#Late Working Fairy

[haaaaaaaaaaaave-you-met-ted]

Battle Spirits Saga - Late-Working Fairy by Davide Luca

[horse-head-farms]

day 2: Royalty/Knight @mcyt-yuri-week

False, a knight famous for her ability to slay magical beings, was sent by her king to defeat the greatest threat of all - the fae. Here, she enters the faerie realm and is greeted by none other than the queen herself, waiting upon her forest throne.

Having grown up on tales of the fae and their evil trickery, False is surprised by how beautiful and kind the queen is, but isn’t going to let down her guard yet.

Queen Stress is rather impressed by this mortal who not only managed to find her way into the faerie realm, but is also brave (and foolish) enough to try and fight her! She has no intention of hurting False, and instead wants to teach her the mischievous ways of the fairies, get her to lighten up a bit and all that. And, well, if she tries to court the handsome knight along the way, who can blame her?

[thrumugnyr]

Hey! Started following you from the moment you started posting things on #curse of strahd. Haven't seen Patataj in a while. I love your art and will definetley commission you when the opportunity comes!

Just wanted to know how is your loveley bard doing? How is the campaign overall?

I hope this question didn't bother you much

Patataj is still running through Barovia, only making the soundest of decisions! For example he wanted to protect some werewolves from certain death after he helped them rebel so he agreed with Strahd's offer of giving him 10 whole favors. He was just too happy about the werewolves being okay.

Rahadin was angry, not so much because Patataj owes favors to Strahd, but because Patataj is clearly absolutely terrible about making deals. And what if something else asks for a bargain?

[fictionadventurer]

Potential Victober Reading List

Short List Bare minimum of books to meet every challenge

The Doctor's Wife by Mary Elizabeth Braddon (group read)

No Name by Wilkie Collins (a serialized book, book that plays with form, and a book by Wilkie Collins)

The Warden by Anthony Trollope (a book about religion)

An Ideal Husband by Oscar Wilde (Victorian drama)

Longer List If I want separate books for each challenge

Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson (serialized)

The Time Machine by H.G. Wells (plays with form)

A Dark Night's Work by Elizabeth Gaskell (serialized)

Books It Might Be Nice To Finish This Month

An English Squire by Christabel R. Coleridge

The Three Brides by Charlotte M. Yonge

Extras Books I Have Around That I Might Be Tempted to Pick Up

The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Bronte (no way I'll have time for it, but it's such a pretty copy)

The Half-Sisters by Geraldine Jewsbury

On the Back of the North Wind by George Macdonald (I still need to read my copy)

Oscar Wilde's fairy tales (I just bought a copy at a book sale)

Verses on Various Occasions by John Henry Newman (I found it on the free ebook site yesterday, the religion prompt would be a good excuse to finally read Newman, and poetry seems like an easy place to start)

Ellen Middleton by Georgiana Fullerton (Just heard about this in a video this morning, couldn't resist downloading when I heard it praised and learned it was by a Catholic author)

[misakarose]

"My friends strengthen my heart! For those that I love, I'd throw away this body!" ↳ happy belated birthday @naruzumake!! ♡

[sweetasmiele]

NALU WEEK - DAY #4

SCARS

“For once, you had a great idea, Natsu! The water is amazing.” Lucy squeezed her hair to let the water out and lay down. A nice cold swim was exactly what they needed. The last quest had left them covered in dirt and ashes, but that was to be expected when your partner was the Fire Dragon Slayer.

“Fish!” Happy yelled, diving once again into the natural pool they had found in the depths of the forest.

It was beautiful. The water shimmered under the sun, and the sound of the waterfall and of the birds singing was therapeutic. Lucy closed her eyes and sighed, her skin drying under the hot summer sun.

Her moment of peace was short-lived. She was showered with droplets of water as Natsu shook himself like a dog next to her.

“Natsu!” she yelled as he plopped down on his stomach just beside her. 

“Ah, this is the life!” he commented lifting his chest to rest on his elbows.

She closed her eyes again, and only to open them a few seconds later. Natsu wasn’t speaking but she could feel his attention on her and his hand was tracing abstract shapes on her arm. 

It took her a second to realize he was following with his fingers one of her old scars. Feeling her gaze, Natsu raised his eyes. He didn’t say anything, but Lucy knew he was asking for permission to continue, and she nodded.

“That one is old. It’s from when we were looking for Macao, remember?”

Natsu's eyes were back on her scar, his eyebrows furrowed and his lips pursed. He looked so focused Lucy was almost afraid to talk. She felt his hand move from her bicep to her elbow, his fingers touching the sensitive skin of another small scar.

“Tenrou Island,” she said immediately without him asking. She felt his hot touch linger a moment longer before his fingers moved down to her forearm. 

“That’s actually from when we got stuck in that bell after the Grand Magic Games.” she chuckled and saw his cheeks and ears coloring. 

“When you decided to get naked right in the middle of a fight?” he teased tapping his fingers on her skin, his smile turning into a smirk. 

It was Lucy's turn to blush. She squirmed under his touch, but he didn’t move his hand.

“It wasn’t my fault!” she whined, but before she could defend herself more Natsu’s smirk disappeared. His hand had reached her wrist. 

The marks from Virgo’s Fleuve d'étoiles had left a mark that went all around her wrist. It wasn’t a dark scar, it was barely there, but Natsu had seen it. 

