#Prospect New Orleans

[ichorai]

ménage à trois.

pairing ; lestat de lioncourt x vampire!gn!reader x louis de pointe du lac

synopsis ; “you turned him,” you said to lestat with a disapproving frown. louis was sleeping fitfully in a coffin between the two of you, skin charred and covered in dust and burns. lestat didn’t have to tell you—you put the clues together and figured out that louis had run into the morning sun without knowing what it would do to him. “you were always the selfish one, weren’t you? i could never have anything for myself.”

words ; 3.8k

themes ; angst, a bit of fluff, vampires, polyamory

warnings / includes ; super toxic throuple dynamics, blood/murder, covers the first two episodes of iwtv, reader is a writer, louis is infatuated <3 and lestat is well... lestat...

there will be a second part (claudia incoming)!

You met Lestat de Lioncourt in 1780—six years after he was turned, and three years after you. It was a wild and tumultuous affair the two of you shared. You and Lestat clashed just as much as you molded together. While he was possessive and greedy, you longed for freedom and space. Eventually, after many bloody rows, the two of you parted ways with reluctant, half-sincere promises of a distant reunion. 

Louis de Pointe du Lac was yours before he was Lestat’s, as he oft forgot. By 1908, you were a regular patron of his establishment in New Orleans—though less for the sex and more for the stories. The women there were immeasurably fascinating. With enough liquor and sweet talking, they would answer each and every burning question you had. When Louis caught wind of one of his customers bringing pencils and parchment of all things to the bedrooms, he’d confronted you about it, curious as to what you were doing to the working girls—especially when they always came out flush-faced and giggling.

“I’m a writer,” you told him with a sweet smile. Close-lipped, hiding your fangs. “I hope you don’t mind. The women here have lovely tales to tell.”

Louis returned the grin after a second to overcome his surprise. “I’m sure they do. Why here, though?”

“Your establishment has the highest rates of colored women. Not many are willing to listen to what they have to say.” You fiddled with the buttons on your jacket, and tipped your head down into a nod. “I’d best be leaving. The night is late, and the sun will greet us soon.”

“Not a morning person?” Louis asked, falling into step with you as you made your way to your convertible.

A huff of a laugh fell past your lips. “You could say that, yes.”

From then on, Louis went out of his way to greet you like clockwork. Every Wednesday and Saturday you came, bright-eyed and pencil ready. Those days, Louis watched you come by nightfall and leave before morning dawned, always making sure to exchange pleasantries. One of the nights, you asked if he had any stories to tell you—though there was little talking or writing that night. It was hard to jot down what he was telling you with his head between your thighs.

You were, by no means, a possessive vampire. You liked to keep your options open and drift from place to place. But around a year and a half later, you heard of Lestat landing in New Orleans, sucking the furniture stores and libraries dry—and setting his eyes on Louis. Your Louis.

You and Louis were not lovers, and the same would apply to your and Lestat’s relationship. You would say you were far closer to being friends with the two than lovers. Though… the prospect of love was not a far away concept to you. Not when it came to Lestat and Louis.

“You turned him,” you said to Lestat with a disapproving frown. Louis was sleeping fitfully in a coffin between the two of you, skin charred and covered in dust and burns. Lestat didn’t have to tell you—you put the clues together and figured out that Louis had run into the morning sun without knowing what it would do to him. “You were always the selfish one, weren’t you? I could never have anything for myself.”

“I’m sorry, did I spoil your little toy?” Lestat said, leering over you with a grin.

“He wasn’t a toy. He’s a friend.”

The blonde vampire’s hands reached out to caress over your face, soft and cold. “A friend that you fucked.”

“On occasion.” Your nose wrinkled. “You fucked him, too.” It wasn’t a question, but a statement. It would have surprised you if Lestat hadn’t fucked Louis.

“Don’t be jealous, my darling,” he said, eyes glinting dangerously. “I’ll fuck you, as well. You need only ask. It has been a long while, no?” 

He kissed you then, tasting of sweet blood and sharp wine. As angry as you were with him, you didn’t push him away. With Lestat, it was hard to say no. That morning, you fell asleep in his coffin, limbs woven together. Come sunset, you were already gone.

It took you a few days to get around to forgiving Lestat. Louis made you softer—his inexperience to vampire life was ever so endearing to you. When you explained to Louis that you were also a vampire—one with a deep history with his maker, he stared at you with widened eyes.

“It’s no wonder I never saw you during the day,” he said, Lestat’s arm slung around his shoulder. “But why didn’t you kill any of my girls? How could you resist it?”

“Older vampires find it easier to resist temptation,” you told him with a dangerous, fanged smile. “Besides—I wanted their stories more than I wanted their blood. I can find food… elsewhere.”

“Elsewhere?” Louis glanced between you and Lestat, the first thought vanishing from his mind just as quickly as it came. “Wait, were you two—did you… did he turn you, too?”

A bark of a laugh fell from your lips. “Oh, Louis, my dear, no. Lestat may have left hundreds and thousands of fledglings in his bloody wake but I am not one of them. My turning will be a story for another time,” you assured him, pressing a kiss to his cheek. Louis smiled and nodded as if he was in a daze. To his side, Lestat looked visibly annoyed. Whether he was jealous of you or Louis, you couldn’t tell.

Sharing is caring, you greedy whore, you said to him without moving your lips. Lestat only stared at you with those icy blue eyes and huffed out a dramatic sigh.

“Well, since the fledgling has already taken a liking to you, would you like to stay?” Lestat gestured around his decorated halls. “There is more than enough room here for three coffins.”

As always, saying no to Lestat was usually not an option. 

“You could just say you’d like me here. Don’t have to be dragging Louis into it,” you told him, patting his chest with a mocking simper.

“Yes, yes, fine—I’d like you to stay, as well. I’ve missed you terribly.” Lestat moved closer to you as if he was going to kiss you, but you leaned away at the last moment and grinned at Louis.

“Louis, hon, how about we get a nice fire started and you tell me all about what mean ol’ Lestat did to you the first few hours of your turning? I love hearing about new vampire experiences. It’s been so long I can hardly remember mine.” You offered Louis your arm and gestured to the living room. The man looked to Lestat, almost as if asking for permission, but turned away just as quickly to take your arm. 

Louis, in his hunger and youth, had impulsively killed an important man in town. Lestat had already angrily berated him enough whilst tossing the body into the cremator. You were more gentle with your approach, taking Louis’ hands and goading him to wash the blood off and change into a new set of clothes that weren’t soaked with his kill.

The amusing thought that you and Lestat were raising a child and parenting together briefly crossed your mind. But then again, the two of you had both fucked Louis before and were most definitely going to again in the future, so perhaps it wasn’t the best analogy. 

“Here, put this on.” you handed Louis, stripped naked and scrubbed of the blood, a fresh button-down whilst Lestat was off cleaning up the mess Louis had made. “That was real dangerous what you did back there, you know. You’ll get detectives sniffing around and swarming you like ants to a honey pot. They don’t take kindly to black folk, neither.”

“I know,” he said, shrugging on the shirt. “I was hungry.”

“I know,” you parroted, though your tone was considerably softer. You placed your cold palm against Louis’ face and he leaned into it for a few silent moments. “Just be more careful next time, alright? Lestat and I have centuries of experience between us—you can trust us.”

Louis’ face contorted at the realization. “Sometimes I forget that this is gon’ be forever. That I won’t just wake up and you two will be gone. That I’ll be human again and my brother will still be around and my ma would still be asking me to come over to her house for dinner every Sunday.”

“Forever isn’t always a bad thing,” you said, voice soft and soothing. “It is daunting, yes, but you still live from day to day just as the mortals do. You’ll grow more comfortable in your skin with time, I promise.” You hesitated to say the next few sentences. “Lestat, as much as you admire his strength, is just as afraid as you sometimes. He’s afraid of being lonely. I confess, I have been afraid to be lonely more than once myself, but I have made peace with the fact that I will be alone sometimes. Immortal life makes it inevitable. My point is, though… you aren’t alone. Lestat is not as godly as you think he is.”

“And are you?” Louis asked.

“Do you think of me as godly?” 

One of his shoulders lifted in a half-shrug. “Most of the time.”

“I’m still a person,” you reassured him. “Lost to time, perhaps, but a person nonetheless. And you are, too.”

Your words seemed to placate Louis, though only momentarily. He parted his mouth open to say more, but Lestat dramatically stormed in the room, expression still creased with anger. After decades upon decades of knowing him, you knew by now that he would get over it eventually—it wasn’t really that big of a deal. But Louis, quite shaken up by the kill and his maker furious with him, couldn’t shrug it off as easily as you. The two of them went to their respective coffins angrily. 

Hours later, whilst you were writing up drafts of your most recent discussions with a few townspeople, you heard the two of them quietly exchange words of apology and plans for the future from their coffins. You smiled down to yourself. The romance between them was strong, you knew. You wondered if you ever had the same connection with Lestat. Or even Louis. You were growing quite fond of him. And you’d always been fond of Lestat, even though he irritated you to no end. 

When Louis bought the most expensive, the biggest, and the brightest club in the district, he made sure to pay all the working girls and musicians twice what they earned before. The doors were now open to anyone, not just folks with light skin. And he even had a room especially booked for you—always decked with the finest pencils and pens and papers and books and the most heavenly chairs imaginable—Louis was a man who thought out your every need. It startled you to think that your fondness for him may be far greater than just fondness. How would Lestat feel about you falling in love with his fledgling? Louis was yours first. And before that, you and Lestat were also each other’s for a time.

With Louis still at the club entertaining guests, Lestat heard your thoughts as soon as you returned from your work—you didn’t bother hiding your mind from him, because he had ways of getting information out of you regardless. 

“I don’t mind,” he said, greeting you as you changed out of your attire into more comfortable clothes for home. He hung by the doorway for a moment before slinking closer to you, running his hands up and down your bare skin. “We can share, my love. I don’t mind—not with you. And I’m sure Louis wouldn’t mind sharing you with me.”

“Rather presumptuous of you,” you replied.

“Not presumptuous if you’re thinking it,” Lestat said, pressing a kiss to your shoulder, then several more up your neck. “Don’t resist us. It can be the three of us together. Doesn’t that sound nice?”

“There’s a reason I left you in the first place,” you whispered. “You are possessive and mean when you want to be.”

Lestat tilted your face so his lips hovered just an inch over yours. “That may be true… but you’ll stay for Louis.” 

It wasn’t a question, but a statement. He knew you better than anyone undead or alive.

“I will.” 

“Good,” he said, and then kissed you as if he was going to devour you whole.

Many moons later, you walked into one of the house’s many bedrooms, about to enquire if either of the vampires had seen your notebook lying around anywhere, when you saw Louis lying on the bed, tears of red slipping down his face. Lestat dabbed the blood away with a napkin.

“What’s going on?” you asked with a concerned tone, sitting down next to him on the mattress opposite Lestat. 

“My nephew,” Louis practically spat out the words as if they had scorched his tongue. “I was so afraid I would… I could hear his heart—his tiny little heart—and I wanted to rip it out and eat it. I’m a monster.”

There was a moment of silence as you studied the young fledgling.

“If you’re a monster, what does that make me?” you whispered, leaning down to press your nose to the back of his ear. “You didn’t kill him, Louis.”

“No, but I could have.” Another bloody tear slipped down his eye and slotted against his nose bridge.

Whilst Lestat wiped his face again, he said, “You have to stop seeing them, Louis. They’ll grow fearful of you if they haven’t already.”

“No,” said Louis, voice hoarse and quiet. “I can’t do it.”

“It’s a rite of passage for all of us,” Lestat went on. “If you love your family, as I know you do, spare them all the pain that you are causing them.” Knowing Lestat’s relationship with his mother, you found his words quite ironic. Louis didn’t need to know about that right now, though. 

“My siblings spent many decades looking for me once I ‘disappeared’,” you told Louis. “It hurt to distance myself from them, but I was protecting them.”

Louis glanced up at you. Sitting with your back to the lit fireplace, there seemed to be an angelic glow framing you. “I didn’t know you have siblings.”

“Had,” you corrected. “They are long gone now, though many of their children’s children and further generations remain. They lived long and happy lives even after I left.”

“I ain’t never gonna have a family of my own, am I?” Louis lamented. “No sons, no daughters.”

It was silent for a moment when you and Lestat locked eyes. The blonde looked back down at his fledgling. “We’re your family, Louis.”

“You should just throw me in the incinerator,” said Louis. “Make another one.”

“What a waste that would be,” Lestat remarked.

You nodded. “And if he did, I would rip him apart limb from limb. You are not replaceable, Louis.”

“The both of us have been on this Earth for around two centuries and we can confidently report that you have no twin,” said Lestat. “No one as angry, as stubborn, as unaccommodating, as maddening—”

Louis frowned. “Sound like trash to me—”

“—as loving, as dedicated, as thoughtful, as imperfectly perfect as you’ve become. You’re a challenge every sunset, Saint Louis. We’d have it no other way.” Lestat waited a second before nudging you to agree with him.

“Yes,” you jumped to say, perhaps a second late. “Louis, hon, I don’t want to force you not to see your family. You’re free to tell them the truth if you’d like. Let them see you as a monster, as a murderer—because they certainly won’t see you in the same way we do. I’m just saying… letting them go may be the less painful option.”

Louis squeezed his eyes shut and inhaled sharply. Though he said nothing, you knew that he knew you were right. 

“Here’s an idea… let’s take a holiday,” ventured Lestat. “What about Rome?”

“Rome sounds lovely,” you said with an excited grin. It had been a handful of decades since you last stepped in Europe. Most of your recent years had you traveling much of North and South America.

“Rome? Rome, like, Italy?” Louis said, cracking an eye open to scrutinize his lovers. 

“Would you prefer Rome, Wisconsin?” Lestat fired back, which made Louis sit up on the bed and shake his head.

“I can’t just pick up and go to Rome. I got a business to run!”

You snaked your arms around Louis from behind and pressed your nose into his neck. You could hear his thoughts of how nice you smelled and smiled against his skin. “I’m sure you have many trusted work buddies that can manage the Azalea for a few days.”

Louis and Lestat bickered some more about transporting the coffins after that, as if they were an old married couple. You only listened in amusement and kissed down Louis' jaw.

Finally, Lestat relented his plans of Rome and instead brandished tickets to another opera. 

“I can spend a few days apart from the two of you to go to Rome myself,” you said, arching your back as if you were a cat and sprawling down on the mattress to watch Louis and Lestat upside down. “I can bring back souvenirs. The Italians have the most divine oil paints—”

“Don’t go,” Louis blurted, interrupting you. “Don’t—not yet.”

For a moment, you studied him with curious eyes. His thoughts were telling you he wasn’t sure if he could handle being left on his own with Lestat without you. Codependency was a common trait amongst vampire couples, you knew this, but that didn’t mean it was at all healthy. Nonetheless, you reluctantly nodded. “Alright. I won’t leave. But we do have to get out of the country at some point—it’s important to see more than America, Louis.”

“With that, I concur,” Lestat chimed his agreement. Then, he seized both of your arms and began to drag you off the mattress until you laughed and twisted up to get onto your feet yourself. “Come, my darlings, I’ve had suits made for us.”

There was a methodology to going to the opera to keep eyes off of you. You would go in first, alone. Then Lestat, with Louis walking a pace behind him, masquerading as his valet. It was degrading, all three of you knew. But it was the early 1900s, and there was little more you could do without drawing attention from passersby. 

Though the opera was a cheap affair, you were considerably entertained until the tenor entered the stage and began to sing all the wrong notes. To your ears, which were sharp, but not suited to the intricacies of musical notes, his singing was strangely off but still fine. To Lestat, however, he was not at all amused. His jaw muscles clenched and his fingers curled and uncurled over the sheet music he had brought. One glance his way and you already knew he had made his mind on who would be that evening’s supper.

Hours later, when Lestat had taken the young singer to your hotel room, you wondered if he was planning on simply fucking some sense into him before biting into his throat. Instead, Lestat sat down by the piano and played the notes, forcing the singer to sing. He pointed out each and every flaw, tone growing harsher with each mistake. 

Louis watched the two with a nauseous stomach and an uneasy mind. You tried to pull him away to another room, tried to kiss him until he forgot about Lestat and his fixation on the poor man, but Louis’ mind was adrift.

“Louis, this is meant to be a vacation,” you reminded him, massaging your fingers over his tense shoulders.

“How can it be a vacation when he’s in the other room about to murder some guy for a note he sang offkey?” Louis asked, a tad too loudly for your preference.

“Lestat gets this way sometimes. You know this by now. He gets angry, he gets sucked in, he gets tunnel vision until something is done exactly how he wants it to be done. It doesn’t affect us, though, not really. Dinner is dinner, Louis.”

Louis crossed his arms. “You have animals for dinner most of the time. And you kill people who deserve it. Lestat, he just—that man could have a family, a whole life ahead of him!”

“The same could be said for the people I’ve killed,” you replied easily.

“No, no, it’s different!” he vehemently said. “You killed the rapists, the child-fiddlers, and even the slave-owners back when they were still around! Lestat, he—”

“I know,” you said, tone firm. “Louis, I know.”

