#Or prose I suppose

[baku-usagi]

Last year's poetry

[musouie]

── .✦ 𝐒𝐀𝐍𝐂𝐓𝐈𝐅𝐘

précis. levi washes your burdens away

contents: fluff, angst, non-sexual nudity, suggestive, reader and levi in a situationship, canon!au, comfort, afab!reader, 1.5kwc

When you return from a gruelling mission, bloodied and bruised, your knuckles bearing the scars of war, Levi does two things:

The first comes as if on instinct, a mere reflex, spewed from his lips without a thought and tumbling before he can stop it. “You smell like shit, soldier.” The comment is uttered evenly, void of any real bite, and closely followed by a sigh. A ragged, bone-weary, half-hearted thing that deflates his frame in a way being in the Underground never could.

And for some reason, it all makes you feel warm.

Perhaps it’s the way he says it, or perhaps it’s the way he chooses not to say anything else. Regardless, you take it and cradle it between your fingers, peel back the multitude of layers and recognise it for what it is: affection (dressed in barbed wire, one with spikes that have begun to wear.) 

The second, however, is something different altogether. This one feels like something that came from inside Levi, something that he had kept bottled up and sheltered, something that only you got a glimpse of. (It was often he gave you these glimpses of himself. None coherent or related to the last. You think you are finally beginning to put him together, to piece the enigmaticness of him —

— but then he turns and walks away.)

He glances at you over his shoulder, motioning with his chin for you to follow him, lips pulling into a line as yours tremble. 

(The puzzle pieces scatter, make a mess of themselves.) 

And with a part of you burning with curiosity and defeat, the other aflame with desperation, you find yourself following. You always do, ever the curious. “It’s in your blood,” he whispered to you one night, voice a muted wisp as you lay against his bare chest, damp and warm and clutching him close.

(He didn’t talk a lot — never talked a lot — when you were in his arms. It’s how you learnt to listen. Sometimes his admissions would come spilling, like those times where he’d drink just enough to get drunk. Or when he’d come back from a particularly hard mission, weary to his bones, his walls finally crumbling as he’d lie upon you —

— he would tell you everything. From his darkest desires, his brightest memories, his dreams, to his nightmares. All filled with you and you and you and you.)

When you make it to his quarters, sectioned off from the rest of the cadets’, you bite your lip and enter hesitantly, hands clenched into trembling fists by your sides, itching to reach out, itching to —

The door falls shut with a click that reverberates through you, bordering on deafening. You nearly miss what comes after. 

Nearly. 

“Strip.”

There is no teasing in his tone, no hint of endearment that, by now, you know only comes to the surface for you, and only if no one else is around to witness it. His back remains to you, and you are, momentarily, left blinking, stunned at the abruptness of the command.

You do not speak; neither does he.

Time presses you, moving relentlessly, budging when you don’t. It doesn’t stop at his request, nor does it hitch to indulge you. And his patience runs thin.

“Strip,” he repeats, turning to shoot you a withering glare. But his eyes are all wrong. Soft around the edges. 

A second of holding his gaze is all it takes for you to lower your own, bottom lip seeking comfort between your teeth. You swallow before peeling back a layer: gear. 

Then another, harder to remove than the first: your jacket; followed by your blouse (shredded around the edges, bearing holes in places it never used to, snarling rips running along the seams.)

They slip from your shoulders and pool behind you, the wood below creaking as you take a step forward, tugging your trousers by their cuffs, slipping a finger beneath the waistband before pushing them lower down your legs; boots discarded carelessly to the side.

He hisses at the mess.

When your eyes snap to his at the sound, he looks down between your legs pointedly, thin brow arching until you swallow around the lump in your throat. 

(Nothing has to be said; the silence is enough —

— it’s always enough.)

Bending at the knee and dragging air sharply through flared nostrils, you slip your underwear lower down your legs, working quickly with trembling fingers that could likely use a steadying hand (except you are alone, and his remain glued to the wooden railing behind him. Steady. Stable. As reliable as the rhythm with which he rises and falls on the swing of his blade.)

