight splashes a dull circle of light onto the ceiling.

 When the stillness settles over them again, Michael cross his arms and leans against the wall. The acetone he slipped into his drinks at the bar has officially worn off, which means the ache in his hand will return soon. It’s a constant, dull pain. With enough acetone in his system, it fades to the background like the hum of the electric wires or Grant Green’s alien podcasts, Roswell’s special brand of white noise. Eyes raking over Alex’s rumpled sweatpants and half-zipped hoodie, he thinks he feels the beginnings of twinges radiating from his wrist down into his pinky.

 Finally, Alex licks his lips and asks, “What are you doing here?”

 “Really?” Michael raises an eyebrow. “I’m the one who just caught you breaking and entering.”

 Lifting his chin defiantly, Alex squares his shoulders. “Well, unless somebody gave you a key, you’re breaking and entering, too.”

 “You did all the breaking,” Michael says with a shrug. “I just entered.”

 “That’s still trespassing.” Cocking his head, Alex says, “You do know that criminal records aren’t bingo cards, right? There’s no prize for filling in all the rows.”

 Alex’s new mean streak is a delicious twist on his high school sarcasm, and Michael leans into it without meaning to. He likes when Alex pulls his hair, too. “Actually,” he says, “I’m in the process of executing a citizen’s arrest, so I think the sheriff’s department will let this one slide.”

 “Doubtful.”

 Michael clicks his tongue. “I have an in with one of the deputies.”

 “I hope you don’t mean Max.”

 “God, no,” Michael scoffs. “He’d be first in line with the handcuffs.”  

 That earns him a small lift at the corner of Alex’s mouth, and some of the stiffness in his spine eases away. Michael feels his own shoulders relax. Every interaction with Alex has been wrought with tension, and he wants desperately for this night to not end in a fight.

 “Aren’t you staying out of town these days?”

 Shuffling around an overfilled trash can, Alex works his way forward.

 “I couldn’t sleep,” he admits with a shrug. He flexes his grip around the handle on his crutch and averts his eyes. The shadows on his face sit heavily beneath his eyes, and Michael frowns.

 “Most people would try warm milk first,” he says. “Or Ambien. Trespassing doesn’t usually make the list of top five insomnia remedies.”

 “Then consider it my last resort.”

 With an indelicate hop, Alex hefts himself up onto the crate in the middle of the room and settles his crutch between his knees. His cell phone sits behind him, plunging him into pure silhouette, and Michael steps farther into the room. Purple Heart Airman Alex Manes is not the kind of man to drive across town in the middle of the night in order to break into a construction site. But this isn’t just any construction site.

 “Why would you want to come here?” Michael asks. Alex stares silently at his hands, and Michael taps the toe of his boot against a stack of two-by-fours. “It’s not exactly—”

 “Don’t play dumb,” Alex interrupts, looking up sharply. “I’m not in the mood. You know why I would come here.”

 It hangs heavily between them.

 Alex had been swift and decisive when he ended things at the drive-in, leaving no room for interpretation. But it also hadn’t been the first time he walked away, so Michael can’t be entirely surprised to be stumbling into the middle of his late-night backslide. The pattern repeats again, a twisted version of an unhappy ending that hurts more than never having him in the first place.

 With a huff, he hops up onto the crate beside Alex. It groans beneath their combined weights but holds firm, and he claps his hands down on his knees.

“Look around, Alex. Everything that made this place what it was? It’s long gone,” Michael says. The wall to the left is where the model UFO hung, backlit by a wall of twinkling little lights. It’s half-torn out sheetrock now. “Whatever you’re looking for, it’s not here. Not anymore.”

 Alex shakes his head. “That’s not how it works. This place doesn’t just stop being important—” He breaks off, tapping his crutch against the ground. Michael watches him swallow. “Never mind. You obviously don’t— forget it.”

 Scoffing, Michael leans back and looks at the ceiling. The only reason he even walked through the front door was because of some desperate need to protect the memories living in the walls. But he never loved the cheesy UFO museum. In the years since Alex left town, he never felt himself drawn back to the building itself. Even before Grant took the exhibits out, Michael never felt there was anything inside for him. It’s strange that now, when Alex is finally on the same continent—in the same town, in the same room—he felt drawn to it. Or maybe it isn’t strange at all.

 “I try not to think about that day,” Michael says. It’s a truth and a lie at the same time, and it’s much bigger than a secret kiss or a shattered hand. At first, everything had bled together for him. He couldn’t think about the cave without thinking about the toolshed without thinking about the museum. When he closed his eyes, he saw burning cars and the curve of Alex’s naked hip and his own blood all at the same time. But his mind has worked miracles compartmentalizing that day. Certain parts have never left him. Others are best forgotten.

 Alex spins his crutch in his hands and says, “I think about that day all the time.”

 “I’ll bet. I hear PTSD is a bitch.”

 “Actually, it was one of the best days of my life.”

 Michael scoffs. “Shit, Alex. That’s not saying much for your life.”

 “Don’t do that.” Alex frowns.

 “Do what?”

 “Don’t minimize it.” Wringing his hands, Alex keeps his eyes fixed on his lap. “I’m not stupid, alright? We only had a few hours, and I’m not delusional enough to think— I know what it was. But you have no idea what it meant to me.” His voice wavers, and Michael feels frozen on the spot. The ten lost years have reduced them to unfamiliar strangers, and sometimes it feels like they don’t even speak the same language anymore. They hadn’t needed to say much to each other for things to things to fall into place the first time. It hasn’t been nearly as easy on their second—third, fourth, fifth, he loses count—try.

 Alex takes a deep breath and turns away, offering the rest of his confession to the empty room.

 “You were mine when I didn’t have anything else. And I know— I know how it ended. I know what it cost you. But you’ll never understand what it meant to me to have you for as long as I did.”

 Heart in his throat, Michael stares at the darkened silhouette of Alex’s profile.

 A few weeks ago, he stood in front of Alex and laid himself bare entirely by accident. I never look away. Not really. Alex had seemed surprised and then pleasantly flustered, but Michael had assumed it was because of how much time had passed. Ten years is a long time for a heart to stay alone someplace, just waiting to carry on, but Alex had admitted to it first. Alex had reopened the door.

 But he doesn’t sound like a man who understands how pathetically Michael has wanted him.

 With Max’s voice still whispering in his ear, Michael bites back, You still have me.

 It isn’t the sort of promise that can be a comfort to Alex now. Michael isn’t really what he wants anymore, isn’t what he remembers having. He isn’t that boy from the back of the truck that just wanted a safe place to sleep. Or maybe, somewhere deep down, he still has it in him to be that soft, but he’s built up a layer of callous and scar tissue on the outside that makes him unrecognizable.

 I can’t be with a criminal, Alex had said, and he hadn’t even known the half of it.

 Max was right when he said that they couldn’t be with the people they love. And still, he’s angry at Alex for the way he’s been hurt, and it makes him feel like an idiot. He hates that the two contradictory truths can live inside him so easily. Like a trap getting angry at a bear for being wary, he resents Alex for running away while hating himself for being undeserving of keeping him.

 It says a lot about Michael that his greatest regret is not letting Alex kiss him the first time he tried.

 Alex takes a shuddering breath suddenly, head ducked low, and rubs a hand against the back of his neck. He seems embarrassed, curling in on himself like it can erase his admission. Leaning closer, Michael bumps their shoulders together to stop his retreat.

 “You know,” he says, “you and me getting together was kind of, like, the most romantic thing that’s ever happened in this town.”

 “Fuck off.”

 “I’m serious,” Michael insists when he catches the bitterness in Alex’s tone. He isn’t trying to tease him, and he doesn’t want Alex to think he doesn’t appreciate the weight of what happened between them. “It was like a movie.”

 “Are you incapable of sincerity, or do you just enjoy being an asshole?”

 “I don’t know. Do you enjoy expecting the worst of me?”

 Alex kicks his heels against the side of the crate. “We made out under the UFOs for ten minutes, and then you went to wait at The Crashdown until my shift ended. If that’s the most romantic thing that’s ever happened in this town, the population should be dwindling. People should be fleeing.”

 “I wanted to wait with you,” Michael reminds him. “You wouldn’t let me into the booth.”

 “I was trying to be subtle.”

 Michael rolls his eyes. “There was nothing subtle about that eyeliner. Or the nose ring.”

 “You didn’t mind.”

 “No,” Michael says. “I didn’t.”

 Alex turns towards him, still mostly a silhouette, and licks his lips.

 “No,” he breathes. “You didn’t.”

 A beat passes between them, and Michael’s breath catches in his chest as the realization settles over his shoulders like a heavy blanket. Alex loves him. He’s suddenly surer of it than anything else in his life, and heat rushes to his cheeks. It should be a pleased flush from his racing heart, but his stomach twists with misery as he stares at Alex’s shadowed face. Alex loves him. Alex has always loved him, maybe, for reasons neither of them can fully explain. They could have been happy. If things had just been a little different, they could have been happy.

 The light disappears suddenly as Alex’s phone dies.

 Michael stares out into the dark to where he knows Alex is, and then he lets his eyes drift shut just long enough to steel himself.

 “I guess that’s our cue,” Alex sighs.

 “Yeah, I think I’m parked next to a hydrant,” Michael says, clearing his throat as he slips off the crate. He rolls his shoulders, trying to settle the rippling tension radiating down his back, and then holds out a hand to help Alex back to his feet. “Can’t afford another ticket.”

 “I thought you had an in with the deputies.” Alex dusts off the back of his jeans and then returns his hand to the crook of Michael’s arm as he adjusts his crutch. Michael figures it’s the steadiest influence he’s has ever had on Alex.

 “We both know that was bullshit. Come on. Let’s try to get out of here without killing ourselves.”

 Alex fists a hand into the back of Michael’s shirt as they pick their way through the dark, and Michael adjusts himself to the task of subtly moving obstacles out of their way without being able to see what he’s moving. They make it to the first exhibit room, less than a hundred feet from freedom, and then Alex loops his fingers loosely around Michael’s wrist.

 “Guerin.”

