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chokisnumber1fan · 1 month ago

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first glimpse of red

in which seishiro nagi veers dangerously close to the path of nihility.

content/warnings: 1.1k words, blue lock x hsr au??? cross fandom fic— this is not a shipfic!!! acheron is here purely as a guide, a LOT of discussion of nihilism and pointlessness and such, like two mentions of death, acheron might be ooc warning, if there’s anything i missed pls let me know

author’s note: i’ve been OBSESSED with the idea of nihility follower nagi— well, not an emanator since emanators of nihility technically can’t exist, so at least whatever acheron is. this is me trying to coherently put it all into words <3

seishiro nagi rubs his eyes and stretches, yawning as he does so. he boots up his PC once more, and shuts it back off when he realises that even playing another game would be too much effort. nagi is tired. sighing as he closes his eyes, seishiro nagi slumps on his chair. the time blurs into monochrome.

reason.

what reason did nagi have to do anything at all? why does he wake up in the morning just to go back to sleep at night? he immediately discards the thoughts from his mind, concluding that it would be a hassle to think about them anymore. and unknowingly, he finds himself walking a step closer towards the edge of the looming blackhole in the horizon of existence. nagi isn’t someone who spends his time dwelling on matters like this— he’d much rather get to the root of a problem as quickly as possible and cut it right off, so it would never grow to be a bother again.

nagi doesn’t know what path he treads on. all he knows is he tends to choose those with easy exits and no catches. what does he even want? it just so happens that the easiest path nagi finds himself to be able to tread on is one of listless monochrome. a lot of people have asked him why he finds everything to be a hassle. he shrugs and says that he doesn’t know. it’s true that he doesn’t, but it’s not like he’s ever bothered to find the answer to the question. and it’s not like he’s asked himself why he doesn’t bother.

nagi doesn’t care. he’s been this way for as long as he could remember.

he meets a purple haired woman in his journey through IX’s landscape. acheron is someone that accidentally stepped into the path of nihility and ventured a bit too far into IX’s shadow. for a fleeting moment, nagi wonders why she couldn’t just have steered course away from nihility, but realises he doesn’t care that much about the answer.

pointlessness.

it finally dawns on him, why he thinks of everything as a hassle. the answer had always been with him, he never had to go look. all of nagi’s actions stem from wanting to eradicate all burden and hassle from his life. he recounts this to acheron, and she comes to the realisation that she and nagi probably weren’t cut from the same cloth; they were two individuals on vastly different courses of life, that happened to intersect at this very moment. unlike acheron who happened to be thrown onto this path completely by accident, nagi seemed like he was destined to follow nihility since birth. he’d always found everything pointless, enough to feel disengaged from everyone and everything around him to some degree, at least.

but then again, unlike acheron, nagi has an easier exit from this path than she does. she’s carved this one singular path for herself out of the hardest stone, in a resolve to reach the light beyond the black disc of nothingness, and to guide people who cross paths with her by making them pick a certain choice that she offers.

well… calling it a choice offered by her would be putting it in the crudest and vaguely inaccurate terms. she’s not the one steering their lives, even for this fleeting moment; she could never take credit for such a thing. she simply shows people possibilities, and lets them decide for themselves which one they’d like to walk towards.

nagi can articulate now that the basis of his attitude to most things in life is because of the pointlessness he associates with everything. so, what now?

but then this leads acheron to question if nagi truly was someone born for nihility, or if he was just another one of the poor souls that was led astray and accidentally ended up on IX’s monochrome path; because, well, no one’s point of existence could truly be to pursue nihility— anyways, it’s not like the answer to that question matters, she surmises.

there is nothing left for nagi to do in this reality except for think, and so he does. why did he keep pressing on until this moment despite the pointlessness of his existence? well, he wouldn’t say he particularly pressed on to live— had death come knocking on his door, he would’ve followed it out with a shrug of his shoulders. do you keep living despite the pointlessness of it all, or do you actively try to find meaning in your actions?

cut that out, the answer to that question is pointless— humans keep living on, regardless of their answers.

slowly, the pieces of the puzzle come together. some pieces are still missing, but he gets the wider picture. in a first, he asks acheron why humans strive to keep living despite the void of meaninglessness that the universe is based upon. she tells him that red is the colour of existence, and that it will be the first colour that will bloom, only for a fleeting moment in this monochrome universe. she asks him if he would roam in search of that first streak of crimson or if he would pick up a brush and paint it into existence. and when a choice is made, it shall reappear once more. in other words, will you search for meaning, or will you create meaning for yourself?

nagi wonders why her question wasn’t about following the halo of light at the end of nothingness— isn’t acheron a guide to those who walk this path? almost as if she hears his thoughts, she clarifies that it would be a pointless question for her to ask. his mouth opens to question her once more, but the word why? gets caught in his throat, as the realisation hits him like a speeding truck. every life is destined to end with the nihility, no matter what— it’s almost like a primal instinct, the way every being is naturally drawn to the light beyond the nothingness. perhaps, that is why a life that edges closer to death fervently approaches nihility, and further aspires to reach the end of it. so, will you strive to fill your life with meaning, or will you willingly thrust yourself into the meaningless pursuit of the primordial light, like acheron has?

he understands now. he picks up a paintbrush that lies fallen at his feet, streaks and blotches of red trailing with its bristles. he walks, but acheron doesn’t care to discern whether he’s walking towards the blackhole or not. she smiles wistfully, slashing her blade and tearing apart the spatio-temporal fabric of the horizon of existence. seishiro nagi wakes up in a cold sweat, finding himself in front of his PC once more, the words you died plastered in big red letters on his screen.

#blue lock #bllk #blue lock x reader #bllk x reader #seishiro nagi #acheron #acheron hsr #hsr #honkai star rail #honkai star rail x reader #nagi seishiro #nagi seishiro x reader #nagi x reader #seishiro nagi x reader

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zvtara-was-never-canon · 10 months ago

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Why is Zuko romantically interested in Mai? What does he like about her as a person? Does he understand her personal desires and struggles?

"Why is Zuko romantically interested in Mai?"

He's a moody, angsty, grumpy teenage boy, she's a moody, angsty, grumpy teenage girl. She hates everything, but she doesn't hate him, and he appreciates that. He practically brags to a guard at the boiling rock that his (ex) girlfriend doesn't need anyone to protect her because she can handle herself.

They find each other physically attractive, enjoy making out and bitching about things they don't like, and they genuinely have a lot in common (troubled family life, struggling with the idea of who they should be VS who they actually are, don't like it when people try to control them, want a comfortable life where they are free to do whatever they want, and experts at using cool weapons that they're not allowed to kill people with because it's a kid's show).

Also Mai knows how to be understanding, caring and supportive without babying him, something Zuko desperately needs and actively seems to want in his life. And while her "aloof", more detached personality sometimes clashes with his need to shout about every single emotion he feels, it sometimes has the very healthy effect of making him chill a bit (and makes her come out of her shell a bit more).

"What does he like about her as a person?"

Like I said, he likes that she genuinely cares for him, but doesn't put with his bullshit, AND he likes that's just as much as an angsty teen as he is. He literally makes a move on her when she finally had enough with their friend group and yells at everyone, including him, to leave her alone. He looks like a lovesick fool when thinking back to "that gloomy girl that sighs a lot." Boy literally said "You're so beautiful when you hate the world" and was being 1000% sincere.

He likes how bold she can be, how she doesn't put on an act for him and how he doesn't have to put on an act for her, and how she literally risked it all to save him and is willing to be by his side now that he's about to start a new era for their nation even though she didn't fully understand why he changed sides.

Mai is, before anything, her own damn self and won't let anyone dictate her life for her, and Zuko really admires her for it because he can relate to that - which leads us to:

"Does he understand her personal desires and struggles?"

Does Zuko, the banished prince that rebelled against his abusive father, his nation's cruel and violent ways, and even against the father figure that he loved dearly but that wasn't listening when he said he wanted more in life than just a job and a roof over his head, understand what's like to only get conditional affection, be told that he needs to shut up and let himself be bossed around if he wants literally anything in life/not to be harmed, to not be listened to even by well-meaning people that just don't get it, and eventually risking everything to carve his own path in life with people he believes actually vallue and understand him?

I'd say yes.

#pro maiko #pro mai #maiko

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madewithlove-sophie · 24 days ago

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Chapter II | Beneath the Mask | Simon Ghost Riley Fanfiction

Chapter 2: Legacy and Lies

Previous | Next | Masterlist

The air in General Shepherd’s office was thick with tension. Y/N stood at attention, her boots clicking sharply against the polished floor as she faced her father’s desk. He sat behind it, staring at her over a stack of files, his face hard and unreadable. She had seen that look before—the one that meant trouble was brewing.

“I don’t care how good you are, Y/N,” Shepherd growled, his voice low and commanding. “This is a bad idea. You don’t belong in Task Force 141.”

Y/N's jaw tightened. She had expected this, but hearing it from her father, of all people, still stung. She had spent years proving herself, working her way up through the ranks, sharpening her skills. But nothing was ever good enough for him. He was always the General first, her father second.

“I don’t need your permission,” Y/N replied, her voice calm but firm. “I’ve been offered a position, and I’ve accepted it. This isn’t about you, Dad. It’s about what I can do—what I need to do. Task Force 141 handles the missions no one else can. I want to be part of that.”

Shepherd leaned back in his chair, his fingers drumming lightly against the desk. His steely eyes never left hers as if searching for any hint of hesitation. But there was none. Y/N had made up her mind.

“You think you can make a difference?” he asked, his voice tinged with disbelief. “You think you’re ready for that kind of pressure? Those men—they’re not like the others. They far from what you're used to at the Shadow Company with Graves."

“I know that,” Y/N replied, her voice steady. “And that’s exactly why I want to be there. I want to be part of something that bigger. I've been personally requested by the Captain, that means my skills are needed.”

Her father’s gaze softened, just for a moment, but the hardness quickly returned. He stood, walking around the desk to stand in front of her. He placed a hand on her shoulder—a rare gesture of acknowledgment—and gave her a look she couldn’t quite place.

“I won’t be there to protect you, Y/N,” he said, his voice quieter now. “But I’ll be watching. Don’t get yourself killed.”

Y/N nodded, a mix of determination and apprehension swirling in her chest. “I won’t, Dad. I’m not the same kid I used to be.”

As Y/N stepped out of her father’s office, she felt the weight of his words heavy on her shoulders. But she had already made her decision. General Shepherd might not agree, but that wasn’t going to stop her. She didn’t want to be defined by her last name or her father’s legacy. She wanted to make her own path, to be part of something bigger than herself.

Y/N arrival at Task Force 141’s base was met with a mixture of wary glances and low murmurs. She had known this would happen. Being the daughter of General Shepherd, a man whose name carried weight—and not the good kind—wasn’t something easily overlooked. But Y/N wasn’t here to live in her father’s shadow. She was here to carve out her own path. To prove she wasn’t just the General’s daughter.

As she stepped into the briefing room, her boots echoed against the cold concrete floor, sending a brief shiver down her spine. She straightened her posture, eyes locking with Captain Price’s. His authoritative presence was unwavering, yet there was a warmth in his handshake when he greeted her. His piercing blue eyes gave her a brief once-over, as if measuring her up.

“Sergeant,” he greeted her with a nod. “Glad you could join us.”

Behind him, the rest of the team stood—Soap, Gaz, and Ghost. The first two shot her curious glances, sizing her up with an almost casual interest, but Ghost’s unreadable expression hid whatever thoughts he may have had. He didn’t even acknowledge her at first, his gaze never leaving the wall as if he was already deep in thought, or perhaps just uninterested.

Soap couldn’t resist. “So, the General’s lass, huh? We’ve got royalty in the house,” he said with a grin, his tone light, but tinged with the usual banter he liked to throw around.

Gaz, however, was quick to elbow him in the ribs. “Lay off, mate. Let her settle in first.”

Price raised a hand, silencing the room. “I know who your father is, Sergeant,” he said, locking eyes with Y/N. “But that doesn’t bother me. You’re here because you’ve earned it. And you’ll be expected to do the same as everyone else. I don’t care about your last name. I care about your results. Understood?”

Y/N gave him a firm nod, her back straightening even more. She could feel the weight of her father’s reputation bearing down on her, but Price’s words were a small comfort. She had no intention of living up to anything except her own standard.

“Understood, sir,” she replied, her voice steady, betraying none of the uncertainty she felt beneath the surface.

As the briefing wrapped up, Captain Price dismissed the team with a simple, “Gear up and be ready for mission briefing by 0600 tomorrow.” The group began to disperse, each moving with a sense of purpose that made Y/N feel like an outsider. This was their territory, their dynamic. She was the new piece trying to fit into a puzzle that already seemed complete.

She lingered in the room for a moment, glancing at the current mission board on the wall. It was covered in maps, photos, and notes scrawled in shorthand she didn’t recognize. The weight of her decision to join Task Force 141 pressed against her chest, but she pushed it aside.

“You’re staring pretty hard at that board,” a Scottish accent broke the silence, and Y/N turned to see Soap leaning casually against the doorway, arms crossed and an easy grin on his face. “Trying to memorize it already? Or just lookin’ for your name?”

Y/N smirked despite herself. “Just getting a feel for how you all work,” she replied, her tone light but measured. “Don’t worry, MacTavish. I’ll catch up.”

“Call me Soap,” he said with a chuckle, pushing off the doorway and walking over to her. “And you’ll do fine. Just don’t let the big man over there scare you.” He nodded toward the corner where Ghost had been standing quietly, his face hidden behind the skull mask that made him as intimidating as his reputation suggested.

Y/N glanced at Ghost, whose posture was as rigid as ever. His arms were crossed, and he seemed content to stay in the background, watching but never engaging. She wondered what kind of person he was beneath the mask. The others were open, their personalities easy to read, but Ghost was a fortress. A part of her was curious about what lay behind those walls, though she quickly pushed the thought aside.

“You mean the one who hasn’t said a word to me?” Y/N asked, arching a brow. “He doesn’t seem like the chatty type.”

Soap laughed, shaking his head. “Aye, that’s Ghost for you. Don’t take it personally. He’s like that with everyone—well, except Price. But give it time. He’ll warm up.”

“Doubtful,” Ghost’s deep, gravelly voice cut through the air, startling Y/N. He hadn’t moved from his spot, but his words were sharp, precise, and unmistakably directed at her. “This isn’t a social club. Focus on the job.”

The room went quiet for a moment, the air thick with tension. Y/N held her ground, refusing to let him intimidate her. If she was going to earn her place here, she couldn’t back down. “Noted, Lieutenant,” she replied evenly. “I’ll stay out of your way.”

Ghost didn’t respond, his unreadable gaze fixed on her for a beat longer before he turned and walked out of the room. Soap gave her a small shrug, as if to say, That’s just Ghost, before following after him.

As Y/N placed her last few belongings into the narrow locker, the muffled conversations from down the hall grew louder, her sharp ears picking out snippets of chatter. The tone was casual at first—lighthearted banter and jokes—but then her name came up.

“...did you see her? Shepherd’s kid, strutting in here like she owns the place.”

“Shepherd must’ve pulled strings to get her on the team. No way she made it here on her own,” another voice scoffed.

Y/N froze, her hands tightening into fists as the voices continued.

“Bet she’s never seen real action. Daddy’s little princess, playing soldier.”

“You think Price actually wanted her here? Probably had no choice. Orders from the top.”

