#but if i do it won’t be for a long while

[junislqve]

THE NIGHT IS STILL YOUNG ﹑ enhypen

──── at the club with enhypen

( 新书 ) ── fem!r . . . 19OO ! con ♡︎ warns. skinship kissing est. rs non-proofread PAGES

juni ˊᗜˋ this took so so long oh my gosh .. wouldn’t have posted this if O7z didn’t threaten me to

𝗋𝖾𝖻𝗅𝘰𝗀𝗌♥︎𝑓𝖾𝖾𝖽𝖻𝖺𝖼𝗄 ─── 𝖼𝗅𝑖𝖼𝗄

LEE HEESEUNG

heeseung has always been protective of you, no doubt. but everytime you two go to the club it seems like his instinct doubles. even when he looks loose and happy, his hands still perch on your thigh, rubbing it up and down unconsciously while he talks to his friends.

when you want to buy a drink, heeseung makes sure to always pay even though he knows you feel bad whenever he does. promising you, that you can pay the next time (spoiler : you won’t).

you wondered how quick your boyfriend could be, even when you’re making a spontaneous night out, heeseung would somehow have a table ready for you, just in case you were tired from standing. in reality, he pays for the tables without you realizing, sliding his card to the waiter the moment you two step in.

something he loves most is when you both are back in the comfort of your home and he’s tucked you in fresh clothes, the warmth of the alcohol still in your system. you’d ramble dumbly on how much you loved him or recount how you fell for him, which never stopped his heart from clenching at how adorable you were. only when heeseung presses a firm kiss on your lips did you finally pause and slowly dozed off with a sweet smile plastered on your face.

“i really love my boyfriend,” you mumble, sleepily.

he grins, “i really love you too.”

PARK JONGSEONG

jay loves holding you whenever, his hands are always on you. more so in bars or clubs because he knew there were creeps who liked staring at you. he never stopped you from wearing whatever you wanted, but it doesn’t mean he doesn’t get pissed whenever someone’s looking at you too much. when it happens, jay would circle his hands on your waist, kissing your neck lightly, right on the person’s line of sight just to leave them the right message.

he lets you get loose because he knows he’ll always be there to protect you. even though you’re on the other side of the frat house, jay somehow manages to catch you whenever you almost slip from being too intoxicated.

jay has everything you love listed down, so it was no surprise when he hands you your favorite cocktail in the first 5 minutes of stepping into the club. he’s attentive, pouring you a cup of water to water down the alcohol when you get a bit too tipsy on a weekday. he knows you don’t like getting drunk on a night before big presentations.

it wasn’t a shock that jay knew how to deal with your drunken self— holding you by your waist as he bids everybody goodbye, trying to balance you who had no intention to leave yet. once you end up back at his apartment he’d lay you on his bed and wiped off your makeup as you smile dumbly at him.

“i don’t know what i’d do without you” his heart must’ve burst at how adorable you looked. that sleepy smile you sported — he would never trade you for anyone else.

SIM JAEYUN

it was clear that jake never liked going to parties. even before dating you, he was the last person to be found in a frat party. that only ever really changed because he met you. you whose usually holed up in your bedroom studying, also likes going to parties to his surprise.

he found out later on it was to let yourself loose amidst stressful schedules. that’s when jake, who despises parties. jake, who would walk away from a crowd. jake, who’d rather be in the comfort of his home, now offers his girlfriend to go to parties every month or two. going so far as to paying for your ticket the moment you show any signs of wanting to go.

when you’re around, any place seems to be bearable for him. jake found himself enjoying the music or maybe that was your laugh? he didn’t know. but he’d do anything to see you smile so loosely like that everyday.

jake also found out you were quite endearing when you’re drunk. talking his ear off about whatever found your interest by the next second. it was already annoying how he’d still listen intently when he knew there was no end to the conversation. it was more annoying to your sober self when you remembered he did all that while helping you get ready for bed.

“i hate you” you suddenly blurt after a long moment of silence, watching him.

“why?” jake’s mouth was slightly agape, his hands hovering over your arms, holding a wet cloth.

“you’re so nice to me it’s hard to not fall for you” you didn’t even get to remember what he replied with. but you had a feeling about it from how giddy he looked the next morning.

PARK SUNGHOON

usually it’s rare to see sunghoon passing off a drink when he’s already an hour into a party, more so when it’s only a light drink— 5% alcohol. it was a wonder to his friends until they noticed he started trailing off behind you, it wasn’t hard, then, to make out that you two are dating.

not when sunghoon’s hands were always on you, glaring off anyone who were bumping into you too harshly. all while you were oblivious to it, rather pulling him every which way to meet people. your giving him a field day with how many people almost stumbled into you while you were walking, scared you’d get hurt.

ultimately, jay got you to drink 2 shots and not long after got told off by none other than sunghoon himself — even though he knew it was technically your choice. he just didn’t want his friends to influence you too much, he knew how crazy they can go.

sunghoon who pulls you out of the party once it starts to get boring and you were starting to look tipsy or tired, carrying you onto his motorcycle. strapping his helmet on you, his hands holding yours tight to rest on him while he speeds through the night, even when you tell him not to. just so he can feel your arms tighten around him. his big smile hidden entirely from you.

“hoon slow down!” you shout after another quick turn, hitting his stomach lightly, your chin resting on his shoulder and your eyes closed tight.

“i’m not going that fast, baby” he chuckles, knowing he exactly is.

KIM SUNOO

sunoo is the bubbly one in your relationship, he’s so upbeat and it doesn’t fall short in loud settings. it was the first time he dragged you along, he’s fast to introduce to you his closest friends who were already holding their own bottles, half empty.

you weren’t a fan of drinking, but when you offered a free one you had no mind to pass up. sunoo made sure to ask you enough if you were sure you wanted to, and you, each time told him you do.

he’s never seen you drunk, he’s never even seen you tipsy, it was a shock to sunoo when you looked so bright and loose after drinking half a bottle. instead of him, you were the one dragging your boyfriend to the dance floor, laughing along with him as you both sing lightly along to the dj.

sunoo ended up having to hold you tightly while you were stumbling, you walking infront of him, his body pressed to yours from behind, his hands on your hips as he walks you both back to your table.

“we should go more often” you hum to him, you head laying on his chest while you two observed the people around.

“of course, babe, anything you want” he murmurs, his hands raking through your hair.

YANG JUNGWON

you were at the club with your friend, deciding to fill up your night instead of doing nothing. you didn’t expect to bump into jungwon on the way to the restrooms. when he recognized you, his eyes lit up pulling you close for a hug. a hug that felt too warm for you to let go.

jungwon pulled you and your friend to the bar, that was when you realized he was already slightly intoxicated. he seems a little off rythmn than he usually is when you meet him in your classes. it didn’t stop him, however, from ordering more. when he handed you one shot you just looked up at him, he thought you don’t drink so he just smiled and placed the shot cup down. it wasn’t that, it was because you knew how expensive the drinks were here so you opt to go sober throughout the whole night, you were confused on why jungwon would spend so much on just a single shot for you.

when you caught up, you down the shot and he turned to you. when he saw your content expression he turned to the bartender to order a few more shots for the three of you, your friend offering him an appreciative smile. you three cheered and downed the shots quickly, jungwon then invited you guys to go out and meet his friends.

as it creeps closer to 2 am, jungwon offers to give you a ride home. he promised the alcohol has seeped out of him and he’s already sober, but you were still concerned.

“i’m fine, pretty” jungwon hums, towering over you as you lean on a pole.

“are you sure? how would i know you’re not going to make us crash?” you frowned. jungwon leaned down and his lips hovered over yours.

“i can tell you how you taste, will that make you trust me?”

NISHIMURA RIKI

if anything, you were the one who had to hold riki back from getting too wasted. once he stepped into the place, you were lucky enough to find him 20 minutes later at the bar. it was a struggle trying to catch up with him, you couldn’t look away for anything longer than a few seconds or he’d slip out of your grip.

it wasn’t a surprise than you found riki again later already tipsy, dabbing up random people as he mingled. you, who spent half the time trying to find him, sport a frown and a disgruntled expression when you walk up to him.

the moment riki saw you, he grins and pulls you close to him, hugging you tight. you felt his hands rubbing your waist, he leaned down and mumbled something in your ear that you couldn’t make out, you were about to ask until his friend pulled him away from you.

you didn’t have time to see him again until the party dropped and everyone were either blackout drunk or too tired to move. you found riki passed out on a couch, his friends calling you over to help him get home. it was a wonder how you managed to get him into the taxi.

riki mumbled something suddenly, you hummed and brough your face closer to his, hoping to hear what he’s saying.

“you look s’ stunning tonight, wish you were mine” he groans out, repositioning his head that was laying on your lap.

“thanks, ki” you clear your throat deciding to ignore the last bit, “you don’t look too bad yourself”

you catch his grin.

join my taglist ?

[hanafubukki]

“Time always passes by much too quickly. It won’t be long before these days turn into nothing but memories to reminisce about.”

“A parent must ensure their child can handle such harshness while the little one is still under their protection."

"I am HIS guardian."

"Ahh, I still remember the days when Malleus wept because he couldn't dress himself..."

"We may not be related by blood, but we ARE family. Right?"

"When he was an infant, he would sometimes emit puffs of flame when he fussed."

"He even singed my bangs once. Khee hee... That takes me back."

"I was most impressed that he managed to harm me, even if it was only my hair. That night, I raised a glass of tomato juice in his honor."

“Dragon eggs can only be hatched by their parents' magic and affection-nothing less than true love!”

“You'd better not go towards any twinkling lights you see, Malleus.”

“Baur said you'd return to the stars before much longer, but here you are, still kicking. That's a good boy.”

“You know, Malleus... l've got a lot I want to show you once you're born.”

“Go to sleep, go to sleep, little darling...And may your dreams guide you to the light...”

"I haven't gotten so soft...as to let this get the best of me..."

"*huff, huff* Okay, Malleus. What do you want to do next?"

"I can do this all day. All century. I could go another two centuries, even..."

"If that's what it takes to wear you down and get you out of that egg..."

"I'll play, and play, and play as rough as you want!"

"Oh, little Malleus... I'm so glad I finally get to meet you."

Thank you for being born, Malleus Draconia.🐉💚

Thank you for your love, Lilia Vanrouge.🦇🩷

[animeowls]

This is me with Parker vanhorn

The long wizard who is a dnd npc from a game with 7 people + the dm

But like 30+ peopep know about him as I won’t shut up about him

Important things

1. LONG. 9 + foot tall

2. Debatably human transmutation wizard

3. Bald but wears a blonde wig

4. Fuck ton of clones of him in the dnd verse the dm plays in, when asked to round to nearest mutiple of 50 the dm said 100 so there are at least 51 version of this mofo in the game , we have met across main game and one shots , three? Four ?

5. Evil

6. Wears a bird cadge on head

7. Has done all the crimes ever except the sex crimes and the vulgar crimes (no public unrination)

8. Was a prince until he went on a murder spree and now is on the run

9. Was in jail

10. Was in jail again but let out by a player character

11. That was my character and now she is his only freind

12. Not evil atm but can go evil and mad when certain trigger words /phrases are said

13. Might be mad all the time

14. Based on Faust guilty gear

15. Cast wish twice

16. Might have died of screeen if my character had not freed him from jail as he was due an execution courtesy of his sister the queen (for the murder he did)

17. Might be undead /an abomination . He died as a child but was brought back , possibly wrong

18. The local main deity hates him

19. Eats bugs

20. Frog tongue

21. Dresses like a fucked up dr man should

22. Medically qualified to do al medical things

23. Sold drugs to my character despite her only having sentience (read int above 3) for less than two weeks

24. gave a 3 int teifling lolth warlock - bear totem barbarian -paladin sentience via wish

25. Had brain damange inflicted upon him to make him forget to be evil

26. Kept casting spells sfyer wish and knocking himself out , getting healing from the aforementioned tiefling

27. While at 3 strength from wish and evil told the tiefling his plans and got chocked out by her to stop them

28. Nearly canabalised to hide evidence of his being out of prison and regained evil , only spared from death as I didn’t want my character to kill her first crush

Sure there is more but this is my hyperfixation man of which there is only art of him due to the dm being an artist and my paying money for art of him

Having a hyperfixation while being in a depressed episode is so fucking crazy. All Food tastes bad and I can’t bring myself to shower and reading for an assignment sounds like waterboarding but show me a good fic of Boo Boo Johnnykins and suddenly the world is sunny and for Boo Boo Johnnykins I won’t kill myself for another day

[cloudwisp]

Caleb and the constant yearning for you to need him and to hear the words coming from your lips. He’s already given you everything he could think of, protection and safety that makes you feel so insulated from the world. But when you need him for something else entirely that goes beyond the boundaries of your close relationship, it feeds into his appetite that he won’t be able to control if you continue to keep this up.

What started as a playful wrestle for the remote turned into you pinning him on the ground, your faces impossibly close so that you could feel the warmth of his breath blending with yours. You have the upper hand yet you’re right where he wants you as tension crackles between you and him. The shared glances clouded with lust make the intentions known when they slowly flit and linger for a sweet taste. He doesn’t have time to process before softness embraces his lips and he surrenders all senses to you.

Caleb has dreamt about this for a long time. How it would feel to squeeze the flesh of your hips and pull you closer to him, how he would respond to swallowing your moans against tongueful kisses as you lose yourself humping his warm and growing arousal in his pants. He feels so dangerously good under you, making you crave more when his hand travels beneath your shirt and teases you by tracing the underside of your breast with his thumb.

You both eventually come up for a desperate inhale to return air back into your lungs. Your cheeks flushed and parted lips swollen as you gaze down only to receive an amorous stare back at you. He chuckles softly, a smile making way and his palm cups the side of your face. “You know, I didn’t think you had that in you. Not that I didn’t enjoy the kiss... it was nice.”

His hand lowers and brushes the pad of his finger along your bottom lip. And new thoughts emerge like how your mouth would feel wrapped around his thumb as he gently presses down on your tongue. “You’re beautiful, have I ever told you that?”

“Caleb… I shouldn’t have done that. I don’t know what came over me.” You glance away amidst the heat of your embarrassment, and you still feel lightheaded from the remnants of the intense exchange. Some things can’t be easily undone once you start them, and yet you feel an overwhelming urgency to kiss him again. His shirt crumples around your clenched fist while your mind tries to make sense of your suppressed feelings for your childhood friend.

“Hey, hey. You didn’t do anything wrong, princess.” He carefully shifts you onto your back, tilting your chin to make you face him again. “Just tell me what you need and I’ll take care of it, hm?” He tests your reaction by hooking one of your legs over his hip and his knee slowly parts your thigh causing your breath to hitch when he makes contact with your clothed clit. He leans down to plant light kisses on your forehead, his fingers curling around the waistband of your skirt tugging at it playfully. “Can you do that for me?”

It’s adorable to him, truly. How precious and vulnerable you look with those eyes full of longing because you also share the same burning desire for something more with him. When you grant him consent with a small nod of your head, he promises that he won’t hold back pouring every ounce of his love and devotion into you that he has withheld for too many years.

[nellasbookplanet]

The thing is, I can get behind most of the desicions bells hells have taken regarding predathos, it’s more that the road to getting there didn’t really work or was sometimes skipped over entirely in favor of circular discussions.

'Keeping predathos sealed will never work in the long run now that the truth is out, and we'd rather see us as the ones controlling it/keeping it from harming people than risk ludinus/someone else using it as a weapon in the future' and 'the exandrian accord will never agree to anything that would risk predathos being freed/endanger the gods and therefore we must make this desicion without their input' and 'as long as the betrayers exist as gods there will be a risk of a second calamity and it’s wise to seek a way to minimize that power differential' and 'if the gods remain gods and predathos can't be killed they will eventually clash and mortals will suffer in the struggle' and 'the primes will never seek to kill the betrayers or assist mortals in doing so because that is their family' and 'the gods themselves have been hurting and unable to heal since leaving tengar, and perhaps the change of permanently becoming mortals not as strictly tied to their domains will allow them change previously withheld from them by their natures' are all valid arguments.