Among all the memories she had cited, that was the most painful to revisit, so she remained silent. Natsu seemed to sense her tensing up because he moved on without waiting for her explanation.

His hands reached her waist, and Lucy’s breath caught in her throat. She felt his fingers push against her skin, suddenly much warmer than a second before. 

“That’s also from the Grand Magic Games,” she whispered, worried she would disturb his meticulous search.

“Minerva,” he growled, his expression darkening. Lucy wasn’t ready for that sudden change of mood, and she observed him quietly as his expression hardened and his eyes narrowed. 

His hand descended to her bikini, where a long scar started from her navel and disappeared under the fabric. His hand stopped right there, where the skin met the swimsuit. 

She blushed, but he didn't seem to realize where his hand was, his gaze dark and intense. 

She didn’t know if it was because it was a sensitive spot or because that touch belonged to Natsu, but each little movement, even her abdomen moving up and down, was enough to make her shiver.

“Natsu, it’s okay,” she said softly, a smile in her words. 

“No, it’s not. I don’t like it.” His gaze was fixed on his hand, still burning against her skin.

“Oh, I know they’re not pretty, but—” she suddenly felt self-conscious and tried to move away, but Natsu’s hand kept her still.

“I wasn’t able to protect you,” he interrupted her, averting his gaze, his cheeks coloring once more. 

Lucy sighed, feeling silly for having doubted him, her body relaxing under his touch. 

“Natsu, I’m a mage,” she said, “you’re also full of scars.” To prove her point, she playfully tapped a scar on his shoulder.

“It’s different,” he pouted.

“How is it different?”

“It just is.”

She gently cupped his chin and turned his head to face her, and Natsu grudgingly obliged.

“Look,” she said, pointing to a scar on her knee. “This reminds me of the first time we met. Remember? When that guy was pretending to be you?” he rolled his eyes, but she continued. 

“And this? This is from that time we ended up in Edolas.”

“And this is from when I made you and Happy those cookies and burned myself with the pan!”

Natsu finally met her eyes, a smile fighting his way out. 

“They all tell a story,” she said. “A story about me and you.”

He finally allowed himself to smile, and, for a moment, Lucy thought he looked beautiful. With his cheeks red from the sun, his cherry pink hair still wet from their swim, and his golden skin shining under the sun.

“Want to know which is my favorite?” she asked, leaning toward him, their noses almost touching.

He nodded, his eyes wide with curiosity, and for a second, Lucy could have sworn he was holding his breath.

“This one,” she pointed to her shoulder, where a series of little dots formed an arc.

“Where is it from?” he asked, furrowing his brows.

“You idiot! You bit me last month!” she smacked him on the head and jumped on her feet ready to run. Natsu was soon at her tail. 

She kept laughing and tripping, and it wasn’t hard for Natsu to catch her and throw her in the water, but she didn’t care. Her heart was full. 

Those scars were part of her and she cherished each of them, just like every moment she had shared with Natsu.

(Needless to say, she added a new scar on her knee, tripping during her run.)

[swasdoodles]

no strings attached

[cak31ssuperi04]

Henna not being back in any capacity in the second Mariposa movie gives me two impressions:

1). untapped potential for a 3rd movie where we get Henna reformation or some such.

2).

Mariposa: I wonder how Henna's doing out there.

Willa: ..... what if she's dead 😧

Mariposa: 😨

Honestly it's entirely possible that she IS dead; a lot of her control over the Skeezites hinged on the promise of invading Flutterfield, and we can see their patience wearing thin throughout the movie. It's possible her failure to follow through would be the final straw, and that her lights would only be able to carry her so far when her entire army is against her. I do like the potential for another sequel to tie up that loose end though, in no small part because "dramatic revenge declaration followed by offscreen death that's never mentioned" is just kind of anticlimactic. Even if it's been a decade and that ship has sailed at this point. We could've had it all. Two fairy trilogies. Also consider: The Skeezites don't seem to be a threat--or even present at all-- in Fairy Princess. They're not once brought up unless in past tense. Regellius brings up Flutterfield defeating them when that's not necessarily how it happens in the first movie(which she does point out but focuses more on the method than the outcome so it's still unclear). Yeah they succeed in driving them off, but if Mariposa's quest or the fact that they've been terrorizing the kingdom for centuries says anything, it's that there are probably way more hanging around than Henna's immediate army. I'm imagining a midquel where she manages to get the Skeezites to hold out for a little longer so she can get her Revenge Plan in, and Flutterfield deals with them for good.

[quietwingsinthesky]

i do love canon amy & rory but god, does some part of me wish they really had gone with the idea of the doctor picking up a child as a companion (and then later, that child’s best friend with a huge crush on her.) with the rest of the season really not changing at all, except now it’s amelia pond with an angel in her head killing her and lost alone in the woods. it’s little rory who dies and is forgotten and becomes a toy soldier. if this is going to be a fairy tale, then let it be one. children have never been safe in fairy tales.

[imnothereokuwu]

《NaLu Winter Wonderland 2022》

Day #1: Cookies and Warm Drinks

Helloooo! I'm Tsushi and I decided to join an event for once :D!

I had a bunch of fancy ideas for the prompt but I decided to go simple since I am currently experimenting and had no idea how the artwork would turn out, heh. I think I went overboard with the blurry effects on all of my entries so sorry if they're kinda hard to look at •́⁠ ⁠ ⁠‿⁠ ⁠,⁠•̀.