 The word is a whisper against the back of his neck, and the hand slips off his wrist and finds his hip instead. Alex curls his arm around Michael’s waist, and he presses himself forward until the lines of their bodies curve together seamlessly.

 This part always comes so easily to them. It’s the rest that gets messy.

 Alex nudges his nose against the knob at the base of Michael’s neck, and he splays his hand wide across the middle of Michael’s chest. Body flushing, Michael lets his eyes drift shut as he relaxes against Alex’s warmth. Alex inspires stillness in him that he imagines total peace is meant to feel like, but he knows it’s only the eye of a hurricane. The rest of the storm still rages around them.

 “We can’t,” Michael exhales.

 Pressing his mouth to the curve of Michael’s shoulder, Alex hums. “Why not?”

 There are so many answers, all of them true.

 He can imagine the seductive tilt of Alex’s head as he leans forward, and he can imagine the anxious hunch of his shoulders in the morning light as he slinks out of the Airstream before anyone notices where he spent the night. If Michael closes his eyes, he sees sweaty strands of Alex’s hair sticking to his forehead and spread out on a pillowcase as easily as he sees the angry sneer of disgust that will follow Michael laying his secrets bare.

 The truth is that Michael is a coward. He won’t survive having and losing Alex again.

 “Because I love you.”

 Without the light from Alex’s phone, all they are to each other is shapes in the dark.

 It’s fitting, considering how lost Michael feels navigating the foreign terrain of an emotion this elusive. Anger is easy. He’s seen enough anger manifested in front of him to know exactly what it is. It’s curled fists and free-flying hands and bared teeth and acidic vitriol that seeks out a person’s soft spots and eats away at the tender flesh until he’s crippled by it. It’s ugly and familiar. But Michael has never been loved. He doesn’t know what it’s supposed to look like. All he knows is that being with Alex makes him feel still. It changes the energy in the air, slows the vibrating chaos inside him, and splits him at his loosely-patched seams when it’s over.

 He’s never said those words before.

 “I love you,” Michael repeats into the dark, and he reaches down to cover Alex’s hand with his own. His scarred fingers ache as they twine. The bones don’t bend like they should, and most of the strength is gone, but this feels like the last chance he’ll get to hold Alex’s hand. Distantly, it occurs to him that this is also the first time he’s ever held Alex’s hand. “And it’s too easy to think it can still be like it was.”

 Alex shuffles forward. “Guerin—”  

 When Alex finds out, he’ll hate Michael like he deserves.

 Michael has never given a damn about the people of Roswell because they never gave a damn about him. A decade in foster care taught him that humans can’t be depended on for anything more than consistent disappointment. He survived just long enough to get himself out, and he did it without help from anybody. Then things went sideways, and then then things turned upside down, and then everything got blown to hell.

 He spent the summer after senior year telling himself new truths. He repeated them like a mantra until they were fully incorporated into him. Katie Long was an asshole, just like her brother, and so was Jasmine. Rosa Ortecho was an on-and-off crackhead on a long road to nowhere. If not them on a slab in the morgue, then Isobel, Max, and himself on gurneys in a secret government facility, locked away somewhere nobody would hear them scream.

 Reality is too terrible to bear if those aren’t his truths. That day, what he is became inextricably linked to what he did, and it can never be undone. There are no apologies to offer. Besides, it spiraled out towards disaster more horribly than any of them could have ever imagined, so even their apologies wouldn’t have mattered. There’s no forgiveness, no absolution, and he would do it again in a heartbeat, if given the choice. Sometimes that feels like the worst part.

 Still, knowing that the people of Roswell would hate him for what he is and what he’s done doesn’t mean much. He’s had years to practice turning his own guilt inside out, and he doubts that public opinion would weigh too heavily on him. The more pressing concern has always been discovery, capture, and the inevitability of experimentation. Fear of being strapped to a table, of hearing Max and Isobel scream through a vivisection, the worst word he ever learned, is a more persuasive motivator than anything else.

 But when Alex finds out, he’ll hate Michael like he deserves, and Michael will feel every ounce of it.

 That, in itself, is all the evidence he needs to know that he isn’t a good man.

 It’s unlikely that their DNA has corrupted them or that they carried murderous instincts halfway across the galaxy, but their hands are soaked in blood from what they did and they will leave fingerprints on everything they touch. Max may have found his way to that conclusion in a heap of self-pitying misery, but Michael hasn’t been able to find a flaw in his logic. Always terrified of being unloved, they have made themselves unlovable.

 Alex has suffered plenty at the hands of people pretending to be good men. Michael can’t stomach being just another in a long line of betrayals. If the best Michael can do now is stay away, it should be enough to redeem some small part of him that remembers an Alex who just wanted to be safe.

 “It doesn’t have to be what it was,” Alex finally says, voice unbearably soft. “It can be new.”

 Michael pulls their hands up to his mouth and presses a kiss to the center of Alex’s palm.

 One day, Alex will have to ask himself what it means to be loved by a monster. He will think back on every time that Michael touched him with softness and reverence and wonder what it means that someone so drenched in horror could look at him and want so desperately. If he asked, Michael would tell him that it means he embodies the best of what lesser men want for themselves: bravery, integrity, and an unyielding capacity for kindness. But Alex won’t ask. Instead, he’ll consider every time he walked away and wonder why he came back. He’ll scrub himself raw trying to get rid of an invisible stain. He’ll thank saints he barely believes in for the narrow miss of almost that Michael will cherish for the rest of his life.

 “We can’t.”

 “Guerin—”

 Alex isn’t the type to beg, so Michael is entirely unprepared to feel the grip around his waist tighten in protest. He holds himself shock-still, terrified to hear what Alex will say to change his mind and what he’ll need to say to protect himself from it. But Alex doesn’t say anything else. He just squeezes his fingers around Michael’s gnarled hand and draws a long inhale through his nose.

 Then, Alex lets go, and, for the first time, Michael is the one who runs.

[aweebwrites]

Original Ending

So you guys remember that fic I wrote for Ninjago Valentine's Week? I had to cut it short because mobile but here's the original ending. If you haven't read it, I recommend doing so to understand this since I didn't start from the top. Enjoy!

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"You wanted to talk?" Zane prompts curiously.

"Yeah..." Cole says, scratching the back of his neck sheepishly before stepping closer, ignoring the frigid water lapping at his hooves. "I kinda wanted to say something a long time ago but I didn't know how to say it, you know?" He says, pulling something out of the small satchel he always carries and lowered himself to his knees, shivering when the cold water lapped at his underbelly but ignoring it in favor of what he held in his hand.

Zane on the other had was still curious but was anticipating now. Was he saying what he hoped he was?

"I talked to Nya during the summer for the best thing I could offer you to not screw this up and well..." Zane lifted himself up on his hands unconsciously, heart pounding as Cole stretched his hand out to him.

Zane gasped softly, seeing the gorgeous pearl in his hand, his eyes widening as his pale cheeks turned light blue with his version of a blush.

"I really like you Zane... More... More than just friends." Cole says, glancing away as his tail flicked anxiously. "And I was hoping you'd let me court you." He says, catching the mer's eyes again, swallowing nervously.

"Cole..." Zane says breathlessly, in awe of the large pearl and at his words. "Of course. Yes." As if there was ever a doubt.

There was no question about it. He had been nursing a crush for the strong stallion with a kind smile and gentle hands since he first met him. He hadn't said anything up until now, despite what Nya told him because he was seen as a monster and he didn't think he could handle the rejection when crush spiraled into love so quickly.

"Really?!" Cole says, baffled yet excited.

"Really." Zane smiled, accepting the pearl and craidling it gently, core warming at the sight of it.

He's never seen any this big before. His webbed hand couldn't fully close over it.

"Great." Cole says with a relieved sigh before grinning wide.

Zane looked up at Cole again and shifted closer, reaching out and tugging him down by the wool vest. Cole flushed, now nose to nose with the beautiful cold water mer.

"May I... Kiss you?" Zane asked softly, learning the term from Nya and seeing it from Jay and Kai.

It seems like a very important part of courting for land creatures so he would like to do the same with his land creature.

"U-um yeah. Sure." Cole got out, face red but anticipation building inside him.

Zane nods once before he closed his eyes and pressed his lips against Cole's.

‘Hot…’ Was Zane's first thought at his first kiss.

Cole was having opposite thoughts but neither minded. Taking the initiative, Cole cupped Zane's cheek and deepened the kiss, his tongue sliding against Zane's longer and smoother one. He tasted so much like cold and ocean and… And Zane. A low crooning sound had Cole pulling back, curious to the sound and where it came from. Instead, he saw Zane with cheeks blue with blush and lips puffy from their kiss.

“Forgive me. I only make that sound when I'm-”

“Wait, you made that sound?” Cole asked, surprised.

Zane nods and Cole… Found he liked it.

“Oh, OK.” Cole nodded as he swiped his thumb against his cheek he still held, smiling warmly once Zane leaned into it. "I know things won't be easy what with me being a centaur and you a mer but I went to this sea witch earlier-"

"You what?!" Zane hissed, flinching back with wide eyes as he almost dropped the pearl.

"I- um... I went to a sea witch..." Cole says, taken aback and confused at Zane's horrified expression.

"Sea witches are not to be trusted Cole! They are tricky and devious beings! Whatever they promised you will come at a cost you may not be able to pay!" Zane says, breathing picking up, worrying for his courted. "What did you ask them to do?" He asked, hoping there was a way out of it.

"I asked her for something that would let me breathe under water so I could be with you there." Cole says quietly and Zane couldn't help but awe at his thoughtfulness.

"Cole... That was thoughtful of you but we could have made it work still. I can breathe air for as long as I'd like. My only concern would be drying out." He says, reaching up and cupped his cheek with his cold, webbed hand, making Cole shiver but lean into it. "You're cold. Let's head inside with the other and we can discuss how to get you out of this." He says as he slithered backwards into the water.

"She was trustworthy though. Even Master Wu trusts her." Cole says as he got up on all fours and began trotting along the coastline as Zane swum in the shallows, head out of the water.

Zane frowned at that. Master Wu is a dragon who can take a more humane form at will. He is almost as old as this world itself and was the one to teach them all about their powers. If he trusted a sea witch then they were trustworthy indeed. But even that didn't soothe Zane's worry.