A wave of anger surged through her chest, but she forced herself to take a slow, steadying breath. She wasn’t naïve—she had expected skepticism. Despite her expertise and experience, it was inevitable with her father’s reputation looming over her like a storm cloud. But hearing it said out loud, so dismissively, stung more than she cared to admit.

Grabbing her jacket, she made her way toward the common room, her boots heavy against the concrete floor. If they wanted to talk about her, they could do it to her face.

As she stepped into the room, the conversation abruptly stopped. Three soldiers—none she recognized—sat clustered around a small table, a deck of cards spread out in front of them. Their expressions flickered from surprise to discomfort as they noticed her standing in the doorway.

“Am I interrupting something?” Y/N asked, her tone deceptively light.

One of them, a wiry man with a sharp face, straightened in his seat, trying—and failing—to look unfazed. “No, Sergeant. Just…talking.”

“Right,” Y/N said, her gaze cool and unwavering as she stepped further into the room.

“You’re entitled to your opinions,” she continued, her voice low and steady, “but don’t let them get in the way of staying alive when the bullets start flying.”

The wiry man opened his mouth, as if to say something, but then thought better of it. The others exchanged uneasy glances, their bravado evaporating under her steady glare.

Without waiting for a response, Y/N turned and walked out, her shoulders squared and her head held high. The weight of their stares lingered on her back, but she didn’t falter. If they wanted proof, she would give it to them.

The rumors echoed in her mind as Y/N walked to the shooting range. The words were like a distant hum, relentless and sharp, cutting through her thoughts. "Shepherd’s kid," they had said. "Doesn’t belong here." "Daddy’s little princess."

It was nothing she hadn’t expected, but hearing it in hushed whispers behind her back made her blood boil.

Y/N felt the heat rising in her chest as the words from the soldiers echoed in her mind. Was she really just a legacy, a shadow of her father’s reputation?

The weight of her last name pressed on her like an invisible hand, threatening to squeeze the air from her lungs. But she refused to let them see her falter. She wasn’t just General Shepherd’s daughter. She was Y/N Shepherd. And she would prove it.

Determined to shake it off, Y/N made her way to the shooting range entrance. She needed to focus. She needed to feel in control again. The steady rhythm of gunfire was her escape, each shot a way to drown out the voices in her head.

As the pistol’s weight settled into her hands, the anger morphed into precision. She lined up her shot and fired, the crack of the gun sharp in the silence. One shot, then another, each round hitting its target dead center. The rhythm of the shots was meditative, almost calming, as she allowed herself to disappear into the routine of practice.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

“You’ve got good aim,” a deep voice rumbled behind her.

Y/N turned to see Ghost leaning against the wall, his arms crossed. His mask made it impossible to read his expression, but his tone carried a grudging note of approval.

“Thanks,” she replied, lowering her weapon. “Comes with the territory.”

He studied her for a moment, his dark eyes unreadable. “Heard about what happened in the common room.”

“Let me guess,” Y/N said, her voice edged with frustration. “You think they’re right?”

“No,” Ghost said bluntly. “But I know how soldiers think. New blood, famous last name—it’s easy for them to jump to conclusions. Doesn’t matter if they’re wrong. What matters is how you handle it.”

“And what do you think I should do?” she asked, her tone more curious than defensive.

“Show them,” he said simply. “Not with words. Out there. They’ll respect you once you prove you can keep up. Or better yet—leave them in the dust.”

Y/N turned, her fingers still tense around the pistol, his presence had made her uneasy, but there was something oddly reassuring in his presence now.

His words, though few, seemed to cut through the noise in her head like a blade, simple yet profound. 'Show them. Not with words.' She considered his advice, weighing it in the quiet of the range.

Was he telling her she didn’t belong here, or that she was exactly where she needed to be? Either way, the message was clear—walk, not talk. It was something she could understand. It was something she could do.

A sense of relief washes over her as she lets out a breathe.

Y/N smirked, a flicker of amusement breaking through her frustration. “That almost sounds like advice, Lieutenant.”

“Don’t get used to it,” Ghost replied, pushing off the wall. “You’re here to do a job. Just make sure you don’t give anyone a reason to doubt you. Including me.”

Y/N watched Ghost leave, his footsteps heavy and confident, a part of her still unraveling his cryptic words. Was he challenging her, testing her resolve, or simply reminding her of the reality she’d already accepted? Either way, she couldn’t afford to second-guess herself—not now. She had a mission to complete. And she wouldn’t back down.

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fun-k-board · 1 year ago

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HALLOWEEN SPECIAL

How would some of my favourite characters be if their S/O loves Halloween?

Media Included : Mortal Kombat 11, Insomniacs Spider-Man, Young Justice.

Characters Included : Mileena, Kitana, Peter Parker, Miles Morales, Artemis, Superboy.

Note (s) : I originally had a poll and all of MK11 won but honestly I would've gotten no enjoyment out of writing it, so, have this instead.

Be warned I haven't watched young justice in like a year.

Mileena

Mileena doesn't know what Halloween is, there isn't much of an equivalent in Outworld that would make sense for her to participate in, however, she's definitely interested after learning about it from you. Especially after seeing how excited you are.

After realising she can carve whatever she wants in the pumpkin, she gets very excited. Mileena would most likely carve a 'scary' face, similar to a Tarkatans with the large teeth, but, she isn't the most skilled artist... It ends up looking a bit wonky and more funny than scary.

If she's in a bad mood, she'd probably try to carve Kitana dying, and it would end up more like a blob than anything coherent.

She likes the decorations, and might help put a few up, but prefers them not to be in her way, she will absolutely destroy any fake cobwebs or skeletons in her path.

If you want to stay at home and put on the likes of 'Hocus Pocus' 'The Nightmare Before Christmas' or even horror movies like 'Halloween', she's interested in them all. She especially finds the portrayals of sorcerers to be hilarious and wants to show Shang Tsung how incompetent humans think they are.

Mileena finds horror movies fascinating but sometimes she's very critical of the gore and how unrealistic it is, one time she stormed out of the house because of how horrible a CGI blood splatter was.

She probably won't bother matching costumes or even going in a costume herself, she's just not interested enough for whatever cheap gimmicks Earthrealm's cooked up.

I actually think she'd just go in her regular clothes but without a mask, it's uncomfortable to be seen as scary, but, she doesn't want to wear a ridiculous costume or spend hours walking around in a mask.

Mileena is most excited for the trick or treating itself, the fact you can just go up to people's houses and ask for sweets and people will just give it?? She's so shocked, nothing like that would ever happen in Outworld.

She won't be too smiley until she gets home though, whenever the door opens she's sweating nervously, Mileena almost wishes she brought her mask to hide her face.

She always manages to stay up until everybody else goes home or falls asleep, and carries, she insists you're not walking even if you're not tired at all, you back home, where she finds the pumpkins destroyed and your house covered in toilet paper.

She vows to kill the person who ruined your pumpkins, and probably ends up springing a Halloween massacre for your area.

Kitana

She's definitely heard of Halloween from Johnny or Sonya, but she's never really been able to dress up or be too involved. Kitana has responsibilities in Outworld, and she can't risk them for a holiday, regardless of her desire to participate.

Once she sees how excited you are, however, she decides to make up an excuse to go to Earthrealm, it's only for a few hours, and she's a bit antsy over the decision, but she's doing it for you nonetheless.

Kitana helps you put up the decorations, laughing at how silly some of them look, and she takes great joy in spending some time with you that she usually can't.

Her pumpkin carving skills aren't too bad, she's not some master artist with them, but she can make a mean scary face.

I don't think she'd want to dress up, but she's definitely alright if you want to, she'll share her opinion on your costume and maybe suggest a different one if she thinks it'd fit you better.

She really enjoys things like The Nightmare Before Christmas, wholesome yet with a bit of scary elements thrown in. She especially likes Hocus Pocus when it comes to the family part of it, it's no secret how messed up hers is.

Kitana's amused at how magic is portrayed in both Halloween movies and by certain costumes, she nearly loses it after seeing an old man mask under the 'wizard' title.

Kitana personally doesn't enjoy the gore heavy and over the top violence of horror movies, although, she will admit she enjoys the fight choreography of some of them. She prefers psychological horrors.

Kitana is rather nervous about trick or treating, she loves the idea of the fun and sweet part, but the idea that the stranger could've poisoned the sweets makes her nervous, even if you assure her that the signs are obvious and if there are none it should be safe to consume.

She inspects the sweets around five times before even considering you take a bite.

She looks like some type of bodyguard, following behind you with swift and graceful steps, she lets herself have fun of course, but her guard is always up.

When you both get home, she's very happy to rest with you and sleep, but if duty calls she might have to cut the night short and return to Outworld.

Peter Parker

Peter skips out on a holiday or two sometimes, his identity as Spider-Man is far too important, and Halloween is the one that usually gets skipped. Aunt May never really celebrated it, she usually just left out a bowl of sweets. MJ isn't an avid Halloween person, neither is Harry after he grew up. So, it was a huge surprise at how invested in Halloween you are.

Peter isn't that good of a pumpkin carver, so he typically does the regular 'spooky face' with wobbly lines, it's his favourite and was his go to ever since he was a kid.

He finds matching costumes cute and especially loves dressing up in his old Spider-Man costume and making one especially for you, of course, neither of you include the web shooters and he makes sure to use an old enough suit where there's no tech in it.

Peter's great at hanging up decorations, he has specialised web fluid that can last for a few days or even a week, so, he uses that to his advantage and usually does that along with crawling on the ceiling.

He loved trick or treating as a kid, it was the one time of the year he could dress up and not be a nerd, he and Harry had so much fun together. It's really nostalgic, and sometimes people will point out your costumes, finding it funny that grown adults are going as the city's hero.

He adores trick or treating, it makes him feel like a kid again. Although, unfortunately a lot of crime tends to happen on Halloween, so, sometimes he does have to slip away quickly to punch a few bad guys.

He might check once or twice to see if there's anything wrong with the candy, but besides that he sometimes forgets how deadly some of them can be. He does feel his heart race a bit when you take a bite, only to reveal nothing is wrong, he lets out a huge sigh of relief.

Peter's nervous watching psychological thrillers and ones that use the whole 'creepy kid aesthetic' to its full potential. He's fine with gorey slasher flicks, and even enjoys some of them for the horrible acting and bad effects.

He prefers more kid friendly stuff, like The Nightmare Before Christmas, but he nearly cried watching Coraline for the first time.

Miles Morales

Miles has been a huge Halloween enjoyer since he was a kid, he used to spend hours trying to handmake a costume with his parents help, he misses those days. He's never missed Halloween, or any holiday, but miles has been close a few times.

After he started dating you he realised just how much fun it can be and that he shouldn't sacrifice time with his loved ones, especially not on a day you both love.

Miles, while not exactly having an over abundance of money to do so, will a hundred percent try to hand make costumes for the both of you, with your help of course. Maybe it's something small like Morticia Addams and Gomez Addams, or maybe it's a huge mecha costume, whichever it is, he has fun making and designing the costumes.

He's a master pumpkin carver, give him any image and he can accurately create it in pumpkin form, regardless of whether you're also like that or have trash pumpkin carving skills, he's putting yours together proudly and pointing it out to anybody who sees them.

Miles loves trick or treating, you and him walk around New York apartments for hours and hours getting all of the sweets you can, he even web swings sometimes to try and get as much as possible before Halloween ends.

I don't think he'd think to look for any poison or razor blades in the sweets you two are given, he's heard some stories for sure, but it's never happened anywhere close to him, so he assumes you're both safe.

Like Peter, he can help put up decorations by climbing on walls and ceilings, plus his webs, and so he's a huge help, although he's personally not a fan of any snake based decorations. They creep him out.

While he can handle more scary horror movies, he still reaches for and squeezes your hand whenever a kill scene happens, although, for older ones or newer ones that are bad looking, he prefers to analyse the artistic side of things. Special effects and practical effects are so interesting to him. Not only that, he could spend hours talking about the music and themes of each character or event.

He loves any stop motion, Nightmare Before Christmas, Coraline, and Corpse Bride to name a few. Not only are they just beautiful, but any bad storylines or things that haven't aged well don't really matter when he's staring at something so pretty.

Artemis

Artemis never had the chance to celebrate Halloween as a kid, she wishes she did because it always sounded so fun, the most she managed to get was her mother putting out sweets for kids in costumes to nab. Some part of her wishes that she was one of them at some point.

When she begins dating you, your interest in Halloween is one she can greatly relate to, perhaps for different reasons, but, it's something shared nonetheless.

Artemis likes the idea of dressing in costumes, it's a quarter of her job so she's used to it by now, but she can admit she feels too childish when she wears a vampire or any other Halloween-esque costume. She thinks you look cute in them, though.

She's used to helping her mother around the house, so when you ask for help putting up decorations she's alright with that, whether or not you can't reach because you're short, you can't do it all on your own, or if you just want to get it done quicker, she'll help you.

Artemis is a decent pumpkin carver, she can make a few impressive faces, but unless she spends hours and hours, she can't do a full body or anything other than a spooky face without it being a little wonky.

She genuinely does enjoy going trick or treating, she can come across a little blank and emotionless when walking around, but she really does feel happy and safe with you. Even if you two are walking alone at night knocking on strangers doors for candy.

She definitely checks every piece for any poison or razor blades, she's not taking any chances with you.

Artemis loves more childish movies, don't tell anybody in the tower though! She especially loves ones like Coraline, she feels really seen and can even relate to her a tiny bit.

She's not a big horror fan, especially not ones that try to make the unsympathetic sympathetic, it's just boring watches to her usually. Gore ones are easier to get through, it's just mindless slashing and bad acting, sometimes they're so bad that it becomes funny though, she enjoys those ones. Artemis isn't the biggest fan of psychological thrillers either, not because they're more scary to her, they're just more uncomfortable.

Superboy

Superboy has most likely heard of Halloween, but never had the chance to participate because... Well, you know. He isn't very interested in it, the costume part, the sweets part, it's not exactly his thing, regardless of if he's tried it before or not.

He's surprised at just how excited you are about Halloween, it's not like he despises the holiday, it just feels so alien to him. Despite that, Conner will help put up decorations in hard to reach places, or if something is heavy, he might grumble about it, but he truthfully doesn't mind.

Well, as said before, he isn't too interested in the costumes. A lot of them are just too silly for him, but maybe with some convincing he could do a matching couples one. He likes when you dress up, though, he thinks you look cute and even funny in some of them.

Conner isn't great at pumpkin carving, he gets frustrated easily and might smash the poor thing, despite that, he may either act like it was on purpose or just hide it from you.

He doesn't enjoy trick or treating, because of his unwillingness to dress up, he's either a guy in a superman shirt who looks like he's about to commit a felony, or a huge, quiet guy in a goofy costume whose fist is always angrily clenched.

He can tell if any sweets are bad, his vision makes it easy, and he will absolutely smack the sweet out of that person's hand and begin yelling at them.

Conner is alright with horror movies, he's not scared by them because he knows they're not real. But, that doesn't mean he likes what he's watching. Most of them are boring or just plain stupid to him. He thinks more kid friendly ones are to his style, they're not overly edgy, funny coming from him, while also not being boring because most kid media is designed to keep a kids attention.