Btw I'm really new to Tumblr, so please let me know if there's anything wrong with formatting and things I might need to know about how to use this site. Other than that, I hope people like these entries, almost attempted to sell my soul to finish some!

[Thank you for @thenaluarchive for organizing this event!]

December 2022

[enlitment]

[eternally-tired-cryptid]

I have another one but it's separate so here.

If you have insomnia bc of anxiety, or your insomnia triggers anxiety (similar but different things 🤷) pick a Thing. For example, during the day, when I start thinking depressive or anxiety thoughts, my go to is "I wanna curl up in my bed and sleep". It doesn't fix it but sometimes there isn't fixing or talking yourself out of the thought, so a broken record response helps.

Specifically with insomnia, I will pick something to "write a story" about. This is when I do most of my oc fanfic plotting, bc I'm more likely to be able to figure out those ideas again when I wake up bc there's an original source material (if I were to think about my original works I may make the insomnia worse bc I NEED to write it down before I forget). But you could pick something you really enjoy talking about, something you're studying, music, whatever. Just pick something that's your "topic for the night" and whenever you start to drift into thoughts that make your insomnia worse, just jump back to the topic.

It sounds a lot simpler than it is, trust me. Sometimes I'll lay there just repeating the topic word over and over in my head bc the moment I stop I'm spiralling again. But trust me when I say that late at night when insomnia is keeping you up is rarely the time to unpack all those thoughts, it's okay to just avoid them in whatever way you can. If it's still a concern come the morning sunlight you can take steps to work through it then.

[seijorhi]

Just to start, thank you for sharing your fica with us and spending all this time answering our endless stream of questions ❤️ you’re a marvel.

But just out of pure curiosity, in a hypothetical world where Blue Lock had won that poll, what characters would you possibly have written about? 👀

i'm not trying to be annoying when i say this, but i genuinely don't know

because the plot kinda relies on not so much set personality types, but there's a dynamic for sure and trying to figure out which characters to put in is something i'm still mulling over haha

it's not just a case of 'these characters are already canon friends/in a team/gang together, lets throw in the reader', which is what i'd normally go with

[bookshelf-in-progress]

A Christmas Alone: A Beauty and the Beast Retelling

For the Christmas Challenge at @inklings-challenge, I've written a Christmas story that ties to my "Beauty and the Beast" retelling, "A Day Late." This takes place before that story, which makes it technically a prequel, but both are meant to stand alone.

Without further ado, here's:

A Christmas Alone

The dining table held a feast fit for royalty, but Beatrice had no eyes for the food. As she pushed a few limp vegetables around her plate, her gaze wandered to the birds and angels painted on the ceiling and toward the rose gardens outside the vast windows. Her mind wandered even further, past the limits of the gardens to an outside world she hadn’t seen for months, where a little cottage would be covered in snow and filled with the hustle and bustle of Christmas preparations. Her sisters would be baking up a storm today. Her brothers would be hunting for Christmas venison. If she were there, she would be decorating the house in every bit of greenery she could find.

In the distance somewhere, a voice said, “Beatrice.”

What would her father be doing today? Would he be out hunting for the Christmas tree alone? Did he miss her company? Did he mourn her, trapped for so many months in a castle with a beast?

“Beatrice.”

Who would be setting up the stage for the Christmas theatricals? Had she told anyone where she’d stashed the curtains and old clothes they used for costumes? She had hoped to convince everyone to put on a comedy this year, but now that she wasn’t there, Ophelia would probably badger everyone into performing one of her silly sentimental melodramas.

“Beatrice.”

The voice, now raised to almost a shout, snapped her out of her reverie. The dining room—and the massive Beast sitting across the table—came into focus. “I’m sorry, what were you saying?”

Beast’s striped, dog-like face showed concern. It was strange how well she could read the expressions of a dog-tiger-monkey man. His eyes and brows were very expressive. “You seem distracted,” he said in his deep tones. “Is something troubling you?”

It felt impossible to speak of it. That rundown, cozy little cottage was worlds away from this elegant palace full of gold and mirrors and portraits. The Beast did not belong with her family.

And yet...the Beast she’d come to know these last eight months was nothing like the fearsome monster her father had described when he’d come home with the rose. He was gentle. Kind. Patient. A bit moody and dramatic, but reasonable. It was just possible he’d grant this request.

“I was thinking,” she said, keeping her voice far more casual than she felt. “Christmas is in two days.”

Beast' s brow furrowed. “Christmas?” He looked at the gardens outside the windows. “It can’t be. It’s summer.”

“It’s always summer here,” Beatrice said. “That doesn’t mean it’s not Christmas. I’ve been here 226 days, which makes it December 23rd.”

Beast shook his head as if trying to clear away fog. “I suppose it is,” he said at last. “Time rather runs together here.”

That was another reason she needed a holiday. She blurted, “Could you send me home for Christmas? Just for a day or two?”

Beast’s face grew solemn. “I’m afraid that’s impossible.”

“Why not? You let Father come home with the rose.”

“To settle the debt by sending you to take his place. Now that you have come, it is not in my power to release you.”

“It wouldn’t be release. It would be...an outing. For good behavior. I promise I’d come back.”

“I believe you would,” Beast said, “but I have not found a way to safely allow even your temporary release. The rules of this place…”

“Oh, the rules!” Beatrice threw a napkin, but an invisible servant caught it before it could fly very far. “It always comes back to those stupid rules!”