“Do you, though?” Louis shook his head in incredulity at your nonchalance and walked back into the main room where Lestat had just struck the young tenor across his vocal cords, destroying them beyond repair. “Why do you do this, Lestat?”

The blonde licked the blood off his fingers. “Well, I like to do it. I enjoy it.”

“Well, I don’t,” said Louis. “You don’t have to humiliate him like that.”

In a burst of outrage, Lestat yelled, “Well, I don’t say that you have to enjoy it! Kill them swiftly if you have to, but do it! Embrace what you are! You are a killer, Louis!”

You walked into the room at that, brows furrowed. “Will you two stop it? All this yelling and drama—this was meant to be a vacation!”

“How can it be a vacation when we haven’t even left this damned country?” Lestat bitterly replied. “I should have gone to Italy with you and left Louis here to scavenge through corpses until he rotted away.”

“You don’t mean that,” you angrily said, volume rising. “You’ve had decades to temper your anger issues, and yet you haven’t changed a single bit!”

Lestat raised his nose in defiance, picked up the tenor (who had crumpled to the ground in a bloody heap), and swiftly carried him to the couch where he would slowly drain him of his blood. Louis took to sitting and watching the dying man’s last thoughts. A part of you wondered why, if he was so horrified by Lestat's cruelty, did he bother to stay and watch—though you didn’t stick around to ask. Instead, you retired to the bedchambers without saying goodbye to either of them. Lestat left you a chalice of the singer’s blood by your coffin as an apology of sorts, but it was left untouched. 

[cryptidghostgirl]

omg omg omg totally new silly idea- human! alastor x human! reader where they meet at a party and go outside for a walk near the pier and the moon is beautiful and… they pull out weapons on each other (specifically Alastor a knife and reader a gun) and thats when they decide to form a partner in crime partnership

And in other to keep appearances they are forced to “fake date”

Mimzy: youve been spending some time with that new girl havent you, is she your gf or smth?” chuckle

Naize 20 yr old smth Alastor trying to think of a response thats not that:...

Mimzy: OMG IS SHE?

Alastor: sureeeeee

And they aren't actually into each other until a lot later into their partnership when they’re chasing some guy and reader gets to them first and just starts going at it “hey man i think hes had enough” “YOU WANT WHAT HES HAVING???” thpe shit

and Alastor has to catch his breath and he lowkey thinks hes dying because his heart starts beating a lot, And he goes again to mimzy for advice cuz i dont think he has anu friends and shes like “oh sweetie…”

And because its quite impossible to not get attached at one point theyre in another chase and reader starts laughing hysterically like “did you see him trying to run away??? lmao” and he goes “I couldnt take my eyes off you” and then just grabs her face and SMOOCH >:)

I think its a good trope- fake dating to actual dating even if its. about. murderers- :3

A/N YOU GUYS COME UP WITH THE BEST REQUESTS JESUS CHRIST!!! Also I promise I will get to the rest of the requests this weekend, I had two exams today so this is the only thing I am gonna post. Sorry.

Cover Up (Human!Alastor x Human!Reader)

Pairing: Alastor x Reader

Warnings: uh, murder. Mild gore. Violence. Weapons.

Word Count: 4,460 (I went a little overboard with this one)

Master Lists:

Master Lists 

Hazbin Hotel Master List

"I'll walk her home, don't worry Mimzy." Alastor was saying as Y/n pulled her coat over her shoulders.

The noises of the party still raging on filtered into the grand entryway of the house, muffled through the walls. Mimzy shot her two friends a suspicious look.

"It's nothing like that, Mimz." Y/n sighed, straightening the collar of her fur coat, "I just asked cause of all those murders in the news. Kinda freaky, don't you think? I don't really wanna be out alone at night and Al here was kind enough to offer."

Mimzy crossed her arms, eyebrows raised.

"Sure." she teased.

"Mimzy." Alastor sighed in response and she put her hands up in false surrender.

"Sorry! Sorry." she hummed playfully, "I know you two free birds would never."

Alastor rolled his eyes and, turning to Y/n, held out his arm. She took it daintily, a grateful smile on her face. The pair had just met a few hours earlier but had quickly fallen into a casual camaraderie. He lead her from the house, Mimzy calling her goodnights and wishes for their safety after their retreating forms.

It was a mostly quiet walk through the desolate midnight streets of New Orleans. Y/n hummed softly, kicking a can along with the toes of her healed shoes.

"You'll ruin them that way, wont you?" Alastor asked, feigning concern.

Y/n just shrugged.

"They're shoes. Yeah, they're nice but I wont let that stop me from living. Let's stop by the water, it's so pretty tonight."

Alastor turned slightly, looking out at the Mississippi with it's slightly turbid waters reflecting the light of the stars. He tried not to smile, it was like she wanted him to carry out his intended work. She was making it so easy for him.

"Sure."

They turned towards the rail and Y/n let go of his arm, leaning her elbows against it. She let out a sigh of longing as her eyes tracked the ripples in the surface.

Alastor watched her for a moment, the moon illuminating her features. She was a handsome woman, there was no doubt about it. It had been proved to him tenfold by the amount of prospective partners she had turned down dances with at the party in favor of drinking with him at the bar. That was not what Alastor was interested in, however. Once he was sure she was distracted, once he was sure she had no intent to take her eyes from the glowing river, he looked down. Moving his coat slightly to the side, his hand quickly found its way to the hilt of the knife he had stashed in his waistband for just such an occasion.

He pulled it out, the weight familiar, almost comforting in a sense, in his hand. There was a click. He looked up, the blade pointed to its intended target.

Y/n was facing him now, a wry smile on her face. One foot in front of the other, she took a step forward. The muzzle of the gun, the cocking of which had been the source of the noise which had drawn his attention, just a few centimeters from his chest. The tip of his knife hovered indefinitely by the open center of her coat. He chuckled in amusement, eyebrows raised.

"I thought there were a few more bodies in the news than there should have been. A gun? Really?"

Y/n shrugged.

"I'm little. I don't have the privilege of being able to overpower my victims like you."

Alastor hummed softly. A slight breeze picked up, playing with the edges of their hair.

"What a shame."

Y/n laughed lightly.

"I don't think so. It works well enough."

"Those machines are inelegant, they are detached."

"And you prefer a sense of intimacy to be involved in all your escapades?"

Alastor removed the knife, holding it up to his eyes. He turned the blade over in his hand, examining it closely. Following suit, Y/n let her hand fall to her side, the gun still cocked should an occasion arise to use it.

"I have an idea." he suddenly announced.

"Oh?" Y/n asked.

She took a step back, returning to the water's edge. Alastor followed, leaning over the railing beside her. They watched one another closely, weapons still clutched loosely in their hands.

"Yep."

"You gonna tell me what it is or am I gonna have to guess?" Y/n teased after a moment, breaking the oddly comfortable silence that had fallen after Alastor's last words.

"There have been a few times, of late, where I've come a bit... uncomfortably close to being seen."

"Getting lazy." Y/n hummed, "Or maybe just cocky."

"It seems like you could use a hand, someone with brute strength in case anything goes wrong."

She scoffed, smiling just the slightest bit.

"Are you proposing we work together?"

"You're the one who said it, not me."

Y/n shook her head slightly, amused.

"How would I know you wouldn't just turn on me? End up killing me or decide not to step in if I needed help?"

"And how would I know that you wouldn't rat me out? Alert someone to where I was and what I was doing rather than telling me someone was coming? It's called trust, Y/n."

Y/n thought it over, fiddling with the gun in her grip as she did so. Alastor watched, seeing the gears turning in her mind through the light of her eyes.

"Fine." she said at last, un-cocking the gun and holding a hand out to him, "You've got yourself a deal."

Alastor smiled, slipping the knife back into his belt before grasping her hand in his. It was chilled by the air of the January night enveloping them.

"Deal."

Y/n quickly learned Alastor's preferred demographic. He had a penchant for angry men, drunks. Y/n had been a one off, a spur of the moment opportunity he had thought to take hold of. Alastor had not been like that for her. Y/n's preferred victims were also men. Anyone that showed any pressing interest in her, anyone who tried to take her home for the night, always ended up six feet under. For both, murder was a way of processing their personal experiences and traumas.

As a result of their deal, Y/n and Alastor began to spend more time together. They had to learn one another's intricacies, their ways of thinking, their nature of being. It was a necessity if anything was actually going to work. They both had rather busy work schedules, Alastor as a radio broadcaster with his very own show and Y/n as a seamstress at a local dress shop. Because of this, more often than not, the only time they had to get to know one another was through shared meals. Both of them had to eat, needed a lunch break or dinner. It was just what worked. Because of their slightly shared demographic of victim, they ended up in bars together quite frequently as well.

It was in one of these meet ups that they ran into their first difficulty. Y/n was sitting across a table from him outside a cafe, lazily sipping on a coffee as she perused the missing persons list in a newspaper. The newspaper was old, they were exchanging information about who was responsible for what. Working together didn't just mean knowing one another as they were now, but their histories as well.

They should have known not to sit in such a public place. Both had many connections in the city due to their jobs, though few friends. It just so happened on that day that the one true friend they did have in common was walking down the very street they sat on.

"Alastor?" Mimzy exclaimed, catching sight of his familiar face and moving towards their table.

Y/n folded the newspaper, placing it on the table as she turned towards the sound. Mimzy came to a stop, her brow furrowing in mild confusion as she saw her friend was not in fact alone.

"And Y/n, fancy meeting you two here."

"Pull up a chair, Mimz." Y/n smiled and Mimzy obeyed.

Swinging a spare chair from a nearby table, she quickly joined them.

"I haven't seen you two since the party! How have you been."

"Fine, fine." Alastor hummed and Y/n nodded her assent.

"And whats this with you two getting coffee?" Mimzy asked, a teasing smile slipping onto her face as Alastor took a sip of his own drink, "I'm not interrupting anything, am I?"

"No, not at all Mimz." Y/n shook her head, a slight smile on her face, "It's always a pleasure to see you."

"You sure this isn't a date or something? I mean, with the way you two left and everything... having coffee alone..."

Alastor nearly choked on his drink. Y/n and Mimzy turned to him as he put a hand to his chest, clearing his throat.

"Excuse me." he said and Mimzy's grin widened.

"Oh this is totally a date."

"No!" Alastor exclaimed, exchanging a fervent glance with Y/n across the table.

She raised her eyebrows, pursing her lips. Without words, she told him to handle it. Alastor sighed.

"Are you sure?" Mimzy asked, a suggestive tone to her voice.

"I... uh..." Alastor stuttered, his brain working in overdrive to think of anything else. It came up empty, "Fine. Yes. We're... we're on a date."

"You caught us." Y/n chimed in and Mimzy turned to her.

"Oh my stars! You two.... I shoulda guessed you'd get on like a house on fire. Shame I can't invite you to any more of my singles parties though Y/n, you are a riot."

Singles parties. A hunting ground. Y/n smiled.

"No, no, Mimz. We're not exclusive or anything."

Mimzy's eyes widened slightly at the revelation as Alastor shot Y/n a look across the table. Dating was going to be hard for them to sell but swingers too? What was she thinking.

"Really? How exotic." Mimzy hummed in thought.

"We're all going to hell anyways so, why not." Y/n shrugged.

"Oh you." Mimzy laughed, placing a hand on Y/n's shoulder as she got to her feet, "Well, I won't keep you love birds any longer. I'll see you next week for the next party then?"

"We'll see." Alastor hummed placidly.

Once Mimzy had gone, he rounded on Y/n.

"Swingers?" he asked, eyebrows raised, "Really?"

"Hey, you're the one who started the whole 'we're dating' thing." Y/n sighed, picking the newspaper back up and resuming the task at hand, "I just made it easier for us."

"It will utterly destroy my reputation if this gets out you know."

Y/n shot him a look over the top of the paper.

"Al, you got a lot more to worry about than pretending to be a swinger in terms of your reputation. Now, Marcus Alcost? Six four, buff, scar on his left forearm? Brown hair?"

"Blue eyes?"

"Umm... yeah."

"Yep, that was me."

"Nice. Musta been a tough one to take down."

Alastor would track men, following them out as they left the establishments in the small hours of the morning with the intent of returning to their families. He would stalk them, corner them, lead them in. Y/n would stand watch, alerting him at the first sign of trouble.

The moment she heard footsteps, chatter, Y/n would duck in. Grabbing Alastor by the arm, she would whisk him off in some random direction, having consistently used the time she was on lookout to scout for escape routes.

They had had a few close calls, one or two times he had had to press her up against a wall and pretend to kiss her to avoid prying eyes. They always had a good laugh after something like that. Mostly, things worked out well. They each had survived on their own for years at this point. They knew what they were doing, adding another person into the mix just made it a tad easier.

Y/n, on the other hand, didn't need to track her victims down, they did that work for her. She would dress up all pretty and the moment someone asked to take her home or something of the like, would agree. Then she'd pull them into some ally or another under the guise of not wanting to wait a second longer and attack. Alastor would stand behind her, arms crossed menacingly as she carried out her work. He threatened so she could perform and she never had any trouble thanks to him.

That was, until one night about a year into their little partnership. As the time had passed, their relationship had grown. They still held the ruse of dating up before anyone who asked why it was they each spent so much time with the other but, a real friendship had begun to blossom between them as well. As it turns out, they had a lot more in common than just a tendency to commit brutal murders. Y/n knew Alastor well by now, better than anyone else most likely, and he knew her as well. That was how he could tell something was wrong.

Y/n had given Alastor the usual signal from across the bar and he had settled his tab. As he followed the pair, Y/n and the tall man whose hand she held, Alastor had noticed something was off. Normally by this point Y/n was stumbling around, pretending to be drunk and ditzy. She was doing this very thing now but in a more halted and jagged way. The man she was with seemed more believably drunk than she was, swaying this way and that. Her movements were uncharacteristically harsh as she pulled the man into the ally about a block ahead of him.

Alastor picked up the pace, breaking into a light jog. He reached the ally and turned down it, expecting to see Y/n flirting with the man or with her gun out already. Instead, he was met with something entirely different.

At the back of the ally lay the huddled mass of the man. On top of him was Y/n. The thuds of her knuckles against his face was the only sound breaking the silence of the night. She hit him, again and again. Alastor stood there, stunned.

"Dear, whatever is the matter?" he asked at last, trying to wrap his head around the situation.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

"Y/n."

Thud. Thud. Thud.

He could see the splatters of blood now, on the ground around them and the wall behind. The thuds included the occasional squelch, the crack of a bone.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

"You'll ruin your hands for work tomorrow if you keep at this."

Still, she ignored him. There was a sickening crunch. Sighing, he approached.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

He could see it now, the man's mutilated face. Part of his skull looked like it had caved in. He had stopped moving long ago.

"Y/n, dear," Alastor tentatively reached out a hand towards her shoulder as he spoke, "don't you think he has had enough?"

Y/n whipped around to him, her eyes wild and her bloody raw knuckles raised. He froze, his hand hovering above her shoulder. There was blood everywhere. It soaked the sleeves of her collard shirt, it dripped from her fingers, it decorated her face and her bared teeth.

"What, you fucking want some too?"

Alastor's breath caught in his throat. His heart pounded against his ribcage, begging for escape. It wasn't fear, it couldn't be. He could take this girl down in ten seconds flat, blood hungry as she was.

Y/n's eyes, sharp with violence, softened slightly as she saw his reaction. She let her hands fall, resting them on the man's chest.

"He tried to drug me." she revealed, turning her eyes back to her mess, her masterpiece.

"He what?"

"Yeah." she sighed, using the back of her hand to push her hair from her eyes, leaving a residue of blood in the wake of the movement, "I caught him, switched the drinks."

Alastor shifted his gaze to the man before falling on Y/n once again. Her face was blank now, all the rage gone.

"He tried to drug me." she said again, her voice hollow.

At last, his hand found its home on her shoulder and she turned to face him once again. Alastor extended his free hand to Y/n. She examined it for a moment before daintily placing one of her own in his and allowing him to help her to her feet. Both her hands now rested in his as they looked back at the remains of the man.

"Well, he's definitely dead."

Alastor let go of Y/n's hands. Now free, he used one of them to turn her face to his. Blood spattered, wide eyed, lips slightly parted -- his heart fought for freedom from his chest once again.

"He deserved it."

Alastor let go of Y/n's chin and used the cuff of his jacket to wipe some of the blood from her face.

"Can you walk me home?"

Normally if she had asked something like that, Alastor would have teased her to no end. Why be scared of the monsters in the dark when she herself was one of them? But her voice had been small, timid. She had avoided his eyes and his fingers tingled at the prospect of her viewing him as protector.

"Of course, my dear."

They did not have another planned meeting until two weeks from that day. Y/n had a big project at work and wouldn't have any spare time because of it. Alastor, normally restless at the idea of having to wait so long to satisfy his bloodlust either by killing or seeing the show of death, was grateful for the respite. He was confused, overwhelmed even, because his strange reactions, the change in his patterns of thought towards the girl, hadn't ended at Y/n's front door.

