#all together making women sound like children

[nomnomnibblenibble]

We have traded one narrow viewpoint for another.

It went from "a woman needs a male figure for guidance" to "a woman can't be expected to make adult decisions until she's 27".

There's such an annoying push to say that the more traditional decisions a woman could make are against her will as though it's impossible to imagine that their are young people who want to get married or have a kid.

[someone-will-remember-us]

A leaden silence descended upon the courtroom as the videos began to play over three screens.

There was Gisèle Pelicot, the victim in the center of a rape trial that has rocked France, lying on a bed on her side, her arms limp before her, her mouth open. The sound of her snoring filled the courtroom. She appeared to be dead asleep.

In the videos, she did not respond to the touches of the men, who engaged with her body in sex acts.

Ms. Pelicot had fought hard for these videos to be shown publicly in the courtroom because, she said, they were incontrovertible evidence. While most rape victims have only their word and memory of events, Ms. Pelicot has a library of proof in the form of videos and photographs — taken by her own husband.

Showing them publicly was essential, her lawyer Antoine Camus told the courtroom, “to look rape straight in the eyes.”

It was another astounding moment in a trial that for the past month has gripped France as if by the throat and shaken it violently. The case has raised profound questions about relations between men and women, the prevalence of rape and conceptions of consent.

More than 50 men are on trial together. Almost all are accused of aggravated rape against Ms. Pelicot, a grandmother and retired manager at a big company, while she was in an unconscious state. Her former husband of 50 years, Dominique Pelicot, has pleaded guilty to mixing drugs into her food and drink and inviting others into their home, in a village in southern France where they had retired, to join him in raping her limp body.

While Ms. Pelicot, 71, had the right to request that the trial take place behind closed doors, she decided to make it public. She said that she did it not for her, but to protect other women. Shame, she said, must change sides — from the victims to the perpetrators.

The accused men appear to be a gallery of working-class and middle-class French society: truck drivers, carpenters and trade workers, a nurse, an I.T. expert, a local journalist. They range in age from 26 to 74. Many have children and are in relationships. Over four months, their cases are coming before the court in batches of six or seven a week.

All but 15 have contested the charge. Many have argued that they were tricked into coming into her bedroom by Mr. Pelicot, who had offered them a playful trio with his wife. Many say he led them to believe she was sleeping — or pretending to sleep — as part of the couple’s sexual fantasy. Mr. Pelicot manipulated them when they were vulnerable, some of them have said, and directed them in the acts like a stage manager. They said they had blindly followed his orders.

One said this week that he thought he was also drugged, and had no memory from the moment he entered the room until he returned to his car later. Another said he was so terrified by Mr. Pelicot, whom he regarded as a “predator” and a “psychopath,” that he interacted with Ms. Pelicot’s body calmly in order to “not show weakness, so he attacks me.”

“They took a precise line of defense,” Mr. Camus, one of the lawyers for Ms. Pelicot, told the court on Friday. Ms. Pelicot has said that while the men were perhaps tricked into coming into her bedroom, once they got there, she was so unconscious that it was clear that she could not have possibly given consent.

This is where the videos come in. Mr. Pelicot filmed most of the encounters, often with two cameras, and carefully edited and titled them. Over the course of their investigation, the police found more than 20,000 videos and photographs on his electronic devices, many of them in a digital folder titled “Abuse.”

After initially ruling the videos would not be viewed because of their “indecent and shocking” nature, the judges of the criminal court in Avignon changed their minds after a heated courtroom debate on Friday. Not all the videos would be shown, announced the head judge, Roger Arata — just those videos deemed “strictly necessary” for the “manifestation of the truth.”

A dozen videos and about 10 photos were shown over the courtroom’s three flat screens on Friday afternoon and projected into the overflow room for members of the public, who have continued to line up every day to watch the proceedings and support Ms. Pelicot.

The videos’ titles alone, packed with crude words and read out by the prosecutor, made many observers flinch. Judge Arata said at one point that he didn’t have any “particular desire” to read them out loud any more.

In many, Ms. Pelicot appeared naked, but in some, she wore a garter belt, underwear and white socks. In one, she had a blindfold over her eyes. Her husband told the police he often dressed her up after she was unconscious, and then at the end of the night, he cleaned her and returned her to her nightclothes.

The accused were seen stroking her sides and intimate parts with their hands and mouths. Five were captured putting their penises in her slack mouth. The camera sometimes zoomed in for close-ups. While Ms. Pelicot could be seen moving slightly in some, in none was she seen responding to the touches. She often snored loudly.

The videos played on uncomfortably long. One defendant lowered his face. Many lawyers and journalists stopped looking at the screens.

Thierry Postat, a 61-year-old refrigeration technician who is among those on trial, told the court that he had been involved in swinging and couple sharing since he was 30. He said that in at least three other cases, he had been invited into bedrooms by husbands to have sex with their sleeping wives — only one of whom woke up.

“I trusted Mr. Pelicot,” because most of the time among swingers, Mr. Postat told the court, “it’s the man who organizes things"

But he was pressed by Ms. Pelicot’s lawyer, Mr. Camus: “You really thought you were practicing couple swapping? You see a couple there?” Mr. Camus asked Mr. Postat, referring to the video that had just been shown.

“Yes,” Mr. Postat responded. “The way I remember it.”

Another video captured Simone Mekenese penetrating Ms. Pelicot, while she was lying on her side sleeping.

“You weren’t aware she was unconscious?” asked Stéphane Babonneau, a second lawyer for Ms. Pelicot.

“No,” responded Mr. Mekenese, 43, a driver on a construction site who was a neighbor of the couple’s at the time. “I thought she would participate soon.”

An argument heard repeatedly in court this week was that while they might not have gotten direct consent from Ms. Pelicot, the accused men did not go to the Pelicots’ home with an intention to rape her.

The day before, Mr. Postat had told the court that they might be rapists because they had not received consent, “but we aren’t rapists in our souls.”

After two hours of viewing videos, the court session ended abruptly. People drifted out of the courtroom, and the overflow room, stunned.

“We are in shock,” said Anne-Marie Galvan, 58, a nursing assistant at the local hospital. Her husband, Serge Galvan, stood nearby, tears swelling in his eyes.

“I’m almost ashamed to be a man,” he said. “You could see she was sleeping. It was obvious she was unconscious.”

The couple, and the rest of the crowd, clapped thunderously when Ms. Pelicot passed by, making her way with her lawyers to the court exit. She stopped, looked at the group, and put her hand to her heart.

“We are here for her. We must not let this lady down. We must give her as much strength as possible. It’s important for women,” said Mr. Galvan.

“This,” he added, thinking back to the scenes on the screen, “has to stop.”

[diejager]

Hello there, love your stuff! How would the monster au boys react to their human reader being on their period? Because I can totally see Soap smelling blood on the reader and thinking that they are injured, but then getting confused when they tell him it’s a period. ☺️

Sweet blood Cw: blood, period, tell me if I missed any.

I completely agree, Soap, even with the intellect and understanding he needed to be a demolition expert, dismantling and building explosives and weapons from nothing, he’s oblivious of some things. Despite his skillful in sights and decisions, he falters in some aspects in a domestic scene and anything related to it. He struggled at first, trying to understand why there was a smell of sweet blood waffling off you as if it clung to your clothes, the smell ingrained in every little groove of your body —you smelled much sweeter as well.

It made something on his mind swoon, instincts reeling for unknown reasons until he asked you himself after someone found him sniffing the air like a mutt and following you like a lovesick pup. He seemed so confused with the notion of you bleeding once a month and only understood when you told him it was your period - or menstruation in more technical terms - and that it was all natural. He brought up to you a memory of his older sister smelling of blood, old yet new, unripe yet ripe, it followed a lunar cycle and that made it easier to understand.

Unlike Soap, the other’s are more knowledgeable of your plight, coming prepared to help you with whatever you would need. Despite their inexperience with menstrual cramps and cycles, they knew the gist of it, what it entailed whenever someone had one, few of them actually had first-hand experience with it. Ghost had Beth and his mom’s experience, their grumbles and annoyed sounds. Gaz from the few girls he dated in high school, soothing their pains when they curled forward, holding their abdomen. Alejandro and Rudy knew of it from the girls they grew up around in Las Almas as children, running around and skipping school when they didn’t feel well. Price - despote his busy life - had a few flings and Laswell’s grumbling to sit through when their cramps started. Horangi and König both saw and heard from the women in KorTac, their swift mood swings and short tempers once a month made them prepared.

If you needed a heated pad warmed in the microwave, Rudy and Gaz were already there with it in hand, wrapped in a fluffy towel to prevent yourself from burning your skin. If you needed water and painkillers for your unbearable cramps, Ghost and Kónig would gladly get you a cup of water and a few pills from their own bottles, strong painkillers for headaches and muscle pains that were probably weaker than the cramps you felt. If you needed a massage, something to soothe the ache in your back and limbs from your hormones getting out of control, a chaotic mess around your body, Price and Alejandro wouldn’t mind setting aside their work to give you a massage, to press and burn the ache through experienced and warm hands. If you needed a distraction from the whole nausea and sickness, Horangi and Soap would jump at the opportunity, a cuddling feline holding you down with his whole body or an enthusiastic and praise-hungry wolf making tricks to please you.

Alone, one could do a lot to help you through your period, reminding you in advance to take your med, bringing you whatever you would need and taking care of you, but together, they worked like a well oiled machine, every member fitting in like a cog, moving in synchrony. They went over and above to satisfying you, dropping their duty to rush to your side at the slightest sound of displeasure. There’s nothing they wouldn’t do for you, from going to a drug store miles away for a specific med to carrying you around in their arms or back.

From that first occasion, Soap goes around with his nose raised and mind ready to help you at the drop of the hat if he gets a whiff of sweetened blood from you. He even has a bag in his room with pads, painkillers, soft towels, fluffy blanket, heated pads and a list of food you crave during your period.

Taglist: @craxy-person @crowbird @dead-cipher @iwannabealocalcryptid @iizx7y @mxtokko @yeetusspagheetus @capricorn-anon @perfectus-in-morte @sae1kie @yeoldedumbslut @tallmanlover @distracteddragoness @vxnilla-hxrddrugs @konigsblog @havoc973 @angelcakes-22 @cassiecasluciluce @ramadiiiisme @ramblingsofachaoticthinker @ki-cant-spel @im-making-an-effort @love-dove-noora @jinxxangel13 @daisychainsinknots @0alk0msan @mul-pi

[kiefbowl]

this is going to sound silly but it isn't silly, and I'm seriously saying this. I do think there is a slight feminist concern to alien abduction stories in so far as we can assume that when people, especially women, talk about their abductions and their abilities to communicate with extra terrestrials et cetera, they are someone who is mentally unwell and who has likely experienced something traumatic. alien abduction stories tend to have common elements even if there are details wildly different from each individual. those details are different because they likely didn't happen, but the common elements tend to be things like being taken from home, being violated, being exposed, having things implanted in the body, experiencing pregnancy, having secret knowledge, having a special connection to the extra terrestrials...

you can start putting some pieces together. yes, sometimes these elements are shared because they are what's heard in pop culture. you're more likely to imagine the details of a book you read or a tv show you saw than come up with something so fantastically new and original. you can imagine, for example, if someone is a say a seven year old girl being manipulated into sexual favors by a trusted adult and doesn't understand what's happening to her and has seen alien media and perhaps even has other messaging around her wrt sin, purity, worthiness, karma (what have you), and also perhaps is predisposed to mental illness, it's easier to believe she's a special person being abducted by other worldly creatures who don't truly mean her harm. you can see how a vivid child's imagination could lead to an adult believing memories that never happened.

and so the feminist concern is to not treat these stories as complete jokes and hoaxes and roll our eyes. I'm just reminded today of something I saw years ago. I think it was a Penn and Teller Bullshit episode on aliens, and they had a group of hard core believers talking about their experiences with aliens, and it felt like we were supposed to be laughing at them when at least one of them was a woman who truly believed an alien husband took her way sometimes and forced her to give birth and she had several children she didn't get to see in space, and she was clearly not very well adjusted socially. all I could think was is this a woman who's been raped? is this a woman who has been forced to have abortions? is this a woman who has had multiple miscarriages? is this a woman experiencing domestic abuse from a husband or boyfriend? but the episode wasn't interested in exploring that, and she stuck out as "one of these things is not like the others" when juxtaposed to fake professors trying to sell their weirdo books as a living or whatever else was in the episode.

when we say believe women, that includes "crazy" women. women who say ghosts are trying to kill them, who talk about people living in their walls coming out at night to steal their body parts, women who believe they are married to alien overlords since they were 12 and have birth 50 alien babies. these women are probably telling us something and I think we can say "I believe something has happened to you" rather than make a mockery of them.

[crushribbons]

ʜʏᴘᴏᴄʀɪᴛᴇ

summary: Alicent Hightower, queen of the realm, cannot sin alone.

cw: 1.3k words, SMUT (18+ ONLY), takes place late s1ish, alicent x chambermaid!reader, fingering, oral (both f!receiving), kind of toxic power abuse, religious undertones (for the vibes), fem!reader/oc. based off a prompt from my love @wedonthaveawhile whose brain is magic. requests open.

a/n: no research we die like lesbian servants!! xx laney

Rhaenyra and Alicent are nose to nose.

“The supposed parentage of my children is nothing but a rumor designed to discredit me,” Rhaenyra says, her teeth gritted together. “Designed, I believe, with intention, by Your Grace.”

The snort slips out of you before you have time to consider that it could be your last. King Viserys’ chosen heir whips around, a streak of lighting running through her stormy eyes.

“Beg pardon, Princess, I was merely coughing.” You curtsy low, with your eyes fixed hard on the stone floor. In your periphery, Rhaenyra turns back to face her stepmother.

Alicent’s gaze never falters, never falls from Rhaenyra’s. Her regal chin is raised in defiance and the fire backlights her auburn hair, making her personage glow in a way not of this earth. Your breathing falters as you watch hers remain even, measured.

She takes in a breath through her nose. “I will not see my children passed over for the throne for the false offspring of a woman who flouts duty and honor as if they mean nothing.” You busy yourself with turning down the queen’s duvet and placing warming pans at the foot of it, all the while straining your ear to hear the low anger seeping out of Alicent. “You have needlessly tainted a bloodline ten thousand years strong, one that I was expected to uphold without question or complaint. I have never faltered in my duty to your father,” she continues, and you notice Rhaenyra’s nostrils flaring, her lips pressing into a bloodless line.

