#Lamb Spare Ribs

[brayneworms]

blood on the bandage, ghost in the room | izuru kamukura

kinktober day two: wet dream

word count. 2.1k

content. 18+ MINORS DO NOT INTERACT, wet dreams, masturbation, past hinata/reader (flashback), introspection, kissing/making out, handjobs (more alluded to than explicit but still), gender-neutral reader (they use body butter and lip balm which i consider to be gender-neutral)

♪ deadlines (hostile) by car seat headrest

kinktober mlist | regular mlist

Izuru’s dreams wouldn’t make sense to the average person.

They are quick and hard and violent like a surgeon sawing away at you. They are more akin to haemorrhages than anything else. He does not often find recurring imagines in his states of hypnagogia—he knows the common ones. Teeth falling out, turning up to a social event naked, falling from a great height. Maybe it’s an indication of how fear has been cut from him by the root, rubbed down to a polished nub, that these dreams quelled as soon as he went under the knife. 

But—it’s annoying. Actually, it’s the thing that makes him realise he is still capable of feeling annoyed. There are trickles of his old self here. Hajime Hinata. He turns the name over in his head like a coin, faces flashing, green eyes-red eyes, short hair-long hair, ordinary-special. The differences between him and Hinata are strides rather than steps, but the boy insists on clinging to him. He supposes, grudgingly, it makes a certain amount of sense. Izuru had been made from the scraps of Hinata; had scrounged himself to completion from Hinata’s spare rib, for want of a poetic comparison. No effort could erase the boy completely.

And yet what remained of him annoyed. Izuru had no favourite foods (sustenance was sustenance) but sometimes when they gave him custard for dessert his stomach did an involuntary twitch and saliva trickled between his teeth. Izuru logically knew that the four toothbrushes in the pack were functionally identical, yet found himself drawn to use the blue one first, every time. Izuru had no friends, no family, no affection—and yet, and yet, when he saw you… 

It was like Hinata existed in gasps of consciousness, sparks of recognition that Izuru doesn’t know how to reconcile. He sees you across the grassy campus and knows the yuzu smell of your skin because you buy drugstore body-butter with the green lid. He knows the feeling of your hair beneath his hand and how your head fits in the hollow of his neck, that your heart beats slightly faster than the average person at around 89 beats per minute and that you have a mild intolerance to lactose that often doesn’t stop you indulging anyway. 

He is a creature cut from desire; such things have been surgically removed from him, and Izuru can’t imagine missing them. He’s seen the way things like love and lust cause people to fetter away their inhibitors, their sense, their selflessness. Desire makes the world an animalistic one; renounced from it, he is clean. Alone, perhaps, but clean. 

Not lately, though. His dreams have become disturbed. Jittery flashes from a life that is not his, but was, flash through him at night like an old film reel. It’s a feeling he cannot reconcile—Hinata had loved you. Izuru does not. But the body, the flesh remembers, even if the mind is absent. 

The body remembers all too well. Izuru dreams:

A camp bed, all they could afford. Most of Hajime’s furniture has been fleeced for spare yen to pay off the tuition fees for Hope’s Peak (the parents don’t know this debt will be settled with finality some way into their son’s second year, their money paid back in blood). The two of you have to squish up close together to have room for both of you, but Hajime privately does not mind, and he suspects—hopes—that you don’t either. Your presence and touch is not foreign, not by this stage of knowing each other, but it still makes him nervous. He feels like a spring lamb around you, his hands too big, too clammy, god he hopes you don’t notice him wiping them on his sweats every chance he gets. And you, doused in the thin lacquer of premature summer heat, skin glimmering with sweat beneath your loose shirt and shorts. Your knee presses into his, lazy, unshaved, but moisturised always with sunscreen and that body butter he likes. It’s citrusy—lemon or yuzu or something. 

You’re gorgeous. So gorgeous Hajime has no idea how he got so lucky. Some talentless loser—but he has to stop thinking about himself like that, really. You’re not talented either. Not desperate enough to remortgage your house to get into Hope’s Peak on a pity course, either, which he reckons still makes him a damn sight more pathetic than you. It’s fine. Whatever. He’s fine being pathetic around you since you seem to like him anyway. 

You look up at him. Your lips gleam dully with remnants of balm; it smudges up over your cupid’s bow, highlighting the skin there. “What’re you looking at?” you ask, in a tone that makes Hajime think you already know. He feels himself go impossibly warmer. 

“Nothing,” he blusters, fidgets anxiously with his too-big fingers. “D’you, uh, have enough room?”

“Well, no. But it’s fine. I might prefer it this way,” you say.

“Ahaha…” His laugh trails to an awkward stop. “Might you?”

“I might. You could convince me.” 

Ah. Okay. He’s not totally dense; he can pick up a hint. As long as the other person giving it to him is wearing bells and flashing red lights and a siren. He draws in a quick breath, steeling his suddenly galloping pace before leaning forward. His nose and chin brushes against yours, the angle awkward, too close; a spring digs into his thigh as he noses closer, feeling the soft slide of your lip balm on his mouth. It’s too hot to kiss properly, he thinks—no, despairs. There’s little he loves more than kissing you. Sex is good—sex is great—but he stumbles under the sheer pressure of it sometimes. With kissing there’s no real standards to uphold, as long as he remembers to keep control of his tongue. 

Still, he’s a young guy, and his body doesn’t listen to reason all the time. Only a few minutes later he has to pull back with a groan, glancing awkwardly where your hip rests in the cradle between his thighs. “Sorry,” he mutters, flushed to his ears. “Sorry, it’ll, uh, go down. If we stop.”

“Do you want to stop?” you ask. Hajime feels slightly dazed when he looks at you like this; your hair a little rumpled, shirt pulled to one shoulder leaving the other bared, looking up in a way that makes him feel big, loved, though maybe those are the same thing, he doesn’t know. 

“Not… not really,” he stammers, feeling grotesque in the face of his own desire. “But I don’t want to—like—just because it’s there doesn’t mean you have to do anything. I don’t want you to feel like you have to. You can just ignore it.”

Your hand on his knee. Not pushing up, just there, but it still makes hot sparks run up his spine. “I can help. If you want.”

Jesus. Hajime closes his eyes briefly, trying to ignore the way his body hums hotly. “You don’t have to.”

“I want to. Do you want?”

Of course, I do, he wants to shout. Can’t you see how much I want? I’m made of want. Instead he just gives a shaky nod, forcing himself not to shut his eyes; the vulnerability of it might be too much to bear. You lean forward and he loses himself in the hazy river of your lips against his, the slow lull that kissing you draws him into. Your hand slides slowly up his leg, squeezes at his thigh, kneads his flesh like bread until he feels his bones turn to jelly, until he’s straining against the fabric of his sweats and letting out pathetic choked noises into your mouth. This is what you do, he thinks as he rocks his hips lazily against your hand. You turn him insistent. 

Your hand slips under his waistband. He has a brief moment of panic, wondering when the hell the last time he trimmed or groomed or did anything down there was before your hand wraps warm and firm around him and the thoughts slip straight out of his head. He’s almost sleepy with pleasure as you stroke him, embarrassingly wet already so there’s no give beneath the soft of your palm. 

And he doesn’t have to hide, not with you, not ever, so he bucks his hips up into the tunnel of your hand, seeking something, so close—

And Izuru wakes. 

It’s cold and around him there is a perfect darkness. It is the furthest thing from a sunbathed summer afternoon as there could be. The sheets on his bed are pristine white and starched with something antiseptic. And the biggest difference is that he is Izuru, not Hinata—he is the furthest thing from that boy, that simpleton, someone who could never conceive of what he might one day become, and—

He’s erect.

Izuru blinks down at himself, ostensibly bewildered, which in and of itself is a pleasant change. But no, there’s nothing pleasant about this. It feels—strange, he can feel his skin prickling against his nightwear. He tries to breathe; it’s not as if this is the first time this has happened. Biology still has as much sway over his body as usual, and he knows that an endocrine system is nothing but a hormonal playground until around age twenty-four or twenty-five, and so yes it happens sometimes. He just ignores it until it goes away, which generally happens quite quickly.

He waits. Nothing happens. Every shift against the fabric seems only to make it worse, in fact.

Izuru grits his teeth. He’s not inherently averse to this—it’s new, and new is always a touch more interesting than the same. But it is, perhaps, a worrying symptom of a larger issue. Hinata, still inside his brain somewhere, tucked away like a badly-kept secret, like a loose penny. He’s not a fan of the idea that he may decide to come back out again one day. 

And he knows this is Hinata’s doing, because when he reaches out tentatively to lay his palm flat over the tent in his pyjama pants, it’s your face that flashes through his mind. It’s yuzu body butter and gossamer lip balm, and a noise rises in the back of his throat before he can stop it, something low and soft. His fingers fan out like a spiders’ body, smoothing over the fabric, the dip of his palm pressing against where he throbs. He remembers your hand doing something similar. 

And it’s second nature—or first, he supposes grimly—that slips his hand beneath the loose waistband of his pants. He doesn’t wear underwear to sleep, so there’s nothing but skin and a thatch of hair before the pads of his fingers graze the side of his dick. Izuru hisses, straight through his teeth; his sensitivity is heightened, no doubt from ignoring this side of himself for months. Just taking himself in hand makes his head spin. 

He knows that most people his age think of something when they do this—other people, commonly, but also pornography or some specific fetish. Izuru doesn’t know what to think of—but his body seems to have made the choice for him. The flesh remembers; as he makes the first slow, firm stroke, it’s you he thinks of. The warmth of your breath against his jaw, the soft of your hand on his dick. 

It would feel better, he thinks absently, if it were you doing this instead.

…How absurd. What a stupid thing to think.

But he doesn’t stop, can’t stop, even loathing his own train of thought. He’d thought he’d have to relearn this, but his hands move on autopilot, remembering how he likes to touch, to squeeze, to wait. His thumb strokes over the head, collects the prespend there and the sound that starts echoing from him as he fucks into his hand makes his brain buzz. One of his legs is flung over the side of the bed, long hair a tangle beneath him; he feels out of sorts, clumsy, and the unfamiliarity makes his blood quicken. 

He squeezes his eyes shut, bucks his hips into his hand. He’s close already. It’s barely been ninety seconds. Eighty-seven, eighty-eight, eighty-nine—

“I can help,” you whisper into his ear, some pretty sweet-smelling ghost. “If you want.”

With a strangled cry, Izuru comes into his hand, clamping the inside of his elbow against his mouth to stifle the noise. In the seconds after he’s breathless, heart shredding in his ears, blinking up at the swimming darkness of the ceiling. It’s dizzying—not just the experience, the crash of adrenaline, but the way it makes his perpetual clarity dim for a minute. 

For a moment, he shuts his eyes, wishes that when he opened them he’d see you lying beside him.

Izuru chalks that thought up to one of Hinata’s; these days, it’s getting harder to tell the difference. 

[nogoodsheepstealing-greatgrandma]

Calling all Aegon II fans who hate Book Dany for burning Mirri (for murdering her baby) and crucifying the slavers (for crucifying slave children) - how do you feel about Aegon's little light show?

Lastly King Aegon II turned his attention to the Shepherd. When brought before the Iron Throne for judgment, the prophet refused to repent his crimes or admit to treason, but thrust the stump of his missing hand at the king and told His Grace, “We shall meet in hell before this year is done,” the same words he had spoken to Borros Baratheon upon his capture. For that insolence, Aegon had the Shepherd’s tongue torn out with hot pincers, then condemned him and his “treasonous followers” to death by fire.

On the last day of the year, two hundred forty-one “barefoot lambs,” the Shepherd’s most fervid and devoted followers, were covered with pitch and chained to poles along the broad cobbled thoroughfare that ran eastward from Cobbler’s Square up to the Dragonpit. As the city’s septs rang their bells to signal the end of the old year and the coming of the new, King Aegon II proceeded along the street (thereafter known as Shepherd’s Way, rather than Hill Street as before) in his litter, whilst his knights rode to either side, setting their torches to the captive lambs to light his way. Thus did His Grace continue up the hill to the very top, where the Shepherd himself was bound amongst the heads of the five dragons. Supported by two of his Kingsguard, King Aegon rose from his cushions, tottered to the pole where the prophet had been chained, and set him aflame with his own hand.

Or what he did to Maester Gerardys for the crime of *checks notes* obeying his maesters vows and offering him medical treatment?

Aegon II lived the rest of his life in great pain…though to his honor, when Grand Maester Gerardys offered him milk of the poppy, he refused. “I shall not walk that road again,” he said. “Nor am I such a fool as to drink any potion you might prepare for me. You are my sister’s creature.” At the king’s command, the chain that Princess Rhaenyra had torn from Grand Maester Orwyle’s neck and given to Gerardys was now used to hang him. He was not given the quick end of a hard fall and a broken neck, but rather a slow strangulation, kicking as he gasped for air. Thrice, when he was almost dead, Gerardys was let down and allowed to catch a breath, only to be hauled up again. After the third time, he was disemboweled and dangled before Sunfyre so the dragon might feast upon his legs and innards, but the king commanded that enough of the Grand Maester be saved so “he might greet my sweet sister on her return.”

