#anyway come talk to me about my song choices i will gladly shriek about these books with anyone at all

[midnightsnapdragon]

the bone season [unofficial ost]

Besides this earth, and besides the race of men, there is an invisible world and a kingdom of spirits.

an instrumental playlist for the bone season series, where each song corresponds to a scene or quotation from the books. cover credit goes to the lovely @mareshmallow​, who kindly allowed me to borrow from the tbs edit she made last summer (x) 

please click below for the full playlist with all the proper annotations!

link to spotify // link to 8tracks // link to youtube

THE BONE SEASON [13]

A Narnia Lullaby (Harry Gregson-Williams) Besides this earth, and besides the race of men, there is an invisible world and a kingdom of spirits. [Prelude]

No Cheating Death (Nathan Barr) No safer place. More like no safe place. Not for us. [London 2059]

The General (Martin Phipps) “XX-59-40.” His voice was deep and soft. “I lay claim to you.” [The keeper]

Long, Long Time Ago (Javier Navarrete) Every day, I would walk to that field and read for hours, watching the poppies nod their heads around me. [Salvia memories]

Slow Wake (Aaron Martin) Soothsayers always said that about Nick when they saw him, that he was like snow. [Nick's theme]

Pleasured Distractions (Trevor Morris) I found myself in a world of dreams. [Possessing the butterfly]

The Haunting Of Hill House Main Titles (The Newton Brothers) There were lines of plaster faces above the windows, at least fifty of them on each of the longest walls. [Death masks]

The Poem (Martin Phipps) “And now we are sworn to protect each other always.” [The golden cord]

To Speak of Solitude (Brambles) “Perhaps I feel safest when I think of nothing.” [The empty dreamscape]

Slughorn's Confession (Nicholas Hooper) Nick was looking at the sky. "Hey, look,” he said. “What?” “Arcturus. I've never seen it that bright.” [The final memory]

Desolation (Adam Hurst) “This place has afflicted me with a terrible wanderlust.” [Warden's theme]

Eros (Ludovico Einaudi) Don't stop, don’t stop [The prohibition]

London Calling (Michael Giacchino) The train [Interlude]

THE MIME ORDER [12]

Danse Macabre (Camille Saint-Saëns) We unhorse the Reaper. [Song of the underworld]

Oogie Boogie's Song (Vitamin String Quartet) “I’m a mime-lord, O my lovely, not a mime-peasant” [Jaxon's theme]

This Is Halloween (Instrumental) (Danny Elfman) “Roll up, roll up for the sale of the month! Don't forget death - it won't forget you!” [Covent Garden marketplace]

Pathetic Fallacy (Trevor Morris) Puppets on a hangman's string. [The Archon]

The King is Dead (Martin Phipps) On the night of November the first, 2059, the Spiritus Club shall exhibit A SCRIMMAGE for dominance of the central cohort. [A day of change] 

Briony (Dario Marianelli) Words give wings [The penny dreadful]

Liquid Spear Waltz (Michael Andrews) “Have you ever seen this famous Rag and Bone Man?” [Tunnels beneath Camden]

Did You Kill My Wife? (Hans Zimmer) He bowed to me, keeping his eyes on my face. “Let us see if dreamwalkers can dance.” [Overture]

Gilbert's Door (Richard Wells) “I'll still go out.” [Moonlit tryst]

I Hate My Life (Michael Giacchino) “Of course, this is a duel,” Jaxon said, “much like the duels of the monarch days, when honour was settled with blood and steel.” Swing, spin. "Whose honour are we settling today, I wonder?” [Showdown]

Duck Shoot (Harry Gregson-Williams) Voyants, do you hear me? Do you hear me? [The silenced]

See What I've Become (Zack Hemsey) “The theatre of war opens tonight.” [End of act II]

THE SONG RISING [8]

The Bells (Ramin Djawadi) Abyssal black eyes [Hildred Vance]

Lord M (Martin Phipps) “You are what change will cost me.” [Goodbye]

Beginning of the End (Movement III) (The Newton Brothers) Look, seillean. Look. He had sounded lost in a way I hadn't understood. The sky is falling down on us. [Father]

Coward (Hans Zimmer) "They’re here. They’re already here.” [The Vance trap]

Statues (Alexandre Desplat) I would not show fear. [Dark wings]

Arcanine (Ursine Vulpine) I remember watching the glass pyramid shatter. It must have exploded in a split second, but in my mind, it lasted for eternity. [Banishing the poltergeist]

Double Bind (Rudi Arapahoe) All that was left of Senshield was a cavernous hole in the æther. [Kin]

Opening (Craig Armstrong) “One day they'll call this country by its name again.” [Paige's theme]

[shipping-receiving]

Fictober 2019 Day 18: “Secrets? I love secrets.”

