#and that's kind of the savior of the novel

[mermaidsirennikita]

🎄Romance Advent🎄 Day 12: When the Duke Was Wicked by Lorraine Heath

One-sentence summary: After losing his wife and child, devoted husband the Duke of Lovingdon becomes a dissolute rake, only to be dragged out of his stupor by family friend Grace, who wants him to help her find a loving husband.

Why read it: I recommend this book a good bit as is, but in my opinion it's right up there with Lorraine's Greatest Hits (Waking Up with the Duke, The Earl Takes All, among the general Scoundrels of St. James) and doesn't get the credit it deserves. It's incredibly emotional, super sexy, and gives you that classic "local man won't say he's in love even though all he thinks of is her and they constantly end up doing sex acts in various semi-public locations". It also presents something you really don't see a lot of in historicals, and it really asks something of the hero on a very deep level. (Also: you can always read Surrender to the Devil to see Grace's parents fall in love, and Between the Devil and Desire to see Lovingdon as an innocent boy who I guess learned a lot of shit from his eventual stepdad, Jack Dodger.)

Lives rent-free in my brain: I mean.... Lovingdon and Grace do that thing where they're casually getting drunk in his study, as buddies do, and casually getting drunk turns into casually making out and casually making out turns into him going "I want to taste rum on your lips" and she's all "oh well keep kissing me I guess" and he's all "oh great" and flips her onto her back, pours rum on her pussy, goes "I said I wanted to taste rum on lips" and Goes. To. Town. One of the most inspired scenes Lorraine has ever written.

[rnaeborowski]

i was talking to my wife about how if our dnd campaign had a fandom they would absolutely butcher my character... it could go a few different ways but it would be 1) making her the mom friend/caretaker of the rest of the group bc she's a bit less chaotic than the others or 2) make her super stoic and quiet and/or shy around ppl or 3) make her really stuck up and a wet blanket who is always ruining the fun

i'm annoyed just thinking about it even tho it will never happen haha

[holylulusworld]

Collateral Damage (1)

Summary: He only wanted some coffee.

Pairing: Mobster!Bucky Barnes x fem!Reader

Warnings: secret admirer, kinda love-struck Bucky, shooting, violence, blood, getting shot

Collateral Damage masterlist

Bucky hates it when things go wrong. He just hates it. Especially when he didn’t expect things to go awry.

On any other day, he’d expect things to turn out for the worst. Just not today. Today, of all days, shit had to hit the fan.

All he wanted was a coffee at his favorite café and a slice of the pie the owner bakes every Friday.

If he’s honest, Bucky would admit that he comes to the little bakery every Friday afternoon to see the woman he spotted some months ago.

She’s there every Friday after work to order tea, chamomile, and a cupcake. Sometimes she’s adventurous and takes a cinnamon roll.

Bucky chuckled when he heard her talk to the barista, telling her she wanted to be wild that day. He couldn’t help but smile at her innocent guilty pleasure. She was so unlike the people in his life. Sweet and kind.

Today, he wanted to talk to her. Today, he planned on introducing himself to the sweet woman stealing his heart bit by bit over the last few months.

Fate had different plans...

One hour earlier.

Bucky is in a good mood. No, he’s having one of the best days of his life. Business is good. He’s on top of the food chain, and he will finally talk to the woman he’s going to make his queen one day. – One step after another.

He opens the door to the little café he found when he was aimlessly roaming the streets of New York. Bucky only wanted to blow off some steam and sort his thoughts but ended up at the little café with coffee and pie. Finding so much more.

Bucky smiles as the little bell above the door rings. It feels like coming home every time he enters this place.

The owner greets him whenever Bucky is around, and the barista knows his favorite order. A risk, Bucky’s best friend Steve would say. Escapism from his life, Bucky would say.

She’s already there, engrossed in yet another book. This time, it’s a dark romance novel about a mafia boss and a shy librarian. Bucky knows because he googled the name to find out as much as possible about the books she loves to read.

“Hello,” the owner waves at Bucky, smiling as she passes him by. “Frankie will get you the usual.”

“Thank you,” Bucky nods before looking for a table closer to her. It’s the first time he’ll sit close to her, not at his favorite table, to watch her from afar.

“All for our favorite regular,” she says, walking away to check on the pies in the back of the café.

Bucky smiles. A soft smile, a genuine one. This place holds magic he can’t explain. It’s the calm in his life. Haven. An escape.

“Coffee and cherry pie coming your way,” the waitress says, balancing a tray in one hand.

Bucky frowns. He’s not a fan of changes. The new face walking toward his table, chirping and smiling as she struggles to not drop the tray, brings tension back into these fleeting, peaceful moments he spent at the café.

His instinct kicks in seconds before the waitress drops the tray to point her gun at him. Bucky takes her out with one precise shot, a bullet to her forehead.

People start to scream, and chaos breaks out. Most of the customers ran out of the café, along with the owner.

“I won’t miss,” the barista he chatted with so many times says. They jump over the counter, gun aimed at Bucky. “Your time has come.”

Bucky huffs. He’s about to shoot his attacker when a book hits the barista’s head. It’s almost hilarious. If not for the gun pointing in his direction, Bucky would laugh.

“Bitch,” the barista turns their attention toward you, their attacker. You gasp and drop to the ground, crawling under the table as they shoot in your direction.

Bucky reacts in a split second. He tackles the barista to the ground, taking them out with one hard punch to the chin. “Bastard, I’ll get to you later.”

He gets back up to look for her, his savior, and the sweet woman who enchanted him. Bucky gasps, watching you hunch over, blood soaking your pretty sundress.

“Doll, no,” he crouches beside you to cradle you in his arms. Bucky presses his hand to the wound on your arm, sighing because it’s not a deadly wound. “I’m so sorry. This shouldn’t have happened.”

“I,” you carefully touch his hand. “That wasn’t how I expected to finally get to know your name …”

[everytimewetouch-dot-mp3]

shen yuan, dragon god of cang qiong mountain sect, has a new mission.

[Mission {Master of Masters} at 2% progress. Subquest {Master of One} begins now! USER_002 must obtain protagonist [Luo Binghe] as a personal disciple! Continue to work hard!]

there are steps between, of course. shen yuan comes back down the mountain once he’s calmed down—just to check on binghe, not to make a scene! but yue qingyuan was alerted that their sect’s god had descended his peak, and a meeting of all cang qiong’s lords was called. every peak lord is called back to cang qiong. it’ll take a week for everyone to arrive—liu qingge is off on a night hunt, and shang qinghua is accompanying his head disciple to negotiate contracts for fabrics and dyes (and, shen yuan thinks resentfully, probably off doing traitor-to-the-sect business. fuck that guy).

while they’re waiting, shen yuan is invited to stay on qiong ding—as if he doesn’t have a perfectly good mountain he can ascend again until the peak assembles. but yue qingyuan seems anxious to have him, and shen yuan is kind of internally geeking out over getting to properly meet this sect leader. so he agrees, and he’s arranged in a manor fit for a visiting sect leader, which is kind of insane. rich, dark woods; silks in qiong ding’s deep blues and grays; night pearls illuminating every room. is this how people live in this world???

yue qingyuan…hovers a fair bit. surely he should be busy with sect-leader-y things, but apparently having shen yuan come down is a huge deal that requires yue qingyuan’s constant attention. bringing tea and snacks, accompanying him to meals on each peak with all the lords in residence (except shen qingqiu), escorting him to and from qing jing every day when he goes to check on binghe.

that always seems a little uncomfortable for yue qingyuan. shen yuan is still rightfully pissed about binghe’s treatment, but he hasn’t gotten that horrible feeling that his territory is under threat again, so he assumes binghe is alright. the first time he tells yue qingyuan that he’s going to qing jing to check on ‘that young disciple your shidi thought it right to whip,’ yqy gets this constipated look on his face before—before fucking defending sqq.

saying sqq isn’t a cruel man, really—or, he is, but not without reason. all of cang qiong’s disciples are disciplined when it’s appropriate, he says. shen shidi has had problems with that disciple before, and lord canglong shouldn’t judge him too harshly before he hears the full story.

the furious energy crackling around shen yuan is enough to cut yue qingyuan’s entreaty for leniency off. yue qingyuan always seemed like the kindly big-brother type in the novel, if a bit too indulgent of sqq. and shen yuan always wondered why he would turn a blind eye to sqq’s abuse of lbh when he knew it was going on. now he’s seen it with his own eyes, and yue qingyuan still has the audacity to try to cover for sqq, and it kind of makes shen yuan sick.

he’s been doing his best to play the part of the great immortal now that the upset of his initial descent from the mountain has passed. but when yqy defends sqq like this, shen yuan can’t help but drop all pretense of formality and glare, eyes blazing, at this sect leader. ‘do you think i’m fucking stupid?’ he spits. and yqy pales, horror in his eyes, trembling more as shen yuan lays into him.

to discipline a child is to teach them the way they should go. what does whipping a thirteen-year-old boy teach him? shen yuan knows what luo binghe has learned from his shizun’s instruction. that he is stupid, incapable, unworthy of his martial family’s care. that the sect who took him in—the sect shen yuan himself established centuries ago—only took him so it would have something to beat.

shen yuan is pissed. he doesn’t wait for yqy’s escort to qing jing; he takes his sword there himself, finds luo binghe, and brings him back to the guest manor yqy set him up in. binghe is confused, of course, to be faced with his savior’s fury, but when lord canglong makes a request of him, he’s all to happy to comply. and if he buries his face against lord canglong’s robes as they fly back to qiong ding, it’s only to protect his face from the wind.

there’s warmth in his chest whenever he walks near lord canglong, and as he’s led by a hand on his shoulder into lord canglong’s guest quarters, binghe feels like he might combust (in one part, from the overwhelming, humbling joy he feels at being the subject of his sect’s god’s attention; in the other part, because lord canglong’s grip is imbued with so much spiritual power it makes binghe’s skin tingle all the way down to his toes).

binghe follows lord canglong into the main room and, when it’s clear they’re done walking, he sinks to his knees in gratitude.

‘enough of that, luo binghe,’ shen yuan splutters, reaching to pull binghe up from his kowtow. honestly, he’s going to be the emperor! none of this prostration; it’ll only be a debt on his head later on! ‘get up. i won’t see you humble yourself to this—uh’ shit! System, help! What do gods like this call themselves?!!

[Answering USER_002, his title is {Lord Canglong, Shen Yuan, Grand Master of Cang Qiong Mountain Sect.} ‘This Grandmaster’ would be expected and appropriate.]

god, that feels so pretentious. shen yuan swallows his millennial sensibilities and does his best to thicken his face a little. ‘—to this grandmaster whose sect has treated him so poorly.’

binghe looks up with stars in his night-dark eyes, and it takes every shred of shen yuan’s self control not to soften at the awe in this child’s face. how come no one told him little lord luo would be so cute?! of course he’s adorable; he’s the protagonist.

‘this—this lowly disciple wouldn’t dare—that is, he wouldn’t presume to, um—lord canglong is—”

poor thing! too cute, too cute!

‘luo binghe is not lowly,’ shen yuan says first, because that feels like the most important part to address. no humbling yourself in front of this old dragon, ah! no debts to this sect! ‘didn’t this grandmaster say in front of everyone that luo binghe is uniquely gifted?’

‘this disciple thought…’ luo binghe’s eyes are already trained on the ground, but he shrinks into himself at this. in this grand room, luo binghe looks so small, so unlike the menacing demon lord shen yuan knows he’ll become. ‘this disciple thought that perhaps, in his anger, lord canglong…exaggerated… to make a point to shizun.’

‘if i have anything to say about it,’ shen yuan mutters, ‘he won’t be your shizun much longer.’

at that, luo binghe’s gaze snaps up, his shoulders tight. ‘this stupid disciple doesn’t understand.’

‘not stupid,’ shen yuan says immediately. ‘what this grandmaster means to say is just that. luo binghe will not be a qing jing peak disciple for much longer. this grandmaster does not trust qing jing peak’s lord to raise luo binghe well, so he will do it himself.’

[pigfacedbitch]

The Price of Promos

summary : Percy is obsessed with you, but people ship you with Jason. what's worse is you two take advantage of it on certain situations.

word count : 0.9k

pairing/s : Percy Jackson x Daughter of Nyx! Reader (Kinda?). Jason Grace x Reader (It's just for show).

warning/s : does lying for free stuff count as one? Percy is a little unhinged.

here's my masterlist!

Note : I, too, would like free stuff.

Perseus Jackson doesn’t hate Jason Grace.

I mean, how could anyone?

The guy is basically a walking PR campaign for heroism— selfless, kind, responsible, and so absurdly noble. They all had their tragic backstories, but Jason?

The guy was literally sacrificed as a toddler. Meanwhile, Percy at least had a childhood (albeit featuring Smelly Gabe and an absentee sea god for a dad, but still— memories were made).

Let’s not forget the sheer unfairness of Jason’s looks: golden-boy Roman features, electric blue eyes, six-pack abs (which Percy totally never stared at), and that conveniently attractive scar that made people swoon like he was the protagonist of a tragic romance novel.

If they only knew he got that scar from trying to eat a fucking stapler.