And you have been a good queen, a noble queen, to us all! Beloved forever by the people of Westeros, to be sure! you want to cry. You do not, however, bound by your station to stay ever silent and unnoticed by the occupants of the Red Keep. You shrink yourself smaller into the shadows beside Alicent’s bed, watching. Alicent’s hands are clasped together, and something stirs inside you as you watch her knuckles whiten. She is so lithe, so elegant, her posture impeccable. The green dressing gown she wears shows off her narrow shoulders and you can’t help but feel the heft of fabric, ghostly, in your hands as you imagine pulling it off her. Shame shoots through your chest at the thought, while arousal hits lower.

Rhaenyra is speaking again, but her voice has lost some of its glass-sharp edge. “I will not speak of this anymore, Alicent—” You bite your tongue to stop yourself from speaking out of turn and instructing the ingrate princess to address her lady queen as “Your Grace” “—certainly not in the presence of such attentive ears.” The attentive ears turn red. Rhaenyra turns to you once more and calls, “Leave us.”

“Stay.”

You freeze. Alicent’s hand is raised, her soft palm pointing at you, but her eyes stay fixed on Rhaenyra. For a moment, all three women are suspended in indignation, anger, fear, and the only sound is the crackle of the fire. It sounds like Syrax, opening her maw wide to summon a pillar of destruction.

“Perhaps sleep…” The queen’s voice is softer than the pillow you don’t realize until that instant that you’ve been clutching. “Would be the most productive course, for now. You have traveled long, Princess.”

Rhaenyra looks as though she wants to say something, anything, to have spoken the last words between the two of them. She does not, however. With a final, searching look into Alicent’s eyes, the Targaryen sweeps out of the room, the heavy door slamming behind her. The candelabra flickers. Its wicks have burned too low.

Alicent does not move for several seconds, staring after the departed princess. It seems she can smell something in Rhaenyra’s wake, and it is not altogether unpleasant to her. Blood is rushing in your ears, and your fingertips are strangely numb. You open your mouth to speak, but your tongue weighs too much.

“You forget yourself too often.”

“I am sorry, Your Grace.”

“We must be more careful. Do not be so quick to defend me.”

“I cannot help it, Your Grace. She tells lies and besmirches the name of House Targaryen.”

“How can you dare to make such indictments against your future queen?”

Your knees are made of water. It feels like a trap. “You are my queen. My only.” Alicent, at last, looks at you, and it makes you sag onto the bed.  

Her head tips to one side. She regards you. “Mm. Very good.” 

She murmurs it again, but the second time, it’s said into your neck, her breath hot against your skin while her fingers work their way inside you and her naked frame presses you to the mattress. The bed is heavenly soft, softer than anything you’ve ever been allowed to sleep on in your life, but it’s nothing compared to her lips on yours. Her tongue laves across your bottom lip, sweet as honey. 

It’s so rare that she takes you in her bed; you almost feel elated. You never mind being with her elsewhere, though. She makes it hard to care about anything other than the sheer her that fills the room every time she enters. While Alicent takes both of your wrists in her left hand and moves over you to pin them to her headboard, her other hand never stopping its pumping in, out, in, her tits brush against your face and you feel no remorse for the wail she lets fly as you bite down on the curve of one. Your teeth dig in, a ragged moan tears out of her, and her bare cunt grinds down on the thigh she is straddling. She’s unbearably wet, and you can feel her clench against your leg as she breathes, “Once again.”

In, out, in. Long, elegant fingers, soft from a lifetime of gentility. Endless locks of hair flow down over her shoulders and down to her waist. She’s an angel, you’re sure now. “The princess is a liar. She flaunts her indiscretions, her lack of care for this noble house. She is shameless.”

Allicent releases your hands so she can move down and suck your clit between her lips, pushing her tongue inside you alongside her fingers. You’re so full of her, so put on display and arousal dripping down onto the royal sheets, that it makes you cover your eyes and groan. “Your Grace,” you weep, grabbing a handful of her loose curls. “Please, keep going, please.”

“Tell me what you think of her bastards,” she murmurs, pulling her lips away from your heat. Her free hand moves to your clit and rubs it, alternating between circles and light pushes that have you keening your hips desperately. You realize that forming words has become near impossible. 

You huff as the coil of pleasure inside you compresses itself. “She fucks anything that looks at her. Any commoner, any pathetic servant in her employ,” you whine. Your head covering is tossed over Allicent’s vanity, your apron on the ground. “Who knows if her children are even Ser Harwin’s? What is to stop her from lying about that, as well?” The queen is as pleased as you’ve ever seen her.

She uses her hand like a sword, sinking into you, the very picture of a conqueror. “You do wonderfully, my sweet, sweet girl. Come for me.” The command is said so mildly, so disinterested, you almost miss it over the roar of ecstasy in your ears. That coil implodes, and you arch your back off the bed with a hollow scream that you should pray can’t be heard throughout the castle. The only thing you have room to pray for, though, is that Alicent never stops moving inside you. That she never stops bedding you. That she never stops needing you to be her mirror. 

Hypocrisy is a sin, a septa who you knew when you were no more than eight years old whispers in your ear. Those who do in the darkness what they rail against in daylight.

You know she will start to feel the wash of shame soon, so you fight through the haze that your orgasm leaves behind. “Please, let me fuck you, my queen.”

masterlist

[novashelby]

The Nanny Conundrum~A Tommy Shelby Smut

Pairing: Tommy Shelby x Nanny!Reader (3rd person)

Warnings: Male masterbation, voyeurism. Meant to be kind of funny. A little cringe and embarrassing.

Prompt 93

Word Count: 2,791

Summary: Tommy Shelby just got a new nanny for Charlie. She's a sweet, delicate girl, but learns quite a thing or two about men while hiding for a game of hide n seek.

Please enjoy. I appreciate reblogs and comments. Likes are kind and thoughtful, and I appreciate you reading my work. However, reblogs really help writers out. So, please, considering rebloging.

Tommy was only delicate and proper with a select few people, and she was one of them, but he couldn’t help himself. Not even Satan himself could give her a rough handling. She was delicate looking, sounding, and acting. Like a daisy, really. And on top of it, she was so, so good with Charlie. Just two years old, losing his mother a few short months before. He was hesitant at first, not wanting to go through a whole hiring process. And so, he convinced Mary and Francis to take on the extra duty. Though, two aging women, their patience was waning. Enough was enough, Mr. Shelby was getting a nanny for the poor boy. 

It was difficult for Mr. Shelby to find employees as many were aware of his antics. There were a few applicants…none did anything for him. They were old. Had no energy with a sharp tongue. Mr. Shelby didn’t want anyone with a sharp tongue. Then there was a quiet time with weeks in between; no applicants had walked through the door. 

Until one day, someone did. It was a Sunday, too. Which got a work motivated man like himself excited. Mary had knocked on the door and he grumbled for her to enter. Behind her was a girl, not too tall and with a young face. He couldn’t make out her age, but her cheeks were round and blushed with youth. He noticed how when she smiled, her eyes would as well and she’d let out this delicate laugh. 

It was right then that he knew. Unlike the others, he immediately slid back his chair and stood, straightening his blue white lined vest. Mary was surprised at the soft smile that tugged at his usually stiff lips. His stress lines seemed to ease, but most of all he turned gentle. Mary watched aghast how he waltzed around his mahogany desk and rushed over to her. Never had he ever shook a woman’s hand as such; both hands gently holding her right. “I’m Mr. Shelby,” he said, and Mary couldn’t take anymore. She gave her employer a pursed look, brow raised, and he mouthed what. 

“I will take my leave, Mr. Shelby,” she said. “I must go to the kitchens and yell at the staff.” The young girl frowned a bit and turned to watch the woman leave. 

“Is she alright?” she asked, turning her attention back to the man who was still holding her hand. 

He was quick to nod and offer a smile. “Yes, yes! She’s fine. Don’t worry about her, eh? I think all women get a certain edge to them when they hit about seventy-”

“And men,” she giggled, putting a finger out. 

Kindly, he chuckled back. “I think we develop that a bit younger. Anyway! Come! Take a seat, eh?” He walked her over to the desk, hand resting politely on her mid-back. “So, are you looking for a nanny position?” They sat across from one another and she handed over CV paperclipped together. His eyes quickly scanned it, grinning. “Nanny program in London, worked for the same family for 2 years, twenty years old, born in Boston to English parents, and the second oldest of six children.” He put it down and pushed it over to her. “You understand this is a live in position, love?” Love. A red rosy tint fell on her face and she had to look away shyly. She could not lie. Of course, Mr. Shelby was a handsome man smooth with his words. “You’d be here Monday to Sunday. Of course, you will have free time and vacation time. Sundays off.” 

“The pay?” she asked. “A family in London has offered me six pounds.”

Six bloody fuckin’ pounds, Mr. Shelby thought to himself, a bit stunted. But nonetheless, he said, “I can offer ten, plus you’ll have a room, food, and free roam of the property. I’ll allow leave for all holidays, Sunday’s off, and early leave on Wednesdays. You’ll be allowed three sick days a calendar year-”

“I can start today,” she said, abruptly, far too eager to work for him. The benefits were like nothing she’d even been offered. He paused, smile dropping a bit, not used to people being so…interested. She coughed a bit and fixed herself in the chair. “Sorry,” she said, clearing her throat. “I can start today. If you would have me, of course.”

He nodded, “not today. Tomorrow. You’ll start tomorrow.” 

Everyone liked her. She was like a breath of fresh air. A positive influence on everyone. Francis and Mary seemed more at ease and talked with less grouch. The kitchen danced when she waltzed in. The other maids enjoyed how she was incredibly courteous of the messes Charlie would make. Even John and Arthur started to look forward to coming to Arrow house. Despite their miserable to be around brother who did nothing, but demand this and that from them. 

And Mr. Shelby, well...he found himself smiling a tad more when he saw her with Charlie. 

She was a wonderful nanny. On top of the normal tasks, she actually played with Charlie and helped with his coloring and motor tasks. She’d sing to him and dance with him. And unlike most girls her age, she wasn’t opposed to rolling around in the grass with him. They’d sleep in the grass and dance in the rain with their shoes off. Charlie was in love with her! Mr. Shelby would watch from the window, feeling this pool of warmth within him when they’d run around in circles. 

“Ah, look at her,” Francis sighed, putting the tea tray on his desk. “Her frocks are always stained with grass.” 

Mr. Shelby flicked closed the blinds and sat at his desk, making up his tea with just a tad of sugar and milk. He enjoyed some honey as well those days. “It’ll rain soon, suppose they’ll come inside. She’s been reading to him a lot.” 

Francis smiled. “Very good. Will you be heading to the stables? Should I prepare-”

“No, no,” he said. “I’m just going to enjoy my cuppa, eh? And you should take a rest.” A rest. That was also something new. Mr. Shelby was allowing staff to have much more rest since she came. 

He finished his tea and went off to the stables when the two were coming in from their adventures from outside. After clean up time and a book, Charlie was still restless, wanting to run around and play. She pouted and poked his nose, “Charlie, I got a game for you!” His eyes widened and he giggled in excitement. She leaned in as if it was something special. “HIde n’ seek! I will hide. Okay? Has Charlie remembered his numbers?”

“One…two..three..eight…four…six…nine…five,” he counted off and she chuckled, telling him it was just fine enough. She picked him up and placed him facing the wall, explaining that he had to count to ten slowly and not move.

“I will hide somewhere, Charlie, on the first floor, okay?” she smiled, ruffling his hair before skipping out. She giggled as she heard his cute counting before opening and closing each door, unsure of where to hide before he stopped counting. She slipped into Mr. Shelby’s office, not seeing the harm when he wasn’t around. Under the desk, she crammed herself in a ball and waited. 

She heard Charlie call for her in a laugh, running around the hallway. She could tell that he checked the bathroom first then her room before going back to his room. She waited and waited before the office door opened, and she grinned, getting ready to say you win! When Mr. Shelby coughed. Wincing, she wondered if she should climb out and explain that they were playing hide and seek or wait for him to leave, but to her annoyance, he took a seat at his desk. At first, he fumbled around with some papers before cursing under his breath, seeming frustrated. She was sucking in her lips to hold back any loud breathing. But what he did next was…shocking. There were no other words to explain it. Shocking. To her, at least. A young twenty year old girl who surprisingly lived a very modest and conservative life. Never had she even held hands with a boy, nevermind witness what she was about to witness. His hands went to his belt clasp and fumbled with the golden hoop before easily undoing his trousers. Peeking out was a pair of men’s white underwear. Maybe he’s just getting comfortable, she told herself, but was quickly proven wrong when he let out a soft groan and slipped under the waistband of his underwear. She watched, frozen. He rubbed himself a bit under his underwear, grinding his hips up at his hand. Soft groans and eager curses filled the room in a hushed manner. As if he was ashamed of doing such a thing in his own home. It was all new to her, and she watched equally horrified and curious while kicking herself for being so stupid. A million hiding spots and she chose the very one he had to wank in. Peculiarly, a small wet spot formed where the tip was. Stupidly, she wanted to just reach up and touch it, but the thought lodged to the back of her head when he pulled it out. There was nothing she could compare it to, being the first cock she’d ever seen. But her cunt ached in an almost fear-like response seeing the shape and length. The tip was glistening with a sticky substance that he didn’t hesitate rubbing his thumb against. “Fuck,” he let out, leaning back slightly. Between his thumb and index, he rubbed it before giving his cock three good tugs. How it dripped out in a long string before pooling a little tiny dot onto the floor next to her. Swallowing, she looked down at it…just a little dab. A droplet. For a split second, she considered touching it. Mimicking how he rolled it between his fingers just to see what it felt like. But she couldn’t do it. It felt grotesque…dirty. Sinister? That’s when she heard him spit on his hand, drawing her attention from the precum and back to his twitching cock. His spit ran down the shaft, wetting the chair.

“Oh, fuck,” he grunted, his hand wrapping around himself, twisting around. He moved slowly up and down, teasing the sensation. It’d been such a long time since he last rubbed one out. Though loving a good fuck, self pleasure was never something he needed to ease an urge. But he felt it that day. His cock consistently throbbed at the seams of his trousers. Not even a smoke and a drink calmed him. And so, he resorted to a good old school wank. Admittedly, it was quite nice. Alone in his element, just feeling himself. “Shit.” His started to roll upward, fucking his hand. 

