#Julius Kwame | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

seeinganewlight · 9 months

Text

2024 books read

2024 goal: 150 books

january: 1 - heartstopper vol. 1 → alice oseman (reread) 2 - heartstopper vol. 2 → alice oseman (reread) 3 - heartstopper vol. 3 → alice oseman (reread) 4 - heartstopper vol. 4 → alice oseman (reread) 5 - heartstopper vol. 5 → alice oseman 6 - a fragile enchantment → allison saft 7 - some shall break → ellie marney (audiobook) 8 - only if you're lucky → stacy willingham (arc) 9 - over my dead body: a witchy graphic novel → sweeney boo 10 - notes on an execution → danya kukafka (physical & audiobook) 11 - murder on the orient express → agatha christie (reread) 12 - our wives under the sea → julia armfield (physical & audiobook) 13 - the invocations → krystal sutherland (arc) 14 - red string theory → lauren kung jessen 15 - the breakup tour → emily wibberley & austin siegemund-broka (arc) 16 - the name drop → susan lee 17 - the secret of the old clock → carolyn keene (reread) 18 - bright young women → jessica knoll (audiobook) 19 - last call at the local → sarah grunder ruiz (audiobook) 20 - no one can know → kate alice marshall

february: 21 - worst wingman ever → abby jimenez 22 - drop, cover, and hold on → jasmine guillory 23 - with any luck → ashley poston 24 - the atlas six → olivie blake (reread, audiobook) 25 - that's not my name → megan lally 26 - not here to stay friends → kaitlyn hill 27 - this golden state → marit weisenberg 28 - today tonight tomorrow → rachel lynn solomon (reread, annotation) 29 - past present future → rachel lynn solomon (arc, annotation) 30 - the atlas paradox → olivie blake (reread, audiobook) 31 - the guest list → lucy foley (audiobook) 32 - in the market for murder → t.e. kinsey (audiobook) 33 - the neighbor favor → kristina forest 34 - in the mix → mandy gonzalez 35 - everyone in my family has killed someone → benjamin stevenson 36 - the seven year slip → ashley poston 37 - veronica ruiz breaks the bank → elle cosimano (audiobook) 38 - finlay donovan rolls the dice → elle cosimano (audiobook) 39 - the simmonds house kills → meaghan dwyer (arc)

march: 40 - the mysterious case of the alperton angels → janice hallett 41 - the book of cold cases → simone st. james 42 - what the river knows → isabel ibañez (audiobook) 43 - cut loose! → ali stroker & stacy davidowitz 44 - how i'll kill you → ren destefano 45 - the reappearance of rachel price → holly jackson (arc) 46 - when no one is watching → alyssa cole (audiobook) 47 - outofshapeworthlessloser: a memoir of figure skating, f*cking up, and figuring it out → gracie gold (audiobook) 48 - julius caesar → william shakespeare (rerad, audiobook) 49 - the family plot → megan collins (audiobook) 50 - if we were villains → m.l. rio (reread) 51 - alone with you in the ether → olivie blake (physical & audiobook) 52 - disappearance at devil's rock → paul tremblay (audiobook)

april: 53 - shakespeare: romeo and juliet graphic novel → martin powell & eva cabrera 54 - shakespeare: macbeth graphic novel → martin powell & f. daniel perez 55 - shakespeare: julius caesar graphic novel → carl bown & eduardo garcia 56 - shakespeare: a midsummer night's dream graphic novel → nel yomtov & berenice muniz 57 - twelfth knight → alexene farol follmuth (arc) 58 - kill for me, kill for you → steve cavanagh 59 - murder road → simone st. james 60 - everyone on this train is a suspect → benjamin stevenson 61 - listen for the lie → amy tintera 62 - king cheer → molly horton booth, stephanie kate strohm, jamie green 63 - twelfth night (musical adaptation) → kwame kwei-armah & shaina taub 64 - in juliet's garden → judy elliot mcdonald 65 - fat ham → james ijames 66 - death by shakespeare → philip l. nicholas, jr 67 - a good girl's guide to murder → holly jackson (reread) 68 - good girl, bad blood → holly jackson (reread) 69 - as good as dead → holly jackson (reread) 70 - dark corners → megan goldin (audiobook) 71 - the one that got away with murder → trish lundy (audiobook) 72 - funny story → emily henry 73 - imogen says nothing → aditi brennan kapil 74 - people we meet on vacation → emily henry (audiobook, reread)

may: 75 - episode thirteen → craig dilouie 76 - the girls i've been → tess sharpe (reread) 77 - the girl in question → tess sharpe (arc) 78 - wild about you → kaitlyn hill (arc) 79 - just for the summer → abby jimenez 80 - my best friend's exorcism → grady hendrix 81 - second first date → rachel lynn solomon 82 - the ballad of darcy & russell → morgan matson 83 - the good, the bad, and the aunties → jesse q. sutanto (audiobook) 84 - truly, madly, deeply → alexandria bellefleur 85 - your blood, my bones → kelly andrew 86 - amy & roger's epic detour → morgan matson (reread) 87 - romancing mister bridgerton → julia quinn (reread) 88 - the viscount who loved me → julia quinn (reread) 89 - bittersweet in the hollow → kate pearsall 90 - to sir phillip, with love → julia quinn (reread) 91 - when he was wicked → julia quinn (reread) 92 - it's in his kiss → julia quinn (reread) 93 - on the way to the wedding → julia quinn (audiobook, reread) 94 - emma → jane austen (audiobook, reread)

