#Mother of the Wise. Mother of the Aimless. She of the Way of Things.

[demaparbat-hp]

Zuko drank in the sight of her because some part of him knew he wouldn't get another chance to do so.

She was the most glorious being he had ever seen.

Mother Wolf guides us to the end of something in For the Spirits Chapter X: Following Your Form.

What will the Southern Seas bring? What depths has she pushed us into?

[aspoonofsugar]

What do you think of the songs from RWBY volume 9?

Hi!

Sorry for the long wait and thank you for the patience <3

So, I love volume 9 soundtrack! It is wonderful musically-wise and I am very happy to see that Casey, just like Jeff, uses the songs to explore the characters' arcs. Volume 9 is really the return of character-driven songs and I am grateful for that!

Here is the list of some metas I have already written for some tracks:

Chatterbox (Neo + CC's song)

Worthy (BB's song)

Quiet (Jaune's song)

As for my favourites:

Guide My Way

Chatterbox/Quiet/Checkmate

Worthy

Trapdoor/Inside

The Edge

Guide My Way is one of my favourite RWBY songs ever, so let's analyze it a little!

GUIDE MY WAY

The Red Like Roses trilogy explores Ruby's feelings over Summer, as she sings to her mother. In particular, the red like roses motif shows the layers and the evolution of Ruby's grief.

Initially, we are simply told that:

Red like roses fills my dreams and brings me to the place you rest.

Red roses remind Ruby of Summer Rose, so she goes to visit her grave:

This is the premise of the Red Trailer, but no other indication is given. This fits Red Like Roses being about RWBY as a team, which mirrors Ruby's tendency to carry others' burdens and to repress her own.

However, Red Like Roses Part II reveals Ruby's reaction to Summer's disappearance is raw and complicated:

Both voices: It doesn't matter how The petals scatter now Every nightmare just discloses It's your blood that's red like roses Voice 1: And no matter what I do Nothing ever takes the place of you

It is Summer's blood, that's red like roses. So, Summer becomes linked to violence and death. However, Ruby refuses to face these dark emotions. It is this hidden trauma, which leads to Ruby's spiral and breakdown in volume 9. Here is where Guide My Way starts:

Saw you In a dream Are you who you seem? Was it always in the cards for me To be aimless? No direction, nothing pulling me down From the sky it seems like I always get too High Oh the air is cold, I don't know how to breathe I'm begging, can you Guide my way out Of this place?

Ruby is aimless and there is nothing pulling her down. This choice of words is interesting because they tie into the gravity imagery, which fills the Atlas Arc:

Keep dreaming 'bout a better world You keep wishing for some clarity Always hoping that a lightning bolt Is gonna save you from this gravity

Gravity is linked to limitations. It is something that chains and makes people fall. People like Ironwood, for example, who is crushed by this force together with his kingdom. And yet, Ruby is designed as a person able to defy gravity. As a matter of fact Petal Burst lets her basically move unbounded by the laws of physics:

And yet, this freedom slowly becomes a burden. Ruby is never tied down by bad things. She can inspire everyone. She can guide everyone. She always flies higher than everyone. And yet, this in itself is a problem:

Past Ruby: That’s right! It’s up to you to make things better, isn’t it? Everything all depends on you! Your sister needs you, your friends need you, the whole world needs you to keep fighting, forever and ever, against an invincible monster that took your mother!

Ruby is so above everyone else that she finds herself lonely and lost:

She drinks the tea and ends up in a strange dimension, where she has to choose alone who she is going to be. In this dream world, she meets the person who fills her dreams:

Red like roses fills my dreams

Guide My Way is just a long monologue Ruby tells Summer. Basically a prayer:

Open wide You were born to hypnotize them all They said their prayers (Can you, can you) can you hear me up there?

Through this one-sided confrontation Ruby affirms herself as a person still strongly defined by her mother:

I can't define Would it even be enough to change my mind? Your memory ever-lasting at war with my foolish pride What is left? I know it's you and I, when I look inside

And yet, a different individual, as well:

I'll be who you were and I'll be even more

She is still incomplete:

Otherside, Did you mean to make me half or whole? Will I ever be (complete)? When will I become all of me?

And yet, she realizes Summer may not be complete herself:

What survives After all the dust has gone? Were you there till the end (the end)? Were you at least called a friend?

Ruby doubts her mother for the first time. Was she at least able to be herself until the end? Like Penny, who was at least called a friend? Or did Summer become her own antithesis?

Who is Summer Rose?

A broken pedestal.

And who is Ruby Rose?

A shattered mirror.

Or is she?

A moment of quiet is all it takes To reclaim a life and a promise made

Just like Jaune, Ruby only needs a moment of quiet to realize who she is supposed to become:

I am the reflection of who prevails I'm what inspired the fairytale

Her own reflection prevails on Summer's one. In the beginning, Ruby wants to be like Summer, that she equals to the fairy tale heroes her mom reads her about:

Ruby: I love books. Yang used to read to me every night before bed. Stories of heroes and monsters… They're one of the reasons I want to be a Huntress!

Still, Ruby is the one who will make the fairty tale into reality:

Blake: The real world isn't the same as a fairy tale. Ruby: Well, that's why we're here! To make it better.

As a result, she doesn't need fairy tale heroes anymore. Rather, she is going to inspire fairy-tales. Actually, she has already inspired one:

She inspires Little to grow into Somewhat. She helps a literally fairy-tale character. She is the childhood hero (Huntress) to Little. Just like Summer is Ruby's childhood hero:

Somewhat: You do feel… familiar. Like a happy dream I can’t remember.

Ruby is a happy dream Somewhat can't remember. Summer is a happy dream Ruby can't remember. This is why in Red Like Roses Part III there is simply:

Red like roses fills my dream

Red like roses here is not linked to death (it doesn't bring Ruby to the place Summer rests) or violence (it isn't Summer's blood that's red like roses). It is simply Summer's color, which fills Ruby's happy dreams. Even if she can barely remember Summer, she still loves her. Not as a hero, but as a mother:

Summer: I love you… just the way you are. Always…

At the same time, Ruby herself becomes someone else's dream. Specifically, she becomes the dream of her inner child (Little). She doesn't need to idealize Summer anymore because she is growing to be her own hero. She is going to take care of her inner child in Summer's place. This is what it means to become an adult.

This is what the refrain of the song hints at. It starts with Ruby begging Summer, but then it slowly changes through the song, until it reaches its powerful ending:

I'm begging, can you Guide my way out Of this place?

Guide my way out Of this place

Guide my way out Of this place (I can guide me, I can guide my way out) Guide my way out Of this place

Ruby herself can guide her way out.

OTHER SONGS

Here comes some quick miscellania thoughts on other tracks.

Chatterbox: I love how it plays when the Jabberwalker appears and it is impossible to understand who is singing. It is a beautiful nod to Carol's original non-sense poem and it ties with the CC and especially Neo's arc

Quiet: The sound of clocks, the reference to Pyrrha and the mention of a miracle as a nod to Jaune's allusion make it a fave. I also love it plays in one of my favourite scenes of the seasons.

Worthy: I like it musically and I love how it describes Blake and Yang's relationship through the metaphor of falling, which calls back to the episode Worthy itself.

Checkmate: It is one of my favourite musically, but I don't have much to say about its lyrics. I think it beautifully introduces the viewers to the season and it calls back to player and pieces in many ways. It also references the chess motif throughout the series.

Inside: I love how its lyrics reference the Blacksmith's speech about living with Balance and beautifully illustrate the theme of the season.

Trapdoor: I like it musically, but I have not much to say about its lyrics. I think it is kind of self-explanatory as a song.

The Edge: My least favourite track. It is good enough, but not my piece of cake.

Thank you for the ask and have a nice day!

[aquanthis]

can I hear about Adelia. I think that’s the name your night elf mage. please

YES ABSOLUTELY!!! ADELIA MY BELOVED!!! oh there's a lot wrong with her. a lot. there are many layers to this little mage good lird. look at her

^ seb's art ofc

i hope you like weird girls because that's all she's got!

Archmage Adelia Starweaver, Eternal Magus

ok the general info like usual: she's an arcane mage, an archmage, and she wields aluneth. she's a bisexual nonbinary woman and a complete disaster. she's a whirlwind of a woman and i'm absolutely obsessed w/ her.

personality-wise, adelia is a pile of masks so high that she doesn't really know who she is underneath them all anymore. she tries desperately to fit in and to pretend like nothing hurts or phases her, when in actuality every mean word clings to her like cobwebs. she puts on an act of being bubbly and loud and brash, trying to get people to like her, but the other people around her actually just can't stand her and think she's annoying. she's very much the "you could pour hot soup in my lap on purpose and i would apologize to you" type except it would be her laughing it off with a big smile and going to clean it up herself and never speaking of it again. this is how she copes. she's so normal lol <3

her childhood was fucked because her mother died shortly after adelia's younger sibling was born, and her dad basically put everything into trying to control adelia and "make her mom proud" or whatever. he tried to force her into druidism, and adelia was, uh. Not Happy! her autistic ass did not do well in druid school. the other students hated her guts and also made fun of her for the situation with her dad and that's when she picked up her Annoying Mask.

anyway, she was obsessed with stories about illidan. like, OBSESSED. special interest level obsessed. she felt validated and vindicated by illidan's rejection of druidism to become a mage, and she began studying magic in secret, all while disappointing her father and her teacher. despite the fact that illidan's life should've, by all means, been a cautionary tale, she did NOT take it as such, and look up to/aspired to be like him. she took the brunt of her father's anger/pressure/abuse, inadvertently protecting her younger sibling for the most part.

so! that was her life up until the draenei landed on azeroth. when the draenei came to darnassus, adelia met paleri (who avid grims oc fans will recognize as aemara's wife!) and they became fast friends. aemara had just disappeared to join the alliance military, and paleri was left aimless and lost, feeling like she couldn't protect her people as a simple engineer and wanted to become a paladin. adelia became determined to help her (had a bit of a crush on her too) and very quickly convinced paleri to go exploring with her. they left darnassus together, paleri determined to become a paladin and adelia determined to become a mage.

the funny thing about adelia, see, is that she's incredibly powerful. as in, her magic is like raw magic energy itself, unwieldy and volatile and unpredictable and dangerous. she has largely unparalleled skill at actually conjuring up the magic, to the point of eventually allowing her to become an archmage, but she's so fucking bad at controlling it. she's like a bomb about to go off at any given moment. so, when she and paleri go wandering together, there are a lot of. Incidents. lol

their journey takes them from burning crusade up to legion, all the while they made names for themselves as wandering mercenaries or minor heroes. and then, in legion, they join up with their respective class halls, pretty much go their separate ways, and begin climbing the ranks (surprisingly quickly).

adelia gets some bad flashbacks to childhood in the mage class hall. everyone fucking hates her. she doesn't know how to not be annoying because that's the mask she's used for so long so she just keeps up with it. khadgar is the only one who really tolerates her but even then he brushes her off (at first. they're kind of friends now). HOWEVER. when they're seeking champions to hunt down the artifacts, she gets chosen to hunt down aluneth. is this a little bit of a plot to get her killed? yes! but also she is the mage champion with the strongest ability with arcane magic, to a point that they can't just ignore her. so off she goes to hunt down the most volatile staff ever to exist lol

the aluneth questline goes as planned and everything and she picks up the staff. but it immediately starts berating her, as aluneth does. constantly. and at first she laughs it off like she always does, but after a while of the constant snide comments and contempt, she starts crying while trying to laugh it off, and aluneth suddenly gets slapped in the face. because, huh? what? this cringy loser girl who picked up the damn staff actually has feelings?

so it goes a little easier on her. just a little. and over time, aluneth starts to grow a bit of possessive attachment to her. a sort of "you're the only one who is strong enough to wield me so that means you're mine and i have to protect you" relationship. and at one point, adelia gets in a fight with her sort of nemesis (raquesis, one of august's ocs, a frost mage!) and is just kind of letting raquesis beat the shit out of her because adelia doesn't really have much fight in her when someone's being mean to her, and as she's about to pass out, aluneth fucking possesses her. and defeats raquesis on the spot. to save adelia.

it's like. all of the sudden, aluneth—this being made of pure, volatile arcane energy, that up until now was seemingly incapable of feelings other than contempt and pride—protects her. not for itself, but for her. no one has ever protected her before. she wakes up on the beach beaten half to death but alive and aluneth makes some smug comment like "you know, you can't rely on me to save you from everything" and adelia just starts wailing and hugging the staff as if it'll do anything.

she loves her fucked up magic staff :')

anyway uh she's still obsessive about illidan in legion so it's really funny that she's there when he's revived in the nighthold. she has some moments in the stuff i wrote about aquanthis in nighthold and it's all really fun. she's so silly. but yeah she's all starstruck by him

OH ALSO she ends up dating illidan's adopted daughter without knowing that and finds out later and it's REALLY FUNNY. adelia fidgeting like "can i meet him can i meet him can i meet him" trying to be so normal about meeting her hero. she meets him and he's like 😬 LMAO he does not like her. unfortunately

after legion she's just kinda, Around. when she's needed. she meets her little sibling again at some point and it's wild but that's something seb and i haven't developed too much so i don't wanna talk about it :P

to give you an idea of how silly she is, here's an excerpt from the gul'dan fight lol

my silly <3

anyway ermmmm it's 5 am and that's as much as my brain can spit out rn but just know she's a disaster bisexual and i want to pick her up by the waist and spin her around. my bestie

[splicedskies]

Altra wasn't sure what he wanted to do in life. At first, he was contempt with living with his mother. she had an idea of what to do, just some simple things. Simple hobbies, encouraging him to interact with Pokémon. Often times steering him away from being a Trainer, or getting too involved with others.

That didn't quite work in the end though. Now he was on his own, aimless, and just.. wandering. Exploring. Trying to find something stable to latch onto. And right now, Altra was just trying to find his footing before actually looking for purpose.

"Yeah.. I don't know why they do. Some don't, sure.. Like my own Partners didn't run from me. But the rest.." He frowned a bit at that. But at least he felt a bit better that he wasn't the only one where this happened. Made it less abnormal.

But hearing about Vic's own Pokémon, Altra nodded. He didn't really know what any of those were. But they sounded intimidating and strong.

Well he knew what one of them were...

"Oh.. I've met Hydregion's before. They're really mean tempered. I don't know how anyone is able to get them to listen." He still remembers a brief run-in with one that was all too unhappy and willing to attack him for his mere presence.

That had not been a fun situation.

"Uhh.. oh.. if you're sure.. Vic." He felt weird addressing someone older than him just by their name. He'd been often taught other wise, to use honorifics if someone was older, or above you in some way. But if they gave permission, then he would just use their name.

'Got a lot of rough n' tumble types from the sounds of it.' Desmond grumbled out, looking to Altra as he relaxed on the teen's shoulders.

"Really? I only recognized one of them.."

'Yeah, take someone with one hell of an iron fist to get rolling. Yer' new friends got that kind of presence at least.' A snicker from the little furry menace before Altra shook his head.

"Oh.. sorry.. he.. said that your team sounds like a lot of 'rough and tumble' types that need someone with a strong hand to train." He'd figured he'd translate at least to Vic, since the Zigzagoon was talking about him.

"Say you 'got that kind of presence'.. Mm what ever that means."

Vicious cocked a brow at that before grunting softly. Yeah, he was probably going to give the kid the money.

"Yeah, stuff like that. May take a few goes, but I'll see what I can do for you. For me, I took a lot of boxing to pay for that education and a lot of studying, but I enjoy it." He replied softly with a laugh.

"Some just teach themselves though or have someone else who's learned it to take them on as apprentice." He added.

So the kid wasn't a trainer, it seemed, more of an Explorer or wanderer. He is definitely not a threat to Rocket, then, good.

"Don't feel bad kid, they all avoid me as well, for whatever reason." He offered in comfort.

At the kid's question he grinned.

"I also have a Tyranitar, Scizor. Metagross, Corviknight, and a Hydregion. But the last one isn't too well trained yet, due to I caught it recently and tends to ignore me. If we can't work something out, I'll go release it back in the wild that I caught him in." He replied, the last being a lie, Rocket gave it to him, so he was stuck with the dam thing.

"And Vic is fine, we're friends, right?" He teased lightly, not bothering to put out he'd be doctor not mister.

[pearwaldorf]

It is a sign of how much I love something if I’m willing to entertain a high school AU about it.

(This has been kicking around for A While but I remembered it existed now that I’m in my Vox Machina feels again. Same universe as all these.)

-- 

”Vax’ildan. I don't ask much of you here.” Syldor’s voice is tight, irritated but not yet angry. ”I let you and Vex’ahlia have your way most of the time, far more than I believe is wise, but both Devana and your mother insist.”

Vax remains unmoved, turned away from Syldor in the armchair in which he is draped.

”It's just one Saturday. Is your time that precious to you?” Syldor’s voice turns cajoling, and possibly a little desperate, Vax thinks. This has now become interesting, so he swings around and puts his legs over the other arm of the chair. Syldor does his best to not visibly show how much it bothers him. (He fails miserably.)

“You know Vex and I visit Mom on the weekends. It’s the only time we get to spend with her during the school year.”

“I'm sure your mother would understand sometimes short-term sacrifices need to be made to invest in the future.”

“I'm sure that's exactly what you said when you were trying to get in her skirts.”

Syldor turns blotchy with anger. It's profoundly unattractive. “Go to your room until you can figure out how to address me with respect,” he hisses.

“Might be a while. Send up dinner.” Vax jumps off the chair and saunters upstairs. He was getting tired of that conversation anyways.

