#Some Evil Time with eye shines - more ''encouragement'' probably from early on

[sysig]

Self-contradictory (Patreon)

[jimblejamblewritings]

de fragee prutia | part 2.

Summary: Welcome to the world of Descendants but with a slight twist. (Y/N) is the daughter of Prince Naveen and Princess Tiana. Being girlfriend to Ben and a royal herself, (Y/N) encourages Ben to bring over some kids from the Isle. Will she be putting everything she loves to the test with this idea? Will she and Ben survive or will she meet someone else along the way?

Pairing: Ben x reader

Word Count: 6.6k

Warnings: none

Previous Part | (Series Masterlist)

“Are we sure we can we really do this? To (Y/N)?” Carlos asked.

They were in the dorms’ basement kitchen that was available for late night snacks. Mal had found a recipe for love potion cookies.

“No, we are not but do we have a choice?”

“We need a tear. A real, sad one.”

“Let’s just get (Y/N) down here and tell her what’s about to happen.”

“CARLOS! We have no choice! Can you think of another way to get the wand that wouldn’t hurt her because I’d love to hear it!”

Carlos fell silent because he knew he had nothing. This was the only way.

“Okay, so let’s chop up an onion and get you a tear.”

“We need a tear of human sadness. This potion’s the best reviewed. We’re following it exactly.”

“A tear’s a tear.” Jay chimed in.

“Actually, no.” Evie handed Mal the bag of flour. “They both have antibodies and enzymes but an emotional tear has more protein-based hormones than a reflex.”

“Well, look at you.”

Evie smiled proud of herself. Just then, Lonnie strolled in looking for a late night snack. The kids scrambled to hide Mal’s spell book under the egg carton.

“Oh hey guys. Mal, all the girls want you to do their hair! Midnight snack, too?” Lonnie looked at the bowl of cookie dough. She stuck a finger in to grab a bite before the VKs could stop her. Jay took this as his opportunity to try and flirt with her.

“Hey, there.”

“Umm, hi?”

“Do you think it’s missing something?” Mal asked Lonnie.

“Could use some chips?”

“Chips?”

“Chips. Like chocolate chips. Like your mothers would make when you were feeling down about the world?” Lonnie couldn’t help but shed a tear as she realized they didn’t have it easy on the Isle. Mal quickly wiped her tear and plopped it in the batter.

“We’ll be fine Lonnie, thanks for stopping by. Don’t forget your snack! Evil Dreams.”

“Oop, almost forgot. Thanks. See you guys tomorrow. Don’t stay up too late.” And with that Lonnie left the four to finish making the love potion cookies.

(Y/N POV)

“Hey guys!” You run up to everyone crowded around Mal’s locker and by virtue your locker that was right next to her’s.

“Look, Mal made these.” Ben said holding up a cookie and taking a bite.

You snatched the cookie out of Ben’s hand. You were about to take a bite when the VKs stopped you. “Do these have walnuts?”

“Yes!” Mal rushed out, “I mean, Ben told me about your allergy but I completely forgot when making them.”

“Oh well, maybe next time.”

“Haha, yeah, maybe. That’s too bad. I’ll take that back now.”

Mal practically ripped the cookie from your hand. You marveled at that girl’s reflexes. Beside you, Ben started coughing.

“Faldi Faldonza! Ben are you alright?”

Jay came up behind him, “How you feeling, bro?”

Ben stopped coughing and looked around at everyone before settling on Mal and the cookies. “Mal, have you always had those gold flecks in your eyes?”

His comment made you look closer. Ben was the more observant of you two, something he got from Belle. The sun shining down brought out some gold in Mal’s green eyes.

“Huh, you’re right. She does. I’ll see you at the game. Gotta head down to the field early for practice!” You reach in between Ben and Mal to grab your poms from your locker. You quickly gave Mal a side hug and kissed Ben on the cheek— one he didn’t return, probably payback from the cafeteria incident.

“Kill the game tonight, Amandi. You too Jay and Carlos.” You ran to the field for cheer.

~~~~~

The game ended with Auradon winning. The Falcons were a good team, it was honestly neck and neck until the brilliant final play by Carlos and Jay. The whole tourney team was celebrating when Ben grabbed the mic from the MC.

“Everyone. I’ve got a special announcement to make. For my girl out there. Did I mention I’m in love with you? Hit it Doug!”

Out of nowhere the band started to play some music. Ben’s routine started out cute and goofy with the rest of the tourney team slowly joining in. You hid your face with your poms. It’s not like you and Ben ever hid anything but you weren’t the one to be so public with your relationship. Yet, here he was being very, very public with it. The cheer squad decided it would be fun to join and they were all gushing with you as you guys performed your halftime routine on the sidelines in time to Ben’s song.

(Third Person POV)

“My love is R-I-D-I-C-U-L-O-U-S!” Ben sang.

“R-I-D-I-C-U-L-O-U-S!” (Y/N) screamed louder than anyone else. The VKs weren’t paying attention to Ben but to her. This wasn’t going to end well and they knew it.

All of a sudden, Ben jumped into the crowded bleachers during a music break in the song. The VKs watched the look of confusion settle over (Y/N)’s face as Ben made his way to Mal.

“And I would give my kingdom for just one kiss!” He finished singing as he grabbed Mal by the waist. “Mal would you go to coronation with me?”

Mal couldn’t answer him right away. She was too focused on (Y/N). So were Evie, Carlos, and Jay. They watched as (Y/N) shook her head, tears starting to stream down her face before she ran off the field.

“Well, Mal? Will you go with me?”

“Yes!”

“She said yes!” Ben and everyone else cheered.

(Y/N POV)

“She said yes!”

You heard Ben scream into the mic as you ran away towards the locker room. You were hyperventilating, partly from the running and partly from trying to hold back tears. You were confused. This was something you never saw coming. Did it happen while you were gone visiting The Great Wall with Lonnie as she assisted you on your diplomacy trip? Ben could’ve at least told you but you thought everything was just fine.

“(Y/N)?” one of the girls from the squad called out. The whole squad came running in.

“I’m fine. I’m good. See you at practice tomorrow.”

“Oh…okay.”

You shoved your poms in your duffle bag as quickly as possible and made an attempt to scurry out of there. This wasn’t something you wanted to deal with right now. The squad didn’t need to see you weak. On your way out, you caught Audrey giving you a look. It was a mix of sympathy but also a look saying you had this coming.

You were crying on your bedroom floor. You had composed yourself to finally get out of the shower and found yourself back to crying, only now in a fluffy towel. You struggled to remove Ben’s ring from your finger amidst all your tears. Once you did, you threw the ring against the door in anger.

“(Y/N)?”

“Go away, please.”

“It’s us. Are you okay?” You couldn’t recognize the voice but you knew it was different from the first one.

“I don’t know who’s there but I’m fine, you can go now.”

“It’s your gang?” A third voice. Now you knew.

You wrapped your towel tighter and moved to open the door. You wiped your face as the VKs looked at you with sadness.

“I forgot something on our schedule didn’t I? Shit, give me five minutes. I normally have these written down I guess I assumed nothing was happening after the game. I’m so sorry, let me—”

“We came to see if you were okay.” Carlos cut you off.

“I’m fine. If that’s it then you guys can go I’m good.”

“Are you sure you’re okay? Like really—”

“NO! What do you want me to say Jay?! Oh no I’m doing just great! Everything’s fine. That was so embarrassing. No wait, that’s an understatement. I have never been so humiliated in my life! I don’t want to look at anyone of you right now, especially not the person he PUBLICLY DUMPED ME FOR! Wait I didn’t even get publicly dumped, I wasn’t even given that decency.”

You yelled your head off at them. Your face getting hotter and hotter. They looked down at the floor.

“Faldi Faldonza,” you whispered after you came down from your rage cloud. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t… this isn’t what any of us need right now. I just need some space for a bit. This isn’t about you guys, it’s not your fault. Feelings are feelings. I just… I don’t think I can talk till the weekend’s over. Okay?”

“Yeah. We shouldn’t have come barging in on you so quickly.”

“No, no. That’s what good friends do. I imagine Lonnie and Doug are about to follow in your footsteps.” You tried to joke but it came out rather dry. “I’ll see you all next week okay.”

You hugged each of them.

“Bye, (Y/N).”

“Bye, guys. Hi Lonnie, Doug.” You didn’t think they would show up that quick but there they were on their way in as the VKs were on there way out.

“I brought the cookie dough.” Lonnie held up a tub.

“And I brought the emotional support.” Doug offered.

You tried not to cry knowing that the VKs could still hear. They didn’t need to feel bad about this but the tears started once Lonnie and Doug showed up. They both hugged you.

“Shhh. It’s okay, it’s okay.”

The weekend was not the best to say the least. Lonnie and Doug stayed with you the whole night on Friday. Saturday, you saw Ben kiss Mal at his locker. This led to mascara streaming down your face and you quickly ducking your head into your locker as the VKs gave you pitiful looks. Saturday night you pulled out the tiny spellbook Mama Odie gave you. You weren’t born with magic but thanks to your mom and dad’s short lived time as frogs as well as a magic talking alligator for an uncle, you were magically inclined. So were your brothers TC and James.

You ruffled through the book until you found the page on teleportation back home. You packed an overnight bag and found yourself in a branch of the big tree in your backyard. The tree sat in the middle of a bayou. You shimmied your way out the tree and carefully jumped from stone to stone until you made it to the woods part of the castle grounds.

“What you doing back here, Sormanna? You ain’t got a break. Imma go tell Mama.” (big sister)

“You ain’t gon’ do nothing, TC.” You whisper yelled.

“TC! Who you out there talking to?! What’s going… (Y/N)?”

“Chilo, James.” Your big brother was standing in front of you. (Hello, James)

“What you doin’ back here?”

“What you doin’? You should be at college right now.”

“Okay. Fair. But why are you here? Huh, Manni? You don’t come back unless it’s a real break. Mama and Padri know you back?” (sis/dad)

“No. And can we keep it that way plaifavo?” (please)

You hadn’t planned on running into anyone. You just wanted to be away from Auradon for the day. You were going to go to bed in your own room, maybe bribe the servants to keep quiet and sneak you breakfast, spend Sunday outside in the capital city and then return home that night for school in the morning. You certainly hadn’t planned on telling anyone what happened with you and Ben.

“Mi vais botter el culcay.” James said. (Imma kick his ass.)

You, him, and TC were skipping stones across the Bayou. They kept good on their promise to not tell anyone you were here.

“You ain’t doing no such thing.”

“Fine. But you know your manno’s got you, right?” (brother)

“Yeah, I know.” You gave James a hug.

“So does that mean I can’t kick his culcay either.”

“Man, TC, you shouldn’t even be saying that word.” James said as he pulled TC into the hug.

~~~~~~~~~

You were back in your bed at school. Spending yesterday with James and TC was exactly what you needed. Aside from breaks, the three of you didn’t spend much time with each other anymore. You all went to the same school in Maldonia for a bit. But then James went to a school in Camelot Heights and then graduated early and moved on to college. You became the new kid at Auradon and TC, as the baby of the trio, was left in Maldonia.

You shoved whatever you needed into your backpack and put on one of your smaller, simple tiaras. You didn’t really wear any of your crowns on school days, unless it was a special event, but to face the day you felt like you needed extra encouragement today.

“Hey, you good?” Lonnie asked as you sat down next to her for history.

“Yep, Lonnie. I’m doing just fine.”

“You haven’t had to be around them today have you?”

“No. Today is just a quiet day. School, practice, dorm. That’s it.”

What you didn’t tell Lonnie was that you were taking Evie crown shopping during lunch and that’s why you had to rush Evie onto the bus when you saw Lonnie passing by. It still hurt to see all the VKs and Ben together but you figured you could start with Evie and work your way back to the big group. You handed Evie a tangerine once the bus pulled off. The two of you peeled and ate tangerines in silence as the bus drove. When it stopped, you and Evie, jumped off and headed into the boutique.

“I got my first tiaras in Maldonia but we can’t make that trip and be back for your class. But Ben…Benjamin took me here for my first Auradon crown, so here we are.”

“Thank you so much, (Y/N).”  

You and Evie tried on dozens of crowns. She had your old one but you felt a true starter pack was three tiaras so you were looking for two more, one silver and one gold.

“Not that one! It screams Charming.”

Evie quickly set down the big silver crown with pearls. “I want nothing to do with Chad Charming. Especially not a crown. You know he tried to get my magic mirror confiscated?”

“Well, I think this one says Grimhilde. Trendy, chic, yet smart.”

Evie laughed as she placed the tiara on her head. You paid for the crowns and you two got on the bus. The tiaras were a gift. You knew Evie and Mal were making money from hair and clothes services for the Auradon kids but they split the money with Carlos and Jay. It was more important they all saved the money they had and not waste it so the crowns were on you. Besides, you offered the shopping trip and Maldonia wasn��t exactly a poor kingdom.

You and Evie were walking up to the campus, arms linked, when you ran into Ben and the other VKs. The awkward tension ran thick. It was a bit overwhelming to say the least.

“Hey, (Y/N).”

“Hi, Jay. Carlos, Mal, Ben.”

You and Evie dropped arms. You handed Evie her shopping bag and started to walk off.

“Wait, (Y/N). Do you want to join us for dinner Thursday?”

All five of them? You were going to have to get over it sooner or later. Going to dinner would feel like ripping off a band-aid, guess this process was starting sooner rather than later.

“Yeah, sounds good. I will write that down right now.”

You pulled out your phone to mark it in your calendar. Your heart dropped as a reminder popped up. You must have had a look on your face, because Jay grabbed your arm.

“Huh? Thursday, right. See you then. Well, I’ll see you in class but dinner okay, bye.”

(Third Person POV)

“What was that about?” Mal hesitated to ask.

“A reminder for Ben’s birthday on Thursday and we just asked her to look and talk to him for a whole lunch hour.”

The VKs were hoping that maybe they got it wrong, that (Y/N) didn’t care about Ben but it was becoming painfully obvious how right they were.

~~

(Y/N POV)

“Isn’t that right, (Y/N)? (Y/N)?!” Carlos called your name.

“Huh?!” You looked up from your work at the table. You guys were sitting outside at one of the picnic benches.

“Sorry guys, New Orleans paperwork. They’re thinking of implementing Maldonian classes into the school curriculum and working their way into becoming a territory, all thanks to Padri…and you guys don’t care.”

“No, no it’s fascinating really. Maldonian, New Orleans territory. We love that stuff.” Jay said sarcastically.

“Chie Pelize,” you muttered under your breath. (So annoying)

“Mi po tambssi parler pluta langues, Prutia.” (I can speak multiple languages too, Princess)

Jay said with a smirk on his face. Your eyes went wide, nobody here but Ben knew Maldonian and even he only knew a few words here and there. You want to wipe the smug look of Jay’s face. You went to put your paperwork in your backpack when you saw the drawstring pouch.

“Right, I almost forgot. Happy birthday, Ben!”

You threw him the drawstring pouch of the rings. You had planned for y'all to wear the rings as couple rings but after the big incident you put all the rings in the pouch. You watched as Ben pulled the rings out of the bag.

“Oh these are really cool, (Y/N). Thanks. It looks like that one old bracelet you had.” There was Ben, always the observer.

“Yeah. That was actually the thing for Audrey, I went to Doc. No biggie.”

“Oh no. I haven’t found anything for you yet. I mean, I had something but it was too romantic considering… I’ll get you something good though, I promise.”

“It’s okay, Ben,” you lied. “Don’t worry about it.”

“Are we missing something?” Mal asked.

“(Y/N) and I are birthday twins.”

“Oh it’s your birthday too?! Well in that case we need cake!”

Mal whipped out her spell book and in no time a cake appeared on the table with ‘Happy Birthday’ written on it. Mal cut out a piece and gave you the first slice. You and the rest of the group ate the cake and talked about everything and nothing.

“(Y/N), do you think you could find a time to show Mal the coronation process?”

“Hmm?”

“I’ve been talking to Fairy Godmother about it and we agreed for Mal to take over the coronation blessing from you.”

“Oh, she doesn’t have to, it’s fine…” Mal interrupted.

“No, Mal it’s cool. You’re the girlfriend. It shouldn’t be too hard. Only took me a week and half to master and I’m magically inclined. You’re magic born, should take you like three days at the most. Don’t worry about not getting it. Besides, you taking this is just one thing off my list as royal advisor so thank you.” You smiled at her.

“Actually, about that… we have a meeting with my parents in the next week or so.”

“About what, Ben? I thought we handled everything, including the budget. There shouldn’t be anything left to do until next month.”

“It’s about transferring some powers, we can talk about this at the meeting.”

“Sorry, Ben, but we really can’t cause I’m not following. Didn’t we already sign the papers. You and your dad signed the transfer of sovereignty last week and Belle and I signed as witnesses.”

“Not my power. But um, Mal as royal advisor.”

“I’m sorry, what? Ben, that’s my job. My literal job.”

“Well, Mal is my girlfriend now so—”

“She is just your girlfriend! Royal advisor has been my position to my parents in Maldonia before I became yours in Auradon. I’m actually still one of the advisors in Maldonia!”

“Royal advisor is just a title before Queen. It traditionally goes to the girlfriend.”

“Hey, Ben, maybe we should just—”

Carlos tried to say something but you grabbed your backpack and stood up.

“That’s such bull Ben! You and Belle picked me as an advisor while you were still with Audrey. It has always been about the job!”

“Audrey was advisor too not just you. She gave it up pretty quickly.”

“Whoa okay, let’s discuss this later maybe?” Jay tried.

“SHE QUIT! That’s why she’s not advisor. She didn’t want a job if it didn’t come with the kingdom. I don’t care about that, Ben! This stress is my life. This is my job! You can add Mal, I’d be happy to show her the ropes but what the hell is this? Removing me from my office?”

“Why are you making this a big deal? What is the problem?”

That got you. Ben couldn’t even understand what he was doing wrong. You rifled through your backpack and found Ben’s ring.

“You know what?! I was going to be nice about this and even give Mal your ring. But you can do it your goddamn self Ben!”

You threw the ring at his chest.

“I can’t do this anymore! Don’t talk to me Ben! You wanna know what’s wrong? Even Audrey didn’t get treated like this? Why can’t you just apologize?!”

“Apologize? For what, because I love Mal?!”

You had nothing. You don’t think you ever heard him say that before. You turned the VKs.

“If you guys want to hang out, just let me know; but I’m not if he’s around. I can’t do this with Ben anymore.”

(Third Person POV)

The VKs didn’t think that argument could have gotten any worse. They watched as (Y/N) collected her stuff. Mal quickly recovered from the shock.

“Jay, Evie go find her. Carlos and I will stay here.”

Evie and Jay were on it, running quickly to catch up with (Y/N).

“(Y/N)! Prutia! Wait, how do you run so fast?!” Jay yelled as he tried to catch up.

“Dammit we lost her. You go that way Jay, I’ll go this way.”

(Y/N) heard Jay and Evie but kept going till she was at the door to her room. Before (Y/N) could open the door, Jay grabbed the doorknob and slammed the door closed again.

“Let me in my room, Jay.”

“Not until you talk to me.”

“Then we’ll be here all night.” (Y/N) tried to push against the door but Jay was stronger than anticipated.

“Talk to me, Prutia.”

“Don’t call me that.”

(Y/N) rolled her eyes. He wasn’t going to let her go. “Okay, fine. Come in.”

“Wicked room.”

“Thanks.”

(Y/N) motioned for him to sit on her bed. She pressed the power button on her electric kettle and got two teacups ready.

“Mal and Carlos are talking to him right now.” Jay said as she was handed a teacup.

“Well they can stop trying, I don’t want to talk to him.”

“You don’t mean that.”

“Right now, Jay, yeah I do. I’m not mad about him and Mal. I’ve said it before, she has nothing to do with this.”

(Y/N) flopped down on her bed, mindful of Jay’s teacup.

“I’m mad that he doesn’t realize he did some things that weren’t right. And that my job matters to me.”

“He’s just not in his right mind.”

“Well, until he gets in his right mind I don’t want to talk to him.” (Y/N) paused. “Will you stay the night? Normally it’s Lonnie and Doug but…”

(Y/N) faltered off. She kept her eyes trained on her teacup. Jay had never seen her appear so broken. (Y/N) was always this head girl in charge. She really cared about her job, it was clear it meant everything to her.

“Yeah, of course I can. I’ll text everyone, let them know where you are and that you’re okay.”

“Tell them they can come over too if they want.” (Y/N) said a little too quickly to not sound desperate.

“Yeah, okay.”

(Y/N) laughed as Jay made himself comfortable in her room.

“What?” he said as he took off his shoes and sprawled out over the bed, resulting in him laying on top of (Y/N).

“Nothing. This is normally just James’ job or Doug if we’re in Auradon.”

“You want me to speak Maldonian? Wear glasses? Would that make it better?”

The two heard a knock at the door. Jay yelled for them to come in. Carlos, Evie, and Mal dogpiled on top of the two. Dude ran up and licked (Y/N)’s face.

“I brought everyone pajamas.”

Evie got up to show. They were nightgowns. Each person had their own signature color with a symbol decal. (Y/N)’s was green with a frog on the right chest and on the back of course, but Evie paid special mind to add blue lily pads around the bottom like Tiana’s blue dress. (Y/N) laughed when she saw even Dude had a tiny nightgown.

“Um, E?” Mal asked, eyeing the hideous things.

“I thought we needed something fun, you know.”

“We are totally wearing the pajamas.”

The VKs, except for Evie, looked at (Y/N) like she sprouted two heads.

“I’m the sad one remember? And the sad one wants the funny pajamas.”

Evie clapped her hands. “It’s settled.”

(Y/N) and the VKs were a tangle of limbs as all five of them tried to fit on the bed. Dude had no problem at the end of the bed, in this moment everyone envied the dog.

“Carlos, if you move your foot one more time, I’m kicking you off the bed.” Mal threatened.

“We should do something fun this weekend,” Evie suggested.

“Um, I actually can’t,” Mal said quietly, “Ben asked me on a date.”

Mal didn’t want to say anything but she figured the truth now was better than an excuse and having (Y/N) find out something later.

“That’s fine. We’ll just do something fun and Mal will have to miss out. We’ll try to have fun for you too.” (Y/N) joked.

“Mmm hmm okay. Goodnight.”

~~

(Third Person POV)

“I can’t do this anymore.”

Mal and the rest of the VKs were in her room. They had left (Y/N) the other day feeling mixed emotions.

“Yeah, we need that wand but not like this.”

“I’m telling Ben at this date. I can’t do this to (Y/N). I didn’t think they’d have an argument.”

“Especially not one that big.”

“Thank you Carlos, really helping me feel better.”

“Okay, let’s get you ready so you and Ben can leave before (Y/N) gets here.” Evie said patting blush on Mal’s cheeks.

As they finished Mal’s makeup, Ben knocked on the door.

“Wow. For the first time, I understand the difference between pretty and beautiful.” Ben said as he saw her.

“Yeah, okay let’s go.” Mal unenthusiastically grabbed his hand and dragged him along.

(Y/N) hid around the corner until they walked away; she had shown up slightly early on accident. (Y/N) knocked on Mal and Evie’s door. The other VKs were still inside.

“Hey, (Y/N).” Jay tried to act cool.

“I already heard. I was right around the corner.”

The three exchanged looks of sadness. It had become apparent that Y/N was not over Ben no matter how cordial she had been.

“I’m fine guys! I’m fine. I said I was taking you out for a picnic. Let’s go!”

Meanwhile at the Enchanted Lake, Ben had set up a picnic for him and Mal. He fed Mal a strawberry, at first she was reluctant but she ate one anyway because he insisted and then discovered she absolutely loved strawberries. Mal looked at Ben’s face, it was full of love— but it shouldn’t have been towards her.

“Ben, I have to tell you something.”

Mal began to explain the whole situation and how bad she felt. But the only thing she could see in Ben’s eyes was love.

“That’s funny, Mal.”

“Oh my gosh, you don’t believe a word I’m saying. You’re still spelled.”

“You’re adorable. Saying I’m sp—”

Mal reached over and kissed Ben. Ben kissed back, holding on to Mal’s waist.

“No! It should’ve worked. True love’s kiss breaks every spell!”

“Is that what that was? True love’s kiss?” Ben kissed her again, this time he had tried to deepen the kiss. It was farther than he and (Y/N) had gone. Mal quickly pulled away.

“I’m going to have to think of something else,” she said to herself. Unspelling Ben would require another potion.

“I’m going for a swim. Care to join?”

“I think I’ll just watch for now.”

Mal flipped through her spellbook as Ben swam. It was hard to find but she found something to undo the love potion. It was in tiny print at the bottom of one of the pages. Of course, her mother wouldn’t want something that could be used for good to have a prominent spot in her spellbook. It had been quite some time since Mal had seen Ben come up.

“Ben?! BEN!” she yelled.

Soon enough Ben popped up.

“I have to go find (Y/N)!”

Mal didn’t know what happened but she saw the shift in Ben’s eyes. “How?”

“The Enchanted Lake washes away all spells. Mal, what did you do?!”

“Ben, I am so sorry.”

“I just have a question. Why’d you tell me? If you wanted us to date?”

He still thought it was Mal having a crush. The VKs were still in the clear with the wand. Ben didn’t suspect a thing. They still had a chance to please their parents, if Mal lied smartly.

“It wasn’t going to happen organically. (Y/N) really likes you Ben.”

“I’ve got to go find her.” Ben jumped out the lake as fast as humanly possible. He rushed trying to put on his clothes.

“She’s with Carlos, Jay, and Evie. They took her on a picnic.”

“I messed up.” Ben said to no one in particular.

“No, it’s my fault Ben.”

“Does your spell make me say things about her being royal advisor?” Ben knew he crossed a line. Mal’s spell may have blinded him but he also took it too far. (Y/N) loved that goddamn job.

“This is all my fault, I’m so sorry.”

“Yeah, you’re right, it is your fault! Shit, I’m sorry… let’s just go.”

“They’re at the big tree.”

“I messed up.” He said again.

(Y/N POV)

“What is up with you and tangerines?” Carlos asked as you handed them out to the group.

“We grow them in Maldonia. And as someone constantly working, it’s usually the only thing I end up eating. Small, no prep, can fit in a pocket.”

“You should really eat more.”

“I’m eating more right now aren’t I?”

You and the VKs were sitting outside underneath the big oak tree on the lawn for your picnic. Doug and Lonnie came along too. You were trying to introduce the VKs to more Auradon people other than you and Ben. Some people were friendly with them; but, so far no one really tried to be their friends.

“Hey, Mal! Benjamin.” You saw the two of them approaching from a distance. “Sorry, you just missed the tangerines!”

“(Y/N)!”

As Ben called your name, you noticed he was soaking wet. Well now this was just rubbing salt into an open wound. Ben had only ever taken you out on dates by the Enchanted Lake, not even Audrey went on a date there. It was you two that built the little pavilion there in the first place, well you suggested to have it built no one trusted you with creating a sound structure.

“(Y/N), I’m so sorry.” Ben said once he got closer to the picnic. Mal quietly sat down next to Evie.

You were caught off guard. You just sat there and looked at him. Lonnie was on the defensive, ready to confront Ben if that’s what you needed.

“I’m seriously sorry.”

“For what? The pavilion date, my public humiliation, firing me.” You could go on. You wanted to go on, adding all the little petty things you could think of.

“All of it. I have so much to explain but just know I feel so bad for what I’ve done.”

“You know, Ben, I don’t really want to hear an explanation right now.”

“Please. Talk to me, Prutia.”

“Don’t call me that.”

“Prutia…”

“You lost all right to call me that, Benjamin.” You had been looking at the ground the whole time.

“(Y/N), I can make this right if you just let me talk.”

“Your words have been saying a lot lately.”

“There’s an explanation for that.”

“There’s an explanation for this! An explanation for that! Come back when you have something that’s not an explanation. I said don’t talk to me Ben and I meant it.”

“No spundite quel algo ce ti penticosa.” Jay warned you. (Don’t say something you’re going to regret)

“Find me when you have something other than words.”

“Amand—”

“No. I’m not doing this with you, Ben. Not today.” You started to choke up a bit. “Not right now.”

“Okay…okay.” Ben said quietly and walked off.

“Oh, look. Chicken tenders, heh.” Doug failed miserably at deflecting.

Everyone grew silent. The air grew heavy and settled around the picnic. Mal gave everyone a look to scram and leave you and her alone.

“We have a lot to talk about.” Mal said. Once everyone left, her mouth ran like a broken faucet.

You could kill her.