No, she was haunting him. Like a vengeful ghost, he saw her in his mind. She took up every waking moment, he didn't know what to do. Alastor waited a day and still, it persisted. The skip of his heart, the odd slightly sick feeling in his stomach at the thought of their reunion. He waited three days and it didn't stop. By the time the end of the week rolled around and Alastor still found himself smiling at the prospect of only having to wait another week not to kill but to see Y/n again, he did the unthinkable. It was the only option he could come up with. Besides Y/n, she was the only other person in the world he even half trusted. Alastor called Mimzy.

"Alastor, darling!" she excitedly exclaimed into the phone, "What a surprise! What can I do for you?"

"Yeah, hey Mimzy. Um..." he struggled to find the words, fiddling with the phone cord as he walked to the window, looking down at the street below, "I just... I need your advice about something."

"What is it, hun?" she immediately replied, "Seems its got you in a tizzy, not a lot can do that."

"I... It's about Y/n."

"Uh-oh, trouble in paradise?"

"No. Maybe?" he turned from the window, collapsing in his desk chair, "I don't know."

"Spill."

"Well, we... I just.... Mimz, I can't stop thinking about her."

"Well I would hope not, you've been together for almost a year now."

"Yeah well, about that. It may have been a... stretching of the truth? Shall we say?"

"Al." Mimzy warned after a moment's silence, "If you are playing with this gi-"

"No!" he exclaimed, cutting her off and quickly crafting an excuse, "No. It was just to get our parents off our backs. We had a deal. They were both pestering us about when we were gonna get married, you know how it is."

"I thought your dad was dead?"

"My ma though, she really wants to see me settled down."

"I guess that explains the swingers thing." Mimzy sighed, "It didn't really seem in character for either of you. So, whats the matter?"

"I told you, I can't stop thinking about her. It's like... it's like... look, we're not dating, but we're friends, you know? And we were out at a bar together a few nights ago and she just... she did something and when I looked at her, it was like I died."

"That little minx." Mimzy laughed in glee, "What the heck did she do?"

"Just something, okay?"

"I have got to quiz her about this."

"No! Please, no. She'd... probably be embarrassed."

"Mmm... okay...." came Mimzy's doubtful reply, "So what was it you needed help with?"

"Well, that. It was like the breath had left my body entirely. I felt... sick, my chest hurt. It was so strange. I thought it would go away once I got some sleep but it didn't. Every time I think about her, it feels like there is a vice around my heart and I can't stop thinking about her."

"Al, seriously? This is what you're asking me about?"

"Yeah?" he uncertainly replied after a moment.

"What are you, twelve?"

"Mimzy, are you going to help or not?"

She sighed.

"Alastor, you have a crush on her."

A beat.

"I do not."

"Yes, you do. Maybe even more."

"I..." his brow furrowed, his breath left his body.

This was bad. This could be dangerous, detrimental even.

"Are you sure?"

"Butterflies in your stomach? Pains in your chest? Can't get her out of your mind? You're even breathless for christ's sake Al. It's textbook first pangs of love."

"Fuck."

Mimzy laughed.

"You're already pretend dating, what harm would asking her to do the real thing with you do? My bet is, she's probably been feeling the same thing about you. That tends to happen in cases like yours, I've seen it before. The whole 'fake love turns real' trope. It's overdone if you ask me."

"Mimzy, this isn't one of your trashy romance novels. This is my life."

"So live it radio man! Go get that girl."

Alastor was nervous, trembling even as he sat at the bar. His glass of whiskey had gone warm on the table as he watched Y/n dancing and having fun in the crowd. This was how it usually went when it was his turn to hunt, she'd have fun and he'd find a target. Once the target left, he'd grab her and they'd move out.

Tonight he was distracted and it showed. The man had nearly given them the slip. With Alastor's knife still sticking out of his shoulder, he had ducked away and started running. Of course that meant Alastor and Y/n had to give chase. They ran after him through the streets of New Orleans as he screamed bloody murder and Y/n's heels clicked definitively on the ground. He was thankful that the hour was late and no one was out and about, thankful the man was so drunk his words came out closer to garbled singing than pleas for help, thankful he was slowed by his consumption.

When they at last caught up with him, Alastor grabbed his second knife from his belt and, taking the man's hurt shoulder in his free hand, buried it deep in the man's back. He fell to the floor, sputtering, coughing up blood. In a few moments he was still. Alastor turned to Y/n, panting.

Her pretty eyes traced a path between murderer and victim a handful of times before a smile broke out onto her face. Before he could really register what was happening, she was doubled over in laughter, clutching her stomach.

Alastor watched Y/n, eyebrows raised as they both caught their breath. After about a minute, she straightened up and turned to him, wiping a tear from her eye.

"What?" Alastor asked with a wry smile, "What is so funny about a dead man."

"He..." she broke out into laughter again, "He... the way he ran! And we almost lost him?! Oh my god, Al, that coulda been so bad."

"The way... he ran?"

"He... didn't you see it? Oh my god, it was so funny. Like he was running in a three legged race with an invisible partner." she wheezed.

Alastor felt the heat pooling in his cheeks. Mimzy was right, it was time for him to live his life. A normal existence could coexist with his hobby, Y/n had already proved that to him.

"Didn't you see?" she asked again.

"No." he shook his head, "I was... I was watching you."

"You were... Al, theres no way you were." Y/n scoffed, "No way. If you were watching me, he would have gotten away. If you were watching me, it would meant that you were unconcerned by your oh-so-precious reputation being ruined. If you were watching me, it would mean..."

She trailed off as he took a step closer to her, his gaze flicking between her eyes and her lips. Y/n's cheeks flushed pink.

"Alastor."

Her voice was a dying prayer. Reaching a trembling hand up, he laid it on the back of her head, his fingers tangling with her hair as she looked up at him with wide eyes. Alastor closed the gap.

He had been so scared. Scared she would push him away, that she wouldn't kiss back. Even a little bit scared he'd just become the next name on her list of degenerate men she'd killed.

There was a moment, a split second, where his fears were realized. Then, she washed them all away. Hands buried in the lapel of his jacket, she pulled him closer, Y/n leaned in.

They broke apart after a moment, their cheeks flushed and utterly breathless.

"I-"

"Would you like to go on a date with me, Y/n?"

Her eyes narrowed in suspicion.

"Are you going to try to kill me again?"

"Oh please, I thought we'd moved past that darling."

Y/n smiled, still holding him close. Alastor let his hands fall onto her waist as they swayed slightly under the light of the moon.

"Yes Alastor. I will let you take me on a date."

"We will not be swingers."

Y/n laughed.

"Just had to make that clear."

"No, Alastor. If I am going to get you, I want you all to myself. Now, what are we going to do about that body?"

----

Next Part -> Cover Up pt. 2

[hurthermore]

Hi,dear!i really really love your writings like a lot! Can i maybe request a human alastor x reader who's a sister in a church,but also a killer like him?if that's okay for sure! have a good day/night:)

»»------► 𝚃𝚑𝚎 𝙽𝚞𝚗

Pairing:  𝙰𝚕𝚊𝚜𝚝𝚘𝚛 𝚡 𝙽𝚞𝚗!𝚁𝚎𝚊𝚍𝚎𝚛

Warnings: 𝙼𝚞𝚛𝚍𝚎𝚛, 𝚋𝚕𝚘𝚘𝚍, 𝚍𝚎𝚜𝚎𝚗𝚜𝚒𝚝𝚒𝚜𝚊𝚝𝚒𝚘𝚗 𝚝𝚘𝚠𝚊𝚛𝚍 𝚖𝚞𝚛𝚍𝚎𝚛, 𝚛𝚎𝚕𝚒𝚐𝚒𝚘𝚗, 𝚒𝚗𝚏𝚊𝚝𝚞𝚊𝚝𝚒𝚘𝚗, 𝙰𝚕𝚊𝚜𝚝𝚘𝚛 𝚋𝚎𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚜𝚕𝚒𝚐𝚑𝚝𝚕𝚢 𝚘𝚋𝚜𝚎𝚜𝚜𝚎𝚍

A/N: 𝙰𝙲𝙺𝙺𝙺 𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚗𝚔 𝚢𝚘𝚞! 𝙰𝚕𝚜𝚘 𝙸 𝚕𝚘𝚟𝚎𝚎𝚎 𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚜 𝚒𝚍𝚎𝚊, 𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚗𝚔 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚏𝚘𝚛 𝚛𝚎𝚚𝚞𝚎𝚜𝚝𝚒𝚗𝚐 >.< 𝙰𝚗 𝚊𝚙𝚘𝚜𝚝𝚘𝚕𝚗𝚒𝚔 𝚒𝚜 𝚊 𝚟𝚎𝚒𝚕 𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚝 𝚒𝚜 𝚠𝚘𝚛𝚗 𝚋𝚢 𝚗𝚞𝚗𝚜, 𝚏𝚘𝚛 𝚊𝚗𝚢𝚘𝚗𝚎 𝚠𝚑𝚘 𝚒𝚜 𝚌𝚘𝚗𝚏𝚞𝚜𝚎𝚍 𝚠𝚑𝚎𝚗 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚌𝚘𝚖𝚎 𝚊𝚌𝚛𝚘𝚜𝚜 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚠𝚘𝚛𝚍!

𝚁𝚎𝚚𝚞𝚎𝚜𝚝𝚜 𝚊𝚛𝚎 𝚘𝚙𝚎𝚗!

Ever since Alastor was a child, his mother made it compulsory for him to attend mass every sunday, which he always did with a fabricated smile on his face; just to make his mother happy. It was a boring occurrence that Alastor found redundant; he was partial to the practice of voodoo, and therefore preferred not to partake in the catholic religion, especially once he started to grow into his adult years.

Even when Alastor began his career in the broadcasting profession, and moved out of his family home, his mother demanded that he was still to attend mass with her; she didn’t care if they rota’d him in for sunday, he was to decline performing his broadcasts that morning of the week, or he’d have his ear shouted off. And Alastor was, and never had been the type of man to let his beloved mother down, even if it were something as mundane as church. He’d attend for her.

On one particular attendance, he noticed there was one more nun designated among the monastics of the church. She stuck out like a sore thumb due to the almost sinister way her smile etched upwards on the beautiful features of her face. He’d only seen that type of smile on one other person; himself. And he’d be a fool not to be intrigued by it.

He found himself thinking more and more about the secrets hidden behind that stretching smile as the weeks passed by, his glances against her only intensified the more he attended church. He often contemplated approaching her, but she never left the stage where the pastor spoke passages from the bible, and once the sermons ended, she was always gone in the blink of an eye.

It became an agitating occurrence as the want to converse with her, to discover what type of person she was seemed almost impossible. But eventually, he finally found a chance to finally introduce himself when the church hosted a function for the annual celebration of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. as she stood among the attendees, handing out beverages; still attiring the same smile she always did. 

Yet before he could approach her, his mother dragged him in another direction, telling him he had to greet the pastor before he dabbled in the crowd. So he obeyed, slightly irritated, but complied with his mother’s demands. As he greeted and made small talk with the Pastor, he couldn’t help but overhear a group of nuns gossiping behind him.

“Why has the Pastor put her on the beverage stand?”

“A menace to society that girl, I can’t believe he’d allow her to prattle among the votaries.”

“I know, especially with the rumours about her burning her last church down too; I swear he’s going to get us all killed.”

Alastor couldn’t help how his eyebrows raised in interest as he focused on the tittle-tattle behind him. It made him wonder; was this girl like him? Did she also have the same refined tastes for murder? With how the only reported murders in New Orleans being his own, he was doubtful of the prospect. 

As he continued to attempt to approach the woman throughout the event, person after person kept interrupting his goal. His sense of murder was becoming heightened. People were always vermin, always in the way. And by the time he finally advanced toward the place he last saw her, she had been replaced with another nun. Turning his head in different directions, he attempted to find her among the crowd; but she was nowhere to be seen. Most likely confined to the bedding area of the church.

It was as if God himself was preventing him from acquainting her.

Grunting to himself, he made his way toward his mother, informing her that he was going to get some fresh air before he made his way outside. Plucking a cigarette from his pocket, he lit it up with a match as he rested his back against the outer walls of the church.

He was pissed to say the least; furious how the numerous sacks of living meat kept disturbing his plans.

All he wanted was to acquaint himself with that god forsaken beautiful smile.

As a puff of smoke vacated his lips, he perched as he heard rustling from the heavily wooded area to his right; eerily similar to how a caught rabbit would struggle as it attempted to leave the confines of its new found prison. Squinting his eyes, Alastor began to make his way into the wooded area to investigate the noise.

The further he moved through the forage and trunks of trees, the louder the rustling became; he swore he could start to hear grunts and strangled coughs. Pausing as he finally came across a sight to behold, his eyes landed on the nun that had been consuming his mind for months now. Her robes and apostolnik were covered in splatters of dark red blood as another nun laid underneath her; her neck sliced almost in half, clearly done moments before he had arrived due to the small amount of blood that squirted from her open neck; saturating the two women in red.

As he looked at the face of the corpse, he noticed it was one of the nuns from earlier that had whispered tales of the subject of his thoughts. Offering a smile, he made his presence known to the murderous nun who had caught his attention long before; taking a heavier step than usual as a way to alert her.

Her face fully faced him, and his smile only stretched in glee as he witnessed her blood soaked face attire that same smile she always did. If she was interesting before, then she was absolutely fascinating now. As the nun gazed at him, she didn’t attempt to run or attack him, only watching his movements.

“Can I help you?”

That voice. Alastor couldn’t help but adore how angelic her tone was; a wolf dressed in sheep's clothing. Just like him. Taking step after step toward her, Alastor offered her his hand as she sat atop the limp corpse. Placing her bloodied palm in his, he pulled her up to stand, kissing the back of her hand before she could pull away.

“Perhaps, but first, let’s get you clean, dear.”

»»------► 𝙼𝚊𝚜𝚝𝚎𝚛𝚕𝚒𝚜𝚝

[crackerzaf]

Oh yeah, it's my favorite time when I get to obsess over my hc about when Alastor was alive

I like the idea that Alastor's father, Francois, stayed with his mother, Myrtle, until Alastor was six years old. However, Francois eventually left because the prospect of raising and witnessing the growth of his "ultimate sin" terrified him. Alastor's parents were heavily Christian, especially Francois

(Francois and Myrtle have a very toxic and complicated relationship)

(His parent's back story)

So my idea is that when Alastor was 16, he was already being told he needed to start working as a farm hand or at a factory anything to pay bills. Alastor didn't want to. He wanted more to his life than sugar cane's and oil rigs. He told his mother about how he dreamed of being more than just another man living in New orleans. Myrtle understood but she knew a woman of her time and place she wasn't going to be able to give him that. So she reached out to Francois and she miraculously manged to convince him to let Alastor study up in New York with him.

Although Alastor was excited to move to the far glamorous and larger city, he still didn't like Francois, and when he arrived there, Francois made sure Alastor blended in with high society after all this was a risky thing to do for Alastor inviting Alastor into a world that would so easily destroy him.

And even though Alastor learned so much from being upstate, the unbridled hatred he had for Francois never left they would get into arguments and although Alastor could get a few hits in ultimately Francois would win and he wasn't afraid to remind Alastor that as easily as he gave him an in he could send him back in to nothing.

In my hc I think the reason why Francois took him in was because deep down he truly did want Alastor to be his son, but he can't let himself because he thinks if admitting that he shows any form of sympathy or empathy for Alastor would be him acknowledging his sins that his religion so staunchly disagree with. So I think he just hits him till he feels as though he’s lulled the demons away.

Side notes I just wanted to point out.

Alastor only got glasses after he started to live with his dad, his mom knew he needed them but she could never afford to buy him a pair.

When Alastor was living with his dad he learned about the mid atlantic accent and started adopting that as his normal voice

More to come later… god I love thinking about these hc au ideas I have for alastor and his family it’s so fun 🤩

[charles-forza-ferrari-sempre]

Expecting Miracles

As the full moon bathed the streets of New Orleans in its ethereal glow, Klaus, paced anxiously in his opulent mansion. His mind was consumed with worry and anticipation as he awaited the return of his beloved, y/n, who was carrying their child.

Klaus had always been a complicated man, burdened by his past and the weight of his family's legacy. But the prospect of becoming a father awakened a softer side of him, a desire to protect and cherish his growing family.

Finally, the front door swung open, and there she was, a radiant glow enveloping her, accentuated by her blossoming belly. Klaus's eyes widened with awe and adoration as he rushed to her side, gently placing his hand on her abdomen to feel the life within.

"My love," Klaus murmured, his voice filled with tenderness and reverence. "You're carrying our child, a miracle born from our love."

Y/n smiled, her eyes sparkling with joy. "Yes, Klaus. Our love created something beautiful."

From that moment on, Klaus vowed to be the best partner and father he could be. He showered y/n with affection, ensuring her every need was met during her pregnancy. He learned about prenatal care, attended doctor's appointments, and even transformed a room in their mansion into a cozy nursery.

Klaus would often place his hand on y/n's belly, feeling the gentle kicks and movements of their unborn child. He would whisper words of love and encouragement, promising to protect and guide their little one through the challenges of life.

As the due date approached, Klaus's anxiety heightened. He wanted everything to be perfect for y/n and their child. On the day of the birth, Klaus stood by y/n's side, holding her hand and offering words of comfort.