"What did she give you?" Zane asked instead as he slithered along the coast really.

"Some kind of potion. She says it will only work when it's time. Sadly I didn't get when that time is." Cole huffed, slowing down as he came to the entrance to the cave where Kai left a few feathers in the outside wall to warn anyone who were not friends to stay away.

Phoenix harpies may be extremely rare but every creature knew their beautiful feathers anywhere and knew it meant agony if they trespassed.

"We'll talk more on the inside." Zane says and Cole watched as he slithered into deeper waters before diving under, his white and blue tailfin disappearing soon after.

Cole smiled to himself despite it all and headed inside, lowering his upper half until he got to the main cave that was nice and wide, able to fit them all and more. Inside, the light from outside was reflected inside thanks to the water, showing Kai who was preening Jay's feathers as they talked with Skylor and Nya who were in one of several pools in the cave. A splash alerted them that Zane had arrived and he climbed out of the main pool that lead to the sea into a slightly smaller one that was closer to the group and was easier to keep cool with his powers.

"Do you feel strange now? Or did you then?" Zane continued questioning.

"No. Not at all." Cole says, settling next to his pool, leaning against the edge.

"What's going on there?" Jay asked curiously.

"Cole went to a sea witch and I'm-"

"YOU WHAT?!" The others immediately blurted.

"Wu trusts her! Mistaké's pretty cool!" Cole defended.

"Oh." They all said, relieved.

"If Wu trusts her then it'll be fine." Kai dismissed, adding another blue feather to the small pile he had going.

"Yeah. Remember that time I got sick and set off this wicked storm that torched everything?" Jay asked, ruffling his right arm of feathers Kai was done with.

"How could I forget? One hit the pool and nearly fried me." Nya says drily.

"Yeah, still sorry about that... But! She came over and gave me some stuff to make me better and it worked in a few minutes! No side effect aside from being unable to use my lightning for a few hours." Jay shrugged.

"I suppose..." Zane relented, relaxing and trusting Wu's judgement.

He glanced down on the pearl firmly clutched in hand with a small smile Cole saw- and made him grin like a dork.

"Holy moley pearl!" Nya gasped, peaking over into his pool to see it.

"So you two are finally courting?" Skylor asked, flicking her tail back and forth in the water.

"Ye- finally?" Cole asked her with an arched brow.

"Nya's been telling me about you two for two years now. Honestly I was gonna intervene if you two didn't get together before we have to split up again." Skylor says with a smirk.

"Same." Kai says, running his talons carefully though the shorter feathers along Jay's thighs.

"I was just gonna dare Cole to say something." Jay shrugged.

"... I've been thinking..." Zane says, gaining their attention. "About splitting up. I was thinking... I should stay here." He says and Cole perked all the way up at that.

"And I could stay here too!" Cole says with a grin as he stood up, looking around the large sized cave. "I mean, it's about time I left the herd anyway. Me and my dad don't get along that much and... Well... I want to be anywhere you guys are." He shrugged and Zane fell in love all over again.

He was too precious.

"This is our favorite nest after all..." Kai shrugged.

"Plus the caves go a lot higher. Maybe even Master Wu can hang out here, and even the squirt." Jay suggests.

"It'll be a lot of work fixing this place up more but it'll be worth it in the end..." Nya shrugged.

"I wouldn't mind sticking around either." Skylor says as Nya wrapped her seal skin around her neck after she took it off.

"And with the pools already here and se- cure?!" Cole yelped once the rock below his back hooves gave away, sending him tumbling back into the water despite his desperate grasping of the rock with his front hooves.

"Cole!" His friends' panicked scream of his name was all he heard before there was water over his head and- he had to hold his breath!

He kicked against the water, trying to swim to the top but the current was dragging him further down, out of the water entrance to the cave and further on still. He couldn't surface! He could swim- all Centaurs could- but this current was too strong. He felt clawed hands under his arms trying to pull him up, a second pair holding him under his front hooves and yet another trying to push him up but it was no use. His lungs were on fire! He had to breathe! If he didn't, he'd die! And if he did, the results were the same.

His vision began to blur as his kicks began to lose stamina. He saw panicked blue eyes before a white tail passing by upwards. He couldn't hold his breath any longer... He was going to... Cold lips pressed against his, breathing air into his lungs but it wasn't enough. His lung capacity is greater than a mer's. As soon as his mouth pulled away, he breathed in. The burning stopped at least but now he couldn't feel anything but the feeble working of his throat and lungs, trying to get air still as he we dragged along the current like a ragdoll. He reached out to touch his face once more but somewhere mid stretch, everything went dark.

"Cole! No!" Zane screamed once his eyes went dim and his heartbeat stopped but his scream was nothing but bubbles under the water.

Nya gritted her teeth as she held him still, tears vanishing instantly in the water.

"We're out of the current now. Let's get him to the surface." Skylor says through clicks urgently, not willing to give up.

They can save him. They will! Zane swallowed then nodded, all of them holding a section and swimming up away from where they knew the currant was. When they broke the water, it was to anxious phoenix and storm harpies hovering over the water.

Jay gasped once he realised he wasn't moving, his red rimmed eyes filling with tears.

"Is he?..." Kai whispered, tears threatening to fall.

"We have to get him to shore. Now." Skylor says, even as they swam as fast as they could with him.

They pushed him up onto shore, Kai dropping down and checking his pulse. He gritted his teeth and shook his head.

"No way in hell you're leaving us now Cole!" Kai yelled then began pushing at the torso of his horse half, barely budging it. "Dammit! I'm too light! Zane, Nya-" He stopped once he saw both mers and selkie not too far behind Cole, Nya comforting Zane as Skylor looked at him.

She shook her head and Kai gritted his teeth as he clenched his talons into his palm. Zane pulled away from a sobbing Nya to lean closer to Cole, trembling webbed hand brushing back his long hair from his face. He looked so peaceful. As if he was sleeping. He felt so numb as he gently stroked his pale cheek, not hearing his own anguished sobs over the deafening ringing in his ears but feeling them rock his body. He just got him…

Jay looked down at his best friend miserably, half blinded by his own tears. He was useless. Utterly useless in rescuing him. If he had… If he had… Done something other than spectating then maybe… Maybe… Kai pulled him into his chest, kissing the top of his head as he shook, his breathing heavy between choked off sobs.

“We-” Kai's choked up words died on his tongue once he noticed something. “What’s with that green glow?” He whispered, gaining Jay's attention.

He peeked out from Kai's feathers, at the body of their friend and realised that he was right. There was a weird smokey green glow around him now that turned the skin of his upper half the same green.

“Guys!” Jay yelled, drawing their attention to him.

“What is that?” Skylor asked as she shifted closer.

Nya gasped then.

“He drank a potion from Mistaké! Do you think-”

Her question was answered by Cole suddenly gasping, his instincts sending him to his hooves and out of the shallows, nearly giving Zane a heart attack. Said mer blinked owlishly at his courted, hand over his wildly beating heart as Cole coughed up an unhealthy amount of water from his lungs, his legs wobbling as he did so.

“Cole?!” Kai gasped as the centaur panted heavily, blinking confused.

“K-Kai?” Cole rasped, confused.

Didn't he just…

“Cole!” Jay screeched happily launching himself at his best friend,  wrapping himself around his upper half and digging his talons into his flesh and repeatedly zapping him with his happy electricity.

“Ow! Ow! Ow!” Cole hissed and pried him off of him. “Glad to see you too pal but I still have feelings!” He says,  holding him back at arm's length.

“Just checking.” Jay says cheekily then gave him a relieved smile. “I'm just glad you're back, no matter whatever you are now.” He says as Kai collected his mate.

“Yeah. You had us all for a while there.” Kai says with a grin as Cole looked himself over.

“Why am I green?” Cole asked as he looked at his hands then chest and hide.

His hide was still black but with a weird low green glow… He gasped.

“Am I a ghost?! Or a zombie?!” He asked, freaking out.

Nya huffed out a laugh as she leaned against Skylor. Yep. This is their Cole.

“Neither actually.” Zane spoke up, shock finally wearing off.

Cole's eyes instantly locked onto his courted before he approached, not feeling the coldness water at all. Not when he had Zane here, when he had a second chance with him.

“Zane…” Cole whispered as he lowered himself to his knees in the water, reaching down-and-out cupping both of his cheeks.

“Up North… There's a name for what you are now…” Zane whispered, reaching up a webbed hand to cup his cheek as well. “Kelpie.” He murmured, urging himself closer, his other hand tracing the beginnings of gills at the side of his lower half.

“Doesn't matter too much to me. I'm just glad I get a second chance with you.” Cole murmured, leaning down and pressing a kiss against his forehead.

Zane smiled softly, glad too. But after a day like today? He just wanted to curl up and sleep with his beloved.

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

Bonus:

“You know, I just realised. I could have tried shocking your heart.” Jay says a week later, perched on the edge of Cole and Zane's shared pool where Cole was getting used to breathing underwater.

“Yeah, no. You still don't have your voltage settings under control.” Cole says with narrow eyes,  switching to air so he could speak. “All you'd do is make it impossible for me to come back.” He huffed, nuzzling Zane's throat where his mark would be when they were ready.

Zane only crooned, wrapping his tail around his front hoof as he pressed closer. That day gave him nightmares still but talking about it like this seems to help.

“Really, thank you for not doing that.” Zane says with a smirk, making Cole and Kai snicker while Jay pouted.

“And you were here when Mistaké came to talk to us. Cole was meant to die that day. There was nothing we could have done to change it.” Nya says, leaning on the edge of her pool and messing up the feathers in Kai's hair below.

It had ate at her how the water currant wouldn't listen to her, despite her being able to control nearly all aspects of water. She accepted it after that explanation. After all, faith was a fickle thing…

“I'm curious about you and Nya.” Kai says to Zane. “You need to stay in cold water and Nya needs to stay in warm. Sure the lake is pretty huge but I don't think it can do both.” He says, looking up at Nya.

“It can't right now but with some new currants and Zane's affinity for ice, it'll be cozy for us both. We can always meet up on the middle for a few hours too.” She shrugged.