june: 95 - first lie wins → ashley elston 96 - we got the beat → jenna miller 97 - firekeeper's daughter → angeline boulley 98 - chlorine → jade song (audiobook) 99 - what stalks among us → sarah hollowell 100 - hollow fires → samira ahmed (audiobook) 101 - part of your world → abby jimenez 102 - the road trip → beth o'leary 103 - yours truly → abby jimenez 104 - finally fitz → marisa kanter 105 - the last love song → kalie holford

july: 106 - dead girls walking → sami ellis (audiobook) 107 - home is where the bodies are → jeneva rose 108 - we used to live here → marcus kliewer 109 - the children on the hill → jennifer mcmahon (audiobook) 110 - what moves the dead → t. kingfisher 111 - my throat an open grave → tori bovalino 112 - dashed → amanda quain (arc) 113 - asking for a friend → kara h.l. chen (arc) 114 - beach read → emily henry (reread, audiobook) 115 - book lovers → emily henry (reread, audiobook) 116 - happy place → emily henry (reread, audiobook) 117 - you have a match → emma lord (reread, annotation) 118 - bonnie & clyde musical script → ivan menchell (reread) 119 - such charming liars → karen m. mcmanus (arc) 120 - she left → stacie grey (audiobook) 121 - let the games begin → rufaro faith mazarura (audiobook) 122 - death at morning house → maureen johnson (arc)

august: 123 - cleat cute → meryl wilsner (audiobook) 124 - i wish you would → eva des lauriers 125 - the break-up pact → emma lord (arc) 126 - water for elephants → sara gruen 127 - when you get the chance → emma lord (reread, annotation) 128 - come out, come out → natalie c. parker (arc) 129 - my lady jane → cynthia hand, brodi ashton, jodi meadows 130 - the lies of alma blackwell → amanda glaze (arc)

september: 131 - the spare room → andra bartz 132 - late bloomer → mazey eddings (audiobook) 133 - savor it → tarah dewitt (audiobook) 134 - triple sec → t.j. alexander (audiobook) 135 - the skeleton key → erin kelly 136 - the examiner → janice hallett (arc) 137 - the dark we know → wen-yi lee (audiobook) 138 - pretty girls → karin slaughter 139 - a good girl's guide to murder → holly jackson (reread, annotation) 140 - lady macbeth → ava reid

#post: 2024 books read #i always get SO excited to start these threads!#and as y'all know i love starting the new year with a reread #so i figured this year it would be heartstopper and then i'd finally get to read heartstopper vol 5 #i loved it which is no surprise #i just love these characters so much <3

78 notes · View notes

slothgiirl · 3 years

Text

a rose by any other name x

prev. /// next.

druig x reincarnating human!reader.

massive chapter warning. like, idk how i even wrote this much and yet managed to write almost nothing in kyoto or hong kong.

Kyoto 1855

Sersi’s gaze finds yours and you can see her go from shock, mimicking a pufferfish, to excitement as she lights up and smiles fully before trying to stifle everything as she tilts her head and narrows her eyes trying to figure out if you knew her. You did.

It’s 1855 and Japan has been forced to open its borders again, finally. You thought you’d died before the shoguns let people travel freely in and out of the country. You’d gotten as far as Kyoto, but even your clever ways and deep well of knowledge came up short when you lacked the money for a bribe and couldn’t exactly chance swimming to Korea. No Dutch ship or Chinese would risk the lucrative trade to smuggle you out of the country.

But it was 1855, and Sersi was here.

Which meant all of them were here.

The tall woman rocks in place, visibly working through her thoughts as people pass by on the street.

It’s an artesian market on the outskirts of the Geisha District. In the day, families came through to shop and watch street musicians play. There were paintings of country scenes, the ever popular calligraphy, and hand carved combs were hawked by a man in a kimono. Another man with a wrinkled face and calloused hands sold onigiri with pickled plums or cuts of salmon.

You add to the life of the district, strumming songs who’s language had changed so much you could no longer speak it’s modern equivalent; you play songs that haven’t been heard in centuries. No one spoke Egyptian anymore.

The Aztec empire was gone.

You were one of a handful of witnesses to the passing of the ages.

Xenia. . .Kwame. . .so many more people just like them, just like you, who were nothing more than another human being living their lives on earth, making ripples that only the community remembered while the waves of history only cared for people like Julius Caesar. You carried their ordinary lives with you. You knew. You were there. Your lives had always been ordinary, and you wouldn’t change a moment.

You strum the wrong key on your shamisen.

Sersi hovers on the outskirts of the small crowd that has gathered, a few coins dropping into a wooden bowl you’d carried all the way from Gifu prefecture nearly a decade ago.

You smile slightly before bowing in respect, grateful that they had stopped and taken the time out of their day to listen to you and help you make your living. Then make the gesture of a word that she would recognize: you curve your hand against your temple.

You knew.

Her eyes widened again. Sersi bites her bottom lip, physically restraining herself from embracing you right then and there, her eyes shine with unshed tears.

You glance around for her shadow, but Ikaris is nowhere to be seen.

You collect the coins and put your instrument down for the day.

She comes to you then, “you’re. . .you’re here!” She had always been an awkward but excitable woman. Her komon was a solid cotton color, and you could just make out the hem of a pair of trousers underneath. It was a world away from the last time you had seen her, in the finest textiles and colourful feathers. She had no mark of wealth that Ajak favored.