He passes Velora’s room on his way down the hall. She’s holding court over a group of stuffed animals, but smiles when she hears him approach.

“Vax! Look what I found!” She takes something out of her pocket and holds it up for his inspection. It’s a feather of some sort, brown and drab; too large to be from a bird of any size.

“That’s super cool.” She grins, pleased that he’s said so. “But what is it from?”

“It’s an owlbear feather, duh.” Velora rolls her eyes at his incomprehension, but in an affectionate way. His relationship with his half-sister is markedly different than the one he has with his twin, but it’s still something he cherishes, even if it means putting up with Syldor.

“Do you want me to braid it into your hair like Vex does with her feathers?”

Her eyes light up. “Yeah!” Velora adores both of them, but any chance she gets to emulate her sister, she takes eagerly.

They move to her bed, and he grabs a brush and starts combing her hair out. Velora has thick dark hair like he and Vex do, although she takes after her mother in most other ways.

“I heard you and Dad talking downstairs. What was that all about?”

Vax concentrates on untangling a knot before he replies. “He wants me to go to some stupid tech meetup thing this weekend. That means I wouldn’t have time to see my mom.”

“That does suck,” Velora agrees. Vax sections out her hair, plaiting it into a braid. After a moment she turns to look at him. “Is it a thing you’d go to if he hadn’t suggested it?”

The question makes him pause. There are only a few things he’s thought about a great deal in his life: getting the fuck out of Syngorn for good, how much he loves Vex and his mom. That might be it, actually.

“Maybe?” He is, at the best of times, an indifferent student, something all the adults in his life despair over. He has a feeling they would be less concerned if he showed interest in literally anything else, but he’s content to be aimless, wandering around Emon, occasionally getting into trouble.

“If you stay, we can hang out, have some quality sibling time?” Velora’s tone is half-tentative, half-hopeful. “I know it’s not the same as spending time with your mom and Vex, but--”

“How could I refuse the best little sister in the world?” It’s true, even if he doesn’t say it anywhere near as often as he should.

Velora shrieks and throws her arms around his neck, the owlbear feather forgotten. “And you’re the best brother. We should go to the dog park, get ice cream, and maybe we’ll see a movie--”

“All right, all right. How about you come up with a plan for the weekend and let me know a little later?”

“Sure!” She grabs a piece of paper and a pencil and starts writing. Then she remembers he’s still in the room. “What are you still doing here? I need to think!”

“I’ll leave you to it.” He sketches a deep, mocking bow and goes to his and Vex’s room.

--

“Do you have everything you need, dear?” Devana asks before she unlocks the car to let him out.

“I guess?” It’s not that he dislikes Devana, but he finds her concern for him baffling. She has no reason to be invested in his well-being, but she is, and it’s weird.

“Have fun, and text me if you need a ride home.”

“I’ll probably take the bus, but thanks anyways.”

She waves and drives off. Vax goes into the community center, his quiet footsteps reverberating in the empty building. It’s ungodly early for a weekend, another reason he didn’t want to go to this thing.

A scribbled piece of paper taped on the door indicates this is indeed the correct room, but it's empty save for a guy looking at his phone. He's older than Vax by a few years, a little heavyset, long dark hair swept into a ponytail. He's in a button up shirt and slacks, but they're the furthest from boring. 

“Uh, hi.” Vax waves awkwardly from the door.

The man looks up. "Oh! Somebody actually showed up! Not that i'm unhappy about it--quite the opposite in fact."

He smiles, bright and charming, and for a moment Vax forgets how to breathe. He's gorgeous: high cheekbones dusted with a hint of shimmery highlighter, copper eyeshadow, bronze eyeliner wings sharp enough to cut.

“Oh, where are my manners? Shaun Gilmore, founder and chief everything of G3 Enterprises.” He strides over and extends a hand. Vax puts his out, and does not expect to have his hand clasped in both of Shaun’s. It’s much more than the firm but polite handshakes Syldor has practiced with him and Vex, but in a way he definitely doesn’t mind.

“Vax’ildan, Vax to my friends.” He does his best not to mumble. Both Mom and Devana say he needs to work on his diction.

“And are we friends?” Shaun’s question is accompanied by a tilt of the eyebrow, like he wants it to be true but knows it’s impolite to assume.

“I don’t know yet, but I’d sure like to be.” It’s more honest than Vax really wanted to be, but Shaun smiles again and he forgets to be self-conscious about it.

“Then let’s work on that, preferably in a more inviting location. There’s a lovely little coffee shop not too far from here. Would you care to join me?”

“I’d really like that, yeah.”

  —

“It’s just not realistic to have physical magic stores in places like where I grew up. Ank’Harel is at least a day’s journey, so while it can be done, it’s not convenient.” Shaun swirls the spoon in his tea, and Vax tries real hard to stay cool about how he’s having coffee with the cutest guy he’s ever seen.

“The mail system is a real excellent invention. For delivering things.” He takes a gulp of his latte and wants to die.

“That’s what I’m talking about.” Shaun smiles at him and his eyes twinkle.

“Cool.” No, he’s definitely going to die.

[goggles-mcgee]

Too Late: Master Fu (commission for miner249er)

Chapter 7 of the commission for @miner249er

Previous Work

Last Chapter Next Chapter

Summary: Living for so long, it's hard not to just hide in a pattern and want to live in the past, even if the best thing is moving forward.

Wang Fu was no stranger to failure and mistakes, and though he liked to believe he had grown past those failures and mistakes, that he had learned and healed past them, now was not one such moment. He wasn’t a man of technology but he did own a television, not at first, but when Adrien and...and Marinette started out as Ladybug and Chat Noir he thought it would benefit him greatly to have an eye out for them. The best way he could do so in his age was the news, he would know about an akuma before his young heroes got to the scene so he would be prepared just in case Marinette would need to come over and borrow a Miraculous. Watching the fights filled him with dread but he would do it because it was one of the only ways he felt he could be useful to Marinette and Adrien, he couldn’t transform anymore, well he could, just not for long. Not long enough to be any real help. Maybe that’s why he ignored the signs.

The signs that screamed at him that something was wrong with Marinette, with her and Chat Noir’s dynamic, that something was desperately eating at her. They say ignorance is bliss, but Fu wasn’t so sure about that, it could be, maybe, in the moment when one is ignorant, but when reality comes crashing down you would have wished you had not been so blind. That is where Fu had found himself lately, trapped in that thinking time and time again. The news reports about Marinette had not helped that in the least, and they way the spoke about her enraged and saddened him all at once and though he was thankful that Hawkmoth was no longer a threat so he was able to be mad and sad, he could not find delight in the villain’s “disappearance” since it cost him the closest thing to family he had.

Marinette Dupain-Cheng. Fu had never thought he would get so attached to someone, he had never done so before, so it surprised him how easily Marinette squeezed herself into his heart. He hadn’t even had to think about who he would pass down the title and responsibility of Guardian to as soon as he got to know her. Even picking her as a hero had been easy, her soul was pure and it sang with creativity and love. When they got to interact with each other more, Fu began to care for her more and more as the days passed, he fully expected her to only visit for Guardian related things but to his delight and surprise, Marinette paid him many visits. From coming simply to see how he was doing, to bringing him some of her family’s pastries, each visit was a treasured moment for Fu.

Her kindness knew no bounds. If she knew he was having a bad day, pains and aches wise, she would bring him some tiger balm that her mom had bought. He had expressed his concern that her mother would notice and get mad with Marinette but Marinette had only laughed and told him that her mother has so many containers of tiger balm around the house and she always buys new ones even though she has, in Marinette’s words, ‘literally a million others.’ That memory brought a smile to his face and a pang to his heart nowadays. He remembered fondly how Marinette would come over and ask for Mandarin lessons since she only spoke Yue and she wanted to surprise her mother’s uncle next time he visited. Fu had been all too happy to assist her. He loved getting to pass on his knowledge and Marinette had been a great student. He even got to teach her how to brew tea.

For all her kindness, she never let it blind her, she let it lead her. She saw the good in people and strived to be the good they could strive to be as well. Wang Fu had admired her kindness and tried his best to live up to that level, where Marinette’s kindness was a strength, Fu’s became a weakness. His kindness blinded him. That was the only conclusion he could solidly come to after everything had changed. Before Marinette was...was akumatized. How else could he have missed the way that Ladybug, that Marinette, had looked during each battle on TV when Chat Noir would joke around...no when he would flirt and distract her from the fight. How stressed she seemed to get after each battle, after each patrol, how she would subtly try to bring up Chat Noir during their visits. Fu had thought nothing of it, or maybe he really did notice and had just willfully ignored everything.

Adrien Agreste was much like Wang Fu. Maybe that’s why he also turned a blind eye towards everything or why he didn’t notice other things. Adrien was a boy trapped by a role he never wanted, or a role he tricked himself into wanting and, or liking, much like Fu had done when he was taken from his family and taken to the Temple of the Order of the Guardians to train as a Guardian. Leaving his family had torn Wang Fu apart, he could have no trace of them in the Temple, not even his name, that too had been stripped from him along with any personal belongings. Truth be told he had forgotten his original name, time and the Order did that and it caused him so much sorrow. He remembered trying to write his old name anywhere he could get away with as a way to remember. He was always caught. So he stopped fighting and fully embraced being Wang Fu, Guardian of a Miracle Box, though at the time he never would have imagined being the Guardian of the most important Miracle Box in the Temple.

So it was easy for Fu to sympathize with Adrien, to him, Adrien joking and flirting around as Chat Noir was in a way the same as Fu trying to write his given name. Adrien just wanted to be free and Fu could understand that all too well. To live under strict rules that made you feel like you were doing anything but living, it was suffocating. So he had been soft on the boy, and that was another mistake for Wang Fu to add to his list, but he would put it up with causing the destruction of the Order of the Guardians and not fighting when he had to “leave” his family. Only because it seemed to be the catalyst to the whole butterfly effect that set everything that had happened into motion. Maybe if he had just spoken with Adrien, had been firm with him, maybe Adrien would have strived to become better rather than just be content with the freedom he had and not thinking of the consequences.

He should have strived to be better, a better man, a better hero, a better Guardian. For as much as Fu spoke and thought and remembered his hatred of the Order and their rules he didn’t try to improve upon them when he fled. No instead he followed those rules that had shackled him and kept him prisoner for as long and as brief as they had. Maybe if he had not lived in fear and guilt maybe he would have been strong enough to tell Adrien he was being unreasonable and maybe he would have told Marinette that she needed to take breaks more often and to just focus on one thing at a time. The kwami also had a lot to learn and that was on him for not teaching them and communicating with them. He should have made it clear that teenagers, no, that people in general, have changed. You can’t be too laid back, sometimes your holder will need guidance. Don’t be too positive and try to enforce that positivity on someone, positivity can become toxic and telling someone they always have to be happy or they always have to be the bigger person is not helping as much as you think it was.

Tikki, Plagg, and him had had a very long discussion at his house about that and about their mistakes in general. Both kwami were displeased with Fu and how he handled everything and honestly he didn’t blame them, but he could tell they took his words to heart as well. Plagg...Plagg hadn’t been eating as much since he was back in Fu’s possession, ever since he was taken from Adrien, and Tikki...Tikki hadn’t spoken a word after their talk. All she did was watch the TV and all the news channels, anything that was about Marinette she would watch, and undoubtedly she would get angry or sad and all the plants in Fu’s house would grow exponentially. All the other kwami tried to comfort her and get her to talk or even just rest inside the Miracle Box for a bit, even Plagg had tried, but the kwami of Creation did not budge. Now Fu could say he understood but that would be a lie, although he and Wayyz were compatible and they enjoyed each other's company, the two of them were not a true match. Tikki and Marinette on the other hand...those two were a true match, two souls connected and bonded, and for a kwami to lose one was said to be unbearable.

In Tikki and Plagg’s silence and sudden mood change, Sass and Longg had been more talkative and desperate than he had ever witnessed before. The snake and dragon kwami had explained to him exactly what their holders had been doing and had done their best to apologize to Tikki, but she had yet to acknowledge their efforts. They were similar to Plagg, their holder may not be a perfect match with them but they were close, so close, so to lose them was painful to them too. They had desperately tried to convince him to give them back to their respective holder, and again they had pleaded with him to do so today as he took a walk to get some air. He had brought them with him so that Tikki and Plagg could get some peace and quiet back at his house, and plus he felt like the two elder kwami needed the time alone. Fu just hoped they could help each other since he and the other kwami were struggling to do so.

“Masster, I undersstand your hessitancce, but I will assk once again, give Luka and Misss Kagami another chanccce. Their heartss were in the right placce.” Sass stated once more, though this time he was hiding himself in Fu’s shoulder bag as he went on his aimless walk.

“Sass is right, Master. I will admit, our holders were hasty in their quest for justice, but in the end their actions were done out of love and loyalty and a wish to help.” Long added.

“I understand that. Know that I do you two, but also acknowledge the fact that Hawkmoth is gone. The reason for the heroes is gone. What reason is there for you to be given back to those children?” Fu replied not unkindly, just with the facts that had been staring at him day after day.

“Masster...you don’t believe that. Yess, true as it may be that Hawkmoth iss gone, we never know when danger comess. Besidess, we don’t know where Miss Marinette iss...I know you want to find her, and Luka and Kagami want to find her too. They can help and they know how to use Longg and I’ss Miraculouss.” Sass replied after a while, and though Fu was reluctant to admit it, the kwami had a point.

“We don’t even know where to begin to look...but you do raise some good points Sass.” Fu muttered, he was grateful for today’s technology as it looked as though he was merely speaking into a Bluetooth speaker, a gift from Marinette, one of many. She had explained it was a good way to speak to the kwami without anyone getting suspicious. Truly the girl was a creative soul, and very smart.

“And, if I may say so Master, this world is not the one of old. The rules made for then do not apply to now, at least that is what myself, Sass, and other kwami believe. The traditional rules demanded our power not be used unless there are other Miraculi active or if the world we inhabit is well and truly on its way to destruction.” Long began after a moment of silence. “Even the word hero has changed, it became a role we never anticipated. I think it is time we change the rules and our views, otherwise, we stand no chance in this new world Wang Fu.”

Fu found himself short of words. Long was right, in all the years he had been alive he had watched the world change, it was a beautiful frightening thing to behold. Yet, in all those years of change, he never thought to change himself along with the world. He had been so stuck in guilt and fear that he mentally trapped himself in a prison of his own design, a prison shaped like a temple that had been lost long ago. There was no excuse really, the truth was plain and simple, Fu was scared. Scared that if he broke the rules that were trained into him from a young age then there would be no redemption, there would be no point in his survival. But the world had changed and maybe Fu did too and could change for the better, because even if the threats to the world weren’t imminent, they were persistent and prominent.

Change was good.

“You believe this change we need is to stay active?” He asked after a while.

“I believe that is a step, yes.” Longg responded and Fu could hear the smile in his voice. “This world needs help and we...we need help too.”

“Longg iss right. You were correct in giving all of uss involved a talking to. At the time we didn’t want to lissten, but the factss are we kwami no longer know how to connect and coexisst in this world with humanss.” Sass admitted, and it was another shock for Fu but at the same time, what they were saying was convincing and true. All of them, not just the kwami, Fu included, had been sheltered away from the world. It was not the advantage Fu or even past Guardians thought it was.

The sounds of children’s laughter brought Fu out of whatever reply he found worthy to give Sass and Longg, he kind of wished Wayzz would give his opinion on the matter but he understood why the kwami was letting his brethren speak their mind. Fu looked around to see where his walk had taken him and felt a pang in his heart and his breath stolen from him for a moment, he had walked to the park next to Marinette’s home. For a while all he did was stand there and take it in before he gave himself a wry smile and decided to take a seat on one of the benches near the fountains. It was a spot Marinette had told him was one of her favorites to sketch at. Sitting there brought fresh tears to his eyes, tears he thought were all cried out.

“I think you two are right, but we will not rush into this. We need to be smart about this.”

“I believe that is the wise thing to do, Master.” Wayzz finally gave his opinion along with a small discrete nuzzle to Fu’s cheek.

“As do I, my friend. As do I.” He chuckled in response.

After that the kwami let him sit there in silence and just reflect and remember. Truly he was grateful for that. He needed some quiet to himself, not the quiet of his home, that was a tense quiet that put an ache in his bones. No he needed this quiet, the quiet of being alone in your thoughts while hearing the noise of everything around you. Sass and Longg both had great points and though he loathed to admit it, if something did happen he wasn’t sure he would be able to do anything or at the very least get help. Fu didn’t like to think about his age much, he didn’t even celebrate his birthday before Marinette, because his age showed how long he had run from his guilt and it showed him his limitations. It would be best to have a team on standby just in case, and besides maybe they could help with just regular crime and disasters too. Yes a team really would benefit them all, but the who of it was where he was struggling.

He already decided he would not give out Tikki and Plagg...they weren’t ready to be out again and he couldn’t imagine giving the earrings to anyone but Marinette. He feared what Tikki’s reaction would be if he even considered the idea. No, it was best that those Miraculi stayed in the box, along with Duusuu who was still healing from being damaged and misused. He would consider Mlle Tsuguri and M Couffaine again as heroes, after all he was intimately familiar with making a mistake, and they made a mistake but they were trying to do the right thing. They were also Marinette’s most trusted friends, she trusted them with her secrets and her friendship, that was enough for Fu. Though he would still test them to see if they could handle being heroes once more. Adrien...Adrien he didn’t know what to do with. With everything that happened he had no way of knowing if their talks did anything. He hoped beyond hope they did because he truly believed that Adrien was a good kid at heart.