They found him hanging from the battlements of the gatehouse beside Dragonstone’s steward, captain of the guard, master-at-arms…and the head and upper torso of Grand Maester Gerardys. Everything below his ribs was gone, and the Grand Maester’s entrails dangled down from within his torn belly like so many burned black snakes.

And perhaps you can compare Gerardys' fate to that of Tyland Lannister... whose fate is indeed very fucked up.

Though the Crown had been flush with gold upon the passing of King Viserys, Aegon II had seized the treasury along with the crown, and his master of coin, Tyland Lannister, had shipped off three-quarters of the late king’s wealth “for safekeeping.” King Aegon had spent every penny of the portion kept in King’s Landing, leaving only empty vaults for his half-sister when she took the city.

Queen Alicent was fettered at wrist and ankle with golden chains, though her stepdaughter spared her life “for the sake of our father, who loved you once.” Her own father was less fortunate. Ser Otto Hightower, who had served three kings as Hand, was the first traitor to be beheaded. Ironrod followed him to the block, still insisting that by law a king’s son must come before his daughter. Ser Tyland Lannister was given to the torturers instead, in hopes of recovering some of the Crown’s treasure.

Down in the black cells, Ser Perkin’s men even found King Aegon’s former master of coin, Ser Tyland Lannister, still alive…though Rhaenyra’s torturers had blinded him, pulled out his fingernails and toenails, cut off his ears, and relieved him of his manhood.

However consider that Tyland stealing and hiding the treasury led directly to Rhaenyra's downfall. The bankruptcy of the realm - and the taxes Lord Celtigar had to raise as a result - was disastrous to Rhaenyra's reign. Of course any monarch was going to order Tyland be interrogated. Had her interrogators succeeded in getting the information out of him, the tide of the dance would have changed completely. If if weren't for the gold, his fate would have been the same as Otto Hightower and Jasper Wylde (Ironrod).

And yes, you can pull out the 'both sides' argument. You can argue that in this fantasy-medieval world both sides commit war crimes - in a world where beheadings and hangings are normalised and committed by both sides, where torture and ripping out tongues is normalised and committed by both sides - can any side claim a moral high ground? But even considering ideas of moral relativism when discussing a fantasy-medieval world, what purpose did it serve to torture Maester Gerardys, other than mere sadism?

Blood and Cheese

And perhaps you can ask, well, what purpose did it serve to kill Prince Jaehaerys? And to psychologically torture Helaena in such a horrifically cruel way? Well, no purpose at all. No justifiable purpose anyway. But I maintain that Rhaenyra did not order it, or even know it was going to happen:

Her first act as queen was to declare Ser Otto Hightower and Queen Alicent traitors and rebels. “As for my half-brothers and my sweet sister, Helaena,” she announced, “they have been led astray by the counsel of evil men. Let them come to Dragonstone, bend the knee, and ask my forgiveness, and I shall gladly spare their lives and take them back into my heart, for they are of my own blood, and no man or woman is as accursed as the kinslayer.” Word of Rhaenyra’s coronation reached the Red Keep the next day, to the great displeasure of Aegon II. “My half-sister and my uncle are guilty of high treason,” the young king declared. “I want them attainted, I want them arrested, and I want them dead.”

GRRM put these two announcements next to each other for a reason for starters - though this was before Luke's death...

On Dragonstone, Queen Rhaenyra collapsed when told of Luke’s death. Luke’s young brother Joffrey (Jace was still away on his mission north) swore a terrible oath of vengeance against Prince Aemond and Lord Borros. Only the intervention of the Sea Snake and Princess Rhaenys kept the boy from mounting his own dragon at once. (Mushroom would have us believe he played a part as well.) As the black council sat to consider how to strike back, a raven arrived from Harrenhal. “An eye for an eye, a son for a son,” Prince Daemon wrote. “Lucerys shall be avenged.” Let it not be forgotten: in his youth, Daemon Targaryen had been the “Prince of the City,” his face and laugh familiar to every cutpurse, whore, and gambler in Flea Bottom. The prince still had friends in the low places of King’s Landing, and followers amongst the gold cloaks. Unbeknownst to King Aegon, the Hand, or the Queen Dowager, he had allies at court as well, even on the green council…and one other go-between, a special friend he trusted utterly, who knew the wine sinks and rat pits that festered in the shadow of the Red Keep as well as Daemon himself once had, and moved easily through the shadows of the city. To this pale stranger he reached out now, by secret ways, to set a terrible vengeance into motion.

Daemon, named the Rogue Prince for a reason, was acting independently of the Black Council - and of Rhaenyra. In fact, the Council itself is suggested to be acting independently of Rhaenyra:

The bird arrived as Rhaenyra and her blacks were mourning Ser Erryk and debating the proper response to “Aegon the Usurper’s” latest attack. Though shaken by this attempt on her life (or the lives of her sons), the queen was still reluctant to attack King’s Landing. Munkun (who, it must be remembered, wrote many years later) says this was because of her horror of kinslaying. Maegor the Cruel had slain his own nephew Aegon, and had been cursed thereafter, until he bled his life away upon his stolen throne. Septon Eustace claims Rhaenyra had “a mother’s heart” that made her reluctant to risk the lives of her remaining sons. Mushroom alone was present for these councils, however, and the fool insists that Rhaenyra was still so griefsick over the death of her son Lucerys that she absented herself from the war council, giving over her command to the Sea Snake and his wife, Princess Rhaenys.

This account is considered by Archmaester Gyldayn to be the most likely. Especially since it stands in contrast to her reaction to Jace's death, making it likely that beforehand she had been withdrawn in her grief.

Broken by the loss of one son, Rhaenyra Targaryen seemed to find new strength after the loss of a second. Jace’s death hardened her, burning away her fears, leaving only her anger and her hatred.

Still, assuming she wasn't responsible for Blood and Cheese, should she have executed Daemon for it? I suppose no more than Aegon should have executed Aemond for murdering Lucerys - a child and a messenger - rather than throwing him a congratulatory feast. Robb Stark would have done it. Robb Stark also paid dearly for it. And Daemon is both the father of two of her children and the rider of Caraxes in a war where every dragon counts, where the remainder of her children's lives are still at stake.

How many innocent ratcatchers did Aegon hang in revenge for Blood and Cheese?

Ok, well what about Nettles?

Obviously I am not here to defend Rhaenyra's treatment of Nettles - but I know TG like to raise it as an example of 'both sides are just as bad'.

On that note, I can compare Daemon's bloodless takeover of Harrenhal to Aemond beheading children. I can detail both Aemond and Daeron's war crimes in the riverlands, including allowing the mass rape of children. I can point out that the Greens also attempted to court Dalton Greyjoy, and remind you that their allies the Triarchy are guilty of their own fair share of kidnap and enslavement.

But lets keep this to comparing Rhaenyra's actions to Aegon's actions. First off, most of her councillors - aside from 2 - were urging her to suspect the remaining dragonseeds, were warning her of the threat of two more dragonriders turning Green, the threat this would pose to her surviving children. And she ultimately acted on the word of her master of whisperers, Mysaria. At a time when Rhaenyra is documented as being in a deteriorated mental state due to her grief at losing 4 children, and paranoia - a consideration that even Septon Eustace allows.

“Her Grace had been betrayed so often, by so many, that she was quick to believe the worst of any man,” Septon Eustace writes. “Treachery no longer had the power to surprise her. She had come to expect it, even from those she loved the most.”

Was Aegon also in a deteriorated mental state due to grief and paranoia when he executed the ratcatchers? Yes, I suppose - though they didn't have dragons or pose much of a threat. But was Aegon also in physical pain himself when he tortured and gruesomely murdered Maester Gerardys, or when he put on his little light show? Yes, I suppose that is a consideration - I'm sure Maester Gerardys forgave it. But Rhaenyra's paranoia and grief didn't compel her to order anything out of the ordinary in this fantasy medieval world - arrests, interrogations, beheadings. Aegon's treatment of the Shepherd and his followers, of the ratcatchers, of Maester Gerardys, is particularly sadistic and pointless.

I'll have to do a separate post to discuss Mushroom and Eustace and their motives, which are not as simple as one always tells the truth about Rhaenyra and one always lies - but it is worth noting that it is Eustace's account that insists Rhaenyra ordered Nettles be executed specifically out of jealousy, that calls Nettles a 'common thing with the stink of sorcery'. I am not saying there is no shred of truth to it, but it wouldn't be out of character for Eustace to depict events in the most misogynistic way possible (plus he wasn't in the room). This is the same guy who went 'who would fight for Rhaenyra now she's fat and ugly?', so it's not beyond him to cast her as a jealous bitch. Maybe it did go down as Eustace says (again, still considering Rhaenyra's mental state), or maybe Mysaria claimed to have proof of an actual plan to betray the Blacks, not just adultery?

It might be so. Yet Queen Rhaenyra did not act at once, but rather sent for Mysaria, the harlot and dancing girl who was her mistress of whisperers in all but name. With her skin as pale as milk, Lady Misery appeared before the council in a hooded robe of black velvet lined with blood-red silk, and stood with head bowed humbly as Her Grace asked whether she thought Ser Addam and Nettles might be planning to betray them. Then the White Worm raised her eyes and said in a soft voice, “The girl has already betrayed you, my queen. Even now she shares your husband’s bed, and soon enough she will have his bastard in her belly.” Then Queen Rhaenyra grew most wroth, Septon Eustace writes.

Eustace says Rhaenyra asked about both Addam and Nettles, but Mysaria is only quoted answering about Nettles. Which doesn't explain why Rhaenyra subsequently ordered Addam's arrest too. We don't have any alternative accounts to Eustace's, but then we could also consider Gyldayn's motives in compiling historical accounts the way he does (though that admittedly can lead us down many rabbit holes).

So maybe Rhaenyra was acting out of spiteful jealousy, or maybe paranoia and a deteriorated mental state, or maybe false evidence, or maybe some combination of the above. Either way, again compare to how Aegon treats Maester Gerardys. You can argue he does so out of paranoia, out of pain - but he could have simply had Gerardys arrested or executed. He didn't have to kill him the way he did. 'Both sides are bad' still leaves room for 'one side was worse', and each side was made up of more actors than just Aegon and Rhaenyra.

After all, who does Daemon ultimately lay the blame on?

The prince greeted me politely, but as he read I saw the joy go from his eyes, and a sadness descended upon him, like a weight too heavy to be borne. When the girl asked what was in the letter, he said, ‘A queen’s words, a whore’s work.’

We could likewise pin the blame on Alicent if you wish, for Aegon ordering the mutilation of a 10-year-old Aegon the Younger and a 13-year-old Baela.

“You fed his mother to your dragon,” she reminded her son. “The boy saw it all.” The king turned to her desperately. “What would you have me do?” “You have hostages,” the Queen Dowager replied. “Cut off one of the boy’s ears and send it to Lord Tully. Warn them he will lose another part for every mile they advance.” “Yes,” Aegon II said. “Good. It shall be done.” He summoned Ser Alfred Broome, who had served him so well on Dragonstone. “Go and see to it, ser.” As the knight took his leave, the king turned to Corlys Velaryon. “Tell your bastard to fight bravely, my lord. If he fails me, if any of these Braavosi pass the Gullet, your precious Lady Baela shall lose some parts as well.”

Well, she didn't say anything about Baela, he just added another child to the mutilation list (if you replaced Aegon with Joffrey and Baela with Sansa, would TG still be salivating?). And Alicent wasn't around when Aegon chose this particularly violent and gruesome execution:

Rhaenyra Targaryen had time to raise her head toward the sky and shriek out one last curse upon her half-brother before Sunfyre’s jaws closed round her, tearing off her arm and shoulder. Septon Eustace tells us that the golden dragon devoured the queen in six bites, leaving only her left leg below the shin “for the Stranger.” Elinda Massey, youngest and gentlest of Rhaenyra’s ladies-in-waiting, supposedly gouged out her own eyes at the sight, whilst the queen’s son Aegon the Younger watched in horror, unable to move.

"This was revenge for Blood and Cheese... Aegon would have assumed Rhaenyra ordered it..." Hey if I was picking a way to go, I'd take a slit throat over being eaten alive. One is a great deal quicker.

Is the psychological torture Aegon the Younger went through here justified by the psychological torture Helaena went through? Do I even care to entertain it? Do you want me to go all the way back to the psychological torture Rhaenyra went through over Lucerys while Aegon and Aemond were partying - how terrifying were his final moments, was his death mercifully quick, did he feel himself being eaten alive, was he swallowed whole, was he still alive when Vhagar digested him - she didn't have a body to bury, only the horrors of her imagination. (hey TG, replace Aemond and Vhagar with Ramsay and his hunting hounds).

Aegon the Elder at this point had also very recently just murdered Maester Gerardys in the most pointlessly gruesome and sadistic way. So you know what, I'm inclined to think he didn't have justice for Helaena in mind when he forced Aegon the Younger to watch. I think he's just like that.

