#a mere star in an endless night - in character

[yandere-romanticaa]

˚˖𓍢ִ໋🍒✧˚.🎀༘⋆ 𝐛𝐨𝐝𝐲 𝐞𝐥𝐞𝐜𝐭𝐫𝐢𝐜.

❝ heaven is my baby, suicide's her father, opulence is the end. ❞ - lana del rey.

various! yandere! honkai star rail men on how they claim you ~

🎀 I just wanted to make a little post which features my favorite male HSR characters lolz. Also, there's zero reason why I picked the song for the title other than the fact that it is for the ✨ aesthetic ✨!

❥ 𝐉𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐘𝐔𝐀𝐍 !

What better way than to leave a mark on his beloved than by his mere presence alone? Jing Yuan is a simple man in his core, even if his tactical nature or even mischievous side can get carried away at times, The General is all too aware of his influence on the Lofu.

The sun could stop shining, the sky could fall and darkness could envelop the whole galaxy but not even that could erase the impact that Jing Yuan has left on you.

Wandering eyes follow you everywhere you go, quaint whispers have become a daily occurrence for you as the entirety of the Lofu knows who you lover is. Some praise and envy your position as The General is known to be handsome, kind and strong. They secretly spit at you and curse your very existence, nasty jealousy rotting them to their core as you march on like a solider to war, aimless and uncertain.

There is also of course the opposite end of the spectrum - adoring fans who just gush about your so called relationship with the dashing general. Hours are wasted scrolling away on your phone as you browse through the endless sea of lovey dovey articles, pictures taken you weren't even aware of that existed, and a plethora of other things you could even bother to remember.

All he needed to do was to just give you a nice golden collar to seal the deal. At least that would be the more obvious way of him trying to brand you as his own sweetheart.

He had his own little secret though. A velvet box was kept hidden away in his desk, ready to be opened on a special occasion.

Depending on how you got on with the general in the future, the little thing in the box was either going to make you the happiest person in the world or, he really would finally shackle you with gold.

❥ 𝐒𝐔𝐍𝐃𝐀𝐘 !

Sunday, ever the gentleman, would try to remain subtle about his feelings towards you in public. There are just some things that you do not do, nor share with the outside world.

This is a rule he always tells you to follow.

Still, all he needs to do is to speak. Honeyed words fall from his lips like candy, always so sweet, so addictive, so passionate. Even a man like Sunday, who is known for keeping his cool, cannot hide his infatuation with you. He rambles and rambles, sometimes even losing himself in his thoughts as he sings his praises for you, like the lovesick fool that he is.

Sunday likes to think that he is being cool, suave, but he is literally anything but.

Sometimes, he gets a little too carried away. Sometimes, his darker desires get the better of him, which can set you off a little. He's always so sweet and apologetic whenever he upsets you...

Please, he says through gritted teeth.

Don't mind my ramblings. They don't mean anything. Truly, they do not.

Disregard those pleas entirely as they are nothing but hollow. All one needs to do is to look into his crazed eyes, and that is where you will find out just how true everything he's saying really is.

❥ 𝐉𝐈𝐀𝐎𝐐𝐈𝐔 !

This sly fox has such a hard time keeping his hands to himself... In all honesty, can you even blame him? Whenever he sneaks up on you, Jiaoqiu cannot help but to place his hands literally anywhere on your soft body and he is not shy about showing his true feelings.

Bearing his pearly white fangs, Jiaoqiu likes to bite from time to time.

The desire to do so is further enhanced with every sweet noise you make. Now now, don't cover your mouth, be nice! Every squeal, sigh, groan, even scream are so precious to him... Don't deny him the pleasure of not being able to listen to you.

It's very cruel of you, he says with a pout.

In the cover of night, he likes to trace the markings he left on you with his tongue, maybe even adding even more marks in the process. If you bleed a little, it's all fine and dandy.

You always taste sweet to him.

And the thought of other people being able to see the red bruises which bloom into hideous purple in green bruises on your neck... My goodness, he thinks to himself.

He could just devour you whole.

[clericofgale]

The stars will be our bed

I'm seeing a very popular narrative that asking for physical sex during Gale's act 2 scene is better for his character development, and the astral scene is bad for him. Or at least not as good. While I do prefer the astral version more, I disagree with the notion that either one is better for Gale's plot development. I've done both options depending on the what felt right for that specific Tav at the time. As always, if that's the narrative you want to build, there's nothing wrong with it.

For me personally I think both are narratively sound for his character development. Yes Gale needs to know he doesn't need magic to be loved, but Gale also loves magic. It's his life, his passion and his artistic medium of choice. What he needs is balance, not total rejection. You want the man, and the magic.

"Tactful, Bowing to the player's desires"

If you insist on regular sex, that's the devnote that's attached to it. Gale is acquiescing to what you, the player wants. Gale wanted to share his magic with you, but you refused. He doesn't care either way, as long as he's spending the night with you. The approval numbers are the same. He obviously prefers the astral sex because it's what he's used to and confident in, but either is fine.

One thing we have to remember is Gale also uses magic to find connection. In the act 1 weave scene, Gale and you share thoughts over the weave. It's exactly what he's trying to do in Act 2 as well. It's a mind meld sequence using the weave. I don't think Gale is trying to use magic to as a front in this scene, despite the "I can wow you" sentence if you refuse. I think he's trying to share his inner self with magic as the canvas, and connect with you in this most intimate way. It's akin to Fane's scene in DOS2 where you share Source with each other and also mind meld.

Gale wants to distill a lifetime's worth of affection into one night because he feels he will die soon. The scene is his "Last Night Alive". Gale, the artist of the weave puts on his final and private show for his beloved. He weaves stars and invites light to the land of shadows. He's prepared for days for this whole sequence, and you only need to trust him.

If you do he leads you into his innermost world. First, where he feels safest, and the balcony that brings him comfort. Then the book of a thousand days and nights filled with his love for you. The amount of time he wishes he had left to show you his affection, physical or emotional.

But he only has one night.

"There are endless worlds out there. Countless ways to declare love. Infinite ways to express it. Too much for one night.. but we shall try."

The astral scene is him trying. He multiplies as he refuses to let go your hand. He caresses every part of your mind, body, and soul. Gale tries desperately to sear every fiber of your being, of the one he loves onto his own soul. He wants to feel everything you do, and the weave is capable of that.

"Your bodies and minds weave together in a masterpiece of intimacy. Never have you felt such wonder, such love - as vast as the universe itself, and just as heavenly. "

You are one and the same that night. Where Gale ends and you begin is a mystery; he is lost in you and you in him.

"We are all sensual vessels. Illusory magic lets us sail farther, and feel more deeply."

The scene is beautiful, both narratively and visually. This is not a man trying to use magic to demonstrate his worth so you won't leave him. This is a man trying to use magic to weave a tapestry from two spools of thread in one night. It's ok to let him do so. It's also ok to remind him he doesn't need to. Whichever feels right in that moment is the right choice.

They all end in giving Gale renewed hope. Magic was merely the medium on which it blossomed and thrived. Whether from a bed of stars or a bed conjured under it, your love is what gave it life.

Thanks for reading this way too long cold take.

[sirenjose]

Characters' Wishing Stars

(Updated to include every character's wish, then added more thoughts about more of the other wishes. Thoughts on Norton's/Fool's Gold's and Jose's are at the end)

Part 1 - Wishing Stars

Survivors

Lucky: I wish for good fortune for everyone! May the lucky star bless all!

Emily: May all be endowed with wellness and joy. May sickness be but a distant shadow in this world.

Freddy: I've made some mistakes, Martha, but I've never regretted loving you.

Kreacher: Set adrift toward the yonder, and let everyone know: Kreacher's ambitions shall be made manifest! Mark my words!

Emma: Father, Mother, are you well? Do you, too, gaze up at the stars this evening?

Servais: I wish to one day stand on the grandest stage of magic! That day will surely come.

Kurt: To live in this beautiful world is a blessing, and in the future, I hope to pursue adventures in higher, farther, and grander realms!

Naib: Will this lantern reach the rivers of my homeland? If so, I wish for it to tell her I'm doing well.

Martha: May each soul find sanctuary, never to lose oneself, never to drift astray.

Tracy: Changing the world might be too lofty an ideal, but I at least want to invent things that bring happiness to more people!

William: Someday, I will be acknowledged! Victory is the domain of the brave-those who defy adversity!

Helena: The night sky must be beautiful, just as it is in my imagination. If possible, I'd like to see this wonderful world with my own eyes someday.

Fiona: Mother, do you see? I've taken another step closer to the truth of this world.

Vera: Vera, I wish you well. It was all worth it.

Kevin: They say the departed become stars.. Even now, I still remain shamefully illuminated by your light.

Margaretha: In the not-too-distant future, there will surely be a stage as brilliant as this starry sky meant solely for me. This is my wish.

Eli: Stars, rivers, flowers. This is a beautiful dream I never anticipated, so please let this dream last a little longer.

Aesop: May this lantern find tranquil shores, as may I.

Norton: I want to live a better life.

Patricia: May fate judge all wrongdoing.

Murro: Well-being to all! I hope someone, somewhere, will remember Murro.

Mike: I wish to bring joy to more people and help everyone forget their troubles!

Jose: May all my loved ones embark on their own journeys, and may lighthouses guide them to safe harbors.

Demi: Brother, are you well? Are you admiring this starry sky too?

Victor: To whoever sees my letter and lantern, know that Victor wishes you eternal happiness.

Andrew: Though I cannot gaze directly upon the sun, this eve, I've beheld the most resplendent darkness. I am grateful for this night and for those who accompany me.

Luca: Those who march toward science and truth will not regret it. One day, I will prove everything.

Melly: What a beautiful night. I hope all those little lives be cherished, as they rest beneath the grass and leaves.

Edgar: The shifting starry sky hides endless beauty and mystery, and we mortals, mere chroniclers of this splendor, stand and gaze, as do I.

Ganji: I wish the people of my hometown healthy and prosperous. At least, tonight, I'm looking at the same sky as you.

Annie: May every child grow in peace and happiness. May every little toy cradle your grandest dreams.

Emil: I often forget the past, but from now on, every day shall brim with bliss. I wish that everyone could remember only happiness.

Ada: I wish for Emil's good health. May we all cherish the present and the love of others.

Orpheus: Fate pens the finest tales, so I hope everyone's story holds fewer regrets, twists, and at least, more favorable conclusions.

Memory: The stars are exceptionally beautiful tonight! I also wish to be a kind, loving person who brings happiness to everyone.

Weeping Clown: One day, when the audience watches Joker, they, too, will wear a genuine, satisfied smile.

Professor: I don't have any wishes, save for this lantern to journey far, far away.

Qi: May old companions fare well.

Frederick: The night always brings to mind fragments of the past and chaotic whispers, yet from such whispers, countless great inspirations arise.

Alice: Alice, follow the path you believe to be true, for earnest living begets serendipity.

Charles: Stars, please tell me - should I hold on a little longer?

Lily: I shall alter all through sheer endeavor, Simon.

Matthias: Will the moonlight shine on me… on Matthias?

Florian: The bright yet warmthless stars evoke memories of childhood Christmases.

Evelyn: Are you still searching for your destination.

Hunters

Leo: Lisa, may you grow up healthy and safe.

Joker: Come on! I wish for everyone to share in the madness and mirth with me!

Jack: Should I wish for clarity, or pray to forever bask in this enchanting night…

Bane: May no creature suffer harm. May the heart of humanity awaken to conscience.

Violetta: Oh, beautiful stars… I wish everyone well! I hope… I hope everyone can be loved.

Michiko: Love is bittersweet, and time ticks on without a care. Gazing at the moon always brings to mind those no longer with us.

Hastur: (There is no writing on the wishing star, but it shows signs of having been soaked in water.)

Wu Chang: May you be well, may the years be kind, and may lovers remain together in love.

Joseph: Does moonlight hold the power to turn back time? If such a thing were true, I'd wish to return to the time when you were still here.

Burke: It's too late for me to start making any wishes. But if everyone else is safe and happy, this old soul can rest easy.

Yidhra: (The wishing star is blank, but a fierce night wind blows upon beholding it.)

Robbie: I want a songbird that can fly to where my parents are and sing to them.

Luchino: Rather than making wishes, I believe humanity ought to strive for advancement through diligence.

Mary: The illusion of opulence has been shattered. Given another beginning, I'd choose to be the master of my destiny.

Bonbon: It's been a pleasure knowing you! Bonbon!

Ann: I'm lucky to have found a purpose in life. I hope everyone's kindness and faith will not be in vain.

Antonio: My violin bow, please play the most exquisite, unbound melodies.

Galatea: Stars above, please grant me more inspiration and opportunities to create beautiful works.

Percy: (The wishing star is unmarked, save for traces of motor oil, resembling a moon perhaps?)

Polun: We want money! Wealth! Fame! Of course, we want our dear father and mother too!

Grace: I wish for no one to be lonely. I wish that you could all be happy. As for me, I can't think of any wishes.

Philippe: If my sister and I could gaze at this starry sky together, my wish would be fulfilled.

Nightmare: Congratulations, you've glimpsed the writings of the "Nightmare" in this wondrous dream!

Keigan: I wish for this world to have more justice and rationality. That should be enough.

Alva: May more forsake the folly of human nature and choose to approach the truth.

Ithaqua: Mother, if possible, I wish to at least dream of those moments in the woods and snow at night.

Sangria: Burn once more, for I still seek to prove my worth.

Fool's Gold: I've already dug my way out of fate's mine. Haven't I?

Ivy: (The paper is scribbled with 2 little girls holding a wishing star lantern together.)

Part 2 - Thoughts

In general, all of them are pretty good and I definitely think helps paint a better picture of each character, who they are deep down, and what their priority/goal is.

Quite a few few of them though are fairly sad, including (to me) Freddy, Naib, Helena, Kevin, Murro, Ganji, Charles, Violetta, Joseph, Burke, Robbie, Philip, Ithaqua, Fool's Gold, and Ivy. I have to say, the ones that made me feel the worst were Kevin and Burke (especially the latter. Can you not make me feel like I wanna cry?).

Freddy's I quite like as I think it tells a lot about him. He admits he's not perfect, he admits even things he did weren't right, but for good or ill he still loves Martha Remington. To me, it's that admission of his mistakes I like the most.

Naib and Ganji both simply wishing to be home, with their families, but because they can't they just wish that their loved ones are happy and sufficiently taken care of. Despite how they may be depicted in their games, they both have a lot of sorrow in their heart and have been through quite the ordeals, all while being far from home and any chance to return is slim or difficult to acquire. Everything they do matters little compared to their longing to return home and move past all this.

Helena's wish I to see the world one day, for obvious reasons, is quite sad considering how she lost her eyesight when she was young. As a result, she can only imagine and dream of seeing the sky. The fact there's little chance she'll regain her sight somehow (unless something happens in the future) is what makes this line hurt the most.

Murro's wish is only for someone to remember him, which honestly is quite the implication of how he feels about himself and how he thinks others' feel about him. He's been through so much, losing his parents, then his ill treatment and abuse while he was kept by Bernard, to the point he simply wanted to get away from people and just be with his partner. It's that feeling he's given up hope, and the idea that this is all he thinks he's capable of hoping for... It's like he already thinks he has no future and nothing much to look forward to.

Wishes of people like Charles, Robbie, Joseph, Philip, Ithaqua, and Ivy are focused on the loss of those close to them, some of which are consumed by the guilt at their role in that loss or inability to prevent their death. Joseph especially has devoted the rest of his life to attempting to revive Claude, and has been incapable of ever having a single moment where he isn't thinking about his twin. It makes me think about what Michiko said regarding the bittersweetness of love, and how time marches on whether or not those we love are left behind. The important question being whether a person is capable of moving forward or will be stuck looking back, which is the whole theme with Orpheus.

Violetta's wish hurts me due to me reading into her line and feeling like she's referring to herself. And the idea that she's wishing there was someone out there who will love her, as her being abandoned by her parents, taken by Max who treated her like an object to attract attention to his freak show and earn him money, but once she no longer did, he disposed of her, leaving Violetta feeling unwanted. Despite what she's been through, she is still a kind and positive person, but even she has moments where she can't help but let slip hints about her true feelings.

Kevin of course has been and still is a very sad boy. He, like Joseph, has his thoughts forever stuck on the loved ones he lost. He is incapable of moving past Angelina's death, further compounded by his guilt regarding Angelina's father and the tribe. He is trapped by his guilt. It's the fact that Kevin refuses to forgive himself, blaming himself for everything that has happened, is why Kevin's wish hurts me so much.

Burke... I don't even know what to say. This was the 1 that I think hurt the most for a bunch of reasons that I don't quite know how to put to words. Netease, please stop trying to make me cry.

As for other wishes that caught my attention:

Mike's simple wish to bring joy to people and help them forget their troubles was curious, as I think it really helps give a better idea about him, considering he's someone I sometimes find tricky to figure out. His deductions depict him as pretty mischievious, especially with things like using rocks or nitrogen in his tricks. But then we get to the tragedy, and all we don't really get any more ... good descriptions from Mike himself as to how he is internally. Except for hints based on how he went to the morgue to confirm who was dead and who was missing. And then with his suspicion of (and disgust for) Margaretha, as well as Joker. His last deduction and backstory really emphasize that his singular goal is essentially revenge. Yet we learn in through the letters that he was unable to do so even when he's given the chance. This is why I at least personally appreciate this little detail about his interest in people's happiness and desire to fix all their problems. It helps put everything else in better perspective.

Vera's was mainly due to how she says it was "all worth it". This seems to confirm how she feels about her actions, despite the sorrow she describes in her 1st letter due to her own actions, and despite the reality of what she did. She continues to reason with herself that, despite the cost, it all worked out in the end. It could show just how broken she's become due to how she grew up due to her father and everyone looking down on her and treating her the way they did. It could show just how hard her heart has become as a result. But it's also possible to read this line as trying to convince herself to not regret. To not dwell on what she's done. To try to tell herself that it's ok, it's ok, it's ok. If this is true, whether or not she actually fully believes this attempt to reason with herself is a separate question.

Margaretha's further confirms the type of person she's in and the life she's interested in. She's still interested in luxury, she's still a bit vain, just like her personality info in-game states. However, what I was focused on was how she talks about having a stage "solely for me". This to me reads as she wants to be able to move forward and survive on her own without having to rely on others, like she did previously with Sergei, or how she's "exploiting" Joker. Which I think is a good development on her part, as I think it shows growth. It's something that may take time, but she's expressing determination to achieve this goal.

Martha was primarily of interest to me as, similar to Violetta, I read it as she was essentially referring to herself. It's a lament over the fact she has no place she sees as "home", and she doesn't even know who she is anymore. She's taken on too many identities, and gone through so much that she isn't sure who is the real her or if even if she does remember if it'll actually feel right to her anymore. She's lost and doesn't know how to find her way back on to the path. Her wish is a warning to others the way I see it, which is imporant considering what we learn happened with her in her game.

Sangria's I find curious as I never really thought about her like that, the idea that she wants to "prove [her] worth". It can make sense considering her backstory and deductions emphasize how badly she was treated by her father and the fact she was viewed as "less than a toy", as well as make sense based on whatever happened between her and the lady to cause Sangria to later ask to "get back on stage". I feel like this wish could potentially help understand some of what happens with her in her game...

Then there's Nightmare. Which to me feels... the strangest and almost out of place of any of the wishes. I'm still not quite sure about the real meaning behind it yet but it does make me think...

On that same tangent, I'll go to Orpheus next. Similarly, his line is quite interesting and will take me some time to really digest. The fact he speaks of wanting to reduce other people's regrets and give them "more favorable conclusions" to me is strange. Some of the stories he writes don't exactly feel like he's trying to give the people it's based on better "conclusions", nor does it feel like he's doing that with the participants of each of his games. Though looking at a different place, what he seems to be doing to Kevin in his 4th letter does feel like he's trying to manipulate Kevin's memories to make him think Angelina isn't dead. The entire truth of the goal of Orpheus' experiments and actions is still something I don't think we fully grasp yet. It's possible more is happening to the participants than we know (especially with how of them, or at least their bodies, are missing, and I still wonder about Yidhra's and Joseph's involvements, considering the Dreamlands or Joseph's photo world could potentially present Orpheus an opportunity to maybe give individuals a happier story if they are trapped there, especially with the memory drugs, but I'm still unsure about so much...).