Alone…except for the sweet nanny under his desk, trapped in quite a predicament she wasn’t quite sure she liked. His hand started to move a bit faster with a better rhythm. He was flowing a stream of grunts, curses, groans, moans, and inaudible sentences. “Baby,” he cried, head rolled back, eyes closed. “Fuck me, c’mon-shit!” He hummed, running a hand over his face. She swallowed and panicked that maybe he knew she was there. Did he? Who was he talking to? But she didn’t move. She hardly even breathed scared he’d hear her. “Mmmmhm.” Pausing, he spit on his hand again before rubbing it all over. Just as he resumed his speed, he said something she could hardly believe. Her name. Followed by a, “just like that…good fuckin’ girl.” In shock, her eyes widened and her hands instantly covered her mouth. “Bounce up and down, right on my cock. Ride my fuckin’ cock!” His breaths became jagged while his hips twitched and jolted. He was close…so fucking close. 

Meanwhile, the poor girl tried to block it out. But how could she? So close to a man jerking his cock, calling her name. Her fucking name? Imagining her bouncing on it. She couldn’t help, but wonder if this was his first time thinking of her like this. She hated to admit it, but her thighs were struggling to stay still. So, so tempted to rub them together to ease a surprise heat growing between her legs. “That’s good, baby, keep doing that….Ugh! Fuck!” He paused, edging himself. She noticed when he stopped, his hands clenched around it harder, shaking. Then he slowly went back to tugging and rubbing, easing back into the lost rhythm. “I bet you are so fuckin’ tight.” One hand slowly went between her legs to cup her aching pussy as she suppressed a whine. “Fuck, I want to corrupt that little fuckin’ cunt….Make you into a dirty little fuckin’ slut. My dirty slut…fuck!” He jolted upward, other hand gripping a chair arm before easing back into speed. 

Make you into a dirty little fuckin’ slut. My dirty slut. Those words imprinted themselves in her head. His words were disgusting, filthy, and humiliating, but so fucking erotic. His possessiveness was like honey. It took so much effort to not ease her curiosities and reach her hand up to touch his cock. So, she had to just watch. Watching was so hot, but so torturous. When he started to get sloppy with his movements, she prepared for him to stop again, but he didn’t. “F-fuck!” He cried out, tugging one last time before a stream of white came from his cock. She was expecting it to be like the sticky clear mess, but no, his cum shot.

In fact, it shot at her…on her face. Frozen, feeling the warmth that landed over her eyelids and dripped down her face and over her lips. Appalled and embarrassed, how was she going to face him after that? With his excrement painting her face. He let out one last, “fuck,” before tiredly tucking himself away and buckling his belt. He took the handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his hands. Sliding back in his chair and standing, she was sure that he was going to leave, but no. He kneeled down to clean up wherever the cum landed, coming face to face with her…wearing it.

Never had he ever been so mortified, looking at the girl who seemed as if she saw death. His cum was right there…teasing at her lips. His nanny….Had she watched the whole thing? Heard every word? Of course. She had to. He swallowed, and said, “Um…this isn’t a great napping spot-”

“Mr. Shelby,” she stuttered out, tongue darting out almost instinctively, accidentally swiping the cum off. She winced as it tasted salty. His eyes flickered down to her quivering lips, widening. There was a bit of silence before she continued. “I was playing hide n seek-”

“In my office?” he asked, not exactly mad. More stunned and quiet than anything. He felt as if he was a young man again, ashamed of rubbing one out. 

“I’m competitive. I didn’t think he’d look in here,” she responded with the same tone. He nodded slowly, reaching out to clean her face, but she took the rag and did it herself before going to hand it back. 

“Keep it,” he said, slowly standing and grabbing for his whiskey. He didn’t even bother pouring it in a glass as he swigged it from the bottle. She crawled out from under the desk watching him gulp it like water. “Fuckin’ ‘ell,” he cursed, putting it down and turning to her. “Did you-”

“Yes,” she said before he could finish the quest. Nervously, she averted her attention off to the side, playing with her dress. His eyes skimmed over her, heart rate through the roof. His head was swarming with a whole bunch of conflictions. “Should I pack my things?” Mr. Shelby licked at his bottom lip and itched the arch of his nose. “Um…well, I think it is alright. You’re not the first woman to look at it. Probably not the last unless I drop dead right now…which is fuckin’ possible.” She bowed and tried to slowly back away when he looked over at her. “C’mere. I’m not done with you. As much as I’d like to jump out this fuckin’ window, you’re still my employee and you were in my office without permission. Why don’t you take a seat-no, no. Right here.” She nervously looked at where his hand was pointing. It was the desk. “C’mere,” he patted. “Sit on the desk like a good girl.” The words played back in her head and she did so…like a fuckin’ good girl.

[saintsenara]

Do you think the wizarding world even has a concept of rape? I don't think this was JKR's intent but love potions are considered perfectly legal, Romilda Vane doesn't get in trouble, Dumbledore doesn't seem to think Merope did anything wrong to Tom Riddle Sr., and despite a member of Magical Law Enforcement witnessing lots of sketchy stuff at the Gaunts' no one steps in to help Merope. Plus we know their society is archaic and lacks modern values - ie. quills, slavery, lack of democracy

it's a great question pal.

the answer for which is under the cut, for the obvious reason that it comes with a trigger warning for rape.

when the statute of secrecy was signed in 1689, rape - defined as "the carnal knowledge of a woman forcibly and against her will" - had been illegal under english law since the middle ages.

however, the "against her will" bit is important here. in the seventeenth century, it was a legal requirement for a victim of rape to prove that she had maintained a continuous state of physical resistance during her assault. in cases where a victim could not prove this, her consent was presumed - even if she had been incapacitated in some way. unsurprisingly, consent was always assumed between husbands and wives.

men could not be raped under the letter of seventeenth-century english law - but the rape and sexual assault of men was illegal under buggery [sodomy] laws, and was often taken much more seriously by the state...

and i think we can plausibly say - should we want to - that, on the basis of what we find in canon, the wizarding world might retain this legal requirement for rape to be indisputably resisted, and that this explains why love potions seem to have no repercussions attached to them.

because, of course, love potions essentially function like date rape drugs, even if they leave their victims appearing to be of sound mind [the officiant who married tom and merope wasn't suspicious of anything, for example - and the only reason ron is so badly affected by the love potion he takes is because it was out of date]. they incapacitate a person to the extent that they cannot offer legitimate consent to sexual acts, and they also incapacitate them to the extent that they cannot physically resist their attacker - in their case, by compelling the person dosed with the potion to regard their attacker as someone they want to have near them.

therefore, if wizarding law only considers rape to be something which is accompanied by evidence of resistance... then using a love potion on somebody would not be rape.

the cultural implications of this are fascinating - especially since [no matter what jkr thinks] the wizarding world appears to be restrictive [by the standards of muggle britain in the 1990s and 2000s - although, unfortunately for those of us on our high horses about coming from a superior nation, not by the standards of muggle ireland...] in terms of conventions surrounding sexual behaviour and gendered expectations placed upon women.

the marriage age for women is extremely low [any woman whose wedding date we can pin-point in canon - molly weasley, andromeda tonks, lily potter, fleur delacour - gets married as a teenager]; the age for having children is also much lower than it was in the muggle world - and even than it was in the muggle world of the 1940s-1980s [all four of the women above fall pregnant before they're twenty-one, for example]; unmarried couples don't seem to live together, and there's clearly a social taboo against premarital sex [molly weasley gets a lot of flack from the fandom for making bill and fleur sleep in separate bedrooms, but nobody in the story regards this as prudish or old-fashioned]; divorce doesn't seem to be common [and blaise zabini's mother killing her husbands certainly takes on a new flavour if we assume that divorce is extremely difficult... or even illegal]; and married women - at least in the middle- and upper-classes - don't seem to work.

i also think that it's canonically plausible that arranged marriage, including between cousins, is a common cultural practice [sirius' comment in order of the phoenix about parents "letting" their children marry basically confirms this, i think] - which means we can also imagine, if we'd like, that there's perhaps little legal distinction between arranged and forced marriage.

obviously - obviously - i don't think that any of these are things the doylist text intended. the reason the story says very little about sex - both consensual and otherwise - or law or gender norms is because the harry potter series is a story about a boy-wizard who goes to a cool magic school and fights a good-versus-evil battle to the death which was written for children. i don't begrudge the publishers for not fancying a hundred pages on harry learning how to put on a condom...

[and the low marriage/childbearing ages genuinely seem to be because jkr is functionally innumerate and didn't realise how young she was suggesting everyone was...]

but from a watsonian perspective, they're really interesting - especially for the extremely disturbing paths they can lead us down as authors when we're trying to flesh out the worldbuilding of magical britain.

what - for example - is the wizarding age of consent? and how would this impact how wizards understand sexual maturity, adult-child power relations, and child abuse?

[after all, if the age of consent is unchanged from 1689... it could be as low as ten. which goes some way towards explaining why nobody thinks of tom riddle as grooming ginny...]

does the law consider it possible for a wizard to rape his wife? and if it doesn't, what does it think about him beating her?

what legal rights do sex workers have in the wizarding world?

is abortion legal? is contraception? is homosexuality? does gay sex have a higher age of consent?

is divorce legal? can women initiate a divorce? how are single mothers treated [and, therefore, what was lupin willing to do to tonks by walking out on her]? how are the children of unmarried parents treated? what property and inheritance rights do women have? are marriages performed by muggles - or dissolved by them - recognised by the wizarding state? what position does this put a witch [like eileen snape] who marries a muggle man in? would a wizard who marries a muggle woman and then abandons her be committing bigamy if he married a witch?

would wizards ever be punished for sexual offences against muggle women? does merope get away with attacking tom sr. in the eyes of the wizarding state because of her gender or because he's a muggle or both? could a muggle raped by a wizard even report the crime?

what modesty standards are there in terms of dress and behaviour? what would wizarding feminism look like? what is it like to be muggleborn [especially from the 1960s onwards] and enter this world?

i think i'm inclined to take the grimmest possible view of all of these questions, to be quite honest...

the wizarding world is fucked up.

[blackpilljesus]

Not everything needs to be announced, do not put a target on your back.

With the rise in popularity of things like 6b4t, 4b, decenter men, etc I'm seeing a lot of women bragging to maIes about it which will not help us. At the end of the day maIes do not care about our happiness, look at how they get off on womens abuse, they constantly seek to break women down at every twist and turn, they dont actually give a fuck about whether single childfree women are the happiest demographic out there. Maturing as a single childfree woman is realising that it's not just about hating maIes but being indifferent to them, not caring about their opinions at all. Only recognise them for the threat & parasites they are. I dont care to prove maIes wrong. This doesn't mean I ignore or hold positive sentiments to them, I just focus on centering myself and womankind in my life instead. I often see women bring up points about single childfree women & our happiness to maIes when maIes already know that.

Let's assume that maIes dont know that women are happier when we're single, why does it matter that they know just how much happier women are when they're single? Given the way maIes have treated women, do you really think maIes give a fuck about women being happy? Do you really think that if maIes didnt know how single childfree women felt before & when they find out how happy single childfree women are they'd be pleased about it? Or that they'd care?

For every single childfree woman is a maIe without a rape maid, a maIe without someone to pummel their legacy through, etc yk how it goes. MaIes are already feeling the effects of our freedom & they're starting to retaliate. In south korea female only parking spaces were replaced with family spaces, in the USA there's project2025 & how they want to coerce women back into the nuclear family unit, in the UK many sexual offenders are being released from prisons due to "overcrowding".

Back to my point on indifference, part of that is realising that all of this shit goes beyond witty one liners on the internet. MaIes are fully aware of everything they do and how they benefit from it. To the women who brag to maIes about 4B et al, what is the end goal here? Is it truly decentering maIes as claimed or is it some type of strategy to spook maIes into being good boys? Because I've seen women try to be threatening with it like "maIes need to get their act together or we they wont be chosen/we'll 4B!" and this is still maIe centric in a way. Sounds harsh but many womens tiktoks, tweets, of this nature tend to have maIe partners or are still looking anyways so it only makes things harder for those actually serious about this. I feel like many women believe at some point maIes would grovel back to them & 'apologise' for their actions and start being better like no; maIes have intentionally done everything through force & violence including wanting a partner & children. MaIes arent going to change nor will ever change on their own. MaIes dont just want parters or children, they want this at the expense of womens lives; our goals, our dreams, and our humanity so they sure as shit dont care about our happiness.

There is thing as centering maIes even in a negative way, I saw it described as "chaotic misandrist" on the pinkpill site. Many women talk about how they want nothing to do with maIes but then make it their entire personality. Many women on tiktok are using 4B as some titillating leverage over maIes or as some divine femininity woo woo femme fatale shit. All of that still centers maIes. What needs to be realised is that it's not all about maIes. I dont solely do this as a "fuck you" to maIes, will it be? Yes. But that is not my primary reason for not dating or reproducing. Dont make this a thing where you solely want to get back at maIes. MaIes dont negotiate so attempting to barter is a waste of time and tiptoes on maIe apologism because even if maIes apologised for all the things they've done I would still not forgive them. I would still want the worst for them. Ik in that situation most women would forgive them without a second thought.

Women saying "act right or else 4B" are saying this because they still want to make it work with maIes. If there's negotiation it means a connection still wants to be formed which misses the entire fucking point. It aint about maIes it's about yourself and womankind. This is why it's hard for me to trust other women because it wont take much for them to cave as has been throughout history. I dont care what moids think about all this, as I said my primary concern regarding maIes is the threat they pose. I dont care whether they'd ever change. Anyone serious about this wouldn't be dangling the prospects of not partnering with them in maIes faces especially bc part of what leads to this is realising that maIes are dangerous & there's no reforming them. Dangling this in their face is poking the bear and maIes have no limits as to how low they'll stoop to get what they want. They'd kill themselves to prove a point.

So for the love of goddess, stop bragging to maIes about this. Doesnt matter if they say you'll be a miserable cat lady like bet. Deep down we all know they need us more than we need them. This isn't to say to hide & be ashamed of it, but it wont do women favours exposing our play to our predators.

[melrosing]

What do you think of the Sansa bullied Arya take if you don’t mind me asking (just don’t answer if you don’t want to haha)

per my usual practice on Controversial Topics im putting this under a cut

At the real risk of that lot showing up in my notes again, I think this ‘Sansa bullies Arya’ pins their pre AGOT dynamic squarely on Sansa herself, rather than the way they are both being raised by the adults around them to behave towards one another. Sure, Sansa is mean to Arya sometimes during their childhood! We don’t have a lot of examples besides the oft-mentioned ‘horseface’ insults, but I think it’s fair to assume that more often than not, Sansa was looking down on Arya. Meanwhile, Arya herself feels inadequate and like she just can’t do anything right. She resents Sansa, but also worries that Sansa’s opinion of her may be true.