“But aren't cold water mers territorial?” Skylor asked as she swung her purple scaled legs back and forth in the water from Nya's pool, her serpent tail doing the same.

“Just as much as your average warm water mer. If food is scarce on the other hand…” Zane says, recalling witnessing death matches over territory with plentiful food.

“It won't come to that. All of the lake is our territory- we made that clear. Even when Wu, Lloyd and whoever else we decide on get here in spring, we'll still have a lot of food to spare. Don't worry about it.” Cole says, pecking Zane's nose the mer promptly wrinkled cutely.

“We made clear? You mean you.” Skylor snorted. “Every squatter was scared speechless seeing a kelpie rise up out of the lake like a demon, flashing fangs and glowing green eyes. Hell, I nearly took off too.” She admits and they chuckled.

“Yeah. If anyone here is territorial, it's you.” Kai grinned.

“Luckily a certain someone just loves that~” Jay cooed and they all laughed at the blushing couple.

Zane smiled despite it though. His pod was unique but he loved them all.

(I love this au so much! You can definitely expect to see more of it popping up! Feel free to drop by in the asks if you have questions! My sleeping schedule is all over so I'll answer them as soon as I see them!)

[azulaahai]

I Close My Eyes, But She’s Still There

When her older brother fails to return from a voyage to a nearby village, it is up to Sansa Stark to find him again.

A messy Jon x Sansa Beauty and the Beast AU based on the Disney movie(s) for @miazeklos for this round of the @jonsaexchange - I really hope you enjoy it! ♥ Title, of course, from the song ”Evermore” on the movie soundtrack.

You can also read this on ao3.

* * *

T H E   B E A U T Y

It will have to be her, Sansa thinks, as she mounts the horse, the old leather of the saddle creaking in protest as she straddles it.

There’s no one else left.

They’ve been scraping by, her family, doing what they could to keep above water. Losing father was unbearable, the loss and grief threatening to undo them. But losing mother, not a year thereafter … that was almost impossible.

That winter brought them close to starvation - Sansa and Robb went without food for days so that Arya, Bran and Rickon could eat. They had few friends in the village, the Stark always having been viewed as peculiar, worshipping other gods and keeping other customs than the rest of the villagers. In the coldest weeks of winter, they all fell ill with fever. Rickon, baby Rickon, was in the worst shape, and for a few days there Sansa was sure they would lose him too.

But Rickon had made it through the peak of the fever, shiny Stark-grey eyes blinking awake in the morning, and Sansa had thanked whatever gods that must still have been hearing her prayers.

And spring had come again, as surely and suddenly as winter had snuck up on them - the drives of snow had begun thawing, the cold winds softened their touch, the early flowers sprung up where there had been ice weeks before. Arya went out without her furs. Hope, that treacherous beast, began spurring in Sansa again. With spring here, the roads would once more be safe for travels - they could trade with neighbouring villages, as their parents had - sell furs and handiworks of Sansa’s making, grow vegetables in the garden again.

It had all looked so heartbreakingly bright, there, for a while. Robb had set out on his first trading journey with a broad, victorious grin on his lips, and they’d all been there to wave him off as he went in the carriage, Grey Wind, their beautiful silvergrey gelding, pulling Robb and their goods off on an adventure.

And then came the waiting.

First, he was a day or two late. It was easy to brush off, to explain to Rickon, who threw a fit when Robb wasn’t home on time - their brother could simply have decided to stay longer in the other village for whatever reason, or have been delayed on the road. He’d be home anytime now, for sure.

But he wasn’t.

On the third day a terrified Grey Wind, without the carriage and sweating profusely, galloped into the garden, large dark eyes stirring white.

And Sansa’s world came crashing down once more.

A cloud of steam rises as she exhales in the early morning - a chilly bite remains in the air, though spring has come for true now.

She is following her brother’s trail, Grey Wind uneasy beneath her as they set off into the woods. The landscape lays quiet around them, the silence broken only by the occassional bird or snapping tree branch.

No one is there to see them go - only Arya knows she’s leaving, and she’s still sleeping inside with their little brothers. Her sister begged and demanded that Sansa let her go find Robb in her stead. Arya is the fiercest of the two, no doubt about it, and by far the superior rider - but with Robb and their parents gone, Sansa’s the eldest, responsible for the others. She could never send Arya off to an unknown danger.

And if she’s to never return, their brothers would likely fare better with Arya, she-wolf with teeth and claws, to protect them, than Sansa with her songs and stories.

* *

The ride is hard, at least on her untrained body; Sansa’s legs are sore after a mere half hour. Grey Wind is not his usual calm, reliable self - he’s taut as a bow string beneath the saddle, freezing or jumping to the side at every small noise. They keep a humble pace, trotting along the forest trail. Not a single man or creature is in sight, save a bunny that flees when it spots them and a bird flying up from the bushes, giving Grey Wind a fright.

There’s something strange in the air, Sansa reflects with a shiver; the air seems to have grown colder. Snow remains in the ditches on the side of the trail, and Sansa must be imagining it, but it almost seems as though the amount of it increases the further into the forest they travel.

The silence, too, seems to grow louder in here among the trees, more piercing. Sansa hasn’t been this deep into the woods for years, but the forest she remembers from her childhood, when she used to ride in the back of her father’s carriage, was not at all this quiet. It’s as if nature itself is holding it’s breath.

* *

When Grey Wind wants to trail off track into the woods the first time, she stops him with a pull on the reins. The horse, behaving highly out of character, ignores her command, continuing on the small path he’s found. Sansa, equally annoyed and scared as she gazes into the dimness of the forest ahead, half-dark even during the day, urges him to turn back.

Instead, he increases their pace as he sets off into the woods, breaking into a trot, then a canter, dark silhouettes of trees whirling by on both sides as Sansa desperately pulls on the reins to hold the horse back.

Grey Winds does not heed her commands, nor her shouts as their speed turns reckless. Snow lies thick on the ground here, though Sansa has no time to dwell on that. The horse has lost his mind, it appears - fear flutters through her. She does not notice the trees beginning to thin out around her, knows nothing but the sound of hooves hitting snow at a mad pace and her own primal fear telling her she’s a second or so from death. Sansa presses her eyes shut, not wanting to see the end as it hits her -

And then - suddenly - salvation.

Grey Wind suddenly slows down, steam rising from him in the cold, Sansa sees as she hesitantly opens her eyes again.

The cold, yes - so unforgiving now, cutting through Sansa’s thick woolen cloak as were it cotton.

The horse’s pace gradually decreasing, until he’s walking calmly again, he bows his head and snorts, as if in apology for his temporary outbreak of madness.

And that’s when Sansa realizes there are no trees surrounding them anymore.

That’s when she sees the castle.

* *

T H E    B E A S T

It has been a long, long time since he’s seen people.

And now there’s two of them in a matter of days.

He hears voices, as he moves up the stairs, echoing in the tower like a beautifully twisted melody.

”Robb!?” a bright, melodious one exclaims. Is that the name of his prisoner? Jon has not bothered learning it.

His steps feel heavy.

”Sansa?” is heard next, in the deep voice he’s come to recognize as the prisoner.

They know each other, then.

”You have to leave, Sansa”, says the prisoner, and Jon grinds to a halt in the stairs.

They’re afraid of him.

Of course.

Why wouldn’t they be?

He begins moving up the steps again, quicker. No more of this, no more strange people in his castle. He prefers to mope in solitude.

There comes more talking from up in the tower, lower now; Jon can’t make out the words. He steps up the last few steps in a rage, angry to be disturbed, angry to be feared.

He steps into the tower room and there she is.

Red hair, glistening blue eyes. She does not cry out when she sees him - that is to her credit. But she flinches away as he steps into the light, and the revulsion written across her features stings.

The prisoner stands on the other side of the bars of the cell, looking ready to break out just to stand between Jon and this woman.

”What is the meaning of this?” Jon roars, in that voice that still isn’t quite his.

”Who are you?” the girl breathes, still taken aback.

”Given that it is my castle, it is I who should be asking you that.”

”I’m here for my brother.” She straightens her shoulders, a quiet defiance in her eyes as they meet his. To his surprise, hers don’t have fear as much as vigilance in them.

In the cell, her brother begins speaking to him, both pleading and demanding at the same time. ”Let her leave. She has done you no wrong. Let her go. Sansa”, he says to the girl. She looks at him despairingly, and for a second, Jon feels …

Strange.

”Sansa, leave now”, the prisoner says. ”Go home …”

”Not without you.” There’s tears in those eyes now. Jon takes a step back without thinking.

The girl turns to him then, accusation written across her features.

”By what right do you hold him here?”

”He trespassed on my land”, Jon grunts. ”Slept in a room in my castle.”

”Sansa”, the prisoner says again. ”Go. Now.”

”And what would it take for you to release him?” Desperation in those sky-blue eyes.

Jon snorts, and the sound startles her. He hates it, hates the way he is a monster -

but he is.

A beast.

”Your brother is imprisoned for a crime. I will not release him. If you leave here now and swear never to return, I shall grant you leave this once.”

”Sansa”, comes from the prisoner again. ”Leave. Please.”

* *

T H E   B E A U T Y

Robb is pleading with her from his cell, the beast before her turning to leave, thinking the matter settled. But in Sansa’s mind, an idea has hatched - a plan vaguely beginning to form.

It’s rather mad. Not at all like her.

But she thinks of her younger brothers back in the cottage. They’ll almost be ready for bed, now - twilight’s just around the corner. She thinks of Arya - angry and frightened and strong. She’ll probably be up all night, waiting for someone to come home.

They don’t need me, Sansa thinks. The thought both hurts and relieves her. Not as they need Robb.

And so she calls out to the beast.

”And if I wish to take his place as prisoner?”

[clove-teasdale]

unexpected encounter

*:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧

A/N: extra ficlet #1. not a challenge. covers full first rp with @brooks-schreave (thanks, grace <3 that was fun). if u wanna see the beginning/context of this, scroll to the end of this pc#2 . don’t worry tho, you can read without that and still understand. enjoy! (rip i hope i’m still doing good with this first tense i’m trying out)

*:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧

Shoot.