With every push and every breath, y/n brought new life into the world. And when the cries of their newborn baby girl filled the room, Klaus felt tears welling in his eyes. He witnessed a miracle, a tangible symbol of the love he and the reader shared.

In that moment, Klaus knew he had been blessed with a new purpose. He would protect his family at all costs, ensure their happiness, and strive to be the father he had always longed to have.

As Klaus held their newborn Daughter Hope in his arms, he whispered a promise. "I will love and protect you always, my little one. You are the greatest gift life has given me."

And so, the Mikaelson family grew, with Klaus, y/n, and Hope at the center.

[splatooshy]

tvdu headcanons

yes these are completely correct, no i do not take criticism. either compliment me and my clever thoughts or walk away.

damon

- pretends his initials stand for ‘damon fucking salvatore.’

- Humanity isn’t something Damon lacks. He ignores it sometimes, but he did that when he was human too

- shy. so PAINFULLY shy. that didn’t change until post 70s.

- fav colour is jade green.

- born in italy, then lily had multiple miscarriages over 5 years and giuseppe decided they would move to america for better prospects, and stefan was born in mf.

- giuseppe despised anything ‘foreign’, and would lock damon in the cellar when he slipped up. never mind that damon didn’t really know any english.

- named his first horse (a shetland pony) sir handsome. loved his horses. hated people, loved animals.

- bibliophile. brains over brawn.

- gets banned from new orleans every few decades. marcel HATES him. also was in nola in 1914, freya and kol both took pity on him/ befriended damon after he managed to piss off the witches AND marcel in one day.

- always had the most inconvenient crushes as a human. the first was the daughter of some middle class storekeeper when he was eight. the second was emily bennett (his secret bff) and the third was a dude with a horse when he was a teenager. stablehand/riding instructor/ young gent passing through, named sebastian. giuseppe caught the boys fooling around one day and promptly shot sebastian in the head, before beating damon within an inch of his life (WOAH I WROTE THIS SO CASUALLY). damon never fully recovered.

- finds grimoires to bring to his favourite witch at the time. often the spells are super wacky and mostly useless.

- chatty and clingy drunk.

- after augustines, physically cant sleep alone, and half the time wakes up only to realise he’s killed his bedpartner (strangling, decap., suffocation etc.)

- in the 30s, he became a professional dancer.

stefan

- fav colour is an icy, glacial blue.

- nobody knows what his first language is. His first few words were either Italian or French, but it’s not certain which one. of course, giuseppe locked damon in the cellar for that.

- first horse was sir handsome, a hand-me-down from damon. loved both people and animals, but most of all loved when damon was introducing him to the animals.

- actually the cutest little child ever. big green eyes and floppy blonde-ish hair. looked like a five-year-old until he was 13? 14? and then suddenly shot up really quick.

- bull in a china shop. brawn over brains.

- the ‘ripper’ was created by lexi. she isolated and abused stefan, manipulating him into whatever she wanted.

- chronic migraine sufferer.

- as a human, he physically could not eat when nervous, which just so happened to be 80% of the time.

- rarely gets drunk but is a very outgoing and slutty drunk.

- lizard brain blood lusty ripper stefan only speaks italian.

- model aeroplane / train / car kind of guy.

- tumbled down into a well twice as a human.

- built the engine for the first automobile, passed it onto henry ford.

enzo

- likes the challenge of getting his way without resorting to compulsion (which is cheating.)

- has the stickiest fingers. he didn’t become a little street urchin in london without picking up some skills.

- turned by jack the ripper in 1888. approached him mid-murder.

- physically incapable of hating damon. and believe me, he’s tried.

- after augustines, physically cant sleep alone, and half the time wakes up only to realise he’s killed his bedpartner (strangling, decap., suffocation etc.)

klaus

- went to college a few times to study art. ended up stabbing the teacher [with a paintbrush] because they critiqued his work.

- was tsar nicholas 2 as a joke, purposely ended the dynasty.

elijah

- slipped ecstasy into klaus’ drink in the 80s just to see what would happen.

rebekah

- had a habit of accidentally wandering as a kid.

- clairvoyant / clairsentient.

- very partial to throwing knives.

kol

- bffs with charles 2, gets knighted (inspired by that episode of parks and rec where ben and andy meet the rich british guy)

- refers to stefan as klaus’ estranged paramour

- mixes vervain and wolfsbane into joints and such to get klaus to chill the fuck out. and mixing vervain into other drugs and stuff so that they’d affect him - damon joins the operation in 1914.

- was jack the ripper in 1888, saw a man drowning in his own blood in an alleyway, just watching as kol disemboweled a prostitute, before approaching him like ‘please sir, can you spare any change?’ and kol was delighted.

- damon pissed off marcel in 1914 and kol decided at that moment they were best friends.

- BIG fan of the ottoman empire. it only collapsed because kol was daggered.

- has grimoires full of odd spells.

alaric

- owns vervain coated knuckle dusters

- basically begs damon to talk history with him.

elena

- pre-accident: queen bee and she knew it. at her core, she is self-centred and used to getting her way. this only changes with her parents’ accident, but eventually elena reverts back into her old self.

- refers to katherine as her identical grandmother

[ - bitchy stares. not even an rbf, her face is just super expressive and you can tell when she’s judging you ]

caroline

- was second to elena all her life, and elena knew how to fuel that envy of caroline’s. but then elena’s parents died and caroline was finally #1, except stefan shows up and it’s back to the elena show again.

[ - well-meaning but tone deaf ]

both elena and caroline are just those bitchy popular girls.

[ bonnie ]

[ i have so many for her but a lot are completely against canon so here’s the ones that could be ]

[ - best cheerleader on the squad // the older girls adopted her as their flyer from day 1 ]

[ - because she’s tiny, yanno? ]

[ - known as the ‘i dunno her but she seems nice’ one, the ‘quiet, seems really sweet but i think she hates me’ one and ‘elena’s minion’ ]

[ - but she’s actually more popular overall ‘cause she does all the volunteering / xtra curricular stuff with caroline and she’s not in your face about it ]

[ - has very weirdly specific daily rituals as to what she eats and when on which day (waffle wednesday), what pyjamas she wears, how her pillows are arranged, etc. ]

[ - she didn’t even notice she did all of that until she was at a sleepover and the other kid’s mum made a different breakfast to what she would usually have on that day and bonnie was like ‘hmm. i seem to be uncomfortable with this. why is that?’ but sucked it up and ate her breakfast without saying anything ]

[iwtvfanevents]

Rewind the Tape —Episode 2

Art of the episode

Just like we did for the pilot, we took note of the art shown and mentioned in the second episode while we rewatched it, and we are sharing our findings with you. Did we miss any? Can you help us put a name to the unidentified ones? Do you have any thoughts about how these references could be interpreted?

Unnamed painting by Marius de Romanus

Created for the show (uncredited artist).

Armand (still "Rashid") tells Daniel that Marius was a contemporary of Tintoretto (1518-1594).

Transformation

Ron Bechet, 2021 [Identified by Gizmodo's Linda Codega, here.]

Bechet is a New Orleans-born visual artist. He's a relative of the early jazz pioneer Sidney Bechet. Exhibition Prospect.5 says about the collection this piece belongs to: "Bechet carefully renders the ways vines wrap themselves around trees for support and access to sunlight. At times, this relationship serves both the vine and the tree. Works such as Transformation depict a harmonious symbiosis, as tree and vine both flourish. (...) Through his immersive compositions, Bechet invites us to see history and ourselves in relationship to the beauty, power, and violence of the natural world." And, from Xula Gallery: "Here, we are gifted with the physical proximity of life and death – How they share the same organic space, how they sleep together as equals. The flora of South Louisiana's natural landscape is cleaved open to expose its roots. (...) Here is botany that has every potential of becoming monstrous. All of these meanderings are used to symbolize the deep historical roots of a family home and exhibits the precariousness of nature, both human and environmental, with all of its nurturing and destructive potential. (...) It is a diaspora body, skin folded back to reveal its elegant and resilient backbone."

Untitled photographs

Vivian Maier, undated

Maier was a street photographer whose work was discovered and distributed after her death —she took more than 150,000 photographs during her life, and never printed or circulated any. You can learn more about how her work came to light here. We don't actually see the self-portrait in the third picture, which hangs to the left, until episode four.

Dancers

Edgar Degas, 1899 [Identified by @nicodelenfent, here.]

Degas produced countless paintings of ballerinas throughout his career. While he is often considered an impressionist, he himself saw himself more as a realist and preferred harsh gritty subjects of working class backgrounds. Ballerinas at the time often came from working class or poor families and worked intense grueling hours.

Berthe Morisot with a Fan

Edouard Manet, 1872 [Identified by @nicodelenfent.]

Manet was one of the first 19th-century artists to paint modern life, as well as a pivotal figure in the transition from Realism to Impressionism. The portrait in this scene shows his close friend, painter Berthe Morisot, wearing mourning blacks after the death of her father, but wearing a wedding ring —she was engaged to Manet's brother.

Portrait of Erich Lederer

Egon Schiele, 1912 [Identified by @nicodelenfent.]

The Schiele depicts a young Erich Lederer, son of art collectors Serena and August Lederer, whose collection was looted by the Gestapo.

Paddy Flannigan

George Bellows, 1908 [Identified by @nicodelenfent.]

The Bellows depicts a young impoverished boy on the streets of New York.

A Doll's House

Henrik Ibsen, 1879

Lestat tells Louis "They'll seat us late, and we'll miss Nora's entrance with the Christmas tree," which quite a few fans soon identified as a reference to this play, in which a housewife becomes slowly disillusioned with marital life and eventually leaves her husband. This conclusion led to the play being banned in certain countries, such as Germany and Britain, and Ibsen was compelled to write an alternative ending, in which Nora's husband forced her to stay. In the two stage productions pictured above, you can see Kelsey Brennan and Nate Burger on the left, and Assad Zaman and Anjana Vasan on the right.

Unnamed paintings of Papa du Lac and Paul

Created for the show (uncredited artist).

Unidentified painting*

* The running theory is that the woman in this painting is Gabrielle, Lestat's mother; which would mean this is another uncredited prop painted for the show.

Woman in A Fur Coat

Edouard Manet, 1879

Additionally, on the bottom left corner of the frame you can catch a glimpse of another unidentified painting, but we couldn't get any clearer looks of it either.

Autumn at Arkville

Alexander H. Wyant, 1909 [Identified by @vfevermillion.]

The one in the mirror and the one on the other side of the door are too blurry, but we managed to place the one on top of the couch!

The Lone Tenement

George Bellows, 1909 [Identified by @nicodelenfent.]

The National Gallery of Art says about this painting: "Bellows has imbued the composition with a sense of eerie wistfulness, recording the precarious positions of those who were being displaced to make way for the future."

Don Pascuale

Gaetano Donizetti, 1842

The opera that Louis and Lestat go to at the end of the episode follows an elderly bachelor, who gets conned by his nephew Ernesto and his friend Malatesta into marrying the nephew's lover, Norina, under false pretenses. You can find a complete synopsis here.

The Storm On The Sea Of Galilee

Rembrandt van Rijn, 1633 [Identified by Gizmodo's Linda Codega.]

Rembrandt van Rijn, Dutch Baroque painter and printmaker from the 17th century, is best known for his biblical and allegorical pieces. Rembrandt's only seascape was stolen from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston on March 18th, 1990, alongside other 12 works of art. The case remains unsolved.

If you spot or put a name to any other references, let us know if you'd like us to add them with credit to the post!

This week, we will be rewatching and discussing Episode 3, Is My Very Nature That of a Devil. We can't wait to hear your thoughts!

And, if you're just getting caught up, learn all about our group rewatch here ►

[opencommunion]

please go to a protest for Land Day tomorrow (March 30th) if you can

AUSTRALIA – Hobart / Nipaluna. 1PM Every Saturday @ Davey St. (Grand Chancellor).

CANADA – Antigonish, NS. 1PM Every Saturday @ Antigonish Town Hall. Antigonish 4 Gaza.

CANADA – Montreal. 2PM Land Day Tatreez Workshop @ Refugee Center. PYM Montreal.

CANADA – Ottawa. 2PM Land Day @ Human Rights Monument.

CANADA – Toronto. 2PM Land Day @ Yonge & Dundas. PYM Toronto.

ENGLAND – Halifax. 1PM Every Saturday @ Wilkos on Southgate.

ENGLAND – Hebden Bridge. 3PM Every Saturday @ Holme Street. 4PM @ St George’s Square. West Yorkshire for Palestine.

ENGLAND – London. 11AM @ 7 Tavistock Square. PYM Britain.

ENGLAND – London. 12PM @ Central London. STW UK.

NETHERLANDS – Amsterdam. 7PM Every Night @ Dam Square.

PORTUGAL – Porto. 10PM Every Night Vigil @ Camara Municipal.

SCOTLAND – Orkney. 1PM Every Saturday @ St Magnus Cathedral Steps. Amnesty Orkney.

AZ – Phoenix. 1MP Land Day @ Civic Space Park. PSL Phoenix AZ.

CA – Los Angeles. 1PM Land Day March @ LA City Hall. PYM LA/OC/IE.

CA – Petaluma. 12:30PM Every Saturday @ Petaluma & E Washington. Occupy Pelatuma.

CA – Ventura. 12:30PM @ 181 E Santa Clara St. ANSWER Coalition.

CO – Fort Collins. 3PM Every Saturday @ Old Town Square. NOCO Liberation Coalition.

DC – Washington DC. 4PM @ DuPont Circle. ANSWER Coalition.

FL – Gainesville. 11AM @ Depot Park. ANSWER Coalition.

FL – Orlando. City Hall. TBA. ANSWER Coalition.

FL – Pensacola. PM @ Main & Reus (Blue Wahoos). PSL CGC. 

GA – Atlanta. 2PM @ Consulate of Israel. PYM.

ID – Pocatello. 12PM Every Saturday @ Bannock County Courthouse. Pocatello for Palestine.

IL – Chicago. 1PM @ TBA. USPCN + Chicago SJP.

LA – New Orleans. 3:30PM @ 701 N Rampart St.

MA – Springfield. 2PM @ 36 Court St. ANSWER Coalition.

ME – Portland. 1PM @ Monument Square. PSL Maine.

MI – Detroit. 1:30PM @ Beacon Park. USPCN.

MI – Detroit. 10AM Land Day @ Rouge Park. PYM.

MN – Minneapolis. 2PM @ 2707 West Lake St. ANSWER Coalition.

MT – Kalispell. 12PM Every Saturday @ Main & Center. MT 4 Palestine.

NC – Asheville. 4PM @ 1 N Pack Square. ANSWER Coalition.

NC – Charlotte. 4PM @ Wilmore Centennial Park. CLT 4 Palestine + PSL Carolinas.

NC – Raleigh. 3PM Land Day @ Moore Square. PSL Carolinas.

NC, Charlotte. 4PM @ Wilmore Centennial Park. Land Day. CLT 4 Pali + PSL Carolinas.

NM – Albuquerque. 4PM @ UNM Book Store. ANSWER Coalition.

NY – New York. 12PM @ City Hall Park. Within Our Lifetime.

NY – New York. 12PM Vigil Every Saturday @ 5th & 44th in Brooklyn. Sunset Park Elders.

NY – New York. 5PM @ Times Square. PYM.

NY – Rochester. 1:30PM @ MLK Park. End Apartheid ROC + SJP UR.

OH – Cincinnati. 3PM @ 801 Plum St. ANSWER Coalition.

OH – Cleveland. 2PM Land Day @ Edgewater Upper Pavillion. USCPN.

OH – Columbus. 4PM @ 120 W Goodale St. ANSWER Coalition.

OH – Dayton. 5PM @ 2680 Ridge Ave. ANSWER Coalition.

OH – Wooster. 11AM @ 538 N Market St. ANSWER Coalition.

OR – Bend. 12PM Saturdays @ Peace Corner. Central Oregon 4 Socialism.

OR – Portland. 12PM @ Desert Island Studios. Letters for Palestine PDX.

PA – Philadelphia. 5PM @ 7th & Walnut. ANSWER Coalition.

PA – Pittsburgh. 3:30PM @ 4100 Forbes Ave. ANSWER Coalition.

RI – Providence. 5PM @ Prospect Terr. ANSWER Coalition.

TX – Houston. 1PM @ Waterwall Park. PYM Houston.

TX – San Antonio. 12PM @ 301 E Travis ST. ANSWER Coalition.

VT – Burlington. 1PM @ City Hall. ANSWER Coalition.

WA – Seattle. 2PM Land Day @ Lake Union Park. PYM.

WI – Milwaukee. 1:30PM @ Sijan Park. PSL Milwaukee.

WI – Viroqua. 11AM Vigil Every Saturday @ Main & Decker. Driftless Solidarity / Wolves PSC.

WV – Martinsburg. 12PM Land Day @ Martinsburg Town Square. PSL WV.