“Look who’s here guys! Timebreaker! What are you doing here? You going to bully us until we disappear too?” Fu heard and he immediately looked up to see a young girl with pink hair surrounded by a couple of other kids her age. He recognized her...ah yes, Alix Kubdel, Marinette had spoken of her a couple times when she told him of her friends and school.

“Careful guys, I wouldn’t touch her, what if we vanish if we do?” One of the girls in the group said with anything but fear in her voice.

Fu frowned and pushed himself up to stand, he couldn’t stand the way the group laughed and seeing as no one else was going to interrupt, he would. “What is this? École?” He paused and saw a girl with long blonde pigtails and a parasol and another with a bob of black hair. He recognized them too, the weather girls from TV that Kaalki liked to watch, Aurore Beauréal and Mireille Caquet.

“Oh back off Aurore.” One of the boys of the group of teasing teens scoffed.

“How about you back off Jackson,” Mireille said which seemed to surprise the lot, “You’ve seen what words can do. We all have.”

“Mireille is right.” Aurore announced, her voice demanding attention. “We are lucky that Hawkmoth is gone, but that does not mean you get to treat people like place mats. Any of you. Just because your victims can’t turn into puppets of a madman to get revenge on you anymore doesn’t give you the right to act like crétins. Shame on all of you.”

“If you insist on acting like children in école, maybe we should just call your parents and let them know how you are behaving. I’m sure they would love to know.” Mireille said with an innocent looking smile.

Fu smiled when the group grumbled and walked away from Mlle Kubdel, he watched as the two weather girls looked her over and spoke to her before the young girl shouldered past them both and ran. The girls looked devastated but all Fu could think of was how heroic it was for them to step up like that. “Heroic indeed…” He mumbled to himself.

[hawkeyedflame]

In your head did Roy and Riza fall for each other right away or was it a slow burn? If it's the latter then when did they realize their feelings?

Literally don't even look at me, I don't know.

Rating: Gen | Words: 1,368 | AO3

They were always friendly with each other while Roy studied under her father, but they didn't define themselves as friends. She cooked, he was polite and helped with chores when he had time. He accompanied her to the market to help carry the groceries home. They talked when they were near each other, but they didn't go out of their way to make time. They didn't stay up all night deep in conversation, nor did they go for aimless walks in the woods together. They worked together if she needed his help, and chatted lightly. He did not consider for a moment altering his path to accommodate her into his future (they simply weren't that close), but he enjoyed her companionship when he happened to have it as they lived their separate lives, side by side. He is four years older than her, after all.

She missed him more than she expected to, when he left for the academy. The house felt less alive, and somewhere in her heart, she did too, although she couldn't place why.

Roy was the closest thing she had to a friend, and her father knew that. And even though he was angry with Roy for choosing to go into the military, he still told Roy that Riza possessed his flame alchemy, still stood by his decision that Roy should be his successor, if Riza found him suitable.

And she did find him suitable. It was in those weeks of Roy studying her tattoo, helping her sort out her father's estate and go through his belongings that they truly bonded. She needed a friend so badly, someone to share her grief with, and after all it's pretty hard to sit in a room with someone for hours on end and not eventually talk to them. Riza told him about her mother, about growing up in this empty house that was no longer a home, how her skin burned where the tattoo needle carved arcs and channels into her back. Roy listened, and he hurt for her. He told her how his parents died when he was young, how his aunt was his only family, how he hated the conflicts at the borders and how he wanted to protect the citizens of Amestris as a state alchemist.

Riza stood in the backyard, arms curled tightly against her chest as she watched Roy test his arrays. She knew every failed transmutation meant more hours spent sitting on the couch rifling through alchemical texts looking for anything that might help him as he pored over his notes, occasionally cross-referencing her tattoo, careful not to brush his fingers against the skin. It was dull work, but when he finally got it right, when a brilliant arc of flame lit up the late evening sky, she felt his excitement as strongly as she felt her own sadness. Because this meant he was leaving soon, and somehow he had taken up a spot in her chest that she hadn't even known was empty.

Something felt different when he left to take his exam. She felt, suddenly, like they'd meet again. She couldn't explain why. She walked him to the train station and he hugged her and it was such a natural thing even though they'd never hugged before, and in that moment she wanted something but whatever it was, he did not give it to her. He could not have.

Riza went home and enlisted in the military that same day. They made an exception for her age, because she would be 17 early in the semester. She met Rebecca at the academy, and though they became fast friends, Rebecca never managed to convince Riza to go on any double dates with her on the weekends. Riza would politely decline, and Rebecca would pout, but never push the issue.

-

She didn't expect her next encounter with Roy Mustang would be through the scope of her sniper rifle. She'd heard that the state alchemists had been brought in, but she didn't want to believe that he would be among them. She knew she was deceiving herself; she had seen the smoke, she knew it couldn't be anyone else. Still, when she shot the Ishvalan descending on Roy and his companion, she felt bile rise in her throat, and it had nothing to do with the man she'd just killed.

And god she was angry. She was so, so angry. But with whom, she couldn't say. Roy, her father, the military, this fucking desert, all of it. It didn't last long; Roy found her in camp later, and she could see in his eyes what she'd been burying in herself. The anger fell out through the bottom of her chest, and the vacuum it left behind nearly choked her with grief. That night she curled up in her cot and, for the first time since she'd set foot in Ishval, she cried.

For six long months, Riza worked adjacent to, but rarely with, Major Mustang. On the days she was assigned to watch over his sector while his unit worked, she kept her senses sharper than usual. Perched in her sniper tower, she refused to avert her eyes from the hellfire of the flame alchemist. Every day she swallowed the emotions that soldiers couldn't afford to have, and every night she laid awake in bed, trying to understand how she’d gotten here.

On the official withdrawal day, he found her again (he'd gotten really good at that), burying an Ishvalan child. She wanted to hate him, she really did. But she knew she couldn't hate him as much as she hated herself. And she still needed him. She asked him to mutilate her back, to destroy her father's life work, to set her free. It was a deception. She could never be free. Her mistakes already caused suffering beyond her capacity to atone with her short, worthless human life. But he agreed, though it caused him great pain, and she knew at that moment that he was still an honorable man.

She returned to the academy to finish her final year, and the months passed in a haze. Her back healed slowly, but her emotions fought to remain as raw as they had been for the past eighteen months despite her best efforts. Rebecca didn't even try to ask her on dates anymore, nor did she ask about the war. Riza told her only the safe things to say, and left out all the rest. She didn't bat an eye when Riza announced she planned to apply for an adjutant position in eastern command, under the illustrious Flame Alchemist, who had risen through the ranks quickly and was in want of an assistant as he built up his team. Rebecca did and did not understand this decision, and wisely refrained from asking, not that Riza would have known how to explain.

When she received Lieutenant-Colonel Mustang's summons a mere day after she'd submitted her request, she knew she had the job. Still, apprehension settled deeply in her gut as she knocked on his office door. She withdrew into the strict professionalism she had grown into so easily in the academy; it had always suited her natural demeanor anyways. She had anticipated his surprise, but she was not prepared for his forwardness: she would be in charge of his back. To protect him, or to remove him. Riza did not misunderstand the blatant admission of trust. The ache in her chest eased a little.

When Riza thinks about it years later, she doesn't really know when she fell in love with him. There was no pinpoint, no flashbulb moment. It came quiet, certain, steady and sure. She had always been his, and though it took a little longer for her to understand, he had always been hers, too. She'd never asked, because it was not the appropriate thing to do, and he had never told. But when she met his eye across the office, when he brought her a second cup of coffee on a busy morning, when they said their goodnights as he dropped her off on those days they'd worked past dark, she could feel it.

Their love, simply was.

[warrioreowynofrohan]

Aredhel, Reborn

This is a fragment that I started putting together a long time ago, and it stops in the middle, but my writing isn’t cooperating right now so I’m posting it as-is for @tolkiengenweek . It’s a sequel to my two previous Aredhel pieces (but not my Aredhel and Eöl one, which isn’t in continuity with it). Hopefully I’ll manage to follow up on it.

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

Aredhel leaves the Halls, permitted to return to life for no reason that she can comprehend. She has not sought mercy for herself, though she has asked it a thousand times for her son and been met with a deafening silence. She chooses to return because Fingon is doing so, and he might not be able to bring himself to go if he left behind both of his siblings as well as his dearest friend. Turgon should have returned - would have been permitted to return, yeni ago, not tainted by kinslaying as his siblings are - but he is being stubborn, out of some mix of reluctance to face the survivors of Gondolin and reluctance to face the Lord of the Waters.

They reenter life to be almost immediately caught in their father’s embrace. Through all that follows - returning to Tirion, reunion with their mother and cousins, an apology to the Lady Eärwen that clearly terrifies Fingon more than any battle he’s ever fought in - the world seems faded and distant to Aredhel, as though some part of her fëa had never left the Halls. She cannot stay in Tirion, she cannot seem to hold the thread of a conversation with anyone, even her parents and brother. She knows, distantly, that she loves them, but it all seems so far away.

Her aimless feet take her to Valmar, and she find herself at the one place in the Blessed Realm that is shunned by Eldar and Ainur alike, climbing from the foot of Ezellohar to the two broken skeletons that were once the purest light in the universe, and as she collapses to the grass she feels, for the first time, a connection with the world. How did you do it? she whispers. How do you continue when what you hold dearest has been turned to darkness and ruin and ash? And something connects within her mind, something that never did through all the years in the Halls, never did during her return to Tirion, though all the reunions and necessary, distant apologies. Her feet carry her south and east, to the seashore and the white city, the city of pearls.

She does not go to the throne room of the king and queen, but to the docks, cloaked and hooded and unnoticed, seeking for faces she remembers. She finds one, working, holding a small curved knife in her hand that she uses to shell oysters.

Aredhel raises her hood, sees the Telerin woman start at the sight of her, and falls to her knees. The knife stops its work, poised in midair.

“What are you doing here?”

“I…I wished to apologize. To say that I was wrong.”

“So? What does that mean? What will that mend?” The woman lays down the shelling-knife, goes to a ship, and picks up another meant for carving wood. She lays the blade to a piece of wood lying nearby and the hands, their movements so smooth and deft when shelling oysters, begin to shake, leaving jagged, uneven cuts, leaving it useless. “I built the ships your people so wantonly destroyed, shaped them as you Noldor shape steel, and now I live again, but that which gave me life has left me. We did not hoard them and hide them in vaults, we sailed them and lived aboard them until they were more our home than the shore, and all you left to us were blood and ash and tainted memories.” The tremors through her body come in waves now, and her voice is choked. “My life was the least of what you stole from me. And now you seek what? Absolution? Resolution? This does not end for me. Why should it end for you?”

Aredhel hunches in on herself. “I surrender. What would you have of me?”

“Why come here, and not to the king?”

Olwë wouldn’t do anything to me - for Uncle Finarfin’s sake, if not for my own. He wasn’t who I attacked. He wasn’t who I killed.

“I thought you had more right. I…I know what it is to be betrayed by one whom you trusted. I know what it it is to see what you love dearest cast into ruin. And if I had - him - apologizing to me, truly and sincerely, as I am to you” - her voice breaks - “I would bury a knife in his guts.” She is shaking. “I came here because I didn’t know what else to do. Only that I needed to do something. I surrender. Say what you want from me, and you will have it.”

The Telerin woman just looks tired. “I don’t want your blood. What use would that be? I don’t want you locked up. What good would that do anyone? You cannot give back what you have taken. You cannot restore what is destroyed.

“Leave us in peace. Go.”

Aredhel goes.

....

She flees to the wild lands she once loved, which no longer feel so narrow as they did in the years of her youth, before Gondolin and Nan Elmoth and the Halls, before she knew that duty was a chain and love was a chain. Fear, too, is a chain, as she find when she wanders into the woods of Oromë where she once hunted with her cousins and stops, trembling, as the treetops cut off the sky, frozen, her thought a thousand miles away in drowned lands where the forest went from wonder to horror to prison. She works her way stumbling back to the light, her arms clutching at branches and tree-trunks to pull her onwards, until she emerges again into the free air.

She goes, instead, to the open plains, where she can run and ride and hunt, and take joy in feeling alive again, with a heart that beats and mouth that tastes and limbs that ache. In time she returns to the forest, first to edges and sun-dappled clearings, later to the denser woods in autumn when the leaves turn yellow and brown and fall to create openings where light and warmth enters, and nuts and fruits and berries surround her at every turn. Regaining the woods in summertime takes longer, where leaves create deep pools of shadow, and it is longer still before she wishes to be in the woods after nightfall, looking up at the stars.

(She no longer wears white. She dresses in greys and browns and tans, and in plain or woodland she might be mistaken for part of the landscape.)

She cannot say, for certain, how much of her escape is driven by avoiding walls, and how much by avoiding people, avoiding the need to hear or speak of (or hear people deliberately and delicately not speak of) a son she cannot defend and will not condemn. Did she shun the woods because they felt a cage, or because it felt that at any moment a pale-skinned, black-haired boy might step out of them with a present for his mother of hazlenuts or newly-caught game or skillfully-carved wood? A boy who is gone, who is become something she cannot and will not name.

Fingon finds her, from time to time, with uncanny ability, though he was never her equal as a woodsman. They share meals, wanderings, conversations light or serious. He does not tell her to return, though he speaks often of their parents and at times ventures to say how much they miss her. She does not know how to explain. Fingon can feel that their positions, failing and pardoned and returned and grieving for the lost, are the same, but it does not feel so to her. He fell in battle, and with a host of heroic deeds to his name. Her father fell in combat, the greatest one in the history of Arda. She died because she trusted the wrong person, loved the wrong person, ran off, was irresponsible and impetuous as always, led an enemy back to the one safe home she still had; her place in the First Age’s history is the dislodged rock or careless shout that starts an avalanche. Turgon has never blamed her for Gondolin’s fall, but that is because she never spoke to him while they were in the Halls, never knowing what to say. I am sorry that my son existed? She isn’t. She isn’t. She isn’t. She is only sorry that his father orphaned him, left him alone among strangers in a strange city with no parent to guide him.

One morning she awakes at her campsite to find her father there, tending the embers of her fire. She does not know how he has found her; he is gifted in scholarship, in diplomacy, in governance, in craftwork, in all the arts of war, but not in woodcraft or tracking or the arts of the wildnerness (save, by necessity, of keeping thousands of people alive in bone-chilling, soul-numbing temperatures).

They speak a little of other things, of her life in the woods and his in Tirion, but he cannot long restrain the question he has come to ask. “Aredhel, can you not come home?”

She offers the easier explanation first, the other being too painful to place in words. “I don’t want to go back to be pitied as a failure.”

“We all failed, dearest. Every one of us.”

“You did not. Not like me. You died fighting Morgoth and every Elda and I expect every Vala respects you for that. Fingon died fighting a balrog. My younger cousins died in battle. Even the philosopher did better than me! I was one of the most eager to go, I killed people in order to go, atta, and I have nothing to show for it, no achievements, nothing to boast of, and I will not go back to be petted and pitied and patronized, I won’t -” and she knows she still sounds like a spoiled child even now, when the others have grown wise and thoughtful and penitent.

Her father simply looks at her, long and quiet, as if trying to perceive all the words she has left unspoken, and they finally struggle to her lips.

“I don’t want to know what they all think of him. I do know what they think of him. I don’t want to be consoled for what my son did or became by people who didn’t know him and can’t understand him, and to know they are thinking of it every time they look at me, I’ll hate them for it and it will break out and I’ll cause trouble for everyone again - ” she’s stopped looking at her father, not wanting to see in his eyes his opinion of such a grandson, not wanting to feel the wrath against him that would come from it. “Why does everything I love fall to evil? My son, Tyelko, Curvo, my - ” she cannot bring herself to say husband, “- him? Do I have no judgement, no discernment? Am I being punished? I loved him when he killed me, I love my son and my cousins yet, and I don’t want to explain or to justify or to live among people that hate them -”

She is weeping now, and her father pulls her into an embrace. “You did not deserve this, Aredhel. Not what happened to you, or what happened to your son.”

“I don’t know.” Her voice is quiet now. “I think, sometimes, it is all of a piece. If you do evil to gain something, whether it be ill in itself or not, it will burn you when you find it. As with my cousins and the gemstones. I killed to gain freedom from limitations or constraint, and when I took it it burned me.”

[the-hoarse-bard]

After turning in the contracts on Hern and Lurbuk to Nazir, Astrid approached and ordered me to head to Volunruud to finally contact Amaund. Hopefully it’ll be more worth my time than murdering random people for gold that I don’t even need. If the Night Mother plan doesn’t pan out soon, I may just go straight to the betrayal plan.

Found a very strange item while clearing out some bandits near Riverwood. Picking up caused me to hear a voice commanding me to take it to Mount Kilkreath. A harsh, angry voice Shirazzha recognized as the spirit of greed and aimless light Merid-Nunda. Drawing the spirits ire is not on Shirazzha’s list of things to do, but it certainly can’t hurt to make them wait. Besides, she’s busy right now, and Mount Kilkreath is a long way away.

Another bandit camp had a book telling of a strange enchantment being sought by the bandits. Weapons made at the forge there were somehow imbued with the power of the moons. Of course, Shirazzha had to have it. Being able to smite evil with the powers of Jone and Jode would be like a dream. Luckily learning how to use the forge wasn’t necessary, the bandits had already made some of their own, and Shirazzha is skilled enough to copy it onto other weapons with a sample.

