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themusingsofacurlyhairednerd · 11 months ago

Text

Datura Pt 5

Summary: Trapped Under the Mountain you're trying you best to learn to navigate Amarantha's Court and your own, budding powers.

Content Warnings: Allusions to assault, slavery, mild cursing

Author's Note: This one hurt me to write, but my depression got the better of me and I needed to let my angst out somewhere; I'm so sorry.

Pt 1, 2, 3, 4

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It’s been three weeks since you’d been dragged under the Mountain, each day counted with a little tally scratched into the wall behind your bed post where no one can see. Two weeks without word from your uncle. Two weeks without sunlight. Sometimes you sit in the dark wondering if, when this is over and you finally get to step into the sun again, if your eyes will be able to bear it, or will they be permanently altered?

The weeks are taking a toll. The girl you see in the mirror each morning is paler and paler each passing day, the lines of your face a little thinner as hunger becomes a constant companion. Amarantha has tasked someone with feeding you, but meals are few and far between, save for the assortment of stale snack Rhys has been sneaking into your training sessions. The male has spent hours each day running you through shielding techniques, followed by sparring sessions to “keep you limber” he’d said, and has only just begun to touch the well of power that sleeps beneath your skin. He’s still tight lipped about what he suspects it was, no matter your questioning. Things are, well you wouldn’t say pleasant necessarily, sometimes he still makes you want to hurl things at his head, but there has been no more threats from Amarantha to enforce upon you and so things are fine between you. The Queen has kept to herself for the last three weeks, until the Attor came knocking on your door.

The creature has the decency to not attempt to carry you by the back of the shirt this time. Instead, it walks ahead of you, leathery wings and talons scrapping the floor, it’s every breath a horribly, squeaking, rasp through it’s crooked teeth. It’s only spoken to inform you that you’re being summoned to the Queen’s chambers and than it clamps it’s thin lips shut and shoves you into the hall.

No throne room today, for that you’re relieved, most nights you can still see the bodies pinned to the wall when you shut your eyes. Instead, the Attor leads you up and up, the climb stealing your breath as you head to what you can only assume is the Mountain’s peak. Someone has painstakingly carved steps into the rock, each stone smooth and worn down over time. The door at the top is the same carved stone as all the other doors, but this one is guarded by masked sentries, both armed to the teeth. Spears glisten in their gloved hands, and you keep your questions about how well those could be wielded in such a small space to yourself. Questioning Rhys about her operations is one thing, the Attor and the rest of her cronies is another.

The sentries knock twice before pushing the door open for you.

Unlike your room, the space of her chambers is cavernous, the walls smoothed over and held by pillars of marble and sandstone. Faelights glitter and twist around each pillar, bathing the room in an unnaturally red glow.

Red seems to be her favorite color.

Her sleeping chambers are set in the side of the space, hidden from you by a crimson curtain. The rest of the room is left open, decorated with plush couches and chairs around a roaring fireplace in the shape of a lion’s head. Beneath the worn coffee table, currently plated with tea cups and scones, is a pelt of some sort of monster, the head bearing curling horns and an open mouth of jagged teeth, the glassy eyes starring right at you as the Attor all but shoves you into the room.

There’s a heavy scent of mirthroot and incense in the room that makes your head feel fuzzy.

The Queen emerges from behind the curtain wearing little other than a silk robe, the bare expanse of her legs on full display.

You reign in the disgust you feel at seeing her, try not to picture what she was doing back there, so flippant after she’d ordered an innocent male killed simply for knowing you. She’s a monster. But she’s also the monster with the power of the High Lords and you’re not so foolish as to upset her here in the quiet of her chambers where no one will hear you scream if she decides she wants to punish you for any slight you might offer.

“Y/N,” she says with a grin that looks wrong on the sharp planes of her pale face. “Glad you could join me! Come, sit.”

The Attor watches you move towards the couch opposite her like he thinks you might pounce on her and drag your claws across her throat.

The couch sinks in when you sit, like it’s been used a lot. You try not to think about why.

“Tea?” She asks as she grabs her own cup, her red lipstick smearing across the rim as she takes a deep drink.

Your stomach rumbles, a reminder that they’d forgotten to feed you again. You pull your hands into your sleeves, trying to keep your hands from reaching out to take what’s offered on instinct. “No.” The chances of you being drugged in here are high, you’re not taking any chances. Mentally, you do a quick check of your shields, just as Rhys had shown you, to ensure the doors of your mind are shut from whatever power of his she can wield over you.

She frowns. “I can see that you’re scared of me.”

You lean back in the couch, arms across your chest.

“I wish it didn’t have to be like that,” she says as she sets her own cup down. “I’ve been training with Hybern for many years, I’ve often thought of him like a father, and so I hope you don’t think I’m being too forward when I say I hope that some day you’ll see me like a sister.”

The urge to unleash your claws and slash them across her face is overwhelming. You’re thankful you’d had the good sense to pull your hands into your sleeves, it hides the way you dig your nails into your palms to keep yourself still. “Oh?”

She clasps her hands together, the eyeball in her ring swiveling to look at you. “My relationship with my own family was… rocky, I’d like to think fate is giving me another chance with you.”

You’re not so desperate to get out that you buy it, but you know, from somewhere deep inside of you that if she’d waited a few more weeks, if the hunger and the dark were really starting to get to you that she could have been convincing. That’s what scares you the most.

“I know I come across extreme,” she continues like she hasn’t noticed your reservations. “But, girl to girl, I really want to see you thrive. Rhysand has been telling me of your progress. He says you’re a fast learner.”

He’d told you that too. “He’s a good teacher,” you say carefully. You mean it, he’s very patient with you, even if he is an ass about how he gets results, he’s never been harsh, never pushed too far--not since that first day had he come into your mind uninvited--but you can’t have her getting suspicious of why you’ve been such a dutiful student. If she suspects you’re trying to awaken your powers too soon, you’re as likely to end up chained to her as the High Lords are. Hybern needs a weapon, not a time bomb, you have to play your cards steadily to unsure you can get out of here at the end of this.

“Charmed, are we?” She asks in what feels like it’s meant to be conspiratorial girl talk, but the look in her eyes... You swear the eye on her finger widens in warning.

“I haven’t had any training before this. It is nice to have a guide for my questions.” As close to the truth as you can get.

Amarantha leans back in her seat, arms spread across the back of the couch, as she studies you. Her eyes are so dark they’re almost black, nothing but cold calculations in a gaze you know has been wielded with extreme precision on the battlefield. It’s like she’s pinpointing all your weak spots when she looks at you. You can’t look her in the eyes, not without fidgeting, you find yourself picking at the fraying edges of your shirt sleeves instead.

“You poor thing,” she coos. “You must have been so confused.”

That much is true too. You still haven’t been able to figure out why they’re doing all this. What terrible power does she think you posses that she’s so desperate she’ll invite you into her personal chambers instead of attempting some dramatic event in the throne room?

You stare at the wall. You can’t give her the satisfaction of asking her those questions. Maybe she does have the answers, but they’re from her mouth and you know better than to trust a damn think that comes out of it.

“I thought everybody was ahead of me,” you admit. “We travelled a lot so regular schooling was out of the question.”

“Oh I’m sure your uncle was a master at weaponizing your naivety. Most males are.” She brings her hand with the ring up to her chest and begins to trace a pointed nail over it, as if she’s thinking about something else.

“He’s a good male,” you blurt before you can stop yourself.

She huffs a laugh, “Good males do not steal children from their parents.”

You bite down on the inside of your cheek.

“Your parents were very powerful people once, and your uncle had always been jealous of your mother. I wish you could have seen her, Y/N, when she stepped onto a battlefield, males coward. I watched them piss themselves just at the sight of her. She was everything I hoped to be as Hybern’s general.”

You’d always imagined your love of books and ancient things had come from your mother. In your mind she’d been a soft woman who grew gardens and was always reading books under big oak trees. In your mind she was kind and gentle and had lost you tragically in some sort of accident. To hear anything else, from Amarantha of all people, made you want to throw your hands up over your ears. Your uncle had alluded to your father not being the best of people, but you had never imagined it would be this bad either.

“Your uncle couldn’t stand it,” she continues, oblivious to your inner turmoil. “I tried to warn them that he was a jealous and dangerous male, but your mother loved him too much to see it. And when he stole you out of your room that night, well, her heart couldn’t handle it. That’s our curse as women, I suppose, we care too much.”

You look into the fire. That can’t be true! You don’t want it to be true. Because, if it is, you’re not only wrong about your parents, you’re wrong about your uncle too and then you will have no family left at all.

“And look at you, following in her footsteps,” she presses. “Caring so much about him that you’ll sacrifice your own peace of mind to spare his miserable life. He’s a monster, Y/N, why are you protecting him? All he has ever done is hurt you.”

The flames dance in the fireplace, reaching towards the carved teeth of the lion’s head. You trace the ash that’s dusted up the creature’s face with your eyes, anything to avoid looking at her. Your shields might be in place, but your face will betray you all the same.

She stands and comes to sit next to you, the heavy scent of earth and incense a cloud around her. “Your powers could have driven you insane without the right teaching. He very well could have killed you. You want to protect a male like that?”

Maybe it is all true, gods above you can barely stomach the thought, but even if it is, you can’t sell him out to her. “I already told Rhys where he would be. I’m not protecting anyone.” These last few weeks, no news of him had been a relief, it meant he was safe, but as time ticked on, the doubts were starting to get to you. None of her huntsman had even heard whispers of where he’d gone. Was it possible he’d abandoned you?

She reaches out and places her nails under your chin, turning your head until you’re looking into her eyes. “You poor thing. I feel for you, I really do. I know the terrible sting of betrayal all too well.”

The eye on her ring swivels to stare at her, like it’s questioning the statement.

Maybe it really is alive; the thought makes your stomach roll.

“What do you want?” You ask.

She laughs like you’d told a joke. “As I said, I want us to be friends.”

“You killed a male to threaten me into submission and suddenly you want to be friends?”

She stiffens a little.

“This is about the twins, isn’t it?”

“Do you smoke?” She asks instead.

The shift makes you pause for a second, long enough for her to shout for someone behind the curtain leading into her sleeping quarters. A moment later, the same male from the throne room appears, shirtless, wearing nothing but his boxers and a glittering, golden collar. In his hand is a small, silver tray and as he seats himself on the arm of the couch, he holds it out to her. A rolled cluster of cigarettes sits on the tray next to a golden lighter and she grabs the nearest cigarette. Out of what can only be habit, the male sets the tray on the table and lights the cigarette for her as she brings it to her mouth. You’ve been in enough taverns to know mirthroot when you smell it, the smoke making the room hazy.

“Helps with my headaches,” she says, holding it out to you.

You glance at the male, now draped over the edge of the couch like this is normal. Like it’s normal that there are scratch marks across his chest; a collar clinging to his throat. So much had happened the last time he’d been around you hadn’t really noticed what was happening, but now…

Amarantha is speaking again but you honestly can’t hear what she’s saying.

What kind of female does this to people?

There’s something prowling beneath your skin, a caged animal pacing the bars of it’s enclosure. The first bits of your talons poke through your skin, digging into your palms to keep it at bay.

“Y/N?” She asks, and by the tone its clear this isn’t the first time she’s called you by name.

You force yourself to draw a breath, then another. You cannot fight her here like this, no matter how badly you want to. No matter how much the sight of that collar makes you want to destroy everything she’s ever touched. She has the power of the High Lords and if you fight her here in her chambers, untrained, you will loose.

You draw another breath. Rhys had said that half the battle was knowing when to throw the first punch. It isn’t time yet.

You repeat it to yourself, to the thing that slumbers in your chest until it quiets.

You know Amarantha is watching, can feel that oily gaze on you. You draw another breath and force yourself to look at her. “I’m sorry, I… I was just wondering…” You should placate her, pretend your just some untrained, naive little girl she found on Calanmai. At the start of this conversation you might have, but the shift you feel beneath your skin…

You need to get out of the room before you implode.

And you need her to know you’re not just some stupid pet.

“I was just wondering what’s so bad about the twins that’s got you rattled, Your Highness?” Maybe you can’t meet her gaze yet, maybe you can’t win a physical fight, but you’re not some helpless toy at her whims. The last couple weeks have weakened you, but they haven’t beat you.

She growls at you, eyes flashing dangerously.

The male on the end of the couch scatters out of range, ducking behind the curtain long enough for you to get a flash of the room, see another body laying in her silk sheets.

You’re going to rip this mountain apart brick by fucking brick if you have to.

“Is this what you’d rather do, little mouse?” She asks, her voice dangerously low. “Play games with me?”

It's too late to take it all back now. The words are out and despite the shiver running down your spine, you know if you back down now she will hold it over your head forever. Might as well stand your ground and see what she'll reveal to you if you keep pushing. “I’m bored in my cell,” you counter.

She takes a drag of the mirthroot. You'll ask Rhys later why she needs so much of it. Is it possible that holding all that power is effecting her physically somehow?

“How forgetful of me to not keep you entertained.”

“Isn’t that what friends do?” You over emphasize the word, put all your venom into it. You can’t spar with her physically yet, but you’ve always been quicker with your words than your fists anyway.

She flicks the cigarette away. “You should come to dinner tonight, if you’re so bored.”

You hope she can’t hear the way your heart thunders in your chest. This is dangerous, so very dangerous. You’re almost sure you can hear Rhys screaming in your head. “I’d be delighted,” you say as sweetly as you can.

Amarantha motions the Attor over, a dismissal. “I was hoping to protect you from the cruelty of this court until you were ready. My subjects aren’t always as kind as me, but since you’re so keen on getting out of your room, I suppose I can’t help you.”

She’s going to throw you to the wolves.

You swallow the lump in your throat. “I’ll have to get acquainted with my father’s court eventually.”

“You’ll remember this conversation after dinner,” she hisses as the Attor grabs your shoulder and lifts you off the couch.

“I’m sure it’ll be a good laugh for both of us,” you say like you don’t hear the threat.

As the door opens, you throw over your shoulder, “I’ll see you tonight.”

The powers she’s stolen rumble as the door slams shut behind you, the mountain shaking.

You tuck your trembling hands into your pockets as you walk back the way you came. At least no one is dead this time, but still you can’t shake the feeling that you’re royally fucked.

Doesn’t help matters that, as you turn the corner back towards you room, Rhysand is there, frowning as he leans against the closed door. That intense violet gaze roams over you as you approach, as if he’s cataloging every detail of you, then the Attor.

“Why is she out?” He snarls at the Attor.

“Well hi to you too,” you grumble.

You’re not entirely sure what powers come with being High Lord of the Night Court, but you’re sure he once was able to burn holes through people’s heads, judging by the intensity of the anger in his eyes. He won’t even make eye contacting with you, only the Attor, who lumbers past you, chuckling.

“Her Majesty requested an audience.”

“She’s only to leave her room with me,” Rhys snarls, pushing away from the wall so he’s standing at his full height. Wisps of darkness unfurl from his shoulders, thrashing behind him like living things.

You shiver a little. These last few weeks had made you forget the male you had seen on Calanmai--what Darkness Incarnate was capable of given the right push.

“Funny,” the Attor rasps, unbothered by the display. Maybe when you spend so much time with Amarantha, only big, powerful displays matter. “She hasn’t mentioned you all morning. Maybe she’s gotten tired of you.”

“And maybe,” Rhys prowls forward, the stars you can sometimes see glittering in his eyes winking out with each breath he takes. “I was out dragging Tamlin’s sorry ass in for you.”

The Attor pauses, wings twitching. “Spring surrendered?”

“His time is up,” Rhys snarls. “He didn’t even fight me.”