Rating: T | Word Count: 3226 Fandom: A Song of Ice and Fire / Game of Thrones Relationship: Jaime Lannister / Brienne of Tarth Tags: Alternate Universe – Office Notes: Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3

(read on AO3)

//////

Hey. Just found out a client is in town this weekend, so I’ll have to work on Sat. Are you free Sun?

Brienne has been staring at that notification on her phone for the past five minutes. She hasn’t opened the message—doesn’t want Jaime to see that she’s seen it. She isn’t free on Sunday, in fact; she’s cancelled on Margaery twice already, and she’s feeling guilty enough about it as it is. She’s also running out of excuses, considering she doesn’t exactly have many friends or commitments outside of work, and Margaery is well aware of that. Although, Brienne has a feeling that if Margaery knew the real reason behind those cancellations, she would gladly revoke any and all appointments for the foreseeable future.

Anyway, Margaery’s coming over to her apartment to hang out on Sunday afternoon, and that’s that. She isn’t going to change her plans for Jaime, not this weekend. Something in Brienne tells her she should be feeling disappointed. She enjoys spending time with him, doesn’t she? Every text from him makes her feel much more joy than a few words in a digital bubble truly had a right to make her feel. But she finds that what this particular message makes her feel is—

relief.

And now, in addition to feeling guilty about cancelling on Margaery—which she will be rectifying by not cancelling on Margaery—she is feeling guilty about feeling relieved about not meeting Jaime, though meeting Jaime generally makes her feel happy, beneath all her nervousness.

It’s all very confusing.

Last weekend, Jaime had told her about his family. He had told her that he thinks she has nice blue eyes. He had told her that he felt hurt when he thought she didn’t think he was much to look at. He had told her that he was listening to the sound of her breathing as they lay side-by-side in her favourite meadow. And perhaps most crucially, he had told her all these things while he was wearing a loose white shirt with the top three buttons left unbuttoned, and the sleeves rolled up to his elbows to expose his forearms.

It was all so… much. Other women—women Jaime has probably dated before—they might have felt flattered. They might have seized those opportunities, if Brienne was even right in thinking they were opportunities. They might not have stood up abruptly from an intimate conversation and thanked the sun for setting just in time. They might have kissed him, right there on the grass. Brienne had thought about that. She really had. Part of her really did want to kiss him, right there on the grass. Part of her wants to walk into his office right now and do that very thing.

Yet the idea of kissing him—it doesn’t make her feel happy, or excited, or passionate, or all these things she thinks she’s supposed to feel. And it isn’t about whether it would be her first, though it would. She’s twenty-five, never kissed anyone or been kissed by anyone, but she’s quite gotten over that already, frankly. It’s just a fact of her existence.

It’s just, the idea of kissing Jaime. Something about that just feels so—monumental. Like everything in her life would change if she just does that one thing, with this one person. It already feels like everything in her life is changing, just because she had punched him in the face. To kiss him—Jaime—it’s—Gods—it’s overwhelming.

So Brienne doesn’t want to change her plans. She doesn’t want to see Jaime this weekend. She wants, for some reason, to talk to Margaery. To tell Margaery everything that’s happened so far. She knows it’s going to be trying—Margaery is… well, excitable is one word for it. Perhaps Margaery will feel all the excitement Brienne is supposed to be feeling, but can’t seem to. Regardless, Brienne just wants to get out of her own head. She’s been trapped in her own head about this for far too long.

(There is, of course, the option of just talking to Jaime. But she’s not ready for that quite yet.)

She taps on the notification, finally, and replies: I’m meeting Margaery on Sunday. Sorry 😕

Slanted mouth face is good, right? It’s not as revealing as a sad face, but enough to convey at least some disappointment.