But the hells rarely if ever touch on these arguments, rather focusing in on individual slights and imagined ideas of the gods being tyrants needing to be humbled. They never slow down to discuss the practical implications of the changes they want to implement (the gods will be back on their side of the divine gate now!), or to consider the good the gods and their followers do (have we already forgotten the changebringer helping fcg find self-worth or the everlight helping resurrect Laudna?), or the nuance behind their harsher decisions and actions (aeor was going to murder them! the primordials were in the process of exterminating all mortals!!), or the sacrifices the primes have made to protect mortals (they went to war against their own family!), or the importance of faith to much of the exandrian populace. No matter how many sensible arguments there are for the end decision, if the characters won’t engage with said arguments leading up to it while dismissing anything opposing it the decision will still feel largely empty and self-centered in the end.

[sunasbabie]

little something for the birthday boy, also i haven't written in over 3 years LOL

it’s the 24th of january and it’s been 5 days since your boyfriend left for an away game, 5 days too long. you were never one to complain whenever rintaro went on away games, you understood that it was part of his job and you knew that even then when the two of you were both teenagers just figuring out your feelings for each other, but now that you’re together and used to seeing each other every day, it’s harder being away from him. especially when you want to spend his birthday with him and not just over the phone.

“how was the game today” you asked as you sat on the couch where you and your boyfriend would usually sit and catch up on shows you missed or movies you’ve been wanting to watch.

“it was a tight game babe, just like you” he chuckled “but we won”.

after knowing him for so long you’ve gotten used to how your boyfriend responds to things, you couldn't help but roll your eyes in response. he’s always been like this, always trying to make stupid jokes, you’d never admit it but it makes you smile everytime, even if they’re stupid.

“you’re so stupid” you stood up and walked towards the window, “i’m glad you guys won”

“yeah, i’m really tired though, can’t want to get home and lay in bed with you”

“i miss you rin” you couldn’t help but say the truth, you’ve never been one to not tell rin you’ve missed him or that you love him. that’s just how you’ve always been with him and that’s one of the reasons why he fell in love with you.

rin smiled to himself upon hearing you say that, of course he knew that but hearing you say that you’ve missed him makes him happy, “i miss you too baby, don’t worry i’ll be home on the 26th”

you frown upon hearing his response, you wanted to spend his birthday with him but apparently this year you couldn’t cause he was out of town.

“aww so you won’t be here for your birthday?” you pouted as if he could see your face right now

“no i won’t, but i’m free the entire day when i get back, we can do something then”

“okay, no complaining about being tired okay cause i’ve got something planned” you grip your phone, excited at the thought of seeing rin in two days and spending the whole day with him after not seeing him for almost a week.

rintaro smiles at the sound of excitement in your voice “don’t worry, i won’t”

“great, i’ll see you in 2 days rin. i love you.”

“i love you, i can’t wait to see you”

and with that you hung up the phone and started to plan rin’s birthday.

—

it was around 12:30am when you heard the locks of your apartment door turning, thinking that someone was trying to break into your apartment. you grabbed the nearest thing that you could swing at the person to hurt them, which was strangely a frying pan.

you walked closer to the door and when the door swung open you saw your boyfriend carrying all his bags walk through the door. you relax and lower the pan and put it on the couch.

you ran up to rintaro, hugging him by the waist, “what the hell rintaro you scared me, you said you’d be home on the 26th? what are you doing here” you looked up at him,seeing his face for the first time in a while and missing him.

he wrapped his arms around you, hugging you back, “i got on the last train going home, i missed you and couldn’t wait” he explained as he hugged you tighter.

you hold on to him for a little longer before moving your hands to his shoulders as you stand on your toes, leaning in to kiss him. you felt him kiss you back, you pulled away but stayed close his face before whispering “happy birthday rin, i love you” before leaning in and giving him another kiss.

"i love you" rintaro couldn’t think of getting anything better for his birthday, after all he’s got all he’s ever wanted. you.

[cthulhus-curse]

Play-Pretend

Pairing: Agatha Harkness x Fem!Reader

Word Count: 2,016

Warnings: Mommy Kink, Agatha has a penis, Blow Jobs, Exhibitionism, Public Sex, Degradation, Dom/sub Dynamics, Breeding | 18+ Minors DNI

Summary: In which you and your girlfriend find yourselves in quite the sticky situation in the middle of a club.

You should have known better, really. But then again, you always did like it rough. Well, she always gave it to you in such a way. Not that you would complain — never again. 

The lights scatter over your skin. At times they are red while others come as purple, but they don’t help you enough to see through the crowd. You blindly stride through it, head held up high as you make a frail attempt to catch a glimpse of what is far from you. But all you can see is a head of brown hair you know so well. Strands that you often run your fingers upon on display.

“Fancy seeing you here,” You almost have to scream. The bustling club is one your partner had picked out, and all you had to do was show up and sit pretty.

But Agatha is not amused. Quite frankly, she doesn’t tear herself away from the whiskey on her hand until she fully downs it. Minutes pass and you remain standing there, curious eyes gawking at your outfit that leaves little to nothing for the imagination of others. 

It is a game the two of you play. Something of a distraction from your busy shared lives that leave you going to bed as early as you leave the house in the morning. Roleplaying of sorts, Agatha had called it, and you went along with it joyously. Because while she often presented herself with unabashed sweetness and softness, when it came down to your shared pretend-time, she let go of any inhibitions. 

“You look like a whore,” she spits out, and your knees just about buck. 

“Well, I-”

“That wasn’t a question,” Agatha husks, her tone fueled with pure disgust. But by the gods does it do wonders to heave your chest. “Nor did I give you permission to speak. You’ve been a very bad girl today, Y/N. Looks like someone will have to make it up to mommy.”

The club suddenly goes quiet as your sole focus lands on the other woman. She stands tall over you, her heels high enough that she is able to tower over. A predator hunting its prey. And all you turn into is a frail little gazelle who instead hopes to be devoured all night long by the demanding lioness that is Agatha.

“I-”

But before you can dare respond, a hand moves to your throat. Its grip is strong on you, holding on for dear life as fingernails dig into your skin, forcing bits of blood to decorate your flesh. You try to break free, to challenge Agatha, but the woman refuses. She won’t let go, especially not when you so pathetically try to get her to do so nor when the bartender eyes you both curiously from afar. 

The crowd around you both is loud enough so your gasps for air are drowned out. No one is looking, nor would they care much, as Agatha pushes you away into the depths of the club. Far enough where no one can hear you, but still somewhat visible if one were to wander far beyond the life of the party. 

“I want you on your knees,” Agatha orders. She isn’t asking, but instead forcing you downwards in a matter of seconds. “It’s not a fucking question, Y/N. Get on your knees for mommy now.”

Sinking down to the floor, your knees gathering dirt from it, you nod. Your mouth salivates as you look up at the older woman with a fire in your eyes that she shares. Not even as she begins unzipping her formerly tented pants do you break eye-contact. Those icy blue orbs have a magical way to hypnotize you without even meaning to. 

“How dare you? You’re my property, understood? And only I get to see you like this,” Agatha growls. “Stupid pet. I’ll have to remind you who owns you, huh? You’re far too stupid to remember it on your own. Doesn’t surprise me.”

And for good measure, Agatha spits upon your face. The saliva lands right on your cheek, instantly making quick work to travel downwards. But you don’t clean it up – of course, unless you want your girlfriend to truly give you something to cry about. 

The sight of her cock springing free from the violet pair of briefs makes you hazy. It is semi-hard, enough that it slaps your cheek slightly before remaining halfway standing. But the more you bore your eyes into it, hungrily planting little kisses along its head, the further it grows. Agatha can only stare down with pride at her girthy member that her hand can barely wrap itself around. 

“Open up, sweetheart,” Agatha says, this time softer than the last. But she doesn’t need to say anything as you already kiss your way up and down every single inch of her dick. Kissing the small veins that make themselves known, fondling her balls before oh-so gingerly sucking them. You give her the utmost attention she requires. “There’s a good fucking girl. Just like that, baby. Worship mommy’s cock.”

And that you do. 

Your mouth opens wide enough to invite the massive intrusion inside. The salty taste of pre-cum becomes apparent on your tongue as it begins leaking from the rosy tip you enclose your lips around. Grabbing onto her thighs, you steady yourself before slowly moving your head forth. Every passing second, it is as though you take an inch, then another, then another.

Bobbing your head back and forth, you find yourself easily taking almost all seven inches given your years-long preparations. A hand moves to the top of your head, sitting there at first before following along with your movements. Back and forth. Back and forth. Back and forth. Until it forcefully moves you further down Agatha’s penis, your lips brushing along her pelvis before you begin to gargle. And even then, she forces you to enjoy it before letting you find a breath of fresh air. 

“You look so pretty, baby. You weren’t meant for this. Only to suck off your mommy where anyone can see,” Agatha teases. For added measure, she thrust her hips forth slightly, forcing her thick penis further down your throat. “Mommy’s little dick-sucker. Now that’s a fitting name for a slut like you, eh?”

Her balls ghost over your chin as you vigorously suck her off. With your relaxed throat, you are soon able to take more than she can give you, and you want it all. Her dick begins twitching wildly inside you as Agatha holds onto the nearby wall for dear life. Yet none of it dissuades you. No, you keep drilling her cock into your mouth, hollowing your cheeks as you tease her flushed head with your famished tongue. 

It does not take Agatha long to cum, and by the time she does, your head is left pinned between the wall and her body. Copious drops of cum ooze out of her tip, every single one forced down your throat. And you take them all, not daring to waste even a smidge of the special treat you adore tasting. Swallowing it whole to make your girlfriend proud. 

“Did you take all of it?” You watch the woman raise her eyebrows even with the near-lack of light around you both. 

“Yes, mommy,” you promise, opening your mouth to show off its emptiness as you took all her cum for yourself. “I’m a good girl.”

“Uh-huh,” Agatha, with flushed cheeks, hums. She motions you upwards, holding out a hand to help steady you along with the wall. “Now, turn around for mommy, baby.”

Frowning, having thought it was over, you begin to protest. “But-”

“Now, Y/N. Mommy still wants to use her best girl,” Agatha feigns a pout. “Be a dear and let me use your pussy, yeah? I promise I’ll make it up to you.” Her arms help you face the wall, hugging you from behind as she presses her messy dick against your ripped jeans. “Mommy just needs to use her little whore for a bit. So stand there and look pretty for me. Maybe put on a show for anyone that wants to watch.” She nearly tears apart your clothes, ensuring that your backside is clear of any fabric while having tugged on your see-through shirt enough, your breasts jiggle out. “Sharing is caring, after all.”

You would be lying if you said it didn’t make a jolt of need flow down your body. “Of course, mommy.”

The bulbous tip of her dick spreads your juicy folds apart as soon as it touches you. Agatha is desperate, refusing to take it slow let alone for wishing to admire her handiwork. To see you so wet, your slickness drifts down your shaky inner thighs. She smacks your cunt with her meat once or twice, giggling at the lewd noise it makes. Yet still not nearly loud enough compared to the music the club plays. 

The remainder of the club-goes are oblivious to the way Agatha slams her cock inside you with one swift movement. Such roughness is one she has leisurely been building up to. Her fingernails dig into your hips as every delicious inch of her penis forces itself into your pussy which welcomes it with a tight hug. 

“Fuck,” Agatha grunts, a sentiment you soon echo. “Oh baby, your pussy feels amazing.” Her curious hands begin traveling upwards, not ceasing their movements until they find your breasts to grope. “Look how well you’re taking me. You dumb cock-whore.” She slams her waist forth, the head of her penis hitting your sweetest spot. The mewl you let out only heightens her pleasure. “Mommy’s fleshlight.”

The two of you are lost in your own world as you become one. The moist sounds of your pussy being repeatedly abused by your girlfriend’s cock booms across the remote corner of the club you share. The thought of having anyone simply walk far enough to see you being destroyed makes you moan. To be shown off to the world as nothing but a brainless toy for your mommy to use. 

Finding the proper tempo, you begin matching Agatha’s ministrations. At first you are awkward, but with each harsh thrust that comes, you grow more confident. Your skins slap together as nails scratch hips further. A haze overcomes your sights, not that you can see anything around you in the first place, as a warmth settles on your lower belly. 

“Harder,” you plead, and Agatha is more than willing to listen. “Please, mommy.”

“Anything for you, my girl,” Agatha mumbles, gripping your tits as she fucks into you with might. Slow, yet harsh attacks which stretch your cunt out further. “I’ll fill you up so well, baby. I bet your pussy will look gorgeous. Nice and full of mommy’s cum.”

She explodes within you, her cock jittering once against as it begins spurting out drop after drop of white. You try to move away, to find some solace from the warmth that seeps into your cunt which you are to take. But Agatha does not allow you to do so. Instead she continues moving her hips, forcing her penis to your depths as you are fully bred with her seed. 

Her breathlessness is apparent as she stands behind you, peppering sweet kisses along your shoulder. Agatha is quite touchy after the matter, always enjoying a closeness to you after having played pretend with such roughness. And as she moves away slightly, her cock gradually slipping from the hold of your cunt, small droplets of cum begin oozing down your thighs.

“Oops,” Agatha chuckles, shaking her head as she admires the mess the two of you, primarily her fault, created. She rubs her dick over your slit once more, this time garnering an obscene amount of your juices mixed with her seed. “Looks like mommy made quite the mess. Nothing short of what a slut like you deserves.”

With your head already high up in the clouds, you share her amusement. “And who is to say we should stop now?”

[astro-stars]

Hear me out on this... TWST with a Southern! Reader.

Like, it's the first day of school, and obviously Reader can't remember the names of the two people they just met, so when Ace says one thing or another, complaining about someone called Riddle, they just go "Hm, yeah, sweetheart."

Ace drops his lunch.

Or when they step on Leona's tail by accident, immediately going, "Oh, darling, are you alright?"

Leona couldn't fall asleep for the first time in a while.

Or after Azul's overblot, how can he not cry more, especially when Reader is rubbing circles into his shoulders, cooing, "It's okay, love, let it all out."

The scammer, unfortunately, couldn't look Reader in the eyes for a while after that.

Or when Reader gets mad, like when they cook something for their friends and Grim eats it, their immediate instinct is to go "WITH ALL I DO FOR THIS HOUSE, YOUNG MAN, WHY DON'T YOU TRY YOUR HAND AT FEEDING THIS HOUSE?!"

By house, they mean the five other first years.

please ignore that theyre out of order😭 its just the order i came up with them!

Ace Trappola

During a Class Mishap Ace messes up a potion and it starts bubbling over, covering his face in soot. Reader chuckles softly and drawls, “Well, bless your heart, sugar, you tryin’ to invent fireworks in here?” Ace sputters, trying to explain himself, but the way Reader says “sugar” makes him forget what he was even going to say. He spends the rest of the class trying (and failing) to act unfazed.

Deuce Spade

When He Gets Into Trouble Deuce gets caught in yet another fight, his uniform a mess. Reader sighs, crossing their arms. “Now, darlin’, I know your momma raised you better than this. You think brawlin’ is gonna solve your problems?” Deuce blushes deeply, stammering out an apology, and promises to do better. He can’t decide if Reader’s scolding feels more like comfort or a proper lecture, but either way, it gets through to him.

Jack Howl

After a Long Run Jack comes back from a run, panting heavily. Reader hands him a water bottle and says, “There you go, honey. Can’t have you keelin’ over on me, now.” Jack pauses mid-sip, ears twitching. He mumbles a quiet “thanks” but spends the rest of the day wondering why being called “honey” makes his tail wag.

Ruggie Bucchi

When He Steals Food Ruggie swipes a bite of Reader’s lunch, thinking they won’t notice. Reader glares and slams their hand on the table. “Now, listen here, sugar. If you’re gonna steal from me, at least have the decency to leave a ‘thank you’ note!” Ruggie freezes, torn between laughing and apologizing. He scratches the back of his head sheepishly. “Sorry, I’ll leave a note next time, promise.”