Shit shit shit. She’s actually done it. Tamlin had been the last High Lord on his throne. When Hybern came in a couple of months, there’d be no one standing in his way. Amarantha would have all the High Lords sitting and waiting for him to do whatever he wanted with them.

You look at Rhys, really look. There’s no damage on him, no cuts or bruises, not even dirt, no hint that he was lying about bringing Tamlin in. He doesn’t look at all bothered by it either, as if this is just another part of the job.

The Attor makes a hissing sound, “Guess we both didn’t get what we wanted today, lordling.”

“This will be the last time you take her anywhere,” Rhys snarls, his voice wholly taken over by a High Lord. Not the male that sits on the floor in the training room, showing you how to shield; not the male who sneaks you snacks to ensure you’re not starving to death in the dark. There is no room for argument, no room for a fight, he is High Lord and he will get his way. “And if I find out any harm came to her while she was under your watch I will take my gods-damned time flaying the skin from your measly bones.”

Measly? The Attor is twice Rhys’s size, yet you know, just by looking at him that he’d win. It’s no idle threat.

“You talk a lot of game, whore,” the Attor snarls as it backs away. It knows it’ll loose too. “But lets see you put that same energy out in front of Her Highness when she has her new pet out for dinner tonight. I’m sure with the Lord of Spring joining us, things will be interesting.”

It scurries away before Rhys can ask what that means, or before you can tear it’s ugly face off it’s bones. Yours claws are piercing into your palms, blood pooling between yours fingers. You hadn’t realized you’d done it, they’d slipped, your control waning at his words. Rhys hadn’t seemed to notice them, hadn’t reacted at all, just as he hadn’t that night in the throne room, but you can’t stand it. And you can’t even explain why.

“Are you hurt?” Rhys asks as soon as the Attor is gone. The wisps of darkness disappear in a rush, like all the energy needed to summon them had suddenly vanished.

“No, I’m fine,” you reply, but you can’t stop yourself from looking down at your hands, the indents you’d left in your palms. Little tendrils of your own darkness slip from them, like it’s leaking out of your skin.

Rhys is on you in an instant, taking your hands in his own, looking at the damage.

“Guess I was clenching my fists a little tight,” you say.

The world tilts and spins, the sound of wind rushing in your ears, and then you’re standing in another bedroom. It’s as barren as your own, lit with a dozen, half melted candles, most of the space taken up by a bed with black silk sheets. There’s some furniture covered in dust around a cold fireplace; it looks less used then your own had been when you’d arrived.

Rhys’s hand is around your wrist, pulling your towards the bathing chambers. He’s breathing hard, as if the winnowing had taken a lot out of him; his skin a little more pale, dark circles around his eyes. How much of his power does Amarantha steal on the daily?

“What did the Attor mean about tonight?” He asks as he motions you to sit on the edge of the tub. It’s bigger than your own, not by much, but there’s enough of a lip around the edge that you can sit without falling completely in. He lets the water run until it’s warm.

You pinch your eyes shut. “She gave me this whole speech about how she wants to be friends.”

He guides your hands under the water and you wince against the sting.

“I was going to wait her out, just not say anything at all, but…” but you kept seeing that male in that godsdamned collar, and the bodies pinned to the wall of the throne room, and the male who had been murdered on the floor.

You know you should be careful here too, no one has explained what his role in all of this is. Was he like Tamlin once? Dragged in when he ran out of options? Or had he come on his own? And you can’t shake the queasiness you get in the pit of your stomach when someone calls him a whore, because all you can do is wonder if Rhys has any say at all what happens to him down here?

“But?”

“But she’s a monster and the last fucking thing I want to be is her friend.”

He steps away long enough to get a towel and dab at the open wounds, still bleeding, the water red as it runs down your hands.

“So I guess I kinda goaded her into doing something with me instead of leaving me in my room all the time.”

Rhys huffs, but you can’t tell if it’s annoyance or anger. He doesn’t say anything beyond that as he shuts off the water and start rummaging through the cabinet under the sink. There’s a lot of vials and bottles and hand towels organized in the small space, the only real sign that anyone ever stays in the room at all.

“You’re lucky she didn’t tear you apart,” he growls as he comes back with a bottle of what looks like antiseptic. He dabs some on another towel and presses it to your palms, ignoring the hiss you make at the sting. “She’s ripped off people’s arms for less.”

“Yeah well one of the joys of being me is she needs me alive,” you drawl.

He tosses the used rag in the tub and then opens a small bottle of salve. It’s half empty, the contents clinging to the sides of the container. It’s applied to your hands with the care of someone who has done this over a dozen different wounds.

“How’d you find all this stuff?”

He’s got gauze too; wraps your hands carefully. “One of the joys of being me is she needs me in one piece,” he returns.

When your hands are all wrapped, he puts all the stuff back and washes his own hands.

“What…” this is dangerous ground, it sounds an awful lot like you care about him. You run a finger over the bandage, trace the sleeve of the shirt you only have because he’d given it to you. You’d still be in a shift in this frozen place if it wasn’t for him. You’d be a lot worse off, if it wasn’t for him.

“What exactly do you do for her?” Do you even want to know? Why torture yourself with the truth when you find out he’s done all of this for her because he wants to? Because he was born a monster just like she was and had only decided to latch onto you because maybe you were as much a ticket to Hybern’s graces as you were for Amarantha?

You watch the way his back shudders as he draws a shaking breath.

Something in your chest cracks and you jump off the edge of the tub.

“Whatever she wants,” he says so softly you almost can’t hear him.

You take a step closer, then another, until you’re right behind him. “And do you… want to do that?”

He turns slowly, head to his chest.

You take the final step so that you can look up into his eyes. So you can see him. There is so much there, in his eyes, in the shadows across his face that you’re pretty sure you have an answer. But you can’t be pretty sure of anything Under the Mountain. You need to hear it said.

“It doesn’t matter what I want,” he whispers.

“Yes it does,” you press.

He shakes his head, onyx hair falling over his eyes. This is the most rumpled you’ve seen him, he’s always so put together. “Not with what I stand to loose.”

“What could be worth all this?” You’ve unconsciously brought your bandaged hands up on his chest, the beat of his heart quickening beneath your palms. He lets you, as if that pulse might show you that he really does have a heart that works under his shirt.

He brings a hand up slowly, gently running his fingers over the back of your knuckles. His mouth opens, and closes without an answer.

“Rhys-”

He pulls your hands away, straightening, whatever emotion had been on his face before is gone, that cold mask of indifference in it’s place once again. “I am High Lord,” he explains, “my duty is to protect my people at all costs.” Whatever he was going to say before will remain buried behind that mask. You don’t know how he does it so easily. Just when you think he might open up, might let you in, might show you that the male you had met on Calanmai was real, he shuts it out behind this mask.

“And who protects you?” You dare to ask, because even though you know you can’t get past that mask, you can’t stop yourself from trying.

“I don’t need protecting,” he says, but it’s not confidence in his voice, nor pride, it’s… broken, as if he doesn’t think he’s worth protecting. “Careful, Y/N, I might think you care about me.”

Caring in a place like this very well may get you killed. But if you stop, if you find your own mask and shut down every piece of yourself behind it, aren’t you just as bad as him?

“Would it be so bad?” You whisper. You can’t help but feel small in a place like this, would having a friend be so terrible?

“Yes!” He snarls and darkness leaks from him again. “The more people you care about in this gods forsaken mountain the harder it is to get out! You might only get one shot and if you don’t take it, you’re likely to get stuck here forever.”

Somehow this is worse than Amarantha asking to be friends, this feels an awful like some sort of rejection and that chasm you often feel after Calanmai, when you’d ignored him, cracks and splits wide open in your chest. You feel yourself tumbling down, down into the dark void.

“Why do you care so much if I get out then?”

“Because you’re-” he bites down on the rest of the sentence, shakes it off with a deep breath. “No one else will tell you the truth, so here it is: You will be the death of all of us if you stay. So yes, I want you out of here. I want you as fucking far away from here as possible!”

You can’t breathe.

The chasm swallows you, drags you under until you don’t know what way is up. You know you’re crying, but you can’t stop the tears that stream down your cheeks. Rhys doesn’t bother to try and wipe them away this time.

“Fuck you,” you whimper.

“It’s not my fault you were so damn isolated the first scrap of attention you got you confused with something else,” he replies. “I’ve kept you alive out of necessity and I will continue to do so until it is no longer required of me. And when the time comes for you to get out, you’ll take it and not look back, understand?”

The world spins again and you’re suddenly back inside your own room.

“Do you understand?” He repeats again.

“Perfectly,” you hiss.

“Good. Now let’s fucking hope I can get you out of this gods-damned dinner before your throw away your chance.”

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154 notes · View notes

whumpbby · 3 months ago

Note

TBH I do think some Jiang disciples did survive the Lotus Pier massacre, if only because they had been elsewhere when it happened/too old or too young to fight so they ran (<-which could be a fun thing to grapple with for both the potential run-aways and newly recruiting Jiang Cheng, who was sent away), but it still wasn't enough people to be called Great Sect. So I think as you say they recruited anyone they could, including some rouge cultivators and some from smaller sects that were destroyed or taken over by the Wen Sect. I don't think they tried to recruit - while the Sunshot campaign was going - a lot of people without active golden core, because they would simply have little time to train them between the battles. Some probably did manage to join the Sect like that, and these would probably grow quite close to people who taught them between the fights.

Also Jiang Cheng having to be at least one of these teachers, because they are short on the disciples but shorter in those trained in Jiang style even more so. And how after the war he must've been doing that still, on top of having the sect to run as both Leader and Head Discipline (because Wei Wuxian was going through things he chose to neither explain or acknowledge) (1/2)

(2/2) Also Jiang Cheng, who almost had to watch his brother get caught by the Wen soldiers when he went off alone in the streets, WOULD try and make his disciples work in big enough groups to protect themselves. Also also Jiang Cheng that seems to go off alone rather often.

Oh, and Jiang Cheng throwing his weight around when his disciples get into some sort of disagreement/scuffle every time, and being harsh on the other party (totally not because of finally being able to shield someone he cares for) and never satisfying the questions about the punishment (totally not because of his mother and Zidian and Wei Wuxian). Even when Jiang disciples were in the wrong. Not meaning there was no disciplinary action, just that it never went outside the sect.

Also taking in some non-cultivators that are good at other things (like Jiang Yanli!) or people who lost their golden cores but can still fight and teach (because he remembers not having a golden core and how that felt like; and maybe he realises somewhere along the way that he might've been able to live without one too; which would certainly add even more flavour to learning whose golden core really was inside him all along).

The latter headcanon is also so amazing because resurrected Wei Wuxian would have to confront how he dealt with the loss of his core and finally stop saying he is fine and reflect on his feelings about all this, including Jiang Cheng

____________________________________________________

Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts with me :D I am so absolutely taken over by this subject!

This is why I'm writing these things, I love to discuss them with other peeps:)

Your message pushed me onto another path of wild speculation via the mention of the other smaller sects that JC would approach to recruit - and that pushed me into the economics of Jinaghu and their influence on the post-war lay of the landXD

Which I am putting under the cut, because it's a lot of rambling to get to a point, but that's how it is in these parts;]

Also, the map I will be using, because it's as good as any other:

From the beginning - smaller sects yes, there was probably not a shortage of them that were destroyed by the Wen passing through and by the blowback of the war happening at all. I imagine that anyone from lone survivors to whole families was displaced…

But I am unsure if inviting them in would be a good idea in JC's position, because, going back to the main point - the Jiang were decimated. I can only go by what the story tells us when it doesn't mention any extra survivors - the Wen banning other sects from night-hunts was a nifty set-up for everyone being stuck at home after all - even if, logically, some of the disciples could be in other locations… however, even if they were, these wouldn't be the meat of Yunmeng Jiang. Because…

…random tangent no 1, because this is a low-fantasy setting (thinking of Game of Thrones I am), I am structuring the Sects as Just Gentry. Maybe not kingdoms outright - because there doesn't seem to be enough land between them to cover for their economic statuses - but city-states ruled by aristocratic bloodlines with the actual political power in their hands. Thus, even if the book doesn't really go into it, I'd wager that the region of Yunmeng was run by the extended Jiang family that was living in the capital of Lotus Pier. That's where the disciples were trained - but that was most likely also where the taxes were being collected, where the trade arrangements happened, where the law was being written, higher education took place, it had the best restaurants, etc.

When the Wen destroyed Lotus Pier, they did away with the whole socio-economic and political setup of the region, which is a smart move for someone who wants to set up their own shop.

…And that circles me back to JC and recruiting - he wasn't just gathering disciples to fight, he was rebuilding a whole intricate system of governance from scratch. A system that used to be run by the extended family that he could trust - now was something he was staffing with strangers.

And, from the example of Su Minshan, we know how jumping sects was considered to be in bad taste - it stands to reason that whatever decimated sect showed up on JC's doorstep, they wouldn't want to give up their own name. Just like JC wasn't going to give up his name. These people would be looking for an alliance and revenge, and, most likely, economic help in their own rebuilding, but most of them weren't looking to join the Jiang. And if they were - what was the guarantee that they'd stay? Or that they wouldn't use JC to meet their own ends and leave him worse for it? Or simply take over due to sheer numbers? A valid fear for a clan of 1 that had to seem ripe for picking.

I think JC would be very careful about accepting disciples from existing sects as his own, and instead build alliances with them. A rogue cultivator or a promising youth looking for a place to settle were a safer bet to build the core of his new sect with. Not to say that some of these alliances wouldn't result in the smaller sects merging into the Jiang later on by osmosis, but not at the outset…

Which leads me to believe that JC would want to start taking in and training coreless youths as soon as humanly possible - just to have someone at his back who was OF Yunmeng Jiang and not just allied with them. Maybe not during the beginning of the war, but by the time Lotus Pier was reclaimed things were probably going this way. If you think about it, Jiang Cheng was a fucking powerhouse of a leader. I have no idea when he slept. Probably not at all.

Probably why he was so cranky XD

That's why I am of firm opinion that the alliance by marriage with the Jin sect was a double-edged sword JC wasn't in a position to refuse, but also wasn't in a position to wholeheartedly accept. (And everyone who thinks that JC 'sold' Yanli to JGS for all these doubloons is just plain old wrong). Because now they're family. Only family he has. And that family can slowly find their way into the important positions of his own 'kingdom', because that's how gentry/aristocracy tends to work in a setting putting that much value on bloodlines, and he doesn't have his own family to plug these positions with ahead of time.

And even if JGS wasn't super eager to marry his son to JYL and the marriage was mostly pushed by Madame Jin and Jin Zixuan - it was in JGS's best interests for Yunmeng Jiang to remain weakened and/or under his control. Because….

…tangent nr 2- economics! :D

The plot doesn't go into it, but I like to know, so I was thinking of the actual economics of the magical land of magical peopleXD I don't need them to be detailed, but just realistic enough to make some sense, and serve as a believable background. I'm not going to question the existence of potatoes or other anachronisms, but one thing I needed to answer for myself was - where is all the money coming from???

Like, for real, where is the cash coming from for all the silks, fancy furniture, houses, swords and so on. How are the gentry sects making money?

Again, the genre, like many others, waves away monetary concerns in general - aristocrats are just wealthy, commoners are poor, and Bilbo Baggins is a landlord. OK.

So, taxes. What makes sect a Great one? Land, mostly, it would seem. The amount of land they own. Which means taxes - if we consider the Gentry sects local aristocracy. That tracks, because ain't no way they'd earn that much dosh via night-hunts from a population that isn't really that large. If you look at the approximate map of the whole realm and consider how fast people are moving from one region to another (even including flying swords and donkey-travel) that ain't a lot of land/people to feed all these sects fleeting about between the 5 Majors.