Jaime’s reply comes soon enough: Next weekend then 😔

Great. Sad face. And it’s the most pathetic-looking of all the sad face options save the ones with actual tears. Now she’s feeling guilty again. But Brienne has made her choice, so she pushes that away, and concentrates on the relief.

(Later, when Jaime walks by her cubicle, he gives her a kind of sad smile. There’s no emoji for that. She wants to bang her head on the table.)

Saturday rolls around, and for the first time in five Saturdays, Brienne isn’t spending the day with Jaime. He’s not even texting her—probably busy with the client, she supposes. By the end of the day, she’s not sure if she feels relief anymore. She was just at the gym in the morning, but she heads there again. She wants to sweat out some of that regret.

(After her second workout of the day, she looks at her reflection. Eyes wide, cheeks flushed to make the blue stand out, Jaime had said. She wants to bang her head on the mirror.)

Sunday morning, at least, could be spent grocery shopping and preparing lunch for herself and Margaery. By some miracle, she manages to keep it all together through their meal, pretend everything is as it always is. Brienne stands in her kitchen after, silently watching Margaery make a pot of tea, trying her hardest to figure out how to start this conversation. When Margaery pours her a cup and hands it to her, she almost drops it, as if she’d forgotten how to use her fingers.

“What’s going on with you, Brienne?” Margaery asks. “You’ve been acting weird through the whole of lunch. Well, for weeks, actually.”

Okay, guess I wasn’t really keeping it all together.

“Marg,” Brienne begins, “I need to tell you something.” She motions Margaery towards her couch. “You might want to sit down for this.” I might want to sit down for this.

“Oh. My. Gods. Brienne.” Margaery somehow manages to bounce over without spilling her cup of tea. “Are you finally going to tell me about your sordid affair with Jaime Lannister? I want to know all the details, please. Sexual positions, everything.”

Seven hells. Brienne knew this was going to happen. She really needs more friends. “There is no—there isn’t a sordid affair. There are definitely no sexual positions.”

Margaery can’t seem to decide if she wants to look disappointed or disbelieving. “What’s with the whole back-and-forth in the office then? And the texting?”

Brienne almost drops her cup again. Perhaps it’s safest to put it on the coffee table. “How do you know about the texting?”

“Aha! So you have been texting Jaime Lannister.” She gives Brienne her smug look, as if she doesn’t permanently have one plastered on her face anyway. “I didn’t know for sure, but now I do.”

“Damn it, Marg,” Brienne sighs. “If you want me to tell you anything, you have to promise to keep it a secret. And you know how you are with secrets.”

“Secrets?” she repeats, all false innocence, setting her own cup down carefully. “I love secrets.”

“You love hearing secrets, Margaery. You love telling those secrets to other people. I’m asking you to keep a secret right now.”

“Fine,” Margaery rolls her eyes. “I’ll try my best.”

Brienne supposes that Margaery’s ‘best’ will have to do. She takes a deep breath, squeezes her eyes shut, and plugs her fingers in her ears, just to prepare herself for Margaery’s reaction.

“IhavebeengoingoutwithJaimeforthepastfourweekends,” she blurts out, and cracks open one eye.

I’m sorry? Brienne sees Margaery mouth at her, and she takes one finger out of one ear. “Could you repeat that slowly, Brienne?” Margaery says.

Brienne plugs her finger back into her ear, and enunciates very slowly: “I. Have. Been. Going. Out. With. Jaime. For. The. Past. Four. Weekends.”

And then, as expected, Margaery shrieks.

When she’s gotten that out of her system, she plants her two hands on Brienne’s cheeks. “What the fuck. You are having a sordid affair! Good for you, Brienne!”

“Again, there is no sordid affair,” she manages to say, despite Margaery squishing her face together. She grabs Margaery’s wrists and pushes her hands away from her face. “I mean ‘going out’ in the most basic sense. We go… out. They’re not dates. He asked me to show him around the Stormlands a few weeks ago.”

“He asked you personally? And you’ve been doing this for four weekends straight?” Margaery has that half-disappointed, half-disbelieving look again. “How could they not be dates? What have you been doing exactly?”

“The first weekend, we went to Storm’s End.”

“Okay, not my first choice for a date, but I guess an old castle can be romantic.”