Jason could’ve been an entitled jerk, taking advantage of his powers, his authority, his stupidly good genetics. But no. He had to go and be a great person. Patient, understanding— the human equivalent of a therapy dog, if therapy dogs could shoot lightning and fly.

How could anyone hate that?

So yeah, technically, Percy couldn’t hate him.

But sometimes... Percy wants to yeet him into the ocean and never let him out.

Why?

Because of you.

The only demigod of Nyx.

You, the one demigod that somehow made Camp Half-Blood look like it had something to prove.

You weren’t rude, per se. Just… too unbothered, like someone who had already seen way too much crap to care anymore.

A walking badass, terrifying in the way that made people question their own survival skills.

Like when a monster asked, “How will you sleep at night after everything you’ve done?” and you deadpanned, "Like a baby, motherfucker." before slicing its head off.

You, who casually sipped a drink after saying, "Gods are the funniest to torture. They don’t die. They can’t beg for death if it never comes."

Or the time you casually dragged a monster into Tartarus instead of fighting it because "Ugh, this is taking too long! I have plans."

Half the camp was terrified of you. The other half idolized you. There was no middle ground.

And Percy? He is obsessed.

It wasn’t a secret either. His friends roasted him constantly about it.

They have a running joke about how the literal savior of Olympus could barely ask you out without causing plumbing disasters.

It was either you were oblivious, or you were just waiting for him to, as Leo so eloquently put it, grow some cojones and finally make a move.

So technically, you weren’t his. Yet.

He is working on it, okay?

But what made his blood boil was how everyone kept shipping you and Jason— the golden boy and the dark, dangerous femme fatale. Oooh, forbidden love! The perfect aesthetic! Percy couldn’t care less.

At first, you and Jason laughed it off. But then—

Sales. Discounts. Promos.

And suddenly, Percy was living in hell.

Because the moment a deal was on the table, you and Jason leaned into the "couple" act so fast it gave Percy whiplash.

That’s when Percy’s casual irritation turned into full-blown homicidal intent. Towards Jason, of course.

The first betrayal happened at a café.

A barista, way too chipper for Percy’s liking, smiled at you and Jason. "Are you two a couple? Lovebirds get free drinks today!"

Percy watched in horror as you and Jason shared a look.

Free drink, (Y/N)?

Duh, idiot.

And with synchronized, Oscar-worthy smiles, you both turned to the barista. "Yes, we are."

The barista squealed. "You’re like night and day. So cute!"

Jason, fully committing, threw an arm around you. Percy was this close to turning that café into an aquarium.

His hand inched toward Riptide.

He could make it look like an accident. Right?

Instead, he settled for stabbing his blue cupcake with enough aggression to count as a felony. He, of course, paid full price for it.

Unbelievable.

The next time, it was at a shopping mall. You were all just supposed to get supplies. Simple. Harmless. Until a saleslady smiled brightly at you and Jason.

"You two are adorable! Are you dating?"

"Oh, we’re n—"

"Couples get a 50% discount per purchase. To keep the love alive!"

"—totally dating! Right, Jason?"

Percy felt his soul leave his body.

Jason, grinning, sealed the betrayal with a playful peck on your cheek.

Percy lunged. Annabeth and Grover had to physically hold him back.

"I can make it swift. Jason won’t feel a thing—"

"No." Annabeth and Grover said in unison.

And then there was the movie theater.

The old vendor, all kind smiles, handed Jason a snack box. "For you and your girlfriend. Enjoy the movie, kid."

Jason, with those perfect teeth, turned to you. "Love, come here."

You complied. He puts an arm around your waist and pressed multiple kisses on your cheek. "Isn't my boyfriend the sweetest?"

Percy nearly exploded on the spot.

Jason Grace. Cause of death? Choking on excessive buttered popcorn and blue Coke.

At the end of the day, Percy knew it was all for the freebies.

Logically, he got it.

But that didn’t stop the irrational rage whenever he saw you two act like a couple.

It looked too good. Too natural.

Like you were actually in love and not just two chaotic demigods scamming capitalism.

So, eventually, like a normal human being? He snaps.

"Are you SERIOUS? AGAIN?" He practically yells during another fake dating stunt.

Everyone stops. You and Jason blink.

Percy throws his hands in the air. "Oh my gods, just date Jason already if you love scamming the universe so much!"

You tilt your head. "Or… you could just ask me out already?"

"...That's a better option. Come on, let's leave this stapler-eating nerd." Percy grabs your hand and pulls you away. "Fly home, Jason!"

"I drove us here, though?" Jason murmurs, confused.

You just laugh, intertwining your hand with his.

And Percy? He just smirks, finally tasting victory.

[gurggggleburgle]

I would like to make the joke that this winter you could sacriligously call Shen Yuan a Jesus figure who deserves a spot on your mantle and tree.

And why would we say that?

1) Father Son and Holy Spirit

Okay so we acknowledge the very real fact that Airplane is God of this world and what is the system if not an abstraction of the holy spirit? And I know what you're thinking how does this apply to Shen Yuan? What is his transmigration into Shen Qingqiu if not a Virgin Birth into a son of Airplane's writing who in PIDW is the narrative justification for all of Binghe's hate and also the eventual release of Binghe's trauma and corruption. Both a sacrificial lamb if you will.

2) resurrection

OK so while his deaths (for the sake of comedy accept big dick death) are all for binghe's sake in the end could one not argue strongly that these deaths carry the symbolic nature of self sacrifice, revival, and of course stigmata. The first death is of course the one that starts the novel where the humble Shen Yuan asks for absolution for the characters and the world of PIDW with his astute words of "dumbfuck novel dumbfuck author" in which he notes the fault of Lord Father Airplane and is born so he may die at the hands of his disciple who will ultimately betray them. His second death comes 3 years later and is the process once makes a statement of absolution towards his betrayer and to once again spare his fellow eleven other peak lords and and binghe who you can read as the 12 apostles. He then dies again in order to save both the world and in the process and absolve guilt and sin in the name of love and forgiveness.

3) stigmata

Much like our favorite anime protagonist from Saint Young Men our boy Shen Yuan experiences multiple cases of gaining stigmata. Stigmata in this instant referring to multiple injuries that Shen Yuan receives in one particular hand and visually in the animated adaptation appears to be the palm. Shen Yuan's hand which was used to read the sacred PIDW text and give head pats to his disciples was injured in saving Luo Binghe multiple times. In first gaining a deadly poison that seals his fate, then in being infected with a disease that ravaged the meek and innocent, third he gets plant spores that need to he repeatedly burned out of his flesh. These stigmata are symbols of his devotion and faith.

4) kindness to snakes and the less fortunate

In showing kindness to a snake Shen Yuan is able to restore Zhuzhi-Lang back to a more desired state much like the way Jesus cured disease. His efforts also resorted in saving the life of Liu Qingge who is restored much like Lazurus. These miracles act as proof of Shizun’s miracles. Proof of his acts as savior

5) god why have you forsaken me

Multiple times throughout the novel Shen Qingqiu can be seen raging against the system as well as Airplane which as we've discussed are both aspects of God. Jesus himself raged against God when forced to confront his own death and spoke of feeling betrayed and forsaken. The same can be said for the way Shen Yuan feels towards both his fate or and for the state of PIDW and Airplanes shitty writing.

6) throwing the money lenders from the temple

Honestly this is just an excuse to make a joke about Huan Hua palace and killing the old palace master.

7) knowing his own betrayal

A large element is that Judas's betrayal is not a surprise to Jesus. It is an inevitability he sees coming in much the same way that Shen Yuan sees Luo Binghe trying to kill him in revenge coming. There is an acceptance of an inevitable betrayal that both figures share

7) Gay

Much like Jesus our boy is gay and problematic

[mediumgayitalian]

Found this on YouTube and thought I send it to you :)

see this is interesting. ive heard this take before and im honestly not sure how i feel.

part of it is like.....i love percy. i have a very hard time criticizing him for much of PJO (although there are few choice things -- his treatment of annabeth and rachel in the later books, for one) because of the sheer amount of good he did, intentionally, while enduring so much active and hostile sabotage. like, nobody told percy SHIT. he was confused all the time in a way no one else was because no one told him anything ever. and when he asked he was ignored or, worse, mocked. percy is at the core of him a deeply kind and caring person who was given the worst possible hand in every possible way.

every time percy is framed as the villain i really just think of sea of monsters tbh. frequently the least favourite book in the series, somehow, but that whole novel was percy desperately trying to work with the information he had to keep the people he loved safe, while his peers and friends were actively turning against him. i think people forget that, for the vast majority of his time at camp, percy was NOT beloved. he had friends, and he liked it there. but people turned on him pretty easily! they blamed him for thalia's tree poisoning, they scapegoated him for the gods' bullshit, they made his quests harder and belittled his accomplishments. percy was and always has been expected to save everyone's ass and then expected to sit there and take it when people list all the ways he could have done a better fucking job. i don't buy it.

percy was friends with michael. he was hurt when he died. he was hurt when ALL his friends at camp half-blood died; he considered the deaths of even those he didn't like as personal failures. percy always TRIED to help, even people he couldn't fuckin' stand. think of how often he has saved clarisse's ass, even though she actively tries -- and, over time, he learned to like the challenge -- to make his life miserable. like, percy didn't personally kill michael yew. he didn't disregard his life. he watched his friend die, too. all while the closest person in his life was bleeding from a poisoned dagger she took to protect him. and while the living embodiment of the end of times was destroying his home and every person he loved in it.

maybe im missing something. was michael not the one to know his own death coming? did he not die laughing, having asked percy to put the events in motion, knowing the sacrifice he was making?

i went back and checked. before michael even died, there was this, from percy:

A hellhound lunged and I sidestepped. I could have stabbed it, but I hesitated. This is not Mrs O’Leary, I reminded myself. This is an untamed monster. It will kill me and all my friends.

and then, a few paragraphs later:

I tried to wound his men, not kill. That slowed me down, but these weren’t monsters. They were demigods who’d fallen under Kronos’s spell. I couldn’t see faces under their battle helmets, but some of them had probably been my friends.

and for michael's death -- i was right. he sacrificed HIMSELF. he was friends with percy, too, and he knew the goddamn cost of letting percy -- their forced savior -- die. michael made a CHOICE. read it for yourself, i'll emphasize some of the more important parts:

I got unsteadily to my feet. The remaining Apollo campers had almost made it to the end of the bridge – except for Michael Yew, who was perched on one of the suspension cables a few metres away from me. His last arrow was notched in his bow. ‘Michael, go!’ I screamed. ‘Percy, the bridge!’ he called. ‘It’s already weak!’ At first I didn’t understand. Then I looked down and saw fissures in the pavement. Patches of the road were half melted from Greek fire. The bridge had taken a beating from Kronos’s blast and the exploding arrows. ‘Break it!’ Michael yelled. ‘Use your powers!’ It was a desperate thought – no way it would work – but I stabbed Riptide into the bridge. The magic blade sank to its hilt in tarmac. Salt water shot from the crack like I’d hit a geyser. I pulled out my blade and the fissure grew. The bridge shook and began to crumble. Chunks the size of houses fell into the East River. Kronos’s demigods cried out in alarm and scrambled backwards. Some were knocked off their feet. Within a few seconds, a twenty-metre chasm opened in the Williamsburg Bridge between Kronos and me. The vibrations died. Kronos’s men crept to the edge and looked at the forty metre drop into the river. I didn’t feel safe, though. The suspension cables were still attached. The men could get across that way if they were brave enough. Or maybe Kronos had a magic way to span the gap. The Titan lord studied the problem. He looked behind him at the rising sun, then smiled across the chasm. He raised his scythe in a mock salute. ‘Until this evening, Jackson.’ He mounted his horse, whirled around and galloped back to Brooklyn followed by his warriors. I turned to thank Michael Yew, but the words died in my throat. Five metres away, a bow lay in the street. Its owner was nowhere to be seen. ‘No!’ I searched the wreckage on my side of the bridge. I stared down at the river. Nothing. I yelled in anger and frustration. The sound carried forever in the morning stillness.

like...i want to know every little detail about will solace as much as the next person. but this post is genuinely in direct ignorance of canon 😭😭 not only did percy stay to search for michael -- he was the FIRST to search. percy cared about him. and he recognised the depth of michael's sacrifice, the risk he undertook. he tried to stop him.

this is no one particular person's fault. i think as the percy jackson universe has gone on, percy, as a character, as been (ironically) kind of watered down. it has been easy for people to forget who he is, how kind he is. but i see it a lot. i see percy as this kind of apathetic, uncaring villain too often and it drives me insane. im BEGGING people to love the side characters and the barely-mentioned as much as i do, but to remember whose voice drew us in the first place.

[imfierylilac]

Who the Nevermore characters would be if they lived in our time:

Eulalie – a writer. I’m sure she’d live in some creepy old house (like the one she bought in life, lol) and write gothic novels or horror. And she’d be a very sought-after author in that genre.

Duke – an actor. That’s halfway canon anyway. I imagine he’d work in both film and theater, and he’d do most of his own stunts on stage, which would earn him the nickname “Fortunato.”

Berenice – a singer. I picture her performing jazzy songs that would be total hits, and her concerts would always be lavish and well-planned.