Floyd Leech

During One of Floyd’s Moods Floyd is sulking in the lounge, glaring at anyone who comes near. Reader plops down beside him, ignoring the tension. “What’s got you in such a twist, darlin’? You look like a cat that’s been rained on.” Floyd blinks at them before breaking into a grin. “Heh, you’re funny. I like you.” He’s back to his usual chaotic self in no time, dragging Reader into whatever mischief he has planned.

Jamil Viper

When He’s Overworked Reader notices Jamil trying to juggle a million tasks at once. They gently take a tray from his hands and say, “Now, love, you can’t be doin’ everything yourself. Even the strongest trees need a little support.” Jamil hesitates but lets them help. Later, he finds himself thinking about how soft their voice was when they called him “love.”

Kalim Al-Asim

When He’s Overly Excited Kalim bursts into Reader’s room, talking a mile a minute about his latest idea for a party. Reader smiles fondly and says, “Alright, sugarcube, slow down. You’re buzzin’ around like a bee in a flower shop.” Kalim laughs, realizing he’s gotten carried away. “Sorry! I just get so excited talking to you!” Reader’s warm tone makes him feel even more enthusiastic.

Sebek Zigvolt

When He’s Loud (As Always) Sebek’s voice booms through the dorm, startling everyone nearby. Reader raises an eyebrow and says, “Well, darlin’, you sure do have a voice on you. Could probably wake the dead if you tried.” Sebek pauses, unsure if that was a compliment or not. He straightens up and replies, “Of course! A knight must always be heard!” But his face betrays the fact that he’s flustered.

Silver

When He Falls Asleep Reader finds Silver asleep under a tree and gently drapes a blanket over him. “Sleep tight, sugar. Even knights need their rest.” When Silver wakes up and sees the blanket, his heart skips a beat. He quietly resolves to thank them later, though he’s already blushing at the thought.

Vil Schoenheit

During a Self-Care Lesson Vil insists on giving Reader a skincare lesson. As he critiques their routine, Reader smirks and says, “Well, bless your heart, sweetpea. I didn’t realize I was sittin’ with the beauty queen of Twisted Wonderland.” Vil narrows his eyes, but the corners of his lips twitch upward. “Flattery will get you nowhere—though I appreciate the sentiment.”

Rook Hunt

When He’s Observing Them Rook starts waxing poetic about Reader’s charm and grace. They laugh and reply, “Oh, honey, you’re layin’ it on thicker than molasses on a pancake.” Rook places a hand over his heart, feigning offense. “But I only speak the truth, mon trésor!” Reader shakes their head, amused by his dramatics.

Epel Felmier

When He’s Feeling Insecure Epel complains about being underestimated because of his looks. Reader pats his shoulder and says, “Now, don’t you fret, darlin’. Even the prettiest apples can pack the strongest punch.” Epel grins, feeling a little more confident. “Thanks, Yuu. You’re real good at makin’ a guy feel better.”

Idia Shroud

When He’s Awkward Around Them Reader catches Idia muttering to himself about a game. They lean in with a warm smile. “Whatcha talkin’ about, sugar? Don’t keep me in suspense.” Idia jumps, his hair flaring pink. “N-nothing! It’s nothing!” But the way they said “sugar” replays in his head for days.

Malleus Draconia

During a Starlit Walk Reader invites Malleus to stargaze with them, saying, “Ain’t the night sky somethin’ else, darlin’? Makes all the troubles of the day seem so small.” Malleus gazes at them instead of the stars. “Indeed,” he murmurs, though he’s not talking about the sky.

not malleus all on his own

TAGLIST; @soramcduckahyucky

[insomniac-dot-ink]

Electrical Wire Vigil

No one knows what to do with the angel tangled in the power lines. The poor thing’s body was wrapped around and around the sparking wires and twisted-up into a ball. The face was obscured by its bent halo—a golden glow that sometimes oscillates like bad television signal. The wings float loosely in the air, all twelve feet of silken bits of light, ragged and torn at the ends.

A storm had felled the trees and the poles and anything taller than a chicken coup in one swoop. Anyone who dared cross the puddles and debris had to risk being electrocuted by the live wires or blinded by the angel’s weakly pulsing light.

The creature would periodically make a break for it too—wings going taut and rising in a flurry of trumpet sounds and frantic flapping. The electrical wires held fast, twisting against the angel’s soft flesh and pushing back. It fell, it always fell, back into the nest of tangled wires and would make weak cooing noises. I was an ornithologist before all this town and couldn’t help but think, pigeon.

The chaplain went to pray under the angel’s bent bod first, getting close as he dared. Everyone knew he wasn’t but a few weeks off the drink and his hands still shook when he lifted up the cross. The nun, she was retired but we still called her just that, caught the 921 bus to the next town that same day.

Some said she was going to the next town over to get a proper priest. Others said she had crossed herself and high-tailed it out of there. What bad luck it was going to be to have a dead angel in our backyard.

All this debris and only the birds can get close enough to it, flapping around the angels head and perching on its mighty back. They call to each other.

Davie, who I had once loved, offered to fetch his shotgun and put it out of its misery. The youngest one there, a girl named Clara, cried so hard she had to be walked back and forth down the lane three times. We opted to put “shooting a messenger of the lord” on the back burner. We gathered up wire cutters, holy books, rubber boots, and a good tree-cutting ax from the messes of our homes and piled them up. We'd wait a day or so at least, watching the angel and all silently hoping it would make it out on its own. 

I wasn’t a praying woman anymore. My house was a testament to a lot of broken things before it was ever leveled by the storm. But I didn’t have any little ones to walk up and down the lane and my car had survived just fine and I owned the best pair of binoculars out of anyone. So, I kept vigil–it was the least I could do. 

I sat and watched and sometimes cooed back when the angel let out long melancholy ooo's. Days of misery in exchange for just a few hours of wind and rain and fury, I thought, the relief trucks would be a while. The chaplain came at sundown and he passed me a drink from his flask. I wasn’t a praying woman anymore so I took a long sip and passed it back.

“Think it’ll make it out?” I asked, nodding at the angel, and the chaplain took a longer drink. I gave him a small smile and elbowed the man. “Glad you stayed, at least.” He nodded again and began to pray, never taking his eyes off the wires up above.

The girl came when the day tucked behind the trees into full dark.

“You shouldn’t be out here,” I told her tiny form at the edge of the puddles. She drew her knees up under her big sweater.

“I have to make sure he doesn’t try anything . . .” she said and I knew she was talking about Davie, who I could no longer love.

 “Does your mama know you’re out here?”

She mumbles from inside her little hoodie, “I can’t let ‘em do it.”

I sighed. “He won’t, not with me here,” I said and waved her over. I made the little girl climb into my lap to stop her shivering and the chaplain gave us all a long blanket to huddle under. The angel flapped those dirty wings and cooed.

“Can I see?” I let the little girl use my binoculars to make out that bent halo and loose curls. She got fingerprints all over the lens and I tried to ignore it.

“I want to be a meteorologist one day,” Clara said, unprompted. “So I can warn people about stuff like this.”

I snorted. “And I want to be a poet.”

“Hush,” Markus says to me and then to the little girl, “I’m sure you’ll make a great weather lady, Clara.” The chaplain gave a punished smile and it made me want to make fun of him just enough to stop it. Clara frowned.

“Did you always want to be a chaplain?” she asked in return and the chaplain didn't answer.

I cleared my throat. “Do you think that’s what it was trying to do? Trying to warn us?” “Or maybe it was just unlucky,” Markus says, rubbing a hand down his long face.

I snorted. “A bad day at work, for sure.”

“Does god allow for bad luck?” asked the little girl.

“Why don’t we ask it?” I say, and we laugh, weakly. We call out to the angel–questions and praise and hopes for tomorrow that we’ll get it out. Or maybe we'd have to get the shotgun tomorrow. The glow of the creature is so weak. Near midnight, the girl suggests we go looking for its horn. If it had been there to warn us, it might have carried a horn, and if it had a horn, we might be able to summon help. 

We search, feebly, avoiding the sparking wires and the upturned wood and metal. We go around in the mud on our hands and knees until we match the trapped thing. Though, we never do figure out what to do with the angel tangled in the power line. The night was long and bitter and we didn’t have anywhere else to be, the drunken chaplain and family-less woman of the birds and that little girl.

Before dawn, I am asleep, we are all asleep, dead to the world like the day will never come. And in the morning, the wires are loose on the ground and quiet. The angel is gone and a truck has come to pick us up. A part of me hopes it made it out. A part of me is relieved to see that Davie is here and he has all his supplies in the back. The trucks are here and the power company remembered us enough to cut off the power.

I have nowhere to be, and walk the little girl home. Gloria is happy to see her and offers me a place to stay the night even though I tell her my car is just fine. Still, she says, just a night.

The window in the guest room faces the electrical wires. They’ll rebuild them one day because you can’t waste the material all the way out here. Clara will go off to college one day. The chaplain will leave the drink for good, he will, and the church in the same breath. I will write a poem one day and it won’t be any good.

It’ll be about the electrical wires outside my windows. About how I don’t know if the angel made it out, but the birds still perch there. They preen and sing and fluff. I count them one by one in the pre-dawn light. Some are flesh and blood and they clean the feathers of the ones that aren’t. Pearly blue jays that sing forgotten songs from yesteryear, and there are fewer ones by the morning light. The angel wire they call it. Year after year, the birds return with their bodies or without them, to sit on the wire and preen their grandchildren and sing to lost mates, and I close my eyes and listen to the ghosts.

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

My book! 🧡 Newsletter

[bokutoko]

kuroo's pretty sure he’s about to lose his job.

but he can’t bring himself to care.

just like clockwork at 5:30 PM, he walked up to your best friend’s apartment with a single flower—your favorite, not just the typical ‘apology roses’ he picked out in the past—along with his work phone. while you never told him where you went, he knew you ended up here, far across town from him.

he stood face-to-face with the cheap mahogany of the door, debating if he should knock. how would you react? would you even answer?

nevertheless, he left his things in a little bag, turning off his work phone that already had four missed calls from coworkers. it wasn’t much, but it was proof. it was evidence that he was trying, trying to show you he could do it.

he could separate work and his life—for you.

the heels of his shoes clicked on the hardwood floor of the hallway as he walked back to the elevator, back to his high-rise that had never felt so dark and empty as it had since you left.

the late-night autumn air was cold, and kuroo saw his breath as he walked, the brisk chill cutting through his coat. but he’ll freeze if it means he could prove to you he could change—that he could be the man you deserved.

and that was what he did, every morning and evening.

as days passed, kuroo brought more upon his visits: your favorite sweets when he dropped his phone off, a book that he remembered was on your TBR, a little note saying he hoped you were well and drinking enough water. you always were bad about that.

one morning, he left your favorite coffee since he knew you had an important presentation that had been marked in your shared calendar in the kitchen. he gave the door a soft knock—not because he wanted you to see him (even though he definitely did) but because he knew you didn’t like your coffee to get cold—and he quickly walked off.

one morning, he came rounding the corner at 8:30 AM on the dot to pick up his work phone, another flower in-hand, when he saw you standing at the front door, and he swore he could’ve fallen to his knees at the sight of you.

you were wearing comfier clothes—must be your day off—and he opened his mouth to say something, anything.

“hi,” is all his voice uttered. is that all you’re gonna say to the love of your life, who you haven’t seen in weeks?? good job, you fu—

“what’re you doing, tetsu?” you softly asked, skepticism lining your gaze as you gave his work suit a once over. his tie is slightly lopsided.

his brain short circuited at the sound of your voice, a balm to his soul. “what do you mean?” he prompted, his brows furrowing in confusion.

“all of this,“ you motioned around you and to him standing before you, “what are you doing?”

kuroo’s eyes followed her, glancing at his hands, which held another one of your favorite flowers, the little bag that was now conveniently missing the chocolates he left for you yesterday, his turned-off work phone that probably had dozens of missed calls—not that he cared about that anyway.

you were here; he wasn’t about to ruin his chance to talk to you.

“you know what i’m trying to prove here, angel,” he reasoned, taking a hesitant step forward, “and i’ll do this for as long as it takes—”

“for what?”

“for you to come home,” he said, his eyes zeroing in on your finger, the beautiful engagement ring he gave you months ago still sparkling, even in the shitty apartment hallway lighting.

she still wore it, after all this time.

he had to remind himself to breathe, and he added a soft, “angel, please come home soon.”

he knew she can see right through him, she can see how this man has stripped himself bare before her, all the way to the marrow of his bones. all his cards were on the table. no games, no bullshit.

he knew it wouldn’t be that day, the next, or maybe even in another long week before you’d come home, but he hoped that one day, you’d trust him to give him your heart once more.

he won’t lose you.

PART ONE HERE

a/n: TADAAA part two! i lowk was not expecting so many people to like angsty kuroo but here we are

*HUGE thank you to the anon for the help with an idea; you’re wonderful, and i hope your pillow is cold on both sides tonight

masterlist | navigation

please do not copy, alter, or repost my work. ©bokutoko 2025.

[redrose10]

Here is the second and final chapter. Thank you for all the feedback. I hope everyone likes it!

Idol Husband Yoongi x Female Spouse Reader

Warnings: Swearing, angst, body insecurity, hints of cheating, jealousy, anxiety, panic attacks, slightly smutty but nothing crazy

Part 1

Part 1.5

🍒🍒🍒🍒🍒🍒🍒🍒🍒🍒🍒🍒🍒🍒🍒🍒🍒🍒

A few days had passed since Yoongi left your home. You needed some space to process everything that had happened and he was willing to give that to you. Luckily, Hana was used to him being gone for periods of time so she didn’t question it too much and went about her days normally.

Yoongi seemed to be handling everything just fine too which only upset you more because you couldn’t understand how he wasn’t a mess. If it wasn’t for Hana needing you then you wouldn’t have gotten out of bed.

If he truly cared about you he would’ve been begging for your forgiveness. It had you questioning a lot of things. Why did he give up so easily? Why hadn’t he tried harder to explain himself? Why did he still have to text you every day to remind you to take your vitamins and drink enough water? Why did he still have to have your favorite breakfast delivered to you every morning knowing you’d be too tired to cook for yourself? Why did he have to remind you about your doctors appointment today when even you forgot about it? You hated that he was still so thoughtful and involved even when he wasn’t there because it made it harder to hate him.

Before your appointment you dropped Hana off at your parents place. She was spending the night there because you wanted her to do something exciting plus you just needed a night to yourself. Your appointment went great. The baby was healthy and you were too so you decided to reward yourself with one of your biggest cravings and a night of relaxing on the couch trying not to think about anything that had happened in the last week.

You had just gotten home with your large pizza covered in pineapple, pickles, and onions with extra anchovies on the side when there was a knock at the door. You sighed before putting the pizza down and slowly getting up to see who was interrupting your peaceful evening.

“Jimin?”, you questioned seeing the smiling man standing in front of you holding up a tub of ice cream. “Hheeeyyyy Y/N. How’s it goin?”, he sang as you stared at him before turning to walk away. “Yoongi’s not here.”, you said knowing that he was just going to follow you anyways.

“Yeah I know.”, he sarcastically said before placing the ice cream into the freezer, “He’s currently moping around on my couch driving me crazy.”

“Sounds like a you and him problem.”, you said taking a bite of your pizza while ignoring the dramatically disgusted face Jimin was making at the sight of it. It tasted like heaven to you thanks to your pregnancy hormones and that’s all that mattered.

Even though you acted indifferent to his news there was a big part of you that felt relief knowing he had been at Jimin’s and not hers.

“Please come get your husband.”, he whined before dropping down into the chair next to you, “Look I love him like a brother, but he’s sooooo annoying when he’s like this. He won’t tell me what happened, but he just keeps sitting there and pouting and if he’s not pouting then he’s crying AND I’m going to have to put a lock on my freezer. He ate my favorite ice cream Y/N. My absolute favorite. I was so excited to come home after a hard day of practice and eat some of my special ice cream but nooooo it was all gone and he didn’t even bother trying to hide the evidence.”

You continued chewing as you mulled over his words. “I didn’t know he was like that.”, you mumbled before taking another bite.

“Yeah tell me about it. He doesn’t even like caramel or white chocolate.”, Jimin scoffed.