Fine. But where has Sansa’s opinion of Arya come from? Is it her cold black heart? Fucking no, it’s come from Septa Mordane, Catelyn, and whoever else surrounds them growing up. The men don’t seem to really give much of a shit how Arya acts because it’s not their business and she’s just a kid anyhow, but the women pointedly give many shits. In our first scene with Arya, Septa Mordane scolds her for not being good at ‘women’s work’, and there’s plenty to suggest that this is just another day in the life for Arya. Meanwhile, Sansa gets the carrot for excelling. Both Arya and Sansa are learning their own worth in this chapter, and the worth of one another. Sansa internalises the praise whilst learning that Arya is bad, and everything she mustn’t be. Arya internalises the criticisms whilst learning that Sansa is good, and everything she can never be.

They’ll be getting this from Catelyn as well. Catelyn clearly adores both her daughters, and will move heaven and earth to get them back in ACOK. But one good adjective for Catelyn is ‘dutiful’ - it’s in her house words, and it’s how she’s lived her life up to AGOT. Doing as she’s told, even when it pains her. She expects the same of her daughters, and finds those expectations satisfied in Sansa’s case, and apparently flouted in Arya’s. So again, from their own mother, Sansa internalises that Arya is bad, and that she, Sansa, is good. Arya internalises the same. If societal standards were reversed, perhaps it would be Arya lording over Sansa, but such as it is, it’s Sansa over Arya. 

Now, Sansa is a child. When children are told over and over that X is good and Y is bad, they generally don’t question it, at least until they're older and more experienced in the world. They will also parrot what they hear, often in graceless ways. Because they’re children. Sansa is told that Arya wilfully misbehaves because she’s bad, and so Sansa thinks: then I should look down on Arya. It sounds like Sansa mostly keeps her distance from her sister pre AGOT. Not always - they play together sometimes - but a lot of the time. She has internalised the teaching that Arya is an aberration, and as she herself knows the adults value obedience in girls, and she wants to please them so badly, the distance between her and Arya demonstrates to them just how good she is - she won’t descend to Arya’s behaviour. 

When Sansa does interact with Arya (pre Darry), we see her being a bit bossy - telling Arya what to do, etc. Sansa is replicating what she has seen the adults do with Arya, and is mimicking them to assert her own position as the good, obedient child. If Arya ever doesn’t want to do something, it can only be because she’s bad. 

[sidenote, it all really reminds me of these short stories me and my sister used to get read a lot as kids, called My Naughty Little Sister (lmao) by Dorothy Edwards. They're pretty old and I don’t think they ever got major circulation outside Britain, but for anyone unfamiliar, you can probably guess how these stories go. There’s an elder sister, good and obedient, who narrates short tales of her ‘naughty little sister’ doing terrible things like idk, making a terrible mess etc, and going ‘now I’m sure you [the child audience] wouldn’t do a thing like that!’ They’re supposed to be short morality tales for the children, and amuse the parent reading them aloud, who recognises the mischievous behaviour of the younger and is charmed by the haughtiness of the elder sister, who you can hear is narrating the incidents of her sister’s mischief with the disdain that she’s heard the adults do so, and is asserting her own good behaviour over said sister. And the whole fucking reason we were read these stories was because my younger sister was precisely the kind of kid who got up to all kinds of shit as a little kid (which now all of us find hilarious but DIDN’T AT THE TIME), and I was the elder sister like ‘my goodness how could she do such things as these!!’ (e.g. paint an entire bookcase with grout). It amused us both to see ourselves in the stories. You could say this was life imitating art, but I think this is simply an age old dynamic, familiar to many people with siblings: you would see how the adults spoke to another child in your family, and replicate their manner in an effort to come across as an adult. Except you weren’t an adult, so you weren’t always as graceful about it as they were. That is pre AGOT Sansa, to a T. And I’m sure that’s what GRRM, a child of three who had two sisters of his own, is replicating here.]

But I think there’s also a loneliness in being the ‘obedient child’. Doing as you’re told all the time can be boring, and living up to expectations is a lot of pressure. Sansa wants a companion in all that, but Arya has no interest in sharing in it. Arya is offering friendship, but from a place Sansa believes she can’t reach her sister - Sansa thinks she’d have to ‘descend to Arya’s level’ to accept it, and she can’t do that. You get a sense of Sansa thrilling in trying Arya’s ‘misbehaviours’ for herself when she quietly delights in behaving ‘as wicked as Arya’, but you see in this that she has to condemn such behaviours and herself for exhibiting them, all in the same breath. And in the end, I can easily imagine Sansa resents that Arya has more fun with their brothers than she ever does with Sansa herself: that the one sister she has is one she has nothing in common with. Sansa can’t find a like mind amongst her siblings, and so clings to Jeyne Poole, and the praise of the adults around her.

So with all that in mind, YES! Sansa is sometimes mean to Arya, and calls her horseface. That is because Sansa is a child, nobody is correcting her behaviour, and she understands that Arya is bad, and the way she behaves is frustrating to Sansa herself, so really what does it matter if she’s a little mean sometimes? She knows that she is good, because everyone says so. Even if she calls her sister a name now and then, she’s still the good child. 

AND THEN we get to Darry. And Sansa starts to see that society isn’t a song, and sometimes it doesn’t matter how good you are, horrible things can happen to you anyway. But she doesn’t want to believe that, because it would turn her world upside down, and her future would look a lot darker, too - Ned has not ended her engagement to Joffrey, and Sansa has to live for the foreseeable in KL. So when Arya doing the thing she ‘wasn’t supposed to’ (playing with Mycah) snowballs into a terrible miscarriage of justice where Sansa’s wolf is killed, Sansa rejects the notion that the songs could be wrong about beautiful princes, and shifts the blame onto Arya for that original 'misdemeanour'. The grief at losing Lady is terrible too (the wolves are meant to have a soul deep bond with the Stark children), and so the target of that grief likewise becomes Arya. What was previously a normal, childishly complicated sibling relationship gets twisted into something else.

This is where I think Sansa becomes different level of unpleasant towards her sister. She’s cruel about Arya’s loss of Mycah, tells Arya she wishes she were dead instead of Lady, etc etc. Arya is not giving as good as she gets here - she even tries to make amends with Sansa, but Sansa throws the offer in her face.

The reasons for Sansa’s behaviour are complicated, but not that complicated. She’s been raised to slot perfectly into this world, without ever being told what that world is really like. And when abruptly it turns out that what she’s being raised for is essentially the slaughter, she rejects it. She can’t see Joffrey as he truly is: she’s been told that princes are charming, that Kings are just, Queens are kind, and she herself will be a Queen. Sansa is going to be handed over to the Lannisters, and she’s going to live the song of her dreams, and the only thing between Sansa and the realisation of those is the thing that’s always been wrong: Bad Arya. Because again, if Arya isn't bad, then everything else is, and Sansa is in terrible danger.

No one is sitting Sansa down and explaining to her that Arya is not bad, just different from her, and that they should love one another - that there are dark forces here far stronger than them that could tear them apart, that the Lannisters are the greatest of them, and they have to fight together, not each other. Arya gets this talk, funnily enough, but not Sansa. Arya is asked to understand that Sansa is different from her, but Sansa is only ever taught to abhor that her sister as different from her. Where Arya is told to be wary of the court of King’s Landing, Ned leaves Sansa to continue her fantasies, and then, when he abruptly tries to put an end to them, he doesn’t bother to explain why. I’m not saying this is unforgivable on Ned’s part - he has a lot on his mind lol - but it’s quite obviously a major failing. Ned leaves Sansa in a fantasy world. It’s fucking Joffrey who has to step in and clarify for Sansa that actually, she’s been dreaming.

So as long as they’re together, Sansa is never able to come to terms with the fact that Arya was not the aberration, but rather, everything else was. In the absence of one another, they cannot reconcile over that fact. So yes, GRRM says they’ll have deep issues to sort through when they meet again, but those aren’t going to be the times that Sansa called her ‘horseface’ - they’re going to be about what happened since they left Winterfell, when their relationship was twisted by forces much darker than Septa Mordane. 

So no, I think the ‘Sansa is a bully’ diatribes are seriously tedious, because even if you want to insist that calling your sister ‘horseface’ a few times even qualifies, you can still accept such wrongs without deciding that that makes Sansa a fundamentally unkind person who cannot be reconciled with Arya and doesn’t deserve to be. It is on the page that the two of them miss each other. Like I genuinely cannot imagine going through everything Arya does in the story and then, upon reuniting with a sister I thought lost forever, deciding I’m actually still mad about the things she got wrong as a child that she herself has paid dearly for, both physically and emotionally. Like jesus fucking christ man. By all means let them talk about it!! But who do you think Arya is lmao

Tl;dr: Sansa is a kid in a society. She is not the arbiter of Arya’s place in society. She is not mean because she’s cruel, but because she has internalised the exact same things that Arya has, based on the example of the adults surrounding them. It just happens that those things were a carrot for Sansa and a stick for Arya. But then in the end, they weren’t a carrot for Sansa either.

tl;dr 2: clarifying once again - i am a jaime stan. i find the stark sister relationship interesting bc I have experience of a similar sisterly dynamic and find it interesting to see a version of that explored on the page. so if you think one has to be a sansa stan to observe all this then that kind of just demonstrates how dichotomous you've become on this issue lol like if I'm talking about takes I dislike re JB I don't generally feel the need to attribute them to JC fandom. let's all grow up x

tl;dr 3: no i don't hate sansa or arya, since i know these are both conclusions various people reach whenever i even mention these two. in fact i think they are both great girls! imagine

[destinyisastar]

Lost in your Love pt 4

Read Part: 1 2 3

Summary: After the day's events Alastor decides to go visit his beloved friend to see if she has any answers.

Vox x Reader, (Alastor x Reader)

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Alastor runs his hands over the panel, fiddling with the switches, his head pulsing. He needs time to think, needs his questions answered. Anyone will do! Of all the thoughts to pass through his mind an idea is finally presented in his head.

Rosie!

Why hadn’t he thought of that before?!

With smile on his face Alastor makes his way to the wonderful cannibal town.

The emporium is full as always, the line is out the door, children sinners press their faces on the windows drooling, the women gossip while eating pinky fingers, men are chatting about nothing too interesting.

There among the crowd of people hovering over her was the delightful Rosie.

Alastor made his presence known by letting out a few static sounds.

Roise perks up her head, “Alastor? Oh, Alastor is that you?! My, my where have you been?!” Rosie stands up from her seat making her way over to him, arms ready to hug him. “Have you been eating?! You’re looking more flimsy than usual dear!” she giggles.

“I’m doing just fine my friend! I’ve just been busy with a new project!”

“Why that’s good to hear! Come sit, sit I’m sure you have much to discuss!” She brings him over to a table.

“I’m afraid I won’t be able to stay to long, I just have some questions, and I was wondering if you may be able to answer them.”

“I’ll doing anything I can my friend!” She sits in her chair, sipping her teacup.

Alastor takes a breath while he sits down, “Have you heard from my wife lately?”

Rosie spits out her tea, she begins to cough rapidly, punching her chest, “I’m sorry, but what do you mean your wife?”

“Yes, my wife, Y/n, have you spoken to her?”

“Wife? Y/n?” Rosie looks confused.

“Rosie, please do not play any games with me, I’ve brought Y/n to your emporium many times, you two always swapped books.”

“I know a Y/n, but that Y/n isn’t your wife, why I believe I would be the first to know if you had a wife!”

“Then who’s the Y/n you know?”

“Vox’s wife of course!”

Everything is still.

Still and silent.

Rosie is still talking, but Alastor hears nothing. His hands begin to claw the table. His eyes begin to turn into dials.

“Alastor?”

Vox.

Y/n.

Y/n is Vox’s wife.

Vox is Y/n’s husband.

“Alastor!!”

Alastor jolts up, “I’m sorry my dear, I’m just a bit surprised, that Y/n is married to vox...” He grits his teeth.

“Of course they’re married! They were married in life, might as well be married in hell! Oh, and they’re so cute together, you can definitely tell that Vox loves her.”

He feels like his teeth are about to break with how much he’s smiling.

Married in life?

Alastor and Y/n WERE married in life. Not Vox and Y/n.

“My dear Rosie, Y/n simply cannot be his wife… you know most of all that she is my wife.”

Rosie tilts her head, “No, she couldn’t be your wife, I would remember an such an important detail! Alastor... did you have a bit of crush on Y/n? Its understandable but you can’t go after a married woman! That wouldn’t be very gentlemanly!”

Alastor runs a hand through his hair, slightly pulling it.

He knew that Vox had feelings for his wife, he just never thought he’d have the guts to take her from him.

But that doesn’t explain why Roise doesn’t remember Y/n being his wife.

“Thank you for answering my questions my dear! Unfortunately, I must be going now!”

“Oh, Alastor I’m sorry if that wasn’t what you wanted to hear! I’m sure you’ll find someone someday!” She yells out to him as Alastor leaves the emporium.

Just what in the hell is going on?

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In your bed you lay awake thinking of the day’s events. The Radio Demon held your hand so gently. Why? Why would the demon look at you with such care? He must be scheming. Your eyes grow tired, and you feel yourself being pulled into a dream.

 A sweet tune of jazz is playing as you dance with your husband, your eyes are shut placing your head on his chest. He’s swaying you slowly as the tune comes to an end.

“I love you dearest.”

You raise your head to meet his gaze.

“I love you too Alastor.”

You immediately awaken.  You sit up in your bed, you raise your hand to your face, breathing heavily, feeling sweaty.

Alastor.

Why were you thinking of Alastor so lovingly? He’s not your husband.

You place your hand to the other side of the bed to find Vox still sleeping. You reach your hand closer to his screen, gently caressing his face. This man….is your husband.

Yes… that’s right.

Vox is your husband.

That Radio Demon must have put those ideas into your head. Holding you so lovingly, tenderly. It was just a dream… did you want to have those feelings for him? No, of course not. You loved your husband.

But the dream…. it felt so right.

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destinyisastar 2024

Hi everyone!! Uni has been kicking my butt but I'm getting through it, (I just procrastinate a lot, I'm working on it) Also some exciting news Alastor's pilot VA is coming to my local convention, and I might meet him!

Stay tuned for part 5!

wordcount: 855

Taglist: @songbirdpond @diffidentphantom @vxllys @sirens-and-moonflowers @bethanythehazbinfan @martinys-world @quinceylikesanime @sweetsaladpainterranch @killer-nightmare0 @ginny-higgins

[wutheringcaterpillar]

Imprisonment

Summary: Tommy holds you to a high standard in marriage, expecting you to care for the children, tend to the house, and serve him. It was all too much and in an attempt to escape from Tommy’s wicked ways, he catches you in a lie.