“I am.” You nod, leading her away from the bustling square and into one of the tea houses in the district. “Tea?”

“Yes, well-” Sersi looks around, “that sounds good.”

“I’m guessing you just arrived,” you ask her, “though Ikaris letting you go out alone. . .I suppose there’s still the whole foreigner execution mandate going on,” you ramble. The teahouse was in a traditional building and affordable. There were no famed Geisha here. Just the family who ran the place. “Maybe he shouldn’t be out and about. . .”

Judging by Sersi’s expression, you might as well have kicked a puppy. She looks away, “maybe we should do this once we’re sitting down. . .”

“Do what,” you arch a brow, “what’s happened?” What could happen to immortal aliens who welded powers like theirs? “Sersi?”

“I-Ikaris isn’t here.” She gushed the rest out, “noneofthemare. It’s just me.” She smiles apologetically, looking more devastated with every word feeling insufficient and obviously missing her family.

“How?” You couldn’t wrap your head around it. They were Eternals. They’d always been together, even when they hadn't wanted to be.

It’s-let’s get tea.”

The tea is perfect. Steeped and full of flavor without the bitterness of having been left too long. Most importantly, you can drink it without burning your tongue, no waiting as steam rises.

“Well,” Sersi mulls over her words, “Thena got sick. Mahd Wy'ry.”

“Mad Wary?” You never even thought it was possible for any of them to get sick. Not like you and other people. You didn’t even know how you’d died last, just the blood and feeling incredibly tired.

“Mahd Wy'ry,” she enunciates slowly. “It’s in our mother tongue. It’s when you get these hallucinations and lose touch with reality. Thena. . .she was convinced there was a battle going on and didn’t recognize any of us, just attacked. No one wanted to hurt her but she is dangerous to herself and others. So Gilgamesh decided to look after somewhere remote. That or have Ajak wipe her mind-”

“Wipe her mind? Like, erase her memories,” you frown. “But surely there’s other ways to treat this without something so drastic.”

“I don’t know much about it,” Sersi admits, holding her warm cup with both hands.

“Laxatives or cocaine pills,” you offer.

“Ajak would know more than me,” she utters longingly. “Since the city fell, we all went our own ways. For a moment it was Ikaris, Ajak and me, but then. . .I don’t know. . .Ikaris left not long after Ajak and I-I don’t know. Maybe he was. . .” She looks up at the ceiling, trying her best not to cry.

You reach for her hand, “it’s not your fault. Didn’t he say anything?”

“No,” her voice is anguished, “he just left one day and never came back. I thought. . .I stayed in Veracruz for years waiting for him, so he’d know where to find me.”

“Sersi,” your hand tightens over hers.

“Yeah.”

She drinks her tea, “then I've just been knocking around and when I heard Japan was opening up, well, it’s been a moment and I was nearby in Vietnam.”

“I’m glad,” you smile, having left for Kyoto to search for Druig, monumental task in the wide world even with telegrams. You couldn’t exactly place an advert in the paper: Reincarnating wife seeking Immortal Husband. They’d laugh you right out of the office. “Really,” you add, when she doesn’t look convinced, “I am. It’s nice to see a familiar face again.”

“How long have you?”

“About a decade, more or less.”

“You’d like Vietnam,” Sersi tells you, “Though I think the French will dig their claws in any day now.”

“Like with Africa,” you think aloud, “I’m sort of glad the shogun closed the borders. Sure, it's a headache for me personally, but it probably kept the country from being divided up like Africa and China.”

“Fucking Africa,” Sersi frowns. “You’d think the USA would’ve outlawed slavery by now.”

“It’s only been three thousand years.” Some things never changed. Societal ills and all that, maybe they would always persist in some form or another.

“I don’t remember that being a problem in the early days, granted there were no steamships then,” she tells you.

You don’t want to be the first one to bring up Druig, not wanting the woman to feel like she was playing second fiddle when you were glad to see her again. You trusted you’d find your husband again.

And you could bring it up when Sersi wasn’t quite so depressed. Clearly she could do with having a bit of laudium.

“How do you even. . .how do you remember,” Sersi asks, looking down at her cup, puzzled. “I always thought you had to run into Druig or I guess one of us would do?”

“Not really. I don’t know,” you shrug, “it’s gotten much easier though even fourteen’s young by my standards.”

“How does it even happen? Not that I’m not thrilled to see you again,” she smiles brightly.

“I don’t know,” you frown, putting your cup down. “I’ve never known but yeah, don’t look a gift horse in the mouth. Which begs the question, how did you manage to get into Japan? I thought the bay out by Nagasaki was the only port of entry?”

“Oh,” Sersi turns crimson. “I convinced a fishing boat near Korea to let me onboard. Rocks into fish. Then I, well I bribed the officials.”

“Rich girl,” you tease.

“With books actually,” she explains. “They’re desperate to catch up and I had quite a few books from my time in France. Had to flee because of the revolution and then it was Vienna before making my way to Indochina.”

You snort, “of course you’d somehow bribe officials with books. I’m surprised you didn’t pull out a pristine copy of The Tale of Genji.”

She giggles.

“Where are you staying?”

“This inn,” she explains, on the shadower part of town.

“Oh, you’re staying with me now.”