DISCLAIMER: I didn't make this list and it's not comprehensive. If you don't see a protest near you, look up what your local orgs are doing, and if you still can't find anything, take autonomous action

[sylvan-librarian]

Nissa Revane, William Wordsworth, and Me

Introduction:

We are not isolated individuals but an interconnected web. Part of embracing green's philosophy is understanding the importance of how each of us figures into the lives of the others. Grasping the role this larger group plays is a vital piece in understanding how the world works. - Mark Rosewater: “It’s Not Easy Being Green Revisited” … Therefore am I still A lover of the meadows and the woods And mountains; and of all that we behold From this green earth; of all the mighty world Of eye, and ear,—both what they half create, And what perceive; well pleased to recognise In nature and the language of the sense The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse, The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul Of all my moral being. - William Wordsworth: “Tintern Abbey” How wonderful there should be a thing we don't yet know. - Magic Creative Team: “Renewal” 

What do Nissa Revane, elf animist who had a good run in the 2010's as Magic’s iconic green planeswalker, William Wordsworth, nineteenth century British poet and the godfather of English Romanticism, and I, a mentally ill librarian who spends all his free time playing a children’s card game, all have in common? Not much, really. I’m neither a lesbian that wields earth-shaking magic nor am I the founder of a poetic movement that English majors still fawn over. However, thankfully for me, the human experience transcends time, gender, sexual preference, and even reality. There’s a lot to learn from both fiction and poetry, and I’m nothing if not a curious student. In particular, though, I’d like to talk about transitions. 

The past couple of years for me have been packed full of constant transitions: I had an emergency move away from the city I had built a life in, I finished a master’s degree in library science, and I began the long, arduous process of changing careers. Not every transition has been so traumatic, though, as I am also now in a joyful, peaceful relationship and have finally achieved a modicum of financial stability on my own terms.

Needless to say, these transitions have had me feeling introspective (even more so than usual), and I have found myself seriously wondering about my place in the world. That probably sounds dramatic (well, if the shoe fits), but as an elder millennial who was around to witness when the first acorn fell from the first tree and the first scene boy put on girl jeans to pair with his trucker’s hat, I honestly just kind of gave up on that brand of stability at some point; after all, I was fifteen on 9/11, nineteen and living in Louisiana when Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans and washed away whatever trust I had left in our institutions, and twenty-one when the Bush-era recession nailed my post-undergrad job prospects into a coffin. Of course, at the risk of sounding like I’m trying to appeal to your sense of pity, I’ll admit that today’s generation coming of age during Trump and and Covid have probably had it worse than I did and have also proven themselves much stronger and more resilient than I ever was, but nevertheless, a swirling concoction of circumstances and terrible mental health habits left me feeling for decades that I’d never have a place in the world to call many own.

All that said, in my attempt to carve out a life for myself and discover my role within my larger community, I started rereading Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Keats (the poets of English Romanticism were my favorite discovery as a literature student and some of the only writers I have carried with me beyond academia), since their poetry also dealt in themes of self-discovery, memory, and transition (also, their poetry is broody and navel-gazing - something I definitely relate with). However, as a Magic: The Gathering Vorthos with basic forest brainrot, I was also struck on this reread just how close my own experiences and the themes of the Romantic Poets mirrored how my favorite green characters from Magic fiction navigate their world. At first, I felt that this is fairly low-hanging fruit, since on the surface, themes like “finding yourself in nature,” “the rejection of social norms,” “celebrating your connections,” etc. are common enough to be found in all sorts of literature. However, the more I thought about it and connected the dots in my head, the more I realized just how much green’s themes in modern Magic fiction, particularly as expressed through Nissa Revane, helped me understand my own place in the world.

Indeed, while this essay grew out of the concept of tracing the similarities between Green Magic and Romantic Poetry (not the most riveting read for most of you, I’m sure), this particular tale kind of grew in the telling (to loot a phrase from Tolkien) until it became my own personal journal of self-discovery. If the entire m.o. of my online presence didn’t already give it away, my love of Nissa Revane - planeswalker, animist, green mage, icon - colors most of my thoughts about Magic: The Gathering, and this is no different. Compiling Nissa’s arc throughout Magic’s Story, synthesizing it with the things I love the most about the Romantic poets, and letting it stew around in my brain for the last year highlighted something of vital importance to me: the message, one that weaves its way throughout Nissa’s entire narrative, that personal growth means learning that the definitions I have held onto for my whole life - of myself, of other people, of even nature and the universe itself - are but a narrow, small part of a greater whole; that embracing healthy connection with the world around me and seeking to understand my place within it helped change parts of me that I thought were intrinsic to my very nature and helped me bloom into the best version of myself.

Part I: 

(me, trying to juggle graduate school and work)

Last year around this time, I found myself struggling. I was wrapping up my last full semester of my graduate program, failing miserably at balancing school and work, isolating myself from my friends because of how busy I was, and unhappy about living in Central Texas again after I swore I was done with the region. Throughout all of this, following Magic Story was a boon to my shocked nerves, though I rarely found time to follow it completely. It wasn’t pure joy, however, because as a result of stress mixed with the, at the time, untreated depression and anxiety, Nissa getting compleated - with “no way” of getting healed - during the “All Will Be One” story (not to mention that her tragic loss happened OFF SCREEN - the disrespect) severely bummed me out, so I tuned most the “March of the Machine” stories out to focus on wrapping up my semester. That is, I tuned it out until the final story, K. Arsenault Rivera’s “Rhythms of Life” was released in late March. Letting Chandra and a healed Nissa kiss at the end was a nice touch, but it was not for another month until we found out what happened to them after the climax of the Phyrexian stories.

When that month passed, however, on May 1, Grace P. Fong’s “She Who Breaks the World,” was released in tandem with previews for “March of the Machine: The Aftermath” products. Of course, I was going to like this story because I like Nissa and Chandra, and I have been a proponent of them being romantically involved since “Zendikar Resurgent,” but this story struck a deeper chord in me than I expected. I felt an immediate kinship with Fong’s representation of Nissa, a character who is also in a state of transition: in a place she doesn’t want to be, isolated from her friends and loved ones, and trying to redefine who she was after traumatic events left her floating listlessly throughout her world. 

The events of “All Will be One” and “March of the Machine,” after all, were Nissa’s darkest hours in a life full of dark hours. Her mind enslaved and her bodily autonomy stolen from her, Nissa was forced to do things in service to the Phyrexian matriarch Elesh Norn that horrified her. However, due to the nature of Phyrexian compleation — having her mind and body altered on a genetic level — she performed these actions in the moment with fanatical zeal, even pleasure. We are told in the first episode of the March of the Machine arc, “Triumph of the Fleshless” that Nissa “is the finest gift the Planeswalkers have given Phyrexia. Even standing at Norn's side, she can steer Realmbreaker's attention. To say nothing of her combat capabilities. If things continued at this rate she might overtake Tamiyo as Norn's favorite new servant.” Later on in “She Who Breaks the World,” while Nissa is reflecting on this, she notes that the alterations the Phyrexians made to her “granted her the ability to unleash a call through the branches of the Invasion Tree and speak the glory of Phyrexia to every plane in the Multiverse. And right now, Nissa is disgusted with herself because—despite her friends' sacrifices, despite Chandra's sacrifices—part of her misses hearing those planes.”

On the other side of these events, Nissa is mostly healed from what the Phyrexians did to her (outside of a metal cage imprisoning her chest and some scarring on her limbs where metal was grafted on), her mind is returned to her own control, and she and Chandra are finally sharing mutual love and affection instead of being mired in “will they/won’t they” hell like they had been for nearly a decade of Magic Story. However, the trauma of knowing, remembering, and feeling intimately all of the terrible things she did understandably leaves her feeling like an outcast among loved ones, and to make matters worse, she is now with a planeswalker spark, meaning she got depowered significantly and can no longer go back to her beloved Zendikar, her homeworld that she has a close intimate connection with. All this is to point out that Nissa finds herself in a spot where she has to completely redefine who she is. Nissa took great pride in being animist; now, she cannot hear the voice of the planes and her magic is basically useless. Nissa had previously discovered meaning for herself being a member of the Gatewatch: traveling the planes doing good where can and making connections with new worlds and interesting people; now, she is trapped on a plane that does not listen to her among people she very directly harmed when her mind and body were not her own. 

After a failed attempt to connect with the world of Zhalfir, Nissa begins to despair, believing that the planes have rejected her because all of the social connections she has made over the years. Nissa believes that “[s]he has spent so long connected to others that she has smothered her own connection to the Multiverse. Whether or not those bonds were made of her own volition, the planes have rejected her.” While she recognizes deep down, even if she can’t forgive herself for it just yet, that what happened while she was a Phyrexian wasn’t her fault, Nissa comes to believe that her original sin that led to this was in getting involved with the wider universe in the first place. She (and everybody who suffered from her actions as a Phyrexian) would be better off, she believes, if she had remained in her primordial, untarnished state of a champion of nature.

At this point in the narrative, Nissa’s experience reflects the way poets and writers of the Romantic Period mythologize their own world. Canadian literary critic and theorist Northrop Frye (a theorist who, truth be told, I disagree with in many respects, though his work on the Romantic Period is exhaustive and insightful) called this the “Romantic Myth.” In “A Study of English Romanticism,” Frye describes how the Romantic Myth delineates from traditional mythology:

In the older mythology the myth of creation is followed by a gigantic cyclical myth, outlined in the Bible, which begins with the fall of man, is followed by a symbolic vision of human history, under the names of Adam and Israel, and ends with the redemption of Adam and Israel by Christ. The two poles are the alienation myth of fall, the separation of man from God by sin, and the reconciling, identifying, or atoning myth of redemption which restores to man his forfeited inheritance. Translated into Romantic terms, this myth assumes a quite different shape. What corresponds to the older myth of an unfallen state, or lost paradise of Eden, is now a sense of an original identity between the individual man and nature which has been lost.

Ignoring, for a moment, the gender essentialism Frye uses, note how the lost Eden of the Romantic period was connection to nature itself. Joining society, spending precious hours having “dialogues of business, love, or strife” - all of these things are the sins that tear us away from our original, perfect self. William Wordsworth begins his “Ode: Intimations of Immortality” this way: 

There was a time when meadow, grove, and stream,     The earth, and every common sight,                        To me did seem                    Apparelled in celestial light,          The glory and the freshness of a dream. It is not now as it hath been of yore;—                    Turn wheresoe'er I may,                        By night or day. The things which I have seen I now can see no more.

To the persona of Wordsworth’s poem, this sense of identity was lost in childhood; in Nissa’s head, she “smothered her own connection to the Multiverse” when she started to value her connections to other people — Chandra, the rest of the Gatewatch, Yahenni, and many others she let into her life — at the expense, apparently, of the natural world. What’s left for her except to turn back to nature and attempt to find herself again?

Part II:

(Nissa's oath to protect the life of "every plane" plays a huge role in her identity)

What does “finding herself” look like for Nissa, though? To answer that, let’s look at a few different things. Here, we’ll examine Nissa’s place as a green character in Magic’s color pie and pick apart the ludonarrative elements in Nissa’s card designs that informs how she approaches her idea of self.

Nissa is the only planeswalker of the original five Gatewatch to have cards that branch out to other colors. At heart, though, she is a green character. Even though she has some blue elements in her personality (curiosity) and black (the ambition to make her ideals reality, whatever the cost), Nissa’s heart is “green to the very door.” 

In his near ten year old article, Mark Rosewater writes this about the philosophy of Green: 

The natural order is a thing of beauty and has all the answers to life's problems. The key is learning to sit back and recognize what is right in front of you. Each individual is born with all the potential they need. The secret to a happy life is to recognize the role you were born into and then embrace it. Do what you were destined to do. The world is this elaborate system, and each one of us gets to play a part. And it's not something we have to guess about; it's imprinted on us, it's in our genes. Just look within.

It’s very easy to see Nissa in the first paragraph: even though she is a warrior out of necessity, she too craves peace and acceptance and this is revealed in one of her favorite hobbies: meditating. Nissa’s animist powers (more on that here) let her reach her consciousness into nature itself so that she can just exist among the wonders of life. Take note of this gorgeous passage near the end of “Renewal,” the last story of the Kaladesh block:

There were rivers in the air; they carried her like a mote of pollen. Great hearts were pounding in the deeps of the sky, singing slow symphonies of joy. Wordless, they expressed the sun breaking over the edge of clouds; the sharpness of stars over frosted peaks; the awareness of a new life growing within, nestled and patient, waiting for its first breath of radiance. She drifted bodiless among the singers, listening. Back and forth they called, echoing across cloud and current, composing shared dreams of weightlessness, rain, and memory. An eye the size of a house blinked. Radiant curiosity washed over her, like the return of sunlight from beyond the edge of all things. There is something new in our sky, it sang in language of sensation and vibrance; quickened heartbeats and quivering muscle; caught breath and a hundred shades of blue. How wonderful there should be a thing we don't yet know.

Nissa is an expert at recognizing “what is right in front of you,” though due to her connection to nature, “right in front of you” could mean just about anywhere on the plane itself. 

To cycle back to Rosewater’s statement, however, it’s important to take consideration of the fact that a green character does not just treat the wonders of the natural world as a conduit for inner peace, they also believe that the “secret to a happy life is to recognize the role you were born into and then embrace it. Do what you were destined to do.” What does Nissa believe the role she was born into is? What drives her throughout much of Magic’s narrative?

To put it simply, Nissa believes that she is the champion of nature itself, the chosen one of Zendikar’s worldsoul. Whenever she planeswalks to a new world, she adopts the worldsoul of the plane as her own; the first thing she usually does when touching down on new earth is to attempt to connect with the soul of the plane. Throughout whichever story arc she takes part in, she usually comes to see herself as the voice of that particular world and acts as its champion as well.

Let’s take a look at the second Innistrad block, for example. Even though her role in this story is quite small, this template still applies. Jace, after unraveling the mystery of what was happening on Innistrad, goes back to Zendikar to fetch the rest of the Gatewatch to help stop the rise of Emrakul. As she planeswalks to the battlefield, the “hill rumbled slightly, the only herald of Nissa's arrival. She frowned as she knelt down, placing her palm against the ground. ‘The mana here is dark. Twisted. It's in the soil, the trees...Emrakul did some of this, but’…‘This is your first time to Innistrad, right? “Dark and twisted” is kind of a regular feature,’ Jace continued.” 

Presumably at some point later on in the story, on the flavor text on the card Splendid Reclamation, Nissa says “No matter how much a plane has suffered, there is a way to restore it." Of course, this line appears nowhere in the story, but there has always been a conflict between what has been written in Magic fiction versus what is printed on the cards. Furthermore, it’s possible that this card was a bottom-up design with the mechanics designed first and Nissa pasted on later since there wasn’t another “green character who cares about lands” present during the battle against Emrakul. Either way, Nissa comes across as a character who sees herself as the champion of nature.

Nearly all other stories Nissa takes part in give her a similar arc. In "Amonkhet," she is the first to identify just how sick and distorted the world had become under Bolas’s influence, and after a trial with the ibis god Kefnet, she ends up believing that she set herself up as a rival to Bolas, able to manipulate the leylines and the gods attached to them just as efficiently as the dragon. During :War of the Spark," in a move that would earn her the disgust of the Selesnya guild, she animates Vito-Ghazi, the home of Ravnica’s worldsoul Mat'Selesnya, in order to fight against Bolas and the zombified gods. In "Zendikar Rising," Nissa’s journey takes front and center, with her conflict with Nahiri ending with Nissa as the one true savior and liberator of Zendikar. Her brief stint during the "Brothers' War" side stories end with Nissa swearing an oath to Gaea, the worldsoul of Dominaria, to personally destroy the Phyrexians herself, no matter the cost. 

Even while she was a Phyrexian during “All Will Be One” and “March of the Machine” and her mind not her own, Nissa follows a similar arc, though a twisted variation: after her capture and transformation, Nissa becomes the voice of Phyrexia, as the card All Will Be One showcases, proclaiming the plane’s glory and, through manipulating Realmbreaker (likely the single largest and most powerful living thing in existence at the time), sending “Phyrexian perfection coursing across the Multiverse.”

You can certainly see Nissa’s confidence in her station as the champion of worldsouls multiverse-wide in her cards: “Nissa, Voice of Zendikar,” “Nissa, Who Shakes the World,” “Nissa, Ascended Animist,” etc. All of these designs showcase Nissa’s might as a master of land magic. Loyalty abilities on these cards almost always animate a land into a creature that can then fight alongside her. The most powerful variation of this ability was on “Nissa, Who Shakes the World”:

On a narrative level, however, what these abilities showcase is that Nissa during this era saw herself as less a friend to nature than a master of it.

Fast forward to the aftermath of the Phyrexian invasion and Nissa is in a much different place mentally, emotionally, and even physically. As Nissa struggles to (literally) bury the physical remnants of what the Phyrexians did to her body, she feels an immense sense of loss that stems from more than just guilt. Fong describes it this way:

[Nissa] felt cut off, lost in the Multiverse with no voice calling her home. Maybe no plane would hear her ever again. They'd all lost their sparks, but only Nissa still wanted to planeswalk. Even if her friends seemed to be moving on without her, she still cared about their happiness. So not wanting to bring down the spirits of their celebration, she excused herself.