Norton's wish is such a great but simple enough summary for his character. He's not asking to be rich. He's not asking for gold despite that's what he searched for in Golden Cave. He's not asking for anything in particular. All Norton cares about is having a "better" life. Something more than being trapped in poverty, with a job that could kill him at any time, and especially over time the longer he has it. He wants to not have to worry about starving all the time, or worry if he'll have a place to shelter for the night, or worry about cruel coworkers or employers, any other necessities he needs. We've seen that he isn't asking for anything fancy. He eats simple bread, and spends what little spare money he has on books and knowledge. He just wants enough so he'll never have to worry about going back to that life again.

Which is interesting when considering Fool's Gold's wish: "I've already dug my way out of fate's mine. Haven't I?". This to me sounds like he's trying to convince himself. He's desperately hoping he's finally escaped the mine, which he describes as "fate's" mine. This referencing his "fate" as a miner due to his father also being a miner. The fact he describes it as how he "dug my way out" is a way of showing how he's done everything himself. He was the one who's fought tooth and nail to get out of his situation, who's spent all his blood, sweat, and tears to originally just work hard enough to earn what he can, and then when that didnt work find another way, and when he was trapped in Golden Cave, how he literally dug his way out (which shows how badly he wants to live). "Fate" being a "mine" also has the symbolism of Norton originally seeing his fate as somethin dark, made by someone else who forced him into it, a place with little room to move full of many dangers, surrounded by many people who either treated him badly or only cared for themselves, and the only path forward led further and further down. This was why Norton wants to escape his fate, and why he's been so desperate to do anything he can if it means a way out. He wants a brighter fate, one not trapped underground, but a fate out in the open world where the sky is the limit. Unfortunately though, as we can see from the ending of Fool's Gold's wish, Norton isn't entirely convinced he's completely escaped his fate. Which is curious and I wish I could see the reasoning behind his thoughts. Is it because he's afraid he'll be caught for what he did? Is it because he's afraid he'll have to go back to the mine if he is unable to find any other way of making a living? Is it because of whatever happened while he was trapped in the mind that he's continuously referenced but never explained, that's lead to him being so deathly afraid of the place? Or does it have something to do with his current situation with Orpheus and whatever the order was in his 2nd letter? Considering this is the 2nd time we've seen Norton trying to convince himself but failing to do so completely by the end (the 1st time being in Norton's 2nd letter where he tries to convince himself to go through with the assassination order), I wonder if it's possible these 2 things could be related. Maybe he feels like or is starting to feel like his current situation is not any better than it was before when he was still a miner, or when he was trapped in Golden Cave. Which is curious as that seems to reinforce how we can't be completely sure what Norton will do in the final game, or what the full truth of his relationship with Orpheus, Alice, and the others is. It's also interesting this line comes from Fool's Gold, who also appeared in Norton's backstory trailer, before he causes Golden Cave to collapse. He's holding his head, and seemingly fighting with himself over whether he should do it or not. Hunter Norton seems to be a way of showing Norton's internal dilemma, his war with himself, with how Hunter Norton is likely symbolized in Norton's 2nd letter, and now again here when Norton's trying to convince himself that he's escaped his fate. But unlike the 1st time in the mine when Hunter Norton managed to win out and cause the mine collapse, these other 2 times haven't ended with a certain winner, which could show how Norton's changed or how he may not be willing to do the same thing again. But maybe I'm thinking too hard.

As for Jose, I wish I could understand him better. Despite how his father treated him, despite how he only cared about fame and fortune, despite how he was only ever concerned about looking good for the Queen and everyone he deemed important, Jose still wishes his "loved ones" to stay safe essentially. Who that would be besides his family I'm not sure. We never learn about his mother, and there's really no one else that could be outside of maybe some people he was friends with, though he specifically says "loved ones". We don't know if he was friendly with those on his crew, though we know at least some were of the same type of person as Jose's father based on Jose's deduction 7, while others died either when Jose's father vanished or during deduction 4. We now know he's tied in some way to Sam Bourbon but not the specifics of that relationship (how friendly were they?). Therefore, it's most likely he's referring to his father here. I wish I knew more about Jose's feelings and relationship with his father, considering deduction 7 and 8, as well as other bits don't exactly make Joaquin out to be a good person or see his son as anything but an object. But it's possible it was because Jose's father was the only family he ever had, and he simply wished he could've stopped him from doing what Jose didn't agree with and/or helped change him for the better.

[nocturnalfei]

“𝒽𝑒𝓎 𝓂𝓊𝓇𝒹𝑒𝓇𝑒𝓇, 𝑒𝓋𝑒𝓇𝓎 𝒷𝓇𝑒𝒶𝓉𝒽 𝓎𝑜𝓊 𝓈𝓉𝑒𝒶𝓁 𝒾𝓈 𝒶 𝒷𝓇𝑒𝒶𝓉𝒽 𝐼 𝒷𝓇𝑒𝒶𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝒻𝑜𝓇 𝓎𝑜𝓊” ⋆˚. ݁˖

��� — 𝓓𝓪𝓻𝓴 𝓔𝔂𝓮𝓼 . ݁˖

song: 𝘧𝘪𝘳𝘦 𝘦𝘴𝘤𝘢𝘱𝘦 - 𝘩𝘢𝘭𝘧 𝘮𝘰𝘰𝘯 𝘳𝘶𝘯

assassin!lee minho x afab!reader // word count: 4.8k

ᴡᴀʀɴɪɴɢꜱ: dark content (do not read if uncomfortable), kidnapping, drugging, minor character death, mentions of blood

note from author: this is my first published work after a long hiatus, hope you like it <3

Minho has never been proud of what he is. It is just the cards that life dealt him, the product of his raising. It is what’s expected of him. He was proud, however, to be the best assassin in his family. He lived to see the glimmer of resentment in his father’s eyes whenever he got to the kill first. Minho was always smarter, always stealthier, always quicker, and always cleaner. His father began Minho’s training at the mere age of 4 and by the age of 7, Minho had successfully poisoned a rank 3 target. He always swore to surpass his father, for if he had to be what he was, he would always make sure his father regretted it.

Minho’s siblings were decent assassins, but only his eldest brother came close to his skill. As the youngest of four, Minho literally fought to survive his childhood. For as his father says, “if any of you are weak enough to get killed by one another, you’re too weak to be in this family.” Minho has never attempted on his siblings, another trait that he is proud to provoke his father with. Minho didn’t need to prove that he was the best.

It was currently 8:21 pm. Minho was perched on the rooftop of an apartment, overlooking the city. He enjoyed the view. The dark sky contrasted with the lights of the city, as if the stars had all descended to the streets, leaving the sky to remain as an endless void. After a deep inhale, he glanced at his watch again. 8:23. In seven minutes, an heiress to some royal family (Minho never cared for these details of the jobs) would arrive home for the night. And that was when Minho would make his move.

A chill swept through the air, carrying the scent of the freshly baked croissants at the next door bakery. Minho’s beanie and jacket kept him warm, along with his gloves and face mask. But, as he shifted slightly, the icy blade pressed into his skin at his waistline sent a different chill through his body. Maybe he wasn’t proud of his career, but he couldn’t deny there was a rush of excitement with every job he accepted. It was in his blood. He was born to be a monster.

8:28. He heard the growling engine growing louder, shifting himself flat against the roof to avoid detection as the car pulled up. Even being 3 stories up, Minho’s observant eyes peered over the tiles to inspect the scene below. The driver got out of the car, heading to the rear passenger door and opening it. And out stepped you.

Minho never showed emotion. His ruthless family would use it against him, so he learned to keep his expression neutral and his body language in check. But when he saw you, his eyebrows betrayed him with the slightest twitch. You were adorned in a luxurious black gown, the chiffon skirt cascading around your legs, the sleeveless bodice framing your figure. Minho blinked to clear his thoughts, watching as you entered the apartment, another man getting out of the car and tailing you. An employee of your father’s, most likely.

Minho remembers the job description: “mafia family heir, to be captured for ransom, then killed. Rank 1.” The ranks justified the difficulty of a job. But rank 1s were saved for kings and queens themselves or other jobs of that severity. Family members and heirs were usually ranked 2 or 3, depending on the security and relations. So what made you special? His curiosity urged him to get closer to you and, convincing himself that it was simply the next move for the job, his body complied.

Minho slid down the roof slanting onto the upper balcony, swiftly tucking into the shadows again. Like the professional he was, Minho had already surveyed the apartment and knew the layout. A 3-story apartment in a small community, tucked away between other similar apartments and a bakery. Expensive, but relatively hidden, blending in with the other buildings along the street. He quickly picked the lock, taking advantage of the precious minutes between your employee disabling the alarm and resetting it as he slipped inside.

He had expected a bedroom as luxurious as the dress you wore, but was surprised to find the place rather simply designed and decorated. You had books and clothes scattered about, an easel in the corner, a stuffed rabbit on your bed. It looked…normal. Not like the bedroom of a mafia heir. And he’s seen a couple of those in his life.

Footsteps ascending the stairs broke him from his thoughts. He carefully crouched behind the easel. Even if you had turned the lights on, the shadow from the bookcase next to him was perfect cover. He had planned every move accordingly. And now, he waited.

Minho listened carefully to the noises outside the door, pleased to find the walls weren’t thin. He strained his ears to pick up on your words. You sounded upset, but he couldn’t make out why. Minho didn’t flinch as you flung the door open, nor when you slammed it shut and turned on the light. He sat perfectly still, eyes just being able to see your figure between the easel and the corner of the bookcase.

You threw yourself onto the bed, hands working to rid yourself of your jewelry. Minho could easily swipe your earrings after his job was done - they were obviously worth a hefty penny. But Minho never cared for money. His grandfather started this family business for money, then fame once his children showed aptitude to follow his footsteps. His father continued the legacy for the same reasons. His siblings would’ve swiped your earrings, your necklace, your rings, and hell maybe even the gown after they were done with you. But not Minho. He only cared about getting the job done.

You stood, catching his full attention again. His eyes followed your every move as you made your way to your closet. You slipped your heels off, throwing them into the corner before grabbing a tee shirt. Your delicate hands reached for the zipper at the back of your dress. Minho politely shifted his gaze, keeping his pupils glued on your calves as the dress plummeted to the floor. He watched you throw the oversized shirt on in his peripherals, the hem reaching the tops of your thighs, not leaving much to the imagination. He tried to avoid seeing your underwear, not understanding why he was feeling some sense of nerves.

Minho has been a professional assassin for over a decade. He had forgotten what nerves were. But as you turned slightly, his eyes took in your face up close, and his heart skipped a beat. You were beautiful. As you grew closer, Minho’s muscles tensed. His fingers naturally found the hilt of his knife. He was a professional, he wouldn’t let you distract him from his job, no matter how much your eyes made his pulse quicken.

Suddenly, your door swung open, stopping you in your tracks. “Y/n, your father is on the pho-“

“I don’t want to talk to him.” You hissed, returning to plop on your bed.

The man from the car took a tentative step into the room. “Will you please not be difficult, Y/n. You knew this day would come.”

You shoved your face into the pillows with a groan. If Minho wasn’t perfectly controlled, he would’ve let a chuckle slip out. Minho had only ever met two types of heirs: stuck up and spoiled or meek and polite. Your childishness was interesting. The man tried to sneak closer to you with the phone, but you jumped up and shoved him out the door. “Leave me alone!” The door slammed shut. Minho watched you return to the bed, grabbing your rabbit and sighing deeply.

Hundreds of jobs over the years. Hundreds of faces that Minho has seen, lives he’s heard, and not one sprouted an ounce of interest in him. So, why you? Why was he curious about what was troubling you? Why were you a rank 1? What was going on here?

Minho sat, still as a rock and in total silence, as the night went on. It didn’t take long for you to fall asleep, rabbit tucked in your arms. The noises of the house quieted as well and finally he slid out of his hiding spot. He stalked over to your bed, trying to deny himself admiring your features. Your hair fanned out on the pillow like a halo.

Minho grabbed the small bag of powder from his pocket, spreading the substance over his palm. “I’m sorry.” He breathed, holding his palm to your mouth and nose while his other hand quickly grabbed your wrists. You woke up with a start, immediately fighting, but to no avail. Minho’s was much stronger than he looked. After a few moments, the drug kicked in a you lay limp in his grasp. Minho took a damp towelette to his glove, pocketing it, then gathered you in his arms.

You woke up in a daze. The room was blurry and your head pounded. You tried to turn, realizing you couldn’t move. Before you could attempt to speak, a voice made you jump. “Finally awake?” You blinked until the blurriness faded, leaving you in a small and dark room with a strange man staring back at you. “How do you feel?”

Still confused, you shook your head, only to wince when it pounded. “Uh,” your own voice startled you. It was hoarse.

The man stepped closer. “I thought so. The drug is relatively harmless, but can cause dehydration.” He is gloved hand reached out a glass of water towards you. “Here.”

You stubbornly turned your head, awareness setting in as you felt the ropes binding your wrists behind you. You fought the panic rising in your chest. You needed to be brave. “Who are you?” You asked, craning your neck to look around, seeing you were lying on a bed. “And where am I?”

To your surprise, the man chuckled. You tried to ignore how charming his voice was. “Drink some water and I’ll tell you.” His tone was casual, as if kidnapping you was just another Tuesday for him. It irritated you.

“No.” You spat. “You probably poisoned it.”

Again, the man laughed. “I’ve had several hours to kill you, my dear.” He shifted you into a seated position before guiding the water to your lips. “If I wanted you dead, you wouldn’t have woken up just now.” You pouted at his words. He was right. Reluctantly, you put your lips to the rim of the glass, allowing him to pour the water onto your tongue. You immediately felt better as the pounding left your head. “There you go,” he praised.

You rolled your eyes, ignoring the warmth that spread inside you. You couldn’t even tell what he looked like, beanie and mask only leaving his eyes on display, but they were enthralling. Those dark eyes watched you intently, reading you with curiosity and amusement. You looked around the room, breaking the eye contact before you could be pulled into their depths. “Where am I?”

He set the glass down on the bedside table. “My room.”

“Your room?” You asked, unable to hide your surprise. “And who might you be?”

“That’s a secret.” He smirked, enjoying the annoyance in your features.

You bit your tongue. He seemed calm and friendly, and yet, there was an aura of danger surrounding him. You needed to be careful. “So,” you drawled, checking out the rest of the room, more so to avoid his eyes. There wasn’t much to it apart from a large bookcase next to a desk and the bed you currently resided on. You did notice a closet in the corner. But, no windows. Where were you? “Why have you kidnapped me, then?”

He sighed, catching you off guard. Coming from a mafia family, you had always been warned of people coming after you for various reasons. Money, revenge against your father, etc. You knew of people attempting to hurt you before, but their attempts were always disrupted by your guards. Your father had never left you alone for fear of this day, always guards around and within your apartment, his most trusted friend to always monitor your whereabouts. You were actually rather impressed that the man in front of you now had managed to pull off this stunt, the first to ever succeed.

Still, you’d always pictured the faces of the attempted kidnappers and assassins over the years. All you could imagine was different forms of evil. Angry, disgusting, maniacal, faces without remorse for what they were doing. But when you gazed upon the eyes of the man in front of you, you saw none of those things. What you saw was a bored and uninterested face, but if you allowed your eyes to linger on his for just a moment too long, you saw what was almost…sadness.

Finally, the man spoke, breaking you from your trance. “There’s a ransom for your return.” He was careful in his words, not to give away too many details about the job or his employer. Again, a professional. “I will keep you here until that ransom is delivered and then return you home safely.” He didn’t like lying to you, but he wasn't going to tell you this ended in your death. ‘to be captured for ransom, then killed…’ A bitter taste sat on Minho’s tongue. To request your murder even after receiving the ransom money, that was a clear giveaway of a personal grudge. His father had given him this job, but who was the employer?

Minho was a professional, always seeing the job to the end. But goddamn him if he couldn’t shake this feeling that something wasn’t right. He watched you intently, finally letting himself admire you. A professional he was, but evil he wasn’t. You were beautiful, innocent. Minho knew evil and you were not that. You didn’t deserve this fate. He had to think of a plan.

“So, this is for money.” you groaned, looking up at the ceiling. “Of course. Very cliche of you, I was actually hoping for better.”

That comment caught Minho off-guard and he snickered. You were different, indeed. “It wasn’t my plan, dear.” He fought the urge to move the stray hair from your face. “Just the job I took.”

You shouldn’t be talking to this man, your kidnapper, so casually. You should be stoic, or fighting, or scared, or something of a normal reaction to being kidnapped. But even with his dark presence, there was an air of ease with him. “You do this for a living then? Kidnapping?”

Minho hummed. “It is part of my skill set, I suppose.” His eyes never left you. It should be unsettling, you shouldn’t be enjoying his attention.

The room was quiet as you pondered which question to ask next. As you watched his eyes, you noticed the aging in them, as if he has seen many things, lived many lifetimes. But the surrounding skin pointed to a man rather young. Your curiosity got the better of you. “How old are you?”

Minho hesitated. He didn’t have friends. He didn’t really talk to anyone, actually. He kept to himself and his books. The conversation taking a personal turn made him uncomfortable, but he was tempted to share himself with you. Still, he had to protect his identity. “20.”

Your eyes widened. “Youre only a year older than me?”

Before the conversation could continue, Minho’s phone buzzed. He fished it out of his pocket, walking away from you to answer the call. “She’s awake.” Minho spoke first.

“The ransom has been posted. Await my signal for the return.” His dad was always straight to the point.

“Understood.” Minho hung up the phone, returning to your side, only to stop in his tracks. The way you looked up at him, eyes wide and questioning, caused a pang in his heart. You were causing him to feel so many things in such a short amount of time. You were dangerous, you would break the facade Minho has spent over a decade perfecting. He couldn’t have that. “Your ransom has been posted. I’ll return you home once it’s paid.”

You should be happy to hear the news, but you weren’t. You didn’t want to go home, where every move was monitored, every decision made for you. Besides, you wanted to know more about this mysterious man with his captivating eyes.

At that moment, your stomach let out an embarrassing growl. Heat rose to your cheeks as you quickly looked away from his amused gaze. “Are you hungry?” You wanted to hide, deny it, but your stomach gave you away again. With a chuckle, Minho turned towards the door. “I’ll be right back.”

A good few moments passed (you had no idea how much time in actuality since there was no clock or windows) before Minho returned to the room, a steaming bowl in his hands. He sat next to you on the bed. You peered into the bowl and inhaled. Wow, the soup smelled and looked amazing. Minho gathered some of the soup in a spoon before bringing it to your lips. The act was too intimate, too kind for the situation you were in, but it surprisingly felt natural. Minho fed you until the bowl was empty, then gave you more water. The comfortable silence that fell upon you two was finally broken by your voice. “So, you cook took?”

Minho gave a small chuckle. “My family doesn’t exactly cook, so I learned some basic recipes.” You waited for him to continue speaking, but he seemed to end it there. You wanted to know more. What was his family like? What kind of childhood would one have to go through to choose this kind of lifestyle? You decided against asking more. The man before you was shrouded in mystery and you had a desire to discover every detail about him.

Minho’s eyes met yours, catching you blatantly watching him. But this time, you didn’t turn away. You let yourself be pulled into those depths. You didn’t even know this man’s name, and he had kidnapped you for the matter, but you felt an irresistible pull towards him. He must have felt the same, taking a deep sigh before his gloved hand reached out to your face. You froze as his fingers grazed your cheekbone, guiding a stray hair behind your ear.

Your eyes were locked with his, breathing stalled as you waited for his next move. Instead, you jumped at the buzz of Minho’s cellphone. He was quick to answer it, leaving you stranded on the bed and walking to the corner of the room. “It’s done.” His father’s voice traveled through the phone. “Finish the job.”

Minho’s jaw tightened, but his tone remained neutral. “Understood.” He hung up the phone, returning it to his pocket. He was just ordered to kill you. He had always finished his jobs, quickly, perfectly, and without hesitation. But as he glanced back to your form on his bed, he couldn’t shake the sinking feeling in his chest. You looked up at him, eyes round and hopeful. Minho has never regretted what he was, until now.

“Your ransom’s been paid.” Minho stated. You quickly noticed his change in demeanor, as subtle as it was. Something was off. You patiently waited for him to continue. Finally, Minho spoke again. “I’ve been ordered to kill you.”

You feel panic rise in your chest. Suddenly you remember the reality of your situation: kidnapped, bound, at the mercy of a dangerous stranger. Minho hated the way quickly your gaze had changed, the admiration and curiosity being replaced by pure fear. “But, you said I would be returned home after the payment.” You pleaded.