Warnings: Noncon, misogyny, physical/mental abuse, traditional values and expectations, spitting, degradation, humiliation, forced breeding

Thomas Shelby. The most important, handsome, dangerous man in Birmingham. The man every woman’s knees would give out for just one night with him and would risk their freedom for. 

If only they knew the rope he had around your wrists and neck throughout your marriage, constantly having to watch your tongue, dress elegantly to events with insecure men who used their position of power to have control over others.

What drew you in aside from his constant devotion to win you over was the fact he could provide for you and a family, he gave you a house to live in and share together. He took you in and loved you when you had no money, never once blinked an eye at another woman, always stood up for you but that all changed.

Currently seated in his office, rocking your newborn he was filling out paperwork jaw clenched, nothing but the sound of the clock ticking on the wall filling your eardrums.

Things weren’t how they used to be before the marriage.

There was no quality time together, no signs of affection other than a quick fuck when he decided he needed it. Date nights didn’t exist, the compassion was missing entirely it almost seemed as if Thomas was always preoccupied with business to care for you or the three children you’ve birthed. There were numerous times where you begged and pleaded for just a night out, for Frances to watch the children for one night a month at the least but he wouldn’t have any of it. 

Then whenever you’d question him as to why he was out late doing business matters with women you haven’t even met it would be a simple “it’s just business, nothing more”. But you knew that was a lie, yet you stayed, you stayed out of fear because you didn’t know who he was anymore, or the lengths he would go to, to keep you in the house.

Matters became difficult after your newborn was born, you’d only been married to Thomas for three years and it seemed all you were good for was carrying his children and doing all of the chores outside and in while he was god knows where handling the family business, the great Shelby Incorporated. When you reminded him of what he’d hired Frances for he’d simply respond with, “She’s not their mother, she’s not my wife. It is your job to watch after the children no matter what arises. I take care of the business, you stay home help Frances with chores and ensure that the kids are fed, bathed and taken care of, as a wife should.”

He held you to a high standard that was too much to bare and any opportunity to discuss and come to a compromise would be immediately dismissed as he “didn’t have the time to discuss such ridiculous matters”. 

You had a plan, a plan to take the kids and run to get away from this circle of madness, even if it meant raising the children on your own and working to make ends meet without Thomas’s help.

Their bags were packed and hidden away outside in the shed, covered with a blanket.

The sound of his pen falling aimlessly onto his desk pulled you away from your thoughts, sending your attention to him immediately as to act like nothing was going on.

He picked up the bottom of his whiskey glass, finishing off what was left in a singular gulp, before his blue eyes that no longer sparkled locked with yours in a moment of skepticism.

“Why were you out in the barn today? You fed the horses at sunrise and released them and if I recall correctly there’s still quite a few more hours until sunset.” Stiffening in your seat, you adjusted yourself to make it seem like nothing was wrong while your hands tightened cautiously around your sleeping newborn.

“Oh I just remembered that Harry left his sippy cup out there and he was asking about it. Didn’t exactly want to handle putting Daisy here down for a nap while he was crying for it.” Thomas huffed and folded his hands, his top lip twitched up as he reached for his cigarettes rubbing the rolled up tobacco on his plump lips before lighting it. You hated when he smoked around the children and he knew that. 

“Well I’d prefer you tend to the house, and we have two other children in case you’ve forgotten. Surely they needed you.” At that moment your third began screaming downstairs, he was beginning to start teething and was having his moment of discomfort. Tommy looked at the door expectantly, silently excusing you from the room without one more word, didn’t even offer to hold your newborn while you tended to Patrick.

The following morning after his coffee, he awoke you from your deep slumber dressed in a suit and tie, smelling of teakwood and mint. He was freshly showered, hair combed back while his hands were tucked swiftly in his pockets. 

“The garden looks like it could use your attention today as well. Wouldn’t want my money to go to waste. Also Frances retreived the mail when you weren’t awake, Harry is overdue for his physical so get that taken care of today.” He exited the room, picking up his briefcase on the way out.

When you heard the car door close outside you peaked out the window to ensure he had left and rushed to the closet grabbing a handful of clothes.

Your mind was running in every direction and you were damned if you weren’t going to have your freedom if not for you, your children.

The Shelby household was no place for children, guns everywhere, all out wars in the dining room, the degradation of women. Daisy didn’t need to see that or be taught she were less because of being a woman.

Tommy already had it planned out for her, her whole life sheltered until he found a man suitable to marry his daughter, it was dreadful.

Frances watched you walk rather quickly outside through the green fields of fresh flowers to the barn, carrying three bags. She wasn’t stupid and she was not going to lose her job over this.

After you closed the door to the car once the kids were buckled in she met you outside, causing you to roll your eyes and anxiety rise in your chest.

“Frances please spare me the you can’t do this, he’ll find you this and that. I will not raise my children up in a house like this with a man who shows no care or love for them! So respectfully stay out of it and do what you do best and go wash my husband’s blood stained clothes because it will never be enough to keep him satisfied.” With that you closed the door and made your way out of the driveway, on your way to freedom.

The backroads were empty as you intended not single soul in sight nothing but the warm breeze flowing through the rolled down windows, deer galloping in the fields. You were almost out of Birmingham on your way to a new life for you and the children.

Harry and Daisy were asleep in the backseat while Partrick was coloring in a book, kicking his small legs back and forth mindlessly. The sight made you smile widely.

Coming to a stop light you reached down to retrieve  your address book and directions to make sure you were going the right way but the sound of tapping on the window drew you out of your thoughts.

“Mommy, look it’s daddy!” You immediately froze in a silent panic, not wanting to look up.

When you didn’t move he reached his hand through the window, unlocking the door and taking a seat on the passenger side.

Your hands gripped the steering wheel tightly until your knuckles turned white, the anxiety rising in your chest causing your breath to get stuck in your throat. 

The metallic feeling of his gun settled on your thigh.

“Now don’t make a scene my love. Arthur is going to take the car tonight and John is going to drive us all home. We’ll talk about this later.” Begrudgingly you brought your shaking hand up to put the car in park as a tears flowed effortlessly down your cheeks in defeat.

Stepping out of the car you gathered the kids, crying even more as you felt you failed them. 

“Mommy what’s wrong?” Tommy scooped Harry up in his arms, swiping the hair away from his forhead.

“Mommy’s not feeling well and asked me to pick you guys up. We’re going back home she needs to sleep.” 

The whole ride home the car filled with silence, Tommy’s hand never leaving your thigh as his nails cut deep into your skin. You were terrified to arrive back home in the prison he built just for you.

After putting the children in bed, telling them you love them you closed the door lightly while Thomas stood next to you outside their room, watching you intently.

Once the door was closed he leaned in against you, his lips just inches away from yours.

“If you attempt this little show of yours again I can assure you, you won’t see the children again. You won’t live to see another day.” He pulled you by your wrist ignoring your choked up cries and pulled you into the bedroom, closing the door behind you.

“You thought you could run away from me? Thomas Shelby? And I wouldn’t find out? Mistake number one was the fucking sippy cup. Frances watched you carry those bags out to the barn and phoned me immediately. Forcing me to cut the deal short and to reschedule. Do you think I don’t treat you well? That I don’t give you everything?” You stayed silent, tears streaming down your cheeks as his dominance and power over you filled the room just by the way he circled around you.

“Did you forget your place? Is that it eh?” He stopped in front of you, wrapping his large hand around your small throat, his hand tightened tremendously, forcing you to gasp for any type of air.

He began to laugh menacingly, darkly. His crystal eyes arose with a blue flame, eyebrows furrowing together in anger as he spat on your face.

“You live because I allow you. You are my fucking property, my dearly beloved.” Not letting go of your throat he began walking angrily with grit, slamming you against the wall where books tumbled down from their shelving.

His lips smashed into yours in a heated, hateful kiss, his free hand running down your thigh to your ass, gripping the flesh harshly forcing a desperate screech to escape your lips.

His knee forced your legs a apart as he unzipped his pants with his free hand.

His hardened erect member popped out freely, smacking against your abdomen.

You tried to protest, words barely even understandable while he slid your panties to the side.

The shadow of his dominating eyes loomed over you with power, his nose snarling while a singular vein in his forehead was standing out noticeably.

In one swift movement his hips bucked upward, his cock sliding between your bruised walls that no longer wanted him.

It stung, you were completely dry, your makeup running down your cheeks in a beautiful disaster, and Tommy took a tremendous amount of joy in reminding you how much power he had over you.

“Big will always fuck small darling. You feel that?” He thrusted up into your core mercilessly, ripping your dress down with a flick of his hand leaving your breasts exposed to him as they bounced up and down, causing you to try to hide your face to look anywhere but him.

“That’s all you are, nothing but an appendage, my little slave. Tell me when are you going to learn your role Y/N, eh?” Your hands left his on your thrust, trying with all their might to push him away but he was too strong.

“Thomas please!” He mocked you repeating those words in a childish tone.

You could feel your body beginning to betray you, his cock warming your insides as the pain turned to pleasure, but you stayed crying as shame fulfilled you.

He began to laugh, as he watched your slick begin to slowly ooze out of you, coating his cock.

“Would you look at that? Still a whore for me arent you? You should feel grateful I’m even fucking you, hasn’t felt the same since you gave birth, more spacious, not so tight anymore.” You spat in his eye.

“Fuck you!” He released your neck, causing you to drop straight down onto the dirty floor. 

As you were gasping for air his hand curled into the strands of your hair, dragging you over toward the bed.

Tossing you onto the mattress effortlessly he tugged his tie off, wrapping the expensive fabric between your lips, tying it.

His hand flew back, and came crashing down in a vicious stroke against your delicate cheek, the blow guaranteed to leave a bruise.

“Can’t have you waking the children now can I?” He flipped you over onto your stomach, his body boring over you as he spread your cheeks, taking your flesh in his strong hand aggressively causing you to let out a muffled screech.

He penetrated you once more, his head hung by the back of your head, his hot breath carelessly running down your neck as he drilled into your aching hole.

“Is this all your good for eh?” His balls slapped against your bruised skin, as he spit his venomous words in your ear.

“A nuisance throughout the day but an average fuck at night?” You could feel his cock pulsate in your soaking core, your walls clenching around him involuntarily while you struggled to breath, your head nuzzled into the mattress.

His hands intertwined with yours, his back arching with each forceful thrust.

“Maybe I should put another child in you hm? Would that keep you happy? Shut you up and remind you of your place?” Your muffled protests merely made him laugh, as if he cared what you thought. 

He knew the children were your weak spot and you’d never abort, no matter how much you despised him.

His cock inched deeper with every single movement, causing your thighs to turn weak beneath him as the feeling of ecstasy ran throughout your veins from being close.

“I’ve ruined you my darling. No other man would look even once at you knowing who your husband is and what a used out whore you are. So desperate to be loved you jumped in bed with the first man who gave you attention.” His words struck a nerve. Your mind swam in every direction trying to understand when love and harmony turned into the never ending abuse and destruction of any emotional connection you shared.

Thomas owned you in every way. He was your first love, first and only husband, first fuck, and your final downfall.

His breathing picked up, and you felt him pulsate, filling you deep with his seed once more, the warmth sending you crumbling beneath him, your muffled moans sounding like music to his ears.

He layed there for a moment, his fingers combing through your hair gently.

“You have one role. How difficult is that to understand love? Serve me and care for the children. That’s all I ever asked.” He undid the tie and you stayed silent, crying into the mattress when you felt him pull out and his seed puddled out of you, soaking the sheets.

“Clean this up, and we’ll go to bed.” The bedroom was silent that night as it was every other night, reminding you that this marriage would never be the same. The man that was supposed to love and care for you was now the enemy, his arm holding you in your place against his chest as he slept effortlessly while you were terrified to sleep in the place you once thought was your home.

[downthe-f4ndom-rabbith0le]

Always Been You (Dick Grayson x Reader) - Chapter 4

Always Been You (Dick Grayson x Reader) Reader Insert: she/her pronouns Word Count: 5438 Warnings: death, violence, fighting, bloody wounds, angst, infuriatingly oblivious love interest, slowburn Spoilers: Young Justice Seasons 1-3 plot partially, but it ended in 2022 so catch up.

Y/N Prince - miracle daughter of Wonder Woman and Steve Trevor - and Dick Grayson - first adoptive son of the Batman himself - have been best friends since day one. They went to school together, trained together, kept each other's alter ego secret from everyone else, and they founded the Young Justice alongside their friends together. 

But as time progressed, Y/N and Dick grew up and Y/N found herself wanting more than friendship with Dick. But he never seemed to indicate that he reciprocated her feelings. And when Wally died and Dick abandoned the team, Y/N realised he never would. So she heads to the one place she knows will help her become a stronger warrior so that one day she can take her mother's place: Themyscira.

Two years after his leave, Dick reaches out to his old friends to help him with a mission. But when he finds out Y/N left too, he chases after her in the hopes to bring her back.

However, when the two finally reunite, it isn't as warm as he hopes. Not to mention Themyscira becomes under siege as they go to war against Echidna, the Mother of Monsters in Greek Mythology, and her army of monstrous children.

Will Dick and Y/N be able to put their past behind them and save the Amazonians' homeland? Or will they fall, unable to tell one another their true feelings?

~~~

Dick stood on the pure white sands of Themyscira, though he did not recall how he got there. But he could not mistake the marble columns and houses higher up the mountain side, nor the crystal blue waters with the odd looking fish swimming. Without ever stepping on the great island before, Dick knew.

It felt like home.

Once Dick realised where he was, he realised another thing. He was alone. Where is everyone? he thought, deciding to walk along the beach in search of someone, anyone.

'Hello?' he called loudly, but the stone walls of the mountainside just echoed his voice back at him. And there were no stairs leading off the beach that he could find. He was truly alone.

Dick stopped when he realised it, accepted it. Devastation threatened to swallow him as the white sand did his feet. The ocean waves lapping the shore quieted for a moment, giving space for laughter and music to dance in their place.

Dick looked longingly up at the buildings on the mountainside. A childish want to join the party overtook him, and his mood soured even more, feeling left out of something huge.

'Nightwing.'

The call of his name cut through all other sounds, silencing the rest of the world so Dick could focus on the source of the call. He swivelled, hope pumping from his heart to the rest of his body, to find the most gorgeous of women standing before him. Only - her face was obscured so he could not make out her exact features.

'Nightwing.' Her voice was like smooth velvet, like soft thunder rumbling his name into the electric air.

'Y-Yes?' Dick wasn't sure how this woman knew his vigilante name. He wasn't in his Nightwing attire, just civvies.

The woman started walking towards him in answer. With each slow, deliberate step she took, her image changed before Dick's eyes. She started off muscular, then grew curves, then was small and petite, then grew to stand taller than Dick himself. One moment she was childish and youthful, the next a frail and wrinkled elderly lady.

Her hair changed colour and texture and style too, as did her skin - as if the light of the sun from different angles highlighted everything this woman was, and what she could be.

She remained faceless all the while, for not just one woman could be every woman all at once and have the same face, the same history.

But by the time she stood before him, she'd shrunk to just under his eyes, her hair morphed and her skin changed shades again until the woman started to look familiar.

Still faceless, the woman reached a hand up behind Dick's neck and brought him down so she could whisper in his ear. 'Wake up.'

'What?' He didn't understand. He was awake - wasn't he? But more importantly, why did the woman sound like Y/N?

'Nightwing.' Now that she was talking right into his ear, her voice was clear as day. 'Wake. Up.'