It trails down, following the movements of your hips, spreading open once they curve in the slightest, only to come together and tangle about your ankles.

“Everything,” he mutters, and you stare at the floorboards, toes curling within your socks, fidgeting nervously beneath his steady gaze.

Heat rises on the back of your neck, splotchy, uneven. Lingering until your body curls in an awkward shape — in an attempt to conceal your bits — and you pluck your socks off, followed by your cotton panties.

And —

— you’re bare before him. 

(You always are.)

“Come now,” he says gently.

(His eyes, however, burn.)

One small step becomes two, which transition into three, and suddenly, you are halfway there. Five strides until —

“To the tub,” he instructs, barely a whisper; barely anything at all, “before the water gets cold.”

You oblige until you slip into the porcelain of it, its temperature almost perfect as you melt into the water. Floating — drifting — lost to the tides. If the sight is enough to please him, however, Levi does not show it. His demeanour remains much the same: eerily calm, collected. Cautiously removed.

It persists as he strides, unhurried, towards you, grasping a washcloth from the tub’s rim and lathering it with soap. A fragrance so delicate wafts through the air — peony, lavender and a hint of vanilla — a fragrance so him, surrounding and enclosing on you until it threatens to seize your very lungs.

(The smell of death may cling to the backs of your teeth, or perhaps beneath your fingernails, buried too deep to dig out. But his tenderness washes it all away.

Now, you’ve made the water dirty. Filled it with grime.)

“Your arm, soldier.”

You robotically surrender it, offering the limb over the lip of the tub, palm facing up in supplication. In reverence.

His thin lips turn down as he inspects it, turns it over and clicks his tongue upon finding a bruise. Clicks again when he discovers a scratch.

The nudge comes as he soaps the inside of your wrist with soothing circular motions; spreading until it trickles up the valley of your forearm, leaving blossoms of white froth in its path. From the valley it divides into two, branching into streams that run parallel as they part ways around your bicep, clinging to the dips and curves of you.

“How do you feel?” He asks without meeting your gaze, focused, wholly, on massaging the inside of your elbow.

“Tired.”

It’s all you can give.

It’s as honest as it is ambiguous, laden with all the heaviness bearing down on your shoulders, dragging you down to the deepest depths of the waters, swallowing you.

But Levi nods, accepts it.

He brings the washcloth to your neck, following the swooping lines of your collarbones, the undersides of your jaw, its grooves. Your shoulders bear the marks of his touch, soon followed by the plains of your chest.

You’re so focused on watching his movements as he trails the cloth over you — from collarbone to shoulder, shoulder to the valley between your breasts — that you nearly miss what comes next.

“I...I’m glad you’re alright, soldier,” he mutters, a slip so sudden and small.

Like the flush tingeing his cheeks and the way it runs up his neck, or the furrow of his brow and the line between, ever prominent.

“I —” your voice, weak in its own right, nearly dies. Strangled in a web of muted hope. You shake yourself loose of its hold, “thank you, captain.”

The expression he flashes you is one of pain, or perhaps disappointment.

He doesn’t acknowledge your gratitude, only nods and drops his gaze to the nape of your neck, tracing the lines there with his gaze. A touch so soft and wistful it could never leave an imprint, doesn’t even burn.

And yet it does. Your chest feels ablaze, your flesh singed.

And it sears more as he brings the cloth to your face, cleaning your chin carefully, swiping away the flakes of blood from the jut of your cheekbones, beneath the curvature of your nose, the expanse of your eyelids.

This, too, is something intimate, has your heart stuttering and your breath stalling, has your face flaring with the heat only shame can bear, but no less welcoming than the rest of his careful ministrations.

From your forehead to the space behind your ear, an exuberance of bliss settles between your ribs. Latching on with pointed fingers that threaten to rip. It could hardly be called anything less.

You shudder out a long exhale as you relax back against the rim, the pads of his fingers trailing beneath your brows, brushing over your lids, again, and again, and again. Until your skin glides with ease, wet and soapy and clean.

The touch lingers. It lingers.