Minho sighed heavily again. “The job was to kidnap you until the ransom had been paid and then kill you.” His eyes stayed glued to the floor, the unfamiliar feeling of shame overwhelming him.

“You lied to me!” Your outburst forced his gaze back to you, the image before him shattering the heart he always questioned having. Tears cascaded down your cheeks. Because of him. It felt so wrong. “I actually trusted you, but this whole time has been a lie!” Your sobs rang through the room. Minho’s chest ached for you. This was wrong.

Minho reached your side in a heartbeat. You jumped at his speed, trying to move away from him, but his hands grasped your shoulders to keep you in place. You refused to look at him, disgusted with yourself for being so foolish. “Y/n,” Minho started. You shook your head. You wanted nothing more to do with the monster in front of you. His hand gripped your jaw, gently forcing you to face him. “Y/n. Look at me.” Your eyes finally met his. Those inviting depths. You wanted to believe they could pull you in, keep you safe. Minho’s thumb wiped a tear off your cheek. “I am NOT going to hurt you.”

He pulled you into a hug, surprising you. His strong arms held you firm until the shaking in your shoulders calmed down. You felt his warm, calloused hands slide down your arms to your bound wrists. When did he remove his gloves? A frigid object sent another wave of panic through you before you realized he had only cut the rope from your wrists. He holds you for another moment before pulling away, hands remaining on your arms, his full attention on your face. “I did not lie to you. I will return you to your family.”

You should be relieved, but you only had more racing thoughts. This was his job. “So, you’re an assassin?”

The question pulled the corners of Minho’s lips up. “I am.” He shouldn’t continue, but he needed to regain your trust. “I come from a family of assassins.”

You let that sink in for a moment. “So, if you return me, you would have failed your job?” Minho gave a curt nod. “What will that mean for you?”

Minho paused, debating how to answer your question. “I have never failed a job before.” He stated matter of factly. “My family will never let me live it down, my reputation will take a huge hit.” He saw the emotion begin to rise in your eyes again. “But that doesn’t matter. I will return you home safely. I promise, Y/n.”

You nodded, believing his words. Your arms wrapped around him and you properly hugged. He held you firm, protectively. He smelled like cedar and you melted into his hold. “May I know your name?” You whispered into the soft skin at his neck.

His breath tickled your cheek and you felt him smile through his mask. He leaned back just slightly, just enough so that when he removed his mask you could get a good look at him. Wow. He was nothing like you had pictured assassins to look. Dark, cat-like eyes and defined cheek bones, soft petals for lips. He was beautiful.

You had a strong urge to cup his face, but resisted as you mentally kicked yourself for having such a thought. Instead, the man leaned in even closer, lips reaching yours in the faintest of kisses, just shy of actually being counted as one but exciting your body just the same. “Minho,” he whispered. “My name is Minho.”

“Minho.” You repeated before his lips finally met yours in a proper kiss. As he distracted you, you couldn’t stop your hand from finding his cheek, pulling him closer and deepening the kiss. This seemed to please him, his own hands snaking around your waist and shoulders, holding you close.

The streets are quiet as the night blanketed the town. You could see your apartment around the corner, guards stationed at the door. You walked along the cobblestone street towards your home. Minho kept to the shadows, but you felt him watching you, making you feel safe.

When you came closer to the lamp in front of your apartment, you saw your father’s consigliere open the door as if he was leaving. “Y/n?“ He stopped in his tracks, shocked. You entered the light of the street lamp, greeting your father’s consigliere.

Minho watched you from the shadows. He didn’t plan to return home right away. He couldn’t shake the feeling of something still being off, and throughout the years, his instincts have always held true and kept him safe. So, he listened to them. He was perched on your rooftop, just like the night he took you when your scream reached his ears. His body reacting before his mind’s command as he swooped into your bedroom. There you were facing your father’s consigliere, a knife in the man’s hand pointed right at you. Minho lunged, gripping his own knife, the blade glistening in the moonlight, hungry for blood.

In a blink, the consigliere was on the ground, knife thrown across the room and Minho’s knife at his throat. “It was you.” Minho growled, everything clicking in his mind. “You posted the job on Y/n. You wanted her killed.” Minho pressed the knife into the man’s skin. A droplet of crimson formed, igniting the predator inside Minho. It took every ounce of his strength to not push further and finish the job, reminding himself that you were watching.

“This good-for-nothing brat doesn’t deserve her father’s riches.” The man spat, wincing as the knife cut even more. “Yes, I listed her as a rank 1 and was told the best assassin was assigned to the job.” Minho saw red. His muscles shake as he used every ounce of strength to hold himself back, but every word from the man made it more difficult a task. “Her death was ensured and guaranteed to not be traced back to me. And I’m guessing you’re the said assassin? Pathetic.”

Minho withdrew his knife long enough to punch the man in the jaw. “In the mafia world, you are closest to her father. You are practically family to her. She trusted you!” Another punch. You watched as Minho’s knuckles broke the man’s nose, blood cascading down his face. “Why list her death on the market?”

“Because,” the man choked, spitting blood. “With her out of the picture, her father may actually be able to focus on his work! He has a significant business to run.” He coughed, blood spattering on Minho’s mask. “Her mother was just as much as a distraction, so I had gotten rid of her as well.” At your gasp, Minho’s heart sank. “At least that assassin could finish the job!”

Minho leaned closer to the man’s face. From where you stood, you could no longer see either of their faces, but Minho’s aura was seething with rage. “What a worthless excuse for a human.” Minho hissed. “I will spend the rest of my life waiting to see you in hell.” And with that, Minho slit the man’s throat. He had purposely positioned his body so you couldn’t see the act.

Minho stood and you ran over to him. He held you tight, wanting to protect you from everything in this world, everything he was. “I need to leave.” He whispered into your hair. “The police will be here soon.”

“No,” you begged, unable to let him go. “Stay. Please.”

Minho tsked, pulling you away but keeping his hands on your shoulders. “Your family wouldn’t exactly approve of an assassin living amongst them.” Minho half-joked.

”Then take me with you.” You pleaded. You heard the faint sirens outside, you still had a moment before the police arrived. “I don’t want to stay here.”

“No.” Minho said, voice stern. “You have a life here. I can’t take you away from that.”

“Minho!” His eyes softened, searching yours as he waited for your next words. “My father arranged to have me married off.” Minho’s eyes widened and you noticed that rage swirling in their depths. “The dude is awful and my father doesn’t care that I’m unhappy. I have no life here. Please.”

The sirens grew closer, but you leaned forward, lips meeting his own as you desperately tried to share your unspoken words through the kids. You didn’t love the man you were to be married to. But you loved the man in front of you now. The one that took you away and kept you say. The one you trusted to do it all over again.

The deafening sirens were on your street. Minho reluctantly broke the kiss, lifting you into his arms and carrying you onto the balcony. He would do as you ask and take you far away. He knew both of your families would come looking for you two, but he wasn’t worried. For once, he was proud of what he was. Because what he was, the horrible skills that he has spent his entire life developing, he would now use to keep you safe. He was born this way so that you may be his, forever.

©𝗻𝗼𝗰𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗻𝗮𝗹𝗳𝗲𝗶 <𝟯 𝗮𝗹𝗹 𝗿𝗶𝗴𝗵𝘁𝘀 𝗿𝗲𝘀𝗲𝗿𝘃𝗲𝗱. 𝗱𝗼 𝗻𝗼𝘁 𝗰𝗼𝗽𝘆 𝗼𝗿 𝗿𝗲𝗽𝗼𝘀𝘁 𝗮𝗻𝘆 𝗼𝗳 𝗺𝘆 𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗸𝘀 𝗼𝗻 𝗮𝗻𝘆 𝗽𝗹𝗮𝘁𝗳𝗼𝗿𝗺. 𝗱𝗼 𝗻𝗼𝘁 𝗰𝗹𝗮𝗶𝗺 𝗺𝘆 𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗸𝘀 𝗮𝘀 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗼𝘄𝗻.

[musamora]

𝖙𝖍𝖊 𝖊𝖈𝖍𝖔 𝖔𝖋 𝖘𝖞𝖓𝖈𝖍𝖗𝖔𝖓𝖎𝖈 𝖍𝖊𝖆𝖗𝖙𝖘 「𝔣𝔶𝔬𝔡𝔬𝔯 𝔡𝔬𝔰𝔱𝔬𝔢𝔳𝔰𝔨𝔶」 ༉‧₊˚

content. f!reader. implied breaking-and-entering, fireworks, metaphors about stars, soft!fyodor, he's secretly down-bad, he's also incredibly possessive. descriptions of moscow (red square, st. basil's cathedral), mentions of eastern european food (pirozhki), references to greek mythology (perseus and andromeda), jokes about greek incest. not proofread. 2.2k+ words.

author's note. starting the last of my fics for the year with the first bungou stray dogs character i've ever written for. thank you for such a lovely year! ࿐ ♡ ˚ .

would you like to see more? fill out the taglist or comment under this post.

synopsis. within the last minutes of the year, sitting underneath the stars, two lovers discuss the stories mapped within constellations. in themselves, they find that some tales are timeless.

"It's so lovely at this time of night."

You couldn't contain your astonishment as flurries coasted to the earth in silent swells, dusting the city in a sheen of sparkling white. With an outstretched hand, you gathered flakes into your palm, admiring them before they melted with the heat of your skin. The riverside stilled as you coasted along the sidewalk, frozen in thickening ice as parents ushered their children away from its tempting surface. Tourists clustered under trees, shivering in their thin hats and coats as they underestimated the spite of Russia's wind. But despite the chill, there was an unmistakable gaiety in the air, smiles strewn on glassy faces as they awaited the new year.

You tailed behind Fyodor as he sauntered forward with broad steps, unable to catch your breath as the basket of freshly baked pirozhki settled heavily in your stomach. Your eyelids threatened to close as exhaustion crept into the corners of your vision; journeying between museums, promenading through parks, and scowering various foods had taken a toll on your energy.

You groaned. "Do we have to go tonight?"

He merely chuckled, the velvety bass of his voice tracing goosebumps down your spine, easily distracting you from the fact that he hadn't answered your question. Your field of vision spiraled into a haze, thoughts shot far in the distance despite the frost attempting to rouse you, left unaware as an assured hand ushered you inside a concealed entrance to the luminous structure slumbering outside of Moscow's main square. You walked forward into the endless darkness, only to bump into something sturdy. Your fingers carded through the puffed fur of Fyodor's coat, tugging on its ends.

"Fyodor?"

With a click, the room was brought to life. The high-vaulted ceiling outstretched to reach the heavens above, walls embellished with intricate frescoes of ancient Abrahamic tales. Flares of resplendent color danced across the floor as moonlight met glass, casting waves of softened light upon your skin. A labyrinth of winding corridors hid in the shadows, prompting any curious wanderer into a trove of antediluvian alcoves and chapels.

Your jaw dropped, gawking at every deliberate component. "What is this place?"

"It was a cathedral erected in honor of Tsar Ivan the IV." His gloved hand puckered altar cloth between his gracile fingers, tracing the embroidery as his mind drifted elsewhere.

You hummed, racking your brain as it itched in anamnesis. "Wasn't that the terrible one?"

He was silent as he released the fabric from his fingers, but the self-satisfied smirk told you everything you needed to know. "Indeed. This place once brimmed with life, hosting religious gatherings and services for the denizens of this city." His boots snicked against the tile, the noise reverberating as it spun towards the ceiling. "It has been left as a relic of time."

You ever-so-delicately brushed your hand against one of the columns, not wishing to disturb the peace of stillness and rest that blanketed the cathedral.

"How marvelous."

Your attention went astray as Fyodor tinkered at a lock, the hinges of a thin door ricketing with unsettling squeaks as he stood aside, uncloaking a never-ending staircase to the unknown.

"After you."

Your muscles cramped with every step, dread buried deep in your gut as your vision remained impaired, the flashlight beam smattering inconclusive rays of light as it aimed at your back. It was almost like the architects had attempted to reach the clouds, their grandiose endeavor churning a flare in your back as you slumped against the wall, your lungs burning with every passing moment. Your spirit was invigorated at the sight of a door through the dime ire of light, basking in your relief as you stepped out the door, the crisp breeze of winter striking your skin as—!

"W-Woah!"

Your feet teetered over the ridge of the roof; only your ankles remained flimsily rooted onto solid paneling as your arms swung out to balance yourself. Fortunately for you, an arm wrapped around your waist, drawing you back against Fyodor's chest. A quick peek upward towards his impish expression revealed everything you needed to know.

"You must be careful, любимая."

Your breath was shuddery, inwardly wavering on whether to punch him or kiss him, the indecisiveness reigning victorious as you pointedly ignored the mellifluous lilt of his tone, hands binding to his arm as your gaze locked onto the ground several hundred feet below.

"Good lord, we're high," you muttered between pants.

His arms braced you further against his chest, leaning away from the perilous drop. "You're trembling." The tension in your grip eased at the sensation of a gentle kiss against the crown of your head. "You know I'd never let you fall, hm?"

"Right." You released the amalgam of tense breath that clawed at your throat, able to balance on your own two feet as you settled your view to the skies.

Your feet shuffled across the panels as you slogged onto a wider expanse of the roof, slumping against a wall as the tension evaporated out through your fingers, the nightmare of plummeting from the roof erased from your mind. However, you swallowed a yelp as the flashlight flickered off, leaving the both of you enshrouded in complete darkness—at least for a brief moment.

Clouds stacked in bunched within the stratosphere, mirroring fragments of light that bounced from below in a nebulose aurora. But despite the wonderment of their decadence, they lost their luster once the stars peaked through their fogged edges, the finite speckles scattered like freckles across the canvas of the heavens. They felt close enough to touch if only you reached out toward them, daring to do so. Your fingers trailed maps of these celestial bodies, finding a sense of peace in their familiar patterns.

"Are you familiar with Ovid's Metamorphoses?" Your voice pierced through the silence.

"I can't say I am."

You withheld the impulse to laugh—he had the entire compendium of books in his personal library. It would be a surprise if he hadn't at least skimmed them, but you decided to humor him this once, scooching closer to point towards a specific cluster of stars.

"Those are the constellations of Perseus, the son of Zeus, and Princess Andromeda, the daughter of King Cepheus and Queen Cassiopeia."

You took his silence as an encouragement to continue. "Perseus found Andromeda chained to a rock as a sacrifice to the sea monster, Cetus, by her parents in order to save her home." Your fingers drew out the character within the stars, a grin upturned on your lips as you envisioned the archaic tale in your mind. "It was told that he found her so beautiful that he slayed the monster, rescuing her before fighting against her uncle for her hand-in-marriage."

"Her uncle?" Fyodor mused.

Your nose scrunched in a grimace. "There's a lot of that in those stories, I'm afraid."

"The couple went on to live happily ever after—an extremely rare ending to most ancient stories."

"There is a simple explanation for that," he replied.

You snickered, already aware that your open-ended commentary would eventually lead to some thoughts from the infamously brilliant man.

His eyes rolled in return at your amusement, disregarding the tightness of his chest. "We hold onto ancient tragedies because they are a reflection of life. Nothing in our world is as simple as a happy ending." A vacant look ruled over his features, a familiar expression that often shielded his thoughts within the dark, contemplative hours of the night. "Most aspired heroes never reach their potential due to their blind devotion to selfish aspirations and goals."

"You're right," you sighed, hands balled against the corner of his cape in an attempt to thaw your frozen fingers. You wanted to say more, but it felt like your mouth was cotton-filled. So, instead, you returned your eyes to the sky.

"Sometimes, I wish I was a constellation." He looked at you. "Even with its flaws, this world is undoubtedly beautiful from above. I like to think the stars admire us just as much as we do them."

And he didn't say anything more; he didn't need to. Instead, he reigned you onto his lap, his coat shrouding your shoulders as he shared its warmth. You leaned into his embrace, basking in the flutter inside your chest.

"You're awfully cold, милая," he grumbled, his fingers mapping your frigid palms.

"Our roles are reversed now," you quipped. "I hope you think about this the next time you decide to stun me with your hands in the morning."

"I'm afraid I might forget," he whistled.

"You little—"

But you found your voice hidden underneath layers of crackling. You ogled as fireworks wiggled their way into the night sky, shimmering onto the city square, the towers of the Kremlin becomen heavenly statues as their structures temporarily glistened. Without a second thought, you grabbed onto his hands, giving them a squeeze with each pop. You were so attentive to the collections of radiant sparks that you didn't notice the eyes boring into your skin; Fyodor's gaze averted from the fireworks to contemplate the interlacement of your fingers.

He surmised you were to be his future the moment you had locked eyes for the first time—his destined, pre-ordained other half as he journeyed to actualize God's promised land. It wasn't a surprise that someone was fated to remain in his keep—another loyal follower, too intertwined in their own aspirations to connect to his cause without deliberate guidance.

But not you. 

You may not have supported his cause with the devotion of his witless flock, but you understood it better than anyone. And most importantly, you understood him. You peered through his intricate plans and performative malice, reading into his cause as you unraveled his intentions. It had been an enticing cat-and-mouse game, the both of you constantly entangled in a mental match, intellect and morals clashing. He knew you were his perfect match from your analytic dexterity, but he had no idea that you would pull at the strings cast around his heart, ones he believed had been severed long ago.

His heart had never belonged to anyone or anything—his mind and will were forever devoted to his cause, but his heart hadn't beat since before he could even remember. The sudden constriction of his chest was so foreign.

You must've been quite the powerful woman to kickstart the heart of a demon, excavating a trove of humanity he had buried within himself with a simple glance of your eyes—and all without knowing, your gentle expression puncturing through his abstruse masquerades, somehow able to see everything except the turmoil that you left in the wake of your very touch.

He found himself less and less concerned about the echoed beat of his heart within the emptiness of his chest, too captivated by your smile as you beheld the heavens with a benevolent expression, savoring the burning red and gold sparks despite their dullness in comparison to you. In spite of himself, your everlasting happiness had become an intrinsic component in his plans.

You were made to remain at his side—not as a brainless devotee, but as his equal and often opposite. The world, so rotten yet somehow divine through your benevolent gaze, may try to pull you away, but he'd have no issue burning cities to their ashen roots if anyone dared attempt to pry you from his hold.

His lithe fingers outlined the constellations of every freckle and beauty mark, star patterns copied onto your skin as his touch drifted your attention from the flashes and flickers to him, your inquisitive eyes scanning his face as he remained unmoved.

"Федя?" 

He shuddered with unparalleled delight at the euphonious sound of his mother language slipping like honey from your tongue, foreign to your lips yet dulcet all the same. Your bonniness beaconed him forward, a heat flowering in his once cavernous chest as he captured your lips, which were as soft as the powdered snow that glinted on your skin. His heavy breath tickled your nose, which crinkled in tandem with your eyes as you drew him in for another. Words became meaningless, his skin seared like static as your arms drew him closer, skin scorched from the cold of your hands against the nape of his neck.

He tucked your hair behind your ear, ensuring that your empyreal features weren't veiled further as flakes of snow flurried once more, your parted lips and shallow breath leaving him in a helpless state of complete limerence. He stirred as his hand brushed against your pulse, your own heart racing concertly with his.

You parted in bittersweet bliss, yearning imbued in your bones as your hands drifted towards one another to intertwine. His forehead rested against yours, your shared breath permeating in spirals within the open air as he peered into your hazy, glossed-over eyes.

His hand cupped your cheek, the frame to a divine masterpiece. "Ты согреваешь мою душу, мое нежное солнышко. Твоя красота вне всякого сравнения; твой разум безупречен." He had never looked at anyone like this before, his ire thawed by the brilliance of your tender gaze as if he had melted. "Я бесконечно благодарен, что Бог привел тебя ко мне."

And you laughed. "You know I don't understand anything you're saying, right?"

He kissed your forehead, concealing his smile as his lips pressed against your skin. "You will one day, солнышко. You will."

любимая = darling милая = dear федя = fedya ты согреваешь мою душу, мое нежное солнышко. твоя красота вне всякого сравнения; твой разум безупречен = you warm my soul, my gentle sun. your beauty is beyond comparison; your mind is beyond flaw. я бесконечно благодарен, что бог привел тебя ко мне = i am eternally grateful that god brought you to me. солнышко = sunshine

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© MUSAMORA 2023 — do not repost or modify my works for any reason. do not steal graphics w/o explicit permission. reblogs are appreciated.

