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ficnation · 1 year ago

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Chapter 1: Dig In

Series: “Eat Your Heart Out” Pairing: Hannibal Lecter x Female! Reader x Will Graham Word count: 4,6k+ Warnings: canon-typical warnings

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Will Graham hasn’t seen you in years—years that felt like centuries to him. When you greet him, your voice is like a songbird’s serenade—sweet, peaceful, and meant only for his ears. It was a melody he missed dearly yet never dared to summon in his mind, even as the memories of you bled into his dreams.

“What are you doing here?” he asks, voice breaking at the last word. The question is not hostile, but it’s not friendly either. He knows you didn’t expect him to greet you like an old friend would. You know him too well for that—or at least you knew him before Hannibal Lecter barged into his life.

A smile crawls up your face, but it never reaches your eyes. You came here because you know, you know someone’s version of the story. But you crave to see the truth—to find out exactly what happened—and you know that Will is the only person who can provide you with the answers you’re looking for.

Jack Crawford raises his hand, his palm facing Will in a silent greeting—almost a peace offer. He keeps his distance as he lifts your suitcases out of the trunk of his car. He’s the one that called you, told you everything you needed to know, how Will lost his mind, how he keeps insisting that an innocent man—someone he considered a friend—is the Chesapeake Ripper.

Will can’t help but snicker at the thought of how this conversation went. You don’t seem bothered by the change in his expression—you hardly ever were, and he was always surprised by your unflappable composure.

“I’m going to stay with you, Will.” It’s not a question nor a suggestion fueled by concern over his well-being. It’s a declaration, and he has absolutely no say in this matter. Jack Crawford has already made that decision for him, and Will is in no position to object—he’s well aware of it.

Will nods and gesticulates to the door of his house. It’s a reluctant invitation forced out of him by his boss’ incessant gaze.

You don’t let him think about it for much longer, fearing he’ll withdraw the offer. You walk up the stairs of the porch and cross the doorstep. The inside is no warmer than the bitter winter on the other side of the door. You shiver slightly, wrapping your arms around yourself for heat.

A flock of dogs runs up to you, wagging their tails in excitement. Some of them you’ve already met before, and some of them seem like recent additions to Will’s collection of strays. You pat each dog on the head as you take off your boots by the entrance. You note that you no longer feel like you are just another stray Will has taken into his home.

The warmth of the friendly dogs quickly makes you forget how much you don’t belong here; you enjoy their company for a moment before reluctantly moving on to explore the room.

Not much has changed since the last time you were here. Will’s bed is still in the room, and you remember the time he confessed to you that it makes him feel more aware of his surroundings—gives him a sparse flicker of safety. He has easy access to the windows overlooking the outside, and he hears whenever someone walks up the stairs to his porch. It’s a small shred of comfort to cling to in the midst of his torment—you understand his reasoning.

The fireplace is the same one you used to warm up in front of every morning when you slept over—just surrounded by more dog beds than before. The old, simple in their design but surprisingly comfortable armchairs stand in their designated spots. Dog toys litter the carpeted floor, while books and familiar trinkets overwhelm the shelves, though if you look more closely, you find new additions mixed in with the old.

“Nothing has changed,” you say to yourself and the chill air of the room. You don’t hear Will’s footsteps as he joins you in the heart of his house.

“I did.” His words make your head whip around to face him, your eyes finding his. There’s a certain darkness in his statement—one you recognize.

The brown curls on his head frame his face in an untamed mess. He’s beautiful, and you find yourself still affected by his proximity.

“I don’t think you did.”

“You’ve been here for seven minutes, I can’t imagine you know much,” Will retorted.

“I know you, Will.” You meet his eyes for a few seconds—it doesn’t take much longer for him to look away. He hasn’t changed.

“Not anymore. Believe me,” his voice is certain and steady, but his hands shake as he reaches for your cozy black coat.

You let him slide it off your shoulders—the chill of the room refreshing. Will Graham isn’t a gentleman—he’s never conformed to society’s expectations. The gesture isn’t meant to impress you, make you swoon, or simply check a box. He does it because he still feels something toward you—he still cares.

You don’t talk much after that. Will makes some space for your stuff in his closet and leaves your suitcases in one of the many empty rooms. You thank him with another smile that doesn’t reach your eyes—there’s too much worry in them to convey your gratitude.

He goes on a walk with the dogs while you decide to take stock of his fridge and cupboards in search of any ingredients that you could possibly turn into a late dinner—french crepes filled with whatever jam or other sweet spreading he has in his kitchen.

You make yourself cozy in one of the armchairs in front of the crackling fireplace, your legs tucked comfortably beneath you when the door opens, and a blast of cold winter air rushes in along with seven dogs, melting snow clinging onto their fur stubbornly. They sniff around the room in search of the source of the sweet, delicious smell.

Will follows in their steps, taking off his boots by the door. It won’t take long for his socks to soak up the drops of water scattered over the floor—remnants of the snow shaken off by the happy furry beasts. He says nothing for a few long minutes, merely taking in your form, the sweet smell, and the cozy atmosphere. It feels like you belong here, even if just for a moment until you deem him deranged and leave again for long years.

“Crepes?” he asks finally, sliding off his heavy jacket. Will imprints on his memory the image of you so peaceful and comfortable in his home, in his presence.

You hum in response, sticking the fork back into your mouth. “I only found jam and peanut butter.”

“It’s an accomplishment you found anything at all.” He chuckles but isn’t truly amused by it—it is a pitiful sound.

The brunet disappears into the kitchen, and when he returns, his plate is filled with food. He sits down in the other armchair with a heavy sigh—a sound so murky only an old man could make or someone so exhausted with life they didn’t see a point in it anymore.

“I believe you, you know?”

Will’s head shoots up in your direction; he almost chokes on his crepes. He didn’t foresee that at all—the thought of you believing him without even hearing his side of the story, believing in his conviction that Hannibal is the Chesapeake Ripper without even asking for evidence. When everyone around him considered him delusional and regarded his accusation with ignorance or anger—you believed him. He straightens up in his seat, looking at you expectantly, begging silently for you to continue.

“I suppose Jack didn’t tell you why exactly am I here, huh?” Will shakes his head, making you sigh deeply as you mindlessly stab the remaining crepe on your plate with the fork—he notices the anger simmering behind your irises. “Figured. They found my father’s killer in our old house.”

“Dead?”

You nod in confirmation.

“Suicide.” Your voice isn’t relieved; it doesn’t incandesce with light like it should.

Will knows that sometimes, even when the murderer is caught or killed, it takes a while to really settle into witnesses’ minds, and sometimes, they never taste that sweetness of relief for the rest of their lives. Yet, it doesn’t seem to be the problem in your case.

“He was missing a lot of blood and it didn’t appear to be anything abnormal back then so they considered the case solved. Let us come out of hiding.”

“Except it wasn’t a suicide,” the man finishes your thought. He’s right—like always. “Someone wanted you to come back… The real killer?”

He looks at you for confirmation, but his idea seems to be too facile—child’s play. If that were the case, the FBI wouldn’t let you stay with him without protection—unless they considered him your protector. Something feels off about it.

“Will, my sister was killed by the Chesapeake Ripper.”

Will stares at you with his eyes wide open. He’s looking at your face in a way that he’s never looked before. He can finally see you, your emotions, and despair—the mask you hid them under shatters into crumbs and floats away with his shaky breath. He hears the misery in your voice now—almost sees your winsome heart smashed into a million pieces inside your chest.

“I’m so sorry… I—” Will’s words are automatic as he processes your statement. He stays perfectly still in his armchair. “I didn’t—”

“What’s done is done, Will,” you interrupt him, shaking your head—a silent plea that he doesn’t blame himself for it. It doesn’t help—he still does.

The moment you stop talking, he can hear the faint ticking of the watch on your wrist. He looks at you, waiting for more to come, but you stay silent. Your eyes linger on your plate with a half-eaten crepe—the jam spilling out onto the white ceramic canvas; you seem to be contemplating something.

He remembers back on that stormy night when you came home at the end of a particularly complicated and brutal investigation—soaked and chilled to the bone. You had a small cut on your arm, not big enough to require stitches, but he wanted—no, he needed—to clean it up and kiss it all better, anyway.

Will could tend to a cut on your skin, but he couldn’t scour the one on your soul—he couldn’t kiss it all better. He always felt the need to fix things—fix you. Now? He has no idea how to take that pain away from you.

He knows he should be glad to see you—glad to see you again. But right now, there’s only sadness, confusion, and guilt because, somehow, this isn’t quite you. There has been this beautiful, bright light shining from you, but it’s missing, and the man feels the loss of it inside. He wants to reach out and take this sadness away from you, comfort you, and bring back that light you always had. He almost wants to cry—he doesn’t even know why himself.

Will swallows hard and finally speaks, voice shaking, “Can I ask you something?”

He hesitates as if afraid of the potential answer. The only thing keeping him from sinking into emptiness is your presence, and asking the wrong question might have a devastating effect. Will looks at you—eyes pleading for understanding.

“Yes. Of course…”

“What did he take?” He almost doesn’t recognize his voice. It seems to be a mere whimper—a noise buried deep within a wounded animal’s throat.

“Her heart.”

Your words strike him like a bullet. Will closes his eyes, trying hard to keep the salty water from filling them. The loss of one heart was unbearable, losing another one physically… He tries to find a reason not to be angry at fate—but there is none. The world gave you back to him, but at what cost?

He reaches out, taking your hand in his. His touch seems reassuring and gentle, but his eyes betray his anger. “I never should have let you leave...”

You ignore his words, looking into the void, and continue, “Her lungs.”

Another cruel twist of the dagger in his gut. He feels your hand squeeze his, almost as if it were asking for comfort. Yet, Will cannot be a comfort at this moment—he is too enraged at the thought of such brutality.

His gaze turns cold as stone, his hand tightening around yours as he holds back the emotions boiling up inside him, threatening to explode and tear everything apart. His eyes remain closed—unwilling to see any more of your pain. You can feel the anger radiating from him like heat.

If she stops breathing, my heart will stop with it—those were his words to Hannibal. Another therapy session he now deeply regrets. It is his fault—his fault that your sister died. And amongst all the hatred, anger, and remorse, he feels a bone-chilling relief that it wasn’t you in her place.

He knows it’s twisted to think like that; he shouldn’t even feel like that, but he can’t imagine his life knowing you were buried deep—six feet beneath the earth he was walking on and still breathing. He doesn’t know whether it was Hannibal’s well-thought-through plan or his fucked up mistake, but Will is grateful.

You are breathing, alive, and your pulse is beating fast beneath his tight grasp. He does not want to let go of it—not yet.

Will opens his eyes, still unable to see your face, yet so very relieved. He doesn’t let go of your hand, his fingers running over your knuckles as if, by touch, he can somehow reassure himself that you weren’t his imagination.

The anger inside him still roils, but he no longer shows it. The only hint of his discomfort is the tightness with which he holds your hand.

“I won’t let anything happen to you,” he mumbles out, almost inaudible.

“No, Will, I won’t let anything happen to you.” You meet his gaze, your eyes almost begging. “I can’t lose you too. You’re the only one I have left.”

Will smiles at you sadly. His eyes filled with a strange light, his fingers running through your hair. Your plates have been long forgotten on the nearby windowsill as he leans forward and carefully touches your cheek, running his forefinger across your lips and down to your chin.

At first, you think the gesture is affectionate—intimate. But then you notice that he’s trying to remember your every feature. It’s painful to think that someone who loved you so dearly might have forgotten your face, the feel of your skin under his touch. Maybe it’s this thought that makes your eyes well up with tears; maybe it is the gesture itself. Or possibly even both.

This moment feels so real, so raw—you are tempted to believe in it, to be hopeful for your future, at least for a moment. But after all you went through, you know that hope is a dangerous thing, and it can turn against you. It’s been so long since all your hopes have been crushed you almost forgot how to have them... And just like that, the moment vanishes, and reality crashes back.

Later that night, when you come out of the shower and crawl into his bed—your clothes sticking to the slightly damp skin, your hair in an unruly mess—he simply opens his arms.

“You claim to be my friend, yet you sleep in my bed like a lover would,” he says—he still remembers the words you whispered to him when the roles were reversed.

Will smiles at the irony, his arms wrapping around you. Your hair is still dripping, the water sliding down your neck and onto his chest. It trickles down in rivulets to his stomach, creating wet spots on his shirt, but he doesn’t seem to care.

You notice his grip is tighter than usual, yet you feel no pain, no discomfort. If he wanted to hurt you, he would. But you’re safe here—in his arms. Safer than you’ve ever been.

“Don’t pretend you don’t love having me in your bed,” you mumble against his neck, your minty breath tickling his skin.

His body shivers, and a soft sound escapes his lips. Your words remind him of the years of loneliness, of his body yearning for your touch. The sound is almost a whimper, and you feel his fingers twining in your wet hair.

The feeling is intoxicating. For years, he couldn’t touch a woman, didn’t even dream about having one so close to his skin, couldn’t feel someone’s body pressed tightly against him in a bed because they weren’t you—they dimmed in comparison. He missed it; he missed this connection, this skin-to-skin contact.

His hand lingers in your hair, the other one tracing your skin, exploring every inch of it, memorizing every imperfection, every bump beneath his palm.

“You haven’t been with anyone else, have you?” It’s not really a question—more of a sure statement—because, after all, you know Will like the back of your hand.

His head shakes, and both of his hands now run down your body. Will takes his sweet time exploring every inch of you—your hips, thighs, your stomach, and neck.

“I haven’t,” he whispers, almost embarrassed. As if his body belongs to someone else, and giving it to you now is a betrayal of that person.

Betrayal of you—the one he once knew—because he’s not entirely sure you’re still the same person. You were always so cheerful and full of life before—anything you touched, growing wings, flying out of the confines of its cage.

He yearns for this contact, craves a woman’s body—craves your body. He touches your skin, lightly running his fingertips over it, trying to bring back the memories from before. Will’s mind spins, trying to place the puzzle of you in the present.

He holds your face, trying to remember the way your eyes shined, the smile on your lips, the way your hair used to look. The feeling of your body, skin to skin, is almost painful. Your lips are so close, your heart beating so fast…

Winston jumps onto the bed, the weight and heat of his furry body on your calves makes you both pull away hesitantly.

“Sorry,” you mumble out the apology into the stillness of the air.

Will looks at you with a soft smile and a faint blush on his cheeks. “It’s fine.” He glances over at the dog. “What’s the matter, little fella? Can’t sleep?” He reaches over to pet the dog, then he turns his attention back to you.

The atmosphere changes completely, filled with the sounds of the night and Winston’s heavy breathing. Yet, although your physical proximity to Will has changed, you still feel connected to him in a way that only two people who are truly close can. The warmth of Winston’s body seems to melt the tension.

The dog snuggles up against you both, the three of you creating your own little world of peace. Will is the first to speak, “I’d rather be in bed with you only,” he sends you a smirk, “but I would still get the same amount of hair on my clothes.”

You feel your lips part in a grin; your breath catches in your throat, and it takes a moment before you’re able to answer his playful jab.

Will catches you in this moment of surprise as if he can smell your anticipation in the air. His hands wrap around your waist, dragging you closer until your bodies are pressed snugly once more.

When he smiles at you, it’s as if the world stops briefly. Your eyes lock, and for a second, there is nothing else but the two of you.

“It’s a sad thing your smile is so rare,” you whisper, your fingers tracing his stubbled jaw.

Will's heart pounds in his chest. He takes your hand in his, running his fingers along your skin. There's always been an undeniable spark between you, but this time, it feels different, more intense. Like if you let yourself go and let the spark ignite, the fire will burst out of your chest.

Will leans closer to you; your noses are almost touching. His brown eyes are so close you can see every detail in them despite the darkness of the room. You can feel the tension in the air, and you know what would break it...

“Will, I... I can’t—” You stumble over your words, gaze parting from his.

Your stutter is cut short by Will’s lips touching yours. A soft sound escapes him as if he’s been waiting for you to stop speaking so he can taste you. His tongue slips over your lips, exploring your mouth.

This is not the clumsy, almost animalistic lust he had for you in the past—it’s something different. Something tender, almost sweet.

Your hands fall limply onto the duvet, your heart beating faster, your breath catching in your throat as you sink deeper into the kiss. You don’t want this to end… So you pull him closer.

Seemingly annoyed by the nonstop movement, Winston jumps off the bed and retreats to his place by the lit-up fireplace. You almost giggle at that, but you’re far too busy with kissing Will’s lips raw.

Your hands find their way onto his neck next, your fingers running through his curls. With lips almost glued to his, you pull him back every time he tries to move.

The sound of your heavy breathing is enough to make his heart pound in his chest as if his very blood is racing. He’s holding you so tightly you fear you might break. Will breathes in the smell of you, almost intoxicated by it. Your scent enriches him—sends his emotions into a whirlwind.

After a moment, he manages to pull away, gasping for breath. He is still holding you, hands pressed against your back, as if not wanting to let go. Will tries to catch his breath—it feels like his entire life is contained in those few moments.

His eyes find yours, looking for some reassurance, as if he expects to wake up from a dream any moment now. He opens his mouth to say words but can’t find any. All he can do is look at you, so beautiful in the darkness. Will closes his eyes as if trying to cling to this moment.

“I’m glad I’m back. Despite the circumstances...” Your fingers play with his curls, your breath just as shaky as his.

“You’re back...” Will murmurs, looking at you relieved, touching your face as if to make sure you’re still here. He wants to speak, to tell you everything that is going through his mind, but when he opens his mouth again, no words come out. He tries to collect himself—tries to bring his heart to your level.

“It’s been a long time... We should probably talk. You know, just to catch up.”

“You like talking now?” Your grin is electrifying, it sends heat down the man’s body. But when he notices it doesn’t reach your eyes, his neediness crumbles.

A veil of insecurity falls over his face. “No… I don’t like talking. But I still do it if I have to, so can we just…” Will gestures to the two of you, the room—just a sign of exasperation and need to do this now. He swallows hard, trying to find his voice. “It’s just... it’s been a long time. And I... you know... there is just a lot that happened.”

“Will,” the way you say his name halts him, “it’s okay if you want to talk.”

He blinks slowly, suddenly confused—why did he even try to lie about it? Hannibal gave him his voice and showed him the power of his words—the good one and the evil one.