Until he goes still, and the cloth goes with him.

𝐦𝐮𝐬𝐨𝐮𝐢𝐞 © 2024 𝐀𝐥𝐥 𝐑𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭𝐬 𝐑𝐞𝐬𝐞𝐫𝐯𝐞𝐝. it is prohibited to reproduce, distribute, or transmit my works in any form or by any means! ﾉ masterlist

[kingroan]

not to ramble about iwtv but i think a lot of people who balk at the unsavory parts of gothic fiction are people who have either 1) never truly had to face an onslaught of the macabre in their own life 2) have not actually sat with the discomfort of the darker parts of existence or simply not learned or had to learn how to process truly twisted emotions within themselves. and i bring this up in relation to iwtv because i see a lot of people pointing out 'problematic' parts of the book or bemoaning which ships are more or less toxic. and it's like it's a cow farm there's gonna be cows on the cow farm.

yeah anne rice wrote some weird shit and some of it is definitely unnecessary, most of those elements were corrected in the show. but a lot of it is just gothic fiction. you don't get to have sexy vampires, romanticism and tortured yearning without the inappropriate attachments, the true face of grief and the blurred lines between violence and eroticism which has evoked great interest in humans for centuries.

[burstfoot]

Your name is Kristen Wright. You’re barely 10. You’re at the outdoor funeral for your parents, a pair of genius scientists that Terra will never see again. You’ve spent the last two weeks giving false smiles to women and men who pretend to grieve them while spending every moment they think you’re not looking lauding them for their ‘foolishness’ and ‘hubris’. Sitting amongst a crowd of these intellectuals, your feel nothing looking at their crocodile tears, knowing they’re just happy there’s less competition for next year’s grants. Your new guardian grabs onto your hand in an attempt to grant you a modicum of comfort. You stare blankly at the sky above.

You’ve never felt so alone. You don’t think this feeling will ever go away.

Your name is Joyce Moore. You can hardly communicate anymore. Your best friend killed herself trying to replicate the experiment that gave you permanent brain damage. Every scientist at Rhine Lab now treats you like a child at best, and an animal at worst. Your parents have not come to see you. None of your colleagues seem to understand that you are still you, with a sense of humour, good taste in TV shows, and fucking feelings, god damn it.

You’ve never felt so alone. You don’t think this feeling will ever go away.

Your name is Ferdinand Clooney. You’ve lost everything you’ve ever worked for in a futile grab for power. The department of defense has you by the dick after saving you from a group of Pioneers who (justifiably) nearly beat you half to death. It’s playing fiddle to their whims or the rest of your life in prison - or, most realistically, a tragic accident report. Your aspirations aren’t within your reach anymore, and you know that it’s your fault. You will never be Kristen Wright, and it’s eating you alive.

You’ve never felt so alone. You don’t think this feeling will ever go away.

Your name is Parvis Ahrens. You’re not that old. You’re only 58. But you’re losing your mind. Every day, a little more slips away. You rely more and more on encyclopedic entries for information you took immense pride in knowing from your heart. You’ve spent the last few years focused on the pursuit of progress of all else. As part of this, you manipulated your star pupil in an attempt to permanently get her under your wing, outside of the influence of the Defense Director, a weak-hearted woman everyone else seems to think is cold as ice. She has years of life to change Columbian science. You don’t.

You’ve never felt so alone. You don’t think this feeling will ever go away.

Your name is Jara B. Wilson. You feel like you don’t see the girl who lived for you with so long in Kristen anymore. You’re a washed-up movie star, working for her cause above all else. Do you have anything that you’re working for for yourself anymore? She’ll be gone soon. You know that.

She hasn’t even left yet, and you’ve never felt so alone. You don’t think this feeling will ever go away once she leaves.

Your name is Nasti Londrey. Your people have never had a home. They might never have a home.

You’ve always felt alone. You will always be alone. That’s fine.

Your name is Justin Fitzroy Jr. Your dad died a week ago, and the cure has just been found for the hereditary illness that threatens to cut your lifespan in half. It was found by accident.