Morella – a chef. I’m certain she’s a natural cook and loves it. She’s definitely the type who gets genuinely happy when others enjoy her food. She might even run a cozy little family restaurant.

Prospero – a doctor. That’s canon, and I can’t see him as anything else. I think he’d be a surgeon and the head of a clinic.

Montresor – the owner of a rodeo arena. It’s weird, I know, but looking at that walking cowboy, I just can’t shake the thought.

Ada – she’d work as a consultant in a fancy boutique. The kind who gives you a judgmental look while you browse, like she thinks you can’t afford anything.

Will – a librarian. No seriously, Will looks like he knows so much but is too quiet and unsure to show it. The shy librarian role would suit him perfectly.

Lenore – she’d work in emergency management, like at FEMA. I mean, come on, this girl has a savior complex and a heroic streak. I imagine in modern times she’d run away from her abusive parents and devote her life to helping others.

Annabel – I think she’d just continue the family business. Probably be the CEO of a company. Annabel totally gives off “boss girl” vibes.

Pluto – an artist. I feel like he’d have a hidden artistic talent and people would really love his work.

[1427]

would you? (pt. 2)

Negan x Reader

Summary: Your mom died when you were 15, your Aunt Lucille was given custody even though she was battling cancer. When the world gets upended and Lucille dies, Negan is all you have, but he isn’t cut out to be a parent. When he becomes the leader of the Saviors and takes residence in the Sanctuary he’s almost a stranger. No one wants anything to do with you because you’re Negan’s “daughter”. So when you confront Negan about needing company, he obliges. You don’t realize that the feelings you’re developing are inappropriate, but Negan does.

Setting: Height of the Saviors era Sanctuary, Negan’s bedroom. 

Warnings: SMUT, age-gap (reader is 18, Negan is early/mid 40’s), virgin!reader, manipulation, guardian!negan (technically it’s Uncle!Negan and it IS mentioned explicitly), oral (f receiving), unprotected piv, creampie, stocking!kink, innocence/corruption!kink, reader is described several times as a doll/toy, read at your own risk ok

Word count: 3.3k

A/n: uhm, my heart was racing the entire time I was writing this please read at your own risk fr

// Part 1 //

masterlist

18+ mdni

I was just bending over to grab my pencil, coach. 

For a while, you don’t bring up what happened that night. Going to lunch like everything’s normal. Negan is even more disturbed by this than he was by your innocent flirting. You don’t bring it up, but you’re different. Reminding him of some of his former students. The girls with obvious crushes - ones they were trying to hide but actively weren’t. They’d do things that could easily be explained away. 

Sorry, I only packed these shorts today. I didn’t realize they were against dress code. 

It was easy to not look then, to hardly be affected by silly teenage girls who had no idea what they were doing. He could go to the teachers lounge and flirt with the TA’s if he was really looking for someone younger. But younger isn’t necessarily what Negan liked. ‘Innocent’ wasn’t something he thought he could get into. But with you? He had all control, every single aspect of your life was in his hands - and he knows he fucked up. He knows he fucked you up… but he’d gone and fucked himself up too. Finding himself wanting to teach you everything. So caught up in the knowledge of how bad you want him makes him feel like a king - moreso than any amount of wives. You only wanted him. You only knew him.

Oblivious to Negan’s dirty secret and because he’d threatened to stop seeing you if you continued this flirting behavior you stick with subtle stuff. Wearing even lower cut shirts, mini-skirts and stockings. And sure, the stockings had holes in them. But Negan liked that even more than if they hadn’t. It let him imagine you weren’t this pristine untouched thing. He wasn’t sure which was worse; fantasizing about you as this perfect little doll that’s never been held by anyone, that doesn’t know anything about a man’s body or as this thing he’d corrupted. Giving you romance novels? What an amateur mistake on a colossal scale. 

When you started wearing skirts he could smell you. Your wet cunt, sweet and unmistakable, every single time you walked into his bedroom for lunch. He tries to ignore it, tells the kitchen to make more pungent food, wears cologne, but it doesn’t matter - he could pick your scent out of a line-up of the undead, having had weeks to memorize it. 

Negan’s cologne only makes you more wet for him. You can barely make it through lunch anymore. Trying your best to keep up with the conversation that you’re almost positive he’s phoning in as well, but it’s not easy when all you can think about is him stuffing you full on the bed that sits a dozen feet away. You’re desperate to make a move and terrified that any move you make will disrupt everything. 

You scour your books for some kind of clue on what to do next, how to make it impossible for him to say no - but there’s no obvious answer. With no experience to tell you that Negan was losing his goddamn mind waiting for you to make a move or proposition so that he could oblige it. 

He gets sick of waiting. Sick of drinking down his disgust with himself. It only makes the fantasies more vivid. Almost tangible and right there. All he really had to do? Touch you. And he knows it. 

He’d stopped getting you gifts and novels after that night, but today? Today he had something real fuckin’ special. 

You’re sitting across from him eating… only desserts? Weird choice, but still delicious. “What’s the occasion?” You ask, taking a bite of the strawberry shortcake set out in front of you. 

“Do I need a special occasion to treat my favorite girl?” He says it so casually, but he’s never said anything like that to you before. 

“Okay,” you breathe out a chuckle, “who are you and what have you done with my uncle?” 

“Woah now, ‘Uncle’?” The title made him visibly uncomfortable, but not because he didn’t like it. He was too far gone with you, and now anything that made it more taboo just spurred his hunger further. 

You breathe in deeply, as if you’d just confessed to something. Simply put, you had. He knows how bad you want it. He can smell it on you, and you didn’t care he was your family. Not even just your almost supposed ‘guardian’, no. You saw him as your uncle and you still wanted it. Bad. “Yeah, you are my uncle, aren’t you?” 

“That makes you my niece.” He says it like it’s news. Not understanding that he’s trying to gauge your reaction. 

For some reason, it makes your heart pound. Your ears get hot, and that same smile you’d tried to will away that night he’d forced a confession out of you (in the form of a moan at his touch) blossoms on your face. Pink cheeked and starry eyed, “It does,” you nod, you really don’t know any better, “Anyway, what’s all this about?” 

Negan scrambles for an answer that isn’t the one he can’t say out loud, “Missed your birthday, wanted to… make it up to you.” His voice is low, droning, and it makes you shift in your seat, crossing your legs. Negan notices and smirks at your body giving you away. You’re so easy. 

“Oh… thanks.” You take another bite of the shortcake before moving your fork to his plate to take a bite of chocolate cake. He lets you, he’s been letting you get away with so much more disrespect than he’d ever allow from anyone else. Telling himself that no teenager shouldn’t be getting away with little stuff like that, but really it’s because he likes it. He wishes you would take more control, and just ask him already. He’d wished for weeks that you would press yourself up against him like you had before he’d made you aware of your own feelings for him. And he hates that he told you that you weren’t allowed. That it was wrong. Because it is, but he doesn’t care anymore. 

He’s sick of waiting for you to understand how to make a move, “I got you a little something too.”

It’s almost unbelievable that he’d gotten this for you. One of the saviors had tried to smuggle it to keep for himself, and once Negan saw it… he couldn’t think of something better for you. “Now close your eyes,” he purrs. 

You slam your eyes shut and put out your hands eager to receive another gift. Feeling a hard plastic case being slipped into your fingers, “Now open them.” 

It was a… you had no idea. Looking up at him in confusion you’re met with a look of complete and total satisfaction from Negan. Smiling wide at your reaction. “What is it?” You whisper, smiling back. 

“Oh, don’t worry. I’ll show you.” And he winks. He fucking winks. You’re a mess. You’re putty. You have no idea what this little pink egg shaped thing is, enclosed in the plastic balanced in your hands, but you know it’s something… different. He can tell you still have no clue what it is, what it’s for, but he sits and waits for your thanks. 

You can feel it, your legs tremble as you’re about to stand up but you stop yourself. You’re not supposed to flirt with him. And he told you that that’s what hugging him is. At least when you do it. You look to him, chewing on your lip, you want to feel him pressed against you so bad it’s making your knee bounce in anxious anticipation. You think about the fact that if you were hugging him you’d be able to smell his cologne even stronger, maybe you could even get away with kissing him on the cheek. After all, you could just blame it on the gift again. 

He’s just sitting there, leaned back in his chair, staring toward the window. It would be so easy to just… you get up and crash down into his lap. Draping your arms around him, pulling your face into the crook of his neck like you always do. This time is different, like everything else has been different since that night. You can’t will yourself to move. Your breath caught in your throat as your gaze travels upward. All you can see is his neck, his chin still pointed away like he’s trying to hold himself together. You feel a guilt creeping into your periphery but it’s drowned out by the heat between your legs. Without even realizing you’re doing it, you plant your lips on his neck. 

He’s quick to react, his hand coming to grip your thigh just as instinctually as you had kissed him. Negan is sick of waiting, he was not built for this. “Do you want me to show you how to use your gift?” 

You’re melting, all your senses dizzy with his hand so firmly on your leg. Feeling his calloused palm through the tears in your stockings, your skin prickles. He puts his one arm underneath your legs and the other under your arms and picks you up, placing you gently back down in his chair. The suspense courses through you, tightening and moving to your limbs. The personification and embodiment of an exclamation point, you’re trembling as he stalks around the room. Taking the still unopened gift off of the table, you hear the click of the knife from behind you as he paces. He’s cutting into it as he leans down and breathes in your ear, “If you want me to stop, you tell me to stop, okay?” 

You nod in response, trying to swallow the knot in your throat.  He keeps talking, walking around to face you again as he gets the small mysterious device free from its packaging. “I fucked up with you,” you can tell he’s going to start monologuing like he always does, building up the anticipation you already can’t take. Your hands pulling at the hem of your skirt because you don’t know what else to do with them. “I want you to know that I know I’ve made mistakes. I’ve really really fucked up your pretty little head.” As he speaks he moves back around behind you. Cheeks flushing at the compliment. He’d called you pretty. 

“But don’t worry, kid,” his voice in your ear feels like his stubble beneath your lips that you’ve imagined so many times, “I’m gonna fix you right up.”

His hand glides down your chest from above you and your body dramatically arches into his touch. Shivering as he moves his way down to one leg, pulling on your stocking to maneuver the limb onto the arm-rest. He does the same with the other, as if you’re some doll he’s positioning. You’re putty, not a single ounce of resistance inside of you. He moves his hand to lift up your skirt, letting it fall to your stomach. Unable to look at yourself in such a provocative position you close your eyes. 

“Holy shit, girl.” Negan’s smile devours him as he takes it all in. You’re not wearing underwear underneath your stockings, something he was absolutely not expecting. Your pretty pussy all smashed up against the mesh, your juices seeping through. In the light it almost sparkles. He’s never seen a damn thing like it. He hadn’t even done anything yet, and you were a shaking mess in his chair. Waiting so patiently for him to fix you. 

He had planned on putting the little vibrator against the fabric of your panties and stockings, and while he still could… he can’t stop himself from putting his warm hand between your legs instead. He doesn’t want to stop himself, he wasn’t built for that. Fuck the piece of shit vibrator and fuck all of his stupid fucking plans to take this slow. No, he knows what you really need. Him. 

His big hand comes to rest on top of your mound, pressing his fingers flat against the wet fabric of your stockings hard. The pressure.. the warmth.. your hands immediately shoot up from your sides grabbing his forearm as you gasp at the feeling. Pulling yourself even more flush against him, any piece of him you can get. 

You’re shaking, Negan can’t think straight. All plans out the window, that smell, he needs to taste you. He rubs his whole hand, all four warm fingers, against the sopping fabric in circles for only a few seconds before bringing his hand up to his nose and taking a deep breath in of your scent. (He won’t lick you from his fingers, that’s somehow beneath him.)

You whimper under his touch and whine when he pulls away, but you don’t move other than to put your arms flat against the armrests of the chair. He was going to fix you, right? So you submit, not really even understanding how to react to any of this. 

His dick is so hard against the fabric of his pants that it hurts. He tries to readjust, but it only makes him groan. Your neck cranes at the noise, but before you can get a look he’s in front of you, pulling up on the mesh directly above your heat, taking the knife he’d still been holding and cutting into it. The sound of the stockings tearing only makes Negan’s dick harder, revealing your glistening cunt like unwrapping a fucking present. Just for him, all for him. He did this… all of it. 

He rips the fabric more before pulling your hips closer to the edge of the chair and kneeling down on one knee. His face buries against you with a haste you weren’t expecting, your body shooting up at the feeling. So sharp and too much, you squirm against his tongue but he keeps you still. Growling into your cunt, “I said I’m going to take care of you, doll, so you have to let me.  Stop. Moving. Just…” his tone softens, and he kisses you sweetly on your hood, “relax.” 

Negan dives back in more gently this time, taking in the taste of you slowly. Drinking from you, he’s never tasted anything so sweet. So pristine. His tongue swathing in large laps against your lips, you’re trying your best to relax but your orgasm builds faster than you can tolerate. It felt like fucking magic, filling you with stars that buzzed all the colors of the rainbow. He flicks his tongue between your folds, directly onto that spot and your orgasm shoots through you like a bullet. From your core to the top of your head, no orgasm you’d ever had had felt like that. It left you wanting, it wasn’t enough. Your walls pulsate, gushing thick white perfect ecstasy into Negan’s mouth. He snickers against you, his nose resting gently on your still quivering clit. 