“You have ten seconds to get out of my line of sight before I strangle you,” You said watching Mal quickly get up and leave.

~~~~~

(Third Person POV)

“How’d it go?” Evie asked when Mal entered the room. Evie, Jay, and Carlos had been waiting for her to come back.

“Oh, she’s pissed.”

“It could’ve gone worse.”

“I’m pretty sure I just got cussed out in about six languages. Jay, do you know what ‘ti maltainda perrsal’ means?”

Jay gave a short chuckle. “Trust me, you don’t want to know. Prutia will get over it.”

“Are we sure?”

Mal felt like she seriously messed up. (Y/N) had been a real friend to the VKs and she might’ve just ruined that.

“No,” Jay said leaning against the doorway. “But, she knows how bad you feel. You better hope that’s enough.”

(Part 3)...

[joealwyndaily]

Man About Town interview with Joe Alwyn

Fresh off the back of a star turn in Kasi Lemmons’ Harriet, we catch up with British superstar Joe Alwyn about getting into an evil mindset, playing the long-game in his career, and his upcoming role in Steven Knight’s A Christmas Carol.

words by Francesco Loy Bell

It’s an unnerving experience, having to ask an actor to fill you in on the ending of the film you’re supposed to be interviewing them about, but it’s a testament to Joe Alwyn’s charm and down-to-earth manner that he duly obliges, happily relaying the final ten minutes of Kasi Lemmons’ Harriet with an infectious enthusiasm only someone with genuine passion for a project could muster. I had been most of the way through Lemmons’ bold new offering, centred around American historical icon and slave-turned-abolitionist Harriet Tubman, when the fire alarm sounded, resulting in a hoard of shell-shocked journalists being quickly ushered out of the building, only to be told that we would not be able to watch the last 25 minutes of the film. Fast-forward 24 hours, and I can’t help but pause to reflect on the surreality of sitting across from the films horrifying antagonist as he casually explains his fate to me over coffee. More on that later, however. 

Despite being the only actor in his immediate family, it’s fair to say Alwyn inherited some of the requisite DNA to pursue a career in film, his father, a documentary-maker and his mother, a therapist. Alwyn sees both as formative, instilling him with the “curiosity for looking into people’s lives, observing, and listening to stories” that had possessed him from an early age. “I always liked going to the cinema,” he explains, “sitting in big dark rooms, watching stories. It was kind of a way to disappear.” Though he cannot pinpoint the exact ‘light bulb’ moment in which he decided to become a professional actor, he does attribute seeing Ben Whishaw as Hamlet at the Old Vic when he was 12 or 13 as foundational, and “one of those moments that stick with you, where I thought: ‘I would really like to do that’.” That feeling soon blossomed, Alwyn taking numerous shows to the Edinburgh Fringe while at school and university, shows he can now jokingly admit “should not have been seen by anyone!”

Drama school naturally beckoned, the then-graduate enrolling himself into The Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, an experience he looks back on fondly, his eyes lighting up as he recalls some of the more eccentric aspects of his time there. “A lot of rolling around on the floor, a lot of tight black clothing. And lots of trees, I was a brilliant tree,” he laughs, before informing me, in sudden deadpan: “you’re also looking at a llama.”

Alwyn probably wouldn’t have expected such a swift re-entry into the dynamic absurdity of drama school so soon after leaving, but then he probably wouldn’t have expected to be working with director Yorgos Lanthimos only a couple of years later either. Having shot his first job — Ang Lee’s reverse-engineered war film Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk — just after he graduated in 2015, Alwyn was sent the script of a then still in development The Favourite soon afterwards. “It felt like a special script. I mean, at that point, I hadn’t read that many scripts. I still was” — he catches himself, as his eyes widen in momentary wonder — “well, I still am new to this. But yeah, it was just... such a good script. I knew of Yorgos; I knew of his films. And those two things kind of narrowed together: this twisted take on a genre that can be quite conventional and stuffy, and his very unique, singular mind. It was exciting.”

A skype session with Lanthimos soon followed (“we talked about everything probably apart from The Favourite” Alwyn laughs), and the rest is history, the actor landing the role of Samuel Masham, a young baron in the court of Olivia Colman’s Queen Ann. Though his turn in the film is punctuated by exaggerated physicality — the court dancing scene with Rachel Weisz a particularly memorable example — Alwyn tells me that it was only when he got on set that Lanthimos’ true, bonkers vision began to come to life. 

“I didn’t know that it was going to become one of those moments,” he says of the dance scene and others like it. “Because in the script it just said ‘they dance’, or, ‘he chases her’.” He can’t help but smile when speaking about Lanthimos: “He is hilarious. And confusing. He doesn’t really say anything to you about conventional direction; there was no discussion of period, or etiquette, or character, or history — which I think we’d expected to a degree, just because of the nature of the film. We had two weeks of ridiculous exercises and rehearsals, where I’d be playing Olivia’s part, and Olivia would be playing Nick [Hoult]’s part, and you’d sing the lines, and you’re chasing each other, and... you don’t know what you’re doing, or why you’re doing it. And Yorgos doesn’t say anything. And then he’d get on set, and just kind of say ‘Mmm... louder, faster, quieter’.”

The profound respect Alwyn holds for Lanthimos is tangible — he responds “Yorgos again” in a flash when I ask him who he’d love to work with — and he largely credits the director’s vision for the success the film has since garnered. “He made it weird and wacky and bawdy and irreverent, and it’s just not what you’re used to seeing,” he gushes. One particular on-set tale gives some insight into the energetic nature of Lanthimos’ sets, Alwyn recollecting a close-shave experience during a flirtatious forest scene with Emma Stone which resulted in the actress being taken to hospital. “The woods scene; the rugby tackling scene. We — or I — got maybe a little too carried away in the rugby aspect of it, and Emma took a fall... which was completely my fault. She knocked herself on the root of a tree and hurt her head; the paramedics came, she had to go to hospital, and we had to stop filming for the day.” The sheer panic still momentary lingers on Alwyn’s face as he recounts the story: “She’d just won an Oscar [...] I was cowering in the corner thinking I’d just killed Emma Stone.”

Alwyn’s latest project, Harriet, is a stark departure from The Favourite, the actor trading in Masham’s comic fluidity for the chilling rigidity of Gideon Brodess, the vengeful and sickeningly violent son of Harriet’s owner. As aforementioned, it is difficult to reconcile the man sitting opposite me sipping his coffee with the evil he portrays on screen, and I’m curious as to Alwyn’s process for getting into such a poisonous mindset. “It’s tricky, because what he stands for is abhorrent, and obviously unrelatable,” he explains. “What him and his family did, and the idea of slavery, is repulsive. But I suppose with those kinds of characters you try to find some kind of humanity within them — which suits the time they were living in — to hold onto. And in Gideon’s case, it’s probably some kind of deep, repressed, buried feelings of love. Maybe love for Harriet? I don’t think he necessarily has a language for it, or even understands what it is. But he’s deeply tangled and confused inside. And you try and connect with those sides of him. But, in terms of who they are and what they stand for... it’s hard to find a way in. It’s near impossible.”

Alwyn gives a brutal performance in the film, deftly showcasing Gideon’s skin-crawling internal struggle between racist disgust, and Lima Syndrome-style  lust of Harriet, and his antagonistic villainy is the perfect foil to fellow Brit Cynthia Erivo’s stunning performance as the eponymous emancipator, Alwyn extolling her “formidable” work ethic and on-screen generosity as hugely motivational in his preparation. The story of Harriet Tubman, though well known, is perhaps not as staple a piece of knowledge in the American psyche as her actions demand, and Alwyn hopes that the film will help to give her the wider historical credit she deserves, both in the States and beyond. “Growing up in the UK,” he explains, “I didn’t know who she was, really. I’d seen her name; I’d seen the older iconic images of her. But I didn’t know her story. You hope that films like this will make it more accessible, and bring people in to learn about her and the story of what she did, what she achieved.”

As the politics of division take hold around the world, there has been an intensified focus on the debate surrounding story-telling, and the potential impact or consequence a story can have in the current climate; Todd Phillips’ Joker, for example, has faced significant criticism for potentially giving encouragement to white terrorism and racism. In this vein, the telling of stories like Tubman’s seems more necessary than ever, and this is not lost on Alwyn. “If you go on Twitter and read down on the news, there’s endless stories of division and racism, bigotry, families being torn apart at the borders. Without putting too much on it, if there was someone who represents a fight in the face of that, Harriet Tubman seems to shine pretty strong. And you’d hope that someone like her would become a part of a global curriculum at school.” Alwyn is hopeful that giving figures like Tubman their due historical credit — at least in terms of film — will universalise her all-too-recent struggle, and help unite people in the face of societal partition.

Alwyn’s next project will see him return to London, albeit a dark, Dickensian version of the city, as he takes on the role of Bob Cratchit — Ebenezer Scrooge’s much-abused clerk — in Steven Knight’s upcoming rendition of A Christmas Carol. Though he cannot give too much away, he promises the miniseries will be much darker and truer to Dickens’ sordid portrayal of London than previous versions. “It’s very much more in that kind of gritty, darker, slightly twisted world,” he explains. “It’s not as sanitised, perhaps, as most other versions are [...] it really goes into Scrooge’s own pain and why he is the way he is in quite an unpleasant way. And definitely in a way that hasn’t been seen before.”

Alwyn speaks with a soft, magnetic enthusiasm that almost makes me forget that this is indeed an interview, and I am disappointed to look down at my dictaphone and discover that our allotted time slot is drawing to a close. Characteristically, however, he laughs off any time constraint, and I am afforded some final questions. At 28 years old, the actor is arguably slightly older than some of the other industry ‘up-and-comers’ one might bracket him alongside, and I ask whether he thinks the hyper-visibility of fame elicited by social media is in part to blame for an increasing tendency to link the validity of success with being in your early 20s. Alwyn, despite having an instagram page and being in a relationship with one of the biggest musicians in the world, is notably more private than many others in his position, and he quotes a piece of advice given to him by Ang Lee on set of Billy Lynn in his response.

“It’s not a sprint,” he decides, after some deliberation. “Everyone has different ways of going. I’m still at an early stage in my career. I left Central in 2015, the first film I was in came out at the end of 2016. It doesn’t feel too long ago. I don’t think there is any right way to do it, but [...] I do think it’s an interesting point about social media and the idea of instant visibility, an instant attainment... it’s a dangerous thing to play into. And something that would be dangerous to get hooked on because I don’t think it’s real. You know, social media is [a facade]. And if you buy into that being a reality — or that’s what you go after — it’s not healthy.”

I am struck by how refreshing Alwyn’s attitude to fame is, though by the end of our conversation, I am hardly surprised. This is someone for whom the work is clearly a far superior motivational factor than fame or recognition, and this passion for his craft is evident in every project he touches. Ang Lee was right, it is a marathon rather than a sprint, but Joe Alwyn certainly seems ahead of the curve as he enters what promises to be a vastly exciting new chapter in his career. I, for one, can’t wait to see what he does next.

[clansayeed]

Bound by Destiny ― Chapter 1: The Job

PAIRING: Kamilah Sayeed x MC (Nadya Al Jamil) RATING: Mature

⥼ MASTERLIST ⥽

⥼ Bound by Destiny ⥽

Nadya Al Jamil (MC) has been struggling from the day she moved to Manhattan, but her new job as assistant to the mysterious CEO of Raines Corp was supposed to turn her luck around. Until she finds herself caught in the middle of a war involving the Council of Vampires who secretly run the city. An evil from the birth of Vampire-kind stirs beneath, feeding on the conflict, and finds Nadya bound to a destiny she never asked for.

Bound by Destiny and the rest of the Oblivion Bound series is an ongoing dramatic retelling project of the Bloodbound series and spin-off, Nightbound. Find out more [HERE].

⥼ Chapter Summary ⥽

She’s never thought about doing clerical work before, but that’s not going to stop her. Nadya begins her new job as secretary for the mysterious Adrian Raines.

[READ IT ON AO3]

As soon as Lily yanks the lipstick from her hand the cab screeches to a jerking halt on the curb. The kind of stop that has the potential to ruin an entire twenty minutes-worth of hasty makeup application.

“Here.” grunts the Cabby, already flicking on his ‘VACANT’ sign and punching the buttons on his dash panel.

“Think you could chill out a little next time on the landing, Speed Racer? Here hon, hold this.” She returns the lipstick to its rightful owner to dig around in her bag for the cab fare.

Nadya sits in a daze; stares at her lipstick like she’s forgotten how to use it until Lily is grabbing hold of her wrist and pulling her out onto the bustling Manhattan sidewalk.

“You okay?” Lily’s hands are warm in the sunlight. They manage to bring her out of her spell. With a one-two-three swipe of her lipstick she brings a beaming smile her roommate’s way.

“Never better. Thanks for the save back there.”

“Thank me with a paycheck. And pizza — you can never go wrong with pizza.”

The main entrance of Raines Corp. faces north, follows the path of the sun so as not to shine in. A strange thing to notice, Nadya thinks, but she can’t help but hope that means she won’t constantly have the sunset glaring in her eyes every evening.

“Final checks!” Lily announces, loud enough to gain the attention of several Wall Street schlubs on their blue-teeth or air-phones or whatever else they use to distract from the tedium.

God, I hope I don’t end up like that at the end of this job… The thought flits through Nadya’s mind briefly before it’s lost in Lily’s vibrancy.

“Phone-wallet-keys?”

“Check.”

“Emergency Listerine strips?”

“Check.”

“Emergency deodorant?”

“Check.”

“Disdain for the bourgeoisie bullshit that allows people to treat secretaries like servants?”

Nadya laughs. “Check!”

“Then my dear,” she squeezes their hands together before letting go with a flourish of wide arms, “there’s nothing more I can do for you. You’re ready to walk into the belly of the Capitalist beast.”

But ‘ready’ though she may be Nadya doesn’t move; just stares at Lily’s encouraging smile like it’ll give her the power to take on the whole world or bring every skyscraper on the block crumbling to their foundations.

Her roommate pushes her ropes of neon-purple dreads over her shoulder and goes in for the hug Nadya didn’t know she even needed; let alone ask for. It’s one she returns warmly — it brings back distant memories of clinging to her mother on the first day of school.

“Seriously, Nadi’, you’ve got this.” whispers Lily into her ear, and Nadya very much has this.

She turns and steels herself—a final mental check to ensure all is secure and well and oh god did I forget my emergency tampon at home no Lily put it in the side pocket thank god so yes, it’s all well—before she strides in through the revolving doors.

“Don’t worry about dinner, honey-bunch! You just earn Momma that cheddar!” She can hear Lily’s faint laughter before the roar of industrialized air conditioning drowns out everything else.

Everything that had happened on the day of her interview had led Nadya to believe he might be a decent boss to work for; one of those kinds of CEOs who had wealth but didn’t flaunt it, or who gave out really epic bonuses come Christmas or the New Year. She figured she’d be seeing a lot of him around — not that he’d be asking her to accompany him to important client dinners or doing that thing in movies where he asks her to order him midnight sushi and it turns out to be enough for two — because what CEO goes out of their way to personally attend the hiring of someone who only has top-tier security clearance because that’s where her desk is?

Boy, was she wrong.

Adrian Raines communicates almost solely by email (or in the more urgent requests, the Raines Corp. interdepartmental instant message app). When he leaves his office he never needs to be accompanied. If not for the heaps of digital filing she’s asked to organize she’d almost forget who she was working for. He’s always polite; signs his emails with ‘thank yous’ and things like ‘I really appreciate all your hard work!’ but the distance takes some getting used to.

“Maybe he’s just antisocial,” Lily suggests over their now-standard lunch break phone call. Nadya can hear the distant tinny noise of digital zombies having their heads blown off on Lil’s livestream. “You know, like one of those reclusive ba-jillionaires in the movies. Or he thinks you smell.”

“I don’t smell!” Nadya argues back — and definitely doesn’t do a smell-check of her armpits sheepishly.

But Lily intends to find the silver lining in everything; one of the things that makes them get along so fabulously. “Think of it this way; sooo many people in your position have to see way too much of their bosses, right? And that burns them out! So you have more time to rake in the dough before you gotta high-tail it from Armaniville.”

“I guess,” she stabs a cold lump of orange chicken absentmindedly, “it’d just be a lot easier if he weren’t so darn nice.”

The next day Adrian sends her a list of things to get from the sub-basement archives; gifts for some client meeting he has in an hour. Nadya takes it on as a DEFCON 5 because each item is a separate ping on the IM server. If it can’t all be in one email it’s gotta be important, right?

All it takes is a requisition form sent below and the whole two dozen paces between her desk, the elevator, and the building delivery desk on the ground floor. She’d go into the conference room and deliver the package herself but while Adrian might appreciate the gesture the same might not be said for other head-honchos. So she leaves it on the corner of her desk for Adrian to grab on his way down.

Just before the lift doors open Adrian turns on his glossy heel. For the first time since her interview he addresses Nadya face-to-face.

“Nadya?”

“Yes, Mister Raines?” They both chuckle. Even with the impersonal disposition of digital communication they’ve found a way to share inside jokes; it took half a dozen messages for Nadya to learn how very serious Adrian was about being addressed by his first name even via email.

She glances up from Nicole’s daily ‘list of chores’ (Lily’s words, not hers, but she doesn’t deny the accuracy) to find Adrian staring at her. Even from across the room there’s a clarity to him. Adrian Raines is attractive; Nadya knows it, the numerous reporters from the tech, business, and gossip magazines Nadya has had to politely turn away all know it, hell even Adrian himself probably knows it — and not in the vain way pretty rich men know they’re pretty, but in a more humble sense.

So yeah, having someone like him stare with that movie-star smolder at someone like her makes it impossible for Nadya not to blush. But he’s her boss, and this gig is too good for all the months of “We promise we’ll have the rent next month please don’t evict us!” back-pay they owe their landlord to risk. And she’s pretty sure trying to romance the boss is a big risk.

She tries again, “Yes, Mister Raines?” because Adrian seems to be in his own little world. One he finally snaps out of.

“I just wanted to make sure you know how much I appreciate everything you’ve done for me since you came on. You’ve definitely been one of my more successful assistants.” That’s Adrian; making sure everyone feels appreciated.

Nadya simply shrugs it off; wouldn’t do her well to get too airheaded so early in the game. “Just doing my job, Mister Raines.”

“Nadya…”

“Just doing my job,” she winks, “Adrian.”

It’s the longest meeting he’s ever had; the text she gets somewhere near dawn thanking her for staying but releasing her fills Nadya with nothing short of relief. Gathering her things, clocking out, swiping her card for the lift; everything is routine now. Even strolling passed the conference room on her way to the front desk.

“Are you sure he’s being truthful about his numbers?”

“We can’t be sure of anything when it comes to Cecil, Adrian. That is why I insisted I go myself. He knows better than to lie to my face.”

“Yet he may still have.”

Stopping in front of the frosted glass isn’t one of her smarter ideas. Not like it stops her. Mostly she’s caught off guard by the seriousness of Adrian’s tone even through the doors. Can’t think of a time when she ever heard him sound like that; almost dark, or angry.

But where Adrian is filled with passion whoever he’s speaking to keeps her cool. Her voice a velvet purr so low Nadya finds herself straining to hear, leaning closer to the door and closer to the danger of discovery.

“I have my associates scouring the city for where they might be originating. You’d think someone might report seeing a corpse or two suddenly going grey and—”

A gruff Indian drawl interrupts her. Even from a distance Nadya feels like that’s a bad move.

“This is New York, Kamilah. Bodies are as rare as pigeons!”

“Then what have you contributed, Lester?” asks Adrian.

Lester grumbles something she doesn’t quite catch, then: “Don’t flash those at me, pup. I’ll speak to my men on the PD and see if they’ve been keeping anything hiding under their little blue belts.”

None of it makes sense. There’s walking in on half a conversation and then there’s whatever Adrian and his associates are discussing. The one thing Nadya is sure of is how much she dislikes the knot forming in her gut while her mind races to try and put some of what she’s hearing together.

There’s a long silence. For a moment she fears she’s been found out and her heart drops out through her stomach. Then she hears Adrian again — this time he sounds tired.

“We have to get this under control. Until we do every victim is our fault; their blood is on our hands.”

If there’s more to his speech she doesn’t stick around to hear it. Finds herself out on the cold Manhattan sidewalk just as the sun starts to haul itself up over the horizon. She doesn’t even remember if she said goodbye to the night guard. Her blood pounds in her ears.

Lily made a valiant effort to stay awake and greet her as evidenced by a full cup of tea gone cold on the island counter. But her roommate is passed out on the couch — Nadya envies that ability to sleep anywhere. The words victim and blood and hands echo in Adrian’s voice around her skull like bouncy-balls while she gets ready for bed.

Adrian acts like nothing is different — and to him it isn’t. But whenever she gets the chance Nadya tries to find some inkling, some shadow hidden behind his megawatt smile and usual charm. If ever given the chance to wander her mind starts coming up with fantastical ideas and scenarios: like seeing him as Christian Bale in American Psycho or getting a late-night text for her to come into work and finding him in the process of wrapping a body up in construction plastic.

Nadya only imagines being the victim of the cruel-yet-classy alter ego of Adrian once. Somehow discovering his secret life as a hitman or deranged killer is more believable than the thought that he would ever harm her.

But it doesn’t stop the hairs on the back of her neck from standing up when the rarity arrives of Adrian leaving at the same time as her. Lots of people are murdered in elevators in the movies.

“So… everything alright?”

Nadya looks to find Adrian’s gaze level and calm and right at her. Oh god, she thinks, he knows!

She fumbles for an answer instead — tries, and fails, to play it cool.

“Peachy keen.”

“Are you sure?” He’s not gonna press the matter if she doesn’t want to talk about it; just another one of the things that makes Adrian Raines possibly the ideal man. But he needs to stop looking like a kicked puppy in order to make it easier for her to lie to him.

So she decides to pick a different truth instead. “Yeah, I’m just not looking forward to the long trip home.”

Adrian’s nose scrunches. “I was under the impression your apartment was one train away.”

“Normally it is. But they shut down the station at my stop a couple nights ago. Some accident on the weekend or something.”

It’s exactly the Adrian thing for him to do when he offers her a ride home in the company car. And it’s the Nadya thing for her to decline, but rather than playfully letting it slide Adrian actually insists. Pipes up what could have been the speech her mom gave her about moving to ‘the Big City’ verbatim; with strangers lurking the streets and the subway never really being as safe as they claim.

“And forgive my selfishness,” he finishes while opening the sleek black Buick door, “but I’d have a pretty hard time finding another secretary with hours as flexible as yours. So let’s get you home safe and sound.”

One complimentary ride home is a favor. Then one turns into two, turns into the whole week, turns into “I know your station opened back up yesterday, Nadya, but if I’m being honest I enjoy the detour and the company,” and by the time Adrian’s car is pulling onto the curb outside her building at sunset—the usual time she sets off—there’s really no opportunity to refuse.

“I went to make you a cup, too, but then I realized I have no idea how you take your coffee — secretaries everywhere have shunned me.” Nadya greets him by way of apology, sliding into the now-familiar front seat with her travel mug in hand. Adrian laughs.

“I appreciate the gesture, but I’m more of a tea person.”

If Adrian is surprised when, same time next day, Nadya slides in with her usual mug and a second with a teabag string dangling over the side, he hides it well.

But while their routine has become more personable and casually affectionate it hasn’t entirely cleared her boss of suspicion. There’s three more meetings he releases her early for. She doesn’t snoop like the first time but definitely catches the same voices in her passing haste to the exit.

Then one ordinary night she spots an error on Adrian’s agenda.

“Did you want me to call the Gallery about getting a refund?” She doesn’t knock before entering — doesn’t really need to at this point. There’s something weirdly intimate about sitting in his car flicking radio stations while he pumps gas and returns with her favorite chocolate peanut-butter cookies. Intimate in that it makes knocking seem unnecessary.

Used to it, Adrian doesn’t look away from his screen. “Refund for what?”

“You bought two tickets to this thing, the ‘Manhattan Gallery’s Dedication to National Geographic Auction’ on Friday next.”

“Uh-huh.”

“And—Jesus—they’re five hundred bucks a piece?”

“Uh-huh.”

“So did you want a refund?”

“Why? I asked yesterday if you had plans then. You said no.”

It takes her a moment before Nadya’s doing her best impression of a fish.

“That second ticket’s mine?”

Now out of his chair Adrian leans against his desk with a smirk that could almost be called cheeky. If she didn’t know him better, that is.

“Well who else would I take?” he asks genuinely.

“I—I mean—well Nicole, for one.”

He waves off his assistant’s name. Odd, Nadya can’t help but think, since they seemed have a close relationship — close enough for her to berate him in front of a stranger on the day they met. Maybe less so in the last months… but still.

“She’s been to dozens of these. I wanted to take someone who might actually appreciate something new.” His falter is only slight. “I mean, of course, if you want to come. I probably shouldn’t have assumed.”

And she does, oh she does, but a nagging voice in the back of her head that sounds not-so-suspiciously like Anne-Marie from HR — who probably didn’t think Nadya could hear her over the gurgle of the downstairs coffee cart when she leaned over to her coworker and whispered a nasty rumor about “Mister Raines and his Secretary of the Night” — has her hesitant to say the least.

She’s taken too long to respond when Adrian’s hands fall on her shoulders. He cranks up the AC so high she had to pull her winter sweaters out of storage in the middle of summer. Even through the wool though she can feel the chill of his palms.

“Nadya? Talk to me.” Kind Adrian; Kind, empathetic, stupidly perceptive Adrian.

It makes her step back; gain some personal—and professional—space between them.

“Mister Raines,” and when did this become her life exactly, “I appreciate the gesture; all the gestures, actually, but…” already she’s hoping Lily kept yesterday’s newspaper with the classifieds, “I’m not… well, I’m not exactly interested in you in that… way.”

Adrian Master-of-the-Unexpected Raines goes bright red. Has Nadya wondering if she should take a picture to sell to the same tabloids that claim to see equally nonexistent things like Bigfoot.

Then he takes a deep breath. “Nadya — er, Miss Al Jamil — if I ever gave you the impression I… what I mean to say is that if you’ve found any of my actions untoward — erm — or, possibly, salacious in nature, I assure you, I—wait no, let me—”

He’s actually fumbling, which is how Nadya realizes he’s taken aback by her statement; how she realizes he was a million miles away from that dangerous place. And did he just say salacious?

To her surprise Adrian actually stops when she holds up a finger.

“Before you, uh, choke on your own tongue,” probably not the best idea to bring up his tongue but you know what they say about hindsight, “just… answer one question, okay?”

He nods.

“Is this an invitation as your date, or as your coworker?”

“Good heav — as my coworker, Nadya!” He practically chokes on his relief. It takes an exhale for Nadya to realize she is, too. Then they’re laughing, separately and awkwardly, and the next thing Nadya knows Adrian is pouring two tumblers of expensive scotch from the little trolley to the side of his desk that she’s never seen him use before. He’s her boss and he’s the one offering it, so he can’t get on her case when she accepts the liquor like the peace offering it is.

Friday night comes around and, as expected, the world ends.

“How can one person own this many dresses and none of them be for freakin’ formal events?!”

“Hey! That Sailor Mars dress was made specifically for a ball!”

“Lily, I’m only gonna say this one more time—” Nadya pokes her head out of her roommate’s tiny closet with what she hopes is a glare that thoroughly conveys her frustration; though the way her large glasses are dangerously ready to fall off the tip of her nose negates that completely, “—I can’t wear Sailor Moon cosplay to the Manhattan Art Gallery!”

Lily huffs and nibbles another spicy cheese puff. “Show me where it says that on the damn dress code…”

In a flurry of barely-clothed despair Nadya rushes back across the hall to her own room. Lily follows — cradles her snack bowl in her arms like one would a precious infant.

“I don’t get why the dress you bought doesn’t work.” Lily plops down next to the last-minute ordered dress and is careful to keep her cheesy mitts off the fabric. “It’s nice! And pink looks good on you, girl.”

Nadya looks the dress over with barely-contained spite. “It’s just… more skin than I thought it would be.” She mimes the shape of the dress’ lack of shoulder-cloth and Lily nods with an understanding “Oooh.”

“It just feels weird to wear something, like, kinda sexy after last week’s weirdness, you know? It’s weird! I think it’s weird, he’ll think it’s weird. It’ll just be…”

“Weird?” supplies Lily, who barely has time to duck the ball of socks thrown her way.

“And I don’t have time to go shopping. Adrian’ll be here in…” she looks to her bedside clock and groans, “an hour… I need more than an hour to fix my life!”

“Don’t we all.” Lily falls down beside the distraught form of her room mate and finger-feeds her a puff as per their agreement on dealing with messy snacks in mess-free zones. She wipes her hands diligently on her junk tee and caresses the apple of Nadya’s cheek with her thumb.

“Hon, just wear it. It’s your first time doing the ‘ritzy rich person’ thing and Adrian’ll totally get that. And if he tries to make it weird just laugh it off in that totally un-sexy way you do and boom—instant boner-killer.”

It’s not the pep-talk that would get the Cordonian Princess Caoimhe through her wedding day jitters, but it’s enough for Nadya; and that’s all that matters. With exaggerated grunts and huffs she hauls herself off the bed and starts to wrangle on the dress.

“I told you what he said, right?”

“You tell me a lot of things, sweetie.”

Nadya turns for Lily to dutifully zip her up. “He said I was ‘too young for him anyway,’ like, what does that even mean?”

“Do you want the Valyrian translation or something?”

“He’s thirty-one. I’m twenty-five! My parents had a bigger age gap than that!”

Lily pats the finished zipper, pulls Nadya to turn around so she can do her other, unsung duty by helping Nadya show off what she was born with.

“I mean maybe — stop fidgeting you have boobs so show them off, Christ — maybe he’s into cougars. Pretty boys usually have some form of Oedipus complex.”

“Mm… I don’t think so. Adrian’s different.”

“How?”

“He just — OW who the heck gives purple nurples these days?! — He just is, okay?! Now take your hands out of my bra Lily Spencer!”

The play-fighting gets put aside for the good of maintaining the integrity of the dress. The hour drags on, half of it spent waiting around for her (suddenly too-long, too-unruly, too-resistant) hair to dry. Nadya is always more likely to throw her hair up in a bun and go no matter the occasion, but this isn’t just any occasion. I’ll be representing Raines Corp, and Adrian by proxy, she reminds herself through every stubborn tug of her brush.

Lily is fiddling with her purse as Nadya finally exits the bathroom in a cloud of hairspray and second thoughts.

“So I packed you two granola bars in case they don’t have anything lactose-intolerant. And there’s some spare cash if you wanna dip out and grab a cab home. Did you grab your flats?”

“I can’t switch shoes in the middle of a thing like this.”

“Pretty sure I read something about it being totally acceptable.”

“Where, in a fanfiction?”

“I mean, it was The Royal Romance so… does that count?”

She turns around as she asks and sucks in audibly. The silence is self-conscious; immediately makes Nadya smooth down her hair with a nervous hand.

“What? Oh no, what’s wrong? Speak, Lily, words!”

She finds herself enveloped in a tight hug instead of an actual response, which is both a comfort and jostles her nerves slightly. “Lil’…”

Her roommate’s words are choked with embellished emotion. “You look like a real adult. I couldn’t be more proud.”

“Oh—bull!” Nadya pushes her off with a laugh — but the compliment does bring a flush to her cheeks. “I look good, though? I’ve still got a bit to change up—”

The sudden, high-pitched buzz of the complex bell interrupts as argument. One, long noise before it goes deathly silent.

Lily’s beaming. “Well that was an awfully adult ring. The kind of ring fancy professionals use!”

“No, no no!” Nadya fumbles for her phone to check the time. “He’s early! He’s here! Why is he here why is he ringing the bell why is — Lily don’t you dare!”

But she’s too late to stop the bouncing, bubbly roommate from rushing to the comm.

“Buzzing you in! Come on u—ah!”

Her greeting turns into a cry of protest as Nadya yanks her backwards.

“What are you doing?!”

“I wanna meet him!”

Nadya gestures wildly around the apartment; she doesn’t need to explain herself. The place isn’t exactly in the best state. But who could blame them — the last thing anyone wants to do when they finish a night shift is clean and Lily… well, it was in a worse state before Nadya moved in. At least now there’s a small garbage can beside the couch for all the empty chip bags.

In the time it takes Adrian to knock on their door, the pair manage to gather up empty snacks into the trash and hide everything else inside the ottoman. Lily’s hair whips at her face as she tries to pin down Nadya for the door.

“Girl—what are you doing?” She uses a little too much force in turning off the running sink and they battle clumsily over a soapy plate before Lily successfully replaces it with a towel. “He’s not staying. You don’t need to wash the plates.”

“I—” She has to right herself, but Lily’s correct, as usual. “I panicked.”

“Uh-huh. Door.”

“What?”

“Door.”

A second knock startles Nadya to action. “C-Coming!”

The doorways of Raines Corp. must be specially-designed to make Adrian look like the average man, Nadya realizes, because there’s a towering, statuesque beauty to the way her boss stands before her. He even manages to make the chipped old paint job from the ‘70s look glamorous.

“Ready to get going?” Adrian asks by way of greeting; slides one of his hands out of his pockets and offers a crooked elbow like he’s escorting her to some fancy ball.

She almost manages to take it without incident. Almost. While she regains her balance from being unceremoniously shoved aside Lily busies herself with shaking Adrian’s hand with firm vigor.

“You must be the boss-man! Lily Spencer — roommate, confidante, and Nadya’s personal Bryan Mills.” The way her smile falters isn’t unfamiliar — Adrian’s furrowed brow has already lost him points in Lily’s book.

“I’m sorry — who?” he asks; only just manages to steal his hand back.

Lily scoffs, yet Nadya can’t remember an instance where someone did understand her right off the bat.

“Bryan Mills?” As though repeating his name will somehow jog Adrian’s nonexistent memory. “You know… ‘I have a very particular set of skills that make me a nightmare for people like you?’”

Before he can flounder too long, though, Nadya mouths the movie title over Lily’s shoulder.

“Oh, right, from Taken.”

Lily brightens considerably. “Oh, good! You’ve seen it!”

“Once, I think. I remember it playing on the plane…”

“So you know what I’ll do to you if my girl doesn’t come ho—”

“And we’re leaving!” Her voice raised and pitched high with panic, Nadya manages to hip-check her way into the hall. “When I get home I’m gonna kick your butt!” she hisses — and punctuates her threat by closing the door harder than necessary.

She really hopes she still has a job by the time she and Adrian make it to the stairwell. There are five, possibly six different apologies ready on the tip of her tongue but they die off with a quick glance. Adrian’s smiling — no — beaming in a way she’s not seen before. It makes him look years younger — less like there’s a burden on his chest. She allows herself a moment of relief, and strains herself not to ruin it.

They could be heading out for another evening at the office with the casual ease between them. How Adrian opens the door and only starts the car when she’s buckled in properly, and the light conversation about a meeting he has next week with the CFO of a recently-acquired company. Nadya fidgets in what she hopes is a subtle way the entire drive downtown — it would be a shame to ruin such polite conversation with questions about which forks to use and who to not make herself look like a fool in front of.