“Maybe,” Sersi posits and really she’d make a wonderful scholar if she put her mind to it, “it’s some form of human magic? Or could it be a latent ability of Druig’s, given your connection to him? Though I’ve never heard of anything like this on Olympia. Do you remember a life before?”

You laugh nervously, reeling at her words. You’d never given it much consideration. “People can do magic? Like actual magic, not like the tricks from Athens, actual magic?”

She nods.

“I barely remember Egypt,” you admit. “It's like trying to remember when you were three.”

“Well,” she offers, “we could visit some sorcerers,” then she quickly adds, “if you’re okay with it. We don’t have too. It is out of the way, and I’m sure you want to go straight to Druig after all this time.”

Brimming with curiosity about human magic and her awareness of sorcerers, you can’t just say no. “How far out of the way?”

“Hong Kong.”

“Hm,” you think, “and Druig is?”

“Back in Mexico. North of what used to be Tenochtitlan. Mexico City expanded so fast. . .you’ll see what I mean,” she grips her cup with both hands.

“Okay,” you nod, “we’d have to catch a ride in Hong Kong or Manila anyway. Might as well.” You wouldn’t mind knowing more. Maybe give you peace of mind that there wouldn’t be a last time, or tell you how many more lives you’d live.

It could be good.

Sersi intertwines her fingers with you. She reminds you of Xenia.

***

Hong Kong is a sleepy fishing village that reminds you more of the farming town you’d grown up in, the rice paddies and endless green. The main blocks of the city where the English have established themselves are much more modernized in a western Greek revival style, while wood buildings and elegant horse drawn carriages. It feels enormously foreign.

You might as well be in an entirely different country.

You could only compare it to Bursa in its golden age. At least the Ottoman Empire was still around, making you feel a bit more grounded. Not everything had become unrecognizable.

“I think it was this way,” she led you around the streets, “or maybe it was down that street?” Sersi forces you to practice Cantonese which is hardly the most difficult language you’ve learned. It’s one of those that just clicked for you.

“Are you sure you remember the way?”

Even your simplest kimono stood out among the Westerners in the street: the rounded collar’s of the Chinese style jackets and trousers.

“Yes. It’s here. The buildings, it’s different.” She glances around before leaning close to you, “There was no English here last time.”

“We can catch a ship,” you tell her, working around the feeling lodged in your throat at the prospect of being so close to answers you hadn’t even known you wanted until they were dangled in front of you. “And just head to-”

“This way!” Sersi pulls you along a bit too hard, forgetting she was much stronger than you.

“Careful!”

“Sorry,” she winces, “I should know better by now.”

“It’s fine,” you wave it off, glancing around the street, wondering what a building run by sorcerers would look like, “‘s long as you don’t rip my arm off, please and thank you.”

She laughs, “I’m not that strong. Well, maybe if I tried and put my back into it. . .it’s just never been an area I’ve worked on.” Then she grins, all Maiko white teeth, and says, “this is it.”

The building is ordinary. Wood and stone like the English buildings, with smooth paint, and seemingly no magic in sight. It gave you both the impression that it had always been here and had been built yesterday.

You didn’t recognize the characters on the sign. They were nothing like the flowing characters of Japanese or Arabic.

Sersi goes right up and then turns to you, “should I or do you?”

You knock on the door.

How bad could this go?

The door opens and a man dressed in a simple Tang suit leans out. “We are closed today.”

“Oh, no, we’re here for the-”

“We are closed.”

“About that,” Sersi tries.

The man starts to close the door.

You stick your foot in the door, “At least let her finish.”

“The Hong Kong Sanctum,” she tries, “I was wondering if you could answer some questions we have.”

The man's mouth quirks up, “usually it’s the other way around.”

“So may we step inside,” you ask, more to the point.

He nods. “I am Chih-Ming.”

Sersi introduces you both.

The inside of the building is more what you would expect from the little you have seen of Hong Kong houses, scrolls with confusian sayings as well as characters that look strange to you. Maybe magic? A woman waters plants around the entryway without a jar; she moves her hands in mudra-like forms and water gently falls, conjured water.

You stare.

“Come, you must speak with Hoa, she runs this sanctum,” he explains. “You are familiar with the mystic arts after all.”

Sersi and you nod though you have no clue. People, doing magic! Actual magic, none of the drug induced “visions” shamen and priests had. Like Sersi turns rocks into, well, anything, a human woman was just summoning water. What else could they do?

“Right this way then.”

You keep your eyes peeled for more. Other Chinese and people from the surrounding places walk around in simple robes. They walk into other rooms, the thin walls doing more to separate the rooms than stone. Not even sound carried. Magic.

It was magic.

Eventually Chih-Ming leads you to a door on the upper floor of the building. “Master Tran,” he says as he knocks on the door, “there are-”

“Yes, let them in. I’ve been expecting them.”

You want to roll your eyes. Now this, this seemed like a trick. You were sure she said that to everyone who dropped by just to seem mysterious and uber powerful.

Either way, you follow Sersi in.

Hoa Tran is old, all her hair gone white and more wrinkles than you can count that map out her age for all to see. She still sits on a woven mat with ease, back straight, as she reads through a book.

The pages flip by themselves.

“You may leave us.”

Chih-Ming bows in respect before leaving.

“Come, sit.” She motions in front of her, closing her book. “Thank you,” Sersi bows. “Sorry to drop in like this. I wasn’t sure if the old address would be correct and mail sometimes takes longer than travel these days.”