“I’m afraid so.”

“I think you make up half of those rules.”

“I wish I were.” Beast leaned forward, his strangely human eyes full of sincerity. “Believe me, Beatrice. If I could safely send you home, even for a visit, I would, but I won’t risk your life by sending you too soon.”

Beatrice sighed. Her visions of a cozy Christmas faded. “So I have no choice,” she said. “I have to spend Christmas here with you.”

“Is that so terrible?” Beast asked.

Beatrice thought about the cottage--her brothers and sisters gathered around the table, the candles, the meal, the stories, the jokes, the songs, the laughter. It was rustic and chaotic compared to the luxury here, but Christmas in this vast, silent, elegant palace couldn’t compare.

“It really is,” she said.

Beast bowed his head. “I am sorry to cause you distress.”

He rose from his seat and turned toward the far doors, which opened beneath invisible hands.

“Beast? Where are you going?” Beatrice suddenly heard her own last words in her memory and cringed. She half-rose from her seat. “Beast! Come back here! I didn’t mean…”

An eight-foot tall beast could cross a room quickly. Before she could say more, the dining room doors closed behind him.

#

Beatrice peered into the library. The shelves, stuffed to the brim with leather-bound books, towered up to the ceiling, every book still in its proper place. Against the far wall, Beast sat in a wing-backed chair next to a fireplace half the size of the attic she shared with her sisters at home. Even in this warm climate, the evenings could get chilly. Flickering firelight cast light and shadows that tangled with Beast’s tiger stripes.

A book lay in Beast’s lap, untouched while he gazed into the fire. Beatrice approached cautiously and peered over his shoulder. She couldn’t read the language, but the pictures suggested it was a scientific text.

At least he wasn’t reading poetry. If he’d gotten into the melancholy ballads, there would have been no talking to him.

She stepped around the chair to face him. “Beast?” she said softly.

Beast looked up. The tips of his pointed ears drooped, his tangled teeth jutted from his jaw, his long tail hung limply over the arm of the chair, but his eyes were so human.

Her carefully composed apology fled her brain. She babbled, “I want to apologize. About before. I didn’t mean it like that. It’s not being with you that’s terrible, it’s...not being with them.”

Beast’s face eased, but he didn’t meet her eyes. “I understand,” he said. “It is natural to wish for your family at Christmas.”

“I just keep thinking about...everything,” she said. “The food and the carols and all of them. I’m missing out on it all.”

Beast nodded, “The first Christmas alone is the most difficult.”

Beatrice sat in in the chair facing him. “You have no idea.” A light sparked in her mind, bringing up a new thought. “Wait. Do you?” She perched at the edge of her seat. “Do you have a family, Beast?”

Beast appeared uncomfortable. He looked down and stroked his tail where it lay over the arm of the chair. “Most people do.”

Beatrice’s mind boggled at the notion of an entire clan of dog-tiger-monkey men. “What are they like? Are there a lot of you? Do you resemble your parents?”

Beast twisted the end of his tail in one hand. “There are...many of us. None of them look like me. I am the only one with such...animal features.”

“Is that why you’re here, then? Locked away like the minotaur?”

Beast grimaced. “My family is not responsible for my current situation.”

Yet he would never say what was. She’d narrow it down eventually, but for now, she had more important questions.

“How do you stand it? Being away from them?”

“I’ve become accustomed to the loneliness.”

And she was trying to leave him. She hadn’t thought of it from his perspective before—Christmas after Christmas alone in this silent palace, with no one except servants that he couldn’t see.

“How long have you been here?” she asked softly.

“Long enough to become accustomed to lonely holidays. I would not subject you to it if I had any other choice.”

Here she was, moping over one Christmas with Beast for company, while he’d suffered who-knew-how-many alone without complaint. Yet she still wished she could leave him. What kind of monster was she?

If only she could have it both ways. “I wish we could both see my family for Christmas. Despite how the two of you met, my father would like you if he could know you. My siblings would torment you, but they’d like you, too.”

Beast’s lip pulled up in his version of a smile. “It’s a lovely picture. I wish I could give it to you.”

How stupid wishes were. Both of them wasting time wanting things they couldn’t have.

Beast suddenly stood up, all eight feet of him stretching toward the ceiling. The book clattered to the floor.

“Be careful!” Beatrice scolded. Just because he had a million books in a huge palace did not mean he could throw them around.

Beast picked up the fallen tome. “My apologies." He strode toward the library doors. "I’ve just remembered.”

As he walked away, Beatrice knelt on her seat, looking over the back of her chair, and called out, “Remembered what?”

Beast turned back with a light in his eyes. “We have much to prepare before Christmas."

#

Christmas morning. Beatrice examined herself in her dressing room mirrors. She wore deep green—a full-skirted silk dress she’d never seen before in her massive wardrobe. With her red curls—delicately arranged by the servants—she looked like a Christmas doll. Like the presents she and her sisters got as children in their days of prosperity in the city.

She smiled at the invisible servants. “You’ve almost made me look pretty.”

She had never been the pretty one back home. She had too much of a mouth for that. Here, she always felt beautiful, without sisters to outshine her. But she would far rather be with them in their attic bedroom this morning. She could almost hear the bustle of their usual morning routine—rustling fabric, creaking floorboards.

Then she realized she could hear something, just outside her door.

She stepped toward the dressing room door. “Is someone in my sitting room?”