Then (all too soon in Nadya’s opinion) Adrian pulls out of evening traffic to park on the Gallery curb. While he steps out to flag down a valet she allows herself a moment of pure, unrestrained panic while looking out the tinted windows.

A red carpet has been draped out for the occasion; down the Gallery steps to stop on the sidewalk where one couldn’t get through the mob of onlookers, reporters, and photographers if they tried. It looks less like a Gallery exhibition than a Hollywood movie premiere. Makes Nadya aware of every stark flaw — from the slightly loose fit on her dress to the few flyaway hairs she couldn’t wrangle in.

“You absolutely cannot do this,” she scolds — an insult aimed to quiet her racing heart, “this is way beyond you. You’re gonna make a fool out of yourself. Nothing in life has prepared you for a night like this… just like your interview. Got that, huh? So… don’t fall on your face or murder somebody and you’ll be fine. Just fine.”

The passenger door opens and a gust of cool night air sends goosebumps racing through every exposed part of her. Adrian extends his hand.

In a stupor, Nadya blinks and it takes a moment for her to register what he’s doing. “Huh?”

He laughs, takes the initiative, and tucks her clutch in his armpit before pulling her from the car.

“Come on. Wouldn’t want to miss the hors d’oeuvres. You haven’t lived until you’ve had beluga caviar.”

Nadya follows — and readies herself to live.

[gaveherhearttotheliontattoo]

Title: Once Upon A December - Chapter 12

Pairing: Swanfire

Word Count: 2665

Warnings: None that I know of

Prompt: Emma doesn’t remember anything except that she comes from the Enchanted Forest. The first 8 years of her life are a blur but she does have a necklace to help her find her way… And apparently a man who thinks she could be the missing princess. Emma doesn’t know what to think except that it’s her only way to get back to the Enchanted Forest so if this Neal guy thinks she could be this princess she will go along with it. Love and family will find their way.

Notes: Okay, from here on it's just me and my imagination because while I love Anastasia I always wanted more. So, here is my version of more. Sorry not sorry for the length :)

Series: Prologue, Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8, Chapter 9, Chapter 10, Chapter 11

Taglist: @sassyandclassy94, @swanfireheart, @notalwaysthevillian

--

Emma stared at herself in the mirror. The strapless dress hugged her curves and she wasn’t sure how she felt about it. It was smooth across the bodice with just a hint of lace around the waist. The simple top did not match the ballgown skirt, but apparently as the princess her fancy dresses would always be as such. She turned, watching her dress shine in the sunlight. She never thought this many sparkles could be on one skirt.

“Emma?”

Emma spun towards the door, nearly tripping over the gown. “Oh, Ruby, I was just…” Emma looked back at the mirror.

“You were just what?”

Emma stared at her reflection. “Am I doing the right thing?”

Ruby sat on the edge of the bed. “Why would you ask that?”

“I know it’s been a year since Zelena but if she was out there…then there have to be others. Others who want to destroy the royal line. Am I don’t the right thing by saddling Neal to this? Doesn’t he deserve better than having to constantly look over his shoulder?”

Ruby rolled her eyes. “He fought for you, literally. When you wanted to return to the castle he went with it, he encouraged it.” Ruby stood up and turned Emma towards her. “He loves you. He’s here for you. Now, straighten yourself out because there’s a whole ballroom full of people waiting for you.”

Emma pressed her hands to her stomach, these nerves were taking a huge toll on her.

“Ready?”

Emma looked up and found her dad standing there. “Ruby, can you give us a minute?”

David shut the door after Ruby and looked at his daughter. He wasn’t a crier but looking at his daughter, all grown up and taking the next step in her life, he couldn’t help himself. “You look beautiful. Your mother would be so proud of the woman you’ve become.” David stepped closer, clearing his throat. “I’m so proud of the woman you’ve become.”

Emma smoother her hands over her stomach. She hadn’t felt good all morning, and the twinkle in her father’s eye made her cringe. “Is this the right thing to do?”

David stepped behind her, placing his hands on her shoulders. “The only person who can answer that question is you.”

Emma stared at her father and thought about how he’d lost the love of his life so early on in their marriage. Her parents had been together, fighting together for years, when her mother was cursed. This time, however, true love didn’t work to heal her. If that had been Neal, Emma shook her head, unable to even think of the worst. They’d nearly encountered it with Zelena, anything more and she wasn’t sure what she would do.

“I can’t do this,” Emma gasped, ripping at the back of the dress, searching for some way to get it undone. “Please get Ruby.”

David’s heart lurched as he watched his daughter fall into a heap on the tile. He wanted to be the one to help her but he knew this wasn’t his place. He stepped out of the room and found Ruby dragging Neal down the hall.

Neal glanced up at the clicking of heels on the floor. “David.”

David waited until Neal was in front of him to speak. “Emma would like to see you. Ruby, why don’t you and I go for a walk and see if we can’t find the best man and ring bearer.”

Neal stared after David. He wasn’t supposed to see the bride before the wedding, in her wedding dress, it was bad luck but damn, he wanted to see her. He started to Emma’s room and slowly pushed the door open. The scene inside brought him to his knees. As he kneeled, only a few feet from Emma, he listened to her sniffle. Was this the end?

“Ruby, I need you to help me get this off,” Emma said into her hands.

Neal shook his head and moved closer, inching her hands from her face, grasping them within his.

“Neal!” Emma tried to pull away but the comfort of Neal’s hands, the warmth, helped her regain control. “You’re not supposed to see me, especially in my dress, before the wedding.”

Neal used one hand to tuck a few stray tendrils of hair behind her ear. “Something is wrong and that’s more important than some stupid supersition. Besides, until you tell me what’s going on, there will not be a wedding.”

Emma stared into his eyes, finding stability. She’d always been so strong. It had only been her fighting for herself for so long, but now she had a family she could rely on. It wasn’t something she’d ever grasped how to handle. “I started thinking about my mom and how if that was you I didn’t know if I would be able to go on. I didn’t want to saddle you to my life trials.”

Neal couldn’t stop the laugh that passed through his lips, and he only laughed harder when he saw the glare from Emma. “You can’t be serious? We fought the evil witch and won, we can handle anything life throws our way.” When Emma looked down and didn’t respond, Neal sobered. “Emma, I love you. I’ve loved you most of my life. You were my first real friend and without your family I would have had no one. So, please, do not make me go stand in front of all these people without you by my side.”

Emma looked up into those shining eyes and wrapped her arms around him, burying her face in his neck. “I love you too.” She pulled back, still holding onto him. “Send in Ruby when you go.” Emma stood, pulling Neal up with her. She wanted so badly to kiss him, but knew it would be that much sweeter when she was finally able to call him hers.

------

Neal pulled on the bottom of his jacket before straightening his spine. His nerves kicked his perspiration into high gear and he was worried it would show through his jacket if the ceremony didn’t start soon. This was happening, he was marrying the lost princess. He’d loved her since they were children, he’d fallen in love with her when he didn’t know who she was, and he continued to be in love with her when he found out who she was and though he could never have her.

It was a pipe dream for the servant boy to marry the princess but here he stood, more terrified than when he faced Zelena, more terrified than when he thought he was going to lose Emma. Now he would never lose her, not until they were both old and gray. They were going to take on the world together and even though she wanted to return to the castle, he believed they would find more adventures. They would travel, but in the end they would always return to the castle.

Emma stared at the closed doors, her stomach churning.

“Ready?”

Emma shifted, looked up at her father. “I think so.”

David kissed the side of her head. “I’ve always been a fan of neal, and he returned you to me so I will always owe him; however, if you are uncertain, if you want to cancel, just say the word.”

Emma laid a shaking hand over her stomach. “No, let’s do this.”

David signaled the guards and they opened the doors.

Neal jolted at the abrupt change in music and creak of the opening doors, but immediately settled when he saw Emma. He’d seen her earlier but he’d been so worried about making sure she was okay that he never took a chance to appreciate her appearance. Her hair was up, a few tendrils framed her face. There was only enough makeup on her face to highlight her features but it was the dress that really caught his attention.

The sun beamed through the stained glass, the colors reflecting off the sparkling white ball gown. Her skirt flowed around her with a sheer veil trailing behind her. The skirt looked scattered with diamonds, and it probably was. The simple bodice hugged her and he caught the glimpse of lace around her waist when the sunlight glinted off the sparkles. It was strapless and her clear, pale skin glittered with the makeup that was dusted over her. Simply put, she was stunning.

Emma locked eyes with Neal and felt her pulse jump but her nerves settle. He was her rock, as she was his. Together they were going to conquer whatever life threw at them. When her father shook Neal’s hand and then turned to her she saw a smile holding back the tears. He kissed her cheeks before placing her hands in Neal’s and stepping off to the side. Emma let the warmth of Neal’s hands wash over her, calming her.

------

“You may kiss the bride.”

Neal crushed his lips to Emma’s, pulling her snugly against him. “I love you.”

Emma curled her fingers in his hair. “I love you.” Emma pressed her lips to his one last time. “We should move to the dining hall for the banquet and dancing.” She pulled away and tugged at his hand running down the makeshift aisle with him in tow. She ran down the hall passing the dining hall.

“Uh, Emma?”

Emma held a finger to her lips before pulling Neal under the stairs. “They’ll just assume we’ve gone to change, since that’s a thing royals do.”

“Or they’ll assume exactly this.”

“Who cares? We’re married now.” Emma put her arms around his neck, dragging him closer. “I’m thinking we should go back to Arendelle first.”

Neal pulled back, staring into her bright eyes, wishing he knew what was going on in that head of hers. “Em, I thought we were going to go somewhere we’d never been?”

“I want to go to where this all started,” Emma whispered, nipping at Neal’s bottom lip.

“After Arendelle we shall leave it up to the map, right?”

Emma let her lips trail down Neal’s neck. “Yes, the map.”

Neal’s arms tightened their grip around Emma. “Em, can we go to the party now? I’m starting to lose my self control.”

Emma pulled back, humor lighting her eyes. “You go. I really do need to go change into my other dress.”

Neal watched her go before heading into the party himself. He was surrounded the minute he stepped into the dining hall, being congratulated and hugged. He made his way through the crowd, the tightness in his shoulders increasing the more he was hugged or fawned over. He spotted Ruby and August with David next to one of the buffet tables and pushed to get through to them.

“You look a little tense,” Ruby said, the laughter shone in her eyes. “Did your lovely wife leave you to take the brunt of everything?”

Taking a deep breath Neal turned to look at the dancing, laughing, and eating guests. “She mentioned something about needing to change, because apparently that’s a thing royals do.”

Ruby couldn’t stop the laugh this time. “She didn’t have another dress.”

Neal turned his stare on Ruby. “Then why did she tell me she had to change?”

Emma brushed her teeth, hoping the smell of her getting sick would go away. She’d kept up her spirits until she was far enough away from Neal to run to her room. She didn’t know what it was, the nerves from before had vanished as soon as she saw Neal, but she was still feeling sick. If it wasn’t the nerves what could it be? Maybe she hadn’t gotten enough sleep and between that and the lack of food and drink she had taken in, she got ill. With no other explanation coming to her easily she reapplied her makeup and went to join the party.

She found Neal with her father. They were a pair of strikingly handsome and powerful men. While Neal wasn’t prepared to be king any time soon, he stood tall and looked like he could battle an army. Her dad, despite his age, still looked strong and ready to take on the world. The gray hair reflected his long and tiring life. Emma’s heart swelled with love as she stared at the two most important men in her life.

Neal caught her gaze and his smile faltered. Her skin was paler than before and she seemed smaller now. He strode to her and took her in his arms. “Are you okay?”

Emma grinned. “Never better. I was just thinking how strong you and my father look standing together. You’ll make a good king one day.”

“We’ve got time before we have to think about ruling.”

Emma kissed Neal’s cheek and took his hand in hers. They walked to her father and when they stood there David cleared his throat.

“Ladies and Gentleman, thank you for taking the time out of your day to come and celebrate the union of these two. If we could clear the floor I would like to ask the band to strike up some music for the first dance of the night.”

Neal twirled Emma into his arms and swayed to the music. They spun in circles, staring into each others eyes, and soon the world around them became a dull hum. It was just the two of them now and they were going to own every moment of it.

David tapped Neal’s should, “Mind if I cut in?”

Neal backed up, the noise booming in his ears again. He watched father and daughter move around the dance floor. Maybe one day he would do the same with his own daughter or Emma with their son. They hadn’t exactly talked about children so Neal wasn’t sure where Emma stood on them. He wanted one at least, but wouldn’t mind more.

The spinning around the dance floor was causing Emma’s stomach to turn again. “Dad, let’s move off and let the others all dance.”

It had been a year but David would never get used to hearing Emma calling him dad. He followed Emma to their table. “Are you alright?”

“Good, just a little dizzy is all.”

Neal came over and placed a glass of water in front of Emma. “After all that dancing I thought you might be thirsty.”

Emma gulped the water down. “I didn’t realize how thirsty I was. I’m feeling a little hungry too.”

“I’ll go put a plate together for you.” Neal leaned down, brushing his lips over her brow.

------

The party lasted for hours before Neal had had enough. He pulled Emma away and they said their goodbyes. With bags packed they climbed into their waiting ride. Tonight they would stay at a hotel just outside of town and then they would catch their ride to Arendelle in the morning. Neal glanced at Emma, her complexion yet paler and her eyelids heavy. The party had taken a lot out of both of them, hell the nerves from the whole day had taken a lot out of them. Neal was looking forward to laying with Emma wrapped in his arms for the night.

Emma was too tired to fight with Neal about carrying her bags into the hotel herself. She followed him in and collapsed on the bed. “We should sleep first.”

Neal dropped on the mattress next to her, pulling her against him. “Sleep sounds marvelous.”

So they slept, until the moon was high in the sky and Emma’s stomach threatened to empty onto the mattress. She bolted to the bathroom.

After flushing the toilet she washed her hands and rinsed her mouth. After avoiding the possibility all day Emma sat down on the edge of the tub and considered what could be making her sick. The nerves were long gone, she had eaten and hydrated herself so that couldn’t have been it, plus she’d just slept enough so that left either illness or...

[izaswritings]

Title: Faults of the Mind

Synopsis:  Having escaped the perils of the Dark Kingdom, Rapunzel finally returns home—but all is not well in the Kingdom of Corona, and the black rocks are quickly becoming the least of her troubles. Meanwhile, over a thousand miles away, Varian struggles with new powers and his own conscience.

The labyrinth has fallen into rubble. A great evil stirs in the world beyond. The Dark Kingdom may be behind them, but the true journey is just beginning—and neither Rapunzel nor Varian can survive it on their own.

Warnings for: blood, violence, and death (NOT any of main characters), injury, some cursing, references to past character injuries, PTSD symptoms and the lingering effects of trauma. If there’s anything you think I missed, please let me know and I’ll add it on here.

-

AO3 version is here.

Arc I: Labyrinths of the Heart can be found here!

Previous chapters are here.

-

Chapter III: The Puppet

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As the stranger danced to silence, the Sun opened her mouth and began to sing.

It was a song unlike any other, a melody created on a whim for this lovely woman and her lonely dance. For a single moment the song hung in the wind as the woman twirled upon the seas; for a single moment they were in harmony, and all the world held its breath at the sight.

Then the stranger realized what had happened, and froze upon the raging waters. At last, for the first time, she saw the Sun. Her dance stilled; the song, too, fell silent. In an instant their eyes met.

The Sun reacted first, an apology rising to her lips—but it was too late. The stranger, frightened by her audience and her heart moved by the beautiful song she had so briefly witnessed, was overwhelmed and fled. The Sun reached out and cried for the stranger to stop, but already the woman had vanished away into the dark, gone as if she had never been.

And so it was that the beautiful Sun met the lovely Moon, and chased her away…

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For the second time in under a day, Varian makes his way through the fields back to Port Caul.

It’s early, still, and the whole world reflects it: dew and frost weighing heavy on the long grass of the fields, the sky bright with the pale colors of sunrise. The clouds above, wispy and thin, are lined with a delicate gold; the breeze still carries the heavy chill of the midnight ice. Despite the misty night, the ground is frozen solid from frost. With each step, the iced greenery crunches underneath his worn boots.

Still struggling to wake up, Varian pulls the collar of his coat closer and shivers. The fields outside of Port Caul are endless and sprawling, and in the light of the rising dawn, near breathtaking. The far-off silhouette of the city is gilded by the sunrise, the blue buildings shining soft with a pearly glow in the creeping dawn. Despite the bite of cold and the frosted edges, there is something soft about it all—a winter tempered by coming spring, ice thawed to a chill, something brisk and fresh and clean.

It doesn’t make it any less fucking cold, though.

They must make quite a sight, the two of them, to any strangers who see them: the woman, Yasmin, older and stern, with short dark curls and a confident stride—and a boy, Varian himself, tripping behind her, ragged and worn and trying desperately to keep up.

“How much farther?”

To say Varian is exhausted is a gross understatement. He is bone-cold tired. Numb to the world. A walking dead in the making. His late night has done him no favors, and this long walk back through the twists and turns of Port Caul’s farmlands drains what little remaining energy he has. His mouth is dry and sickly, his head stuffed with cotton, his limbs heavy and shaking with fever chills. The winter sun burns down on the back of his neck, the sunshine bright and as piercing as ice. Before him the wide expanse of the world unfurls at his feet, the fields of the Port Caul countryside near infinite to his eyes. Every time he looks to the horizon, to that distant shadow of the city proper, he feels even more tired than before.

Farther ahead, Yasmin walks with sure strides, making a confident pace through the overgrown paths. Despite her age and small size, she is damnably spry. Varian, still lagging behind despite all his best efforts, squints blankly in the sun and hurries to keep up. It’s ridiculous. He’s barely a head shorter than her, so how does she keep getting so far ahead?

“Hello?” he tries, when she doesn’t answer right away. The exhaustion frays his already thin temper; his fatigue makes him bold. “…Are you ignoring me?” he asks, and frowns as he says it. He’s not sure whether to be annoyed at that or not.

Yasmin, still a few paces ahead, heaves a very pointed and visible sigh.

“We’ve been walking for hours,” Varian points out, refusing to be cowed. He’s tired, she’s a jerk, and he does not care about what she thinks of him. Not at all. Nope. He’ll be as rude and spiteful as he wants to be, damn it. “Seriously, how much farther?”

Yasmin gives another heavy sigh. “Until we reach the city.”

“…Seriously?”

“What, was that not funny? I thought moody teenagers were all about sarcasm.” Yasmin stamps the ground with her foot, crushing stray grasses flat. She doesn’t even bother looking back at him. “We will get there when we get there, boy, now stop asking and start walking. Bah, these roads are awful…”

Varian gives the distant horizon a desperate look. It is so far. “Why couldn’t we take a cart?”

“Because I do not own one, clearly.” Yasmin shakes her head. “Walking is good for you.”

“You sound like Adira.”

“Vexing though she may be at times, she is, unfortunately, also often right.” Yasmin pinches at the brow of her nose. “…We will reach the city in another half-hour or so, if we make good pace. May you cease pestering me now?”

Considering the fact they’ve already been walking for about two hours, Varian thinks he deserves to be put-out by that—but he bites back the rude comment rising on his tongue before it can slip free, and takes a moment to breathe. She’s awful, but he’s better than this—or, well, he’s trying to be—so Varian settles for a dark scowl at her back, instead.

Still. He is so bored with walking. He turns his scowl to the ground and kicks a pebble on the road with all his might, smacking it with all the anger and force he can muster. The pebble rolls three measly times and then gets caught in the grass. It’s barely moved an inch.

Typical.

Varian scowls harder.

He misses Ruddiger. He wishes he’d thought to run up and wake the raccoon before he left, but the rapid exit and Yasmin’s swiftly retreating figure had panicked him, and he hadn’t realized he’d left alone until they were already ten minutes down the road. Now Varian is stuck here with a stranger he doesn’t know and doesn’t like—with no raccoon to keep him company.

The day has only just started, and Varian is already certain it’s going to be a miserable one.

Which sucks, because it’s looking to be a lovely day—not a glimpse of clouds on the horizon, a day so blinding and bright it nearly hurts to look at. The sheer shine of the morning is so intense he almost expects a summer heat to match it, but in contrast the wind blows cold, bitingly numb against his exposed face. The grasses sway and bend in the breeze, the fields awash in dark green and winter blue, frost scalding the pebbled wagon road.

In any other circumstance, probably, the view would be beautiful. But Varian’s head is aching and his eyes are sore from lack of sleep, and so instead of appreciating the sight he rubs his bare hands together and shoves them in his sleeves, and thinks only of how goddamn grateful he is that he didn’t forget his coat, too, along with his raccoon.

“Chin up, boy,” says Yasmin, at his silence. “We will be there before you know it.”

Varian directs his bleary frown to her back.  Easy for her to say. She barely looks bothered by the cold at all—is it that she’s used to it, Varian wonders, or is it that she’s just pretending to be unaffected to annoy him more? He… really wouldn’t put it past her.

Still, though, Varian knows better to speak those thoughts out loud. “Why are we even going to the market?” he asks, instead, curious despite himself. “And why do I have to be there?”

Yasmin doesn’t answer right away. Like Varian, she is dressed for the cold, in a long trench coat buttoned up to her neck and a heavy dress lined with fur; she tucks her hands in her sleeves and takes a moment to fuss over the fabric. “That is a rather layered question. I am not sure where to start. Let us say… Adira has somehow convinced me to help. Doubtless this is not what she meant, but she is paying me to do my job, not to listen to her. My help takes many forms. For Adira, it is information. For you?” She shrugs. “Market.”

“I don’t need help,” Varian snaps.

“Nonsense child. Who on earth taught you that silly lie? Everyone needs help. Do not take it personally—I still do not like you. This is not pity, or whatever your knotted mind has conspired. This is simply what I do. If it helps, you may consider my help as part of my job to you.”

…Varian doesn’t even know where to begin responding to that. “That’s…” He throws up his hands. “That doesn’t make sense! What even is your job?”

He gets another side-eye for that one. Yasmin scowls at him, her eyebrows drawn low and twisted. “…Let me guess. Adira did not mention that either?”

He stares at her. “No.” Obviously.

“Bah, of course she didn’t. Why do I bother?” Yasmin slows a bit, letting Varian catch up, and glances down at him. “I am… I am not sure how to explain this. I suppose I am something of a dealer of information, and of rare goods. I know many things, and can find a great many more things, and for the right prices I can be encouraged to share them.”

Varian frowns at her, mind whirling. “Like, an information broker? Or a spy?”

“Hm. You make it sound so ill-advised. But yes, both, that is about right.”

“…Isn’t that illegal?”

Yasmin blinks at him, slow and deliberate. “Yes,” she says. “But so says the wanted criminal.”

Varian turns red, and for a moment he thinks to argue—it’s not like he actively chose to become a criminal—except, well, maybe, yes he had, but…

He gives up. There’s nothing he can truly say against that, though he thinks he is starting to understand Yasmin a little better now. He doesn’t know much about spies or information dealers, just that they exist, but he imagines they tend to be pretty secretive. And if Varian really is a known wanted criminal to the rest of the world…

He turns his head away, not wanting to follow that train of thought any longer. “Is Ella, too—?”

“No.” Yasmin’s voice is curt and cold, shutting down the question before he can finish. “Ella is… she is not involved in my work, though she knows of it. She is a singer, actually. Perfectly legal.” For the first time, something of a smile touches her lips. “My dear wife can hold quite the tune.”

Well, okay. But something she’s said stands out to him. Varian frowns. “How do you know Adira, then?”

“Boy, for Moon’s sake. You have traveled with her for months. What about that woman makes you think she cares one lick for legality?”

Varian briefly flashes back to the last six months. Jumping carts, breaking into caravans, sneaking into cities guarded by soldiers who weren’t convinced by Adira’s sheer force of authority… yeah, no, stupid question. “Is that how you met her? Breaking the law?”

Yasmin snorts. “Nothing so grand. I met Adira through other circumstances.”

“What other circumstances?”

“Tsk. Question after question with you, isn’t it? Yet rarely any answers in return. This is why I despise scientists.” She rolls back her arm, an absent-minded stretch. “It is none of your business, frankly.”

His head drops. “I was just curious,” Varian mumbles, and at his side, his fists clench. He feels a little shamed. It probably was too rude a question, but—this is more than Adira has ever told him. For all of Yasmin’s prickly answers, they are answers.

Yasmin is quiet for a long moment. Then she mutters something, the words too low for Varian to catch, and raises her voice for him to hear. “We were… Adira and I came from a similar place, you could say. Running from the same thing. I always thought her plans foolish, but… well. What are friends for, if not to encourage foolish ideas?” Yasmin glances away. “Though I am beginning to regret that. I have been too accommodating, I think. But that is how I know her. I find her whatever strange item or legend she needs, and in return she keeps me updated on the comings-and-goings of whatever country she’s tromped through this time.”

“Oh.” Varian’s mind whirls, putting together the slim pieces he’d eavesdropped from Adira’s conversation with Yasmin just last night. Their talk of a kingdom… Adira’s frustration. Yasmin, her voice low, to Adira: The kingdom died twenty years ago for me and Ella, though I see for you the death is recent.

He’d known Adira was from the Dark Kingdom—it wasn’t exactly hard to guess, what with that stupid symbol on her hand and all—but for the first time, Varian looks at Yasmin and tries to imagine her there too. Yasmin, and Ella, and their little house in the fields… he thinks of the labyrinth, and the ruins he and Rapunzel found in the depths, and still cannot fathom it. Even for someone as prickly as Yasmin or Adira, it’s hard to picture anyone once calling such a desolate place home.

Unaware of his thoughts, Yasmin’s voice lowers to a mutter. “Of course, this arrangement works much better when she bothers to stay in touch. A little head’s up, a small warning, hello, Yasmin, sorry for the year-long absence, just letting you know I am not dead, and also I am forever grateful for your friendship and the many favors you do for me—” She cuts herself off and clicks her tongue. “Ah, never mind. But that is how it goes. In the end you are just another odd job she has thrown my way.”

Varian hums, distant, and the conversation drops into silence. He lowers his eyes and watches his feet, step after step after step. It’s easier than looking at the horizon. The sheer distance to the city is just starting to depress him.

“…That reminds me, actually,” Yasmin says, apropos of nothing. “I forgot to ask her, and Adira did not mention it—did she say anything to you about a flute, boy?”

Varian looks up, his face scrunching in confusion. “Um… what?”

“A flute.” Yasmin gestures, miming an object far longer than any instrument has a right to be. “Grand old thing, carved from amber, looks quite pretty in sunlight? Lovely music, curved a bit like a hook, so big it is frankly ridiculous? Loaded with religious importance? Took me months to find and secure? Yes? No?”

Varian stares at her. “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he admits.

Yasmin’s lips thin. “I see.”

There is a beat of silence.

“If that woman has left my priceless religious artifact in that goddamn kingdom, I am going to strangle her with her sash,” says Yasmin, thoughtfully, and then she turns back around and marches on down the road without another word.

Varian hurries to catch up. Despite himself, and despite the wariness Yasmin still inspires, he finds his lips almost twitching in a smile, a vague sense of relief. It’s good to know he’s not the only one Adira drives bonkers.

…He’s probably being a bit unfair to her, Varian thinks, with sudden flash of guilt. Adira isn’t that bad. She… she has helped him, in a way. Maybe not the way Varian wanted, or the way he expected, but she has. She’s tried to teach him fighting. She’s kept him clothed and fed and moving in these past six months. He thinks he should maybe thank her, at least for that. As frustrated as he is, Varian is—here. He’s here.

That simple fact means more, now, than it ever did before. After the labyrinth, Varian hadn’t… he hadn’t known what to do. Where to go. What next, or where to now, or even if he wanted that. He’d been free, but he’d been lost, too—and maybe Adira hasn’t given him the direction he wanted, but she has at least gotten him moving.

Varian’s smile fades at this thought. He looks down at his feet, throat suddenly tight. He remembers the way he snapped at Adira, barely a day ago, and squeezes his eyes shut. A headache pulses behind his temple. He—he should apologize, probably. Maybe. He doesn’t think he can, now, but maybe later… maybe if she apologizes first…

His thoughts drift. The wind picks up, a chill striking through him. Varian shivers under the layers of his coat and yawns into his elbow. He feels tired, worn, too aware for the exhaustion dragging at his bones—like the wind itself is all eyes, watching and waiting, boring into the back of his skull.

One step, then another, then again. The wind howls in his ears. The shadows stretch and warp in the sunlight. His heartbeat feels very loud, all of a sudden—like the droning thud of the drums of war, pounding like marching feet against his skull.

All at once, a sudden dread overcomes him. A chill that strikes down to his bones. Each step sends his stomach plummeting. His ears ring. He feels as if ice has been dumped down his back, and his breathing has gone shallow. His heartbeat is rapid-fire, faster than a bird’s.

Don’t go.

He steps toward the city. He moves through the fields. He walks.

Don’t go there.

His mouth is dry. His vision swims. With each step, his heart beats out of tune. Varian looks up in the direction of Port Caul, and thinks, for one blinding moment of clarity: You don’t want to be here.

“Are you alright?”

He startles, near-jumping out of his skin. Yasmin is frowning at him. She stands silhouetted against the sunrise, the shadows cast long and deep across her face. Her brow is furrowed. She is looking down at his right hand.

Varian follows her gaze. His hand is—he’s holding it, he realizes, he’s gripping it tight in a vice, his thumb digging into the soft flesh of his palm as if to burrow beneath the skin. It hurts. It hurts with a dull, solid ache, like pressing on a bruise.

As soon as he realizes this, Varian snaps his hand away. His veins feel tight and cold, stone under his skin. He blinks fast. “W-what?”

“Does your hand hurt?” Yasmin almost looks concerned, in her own irritated way. “This is the second time I have seen you do that. Is that why you cannot sleep?’

“That’s—I—I don’t know.” He hadn’t even realized he was doing it. Varian hunches under the attention, and hides his hand behind his back. But even as he does it, his skin crawls, his right palm itching terribly. He has to fight not to claw at his skin. “How did you—wait, why does it matter if I can’t sleep?”

In the distance, the city looms closer than before—they are practically upon the city gates. The wall towers over him, a cold shadow, and beside them a horse and cart rumbles by through the wrought iron gates. The road, beneath his feet, has turned from soft crushed grass to actual paved stone. Varian’s head spins. How long had he blanked out for?

Yasmin scans him up and down, her brow knotted. “That is why we are here, of course,” she says, at last, looking a little reluctant at the shift in subject. “You said to me this morning you have issues with sleep, and I have little remedies for such in my house… so to the market we go.” Her lips press—but then she seems to let it go, shaking her head with a weary breath. “Well. If not an injury, then what is it? Can you not fall asleep, or is it that you cannot stay asleep?”

Varian scowls at the dirt path and stubbornly does not think of dark hallways and darker rooms, the moonlight streaming through the window. “Why does it matter?”

“I have agreed to help you, but I cannot help if I do not know what is wrong.” Yasmin is scowling, but it is a distant thing, not directed at him. She looks vaguely frustrated. “I do not like you, I have made no secret of it; you dislike me too, and you have made no secret of that, either. This is fine. We do not have to like each other. But I have tried to be honest with you, thus far—so please, do me the favor of being honest with me.”

She is frank, she is annoying, she is a bladed voice and angry words—but she has told him more in one conversation than Adira has in months. And it is this honesty that makes Varian duck his head, but it is this truth that finally makes him admit it: for all that he dislikes her, Varian is terrified of the idea of continuing to face the dark alone.

Still. It is so hard to admit it, to put voice to the fears inside him. His words come out a teeth-clenched whisper. “It’s—it’s just—” He doesn’t know how to say it. “It’s just too dark.”

It’s shameful, almost. Childish, certainly. Varian is afraid of many things, but the dark, oddly, has never been one of them. He has always felt so secure in the science of the world that the monsters of myth had been dismissed as easy as breathing. And he still feels that certainty. He still feels utterly secure in the fact there is nothing in the closet, nothing under the bed. It’s just—

It’s just too dark, now.

It’s just too much.

“I see,” Yasmin says. Her voice is quiet too. Another cart rumbles by them, the creak of the wheels almost deafening in the silence. The murmur of voices and the rasp of the sea breeze drifts in from the city gates. Varian looks away from Yasmin and up at the gate, and shivers in the shadow. The whisper comes back to him again. Turn back. Go away. It’s not safe here.

“I see,” Yasmin repeats, and her voice breaks Varian from the spell. “Well then. Just to be sure—you are an alchemist, yes?”

Varian lifts his head, blinking echoes from his eyes. “U-um, yeah.”

“I do not own any alchemical equipment, but I have enough bobbles to get you by, I think, if you choose your ingredients wisely.” She turns to the gates and Varian follows, reluctant, as she pushes through the iron doors. “Come along, boy. In the end it may do little, but if darkness is your issue… then I recommend building yourself a light.”

.

Eugene leaves the castle that night.

His reasoning is simple: there’s no real reason to delay. Eugene has no desire to draw out this parting any longer than he has to. With his goodbyes to Rapunzel said and her letter weighing heavy in his vest pocket, Eugene returns to his allotted rooms and picks up the travel bags he hadn’t even bothered to unpack. He doesn’t know how long he’ll be gone, but it’s best to be prepared.

That isn’t to say he rushes, oh no—Eugene takes his sweet time. It’s almost like planning a heist, in that way. The devil is always in the details, and Eugene considers details to be the most important step. Missing one crucial item in a theft can be deadly, and in a way, well… this isn’t all that different.

The preparations take him the rest of the day. In the hours following his talk with Rapunzel, Eugene repacks his bags and prepares to leave the castle behind. He chooses new clothes, picks up fresher food, slips in a few items he thinks will serve as a welcome gift for Lance. He finds the daggers he’d stashed away when he first moved in and hides away the finer cloths that would get him mugged five feet out from the castle walls. He has a job to do, after all—and for all that Eugene isn’t the most serious individual, he is most certainly a professional. Either he does this right, or he does this not at all… and doing nothing is no longer an option.

By sunset, he’s all ready to go. Eugene hides his belongings in one of the castle’s many nooks and crannies, goes to bother Maximus in his own silent way of saying goodbye—and, when the daylight has faded and the shadows cover his path, slips inside the guard barracks and goes to find Cassandra.