I stare at the books now on the floor as silence takes over the library again. No sudden movements made as I hold my breath in and wait--hoping I still have a chance at avoiding this conversation. That is until...

“Hello? Max?” Brook’s voice breaks the frozen moment of time.

I snort at the suggestion of being Mr. “I like older women", but quickly run to hide, not minding stealth now that he knows there's someone else with him. A minute passes by without a word, yet I hear him walking, trying to find who he believes is his youngest brother. 

“Max, it's too early for this! Where are you?”

I keep moving in an attempt to pinpoint where he is myself and say, “Max doesn't strike me as an early bird.”

His footsteps stop at that. “What? Quinn? “

Quinn? Her voice doesn’t sound like mine.

I get a glimpse of Brooks through an empty spot on the bookshelf I’m hiding behind. “You can't even recognize her voice?”

He looks around wildly and yells, “WHO IS THIS?”

I try not to laugh at his reaction, realizing it’s satisfying to be the annoying one for once. “It's your conscience. Honestly, a little offended you've ignored me for seventeen years.”

He starts moving again, walking to a different aisle out of sight. “Well you kept telling me to be boring; what else was I supposed to do?” 

Quick footsteps follow, coming to a halt every few seconds. I lean back on a bookshelf when I feel safely hidden. His footsteps repeat the same pattern and I quote Pinocchio with a smirk. “Let your conscience be your guide, Brooks. How else will you ever turn into a real boy?”

I get no reply, so I wait. The pattern of footsteps continues. Wait..

Suddenly, he appears around a corner and knocks me over. I’m so surprised a shriek leaves my lips as we fall together and he ends up on top of me, brows furrowed as he realizes who I am. “Clove? Clove Teasdale?”

How many Cloves do you know?

I only blink up at him in silence, too stunned to say anything. This is even worse than bumping into him. Grunting, I push him aside and brush off invisible dust from my shoulder as I sit up. “I see you haven't gotten any more graceful.”

He gapes at me before his face falls flat. “I see you haven't gotten any more ladylike.”

Right. “You just tackled me.”

“You just cat-fished me.” He counters. Like that justifies anything. After standing up and brushing his own pants, he reaches a hand out to offer help. That’s new, but I decide to accept it.

“That's your excuse?”

He pulls me up. “Ah, not an excuse, but a reason.” His index finger taps his temple with a grin at the end of that statement. I roll my eyes at the reference. 

“Cat-fishing is online by the way. The word you're looking for is: deceived.”

“Doesn't make it any better. So,” he crosses his arms, “what're you doing up, invading my space and trespassing in my home?”

Invading his space? You can have your space back. I scoff. “Not everything's about you, Brooks.” Then crossing my arms like him I mutter, “And it's not my fault you can't recognize your sister's voice...”

“Pardon?”

I sigh. “Forget it, but you should be nicer to me now that I'm a Selected.”

“Oh, yes, I recall. I always knew you had a thing for my brother.” 

My eyes widen at the old, stupid assumption he’s never let go of. It takes me another moment to align my thoughts after an accusation I haven’t received in years. "I was a kid. I didn't have "a thing" for anyone. I'm just…giving it a shot.”

“Sure, and you following him around with doe eyes as a child wasn't you practically professing your undying love.”

I narrow my eyes at his words, knowing very well I’m not lying. Boys weren’t that appealing to me younger. I did use to care about what other people thought of me though, so this kind of conversations made me flustered back then, and in consequence, frustrated that that was taken as confirmation even if that wasn’t the case.

“Nate was nice to me–unlike someone else–so yeah, I liked being around him.” I begin to say, matter-of-factly. “I don't recall being in love though, but I'm starting to remember why you and I never got along.”

“Was it because of my dazzling personality or my incredible wit? Maybe both? I'll let you answer that.”

“Hmm...How about your amazing ability to be an annoying jerk? Bet that's a winner with the ladies.”

Surprisingly, he gets flustered at that. “I-It..uh... N-Not the point!”

I give him a once over with raised eyebrows. This is also new. “What was the point?”

“I don't know! Just not that!” He makes a move to leave and quickly adds, “Look, I am not a fan of this conversation. I'm ending it. I hope you have a good day.” 

“Oh no, you don't.” I reach for his arm and pull him back, not giving him the chance of making this kind of decisions anymore. “You could do that when we were five, not now. It's not my fault you can't deal with a conversation if it doesn't go your way.  If anyone is going to leave the other behind it's gonna be me.” I release his arm and walk off, but he decides to speak again.

“Always a flare for the dramatics.” 

I gaze at him over my shoulder. “You've got horrible perceptual skills. And here I thought age brought growth.”

“Funny. I could never expect the same from you.”

I scoff, fully facing him, “Which only proves my point that you're still a jerk.”

“I am not!”

“Nice comeback, Brooks. Very elaborate response.”

“I didn't realize I was trying.”

Shaking my head, I focus on a bookshelf. Living in the same breathing space as him will be torture. “I have a proposition.”

“Oh? And what might that be?” He crosses his arms for the second time. Defensive stance 101.

We both remain silent for a moment, throwing daggers at each other with a glaring match. “Let's do a little experiment so I can prove my point.” I say, walking over to him and poking his chest, “I dare you to be nice to me during my stay here.”

“You dare me to be nice? I've been nothing but nice.”

“Oh really?” I ask, raising an eyebrow to which he grins.

“Really,” he replies, earning another glare. “It was good to see you, Teasdale. I can't wait until we're brother and sister. Best wishes.”

That annoying, smug look he used to give me when we were younger is on his face as he heads for the exit of the library. I throw a couple more daggers at his back. This is what he used to do when we were little. He started arguments to spite me and then left if he believed he had the upper hand and wanted to keep it. I’d rather that not be how it works anymore.

Picking up my pace, I walk past him and bump my shoulder into his on purpose as I do.

“Rude,” he calls out.

I don’t stop. “Bite me.”

[vorthosjay]

Let’s Talk About Endure

Today we have ANOTHER new feature from Michael Yichao in the form of Endure. We’ve got a bit to talk about with this penultimate episode of Amonkhet. I should note for those of you who haven’t heard yet, after next week’s episodes we have five story-focused podcasts on the C17 tribes and legends. During that time I’ll be doing various features, both on the C17 tribes and on Ixalan speculation. I’ll also start answering Ixalan questions the moment the final episode of Hour of Devastation is out.

My analysis today is short, but with some important points.

Puncturing Blow by Eric Deschamps

The brutal champion with a spear of flame: it could only be Neheb the Worthy, a legendary initiate skilled in magic and combat alike. He had passed the Trials when Samut and Djeru were mere children.

So Neheb is from almost a generation before Samut and Djeru. That’s interesting.

Djeru stood and clapped a hand on Gideon's back. "That is the second time today that you have saved me. The first time, I was furious. Now, I am grateful."

Don’t forget, the entire story of HOU, plus the last couple of Amonkhet, all take place in the same day.

Hazoret's spear glowed with heat.

A swing of its bladed edge.

The sizzle of flesh.

That’s pretty metal.

Surprise turned to epiphany as she realized that the molten heat from Hazoret's spell must have softened the god's impenetrable shell.

So there is your explanation for Samut and crew beating The Scorpion God. Like the art of Gideon being held back last time, there was a perfectly rational reason for the art depicting something that seems off.

Her hands glowed with golden power, some last vestige of the god's strength coursing through her body, and she ran forward with the staff held high overhead.

Here we’ve got another example of a mortal wielding a god’s weapon and being imbued with a vestige of their power.

Samut looked up, her eyes not quite comprehending what she saw. The sky held no suns—in fact, the world seemed covered in a strange darkness, punctuated by peculiar speckles of light that danced and twinkled like distant gems.

Amonkhet has two suns.

Samut. Doesn’t. Know. What. Night. Is.

A deep panic swelled within Samut. This is not Naktamun. This is not Amonkhet. This is . . . some other world.

Where did Samut go? We got an image.

Art by James Ryman

It’s not that hard, people.

Ephara’s Radiance by James Ryman

I TOLD you all Theros was on the super short list in Future Foretold.

It makes sense. We kind of killed our LAST red-green walker on Theros. Plus, she has a connection to gods and may be investigating how to revive her own.

I’m expecting it either late next year or early the year after.

Note: If Samut returns to Theros, we’ve got a fair idea of the color breakdown of all the planeswalkers:

Gideon W 1.0

Samut R 0.5 G 0.5

Dack Fayden (who is canonically still there) U 0.5 R 0.5

Ashiok U 0.5 B 0.5

That leaves us with a Green-Black walker, Maybe. Or maybe it’s not perfectly color-balanced, or one of the above isn’t actually there. We’ll have to wait and see, it’s too far out to do too much speculation, but there are a TON of story threads remaining for Theros.

And she marched forward toward the distant sands, her people trailing behind her, as the dragon trespasser descended on his unseen foes among the ruins of Naktamun.

And so we exit the story of the people of Amonkhet. My hope here is that next week we see the story from Bolas’ point of view, something we’ve been severely missing since the prologue of Alara Unbroken. We’ve got one story to wrap up the Gatewatch’s story on Amonkhet and propel the story forward for the next few years. Let’s hope it’s a doozy.

[fandomlife-giver]

His Maid, Up In Flames

Summary: The smoldering cries of an infernal beast echo throughout the streets of London. And for some reason, I find myself without a master. Would you, by chance, wish to enter into a contract with me? Worry not. When the time comes, I shall plunge you into a deep, fathomless, soothing darkness as gently as possible. The pain shall be brief.

Next Time on Black Maid: "His Maid, Up In Flames"

You see, I am simply one hell of a maid.

Pairings: Sebastian x Demon!Reader

@wintersdoll​

Warnings: Death, fire

Word Count: 4021

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"You were such a sweet, pure girl, Abigail. But your mother ruined it by fornicating with that demon. I never thought I would find myself cleansing you, of all people. "

She stood and turned around, spreading her wings. "Very soon, not only will you be pure, but you will become one of us. An angelical fiend, indeed."

"I'd rather watch my mother's death a thousand times before becoming a monster like you."

She chuckled. "Monster, am I? A simply horrid thing to call someone. No, I cleansed your mother. She was very impure."