[farfromstrange]

‘I Love You In Every Universe’

Chapter One: I Bet On Losing Dogs

Masterlist | List Of Installments

Pairing: Matt Murdock x F!Mutant!Reader

Summary: The day you lost Matt, you lost everything. There is no moving on from what Spider-Man put you through, and you plan to execute your revenge.

Warnings: ANGST, Major Character Death, blood, suicidal thoughts, mutant!Reader, evil Peter Parker, 18+ because of darker themes, multiverse (No Way Home Era), slight AU

Word Count: 5.8k

A/n: FINALLY! This took me way too long to edit. Today, we’re setting the scene for future installments, but you’re not getting all the details, even if the first 3000 words of this are somewhat a flashback. So, if you think that there is too little dialogue for a Prologue, that’s probably why. This chapter is integral to the future installments.

Read Me On AO3!

The world was silent when he died—an endless pit of nothingness, and above a sky full of stars. 

You don’t remember if it was raining. The moon was hiding behind a thick cloud, and the stars were burning, but you can’t remember if you were drowning in a river of tears or if it was the sky that broke that night. Everything else about that night, you remember quite vividly.

Hell’s Kitchen had become a battleground. The city lay at your feet in shambles; Wilson Fisk had become mayor after you tried hard to stop him, and the world fell apart. But it was his second in command, Peter Parker, who gave new meaning to the word ‘notorious’. Spider-Man infested your home like a parasite, slipping through your finger like dry sand. He knew what he was doing. He and Fisk held the city in the palms of their dirty hands, slowly crushing it like mealy little ants. 

When you met Matt Murdock, it was years back when things were still better, yet they were never perfect. He found you broken at the side of the road—or that was what it felt like, anyway. 

From the start, you have always been different. In a world where everyone wanted to be someone, your uniqueness painted a target on your back. Your nature was misunderstood by most; they either wanted to be you, or they were vying for your inevitable downfall. 

You stood out of every crowd. The target on your back remained no matter how hard you tried to turn yourself into a shrouded mystery. Eventually, you had to start running. You operated out of the dark like a criminal—a vigilante, and a mind-reader who could set the world on fire if she only tried hard enough. 

For most of your life, you were hunted. Scientists wanted to run experiments on you, tie you to a gurney, and study your brain until they understood how your abilities worked. Freaks wanted to sell you for millions to equally disturbed individuals. 

You couldn’t take it anymore. You were merely a scared child who grew into a terrified teenager who didn’t know any better: dead parents, dead everything, and a mind built to read those of others. 

Back then, your only instinct was blatant survival, so you ran. You ran fast and you ran far, an orphan so many would have rather seen dead than operating in the dark, but oh, you had to become something to feel like you were worth something.

When you landed in New York, beaten and alone with a bone-crushing fear of the future, the Devil found you, taking you home with him. He saved you. He picked up your pieces, glued you back together, and wrapped you in a protective glaze. All the heartbreak you’d endured, and the trauma you’d suffered getting there seemed worth it whenever he held you in his arms. 

You were Matt Murdock’s world, and he was yours. He showed you heaven and hell; he saved you from the purgatory you pushed yourself into and got you settled with a one-way ticket to paradise. After all these years, you finally found your salvation in a person.

He was your broken Catholic boy with a heart made out of gold. The universe didn’t deserve him, and yet he gave the world everything he had. He sacrificed his soul to God and his city. He prayed, he begged, and he fought hard for what he believed right at the time. 

Matt saw himself as the Devil; embodied him, too. Though in your eyes, he was an angel with an invisible halo only you could feel in every fiber of your being. His thoughts, his heart, and his soul; he gave it all to you.

You cherished him with all you could give him. It wasn’t much, but he loved you more than anyone had ever before. You were more than a mutant, more than a broken girl at the side of the road, and more than a potential test subject. With him, you finally learned what living was like—what it was supposed to feel like to be human.

The world tried to clip your wings. They took away your voice and your ability to breathe. Matt brought you back to life. He was not the love of your life; Matt Murdock was your soulmate. You lived for him. You existed for him. He was your heart, your soul, and the reason for your survival. 

It wasn’t healthy, how dependent you were on him. He made you see colors you couldn’t see with anyone else. You loved him fiercely. You loved him in a way that was pure agony. And you loved him in a way that you knew would screw you up forever.

It didn’t cross your mind that you could ever lose him. To you, Matt Murdock was immortal. He was the man you could see yourself growing old with. 

You got married in a small ceremony at the courthouse—it wasn’t just for love, it was also convenient, but he forever tied himself to you as you tied yourself to him with a golden wedding band—and you talked about maybe having children one day. A mini-you and a mini-him in your little farmhouse in the suburbs. For that, he would have left Hell’s Kitchen once it was safe enough to do so.

It was a foolish dream now that you think about it; you were foolish to think that happiness would ever be in the cards for you, but then he kissed you again, good morning and good night and in between, and all you could see was a sea of roses. 

He walked through fire (sometimes literally) for you and came back on the other side, hardly always unscathed but always alive, and always with a smile on his chapped lips. He crawled home to you even when he was broken. He crawled home to you when he was full of adrenaline. And he crawled home to you when he thought he couldn’t or wouldn’t anymore, both mentally and physically. He knew he could always come home to you, his best friend, his lover, his confidant, and soon enough, his wife.

You stitched his wounds and kissed his scars to breathe new life into him. You brought him back from the edge. You gave him something to live for. He told you that you saved him, and hearing that after getting on your knees every night, thanking him for the same thing, did something to you. It healed you from the inside out.

You kept him alive the same way he did you. You stood strong together against your enemies every night, fighting as a team. He taught you how to fight, and you taught him how to connect. Matt didn’t know what it was like not to push someone he loved away, but you made sure he understood. He connected to himself; he connected to his past, present, and future with you, and that made him a better man. 

You lost and you won, but at least you had each other to fall back on. You did it together. You did everything together. Boyfriend and girlfriend. Husband and wife. Lady Red and Daredevil.

The fragile little yet oh-so-big thing you had was raw, vulnerable, yet the most tragically beautiful love affair you could have possibly had the pleasure of calling yours. And pleasure, you had plenty. Love, you had plenty. You had everything until everything was ripped from your bare hands—until the very thing sustaining you shattered on a white cloth, spilling crimson blood everywhere, and what you swore could only be pried from your cold, dead hands slipped away in a moment in time. 

You both died, in a way, but it was Matt’s body you held as he took his last breaths in the dead of a hot summer’s night. You can’t remember if it rained, but he was certainly drowning in your tears.

“He’s going to kill you,” you warned him. “Parker and Fisk are out to destroy you. If Spider-Man sees you with your guard down, he won’t hesitate.”

Matt slid his skilled fingers into his pair of leather gloves. They were worn down, but they smelled like him. You could feel the unease sizzling in the pit of your stomach—a parasite. 

“I have to do this,” he told you, his voice laden. “The bastard is ruining innocent lives in my city. I can’t stand idly by and let it happen.”

You weren’t fighting, but the statement still hung deafeningly loud in the room, hanging itself from the ceiling with a noose that was threatening to take you down with it. 

“He challenged you because he knows you’d do anything—” 

He cut  you off, “He’s underestimating me.”

You stared into his eyes. It hurt. It hurt so much. The dark cloud was heading straight for you, but he couldn’t sense it. “You almost died the last time you came face-to-face with him,” you tried again.

“So did you,” he said. “Fisk is nothing without Spider-Man behind him, and those two have done enough damage already.”

“Matt, please—”

“I have to, sweetheart. This is the only way.”

“There is always another way.”

He shook his head. “Not this time. The city is about to fall. If I let them win, there is no coming back from this. You know that.”

“At least let me come with you then,” you said. You begged him to listen, but he wouldn’t see how worried you were. “We’ve been through hell together. We can fight this war together, too.”

“No,” Matt insisted. “He will see an easy target. You mean too much to me. Spider-Man is gonna use you to get through to me. I can do this. You just have to trust me.”

“I trust you. It’s him I don’t.”

“I’m gonna talk to him, and if I have to fight him again for the whole fucking world to see, so be it.”

The words slipped you before you could stop them, cutting through the air like a sharp-edged sword. “What if you die trying?” 

He stopped dead in his tracks.

“I don’t want to lose you!” you cried. 

You had not cried in front of him often before that night, but your walls cracked, and you broke. 

Matt cradled your face as he whispered, begging you to listen, “You won’t. I promise. I’ll be back in a few hours.”

The invisible string pulled you tighter together. Fear, anger, and desperation; he felt so many things—so many things running deeper than the ocean—but you swallowed them. 

“I’m not okay with this,” you murmured.

“I know. Here–” he guided your hands to his face, “Feel me,” he said.

You remember gasping when the floodgates opened. “I always feel you.” 

You stroked his delicate cheeks. He was here, home with you; why couldn’t he stay like that forever? Why did you have to let him go? Past, present, and future began to blur. 

I love you. He tuned out all other thoughts so you could hear him.

He was praying. He was hoping. Only a handful of times had he felt this way. You were so tightly interlaced that you could feel all of him without even trying, but that night, you tried. That night, he tuned out all of his self-deprecating thoughts. He allowed the silence of your connection to engulf him—for the city to disappear, and he allowed you in. 

I love you so much. Do you hear me? You’re everything to me. I love you.

Those three words weighed heavy like bricks on your heart. 

“Remember, three knocks,” he said aloud. “Don’t open for anyone else.”

“Three knocks,” you whispered in agreement. 

Three knocks like three words: I love you.

You read his mind, swallowing the words, but a big part of you wanted to spit them back out. You didn’t want to hear it. The universe was sending you a warning sign. 

Matt exhaled. He cupped your hands in his. The connection deepened, the string pulled tighter, and you became one. That night was the first night you saw glimpses of the future, and you didn’t want to accept it. You were such a fool to think everything could ever be fucking alright, both for you and for this magnificent force of a man you chose to call home—because home isn’t a place, it’s a feeling, and often enough, it’s a person.

He nuzzled his nose against yours. He kissed you. Softly, gently, passionately. You kissed him like you knew it would be the last time.

“I love you,” he repeated. 

The red flags waved, but you looked away. “I don’t want to say it back because you have to come back to me,” you confessed, “and this feels too much like a goodbye.”

He forced you to look at him instead. “Say it back, baby.”

“I love you,” you caved.

You shouldn’t have. You should have put up more of a fight. 

I will always come back to you. Cross my heart. He crossed his heart, but he hoped too much to die. Perhaps in not saying it out loud, he thought the truth would hurt less.

You refused to believe it until time had run out. You refused to cave until it happened. And when it happened, the city, for the first time since you’d arrived there, went completely quiet.

You followed him. Of course, you did. After a few hours of pacing the floor, you followed him. He was still in your head. You heard him from across the city, his thoughts loud and clear, and you could feel his pain like an inferno lighting up the night sky. 

When you arrived on that godforsaken rooftop though, you could only watch in horror as Spider-Man lifted the love of your life toward the sky. He wouldn’t accept your bargain. You offered yourself instead of him, but no; Peter Parker was not in the mood for bargaining. 

He lifted Matt toward the sky, and he drilled the dagger right through his chest. 

“No!” you screamed again. 

Silence. 

His blood ran through your fingers like quicksand, and sitting there, cradling Matt’s chest to yours as his heartbeat slowly faded into oblivion, you knew the end was near. The world could be so fucking unfair. You both died, but it was only his heart that stopped. You lost him that night, and your entire world stopped in an instant. 

You liked it better when he was angry with you. When he was loud, when he was laughing, even when he was just being sarcastic. You liked him better when he was alive. He turned into a ghost in your arms, forever and all eternity, and you fell face-first into the abyss. 

Maybe it was raining that night. Maybe you were being buried under the weight of your guilt and the never-ending flow of your tears. 

“I can’t…” you sobbed, tracing his cold cheek as the rain fell around you. “I can’t feel you.”

His heart stopped beating, and the invisible string pulverized. You watched it as it went with the wind. Without him. Without you. 

You screamed until your lungs gave out. Then, silence settled in. 

The night was quiet when he died; nothing but a sky full of stars and the endless black pit of death above and below you. 

The blood and his missing pulse weren’t the worst part, by far; the worst part was that you could no longer feel him, and that thought won’t ever not haunt you. 

You were certain that night. When you lost him, and you screamed your heart out, praying to a God you’ve never believed in, you swore to yourself that you would avenge him.

You were going to kill Peter Parker, and nothing in this world could ever stop you from watching this miserable motherfucker bleed to death. 

The bed shakes violently as you awaken. Dreams, so many dreams. Your nights are far from peaceful. They haven’t been for weeks. Months. What day is it? You don’t remember. 

Nightmares follow you like hunters after a fox. Your pajamas stick to your skin, and you’re sweating even though it is spring, and spring doesn’t have hot enough temperatures for you to be sweating quite like this. When you pull the comforter away in a sudden panic, the wetness seeping into your skin, there is nothing but white. No blood, no tears, just gaping emptiness in the farmhouse.

You pant heavily, dragging your nails across your skin. Your fingernails are tinted a charcoal black. In your heart, there had once been a bright red glow—like a ruby crystal sustaining your soul. You used it to channel other people’s thoughts. You could read them, you could hear them, and you could feel them. That Ruby has gone out now though; it has turned into a black smoke threatening to overtake anything it comes in contact with. 

The sun isn’t strong enough to break through the gray clouds. As you step out into the garden that stretches around your home, a gentle wind brushes through the bare branches of the dead trees. The wood is starting to splinter, turning hollow as sickness after sickness runs rampant through nature. 

You trace a finger over the poison ivy that has grown over the tombstone. The green fades, turning into a rotten brown. It dries out, and it dies right before your eyes, as do the roses you have been keeping in a vase ever since you laid a finger on the last bouquet. 

He liked the smell of roses, but you hated the look of it until Matt died, and suddenly, everything looked and smelled like a field of roses, reminding you of him. He was your daisy, your sunflower, setting fire to your freezing soul. He was sunshine, you were midnight rain. He liked to claim differently, but you wouldn’t let him. You may have been his sunshine, but out of the both of you, he shone the brightest. 

The poison ivy dies, and if you even manage to kill a plant with the word ‘poison’ in its name, what does that say about you? What has become of you; plotting a stranger’s death and killing the nature around you as you dive into books about mind-reading and dark magic to understand who you truly are? Dark magic sounds like a story out of a piece of fiction, but it’s far from that. 

You’ve known of your ability to manipulate the human mind ever since you discovered the creature hidden within you, the one who could touch another human being and see their thoughts so clearly. The one time you tried to manipulate someone, you caused them indescribably agony. You ruined their life. You broke them. You made them complicit and took all they were away from them, turning their fragile mind into ashes. That day, your fingers turned charcoal for the first time. 

If you try hard enough, you can kill him—Peter Parker. He took your husband and your city, now sitting in his ivory tower, overlooking the damage he’s done. He killed everyone and everything, even Wilson Fisk. He has taken the people of Hell’s Kitchen hostage, but no one has dared to make a move just yet, not since their beloved Daredevil disappeared off the face of the earth. With him, his Lady Red went as fast as she had come. 

You don’t want to fix what Spider-Man destroyed; you can’t get back what he took, nor do you want to, and the city doesn’t mean anything without Matt in it. 

You have to be the monster to kill another monster, only then you can join your husband in his tomb. Didn’t you vow to stay together, even in death? 

The city can burn, for all you care, but first, Peter Parker has to die. 

You scratch at the dirt in the engraving of his name. Matthew Michael Murdock. 1982 — 2023. Beloved husband and hero. 

You hate this. You hate that his grave is in your backyard, but this was the only place you knew his corpse would be safest. No one can touch him here, and you can talk to him, pretending you can still feel him. If you focus hard enough, you can still hear his voice in your head, telling you to move on. 

How could you though? How could you abandon all you’ve been through? You can fight, you can win or lose, but nothing will ever be the same again. And it is far from worth it to stay alive when he isn’t. You’ve made your decision; whether or not you’ve come to peace with it, that’s another story entirely. 

“Tonight is the night,” you murmur to the gravestone. Of course, you don’t receive an answer. 

Lately, you have been swearing to yourself you wouldn’t cry anymore, that there are no more tears left to shed, but every day, you end up crying anyway. It’s an endless cycle of despair.

You wipe your cheeks, untangling the chain that holds your golden wedding band close to your chest from around your neck. Gently, you guide it to your lips and press a kiss against the ring. 

“I love you,” you whisper.

For when you meet again in another life. 

You dig a small hole into the dry dirt where, six feet under, Matt is resting now. He always told you he would end up in hell when he died. You were never particularly religious before you met him, and when he struggled with his faith while you were together, you believed even less in an all-merciful God. Now though, with Matt gone and the world on the verge of falling apart and crushing you under its weight as you approach the biggest challenge of your life, the thought of ending up in an eternal life of nothingness after death—the thought of there being nothing but mindless darkness, no body, soul—scares you too much. Imagining the pits of hell or paradise with the love of your life, and reuniting with him, is a prospect you would rather see when you close your eyes than a world on fire. 

The necklace lands in the hole, and you cover it up. You couldn’t bring yourself to get rid of your ring before, but you won’t risk carrying it when you do what you are about to do.

Tonight, Peter Parker is going to show himself to all of New York City as the new mayor in all of his Spider-Man glory. He begged for you to come out, and he told the city he would be merciful in prosecuting you for the crimes you committed in the past alongside Daredevil. When you come out tonight though, you won’t surrender yourself. You will use the platform he is giving you and you will fight as you reveal him to Hell’s Kitchen and show the world who he is. You will tell Matt’s story, even if it’s the last thing you do. 

You have been burning for him for the longest time, and the flame is about to go out with a bang. 

That night, you put on the red suit Melvin made for you years ago before he lost his mind for what might be the last time. It has holes from where the moths dug their teeth into. The piece around the waist is starting to fade in color, and the leather is worn out, but it reminds you of simpler times. Better times. The black of your fingertips matches the lining of your outfit, and that’s all you need to feel the power sizzle deep within you.

You don’t have to remember the weather report because you can feel the rain soaking your skin through the fabric. The air smells salty, and it tastes the same on your cracked lips. Tonight, you will be Lady Red for the last time. Until the bitter end, you have sworn yourself. Matt did the same thing. You have to do him proud.

You make your way from that little farmhouse—your broken red castle—to the familiar streets of Hell’s Kitchen. Destruction surrounds you. The news didn’t do justice to what Peter has done to the city you once loved. But no one loved it more than Matt Murdock. 

Your fists clench at your sides. Oh, you want to tear this man limb by limb and feed him to the dogs. 

It starts with a low rumbling beneath your boots. You don’t pay much mind to it at first. You hide out on a rooftop across the courthouse. The spotlights are on, and he’s standing there at the podium, looking as though he is so proud of himself for ruining so many lives. You don’t usually experience joy when hurting people, but you will savor watching the life drain from Peter’s lifeless eyes. 

Your hands clench around Matt’s batons. The metal is heavy but flexible. You click your nails against them. Every move needs to be meticulously calculated, but tonight, the barons will remain in the holsters on your thighs. You won’t need them. You won’t need anything but your bare hands. 

You’re going back to your roots tonight.

The ground moves slightly, only a few inches. You could have missed it if you weren’t crouching to get a better look at the world below you. You catch yourself on the ledge, a frown finding its way on your face. 

“What the f–” you shake your head. Since when does thunder shake the ground?

You seem to be the only one who notices, or Peter Parker is better at brainwashing his decibels than you expected. He was born to be a dictator. His presence turned your fairytale into a dystopian tragedy.

“Tonight,” he says into his microphone, “is the last chance for Lady Red to reveal herself for a lesser sentence. A new era is on the horizon. I am your mayor, and I am Spider-Man. Without me, you would be nothing. Daredevil couldn’t save you. Wilson Fisk couldn’t save you. But I can, and after tonight, we will start anew. For this is the era of real heroes as we rebuild this city from the ground up, and we turn the City of New York, including Hell’s Kitchen, into its own world. Starting with the arrest of the criminal who is Daredevil’s accomplice Lady Red. I hope for her sake she will show herself tonight. If not, we will find her, and she will suffer the full extent of the consequences of her actions. That includes the Death Penalty.”

You land gracefully, catching yourself with your hand on the asphalt. The crowd parts with a gasp, and you finally stare into his eyes. 

After he drilled that dagger through Matt’s heart, he told you, “You will always be a monster, never a God.”