He doesn’t want to wait - picking you up like you weigh absolutely nothing, bringing you and your dizzy head to lay gently on his satin sheets. Bliss; and yet, you yearned. 

Inside. 

Your whole body shouting, the personification and embodiment of a fucking exclamation point. His belt clacks against your sensitive folds as he races to get himself inside.

And then, all of a sudden and just like that - you’re whole. His lips smashing into yours in a desperate need to claim every part of you. 

When he’d imagined it in his head you were naked, all skin and blush and like sweet honey coating his senses. It was all different, but he didn’t mind you like this. Clothing soaked with sweat and your own sweet nectar; he felt like he was in high school and he’s taking your virginity underneath the bleachers. All limbs and throbbing need and no time, no breath to waste.

 He kisses you deep and rough until you can’t breathe and you pull away, still adjusting to his size which you imagine is large from the discomfort inside of you, snaring itself into your vision like white flashes of electricity.

His first few labored thrusts hurt like you imagined it would, though it’s not like anything you’ve felt before. The burn of your walls stretching over him makes your breath hitch sharply in your throat, “That’s a good girl,” he purrs in your ear as he pulls out and slams into you harder. Tears sting your eyes as you nod into his shoulder, silently willing him to keep going. Don’t stop. He couldn’t stop even if you’d asked him too, your pussy is too wet, too hungry and swallowing him whole. He knows what you need, he can tell, even if you couldn’t. You need this. 

Negan is seeing fucking stars, your hole stretching so perfectly around him like it never needed anything more, “Fu-uck,” he’s not going to last 5 minutes. He leans back, taking your hips and pulling them off of the bed to stay attached to his while he fucks you like that. Your shoulders still down against the bed, you’d never read about a position like this and it hurts but you like it. Your eyes traveling down his body as he buries himself slowly into you. All the way to the hilt, and that’s when you see it.

“Oh my god,” you breathe, causing him to look down and see what was going on but he had already pulled back. 

“Hm?” His tone is amused. 

“Do it again,” you whine. He smirks a brilliant flash of white teeth, before his face completely falters at the sight when he presses himself all the way into you again. Both of your eyes wide as the outline of his cock protrudes from your belly. 

“Jesus,” his voice is loud, it seems to vibrate your brain against your skull. He draws himself out of you and shoves back in - more unceremoniously than previous. He’d been trying his best to not hurt you, to take it as slow as he could manage; but seeing his hard length poke out of your body was too divine, way too fucking hot for him to not lose any semblance of control he’d had. 

Negan drowns you out, your loud screams, your hands clawing at his forearms, as he rails into you. Eyes fixed on your stomach as he watches; he doesn’t even realize you’re cumming until your hips shake violently in his grip. Your walls clench so tight his cock is pushed out. Negan clicks his tongue, as if you’d done something wrong. Moving himself in position back on top of you, his elbows coming to rest above your shoulders, his whole being swallowing you up. Your arms and legs wrap around him to try and still your shaking body as he ruts up and into you like a wild animal, his breathing jagged, his movements much less languid. Rough and desperate and all consuming. 

Using your body like a toy to get himself off, he’s hardly paying attention anymore. Grunting curses that you’re trying to memorize through a hazy veil of satisfaction.

He’s. Falling. Apart.  

And it’s wet and hot and so deep inside you that you can feel it in your fucking throat. You scream, loud, as he empties himself inside you.

Quickly, too quickly, he pulls himself out. He wants to watch his seed spill out and onto the gray sheets. You’d said you fucking sucked at painting, but Negan thinks this is the most beautiful piece of art he’s ever fucking seen. His cum dripping out of your freshly and newly used pussy in soft glistening strings to pool underneath of you, the white in stark contrast to the dark fabric is something real fuckin’ special. 

He’s smiling, kneeling above you with his hands on your stockinged knees as he watches between your legs. You’re in another world, on another planet and lost in your senses. It was everything you’d dreamed it’d be. Heaven. 

Negan had every intention on this being a one time thing. After all, hysteria was curable - but as he lays back on the bed to catch his breath he’s already caught dreaming about you in every position, any way he can place you. His perfect little toy, all just for him. Only his. 

[synity]

His salvation

What if…

The coldest man in the city, a man with blood on his hands and a heart carved from marble, found the one thing in this world worth saving? What if a monster… found his angel?

They called him The Tiger.

*Mafia · Dark Romance · Obsession · Possessive Love · Soft for You Only*

Hoshi didn’t get that name from nowhere. Leader of one of the most feared mafia empires in the country, he was ruthless, calculated, and devoid of mercy. His smile was rare, and when it showed, it meant blood was about to be spilled.

People feared him. Rightfully so.

He had no family. No one close. No one that mattered. He believed emotions were for the weak. Love? A fairytale. He trusted no one.

Until he saw you.

It was a cold night. You had been walking home from your part-time shift at a café, headphones in, eyes tired, the city’s glow lighting your path.

And across the street, in the shadow of a blacked-out car he saw you.

You didn’t notice him. But he noticed everything about you.

Your smile when you helped a lost child. The way you paused to pet a stray cat. The way your fingers fidgeted with the zipper of your bag when you were nervous.

You were… soft.

Too soft for this dark world.

Too soft for someone like him.

Which is exactly why he became obsessed.

At first, it was from a distance.

He learned your name. Your schedule. Where you worked. Who you hung out with. He hacked your building’s cameras. Stationed his men discreetly to ensure your safety. And every few days, a little black box would arrive at your door.

A diamond necklace. A designer coat. A rare first-edition novel you once mentioned liking in passing. But never a note. Never a name.

“Creepy,” your friend joked. But you… you couldn’t lie. A part of you was curious. The gifts were never threatening always perfectly tailored to your taste.

And somehow, you felt eyes on you. Not dangerous… but constant. Protective.

Then came the night everything changed.

You were walking alone again, a shortcut through an alley you’d used a hundred times.

You didn’t hear the footsteps behind you.

Until a hand yanked you back rough, cold, and wrong.

You screamed. Tried to fight. But it was hopeless

Until he showed up.

The man was thrown against the wall in one move, a knife to his throat in seconds. And there he stood your savior. All-black suit, leather gloves, and dead eyes. Except when he looked at you.

With you… his expression softened. Just barely. Enough to make your breath catch.

He turned back to the man and didn’t even hesitate.

A single move. A choked gasp. Silence.

Blood splattered the wall. You should’ve screamed. Run. But you didn’t.

Because something about him… felt safe.

“I’ve been watching you,” he said quietly, wiping his blade. “Not to hurt you. To protect you.”

“Who are you?” you whispered.

He didn’t answer. Just stepped forward, brushing your hair behind your ear.

“I’m someone who’s never cared about anything. Anyone. Until you.”

Your knees trembled.

“Why me?”

“Because you’re the only thing in this rotten world that makes me feel something.”

He took you home that night. Not to his mansion but to yours. He didn’t touch you. Just sat on the balcony, arms crossed, watching the stars like they had answers.

You offered him tea.

He blinked.

No one… ever offered him anything.

Especially not kindness.

After that night, he didn’t stay in the shadows anymore. He sent a bouquet of black roses to your doorstep. He showed up outside your work, leaning against a matte black sports car, eyes only for you. People whispered. The air around him screamed danger.

But he was gentle with you. Always.

One night, you asked, “Why me, Soonyoung?”

He leaned in, fingers brushing your jaw. “Because I would burn down this entire city just to see you smile.”

You became his weakness. But also his strength.

And though his hands would always be stained, with you he held them open. With you he was just Soonyoung.

Not The Tiger. Not a murderer. Not a monster.

Just a man in love.

[apoloadonisandnarcissus]

Robert Eggers on the ending of his “Nosferatu”

But isn’t it interesting that this female archetype who understands the dark side of humanity and is sexualized keeps being reconstituted as the savior of Victorian culture?” [Interviewer says Ellen dies for our sins] She dies for our sins, in a way, yeah. I think there is a sacrifice. But there is also vengeance, and there is also a weird kind of sacred marriage, in a union sense, and a sort of completion of some kind of destiny, because as much as Orlok is a disgusting abuser, he’s the only person who can understand and fulfill a part of Ellen. Hopefully there’s nuance going on there, and it’s not just this or that. Source

Let’s try to break this down:

Eggers is clearly aware of the audience response to his work, and what the loudest voices are saying, especially in mainstream media, and he’s being very careful with his words in this interview not to “glamorize” his gothic tale, and get misunderstood, hence why he talks about nuance. This is a gothic horror romance tale, after all, it’s supposed to be dark and twisted, based in the OG toxic and dysfunctional love story, Catherine and Heathcliff. This story is pretty much “Wuthering Heights” on steroids.

Eggers talks about his intended “demon lover story” and the “Wuthering Heights” inspiration in this interview, too. Only in “Nosferatu”, the roles are reversed, and it’s Heathcliff/Orlok ghost who’s calling Catherine/Ellen to her grave. And like Catherine’s ghost with Heathcliff, Orlok stalks and torments Ellen to get her to join him in death, until she does.

I’ll start by saying female characters in Robert Eggers’ films are usually sympathetic, but they can also be selfish, cruel and their motivations complex (often not straight-out told to the audience) in reaction to the patriarchal societies they live in. Apparently, many are assuming “Nosferatu” is somehow different from his previous works in this regard… for some reason. This has been his dream project for decades, and he started working on the first script in 2016.

"A Sacrifice"

Robert Eggers doesn’t say (nor confirms) that Ellen sacrifices herself to save everyone, and even calls it “a sacrifice” (not “the” sacrifice like in previous adaptations, which was the sole purpose of Ellen/Lucy’s deaths). To me, the “in a way, yes, she dies for our sins” is also curious, because this implies that’s not the point? This is also my idea of the ending: I think Ellen saving everyone was a “colateral” more than the actual goal.

We know there’s sacrifice involved because that’s what the Solomonari book said:

“And so the maiden fair did offer up her love unto the beast, and with him lay in close embrace until first cockcrow, her willing sacrifice thus broke the curse and freed them from the plague of Nosferatu.”

The selfless sacrifice for the greater good can’t be the only thing going on here (and it isn’t, according to Robert Eggers), because when we look at the three adaptations side by side, there’s a huge difference between them, especially from the heroine side (who doesn’t behave like a “sacrificial lamb” like in the previous adaptations):

Robert Eggers also gave us a scene to parallel this one with Thomas early in the film, to provide a contrast, and show to the audience how different these scenes are meant to be.

Here the “prey and predator” theme is obvious; poor Thomas is completely at Orlok’s mercy. For the r*pe interpretation “enthusiasts”, here is your scene. This also happened in the OG 1922 “Nosferatu”, as a reference to the “Dracula” novel, where it’s the brides of Dracula who feed off Jonathan Harker (Thomas book counterpart); which is probably why we see a vision of Ellen during this scene.

“Vengeance”

What I find more intriguing here (and even in the 2023 script when it’s said Ellen looks at Orlok with “fiery reckoning” and has “won”, when the sun is rising) it’s how Eggers talks about “vengeance” but then describes Orlok and Ellen union as a “weird kind of sacred marriage”, and fulfillment of fate, because, in spite of all the obsession and raw toxicty, he’s the only one who can understand and fulfill her (Catherine and Heathcliff textbook). This is nothing new, because Eggers has talked about it before:

“Ellen’s husband loves her, but he can’t understand these ‘hysteric’ and ‘melancholic’ feelings she’s experiencing, and he’s dismissive of her. The only person she really finds a connection with is this monster, and that love triangle is so compelling to me, partially because of how tragic it is.”

Who is Ellen? She’s referred as the only heroic character in the film, several times. Like Von Franz says, she’s a woman born out of time, because while in Pagan times she would have been a “great priestess of Isis”, in 19th century Victorian society she’s medicalized because of her supernatural abilities. Which summons up, Robert Eggers explanation:

“She's an outsider. She has this understanding about the shadow side of life that is very deep, but she doesn't have language for that. She's totally misunderstood and no one can see her," he says. "Because of this gift, in her teenage years, she ends up reaching out to this demon lover, this vampire, who is the one being who can connect with that side of her. But then that other, sensual, erotic world is connected to this evil force, which only increases her shame.”

In a interview to “Deadline”, Willem Dafoe, explains his character, Von Franz, an expert on the occult and mysticism, is the only one who truly understands the psychic connection between Orlok and Ellen (which is unique to this particular adaptation of “Nosferatu”): “I’ve heard Robert describe it as a triangle between Ellen’s husband, who’s a loving guy, he loves her dearly, and he’s conscientious. He wants to be a good husband, but he doesn’t quite see her, and he doesn’t understand what she’s going through. And then on the other hand, you have this demon lover that attracts her, and she doesn’t know why, but somewhere there is a deep understanding there and a deep attraction.”

In the same interview, Eggers also says:

“Thomas thinks he's the hero but really his wife, who everyone is calling crazy and telling to shut up and tying to beds, is the only one who can solve the problem," Eggers says. "That's much more interesting.”