I slammed the doors shut and walked forward. "And you believe you will do the same with me? This little trick of yours, it won't work. You can't fool me and you will not cleanse me!"

My voice had changed into something darker and this made her gasp and hold herself. "Oh my...you are covered in impurity. The sins you've committed, your way of thinking, the very body you wear is unclean!"

Your fingers twitched against the wood as your nails began to lightly tap on the railing.

I was forced back and landed against the wall. And away from my meal!

I cursed under my breath as I looked to the culprit and my eyes widened. A woman in white. With large white wings. It was her. The Angel.

"You..." My voice was different. Deeper, inhuman. It was demonic.

My anger was fueled as I stood and charged for her. But before I could reach her, she spread her wings, a blinding light erupted and I shielded my eyes. Once it finally died down, I moved my hand and opened my eyes. She was right in front of me, and she was smiling.

My hands shot out for her throat, but before they could do what I wanted them to, she placed her hand on my face. Her fingers circled around it, covering my eyes.

"Don't worry. This will all be over soon."

With those words, my eyes rolled back and there was darkness.

Your nails were tapping furiously now, to the point where the very wood began to chip and a small hole was forming.

A loud rumbling erupted beneath my feet and I glanced down to see the bottom of the well. The water boiled to a sizzle and it became red. As red as blood. It made me attempt to swing back even more, but I froze when I heard a demonic male voice.

The chain holding me over suddenly snapped. I gasped as I fell. My eyes wide and my heart beating non-stop until I hit the water.

"My, you really are torturing that poor railing."

Your nails stopped their symphony of destruction. Slowly, your head turned to look at the person who was leaning against the wall with his hat over his eyes. As he stepped out of the shadows, your eyes narrowed.

"What the hell are you doing here?"

A small smile formed beneath the bowler hat that shielded his face. "Oh, me? Why, it's as if you don't know me at all."

You pushed off the railing and slowly walked towards him. "I don't know you. All I know is who you are. So, here is my question...why are you here?"

He laughed under his breath and shoved his hands in his pockets as he began to circle around you. "So suspicious. And protective of that little human that is drooling over a crate of cabbages right now. I never can understand how much effort you all put into your meals. The problem is, he's not even your true master. Is he, Felis?"

He unexpectedly spun around and his feet skid across the floor to a stop as he faced you. "So, here is my question..." His eyes lifted up and his steel blue orbs stared straight through your red ones as the ghost of a curious smirk appeared on his face. "Why exactly are you here?"

Your lips remained sealed as your eyes stared as a threatening warning back into his. "He sent you, yes? To take me back. I hate to inform you of this, but you wasted the trip. I have my reason for being here and that reason is about to be fulfilled. I will return, just not yet. By the end of today, I will have no purpose of being here. His little flying monkeys interfered after I warned them, they failed their mission, and they paid the price."

While you spoke, he had been moving his head side to side in boredom, but then stopped.

"Ah...you mean Azah and Luesir. He actually sent them? That was doomed to fail from the start. He's a fool for believing otherwise." He looked back up at you. "Let me guess...it has to do with the Angel, right? I hear she's been quite busy these past few years. We've had so many new souls coming in to be tortured. Those reapers must be pulling their hair out. Especially since she trespassed into their precious library and stole their precious cinematic records."

He sucked in air through his teeth and walked closer. He passed by you, then turned around and you felt his lips by the shell of your ear. "I'm not his toy, Felis. I don't act as he tells me. I am not a messenger boy and I could care less about your human or where you end up." He straightened up and let out a sigh. "But, I do part-time of being a delivery boy."

You watched from the corner of your eye as he moved behind you and you felt something fall around your neck. "It's a gift from him. He hopes this will be enough to persuade you back into his arms." There was a click that sounded. He rubbed his hands down your arms and smirked.

"The boy was right. You look much better with your hair up. It shows your beautiful face."

You glanced down and saw the black jewel that rested in the crease of your breasts. He stepped back and walked ahead of you. "I am only here out of boredom. Everyone is preparing for the events that will unfold tonight. It seems you have been for a long time, as well."

He grinned. "This will be quite the show."

You expected him to keep walking, but he stopped his feet and glanced back at you. "How about we make a deal?"

You rose an eyebrow. "A deal?"

He smiled. "Tell you what, after this game of yours ends, I'll tell him that by the time I arrived you were long gone and I wasn't able to find you. And in return..."

You tilted your head. "In return what?"

He gave a small shrug. "Just, when this is all over for you, there's something I want you to do for me."

"What is it that you want?"

A wide smirk pulled at his lips as he slowly looked up at you. . . .

During your encounter, what you didn't know was that Ciel had already woken up. He slid out of the wall of boxes he had pressed himself against and looked around.

But as he moved to leave, he bumped into something. He stepped back and looked up at the man who grinned down at him.

"U-Undertaker?" . . .

"Oh my god!"

"What's happening?"

"It's everywhere!"

You stood watching with an anticipating smile on your face. Your fists gripped the railing at the front of the ship while the passengers were staring and screaming in horror.

From the corner of your eye, you saw Ciel run out and once he saw it too, he stopped in his place. You focused back on the sight of England, the entire land that they had called home, completely engulfed in flames of fiery rage.

He walked closer to the railing and only stood there, staring in frozen shock that he hadn't even noticed who was standing beside him.

"What a sight to gaze upon. She did say she was going to put on a real grand finale."

Slowly, he turned and looked to the person who stood beside him. "Wait...it's you! What are you doing here? You live in Paris!"

You narrowed your eyes as you turned to him. "How exactly would you know where I would live? You don't even know me. If you even cared for your safety, you would have stayed there. Now it's too late. What happens next will be beyond even your control, Ciel."

He had to look back at you again. "What did you just say? I barely even know you, who gave you permission to address me by my name?"

A frown replaced your smile as you glanced down at him. "Ever since you could speak, that's all you've been lecturing me about. 'Y/N, how many times do I have to tell you to call me Ciel?'"

His breath hitched.

Flashback...

"Y/N, how many times do I have to tell you to call me Ciel?" He said while poking your side.

You chuckled. "My, my, you have been spending far too much time with Lady Elizabeth, my young lord." You said with a smirk as you both walked up to Your master and mistress.

He took a step back and his hand slid back on the railing. You rose an eyebrow and turned your body to fully face him.

"What's wrong, Ciel?" You couldn't help the smirk on your face. "Cat got your tongue?"

He stopped waling backwards once he saw the pink glowing eyes through the bandages. You smiled as you reached up and tore the wrappings that covered your face. They fell to the ground and you looked up at him.

His face at first was unreadable, but then he unexpectedly ran forward and wrapped his arms around you. The force of it made you slightly loose your footing. You gazed down in surprise.

This was not the reaction I was expecting.

He buried his face in your stomach and you heard him muffle one word. "Y/N..."

With a still confused expression, you rubbed his head and wrapped an arm around his waist. "Hello, Ciel."

"Hehehehehehe, my, you all put on quite the show!"

You looked to the side and your eyes widened. "Unnie? What are you doing here?"

Ciel let go of you as you ran to Undertaker and pulled him into a hug. He giggled and held you close to him. "I think the real question right now is where have you been, dearie?"

You smiled as you pulled away. "I've had a few arons to run." You turned and looked back to the flaming land that was growing closer.

Your smile fell. "And it seems my work is yet to be finished." . . .

A belt of laughter rang out over the buildings that were burning from the inside out, echoing in the heads of those who were on the verge of burning to death or running from it and the person who had released it was grinning from ear to ear.

"Look at this filth. it's absolutely horrid."

As his eyes moved around, they landed on a figure who was running with a maid. "He's here. He made it all the way back to London on his own?" He turned and looked over his shoulder at the figure behind him. "Tell me, what do you think of the view?"

The person stayed silent, and Ash turned all the way around. "Speak your mind."

Sebastian had a frown practically glued to his face, his eyes glistening in boredom. "Compared to the Great Fire of London in 1696, this one burns rather slowly."

Ash smirked. "Yes. Well, filth takes time to burn." He lifted his arms and the fire was fueled, rising it up to burn even more of the city. "Soon, it will all be cleansed." he turned back around and hummed.

"You know, when I pictured this moment, I will admit it was always with Y/N and I watching side by side. Do you think she would enjoy this? I think she would. A very sadistic little kitten, she is."

Sebastian's lips pressed firmly together in annoyance. Ash had noticed this and smiled. "Oh, sorry. A sensitive topic for you, I imagine." He chuckled to himself and as he turned to look again at the city below, his sight had stopped and moved back to a few buildings across.

He saw a dark figure moving quickly in the shadows, running and jumping from rooftop to rooftop. His amusement began to fade.

"Despite al the good qualities she possesses, she is a fool. Always has been and always will. I gave her a chance to be something. To be who she truly was, but she rejected me. She manipulated me for her own use because she has one quality that neither you, nor me will ever have."

His teeth gritted as he watched the figure continue jumping and running on the roofs in sync with Ciel and his maid.

"Loyalty."

After a few seconds, a devious smirk came on Ash's face. "You know, I've been thinking. I wouldn't mind a partnership with you. Especially after the failure with Y/N. With you, Sebastian,  by my side, she will surely crumble and finally fall." . . .

"With you, Sebastian, by my side, she will surely crumble and finally fall."

You stumbled as you landed on another rooftop and your feet slid to a stop at the base of the ledge over the roof.

Your head rose up as you looked to the roof that was only a few buildings away.  The ashes flew in your face as your hair blew to the side by the wind. Your eyes were looking at them.

And you were too distracted to know that Ciel was looking up at you, waiting for you to jump down to him.

"Come on. Y/N, what the hell are you doing?"

When you heard him mutter, you glanced down at him. But your gaze went back to Sebastian.

'Trust him, Y/N.'

You looked down at the ring that was once again on your finger. You stole one last glance at your dear crow, before turning away and jumping on one more roof top.

A loud growl made your body tense up. You looked over and saw Pluto, standing high up on a structure. The collar residing around his neck was glowing, explaining his form of the demon hound. His eyes were glowing a blazing red as every roar he let out released one made of fire.