The sword of Damacles no longer hangs above your neck. Why then, do you still feel so alone?

Your name is Loken Williams. You reach out to a girl you tortured, who you know can’t remember what you did to her, because you’re going to die soon, and you need someone to remember what you did with your life.

Even if she kills you, at least you won’t die alone.

Your name is Trevor Friston. It’s been thousands of years down here. You just want to see your daughter again, and it will be another thousand until you do.

You’re very familiar with the loneliness that wraps around every single nanometer of your circuit board.

Your name is Dorothy Franks. Your whole family was killed in a Catastrophe. Your name is Elena Urbica. Your whole family, besides your twin sister, has disowned you. Your drive yourself head-first into the sciences to distract yourself from the loneliness.

Your name is Ho’olheyak. Centuries of ancestral memories swarm around your mind. Because of this, your lifespan was cut to a fraction of the life you should be living. You are obsessed with the history of your people, and you resent them from tearing your life away from you. You tear over books and tomes of history to find all means of unspeakable knowledge, hoping that somewhere in there you’ll find something that you can connect to.

You don’t even know you’re lonely.

Your name is Muelsyse.

You saw the writing on the wall. Saria and Kristen just had a massive fight. You’ve been drifting apart since college, but the only two people who you’ve felt a real connection to on all of Terra will hardly speak to each other anymore. Do you try and mend what happened between them? Can you? You don’t know what to do besides take all means to protect yourself in the fallout. You wish you weren’t so paranoid, so self-centered, that all you know how to do is ensure your own safety.

Is there anything on Terra for you besides loneliness?

Your name is Ifrit. It’s cold, and quiet, and you’re pretty sure you’ve killed everyone around you. Your eyes are blurred, you hands are shaky, and shards of black crystal stick out all over your body. Before you pass out, you think one thing:

Hell, you might be alone, but at least those bastard whitecoats got what was coming to them.

Your name is Olivia Silence. You pull yourself out of the rubble in a destroyed laboratory, where you see Saria looming over Ifrit, beaten half-to-death. You beat yourself up for thinking you could trust her - that she was there to protect Ifrit, and you. You can’t trust anyone in Columbia. You run to embrace Ifrit with your entire body, to protect her from the cold eyes of Saria standing above her. You look back at her with nothing but fear in your eyes.

You’ve never felt so alone. You have to get Ifrit out of Rhine.

Your name is Saria. You’re barely 8 years old. You went your father in tears, as a group of bullies came after you and destroyed your toy car. He tells you to stop crying. You’re not accomplishing anything by throwing a fit in front of him. He tells you to fight back - take responsibility for your weakness.

You’ve never felt so alone.

You won’t ever be this weak again.

Staring up at the sky, looking up as Kristen’s ark sends her out through the hole she tore in the false sky, you know that you were foolish to believe you could bypass your own weakness through sheer will.

And you’ll be lonely for the rest of your life without her.

[cruel-hiraeth]

WHAT COULD HAVE BEEN ꒰ ajax tartaglia childe x reader ꒱

cw: a little angst, a little romance, a lot of ambiguity. wc: 777. notes: this is based on a prompt—childe x the last time you see each other, but only one of you is aware of the fact—suggested by my loveliest bitti @rabbbitseason and leigh @sugurei.

Snow flurries dot his lashes, kissing the freckles that dust his strawberry cheeks as he knocks on your door—nearly too short of breath for his dimpled smile to be convincing. While he knows the news (held it as a secret from you, one which putrefied and festered until it nearly rotted his organs), nothing could prepare him for this meeting.

The door creaks open. Behind it, your face is wan and drawn up, funerary. Once lively and headstrong, the sunny candlelight of your eyes—a balm that soothed his soul in foreign lands, an omniscient presence in his fondest memories—has been snuffed.

“I take it you’ve heard the news?”

For perhaps the first time in his life, Ajax doesn’t have a biting or witty remark; he simply stares at you for a beat too long, then nods. He wishes you would tease him, now, just like you used to. 