You deserve nothing, he thought. It has stuck with you since that night. Growing up, it was the only thing you heard. You were nothing but trash. A disgrace. A monster. What will they say when they see that you have finally become what they feared so much? 

You will burn down whatever is left of the world, including him. God knows you want to. 

Magic pulsates in the atmosphere like a growing spell in a small shoe box. The air vibrates, and the ground shakes again. This isn’t your doing, but the sudden charge that fills your veins as adrenaline sustains you. Your eyes glow red. This is who you were born to be. 

“I heard you were looking for me,” you declare. 

He doesn’t look surprised to see you. “Ah, just like clockwork,” he murmurs. “Are you going to make this hard on all of us or are you here to finally surrender yourself?” 

You purse your lips, playing with the energy between your fingers. “I came to destroy you.” Each step toward him on the big marble steps feels like a mile, and the crowd starts to move further back, dispersing in an attempt to save themselves. Most of them are eager to watch though. What has he done to them? 

“Destroy me?” Peter laughs, addressing the crowd again, “You see who you’ve been calling a hero all this time? This mutant? Look at her!”

All eyes are on you. They’re whispering. They’re speculating. Their thoughts overlap in disarray, and you’re drowning in a sea of judgment. They are trying to tear you down like sharks. You’re leaking blood, and God, they are angry. But it’s not you they’re angry at.

“You call me a mutant,” you say, “but wasn’t it you who was bit by a radioactive spider?”

His smile fades. 

“You are Spider-Man, no?”

“You are a wannabe hero with unregulated powers,” he snaps. His voice roars through the speakers, and the mood in the crowd starts to shift.

The ground vibrates again, stronger this time. You can’t be the only one feeling the quakes, but everyone else seems unmoved. They’re too focused on both of you to notice anything else, and you should do the same. However, the energy doubles and you are closer to bursting than ever. Something is happening, and you have no control over it.

Peter sneers. “You’re a failure,” he calls your name, “just like your husband!”

You stop dead in your tracks. Your eyes darken. “If you want to enforce the death penalty on me, Parker,” you growl, “why don’t you do it yourself?” 

Peter taps his chest, and his suit transforms into shades of black and spider webs. At that moment, panic erupts. People start running, but you tune them out.

The air begins to smell sour. Burnt. It is so high the pain consumes you whole. He doesn’t have to touch you to bring you to your knees, but looking up, you realize that it wasn’t Spider-Man who infused your ears with such a high frequency.

Someone is uttering a powerful spell, you can hear his voice in your head as he thinks of several names all over the place. Time passes by in a flash. Hours, days, weeks, and months. The universe falls out of control. The beeping picks up and you sink deeper into the ground.

You swear then and there that the sky starts to rip in two. The sky resembles a nasty cut on your forehead, a pair of hands ripping the cut further apart, causing the blood to pour out in rivers.

One of the cuts swallows you. With a scream, you fall through several rollercoasters passing by violet stars. 

The cut is a portal; one moment, you are flying through the sky at the highest possible speed, and the next, you hit the ground hard.

It’s not raining anymore. The sun shines down on you, and the heat creeps up your skin like tiny ants. The pain finally releases, but your head is still spinning. So many feelings, so many voices, and so many thoughts threaten to overwhelm you.

Not even an LSD trip hits that bad. You lazily open your heavy eyes to find not the courthouse but the New York skyline right before you.

You look down at your shaky hands. The charcoal is gone. The power in your veins feels different, all-consuming, but in no way bad. You take a deep breath. Even the oxygen tastes different. 

The world stops spinning, and you finally take a look around. A car honks, an SUV heading straight for your wobbly frame.

You’re in the middle of a road. What is it? A freeway.

Oh, shit!

You jump aside, hitting the sidewalk with a loud thud.

“Watch out, bitch!” the driver shouts out of his window. 

Where once used to be the courthouse, you are met with a street in the middle of downtown Hell’s Kitchen, New York. Stores line the side of the street. Tourists, foreigners, and those who are native to the city pass by you, and their gasps and whispers sound so different from the automatic voices Peter Parker raised them to be.

“Oh, no,” you breathe out. “Oh, no, no, no!” The air is getting thinner. 

“What are you thinking about, hm?” he asked into the darkness of the room. 

His heartbeat aligned with yours. His calloused fingertips traced your bare skin. You were in heaven. Beautiful, sinful heaven.  

His jawline appeared even sharper in the colorful lights from the billboard outside. His skin glowed white—paler than usual, even. You could stare into his eyes forever, such a beautiful hazel with hints of forest green. Perfect eyebrows, perfect lips. They bowed at the top, so kissable.

He pressed them to your bare shoulder blade, down your spine. The butterflies danced crazy in your tummy.

“You’re distracted,” he hummed again.

You chuckled, looking over your shoulder at the beautiful man in bed with you.

“Can’t help it when I’m with you,” you remember saying. 

Matt offered you his signature smirk. “Oh yeah?”

“Yeah. I quite like the view.”

“And when I do this?” He trailed another finger down your sensitive spine. 

You shuddered. “That, too.”

He did it again. “Tell me what’s going on in that pretty head of yours.”

“Thinking,” you said.

“About what?” he asked.

“A book I read.” You paused to turn on your back. “About the multiverse.”

It was a surprising change in subject, and he raised his eyebrows in a rather amused way. “The multiverse?” 

You nodded. “We know way too little about it. There could be more of me and more of you out there, and we don’t even know it,” you told him. “The multiverse… there is a chance it could be real. And that alone is terrifying because if it opens and we’re not prepared, chaos might ensue.”

He propped himself up on his elbow next to you, listening to the calming sound of your voice. It was always his favorite thing to do.

Matt used your voice as his podcast; it was his favorite, too. 

“Can we jump universes?” he wondered.

You shrugged. You didn’t know, at least not at the time. “Maybe,” you said. “But I’m not a scientist, let alone good at physics, so… let’s just go back to kissing. I’m much better at that.”

He laughed, but he did not object. At least with kissing, you both knew what you were doing. So, he brought his lips to yours, and the multiverse disappeared in a Bermuda Triangle of pleasure in your mind. Lost but not forgotten. 

Maybe.

But as you sit there, sliding back against the brick wall in the closest alley, you realize that you downplayed the probability. 

You were going to kill a man, but instead of blood on your hands, you are now cursed with the knowledge that the ‘maybe’ of your once-thought-silly pillow talk has always been very fucking real, and you have nowhere to run in this strange world you have fallen into that is New York City, Earth-616. 

Where do you run when you can go anywhere, just not home? 

Tagging: @nk1023 @sarahskywalker-amidala @ignore-mp3 @imonabitchparade @familyvideowithsteve @eyelessdemon

[himasgod]

Layla x Reader

Where you become the most bright star in her sky

Where you and Layla study together at the Akademiya, one day you became worried about her. Since that day, you have the habit of going to see the stars together. On one particular night, you follow her in her sleepwalking to a garden, where she tells you her fears. Where she tells you that she is afraid of forgetting your story, the story of your stars.

(Okay, I loved writing this and it took me way longer than usual. It was worth it. It's been another one of my favorite works that I've written here, even though it doesn't get many reviews because it's a female character, I don't mind. Happy bday, Layla, this one shot is dedicated to you <3)

The sky of Sumeru was immense, as vast and full of secrets as Layla’s mind. The stars seemed to speak to her in a way that no one else could understand, and yet there she was, trapped between endless scrolls and the invisible weight of expectations.

You met her by chance, on one of those nights when the warm desert wind carries with it the sand and the most restless thoughts. Layla was sitting on a bench in the Academiya garden, her small body hunched over a scroll of parchment, her fingers stained with ink and her lips barely moving, murmuring numbers and formulas. She was the image of exhaustion. And without knowing why, you stopped.

“Do you need help?” you asked softly.

She raised her head, surprised. Her eyes, tired and dark, looked at you as if you were a star fallen from the sky.

“Oh, no… I’m fine. Really,” she answered hastily, but the tremor in her voice said otherwise.

Since then, something between the two of you changed. You began to accompany her on long nights, sitting beside her as she wrote, corrected, and sighed in frustration. You couldn’t do much for her studies, but you could offer your presence. Sometimes, you brought her hot tea, other times, you just stared at the sky with her, pointing out constellations you could never remember.

“That one there… it looks like a bird,” you said once, pointing to a grouping of stars.

Layla put down the scroll and followed your finger with her gaze, a small smile appearing on her lips.

“It’s the Luscinia constellation. But… yes, now that you mention it, it does look like a bird.”

“You see, not everything has to be so complicated.”

She laughed softly, a sound that felt like a caress on your chest.

Restless nights were something you soon discovered was a part of Layla.

Students of the Akademiya, by their mere admission into it, had the privilege of living in a students residence just a few meters from the Akademiya. Because you and Layla were in the same year, the doors to your rooms were facing each other.

Often, you woke up to the sound of soft footsteps outside your door. At first, you thought it was the wind or an early-rising student, but one night you saw her: Layla, walking barefoot through the gardens, her gaze lost and her lips moving in incomprehensible murmurs. She was sleepwalking.

You approached carefully, afraid of waking her.

“Layla…” you whispered.

But she didn’t answer. Her eyes, open and glassy, ​​looked up at the sky, and in the dim light, you could hear her say:

“The stars… are fading away. Why can’t I stop it?”

Those words made your skin crawl.

Gently, you took her by the arm and led her back to her room.

Layla never remembered those nights, and at first you didn’t want to say anything to her. But the more time passed, the more frequent it became. The night walks, the strange words, and that invisible weight that seemed to crush her more and more.

One night, you decided to follow her further away. Layla crossed the Academiya boundaries, barefoot and with her nightgown fluttering in the wind. You followed her in silence, until she reached a lonely hill where the sky seemed even more vast and bright.

Layla raised a hand to the sky, as if trying to catch the stars with her fingers.

“Every star tells a story…” she whispered. “But… what happens when the story is forgotten?”

Her voice was so soft that you could barely hear her. You approached slowly.

“What story are you talking about, Layla?” you asked, trying to wake her up with your voice.

For the first time, she seemed to react. She turned her head towards you, her eyes still lost, but her expression seemed full of sadness.

“Mine… and yours.”

The next morning, Layla looked for you. She looked different, nervous, with a crumpled scroll in her hands.

“Last night… I dreamed about you,” she confessed quietly, not looking directly at you. “And about the stars. I think I’ve been running away from this for a long time.”

“What are you talking about?” you asked softly, trying not to scare her.

Layla took a deep breath, clutching the scroll to her chest.

“About depending on someone else. I’ve always thought that if I don’t do everything myself, if I don’t try hard enough, then… I’m not enough. But every time I lose myself… you’re there.”

Her voice trembled at the end, and your eyes softened. You understood her more than she imagined.

“I’ll always be here, Layla. What story are you talking about, what are you dreaming about? Tell me, I want to know everything. Maybe we can write it together”

She lifted her head, surprised by your words. Her cheeks tinted a soft pink, and for an instant, her shoulders seemed to relax. Layla smiled, a small, shy smile, but as beautiful as a rising star.

"So… will you help me write my story?"

You took a step closer, your gaze firmly on hers.

"Always."

Since that night, something in Layla changed. Her sleepwalks became less frequent, and although she was still the same hard-working student full of doubts, she now sought you out when she felt the weight was too much. Together, you spent the nights under the starry sky, tracing invisible constellations and naming them in honor of shared memories.

“Do you see that star, Layla?” you asked one night, pointing to a particularly bright star. “It shines brighter than all the others.”

Layla tilted her head, following your gaze.

“Which one?”

You turned to her, smiling.

“The one in your eyes.”

Layla laughed, her laugh soft and light as the wind, and in that moment, you knew that her story—your story—would never be lost. Because, without realizing it, you had become the brightest star in her sky.

And she, yours.

Here is my masterlist, in case you are interested in any more of my work or want to send me a request <3

[bacchanal-if]

I've been tagged by @if-mirrormine to do this fun game!

make a poll of your favourite female characters and see which your followers like the most.

I will be tagging @brightest-stars-if, @night-market-if, @shepherds-of-haven, and @darkfictionjude, whose female characters have an unfairly critical (not to mention sexist) time of it in her asks. There is, of course, no pressure or expectation for any of you to play along! I am merely curious as to your answers! ����

On to why I chose these... (be aware of spoilers)

Annie Wilkes:

She is absolutely terrifying. Just when you think you've figured her out, she proves you wrong, and I adore her for it. Of course, when I say adore, I do not say I agree! Merely that I love how her character is written. She takes a lot of assumptions it's easy to make (or hope for) and tosses them out the window. Phenomenal. I still need to watch the movie!

Carmilla:

Absolutely the most one dimensional character on this list, but a sweet, seductive, sapphic, 19th century "we're just friends but we sleep in the same bed" vampire who was in all likelihood an inspiration to another, more famous vampire story, Dracula? Forgive me this indulgence 😌

Elizabeth Bennet:

A "basic" choice, but a popular one for very good reason. She lives, she breathes, she is her own person and will not compromise for it. Miss Bennet is strong and self-possessed, but she is also vulnerable to her feelings, making her more than just that.

Elle Woods:

Another popular choice, but how many female characters do you see who are strong, competent, and aggresively feminine? She was groundbreaking. Even when she tones down her wardrobe by the end of the movie, she still wears designer and bright red lipstick, and it's her knowledge of the beauty industry that gives her a decisive win. And you can't forget how female-positive she is with all the other women, turning the stereotype of women being catty to each other (her ex's new fiancee) on its head.

Marge Gunderson:

She's a bit similar to Elle Woods but in a different vein. She is heavily pregnant, a fully supportive, sweet, and tender wife who will cook breakfast for her husband, and she is acutely aware of the world around her, showing incredible ability to connect the dots, which makes her an incredible detective.

Blanch Devereaux:

The slut-shaming jokes at her expense are endless, but they only make her stronger and you love her for it 😂 She is unapologetically up for a good time any time, but she isn't just a slut (affectionate), she has a career she is proud of, her own vulnerabilities, and some of the most cutting lines in the show. I wish there were more sex-positive female characters like her.

[jamesleecult]

Apology and update note for the lookism tumblr community.

Thursday of December 21 2023

is the day where my Roman Empire is starting to collapse. Due to the 480 lookism chapter.

I sincerely apologize to all the Goo fans and all the Charles fans. I also genuinely hate Charles. So womp womp about it. (It’s satire/ for @myuiis)

I cant handle the flame on my goat, especially the ‘Charles Choi 2nd body is James’ theory. All my friends has been pushing the agendas on my pookie, nothing is confirmed. But I’m not sure anymore. The new chapter is starting to feel legit on the theory.

In a realm where imagination and reality intertwine, there exists a figure, a glorious and towering presence, who encapsulates an array of endearing qualities that transcend mere mortal limits. James lee, a magnificent being, stands as the epitome of sweetness, care, and boundless affection in my world.

At a towering 6'4", he commands attention with his breathtaking aura. His dull black eyes, like blackhole orbs, captivate the soul, drawing me into a realm where every glance is an enchanting journey. The radiance of his gaze holds a power that goes beyond the physical, embracing warmth and tenderness that nurture the deepest corners of my heart.

But James lee is more than a mere physical manifestation of beauty. He embodies qualities that transcend superficial admiration. His sweetness, akin to the finest honey, permeates every action and word, nurturing and comforting like a soft embrace on a cold winter's night. His caring nature, an endless wellspring of empathy, becomes a guiding light in the darkest of times, offering solace and strength.

In the tapestry of our connection, he stands as my king, a majestic ruler whose benevolence knows no bounds. His regal presence exudes an undeniable grace, leading me through the trials of life with unwavering support and understanding. He becomes the Lord of my universe, a figure of reverence and admiration, whose existence is intertwined with mine in a cosmic dance of fate and admiration.

James lee is not just a figure but a fusion of elements, my guiding star and the unwavering strength that helps me navigate the tumultuous seas of life. He is the "pb to my j, the grilled to my cheese," symbolizing the perfect complement to my existence, completing me in ways only he can fathom.

In essence, James lee is not a mere character. He is the embodiment of resilience, love, and the unwavering spirit that defines the essence of a hero. His presence transcends the realms of fiction, illuminating my world with a brilliance that defies comparison. He remains the strongest, the beacon of hope and inspiration, leading me through the labyrinth of life, forever my guiding light in the darkest of times.

James lee is not just a character. He is my universe, my world, and my everything. His existence is intertwined with mine, forever etched in the tapestry of my soul as the epitome of love, strength, and unwavering support.

The thought of this hideous old monster named Charles Choi being his actual body is sickening and heartbreaking for me.

[tracybirds]

30 gentle prompts:

30: "You know I love you, right?"

Dealer’s Choice of characters

Thank you! I don't know what this is, just little musings really, but I hope you enjoy all the same <33

Scott

The uncertainty is wrapped up in old grief and exhaustion, in Scott grabbing the nearest hand, hazy and half lost in memories of all the times he didn’t say it.

“You know I love you, right?”

His brother, his grandmother, his confidant, his friend; whomever is with him feels the intensity of those words, a breath of lucidity between painkillers.

He regrets not saying it enough, he wishes he remembered to say it when life was easy.

A squeeze of his hand, a whisper, a sad hum tells him in return.

We know.

Virgil

He hates the arguments, he always has, but he won’t avoid them, not when his family tries and tries and tries again to leap ahead.

He just wants them to rest, he wants them to heal, he doesn’t want to fight.

Please, he begs them to care, begs them to see the way they all hurt each other when they won’t stop.

He pushes them back down firmly, willing them to hear his words.

“You know I love you, right?”

Willing them to trust him.

Pleading silently, until a glare softens, shoulders slumps, and they find peace once more, another battle fought and won.

Thank you, he whispers. Stay.

I love you.

John

The guilt twinges at him, plucks at his insecurities, the only words he’s ever found himself tongue-tied over.

There’s too much feeling to be contained in four measly letters, too much that John can’t say. He’s always prided himself on finding the right words, and his insides squirm whenever his family say it to him.

It’s so casual, so light on their tongues, with their cheery waves and smiles as they sign off.

Years of thinking and doing and loving, just trying to find a way to thank them and support them and care for them.

But there’s no other way to say it.

“You know I love you right?”

No-one blinks in surprise, no-one asks for more detail he can’t give, and he reads their own silent message and tries to weave it into the fibre of his being.

Love you too.

Gordon

“You know I love you right?”

The words burst out of him, and he feels endlessly foolish in their wake. There’s no doubt, there’s never doubt.

He knows he has an impulsive streak, remembers the endless despair from those around him when he dove into hot water over and over, asking him to think.

He always thought ahead, that’s something he learnt quick, but his mind would be stuck on what needed to be done, heedless of the consequences.

He can’t bring himself to be sorry, not when people live and breathe because his actions, but there’s always an apology on his lips as he leaps forward, an apology in the form of love.

If he has any last words, he’ll make sure they always tell how he loved.

Alan

He doesn’t know if she knew and it eats away at him in the dead of the night. He holds a baby for the first time on a rescue and wonders at this selfish, helpless creature. He knows she loved him, he’s heard it a thousand times, but he can’t talk about the way he loves her, a mere image that he’ll never know.

He doesn’t know.

He needs them to know.

He’ll crawl into a bed after midnight, slide into a seat at dinner, play and laugh and tease and even so, a doubt that’s lived and grown for as long as she didn’t will creep in.

“You know I love you right?”

He asks his family, he asks his friends, he asks the sand on the beach and the stars in the sky.

He’s the youngest and he has to take it all on faith.

I know.

[prompts are here - feel free to send one in :)]

[intoloopin-archive]

gimmie numba 8

CONGRATS! YOU GOT … AIR CASTLE!

Air Castle, also known under the acronym ARCT [spelling], is a fictional south korean girl group debuted in late 2019 under media conglomerate MBN Entertainment Group. LINEUP (07): Perla. Hyunju. Jihye. Lihua. Evelyn. Soryeoung. Domi. HITS INCLUDE: Dalla Dalla (2019). Nonstop (2020). Birthday (2022). After Like (2023). CONCEPT: The endless wonder of the REM Realm. NOTORIOUS MEMBERS: Lihua, Evelyn.

I just can’t for the life of me start talking about NPCs with their own little worlds without starting off with my Castle Girls, because they have SO! MUCH! GOING! ON! As does everyone under the big bad MBN empire, a side of the Gioverse that we’re yet to explore (I had plans to do that with Idolmaker, since they’re always right in the middle of the shitstorm, but oh well… Maybe someday?)