A beautiful enchantment for her silver sword. In the name of the moons, the undead will feel its sting and fall in droves. It would probably be wise to save that grand soul gem for when my enchantment skills are less..... Mediocre.

What luck that Volunruud turned out to be one of the many Nordic barrows that dot Skyrim. Namiira’s Bane will surely serve well here.

It seems someone else got here first and was cut down by the undead skeleton just inside the door...... What a wimp. He kept a pretty detailed journal though, apparently the greatest treasure in this barrow is behind a door that requires duplicates of the main occupants weapons, which are guarded somewhere within. Strange way of opening a door, but hardly as convoluted as some other ancient Nordic doors.

Amaund wasn’t that far in. I found him before I even found the stupid ancient Nord door. He handed me a letter for Astrids eyes only and a strange amulet that he says will act as my pay. He also revealed that the target he wants us to assassinate is.... The emperor of Tamriel. That’s certainly less morally dubious than killing a random homeless man, but he refused to elaborate why. I suppose there are more details in the letter. Strange days for this cat. Strange days indeed.

Neither of the appointed guardians for these weapons was really all that tougher than a regular draugr. Namiira’s Bane has served well so far, but the magic seemed to fade from it as soon as day broke outside. I suppose it makes sense that it can’t tap into the magic of the moons when they aren’t out, but it is inconvenient. Silver is still silver though, and it should cut through draugr as a reasonable pace without it.

Oh dear. That glowing fellow certainly seems dangerous. Luckily, I brought some silver arrows, which served to soften him up nicely before he closed the distance and I cut him down with ease. The other draugr in the room was more obnoxious with her frost magic making approaching near impossible. I lured her around one of the pillars in the room and stabbed her in the back. Undead are foolish as a rule, apparently.

Another one of these strange walls with glowing lettering. The words burn themselves into Shirazzha’s mind, although she does not understand their meaning yet, and the letters fade. Perhaps the words on the wall have something to do with the odd tongue that seems to fuel the strange magic some draugr have?

Now what’s this? Some kind of dagger, though I can’t place the design or the material.

Hm. Can’t even discern its maker in the light. Not a bad prize to have claimed before the sun is all the way up. Just looking at it gives me the urge to make use of it somehow....

[demaparbat-hp]

For the Spirits— Chapter X: Following Your Form

Read here!

Dragging along

Following your form

Hung like the pelt

Of some prey you had worn

—Shrike by Hozier

.

She had the shape of a tempest.

The Wolf was a shattered breeze of wind that coursed up and down his spine, leaving him breathless. Eye contact, blue on gold, and Zuko was gone. Gone, gone, gone, as if he was a drop of blood marring the otherwise pure white fur of a Goddess of the Hunt.

She stared him down like he wasn't even worth the appraisal a proper prey deserved. She would not hunt him. She would not chase him. She would not fear him.

Zuko was nothing but a footprint left behind by the Wolf.

[pikapeppa]

Fenris/f!Hawke pirate smut: Hands

Chapter 23 of @schoute‘s and my beloved pirate AU Where The Winds Of Fortune Take Me is up on AO3! Read it here.  It was actually up on Friday but I went away and didn’t have time to post it and I just got home and CAN I STAY HOME FROM WORK TOMORROW PLEASE I’m so fucking tired~

In which... well, the title is relatively self-explanatory. And because I’m still sobbing over it, some beautiful gift art for the previous chapter from the insanely talented @lethendralis-paints!

!- FENRIS - 

Fenris lay on his bed gazing up at the ceiling in a happy daze. His entire body still felt like it was buzzing from his and Hawke’s long meandering conversation on the forecastle deck this afternoon. 

They’d shared little bittersweet stories of their childhoods, and Fenris marveled at the strangeness of being able to share those stories at all, now that Hawke knew his past. She flirted outrageously with him, which he was able to finally enjoy without reservation, and when Fenris flirted back, her delighted laughter was the most thrilling reward. She prodded him to talk about his favourite places that he’d travelled with Piper, and her questions were incessant as always. But for the first time since they’d met, he was able to fully answer them. 

He could look at her beautiful face and he could openly admire her bright and brilliant smile, because he had nothing left to hide. Hawke had seen the worst of his past, and she wanted to be with him anyway.

Somehow, despite his attempts to push her away and his undeserved coldness, Hawke loved him. And Fenris wanted nothing more than to be wrapped in her arms again. 

Unfortunately, Anders had returned to the ship with an armful of new medical tomes and had called Hawke away to look at some blasted thing or another. Fenris forced himself to let her go, and he’d busied himself as best he could by cleaning and sharpening the Lady Luck’s store of weapons. But the afternoon had gradually melted into evening, and it had been hours now since Anders had pulled Hawke away… 

Fenris pushed aside his frustration. He was too thrilled about the turn this day had taken to be truly annoyed. He settled his head more comfortably on his pillow and closed his eyes.

The weight of Hawke’s slender body resting over his hips and her affectionate arms around his shoulders… he couldn’t decide whether he preferred that breathtaking embrace, or the careful stroke of her fingers over his scarred and spoiled skin. For weeks he’d imagined the feeling of her hands on his skin, but the fantasies were always tainted by shame at the thought of being seen. Ah yes, shame: that vicious but well-earned byproduct of the disgust in the mineworkers’ eyes when he was forced to punish them. 

But Hawke never looked at him with disgust. From the first time they’d spoken in the market in Kirkwall, the look in her eyes had been nothing short of enthusiastic. No, even before that: that time when they’d spotted each other while she was standing on the steps of Lowtown, before they ever even spoke. Her smile was mischief and heat and openness, and never even a hint of disgust. 

He wanted her to look at him that way again. Kaffas, he wanted her to touch him again with tenderness like she had this afternoon. No, not just with tenderness, but with urgency like she had when he’d pinned her to the floor and kissed her, right here in his cabin…

A wriggle of warmth twisted in his belly. He shifted restlessly on his bed, then rolled onto his unwounded side. 

He wanted to see her. Surely she was finished studying with Anders by now. And even if she wasn’t, it wouldn’t be strange for him to go and find out what she was up to. He’d interrupted their sessions before, after all. 

But the thought of going to her… Even after everything that had been said, even with everything laid bare between them, there was still a small and visceral part of his heart that balked at the thought of making his feelings so plain, and for the second time in one day. Perhaps these nerves were to be expected after spending the past few years so profoundly alone, but it didn’t make it any less frustrating.

Fenris rolled onto his back again and stared at the ceiling for a minute longer. Then he pushed himself upright and slid off of the bed. But before he could pull on his tunic, there was a knock at the door. 

Hawke? His heart lodged itself in his throat. He hoped it was Hawke. She was the only person he wanted to see right now. 

He strode over to the door and cracked it open, then threw it wide. Hawke was standing at the threshold, and as soon as she laid eyes on him, her face lit up with a grin. 

“Well well, what’s this?” she purred. Her gaze slid slowly over his bandaged chest. “Were you waiting all lovely and half-naked just for me?”

“Perhaps I was,” he said. He stepped back to let her in.

To his amusement, she blushed. She laughed and fanned herself playfully as she stepped into his room. “Well, that’s a treat I won’t turn down,” she said. 

Fenris gave her a half-smile. She was moving around his room in a slow and aimless manner, and when she paused near his rumpled bed, his heart flipped with excitement.

And perhaps a little anxiety. 

She nibbled her lower lip, and Fenris swallowed as the silence between them started to grow heavy. Then she turned to face him. 

His breath stopped for a moment. Her clear coppery eyes were hot with intent, but her next words were very innocuous. 

“Are you hungry? Did you eat anything?” she asked.

Slightly nonplussed, he shook his head. “Are you?”

She shook her head as well. “I had something with Anders. But I’ll come to the galley with you if you want–” 

“I’m not hungry,” he assured her. The buzzing feeling deep in his abdomen was definitely not hunger, at least not of the kind she meant. 

She nodded and nibbled her lip, and Fenris returned her stare in silence. She was standing near his bed, and he was standing near the door, and the gap between them seemed so incredibly enormous, and he wanted nothing more than to cross it. But he felt somehow frozen in place, paralyzed by the terrifying and delicious want that was humming through his limbs more strongly with every beat of his heart… 

He took a step toward her. Then another. Then he was standing in front of her, and her chin was tilted up and her palms were resting lightly on his bandaged abdomen, and her lush raspberry lips were parting–

“Fenris, I don’t think we should, um, make love tonight,” she blurted.

He blinked, and her pinkened cheeks flamed red. “If that’s even what you were thinking, I mean,” she babbled. “That is, I hope you were thinking the same thing as me. I swear half the time when I think about you it’s to think about ripping your clothes off, but I don’t think we should tonight because you’re wounded and I don’t want to hurt you by accident…”

A little squiggle of disappointment and relief made its way through his belly. Perhaps she was right. It would be moving a little fast if they had sex tonight. Even if it would mean bringing his fondest and most intimidating fantasies to life. 

He took a reluctant step away from her. “A wise thought,” he said softly. “There’s no need to rush.” 

She blew out a breath. “Speak for yourself. I’ve been wanting to throw myself at you since I set foot on this ship.” 

Fenris huffed out a quiet laugh. “Would you believe it if I said I felt the same?”

Her eyes and her smile widened. “No, actually,” she said. “I’d believe you if you said you wanted to throw me off the ship the second I set foot on it.”

He winced. She was joking, but her words still struck a little too true. 

He ran a hand through his hair. “Hawke, I… I’m sorry. I have not been kind–”

She grabbed his hand in both of hers. “I’m kidding, I’m kidding! Maker’s balls, I’m just…” She squeezed his hand and beamed at him. “Honestly, I’m just so happy that you like me. I still feel like I should be pinching myself in case this is a dream.”

Fenris swallowed hard. It felt paltry to say he simply liked her. He meant it when he said he felt the same as Hawke. She claimed never to have felt this way about anyone else; Fenris too had never known anyone who made him feel such a deep and giddy fondness, not even in the occasional dalliances of his youth. 

He loved Hawke. It might only have been just over a month that they’d been on the ship together, but he loved her just the same. But he’d also never confessed those words to anyone before: certainly not to any lover, and not to his mother nor to Varania, not that he could recall. 

But he wanted to tell Hawke. He wanted to return the words she’d said to him, those words that meant so much. But in that guarded and cowardly part of his heart, he was still too afraid. 

He twined his fingers with hers and admired the contrast of her pale golden skin with his darker complexion. When he lifted his eyes to her face again, she was smiling hopefully. 

“Can we lie on your bed?” she asked. “Or is that too bold to ask?”

He nodded, and Hawke smiled more broadly before releasing his hand and crawling onto his bed. 

Fenris slowly sat on the edge of the bed, then laid on his back with his hands resting on his belly just as he usually did. Beside him, Hawke rolled onto her side to face him and tucked one arm beneath her head. 

His heart started to thrum a joyful beat in his chest, laced with just a hint of nerves. He’d never shared a bed with anyone before. When he first became the master-at-arms and moved into this cabin, even having a bed that was large enough for two felt like a needless luxury. To think he now had someone who wanted him, someone who loved him and wanted to share this bed with him… 

He swallowed the lump in his throat. Then Hawke spoke in a soft voice. “Fenris, can I ask you something?”

He turned his head to look at her, and was surprised to find her looking quite serious. “What is it?” he said quietly. 

“How did you leave Minrathous?” she asked. “Varania escaped by winning over a merchant. How did you escape?”

He released a slow sigh and looked up at the ceiling once more. “I didn’t escape right away,” he admitted. “I remained under Danarius’s thumb for nearly a year after Varania left.”

“Why?” she asked softly.

“It didn’t occur to me to leave,” he said. “I… had forgotten what it meant to be free.” He sighed again, then looked at her. “You have not been a slave, Hawke. A slave does not dream of freedom or wonder at possibilities. I thought only of keeping Danarius happy in order to keep my sister safe.”

Her expression was serious and sympathetic, but somehow her sympathy didn’t grate at him the way it did before. Then she reached for his wrist. 

He glanced down. Her hand was sliding over his, and her fingers were twining between his own. Then she shifted a little closer to him and pulled his hand toward her, tucking it close against her chest. 

He swallowed hard at the tenderness of her gesture, then continued to tell his tale. “After Varania left, I was… I felt more hopeless than before. It did not occur to me to run away until I saw some other slaves fighting for their freedom.”

Her eyes widened. “You saw a rebellion?”

“Yes,” he said. “At the lyrium mines. It happened when I was there one day with Danarius. The slaves rose up and fought back. They used their own shackles and their mining tools as weapons. They even managed to kill a few of the slavers.” 

“Wow,” Hawke breathed. 

He nodded. “Danarius made me protect him, but… to see that slaves could fight? That they were willing to die for a chance to be free? It… it forced me to think. And I did think, for months.” He turned his head to face the ceiling again. “Then, one morning when Danarius approached to shackle me as he did every day, I killed him.”

“Just like that?” she said in surprise.

He shot her a sharp look. “It was not easy,” he said. “I had spent most of my life doing what he told me to do. But the disbelief in his face when I crushed the breath from his miserable throat…” He curled his lip. “He never expected such agency from me. He thought I was but a pet that he had tamed. His tamed little wolf.” He scowled at the memory. “An ignominious death was the justice he deserved.”

Hawke was silent for a moment. She stroked his knuckles with her thumb, soothing away his momentary agitation.

“What happened then?” she asked.

“I ran,” he said quietly. “I was pursued by the city guard and wounded, but I killed them and escaped. I stowed away on a Seheronese fishing trawler, but they eventually found me; it was a small ship, after all. And…” He exhaled slowly and shrugged. “Well, you have heard the rest.”

She shuffled closer to him. “You liked being on the fishing boat, didn’t you?”

He nodded. “I did. They were kind and quiet. They taught me to sail, as I told you. I knew them only a few months, but in that time, I felt as if I truly lived.” He shook his head slowly. “It made it all the harder to tolerate the return to slavery when the pirates came.” He took a deep breath and looked away from her. “By the time Piper and Varric raided the slaver ship, I… I had almost given up.”

Hawke was quiet for a moment as she ran her thumb gently along the side of his hand. “I don’t believe that,” she said eventually.

He looked at her. “You don’t believe what?”

“That you would give up. You’re too strong for that.”

He frowned slightly. “You didn’t know me before. I was… cowed. Hopeless.”

“If you were really hopeless, why did you join Piper’s crew?” she asked. “Piper told me she gave you the option to go to the colonies with the other slaves. But you didn’t leave. You stayed on the Lady Luck.”

He shrugged a little irritably. One again, Hawke was giving him more credit than he was due. “I was angry,” he said. “I wanted the slavers to suffer. Being on this ship gave me the option to fight back.”

Hawke shrugged and continued to stroke his hand with her thumb. “That sounds like a strong choice to me. A fighter’s choice.”

He shot her a flat look, but his irritation was short-lived. Her expression was confident and affectionate and perfectly lovely. 

He carefully rolled onto his unwounded right side so he was facing her. “Ever the optimist, Hawke,” he murmured.

She smiled. “That’s me. Rynne Hawke, the insufferable optimist.”

He gazed adoringly at the cheeky twist of her smile and the warmth in her coppery eyes. “You are not insufferable,” he told her. Then he smirked. “I would gladly suffer your company whenever you deign to give it.”

She laughed brightly, then shifted closer to him. “Was that supposed to be a smooth line? Because it was not so smooth.”

He smiled more broadly, but his heart had just kicked into an excited rhythm. Hawke was very close now, close enough that their slightly-bent knees were touching and her nose was a mere few inches from his. 

He wanted to find a clever response, but he couldn’t. Hawke was so near, near enough that he could smell her warm sandalwood scent. She was still holding his hand, but he wanted to hold more than just her hand; he wanted to hold her, to have her body pressed tightly to his the way it had been earlier when she embraced him on the forecastle deck–

And she was moving closer. No, that wasn’t true; he was moving closer, shuffling nearer to her on the bed so that he could hear the gentle sound of her breath as she inhaled through her parted lips–

And he kissed her. After weeks of waiting and wanting and agonizing, Fenris was kissing Hawke for the second time. But this time couldn’t be more different than the last.

The last time he’d kissed her, his mind was a turmoil of lust and anger and uncertainty. That kiss was a moment more bitter than sweet, burned into his memory as a perfect example of passion that he both regretted and idolized, but this…

This was completely different. There was no regret here. There was no anger and no angst. Instead, there was the longing that had been living in his heart for weeks, which Hawke was finally able to fulfill with the sweetness of her mouth. There was the love that she’d proclaimed to him this afternoon in the deck, and he could only pray she was feeling its return in the impassioned press of his lips to hers. 

Her parted lips were soft beneath his own, and her waist was a smooth dip beneath his roaming hand. She was perfect, and this kiss was perfect, and it became even more so when she cradled his neck in her palm and shifted closer still. 

He encouraged her closeness, pulling her body flush to his with his arm around her waist, and when their hips pressed together, she broke away with a gasp. 

Fenris pulled back slightly and opened his eyes. Her eyes were still closed. “Are you all right?” he whispered.

She nodded and slid her fingers into his hair. “Kiss me again, you handsome fool.” 

He smirked, but he was more than happy to comply with her cheeky demand. He coaxed her lips open by gently nipping her plump lower lip, and when he gently lapped at her tongue, she whimpered and pressed against his groin. 

He exhaled shakily against her mouth. Her lithe body was pressed firmly to his, and the skin of her back was soft and temptingly warm where his errant palm had slid beneath her tunic. Despite her words and the wisdom of taking things slow, he wanted… fasta vass, Fenris wanted her, and he could openly admit that he wanted her, and that alone – the simple and joyful ability to confess that he wanted Hawke: it just made him want her all the more desperately. 