The scoff that leaves your lips is a comforting, familiar sound. Yet it’s ephemeral—over before he can appreciate it. He steps inside your room. 

A private dwelling on the Fatui base is sought-after, and your friend was able to pull some strings as a Harbinger to secure you your own space. Your quarters are exceedingly cramped, and have only the necessities: a standard cot, a wet bath, and a kitchen with a sink, a hot plate, and a narrow counter. There’s a table attached to a wall in the entryway—unusable during the lingering, frigid winters—accompanied by a pair of folding chairs. 

You treat him too formally, he thinks mirthfully, as you busy yourself brewing tea that he gifted you after a trip to Liyue. It’s your pride that keeps an appropriate amount of distance between your bodies, that firmly measures your tone, that keeps your heated glances brief. But it’s also your pride that drew him to you. 

(Ajax was never good at backing down from a challenge.)

Tears silently slip down your cheeks as you work with your back to him, swallowing any noise that threatens to bubble past your lips, though—unbeknownst to you—he understands what the telltale tremble of your shoulders means. With a delicate hand, you pour boiling water over the precious tea leaves and watch as they slowly bleed into liquid amber.

The quiet in your small home stretches uncomfortably thin. Words catch along the curve of your tongue and the tip of his; neither of you can vocalize your emotions. His boot taps against the floor, your fingers against the counter. 

When you serve Ajax his tea, his ultramarine stare pins you in place, unfurling your wings and your worries. He soaks in your watery gaze, and wishes (cruelly, selfishly) that he could revel in the beauty of your sorrow; perhaps he should—before it’s too late. But he can’t bring himself to hurt you further, no matter how desperately he wants to taste you, salt and spit and skin. 

“It’s just for a few years,” you reason aloud, absentmindedly worrying with the side of your porcelain cup—another gift from your companion. Your voice is thick with all that remains unsaid; it quavers.

“The Chasm is a treacherous place,” you say between sips of scalding tea that burns your tongue, “but I have faith in the Tsaritsa’s infinite wisdom. She will see to the safety of our expedition.”

No blade could cut through the tense air between you. Ajax clears his throat and musters a smile that feels like a lie. “It will be over before we know it.”

He reaches for your hand—palm upwards, welcoming—and you take it. The lambskin of his glove is soft, warm from the blood thrumming through his veins. You rest in silken stillness for a few moments, intertwined like that, chests rising and falling in unison. Then, he brings your hand to his lips, and brushes a kiss against your knuckles. It’s as brief and gentle as the flap of a crystalfly’s wings, yet the caress steals your breath—as does the flame-blue burn of his eyes. 

Before you can say anything (and before he does something he shouldn’t), he rises to his feet and grasps the doorknob. A rushed “I’ll miss you” is all he can utter before ripping the door open and slamming it shut.

Tsaritsa forgive me.

He repeats the words over and over like a mantra, tears blurring his vision, though the archon isn’t the one he should be asking for forgiveness; she’s not the one who is about to embark on a mission that’s as good as a death sentence. 

But you? 

Left to your fate, thoughts of what could have been prickle your flesh, steam curling up from the cup of Ajax’s untouched tea.

[devondespresso]

im confident that part of The Stobin Bond™ comes from them having impeccable chemistry which means they would've probably gotten along really well even before the whole Russian torture thing BUT Robin still had a pretty strong grudge against him from highschool so she just really really doesn't want to

so imagine: Steve and Robin working one of their firsts shifts at scoops together. During a small break between customers Steve gets her attention. makes unbroken eye contact. holds up one of their little spoons, and says "poon". then immediately breaking into a goofy ass smile. maybe even a giggle. and robin is trying so so so hard to look unaffected. annoyed, ideally.

then later that night while Steve's on break or maybe went home, shes waiting for the inevitable rush when the latest movie lets out. She wanders up to the register. sees the "poon" again. and laughs

[hrokkall]

Praise no power higher than your own code

[a-dreamersjournal]

Maybe in another life, I tended to my wounds so they wouldn’t fester.

Maybe in another life, I let go of my grief instead of allowing it to take root in my bones.