So, my idea is that the small sects do support themselves mostly via night-hunting and general spiritual upkeep of their locals, but the Greats are just aristocracy and live off of taxes and trade.

And that makes me wonder how Yunmeng Jiang managed to recover their wealth in such a record time, and why was the Jin so wealthy for apparently doing so little.

I propose that Lanling Jin grew out of a port-city and made its money on sea-trade. Sea trade was always The Shit if you wanted to, dunno, gild your palace in gold or something.

Yunmeng - with its access to lakes and rivers - was another trade hub of the realm with the additional bonus of lotus, fish and all other crops a well-watered land can give you.

Qishan - being the most West-ward placed of the Great sects we know of, had to have access to - or even monopoly over - the intercontinental trade routes, or a lot of raw materials available. But at the same time, being a mountainous region, it wasn't rich in water and water-intensive crops. I think that once the material appetite of the Wen upper echelon grew, the more they needed to look towards consuming other regions to sustain it.

Annexing Yunmeng was a good strategy from that point of view - it fixed the water issue and also opened new trade routes towards the South and East via the rivers.

But then the Wen were defeated - and all that West-ward trade potential suddenly was left unattended, and JGS would be a fool to let it slip through his fingers. And the only 'large' clan placed close enough to was Yunmeng.

Stands to reason that, somehow, JC managed to wrestle some of that for his own people to refill the coffers. Gusu was too far and not a trade hub by any means, and Nie Mingjue/Huaisang seemed uninterested in reaching out for it, so the only serious competition on that front were the Jin… Which, again, JC somehow managed to outsmart there, because I do not believe for even a moment that a fierce economic battle wasn't fought as soon as the military operations ended.

#headcanon #mdzs #jiang cheng #yunmeng jiang #i am at no point saying this is gospel - just how i explain things to myself in my head #i am no economy major - just a dedicated Age of Empires player XD #addressing the possible characteristics of yunmeng jiang disciples will come next #I imagine JC and JGY having a battle of spead-sheets during every conference #and their trade disputes being so damn tangled and complex that even sect leader yao usually sat them out #i think that JC was always running the type of anxiety that made it impossible to stand up for himself - but the moment someone he liked #was concerned the Mom Friend override was slamming in and HE SAID NO PICKLES FOR FUCK'S SAKE!#like - JC was taught that standing up for himself usually leads to more scolding and so he instinctively doesn't until he's too angry #to hold back #thanks mom&dad :DDDDD #that nothing he can say in his own defense matters #so why the fuck should he try?#but he will go to bat for the people he loves at all times of day & night #and his closest disciples noticed #and decided that yeah that won't do - let's make it so that the zongzhu doesn't have to take it for us #no witnesses means no accountability>;]#and #no #one #saw #anything #right?:))))))))

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wolfsrainrules · 3 months ago

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A Quiet Night AU- A DC/ A Quiet Place fusion thought Long Post

Sooooo I was watching A Quiet Place (which I love deeply, it was such a DIFFERENT handle on horror movies, watching that in a theater was a RIDE) and I am neck deep in DC and had t h o u g h t s. Please keep in mind that I have only fandom knowledge of DC and am playing with the death angels (name of the Quiet Place creatures) make up for this au:

To Start:

AU is an AOB verse, cause I wanted to play with what a situation like this would do to instincts and packs and I need everyone to do the thing we do with comics where we apply “Comic Book Logic” to why these death angels succeed in invading the Earth. Why the metas and supers didn’t get them out, because this verse would be taking place AFTER the world has been invaded, and the creatures have wiped out QUITE a large chunk of Earth’s population. Read the VERY LONG ramble about this verse under the cut.

We have Alphas Jay and Cass, Omegas Tim and Dick, Damian is unpresented but approaching the time he would present properly, and he’s an Alpha-to-be. Alfred, Steph and Duke are Betas.

The Death Angels: For those not in the know, they are large, kind of spider-like in movements, VERY fast, and fully armored. The armor stands up to bullets and knives, and explosions can toss them but don’t seem to do damage. They’re entirely blind, have claws and a mouth full of sharp teeth and their hearing is VERY sharp. Their head opens to expose soft insides that work like a super-ear, tracking sound, and that’s really the only vulnerable spot, and they can’t swim. That’s all canon to their verse. I’m playing with them a little, so that the planet they come from is laced so deeply with kryptonite they’ve adapted to sort of work on supers, as in they can’t use their powers on them. I’m upping that armor to be stronger than standard canon, as we do have metas running around and I want them to really only be vulnerable while hunting and exposing the ear to hunt.

It means to kill them, you have to get close enough to be heard, to be HUNTED. You have to be clever. Usually with some kind of blade, as most other things (especially guns) are too loud, and even if it works it brings the hundreds of death angels in the area, every single one that heard it, your way and then your fucked. On top of all of that- if they close the plates of armor that shield their ‘ear’ bullets don’t penetrate it, and blades skitter off. You have to get to that soft unshielded ear to take them out. The hearing was picked up real quick by the Bats and they tried to use that.

On technicality, very high pitched feedback sounds can fuck with their hearing, and cause them pain, usually making he plates that cover the ear kind of…lock up? And then they stagger around, can’t track people or what’s around them, and the ‘ear’ stays exposed cause the plates of armor are locked in an open position, even if they’re jerking around like animatronics move trying to make the sound make sense and stop hurting.

I’m messing with that cause I want to make this more difficult lol. If you manage to mess with the main method of hearing, the death angels are evolved to slam the armor plating that covers their ‘ear’ closed, block out the sound, and shift to a low clicking-purr sound that vibrates their body and acts as a makeshift sonar type ability over the kind of echolocation they’d been using, reading the vibrations of it through their legs and basically triangulating prey and obstacles around them and it makes them more dangerous because it’s a response to being hurt and they do NOT appreciate it.

In canon rain/waterfalls can hide you, if you keep the sound level under the sound of the water. I’m going to keep that, saying the rain hitting the ground hard enough can sort of hide people from that sonar too, if you move carefully. Caves are also a good place to hide- provided the death angels don't get inside. Which means the Bat-Cave is a kind of ‘safe’ space, far enough underground they can speak softly, and the equipment inside is safe to run, so long as they are careful with the clock-entrance.

I babbled to wintersnight (@iphoenixrising) for a good while about this AU (@north-peach doesn’t like horror, she thinks the protags are all stupid and it drives her nuts so she missed this ramble lol) but Winter followed my logic and encouraged me to actually post this somewhere lol

Leading into the Next Important Thing:

Cities are death traps. All that confined space and the noise of it? The death angels came in like moths to a flame. Large groups of moving people trying to evacuate? Too much noise. Death angels stampede in and hit the group like a pack of wolves cornering prey.

Gotham was one city of many that hit hard and fast. The Bats are good at what they do, but they’re not omniscient no matter what anyone thinks. It was so fast.

This verse would be covering the AFTER of the invasion of the death angels, AFTER they’ve swarmed the world, after so many have died. This verse would be the ‘post-apocalypse’ survival AFTER.

Zeta-tubes are technically usable to get them out, and up to the Watchtower, but the sound of them activating is loud enough to pull the death angels, and the tube gets destroyed in their hunt for the sound. This also works in reverse- if you use them to come back down, the creatures will swarm towards whoever arrived, and the tubes still end up getting destroyed.

Coming back to the AOB concept:

I love how all of what’s happening opens the chance to play with their instincts and protective territorial instincts. The urge to den down in a defensive position. To patrol their chunk of space, keep their pack alive and safe

To fight.

They were all scattered when the invasion happened, so they have to work their way back to the cave by foot, cars are too loud, and their grapleguns make enough sound to also be unusable when firing as well as anchoring down. They can’t open the hidden entrances for vehicles, it’s too loud and opens a way straight in, so they have to find other ways in. If they can get into the manor, the clock would be an option, it opens smooth and quiet, but the trade off is risking any sounds inside the cave traveling up the stairs and getting the location found.

So most of the Bats running around Gotham are going to sneak into the hidden natural entrances into the cave systems and navigate back to the cave. Defenses and redirects are going to be set up to prevent death angels from getting in.

Which leads to my favorite part of this AU:

How this situation combines with AOB instincts in the Bats specifically.

How clever the Bats are.

I want to play with that. Wanna address how smart they are, their instincts going absolutely feral-survival-mode wild in this kind of life-or-death situation, with threats actually actively hunting them, zero chance of reasoning with them.

Wanna address the genetic memory of packs before cities were made being drawn out. Wanna look at how packs actually hunt when those instincts are stirred and it’s life-or-death, how the Bats work together. When an Alpha, Omega or Beta is pushed to the brink, pushed to feral, their pack, their territory all threated, all in actual danger by something that can and will hunt them back. I want to see their senses cranked up and used to track death angels down, hunt and kill them.

How terrifying it probably is to go into rut or heat in this kind of situation. Being hazy and vulnerable, instinct driven, unable to focus well, in a situation like this one. How, once the situation has settled correctly into their psyche and bones, it might change. The mess that is a presentation heat or rut in this kind of hell, because Damian is within the age of when it happens (between 13-16 is average in my head, this AU places Damian at 15 in my head, so he’s due for it). What it does to the pack of the person in heat or rut for them to be so vulnerable while something like this is happening.

The protective pup-instincts triggered by an unpresented Damian. What the urge to shield the pack, keep it alive and safe, and protect pups might look like when combined with the hero-vigilante instincts in them, and finding pups who survived the invasion, but are abandoned or the last of their packs, with no one and nothing left. What the drive to protect and expand their packs, keep them alive and thriving might look like.

The territorial instincts playing out, in a hunted/hunting situation with- as Winter put it- “The backdrop of Gotham and how many traps they'd set since this is their territory and they know every rusty fire escape, crumbling Bailbondsmen, and gargoyle in this entire city.”

She understood where I was going with it lol. I adore how well they’d know Gotham, and exploring how that knowledge would play out in setting up traps and triggerable distractions for the death angels, to help in hunting and killing them. How it’d be fed by those territorial instincts of their city being invaded, their people killed, and their pack in so much danger.

On top of all of that, I also like exploring how the pack leader (Omega Bruce) vs pack alpha (Jason) would react in a situation like this, and the give-and-take of compromise and keeping their pack safe in such a situation.

I imagine, when all this starts happening, the Bats are collectively scattered all over Gotham. When it happens, they try fighting first, but the creatures are fast and deadly. They figure out sound being what they use to track quickly, that they need to be quiet, and they’re trying to save who they can but… in a city, always moving, always going, full of crime and all the screams with only so few Bats and everywhere ELSE having the same issues at the same time?

They get forced to retreat and fallback. None of them are sure where the others are, who’s in active danger, they can’t talk to each other over comms, can’t make any sound too loud.

They just have to be dead quiet and make their way to the cave on foot, make jumps that they know they can land silently on buildings, watch for the death angels when they move, being so so very careful. Unable to check in and see if their packmates are alive or not. Bonds blocked on the job, to not distract their pack, and having to KEEP them that way, while headed for the cave, to not distract each other coming home.

Oracle being in the Clocktower- frantically shutting down the clock so it doesn’t ring over the city and bring the creatures to her, shutting down any alarms or alerts that could be too loud from her equipment. Sending the news all over Gotham any way she can, as silent as she can, on how the creatures work, and how the survivors can use that knowledge to STAY alive.

Being scared as she watches trackers, and prays, terrified any time they’re still too long that they may be hurt or dying. Praying she doesn’t see the trackers start moving a vehicle speeds, cause it means they’re going to get chased down by creatures OR a creature has grabbed them and soon the alerts for vitals will scream at her.

Dick shows up at her tower to get her out with Damian on his heels, so they can get her to the cave, because a city destroyed by invasion is not really wheelchair accessible, much less getting all the way over to the cave silently while trying to get through the rubble.

Now for my favorite boy:

Tim. Tim in this AU has lost his pack bonds while on Brucequest. He hasn’t accepted a place back in the pack, hurt and distrustful of if the others mean it, after having been pushed out of the pack in his eyes, rejected and unwanted.

They’ve been trying to fix that, mending bridges and working hard to prove he not only has a place but is WANTED. Building bridges back out with him. By the time the invasion happens, he’s actually starting to believe them- he’s coming to the manor, interacting, trusting they’ll back him, save him, welcome him. He’s coming around- but he still hasn’t accepted a pack bond yet. Not again.

Didn’t feel quite ready for it, so he doesn’t have a bond with any of the other Bats. He doesn’t know if they’re alive or dead, can’t sense the bond and know for sure, and they can’t check on HIM like that either.

The panic of both sides of that equation is REAL. All of them have seen these creatures hunt and kill and destroy. And they don’t know if-

This event, this potential of loss on both sides is what makes Tim realize he is NOT willing to keep going without that bond in place. That he wants to feel them in his head again. He could have died or lost any of them, and never had the chance to be bonded to them as pack again, and-

He can’t do that again. He wants the bonds nestled in his chest, wound around his ribs and heart, thriving and anchored in his head. I may write the scene I have in my head out for Tim coming back to the cave last and just having a breakdown cause everyone is THERE, they’re alive.

This AU is going to be tagged “Quiet Night AU” on my blog, so keep an eye out for more.

And if you made it this far into this monster post, PLEASE feel free to send asks in about this verse, I wanna think about/talk about it and share. My brain is turning over all kinds of snapshots of moments in this verse, and I’d love to hear what yall wanna see from it, what questions or scenes you have in mind. Just address in the Asks that it’s for the Quiet Night AU. Edit: I ended up writing the blurble with Tim making it back to the cave found HERE

#Quiet Night AU #Crossover Fun #DC #Batman #A Quiet Place #Alpha Beta Omega #Omegaverse AU #Wolf Talks Fic Ideas #wolfsrainrules

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wingedblooms · 4 months ago

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Here are some moments in the acotar series and spin-off that give the same vibes as these books @courtofmaas featured on instagram. These books were in the background when Sarah shared that she was working on the next acotar spin-off book.

Below the Edge of Darkness by Edith Widder

The River House had finally fallen quiet after the raucous Winter Solstice party, the faelights dimming to cast little pools of gold amid the deep shadow of the longest night of the year.

[…]

But even the silence weighed too heavily, and though the shadows kept him company, as they always had, as they always would, he found himself leaving the room. Entering the foyer. Soft steps padded from under the stair archway, and there she was.

The Faelights gilded Elain’s unbound hair, making her glow like the sun at dawn. She halted, her breath catching in her throat. (Azriel’s bonus chapter)

The Once and Future Sex: Going Medieval on Women's Roles in Society by Eleanor Janega

“She loves to garden. Always loved growing things. Even when we were destitute, she managed to tend a little garden in the warmer months. And when–when our fortune returned, she took to tending and planting the most beautiful gardens you’ve ever seen. Even in Prythian. It drove the servants mad, because they were supposed to do the work and ladies were only meant to clip a rose here and there, but Elain would put on a hat and gloves and kneel in the dirt, weeding. She acted like a purebred lady in every regard but that.” (acowar)

Elain is pleasant to look at, her mother had once mused while Nesta sat beside her dressing table, a servant silently brushing her mother’s gold-brown hair, but she has no ambition. She does not dream beyond her garden and pretty clothes. (Nesta's memory of Mama Archeron, acosf)

"Go back to Feyre and your little garden." (acosf)

Elain said, "Then I will find it. I might require some time to...reacquaint myself with my powers, but I could start today."

"Absolutely not," Nesta spat, fingers curling at her sides. "Absolutely not."

"Why?" Elain demanded. "Shall I tend to my little garden forever?" When Nesta flinched, Elain said, "You can't have it both ways. You cannot resent my decision to lead a small, quiet life while also refusing to let me do anything greater."