“These days, you really mean that don’t you,” Master Tran smiles knowingly. “Sersi of the Eternals.”

“You know?”

Things continued to get more and more interesting. How could this random woman know?

“I do. There’s multiple books in the Sanctum categorizing accounts of your. . .group, going back three thousand years.” The old woman’s gaze moves to you, “and yours.”

“Really,” you lean forward, “could I see them? The books?”

“Our library is open,” she nods, “to all who enter and choose to study our ways.”

“And what are your ways?” You arch a brow, not sure you liked the idea of having to be here and join whatever this was, but magic.

“Before we get ahead of ourselves,” Master Tran raises a hand, “let’s go back to why you are here, no?”

You nod. “Okay. Yeah, um,” you felt strange to even say it after all this time. For so long you have just accepted this as part of you and moved on. “I’ve been reincarnating, for as long as I can remember. This is, I think this is the tenth time?” You hadn’t exactly kept track. “I don’t know why or how or if it’ll suddenly stop.” That was your main concern. You didn’t want to just-

“Are you comfortable,” she pauses, “or would you want to speak privately?”

You glance over at Sersi.

She leaves it up to you.

“I’d be more comfortable with her here,” you admit easily. You didn’t trust this random woman. Sersi, you knew.

“Alright then,” she nods, “let’s see what we’re working with,” then she puts her thumb in the middle of your forehead and before you can ask what she’s doing, you fall.

The world ripples and grows, lights form shapes and collapse around you and everything becomes insubstantial. It’s giving you a raging headache to even watch as everything around you shifts.

You try to lift your hands to catch yourself only to find yourself standing.

“What did you do,” Sersi tilts her head. Her voice is murky like hearing something from underwater.

Hoa ignores her, her gaze traveling from. . .from you to you.

Your body was laying on the ground.

“I don’t understand?”

“Few do,” Master Tran utters, voice clear. “Or else everyone would do what you call magic, what we know as the mystic arts. Now, let’s see-”

The world blurs again.

Your feet sink into sand even as you topple over. Your head hurts. Sersi is gone.

You reach to push yourself up but your hand passes right through the sand. You didn’t understand.

“Do not limit yourself to what is in front of your eyes,” Master Tran says simply, “just do. If you want to stand, you will. It’s all willpower.”

It was getting annoying. You might look fresh faced and in your twenties, but you were older than many countries.

You stand, “what do you mean everyone could do magic?”

“Everyone has the potential if they wish to learn, but most people lack the discipline to continue on this journey.Like with all matters in life, it isn’t for everyone. Not everyone can be an explorer in the arctic or a linguist. Not everyone can be a sorcerer.”

You recognize this place, “Egypt.” The Egypt you knew, not as it was now. The pyramids are capped with gold. The shine across the horizon. Wheat and grains line the fertile land surrounding the river. You used to come here sometimes, a very long time ago.

“It’s not-we’re not really here,” you meant a time.

“No, it’s just your memory,” the sorcerer nods, “I. . .cannot time travel.” But she didn't say it wasn’t possible, just that she could not. “May I see your hand?”

“Now you ask,” you say archly, holding both hands out.

She runs her fingers over your skin. “You have a spell woven into the very fabric of what people like to call souls, your astral projection, that which makes you, you.”

“What?”

“It’s your spell. You never. . .did things without meaning to? A treasured plate you found unbreakable? Shoes that never wore out?”

Rain that never drenched your drying clothes even as it fell on your hair.

Master Tran smiles softly, clearly remembering her own life, “Or one day something terrible happens and you search for a miracle only to learn how to make miracles for yourself.”

“What happened to you,” you ask, flinching at how aggressive you sound, how rude, “if you don’t mind me asking. You don’t have to tell me Master Tran.”

“One of our water buffalo crushed my foot. And yet,” she looks down, “here I am.”

You found it hard to believe that they could do the same kind of work Ajak did. “Why keep it to yourself? Why not teach everyone?”

“We follow the path set up for us by the Ancient One. We are here for those who seek us out. Our doors are open, but the mystic arts are not to be taken lightly.”

You frown. It sounded like an excuse more than anything.

“Here we are,” Master Tran nods her chin and sure enough, you watch a younger older-looking you walk up to watch the sun shine over the land.

“So. . .if I made the spell, what then? Will it just run out of steam? Do i have to keep on making it?”

“I could undo the spell if you wish, or you could stay here and learn the mystic arts yourself and undo the spell on your own. You would not be able to draw energy for the spells you would learn and power the spell you have made.”

“I’d die after this,” you say, more to the point.

“Yes, as all things must. We are bound to the laws of nature. Everything dies.”

“Would you undo the spell by force?”

“No,” she shakes her head.

Tension eases in your chest as the sun sets over Egypt.

“I would advise you to-” she tilts her head, “You have lived a long time.”

“But the spell won’t randomly break?”

“You are fueling it yourself, unconsciously, the same as you forged it here, thousands of years ago. I would be very surprised if it were to break.” She frowns, clearly not pleased at the idea. “It’s not for us to live so long.”

“But I haven’t,” you point out. “I live and die, over and over again. It’s not exactly thrilling to remember dying and to-I don’t get to grow old with the man I love or have a life like other people do, but at least we can be together.”

“A half measure.”

“Do you have a better solution,” you snap angrily.

“No.”

Your anger flares at her flippant tone. This was your life. You were done here. There were only explanations but no answers.