~~~

Dick's eyes flew open as he gasped, as if he'd been holding his breath for too long. He blinked a few times to adjust to the darkness flooding his vision. He quickly realised it was nightfall, and he was staring up at the night sky through a circular hole in the ceiling.

He sat up quickly and realised that was a mistake, as a throbbing pain pounded in his right temple. He hissed as he laid back down, gently brushing his fingers against the sizeable egg that had formed above the injury.

He was briefly distracted as someone removed his hand from his temple, and placed a cool cloth in his hand, then pressed it back on the source of his pain. Dick released a relieved sigh as the coolness eased the throbbing slightly.

'Thank you,' he half said, half whispered, tilting his head to the left to see his saviour.

The only light that filled the room were bowls of fire situated atop pillars all around the circular room. There was a slight breeze, making their flames dance and cast a myriad of shadows around the room. But from what Dick could make out, there were other beds like the one he was situated on - ones of stone, pillows and fabrics - and a table of instruments and tools beside each one.

He didn't recognise the place, which had him searching the face of the person at his bedside more earnestly, wanting answers. But he was not met with the gentle smile nor the soothing voice of an angel.

Instead, he made eye contact with a very stoic and silent Y/N, her bright (e/c) eyes cold and unfeeling. Not even the firelight could cast a flicker of warmth on the expression she looked down at Dick with.

'Y/N,' he groaned, trying to sit up.

'You shouldn't do that,' she said, and her voice was just as stoic and monotone. 'You were hit... quite hard.'

Dick ignored her and pulled himself into a seated position so his back pressed against the back wall. He was relieved to find he was still in his civvies from when he arrived on the island.

'You mean you hit me quite hard,' he countered, pressing the cloth once more to his temple with a slight hiss. 'Not the kind of welcome I was thinking of...'

'Well I certainly hope you didn't expect a big parade or fireworks in your name,' Y/N bit back, keeping her voice low and contained, something she never used to do before. 'Besides, Themyscira doesn't usually get visitors. let alone male ones.'

'In that case, I'm sorry to... disappoint?' Dick wasn't sure what to say. This was a far cry from how he imagined seeing Y/N again.

'A bit too late to be apologising now, isn't it?' Y/N asked, and Dick couldn't help but feel she was indicating to something else. But before he could answer, she continued, stoically, 'Don't worry about it now. Rest up. The Queen wants to speak with you as soon as you wake up. And believe me when I say she is not so easily charmed as other women.'

Dick's heart thumped faster with confusion and fear. This was all going so wrong. Where were the hugs, or even the slaps to the face and the screaming? Anything but this... coldness.

Just as Y/N was walking to the doors of the infirmary, Dick called out to her. 'Hey, wait.'

To his surprise, Y/N did stop, though she only gave him a slight turn of her head so she looked over her shoulder at him. He didn't care. He would take anything. 'It's good to see you.'

Y/N didn't respond straight away, but when she did, Dick questioned whether or not he should've listened to his friends' warnings.

'A sentiment that, I must say, is not shared,' she replied coldly, then proceeded to walk out of the room, giant wooden doors clanging shut after she left.

Dick suddenly became unaware of his throbbing temple as he stared at the doors where Y/N just was. Instead, he became increasingly aware of the twisted feeling growing in his stomach.

He wasn't sure what it was, but it kept him up until the early hours before sunrise, into which he had three hours of dreamless sleep before some women in white robes and pinned or braided back hair woke him up.

They greeted him with gentle smiles and soothing voices, checking he was all right before they prepped him for his chat with the Queen. Any other occasion he would've tried to charm the beautiful women who did not praise him, but treated him with an innocent kindness that he imagined they treated any and all with.

But he still felt as if he was going to throw up, and his mind was preoccupied by the startling image of Y/N's cold, unfeeling eyes staring back at him the previous night. She'd never looked at him that way before. Similar to M'gann, Dick wasn't even sure Y/N was capable of such indifference.

And yet, she'd looked at him just that way, and it stung more than any injury he could imagine.

He'd been allowed to wash and dry himself, and put his dirty civvies of jeans, boots, white t-shirt, and black bomber jacket back on. Then the women sat him in front of a mirror and combed his dark hair, tidying him up one final time before a guard of six strong women came to collect him from the infirmary.

The six women flanked him as they led Dick through the palace made of white marble. If it weren't for the rich colours in the rugs and the wall dressings, the place would be as cold as the sea water lapping the shoreline. Women of different sizes, skin colours, and ages milled about the palace, each of them greeting the guards warmly before looking curiously and even fearfully at Dick as they walked by.

Dick did not let their looks distract him from the real worry ahead of him, though.

Soon enough, the guards and Dick reached a giant set of doors with gold intricately painted over the door and on the archway around it. The front two guards stepped up to open the doors, and stepped aside to allow the rest of the party to enter a spacious room.

Actually, a room wasn't the accurate description for it. There was a ceiling and a floor, but the walls constituted of a few pillars holding the ceiling above the floor, allowing a stroking view of the rest of Themyscira to surround anyone in the room. From the city just below, to the mountainside further along, and then the sand and ocean at the bottom.

Every aspect of Themyscira could be witnessed from what Dick assumed was the throne room, for at the far side of the room was a simple but intimidating throne made of marble, intricately designed to have vines and fruit pop out along the arm rests, and swords and shields to support the back of the throne. Only two people occupied the room other than Dick and the six guards: Y/N - who stood beside the throne in the same leather uniform as the other guards, sword strapped to her hip - and a regal looking women with with ebony hair that billowed out behind and over her white cladded shoulders.

Grey streaks striped through her hair, and Dick could make out a few smile wrinkles on her forehead from where he stood. She wore a white cloth that wrapped around her body as she sat on the throne, pinched by a golden belt that matched the golden leaf crown holding back her hair from her face.

Though she sat down and looked smaller than Dick, she radiated a power that he even recognised to be respected. As the soon as the doors closed, the six guards kneeled to the floor and placed one arm over the chest as they bowed their heads.

'Our Queen,' the said in unison, and suddenly Dick felt very self-conscious as he looked around at the women then looked up at the Queen herself made eye contact with him.

Dick looked around at the women kneeling before their queen. Either he was hit harder in the head than he thought and he could somehow understand Greek suddenly, or they somehow knew English this whole time.

Either way, Dick rushed into a flimsy kneeling position. 'Y-Your Majesty,' he stuttered, hiding his cringe as he kneeled. The first time you meet a queen and you stutter? Good work Grayson, he internally berated.

The Queen offered a kind but hard smile. 'Please, rise, young man. Any friend of my granddaughter is a welcomed guest here on Themyscira.'

Dick's eyes widened, looking to Y/N for confirmation. 'Granddaughter? So... So that would make Y/N-'

'A princess of Themyscira,' Y/N answered monotone. 'But I can assure you, Nightwing, that I do not consider myself exempt from work because of the newfound title. I believe in strong connections, on working with others and creating a strong unit with which to fight alongside.'

Y/N looked directly at Dick, her eyes piercing his as if asking a silent question. What about you? Do you believe in the same?

Dick didn't know why he felt slightly ashamed, but he did, and feeling a great need to be rid of such a compressive feeling, he stood upright once more and addressed the Queen directly. 'I was informed by your Princess that you wanted to speak with me, Your Majesty.' Dick dialled up the charm - opened his arms in offer, and let a loose and charming smile curl his lips upward. 'I am yours to question.'

But the Queen only offered a half-smile in return, amusement never quite reaching her eyes like Dick was used to when charming other women.

'How... noble of you to think you are helping us out,' the Queen said, arms resting peacefully on the throne's armrests, but her eyes locked Dick to the ground with their intensity and fire. 'But let me make one thing clear. You are our guest because I deem it so. I'm sure you are well aware that our island isn't meant for man or mere mortals. You are not meant to be here, so it would be wise of you not to take our hospitality for absolute fondness or security.'

While always the usual jokester, Dick had always understood from a young age when someone was being serious with him. And especially when he wasn't the one in power in a situation such as this.

Dick nodded his head solemnly, and mustered up his most serious expression and voice to express his sincerity. 'Of course, Your Majesty. How can I help you?'

'Well, to begin with,' she said, pleased with his new compliant demeanour, 'you can start by telling us how you found Themyscira.'

'Through old sailing legends and odd encounters fisherman have had in this area,' Dick answered, briefly looking at Y/N as he continued. 'My friends and I collaborated and researched and came to the conclusion that this area - an area which has no volcanic or underwater mapping of any kind - would be my best bet at finding the island. That, and some reporting of odd-looking fish.'

Dick couldn't help but laugh at how ridiculous he sounded. 'I'll admit that was a stretch, but one of my friends comes from the sea himself. I trust his judgement on all things sea-related.'

The Queen nodded her head thoughtfully, and Dick wondered if she was impressed by his deduction. 'But if others have been swayed for hundreds and thousands of years by our defences, how come you were not?'

Dick went to answer but quickly stopped himself. Blinked once. Twice. It was a good question.

'I-I don't know, Your Majesty,' he admitted. 'All I know is that, one moment I was talking with Alfred - a guardian of sorts, but he's pretty much family - and then I hit something invisible, twice actually, and my line to him was cut.

His gaze flickered between her and Y/N, who looked at him with a mixture of annoyance and curiosity. 'We were discussing your Princess, actually. We were just hoping she'd be out here, that's all.'

'Is that why you've come, then?' the Queen asked. 'To speak to my granddaughter.'

'Well, not just speak, Your Majesty,' Dick said. 'I wanted to recruit her for a mission back home.' He spoke directly to Y/N then, eyes locking. 'We could really use your help. I could really use your help, Y/N.'

One of the guards beside him raised her spear to point at his neck. The tip of the blade was a hair's breadth away from his bobbing Adam's apple.

'How dare you talk to our Princess directly,' she growled. 'Show some respect.'

Y/N raised a hand up. 'Easy, Calliope,' Y/N said with a soft but commanding voice that resonated like a melody through the room. The guard - Calliope - looked long and hard at Dick until she eventually returned to her post beside him, quiet and still.

Dick allowed himself a steadying breath. How many times can I be almost killed in the shortest span of time? he asked himself, before looking back to Y/N.

'If talk is what you want, Nightwing,' Y/N said for the whole room to hear, 'then talk is all you shall get. But if you intend to take me back with you, then I am afraid your breath will be wasted on words I will not hear.'

'But, Y/N, you don't even know what I am going to say,' Dick objected, disbelieving that Y/N Prince - Wonderess, his best friend for nearly a decade, the one person he always thought would be there when he needed her - was looking down at him now with no warmth, no familiarity, no room for hope and belief.

Y/N opened her mouth to speak, perhaps berate him and shun him more, but the Queen interrupted. 'He has a point, dearest,' she said, and gracefully rose from her throne.

Immediately, a guard was there helping her down the few steps from the dais that held the throne. Now that she was standing, Dick saw how her robes drowned her, and imagined how frail she was underneath it all. She spoke and appeared strong, but obviously immortality had its limits. Even the strong had to age at one point.

'We shall leave you and our guest to discuss your... personal matters,' the Queen explained further, looking between Dick and Y/N with scrutinising eyes. But she was quickly hurried out of the throne room, leaving Dick and Y/N alone together for the first time in two years.

Dick hated the silence that seemed to suffocate them, but he couldn't find the words to breathe new air into the space. So he just looked at her. She was both entirely the same and entirely different at the same time. She'd gained more muscle in her arms and legs, her face had sharpened with maturity but not to the point she looked harsh. She looked fierce, and the leather skirt, sandals, and plated armour top alongside her sword certainly added to that effect.

Dick had always found her fierce, the most fierce out of their entire team when they first formed. It had sometimes just got lost when she laughed, when she smiled, when she didn't know modern world slang because her mother never knew either.

But she wasn't smiling now, nor laughing. Now, she stood before Dick, the picture-perfect warrior, as if she was born to be as such.

As if it were her destiny.

'So...' Dick started, hoping Y/N would set the ball rolling.

'So,' she echoed back, her tone unamused and bored.

'So...' Dick found himself repeating, then realised she was never going to continue, so he did. 'There is a huge problem with the illegal trade of meta-humans and meta-human testing globally-'

'I am aware, I was fighting it when I was still with the team,' Y/N interrupted, her words unfazed, unfeeling almost.

Dick internally winced at his mistake. 'Of course you were, sorry. So anyways, there is this royal family who-'

'I don't care to hear about your problem, Nightwing,' Y/N cut in again, this time with annoyance and anger threatening to sharpen her words. 'Nor do I care that you infiltrated our island, crashed on our beaches, and waltzed into my people's home with swagger and self righteousness.'

Now Dick was getting annoyed. 'Stop calling me Nightwing, Y/N. You know my name, and I'm not even in uniform right now-'

'You've waltzed into my home,' Y/N interrupted, and finally, a spark of ire igniting in her previously cold e/c eyes, 'and have demanded I help you, when you couldn't even spare me one word over the past two years.'

Suddenly sheepish, Dick didn't know how to respond. Y/N finally stepped down from the dais and walked over to him. She only stopped when she was two steps away from him, and he could see it then, how she was straining against something internally. It was in her tight jaw - clenching and unclenching - and it was in her stiff posture.

'We might've been friends when you left,' she said softly, heatedly, 'but I found a new purpose, a new family - one that will never abandon me when times get tough or when I need them.' Y/N looked Dick up and down, then took a half step towards him so he could feel her breath. 'If you expected me to sit around waiting for you to come back like some lost puppy, you never knew me at all.'

Dick swallowed thickly as he kept eye contact with her. 'We were more than just friends,' he said softly, causing her angry facade to drop for a moment in confusion. 'We were best friends, Y/N, and I am sorry. For everything that I didn't do these past two years.'