"Then go off on adventures," Nesta said. "Go drink and fuck strangers. But stay away from the Cauldron." (acosf)

Redouté. The Book of Flowers by H. Walter Lack

If Elain was a blooming flower in this army camp, then Nesta…she was a freshly forged sword, waiting to draw blood. [...] Nesta stared them all down. Elain kept her focus on the dry, rocky ground. (acowar)

She had no mental shields, no barriers. The gates to her mind…Solid iron, covered in vines of flowers–or it would have been. The blossoms were all sealed, sleeping buds tucked into tangles of leaves and thorns. (acowar)

If Elain’s mental gates were those of a sleeping garden, Nesta’s…They belonged to an ancient fortress, sharp and brutal. The sort I imagined they once impaled people upon. (acowar)

“What now?” Elain mused, at last answering my question from moments ago as her attention drifted to the windows facing the sunny street. That smile grew, bright enough that it lit up even Azriel’s shadows across the room. “I would like to build a garden,” she declared. “After all of this…I think the world needs more gardens.” (acowar)

Like @psychologynerd said in this post about the Book of Flowers, Elain is coming. 🌸

#elain is coming #acotar fun #🌸✨🌿🦇🌗#elriel #elain archeron

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greenbergsays · 8 months ago

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I started rewatching Leverage again, because...I have a problem, obviously (what is this, the third time in like six months???)

And if I had to give you ONE criticism of Leverage--and it would be difficult, because I love it so--but if I had to give you ONE, it would Eliot and his background

I've had a problem with the Leverage: Redemption episode on Eliot's father since I saw it but I didn't realize HOW big of a problem I had with it until I watched the show again after seeing it

Because all of the early seasons set Eliot up to have an abusive father. The almost-stereotypical drunken redneck white dad that ignores you until you've done something wrong kind of thing. The kind of pathetic father figure that expects to mooch of you for the rest of your life, because he raised you, damn it.

And then they retconned it

Now, I know what you're thinking

"Des," you say. "Why would you want him to have that kind of background?"

I don't, really. But every little hint we get of his background points toward that

Actually, if you want me to be totally honest, some of the stuff he says kind of hints at him having some sort of sibling figure, too

02x02: The Tap Out Job, Eliot says, "I can take the beating."

And those words have weight. They have meaning. Eliot is thinking of something very specific when he says it, and it's not new. It's an ancient hurt, an old scar that still throbs when he thinks too hard on it.

But that, more than anything, those words hint that Eliot's been a Protector Role his whole life, shielding others from harm.

That kind of background would also explain why he got his hands dirty early on, because when you're in that kind of pain, you cause other people pain before you realize--if you ever do--that you've become the monster in someone else's story and you don't want to be that, so you change. You can't take back what you've done and it haunts you, but you try to do better.

All of this would explain the huge fight Eliot and his father got into the night before he went to basic and why he never went back

I don't really have a point to this post, it's just something I've had in my head the last couple of rewatches and I figured it wouldn't go away until I got it out of my system

#greenberg watches #leverage #cw: mentions of abuse #eliot spencer

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youvebeenlivingfictional · 1 year ago

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omg bond would be an incredible choice for a knight/queen au,, I would go so crazy if you ever wrote that

Rating: Explicit - 18+ Only. Minors interacting with this work will be blocked.

Notes: Not beta-read. Reread several times and will probably spot 87 typos once I hit post.

Sometimes you write a regular fic and other times you find yourself googling whether or not people performed oral sex in the medieval era. it's all a crap shoot.

anyway.

Length: 7.9K

Warnings: Slow burn; explicit sexual content - oral sex; vaginal sex

From the moment that he kneels before you—as the light sets a halo about his blond hair, and as he tips his chin up to meet your eye and murmur his oath of fealty—you know that he’ll be trouble. It’s in the flash of his eye.

His crisp blue gaze flickers to yours, and he shoots you a wink with such speed that your husband hardly has the chase to catch it. It makes your stomach flip with an allure and vehemence that nearly unseats your stern concentration.The feeling that rises in you isn’t love. It’s not even interest.

It’s fear.

He trails you like a shadow.

You can’t blame him; you know that he acts on your husband’s orders. Blofeld worries for your youth, and fears the possibility that you may stray. You have a guard set on you every day and night. On the evenings that you don’t spend with Blofeld, you sleep with Bond posted just inside your door on your husband’s insistence, ensuring that your bed remains empty, and cold.

On those nights that he occupies the stool beside your door, you sleep very little. He stays awake out of a sense of duty; you stay awake with the lingering, heavy knowledge of the man just a few feet away. You know that he’s popular with the ladies of court. He can’t stride or ride by without inspiring the twittering of giggles and whispers by the ladies gazing from behind their fans, or over the tops of their books. You hear of his bawdy teasing, his warm smiles, his winks. You’ve never been privy to them, save for the single flash of a wink as he swore his oath to you, and to Blofeld. When your protector’s name and nighttime companion are brought up in conversation among your ladies, you force a straight face regardless of their speculations and teasing. For all of your interest and fascination, you have no right, no daring to look toward a knight with interest.

Even if you did—even if you had any sort of designs on Bond, any interest in the way his gazes hold to yours, and the way his careful grasp lingers as he helps you from a horse or carriage—your affair would be nigh on impossible.

It’s no matter.

Your husband has spies in the court, so many that you have no trust in Bond’s exclusion among their number. You hardly trust your ladies maids. For all of their own secrets that they share, and their encouragement to trust them with the matters that occupy your head and heart, you shield yourself from them.

Well, from most of them.

Lady Eve is the only one of your ladies maids that came to Blofeld’s court with you when you were sent to wed him. She’s your only true confidant, quick with a smile and a joke if needed, and skilled at unsheathing her sharp tongue to guide the other ladies back into line if they begin to speak or act out of turn. She manages several duties that you wouldn’t trust others with: running messages, communicating with cooks and servants. Between Blofeld’s controlling insistences and Eve’s obliging care, you slowly build a wall around yourself, separating you from the court, and the people that look to your husband for guidance.

“You ought to try smiling one of these days.”

It’s not an unexpected criticism, but it’s certainly an unwanted one. You’d be happy to spend the afternoon in the garden in a companionable quiet, but it seems that she has other plans. You cast Eve a surly glance, but her smile remains bright and unwavering. Her hands work just as steadily, knitting needles clicking softly as she casts off.

“I mean it,” She insists, finally lowering her gaze to her work. “If you’re not careful, you’ll forget how.”

You sigh softly, shoulder slouching slightly as you look around the expanse of grass, and the vines creeping up the sides of the castle walls.

“I’ve no reason to smile.”

“You’re alive. Is that not reason enough?”

“No. It is not.”

“...You know what you ought to do.”

Your stomach churns with the conspiratorial edge to Eve’s voice. You glance toward her again to find her pointedly fixated on her craft.

“It would never work,” You insist.

“It could.”

“He would have my head.”

“Only if you were caught.”

Eve’s conspiratorial gaze flickers to you again, her smile widening. You can’t bring yourself to feel the same sense of mirth, of excitement.

“Your Majesty.”

You whirl around, spotting one of your husband’s advisors. Bond lingers not too far behind, his hand poised on his sword as if the man is a stranger—as if you’re about to ask him to take the advisor’s head off.

“The King insists on your presence in the throne room.”

You nod, stony-faced. “I will join him presently.”

The advisor gives a low bow before he turns, striding away without you. You shift up onto your knees, wobbling as the fabric of your dress catches beneath your shoe. Before you can tumble backward, a firm hand rests against your lower back, and another hand catches hold of your own flailing one. You freeze at the steady contact, your eyes widening as you look up at Bond. He draws you up gently. Your legs feel unsteady, even when you’re drawn to your full height, with your feet planted firmly on the ground. Bond’s arm skims against your side, his fingers flexing in the fabric of your desk as his thumb sweeps tenderly across the side of your hand. It sends heat skittering through your body, and sets your heart fluttering in your chest. Bond’s eyes search yours in silence, his brow scrunching slightly. Your gaze drops to his lips, and damnably lingers as his pink tongue sweeps across his lip.

You’re jolted by the clacking of Eve’s knitting needles, and the sound of her pointedly clearing her throat. You step out of Bond’s grasp, yanking your hand from his as you avert your nervous eyes.

“...Thank you, Sir James.”

“At your service, Your Majesty.”

You stalk around him with Eve hot at your heels. You feel him tracking you as you leave him standing alone in the garden.

He would have your head.

Blofeld is not known for a tendency toward kindness. He has a reputation for his traps, for tricking opponents into showing their hands for the purpose of identifying their weak spots. He makes no attempt to shield you from his bloodlust and cruelty. You take each instance of outward barbarism as a warning, each smiling goad and teasing admonition as a silent threat:

This could be you.

The festivities to celebrate the day of Blofeld’s birth are a mighty affair. The events are to last a week. Lords, ladies, vassals, and knights arrive from all over the kingdom. There are dances, plays, poetry readings—and most importantly, a tournament. Of all of these events, you know that it’s crucial that you’re present for the tournament. With all of his barbarity, Blofeld adores the play of war. He takes inordinate pleasure in watching his knights fight for his attention, and finds amusement in the spilling of their blood.

You have little interest in watching men beat one another senselessly, but you know that you must make a public showing, not only for your husband, but for the court, and his people.

For all of your impatience and disinterest, you can’t help but keep your eyes trained on Sir James. His form and composure are a fascinating sight. You see the man nearly every day, but hardly ever in this way. It bolsters your belief that should you be attacked in the night, the man hunkering by your door will protect you with his life—and come out cleanly on the other side.

When he approaches the stands on horseback before the joust, you’re certain that he’ll ask your husband to look on him with approval. But after he dips his head in deference toward your husband, he turns his attention to you.

“Your Majesty,” He speaks up loudly enough for others in the stands to hear him, “Would you do me the honor of allowing me to wear your favors today?”

You can see Blofeld turn to you expectantly out of the corner of your eye, and hear the murmur of others around you. In the two years you’ve been married to Blofeld, you’ve never given your favors to any knight—every knight has been too afraid of your husband to ask. And since the very first moment you saw Sir James, since he gave you that quick wink as he swore his fealty, he has avoided untoward outward displays of interest. This is hardly untoward, but you know that it’ll set tongues wagging among the court. Now, you rise from your seat, fingers twining in the rich purple fabric. Sir James raises his lance, resting it on the railing for the stand. You look down, fighting to steady your shaking fingers as you carefully tie and knot the favor around the lance’s blunted tip before you step back again. The two of you trade a genial nod before you lower yourself to sit on your cushioned seat again. With nothing else to hold to, you rest your hands on the arms of your seat.

It’s no great surprise that with his skill, Bond rises through the standings throughout the tournament. You watch time and again as he lowers his visor, tilts his lance, and sends his opponents off-kilter, or crashing through the ground. But his form, while near-perfect, is not invincible. Perhaps it’s just as well that the one man that matches him equally is the one that he’s closest to in court. In the rare moments that you’ve seen Bond relaxed, he’s been with Sir Felix. They were squires with the same knight, became warriors in the same war—and, if rumor is to be believed, became men with the same woman. They are as near to brothers as any two unrelated men could be.

Perhaps it’s this familiarity that drives them both to tilt with such ferocity—a ferocity that nearly knocks Bond from his horse during the second round. A gasp catches in your throat as James’ body is bounced, nearly prone in his saddle. It’s another moment before he straightens. As he removes his helmet, you can just make out his expression twisting with discomfort, his startled, dazed blinking as blood runs from his forehead, nearly obscuring one of his bright eyes. Your stomach flips, and you tighten your grip on the arms of the chair to keep from rising to your feet. You have a damnable urge to run to him, to use your sleeves to wipe the blood from his face, and insist that he leave the tournament to see a physician.

Bond just impatiently pushes his squire’s hand away as the young boy tries to clean the blood from his master’s head. Bond crams his helmet back onto his head and grasps his previously fallen lance. Your gaze darts between him and Sir Felix as each man takes up their positions. Blofeld leans in to you, mistaking your panic for rapt interest.

“Now all Felix has to do to finish him off is land a blow to James’ arm,” He says, “And he’ll win the championship.”

“Has he ever won before?” You ask.

“No. There’s yet to be a tournament that Bond hasn’t won. But that is all about to change.

Turning to look at your husband, you find his smile split wide into a bloodcurdling giddy grin. When he turns it toward you, you push a smile onto your lips, and murmur,

“If his defeat pleases you, then it shall please me.”

Blofeld’s grin manages to widen, and he claps his hand over yours with stinging force. You break your attention from one another as the thundering of hooves fills the air. Your gut tightens, your heart sinks—and then soars as a solid blow sends Felix tumbling from his horse and onto the ground. The crowd roars as James hoists his lance high in victory with your favor blowing in the wind, and you have to bite back your own sound of excitement. You feel Blofeld’s grip go slack, then drop away to grudgingly applaud Bond’s efforts.

Bond’s face is as victorious as he tosses off his helmet, despite the river of red obscuring part of his face. He turns finally to the stand again and slides from his horse, kneeling to Blofeld.

You know that Bond will be crowned champion. You’re certain that your husband is displeased.

For all of his cruelty, Blofeld hardly exerts that power over you in your bed chamber. You spend most nights alone, and it’s rare that he orders for you to join him. His birthday is always one such occasion. You resign yourself to a dispassionate evening—a handful of thrusts, an encouraging pat on your cheek, and a mumble of producing an heir before he rolls away from you. You’re certain that he spends most nights with other women.

You are at once grateful and pitying of their place in your husband’s affections.

Tonight, there is no knight in your chamber. It’s simply you, your husband, and the shock of Bond’s bright gaze and shining halo of hair in your mind’s eye.

You’re told of Bond’s carousing. Eve recounts how the evening unfolded to you as you breakfast together in your chambers. She tells you that Sir James and Sir Felix’s antics continued through the evening, starting with an arm wrestle, and ending with a drinking contest. She teases that Sir James was seen leaving the hall, following Lady Vesper into the night. The news unsettles you so much that you lower the last of your bread, unable to stomach it. For all of Eve’s teasing, she quiets when she notes your discomfort.

“...You would have enjoyed yourself,” She finally offers.

“I did enjoy myself.”

It’s a hollow insistence, and one that she knows as well as you is a lie.

Despite his victory and the whispers of his evening with Lady Vesper, Bond is as attentive and consistent with his attention toward you the following day. He has a bandage on his head, and you recognize a smear of salve that the physician uses on wounds. You go about your day as usual, fighting the urge to ask Bond if he needs rest, or if he’s in any pain, if he feels that your favors brought him any luck.

The question sits on your lips all day. In the evening, alone with him, you can’t bring yourself to quiet it anymore:

“Are you quite well?”

He hasn’t settled on his stool yet. He stands firm by the door, his hands clasped in front of himself. Surprise flits across his expression so quickly that you nearly don’t catch it, but he smooths it away again.

“Well, ma’am?”

You swallow thickly, tightening your robe around yourself and gesturing toward the bandage on his forehead.

“You took a hard hit at the tournament yesterday.”

His hand raises to it, but he stops and lowers his hand before he can touch it.

“I have taken worse.

“I’m sure.”

Perhaps that was a wrong thing to say; Bond’s gaze seems to narrow just a touch.

“I am well, ma’am.”

You give a short nod, mumbling, “Good,” Before you shuffle over to your bed. You blow out the remaining candles, plunging the room into darkness before you shrug your robe off and toss it aside. You curl up under the covers, curling your arms under your pillow and peering toward the window as you hear Bond lower himself to the stool. Tonight, you can’t abide by the quiet. Tonight, you find yourself fearing that you may have offended James when you simply meant to ask after his help.

“Goodnight, Sir James,” You murmur. You hear nothing for a few long moments, and you resign yourself to a cold loneliness. And then, so softly that you nearly miss it—

“Goodnight, ma’am.”