Will lets out a deep breath and then closes his eyes. It’s always been hard for him to tell people how he feels. Especially when he wants to say more than any amount of words can describe—and there is a lot to describe. There is so much he has to tell you, and yet when he tries to form the words—to get them out—his mind goes blank.

He opens his eyes and looks at you for help, but you look just as confused as before. “I don’t even know where to begin,” he says softly. “So much has changed.”

“You haven’t. Not as much as you think you did.”

He sees the impossibly black creature in his peripheral vision. It stands behind you, completely still, and its antlers seem much more massive than ever before when he catches their shadow falling onto you. He wants it to be gone so badly, but deep inside, he knows it’ll never vanish if Hannibal is still alive, and maybe even after his death, he’ll never get his peace back.

“Your opinion will change quicker than you realize.”

The creature’s still there, Will looks it straight into its void of color eyes. It’s just in his mind, yet the shiver that runs down your spine tells him you might feel its presence, too. He hates that he can’t tell if it’s his imagination or not or if you can indeed see it, too. A feeling of dread seizes him, a cold sensation that runs up his arms and into his bones.

“Hannibal...” he whispers, but when he looks around the room, he sees no sign of the creature. The sense of dread lingers, nevertheless.

“The Chesapeake Ripper?” you question, and he tells you all about it. All about Hannibal’s mind games—what he did to him and then what he undid.

Will tells you about the therapy sessions, his transformation, and the darkness that took hold of him. He talks about his memories of your sister, about his guilt, and then he moves on to you—your absence and the reason why you left. The void he felt for all those dark years without you—until he was given the chance to have you back, a light guiding him back into reality. And you listen carefully to all of it; you let him speak his heart out until he no longer feels the need to speak.

When he is done telling you everything, Will falls silent. It feels like he laid bare his soul, exposing his most intimate thoughts, yet you still lie in front of him, unchanged. He looks at you, almost expecting you to leave. After all, how much can a person handle? But your gaze is still strong; you still care about him at least a little…

It’s almost as if you’re reading his mind. “I still care about you, Will. My feelings never changed and they never will. I’ll do anything I can to help you get him.”

His eyes soften at your words, and he closes the distance between you two. Slowly he kisses your lips, tasting your breath, feeling his mouth move against yours. The sensation is so intense that it almost sends sparks through Will’s body.

“I’ve missed this,” he whispers into your ear before he turns your head and kisses you again. His hands rest on your back, pulling you in even closer as his tongue dances against yours. “And I’ve missed you. So goddamn much...”

Will pulls away, breathless, as if his entire body is aflame. He looks at you, studying your face so intently it’s almost as if he wants to burn your image into his brain. “So much,” he repeats softly.

He rests his head against yours, breathing in the sound of your heartbeat, listening to the rise and fall of your chest. “You’re here. You’re really here.” He exhales a sigh of relief as if your presence is the sweetest gift he could have ever wished for.

#hannibal #hannigram #hannibal lecter #hannibal lecter x reader #hannibal lecter x will graham #will graham #will graham x reader #will graham x hannibal lecter #Hannibal Lecter x Reader x Will Graham #hannigram x reader #eat your heart out

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strawberry-daiquiris · 16 days ago

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happy lando is 25 day! quarter of a century, cheers ears etc. what a wonderful day!!!

inspired ✨ to write some established relationship landoscar celebrating to celebrate lando becoming old and haggard (spoiler: he's not, he's just being dramatic, they're probably just blonde, right?)

They’re granted a rare, extra day off for Lando’s birthday. Andrea takes Oscar to one side in the MTC, looking all sincere with a furrowed brow, and tells him he thinks it’ll be good, for Lando, for them, to have some time alone for his birthday after everything, lately. Oscar’s phone starts lighting up ten minutes later, notification after notification of his meetings getting cancelled for Wednesday, crossed through in his Google calendar.

Not that it can really be considered time alone. Lando’s playing golf with Max at 11, and they’re going to a restaurant in London tonight with his family.

Still, it has been nice, spending a couple of nights at the hotel together. It’s the kind of place they don’t really stay that often, grand in an old fashioned way, paint chipping off corners and daring you to complain when it’s all part of the character. Last night Oscar went for a swim, and the only other people in the pool were nearly triple his age. He had a great conversation with Mary, celebrating her 50th wedding anniversary, cooing over how nice a boy he is.

Lando’s got a special relationship with the girl on the front desk after she fixed the pizza disaster. He tells Oscar about it in a vague way that’d be pretty worrying, if he hadn’t been watching Max’s stream at the time, curled up in his bed in Monaco thinking he should’ve flown in a day earlier.

Lando’s in bed himself, right now, still snoring. Oscar’s managed to pull on a pair of joggers he doesn’t think are actually his to open the door to room service. He’d arranged breakfast direct with the kitchen, trying to bypass Lando’s card on file to sign for it himself. It’s not really a birthday surprise, after all, if you make the person celebrating pay for it.

“Thanks,” he whispers, relieved when he sees it’s Lando’s pizza girl. “Did you get the note about…”

“Mayonnaise?” Her smile as she says it makes something curl in Oscar’s stomach. The horrifying idea that anybody else but him knows Lando’s quirks, even when Oscar knows they’re on show for the world to see. Half of Twitter probably knows about the mayonnaise thing. “Yeah, we might have to get an extra delivery in if he keeps staying.”

Oscar smiles, laughs, even though inside he’s sort of plotting how he can get Lando barred from staying here ever again. They could buy somewhere, near the MTC, he reckons, with their salaries.

As soon as the thought comes, Oscar shakes it off.

It’s mad talk, wanting to buy a house with the guy you’ve been seeing for six months, even if you’ve known him longer, even if you spend most of your lives in each others pockets.

He notices the snoring has stopped when he starts wheeling the trolley into the main area of the suite. Oscar frowns. Silence is never a good sign, with Lando. It’s either the snuffling breaths of his sleep, the repetitive sounds of a game, or incessant talking. He’s been silent more, lately.

Oscar pops his head around the door to the bedroom. Lando’s laying on his back, frowning at something in his hand. For a second, Oscar thinks it’s his phone, that Lando’s back reading the bullshit people are writing about him again.

“Uh, hey,” Oscar says, then stops. Not exactly how you greet your boyfriend on his birthday. Even if he’d said it last night when the clocks flickered to midnight, buried deep inside Lando, kissing his neck and his shoulders as they both tried to stave off coming for a little bit longer. “Happy Birth-”

“Have you seen this?” Lando interrupts, sitting up abruptly, holding himself up on one elbow. He sticks his hand out in Oscar’s direction. “I’ve got fricken’ grey pubes.”

Alright, so not his phone then.

Oscar can’t help but laugh, one of the special ones he thinks he reserves pretty much only for Lando, collapsing a bit into his own chest with a huff, letting out the warm air that collects in his chest and has been whispering you love him for a good year now.

“Can’t say I noticed that one last night,” Oscar tells him, and Lando rolls his eyes, brandishing what Oscar now knows is a pubic hair in the air. “Alright fine, I’m coming, let me see.”

He climbs onto the bed, the joggers he’s now sure are Lando’s slipping further and further down his arse as he crawls. He kicks Lando’s legs apart so he can rest between them, and Lando automatically curls an ankle over his. It’s what they do when they can’t touch properly - in meetings, on planes, sitting in the back of cars in countries that’d kick them out or worse if they knew.

It’s been easier, since they told Andrea and Zak, since it’s gone from secret to just private, at least at work.

Oscar takes the pube from Lando, holding it up to the slither of light that’s coming in from where they’ve not quite closed the curtain.

Lando looks up at him a bit hopeful, like he’s desperate to be proven wrong. Happier to find out he’s colour blind to greyscale than being old.

Unfortunately, there’s no mistaking it. It’s definitely lighter than the rest.

“Ah, that does look a little grey, mate, yes.”

Lando groans, flopping down against the pillows, screwing his eyes shut.

“Might as well just die,” he says dramatically. Oscar sits back, sliding his hands onto Lando’s naked thighs, rubbing them, watching the muscles tense and getting a bit distracted by just how hot he is. It’s a better option, sometimes, than listening to him. “I’m fucking old. Do they even let old people drive? I’m gonna need a fucking pube transplant.”

Oscar snorts. Convenient that he’s forgotten about Fernando being nearly twenty years older than him.

“You don’t need a pube transplant,” Oscar says, using the sensible voice he puts on when he needs to explain something to Lando. He’s complained before it makes Oscar sound like a teacher, storming off into another room and coming back ten minutes later with a wicked glint in his eye and a potentially slightly illegal PornHub tab open in incognito. “They’re fine. Look…”

He slides his fingers into the tuft Lando’s got above the fat base of his dick. It’s pretty much the same consistency as his facial hair, which he’s absolutely forbidden to mention if he doesn’t want Lando getting the huff for a half hour.

“Very brown, completely normal for a 25 year old.”

Lando groans again.

“25 is so old, it’s halfway to fucking 50.” Lando grumbles. “Who’s even 50? Aren’t they all dead?”

“Mark’s nearly 50,” Oscar says, then cringes immediately, curling his fingers a bit too tight in Lando’s pubes. His head veers up, eyes a bit dark. Number one rule, no mentioning Mark when either of them is naked, it never ends well. “And er, our Dads? Andrea’s older than that too, and um… Zak.”

Lando screws his face up.

“Oscar, don’t mention Zak when you’re touching my dick, please.”

Despite the annoyance, there’s a hopefulness in the way he says it. Oscar is more than happy to oblige, if it gets him off the hook. He slides down the bed, and even though Lando hasn’t showered and still smells of sweat and come from last night, Oscar takes him into his mouth. He might not be able to play golf, but he can organise breakfast and give a mean blowjob, so he reckons he’s alright.

Lando’s easy for it, writhing and bucking his hips, and Oscar wants to make it good. Eases Lando’s hips up so he can slide deeper, feeling the press at the entrance to his throat.

After Lando comes, he starts choking, and Oscar has to push him back gently, come still coating his mouth. Lando’s really good at things like this, immediately sitting up to caress the back of Oscar’s head, looking worried. It’s one of the best parts about doing stuff with someone who’d never been with a bloke before Oscar, actually. He still finds the gross parts of sex vaguely horrifying.

“Are you alright?” Lando asks, and Oscar nods, pressing his fingers into his mouth and swiping around until he finds the culprit, dragging it out from his throat and holding it up.

They both look at it. Drenched in Oscar’s saliva, it’s darker than the first, but it’s still unmistakably grey.

“Don’t,” Lando warns, and Oscar nods, reaching his hand off the bed and flicking his fingers until it drops to the floor, someone else’s problem. “Fucking don’t.”

Oscar snorts, dropping his lips to the inside of Lando’s knee, kissing the soft hairless part that’s only for him. He nods to the door, and the trolley with the steaming plates of waffles, pancakes, and inexplicably, mayonnaise.

He smiles. It’s criminal, really, how much he likes Lando.

“Breakfast?”

#my fic #happy birthday lando!!!!#as someone who deffo got her first grey at 25 - you're welcome #it's distinguished ok #landoscar #lando norris #oscar piastri

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alexisomnias · 2 years ago

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— CUPID DON'T MISS ME. . .

⤷ you pretend your going to kiss them, then fake out last moment before your lips touch

featuring the OVERBLOT BOYS (MINUS IDIA)

RIDDLE ROSEHEARTS

• honestly it was as regular as any other day, riddle was tutoring you for your final exam, while the spring outside was rolling along as it usually does. the sun was high up, shining its light on you both and he couldn't help himself but to stare at your feature while you worked away.

• he did this mindlessly, he doesn't even notice it until he blinked, realizing you were now close up, having leant forward. • right away he blushed, his skin turning a red akin to the paint he puts on his roses as his mind swirled. • he watched you lean in intently, as he freezes up. his mind weighing him down as his thoughts piled up like weights. piling at a pace he couldn't even catch up with. • this was supposed to be studying, supposed to be studying, WE SHOULD BE STUDYING!! *(｀Д´) • despite how his mind screams, his lips just tremble, his mind truly did blank when it came to you, vulnerability seeping through, into the something he only wished to define as love. • he thinks your lips will land, fully expecting the warmth of your lips on his so his mind sets off an alarmed confusion for when he blinks out an eye and sees you leaning back giggling. • his stomach churns with anger (and perhaps disappointment?) as you laugh. • "OFF WITH YOUR HEAD !!!" • the study session was awkward after that, but riddle wouldn't, couldn't deny how often his own eyes begun to drift to your lips.

LEONA KINGSCHOLAR

• it was a pretty normal afternoon, you were hanging around leona in the botanical garden. the day was average looking, and in reality its no different from any other of the times you've hanged around leona, except for the fact he was actually awake this time. • no active conversations at all really, you'd state an opinion or narrate about something you saw and leona would either open an eye or make a noise of acknowledgment. • for now you've stayed silent for a while, and leona was beginning to get curious. he could catch on to the sounds of movement or pace, so curiosity peaked he opens both eyes to glance over at you. • what he did not expect to see was you being so close. he could feel a bit of warmth latch to his face (whether from nerves, or from your breath is the question), though his composure was not shaken as you begun to lean in. • a smug grin reached his face watching you lean forward, oh he dreamt of this for sure, letting you lean forward he shut his eyes to accept your lips. • when your breath hovered, he begun to grow impatient as he opened his eyes. hearing you laugh mischievous and back off from him left him feeling undone. • he let out a noise (perhaps a growl..?) of distain, and leant up and grabbed you by the cuff of your shirt before you could really get off and move back out of reach, pulling you into a kiss, the kiss you never finished. • "Haven't you heard of not poking the predator?" • your mischief this time seemed to backfire, but in the best way possible.

AZUL ASHENGROTTO

• you don't really remember the exact reason why azul called you to his office, so while he rambled about whatever the actual reason he called you over was, you stared at his features bored. there must be something you can do to politely get him to shut his pretty mouth without using words, right? • the monstros lounge lightening hit his pallete perfect, the blue reflecting off his silver hair and beautiful eyes perfectly. • azul catches on to the grin arising on your face, and he clues in that you weren't listening at all, his brows furrow and his eyes narrow annoyed. • "were you even listening, you know it's incr- what are you doing!?" • the sudden pitch in his voice leaves a sense of accomplishment as you lean in close, using his (messy) desk to forward you more, and hold you up, you lean in close to his face. • to azul it seemed like a century as wordless stutters leave his tongue and his eyes frantically search everywhere without a direction. from your eyes, your lips, your nose, any distinctive features he sees, and were you always so ethereal!? • his entire body flushes over and it almost makes him look like a raw fish. • his eyes waver as you stop right in front of his face and his mind runs debating on whether he should lean first or you, and then his breath hitches once you back off. • he blinks softly before yelling, how dare you play around with me like that! • you can see why the leech twins enjoy getting under his skin so often, his face under the business mask is quite cute.

JAMIL VIPER

• having you visit him during class at his desk became common for jamil, during your break time, showing up to his class and taking a seat on his desk as you ramble to him about whatever happened during class, positive or negative. • something that has become of schedule since the last school year, and jamil can admit it to himself (but not to others) that this arrangement of you visiting him makes him feel content, its nice to be sought after (even if he's not moving). • honestly he was expecting the regular, you show up, talk, then leave. • so why are you leaning in so close?! • jamil has enough mind to not lose composure, but he can't ignore the fast beat in his heart and how heavy his breath got as you move in your face close to his. • he fully expects a kiss, and who would he be to deny? • he didn't expect you to pull back last second, the call of the bell not too long after • he chooses (tries) to ignore your handsomely beautiful, yet puckish laughter as you rush out of the class with a wave. • he feels a wave of embarrassment brush over him as you leave, he's normally pretty composed, but the staring eyes (there were none, nobody in that class cared enough), and the fact that he wanted to kiss you leave him losing his cool, and in an attempt to redeem he pulls his hood over his head and lays his head into his arms patterning his breaths.

VIL SCHOENHEIT

• vil schoenheit was no stranger to looks, looks of admiration, or lust. he received all with dignity from whatever fan of his he came across. picture perfect beauty for the camera he is known. • so for him to let someone in his life see the side of him that's not covered in makeup is a privilege, and yet he still doesn't for exactly know why it is you that is that special someone. • really you should know better, know well enough how to dress yourself in an neatly way, and yet here he is fixing your tie, and patting down your uniform. • a light scolding he leaves. one for you too remember, so admittedly when he catches you distracted by something, he's a bit irritate. • when he finds you slanting towards him, in a slow manner (it seems like forever) he's admittedly a bit shocked, but yet not against what's possible mixing in your head. he watches your eyes close intently, never losing his composure. sure his gaze might've drifted once or twice himself, vil knows a beauty when he see's one for sure. • and you happened to be the one in a million he sees. • vil himself does not close his eyes, his eyelashes instead fluttering down as he observes your expression, he devotedly looks to you as your face moves in front of his. a light flush catching his skin, completely opposing his calm state of mind as his own breath turns weighted and hot. his lips part ready to capture yours, but instead his eyes capture the slight tilt up in your lips. • his eyes narrow as he see's your eyes open, a teasing glint in yours, and he most definitely won't have that. • his hands clutch against your uniform as in a rough yet so delicate manner his lips mesh against yours. he feels your surprise seep into his skin, and he's left satisfied as he parts. • "Next time, have some confidence in what you wish to take, even if it is the act of stealing my breath away."

MALLEUS DRACONIA

• listening to malleus talk was always relaxing you find, from how smooth and clear his voice is, to the tone of which he says it. such a shame, you only really see him before your due to head off to bed (though must admit, would you really head to bed on time?) • the moon was nigh to the middle of the sky, as the tall draconia rambled off to you about the different types of gargoyles found around NRC, every nook and cranny he could find a gargoyle in. you began to wonder whether malleus has ever played hidden mickey, knowing how many he's found so far. • you stare off, tiredness seeping into your figure as his words begin to jumble. you decided to leave him a surprise before calling off, "malleus, can you lean down for a moment?" • malleus lets out a small noise, sounding similar to a hum as he does so, a bit confused as his brows crease and face turns to curiosity. • you lean forward, towards the tall fae, your lips parting as malleus stays still, and if you looked a bit harder you could see him tense as he watches you lean closer in a mix of tension and interest. • you lean in, right in front of his face before singularly letting out a hot breath before giggling and leaning back, before you could wave him goodnight, you heard his voice echo. • "Are you really going to leave me here without pulling through?" • malleus draconia, future king of briar valley always gets what he wants, and currently he wants you to finish what you started, so now dear, where's his goodnight kiss?