“Has he really been crying?”, you questioned. You had known Yoongi a long time and you had only ever seen him cry once, on the day Hana was born and they were tears of joy. He certainly never cried over your relationship before, at least to your knowledge. That was not like him. He always wanted to come off as strong to you, even when he was struggling.

Jimin nodded, “Yeah he is a total wreck. He keeps mumbling something about being stupid and a divorce and then he starts crying again.”

“Divorce…?”, you whispered.

“Hey uh I hate to pry and I know it’s not really my place, but what happened between you two? I’ve never seen him like this so it must’ve been pretty bad.”, he hesitantly asked.

“He cheated on me.”, you answered deciding to just rip the bandage off.

Jimin laughed which made you quickly throw a glare in his direction so he stiffened up and cleared his throat. “No he didn’t.”, he simply said shaking his head, “Yoongi is a lot of things, but cheater is not one of them and he definitely would not have cheated on you.”

“Yeah well tell that to the woman who pulled his tie out of her purse because apparently he left it at her place.”

Jimin’s eyes widened in shock, “WWWHHHAAATT?”

You nodded, “Yep, we were at Hana’s talent show and this woman came up to us and handed him his tie from her purse. You know that cherry tie I gave him for our anniversary? She said he left it at her house. What other reason would there be for him to remove his tie other than sleeping with her?”

“I don’t know. Maybe they were eating and he didn’t want to get it dirty? He loves that tie.”, he shrugged.

“Okay then why was he eating at her house to begin with?”, you rolled your eyes, “And he just left. He didn’t even try that hard to explain himself. Maybe he didn’t want the truth to come out.”

“Y/N you know how he is…He’s all about letting things cool down. He probably just didn’t want you getting even more upset and then things would be made worse. He did mention something about the baby and stress and how it’s bad. I don’t know. He’s the one who reads like every baby book ever published.”

Nodding along you started to agree, “I guess...”

Jimin turned to look at you with a raised eyebrow. He tried to speak, but you cut him off, “I don’t blame him to be honest. I mean look at me Jimin. I look like I swallowed a beach ball. I have stretch marks and my boobs are saggy and uneven and that all happened before I even got pregnant for the second time. That woman…she was perfect. She definitely didn’t spend her Friday nights sitting on the couch eating a whole pizza by herself. Why wouldn’t he choose to be with her over me? I bet he doesn’t even find me attractive any more. He probably hasn’t since Hana was born so this was a long time coming anyways.”

You could feel the familiar burning sensation in your waterline and you began to sniffle. Jimin reached over and took your hands into his. Lightly he gave you a squeeze to remind you that he was there for you. “Y/N, deep down you know none of the that is true. Yoongi loves you. He loves you more than anything in this world. He loves every part of you. Trust me. Yoongi loves to brag about you…sometimes a little too much. I still can’t look at a can of whipped cream without feeling weird. And DO NOT even get me started on that cherry neck choker thing he likes you to wear.”

You laughed a little thankful that he was there to help you work through all of this.

“Hey do you remember what that woman’s name was?”, he asked suddenly like he had just thought of something.

You shook your head, “I don’t know. Sarah or Aera or something like that. I kind of blacked out a little.”

Jimin softly chuckled to himself before breaking out into a big smile, “You need to talk to Yoongi. Let him explain and then the two of you need to discuss all of this. Tell him how you’re feeling. It’s not good to bottle this up…for either of you.”

You nodded and whispered a small okay before Jimin grumbled something about going home to save the rest of his ice cream and quickly scurried out of the apartment leaving you to process everything alone.

You were nervous. Hana was spending the second night in a row with your parents and you weren’t sure which one of them was more excited about the extended stay, but you were happy it worked out. Because currently you were pacing around the kitchen waiting for Yoongi to come home. When Jimin came over yesterday he had made it seem like there was a perfectly good explanation for everything that had happened so you texted Yoongi at 3am asking if he wanted to come home for dinner and talk. He responded immediately with a yes and a light scolding for being up so late, but it wasn’t that easy for you to get to sleep.

There was a beep at the door before it opened and shut quickly. Yoongi’s socked feet padded into the kitchen shortly after. The familiar smell of your favorite noodle spot quickly filled the air. He held up the bag with a shy smile and the two of you ate in awkward silence. And when you were done and cleaned up and you couldn’t stall any longer you moved over to the couch to get comfortable. Yoongi took a seat next to you, but still made sure to leave some space unsure of how you would react to him and it killed you that things had gotten so uncomfortable between you both.

“How have you been Y/N?”, he asked.

“Good. You?”

“Alright I guess. I’ve been better.”

You nodded unsure of what else to say.

“I miss you Y/N. I miss you and Hana.”, he said after a while, “I want to come home.”

“Yoongi…are…are you…are you cheating on me?”, you finally questioned wanting to just get it over with. Your bluntness shocked you and him both, but at this point you were tired and you figured what else could it hurt.

You watched his body tense at the question which brought instant tears to your eyes knowing the truth.

Frantically he began wiping away those tears. You wanted to shove him away and tell him not to touch you, but you couldn’t. Having him so close to you. Smelling his cologne that usually signified safety and comfort. Feeling his skin on yours after so long was too much to bare and you needed it.

“Y/N I didn’t cheat on you. I swear on everything I have.”, he whispered trying to keep you calm.

“Then who is she Yoongi? Why did she have your tie and why were you at her place to begin with? Why are you so close with her son?”

He took a deep breath and ran a shaky hand through his hair, “Her name is Aera Kim. She is the new Director of International Relations for the company. She helps coordinate things for us outside of Korea like tours, promotions, merchandising, things like that.”

All you heard was not only is she beautiful, but she’s also really successful and powerful too which didn’t help. Yoongi could see the drop in your demeanor so he turned to look at you so you could see how serious he was.

He continued, “We were at her place a few weeks ago. All of us. All of the guys, our managers, and a few others on the team. We were discussing the upcoming album release and world tour. Things were fine and then she said that they decided to add more tour dates. Five more in the US, three more in Europe, and they want to add a whole leg of the tour in South America plus all of the promotions and interviews that come with that. AND they want Namjoon, Hobi, and I to release an EP for a rap thing.”, he took a deep breath trying to collect his thoughts, “That’s going to add on an extra six months to the tour which was already going to take almost nine months to begin with. Then if we do release this EP there will be EVEN MORE work on top of all of that. Y/N I’ll be gone for well over a year and who knows how much longer. There might be a little break here and there, but not a lot. I’m going to miss so much. I won’t be here for you or Hana or the baby. I’ll miss the baby learning to crawl, maybe even their first steps and first words. Hana already tells everyone how I’m always gone on “bwusiness” and this will only make that worse. It kills me every time I hear her say something like that. I was already struggling with going on this tour to begin with and now it has me questioning everything. I…I just…I don’t know if I can do this any more Y/N. I’ve been thinking about leaving the group. I can just write lyrics or maybe just produce. At least I get to be here more often if I I do that.”

You felt bad for him. You knew it was tough on him at times, but you didn’t know it was to this extreme.

“The more I sat there and thought about it the more I began to panic. If I back out of the group then I’m letting down the guys and the label and of course the fans. If I go on the tour then I’m letting down my family. I got so worked up during the meeting that I had a full blown panic attack. I walked out onto the balcony to get some air, but I still felt like I couldn’t breathe so I took my tie and jacket off because I felt like I was suffocating. Namjoon came out to try and calm me down and after a while they called a car to bring me home. I swear I thought I put the tie in my pocket when I grabbed my jacket so when I couldn’t find it I assumed that I dropped it somewhere or left it in the car, but I guess I left it at her place. I…Y/N I didn’t sleep with her. I promise. I barely speak to her. Her son is a huge fan of mine and he’s friends with Hana at school. Sometimes I let him hang out in my studio so I see her for like thirty seconds while she drops him off and picks him up, but that’s like the most I interact with her outside of business situations.”

Either from relief at getting this off his chest or reliving the stress again or maybe a little of both his shoulders started to shake and he buried his face into his hands. He cries shattering your heart. Your cheeks were fully soaked with your own tears now so with nothing to loose you leaned in and nuzzled your face against him pulling him as close to you as possible, “I’m sorry Yoongi. I’m so sorry. I should’ve let you explain from the start. I’m sorry I didn’t trust you. I’m sorry you feel like this. You’re not letting anyone down no matter what you do. Please don’t think like that.”

“I never should’ve given you a reason to think that I was cheating on you to begin with.”, he shook his head, “I hate that I let it get to that point. I’ve just been feeling like everything was closing in on me and I didn’t know what to do other than ignore it and hope it all gets better, but it just kept getting worse.”

“No it’s not your fault. I’ve just been so insecure and things have just been kind of weird between us and I really thought you weren’t attracted to me any more and then I saw her and how perfect she is and I panicked because I thought you had moved on to someone better.”, you said through your own tears.

Yoongi surprised you when he moved to get down on the floor to kneel in-front of you. He gently supported himself on your thighs. The warmth and pressure of his hands sent a tingling sensation through your body.

“Y/N, I…fuck I’m sorry I made you feel like that. I’ve just been so stressed and tired and then any time I did want to initiate something I felt like you weren’t into it and I didn’t want to push you or make you feel like I expected something. And you know I’m not the best at speaking my feelings so without being able to show you how I felt I didn’t know how to proceed. But you have no idea how much love I feel for you. And how attracted I am to you. Every little thing about you drives me crazy in the best way possible. I can’t get enough of you and I’m so incredibly sorry that I ever made you think any less.”

Your heart swelled as you grabbed onto the collar of his shirt pulling him up onto the couch with your lips searching for his. He laughed trying to catch himself from falling over before reciprocating the action. He straddled you enough to make sure he wasn’t putting too much weight on you as your fingers furiously undid the buttons of his shirt having it removed within seconds. It didn’t take much longer for your shirt to also end up in the same pile on the floor next to you with your bra following right after.

Even though you were burning up Yoongi’s touches left goosebumps on your skin as his fingers trailed down your side to the band of your shorts. He hooked two fingers inside. He teased you just enough to get a desperate whine out out you begging for more. You could feel him smirk against your lips because he got just the reaction he was looking for. He rocked his hips against you searching for any kind of friction and also making sure you could feel how badly he wanted you. Your brain turned into mush with thoughts of him after that.

You pulled away just long enough to catch your breath, “Bedroom?”

“Fuck yes, please.”, he said already picking you up in his arms and carrying you down the hallway while you giggled loudly in response.

Yoongi dropped down onto the bed next to you. “Are you hurt? Was it too much? I wasn’t too rough was I?”, he questioned trying to steady his breathing while pulling you flush against his body and looking you over at the same time. “No”, you shook your head, “You were perfect. I think I…I think we needed that.”

“Yeah.”, he laughed, “It’s been a while huh? Let’s not do that again.“

“Yeah I uh I guess I was afraid to let you see me like this, but it still hurt that lately you never seemed to really even try which only made me feel worse. And everyone’s always talking about how handsome you are and I just felt like I wasn’t good enough. And then I was worried that you found someone el-“

He silenced you with a kiss, “Y/N there will never be anyone else. Not in this lifetime or the next. You’re it for me.”

You smiled and relaxed into his warmth while he soothingly ran a hand over your belly as your baby happily kicked away excited to come into the world soon.

Between the relief you finally felt and his steady heartbeat lulling you it was only minutes before you had nearly fallen asleep in his arms. But then you startled awake remembering a special treat that was waiting for you in the freezer. You and the baby definitely wanted a late night snack and you were thankful it was there.

“Where are you going in such a hurry?”, Yoongi chuckled watching you closely.

“To get cleaned up.”, you grunted as you scooted off of the bed, “Jimin dropped off some ice cream yesterday and I was saving it.”

“Really?”, he asked following you into the shower, “I could go for some ice cream right about now. What flavor?”

You relaxed letting the warm water run over your sore body as you looked up at him with a cheeky smile, “Cherry.”

[batboysanonymous]

A Taste of Silence (Pt. II)

Rhysand x Reader

Summary: Rhys's drunken words cut deeper than any blade, leaving Y/n questioning everything she thought she knew about their bond. As heartbreak and betrayal collide, she faces a choice that could shatter the fragile threads holding their world together.

Pt. I

Word Count: 1.5k

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Rhysand was drowning.

He had endured centuries of torment in Amarantha’s Court, faced death and destruction in ways that would have broken lesser males—but this? This was agony unlike anything he had ever known.

Because this wasn’t just losing her. This was being the cause of her pain.

The bond was still there, a heavy, throbbing weight tethered to his soul. It twisted and pulled at him, refusing to let him forget the raw betrayal in her eyes when she left. He couldn’t block it out. Couldn’t shut down the waves of anger and hurt radiating from her, nor the faint echo of her presence that haunted his every step.

He didn’t deserve to forget.

He followed her from a distance, staying just out of sight, knowing he had no right to approach her. She had retreated to a small, snow-laden village on the outskirts of his territory, a place so quiet and unassuming it seemed designed to swallow grief whole. Rhys respected her boundaries—at least, as much as he could while still ensuring she was safe.

The villagers had no idea their little haven was now fiercely guarded by shadows. Every night, he patrolled the perimeter, silent as death, ensuring no threat could come close. When a pack of feral beasts wandered too near, Rhys killed them before they could even scent the village. He cleaned up the blood and left no trace, unwilling to let her see the lengths he was going to for her protection.

She might hate him, but she was still his mate. And he would protect her, even if it tore him apart.

But even the small things he could do weren’t enough. Not when every second without her was a reminder of the chasm he’d created between them. The cold, empty nights stretched endlessly, the silence gnawing at his mind until he thought he might go mad.

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The third week after her departure, he broke.

He had sworn to himself that he wouldn’t intrude, and wouldn't push her until she was ready. But the bond burned unbearably that day, tugging at him with a force that felt like claws raking through his chest. He flew to her cabin before he could stop himself, landing with a muffled thud on the snow-packed ground.

She was outside, stacking firewood with her back to him. She froze when his boots crunched against the snow.

“Don’t,” she said without turning, her voice cold enough to make him falter.

“Please,” Rhys choked out, his voice hoarse.

She didn’t respond, and he didn’t think—he just dropped to his knees. The snow soaked through his leathers, numbing his skin, but he didn’t care. He couldn’t care.

“Please,” he repeated, his voice breaking. “Please, just listen to me. I—” His throat closed up, the words catching on the lump that had lodged itself there since the moment she left. He dragged a trembling hand through his hair, his shoulders sagging under the weight of his desperation. “I know I hurt you. I know I don’t deserve your forgiveness, but I—Cauldron, I can’t live like this. I can’t live without you.”

Her breath hitched, but she didn’t move.

“You are everything to me,” he said, his voice raw. “Everything. And I hate myself for what I did, for the way I made you feel. I’ll spend the rest of my life making it right, if you’ll let me. But if you can’t…” He swallowed hard, tears stinging his eyes. “If you can’t, I’ll still do it. I’ll protect you. I’ll make sure you’re safe and happy, even if it’s from afar. I don’t care what it costs me, as long as you’re okay.”

“How can I trust that the next time you’re drunk or angry, you won’t say something that cuts me to the bone?”

Her words hit like a dagger, sharp and precise. He bowed his head, his voice trembling as he replied, “I don’t deserve your trust, not after what I said. But I swear to you, I will never drink if it means risking your pain. I’ll stop entirely if you ask me to. Nothing—nothing—is worth losing you again.”

Her arms crossed, her shields firmly in place, though he caught the faintest waver in her expression. “And what happens the next time we fight, Rhys? What if you get angry? Will you throw my weaknesses in my face again?”

His head snapped up, anguish written across his features. “Never. I would never—” His voice broke. “You are not my weakness. You are my strength. And if I ever forget that, I want you to walk away and never look back. But I swear to you, Feyre, I will spend every day of my life proving to you that I’ve learned from this. That I will never, ever make you feel like that again.”

Her lips parted, but no words came. He could feel her battling herself, the bond between them a swirling tempest of doubt and yearning.

“I’ll do whatever it takes,” he whispered, his knees sinking deeper into the snow. “I’ll spend the rest of my life earning your trust if I have to. Just tell me how to begin.”