He propped himself up on his right elbow and abruptly pulled her closer before kissing her again. She was practically beneath him now, and her fingers were clutching his shoulder in a firm grip, and– 

And then her fingers left his shoulder. She was grabbing his hand firmly and pulling it away from the soft warm skin of her back. She slid his greedy fingers up over her waist and then over her ribs–

Then Hawke arched her spine and pressed his hand to her breast, and he gasped into her mouth. He could feel her nipple beneath his palm, so firm that it was budding through her loose tunic… 

Her tunic. He could feel her nipple through her tunic. 

She wasn’t wearing a breastband or a bustier. 

He broke away from her lips. “Festis bei umo canavarum,” he groaned.

She pressed his hand more firmly to her breast. “What does that mean?” she breathed. “Something nice, I hope?”

He gazed at her with a mixture of adoration and total exasperation. “It means ‘you will be the death of me’,” he said. He reached down and inched his fingers beneath the hem of her tunic.

She burst out a little laugh, but seconds later she was panting fitfully, a rapid desperate staccato of breath as his hand moved higher over her ribs. “I’m sorry,” she whimpered. “I just, I – I don’t want to interfere with your wound…” 

He cupped her bare breast in his palm. She gasped and arched toward him, and he kissed her parted lips once more before pulling away.  “Don’t apologize,” he murmured. “Perhaps I can do something that won’t affect my wound.”

“Like what?” she panted. Then she grinned. “Fenris, are you going to teach me something?”

He smiled back at her and stroked her nipple with his thumb. He was hardly an expert in this arena; it had been years since he’d been with anyone. But hopefully Hawke wouldn’t be able to tell.

“I could,” he said. “Is that what you want?”

“Yes,” she said loudly. “Maker’s balls, yes. I…” She broke off, then clumsily started pulling her tunic up, and Fenris gaped at her stupidly as she pulled the garment off and threw it to the floor.

Hawke was half-naked, bare to him from the waist up, and she was… venhedis, she was beautiful. Small breasts and tight budded nipples and skin that would be a burnished gold if it saw more of the sun, and the delicate lines of her collarbones rising and falling as she panted for breath, and as Fenris shamelessly admired her, he couldn’t quite believe his fortune. She was here, in his bed with his hand roaming from her slender neck over the crux of her collarbones and down, and as he happily lowered his mouth to her breast, he couldn’t help but marvel at the difference a single day could make. 

In the space of a single day, he now found himself curled on his bed with Hawke’s willing body stretching beneath him as he tasted the delicate tip of her breast. Her hands were pulling gently at his hair and her pleading voice was floating through his ears, and… fasta vass, this was everything he’d barely dared to want, and now that she was here, he could admit that he hadn’t really thought this would happen, not truly. 

Having Hawke here… it had been a hope. A very dear hope that was too close to his guarded heart, and despite his vague intention to tell her how he felt in Afsaana, Fenris hadn’t really trusted that this could all come true. 

But Hawke had brought his hopes to life. She was his hopes brought to life, a lucid dream given colour and form and sound, and as his hand slid down her ribs and over the planes of her belly, he marvelled at how very tangible she was. 

Her breath was sharp in his ears as he unbuttoned her breeches, and the movements of her hands were impatient and rough as she shoved her breeches down, and the glossy sheen between her legs was the most enticing indication of how strongly this foray was wanted by them both. 

She grabbed his hand. “Teach me,” she begged.

He smiled. Only Hawke would make that particular request of him with this particular degree of nakedness. And only Hawke had ever tempted him to want to fulfill such a request.

He pulled his hand from her grip and stroked his fingers between her legs. 

She arched her whole body and spread her legs wider. “Fenris,” she mewled. 

He captured her gasping lips in a kiss. He smoothed his fingers slowly through her slippery warmth, but she was bucking her hips desperately fast, and Fenris eventually peeled away from her lips to whisper against her ear. 

“Move with me, Hawke,” he told her. “It is not a race.” 

She slowed down with a groan of frustration. “But I want you so much…”

“I’m right here,” he whispered. 

“I know,” she whined. “I know. But I really…” She broke off with a gasp as he stroked the swollen bud between her legs. 

“Focus your attention here,” he said quietly. “Tell me if you want more or less.”

She strained against his hand. “A little less,” she panted.

He lessened the pressure of his fingers. A moment later, she twisted on the sheets and spread her legs wider still. “Oh Maker, yes...” 

Her voice was high and strained, and it sent a hot rush of lust burning down his throat. He inhaled slowly and kept his fingers light between her legs, and soon she was rolling her hips in a slow rhythm that matched the gentle slide of his finger around her precious tiny bud. 

Her cheeks were pink and her raspberry lips were parted with pleasure, and Fenris watched her lovely face with an attentive sort of hunger until she threw her head back in the pillow with a rapturous cry. 

She shuddered and pressed her hips insistently toward his hand. “P-please,” she gasped. 

He slid his fingers low to stroke her cleft, and she lifted her hips right off the bed. “Fenris, please!” she sobbed.

He stared at her. She was so beautiful and so shameless, begging him with her pleading words and her twisting golden body, and her lack of inhibitions was… well, it was Hawke. This was who Hawke was. She was uninhibited and open, asking him questions and telling him about her life without any reservations at all, offering herself to him and asking him to love her in return, and he’d been too scared to meet her halfway. 

But he didn’t want to be scared. He wanted to be open like she was, to give her all the affection she deserved and all the heated press of emotion that he’d kept too close to his chest. And this was how he would start. Here and now, with Hawke’s arching body under his hands, he would start to give her everything.

“What do you want, Hawke?” he asked.

She opened her eyes, and Fenris breathlessly returned her heated stare. Her ribs were rising and falling with the rapid cadence of her breaths, but she didn’t speak.

He lightly petted her glorious heat. “Tell me, and it is done,” he murmured. “Do you want me to do that again?” 

“I… I want more,” she panted. “I need… I feel like…” She broke off with a whimper and thrust her hips toward his hand, and Fenris knew what she meant. 

He hovered his fingers over her entrance. “Can I–”

“Can you fuck me? Please?” she blurted. 

Her drew back slightly in surprise – and undeniable excitement. He was going to suggest sliding his fingers inside of her, but if she wanted him… 

She reached for the laces of his breeches, but he gently caught her hands. “I thought you were worried about my wound,” he said. Frankly, he didn’t care about his wounded side; if it started to bleed again, Hawke could simply patch it up. The shining possibility of giving himself to her was overriding any other impulse that he had right now.

She sighed sharply. “I… fuck. You’re right,” she admitted. She pulled her hands from his and pressed her legs together in frustration. “Fuck,” she whined. “I just… Fenris, I really…”

He traced the line of her jaw, then turned her face so she was looking him in the eye. “If you want me, I am yours,” he said softly. 

Her frustrated expression melted into an almost disbelieving look of joy, and Fenris’s heart squeezed at the hope in her face. Then she smiled and gently pinched his chin. “Such a smooth talker,” she murmured.

He gave her a little half-smile. Then, without moving his steady gaze from her face, he slid his hand over her knee to pull her legs apart. 

Her breathing was growing short and sharp again, and even more so when he ran two fingers through her slippery folds. Then, slowly and carefully, he slid one finger inside of her.

She keened with pleasure and arched beneath him. Venhedis, she was so slick and hot, and the smoothness of her flesh pressing around his finger kicked his rising desperation even higher. 

He forced himself to breathe through a fresh and dizzying rush of desire. “Do you want this?” he asked. He curled his finger slightly, and she jerked. 

“Yes!” she cried. “Fenris, please!”

He curled his finger again, and she clawed at the bed and sobbed. “I want you so much, it’s not fair…”

He carefully withdrew his finger from her heat, then stroked her cheek with his knuckles. “Then let me do this,” he urged. “I want to be with you.”

She looked at him worriedly. “But what if I hit you in the side with my knee or something clumsy like that? I don’t want to hurt you…”

“It is worth the risk,” he said. “Being with you is worth the risk.” As soon as he said the words, he realized it wasn’t just the sex that he was talking about, not anymore. 

Fenris didn’t like taking risks. For as long as he could remember, he avoided taking chances when the potential losses were more than he could afford. But not being with Hawke – not taking that risk to let her in all those weeks ago when she’d first offered herself to him: he’d regretted that choice ever since, and he wasn’t going to make that same mistake again. 

He ran his thumb along her cheekbone. “It is my risk to take, Hawke. I want this.”

A slow and brilliant grin lit her face, and she eagerly nodded. “All right. Yes. Yes, let’s–”

He cut her off with a kiss. Her tongue stroked his own, and her fingers were tugging at the laces of his breeches once more and loosening the knots and–

And she was touching him. Her impatient fingers had burrowed into his half-loosened breeches, and she was stroking his cock. 

“Hawke,” he moaned.

She tried to wrap her fingers around him, but his breeches weren’t loose enough. “Please,” she mewled.

“W-wait a moment,” he panted. He pulled her hand out of his breeches and pushed the garment down with his left hand, ignoring the ache in his side as he twisted to free himself. But before his breeches were fully down to his knees, Hawke was pulling impatiently on his hips. 

And her impatience was feeding his own. His breathing was just as harsh and hurried as Hawke’s, and it grew harsher still as she pushed herself up on one hand and kissed his neck.  

Her tongue on the side of his throat, and now her teeth in a gentle nip, fasta vass... Fenris gasped for breath and shoved desperately at his breeches. At long last, he finally kicked them away and settled between her legs, and when he was poised and ready, he looked her in the face. 

Her eyes were wide and her breaths were sharp, and her fingers were clenching against his arms. As Fenris stared at her, he was seized by a ringing sense of unreality. He’d imagined this so many times – what it would be like to have Hawke beneath him, and to have her treasured hands on his marked skin and her treasured body sharing his bed. He’d imagined this and wished for this and rued the thought that he might never have it, and now that she was here…   

Venhedis, he was nervous. It had been so long since he’d done this, and just as long since anyone other than those vile Tevinter doctors had seen his body bare. And no one had ever mattered so much before. Hawke was so important, and this was her first time, and Fenris needed to make it right. 

She stroked his cheek. “Are you all right?” she asked. 

He snapped his attention back to her. “Yes,” he said. “Everything is fine.”

She studied him for a moment, then smiled. “It’s all right, Fenris. I’m nervous too.” 

He sighed and bowed his head. “I’m sorry,” he lamented. “It’s… it has been some time.” He shook his head dismissively. “But it doesn’t matter now. You have never–”

She stroked his hair. “How long?”

“Six years, give or take,” he said. 

Her fingers went still in his hair. “Why so long?”

He took a deep breath. “I received the tattoos six years ago,” he told her. “The way those doctors looked at me and… handled me. I did not want to be touched after that.” He remembered it all too clearly: the humiliation of their cold eyes on his naked skin and their clinical hands prodding and cutting his unwilling body, and the months of agony as the lyrium scars healed.

Strange hands on his skin and strange eyes on his naked body. He shoved the memory away and looked into Hawke’s wide whiskey-coloured eyes. “I did not want to be touched,” he told her. “I barely wanted to be looked at. But it is different now,” he assured her. “With you, it is different.”

“Are you sure?” she breathed. She looked quite stricken now. “I don’t mean to…” She covered her mouth with one hand. “I’m so stupid, Fenris,” she mumbled. “I didn’t even think about all of that. I mean, I knew you didn’t want the tattoos, but I didn’t… I just thought you wanted me to keep my greedy pervy hands to myself.”

He shook his head. “You’re mistaken. Yours are the only hands I have wanted.”

She swallowed hard, then dropped her gaze and bit her lip, and Fenris watched her with a fresh and heart-wrenching surge of affection. 

He tipped her chin up until she met his gaze. Her eyes were wet, and Fenris studied her fondly for a moment before speaking.

“Hawke,” he said softly. “I never needed anyone, or wanted anyone. Until now.” 

A tear escaped the corner of her eye, and she beamed at him. “Keep up that smooth talk, you handsome fool,” she said. “It’ll get you everywhere with me.”

He grinned, then flexed his hips and slid his cock against her.

Her smile melted into a look of pleasure and surprise, and Fenris continued to rock himself between her legs until they were both panting fitfully. She was so very slick and warm, and his cock was pulsing with want, and any remaining nerves he had were chased away by the temptation between her legs. 

He pressed his forehead to hers. “Are you ready?” he breathed.

She stroked his face. “Yes,” she panted. “I’m ready.”

He nodded tightly, then reached down with his left hand and positioned himself at her entrance. Then, very slowly, he began to fill her up. 

A breathy moan escaped her lips, and Fenris caught it with his lips and fed his own pleasured moan back to her. Her fingers were tightening on his biceps with every slow shift of his hips, and by the time he was fully sheathed, her nails were biting into his skin.

He broke away from her kiss and pressed his lips to her ear. “Are you all right?” he breathed.

“Yes,” she whimpered. “I… I feel so fucking full.” She burst out a breathless little laugh.

“Does it hurt?” he asked. 

“No, no,” she said hastily. “No, it’s… I...” She shifted her hips experimentally, taking him just a little bit deeper. 

Fenris jerked with pleasure, and she gasped and tilted her hips, and he dropped his lips to her neck. “V-venhedis...” he groaned, and he nipped her damp neck.

She let out another little sob of pleasure and tilted her hips toward him. “I hope that means something nice?” she moaned. 

He couldn’t reply. She felt so good and she tasted like sweetness and salt, and he couldn’t find the words to respond. 

He kissed her hard and flexed his hips, and her cry of pleasure echoed into his mouth. They fell into a slow and rolling rhythm, hips meeting and moving apart in a smooth and steady grind, and a dull pang of pain pulled at his wounded left side with every thrust. But Hawke’s fingers were twisting in his hair and stroking his neck, and the slick pleasure of her body and her tender hands on his skin was more than enough to drown the pain away. 

They moved together in tandem, and Fenris inhaled her scent and her breath and her eager little cries, and with every stroke of her hands and every glorious thrust, his sense of giddy wellbeing continued to grow: Hawke was here, sweat-laced and panting with pleasure and pushing him toward his peak with her every ecstatic cry, and before he knew it, before he meant for it to happen, he was shuddering and releasing his rapture as a guttural groan against her throat. 

She tilted her head back with a gasp, and Fenris nipped her neck, leaving a delirious trail of tiny bites along the margins of her throat until his climax left him boneless.

He sighed and relaxed into Hawke’s supine form. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders, and as their sweat dissipated into the relative cool of his cabin, her hands began to move. 

He sighed leisurely into her collarbone. Her slender hands were drifting over his back, trailing slowly over the raised scars that traversed his skin. There was something so soothing about the feel of her hands, the firm stroke of her uncallused fingers and the care they left in their wake, and Fenris wished there was some way to capture this moment perfectly in his memory, like a carefully rendered oil painting. With every gentle pass of her hands across his back, it was like she was wiping the old memories away, pushing away the pain and the hurt and clearing space for her own caring caresses instead.

More than the sex, more than the pleasure he’d stroked from Hawke’s twisting body or the rapture she’d pulled from him with the rolling of her hips, this moment of afterglow stood out: this feeling of her hands on his body – her hands and all the love and pleasure and care that she gave to him by smoothing them across his scarred and knotted skin. 

“Do they hurt?” she murmured. “The scars?” 

He drew in a deep, relaxed breath. “Not anymore, no.”

She hummed in acknowledgement, then traced the tip of his ear delicately with her fingers. “Well, if they do ever hurt, I’ve been told that massage is very good for painful scars.”

He huffed in amusement. “Is that so?”

“It is,” she said pertly.

He lifted himself on his elbows to look down at her. “Are you any good at massage?” he asked.

She smiled cheekily. “Well, we’ll never know unless I try.”

He chuckled, and her smile broadened before turning soft and sweet. She reached up and brushed a lock of hair from his eyes. “You look happy,” she said softly.

He regarded her with some surprise. “I am happy,” he said. Then he realized how significant this was.

He was happy. Fenris was happy. And it was a deeper happiness than the momentary amusement of bantering with Piper and Varric. It was a richer sense of wellbeing than the fleeting peace he derived from meditating at the bow of the ship. For the first time in years, Fenris felt peaceful and good all the way down to his muscles and the core of his belly. 

“Are you happy?” he asked her.

She grinned at him. “Are you kidding? This is exactly what I wanted. I’ve never been more happy.” 

He stroked her cheek. “Neither have I,” he murmured. 

Her grin softened into something so heart-poundingly sweet, and Fenris gazed at her in total adoration. That soft smile on her face: this was the smile that had drawn him unerringly since the day they’d met, and which he’d fled for fear of what he might lose. 

But now, in the warmth of Hawke’s arms and the heat of her gentle smile, there was no fear. There were no reservations. There was the desire that they’d finally sated, and there was the love he had yet to speak.

And most of all, there was happiness. 

[skost-skribbles]

The Shore

AKA, Sad Dad Takes Son on Depressing Roadtrip, AKA I can’t think of good titles I’m not sorry

More OC nonsense with our ( @bogglebabbles and myself) characters in a scene that happens before the story even takes place but consider the following: so what

What was she like?”

The soft but endlessly inquisitive voice of his son rose above the clatter of the train storming along the tracks. Faramund turned his head so slightly downward, met immediately with hazel eyes, staring solely at the older gentleman. Already he could see the striking slivers of grey seeping into the hazel.