#twisted wonderland #twisted wonderland x reader #twst x reader #riddle rosehearts x reader #leona kingsholar x reader #azul ashengrotto x reader #jamil viper x reader #vil shoenheit x reader #malleus draconia x reader #riddle rosehearts #leona kingscholar #azul ashengrotto #jamil viper #vil schoenheit #malleus draconia #suns pencil.

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strawberrylabs · 1 year ago

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Goodnight with Genshin characters! (Pt 1)

Featuring: Lyney, Freminet, Kazuha, Venti, Cyno and Childe

Summary: Nights with some of the Genshin cast based on their voice lines!

Warnings: some of these are quite angsty!(it depends on the voice line of the character), and some also contain spoilers for character lore!

Note: this is my apology post for being a solid 19 posts behind whumptober and ignoring my inbox<///3 im getting there guys I promise!!!

Lyney! (125)

"Good night. If you have trouble falling asleep, I have a few little props used for hypnosis that might help... or Maybe not. Either way, sweet dreams!"

Lyney's gentle smile after his comedic suggestion helps you feel at ease. He comes up with something different every night- you really don't know how he hasn't run out of magic-related-sleep-remedies yet.

He often goes to bed after you. Whether he's up practising some magic for his next show or doing some work for Father in the veil of the night doesn't matter to you. As long as you awake to find him there, unharmed, you can manage falling asleep with out him.

But, on the rare occaision he goes to bed at the same time as you, sharing in your night-time routine and holding your hand under the covers, the two of you can stay up for hours talking about anything, everything and nothing.

Freminet (156)

"You go ahead, I'm gonna stay up and read for a while. Hmm? What am I reading? It's, um... It's about diving. There's a bunch of skills I need to... Anyway, night!"

It's not uncommon for Freminet to read before bed. If you're lucky, he may even read with you next to him, allowing you to read along, always checking to make sure you've finished the page before turning.

Althought every night he says he's reading about diving, or marine life, or automechs, you've learned to pick up on the slight rouge of his cheeks, and the stutter that becomes a little more apparent when he lies about what he's reading. It's on these nights you know he's reading about Pers, and it's on these nights you know to leave him be.

Whether he chooses to sleep with you- in the same bed or the same room or the same house- you know not to betray that trust. And for as long as you respect him and his boundaries, he will be grateful.

Sometimes, in the night, you think you feel yourself awake to a faint 'thank you',

Kazuha (194)

"The wind has ceased... The world is silent, so now is the best time to rest well. See you tomorrow."

Kazuha often doesn't join you during the night, whether you are choosing to sleep or stay up. He opts to sit in the crows nest of the crux, listening to the silence of the night. He'll swear that from up there, it appears as if the world itself has gone to sleep with the night- the sea acts as a blanket for the life below, the stars and moon a night light for the trees and the sand and the surf, the clouds casting a shadow of calm upon the land.

Kazuha spends his nights writing about what he sees, and when you awake you find a poem written in his hand about how the beauty of the night reminds him of you.

On the nights when the land is not calm with dreams, but instead enraged with nightmares, he will sit with you in your cabin, and chat about the day gone by. Despite the conditions outside your walls, you sleep best on those nights. The nights where you awake to find you had both fallen asleep with smiles on your faces, after long conversations that drift into the night on lovesick clouds.

Venti

"Off to the land of nod? Haha, farewell, my friend!" (318)

You loath the nights where Venti bids you goodnight without joining you. You can tell by looking at the way he looks everywhere but you, by the way he laughs- hollow and false, so unlike his usual mellodic, spring filled chuckles- and you can tell by the way he says "friend", that he'll be spending his night alone in the hands of his statue, or at Windrise, or at Stormterrors lair. You know he'll be contemplating the centuries of his past.

He'll sit in his own hands, because they're not really his hands, but the hands of his first companion; and by doing so he can feel that maybe the memory of that unnamed bard who he held so dear is not truly forgotten by his people- after all, they built a statue of him, even if they did it unknowingly. He'll gaze at the bark and the leaves of the tree at Windrise, and recall how he let Mondstadt fall into the hands of couption and tyranny due to his negligance the first time around. He'll gaze upon the ruin's of Stormterro's lair- of Old Mondstadt- and replay the events from thousands of years ago, when he was just too weak, too slow, too powerless to save the first being to make him feel something.

You know you should leave him alone. Let him sort through his mind and his memories. But you also know that his mind plays the nastiest, cruelist of tricks on him- dragging him down with nightmares and jabs of "what if's" and "why's".

So when he turns to retreat into the neverending chasm of his mind, you reach out and grab his hand. You follow him into the chasm, and help brighten the darkness with the light of your presence.

Venti is reluctant to admit it- but he will.

'The monsters of my mind seem a little less scary with you here.'

Cyno

"Goodnight. Now, there's some criminal activity nearby that I'll go deal with."

You can't help but worry about Cyno when he says he's going out late to deal with something like this. You know as the General Mahamatra he has various responsibilities he must uphold. But when you're alone at night, your thoughts wander, and you ponder more on his situation.

You wonder, if his father hadn't suffered such a fate, would Cyno still be doing such dangerous jobs as a Matra? Or would he be a regular Spantamad scholar of the Akademiya? If he hadn't been pushed into this position, would he be lying with you now, drifting to a dreamless sleep with you, and not risking his life without recognition- or at least not the recognition he deserves.

You know it's not your place to think these things. Cyno is happy with his job, happy to follow after his Father, regardless of what things are said about him.

You quash your fears and your thoughts when you hear him return. He never left you for long. You knew he would always return to you. And he had every intention of doing so as long as the need remained.

Childe (182)

"Today was great. See you tomorrow, comrade!"

You always chuckled at his Ajax's tendancy to call everyone comrade. You teased him about it whenever it happened, and he always laughs with you and exclaims 'it's just habit!'

You know Ajax is busy, and he'd have less work during the day if he worked through the night. But he always insists on going to bed with you.

He created a bed-time-skin-care routine for you both- courtesy of him buying all the products. He puts is hair in a headband and follows the usual plan to a T.

When it's time to sleep, he smiles warmly at you. You pretend not to see the sadness in his eyes. He pretends it isn't there too.

So, for as long as the shadows of night will hide the pair of you, you'll bask in each others warmth, and soak up the laughter and the kisses you share.

And when the morning comes, as Ajax leaves to do jobs you never speak of, you will both eagerly await the fall of the sky's curtains, so you can forget the worries of reality once again.

Hope you enjoyed!

-Strawberry

Masterlist

Rules

#genshin impact #The steambird: Hot off the press!#The steambird: Lyney #the steambird: freminet #lyney x reader #freminet x reader #genshin impact x reader #childe x reader #tartaglia x reader #cyno x reader #venti x reader #kazuha x reader

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snowb3rryy · 11 months ago

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Hi there! I was wondering if you'd be interested in doing a Simeon nsfw prompt?

Sure thing! I hope this is close to what you have in mind♡

I added an sfw version as well, just to go smoother to the nsfw part.

Simeon SFW&NSFW Prompt

· · ─────── ·𖥸· ─────── · ·

SFW:

First Kiss:

At first, he's quite old-fashioned. He didn't kiss you before asking you properly to be his girlfriend, and of course, your first kiss happened at the end of your first official date as a couple. A soft, small peck on the lips with his hand placed on your cheek to hold you close.

Making Out:

Simeon is pretty shy to do more than a kiss or hold hands when you're not in one of your rooms. Even if you're alone, let's say, in the common room of the House of Lamentation or in the Purgatory Hall, he still prefers to get more intimate at the privacy of your rooms. He holds you close at first, stroking your hair as you both initiate on a french kiss that slowly ends up with your legs resting over his lap while he holds you by your waist. As the weeks passed, he started to get more comfortable on touching your body underneath your clothes but still not under your underwear.

Public:

Going out in public with Simeon either for a walk or shopping or on your way for a date, he loved to hold your hand inside his. Occasionally, he'd caress the back of your hand with his thumd and kiss it. He would allow you to kiss him on the cheek and hug him, but nothing more than that because he felt that doing morw would draw unwanted attention.

Dates:

Simeon is quite spontaneous on dates. He'd arrange one date for you every month, however it was a usual occasion for him to walk around fhe Devildom and suddenly text you about this new place he found and that he'd love for you to join him on a date. He'd never let you pay no matter how many times you insist. Most of the time, he'd let you choose for him what to order if you're out for food or a drink. However, he prefers going on a date with you simply walking to a nice park or by the sea.

NSFW

Kinks:

~ Voyeurism: He may not admit it but, a few times when he caught you pleasuring yourself he silently stayed behind your closed door and listened to your voice, keeping it close to his mind so that he can use it late at night to relieve his own self. Of course, the word "caught" is an exaggeration since he never actually opened the door. He kept it to himself for a while, but after he heard you at least 4 times he did mention it because he felt a bit bad. From then on you do as you please with that knowledge in your head.

~ Face sitting: after he got more comfortable with you (~about after the first year of your relationship) he asked you hesitantly if you can sit on his face. Not 69, simply sit on his face and let him enjoy you. After the first few times, he simply laid down after foreplay and waitted for you to sit on him.

~ Pegging: You actually were the one to bring up this idea. When he first heard it, he blushed but not from embarrassment, but because he got so flustered and turned on that you actually were into that. It's not that usual when you peg him but, when you do he really is becoming a whole other person, losing his mind and collective self in front of you.

~ Denial and Edging: He loves when you ride him to get off yourself and simply stop before he can finish. You keep him buried inside you for a couple of minutes while you keep his hips down whenever he tries to thrust. Keep teasing him with kisses behind his ear and trace your nails inside his palm and he'll be begging you to continue.

Masturbation:

Masturbation is something Simeon never really cared for. He did do it in the past when he first found out about it and also whenever he was interested in someone, but it was such an insignificant time in his centuries of adulthood that he eventually stopped caring. However, that changed when you came around. After a very long time, he felt the excitement of a crush in his heart but also in his pants.

Dom/Sub or Switch:

Simeon is a soft dom leaning switch. He enjoys when you let him take over and make sweet love to you or trust him entirely when you both try something new out. However, there are some few times that he will enjoy you taking the lead even if he's the one penetrating you.

Oral:

Simeon isn't very interesting in receiving oral, he won't mind to try it out at first but he won't ask you to do it since he prefers to get inside you then toy with your mouth. On the contrary, he enjoys giving you pleasure using his mouth, in fact he loves any way that will make you reach your orgasm and make you feel euphoric during it, however he almost always adds eating you out (preferably with you on his face) in your foreplay time.

Favourite Position:

Train: In other words, face sitting.

Inquisitor: Between your legs, giving you cunnilingus

Slope: You lay on the edge of the bed with your upper body and hands hanging off of it while he kneels between your legs and hold you

Missionary: Traditional, always the easy way to go

Doggy Style: Simeon is more of an ass man, so he just loves the feeling of your butt against him. He usually lets you get comfortable, but when he's close, he'll lift you up to him and hold you secure with one hand in your tummy and the other on your chest.

First Time:

It took a long time for Simeon to accept that he has feelings for a human, and even longer to even actually get comfortable with asking you out so it's only reasonable for him to take it slow. Your first time was after a date, specifically a datw for your birthday after the celebration the brothers threw for you was over. He took you to your favourite place, yet when it was time to return you home, he still didn't have the idea of sleeping with you. After you arrived home, you called him to your room to sleep together as you usually did. However, you mentioned getting intimate with him for the first time, and he felt like it was indeed time. A lot of time has passed and he was sure about his feelings so now after confirming that you want this too, he stood up, hugged you and whispered in your ear "Let me love you in a way I haven't loved anyone"

#obey me #obey me shall we date #obey me smut #obey me simeon #obey me simeon x mc #obey me simeon x reader #obey me headcanons

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jiangwanyinscatmom · 4 months ago

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Once more exorcising spirits or using them like WWX does, doesn't stop them from reincarnation, you all gotta stop this when the only thing that is said is if resurrected WWX doesn't fulfill his "term" HIS primordial soul is forever destroyed based on the usual points of Mo Dao usage that is performed by everyone else that is not Wei Wuxian (i.e. Jin Guangyao, Mo Xuanyu, Xue Yang and Su She).

The nature of this “sacrificial ritual” was a type of curse. The caster was to harm themselves with a weapon, making cuts on their body and using their own blood to draw the array and write the spells within. They would then sit in the center of the circle and give up their mortal body to evil spirits, using the annihilation of their soul as the price to summon a nefarious, malicious ghost. This was all done in order to request the fulfillment of a wish. Thus, it was the opposite of “possession.”

This is the part that I can see confusing others, but, with doaist belief, there are several souls, the human (living one, the three hun and seven po that remain in death). Mo Xunayu did not sacrifice his right of reincarnation just the living one he had at the time, and frankly the one that is cared about in the moment as that is where karma is accrued in order to be judged throughout the circles of Diyu until a soul is purged clean to enter their next reincarnation cycle, samsara. Your karma only follows you based on what you did in your wordly life in consequence and a soul is thusly free to garner further negativity or, better itself to enter the next samsara. When it comes to the Po that stay it can be for any reason, and are liable to rise apart from the "human" as they are only the emotions left at the time of death or, of the "human" daily actions that were strongest. Once the hun souls (these ARE essentially the parts of the person that are essential in spirit and is the primordial existence of that life) are all reunited within Diyu, the human can move on. The Po can still roam the world and why funerary rights and respect are performed and met.

While both were forbidden magics of ill repute, the difference was that the former was much less popular than the latter. After all, few wishes were so strongly desired as to make someone willingly sacrifice everything they had. This was why the technique had been nearly lost after centuries of disuse. The examples recorded in ancient books had only a handful of cases that were backed by reliable evidence, and every single one of them had been for revenge. Every malicious ghost summoned by the ritual had fulfilled the caster’s wishes perfectly, in cruel and bloody ways.

He also did not make anything to do with this ritual or any of the actual mo dao curses (a whole one which we see in book which is the one hundred holes and what it's backlash is for Su Shi using it). What Mo Xuanyu does is also true Mo Dao as it is manipulating the primordial spirit self of another and his human existence. It is a disruption of several Samsara and consequence that will be righted, good or bad for either. Wei Wuxian's cycle just started anew sooner as he was given life again and paid for his karma with his previous death, as reiterated through the novel and himself. Mo Xuanyu has only swapped their places in samsara and death and life.

But the tough thing was, the Sacrificial Ritual followed the will of the caster first and foremost. So it didn’t matter how much he objected… He was already inside this body, which was a silent acknowledgement that both parties had formed a contract. He had to fulfill the wish of the caster, or the curse would rebound, destroying the possessor’s primordial spirit and extinguishing it forever.

Following the rules of karma and Samsara, Mo Xuanyu already gave his place in the human world, he fulfilled his part of the ritual as needed and will eventually reincarnate based on whatever karma he accrued in that life. Wei Wuxian still has to fulfill the wants of that sacrifice before he is free to do as he wants as his primordial humanity is what will be destroyed, the part that always is made to enter Diyu in order to reincarnate.

In all of this, it is not gui dao, as gui dao uses what is already in existence in order to be used with the many Po souls that can arise and still be found in the likes of graves and disturbed places. Po can be disturbed even after years of rest and why you also do not bring negativity into temples, ancestral worship places and areas, or the graves itself. Po being the emotionality left to the world are prone to aggression and can make themselves rise as jiangshi 僵尸, stiff corpse, or as the work calls mutations of them 走尸, zou shi, walking corpse and 凶尸, xiong shi, fierce corpse. None of these retain human characteristics other than the po it relies on that already have existed before Wei Wuxian was present.

I have said this before but I'm expanding on this as it fandom falsely put the onus of this all on Wei Wuxian still for a sacrifice. Or to put the death of Mo Xuanyu, the caster, on Wei Wuxian, who wasn't sure why he had been summoned back to life and was not expecting that. Wei Wuxian had already been dead, nor within that thirteen years he had been, conspired, as what most Mo Dao users do when they break their nascent souls, to eventually revive physically.

In the very first chapter it has already exposed that the moniker of the book is false. The practitioners of Mo Dao are Mo Xuanyu, later Xue Yang, Su She and Jin Guangyao, not Wei Wuxian who we see works in a totally different medium of physical cultivation and meditation that does not warp or manipulate a soul itself to become defiled, the po wandering the human world are not the human soul that are being made into jiangshi. The point of Mo Dao is to corrupt a living soul (the self usually)by evil manipulations.

Wei Wuxian is not, never was, a Mo Dao demonic cultivator, nor was the first as there were centuries of techniques for this, and his crafting of ghosts is falsely defined within the same category. This is also foreshadowed with his argument with Lan Qiren about the exorcism and suppression of ghostly spirits being the only orthodox means of dealing with them, and the lack of understanding orthodox clans approached spirits as a social taboo.

#mdzs #mo dao zu shi #wei wuxian #saying this again #and again #...and again

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cressidagrey · 5 months ago

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Something good and right and real - Chapter 9

Summary:

Azriel had spent centuries believing that he of all people didn't deserve a mate. And if anything, the last three years had just galvinised that particular belief. And then he meets her.

The first time Oriana met Azriel, she thought that he reminded her of a skittish cat. Shy and a little bit broken. Good for him that she absolutely excelled in fixing the things around her.

Warnings:

Rhys Bashing, Discussion of Murder, Kinda Lucien Bashing?

Notes:

I put a lot of world building into this. If you don't recognise it from canon, I probably invented. Or I forgot that canon existed.

(thanks to @firefly-graphics for the super pretty dividers!)

“It’s nice. The music is good. I think you wouldn’t hate it,” Oriana ended her presentation of why he should accompany her to dance.

Quite frankly, Azriel had been willing to agree with anything Oriana had been saying, because she was sitting on his lap after they had shared lunch. He had managed to take a break from his duties for once and lunch with Oriana was definitely worth the detour he had needed to make it happen.

And he was more than willing to agree when Oriana told him that she liked going there with friends to dance, as it was quick stomping dances that reminded her of the mountain.

“Let’s go tonight,” he said impulsively. Even if he ended up hating it, he would have seen Oriana do something that she loved. He could sit through a few hours of that.

And really, sitting through a few hours with live music was a far cry from the less pleasant aspects of his job. So really…

“Yeah?” Oriana made sure, but a smile was growing on her face and he nodded.