While we can theoretically blame Daemon for Blood and Cheese, and Mysaria for Nettles, Aegon has no such deniability for the ratcatchers, for the Shepherd and his followers, for Maester Gerardys, for Rhaenyra, for Aegon the Younger and Baela. While we can see the high stakes behind the interrogation of Tyland Lannister (which could have changed the course of the entire war), what point did it serve to torture Maester Gerardys? And while we can make mitigating considerations for both Aegon and Rhaenyra's mental state, one is considerably more sadistic than the other.

[writer-of-the-lamb]

Long Before The Lamb

How I like to think Ratau relinquished the crown.

This is referencing that sick new update (where those pillars appear and you can make heart offerings for lore tablets) because I LOVE LORE

—————

His body burned with the stream of heat radiating from the cavern. His chest ached, his heart a trapped animal banging on its cage. The pillar stood tall, mocking him, tugging the red beam of energy from his crown and watching him kneel. The stone scraped his knees, dyed in red-brown ink from past travellers.

‘Make offering.’

The stone inscription laughed at him, waiting in front of the swarming red cave where tendrils of black and red mingled in a silken veil. His heart begged him, screaming, throbbing, to lower his hand. To close his fist and decide ‘later’, or ‘never’.

He plunged his hand into his chest, his flesh giving way in a sickening squelch of agonising pain. The will of the crown parted his ribs, spewing his beating heart into his hand. Its first taste of air shrivelled it in horror, beating limply.

He staggered upwards, his chest closing once more like a seamstress pulling a thread. He gasped for air, feeling his insides swirl with magic. Soon enough, his veins sparked again, and another muscle began to form within him.

The crown’s eye swivelled around, as if guarding him while he shakily stood, regenerated.

He scraped his feet along the new splatters of scarlet, gentle kneeling once more to offer the nearly still heart in his hands.

The cavern’s colourful wisps grew excited, swirling outward and grasping his heart in a grip so fiery he felt burnt. Withdrawing his hand in a hiss, he watched the ribbons of red drag his heart away before manifesting a single, stone tablet.

He frowned. A commandment stone. He had seen many before. Each the same, virtues handed to him by the One who waited, all for him to choose.

The heat steamed around him as he stood once more, extending his hands to meet the warm stone. Engravings danced, suddenly, in a chatter so quick he held his breath.

The crown atop his head opened its eye, crinkling in a nonexistent grin.

“You are not the first, nor will you be the last. Another will come, another will conquer, another will erase your story in a breath. The time is now for you to prepare in prayer. There is a chance your soul will be spared.”

He clenched his jaw.

“You are not the last, Ratau.”

—————

The Lamb grinned, absorbing the devotion from his shrine. “You wouldn’t believe how sick he got. I had to find at least 20 flowers.” he said, turning to face him. “Thank god for your garden.”

Ratau nodded, leaning on his staff. “It is always my pleasure.”

The Lamb smiled, digging into his robes. “I also gotcha a crystal,” he sang, “I know ya like em, and your shack needs a new light.”

His hand opened to receive a crystal shard, warm and pointed in his hand. Ratau frowned. “Anchordeep is certainly warmer than I recall.” he commented, turning the shard in his hand.

“Is it? I don’t know, I’m always warm.”

Ratau hummed, dismissing the thought and pocketing the crystal. “Join us for Knucklebones tomorrow.” he said, smiling.

“You know I will.” the Lamb replied, turning and wandering to the pentagram where he vanished.

Ratau felt for the stone, still abnormally warm in his robes.

“You have come from a place I never wanted him to find.”

[lunanheartache]

hiiii this is the second lamb pov piece ive done... lamb has a sleepless night and contemplates a few feelings. j'gar wakes up and asks. 2.2k words

the wishbone inn is quiet.

at this hour, everything is. winter smothers sound like thick cloth, blurs consonants into vagueness. the wind curling at the frost-freckled window whispers instead of howls. there's something gentle about its beckoning, weaved between promises of mystery and moonlight. his next breath in almost tastes cold in the anticipation of it. it would be better than this stillness. the room air stifles and stales; the groan of treated wood under their feet a poor approximation of the crunch of snow, the whining yawn of still-flowing sap in the trees.

inside, the night drags its heels. if she just steps out, the world would turn again. back to movement, to sound, to vibrant, eager life. winter is cold but full of it. in here it's almost like being trapped again.

lamb drags his gaze from the window. the body in the bed lays unbothered, soft breath rustling against the pillow the only sound worth hearing. the room sleeps in muted gray. the windowframes restrict moonlight to a small square at their feet, kept contained and docile.

sit and stay. speak when spoken to.

his breath catches in his throat. they touch a hand to their sternum and settle. it's difficult to stay occupied when the world is asleep but sleep abandons you. difficult to avoid old thoughts.

their pack is five-times organized. spare clothes twice folded, coinpurse four-times counted. they tried sleeping, tried lying down with j'gar as still as possible so as to not scare it away like a shy cat. but it never works on nights like this. there is no rest for the restless. her brain and body whir like the sun hasn't set. not insomnia but a pure absence, an un-need. even if guilt and shame didn't stick like a knife in his ribs, sleep would stay far away. no, they're wasting time. she needs to move, needs to get out, needs to go, go, go.

these are always the worst.

lamb sits at the side of the bed. the window is dark beyond the glare of the moon. the stars look like snowflakes. his feet just break the boundary, shins to the knees lit like a searchlight.

they probably aren't even looking for her.

it's been nearly two years. she is either better at hiding than she thought, or they haven't looked. a shitty game of hide and seek. lamb tries to imagine the feeling of seeing his father again and comes up empty, bleaker than the abandoned streets outside. if his father knocked on the door right now, he would jump right out the window. the action would be thoughtless, instinctive, immediate. his father would step in and lamb would leave like a magnet repelled. no fear or panic, no stupid, desperate need for approval. just plain, boring nothing. because his presence would mean nothing. it wouldn't be a relief, wouldn't be proof that everything he did was out of love and he did his best and.

she's childish, really. running away to escape and being upset when no one cares enough to follow. it's stupid. their father is never going to care. if he is looking for her, it's only because he is furious at losing that last wince of control. nothing else.

"mm."

j'gar makes a tired sound behind him, startling enough in the silence to make her flinch around. when she turns, he is in the middle of a yawn, little tusks looking bigger in the stretch. his hair sticks up in odd cowlicks. when he blinks his eyes half open, they don't focus properly in the dark. he smiles anyway, face pressed sideways into the pillow.

"can't sleep?" he asks, voice rough with sleep.

lamb says, "why are you awake?"

"could hear ya thinkin'," j'gar says through another yawn, arms outstretched and bumping lamb's hip. he laughs a little to himself. "nah, 'm kiddin'. iunno, sometimes i'm a light sleeper. wishbone's kinda creaky. more like old bones."

lamb exhales fondly, patting his hand where it falls to rest on the bed next to her. "bad joke," she says.

"i think it's pretty good."

"go back to sleep, jay."

"i ain't far off," j'gar says, closing his eyes. he lifts his arm and holds it in the air. "you comin' back in? come keep me warm."

"maybe in a little."

with a soft sound, j'gar drops his arm to the mattress. "you can talk to me, y'know. if you want. i can wake up in two shakes of a. well, a lamb's tail. you'd be kinda cute with a tail."

lamb closes their eyes.

impulse burns in their limbs like frostbite. they should go. they should get out, save j'gar the trouble of knowing them, and.

and nothing. there is no plan. the plan is wander until his legs give out. don't stick around because staying causes problems. it's built into the brick of her: lamb is a problem, and if she lingers it festers like a wound. leeches out, drags everyone else down with her. his family is so happy to be rid of him they haven't looked for him. he's been missing for two years, and who cares. not even a reward for the safe return of an aristocrat's daughter.

j'gar mumbles through another yawn. he doesn't push. the sheets rustle, bed creaking as he rolls onto his back. not once does he demand. he follows boundaries like a fence, takes the quiet as the no it is.

it is a no.

it is. lamb can't talk about this. saying anything is an admission of failure. as long as he admits to nothing, juggles every stupid ball thrown their way and hide the ones he drops, no one cares. that's what they are supposed to do. they are fully independent.

the only thing better would be automated, stripped of annoying feeling.

he needs to do everything right and on her own and not say a word. there is no choice but to handle it. he can't be upset, can't be angry, anxious, scared, can't be anything other than fine because his feelings are an inconvenience and a problem. she is an inconvenience.

it's a no. lamb can't talk about it. lamb can run away.

lamb doesn't move from the bed, still half twisted at the waist to look at j'gar. he is different at night, if only because all of that bright energy tapers down. he's still beyond the casual rise and fall of his chest, face relaxed as he returns to sleep.

he makes it look so easy.

he makes everything look simple, dashes lamb's grey anxieties with black and white confidence. sometimes he's wrong, but he shares and he listens and he has never turned away from vulnerability. somehow, he doesn't worry about how the world sees him.

lamb shifts, bringing a leg up to sit sideways. her heart feels so loud that he is sure j'gar can hear it, sure the entire goddamn inn can. "i, uh. i can't- sleep," they force out, voice small.

there's a moment where she worries j'gar already fell asleep when he cracks open one eye. "wanna try?" he asks, lifting the sheet.

"no, i."

this is a terrible idea. lamb breathes carefully. keeps their eyes focuses on their hands in their lap. their fingernails are getting long again. there is an small old scar shaped like a crescent on her thumb, nicked by the front gate when she was small. she threw it open, thoughtless in her haste to get out.

always running away.

"i don't have to sleep every night," says lamb.

"i do," j'gar says. he lets the blanket fall, arm relaxing. "i don' need like, a buncha hours, but if i get too far behind i just catch up with a nap."

"i'm not great with naps."

"you should try it. i nap everywhere. my momma used to just send the chickens out when she couldn't find me 'cause they'd all pile on me for bugs since i was sleepin' in the fields again."

lamb breathes out a smile and shakes her head. j'gar talks so freely. he sounds lighthearted but the soft expression on his face in the moonlight belies something aware. this isn't some oblivious rambling. he is half asleep and still reads them better than most: he keeps the conversation at the surface, leaving them the opportunity to break it or float with him.

in anyone else, it would be awkward and obvious. in j'gar, it looks as natural as breathing.

"i- i have- a lot on my- mind, i think," lamb says haltingly.

"i feel like y'always do," says j'gar. "anythin' you wanna put down?"

"i'm. i'm not sure. i don't- know how to talk about it."

"jus' like anythin' else," he says, like it's that simple. maybe for him it is.

lamb takes a deep breath. she draws a thumb over the scar on her hand, hesitating. wanderlust still shimmers in their legs like pins and needles. "i'm... i think i'm having a hard time reconciling my feelings about my father. my family as a whole," they say quietly, admission smaller than it feels.

"they was why you left, right?"

turning slightly to face him, lamb nods. their pulse is an anxious beat in their throat. j'gar doesn't seem to notice. his eyes don't pin to her and dig; they wander a little, flicking to the ceiling, the window, or closing for too long of a blink. maybe he is too polite or too tired to acknowledge it.

j'gar talks with his hands. this time, his hand starts before his mouth, a visible delay. "i don't know nothin' about your folks, so i don't wanna speak too ill of 'em, but. i bet if they were enougha anythin' to make you leave, maybe they weren't all that great. you said before your daddy was rich, an' too much money don't do nothin' good for the soul, but. that don't change that they were the first people you ever known, y'know? they're always gonna be that. an' gettin' outta there, well. if they weren't like how they were, you'd be a different sorta lamb, an' maybe you weren't have met an' done everybody an' everythin' you have. i'm not excusin' whatever they hurt you, but... y'know, there ain't a whole lot to do to change that 'cept keep bein' you. i don't think you gotta feel any one way about 'em. you can just- feel all of it."

he makes everything sound so simple. lamb exhales the trapped air in his lungs and it trembles. his eyes are that embarrassing hot that wells up with tears, and there's something terrible about that. terrible about being allowed to feel anything, everything, torn in two and told finally that that's okay. she can be conflicted and angry and upset, and miss them in the same stupid breath, and that's- fine.

j'gar doesn't say she's an idiot for any of it. doesn't say they're being a child, being difficult, being contrary and inconvenient just cause problems because when does he do anything but make his father's life worse?

j'gar says maybe both is okay. lamb presses a hand to their cheek and sucks in a breath too sharp. behind them, the bed shifts, blankets rustling.

"ah, shit," j'gar frets, "you're cryin'. did i say somethin'? 'm sorry, i know i run my mouth sometimes an' you can't hardly say nothin'. i shoulda waited 'til you explained. i don't mean to talk over you. sorry. what- what did you wanna say?"

when they turn fully to face him, j'gar is sitting up, worried hand hovering over their shoulder like he isn't sure if he can touch. his eyes are wide in the dark, fully awake in his concern. lamb laughs a little, the sound wobbly and fragile.