She reached for the doorknob, but an invisible hand wrapped around her wrist. Beatrice slapped it and yanked her hand free. “Stop that!”

Another hand grabbed her other wrist. Beatrice tried to step forward, but a strong grip on her shoulders held her back.

“What are you doing?” Beatrice shouted. “Let me go!”

She wriggled out from beneath the hands and managed to grab a hair brush from her vanity, which she smacked against the fingers holding her wrist. A minute later, the hands were back, holding her more securely than ever.

Beatrice struggled against them. “How many of you are in here? Is this a conspiracy? Have you all decided to rebel?” If the invisible servants had started a Christmas morning mutiny, she and Beast didn’t stand a chance.

While she looked for other means of escape, the door to the sitting room swung open, and the servants released her so suddenly that Beatrice fell to the floor. She rose, straightened her crumpled skirts, and scowled at the room, hoping her expression was directed toward at least a few of the servants.

“What was that?” she demanded.

The only response she received was a gentle nudge on the shoulder urging her toward the open door.

She had half a mind to stay right here, just to spite them. But she was curious.

She edged through the doorway and found Beast standing in her sitting room, resplendent in a suit of royal blue that dripped with gold and silver embroidery. He bowed to her. “Merry Christmas, Beatrice.”

“Merry...Christmas,” Beatrice said, bemused. “What are you doing in my sitting room?”

Beast gestured to the wall opposite the windows. “I was overseeing the delivery of your present.” A large, rectangular something was mounted on the wall and draped with a white sheet. In deference to the season, a gold bow had been placed in the center.

She hadn’t even thought of presents. It hadn’t occurred to her, trapped in a palace where Beast already owned everything.

“Did you wrap it yourself?” Beatrice teased, to hide her embarrassment. She stepped toward the wall and picked up one corner of the sheet. “May I?”

Beast’s eyes shone. “Whenever you like.”

Beatrice pulled off the sheet with a flourish. A heavy, carved wooden frame, as thick as her hand, as tall as Beast and nearly as wide, surrounded a painting. An interior Christmas scene, with a family gathered around a table in a room bedecked with ribbons and greenery. Yet something about the scenery looked familiar, something about the people tugged at her memory—

With a gasp, Beatrice saw that the family wasn’t just any family—it was hers. Every face was unmistakable. There was Viola’s dark hair, Rosalind’s freckles, Ophelia’s bright green eyes, Henry’s scar from where Edmund had pushed him out of a tree. And there, at the head of the table, his face mostly turned away, but unmistakable...

“Papa,” Beatrice breathed.

She ran a hand over the painting, the brushstrokes rough beneath her palm, as she touched every face in turn. “How did you do this?” she asked Beast. “You’ve met my father, but all the rest…”

“A gift from my godmother,” Beast said, “long ago. It shows us those who are far from us. It won’t show my family, but with a bit of rule-bending, I convinced it to portray yours.”

Yet another wonder of this place. Beatrice marveled at it. A masterwork of a painting. Every brushstroke precise. The colors vivid. The shadows and light as real as life. She felt as though she could walk inside the frame and be with them all.

She turned away, overwhelmed, with tears pricking her eyelids. “It’s lovely, Beast. I can’t thank you enough.”

A lump in her throat choked her. It was a lovely, thoughtful gift, and yet—it was almost worse to see them like that, memorialized in a single still image, like people long dead.

She was being ridiculous. She turned back to the painting.

Her jaw fell. Papa, who had been turned away, now faced directly toward her with a smile on his face.

“What?” Beatrice stepped toward the painting and scrutinized it. “I’m sure he was facing the other way before.”

“Was he?” Beast asked wryly. “This is a painting that must be watched closely.”

Beatrice examined the painting. It wasn’t just Papa. She was sure Viola’s arm was more outstretched than before. Henry’s eyes had opened wider.

A moment later, there were more changes. Papa’s mouth was open in a smile now. Viola held a pot of tea.

The image changed again, again, again, tiny movements every time, and soon it was changing so fast that Beatrice couldn’t see the changes. Everything in the picture moved in perfect fluid motion, as if the people inside were alive. She watched her family laugh and chatter as they shared a breakfast of tea and Christmas bread. There was no sound, no scent, but her memory filled in the gaps. She could hear the same old Christmas morning jests, hear the birds outside the window, smell the pine of the wreaths, feel the warmth and closeness of being with her family on Christmas morning.

Tears ran down Beatrice’s face, and she didn’t even try to stop them. “Thank you, Beast,” she said. She wiped her face in her silken sleeve—she had hundreds of dresses, but she couldn’t waste a moment of this miracle hunting down a handkerchief. “This is the Christmas I wanted.”

Beast bowed and backed away. “I shall leave you to enjoy it.”

Beatrice leapt toward him and seized his arm. “Don’t you dare!” Though she barely came up to his chest, she dragged him toward a sofa that had been turned to face the wall. “You are staying here. Sit.”

Beast, seeming lost and bewildered, meekly obeyed.

Beatrice spoke to any invisible servants that might be in the room. “Do we have any Christmas bread available? Something like what’s in the painting?”

A single knock on the wall. Yes.

“Bring some to us,” Beatrice says, “and a pot of tea. We’re sharing Christmas morning with my family.”

In moments, the food arrived, and she and Beast shared it in a picnic on the floor while she explained everything that was happening in the painting. Though she talked almost without stopping for breath, Beast listened to everything attentively, as if he was as hungry for company as he was for breakfast.