“Yeah,” he agreed, and the kiss she bestowed on him at that was worth so much more than sitting through 4 hours of music that may be horrible.

He caught her face in his hands when she pulled back, kissing her again…and then another time.

He only pulled back suddenly, when he felt a razor-sharp talon at the edge of his mind.

He wanted to curse.

It must have shown on his face because Oriana cradled his head in her hands.

“Are you alright?” she asked him, eyebrows furrowing, and he nodded.

“My Brother,” he gave out with a sigh, as Rhys scraped at his mind edge, obviously unwilling to wait.

“Your brother,” Oriana repeated flatly.

“He’s a daemati,” Azriel explained. A daemati and a pain in his ass.

He slipped open his mental shields just enough so that Rhys could slip into them.

His shadows hadn’t told him that anything was amiss, so really, what could this be about?

What happened, Rhys? he asked.

Elain and Lucien are coming over from Day.

Right. And that mattered to him how exactly?

It was nice that Feyre and Nesta could see their sister. But Azriel himself…well, he doubted that either Lucien or Elain would be happy to see him.

Good for them? Azriel responded bemused.

He hadn’t heard that it was a diplomatic mission of any kind between Day and Night, Helion hadn’t been the one dispatching his son and heir.

So really, what did it matter?

We’ll have dinner at the River House this evening.

Now, he had his answer.

I have plans, Azriel responded quickly.

He did. And he could really imagine a better use of his time than sit through the awkwardness than that dinner promised to be.

Everything so that he didn’t need to sit through that .

Being cooped up alone in your house isn’t a plan, Rhys responded pointedly. Azriel wanted to bristle.

He wasn’t the only one. His shadows actually did.

Besides, we are talking about the future High Lord and High Lady of Day, so I am sure you can make space in your busy schedule for them, Rhys’ mental voice dripped with sarcasm but Azriel just stayed silent.

Rhys sighed.

Get over yourself, Azriel, Rhys said quietly.

Right.

That’s all he was ever supposed to do, right?

He smashed down against the bitterness that welled up into him at that because quite frankly, it didn’t fucking matter anymore.

It didn’t.

I actually do have plans, Rhysand. I can come for dinner, but I am not staying for dessert, he gave back clipped instead.

Fine.

Rhys left. Azriel snapped his mental walls down behind him with far more force than necessary.

He focused back on Oriana, who still sat on his lap, watching him carefully.

“I am expected for dinner,” he said quietly.

“Want to go out dancing another time?”

Maybe he shouldn’t have expected something else, because Oriana had never asked him to tell her anything more than he had been willing to offer up by himself, but he still was. He still waited for the moment when she would be upset or angry with him because he couldn’t force himself to drag her into the abyss that was his work. Couldn’t force himself to answer a question.

That was one thing. Oriana was another thing.

It was unfair, he realised that. She told him about her family. About growing up and how Enya braided her hair and Kiran had used to let her run wild in his forge, about how Samson had let her hold his sword when she had just been a child of no more than 5, about how Titania was strict and seemed arrogant but had still sobbed over her husband losing a leg, and weeks later about the prothetic that Oriana had enchanted…about Cyrus and her playing together, the brother with whom she shared a father and the reality of being a child of two worlds and somehow not belonging into either.

He couldn’t even open his mouth and tell her about Cassian or Rhys.

He wanted to sometimes. Sometimes he thought about it.

About what Cassian would say if he came to his brother the next day and admitted the whole thing.

Cassian would be happy for him. He knew that.

At first at least.

But he didn’t know how Rhys would react and he wasn’t willing to stake Oriana’s happiness or safety on it.

Not yet.

“No,” he said quietly. “I’ll be done by nine? Is that early enough?”

“That’s the time, I am just starting to drink at,” Oriana said with a grin. “I’ll be waiting. I am the one in the red dress.”

He couldn't help but smile at that.

“So who is coming for dinner? If you can tell me?” she asked curiously. “Your brother?”

“Both brothers,” he answered. “Their mates. Some old friends. Lucien and Elain.”

He could give her the names. It didn’t matter.

She pulled back, looking at him curiously. “Lucien Vanserra? Or whatever he calls himself these days?” she asked, her voice curious, but there was something else there.

“You know him?” he asked carefully. How? Why?

“Yeah, I know him,” Oriana said with a laugh. “He’s my cousin , Azriel.”

His brain felt like it was freezing in place.

What.

“His mother and my father were siblings,” Oriana explained. “You knew my father was from the Autumn Court. When my parents married it was quite the scandal. Lucien is a few decades older than me, but we are cousins. Haven’t talked to him in…over a century, I think though.”

Azriel had no clue how to even react to that particular bit of knowledge.

This was entirely unexpected. And he wasn’t sure that he liked it.

“So. I am thinking I am gonna make rabbit stew next week,” Oriana changed the topic, without asking another question or saying anything else. “Are you gonna hunt me one and bring it to me like some barbarian warlord returning home with the carcass slung over your shoulder like a prized kill or should I just go buy one already dead?”

He dropped his head to her shoulder and started shaking with laughter.

Azriel left Oriana with the promise to be the one responsible for the demise of a poor bunny later that week and then trudged his way towards the River House for dinner.

He was really not looking forward to that.

Not because he had some kind of feud with Lucien or Elain at that matter, but because seeing Elain was a constant fucking reminder of that solstice night.

And that still pissed him off to no end, even when it was 2 years and a mating bond for him ago.

It was still the night where Rhys had pulled rank with him about something purely personal and expected him to just accept that, without even a discussion.

Something inside him, Azriel was quite sure, had fractured that night and he wasn’t certain if he was ever going to piece it back together again like it was before.

If he even wanted it to

The only thing he was sure of was that his private life was going to be kept far out of Rhys’ grasp.

Oriana was his and no one else’s and nobody was going to take her from him.

And now he sounded like a possessive asshole.

Weakly, he wondered if that was the mating bond at play, pulling out every territorial instinct he had…and he had quite a few of them. He had never really had anything that was his and his alone after all.

Still, every thought of Oriana was banned from his mind as soon as he arrived, instead replaced with once again contemplating table linens.

Why not.

If Rhys picked up a stray thought, he would probably think that Azriel had gone completely mad, but hey, that was fine too.

Still, Elain looked as lovely as always, and Azriel managed to snag a seat at a corner of the table, next to Cassian on the other side, and Morrigan at the head.

It could be worse, he imagined.

Like this, he was far, far away from Rhys…and from Lucien as well.

The one thing that did quip his curiosity was the incessant whirring of Lucien’s mechanical eye though.

“Is everything alright with your eye?” Feyre was the one who asked the question that Azriel also had. He listened with half an ear, not that interested in the answer.

“No, it has decided to act like this,” Lucien gave back sarcastically. “Nuan already took it apart, she has no clue what is wrong with it. She has reached out to some old friends of hers, including the person who figured out the spell in the first place. But until then, I am stuck with this.”

He means Mistress, his shadows piped up suddenly and Azriel’s eyebrows rose with that.

You are sure?

Mistress figured out a way to make artificial limbs feel real when her brother-in-law lost his leg in a mining explosion. She spent around a decade concentrating on that, his shadows hissed.

He knew about the prosthetic leg. He hadn’t known that she had spent a decade working on that.

Mistress talks to us while she is working, his shadows answered the unspoken question. Mistress is very smart.

Yeah, Azriel agreed with that assessment.

But if Nuan, the Master Tinkerer from Dawn Court had already taken the eye apart and not figured out anything that was wrong with it…well. Then it clearly wasn’t a mechanical problem. It was a problem with the enchantment that made it work.

“You need an enchanter,” he said evenly. The conversation quieted down at that.

“I do not,” Lucien sniped back.

“Yes, you do,” Azriel disagreed. “If it was a mechanical problem, Nuan would have figured it out. So it’s a problem with the enchantment. Who did it the first time?”

“Nuan did,” Lucien answered, crossing his arms.

“She’s an alchemist, not an enchantress. You need one of those to fix…whatever the problem is,” he said with a wave of his hand.

“What do you even know about it?” Lucien asked with a snort.

“I know that it is a completely different skill set,” Azriel gave back tightly. And then, he said something he shouldn't have because his temper got the better of him. “I also know that you are related to one.”

Lucien’s knife hit the plate with a clang. “How do you even know that?” he demanded.

“I am the spymaster of the Night Court,” Azriel gave back like that answered every single question Lucien could possibly pose.

And maybe it did.

It was nothing that he could not also have found out through very different channels.

“So what, you care about gossip from 3 centuries ago?” Lucien responded sharply. “Do you have nothing better to do?”

“Luce…” Elain said softly, but Azirel ignored her.

“If it’s useful, yes .”

“How could it possibly be useful to you? Also, he’s dead. Has been dead, for over a century,” Lucien told him harshly.

Oh.

Well, that made it better. Lucien didn’t even think about Oriana. He thought that Azriel had been talking about her father .

“That didn’t show up in your research, did it?” Lucien asked with a harsh smile.

Oh, he was willing to let Lucien have that round.

Can you ask Oriana if she would be willing to take a look at Lucien’s eye? She probably already got a letter about it from the Head Tinkerer from Dawn.

The answer came minutes later, not by a sentence hissed by his shadows, but by the letter they dropped next to his plate.

He opened the note. It smelled like peppermint.

Yes, of course. Just give him the note enclosed. Tomorrow morning. And just tell him that we share a common acquaintance, if you don’t want him to know that we know each other, Sweetling.

Also, If you have read this note, drop it in a glass, please.

He did just that.

It went up in flames, just seconds later.

“By the cauldron, you are seeing Eris!” Cassian blurted out and Azriel felt like his brain froze for the second time that day.

“Cassian!” Nesta snapped, for some reason managing to sound long-suffering, "We talked about this."

“The letter just went up in flames! That’s how the Autumn Court sends correspondence!” Cassian reasoned. “You are seeing Eris!”

“And because of that, you are now thinking that Azriel has a love affair with Lucien’s half-brother?” Feyre asked, sounding like…she couldn’t quite believe what she was hearing.

Well, neither could Azriel.

“Yes!” Cassian exclaimed.

“No,” Azriel deadpanned.

Over his dead body. Not after what happened with Mor. Never.

“But…” Cassian started to protest.

“Cassian, I have absolutely no idea what makes you think that I am in some kind of romantic relationship with Eris Vanserra but I’ll gladly swear to you on my own life, that that is not happening in a million years,” he said drily. “And Eris was not the one writing me.”

“Who was writing to you then?” Rhys questioned pointedly. “Must be somebody from autumn.”

“I know somebody that knows somebody,” he gave back evenly, as he handed the second not for Cassian to pass to Lucien. “An enchantress is willing to meet you tomorrow. Bright and Early.”

Lucien reached out for the note with some trepidation.

“If I wanted you dead, the plan would be a lot less convoluted. Just for your information,” Azriel said drily.

Lucien glared at him.

“Where did you meet her?” he demanded.

“I know somebody that knows somebody,” Azriel repeated. “That’s my job. And that reminds me, I have to go.”

Far away from Cassian and his conspiracy theories, that much was certain.

He still had no idea how Cassian had even come up with this. He didn’t know if he even wanted to know.

“So soon?” Feyre asked surprised.

“I have plans.”

“What kind of plans?” She wondered.

“The kind of plans that I am not willing to change.”

Quite frankly, all he wanted was to curl up on Oriana’s couch, underneath the ugliest blanket he had ever seen, but he should have known that it was not gonna be quite that easy.

So he went to the pleasure hall she had named him and let his shadows lead him right to the female in the bright red dress.

He would have found her even without knowing the colour of the dress, because even now, in a dress with nothing that proclaimed her a goldsmith by trade…there was traces of it, everywhere. From the points of her shoes that were decorated with a gold tip, to the low open back of her dress that was held in place at her neck with a myriad of chains.

From the front…it was deceptively simple. From the back…not so much.

She suited the colour. Not as much as Blue did in his opinion though.

“Sorry, I am late,” he said softly as he slid to her side at the bar and she grinned brightly at him, just as the bartender, pushed four glasses in her direction and she immediately handed two off to him.

“You aren’t, Sweetling,” she assured him. “Ready to meet my friends?”

He just nodded.

The fluttering pearlescent wings that resembled a butterfly, were the first thing he saw.

He immediately placed that to belong to Palote Fairy, a lesser Faeries, often found in the summer court.

Far from home, that much was certain.

She turned to him, a head covered in blue hair that matched her wings and she stared at him.

“By the cauldron, you are real!” she explained as Oriana slid into the seat beside her. A High Fae male was with her, blonde and blue-eyed, looking like he wanted to be everywhere but here.

“Did you think I was lying?” Oriana said with a snort

“No!” The female hurried to add. “I just didn’t…Hi! I am Hyacinth! That’s Evander!” she said quickly. The male fae, Evander, lifted his glass in greeting, obviously quieter than his companion.

“Nice to meet you. Oriana has told us literally nothing about you,” he said drily. “Which is good, because Hyacinth wouldn’t have believed her anyway.”

Hyacinth just glared at her companion.

“Hey! It’s just that she came out of it with nowhere! She disappears for a few weeks and then shows up with, Oh I met my mate! By the way, he’s Illyrian!” Hyacinth defended herself.

“Because Oriana has totally bothered to lie to you before. We all remember that one time…”

Or maybe the male wasn’t quite after all, because these two started squabbling in a way that was worse than Cassian and Nesta sometimes were prone to be doing.

“What happened that one time?” he wondered quietly to Oriana, who just snorted.

“Hyacinth and I didn’t know each other very well and she didn’t take me at all seriously when I told her that I could control fire. So I showed her. Right there in the middle of her flower shop. And she dumped water all over me…Did I mention that the flowers were still in said pot of water? I got to pick out tulips out of my hair for ten minutes afterwards.”

The mental picture that painted, made him snort, even as Oriana leaned into his side.

Nobody threw water at Oriana that evening, though she did seem to seemingly know every person who attended and dragged him down onto the floor as soon as there was a dance that wasn’t the very quick stomping dances that she seemed to enjoy the most.

Still, for once he was very thankful that centuries of fighting training meant that he was very quick on his feet and managed to figure out the steps behind it quickly.

But even if he didn’t…he wouldn’t have cared, because Oriana glowed with happiness throughout that night. It seemingly surrounded her, an effervescent beauty that he couldn’t name. He could just stare at it in wonder.

“Thank you for coming,” she said as they spilt out into the night air as the evening ended, her arm slipping through his, her hair curling against her neck, where she had sweat from her dancing.

“Of course.”

✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦

“So Dinner didn’t go that well, did it?” She asked Azriel as they ambled their way to her apartment. The walk wasn’t longer than maybe 5 minutes, and it was a night in the Rainbow…of course, it was still filled with faes and fairies of all kinds mulling around.

And still, Azriel had showed up at The Moonlight Vault with a face like thunder. (Yes, the name sucked. It was still one of the best establishments Velairs had to offer as far as Oriana was concerned.)

“…How,” Azriel wondered and Oriana just shrugged, holding his arm a little bit tighter.

“You were looking ready to flee as soon as you entered,” she said drily. “You know, you could have just had your shadows tell me that you weren’t in the mood. That would have been totally fine, Azriel.”

She didn't want him to go through that kind of torture if he didn’t want to. It wasn’t…His day job already promised to be horrible enough.

“I wanted to be with you,” Azriel gave back quietly like that explained everything.

Her heart melted a little bit at that. She just grasped his arms a little bit tighter.

“I ordered the couch we picked by the way,” she said at that moment. Furnishing the Lake House was coming along…questionably.

They had managed to pick out a couch, thanks to her offering up multiple furniture catalogues for Azriel’s perusal and him having opinions about interior design that she never even thought he would have.

They had ended up going with a brown leather couch, big enough to fill some of the empty space in their house.

“Sounds great,” Azriel said softly.

“Any luck with your table linens?" she teased him as they finally reached her apartment and she unlocked the door.

“Not yet,” Azriel answered with a snort.

“Haven’t had any luck with chairs yet…especially none that look like they are comfortable for your wings,” she admitted. “Still working on that.”

“Just buy whatever you want. I’ll deal with it,” Azriel said, like that was completely reasonable as he followed behind her up the stairs.

Completely reasonable for him to be uncomfortable.

“It’s your home, you don’t need to deal with it. I already found you one chair that works with your wings, I’ll find dining chairs that work as well,” she pointed out drily. “You maybe can’t expect the rest of the world to accommodate you, but you definitely can expect that at home.”

Especially as far as she was concerned. “What else?” she added, tapping a finger against her lips. “I am working on a warding net by the way.”

“A warding net ?” Azriel asked her, sounding confused as she shrugged off her coat.

“You can put it into stones,” she explained with a shrug. No need to shoulder the magic for it on their own. It was something she had made for the mountain. Granted the road to the final version had been, pardon the pun, stony.

“That works?” Azriel wondered.

“Of course it works, I made it,” Oriana said drily. She had trust in her abilities. More than she should probably have. Azriel stared at her for a moment.

“How many things do you make that you never bother telling anybody about?” he asked her curiously, shrugging off his own coat. She thought about it for a minute.

“A lot,” she admitted with a sigh. “If it‘s easy enough to replicate and scale, and selling it would give me a profit…then I go to the mountains, to our guild and file a kind of patent on it. So nobody can replicate that without paying me for the right to use it,” she explained. “Like the teapots,” she pointed out as an example. “But the warding net? It’s going to take me at least a couple more weeks of working on it before it’s ready to be placed. It’s a question of want and need. Not many people would have the money to pay me enough to make the work worth my time,” she admitted. “It just takes too long to be financially sound. I just make it because the time is worth it to me for the security it provides.”

“It’s safe?” Azriel asked, his voice and eyes serious. Oriana met his gaze.

“As safe as I can make it. The safest ward I ever made.”

“Did you put an anti-winnowing ward into it?” he asked her, and she grinned at him.

“Who do you think I am? Of course. Shadow Walking will work though.”

She took a quick bath, and by the time she got to crawl into her bed, Azriel was already waiting for her, paging through the book that she had had on her bedside table. The Knight and the Dragon's Heart.

Quite frankly, she slept better curled up underneath his wing than she did anywhere else. Especially after she got a kiss goodnight and then got to sleep straight through until the next morning, when they had breakfast together with some pastries he had fetched from the bakery two buildings down.