***

The boat rocks and you feel your stomach swim again, turning into knots and the nausea rises all over again. It didn’t matter if you were in the second class cabin curled up in the bottom bed or if you were on the deck getting air.

“There, there,” Sersi tried.

“You don’t have to,” you close your eyes and take a deep breath. “I’m sure you’d rather be enjoying the dining room, or those musicians. . .”

“I don’t mind. I can read down here. They have newspapers from all over the world, the art scene in Paris sounds amazing right now,” she rambles. “And they’re a few months behind, but I like catching up. Knowing what’s going on.” You were sure she was also lonely after who knows how many decades living by herself. You thought she’d be happier settling down in one place and making a life for herself in the community even if the most she could pull off was thirty years before her lack of aging raised questions. Sprite had even less time.

“Read one to me?”

“French? Or maybe Spanish, I don’t think you know Spanish and since that is where we’re heading. This one might be the most recent one from when we were in Manilla?”

“Anything, really.” You weren’t paying attention. Anything would work to take your mind off the rocking.

It hadn’t been bad near land. From Hong Kong to Manila had been fine. Stopping by Sydney for a few hours, it had been the open ocean that had done you in. The road to Mazatlan was long. Especially if the waves were this rough all the way across the Pacific.

You wish you had run into Makkari.

Sersi’s soft voice fills your cabin.

It grounds you.

For days you've thought about the little choices you had been given. Understand magic, but die, permanently. Don’t understand it, and keep on going like you always had. You didn’t want to live and die. It was difficult on both you and Druig.

What choice did you have though?

The luggage creaks as it rocks with the movement of the waves.

***

You spy land for the first time in weeks. Too bad it’s Hawai’i.

The ocean at least is calm.

“Did you ever look for Ikaris,” you ask Sersi, leaning on the railing.

Sersi raised her head and leaned back, soaking up the sun. “No. I guess that's my problem. For so long I was. . .I just went along with everything. I followed Ajak even when I felt we were doing wrong. . .I followed Ikaris’ lead and then he was gone and instead of doing, of looking for him and demanding answers I just waited around.”

“You aren’t now.”

“I’m not,” she laughs. “I’m done, waiting for something.I’ve done more in three centuries than I did in three thousand years.”

You laugh with her. “I'm glad. You’re, you’ve always been so good and. . .you deserve to be happy and find something fulfilling to do..”

“Yeah, like what?” She wonders.

“You could teach all these languages, or teach about dead ones,” you snort, “pretend to crack what Egyptian hieroglyphs are saying.”

“I do like history,” Sersi nods, “though,” she grins, “is it really history if you’ve lived through it?”

***

“This is quite remote,” you point out, having traded your kimono for one of Sersi’s Hong Kong style trousers and suits. It was easier to trek through the mud up the mountain. Days had gone by since the last time you’d seen civilization. Sometimes you lost track of the road entirely; in places, it had been overgrown by weeds.

“You don’t know the half of it,” Sersi catches her breath. It was a good thing you both travelled lightly.

“I thought you said north of Mexico City,” you huff, sweat dripping down your back, “not in the middle of nowhere.”

“Well, the rainforest north of Mexico City. Cities have grown a lot.”

“I know that. We should’ve brought horses.”

“Sorry,” she utters, with a laugh, “at least you’re not seasick anymore?”

You roll your eyes at her. “Not sure I agree.”

***

“You do get how fucked up this is,” you ask, looking at the floor. You’d left your shoes, entirely caked by mud, outside of Druig’s home. “Don’t you,” you look up at him. It’s the same man, the same face you know better than you know your own. You’ve traced his expression lines a hundred times over.

Druig is taken aback. “I’ve given them everything. Peace. Prosperity, a home. Proper healthcare.”

You press your tongue to the roof of your mouth, swallowing. “What about choice? Or free will?” You have not always been free yourself. “It’s not-it’s artificial peace. It’s not real when they’re not deciding to do it themselves. It should be-”

“No murder. Slavery,” Druig argues back stearnly, clasping his hands together, “No one goes hungry. Tangible results. What do philosophical thought experiments matter when they are living better lives than anything out there.” His mouth was a harsh line.

There was no getting through to him.

You knew how stubborn he was.

“Because. They. Didn’t. Choose. This.”

“They’re free to leave,” Druig frowns, placing his hands on your shoulders. “They choose to stay.”

“Oh yeah,” you roll your eyes, pulling away, “they choose living under your thumb like it’s not the only life they’ve ever known! What is it slavers always say? The slaves are happy,” you utter sarcastically.

You take no pleasure in Druig flinching, stepping back. “It’s not the same. Don’t try and pretend it’s the same,” he raises his voice, clearly exasperated.

“No,” you make your point, drawing the line in the dirt that this was not something you were going to accept just because it was coming from him when you disagreed with such a large-scale and persistent use of mind control, “you’re more like Arishem and Ajak deciding you know best.”

“I’m going for a walk.”

You look away from him, not really sure you had much else to say.

The entire feel of the place made the hairs on the back of your neck stand.

***

Sersi, in true Sersi fashion, has already made friends. “This is Cualtzin. She was telling me what they use to weave watertight baskets now. A lot’s changed. Like wool,” she points at the woman's skirt, “they have sheep now. And horses.”

“Right,” you smile at the woman. She looked only a few years older than you with dark hair plaited to her waist, and a lovely round face.

“They still mostly speak nahuatl though they know Spanish,” she smiles, “verdad?”