This was different, but it was good. A Christmas she could never have imagined, but one she would never have wanted to miss, here with her strange, hulking, melancholic, thoughtful Beast.

She had so much she wanted to say, to let Beast know what this meant to her, and no words to express it—she didn’t do well with sentiment, and some things were too deep for speech.

At last, on impulse, she threw her arms around Beast’s neck. “Thank you,” she said.

Beast, stunned, was frozen beneath her, but after a moment, he relaxed and returned the embrace.

Catching herself as she realized what this might look like to a beast who had proposed to her every day she'd lived here, she hurriedly pulled away and said, "I'm still not marrying you!"

For once, the refusal didn't leave Beast looking forlorn. He merely chuckled, his eyes sparkling. "I don't mind. Right now, this is more than enough."

She settled back to her seat, relieved he understood. It was. More than enough.

"Merry Christmas, Beast," she said.

He placed one of his hands over hers. "Merry Christmas, Beatrice."

[of-fairys-and-tails]

A chapter a day!

Chapter 54/545

[imagines-for-earthbread]

Can I get something romantic between warlord longan and dread trident sea fairy? (Both are lesbians)

The ocean was deeper than they remembered. Long did the trenches at the bottom of the ocean extend, ever darker and ever deeper, ever heavier as it pressed down upon them. They felt it in their scales as they breathed and as they moved, even though the dim trill of magic still hummed in their lungs and prolonged their life. They weren't a swimmer, but they swam now, in search of anything that existed anymore, even if it wasn't gilded gold or ever touched by the rays of the sun.

They didn't know what they were looking for. Something alive? --Certainly, the ocean here teamed with its own particular breed of life. Ancient fish and creatures whose shapes held up under this oppressive pressure, who were both clear and glimmered with their own particular brand of bioluminescence whose purpose served to lure prey closer. They would have to struggle less to find food in the dark that way.

Or something ancient and forgotten? There were many shipwrecks in the ocean, pirate ships and cargo boats that found themselves a necessary end. Cookie skeletons slumbered at the bottom of the sea, sugar bones cracked and frayed and perhaps nothing by now, if the years of observing the whalefall were anything to take into account. A ship didn't harbor as necessary an ecosystem as a whale did. Cookies were too small--too insignificant--to matter much down here. And that was only if their bodies made it down this deep in the first place.

They spent years diving the depths of the world, taking in the wildlife that existed subservient to dragons. They found Sugarteara and tore it to pieces mightily, cookies and shrapnel sharp upon their tongue, coral buildings torn to pieces by tail and claw. They hadn't caught every Sugartearan cookie in the slaughter. Some of them, even, managed to flee, scattered across the ocean like motes of dust in a high wind.

Perhaps that's what Longan Dragon Cookie was searching for: The survivors.

Fish, treasure, or stragglers... It was impossible to tell anymore.

Their eyes couldn't adjust to the darkness that permeated so deep without the aid of a dim, golden magic. Their lythe, draconic form wound its way, serpentine, ever deeper, twisting into the underwater canyons and gullies below. Their claws scraped against the smooth stone walls worn away by a millena of salty current and water wear.

They could hear their nails scratching at its surface more clearly now than ever--the noise was louder under the water, and the dense pressure only served to amplify it. They could almost hear their very own bones creaking and hear the shifting of their leathery scales rubbing against each other. They could hear the ichor flowing in them from the tip of their nose to the tip of their tail.

And they heard the sound of nothing--nothing, that was, except the sound of pressure, the noise of the ocean itself breathing.

They snuffled their snout against the earth at their side, snorted, and dug their claws in deeper, determined to leave their mark. They were here. And in a million years, they would come back and leave this mark down here again, fresh and deep, because there was nothing left to do. The world was empty.

The world was quiet.

At the bottom of the trench lay a gently swirling expanse of dusky sea brine, of which the haze beneath concealed the true bottom of the ocean floor. Longan Dragon Cookie paused here, golden eyes shining light and making the cloudy mass almost seem to glow with an apparent halo. It looked like the sunlight reflecting off of the clouds, only salty, wet, and dense. This was where the heaviest matter collected at the bottom of the ocean. Testily, Longan Dragon Cookie extended their paw, reaching inside to press down to find there was no immediate ground to stand upon. The trench extended deeper than life and deeper than sight.

A noise reverberated all around them suddenly, echoing loudly off of the ever-narrow walls of the trenches and leaving a dim ripple of water flowing east in its wake. It sounded like the ocean--not something cracking and breaking all at once, falling to the bottom of the ocean floor, but moreso the humming of an ancient song, one that only Earthbread itself could possibly know. Something about it seemed familiar to Longan, though they couldn't quite place it.

Longan twisted their head in the direction of the noise, bracing themself upon the precipice that dipped into the briney sea, weighted down upon by pressure and cold. For all their sense of sight, they couldn't see particularly far ahead of themself. It probably wouldn't have done much in the first place.

The noise didn't stop. It rumbled within the earth, tingling their claws and sending shivers down the length of their body, from the tip of their nose to the tip of their tail. It shuddered in the air with every ancient note, a siren's call that sang an ancient song of love.

To investigate or to draw themself back?

Well. Longan Dragon Cookie had conquered the world with a mighty swiftness and resolve, dragging the world from a golden age of pathetic, crumbling cookies to the golden age of dragons sprang anew. If life could exist, even down here--if this was a song being sang by a cookie of any form--even if it seemed unlikely that any cookie life could exist this far down, they knew what they had to do.