He went to work and Oriana opened her shop, greeting Cilla, the second female that she had come in to help in the shop these days so that she could concentrate on her forge.

Penelope and her did a great job at manning the till so that Oriana could go back to creating and quite frankly, she quite enjoyed it.

Still, that day she lingered in the front room of her shop at least until she recognised a shock of auburn hair.

Lucien.

Time had been kind to him, though the brutal scars that ran down the left side of his face…that was another thing entirely.

She had never actually seen them, though she had heard what had happened to him. Gossip was strong, even in Velaris.

“Lucien,” she greeted him, adopting the persona of her mother’s daughter. Her shoulders went back, her voice found that perfect tone of polite and warm.

Normally she didn’t see the need for it. But he wasn’t alone.

With him was a beautiful female. Golden Brown hair that fell down her back in soft waves and was tied away from her face with a little ribbon, big doe eyes, and a lithe frame.

Delicate was a good description for her.

“Oriana,” he greeted her. “Last I heard you were no longer an enchantress,” he quipped as he came to stand before her.

“Well, family has privileges,” she said calmly. “And it is my work that is keeping that eye from exploding, so I figured, I should lend a hand, of course.”

Both polite, but pointed as well.

Making it very clear that she may be 2 centuries younger than him, but she was the best in her trade. And she said that with no arrogance.

A smile stretched over Lucien’s face at that.

“Of course,” he repeated. “My wife, Elain. My cousin, Oriana,” he introduced his wife who stared at Oriana wide-eyed for a moment. Oriana mentally checked that her eyes were black and not fucking creepy as Cyurs liked to say and smiled at her. Suddenly, Elain smiled prettily at Oriana, offering her hand.

“It’s nice to meet you,” she said, her voice high and light. “I never met an enchantress before.”

“We are a rare breed,” she said drily as she took Elain’s soft hand surprised at the calloused she had. Not a delicate little flower after all, maybe?

One should never judge a book by its cover, she had learned that early.

“Let’s go into the forge. Then you can tell me what is wrong with your eye,” she invited Lucien and waved him and his wife through to the backroom. She had even tidied up a bit for him.

Elain stared around like it was the first time she had seen something like that and Oriana imagined it probably was.

“It looks like it does at the blacksmith’s,” Elain said suddenly.

“Oriana is half Tartera,” Lucien hurried to explain. “They are lesser faeries and life in the mountains surrounding Velaris. They are known for their jewellery making.”

One could break it down like that.

“Lucien and I are cousins through his mother and my father,” Oriana explained as Lucien carefully removed the golden eye. She held out a tissue for him to place it in because she would need to completely take it apart.

“The last time I met Oriana, she was still living in the mountain full time though,” Lucien said quietly. “The jewellery shop seems to be a new addition.”

“If you call new a hundred years ago, yes,” Oriana said with some amusement as she received the eye and carried it over to her workbench to take it apart.

She had even pulled out the tiny screwdrivers for this job.

“I left the mountains over a century ago,” she picked up the conversation.

“Why?” Elain wondered. “Didn’t you grow up there?” she seemed actually curious about it, a kind and gentle fae or at least willing to make every appearance of it.

“I did. But I feel out of love with my job,” Oriana answered honestly.

“How is Wynstan?” Lucien wondered. “Did he come with you?”

“He’s dead,” Oriana said drily. “Has been. For over a century. I am surprised that you haven’t heard that story,” she quipped. “It was quite the thing when it happened.”

Though since she had gotten rid of the necklace…the only thing she was still feeling when she thought about Wynstan was fury for what he had taken from her.

It clearly wasn’t what Lucien had expected though.

“My…condolences,” he hurried to say but she waved him off.”

“Oh don’t worry about it,” she said absentmindedly as she peered into the inner workings of his eye until she found the culprit.

“Ah, I found your problem,” Oriana said, as she poked at the runic array. “Some of the runes have eroded.”

“Can you fix it?” Lucien asked, his voice trembling slightly.

She looked up from her work.

“I used to be the Master Enchantress of my people, one of the foremost goldsmiths they have, and you ask me if I can fix an eroded rune?” she asked him, her voice bone dry. “Yes, Lucien, I can fix that. I can also make sure that it never happens again and even renew the runic array so it works better than before.”

“And you aren’t an enchantress any longer?” Lucien asked with a raised brow.

“I still have the training. I just tend to use it for personal projects. These days there are other titles I would much rather claim,” she answered drily, as she went back to her work.

A few minutes later, she polished the golden eye, before she offered it to Lucien.

“All done,” she said.

“How did you meet Azriel?” Elain piped up suddenly and Oriana went back to picking up her workbench. “He was the one who told you that…”

“Azriel didn’t tell me anything,” she corrected. “We have a common acquaintance. Azriel pulled a lot of strings and a lot of favours. My acquaintance asked me as a favour to him, just as he did it as a favour to Azriel.”

Lucien seemed less than pleased with the sudden change of conversation.

Or maybe less than pleased with the topic of conversation.

She wondered what that was about, but she didn’t want to outright ask.

“Azriel didn’t need to do that,” she pointed out, keeping her voice even. “I hope you are aware of that.”

Lucien ignored that pointed comment.

So there was definitely something.

“Are you one of his spies?” Elain asked, sounding somehow wide-eyed and naive and for a moment Oriana froze.

Spies.

Somehow that answered so many questions that she hadn’t even known she had had. Azriel's spies. He was a Shadowsinger. He was the spymaster of this whole damn court, wasn’t he?

“Do you really think that if I was, I would tell you?” she gave back, forcing out a high tinkling laugh that sounded only natural because she had spent decades honing it. “And the answer is a very resounding no. I am not subtle enough for that.”

“She’s not,” Lucien snorted. “People that annoy her are getting set on fire on the regular.”

She just shrugged, even at Elain’s horrified look.

She was not going to apologize for that. She had only ever done it to people that really deserved it.

Still, the list was quite amusing. It not only included the current High Lord when he had been a few hundred years younger but also her brother on more than one occasion and as a 5-year-old even her grandmother.

“Thank you,” Lucien said at that moment, and she looked at him, the gold eye moving smoothly. “It’s better than new.”

“Of course it is. Do you still not have any trust in my abilities?” Oriana quipped. “And I am not the one you need to thank.”

“What do I owe you?” Lucien asked but she shook her head.

“It’s taken care of.”

Still, as she watched, Lucien and Eleain leave, she couldn’t help but wonder, her mind running wild, as she thrummed her fingernails against her workbench.

“How did it go?” Azriel asked her that evening.

“I fixed the eye,” she answered honestly. “I met his wife.”

She watched Azriel as she said these words, watched how his fingers tightened near imperceptively around his cutlery.

“Lucien was the mate, wasn’t he?” she asked evenly. Lucien had been the mate of the female that Azriel fell in love with after he spent 500 years pining after a female that couldn’t be less interested in him.

That’s what he had told her. Right at the very beginning.

“Lucien is the mate. Elain is the one who got away.”

“Yes,” Azriel said, his voice hoarse. “Ask.”

“Ask what?” she asked him, needing Azriel to say it. Needing him to…

She wasn’t even sure why. He had been honest to her from the beginning. there was no reason for her to doubt him. And she felt bad that she even thought about it.

“Ask if I still love her,” Azriel said softly. “That’s what you are wondering about.”

“Do you?” Oriana said quietly. Did he?

She was his mate. But was she…

“No.” There was no doubt in Azriel’s tone. “I liked her. I have loved her. I was in love with her. I was infatuated with her. And I’ll always think that…how it was dealt with wasn’t right,” he struggled to form the words. “It wasn’t…Being ordered not to pursue her wasn’t right,” he repeated, the words low and she stared at him. Who had…Who had the power to order Azriel not to pursue a female? What…what even… "But it did work out."

“Elain is lovely. But she isn’t you…what I had with her was a spark, Oriana. You are a whole firestorm.

#acotar fanfiction #azriel fanfic #azriel fanfiction #azriel x reader #azriel x oc #my writing #A Court of Gold and Shadows #Something Good and and Right and Real

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cherrycola27 · 7 months ago

Text

false god

Series Warnings: Mythology!AU. Language, alcohol, drinking. Military inaccuracies. Mutual pining, unrequited love. Allusions to and full smut. Minors DNI. 18+. Individual chapter warnings will come as needed. Banner Credit @thedroneranger

Masterlist Previous Part Next Part

...........................................

Chapter 20: Right Where You Left Me

welcome home

Your brother's words rang in your ears, catching you off guard.

Home

Olympus

You were restored

But you weren't home. Olympus hadn't been your home in a long time—if ever.

Home was Earth. Home was a house in Coronado with your husband.

Home was Bradley.

You stood there, staring at Poseidon for a long while before taking a deep breath. "Si, this isn't my home." You tell him softly. "What do you mean? You're a Goddess. Olympus is your home." He questions you.

"This place may have been my home once, but not anymore. Not after everything—" You trail off, but your brother nods, knowing what you mean. He was the only one who took your side when everything happened with Persephone.

"My home is Earth now, with my husband." You tell him. "Husband?" Poseidon asks you.

"Yes, a mortal, his name is Bradley. He's the reason I'm here. There was an accident. I sacrificed myself to save him." You say, not wanting to tell much more.

"Does he make you happy, sister?" Poseidon speaks softly. "Happier than I have ever been." You smile. "Wonderful. I am happy for you." He smiles at you.

There is a beat of silence. "Well then, I would love for you to stay around, but I'm sure you want to go back to him. Promise to visit some, or I can come see you." Poseidon smiles.

"That would be wonderful, Si." You smile at him before hugging him. He hugs you back tightly before allowing you to take a step back.

You roll your shoulders back and touch your wedding rings. "Take me to Bradley." You whisper, waiting to be whisked back to him. Instead, electricity floods your body, jolting you with pain. You cry out and collapse. Poseidon runs to your side. "Sister? Sister, are you alright?" His voice heavy with concern as he helps you to your feet.

"Something is wrong. I can't, I can't travel. I can't feel Bradley." You stammer out.

"Your husband, are you tethered?" Poseidon asks you. "Yes, I checked, see?" You say waving your hand over your wedding rings, but instead of finding the golden string that once lived there, you find it dull and lifeless. It's been cut.

"Zeus." Your brother breathes out before you can. "He had Hera and Aphroditie cut your tether. He must have forced them because they would never do it willingly." He says. "I've always known our brother was wicked, but this—this is just cruel." Poseidon breathes out.

Your lip quivers as you look at the limp string tied around your finger as tears silently fall. But soon, the sadness morphs to something else.

Rage burns inside of you. Anger fills your senses as the centuries of animosity that you've choked back explode from you in a burst of white-hot flames as you scream.

Poseidon jumps back as the flames of hatred wrap around you, turning your white dress black with smoke and ash.

"Where is he?" You growl lowly. "Court, Zeus, is hold court today in the palace." Your brother stutters out, simultaneously terrified and in awestruck by you.

You nodded before vanishing in a flash. Moments later, you were in the middle of a white marble hall. Columns stood tall on either side of you. Flaming torches of gold lined the walls, lighting the way. Ornate carvings dripping in gold, silver, and precious stones adorned the high ceilings.

Beautiful busts, paintings, tapestries, and statues decorated the hallway. You didn't take time to stop and marvel at them as you marched by, though.

You were on a mission. Each step you took had a purpose. You quickly found your way to the Great Hall. The solid gold doors were manned by two sentries who drew back the moment they saw you.

"Open." You commanded. They nodded before each grasping a handle and pulling the doors wide. You could hear your idiotic brother speaking as the doors opened, but the moment you appeared in the doorway, silence fell over the hall.

"Zeus!" You yelled out as you charged at him, feet pounding on the cool stone.

"You! You bastard!" You shrieked as you launched yourself at him. You saw terror briefly flash across his face before two strong pairs of arms subdued you. You struggled as you turned to see Ares and Apollo holding you firmly.

"Hades! Sister! Welcome home! I am so thankful you have been restored!" Zeus taunted you.

"Do not vex me with your passive-aggressive words, Brother. You and I both know you don't want me here." You seethe.

"Sister, why do you say that? I mean, after you were restored, I had Hermes lift the charm that prevented you from traveling to Olympus." Zeus smirked as you still struggled.

"Yes, and then you made sure to have him create a new one so I couldn't go back to Earth, and you forced Hera and Aphroditie to cut my tether to my husband, you bastard." You gritted out.

"Hades, darling baby sister, you must understand why I did it. You've spent so much time on Earth. I thought it would be best if you spent some time here, at home. And as for your tether, you and I both know you can't be with a mortal. It compromises your loyalty to your family." Zeus says as he pats your cheek.

You cry out as you heat your body so hot that Ares and Apollo release you as they wince in pain from you burning them.

Zeus stumbles backward and calls for someone else to restrain you, but you produce the Soul Sword and everyone backs away.

You turn and see that Zeus has he bolt in his hand, ready to throw it at you. You stalk towards him.

"Loyalty? That's what this is about? Loyalty and family? Zeus, you wouldn't know the meaning of those words if someone slapped you in the face with them." You say.

"Where was family when Persephone falsely accused me? Where was loyalty when you imprisoned me in the Underworld? You act like you are doing me a favor by letting me come to Olympus when you are the reason I was banished in the first place! You flaunt there on your high horse acting like you have changed by giving me 'freedom,' but I am still trapped! I am still right where you left me all those years ago, trapped in my own personal hell that you created by taking away the one thing that I love!" You scream at Zeus. Through angry tears.

"Hades, please, calm down. I'm just trying to be a good brother and look out for for well being." Zeus says.

"You are not my brother. You're just some bastard keeping me from my husband. And mark my words, you will rue this day, because I will have my revenge. It will not be today, and it may not be tomorrow. But one day soon, I am going to burn you and Olympus to the ground and then dance upon its ashes." You threaten him before disappearing in a could of smoke.

Zeus lets out the breath he has been holding and lowered his bolt. The eyes of the other Gods and Goddess are all on him, none of them daring to speak until Hera breaks the silence.

"You stupid, stupid man. I told you that forcing Aphroditie and I to cut her tether would end badly, and Hermes warned you that taking her traveling away would have repercussions; but you didn't listen. Now all of us are going to have to suffer. I hope you're satisfied with yourself." Hera says before turning on her heels and walking away, the others following her.

................

The sound of pots and pans rattling in the kitchen downstairs alerted Bradley that it was time to get out of bed. He'd been up for hours, lying awake, staring at the ceiling, replaying your last moments over and over in his mind again. It had been two weeks since the accident.

Two weeks since he had seen your smile, felt your touch, kissed your lips. Two weeks since he cut those ropes and watched you fall into the waves below without a trace.

Maverick had been staying with him in one of the guest rooms, trying to keep Bradley from drinking himself to death while wallowing in his grief.

Today was a day Bradley had been dreading. This morning, he and Maverick were going to meet with Cyclone to officially declare what Bradley already knew, that you'd been killed in action.

Begrudgingly, he swung his legs over his side of the bed and stumbled into the bathroom. He needed to shave. The stubbly beard he now had was well out of regs, but helped hide the way his face had thinned out some as a result of him being too sick with grief to eat.

After a shower and a shave, Bradley pulled on his uniform. The khaki material that had once hugged his frame nicely now hung loose and limp due to his diet and lack of exercise.

After trudging down the stairs, Bradley was immediately greeted by Cerberus and Hydra. He pet both of them before walking to the coffee maker and poured a cup of the scalding liquid before taking a long sip.

"I made breakfast." Maverick said, breaking the silence. "M'not hungry." Bradley mumbled over his coffee mug. "You need to eat something. You can't sustain yourself on black coffee and whiskey. Remember what Hades made you promise her." Maverick said.

Bradley turned to face his uncle and snatched the plate of eggs and toast from his hand before sitting down at the breakfast nook. Sometimes Bradley hated that Maverick knew everything about you now. He didn't mean to tell him, but the first night back stateside, Bradley had come home and drank almost a full bottle of whiskey. Maverick had come over to check on him, and Bradley let everything spill out.

Every detail about your relationship and your true identity and how you sacrificed yourself for him and the promise you had Bradley make you. Maverick was taken aback at first, but the more he thought about it, the more it made sense.

After breakfast, Maverick insisted on driving to base. He and Bradley climb into the beat-up red jeep Mav had purchased on a whim a few years ago and made the twenty or so minute drive to base. It was silent the whole way there.

Bradley was stoic as he sat in the chair across from Cyclone and some other officers as they gave him the official declination of your death along with their deepest condolences.

After the meeting, he was flooded with questions about the arrangements he wanted to make for your funeral.

People were asking him what kind of service he wanted, when, and where. There were questions about flowers and speakers, but the one that broke him was when someone asked him what type of casket he wanted to pick out for you.

"Excuse me?" He spit out. "Did you just ask me about a casket?" Heat flooded his cheeks. The man sitting across from him stammered a reply.

"Why the fuck would I need a casket? My wife was killed in action, and they never recovered her body. Why would I need a fucking casket if I'm never going to get to lay her to rest and give her a proper goodbye? What kind of fucking question is that?" Bradley growled as tears streamed down his face.

"I don't give two fucks about any of this. The casket, the flowers, a head stone! None of it matters!" He roared before slamming his palms down on the table.

Maverick quickly helped him out of the room before Bradley collapsed against a wall and sobbed.

"Mav, what am I supposed to do? Bury an empty box? Am I supposed to get a headstone with her name on it and put it beside mom and dad with an empty casket under it?" Bradley cried.

"If that's what you want to do." Maverick said softly. "Do you want to put a headstone in Virginia?"

"We talked about it once. When we went other there. She asked me where I wanted to be buried, and I told her with my parents. But if I do that, I can't stay here in California Mav. I'd have to go back to Oceana." Bradley explained.

"If that's what you feel like you need to do, we can start the paperwork. I'll help you get everything taken care of with it. What about your house, though? Maverick asked home.

"I'll sell it. It doesn't feel like home without her it feels more like a prison because it's so empty. We were supposed to raise our kids there and grow old together. But instead, I'm right where I was before I met her, alone." Bradley sighs.

Maverick pats his shoulder and helps him to his feet. "I can't help you put together a nice tribute for Hades. One that she'd be proud of." Maverick gives him a half smile before walking Bradley down to his office.