We also see this in story itself: in the first and second act, Ellen sees Thomas as her “savior” and often talks about how his love has saved her from her connection to Orlok/Death. And while Thomas tries to embody the “savior” role on the third act, Ellen says to Von Franz: “I need no salvation” because she has never done anything wrong but to be true to her nature. And Von Franz, asks her to act according to it now, too.

This idea of Ellen being the one to “solve the problem” goes back to the first interview I shared: “But isn’t it interesting that this female archetype who understands the dark side of humanity and is sexualized keeps being reconstituted as the savior of Victorian culture?”

Robert Eggers explains that, unlike her friend Anna, Ellen cannot, or will not, conceal her sexual desires. Orlok hears some internal cry in her, and targets her as a result, and in this, Eggers explores themes of punishment and the shaming of female sexuality. In Gothic female novel fashion, Orlok symbolizes Ellen’s sexual awakening, and sexuality, Victorian era sought to contain and repress.

“Particularly in the 1980s, there was a lot of literary criticism talking about all these Victorian male authors who created these female heroines who have sexual desire and sexual energy, and then need to be killed and punished for that,” Eggers says. “It’s this misogynist thing. But I think a lot of female literary critics who I was also reading were saying, ‘But isn’t it also interesting that, from this repressed cultural period, there’s the idea of this dark, chthonic female heroine who would be the person who could understand the depths?’ And in telling that same kind of story in a modern context, even trying to stay through the lens of the 19th century, we could have potentially some more nuance there, potentially, hopefully.”

“Chthonic” is an adjective from the 19th century, and means “inhabitant from the Underworld”

We see this punishment of women who embrace their sexuality in Bram Stoker’s “Dracula” novel, too, with the character of Lucy Westenra (who’s more progressive and liberal) and gets punished (vampirism + death) as a result, while Mina Harker is the embodiment of the modest and virginal Victorian woman and is “saved” by the narrative.

The character of Ellen Hutter in the 1922 “Nosferatu” is based on Stoker’s Mina Harker, and it’s her purity that allows her to sacrifice herself to stop Nosferatu, which Eggers subverts on his adaptation (sex + death). In a way, his Ellen is more Lucy than Mina, and even how Orlok/Dracula lures them is the same (sleepwalking).

On a superficial level, one could interpret this as 2024 Ellen weaponizing her sexuality to destroy Orlok, and getting revenge on him for the torment he put her through, but isn’t this kind of contradictory with the rest? And this is very straightforward, there’s no nuance here, like Robert Eggers says.

I’ve read some weird mental gymnastics to justify Ellen and Orlok’s covenant was broken due to her sacrifice (or whatever), but that doesn’t seem what Eggers is talking about here, nor it fits with the “Wuthering Heights” inspiration on this story. Speaking of which, “revenge” is associated with Heathcliff (Orlok), not Catherine (who’s selfish and indecisive), she’s manipulative but it’s in connection with their desires, not for revenge purposes.

This “reckoning/vengeance” bit wasn’t in the 2016 script, it’s an addition to the 2023 final version, and Eggers has said several times he didn’t changed his story all that much. Ellen planning to die and take Orlok with her, driven by revenge, sounds like a huge change to me, because it’s a whole new motivation. In the 2023 script, we also have a description of how Ellen is ready to marry death, like her dream foretold (the one where she has never been so happy, which seems kind of contradictory if she’s doing it for revenge).

A commentary on the 2023 script, it’s incomplete, has omitted parts and scenes that didn’t play out that way in the final version. One example is in the prologue; in the film, Orlok’s first line is about how Ellen has awaken him, but this line is missing from the script. Ellen embracing Orlok as they die is also not the script the public has access to; instead it’s said he covers his face and falls over her, dead (which doesn’t happen in the actual film, thankfully). So, indeed, there is something dubious about this script. Also there will be a Blu-ray extended version of the film; and this script already has missing dialogue and scenes from the theatrical release, so it can’t possibly be the final version of “Nosferatu” script.

This is the so-called “fiery reckoning” look Ellen gives Orlok as the sun rises. Lily-Rose Depp proved herself as an actress in this role, and I’m not seeing any vengeful expression here. She’s just smiling, which, honestly, can have several possible meanings.

But still, Eggers mentions “vengeance” plays a part in this scene, alongside with the sacrifice, the sacred marriage to Orlok and them being fated. All of these are involved on his ending. Also, we have social commentary on Victorian society throughout the film.

Lily-Rose Depp explains Ellen is trying to come to terms with her own sexuality during the film, and Eggers calls her “heroic” because of her sexuality and her understanding of darkness. We have the cast and crew saying Orlok is sort of an embodiment of Ellen’s dark desires and sexuality (that Victorian era tries to repress and shame).

If she’s getting Orlok killed out of revenge, and herself by extension, doesn’t that, on a symbolic level, signifies that she’s killing her own sexuality and desires? Punishing herself? And doing exactly what Victorian society wants her to do? Which seems to be the opposite of what Robert Eggers intends here? Ellen dying alongside Orlok already symbolizes her sexuality getting punished according to Victorian society (like “Dracula” Lucy) however, she’s the one who’s saving everyone.

“Vengeance” and “reckoning” can also have another meaning: “Vindication”. Which in Christian theology is connected to another word: “Providence”. “She has been vindicated” and “she has won” mean the same thing. “Reckoning” is also connected to Doomsday = Apocalipse = “Book of Revelations”; which can be connected to the occult meaning behind these characters (Babalon and the Beast).

“Vindication” means to prove oneself right after being accused of being wrong by others. To me, this seems to be more aligned with Eggers words:

“But isn’t it interesting that this female archetype who understands the dark side of humanity and is sexualized keeps being reconstituted as the savior of Victorian culture?”

In accepting Orlok, Ellen is accepting herself, symbolically embracing her own sexuality and wearing her shame like a badge of honor. And by extension she breaks the curse of Nosferatu and saves everyone. She’s vindicated because she has been medicalized, drugged and tied-up because of her “hysteric seizures” (which were believed to be caused by a wandering womb, connected to female sexuality) for years, but it’s her empowerment through free sexuality that saves the day, and proves Victorian society wrong.

But this “vindication” can only be possible if all that’s happening here is what Ellen truly wants, because she has fully accepted herself, her nature, because she’s been fighting against her dark desires (Orlok) all movie. Which is exactly what Von Franz advises her to do:

“Harken” means “to listen” or “give respectful attention”.

Then, “succumb to the darkness” isn’t about Ellen passively surrender to Orlok; but about her accepting her true nature and self. She’s the one who says she doesn’t need to crucify the evil within her, after all. Robert Eggers also says he wants to provoke reflection on the audience when Ellen asks “does evil comes from within or beyond?”, but, to him, it’s both.

Still, “evil” is nuanced in this film, too. In one interview, when asked if Orlok is the villain of the film, Bill Skarsgård joked he’s the “romantic lead”, but, as Nosferatu/Dracula he’s obviously villainous, but there’s nuance to him in this adaptation. When Ellen accuses him of being a villain, his answer is “I’m an appetite”, after all. He is what he is, he doesn’t hide his nature. The “nuance” to Orlok’s evilness here is most likely rooted in Romanian folklore where the demonic isn’t inherently evil, it’s simply more attuned to Chaos than with Cosmos, where God and the Devil are twin brothers.

Bill Skarsgård says there’s an entire novella on Orlok’s back story that Eggers wrote just for him. Orlok had a family and was once married, but Eggers doesn’t want the world to know his full backstory but it’s detailed.

We are also told Orlok was a sorcerer in life, one of the Solomonari (from Romanian folklore) who studied black magic at the Scholomance, a school in the mountains where the Devil teaches 13 disciples and chooses one of them to be his slave at the end (demonic version of Hogwarts, if you will). He sold his soul to the Devil and became a vampire as a consequence.

Wicked Sacred Marriage

“Bride of Dracula” theme. It’s pretty obvious. Count Orlok and Count Dracula are the same thing, and Robert Eggers’ “Nosferatu” is also based on the Bram Stoker novel.

Not only Herr Knock bitterly says Orlok only cares about “his pretty bride”, but his covenant with Ellen is literally “And shall you be one with me ever-eternally.” And then even consummate it: “As our spirits are one, so too shall be our flesh. You are mine.”

Ellen saying to Orlok “You cannot love” is a reference to Bram Stoker’s novel, “Dracula”, when one of Dracula’s brides accuses him of the same: “You yourself never loved! You never love.” And his answer is: "Yes, I too can love. You yourselves can tell it from the past. Is it not so?”

In “Nosferatu” (2024), Orlok takes the “Heathcliff route”, but his hesitation after the “I… cannot” and the context of their conversation (“remember how once we were?”) is a direct parallel with Dracula’s exchange with his bride, in the novel.

The “I’m unclean” is also a reference to Bram Stoker novel, by the way.

But in this story, vampires aren’t made the “traditional way”; Orlok’s victims don’t turn into vampires, they just die. Orlok himself is dead, and his spirit appears to be trapped in that rotten corpse. Him physically dying is the only way to set his spirit free.

Fated

Why are Ellen and Orlok fated?

I think this is what Ellen was asking Von Franz at the beginning of their last conversation: “I must know… why me, professor?” Von Franz replies she was born to the occult. So, indeed, it has occult meaning. Which is also connected to the “sacred” part of her marriage to Orlok.

I already talked about this in another post, but I don’t buy that Orlok was deceived by Ellen: they were both meant to die, and knew what they were both signing for. Because this was the only way to complete their covenant, and the book with the knowledge of how to defeat Nosferatu belonged to Orlok and was in his fanatical servant office (so he obviously knew about this, and was a part of his plan). Eggers isn’t a director that leaves things to chance.

And in true “Wuthering Heights” fashion, Ellen and Orlok, like Catherine and Heathcliff, couldn’t be together in the living world, only in the spiritual world, united by death. And Ellen, like Catherine, dies and leaves behind a grieving husband, Edgar/Thomas, while being reunited with Heathcliff/Orlok in spirit.

Ellen was “fated” to break the curse, which involved “offer[ing] up her love unto the beast, and with him lay in close embrace”. She has a connection to the Underworld, and she fulfills her role as “priestess of Isis” in the end. She’s also the one who awoke Orlok, and she’s the only one who can tame him, and destroy/free him from Nosferatu curse.

[bluemoonscape]

The like, painful thing about Vader being such an iconic and famous character in the star wars mythos is that the more we receive of him, the weaker his initial redemption arc becomes.

Like it was always going to be a problem and it's not really bad if you just never think too much about everything Vader is said to have done in between the prequels and the original trilogy. But it's hard, because the ancillary material provides so so much depth and complexity to Anakin and Vader. He is, at once, made worse and better by continuously expanding on his life.

The tragedy of Anakin is made even more tragic by going into the mind of Anakin the day order 66 happens and seeing the glee he takes in mocking the council during his slaughter. It makes you feel sick, and then you are presented with the failures of the council and how Anakin was raised from slavery and made to believe he is some savior, but he couldn't even save his mother. He was PUNISHED for even suggesting that he intervene. The Jedi Order had already been compromised and their ideology warped to cause harm through inaction and placing the importance on their relationships with banks and private factions that have a stake in an eternal war.

There was a comic where Anakin and Obi-Wan are trying to save this planet that isn't technically part of the Republic and is facing a natural calamity AND the Separatists aiming to take control of the planet. I can't remember the entirety of the comic but I remember what Obi-Wan says to Anakin as the Jedi arrive with the Clones to take control of the situation: he said that the Jedi didn't arrive to help because help was needed, they showed up because a JEDI requested aid. They had known about the planet, they had received their distress calls, they didn't mobilize UNTIL a Jedi sent a distress call (and I think they took control of the planet for its natural minerals)

The comic was meant to emphasize the shift from the Order's altruistic peacekeeping origins, into a for profit military force. So when Order 66 happens, it is an immensely tragic event to everyone else, but it feels as if its divine Retribution to Anakin. iirc he says "I'm what you prayed for, aren't I lovely" or something to that effect in the novel of Revenge Of The Sith. It's like, effed up, but it you can see how--through Anakin's many many troubles and Sidious' constant manipulation--Anakin comes to view his actions as just.

And then going forward, as Vader, we are constantly in his headspace in almost every piece of media he appears in as a character. His disdain for Anakin, unending pain(physically and mentally), how Sidious punishes him for his defeat to Obi-Wan. The comic where he bleeds his kyber crystal...it's such a good goood comic. Gosh, in the vast world of Star Wars, it's hard to imagine a character who suffers as much Vader or who is as punished as Anakin.

Plus Anakin and Padme were T4T m/f and Anakin and Obi-Wan are toxic doomed mlm 🤧 thank you.

GOD you're so right about the continued expansion of his character both making him deeper as a character and yet showing us dimensions of his cruelty and capability for cruelty that we haven't seen before... he's such a tragic character at his root and literally every piece of media added to the collection of his story adds something new and often jarring.