“I didn’t mean for it to be romantic,” Brienne groans. “It’s the castle of the Stormlands, Marg. The city we live in was literally built in its shadow. It’s the first stop on the list for any tourist.”

Margaery shrugs. “I just ignore it, most days. How about the next weekend?”

“We drove out to Bronzegate—”

“Not another castle!” Margaery interrupts. “Unless of course Jaime loves castles. Then bring him to every castle.”

The way Margaery said that last bit seemed to suggest they should be doing much more at castles than just wandering around with the audio guide included in the admission price, but Brienne valiantly ignores that implication. “We didn’t go to the castle. We just went to one of the small towns near Bronzegate.”

“What did you even do?”

“Um. He bought a lot of cheese?”

“... Okay. Maybe let’s move on to the third weekend.”

“Art museum.”

“Ooh, very sexy. Lots of naked bodies.” Margaery’s eyes seem almost to glaze over as she says, “I bet you Jaime Lannister’s built like some of those sculptures underneath that very well-tailored suit.”

“Seven hells, Marg.” Brienne shoves the image of Jaime in his half-unbuttoned white shirt out of her mind yet again. “We actually spent more time with the modern and contemporary art. Less naked bodies, more… shapes. Everyday objects.”

“Hmm. Boring.”

“They’re really interesting, actually, Jaime’s very good at talking about—”

Brienne stops herself there as a sly smile forms on Margaery’s face. “Ooh, Jaime’s very good, is he?”

“Will you stop reading or inserting innuendos into everything, please?”

Margaery puts a hand to her chest in mock offence. “As my friend, Brienne, you shouldn’t be asking me to go against my nature. How about the fourth weekend then?”

Brienne takes another deep breath. “Don’t freak out, but… I brought him to Tarth.”

“You brought him to Tarth?” Margaery practically shrieks. Again.

“I just told you not to freak out. It wasn’t a big deal.” It was a big deal. “He wanted to see some nature and that was my first thought!”

“Brienne, you brought him to your island.” Great, Margaery’s hands are squishing her cheeks together again.

“You say that like my family still owns the island,” Brienne reminds her, as she pushes her hands away, “which we haven’t in maybe five centuries, Marg.”

“I mean, Brienne, you grew up there. You love that place. It’s like you’re giving him a part of your soul.” Well, that’s a bit dramatic, but at least she moved on from the sexual positions. “Oh my gods, your father lives on Tarth,” Margaery gasps. “Did you bring Jaime to meet your dad?”

“Of course not,” Brienne says, exasperatedly. “Why would I bring my boss to meet my dad?!”

“At this point, Brienne, I think calling him your boss is a tiny bit inaccurate, don’t you think?”

“What should I call him, then?”

Margaery pauses to think for a moment. “Your… man friend.”

“My man friend?” Brienne’s brow could not be more furrowed. “What the hells is that?”

“He has to be at least a friend by now, even if he’s not a boyfriend. And he’s one of the gold standards of the male specimen.” Margaery looks like she’s salivating, Maiden save her.

“Gross,” Brienne replies, even as she curses her brain for bringing back the image of Jaime in the white shirt for the ninety-second time today.

“Please tell me you brought him to your favourite meadow and kissed him passionately,” Margaery pleads.

“I brought him to my favourite meadow—” Margaery’s eyes are wide with anticipation— “and didn’t kiss him passionately.”

And Margaery’s face falls. “Well, what did you do, then?”

“We talked. Well, he talked. About personal stuff.” Brienne suspects Margaery probably knows much more than she does about Lannister Corp power struggles, seeing as she’s worked in the main office at King’s Landing before, but she definitely doesn’t want to betray Jaime’s confidence. “And then he asked me about the thing I said,” Brienne mumbles.

“What thing?”

“You know. About how I thought he looks average. Which I don’t, obviously.” She was born with eyes.

“I knew you were lying about that. Wait, you’re telling me he actually cares?”

“... He might have told me that it hurt him.”

“Why?” Margaery is as confused as Brienne was. Or still is. “That is a man who knows exactly how good-looking he is.”

Brienne covers her face with her hands. She’s been going over Jaime’s exact words in her mind ever since he said them. “He didn’t exactly say why. He just said, ‘I was a little hurt that the tall one with the nice blue eyes thought I only looked average.’ That’s—that’s weird, right?”