A week later, Bradley is standing in a hotel room, preparing his dress blues for your funeral. He looks at his reflection in the mirror and flexes his bicep. The Roman numerals that are inked there now have a pair of angel wings beside them. He'd first noticed them a few days after he lost you. He knows that you had to have put them there as a way to make good on your promise to always be with him. He smiled as he traced them.

Bradley doesn't remember what people said about you at your service. It all passed in a blur. He'd written a speech but doesn't remember giving it. He was, and still is on auto pilot.

The realization of everything doesn't hit him until he is walking up to the empty golden oak casket that Maverick helped him pick out and pounding his his wings into it that this is happening.

As the gun salute rings out and jets fly overhead, he feels his heart shattering like a red wine glass over a white table cloth.

After the service, people disburse, but Bradley takes a seat on the freshly broken Earth and stares at the granite stone that reads your name. He stays there for hours, unmoving even as the sun begins to fade, and the first few leaves off autumn drop from the trees and collect on him like dust.

It's only when Maverick and the rest of the Daggers come back at sundown that they are able to coax him away from your grave.

Bradley gets dressed and leaves his hotel room early the next morning, getting to the cemetery just as the sun is coming up. He just wants to be alone. He hopes that maybe in the peace and quiet, he'll be able to feel your presence.

.............

Despite being away from the Underworld so long, you were able to fall back into your routine as queen quickly. It helped keep your mind busy and thoughts occupied. If you were left to your own devices for too long, your mind wandered back to Bradley, and you'd cry so hard that you'd make yourself sick. Honestly, you felt sick most of the time since you'd been back. You chalked up to a broken heart.

Minthe and Hecate encourage you to go visit Bradley's parents in their piece of Paradise, but you were afraid. What if they didn't know who you were or didn't like you?

Right now, it didn't matter. You had to put those thoughts on the back burner because you had a meeting with the Council of Fates. You'd donned a simple but regal black dress and were sitting at the head of a long mahogany table. When Théama, the leader of the Council, walked in with the rest of the Fates in tow.

"Greetings, Majesty." Théama curtsied to you before shaking your hand. "I believe you know the rest of the Council members, but I would like to introduce you to my younger sister, Mantisa. She has just come into her gift of sight.

A younger girl who looked just like Théama curtsied to you before extending her hand to shake yours. The moment her hand touched yours, her head snapped back, and her body froze. Everyone stood still until Mantisa came around.

"Sister, what did you see?" Théama asked her.

"Pardon my ignorance Majesty, all of ours really. We were not aware congratulations were in order." Mantisa spoke.

"What do you mean?" You asked the young Fate with a puzzled look.

"Oh, forgive me. Are you unaware, my lady?" Mantisa asks you. "Unaware of what?" You say, a tad harsh.

"That you are with child." Mantisa says with a smile. You feel your eye twitch before you reach forward and grab her roughly by the arm.

"What did you say?" You grit out. You nails dig into her flesh. "You are with child, my lady. I saw it in my vision." Mantisa trembles out.

"How dare you say that. I have not laid with my husband in weeks. I died before being restored, plugged into the ocean from a tall cliff, and drowned. No babe, could have survived that. The words you have spoken are treason, and I could have your tongue, or better yet, your head for it." Your voice is laced with venom.

"Majesty, please. Mantisa has just received her gift. She does not know how to interpret her visions yet. She is just a girl. Please. Mantisa, take it back!" Théama begs.

"No, I'm not wrong. I saw it. I saw you with a babe. Please, Majesty. Take my hand. Please let me show you." Mantisa pleads. You battle with yourself before deciding to humor her.

"Fine. Prove yourself." You say as you let her go.

Mantisa takes your hand and places it on your stomach and puts her over your own. "Close your eyes, take a deep breath, and feel." Mantisa encourages you.

So you do.

You close your eyes and relax. You think of Bradley and the happy times you spent together. The warmth and the love that he made you feel. And suddenly, you feel it. It's no more than a flutter, but it's there. The beat of a heart that isn't your own.

You gasp as a golden light surrounds you before wrapping around your hand and lighting up your tether, restoring it.

"My gods." You whisper as tears streak your face. "But how?"

"Demigod children are resilient, that have had to be." Minthe tells you as she hugs you.

"You daughter is perfect. She will grow to be a strong and healthy princess and a wise queen." Mantisa tells you.

"Daughter?" You say. "Yes. A daughter. Strong like her mother and father." She smiles at you.

"Thank you." You tell her. "Thank you for this gift. Forgive me for my behavior. I—" you trail off. "You are forgiven. I could not imagine what you have been through." Mantisa says as she hugs you. You and the Fates decide to meet again at a later date. You have something more important to do.

...............

You rocked nervously on your heels as you stood on the porch of the small farmhouse that looked exactly like the one from the photos Bradley had shown you.

After visiting with the royal healers, you found that you were around ten weeks pregnant. Once you realized it, it explained much of your sickness and feelings. You only wish you had a way to tell Bradley. But now that you tether was restored, maybe you could find one.

For now, though, you wanted to tell his parents. So, you changed into a simple black sundress and picked a bouquet of poppies and sunflowers.

You took a deep breath before knocking on their door. You could hear footsteps as you stood there waiting, going over the speech you prepared in your head again.

But the moment the door opened, and you saw Carole Bradshaw standing there, just as beautiful as she was in all the pictures you'd seen of her, you froze.

"Well, hello there." She said to you warmly.

You opened your mouth to speak, but no words came out. Carole stood there, waiting patiently with a bright smile on her face.

"I—" you choked out. "I'm sorry—I should go." You say quickly, taking a step back. But before you can leave, Carole places a gentle hand on your arm.

"Nonsense. Please, come in. Goose and I have been so eager to meet you, Sweet Girl." Carole smiles as she guides you through the door.

"You—you know who I am?" You ask her. "Of course I do. Goose and I check on Bradley every day. And did you think I wouldn't recognize my own ring?" She asks you. "Oh." You say shyly.

Carole leads you into the living room that is filled with pictures that you know well. She offers you a seat and you offer her the flowers.

She takes them and calls into the kitchen. "Goose!"

"That's me, Honey!" A male voice calls back. "Get me a vase with some water and start some coffee. Our daughter-in-law is here for a visit!" Carole calls back to him as she walks in the kitchen.

A few minutes later, Carole comes back with coffee, and Goose follows behind her with a tray of sweets. You're stunned at just how much Bradley favors his father. It's uncanny.

"Bradley looks so much like you." You blurt out before you can even think. Goose laughs. "What a shame. I was hoping he would get his mama's beauty." Goose laughs. "Goose, you and I both know how handsome he is." Carole playfully pushes him.

You stand up to shake their hands. "Now, Hades," Goose begins, "we are family, and families hug, Sweet Girl." He says to you before wrapping his arms around you. Carole joins him, and for a minute, everything feels normal.

It feels like home.

You spend all evening with Goose and Carole. They tell you stories about Bradley's childhood, and you tell them about how he is now. Carole makes dinner, and you eat with them, and it makes you feel so warm inside. You only wish Bradley were here. If you could travel to Earth, you could bring him here. Yet another thing Zeus had taken from you.

It's late in the evening when you tell them you have to leave. They offer you their extra room to sleep over, but you decline.

"Before I leave, there is one thing I wanted to tell you. It's the reason I came in the first place, actually." You say.

"What is it, Sweet Girl?" Carole asks you.

"You're going to be grandparents." You tell them. Cries of joy leave their mouths as they hug you tighly.

"Does—does Bradley know?" Goose asks you. You hang your head. "No, I found out today, and with everything I've told you, you know I can't go to Earth and tell him or bring him here. But I'm not going to give up. Bradley is going to meet his daughter." You say.

"Daughter?" Carole smiles. "Yes, daughter." You confirm. "How wonderful. Hades, you are smart. I know you'll figure something out. And we are here if you need us for anything." Carole reassures you. You hug her and Goose once more before traveling back to your palace.

It's late once you get back. You fall asleep almost as soon as your head hits your pillows. You find sleep easy for the first time since you'd returned. You were content to drift off and dream about you and Bradley and your daughter. But hours later, Minthe and Hecate burst into your room.

"My lady! My lady!" They shout, rousing you from your slumber. "What? What is it?" You ask, still groggy.

"My lady, the guards have reported a disturbance at the palace gate. You must come quickly." Minthe tells you.

You jolt up out of bed and wrap yourself in a long, flowing black robe. You run down the hall and down the stairs and through the castle until you burst out the doors. You make your way through the courtyard and through the crowd that has gathered at the palace gate.

You don't believe your eyes when you see what—well who is there. You blink a few times and a pinch yourself to make sure you are awake. Sure enough, you are. Your heart rate quickens, and your palms sweat. You place a protective hand on your stomach before opening your mouth and speaking.

"Bradley?"

...........................................

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#cherrycola27 #top gun maverick #top gun #bradley rooster bradshaw #rooster bradshaw #bradley bradshaw #rooster top gun #tgm #rooster smut #bradley bradshaw fic #bradley bradshaw x reader #bradley bradshaw smut #tgm fic #tgm fanfiction #tgm 2 #false god #Spotify

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catbread0 · 4 months ago

Note

Can you please do a (2007 mononoke) medicine seller x onmyoji reader fluff headcanon

Kusuriuri (2007) x Fem! Onmyoji! Reader

I'm not sure if you meant the anime Onmyoji, but that's what I based the reader a bit on. I'm sorry if that's not what you meant. Hope you enjoy reading!

ヾ(≧∇≦)ゞ

Words: 1000

Fluff

Mononoke (2007) Masterlist

Fox Couple

How you two met:

Lady (L/n) (Y/n), an Onmyoji who is half human and half fox. Because of that, you were called a lowly fox-child.

You’ve dealt with and exercised many supernatural spirits within your lifetime, living for multiple centuries now. You’ve lived in your enormous mansion all by yourself for as long as you can remember. Sure you’ve summoned Shikis, but they weren't real people. Their true identity came from the flowers from your garden.

It was during the Edo period in Japan. Since you were an Onmyoji, you've stayed in the capital of Japan, Kyoto, where the Emperor resided.

Your Emperor had called upon you to dispose of what was making boats get wrecked, and to finally put a stop to what was taking the people's lives in the Sea of Ayakashi.

You went on your quest to fulfill the Emperor's orders. You first rode a boat to Niijima. You had spent a few days to see if there were any leads to the cause but found nothing. Until, you overheard that the Sea of Ayakashi was in the Dragon's Triangle, which included Niijima, Nojimazaki, and an uncultivated island. There was your lead. However, no one wanted to enter the area, afraid of being killed by Ayakashi.

You were about to go back to Kyoto without being able to exercise the Ayakashi. That's until when you saw a strange man, or should I say fox, board what looked to be a red seal ship, but it was changed to be something else. You saw that he had fox features just like you, and you could tell since you are a fox. You quickly boarded the ship the ‘man’ had gone onto.

You knew that if a kitsune was to board a ship, it could be possible that something would happen, and they would need to be there to ward off evil spirits. You paid the fee to the small-looking older man to enter the ship and for last-minute arrival.

You and the rest of the people on the ship introduced themselves. You realized the fox-looking man was Kusuriuri, meaning medicine seller. He didn't have a name.

You found yourself staring at Kusuriuri’’s fox-like features. He would feel your stare and stare back at you. You two would stare at each other before you decided to walk towards him.

“You're not a human, isn't that right, cunning fox?”, you smirk as you point him out.

“You may be correct. But aren't you half a fox? That doesn't make you fully human either” He said in a monotone voice.

After everything was settled, the sea was no longer filled with curses of Ayakashi and Mononoke. You were returning to the Emperor, but not alone this time. Kusuriuri was walking beside you as you both arrived in Kyoto. You went inside to talk to the Emperor as Kusuriuri stayed outside.

You bowed and spoke, “Your majesty, I’m here to tell you that the Sea of Ayakashi has been dealt with. However, I want to request something.”

The Emperor was curious, since you have served the capital and the royals for centuries you’ve never requested something from him.

“What is your request?”

You were silent for a moment before finding your words, “I want to be granted permission to leave the capital and to be able to walk around Japan to continue to exorcize evil spirits.”

The Emperor answered, “For centuries you have been loyal to the capital, in reward I will grant your permission.”

Headcanons:

- After the Emperor granted your permission, you started your journey with Kusuriuri, not before explaining to your Shikis that you will be gone for a while and to take care of your mansion.

- After some time, you two would start a relationship with each other. When you and Kusuriuri would stay at an inn, you would sometimes poke his ears to see them twitch

“Don’t you have anything better to do?”

“Nope!”

- Sometimes you also play tricks on Kusuriuri. You and Kusuriuri were on a date, and you two were about to kiss when you suddenly switched places with a frog that was nearby.

“...Seriously? Again?” He would look at you with an annoyed face.

- You would teach and show Kusuriuri some of the things you were able to do and what you have studied to become an Onmyoji

- You had found his Shunga collection in his box after you saw him reading a book, and you were curious. You knew about the stories of Kitsune representing lust or seduction. But you were still upset with Kusuriuri having them and not being guilty of reading them in front of you.

“I’m sorry dear, but it’s interesting to look at.”

Oh, he pushed his luck right there….

- You would sometimes get jealous whenever someone blushes at Kusuriuri. When Kusuriuri sees your jealousy, he would tease you about it after the Mononoke was slayed.

“Don’t tell me you were jealous over another girl's crush on me.” He would smirk and tease you about it the whole day.

- Whenever you were mad at him, he would sometimes make the situation worse.

“If you keep scowling and being angered easily, no one would want to marry you.”

“Are you saying you won’t ever marry me!?!?!”

- Kusuriuri would like to catch you off guard by kissing you out of nowhere.

- After years of being together, you two would eventually have a Kitsune no Yomeiri. When he saw you, he felt as if he had fallen in love with you all over again.

“For the next centuries to come, I shall stay with you until we meet our fates, for that is my truth and vow to you, Tsuma.”

Shunga(1) - It's a book filled with pictures of adult stuff…

Kitsune no Yomeiri(2) - The fox’s wedding

Tsuma(3) - Wife (Yes, I know Okusan means wife as well, but it says Okusan refers to someone else’s wife, while Tsuma refers to their own wife. Please tell me if I’m wrong.)

~Lilly's

#kusuriuri #mononoke 2007 #mononoke kusuriuri #x reader #character x reader #fluff #x female reader #headcanon #mononoke #medicine seller

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bu-blegh-ost · 1 year ago

Text

What Chip's current condition may possibly mean for both him and the crew (a theory of sorts)

Spoilers for ep. 109 and 110. Heed the warning.

Okay, so ever since ep. 109 came out I've been frantically reading about undead and what does it mean for your pc to be undead. I stayed silent about it, cause I wasn't sure if Nik could fix this, but now that ep. 110 is out I'd like to share some of the things I found, for folks like me, who do not know much abt DnD yet.

So, in a long list of features the undead have, most prominent problem is how hard it is to heal them. None of Jay's or Gillion's spells can heal Chip now, we'd need a spell that normally damages people, like necromancy spells, since they have a reverse efffect on the undead, and none of them has access to that currently. Not only that, once Chip's health reaches zero at this state, that's it. No death saves, no going unconscious or going down. That's it, which is why the moment he turned undead, Jay started spamming the temporary HP canon. So Chip doesn't lose any of his core health pool. If he did die in this state, from then on, only a spell called Wish (if I'm not mistaken a lvl 9 Sorcerer wish, so Gillion could do that if he cranked up three more levels in sorcery real quick) or True Ressurection could save him. But these two spells would also bring Chip back to life as a regular person, not the undead, so it would be cool to seek out someone who could do that for them at the most convenient time.

To balance it out, Chip is resistant to a shit ton of attack types, including poison, physical, necrotic and many other. To top it off with Chip's evasion skills, I'm giving him good chances to either minimalize or negate most damage in this form. And well, considering everything, he'd be wise to take every opportunity to do so, joke damage taking is no longer an option, I think. Also Gillion needs to be very careful with radiant damage around Chip, cause it's very effective on the undead. Chip getting hit by Gillion's strike may damage him greatly, and the two need to be very careful around each other from now on :(((

And the most interesting thing I found is the Undead Hunger variant. Some undead can just live on for centuries and be fine without a need to feed on something. But some, even the intelligent ones like Chip, may need a bit more than that, and given that very ominous intelligence check Grizzly made him roll at the end of the day, I'm thinking he's implementing the hunger rule on Chip. Lemme tell you a bit about it.

So Undead Hunger is a Variant Rule that DMs use on player characters that are undead sometimes. And that means that once in a while Chip would have to feed on some sort of specific type of morsel to satisfy his craving, or suffer the cosequences. There are two variants of undead that can make roll for this: Inescapable Craving or Diet Dependent. The player in that case rolls for willpower, which DMs usually make a wisdom or intelligence check. In our case Grizzly chose intelligence, and Chip passed with a 19. The DC for Inescapably Craving Undead is 25, but the DC for Diet Dependent Undead is 15. So from that I deduced that Chip would be a Diet Dependent Undead, since he passed the roll.

Hunger for the Undead is like addiction to the living. This means that unless Chip can resist it with a succesful roll, he may become more agressive, anxious, violent or even self-destructive the longer he is denied a preferred meal. If he can't eat, he'll have to roll for keeping himself at bay every three days. He doesn't have to roll if he eats.

So you may ask now: what happens if he fails one to many times? This is the interesting part. So if Chip fails his once per three days intelligence check, the DM will make him take ability damage. That means that one of his stats (wisdom, strength, dexterity etc.) will reduce by a whatever number Grizzly sees fit (Chip can get all the lost points back the moment he eats). In the guide I've read it says that wisdom is the most crucial ability score to lose, tho I'm unsure if the DM takes away only from wisdom or if he can take any of the stats, I may need to read more on that. But the thing is, the more rolls Chip fails, the more wisdom he may loose, and please note, Chip does not have much wisdom to begin with (but he does have high intelligence so thank the gods for that at least).

The less wisdom Chip has, the more desperate he gets when it comes to eating. He may start seeking out more risky ways to get fed or do things he normally wouldn't to get it. Hunger can't kill him though, it may just make him lose himself (hence that comment of Grizzly's about him needing to hold onto his sense of self, at least that's what I think that is). Once Chip reaches wisdom score 0, Bizzly actually loses control over him, and Grizzly takes over Chip and he plays Chip as he was a wild enemy beast. In that state Chip can throw himself on anyone or anything that can provide him food, his mind completely lost. He can hurt others, attack his crew. He can do anything the DM determines a starved mindless beast would do.