What's so striking to me (which I recalled because you mentioned the RotS novelization which I'm normal about totally) about him is that, at his root, he's kind, loving, and altruistic - everything the Jedi hail. In the Phantom Menace novel, Watto sends him across the Dune Sea on a speeder to negotiate a trade with a merchant. On his way back, he encounters an injured Tusken and stops to try and help him. He stays with him through the night, not knowing how to help but unwilling to leave him, and this small child is thinking and recognizing that he and the Tusken were both afraid of each other, and yet this gives them something they have in common. Eventually little Ani falls asleep and wakes up however many hours later to find himself surrounded by other Tuskens who had come for their injured man. He's terrified, he's carrying valuable parts from the trade he was forced to do, but the Tusken he spent the night watching over signals for the others to lay off, and so they leave him and his valuables alone. This is such a simple but profound scene to me because we know what Anakin does to a village of Tuskens in AotC. In the time after he spent in slavery and before the start of the Clone Wars, something in him shifted to gain the capability to harm rather than guard. He was punished for things he couldn't control and was victim to the war's intentional corruption of the Jedi Order.

And then in the same novel, he helps Qui-Gon, Obi-Wan, Padme and Jar-Jar get off-world by offering to win them the parts for their ship, something he was not aware would end up benefiting him since Qui-Gon didn't reveal he was freed until after the race. His mom mentions a time when Anakin ran up a huge sand dune to scare away a herd of Banthas because he was afraid they were going to be shot. None of these actions benefit him. The most heart wrenching thing about Anakin's story is that he was such a sweet, loving, selfless kid. He wasn't born with a bad bone in his body.

And that compounds his resentment of the Jedi Order as a whole so much! Of course the orchestration and fall of the Republic is the fault of Palpatine and Dooku, we know who the villains are, but the Jedi Order just wasn't equipped to handle someone like Anakin. They made a fatal mistake. You have Qui-Gon, who freed Anakin - being brutally honest - because of his midichlorian count. He liked Anakin but he wouldn't have gone out of his way to free him if Anakin wasn't a Jedi. This already wildly fucks up Anakin's head because he was freed over his mom or any other slave child because he's special. He was treated differently by the Council because, for anyone who didn't believe he was the Chosen One, he at least had massive potential to be the best Jedi they'd ever seen. Padme and Obi-Wan, the people he loves most, are the only ones who treat him with love that is entirely unrelated to him being the Chosen One. They didn't care about this aspect of him, didn't even believe it was true, and they loved him long before they realized "oh damn, he might actually be? Okay then." Palpatine manipulates Anakin by pretending to offer a similarly unselfish love. Anakin's head has been fucked with so much from going from one in a hundred million slaves to having the weight of the galaxy on his shoulders. He went from one extreme of being nothing to suddenly being everything to so many people. Extremely unstable world for an extremely unstable boy to be growing up in. Anakin is incredibly BPD coded and so being surrounded by such chaos while there's already so much going on in his head just broke him, over and over.

So yeah obviously him killing the Jedi was NOT right or righteous by any extent but as viewers we can understand how he reached this point after a childhood of abuse and then an adolescence and young adulthood filled with grooming, grief, war (I think some people forget the Clone Wars literally started when he was 19, like that is YOUNG and then he had the responsibility of Ahsoka's life thrust upon him essentially to test him and his ability to let go, which was unfortunately unfair for both him and Ahsoka) etc. Then his relationships with Padme and Obi-Wan are so complex because in both of these dynamics he's pushed away at some point despite Padme and Obi-Wan loving him so dearly. They try to protect him from himself and he doesn't understand why. It's all of these things that build the resentment not only for the Council but then Vader's resentment for Anakin himself. Because he was "weak." Because he "let" all of these horrible things happen to him.

Because in the end Anakin hurt himself as much as anything else. And he still can't let go of his attachments. He holds onto Obi-Wan long after RotS and holds onto both him and Padme through Luke in the end, thus bringing Anakin back to the surface through the fog of Vader. The kyber crystal comic is INSANE because it shows us how deep that love and those attachments still run.

Anyway answering rant over,,,,

T4T ANIDALA PULLING OUT MY "ANAKIN IS BASICALLY A CLONE OF SHMI MADE FROM THE FORCE AND LACKS MALE CHROMOSOMES FROM AN ACTUAL FATHER THEREFORE FTM ANAKIN" PROPAGANDA!!!! And toxic doomed Obikin. Clutching you. Shaking you. Shaking you like a toddler who has never seen a cat before shakes a cat. You get me

[httpjupiterbby]

Swanqueen fanfics recommendations:

note: ngl i’ve been wanting for someone to ask me this. also all the recs are multi chapters… don’t get me started on how many one shots i saved or how many are in this post 😅

Every secret it keeps - Two years into emma and regina's loving marriage, emma discovers that she's somehow, impossibly, pregnant. Unfortunately, no one in this family is naive enough to believe that true love can make babies, and the swan-mills family is thrown headlong into a situation that will strain at the seams of their family– or tear them apart completely.

Dusk til dawn - what happens when the evil queen returns to a post-swan queen storybrooke? How will regina and emma's former relationship affect her pursuit of a happy ending with the savior? (warning: elements of mommy kink, ageplay/regression, and a bit of everything in between; even if you’re not into that, i would still give this one a read! it’s so good and super cute! .)

Storybrooke scandal - Regina Mills and Emma Swan have a long lasting sexual relationship with each other, but they got married along the way, however not to each other. Behind closed doors their relationship still continues, but what will happen when their respective husbands find out about their secret relationship and what will such a scandal do in the small town of storybrooke?

Making exceptions - No magic. Multi-chap. College AU: Emma Swan is a culinary arts student. Regina Mills is her English teacher.

Whispers in the night - AU: Emma's plagued by grief over the loss of her best friend. She joins a support group and meets Regina Mills. They share their heartbreaking stories and come out as friends. Can they find a way to become more than that?

Nine months to love - Regina overhears that Emma is pregnant. As the months pass, she is frequently at Emma’s place, and Emma at hers. Emma and Regina grow emotionally closer as the pregnancy goes through ups and downs. 10 chapters.

Project wingman - Regina has a secret admirer. Unknown to her, this mystery person has been standing right before her eyes all along.

We'll always have hope - “Are you saying I seduced you? “Regina frowned. “If I remember correctly, it was you that pinned me against the bed. It was you who kissed me. It was also you that pulled my panties down using your-“ Emma had messed up. She had messed up badly. There was no way she could choose between her best friend that she had been in love with for years and her husband who she just kind of tolerated. After their impromptu trip for their son's graduation, A few positive pregnancy tests changes Emma’s life forever and makes the decision for her.

Could you escort the maid? - Emma Swan is a 28 yr old aspiring writer who happens to be a professional escort. On a night out with a client Emma obtains a chance to save for her dreams when she is hired by a respected rich couple Robin and his wife Regina as their new maid.What happens when Emma soon realizes their marriage isn't as it seems and what will Robin do when he sees that she is falling for his wife

Darkness Falls - The story of how Emma and Regina discover they share true love is a rocky one. Snow White interferes stripping Emma and Henry of their will and Regina is on the run from a town that has turned on her. With few allies, how will the Queen restore her family and what will be the fall out of Snow's magical manipulations?

Bridges of storybrooke county - Based on the plot of the movie/novel 'The Bridges of Madison County'. Regina is a married and unsatisfied housewife living on an Iowa farm, Emma is a globetrotting photojournalist. Their fateful meeting begins a love affair neither of them is ready for. (And if you want to know whether Francesca gets out of the damn truck this time? You'll have to read the whole story.)

The choices we make - Would you give up the love of your life in name of a dream? Emma Swan and Ruby Lucas have a hard decision ahead and this will change their lives completely, and everyone around them.

What we could of had - Emma breaks up with her high school sweetheart, Regina out of the blue.Ten years later, Regina gets a visit by two adorable kids claiming to be hers.

Someone will remember us - On day one of her junior year at Boston College, Emma makes a fool out of herself in front of the most beautiful woman she’s ever seen. She tries not to dwell on it, though – after all, it’s not like the woman is going to end up teaching one of her classes.

A date with destiny - Regina Mills is a 35 year old, rich business woman who is also a virgin. Emma Swan is a 28 year old friend and roommate of fellow business man Robin Locksley and works for Killian Jones. Regina's assistant is tired off suffering from the backlash of her boss's stress and decides to set her up on a blind date with Robin but he can't show and so sends Emma instead.

Circumstance - Emma is an owner of a renowned Fitness Club called Swan Fitness and is also a grad student seeking a Master's in Counseling. Regina is one of Emma's professors and soon to be a member of her club. Will they allow their circumstance to prevent their feelings from evolving? Or will they fight to have their chance at their happy-ending? (TW!!!!)

Indecent Proposal - Emma Swan, a single mother, struggling to pay for her son's medical visits along as his medication, gets more than she bargains for when she meets Regina Mills. New York's bachelorette billionaire who offers her the solution to all her money problems: 2 million dollars and a signed contract stating her companionship for an entire year. One year, where anything could come into play.

Miss Swan goes to storybrooke - Regina Mills is running an underdog mayoral campaign when her hapless partner in crime, Neal Cassidy Gold, hires his new girlfriend to be a part of it. It's hate at first sight. Emma Swan is infuriatingly attractive, infuriatingly competent, and– most infuriatingly– will absolutely bring down their entire campaign if Regina doesn't get rid of her first.

Hi, i'm calling to answer your craigslist ad - Emma, Just like every 18-year-old foster kid, just aged out of the system. With nowhere to go, Emma searches Craigslist's Ads in hopes that she may find a job. While Browsing the "live-in housekeeper" section Emma comes across a post titled: "Seeking Live-in Pet/housekeeper". Starts off as OutlawQueen, ends with SwanQueen.

Chronicles of eris - After bringing back Marian from the past, Emma is left to deal with the consequences and repercussions of that decision. Two months of silent treatment from Regina is enough to push Emma completely over the edge. Together she and Ruby jump into a portal to the Enchanted Forest in order to figure out where they belong in the world.

To woo the queen - Emma Swan finally confesses her love for Regina Mills but as soon as she does, Regina pulls away. If it was just a casual fling Emma wanted, Regina thought she could have done with just that, but an admission of love and feelings scares Regina. Will Emma be able to woo her lady love and change her mind?

Bridges - Emma Swan has always run from everything and everyone; make no connections and no one can hurt you. But one night, something stops her from running. She meets Regina standing at the edge of a bridge, and everything changes. Major TW for suicide, depression, rape/non-con, abortion, child abuse, baby conceived by rape

The Girlfriend Experience - Emma Swan is a successful soccer star who was born with a dick. Regina Mills is the escort she hires to give her the 'Girlfriend Experience' but it turns into more. Little does Emma know, Regina is actually a victim of Mr Gold's sex slavery trade. What will they have to risk to be together? Smutty G!P! (last time i read this, it was still getting updated..)

What have you done - Regina is not speaking to Emma over Marian's sudden appearance. Emma decides she's had enough. Set at the end of Season 3, before things got "frozen." The beginnings of Swan Queen. So what started out as a simple one-shot, expanded and will continue for four chapters.

Lawyer vs. love - Regina Mills is a hard-ass lawyer from New York. Her life is nothing more than work until one day she meets Emma Swan, a barista with a troubled past. But, when a jealous ex comes to town, everything seems compromised and when Emma is sent away she asks Regina to do something that seems impossible.

A moment of truth - After Emma and Regina finally confess their feelings for each other, the dam breaks. This is the story of discovering their love for each and realizing that it had been there all along. This story is low on the angst but high on the feels and does contain plenty of magical sex.

Safe in the arms of love - Storybrooke AU. After an attack, Regina is forced to confront a past she spent her life burying. Can Emma help her find her way back before the darkness threatens to consume her? SQ ending. Trigger Warnings: Rape, assault, child abuse, violence, sexual content, stalkin

Group therapy - Emma Swan meets Regina Mills in group therapy. Contains potentially triggering content such as self-harm, drug use, and discussion of eating disorders. SwanQueen.

One touch - Emma is in therapy, and Regina Mills is her therapist. Eventually SwanQueen. Warning: this story contains mature themes that may be triggering to some individuals. Please read with caution !!!!!!!

In sickness and in health - As if being in an accident wasn't enough, now she's being told she's forgotten the last 3 years of her life? And in those 3 years, she got married...to her? Just great.

Bait and switch - Henry Mills is sick and tired of his mother’s skating around the truth and not realizing that they are perfect for each other and that they belong together. So he has a plan to bring them together and convinces his grandmother to help.

Broken together - After experiencing a great loss, Emma leans on Regina for support. Can she get through this with the help of Regina and Henry? (TW!!!!) (will squeeze the fuck out of your heart)

One more try - Emma and Regina are having relationship issues. (this will eat your heart out!)

Reservation for ms. mills - Senior Henry Mills tries to set up his daughter Regina and Emma because he thinks they'll be perfect for each other. One way or another. (major romcom vibes !!)

Out - Regina breaks up with Robin after returning from the NY road trip. She begins to question her sexuality and decides to test the waters with a familiar face in town. Emma’s jealously rages and Killian is confused. Some Red Queen. Mostly Swan Queen.

Lost time - Emma gets accidentally sucked into a portal to a realm where time works a little differently and when she comes back she's got a little surprise with her. (crazy shit. read it.)