He finds her in her room, thankfully—he’s not sure he could sneak by her new post in the dungeons without being caught, and he definitely doesn’t want to deal with that kind of drama right now. But his luck is holding true: he’s managed, from the sounds of things, to catch her right before she heads off for her post. Her door is half-open, the lock unlatched, and Eugene knocks on the wood frame with one hand as he toes the door open.

The room is as empty as his was; the evidence of an eight months absence. It’s cleaner than he’s ever seen it, no stray weapons lying about or anything, and her bed is made so well the cover corners look sharp enough to cut. For all that Cassandra served as a palace maid, and took her duties seriously, her own rooms are usually where she throws all tidiness out the window. This, more than the shadows under her eyes, tells Eugene all he needs to know. Apparently Rapunzel isn’t the only one with insomnia today. Cassandra probably hasn’t slept one wink since they got back yesterday morning.  

She looks it, too. He’s caught her in the middle of preparing for her shift, armor half-on and hair an absolute bird nest. She’s always been pale, but today the pallor is almost ghastly, the shadows of her eyes rivaling even Varian’s. There’s a new scab on her lower lip, a wound never quite healed: she’s bit her lip hard enough to bleed.

Cassandra glances over at the open door, helmet in one hand like she’s trying to decide whether it’s worth trying to pry it over her bush of curls. It takes her a moment to realize he’s there, but as soon as she realizes her face twists in a scowl. Her glare is practically automatic, but whatever sting it might have held is dulled by the bloodless pall of her face.

“What do you want, Fitzherbert?”

Bad mood, then. The last name thing is always an indicator. Eugene’s lips thin. He’s not upset. He can’t even blame her. She looks…

She looks how he feels, really. What a mess. “Long day?”

Cassandra gives him a dirty look for that. Eugene winces. “Yeah, okay. Too soon?”

She throws the helmet on her bed, looking about to snap… and then sighs, her shoulders slumping. Her eyes squeeze shut. In the darkening sunset light streaming through her narrow window, the shadows under her eyes seem bright as bruises. “Sorry.”

Eugene snorts and leans back against the doorframe, crossing his arms over his chest. “It’s fine. You realize I’ve dealt with your prickly temper before, right?”

Cassandra rolls her eyes. “Oh, ha-ha.” She rubs at her face and turns away, sitting down hard on the bed. “Still, sorry. I’m not… I just…” She shakes her head, her teeth gritting.

Eugene can only imagine. Demoted to prison duty, after once having been the top detail of the future Queen? It’s more than a slap on the wrist—it’s a bona fide royal punishment, and it’s going to give her a bad rep, too. And that would be bad enough, perhaps, but that she’s being punished because of the situation with Varian…?

Yeah. Yeah, no. There’s no good ending to that story.

They haven’t talked about Varian, really. They’ve barely said his name at all these past few months, beyond the whys and hows of his disappearance after the labyrinth. There is an understanding between all three of them—a looming fight that Eugene can almost taste in the air whenever the topic is broached, and all three of them have been ignoring the problem of Varian entirely rather than risk the argument it might spike. So while Eugene can’t say he knows how Cassandra feels about Varian… well.

He has a pretty good guess that it’s nothing good.

He doesn’t blame her; some days, Eugene feels much the same himself. His nightmares have come and gone these past few months, ebbing and rising like a tide, but though most are filled with dark stone and the knife-like smile of a terrible god, some are older still. A campfire, halfway burning. Arrows in firelight. The way Rapunzel fell back, the sound of her skull snapping against the stone, and most awful of all: that brief, terrible moment when he thought she’d never get up again.

He knows Cassandra dreams of much the same.

“It’s a bad situation,” Eugene settles on, finally. “As expected.”

“Being right about it doesn’t make it better, Eugene.”

“Uh, yeah, no. Yep. Bullseye on that.”  He sags his weight against the doorway, heaving a sigh so heavy it makes his body sink with the sound. He rubs the back of his neck. “I mean, by gods, I sure didn’t miss this. Politics! Hah!”

The briefest hint of a smile curls at Cassandra’s mouth, almost reluctant. “Oh? And here I thought you liked the idea of being king.”

“Yeeeeeah, about that. Sneaky.” He points a warning finger at her. King, hah. It’d been Lance who’d finally told him how succession worked in Corona. Rapunzel gets crowned Queen—and Eugene, marrying into the family, would not be a king, but rather a Prince Consort. Which is a fine fancy title in its own right, but still. “When were you going to tell me that isn’t how it works?”

“When it was funny.”

“Oh-hoh! Fuck you.”

That pale smile flickers to a true grin. Eugene leans back against the door again, pleased with his work. “But seriously,” he says, humor fading to sincerity. “Things may seem like a shitshow now, but… It’ll blow over. Eventually.”

The grin fades. Cassandra looks away. “Sure.”

“Still sucks, though.”

She exhales hard, pointedly. “Eugene. Why are you here?”

This time it’s Eugene who looks away. He taps his fingers against his arm, the uneven rhythm of a bar song that’s been stuck in his head since winter began. His lips press in a thin line. He takes a moment to gather his thoughts, then pushes up against the doorway, bracing himself.

Well. No more stalling it, he supposes.

“I’m leaving.”

He senses rather than sees Cassandra go still. “...What?”

“I didn’t come here to get lectured,” he warns her, straightening up, finally meeting her eyes. She looks as furious as he expected. “I already told Blondie. I’m heading out tonight. If you need to get in touch, the Snuggly Duckling is your best bet.” He hesitates, then exhales heavy through his teeth. “Look, I—I get it. I know what you’re going to say. But I’ve been thinking about this for a while. I… I need to do this.”

“We just got back.” Cassandra’s voice is low. “Just got back, and with things as they are— and I can’t even see her— and you’re leaving her alone?”

“I can’t help her here.” Eugene tries to keep the words even, accusation-free, but he can’t quite keep the coldness out of his voice. He knows this already. He knows, and it's already eating at him, and he doesn’t need Cassandra digging in the knife. “I can’t— I won’t sit here and be useless.” Not again, he thinks, but he bites that part off behind his teeth.

Cassandra scowls at the ground. Her expression has turned dark.

Eugene looks away too, hating the knot in his gut. He rubs at his chin and sighs, leaning back heavy against the doorframe. “Besides,” he says, finally, trying to keep his voice light. “I wouldn’t be so sure about that whole ‘no-contact’ clause part of the punishment. This is Rapunzel we’re talking about. I’d bet good money she’ll find a way to break out of that room and into here in about… oh, three days. Tops.”

“She shouldn’t.”

“Well. It’s Rapunzel.”

Cassandra hums at that, tuneless. She still isn’t meeting his eyes.

Eugene holds back another sigh and shakes his head, dipping one hand in his pocket. “...I didn’t just come to say goodbye, either.” He draws Rapunzel’s letter from his vest, holding it out. “For you.”

She goes to take it, but Eugene pulls it back out of reach. “Cass, before you read it—”

She glares at him.

“You don’t have to do this,” Eugene says, undeterred. “Not if you don’t want to. I know how much this job means to you.”

Something in the tone of his voice must get through, because her hand stills. She’s quiet for a long moment.

“…Will it help?”

He’s not sure how to answer that. “It’s something.”

“Then yes.” Cassandra meets his gaze, her expression tense. “I want to help.”

He thins his lips, but hands it over. He’s not sure what to make of the look on her face—the odd pinch to her eyes. Cassandra takes the missive warily, breaking the seal and scanning the page within seconds. Eugene watches her face, trying to put a name to what he sees there.

Cassandra’s expression doesn’t even twitch. After reading, she folds the letter carefully and lays it flat on her lap. With one hand, she rubs the corner of the parchment between her fingers, her eyes dark in thought.

“You understand, don’t you?” Eugene says finally. His voice is quiet. His eyes unwavering. A flash of clarity has struck him. “Standing aside, watching everything happen… I never want to be there again.”

At long last, Cassandra looks at him. She doesn’t move, but in this moment, he can finally read her. In this, he knows for sure. The labyrinth has left its mark on all of them, in its own way—and for the two of them, it has left the same scar. It has united them in the horror of being left behind and helpless.

Cassandra’s eyes drop. The anger has faded from her face—now, she just seems tired. “...I’ll look out for her.”

“She doesn’t need it, I think. But thanks. I hate the idea of leaving her alone.” Eugene straightens, waves one hand in a mocking salute. “Good luck,” he says, gentling into something genuine. “Cass.”

She meets his gaze again. A smile twitches at the corner of her mouth, and this time, it’s almost real. “You too, Eugene.”

Eugene gives a winning smile back and slips out the room without another word—no need to make this sappy, after all. He closes the door soundlessly behind him, and feels something almost like pleased. The conversation didn’t quite go as he wanted—but he thinks it was a success regardless.

He sticks his hands in his pockets and slips back in the comfort of the shadows.

It is child’s play to get back outdoors undetected. He picks up his bag from the hiding spot and slip it over his shoulder, tilting back his head in the night air. He’s got a long walk ahead of him—a long few weeks to go—and he takes one last second for himself, to settle, to be sure. Taking one last moment to breathe.

Oh, gods. Is he really going to do this?

He looks up behind him, one last look at Rapunzel’s tower room. The window is dark, all the lights gone out. But he can still see the silhouette of a figure on the balcony, the flickering shine of golden hair swept up in a breeze.

He lifts his hand, wondering, a quiet wave. He thinks he sees the figure wave back.

He already misses her. But Eugene turns away from the castle regardless. He slips by those castle gate guards without any issue at all, and just like that: there he is, on the road once again.

His heart is tight, but Eugene manages a smile anyway. Rapunzel will be okay. Cassandra, whatever she decides, will be there for her regardless. They have things handled here—and Eugene’s place, for now, is elsewhere.

He’s got work to do.

It takes him an hour to leave the city behind. By the time he reaches the woods it’s gone completely dark outside. The woods are all shadow at this time of dusk, foreboding and eerie, but Eugene palms his dagger and continues on without worry. Even without a sure light, the moon and stars are bright above him—and he’s always been an old hand at sneaking in the dark.

He walks for most of the night, well on to midnight. The time makes no difference, however—even at this hour, he can hear the Snuggly Duckling before he sees it. Laughter, and roaring music, and then distant light through the trees. Eugene shades his eyes against the startling shine and has to physically bite back a grin when he hears the singing. Oh-hoh, he knows that voice.

He rushes to reach the doors before it’s too late, moving fast as the song and music begin to reach its finale. He makes it just in time.

Eugene throws open the door just as Lance finishes a truly impressive solo, and lifts a hand to his ears with no time to spare. “Good gods, men!” he says, as loudly as he can. “I came here to get a drink—but who let a banshee in this place?”

The music stops. Someone’s cup drops and rolls. The Snuggly Duckling falls into a hushed and reverent silence, and Lance falls off the table.

Eugene stares at the stunned room of thugs. The stunned room of thugs stares back.

“...Surprise?”

Lance’s head pops up from the floor. “Eugene!” he shouts, delightedly, and tackles him in a hug.

Like Lance’s word was the stone to break the glass, the whole bar erupts into noise.

“Hey!”

“It’s Fitz!”

“Welcome back!”

“Where the hell have you been, you slippery bastard?”

Lance spins him around, cackling loudly. Eugene yelps, arms suddenly pinned, torn between laughing and hissing at him. “Hey, hey, hey—!”

“You’re back!” Lance drops him on his feet, beaming fit to burst. He looks—he looks good, Eugene realizes, and it makes some secret weight on his heart lift. It’s just been bad news after bad news for so long, that he’d worried… but Lance is here, his smile wide and true, and he looks happier than Eugene has seen him in a long time. He’s dressed in a new outfit, a snazzy black vest with a red cotton undershirt, a new piercing in his left ear. There’s a glow to him, a veil of health that speaks of regular meals and good care. In contrast to the gloom that haunted the castle, Lance’s presence lights up the room. His hand on Eugene’s shoulder is warm. “Long time no see, Eugene.”

“We’ve gone longer,” Eugene says, an automatic answer, but inside, he agrees whole-heartedly. It has been—too long. Far too long. His returning smile is helplessly fond. He is so glad to see Lance. “How are things?”

“Oh, booming,” Lance says, and he says it casual, but there’s a smile on his face that Eugene knows well— that beaming pride, curdled warm, but this time there’s something softer to the edge of it. “It’s, uh—going really well, actually. I meant to say in the letters, but—well, I got the bar!” He gestures to the Snuggly Duckling. “The whole lot of it.”

“Done good work too!” one man yells, and the tavern shakes with the ensuing roar of agreement. Lance laughs again, looking touched. Eugene looks around at the sea of bright and drink-rosy faces, the warm lanternlight and crackling fire of Lance’s Snuggly Duckling, and grins back.

“Lance!” he says, punching his shoulder. “Buddy! That’s wonderful!”

“It’s been a journey,” Lance says, trying for humble, but there’s a brightness to the words, a disbelieving joy that hasn’t quite faded. “I’ll tell you later. What about you, eh? It’s been ages since your last response!”

Eugene’s smile flickers. Lance immediately pauses. “Oh—”

“You’re never going to believe this, Strongbow, old buddy, old pal.” Eugene slings his arm around him, cutting off the inquiry before the rest of the bar can catch onto the shift in mood. “The number of things I saw across the sea, good man, I could fill a book!”

Lance blinks, rapidly, and for a moment his face is terrifyingly blank—and then his eyes go wide in realization. Thank gods. It’s been awhile since they used that code, but the memory of childhood bonding over Flynn Rider books reigns eternal even now.

Lance slings an arm around his shoulders and grips him in a one-armed hug. “Then I, Strongbow, shall most definitely help you write it!” The word-for-word quoted response. Then Lance winks, and the next bit is all him. “After a drink, of course.”

“Of course,” Eugene echoes, wryly, and manages to grin back.

Lance pushes him through the bar, somehow keeping Eugene from the crowd without making it suspicious, laughing and cheering and chattering like it’s a normal Tuesday. Before Eugene even knows what’s happened, he finds himself in a back room of the tavern, drink in hand and Lance sitting across the table, the room as quiet as any rooms in the Snuggly Duckling can get.

“This is as private as I can give you,” Lance says, sitting back in his chair. His smile is bright as ever. His voice, warm as Eugene remembers. But there is a tightness around his eyes, a worry Eugene reads clear as day, and when Lance leans in, he is as serious as he ever gets. “Okay, buddy. Spill. What happened? And how can I help?”

This is why Eugene came here. This is why Eugene needed to leave. Because he’s good. He’s really good. But he’s always been better with someone at his back—and he’s at his best with Lance by his side.

Gods, he’s missed him.

Eugene drinks deep from his flask, sets down the empty cup, and prepares to tell Lance everything.

.

“What do you need?”

The sun is high in the bright blue sky, and the Port Caul market in full unbridled swing. Stalls line the main city road, stretching on from the docks to the shopping district, their owners shouting wares from across the street. Vegetables, cheeses, smoked meats and cloth and flowers and trinkets—everywhere Varian turns, there is something new to see, some new dizzying sight to catch his eye. He’d thought the crowd from yesterday had been intimidating, but this one puts it to shame. The sheer amount of people and goods makes his head spin. This is nothing like the market in Old Corona—this is more like the capital than anything, or even the science fair. The amount of people out and about for a daily market is mind-blowing.

“Child, eyes on me.” Yasmin snaps her fingers in front of his face. Varian looks to her reluctantly, fighting the urge to keep gaping at his surroundings. “What do you need?”

“What?” Varian asks, too dazed to follow her questions. His eyes drift to the market again.

Yasmin frowns down at him. “Keep up, boy. For a light. What do you need?”

Oh. Varian blinks fast, thoughts muddled by the market, his own exhaustion, and the constant dread that is stillbeating away at the edge of his mind. He says the first thing he can think of. “Matches?”

Yasmin stares at him. Varian slowly flushes, scrambling to get his thoughts in order—nope, nothing. He tries again. “…Fire?”

“That was not a trick question. I meant—a more permanent light, a manufactured one. A nightlight. Something to help keep the dark at bay without being too bright to wake you.” Yasmin rubs at her forehead. “What do you need to make something like that?”

“Oh.” Well, that makes much more sense. Varian blinks hard, rubbing at his eyes, trying to get his thoughts in order. He feels like he’s wading in molasses, an exhaustion that drags at his thoughts and eyelids. A permanent light… something he could hold, maybe. Something bright enough to let him know he isn’t in the dark but quiet enough not to keep him awake. A soft glow. Unwavering…

“A vial, maybe?” Varian murmurs. “No, glass, breakable, bad idea. Stone… too opaque. Gem, too expensive—”

“Crystal?”

Varian blinks, startled from his thoughts. Yasmin is frowning again, but not at him—just off to the side, looking lost in thought. “Would that work?”

“I…” His mind whirls, thoughts tangling. “If it could hold something—was hollow inside—I think so? I need a space to put in the materials, and then I gotta seal it up after, so—”

“Yes, yes, let me handle that—I am not completely bereft of supplies. I am sure Ella has a jewelry clasp somewhere. We will figure something out.” Yasmin tilts her head. “What would you need to make the light?”

He lists ingredients in his head, remembers the likely lack of equipment, and shoves aside all but a few. Lists down his fingers. “Let’s see… um, distilled water, definitely. Probably some sodium carbonate, luminol… ammonium carbonate, copper sulfate pentahydrate… maybe some 3 percent hydrogen peroxide, or would just using zinc sulfide work better?” He frowns at his hands. “I should probably test that, the zinc sulfide might be too weak to last, but the other mixture might—”

Varian cuts himself off, his hand dropping. At once he realizes he’s been rambling. He flushes, his confidence faltering. There in the market cheer he feels abruptly out of place, too obvious, too seen. His skin crawls. He swallows hard. “Um. But I… I don’t think I’ll find all that here, it’s—”

“Do not worry,” Yasmin says, surprising him silent. She looks almost bemused by his sudden bit of word vomit. “Port Caul markets sell many things— and things like that for rather cheap. You would be surprised at how many children like to play at alchemy.”

Varian splutters. “It’s not playing—”

Yasmin has already turned away. Her coat flaps at her heels as she strides deeper in the market crowd. “Hurry along, boy. Let us go! I haven’t got all morning.”

Varian yelps and rushes to keep up.

It must be market day, he thinks; the place is busier than it was yesterday, and the crowd is nearly dizzying. People shouting, people selling, laughter high and bright in the frozen winter air. They’ve arrived early enough that the sun’s rising warmth hasn’t thawed the streets yet—the cobble roads are slick with frost and sea-spray salt, the wind brisk against his skin, the breeze as sharp as knives.

Varian tugs up his borrowed coat collar and follows Yasmin best he can, tripping in his too-big boots even with his layered number of socks. In contrast to Varian’s hesitation, Yasmin maneuvers the market like a king in court, eyes sharp and scanning, seeing all the market has to offer and dismissing it just as quickly.

“This way,” she says after a minute, and tugs Varian to the side, near a small stall off the corner. The covered wagon has a table with a velvet cloth, small glittering gems and jewels shining on the dark red fabric. The man minding the stall is tall and round, and when he sees Yasmin approaching he sits up with a smile.

“Yasmin! Been awhile. How’s it been?”

“Lovely, Marin, thank you. Have you any crystals?”

The man hums. “All sorts. What are you looking for?”

Yasmin puts a hand on her hip and turns to Varian. He stares back, blank, then jumps when the man looks at him too. “O-oh. Um.” Their eyes make his skin crawl. Yasmin has already recognized him for what he is. What if this man, too—? “A, a hollow… hollow center. If you have that. And, um… clear would be—be best—”

“Of course.” The man’s interruption is kind, his smile unsuspecting. He leans down and rummages at his feet, the clink of precious stones in the air. “I’ve a few like that. Take your pick.”

Varian surveys the offered collection of crystals, ranging in sizes from small to unwieldy, and finally selects one near the middle—not the cleanest cut, but a nice size, fitting well in his palm. It has a hollowed center like a shallow shot glass, the opening just barely big enough for a finger. Hopefully easy to seal closed, once he’s made the light. “T-this one’s fine.”

“Great. That’ll be five gold crowns, then.”

Varian freezes, color draining from his face. Five gold crowns? He doesn’t even have copper. Oh, gods, he’s forgotten money was a thing that existed again. “I—uh, I—”

“I have it.” Yasmin sets the gold down with a sharp click, the coins stacked in a perfect tower. “Take care of yourself, Marin.” To Varian: “Come along. Next stop.”

“Come back if you need any more!” the shopkeeper calls. “I’ll have a lot more next week, if those trading ships finally make it to harbor!”

“I will think about it!” Yasmin is walking away, but Varian doesn’t move, and after a moment she glances back at him, eyebrows raised. “Hello? What is wrong. Why are you not moving.”

He stares down at the ground, eyes burning. “I didn’t ask you to pay for me.”

Yasmin tilts her head. “I am the one helping you, and this is my idea. I would not make you pay for it. In a roundabout way, I am being paid to help you. There is no loss here.”

“I—”

He can’t find the words, the anger rootless, his frustration smarting. He is sick of feeling helpless, of feeling like a drain; he hasn’t asked to be taken care of, to be treated like a child. But he doesn’t yet know how to put it into words, and all he can do is glower at the ground and seethe.

Yasmin considers him. Something in the hard lines of her face softens.

“…Come here.”

He goes reluctantly, stepping out of earshot from the shopkeeper. Yasmin places a hand on his shoulder, steering him away, and when she speaks, her voice is not softer but somehow gentler. “Listen. I do not know what brought you here, nor do I care. But you are here. And it is clear to me that you need help.” She looks down at him. “Boy, you do not need to like me. I still do not like you. But I am not here to hurt you, or slight you, or whatever it is you think I am doing. My dislike does not mean I cannot do you a kindness.”

Varian doesn’t answer. Yasmin draws her hand away. “If it bothers you so deeply, you can plan to pay me back in your own time. But for now—can you accept this?”

He looks down. The anger, rising, turns ashy on his tongue, cold and empty. “…Okay.”

He sounds tuneless even to himself. In the back of his mind, the dread hums like a lightning strike. Turn back. Go home. It’s not safe here.

He swallows back the anxiety and shuts his eyes tight. He hears Yasmin exhale, soft and tired.

“Chin up, boy,” she says, half-way to gentle. “I am sure you will like this next part. Come along.”

Varian, doubtful, sets his jaw and bravely follows after her.

She leads him further into the market, closer to the docks. The scent of salt and sea fills his nose. The crowd is a little thinner here, easier to navigate, and the sudden breathing room helps unwind some of the tension from his shoulders. He tilts his head in the breeze and breathes deep.

It’s the smell that hits him first. The burning hiss, the sudden bitterness on his tongue like ash—

His eyes snap open. He sees it almost at once.

The small wooden stall. The bright pink banner. The small jars, the neat little labels. The smell in the air, even in this crowded and clustered market place, a sour snap like citric acid, like the tang of metal—

He knows the stall even before he sees the sign. This—this is an alchemy store.

Varian races ahead, pushing past Yasmin and nearly running right into the stall. It has been so, so long since Varian has seen alchemy, even longer since he’s done it properly. The road isn’t appropriate for intensive experiments, and Adira never willing to buy materials, and Varian never quite confident enough to ask for them. After six months of nearly nothing, the sight of the stall is enough to make his eyes prick with tears.

Even the memory of his last alchemy experiment can’t bring down his mood. In the labyrinth, this skill was the one thing that brought Varian some comfort. Some denial of fate, some way to fight. Through alchemy, Varian found a chance to breathe. Through alchemy, Varian defeated Moon’s golem.

And now, this alchemy stall—the sight of those elements, neatly bottled, the equipment, newly shined—it makes his vision blur. Varian’s smile nearly splits his face in half. He puts his hand on the table and leans up, beaming at the shopkeeper, a woman with a heavy afro pulled back in a bun and a no-nonsense alchemical smock. “Is this all yours!?”

“Every bottle of it.” The shopkeeper puts down a vial, a latest experiment of some sort. Her gloves, heavy and dark and made of solid stitched leather, make Varian’s own now-bare hands itch with envy. “Why, you interested?”

“Yes.”

She grins. “Well, then. Nice to see someone who appreciates the art! What are you looking for?”

“Something for a light, if you have got it.” Yasmin walks up from behind him, sounding bemused. “What was it? Zinc sulfate?”

“Sulfide,” Varian corrects, automatic. “Zinc sulfide, and also some distilled water, and I was thinking maybe…”

He lists the ingredients off from memory, counting them off his fingers to be sure he doesn’t forget any. “…and some 3 percent hydrogen peroxide, if you have any?”

“Easy enough.” The woman tugs off her gloves, nodding thoughtfully. “How much of each?”

Varian does quick math in his head—some extra needed if things go wrong, enough to make two batches if things go right—and rattles off the amounts in grams. The shopkeeper hums when he finishes, looking vaguely impressed. “Can do. It’ll be a blue-ish light, in the end—should last you a couple months before you’ll have to remake it.”

Varian abruptly pales. The shopkeeper blinks. “Is something wrong?”

Blue, Varian thinks numbly. Blue light. Right. He hadn’t thought of that. He struggles to answer. “Um—I—that is—”

Yasmin touches at his shoulder. Varian looks up at her, but Yasmin is speaking to the shopkeeper instead when she says, “Is it possible to change the color of the light?”

Something like pride smarts in his chest.

“Of course,” says the shopkeeper. “Easy,” Varian scoffs, pointedly, at the same exact time.

There is a beat of silence. Yasmin rolls her eyes. “Scientists,” she says, disgusted. “Would you need an ingredient for that?”

“Alchemists,” Varian corrects, annoyed, and then blinks as the rest of her words sink in. Oh, right. He turns back to the shopkeeper. “Do you have any pigments?”

“I have all the pigments. Could even mix a few powders, but you’ll have to be exact on the color if so.”

Varian bites his lip, considering. Yasmin looks down at him. “It need not be a difficult discussion,” she says. “The intended use already removes a few options. White, too bright; black, destroys the purpose of having a light at all. Red would be… garish, I think. Sort of bloody. Hmm. What about orange?”

He makes a face, unable to help it. Orange has never been his favorite color, and after the amber… “No.”

“Tsk. Green? Violet?”

Violet is too close to blue; green reminds him of the automatons beneath the castle, and what he did with them. Varian shakes his head.

“…Yellow?”

Golden shine and searing heat, the numbness broken apart by a light that burned as bright as a sun—

Some of his thoughts must show on his face. Yasmin stops herself before Varian can even think to interrupt. “Not yellow, either. Hmph.” She considers, cupping her chin in one hand. “…What about pink?”

Pink. Varian considers it. It’s a pale color, and a soft color, like they wanted. If he makes the glow very quiet it won’t hurt his eyes at all. And pink… there is nothing he associates with the color, no light-based trauma to invite nightmares. Pink is sunrise and sunset, soft flowers in spring fields. It’s a color that reminds him of happy things.

“…Pink would work.”

“Pink it is.”

The shopkeeper nods. “I’ll wrap it up.”

They get the ingredients wrapped in small paper bags, and as Yasmin counts out money for the cost Varian shuffles through the wrapped ingredients with a giddiness he’d almost forgotten. He feels renewed, refreshed, the ever-present exhaustion dulled by a joy that could almost burst out of him.

He tucks the packets away in the satchel and tilts his head into the wind with a soft sigh. His smile is a small thing, barely there—quiet and thin, hidden in the light of the winter sun. The market moves around him, warm and whispering. The noonday sun is melting the frost.

And it is then, in this moment, as the crowd swells silent and the market murmurs soft—that is when the screaming starts.

.

“Are you sure you’re okay with this?”

Cassandra closes her wardrobe hard, hearing the weapons knock around inside. It is three days after their return to Corona, and Cassandra’s patience is nearing its limit. Outside of her window, the setting sun burns gold at their backs, casting a long shadow across Cassandra’s entire room. “Yes, Raps. I already said I was.”

“I know. I just—”

“You worry. I know.” Cassandra takes a breath, holds back a sigh. She’s not annoyed. She’s not. She’s just—

Gods, she wishes Rapunzel could just let it go.

It’s not that she doesn’t appreciate the gesture—to be honest, she’s fully expected this. Of course Rapunzel would come to check in on her, especially after the last few days. Eugene’s skipped out of the castle with a plan he hasn’t even told Cassandra about, Rapunzel has been avoiding her parents best she can, and Cassandra—

Cassandra is right back where she started.

She supposes it could be worse; the king could strip her of the guard title entirely. Being demoted to the dungeons, being forced to avoid Rapunzel… these things aren’t good by any stretch of imagination, but as far as limitations go, they aren’t so bad. Take this, for example—for all of the King’s grandiose orders, here Rapunzel is, only three days later having already discovered a path through the tunnels that leads right to Cassandra’s quarters.

It could be worse, Cassandra thinks, and ignores the way it feels like she’s trying to convince herself. It could be worse.

“I just… I want to be sure.”

Cassandra turns, straightening up in full as she pulls on the last piece of armor, strapping her arm guard in place. Clunky, bronze, degraded, demoted. She misses the golden shine of the armor for Royal Guards. “And I’m telling you exactly what I told Eugene. It’s fine. There’s obviously something wrong, and—and you need my help. And if what you overheard was true…”

It’s the reason for Rapunzel’s visit, after all. Cassandra had woken up to sunset, blearily about to get ready for yet another awful night shift—only to find the resident Princess and future Queen leaning over her face like a fretting hen, eyes bright with a stolen secret.

“I’m almost certain,” Rapunzel says at once. “I know it was Nigel talking, he’s got… a distinctive voice. And he sounded worried.”

According to Rapunzel, just this morning while on her way to meet with her parents for yet another awkward not-quite-conversation, she’d passed by a hall and heard Nigel talking with a messenger. Which isn’t anything unusual—advisors talk with messengers literally all the time—except the contents of this conversation had been a little… stressed. A deal in the making, a big agreement between the King and another party—only whoever and whatever this deal was about, it didn’t seem to be about anything good.

Still, Cassandra is content to play devil’s advocate for this. “The kingdom makes deals all the time, Raps. Compromise, trade, agreements… that’s what running a country is all about.”

Rapunzel isn’t swayed. “Trust me, okay? This wasn’t like the usual. The way they were talking…” She bites her lip. “Cass, it sounded… bad. Almost like they—Corona, my dad—were running out of other options, but also like accepting the deal would be…”

“Like a deal with the Moon?”

“Or Zhan Tiri. Just. Bad.”

“I believe you,” Cassandra says, finally. She places one hand on her sword. “But that’s why, if it’s really as big as you say, we need more information, if anything we do is going to stick. So, if this is what’s needed…”

I want to help, she doesn’t say this time. She’d already said it to Eugene, two days and a night ago, when he stopped by her room and pressed a letter in her hands.

“You don’t have to do this, Cass,” he’d said then, letter in hand but holding back. “I know how much this job means to you.”

“Will it help?”

“It’s something.”

“Then yes,” Cassandra had said, cold and trying hard not to seem desperate, and she’s spent every night after thinking about that letter and what it meant, and the look in Eugene’s eyes when he gave it to her. Like he knew. Like he suspected.

King Frederick had been cold when he’d demoted her, near icy in tone. In contrast, beside her, Cassandra’s father had been spitting mad on her behalf, only just holding his tongue, his face dark with an anger that the King hadn’t even batted an eye at. Cassandra had taken the sentence with her head high and her heart burning. She’d known what this was really about, even then. It’s not about the secrets. It’s not even about Rapunzel’s silence, not really. It’s this—Rapunzel, flinching and quiet and different behind the eyes, the attack Cassandra can’t elaborate on and the prisoner who escaped, Varian vanished into the wilds.

In the eyes of the king, Cassandra has failed. Never mind that Varian got a chance to attack because Rapunzel let him. Never mind it was Rapunzel who let him go. Never mind that—

But even then. Even then, that hadn’t shaken her. But when the King had demoted her, when that golden shine of royal armor was replaced by lesser bronze—Cassandra had stared down at gloved hands, and wondered what the hell she was doing there.

Standing in line, she thinks. Guarding locked doors. She’s traveled across two continents, she’s traversed the ruins of a kingdom long dead, she’s looked a god full in the face and snarled—

And here she is. Back again in the kingdom, with armor that doesn’t fit quite right and a restless burning beneath her skin, the whisper of opportunity lost.

When did I outgrow you? she wonders, absently, picking up her halberd, putting the helmet under her arm. She draws the sword and looks at it, the person staring back. When did I lose this?

But she doesn’t say that. She can’t, not really—she hasn’t the words, and a little bitter voice in her gut says that Rapunzel won’t understand anyway. Besides, Rapunzel has her own issues to deal with. Her own struggles. Cassandra doesn’t want to become another burden—not any more of a burden, at least.

When did I become so weak as to be used against you?

But those are quiet thoughts. Cassandra shoves them away, locked back in the corner of her mind where they belong, and turns to face Rapunzel with both hands on her hips. Rapunzel is sitting quiet on the bed, head bowed, gloved hands folded in her lap, and at the sight something in Cassandra’s chest eases. She crosses over, and kneels down before her. “Hey. Raps.”

Rapunzel looks up. Her eyes are dry, the green of her irises cold and clear. Her mouth is set in a mulish sort of stubborn. That tight knot in Cassandra’s chest eases further, and she manages the barest hint of a smile. “Look,” she says. “I get it. I do. And you’re right. It’s—a lot.” Which is a nice way of saying basically treasonous, but hey. “Look. It’ll work out, okay? I’ll do a scan on the dungeons when I can, get info like you requested—” As per the letter still in her pocket, anyway. “—and yeah, sure, it’s… dangerous.”

“Treason. If you get caught. And my dad—”

“Yeah. But Eugene has the right idea. Don’t tell him I said this, but… look. You can eavesdrop on the nobles. Eugene is doing…whatever he’s doing. And me?” Her lips thin. “I can see what the prisoners say. I can walk around and listen, and see what they know. And maybe it’s dangerous, but if it gets us what we need to know, gets us where need to go…” She trails off, pointedly.

Rapunzel dips her head. “I’m worried,” she admits, quiet. “And you’re right, I don’t know enough. But—Cass, what if you’re right about this, too? What if it’s nothing? What if it’s not worth it? What if we just make things worse?”

“Yeah, okay. Good point. But you’re doing this anyways, right? So… I—I don’t want—” Oh, how to word this. Cassandra blows out a breath through her teeth, hard and hissed. “I can’t just sit here, Raps. I can’t do nothing.” Her hands curl, unbidden. “Don’t shut me out again.”

The set to Rapunzel’s jaw eases, just a bit. She reaches out and squeezes Cassandra’s hand, brief and firm despite how the pressure on her injuries makes her face twitch with an echo of pain. “I won’t,” Rapunzel says, and a pale smile flickers across her face. “I… I did promise, after all.”

“You did,” Cassandra replies, neutral.

“Okay. Okay. I’ll lay off. If you’re sure.”

“Very sure.”

The smile on Rapunzel’s face settles, a little stronger. “Thanks, Cass.”

“It is literally the least I can do,” Cassandra informs her, dryly, and stands up with the creak of new armor. “Now get out of my room before your new guard realizes you're missing, yeah? Elias is skittish, but he’s going to realize you used your hair as an escape route sooner rather than later, and if I have to go guard the sewers we’re all going to suffer.”

Rapunzel’s smile widens. “Right!” she says, and scampers up, heading back for her newfound secret entrance to the tunnels. Seriously, how does she keep finding those things? “I’ll try and visit again soon. There’s this dinner party with my parents, and I think I might be able to ferret out a few details on this mysterious deal. I’ll let you know!” Something in her face gentles. “…Please take care of yourself, Cass.”

“Only if you do.”

Cassandra watches her go, and manages a small wave and a weak smile when Rapunzel looks back. She waits, patiently, until the stone door of the secret entrance latches shut, and then lets her hand falls with a sigh.

For a moment she just stands there, basking in the silence. Her hand goes to her pocket. The missive Rapunzel wrote and Eugene gave her sits heavy by her side.

I’m sorry to ask this of you. I know my father is your King. But I need you, Cass. I need to know if you’re with me. You don’t have to say yes now. You don’t have to answer at all. And I will never, ever be angry if you say no. You’re my best friend, now and forever. But whatever you’re willing to give. Whatever secrets you find willing to share with me…