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punkpandapatrixk · 2 years ago

Text

👠Your Life as A Celebrity — Timeless Pick A Card

A girl who is unapologetically herself is a beam of Light in this dark world that benefits from girls doubting/hiding/despising themselves. A girl who creates her own bubble of dreamy Reality becomes instantaneously a Celebrity! Any setting she walks into, she commands attention, as well as admiration.

In a world of digital connectivity where communication is easy, room’s aplenty for everybody’s Story. We’re a new generation of celebrity, babe—what are you choosing to be?☆People become Heroes to other people not because they’re infallible, but because in spite of their shortcomings they managed to overcome🤡

[PAC Masterlist] [Part 1] [Part 3]

[Patreon] [Paid Readings]

☆♪°・. ☆♪°・. ☆♪°・. ☆♪°・. ☆♪°・. ☆♪°・.

Pile 1 – The People’s Dreamy Muse

VIBE: Marunouchi Sadistic by Utada Hikaru

your rise to celebrity – 7 of Cups Rx

You may consider yourself a bit timid and shy. You think you’re somewhat clumsy and more often than not deeply confused about what you’re doing with your Life. You can be random and scatter-brained, too! An abstract artist yourself, some of you may even deal with autism (of the high-functioning variety most likely) or dyslexia. Truth is, you’re this way because you’re inherently a dreamy creature. In fact, so dreamy you bring to Life people’s dreams and imaginations instead. There’s something otherworldly🧝🏻‍♀️/alien👽about you. So ethereal people think you should only exist in picture books and fairy tales (or manga LMAO).

You may not always be aware of this, but people want to immortalise you and make you a thing of their own. Artists secretly make you their Muse. Other people seem to always want to take pictures of and with you. Secret illustrations of you exist in people’s drafts~ Many people won’t be upfront about it (though they definitely show it) but they’re obsessed with you. Down bad, baby. Down, down on their knees so bad they’ll do anything to become your slaves—if you ever let them.

But you hardly let anybody get close to you, let alone enter your circle. You’re a natural born celebrity and you value your privacy. Some of you were literally born into fame or wealth, and you will eventually carve out a path of your own and continue to be famous. Some of you had past lives as famous and influential people (very likely to have South Node in Leo or 5th House, 10th House, or other placements to do with fame in a past life) and so being noticeably striking is a natural trait of yours. For that, you could get scouted to become a model, actress, idol, presenter, whatever really, and then you just naturally enter the scene.

Whatever the scale or industry may be, you were born for stardom—there’s just no other way around it, babe~🦋

your public image – VII The Chariot Rx

People see that you’re often unsure about your feelings, or that you do have a lot of feelings that seem to spill easily, and that sometimes you drown in your emotions. Some of you, you may even hide your feelings so well (you try), but people will still notice this about you. But your stories will be heard by everyone eventually.

How you came from a really harsh background emotionally and how you’ve managed to turn your past hardships into a magnificent Story that inspires. It wasn’t easy and you’re not always happy about how Life treated you in the past, but as long as your stories serve to save someone’s life, sanity, you’re cool with it. And people really appreciate you for that.

You are the kind of celeb that has a lot of sad, even tragic, stories (like YOSHIKI of X JAPAN) and your fans will want to dedicate a lot of love to you. These are the fans who say, ‘Oh, I wish I could just give them a warm hug right now.’ Your fans are hugely loyal and they talk about you to their friends and family, A LOT. They want to extend your stories to everyone who would listen.

Your stories are like honey gold, or unicorn fart, depends on what your preferences look like~ You can be glamorous, you can be amorous, you can be shy and sweet and sometimes out of control; but you’re eternally everyone’s dreamiest Muse~🪷

your impact/imprint – Page of Wands Rx

You, are, a, copycat manufacturer. Whether or not you try, whatever you do, everyone wants to copy. Name it all: fashion, hair, nails, voice, mannerism, but the coolest of all, your enterprise. Perhaps you write, in a specific dreamy/otherworldly fashion and there’s something ultra unique but touching about what you do, and now everyone tries to do the same because they know they’re gonna get attention that way.

It’s not an evil type of copycatting though; you’re just too original, too fresh, and people want to experiment with themselves by emulating you. In most cases, it’s also because you inspire people to level up themselves so they can become like you. But ngl, plenty of other celebs try to copy you with spite in their hearts, but you’re plenty aware of that, so you don’t really give a fuck. And your cold nonchalance makes you so enigmatic, elusive, that people can’t cease to speculate.

On top of that, no matter how hot or trendy you are, you’re not a sell-out. You won’t give in to corporate money if what it’s asking of you is a betrayal of your values. You have your own thing going anyway—you always will—so you’re not afraid of losing top-tier PR, lucrative contracts, expensive gifts, what have you. At the end of the day, only your true fans understand that your true Art as a celeb is the way you elevate people to the greater heights of their own potentials. You’re like Po in Kungfu Panda 3~🐼LMAO

LASTING LEGACY🔻💛

How A Biographer Would Write About You – Gold Alchemist (Roger Bacon)

How You’re Remembered by the People – Priestess of Illumination

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☆♪°・. ☆♪°・. ☆♪°・. ☆♪°・. ☆♪°・. ☆♪°・.

Pile 2 – A Soft Hero Holding A Blue Light

VIBE: Somewhere Near Marseilles by Utada Hikaru

your rise to celebrity – 9 of Wands

Your rise to fame is not an easy one. It ain’t a walk in the park the slightest bit. You worked really hard to be where you are, to have all the beautiful things you possess. You overcame a lot of challenges—mostly, challenges in your self-development. You weren’t always sure what you wanted to be when you grow up. You had vague, dreamy ideas but never were you certain because there were no signposts. You walked your Life with very few stars to guide your path on Earth.

You didn’t get told many times what your natural talents were, and those that you did showcase rarely got any praises. So you thought these abilities would never matter in the bigger world—that you would never be good enough at them to become a Star yourself. Growing up, you battled quite a lot with self-doubts and occasional self-loathing because you didn’t know if there would be a place for you in the world. You didn’t really know what you were put on Earth to do.

At some point in Life, there was a time you could only see the world as a battlefield and it was really painful to live in it. But after a painstaking process of healing yourself and making peace with the hardships that come with being Human, you triggered a miracle to stir. A shooting star of a very precious kind deep dived from the sky right into your bedroom, and suddenly, all your wishes were beginning to come alive one by one by one and one and on and on and so on.

Babe, your world fucking flipped~💃🏻

your public image – 2 of Pentacles

People see you as a bit of a tragic character; but they are enchanted. To them, you’re so fragile yet so inexplicably strong all by yourself. You’ve transformed yourself; gained your glow up in ALL areas of your Life. People are baffled at how such a soft creature could’ve endured the world’s hardest hardships yet remain so untainted. People want to know what you are made of and all the secrets to your courage, strong determination, as well as character. Most of all, how exactly did you flip your world? Ever curious are they, but no one could solve the mystery.

You are naturally soft and transparent, yet people can’t figure you out. There’s a wholeness of your spirit that feels too big to grasp. To a lot of people, your success story serves as inspiration. There’s something ultra Heroic in the way you’ve managed Life, and that alone becomes a lighthouse for others to believe in their own miracles as long as they continue to fight for what truly matters.

Your Light is so blindingly inspirational even if you feel like you’re not doing much. Your sheer existence gives people courage to fight for their Life. Those who are starting anew in Life are the ones who look up to you the most. But those whose hearts are too dark, those who are deeply scarred and afraid to do anything about their lives, those whose bandwidth of Reality is too different from yours, tend to hate you irrationally.

But truly it is because your softness, reminds them of what they have confused as their weakness.

your impact/imprint – XVII The Star

It’s pretty obvious, though unfortunate, that a lot of people find letting go extremely painful to do. Most people are often afraid of losing what’s familiar even when the familiar is no longer safe or comfortable. People are also often afraid of stepping into the unknown, journeying across unstable grounds, and that causes people to stay miserable with the known.

Something about you though, awakens a hidden courage in people. You’re that shooting star people are hoping to see on their balcony to wish their earnest dreams upon. People comment on your social media a lot, and even write beautiful handwritten fan mails, to tell you their feelings as well as gratitude. Even if they know you probably won’t read, they write anyway because when they write, it feels either like a catharsis for their pains or affirmation scripting for their wishes.

People just know that when they connect with your energy, something miraculous is bound to happen in their own Personal Reality. Not sure what that is; it is your personal touch of blue magic—the magic of profound self-alchemy~💠

LASTING LEGACY🔻❤️

How A Biographer Would Write About You – Silver Astronomer (Galileo Galilei)

How You’re Remembered by the People – Priestess of Purity

Access full reading + cards on Patreon🌸

☆♪°・. ☆♪°・. ☆♪°・. ☆♪°・. ☆♪°・. ☆♪°・.

Pile 3 – A Decadent Éclair Amongst Empty Croissants

VIBE: Tokyo Flash by VAUNDY

your rise to celebrity – King of Cups

In this world where people are underestimated for having emotions (because hardheaded logic is prized higher) you’ve always prided yourself in prioritising listening to what your heart tells you. Your strong intuition knows your heart would never lead you astray. In fact, it really hasn’t. And you’re proud of that—more like, you’re glad you’ve always been true to yourself, really.

Sure being this way has led to occasional alienation, but what’s it to you when you’re the one building, creating, and enjoyably living an awesome Lyfe you’ve made yourself? You’re the one having all the fun, and dang, all the money. And you’re happy. You’re doing all these things you’re passionate about. Because you never stopped listening to your singular truth, you’ve cultivated a unique skill that sets you apart from everyone else in your trade. A refinement you’ve been doing since you were a kid.

Whether or not you become a public figure, actually, you’ll always be that eccentric that draws attention. People like to flock to see what new art/invention you’re working on. Many of them are genuinely in awe; quite many of them secretly jest. Little do they know—weird as you can be, you’re a compassionate person who has a big enough heart to accept that not everybody can accept you.

You get where most people are coming from and why they are essentially afraid to accept you. Your heart is so incredibly kind~🍃Psst, amongst your fans, many are simps!🤪

your public image – 7 of Pentacles Rx

You’re a pro at your Art that gets everybody talking but they know they can never emulate what you’re doing. People know it takes way too much originality, which they’re painfully aware they don’t have; and they know it takes courage to express a singularity like yours, and they’re again painfully aware that they’re too much of a coward to even begin.

Ngl, something in your originality sends some people shrieking into self-deprecation just because they can’t help but realise they’ve wasted many years of their lives not pursuing their very own original passions. People are wont to hypnotise themselves to believe that their mistakes/wrong steps are justified, right? Just to pacify their sorrows/regrets. But when they see what you do, how you live your Lyfe, their old potentials haunt them like that motherfucker from The Ring👻

You inspire a lot of young people but make sad many old people who have nearly completely lost touch with their inner child. But you also rejuvenate those older than you who are still working on their dreams~🐣If anything, your guts resemble theirs so much that they feel relieved to know they still have a place in this strange world🌏

your impact/imprint – Knight of Swords Rx

You’ve always lived with a special courage to be unique; refusing to abide by rules let alone oppressed by set laws. You can be reckless, but that’s like a breath of fresh air in a society that’s strangling its own citizens. But you’re never really a fighter nor a warrior; you’re an Artist through and through. You’re setting an example (or more like a possibility) to live differently—against, even—society’s standards and expectations.

You’re not immoral; you just believe human beings are supposed to be FREE but governments have been criminally oppressive. What even are those questions about theft and murder? Free people who are happy, content wouldn’t deliberately hurt another person. Oppressed citizens who are deprived of resources, and subsequently the ability to feel joy, kill and steal from each other. In your lifetime, as an attempt to be somewhat of an “activist”, you are likely to quote this from Utopia (1551) many, many times:

‘For if you suffer your people to be ill-educated, and their manners to be corrupted from their infancy, and then punish them for those crimes to which their first education disposed them, what else is to be concluded from this, but that you first make thieves and then punish them.’ – Sir Thomas More, ah also, Drew Barrymore in Ever After: A Cinderella Story (1998)🤪

LASTING LEGACY🔻🧡

How A Biographer Would Write About You – Red Magus (Edward Kelly)

How You’re Remembered by the People – Priestess of Fertility

Access full reading + cards on Patreon🌸

☆♪°・. ☆♪°・. ☆♪°・. ☆♪°・. ☆♪°・. ☆♪°・.

[PAC Masterlist] [Part 1] [Part 3]

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withclawandvine · 3 months ago

Text

title: meet you after dark

tags: smut, 18+ only, slight domme/sub dynamics. what can i say… i love it when men beg, y’know those statues of men on their knees for a woman?? this is my love letter to that

wc: 4k

summary: Elain’s fingers knotted in his hair, and she used the leverage to push his head back, giving herself access to the near-feverish skin of his throat. Her legs locked around his waist as she kissed a path up to his ear before whispering, “What else do you think about?”

“You,” he said, breathless as he tilted his face up to the stars, exposing more of his throat and moaning gratefully when she scraped her teeth over the taut skin. “What you feel like. The kinds of noises you’d make, how you’ll taste.”

author’s note: i can’t believe this is finally done !!!! i’ve been workin on this shit since like.... march?? it was literally supposed to be for elriel month 😭😭😭

read on ao3 here!!

After years of hard work, the garden, nestled in the peaks surrounding Velaris, was once again lush and expansive. The couple the land belonged to had called it home for what might have been eons, for all Elain knew. She was honored they had trusted her not only with the garden’s reconstruction, but also with tending to it while they stayed with relatives.

Three tiers had been carved into the mountainside, all connected by cobbled staircases that led to meandering paths through the flora. Elain sat on a blanket along the low wall dividing the highest tier from the middle, her feet hanging over the ledge, toes just barely skimming the soft grass beneath.

The long afternoon of harvesting, pruning, and weeding under the sun had left her with aching hands and pink cheeks. And for her efforts, she’d been encouraged to take whatever she wanted for herself.

From the basket at her side, Elain withdrew an apricot and bit into it. Juice dripped down her chin and onto her front, making her once again grateful for the stained overalls she wore. The garment was perfect for gardening, right down to the pocket stitched into the panel that covered her chest. The pant legs, made of breezy linen, hid her shape almost as well as a dress, while being much easier to move around in — less likely to catch on branches or her own feet.

She leaned back on her elbows to watch the lowering sun set the sky ablaze, then disappear behind the mountains, bringing the stars to life, and along with them, the night-blooming flora. Some, she’d recognized from her old garden at the estate on the other side of the wall, while others — such as those with faintly glowing petals — were native to Prythian. She sat among it all, breathing in their heady scent and mountain air, in perfect serenity.

Until her pointed ears twitched at a faint noise from above. A rhythmic drumming grew louder with each beat, until the sound was accompanied by a breeze that swept up the fine tendrils of hair that had escaped her braid and a dark, powerful figure landing softly in the grass.

He wore no armor, wasn’t cast in the azure glow of siphons, or surrounded by swirling shadows. It didn’t matter. Elain, whether she wanted to or not, would recognize Azriel anywhere.

She stiffened, eyeing him warily.

He’d landed in the middle of the garden level below where she sat, several paces away. But still closer to her than he had been in weeks, when they’d been seated across the table from each other at a mandatory family dinner at the river house.

It was the first one Azriel hadn’t been able to wiggle out of since Solstice and it had been painfully uncomfortable. Their sole conversation had lasted roughly two minutes, and Azriel spent the entirety of it looking anywhere but at her, his eyes shifting around the room, as if searching for anything that might liberate him.