Love undefined - It’s been eight years since the last time Regina and Emma saw each other, eight years since Emma lost part of her happiness, her family, and everything fell apart. But she hasn’t forgotten those three years in New York, or any of what Regina had brought into her life. And if she can be honest with herself, she might even admit that she wants it back.

What’s wrong with emma swan? - Since Emma's return from the Underworld she is a shadow of her former self. Snow seeks Regina's help to get to the bottom of what's wrong with Emma. When Regina discovers the truth their lives are destined to change forever. An unexplained pregnancy and their evolving relationship leads to a future that neither of them saw coming.

A million tiny little things - emma swan doesn’t seem like the kind of person you’d leave in charge of your kids, but somehow she’s landed the job of nannying the mayor’s son. no matter her rebellious streak, she’s more than a little concerned that she’s breaking the cardinal rule of nannydom: do not, do not, start sleeping with your employer. swan queen romcom au.

The staircase - Regina could still smell her cologne and feel the cheap pleather pressing into her back. The brunette sucked in a breath. She was still lying on the floor at the staircase's base and she stared back up at it. Everything was different now. Changed. She felt broken by what had just happened, appalled and enraged, dirty. (TW!!!! very very fucking dark. probably the first dark fic i’ve ever read)

Villains don’t get happy endings - It had been her sacrifice—the price she had to pay. Save everyone she had cursed for 28 years while simultaneously losing the one person she loved the most. Villains, after all, didn't get a Happy Ending. That was reserved for Princesses and Saviors. A 'what if' story where it's Regina, not Hook, who visits Emma in NYC at the beginning of 3B.

Miles to go - Everyone has their own story, this one is theirs and it paints the picture of a love story that spans over two decades, with all the ups and downs and everything else in between. (so fucking amazing!!)

Little match girl - Emergency circumstances lead Emma to move in with Regina and Henry, and the unexpected attraction between the two women stresses their current relationships. At the same time, someone is targeting Storybrooke's children with deadly consequences. (TW!)

The story - Takes place after 3x22. After everything they've been through... After everything that was said between them Robin leaves Regina for Marian and Emma is there to pick up the pieces. Swan Queen Angst and Romance

Oops - Emma and Regina get together at the mansion after they break up with Hook and Robin. Obviously, they get drunk and well...things happen. After one night of pure passion what will happen between the mayor and the sheriff when that night changes their lives, and their relationship, forever.

Skinny love - What are you going on about?" Regina swallowed harshly, really looking at the only person she has been able to bare her soul to. "You don't want me anymore because you found somebody else. Somebody better." Emma looked blankly at Regina. (a-fucking-mazing)

Memento Mori - Regina rejects Emma to stay with Robin after they've slept together. Emma winds up pregnant and tries to win the Mayor back. When the pregnancy is revealed, Snowing forces Emma to Underworld to save who they believe is the baby's father. The Underworld could prove fatal for Emma and her baby. Will they survive or will Regina lose her chance at having true love forever? (the fucking best- i’ve been looking for this..)

Crazy changes - A chance encounter in a bar changes Emma Swan's life forever. One of those changes is the arrival of Regina Mills in her small town. But there's more to the newcomer than meets the eye and when Emma finds out the truth behind a family feud, she must re-evaluate everything she thought she knew.

For endings are where we begin - Regina Mills is your average working mom - she spends long hours at her bakery, loves her son Henry with all that she is, and can touch dead things and bring them back to life. Emma Swan is an orphan, an ex-convict, and a bailbondsperson residing in Massachusetts. She is also currently dead. This is the story of how they meet. [a Pushing Daisies AU]

Forget me not - Tired of feeling heartbroken after Robin's death, Regina takes a Forgetting Potion to eradicate all memories of her True Love. However, things don't go to plan as she can still remember Robin, but has no idea who the blonde sheriff, who goes by the name of 'Emma Swan', is.

Direct and linear relationships - Emma Swan is a barely 17 year old senior. She just has to worry about getting through the year, but a new Physics teacher might make her last year in high school much more interesting.

A single kiss - Emma is only a teenager when she falls madly and irrevocably in love with Regina Mills. She is convinced that Regina is "The One" for her, but it's a love that cannot be. At least not at the time. When Emma returns home years later will they finally find love and a happy ending?

Flu love’s kiss - Magic returns to Storybrooke bringing back magical illnesses as well. 'Love Flu' is going around and it's catching. Swan Queen.

Temporary Distractions - It's been a month and Regina won't speak to her, until she does and Emma is left pretending to be in a relationship with her so that Regina can get through a dinner invitation with her pride intact.

Not going anywhere - Emma’s life was finally starting to come together. She has her parents. Her bond with her son growing. Regina’s walls have slowly started to fall, their friendship blossoming. This doesn't settle well with a select few townspeople that believe there is no hope for The Evil Queen, so they kidnap Emma. They will make her see things their way at any cost. Emma is found beaten and left for dead with no memory of who she is. The ones that took her still at large, Emma is left in the care of the only one who can truly protect her and the only person she allows near her. (tw!)

Reckless abandon - After Regina and Emma spend a night together, Emma is left to deal with the fall out, and a life-altering event, all alone as Regina changes her mind and decides Emma is not what she wants, after all. Will Regina realize what she's done before it's too late? Angst and Swan Queen. (the fucking best!!!!!!)

Casual sex - Emma and Regina begin to have nothing but casual sex diving head on into a friends with benefits, well more so enemies with benefits what will happen when one or both begin to start actually feeling something for each other.

Lattes & lace - Regina's a successful, focused businesswoman running a burgeoning lingerie line that is just starting to gain international attention. Until one winter, an irritating woman opens up a coffee shop next to her studio... and generates constant distractions. But not all of the distractions are a complete disaster. Only few.

Take a chance on me - As Emma recovers at the mansion from an encounter with Storybooke's latest threat, nightmares start to plague her from the trauma she suffered as a child. As Regina comforts her, the women grow ever closer. When Regina is attacked, Emma vows to do everything she can to protect the now terrified and vulnerable mayor.

Teacher’s pet - Emma Swan is starting her senior year this year and she's got a pretty easy schedule. But as her friends tell her about the Creative Writing teacher and how no one has passed her class with an A, what will she do? And who exactly is this 'bitch' as they claim her to be? Swan Queen-Student/Teacher AU

The reason why - Emma Swan never stopped wondering why she left without a word, not even a goodbye. She was used to being left behind and abandoned but when Miss Mills her favorite teacher/mentor of three years disappeared without explanation it still stung. Now over ten years later and a chance run in she might finally find out the reason why.

The crush teacher - Emma Swan's life was easy. She was constantly hanging out with her friends and was dating the most beautiful boys at school. But everything changes when a new teacher starts teaching her at school. Feelings and sensations that Emma had never felt before begin to appear.

A fortunate mistake - After Emma and Regina share a night of passion and a morning of misunderstandings sprinkled with some amnesia, Emma ends up getting married to Hook. But when Emma realizes she’s pregnant, their worlds get turned upside down. With Regina’s unwavering support and Emma slowly piecing her memories together, will their love prevail?

I’ll be home for christmas (with my fake girlfriend) - When her girlfriend dumps her the week before Christmas, Regina Mills needs a date to placate her mother’s insistent badgering. Emma Swan, who’s never really spent Christmas with an actual family, steps up to the plate. Throw in a very pregnant woman, her two children, and a Christmas Eve party? Emma and Regina experience a Christmas weekend they won’t soon forget.

You again - Emma and Regina have known each other since they were kids, and it's amazing how they just can't stand each other.

Has anybody ever told you - After a night on the tequila Emma Swan drunkenly causes mayhem in Granny’s leading to a few home truths for our Madame Mayor.

The rain came pouring down - Emma and Regina have spent the past year working on Operation Mongoose. Emma has fallen in love with Regina and is sure Regina loves her back... until a surprise shows up from the recent past.

A date to remember - AU. Regina is a very successful architect who runs her own company in NYC. She has no time nor need for love. Although, to spice things a little, she allows herself to indulge in a date per person, in order to get some action – no strings attached. Would she change her own rules after meeting a beautiful blonde? Swan Queen (No!Magic)

A month and a half of wednesdays - 40 weeks is ten months not nine... They have it all wrong.Emma spends every Wednesday night at the mills Manor, and has made a little discovery after one wild Wonderful Day with The Mayor.

Waking up - Emma wakes up in the hospital with no memory of her life in Storybrooke with her family. When she sees Regina, though, she suddenly feels a connection between the two of them and feels like she knows her. But how?

Always & forever - Regina Mills is a 34 year old widow who lost her husband Daniel just 4 years after they married. Not only has she lost Daniel but she's lost her 4 year old son as well; Henry. Before their sudden deaths she saw herself as the happiest and luckiest woman in the world. Now that the two people that she's loved most are gone she's afraid that whoever she ends up meeting next will vanish from her life forever. Now to avoid that pain again she's completely shut everything and everyone around her out. Family included.

Pixie dust never lies - A revealed secret, a broken heart, and a stormy night lead Regina and Emma on a path of self-discovery. In the end, they will have to make a choice that will shape their lives forever.

A new perspective - Regina disowns her mother and moves to London. Cora takes Emma under her wing and cultivates a business and a personal relationship. Regina and Emma meet after Cora's death and the fireworks start!! Slow burn SwanQueen and SwanQueen Family. Don't worry, dears, our ladies are alive and kicking through the entire story!!

There goes the neighborhood - SQ AU: Emma Swan has recently relocated to a neighborhood just outside of Quantico, VA after the death of her husband (Neal). She and her twin adopted daughters are just trying to find happiness again. Meanwhile, her new neighbors Robin & Regina Mills have a less than happy household. The women clash from the start, but through a marital betrayal the two women begin to see each other in a whole new light.

Stolen darkness - What started with a dream had revealed to Emma who she really was, upon the confessions of the Charmings' past sins, Emma embarks on a journey of self discovery. Dark Swan, Maleficent, and Swanqueen.

Mirror, mirror. - Emma is working her side-job as a mover when she finds the mirror, shattered in the back of a wardrobe. She takes it home, drawn to it for some reason. Regina finds the mirror in the back of her mother's old wardrobe. It was once broken and put away in a time of duress. Yet the mirror she is holding looks as good as new. When Regina speaks into the mirror one night, Emma answers.

Shadow Haven - Emma Swan is a PR agent who is sent on a holiday by her boss. Regina Mills is the owner of a private island named Shadow Haven. There is more to Regina than initially meets the eye. Swan Queen romance / BDSM story.

Feather of a swan - Emma Swan also ended up cursed in Hyperion Heights. With absolutely no memories of Storybrooke, she gets by working as a bounty hounter. After a particular long day, she just longs for a drink, and goes into Roni's Bar to get just that. But after she meets the bartender, nothing wil be the same again.

In it together - After both Hook and Robin are killed (and Hook doesn't come back in my story!), Emma and Regina grow closer. At first it's about getting each other through the grieving process, but eventually it turns into a much deeper connection.

—-

authors:

@ hunnyfresh | ao3

@ devje | ao3

@LZClotho (LZielinsky) | ao3

@LunaCeMore | ao3

@ClashofShips | ao3

@Z_OTAKU19 | ao3

@ starsthatburn | ao3

@ emmasyellowbug | ao3

@JuiceCup | ao3

@AshKnight | ao3

@Ash M. Knight | fanfic.net

@IShipLOVE | fanfic.net

@ angstbot | ao3

@rhysMerilot | ao3

@XSerendipity92X | fanfic.net

@AnotherEvilRegal | fanfic.net

@Nasty Nikolo | fanfic.net

@Gravity In the Air | fanfic.net

@PlayfulMay | ao3

@LittleSwanLover | ao3

@AOBZ | ao3

[spot-the-antisemitism]

So I'm pretty familiar with the White Savior trope in movies centered around racism (whether it's Black Americans, Native Americans, etc).and other kinds of films (mostly US films). What about the other version of that, with non-Jews/goyim being the "Savior" of Jews in films?

Wasn't that one of the kind of criticisms for that movie The Zookeeper's Wife? (admittedly haven't had a chance to watch it yet so I can't say whether that criticism is valid or not)

Basically what are some of the worst examples of a saviour complex people have about Jews? What are some of your personal examples / or films that might be well received but still use that saviour complex?

Or more broadly, multimedia that uses their Jewish characters as props rather than fully fleshed out characters / people.

Other forms of media can be included like podcasts, plays, books, graphic novels, comics, and so on.

- An Anon curious about media

Dear anon,

this took me some time to write because I honestly think its gotta be most Holocaust films actually

“What are some of your personal examples?”

"boy in striped pyjamas" is hated for this but honestly EVERY " goy time travels to see it from a holocaust survivor's eyes" devil's artimetic rippoff is JUST as egregious along with EVERY "European hides pretty Jewish woman/girl in attic" plot and those holocaust movies that focus on ANYONE but the Jews. You also see some of this is in the way Mizrahi are treated as noble if they put up with dhimmitube but montrous if they demand equality.