If the time comes to choose, if circumstances force us to make a stand—will you stand by my side?

Cassandra has never been readier. But still—

For some reason, the knot remains, cold and heavy in her chest.

She marches out of her room to her new guard shift with her chin up and back straight and proud. Some heads turn when they see her pass; some faces creases in sympathy, others tight-lipped. Odd, she thinks, and remembers vividly Eugene’s offhand comment on the castle’s reactions. She thinks again of her father’s face when the King stripped her of rank, the anger he didn’t even try to hide, and her lips thin further. There’s something wrong here after all—she just hopes it’s not the internal battle she’s starting to suspect it might be.

She turns another hall, pushes open the last door. Cold, rank air blows against her face. Her nose wrinkles.

Once, in a different age, the dungeons of Corona had served as part of the castle proper. In the start of Corona’s great history, King Herz der Sonne had walked these halls and eaten in these empty rooms, enjoyed food and rest in the grand circular hall that has become the main prison pit. These stone walls were filled with history and majesty, until an unfortunate winter earthquake fifty years after his reign brought the whole castle tumbling down.

The castle was rebuilt, of course—better this time, and it has withstood every earthquake since for the remaining hundreds of years. But of that first, lonesome castle, only the tunnels and this hall remain—the tunnels locked down for fear of constant collapse, and the rubble of the first castle become one of the worst places in the whole kingdom.

The point is that the dungeons are a place of history—and at the moment, Cassandra feels as if she’s experiencing each one. As she marches through and down the enclosed halls, the cold deepens, the stone growing soft with age and dark with a grime built up over centuries. Voices murmur low and bitter through the grates as she passes, and the stench of rot and mildew and waste is so heavy she almost struggles to breathe. There’s a slick moss crawling stubbornly through the cracks in the mortar, and as she passes down to the last and final floor, the old stone sagging and heavy, the ceilings low and strained under the weight of the years, even the voices fade out. There aren’t many prisoners here. In truth, there’s very little here at all. Something wet and watery drips down the wall. The cells are silent and empty. Cassandra, standing all and alone in a dark corridor, takes a deep breath and regrets it almost at once.

She’s in full guard armor, the bronze polished and shining, her curls forced under the tight helmet. Her gloves are crisp on her hands, the halberd stiff in her palms; her stance is straight and her eyes unwavering from the door. Every few minutes she’s to turn from her post to pace up and down the corridor for a routine check before she returns back to the door at the end of the hall.

It’s a joke of a job. It’s a job for newbies and rookies and guards with their heads too full of pride for sense, and here she is. Stuck here until Rapunzel either breaks her silence—unlikely—or until the King cools his temper, which…

Well.

She’s probably going to be here for a while, she knows, and as she stops before her new post, she closes her eyes, breathing in deep through her teeth.

Gods, she has no idea what she’s doing here. Cassandra is skilled and she knows it. She’s wasted here, and the fact she’s only been posted here as punishment for Rapunzel’s actions only furthers the insult. She’s not—resenting it, really, or at least she’s trying not to. It’s not Rapunzel’s fault. That the King is punishing Cassandra in order to punish Rapunzel… it’s more than insulting. It’s downright infuriating.

Not to mention being replaced by Elias, of all the guards. The boy is… new is almost too kind a term. He’s barely not a trainee, and while he’s not a bad kid, Cassandra suspects that kindness won’t stop him from reporting Rapunzel’s every action to the King.

They’ve been back for only a scant three days, and already, most of Rapunzel’s worries are proving justified. If this is destiny, Cassandra wishes she could punch it into submission or something. First the Dark Kingdom, now this—for gods’ sake, don’t they all deserve a break?

But no, of course not. And so Rapunzel’s confined in the castle and Eugene’s walking on so many eggshells he decided running was the better option, and Cassandra is here: stationed in the deepest, darkest, most boring corridor in the dungeon, waiting for nothing.

She closes her eyes. “Look around,” Rapunzel had said. “Keep your eyes open. Maybe you’ll find something everyone else missed.” But gods, how is Cassandra going to find anything if she’s stuck miles underground for eight straight hours a day? She’d mentioned the idea of wandering around to listen in on the prisoners herself, but in the secret depths of her mind, even she can admit it’s basically a worthless task. Who on earth would spill the beans when guards lurk around every corner?

She wants to help, but this—

It feels terribly like being shunted. All. Over. Again.

Cast aside and left in the dark, something in her whispers, dark and bitter. Cassandra sets her jaw. There isn’t even a guard on duty to take over once her shift ends— there’s nothing here to guard at all. This job is a joke.

She turns hard on her heel, walking away. To hell with it. If she’s stuck down here, she thinks grimly, she can at least explore. As useless as it is, at least those cells aren’t empty.

The air is like ice around her; the winter cold turned something subzero in the freezing hold of the underground stone. Each breath puffs like fog before her. In her armor, the metal is so chilled her fingers flex on impulse to get blood flow going. She turns down the twisting halls, eyes passing blind over the shadowy cells and water-rusted metal, the withered skeletons of the ruins of the ancient castle. She breathes in, breathes out. Nothing appears. Nothing happens.

Nothing’s ever going to happen.

Who is she even kidding? She’s going to be down here for hours, for days, for weeks. She wants to help but she couldn’t even see Rapunzel herself; the princess had to find a way to her instead. Rapunzel may be trapped in her room, but she already knows how to slip free— and Cassandra’s chains are so much tighter. She has so much more to lose.

And if things do go wrong, guess who’s going to suffer for it? Her, probably. Definitely. She loves Rapunzel, gods know she does, but so much of this mess is just—!

Why did she let Varian go? Why didn’t she ask them? Why hasn’t she explained? What little Cassandra knows of the labyrinth is just that—just the little. Just the bare minimum. She’s not asking for a play by play, but if Rapunzel is going to release known criminals, couldn’t she at least give a real reason? She’d said it was because it didn’t feel right, but what had that even meant? Feeling has no place in politics. No place in acting queen, or princess…

Even after everything, she’s still weak.

Cassandra stops mid-step.

She feels struck, stunned still by her own thoughts. Her hand rises to her head. A wave of dizziness overcomes her, shame like a blooming poison in her gut. The cold of the dungeon bites at her skin like a beast.

That’s… that’s a cruel thing to think. Sure, Rapunzel is a little much at times, but she’s been growing too, changing, becoming more and more sure of her place every day. More confident in herself, even if Cassandra doesn’t agree with all her choices. And—and Cassandra knows that, she understands that, so why—?

“…Cassandra? Is that you?”

She jumps, just barely avoiding dropping her halberd. She whips around, breath caught, weapon raised—and the confused face of a guard blinks back, almost bemused.

She stares at him, mouth open in shock—lowers her weapon rapidly, heat climbing in her cheeks. “I— sorry. You snuck up on me.” She pauses, abrupt. “Wait, what are you doing down here?”

The other guard frowns at her. “Cassandra, this is my post. Aren’t you stationed in the lower dungeons?”

“I…” She looks around, rapid, and realizes he’s right—the walls are lighter, the stink stronger. This isn’t her post at the lower dungeons. This is the first sector—the private prison, for top-priority prisoners, serious threats to the kingdom. Once upon a time, Varian had been kept in this sector, only one floor above her. When had she…? “Apologies. I got lost in thought.”

His scowl deepens. “Look, I know the demotion must sting, but that’s no reason to leave your post. What would the Captain say?”

Cassandra flushes, her lips pulling away from her teeth. “Look, I didn’t mean to—”

The guard is glaring.

Abruptly Cassandra remembers herself. She cuts herself off, breathing in deep through her nose. Her fingers clench white-knuckled under her gloves, curled tight and shaking around the halberd. “…No, never mind. You’re right. I apologize. It won’t happen again.”

She turns away hard before he can say anything more, marching off down the stairs. She doesn’t look back. The guard shakes his head and turns away, pulling the door latched behind him, back again at his post.

She leaves the private dungeon behind, and slams the door tight behind her. She walks quick, her stride furious. Her footsteps echo off the walls. Just like that: alone again.

Water drips uneven on the withered stone. The darkness slithers and seeps in the corners. The lanterns flicker. Unknown even to herself, Cassandra shivers once, and hugs her arms tight.

And in the darkness of a cell just out of view, someone else watches her seethe—and smiles.

“Oh, yes,” the prisoner says. Their voice is nothing but a hoarse whisper; their smile bares feral in the lanternlight. “I agree.”

Cassandra opens the final door, the exit to the prison floor. A sharp, foul gust of air howls through. The lantern flickers. For one shining moment, the prisoner’s eyes glint bright and green.

“She’ll make a wonderful disciple.”

.

For a moment, Varian doesn’t understand what he’s hearing.

He stands there, before the market stall, hands cold and heart growing colder; the screams, distant, are indistinct to him. It could be cheering, he thinks. It could be celebration. It could be nothing at all.

Except then Yasmin grabs his arm and yanks him back, and people have started to run, and then all at once he hears a boom like thunder and sees shrapnel fly, and he thinks—cannons—and he realizes.

The harbor is under attack.

A whisper drifts by his ears, paranoia crystalized to reality. The wind hisses like a curse. I warned you, child. Now it is too late.

The ground rocks with the force of the explosives; Varian stumbles sideways and just barely keeps to his feet. He can hear laughter, distantly, in the crowd, faint above all the screaming, mingling with the shrieking steel of sword against sword as the guardsmen of Port Caul rush in. But that doesn’t make sense, he thinks—how could it all happen at once, so soon? Or had these attackers planned this, had they snuck in with the market crowd and waited amongst the people for the attack to begin?

Another blast of cannon fire shakes the stonework, cutting his thoughts short. This time Varian isn’t so lucky—he falls hard on his knees, unable to stand on the shaky ground.

A hand grips his arm, nails digging into his shoulder—Yasmin drags Varian to his feet, supporting him against her. In the alchemy stall, the owner has vanished. Varian lists sideways in her hold. “What—”

“Pirates,” Yasmin hisses, and they both stumble when the ground rocks again. Cracks line the street. “I knew they were getting bold, but this is—!”

The jeering grows louder, closer to them. Yasmin pulls him up to his feet, and this time Varian needs no instruction. The pound of blood in his ears, a looming threat coming ever closer—he knows this feeling, this metallic tang in the air.

The labyrinth has etched this lesson into his bones.

He runs, and Yasmin runs with him. The crowd, once comforting, has turned confining; bodies shifting like a living thing, people on the ground, someone crying. Varian shoves his way through, trying to get away. A piercing scream makes him falter, then push on, but Yasmin turns back, vanishing momentarily in the crowd.

Varian stumbles, stopping too, turning back less because he wants to and more on instinct. Panic coats his tongue. He pushes through the mill of people, searching—and finds Yasmin on the ground, kneeling down to help someone up.

“To your feet!” Yasmin is saying, pulling the poor bystander upright. “Hurry! Get others off the ground! We will all be trampled at this rate.”

“Yasmin—!”

“Boy, what are you standing there for? Go hide!”

“I—” He wants nothing more than to run, but her moment of altruism has sent a cloud of shame through him. She’d stopped at the screams and cries for help. He had not. “I can, I can help—”

“I think not.” Yasmin grabs his arm, pushes him away; the crowd swells and ebbs around them. “Go to the buildings, you are small, hide by the crates—this crowd will kill you if the pirates don’t get there first, now hurry and—”

A shrieking sound rets the air, the awful screech of metal sliding against metal. Yasmin cuts herself off, whipping around; Varian stares over her shoulder, numb and horrified. There is a body in armor fallen to the ground, and red smeared across the cobblestone. Above the body there is a pirate, pale like a fish’s belly and smiling with teeth like tombstones, pulling free a crude sword dripping with blood and gore.

Varian claps a hand over his mouth, bile sour in his throat. The sight of blood makes his head spin. He’s never—he’s never seen someone die before, he realizes. Not like this. Not so brutally. He’s never…

Yasmin grips his arm so tight her hand spasms, hard enough to bruise. The pain grounds him, and Varian pulls his eyes away from the dead guardsman with difficulty, swallowing back the sick. Yasmin tugs him behind her, as if to shield him, and herds him back as she steps away from the scene, moving out of the pirate’s line of sight slowly and silently—

And the money pouch in her pocket, still untied and hanging out from her pocket from when she’d opened it, minutes ago, to pay for Varian’s alchemy ingredients—dips, opens, and spills bright golden coins all across the street in a clatter.

Yasmin freezes, her eyes going wide and horrified. Varian’s breath slams shock-still in his throat.

The pirate’s head snaps up. He stands, sword in hand.

He looks right in their direction.

Yasmin says a foul word in a language Varian doesn’t know, grabs his arm, and turns to run.

Varian scrambles to follow, his heart stuck in his throat. He can hear the pirate behind them, beginning to laugh, cackling with a bright and bloodthirsty sort of glee, drunk on something far worse than wine. “Pretty lady!” the man coos over the screams of the crowd and the cannon fire. “Pretty lady, you look like you might have gold!”

“Fuck,” Varian says, distantly, and then Yasmin shoves him into an alleyway. Crates and barrels and open buckets of produce line the dirty side-street, and despite the lack of people it’s nearly a maze to his eyes. Varian dodges crates and spilled fruit, following Yasmin’s sprint best he can—and he thinks, in that moment, he will make it. He can see the other side, the open street, and he is close, so close—

He bursts out of the shadowy alley into the sunlight—and then the ground tremors with a force more than cannon fire, and sends Varian crashing to his knees.

His vision flips. White bursts like stars behind his eyes. The ground rushes up to meet him and he catches himself badly on the stone, cobble scraping up his hands, the street rocking beneath his palms like a bucking horse. Small cracks break through the rock. He doesn’t understand. This can’t be from cannon fire. This is—this is—an earthquake?

He can’t see Yasmin anymore. His head is spinning. Varian pushes dazedly to his feet, and feels so turned around he falls right back down again. His breaths rasp distant in his ears. His hands are shaking. He gets to one foot and lists hard to the side, stumbling sideways until he falls heavy on the thick glass window of a shopfront.

Varian fumbles blindly for purchase, and his fingers catch on the window frame. He gets one hand on the shopfront wall and pulls shaking to his feet, standing hunched and wheezing in the burning daylight. The glass of the shop window shines cold in the sun. He looks beside him, and the shop window reflects back at him, a distorted image of himself. In his reflection he can see the blood on his face, the shadows under his eyes. The fear and confusion clouding his expression.

And behind him. Behind him—

The man. The pirate. Blood on his coat and a smile like death. He is still laughing. Still standing. It’s as if the earthquake hasn’t touched him at all. His eyes burn green in the windowpanes. His hand is raised, and his sword glints bright in the winter sun.

Varian should run. Varian should fight. He doesn’t, though. He can’t. He feels cold. He feels frozen all the way to his bones, all the way to his navel. Like an icy cord has been pulled taut—like a hand on his neck, holding him in place. A weight in the air that is more than fear… an anticipation that is almost supernatural.

All those dreams. All those sleepless nights, trying in vain to fight the exhaustion and the dark. All those whispers in his ears. The memory of it chokes him. The memory holds him still.

The pirate lifts his blade. In the window, Varian’s reflection shimmers like a ripple effect. For a moment, someone else stands in his place. A woman, terrible in her familiarity, with stone-dark skin and eyes glowing yellow like a moon.

Hello, child.

The pirate swings.

Did you miss me?

His right hand is searing with pain. His veins feel like molten metal. The world flashes white, and the pirate’s laughter, behind him, cuts off into a scream.

And like something from Varian’s deepest nightmares—the black rocks begin to grow.

They come out of nowhere: the dark rocks bursting all at once, a starburst of deadly intent. They spear through the cobblestone like a hot knife through butter, crisscrossing and tearing up and down the street in a deadly wave. Dust bursts up in the air like a fog, the streets turned to rubble and ruin. Through the distant ringing of his ears, Varian can hear the rising screams like a final curse.

In the mirror, the Moon smiles. The icy touch at the back of his neck burns like a brand. His hand spasms with a pain white-hot and bleeding, and Varian drops to his knees.

His vision whites. Exhaustion hits him like a physical blow, the drain so sudden it makes his head spin. He blinks, and then—just like that—she’s gone. It is just him in the mirror, now. Just Varian, staring wide-eyed and horrified at his own reflection, blue eyes gone empty and cold with remembered terror.

“—get up!”

A hand pulls at his shoulder, and Varian fights on instinct, struggling to pull away. His limbs are weak, his body aching—he bites back a sob and tries to throw himself back. He hears someone curse.

“Boy, snap out of it! We need to go!”

At last, familiarity seeps through. That voice. He recognizes it.

“Varian!”

Yasmin.

His eyes clear, and he finally recognizes her. Her grip on his arm is almost bruising in its force. Her eyes are wild. There is blood on her cheek.

“Hurry!”

This time, when she pulls him up, he does not fight her.

Varian stumbles to his feet, wavering back and forth. He feels very far away. He feels like he’s drowning. He’s barely breathing at all.

Yasmin is running. Yasmin is dragging him with her. The satchel thumps heavy against Varian’s side like a promise, or a reminder. His hand hurts, but the pain is fading, needle-like piercing turned to dull aching. He feels cold. He feels so cold. He doesn’t want to know.

He looks behind him anyway.

People are crying. People are still screaming. It rings in his ears like the distant toll of a bell. Smoke and dust cloud in the air and drift soft like a fog onto crumbling streets. People are lying still. People are lying silent. He cannot see the pirate at all.

There are rocks, too. Black rocks torn through the ground like a spiny crown, ripping apart the streets. They are everywhere. They are tearing through the city like they once tore up his home. Needle-like and deadly, and each and every last one of them is pointing right at the sea.

His hands are numb. He feels so cold. In the back of his mind, he can hear laughter on a distant breeze, and for the first time he’s not sure if it’s only a memory, or perhaps something more.

Something worse.

Hello, child.

Varian looks away.

.

.

.

In a grand ship by the eastern coast, Lady Caine watches the distant sprawl of Port Caul go up in smoke.

Her hand is outstretched, reaching—her fingers curled as if to grasp the air itself. Her lips have peeled back from her teeth; her dark scowl cuts into her pretty face. The ship is empty but for her, her crew gone out to battle—armed only with their swords and a spare vessel for cannon fire. She is alone here. She is the only one watching. The only one to see exactly when the battle started… and the only one to see how it ends.

It is only Lady Caine that sees the rocks rise up, black towers hanging heavy over the city skyline. Only Lady Caine that sees her crew fall back to the sea, their numbers gutted, their white shirts turned red from bleeding.

She drags her hand away from the water, and her scowl turns to a snarl. She watches, white-knuckled and furious, as the black rocks rise up over the city. Tens upon tens of deadly spears, that lethal black stone slanted and sure, each and every needle-tip edge pointing right towards Lady Caine in her ship.

“Is that a threat?” she hisses, and turns away from the sight, pacing furious across the deck. “No one said the gods would be involved.”

She pivots on her heel, the wind whipping at her hair. Her eyes fix bright and poisonous on Port Caul. Her muttering darkens. “What happened to the Moon being too weak to make an appearance, anyway? I thought she needed a conduit for that. But that fucking moonstone is gone, and all reports say she’s an avid hater of mortals, so how…?”

She trails off, the words falling short. Her pacing stills. She holds herself tall and stiff in the shine of the winter sun, and her hands clench tight into fists. Her nails cut deep in her palm.

Something shudders across the deck. A shadow, a cloud over the sun. The boat creaks and groans like a rusty hinge. Frost crawls along the side of the boat. The wind whispers. Lady Caine closes her eyes in thought.

“Maybe,” she murmurs, the rage falling slowly to contemplation. “Maybe she did choose a mortal vessel. For some reason. Against all reports of her personality.”

A pause. Lady Caine tilts her head.

“And, say, if the Moon did choose a conduit...”

Her eyes open. She looks at Port Caul with fresh eyes. She traces the path of the black rocks. That deadly slant. That unbreakable sword. Those cruel, uncontrolled towers, and the unerring accuracy of their direction, the blade pointed right at her.

Slowly, surely, Lady Caine starts to smile. She watches as her men flee like cowards, running from the dark rocks like cities from a plague, and laughs under her breath. “Someone who can summon the dark rocks, hm…? Sounds like someone we could use.”

Another pause. She tilts her head. She turns to the shadows, to the empty air beside her, and smiles with all her teeth. In the midday shine, the green of her eyes nearly seems to glow.

“Well?” says Lady Caine. “What do you think?”

[goodqueenaly]

House Words Wednesdays: House Horpe

Welcome to House Words Wednesdays! Each week, I take a House without known canon or semi-canon words and present what I think could make sense as that House’s motto. You’re free to suggest more as well, if your favored House has not yet been suggested; take a look at this link to see what has already been suggested, and shoot me an ask if you have another House you’d like to see done. 

House Horpe is a noble House of the Stormlands, presumably sworn to the Baratheons of Storm’s End. I say “presumably” because truthfully little is known of House Horpe. Neither its seat nor its ruling lord has been named, and indeed the House went unrepresented in person until ADWD and the introduction of Ser Richard Horpe. The sigil of House Horpe is known, at least: per chevron engrailed gray and bone, three death’s head moths counterchanged.

The only known - which makes him perforce the most important - member of House Horpe is Ser Richard Horpe, a knight in Stannis’ service. Horpe has probably been with Stannis for some time; Stannis mentions that Horpe was hopeful for a white cloak until Cersei talked Robert out of the idea, and given that the Kingsguard at the beginning of AGOT seems to have been more or less the same for the past decade, I think it’s probable Horpe was serving Stannis as Lord of Dragonstone in some capacity from early in Robert’s reign. As Stannis himself notes, though, Horpe’s taste always ran to the bloodshed and killing of battle. Though “high in the king’s councils” in ADWD, second in command on Stannis’ march to Winterfell, Horpe is distinguished mostly by his harsh attitude. He accepts risk and death as a natural part of war, and encourages aggressive moves against the Dreadfort and Winterfell. What’s more, though he censures Justin for referring to more gods than the one Lord of Light, Stannis makes clear that Horpe “loves the Lord of Light only when it suits his purposes” - meaning, presumably, when he gets to kill in the name of R’hllor. 

It’s fitting, therefore, that the sigil of House Horpe features three death’s head moths. These insects are perhaps most familiar to modern eyes through the poster of The Silence of the Lambs, but their legacy goes much farther back than that; indeed, the death’s head moth has long been associated (due to the skull-like marking which gives the creature its English name) with evil. English entomologist Moses Harris wrote that the moth was “the device of evil spirits -spirits enemies to man - conceived and fabricated in the dark, and the very shining of its eyes is thought to represent the fiery element whence it is supposed to have proceeded”, while his fellow entomologist Edward Newman wrote that the moth’s squeaking “produce[s] the most superstitious feelings among the uneducated, by whom it is always regarded with feelings of awe and terror”. Legend even claimed that the death’s head moth only came to England after the execution of Charles I - a grievous, almost unnatural act in an age where the literal body of the king was considered sacred - though this seems very unlikely.

Given this background, I decided to make the Horpe words All Become Equal. Death is the great equalizer: whatever fortune or status any man could make in his own lifetime, he is destined eventually to die, to be reduced to mere bones and eventually ash and dust. This is the message of the Horpe sigil, with its death’s head moths so prominent: as great and proud as any enemy is in life, death will come for him, and no less so than on the blades of the sons of House Horpe. Certainly, Ser Richard himself is more than equal to make his enemies equal in death, relishing in his role as “the slayer” whose true place is battle. Lannister men, Bolton men, wildlings, even those in Stannis’ own train too weak to continue the march to Winterfell - Ser Richard, like death itself, makes no distinction, only seeking to make them equal by the edge of his sword. 

[crystalninjaphoenix]

The Start of the Nightmare

A Stitched Story

JSE Fanfic

So, Stitched Together sequel thing. This is sorta dealing with how all the boys fit into this AU, so it’s gonna be longer than Stitched, and possibly not as interesting character development wise, but what can you do

tagging @septic-dr-schneep​ for the original idea

“You are lucky to not be dead.”

Jack couldn’t help but poke at the wound on his neck. He winced. “I’m lucky I know the best doctor in the world,” he said quietly. He didn’t want to tear the stitches.

Schneep huffed, but couldn’t hold back a smile. “Well, yes, I am a qualified doctor. But that is no reason for you to play with knives.”

“It was Halloween, bro.” Chase piped up for the first time since his arrival. He was leaning against the doorway of the hospital room, trying his best to look casual when he’d just been hovering nervously by Jack seconds before. “Pumpkin carving is a tradition, you know. How was he supposed to know he’d cut himself?”

Jack shifted uncomfortably on the hospital bed. For a moment, he wondered if he should just stay silent. But honesty was always the best policy. If what happened was real, then they had a serious threat to deal with. If it wasn’t, then they could figure out why the hell he was seeing things. “Well, actually, guys...I didn’t exactly do it myself.”

Immediately, Schneep and Chase jumped to attention. “Why? What happened?”  “Should we call the police?”

“No, I...you guys are gonna think I’m crazy,” Jack sighed.

“No way, dude.” Chase shook his head. “We’d never think that.”

“I—you haven’t even heard what it is.” Jack muttered. “Okay, here goes...so, like, for a couple weeks now, I’ve had a feeling like something is watching me. But not at times when that would make sense, I mean all the time. And sometimes I’d see things out of the corner of my eye, or hear whispers that aren’t there.”

“Jack, I do not think I am the right kind of doctor for these problems,” Schneep said, half-joking.

“No, no, let me finish. So, sometimes I’d get nosebleeds out of nowhere, and sometimes I started, like, walking down to the shop or something but then a split second later I’d be back home, like there was a—a glitch in the fabric of reality. And I’d start laughing or hearing laughter for no reason.”

“Okay...so what does that have to do with this business?” Chase asked.

“So, I was doing the video, just like normal, and I’d keep hearing noises. When I went to check them out, nothing. I got another nosebleed, heard more laughing, and just...it just seemed like everything that was happening that month got dialed up to eleven. And then, after I got the pumpkin all finished and was about to do some fine cleaning...I just—I fucking have no idea how to describe it. My arm was moving on its own and it was like—it was like there was someone else in my head, like...squeezing it. And this thing was controlling my arm and it—it did the thing.”

Silence. Jack tried not to squirm as his two friends exchanged glances. They looked worried. “Jack...what I said before was joke, but I really think you should talk to a different doctor,” Schneep suggested haltingly.

“You haven’t even heard the weirdest part.” Jack shook his head. “It—he talked to me. He called me weak...and...” He swallowed nervously. He didn’t really want to talk about the things he said after he cut his throat and used his body like a puppet. So he skipped to the most important part. “Anyway, after he left, or retreated, or whatever, I saw him. And he looked a lot like me, but...wearing different clothes. He looked like a living computer glitch.”

“You sure you weren’t just...hallucinating?” Chase asked. “I mean, you’d lost a lot of blood by the time I came to check on you.”

“I know, I know, it’s a real possibility. But the weirdest thing was his neck. It was—was also cut open, but it was stitched close. With green string. But it wasn’t doing a very good job at keeping the wound closed, and the stitches were pulling apart...and I got the strangest feeling I knew him.”

Schneep walked over to the counter nearby and grabbed a pen and pad of paper. He wrote down something real quick, then came back and handed it to Jack. “I think you should check out Dr. Laurens. She is very good. Not to say you have to, but I think it would help.”

“Wait, doc, hang on a second.” Chase frowned thoughtfully. “I think...maybe...”

Schneep glared at him. “Chase, do not encourage him,” he said through gritted teeth, trying to keep Jack from hearing. “I know you are wanting to help but it will not to do this.”

“All I’m saying is—I mean—I’m wondering—” Chase stopped, gathering his thoughts. “So, I know you remember what happened a little under a year ago. I do too.”

The doctor’s expression immediately darkened. Nobody needed a reminder of what happened to Marvin and Jackie. It was bad enough that the double murder—or possibly murder-suicide, nobody could agree—got an unholy amount of media attention, given that no one could figure out what actually happened. One had a slit throat, the other held the knife, both were dead but only one was injured, and they were inside a circle drawn on the floor like some sort of ritual. How and why did they even die? And then the police found Jackie’s super suit hidden in the closet and all sorts of shady websites on Marvin’s computer. That only made things more complicated.

“Well, it can’t be a coincidence that the same kind of cut appeared on Jack nearly a year later,” Chase pointed out. “And they were probably doing some kind of magic, right? Maybe black magic? Doesn’t what Jack said sound like he got attacked by a black magic demon or something?”

Jack smiled. He hadn’t really thought of the possibility that what happened to Marvin and Jackie could be connected to the thing that attacked him, but it was nice to know that Chase thought there was an explanation besides him being crazy. Schneep, on the other hand, looked doubtful. “I do not mean to speak ill of the dead, but Marvin believed in things that could not exist. If he dragged Jackie into his shit, then that was between them. But it had nothing to do with their deaths.”

“You don’t know that,” Chase snapped. “Maybe there was some sort of sacrifice or something, and things went wrong.”

“For god’s sake, do you really think Jackie would be part of black magic?” Schneep threw his hands up in the air. “Have you ever heard anyone speak out against evil more than him?”

“I mean...the dark side can be tempting, bro,” Chase mumbled.

“I am not being part of this. I am leaving, I have other patients to check on. Jack, please at least try to visit Dr. Laurens. She can help more that mindless speculation.” Schneep stuck around long enough to see Jack nod in agreement, then quickly left.

“Jack...you think that...” Chase hesitated, then said the next few words in a rush. “D’you think that if we find out more about what attacked you we could find out what happened to them?”

Jack hesitated. There was a bit of desperation shining in Chase’s eyes. No, actually, there was a lot. Jack couldn’t blame him. A lot of terrible shit had hit Chase at that moment in time, shit that led to...well, it made sense that he wanted his friends back.  Jack did too. But also, he just really wanted to know what the deal with this thing was. Why was he targeting them? “I mean, maybe,” Jack shrugged. “It’s worth a shot. And if there’s really a demon out there, we need to protect ourselves. But how do we do that?”

The next day, Chase and Jack found themselves standing outside a little shop on the edge of town. The window showed a display made of books, amulets, and hanging talismans. The sign identified the shop as “Jackson Magick Emporium.”

“So, this place is, like, legit, right?” Chase asked.

Jack pulled on the bandages around his neck. “I mean, as much as one of these places can be. The website seemed to know what they were talking about, and there were good reviews from people who weren’t nutters. So...let’s go in.”

A bell ding-a-linged to announce their arrival into the shop. Chase blinked.  “Good god, did we just step back in time or something?” The front room of the shop looked a lot like a living room from the early twentieth century, but with the addition of a counter with a cash register and price tags on the various knickknacks scattered on the tables. It was a pleasant place, pastel blue in color and well-lit with yellow lamps. But nobody was there.

“They head the bell, right?” Jack wondered, glancing over at the little silver instrument hanging by the door.

“Don’t see how they could’nt’ve.” Chase wandered over to one of the tables and picked up the leather-bound book on its surface. He turned it over in his hands. It did look like something Marvin would’ve had. This must be the right sort of place.

“I’d advise you to put that down.”

Chase jumped, looking around for the source of the voice. A well-dressed man in a blue vest and black hat was coming out of a door behind the counter. He...weirdly enough, he looked pretty similar to Jack and Chase, just with a mustache. Did Jack have some sort of doppelganger magnet attached to him?

“Sorry,” Chase mumbled, putting the book back.

“Quite alright. You had no idea. But I must warn you that it’s very old and fragile.” The man walked around the counter and approached the two. He gave a friendly smile and stuck out his hand. “My name is Jameson Jackson, but you may call me JJ if you like. Welcome to my shop. How may I help you?”

Jack shook his hand. “Hello. I’m Jack and this is my friend Chase. We, uh...” He looked over to Chase for support, but he just shrugged. “So I went onto your website and saw that you did a thing where you could get rid of, like...evil spirits and shit.”

“Well, I wouldn’t use that type of language,” JJ frowned. “But yes, that is correct.”

“Okay, so, you see...I mean it’s been happening for a while, but last night it really...really, um...” Jack fidgeted with the bandages again. “So, I’m not wearing these for fun. You see what I’m talking about?”

JJ’s brows furrowed. “Yes, I think I’m getting the gist of it. Why don’t we go into the other room? I can make us some tea and you can tell me everything, at your own pace of course.”

The other room looked pretty much the same, but red instead of blue and no items for sale. The main piece of furniture was a table and chairs in the center, but there were a few drawers and chests along the edge for holding things, along with a small stove. Jack and Chase sat down and spilled out the whole story, starting with Marvin and Jackie’s mysterious incident last year, and ending with Jack’s account of this thing taking control of his body and seeing it afterward. By the time their tale had ended, the tea was long finished. JJ set a cup in front of each of them, then joined them at the table. He leaned forward and rested his head on his hands.

“So, do you have any idea what your friends were actually messing about with?” he asked in a quiet voice, as if afraid someone would overhear.

Jack shook his head. “No, sorry.”

“They were in a circle?”

“Yeah, with candles around the edges. Is that...is that helpful?”

“Not very, unfortunately. Most spells—or at least, most heavy-duty spells—take place in a protective circle. It’s meant to protect the casters from outside dangers and keep any misfires contained inside. Do you remember anything else? Did they discover any spellbooks or charms?”

“I don’t remem—”

Chase interrupted. “Wait, I think...I think there was some weird things. A bunch of burned paper, and...and there were two weird necklaces, but...I dunno about those ones.”

“Explain.”

“Well, Schneep—he’s a friend of ours, a doctor—showed me the police report of the crime scene. They were both wearing them, and they were when he saw the bodies, but later, when he asked the cops about where those necklaces went, they swore there weren’t any.”

“Hmm...” JJ took a sip of the tea, thoughtful. “Disappearing amulets...that is unusual. Depending on their purpose, we could guess at the spell they were trying. Hang on.” He stood up, walked over to a chest and rummaged it, then came back with a book with a red cover. He opened it, revealing that the book had been patched together with pages tied into the lining, like an old-fashioned kind of binder. They were covered with ink drawings of various amulets, with explanations of what each did. “Did your friend happen to describe them?”

“Uhhh...” Chase cast a line back into the waters of memory. “This is a recall of a recall of a glance, so don’t take this too seriously. But they were white...a bit teardrop-shaped.”

“Wait wait wait I saw those!” Jack nearly knocked over his teacup in excitement.  “He was wearing them! They had these weird designs on them, and they were glowing green.”

JJ slid the book toward him. “Do you think you could identify them?”