The trip is a mandatory one, and something that you’ve undertaken twice before. It’s customary for Blofeld to make the journey, as he has every year since he was a young boy. The trip is long and arduous, tracked over the same path time and time again. You school your focus and try to embroider or read, despite the lingering headache that it inspires. You’ve learned the hard way that Blofeld doesn't care for idle hands, even if the efforts are to your detriment.

Still, you squint narrowly, fighting to hold the book steady as the carriage rocks and jostles along the forest path. You push off the lingering fatigue that you feel, certain that if you nod off, Blofeld will level some whack or shove to bring you to again. It’s no use. Your eyelids begin to droop, and your head begins to hang over your book as your focus grows…dim…

You’re awakened at a thwack on the side of the carriage. Your eyes snap open, and you startle, shrieking when you spot an arrowhead buried beside your head in the wall of the carriage. You realize that the carriage has come to a standstill, and the air is filled with shouting voices and the hammering of hooves. The carriage door is flung open, and you cower as best you can as you hear Blofeld demanding, “Take her!”

You think that you may be greeted with the concern of one of your loyal knights, but shock and fear twine in your belly as an unfamiliar bandit shoves his face through the door. He gives you a sinister grin, showcasing his scant, yellow teeth before he grasps your wrist and yanks you roughly from the carriage. You scream as you’re dragged out into the cold, your face pelted with torrential rain. You try in vain to dig your heels in, struggling and tugged through the mud. You can hear a fight around you, the yowling of Blofeld’s commands in his thin, screeching voice. For all of your efforts, you’re pulled nearer and nearer to the tree line. You wobble, losing your footing as your toe catches on the root of a tree. You stumble, and are shoved to the ground as your attacker lets go of you. You shriek as he catches hold of your collar, yanking you along like a disloyal dog.

You draw in tight breaths, hands scrabbling with your clothing. You hear the thudding of boots running through mud before you’re abruptly dropped to the ground. Looking up, you hear the singing of steel, and the clash of it makes you wince, the sound grating to your ears. You recognize one of the knights as one of Blofeld’s men, but you can’t make out which. It’ll win. You scramble to stand, hands suctioning to the mud as you push yourself up before hurrying away from the road, deeper into the woods too dark to see which one—and for as much trust as you have in their skill, you have no certainty that they’s.

You pant as you run, looking back every few moments to ensure that there’s no one following you. When you see a shadow falling into step with you, your heart pounds impossibly harder, and you face forward, pushing your legs to pump harder than your screaming muscles ought to allow. Someone catches hold of your hand, and you scream as you’re yanked to turn. A gloved hand claps over your mouth, and familiar blue eyes catch on yours.

Sir James hushes you, snapping, “It’s me!”

You push his hand away from your mouth, heaving in greedy breaths. You glance around as you hear the clashing of steel, the shouts of men that must still be by the road. Sapped of speech by your panic, you allow him to pull you along through the woods, winding a path that you’ve never known and will never be able to remember. Night is falling as quickly as the rain tumbles from the sky, and it becomes harder and harder to keep up with Bond. You finally manage to yank your hand loose from his, leaning back against a tree. You’re weak with fatigue, and your lungs and legs are pained. Sir James turns to face you, glancing around the tree that you’ve leaned against.

“We cannot stop, ma’am.”

“I need—I need a moment,” You insist between pants, bracing your trembling body against the tree. Bond glances around you again, taking a couple more steps toward you cautiously.

“We need to get to safety before these woods grow too dark to travel.” He shifts his saddlebag on his shoulder, glancing over you as well as he can.

“Are you hurt?” He asks.

“No.”

“You’re shaking.”

“I’m cold.”

Sir James reaches out, gently sweeping a few drops of rain from your cheek. Heat pulses through you despite the chill, your lip wobbling a touch.

“Your Majesty,” He urges, “I know that you are tired, but we must go. There is an inn not far from here. We will room there for the night, and then we will find a way back to the castle, or to the king.”

The king. You hadn’t thought of Blofeld, had time enough to well up your righteous anger. It surges up so harshly and suddenly that it pushes your breath from your body in a harsh pant. You swallow thickly as the sound seems to rouse Bond’s concern.

“Alright,” You concede softly, “Alright. But…Must we run so fast?”

Bond’s lips twitch slightly, and you know that he’s fighting off amusement.

“Perhaps not quite so fast, Majesty.”

The inn is a ramshackle little thing compared to the castle that you’ve become accustomed to. You can’t help your embarrassment as passersby cast you curious and pitying looks, taking in your mud-soaked garments and chilled body. Your confusion is jolted when you hear Bond’s barked argument, the slamming of his first on the table. You turn toward him and find him staring the innkeeper down.

“I told you,” You hear Bond growl, “I will pay you in four days time.”

“You pay me now, or you sleep outside, in the mud.”

You start forward before you can stop yourself, yanking your wedding ring off of your finger and joining Bond at the table.

“This will cover it,” You insist primly, pressing it into the inn keeper’s hand, “Along with firewood, and meals. We will need hot water as well.”

The innkeeper seems stunned by the sight of the thick gold band encrusted with rubies. Shock radiates from Bond beside him. You keep your gaze on the innkeeper before you clear your throat firmly. The innkeeper snaps to, stumbling over himself to round the table. His words fumble, offering to take Bond’s saddlebag in the same breath that he urges you to follow him.

The room is nicer than you expected, but only slightly. There’s a large bed across from a fireplace, with a wool rug in the middle. There’s a shallow washbin in the corner with a pile of linen beside it, and a bar of soap sitting atop the fabric. Bond waves the servants carting the water deeper inside, and nods innkeeper away as he tries to further offer services. Bond simply insists that food and wine is brought as quickly as possible. Once he’s gone, Bond lowers his saddle bag. He looks around, catching sight of a solid partition divider. He takes hold of it, moving it around to the basin and setting it in front. You watch him stride back to his saddlebag then, drawing off his gloves and tossing them aside before he begins to look through his things. After a few moments, he draws out a long tunic, and rises.

“It…” His gaze drifts over your muddied clothing. “I’m sorry that it isn’t what you’re used to.”

You shake your head a touch.

“It is clean,” You insist, “And at this moment, that is all that matters.” You pluck it gently from his hands, muttering your thanks before you round behind the partition. You remove your soiled garments one by one, wincing at the dried mud crackling and dirtying the floor.

“If you give me your garments,” Bond’s voice rings out on the other side, “We’ll have them washed.”

Embarrassment churns your stomach, but you force it back and away in favor of throwing them over the divider. You wince as it rocks, then puff out a breath of relief as it settles without falling. After a moment, the cloth slips over the other side of the partition. You wash yourself as thoroughly as you can, scrubbing away the muck and the sweat and the panic. You feel yourself relaxing incrementally. It doesn’t disappear fully; it can’t, with you fully bare on one side of the partition, and your protector fully clothed and waiting just on the other side. Your heart flutters in your chest when you hear him move, or sigh, or clear his throat. Once you’re clean, you pull the light grey tunic on. The fabric is a little itchy, but it’s a far cry from the fabric you’re used to—lighter, and…Shorter. It hardly brushes your knees. You go warm with nerves as you gaze at the expanse of your bare legs that will be revealed to him. You’ve really no other choice, and you try to make peace with that.

You’re about to step from behind the partition when you hear the door open, and freeze. The murmur of Bond and the innkeeper’s voices exchanging food and soiled clothing drops away quickly enough, and is chased by the door behind closed again. You wait a few moments in testy silence before speaking up:

“May I come out now?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

You step out from around the partition, pointedly avoiding Bond’s eye as you walk to where plates laden with food have been set down on the wool rug.

“Smells good,” You mumble, lowering yourself to the floor. When Bond makes no response, you glance warily uup at him. You thrill when you find his gaze sweeping your bare skin with covetous fascination. When his eye catches on yours, it lingers. You’re a touch stunned by his boldness, though perhaps you ought not to be. This man sees you every day—but not like this. He finally turns from you, mumbling that he ought to freshen up. You sigh softly once he’s moved behind the partition, scooching closer to the fire and letting your legs stick out straight, warming your feet with the heat coming from the hearth. You wiggle your numbed and chilled toes, resting back on your hands as you listen to Bond disrobe, then the babbling sound of cloth being pressed into water, wrung out, and, presumably, scrubbed across his body.

What must he look like? You can only imagine—and you have imagined before. Seeing him at the tournament had only bolstered what you thought his body must look like, the expanse of muscle. Would there be a scar, or two? All accumulated before his squireship? Some during his knighthood, surely.

When Bond rounds the partition, pink-cheeked from his vigorous washing, he seems surprised.

“...Have you not eaten?”

You shake your head a little, pushing yourself to sit up straight.

“I was waiting for you.”

He seems even more stunned by the prospect, but he lowers himself to sit on the other side of the plates, and the pitcher of ale that had been brought up with the food. The taste is far sharper than the wine that you’re used to, and you just manage to stave off a wince. It warms you right through as well as the fire, and you take two deep swigs. You hear a soft huff, a warning of,

“Perhaps you ought to slow, ma’am. You’ve had nothing to eat.”

You grunt softly, setting the glass aside and using the long sleeve of the tunic to swipe at your messy mouth. The food isn’t much, but it is delicious. It’s nearly enough to fill you—and would be if there was only one of you there. Bond eats with less ravenous hunger than you do. Perhaps he’s less hungry; perhaps he’s doing his best to oblige you for the sake of how trying your day has been. Regardless, when you’ve finished, you lean back against the wall behind you. You point your toes again, wiggling and watching them as fatigue begins to creep up in the place of hunger.

“...I will get you home safely.”

Sir James offers it without provocation, and you wonder if your face has belied some concern, some confusion. You glance up toward him and find you watching him closely.

“I am sure of it,” You nod.

“And I am certain the king is well.”

You laugh bitterly, then. You can’t help the way it falls from your mouth, or force it away again in the twist of his confusion.

“I am sure,” You agree dryly. “I am sure he is well. God save him. God save the noble king.”

If Blofeld were there, he would order your head struck from your shoulders. If Bond relayed your words, you were certain you would face the gallows. But now, with your belly fool and your head swimming slightly from panic and ale, you can’t bring yourself to care. You take your tankard up again, wincing at the scent that rises from it, the low slosh of liquid.

“You shouldn’t have given that man your wedding ring,” Bond chides.

“He told them to take me,” You tell him. “When those…Men,” You spit it, “Came to the carriage, the King told them to—” Your breath hitches in your throat, hand tightening around the tankard further. You raise it and swallow roughly as tears prickle your eyes. You set it aside once it’s empty, sniffling as the tears rise further. For all of his cruelty, Blofeld’s blatant disregard for your life was a step too far. How were you to know whether or not he’d set the attack himself? You’d always feared that he’d grown tired of you, your charms.

You hardly registered the shift of Bond’s shadow until he’s standing over you.

“Are you still cold?” He asks softly. You nod, and Bond holds his hand out to you. You take it, allowing him to tug you to stand. You wobble a little, stilling only when his other hand rests on your hip to steady you. He tows you to the bed, and you let him push the covers back and nod you in. You scooch down against the mattress, pouting at the feeling of the odd piece of straw poking through. You watch as Bond turns his back, settling down on the wool rug again. You push yourself up onto your elbows, frowning.

“Where will you sleep?”

He turns to look at you, brows furrowing a touch.

“Here.” He gestures to the rug.

“But,” You shake your head, “You’ll freeze.”

“We’ve a fire.”

“We’ll take turns.”

“Ma’am.”

“We will.” You use your most imperious tone, but he doesn’t so much as blink.

“You need rest,” He insists.

“As do you. If you fall ill…” You consider for a moment. You know this man, a little. You think you know what may spur him to action. You force a slight pout, urging:

“What will I do without my protector?”

Darkness flashes across Bond’s gaze. It’s another moment before he pushes himself up again, walking around to the other side of the bed. He pushes the covers back, carefully lowering himself to the other side of the bed and tugging the sheets up around the two of you. You glance over toward him and find him stalwartly watching the ceiling. You hesitate before you finally scooch a little closer. His gaze skates sharply toward you, and you bite your lip to silence your panic.

“I’m still cold,” You mumble. Bond is quiet for a moment before he rolls onto his side, shifting closer.

“Give me your hands,” He urges softly. You roll onto your side as well, holding your hands up from beneath the covers. Bond cups them, drawing them close and puffing his hot breath against them. Your fingers twitch in his gentle grasp, and you shiver softly as his lips brush against your fingertips. You well up your courage, your want, your sorrow, and turn an index finger toward his lips, pressing it gently there. It’s a moment before he presses a tender kiss to it. You gently draw it back as if moving too fast will startle him, turning your finger toward yourself and pressing a kiss to it in turn. Bond’s gaze drops covetously to your lips, his own parted as his grip tightens on your other hand. You shift a touch closer, brushing the tip of your nose to his. His eyes hold steady on your lips, even with you this close.

“Your majesty,” He warns softly.

“Sir James—”

“We ought not to—”

“Please.”

Your plea seems to shock him. Perhaps he’s never heard a queen beg. Perhaps he can’t imagine her needing to. Perhaps what spurs him is his oath of fealty, to serve at your pleasure. Before you have any further time to question his motives, he dives in, pressing his mouth to yours.

There’s far more heat to the embrace than you’ve ever felt with Blofeld, and it’s hardly more than a kiss. But James’ jaw grasps warmly at your cheek, holding you steady as he spears his tongue between your lips. You whimper softly, raising your free hand to slip into his hair and keep him close. He draws away with a slick sound, and before you can whimper or whine, he pushes you onto his back, covering your body with his own. You splay your thighs for him, whimpering as his warm, solid body settles over you. Your fingers grapple with the fabric of his tunic, nails catching in the odd snag. James kisses you with an almost ravenous force, as if there’s some great fire in him that only your lips can quench.

James’ hips rock down against yours, and you quiver at the feeling of him hardening against your thigh. It’s not a sensation that you’re unfamiliar with, but you’ve never thrilled in the sensation in quite this way before. You tip your hips up toward him, letting out a pleading moan as your cunt throbs.

You expect it to be perfunctory, and you’re resigned to it. For all of Bond’s passionate kisses, you’re content with a handful of quick thrusts before settling into sleep and silence. But Bond pushes the fabric of your tunic up, drawing it over your head and off. You lick your lips as his kisses skim over your neck, brushing along your clavicle, then drifting over the swell of your breast. You suck in a soft, stunned breath as his tongue swipes out, swirling around one of your pebbling nipples before toying it tenderly between his lips. You bite your lip, desperate to stifle your moan as his thigh presses against your core. You don't know what possesses you, but your hips seem to roll on instinct, chasing the tantalizing pressure. Some part of you brushes against the muscle of his thigh, and your hips give a jolt of their own volition.

The sensation that ripples through you knocks loose an embarrassing moan. Bond’s smile goes rakish and wide, his hands and lips tenderly smoothing their way down your body. You’re dismayed as he draws his knee away, certain that your time together is nearing an end. But rather than spear into you as you expect, he pushes your thighs wide. You bite your lip as his finger trails gently over your slick, aching skin before you feel the tender brush of wet heat. You jump in shock, but Bond’s arm keeps your hips pinned to the bed as he gives your cunt another tender lick. Your body goes hot as you catch sight of his darkening eyes peering up at you in the dim light of the room. You push out a shaky breath, your hips giving an exploratory tip toward him. His eyelids flutter as he laves his tongue along your plumping lips. You slide your hands down over his head, chasing your stunned pleasure. Your mouth parts as you pant, as Bond laps and licks and teases you with his fingers and tongue.