He can come back to his senses once more, when he does feed on whatever is decided his preferred meal is, all his wisdom regained and all, but the consequences of his actions, when he was not himself, the dreadful realisation that he is now a monster, who needs to be kept in check so he doesn't hurt the people he loves...This may be a lot for Chip to take. If this were to happen, he'll need a lot of his crewmates' support and reassurance, and a lot of honesty will be demanded from Chip. He'd have to warn people around him and make sure everyone knows how he's feeling, if he needs help in finding food. Casue hiding this hunger may result in tragedy.

And of course, it doesn't help that they are where they are now. In any case, if Grizz decides that Chip's favourite meal is humanoid flesh (beyond cruel is what that would be), they are fucked, basically. If it is the flesh of any other creature or animal, well they are also fucked, because they are in a motherfucking Black Sea, so good luck finding anything consumable like this either way.

But hey, of course do remeber that in the end these are just my conclusions based on what I read. Grizzly might not be even using any of these rules, cause he's the DM and he can do whatever he wants. I just thought that based on what we saw, this is very likely to happen (consider it a theory of mine for the time being). If you would like to read more about it, I'll leave you the link to this one really good website that I found most of the information on. I can't confirm its relaibility, but it looks very informative, comprehensive and thought out, and thus far was the most thorough source I found, so I'm personally willing to trust it. But please do find out for yourself. That'll be it, see you and I hope you had fun reading!

Link to the website: https://www.realmshelps.net/monsters/aboutundead.shtml#undeadhunger

UPDATE!!!!!!!!!!!

Tags written out by the wonderful @dinzeeyz !!! They explained here what is ACTUALLY happening to Chip, not a theory, facts from the boys themselves! Please make sure to read them!!!

Well, there it is folks! Of course, I do not mind that I was wrong! The fun part in theorizing is not being right or wrong, but the journey one takes to find out the truth! And the truth is SO much more horrifying than I could ever think! You see, I was kinda thinking abt ways for Chip to still function while undead, but there is NO FUNCTIONING WHATSOEVER APPARENTLY. Grizzly's not playing, and the prospect of losing Chip forever is real oh dear OMG, that's absolutely insane!!! Please feel welcome to discuss this, I'll be definitely making more posts about this once I have a little more time but holy shit guys. We need to fix that boy up F A S T. If we lose Chip, I'm not recovering-

#jrwi riptide #just roll with it #chip jrwi #gillion jrwi #jrwi #theory #undead #jrwi spoilers #spoilers #jrwi riptide spoilers #GUYS GUYS GUYS #this theory has already been disproven by rolled and THE TRUTH IS EVEN CRAZIER #pls check out the update #https://www.tumblr.com/bu-blegh-ost/730136739405086720/tags-written-out-by-the-wonderful-dinzeeyz?source=share

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tadpolesonalgae · 1 year ago

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Vampire!Poly-batboys x reader: Mercy, Devil - Part 2

A/N: The poly part two to the vampire fic is here! Hope you enjoy!!

Warning: Vampirism, poly!batboys, blood, biting

Word Count: 4,154

-Part 1- -Part 3-

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Thunder rolls across the perpetually stormy sky, his castle seemingly gifted with its own unique weather system. Rain lashes at the windows, criss-crossed with diamond-shaped indentations upon the glass, streaked with icy water. Lightning cracks across the dark, heavy clouds, flashing with startling light, briefly illuminating the chambers you’ve been returned to.

You swallow heavily, rousing from an empty sleep, fatigue weighing on bone marrow as you push up from the bed. The pearls have gone, replaced by a pale blue nightgown and memories of the evening you stumbled into the castle return. Right into the beast’s jaws.

Fingers trace over your throat, pockmarked with tiny puncture wounds, skin aching around the slightly swollen marks. Memories of the fear and alarm upon feeling those gleaming incisors skating across your neck rush in, the overpowering strength of his hands on your body, shoving your head to the side so he could drink deeper. The hot spill of blood as it dripped down over collar bones, the mad frenzy in previously sharp and clear eyes. He’d seemed utterly undone, at the mercy of his own hunger as he’d fed.

Your pulse spikes in your chest, fear diluting in your lifestream, breathing deepening as you hastily peer around the room. Searching for something that could possibly help keep the beast off of you. It’s a stupid thought, you know that—why would he have the means to his demise so readily available? In his own home, no less. That would be idiotic.

“Sleep well?” A low, silken voice asks, making you scream, flinching back as you snap your head to the doorway. He’d entered on completely silent feet—the door hadn’t even made a sound. “Now, now. There’s no need for that,” he chides soothingly, “you’re alive and well. No need for theatrics.” But your nails are practically tearing at the sheets with how tight you’re gripping them. Something like him—something that drinks the blood of women, relishing in draining away their youth—can be nothing but pure evil. Hell incarnate.

“Stay away from me,” you grit out lowly, back pressed against the plush cushioning of the headboard. “You have no power over me. Let me leave.”

He’s quiet for a moment, watching you intently, before lowering his head, a mix between a sigh and a laugh huffing from his lips. Raises gleaming violet to pierce into you, as if able to pin you to the bed with a glance alone. “I’m afraid I won’t be doing that,” he says amicably, still in that velvety voice of his, like satin brushing teasingly across your skin. “You see, little devil, I have lived centuries in this world. Travelled far and wide, sampled a number of women and men alike, and yet I’ve never once come across a taste quite as exquisite as yours.” Protectively, you raise your palm to your throat, as if blocking the skin from his view may serve a chance for freedom—or undo what he’s already found.

“Because of that,” he continues leisurely, as if he hasn’t turned your life upside down within the span of a breath. “I will be keeping you for myself, here, in my castle. Is everything clear?” You blink, dread sluicing through your veins.

“I’m not— You can’t do that.” You splutter quietly, incredulity and fear drenching your tone in horror. “I’m a living person. You can’t just lock me up. That’s— That’s wrong.” You manage to whisper, too shocked to bellow.

“You don’t have a choice here. Well, not one you’d like,” he muses idly, hands sliding into the pockets of his dark, tailored trousers. “What is it?” You grit out anyway, attempting to conceal your trembling fingers.

The charming smile fades from his elegant mouth, slipping into something blank and unreadable. “Either, you can agree to my generous offer and remain mine in this castle,” he says, voice turning to freezing silk, prowling toward you in the low thunderous light. “Or, I can take my final drink now, and let you pass on into the next world—or rather, into the next half world.” He reaches the edge of the bed, but you’re too terrified to move.

Even as he pulls his hand from the neatly stitched pocket of his dark trousers, you remain still. Petrified, until his icy hand settles on your throat, thumb and index finger pressing to the soft sides beneath your jaw, tilting your head to him. “You should know: I would not be kind if you forced me to turn you,” he murmurs tenderly, leaning over the bed, bracing his forearm against the headboard. “You are quite to my tastes,” he says softly, lowly, “I would hate to see you become a servant, instead of what you could be.”

“And what is that?” You manage to ask shakily, forcefully pushing yourself as deep into the headboard as you can.

Glittering violet briefly scans your features, then the edges of his mouth are curving, dipping down to nose at your throat. Sharp, piercing teeth graze the shell of your ear. “Cared for,” he answers, cold lips brushing the erogenous skin, fingers flexing around your neck. “Desired,” he murmurs softly, dipping lower, skimming the erratic pulse of your life force. “Cherished.”

Incisors scrape, and you flinch, muscles contracting with fear.

He pulls back, staring down at you from not even a breath away.

“So, my dear,” he muses, “what will it be?”

You stare at him, eyes widened, pupils no-doubt dilated with fear. You swallow thickly, overwhelmed by the intensity of him, the heaviness of his presence, the dominating sense of self rolling from his powerful figure. Pulse spikes with the thought him ending your life—would the rightness of thwarting him be worth an eternity of obeying his word? At the mercy of his absolute power?

“You wouldn’t ever taste my blood again if you turned me,” you rasp, trying to force the tremors from your voice. “You’d lose the exact thing you’re trying to gain.” Sharp eyes flash, his jaw working at your brazen answer. “Are you sure you want to test that, little devil?” He asks, voice rougher than before, anger and hunger kindling in his eyes. “I’m offering you a life of comfort and care in exchange for your compliance. Anyone can see you’re gaining much more than I am out of this agreement.”

“Which is exactly why I know you won’t turn me,” you return shakily. “Why give so much for something so unimportant, right?”

A muscle feathers in his jaw, then he’s pushing away from you roughly. “You’re being foolish,” he warns, eyes glittering with hunger. “Maybe I won’t turn you, but I believe you’re somehow forgetting I don’t need your permission to take what I want.” His fingers flex at his sides, shoulders rolling subtly before he’s sliding hands into his pockets. As if to calm the urge to pin you down and drink.

You stiffen in your place. Reconsidering his offer. If you refuse, but he decides to take anyway, where will you be kept? In some subterranean dungeon, left to lie and rot on a damp pallet of hay? Locked in some long-forgotten room, only allowed out when he wants to feed?

Rhysand senses your doubt, honing in on it like the beast he is, able to smell the indecision. “Think about it,” he says calmly, earlier hunger banished, not a trace to be found. “I have some visitors to see to, but will be back this evening for your answer,” he smiles politely, turning for the door but pausing at the threshold. “If you need a reminder of what it feels like…” You could swear his eyes darken with glee at the way your muscles contract, legs pressing together as you remain huddled to the head of the bed.

“Until tonight, then,” he grins, gleaming white teeth glittering in the low light. The door sweeps to a close behind him, leaving you alone with a choice to make. A sense of impending doom weighing in your blood.

————

You have to get out. It’s the only viable solution.

You don’t want to be stuck as a glorified chicken for the rest of your life—used until you’ve grown too old, then devoured entirely. You have no preferable choice, so you’ll have to make your own, and escaping seems like a pretty good idea.

Easing down a breath, you swing your legs over the edge of the bed, the pale blue cotton of your nightgown swishing softly at bare ankles. Peering around the room, you search for anything that could be used as a weapon against a…whatever he is. Some blood-sucking devil.

The neatly preserved figure of gleaming armour catches your gaze—if a weapon is to be lying about somewhere, surely it would be here? With a spark of hope in your chest, you creep forward on what you hope are quiet feet. Not that you should be too concerned. Despite how silently he can move, the castle seemed intimidating in size, and you doubt he’d be able to pick up footsteps from so much as a corridor away.

Your pulse spikes as you eye the short scabbard wrapped over the waist of the armour, slightly shaky fingers pulling on the string to move it around. There’s a handle poking from it’s top, and your heart stumbles in your chest. With trembling hands, you pull the string loose, tying it instead around your own waist, thumbing the blade free experimentally. It’s so clear you can make out the gleaming wetness to wide, frightened eyes.

Breathing deeply, you return the blade to its new home at your hip, tip-toeing for the door, hoping he will have left it unlocked. Underestimating your drive to keep your own pathing. You will not have choice taken away from you.

The handle turns, and the door swings open on well-oiled hinges.

A cool wave of relief sweeps over you, pulling it open to peer down the long, stretching hallways either side. Nothing out-of-the-ordinary to be found. Except maybe the blood-red carpeting. You should have realised how strange it was, how macabre the whole setup is. Maybe it’s a lovely colour, but not one you slather your entire house in, let alone a whole castle.

Shaking your head, you slip out over the threshold, silently bringing the door to a close at your back, before making your way down the stretching hallway. You move silently, keeping to the edges of the carpeted floor—as if you’d be able to hide from him. In the pale gown, you stick out like freezing blue lips in a rose garden.

Following the path he had taken you to dinner, you manage to relocate the entrance hall, heart beating wildly in your chest, eyes darting left and right frenetically, searching for movement. It’s an open stretch. Once you’re out there, you’ll have to go straight for the door. There’s nowhere to hide yourself once you step out into the hallway.

You take in a steady breath, then step out into the open.

Silently, you make your way as swiftly as possible down the curving case, feet padding softly along the well-polished boards, trying to keep sound to a minimum. The heavy-looking door looms before you, menacingly staring as you approach. Hairs raise at the nape of your neck, but you push away the apprehension, hands shaking as you reach for the knob.

It doesn’t shift.

You try pulling, but nothing.

You twist it harder, using both your hands, but to no avail.

Mentally you curse—you’d hoped it would be unlocked like last time. He’s seemingly taken some precautions, then. You’ll need to find another way out, or maybe the keys… Where would keys be?

They could be anywhere, you realise despairingly, and in a castle this large, you don’t have the time to spend painstakingly searching for them. You’ll have to find another exit. Every home has a backdoor, there must at least be one for the servants he mentioned—there’s no way they’d be allowed entrance through this hall.

“Who are you?”

You scream, jolting away from the voice, turning to find a man at your side—he’d been completely silent, just like Rhysand. You stumble back, hands shaking at your sides as you take in his towering figure. Wearing dark leather, surrounded by the glowing red of the castle, he cuts a terrifying silhouette. With black hair that come to his shoulders, and the eyes that feel like they can pierce straight through bone, you can feel in your blood he’s the same creature as the Lord.

The blade at your hip weighs heavily, but you know from a single look there’s no way you’d be able to do anything with it. You’re more likely to end up slicing yourself open, dripping over the blood-red carpet.

His lips part in an almost wolfish grin as he takes you in properly. “Oh, I see,” he drawls, stepping closer. “You’re one of Rhys’, aren’t you?”

“Please…” you breathe, heat building behind your eyes. “I don’t—…I just want to leave…” Lungs spasm with fear, and his nostrils flare delicately, before taking a step back. The man raises his arms placatingly, exposing his palms in a sign of peace. “I’m not stopping you,” he says lowly, still baring his teeth in a smile.

Your tongue swipes out to wet your lips, staggering a step back hesitantly, then another. Never taking your eyes from his hulking figure.

Your muscles involuntarily contract with soul-deep fear as a blood-curdling snarl rips through the castle’s interiors. A wave of bone-crushing terror smacks into you, like a flash of lightening followed by the roll of thunder as something dark pulses through the building. The man’s smile widens at the sound, turning a little feral. “Better be on your way,” he warns roughly, voice like gravel. “Before the beast catches you.”

Heart pounding, you spin on your feet and run.

You could swear his low chuckle follows on your heels as you sprint from the room, nearly stumbling over your own toes as you pass over carpets and rugs, running through doorways and dodging around rich, plush armchairs and large, heavy instruments. Fire crackles in one room but you have no time for pause, feeling that power closing in no matter how far you run.

Feet slam on the polished wood of floorboards, and you spot an open door down the stretching corridor. Without care for noise, you dart inside, snapping the door to a close, hurriedly taking in your surroundings—it’s a frighteningly large library. Cases of books tower on wide-set shelves, neatly stacked but tightly packed, perfect to hide within.

Not giving it a second thought, you make for the towering furniture, darting between the aisles as quickly and as quietly as possible, keeping your eyes wide for any sign of movement. If you can just wait until you feel this cloying power pass, you can try venturing out again.

You think back over the conversation which must have been in the morning if he said he would return at night. He’d said he’d had guests to see to—that man must have been one of them, but how many are there? Are they all like him? They must be. Unless they bring humans along with them? What if there are more beasts prowling the halls for you now that signal has practically shot lightening into anything capable of breathing within the castle?

“You aren’t supposed to be in here.”

Muscles go taut, stomach tightening as cold dread ices your skin.

You turn rigidly on your heel, coming to face another man, wreathed in darkness. Silky hair gleamed in the low library light, his sharp hazel eyes pinning you to the spot with a single look. You shake your head, managing a single wobbly steps back, before he’s slowly prowling forward, gaze trained on you like he’s finally locked in on his prey.

Turning, you stumble away, running back through the tall cases, now understanding their disadvantage. He can’t see you, but you also can’t see him. Fighting your growing terror, you break from the shelves, running toward a door that will no doubt only lead you deeper into the castle, separate from the one you came in from. But he appears before you in a blur of shadow, and you smack into the stone-like muscle of his chest—utterly freezing, utterly lifeless. Death wreathed in darkness.

You still in your spot, staring up into sharp, predatory eyes with visible terror, vaguely remembering the blade at your hip.

“What are you doing here?” He asks lowly, hands kept casually at his sides, but you don’t doubt he could strike at any moment should the desire take him. “I— Please,” you beg, internally screaming for your body to move, to turn and run from the beast before you clad in the skin of an angel. “Just let me go,” you breathe shakily, stumbling back.

The man watches you silently, coldly. “You know that’s not going to happen,” he says shortly, “either you can obey and I’ll escort you back to your room, or you can make this painful.” Your eyes widen, pressure building quickly, the blade practically searing into your skin. If you comply, you’ll probably be locked up. You’ll never escape, and choice will have been taken from you. But if you fight… Even against something as terrifying as him… It will be on your own terms.

But you’re not a fighter—at least, not in the face of this particular beast. The best you can do it run.

You spin on your heel, turning for the door, but a stone-cold hand has already gripped your shoulder and you cry out in pain. His hold is like ice, stern and unforgiving. “Fine,” he mutters, making to—

“Hold on, Az,” that voice drawls, pure terror slicing through your stomach.

One was impossible enough, but two? There’s no way. You’re going to die.

The man—Az, he’d said—stops, his grip lightening by a fraction. “She’s Rhys’, Cass. We should return her.” Muscle trembles beneath his grip, neck craning to turn to spot the other man at your back, having come in through the hallway. He shrugs nonchalantly, as if the warning gleam in the shadowy one’s eyes doesn’t bother him. “That’s his fault for letting her out,” he drawls, coming to stand closer behind you. Too close.

His hazel eyes drop to yours, that wolfish smile breaking across his lips. “Besides,” he says lowly, “you know he only keeps the good ones around for more than one meal.” The man—Cass—steps closer, hands going to your waist as he lowers to your throat, pulse spiking as he noses along the smooth expanse. “This is it,” he mumbles, lips brushing your skin. “This is what I picked up, Az. She smells so good.” He pulls away, pulling your hair to the side, exposing the bare top of your shoulder and you tense, remembering how little clothing you’re wearing. How unprotective it is. “Go on,” he urges quietly, “give her a try.”

Az narrows his eyes, but relents, curiosity getting the better of him. Spine turns rigid as he dips down, nosing along the column of your throat, feeling the trembling pulse of your life-force beneath his mouth. You hear the sound of him inhaling, scenting your skin, before pulling away. “See?” The man at your back drawls. “I’ve got a good nose for these things. I told you I smelled something delicious.”