“I…” Faramund licked his lips, adjusting himself upright on the bench. “I can’t say much for certain. She…”

She was in so much pain, and we were powerless to help.

“We didn’t have many opportunities to talk on the ship, y-you see,” he mumbled, hooking his fingers along one of his cufflinks. “Everyone rather kept to themselves.”

The uncertainty was not caught by the young boy. He leaned closer, hands pressing firmly into the wool seating. “Did she look like me? What did she sound like? Did she have a pretty voice?”

Desperately, his fingers searched for a loose button or even a thread to pluck at. Finding that the tailor’s immaculate work lived up to its infamy and neither were found, he prayed for a distraction among the blurry scenery outside. The country landscape offered nothing.

“I don’t…” Faramund paused, gulping down the hesitation trembling in his voice. “I, ah, I don’t recall. It was risky to go out on deck during the day, and even at night any trace of light would have alerted us to unwanted eyes. On the chance I did see her before… I wouldn’t have remembered.”

“Oh.” Sotiris sank into the seat, shoeless feet dangling and swinging to and fro off the bench. Lips pursed, and suddenly his head lifted with a wide grin. “Maybe she was really nice…! And she sang as good as you do!”

A small, somber smile played on Faramund’s face and he chuckled. “You’re far too kind, son. If you believe my singing is good, then hers would have been the voice of angels! You certainly got your generosity from her.”

The younger beamed, throwing a brief look to the empty seat across the way. “How come Da didn’t come with us? He said he loves traveling!”

“A-ah, he does, yes! It’s, well…”

I worry he’s done what he always does with things that put him in great distress: he avoids it at all cost. He’ll always tell me he’s fine, but it upsets me to know how much he’s allowing to build on his shoulders. I fear it will be too late for me to pull him free when it collapses on him.

“He thought it better to stay at home to oversee the factory’s remodeling. But, I know any other day he would have loved to join us.” His smile broadened and he mussed the curly mess that was Sotiris’ hair. A moment later, the smile dropped. “Are you certain you want to do this now? We can always come back when you’re older, no one will fault you for that.”

When I can be stronger for you. When even I can accept this.

Sotiris was quiet for a passing minute, then leaned against Faramund. He pulled his knees to his face and lowered his gaze.

“I do; I don’t want to wait. I… I want to see my mom.”

                                                       ~ ~ ~

In dreams, he would see the beach.

He saw the same shoreline, walked along its eerily perfect curve over and over, to the point where he could spot even a grain of sand out of place. He would see the same waves roll and crash along the shore leading to the forest on overseeing hills. Sometimes, the sky would be as blue as the ocean’s surface, with nary a cloud to be seen; sometimes, it would be hidden by the dark blanket of the moonless night.

For a moment, Faramund would hold a hand in the air, running his fingers through the incoming winds, and in that moment, he believed all would be well.

Truly, what a fool he was.

It would happen so quickly, so suddenly that he would stumble and fall on the rocks. The flames swelled high from the scattered ruins, a sickening odor of smoke choking his lungs. In both the distance and within an arm’s reach, he heard the cries and pleas of the faceless, nameless passengers before they succumbed to silence, swallowed by the fire, or the dark waters. Tomas was nowhere to be seen, and his own hands began to burn to a ghostly heat. Somewhere, elsewhere, a woman -- no, a child cried for help…

In a blink, the calm waves returned below a gray sky, the melody of crying seagulls echoing far away. Faramund’s hands started and he threw a panicked glance downward. Uneasy relief in the form of a gentle breeze slithered past him; they were not burning, but shaking.

A small voice calling for him pulled his head upright and he turned. Sotiris stood at his side, hands grabbing the back of his heavy coat. His eyes followed the child’s sight, spotting the barren, skeletal remains of a vessel lodged in the shallow waters. A hand cupping the boy’s head, they walked towards the looming, metal wreckage. Perhaps a curious passersby would mistake the sight for an unlucky ship running aground, never to make it back to the vast waters; perhaps the House of Gilroy succeeded in wiping the ambush off the face of the beach to mask their crimes on innocent lives before one became wise.

Sotiris tightened his grip on the coat, taking a cautious step forward towards the waves. They sputtered to a stop before his feet and retreated in haste. One, both hands slipped away from the safety of the thick wool and he edged around the coming of another wave, eyes wandering up the bare frame trapped within the sand and ocean.

Softly, Sotiris spoke. “Is this, is this where...”

Faramund nodded, his voice wavering slightly. “Her and many others, yes.” He forced a swallow and exhaled faintly. “We were to dock in a small fishing mill down the coast, go about our new lives.” A shell crunched beneath his foot as he stepped towards his son. He rubbed his thumb in circles along Sotiris’ hair. “Had they mistaken us for the enemy, or they simply despised the idea of newcomers, I’ll know not, but… it won’t change what they did. What they stole.”

The last words lingered in the air; like a hot knife, they poked and prodded at invisible wounds thought to be healed years back. Across the waters, he spotted the protruding, smooth rocks of the foreshore making itself known; at the hitch in his breath, day swirled into night, and he stood, rooted in place, watching a scene so utterly familiar to him play out.

Two obscure silhouettes pull themselves upon the rocky outcrop, towing along a single lifeboat. Through the roaring flames, the crashing water, the whimpers and gasps of a young woman are barely audible. One slumps to their knees, the other scrambles to grab hold and gently ease her out of the boat, immediately dipping and catching as she collapses upon setting foot on land. She shrinks closer into herself, and a sharp, keen sound of shock breaks into the night sky. 

The cry is not from her.

“I don’t see Mom.”

Night flashed back to day in a fell swoop, wiping the tidal pools clear of any beings, of any boat. Faramund started in place, shuddering at a swell of goosebumps riding up his arms and neck and a patch of cold sweat breaking across his neck. Shaking his head, he rubbed furiously at his eyes with the heel of his hand before catching a trail of footprints leading away from him, aimless in their journey as they stopped in numerous directions in the sodden sand, stopping at the foot of marram grass atop a small mound further from the shore. There, he saw Sotiris, head and body twisting and turning for a destination he knew not. 

“What was that, Sotiris?” 

Sotiris wrung his hands along the hem of his capelet, frowning slightly. “I don’t see her. All the people in the cemetery had graves and headstones, and so did the people in the churchyards back home. How come there’s not one for her, Dad? Or for the others?”

“O-oh,” Faramund whispered, his heart sinking like a stone. “I,” he continued, louder, his own hands now pressing tightly against one another. He feared both would break under the mounting pressure any moment, and he forced them to latch onto his coat. “I’m afraid… I’m afraid there aren’t any.”

Sotiris turned quiet, eyes downcast. “Why?”

He opened his mouth to reply, but Faramund found his voice to be dry, bare. What could he say to the child? That their attackers likely held no interest in granting the passengers a proper burial, for doing so would bring to light their crimes?

Faramund’s head drooped, his gaze at his sand-coated shoes. “I’m sorry, Sotiris, but… I don’t know.”

The distant lapping of waves turned heavy to his ears, accompanied with the howling of winds that were once faint and soothing. Above, the gray clouds split apart to reveal blue skies, and rays of the summer sun found their way to the crescent shore and waters. The warmth it delivered, however, was but a fleeting touch to the man. 

“I wish I could tell you so much more.” Faramund exhaled heavily, his eyes settling upon the tidepools. “I wish I could tell you with certainty that her voice was soft and surpassed those of the angels. Of what she looked like, of how you have her eyes, her smile. I…” Heat bit at his eyes, and tears trickled freely down his cheeks. “I wish I could say why there’s no grave for your mother. I wish… And knowing that I can’t, knowing that my memory is as dark as that night… I-”

He found himself at a loss of what to say when a cutting, sudden sob broke into the air. His head snapped up, panic written across his face before, trembling, guilt swept over him in a landslide. 

Rooted in place among the marram grass, small fists clenched at the capelet’s hems, Sotiris stood, his own tears brimming and rolling wildly downward and disappearing within the grassy sea. Immediately, Faramund stumbled over to the mound and rested his hands lightly over Sotiris’ arms, kneeling as he gave the boy’s arms a reassuring squeeze.

He opened his mouth to speak, to freely utter words of comfort.

“I’m sorry,” Sotiris choked out. He shut his eyes and tugged at the capelet, shaking. “I-I’m sorry!”

Rigid, he furrowed his brows. “Sotiris, wh… what are you…”

“I, I…” The boy sniffled sharply, raising his hands as if to wipe away the tears before they fell limp at his sides. “Y-you’re supposed to r-remember all the good times you had with s-someone before they died, and you’re supposed to know wh-who they were when you visit them. But, but… I don’t remember Mom. I don’t kn-know, know anything about her. I thought if y-you o-or Da knew, seeing Mom would...” His breath began to hitch between deep, heaving sobs.

All Faramund could choke out was a shuddering “Oh,” and with it came a devastating realization that gripped his soul. “Oh, Sotiris-”

“I… I…” He threw himself at Faramund and buried his face within the man’s shoulder with a mighty whimper, his small arms wrapping tight around his torso as his fingers dug and twisted into the coat’s fabric. Though muffled, his voice rang clear as day. “I wanted h-her to see I was a go-good son and m-make her, her proud! How can I do th-that when I…” His voice cracked and devolved into hoarse, sharp sobs, each one a striking flinch through the child’s body. 

Faramund absorbed each snivel, each flinch with the same countenance one would find on a prisoner facing the judge. The persistent questions shot at both he and Tomas to the point of exhaustion; pressing requests to return to the island, a land once home to them all, hidden over the ocean’s horizon. These questions were not to fulfill a child’s curiosity; they were to earn sole gratification from those of the past, from those whose voices were as silent as the night stars. 

Both arms easily took up Sotiris in a warm embrace, pulling him closer with a gentle squeeze. “My dear, sweet boy,” he said slowly. One hand trailed up and rested upon the boy’s hair. “You’ve nothing to apologize for. Not for this. You can’t fault yourself for something far out of your control, out of anyone’s control. You were much too young when she passed; it would be maddening to think she or anyone else would condemn you for it.”

He shut his eyes, exhaling shakily. He fought to keep his voice steady. “I know it hurts, Sotiris. I know it hurts to have your mother’s image as nothing more than a blank slate, and the memories you would hold close to your heart are vague details told from others. But, she did not leave you stranded. What she left you is something that surmounts everything else, something no one else could provide or take away.”

Sniffling, one teary, reddened eye peeked from the shelter of the coat, staring upward.

“Your mother… she loved you more than anything the world could have given her. When the ship was attacked, through the destruction she made certain you were safe, e-even when it meant risking her own well-being in doing so. She…” He stilled, swallowing down a growing break in his throat. “It didn’t matter to her that she was hurt, how far she had to pull that lifeboat through the cold ocean waters that night. Nobody or nothing else mattered to her. Only you, Sotiris. The love she had for you, even in her last moments… Try as your father and I might, there’s no such affection or obstacle that can master it.”

His gaze flickered back to the tidepools, and through half-lidded, misty eyes, he saw her.

It’s a challenge to keep her head upright, to stop herself from completely slumping over and away from the lifeboat. In slow, harsh gasps, she puts on a rueful smile and stares at the crashing waves along the rocks. It takes minutes for her to gather her bearings, more to utter a pained request. There’s no hesitation from the two figures at her side, and immediately a small bundle is set in her shaking arms. Her smile only grows, the tranquil demeanor along her face a stark contrast to the grim injury stealing her life. She lowers and presses her forehead into the bundle, holding off the trembles that took over her body a short while ago as she murmurs a hushed promise to the infant wrapped snug in the dry blanket. 

‘You’ll protect him, won’t you?’ She breathes out. Her eyes don’t leave the bundle. ‘Please, he deserves what I can’t give him anymore. My Sotiris, he…’

He found himself nodding, an anguished, silent reply to her plea that night. Neither he or Sotiris moved or pulled away from one another, and it wasn’t long before a growing wet patch broke through his coat and seeped past his shirt. His hand lightly rubbed circles into the boy’s back as the sobs rumbled against his shoulder, dying off into sputtered coughs before a spell of stillness fell over them both.

After a long while, sniffling, Sotiris withdrew from Faramund, the heels of his hands rubbing at his eyes. Faramund wasted no time, fishing out a small, green handkerchief decorated in red holly leaves and carefully taking hold of Sotiris’ arms in one hand, dabbing away tears fresh and old along the child’s eyes and cheeks with the other. 

He mustered a small, melancholy smile. “One does not require memories to mourn the loss of a loved one, Sotiris, and let no one tell you otherwise. You’re allowed to grieve for your mother, now and forever.” He paused to wipe a new tear from the corner of Sotiris’ eye. “Her love for you, you carry it wherever you go, and it will stay strong through your own love. I know… if she were here now, she would be proud to see how far you’ve come. To have such a bright and passionate child as her son… she’d be honored.”

Sotiris’ voice was meek, croaky. “R-really?”

“Of course.” 

Sniffling again, his eyes bloodshot, Sotiris glanced to the tidepools. “Can we stay here for a while longer? Please? I don’t want to go back to the inn yet.”

Faramund blinked in surprise before his face turned somber, patting the boy’s shoulder. “We can stay here for as long as you’d like. Come, the tide’s still low, and we can look at all the little plants and creatures nestled in the pools…”

                                                     ~ ~ ~

He found himself thinking of her. 

With the exception of a single candle fluttering in an ashen-coated lantern in the corner, the inn’s room was completely dark. Outside, the clouds returned in hordes and hid the stars and moon from curious onlookers, much to one’s displeasure outside their window. Much to Faramund’s relief, their outcries of vexation did not disrupt the sleeping occupant in the bed across the room, curled halfway into a ball beneath a patterned quilt. 

In the dark, his back and shoulders pressed along the headboard and hands wringing themselves, Faramund thought of her. 

How would she react, knowing he brought her child to not only her unmarked grave, but to the grave of the other passengers? He came to the only reasonable conclusion he could think of: furious. No doubt she would have berated him for such a foolish action, and he wouldn’t have blamed her had she decided to strike him.

Children should be basking in the care of their parents, running around and exploring imaginative worlds. 

They should not be led to an area once clenched in death’s cold grasp.

Ah, a voice sang in his head, but the boy was in those cold hands once not so long ago. Is he not already familiar with its ways?

He winced at his fingers nearly choking one another, prying them away with some hesitation. He shook his head, shutting his eyes closed with a shaky breath. 

What was your name?

Quiet.

Why were you on the ship? What were you running from?

Nothing.

Had she survived, he wondered what would have become of her and Sotiris. Would she have gone the way of her unknown goal, possibly to be never seen again? Would she have accompanied him and Tomas to Amaranthine, perhaps extending a branch of friendship and camaraderie? 

He shook his head again, shifting his position on the mattress. He had all these questions and more, questions to answers that will forever be out of his grasp.

“Dad?”

A sudden creak of wood against pressure snapped him from his thoughts and he started, his hand nearly slipping from the bed and almost throwing him to the floorboards below. He righted himself, fumbling with the ends of his undone necktie when he turned his head. In the dim light, Sotiris’ outline wrapped in the quilt stood out clear.

“Dad?” he repeated, hushed. “How come you’re not asleep?”

“Ah, unfortunately it’s one of those restless nights I picked up from your father. Did I wake you?” 

He could barely make out Sotiris shaking his head. “I can’t sleep. I did all the suggestions you and Da say to do and I can’t. I don’t feel tired.”

“Given today’s events, I’m not wholly surprised to hear that.” There came a moan from the bedframe, and Sotiris’ mattress dipped from the newfound weight shifting on the edge. “It was a lot to take in, I’m sure.” 

A moment of stretched silence crept through the room.

“I suspect, however,” Faramund added, slowly, “that today isn’t all that’s currently on your mind.”

“No,” came the shy response. The quilt rustled faintly in the dark. Then, “Da said you were an orphan, and… a-and you didn’t know your parents, either.”

His brow knit, Faramund said nothing at first. His hands took to tugging at his cufflinks once more, and he swallowed. “He is correct. Why… How did he come to tell you this?”

“I asked,” Sotiris mumbled. “I was asking him about his family, and then about yours, b-but he didn’t say anything else after it. Da wouldn’t talk about his family, either.”

“That… sounds like your father. But don’t take it too hard, Sotiris. He…” The corners of Faramund’s lips flickered downward. “The less he’s asked about that particular subject, the better.”

The fabric of the quilt continued to swish in Sotiris’ grip. “Did you miss them? Your parents?”

Were the lantern closer to them, a shadow would have fallen over Faramund’s eyes. “Truthfully, I did not think of them with pleasant thoughts growing up. I was about your age if not younger when th… When I lost them.” He licked at his lips, pinching his fingers deep along his cufflinks. “I didn’t miss them.”

“Oh.”

The candle sputtered out its last flames, then the once feebly lit corner turned black. 

Sotiris’ voice was barely above a whisper and he shuffled closer to Faramund. His head rested along his father’s arm and he said, “Dad?”

“Hm?”

“Is… is it okay if I miss Mom? Even if I can’t remember her?”

Against the window, faint droplets of rain tapped and splattered along the glass and shutters, falling to a rhythm lasting seconds before it unleashed a mighty torrent to the inn and streets. For but a moment, Faramund feared some had broken through the ceiling, as the sleeve of his shirt became damp. His heart sank at the reality, but he shifted and closed his arm around the child’s shoulders with an assuring squeeze.

“Absolutely.”

In the distance roared thunder. Neither seemed to notice, nor care.

“I miss her.”

Faramund closed his eyes tight at the brimming heat poking at them. 

“So do I, Sotiris.”