Powerful legs and a serpentine body snaked its way through the water, defying the laws of gravity, twisting its way through the current. The noise only grew louder, raising in volume, not for lack of becoming louder on its own but for how distant it apparently was. It followed the sea of brine--a sea so long that at some point, they were willing to call it a giant's river instead. The darkness was cold, and it was difficult to see farther than a short distance ahead of them. They found themself hugging the wall of the trench more often than they didn't.

They didn't know how long they swam. Hours, perhaps--it felt like it might have been days. Time was impossible to measure down here, unless one wanted to waste the effort to keep count of seconds and minutes and hours themself. Longan was not one of those creatures. After all, they had all the time in the world now.

As they swam, the taste of the brine seemed to grow thicker, punctuating the water with a taste so dense one could choke on it. They thought at first they were hallucinating how the brine seemed to rise as they traveled, but eventually there came a time that even they had to admit they were wrong.

They traveled for many hours--until, finally, a most peculiar sight met their eyes: A wall of brine, filtering slowly down, in a manner not dissimilar to a waterfall. Longan Dragon Cookie sniffed at the air, magically artificial gills flaring, head lifting in defiance of gravity. Gravity itself threatened to pull them under for how much the water tried to strangle them--they had to kick their feet with great aggression to not sink deeper before they were ready.

The song by now had stopped, the water stilling with the silence of nothing save the beating of a dragon's heart and the breathing of the ocean. Longan gazed upward, estimating the likelihood that the brine was pouring from somewhere above. It was easier to go down than it was go go up, they decided--and besides, it's not like they had anywhere to go but up or back the way they came, anyway. Twisting their body to face upwards, they began to swim in the serpentine manner that their cousins swam upon the air in the far-off tundra.

They thought of their corpses, intermingled in the midst of a fierce battle that ended up leaving the earth flowing red with the flow of dragon jam. They died protecting each other--protecting the cookies that they saw fit worthy to protect--and for what? Nobody would remember them now except as the villains who stood in the way of the re-emergence of the glory of dragons. It was a fitting end for the greater good. They knew not the forces they toyed with.

After a long, long while of swimming upward, taking rest at perches they found along the way, eventually they found they could rise no more. The brine filtered in from somewhere in the cavern wall, which meant there was a hole that led elsewhere. Longan Dragon Cookie's tail lashes furiously, glowering at the brine that drifted steadily downward and tumbled upon itself in slow motion. What a waste of time, they thought with disgust. And they were about to leave when all at once the song of the sea resonated once again.

It was louder here--loudest, even. The source of the noise seemed to come from wherever the source of this brine was.

Longan's tail thrashed, body dancing contemplatively before the brine. Fine, they eventually concluded. They'd come this far. What would be the point if they retreated now? Taking a deep breath of water, Longan Dragon Cookie flattened their gills shut (a feat that wasn't easy and took a great deal of concentration in itself) and dove forward.

It was very thick--so thick, it was viscous. The tunnel they twisted through was large enough to fit their body, but it was impossible to see and seemed even more impossible to work through. More than once, Longan found themself pausing, taking a moment to register from what direction the brine came by sensing the dim pull of the current. It seemed to bring them ever-upward. They held their breath so long that their lungs burned. They held their breath for so long that they had to breathe, and they sucked in water that was more salt than it was water and half as fluid. It burned in their gills, sharp and painful, rubbing the fragile flesh beneath raw and tender.

The song was still singing when Longan breached the surface of the brine, clawing their way through the final gap and finding themself finally drifting above it all. They opened their gills and breathed, heavy at first, and then softer. Already, they found themself bring dragged down by gravity once more, but it felt easier to move from where they currently rested, though it was no less difficult to see. There was no light here--none from above--though looking down, the brine on the ocean floor seemed to glow the palest of teals.

The song rocked softly, so loud that their head buzzed from the noise. It sounded louder to their right, so they angled their head in that direction and began to swim to investigate.

They drifted close. Closer. The golden light shining off of their eyes illuminated what lay ahead dimly, until they could see the face of what looked to be some kind of statue--the statue of the beautiful face of a young woman, one who looked so distantly familiar, Longan could swear they should have been able to remember her name. And yet the song of the sea seemed to emanate from somewhere deep within the statue, playing like the distant memory of a lullaby.

Before Longan could think too much of it, the statue suddenly moved. Soft, quiet eyes suddenly stared back at them, and the music that the sea had been singing all this time faded all at once.

Longan flinched backwards for a moment, alarmed, but didn't draw too far back. Recognition snapped into place in their mind all at once--the song of the sea a song that sailors used to sing on the ocean when they missed their loved ones at home. The thick sea of brine that twisted like rivers in the trenches of the sea, the very same brine that fell from her head like hair. The tale of the Sea Fairy, how she loved the moon so fiercely she never stopped trying to reach the cookie she loved, until finally she did and disappeared thousands of years ago.

This was where she disappeared to.

She stared at them for a long moment, the living embodiment of water staring deeply into their own eyes with a chronic lack of fear that either came from ignorance or dismissal. The brine glowed stronger now, as if awoken from a deep sleep of its own, shimmering a cold teal and allowing Longan to finally see for the first time in what felt like weeks.

She was silent. They were, too.