The silence stretched taut between them, and Rhys didn’t dare move. Finally, she spoke, her voice soft but edged with steel. “Prove it.”

Her shields weren’t just up—they were fortified. But he didn’t need to feel the bond to see the war raging within her.

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The days that followed were a slow, painful process. Rhys didn’t push. He stayed near enough to be there if she needed him but far enough to give her space. He continued his quiet watch over the village, eliminating threats before she ever knew they existed. He left her gifts—small things he hoped might bring her comfort. A new brush when he saw her old one had broken. A scarf enchanted to keep her warm even in the bitterest winds. And a note with every gift: I’m still here. I always will be.

She started letting him stay for longer each time he visited. They didn’t talk much at first—just sat in heavy, charged silence. But gradually, the walls began to crack. She started asking him questions, small and tentative, and he answered with an honesty that left him vulnerable and bare.

The night she finally forgave him, it was snowing.

They were sitting by the fire, the soft glow casting flickering shadows across the room. Rhys’s voice was low and steady as he recounted the years he’d spent under the mountain. The rawness of the memories was evident in the way his hands clenched and unclenched, but he forced himself to speak, each word a step toward atonement.

Y/N sat across from him, silent, her gaze fixed on the flames. Her fingers twisted the hem of her sweater, the movement restless and uncertain.

“You didn’t just hurt me,” she said at last, her voice trembling. “You betrayed me, Rhys. You made me feel small, like I didn’t matter.”

The words tore through him, but he didn’t flinch. He nodded, his throat tightening. “I know. And I’ll spend the rest of my life making sure you never feel that way again.”

She looked at him then, her eyes glassy with unshed tears. “How can I trust you not to run your mouth again? To not let some drink or situation make you careless with me?”

He sucked in a sharp breath, shame crashing over him. “You can’t—not yet. But I’ll prove to you that you can. I’ll prove it every single day, Y/N.” His voice cracked, his chest heaving as he lowered himself to his knees before her.

“Please,” he begged, his hands trembling as he clasped hers. “Please, give me a chance to earn back your trust. I’ll never take another sip of wine if that’s what it takes. I’ll never let myself forget the weight of what I have to lose. You are everything to me.”

Her lip trembled as she stared at him, the rawness in his expression and the desperation in his voice cutting through her defenses. “I’m terrified, Rhys. Of trusting you again. Of getting hurt again.”

His thumbs brushed over her knuckles as he held her hands tightly, his head bowing. “I know. And if I ever break your trust again, I’ll deserve every ounce of that fear. I’ll deserve to lose you. But I won’t. I swear to you, Y/N, I won’t.”

The bond between them hummed faintly, like a whisper of what it once was, and it pulled at her even as she hesitated. She reached out, cupping his face with trembling fingers.

“You have one chance, Rhys,” she whispered, her voice heavy with both hope and caution. “One.”

He exhaled a shaky breath, pressing her palm to his lips. “I won’t waste it. I swear to you, I’ll never waste it.”

When she finally leaned into him, resting her head against his chest, his arms wrapped around her protectively, as if he could shield her from every hurt in the world—including himself. The bond sang louder, fuller, and in that moment, they began to mend what had been broken, piece by fragile piece.

[bunnyshideawayy]

it’s giving people who don’t know the difference between Queen Consort (married to the king, crowned “queen” for the sake of a title but often holds no real power specially not over the king) and Queen Regent (a queen who rules in their own right/inheritance and would have the same ruling political power if not more than their spouse)

⬆️something Feyre is not and doesn’t not have. she has the physical power of all the courts but magic did not pick her and just bc Rhysand placed a crown on her head does not mean she has the same power of a ruler that Rhsyand or any of the real, actual high lords do. rhysand only named her HL as a manipulation point mostly against Tamlin who told Feyre that there has never been a high lady before and probably wouldnt be unless the magic picked a woman. because he understands how the magic works and won’t just crown feyre (who btw literally said she didn’t want the title and/oe possible responsibility that comes with it when Tamlin mentioned it) for the sake of it. not that she could never be a high lady, he literally had no power or precedent to randomly crown his gf. no other high lord even thought about that until after rhysand crowned Feyre and then only the HL of Winter titled his long term gf who imo actually deserves it bc she actually ruled the winter court in the HL’s absence while everyone was UTM. Feyre was a literal teenaged girl, at most 20/21 years old, who up until that point was human. remember humans know next to nothing about the fey, what they DO know is misinformation like they can’t tell a lie. feyre has no political footing or understanding, nor does she have any respect over any court let alone the night court, the CON would never take her seriously without Rhysand and if push came to shove Rhysand wouldn’t leave her in charge- at least not by herself. her title is simply that, a flashy title that Feysand can rub in people’s faces. frankly, i highly doubt feyre understands this. i truly think she believes because she has been given the title of “high lady” she must act and rule as if she held the same power as Rhysand and in the text it’s clear Rhysand lets her think that, too.

Day 100828277 of wishing people would stop romanticizing "High Lady" and using it as a tool to praise Rhysand.

Feyre is NOT a real "High" anything. "High Lord and Lady" must be chosen by the magic—SHE ISN'T. Feyre is NOT a real High Lady simply because she isn’t. SJM thought she nailed it with this, but she didn’t. People thought Rhys is the best mate ever and such a great feminist icon for doing this, but those who believe it are fools who don’t even use a tiny bit of critical thinking. "FEYRE THE HIGH LADY" is nothing more than a pacifier for Feyre and her stans, and they fell for it. After the High Lord meeting, Viviane and Kallias probably laughed at Feyre and then felt sad for her because she’s just so gullible. I doubt Viviane actually want another word in her title if it’s just a dumb, meaningless label.

TLDR: If not chosen by magic, no one is a true High Lord or High Lady. Feyre’s title is meaningless, and the only ones unaware of it are likely her and Rhys’s GULLIBLE AF mafiastancult.

[pricklyjim]

Sorry to ask. I was just curious about Arcee and Elita lore?

I WAS WAITING FOR SOMEONE TO ASK THIS BEFORE I START RAMBLING!! YESSS—LET’S DO SOME LORE DROPS!!

MARRIED IN MY HEAD^^

Arcee: “If I had to re-walk into the mines and almost get crushed by a crate in order to meet you… I’d do it again without hesitation”

Elita: “and i’d run to save you a every single time…”

Origins:

Elita was a middle-caste Cybertronian, working as a mining supervisor. slightly stern, yet empathetic, and fiercely protective of her workers, bending rules to prioritize their safety while maintaining high efficiency to keep the government off her ass.

Arcee, is from the upper caste, serving as a diplomat and secretary to aid the Primes, managing peace talks, social events, and Cybertronian national affairs. She’s calm, graceful, and loyal to her duties but unfortunately very unaware of the struggles of lower-caste workers.

their meeting:

their meeting starts when Sentinel prime tasks Arcee to visit the mines to gather feedback, brushing it off as too unimportant to attend to himself.

she accepts, it’s not like she can say no, so she just gets on with it and heads down there to the most well-known mine.

there, In the mines, she’s nearly crushed by a crate of raw energon but is saved by Elita at the last second when she pushes her out the way.

Their first interaction is slightly awkward and tense: Elita questions Arcee’s presence there and her motives— saying she won’t make it long im the mines.

but Arcee insists on staying anyway, to complete her report properly, of course, much to Elitas dismay.

now working together, Arcee, over time, grows fond of Elita’s courage and compassion for others, while Elita is drawn to Arcee’s genuine desire to understand the miners’ struggles, asking them questions and even helping out when she can.

after many late-night conversations and shared drives across Cybertron, their professional relationship deepens into a friendship—and eventually, love.

first comes chatting, then comes courting, then comes:

When the caste system inevitably collapses and the Primes fall along with rodimus, the invisible social barriers keeping arcee and elita apart disappear. They confess their feelings under the sight of the shining ores in the mine and deepen their bond through a simple conjunx ceremony, alone, away from prying eyes.

siding with the Autobots:

Elita’s leadership and people organisational skills make her valuable to Orion Pax’s cause as he officially forms the Autobots, while Arcee’s diplomatic experience’s help navigate any future relations and peace talks with Megatron.

whilst the pair join the fight, Arcee also runs into Magnus!

Once reunited with Magnus, an old friend, Arcee finds ground to bond more closely in their shared work, even helping give advice and support to Magnus as he silently mourns Rodimus’s absence, trying to be a pillar of support to the mech who once looked out for her.

Through every challenge, Elita and Arcee’s love endured, and to them, as long as they’re besides one another, that makes them content, and helps them to fight for a future filled with peace and prosperity.

[jims note]

I wanted them together because although I love seeing optimus and elita together, SHE NEVERRR GETS A HAPPYYYYY ENDING, like DUDE- give her a break!!! 😭

plus I wanted elita to love and fall in love with someone who is able to give her that much love back and more and be fulfilled, and also to be a beacon of happiness in a story with one relationship that’s essentially a man who misses his dead situationship and another who is having to deal with loving a poet/now turned sad dictator.

Plus they’re cute :)

[grandline-fics]

Immune To Your Charms

DESCRIPTION: Soulmates are incapable of harming the other in any way. Normally that would be a good thing but not when you're meant to be enemies.

WARNINGS: It's Doflamingo so he's his own warning. Brief mentions of violence and killing. Enemies to Lovers, Soulmate!AU, some slight suggestiveness(?)

CHARACTERS: Doflamingo

WORDS: 4,540

A/N: The next chapter is here and I'm a lot happier with how this one turned out. Thank you to everyone who voted in the recent poll to determine one of the reader's talents and I think it linked into the story better than I'd anticipated. I hope you all like what I came up with and thank you for all your support, it means a lot 💕

*REQUESTS ARE OPEN*

DIRECTORY | PROMPT LIST

Chapter One | Chapter Two | Chapter Three | Chapter Four | Chapter Five | Chapter Six | Chapter Seven | Chapter Eight | Chapter Nine | Chapter Ten | Chapter Eleven | Chapter Twelve | Chapter Thirteen(here) | Chapter Fourteen (coming soon)

——————

After having a taste for escaping your room, you grew more determined to get out of bed at least a couple times a day. In your eyes if the doctors were happy to reduce the strength of your medicine then you were getting well enough to be more physical even if it was a light walk into the corridors. Some attempts were more successful than others. Some occasions you’d managed to avoid anyone spotting you until you were already headed back to your room and allowed them to usher you back to bed without much resistance. Other times you were caught almost immediately. Depending on who it was, their tactics for getting you back to your room varied. 

The servants pleaded, fearing Doflamingo’s anger would be directed their way, some even going so far as to fall onto their knees in front of you. The doctors tried to convince you to be a little more patient and with a few more days of complete bedrest you could maybe start attempting light exercise but not yet, throwing medical jargon at you to exhaust and frustrate you. For them you dug your heels in but eventually went back. Then the middle and lower ranked pirates seemed the most unsure about how to approach you because you always held your ground with them, refusing to go to your room. They couldn’t order you to go back and touching you was not an option so all they could do was block your way forward while one of the group ran off to get Doflamingo. 

It didn’t matter what the Warlord was doing, all it took was the report you were out of bed to get him to his feet. He followed the subordinate to your location. Upon seeing him appear you would let out a huff, watching him approach and let your body go limp when he lifted you; sometimes under his arm or over his shoulder. Normally he went straight for your room, this time however he turned and started to head back in the direction of his office. “Oh, we going the scenic route today?”

“You’re sounding better.” Doflamingo noted, choosing to ignore your question. “Your breathing seems clearer.”

“That’s what I keep telling you and your doctors, I’m practically completely healed.”

“Apart from your unrecovered energy levels, remaining infection reading in your latest test, limited-”

“I said practically, not entirely. No need to get smart.” You cut in with an unimpressed roll of your eyes as you heard the office doors open while Doflamingo laughed. “So, why the change today?”

“I have a lot of work to catch up on and so long as you’re here you won’t get into trouble.”

“I could get into plenty of trouble here if I wanted to.” You answered with a disgruntled mutter as you were dropped unceremoniously onto the plush sofa near his desk. 

“Well then by all means, cause trouble.” Doflamingo taunted down at you, the challenging grin fixed firmly on his lips as he watched you recline against the cushions and glared at him while a pout shaped your lips. 

“Don’t want to. Maybe later.” You explained. Truthfully the walk through the halls before you were caught had started to drain you and now that you were sitting down again, you weren’t going to get back up anytime soon. Doflamingo didn’t need to know that though. Even if he correctly assumed the reason for your choice to relax against the sofa, you weren’t going to admit it out loud. Draping your arm over the back of the sofa and laying your head against it you glanced towards the desk to see the stacks of papers on the usually tidied and more managed surface. “Wow, you weren’t kidding about work. Guess there’s more to being a King and ruler of a criminal empire than attending fancy galas and terrorising civilians.”

“I much prefer the paperwork to fancy galas.” Doflamingo told while while he slid into his desk chair and lifted the top sheet of paper on one of his piles. 

“Oh yeah, good food, good booze. Simply torture.” You drawled sarcastically.

“Go to one you’ve been to them all. Besides there’s no actual entertainment.” Doflamingo explained without taking his eyes from the report of materials expected to be brought to Dressrosa’s SMILE factory in the coming days. “Everyone tries to be sneaky and subtle about their clumsy assassination attempts and seductions and fail spectacularly. Plus the fancier they are, the less blood gets spilled. Boring.”

“Awww poor King Doffy doesn’t get to massacre rich people.” You pouted in false sympathy. “However will you survive such hardships?”

“With admirable dignity and humility.” Doflamingo grinned when you let out a small amused huff at his reply and moved onto the next set of reports. “Why so curious anyway? Would have thought you’d have harsher feelings than I do on fancy nobles and their parties.”

“Being a bodyguard on the sidelines or stationed outside their rooms until they returned isn’t exactly the same as attending.” You shrugged lazily. You weren’t often stationed on those kinds of missions. Normally your assignments were more action and surveillance based. Protecting people of importance and wealth was usually left to those with higher ranks and for the most part those were the easiest jobs about since it was more a precaution than a necessity to have a Marine presence at such events. You hardly needed to worry or think about that now though, given your new place in life. No longer dwelling on it, you focused your attention onto Doflamingo once more.

Silently you were impressed to see how much he’d manage to work through in such a short amount of time. It made you wonder why he’d let it all just gather in the first place. You knew enough by now to know the correspondences, missives, updates and completed reports from subordinates never came through at a rate to make it unmanageable. Because you’d been so ill you hadn’t heard much chatter from the servants that you’d normally pick up on when they were unaware you were in earshot so you had no idea what else was happening with Doflamingo or the rest of Dressrosa. Then you paused, had he neglected everything because you’d been ill? You recalled how nervous everyone was around him while you’d been so close to death. Perhaps it was for the best he’d ignored those reports until now. You noticed his jaw clench slightly as he read over the sheets of paper in his hands before setting it aside to a new pile while making note of something on a different sheet of paper. Had he read that a week ago, there was no telling how he’d have dealt with it and the person who sent the report had no idea how lucky they were.

————

Over the course of the next few days your plans to leave your room were already met and anticipated by Doflamingo before any servant, doctor, or subordinate could find you first. As expected you were brought to his office and dropped on his sofa while he continued to work. Some cases you grabbed a random book from the shelves to flick through to pass the time in between idly talking to Doflamingo or taking a small nap. 

For you it was just nice to be somewhere other than your room and you weren’t pestered as much here as you would have been in your room by the still hovering and assessing doctors. Even with your visible improvement they weren’t ready to give you a complete all-clear just yet, their protectiveness and cautiousness stemming from their own need of self-preservation more than anything. For Doflamingo, having the reassurance that you were staying still and technically resting while also being in his line of sight brought him the ability to focus on things again. At least for the most part because today it seemed like you were determined to be restless. You were constantly shifting on the sofa, adjusting the cushions, lifting the current book that had your attention only to close it and set it aside repeatedly. 

While he was re-reading the same line of the report for what felt like the tenth time he finally looked up when you rose from the sofa and started walking around the spacious office. Surely you had everything memorised by now but still you casually let your eyes scan everything, searching for something you might have missed or something to capture your unsettled attention. Finally you stopped longer than you had at anything else and Doflamingo sighed when he realised what it was. “Have you been cleared yet for alcohol?”