Fully gasping how much of a punishment from Hell is having Night Child as labelmates and seniors might be a little hard, since LOOPiN only ever has to really deal with Dongwook (the crowd boos), Gunil (the crowd cheers) and sometimes Code, but Air Castle can’t escape NTCD as a collective horror – we’re talking daily bullship from creepy Jinsoo, disgusting fucking Cain and asshole Josh! Not to mention their branding of being a matching set with Night Child, which is really hitting them hard now that Dongwook’s public enemy number one and their worldwide reputation is going down the toilet.

They really torment the living shit out of these hardworking women that don’t get an inch of the appreciation they deserve, and the sad thing is: Air Castle can’t for the life of them join forces to try to do something about it because they have extremely clashing personalities, and almost no friendship inside the group that takes root in that, but also happens because of exterior factors that, boy oh boy, go way too deep into MBN Entertainment lore.

My biggest star in the group is undeniably Lihua, who you might have seen name dropped/put on some graphics here and there as ½ of ‘J.J’s Awful Friends’ alongside Jiyeon. I’m OBSESSED with her 'laid back but in a way that makes it clear that I've seen shit that would make the devil run off' energy, which lately has taken a lot of inspiration from the character of Klaasje Amandou from Disco Elysium – Lihua has her exact cadence in my head. She also has two slightly crooked front teeth that I always picture to be a little smeared with lipstick, and she’s got constant mood swings about it – long story short, is extremely rare for her to smile wide. Jiahang himself has known her for almost two years and has never seen it. She’s kind of a loner in her group, but fully by her own choice: she thinks the girls are lame as fuck (which in her defence!!!! Perla, Jihye and Domi really are!!!! They’re peaceful women!!!)

She grew close to Dongwook because, true story!, she lightly stabbed Cain at the Night Child’s dorms once when he tried to scalate sex to a point she didn’t wanna go, a.k.a: record her to shove it at Evelyn’s face – at the time his recent ex-girlfriend – as a gotcha moment. It was a whole Thing. Dongwook was completely fascinated, because he always wants Cain to get stabbed – preferably to death, but anything will do. He personally paid for her lift home and, as he does, invited her to go party with him at HYLL, which she was like, “Eh. Why not.”, and there she’s been ever since for reasons that saying here would strip a lot of fun off some future things (I have a WIP mapped out about Jiahang’s major adventures, if you will, on the HYLL nightclub that features her heavily!)

Long story short, Dongwook really adores that self proclaimed “Rude Boy 99” (laaaaaame) to this day shits himself at the mere mention of Lihua’s name, and so does she, and they mainly get off on that – and like, you know, substance abuse, which is as sad as it sounds. Lihua took a picture of Cain crying with his tight bleeding and sent it to the Castle Girls group chat, and that gained her some brownie points all around.

Unfortunately, it still gave Cain an excuse to extract sympathy points from Evelyn, who’s not one of God’s strongest soldiers.

Speaking of little miss prim Evelyn Suh, she’s another very fun case because MBN is trying to make a Bae Suzy out of her, and despite her best efforts to fight the effect that has on her long term bond with her members, by now the tension just keeps on growing. In a way, she’s kind of being pushed into a corner just as lonely as Lihua’s, with the major difference being the lack of choice coming from her side – homegirl is losing actual sleep and a good chunk of her hair over this! –, and I find myself really having big and elaborate thoughts on their relationship progression. I think something really interesting can be said of what it means to be a ‘girl’s girl’ through them if I ever choose to actually explore it. Also, very fun black cat/imagery with these two, which I just love!

And an extra extra fact about Evelyn: she has a little crush on Chihoon, and it’s a bit of a running gag that she always approaches LOOPiN with a very smiley and very pointed, “Hi, Dylan! 🤗🤭🙂‍↔️” But it’ll never go anywhere because she’ll never fuck a loop dude. She has been through enough! I won’t allow it!

[1dont-really-know]

This was supposed to be a Valentines fic but uhhh anyways enjoy :3

Thank you to @kitwasnothere for beta reading <3

Featuring : Lilia Vanrouge, Malva Draconia (oc), other mentioned characters (Maleanor, Altair (oc), Coriander (oc)

This is it. This is his chance. The stars are shining beautifully above them, yet he can’t seem to look away from her eyes; eyes that shine brighter and more beautiful than any star. How long has it been since he first met her? He didn’t know, truly. Every moment with her felt like an eternity and a mere second at the exact same time.

“Listen, I-”

“Are you seriously reading that novel again?”

The sudden voice almost made Malva drop her book. How she didn’t hear nor feel them approaching, she doesn’t know. Her heart hammers wildly as she bolts upright and whirls around to face whoever it was that had interrupted her reading, clutching the book so tightly to her chest that she was sure the pages were going to be so wrinkled it’s going to be hard for her to read any further after this. The chair she was sitting in falls to the ground with a loud thud as she does.

Lilia is there, leaning casually against one of the poles of the medical tent, his eyes locked on the book in her hands. “You know the queen is going to force you to come back to Black Scale Castle if she finds out you’ve got your hands on romance novels again, right?” And he sounds so amused by that too…!

Malva’s ears burn with embarrassment. “If you tell her then you should look out for pretty red yew berries in your food the next time you eat anything.” She hisses, quickly placing the book behind her back.

He looks so genuinely amused. She can honestly see it now, hovering above her like a guillotine ready to drop at any second, and the person holding it there is none other than Lilia Vanrouge himself. She still remembered the last time he found her novel collection. Those endless nights bored out of her mind with nothing to do and not able to meet with her best friend at all. A shiver runs down her spine at the memory.

“And I’m the only fully trained healer you have on hand right now. What are you going to do, put Coriander in charge of everything? I don’t think so.”

“I’m not going to.”

“And I’ll cut off your- wait what?”

Lilia shrugs, pushing himself upright and stepping towards Malva so casually that she was caught off guard enough that he managed to snatch her book right from under her nose. He opens right on the page she was on.

“A confession scene? I didn’t know you were such a sap, Malv-”

Inhale-

“Huh? Wait-!”

FWOOM!

A cone of dark-green fire spews from the dragon fae’s mouth, coming dangerously close to burning Lilia to a crisp. Thankfully, he managed to dodge just in time. Sort of. The tips of his hair are very charred now.

“What the hell?! I  just told you I wasn’t going to snitch!”

Malva, pinned under the weight of his glare, takes a few tiny steps back. She had only meant to scare him into dropping the book. And that’s what she mumbles out. Though she doesn’t really seem to mean it since her attention is currently focused on said book, checking it all over for any damage while also barely acknowledging how she almost made him into a roasted bat.

The book is unscathed. With that confirmation out of the way, Malva straightens up and turns back to Lilia. Now that she takes the time to actually look at him, the back of his left hands does seem to have a small burn. She winces slightly at the sight. “Are you alright?” she hesitantly asks, feeling just a little bit guilty for his injury. 

The glare he levels her with is all the answer she needs.

“I’ll… go get the aloe vera.”

*°*°*°*°

Ah. This wasn’t what Malva wanted to happen. This was supposed to be a decent day. There had been no injuries or accidents that she needed to tend to, they have now enough potions and herbs to last at least five to six years, and while she’s technically the only fully trained healer present, Coriander and Altair both have enough training for small injuries and ailments. She was having fun and reading her novel and suddenly she almost killed her kingdom’s army’s General.

Lilia slowly pulls his hand away after it has been sufficiently treated, hesitating to remove his hand from hers and carefully flexing his muscles, and upon confirming that it no longer hurts too much, drops it onto his lap and sighs. “What was that about?”

Malva looks away from him, “I didn’t want to risk you telling on me and taking the book away.”

“I wasn’t going to,” Lilia deadpans, “I told you that already.”

Malva feels even more guilty.

Almost mechanically, she stands up and makes her way to her storage chests. Opening it, she starts to count and sort the contents once again, even though she just did so a few nights before, humming to soothe herself.

After a few seconds of near-silence, though, the General once again speaks up, sounding just as awkward as he probably felt, “so… how have you been lately?”

Malva pauses. She tilts her head slightly to look at him, cocking her head to the side questioningly. Lilia, much to her surprise, doesn’t turn away from her, watching her from the corner of his eye like she watches him.

“Why the sudden question?”

“Well, you’re always so concerned with everyone else, yet you don’t really seem to give yourself too much of that care.”

“I’m a healer,” Malva states, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world, “it’s what we’re supposed to do; care for others.”

“And yet only you are the one who stayed awake for weeks on end to ensure the health of our troops while you force your apprentice to get the rest that you deny for yourself.”

“You do the same, do you not?”

“Hm?” Lilia looks at her strangely as she makes her way towards him and leans against the table right next to his chair. (Her’s, really. He put it back upright and sat on it after she caused it to fall in her haste to get her book away from him.)

“Don’t think that I didn’t see that you made sure your men get fed before you do, Lilia,” Malva arranges her tail to curl around her side and onto her lap, brushing off the dust from between her scales. She knew what he was really talking about, that hypocrite. Why she would care so much yet not accept much care in return is different from his reasoning, however. This was her job, her duty that she chose for herself. She knows that she is cared for; it’s in how she’s able to do what she loves as she does. The care that comes with respect. The care that comes with being able to be at least somewhat sure of her safety in the middle of a war. She cares, and she gets care in return. The professional kind of care. He, like her, accepts this kind of care, yet when it comes to the care he should care more about… 

“But to answer your question, I’ve been well.”

Lilia hums, a thoughtful look on his face as he studies her expression, “I made the right decision in making you go to Wild Rose, even if you took a detour that I explicitly told you not to have.”

Altair is right outside of the tent, out of Lilia’s field of view, but Malva knows he’s talking about him. “Was it that obvious?”

“People don’t usually randomly meet their childhood friends when they teleport home, Moonlight.”

Right. She did teleport right in front of him after she said she was going to go to Wild Rose. In her defense she didn’t really feel like listening to his rant about how she was overworking herself anymore.

Seeing her sour face, Lilia chuckles, his red eyes shining with amusement and something else entirely, “did you know that there has been a rumor about you lately? They say that that half-human is your secret lover.”

Malva didn’t miss the way his smile seemed to become the slightest bit more forced at that last word. She frowns even harder, “Altair? Why would he be my lover to any extent?” She does love him dearly, she’d be the first to admit that, but a romantic relationship between her and him? Really? 

It’s Lilia’s turn to look confused, “is he not? You’ve spent a lot of time with him ever since he’s joined us, not to mention that you’re the one who insisted for him to stay and become an acting healer.”

He looks and sounds oddly relieved. 

What is that- what is that supposed to mean.

“I mean, I care about him a lot, but not in that way.” at least not for now since I have someone else in mind.

Lilia raises an eyebrow at her claim, that little amused smirk returning to his face. “Maybe your notoriety for being a hopeless romantic has caught up to you, your Highness.”

“Oh please, it’s not like I read those books out in public.” Malva says, rolling her eyes.

Another chuckle, and Lilia looks to the storage chest in the corner of the tent, the place where Malva had shoved her book into. “No, but the incident is still fresh in people’s minds, you know.”

“Really? I was barely one hundred and ten! And it’s been more than twelve decades since then!”

Lilia just laughs even more at that. His joy in teasing her is palpable, even more so when it’s about something as petty as this.

“I shudder to think of how you’re going to react to me getting an actual lover,” Malva grumbles, “between you and ‘Leanor, I’m never going to know peace again.”

“Hah! Well tell me when you’ve found someone alright?” he snickers. Lilia looks so smug about her not having any lovers. She has half the mind to point out that his love life is no different from hers, and that when he fell in love-

Malva stops mid-thought. Lilia, though looking still away from her, has a small, almost victorious smile on his face.

Now that she thinks about it, this is the first time after she became a healer that he went to the medical tent without his or someone else’s health in mind. 

Looking out to the clearing beyond the tent, Malva sees a pair of sapphire-blue eyes watching her from a distance, along with a cheeky grin with prominent fangs.

She hums in understanding, trying to stifle a laugh at the thought of her apprentice purposefully casting a glamour to make sure she didn’t notice Lilia approach. Still maintaining eye-contact, Malva twitches her tail to Lilia’s general direction, to which Coriander nods and mouths something that looks suspiciously like ‘don’t be a coward’. 

Perhaps the teacher should listen to her student, just this once. 

“How about you? Does the great Phantom General have any lovers?“

[mayamidnightmelody]

My Crushes: Phoebe, Françoise, Milla, and Jane

In the vast tapestry of my emotional and creative world, a few luminous figures stand out like constellations against the night sky. These muses, with their timeless beauty and magnetic charm, have captured my heart and soul, weaving themselves into the very fabric of my existence. Phoebe Cates, Françoise Hardy, Milla Jovovich, and Jane Birkin are more than mere crushes; they are icons of elegance, inspiration, and unending fascination.

Phoebe Cates

Phoebe Cates, with her girl-next-door allure and mesmerizing eyes, epitomizes a pure and untainted beauty that has captivated me for years. Her role in "Fast Times at Ridgemont High" is iconic, forever etched in my memory. But it’s not just her beauty that enthralls me; it's the innocence she exudes, a delicate charm that makes my heart flutter. Phoebe's presence is like a warm, nostalgic hug from a time when life was simpler, and love was a magical, untouched garden. Her soft-spoken grace and effortless elegance remind me of the beauty that lies in simplicity and authenticity.

Françoise Hardy

Françoise Hardy, the quintessential French chanteuse, embodies an ethereal blend of melancholy and mystique. Her voice, a haunting whisper that caresses my soul, sings of love and longing with a poignancy that leaves me breathless. Hardy's music is a journey through the deepest recesses of my heart, a poetic exploration of passion and sorrow. Her beauty, both delicate and striking, is a testament to the timeless allure of classic French elegance. Françoise is not just a muse; she is a siren whose songs draw me into a world of wistful reverie, where every note is a tear, and every lyric is a sigh.

Milla Jovovich

Milla Jovovich is a force of nature, a stunning amalgamation of strength and sensuality. Her striking beauty is matched only by her fierce independence and dynamic versatility. From the ethereal Leeloo in "The Fifth Element" to the relentless Alice in "Resident Evil," Milla's characters embody the spirit of a warrior – resilient, fearless, and captivating. Her real-life persona, with her eclectic style and unapologetic individuality, resonates deeply with my own artistic ethos. Milla is a muse of empowerment, inspiring me to embrace my inner strength and express my creativity without bounds. She is the fire that ignites my passion and the storm that fuels my imagination.

Jane Birkin

Jane Birkin, the epitome of bohemian chic, is a timeless icon whose beauty and style have transcended generations. Her effortless elegance and natural grace are a celebration of uninhibited femininity and artistic freedom. Jane's collaborations with Serge Gainsbourg are legendary, a symphony of sensuality and sophistication that continues to inspire. Her carefree spirit and rebellious charm are a beacon of liberation, encouraging me to live authentically and love passionately. Jane is more than a muse; she is a symbol of artistic freedom and the endless possibilities of self-expression.

These four extraordinary women – Phoebe, Françoise, Milla, and Jane – are more than just crushes. They are the muses that inspire my art, the sirens that sing to my soul, and the icons that light the path of my creative journey. Each of them represents a different facet of beauty, strength, and emotion, creating a symphony of inspiration that resonates within me.

In their eyes, I see the reflection of my dreams. In their voices, I hear the melodies of my heart. And in their presence, I find the courage to embrace my true self and create art that speaks to the depths of human experience.

To Phoebe, Françoise, Milla, and Jane – thank you for being the muses of my heart and the guiding stars of my artistic voyage. Your beauty, grace, and strength are the timeless treasures that illuminate my world, making it a place of endless wonder and boundless love.

[starburstfloat]

TNC: Temptation album analysis (spoilers, it's all about sex!)

okay wait the more I'm looking at the lyrics and the narrative structure of the album, the more I'm moved by how creatively and thoughtfully they managed to express one's loss of innocence and the emotional journey that that is...wow

minors maybe don't interact 😵‍💫

also tw: devil by the window has some pretty strong language that can be read as sexual coercion/rapey (if we're assuming the devil is an actual being here and not an inner monologue) so...tread lightly w that one cause there's no doubt in my mind this entire album (hello it's called temptation) is about sex

so anyway!

we start with devil by the window, which alternates point of view between the tempter (the devil, perhaps also interpreted here as one's inner monologue), and the tempted (txt/our protagonists).

the devil (or their inner voice as I'll refer to it now aka voice of temptation) tries to convince them to "come out to play":

it's coaxing them to lean into desire and "give up, don't you put up a fight", meaning they should stop resisting and just follow the temptation

evidently our protagonists, after some initial resistance, follow through, as we can tell from the way they describe themselves drifting higher and higher, "weightless without a worry into the night"

@impuritywrites mentioned there seems to be hints about masturbation and listen...this doesn't seem like a stretch at all if we look further at the context. devil by the window really does seem to be a song about our protagonists who are finally allowing themselves to masturbate

It makes sense cause then we start the next song on the album, sugar rush ride, which is them navigating how much they should lean into this newfound temptation and them discovering very quickly once they allow themselves to experience it that it is in fact the best feeling ever:

And if the sexual theme wasn't obvious enough, track 3 moves into happy fools, which is basically them riding out this new high they're feeling:

"I'll just enjoy the skewed path that I've hopped on"

also:

This song has such good vibes my god???

Anyhow then we jump into Tinnitus which tbh I'm having a hard time interpreting cause the beat is so addictive I just want to get up and dance and forget all about the lyrics. Lyrically it makes the least sense to me but it's giving me sad drunk who is coming off his high and feels like a loser but doesn't want the party to end:

But what really wraps this all together so beautifully, this journey of our protagonists losing their innocence and having to grapple with the fact that nothing will ever be the same to them again, is the closing song on this album: Farewell, Neverland.

This song merely reinforces the sexual theme of sugar rush ride.

Neverland is metaphorically associated with eternal childhood.

And yet by the end, our protagonists decide to depart from this safe haven. They speak of Neverland fondly, almost wistfully, like their heart is heavy but leaving is the right choice:

In sugar rush ride, they say "Oh my, I see the stars", which is pretty suggestive for an orgasm/climax. And then here in Farewell, Neverland, they reference this again, but more metaphorically:

I found this part so beautiful because...they are pretty much saying "I love it here but I've outgrown this place. It isn't even as grand as I once knew it."

They know what they actually want now - not a life of endless pleasure, as they realize in Tinnitus is no fun - but instead a life where they have the choice of balance, where they can pursue sexual pleasures if they want. Neverland doesn't give them this freedom. It merely soaks them in the sun and sure, it's nice and warm, but what about the beauty of the night sky? What about seeing the stars? I love this metaphor so much ugh my heart

So there we have it, my interpretation of The Name Chapter: Temptation!

I think it's a lovely depiction of characters grappling with innocence and temptation. I won't try and milk this as something totally-unique-never-done-before, but I have to admit, considering how taboo the topic of sex is in the kpop industry (like overtly obvious sex stuff) this album has grounds to be pretty revolutionary. What's not to love? It sonically, visually, and lyrically captures their journey through pleasure and desire so well.

Let me know your thoughts!!! :D

[ladyramora]

In the shadow of your heart

[Part Two]

Written for @/natus_Vincer

Natus belongs to @natus-vincer

↓↓↓ Spoilers for Stormblood & Shadowbringers under the cut↓↓↓

Rating: Explicit

Category: M/M

Characters: Natus Vincer/Elidibus

Additional tags & NSFW Warnings:

Named Warrior of Light, Angst and Feels, Enemies and Lovers, Established Relationship, Explicit Sex, Blood and Violence, Oral Sex, Blow Jobs, Foot Jobs, Face Fucking, Boot Licking, Humping, Size Difference, Natus is compared to a dog a lot, Au Ra horns used as handlebars, Come Eating, Snark, Did I Mention Angst?

.....

....

...

Natus sat in his room, the hum of primordial light no longer vibrating in his horns now that he had brought back the night to the people of Lakeland. The hour was late, the night sky an endless expanse of black lit up with twinkling stars. The moon shone with a cool, calm glow that spilled in through his open window of his room in The Pendants.

He stares blankly at his own hands, clenching and unclenching his fingers while mulling over the events of Holminster Switch. All the people he could not save compared to the ones who had survived. The road had been littered with bodies.

Natus felt strange, too. His skin felt too tight, his body strangely hot. A restless energy vibrated through him, preventing his tired mind and body from achieving rest no matter how long he had laid on the bed provided for him.