"I thought you were somebody else for a moment," Sea Fairy murmured, her eyes drooping tiredly. The glow of the ocean floor eased, but didn't go away entirely.

Longan answered: "The depths of the ocean is far too deep for any light from the sky to reach."

"I know," came the quiet answer--quiet, though it still trembled loudly in the air. She shifted, her eyes sliding away from them and drifting to the side, a spark of some unnameable emotion Longan never cared to consider slipping onto her face for a moment.

"So this," Longan Dragon Cookie noted, gazing about the empty ocean themself, "is where you have been hiding all of this time, brooding because you could never reach the unreachable dreamer." It wasn't a question--it was a statement of fact.

Sea Fairy hummed, the sound not dissimilar to the song they'd heard in their search to find the source. The song of love. Were Longan Dragon Cookie not fully aware of just whose domain they resided in, they likely would have scoffed.

"You have dived quite deep," she murmured finally, "to have come here." Carefully, her eyes slipped back over to them, her brow lightly furrowed as she gazed upon the comparatively small dragon. "I wish that you hadn't."

"I certainly didn't descend these depths to find you," Longan proclaimed, searching the ocean floor for a distant island that could be deemed at a safe distance. There was none. "I followed the sound of the sea's song of love, and it brought me here. That is all."

"What are you doing so deep in the first place?" she asked, moving. Longan Dragon twisted back, scowling, but she continued to move her arm, slowly extending a cupped hand, assumedly for them to perch upon. As if they would. "You're no manner of sea dragon."

The bubbles rose from Longan's snout in a shimmering gesture, eyes shifting from hand to face to general demeanor. Her hair fell slowly in waves, blanketing the bottom of the ocean floor in a salty teal that glowed with the power of her magic. Somehow it made her seem paler, framing her face and making it almost seem to glow like the face of the moon on a clear night--all except for her eyes, dark and carefully neutral like the depths of a somber sea.

She was beautiful, they thought.

"I could ask the same," they answered briskly, turning their head aside but still keeping their eye on the waking legend. "But we already know that reason. Don't we?"

Sea Fairy Cookie blinked.

"Is that why you're here, then?" she asked, voice humming like the the curling currents. "To relish in fate's decision to leave you lonely?"

Longan Dragon opened their mouth to speak, but paused, grimacing--an out-of-character action that took them by surprise. But there was something to it that troubled them, rearing its ugly head and hissing with agony and frustration. For several long moments, Longan Dragon Cookie puzzled over it, eyes flickering slowly and warily over the oceanic hue surrounding them.

And then it hit them.

'Alone'.

In all of Longan Dragon Cookie's efforts to expunge the world of all cookie life, they've found themself alone. In electing to live their life in accordance to the superiority of dragonkind, they've also turned away from their very own family--their dragon kin, their brood, their heart. How disgustingly attached to mortal musings they had been. How spiteful and angry they were to turn Longan's vision for the future away.

They'd seen these events unfold. They knew this song and dance. As far as they were concerned, it was worth a millennium of loneliness, if it meant destroying the cookies who were destroying the world and the legacy left behind by dragons everywhere.

But now they were facing the consequences.

And here they were, facing the unforeseen--a living goddess hiding beneath the sea, for a thousand years hence, unable to face her own loneliness in her longing for the sleeping moon.

Briskly, Longan's tail thrashed back and forth, claws digging into the stone to keep themself rooted in place. "I made my decision long ago," they hissed, vile and contemptuous, turning their head to glare at the queen of the sea. Such a shame that it wasn't quite so easy to turn the very sea itself into stone.

She met their gaze for a long, silent moment that was only as silent as a dragon's heart beat. It was only as silent as the static noise of the ocean floor. Somewhere leagues away, a whale hit the bottom of the ocean floor, alone and dead.

She closed her eyes and shifted her head, the light of her magic flickering subtly.

"I did, as well," she whispered. "A long, long time ago."

She really was beautiful, Longan decided. They wondered whether the moon saw her face looking up toward the sky, eyes meeting eyes in desperate want to hold her hands and dance together rather than miles upon miles away from each other. Had Moonlight seen her--seen her reaching out her hands toward the sky from atop her tower, trying to do something so small as to be acknowledged once more by her love?

Or had Moonlight merely slept through it all, peaceful and unawares, as uncaring to the sea's pull as a cream wolf was to it's freshly-killed meal?

"Perhaps," Sea Fairy breathed, drawing Longan grudgingly from their thoughts, "if you don't mind... perhaps we can be lonely together. Just for a while."

She lifted her hand once again. Unlike her face, it was dark, like the abyss of the sea swallowed the light and refused to grant it purchase. They hadn't noticed it when she lifted her hand before, and they hadn't noticed when she moved her hand back to her side.

Dubiously, Longan turned their attention toward her face once more, taking in the expression of her eyes, the movements of her face. Perhaps she was trying not to sound desperate. Who knew how long she'd spent in these depths in an exile of her own making, cold and alone?

Who knew how long it'd take for Longan to find company of their own, in the world above the sea where their pairs of eyes could see?

They knew.

"Very well," they scoffed. "If only for a time."

Gradually, they lifted themself up and swam to Sea Fairy's waiting hand. They nestled there uneasily, muscles tense and poised to spring away at the slightest sense that danger was afoot. But her hand didn't move, and it was oddly warm to be held by the hand of a cookie god where the sun never touched and warmth only came from volcanic vents along the sea floor.

They hoped, then, that they didn't sound desperate.