By seeing his state, you now knew how the town became a fiery wasteland. And by looking at the collar, you realized exactly how he was activated. . . .

Finny was in tears, Mey-Run was covering her eyes and Bard was tearfully loading his rifle.

Ciel watched Pluto in disappointment. "He's too far gone. Take the shot, Bard."

He looked over at Finny and Mey-Rin. "And you two. Crying like children. I expect more from servants of my family."

Their sobbing grew quiet as they, along with Bard saluted him. "Yes, master."

Ciel nodded in approval, then turned around and began running in the opposite direction, leaving his servants to their work.

Bard cocked his rifle and aimed it up at Pluto. Once he was in his sight, just as Bard was about to squeeze the trigger, he was blinded by something. He looked away and realized a black coat was thrown on top of him.

"What the hell?"

Mey-Rin gasped. "It's Y/N!"

Finny pointed up at you as you had jumped on the structure and got Pluto's attention by calling his name. Pluto looked to you and his eyes burned with rage as he let out another roar. . . .

"We can rule the newly born world. The clean world. When it springs for the fire. It won't be difficult at all. All we have to do left is take down the abomination."

Sebastian's eyes narrowed. "And how would that work? For one, my mate cannot be killed. Any attempt of doing so and you would have all of hell along with the grim reapers as your enemy."

Ash chuckled at this. "Death wasn't exactly my intention. I have something far better in mind for our sweet little kitty. She's already weak enough. All I need is you. And that ring she cherishes so much."

He frowned. "I thought I was the epitemy of the uncleanliness you so detest."

Ash stepped forward with his arms spread out. "If you look closely, all things are two sides of the same coin. All contain both the clean goodness of the mind and evil darkness that plagues out hearts."

He glanced to the side. "Y/N is not but one like you or I, she is confused, pulled in different directions. My goal is to guide the way of her natural born purity."

He looked up at him. "And with that purity, she holds a certain power. This power matched matches that of God, she is a being to not be trifled with. To harness and control that power, anyone can rule."

A darkness flickered in Sebastian's eyes as he turned to look at him. "You wish to weaken Y/N even further, to completely break her until she is as lost as a human. Purify her, then create her into a weapon. You want to use her for your own selfishness in order to satisfy your hunger for power."

Ash tilted his head. "I'm not sure about your tone. Don't tell me you would actually care. No?"

Sebastian furrowed his brows as Ash began to unbutton his coat and shirt.

"So you hunger for something else?"

He pulled open his articles of clothing to display his bare chest, that surprisingly had breasts.

"If you hunger, I can come to you as a woman."

His voice had changed into a blend of Ash and Angela. Along with his face, that now looked like Angela.

This made Sebastian's eyes narrow as a spread of darkness filled them.

"It's Y/N!"

By the sound of your name, they were both looking back to the servants. But Sebastian looked up and his eyes widened once he saw you jump on the structure. . . .

As you looked around at your audience, you felt a prideful smile on your face. "Now that everyone is finally seeing me, it's time to put on a show."

You stood up and eyed the large hound that breathed his fire into a building.

"Pluto!"

His head snapped to you and you shook your head in disapproval.

"Tsk, tsk, tsk. You have been a very bad dog."

A growl vibrated in his throat as he let out another roar.

Your fingers wrapped around the bandages on your left hand. With one movement, they were torn off, along with the ones on your right.

"So, you wanna play, do you?"

You rolled your head around, until you heard a pop from your neck.

A smirk appeared on your lips as your eyes flashed demonic. "Then let's play."

He let out another roar as he charged forward. You stood still until he came close enough, then you jumped up.

He slid to a stop, nearly falling over on the side.

"Over here, puppy."

He turned and saw you standing dangerously close to the edge.

The servants watched in fear. Without wasting a second, Pluto charged again as fire blades from his nostrils. This time, you didn't jump or run, you let him push you down.

His paws slammed down on either side of your head as his body hovered over yours and his tail slapped down, all preventing any attempt of escape.

His teeth snarled. His eyes raged as he let out an intimidating roar in your face.

You coughed a bit due to the foul stench of his breath. His head leaned closer to your face and you went still. Slowly, you rose a hand and lightly petted his nose. For a moment, he made a move to literally bite your hand off, but he started to relax into the touch.

However, as he leaned in closer, your other hand went to his neck. You grabbed around the collar, and at the last second, he growled, but it was too late. Your other hand grabbed it and by using all of your strength, you pulled it apart.

The pieces shattered and fell down to the burning ground below.

You stared at Pluto's eyes. For a moment, he stepped back and groaned out a whimper. But then, as he looked back to you, his eyes slowly returned back. A blinding light erupted and once it died down, Pluto was again, a naked man, quivering in fear. . . .

Everyone stepped back as you landed on the ground with Pluto in your arms. He kept his arms around your neck, so you very slowly placed him on the ground. You picked up a charred blanket off the ground and placed it over his shoulders.

He wrapped it tight around himself and curled up into a bawl, whimpering.

When you stood up, your eyes widened as you were tackled by the servants.

Your back slammed against the flat ground. They were showering you in hugs and kisses and tears.

"Y/N, you're here! You came back!"

"I knew you wouldn't leave us, you're too important!"

"You saved Pluto! We missed you so much!"

You sighed in annoyance. "Yes, I'm here."

You sat up and stood up as the stood and smiled at you.

You brushed off your clothes and narrowed your eyes at them.

"Why are you all here? Why aren't you at the manor? Remember your jobs. Protect the manor no matter what."

Their smiles fell and the atmosphere became quiet. You rose an eyebrow at all of them expectantly.

Bard rubbed the back of his neck as they all looked at each other. Mey-Rin looked at you and stepped forward.

"Um...well...when Pluto began all of this...he..."

Your brows furrowed in concern. "He what, Mey-Rin?"

She sighed in sadness and looked up into your eyes. "It's the manor, miss. It..."

Your jaw clenched and without another word, you turned and ran. Mey-Rin called after you, but you only increased your speed.

No. It can't be gone. It can't . It has to be there!

Not once did your speed slow, you were determined to get there. You needed to see it for yourself.

Though you didn't stop, as you ran closer and closer to it, there was far more damage. Victims of the flames were long dead and charred. There were even still some who were begging for help.

You ignored them.

You turned off into the road that led to the front of the manor. The very first thing you noticed, the woods surrounding the forest were still burning, but were all black and nearly gone.

You got closer and closer, until your feet had stopped. Falling to the ground, your knees sunk in the ashes that now made up the ground.

For the first time in centuries, your confidence had wavered. It was all gone. Everything. Rubble, result of the roof, the pillars, the walls. Only a few were standing.

It felt like an eternity that you stared at the remains.

"Twice, I have seen the fall and the aftermath of this structure. Of the Phantomhives."

Your eyes tightly shut as you stood up. Your legs were completely covered in black, along with your hands.

'No . I-I won't end here. Not like this!!'

The marks engraved on the backs of your hands shined. The ring upon your finger glowed brightly.

'What are you waiting For ? Don't just stand there. Go! End this!'

Your eyes slitted and they, too, glowed a grand pink color. You closed them.

Seconds passed, and once you opened them again, you found yourself standing in the dark corner of a room in the castle. By looking to the side, Ciel was on the floor in a pool of his own blood, surrounded by soldiers.

You smirked to yourself. "Yes, my Lord."

[iamnothyper]

FANACCOUNT - B1A4 NYC

Cause I had such a great time and I need to share my delulu “OMG HE LOOKED AT ME” moments.

lining up was messy, almost fought with this power tripping venue supervisor, but got over that. i had balcony ga and lined up sometime after 6. it was fucking cold. i couldn’t stop shivering and the show as usual started late. we were still outside when it was 8. (spoiler: no photo-op sticker for me :/)

i ended up super close to the stage. i kinda half-trespassed into this curtained-off area and this guy tried to barrier me out, but some girl had wound up on the floor next to me so i literally could not move. pros: i was close. cons: i was next to a huge column and this huge speaker was blocking part of my view. i have two shitty videos that i can post. the irl view was much clearer though and wasn’t so fucking bright.

the boys were awesome, they were so into it. so much fanservice my god. they just looked like they were having the time of their lives with us and it was great. the funny thing was that from my spot i could see the prompter and basically all their ments. baro spoke so much english ;D and i’m really shitty at recounting this stuff so i’m just gonna do moments i remember. in no particular order cause did i mention my memory sucks?

HIGHLIGHTS

I am Jinyoung/Sanduel biased so I noticed both being super into the singing. They also were miming Baro’s rap to each other at one point and Gongchan was in between them completely oblivious. Baro was hyping up producer Jinyoung when a fan shouted out “1 Step, 2 Step” and B1A4 ended up singing/dancing to a bit of Oh My Girl’s song. During a ment, Jinyoung messed up and they all teased him. During another ment (encore/last one I think) Sanduel started singing some English song and all the fans started singing along. He was taken aback and we were told to calm down. Actually, they said calm down very dramatically a lot lol.

This was something small but I found it funny. They were doing the “SAY YEA” thing and Gongchan kept holding out his mic when it wasn’t the fans’ turn to scream. He realized this after awhile and “smoothly” made it seem like he was just throwing his hands up. (i saw u, i know what you did)

There were a lot of cute interactions between members and towards fans, but I remember the encore and fanservice most. They replayed that Good Timing chorus so many times. They kept saying “1 MORE???” and it was great. So many water bottles were sacrificed that day. They were really just enjoying it and trying to hype everyone up.

There was a huge column that was in the middle of the crowd. Gongchan was using it as leverage so he could lean out more and high-five people. Sanduel later did the same thing and was having a grand time with himself. Gongchan also started waving like a maniac. And, so so many hearts. 

Gongchan took so many selfies with fans’ phones. He was even taking them as the group was leaving the stage so Jinyoung came back on and lingered with him. Jinyoung was trying to tell the fans to take pics OF him when they wanted him to take selfies. Communication failure. He later did take people’s phones, but I thought it was a funny interaction. Sandeul on the other hand was trying to take a selfie and accidentally exits out of the camera. Don’t worry, he figured it out in the end.