“Have you given them permission to clear me yet for alcohol?” You asked lazily, turning your head to give him an accusatory stare. Your fingers curled around the handle of the drinks cabinet and slowly opened it, your knowing smile growing when Doflamingo clicked his tongue. Your pressed a little more. “I’m down to medication just once a day now. Just a little one? I’ll even be nice and let you pour.” 

Even as you asked you didn’t fully wait for an answer, your fingers were already skimming along the neck of the first bottle you came into contact with, but not firmly taking it yet. Keeping your eyes only on Doflamingo allowed you to at least pretend to be innocent. After a few seconds Doflamingo sat back in his seat and arched his fingers, pulling two glasses from the inside of the cabinet and letting them settle silently onto his desk. Immediately you grabbed the bottle under your touch and brought it to him, perching yourself on the edge of the desk while handing the bottle over. You looked momentarily surprised to see him pour a plentiful amount into the first glass but then you glowered when he poured a pathetic dribble by comparison into the second and pushed it towards you. “Cheers.”

“Gee thanks.” You hummed unenthusiastically. Really you knew to be grateful to even get that much when he could have easily been a bigger asshole and given you a single drop instead. Lifting your glass you took a small sip, deciding to savour the drink you had. The rich taste flooded your mouth and you wanted to drain the glass completely now but knew you had to resist that urge. Forcing yourself to take sips you distracted yourself with the paperwork on the desk. 

Your eyes scanned the different locations each report was coming from, places deep into the Grand Line and as far back as the North, South, East, and West Blues. You caught sight of ‘Wano’ on a letter underneath a few other pages and your eyes flickered to Doflamingo. So his criminal empire even had a connection to Kaidou? Deciding you were better off not delving any deeper into things you turned on the desk so you were instead facing the window behind Doflamingo and let your gaze drift upwards. The usually bright blue skies seemed to be gathering more clouds today. While you were silently predicting that rain was going to hit at some point in the day you were pulled from your thoughts when you heard Doflamingo’s pen snap and his voice growling out a curse of anger. “Problem?” 

“Weapon shipment got intercepted by the group they were meant to be used on.” Doflamingo growled, casting the missive aside to take a longer drink from his own glass, now in greater need for the sharp alcohol. These things did happen occasionally but it was infuriating all the same. You lifted the paper and scanned over the report. You didn’t see any mention of who the groups were. The name of the island the report came from didn’t ring a bell as being a place under protection or rule of the World Government. Your expression became thoughtful, not escaping Doflamingo’s notice. “What?”

“Civilians aren’t involved in this?” You asked, deciding to address that point before speaking your mind. 

“No, it’s a lawless island. Two major criminal groups are fighting over territory.” He explained, sitting back in his seat, propping his foot onto his knee. “What are you thinking?”

“Let the opposing group keep the weapons they intercepted.” You explained, rolling your eyes when Doflamingo interrupted you with a bored, uninterested noise. “Extort a bigger payment for replacement weapons to be sent out to the group it was intended for since they’re clearly compromised and there’s a risk of getting intercepted again.”

“Who said they’re compromised?” 

“They probably aren’t but it’ll spread distrust amongst them.” You shrugged, taking the final sip in your glass. “Tensions will be high anyway, no doubt some will already be thinking how their enemies knew about the weapons coming. It’ll lead to infighting, some will most likely defect and start a third group. That third group will need weapons too and they’ll reach out to you.”

Doflamingo’s grin had been spreading the more you talked. Truly you had a diabolical mind when it came to dealing with criminals. So long as it didn’t involve innocents or civilians, you held no remorse for letting criminals hurt or kill each other. It was an added sign you were recovering because the last time he caught a glimpse of this side of you was just before you’d fallen ill and you’d both kissed after he watched you kill. Quickly needing to wipe the memory of the tempting taste of your lips Doflamingo drained his glass and grabbed the bottle of alcohol, pouring another small amount into your glass and then poured into his own. 

“I think a plan like that deserves another drink.” He explained, grinning at your confusion over his actions. Slowly you looked up at him and smirked, not going to say no to another glass of the delicious drink. You lifted your glass and this time, you clinked your glass against his in gratitude.

————

As you’d expected rain did fall that night and into the following morning. When you stepped out of your room you were slightly caught off guard to see that Doflamingo was nowhere to be seen. Partly you suspected he was still in the dining room with the family for breakfast and if that was the case you knew it wouldn’t be long before he made his way to his office. As you walked you thought you would have run into him along the way but still he didn’t show. You were confused until you opened the doors and stopped to see Doflamingo already at his desk, reclined back on his seat and from the deep, even breaths you could see he was asleep. His face was obscured by an open book and as you stepped closer you saw it was the one you had been idly reading while he worked. 

Standing by the desk you saw that save for a couple of new reports and letters, everything else had been cleared away. Silently you became suspicious that he had decided to work through the night to clear the backlog. Perhaps after coming across the days old report of the intercepted weapon shipment, he didn’t want to risk missing any other important reports. With a small sigh you reached out, beginning to lift the book from his face only to stop when you saw under the cover of the book his glasses were no longer covering his closed eyes. You froze and stared as your attention was firmly grabbed by his face. You knew he was handsome, but without there was just something that heightened his looks now that the glasses no longer obscured his features. 

You could finally see the full peacefulness in his expression as he slept. Tilting your head you spotted the pale lashes brushing against his cheeks. You curiously now tried to picture him with different eye colours, trying to work out what suited him best and what the truth was. Looking around you couldn’t see his signature glasses anywhere and you weren’t about to start rifling through Doflamingo’s pockets for them. As carefully as you could you set the book back over his face and took your place on the edge of the desk, deciding to stay close just incase the book fell. In all your time here you knew it was an unspoken rule to never see Doflamingo’s eyes without his permission. 

You recalled passing by in the gardens one day to overhear one of the maids shaking in fear as she recounted for her friends that in the middle of one of his attempts to kill you, the glasses had slipped slightly. She explained that she turned her back in time and didn’t see a thing, relieved that Doflamingo was too busy with you to have even questioned what she saw. You remembered how the other servants sympathised with how frightening that must have been while also joining in her relief that no harm befell her for what would have been an accident. Part of you had considered waking him now while it was just the two of you but after seeing how peaceful he was, you decided he needed the rest even if it was for just a little while longer. 

That extra time didn’t last long at all. You heard the sound of footsteps approaching and moved on the desk to block more of Doflamingo from their view when they would open the door. However in your adjustment, it caused Doflamingo to stir in his sleep, the book falling to the floor before you could stop it. As you heard the soft knock and handle turning you moved without thinking. Your hand fell over Doflamingo’s eyes while you landed on his chair. With your knees on either side of his legs you made sure to keep all of your weight off of him and turned your head sharply to see who had entered. 

“Ah! U-um.” You stared hard at the servant who froze in place at the scene in front of him. For yet another instance in your time on Dressrosa there was an innocent explanation for what was happening but those that intruded saw things differently. From this servant’s perspective you were straddling his King, unable to see you were only doing this for his benefit.

“What is it?” You asked sharply, not knowing how much longer Doflamingo would be asleep for but your tone only served to fluster the servant, mistaking it for frustrated impatience. His mouth opened and closed as he tried to force his mind to work. His floundering however only annoyed you. 

“N-no-nothing important!” The servant finally managed to declare once he wasn’t so tongue-tied. “Sorry for intruding!”

You watched the servant bow lowly and scramble to leave the room, pulling the door shut behind him. You let out a sigh at the same time Doflamingo’s chuckle began to build in his chest. Still you remained unmoving, staring down at his laughing face as you kept your hand over his eyes. Only now you could feel that his eyes were open, his lashes brushing against your skin with each relaxed blink. 

“Where are your glasses?” You asked, not needing to explain yourself, knowing Doflamingo was awake long enough and smart enough to connect things. Still he laughed at the situation and could already imagine the gossip-hungry servants having this spread through the palace before lunchtime. To lazily answer your question, Doflamingo sat up from his previously reclined position and used his strings to pull his glasses from the top drawer of his desk and let them dangle in the air. With Doflamingo’s change in his seat you were closer against him but still you refused to draw any further attention to how close and intimate this was and how easily it could have been deepened should either of you wishes it to. Instead you kept on the topic at hand. “Aren’t you going to put them on?” 

“Don’t you want to see first?” Doflamingo asked in amusement but you could clearly hear the curiosity underneath. 

“What horrors await me if I look?” You asked, a small smile curving your lips while Doflamingo’s grin grew. “Everyone’s so scared about what happens if they see, it needs to live up to the hype. Will I turn to stone? Or will I have my eyes gouged out maybe?”

“Does it matter? You’re unaffected regardless of what would await you.” Even though his eyes were covered, Doflamingo could practically hear the bored pout shaping your lips at his answer. “Choice is yours though.”

You weighed the options but ultimately decided that seeing that part of Doflamingo, to see a part of him no one else was allowed to was a step in trust and further closeness you weren’t ready to invite or indulge. Keeping your hand in place you leant over to reach for the glasses suspended in the air. You stilled when you felt Doflamingo’s hand settle on your lower back; not to pull you closer but just to simply keep you steady. You managed to get a firm hold on the glasses and pulled them towards Doflamingo’s face. “Close your eyes.”

Doflamingo smirked and did as you instructed, only feeling the gentle warmth of your touch leave his face when you felt his eyes close firmly and were certain he was going to keep them closed. He felt the cold frames brush against his skin and even after he felt the familiar dark tinted lenses hover over his eyes he still kept them closed. You stared down at him for a moment, amazed at how different he seemed now all because of his glasses. To those who were scared of him, never knowing what lay beneath the very recognisable accessories only added to the menacing and mysterious enigma that was Donquixote Doflamingo. To you though, this was the version of him that you knew and were used to. “Okay, you can open them now.”

“You took your time.” Doflamingo chuckled. “Were you going to change your mind?”

“Nope, was just relishing in you doing as you were told for just a little while longer.”

“Well with a view like this can you blame me? Now I can fully appreciate what got my servant so flustered.”

“Oh shut up.” You lightly rolled your eyes at his teasing, shoving his shoulder as he grinned widely. You finally rose from his lap and crouched down to collect the fallen book from the floor. As you straightened and stronger and clearer knock sounded compared to the soft and meek one the servant had made. 

“Doffy, is it okay to come in now?” You frowned at the deep voice, you didn’t recognise the speaker on the other side of the door. Doflamingo knew him though and with a twitch of his finger he pulled the doors open with his ability. You watched the figure enter and you stiffened to see Vice-Admiral Vergo walk into the room, completely at ease. You knew Doflamingo had people working on his behalf from inside the Marines given how well-connected he was but you had no idea it went so high. You remained standing in place by the desk while Vergo came to a stop in front of his, his attention firmly on Doflamingo. 

“This is a surprise.” He grinned at his subordinate. “This a social call or is it something more pressing?”

“Social but I’ll be setting off again very soon.” Vergo replied simply. “Decided to stop by on my way to Punk Hazard. Partly I wanted to see your soulmate for myself Doffy, I truly didn’t see that coming when you first told me they rendered your abilities powerless.” Finally Vergo turned his head toward you. “Your personal affects from your Marine lodgings were sent into storage. I brought what I could with me and instructed one of the servants to leave them in your room when I arrived.”

Your personal affects? You frowned slightly at that. Any uniforms you had there would have been reclaimed for officers. The same would have been the case for any of your standard issue weapons. At first you couldn’t think of what would have been snuck out of storage to bring to Dressrosa then your eyes widened. You wasted no time and left the room, moving straight for your room. Seeing you leave so abruptly made Doflamingo’s grin slip slightly, and he looked to his elite officer as he rose from his seat. After having sat for so long through the night finishing his work and sleeping, he now needed to stretch his legs. “What was that about?”

“You’ll find out soon enough. First I need to ask, when I arrive on Punk Hazard am I to check on his progress regarding the research you asked him to look into?” 

Doflamingo left the office with Vergo matching his strides, walking in silence as Doflamingo considered the question. In the beginning when the first few attempts to kill you hadn’t worked he’d tasked the scientist to look into the matter of soulmates to find a way to kill you by his own hand. Since there’d been no updates or theories on how to undo fate from him, and with the recent events Doflamingo hadn’t bothered to contact him. “Since he’s yielded no results in the time I’ve given him, tell him to stop and return all of his focus to SAD. The last thing he needs is to fall behind schedule.” Vergo nodded and for a moment Doflamingo thought he’d take his leave immediately. It was never in him to linger, out of a need to ensure the wrong person didn’t spot him in Dressrosa and blow his cover that he was truly on the side of the Donquixote Family. “Was there anything else you wanted to discuss, Vergo?”

“Hm? No. I just wanted to hear first.”

“Hear what?” To answer Doflamingo’s question a sound began to break through the silent corridors. What began as the low testing of a bow against the strings, playing individual chords soon turned into the starting of a song. Immediately it caught his attention, the striking melody building and capturing notice of the rest of the inhabitants within earshot. Vergo let out a low appreciative whistle at the obvious mastery of your playing. Satisfied he bid farewell to Doflamingo and moved towards the palace’s exit while Doflamingo headed closer to the sound of the violin being played finally stopping at the open door. You stood in the middle of the room, eyes closed and lost entirely in the song you were playing. As the song quickened Doflamingo couldn’t help but stare at your fingers moving against the strings under your precise command, noting how they arced and pressed beautifully in a way almost reminiscent of how his own hands moved when he used his strings. Of all the things you had a talent at, of all the instruments you  could have known to play, it had to be this. It just had to something that created another similarity and connection between you both and with each one he discovered it made it just an extra bit harder to want to sever it.

——————————————-

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[writing-for-life]

Tales from the Flat Earth by Tanith Lee

A few thoughts on the supposed similarities with The Sandman—with actual comparisons (and a summary of the most important beats for those who want it)…

[This post is super long. It contains a lot of different thoughts, that’s why I broke it down into three parts: 1. General Considerations, 2. Boroson’s Claims and 3. A beat-by-beat summary of all five volumes of Tales from the Flat Earth. You might want to read this in instalments, or you might want to leave part three if you are still planning to read any of the five volumes.]

Part One: General Considerations

By now, many of you will have heard of Tanith Lee’s series “Tales from the Flat Earth”—not because the world all of a sudden woke up to a literary genius, but because of a Facebook post by Matthew Boroson in the immediate aftermath of the sexual assault allegations against Neil Gaiman. Boroson now made a further statement that he will “delete […] challenges so he can live”. I completely get the exhaustion of a post going viral—been there, got the T-Shirt—but why not just ignore it? Switch off notifications or comments altogether? Actively censoring only the people with different opinions, whom he even admits have mostly been engaging in good faith, because “he can’t do this 24/7”, while leaving up those in agreement (apparently he can do that 24/7)? He might not have thought through how bad this looks, and the irony of a man silencing dissenting voices and trying to control the conversation really shouldn’t be lost on people. But apparently, it is.

Anyway: I have absolutely no desire to defend Neil Gaiman. As should be clear from my blog, I stand with Gaiman’s victims and have done so since last summer when the allegations first broke. I believe those women, for both personal and professional reasons I won’t go into here. And I believe them, whether some author guy tells me I should or not. What grates on me is that this overshadows what’s actually important here, and I’ll get to why in a second.

I love Tanith Lee’s Tales from the Flat Earth and have read them first in the 1990s, and quite a few times since. For that very reason, I wish people would just read her work without trying to engage in a “gotcha” that is still all about Gaiman and not her. She was a great and talented writer who deserves more than now forever being known as “the woman whom Neil Gaiman plagiarised”. And to say it quite frankly: The sexual assault allegations can stand on their own and don’t need a male writer telling us, verbatim, “I have no difficulty believing the accusations against him. Because I know — KNOW — that he has felt entitled to take what he wants from a woman, without her permission, and without any acknowledgement of her contributions.”

I can’t even begin to say how problematic this statement is, for so many reasons. So all I’ll say is:

There is a certain tone-deafness in thinking a sexual assault claim holds even more weight because a male writer says, “See, he did this, so you should also believe that.” We should believe SA victims. Full stop. We don’t need wonky plagiarism or “inspiration without credit”-claims to give them more weight. These two things shouldn’t even be mentioned in the same sentence.