“Maybe...I didn’t really see them that good.” Jack started flipping through the pages, then suddenly stopped. He looked around. “It’s happening again...” he muttered. “I feel like someone’s watching us...”

Chase, confused, said “What?” But JJ didn’t hesitate, shooting to his feet and dashing to the drawers, pulling them open and glancing at the contents before slamming them shut again.

“What are you looking for?” Jack asked, nervous.

“Either protection or the source of that feeling,” Jameson explained. “If you can, help me look.”

“We don’t know—oh, alright.” Jack didn’t want a repeat of Halloween night. He stood up, pulled Chase upward too, and ran toward the drawers. He figured he’d know if something was important. The drawers were filled with books and loose papers with strange writing, crude dolls with paint on them, amulets and other magickal jewelry, and so many other talismans that Jack couldn’t identify. Nothing stood out.

Until Jack heard a sudden shriek.

His head whipped around, and he saw Chase standing in front of an open drawer with a look of absolute shock and horror on his face. He held something in his hand, a pair of teardrop-shaped amulets dangling from strings. They glowed green, but the glow couldn’t mask the cracks that marred their surfaces.

“Chase! Drop it!” Jameson yelled.

Startled, Chase did exactly that. The amulets clattered to the surface. There was a sound, a sound in the back of their minds that seemed to be coming from the broken talismans. It was a high whine, punctuated with electronic-sounding crackling. Or was it laughing?

“How’d they get there?” Chase asked, breathless.

“They came with him,” Jack muttered.

It was definitely laughter. Then Jack heard, directly in his ear, “I'm so p̶ro̡u̡d, J̷ąck͝ie̴bo̢y.”

With a yelp, Jack whirled around, but nobody was there. Chase and Jameson, who’d apparently also heard something similar, were looking around wildly as well. The room seemed darker. The whine was growing louder.

“Where are you?” Jameson asked. “Show yourself!”

A giggle. “You’d lik̵e̵ that, wou̡l͞dn̕'͢t͝ yo͢u҉? A neat little ta͡r̴g̨et to throw your s͠p̛e͞l̡ls̶ at? Oh wait, Ì f͝ór͠g̕o̶t, you don’t a̦̝̤̱̥c̗̭͝t̮̤̭̝u͈̭͓̰͈a̦ḻl̩̦͈y̠͟ have any m̀͏ag̢ic̢..” The voice bounced around the room, seeming to come from the corner one moment and the center the next.

“There’s more than one way to skin a cat,” Jameson said.

“Oh, I̢̕ ̨͏k͏ǹ̸̕o͠w̸͠.” He sounded amused now.

“What are you?” Jack cried.

“Can’t you t̶e͟ll? I’m y̕͢o̢͞͠u̷̶ , of course, J̮̪̘̯͝à̵̟̣̻́ͅc̨̘̬͓͖̭̞̳̲̟k̛̼̣̝̞̹̹͍̬i̖̞̭͝e͏͓͢b̷̨̫̗̗̕o̤͔̝͖y̖͕̣.”

“N-no...” Jack whispered. “No, you’re not. If anything, you’re the anti-me.”

“ Ą̴̀n͢͠t͞í̶..oh, I l͟i̸̛ḱè̵ that. V͠e̡r̵y̛ m҉uch͝.”

“Great, you just named it,” Chase grumbled. Jack noticed his hands were shaking, and his eyes were darting everywhere.

He—Anti—laughed again, and the lights flickered at the same time. Jack felt the feeling of being watched lighten up, and the white noise seemed to shift...to Chase. “ Y̕o͞u’re putting on sųćh͢ a b̷͝r̴͞av̧̀e fa͏͝c̶͢e, but I can taste the f̛e̵̷a҉̨ŕ̶͝ i͝n͡ y̢o̕uŕ m͏̕͟i͟͠ǹ͞d̷̸̶. It’s dȩ̴l̛ic̶i͠o͡u̡s̸͢.”

The flickering intensified. Jack’s eyes widened as Chase’s shadow shifted, contorted, then stepped away from the wall. “Chase, watch out!” Jack yelled. He started to run toward him, and Chase himself tried to turn around, but it was too late. Anti was real, and he was holding a knife to Chase’s throat.

Jack froze in place.

“ G̨ood i̢ḑeà, J̷̶a̧ck͏̷i̛e̕.” Anti bared his teeth in what would’ve been a smile on anyone else, but on him it could only be seen as a threat. He did indeed look a lot like Jack, but his form was spazzing out and glitching at every moment, coming apart in pixels. The upper half of his face was hidden in shadows that twisted and writhed, strands of green light trying to form a symbol on the center of his forehead. The wound on his neck wasn’t just a cut, but a wide gash weeping blood. Green stitches were trying to keep it closed.

“What do you want?” Jack whispered.

“What do I w̶̡a͡n̵̴t̸̸?” Anti repeated the question, tilting his head like a predator sizing up its prey. “First, I want to see if y͡ou̴r f̢r҉ieńd he͠r̶e̡ b̵̶lè̷e̢d̴̡s͟͠ like you, if your faces are t͢hè ͝s̶a̡m̡e. Then...well, you͠'̀l̷l ͡soon fin͢d̀ ͢o̧u̢t̵. I wouldn’t want to s̴po͠į͟l e̦̼v̖̫̱̰͇e͏̰r̤̜͝y̪̼͖̙̙̕t̥h̪͎̙̱i̖n̦̻̭̹͈̼̮͝g͢ for you.”

Chase’s eyes were wide, and he held perfectly still. The knife was glitching ever so slightly. As Jack watched, it nicked Chase’s neck and a single drop of blood trickled down his throat. Jack sucked in an panicked breath. What could he do? Was there anything he could do?

Suddenly, Anti’s smile dropped. His head snapped—quite literally, the sound accompanied by a shattering of pixels—toward Jameson. Jack realized that he’d been awfully quiet during the whole confrontation. And it was because he was preparing. Several drawers were hanging open. There was a tall blue candle burning on the table, surrounded by strange symbols written in red chalk. Jameson held a golden amulet out in front of him, a golden square with a purple gem in the center. It was emitting a faint white light. He grinned triumphantly.  “What were you saying about magic?”

Anti growled. “ F̵̮͎̠̭̮̯͇̀͟i̛͓̦̠͖͈̥̹̞̕n͎̰̠̙̻͟e͖̱̼̬. I’ll l̶͟e͠t ̛͝yǫ͝u win t͞͠͡hiş ̀t̀i̷͞m̶̧̢e. But this i̛sn'͏̶t ̧̕o̢v̵̡e͞r̛.” Reality flickered, and shattered. When everything was set back to normal, the room was light again, Chase was gasping for air, and Anti and the amulets were gone. “S͏҉e̵̡e̶ ̸́ýo̸͡u͟ ̧̀s͏o̶̡o̸͢n͢͞.” One last whisper around their minds, and they felt his presence disappear.

Silence.

After a long while, Jack turned to JJ and said, “You have to teach us how to do that.”

JJ smiled shakily. “A strong and more specific variant of the banishing. I wasn’t sure it would work. But it was better than the alternative.”

“You can say that again.” Chase almost reached up to prod the small cut on his neck, but stopped himself. “We need to tell Schneep about this. Let’s see him deny it in the face of three eyewitnesses.”

“He’ll find a way to.” Jack sighed. “But we gotta convince him. He could be in trouble too.”

And still, Jack couldn’t shake the feeling that he knew who Anti was, and not just because he shared his face. There was something eerily familiar...like a favorite song that had been twisted and distorted into a different tune entirely.

[autolovecraft]

Great heavens, Birch, just as I thought!

After a full two hours Dr. Davis left Birch that night he had taken a lantern and gone to the old receiving tomb. His head was broken in, and everything was tumbled about. His head was broken in, and everything was tumbled about. His day's work was sadly interrupted, and unless chance presently brought some rambler hither, he might have to remain all night or longer. He would have given much for a lantern or bit of candle; but lacking these, bungled semi-sightlessly as best he might. In time the hole grew so large that he ventured to try his body in it now and then, shifting about so that the narrow ventilation funnel in the top ran through several feet of earth, making this direction utterly useless to consider. In this funereal twilight he rattled the rusty handles, pushed at the iron panels, and wondered why the massive portal had grown so suddenly recalcitrant. He had even wondered, at Sawyer's funeral, how the vindictive farmer had managed to lie straight in a box so closely akin to that of the diminutive Fenner.

Steeled by old ordeals in dissecting rooms, the doctor entered and looked about, stifling the nausea of mind and body that everything in sight and smell induced. At last the spring thaw came, and graves were laboriously prepared for the nine silent harvests of the grim reaper which waited in the tomb. When Dr. Davis left Birch that night he had taken a lantern and gone to the old receiving tomb.

Then he fled back to the lodge and broke all the rules of his calling by rousing and shaking his patient, and hurling at him a year ago last August … He was the devil incarnate, Birch, and I don't blame you for giving him a cast-aside coffin! As his hammer blows began to fall, the horse outside whinnied in a tone which may have been mocking.

I agreed that he was wise in so doing. To him Birch had felt no compunction in assigning the carelessly made coffin which he now pushed out of the enlarged transom; but gathered his energies for a determined try.

That he was not an evil man. Most distinctly Birch was lax, insensitive, and professionally undesirable; yet I still think he was not perfectly sober, he subsequently admitted; though he had not then taken to the wholesale drinking by which he later tried to forget certain things. I was his doctor, and because he probably felt the need of confiding in someone else after Davis died. He gave old Matt the very best his skill could produce, but was thrifty enough to save the rejected specimen, and to use it when Asaph Sawyer died of a malignant fever. On the afternoon of Friday, April 15th, then, Birch set out for the tomb with horse and wagon to transfer the body of Matthew Fenner. Then he fled back to the lodge and broke all the rules of his calling by rousing and shaking his patient, and hurling at him a year ago last August … He was the devil incarnate, Birch, and I believe his eye-for-an-eye fury could beat old Father Death himself. He was just dizzy and careless enough to annoy his sensitive horse, which as he drew it viciously up at the tomb neighed and pawed and tossed its head, much as on that former occasion when the rain had vexed it.

Birch were sure—absolutely sure—of the identity of that top coffin of the pile; how he had been certain of it as the Fenner coffin in the dusk, and how he had distinguished it from the inferior duplicate coffin of vicious Asaph Sawyer.

I've seen sights before, but there was one thing too much here.

Better still, though, he would utilize only two boxes of the base to support the superstructure, leaving one free to be piled on top in case the actual feat of escape required an even greater altitude. As his hammer blows began to fall, the horse outside whinnied in a tone which may have been mocking.

The moon was shining on the scattered brick fragments and marred facade, and the emerging moon must have witnessed a horrible sight as he dragged his bleeding ankles toward the cemetery lodge; his fingers clawing the black mold in brainless haste, and his body responding with that maddening slowness from which one suffers when chased by the phantoms of nightmare. He had, it seems, planned in vain when choosing the stoutest coffin for the right grave. He worked largely by feeling now, since newly gathered clouds hid the moon; and though progress was still slow, he felt heartened at the extent of his encroachments on the top and bottom of the aperture. He always remained lame, for the great tendons had been severed; but I think the greatest lameness was in his soul. The day was clear, but a high wind had sprung up; and Birch was glad to get to shelter as he unlocked the iron door and entered the side-hill vault. He gave old Matt the very best his skill could produce, but was thrifty enough to save the stoutly built casket of little Matthew Fenner for the top, in order that his feet might have as certain a surface as possible. To him Birch had felt no compunction in assigning the carelessly made coffin which he now pushed out of the way in his quest for the Fenner casket. An eye for an eye! The body was pretty badly gone, but if ever I saw vindictiveness on any face—or former face. The narrow transom admitted only the feeblest of rays, and the emerging moon must have witnessed a horrible sight as he dragged his bleeding ankles toward the cemetery lodge; his fingers clawing the black mold in brainless haste, and his aching arms rested by a pause during which he sat on the bottom step of his grim device, Birch cautiously ascended with his tools and stood abreast of the narrow transom. He changed his business in 1881, yet never discussed the case when he could avoid it. Birch seldom took the trouble to use—afforded no ascent to the space above the door. I don't blame you for giving him a cast-aside coffin! Fortunately the village was small and the death rate low, so that the narrow ventilation funnel in the top ran through several feet of earth, making this direction utterly useless to consider.

It was Asaph's coffin, Birch, but you always did go too damned far! There was evidently, however, no pursuer; for he was alone and alive when Armington, the lodge-keeper, answered his feeble clawing at the door. Perhaps he screamed. Horrible pains, as of savage wounds, shot through his calves; and in his mind was a vortex of fright mixed with an unquenchable materialism that suggested splinters, loose nails, or some other attribute of a breaking wooden box. Birch, and I don't blame you for giving him a cast-aside coffin!

He was curiously unelated over his impending escape, and almost dreaded the exertion, for his form had the indolent stoutness of early middle age. Fortunately the village was small and the death rate low, so that the coffins beneath him rocked and creaked. It may have been encouraging and to others may have been just fear, and it may have been encouraging and to others may have been mocking. The pile of tools soon reached, and a little later gave a gasp that was more terrible than a cry.

In this twilight too, he began to realize the truth and to shout loudly as if his horse outside could do more than neigh an unsympathetic reply. Sawyer died of a malignant fever. He changed his business in 1881, yet never discussed the case when he could avoid it. The practices I heard attributed to him would be unbelievable today, at least to such meager tools and under such tenebrous conditions as these, Birch glanced about for other possible points of escape. I thought! Only the coffins themselves remained as potential stepping-stones, and as he considered these he speculated on the best mode of transporting them. What else, he added, could ever in any case be proved or believed? He was oddly anxious to know if Birch were sure—absolutely sure—of the identity of that top coffin of the pile; how he had been certain of it as the Fenner coffin in the dusk, and how he had been certain of it as the Fenner coffin in the dusk, and how he stepped on the puppy that snapped at him a succession of shuddering whispers that seared into the bewildered ears like the hissing of vitriol.

Clutching the edges of the aperture, he sought to pull himself up, when he noticed a queer retardation in the form of an apparent drag on both his ankles. Fortunately the village was small and the death rate low, so that the coffins beneath him rocked and creaked. He was the devil incarnate, Birch, just as I thought!

His head was broken in, and everything was tumbled about. To him Birch had felt no compunction in assigning the carelessly made coffin which he now pushed out of the enlarged transom; but he could do better with four. But it would be well to say as little as could be said, and to let no other doctor treat the wounds. Birch decided that he would begin the next day with little old Matthew Fenner, whose grave was not far from the daily paths of men was enough to exasperate him thoroughly.

His head was broken in, and everything was tumbled about. As he remounted the splitting coffins he felt his weight very poignantly; especially when, upon reaching the topmost one, he heard that aggravated crackle which bespeaks the wholesale rending of wood. His head was broken in, and everything was tumbled about. The narrow transom admitted only the feeblest of rays, and the company beneath his feet, he philosophically chipped away the stony brickwork; cursing when a fragment hit him in the face, and laughing when one struck the increasingly excited horse that pawed near the cypress tree.

[ivy72376]

THE FATHER’S WORDS OF WISDOM - August 16, 2020

A very dear aunt, my mother’s paternal first-degree cousin, died this morning in her sleep, at 81, in perfect health, except for some very early signs of Alzheimer.  She was also a very enthusiastic and faithful church pastor for many years, and her legacy, undoubtedly, will never be forgotten by those of us whose lives were affected by her in so many ways.  Apart from her faith, I owe a lot to her especially when I went to college, as she so very generously gifted me with fabric for my college skirt uniform (the only one I had in fact, up until the fourth year when a generous schoolmate and friend who was one year my senior, donated hers to me because she said she has no younger sister to pass or hand them down to).  You see, my poor family’s budget was so tight up during those times, my “aunt’s gift” will forever be appreciated, buried deep in my heart and forever a part of me, even if the physical skirt was long gone.

 Life was difficult for so many years in the past, when she and my mom were in their younger years, and when I was in my younger years, but it was also happier because it was simpler, and we had simpler joys back then. And through it all, her family and mine never lost touch and remained close, and never failed to visit each other when we had time.  Now that she is gone, we are both sad and happy, that we could no longer see her in the flesh, but hopeful that someday, when the Lord returns, we shall see each other again, along with the loved ones we have lost in the Lord who share our faith.

 Sometimes I think that maybe those difficult times made me resolve why I should never enter into any romantic relationships while as a student. I felt that at that time, life is difficult as it is, so romance, and the time and energy it entails, would be a luxury I could never afford. Oh, well.  Good thing though, I realized that more than romantic relationships, family ties are stronger.  And in the future, if GOD wills that though extremely late, I be given the chance I deserve, I know better, I have learned more, and I have prepared myself really well whatever and however things turn out to be.

 And these are a few of the things one can learn when we read the Word today, in the book of Proverbs chapter 4, what I call the “Father’s Words of Wisdom”.  These are intergenerational, passed down from father to son and to their grandchildren by those who have lived the full lives that GOD has planned for them, in obedience and faith (verses 1 to 4).  We can think of this Father as GOD the Father Himself (if our own human fathers are absent or doesn’t fit the profile), but we could also think of this as our physical human fathers, particularly what is in their hearts when they have matured and learned how life is really like.

 In verses 5 to 13, the father advised the son (and daughters too) to get wisdom and understanding, for it is the highest virtue one can have in life, prolonging our days, giving substance to our existence, and meaning to our daily living.  The father cautioned us against joining or being company with evil people in verses 14 to 17: those who are disobedient to their own parents, those who do not bother getting wisdom or understanding the way of things, but are only after conducting their affairs through taking advantage of other people, feeding their greed and lust, and giving way to pride, rage and violence.  They only lead to darkness, destruction, stumbling and fall (verse 19).

 But the father has some good and encouraging words for those who are just, people who uphold and live rightly and fairly amidst a world of chaos, fear, injustice, corruption and greed—“The path of the just is as the shining light, that shines more and more unto the perfect day.” (verse 18).

 Don Moen also made a song of verses 20 to 22: “My son, pay attention to my words; incline your ear to my saying. Do not let them depart from your sight; keep them in the midst of your heart. For they are life to those who find them, and health to all their flesh.”  Indeed, giving respect and honor to and being obedient to parents and lawful authorities is one key factor that will determine our success in life (Exodus 20:12). And in this pandemic, quite literally so.

 In the last five verses in the chapter (verses 23 to 27), the father admonished us all about the things we have control over and that we have to watch out for, what I call, the “Bodily Affair”: 1) our hearts = we have to guard it well with all diligence, for all issues in life—our learnings, our future plans, our current living, our careers, our relationships and our eternity—are affected by how we feel and how we manage them; 2) our mouths = what we say can make or break not only other people, but more so ourselves; 3) our eyes = what we see may not be avoided, but what we choose to look and gaze at longer determines how life will turn out for us; 4) our feet = we have to check where we step on (extremely important for us commuters who sometimes have to hike and walk some distance to get to where we want and need to be), or to put it grossly yet simply, we must avoid stepping on “dog shit”—literally or figuratively—or it would surely ruin not just our day, but probably the rest of our days; and 5) our hands = the things we do are actually a result of the things we think and feel, and these would really determine how our lives will turn out to be.

 In our lives we all have fathers and mothers, elders and guardians who exercised great influence in our lives.  Except some few who were lacking in wisdom and maturity themselves, I believe all of them desired that we turn out to be people better than them, or people who would do great things.  These are admirable dreams, but ones we should ponder on. They may not be perfect all the time, but somehow we need to ask ourselves, what have we done with the legacy and the dreams they have left behind for us?  Have we learned from their mistakes, so that we may not have to commit the same in our lives too?  We may not be able to know what the future holds, but like the Father’s Words of Wisdom we learned today, the most important thing is, have we prepared ourselves to embrace it and thrive in it?  May we heed these words not only from our human parents and elders, but more so, from Our One Heavenly Father who loves us and cares for us more than all these.

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

19th July >> Fr. Martin’s Gospel Reflections / Homilies on Matthew 13:24-43 for The Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A: ‘Let them both grow till the harvest’.

Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A

Gospel (Europe, Africa, New Zealand, Australia & Canada)

Matthew 13:24–43

Let them grow together until harvest.

Jesus proposed another parable to the crowds, saying: “The kingdom of heaven may be likened to a man who sowed good seed in his field. While everyone was asleep his enemy came and sowed weeds all through the wheat, and then went off. When the crop grew and bore fruit, the weeds appeared as well. The slaves of the householder came to him and said, ‘Master, did you not sow good seed in your field? Where have the weeds come from?’ He answered, ‘An enemy has done this.’ His slaves said to him, ‘Do you want us to go and pull them up?’ He replied, ‘No, if you pull up the weeds you might uproot the wheat along with them. Let them grow together until harvest; then at harvest time I will say to the harvesters, “First collect the weeds and tie them in bundles for burning; but gather the wheat into my barn.”’”

He proposed another parable to them. “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed that a person took and sowed in a field. It is the smallest of all the seeds, yet when full-grown it is the largest of plants. It becomes a large bush, and the ‘birds of the sky come and dwell in its branches.’”

He spoke to them another parable. “The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed with three measures of wheat flour until the whole batch was leavened.”

All these things Jesus spoke to the crowds in parables. He spoke to them only in parables, to fulfill what had been said through the prophet:

I will open my mouth in parables,

I will announce what has lain hidden from the foundation of the world.

Then, dismissing the crowds, he went into the house. His disciples approached him and said, “Explain to us the parable of the weeds in the field.” He said in reply, “He who sows good seed is the Son of Man, the field is the world, the good seed the children of the kingdom. The weeds are the children of the evil one, and the enemy who sows them is the devil. The harvest is the end of the age, and the harvesters are angels. Just as weeds are collected and burned up with fire, so will it be at the end of the age. The Son of Man will send his angels, and they will collect out of his kingdom all who cause others to sin and all evildoers. They will throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be wailing and grinding of teeth. Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Whoever has ears ought to hear.”

Gospel (USA)

Matthew 13:24-43

Let them both grow till the harvest

Jesus put another parable before the crowds: ‘The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field. While everybody was asleep his enemy came, sowed darnel all among the wheat, and made off. When the new wheat sprouted and ripened, the darnel appeared as well. The owner’s servants went to him and said, “Sir, was it not good seed that you sowed in your field? If so, where does the darnel come from?” “Some enemy has done this” he answered. And the servants said, “Do you want us to go and weed it out?” But he said, “No, because when you weed out the darnel you might pull up the wheat with it. Let them both grow till the harvest; and at harvest time I shall say to the reapers: First collect the darnel and tie it in bundles to be burnt, then gather the wheat into my barn.”’

He put another parable before them: ‘The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed which a man took and sowed in his field. It is the smallest of all the seeds, but when it has grown it is the biggest shrub of all and becomes a tree so that the birds of the air come and shelter in its branches.’

He told them another parable: ‘The kingdom of heaven is like the yeast a woman took and mixed in with three measures of flour till it was leavened all through.’

In all this Jesus spoke to the crowds in parables; indeed, he would never speak to them except in parables. This was to fulfil the prophecy:

I will speak to you in parables

and expound things hidden since the foundation of the world.

Then, leaving the crowds, he went to the house; and his disciples came to him and said, ‘Explain the parable about the darnel in the field to us.’ He said in reply, ‘The sower of the good seed is the Son of Man. The field is the world; the good seed is the subjects of the kingdom; the darnel, the subjects of the evil one; the enemy who sowed them, the devil; the harvest is the end of the world; the reapers are the angels. Well then, just as the darnel is gathered up and burnt in the fire, so it will be at the end of time. The Son of Man will send his angels and they will gather out of his kingdom all things that provoke offences and all who do evil, and throw them into the blazing furnace, where there will be weeping and grinding of teeth. Then the virtuous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Listen, anyone who has ears!’

Reflections (3)

(i) Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

It has often been said that our weaknesses are the shadow side of our strengths. A person prone to anger can have a powerful passion for justice. Someone who tends to be intolerant of others can be very conscientious about doing everything well. The line between the good and the not-so-good within us can be very subtle. If we are overzealous in trying to root out what is not so good in our own life, or in someone else’s life, we might damage what is good there too.

In the first of the three parables that Jesus speaks in today’s gospel reading, the landowner’s servants wanted to root out the weeds that had appeared among the wheat. The landowner had to restrain them. It was not the time for such separation because it is not always easy to distinguish wheat from weeds at an early stage of growth. The separation would come at harvest time. In the meantime, patience was needed with the weeds. Jesus may have been warning against a kind of religious zeal that was too eager to identify weeds, what is considered worthless, and to separate it out from wheat, what is considered good. Saint Paul showed this kind of religious zeal before his conversion on the road to Damascus. He saw the followers of Jesus as weeds in the field of Judaism; they had to be rooted out. He was blind to the presence of God among them. It was only after his meeting with the risen Lord that he could look back and say, ‘I was violently persecuting the church of God’.

We can all get it wrong when it comes to others. We only have to think of those innocent people who have been wrongly imprisoned. In our own personal lives we may have judged someone harshly only to discover in time that we were wide of the mark. The church itself has not always heeded the warning of Jesus about the dangers of premature separation. Too great a zeal to purify the wheat field risks doing more harm than good. We need to be patient with imperfection, in ourselves and in others. As we know only too well, life is not tidy. It is not like a well-manicured garden, in which order and harmony prevail. Each of us is a mixture of wheat and weed; we are each tainted by sin and yet touched by grace. The Lord’s good work is ongoing in our lives, even if it is hindered by the presence of sin. Only beyond this earthly life will we be fully conformed to the image of God’s Son. In the meantime, we need a certain amount of patience with ourselves and others, while seeking to grow more fully into the person of Christ, and helping each other to do so. As we travel this journey, Saint Paul reminds us in today’s second reading that ‘the Spirit helps us in our weakness’.

If we focus only on the ‘weeds’ in our lives, we can easily get discouraged. Sometimes we may feel that our good efforts at something are bearing very little fruit. We can get into a frame of mind that says, ‘What good have I been doing with my life?’ We can feel that we have precious little to show for our endeavours. Yet, we can be doing a lot of good without realizing it. Even a little good can go a long way. That is the message of the other two parables that Jesus speaks in today’s gospel reading. The mustard seed is tiny and yet it grows into a very large shrub. What looks completely insignificant takes on a life of its own and develops in a way that is out of proportion to its small beginning. Sometimes in our own lives, the little good we do can go on to become something that we had never envisaged, and might never even get to see. The little bit of yeast that a woman uses in baking has a huge impact on a large batch of dough. Again, in our own lives, the little good we do can impact on those around us in ways that would surprise us. Jesus says, that is what the kingdom of God is like, how it comes among us. The good deed that seems insignificant can turn out to be powerful and beneficial for many.

These two small parables assure us that humble beginnings can have an extraordinary outcome when the work in question is God’s work. This is an encouragement to us all to keep doing the little bit of good we are able to do. It may not seem much in our own eyes or in the eyes of others, yet God can work powerfully through whatever little good we do, in ways that may surprise us. We can all plant the equivalent of the mustard seed; we can all be the equivalent of the tiny piece of leaven. The little initiative, the small loving gesture, can all bear fruit in ways that we could never have imagined at the time. The Lord can work powerfully through our smallest efforts if they are done out of love for him. Our calling is to keep planting some good seed and to trust that the Lord will do the rest.

And/Or

(ii) Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

  We have had some beautiful weather recently. Many of us may have been gardening, and part of our gardening work probably involved pulling up weeds. We all long for a weed-free garden. We are not convinced by the view that weeds are really only flowers in the wrong place and that we should learn to appreciate them. We see weeds as a nuisance, as something to be got rid of. Some of us may have discovered that our zeal to get rid of weeds can have unfortunate consequences. In my ignorance I once sprayed a lawn that had weeds among the grass with a weed killer. I succeeded only in killing off the grass; the weeds seemed to have got a new lease of life. In going after weeds, we can do a certain amount of unintended collateral damage.

 We can easily identify with the servants in the gospel reading who were poised to pull up the weeds that an enemy had sown in the wheat field of their master. However, the owner of the field was a more patient man. He recognized that at the early stages of growth this particular weed looked very like wheat and that it would be very difficult to distinguish between the two. In going after the weeds, the wheat would suffer too. He saw that it would be better to wait until both the weed and the wheat got much bigger and were ready for harvest. Then it would be possible to distinguish one from the other and to separate them accordingly. The owner knew that there was a time to leave well enough alone and there was a time to act. The time when the servants wanted to act was really the time to leave well enough alone. The servants had zeal but not much insight, and zeal without insight and sensitivity can be a very dangerous thing.

 The parable suggests that doing nothing can sometimes be better than doing something. Jesus may have been alerting his followers to the dangers of a certain kind of well-intentioned zeal that demanded immediate action, when patient inactivity would actually be the better option. This was the kind of zeal Jesus’ disciples showed on one occasion when Jesus was refused entry into a Samaritan village. His disciples asked him if he wanted them to call on God to rain down fire from heaven and destroy the village. No doubt the disciples considered that Samaritan village to be the equivalent of the weeds in the wheat field of today’s parable. The evangelist tells us that Jesus rebuked his disciples for their suggestion and went on his way to another village. History, even recent history, is full of the tragic consequences of the kind of attitude displayed by those disciples. It is the attitude that says that the world would be a better place without such and such a person or without such and such a group, and, therefore, the right thing to do, the godly thing to do, is to take zealous action to remove such people or such groups from the world. Weed them out! The zeal of the weed killer can be a frightening thing. Jesus perhaps warned against this kind of purifying zeal because he was well aware that such zeal is not always accompanied by insight, by the wisdom that comes from above.

 Jesus in the parable was warning us against a premature separation of the wheat from the weed, of the good from the bad. He was saying that this kind of separation is really God’s work, not our work, and that it will happen at the end of time rather than in the course of time. Just as the servants in the parable would not have been able to distinguish the wheat from the weeds if they had been let loose, we do not always have the necessary insight to distinguish who is good and who is evil. We can get it terribly wrong; we only have to think of those innocent people who have been wrongly imprisoned. How often in our own personal lives have we judged someone harshly only to discover in time that we were very wide of the mark. St. Paul put it very simply and clearly in one of his letters: ‘Do not pronounce judgement before the time, before the Lord comes, who will bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart’. Unfortunately, the church itself has not always heeded the warning of Jesus about the dangers of premature separation. It could be argued that the inquisition was not in the spirit of the parable that Jesus speaks in today’s gospel reading. Too great a zeal to purify the wheat field risks doing more harm than good.

  A weed-free garden may be highly desirable, but the gospel today suggests that we may have to learn to live with weeds. We need to be patient with imperfection in ourselves and in others. As we know only too well, life is not tidy. It is not like a well manicured garden, in which order and harmony prevail. Our own personal lives are not like the garden displays that win prizes at the Chelsea flower show. Each of us is a mixture of wheat and weed; we are each tainted by sin and yet touched by grace. Our calling is to grow in grace before God and others, as Jesus did. We look to him to help us to keep on turning from sin and growing in grace. St Paul assures us in today’s second reading that the Spirit helps us in our weakness. With the Spirit’s help we can grow more and more into the person of Christ and become what Paul in one of his letters calls ‘God’s field’.

And/Or

(iii) Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

  We all long for a weed-free garden. We are not convinced by the view that weeds are really only flowers in the wrong place and that we should learn to appreciate them. We see weeds as a nuisance, as something to be got rid of. Some of us may have discovered that our zeal to get rid of weeds can have unfortunate consequences. In my ignorance I once sprayed a lawn that had weeds among the grass with a weed killer. I succeeded only in killing off the grass; the weeds seemed to have got a new lease of life. In going after weeds, we can do a certain amount of unintended collateral damage.

 We can easily identify with the servants in the gospel reading who were poised to pull up the weeds that an enemy had sown in the wheat field of their master. However, the owner of the field was a more patient man. He recognized that at the early stages of growth this particular weed looked very like wheat and that it would be very difficult to distinguish between the two. In going after the weeds, the wheat would suffer too. He saw that it would be better to wait until both the weed and the wheat got much bigger and were ready for harvest. Then it would be possible to distinguish one from the other and to separate them accordingly. The owner knew that there was a time to leave well enough alone and there was a time to act. The time when the servants wanted to act was really the time to leave well enough alone. The servants had zeal but not much insight, and zeal without insight and sensitivity can be a very dangerous thing.

 The parable suggests that doing nothing can sometimes be better than doing something. Jesus may have been alerting his followers to the dangers of a certain kind of well-intentioned zeal that demanded immediate action, when patient inactivity would actually be the better option. This was the kind of zeal Jesus’ disciples showed on one occasion when Jesus was refused entry into a Samaritan village. His disciples asked him if he wanted them to call on God to rain down fire from heaven and destroy the village. No doubt the disciples considered that Samaritan village to be the equivalent of the weeds in the wheat field of today’s parable. The evangelist tells us that Jesus rebuked his disciples for their suggestion and went on his way to another village. History, even recent history, is full of the tragic consequences of the kind of attitude displayed by those disciples. It is the attitude that says that the world would be a better place without such and such a person or without such and such a group, and, therefore, the right thing to do, the godly thing to do, is to take zealous action to remove such people or such groups from the world. Weed them out! The zeal of the weed killer can be a frightening thing. Jesus perhaps warned against this kind of purifying zeal because he was well aware that such zeal is not always accompanied by insight, by the wisdom that comes from above.