The anger returned, and Y/N just pushed past him, knocking his shoulder hard in the process as she strutted towards the doors to exit. 'Best friends or not, sorry doesn't make up for your ignorance, Nightwing. Nor does it endear me to want to help you anymore than when you did when you entered this room.'

'Please, Y/N,' Dick said, racing after her and clasping his fingers around her wrist. He winced at how she tensed at his touched, but continued. 'I know I messed up. Believe me, everyone made me more than aware of it before I came here. But however you felt about me, I knew I had to come see you. Try and get you to come home.'

Y/N flung around with furious eyes, her h/l, h/c hair flinging as she did. 'This is my home,' she said with absolute resolve and conviction. 'This is my home, and by sundown tomorrow, you will be on a boat headed back to Gotham City or wherever you call home these days, and out of my life. For good.'

Dick's heart cracked at the insinuation. Had he really done this to her? His precious Y/N - kindhearted, welcoming, fun-loving, protective Y/N. Was he the reason for such coldness, such animosity?

'But, Y/N, the team-'

'The team were the ones who encouraged me to leave,' she answered. 'They saw I was meant for something more than just silly little missions that got us nowhere. They saw how much I'd given to the team, and saw I needed to go find myself again. They saw, because they were there.'

Y/N ripped her wrist away from Dick's reach. 'I am not some girl you can charm into thinking she is special and wanted. I know I am, and I know my place is here, with people who actually care about me. So do me and everyone on the island a favour and stay in the infirmary until your departure where you can't lie and hurt anyone ever again.'

Before he could reach out again - he wasn't sure what he'd say if he got her to stop anyways - she was opening the doors and slamming them shut again, leaving Dick alone in the throne room, the crashing of waves and the rush of wind the only sounds to be heard.

Dick stood looking at the door for a little while longer, the image of Y/N's hurt and angry eyes imprinted in his brain. He'd been warned, boy had he been warned. By Kaldur, Connor, M'gann. But he never could've expected Y/N to be so... hostile.

Are you really doing this for Y/N's sake, or for yours?

Connor's question echoed in his head as turned his attention to the ocean that lay outside of the room. Maybe he was right, Dick thought. Maybe this was all a big mistake. The biggest indicator had been in her eyes. She'd never looked at him, let alone anyone, like that before. Like she'd rather be anywhere in the world than be in the same room as him.

You're my best friend...

He raised his little finger to the door, though he was sure she was long gone. 'Alway have been,' Dick whispered, and some inner hope of his was waiting for Y/N to come back and finish their vow.

But she never did, and so he dropped his hand entirely.