“or films that might be well received but still use that saviour complex?”

and "shindler's list" and “number the stars” are STILL this problem. Because you are told to empathize with the savior not the jew being hidden. It’s easier to list the few stories that aren’t that trope: “Jojo Rabbit” and “The book thief” as they actually show the hidden Jews as humans with wants and needs. Jojo Rabbit is unique because it shows a kid who is extremely antisemitic and bigoted, forces the audience to relate to him and root for his redemption. Instead of making you feel good and virtuous , Jojo Rabbit makes you confront your own antisemitism. Which is actually just the main appeal of these books and films is feel good escapism for the gentile audience.

Honestly go read some holocaust memoirs and avoid all those historical fiction “[so and so] of Auswitz” books like they’re nefarious propaganda.

Cecil

sorry for taking so long as I had to think about this

[fangirleaconmigo]

Geralt x Jaskier Geraskier First kiss, friends to lovers

Geraskier Dancing

When Geralt of Rivia was a child, he begged Vesemir to teach him the kind of dances they performed at court. The answer was always no, but he kept trying.

After the trials, when Vesemir seemed so affected by his eyes, Geralt would widen them and look up at his tutor, pleading.

After all, Geralt thought, what if he rescued a fair maiden, and she demanded that he accompany her to a party? Perhaps she would drag him, giggling and flushed, onto the dance floor. He would be her noble savior, and she would be his grateful maiden.

He didn’t tell Vesemir his reasoning of course. He said that it might be important for royal courts, with kings in them. Wouldn’t it be best if he could fit in? Fencing was similar to dance, so surely Vesemir could handle teaching it.

Vesemir sighed and gave him the same speech he always gave.

"Geralt. You are not training to be a knight. Put that out of your mind. You are a professional. A working man.

Further, you are a mutant now. You will not be greeted with gratitude. You will be lucky to be greeted with the cash that you are promised."

Geralt felt stubborn. Furious. But he knew when to drop the subject.

Vesemir would pat his shoulder and offer him a sweet bread. His eyes always held regret.

Geralt understood him now. After years of hard lessons, he understood. When he thought back on his youth, he felt like a dolt.

The women he saved were traumatized. He was meeting them during the most terrified, violent moments of their lives. They screamed, bled, and threw up. And they all ran. With his bloody sword and ashen skin, he looked little different from the monsters he fought.

At least to them.

And yet?

He still learned how to dance, despite having given up the dream.

It started with Jaskier of course, like most misadventures and novel undertakings. The young bard had just shown up in his life one day and sort of just...never left.

His enthusiasm, energy, and optimism infected Geralt's life, as did the handsome twinkle in his eyes.

One night, after several glasses of wine they shared their most ridiculous childhood dreams. Jaskier admitted that he wanted to publicly rub his success in his family's face, to make their rejection sting less. So Geralt admitted that he'd always stupidly wanted to woo a grateful damsel on a dance floor.

He thought they were just talking nonsense, so he was startled when suddenly, Jaskier was on his feet, woozy and holding out a hand.

"C'mon. Lesgo." Jaskier jerked his curly, disheveled head towards an empty spot on the tavern large enough maybe for one large man.

Geralt refused at first. It was silly. Besides, They were both men. Who would lead?

But Jaskier simply grabbed his hand. When they touched, Geralt found that all of his resistance dissipated like a magic spell. He found himself standing and allowing himself to be dragged. And after they moved a few tables, he found himself touching the small of Jaskier's back and swaying with him.

Why didn't it feel odd? It should have felt odd.

It probably felt fine because they were alone.

They always danced alone.

They would be in a bar that was emptying out, the last drunkards stumbling home. Jaskier would be inviting, leaning against him, words slightly slurring.

Geralt selfishly loved him like that, not because Jaskier would lose his inhibitions, but because Geralt would. Plausible deniability.

"No one is here, Geralt. You won't ruin your fearsome rep--rep--pox on it. People won't see you." Jaskier waved dismissively as he dragged him.

The bard's lips grew pinker when he drank, and his cheeks flushed when they danced.

So Geralt let himself be led into the middle of empty bars, dance halls, and sometimes even just under the stars near a campfire.

"Y'need this for" *hiccup* "d'plomacy." Jaskier tugged him this way and that.

Despite the slurring, Jaskier always moved gracefully, like a swan. He'd sing to himself, lost in the music, touching Geralt with surety, guiding him. His body would be warm and little puffs of his wine soaked breath would drift towards Geralt. The witcher would inhale and try to control the surge of something primal in him awakening from a terribly long slumber.

Jaskier always led.

"I thought you were teaching me to dance with ladies," Geralt complained playfully one night. Jaskier was leading him in a lazy circle under some street lanterns on an abandoned street. Trash and litter was everywhere, left over from the spring festival. Their feet crunched on discarded candy wrappers as they moved.

"I am," Jaskier huffed indignantly, eyes hazy. "You must charm these noble ladies. It's not easy, you know. You must practice."

Geralt bit the side of his mouth trying not to smile. He didn't want to ruin the moment. He was so close to Jaskier, the closest he ever got to stand. "But I'm not learning to lead."

"Oh, s'fine. You'll just," Jaskier gestured, twirling his hand in a circle, "turn it all round." Then it was a rolling motion. "Flip it. Change it backwards. You know what I mean. They'll love it."

It was quiet for a moment, Geralt turned his head and crept closer, so he could secretly smile to himself.

"You already complain they simper around me," he murmured near his friend's ear. "You want to make it worse?"

Jaskier snorted loudly. "They're just trying to get to me, Geralt, you know that. Price of fame!!"

Then he spun Geralt, and all the while, Geralt grumbled, purposely moving stubbornly. "I don't twirl, Jaskier."

Jaskier was wobbly and dismissive. "Y'doing great."

Geralt really did learn during those nights. But they never spoke of it in the morning. Those nights were sacred and untouchable lest they shattered in the light of day.

But one day, they finally, truly paid off.

Geralt wanted to run and tell Vesemir. He'd been right. He had needed to learn the skill after all.

Because one spring day he rescued a beautiful young woman, and she was grateful. She was lovely, truly. Her auburn hair cascaded down her back, caressing her delicate waist.

She had been menaced by a werewolf and run screaming into Geralt's arms, invitation to a ball at the ready. It was just like in his youthful dreams.

The werewolf wasn't such a bad guy to be honest. His name was Gil. And he wasn't so much menacing her as he was trying to say hello and simultaneously coughing. But it was an unpleasant sound to be sure. It was a hacking cough.

Geralt had intervened, having been sent there on an errand by Jaskier. The witcher took Gil aside to speak to him. The werewolf was moving on, anyway. He'd just come to see a picnic of beautiful women that Jaskier had told him about, thinking he would say hello.

Geralt wanted to shake Jaskier. Gently of course. To tell his friend that yes, he had needed help with dancing, but certainly did not need help with finding ladies to rescue. They were lying about everywhere there were monsters. Jaskier wasn't around though, he was nervously flitting around at fittings and lute tunings, preparing anxiously for the dance.

It was silly of course.

And to be honest, the young woman hadn't needed much rescuing. Gil's nose was still sore where she had hit him with her bag.

But nonetheless, when she'd seen Geralt she'd sighed and pretended to be quite helpless.

Geralt carried her to safety on Roach, and she had invited him to a dance that night. They were in Lettenhove, and the dance would be packed with nobles. It was the perfect setup.

Geralt got ready with trembling fingers. He laced on his best armor and slicked down his hair. His stomach was weak just to think of it.

When Geralt arrived, the maiden was there in a stunning gown. She arrived breathlessly, ready for her dance. She batted her eyes and curtseyed.

Geralt bowed slightly, and led her onto the dance floor. After a few moments, her raptured attention began to cool. She was well educated and polite, but Geralt caught her regretful glances towards the handsome young nobles in the corner.

He didn't blame her. He was not a small man, and he was stepping on her toes.

The bloom was very quickly off the rose for the young maiden.

"I'm sorry. My mistake." Geralt muttered at every wrong turn.

If you had asked Geralt as a child, whether the disappointment of a maiden would sting, he would have imagined so.

But it didn't. This was not what he had come for. This was not why his stomach had done somersaults as he had laced on his armor. It was because this party was not just packed with nobles, but very particular nobles from a very specific family.

Geralt glanced up to find him.

Jaskier stood off to the side, close by, clutching a glass of wine, and staring daggers at his cousin across the room. His cousin was a handsome man, if you went in for that kind of thing, though not as handsome as Jaskier. But he was holding court with several ladies.

Geralt excused himself with the relieved young lady who tried to look as though she were not fleeing.

Geralt came up behind Jaskier, and touched his back.

Jaskier did not jump or startle. He must have known Geralt's touch and scent by now. He simply turned and smiled.

"You're here!" Jaskier looked behind him. "And Juliet?"

Geralt shrugged. "I never actually learned to lead."

Jaskier's face fell. "I'm sorry, I-" he looked mortified, "-I don't actually know how to teach dance. I only know how to dance. I was just-"

Geralt cut him off by pulling him into his arms with an 'oof'.

Jaskier startled, leaning eagerly into the embrace. But then he remembered himself and looked around cautiously.

"I don't care if they see," Geralt whispered. "I want them to. Let the miserable bastards gossip until their throats are sore."

The widest, brightest grin he had ever seen blossomed on his handsome bard's face. "Well then." Jaskier straightened his shoulders and cleared a catch in his throat. Let me do this properly."

The bard gently detangled himself from Geralt's arms. Then he bowed at the waist and held out a hand. "Geralt of Rivia? May I have this dance?"

Geralt nodded and straightened his jacket. "You may, Viscount Julian of Lettenhove."

Jaskier held his hand with both of his, but he shook his head and whispered. "No. Viscount Julian is theirs. I am Jaskier. I am yours."

Geralt's heart melted. He did not know how to cope with that, so he just nodded.

The music fell silent, and a new song began.

The witcher and the bard were the first couple out on the floor. It may have started as a way to help Jaskier rub his success in his family's eyes. But almost instantly they forgot all about that. They lost themselves in the movement, the laughter, they only saw each other.

But Jaskier's family saw. His mother. His father. His envious cousins. They all saw that he was loved. That he was talented, famous, and loved.

Geralt didn't think a whole lot about Vesemir that night.

He simply danced. And when the last note on the last song died out, he touched Jaskier's chin. His love's eyes lit up with hope. Geralt didn't want to draw out the suspense, so he pulled him in for a kiss. It was tender and they were sweaty, their hearts beating in their chests.

It felt right. And not because they were alone. It was because they loved each other.

When Geralt visited Vesemir during the winter, he brought up his childhood dream. He would tell the old witcher that he understood now.

Love wasn't something you earned through daring acts. It wasn't something you extracted from terrified women as the price for their safety.

Love was a bard who tried his damndest to fulfill your dreams at the expense of his own.

Love was taking him in your arms and fulfilling his.

Well, Geralt tried to say all that. Perhaps it didn't come out the way he meant. Perhaps he stumbled over his words and grunted some.

But when he pulled Jaskier into the room to introduce him to Vesemir, the old witcher understood.

[heroofshield]

♗: One falling asleep with their head in the other’s lap.

More Rookanis! because i need some poor little meow meow in my life right now

@anderfels

Elsbeth sat the stack of parchment on the low table in front of her before sitting down on the couch in the main hub of the Lighthouse. She needed to focus and knew she wouldn't be able to do that in her room with the glow of the aquarium.

"Going through contracts at this hour?" Lucanis asked as he appeared out of seemingly nowhere. "Viago should have given you at least a few days after everything before sending you back out."

Elsbeth shifted slightly to make more room for him as he sat down next to her. "He offered, his way of thanking me for helping to save the city, but I said I wanted to get a jump of my next contract. This," she picked up and waved the thin ledger book in the air before setting it down again. "is still thin from when I was gone."

Lucanis let out a hum, knowing that while she trusted Viago she liked to keep her own ledger of contracts and what she earned for the guild. "Anything promising?" he asked while lightly thumbing through the stack of paper.

"Not sure. Viago said that everyone wants to hire the 'Savior of Treviso' so this is just the most recent stack he sent." Elsbeth made a face at the title the city was suddenly calling her. The irony of it all wasn't lost on her, the same nobles who now wanted to hire her had only just stopped calling for her head.

"Why don't I help you sort through them, see what might be promising and what can be passed on to other Crows."

"And how many will get passed to House Dellamorte?" Elsbeth teased while handing part of the stack to Lucanis.

"Only the most expensive ones of course." Lucanis let a tired smile appear as he took the offered papers and shifted, laying down on the couch and resting his head in her lap. They'd sat like this before; taking turns reading the novel for book club aloud, silently reading their own books, or going through intelligence reports from the Crows or one of their allies. It was relaxing and seemed to calm Spite down as well, so Lucanis knew that she never minded.

Elsbeth finished reading the contract and made a few notations for her own benefit before putting it in the 'accepted' pile while realizing that it had been awhile since Lucanis had made any kind of comment about the contracts he was going through ('This price is insulting for someone of your talents.' 'Don't they know that this isn't a serial, that's not possible.') and looked down to see his eyes closed.

Listening to the slow and even breaths, Elsbeth felt her eyes soften as she waited for Spite to show up. But the familiar purple glow didn't show up and she was slightly surprised. "It seems even Spite wants him to sleep." she thought while carefully running her fingers through his hair, then slowly reached for another contract.

She didn't mind waiting for Lucanis to wake up, they had enough time.