But all of that aside: Read Tanith Lee’s “Tales from the Flat Earth” because you are interested in a writer who crafted imaginative worlds in a florid prose-style that hearkens back to old fairy tales and Arabian Nights. If you only want to read it for a “gotcha”, I might be able to spare you the arduous work, although I strongly recommend you read it to come to your own conclusions (go to the source yourself. And I honestly wish more people did before they just blindly believe things). Again, spare a thought though if Tanith deserves to be “the woman NG plagiarised” to a new audience, because let’s be honest—that’s the only reason why so many people now read her works.

And that’s exactly why I thought so long and hard whether to even write this post, but there comes a point when people who actually know both works in depth need to speak up about the informational conformity bias that now has us at over 30,000 notes on Tumblr alone, all the while the person who put this into the world seems to actively censor anyone who dares to disagree. I get that Boroson’s claim is what a lot of people want to believe right now, but that doesn’t make it more true. Someone even said that “misinformation doesn’t matter in this case because only the result does.” That’s an incredibly dumb and also dangerous statement, but I’ll leave it at that.

Horrible people can create good art. We don’t need to pretend they were always hacks. We have to learn to sit with that cognitive dissonance and can disassociate ourselves from the creator regardless—because he’s an abuser.

Part Two: Boroson’s Claims

With all of that out of the road, let’s have a closer look at all that Boroson alleges in his FB post; quotes are verbatim.

1. “Despite the fact that the main character — a byronic, pale, otherworldly, deity-like character - is the prince of night and dreams.”

Here, we already have the first bit of wrong information. Azhrarn is one of the Lords of Darkness. He is the Prince of Demons. He is evil-aligned. He is not a “prince of dreams”. He is “Night’s Master” because he only walks the earth at night, and sunlight is lethal (oh?) for him. He is really nothing like Dream. One is all about rules and responsibilities, the other is about inconsistency, wickedness, mischief, changing his mind on a whim and treating humans as playthings (which he repeatedly admits himself). You could build a much stronger case for similarities between Azhrarn and Lucifer/Iblis (and Loki if you wanted to go Norse) than Dream, because Azhrarn actually hates the gods, and Lee’s whole series builds very strongly on how he (and then someone else) tries to bring them down. And Azhrarn might be older than gods, but whether he is truly more powerful depends on how you look at it—he even asks them for help at some point. Dream, on the other hand, is more than the gods. They begin in his realm, and they end there when people stop believing. Because gods come from the collective unconscious—and that’s who and what Dream is.

2. “Despite the fact that every time people see art depicting Tanith Lee's main character Azhrarn, they think it's Morpheus from the Sandman.”

This is interesting since the depiction Boroson chose for his FB claim is fanart. If you claim something like this, at least use original artwork, not works that have already gone through 20 subconscious filters. If you look at original art, you get this:

Azhrarn in the middle, Uhlume (Lord Death) to the right, Chuz (Lord Madness) to the left. And in the other picture, Azrharn in his eagle form. Which is just weird, soz. But that’s why he has feathers on his garb.

Maybe there’s a fleeting similarity in the one to the left, but there’s also literally none in the one to the right. And if you have ever read any dark fantasy of the 1980s and 90s (and even earlier), pretty much the majority of male protagonists fitted the stereotype of “pale, clad in black and byronic”. It was a dark fantasy trope—goths read that stuff in droves (I was one of them). And it became even more likely if the hero/antihero/villain was somehow aligned with the underworld. Which Azhrarn is.

And since artists are always influenced by other artworks and their own mental image of a character, have an actual description of Azhrarn’s looks from “Night’s Master”:

“marvelously handsome, with hair that shone like blue-black fire, and clothed in all the magnificence of night.”

But we also get this when he makes a not so great experience:

“He gazed to east and west, to north and south, and the face of Azhrarn, it is truly said, had become white. Long he looked, and long his pallor increased. A mortal man could not grow so pale and live.”

So we can reasonably deduce that he isn’t usually as white as Morpheus in his main form (I don’t know what else to call it)?

There are many other descriptions of a similar ilk. Is this really enough to say they look the same? Really? Instead of admitting that we might be filling in some blanks here if descriptions are so vague?

3. “Despite the fact that the dream lord's younger sibling is Death.”

That one truly made me laugh out loud. Apart from the fact that Gaiman’s Death is older and female (which one could say was a purposeful switch to “hide the tracks” 🙄)—only the least read people would assume this was in any way new or sensational and “borrowed” from any one particular writer. Hypnos (Sleep) and Thanatos (Death) are twin brothers in Greek mythology. And the closeness of Death and Dream in The Sandman (both conceptually and on a relational level) is much more of a mirror of that than the relationship between Azhrarn and Uhlume in Tales from the Flat Earth, because in all honesty: The latter two don’t get on that well, which Boroson conveniently forgets to mention. Their relationships are really nothing alike.

Hypnos is also a deity residing in the underworld, and you have to cross the river Lethe (forgetfulness/oblivion) to get to him. Lee borrows from that idea very heavily when she tells the story of Kazir visiting Azhrarn in Underearth. These are myths, told and retold by hundreds of writers over and over again, including Lee herself.

I don’t even know what to say about this one. It’s so thin that it immediately blows away if you as much as cough at it.

4. “Despite the fact that other members of his family include Delusion, Delirium.... They are not gods but beings older than gods, and when the gods die, Dream, Death, Delusion, and Delirium will remain. This family of immortal, eternal, unchanging beings, who each embody an eternal abstraction starting with the letter D.”

There are only two Lords of Darkness beginning with a D, and they are called Uhlume (Death) and Chuz (Delusion). Azhrarn is Wickedness.

There is no Dream, as I already stated. And guess what? There is also no separate Delirium. So wrong facts again. The character is Delirium’s Mistress (or at least that’s the title of the volume), and in that case, we are referring to her as being the lover of Chuz (so Delusion and Delirium are effectively the same person). And her name is Azhriaz; she is half human, half demon (and something else, but that would be too spoilery) and Azhrarn’s daughter. She looks like this in original artwork (sorry for the crappola photo):

Without wanting to give too much plot away because some of you might still want to read this: There are three Lords of Darkness (or one could argue five—more about that later) in Lee’s Tales, but they don’t all begin with a D—neither if you look at their names (their initials are A, U, C, K and A), nor at their functions (in which case it’s W, D, D, F and L).

Okay, the domains of two Lords of Darkness start with D. Is it really enough to be sure Gaiman borrowed from it, turning it into seven? Or is it perhaps far more likely that this still falls into the realm of literary archetypes? And even if Gaiman did expand on that idea—that’s not plagiarism (which, to say it very clearly, Boroson didn’t explicitly say it was. He just implied it a bit between the lines, and other people who probably didn’t read either ran with it). I don’t think it would even constitute “heavy borrowing”, especially since the characters, their relationships and the stories as such are so, so different.

Why is Boroson’s account riddled with inaccuracies? Why be so wrong in your descriptions of a work you supposedly know so well? I really don’t know. It’s either that he doesn’t know it as well as he says he does (which I can’t imagine, since he’s apparently been going on about this for years), or he purposefully misrepresents it to add more weight to it. Which looks bad to be honest. Or at least as if he’s a bit too taken with an idea and at the stage where he can’t let it go anymore.

5. “[…] description of a character who was clearly the inspiration for Gaiman’s Mazikeen.”

That’s also Chuz. As depicted in the art above, and also here:

One side of him is young and beautiful, the other old. I’ll let you decide if this is clearly the inspiration for Mazikeen:

“So she beheld the entire aspect of his face, one half youthfully bronzed, one half haggardly gray, the rusty hair and the blond, but it seemed to her it was the most natural face she had ever looked on.”

And to say it quite frankly: Framing it like that is a bit dishonest to start with? It’s not the description of “a character”. It’s the volume’s protagonist. Whom Boroson earlier insisted was the inspiration for Delirium (also a bit wonky that one, as I already wrote, since I bet most of the people who don’t know Lee’s work pictured her Delirium as a woman after reading Boroson’s account). But now it’s Mazikeen all of a sudden? Leaving out he’s actually talking about the same character here looks like wilfully obfuscating that neither of it truly holds water, so he’s picking little bits and offers them without context.

Mazikeen is a visual creation of Kelley Jones btw, so maybe Boroson should also take it up with him? The same could be said to everyone who might feel tempted to shoehorn a certain other character (DC’s Destiny) into this, woefully forgetting that Destiny is not a character created by Gaiman. He has existed in the DC Universe years before Lee wrote Tales from the Flat Earth. I don’t hear anyone complaining that Lee stole Kheshmet/Fate from DC because it would be quite frankly idiotic—these are literary archetypes!

6. “The prose, the characters, the narrative strategies, the mythology, the story structure, all of it: Gaiman found it all in Tanith Lee's writing and never gave her any credit.”

The prose is really hard to compare because one is a novel, the other a comic. I really recommend you read both yourself so you get the full picture, but just two examples here:

Tanith Lee:

“A mile from the enameled walls of the city, where the desert lay gleaming like golden glass, a beautiful woman sat in a stone tower, and she played with a bone.

“Will he come to me today?” she asked the bone, rocking it in her arms like a child. “Or will he seek me tonight? All the stars will shine, but he will shine more brightly. For sure, he dare not come by day, for he would outshine the sun. The sun would die of shame, and the whole world grow dark. But oh, he will come. Nemdur,” said the beautiful woman, “Nemdur, my lord.”

Her name was Jasrin; Nemdur was the king whose city stood one mile to the east. Once, he had been her husband.

No longer.”

Neil Gaiman:

As someone who’s read both many times over, my personal assessment is:

They are not very alike. Lee writes floridly, Gaiman is often fairly to the point. Even in Ramadan, which is one (out of 75!) issues that closest resembles the style of Arabian Nights (which is Lee’s inspiration), his voice seems distinct to me—as is hers. Lee’s prose always struck me as great, Gaiman’s as good (I always loved his world building more than his actual writing style). I think Lee’s prose is more accomplished, but that’s personal taste.

Characters: I already expanded on it.

Narrative strategy: This is so vague. Does he mean perspective? Point of view? Other narrative strategies like foreshadowing?

Since I don’t know what exactly Boroson is referring to because he likes to keep it nebulous, I really can’t say, but I don’t think the way the stories are told are in any way alike. And where they seem similar (“Night’s Master”, as an example, is told as interconnected stories in the style of Arabian Nights with a throughline. And of course the Sandman also contains some interconnected stories with a throughline, although they are in no way reminiscent of Arabian Nights to me, bar Ramadan), I seriously have to ask again:

Do we believe only one writer utilises these strategies and/or has a monopoly on them? Because there are truly only so many of them to go around. And we could say that Lee’s “narrative strategy” is hardly unique either. This is just a bit silly.

Mythology: Just no. Both Lee and Gaiman use themes that have been there a million times before them, I already brushed on it. Both lean heavily into existing mythologies, with Gaiman more into Greek, and Lee into Near- and Middle Eastern one (especially Mesopotamian/Babylonian—there are some parallels between her characters and deities like Nergal, Sin/Nanna and Ninazu), although they both also use others. But the bottom line is: Both have expanded on long existing mythologies.

Story structure: Again, what is Boroson insinuating here? He is truly the master of vagueness.

To say it very directly: The story structure is not the same. If you look at The Sandman in its entirety, it’s a clear three act tragedy with a lot of Hero’s Journey thrown-in. The fact that it’s told in 10 arcs changes nothing about that—you can clearly make out Campbell’s stages, like Call to Adventure, Crossing the First Threshold, Belly of the Whale… you name it. This is long enough already, but look at Campbell’s Hero’s Journey, and it’s fairly obvious (and no, the hero doesn’t always have to survive).

Tales from the Flat Earth have a throughline in their five volumes, but they are connected more loosely, with the odd referential throwback. Only “Delusion’s Master” and “Delirium’s Mistress” have an ongoing narrative (of sorts). “Night’s Sorceries” always seemed like an afterthought of material Lee would have liked in volume four but couldn’t fit in. They are all told in a way that hearkens back to oral storytelling (hence Lee saying she was inspired by 1001 Nights), and there is a clear sense of an unchanging, but not personally involved storyteller/narrator all the way through who sometimes even offers commentary.

7. “Tanith Lee was far more progressive about Igbtq+ identities, and that was twenty years earlier.”

Well, for starters: Ten years earlier (“Night’s Master” was published in 1978, the first issue of The Sandman in 1988).

Is Tales from the Flat Earth truly more progressive? I’m not sure. Both were progressive for their time, simply because they wrote about LGBTQ+ characters at all and gave them a voice. And to put it in a disclaimer: I don’t apply moral purity standards to fiction, neither do I believe certain things that would be problematic in real life can’t be written about in fiction (and dare I say: I find that take worrying, for many reasons, but that’s a different discussion). But if we’re talking about “progressiveness”:

A clearly bisexual Demon Prince grooms a child to then seduce him on his 16th birthday—in a time when gay men were often still thrown into one pot with groomers and even pedophiles?

A lesbian queen who basically gets cursed to have sex with many, many men because only a pregnancy can lift that curse (!), finds out she is barren and can only conceive if she has sex with a dead guy, makes a deal with Uhlume who then brings a man back from the dead so she can be impregnated and then, via many many twists and turns, turns into [I’ll tell you later if you really want to know]?

I don’t know, but it’d probably be the same people who find certain angles of the Sandman problematic who would also bolt or get outraged at this? And they would 100% engage in the same type of revisionist readings they now apply to Gaiman’s works if they ever found out that Lee did anything wrong. There is a lot, and I mean a lot, of rape, SA and questionable power dynamics in Lee’s work. But it’s also a work of fiction.

8. In the 1990s, toward the end of her life, she complained in an interview that magazines weren't buying her stories anymore.

[edit: Lee died in 2015, so Boroson’s claim the 90s were “towards the end of her life” also reads a bit weird to me—as if he’s consciously trying to appeal to the sympathy of his readers by portraying her as “the poor woman on her death bed”, when she still lived for another 20 years]

That’s a bit nebulous again. It’s amazing how some people never quote their sources. I am near certain that Boroson talks about this interview from 1998, but I stand corrected if it’s a different one:

Tanith talks about her troubles getting published, but she also says it’s a hard time for everyone right now. Plus, her bibliography also clearly indicates she still got published on the regular, and that the amount of works published in any given year didn’t really fluctuate all that much apart from a burst in the ‘70s (and “burst” refers to the difference of publishing four books instead of two per year), a dip towards the end of her life (when her output was probably affected by her illness) and then the sad thing that always happens when someone dies: Suddenly, there’s another uptick.

Someone even went through the trouble of visualising her published works in a graph:

Courtesy of Das_Mime

Does this honestly look like no one published her anymore?

Now, don’t get me wrong: Of course it is a nice gesture if those more successful put in a word for those who find themselves in a bit of dry spot. But to turn this almost into some conspiracy theory is just a bit weird if I’m honest. It’s much more likely that people are simply not on someone’s radar than that they are actively trying to hinder their career. Writing is hard. Getting published is hard, even if you already have a few published works under your belt. Ask me how I know…

These were the points Boroson made that I wanted to address directly. For those of you who want to get a feel if the story as such is actually in any way similar enough to even call it heavy borrowing, I’ll now do a summary of all major story beats for all five volumes.

Part Three: Tales from the Flat Earth Beat-by-Beat

I assume that most of my followers are familiar with The Sandman, but only a few with Tanith Lee. Hence I won’t do a summary of The Sandman, and once again: You really have to read both works yourself to understand why Boroson’s claims are so far out there. I’m more than willing to discuss and answer questions that come in good faith, but I’ll say it outright: I am not interested in engaging with anyone who just comes here to peddle conspiracy theories and platitudes like “misinformation doesn’t matter in this case because…” if they haven’t even read the works in question.

Just as a quick hint, because that’s where you’ll find the superficial similarities (and that’s my phrasing it with the utmost goodwill):

If you want to compare the entirety of both works, there’s no way around reading both.