Elain couldn’t begin to fathom why he’d intentionally seek her out now, and he certainly wasn’t making it any clearer as he remained still and silent.

“Are you going to stand there like a gargoyle all night, or were you planning on saying hello?”

“Hello.”

Despite herself, Elain couldn’t contain her laugh. The sharp, undignified snort breaking the tension between them. Her keen Fae eyes could make out the flash of Azriel’s teeth in the dark, making her heart jump. A genuine smile on Azriel’s face reminded Elain of Starfall; it was as brilliant as it was ephemeral, and stirred in her the same sort of dewey-eyed wonder.

She willed the feeling away; she couldn’t let herself fall back into him or her own guilelessness. She cleared her throat, as if it might expel any lingering traces of her laughter from her voice. “Is there something I can do for you?”

But as he ventured closer to Elain’s perch, Azriel just asked, “Is this one of the gardens you helped rebuild?”

“I’ve been checking on it while Celstine and Zekiah spend the summer in the Dawn Court with Celestine’s sister,” she said, feeling two steps behind. As if to make up for it, her next words came out in a rush. “And they asked me to draw up some plans for a water feature.”

She pointed up to the empty space next to the house and started explaining her ideas for a pond that would cascade over the nearest wall into a trench dug to look like a natural stream that would slither through the whole garden. She’d read about a system of spelled pipes that would force the water at the end back up into the pond so it never ran dry.

Azriel’s attention never wavered, and damn if it didn’t remind her of her first Solstice, how engaged he’d been as she sketched and rambled, even going so far as to encourage her to go on once she’d fallen into self-conscious quiet. Like there was nothing else he’d rather be doing at half-past midnight.

Elain felt the ache of losing it — whatever it was they’d shared — all over again.

So she steeled herself, made her voice hard when she asked, “And is that what you came to discuss? Water delivery systems?”

Finally taking a few steps toward her, he said, “It’s not.”

“Then what is it you need?”

It was unlikely that Rhysand would need her for anything, and if Feyre wanted to send a message, she would knock on the doors of Elain’s mind. Could Nesta have sent him?

Elain was still trying hard to sound disinterested as he stopped right in front of her. If she wanted, she could swing her leg and kick him. Her left foot twitched, as if persuaded into motion by the mere thought.

“A moment of your time, away from —” Azriel’s jaw worked, forcefully holding words back. “Please.”

His eyes found hers, heavy and imploring. It was that small fracture in his composed exterior, rather than the plea itself, that made her nod.

“I lied,” he said. “On Solstice, when I said we were making a mistake.”

Elain felt herself recoil at the word, but Azriel pressed on, undeterred. “I go back to that night all the time. What I’d do differently. What might’ve been if…”

Azriel leaned in closer, the words fizzling out. As if he’d driven himself to distraction by daring to cradle her cheek in a rough palm.

“If?” Elain prompted, a little breathless.

“If I’d just…” he murmured, thumb tracing over her bottom lip. And when he leaned in, she didn’t stop him. His lips brushed against hers — a soft, sweet thing. Tentative and brief, it was nothing like the kiss that would’ve been, had he gone through with it that night, when the air had already been laden with desire.

“If I’d told you that I once thought myself something of an expert on longing,” he said. “And that after spending so many years yearning for my freedom, for a family, for something that was truly mine, I knew everything there was to know about wanting something you didn’t have — knew how to live with it.”

“But then I met you, and I…” His smile is faint, and a bit rueful. “It was different than before, when I was young and hoping for things that seemed impossible. Because you were within my reach. And yet, all I could do was want you. And I have carried it with me for so long, and I have said nothing — even when I should have — but I’m saying it now. I have to say it now.”

With a gentle hold on her chin, Azriel tilted her head back a little, so his lips nearly brushed hers when he said, “Because I don’t just lose sleep thinking up grand speeches.”

There had been thousands of questions racing through her head for months, answers she wouldn’t allow herself to beg him for. She was still angry, still hurt. But all of it was losing the battle for her attention while Azriel stood between her knees and the feel of him still buzzed on her lips.

Elain’s fingers knotted in his hair, and she used the leverage to push his head away, giving herself access to the near-feverish skin of his throat. Her legs locked around his waist as she kissed a path up to his ear before whispering, “What else do you think about?”

When his only response was a strangled groan, Elain nipped at a sensitive spot below his ear, prodding.

The admission was like oil poured over the smoldering embers of her arousal.

“Do you still want to know?”

Head tilted coyly, she watched Azriel all but shudder as the words and their meaning landed.

There was hardly anything seductive about unfastening the buttons keeping her overalls secure before having to wiggle out of them, but Azriel watched the graceless movements like a charmed snake. And when she struggled to kick her feet free, he sank smoothly to his knees and guided the garment over each one.

A hand lingered, wrapping around her ankle and worrying his thumb over the bone. The heat of his touch rolling through her like thunder.

He hadn’t been the only one to fall victim to wanting and wondering. Elain was desperate to memorize the taste and shape of him. But even as he gazed up at her — drinking in every inch of her newly exposed skin, her nipples, peaked through her undershirt — eyes dark and heavily lidded, Elain couldn’t let herself forget that she’d been here before.

Or rather, in a dim corridor, to be left feeling humiliated by her desire and betrayed by the object of it.

Now she was half naked and soaking through her panties, but if she was going to offer any of it up to Azriel again, she needed some reassurance, indisputable proof that he wanted her.

Without giving herself the chance to think herself out of it, Elain pushed her panties aside and dipped her fingers into her wet center, gasping a little at how easily they slid in. She watched Azriel’s face, the hungry way he licked his bottom lip, as she circled her clit with trembling fingers.

She felt Azriel reach for her other ankle, then the tensing of muscles, poised to pull her closer. A shift in energy that built… then buckled under his hesitation. Whether he had intended to back away or pull her closer, Elain would never know, because she moved first.

She brought her slick fingers to his mouth, felt his satisfied hum as he closed his lips around them.

Elain’s breath caught at the sight of him, a warrior, powerful and unyielding, on his knees before her, savoring the taste of her on her fingertips as he looked up at her with heavy-lidded eyes. Even in the dark, it was easy the desire plainly etched into his face. Gone was the impassive spy, the formidable soldier.

This was Azriel. Open and vulnerable. Gentle and…

“Beautiful,” she whispered, and pushed down on his tongue a little, just to watch his eyes roll back, before pulling her hand away, brushing her thumb across his bottom lip and wiping away the trail of spit.

She felt his shaky exhale against her skin as his wings twitched, the movement small, brief, and agitated. It was a silly impulse to reach out and stroke the arc of bone that formed the top of his right wing, as if he were an anxious horse, but it was also impossible to resist.

He trembled under the caress, and the wounded sound he made had Elain yanking her hand back in surprise.

The question that had been forming in her mind was answered when Azriel leaned in, chasing her touch, and let out a very unspecific “please.”

She touched him again, more purposefully this time, and Azriel muffled his moan by pressing his face into her thigh. Elain’s fingers straying along the inner curve of his wing had him sinking his teeth into her skin. The pain was sharp, but short-lived, arousal its echo, pulsing through her.

Azriel looked up at her, nostrils flaring.

“I need another taste,” His voice, usually cool and smooth as a midnight breeze, was gravelly and low. It struck her, this change in him — the knowledge that he trusted her with it. “Need you to come in my mouth.”

“So greedy,” she mused, unable to fight the smile pulling at her lips.

“Yes,” he agreed readily, then paused to kiss the delicate skin where the mark from his teeth was already blooming.

“You…” he shook his head a little, breathing out a soft, dumbfounded laugh, as if he couldn’t quite believe that after such a long life of convincing himself that he was content on the fringes, he was finally allowing himself to want more. “I’ll take anything you’re willing to give me.”

Elain’s heart soared at the words while her body burned hot from the way he spoke them. She wanted to swear to give him everything; she wanted to put her lips to better use. But in her indecision, she must’ve been quiet for too long, because wariness had crept into Azriel’s gaze, the way he said her name.

Her hand found his cheek, her thumb caressing the flushed skin, which seemed to settle him.

“I like you like this,” she admitted with a blush. And as Azriel looked at her with black eyes, chest heaving, she thought he might like it too. Kneeling for her, being at her mercy. She moved her foot, nudging his stiff cock, and his hips jerked at the contact.

“Fuck, Elain,” Azriel groaned. “Please.”

He pinched the lace waistband of her underwear between his thumb and forefinger, and pulled at the material gently, supplicatingly.

At her nod, Azriel slid them down Elain’s legs.

His hands were hot and frenetic, guiding her gently onto her back with her feet hanging over the ledge, toes skimming the grass below, reaching for an ankle and propping it on his shoulder. The cool night air against her wet cunt made her whimper, the soft sound seeming to echo through the otherwise still night.

As awkward as the position was, Elain kept herself propped up on her elbows, so she could keep looking at Azriel. Watch his eyes, heavily-lidded and cloudy with lust, flutter closed with the first broad lick through her folds.

And with that one taste, it was as if all the urgency had bled from his body.

He’d gotten what he needed, so now he could take his time getting what he wanted: Elain, pliant and breathless, as he teased her with his tongue, slow and indulgent.

“Azriel,” she whined as he took clit between his lips, sucking at her. It was as if the heat and tension building in her abdomen was sapping the strength from everything else — her voice, now high and reedy. Her legs, shaking under Azriel’s hands. Her arms, buckling and dropping her flat on her back.

Elain couldn’t see Azriel anymore, but gods could she hear him. He moaned into her, noisy and salacious. Letting her arousal coat his nose and chin, and then smearing it on her trembling thighs when he pulled away from her pussy to kiss and nip at them.

She was panting by the time he sank a finger into her, slowly working her open while his tongue circled her clit, before adding another. And when his fingers found that sweet spot inside her, the stars above swirled like a snowstorm.

Squirming, Elain couldn’t decide if she wanted reprieve from the burning pleasure sparking in her core or if she wanted to chase it.

The choice was made for her by a hand, splayed across her stomach and pinning her in place. Too breathless to make any real noise, Elain’s mouth fell open, a cry caught in her throat, as she came.

Azriel settled back to watch himself fuck her through it on his fingers, moaning as if it were his cock inside her instead — pulsing around him, begging him to stay.

Still so wet and sensitive, Elain was sure that if he kept going, he would make her come again. But if that was going to happen, she didn’t want it to be while she couldn’t really see him or get her hands on him. Suddenly desperate to have him closer, she clumsily surged forward and grabbed his shirt collar.

Only when she knew he was getting to his feet did she let go and settle herself at the center of the blanket, giving him the space to climb up after her. But the instant he was within her reach, Elain was crashing back into him, capturing his lips in a near vicious kiss, needing his mouth to be on her again, in one way or another.

She could taste herself on his tongue, feel his hands shaking as they cradled her head, fingers knotting in her hair. Elain reached again for Azriel’s shirt, pulling at it, trying fruitlessly to peel it away.

“Take it off,” she breathed, dimly aware that she was the one begging now.

But as if it had been a command, Azriel unraveled the network of buttons and flaps keeping his shirt on his back, then grabbed a fistful of the fabric covering his chest and yanked it off.

The fastenings of his pants were much more straightforward.

As he sat back with his weight braced on his hands, Elain crawled into his lap. She knelt, trapping his legs between hers, feeling as if she could melt into the heat of his skin on her thighs, the curve of her ass. While one of her hands curled around his hip, the other wrapped lightly around his length, flushed and dripping with arousal.

Azriel sucked in a stuttering breath, as if she’d punched him in the gut instead.

Elain quirked a brow — a little surprised and a little smug — but he was unabashed, arching into her touch, his hands coming to clutch at her waist. He was uninhibited in the way he reacted to the languid slide of her fist, yet clearly holding back. She could feel it in his fingertips, the way they dug into her ribs — the effort it was taking to keep still and let her touch him as she pleased.

Azriel’s cock throbbed in her hand, and she squeezed him at the base, just enough to keep him from tipping over the edge, to pull a low whimper from his throat.

Tempted as she might have been to continue toying with him, nothing compared to Elain’s desire to feel him everywhere.

“Can I —”

“Yes,” he breathed. “Please.”

She never said what she wanted, didn’t get the chance to ask for it, but Elain got the sense that it wouldn’t have made a difference.

With a hand on his shoulder for support, she guided him into her, bracing herself for pain. But while, yes, there was some discomfort as she stretched to accommodate him, Elain felt most intensely the relief of having him. It was the first bite of food hitting a growling stomach, a flushed cheek against the cool side of the pillow on a hot night.

One of Azriel’s hands trailed to the apex of her thighs, his thumb finding her clit. A feathery, coaxing touch to tempt her body into staying pliant for him until she sat heavy in his lap, her legs loosely wrapped around his waist.

Elain’s fingers linked behind his neck. Under her thumbs, she could feel the blood surging, propelled by a ferocious, erratic heartbeat.

“Does it…” Azriel started, the words choking out as Elain clenched around him, adjusting. “How do you feel?”

Her response came more as a sigh than a word, “Good.”

Elain rocked against him, slow and deep. So exquisitely full, she could feel him everywhere. “You feel so good.”

Azriel practically whined at the praise. His hands slid up her body, pushing her shirt up as he went, finally exposing all of her to him. His fingers roamed all of it — from her wrists to her shoulders, her hips to her ribs — before splaying across her back, fingertips pressing into the skin, holding her to him.

Elain’s arms fell back down around his neck, cradling his head between her shoulder and her palm, holding him just as tightly. He turned his face into the spot behind her ear where she always dabbed her perfume oil, inhaling heavily, as if trying to trap her scent inside his lungs.

It was a slower burn than before, but no less intense. Every touch, every roll of her hips stoking the fire until she was entirely consumed by the heat, her desire. Became single-minded in her need. Azriel must have been thinking the same thing, because as her hand strayed to one of his wings, his drifted down to where their bodies were joined.

A few messy circles of his fingers and Elain was coming. The hand in Azriel’s hair closed into a fist, holding him tight to her, the crook of her neck muffling the near-guttural sounds he made as she fluttered and squeezed around his cock.

And then Azriel was leaning forward, getting his knees under him and letting the momentum tip Elain onto her back. He braced himself over her, one of his hands between the back of her head and the ground. Cradling her gently, even as he fucked her without restraint.

Elain’s arms, which had landed limply at her sides, wind around his shoulders, at first to hold him, then to reach again for the sensitive membrane of his wings.

The touch seemed to unravel Azriel and any remaining thread of control he had over his body. The rhythm of hips faltered, becoming frantic and sloppy. His eyes squeezed shut, just before his head fell forward, hanging heavy over her. He was too far gone to do much more than slur something that sounded like her name against her cheek as he came, his whole body tensing with the intensity of it.

And then, all at once, a softening — his brow smoothed and his eyes fluttered open, holding her gaze. A deep sigh relaxed his clenched jaw. Slowly, his body melted into hers.

Elain welcomed the comforting weight of him. She curled a hand around the back of his head, gently dragging her nails through his dark hair, damp with sweat. He kissed her collarbone before pressing his cheek flush to her neck — nuzzling a little, she realized — then shook with a breathy sort of half-laugh that had her thinking he was just as giddy and dazed as she was.

But when he spoke a moment later, his voice was pensive: a confession, murmured into her skin, “There’s still so much I need to tell you.”

There was still so much she wanted to know. But Azriel’s warmth was seeping deep into her bones and his fingertips were skimming up and down her arm in a tender, lazy rhythm that had her lulled halfway to sleep.