“Si, es bueno saber los dos idiomas. Los enseña mi abuela en la escuela del pueblo.”

It was a village, tucked away on the hillside. The houses were wood and stone, with a large building that might have been the school, or a town hall of sorts. In a village this small and remote, it might serve multiple purposes.

Like buddhist monks, the people wore simple clothes, made for function, in hues of blue.

In clumsy Spanish, you ask, “y tu, que haces aqui?”

“Y usted,” Sersi corrects you easily, having spent all of the road from Mazatlan to Mexico City schooling you in the current tongue of this country that had once been your home.

“Su español está bien. Como dice mi abuela, con que puedas hacerte entender está bien. Yo cuido a los pollos. Tenemos que estar moviendo los seguido.”

“Thank you. I haven’t really gotten the hang of it. Mayan, Nauhatl, Japanese, those I know.”

“You speak a lot of your grandmother,” Sersi points out.

“If you like,” the woman smiles, “you could come to our house and meet her. We could have dinner, if you like?”

Sersi smiles at you, “I’m starving. The journey took a lot out of me.”

“Agreed,” you nod, still feeling uneasy about the situation and how your talk with Druig had gone.

The Eternal reaches her hand for yours, squeezing your hand in comfort.

***

“Why so far from the city,” you ask Druig, reading a copy of El Si De Las Ninas. Rice could have been harvested three times over at the rate you were reading. The alphabet was so strange: assigning every shape a sound and putting it back together.

“To put distance between the village and the rest of the world. The Spanish completely destroyed Tenochtitlan.” He concentrates, planking in the living area of the house without a tremor in his arms.

“I know,” you muse, watching him from over the pages of your book. “I didn’t recognize it at all when we arrived. And the smell,” your nose wrinkles. The downside of so many horses, so many people, was the literal shit on the streets. The Aztecs may have ripped people’s hearts out, but at least they had clean water and basic hygiene.

Druig snorts.

You put your book down.

“So you’ll stay?”

“I don’t know,” you admit. “They seem. . .nice, welcoming.” You liked Cualtzin and her family. Sersi liked the children who were endlessly amused by her, having never seen anyone who appeared Chinese before. And she had the patience to entertain all the questions and the games they came up with.

But that didn’t change the facts.

Did this make you an accomplice?

Could you live in a place where people’s eyes flashed gold if they started arguing, if they fought?

“They are.”

“Hm,” you move, laying on his back, only slightly annoyed that there was no give. Superhuman strength had never bugged you so much.

“What are you thinking, my beautiful lady?”

“That I’ve missed you,” you whisper softly against the shell of his ear, “and I didn’t cross an ocean to argue with you for the next fifty years, and I still think you’re awful for doing this, no matter your good intentions. And they are good,” you state, “I wouldn’t still be here if they weren’t. . .I know you. You’ve always had a good heart,” you rest your chin on his shoulder, “but this isn’t right.”

“We’re at an impasse then,” he muses quietly.

“I don’t know.” You didn’t want to stay. You didn’t want to leave. You wanted DRuig to stop. You didn’t think he would. Through it all, you loved him.

Druig lays down on the floor.

You press a chaste kiss onto his shoulder.

“They do leave you know. To get what cannot be made here. Or for books and small amounts of trade. News of what goes on. . .yet they always return.”

“Sh.” You hush him, “I’m still cross with you. If anything, it’s talking to Cualtzin and her grandmother, seeing Javier who. . .he joined right?”

Of the top of his head, Druig answers, “Javier was found wandering the jungle as a child. I couldn’t find his family or where he had come from so he has stayed with us ever since.”

“Oh.” You rest you cheek against his back, breathing in sync with the rise and fall of his chest.

“Do you remember. . .last time. . .” Druig was loath to bring up your deaths.

“Yes. . .I don’t really know what happened, or why I bled out?”

Weak from bleeding so much, your memories were clidy at best. You should’ve screamed for help. You hadn’t had the energy by the time you realized how serious it was when you woke up in the morning.

“Hemorrhage,” Druig shifts, rolling over so that he can wrap his arms around you and tuck you into his chest. You welcome his touch, his embrace. You’ve missed him so much. It’s been months since you set out from Japan. The side trip to Tokyo took up a good chunk, and overland travel had slowed to a halt once you’d left the comfort of the train to travel by foot the rest of the way.

You lean into him, basking in the feel of him.

“That’s what Ajak said. When I got back. . .you were so pale. . .”

“I’m here now,” you whisper softly, “I'm right here.”

Druig kisses your temple. “Hemorrhage, from miscarrying. That’s why you died,” his voice has gone so quiet you can barely hear him.

“What.” You still.You hadn’t-that hadn't ever been a worry, it had never happened, you had been sure it wasn’t even possible. To now know that. . .it was, and you hadn’t even known. You could have taken care of yourself, you would have lived longer. There were herbs to prevent conception and herbs to strengthen you.

A child.

Your child.

Druig and your child.

It wasn’t that your thoughts had gone straight to having a family right this very second, only that the possibility that you could, that you could decide if that was something you wanted along with your husband, was such a paradigm shift to what had become your constants in your repeating life.

He waits for you to process.

“How-after all this time.”

“I know,” his voice is somber. “I didn’t know what to think after Ajak told me.”

You’re silent for a long time after that.