Someone threw a plush pokeball onstage that landed between Baro’s feet. He held it out and struck that pokemon pose before throwing it at himself. Sandeul had a panic wtf moment when bunny ears were thrown on stage. He picked them up but never wore them (no one else did either). Gongchan was very pleased with the plastic roses someone threw and started waving them around. Overall, they loved it, we loved it, it was awesome.

WELCOME TO DELULU LAND

So, in my mind these are totally interactions that happened to me directly.  CNU was waving to the crowd, looks in our direction so I start waving, he looks surprised for a sec (could be because the girl sitting under me had a sign in korean, but nah its def cause my good looks) and waves back. Towards the end of the concert he’s waving again and just as he’s about to stop I start waving like a maniac so he waves back.

So, being in the balcony (and half of me illegally trespassing) there’s not much room to get hype. Most of the people were just standing/sitting still. I started bouncing and throwing my hand up and down over the railing during the encore. And... I ALMOST MISSED THIS, but I looked back at my side of the stage and Jinyoung was looking up (at me yo) like he was waiting for something. I had my hand out and bobbed along to the GOOD. TIME.ING. beat (with him? tbh I cant remember) and he did that satisfied “good job” expression. I felt so accomplished. This happened with Gongchan too. GOOD. TIME.ING. smile, nods, moves on with life. 

Now, Gongchan is not my bias, but he was on my side of the stage and he looked up a lot. Prettttyyy sure we made eye contact a buncha times. We gots that connection you know? Most notable would be when I did the finger heart then when he saw me went on my tippy toes to lean closer. He raised one eyebrow and gave me the “hmm??” look before turning away. As he was waving goodbye I waved too and I swear to god he smiled and waved back. I’m also pretty sure I did finger heart again and he reacted to it by smiling that time.

Who know’s though, I’m probably insane. 

[caramelophibia-blog]

(Published on Zomato, TripAdvisor, Google Maps, Quora & Swiggy)

(Photo Credits: Carmelita Fernandes)

If there is one quirky pub to be, one which follows no conventional rules in its blending of cocktails and crafting of meals – CraftBar it is.  A place to hang out at after work hours or to chill out during weekends, typically for those located at Mumbai’s central corporate hotspot – B.K.C.   A startup set-up which comes equipped with unique selling points that sets it apart from its competitors.   Its owner, the ever hospitable Sagar Chakraborty, breaks away from traditional food patterns having applied his own ingenious art in designing the restaurant’s menu.  This is my creed too, to deviate from time-honoured cooking/serving models, like eating shrimps from a gol gappa or sipping a cocktail from a gola or devouring a spirit infused melon!

(Photo Credits: CraftBar)

As I stepped into this gastro pub, the first thing that I caught sight of was an assortment of colourful bottles which apparently are done in what is termed barley art.

Barley art which has its roots in Indian culture has been selected as its thematic design.  So it is but natural to see the pub’s walls adorned with circular embroidered frames conforming to this art.  Naturally, the restaurant’s menu is printed in a similar fashion (see pics).

(Photo Credits: Carmelita Fernandes)

Piped upbeat music plays in the background making this the last place to want to have a heart to heart chat.  If you do, you won’t be heard.

At the far end of the restaurant IPL matches get screened, attracting cricket aficionados.   More excitement and less audibility.  Not my cuppa tea.

Come Thursday evenings, you will see (or should I say hear) the town’s self-proclaimed singers assemble to sing along on Karaoke – both Bollywood ishtyle and Hollywood.

For those who dig olde worlde music, Fridays has been picked to be their Retro Night targetted to start with effect from May this year.

There’s nothing like a ‘live band’ that performs inside the restaurant that makes this place come alive!  Hear that celebrity singers are being geared up to be brought on board soon.

What is CraftBar’s singular attraction you might ask?  Its Sunday brunch which allows you unlimited food from a set menu.  Designed for those whose mission is to live to eat.

CraftBar Sunday Brunch menu

The brunch constitutes a whole collection – of 2 breakfast items, a soup, 4 types each of vegetarian and non-vegetarian starters,  a large salad station, 1 non-veg and 2 vegetarian mains plus 2 types of desserts.  @ a mere Rs 799 per head and guzzle unlimited drink @ Rs 1,299!

Didn’t you just go back to check if you read right?  I bet you did.  What better incentive than unlimited food and drink at as nominal a cost!  Now, if that didn’t catch your attention, you probably need a doc’s prescription!

(Photo Credits: Carmelita Fernandes)

Having provided a broad description of the pub, I’d like to get started with an illustration of my very first and experiential tryst at this gastro pub.  The first dish came in the form of a Caribbean style Pirates Pepper Soup which is a milky, peppery and banana-sweet potato inspired soup.  Almost Thai-like in taste owing to its coconut content perhaps.  Velvety on the palate, no black eye whatsover setting me wondering about its Pirates connection.

Some light Glassy Classy salad with cherry tomatoes, dry fruits, dark olives, citrus fruits and lettuce dresssed in vinaigrette to accompany.  For the diet conscious.  Looks prettier than it tastes.

(Photo Credits: Carmelita Fernandes)

(Photo Credits: Carmelita Fernandes)

This was followed by Paneer Tikka Tarts which came trundling on wheels.  Not the Formula One types but one served on a cart like tray which makes picture-happy people happier.

It tastes cheesy, I mean not in the trashy sense but like cheese.  Small enough to pop into the average mouth. An eager one to pop in a couple in quick succession and without guilt.

(Photo Credits: Carmelita Fernandes)

Being a born and bred Mumbaikar I’m naturally inclined towards the city’s archetypal

(Photo Credits: Carmelita Fernandes)

snack.

The Pav Bhaji Bruschetta it is called, which comes with pav bhaji topping over baguette slices to give it an Italian twist.

A creative fusion play that makes the die-hard vegetarian Mumbaikar happy to go the Italian way.

Just wish there were fewer chopped onions over the bruschetta topping.  Leaves no room for a close-up peck :-)

(Photo Credits: Carmelita Fernandes)

For the hard-nosed non-vegetarians as I, there was comfort in chicken tandoori momos which taste close to wood fired kebabs.

What goes into it, I learnt from the chef, is minced chicken and veggies steamed in typical momo style which is then dipped in flour and oven grilled.

Unfussy and delicious!  Tops my list of favourites.

How could one forget those prawn gol gappas!  Yes, you heard right.  Fried prawns stuffed into crisp home-made puris sat invitingly upon a shot glasses filled with sol kadi.  How do you eat it?  Just pick up a puri, crunch into it and wash it down with the kadi which is nothing but a digestive.  I didn’t venture pouring the sol kadi into the puris and mouthing them whole.

While the waiter at our table did his best to explain the food on an lazy afternoon, I suspect it could be hard to keep pace with the evening crowd.  Waiting is an area that needs rephrasing and polishing.

(Photo Credits: Carmelita Fernandes)

Well, that’s a full measure of food art for now.  Let’s get to the fundamentals of this gastro pub.

(Photo Credits: Carmelita Fernandes)

No visit to any pub is complete without indulging in spirits or cocktails.  CrafBar, in particular, is known to  attract its customers for its craftily mixed blends.  For me it had to be the vodka gola which is what drew me to this pub in the first place.  Tera Kya Hoga Kaliya is its name.  The concoction wasn’t chaotic as I believed it be, in fact I thought it was a remarkably good idea to have a crushed ice gola sitting in a kala khatta vodka of a drink.  The gola has dual benefits.  For one, it reminds you of those good old picnic days on the beach when you would happily slurp gola after gola.  Or if you didn’t feel young enough to remember those picnics or perhaps didn’t go to any, you could at least let the gola cool your drink.  Blended with vodka it is bound to revive you into a gola-sucking-youth a few pegs later.  Priced @ Rs 335 per drink.

(Photo Credits: Carmelita Fernandes)

If you happen to be a coffee fan, you are likely to enjoy its coffee liqueur cocktail served in a chocolate shot glass, with whole coffee beans.  Don’t Angry Me – a funky name – made angrier with some dark rum.  I took a sip of this one and let the rest take a miss as the coffee beans interfered in the channeling of the liquid inside.  I bit on a bean as it popped into the mouth while sipping the liqueur and then I wondered why I hadn’t swallowed it whole!

(Photo Credits: Carmelita Fernandes)

Not all coffee liqueurs here come with trespassing beans.  There’s the Irish Cream which came as saviour but was a mite too sweet for my liking.  Aata Maji Satakli, whose coffee powder aroma is intensely reinvigorating.  Sweetened with condensed milk and spiked with whiskey.  Priced @ Rs 350 per cocktail.

(Photo Credits: Carmelita Fernandes)

And then came the biggest thunderbolt of it all, KICK.  This translates to a tequila shot in an ice glass!  A fantastic herbed flavoured drink that couldn’t have been a better bet to give an ice glass company but not for long as the meltdown begins.  Kickass.  Priced @ Rs 395 per shot.

Smoke Valley is the name of CraftBar’s bar station.  The drinks range from wine, beer, aperitifs to single malts, blended whiskey and so on.  Beer starts at Rs 135 while malts @ Rs 400, blends @ Rs 270, cocktails @ Rs 345, Sangria pitchers @ Rs 1,260 onwards.  Refer to its menu for more options and pricing.

(Photo Credits: CraftBar)

Fun all the way, not surprising then that the pub’s chef and mixologist are of Indigo fame!

As if this wasn’t enough of a surprise tour, there came a brown surprise at the end of the meal.  Brownie sandwich with gajar halwa, a sensation that can take your breath away.  Learnt that it’s a popular choice.

(Photo Credits: Carmelita Fernandes)

In summary, this is a great place to indulge in eccentric spirits/mocktails/cocktails, devour idiosyncratic fusion food with Indian undertones, sing/listen to music and watch your favourite game even if you have to shout to be heard.  A handful and a quite a mouthful!  

To check out more of its features than what is covered, do log on to CraftBar’s website http://craftbar.co.in/

Do so while the menu’s not as hard on the wallet, at least not yet (relatively speaking)!

A review on CraftBar, BKC – an quirky bar with a crafty menu! (Published on Zomato, TripAdvisor, Google Maps, Quora & Swiggy) If there is one quirky pub to be, one which follows…