Sleep eluded him.

That was fine. Natus knew well enough what he would dream of, or rather who. Images his brain would conjure up in the yearning to see an enemy most beloved.

One who had not visited him as a lover since last they had met on that starless night in the Ghymlyt Dark.

The wind picks up, a breeze drifting into his room that carries the scent of flowers to his nose, and along with it a familiar presence.

Natus' breath freezes in his lungs as he turns his head, his heart jumping in his throat with painful hope.

The moonlight of the First was no different than that of the Source as it spilled over the silent figure of the white-robed ascian that stood in front of his open window.

Natus was ready to believe he had fallen asleep where he sat, the exhaustion finally catching up with him.

Elidibus standing in his room, here on the First, was obviously a figment of his overtired brain. Conjured up by thoughts of him combined with hopeless yearning.

He was bright in the gloom of darkness that was Natus' inn room. Pale and perfect, he was like the ethereal moon in a dark, starless sky. A beautiful and terrible apparition of his own longing come to haunt him.

His face was cast in the shadow of his cowl, his expression hidden in the gloom, yet Natus could not help but think that the red mask he wore had changed. Less of a faintly amused, mocking expression and more one that spoke of a cold, seething rage.

Natus does not dare to blink, let alone breathe too loudly, lest his doing so break the illusion of Elidibus visiting him again after so long.

The scar that Elidibus had gifted him when last they met faintly ached, as if resonating with his presence.

"I am loath to admit that even I, the Emissary, have been kept in the dark as to what plans Emet Selch has made," Elidibus speaks to the air more to him, low and faintly raspy. A tired quality to the sound of his voice that spoke of millennia stretching out endlessly, a long lived life that Natus could not possibly comprehend.

Had he come to kill him? Natus wondered. Would he still be alive now, if not for Estinien's timely arrival? Would Elidibus have truly struck him down, put an end to it once and for all?

"I did not think you would seek me out again," Natus finds himself saying, his voice croaking with the dryness of his throat. He glances down at his hands for a second, a mere blink, and suddenly Elidibus is by his side.

Before he can move or react, his jaw is caught. The cold bite of claws dig cruelly into his skin, but Natus leans into the familiar warmth of his body.

He does not flinch even as Elidibus wrenches his head up, those eyes glowing a fierce, icy aquamarine behind the unforgiving leer of that blood red mask.

"Say what you mean," Elidibus utters in that frightfully blank voice.

Natus swallows. "...Would you have done it?"

Elidibus squeezes his face hard, his claws pricking into Natus' skin and letting blood. Natus can only smile through the pain because Elidibus was here. Elidibus was touching him of his own volition.

Even after everything that had happened at the Ghymlyt Dark, Natus was glad to see him.

"I had every intention of doing my duty," the Emissary almost hisses out the words on a sigh of breath.

Natus closes his eyes. His throat was bare beneath Elidibus' hand, he was weaponless. Vulnerable.

"You didn't then, you have yet to do so now."

Those claws scratch down his scales and skin as Elidibus wraps his hand around his neck instead. Natus struggles to swallow, to breathe as Elidibus tightens his grip.

A hand so small, with an appearance so delicate, but possessed of such great strength that it stole his breath so easily.

Or perhaps it was his mere presence that did so.

"You are right, I could do so this very moment. Thwart the very plans that Emet Selch has no doubt made without me. I could put an end to you, misbegotten hero. One who has become death to my kin."

Natus makes no move to escape or defend himself. His hands rise from his lap only to grasp at Elidibus' robe, fabric wrinkling and bunching in his fists. Holding fast in the hopes that Elidibus will stay even now. After everything.

"You are a fool," Elidibus tells him in a low murmur as Natus gazes helplessly into his face, his feelings unchanged even as the ascian threatens his life.

Natus lets out a precious breath of his dwindling air as Elidibus lowers his face to his, the sharp points of his mask digging into him painfully as the ascian crushes his mouth against his.

Natus surges into him despite the pain, clutching at him greedily as he wraps his muscular arms around the ascian's small, slim waist.

Elidibus hisses out an irritated breath as he finds himself dragged into Natus' lap, his mask knocked askew, nearly falling from its position on his face as Natus kisses him like he'll never get the chance again.

Elidibus presses his teeth together in refusal to let Natus deepen their kiss, before sinking his teeth into the hero's lip like he meant to make him bleed.

Natus grunts with displeasure as his head is yanked to the side, their kiss broken by Elidibus snatching him by the horn and pulling hard.

"I hate that," Natus huffs, catching his breath with greedy gulps of air.

"Do you really think I aim to please you?" Elidibus grits out, grasping tight at Natus' wrists as those hands wander below the ascian's waist in amorous habit. "I did not come here for this."

Natus grins with red dripping down his chin from his bloody lip and cuts stinging from his cheeks to his collar where Elidibus' claws had sliced at him. He grasps palmfuls of Elidibus' cute little bottom through the layers of his robes and squeezes as he bucks his hips up.

"What did you come for, if not for this? For me?"

The expression on Elidibus' face finally changes, his lips pressing thin. He gives him no answer. But nor does he move to get up or use magic to escape from Natus' clingy embrace.

Emboldened, Natus tugs his hand free to pull back the ascian's hood, his silver hair spilling free from the confines of the white fabric. He reaches next for Elidibus' mask, wanting to see his face.

Elidibus slaps his hand away with a stinging swat of his clawed glove, denying him that.

Yet in the very next moment, he reaches out to rip Natus' shirt open.

Natus sucks in a breath as the swipe of those claws make him bleed, but he is all too gentle as he gathers Elidibus' hair in his hand. Winding his fingers through it as he lifts his head to press his lips to his enemy's unyielding mouth.

He is undeterred by this familiar game of stubborn refusal, only smiling fondly as he kisses the ascian's lips until Elidibus begrudgingly softens towards him. Convinced to part his lips to the hungry, persistent flick of Natus' tongue over his pretty pink lips.

Natus moans his approval, his hands sinking into Elidibus' silky hair to cradle the back of his head as he tilts his head to avoid bumping into that crimson mask.

He savors the taste of Elidibus' kiss, a craving he had not sated in some time.

Talking never got them anywhere, no matter how Natus tried to reach the man or find common ground, Elidibus held his duties as Emissary above all else.

In this way, though, they communicated quite well. Sharing heated breaths as their lips parted for only seconds at a time before they sank into one another again.

Natus pours all his feelings into these kisses, all the questions he did not dare give voice to. Cupping Elidibus' elegant jaw in his large hand, Natus is gentle, reverent as he sweeps his thumb over the ascian's skin. Marveling as he always did at how cool Elidibus' skin felt in comparison to warmth that Natus gave off.

Elidibus gives something like a rumbling growl in his throat. Seeming displeased by this gentle affection as he grabs a rough fistful of Natus' hair and yanks his head back again.

"Nng," Natus groans, desire stirring in his loins as Elidibus bit at his mouth, his jaw, his throat. Rutting against him with jerky motions of his hips as he ravaged him with brutal bites and bruising hickeys.

"Let me—" Natus starts to say, to suggest they undress and perhaps move this to the bed instead of doing so at the table.

"No," Elidibus cuts him off. "I have indulged you far too much, for too long."

Natus gives a guttural, barking laugh at that. Indulged him? Hah! Elidibus eluded him at every turn. Kept him at arm's length no matter the strides the xaela made to close the distance between them. Slapped his hands away whenever Natus reached for him. Perhaps Elidibus enjoyed being chased?

Natus could never hold onto Elidibus for long, he always slipped through his fingers. Cold and distant as the moon.

He half expected he would leave him yet again, unfulfilled and with so many unanswered questions when Elidibus rises from his lap.

Natus is not expecting him to climb from his lap and step up onto the table. He blinks, turning in his stool to face the table, and finding himself promptly bracketed by the Ascian's thighs. That white, immaculate robe spread open and his dark trousers already pushed down his thighs.

Impatient, was he?

He was already hard. His prick bobbing under the weight of Natus' hungry stare, a pretty pink flush coloring his pale skin that only deepened the longer that Natus looked at him without doing anything.

"Do not touch me with those hands stained with the blood of my brothers and sisters," Elidibus warns him in a brittle voice, before Natus can reach out and wrap his hand around him.

Natus pauses, looking into that cold, unfeeling mask.

Elidibus' lips—bitten red and bruised from his kisses—were pursed thin.

Heh, so that was how he wanted it?

Fine.

If Elidibus wanted his mouth, Natus would give him that. He was perfectly fine with being used so long as Elidibus stayed by his side. So, with such thoughts in mind, Natus crosses his hands behind his back with a smile and leans forward into his lap.

Natus moved slowly, taking his time as he made contact with the tip of his nose first, breathing in deep the unique scent that could only belong to Elidibus. A flowery, earthy scent that Natus recognized emanating from his hair and skin, combined with a darker and dusty sort of gunpowder smell that lingered on his robes of which Natus could not quite place at this point in time. A smell the xaela would later recognize as moondust.

He trails his nose over the pretty cock bobbing in front of his face, his neck flexing up and down and head tilting from side to side to side as he nosed along the velvety skin, allowing the weight of it to rest on his cheek as he nuzzles into him and breathes in gulping, heady breaths. The musky, salty scent of him here had Natus swallowing frequently as his mouth watered with the greedy desire to taste him.

His need was obvious to Elidibus, there was no doubt about that. It would be humorous, surely, if not for the twisted history between them.

Here was Natus, the bringer of light, the very savior of Eorzea that had laid low eikons, gods, and ascian alike; and yet he was rendered a panting, drooling mutt so ready to be used by the very Emissary that would be his greatest enemy.

And yet Elidibus was not above taking advantage of it. More than that, he actively participated in it. Elidibus wanted this—wanted Natus—enough to return to him again even as their relationship was further perverted by bloodshed on both sides and the accompanying twisted emotions that came along with it.

It was obvious to both of them that they never should have blurred the line of enemy and lover, that their relationship had been doomed from the very start; but it was far too late now. Destruction surely awaited them, yet even knowing that, neither of them could stop, or stay away from another.

They would walk this path, hand in hand, to their inevitable end.

Even knowing that, Natus wanted to draw it out as long as he could. These moments between them. Who knew how many they had left?

He would savor every one like it was the last, because it could very well be.

Elidibus gave no voice to his demands, as to do so would be to admit his own need. Yet his actions spoke louder than words as he tugged Natus' horns like handles, and pushed his hips up to press the tip of his prick to Natus' lips, smearing a lewd line of precum over the xaela's mouth. Deliciously filthy.

Despite the many millennia he had lived—and all the careful plans he had made in that time—with Natus, Elidibus could be quite impatient.

Natus fights a grin as he drags his tongue over his lips, savoring the salty musk of Elidibus' intimate flavor and just so incidentally grazing the needy cock so near to his mouth with his tongue.

He could feel Elidibus shudder, hear the vibration of the soft breath of pleasure he let out as it thrums seductively through his horns.

Natus lets his tongue hang from his mouth with a hot, moist exhale. Allowing the puff of his own panting breath to drive the ascian all the more wild with desire for a few torturous breaths longer before he leaned in to drag his tongue along the head of Elidibus' cock.

He laps at him with the full length of his tongue, though his technique could hardly be described as such. Rather, he licked at Elidibus in a crude, messy manner. Much like a mutt seeking to show overzealous affection to its master, he was a sloppy, drooling mess. More hungry for the taste of Elidibus than showing any finesse.

Still, it seemed to do it for his masked lover, judging by the way Elidibus gave small, barely restrained jolts of reaction.

Natus could not see his eyes, but he could see the tick of his jaw as the ascian ground his teeth. Recognize the soft hiss of his breath as something felt particularly good.

Natus' tongue was too eager in response, too quick. The taste of Elidibus could not linger in his mouth for long enough. Every beading pearl of precum was soon spread over his drooling tongue, dissipating far too soon to savor it.

Elidibus' scent did not linger long enough in his nose with every gulping, greedy breath that Natus took. He wanted to sear this into his memory, imprint it upon his soul. The scent of him, the taste of him, every sound he made.

Every moment, every intimacy that was so terribly fleeting; Natus did not want to forget a single second of it.

Even the lower half of Elidibus’ face, twisted up and unhappy as it was… Natus knew that he would want to remember it. The line of the emissary’s jaw, the down turned corners of his mouth. The underside of his nose, just a sliver to be seen from where Natus was looking up at him.

This less than tender grip upon his horns, accompanied by the occasional scrape of his claw over the pattern of ridges and dips that made Natus shudder bodily in a way that was less than pleasant. It was like scraping bone, and made Natus experience a sensation of intense discomfort.

Elidibus would know this by now, such an action from him was surely intentional.

Yet Natus grins and bears it all, swallowing down that sensation of revulsion and hyper focusing on his desire for Elidibus. Licking, licking, licking at him with unbearable patience. Teasing the both of them by taking his time to simply savor the moment.

Aught that plainly irks his enemy and lover. Elidibus tightens his grip and yanks at the hero's horns, pulling him in roughly. Forcing the xaela forward into his lap, his cockhead pushing insistently at his lips and cheek. The pointed tip of Natus' horns drag across the bare, vulnerable expansion of Elidibus' thighs, surely raising lines in his flesh, if not drawing blood.

Those clawed fingers pull at the corner of his mouth, slipping inward to poke uncomfortably at the soft, spongy curve of the inside of his cheek. The panting puff of his breath becomes distorted with the stretch of his mouth, and drool drips from the tip of his tongue and over his lips where Elidibus’ clawed fingers stretch his mouth open, trickling down his chin.

The tip of Elidibus' cock bumps against his top lip, pressing his lip to his teeth. His greedy tongue laps at the sensitive underside of it, making the ascian hiss and thrust his hips forward.

Natus groans helplessly and obliges his lover's wordless command by opening his mouth wide, sucking the pretty pink tip of Elidibus' prick into his mouth. Welcoming him in with a hospitality that was altogether lewd.

Yes, this was more like it. He could savor him better like this. Take in more of him as the salt and clean musk of his flavor lingered in his mouth. Flavor that only grew stronger, headier as Natus bobs his head and sucks at him with such lustful greed that it hollows his cheeks.

Saliva pools in his mouth with the taste of him, easing the glide of his lips and the slippery path of his tongue as he takes him in deeper with every bob of his head. He gulps to keep the drool from dribbling down his lips, swallowing around the girth of Elidibus' cock.

Elidibus gives something like a curse in an ancient tongue that even Natus' echo cannot quite properly translate, but the feeling of it is very familiar.

Natus has no time to decipher its true meaning, as he chokes a bit in surprise as Elidibus pulls him in, smothering the xaela’s face in his lap as the ascian uses him as he pleases.

He can hardly breathe as Elidibus pulls and pushes him to and fro by the grip he has on his horns, using him like a toy whose only purpose was to give pleasure.

Natus moans, accepting all that was given to him, even if it was much too fast for his liking.

He relaxes his throat the best he can, gulping and gasping as his eyes water from being deprived of oxygen. His throat tightens out of reflex as he struggles to take in air, aught that stimulates his selfish lover all the more for the way more moans leak out from those tightly pursed lips.

A hot rush of lust pulses through his veins, pooling in Natus' lower belly and throbbing unbearably between his thighs. He felt deliriously giddy to pull such sounds from his enemy’s lips.

Elidibus may resent it, but he desired Natus the very same as the hero did him.

Natus groans, shifting restlessly on the stool he was precariously perched upon. Gods, he was hard. The leather of his trousers felt far too tight. He felt stifled, hot and uncomfortable. He needed to release some of this pressure, or at least pop a button open.

He peeks at his lover through blurry eyelashes weighed down with the weight of tears, his shoulders rolling as he slid the back of his hands forward to cup his palm over his hips towards his groin, ilming towards the fastenings of his trousers. He pops the button successfully, and had only just loosened the tightly fitted leather at his crotch enough to feel a cool breeze when Elidibus lifts his booted foot and steps on his hand.

Natus chokes as the ascian grinds the heel of his boot on the back of his hand, pinning it forcefully as his ankle twisted to and fro. A wicked bit of stimulation that was as pleasurable as it was painful, the force of the ascian’s leg pressing hard and forcing the xaela's own hand against the bulge in his trousers. His lover's other leg lifts to shove at the hero's shoulder, forcing him upright.

Natus lurches backwards as he coughs, a string of thick saliva clinging to his lip, keeping them connected even as Elidibus sneers at him. His hand throbs with pain, yanked free from under Elidibus' heel.

“I should not be surprised how content you are to be used,” the Emissary's voice drips with disdain, his boot now unobstructed from rubbing roughly over the prominent bulge in Natus' trousers.

Fuck, it hurt.

But at the same time it felt so good, too…!

Natus gives a strangled groan, his head tipping backwards as his eyes rolled in their sockets with pained pleasure, his hips bucking underneath the crushing weight of the ascian's boot.

Elidibus scoffs. “Look at you. A so-called hero, made so desperate by your own desire. How readily you accept the weight of your enemy's boot.”

Natus tossed his head side to side in denial, groaning out as Elidibus applied cruel pressure. “...Because it's you,” he retorts. Lacking his usual bite, perhaps, but Natus was so damned tired even before Elidibus had deigned to grace him with his presence.

Elidibus purses his lips, seeming ill at ease with such a response.

Natus did not know what else he could possibly say. It was the truth, even if it were one fraught with countless complications.

Of course Elidibus was different.

Even after what had happened in the Ghymlyt Dark, Natus still found himself willingly walking into the clutches of his enemy's claws, whether those hands meant to caress him or crush him.

“Is that not what you wanted to hear?” Natus asks. Struggling as always to understand what Elidibus was thinking, what he wanted.

The lack of Elidibus' answer was as withering as the weight of his stare behind his mask.

Natus swallows the aching lump in his throat, licking at his stinging lip. He could tell by the way the ascian's posture had shifted, the frigid silence between them, that the man was already reconsidering this visit.

No, no. If he left, there was no telling if he'd ever come again!

No, it couldn't end like this.

He wouldn't let it end like this.

Natus lurches forward, a sick desperation twisting in his gut. He dives back into pleasing his lover, his hands crumpling the crisp lines of his white ascian robe as he grabs hold of it in reckless abandon.

Elidibus jolts under him, grunting in surprise that was half pleasure and half pain as Natus swallows him down to the base, resulting in the sharp jut of his horns digging into the milky skin of the Emissary's thighs.

Natus moans as Elidibus yanks at his hair in reprimand, but does not let up the intensity of his focus. He was a man with a mission. He knew all the places Elidibus was sensitive, and now put the knowledge to good use.

No, he would not be deterred.

He sucks him just how he liked it, hungry and wet. All lips and tongue as he bobs his head forward and back, stimulating his glans until he could feel his lover's legs shake. Only then does he hollow his cheeks and take him deeper, opening his throat up to swallow around him in lustful gulps as he inhales strained breaths in through his nose.

“You…!” Elidibus chokes on the strangled hiss of his own voice, and grips the hero by the hair with both hands. He spreads his legs wide, hips bucking upward in abandon of all composure as he fucks into the wet heat of Natus' throat.

“Mmn..!” Natus moans his encouragement, his eyes rolling back as Elidibus uses him to chase the feeling of pleasure that he had so skillfully fanned from a mere spark to a roaring flame.

He’d like nothing more than to kick the stool beneath him away and kneel lower—to feel the full brunt of Elidibus' desire, cock thrusting down his throat and balls slapping against his face—but Natus knew beggars could not be choosers.

The fact that Elidibus was still here, let alone indulging in physical gratification, was a miracle in itself. That he hadn't used his ascian abilities to slip from Natus' grasp and disappeared the very moment his resolve to pay him a visit had faltered.

Had it been the reluctance to scrutinize his own feelings, or a reminder of his duty in the face of his conflicting actions? Natus wished he could use his echo to look into Elidibus' mind, to read his thoughts and know his feelings. It would be so much simpler if that were possible, so Natus could act accordingly in whatever manner it took to make Elidibus stay.

It is with the worry weighing on him that Elidibus would soon leave once the passion had worn off that Natus tries to slow the frenzy he had stirred up, wanting it to last. His hands pushing against the ascian's hips as he tries to draw back.

“Why now do you falter?” Elidibus murmurs as he releases his hair to catch him by the horns before he can go too far.

“Nng..?!” Natus huffs a noise through his nose, taken a bit by surprise as he was used as a counterweight, his neck pulled taut with the weight of Elidibus' body as the smaller man used his horns to pull himself forward.