[mvrcutios]

— INTRODUCING:

➺ Alexandre Preston as  M𝔢𝔯𝔠𝔲𝔱𝔦𝔬

Hi everyone! I’m Olivia, 24 from the pst timezone !! I love romantic foreign films and every incarnation of Skam ever created. Also, tik tok. Way way too much tik tok. This is my interpretation of Mercutio (loml tbh), Alexandre! A pretty boy with charm and brains and you bet your ass he knows it. Portrayed by the beaut that is Maxence Fauvel,  i’m genuinely filled to the brim with muse for this boy so, without further ado, time for the main event! (as he prefers to be lbr )

name: alexandre henri preston

age: 21

birthday: July 28th, 1998

gender: male

pronouns: he/him

degree: double major of business & music composition (father currently aware of the 1st)

zodiac: leo.

languages: fluent in french & italian, attempting to swear in russian and japanese.

hobbies: piano, cello, running, sex, parties, reading

vices: whiskey, gin, socialites, card games, fast cars, midnight symphonies, menthol cigarettes

pinterest is here !!

the aesthetic: Dom Pérignon, lipstick stained shirt collars, blue eyes with darkened circles, menthol cigarettes, 2am melodies on a piano down the hall, bruised knuckles, hotel balconies, strobe lights and heavy bass, macarons flaked in gold, lips pressed to cheeks, 3am club invitations, lingering eyes, too bright smiles, bitten bruises soothed with a tongue,shattered mirrors, ripped fingernails, screaming into the silent night, laughter whispered into skin, pills pressed to tongues,  platinum amex cards, chewed on pens, eyes growing distant, texts left on read, ink over his heart for his maman, naps under campus oak trees, flasks sipped in a lecture hall, hands on hips, backs, and his own throat.

           ➺ but what is in a name?

➺ { Alexandre } : The french translation of Alexander. Defender of Man. The irony of a name is not lost on him, nor the man who’d held it. He was named for his maternal grandfather, a man who had sold his soul (and his eldest daughter)  for money, power, name, all under the guise of the importance of family. A name meaning man of honor. Certainly a strong name for a boy who’d been born to rule a soiled throne, but content to find ways to sneak sweets from the kitchen, trick a smile from his mother as she stared out the window yet again. But defenders are not born, no.They are made, and from the moment blue eyes opened for the first time he was destined to be just that. Made. Into his father’s visions, his mother’s dreams. And Xandre is no fool. All he wants — no, rather. All he desires from life is simple. Everything.

➺ { Henri } Ruler of households. Once again nothing but irony for a boy who grew up wanting for nothing in life, but knowing the expectations were to be just that. A leader. Who would be the one to tell him that the throne he was set to rest upon was built on the blood and bones of the lesser fortunate? More importantly, who would teach him to care?

➺ { Preston } Meaning priest, settlement, enclosures of God. Carried to England from Normandy after the great conquest. A name befitting to the family who in some circles considered themselves holier than most. Gods among men. Who turned whiskey to gold, words to bank notes, and blood into power. If you were a Preston, people knew it. And what could be better than that?

   ➺ for he  is the devil in every detail                

➺ ( + ) He was a boy of pressed shirts and dark windswept waves. Blue eyes that sparkled of mischief and peels of laughter that echoed down marbled halls. He was Alexandre Preston, a boy with the stars in his eyes and the world at his feet. Who when he smiled, his entire face lit from within and led to that hint of the  devil sparkling just so from that gaze of his. Who smelled of citrus and whiskey and a bite of mint. Who adored beauty, in life and what it had to offer him. A man who’d grown into his looks and was taught by a wise mother just how to use them, a well placed kiss to a cheek or brush of skin, eyes meeting across a room enough to give them what they desired and more than ever, what he craved. He was tall, dark and oh so handsome, and knew how to get just what he wanted. Born with his father’s intellect and drive for more, padded by his mother’s beauty and ability to wield it for the weapon it could be. It made him anything but a bore, a useless first son too afraid to grasp what was before him. No, Xandre knew his fate. But in the meantime, he lived his life how he chose. If dearest dad was none the wiser, well. What’s the harm?

➺ ( + ) But let’s go back to the beginning, shall we? Born on a warm evening in late july, Alexandre Henri was destined to be the only child of Simon Preston and Violette Dupont. A product of two passionate individuals and a loveless marriage, Xandre’s mother was the eldest daughter to a man of debt. The Dupont family had in name what they lacked in capital and with a marriage between Violette and Simon, had everything to gain. Xandre’s birth was a bright burst of fleeting color for a mother who felt caged into the world she’d sold herself to, doting on the little boy and doing what she could to leave him with a part of her, a piece of her own waning soul. Where Simon was boastful, she was wicked, demure. Where he was aggression, she was soft sighs and whispered curses. Two sides of  what lead to be a machiavellian son. Destined to rule with a gilded fist and fleeting, passionate heart.

➺ ( + ) He was put into lessons as a boy to dwindle that energy that thrummed with his every step, sports and arts and languages but they were fleeting moments of time, hobbies cast aside once the obsessive grip of his mind released them. But his mother’s love of piano rang true to his blood, picking up the instrument even with some difficulty. It bothered him so, to have something he couldn’t master with minimal effort. It required a honed drive, a passion and ethic to create something magnificent through nothing more than hard work. It fueled him, the boy almost manic with the late hours he spent alone in the sun room, fingers dancing along keys and cursing with every missed note. As he grew, so did the realization that it was not something you could master. The great composers themselves went mad with trying. It was a never ending race, and one he still holds steadfast this very day. It is as much a part of him as anything could be. Alexandre is meant to be a leader, Alexandre blows thousands on parties and card games, Alexandre needs music like air to rattling lungs. His current double major at Ashcroft is a direct result. If he’s to live out this new version of day to day, he’ll do as he pleases. As long as his father remains where he belongs, ignorant as the rest are.

➺ ( + ) if music was a stronghold, most everything else in his world was a passing fancy, aimless ways to spend time and money and have fun in this life he was so destined to lead. High school meant parties and fun, learning the intricacies of the body and passion as girls and boys alike came and went from white rumbled sheets. For his mother had taught him to wield beauty for what it was; a weapon. And oh, did he learn with the best. A university career begun at Oxford (if only to spite his father), where the real fun began, nights spent in club after club until the sun rose again, liquor fueled nights of passion and fun, barred from certain clubs and embraced at others, heavyweight card games and street races with a bottle of dom in hand. Started a gambling ring in his dorm hall until the RA caught wind a year later. (But he eventually joined, so no harm no foul) He was at an all time high, never fearing the inevitable crash to follow. He welcomed it like an old friend, navigated the highs and lows with a long learned finesse. Now in Edinburgh, he chases the residual high with his normal vigor, finding drinking buddies to waste an evening with, occasional bodies to slip into his too high thread count sheets.

➺ ( + )  The very definition of love ‘em and leave ‘em. Xandre doesn’t do true relationships, has never truly given his heart to someone in any form. He doesn’t believe in it, the type of love that makes people do such foolish things. He does foolish things just fine on his own, heart be damned. He can be passionate, charming, attentive lover at the best of times, possessive fool at the worst of times. He loves to feel desired, wanted, needed even. But never aims to be someone’s entire world. That type of need, that type of love does nothing but wound. And every wound he will ever have will be of his own creation. Has had more than a few flings, even reoccurring instances of women or men a few times in a row. But the connections are shallow, surface deep. You don’t need to witness his soul to get into his bed, afterall.

➺ ( + )  It was all a beautiful distraction from the blood that stained every letter of his name. His cousin was allowed to live in blessed ignorance of the family means, but Xandre, he was thrown headfirst into the lion’s den and came out grinning, the truth of it never leaving past blood stained lips. He isn’t resentful of that fact. A part of him feels it was always meant to be this way. If his cousins were the sun, he was the endless night, the whispers of shadows and secrets meant to withstand. For he could take it, surely. Right?

➺ ( + ) while his fate may be anything but up for debate, he is anything but a too willing participant. Being at Oxford meant enough distance to gain a bit of the freedom he craved. The night his father was arrested, Alexandre was doing what was normal, even on a tuesday evening. Partying at a local hotspot four bottles deep in champagne and whiskey, pills pressed to lips in between fevered kisses of a woman who’s name escaped him the next morning. Sweetened black coffee in hand as he watched his phone buzz over and over, the news blaring the headline of what he’d always known would come to fruition. But his father was still kicking, and so the heavy head who bears the crown was not yet his own. So he went about his day, his week, his months. Until, octavia.

➺ ( + ) his cousins were the siblings he’d never had, and for a man who doesn’t truly believe in intricacies of love he loves them with all he has in him. Wolfie the brother he’d craved, the two stirring trouble with every laugh as they raced down the cavernous halls of their homes. Days spent listening to his whispered dreams, his own a hollow echo in response to the passion that thrummed from his cousin’s. The lectures of his poor influence never bothered him, his role had always been rather set after all. The shadow to the sun. Was he ever to be a leader? Possibly. But he was never born of the responsibility and dreams that lingered over his cousin, never expected to amount to anything rather spectacular beyond the built business reputation and blood that soaked the name Preston. He was too impulsive, too passionate to have it beaten from his bones, just always a little too much.

➺ ( + ) And Octavia – she held a special place in his heart. Daddy’s little girl, it was easy to see how she could bat her lashes and smile her smile and let the world fall at her feet. He admired it, respected it even. Game always has to appreciate the game. She and her brother leaving for Ashcroft was a blow he hadn’t anticipated, for they’d always had one another, the two musketeers and the girl who fought to be anything but a shadow. It was an unfamiliar ache, missing them. And with Octavia now gone, that ache has grown tenfold. Morphed into anger for what he knew she was up to, for somehow somewhere, she’d pissed off the wrong people to where even the Preston name couldn’t quite save her soul. But her essence is everywhere, haunting the halls and whispering in ears. It’s all so very dramatic, so very her. He’d pour one out for her if he didn’t think she’d simper about his distaste for wasted wine. Her spirit was a mild comfort, a balm over a roughened wound. a bigger amusement than anything, a middle finger to those who’d ended her bright existence. A Preston knew how to fuck you over, that was made all the more clear with each report of her sightings. And god, did he love her for it.

➺ ( + ) and that at the very crux of it all, is what has brought him to ashcroft. A new scene for parties, new faces, and a remaining cousin who could use a shoulder to lean on. & those all look lovely on paper, but the fine print? Always read it carefully. For the smiles and charm are all Violette without a doubt. But the danger that lingers, the passion and fire that fuel his soul and border on the precipice of mania? Alexandre is Simon Preston’s son, that was never to be denied for long. And someone has wronged them all, taken things they had no right to take. Someone he considered to be a part of his heart. He doesn’t take kindly to such things, and so to Ashcroft he’s come. He is passion, recklessness, a hidden grief fueled by fleeting love wrapped in a shiny veneered package. He’s here to revel, to discover, to maybe even punish. If deemed necessary. Blood will always be blood, and for a man who’s always willing to go a little too far? It is all that remains.

➺ ( + ) as for what has qualified him for such a prestigious society upon his enrollment well, that is a mystery to some and a hard headline to others. His family’s connections? His relation to Wolfie? His letters of transfer from his classical composition professors back in London? As far as Xandre is concerned, it’s nothing more than a certain Oberon Ashcroft seeing he has a role to play, and one he plays rather well. Unassuming at first, a disarming charm soothing the blunt edges of his words. He says what he feels, and what he knows must be said. And due to that, he knows his worth, what he brings to the table. Knows how poorly it would look if he hadn’t been inducted. He brings a good time, a laugh, a chance to rebel against the societal norms and oppressions that leak from every pore of Ashcroft. But he also brings a weighted name, a wicked ability to decipher through the purple prose people can preach, to the truth at the core of it all. And he plays a mean Chopin, what can he say?

➺ ( + ) there is no way to wrap up all that he is, to summarize a man who is nothing short of a dichotomy, a symphony in fractured parts. Perhaps a jekyll and hyde of his own making, two heads of the same beast he wielded within his soul. for there was something to be said of being seen, eyes drawn to your every move, to feel the power of being adored, desired, craved. He is the devil on your shoulder, crooning saccharine words and screaming in triumph in a breadth. A gleam of mania tinging those baby blues when he pushes just so to get his way. He is that very symphony, a concerto who’s pace continues to drive faster and faster, upward and onward until its very PEAK, a cacophony of beauty and agony as notes ring out, clash, COLLIDE. and then, the briefest moment of silence. He has discovered the distractions his body can wield, but also the power to be found in stillness, in silence. At his lowest he craves it, aches to be surrounded by masses just once more to drown out the roaring in his mind, to draw it to ecstasy, to blissful silence. All leading up to the final, ringing note. Before the applause, of course. never deny yourself the applause. That had always been Lesson One.

                          ➺    A LETTER TO OCTAVIA:

Tavia —

Where do I start? You always knew how to make an entrance, tav. should’ve figured your exit would be the same. But…why the fuck wouldn’t you call me? Why wouldn’t you tell me the extent of just how bad shit had gotten so quickly? You knew no matter what I said, or how I complained or warned you off to be careful I would’ve been there in a heartbeat. You didn’t have to do this alone. I should’ve seen that and come the first time you called. Don’t haunt me for that. And that police chief mentioned a baby, Tav. You never– me of all people would have understood. You were the only one I ever told about Clara, how my dad paid her off. You never judged me for him, you understood. Let me get wasted and cry it out in that shitty suite in London. We could have made a club of it, you and me. Poor little Rich kids with secret kids. Poetic, no?  Poetic justice is bullshit in hindsight. And I just really, really miss you.

I’m sure everyone in these letters are telling you the reasons they adored you, how they’ll never forget you, the wild memories they’re sharing with you, that they say they’ll never forget. I don’t need to say all those things. You know I do, and you know I won’t forget. You’re a part of my heart, as battered and shriveled as we liked to joke it is. But apparently death makes us sentimental fools, so here’s this for you, because it’s 4am and the memory won’t leave my mind no matter how many times I close my eyes. That summer we spent, all of us, vacationing in that house on the riviera. Remember? I spent the day running around the grounds with Wolf and we’d laugh and tease like elder brothers do when you’d seek us out, pouting those lips and crocodile tears until we included you in our games. But when the sun set and dinner was long gone, you’d drag me into the tea room with that baby grand in the corner and demanded I play. You always were a determined thing, you brat. But you’d smile that smile and even I couldn’t fight the urge to sit and play your favorites.You sang along and danced and danced and danced until you were breathless with it. Only you could make dancing to britney fuckin’ spears look like an artform you know? You’d call me your co-star, and never let me hate myself for the mistakes, never laughed if I stumbled on a note. You were my biggest supporter that summer, but I was only one of your many adoring fans. That’s how it was supposed to be. That won’t change, I promise.

( A few tears stain the edges of that previous paragraph, angry, bitter droplets that he wipes away and slips the paper further to defend the onslaught of them. He sighs deeply, clears his throat. )

And look at you now, huh? Haunting your friends and your brother with the best of ‘em. Leave it to you to find a way to remain the star of the show even in death. I can see how it’s unravelling them. The ones who look too pale to be innocent, everyone here has a fucking secret. Thanks to you maybe we’ll see them all sooner than later. And what fun that’s gonna be. But do me a favor and haunt some hot freshman for me, will you? Whisper sweet nothings of my beauty in their ears, make it a good one. I’ll owe you one. You know I’m good for it.

I’ll watch over Wolfie. Of course I will.  I’ll get him piss drunk at that club you mentioned last time we talked, bring a few lines and a bottle of dom all just for you, gorgeous. I’m here now for him, for you. I’m here for what I should have done from the beginning. If you had to leave him —had to leave us, it won’t be for nothing.

I miss you, cherie. Visit me tonight in my dreams, alright? You can dance for me, I’ll play you a song.

We’ll make it a happy one, for old times sake.

                                                     -Xandre

[hiraeth-wayfarer]

Hiraeth Creature #1000 - Vesailia 

Aesalith, City of Ghosts; Fierfohen, City of Beasts, and Empyrean, City of Blasphemies. The bones of a transient golden age sit stark and wilted in the furthest reaches of Hiraeth's northern wilds. Beyond beautiful fields and ancient forests, kissed by snow and embraced by flowing sunlight, a curse festers and squirms under its heaving weight. The cursed forest guards the way to the kingdoms, its breath haggard by toxins and its voice strained by the calls of malformed and otherworldly creatures that spirits watch from afar, lest the forest take them as well. This place was once a sprawling, radiant paradise, built with unprecedented magic.

Those who crafted this utopia were three Summerfolk siblings: youngest brother Ezia, cunning and tricksy with words; middle sister Tevenka, strong and brave until the end, and eldest sister Vesailia, kind and compassionate to all. Though Vesailia was eldest, she was meek, but her fragility came with a blessing. As a child, she had stumbled upon a beautiful staff, but when she touched it, celestial magic coursed through her body, scaring and burning her inside and out. Her siblings took care of her always, well after they were left as orphaned nomads in the desert. Wherever they went, they helped those they could and survived by the good will of others. Ezia fought for the rights of peasants and workers, Tevenka fought bandits and monsters who tormented them, and Vesailia fought to keep them alive as they struggled to make a life in the wastes. Vesailia's blessing was that she could use celestial magic with Hiraeth's innate magic in tandem, and though it pained her tremendously, she saved many with her miraculous gift.