“Rhys has good taste,” the other answers flatly, “unlike some people, Cassian.” Still, his eyes remain on your throat for a little too long for your comfort.

Cassian doesn’t seem bothered by the jab, instead raising one of his hands from your hip to trace along the stuttering pulse of your heart, grazing down your neck. “I bet she tastes good,” he murmurs, and you can feel the weight of his gaze alone, hairs prickling beneath its intensity. “Cass,” the man at your front warns, voice low and cold. “She’s Rhys’. He won’t like it if you decide to put your grubby teeth all over her.”

Cassian pays him no mind, and Az’s grip on you tightens, pulling you toward him, aiming to distract the other. “When was the last time you drank?” He asks distastefully. Cassian shrugs again, “I assumed Rhys would provide a meal, and since he has such good taste,” he says pointedly, “I thought I’d enjoy myself.”

Another beastly snarl rips through the halls of the castle, and Cassian muffles a low chuckle. The man before doesn’t seem to find it as funny, the shadows at his back darkening. “What did you do this time, Az?” The man asks, lips curved with mirth.

“You’re the one who said you wanted to slip away,” Az hisses in a flash of canines. That deadly thrum of power intensifies, and you realise it must mean Rhysand is approaching. Whatever Az had done, the illusion’s over. It feels like he’s already right outside the door.

“Are you going to drink, or not?” Cassian asks, rough fingers slipping beneath the neckline of your gown, thumbing at the soft buttons at your front, slowly un-popping them in order to move the fabric out of the way of his teeth. “I don’t want to share Rhys’ meal,” Az says, a note of distaste to his words.

“Why not? It wasn’t a problem a couple of centuries ago,” Cassian drawls, challenge in his tone. “What happened? Spend a few decades fawning over a woman and suddenly all taste for adventure’s gone?” He scoffs, the taunt clear in his deep voice. “You’ve lost your touch, brother. You’re getting soft.”

A warning snarl drags from the other man’s throat, hazel eyes flicking to the door.

But Cassian sees his chance, head dipping down, incisors piercing your throat, biting down and spilling blood. Your lips part in a scream, paralysed as his venom enters your body, making your limbs feel heavy and clunky.

“Cassian,” Az hisses roughly, forcefully ripping him from you. Pain stings through your shoulder and collar bones, the only thing keeping you up being the hand at your hip and the chest at your front. Pressure wells behind your eyes at the ache, blood trickling down your skin. “What’s gotten into you? One scent catches your attention and suddenly centuries of discipline dissolves?” He snarls lowly, aware of the pulsing power that’s filling the room.

Cassian’s silent, but you can feel his body begin to tremble at your back. Fear drenches your skin as his grip tightens on you with the same display of inhumane strength Rhys had shown after his initial bite. Weakly you try to press closer to the man before you, but his attention is now trained on the blood beading at your throat, the puncture wounds already sealing over.

Terrifying hunger fills the dark hazel of his eyes, and you want to shrink away.

“You’ve got to try her, Az,” Cassian rasps at your back, voice low and strained. “Fuck, that’s the best I’ve ever had.” Wide eyes lock with hazel, silent and pleading. You’d take being returned to that room over this easily, no doubt in your mind.

The dark, raging power grows closer, reaching it’s peak. He’s right there.

Az’s lip curls back for a moment, but then he’s forcing the neckline of your gown over your shoulder, tearing at the lovely cotton in favour of piercing his canines into the softness of your neck. Your head tips back, falling into Cassian as your lips part in a soundless scream, rounding into a pained shape as he drinks, his own venom sinking into you.

Already dizziness is taking over you, but then Cassian is curving over you again, mouth parting, incisors sliding back into your skin with a now pleasurable pain. Arms go limp at your sides as their bloodlust wraps around you, completely overpowered by their hunger as hands grip and grope at your skin.

Tears push from your lashes, dripping down your cheeks as the ecstasy spins your mind, wickedly turning the pain into something soft and blissful. Making you want them to drink deeper, wanting to have their teeth in you, to put their hands across your body.

Darkness explodes through the room, rage blasting through the soft warmth of lust, pulling you from the jaws of vampiric seduction.

The world tilts a little as they pull away, but without the adrenaline of their venom you feel weak. Like you’re unable to go on.

The last thing you remember is the fierce grip on your hips, the possessive touch over your back and shoulders as icy violet brings the night to its crescendo.

Then everything explodes in glittering black.

——————————————————————————————————————————————

general taglist: @myheartfollower @tcris2020 @mali22 @amygdtjhddzvb @sfhsgrad-blog @needylilgal022 @hannzoaks

az taglist: @azrielshadows1nger @jurdanpotter @positivewitch @nightcourt-daydreaming @vanderlinde @marvelouslovely-barnes @v3lv3tf0x @kalulakunundrum @vellichor01

#poly!bat boys #poly!batboys x reader #poly!fic #vampire au #vampire!rhysand #vampire!azriel #vampire!cassian #mercy devil

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writeywritey-o3o · 7 months ago

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Double Trouble

Ascended Astarion fanfic

- Angsty, Reincarnation, beyond saving, tw:suicide

It had been centuries since Astarion and you ruled the world together as The Ascendent and his Favourite Consort.

It was nice, at first. Never having to go outside, never having to go hungry, and never fearing death. Astarion had given you all the riches he had promised, everything and anything you desired. Outfits, jewellery, sprawling palaces. You had it all, especially with your love always right beside you. Until he wasn’t.

More often than not, he would go out to run errands, or take over new lands. He would sometimes come back with 1 or more new spawns hanging on his arm, either for the two of you to use or feed on. As much as the unhappy feeling threatens to bubble up inside you when he ignores you for a menial task, you really couldn’t ask for anything more.

Sometimes you try your luck at asking him to make you a true vampire just like he is, but he always reassures you that there is no need to. Not when you had literally hundreds of servants at your beck and call for whatever you could possibly need. You would tell him how much you missed the sunlight on your face, and the hustle bustle of the city at midday. He usually scoffs and tells you that you aren’t missing much. That staying inside and twiddling away with your hobbies is the best you can do, and laments about how he wishes he could stay inside all day, that even though he can't be burned by the sun anymore, the sweltering heat it brings is barely a consolation prize.

It reached a point where he made sure every corridor of the sprawling palace you lived in had skylights that were unable to be closed. and had you shunned to one of the rooms during the day and would only come to you at night, almost like he was rubbing it in as to how you couldn’t even stand under the sky without assistance while he came and went as he pleased.

Slowly you grow tired. Traversing the palace with the help of one of your servants no longer became an issue because you never leave your room. He becomes impatient and demanding, throwing more luxuries at you to make you ‘go back to how you were’. You ignore everything until one day he catches you trying to open the blinds in daylight. He went insane and had you chained to the centre of the room. The chains were long enough for you to just barely reach the heavy drapes. He told you that since you wanted to act like a child then he would give you what you wanted, to never leave that room again.

You still had the servants, and the decadent meals, and the finest dresses and beds in all the land, but you weren’t happy. Every day seemed to go by in a blur, with him coming in at dusk to dine with you silently, and then again at dawn for more of the same.

Day by day the soft glow of sunlight around the drapes seemed more and more inviting. Everything could be over in one swoop, if you could just break these chains.

A shatter spell could do just fine.

But you weren’t a spell caster. You trained your whole life to be a heavy hitter, often killing enemies in a single blow. But ever since you became a spawn you’ve neglected your training, becoming weaker over the years. The cuffs on your wrist rub your skin raw, even through the plush and silk he had custom made to ‘not damage his perfect little spawn’.

You decided enough was enough and started to train in the hours he left you alone. You requested libraries worth of books from your servants, all kinds so as not to raise suspicion and began your work. He noticed the difference and yet the silence during meal times remained.

“Don't you want to know about my day?” he once asked.

You only replied with a bland repeat of his question, not even bothering to listen to his answer. That infuriated him. He pulled a dagger on you and threatened to cut your pretty throat open and bring you back just to show you how lucky and ungrateful you were being. When your reaction wasn’t up to par, he trashed your room and commanded a few spawn to clean up afterwards. You could hear the screams of the spawn suffering at his hands because of you the rest of the day.

Soon at long last the day had arrived. Your scroll had been scribed and all you had to do was use it. You had wanted to enact your plan at midday, quietly while he was out. But you realised the sound the spell made would attract people anyway, so you decided on a different plan.

In the few hours before he would come in at dawn you had grabbed the candelabra in the middle of the dining table you had in the room and set fire to anything and everything you could. Once you were certain people were taking notice, hearing their footsteps nearing the room, you stood as close to the window as you could, setting the spell off, breaking your chains and flinging open the drapes and the windows as the man himself burst through the doors. He paused at the sight of your room, burned and smokey, just barely making out your silhouette by the window. The first rays of the sun broke through the horizon as he ran through the fire to you.

For a moment, you saw the man you fell in love with in his eyes. Astarion. you whisper a final “I Love You” to that man as the sun catches on you. You revel in the pricking of your skin as you feel the sunlight for the first time in centuries, turning you to ash before blowing away into the wind.

He reached you just a second too late, touching your hand as you crumbled away, leaving only your dress and jewels behind.

______________________________________________________________________________

you reincarnated into someone else and you are on a quest to take down The Ascendant.

______________________________________________________________________________

When you opened your eyes for the first time again, you were in a raggedy old bathtub in a barn. Confused and wet. You don't remember anything from those formative years but you knew what mattered. You were loved.

When you were young, The Ascendant came and took over your town. It was fine at first, until people started going missing. Everyone started to live in fear of being the next one to be kidnapped. It wasn't like no one knew where the people had ended up, but no one wanted to find out either. There were a brave few, who ventured far to his palace on their own to take down The Ascendent, but they never returned.

You weren't born a cleric, or even to parents who were clerics. When you were 15 Jergal came to you in a dream. Appointing you his cleric, and honestly, you just went with it. Jergal was a mostly hands-off patron god, letting you learn whatever you please and bestowing you new powers to train up every now and then while you offered up prayers.

You tried to live quietly, keeping your head down and working your days away praying to Jergal and helping at your parents’ apothecary. You never let your anger spill out, not even to your patron god. It wasn't until one of your friend’s little brothers was taken before you lashed out. You and Your friends agreed to form a party and take him down. You prayed to Jergal, asking him for strength to carry this out. He gave you a blessing in the form of a dagger.

He was a tyrant, a psychopath. The Ascendant had ruled for long enough. With Jergal’s blessing, you and your party set out to train and take down the Ascendant’s forces slowly.

You and your party enter the city at which he resided after a long and gruelling journey, in his hilltop palace looking down on everyone. The city was grey and foggy in the early morning. You find a place to settle in for the night, taking a long, needed rest after your travels.

The next morning your party agrees to explore the city for supplies and take a few days to prepare before going in to finish your quest and free the world.

Around the city were many many statues of The Ascendant himself. Which was expected from a man with such a big ego, but other than that, there were many statues of a woman. Her eyes were soft and kind, her hair blowing eternally in the wind, she was dressed to the nines looking endlessly regal. Who was she? Your party members comment on the uncanny resemblance between the two of you, but you brush it off.

You and your party sneak into the Ascendant’s palace, snooping around to learn the layout. All of you enter from different places in pairs to cover more ground. You decided to sneak into the only open window, while the other half of your party members sneak in through the servants quarters.

The open window led to a room that seemed unfit for a palace. It was black and scorched, a big crater centred the room. Everything else was burned. You and your pair looked around. Where the crater was an ornate coffin, labelled with a scratched out name. Opening the coffin revealed a beautiful dress and jewels. It was probably the most expensive thing you’ve ever seen. Snooping around the rest of the room uncovered half burned letters and books. whoever lived here really wanted to learn how to scribe spell scrolls, and with the crater at the centre of the room, you knew what spell they were trying to scribe. Metal bits sprinkled the floor and the letters seemed to be addressed to what seemed to be a long lost lover.

Exiting the room, you see what you would more expect from a palace. Gleaming marble floors and columns. Portraits of the same beautiful woman you’d seen statues of all around the city. Some of them were even of the woman pictured next to The Ascendant himself.

Who was she?

The older portraits of them together pictured them smiling at each other. Were they in love? The portraits with newer frames looked sad. The Ascendant wasn't looking at her anymore, his face became more and more serious, and her expression followed in suit. The newest portrait you saw was the one in the foyer, once you made your way there. The man in the portrait looked like a ghost at this point. His skin was a sickly white, his eyes sunken in and red, his clothes were a dark red and black. This man seemed a far cry from the earlier paintings you saw. Even the last painting that showed him with the woman was at least a bit brighter than this. You skulked around the rest of the palace, killing spawns who witnessed your machinations and meeting up with the rest of your party.

When you made your way out of the palace, having mapped out the entire thing and learning where the best entrances and exits are, you decided to exit through the window you had entered. The others in your party snooped around the room a little, revealing a smaller frame covered by a leather cloth that seemed too new for the state of the room. It was a sketch. A sketch of The Ascendant and the woman. A caption was scrawled across the corner of the paper “To my dearest friends. Who could be more in love than them.”

In love.

The pair of them had been in love.

Now the letters made more sense. The lover was him. He had changed and his lover no longer recognised him. Someone made a comment about how he’d surely been the one to drive her away while all of you snuck out the window. There was a peculiar ache in your heart when you saw that picture, one that you couldn't put into words. It was almost like you were mourning, but over what?

You spent the rest of your preparation time studying the ascendant. his strengths, weaknesses, his history. His name. The more you read about him the more you felt like you knew him. He defeated his master, Cazador, with his party and his lover. He learnt of the runes in his back and took his master’s place and ascended. Becoming who he is now. The city and everywhere else withered in his rule. He only knew how to take, to consume all there was and leave nothing behind. And you had a feeling he did the same to his lover. Who he named his favourite spawn, his favourite consort, yet never his queen.

A few days later you returned to the palace, all of you prepared to take down the tyrant. All of you decided that you would sneak in through the main gates, killing anyone in your way until you reached him.

But the gates were open. and the halls were empty. The four of you made your way deeper into the palace, expecting an ambush, all in vain. When the four of you reached the ritual chambers, he was alone. Sitting on a throne atop what seemed like his coffin. You hung back, letting your party go ahead with hits before you went forward to heal them and get a few hits in yourself.

“Did you really think you could come into my house, poke around, and I wouldn't notice?” his voice rang in the room loud and clear, “I'll give the three of you credit, you are brave. But you're not the first to try, and you won't be the last to fail.”

Three? He must have not seen you yet.

He offered your party to fight them 3 on 1, winner takes all. Your friends sprung into action throwing spells and hitting him one after the other using up spell slots and energy and getting hit in return. Even as he was being hit, he still went on, telling your party how generous he is, how nice, how brave, how considerate, how much he sacrificed to get to this point. As you watched the fight while healing your friends every so often, you notice he didn't really have any defensive advances. He lets himself get hit multiple times, and only shoots back with offensive spells and blows.

Your party was fading fast, and from your semi hidden position you couldn't heal them up quick enough. At some point you slipped, and all your friends were down.

“One more is there? Well come out little mouse, take your turn.” you could hear the laugh bubble up his throat, talking down to you, “I'll even let you start real close.”

As egotistic as he sounded, you knew he was weakened. One more spell could do it. One that wouldn’t miss.

You slowly came out of your hiding space. Tentatively walking towards him, making sure not to get too close while quietly preparing the spell you knew would take him out, Shatter.

When you finally stepped into the light, you let the spell lose from your lips as you watched his own move incomprehensibly. Had he whispered a name? His eyes widened and in a split second the spell hit him, injuring him enough for him to explode into his gaseous form and fly back into his coffin. The floor cratered around where he stood and all was quiet.

You took a moment to collect yourself, and jumped into healing your companions. Once they were up and walking, the four of you made your way to the coffin beneath the throne and opened it, ready to stake him, to end it all for good. But he wasn't there.

“If this wasn't his coffin then, where is it?”

“This palace is huge, it would take us days to find his coffin. and by then he would have regenerated. Lets…”

Your companions’ words were lost as you thought to yourself as to where his coffin could be. In the dungeons? His own quarters? On the roof?

No.

The burnt room. The coffin in the middle of the crater. It had to be that. It was not broken like the floor beneath it.

You lept to your feet, telling your party you knew where it should be. There were some disagreements however, so all of you agreed to split up. You spent the rest of your spell slots and healing potions healing everyone and you set off.

Running through the halls hit you with deja vu, but you’d never been in this palace even before coming in to snoop, so what was that? You followed the portraits and reached your destination. You opened the door and stepped inside. The room looked the same as how you left it.

Carefully you made your way to the crater, a glint caught your eye, coming from a hole between the coffin’s lid and body.

Pushing the lid off the coffin this time reveals a dark red heart, around it gold wisps of light floated around in the shape of a man. You remembered how he looked at you before you hit him. His eyes looked so familiar for a second you thought you were looking at the sketch of him and his lover. Happy and blissful. It was like all his defences dropped and he didn't even try to counter your spell. His real name slipped from your lips before you could stop it.

You unsheathed the dagger Jergal gave you after that and positioned it over the heart. It all ends now.

Piercing his heart, the gold whisps dropped away in what sounded like a relieved sigh. The tears running down your face made you uneasy, why were you even crying over a monster. You knelt next to the coffin taking in everything that just happened, all that you learnt in the past few days.

Soon the footsteps of your party neared you. You stood to face them and all of you burst out laughing. It was all over.

You spent the rest of the day looting the rest of the building before painstakingly filling every crevice of the palace with explosives, with one specifically right above the coffin with your dagger still embedded.

Your party gave you the pleasure of lighting the first barrel to blow up the whole place. you took a few moments to send a prayer up to your patron god, Jergal. And spent a few moments sitting with unfamiliar feelings of mourning for this building, for the spawns inside that would perish with it, and for the sketch still hung up in the room. Because whoever was in that picture was forever gone, both of them.

Whispering a cantrip, you put an end to this story, even if you aren't sure when it really started.

Ignis.

#astarion acunin #astarion #bg3 #bg3 fanfiction #bg3 fic #astarion x you #astarion x reader #baldurs gate 3 #idk if anyone will read this but its my first bg3 fanfic n i really like it so i shall put this here #ascended astarion

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