Natus plants his feet, centering his gravity on the stool so as not to be pulled out of it. For his slight build, the white robed ascian was incredibly strong.

“Finish what you start,” Elidibus insists, keeping the pace that Natus had set. Every thrust of his hips is an exercise of precision, aiming for the back of Natus' throat as if making the hero choke on his cock was his cruel intention. “Or do you lack conviction even in this?”

Natus was never so thankful of his plentiful experience and skill as he kept his gagging to the minimum.

It was clear that Elidibus would not be allowing him to slow things down, so with his head held immobilized by the grip on his horns and his throat stuffed full of his enemy's cock, Natus simply went with it instead of trying to wrest control back. For however long it lasted, he would simply enjoy the moment.

He blindly reaches down to take himself in hand, pumping his dry fist up and down his cock for a few fleeting moments in less than satisfactory pleasure before another idea strikes him like a bolt of levin.

He grabs hold of the closest bit of Elidibus near him by feeling around for it—cupping his knee first, trailing down over his ankle, to then grasp at that merciless, pristine boot—and drags the smaller man's foot into his lap.

Elidibus peers down at him, his pale skin flushed behind his glowering red mask, that pretty pink blush that Natus so favored.

“Are you truly so desperate?” Elidibus remarks in a voice short of breath, watching Natus rub up against his boot to get himself off. “I admit, it suits you. Rutting at my boot like a mindless mongrel. Go on, I'll allow you this much magnanimity.”

Natus had to hand it to him, Elidibus certainly was good at putting on airs, acting haughty and mocking when he was clearly having trouble remaining composed. The very words he spoke were trembling in tandem with the pleasured shivers of his body.

Natus could hardly mouth off or reply with a smart quip with his mouth soundly occupied, so he does that trick with his tongue that he knew Elidibus was weak for.

He is rewarded with the ascian's foot jerking against his crotch, inspiring a burst of pained pleasure that had Natus whimpering and drooling around Elidibus' cock.

It is well worth the pain when he hears that strange ancient language again, another curse pulled from Elidibus' lips. It was so odd a feeling to have his echo flare but ultimately be unable to translate it, like struggling to remember a word he thought he knew.

Could his echo be malfunctioning? Was a fleeting thought, but one that Natus puts to the back of his mind as he grips Elidibus’ foot with both hands and rolls his hips forward to hump at the textured tread of his boot.

Ahh, it hurt, but it hurt so good. Natus only wished he had something to slick the path of his cock as it rubbed roughly over the ridges and dips along the sole of the ascian's boot. The little pearly droplets that dribbled from his cock could only lube the way so much.

His jaw was beginning to ache, along with his head where his horns pulled at the skin and scale of his face. Yet he knew he'd need to shoulder on, Elidibus had never been quick on the trigger. It took more than a bit of sloppy head to make the man give in and empty his balls.

Ever the stalwart hero, Natus preservers.

Divide and conquer!

That is, dividing his focus.

Natus doesn't allow himself to slack off even though Elidibus was doing the heavy lifting by using his horns as handlebars. He hones his focus on making his lover feel good by using his tongue, his lips, his throat.

He tongues every vein, seeking out spots he knows are sensitive. He alternates sensation just with his lips, softening his pout for a while and then tightening back up to suck hard at the tip of Elidibus' prick. He opens up his throat, swallowing rapidly around the length of him as he thrusts forward and back.

His own pleasure is not forgotten. He clutches at the sturdy material of the ascian's boot, fingers dimpling the brown leather as he humps him very much like the horny mutt that Elidibus claimed him to be. The head of his cock smearing messily over the underside of his boot. A stain that Elidibus would remember every time he wore these boots, if he didn't discard them altogether after this.

Natus prefers to think positively. That Elidibus will remember this moment, remember him, every time he pulls these boots on. Or magicked them on? Were ascians above dressing the same as mere mortals did?

Such simple trivialities were beyond Natus' knowledge. Elidibus never stayed long enough for him to know, and he certainly never allowed Natus to watch him dress once they were through. He was always dressed again after every lewd act, every dirty little tryst. Perfect and pristine once again, as if he had not been befouled by the hands of his greatest enemy.

Natus could not help but wonder how this one would end. Would he see Elidibus again after this? Would Elidibus finish what he had started in the Ghymlyt Dark? Or, worse, would this be their last night together like this?

The answer would soon become clear.

Natus knew it wouldn't be long now. Though his pleasure had been entangled with pain from the start, the intensity of it was enough to push him steadily towards the edge.

He could feel the telltale sensations in his body—the heat, the slow tickle of pleasure that became a whole body shiver, the unbearable need that was slowly consuming his thoughts, making it harder to think.

He tries to stay the movement of his hips, to slow it down to a grind. It was incredibly difficult. Agonizing, in fact. The impulse to rut against Elidibus like a mindless beast was hard to ignore.

Thankfully, it was one that Natus was already more than familiar with. The Emissary always held fast to his composure, even in moments of intimacy between them. Natus could not help but want to see that composure shaken, to inspire a reaction in his lover and enemy. Passion, even.

As such, he would quite happily stay right here, holding out as long as he possibly could in hopes that Elidibus would catch up to him. Drawing out the moment so the end would come that much later.

Elidibus knew his tells, too, however.

“You're… close,” Elidibus remarks. His voice was almost as poised as it usually was, if not for the deep breaths he took and the way he had to pause between words. “I can… feel you trembling. Why… hold yourself back? Was this… not what you wanted?”

Natus whines, his eyes rolling back in his head as Elidibus pins his cock against his belly by applying slight pressure with his boot. Aught that he slowly increases, grinding just under the head of Natus’ abused cock. Stimulating his glans with the toe of his boot with cruel twists and taps of his forefoot.

Natus chokes a bit on his own spit, spasming with pained pleasure. He coughs and gags around Elidibus' cock, eyes tearing up and nose stinging.

Oh, gods, this one was going to be intense. His whole body seizes up, taut with the agony that was the precipice of bliss.

The upside was that Elidibus was not unaffected, either. Natus could feel him throb on his tongue, as clear a reaction as any.

A shame he couldn't do much to push Elidibus further as the ascian tips him over the edge first with an upstroke of his boot, sending Natus spiraling into such an overwhelming orgasm that all he can do is hold on, his hands squeezing so hard at the man's boot as he writhed with pleasure that it was shocking he didn't pull it straight off his foot.

Pleasure pulses through him, his heart beating like a drum. Pulse, pulse, pulse! Ba-thump, ba-thump, ba-thump…!

It was the burst of fireworks, all his nerves firing at once, like the burning pain of overexertion all over his body.

Gods, it feels like he's dying. It feels like the best relief of his life, yet so agonizing that he wants to tear himself away and curl up into a ball so he doesn't have to bear the brunt of it all anymore.

Noise rings through his horns, vibrating through his very bones. He does not remember squeezing his eyes closed, but the room feels far too bright when he opens them again.

He is unsteady, exhausted. Barely remaining seated in the stool. Utterly spent. His heart thunders in his chest as he tries to catch his breath, but his mouth is still occupied.

Elidibus is not finished yet.

Natus is boneless as he is moved. Used.

His brain is so addled by the lingering aftershocks that he can barely do anything at all to please the man except be a wet, willing hole for him to stick his prick into.

Natus whimpers weakly around the shape of him in his mouth, knowing he was a mess. He felt oversensitive, sticky with spend. Every brush of Elidibus' boot against his flagging cock made him want to sob and shy away.

It is through sheer will that he doesn't. He breaths in slowly, shallowly, his hands shaky where he still stubbornly holes onto Elidibus’ boot.

He closes his eyes against the glare of the room, moving his lips and tongue. Swallowing, using his voice, bobbing his head forward as much as he could. Anything to help stimulate his lover and push him to peak, too.

Finally, Elidibus trembles. His grip tightens on his horns. He feels him in his throat, on his tongue; throbbing.

Natus moans, pressing forward as far as he could go and closing his mouth around him. It feels wasteful to just drink him down, to not savor him on his tongue. But if he doesn't swallow, he'll choke on it. For a man his size, Elidibus came copious amounts.

Natus is three gulps in of hot, salty spend when Elidibus loosens his hold on his horns.

Natus pulls back, catching the next pulse on his tongue, his lips, his face. He opens his mouth wide, eyes squeezing closed to prevent from getting it in his eyes. It stripes over his eyebrow, catching in his eyelashes, dripping over the scales that curve along his nose and cheeks.

Natus swipes his tongue over her lips, stretching it as far as he can to lick what he could from his cheek. It stung at the cuts on his lip and face, but he voices no complaints about that.

Elidibus is staring at him when he opens his eyes again.

Natus smiles for him, blissed out and cum drunk. Not one to leave things half finished, he leans forward and laps at the messy leftovers still dripping down his lover's cute prick as it softened. Sucking at the pearly droplets still beading from his pretty pink tip until nothing more was forthcoming to wet his tongue.

“Enough,” Elidibus presses his unsullied boot to his shoulder and pushes him off. Pointing to the boot that Natus had thoroughly molested, he mutters with what seems to be annoyance. “You have more mess yet to clean.

Natus snorts, finding it somewhat ridiculous that he wanted him to clean off his boot when they were both still sitting here, cocks out and covered in cum. Especially Natus, who had stained his own pants just as much as he had Elidibus' boot. “What, you want me to lick that clean, too?”

Elidibus stares at him. Expectant.

Really?

Right, then.

Natus leans forward and licks his own cum from the top of Elidibus' boot. It tastes like salt and leather, and somewhat like licking the barrel of a gun. It tasted just like that dusty gunpowder smell he had detected on Elidibus’ robe.

“Satisfied?” Natus asks, arching his eyebrows.

“You missed a spot,” Elidibus says, lifting his leg to show him the smeared, tacky mess on the bottom of his boot.

Natus had a sneaking suspicion that Elidibus simply had something of a thing for seeing him degraded.

As if this was the worst thing Natus had ever had to do. Licking his own cum from his lover's boot hardly ranked anywhere near the top of the list of terrible things that Natus had been made to do in his line of work.

Natus gets one, two pointed licks in before Elidibus plants his boot in his face and shoves him off the stool.

Natus goes down like a sack of popotoes, smacking hard against the floor. Certainly bruising something.

His face throbs something fierce. A fitting end to a shite day. He bites his tongue, wanting to call his lover a few choice names, but holding back. He supposed this was Elidibus being nice, all things considered.

Natus groans, checking to make certain his sunglasses were still on his head. Phew, alright. Not cracked, but they were covered in cum. Wow, he must have shot high.

Elidibus looms over him, once again immaculate like he didn't just have his prick shoved down Natus' throat and been covered in the hero's cum.

Natus groans and lifts himself up to his knees. Stopped by his enemy crouching in front of him before he can find his feet.

Elidibus catches Natus' jaw in his hand, thumbing cruelly at his lip where he had drawn the hero's blood with the bite of his teeth. Rubbing under his nose and smearing a trickle of blood across his skin that has begun to drip down from being kicked in the face. “Where is your usual fire? That fervent flame that consumed my brethren?”

Natus leans into his hand, smiling. Intentionally meant to be aggravating. “Maybe I'm tired. You caught me at a bad time if you were wanting a fight. I'm all tuckered out.”

Elidibus' lips tug down. An expression most familiar.

“I should not have come,” he says predictably. Drawing away again, just like he always did.

How humorous the phrase “know thy enemy” when thy enemy is also your lover, your begrudging bedfellow.

“Too late for that, isn't it,” Natus says, putting on a facade of nonchalance. He was watching him very carefully now. “What do you say, this time next windsday?”

Elidibus turns towards him.

Ah, there it was. He'd gone cold again.

“I'll take that as a no,” he tries to keep his voice light, but there was a tightness in his throat. It hurts to swallow. He tells himself it's just because he gave it his all, treating Elidibus to a hell of a blowjob. Not that he was ever grateful.

“No kiss goodnight, then?”

Natus had to remind himself to laugh, rather than allowing himself to feel miserable over how their relationship had shifted. They had not been able to deny their attraction, and now everything had led to this.

Elidibus pauses, raising a hand towards his face. Hovering over his mouth a moment, but then lifting higher to press against his mask. Straightening it, or perhaps reminding himself it was there.

“The next time we meet, it will be as enemies, Warrior of Light.”

He is gone between one blink and the next.

Natus stares at the place he stood for a long, quiet moment.

The room is darker now, the moon hidden behind the clouds. The stars seemed dimmer.

He drags himself to his feet.

His bed was a siren's call beckoning him to wrap himself within his blankets and surrender to sweet oblivion, but Natus headed towards his drawers, gathering his things that he needed to wash up instead.

He could still taste him on his tongue.

[ichorsveined]

LADY BRONTE VELARYON .

announcing  the  arrival  of  BRONTE  of  house  VELARYON  ( née  SWANN ) ,  the  LADY  REGENT  of  DRIFTMARK .  whispers  among  the  court  name  them  to  be  both  INNOVATIVE  and  VOLATILE  in  disposition ,  and  those  closest  to  them  speak  to  their  interests  in  reading  &  writing  poetry .  if  we  bards  could  compose  a  song  for  them ,  it  might  tell  stories  of  endless  stacks  of  paper  ,  each  page  filled  with  immaculate  script  and  verse ;  once  a  willing  pawn ,  moved  across  the  board  by  adept  player  to  the  last  rank  ,  reluctantly  promoted  to  queen  —  this  ,  too  ,  is  merely  something  you  must  become  accustomed  to ;  a  calm  ,  august  bearing  in  the  face  of  tragedy ,  maintained  even  in  private  —  save  for  a  wail  heard  in  the  middle  of  the  night .  the  seven  whisper  to  their  most  devout  queen  as  she  sleeps ,  making  her  question  where  their  loyalties  truly  lie .  are  they  right  to  whisper ?  for  their  loyalties  truly  lie  with  HOUSE  TARGARYEN  &  HOUSE  VELARYON  (  LAENOR  MOST  OF  ALL  ) .

statistics ...

#basic  information .

official  name  :  bronte  cassandra  velaryon  ,  née  swann  .  nicknames  :  bron  .  noble  title  :  lady  regent  of  driftmark  ,  lady  of  stonehelm  .  date  of  birth  :  september  23  .  age  :  35  .  birthplace  :  stonehelm  ,  the  stormlands   .  home  :  high tide , driftmark  ,  the  crownlands  .  nationality  :  stormlander & crownlander , westerosi  .  gender  :  nonbinary  .  pronouns  :  they / them / theirs  &  she / her / hers  .  orientation  :  bisexual  biromantic  .  monikers  :  the cygnet of driftmark , the wailing widow .  languages  :  the  common  language (  fluent  )  ,  high  valyrian  (  conversational  )  .  accent  :  standard  stormlander  , though with a flowery lexicon .  has  a somewhat  husky  voice  .

#physical  information.

ethnicity  :  korean  .  hair  :  black  as  the  sky  before  dawn  ,  with  scattered  gray  hairs  . once flowing long hair was recently hacked off , in the months since it's grown into a clean cut at the nape of her neck .  eyes  :  dark  brown  .  height  :  5'9" / 175cm  .  build  :  lean  ,  statuesque  .  scent  :  tba  .  dominant  hand  :  right  .  allergies  :  none  known  .  scars  :  nothing significant  .  distinguishing  features  :  an  almost  preternatural  grace  , reminiscent of the bird referenced in their maiden name .  clothing  style  :  combines the eccentricities of fashion in the crownlands  with the durability of the stormlands' wardrobe , especially in the colder months . as she is currently in half - mourning , she avoids more extravagant accessories and is limited in the colors she can wear ( mostly wearing black , white , and a darker shade of velaryon sea green at the moment ) .

#personality.

label  :  the  socialite , the ( tortured ) poet , the cygnet .  mbti  :  test in progress  ...  enneagram  :  test in progress  ...  element  :  water  .  star  sign  :  libra  .  temperament  :  melancholic  .  character  inspirations  :  yi hwi / yeonseon ( the king's affection )  .  deadly  sin  :  lust  .  heavenly  virtue  :  charity  & humility .  godly  parent  :  tba  .

#drives.

hobbies  :  reading , writing , poetry , cyvasse , entertaining others .  religion  :  faith  of  the  seven  .  alliance  :  house velaryon  and house swann . publicly , house targaryen as well . above all else , though , they are loyal to their son ;  if they must burn bridges with anyone for his sake , they will do so . personal  goals  :  prepare laenor for the future  , and  ensure he doesn't have the same ego and hubris as his father . also , don't fall apart in front of court . would  they  choose  family  or  power  ?  family , in spite of an upbringing being taught to always choose power  .

#familial  ties.

parent  one  :  tba  .  relationship  :  tba . parent two : tba  .  spouse  :  ruling  lord  jacaerys  velaryon†  .  relationship  :  dearly  beloved  , eventually .  siblings  :  tba  .  sister - in - law  :  lady  baela  velaryon  .  relationship : tba . brother - in - law  :  lord  velaryon  .  relationship  :  tba  .  child  :  ruling  lord  laenor  velaryon  .  relationship  :  doting  ,  increasingly possessive  .

    narrative  ...

the path of your life , every twist and turn , was written before you took your first breath . or so you thought . as the fourth of five children , your role in furthering the family name , barring a devastating accident , would be achieved through an advantageous marriage . so , tasked with learning everything possible to make yourself a remarkable marriage candidate , your schooling began .

you were drilled on etiquette , politics , dance , equestrianism , the high harp , among numerous others . a thorough education , one fit for an heir — the only appropriate match for you , save for a ruling liege . and you absorbed your lessons with enthusiasm , eager to meet your parents' high expectations . anything less would bring a tear to your eye .

outside of your lessons , you were often found by the banks of the slayne , swimming , or sitting with your nose in a book , or at your writing desk , hands stained with ink . which wasn't to say you were shy , as visitors to stonehelm were greeted by a brilliant smile and scintillating conversation whenever you were present . but you had a penchant for words , especially script , one honed over the coming years .

your parents' efforts , and yours , were fruitful . many vied for the hand of one so skilled and so fair , but one name in particular stood out : velaryon . so , with an exchange of letters , and an introduction , a deal was made — the cygnet's hand for a trade agreement and river access .

taking up residence on driftmark revealed your secret — thunderous as any stormlander , ebullient as you were with company , ultimately , you were sensitive and struggled with change . even at twenty name days . after the wedding , you remain locked away in your chambers for weeks , only emerging in the dead of night to wander moonlit halls . on one of these excursions , you met your new husband . he didn't begrudge the shift in your demeanor , your sudden reclusiveness . and being the romantic you were ( and remain ) , you were enamored . from there , you fell .

over time , you and jacaerys found harmony , just as you did with the other members of your new family . and with the birth of your son , your place among them was secured . you could relax , you could write again . you flourished in your new home , and continued to over a decade later .

but you changed , after the third month of the year 850 . more somber , more irritable , with less control over your vacillating emotions than ever before . but you must succeed , for you were born for this . and , most important of all , laenor needed you .

#wanted  connections .

potential suitor  :  romantic ? to be sent to the main . it hasn't been long since jacaerys'  untimely demise ,  yet  some have  already  expressed  a  desire  to  court  his  widow (this muse included ) .  their pursuit could  be  out of  genuine  interest ,  though the  much  more  likely  scenario  is  something  to  do  with  twisting  her  emotional  vulnerability  and regency for  their  own  gain . bonus points if they're a childhood friend she thinks she can trust .

house swann : familial . i simply would like to see it , especially as bronte goes through such a tumultuous time ! this is super open - ended , as the only things set in stone are that 1) bronte is a middle child , and 2) her parents were / are skilled at politics . anyway , the exact relationship between her and the current generation of swanns is totally utp ! in my mind she's a sister or aunt to the current ruling liege , but any familial dynamic is fine by me !

friends and acquaintances : platonic . bronte was raised up to understand the importance of establishing connections , and like any other lesson of theirs , they applied what they learned to the best of their ability . their web centers on the stormlands , their ancestral home ( and i would love for them to have some childhood friends through this ! ) , spreading over time to other regions of westeros . they thrive in the presence of others . elias baratheon , carilyn harlaw , aelyx targaryen , open to others

allies , old and new : platonic . similar to the above , but more for business than pleasure . especially looking for those who can convince bronte to turn away from the targaryens , perhaps aid in northern and / or dornish independence , which she already has some passing interest in . dilara martell , klahan rogare , open to others