I recall seeing a few half-hearted takes on social media after this story was released expressing frustration that Nissa spent so much time in this narrative grappling with the harm that was done to her rather than acknowledging guilt for the harm she inadvertently did to others. First of all, she clearly does feel guilt for the harm Norn wrought through her:

[Her] copper skeleton is covered in mangled spikes, and those spikes are covered in the dried blood of her friends. She rubs one, and dark residue flakes off on her fingertips. She wonders whose blood it was. Maybe Koth? Maybe Wrenn? Maybe Chandra? Chandra. She had hurt Chandra, almost killed her.

Secondly, exploring Nissa as a green character shows us that Nissa has lived her life believing firmly that she was alive for a purpose: to be the voice of nature and act as its most ardent champion. However, now worldsouls won’t speak to her and her magic barely works at all. Her spirituality that drives her and her magical might that allows her to act in service of that spirituality have been unceremoniously ripped away from her. Everything Nissa has ever believed about herself has come dramatically (and traumatically) crashing down.

Nissa is a character whose entire system of beliefs has now been obliterated by her experiences, and as mentioned in the previous sections, she believes it was because her original mistake was in seeking her identity in her relationships with people rather than with her relationship with nature.

I asked at the end of part one, what’s left for Nissa except to turn back to nature and attempt to find herself again? Perhaps, however, a more apt question to ask is what’s left for Nissa at all? Yes, she and Chandra are (mostly) on the same page about their feelings for one another and yes, she is alive and physically healthy (though weakened and scarred), but notice that even if Nissa despairs about what she has lost, she shows little desire to go “back” to nature. Even though she believes with absolute certainty that “the planes have rejected her,” she stays true to her duty as one of the stronger warriors left among the surviving Mirrans; when faced with decision to either explore the brand new omenpath or to help the survivors, Fong writes, “as much as Nissa loathes to abandon the portal, she knows Koth is right. As much as the war took from her, others have lost even more. They need to help first.”

Though separated by over two-hundred years and in different genres altogether, what Nissa is going through reminds me of what Wordsworth writes in “Tintern Abbey”:

I bounded o'er the mountains, by the sides Of the deep rivers, and the lonely streams, Wherever nature led: more like a man Flying from something that he dreads, than one Who sought the thing he loved. For nature then (The coarser pleasures of my boyish days And their glad animal movements all gone by) To me was all in all.—I cannot paint What then I was. The sounding cataract Haunted me like a passion: the tall rock, The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood, Their colours and their forms, were then to me An appetite; a feeling and a love, That had no need of a remoter charm, By thought supplied, nor any interest Unborrowed from the eye.—That time is past, And all its aching joys are now no more.

You see, Wordsworth — like Nissa, like me, and probably like you at some point in your life — found himself in the late 1700’s grieving a deep sense of loss as everything he believed in came crashing down around him. Spellbound by the fervor of Revolution-era France, he lived on the continent for years and had a child with a woman he fell in love with there, but France’s tense political relations with his home country and the Revolution descending into the Reign of Terror forced him to return to Britain. Witnessing what he saw as his utopian beliefs plummet to irredeemable violence utterly broke him (on a personal note, I likely have a different view than Wordsworth on the merits of putting aristocrats to the guillotine, but that’s another essay entirely), and — like Nissa, like most of us — had to rebuild himself from the ground up.

What a relatable human story, right? As someone who is closer to forty than he is thirty, I have stumbled upon this crossroads multiple times in my life. Years ago, it involved disentangling myself from my evangelical upbringing and accepting the fact that, though my parents and (just to give them the benefit of the doubt) many of the religious adults who helped raise me had my best intentions in mind, instructing an impressionable, vulnerable, and anxious child that deep down in the center of his being he is evil and deserves eternal torment for the crime of being born was pretty fucked up. It took years of therapy, medication, and daily affirmations to finally feel good about myself. More recently, as alluded to, going through a tough breakup, wrapping up a master’s degree, and beginning the process of changing careers all within the span of roughly two years left me scrambling in my pursuit to create a new self to be a better fit for my new circumstances.

What choices did I make at this crossroads? What about Nissa or Wordsworth?

Part III:

The answer to that question is that the three of us (Nissa, Wordsworth, and I) all came to similar conclusions. This answer is two-fold, and I hope you’re not expecting some life-altering nugget of wisdom here, because — true to the heart of a green mage — the first lesson we learned is, quite simply, the art of acceptance: acceptance of the world that is, not the world that was or the future world our anxiety creates in our mind. Rosewater writes,

Green wants acceptance.

The other colors are all focused on how they'd change the world to make it better. Green is the one color that doesn't want to change the world, because green is convinced that the world already got everything right. 

There is, of course, something to be said for improving your circumstances — especially if the environment around you is toxic — and the relentless ambition to mold your life into one you are happy with, but in Nissa’s case, what she needed most was to accept that she was living in a different world than was previously. Bereft of the planeswalker spark that gave her a sense of purpose and traumatized by remembering what she did when her body and mind were being puppeted by the Phyrexians, Nissa finally comes to understand and acknowledge her new place in her new world. 

Early on in Fong’s “She Who Breaks the World,” Nissa attempts to connect her soul to the leylines of Zhalfir, but instead of basking in the orchestra of the planes, the music is drowned in all of the other songs that have influenced her, her tune “muffled by dozens of new, alien voices she recognizes and despises: the Eldrazi, Bolas, and finally, loudest, Phyrexia.” This leads to her belief that was discussed previously that her original sin was embracing human connection instead of remaining the voice of Zendikar’s worldsoul. 

However, at the climax of the story, Nissa shares this struggle with Chandra when the two of them are trying to fight their way out of an impossible situation. A wild, out-of-control storm elemental was threatening the Mirran survivors of the Phyrexian invasion, and Nissa and Chandra were defending the populace against it. However, the two of them are not working well together, and the elemental manages to capitalize on their poor tactics and absorbs copious amounts of steam arising from a burnt baobab tree to become a colossal being whose head caresses the sky. After they get trapped in a hole with no way out, Chandra suggests a plan of attack reminiscent of the channel-fireball combo the two of them used to destroy Ulamog and Kozilek all the way back in “Oath of the Gatewatch,” and Nissa finally admits to Chandra that her magic no longer works and expresses her deep anxieties about why: “‘it's like my voice isn't my own,’” she admits. “‘Like it belongs to Phyrexia instead, like everything I've ever connected to is drowning me out.’”

Chandra, however, does not see it that way. Choosing, for once, to think before she talks (a skill she no doubt learned from her years around Nissa), eventually concludes “‘you know … you have good connections, too.’” She continues:

‘It's true—you did bad things while they had you. But everyone you've connected with over the years with the Gatewatch, we're just happy you're still here. With us.’ Chandra sets fire to a chunk of moist dirt that was about to fall on Nissa, turning it into a soft rain of ash. ‘With me.’ For the first time since she awoke in Zhalfir, Nissa smiles. Chandra, sweet Chandra, even if she doesn't realize it, has always understood and explained emotions better than Nissa ever could. Chandra continues, ‘Your connections aren't drowning your voice, Nissa. They're changing it into something new, maybe something even more powerful. Infinite voices, infinite possibilities, right?’

What Nissa needed was not to perform some kind dramatic penance or to reject society for asceticism once again but to simply accept that the world around her had changed, that she had changed. This fact is hammered home by the next section: agreeing to try connecting to Zhalfir’s worldsoul again, 

Nissa closes her eyes. She retreats inward and listens for her inner voice. It's hard, much harder than before, but Chandra is dutifully helping her concentrate, blasting the falling rock away before it can reach her. Nissa is greeted by ringing deep in her ears, but she refuses to be deterred. With her connections in mind, she picks the static apart into unique melodies, the individual songs she picked up from all around the Multiverse. She arranges them, harmonizes them, and this time, when she calls to Zhalfir, her voice is amplified in chorus. She offers an apology. The plane answers. It too was cut off from everything it knew, from the connections it had made. It, too, was scarred by Phyrexia and is growing into something new. It forgives her, and Nissa can finally forgive herself. Magic floods her flesh, her blood, her bone. She hears Chandra laugh, delighted by their success.

It’s only through accepting that her life now is different from what is used to be, through confessing that her priorities had changed, through acknowledging that presence of others in her life had made her stronger, and most importantly, through forgiving herself for what’s she did when her mind wasn’t her own that Nissa is able to reconnect to the source of her magic and her joy. 

Nissa learns to reinterpret her world in a new way. This can be seen in mechanical elements as well. Most of Nissa’s planeswalker cards have her manipulating lands, either by animating them into creatures to be controlled or by fetching them from the library. Nissa, Resurgent Animist, however - the first time she has been printed as a creature since the flip-walkers of 2015 - does not do any of those things. The text on this card reads:

Landfall — Whenever a land enters the battlefield under your control, add one mana of any color. Then if this is the second time this ability has resolved this turn, reveal cards from the top of your library until you reveal an Elf or Elemental card. Put that card into your hand and the rest on the bottom of your library in a random order.

The act of playing a land during the narrative of a game of Magic is the act of a planeswalker establishing a mana bond with a certain place in the multiverse. ‘Mana bond’ is a term almost never used in Magic fiction anymore, but as far as I know, it has not been retconned either. Even if not explicitly stated, there are nods to the act of creating mana bonds throughout the tie-in fiction. Look at this section from “Nissa’s Origin: Home,” for example:

As they picked their way deeper into the marshland, Nissa formed a connection with it. She saw the beauty in the moss-laden trees, felt the magic in the mists that rose up from the brackish waters, and swayed to the song of the swarms of lion flies that circled them. She never would have believed a bog had so much to offer.

In the narrative of a game, this paragraph would simply read “Nissa plays a swamp.” Explicit or not, establishing a mana bond with a particular piece of geography means that the planeswalker can, among other things, draw mana from that place no matter where in the multiverse they are. This is why, flavorfully, a player can play Ravnica shock lands alongside Tarkir fetch lands: in the narrative of a game, your planeswalker avatar has gone to these places and forged a bond with those pieces of land.

To cycle back to the card, however, instead of manipulating the land itself, having Nissa, Resurgent Animist alongside the player allows them to, firstly, hypercharge their link to the lands they play, giving the player extra mana for the act of forming connections with lands. Secondly, the player forming connections with as many lands as possible in a single turn (two in this case) allows Nissa to discover other creatures to fight alongside them. Instead of being the champion of all nature, Nissa now fights alongside nature as an ally rather than a general. This makes it all the more fitting that according to the “Aftermath Set Design” article published last year, the original name for this card during the design process was “Nissa, Friend to Nature.”

The journey Nissa goes on lets her reinterpret herself from champion to friend, but celebrating things others consider dark and reinterpreting the world in a way to showcase its beauty was close to the heart of many Romantic Poets as well. In “To Autumn,” John Keats celebrates the season of change, a season so often characterized as a time of preparation and vigilance for the coming winter. Keats writes,

Where are the songs of spring? Ay, Where are they?    Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,— While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,    And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue; Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn    Among the river sallows, borne aloft       Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies

Keats argues that we should not characterize an entire season through the lens of humanity. Instead of pining for spring, we should live in the moment and appreciate what fall offers us. Similarly, Nissa learns to appreciate the current, sparkless season of her life with Chandra instead pining for the life that was.

Keats again argues this in “Ode to a Nightingale”; a creature poets often infuse with sadness is only that way, he argues, because of how it is interpreted:

Thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird!          No hungry generations tread thee down; The voice I hear this passing night was heard          In ancient days by emperor and clown: Perhaps the self-same song that found a path          Through the sad heart of Ruth, when, sick for home,                 She stood in tears amid the alien corn

 “Thou wast not born for death,” Keats writes, meaning that the nightingale is not infused with sadness by nature, but only because that’s the emotion humans have assigned to it. Nissa too learns to stop infusing her world with despair by labeling herself as powerless, damaged, and guilty, instead choosing to enjoy the moment she is in.

It is through accepting that age and experience has changed how he views the world that Wordsworth also is able to move forward. Instead of treating nature as his “all in all,” he writes,

For I have learned To look on nature, not as in the hour Of thoughtless youth; but hearing oftentimes The still sad music of humanity, Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power To chasten and subdue.—And I have felt A presence that disturbs me with the joy Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime Of something far more deeply interfused, Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, And the round ocean and the living air, And the blue sky, and in the mind of man

Instead of nature being the only thing in his life, nature is now simply one of the important things in his life, a feeling too that Nissa wrestles with. Instead of hearing only the song of the leylines, the worldsoul’s tune is now just one of many melodies she sings.

Acceptance is a song I too have been singing. As a staunch leftist, living in Central Texas is not particularly suited to me, and I have left here once before. Swearing never to move back, I moved away in the 2010’s for a relationship with a woman that ended up failing some years later. Financially desperate, broken emotionally, in the middle of a graduate degree, and not having anywhere else to go, I moved back to Waco to live cheaply, wrap up my online library science degree, and re-constitute my support network. It was not easy reacclimating to life here. Though I love the people I know in the area, I felt then and still feel now haunted by the ghosts of old memories, all of which had become flavored by loss. After I finished my degree in mid-2023, it did not get much better; even though I’d become ambitious and committed to looking for work elsewhere, the job market for librarians kept me here (entry-salary positions asking for five years of experience and all that). Note that for as much as change scares me, I had dared to face those fears and dared to dream only for it to come to nothing - not an uncommon story these days, I’m afraid.

Now, however, I’m working at the public library in Temple, Texas (close enough to Waco to commute) and settled myself down for the time being. Composing a new rhythm for my life has drastically helped heal the damage that almost three years of rejection, chaos, instability, depression, and anxiety wreaked on me, but that journey began, I think, with acceptance. I’m not currently where I want to end up, but despite what my anxiety and self-doubt tell me, that’s okay. I had to accept that this is where I am at in my life right now, confess that my ambitious priorities were probably going to be achieved at a much slower rate than I had hoped, acknowledge that people in my life made me stronger, and most importantly, forgive myself for the many mistakes I made over the past three years. Only then was I able to truly move forward. 

The second lesson we all learned was to embrace connection with people in our lives rather than reject it. In Nissa’s case, as previously alluded to, part of the process of accepting where she is at in life involved understanding that becoming part of the Gatewatch pursuing romance with Chandra had made her better and happier than she had been before. Once that hurdle was crossed, Nissa was able to come to terms with just how different Chandra is from Nissa in how she thinks, feels, and loves. Chandra tells Nissa:

I realized I can't just burn through any relationship I care about. Love leaves room for the other person to be who they are. I have to make room for you, too. I want to." "Like fire needs oxygen . . ." Nissa asks her final question. "You have room for someone who can't planeswalk?" "Yes. I'll make it. I will falter, I will be tempted, but I will make it. Fire's going to burn, no matter what you do, but you can shape it if you try. And I want to try. For you." Nissa thinks for a moment. Finally, she nods. "I can handle that."

Later on, Nissa describes the omenpath she ran into earlier:

“I think I can still hear Zendikar out there, strange and distorted, but possibly still out there. I could just be imagining it completely, but I think I would risk that unknown to see home again." Chandra nods firmly. "And I'll be walking right alongside you." Every Planeswalker can go anywhere they want, but Nissa recognizes Chandra's need to roam runs deeper than that. It's part of who she is, and part of what Nissa loves. So Nissa offers, "Maybe, after that, I wouldn't mind seeing more. As long as it's with you." Chandra breaks into a wide smile. "Let me be your torch, then.”

Compromise is an important part of any relationship, and through embracing change in her life rather than running from it, Nissa is finally able to compromise with Chandra in a way that should fulfill both them - something Nissa has clearly wanted since at least the Kaladesh arc (though I would argue these feelings began long before that). Pursuing connection and intimacy with Chandra at this crossroads allows Nissa to blossom into a much happier and more self-actualized character than she has been in Magic fiction so far. Once, back in “Renewal,” the last story of the “Aether Revolt” arc, Nissa - deep in meditation and basking in her connection with the worldsoul of Kaladesh - watches the birth of a new aetherborn and ponders:

How could she tell this new life to laugh and weep without reservation or regret; to sing to the stars and waters, or to nothing at all; to love unreserved and unguarded; to treasure every moment with those beloved; to forgive any regretted trespass; to dance when moved to; to savor long silences in warm company; to greet each dawn, each face with the thought, this will be an adventure; to be brave, and kind, and trusting, and... ...like Chandra.

Years later, Nissa has finally learned to be more like Chandra, and she is better for it.

For his part, Wordsworth famously had a great relationship with his sister Dorothy, and part of the change he embraces throughout “Tintern Abbey” involves reclaiming himself through her:

…in thy voice I catch The language of my former heart, and read My former pleasures in the shooting lights Of thy wild eyes. Oh! yet a little while May I behold in thee what I was once, My dear, dear Sister! 

Earlier in the poem, Wordsworth lamented that he could not “paint / What then I was.” In this passage, Wordsworth finally finds himself again through communion with his oldest and dearest friend.

As for me, I’m in a happy romantic relationship again after years of trying to rebuild myself. Additionally I've made friends with people I wanted to meet, and I’ve managed to carve out a small niche for myself in my own small corner of the world: I realized last summer that I thought about Magic: The Gathering in a much different way than many of my local friends do. As a game that occupies much of my social life and possibly more of my internal life, I searched for an outlet for these thoughts, and that led me here, where I’ve made good friends and joined an online community that I once looked at from afar. If you’re reading this, thanks! I’m happy to be here and to know you.