And then there’s just silence. Brienne separates her fingers slowly, to see Margaery looking at her with a strange expression on her face.

“Brienne, I want you to think very hard right now about anything else he’s said that might have seemed weird to you.”

She wants to tell herself that she has to rummage through her memory for these examples, but the fact is she’s already far too prepared. “Well, it wasn’t the first time he’s asked me about that whole thing. He asked me after the meeting with HR, if I really thought he looked average. And I said no, and then he said ‘Good to know.’”

Margaery is nodding her head vigorously right now, and it’s very unsettling. “What else?”

“And then, I may have stupidly said something like, ‘Renly’s just a friend’, and he also said, ‘Good to know.’”

Margaery is letting out a very bizarre high-pitched hum. “What else?”

“The thing about my eyes being blue. It was probably the fifth time that day that he mentioned that. He just kept… slipping it into conversation. We talked about how Tarth is known as the Sapphire Isle, and he asked if it was because of my eyes.”

Margaery claps her hands around Brienne’s shoulders. When she does this, it somehow always makes Brienne very conscious of how broad her frame is, but now it’s far more disconcerting because Margaery is giving her the most direct stare in the history of direct stares.

“So what did you do with Jaime Lannister this weekend, Brienne?”

“... N-nothing,” Brienne stammers. “I—I didn’t meet him.”

“Why the hells not?!”

Gods, Brienne forgets sometimes that Margaery can be really scary when she wants to be. She shrugs her shoulders out of Margaery’s grip. “He had to work, yesterday! And you were planning on coming over today.”

“I would have gladly not come here if I had known any of this.”

“I know, okay? But I was—I needed some space. From Jaime.” Brienne grabs a cushion from her couch and buries her face in it.

“For Gods’ sakes, why? He likes you, Brienne. I’m sure he does.”

“I like him too.” Brienne has to say it into the cushion, because she feels like she might start crying if she hears those words said out loud from her own mouth. She brings the cushion down and hugs it tightly. “It’s just… so many feelings.” She doesn’t know how to articulate it to Margaery in any other way. “And what if it’s all just some big joke?” She’s been the butt of a joke before, a cruel one, though she’s never told Margaery all the details. “What if I’m just—something to help him pass the time until he has to go back to King’s Landing?”

“I don’t think it’s a joke, Brienne,” Margaery says, gently. “He wouldn’t have spent four weekends with you if it was all a joke. And even if that last part were true, you’re enjoying that spending all that time with him, aren’t you?”

Brienne nods.

“Won’t you allow yourself some happiness, Brienne? No matter how long it lasts?”

And then she has to bury her face in the cushion again, because she is going to cry.

Brienne had learned, long ago, how not to cry in the face of cruelty. She had learned it by walling herself away—from everything, even from things and people that were not cruel. She may have even learned it by inflicting cruelty on herself first, before others could do it to her.

But kindness—the kindness Margaery has shown her with just a few words, the kindness Margaery is asking her to show herself—that is another matter altogether.

Their tea has gone cold, by then, and Margaery gets up to makes them another pot while Brienne calms down. Brienne doesn’t want to talk about Jaime anymore after that, not for the rest of the afternoon. They watch a movie instead, something funny and distinctly unromantic. Brienne thinks of Jaime anyway.

Margaery finally leaves around five, but not before giving Brienne a big hug, and suggesting to her yet again that she might want to get around to starting that sordid affair, with sexual positions involved. Brienne just blushes and laughs, this time.

When she’s back on her couch, Brienne checks her phone for the first time since Margaery arrived. Jaime hasn’t said much, but he’s sent her some photos from their trip to Tarth. He’s been sending them to her all week. There’s one in this batch, though, with her standing in the grass, in the distance, blue sky all around her. She doesn’t know what it is about this image, but she finds she doesn’t feel that discomfort she usually feels when she looks at photos of herself.

Hey, Brienne types, before she can ruin it by thinking too hard about it. I know this is really last minute. But are you free for dinner tonight?

She looks at the message for a while, and considers adding some comment about it being their sightseeing for this weekend. But she decides against it. She won’t frame it as that. She wants to have dinner with him, just dinner. If he interprets it as a date, then he does.