For every tumble into your marriage bed, you’ve never felt yourself come alive like this before. You’d been a virgin when you met Blofeld, and have only ever been with him. For the scant whispers that have made their way back to you in court, you’ve never heard that Blofeld has any additional vigor or passion with the other ladies at court. You’ve just assumed that that is what the act of lovemaking was: quick, simple, and unenjoyable.

You’ve never been so happy to be so wrong.

When James hikes your leg up around his hip and eases into you, your mouth drops open in a wail. He claps his hand down over your mouth, shushing you softly. His already-bright eyes are brighter still with mirth; his lips and chin are slick from his lapping and teasing; color is rising in his cheeks.

“You don’t want them to know what we’re doing in here, do you?” He murmurs. “If they should learn whose ring that is, who you are…” He rolls his hips, “It’ll be both our heads.”

You nod slightly in agreement, cunt throbbing as his hips begin to drive more roughly. Your mouth drops, and you pant hotly against the broad stretch of his palm. The odd whimper and whine still slip from your lips as James fucks you with an almost leisurely pace. You’re used to a shove, a harsh pounding, a spill—but James lowers his hands and strokes reverently over your body, loving you with an unhurried pace, as if he has all the time in the world.

–

Waking is slow going. You immediately feel that something is…wrong. Your bed isn’t nearly as soft as it normally is; you can hear the calls of voices below, bellows for breakfast, and hot water, and for someone’s horse to be brought. You draw in a deep breath, shifting and wincing as a piece of hay jabs at your back. You still as you feel someone’s foot brush yours, then draw in a quiet breath as you feel James’ lips brush your shoulder. You turn your head to find him still blinking the sleep from his eyes. You raise your hand, gently stroking over his cheek. He smiles softly, tipping his head toward you and pressing another kiss to your skin. You let your hand slide down from his cheek before you roll onto your side. James’ smile drops away for a moment as you nudge his shoulder, urging him on to his back. It blooms again as you slide your leg over him, straddling his thighs. You let your gaze drift openly down his chest, trailing your fingers over fading scars and raised scratches from yesterday’s fight. You bow over him, nuzzling into his neck as his hands smooth over your back.

“How did you sleep?” He murmurs. You have to fight away a shiver at the sound of his voice, so much deeper than you’re used to hearing.

“Well enough.” You brush your cheek against his, drawing in the still-lingering scent of the soap that he’d used the night before.

“We’ll need to leave soon,” He warns. You don’t let him see you pout; you just hum your agreement as you tenderly draw his earlobe between your teeth, giving it a tug. You feel James’ hips twitch beneath you, and a little thrill curls in your stomach as James’ hands smooth over your thighs. Your body is a touch sore, but you know well enough that it’s a result from your stumbling through the woods as quickly as you could the day prior, and not from your night with your knight. You smile as James tips your head to the side, his nose nudging gently against yours before he catches your lips with his. You let out a happy little sigh, shifting atop him. Your cunt throbs as the apex of your thighs brushes against his muscled stomach. James’ hands raise to cup your cheeks, loosing a soft, encouraging hum as you begin to roll your hips down against him.

Your night of tender care has brought out a boldness in you that you’ve tempered for a long time. James urges you on, his hands closing around your hips and guiding your aimless grinding. He eases you back after a few moment, your plumping cunt catching against your opening.

You don’t need convincing, and he doesn’t need urging.

You’d clung to him as long as you were able, but your grip had grown slack as the castle had come into view. Sir James had lowered his hand, resting it gently atop yours.

“What do you say if he should ask where your wedding ring went?”

“I lost it in the woods,” You mumble obediently.

“And where we were?”

“It was dark, and I can’t remember.”

“Good girl.”

You press your face into his neck, grip tightening around him again.

“And if he should ask if you took care of me?” You murmur. James gives your hand a soft squeeze.

“That answer is at your discretion.”

He isn’t happy that you’re alive.

Blofeld manages to feign relief for a few seconds, but it quickly drops away, leaving behind an apparent disdain, one that you wouldn’t know if you hadn’t known him for so long. But you throw yourself at his feet, and sob, and swear that your only thought for days has been for his safety.

Blofeld insists on staying with you on your first night back, but he hardly touches you. It’s not for a lack of trying. You force yourself to curl up to him, to rest your forehead against his shoulder and grasp his hand, dropping kisses to his skin and pressing as close as you dare. It’s a relief that he doesn’t take as he likes, knowing that Sir James is just on the other side of the door.

He’s been your shadow for so long, but he sticks even closer now. James is hardly a step or two away from you these days, close enough that you can feel the heat of him bleeding through his armor as he lingers behind you.

Your bed is no longer cold in the evening, and James’ stool sits unattended. His body covers yours, his cock sheathed in your loving cunt as you bite your tongue and dig your fingernails into your muscles, silencing your moans and whimpers.

You’ve never known what it was to be cuddled and held through the night, to wake up day after day with the press of lips to your forehead, a murmur of, “I must go,” and, “I shall see you soon.” He’s always at your side, in your bed, in your arms. Sir James gives you the constancy that you were meant to expect from your husband. It occurs to you that you are breaking your marriage covenant, that your actions may lead to trouble, to Hell.

But as you peer up into James’ eyes, and tenderly swipe the beads of sweat from his forehead as his cock softens inside you, you realize that you’ll take your steps into the underworld happily.

He begins to openly slight other women. Lady Vesper makes her advances. She flirts in the dining hall, and makes eyes as she sits with you and your other ladies maids. You can’t help but glance toward Sir James as she does, as she bats her eyelashes and pushes out her chest. They’re valiant attempts for a valiant man, but Sir James keeps his gaze focused ahead of himself, hardly flinching, not even bothering to give her a wink. It makes your smile widen villainously as you lean back in your seat, raising your book to cover your grinning face.

“They want you, you know,” You murmur. James shifts his head questioningly on the pillows, tipping his head to the side as you ghost your lips over his strong chest.

“My ladies,” You clarify, waggling your brows. He smiles a touch, raising a hand to stroke your cheek.

“I haven’t noticed.”

“Oh, no? It’s been difficult for me not to notice,” You argue.

“I’ve no interest.”

“None?”

James grasps your jaw gently, tipping your chin up to meet his gaze. His eyes bore warmly into yours, mischief and affection sparkling in his gaze.

“Whose bed am I in now?”

Your skin heats at the reminder.

“Mine,” You murmur.

“And you think I care for anyone else’s affection?”

“Your king’s?”

James gives you a shove that catches you off-guard. You land on your back, sucking in a gasp as he grasps your thigh and tugs you closer. You lay flat and open beneath him, heart pounding in your chest.

“I have no king,” He swears. “Only you.”

It’s Eve to notice it first, and it’s no great shock. You don’t think of it at first—you have other things on your mind. Your body is constantly aching; you’re so satisfied that you simply don’t think of it.

But after two weeks—after she grasps your arm upon your waking and asks if your courses have stopped—your heart plummets.

You don’t call for a doctor. You think that perhaps you’re merely late. But you know, deep down, that that simply can’t be it. You haven’t been with your husband in months, not since your birthday—not since you tried and failed to entice him on your return. There’s no doubt of whose it is.

James groans, shoving your hips more harshly against the castle wall as his hips push more insistently against you. You’ve taken your leave early from a banquet, pleaded your shadow to follow you into an alcove so that you might have a chance to talk, unable to wait until you reach your bed chamber.

A child.

His hands had grasped and tugged at your skirts, spreading you wide in the darkness and pressing into you as if he can give you another just now. You press your face into his neck, muffling your moans.

“I have nothing but you,” He growls, sliding his hand down to smooth over your belly, “We have nothing but this.”

“It isn’t safe for us here.”

He murmurs it against your hair as he smooths his hand up your bare back. You consider for a moment, fingers trailing over his shoulder as sunlight begins to creep into the room.

“Where could we go?”

“France.”

You frown, tipping your chin up to get a better look at him. His gaze is fixed on the ceiling as he adds, “Blofeld only has enemies there. We are to become traitors to the crown.”

“We are already traitors to the crown.”

James hums in soft concession, and you let your eyes slide closed.

“When would we leave?” You mumble.

“As soon as we possibly can ”

“And how?”

“You leave it to me.”

“But James—”

He looks down, running his thumb over your lower lip and silencing you.

“Do you trust me?”

You turn your head, pressing a kiss to his thumb.

“Of course I do.”

His smile widens as he ducks in for a gentle kiss.

“Then you leave it to me.”

Tag list: @missredherring ; @fantasticcopeaglepasta ; @massivecolorspygiant ; @blueeyesatnight; @amneris21 ; @youngkenobilove ; @carbonated-beverage ; @lorecraft ; @moonlightburned ; @milf-trinity ; @millllenniawrites ; @chattychell ; @dihra-vesa ; @videogamesandpoorlifechoices ; @missswriter ; @thembosapphicclown ; @brandyllyn ; @wildmoonflower ; @buckybarneshairpullingkink ; @mad-girl-without-a-box ; @winchestershiresauce ;

#so anyway they escape and have the baby and die in obscurity in france and they're happy #James Bond x Reader #James Bond x You #James Bond/Reader #James Bond/You #James Bond fic #James Bond imagine #anon #asks #replies

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basilone · 4 months ago

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Can I request Benny x Darlene + ⁸⁴⁾ a steamed-up bathroom and cold floorboards, please? 💕

You most certainly can, thank you so much for sending this! 💙 Fair warning for this one, as it is one that packs a whole punch of feelings in it because it's a Benny/Darlene + post-stalag reunion... Also might give a tiny bit away about the state of another pairing in this particular narrative, but the main focus here very much is these two navigating Benny's homecoming.

Darlene shivers when the bedroom’s chill nips at her skin. It hadn’t been this cold when they’d first arrived – the same room they’d had last time when they were at the coast, the same comfortable bed that would get almost too warm in morning – but she supposes anything will feel colder than the steamed-up bathroom she’s just escaped from.

Escaped.

Her stomach twists at the notion. Feels like it’s sinking all the way down to her feet, plummeting abruptly toward the cold wooden floorboards without so much as a by-your-leave. Her hand shoots out before her next step becomes a stumble. She breathes, sharply, in through her nose and out through her mouth, when her fingers lock around the edge of the dresser beside the door.

Escaped is what the brass had said about Lot and Major Cleven, already back on base before all the rest of them had finally been brought home. Escaped, which Darlene supposes sounds like a prize you can win except for the part where she’s seen Lot’s hand shoot out simply to anchor Major Cleven’s trembling fist. Except for the part where they only sleep when lying together in the belly of their plane, but never in their separate bunks at night. She has seen Major Cleven’s body rest between Lot and everything else, as though their prison had created more shield than man out of him, and Lot’s eyes had followed Darlene’s every move through the plane with all the air of an animal that is not used to freedom.

She’s seen the same look in Ben’s eyes tonight.

Escaped wasn’t what they’d said about him. Liberated had been the term – the news, the joy, the pride – when they’d told her he was coming back to England.

Darlene scoffs to herself as she opens the dresser. She supposes it’s only apt to speak of liberation when you are sitting in some office back home, on some plush chair in the United States, ready to tell the people and the President that the boys are coming home. It’s a word to use in newspaper articles all right, becoming harder to stomach with every byline. Her own tummy roils at the thought of someone else telling her that Ben’s free. Liberated. She’s gonna damn well take a swing at the next fella proclaiming that sort of nonsense.

Her hands lock around the softest towel she can find. It’s softer than her hands, which are calloused and worn. Softer than the bedsheets, even, but Ben had met even those with a wonder he hadn’t…

Her fists tighten around the towel. Darlene swallows back the noise that threatens to claw out of her throat. Bites her tongue to stop it from rising again – halt that fucking wail, that horror of grief – and exhales past her teeth. Brings the towel up to her cheek to halt her lone tear in its tracks before it can multiply.

It’s not the place for tears. Not yet. She scrapes her throat. Blinks at herself in the mirror until her eyes stop blurring her freckles and the white lace of her top. Hold it the fuck together, Dar, she almost says out loud, except he’s in the warm bathroom next door and the walls here are too thin. She’s been telling herself she’ll cry later. Has been digging half-moon reminders of it into the palms of her hands since Lot’d come home and whispered a sorry into Darlene’s collar that had somehow managed to sound like an apology for all the goddamn hurt she’d caused. Has been biting it back since her arms had first locked around Benny – around what them damn Nazis had left of him, all bone and cold – and he’d been wet-cheeked enough for both of them already.

She exhales again. Clicks the dresser shut. Swings the door to the bathroom back open before the tears hit after all, welcoming its heat even though it’s gonna make her hair curl and frizz up to stay in it for long.

“Got ya a nice towel,” she announces needlessly, holding it aloft before dropping it onto the small stool beside the tub. “Knew I’d seen it somewhere in that damn dresser, hidin’ behind all them scratchier towels they want ya to use first.”

“You’re messing with their hotel business plan,” he replies, gaze gliding past the towel and straight back to her face. His mouth quirks a little, as if to signify how broadly he would’ve smiled about teasing her some months ago. “They’re going to make you pay extra for using that one.”

“I’d like to see ’em try,” snorts Darlene, vastly accustomed to all the ways in which people try and scam you out of having a good time. “Didn’t work last time we were here”– when they’d used towels like those for means other than a bath, which still brings color to her cheeks if she dwells on it too long –“and it sure as hell ain’t gon’ work on me now. They should be thankin’ us for comin’ back at all, given the damn sorry state of them pillows.”

Ben’s eyes are still soft when he looks at her. Impossibly soft, with some gentle twinkle of humor locked in them after all this time. He looks at her like he still recognizes her, from the top of her head where she’s piled most of her curls right down to her hands which are drawing small circles of comfort onto his skin. Like he still knows how to map every freckle on her skin – she’s seen his eyes follow familiar patterns, lips moving slightly as though the memory of kissing them is coming back to him the longer he looks at her – and like he remembers every detail of her eyes.

His hand is at her elbow, thumbing its crease. He doesn’t reply to her anymore, already drifting again amid the heat of the water and the touch of her fingertips. She scoots closer, as close as she can get without getting in the tub herself, and presses a close-mouthed kiss to the boniest part of his shoulder. Hears the soft rattle of his exhale. Hears the sniffle that follows it, with her lips still ghosting over his skin, with one of her stray curls tickling his collarbone, and silently blames the steam of the bathroom for misting over her own eyes.

“It’s all right,” she murmurs, summoning her last remaining vestiges what George had called bravery and what she’d dubbed foolishness. “Ben, it’s okay”– it’s not, it’s really not, but what the hell else is she gonna tell him? –“it’s all right, hey,” she hushes, leaning over to kiss the tear that’s slipping down his cheek away, “you’re here with me, all right? You’re home with me. We’re in that hotel ya dragged me to on our first weekend pass, that real long one ya’d wrangled without me even knowin’ it.” She smiles at the memory. Lets her smile rest against his cheek before kissing him again. “Thought it’d do us some good here. Ain’t nobody gon’ clock us getting into the same bed here. No write-ups happenin’. Just you an’ me.”

“Not…”

“Yeah?”

“Not a whole lot of use you’re getting,” he murmurs. “Not with… With this. Me.”

Darlene leans back just so she can fix him with the most beady-eyed stare she can muster. “You’re here, ain’t ya,” she deadpans, not even bothering to make it sound like a question. “I’m gon’ be the judge of use, Ben, Jesus Christ. Bein’ here with ya? Having…” She swallows, blinking, and almost curses as she sees the drip-drop of her own tears in his bathwater. “Having you back? Alive? Bein’ able ta… Goddamn it,” she sniffles, rubbing at her cheeks with a trembling hand, “being able ta hold ya? To kiss your cheek, to breathe ya in, to wake up with your arm around my waist? I dreamed about that the whole damn fucking time you was gone, ya hear? The whole goddamn time them Nazi fucks had ya locked up in there, I was thinkin’ about today. About right now, havin’ ya with me.”