“In the morning,” she murmured.

“We can’t stay out here all night.”

“I don’t want to leave.”

You, she thought, I don’t want to leave you.

She hadn’t said the words out loud, but it didn’t matter. Azriel, as he so often did, seemed to understand them anyway.

“Alright,” he said, tightening his hold on her. “A bit longer then.”

#elriel #elriel fanfiction #acotar fanfiction #elain archeron #azriel #my writing: acotar #otp: you came for me

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sprnklersplashes · 2 months ago

Text

it was legendary; it was momentary

ao3 ko-fi fundraiser

Something’s changed in him.

Something changes every time he comes home; the long stretches in Camelot carve lines into his face, his mighty destiny casts shadows beneath his eyes. There are good things too; he carries himself with a sureness he had never possessed before, and she wouldn’t change it for anything. But she does wonder if his softness will grow with him or if one day he will come home with eyes of pure steel.

He smiles when he sees her. She pulls him into an embrace, only to find him shaking as she does. He leans into her, holds her tight as if there’s something coming for her. He sighs against her, and the pain inside it strikes her heart more than any weapon could.

When they break apart, they smile as if nothing is wrong. She doesn’t mention the tear tracks on his face and neither does he.

It follows him around all day. Hunith watches as he drifts through the village, his body present but his mind somewhere else. He used to get like this as a child, when it was becoming more and more apparent that he couldn’t stay. Just like those times, she gets the feeling that he’s searching for something. When he was younger, it was easy to know what it was. Acceptance, answers, a purpose for the magic inside him.

Now, she watches with an ache as he traces the same path, searching for answers and coming up empty each time.

Merlin stops his pacing. He looks so haunted and Hunith knows this is beyond her. Whatever has happened has buried under her boy’s skin into his soul, and holds him a grip so tight that he’s bleeding from it. And she doesn’t know what it is. As much as she tries to put her own feeling aside, she can’t ignore the helplessness gnawing at her heart.

Night falls before she finally decides to ask. She and Merlin ate dinner in relative silence. They washed up, and as they did Hunith watched him look around the house like there’s something missing. As she puts away the plates, Merlin turns in a circle, his eyes darting everywhere. He bites on his thumb, a habit he’s had since boyhood, and she decides enough is enough. If she lets Merlin go on like this, he may wear himself down to nothing.

Slowly, carefully, she lays her hand on his shoulder. He starts, a gasp sticks in his throat before he realises. Hunith curls her hand into a fist and breathes out.

“Merlin,” she whispers, remembering to keep her voice light. “Something’s troubling you.”

“I’m fine,” he mumbles, but it tapers off. She shakes her head, rubs his arm.

“That may work in Camelot, but I know you too well,” she reminds him. Something flashes in his eyes then, and Hunith holds her breath before continuing. Wind picks up outside, but it could be a coincidence. “Whatever happened Merlin, you and tell me. We can work it out-”

“I met my father.”

And oh.

Hunith stumbles backwards. Dull pain billows across her back when she hits the countertop, but she swallows her cry. She tries to breathe, but her chest is too tight, as if someone has wound wire around it and keeps pulling. Vaguely, she hears Merlin call her name, concern wavering in his voice, but she can’t make herself reply. Blood is rushing in her ears, trembling hands grasping the counter behind her.

She’s no longer here. Suddenly, she is a girl of nineteen, twisted in bedsheets while Balinor kisses her. Then she is twenty, still and silent on that same bed while villagers whispered around her.

‘Bastard child,’ they had whispered. ‘It would be one thing if she was just unmarried, but by him’. They turned to her, unsure whether to feel pity or disgust. Someone had stroked her hair then. Hunith wanted to bite her.

With a shuddering breath, she comes back to the present. Merlin is across from her, so still he might as well be a statue. Blood blooms across her mouth; she was biting her tongue. Slowly, she lets go.

“No,” she whispers. She shakes her head, pulls her shawl tighter around her. Gods, when did the room get so cold? “No, you can’t have-he-”

“My father,” Merlin says again. “My father, Balinor, the Dragonlord, ran away before he even knew about me-” He stops, his breath coming in a swift, sharp gasp. His mouth opens and closes wordlessly, and the tears he’d been holding back now shine in his eyes.

Hunith looks at the floor. Her gut twists, her mouth is dry. She drives her hand into the counter. At least, she supposes, she doesn’t need to wonder where he found out

“Gaius told you?” Merlin nods. She laughs then, though calling it that feels wrong. It��s too short, too bitter. But she can’t do anything else. She runs her hand through her hair, presses her tongue against her teeth. “I’ll murder him for it. Court Physician or not I’ll-”

“Don’t,” he says. He stands by the table, tracing patterns into the wood, but she isn’t fooled. The tension in his shoulders could fell whole forests. “He should’ve told me sooner.” Then he looks up, and the fire in his gaze makes her gasp. “You should have told me.”

“No, I shouldn’t have,” she says. “I don’t expect you to understand, Merlin, but I-”

“I understand that you lied to me,” he replies. His voice burns, and Hunith knows deep down, it’s a fire she started. Gaius had warned her, years ago, that hiding this from him would come back to haunt her. “I understand that every time I asked who my father was, you pushed it away.”

“I did it to protect you Merlin.” Her skin tightens, her pulse quivers against her wrist. “You were better off not knowing who he was.”

“That he was a Dragonlord? You thought I was better off not knowing that?”

“Yes,” she tells him, and she says it with such force that Merlin falls silent. Not regular, everyday silent either; one that is complete, all-encompassing. All Hunith can hear is the beat of her heart, pounding like the wings of that blasted dragon. Tears run down her face yet she still raises her chin.

Pride is not something she is known for. But damn it, she will not be lectured about her choices by a child. What can he tell her that Gaius hasn’t already?

“Everything I kept from you was to protect you, Merlin.” She resigns to speak once more than consider the matter over. “And Gaius should have known better than to tell you.”

But then Merlin looks at her with a face like thunder and it’s far from finished

“Gaius was more honest with me than you were,” he tells her. “My father was a Dragonlord. I had a right to know that.”

“And I had a duty to keep you safe,” she says. “That duty goes above everything else, Merlin.”. Her voice is shaking now, a string pulled too tightly. Heat scorches her chest and she drops her shawl to the ground. “He was gone and you were all I had and I will never apologise for what I did to protect you.”

She turns away before he can see. Self-pity sobs wrecking through her body because it’s the truth. She feels, rather than sees, the shift in Merlin’s mood and she curses herself. All her life, she had one rule for being his mother; never let him see her break.

Yet, here she is. Breaking.

“You were already carrying one burden,” she mutters. “What kind of mother would have made you carry another?”

No-one told her what to do. Gods, no-one taught her how to be a mother, let alone how to raise a Dragonlord’s son. She was the one who watched as Merlin’s eyes turned gold, who swept him behind her skirts when the knights rode through their village. It was her who lay awake at night, formulating plans to take Merlin and leave before the sun came up. They say it takes a village but when it came to her, all she had was herself and her intuition. It wasn’t fair, but she never complained.

Perhaps if Balinor had stayed, it would have been easier. But she gave up on those girlish ‘what if’s a long time ago.

With a final cry, she sinks down to her knees, her skirt pooling against the dusty floor. A voice in her head urges her to stand, that she is still a mother and her son is right there, but she can’t make herself move. All those long years weigh her down; nights she spent crying and days spent wandering around the village like a phantom. The grief she locked away now trickles through her veins and around her bones and she can’t stop.

There’s a snuffle, the scrape of a chair, and then a warm presence at her side, pressed against her hip like he’s still seven years old. Like he’s still a child.

(Isn’t he though, she asks herself. No matter how old he is or how powerful isn’t he always her baby?)

“Oh Merlin.” Despite him towering over her, Hunith wraps her arm around his shoulders and pulls him in close. She kisses his hair and rubs circles into his arms and lets him weep into her shoulder. His body trembles against her, a leaf caught in an autumn wind.

She looks up. A small, tired sigh escapes her. She threads her fingers through the soft, ink-black strands of Merlin’s hair. She rests her chin on it, squeezes his shoulder as if she can squeeze the hurt out of him.

“What happened to him?” As if she doesn’t already know.

“I-I tried to save him,” he tells her and oh, her heart. Broken doesn’t begin to describe it. His chest heaves against her legs, his shoulders shake as if a hurricane is attacking them. “I tried, but I couldn’t-”

“It wasn’t your fault, Merlin.” She doesn’t need to know what happened. It will never be his fault.

She lets him tell her then, in his own time and his own words, about what happened. The Great Dragon freed, Uther demanding Balinor come to Camelot. Hunith bites back anger when he tells her how Gaius told him, holds her breath as he recalls finding and losing his father in a matter of hours. When she hears how he took his father’s gift and he commanded the Dragon away from Camelot, Hunith isn’t sure what she feels. Pride, because her own son banished a dragon. Complete terror, because her little boy can command dragons. A wistful sadness, because she wished she could have seen it.

Beneath it all, she feels a longing she thought she’d have grown out of. Longing for him and for their little family to be complete. For a life where she didn’t raise Merlin alone, plagued by his endless questions.

There are other things too, but she puts them aside for now. They sit in silence as night settles over Ealdor, hearts slowing until they beat in time with each other. She rubs his back, feels the slow rise and fall of his chest.

“He still loved you,” Merlin mutters. When she looks down, she finds him tracing patterns on their floor and she smiles. “He wanted you to be happy.” He shifts on the floor. “He thought you married someone.”

“Did he?” she asks, a faint smile on her lips. “Bastard…” Honestly, Hunith isn’t sure if she should be happy or insulted. Didn’t he know that it would only ever be him? How could he come into her village, breathe new life into her, and then expect her to forget?

“Mother?” His voice is heavier now, the ordeal having exhausted him. Hunith strokes his hair again.

“Yes?” He’s quiet for a long moment, and Hunith thinks he’s fallen asleep. Until he asks, in a voice so small and so broken, “Will you be all right?”

What else can she say?

“I’ve been all right for twenty years now, Merlin.” She swallows and gives his shoulder a gentle pat. “Get some rest. I just have to go out for a moment.”

“Go out?” Immediately, he is up and turns around. In the dim firelight, Hunith can see the redness around his eyes, the palour in his cheeks. He reaches clumsily for her, wraps his trembling fingers around her hand. “Go out where?”

“I won’t be long, I promise.” She places her hand on his cheek, rubs her thumb beneath his eye.

Before she knew about Merlin, Hunith had wondered if her life would have been better if Balinor had never crossed her paths. She had thought about all the heartache she would have saved herself. But then Merlin came, and she knows now just as she knew every moment since his birth; she would go through all that pain all over again if it meant she would have him. One messy moment with her boy is worth a thousand broken hearts. “Get some rest, darling.” She takes one last moment and presses her forehead to his.

“I’ll be fine.”

She always has been, hasn’t she?

Balinor told her he’d meet her at the clearing. That horrible morning when the sky turned red and the Knights of Camelot were closing in. He told her to meet him at sunset at this clearing and then he would come and get her.

The village healer estimates she’d been sitting there for four hours when the search party came. Gods, she had screamed the place down, refused to move until one of them told her the truth. Balinor was gone, and on his way out asked one of the men to come and find her here.

She hasn’t been here since.

When she enters, she checks over her shoulder. She never could be too careful with Merlin. He had a way of sticking to her like a shadow as a child and he made her even more cautious than she was before.

Once she’s sure he didn’t follow her, she looks out at the clearing. The place is quiet, the dark blue sky half-hidden behind densely-gathered leaves. Up in the branches, a small animal scampers around, likely off to settle down for the night. As she breathes in, the air tastes cool and crisp, and tiny whisps of smoke appear as she gives a slow exhale. She chuckles, as if she’s sharing a joke with the place.

Then she drops to her knees, and she screams. Tears run like rivers down her burning cheeks, her breath hot against her hand. Her fist strikes the ground over and over, until the skin splits and her hand bleeds. The scream keeps coming, an ugly and rabid thing, driven wild by the years locked inside her.

She hadn’t admitted it. But the moment Merlin said the word “father”, a small bud of hope had opened. For just a part of a moment, she thought he’d come back to her, and she could make sense of the world again. No. He died, and she wasn’t there.

Should she be glad that she no longer needs to wonder if he’s alive?

He left to keep her safe, they said. When did she ask him to keep her safe? How many times did she tell him she would choose him over safety? What had safe ever done for her? He gave her safety and with it gave her a broken heart and a magical child she had no idea how to raise. As far as deals go, it’s a rotten one.

She’s under no illusion about what she would have done if she’d found him again. She would have slapped the living hell out of him, screamed at him til she was blue in the face, asked how he could do this to her, called him every horrible name under the sun. A cheat, a liar, a disloyal ass, failure of a man and a failure of a father.

Then she would have thrown her arms around him and never let him go.

She has hated him for so many years. She has loved him for all that time too.

Eventually, her voice gives out and she can’t scream any more. Her knuckles are caked with dirt, blood trickling down her hand where she broke the skin. She pulls herself to her feet, pushes her hair from her face. The valley looks back at her, just as it did that night, and its vastness reminds her of just how small her life is. How insignificant, unextraordinary, uninspiring her life is. It taunts her, whispers that one way or another, Balinor always would have left. Ealdor was too small for him, just as it was too small for her son.

Hunith wipes a tear from her face. She looks up at the sky and, with fire in her eyes, she tells it she will not listen.

She knows now that Balinor loved her still. There is nothing-no kingdom and no magic-that can take that from her.

Just as she closes her eyes, a soft rustling appears behind her. She laughs, because she has to, and because she should have seen this coming. When has her boy ever, for a second, done what she tells him to?

A smile creeps across her face, slow, tender, almost reluctant after the evening she has had.

He wraps his arm around her shoulders, head pressed to her neck. So mighty and powerful and yet, still her baby.

Trembling, she grasps his hand with her cold one Merlin doesn’t understand why this place is so important to her. She doesn’t know if she will tell him or how much if she does. He deserves to know. He deserved a father. He deserved better than what he was dealt.

All three of them did.

#its my teenager hyperfixation and I get to choose the rarepair!#merlin #hunith x balinor #hunith #balinor #bbc merlin #merlin bbc

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separatist-apologist · 1 year ago

Text

Lying In Between The Memories

You could call it paradise but it looks just like hell to me

Summary: Following the blood rite, Gwyneth Berdara can't shake the memories of a life long-gone.

The shadowsinger can't seem to move on after five centuries of loving the same woman.

Together, they'll have to carve a new path forward.

Read on AO3 | Previous Chapter

[ongoing TW for Sexual Assault]

The tension in the room was so thick, Gwyn could have cut it with a knife. Azriel looked wild and somehow pained, his expressions shifting second to second along with what must have been his chaotic thoughts. She exhaled a breath and pressed a hand to his chest, which seemed to strengthen some unknowable resolve.

“Everything will be fine,” she began, wondering if she was reassuring him or herself. “We’ll talk to Eris—”

“Let me take you home,” Azriel interrupted. Gwyn nearly screamed out loud. Of course that was his solution. Of course he’d think she should go back to Prythian, leaving him to deal with whatever the Vanserras wanted while she sat in a library.

“Are you serious right now?” she asked, taking a step away from him. Crossing his arms over his chest, it was clear that yes, Azriel was very serious.