Maybe in another life, I was allowed to mourn my innocence and accept my guilt.

Maybe in another life. Anywhere but here. Anyone but me.

Because here, life moves too fast, days are too short, winters are here, and I have projects to finish and assignments to do.

So, I wish—that in another life—I can be more of myself. More of a Human.

[babytoothbrain]

I Have Never Been Forgiven for not Understanding

You Shall Know our Velocity!, Dave Eggers// @heartmush // "Outbreaks", Kitchen McKeown// "Cures for Shame", Rookiemag// The Allure of Shame, John Dalton// "Outbound", Hieu Minh Nguyen// Visual Overdose//

[meownotgood]

done!!!!!!! I'll proofread and (hopefully) post it tomorrow 💪

[mewnoroma]

Hi quick question: what the fuck is going on with her roots

I like that she grows (??? | Eigong are those growing on their own or are you just implanting more because you're insane) more as time passes, but I'm also curious in what that other part on her head is. It's attached(?) to her stabilizer so I assume that she added that later (maybe when she attached the first root, assumedly the one coming out of the top of her head)...actually semi-related question, did she ever have rejections or shit from just implanting the roots on her head like this? Hrm...

[strawberrycowtime]

miles edgeworth is a LOSER (affectionate)

[da-janela-lateral]

At this point I don't think Teruki's parents are exceptionally horrible individuals (long-term psychological consequences still happen in cases in which the abuse isn't considered particularly severe + everyone is capable of harm, even "good" people), but they weren't the best, without a doubt.

Okay, they got too busy with their jobs and had to move overseas to progress on their career. External circunstances. Things that happen. They left their son behind, but that could always be justified by hectic schedules of ever-moving businesspeople. How else could he have a stable routine to focus on his future? They're just busy. Teruki hasn't seen them in long but that's not their fault, right?

They cared for Teruki, didn't they? His parents made sure that there was someone home to watch him whenever they were far away. It was inevitable that there would be times he would be with himself, though. But that's not bad! It only became a problem once those strange espers tried to take hold of him on the street. And even then, they were so weak he could barely give them the title of a psychic. It wasn't an issue that it happened more and more and there was no one to intervene. Or that Teruki had to torture descriptions of "Claw organization" and "brainwashed soldiers" out of these grownups to know what they wanted with him. His parents couldn't know. Why should they know? Better put: what could they do?

What could a normal person do against someone with psychic powers?

It was Teruki's choice to live by himself. He could manage it all. Contrary to the other kids, he was an independent and responsible young man who could be trusted with a house and money. Such a great boy. His parents were so proud to have someone as competent as him as a son, one which wouldn't mean hard work for them. One who always had the best grades and was the soccer team's best player and was the best student on the town's best middle school.

Of course they would suddenly allow Teruki to live on his own. Any parent with a child like him would, wouldn't they? Anyone on their right mind and who knew the slightlest about him would be sure he could do it.

And even if this "Claw" organization scared him a bit and he felt a bit lonely at times, it wasn't an issue. Issue would mean it was an obstacle - which it wasn't, as Teruki did perfectly on his own. His parents believed on so. That's why he had his own apartment at 12 on the first place. Teruki was so wonderful at this. It wasn't horrible if they didn't answer his calls, because they were so busy and he wasn't a little kid who depends on his mommy. None of this was their fault. He shouldn't bother them or himself over this.

Because they cared, right? On the end, it was only a pile of tragic circunstances and coincidences no normal person could act against. It was part of life as someone special like him. He couldn't expect that his parents could change any of this, and this made his loneliness the best possible choice. It was obvious that they would support such a decision.

What would a normal person do against someone with psychic powers?