Brienne turns the screen off immediately after sending it. She wants to put her phone down, walk away from it to make herself another cup of tea, just so she doesn’t sit there just waiting for his reply.

But before she can even move, her phone screen lights back up again.

Definitely. Pick you up at 7? Let me know where 😊

[mikauzoran]

Lukadrien/Lukadrienette Drabble: Nachtmusik Chapter Eleven

A Little Night Music (Eine Kleine Nachtmusik) Chapter Eleven: Dies Irae, Dies Illa

“What were you humming just now?” Marinette inquired through a yawn as she took Hugo from Luka, careful to support the baby’s head. “It seemed to calm him down.”

Luka froze. “…Uh…”

He’d been absentmindedly humming a Gregorian chant, the Dies Irae from the requiem mass. Literally, the title meant “day of wrath”, and the lyrics in Latin described the Day of Judgment: ashes and fire and punishment and despair. Not exactly the most age-appropriate lullaby for their four-month-old.

It was quoted in a lot of classical pieces, though, and, thus, currently stuck in Luka’s head.

Not that he wanted to try to explain any of that to his wife at three in the morning.

“Nothing,” he lied but then immediately repented. “It’s just a little snatch of something the Orchestre is playing at an upcoming concert.”

“Teach it to me?” Marinette requested as she got situated in the rocking chair and held Hugo up to her breast to feed him.

“How about we do Bach’s Little Fugue in G Minor instead?” Luka suggested, coming over to give the side of Marinette’s head a kiss. “He likes that one too. That’s the one Adrien always sings to him…when he’s not singing something from a musical or a video game.”

 Luka hummed softly as he gently bounced Hugo, walking him round and round the island in the middle of the kitchen.

“Why are you humming the Dies Irae?” Adrien finally inquired from where he leaned in the doorway watching.

Luka jumped.

Adrien sprang forward to steady his husband and make sure their eight-month-old son was secure in his sling. “Sorry. Sorry. I am so sorry. I thought you knew I was there. I’m so sorry, Luka.”

“It’s…okay,” Luka struggled to get out, breathing ragged.

“You okay, Sweet Prince?” Adrien peeked down at Hugo to find the baby laughing happily.

“Looks like someone enjoys jump scares,” Luka snorted in amusement, leaning in to rest his forehead against Adrien’s.

“Sorry, Orpheus,” Adrien whispered, hands going up to Luka’s cheeks to gently pull him in for a kiss.

Luka hummed contentedly into Adrien’s lips as they waltzed with his own.

“So why the Dies Irae?” Adrien mumbled, back on task the instant they pulled away.

Luka groaned, bouncing Hugo once more. “Not only is the Orchestre doing Berlioz’s Symphonie Fantastique, but I’m also soloist for Liszt’s Totentanz, so that melody is doubly stuck in my head.”

“My poor baby,” Adrien teased.

Luka rolled his eyes.

“I loooove Totentanz,” Adrien chuckled, catching one of Luka’s hands in his own. “Play it for me?”

“Now?” Luka laughed incredulously, shaking his head at his husband’s capriciousness.

“I mean…we’re up anyway, and Hugo seems to enjoy the Dies Irae, so…why not?” Adrien reasoned. “Besides, why did I go to the trouble of marrying a sexy piano virtuoso if I can’t have songs played live on demand at any hour of the night I want them?”

Luka tried not to grin as he tugged Adrien into the front room where they kept Adrien’s old baby grand piano. “You certainly didn’t marry me for my money or my body. I honestly don’t know what you were thinking.”

“I wasn’t thinking.” Adrien shrugged. “I’m so in love with you, I’m not capable of rational thought.”

Luka snickered. “You weren’t capable of rational thought before you fell in love with me.”

“Rude. See if I make babies with you anymore.” Adrien flicked his husband on the cheek before carefully taking Hugo in his sling from Luka.

“Angel,” Luka cajoled, lifting the lid on the piano keys.

Adrien shook his head as he sat on the piano bench. “Nope. Don’t you ‘Angel’ me. I will not be seduced.”

With a shrug of defeat, Luka sat beside Adrien and began a quick warmup.