“The Vanserras are dangerous,” Azriel said, his voice pitched lower than was typical. “You don’t know what you’re dealing with.”

“Oh, but you do? I’m dangerous, Az, and I can handle myself just fine. If you want to go home so badly, be my guest. I won’t stop you. But I’m staying.”

“Gwyn—”

“No. No. I can’t…I won’t do this with you, Azriel. Either you mean it when you say you care about me—that you trust me, or you don’t. Decide. Right now. Either we’re equals or we’re not and I just want to know where I stand with you.”

This was it and Gwyn knew it. Whatever Azriel said would determine how they moved forward—if they moved forward at all. After everything that had happened between them, it seemed almost cruel to provide him with an ultimatum, but Gwyn wasn’t going back. She wasn’t going to hide in the library, lost in her regrets and wishing things could be different. They were different.

She was different.

There was no point following through on the promises she’d just been willing to make if Azriel was never going to make good on his. Why train her, why teach her to use weapons or how to take the likes of him down if every time there was danger, Azriel was going to swoop in and hide her away?

What was his problem?

There clearly was one, because the only reasonable answer was to immediately assure her that he trusted her. Not war with himself between what he actually wanted—she assumed that was her returning to Velaris—and knowing that if he took her back, she’d never see him again. Gwyn’s heart thudded in her throat against the long stretch of silence.

“I—” His throat bobbed, working against whatever emotion he was swallowing. “I’m sorry—I…I’m scared.”

The admission hung between them. Azriel was so many things to Gwyn and frightened was never one of them. Azriel wasn’t afraid of anything, including death. How many stories had she heard of him running head long into battle, damning the consequences? What could he possibly be afraid of when surely Eris Vanserra was no threat to the likes of him?

“Eris is all talk,” she dismissed, sliding around him in an effort to clear her senses. She could still feel his rigid cock held in her hand and if she wasn’t careful, she’d make Eris wait on them.

Presumably, for hours.

It was a good plan—one she would have succeeded in, had Azriel not followed just behind her. Dragging a hand through his hair with frustration, Azriel growled, “He has plenty of bite—don’t let his pretty face fool you.”

“Oh, is it pretty? I hadn’t noticed,” she said with too much innuendo. She hadn’t meant to be so suggestive, though she also didn’t mind that soft growl that slipped from Azriel’s throat. He’d always been a little territorial—obnoxiously so, if she was being honest—but now? This was why she hadn’t wanted to sleep with him. He was going to take things too far.

That should have bothered her, but right then, Gwyn wanted Azriel to take things too far. It was the worst possible time, in the worst possible place, and she couldn’t really focus on the threat of the Vanserra’s because Azriel was staring down at her with eyes so dark there might have been no color to them at all. Just endless pools of starless night threatening to devour her.

Azriel cocked his head to the side, all animal, and Gwyn knew right then, that he could scent what she wasn’t trying to conceal. He didn’t seem to breathe as she dared to come closer, pressing her hand to his still chest.

“I don’t care about Eris Vanserra,” she murmured, peering up at him through dark lashes. “Lock the door. He can wait.”

“Gwyn,” he whispered, his voice hoarse.

She didn’t think she could take it if he told her no. Her pride certainly could not withstand that level of rejection no matter how valid it was. Gwyn was tempted to say something to him that might change his mind, but right then she felt nervous. Too vulnerable for speech, too embarrassed to do anything but remain rooted in place as the realization of what she’d said swept over her.

Oh. Oh no.

She was becoming the thing she’d sworn she wouldn’t be. Resolve slammed into her, stealing her spine as the memory of all those months training washed back over her. The recognition that this, right here, was why she had to quit training with him. Why she needed to step away before he did any more irreversible damage to herself.

Oblivious to her racing thoughts, perhaps to her detriment, Azriel grabbed her upper arm the moment she started to step back and without a word, pressed his mouth to her own. She’d expected hunger and heat—not desperation to greet her. His other arm wound around her waist, holding her so tightly there was nowhere to go. That was by design, though Gwyn had nowhere she wanted to go.

There were a million things to be afraid of, but this right here—and the way she felt about him? That was, perhaps, the most terrifying thing. Instinct warred between walking away from him again and staying where she was, letting go and giving in, pulling and pushing until Gwyn was muddled and confused.

And yet there was clarity in that kiss. Reason, among the madness, was found in his lips. She didn’t realize they were moving, that she was taking steps toward something until Azriel was pulling her into his lap, himself seated on that sofa.

“If I start,” he breathed, trailing his mouth over her jaw and down her neck, “I won’t be able to stop.” Something twanged within her—something old, something primal. “Good,” she replied, raking her fingers through his dark hair.

“You deserve better than this,” he said, scarred hands coming to cup her face so she had to look at him. “Better than a rushed coupling so I can race off to deal with Eris. Wait for me. For tonight,” he added, a plea to his words.

Wrapping her fingers around his wrists, Gwyn met that hungry, desperate gaze. “Together?”

“We’ll do everything together,” he swore softly, a lethal menace to those words. “Let someone try and stop us.”

Gwyn kissed him again, unable to deny what she felt or what was happening between them. Love.

This was love.

Somewhere between swearing she’d never train with him again and looking into those hazel eyes swearing he’d do everything with her if she wanted. Goosebumps erupted over her arms, drawing ice through her fingers. She was excited and she was scared all at once. Dread and elation pooled in her gut though Gwyn did a good job of concealing both. Azriel didn’t seem alarmed by what he saw, at any rate.

“Can you stand?” she asked when Azriel shifted his hips, revealing the hard cock just beneath.

Closing his eyes, head tipped back, he breathed, “Give me a moment. If I think about Vanserra long enough, it’ll pass.”

Gwyn tried to slide off his lap, and was too delighted when he tightened his grip, holding her tight. “You hate him so much. Why?”

Azriel looked up at the ceiling. “He’s a bastard.”

“That’s not a real reason. Tell me.”

“When I was young—in my twenties—Eris was engaged to Mor.”

The words hung between them for a moment, weighty as Azriel considered what he wanted to say. This was ancient, then. Old, unfinished business between them that Azriel had never forgotten.

He didn’t look at her as he added, “I was in love with her.”

Oh.

Gwyn could see Mor so clearly in her mind right then. Beautiful in such an easy, effortless way. All that golden hair, her beautiful eyes…and the way she’d been looking at Emerie, she reminded herself before jealousy could fully take root. It was impossible, though, not to compare herself to Mor. Not to imagine Azriel with his fingers curled around Mor’s waist, his lips against her neck—

“Mor was never interested in me,” Azriel continued, blazing through this confession like he needed to say it. “But I thought, back then at least…maybe…it didn’t matter. She was engaged to Eris and Rhys could do nothing about it. Wouldn’t do anything about it,” Azriel added, as if that were important to the story or to him. Gwyn certainly wasn’t going to wade into that old fight, though she saw there were leftover scars that had healed poorly.

“Mor took things into her own hands—she came to our camp in Illyria and she slept with Cassian. Virginity…it’s…it’s important in the Autumn Court. It’s an old custom for females of nobility and a point of pride for males. Mor decided if no one would help her, she would do what we’d always done—she’d help herself.”

“You slept with her?” Gwyn questioned, her blood turning to ice. She didn’t think she could stand knowing that Azriel had both loved her and slept with her, unfair as it was. This was centuries old, a drama older than her, than her parents, and likely her grandparents.

Azriel shook his head. “No. I told you��she never wanted me. She went to Cassian. Everyone knew. It was an open secret in the camp, and secrets like that are hard to keep. There was no love lost between the three of us and the rest of the Illyrian’s, who already felt we were given special treatment because we were so close to the High Lord. Someone told Keir—but rumor had already begun to spread around Hewn City and Beron knew before Keir could control the situation.”

Azriel took a breath as if he needed to control himself. Gwyn swore she could feel his rage somehow, though maybe it was just her own anger as she imagined what it must have been like for Mor back then. Sold, by her own parents, like she was mere cattle for breeding. Knowing that she had no good options and still trying to do something that gave her agency.

“Keir nailed a note to Mor’s womb and dumped her into Autumn letting them know she was their problem now,” Azriel whispered, his voice lethal. Whatever Gwyn had been imagining paled in comparison to the reality.

“Eris could have helped her. He found her before me—we weren’t allowed to step foot into Autumn so we had to wait. Cassian, Rhys and I…we were patrolling sections of the border between Autumn, Summer, Spring, and Winter. Flying overhead, trying to find her, we—we were going to get her even if it started a war. But it was Eris who found her first. Who saw how injured she was, who could have helped. He left her there, where I found her hours later and…”

Azriel fell silent, eyes glazed as he relived that moment. As he considered what it still meant to him and the hatred he’d never be able to let go of.

“He’ll say he couldn’t intervene. That it was better, politically, to look the other way while I stalked across that border and brought her into Summer. But the truth is Eris is a coward, too scared to do anything that might endanger him, first. He’d let his brothers die, he’d let his mother suffer, and he’d see the rest of the world burn to keep himself safe first and I hate him for it.”

There was nothing else to say. Even if Gwyn did have a defense for Eris—and she didn’t—she wouldn’t have offered it up to Azriel. There were other questions she had, questions that felt too embarrassing to ask.

Are you still in love with Mor?

She swallowed that one, terrified he’d say yes. What had happened, in the aftermath? She’d never wanted him, so maybe nothing at all…but had something? And did he know they’d had a whole dinner in Velaris right before Gwyn left specifically trying to catch Mor’s attention because Emerie thought she was beautiful?

Questions better left for another time.

“So how do we play this?” she asked instead, because she wanted to be a team more than she wanted to plumb the depths of his life before her. Gwyn simply had to trust that, at least here and now, she was the only female Azriel cared about. That whatever feelings he had for Mor had fizzled over the years until only friendship remained. Perhaps when Eris was gone, and they were back in Velaris.

Or maybe Gwyn would tell Nesta all this and they could compare notes. Did she know Cassian had slept with Mor? Did she even care? Gwyn couldn’t imagine Nesta being cool about it, but what did she truly know? Nesta and Cassian were mates and that changed things.

“Carefully,” Azriel said after a moment, his expression wiped clean of its former fury. “Eris’s weapons are his words. Give him nothing to work with, let him back himself into a corner. And we can’t kill him.”

“Are you saying that to me or yourself?”

“Is there a difference?” he murmured without any awareness of what he was implying. “Knives stay under the skirts.”

“I’m tired of dresses,” Gwyn mumbled, swinging her legs off him to stand.

“I’ll have you out of them soon enough.”

He couldn’t see the grin that spread over her face, though he likely knew the heat spreading through her. Gwyn merely waved her hand.

“Big words, Shadowsinger.”

AZRIEL:

Unlike Eris, Azriel didn’t need a mask for his boredom. He was bored—irritated, even, made worse by Gwyn sitting close enough his knee was touching hers. Fully clothed when her perfect hand had been wrapped around his cock and she’d been all but begging him to take her. Gods, Azriel couldn’t focus on a smug word leaving Eris’s mouth. And Eris knew it. Knew what Gwyn hadn’t yet figured out, putting a countdown on a conversation Azriel wasn’t sure how to have. He’d just gotten her to open up to him and Eris was going to wreck it all before Azriel built the sort of intimacy he was certain he needed.

All he knew for certain was the information had to come from him rather than Eris Vanserra. Gwyn, lovely, perfect Gwyn, was doing the hard work of making small talk with Eris. She’d put on her most charming demeanor and Azriel wondered if she wasn’t playing dumb on purpose. Eris, on the other hand, had a gleam in his eye reminiscent of a wolf unaware his sheep was really a dragon in disguise.

“I’ve never been to Autumn,” Gwyn was saying, tucking a long piece of that cinnamon colored hair behind an arched ear.

Azriel was in love with her and gods, but he wanted to tell her so badly it made his teeth ache. She played Eris so well—hadn’t the first born son been told Gwyn was a scholar from the Night Court? And wouldn’t he assume she was smarter than the average High Fae? But Eris was buying her bright eyed, too-idealistic act which left Azriel left to play the brooding bodyguard. That was a role he knew all too well, at least. And Eris had the decency to keep his eyes fully on Gwyn’s beautiful face rather than let it drift.

Azriel might have abandoned his no violence policy had Eris not managed this. He had one hand clenched beneath the table, nails digging into his palm to keep himself from squeezing the life from Eris’s smug, imperious eyes.

As Eris described Autumn to an enraptured Gwyn, Azriel’s thoughts once again drifted to his mate. He needed to tell her. It was a last ditch attempt, sleeping with her and hoping it snapped for her then. Azriel knew that had worked for Cassian in theory. Nesta had felt it…and chose not to acknowledge it.

He might go insane if that happened to him and Gwyn. So focused on his inner thoughts, Azriel nearly missed Gwyn’s sweet, “Is the High Lord joining us?”

“He’s around,” Eris replied with a bored wave of his hand. “I’m certain he’s looking for Helion—”

“Helion?” Azriel interrupted. Helion arriving had Rhys written all over it. Eris’s eyes shifted, that smile sharpening at the corners. Fuck. Azriel hadn’t meant to say anything at all.

“Did your High Lord not inform you? Fascinating given how long you’ve been here…”

Azriel didn’t respond, leaving Gwyn to scramble. Without missing a beat, she threw that sunny smile on her face and said, “We’re only here for the library. I can’t remember the last time the prince stopped by to say hello. I’m sure he’s too busy for us.”

Eris glanced up at Azriel, two lines of concern creasing between his brow. “You haven’t seen him?”

“In at least a week,” Gwyn replied without betraying her real question. “Perhaps we will now that more emissaries from Prythian are visiting.”

“I was under the impression–” Eris stopped himself before he could finish that thought. Gwyn glanced “Well. I suppose we’ll all learn together, won’t we?”

Gwyn’s smile never wavered. “It’ll be nice to get to know all the new courts. We could keep in touch.”

Eris was clearly lost in his own thoughts, eyes drifting across the room. Azriel turned his head to look, curious what had drawn Eris’s attention from the cat and mouse game happening at their current table. Helion had sauntered in, every inch the Day Court High Lord in his white draped robe and the gold jewelry adorning his gleaming bronze skin. Something about him was striking right then—an expression Azriel had seen once before, though he couldn’t remember when.

Eris’s upper lip had curled with distaste, his dislike plain against his features. Flanked on either side of the High Lord were two others—a rather beautiful blonde with a book tucked beneath her arm and a male with the same onyx colored hair as the High Lord. Both wore azure clothes, their eyes lined with kohl.

The trio didn’t spare Night and Autumn a second look, making their way toward the high table. Eris didn’t take his eyes off them until they were fully behind them, though his expression was inscrutable. Still, it was something. It shouldn’t have surprised Azriel that Eris didn’t like any of the other courts, nor was it really worth following up on, and yet he would have been a poor spymaster if he didn’t order his shadows after both Helion and Eris.

After all, Eris and Helion would likely be trying to spy on him, too. The High Lords loved their secrets almost as much as they loved their games. Whatever was going on between Autumn and Day was for them—not Night. Azriel and Gwyn were nearly done, besides. She merely needed to finish her cypher for the two to return with her stolen book on Koschei. They didn’t need anything else—not really. Though, it occurred to him right then that his shadow had never returned from Koschei’s lake.

Strange.

He’d need to follow up on that.