"no, i." she scrubs salt from her cheek with a palm. "i'm good. you were good. that was- that was helpful, jay. i just- i don't know why i'm crying."

"you sure? you can always tell me to shut up if i'm talkin' too much."

"no, i think you said what i needed to hear," says lamb softly.

that seems to work, seems to pass whatever social inspections j'gar runs his words through; he settles, searching her face, just a little. gently, he cradles the curve of their jaw in a warm, rough palm and smudges the pad of his thumb over their cheek.

he lingers for a moment. if he was hesitant to touch before, he seems reluctant to leave now. there is sleep at the corners of his eyes, and his hair curls messily at odd angles. in the dark, lamb can't make out the freckles that dot over the bridge of his nose and those high cheekbones, but j'gar is j'gar still. he looks tired, but that weird, impossible, infatiguable brightness to him flickers at the edges.

if j'gar ever met his father, lamb could almost believe he would change. that's a funny thought.

huh.

his heart hurts. he trusts j'gar. it's remarkably hard not to. it's a strange feeling, having such faith. lamb breathes a fraction easier, relaxes into j'gar's palm.

j'gar's hand falls, mumbling in the space between them with an unspoken gesture. "i promise you the resta the world don't think like your daddy, lamb. whenever you can talk about somethin', that's good."

"i'll try to believe that," lamb murmurs.

[psychospore]

An Exquisite Treat

A/N: hello lovely people - happy new year to all of you. 💚

You're a young owner and chef of a new hole-in-the wall restaurant in New York. You've only been operating for a few months with a handful of staff but business seems to be working in your favor. You usually stay in the kitchen to do most of the cooking but your sous chef assures you he can handle the workload when things get busy in front so you can help out there - especially Friday and Saturday nights.

You have noticed a particular person frequenting his dinners there, normally with another woman... Different women each time... He has luscious raven hair flowing and barely touching his broad shoulders. He looks divine in how he wears that suit each time he dines there.

One night, he visits there alone. One of your waitresses was absent so you ended up walking up to his table making sure you look presentable, sweeping away stray hairs from your face, greeting him and handing him the menu. The way his eyebrows furrow, fingers running through his lips as he scans through the menu puts you in a trance, until he breaks it by staring at you with those deep, ocean eyes and speaking in a velvety tone

"Aren't you the owner of this lovely place?" with his deep voice, he asked

"yes, I am - my name is y/n. I see you frequently around here" you smiled

"apologies for the late introduction - I am Loki. I love this place, the ambiance is good. Would you like to join me for dinner - I'd be interested to talk about my experience here? I figured since tonight is not as busy as the other nights but I do hope I'm not imposing on you"

You scanned the room and it seems you could spare some time here. You gestured one of the other waitresses to come to your table. "Hey, we don't seem to have many people tonight so I figured I'd hang out with this gentleman for a quick chat. Please let me know if anything comes up." The waitress seemed to let out a hidden smile. Little did you know, Loki has had his eyes on you for some time now and most of your staff has started noticing. Despite being with other women, his eyes constantly linger towards you whenever you come out to the kitchen and help out in the front. He always wondered how you can be constantly graceful in the face of a high intensity work.

"Also, what would you like to have Loki?"

"I'll have whatever the chef recommends" he answers as he looks at you

You chuckled, "well the chef recommends - for starters, Tomato Bruschetta, for the main course I'll have a Rib Eye Roast and I'll have Stout-braised Lamb Shanks for Loki, with a side salad. Dark chocolate coated cherries and strawberries and our finest red wine please. Thank you" You looked at your waitress while taking the order. "Gotcha - give us 10-15 minutes. In the meantime, please enjoy" she winks at you, grinning, before heading to the kitchen which took you a bit by surprise.

"how did you come up with all of this?" Loki asked

"oh - my parents gave me money to start this place when I graduated from Culinary school. I loved the energy here when I first came and I was so sure I just had to build my restaurant here, and now here we are" smile spread on your lips, eyes twinkling as you talk about how everything came to be. Loki adamantly listened to your saccharine voice filling his ears. How he wished he could pause time and make this moment last forever.

You turned to him as you finished talking, "how about you? Tell me about yourself" Food started being served, he told you how he has a brother who dragged him into working in the same company here in new york. It's tiring at work so your restaurant is a safe space for him to unwind and enjoy.

A curious part of you asked, "how about those different women who accompany you on a regular basis? " but then you realized "sorry - it was extremely rude to ask"

"Rest assured, they are just female companions. I have my eyes set on someone else already. Ever since I've set my eyes on her in this very place" as he nibbles a piece of the savory chunk of meat.

"that's interesting - I'm pretty sure she's a lucky gal" you answered as you sip a big gulp of wine, lowkey crestfallen. You've had your eyes set on him for a while too, albeit in denial.

"well - I'm luckier, I'm dining with her right now" he smirks, looking at you

You almost choked yourself with wine after hearing his confession, pretty sure you made a fool of yourself by having wine come out of your nostrils as you scramble to bring the napkin to cover and wipe your face. "Are you alright?" worried, Loki asks.

"I'm fine. Maybe next time save your confession to when I'm not drinking anything" you paused as you both laughed at the absurdity of what happened.

"Oh dear - I profusely apologize. I hope it doesn't change your perception of me. I am extremely smitten with you and how wonderful of a person you are and would like to pursue you in courtship." he declared

"I'd be honored." He takes your hand, brings it up to his lips to kiss it as you blush beet red. His piercing gaze strikes right through your soul.

You argued a bit on who to pay the bill, you wanted to waive the dinner you had tonight with him and him wanting to pay everything that you end up just giving it all as tips for your staff - which made them extremely happy.

You accompanied Loki to the door after dinner to see him out and he gave you a quick peck on the forehead before you closed the door. "I'll see you soon" you say to him.

Loki on the other hand, walks in the dark alleyway, his suit changes to an emerald battle wear with a smile on his face. He can't wait to see you again - maybe he should bring you flowers.

[banisheed]

TIMING: Current LOCATION: A Latte To Love PARTIES: Siobhan and Wynne CONTENT: Discussions of cults, ritual sacrifices of flesh, body and animals SUMMARY: Siobhan wears a bone dress and Wynne experiences a case of mistaken identity that rings too close to home.

A dress made out of bones was a stupid, terrible and impractical idea…which was exactly why Siobhan needed to have one. When she’d heard that some wannabe fashion designer had put one together, she was off to steal it. When she realized that the dress was too large to fit in her duffle bag and too annoying to carry, she did what any sensible thief would do: she wore it. Thus began her current predicament: she was right in thinking the dress was impractical but she hadn’t considered just how much the ribcage of a rabbit stabing her asscheeks would hurt. She stumbled down the sidewalk, fatigue stinging the edges of her eyes. She could do this, she just needed a little liquid help. Help that would come in the form of the strongest coffee she could legally order, and maybe a pastry or two. She rattled her way through the doors of the closest coffee shop and up to the counter. “Strong,” she said, as though that was a way anyone ordered coffee. “Very strong. Lots of sugar. Do you do Irish coffee, actually?”

—

Modern fashion was strange and inexplicable, Wynne thought. Back at home, all clothes had been handmade and simple — cotton and plaid and wool. Not quite uniform, but still: there had been a throughline. Out here, though, people seemed to wear a wide array of fabrics, in combinations that dazzled and overwhelmed and most of the time, they were intrigued. They spared what cash they had left on clothing pieces they’d never dreamed of wearing. And sometimes, they thought they were going to get it: and then something like this happened. The patron that entered on this fateful day rattled with her dress and Wynne’s eyes widened. In recognition and surprise and a bit of horror too. It was almost as if they could feel lamb rib bones resting against their collarbones again. Their mouth opened, closed and opened once more. “No.” Wynne frowned at their own reply. “Um, no alcohol, I’m sorry. But we do strong.” 

They stared at their hands for a moment, before punching in the order. They were too easily unsettled, they knew it — but this was too reminiscent. Not that they or the others had ever worn this many bones at once, but still. “Anything else?”

—

“What kind of an establishment doesn’t have alcohol? It’s nearly 8am, you should be serving it.” Siobhan shook her head; humanity was strange and limited by their arbitrary rules. “I will take strong. Make sure it is very strong. If I sense even a little weakness I will complain.” She was joking, just a little, but her expression remained serious. “And no milk, unless it’s sourced from a farm that treats its livestock and-or the land well. But I sincerely doubt it. So, no milk.” Coffee was not something Siobhan drank often, she had other beverages of choice. Though, with enough sugar, coffee became tolerable. She could manage with a little less if she paired it with something sweet. Which did remind her…

“Aye, can I also get a…” Siobhan whipped her hand out to point, freeing one of the bones on her sleeve. It clattered against the counter and rolled to the other side. “Sorry,” she smiled, “can you get that bone for me?” 

—

Of all the lessons Wynne had learned in this so-called real world, dealing with entitled customers was one of the most annoying yet helpful ones. “I know, right?,” they agreed, even if their heart was far from in it. “I’ve told my manager we should get into it.” They nodded at all the requests, swallowing comments on cattle and mass-production of animal products (what a horrible thing!), as Wynne felt like their mind was still playing catch up with the bone attire. 

Not that there was much time to do so, with one of the white-yellow things falling from the dress. Poorly constructed, Wynne gathered. What a waste. They watched the thing clatter on and on before ducking behind the counter to lay their fingers on it, bringing it up. For a moment, it laid on the palm of their hand as Wynne observed its familiarity. “Did you know that femurs are beneficial for spontaneity?” They let it roll to the tips of their fingers, extending it and flushing, slightly. “Keep that safe.”

—

“Then why has your manager not implemented an alcoholic menu?” Siobhan questioned with a harsh seriousness. “I believe you are being disrespected at your position; your manager clearly doesn’t respect your opinions and you should stab them.” She paused. “Sorry, I mean speak to them.” She did not mean that nor did she really care for the plight of minimum wage earning employees, but any change that would get her whiskey at 8am was a victory. If one poor barista had to be sacrificed to get it, then she would sacrifice the damn barista. It was that sort of ambition that had gotten her far in life and also exactly nowhere. 

“I don’t need help with spontaneity,” Siobhan said, then paused again, hand frozen steadily in the air. A silent beat passed through the air, the lazy sounds of the morning muffled between the glass of the shop and the distance to the counter. “How did you know that was a femur?” Humans weren’t so good with their bones and certainly not animal bones—femurs turned to humeri, ulnae to radiuses. She took the femur from their hands, smiling brilliantly. “What’s this?” she asked, pulling another bone off her dress and then another. “Can you tell what animal they’re from too?” This barista wasn’t a fae, she knew, but it didn’t mean that they couldn’t have ties to banshee culture somehow. 

—

They were a bit taken aback by the other’s words, eyebrows creasing. As if going against the wills and wishes of a superior was something Wynne was keen on doing. Despite previous bouts of disobedience, they were still fond of following rules and bending to another’s will. “Oh. Well, maybe I will talk to him about it again.” Not that they had even talked about it in the first place. It seemed this world required a lot of white lies, especially when dealing with customers. They much disliked the insinuation that they were disrespected, however, and tried to let it go by wasting no words on it. 

Wynne had expected that their comment on the bone might have been met with skepticism and confusion. They get skepticism, though the confusion was all theirs when the other smiled and dropped more bones on the counter. While taken aback, they also found themself intrigued, pulled to the familiarity of once-alive things. Remnants of a life lived. “Rabbit.” They cleared their voice, turned one of the bones over with the tip of their finger. “And this is a vertebrae.” A moment of thought, but they’re not sure what kind of vertebrae. They point at the other bone. “Scapula.” That was easy. Wynne remembered the initial question posed and circled back, not out of a wish to answer but rather politeness. “I was taught by my parents.”

—

There were a few explanations for humans that could decipher animal bones from a look: bone hobbyists, veterinarians, hunters (of actual animals) and people who had read the rare classic Animal Bone Identification for the Lazy Banshee. Though, seeing how the book only had one copy and laid unfinished in her grandmother’s study, it probably wasn’t that. And how many of those humans were taught by their own parents? Siobhan was intrigued. “Does your family scream a lot?” she asked. “Were you taught the old ways?” How long had it been since she’d spoken to a banshee or banshee-related-family-member-who-will-probably-be-used-for-ritual-sacrifice (a BRFMWWPBUFRS for short)? Too many years; she’d fallen out of touch with the euphemisms. Too tired to spare a moment for reflection, Siobhan pulled her glove off and revealed the thick scar line across her palm. “Did you give blood too?” Siobhan wasn’t one for politeness, she could be cordial if the whim struck her but, after decades of mingling with humanity, the whim didn’t strike her very often. “I’m surprised you’ve lived this long, you look to be…what? In your early 20s? Did they not take your life yet? Or are you…” Maybe they didn’t know; a few BRFMWWPBUFRS’s were raised with the knowledge of their necessary gift to their sisters or daughters, but most were not. Humans didn’t like knowing that they were going to die, after all. 