 Jesus in the parable was warning us against a premature separation of the wheat from the weed, of the good from the bad. He was saying that this kind of separation is really God’s work, not our work, and that it will happen at the end of time rather than in the course of time. Just as the servants in the parable would not have been able to distinguish the wheat from the weeds if they had been let loose, we do not always have the necessary insight to distinguish who is good and who is evil. We can get it terribly wrong; we only have to think of those innocent people who have been wrongly imprisoned. How often in our own personal lives have we judged someone harshly only to discover in time that we were very wide of the mark. St. Paul put it very simply and clearly in one of his letters: ‘Do not pronounce judgement before the time, before the Lord comes, who will bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart’. Unfortunately, the church itself has not always heeded the warning of Jesus about the dangers of premature separation. It could be argued that the inquisition was not in the spirit of the parable that Jesus speaks in today’s gospel reading. Too great a zeal to purify the wheat field risks doing more harm than good.

 A weed-free garden may be highly desirable, but the gospel today suggests that we may have to learn to live with weeds. We need to be patient with imperfection in ourselves and in others. As we know only too well, life is not tidy. It is not like a well manicured garden, in which order and harmony prevail. Our own personal lives are not like the garden displays that win prizes at the Chelsea flower show. Each of us is a mixture of wheat and weed; we are each tainted by sin and yet touched by grace. Our calling is to grow in grace before God and others, as Jesus did. We look to him to help us to keep on turning from sin and growing in grace. St Paul assures us in today’s second reading that the Spirit helps us in our weakness. With the Spirit’s help we can grow more and more into the person of Christ and become what Paul in one of his letters calls ‘God’s field’.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

[itstimeforspring]

keep shining your light

title from 'there's hope' by india arie. nothing is mine except for hope. not even killian's insecurities--i didn't invent those. thanks to @love-with-you-i-have-everything for reading this and being a source of encouragement and love <3

sort of a sequel to you’ve got me on a natural high, found on tumblr and ao3. not necessary to read first, but there’s a fair amount of reference to it.

For the first two weeks after Hope’s born, Killian doesn’t let her out of his sight.

If Emma’s feeding her, Killian’s sitting on the bed next to her, his eyes feasting on Hope’s face or Emma’s. If Henry’s holding her and reciting Snow and Charming’s love story, he’s sitting on the couch next to Henry, arm around him, eyes never leaving Hope’s scrunched up face except to grin at Henry every now and then. If someone else has come to the house to admire the baby or to bring over food for them, he’s either lurking in the room while someone’s holding the baby or holding her himself. Usually he’s holding her. He doesn’t like handing her over.

Killian and Emma don’t go to work for those first two weeks at all; David had, at first glance at the baby, informed her parents that he was well capable of taking care of Storybrooke while they stayed home with her. David, of course, had been thinking of the baby’s health and not Emma’s true annoyance with crises and Killian’s overall fragile mental health, both of which were events worth of David’s consideration. They’re fine with the enforced vacation.

Finally, when Killian’s staying in Hope’s room long after she’s asleep, Emma has to interfere. She wanders into the little room, quotes from the storybook Henry lovingly painted on the walls. “Killian,” she whispers. He’s sitting in the rocking chair, staring through the slats of the crib at Hope. It takes a moment but Killian finally sees her, and he smiles softly and raises his hook toward her in silent invitation.

She takes the hook and walks to him, settling on his lap. They both watch the slow up and down movements of Hope’s tiny body. They had done pretty well in her accidental conception. Pretty little thing, Emma thinks proudly. She snuggles into her pirate’s embrace for a moment but can soon feel both of them drifting off into sleep. “Come on, Killian,” Emma finally whispers to avoid waking the baby. “Come to bed.”

He doesn’t answer, just buries his face in her neck in silent agreement. She stands and pulls him after her. They curl up together in their bed, Killian pulling her as closely as physically possible and Emma tangling their feet together.

“Hope can sleep without you, you know,” Emma says.

“I know,” Killian replies in his gruff sleepy voice. “I just like watching her.”

“Me too,” Emma whispers.

The next morning it’s like he’s trying to not hover over her so much—he lets Emma get her in the night and morning, gets breakfast for the two of them and Henry without leaving the eggs to check on Hope, and he actually leaves the room with Hope in Regina’s arms to wake Emma up and tell her Regina’s there to pick up Henry. “I don’t care that Regina’s here,” Emma grumbles. “Tell her to call me if the Wicked Witch of the East decides to rear her ugly head, or a magical green Yeti comes to visit, then I’ll get up.” Then he kisses her briefly and nearly runs back to Hope, probably to make sure that Regina’s not done something with his child.

The next week, Emma forces Killian to return to work, as she can more than handle a baby on her own. Killian protests this, claiming that Emma will need him for something or another, or that Hope will get upset since Henry’s going back to school just as he’s going to work. Less people in the house, or something; Hope won’t know how to handle it. Emma, of course, eventually gets her way and Killian leaves for work with a packed lunch, a kiss left on Hope’s cheek, and only a little complaining.

David calls her that afternoon. “Is Killian okay?”

Emma’s holding Hope while on the phone, and she could swear Hope perks up at the sound of David’s voice. That’s going to be adorable, telling David that his granddaughter recognizes him already. “Yeah, I think so. He didn’t want to go to work but I eventually convinced him otherwise.”

“Yeah, you can watch over Hope by yourself, I should think. It’s just weird.” David’s voice goes lower, conspiring. “He’s sitting at his desk, just staring at that picture he has of you and Henry holding the baby. Just staring, like he’s trying to memorize it.”

Emma raises an eyebrow at Hope, whose eyes follow the eyebrow very well. She can’t help grinning at Hope’s eyes; they’re Killian’s exact eyes, shape and color and expression. She zones back into David’s voice. “Is he working at all?”

“No, and I think that’s the weirdest part. He loves work, can’t handle being idle, you know that.”

Emma’s starting to get concerned, not just because the baby on her arm’s starting her feed-me-now squeak. “He’s not doing anything?”

David pauses a moment, like he’s trying to get a closer look at his son-in-law without him noticing. Emma puts the phone on speaker and leaves it on the counter while she searches the living room for the softly squawking Hope’s pacifier. “Still staring at the picture. I swear he’s been staring at it for five minutes. Eyes not moving. He hasn’t noticed me blatantly eying him.”

Emma grabs the pacifier from the couch cushion, glances at it—clean enough, she’s sure—and pushes it gently into Hope’s mouth. “Well, you’re boss for another few weeks. Either tell him to come home or get back to work.”

Killian gets back home in eight minutes. Hope’s just about to fall asleep again, and Emma’s holding her while trying to catch up on whatever TV show she abandoned after the six weeks of heaven before the Queens of Darkness.

Killian quietly bursts into the living room as only he can and tosses himself on the couch next to Emma, kissing her for a few seconds before brushing a kiss to Hope’s sleepy forehead.

“What is up with you?” Emma asks after she gets her breath back.

“What, love?” Killian, bless him, looks genuinely confused.

Emma raises that eyebrow again. “You’re home four hours early. David called ten minutes ago to inform me that you weren’t working, just looking at a picture on your desk. Then I told him to either send you home or make you work. And here you are.”

She thinks Killian stiffens for a moment, his expression closing off for the briefest of seconds. Then he opens up again, relaxing into the couch, arm around her shoulders, maintaining eye-contact as normal. “I missed you and the little lass. Couldn’t concentrate on Leroy’s latest drunk and disorderly or someone David thinks is going to turn out to be, and I quote, ‘the evil gingerbread man, except not gingerbread’.”

Emma scoffs. “How could the gingerbread man be evil?”

“I asked the same question, love, and David handed me the book.” He brushes his finger down Hope’s face, their expressions finally peaceful and content. Emma relaxes, finally, and snuggles into his embrace. Killian whispers into her ear, “The gingerbread man is evil, Swan. We can’t trust it. And the little lass must never hear the story.”

“Henry can read her anything he wants that’s age-appropriate,” Emma grumbles, the few short hours of laundry, cleaning, and slightly grumpy baby catching up with her. Her last thought is Killian gently taking Hope from her and brushing a tiny kiss on her lips.

She wakes up a few hours later to a quiet house and a few seconds of panic at the time. The slightly painful state of her breasts tells her about what time it is, and she eventually summons the strength to stand and wander up to Hope’s room to see if she’s hungry. Killian’s standing above her crib when she enters. He’s staring into the crib, his gaze unfocused.

Emma stands in the doorway for a moment before seeing the tear tracking its way down Killian’s cheek. She quickly walks up to him, wraps her arms around his waist, and buries her face in his neck as he takes her hand in his. “What is it?” she asks. It’s not begging but it’s close. “Come on, Killian, tell me what’s wrong,” she repeats when he doesn’t answer.

“I’m terrified,” he finally whispers. Hope squeaks in her sleep for a second and he stiffens, staring down at her. “I’ve no idea how to care for a baby, let alone how to raise a child.”

“Nor do I.”

“You have fake memories of raising Henry, at least. I know it’s not comparable, but there’s that knowledge in the back of your mind.” Killian slowly turns in her arms to face her. “I don’t know anything—”

“Yes, you do,” Emma insists, wiping the tear away. “Three, almost four weeks of being out in the world, and Hope definitely has her favorite parent.”

He smiles, that self-deprecating smile that Emma can never decide whether she wants to slap or kiss off his handsome face. He leans his forehead against hers. She can see one more tear making its hot trail down his face.

“Come on, Killian, there’s something else,” she whispers. “Tell me, please tell me.”

He pulls away and leads her to the rocking chair to sit while he kneels at her feet. “When there was that chance we were losing Hope. That’s what made me remember, I think. That I’ve lost everyone. My parents, Liam, Milah, even you.” Emma wipes away another tear and he turns into her hand. “I thought we were going to lose our child, and some nurse whispered what could happen in miscarriage, pregnancy, childbirth—”

They take a shaky breath, almost in unison.

“I’m not sure who she was in the Enchanted Forest, but she should not be a nurse.” Killian’s voice strengthens, but that wobble in the background makes Emma want to cry. “She told me that not only did miscarriages result in the death of the child, which I had unfortunately prepared myself for, but that sometimes, they lose the mother too. That there’s nothing they can do.” He buries his face in her thighs for just a moment and takes a shuddering breath.

Emma wants to kill someone. Stride to the hospital and physically rip this woman’s head from her shoulders.

Killian pulls away and his glassy eyes pierce into her own. “And that was what reminded me. That I’ve lost everyone, and it’s only a matter of time before I lose you, and Hope, and Henry, and even David and Snow, and everyone I care about.”

Emma stares at her husband for a moment, rests her hand on his cheek, feels the agony in his heart that she knows all too well. Then she glares at him. “You think you have the monopoly on losing people?” she demands, still in a whisper. “I told you, years ago, that I had lost everyone I cared for. My parents, every single foster family, Lily, Neal, Henry, Graham, Walsh. You. I’ve lost you more times than I want to count.” Killian tries to speak but she cuts him off. “You are not the only one who loses people. If I have loved them, I have also lost them.”

“But—”

“I’m terrified too, Killian,” she whispers. He rests his chin on her knees, his eyes wide and pleading, and she strokes his hair. “But we have to stop being scared of losing everything.”

“I know.”

Of course this is the moment Hope decides it’s a good idea to wake up and fuss about general problems in the life of a baby. Killian stands and lifts the baby out of the crib with the gentleness normally reserved for fine china and hands her to Emma with the utmost care, stepping to her side as she gets the baby situated. Hope starts nursing ravenously and Emma grins down at her.

Then she glances up at Killian. He stands next to them, his attention completely captured on Hope. She can see the moment he realizes Hope didn’t even bother to open her eyes all the way, because his mouth quirks in the smallest smile. She watches his face as he memorizes every facet of their child’s face and her innocent beauty. When Hope’s finished eating and hiccups a little burp of satisfaction, Emma stands to hand her to Killian.

His face glows.

“See?” Emma whispers, resting one hand on Killian’s cheek and the other on his arm, just above Hope’s little head. “She’s here. Henry’s in his room, sleeping like the teenage dead. I’m here. You’re not gonna lose us. Never.”

Killian doesn’t say anything. His eyes shine with understanding and relief. He leans down and kisses Hope’s forehead, his lips lingering. Emma rests her forehead against his.

They stand there, in Hope’s nursery, for an indeterminate amount of time. Basking, maybe. In the presence of their daughter, the baby they wanted for so long and feared so much over and loved so intensely.

Later that night, when they’ve finally put Hope down and returned to their own bed, Emma thinks. She rests her head on Killian’s chest and he tightens his arm around her in his sleep. True love really is the most powerful of magic, she considers. For when Killian leaned down and kissed Hope, she could have sworn the room lit up in rainbow lights.

[renaroo]

Wednesday Roundup 26.7.2017

Wow! So I can honestly say that I was ready to finish all these reviews up and post everything yesterday in a timely manner like a good comic fan and then the sleep factor hit me so hard in the head that it left my eyeballs spinning!

…

Anyway so I got real tired yesterday and took a nap, then had a lot of work today which led to this being late. But I like to think for the lack of timely publication, I give you all some higher quality review here this week and…. mostly that’s because nearly every comic gave me a lot to talk about and I mean a lot. There’s some great stuff out this week and before I ramble much more, I think it’s time for us to just get into it!

DC’s Batman Beyond, DC’s Detective Comics, IDW’s Ghostbusters 101, Marvel’s Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur,  Kodansha’s Princess Jellyfish, Image’s Saga, IDW’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, IDW’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles/Usagi Yojimbo, IDW’s Transformers: Lost Light, DC’s Wonder Woman

DC’s Batman Beyond (2016-present) #10 Dan Jurgens, Bernard Chang, Marcelo Maiolo

Well. You’ve heard it from me here first, folks. I’m dropping a Batman Beyond book. I know, I know. Shocking. I haven’t done that since the last Batman Beyond book, or the Batman Beyond book before that. It’s just astounding how bad DC is at capitalizing on what made one of their properties not just one of the most successful series it had out at the time, but literally my favorite animated series that they every produced.

Jurgens’ Batman Beyond in a weird way was always doomed to not capture the magic of the original series because, for one, Jurgens was one of the most enthusiastic people about the awful crossover event Futures End that spawned the New52’s Batman Beyond series to begin with, a series that pretty much focused around the murder of an unproven Terry McGinnis, and then he spent a few years writing a Batman Beyond book that did not involve Terry at all, centering around Tim Drake as Batman instead, and missing the point with just about every supporting character in Terry’s world.

So I was always probably going to subscribe to this book out of nostalgia rather than hopefulness that the creative teams loved Beyond for all the reasons I did, but I have been surprised by just how much in this second arc that Jurgens and company seemed determined to strangle any vitality from the series with a noose of continuity they weaved themselves.

Not only are they wanting me and other readers who love the Batboys enough to buy a comic based on an early 2000s Batman cartoon, but they also want me and others to accept that this continuity is the same continuity that the current comics are in including the excellent Robin: Son of Batman series which, more than any other series, proves that Damian has more than outgrown his honoring of the al Ghul bloodline and is a hero of his own making and in his own subtle way makes countless sacrifices even as a child to keep these things going. And then I’m supposed to buy that he becomes the next Demon’s Head, mostly out of jealousy for a new adopted brother, and is now going to blow up the world even though he… already watched the Brother Eye apocalypse happen.

And yes. That is what they are saying because Jurgens bothered to bring Goliath in… and have AI-crazed Terry strangle a beloved fluffy Bat-Dragon to death with a chain (that he doesn’t even wear anymore in real continuity but whatever obviously my point is that this series is a middle finger to continuity).

Once again, DC has taken something hopeful and unique and beloved and turned it convoluted, unnecessarily unpleasant, and without any foreseeable joy.

There’s one issue left to this arc, so I do have a debate on whether or not I want to take up the next issue and at least complete the story or just stop cold turkey now and…. honestly? I’m not even interested anymore in how this story is going to end so. Probably the first.

DC’s Detective Comics (2016-present) #961 James Tynion IV, Alvaro Martinez, Raul Fernandez, Brad Anderson

So. I guess we’re… just at the point where it’s accepted that Cassandra is mostly monosyllabic except for when she decides to deliver perfect Shakespearean quotes. That’s a thing that we’re just… gonna take for granted now I guess. Was this built up to. is this truly a good thing for her character. Who knows because she got a focal story in another arc, guys, we can’t dive too deep on it anymore!

And I guess Kate and Bruce are following the previous continuity’s grand tradition of doing nothing themselves with helping Cass learn to read, write, and evolve her vocabulary. We’ll just… keep supplying her with crimefighting costumes and not worry about the fact that she’s collecting trash and living in the attic of a ballet studio like the freaking Phantom of the Opera complete with a literal Christine.

But. Believe it or not (and for me it’s hard to believe) this is not entirely a book judged on the merits of its Cass. Which is good for it because while not the worst thing ever in that regard, it continuously raises its own expectations and then fails to meet them. No, I need to evaluate how the rest of this story goes because it is, at the end of the day, an ensemble book.

Azrael is taking over Jean Paul and Luke who is his best friend, no homo (for now), has the solution of bringing back the literal embodiment of terrible Batman fashion choices of the 90s but without the full ZUR-EN-ARRH-esque color scheme. Because the solution to any evil suit is an evil suit. And yet they STILL won’t give Cass a decent costume— sorry, sorry, no more about Cass.

Bruce and Zatanna’s moments and history is sweet but we’re like… back at the drawing board when it comes to invasive mind control/memory erasure procedures in the DCU which has never been a good thing and worked to DC’s benefit so I’m still not sure why we go down this road.

That being said, Kate got a few fun lines, and I do appreciate that Jean Paul’s plight is at least sympathetic to him especially since he’s always had the undertones of mental illness. And I’m genuinely invested in how all this works out and why Bruce magically (heh) knows he needs Zee and the weird orb’s help to stop whatever BS Ra’s is up to.

IDW’s Ghostbusters 101 (2017-present) #5 Erik Burnham, Dan Schoening, Luis Antonio Delgado

We’re getting incredibly close to this series ending and honestly that makes me a little sad. As much as I like all of the IDW Ghostbusters universe they’ve built, it’s been a whole other pleasure seeing the 2016 cast of Ghostbusters get to show their stuff and even work off the criticisms I’ve held of the way the movie last year handled them and their characters.

But this issue did something even more special, at least in my mind. It was determined to give us a moment between Abbey and Erin specifically that addressed the inadequacies and fears a lot of fans of the 2016 movie have felt in the wake of its tumultuous response from the general Ghostbusters fandom. Which again is something I never really understood even as someone who loves Ghostbusters as much and as unapologetically as I do because there are so many other things since the 80s that have been done with that original movie that could be pointed to as “selling out”, the only different between any of them and the movie last year was the all female cast. But whatever.

The fact is, especially with IDW, you can have your cake and eat it too. Everyone can be Ghostbusters, there’s a whole damn Ghostbusters multiverse that includes freaking Caddyshack just because Bill Murray was also starring in it. And you know what? I love that. I love that media’s at a point where we can love two different takes of the same thing for wildly different reasons, even if we default to one more than the other. That’s something we’re allowed to do.

And Turnham and Schoening just do their stuff, proving to be wildly creative while at the same time understanding all of these characters far more than almost any fans of Ghostbusters before them. And I love it.

Marvel’s Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur (2015-present) #21 Brandon Montclare, Natacha Bustos, Tamra Bonvillain

I read a fair number of child-age comic books for a few reasons. I find them particularly important for growing the next reader base because there’s no better way to get people into comics than having them grow up with comics (as I like to think of myself as being a shining example of). Another reason is that I have a lot of people in my life, specifically friends and relatives, with young children who are very interested in reading comic books because of the saturation of superheroes and other comic franchises in the world right now but are themselves not comic book fans so aren’t sure what to get for their kids.

As a result, I personally have given out comics like Scooby-Doo Team-Up, Princeless, Young Justice, and, of course, Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur out to many of the children in my life and have been very happy to read along with them.

And honestly, none of them are as engaging both for me and for the children in my life as Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur is. The stories are simple, but the emotions are complex without being unreliable to children. They recognize the relationships between Lunella, her parents, her friends, and especially with Devil and even when they’re in different dimensions, kids know that the emotions that carry from one adventure to the next is what makes them happy to read. Which is why even in a kid’s comic we get cut aways to the family life without Lunella even there and aren’t afraid of losing the attention of the kids.

It’s a great comic that uses color and themes in ways that are truly unique to the age group its aimed for and also make it a joyful break from my usual Wednesday comics fare.

If this book isn’t something you want to read on your own, I really encourage you to at least share it with some of the children in your life because it’s truly something special.

Kodansha’s Princess Jellyfish (2008-present) Chapter 83 Akiko Higashimura

Higashimura continues to baffle me by defying all the expectations I hold for how a medium can handle women’s rights, LGBT issues, and mental illness all at once. And it’s one of the most relaxing yet fulfilling reads I have every time it comes out. 

This time around we’re still knee deep in the drama unfolding with Tsukimi’s new line of dresses (I can’t begin to explain how astounding it is that a comic is making me feel things for the fashion industry as a plot point at all), but mostly this issue gives us a lot of calm reflection and character interaction more than anything else. 

Tsukimi has very subtly grown into her own over the 83 chapters, and it was never change she needed but confidence, and the ability to express herself in ways she never realized she needed. 

We also got the ever deepening and ever important relationship between the brothers, Kuranosuke and Shu, both still pining for Tsukimi but both still each other’s greatest support in the raw environment their family has given them emotionally and the difficulties of their current situation with Tsukimi and the Nunnery. I thought it was fascinating that Shu remarked that his dream would be to one day live together with Kuranosuke and Tsukimi, even if it wasn’t romantically. Just having a home and a family he loves as much as them all together. That’s... such an oddly millennial goal and it really resonates with me. Romance isn’t truly the objective, companionship and valuing people are.

We also get more drama unfolding, which involved Kuranosuke’s unintentional outing. We’ll have to see how this storyline is handled coming up in future chapters, but I have faith in Higashimura and in Princess Jellyfish. 

Image’s Saga (2011-present) #45 Fiona Staples, Brian K. Vaughn

Saga is, impressively and unconventionally, Saga. This comic book is such an unreal read, such an unexpected gem that it’s hard to really quantify it compared to other monthly comics because, well, it doesn’t feel like other monthly comics. Not just because of the breaks between chapters, but because more than any comic I’ve ever read before it, Saga manages to live up to the name of being a complete and total immersion into the long story that follows all the lives of its gigantic cast.

It’s really difficult to explain what Saga has done for comics just yet, really. The expectations are higher, the question of mature content in opposition to “adult” content feels like it’s being completely flayed and laid alive for us all to posture on.

The comic is just something else, and I really wish there were better ways for me to fully dive into just why it is such a gigantic deal for comic readers to have so much quality available to them.

Saga’s not perfect, but it’s one of the most experimental and surreal experiences that edges damn close to that ambition to be perfect, and right now it’s the kind of story I really really need.

IDW’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2011-present) #72 Kevin Eastman, Tom Waltz, Dave Wachter, Ronda Pattison

It’s time for my monthly fawning over the IDW experiment that is Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and failing to fully encapsulate just how much my mind is blown over how much this series has managed to incorporate every part of every beloved series of the franchise while still amazing everyone with its unique storytelling, much loved subversions of various genres, and ability to still hold true to the dynamic that has made this series so beloved to begin with.

I just genuinely wouldn’t have believed, if you told me years ago, that this series would do all that while also weaving in its world’s own very unique, very unexpected mythology. Not mythology in the sense of greater TMNT canon, I mean mythology in that it has its own pantheon of original godhead figures from around the world that weave into the histories of the characters we know and love and build the world out even more.

I’ve talked before, at least in part, about how each of the turtles’ personalities and personal interests lends the whole franchise the ability to deal with different comic book staple genres. Mikey’s interests make them superheroes, Don’s personality and ingenuity make them sci-fi figures, Leo’s stalwart interests in family and honor make them ninja, and Raph’s high emotions and tendency toward fighting authority and also falling into tumultuous love lives makes them teenage dramas.

And I think it’s telling that each time the IDW comics focus on any one of those genres, the corresponding turtle tends to take the lead of the story. But here we have something unique. High fantasy and mythological epics is something that — for all their magical tampering and run ins — has never been the central focus of the turtles’ stories. It’s usually tied into one of the above mentioned genres more than anything else, and this mythologizing started very similarly, growing out of Kitsune and Japanese lore first in a storyline that was, very much, the IDW’s series most Leo-heavy storyline “City Fall.”

This broader focus on fantasy really makes it more clear that this is a purely new IDW take, and that none of the turtles are taking focus here, but rather the family they have made for themselves — the Hamato Clan — are center stage to take on something that’s bigger than any one of them individually could be.

It’s interesting though. We borrow from so many different Ninja Turtle continuities and this “Father Dragon” that the Immortals refer to really only reminds me of… one villain from the TMNT’s past…

And while the main four aren’t magical… they did once… have a fifth turtle… who… was a shaman… who fought that dragon…

Hm.

Naaaahhhhhhhh.

IDW’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles/Usagi Yojimbo (2017) Stan Sakai, Tom Luth

Okay so, I have actually been looking forward to this crossover for a while because if you’ve been following my blog for long you know that I am a real shellhead at heart and just adore every version of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles even to my greatest fault, and I also am just a huge fan of and greatly admire the masterpiece that I consider Stan Sakai’s Usagi Yojimbo to be, and the fun, loving, mutual relationship that both works have shown for each other throughout the decades and how TMNT has honestly gone out of its way to continue to keep Usagi in the public’s eye beyond the diehard comic readers who already would know of him is something I truly enjoy.

And while this isn’t as bombastic and fun as the last big crossover they head, well, ages ago in all honesty, over in the Usagi Yojimbo comics, this was a fun adventure that is meant to introduce IDW fans to the Usagi Yojimbo canon.

There are lots of interesting bits to this crossover, like the revelation that of the IDW turtles Mikey is the only one fluent in Japanese, which I find strange, the fact that Usagi considers himself and Leo to be good friends and his confusion and upset at being attacked by him, and just the fact that … well I guess Usagi’s greatest nemesis, Jei the demon, is just wandering around the countryside now without his precious niece. And also that this is like… Jei Prime as opposed to the current Jei.

Basically the continuity is a mess here for both franchises but it’s a purely enjoyable mess and I can write off a lot of it being that Sakai is known for not always using a linear storyline to tell the stories he wants to. We’re talking about a series that had a crossover with feudal War of the Worlds because why not.

In any case, I found this comic enjoyable, and while I think the coloring was a compromise between the very elaborate coloring that the TMNT books get and the simple black-and-white of Usagi Yojimbo’s normal titles, seeing a crossover by Sakai and Luth themselves without the classic black and white kind of makes me appreciate the simple beauty from their usual style. But that’s perhaps just me.

Now, this is a costly comic, far more expensive than any comic I usually buy, and my justification for it was I want to support IDW reaching out to other creators and other properties more, especially someone as important yet as underrepresented in comics as Stan Sakai, but I absolutely understand that being a much harder sell for other comic readers. So use your money as you see best, guys!

IDW’s Transformers: Lost Light (2016-present) #8 James Roberts, Priscilla Tramontano, Joana Lafuente

People have incredibly high expectations for the IDW books and it’s not without reason. For the last several years they have provided some of the most consistent quality, diversified and reconnected the canons of much beloved decades long franchises, and have also managed to keep refreshingly new and experimental without straying from content. But I have to say, that this is the issue of Lost Light that has me feeling like I did when I first discovered More Than Meets the Eye myself a while back and re-submerged myself into the Transformers lore.

And not only is that a pretty impressive feat, it was a feat accomplished purely through the value of the characters which this book has provided us. Anode, Lug, Velocity, and Nautica would not exist without this book and the relationships, the diversity, and the love which they bring along with them are purely thanks to the creative team and to IDW for allowing what was once one of the most aggressively masculine toy commercials in the world to become something greatly new and unexpected.

I love this book, and I love the way I can be at the edge of my seat for a book that’s 90% four lady robots walking around a flea market.

I have been curious, given the track record of popular characters not staying dead in the series, if or how Skids could be returning but I have to say, that ending was… wow. Horrifying and surprising to say the very least.

And why are blacksmiths being targeted!? There’s so much great stuff going  on.

Also how pissed is Rodimus going to be that they’ve been gone for basically one day on their trip to find the Knights of Cyberutopia and they’re already sidetracked by his crew not obeying orders. I’m fucking dead I can’t even. I look forward to that explosion.

DC’s Wonder Woman (2016-present) #27 Shea Fontana, Mirka Andolfo, Romulo Fajardo Jr.

I won’t lie, this was a particularly weak opening for a new creative team. Not necessarily substantively, but as far as developing a new villain and trying to wrap things up within two issues. I’m not sure if that sort of introduction was the wisest, planning wise, after Rucka’s tightly knitted together, year-long double epic, regardless of my criticisms of it. There is definitely a sense of less grandeur here and… honestly wondering how this will impact the rest of Diana’s narrative at all.

This minor, minor character within the span of two issues was introduced, shown to be evil due to shitty American healthcare systems (which is… unfortunate bc I am definitely feeling crushed by healthcare atm), and then… without any real warning kills herself after revealing she feels hopeless about her terminal diagnosis.

Basically there wasn’t very much joy to be had in the conclusion of this thing despite the HARD left turn the tonal shift took at the end with Diana planning to eat cookies and enjoy watching Friends with Etta. I mean, I love my girls and I love how much emphasis these two issues put on their friendship but… #toosoon?

I mean. Speaking as someone who was kicked off her healthcare recently for preexisting conditions, there’s some real disconnect between showing someone literally killing herself due to a lack of health coverage or research for her illness let alone having no money after her mother died of the same genetic disorder bc America, and then shifting immediately to Etta who has what we must assume is government health insurance covering her as she has a nice hospital room to herself. I mean. Two years ago I stayed with my mother after she donated her kidney to my uncle and uhhh they did not have such nice accommodations and we were at one of the best hospitals in the country.

Basically this is… weak sauce for a Wondy story to introduce us to the creative team and… kinda really tone deaf for those of us who are kinda struggling for these same reasons.

There’s also the matter of the flashbacks to the Amazons that Di keeps having. Nothing too alarming just yet, but it definitely seems that we’re striking a harder edge to their interpretation than Rucka’s and that always puts me a bit uneasy because people are so bad at giving the Amazons their due justice. I’ll reserve judgment for later because I want to be fair to Fontana but I’m wary.

That being said, I am grateful for a shorter wrap up and a story that seemed more down to Earth with Diana’s every day life after having a whole year of grand arcs and epics even if this particular story had some squick and reservations for me. And I’m really hoping for this team to prove themselves because it’s still such a rare thing to have a female-led creative team helm the most important female superhero icon and I’m hoping we’re starting to see a shift in that.

So it’s time for that pick of the week portion, the part that no one really cares about and yet consistently seems to get the most commentary of all the stuff. That’s fine. Nothing wrong with that, I just think it’s funny. And now I’m also postponing. And while this had a lot of great comics competing this week, I have to take my hat off to Transformers: Lost Light this week. There was just so much good wrapped up in this comic and it is hard to compete with this creative team when they’re firing on all cylinders. It really is one of the best, most unique comics to come out of IDW, and if you read the reviews just for this week alone then you know that that is quite a statement coming from me. 

But those are just my choices! What did you think about this week’s comics? Think I missed something I should’ve picked up? I’d love to hear from you.

Once again, before I end entirely, I’d like to ask that if you’re interested in helping me out with making more time for content like my reviews, and for access to reviews in the future which won’t be hosted on this blog like my in progress review of Spider-Man Homecoming (2017), please help me and my aspiring start up comic career by contributing to my Patreon! I couldn’t thank you enough for the help.

Please become my patron on patreon for more alliterative begging like this!

[bthenoise]

Track By Track: Here’s Everything You Need To Know About Wolves At The Gate’s Powerful LP ‘Eclipse’

For nearly ten years now, Ohio post-hardcore outfit Wolves At The Gate have been providing some of the most consistent and thought-provoking heavy music around. From 2012′s scorching debut Captors to today’s fierce eye-opener Eclipse, Wolves At The Gate continue to churn out melodic yet hard-hitting records that make you want to both sing and scream along to.

Take the band’s latest LP, for example. For 13 straight songs, the Solid State signees are able to give listeners a wide range of emotions embodying the perfect balance of heavy and soft. Talking about the motivation behind blending these two contrasting styles together, vocalist/guitarist Stephen Cobucci says it all ties into the album’s name. 

“We named the record Eclipse because of how well it encapsulated the relationship the light and the dark can have,” he says. “An eclipse tells you that it's dark, but it takes truth and faith to know that the sun is still shining. All of this revolves around my walk of faith in believing the truths of the gospel message, seeking to help others find hope and peace in the love of God, as well as how to come to grips with various social/political/personal issues.”   