Word of the siblings changing each town they passed went far and wide, and soon they had caravans following them, seeking their aid and teachings. Their once aimless wandering was taken over by a great pilgrimage of lost people, looking for salvation. Kingdoms from all over had been devoured by the Earthen Maiden, mother of Hiraeth's balance. Those who grew too quick or practiced forbidden arts were swallowed into the abyss and the survivors sought out hope, finding it in the three siblings. They planned to head north to the great City of Myths, home of legendary spirits, to beg for sanctuary. They braved the northern winds as far as they could, before Vesailia could walk no more. They built a town around her resting spot, and people from all over came to pray for her health. Eventually the town grew into a city, as Ezia and Tevenka used their strengths to bind folk together and give them purpose. Once wanderers, they become citizens, workers, and knights, strung together by focus and determination.

While her siblings eked out a new life, Vesailia was plunged into a deep, dark dream-- visions billowed like storm clouds and overwhelmed her senses. She sunk into a sea of conscience and found another her-- a her that wasn't her, but had the same soul. She saw a soul connected to countless souls, coalescing into a great winged form, each silver feather a veil, the silhouette of far-off lands behind each one. She awoke from this dream to the joyful tears of her siblings and the unending devotion of friend and stranger alike. She felt the hands that weren't hers clutch together against her beating heart, and found the magic she needed to save her people.

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

With unfathomable power, the grandest city Hiraeth had ever seen was built. Separated into thirds, they became knowns as Aesalith, City of Riches, Fierfohen, City of Steel, and Empyrean, City of Wonders. Vesailia wished to make the people of Hiraeth their City of Myth, so that their journeys would not end in the deathly pale like theirs had almost done. She met with the spirits of the wilds and begged them for their blessings, which they granted after seeing that their lands had been undamaged by the miracle Vesailia performed, and the land became saturated in fertility. The Earthen Maiden was not keen with the choice the spirits of the north had made, but found that the grand city was protected by wards never seen before, as if pulled from another world entirely. The foundation was changed, and the Earthen Maiden's judgement could not be passed.

Together, the siblings ruled wisely over their kingdoms, meeting often in council. Ezia brought the kingdoms prosperity, Tevenka brought safety, and Vesailia brought miracles. She poured over old and new teachings, and her knowledge lead Empyrean to be capital of magical studies. They welcomed travellers and refuges from across the world, but Vesailia began to feel a great unease when she would see caravans of the needy and the sickly enter their walls. Years were passing, and all the magic she had burned within her was taking its toll-- she wanted more power to keep everyone safe, but the more she gained, the weaker she felt. Her whims changed over time-- she stopped appearing at council, and her royal ministers took her place in greeting the people and walking the streets. Vesailia saw the other her when she closed her eyes, and wanted to join with her at all costs, seeing the strength in her that she needed. Her eyes for the people shifted away to the ethereal reflection always in front of her, but just out of reach. She toiled in her castle, forming a new council of her own, made up of bright and twisted minds-- those who had lost themselves to magic, willing to do anything to reach and become higher beings. Maleficorum once shunned by the world now whispered in the queen's ear, telling her of ancient secrets long left behind.

Vesailia, once healer and weaver of blessings, put her foot forward down a foreboding road-- a road she would walk alone for now, she thought. If the people of Hiraeth were to be saved, she would need to save herself first. Many had to be taken to the castle to learn this royal vow and were never seen again. Witches, druids, shamans, soothsayers, arcane beasts, spirits, demons, Fae, and many others with powerful magic were gathered in the gloom of the castle, and joined with the queen's soul to help her continue making miracles. Even members of her family weren't immune to the castle's cold shadow. Vesailia wanted souls to flourish and join with her's to make her wings, just as she saw in her dream years ago. The souls she embraced warped her body in odd ways, but she could feel her wings sprouting along her back, and continued bringing more and more souls into her caress. Her devotees called upon creatures far away to aid her, but many of them began fleeing their queen and escaped into the wilds, changing the land slowly, to the dismay of both folk and spirit. Vesailia cared little if a few got away, as her metamorphosis was almost complete.

She needed two more things to finish her decree: magic in its purest form and a fitting symbol of her change. Her ministers recovered the staff in the south that blessed her long ago-- a great metal horn, which kept a colossal, consuming flame at bay until she had it brought to her side. She looked to the Land of Giants, where forbidden stories told of a Ravenous Beast made from the chaos of the celestial sea was left to rot away. She took the pure blood of the beast, awakening it in the process. The paradise she had been tending had descended into wild madness, but once her other self was here and once they shared the same pair of wings, she could right all the wrongs of the world. Monsters howled in the night and realms tore apart at the seams, but in her throne room, Vesailia stood proudly and unflinchingly as her attendants performed the ritual to call upon her other self. Before they could finish, the spirits she had imprisoned let loose the light of the Niveous Moon. The queen's eyes were blinded by the moonlight, no longer seeing her other self, she fell back into her old dreams to try and find her again. Some say she still stands in her throne room, waiting for her other self. Her machinations brought calamity to the world, destroying everything she understood, and yet she still lives in the depths of the cursed forest. Like a statue she endures, a monument to the Mother of Blasphemies, the Blight of the North, and the Queen of Nothing.

[sellyoursoulforagoodfic]

Hiding Things to Save Them Chapter 4

Trevor Belmont x reader

Summary: So you can apparently fight, and by the way he’s not the last son of the house of Belmont . . . 

Word Count: 1628

For almost three weeks he’d been in the little village staying with a woman he still wasn’t convinced wasn’t just a dream. With the peaceful atmosphere that surrounded her little house, it was easy for Trevor to start calling it ‘home’. The two of them had become close from their near-constant conversations that neither wanted to dwell on the fact that their time together was quickly coming to an end.

Unfortunately, a forced reminder came by way of about seven men cornering Y/N as she was leaving the market. She’d gone to gather groceries for the next few days while Trevor went to the tavern for a cask of ale for the pair to drink with dinner. As soon as she realized the strange men were following her, Y/N started subtly veering into an alley away from the busy people of the village. Either these men were bandits and she could handle them before they went after anyone else, or they were tailing her because of Trevor. Of course, the men took the opportunity provided by the narrow path to trap her, forcing her to stop.

Cautiously, Y/N set her few bags on the ground off to the side to free up her hands. “Can I help you?” Her hand drifted to the small of her back where a curved dagger rested in its sheath.

“Father Fredrick has been hearing rumors about you housing a drifter of a rather unsavory sort,” the one directly in front of her replied, fingers tightening on his own sword. “Sent us to talk to you about it.”

“I would think the good Father would be proud of my hospitality. That’s what he teaches, isn’t it? We should be accepting to travelers?” she did her best to sound innocent.

“That would be the case,” a man to her left said, “but there are other concerns about your . . . hospitality.”

“Many,” this one was behind her, “are saying that you’ve been having an affair with the man. I’m sure you know that it’s frowned upon to have an unmarried woman with a man staying in her home unsupervised . . . Rumors could be rumors, but you’ll understand if we air on the side of caution.”

“I don’t have to defend my honor to the Church’s thugs. I have done nothing wrong, and the lot of you cannot tell me what I should or shouldn’t do in my own home.” Her blade was now at her side, drawn from its sheath and clenched tightly in her fist.

As if taking that movement as a threat, the first man cracked his neck and raised his blade. “The most concerning matter, however, is the talk that the Father has heard about just who this drifter is. Several say they recognized the crest on his chest when he first arrived.”

“So the man is from a known family. All the more reason to be welcoming,” she shrugged, feigning nonchalance. 

“Then I assume you will be surprised to learn that he has reason to believe this man is a Belmont.”

“I will believe no such thing,” she lied smoothly. “That man introduced himself as a Louis, and I would sooner believe him than the rumors of uneducated housewives looking for the latest gossip.” And with that, she struck.

~

“By the time I found her, she’d downed all but one of those men,” Trevor was saying. “When I struck down the last, she was half crazed from her wounds and fear and didn’t recognize me. She lashed out and caught me off-guard. I was damned lucky I didn’t lose my eye.”

“Hold on, are you saying that she was the one that gave you that scar?” Alucard asked.

Trevor’s hand raised to trace the old wound of its own accord. “Yes. Once she came to her senses, the woman panicked for hours. She literally dragged me back to the local healer. They managed to close it the same day, but you wouldn’t know it based off how much she apologized.”

“Wait, they had a healer that skilled yet left them alone but came after you?”

“It . . . was not a good town. And they weren’t that great of healers, don’t be fooled. It was closed, but in case you haven’t noticed they left a pretty nasty scar behind. It didn’t matter, though; she moved right after. We were more cautious once she got settled a few hours away in a new village.”

“So you kept visiting her?” Sypha spoke up.

“Whenever I can,” he nodded. “Few times a year for as long as I can get away with without people figuring out who I am.”

It was odd, Sypha decided, to hear him talk about this woman in the present tense. Usually, when he referred to his family it was in the distant past, so it seemed strange to know that this woman was still out there.

“About six years ago we got married,” Trevor decided the blunt was to drop that bit of information.

Alucard chuckled. “As Trevor Louis, I presume?”

The hunter groaned. “God no. I fucking hate that name. I love her with all of my heart, but that woman cannot think of names in a hurry.”

“Then how . . .”

“It required a fair bit of travel, but she managed to track down an unbiased priest that was still loyal to my family. As far as their goddamn God is concerned she is a Belmont. As far as anyone else knows, she is a Monbelt.”

Sypha couldn’t stop the hysterical giggle that tore its way out of her throat. “Monbelt?! You give your wife a hard time, and that’s the best you could come up with?!” She dissolved into a fit of laughter that brought a light blush to Trevor’s cheeks.

“Indeed,” Alucard was smirking. “An anagram? I know you are not the brightest, Belmont, but I assumed you could do better than that.”

“Alright, we’re both terrible at making up names,” Trevor muttered, crossing his arms. “Either way, moving on with the story, that priest hid the real paperwork deep in their archives.”

“Now that is uncharacteristically wise,” the dhampir mused. “It prevents the nonsense of accusing her of impropriety, hides her true involvement with the Belmont family, yet if they demanded it they could feasibly find the real documentation . . . Though in the current climate of the church, perhaps it’s a good thing they won’t stumble across that paperwork . . .They seem to be torn between wanting you dead or worshipping you as a second messiah.”

“I do have a question, though,” Sypha started, still smiling residually from her little laughing fit.

“If it’s more about the name thing, I think we’ve talked about that enough.” Though Trevor sounded annoyed, both of his companions could see the amused smile tugging at the corners of his lips.

“No. I was just wondering . . . If your wife is such a fearsome warrior, would she not have been helpful in the fight against Dracula?”

That question had Trevor choking on his own saliva after a surprised sharp inhale. “That’s--I’m--” he couldn’t come up with the words.

“After what he’s said about the woman, I rather doubt our valiant hunter would put the woman he loves in that kind of danger regardless of how . . . as you said, fearsome she might be.” Those golden eyes flitted back up to Trevor. “Although, none of his explains your repeated insistence about your status as the last Belmont.” His head cocked to the side. “You have a child. Don’t you?”

Trevor’s first response was a shaky nod. Admitting his fears was something his father had trained him to avoid at any cost, so he chose to keep his mouth shut. All his aimless drifting kept his family safe. The drinking made people think he was idiotic, incapable of having any sort of relationship let alone something serious. And it had the added benefit of numbing the pain of being away from them. He hated it whenever he went home and saw how much his child had grown during his absence; it just reminded him of what he missed being there for. Needless to say, it was more than a little terrifying that someone else was learning about his little family since it made all that time he’d missed completely worthless.

“And with that, I think we’ve passed Trevor’s threshold for storytime,” Sypha spoke up upon seeing the distraught look on the man’s face.

“Belmont,” Alucard removed his arm from around the magician in order to lean forward, elbows resting on his knees. “I hope you realize that my offer still stands. Very few people are as . . . good as you and Sypha. Times like these, I find myself thinking like the man my father was around my mother; I want to protect the both of you. If this woman has captured your heart, she is clearly of the same caliber as you. It will likely never be safe for the lot of you out in the Wallachia that wants the Belmonts dead. Bring them here. We are atop the library that belongs to them, to your child, and the land that belongs to them. They should be here anyway; the fact that this is the safest place for them is . . .” Alucard smirked as he chose his next words, “a luxury we can most definitely afford.” The little taunt pulled a tiny smirk to Trevor’s lips too.

Sypha absolutely beamed at the offer.

All at once, Trevor’s usually-tense body seemed to sag into the couch in utter relief. “Thank you, Adrian.” The use of his real name surprised the dhampir. “I suppose . . . I should go fetch the missus.” He winced, biting his lip. “Don’t tell her I called her that; she’ll kill me.”

From there, all three fell into laughter.

[awakenedrp]

VALEN JAER HAS JOINED THE STARS

THEY ARE A 24 YEAR OLD JEDI WITH FORCE SENSITIVITY THEY ARE A OUTLANDER FROM AN UNKNOWN PLANET (PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION:)  vahla are near human in physiology, save for the fact that their skeletons are largely cartilaginous, lending them to a higher degree of flexibility. the offset, however, is that they are perhaps less durable than most species. appearance wise, vahla differ only in the lightness of their eyes, with pale shades such as blue, grey, and lavender. while most vahla have a gradient of hair colors—black to grey to white—the odd vahla would be born with fiery red hair, seen by most as a blessing from their goddess. unfortunately for valen, he’s had no such luck.

KNOWN TRAITS:

+ intuitive, adaptable, methodical - volatile, cynical, withdrawn

BIO: THE UNIVERSE DEMANDS BALANCE; ARE YOU OF THE DARK, OR THE LIGHT?

i. the embers of a dying fire

the vahla are a fractured people, his mother would say. doomed to roam the galaxy in search of their lost homeworld. destroyed millennia ago, punished by the ancient jedi for their allegiance to the dark. this same force flows through you now, she would say, just as sure as the blood that flows through your veins. through the force we are all connected, and for this, we will never die.

“don’t you get tired of telling the same old stories?” valen murmurs, barely lifting his head from where it hangs between his legs. he’s well used to the soft croon of his mother’s voice over the crackle of the fire, the only certain thing in their lives.

“no.” his mother smiles in a way that is both peaceful and sad. resigned. “the stories are all we have left.”

all we have left—a few lonely people scattered in tents across desert sand, across the galaxy in the empty pockets of space—if his ancestors are looking down on them, then surely they must be laughing. valen flexes and unflexes his hand, holding it out in front of the fire. the dark side of the force that flows through them all, the darkness that was cause for their destruction, is that something to be proud of? looking around him now, there is nothing but the sand that filters through his fingers. no jedi, no goddess, no ember of vahl.

nothing.

ii. dust in the solar wind

the vahla are a people long dead, valen prefes to say. clinging to their skip-stone memories of a force that lies useless in their hands. but perhaps there is some truth to his mother’s words, for if there is anything that the vahla are truly good at, it is drifting.

ships are not so different than the rust-colored tents he grows up in. though not as tattered, the slant of cold metal serves only to provide him with a roof over his head, the only certainty being the blaster attached firm to his hip. his formative years, if one can call them that, are uneventful. ( though looking back now, nothing could ever compare to his training with the jedi. perhaps that is when his life had truly started. and so too where it would end ). valen makes himself out to be something of a puzzle: the stray piece with too many jutting edges, the piece that you would jam in, in order to make fit. more than anything else, valen learns to be useful. his hands callous from raid after raid, the same rust-color seeping under his fingernails with every bullet he fires. he does it all for credits, any scraps he can take, for what other purpose is there than survival?

but just as the stars rise and fall, so too does the dark with the light.

iii. desert shoal

funnily enough, he meets rey on a lonely desert planet, where only the aimless would stray. i grew up on a planet just like this, she would later reveal to him, but in the moment, she feels, rather than sees, something in him. she feels him through the force. and somehow, he feels her too. still, he meets her steady gaze, curious yet guarded, with a challenge. can you feel the darkness in me? the centuries of slaughter? whatever she sees, rey extends a simple offer: to train in the ways of the Old Jedi.

the jedi of old that destroyed my people? that seeked to extinguish the darkness lurking within me?

a simple offer, a simple answer. a life changing moment.

yes.

valen takes to his training with a certain uncertainty. the more he engages with the force, the more alive he feels, the more he fears his ancient ties to the dark side. he takes to his training with a zeal he never thought existed inside him, a passion ignited, a stubborn need to be something more. still, his fears are his undoing. can someone like me truly walk the path of the light? there is no passion, only serenity, hold it in, hold it in, hold it—

steady your emotions! rey orders. her voice, though firm, is not unkind.

valen exhales a shaky breath and looks up at her from where he kneels. a humid wind brings with it the scent of rain. he forces his trembling fists to lay flat atop his knees.

again, rey says. her eyes are grey, steely.

deep down, he wonders if she knows.

iv. there is no death, there is the force

there is no death, there is the force.

there is no death. valen tries, rather vainly, to keep his thoughts focused as he finds himself lying underneath yet another metal ceiling. he tries, rather vainly, to feel for rey’s prescence in the force, for his fellow padawns lost in the chaos. nothing. nothing.

perhaps he should be grateful he survived. but surviving is the only thing he’s ever been good at. it’s all he’s ever known. it would be easy to go back to surviving. but he thinks of his mother, his ancestors, adrift for centuries, pulled along by nothing but the current. he feels the hollow inside him, the smoulder—yearning anger, empty rage, fire with no flame. without rey, he’s just smoke.

the desert tides hold nothing for him now. but whoever their enemies are, whatever they may face, valen knows he’s not ready. and he doesn’t know if he ever will be. but he can’t go back. he won’t.

there is no death, there is the force.

there is the force.

there is the force.