“I’m sorry,” Siobhan shook her head, pulling her glove back on. She wasn’t a banshee anymore, not like she used to be. Rules and traditions and secrecy were no longer meant to be in her vocabulary. It was for that reason that she didn’t think to temper her thoughts. “Did you run away, is that it?” 

—

They should have lied. It could have been easy to say that they were a student in the field of animal biology or something of the sort, but Wynne had somehow offered a nugget of truth and now there was question after question. They knew their eyes were growing wide, that the trepidation that spread through them must be noticeable — they just weren’t sure how to stop it from happening. The questions were simply too pointed, too fitting for the life they had tried to abandon for them not to have some kind of reaction.

Mouth opened and closed. They nodded, “I was taught the old ways. We screamed, sometimes.” How they had screamed! Of euphoria and rage and laughter, around bonfires and dressed in dead things or even in nothing at all. Wynne tended to forget that, that they had been loud once. Their eyes were glued to the scar on the other’s hand and they shook their head, as if to say no, not yet, I was meant to give my blood, all of it, but I refused. Something in them resisted answering out loud, as if doing that would be to acknowledge that there was something true here. They tried instead to focus on ringing up the other, but the idea of asking her to pay for her coffee seemed ludicrous now.

The scar disappeared from view, hidden by cloth. The bones still remained on the counter, though. Wynne laid them in the correct order through force of habit. “How do you know?” Their voice was quieter now. Defensive, in a way. “I don’t know you.” Their gaze leveled with the other, wide-eyed yet unwavering. They weren’t sure if they were talking to the other or themself. “So how could you possibly know? Are you here to collect?” But was this it, was this where it would happen? In the coffee shop Wynne hated and loved, at the beginning of a long shift? Surely not — it would be a lousy way to meet their reckoning. “I didn’t run away. I don’t know what you’re talking about.” 

—

The emotions that danced on the barista’s face were a shock to Siobhan just as much as it seemed her words were a surprise to them. She nodded as they went on: yes, the old ways. Yes, the screaming. And finally, yes, collection. Siobhan eyed the barista up and down, surveying the angle of their jaw and the curve of their ears. She’d been expecting a banshee, but what did she really know about Regis? She knew Regis had run away from Saol Eile and nothing more; she was issued a command and servants didn’t ask for clarification. Siobhan’s smile sharped, a knife’s edge on either side. “I was gone before you were born but I will return again, with you, to serve Death as our birthright dictates.” Siobhan held her hands out, palms up, smiling frigidly; there was no space in her to hold warmth for an insolent, ungrateful and selfish idiot. 

Her gaze moved to the swing door at the end of the counter and then to the counter itself. Should she jump over or run to the side? Siobhan stared up at the barista. “Look at how you debase yourself here. You are worth more than this. You abandoned your duty to Fate and Death and still, even a coward like you is better than all these animals. You have a place in this world. You ought to serve it.” Her hands snapped into fists as a tremor erupted across her body; a flare of anger. Regis didn’t know how good they had it. Siobhan’s penance didn’t include playing pretend at a human job with soft, unmarred skin and freshly baked goods. She lived in damp alleys. She endured the phantom pain of old punishments. She had to live with an ugliness that could never be uprooted. But together--tethered by cosmic forces beyond them--they’d been granted an opportunity for atonement. 

She leaned across the counter, betraying desperation. “Take your place as the prodigal child then,” she pleaded softly. “Be received again among our family. We can reach absolution together, child.” Perfection stood just one false marble countertop away. If the barista wouldn’t come willingly, SIobhan would make them. “Come home.”

—

Wynne’s mind returned to that state it was often in: attempting to play catch up. As if life moved just a little too fast for them. As if they weren’t supposed to be here — which might be true enough. They should be ashes and bones, drained and immortalized in oil paint like all those before them. Or if not that, they should be further west or south, not in the same state, stuck in a place that had appealed to them for reasons that seemed unjustifiable now. They felt their hands fall slack to their sides, the cash register and all others in the store forgotten. Their heart climbed up in their throat. 

Rationality was hard to come by as Wynne imagined this stately woman taking hold of them. They were only a few hours away from the lake. And there had been stories of deserters returning, hollow-eyed and starving — but Wynne was doing fine, no demon had come knocking, no end-of-the-world had occurred. The lake still stood. They shook their head, uncharacteristically adamant. “It’s too late. How can I serve my purpose now, when the time has passed? I rejected it. I won’t go back. There’s no use.” The blue moon had occurred and here they were, still breathing. Maybe there was a hint of regret in their tone, as this half-life so often felt hard to live: but it was being lived. Better the uncertainty of what was to come than the certainty of being dead.

And yet here was the word absolution, that promised word. A biblical word, that the elders sometimes spat on and sometimes dangled over their heads. God would never grant them as much, but Gythraul might, if they did what was asked. Wynne was quiet for a moment, before their voice betrayed them. “So they’re alive?” Their tone small, eyes inquisitive, perhaps hopeful — there was no way that they’d be received kindly, but if they were alive, they might be okay. “They’re okay? My family?” 

—

“There is always time,” Siobhan smiled; she was doing her best to remain friendly. If she thought too long, too much, about Regis she would remember how much the idea of Regis made her skin crawl. All the things she had ever wanted, all the things she had broken herself for were things Regis had abandoned. And why? Didn’t Regis want perfection? Didn’t Regis want love? Home was the only place for people like them to be. Siobhan had been cast out, Regis had left. “For people like us--children of powerful forces--there is always a space for us at our home. We can go there, you and me, we can become whole again and serve our higher purpose. Isn’t that what you want?” Siobhan reached out again, eager to take the barista’s hands in her; the woman of Soal Eile often had, screaming in unison. “Don’t you seek atonement? Don’t you want to be in the place where you belong? With the people who understand you? These humans…they don’t know what it’s like to be us. They don’t know how wonderful life can be--how our bodies can be used to serve Fate. They don’t understand us, they never will. Come home.”

The barista’s worries gave Siobhan pause. Regis didn’t seem like the type to be concerned about the family they abandoned; why abandon them at all then? “I don’t know,” Siobhan sighed. “I assume…” She swallowed hopelessly at the lump that had formed in her throat. When she had betrayed Fate, her mother’s reputation was on the line. Daughters were nothing but extensions of their mothers, after all. And she had made the only decision a sensible mother could make: punish the daughter. “I don’t know, honestly. I would think…I would guess that they are…we won’t really know unless you…” Siobhan let the answer hang in the air like a guillotine. “I was told to bring you back, I can assume that they wouldn’t have bothered with that at all if your family wasn’t alive and waiting.” Siobhan’s head hung low; an honesty escaped her lips. “My mother..when I…” Her body caved in on itself and she shrunk, imagining the lanky girl that she used to be. “I was insolent; disobedient. The punishment was for me, not for her, and she cleaned herself of my sins. She is alive. She is well. So is my family. Perhaps yours is too? We look out for our kind, don’t we?”

—

They had once been good at keeping their face slack, at removing all emotions from it. Wynne had sat front-row at rituals, decorated with bones and flowers and leaves, looking tranquil as ever. Emotion had not betrayed them then, but that was when they had still easily buried it. Now it raised through their body, painting their face with confusion. They did not touch the other’s hands, staring at them instead. “The betrayer’s moon has come and gone, it’s too late.” It was too late to think of returning, to think of atonement, to consider that there was still a home to return to. Wynne swallowed. “You lie.” The words are uttered in a defiance they’d not often shown their elders, back home. Was this woman like them? Someone so wise, so well-read when it came to scripture, fluent in Welsh and all things gythraul? If so, why hadn’t Wynne ever met them? “What is there for me? Not life. Sacrifice? You want me to return home just to live with my impending death? There’s no atonement. It’s too late.” It would be a decade before the next human sacrifice. A new child had already been chosen. Wynne had held Gawain’s hands plenty of times, sat in the knowledge they both shared: that their sole purpose was to live long enough to die. “I don’t belong there.”

But how could Wynne be immune to all of this? The promise of home, the image of their parents and brother still alive and willing to welcome them with wide arms? Their breathing was shallow, their stomach tense. “What do you mean, you don’t know? You must know if they’re all dead or not. You have to —” Their mouth closed before desperation could make their words tumblr out in quick succession. There was truth in the other’s words: there was no way to know unless Wynne went back to the lake and saw for themself. They hadn’t, for months. “Who told you to bring me back?” It had to have been one of the elders. Their head shook, their eyes wide as the other seemed to betray emotion herself. Wynne wanted to cry, felt it gather in their throat. How they missed this sense of kinship and community the other spoke of. “You’re not like me. It’s different. No matter why you were cast out, and I’m sorry that you went through that, but it’s not the same.” Their bottom lip trembled. “When have they ever looked out for me? You’re lying.”

— 

Siobhan had no idea what a ‘betrayer’s moon’ was, but all banshee lineages were a little different. Hers was millennia old and they had strange words for a number of things, even as they tried to modernize themselves. “You would know if I was lying—I would get hives.” Siobhan rolled her eyes, losing her patience for Regis’ antics; she ought to reach across the table and drag them back home. Yet, as the barista went on, Siobhan’s fists stopped trembling with rage. Impending death? The thought tickled her mind. Again, she looked over at the barista, eyeing them from the top of their head to the end of their apron. “Ah…” The recognition burst in her eyes, wide with the reality that laid before her. “So you are a BRFMWWPBUFRS then? I didn’t want to assume but…” Of course, the acronym when spoken sounded like jumbled nonsense and so Siobhan realized she should clarify. “They planned on killing you for someone else’s awakening?” It was true that all banshees were women. It was more true that not all banshees gave birth to daughters. What became of the other children? The idea nauseated Siobhan and as she stared at Regis, she realized just how young they were. Her family believed strongly that the children should never be taken, that was why you had fathers and friends. Not all families thought the same. What good was a BRFMWWPBUFRS except for the ‘ritual sacrifice’ part of that acronym? 

The reality of their life was grim but what did it matter to Siobhan? She dreamed of this day; fantasized the sensation of her wings against her back again. She told herself that the cost didn’t matter, she would return and become whole again. Regis was so young. But who cared? Regis had life yet to live. But why should that stop her? Everyone had their role to fulfill. “You have a duty to Death.” Regis would serve theirs by dying, giving way to the world’s next banshee. Siobhan didn’t care that they looked to be in their early 20s at best. It didn’t bother her that they had feared their fate so much that they ran away. “Yes, normally people like you are expected to live more of a life and have a family but if your death needs to come early then it should and that…” Siobhan’s voice cracked. She swallowed. The barista was right, she had been lying. She said any cost was well worth it. “I won’t take you back.” But she couldn’t justify this. “Not unless your family can reach some agreement. You’re too young and it’s not right to take the child. It was my mother who instructed me to come for you, Regis, though she gave me no details. Yes, I am not like you. I am a woman. I screamed. But I have no intention of sending you to an early grave for a question that can be easily answered by patricide or getting your sister—or niece or cousin or what have you—to make a friend. Really, there’s no reason you, specifically, have to die.” 

—

The way the woman held herself so casually and yet so tight with anger made Wynne hesitant, but their confusion won over time and time again. It was as if from the moment they’d run off and started asking questions, it had become second nature. To question everything. “A what?” It’s not really curiosity any more, but rather desperate confusion. Something wasn’t matching up, was it? “No, not for an awakening — we don’t subscribe to ideas of enlightenment, or any of that. I was to die in order …” They took a deep, shaky breath in, closing their eyes for a moment. They forbade their mind to go to these places most days, years of repression having made Wynne into a skilled escape artist when it came to their own feelings. “Because gythraul demanded it, because we needed to appease It.” It was impossible to say, it seemed, that it would have been for the betterment of their community — either the other knew and could see through their selfish lies, or they didn’t and Wynne could keep their evilness to themself. They swallowed. “Because it was time.” The betrayer’s moon had been close, the night of their abandonment. A waxing moon bright in the sky. It had been hungry and Wynne had been too.

Something seemed to settle. Like the ashes after a bonfire, falling on the center yard of the commune, the rest after rage. Wynne wasn’t sure whether it was a good or bad change and so held onto their breaths tightly. They wished to open their mouth, to exclaim that they did not want to die yet, that it was cruel and unfair that it was demanded of them — that the world still turned and they still breathed and no creature had risen from the cracks of the earth or descended from the sky to take them. But they’d learned not to petition for their own needs long ago and so they only did it quietly. And then things did settle, the woman reaching a conclusion that made Wynne’s breath slip from their mouth. “You’re not making sense. If they sent you, then you ought to know that it can only be me, that it should have happened already.” They shake their head, breathing in and pushing a hand against their collarbone to center themself. Wynne was distantly growing aware that perhaps not everything they had been taught was based in truth, or at least that there was more to it: but what their life had led up to was true, wasn’t it? “It is always a child! It has been that way for three hundred years. There is no agreement: there’s just me, alive, gone from them.” They shake their head again, look up with wide, fixed eyes. “I won’t go back.” The bridge was burned. Its ashes had settled.