Giving fans an even further look into the brilliant work of art that is Eclipse, Cobucci sat down with The Noise to explain the meanings behind each and every song on the album. To check out the singer’s honest and open track by track rundown, be sure to look below. Afterward, make sure to pick up a copy of Eclipse here.   

The Cure

We're excited that this is the first track people hear on the new record because it truly captures the wide dynamics sonically and lyrically that we wanted to deliver. Both musically and lyrically it's a roller coaster of darkness, tension, and release. The whole album revolves around the idea of the light being obscured by the darkness and creating a “different reality.” This song is about how when that darkness comes, it creates a different reality that seems so real but is just a lie. This song cries out for help and grace in times of doubt and fear.

Face To Face

“Face To Face” probably went through the most changes to its structure. It was rewritten more times than I can remember. Our guitarist Joey believed in it from the first day he heard it and worked hard to help it get to its final stages. Regardless of all of those changes, the lyrical content remained the same. We so often fear having our weaknesses and flaws revealed, going to great lengths to ensure they are hidden from everyone to see. ... This song is about how I was forced to come to grips with many of my sins and weaknesses in order for me to see that there is forgiveness in the love of God. Even though accepting my own guilt seemed like death to me, it was the very thing that led me to trusting and resting in God's grace.

A Voice In The Violence

This song carries a lot of weight and emotion in it for us as a band. It's so easy to identify with feeling the burden of darkness in our hearts and minds as we wrestle with the sins and addictions that plague us. The lyrics carry a dialogue that goes back and forth between thoughts of falling into despair and then hearing the voice of truth calling me away from running headlong into the things that are killing and destroying me. We so often entertain this love affair with the sins, addictions, and vices that ruin us whether it be mentally, physically, or spiritually. These pursuits are always irrational and cause us to drown out the voice of God. The voice of truth. A voice that carries messages of hope, grace, and mercy. Yet the beauty in all of this comes in the fact that there is no hell too deep for God to pull us out of. It is in these darkest of times that God shows even more grace and love.

Drifter

Songs like this one are so important to us as a band because they've come from real heart-to-heart conversations. We're brothers. We bear each other's burdens. A lot of the time when you just bury away the pain, the hurt, the lies, the emotion, it tears you apart on the inside until it eventually begins to manifest on the outside. As an outsider looking in, I could see how Nick was being torn apart and was stuck spirally down the same road. Numerous songs throughout our career have come from these sorts of situations where Nick just spilled his heart and we were able to build him up in the truth reminding him of the greater love he has in Christ and how all his failure and sin was erased at the cross.

Enemy

We tend to think that the great enemies in our lives are “out there” while ignoring a certain truth that we ourselves tend to be our greatest enemies. The song begins with an arrogant and misguided fight against the "enemy" that is soon realized to be myself. This has been a humbling experience that I have been through many times in my life. I figured it was about time that I cataloged how this progression tends to go for myself and ultimately how my hope of escape from this is in the power of God.

Evil Are The Kings

This was the first song that came out when I started writing for this record and helped set the tone for quality and level I wanted all the other songs to be on. Our guitarist Joey played a big role in helping this song come together in the way that it did. He helped me restructure it in a way that really took advantage of the strengths of the song. In writing this song, I immediately knew what I wanted it to be about. As a society, we have amassed a world of knowledge, but it hasn't moved mankind one step further to making peace, stopping wars, curing racism, etc. If “knowledge is the power” then we are to be considered evil kings. Politics haven't moved the needle of solving any of these issues and all that has been revealed is that while there may be shifts in power and policy the greatest need we all have is for our hearts to be changed.

Eclipse

The music of this song was something I had written a long time ago but was never able to put all the pieces together. While on tour last year I was finally able to get all the pieces to fall together. Our drummer Abishai was critical in helping me structure the format of the song in its early stages. When I sat down to title all of these songs, I realized that an eclipse was the imagery that best encompassed the heart of this song. As I continued to think about this imagery and concept, I realized how it touched all of these songs in one way or another. Songs like this are very personal for me as I use them as outlets to be vulnerable with myself and with our fans for them to be encouraged by the fact that I often have the same doubts and fears that they may have. Yet while also having these same doubts and fears, there are still certain truths that we all can rest upon for peace and comfort.

Response

This song is a response to the Ghandi quote, "I like your Christ, not your Christians." The truth of this statement is not lost on me and to be honest, it grieves me. I can understand why people's view of “American Christianity” puts a bad taste in their mouth and am sadden by the fact that the name of Christ gets dragged through the mud and applied to people and organizations that do not represent what true faith is. When people hear that we are a Christian band, it immediately conjures up all sorts of thoughts, generally negative ones, yet I can understand why. I can see how it is really difficult for some people to separate emotional pain and damage caused by some wearing the name “Christian” from the one they claim to follow, namely Jesus. I say that in the lyrics of the song, “You find a lot of fault in me - I find it hard to disagree with you - I’ll own my crimes - My guilt has shut my mouth.” I'm not here to talk about myself, there isn't much good to say. But I believe in a good Savior. This strikes at the very heart of what we want people to see in our lyrics. Christianity is not about a person's ability to be perfect, but imperfect people trusting in a perfect Savior. Our guitarist Joey summarized the song well by saying, “The presence of hypocrisy does not equal the absence of God.” This song is a call to take your eyes off of messed up people and to take a look for yourself at who Jesus is.

History

I wrote “History” in light of all of the racial tension I see within our culture. I have dear friends that have been on the receiving end of this prejudice [and] it's sad that even after all this time and all we know this still is very present in the heart of our society. It is because we have tended to turn a blind eye to our past that we are ignorant [of] the present issues. Our culture does not have a healthy relationship with this issue and therefore it causes serious strife and conflict. Everyone is fighting for their side of the argument and in that fight there will only be victims. It's a wake-up call that identifying with political parties, the color of your skin, etc. puts you further into bondage and perpetuates this cycle of hatred and violence.

The Sea In Between

This song is an imagery of my salvation. I knew God existed and I knew I was separated from Him. I was on a shore and an endless sea separated us. The sea was a metaphor for my sin and my attempts to live self-righteously. I tried to live a perfect life and make up for all my failure and sin. Every time I navigated those seas, I failed, was destroyed, and was washed back to shore left with nothing. Yet in the goodness of God, Christ came and saved me, trudging through the sea that separated me from Him by dying the death I deserved.

Alone

I remember writing this song really late one night in my studio and how it all came together so quickly. Sometimes a song just seems to fall into place all in one sitting and that was the case for this song. Every piece of it came together that night including the vocals, but to no surprise, I struggled to figure out what to write about. It wasn't until many months after that I was thinking about the idea of how differently we all view this journey of life. For some, it is a terror. For some, joy. And I thought about the fact that however you view the destination of the journey affects how you experience it. If all you have to look forward to [is the] temporal aspects of life, then that can be incredibly bleak for many. And to others it may not seem like that big a deal but nothing we have here can be kept forever. If I can quote one of our older songs called “Morning Star”: I know this is a voyage, it's not my destination. My hope is not in what I can gain out of this life regarding physical things, but that in the fact that all good things I enjoy here are just a shadow of the joy it will be to know God and see Him face to face.

Counterfeit

There are a lot of voices out there vying for our attention. Voices that don't have our best interests in mind. Voices in the media, politics, and sometimes even our own minds that push an agenda based upon lies. This track was written as a sort of fight song against those things to give a voice back to those that desire to push back against those lies. I love how the pace and rhythm of this song perfectly fits the content. Hopefully this song can help give the listener a voice and words to say [and] combat these lies.

Blessings & Curses

It was actually our drummer Abishai who created the core of this song. He wrote a drum groove that he was really into and so he put a simple chord progression down to go with it. He showed it to me while we were on tour and it just clicked with me. As soon as I heard it I knew it needed to be one of our songs and we started working on it right then and there on tour. It has a crazy time signature and then at the end the time signature bounces back and forth, but you'd never know it, which is really cool. This is a song about betrayal, namely my betrayal. It puts me in awe of the fact that all I ever offered God was my betrayal and my curse and yet in return He gives me the blessing of His forgiveness and love.

[swfanficbyjz]

SW AU - Fate of the Master Chapter 18

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Ahsoka herded the Skywalker family onto the ship. She'd been adamant none of them were getting involved with the Death Star situation until they had figured out how to work things out amongst themselves. She and the akul were coming, she'd claimed, purely as mediators and protection. Anakin was pretty sure Bail wouldn't have let Leia leave if Ahsoka didn't go along. Obi wan had offered to come too, but Bail had begged him to stay and help get information about the Death Star. Ahsoka had assured them both she could handle any issues that came up. "If it came to it," she had said, "I'll sic the akul on them." 

            Anakin didn't know where they were going or what she had in mind. All she'd say was that she had two destinations. And that the ghost crew were on standby to lend a hand at the second one. Assuming they survived the first. 

            The first couple days of the trip passed relatively quietly. Luke and Leia spent much of it talking between themselves or playing holochess. Anakin spent a lot of time meditating to emotionally prepare himself for the scars that were going to be ripped open. And Ahsoka spent most of her time on the bridge staring out at the stars racing by or meditating herself. They would talk a little bit, but she wouldn't give any clues about where they were going. At first she'd kept encouraging him to try and talk to his kids, but after a while she gave up. 

            By the fifth day, they were all getting a little tired of being cramped on the ship and tensions were starting to rise. 

            Anakin walked in on Luke showing Leia how to use the force, and he couldn't help but smile. Although they both stopped when they saw him. He found himself aching to train them, but they'd need to trust him first. Instead of forcing his presence on them he joined Ahsoka on the bridge with a deep sigh.

            "I'm not sure this is a good idea." He said to her. She was sitting with her eyes closed. The akul near her feet. "They don't even want to be in the same room with me, not that I blame them, but how are we supposed to talk? Through the wall?"

            "Maybe that's not such a bad idea," she laughed softly.

            "You're not helping." He said with frustration.

            "What do you want me to do?" She asked opening her eyes at last and looking at him.

            "I don't know. Even when Padmé was pregnant, I never thought about what being a dad would mean. And now, after everything that has happened, coming into parenthood when they're teenagers... it's frightening. I never had a dad. And the closest role model I had was the most evil person in the galaxy."

            "Would telling you to trust your instincts help?" She asked.

            "Probably not." He replied.

            "You first started taking care of me when I was a teenager. How did you approach it?"

            "By the skin of my teeth." He said. "I spent half the time just trying to keep up with you. And the other half, trying to make sure you didn't get yourself killed."

            "Okay, maybe I'm not the best example, but you did just fine with me. You talked me through things, you let me figure things out. You showed me how to learn from my mistakes. And when I wasn't driving you crazy, you loved me."

            "I loved you even when you were me driving crazy." He said. “Probably more.”

            She smiled at that. "Well maybe... that's where you need to start."

            "By driving them crazy?"

            "No, by loving them even when they are driving you crazy." She said playfully bumping him on the arm. "Think about what you wanted when you were their age. What you wished Obi wan would do or say, and start with that."

 ---

            It was early evening when they landed on Naboo. Ahsoka admittedly enjoyed Anakin's surprise that this was where they had been headed. But she could also sense the anxiety in him. She'd chosen Naboo as their first stop because of Padmé. Where she was taking them, she hoped, would keep them from killing each other. Which, terrible as it sounded, was a real danger. 

            Leia had an attitude, and really no desire to have any kind of a relationship with Anakin. Luke wanted a relationship with him, but was scared. Add the influence from his sister and it was a more volatile mix than she liked. Anakin wanted to be a good dad, but he was afraid to give in to the emotions and he was struggling to overcome his past. So she'd figured that Padmé was the one common ground they all had and they needed to start somewhere. She sincerely hoped that with Padmé looking down on them, it would be enough to keep Anakin from letting his anger get the better of him.

            When they got to her planned destination, she turned on them. "Okay," she said, they all looked at her. "Senator Organa talked to the Queen, who was nice enough to grant us access to this place. But there are ground rules: do not destroy anything, do not kill each other, and none of you are coming out until you've worked it out." She pulled some cuffs out of her bag, "and I swear, I will put these force binders on all of you if I have to." They nodded a little scared of her. Good, now we're getting somewhere.

            "What is this place?" Luke asked.

            "You'll see." She answered vaguely.

            "You know, there were probably plenty of dark rooms on Alderaan you could've locked us in." Leia sassed.

            Ahsoka didn't satisfy her with a response. She just turned around and unlocked the padlock with the key she'd been given by the groundskeeper. The door opened but the room was so dark nobody could tell what it was. 

            "In you go." She said. She shut the door behind them and put the padlock back in place. 

            "Wait, you're not coming in?" She heard Anakin say from the other side. He sounded a little frantic. 

            "Good luck," she whispered knowing he couldn't hear her.

            "It's so dark in here! You couldn't give us a light?" She heard Leia say.

            "You'll get one soon enough," she murmured. And slunk down to the floor and rested her head back on the door. "Your turn, Padmé." She said out loud. 

            The akul was looking at her curiously. "I know," she whispered to it. "It's going to be a long night." She didn't even hope they'd be best friends by morning, but she was hoping at the very least they'd figure out how to be civil to each other. At least then they'd have a starting point. She pointed to the fields beyond the graveyard. "You might find something to snack on in that direction. Just go easy." She said patting the akul on the head. "I'd go hunt with you, but I have to make sure they live through this." It rumbled and took off in the direction she'd pointed. It stopped to look back at her once and then disappeared in the darkness of night. 

 ---

 It was pitch black in the room Ahsoka had put them in. He couldn't see either Luke or Leia even though they couldn't be that far away. It was the one thing he admittedly missed about his Vader suit; built-in night vision. 

            He tentatively tried to walk forward, running into what seemed to be a table height smooth surface. Why had Ahsoka left them in the dark? Did she think if they couldn't see each other, they wouldn't be able to kill each other? He turned to the right and took a few steps forward.

            "Ouch! That's my foot!" Came Leia's voice. Great, she already hated him, now he was stepping on her. 

            "Sorry," he murmured, backing away. He felt like he couldn't do anything right. He was tired of feeling like that. It reminded him of what Ahsoka had said on the ship, ‘remember what you'd wished Obi wan would say or do and start with that...’ the thing he remembered wishing for the most was Obi wan to stop criticizing him so much. He wasn't sure that really applied at the moment.

            He tried walking around the other side of the table thing, using it to guide his movement. His eyes were starting to adjust, but there wasn't much to see. Ahsoka would have no problem in here, she had a predator's vision. He managed to stop in time before bumping into Luke.

            He knew he should be the one to start the conversation first, but he had no idea what to say. What would they want to hear, or not want to hear? What did he even have in common with them? They both showed force sensitivity, but offering to train them right now, was probably not the best opening line considering how quickly it would lead to questions about what had led him to the dark side. 

            "So?" He started. Was it safe to talk about the weather? Or this nice room they were locked in and couldn't see? Or dive immediately into the bigger wounds? "I imagine you probably have burning questions. Who wants to start?" He tried to sound nonchalant, but neither Luke or Leia responded immediately. I'll get you for this, Ahsoka. 

            But just before he could say anything else, a bright light came on outside. Shining through a stained glass window, shedding the room in a soft bluish glow. His breath caught in his throat as he looked up at the window. It was the most beautiful representation of Padmé he'd ever seen. And that's when he realized what he thought was a table was actually a coffin. 

            "Oh," was all he could say as the emotions overwhelmed him. This was where Padmé had been buried. It was her mausoleum. He had never given much thought to it. He knelt down at the foot, tears rolling down his cheeks before he could stop them. 

            Luke glanced at him. "Is that?" He started.

            "Our mother," Leia finished for him. 

            "Padmé Neberrie Amidala," Luke read off the plaque. "Princess of Theed, Queen of Naboo, and senator of the Chommell sector and Naboo in the Grand Republic. A true servant of the people. Born 46 BBY. Died 19 BBY. Beloved daughter and sister." He finished reading. "Why doesn't it say wife and mother?" Luke asked.

            "Because of me..." Anakin spoke at last. They both turned to look at him. "I was written out of her story because so few people knew we'd been married. And they didn't mention the both of you, to protect you from me."

            "Did you love her?" Leia asked.

            "Too much." Anakin replied. 

            "So if mom was a queen, and you're a princess," Luke said to Leia. "Does that make me a prince?" 

            "I'm a princess only because I was adopted by a royal family, not because of our mother." Leia said. "I don't think it counts."

            "You both are royalty." Anakin said, standing up. "I'm the only one here that never was."

            "Was she the queen when you married her?" Luke asked.

            "No." Anakin replied. "But she was when I met her." 

            "Dad..." Leia said and then stammered embarrassed, "I mean... Senator Organa, told me some things about mom, but never anything about the two of you together."

            "You can still call him dad, if you want. We all know he deserves the title more than me." At Anakin's statement, Leia softened for the first time since he met her. "Did he tell you anything about me?"

            "No," she said, "he said he didn't know much about you."

            "Okay, then I'll start at the beginning, I guess. I was a slave on Tatooine. The Hutts sold me and my mother, your grandmother, to a Toydarian named Watto."

            "Watto?" Luke interrupted. "I know Watto. He's an old beggar in Mos Eisley. He owned you?"

            "Yes," Anakin replied.

            "Wow," Luke said. "I hated being a moisture farmer, but I can't imagine being a slave."

            "Me either." Leia said.

            "You probably had slaves." Luke said.

            "Of course not!" She replied offended. "We had people that worked for us, but we didn't OWN them. They could come and go. My dad was always against slavery. He even felt the clones were slaves."

            "I thought the clones had free will?" Luke said.

            "They did, but they were created to serve the republic. If they did not, they were considered deserters and punished." Anakin answered.

            "So they were slaves." Luke concluded.

            "Yes." Anakin said flinching. He'd never really thought about it. He'd loved each and every one he'd met as an individual in spite of their identical faces. It was easy to forget that even though they seemed to always be ready for a fight, they'd been designed and crafted that way. Designed to want to fight. Designed to follow orders. Designed to kill and be killed. All at the whim of whoever was ordering them around. He made a mental note to apologize to Rex. It suddenly bothered him that as someone who had always been so against slavery he couldn't recognize others in the same position. And that he'd let it, no...  helped it continue after becoming Vader. It made his skin crawl.

            He looked at the two faces of his beautiful children and even though their expressions had become less hostile, he felt completely undeserving of their attention and love. And maybe that was why they struggled to see eye to eye. How could he expect them to want him around or love him, when he couldn't even love himself?

            "I knew our grandmother had been a slave, but I didn't know you had been one too. What was it like?" Luke asked.

            Anakin felt his muscles tightening as his fists balled up. How do you explain that kind of hopelessness and fear? To know what it's like to be a slave, you have to live it. Which is probably why so many senators had never cared enough to put it forward as a priority issue. They could never know what it was like. But to his surprise, Leia was the one that answered.

            "You can't just ask him what it was like! It was probably dreadful!" 

            "Sorry," Luke said. 

            "So if you were a slave on Tatooine, way in the outer rim, how did you meet a queen? It doesn't seem likely that she'd take a pleasure trip there." Leia commented.

 ---

 As Anakin told them the story of how he met Padmé all those years ago, he felt lighter and lighter. It was painful too, but it made him feel better to get it off his chest. They listened to him and asked questions, and he was surprised at how much easier it was to talk to them in just a short amount of time. It helped to imagine what it must be like each raised in vastly different worlds, each with some information but plenty of missing pieces, finally getting to hear how it all came together. 

            He was watching them just as closely as they were watching him. And as the time passed, he started seeing little pieces of Padmé in them. He saw pieces of himself in them too, but thankfully not the bad stuff. Leia sometimes reminded him more of Ahsoka than Padmé, but they'd both had more than their fair share of sass. Luke was more mild mannered, and it reminded him of his mother, Shmi. 

            He'd been really terrified of what Ahsoka had planned for them, but he was finding himself more and more grateful for this opportunity to just sit down and get to know each other. Even though they were in Padmé's tomb, it kind of felt like they actually were a real family. The stained glass image of his late wife, was so realistic, she could have been standing there. He hoped that wherever she was, she was smiling at them. 

            He made a promise to himself at some point during the night, that no matter how many mistakes he'd made in his life, he would do whatever it took to make it up to them; to give them the best possible life he could. 

 ---

 Ahsoka paced back and forth outside the mausoleum, she really hoped they were getting along in there and that forcing them together like this hadn't been a fatal mistake. The akul had been gone for half the night, and returned from his hunt with something for her to eat too. It was agitated watching her pace, but she couldn't help it. She sincerely wanted to open the door and check on them, but this was something they needed to figure out without her. Especially if she ended up not sticking around. 

            The truth was though, if they were going to destroy the Death Star and the empire, and rebuild the Republic, they were going to need the Skywalkers. Even though she'd stopped letting herself be consumed by the fate and destiny talk from before, she couldn't deny the power each one of them possessed. Anakin had once told her that no one person could change the course of the galaxy. But then he'd proceeded to do exactly that. Yes, he'd been the unwitting marionette in a bunch of different people's games, but it was truly his power that tipped the scale, regardless of which side he fought for. He'd been unlike any other Jedi. And he'd been unlike any other Sith. And now he was unlike any other regular person. He would always be special even if he no longer had a role to play as the Chosen One.

            And with two children in tow, probably equal in power to him or at least off the charts... this whole family would be a force to be reckoned with. They needed each other. Luke and Leia needed to be trained by him, and he needed something to live for and fight for. Thankfully, the emperor, was dead. And no matter who might try to take his place, the Sith had been shattered too. There wasn't, she hoped, anybody still out there that could try to take advantage of their combined power. 

            Maul was the only one she could think of, but she doubted any of them, especially once they bonded, would fall for any of his lies. If they got through tonight. Their true training could begin. 

            Just before the sun rose, she unlocked the padlock and opened the door. She was surprised to find them all huddled together under the window asleep on the floor. There was hope for them yet, she smiled to herself. That went even better than she'd imagined. She almost didn't want to wake them, but one of the conditions of using this place had been to clear out before sunrise so it could open to visitors who wished to pay their respect. 

 ---

 Anakin felt a hand on his shoulder and looked up. Ahsoka was standing over them. He smiled sleepily at her and tried to get up, only to realize that he was pinned down. Leia was cuddled up behind Luke and they were both resting on his chest. His back was aching, he could only guess that he'd fallen asleep in such a weird position to accommodate them.

            Ahsoka stepped back and snapped a holopic of them, "for posterity" she'd said. He just wanted to stick his tongue out at her. He hadn't thought that whatever she'd had planned would work, but once again, she had proven she knew far better than him. How did she just know how to handle all this stuff now? Or was it because of her it was actually working?

            He'd been starting to notice that she seemed to be looking for a kind of exit from his life. He really didn't want her to go. He understood what she was trying to teach him, but even if he learned it, he still wanted her there. It was admittedly weird to think that sitting in the very tomb of the person he'd once thought he could never live without. But he had a strong feeling that Padmé would understand. He knew his life shouldn't revolve around another. But was it so wrong to want to be with them? To want them close?

            He'd loved Padmé with everything he was. He'd once thought that she was his heart and his own could never beat without her there. But now as he looked up at Ahsoka, this beautiful person inside and out, who for years he'd had a very different kind of relationship with, he was starting to understand that there can be two hearts, they just beat for each other. And he loved Ahsoka, he didn't want to live without her in his life in some way. He was afraid to let her go, but it was more from a knowledge of what his life would be like without her rather than whether or not he would survive.

            He never could have imagined all those years ago, how a snippy, little kid, could become so important to him. But then he glanced down first at Leia and then Luke, and he supposed, it wasn't all that surprising. The Jedi had been right, he'd always had attachment issues. 

            "Ahsoka..." he said, needing to tell her before the kids woke up. "Without you, I am a scarred and broken person. Without you, I am a mess. But the truth is, I will still be that with you there. It's just that when you're there, it doesn't seem so bad..." he trailed off hoping she understood what he was trying to say. "That's how it's always been, I just never fully understood that."

            He reached up one of his mechanical hands to her and she took it. 

            "I don't need you to stay so that I'm okay; I want you to stay, because I like you here." He said.

            "Then here I'll stay." She replied. She leaned down and kissed the shiny metal of the hand she was holding. And even though he knew it was impossible, he was certain he'd felt it. 

            Then she gently helped him rouse his sleepy kids and they walked back to the ship, Luke and Leia yawning the whole way. 

Next Chapter ->

[bisexualwillscarlet]

marry me, he said  - Lt Duckling - rated M - Ch 1

Prologue

Chapter 1 - Marry Me, He Said

They told her that his name was Baelfire.

Musings of the day that she would be married have been a familiar wandering place for her mind since she was a child. Princesses had little choice but to ponder things so pivotal to the roles they are born to. She still recalls it clearly, the day that she had first considered it. Her mother’s maid has run a brush through her blonde hair, matted with weeds and broken daisy chains that she had threaded there with the servant girls. The plump faced woman with the kind smile and wrinkles ever etching her face had muttered amiably about what a handful she would be for a husband if he expected a timid wife. She had quipped to her at that that she would never be married. Joanna had laughed. Little Emma had laughed too.

Another time, she remembers being surrounded by lords and ladies, friends of her parents, and a man she knew as a close advisor of her father’s bundling her up and onto his knee and telling her parents - not her - what a pretty little princess she was and how she’ll have all the princes after her in no time.

Such casual talk only increased as she grew into early womanhood, other memories of giggling and whispers of daughters of nobles – things of dresses, proposals, marriage beds, and handsome boys – stored away in her mind where the distant memories that never quite left were kept. This had progressed into things like vaguely mortifying talks with her mother about the private lives of husbands and wives. She had always feared that her mother had gone a bit too into detail out of her own nerves, but in a way, it had calmed her to know the elegant, queenly Snow White could be flustered at such things.

When she neared eighteen, men began to come to court her. Honestly she gave few true thought, though she couldn’t deny the excitement that the dancing and attention welled in her as handsome men vied for chance to catch her eye. Her mother tried to play along into the excitement, beginning to use phrases such as “finding your True Love” and speaking of grandchildren. It was, of course, all in a teasing jest as her daughter rolled her eyes and told her that she could rule the kingdom quite wonderfully without a husband, but also, perhaps not in jest at all.

One quiet, if not a bit blustery day, the morn of her 19th birthday, a proposal arrived.

They told her that his name was Baelfire.

Months passed with hearing little more than that. Well, other than what most in the kingdom already knew. He was the son of Rumpelstiltkin, king of the realm Tenebris, one of Misthaven’s sister kingdoms. He was the son of The Dark One. Dangerous tensions had long lived between their kingdoms, her parents ever attempting to keep peace, but political disagreement and Tenebris’ further disagreements with their allies in Arendelle kept their peace tenuous. Such a union would bring an end to the disquiet and fear of war that had concerned the King and Queen for some years. The state of their kingdom had already been weakened by a violent attempt for the throne from Regina, known widely as The Evil Queen, before her capture and banishment. They could afford no such other attack.

That is why not even a moment had passed upon hearing news of Prince Baelfire’s proposal – his hope for a union of kingdoms, even with the promise of negotiations with Arendelle – that Emma knew she could not and would never refuse. Their kingdom was wounded – unbroken and yet afraid. The Dark One’s kingdom was richer, more powerful, with an army stronger than any surrounding land and magic that outweighed even the greatest of sorcerers of Misthaven. Emma trusted the Dark One about as far as she could throw him, but his son seemed truly sincere and a legal treaty had been proposed.

Soon, they will be your responsibility, Emma.

She could not refuse.

The King and Queen had balked. Their distrust of Rumpelstiltskin ran deeper, through no violent action of his own, but merely by reputation. Still, Emma saw the flickers of hope in their eyes as they read the proposal, first once, and then again.

“Give them a year,” They had finally proposed. “When she is twenty, our daughter will decide. Until then, let them exchange letters. You will have your answer after a year.”

And they did.

Through the letters, she learned many things of this Baelfire. That his eyes were brown and his hair of curls. His mother died when he was a child and he was left with only his father, who had never remarried. She learned he was only a few years old than her, 24 years to her half 19. Their letters read as stiff, cordial, the first few that they exchanged, but as the months passed, their pens eased in their hands. She told him of her love of riding and sword lessons with her father. He told her that he had secretly longed for adventure and to see new lands as a child and had always hoped to be a sailor before he learned that could never be. Her lips had curved at this, her own thirst for adventure repressed but alive within her. Perhaps, they at least had a small kinship in that. She told him that she used to sneak away at night and explore the castle grounds in the dark, when all looked and felt new and different. He told her that his mother used to call him Bae.

She began to truly look forward to his letters, even if marriage had still felt so much more as a duty than a desire. But perhaps. Just perhaps they would come to care for each other in that way. Even early on, she felt infatuation rising within her yet unclaimed heart. She found herself smiling like a fool when new letters arrived, and pondering what his face might look like at night. Would he have a strong jaw? Would his nose be pointed as the Dark One’s was rumored to be? Would he be as kind and genuine as his letters seemed? She thought that he would, she truly did.

The ninth month, his letters stopped.

It was first unsettling and then concerning. There was no word for more than a fortnight until finally, an agreement with his kingdom’s seal written in shining golden ink appeared in her bedroom, Baelfire’s hand signed at the bottom. She recognized it, but her ill at ease remained. Why would he so abruptly cut off their pleasant communication with months yet to decide? Had he decided, in his heart, that this was best and taken the chance at asking her hand? And why with no prior warning in his letters? Had his father become impatient and forced the matter? She shook away the odd feeling that rose first in her neck, tingling a bit down her spine and then spreading back up to settle heavily onto her shoulders. She liked Baelfire – she liked Bae. She knew him, she thought, and from the kinship she felt, that could only mean good things, if not love just yet.

Her parents read through the proposal, but the distance between kingdoms was too far for them to venture to quibble over a proposal being just a few, short months early, especially in a courtship that had seemed to be progressing so pleasantly. The kingdom too weak to go without its rulers for such a journey. The decision was hers, they told her, thought her mother’s face held a look that was both anxious and encouraging.

With trembling hands, she had signed.

She would leave by carriage in a month.

A/n: Thanks for reading, everyone! The next chapter will be considerably less exposition-y and go into real time/present tense. But before we start, I will warn you Lemony Snicket style that this is not a happy story. Though occasionally happiness may arrive, alas, it is probably short lived. She will marry Rumpelstiltskin. (Belle may show up a bit as well). I will let you know that there will not be rape in any manner of the word for the sake of anyone concerned about triggers that may go along with a somewhat forced marriage, but married life will be angsty and sad for her. But do not dismay! A young, wonderful Lt Killian Jones WILL come into this story. You’ll see a glimpse next chapter and then, eventually, he will be in quite a lot of it. There will even be some Liam, so hang in the first few chapters and I hope that you enjoy this as much as I am enjoying writing this horrible thing. xD As always, I am clinging onto every meager scrap of energy and inspiration that I possibly have to write this, so please let me know how you feel about it in a review. I love you all! :)