Conclusion

Relearning ourselves, redefining ourselves, and finding a place for ourselves is a journey most of us must embark, whether of our own volition or not. I’m certainly not a master of this process, so I’d like to leave you with the following thoughts:

One of the more, well, magical things about Magic The Gathering’s tie-in fiction is the fact that you could put just about any character from across the entire history of the game into a random number (character?) generator and the character that gets selected will be near and dear to some Magic player’s heart. In a game as wide and varied as Magic, there is a massive range of experiences portrayed throughout the stories that someone will personally identify with. I’ve seen communities big and small form around fans’ shared love of popular characters like Liliana, Vraska, Oko, and the entire concept of Phyrexians, but also less commonly known characters like Kallist Rhoka (who doesn’t even have a card) and less commonly liked characters (if we’re using loud people on the internet as a gauge) like Jace, Nahiri, and yes, even Nissa.

The biggest lesson I learned from my time as an English major (whether my professors meant for me to learn that is another thing entirely) was that there is no such thing as good and bad literature; there is just literature. Magic story has varied in quality drastically over the years, but one of my main reasons for writing this piece is to emphasize that Magic fiction has a place in the world of literature. It’s not likely to be studied by English students decades from now, but that says nothing about its ability to delight, upset, soothe, and even instruct those of us who enjoy it.

As for myself, I’m eternally grateful to writers who have picked up the task of writing Nissa over the years, because even when she is written poorly (ignoring that one instance where her characterization was butchered beyond recognition), I see much of myself reflected in her deep sense of conviction, in her struggle to express true feelings to people she loves, in her obsessive loyalty to those she lets into her life, in her adoration of the natural world, and even in her love of music. More specifically, I’m especially grateful to Fong and the story team behind “March of the Machine: The Aftermath” for giving me exactly the right Nissa story for exactly the right time in my life.

Whichever omenpath you personally are crossing through, I hope that you find what you need to come out of the other side of it happy, healthy, and ready for the next adventure.

References

Davidson, Nik. (2016). Battle of Thraben. 

Fong, Grace P. (2023). She Who Breaks the World. 

Frye, Northrop. (1968). A Study of English Romanticism.

Humphreys, Dave. (2023). Leading March of the Machine: The Aftermath Set Design 

Keats, John. (1819). Ode to a Nightingale.

Keats, John. (1820). To Autumn.

Kreines, Kimberly J. (2015). Nissa's Origin: Home.

Magic Creative Team. (2017). Renewal. 

Rivera, K. Arsenault. (2023). March of the Machine | Episode 1: Triumph of the Fleshless. 

Rosewater, Mark. (2015). It's Not Easy Being Green Revisited. 

Wordsworth, William. (1798). Lines Written (or Composed) a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey, on Revisiting the Banks of the Wye during a Tour, July 13, 1798. 

Wordsworth, William. (1807). Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood. 

[fictionadventurer]

I dream of a Hallmark royal romance where the worldbuilding goes beyond "there's a tiny British-flavored Western European nation." Let's branch out. Let's go crazy. Let's put this monarchy in North America so we've got this entire alternate history of political and cultural differences that our spunky commoner has to navigate.

Our options include:

Most of the US exists as we know it, but there are a handful of micronations that for some reason maintained their independence and established monarchies. These nations would have a history of distrust of the wider United States and be fiercely patriotic--devotion to their national identity is the only thing that has kept their kingdom alive. Spunky Commoner would be a bit uncomfortable in this kingdom. Why are these people so devoted to a monarchy in a modern democratic continent? It's weird. If she starts a romance with their charming single prince, the wider public would not be happy with the prospect of an American queen. The prince would have to do a lot of explaining about sociopolitical history to make this cute American understand his nation, and he'd have to do some serious PR to bring his people around if he wants to marry her.

The US consists of little more than the original thirteen colonies, and the rest of the continent is made up of kingdoms that gained their independence from other European nations but maintained a lot of cultural ties. The middle of the country is a French-styled monarchy based in New Orleans. California is ruled by a very Spanish monarchy. There's a czar in Alaska. Maine became a monarchy when they seceded from Massachusetts. Our Spunky Commoner is familiar with the history of this multi-cultural continent, but there are a lot more cultural and political differences to navigate--potential language barriers, various alliances with other monarchies that could be jeopardized if he married a US commoner, etc.

The thirteen colonies never managed to come together into one nation and remained separate states, some that stayed republics and some that became monarchies. Each of these states made their own purchases and alliances that extended their territory--some of which added to the original states and some that eventually broke off to form their own nations. Cultures have evolved in each state based upon alliances and immigration, and there's a complicated history of wars between the states. Things have been pretty stable since WWII, and our Spunky Commoner from a republic is traveling to different nations when she catches the eye of a foreign prince--which could have a massive effect upon this fractured continent.

[aheathen-conceivably]

🎶 Love is Complicated 🎶

Zelda left New Orleans one brisk morning in the final days of 1928. Antoine accompanied her to the docks where her steamer boarded and no further. They had barely spoken since the day she received the call that her mother was dying and he refused to accompany her to England. At first, she had merely been swept away in preparations; but as Antoine grew more guilty and withdrawn, their initial fight settled into a gaping divide filled with nothing but silence.

Zelda had tried to compensate for his lack of support with her own quiet reserve; avoiding his spiraling morbidity in the face of her own despair, hoping that he would realize that she was the one who actually needed his strength. Yet the day she boarded the ship he avoided her eyes, keeping his hands near his side until Violette came to tell him goodbye; then he held her until the whistle blew and watched them walk away without a word.

Their passage over the Atlantic was only six days, most of which Zelda spent confined to her cabin. Violette had been incessantly seasick, only coming out of her stupor to ask Zelda where her father was. At home. Zelda would tell her. He’s at home. Then her bleary eyes would close again, seemingly disappointed that only her mother was there to comfort her.

But suspended above the sea, surrounded by nothing but open water, Zelda thought that perhaps she was sailing home, that England was where she was always meant to be. It was where her family and her history were; and in an increasingly fearful thought, where she and her daughter’s futures were as well.

As she looked down at her sleeping daughter Zelda couldn't help but think of how much easier Violette’s life would be in England. The stares in the streets of New Orleans had grown no less frequent; and they were only worse any time the three of them tried to go in public together.

Of course she knew Violette would face prejudice wherever she went, but at least in Henford she would have Wally and her older cousins, who had all gone through life in similar circumstances. There, Violette would be free of the stigma of her unwed parents or the decision every minute of every day as to where she should sit on the bus or which water fountain to drink from.

When Zelda truly tried to picture her life in England, one thought continued to haunt her mind: Antoine. She knew that she couldn’t leave him there, alone in the club without his daughter, just as she knew he would never go with her.

But as the boat sailed further out to sea, she only became more aware of how distant he had become. For years she had tried to deny it, but Zelda knew that he had been lying to her: lying about the state of the club and where his money was coming from. He was unwilling to plan for the future or even acknowledge the slow decay of their home all around them.

Then in the moment when she needed him most, he had turned inward and offered only his own guilt and trauma. Zelda knew that it was in part who he was, to remain seemingly unbreakable in the face of so much; but she felt like less and less of his partner, and more and more vulnerable to the ever changing tides of the world without his honesty or support.

Yet as England drew closer, the prospect of a life there seemed even more hollow, the way it had after her father and sister died. It had been impossible not to think of Rosella on this voyage, to wonder if she perhaps sailed over where her body rested. It kept her awake at night, picturing the shards of fine China and wrought iron at the bottom of the sea, slowly breaking into ever smaller pieces as the salt and waves claimed them as their own.

But what Zelda was truly the most afraid of was what she knew she would find in England: her sister’s room, her father’s grave, and most unavoidably of all, her mother on her deathbed. She sailed to England to face the same pain that she had left to avoid, and she didn’t know if she could handle it, or if she would run again.

(As a little note for all you lovelies, when you see a 🎶 at the beginning of a post, it means that you can click on it for musical ~vibes~ to accompany the story. My many, many thanks to the marvelous @theplottdump for inspiring this idea. Anne’s legacy is all the vibes and I cannot recommend it enough).

[blueiight]

Its very interesting how Jacob compared Louis in E13 to the businessman of the 1910s “with a new shine”, aka the Louis that asked Lestat to buy the Fair Play, and whats universally regarded by fandom as the “happy days” of Loustat pre-Claudia. I’d like to ask ppl to refer also to the podcast where Jacob said “Louis grew up in New Orleans in an affluent Black Creole family - his family was on the wrong side of that history [as the oxymoronic free-Black slaveowners] and Louis was born on the wrong side of Jim Crow” [born in the wrong time to profit from the class he was born into.. until he’s made immortal] and ties that directly in with this idea of “Paris [being] a utopia for a Black American, so long as you are exceptional” mentioned both by Jacob the actor and Louis the character in E9. These aspects of Louis pre-date his turning, and a “new shine” on old careerism, especially as he’s faced with the prospect of true separation from Claudia, is a far more interesting approach.

[elix8r]

The Frat Diaries Glossary (heads up: I realized while writing that i’m using a lot of lingo that not everyone might be familiar so this should help you out with understanding everything and the story will make more sense esp if you’re not already familiar with Greek life and also this is all based on my personal experiences so it might be different at each school):

Rush: a process where prospective sorority and fraternity members and the actual sororities and fraternities meet each other and through this they pick out the people that they want in their organization. Sorority rush (recruitment) is much more of an organized event where PNMs come weeks before school actually start to rush. They have specified schedules that let them know which sororities to meet. This process is so intricate lmao I literally thought I was dying when I went through it cause everyday I had to wake up at like 5am to get ready and got back to my dorm at like 8pm. Each day the amount of sororities you can get back lessen until the last day where you are left with your top two and you choose from there. Fraternity rush is much more of a laidback event that also happens before school starts. Fraternity rush is more about who you know and connections. Many start inviting potential members over the summer to their houses to see if they vibe well with everyone else. Then during the official week of rush, frats will hold events or dinners that are invite only and from there they narrow their choices before handing out bids. 

PNM: potential new member 

Pledge: A non-initiated member of a fraternity. He isn’t considered a full-fledged member and this is usually where the “hazing” happens and a good chunk of them are first years

Chapter: a weekly mandatory meeting held at the sorority house where members come and learn about upcoming events and etc.

Initiation: a very very secretive ceremony that is different for every organization but this is where the new members are officially indoctrinated into being a member of the sorority or fraternity. It’s usually really formal (almost cult-like with coordinated dress code, usually long white dresses) and a big deal. 

Bid: the official invitation you receive from the sorority or fraternity to join them 

Bid day: an important day at the end of rush week where new members run home (sometimes literally) and the sororities throw huge celebrations to celebrate the new members that have received a bid from them 

GBig/Big/little: a big is usually an older member of your organization that is a mentor figure that basically takes you under their wing and helps you adjust to your life in Greek. While not always, these relationships are usually one that develops to an actual older sister/younger sister situation. Your GBig would be the big of your big and all together you would refer to everyone in your group as a family and the little would be the new member

Tailgate: pre-game for a big sports game and it usually involves lots of day drinking, barbecuing, yard games, and socializing 

Darty: day-party

Formal/Semi-formal: kinda like college prom for fraternities and sororities. Usually held in like some city (New Orleans) or a special place and it’s really fun as you’re probably gonna be drunk at it

Game day pin/stickers: Im not sure that this is a thing outside of the South but because it is a thing everyone has on gamedays i’m going to add it. It’s like pins or stickers that usually showcases your sorority’s support for your school. Pins are worn by the members (and maybe parents or significant others as they aren’t handed out in bulks like the stickers are so if you see someone who isn’t in that sorority wearing a pin, then they probably have a close relationship with whoever gave it to them) and stickers are put on just anyone who wants one. Click this link for some examples. 

Letters: the Greek letters for you fraternity or sorority. For example the two main organizations in this story is Epsilon Nu (EN) and Alpha Epsilon Sigma (AEΣ). Many Greek members will be seen sporting their letters on their shirts, hats, computers, backpacks, water bottles, etc.

Dues: how much you pay the organization and it usually covers the cost for the house, meals, membership, etc. 

Date Party/Socials/Mixer: social events that usually have a theme or is held with other fraternities. I’ve been to like My-tie, ski lodge, Hawaiian luau, country-club, etc and they’re just a real fun time to socialize and spend time with your fellow sisters

Philanthropy: Usually each organization has a specific charity or awareness they raise money for (ZTA raises breast cancer awareness and Tri-Delt raises money for St. Jude) and there will also be drives or events held to raise money or volunteer

Executive Board: aka exec is the leadership council for your organization. For example: President, VP of Recruitment, Standards chair, etc.

Standards: This is like HR or risk management. This is the board that makes sure the girls follow rules and policies and if they don’t, then you will be called to standards and given consequences based on what you did wrong. Example: I got fined for talking to a PNM who was a friend of mine outside of rush during recruitment week.

Author’s Note: I might add more as I write but seriously if you have any questions do not hesitate to send them my way and i will be more than happy to do my best to try to explain things further also I have made my mind to further expand this universe and create stories with some of the other members! so look out for those in the near future! 

[leslutdepointedulac]

The phone rings. Armand heads over to the table that sits against the wall in the living room to answer it. It’s still fairly early in the night, only around 10pm, so it strikes him as odd that someone should want to call him so soon into the night. 

When he picks up the phone, there’s no answer on the other end. He waits for a moment, thinking the other person will say something, but there’s nothing. All he can hear is what sounds like someone trying to control their breathing, as if they’re attempting to hold back their emotions. 

“Who is this?” Armand’s tone is impatient; he doesn’t have the tolerance for someone calling the wrong number, or prank callers. “If you’re not going to say anything, I’m hanging up. I’m not wasting my time with this.” He goes to put the phone down after another second or so of silence, when suddenly he hears a voice on the other end. 

“Armand?” 

The phone goes back to his ear. “Yes?” After turning it over in his mind, the owner of the voice registers. “Lestat?” His mind races. Lestat. But shouldn’t he be in his coma? When did he come back to the waking world? “Lestat, you’re awake. When did you come out of it?” His own voice is hushed, as if speaking any louder will rouse him from what is surely a dream, his heart thuds in his chest at the prospect that maybe this is actually real. 

“I’m here, Armand.” Lestat responds, equally as quiet, almost as though he were able to read his mind all the way from New Orleans. “There’s something I need to tell you.” He doesn’t answer Armand’s question, instead jumping straight to the point of his call - which apparently isn’t to tell him that he’s awake and well. 

Armand lets it slide. He would press Lestat to answer but judging by his tone, whatever it is he has to tell him is rather urgent. “What is it?” 

“It’s. . .” Lestat trails off and Armand swears he can hear him take a shaky inhale from the other end. “Something’s happened.” 

Armand’s expression turns serious. Normally, he would chalk something like this up as one of Lestat’s adventures gone wrong, but considering his recent condition, that’s clearly not the case. Whatever it is, it doesn’t sound good. “Tell me what’s happened.” 

“It’s Louis.” 

[The Long Road A03]

[rimouskis]

rimouskis's 10 observations: betting on losing dogs and the swampening of ppg paints arena

after a foiled attempt to attend a NoA in 2019 (which sounds more nefarious than the truth of the matter [I am deeply too much of a coward to go to one of these alone]), Lo, Hark, I made it, baby. in an attempt to convey the experience, which was wonderful, I am doing a drive-by robbery of our favorite game recaps and stealing the format for my nefarious purposes (sharing photos and memories).

come, come, join me:

01. PPG Paints Arena Gets Shrek'd

I can now say I have been greeted at the arena doors by a juggler. that was the first surprise of many that night. the whole joint was honestly really impressively decorated. the event took place entirely on the first floor concourse, and even the bars were decorated to look vaguely new-orleans-y.

special lanterns and decorations were strung across the ceilings; there were enormous french-quarter-esque pillars erected in the halls; there was a fortune teller house with actors inside waving their arms very mysteriously over illuminated crystal balls; there was a woman gliding through the crowd with a skirt made out of servable and drinkable champagne flutes; there were people made out of disco balls wandering around; they flew a band in from new orleans to provide live music; mood lighting GALORE [more on this later].

I was super impressed. you can only do so much with an arena, and especially an arena concourse. they sunk serious time, effort, and undoubtedly money into transforming the arena into a gorgeous louisiana swampland. it was just so cool to see and worth gawking at.

02. Held Captive in the F.N.B Club

@ehghtyseven and I arrived almost-promptly a few minutes after 7. we were between a rock and a hard place: we wanted to take advantage of all the time we could, but also didn't want to be the first ones in. clearly there was nothing to worry about, though, because crowds were already moving through the gates. that was a balm to both of us, as we were kind of worried it'd be an intimate evening and I'd be forced to make smalltalk with penguins right and left.