—

Fainche Dolan had a theory about the world: all lives were tangential to each other, creating a dizzying pattern of never-ending curves and long dark lines. She swore that she could see it in the sky some days but most days she was lost along its winding trails, searching for the lives that were meant to meet hers. Siobhan never took anything her grandmother said seriously. Her mother asserted that Fainche wasn’t right in the head, whatever that meant. Siobhan had grown up watching the woman flagellate herself over dinner, the constant whip crack and tearing of flesh found a rhythm over the steady beat of forks against shitty paper plates. Fainche was troubled, yes, but she was also right. No one experience was wholly unique. All of it was tangential. Siobhan could see it now and with only a little embarrassment that she hadn’t noticed it sooner. 

Siobhan didn’t know a Gythraul and the children didn’t always die and an awakening was a concept so deeply related to the core of being a banshee that to deny it wasn’t just foolish, it meant that the person she was talking to wasn’t talking about the same thing. And, of course, their way of living was much, much older than 300 years. This person wasn’t Regis, but they were something so terribly similar that even now, even after she had cleared the fog of confusion from her own mind, they were still making sense. Siobhan laughed. Her head tilted up to the ceiling and she clutched her stomach, rattling all the bones on her dress. She exploded with laughter, she barked with it. She made the glass tremble around her and didn’t care. When she was done, she swiped at a tear that had formed in the corner of her eye. “You were going to die to appease someone named Gythraul!” Siobhan clutched the end of the edge of the counter. “Gythraul! What a stupid name. Doesn’t that just mean devil? The name’s not even original. That’s so embarrassing for you.” Siobhan shook her head, taking the bones off the counter. “Can you imagine if you died for some cretin named Gythraul? I think I would sooner perish from the humiliation of ever worshiping a Gythraul.” 

Siobhan, now with the bones in her hand, shook them quickly in the air. “Look, if I know anything about groups of people that worship entities that call themselves the devil, or some such nonsense, it doesn’t matter who dies. No one is that special. So you can…” She waved the bones around some more. “…rest easy knowing that your life doesn’t matter at all and that you’re going to die having worked as a barista in a coffee shop that doesn’t even serve alcohol at 8am. I’m sure Gythraul just ate someone else, or whatever happens there. Oh! Is that why you were asking about your family? Yes, maybe Gythraul ate them.” She’d meant all that as a reassurance, as the easy smile and bright tone of voice was meant to convey. 

—

The other laughed, the entire shop shaking with her disrespect and Wynne wasn’t sure what shook them more: the threat of being dragged home or the way the other spat on Gythraul so easily. Back at home, such behavior would be met with repercussions the Protherians didn’t speak of but all knew about. There was no questioning the lack of name, the lack of details, the way there was no proof that any of this was necessary. To ask was to cause dissent and to cause dissent amongst a society that functioned so well with its hands clasped together? Well, that simply made no sense. And if one were to cross that line, they never would again.

“It’s not Its name, it’s Its title,” Wynne said, their voice more strong now. They might have run from the demon’s demands, but that did not mean they had abandoned all their respect in the same move. It still remained to be a powerful being that had granted fortune to their family over the centuries, after all. They stared at the other and her ignorance, the way she put it so blatantly and proudly on display. Another heathen, like so many others — but one Wynne found easier to condemn. 

It would be so easy to lose themself in judgment, though. To revert to the old ways and to look down on all those who thought the Protherians fools. To spit on them and their naivete. But Wynne’s customer seemed knowledgeable, somehow. “What do you know, of communities that worship demons? Of sacrifice?” Their legs felt shaky, their fingers itching with the need for more knowledge and the equally strong fear of receiving it. They knew that there were repercussions for their abandonment – there simply had to be – but what they were was a truth Wynne had avoided. And yet here was a stranger, alluding that their family might have paid the price. How realistic a thought. Wynne forgot, momentarily, that their family had been content to watch them die too as their fingers were closing around the fake marble counter. “Who are you?” A beat. “I need to know. For the order.” A half-truth.

—

“Oh, it’s a title,” Siobhan laughed again, stifling the sound with her hand. “That’s even worse. Did your people bestow it upon Gythraul or did Gythraul do it? Because in one scenario that’s cute--” she emphasized the word sharp sweetness, equal parts patronizing and delighted. “--and in the other it’s just sad.” Siobhan picked at a piece of lint that had gotten stuck between two of the bones on her dress, stuffing the ones she was holding into her convenient dress pocket. As the barista went on, it occurred to the banshee that her conversation partner wasn’t thrilled. She couldn’t tell what emotion it was: fear masquerading as anger, ignorance playing into the hands of stubbornness. Could someone who abandoned a demon still hold its name in reverence? Siobhan cocked her head to the side, eyeing the barista.

Her lips curled upwards. “Of sacrifice, I know everything--” It was a hard statement to make as a fact, but Siobhan thought of it as the truth. She had been birthed into sacrifice, forged by it, watched it given over and over again. Every breath she took was a sacrifice she made; every word came with a cost to her. She had already been broken into shards and offered out bit by bit. What remained was not a woman, not a person, but an instrument belonging to higher powers. What did she know of sacrifice? It was a cruelty to be asked. Siobhan tore her gloves off, showing the thick scars across both of her palms once more. Slowly, she turned them over to reveal the scars that ribboned the back of her hands; the webbing across her knuckles, the carving of another’s initials on her right hand, the rivers of scars that ran without purpose and the valleys of once-perfect skin that were hidden between them. “There are ways to sacrifice a life that don’t involve death; there are avenues of worship that you cannot fathom. Every so often, a group of people like you emerges, worshiping some person or demon or idea. Sometimes the thing you fear is real, sometimes it isn’t. Eventually you fall away, the world forgets you and the thing you held with such reverence. Or your demon gets bored. But what I am? What I worship? It is always here. It will always be here. You’re not special.” 

Siobhan squeezed her hands into fists. “Siobhan. Spelt like--” Siobhan’s fingers unfurled. “You know what? Just spell it however you want.” 

—

They fought hard to keep their cheeks from flushing with indignation and shame. Wynne could make no sense of it, their shame in leaving the commune and how it went hand in hand with their need to defend it. “It’s just Welsh. It’s just what we call It. Its true name is only reserved for a few to know, that’s just common sense.” They would have known it, on that fateful day they escaped. It would have been their job to summon It by name, speak those secret syllables to let It know the hour was there. And then the knife would have come down and they’d have bled and never even seen it.

Their head shook in response to the others’ answer. “No, I mean — you said it wouldn’t matter to a demon, who dies? What do you mean, I’m not special?” Wynne was unable to hide their desperation, their stomach growing as tight as ever. They weren’t supposed to heed the opinions of others in regards to all of this, but the woman seemed far from ignorant. And they had always stood in the shoes of a follower, someone who took the words of their elders as truth. There had been so few guiding hands these past months. Besides, this mattered, if it was true. If they weren’t special, if their death could have been replaced by any other young or even old body … it was something their mind had played with before, the question of why them. They had asked it and met the repercussions and then never asked again. More importantly, and perhaps more harrowingly: neither had their parents. Wynne’s thoughts circled around that thought as they stared at the scars on the other’s hands. “What do you worship?” This was asked more quietly, with a trepidation. “Why would it demand this?” Even if this kind of sacrifice didn’t demand death, why did it have to exist in the first place? Wynne was tired of the thought of bleeding for another. In their naive mind, the fatigue extended to the marred skin of a customer. Even if she scared them.

Wynne took a paper cup, not bothering to ask if the other wished to have the coffee for here or to takeaway. Takeaway it would be. They wrote down Siân before starting the process of grinding beans. “I know how it’s spelled.”

—

Siobhan stared at the hypocritical creature in front of her--the compromised morals, the twisted loyalties. Why run away if they were still going to defend their little community? She watched them cling to whatever respectability they could. She saw something of herself there: how she still held her head high, spoke of fae like she belonged among them. Her body flared. She looked away. “Do you think a demon really cares who dies for it? Do you? If a train is rushing forward, does it matter who you’ve tied to its tracks? If a hungry lion needs to eat, do you think it cares what body its teeth sink into? Would a demon really care? What makes you so special? What stars were you born under that someone else could not see as well?” Siobhan faced them again. “No one is special in the gaze of Death. No one is special under the order of Fate. We are all the same, in the end. Just bodies.” Siobhan knew; she’d made this mistake before. She’d believed someone could be special--she believed Fate would acquiesce. She was wrong. This barista was wrong now. To be special was blasphemy. 

“I worship Fate, Death, nature, the turn of the world and my place in it. A nebulous concept. To assign an understanding to Fate or Death would be a disservice; those forces do not act with intention. They command. They take. I give.” Siobhan pulled her gloves back on. “Fate demands nothing, Death demands nothing; to demand is to possess desire, of which they do not. These are actions taken to assure that I am serving as faithfully as I can. In truth, I can be devout without ever spilling my blood--but I can give more like this. Fate and Death exist without me, I am not so special that they require my sacrifice specifically. I am nothing but a servant to them. It is my place to be.” Her hands fell to her sides. “Or I was. I will be, again, one day. Properly.” She looked up. “Is my coffee done?”

—

Wynne felt something twist and pull in their stomach. These were just observations spoken by a stranger, ones they should disregard and not even ask after — but they scratched an itch they had been trying to ignore for months, if not years. They had purged themself of their questioning nature, bending curiosity into something more palatable. The elders could be cruel in their guidance, when met with too much skepticism. “I was born after a betrayer’s moon, that’s what marked me and –” The sentence died on their tongue. Wynne placed the cardboard cup under the espresso machine, working on the big coffee the other had requested in what by now seemed another day. If this stranger’s words were true and there was nothing about their flesh, their being, their life that was special then someone else was dead, now. Then it made sense, why the earth hadn’t ripped in two or goat’s hooves hadn’t followed them down here or there was no word of a massacre up at the lake. They found no words to answer, all energy spent on keeping their hands from trembling.

The customer’s beliefs hit close to home too, the way she spoke of the turn of the world and how people stood outside its ways. But their religion had always been marked by desire and demand. Corwyn Prothero had demanded something and so gythraul had demanded something in return and on and on the cycle went. They were just a chip in a game. “What is it called, what you believe in?” It was the only response Wynne could come up with. Their head felt light. “I hope you can return to it.” Another thing said distantly, as if it echoed. They weren’t sure if they meant it. Maybe they were all better off without any of this, like the rest of the world seemed to be. “Almost.” The smells of freshly brewed coffee were filling the air, the machine churning on. 

They pulled the cup from underneath it, placing a lid on top and sliding it towards the other. It took a moment before they realized they weren’t quite done yet. “Cash or card?”

—

“Do you believe that your birth charts the course of your life?” Siobhan asked as though she didn’t believe the same principle. Her birth, during a war to a banshee, marked the course of her life so inextricably that the roadway of it haunted her. She knew what she was, what she was to become and what essence prescribed her meaning. She was not a woman, not a coffee drinker, she was the same as the girl who had been born under the stars in 1917; she was a tool of Death and a follower of Fate. Never once did her life deter from its goal, and eventually, she would return to it as though she had never left.

“I said already; I worship Fate,” Siobhan answered plainly. “Death. Their core essences and their unchanged presence. I worship the natural world and its proceedings. Not a name; not a face. Just this that already rules our lives.” The weight of it pressed against her shoulders; it dug in and made a home in her flesh. For so long, she had been banished from her people, but to them that was only a droplet in the span of their lives. She would go back. She would forget this encounter, as she would anything that happened in this unimportant town. “To live under the rule of a higher power is our calling, isn’t it? What do our lives matter anymore?” Siobhan stared at the barista, waiting for something that never came. 

Across the counter, Siobhan slid the femur they had identified earlier. “For spontaneity,” she laughed before she grabbed her coffee and wiggled out of the shop--her dress was hard to move in, after all. She had to go one leg after the other and looked more like a crab than a humanoid. 

She trusted that the barista understood that it wasn’t a matter of cash or the card she clearly had in her pocket, but the things that needed to be done to cling to an identity that faded with each passing day.

[lunarscaled]

❝ i’ll hear the truth, or you’ll wear chains. ❞ [ groazei aka alucard ]

A FEAST FOR CROWS @groazei

"What chains could you shackle me with that you have not already bestowed upon me!"

-> Voice noisy like rust scraping over stone, ragged with each of their heaving breaths that tickle their throat until they think they'll fall into a fit of hacking coughs; he had taunted and herded them into a long, thin English alleyway built high between buildings with old, greyed brick and like a fool they had thought they could escape him at the last moment. Of course not. Not him---Hellsing's finest monster, master of all he surveyed as his domain, a dog barely reined in by its leash. Leaving the organization had gained Lyric ground but lost them any of its frivolous protections from his savagery: the socket where the eye he had plucked out with his fingers, no anesthesia, had once been feels painfully empty now behind the patch of cloth. ( they wonder what they might lose this time. what new terror and tragedy he will inflict upon them. their body trembles with the fear of what has not yet happened to them. ) In the corner of the dead-end, their arms are wrapped around their ribs as if it will stop his teeth or hands from tearing through them however he likes; they are pushed as far back into the dark as they can be while they feel their lip quiver and their eyes water---they are so sick of being afraid, and yet it is all they can do. Cower and yelp like a small beast, lash out against him and be brutally reprimanded, try to be free or escape him again only to find no success. He takes one long step closer. The height of his body seems stretched dramatically as he boughs over them like the willow, one hand placed palm-flat on the wall next to their head. They can hardly see any more of his expression in this position than the inhuman glow of his eyes and the faint reflected light that catches the lines of his gaunt body. ( they hate this. they hate him. ) ( they know what he wants. )

"Leave me be!"