***

“Look at this El Salon des Refusés,” Sersi shows you a newspaper she had picked up on the last venture into the nearby town, “Some artist named Manet and apparently Emperor Napoleon had things to say.”

You were laying in her room. Apart from the uncanny peace in this village, you couldn’t find anything to do. The pace of life was akin to counting grains of rice. You missed the happenings of Kyoto. Change in the air. Rich and poor rubbing shoulders and the world changing. Clearly, Sersi agreed.

“Artists are so boring.They have all these rules.” Lowbrow art was where it was at. No one cared what crude carvings you did on bowls and spoons, but those marble sculptures and mosaics always had so many ratios and conventions handed down from the state.

“Not anymore. It's the subject matter that was frowned upon, but subjected to public opinion instead of the Salon.”

“What could it be,” you rolled your eyes, “the wrong color for the nobles.”

“Nudity.”

“In art,” you laugh, that was normal.

Sersi snickers, “alright, hush you, do you want to know or not?”

“Okay, tell me.”

“Nudity, but with an ordinary scene. Not allegorical, or mythological or-”

“I get it,” you laugh, “they should see Thena’s crude mix of vivid colors and misshapen bodies torn apart.”

“I just wish they'd taken photographs of the paintings and not the front of the exhibition,” Sersi notes wistfully.

“Planning a trip somewhere,” you wink.

“No,” she frowns, “not really. I'm enjoying being here with you.” Sersi wasn't looking forward to being alone.

“We could go together.”

“You don’t have too,” Sersi buries herself back in the newspaper, soaking up everything. “Mexico is a beautiful country. I’m teaching the children English. Well, history in English.”

“You do know a lot about history,” you tease.

You had no idea where she found the patience to not only wrangle kids but also teach them.You just didn’t have that talent, or desire. You wondered what it might be like to be a mother, to have your own, but it wasn't something you wanted with the burning ferocity couples in the midst of baby fever had.

You just had a lot of time to think.

***

“I was thinking of going to Europe. With Sersi,” you tell Druig casually as you help him make dinner.

“You were thinking or are planning,” he asks casually. There's an array of fresh vegetables, frijoles from the communal kitchen for anyone who wasn’t up for cooking or simply couldn’t for some reason, and the classic tortillas you still knew how to make. Your hands never burned.

“Both. She hasn't asked me, but I can tell she wants to go and is lonely and a lot of interesting things seem to be going on in Paris. Much better than the American Civil War. Overdue. I still don’t get why they couldn’t just pass a law like the English.”

Druig smiles, “if you want to go, you should. I don’t think you’ve been to Europe in a long long time.”

“That is true,” you grin, finishing up. “Lots has changed,” then on a more somber note, “are you sure you’re okay with it? We already have such a short time together.” It had been More than two hundred years since the last time you’d walked the earth.

“Don’t worry about me my lady,” Druig insists, “I’ll be here when you get tired of all the shit out there aye?”

“I’ll make a killing. I heard the Japanese aesthetic is all the rage right now. I can paint some good scenes of pagodas and geishas.”

“I’m glad you can cheer Sersi up,” Druig brings up, “Makkari’s has dropped in on her but she’s taken a long time to process-”

“He’s an ass.”

“I won’t argue with that.”

***

Druig kisses his way down your chest.

Your luggage is packed, but for now you lay in bed with your husband, your lover, the man you come back to again and again.

“I’ve missed this so fucking much,” he wishpers against your skin. You arch against him, towards his touch. “You’re so fucking sexy.”

“I know,” you grin, before moaning as his hand grazes your core. “I almost don't want to go.”

Druig smirks, “careful my love, I might make you miss your train.”

“Go ahead,” you tease, “try.”

***

A painting of you and Sersi hangs in the house you and Druig have shared for decades. It was a gift from Mary Cassat, back in the days when Impressionism was barely rising. She had gone on her way since then, going on to England. Sersi still sent you letters, not that you could read them with your eyes anymore.

Druig or Cualtzin’s granddaughter would help you read the letters.

Getting old came with all these drawbacks. Including being cold at all times.

You wrapped a blanket around your shoulders. It was still a nice day for a walk.

Druig is looking out down the hillside.

“You just had to build your dumb village on the side of une cerro,” you tell him, “what’s wrong with a nice even valley.”

He laughs, offering you his hand. “There’s water up here.”

“I do like the river,” you agree, “it makes for a nice swim. A shame there’s no axolotls there. Or tuna. Have you had tuna?”

“I have.”

“It’s great. I did love the ramen we invented here.”

“You are a very demanding taste tester,” Druig jokes, wrapping his arm around you.

You’re old and wrinkly and your bones pop everytime you stand up, and you’re still in love with him. You’ve been in love with him since Egypt, nothing had happened then, but you’d loved him.

Druig had obviously loved you back, why else would he have visited you nearly every day.

You watch the sun rise over the jungle.

notes: i learned everything about dr strange from 2 youtube clips of him arriving to kamar-taj and from what he’s featured in avengers and thor ragnarok. im not sure that the ship really would’ve stopped in hawai’i before mazatlan because the records i was able to find were mostly manilla to japan to hawai’i to california in the 1900s, not the correct time, but it would’ve been mazatlan because it was a port of entry. lots was happening in the world in the mid 1800s, or maybe its that its more relevant to us than history from three thousand years ago. the part ends in the late 1890s.

#druig #a rose by any other name #druig fanfiction #druig imagine #druig x y/n #druig x reader

126 notes · View notes