("So, uh, what do you do?" sid would ask. I would stare at him, unsure how to explain the banalities of corporate life. I would walk away. He would be offput.)

we walked inside and immediately I got effusive compliments on both my shoes and my earrings. ah, I thought to myself, even the arena employees are in on it. they know how to butter up prospective donors to spend more money at charity events. but, in their defense: my shoes and earrings were both great, haha. we were handed some complimentary penguins-branded casino chips and sent on our merry way.

it was then that we went rogue. semi-accidentally. they weren't really herding us one way or another, you see, and as the night had only just begun, it wasn't too crowded yet. I looked at wendy. wendy looked at me. we mutually agreed that we should get a lay of the land. off we set.

we wandered around the concourse and looked at all the stations, abandoned and with signs saying play would begin at 8. we then ducked into the captain morgan club (which is one of the two clubs at the arena that normally are limited to ticketholders for those seats) to take a peek. it was made even more pirate-y than usual, I can only assume, and we got in line for drinks. the line did not move. (the poor folks staffing the bar needed reinforcements). we decided to keep moving and looped around the other half of the concourse to try our luck at the F.N.B. club. somehow that line was worse? penguins, please give more of your bartenders overtime to work charity events?

eh, we thought, we'll just keep walking around.

nope. no can do. they were herding us into the clubs like heifers in a cow chute. and, in fact, something dire was about to befall us:

03. The Penguin Parade

have you ever had a bunch of famous/famous-ish people trotted out in front of you like kindergarteners being shepherded across a suburban street? no? let me illustrate it.

iceburgh emerges with a bejeweled new orleans parasol above his head. out come colby and dan. I think colby is, like, roughly four drinks deep. maybe five. he and dan get through a very awkwardly scripted "thank you for giving us money:) please give us more:)" speech and then the processional of penguins begins.

they're announced in ascending numerical order, which of course leaves sid for last (no three years superleague will win geno that honor here). they all wander out and stare up into the stands, where we donors look down upon them like emperors at bloodied gladiators in the coliseum. I hold out my thumb and point down, signaling my displeasure. sid is immediately taken out back and s—

no no I'm joking. we all clap and woooo at them. geno spins in circles as he enters so he can wave at everyone, but he does it in a way that feels DISTINCTLY put-upon and tired. you know how some pets absolutely know they're being made fun of when you put stupid outfits on them? how they'll give you that deadpan look that says "I know what you are doing to me, it is cruel, but I have no choice but to weather it" ?

geno was that pet. long-suffering, exhausted, wants to go aggressively smack a card table instead of wander about in his special special jersey.

one of the new owners (from FSG) gets up to say some words. he's a horrendous speaker, so I retain none of it, but I suppose if you're a billionaire you don't need to be eloquent or engaging. #eattherich. he tells everyone what some of the various players will be doing tonight around the concourse, and he throws in a very weak joke when he gets to explaining how geno will be manning one of the blackjack tables.

"and geno," this offensively wealthy man says, "try to keep it PG tonight."

I desperately, painfully wish I had a photo of the expression geno made. with the jumbotron camera trained on him, geno gives this man the most DISDAINFUL FROWN I have seen on his face. ever. he was NOT IMPRESSED. this man was NOT FUNNY. geno is a WORKING CLASS, BLUE COLLAR MAN and will not stand for billionaires saying he has to keep it family-friendly at a 21-and-up event! viva la revolución, baby.

sid, meanwhile, is making goo-goo eyes at jeff and giggling all over the place. also a few drinks deep, methinks. after a bit, the players are mercifully released from the grasp of the arena lights and flee back into the locker room, likely to take a few more shots to get ready to mingle for two hours straight.

we, the unmerciful coliseum audience, are freed from our club.

it's time to party.

04. Dan the Man

wendy and I made a break for it, finally let loose from our enclosure. we darted away and moved past some evil looking betting game being set up [more on that later], through a section of food that we couldn't eat [more on THAT later], and finally took up our posts at a cocktail table to get our bearings.

this was when we realized we'd put ourselves right by the elevators.

there were VIPs in attendance; they were schmoozing in the actual club seats a level above us for an hour before we plebeians were let inside. they began spilling out of the elevators in their evening gowns and suits, and wendy realized there were penguins among them.

we watched jason run off, and then drew, and then others. they scattered to the wind to their assigned games for the night. we tittered and surreptitiously watched. I complimented two different women's outfits (#girlpower #girlsgirl). we turned and realized dan and colby were posted up at the bar behind us.

dan caught us looking. wendy waved; dan waved back. thus our interaction blossomed.

when we went over to talk to him, he was incredibly nice and NOT very trickster godlike. he's miles-less confusing when he's not asking interview questions. and he's incredibly personable! he tried to get us excited to see connor mcdavid, though, which is something an evil trickster god would attempt at an event with sidney crosby in attendance. so perhaps I can be convinced after all.

05. FRENEMIES: Craps Edition

that evil betting game? yeah, that's craps. shitty name for a game, if you ask me. the last time I was in a casino, I was 16 (don't ask) so I had no idea what was going on. nonetheless, when we heard loud voices, we were drawn close like moths to a flame.

that flame was the not-so-dulcet tones of one mr. jason zucker and one mr. bryan rust. these two goofballs were "running" the craps table, by which I mean jason had been armed with the dice stick and they were being heavily coached by who I could only assume was an employee from rivers casino, lol.

it made me feel a little better that said employee was gently cajoling some people on the other side of the table. "you ready to play yet? got it figured out?" he asked. no, man. no one gets this without a 15-step breakdown. stop making me do math. why does this board say COME in huge red letters? what the fuck is a COME bet? what the fuck is a DON'T COME bet? is this a sex game? why are jason and rusty hosting a sex game?

here's jason catching me sneaking a photo of him hosting a sex game. my middle name is subtlety.

06. A Crisis of Sexuality and Chutzpah

I'm a seasoned penguins-watcher, okay? I've lived here for years, I've been to more games and practices than I can count, I've held doors for them in restaurants and walked past them in bars, and I like to pretend I have a scrap or two of composure about interacting with the players.

ha ha. hoo. wa ha ha.

so, that sid guy, right? crazy. he's, like, just some guy. just a dude. just a funky little guy.

he's also the most handsome man I've ever laid eyes on.

I can't quite articulate what my brain did when we came upon sid's Wheel O' Fun, which he was manning alone the first time we swung by (the second time jake had joined him after being freed from his shift at the milkshake factory making jake shakes [like for real]).

he was all smiles and was working the crowd (and there WAS a huge crowd around him) effortlessly. he'd lean in across his Protective Barrier of Folding Tables and take photos with folks between spins. as the night went on he'd even place people's bets for them as the crowd grew deeper. he was furiously chomping on a piece of gum the entire time (his masseter muscles have to be unbelievable).

what really threw me is that he isn't a big guy. he doesn't come off as large at all. objectively I know he's sturdy, but... those hockey pads and oversized jerseys really help you overestimate their size.

he was a crowd favorite for good reason. funny, was a good sport the whole evening, engaging and friendly, has a well-deserved air of confidence about him. he's got chutzpah. I, uh, didn't talk to him though. if he looked in my direction I immediately became preoccupied with something very important elsewhere, like a nearby woman's hat or which chips I was placing on the table. I couldn't handle it, I'm so sorry. he's really beautiful. ugh. who am I. is this what I'm reduced to. what siren song does he sing that enraptures me so. what's wrong with me. what's wrong with him.

weirdo. ugh. <3

07. PPG Paints is for Carnivorous Beasts Only

listen I don't know what I expected when the theme of the night was mardi gras. like, what about new orleans cuisine screams "vegetarian"? nothing! so I was not surprised when the food selections were everything from shrimp gumbo to jambalaya (chicken) to ALLIGATOR (!!!!) and nary a vegetarian option in sight.

disappointed but not surprised! I did have a few tiny beignets (good) and a slice of king cake (meh) but I was mostly running on the poptart I'd eaten before the event, lmao.

this is not new with the arena; ever since The Yard's arena location closed, vegetarian dining has been dire there for games. their pizza is bad, don't get it. in fact, next time you come to a game, don't get arena food. do yourself the service of eating beforehand. emporio never fails and if you need to be closer, go to moonlit burgers. up your game, ppg paints!

also since I had, like, one RC cola all night and not a drop of alcohol, I probably didn't recoup the cost of my ticket lol. dear pens offer me a discount next time I'M A CHEAP DATE I PROMISE

08. Evgeni Malkin's Blackjack Table

I had quietly made a rule for myself.

if I was committing financially to this event, if I was going to the trouble and stretching my budget and going all in, I had to go all in.

I had to play at evgeni malkin's blackjack table. I just had to. there was no way I couldn't. we came upon his table for the second time that night and posted up at a corner to watch, just like we had the first time we passed him. I eyed the players and waited for someone to give up a seat as I tried to remember the details of the "How to Play Blackjack" youtube tutorial I'd watched an hour earlier.

(I remembered, like, two rules. memory bad + star struck = bad combo).

the thing about geno, you see, is that he's a performer at heart. the drama? that's just him, doll. that's his personality. he was a dramatic dealer. he pretended to steal chips. he was LIGHTNING QUICK at mental math. he'd slap down a card and immediately move through with confidence. probably a solid 30% of it was unfounded, but it came off as both professional and intense... and still approachable, because he was being a little intentionally goofy.

he was also directly under one of the colored light beams they had set up in mardi gras colors around the arena. listen, learn some color theory with me: yellow light is SHIT for seeing colors. poor geno couldn't tell one chip from the next and kept having to squint at them to figure out what was up. it played into the goofiness very well. he rolled with it.

he kept a very good energy at the table. all the attendees were getting a kick out of him and the game, and geno ran it as a proper game. he'd reward you if you won, but he'd take your chips if you lost. his huge hands moved the cards clumsily. he sometimes threw them at people. y'know. Just Geno Things.

a chair freed up. I hesitated. someone else sat down. fuck. I continued my vigilant watch. I needed to do this, I reminded myself. I'd never forgive myself if I went to NoA and didn't play at geno's table. WHO DOES THAT? not me. no way.

a second chair freed up. I pounced.

I was in.

and, fuck, now I had to remember how to play blackjack.

he dealt me my first card. I looked at it with a healthy mixture of fear and curiosity. he dealt me my second card. I added them together. I tried to figure out if I should ask for more cards. sure, why not?

wrong. I went over 21. bust. I lose. I've just lost in front of evgeni malkin. that is the correct way of the world, I SHOULD in fact lose in front of (and to) evgeni malkin, but I couldn't go out like that. no way. I stayed put in my seat. deal me more cards, dealer. I have something to prove.

he was also kind of sweet, because I was absolutely the only person under 30, if not under 40, at this table, and I think they could smell my inexperience lol. he sort of nodded at me to make a move the next round and keep adding cards. I heeded it. people at the table started making noise. something was happening. I didn't really know what, but there was excitement in the air. I "held" instead of "hit" when it felt right. geno continued on. the man next to me had a bust. geno did something with his own cards, and WOW!

I won the round!

people literally congratulated me. it was deeply undeserved. I didn't know what the hell I was doing. even in retrospect I don't know what I did. but whatever it was was good, and I earned my first chip. hallelu!

I'm not a betting gal, but I know that you cash out when you're up. on that high note, I got up and took my leave. I'd done it. I'd played at geno's table. I'd WON at geno's table. the world was my oyster etc.

so, here is me [just out of frame] getting a smile out of geno as he nudges me along at blackjack <3

[photo credit to wendy <3]

09. America's Sweetheart, Brian Dumoulin

the night was winding down, and wendy had been very conservative with her chips, whereas I'd blown through mine [this is why I don't gamble, kids]. we need to find a table, I told her. we had bets to make!

and, serendipitously, dumo was hanging out at a somewhat poorly-attended table at that very moment.

dumo was so great. he lacked any of the confidence geno had at blackjack but more than made up for it with his sweet easygoing conversation and a truly great smile. he was CHARMING. like, I genuinely felt he was interested in talking to attendees and having a good time. the vibes were fabulous. I know I've been a little harsh on him hockey-wise this season, but wow, the babygirl truthers got me with this one. he's a goddamn sweetheart. long live dumo, who winced every time he beat you at blackjack.

10. Kris Letang's School for Beautiful Women

after exhausting our chips, saying farewell to dumo, and watching geno get dragged by security with a firm grip on his arm away from fans wanting photos as soon as the clock struck 10 [the official end of the event, because geno is a union man who doesn't work overtime], we wandered the slowly-deserting halls.

geno may have been dragged away, and sid may have been gone from his post, but kris? oh, buddy, you were NOT dragging him from his blackjack table. no sir. he had games to win, you see, and judgemental faces to make at his players, and women to charm.

so, so many women.

his table had a higher ratio of women to men than I'd seen at any other, lol. and they were all having a BALL as he was holding court. he raked one high better over the coals with pleasure as he took her chips. you can be the most beautiful woman in the arena, but kris letang will be more beautiful and will beat you at blackjack.

he was clearly great entertainment, as both kappy and POJ came to watch him work. (and to fetch him drinks). he, as all the boys, honestly, was an excellent schmoozer. they're very good at this. I think they know they work in professional entertainment. I didn't have a bad or sideways interaction all night.

it was a fabulous night. I had so much fun. the penguins did a wonderful job, the players were all lovely, and I also won a signed jersey, so hey, everyone was a winner.

brava, fellas. make sure to pay geno overtime for his post-10 o'clock photo ops.

[pynkhues]

i cannot even begin to tell you how much i’m looking forward to your next iwtv fic. to your beacon in the gloom has been living rent free in my head ever since you posted it….. the prospect of a 25k!!!!! loustat fic from you makes me feel like i’m going to explode with excitement

Ahhh, thanks, anon! You're all so sweet! Hopefully it'll live up to the expectations. Have a little excerpt ;-)

-

“Got quite an audience out there already,” he says, and when Lestat glances back at him, a question in his look, Louis tilts his head back out towards the hallway, gesturing to where the groupies linger out of sight on the other side of the door, and okay, here’s the thing:

They’d decided this current stasis – this period of being intimate, often, but not necessarily together – would continue until the last note sounded on Lestat’s current tour, at which point the stage lights would dim and the light at a house back down in New Orleans could flicker on. A vow to be renewed, a home to be remade, a bed, Louis had said when they’d agreed, wry smile on his lips as Lestat’s eyes danced, to be broken in. In theory, it had offered them a window of time that would allow them both to get certain indiscretions out of their system before they tried their hand at monogamy again, but the reality had proven - - complicated.

After all, the result of the agreement had felt to both an effective engagement, and combined with the fact that they’d been fucking more than they hadn’t lately while still both, separately, dabbling in the company of pliant and reverent strangers, had resulted in more sore feelings and spikes of jealousy than either seemed willing to admit.

Still, Louis reminds himself, this is what they had decided for this brief chapter in their story, and he is trying to be okay with it.

“Any of them worthy of your time tonight?” he asks, echoing Lestat’s earlier words back at him, because he’s curious, yes, but also, perhaps, because it means he won’t ask about the other thing that Lestat’s been doing tonight. In the mirror, Louis can see Lestat’s lips twitch into a smile, but he covers it quickly (tries to, at least), turning slowly around to take Louis in. The run of his gaze envelopes Louis like a hot bath, Lestat’s desire always something desperate to swallow.

“Bright eyed innocents and sweet-talking sycophants,” Lestat says, voice rolling out towards Louis as he places his liquid liner pen back onto the surface of the vanity. “It’s sweet for a moment, but moments are fleeting. How could they be worthy when you are here tonight? Endless in your beauty, my Saint Louis, they should glaze your image in church windows to bring the faithless back to worship, the devil himself would crawl out of his bed in hell to pay penance in your glow.”

And it ain’t right, the effect Lestat’s blasphemous tongue has on him, the heat it sends to the holy thing between his legs, and Louis wets his lips, feels Lestat’s gaze drop to his mouth, and makes a point to roll his eyes in Lestat’s direction. It serves as an invitation, like they both knew it would – there’s nothing Lestat likes more than proving his devotion when Louis flirts with skepticism.  

“Careful, keep talkin’ like that the devil might come lookin’,” Louis drawls, voice lower than he means as Lestat starts to slink into his space.

“You don’t believe me?” Lestat asks, nimble fingers hooking instantly in the waistband of Louis’ pants and here, this close, Louis can smell him – the honeyed sweetness of his shampoo, the faint smell of blood (too faint, has he fed tonight? Has he had the time to?), that thing underneath it, soft as an iris in bloom, that’s somehow just him. Lestat leans in close, eyes somehow bluer now that they’re rimmed in sparkling eyeliner, gaze dipping to Louis’ parted lips. “Comment un homme peut-il prouver au divin qu’il est un vrai croyant?” 

And with that, he kisses him again, the rest of the world slipping away, and Louis cups his cheek, traces his fingers over the line of his cheekbone, the skin rougher than it should be from the glitter, as Lestat slips his tongue into his mouth. It’s over too quick, Lestat pulling away just to drop to his knees, and Lestat’s working on the buttons on Louis’ slacks before Louis’ brain can catch up.

“That a good idea?” he asks, because shit, now? He can already feel the vibrations through the floor of the support act starting to play, but Lestat looks up at him through the fan of his lashes, mouth open and eyes wide, and Louis thinks actually, maybe it’s a great idea.