-> The victim's desperate plea. All the force in their chest that cracks off the walls and fade into the dead night, every building empty and with them any chance of dragging in more lambs to the slaughter. ( what about help? help was beyond them in this equation. ) They are so strong---or they try to be. Try to bear the weight of their past and the weight of the mistakes of others on their back and never complain; they work hard, diligently, they do what they can until their hands crack; they make amends everywhere they can, so why is this happening? What have they done to deserve it? They are so sick with hate in the pit of their gut it makes them want to do anything, say anything so they may never set eyes on him again, but he comes back! Again, again, again, always with more taunts and more tortures! He bleeds their reactions from them drop by drop as if it something to be savored, his appetite which can never be satiated forced upon them who never wanted it. Was their eye not enough grief for him? What else will he take? Their liver; their kidneys; their fingers, one at a time? They fear many hands and many eyes upon them, dissecting them like fresh kill. They fear him, and hate him, and it makes their head fill with such pain it wants to split right in two looking at him right now. ( what of Anderson? what of Anderson? where was he to tame his beast, his lover? his quarry? where was he to spare them of this, an innocent? how dare he look away---how dare he look away! )

"What else can you take from me! I can't sleep, I can't work, I have no one to turn to!"

( how could any of them LOOK AWAY! )

"There is nothing left in me for you! You're spending your nights, the terrible No Life King, chasing a NOBODY!"

[quailfence]

[ID add: the text of the story is by writing-prompts-s, sadoeuphemist, stu-pot, and ciiriianan. It is as follows:

Temples are built for gods. Knowing this a farmer builds a small temple to see what kind of god turns up.

Arepo built a temple in his field, a humble thing, some stones stacked up to make a cairn, and two days later a god moved in. 

“Hope you’re a harvest god,” Arepo said, and set up an altar and burnt two stalks of wheat. “It’d be nice, you know.” He looked down at the ash smeared on the stone, the rocks all laid askew, and coughed and scratched his head. “I know it’s not much,” he said, his straw hat in his hands. “But - I’ll do what I can. It’d be nice to think there’s a god looking after me.” 

The next day he left a pair of figs, the day after that he spent ten minutes of his morning seated by the temple in prayer. On the third day, the god spoke up. 

“You should go to a temple in the city,” the god said. Its voice was like the rustling of the wheat, like the squeaks of fieldmice running through the grass. “A real temple. A good one. Get some real gods to bless you. I’m no one much myself, but I might be able to put in a good word?” It plucked a leaf from a tree and sighed. “I mean, not to be rude. I like this temple. It’s cozy enough. The worship’s been nice. But you can’t honestly believe that any of this is going to bring you anything.” 

“This is more than I was expecting when I built it,” Arepo said, laying down his scythe and lowering himself to the ground. “Tell me, what sort of god are you anyway?” 

“I’m of the fallen leaves,” it said. “The worms that churn beneath the earth. The boundary of forest and of field. The first hint of frost before the first snow falls. The skin of an apple as it yields beneath your teeth. I’m a god of a dozen different nothings, scraps that lead to rot, momentary glimpses. A change in the air, and then it’s gone.” 

The god heaved another sigh. “There’s no point in worship in that, not like War, or the Harvest, or the Storm. Save your prayers for the things beyond your control, good farmer. You’re so tiny in the world. So vulnerable. Best to pray to a greater thing than me.” 

Arepo plucked a stalk of wheat and flattened it between his teeth. “I like this sort of worship fine,” he said. “So if you don’t mind, I think I’ll continue.” 

“Do what you will,” said the god, and withdrew deeper into the stones. “But don’t say I never warned you otherwise.” 

Arepo would say a prayer before the morning’s work, and he and the god contemplated the trees in silence. Days passed like that, and weeks, and then the Storm rolled in, black and bold and blustering. It flooded Arepo’s fields, shook the tiles from his roof, smote his olive tree and set it to cinder. The next day, Arepo and his sons walked among the wheat, salvaging what they could. The little temple had been strewn across the field, and so when the work was done for the day, Arepo gathered the stones and pieced them back together. 

“Useless work,” the god whispered, but came creeping back inside the temple regardless. “There wasn’t a thing I could do to spare you this.” 

“We’ll be fine,” Arepo said. “The storm’s blown over. We’ll rebuild. Don’t have much of an offering for today,” he said, and laid down some ruined wheat, “but I think I’ll shore up this thing’s foundations tomorrow, how about that?” 

The god rattled around in the temple and sighed. 

A year passed, and then another. The temple had layered walls of stones, a roof of woven twigs. Arepo’s neighbors chuckled as they passed it. Some of their children left fruit and flowers. And then the Harvest failed, the gods withdrew their bounty. In Arepo’s field the wheat sprouted thin and brittle. People wailed and tore their robes, slaughtered lambs and spilled their blood, looked upon the ground with haunted eyes and went to bed hungry. Arepo came and sat by the temple, the flowers wilted now, the fruit shriveled nubs, Arepo’s ribs showing through his chest, his hands still shaking, and murmured out a prayer. 

“There is nothing here for you,” said the god, hudding in the dark. “There is nothing I can do. There is nothing to be done.” It shivered, and spat out its words. “What is this temple but another burden to you?” 

“We -” Arepo said, and his voice wavered. “So it’s a lean year,” he said. “We’ve gone through this before, we’ll get through this again. So we’re hungry,” he said. “We’ve still got each other, don’t we? And a lot of people prayed to other gods, but it didn’t protect them from this. No,” he said, and shook his head, and laid down some shriveled weeds on the altar. “No, I think I like our arrangement fine.” 

“There will come worse,” said the god, from the hollows of the stone. “And there will be nothing I can do to save you.” 

The years passed. Arepo rested a wrinkled hand upon the temple of stone and some days spent an hour there, lost in contemplation with the god. 

And one fateful day, from across the wine-dark seas, came War. 

Arepo came stumbling to his temple now, his hand pressed against his gut, anointing the holy site with his blood. Behind him, his wheat fields burned, and the bones burned black in them. He came crawling on his knees to a temple of hewed stone, and the god rushed out to meet him. 

“I could not save them,” said the god, its voice a low wail. “I am sorry. I am sorry. I am so so sorry.” The leaves fell burning from the trees, a soft slow rain of ash. “I have done nothing! All these years, and I have done nothing for you!” 

“Shush,” Arepo said, tasting his own blood, his vision blurring. He propped himself up against the temple, forehead pressed against the stone in prayer. “Tell me,” he mumbled. “Tell me again. What sort of god are you?” 

“I -” said the god, and reached out, cradling Arepo’s head, and closed its eyes and spoke. 

“I’m of the fallen leaves,” it said, and conjured up the image of them. “The worms that churn beneath the earth. The boundary of forest and of field. The first hint of frost before the first snow falls. The skin of an apple as it yields beneath your teeth.” Arepo’s lips parted in a smile. 

“I am the god of a dozen different nothings,” it said. “The petals in bloom that lead to rot, the momentary glimpses. A change in the air -” Its voice broke, and it wept. “Before it’s gone.” 

“Beautiful,” Arepo said, his blood staining the stones, seeping into the earth. “All of them. They were all so beautiful.” 

And as the fields burned and the smoke blotted out the sun, as men were trodden in the press and bloody War raged on, as the heavens let loose their wrath upon the earth, Arepo the sower lay down in his humble temple, his head sheltered by the stones, and returned home to his god. 

Sora found the temple with the bones within it, the roof falling in upon them. 

“Oh, poor god,” she said, “With no-one to bury your last priest.” Then she paused, because she was from far away. “Or is this how the dead are honored here?” The god roused from its contemplation. 

“His name was Arepo,” it said, “He was a sower.” 

Sora startled, a little, because she had never before heard the voice of a god. “How can I honor him?” She asked.

“Bury him,” the god said, “Beneath my altar.”

“All right,” Sora said, and went to fetch her shovel.

“Wait,” the god said when she got back and began collecting the bones from among the broken twigs and fallen leaves. She laid them out on a roll of undyed wool, the only cloth she had. “Wait,” the god said, “I cannot do anything for you. I am not a god of anything useful.” 

Sora sat back on her heels and looked at the altar to listen to the god.

“When the Storm came and destroyed his wheat, I could not save it,” the god said, “When the Harvest failed and he was hungry, I could not feed him. When War came,” the god’s voice faltered. “When War came, I could not protect him. He came bleeding from the battle to die in my arms.” Sora looked down again at the bones.

“I think you are the god of something very useful,” she said.

“What?” the god asked.

Sora carefully lifted the skull onto the cloth. “You are the god of Arepo.”

Generations passed. The village recovered from its tragedies—homes rebuilt, gardens re-planted, wounds healed. The old man who once lived on the hill and spoke to stone and rubble had long since been forgotten, but the temple stood in his name. Most believed it to empty, as the god who resided there long ago had fallen silent. Yet, any who passed the decaying shrine felt an ache in their hearts, as though mourning for a lost friend. The cold that seeped from the temple entrance laid their spirits low, and warded off any potential visitors, save for the rare and especially oblivious children who would leave tiny clusters of pink and white flowers that they picked from the surrounding meadow.

The god sat in his peaceful home, staring out at the distant road, to pedestrians, workhorses, and carriages, raining leaves that swirled around bustling feet. How long had it been? The world had progressed without him, for he knew there was no help to be given. The world must be a cruel place, that even the useful gods have abandoned, if farms can flood, harvests can run barren, and homes can burn, he thought.

He had come to understand that humans are senseless creatures, who would pray to a god that cannot grant wishes or bless upon them good fortune. Who would maintain a temple and bring offerings with nothing in return. Who would share their company and meditate with such a fruitless deity. Who would bury a stranger without the hope for profit. What bizarre, futile kindness they had wasted on him. What wonderful, foolish, virtuous, hopeless creatures, humans were.

So he painted the sunset with yellow leaves, enticed the worms to dance in their soil, flourished the boundary between forest and field with blossoms and berries, christened the air with a biting cold before winter came, ripened the apples with crisp, red freckles to break under sinking teeth, and a dozen other nothings, in memory of the man who once praised the god’s work on his dying breath.

“Hello, God of Every Humble Beauty in the World,” called a familiar voice.

The squinting corners of the god’s eyes wept down onto curled lips. “Arepo,” he whispered, for his voice was hoarse from its hundred-year mutism.

“I am the god of devotion, of small kindnesses, of unbreakable bonds. I am the god of selfless, unconditional love, of everlasting friendships, and trust,” Arepo avowed, soothing the other with every word.

“That’s wonderful, Arepo,” he responded between tears, “I’m so happy for you—such a powerful figure will certainly need a grand temple. Will you leave to the city to gather more worshippers? You’ll be adored by all.”

“No,” Arepo smiled.

“Farther than that, to the capitol, then? Thank you for visiting here before your departure.”

“No, I will not go there, either,” Arepo shook his head and chuckled.

“Farther still? What ambitious goals, you must have. There is no doubt in my mind that you will succeed, though,” the elder god continued.

“Actually,” interrupted Arepo, “I’d like to stay here, if you’ll have me.”

The other god was struck speechless. “…. Why would you want to live here?”

“I am the god of unbreakable bonds and everlasting friendships. And you are the god of Arepo.” End description.]

@a-captions-blog @accessible-art

My adaptation of the God of Arepo short story, which was originally up at ShortBox Comics Fair for charity. You can get a copy of the DRM-free ebook here for free - and I'd encourage you to donate to Mighty Writers or The Ministry of Stories in exchange.

Again it's an honour to be drawing one of my favourite short stories ever. Thank you so much for the original authors for creating this story; and for everyone who bought a copy and donated to the above non-profits.

[softdaydreamsdiary]

“Inspiration”

Ours was a house of God.

Many homes, one church, one God, many hands,

“Jesus loves me this I know,”

Pastors granddaughter, sins of the father, accursed bloodline. Christ said let the little children come to me.

Long nights in a darkened basement, empty pews, dusty nursery, a room in the back with a pulpit and nothing else.

“For no mark of sin may enter the Kingdom of Heaven.”

Visceral touch, prepared for harvest upon an unholy altar.

Strange situation, dissection, perfection through salvation.

“Your sins were bore on the cross.”

When does a child understand sin? How old do you have to be to go to Hell? How many lashes to absolve my iniquity?

Only speak when spoken to. Spared not the rod. Idle hands are the Devil’s playthings.

“For the Bible tells me so.”