Azriel was distracted and couldn’t even pretend he didn’t know why. If he’d come alone he’d be on top of all of this and right then, Azriel wondered if Rhys hadn’t suspected. Of all the people…of everyone who could have come, Rhys had insisted it be Gwyn. Untested. Unknown. Azriel’s mate. Had his brother suspected?

No.

No, Rhys would have warned him surely. Or, at the very least, put them in a better environment. Though…Azriel remembered all the shenanigans Rhys had gotten up to with Feyre around and oblivious. Maybe not. Azriel was spinning himself in circles, unable to focus and he knew he wouldn’t until Gwyn knew, too.

At least then he could free himself of the indecision. Get back to working—throw himself into it, even, if need be. He’d always been good at distracting himself, and this would be no exception. He had centuries of practice with Mor, though Azriel suspected this would be infinitely more painful.

Pain was home, though. He lived there, loved there—worshiped at its altar.

Glancing at Eris, Azriel wondered if the prince of Autumn didn’t understand that, in some strange way. He almost felt pity, catching a familiar look of yearning streak across Eris’s features��gone so quickly Azriel could have lied to himself and said he imagined it.

“Did you want something, Eris?” Azriel demanded, ignoring the cooling food on his plate.

Eris offered a fox’s smile. “Only the pleasure of your stimulating company.”

Gwyn never broke character, which was more than Azriel could boast. She merely continued eating, pretending this was a normal conversation between normal people. Friends, even. Eris stood, though, catching the eye of his father striding into the room with the king.

“Bye!” she called after Eris’s retreating back before adding, “Prick,” under her breath.

“You were charming,” Azriel said from the side of his mouth, noting how neither father or son deigned to look in his direction. Why would they? He was merely a bastard born Illyrian, after all. Trash, as far as they were concerned.

“Isn’t that why I’m here? To smooth out your edges?” she teased and gods, he wanted her so badly it was making a fool of him.

“More than you know,” he replied, pulling his wings tighter against his body to keep them from flaring outward. Not that anyone would understand what that meant, and still it was probably better not to have a preening, territorial Illyrian stomping about the dining hall.

He needed to get them both out which was harder than he thought it would be given Gwyn was fixated on the missing prince. “Where is Kai, do you think?” she asked when Azriel stood, unconcerned himself. Who cared? Kai’s absence was the only good thing that had happened lately, utterly eradicating any competition to Gwyn Azriel might have had.

After all, he wasn’t convinced he could compete with a prince.

She would have realized, had Kai stuck around, the choices being offered. Would have realized she could live easier with Kai than she ever could in Velaris, no matter how much she loved it. And Azriel had nearly convinced himself that she would have chosen Kai—because why would anyone choose him when there was another option readily available—until Gwyn murmured, “I miss Nesta and Emerie.”

Walking down the hall with her, Azriel glanced down at Gwyn, his expression inviting her to continue.

“It’s just…I would have told them about Eris, and we would have laughed about how pathetic he is. And I’ll bet Nesta knows something about that courtier from Day he was staring at—”

“What courtier?” Azriel demanded, his shadows swirling around his shoulders.

“The blonde. You didn’t see? He had tragedy written all over him when she came in.”

He didn’t need to tell the shadow slinking away what to do. If Gwyn thought she saw something—however absurd it felt—then Azriel would follow up on it.

“We’ll be home soon enough,” Azriel said, pulling their shared door open so she could sweep in, still a princess, even if all she had was him. “You can tell Nesta and Emerie everything then.”

“Everything?” Gwyn challenged, crossing her arms over her chest to stare him down.

“Most things,” Azriel amended. “Nesta tells Cassian too much and I don’t need him knowing what I do when he’s not around.”

“Why would he care?” Gwyn pressed, but Azriel didn’t want to talk about Cassian for another moment. Didn’t want to think about Cassian. This was as good of a moment as he was going to get, he reasoned. There would never be any time better, at least while they were in this palace.

Azriel didn’t answer, unwilling to admit Cassian would find it all absurdly funny much in the same way he and Rhys had a good laugh over Cassian’s trouble with Nesta, and how Cassian and Azriel had been so amused by how oblivious Feyre had been to Rhys’s obvious affection.

They weren’t blood brothers.

But stupidity ran between them like a cord, strong as any mating bond. Reaching for her face, Azriel kissed her before she could say another word, hoping to pick up where they’d left off just before Eris had so rudely interrupted them.

He hadn’t forgotten the pleasure of her soft hand gripping his aching cock, nor could he erase the look in her eyes from his memory. That sultry look was enough to drive him to his knees, to make him beg, crawl, plead. He’d do anything she demanded and more simply because it was her lips speaking the words.

She didn’t protest, melting against the leather of his armor he was now desperate to get rid himself of. Instead, Gwyn kissed him back, hoisting herself up on tiptoes until Azriel said fuck it and lifted her into the air, if only for an excuse to put his hands on her ass.

He was brainless by the time he managed to walk them into his bed chamber, made weak by her tongue stroking his own and her fingers in his hair. Had he ever been so aroused? So desperate? So excited? Azriel racked his brain for an answer but none came. There was only those teal eyes, that freckled skin.

“Is this happening?” she asked him, her breath warm against his cheek.

“If you want me, I’m yours,” he replied, saying the only words that came to him.

Stroking his cheek, Gwyn looked down at him, her hair forming a curtain around them. “I want you. You’re mine.”

A groan slipped from behind his lips, their gazes locked.

They were doing this.

“I’m yours,” he repeated.

I’m yours.

#gwynriel #is it really a cliffhanger if you know whats going to happen in the next chapter?#i just cant write gwyns first real time from azriels pov

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one-of-many-journeys · 13 days ago

Text

Day 34

Ourea's Retreat

I left the retreat as the sun rose. Would have been nice if you’d told me about this open path up the mountain, Naltuk. I guess the whole rite was meant to test me. I made my way down the mountain, moving as fast as I could to keep warm, then picked up another mount from a Charger site on the way.

Stopped in a small camp at the base of the mountain and changed back into my warmer furs, cleaned off the paint. Then I overheard the hunters there discussing two missing among their number, wondering when they might return. I asked the Chieftain and Shaman of the Werak about them, and they told me that the hunters were participating in some sort of initiation ritual for their Werak, the White Teeth.

The hunters were tasked with surviving alone for four days and nights with nothing but the clothes on their backs, their weapons, and whatever they can find out on the ice. The two missing hunters should have returned at sunrise with the rest, but there was no sign of them. The others wouldn't even consider searching. When the ice melts, the Chieftain said, the water would wash the bodies downriver to be spotted by the sentinels and dragged out. That's all the effort they were willing to spare.

They told me that the hunters wouldn't accept my help even if they were still alive, as the ordeal had to be weathered alone. Either way, I have to try. These people are so wrapped up in the value of their own deeds...their pride is everything to them. And I thought the Carja were bad.

Snow storm kicking up as I rode to the ritual grounds.

One of the hunters was still standing strong, surrounded by Lancehorns, holding her own. I helped her take out the last few by catching three in a chill water canister explosion. The two of us speared them to scrap once they were brittle. Her name is Ikrie, and she seemed more than well enough to make her way back to camp. She said something about fighting against Banuk tradition—it was starting to get interesting, when a pack of Scrappers and Glinthawks came to scavenge the Lanehorn carcasses.

Ikrie favours frost, which suits me fine. We make a good team. Once the machines were downed, she told me of the other hunter, Mailen, her friend and hunting partner since childhood, who snapped her leg when descending the ice and refused all aid since. Mailen believes deeply in the tribe's laws and was willing to die in pursuit of a place in the White Teeth. Apparently it's a well renown Werak, though I'm not sure why that makes it worth dying for.

Ikrie only stayed past the end of the ritual to protect Mailen, but knew she wouldn't survive much longer without proper care. I agreed to help Ikrie save her friend, no matter what useless death she was set on dying.

I followed Ikrie to the place Mailen had carved for herself in the ice, waiting to die. Two Longlegs and a Scorcher; frost came in handy, but I had a couple of close calls.

Fire kiln root potions are essential against these things. Once I tore off its mine launcher and had it tied down to unload its ammunition, it was dead before long. Taking out its blaze canisters did a lot of damage too.

Unsurprisingly, Mailen wasn't happy to see us, but I could see in her eyes that she didn't want to die. She begrudgingly accepted my help in fashioning her splint, but she got up alone, walked away, stumbling, alone. Ikrie hoped for her forgiveness, but Mailen responded coldly. There's no forgiveness coming. Mailen chose the tribe.

These Banuk, they keep themselves as cold as the ice they endure, as if only closing their hearts will make them strong. I hope Ikrie will be okay.

I climbed back down the ritual pass and picked up my mount, heading back to the camp. For a moment, the road was higher than the swirl of the storm. I stopped on the way to hunt goats and badgers—for the meat, and to pay for a map of sites where Bluegleam is known to gather. If I'm going to afford something warmer to wear, and some of the Banuk's powerful weaponry, I'm going to need to scrape up as much frozen machine fluid crystals as I can get.

Mailen was back at camp when I returned. I told the Chieftain what Ikrie bid me tell, that she was the one who died on the ice, and Mailen alone prevailed. It was obvious to the Chieftain that I had helped Mailen, but by the laws of the ordeal she succeeded: four days, four nights, alone. She gave up everything for the White Teeth, but it was only because of that technicality in tribal law that they accepted her. I'm not sure what Mailen would've done if they hadn't.

She thanked me, in an indirect, frozen way. Not that I care; I did this for Ikrie. I hope that someday Mailen can see how foolish she was to cast Ikrie aside for a Werak who wouldn't even search for her corpse.

I journeyed up to the Hunting Grounds nearby in the Snowchant mountains. The keeper there was about what I was expecting. Grizzled, reserved, and lamenting the fact that she didn't die young with spear in hand, for some reason. She and Mailen would probably get along great. She was surprised to hear that Ourea had sent me to compete against the fastest times set at the grounds, though she didn't show it much. It was clear she didn't think I was capable, but reserved her judgement, unlike the Carja keepers tend to.

I went for the Onslaught trial—still haven't got a handle on the Stormslinger Ourea gave me. The trial was tough, far tougher than any Carja trials. I suppose I should've expected that, given that the Hunter's Lodge is more a parade of nobles than elite hunters, at least historically. The Banuk attending the grounds released gates to different stone-enclosed arenas as I took down wave after wave of machines. Mostly Watchers and Scrappers—easy enough to take down in groups with my blast sling, a few well-placed spear strikes and hardpoints if not. The Longleg I tied down and set off its power cells with my war bow, taking out the Watchers following it with the ensuing shock blast. In the final arena there was a Ravager, the final challenge, along with a swarm or Scrappers. I tore off its canon and tied it down while I picked off the others, and finally let loose with the canon to destroy the Ravager itself.

I didn't even beat the fastest recorded time first try! Take note, Carja keepers. I had to give it a second go, of course, and used the same strategy, just better executed. Beat the fastest champion by nearly thirty seconds.

Night was falling by the time I finished off the final challenge. It was around then that Ikrie arrived, keen to try out a challenge of her own design. She assured me that she was okay after everything that happened to Mailen but...let's just say if I was spurned like that the first thing I would do would be to set myself an extremely difficult hunting challenge and train until I dropped too.

My body was done for the day, so I declined Ikrie's offer, but promised to return. Slept in the tent at the Hunting Ground. That's one great deed for the Werak down, but I'll have to do a bit more than show up their greatest machine hunter to gain Aratak's attention.

#I maintain that Ikrie is the character that Aloy has the most chemistry with. sorry Seyka but if Aloy had been further along in her journey #to emotional vulnerability she would have snapped up that ice cold babe so fast. Mailen rebound for Ikrie too.#hzd #horizon zero dawn #aloy sobeck #aloy #aloysjournal #hzd remastered #photomode #virtual photography #horizon

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impasta-wall · 3 months ago

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I wrote an interpretation of the end of the Double Life SMP wayyyyy back in 2022 and never really expanded on it. So here it is I guess?

“I have to be with her” his hands are shaking, small tremors she remembers them from another time. That was a whole universe away. Remembers their quiet nights and their quiet home and their quiet life.

Why did it go wrong

“You win Pearl. Congratulations,” there’s no remorse in his voice nothing not even an ounce of love or caring. But thats right why should he care about her. Pearl the one who left him first. She was the one to abandon him before they were even soulmates. She’d chosen a path and chose to stick to it. Til the very end.To whatever end–something like a hum, a small buzzing in her ear.

But as the flicker died down, that small moment of singularity before the fire reacted with the gunpowder before all she knew would scatter to the winds, she saw him smile. Sweet bliss and eternal release. She couldn’t make out if that was for her or himself.

It’s instinct really, the shouting in her head to stop him, lay her life bare and ask for anything, anything to be one half of their two.

“NO!” she reaches out trying desperately to hold on. It’s too late though, Pearl it seems is always somehow late, a devastating inconvenience at times—a curse she dubbed it in the moments after the explosion.

If you wanted to go why didn’t you take me with you

She realises how ironic that thought is. He would have wanted to go with her, she knew that, they shared so much, traveled worlds and galaxies in hopes to stay, linger in the same place. But she had chosen and she had been late and she had lost. All on her own, she had done it.

***

In the recess of dawn, the small window of time before the sun can hit her face, she can’t help then but remember.

The first universe where she had found him unwillingly and then they had grasped one another at the end of it all, holding on, distant cries of home— a house and life shared without the misery. Oh how cruel the world was— where had these memories gone when they had started here?

The loss carves into her like an arrow

***

She craved it, that peace— that silence of love and need and being whole.

…being whole. Like she hadn’t been already. Scott was gone she reminded herself. He was gone and now she was all by herself no longer attached or connected to someone who never wanted her.

She wanted to feel whole even just for a minute or a second. The crossbow rose up on its own accord, arrow carefully notched in place from her last hunt.

Her dogs whined, small cries of indecision, in their eyes a reflection of her own longing.

“Sorry,” one last time, she couldn’t help herself.

An explosion of colour, kaleidoscopic indifference, enigmatic resolve and love— despite it all love. And then there was nothing. Just blank universe, stretching out, stars speckled across the cheeks of the galaxy and a small world coming to its final end.

Blink, and it disappears.

#this is in like a platonic way i just like to write things in a more aggressive way #i also miss the smps a lot so i might rewatch them sometime #double life smp #double life scott #double life pearl #pearlescentmoon #dangthatsalongname #bio’s stuff

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bthump · 7 months ago

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What if the eclipse rape didn't happen, but Casca still survived somehow and retained her sanity? Do you think she'd follow Guts in his quest for revenge or carve her own, distinct path? How would her opinion on Griffith shift, would she hate him/deeply resent him/try to understand him/a mix of everything?

To be honest, I'm more interested in how you think this scenario should play out in order to feel satisfactory than in how Miura would've handled it, because I really dislike his portrayal of Casca post-eclipse. Also, there's a sequence leaving rent free in my head of Casca being mad and yelling at Griffith for sacrificing the Hawks and basically betraying the blind trust she had put on him and shattering her whole worldview in the process lol. Without Miura silencing her and the eclipse rape taking away her dignity and virtually destroying any hope for a fulfilling future interaction with Griffith, she would've had a solid chance to grow and develop really interesting changing dynamics with our two protagonists, and it's a shame it was stunted...

Thanks for the ask!

For me, when it comes to what I'd want to read or write in this scenario, I think Casca should go her own way and separate herself from Guts. Partly for worldbuilding-logistics reasons, actually - two branded sacrifices can't stay in the same place for long without majorly fucking up that place, as we saw in the Conviction arc.