“You’re not even trying to seduce me,” Adrien pouted. “What’s the big idea here?”

“I thought you wanted me to serenade you with macabre dance of death music about the black plague,” Luka replied with a smirk.

Adrien’s lower lip jutted forward. “Well, yes…but you could at least kiss me first.”

Luka gladly obliged, and when he pulled back, Adrien looked deliriously happy.

Luka grinned, chuckling at Adrien’s expression.

“What?” Adrien pouted, rocking Hugo from side to side.

“I love your smile.”

Luka could just make out a pastel pink blush on Adrien’s cheeks in the dim lighting.

“I love you,” he added.

“I love you too,” Adrien whispered back, scooting closer on the bench to rest his head on Luka’s shoulder. “It’s good to finally just be together and happy, isn’t it?”

“Mm,” Luka agreed, content to sit there with the man he loved and their child for as long as the moment lasted.

That turned out to be about thirty seconds.

After that, Adrien decided that they’d cuddled enough and that it was time for Luka to play piano. “I’ll go ahead and sing the orchestra parts. You play the piano solo.”

 “My baby!” Adrien cooed, eliciting a happy shriek of laughter and an answering, “Daddy!” from sixteen-month-old Hugo.

Hugo reached out his arms, and it was all Gabriel could do to keep a hold on the squirming toddler.

Adrien took his son, covering him with kisses and nuzzles.

Gabriel grinned, putting a polite hand over his mouth as he chuckled.

Plagg and Nooroo shared an amused look before returning to their posts in Adrien’s left and right shoulders respectively.

“How was he? Did he wake you guys a lot?” Adrien smiled up sheepishly at his father.

“Not too bad,” Gabriel replied judiciously. “A little fussy, and he wanted you three, but Nooroo and Plagg helped a lot as far as his homesickness went. Hugo ate just fine and eventually went to sleep after we laid him down last night. He didn’t disturb us too much. Not unreasonably so for sleeping away from home, anyway. You were much, much worse at his age.”

“Good to know,” Adrien snorted, a bright smile breaking out on his lips as he hugged his child to him, bouncing Hugo slightly. “Thank you so much for doing this. Luka and Marinette are super grateful too.”

Gabriel waved the thanks away. “It was no trouble at all. You know how much we enjoy babysitting. Hugo is a joy to spend time with.”

Adrien’s grin widened. “I’m really, really happy to hear you say so.”

Gabriel shrugged. “Nathalie and I would be glad to watch him whenever you need. Tom and Sabine hog him too much, and I’m uncomfortable with you leaving him alone with Anarka.”

Adrien grimaced. “She’s his grandma too, Dad. Play nice.”

Gabriel gave a petulant scoff. “It’s a wonder that Luka managed to raise himself so well with a mother like that Gaelic witch. She thinks she has more right to Hugo than I do.”

Adrien refrained from commenting that Gabriel himself had been a little slow to embrace Hugo as his grandson in the absence of a genetic link. “Well, she’s wrong. Try to be the bigger person when we have a green-eyed baby, okay? Regardless of biological paternity, all kids of this union belong to all three of us equally, so make sure you treat them all the same. Hugo adores you, and I’m sure it would really hurt if you started giving a hypothetical green-eyed sibling preferential treatment.”

“I would never,” Gabriel snorted in disgust, reaching out to stroke Hugo’s thick, dark hair. “He may not be biologically yours, but he’s one hundred percent your son, Adrien.”

Adrien blinked, taken aback by the certainty in his father’s voice. “Really? What makes you say that?”

Gabriel chuckled. “He has your mannerisms. Sometimes he’ll do something that’s obviously Marinette or patently Luka, but, a lot of times, he’ll make a face, and I can tell he got it from watching and mimicking you.”

“Yeah? Like what?” Adrien pressed, excited by this revelation. He had never really thought that Hugo resembled him even though both Marinette and Luka had commented upon it separately before. Perhaps it was because Adrien couldn’t see himself to have a mental picture to compare his son with, but…

“His pout is a carbon copy of yours,” Gabriel sighed. “He’s got your puppy dog eyes too.”

Adrien’s smile turned pained. “Ah. I see. So all the manipulative ploys, huh?”