Dress up, porcelain doll, glass house, ritual sacrifice, white knuckle, love me love me love me-

Outside of wedlock, no immaculate conception, “you’re just like your Mother,” martyrdom as my birthright.

“Whether covered entirely by the stain of sin, or wearing even a single drop, it matters not”

Gut me. I have known nothing else. This is my gift, my purpose, “It’s all part of Gods plan.” Jacob’s Wife. “You were made to serve your Husband.”

Savior, take me as a humble convert. My bleeding heart for your righteous crusade, hands clasped so tightly, reverent, weeping, possess me-

“All sinners left marked before judgement, however mournful, will be denied.”

I wish I was still pure. Only ever good for eating. Succulent mana, ritual offering, dirty dirty dirty-

You spread me open and study as if I were scripture, I find faith as monastic fingers turn each delicate page, speaking in tongues, you transcribe my word with no need for translation.

“The first blood belongs to the Lord.”

Divine blessing, guardian Angel, let me worship something please, higher power make me yours. Save me so that I may be clean.

Who am I if I’m allowed to live? Where does Isaac lay his head to feel safe? What does Abraham repent, if anything at all?

“Be not afraid.”

Where is the line for sacrilege in your heart? Shatter my every taboo, break me upon your wheel, indulge me in this secret heresy.

I am both Abel and Cain. Neck splayed, you deny me the butchers knife. I lie until I can’t anymore. Born-again.

“By His wounds you were healed,”

I don’t know how to love gently. Black sheep, prized yew, The Devil and The Lovers, euphoria, for once I was lost-

Baptize me, please. God, let me feast upon your sacrament, I believe I came from your rib. Won’t you let me back inside?

“Little ones to Him belong,”

Kneeling by the bed, penitent, your teeth at my throat, praying to be chosen, eyes closing, head bowing, make me your disciple, hedonists messiah-

I’ve never known a merciful God. Your breath of life into my lungs, my tears as holy water upon our brows,

“Blessed are the meek,”

Your tongue set to pilgrimage and I am crucified, catharsis to be devoured as a lamb of God.

Please, let me love you. I would tie my soul to yours, if I may make a deal with the Devil, forgive me Father, for I have sinned.

“For they are weak but He is strong.”

Eternal damnation, final revelations, cosmic machinations. I have only my promise and devotion.

I would walk into outer darkness to wash your feet, bear the thorny crown to purchase your passage into Heaven,

“For they shall inherit the Kingdom of God.”

I pray to become the Garden of Eden. Hide me away and let no man set foot nor eye upon your sacred ground.

Peter judge me as a sinner, but do not take me where he cannot follow.

Free will for the damned, and I choose a simple vice.

They shall know us by our love.

“Amen.”

-r 9.24.2024

[lazyhousecarly]

Check out this listing I just added to my Poshmark closet: Vintage Brown Leather Bomber Jacket Designer Aviator Genuine Lamb Skin Small.

[grandhotelabyss]

Thoughts on Fosse? I had to look him up, but apparently he's principally a dramatist and frequently compared to Ibsen. What's with the craze for all these mild-mannered, stylistically restrained Norwegians?

I think he got the Nobel on the strength of his novel, Septology. A summary from the laudatory New York Times review:

“Septology” is narrated by Asle (also a Catholic convert), a widowed painter living outside a coastal village in Norway. The action transpires over the course of a few memory- and prayer-filled days around Christmas, while he’s working on a painting of a purple line and a brown line intersecting to form an X, which he likens to the cross of St. Andrew. Asle is visited only by his neighbor, Asleik, a salty and chatty fisherman who’s always inviting him to dinner at his sister’s. He drives to the nearby town, to check on his namesake and doppelgänger, another painter named Asle. The latter is gravely ill, hospitalized because of alcoholism, and the narrator Asle is taking care of his dog, Bragi. The climactic (outward) event of the seven novels is a boat ride Asle takes with the dog and the neighbor, to attend Christmas dinner at Asleik’s sister’s house. He dies in the spare bedroom before they eat her specialty, smoked lamb ribs.

The seven-novel sequence, nearly 800 pages, is narrated in a stream of consciousness with no sentence breaks, and the namesake-doppelgänger story line is never definitively established as an extended speculative exercise or an astounding coincidence (or taciturn act of autofiction). Each novel begins, midthought, the same way, with Asle reflecting on how to finish his painting of the St. Andrew cross; each one ends the same way, mid-Latin prayer, at least until something else happens in the final book.

Fosse said, and to an interviewer who claimed that his work made her feel the presence of God on earth:

I had a kind of religious turn in my life that had to do with entering this unknown. I was an atheist, but I couldn’t explain what happened when I wrote, what made it happen. Where does it come from? I couldn’t answer it. You can always explain the brain in a scientific way, but you can’t catch the light, or the spirit, of it. It’s something else. Literature in itself knows more than the theory of literature knows.

I am sympathetic to this. Carve that last sentence on the lintel of the English department. I can't comment on his work because I haven't read him. His vogue in the Anglosphere seems to be part of the depoliticizaton of culture I've already observed several times—a healthy impulse. Yet, if I'm being ungenerous, Septology doesn't sound like my type of thing. Another reviewer mentions "the art of tedium."

I remember sitting in a very strange graduate class called Discourse of the Novel over 15 years ago as the professor, a famously erratic, perhaps even unwell, and yet formidably learned man of deconstructive intellectual tendencies, improvised a distinction I had never encountered before and have never encountered again between two types of novelists, or maybe writers in general. There is the writer of the "semanticon," interested in words, principally nouns, i.e., the things of this world, on the one hand; and, on the other hand, the writer of the "syntacticon," interested not in things but in the grammar of forms and ideas. Joyce vs. Beckett, I think he offered as examples; we read Beckett's Company in the class ("A voice comes to one in the dark"), but nothing by Joyce, announcing his allegiance to the syntacticon. Despite my reputation for deploying overstated binaries, I'm not sure this is a very persuasive one; I just like the two words. But, if I absolutely had to choose, I would be more allegiant to the semanticon myself, as I am more attracted to Joyce than I am to Beckett. If I were going to write an artfully tedious 800-page religious testament of an experimental late modernist novel, it wouldn't be one long sentence full of repetitions; it would be no sentence at all, just a list, a litany, of words, with no two repeated: semanticon, syntacticon.

[if-you-fan-a-fire]

"Cooks Cowed By Meat Edict," North Bay Nugget. May 26, 1943. Page 1 & 16. --- By BETTY DESJARDINS Tomorrow, May 27, ham actors will come into their own to gain recognition in Canada as "just the thing for the duration." Hungry theatre-goers will pack playhouses to capacity to glimpse, in starved approval, the ham actor swinging into his incomparable performance.Shades of Hamlet's ghost! This famous product of the pen of Shakespeare will gain hitherto unheard of prominence in movie fan circles, and cows, pigs, sheep and other farm animals will, or should, be banned from appearing in moving pictures by a rigid board of censors, lest the sight of potential Sunday cuts, yet on the hoof, provoke panic in crowded theatres. across the Dominion.

And all because a little paper-hanger bearing the name of Schicklegrueber picked a fight, resulting in the onslaught upon Canadians of a series of uncomfortable rations coffee, tea, butter, sugar, beer, liquor, and now meat.

Thursday, nervously fingering the brown Spare "A" coupon from her No. 2 ration book, unhappy Mrs. North Bay, along with several dozens of her kind, will stand regretfully in line before the meat counter in her favorite groceteria, carefully avoiding with dewy eyes the display case decked gaily with parsley, dill pickles and MEAT.

Slowly, in line with the miserable little procession, Mrs. North Bay finally shuffles her way up to the salesman who, wearing a deliberately solemn face in place of the usual leer, gazes at her with companionable melancholy and taps his fingers expectantly upon the counter.

Mrs. North Bay stifles a sigh, silently hands her ration book to the waiting man, and utters: "You do it." The grocer may have a fairly broad imagination, but he cannot guess the likes and dislikes of the various members of Mrs. North Bay's family. Bravely, how- ever, he begins: "Sirloin? sausage? leg of lamb? tenderloin? roast of beef? veal cutlets?" Receiving no answer he continues: "Back bacon? ham? Short rib roast? Spare ribs?Stewing beef? Hamburger?"

Other customers, particularly toward the end of the long line, begin to cough gently and shift. from one high heel to the other, in a delicately hintful manner, as Mrs. North Bay delves into her handbag and extracts therefrom pages 12 and 13 from the North Bay Daily Nugget, Tuesday, May 25 issue.

Unmindful of the distressing fact that she has been holding up the line for 20 minutes, she peruses with concentration the literature thereon. Through Group A to Group D she reads, debating long and hard upon. the merits of the various meats listed.

Her eyes light up. She has decided. Customers crane their necks, the salesman, with an artificial smile lighting his features, waits breathless, for her next remark. Then "For goodness - rakes! I just remembered that my husband went fishing yesterday and caught six fish. Why did I even think of buying meat!"

And she flits happily out of the store, bound for home and her six fish and, entering the family domicile, says to her husband, who has been patiently waiting for his dinner for 45 minutes: "You know dear, there is really nothing to this meat rationing situation!"

[solyecom]

What are the most caloric animals to eat?

There are many animals that are high in calories, and the specific caloric content can vary depending on the specific type of animal and the specific cut of meat. In general, meats that are high in fat tend to be higher in calories than leaner meats. Here are some examples of animals that are relatively high in calories:

Beef: A 3.5-ounce (100-gram) serving of beef can contain anywhere from 200 to 300 calories, depending on the cut. Beef cuts that are higher in fat, such as ribeye or T-bone steak, tend to be higher in calories than leaner cuts like sirloin or flank steak.

Pork: A 3.5-ounce (100-gram) serving of pork can contain anywhere from 200 to 300 calories, depending on the cut. Pork cuts that are higher in fat, such as pork belly or spare ribs, tend to be higher in calories than leaner cuts like pork loin or tenderloin.

Lamb: A 3.5-ounce (100-gram) serving of lamb can contain anywhere from 200 to 300 calories, depending on the cut. Lamb cuts that are higher in fat, such as leg of lamb or rack of lamb, tend to be higher in calories than leaner cuts like lamb chop or loin chop.

Duck: A 3.5-ounce (100-gram) serving of duck can contain around 300 calories. Duck is generally higher in fat than many other types of poultry, which contributes to its higher calorie content.

It's important to note that the caloric content of these meats can vary depending on factors such as how they are cooked, what they are served with, and whether they are consumed with skin or fat trimmed off. It's also worth mentioning that it's important to pay attention to portion sizes when considering the caloric content of any food, as eating too many calories can contribute to weight gain and other health issues. 

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[sacricat-a]

@lamblood said : " narinder? nari, look at me, won't you? " the little lamb turns to her partner, and his paws now in hers, she speaks gently. " i have very important question for you. " " you... make me very happy, happier then could ever dream of, you know this, yes? " " well, have been thinking, think a lot, and... i realize, i would not rather anyone else to share lifetime with. " she begins to shy, nerves getting the better of her. but, she presses on. " narinder... marry me, please. "

the night had been a pleasant one: the air was balmy, tinged with the scent of fresh-turned earth, the stars above like diamonds on deep blue silk. laughter and smiles abounded, giving way to hushed tones as their followers went to bed. now, in the relative quiet of the normally bustling camp, the two of them lingered, wanting this night to stretch on forever.

ovtsa's voice makes narinder's heart swell as she speaks, her simple declarations worth more than any adulation he had received in his years as a god. his heart skips a beat, two, fluttering against his rib-cage like a trapped butterfly. words stick in his throat, his fingers reflexively curling around ovtsa's smaller paws, holding them tonight. oh, how small her hands were in his! how delicate, how kind! these hands that brought him back, that spared him, that gave him a second chance at life, a second chance at happiness. these hands, that he knew could slaugh- ter, but instead she chooses to be kind. these hands that he knows better than his own scarred ones.

" i... " narinder's voice fails him, words caught in his throat. he breathes deeply, the warm air decadent and heady, and a smile tugs at his lips, lights up his eyes, and he looks fondly down at the little lamb before him. " i cannot imagine anyone else i would like to spend eternity with, " narinder finally manages, voice soft, so soft, syllables warmer than the night air. " you...my saviour. my heart. "

he feels a prickling in his nose, in his eyes, his throat feeling tight: tears, he realizes, tears that spring forth, tears born of joy. his heart is warm, his heart swells, emotions too big for this body, emotions that he never thought he would be allowed to feel. he is worthy, he is wanted. he has been chosen -- not because of what he is, but because of who he is.

" of course, ovtsa. " the answer is as natural as breathing, as natural as the magic that still runs through his veins. " of course i will marry you. " narinder leans down, kneeling so he can press his forehead to hers, eyes closed, smile so very wide present on his features. " i love you. "

[fieriframes]

[You do not hear of lamb ribs. So, are these spare ribs or back ribs? Hi, Piper said, as casually as she could. We’re back. I like the way it already starts. So, we're gonna make a brine?]

[coolinaria]

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