[authenticity2025]

I wonder how many people don’t get the one they want, but end up with the one they’re supposed to be with. Fannie Flagg

[darlingpoppet]

ＬｉｍｉｎａｌＳｐａｃｅｓ— Chapter 3

Hades (Video Game) | Modern AU (College/University) | PZA | Explicit | Chapters: 3/7 | Words: 21,238 (Chapter 3: 6,763)

Summary: Inspired by The Dreamers, except make it 2010s and ｖａｐｏｒｗａｖｅ. Zagreus is a university student who feels aimless in life. His girlfriend dumped him, things between him & his best friend are weird, and he lacks ambition in his studies, all while the optimistic visions of his generation’s future are becoming lost. Until one day, he falls into the orbit of Achilles & Patroclus―a charming, yet eccentric pair who completely alter Zagreus’ outlook on life & death, love & loss, past & future, and the transitions in between. (Chapter 3 summary: Zagreus reaches a stalemate in his relationship with Thanatos. Achilles & Patroclus invite Zagreus back to their place again for what ends up being a highly-charged evening of music, games, drinking, and sex.)

Excerpt:

“Ugh, Pat. Why don’t you go get a glass?”

Achilles scowls as he watches Patroclus take a particularly clumsy swig directly from the wine bottle, accidentally allowing some to escape from the corners of his mouth and run in blood-like rivulets down his chin and neck. Achilles, to his discredit, hasn’t been behaving much better. His own glass has gone untouched for a while now, and he opts instead to pass the bottle back and forth between himself and Patroclus.

“I will get one whenever I next have an excuse to end up in the kitchen,” Patroclus says as he hands the bottle back to Achilles. “Consider every sip of wine a kiss from me.”

“Why consider it, when I can just do this?”

Achilles pours some wine into his mouth, holding it there while he leans over to Patroclus and feeds it to him. Wine dribbles out between their mouths as the transfer devolves into a sloppy, open-mouthed kiss. They struggle to stifle their giggles over the mess they’re making, while reveling in the delectations of the kiss.

If they were anyone else, Zagreus might have felt irritated to be made a captive audience to their impudent displays of affection. But as it is, he has difficulty ever seeing their behavior as anything but endearing. And to be fair, he thinks to himself, as he tips back his wine glass for small sip: they are probably really, really drunk.

“We should let Zagreus have a turn at the game,” Patroclus says as soon as he regains his composure.

Zagreus, whose mouth is still full, tries not to splutter as he swallows down his drink all at once. He titters incredulously.

“What, me? I don’t even know anything about the kind of music you like.”

“Don’t you worry about that,” Patroclus says kindly. “I’ll help you with it.”

“Patroclus, no, don’t you dare—” Achilles starts, his voice sharp with warning.

“It’s all right, Achilles! Don’t you want to make our guest to feel clever? And who knows, maybe you’ll know the answer.” Patroclus grins impishly as he bounds over to Zagreus’ side, taking the wine bottle with him.

“And what if he doesn’t?” Zagreus asks Patroclus.

“And if he doesn’t—” Patroclus repeats; he leans in slowly, his mouth now so close to his ear that Zagreus can hear the gentle intake of breath in his preparation to speak. Zagreus feels the coarseness of his beard, the nearness of his warmth, making his skin prickle; he can catch a whiff of the alcohol, along with the earthy, yet floral sweet smell of his dark brown skin. “—He’ll have to do whatever you say.”

READ THE REST ON AO3 HERE!

https://archiveofourown.org/works/57964459/chapters/148565071

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[rxttenfish]

okay ive been listening to an audiobook of Winterset Hollow and holy FUCK this book is so good. we LOVE to see a horror novel that actually knows how to write some DAMN GOOD CHILDREN'S XENOFICTION that is about colonialism and xenofiction and the glossing over of the past in favor of a polished history told by people who have no authority telling it, and also reminds me VERY acutely of how i write my merfolk in that theres a repeat issue of them not being seen as whole people, people who do not exist for your consumption or to fulfill certain hopes or dreams that you have, people who are viewed as setpieces for someone else's story, their bodies treated as novelties to be gawked at, something which was never human and never will be and thus are seen as something to have and to own, not a whole person. there's what i could only describe as a simply fucking beautiful self harm scene.

GOD WINTERSET HOLLOW IS SO GOOD ALREADY. and very fitting for thanksgiving and provides some excellent anticolonial narrative for the season.