Gabriel rolled his eyes. “He has your smile too…and your sweetness with none of your mischief. He’s inherited a lot from you despite the lack of shared genes. Don’t pout so, Adrien.”

“I’m not pouting,” Adrien pouted.

Gabriel gave Adrien an eyeroll encore. “How was your date last night? I trust you three had a nice dinner out?”

Adrien immediately perked up. “It was wonderful. Thank you. It was also nice to be able to get a solid eight hours of sleep without having to get up with Hugo.”

Gabriel assumed an air of nonchalance as he inquired, “Just out of curiosity and not to sound like I’m competing with Anarka, when are you three planning on having a green-eyed child?”

Adrien’s brow scrunched up like gathered fabric folds. “Seriously?”

Gabriel shrugged primly.

“We’re not actively trying, but we stopped actively not trying two or three months ago, so…but it’s not like we’re being intentional about who the biological father is. You and Anarka really need to cut it out.” Adrien shifted Hugo onto his hip with a sigh. “Should I have Luka talk to her?”

“That won’t be necessary,” Gabriel assured sullenly and then abruptly switched topics so as to put an end to the discussion. “By the way, I’ve wondered this for a while, but…why does Hugo hum the Dies Irae? He wanted it as a lullaby last night. It was rather…odd. Not that I’m one to comment on your parenting choices, I suppose.”

Adrien gave a snort as he struggled to stifle a bout of laughter. “That’s Luka’s fault. It’s one of the most quoted musical passages in the repertoire, so it gets stuck in his head a lot, and when he’s tired and up in the middle of the night with Hugo… I think it’s because he didn’t get a lot of traditional lullabies when he was little. Anarka sang him rock and roll, so he doesn’t have the standard classics to fall back on, and he fills in the gap with music he does know.”

Adrien bit his lip. “…Kind of like how you and Maman had crappy parents who didn’t sing standard lullabies to you two, so you didn’t know them to sing them to me, so now I sing musical numbers like All I Ask of You from Phantom of the Opera or video game music like Zelda’s Lullaby from The Legend of Zelda to my own child. I think Marinette’s the only one who really knows traditional lullabies, and half of hers are in Chinese…which she doesn’t speak, so she’s not even sure she’s getting the words right.”

Gabriel frowned. “Can’t you tell?”

Adrien shook his head, bouncing Hugo gently. “They’re not in Mandarin. Sabine’s parents both spoke Mandarin, so that’s what they spoke in the house growing up, but her mother was originally from a different region in China before they moved to France, so the lullabies she sang to Sabine were in a different dialect which I do not speak.”

Gabriel pursed his lips, tempted to ask whether the dialects were similar enough that Adrien could make any of it out, but he remembered Adrien once telling him that most Chinese dialects sounded like completely different languages to him.

“What dialect do Bridgette and Félix speak?” he inquired instead.

Adrien shrugged. “Mandarin. I’d have to ask Sabine about the lyrics…. Well, I should probably get going. The first thing Luka asked me this morning was when I was going to pick up Hugo. I think he’s going through withdrawal,” Adrien chuckled, giving Hugo a nuzzle. “Your Papá misses you.”

“Papá!” Hugo trilled happily.

Adrien turned back to Gabriel. “Thanks again, Dad.”

“Bring him back any time,” Gabriel stressed. “Make sure you ask us before Anarka.”

Adrien shook his head, making a mental note to have Luka talk to the Capitaine about this grandparent rivalry she and Gabriel had going on. “Will do. Thanks, Dad.”

Adrien turned to go, and Gabriel hesitated a beat before calling out, “Adrien?”

“Hm?” Adrien looked back, tipping his head.

“Do you…” Gabriel worried at his bottom lip. “Does it bother you that you’re not familiar with the traditional lullabies?”

Adrien shrugged unconcernedly. “Not really. In a way, it’s more fun to sing anime theme songs and Bach and the Dies Irae. I think it makes Hugo more cultured too, so it’s not a bad thing.”

Gabriel nodded, relieved. “Good. That’s good. Take care, Son.”

Gabriel later stopped to think that his grandson was going to be a very eclectic child with so many varied influences. He wondered if the other children at school would appreciate Hugo’s uniqueness.

Gabriel winced and wondered whether Marinette, Luka, and Adrien would allow Hugo to be homeschooled.