“Dar…”

“Don’t talk to me about use, Ben,” she snaps, furiously blinking to stop herself from blubbering about the whole thing. “I ain’t in this relationship with ya just because the sex blows my fuckin’ mind, all right?” She pokes at his chest, unable to bite back a slight grin now that she’s gone and confessed that, and shakes her head as her fingers meet scar tissue that wasn’t there before. “You’re a goddamn idiot, Bernard DeMarco”– she laments, fingertips slipping beneath the water just so she can memorize that new scar –“if ya haven’t realized by now that I fucking love ya, I’d go fight the whole damn world to get to keep ya,” she whispers, hearing him go quieter than ever, “and I’d say yes to marryin’ ya in a heartbeat.”

It takes less than a heartbeat for his lips to find hers in a kiss that makes everything else go silent.

“Darling,” he murmurs, after, voice almost catching on the ache that resides inside it. “Darlene”– he exhales, breath a mere flutter against her cheek –“darling Darlene.” Ben’s lips find that little freckle, high up on her cheekbone, that he’d once proudly proclaimed was his favorite. “I love you too.”

He makes it sound like freedom.

#mota fanfic #bernard demarco #benny demarco #oc: darlene #benny x darlene #basilonefic #they are just sooooo !!!!

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m1d-45 · 2 years ago

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i NEED xiao writings in my BLOOD STREAM arghmfhashrgh (snarling) (crawling darkly)

what if reader shows not-so-subtle favoritism to xiao, even after the whole impostor hunt? i want this man to WEEP.

maybe reader takes him up as a bodyguard of sorts, taking him around from place to place like he’s their happy little charm.

But even if reader just can’t get enough of (their scrunkly boogly bloop) - xiao, old habits die hard. sometimes when he makes a sudden move at reader, such as to catch their fall, reader still flinches. nightmares of the scarring past are common, and when they wake up to see their beloved guard hovering over them in concern, reader can’t help but yelp and shield themself with their arms.

but oh, oh no no. reader couldn’t bear to tell xiao about the dreams they have, like he kindly requests them to. then they’d have to tell him about the gruesome nightmares of him nearly tearing them apart ! that would make him awfully sad.

it would be a real shame if he found out, considering how you obviously avoid his gaze and touch during those nights. how you have a bad habit of sleep talking, when your body cannot hold in its terror.

but surely if he did find out, reverting to his small finch form as not to scare you, you’d still cradle him in your hands as if he were a fragile chick. whispering comforting words as you caress his wings, nuzzling his small head.

poor little guy awwww :((

poor little scringle :(((((

i’ve been meaning to do something w xiao post imposter au but like… this..

xiao who knows you’re afraid of him, who can’t even blame you or be upset. xiao unsure if he should try and wake you up, if it’s worth seeing the terror in your eyes when you realize who’s next to you. he wonders if it’s worth bringing you back to reality if it’s just as dangerous as your dreams.

typically he teleports out the second you’re awake as to not scare you—the glimpse of shadow he leaves behind undoes a lot of it—but one night your hand jerked and grabbed is, and in an attempt not to teleport you into the roof of the inn, he accidentally shifts into his bird form.

you blink awake, disoriented, feeling something wriggle in your palm. you sit up blearily, bringing your hand to your lap, and see a bright blue bird in your hand. it stares up at you with wide gold eyes, seeming just as startled as you are. you open your hand a little further, encouraging it to fly away—how did it even get inside??—but it doesn’t. instead, it hops closer to your fingers, bending to butt it’s head at them. you carefully close your hand again, stroking its side with your thumb, and the bird seems satisfied.

your mouth pulls into the smile, and the little blue bird closes its eyes.

#m1d : [chats]#m1d : [secrets]#bird!xiao shenanigans #first off can i say i adore the use of color in this ask. absolutely made it so much more tolerable to read #that sounds bad- i mean big chunks of text can be hard to read #this doesn’t even have that big of paragraphs- yk i’ll just shut up now #thank you anon

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communicationthroughlyrics · 1 year ago

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I Like Your Blood On My Teeth Just A Little Too Much - 1

You're a former military, career oriented security executive who has made quite the living for yourself- but it has always been lacking. Your non-committal attitude has led you down a playgirl lifestyle, never really settling. What happens when your new boss throws you a curveball, and as a result? You end up hopelessly involved with a Hollywood starlet.

Here it is, the first story. Chapter numero uno. No smutty stuff yet, but it'll be incoming. If y'all like it, I'll keep posting. It will be a series. A long one, the plot needs to thicken. Bonus points if you can tell where the lyrics are from XD

3K Word Count

Chapter One- Are You At One, Or Do You Lie?

You stood on a patio, gripping your fresh mug of coffee as you gazed out towards the vast landscape that lay to the front of you. Sleep had eluded you all night, and when the decision had finally been made that you weren’t going to receive a restful slumber- you groggily made your way to the kitchen of mountain home for a source of fuel. Bundled in your favorite zip up hoodie and some fleece lined sweatpants, you made a strong cup of coffee and slowly made your way to the best part of the home (at least, to you).

This place you called home was far from most’s idea of humble and conservative, but to you it was a dream, and it was the perfect place to escape your tiny city apartment. Those who you trusted enough to bring here, upon their first visit could not believe that the slummy 600 sqft. apartment you slept in within city limits belonged to the same person who owned this chateau. It was easily ten times the size, housed your selection of transport handily- and allowed you to tinker and build to your hearts desire- in your free time.

Free time was a concept that had eluded you the past 8 months. This was the first time you had been able to escape the demanding requests of what allowed you such luxuries- your job that you had once loved. It allowed you to live this lifestyle of multiple residences, cars of your dreams, and a comfortable living since your early graduation from college, and you couldn’t help but feel a sense of gratitude for that. Of late, the very job you swore you owed your happiness and gratitude for had completely drained you of all satisfaction you once held. The switch to a new management company and new bosses has made your life a living hell, and you were simply exhausted. You had spent the last year helping to roll everything over for this new ownership group, working tirelessly and many times staying at your corner office in a posh downtown Los Angeles high-rise, sleeping on the sofa that sat across desk.

Being a high ranking executive officer for a government-trusted security firm, you saw everything. The early exit from college sent you straight to the military- quickly earning the respect of all around you, and you worked the ranks within your 6 years in the US Army as fast as anyone ever had- particularly for a woman. Holding the title of a three star general was sheer insanity, with which no one thought it was a possibility to obtain a rank that high, that quickly- not without the drama and rumors, at least. That is what made you discharge with honors, quickly accepting your current position as the Chief Executive to Internal Affairs, which was a fancy way of saying you were in charge of the clean-up. You handled all internal affairs, information leaks, and other messes that someone’s lackadaisical attitude or poor judgment had created. You were also a secret weapon, of sorts. Many mistook your title as one where your hands never got dirty, you would have someone handle your “dirty work”. Oh, the fact that you handled it personally messed with many of the poor soul’s minds with whom you had to scour their mistakes and tie up any loose ends.

You were leaning up against one of the main support logs with your steaming cup, a timber that held the weight of a massive roofline, shielding your best mountain view from too much weather. The only lights on were the under cabinet lights in your kitchen, which was 30 or so feet behind you, behind a wall of glass that you demanded the house be built around. You had all but built the majority of the house yourself, the lack of control was too much- only contracting out the major structural aspects and work that was too involved for you to do alone. You had also purchased a fair amount of land surrounding your escape, to the tune of a few thousand acres. You wanted to ensure the utmost in privacy, and also security. Your career ensured that you made more than a lifetimes worth of enemies, as you more often than not cost them their jobs, at least.

Sometimes you cost people all but their lives, but made them wish you had just taken that instead. To this you had long since steeled your emotions to this, as it was a part of the business. The land included a large lake- so even on frigid night like tonight, you found solace in coming outside with something to warm your hands, while gazing at the reflection of the mountains and the nighttime sky reflecting in its calm waters, your boat barely moving against its dock. As you found yourself becoming more and more entranced by the view in front of you, the ever so slightly lightening of the sky before you and the vibration of the watch on your wrist told you that you needed to try and get at lest a few hours sleep, so you begrudgingly turned around, and placed the half empty mug of coffee in the sink, before slinking over to your sofa and flinging your exhausted form onto it, and turning into its back for a nap. Today was going to be a big day, so you needed some rest.

Your eyes opened right before your alarm went off on your cell phone, and you slowly sat up and groaned, muttering a “fuck” to yourself before standing up and stretching your sore body. You shuffled off to the master suite upstairs, quickly discarding the hoodie and sweatpants before walking into the shower to fire up its multitude of jets and shower heads with steaming water. You desperately needed to rinse off the lack of restful sleep and freshen up for your day. You grabbed a fresh towel from the linen cabinet that towered next to your side of the sprawling double vanity. The combination of wood and stone always calmed you- and it was evident in how this home was designed.

The shower you stepped inside of appeared as thought it had been cut out of a mountainside- with stone ledges holding all of your favorite soaps, shampoos and conditioners, and made you feel like you were showering in a waterfall. As the water cascaded and massaged at your aching form, you grabbed onto your soap of choice for the day, and lathered it all over your tattooed, chiseled body. Your parents had never been happy with your decision to tattoo the majority of your body, particularly the back of your neck. That had been the final straw of disappointment from you- they haven’t spoken to you since. Your childhood was highly conservative, as your dad was a southern, religious and military man himself, and your mom was the epitome of a housewife. She would bend to his opinion and will, as though she had no say of her own. While you deeply loved your mother, you could not stand to see how her opinions and values disappeared over time- being taken over by your strict fathers.

It’s not that you really mind that they cut you out- as you had always longed for your own sense of being, and hated living in your fathers shadow. The tattoos were at first seen as “acting out”, but they quickly realized that it went further than that, and you weren’t going to hear any of their disapproval regarding what you did with your body. The short hair dyed in any and every color, piercings that came and went, and ink were your way of displaying your current state. As you turned around to shut off the water, you reached out of the veil of steam that was flowing around the shower, and grabbed the towel hung on a convenient rack just on the outside of the showers walls, made to look like dead wood. You peered over at the large mirror, slicking back the dark brown and blonde streaked hair, leaning on the counter to truly see how exhausted you look. “You look like hell, Y/L/N.” You say to yourself in the mirror, before carrying on with your morning routine.

Opting for a navy blue pinstripe suit, with a black button up, you mussed your hair in the mirror, giving it your signature tousled look, before turning to weave the brown belt through the loops around your trim waist. You grabbed the matching pair of brown shoes out of your walk in closet, and slipped them onto your feet before turning and looking at your appearance in the mirror. You had always been an athletic kid, and the myriad of sports you were involved in growing up allowed you the luxury of a muscular build on your tall frame. You weren’t insanely tall, average for your family, but taller than most. You looked down as your watch vibrated on your wrist, reminding you that you needed to leave soon- otherwise your commute to work would take you past your typical start time, which was not the impression you wanted to set for the new bosses. You quickly spun around on the hardwood floor, grabbing your cologne from the wooden shelf, and spraying it onto your pulse point and wrists before grabbing the keys hanging below and making your way out of the bedroom and towards the other wing of your house- where all your toys were kept.

Typically you wouldn’t escape unless you had at least a few days to spend here, as this was seriously out of your way for a commute to work. But you needed the respite. Work had been abnormally stressful for you, as you were planning for a massive undertaking at work- a new security project that required the best of the best- so you were “volunteered” to be the only person for this mystery operation. You arrived in the warehouse of vehicles that were varying degrees of extravagance- from classic cars to modern exotics, you had your bases covered. You walked past them all, climbing a spiral staircase the the opposite end of the garage, and opening a hefty steel door and walking out to your helicopter. Your days in the military afforded you many things- a pilots license being one of them. You quickly climbed inside, placing the headset hanging from the ceiling next to you onto your head, and grabbing the aviator sunglasses on the seat next to you before switching all the necessary toggles and firing up the machine. You announced your presence to the nearby air traffic control tower- located in the neighboring city, before gently pulling the joystick between your legs and slowly raising the vehicle off of the ground, and up towards the city. The two hour flight to work would be plenty of time for you to get your mind into work mode.

You swiftly landed the helicopter on the rooftop of your workplace, only to be greeted by your new boss, as well as your assistant, Kris, waiting for you a safe distance off of the helipad. You hopped out of the copter, re-buttoning the top buttons of your pinstripe blazer, and walking towards the pair. Kris gently smiled your way, handing you a large cup of coffee, for which you were thankful. You nodded her way, raising your eyebrows so they could just be seen above your glasses as you too a sip of the liquid, then letting out a long sigh after swallowing the drink.

“Thank you.” You spoke quietly, and turned to your direct supervisor to shake his hand.

“Y/L/N. Good Morning, we have a lot to do today. I hope you are prepped and ready.” He lifted his head slightly, as he tried to make it like he was taller, so he could look down towards you.

“Yessir. I’ve been prepared for the last two months, sir.” You replied curtly as he turned and stalked back to the doorway that would descend back down to the executive level of the office.

“You look like shit, Y/N…” Kris whispered to you as you both walked behind your boss, a slight look of worry on her face. She had been one of the first people you met after you discharged from the military, and moved to Los Angeles. You had actually gotten her this job as your new assistant as she was one of the few you knew you could trust, and your former assistant had kept trying your patience and trust. She was dressed up more than usual, wearing a tight black pencil skirt, that fell just below her knees. It was slightly split up the back, and allowed you the slightest view of her toned thighs. She wore a dark green blouse, and her blonde hair was wrapped up in a bun, with her black glasses framing her piercingly grey eyes. That was the first thing you had noticed about the woman when you first met- how her eyes seemed to be so colorless, yet full of emotion. You both had tried the whole relationship thing- but with your lack of comfort within yourself to fully admit you were gay, and years of pretending you weren’t, being in the military and with your conservative parents- you had both decided that you couldn’t be together, but were mature enough to recognize that you both were good friends, and wouldn’t let the failed attempt ruin your friendship. But, the brief glimpse beyond your hardened, tattooed exterior allowed her to read you like a fucking book. And you hated it.

“Thanks, Sherlock.” You smirked over your coffee cup, as you approached the elevator to take you down towards your office.

“You’re working too much.” She stated flatly.

“No, I’m only doing what is necessary.” You state, and she rolls her eyes as you peel the glasses off your face, setting them on top of your hair. You briefly glance her direction to notice she rolls her eyes at you before the doors ding open, leading you towards a long marble lined hallway flanked by frosted glass doors and windows. You both walked towards the door that led you to your office.

“You never fly to McCall unless you can stay for a period of time. You flew there to stay the night? That’s not like you.” She was walking in front of you to be able to open the door before you approached it.

“Yeah, so? It’s my house. I can go if I want. What made you so sure I went there in the first place?” You asked pointedly, not meaning to come out that rude as you crossed the threshold to your office.

“Your car was still in the parking garage when I left last night. I came back up to check on you, but you were gone. I went upstairs and the heli was gone.” She narrowed her eyes in your direction. She always warned you not to burn the candle at both ends, but you did it anyways.

“You don’t need to check on me. I’m a grown ass woman, I will do what I need to for my job.”

“Y/N, this isn’t about work. You need to take care of you.” She spits back pointedly, before spinning on her heels and walking back out the door towards her office next door. You sighed, rubbing your hands on your face, before removing the blazer adorning your shoulders, and unbuttoning the cuffs to your black dress shirt, allowing you to slightly roll up the sleeves to show some of your inked skin. The holster you wore on your hip that housed your work pistol came off, to be sat next to your on your desk. You sat rather heavily into your large leather chair, taking a deep breath and opening your laptop to begin checking your emails.