For “Night’s Master”, I’d argue you also need to read the entirety of The Sandman, because in a nutshell, it is, at least at first glance, about the heel-face-turn of its protagonist. You’ll need at least Preludes and Nocturnes and The Kindly Ones, but it makes no sense to read them separately, so…

For “Death’s Master”, maybe read The Doll’s House and Season of Mists, because it is partly about a queen who wants to save her land (everything else would be too spoilery, but just so much: The similarities are fleeting at best, and that’s already generous).

For “Delusion’s Master”: Again The Doll’s House and Season of Mists, because at its very core we have a love story that gets torpedoed by a traitor. But other than that, said love story is truly nothing alike.

For “Delirium’s Mistress”: Honestly, I thought long and hard about this. I really don’t know because it is so different from the Sandman that I see absolutely no parallels at all. Maybe read Brief Lives, because there is something in there about parent/child relationships. But they are hardly unique in literature, so once again: I truly don’t know how anyone could find similarities here. And The Kindly Ones would be such an immense stretch that I won’t even go there.

For “Night’s Sorceries”: There are three stories that give a bit of context to the rest. If anything, I’d say read The Wake. But that would actually be insinuating Azhriaz is Daniel, and I’m like… no, massive stretch. If it’s just about loosely connected stories that somewhat fit into a greater narrative, read “World’s End”. But if we’re thinking that’s already a similarity, I truly cry for literary analysis…

Briefly about the world we’re in: The Flat Earth basically consists of four planes: Upperearth, home of the gods; Earth (the Earth of humans before it changed shape); Underearth, home of Azhrarn, Prince of Demons and Wickedness; Innerearth, home of Uhlume, Lord Death. Azhrarn’s kingdom, Druhim Vanashta, houses three classes of demons: Vazdru (most like Azhrarn himself, beautiful and prone to change into eagles and other animals), Eshva (basically mute servants to the Vazdru who can change gender at will) and Drin (ugly, exclusively male creatures and accomplished creators of beautiful and practical things). All three demon kind frequently visit earth to tempt and create chaos.

Volume One: Night’s Master

Night’s Master begins with Azhrarn finding a dying woman and her newborn son, Sivesh, on a hillside. After her death, Azhrarn becomes captivated by the beauty of the child and takes him back to Underearth to raise him (and then promptly seduces him on his 16th birthday). Azhrarn then creates a woman called Ferazhin from a flower for Sivesh (because, you know, Azhrarn thinks it’s good sport to sample a woman. As one does). However, nothing can prevent Sivesh from longing to live on earth because he is human, and the decision to leave Azhrarn for a life in the light offends the Demon Prince. So he consciously tricks him into death by drowning (by chapter three).

The next storyline shifts to a collar (crafted by a Drin) from Ferazhin’s tears because she is inconsolable. We follow the collar around on its journey to different owners (who all meet a gruesome end in one way or another). The final owner, the blind bard Kazir, is the only one not to get corrupted by it, and we conclude the first book with his journey to Underearth to give the collar back to Azhrarn in exchange for Ferazhin, whom he loves without ever having met her. Azhrarn agrees to let Ferazhin go if Kazir can answer a particular question, which he can (not going to get too deep into that, apart from: Azhrarn is rattled, and we’ll revisit it at the end of this volume). Kazir and Ferazhin are happy for a while, but as usual, Azhrarn changes his mind, and by the end of it, Ferazhin is dead (a bit of a nod to Romeo and Juliet in there, but that just as an aside). But lo and behold, Kazir manages to bring her back after a while, and “somewhere perhaps, some dark door slammed like thunder in a city underground.”

Book Two of Night’s Master focuses on Zorayas, who survived the overthrow of her father (a king) as a newborn but suffered severe disfigurement. After the death of the monk who took care of her, she seeks revenge for being raped by a Prince and takes back her father’s kingdom with the help of the Drin. And, as usual, she meets her demise through trickery orchestrated by Azhrarn.

Book Three. Azhrarn’s cruel prank on a young married couple goes wrong, escalates and ultimately leads to humanity teetering on the brink of destruction (the remnants of the husband turn into Hatred and wipe out everything). After seeking intervention from the gods of Upperearth in vain, Azhrarn makes, for once, a sacrifice to preserve humanity’s existence. But does he do so completely selflessly? Could be argued, and I guess Kazir knew, but that’d be too much of a spoiler… Suffice it to say, Earth enters an age of innocence without the presence of hatred and wickedness. Until… 🤣

Volume Two: Death’s Master

Narasen, Queen of Merh, is sexually assaulted by the magician Issak. Feigning cooperation, she manages to kill him. Before he dies, he curses Narasen and Merh, declaring that both will become barren. The curse can only be lifted if Narasen (we have deduced at this point that she is a lesbian because she “doesn’t lie with men”) gives birth to a child, but includes a stipulation that prevents this solution: “Your reluctant womb will never quicken from the seed of living man.” After numerous attempts to conceive, Narasen, driven by her desire to save her land and people, makes a deal with Uhlume to conceive a child from a dead man. In return, Narasen agrees to spend a thousand years in Uhlume’s kingdom. Narasen is poisoned shortly after childbirth.

After Narasen is locked in her tomb with her newborn child Simmu, Uhlume arrives to claim her, leaving the child behind. However, Simmu is rescued by two passing Eshva and lives with them by night. Simmu develops Eshva abilities, like changing gender at will. Eventually, the Eshva grow tired of Simmu and leave him at a temple near Merh, where he grows up among monks and becomes friends and later lovers with a boy called Zhirem.

Simmu and Zhirem eventually become separated and somewhat turn into the tools of Azhrarn (Simmu hates Death because he remembers him coming for his mother) and Uhlume, respectively.

Meanwhile, Uhlume and Narasen don’t get on too well—Narasen sets herself up as Lady Death and constantly struggles for power. To get her off his back, Uhlume grants her permission to spend a day in Merh, where she promptly destroys her city (yeah, after all that trouble…). Upon her return, she gradually takes over the supervision of Innerearth from Uhlume and turns into “Lady Death.”

Azhrarn saves Simmu during Narasen’s attack on Merh. He instructs Simmu to obtain water from the Cistern of Life (a little throwback to volume one). His plan is to kill Uhlume, hence bringing death to an end. The well is guarded by nine virgins called the Golden Daughters—Simmu makes use of his gender-changing abilities and sneaks into each of their chambers as a woman and then takes their virginity as a man. With their virginity taken, the well cracks, and Simmu founds the City of Simmurad (populated by immortal humans) with the golden daughter Kassafeh (too long-winded to get into it all).

Zhirem has embarked on his own adventures and eventually returns to Earth as the magician Zhirek. He agrees to serve Uhlume, who plans to destroy Simmurad, perceiving it as a threat. With the guidance of Azhrarn, who has grown weary of Simmu and Simmurad (you see, Azhrarn is not very consistent and doesn’t abide by rules nor responsibilities like our boy Morpheus 😉), Uhlume lets Zhirek destroy the city by submerging it under water after re-introducing death via creating and killing an insect. Simmu seemingly dies at the hands of Zhirek, who casts him into a well of fire. Zhirek retires into solitude, and Simmu is ultimately saved by Azhrarn, who transforms him into an Eshva and erases all memories of his past.

The story concludes with Narasen effectively ruling Innerearth and giving death, while Uhlume spends most of his time on Earth, finding solace in the presence of Kassafeh.

Volume Three: Delusion’s Master

We’re starting with a tale about Jasrin, the young wife of King Nemdur of Sheve. Because she is jealous of her newborn child, she abandons him in the desert, where he gets killed by dogs. Nemdur banishes Jasrin to a tower, where her sanity gradually deteriorates. She is visited by Chuz, the Prince of Madness (the third Lord of Darkness). Inquiring about her deepest desires, Jasrin expresses her wish for her husband to share her madness. Nemdur awakens with a crazy plan to construct a towering structure that reaches Upperearth (where the gods live). Inspired by the legend of Simmu, he envisions attaining immortality. The Tower of Babyhelu, aptly named “The Gate to the Gods,” grows and grows until it becomes unstable due to its immense weight, causing it to collapse with catastrophic consequences: The fall of the entire kingdom of Sheve.

Azhrarn and a few of his demons are drawn to the commotion, and a conversation between him and Chuz reignites Azhrarn’s disdain for the gods, who had failed to assist him in “Night’s Master”.

Hundreds of years later, we meet 7,000 pilgrims on their journey across the desert to worship the gods at Bhelsheved (Sheve rebuilt). Azhrarn is incensed that his sacrifice to save humanity in “Night’s Master” is credited to the gods. Disguised as a prophet, he reveals that a Lord of Darkness (not the gods) is the true saviour of humanity. For this, he is lashed with a whip and sheds three drops of blood. Azhrarn continues with his quest to destroy Bhelsheved but is unexpectedly diverted by the beauty of a young priestess named Dunizel. Recognising Azhrarn’s true intentions, Dunizel bravely offers to sacrifice herself to appease his wrath. Azhrarn turns into a wolf and bites off her lower arm, but when she encourages him to bite again instead of showing terror, he hesitates. Reminiscing about his own sacrifice to Hatred, he changes his mind, heals her with his own blood, and falls deeply in love with her.

We then learn the story of Dunizel’s mentally disabled mother, who was held captive by the assistant of an astronomer (who was on a field trip to observe a comet passing by). After impregnating the girl, the assistant attempted to abort the child by exposing her to the comet’s energy as it passed. The girl was instead exposed to a rainbow of light captured by the astronomer’s magical engine, regained her sanity and gave birth to Dunizel, who was also affected by the comet’s light. Dunizel’s mother raised her but gradually transformed into a fire elemental and ascended into the sky. The assistant gave Dunizel to a grieving mother from a nearby village, who raised her until she was chosen to join the religious cult (like her mother, she is also part solar being).

We are panning back to the love story of Dunizel and Azhrarn. Dunizel gives birth to a daughter named Soveh, who is initially mistaken for a goddess on Earth and grows at unnatural speed. Through the workings of Chuz though, the truth about the child’s paternity is revealed, and Dunizel dies at the hands of an angry mob (she also comes into contact with one of the drops of blood Azhrarn had formerly shed in the desert). Devastated, Azhrarn takes Soveh, whom he renames Azhriaz, to Underearth. Before he departs, he addresses Chuz and declares their relationship as “un-brothers, un-cousins, and now, un-friends”. He also reveals he will go to war with him and considers it a kindness he has informed him in advance.

The story concludes with Chuz finding Jasrin, who is haunting her tower, and releasing her.

Volume Four: Delirium’s Mistress

So if you waited for this to start with all-out war between Azhrarn and Chuz, you’ll be disappointed. We meet Oloru, a court jester to tyrannical prince Lak Hezoor. Oloru convinces Lak Hezoor to take him on a sightseeing tour of Underearth. It’s not going well—Lak Hezoor is torn apart by Azhrarn’s red hounds. Oloru transforms into a “slender rod of yellow radiation, vaguely purplishly limned” and flies towards the island where young adult Azhriaz has been sleeping since her arrival in Underearth (it’s a been a few years). Oloru, who is actually Chuz in disguise, awakens her, convinces her to escape, and takes her back to Earth. And of course they become lovers.

Kheshmet (King Fate) enters the story, just like that, and in no time, Azhrarn arrives and ends his quarrel with Chuz— also just like that. But to atone, Chuz has to agree to live a mortal lifetime, disfigured, without his powers and truly mad. Azhriaz initially stays with Chuz, but he forgets who she is.

Azhriaz, now without Chuz, despairs. She visits her mother’s grave with Khesmet and decides to embrace her father’s legacy: discrediting the gods. She replaces a king who committed suicide and ascends to the status of a cruel goddess on Earth, conquering much of the world who revels in her cruelty. Her teachings to humanity are that the gods care nothing for them: “Remember, to the gods, you are nothing. To Azhriaz, the Goddess, you are only grains of dust or sand.”

Khesmet arrives to foretell a looming war with sea and sky.

And weirdly, that war starts because a god, whom Azhrarn kissed in “Night’s Master”, awakens and decides that was sacrilege, plus he’s also not pleased with Azhriaz’s activities on Earth. The gods consequently hurl three shards into the sun that transform into three angels—the Malhukim of the gods: Ebriel, Yabael and Melquar. Azhrarn holds the angels at bay while Azhriaz escapes into the ocean aboard a special fish-ship crafted by the Drin, pursued by Ebriel and Yabael. Azhrarn fights Melquar in the air and narrowly avoids incineration. Azhriaz escapes imprisonment in an underwater city when Yabael destroys it with his sword. She receives no assistance from Azhrarn because he lies in a death-like coma in Druhim Vanashta and has been usurped by the demon Hazrond. Eventually, Azhrarn recovers and reclaims his kingdom. Azhriaz is still pursued by Yabael, who conveniently undergoes a transformation and forgets his mission in the process. Then pursued by Ebriel, she travels with Dathanja (Zhirek making a reappearance) and ultimately engages in an eternal battle with the angel. Realising she’ll be otherwise stuck there forever, she convinces Ebriel to stop by revealing her plan to give up her immortality.

Ebriel departs, snd Azhriaz (who is actually called Atmeh at this point, but that’d lead too far) seeks out Kassafeh for a bargain with Uhlume (who is in the process of abdicating to Narasen) to become mortal. She reunites with Chuz, who has paid his penance, and they stay together for a while until Chuz helps her with her final transformation into a mortal woman.

Atmeh/Azhriaz approaches death after 200 years or so, and is visited by Azhrarn, who tells her, “Humanity is my plaything no longer, only a toy for those that are mine under the earth. But you, you are her child. You are hers. You are Dunizel. Not mine. Never mine. Though I made you to be my curse upon the world. Though I made you to be myself. You are Dunizel, that I loved, Dunizel who was the moon and sun together.” Azhrarn expresses his sadness over his inability to cry, and Azhriaz responds: “Each word you have spoken has been a tear.”

Volume Five: Night’s Sorceries

I wasn’t sure if I should even go into this one, because “Delirium’s Mistress” always seemed like the final volume to me to be honest, and it concluded the story for me. “Night’s Sorceries” is a collection of short stories that seem connected to “Delirium’s Mistress” and fill in some gaps (that’s why each of them has an introduction that explains where we are, and when). So I will only go into three of them (there are seven altogether):

“The Prodigal” is essentially about Narasen’s reign as Queen Death.

“Dooniveh, The Moon” is written like a fairy tale about a monk from Nannafir. He travels to the moon on a winged horse, and by the end of his adventures, we witness the wedding of the Moon Queen and the Sun King. And that’s connected how? Well, the winged horse was a gift from Hazrond (who usurped Azhrarn) to Azhriaz.

“The Daughter of the Magician,” recounts the tale of a magician who successfully resurrects the soul of Azhriaz. But the child, named Ezail, ends up being offered as a sacrifice to a monster. And that’s connected how? Well, the monster was created as the counterpart of the winged horse in “Dooniveh, The Moon.” But Ezail regains Azhriaz’ memory and lo and behold, Chuz just happens to appear in the reincarnation of a young boy named Chavir. Together, they decide to take the monster with them and embark on a life together.

The main reason I did include this volume is that it somewhat puts the former four in context. The last sentence of “Night’s Sorceries” is:

“Love is also an immortal.”

Which somewhat suggests that Azhriaz is operating on the same plane as Azhrarn, Uhlume, Chuz and Kheshmet. And we already get hints at that in the other volumes.

In “Delusion’s Master”, Azhrarn says to Dunizel that their child will be his feminine aspect. It’s just ambiguous enough, but we also get this in “Delirium’s Mistress” when Azhrarn wonders about love: “There is no such commodity. There is carnality, our plaything. There is worship, and there is obsession. Death you may perceive walking the world, and Fate, and Delusion, too, in a form that I have kindly granted him. But no man sees love, and no demon sees it.”

So while many of the stories of Tales from the Flat Earth can stand on their own, there is also an overarching theme: Establishing another power that serves to balance out the others: Wickedness, Death, Delusion, and Fate—Azhriaz’ four “sons” (cryptically mentioned in the final chapter of Delirium’s Mistress)...