After some time, his party of guards from before came back in to collect him and take him back to the infirmary. Feeling deflated and having no other reason to be there, he silently complied.

~~~

Y/N slammed the doors to the throne room so loud she was sure the whole island heard them.

She let out a controlled but shaky breath as tears threatened to burst from her eyes. Thank Athena Y/N escaped when she did, or she wasn't sure how much more slander she could throw at Dick.

She'd decided as soon as she saw him at the training field that she wanted nothing to do with him. That the best way to handle him was to give him no room to charm, to speak, to be his usual self and get under her skin. So she'd knocked him unconscious, been curt and unfeeling with him, denied him passage to her mind again.

She'd convinced herself that Dick Grayson was nothing more than a lying, self-centred and self-righteous boy - and yet she found her hands yearning to embrace him, her eyes wanting to inspect him and note all his changes, and her heart yearning for the unconditional love she knew Dick to be capable of.

'Princess?'

Y/N jumped at the call of her title, but when she noticed it was only Calliope, she relaxed. 'Yes, Calliope, what is it?'

'Queen Hippolyta would like to see you in her personal chambers.'

Y/N nodded. 'Of course, thank you.'

She quickly made her way to her grandmother's personal chambers. The first half of the chambers doubled as a meeting place on more than one occasion for Y/N and her grandmother, usually preferring to discuss important matters in the comfort of lounge chairs as opposed to stiff and cold meeting rooms made of stone.

Y/N entered the Queen's chambers, walking into an open floor-plan lounge and foyer entrance, with lounges and chairs draped in fine and rich velvets and satins. Attached to the lounge was a big balcony overlooking the city of Themyscira.

She found her grandmother leaning against the balcony's edge, looking over the island, when she walked out to join her.

Y/N braced for her grandmother's first words. Would they be harsh? Would they be enraged? Disappointed even? But they didn't come initially, and Y/N welcomed the peace that came with the silence. She looked over the balcony to the city below, and the forestry and ocean below that.

This is my home, she reiterated to herself, unlike how she'd talked to Dick just moments before. Even then, her gaze slipped to the horizon line far off in the distance where it became almost indistinguishable where the sky and sea met.

If she were being honest with herself, she hadn't thought about her old life, her old friends since she stepped foot on Themyscira. Guilt tugged at her heart, but she reminded herself that it was them that encouraged her to leave, to find herself again.

Even so, with Dick's unexpected arrival, Y/N realised one thing. She missed them all dearly.

But not Dick Grayson. Absolutely not.

'Your friend,' Queen Hippolyta finally said, eyes never leaving the view in front of her, 'he is... charming, to say the least.'

Y/N scoffed and rolled her eyes. 'So he likes to think. And he's not my friend. Not anymore.'

It was silent again for a moment, and Y/N wondered for a moment if her grandmother had heard her at all. 'Either way,' her grandmother continued casually, 'he has certainly highlighted some weaknesses in our defences that we will need to remedy straight away.'

'I can get Cora and the rest of the Guard onto that right away,' Y/n said, grateful for the escape.

'Not just yet,' Queen Hippolyta said, bringing Y/N back to the balcony begrudgingly. 'Are you okay, dearest?'

Y/N scrunched her brows in confusion. 'I'm... fine? Why do you ask?'

Queen Hippolyta gave Y/N a knowing look that silently said Don't play dumb with me. 'Isn't he the boy who broke your heart?'

Embarrassment flooded Y/N's cheeks in a wave of red heat as Y/N shook her head furiously. 'He didn't break my heart. He made me realise I was better off without him.'

'Perhaps, but you are not better off without friends.'

The gentle touch of a hand on her arm brought Y/N's attention solely on her grandmother, who looked at her knowingly.

'I can see your love for this place, dearest,' the Queen said. 'From the moment you have arrived, you have thrown yourself into our way of life, into our community and given it your all.'

'Because this is where I come from, grandmother,' Y/N said. 'This is where I belong.'

'Right now it is, but it is not your home, Y/N.' When Y/N gave a confused expression, the Queen continued. 'The women all love you, so do the children, but they do not know you, you do not let them see you - the real you. Only the you that is Princess of Themyscira.'

Queen Hippolyta's hand travelled down to clasp one of Y/N's tightly, looking at her earnestly. 'Your real friends are the friends you left behind, the ones who have fought and lost and loved and laughed with you.' Her gaze flickered to the doorway briefly then returned to Y/N knowingly. 'And one of them came all the way across the world to find you, on the word of sailor stories and a lucky scientific guess.'

Y/N rolled her eyes again, and pulled her hand out of her grandmother's grasp. 'He is not my friend,' she repeated, turning her attention back to the sea, trying to focus on anything by Dick Grayson's stupid smiling face. 'He only came here to make himself feel better, not because he actually cares about me. Maybe once I needed his validation, but I know who I am now. And if he is what a friend is meant to be, then I think I am better off without them.'

'Y/N, dearest, just-'

'I would kindly ask that we never talk about Nightwing again, grandmother,' Y/N interrupted. 'Soon enough, he will be out of our lives - out of my life - forever...'

Queen Hippolyta remained silent for a moment, until she blew out a defeated sigh. 'If that is your wish,' she said, deflated.

'Yes, it is,' Y/N said with conviction, ignoring the painful tugging of her heart, ignoring the inner voice that wanted to scream otherwise. If Y/N was going to leave Dick Grayson behind, she needed to stop listening to her stupid heart and listen to reason. Like Athena, who was technically her ancestor in some respect.

Y/N turned back to the Queen and bowed a farewell. 'If you don't mind, I will go talk with Cora to discuss how to fix our defences right away.'

Queen Hippolyta gave a small nod, which Y/N took as dismissal enough, and so set a quick stride to the chamber doors. But just as she was about exit the balcony, her grandmother stopped her again.

'It's odd, don't you think,' she started, her tone coy, 'how, not even for a moment, he forgot his mission as he neared our island. Not once did he get deterred by our magic.'

Y/N turned around to face her grandmother, who gave a small knowing smile to her. 'He must have a strong will to resist such forces, or was motivated by something of equal power, don't you think?'

Y/N didn't say anything, her thoughts taking her back to the conversation they all had back in the throne room, when Dick was questioned about how he resisted the defences.

We were discussing your Princess, actually. We were just hoping she'd be out here...

Y/N rushed to exit the chambers, not even bothering to close the doors on her way out to fresh air.

What did Grandmother mean by that? she asked herself, and felt the tell tale signs of hope blooming in her. The increase heart rate, the tingles at the ends of her fingers, the small but warm ball sitting heavily in her chest. Surely she didn't mean...

Y/N shook her head; the tingles faded, the ball dissipated. I will not be tricked again, she told herself, proceeding to find her way to the training grounds, where she stayed until dusk fighting out her fears and squashing her childish hopes.

---------------

Tag List:

@valiantbouquetcloud | @epicy0n | @resistanythingbuttemptation | @lunaizhere | @nameunknownsthings | @tqrgvryen | @pariahsparadise | @edgycat | @b4tm4nn | @cynwing | @lilylovelyxo | @herondale-lightworm | @animeflower26 | @tiny-mari

[rayveneyed]

cw; violence, gore, angst with a tinge of hope, god!au, power imbalance

the reputation of the war god, sukuna, casts a monstrous shadow over the land.

four arms and two heads and a gaping, snarling maw carved into his stomach — a host of violent magic at his disposal. he is the boogey-man beneath the bed, the shadow lurking around the corner, the glinting edge of cold steel. he is the pang of hunger in the stomachs of marching soldiers; the cold sweat of fear in women and children, cowering low in their homes as their village is ransacked by enemies. he is pain and adrenaline and strength, cleaved in half and sewn shoddily together. he is all of this and more, and yet you serve him.

you have never seen your patron god. you have never hoped to see him. to devote yourself to the two-faced one is to fear him. thousands of years have passed without a single sighting of him, or any god, for that matter — you are poorly prepared to stand in his presence.

and so, when the war god sukuna looms above you in the crushed remains of your home — a temple once grand, once mighty — with his coiling muscles and gargantuan size, you repeat this to yourself. a comfort of sorts.

pain and adrenaline and strength. the glinting edge of cold steel. the boogey-man beneath the bed.

to have him stand above you is enough to have your breath curdling in your throat. he eclipses you completely, his size almost indescribable — in your fear, in your grief, you can only gape up at him, teary-eyed and shivering like a kitten in the cold. your vestments have all been torn, or burned, or bloodied. this is not how you should present yourself to your god.

you shouldn’t even dare to meet his eyes. you’re simply too shaken to right your wrong.

“my lord,” you manage to greet, though most syllables catch like treacle in your throat.

you are insignificant. you realise this, in his shadow. your life is minuscule, paltry, meagre in his presence. he is a god and you are a girl, bones and veins and flesh that gives, and he may as well be obsidian. diamond, perhaps. he has seen thousands of years pass — empires rise and fall. the follies and infightings of man are entertainment; the deaths of millions are nothing but numbers lost to time.

he hums, and it’s like your brain is snapped from its shackles. you feel the blood drying against your cheek. the smell of burning flesh dizzying your mind. viscera beneath your palms. the entrails that were once your sisters give a sickening squelch, and all at once bile rises in your throat. you try to temper it, to focus on anything except your life that is crumbling to pieces around you — but the only thing to ground you is the cracked marble underfoot, cool and hard where your skin presses against it.

sukuna regards you as if you’re nothing but a speck of dust; there’s that sort of bored amusement about him, a cat batting idly at a squirming, broken-winged bird. he tilts his head, and raises a sharp, dark brow.

“woman,” he speaks, and his voice is a thousand drums beat in unison, the roar of a moving war-front. echoing and sonorous and enough to have you shivering where you sit. “it seems you are the only survivor.”

you make a sound like the wind has been punched from you.

“pity,” continues sukuna, seemingly ignoring your squeak. his gaze rises to the shattered pillars and rubble of your home, the smoking piles of fabric, the fires that rage even now. “you were minutely more valuable than cockroaches, at least.”

again, those eyes — four of them, unerringly dark — drift down to you, his brow furrowed in what you suppose might be curiosity. his lips twitch upwards in the cruel imprint of a smile. “oh? you protected yourself. how quaint.”

as if to make a point — or perhaps just to startle you — he reaches one grand hand out, and moves to flick you with a razor-sharp nail — only it never makes contact with you. you watch, wide-eyed and sick-stomached, as the air around you shimmers with a blue reflection. his finger bounces right off, though the force he first hits it with is far more gentle than his limit — the next time he flicks, seemingly finished with his demonstration, the paper-thin barrier cracks and shatters into a thousand shards, all eventually carried off by the wind. it is all too easy for him. you are once again reminded that you are nothing in comparison.

one of those monstrously large hands lunges forward, grasping your chin roughly. those sharp nails prick painfully against your cheeks. your god clearly does not care much for the blood and tears that scar you.

“i still desire some modicum of worship,” declares sukuna, glaring down at you. “i have lost 59 priestesses, and i must cull those who worked against me. you will have to do.”

a tear tickles the side of your nose as it migrates further from your eye. “yes, my lord.”

“my mercy does not strike twice,” he warns — and though his voice is so amused you have no doubt he is being truthful. “a hair out of line will see you joining your sisters.”

another sudden burn of tears. his grip on your jaw is still quite painful. “y-yes, my lord.”

silence reigns once more. the crackle of fire reminds you of the snapping of tree branches. the flicker of flames reminds you of the dances you and your sisters once performed in devotion to him, intertwining and spiralling, ceremonial swords and daggers and spears. you never would have danced had you known this fate would once befall you. you would have left this temple as soon as your girlhood ended.

sukuna tilts your head side to side, suddenly, as if to inspect you. his eyes trail from your jaw, to the curve of your cheekbone, to the roundness of fat that forms your cheek. they finish at your eyes — teary, bloodshot eyes, squinting in pain and sorrow and discomfort.

“hm,” he says, releasing you to turn on his heel. the muscles in his back ripple with each step he takes away from you, and the ground seems to tremble in time. “yes. i suppose i’ll keep you.”

he disappears through the crumbled archway, and your lungs seem to collapse. you suddenly feel very frail.

the remaining priestess of a war-hungry god. you suppose that a purpose is exactly what you need, now that your home is destroyed. now that all you have loved has been reduced to ash.

death may have been a mercy for your sisters, but should this be your last task before you join them, you can only do what you have always done: worship.

you can only hope you survive long enough to do them proud.

[transmascaraa]

Noelle Anon here! I loved your work! It was so cute and made my little sapphic heart explode! Could I maybe request the same thing with other genshin girls of your choosing? I just love them all so much!!!! Maybe with fem!reader this time?

Have a good night/day! <3

multiple characters headcannons!

cooking with them...

characters: furina, sucrose, arlecchino, navia x fem!reader

author's note: hiiiii i haven't written in a while😭 didn't have much time and not too much motivation for writing lmfao but now i'm here to write this because the req is adorable! i chose women that i thought you'd like because everyone likes them i guess so yeah<3 i hope you enjoy this and i tried my best to write smthn wlw i hope it's good enough

♡ Furina

-we all know how she's not one of the best cooks. so, you being one makes it a bit better.

-still, if you wanted to cook WITH her, then the food would probably just have to be macaroni.

-not gonna judge, i love it js as much as she does.

-you decided to get prepared one day, to cook together, and prepare a meal for one another!

-although you know that the only options you had were macaroons and macaroni, where she only had one option.

-so you started cooking macaroons.

-it is always SO fun to cook with her. she's always smiling and talking with you, talking about the most random things ever.

-of course, if you don't like talking much, she'll talk less but not be quiet entirely.

-know that you're gonna get a few kisses during the tiem being.

-and when you finally finish both of your meals, and prepare them for eachother, furina literally has a new shine in her eyes.

-when she tried it, she mumbled something that she thought you wouldn't hear

-"i don't care. this is my new favorite food."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

✿ Sucrose

-she's like noelle, so i think you get the point what she'd be like.

-whatever you'd cook for eachother, she'd like it. and the other way around.

-the cooking experience with her is very calming, too.

-you might chit-chat about something randomly but know that it's mostly quiet with the sounds of nature from outside.

-if you liked to talk a lot tho, she had no problem of listening to your pretty voice while she cooked something for you.

-you made a cheesecake for her!

-setting the table together, and finally sitting down to try the food.

-whatever she made you, it was really decorated and the only thing that you knew that it was some type of cake.

-and she recognized that your's is a cheesecake almost immediately.

-when she tried it, she started talking to you, blushing a bit, about how much she's grateful for you.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

✧ Arlecchino

-i'm pretty sure this isn't too ooc

-now, what i know is that she's definitely a great cook.

-i mean, she's a 'father', a parent to her children, of course she knows how to cook!

-so you had no problems asking her to cook with her. you knew that the kitchen wouldn't be burned down. hopefully.

-alright, you start cooking something that everyone likes, cupcakes! but the ones that you were able to make for her were cherry ones!

-arlecchino wasn't entirely quiet throughout the cooking either. it was either you or her talking with some kisses that can't be missed. she talked about her kids and her missions, while you either talked about her work in return, or about why you still love her despite it all.

-when you finish cooking and come to the dinner table with her, there's not much reaction on her face yet, unlike your's which was clearly happy.

-she made you cinnamon rolls!

-(i'm sorry if it's something you don't like)

-when she tried the cherry cupcake, you got a smirk from her.

-"you're a good cook, pretty girl."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

✯ Navia

-this girl will make you the best food ever. she will take this activity very seriously with you.

-usually, you'd think that maybe the conversations that you'd have throughout the process very little, but that's not the case.

-she would talk with you the whole time.

-"i remember once when i was little..."

-"do you remember when i..."

-"can you pass me the sugar?"

-you get the point.

-of course, she won't miss the chance to give you a few kisses.

-and finally when you cooked eachother the "special food", turns out the both of you made macaroons for eachother.

-that just resulted in a laugh from you both as you now started talking about whose are better.

-she said yours were better.

-but you denied and said the opposite.

-however you look at it, cooking with her is a great experience to not only get to know eachother better, but also just for the fun of it.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

okay i love this one

it's so cute

i hope anyone who reads it likes it, especially you anon because i liked the noelle req too!!^^

| @mariaace <3

[aphroditesmoon]

children of the empire

king!jacaerys valeryon x reader

summary: the tale of the king and the slave.

warnings: slave!reader, infidelity, hurt/comfort, angst, childbirth, grief, death, inspired by paul and chani from dune book series.

A/N: just jace and reader being wholly devoted to eachother

wc: 1.4k

----

HE KNEW THE two of you were destined to be together from the moment he laid his eyes on you. After the coronation held for him as King, multiple houses that had changed the course of their loyalty at the last minute had begun to seek the now young King Jacaerys’ favor. And so began the parade of gifts from ornaments, jewels and women were presented. Exotic slaves from colonized lands were brought forth to the king. He had sat on the throne as if it was made just for him. The throne his mother had not been given the privilege to sit on for even a whole year. 

By his side, was his once betrothed and now Queen Baela. Their union was celebrated the way their parents would have wanted, and the two tried their hardest to uphold all the traditions and rulings to make worth of the sacrifices and bloodshed in the name of Rhaenyra Targaryen.  

In everyone’s eyes, the pair was unstoppable, a united front with grudging respect for the other. A pair not only blessed with deserving power, but also with love. 

But no one knew what really lied behind closed doors. The King Jacaerys and Queen Baela Targaryen had not loved one another. They might’ve liked each other in a way, back then. But the war and deaths have changed them both forever. They could not find any semblance of romantic attraction or comfort in the other. They had mourned their families in such a similar way, yet somehow still jarringly different. To find intimacy with the other was to face unspoken grief. 

Jacaerys had thought that the loveless marriage would be the end of him ever experiencing a pure, tender bond with anyone. But he had seen you in a line of tired looking, plain and pretty girls, and he had sworn he’d seen you in a dream before.  

If his mother was alive, she would be cursing him off his head. In fact, sometimes he hears her too. Yelling, and calling him a failure of a son, as he’s holding your thighs open, plunging himself deeper inside of you. An affair had by kings wasn’t uncommon, but he wondered how many of them were of love and not lust. He knew he would love you like his mother loved his father. But no matter how much of him is his mother’s son, he would not let you suffer the same end as his father. 

He learned quickly that you weren’t as docile as you looked. Ask the wrong question and you’ll snap back. And yet, you were also not as hostile as you make yourself to be. You scold him like no one dares to do to the King, and you call him names on days he’s being particularly irritating, receiving a rising reaction from his shocked and baffled advisor and guards. But he knew that you were harmless. And you knew that a man like him can take a few jabs. And as much as the insults keep on coming, you advise him like no one does either.  

You run your fingers through his hair like you’d give up everything you have to be able to touch him. And he looks up to your standing figure through his mussed-up hair as he kneels down with his arms circling your waist, like no one could ever look to even the greatest of kings. 

“You will carry my children.” He had once told you.

The late-night silence where only the wind was able to speak louder than either of you, making anything he was saying sound possible. “Your queen will hold a knife to my throat.” You responded, feeling him pull you closer to his chest as he rests his chin on top of your head. “I would not let any other woman be the mother to my children except you.”  

You let out a hoarse laugh that sounded almost too cynical to his liking. “I am not your woman, even if I am your property. Any child you have with me is a child destined for a life of suffering.” Had he not been so tired, he would have presented a stronger case after seeing you argue with much more fire even in such an hour. But instead, he only shook his head hard enough for you to feel his disagreement. “You are not my property.” You hummed with your ear to his heart. “I would be yours if you’ll have me, and I’d let you rob me naked if that be your heart’s desire.” You let out a scoff you always do when you’re finding him ridiculous and drunk. Only soft kings dare to dream, a reminder you bring up constantly to him. All because you knew what usually happens to those kinds of rulers, and even if you wouldn’t say it out loud, you cared for him too much to see him resigned to such a fate.  

Three months later, you were with child. Brimmed with joy, Jacaerys had vowed to legalize the babe as soon as it comes out. And even with his queen’s relentless challenging to his title and responsibility, he refuses to send you away. He asks her forgiveness for the disrespect the child’s birth would be to her, but his mind was set.  

An illegitimate royal child was not unheard of, and Jacaerys’ fortunate case of being a man helps lessen the cacophony of riots and disagreement within the council. But when it had been confirmed that the child would be legalized and appointed as his heir. How can a scion of the Targaryen family be a bastard made by bastards.  

And yet with every voice raised against him, his assurance only becomes stronger. Every drink you take and every meal you eat will be tested first for poison. And every move you make would be supervised and followed by personal guards that were starting to make you regret being with him.  6 months into the pregnancy, you had relented into staying in your chambers, his overprotectiveness had become more obvious. Not even the Queen was granted to visit you, in fear of bad intentions.  

His actions had hurt Baela, for she expected him to know better what kind of person she is in terms of morality.  

When your water finally broke, he was 20 minutes late. When a guard had run to him in the throne room to announce the birth, he didn’t need to be told twice to get himself off the iron throne, running to you as fast as he could. You had given birth to a set of twins. A girl, and a boy. He had made it to you in the last few seconds before you let out your final breath. You had whispered his name as he squeezes your hand in a fist while apologizing profusely. “I couldn’t have belonged to anyone else, even if I wanted to.” He had cried by your side. You responded with a confession you’ve never uttered aloud, though both of you already knew what it was. You had breathed out so quietly, words only meant for his ears, “I love you.” The lights in his eyes died out the second you were announced deceased.  

He sat by your cold body for hours before he could be convinced to let his grip on your dead arms off. He held both of his babes for the first and last time in his arms that day before spending the next 2 days locked and isolated in his chambers. Rhaenyra and Lucerys Targaryen. A storm brewed in the sky of Kings Landing. Wild winds and lightning as devastating as his own heart. The people stayed inside as the weather rips off wooden houses and floods the streets in every corner that is 

Baela had tried speaking to him, as gentle as she could, reminding him of his children. But he was non-verbal. And so, she gave up.  

On the third day, Rhaena Targaryen had rushed to her Queen sister, screaming in pure terror as she held up a folded and opened envelope of a letter. The doors to the King’s chambers were slammed open, only to find the place empty. The King hadleft. He had exited the castle to the storms.  

And in his letter contained his want for his wife to rule in his stead until his daughter Rhaenyra reaches the age of 10 and 8, old enough to be wed to her brother, and then after, she’d take her rightful place as Queen.

A legitimate claim to the throne.  

The only other thing written besides his will, was a sentence among the lines, ‘Only a soft king dares to dream. And I am as weak and soft as it can be.’ 

[dtmsrpfcringe]

We don't hate women. We hate women who are abusive towards their partners.

Michael and David both deserve better and just because you want to buy into what PR and social media tells you, you don't have to attack other people for being upset over actors they care about possibly not being happy.

David wouldn't leave Georgia, they are married and have children, so he feels responsible. He always puts other people before himself. And Anna played it well with the babies, as harsh as it sounds. Michael would feel terrible leaving the girls. People staying in relationships doesn't prove you right, sadly. It's no sign of anything other than commitment and commitment doesn't always come from a place of love.

By saying that Michael and David shippers want to see them unhappy in their relationship, you show that you're missing the point. The whole point of shipping them is wanting them to be happy. You just want to be hateful towards people who don't suppprt your narrative, it seems.

GOD I WISH TUMBLR WOULD LET ME ADD TEXTS BEFORE ASKS SO I COULD SAY “Warning: you’re about to hear one of the most moronic takes I have ever heard” *insert gif of amanojaku from ghost stories here* okay let’s…we have to break this down it’s too much for me to just laugh at and go “wow this is dumb as hell”

“We don’t hate women, we just make up stuff so we can justify hating them”- you. where’s…where’s any shred of proof that either women are even a little bit abusive? I mean don’t you think we would have seen some of that by now? And no, enty lawyer doesn’t count as proof and neither does random screenshots of a bit of text with zero context. Also neither do jokes online with your partner when they’re okay with it (and make the same jokes quite literally all the time) and nobody sees a problem with it except the people that conveniently hate these women.

2. “Michael and David both deserve better” yes I’m sure the rich white middle aged men who are two of the most popular actors in their countries who have girlfriends/wives and kids who love and adore them are surely hurting because some weirdo on tumblr says it.

3. Hate to tell you this but married people with children divorce all the time. It’s not like if they divorce he is going to suddenly vanish in a puff of smoke babe.

4. Even if that’s true, your theory of him only staying out of responsibility is bullshit. Someone who stays for the kids isn’t going to dip their wife into a kiss on the red carpet and look at her like a hozier song sounds. If there’s any event or interview where he can find a way to praise Georgia, he does it. He always talks about her. After events they’ve been seen kissing deeply and walking arm in arm honeymoon style.

5. as for Anna and Michael, (David and Georgia too but they seem more open to pda) they don’t owe you pda. Michael has been more than adamant about defending his girlfriend on twitter and good for him about it.

6. if you guys were genuinely concerned with Michael and David’s impending relationship crashes, why is it always tied to their love for one another? The only people who see This rampant “abuse and unhappiness” is this group of people who believe David and Michael are actually in love and want to elope together. Nobody else. Not even other Sheenant shippers. You guys literally just hate them, I mean Invisibleicewands has been talking shit on Anna since she posted her first photo with Michael back in 2019 and hasn’t stopped.

7. “And Anna played it well with the babies, as harsh as it sounds.” seriously what the absolute crap is this supposed to mean my dude? I’ve gotta be honest….you know how smex works right? Michael could absolutely choose to use protection!!! Why is it on her? Not on him. He’s had kids before I think he knows that a stork doesn’t bring the baby. Holy hell you people make my eyes hurt

8. (finally) funny you should bring up narratives, you know considering you’re part of the group that thinks any affection towards anybody else that isn’t them is PR (thinking of the Joseph Fiennes hug fiasco) that lied about Georgia and Anna being abusive, that has tried time and time again and moved the goalpost, that fabricates evidence and tries to send death threats to people who speak out, and then lie about it, that your group is the one who can’t handle women working together and have to call everything PR. The same group that ignores the fact that Anna and Georgia are friends, to talk grave shit on them. Newsflash sweetheart, we aren’t the ones pushing the narrative here. You only want to see David and Michael happy as long as it aligns with your delusion. Have the day you deserve.

anyways, I think this is going to be my pinned post. Mostly because I want this to be embarrassing if you ever try to come back here and lie on Betty whites internet again, but also because I think this addresses so many tin hat talking points at once. Just because we love aziraphale and crowley doesn't mean we get the right to insert ourselves into their personal lives, you wouldn't want someone else praying for your relationship to fail.