You scrolled through every email, skimming them over, deleting the unnecessary ones, forwarding ones to Kris that she could handle, and finally your eyes fell upon the email you knew was coming. There was an attachment that was rather large, and you had to print it off before slipping it into a file and making your way towards the board room two floors down. You heard Kris’s door open as you opted to go down the stairs instead, and opened the door to lead you down towards your next assignment. You took the opportunity to glance at the file as you swiftly descended the stairs, and right as you approached the door to the correct floor, it opened up- causing your eyes to dart up and be met with a discontent gaze of your best friend. You blankly stared back as you walked by her, and made your way to the board room.

“Did you read any of that file yet?” She asked, shuffling a little bit quicker to catch up with you.

“Some of it, yes. Why are the names redacted? I have the highest security clearance of anyone here.” You turned to your assistant, who shrugged her shoulders, narrowing her eyes as she reached for the folder, to open the pages and confirm what you had already stated. You approached the door to the boardroom, the occupants of the room were obscured by heavily frosted glass, but you could hear a faint conversation. Kris shrugged, not knowing why, and stepped around you, to grab the door and hold it open for you. As you step inside the room, your eyes glance from person to person, astutely taking in their demeanors as your gaze bounces from person to person. First, your bosses, who were starting at you expectantly, and then to the people in the room you had no clue of- except one.

“Are you ready to start, Y/L/N?” The owner of your company asked. Your eyes remained locked onto the blonde bombshell sitting at the far end of the table, surrounded by people you assume are her assistants. You sit down at the opposite end of the table, without breaking eye contact.

“I thought we were a government military contractor, not some for-hire security outfit.” You state coldly as you sat next to your boss. He glared back at you, giving you the impression that this was not the time.

“We’re not for hire. But when someone asks for the best, they ask for us- more specifically, you, Y/L/N.” He quipped back. “And I shouldn’t have to remind you, that in this business- money talks. Back to business,” He says pointedly in your direction, earning a smirk from both blondes in your presence.

(CHAPTER 2)

A/N: Nothing like making your boss call you out in a meeting, amiright? Let me know what you think!

#communicatethrulyrics #scarlett johansson x fem!reader #scarlett johansson x reader #natasha x reader #natasha romanoff #scarlett johansson #scarlett johansson x you #scarlett johannsen #wlw fanfic #ILYBOMTJALTM

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agoodfictitle-shadowban · 1 year ago

Text

From Vormir, With Love - Part 2

Tags: strangers to lovers, love in space angst on earth, slavery mention, alien abduction, post Endgame, will add as we go on

Summary: As you're being chased you crash on Vormir. So far, so bad. But things take a turn when you come face to face with a marooned Black Widow.

[Part 1] [here] [Part 3]

Word count: 3.1k

A/n: after some nice vacations I'm back! Thanks for all your support, and I hope you'll like this chapter!

Taglist: tbd

You were right, June didn't like you bringing one more person along. An Avenger on top of it. Still, she simply gave one look to the newcomer, groaned, and went back to her repairs. You could work with that.

Now, you're hanging in the cockpit of your ship, looking at the star chart. In the five years you spent drifting into space, you never managed to find Earth again. Most Aliens don't care for humans, and don't know where they're from. As for star charts, they cost an arm and a half, so you have to work with the one you have - one which of course doesn't give the common names of planets in human language and no translator has cracked it.

"What are you doing?" The voice comes from behind you, covering the snores of the rest of the crew in the background. Sleep doesn't come as easy to you, even if you have the privilege to have your own bed. For tonight, you decided to give it up to Tim. He looked miserable after the fight with Natasha.

"Looking up at the stars," you answer simply, eyes still on the chart.

"What are you doing in space?" She asks after a moment of silence.

"What are you?" You retort, not even contemplating answering her question, and finally looking up at her. Now that you know who she is, bitterness is starting to build inside you, for her and all the so-called Mightiest Heroes of Earth. You take a deep breath, you don't want to lose focus. "I know for a fact Avengers don't travel that far out without a reason, and clearly something happened." You point at the Aliens who came back from the blip. "Cause those guys appeared out of nowhere three days ago. So, what's up with that?"

"So it worked…" she whispers at first, in a sort of wonder, and you understand she had something to do with all that. She looks at you, searches your face, and for a bit you think she won't answer you. And then she smirks. That surprises you. "You're a smart one, aren't you?" She puts her feet on the board and you glare at them as she keeps talking. "I was here to save everyone from the snap. It's good to see we succeeded." She seems genuinely happy about it, but also troubled.

You hum, and you wonder if that's truly for the best. Memories from the day of the Snap flood back to you.

You had never been that scared in your life before. You had no idea where you were, if you were even still on Earth - you guessed that you weren't, because those… people were clearly non-humans. You remembered going to the convenience store down your street, after a long shift at work. The night had already set for a few hours at the time, and as you were about to pay for your ramen pack and soda, those things came out of nowhere. You tried to hide, to fight, but it was no use. You remember thinking that maybe, just maybe, someone would come and help you. The cops, the military, anyone. Maybe SHIELD or the Avengers had detected that strange activity, somehow, and they were on their way. But no one came.

The aliens took all of you, all the ones that were in the store, and the next time you opened your eyes, you were in what looked like a ship.

You were kept in a cell with the clerk from the store - June, you learned, an engineering student who was working two jobs to pay for college - and food was coming from the ceiling in bags. You quickly realized it was sedated, and stopped eating until your stomach begged for something, anything. Some of the aliens were walking around, probably to keep an eye on the prisoners, and you quickly noticed that the only ones armed were those who had six eyes and a weird stone in the middle of their forehead. There were others, they looked like they were only doing maintenance or cleaning. They had a collar around their neck. This lasted maybe a week, and you kept praying that anytime, at any moment now, someone would come to save you. But once again, no one came.

And then one day… no one came again. No guards. The prison doors opened for apparently no reason, and you took a step outside. Was it a trap? Your naked feet walked alongside other prisoners. Besides June, you couldn't understand any of them - they were all aliens speaking different languages, and the other three humans were nowhere to be seen. You found weapons, and fought some of the aliens. You managed to outnumber most of them with the other prisoners. Soon enough, you were aboard a ship and on your way elsewhere. You remember looking at the star chart with so much hope. Home. It was right there.

Home is nowhere to be seen.

"I wish you could be as optimistic as you." You shake your head.

Now, those Aliens have more manpower than ever, and will certainly come after you again. You will need to lay low for some time before you can keep going on your quest for Earth.

"You're not happy," Natasha simply states. It feels like you're raining on her parade, so you decide to reassure her in order to keep the peace. There is also this weird feeling in your chest that makes you like her smirk, and the stupid spark in her eyes, so you might as well try to keep it there even just for some personal gratification.

"No, it's probably good. Means more people to help us get back to Earth. Which, you wouldn't happen to have a star chart on you?"

"No. But I might know someone who does." Here is the smirk again, thinning her full lips that you could kiss right now if she is telling the truth. You lunge towards her and put your hands on her upper arms, one on each side, squeezing her. She looks surprised, eyes wide, almost ready to fight but she keeps it in her.

"Wait? Are you for real?! This would be fantastic!"

"Why don't we calm down first, hm?"

You want to throw a party and dance of joy. "Calm down? It's been more than five years!" You whisper yell to not wake up your guests. "I can finally go home!"

She decides you're a lost cause when she sees you walk towards June's quarters and almost fall from dancing happily between the bodies sleeping on the ground. Somehow, seeing this after the past few days makes her smirk slightly, her heart lighter. You disappear around a corner just as the memory hits.

When she opened her eyes, it was to a dark sky and crimson surroundings. Her clothes were damp from the small pools of water under her. Not far was the sharp cliff she jumped from. She remembered the last thing she saw. Clint. She sat up. He was nowhere to be seen, and she wondered if her sacrifice didn't work, because right now, she was very much alive. No. She should still be dead. She should still be… free. She swallowed. She never wanted to die. But. But… she stood up, as tired as ever, and checked her equipment. Her Widow's bites were fried, as were her comms, but she still had her sidearm. Now, she had to find Clint.

He was nowhere to be seen, she realized once she came back up the cliff. No one was here anymore, not even Red Skull, she was all alone. Alone. She was used to it, it was fine.

She checked her comms again. Still nothing, not even statics.

She sat down on the same rocks as earlier. Was it earlier? She searched around her pockets, and found her phone. She was barely able to make it work, but soon enough she realized what her problem was. She was back to today's time, after she left for the past. Clint wasn't here, not because he abandoned her, because the last time he was had been years ago. It suddenly made sense. What didn't was why she was here. But for now, she had a much more pressing question: how was she going to go back to Earth?

Luckily, fate gave her a quick answer.

In the horizon, light caught her eye. Someone was crashing here, and she would only hope to get to you before you left again. With no time to lose, she started her walk.

"Are you sure she isn't brain dead? 'Cause she ain't answering." June's voice brings Natasha back to the present. She arches an eyebrow and tilts her head the slightest in her direction.

"See, not dead," you say in triomph.

"Why don't you stop talking about me like I'm not here." Her tone is harsh, and it shuts up both of you. You rub the back of your neck and look away, ashamed, while June just crosses her arms almost in defiance. It's still enough to get back to the main subject.

"Whatever," June starts, "do you really know people who could help us?"

The irreverence aside, there is some fear in her voice, and it quickly clicks in Natasha's head: she's scared to get her hopes up. It's a fear she understood all too well; hope is always the first step towards disappointment. Hope is dangerous. But sometimes it's all you have, and she isn't about to disappoint those lost women.

"Yes, we just need to find them."

"And who are they exactly?" asks a very guarded June. You elbow her, and she simply send you a glare, ignoring your suddenly very shiny personality. You'd never been one to be pessimistic, despite everything that happened, you just knew how to hide it, but right now you were almost beaming with joy.

"Carol Danvers, ideally, then Peter Quill, or Thor, one of the two if we don't have a choice." She shrugs like this will be easy. To be fair, they are very well known individuals. June looks at you to see if you know who she's talking about, since you're well informed usually. You are always the one going outside the ship to find the missions. It takes you a second to know exactly who she's talking about, and you nod.

"Carol is our best bet, anyone with authority has a way to contact her. We can just go to the federation probably, but the Nova Corps could be closer. I think they have an outpost a few jumps away…" You're already thinking, looking back at your star chart to find the closest place where you can contact Marvel, or whoever the other two were - well, Thor you know, but the name of Peter Quill sounds made up, even if it titillates your brain. "I'll check the radio as soon as we leave Vormir's atmosphere. Something is blocking the communications."

June nods, then looks at Natasha with distrustful eyes. "You better be telling the truth or you'll pray you did."

Somehow, the threat works on you too and you move on your seat in discomfort. June always was the more serious of the two of you, and held an even bigger grudge against the Avengers than you did. It reminds you that maybe you should distrust a spy a little bit more, as you eye the ship's console. Natasha is less impressed, but still takes things seriously.

"I am," she simply reaffirms in all seriousness. You observe her, and she seems genuine to you. It looks like it's enough for June too, because she simply goes back to her bed.

"Sorry for June," you say when she's out of earshot. "She's… we both went through a lot. Makes things hard." Hard to trust, hard to forgive. You're happy that she could help, but you also know tomorrow the bitterness will still be there. Of course, Natasha knows too well what you mean, the vulnerability that comes with the short explanation, and she offers a simple nod in understanding, her eyes expressing all of her empathy.

You're thankful for it.

A small silence establishes itself, during which you look each other in the eyes. It's easy to fall in hers, the infinite pool of water so inviting, so full of hurt to learn and comfort to find. You could read a full life, and something more, a spark no one else had. It lasts a few seconds, before you get back to the star chart, and she stands up to go get some water. When she comes back, she brings some to you, and you thank her in a whisper. She starts to clean her weapons and tinkers with her widow bites to try and repair them. While she does that, she notices you talking to yourself when you plan your next course and smiles slightly while looking down. Her lips crack from three days spent in what was virtually a desert.

Somehow, it makes her think of home.

Everything is ready for take off, and as your hand hovers over the handle ,you send a look to June. She gives you a thumbs up, but you know she isn't as sure as she looks, you know she probably thinks there is a small uncertain chance you will crash again and not survive this time. But with the help of Natasha - turns out she's a good mechanic at least - and some of the maintenance crew, you managed to repair the ship earlier than June told you the first time.

"Okay, up and away we go," you whisper to yourself as you push the thrusters. "Let's hope."

The ship shakes under the building pressure, but it holds. You push them some more as you gain elevation, the ground further and further away, and before you know it, you manage to leave Vormir's atmosphere.

You let out a breath of relief.

The ship stabilizes under you, and you send a thumbs up to June this time. As you go back to the console, your gaze crosses with Natasha's, and you exchange a small smile. You only had brief talks since she joined you, but she always was nice to everyone, if a bit short with Tim. The giant humanoid feline was still suspicious of her, the same way he was suspicious of almost everyone. You mainly tried to ignore the small brewing conflict, but it was getting harder. For now, you were simply happy to be back in space and not in pieces.

"We're green across the board," you announced, and everyone let the reassurance lift the weight off their shoulders. You then focus back on the ship. You still had to have the autopilot calibrated to the nearest jump point that would allow you to access the Nova Corps, then, if you were lucky, Earth.

It takes you little time to get the autopilot calibrated, and once you do you notice Natasha is still watching you, where the others simply went back to their activities. She's leaning against the hull, her arms crossed, a spark of curiosity in her eyes.

"How did you learn to pilot?"

"Observation. When we… commandeered this ship–"

"You stole it?" She raises an eyebrow.

"They were bad people." She nods, and you continue. "We had aliens with us. I just watched them pilot and learned via observation."

"Not everyone could have done that. What did you do back on Earth?" Her interest starts to make you the slightest uncomfortable, but you simply answer with a shrug.

"I worked some job that barely matters anymore."

"Never had a flying lesson?"

You shake your head no, and you notice admiration in her traits. It seems like you impressed her.

"I'm impressed," she confirms. "It takes some exceptional skills to pick up something like that."

Somehow, it makes you blush slightly and your chest rises with pride. You look away to hide it as you feel conflicted, and decide it's probably because the only other person you spent time with the past few years has been June, and she's not one to show admiration for others. Definitely nothing to do with Natasha herself being incredibly competent, and pretty. Very pretty.

Your eyes can't help but wander back to her when you notice the way the dim lights from the ship are highlighting her sharp jaw and her cheekbones, her long lashes projecting their shadows on her delicate skin. You realize you're staring, and that she's actually staring back. It makes you slightly uncomfortable, as you feel that after five years, there isn't much to look at, so you decide to break the brief silence.

"It's not… maybe a bit but– you know, you look tired. Maybe you should rest or something?" You fumble to change the subject. She has the audacity to smirk, and you want to cross your arms like a petulant child who's been caught in the cookie jar. But she's nice, and simply agrees.

"I should. You should too, commander." There is some teasing behind her voice, and you sputter a bit. She doesn't wait for an answer before she ducks back to the other side of the ship.

You stay there for a minute, trying to process the whole conversation. Was she…? Was that flirting? No. No way. You frown, trying to understand what just happened.

"Nope, no way. She's right I'm just tired," you finally settle on. You stand up and go back to the living side of the ship, asking Tim to keep an eye on the trajectory before you join your bunk. It was more a hole in the wall with a mattress stuck in it than anything else, but it was yours. There was another bunk on top of yours, where you kept some of your stuff before the arrival of everyone, but it had been cleared to give space to them. On the other side of the room, there is the same configuration, and on the top bunk you can make the silhouette of the spy.

It's the last thing you see before you fall asleep, and you wonder how long the newfound safety you felt is going to last.

#natasha romanoff #natasha romanoff x reader #natasha x reader #natasha imagine #natasha #idk how to tag #fvwl

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