But mainly because I like the idea of the two of them separating and doing their own thing, and I think it would work with the themes. Like the story could use their two characters to explore differing reactions to trauma - the healthy and the unhealthy. The making connections with other people and growing reaction, and the killing stuff as a coping mechanism reaction. Guts and Casca would essentially be foils for each other.

Unfortunately Casca's stuck with the less fun healthy reaction lol because only the unhealthy gets to be mired in fucked up homoeroticism with Griffith and I'm unwilling to sacrifice that for the sake of a more interesting female character.

So with that division, it would make sense for the narrative to divide the behelit and the armour between them, and in this case Casca should get the armour while Guts gets the behelit. The armour is in a way a test of self control and you can be pulled back from succumbing to it, while the behelit is a one and done monsterizing device, so the armour goes to the healthier one. Casca also collects friends in this scenario while Guts miserably Black Swordsmans around (Farnesca, anyone?)

So ultimately Guts gets my ideal post-Eclipse arc of obsessing over revenge/equality with Griffith and eventually becoming a monster just like him, whereupon maybe one or both die, or maybe Guts ironically rejoins him in a homoerotic "tragic" ending for him 😏

And Casca kind of gets Guts' Millenium Falcon arc through which the story reiterates the importance of relationships, where she wrestles with her own inner darkness but grows past the need for revenge and turns to other goals.

And then maybe her story intersects with Guts and Griffith's in that Griffith needs to be stopped to save the world from dragons or whatever so she allies with various people and does that, and is able to succeed specifically because she's not obsessed with revenge and can keep her head or something like that. Yk, like she uses the armour but is able to come back from it. Whatever.

I don't know or really care what the climax would be here. Does she kill Griff and maybe Guts too? Does she serve as a distraction while a magic thing happens? Or maybe they're reverting the world back to low fantasy and it has nothing directly to do with Griffith and Falconia and she has to slay a dragon or something. Idk, point is she gets a moment to be badass and maybe be tempted by a monsterizing power-up but doesn't succumb to it.

Anyway yeah, idk I'm not super imaginative so my answer is basically "Berserk but Casca gets Guts' role and Guts gets to be gayer" lol. But that said, I would love to see Casca get to express her feelings so yeah that also fits into my thoughts here. Maybe she doesn't directly yell at Griffith but rather tells someone else about what happened and how fucked up it was? Or maybe she gets a Hill of Swords style reunion as well and does get to scream at Griff. It'd be nice. I do think that, in the brief amount of time we saw both her and Guts after the sacrifice and before the Eclipse rape, she was angrier with Griffith than he was.

#ask #anonymous #b #headcanons #canon divergence #sorry this took a while to answer lol i feel like headcanony creative asks often take a little longer for me

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sssammich · 11 months ago

Note

one word swan queen prompt: "Snow"

(see what i did there.... is it winter themed? is it Emma's annoying mother?? is it something unexpected from your galaxy writer brain???)

XD luv ya bestieeeeeee

lol no galaxy writer brain here but i do have an update to ritual fic.

if you wanna read on ao3

otherwise, here's ch 1

---

Storybrooke, Maine is not exempt from the dirty piles of snow that accumulate after trucks go through the streets and plow them off the road. The snow is never ending, pouring out of the sky like a broken machine. For days now, fat flakes of snow descend from the heavens, blanketing any and every inch of whatever has been cleared the day before.

Still, Emma shoves her feet in her snow boots donning only loose black sweatpants and a zip-up hoodie before making her way to the garage to retrieve the snow shovel. She grips the shovel while the other presses the garage door button, the metal cranking of the door rising fills the quiet stillness of the morning. It squeaks and it screeches and Emma notes to herself to get some grease to put on there.

Carefully, she maneuvers around the parked Mercedes Benz and begins the first dig. She clears the path with a small ‘hup’ as she exhales and chucks the shoveled snow out of the way, a growing snow mound on the perimeter of the driveway. All too soon, she works up a sweat, her hands reddening from both the cold and the exertion, her breath visible as she tows herself back and forth.

Before long, she has cleared half of the driveway and is making her way towards the walking path to the front door. She quickly surveys her progress and wipes the sweat off her brow with the back of her sleeve. She doesn’t know how long it takes her to do this; only focuses on the way her muscles strain and stretch with each shovel, with each dig. It is as meditative as it is repetitive and it gives her body purpose despite the tempest of her thoughts.

She takes a small break and inspects her work thus far, her gaze not quite landing towards the front window where she can just make out a shadowy figure.

She returns to her task, her mind wandering once more. Emma is exploring unknown territory having accepted the offer to move into the mansion. She is happy to live in the same place as her son, the back and forth shuffling of shared custody taking a much deserved respite after all that’s gone on. She is happy to carve out space for herself instead of whittling herself down to fit whatever space is available.

She enjoys leaving work on time in time for regular dinners, happy to close out the workday at her desk knowing what waits for her at home.

All of these, she favors more than where she’d been in the past. The mansion is very much Regina’s house, without question, but she does not feel temporary, like an outsider, like a trespasser.

However.

However, what she struggles to contend with is the limbo space she has found herself in as of late. One that blurs the lines that she’d drawn for herself when she accepted Regina’s offer to make her temporary stay more permanent.

“It’s not too much of a leap, dear. But I won’t stop you if you need to find your own space. Just know that you have a place here,” Regina said, pausing her stirring of that night’s dinner and turning to face Emma sitting at the far end of the counters. She’d placed the spatula on the holder before docking her hand on her hip, tilting her head slightly and studying Emma. For her part, Emma tried her best not to squirm under Regina’s gaze.

“Alright. Can I let you know soon?” she asked, flashing a lopsided grin just as Regina smiled at her warmly in return.

“Whenever you want.”

So here she is now, heaving a large chunk of packed snow and swinging, until it hits the top of the existing snow hill and breaks into hundreds of tiny pieces. She grunts and breathes hard, resting against the ground and her arm against the handle. The walking path is clear now, and she can return to the remainder of the driveway.

Despite the cold weather, Emma has shed herself of her hoodie and wrapped it around her waist until all she’s left in is her black tank top. The cool, crisp air a welcomed sensation on her heated skin.

While she resumes shoveling the driveway, she doesn’t immediately turn towards the soft click of the door to the garage opening, nor the padding sounds of boots approaching.

She angles her body away just slightly under the guise of her shoveling efforts, waiting.

“Emma.”

She bites the smile threatening to swallow her face whole before she turns her head. Only when Regina comes into view that she draws herself back up, propping the shovel up and resting her weight on it. “Hey, morning. Oh, careful you don’t slip.”

She holds a hand up to catch Regina, if she slips or falls, but she never does. She is as graceful and poised on snow as she is on dry land.

“Thank you.” The corner of Regina’s lips quirk upwards, the scar on the top of her lip moving slightly. “Thought you might like to have some breakfast.”

Emma glances down to find a rolled pancake wrapped in wax paper in one hand and a steaming cup of coffee in the other as Regina stands right in front of her. She observes that the coffee is the exact shade of brown she likes, no doubt from the perfect ratio of cream Regina has added. If she takes a sip now, she knows it'll have the right amount of sugar just to her liking.

She arches a brow at the offered food, but Regina shrugs, almost defeatedly. That brings an amused smirk on Emma’s face.

“Henry insists that the pancake is better this way. Something about syrup density.”

“Well, he’s not wrong,” she says, slowly taking the food out of Regina’s hands. Without any more prompting, she takes a healthy bite.

Regina grimaces before sighing. “Please stop teaching our son terrible eating habits.”

“It can’t be terrible when it’s clearly genius.”

She continues scarfing down the rolled pancake, alternating sips with her coffee. Regina wraps herself in her arms, her focus shifting around her driveway, seemingly inspecting Emma’s work.

“You know, there’s more snow coming overnight,” she announces needlessly. Emma is more than aware that there is another week of heavy snow forecasted for them.

“I know.”

“Yet you still do it.”

“If I don't, who will?” she asks, testing. The answer, of course, is Regina will. If Emma didn't do it, Regina’s magic can easily melt all of the snow on her property before Emma can even think it.

It’s not about the snow. It's not about the magic.

“You’ll be late to work if you don’t hurry along.”

“It’s fine. I have it in with the boss. She won’t get too mad if I’m a few minutes late.”

“Is that so?”

She doesn’t immediately respond. Instead, she polishes off the now empty mug of coffee and places it back in Regina’s hands; the coolness of her knuckles grazing against the warmth of Regina’s fingers.

“I have it on good authority.”

“And how can you be so sure?”

“Just a feeling,” she shrugs.

Emma chooses to participate in the same song and dance with Regina if only to make sense of the steps she’s making—if it will lead to anything. If it will lead to anything more.

“I wouldn't be too sure of that.” Regina hums, thoughtful. Emma just offers her another toothy grin before returning to her task, flexing her arms just so as she shovels a particularly dense section of snow.

“Thanks for breakfast.”

Emma catches Regina from the corner of her eye and simply stands there without moving. She shovels three more times before she sees movement, Regina trekking back into the garage. She’s just about to fully turn to her shoveling when Regina glances back at her.

Wickedly, she smirks at Emma and waves her fingers.

A small rumble fills the air until a small avalanche of the snow on the roof drops straight down and covers the driveway that Emma had just finished clearing.

Her jaw drops, but she can’t get too upset when she hears the melodic lilt of Regina’s amused laugh filtering out from the garage and to her ears.

She takes a deep breath and starts shoveling again.

#swan queen #emma x regina #swen #chapter update #samfic #ok thanks for reading bye #replies #waknatious

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coffeeangelinabox · 8 months ago

Text

Whumpril #28 Fight/Flight/Freeze

Fight

Unbelievably stupid to get caught. Jemma has completed far more dangerous missions. She once single handedly took down a whole platoon of guards; she’d survived a standoff with Fenrir, the last of the Elite-ids (after Darrow, but he doesn’t count); she’d crashed spaceships and moon buggies and drop ships and, one memorable occasion a life pod which was supposed to be impossible; she’d shot her way out of a dozen besieged strongholds, on a couple of occasions with little more than a water pistol…

This should be easy.

But they hadn’t been expecting the state of the art security, not this far from the core words and lightyears from the high profile rebel activity they’ve been stage managing for the last year, for the sole purpose of making this station an easy, undefended target. They’d had biometrics and voice prints and forged security guards. Jemma had studied shift movements and Darrow had drilled her ceaselessly on commands and codes.

But coded checkpoints and active blood scanning. It’s her own damn fault. She should have called for evac when it was clear that this wasn’t going as planned. Arrogance, pure and simple, had kept her at her post. Worse, the blood scanning has shown her enhancements, so they come at her in force, well armed.

Her only saving grace is that they want to take her alive. That and her strength and speed and durability.

She’s just as susceptible to pain though, and they use that to their advantage.

Jemma fights and screams. Shots hit their mark, a squad worth of bodies, but they are a whole space station and she is one. It’s too late now to call for back up, all that ill happen is she’ll doom whoever (Gene) comes for her. When her power pack runs dry, she throws the gun with a force that cracks a face plate.

She resorts to physical defence, flurries of punches and kicks and holds; and then to dirty street fighting she learned in cantina brawls. She uses every skill she has. Their eyes trick them, expecting certain things of her size and physique, whereas she is actually much more powerful than the next three of them put together. The gouges out eyes, castrates more than a few, pulverises knees and breaks wrists, fingers, femurs.

But they just keep coming.

Flight

The manacle is loose.

The thought drifts slowly across her mind and it takes her sluggish thoughts precious seconds to grab hold of it. The manacle is loose. Not very loose, not unforgivably so, but enough to give her a finger width of leverage. She can yank it off the table, she can break herself off this bench.

The thought holds her mind together as the electricity courses through her body, then as the needles rip into her skin. She bares bloodied teeth and snarls like a wounded dog, and uses the promise of the loose chain to keep her cries silent. She will tell them everything eventually, everyone does, and when she does they will have her sent to the quarries or the ice chasms or the organ banks.

At least her enhancements mean they can’t touch her mind.

But she will not give in today, not with escape so close.

Still, when her torturer steps outside for his midday meal and a sit down with the news feeds or sport updates or insipid broadcast media, whatever he needs to unwind after the stressful morning, she cannot bring herself to prepare for a fight. Once (when she was captured, yesterday, this morning) she would have ripped her arms free, pulled out the tubes, killed whichever security burst through the door with the tray of instruments and the secretary outside for good measure. She would have aimed for the shuttle bay of the station, leaving a trail of bodies in her wake, carving a bloody path through them so they would know their error in hurting her, in trying to use her against her family.

She can’t blame lack of strength either: she pulls the thick, imprisoning chain from the mooring as easily as snapping a necklace with a too-careless tug. But she fears losing, fears the consequences of ending up back here for punishment as well as questioning.

And so, shamefully, she prepares for flight. She removes the wires slowly, carefully, using every trick Gene ever taught her to keep the monitors from shrieking her disobedience. She finds discarded scrubs and even a medical mask that covers her face in a locker. She can’t do anything about the wrenched open door, but fashions together a clipboard from a disconnected tablet screen and a stylus. She tidies her hair and washes the blood from her neck. She can do nothing about the bruises on her wrists or her bare feet, but hopefully her disguise is enough to protect her long enough to run.

Even hypoxia on an uninspected spaceship is preferable to another day of this.

He’s waiting outside the door, picking his nails with the scalpel he’d peeled the skin from her calf with.

“I thought you hadn’t the strength to pull free. I’ve been waiting all morning.”

Freeze

Jemma’s first response is - has always been - to attack. To fight her way through whatever obstacle has set itself against her and shred it to its component pieces. Failing that, she will run. That’s what she’d done when pulled out of the slave pens, when she’s finally crawled free of the interrogation block.

She is not an indecisive person. She lacks Darrow’s sheer magnetism, but she is by far the best leader aboard. Jemma can plan and think strategically and people manage. She thinks quickly on her feet and is both strong and clever enough to see her plans enacted.

And on top of all that, every experience she has ever had has simply sought to reinforce that a single hint of weakness is little more than blood in the water to tempt circling sharks. Strength and solidity and certainty are a better protection even than blasters and blades.

Yet, here, in the doorway of the cell, she falters. Because Gene wasn’t alone, there had been someone leaning over him, someone with her hands on him, and he’d been crying, panicking. She’d shot before she’d even thought about it. No one has the right to touch her people and cause them that amount of pain, and Gene least of all.

Now though, the second after the simultaneous thought, action and reaction, she has time to look. Really look.

And it isn’t the cell, smelling of vomit and unwashed man. It isn’t the marks on Gene - less than hers and far more enraging. Isn’t the sight of him covered in blood, though she knows already that that sight will return in her nightmares for some time yet. It’s his aggressor.

Familiar slight stature. Familiar tousled blonde hair. A face she sees in the mirror every day.

All Jemma can do is stare at Gene as he looks in horror at the corpse across him. Her corpse. His mouth moves, soundlessly at first, then she is able to pick up the rapidly whispered, “Not again, not again, not-please, not…” Then the words trail away to a long wounded note. And Jemma stays where she is, frozen with horror in the cell door.

#my writing #whump #whump prompts #whumpril2024 #coffeeangelinabox's space opera ocs #torture #capture #interrogation #whumprilday28 #fight/flight/freeze #introspection

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